//------------------------------// // Chapter 23 - A Call for Aid // Story: A Gamer In Equestria // by The Dark Brony //------------------------------// Church’s POV With a covenant threat looming overhead quite literally in my case I had little choice but to go to extreme measures to fix the threat. I exited the library right after Celestia finished her power transfer and walked into my pelican. “How are the systems?” “All systems online. What do you need?” I transfer my electronic copy of the map of equestria to Virgil. “Destination: Edge of the border. Speed: Mach 8.5” Two hours later… We arrive at the edge of the border and I wait for the gunship to land. When it does I get out and take Craig’s token from the pile and say, “Come on Craig, I need you!” A few seconds later a voice comes back through the amulet and says “Oh man Church you only gave me half a day without a call, that's fast… Give me a second” I then hear him say “sorry guys looks like I need to call it a day early.” Seconds later a bright portal appears in front of me as Craig walks through it and it closes as soon as he is clear. He then looks at me and say “Well what's happened for you to need me so badly?” “Pop quiz, what destroyed Reach?” I then see Craig’s eyes widen as he say “Oh hell you got the fucking covenant to deal with great i’m getting pulled into two wars.” He then says “OK then what do you need to do?” “Well first, what do you think will happen if we destroy the ships above us currently? Exactly, more will come to finish us off. We need to scare them off somehow. Flood? No. Too risky. Uh… no. Forerunners will only attract their attention. Shit.” “Or maybe you could just go up there and try peaceful negotiations…” “Um Craig… Have you taken any drugs or alcoholic substances recently?” “No but i have been hit round the head by half the Equestria army. so yeah that could be it.” “Virgil, open the hatch.” The hatch of the gunship opens. “Now Craig, have you read any of the Halo books? Every single weapon even the ones that were prototypes that were never released in Halo are in this pelican. It’s using Red Vs Blue logic where it’s bigger on the outside than the inside as it may be a facsimile of the pelican they transferred Sheila into. Now look in.” I pull out my m99 Stanchion rifle. “You see this? It’s a fucking Gauss sniper rifle.” I pull out a M6J Carbine and throw it to Craig. He then looks at me and sighs then says “What's eating you up so much… listen buddy you're talking to a guy who doesn’t want a full scale war, that could kill everyone on equestria.” He then looks up and says, “Listen, if push comes to shove there is one thing I can try to do and that is rewrite their captain’s memory.” I get a shit-eating grin inside my helmet. “Can you breath in space?” Craig then scratches his head and says, “Did Bardock in Dragon Ball Z?” “I don’t know, I never watched that show.” I say blankly. I then smile and say “He did when fighting an alien who could breath in space, I am able to manipulate any ability, skill or technique so yes I can.” An idea enters my head and my grin is so big it could split the planet, yes it’s that big. “Wait a minute, bigger on the inside… LOADING BAY! ARMOR! AI! DRONES! Oh my god. Mexican Army! Yes. So much yes. We have to do it! It’ll be like Halo legends ‘The Package’ except with mexican space robots!” Craig then smile and says “Are you sure you don’t want them to speak spanish and call them Lopez?” 2 hours later… We had finished assembling all the sets of armor and installing voice chips in them. “Activate Lopez Protocol!” Yes, I made a protocol for that. “López se ha activado.” They all say in their native language. Craig then smirks and says “Sorry but I feel like one's going to turn evil and attack us” “Si usted es Simmons te mataré.” The Lopezes say dangerously. Craig then puts his hands up and says “and they know about Simmons we are in trouble” He then smiles and says “No, mi nombre no es Simmons . Mi nombre es Craig y yo no soy tu enemigo.” (No, my name is not Simmons. My name is Craig and i am not your enemy.) “Ah, hablas español a diferencia de ese idiota roja Sarge. Él es como un borracho rusa en su estupidez.” (Ah, you speak Spanish as opposed to the red idiot Sarge. He's like a Russian drunk in his stupidity.) Wow, that’s fucked up. That hurt what feelings I had left. Craig then said “Estoy de acuerdo contigo López Sarge era un idiota absoluto.” (I agree with you López, Sarge was an absolute idiot.) “Ok, I get you guys like talking to people that speak your language but can we move on and get armored, we are going to space to take out covenant. “Pacto?! ¿Estas loco?” (Covenant? Are you insane?!) “I don’t know. Am I insane?” “Sí. Sí, tú eres.” (Yes. Yes you are.) The Lopezes all say in agreement. “Okay, then just make backups of yourself.” The Lopezes all facepalm. Craig then looks at me and says “Seriously Church? You realise they are all just one program, right?” He then turns to the Lopezes and says “Sin ofender” (No Offence) “RACIST!” We all say to Craig as we cross our arms. He then razes his arms and say “Yeah i’m sorry” “Seriously? You guys already made two million backups?!” I shout in surprise. “Nunca está de más estar preparados, idiota.” (It never hurts to be prepared, idiot.) I look around at the group of thirty Lopezes and say to craig, “Half of them are with you. Get them armed and ready.” I turn to the rest of them which don’t move. “You heard that?! Half of you with Craig and half of you with me! Get armed and I need a sitrep!” Half of them move towards Craig and stand in front of him, awaiting orders. Craig then turns to the other half and says “Ya has oído la IA Estamos mejor prepararse.” (You heard the AI. We best get prepared.) “Warning.” Virgil says. “Precursor presence detected. Identified as Flood, and are capable of Neural Physics. You have been warned.” “I fucking hate my life.” I curse. “At least they can’t screw you over buddy.” “You know why it said Precursor presence? The Flood were created from the ashes of the Precursors when humans and San 'Shyuum ate pheru which were infected by the ashes which failed to revive the Precursors. This infected humans and other life forms. These motherfuckers mean business. They hate all life for destroyed them. I’m only worried about your survivability.” “You and me both. I think i need to get in some XCOM skills” “Recommended loadout for this mission: Forerunner weapons. No Covenant presence detected. If you look close you will see a flood hive connected to that ship. We need to stir it away from the planet and towards the sun.” I say. “I got a better Idea” He then put two fingers on his forehead and disappears. I look around, since my promethean vision shows him as completely gone. My eyes rest on the window. As I look towards the location of the hive and see a tiny spot that is barely noticeable floating nearby I then see a bright blue light flies towards the Hive and the smash into it leaving it pieces as it begins to just float away from the ship and slowly begins to break apart. Seconds later Craig then appears back in the Pelican and says “That should thin the numbers a bit.” “Warning: Flood spores en route towards planet Equis.” I sigh and am about to get up before I fall to the ground immobile. The lopezes collapse as well. “Electrical failure on sector 6! Warning: Energy failure. System failure.” Virgil’s voice starts to distort as the pelican starts to go off course. POV: Craig I see all the Lopezes collapse suddenly. “Electrical failure on sector 6! Warning: Energy failure. System failure.” Virgil’s voice says. I turn towards Church as he collapses and shout, “Church! Church you OK” Delta’s distorted hologram appears in front of me and says, “I’m afraid you are going to have to restore the power somehow. This unit is suffering failures.” He disappears. I then mutter “dammit wish one of you guys were active right now could really use the technical knowhow to fix this mess.” Suddenly a hologram of Church appears as he exits his armor. “Me. Inside your head. Now.” I then nod my head and quickly grab my helmet and put it on as Church accesses the neural Interface in my helmet and Bii begins to cover my body encasing me in my symbiotic skin I then say “You OK up their Church?” “Your architecture isn't much different from this Pelican's…” “Don’t get any funny ideas.” I say. “You really don’t want to piss Discord off.” “Fine. I’m going to activate your HUD and I need you to get armed. There should be a weapons bay around here somewhere. Grab any Forerunner weapons you need.” I then say, “Okay.” With that I run towards a Z-180 Close Combat Rifle/Asymmetric Engagement Mitigator otherwise known as a scattershot and a Z-130 Directed Energy Automatic Weapon also known as a suppressor. “New energy source found. Enough power has been restored to keep autopilot enabled but I’m afraid your MJOLNIR Mark VI Generation 2 army will not be active.” The pelican rights itself back towards its destination. I roll my eyes and say “Absolutely bloody brilliant” I then run towards one of the doors and say “Church where is the nearest power source we can use to refuel the ship?” “Hehe… Yeah, about that. You’re looking at it.” I look at him in confusion. “What?” “You see that sun right there? Yeah, it’s an artificial star. My guess is that it is forerunner-made.” “How are we gonna sort this out then we can’t leave the ship to get it otherwise they’ll take over… Got any good ideas.” “Wait. Something’s happening. The flood spores… they’re actually burning in the atmosphere. That isn’t supposed to be possible. Or at least very unheard of.” Church’s projection flickers for a moment. “There.” A waypoint appears on my hud about 300m away. “There should a backup power generator in that direction. I run through the corridor and up some stairs until I reach a door that is locked. “ “Fuck the doors locked. We got any way to open this or does it need to be forced open?” “You realize you are talking to an artificial intelligence program right?” Church quips sarcastically. “yes… yes i do. Ok then could you get this door open I know this is Delta’s specialty but you should be OK” “Delta.” Church’s voices rings out. A hologram appears next to Church. “Yes, Epsilon?” “Get this door open.” “I’m afraid you are going to have to wait a moment. Virgil has currently locked herself out and is denying communications.” A hologram of Tex (Allison or Beta) appears next to Delta. “Well she probably has a very damn good reason for doing so.” “Beta. I have not seen you in a while. The door is unlocked.” With that the holograms disappear. “OK then wasn’t expecting that lets sort this generator out then stop that invasion before it begins” With that i run into the room as I hear the sound of footsteps outside the door “fuck… you deal with the generator i’ll deal with our uninvited guests.” “If you say there are flood in there I will literally fucking scream.” Church says. “I don’t know what it is but i can swear i heard something outside.” “Do you want to pull a Halo 2 on those fucking flood if they are outside?” I then smile and announce “thought you’d never ask” “Delta, are there any space pickles in here?” “Covenant antimatter charge located.” A waypoint appears on my hud, right next to the banging that is coming outside. “I really don’t like where it is located. Chance of survival: 13.9%” “Great. The percentage has a 13 in it. We are fucked.” Church moans. “Oh quit your bitching.” Tex says. “Could be worse I could act like Agent Carolina” “*sigh* Did you really just talk about her in front of Tex?” Tex’s hologram appears and flips me off before disappearing. “Oh bad thinking on my part sorry” I then grab the scattershot from my back and get ready to fight and whisper “got any music up there?” The instrumental version of Breaking Benjamin’s Blow Me Away starts to play in the background. I then smile and put three fingers up and begin to count down and on one kick the door down, sending it flying, revealing a small group of grunts, one of them saying, “We barely got out of there! The demon is here somewhere. We must kill it.” “Ok i’ve had enough i think it’s time for the best battle plan of all time” I then fire of one shot and obliterate one of the grunts and say “It’s called shotgun to the face” “LEEEEERRRRROOOOOYYYYY JEEEENKIIIINSSSS!!!!!” Gamma/Garry shouts. What? If he couldn’t tell a knock knock joke then he had to choose an even worse one. Seconds later multiple black tendrils shot out of my body and begin to impale each of the grunts on them and instantly retracted leaving the dead body of multiple grunts in my wake. I then look up and say “You are fucked.” At that point I grab my staff and smash it on the floor and a portal opens up below the group of grunts sucking them into the Warp i then close it and say “Prepare for insanity” “That shit is seriously fucked up.” Before Church can say anything else something that makes me literally shit myself appears. A dozen flood juggernauts jump through the glass, shattering it. “I don’t even want to know how the fuck that is possible.” Church says, pointing at the abominations in front of us. I just look at Church and say “how's the reboot going for the generator?” “All systems online. Life Support Online. Artificial Gravity Online. Shielding system online. FTL Drive online. Starboard cannons enabled. Self-Protective Priorities Authorized.” Virgil announces. “Disable United Nations Space Command Emergency Priority Order 098831A-1.” Church says, I just look at him in confusion. “Cole Protocol disabled. Are you sure about this?” Virgil asks. “Affirmative.” Delta replies. I then look at my side and say “ok time for something new i then grab my bolter pistol and form a fireball in my other hand and shout “BARBEQUE’S ON!” I then throw the fireball just in front of the juggernauts that begin to launching them backwards from the force of the explosion and then fire the bolter pistol multiple times at them getting multiple headshots with each shot. Down the corridor we hear a shout, “Usted no va a destruir el López Ejército pesado!” (You will not destroy the Lopez the Heavy Army!) With that, all thirty Lopezes charge and fire. “Targets identified.” One of the Lopez’s assault rifles pulls a Freckles and shouts every single enemy in sight. “Targets neutralized.” “This is why I am scared of Freckles.” Church says. I laugh and tell him, “Same here, before and after.” “Had a bad experience?” Church quips sarcastically. “Nah just saw how badass he was beforehand… hey if the covenant and the flood are here that could mean you could get agent maine to deal with in the future or even the rest of the gang appearing” “Wait a minute. Flood, covenant. In season 1 Master Chief was mentioned… Project Freelancer… Staff of Charon… Mother of Invention… We need to find out what season this is. But how?” “if only we knew someone who could break the fourth wall” Discord’s distorted voice is heard, “Oh shut up, you read too much fanfiction.” “Why does his type of humor remind me of Wyoming so much?” “I honestly have learnt to ignore it” “Wait a minute. I just realized something. The freckles assault rifle said targets neutralized. Does he mean… all of them onboard? The lopezes could have taken out all invaders since the power has restored...I remember outfitting the lopezes armor with promethean vision.” “I don’t know.” I then close my eyes and say, “There's some left feels like there in the control room.” “Fucking hell, why did I have to get a Tardis pelican. I mean I’m not complaining, it’s just… It feels too easy.” “Yeah I thought the same thing it’s like…” We then feel the ship getting dragged by something, “We can’t catch a break today. What are the chances of blowing up their tractor beam?” “Hyperdrive, Warp drive and Interstellar teleporter have been enabled.” Virgil’s voice says over the intercom. “Excuse me?” Church says in confusion. “SOMEBODY PLEASE TELL ME WHY THE FUCK WE ARE IN A DOCTOR WHO PELICAN?!” Delta’s hologram appears in front of me. “The chances are 199.3215223%. Hmm, my systems are functioning normally so I am unable to gather how I received that percentage.” He disappears. “OK Virgil where are we going?” “Destination: Unknown. This system has not been catalogued by the United Nations Space Command.” “Ok this is getting ridiculous… Virgil who entered the commands to where we are going?” “Do you talk to your mother like that?” She quips. “And for your information, I did. I locked the system out to these unggoy who are trying to hack into me.” “Wait, why are there only grunts here? Is it another grunt rebellion? I swear, the last one almost destroyed the entire covenant.” “Unknown.” “Virgil Send me the coordinates of the grunts. we’ll deal with them” “Access denied.” Virgil replies to me. “Access override, level Alpha.” Church says. “Access granted. Welcome back, Director.” I look at Church and whisper, “Wait a minute, she didn’t notice that before?” He just shrugs. “meh suppose it never gets old” “Virgil! What is the real classification of this ship?” “Ship identified as G79H-TC/MA Pelican.” “Director override.” “Ship identified as Project Freelancer G79H-TCTA/MA Quantum Pelican Experiment #2601” “Hey Craig? Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” “I don’t know” “Good because that would be fucking creepy. So, what I’m thinking is, we should destroy the whole covenant fleet. This is an experimental prototype pelican which uses quantum mechanics right? Well there has got to be a mac cannon on here or something.” “Virgil are any experimental weapons on this ship that will work? if so send them to my hud.” “Designation Craig, you realize you forgot about the covenant antimatter charges right? Before I allow to use any others you must first go through with your original plan. Organization is important.” She says icily. Okay, I do not want to piss her off. The sound of a palm hitting face is heard throughout the galaxy. “Did you really forget that plan?” Church asks, sounding strangely betrayed. “Sorry a lot to deal with right now. cut me some slack i’m only one guy” I then shake my head and say “I should have done this earlier” “Oh, dejar de poner excusas. Esto es por qué las máquinas son superiores.” (Oh, stop making excuses. This is why machines are superior.) One of the lopezes who we forgot about said all too enthusiastically. “I’m basically the same thing as you and yet I’m insulted.” Church says to Lopez who facepalms. “Yeah, Yeah don’t blow a fuse” I then close my eyes then say “Shadow Clone Jutsu” I then look at the copies and say “get rid of any covenant soldiers you can find” With that they all just nod their heads and disappear. “Fucking Naruto.” I curse. “Whats wrong with Naruto?” “I’m just saying that because you’re op as fuck. Not that I’m not op as fuck as well.” I then smile and say “OK let's deal with that Covernet ship” I then teleport outside and move my hands to my side and shout “Big Bang Kamehameha” with that a massive beam burns through the whole ship disintegrating it completely. “Case in point. That is why you are op as fuck. You even went through the shields.” “Oh god did I just do that… that's insane” “Yes. And it was cliche as fuck. I’m so proud of you.” Tex says sarcastically. “Are you done yet or have you got some more insults to go?” “Maybe. You never know. She’s only female.” Tex’s hologram appears and she punches Church in the nuts. “Ow you fucking bitch!” She flips him off and disappears. “You really shouldn’t have gone there buddy.” Ok, well the flood is pretty much gone, and the ships are disintegrated and I didn’t get to go through with my plan.” Church grunts. “We should try to find a way to contact the unsc or something. Actually no that’s a terrible idea. But if we don’t do that then how will we find out what season we are in of RvB? I already know we are past Season 5 of MLP.” Maybe you’ll get lucky and a ship will just come into this Solar System.” “Nice try but-” Before Church can finish red lights start to flash. “Slipspace rupture detected.” A ship bigger than the Mantle’s Approach exits a slipspace portal. “Do you hate me or something, because I don’t know what I did to deserve this. YOU SHOULD KNOW by now that Murphy’s law loves to fuck with people here!” “Hey it could worse it could be one of the red or blues from Blood Gulch.” “The mantle’s approach is over 100x larger than the unsc infinity and this ship is at least 10x bigger than the mantle’s approach. So tell me, what could actually equal worse?!” “It could be that ship from Halo 4 i think it was.” “Which one? The didact’s ship? Because funny story… That ship you’re talking about is the Mantle’s Approach. An-” A black hole suddenly appears and pulls the entire ship back, literally tearing it in half and suck the halfs in before closing. "Craig, I can't. Craig our contract is complete." Before Craig could react he was pulled into the portal as I exited his helmet.