"Oh shit!" Joker exclaimed while scrolling through his HUD over system error reports and authentication checks "We are IN! we are connected to the global Sentinel network! how the fuck?!"
"Don't know, don't care" Gideon responded while typing authorization codes for the network on his exo wrist pad "There, I dropped full authorization to all of our comms, tablets, and computers; now whatever the fuck you need to do, get it done fast!"
As soon as he said this; most Sentinels frantically tried to establish links to the network while some Sentinels and the pilots rushed to the VTOLs; activating the computers within, in hopes for better and faster connection. While the sentinels retrieved their laptops and tablets before distributing them to their comrades and doing the same.
Seeing the sudden eruption of activities, Shining Armor trotted towards them with a couple of guards by his side.
"What is going on here!?" He asked.
"I will explain later Captain" Gideon replied "but right now, this is maybe our only chance of getting back or at least getting what it takes to survive here"
Shining Armor nodded, and stepped back to give them some space
the laptops...
"I am sending mission reports and our current status, we are declared MIA for now that's all I can tell" Mitchell said while typing frantically on his newly acquired translucent laptop.
"I am downloading as many latest information and developments as possible from the servers as we speak" Ilona added. She quickly surfed through the files and downloaded as many debriefings and records as possible since their disappearance into her 5 terabyte capacity laptop before copying it to her spare hard-drive for back-up.
"I am downloading weapons schematics; medieval. Just in case if we ran out of ammo" Ramirez stated "Aegis, Hunter, and Phantom are doing the same to speed up the process"
"I am uh, downloading recipes for vegetarian food...seeing these ponies, I assume they don't eat meat of any kind" he said sheepishly, the others ignored him as they were to busy with their own businesses. But he received nods of aproval from the guards.
"And...se- ah damn it! I can't send the report through!" Mitchell exclaimed "The signal's not strong enough for two-way communication! keep getting timed out from all servers!"he said as he tried to resend the report; but after a few times of fumbling with his laptop and connecting it to his Razorback's communication relay for signal boost, he finally got the report sent. But as soon as the report was sent; their connections with the network ceased. Any further attempts to reconnect to the Sentinel network were useless; resulting in only in statics.
"Damn that was close..." Mitchell said while wiping a few beads of sweat forming on his forehead "I got the message through; but it seems the entire network's swarmed with something else. I've never seen so much activity; not since Manticore" he paused "How's everyone else doing?"
Hearing the word 'Manticore' the guards' ears perked up, but they knew it was best not to ask at their current situation. Not yet.
"I have the schematics with me; same goes with Aegis, Hunter, and Phantom" Ramirez replied "With these, at least we have some additional human techs on our side. But even with our weapons schematics on the central computers of our VTOLs, I don't think we will be making any guns or bullets anytime soon. The precision tuning and the materials required to make one,are the two things we don't have" he paused "But considering the buttload of guns and ammo we have right now, running out of 'em is not something we should be worried about; for now at least."
"Ilona?" Gideon glanced over to the former Spetsnaz sniper who was putting away her hard-drive, giving him a thumb up.
"I have all of the latest data and intel after our disappearance" she paused "Now we just have to look through them"
"I, uh, got those recipes" he said sheepishly; earning glares of confusion from the others "What? I mean, this is going to be one hell of a ride. Might as well enjoy it right? even if we can't return to Earth; with our VTOLs, buttload of weapons, supplies, and ammo plus the schematics we have acquired; coupled with the killer scenery here, this is going to be fan-fuckin'-tastic!" he said with joy while dramatically pointing his hand on the gardens"And as long as the sun shines, we will have no problem over recharging our exo batteries and the VTOLs" Joker shrugged with a smug smile on his face.
"Well, that 'we can't go back to Earth' thing is fucking real and I think I know why the network's activities have been spiking up" Ilona commented with a deadpanned tone; but before any of them could ask what she meant, Ilona spoke again "sync to my HUD. I have to show all of you something"
"What the bloody hell's going on?" Gideon asked while syncing his HUD with Ilona's.
"Here, I am sending you my feed" she replied. As soon as she said that, an image of what looks like the EMP cannon installed on the experimental T-740 Hovertank were projected in front of them; much to the guards' astonishment. Except this one was ten times larger and were connected with lots of large cables.
"What you are currently looking at is a prototype of Atlas' latest weapon, dubbed as 'Excalibur' " Ilona began "It was developed by Atlas shortly after they knew the Manticore had been destroyed; built in the most remote part of Switzerland to avoid early detection" she paused "This weapon is capable of discharging highly unstable molecular particles of incredible range, accuracy, and power. So powerful that it disintegrates it's targets to their molecular levels. How this thing does that, is beyond me...but one thing's certain, a single shot of this thing requires an entire power of a city's power-grid. And before you ask, yes. This is what hit us back on Earth"
"You humans are sure capable of creating such powerful weapons, and what is this Atlas?" Shining Armor stated; earning nods of agreement from the guards.
"We didn't even know that this kind of weapon exist in our world, but like I said before; I will explain later" Gideon replied
"Jesus Christ..." Joker sighed with deep frustration in his voice "but if it really disintegrates it's targets to their molecular levels how the hell are we still alive? And how the hell do we end up here?"
Ilona sighed "According to the reports, the fucking cannon malfunctioned during it's first testing which included us as target practice" she paused "maybe that 'malfunction' is the cause"
"Whoa hold on, how can we know about this should be top-secret weapon so fast? We are only gone for eight hours for God's sake!" Ramirez said out loud.
"Well, have you checked the time on this report?" Mitchell asked "tell me, what date is it today?"
"January 9th 2062" Ramirez said "but in this report the date is..." He trailled off, eyes widened in disbelief.
"January 17th 2062" Mitchell replied with a deadpanned tone.
"Wait, fuckin' 17th of January?!" Joker exclaimed "guys, I think we are having a time dilation issue on our hands!"
"Since when you became an expert on this thing?" Mitchell asked sarcastically.
"Hey I read you know!" He retorted.
"Can the chatter you two!" Gideon cut them off "now what happened to that cannon?"
"In this report, due to the malfunction; the cannon's innards blew up, so it won't be operational anytime soon. Who gave us the intel? Atlas defectors. I think they are going to launch an all out attack on that thing soon" Mitchell stated while scrolling through his laptop "as for us, we are declared MIA just as I said before"
"Joker, what did you say? Time dilation?" Gideon asked.
"Yeah, what about it?" He inquired nonchalantly.
"Fuckin' hell..." Gideon sighed "then that means,a few hours here equals to days or even weeks back in our world"
"Whoa hold on..." Ramirez held his hand up, signaling them to wait for him to untie his brain "so, you are saying, um...the whole damn war could be totally done with,even if we manage to get back?" He asked, receiving a nod from Gideon.
"I don't think we will ever get back" Joker commented "that weapon requires an entire juice from a city's power grid to use, right?" he said "I mean where the hell are we going to find that here? Not to mention the sensitive materials and minds required" getting acknowledgements from the others.
"So, what do we do now?" Captain Mcknight asked "We are stuck, no way home, not even sure if we wanted to go home anymore."
"Live" Gideon said "Live our lives as best as we could. As far as things go now, we are strangers in a strange land. I don't want to get involved in any uneeded fights, especially with our gears" he said; getting nods of agreement from his team and the guards, "live our lives here in peace; as much as I'd like to rejoin our boys back home and fight against Atlas, we are simply not in the same plane of existence anymore. But no matter what, we will always be Sentinels"
The team stood at attention and snapped him a firm salute; exclaiming 'oorah!', 'hooah!', and 'hooyah!'s respectively. Even the guards and Shining Armor himself had found a new respect for the human soldiers; seeing none of them were truly intending of harming him and the rest of the ponies, their distrust have eroded greatly. After the Sentinels cleared the whole 'never going back' issues they chatted with the guards to shift their moods into a better state. Even Joker and Shining Armor began to warm up to each other.
"An impressive speech Major" Shining said while walking to Gideon's side.
"Thank you Captain; but personally I am not very fond of speeches" Gideon replied with a neutral tone "When can I see Princess Celestia? I need to relay this news to her personally."
"Princess Celestia is having her daily court as we speak but--" Shining was cut off when he heard the all too familiar screeching of food cart wheels approaching them"I guess we can talk over breakfast; you know, to kill some time"
"Fair enough, why not? You look like you could use some coffee yourself. And please; call us by our names no need for bloody formalities" Gideon replied with a smile; earning a chuckle and a nod from the ivory-coated stallion "gather round gents, time to pack our gullets"
With that, the Sentinels gathered with the guards and sat on the grass as a quartet of pony chefs bringing in four carts filled with plates and foods. The mouth-watering scent of pancakes, hash browns, and various other non-carnivorous meals accompanied with pots of freshly brewed coffee, fresh air, and the stunning view of the Canterlot Gardens really made a perfect atmosphere for breakfast. The Sentinels put their laptops and weapons aside as the chefs unloaded their carts; both the guards and the Sentinels stared at the delicacy before them hungrily.
"Before we all eat together, I'd like to say something" Shining Armor rose from the ground; getting the attention from ponies and Sentinels alike "on the behalf of the Royal Guards, I apologize for the hostility last night" he said while lowering his head a bit "but as fellow soldiers, I am sure you understand the steps we took to prevent harm from befalling our leaders and citizens"
The Sentinels smiled and Gideon rose from the ground and placed a hand on Shining's soldier " We completely understand for what you did, it was necessary" he stated firmly, but in a friendly manner "We would've done the same if it was the other way around"
Shining smiled and offered his right hoof "No hard feelings?"
"No hard feelings" Gideon replied with a smile and shook Shining's hoof proudly; resulting on both parties to applause. Unaware that the Princesses and their friends were watching at the distance.
With no further delay, both sides started to feast on the delicacy provided ravenously.
"HOLY SHIT! this is fuckin' tasty!" Joker exclaimed while munching happily on a plate of hash browns and pancakes; stuffing his face irresponsibly, not minding his table manners. Well, technically there were no tables on their current picnic site.
"Beats the hell out of any MRE" Mitchell stated, also munching on pancakes and hash browns; earning nods of agreement from his team.
"What's an MRE?" a random unicorn guard asked.
"Meal, Ready-to-Eat" Ramirez replied, running to his Warbird and returned seconds later with a dull brown bag that says 'Meal, Ready-to-Eat' on it's surface and showing it to the ponies.
"ookay..." the guard stated "what is it actually?"
"Well..." he said while opening the bag "we have jerked beef, crackers, bread, energy bar, and various powdered beverages. The most tasteless food you will ever eaten, but at least it's filling. Wanna try one?" he said while offering the bag to the ponies.
"Sure" the guard and Shining Armor replied in unison; while levitating some crackers in front of them before eating them up "yeah, pretty tasteless but not bad" the rest chuckled at this.
"So, you guys are omnivores?" Shining Armor asked after sipping his coffee dry; receiving nods from the Sentinels.
"You seemed to be calm, remembering all of you are vegetarians" Ilona commented.
"True, er--I am sorry ma'am but I never catch your name" Shining Armor said politely; while extending his right hoof.
"Ilona" She replied with an almost invisible smile on her face, and shook his hoof.
Shining smiled"Okay, so for your information we are not the only sapient beings here; we also have dragons, griffons, and minotaurs which are carnivorous" Shining began "At some occasions, Griffon and Minotaur diplomats stay in the castle; so the Princesses usually stock up on meat for them" he stated.
"First ponies, now dragons, griffons, and minotaurs?" Joker said sarcastically "man, we really are in fantasy land aren't we?"
"Yeah, I know this must be strange to all of you; being here and all" Shining replied "We, don't know much about your kind's existence either; except from that one unicorn mare in our nearby town of Ponyville who somehow knew about your kind"
The Sentinels glanced at one another with confusion audible on their faces. Seeing this, he quickly changed the topic.
"Anyways, what are those metallic sticks you are wielding all the time? Are they crossbows of some sort?" Shining asked again; this time, more guards seemed to be anxious for their answers.
"Kinda" Joker replied while holding his IMR in front of the ponies; who were looking on it with awe and confusion. They have never seen anything like it, since their weapons tech were hundreds of years behind what the Sentinels had. "It shoots out these" he said after opening the chambering mechanism and pulling out one 7.62 mm caseless round.
"And what are those mechanical metallic bars attached to your bodies and appendages? Are they part of your bodies?" Another guard asked while pointing at Gideon's exo-suit.
Gideon chuckled briefly "No, this is called an exo-suit" he said while standing up so the ponies could get a better view of his suit "it's not a part of our bodies, but when worn, these suits basically merge with our bodies. Enhancing our strength, speed, durability, pretty damn much everything; boosting our effectiveness and efficiency on the battlefield. We have developed two types of exos; the assault and specialist variant." He paused "Each exos have primary and secondary ability. Assault is equipped with boost jump, as well sonics for crowd control; basically it gives you versatility during assault missions. The Specialist exo like the one I am wearing right now, has a built in shield" he said while activating his riot shield; astonishing the ponies "in addition to Overdrive capability; which slows down things in our visions so we can shoot them more easily. So, in my opinion this type of suit is best used during covert ops or rescue operations" the ponies were stunned when they heard this, never before they knew a piece of technology capable of doing so "And before you ask, even without our suits we are still perfectly capable to fight."
Shining Armor and the guards nodded in acknowledgement; satisfied by his answer.
"Actually, I still have a lot of questions in my mind; especially in your war with this 'Atlas' and this 'Manticore' " he paused "but I think it would be best for you to answer our remaining questions during your audience with the Princesses" Shining Armor said "but could you maybe demonstrate your weapons and equipment later?" He asked
"I guess we could arrange that" Mitchell chuckled "But, I think it's best when the Princesses or perhaps your generals and military advisers are here with us" he paused "we don't want to cause panic of any kind, remembering how loud our weapons can get"
But before any of them could respond, an light gray-coated pegasus guard landed in front of them and snapped a quick salute for the guards and the Sentinels; which they returned "Forgive me for interrupting, but the Princesses demands a private audience with Major Gideon, Captain Jack Mitchell, Lieutenant Joker, and Sergeant Ramirez"
"Oh, this is gonna be good!" Joker said cheerfully.