PONYHAMMER 40,000. The Warp Incursion.

by Duskrunner

Chapter Seven - Research

The funeral had ended hours ago. The Princess Twlight Sparkle had constructed her hourglass and declared the hour to be 'dawn'. Twilight then flipped the glass over and declared it was time for the new shift. Ponies left their posts to return to their bunk and wake their replacements.

The lights had been dimmed to help everypony adjust to the transition.

A small shape crept along the floor, scrapping by, doing its best to remain unseen by anyone.
It reached the sealed bulkhead of the loyalist mausoleum and poked around, probing for a weak spot that it could use as an entrance. It poked at walls and grates, pulled at the reinforced door and made a futile attempt at stacking materials to push up a ceiling panel. The room was sealed and, since security was a priority and each room was designed with its own supply of air scrubbers built into its walls; completely impenetrable.

With no other choice the shape pressed the release on the door lock.
The wheels began to move with a terrible grinding noise and two seconds later the intruder found itself bathed in the light of a unicorn sentry's horn.

"Lyra?!"

"Aw nuts..."

Twilight had come out from her office, her eyes wide in terror and was left looking at an awkward glancing Lyra.
"My office. Now!"

Twilight said, using her levitation to grab Lyra's ear and tug along behind her, Lyra 'oh'ing and 'ah'ing the entire way.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A second pair of eyes opened opened in the darkness, breaking the cloaking camouflaging effect that hid them against the wall, and now that the bait had been caught and the main obstacle's attention was diverted entered the loyalist's mausoleum.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Do you have any idea how dumb that was?!"

Lyra was looking at her lower hooves. Sitting on a human chair, staring at her hooves, trying hard not to move so much that it swiveled across the room.

They were inside the room Twilight had chosen as her office, and from the looks of it the military fortress' previous commander had used it as his office as well. Papers, files, machines, trophies and general items of intimidation lined the walls and filled the bookcases. Everything conspired to make Lyra feel uneasy, especially the giant letter 'I' etched on the wall behind Twilight.

Despite the fact that Twilight was sitting lower than Lyra (she had pushed the command chair into a corner and was sitting on a simple cushion) the geometry of the room and the weight of that 'I' were determined to undermine Lyra's bravery.

That Twilight was very reasonably dressing her down only made her feel smaller.

"Lyra, are you listening?"

and instead of paying attention I'm wandering. Come on girl, get it together. Just explain rationally and reasonably how you... completely and for no reason wanted to see something everypony had been warned not to. Oh Celestia, I'm going to sound so stupid.
All Lyra could do was wrinkle her muzzle and whimper a lame explanation that was completely incoherent.
Why couldn't I talk Bon Bon into coming along with me this time? She always did it before. I'm just no good explaining these things to normal ponies.

Twilight sighed heavily and decided to try a soft approach.
"Lyra, tell me what happened."

"I didn't mean any harm. Ok I'm sorry if I surprised or scared anypony but I just wanted to get a look at them. Bon Bon told me that everyone was in shock that those things we saw getting killed were suits with humans inside them. And you know me, everpony knows me. She had to get what she was feeling off her chest and she knew that if it was about humans I'd listen to her for hours - and now that I think about it I really should be insulted or at least a little annoyed because I'd listen to Bon Bon anytime if something was bothering her, humans or no humans."

Twilight arched a brow in confusion.

"Anyway. So she told me about that and I just lit up with questions. 'They were suits?' 'Humans?' 'Did somepony see them?' 'Do you think we'lll get a chance to run into them again?'
And she let it slip that we found humans right here and that they were dead the poor things and that you performed an autopsy and a funeral and that I slept through the whole thing! Me! Slept right through it!"

Twilight thankfully stepped off from her cushion and went over to Lyra. She put a hoof over the unicorn's shoulder. "It's all right Lyra. You didn't mean any harm and I appreciate that you weren't doing anything you thought was dangerous. But the truth is it might be, so I need you to promise me you won't try to do anything like that again."

"But-"

"Lyra promise me. You won't disturb the mausoleums."

"Allright Twilight. I promise."

"Now go get ready. You've got guard duty and we need everypony that's staying alert because we've got ponies outside tonight."

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Out in the wasteland the first scavenging team picked through the wreckage of what had once been an Imperium Drop Pod: a roughly pear-shaped structure with five walls that deployed from orbital vessels. Space Marines had exclusive use of them, primarily to deliver squads into battle.
The deployed ceramite walls had long since been swallowed by the earth; only the tips of the support beams jutted out.

The Drop Pod was the one exception in an area that appeared to follow natural laws.
A network of trenches had been dug around the pod, the strongest point had been reinforced with one of the pod's doors. A trio of imperial Guardsmen's bodies lay demolished in the dirt along with a half dozen Emperor's Children.

It didn't escape the team's notice that over a dozen weapons littered the floor, some dangling from slings around Guardsmen's torsoes, the rest discarded at random the fate of their owners unknown.

They busied themselves with the chaos marines.

"Flawless... I believe this script translates as flawless," Rarity observed even as she tried not to step in something. The maddened cries of the noise marines hadn't been silenced, even in death, and the absurd claims written into their armor struck her.
"Look at these things. The adornments , the colors, the ...subject matter. Who could possibly wear such a thing and see it as an improvement, let alone perfection?"

Vinyl and Berry Punch were with her.

"Exactly what is the subject matter anyway?" Berry asked with a curiosity that was mild at best.

Rarity blinked, then strained her eyes looking at the imagery sketched in parchments and painted onto armor. "I'm not quite sure. I think they're living things... maybe?"

What Rarity wasn't able to identify were different generations of Daemonettes, humans in various stages of possession and greater Daemons frolicking, occasionally with their victims.

Behind her Vinyl's loud voice was giving a play-by-play of an argument to the one pony who found it physically painful to listen to her. "So Tavi and I were discussing it last night."

Which would be code for 'Vinyl was talking about it while Octavia listened politely'. Berry thought ruefully.

"And I'm positive. None of the small stains and holes on the walls we found over at our new haunt match. Those - what did Princess Twilight call them? Space Marines?"

"Space Marines." Rarity confirmed.

"They fired stuff at the oogy-boogies and they just splattered like somepony stamping on a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. So I figure, if it hits you like a wave and totally smushes you, and it makes a wicked loud sound, it's gotta be some totally nasty magic making the noise and invisible waves.
And then I thought: Vinyl, sound is already wicked loud and full of energy and totally invisible moving waves. It's crazy but it works. Sound magic. And we totally know it's real because that's the only thing keeping the haunt from sinking into the desert."

"Hmm, well that's true." Rarity said, assuming that Vinyl was talking about the fortress.

"I know! So there are dudes out there and they were shooting wubs at us. That's totally killer!" Vinyl shouted, thinking back on the noise marines that marched on the forest.
"At first I'm like, 'seriously?' But seeing it in action 'cuz let's be honest it ain't safe hearing it in action and I've flipped 'cuz hey, I get it. I've got my dishwasher back home and don't get me started on the bass cannon but this stuff, they can actually do demolition with this stuff. All the bass I've dropped over the years and the worse I ever felt was a little motion sickness - and you totally need to add that gnarly grunge carnival air or a laser show induced epilepsy attack to hurt anypony at one of my gigs. To think that somepony, I mean somebody, could actually make a weapon outta <i> sound </i> - Like I said, it's killer!"

"Literally." Berry deadpanned. She could appreciate the marvel of it, really she could, but Vinyl had easily spent the enthusiasm for three of them.

Rarity appeared to agree.
"Vinyl dear I appreciate your enthusiasm for these... Chaos Marines and their achievements, really I do. For instance, the colors and randomness and sheer... overdoing with the paint scheme and the decorations on this armor are appalling and ghastly to look at. Really they're an eyesore even without expressing admiration for violence and depravity. And yet, once I get past that superficial layer I can't help but think there's some deeper idea behind it putting it all together."

Berry approached a dismembered noise marine champion.

"Careful" Rarity warned. "Twilight warned us not to touch anything, even with our magic. She said their corruption is like a vile disease."

Berry looked around, trying to find something on the ground she could prod the body with but found nothing. A dead guardsman was nearby and she went over to it, pointing at its lasgun.

"Did Twilight say anything about these guys?"

"The 'men' they were fighting? No I don't believe so. If they're enemies it stands to reason they aren't corrupted like them."

Berry picked up the lasgun, ignored the bayonet on the end and used it to flip over the dead chaos marine. A lot of details about him were curious but nothing drew her attention as much as the transparent vials filled with fluid encrusted about it's back, neck and on its shoulderguards.
She clumsily pried one of the vials loose with the bayonet and found its feeding tube. After a few more curious tugs the tube snapped off and a dribble of dark black blood leaked out along with the vial's green elixir. Her face contorted.

"Rarity? These ponies, er, people eat through their mouths like us right?"

"Yes dear as far as I can guess."

"Any idea why they would feed stuff directly through their skin into their blood then?"

"That's beyond me but it's obvious they're insane. You can see it in their colors, their weapons, and if that is what you think it is then yes, even in the 'food' they put into their bodies." Rarity judged as she turned to examine another dead Marine.

Of course that's food, it would have to be, right?. Why it's the only thing I can think of, there's no way it could be a dangerously poisonous, unstable, volatile substance. A pony wouldn't really know about that, would they Berry? Nopony in Equestria is addicted to anything harmful, are they? A voice taunted within Berry's mind, making her eyes widen and her temples sweat.

Neither of her companions appeared to hear the voice or notice her nervousness.

Vinyl nodded at Berry's idea, produced a set of bayonets of her own from the lasguns littering the trench and slid them into a length of chain and began dragging a noise marine out of the trench and back to the base.

"Vinyl, what ever are you doing?"

"This stuff makes sound and I see at least three different instruments making it. I can leave them here and that'd be giving up, or I can drag em back and see if I can disassemble them to see what makes em tick."

Quickly pushing in front of Rarity Berry huffed past, dragging the noise champion.
"Second verse same as the first. I don't think this is food." Berry added through teeth clenched about a chain. "Twilight said recon some evidence, well here it is and we're hauling it back."

"Well... yess... very well then. I'll just... get a little bit of this and take back a sample-"
Rarity pulled at a piece of cloth covering a shoulderguard with the barrel of the lasgun Berry discarded. The fabric tore off and fell heavily to the ground. As she fidgeted with her grip on the barrel she noticed the way gaps in the cloth flapped as it settled.

Then she shrieked.

Now that it was longer stretched out crudely over a large curved surface the fabric resumed it's natural state, leaving the poor pony staring into a human face.

"I've changed my mind, your samples will be fine!!" She screamed as she ran to catch up with them.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Big Mac had gone to sleep. The stallion had endured a double shift before Applejack convinced him to get some shut-eye.
With so many other ponies out scouting and the rest on guard duty or sleeping it was no surprise the unfamiliar and unsettling weapon was left un-maned.

It should also have been no surprise that the way was wide open for Lyra to examine it.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"How's it going Cheerilee?"

"I've finished translating your room's basic stationary and notes. Apparently your predecessor was a man with the title of 'Inquisitor' and he held authority over and outside the Imperial Guard, Mechanics and Space Marines garrisoned here. There's also a group called the so... so-ro-ri-tas. I'm still trying to find out what that means WHAT THE HAY?!!!"

Everypony's teeth rattled as machine noises competed with explosions to be the cause of deafness.

Twilight hoped onto Cheerilee and pony-piled her onto the floor. They made eye contact and Twilight signed at her to stay on the floor. Cheerilee nodded and Twilight scooted out of the Inquisitor's office and out into the hallway. The noise had stopped and at every corner she called out and a few ponies responded they were unhurt. Always the statement carried the follow-up question 'What happened?'

The only relief Twilight had was to order the ponies from the sleeping room to collect their supplies and be ready to evacuate.

She turned a corner and felt something pushing against her flank. When she looked behind her she saw Applejack, Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie pushing against her flank trying to look over her shoulder (Pinkie Pie technically wasn't since she was hoisting up an angled mirror on an artificial extending arm).

"Girls, what are you-?" Twilight whispered loudly.

"Do you really need to ask Twilight?!" Rainbow Dash shot back.

"Fine. Dash get ready to go high after the rest of us. Applejack, I'll run in with a shield, stay behind me until we're in the thick of it. Pinkie Pie... I don't know what to tell you."

"The hallway's clear Twilight. Ten steps to the corner where the main door is."

"All right. Just let me call out in case somepony is still there."

"Twilight no. If you do that we lose the element of surprise." Dash hissed back.

"Hello? Anypony? it's all right. I'm ok."

The four ponies turned to each other and blinked. The voice was Lyra's.

"Let me see if I got this straight, sugarcube." Applejack started. "You shot up the front gate?"

"Yes but that wasn't what I was going for. Big MacIntosh was on this thing but he didn't really know how it worked or if it worked. So I was fidgeting around, trying to find out what made it tick and it did... well that."

Twilight was trembling. The wall directly behind the chokepoint had already been a pockmarked mess before her arrival. Lyra's incident had changed the landscape of the arches, the ceiling and some of the walls in addition to adding to the chokepoint's structural decay. The first words out of Twilight's muzzle, thankfully, were "Lyra, are you sure you're ok?"

"Yeah. I'm fine. I was behind the device the whole time, I mean, I knew enough to figure out the end with all the hollow pipes is the end the stuff comes out from, that's just common sense. The hard part is, well, what exactly is the stuff that comes out.
I thought it might be tiny like a cannonball or a firework, who can tell? So I was trying to open it or disassemble it and something caught and it rattled off into the doorway. But it's not a problem I think I can get it off again I'll just need to grab a few tools and maybe I can get a hand or two from sonepony who's better with machines than I am or at least somepony with size and weight to hold it down like Big Mac-"

Twilight's relief and general adrenaline were leveling out.

"Of course it'd be just easier to find someone else who could do that for us. A whole planet full of people, well maybe not full of people it's a monster world but still a lot of people, we're bound to find one willing to help us out it's just a matter of luck or time..."

"Lyra."

"And once we have them it's just a question of adapting everything they have to pony use. Of course! Why stop there? It's one thing to get their weapons but there's bound to be uses for all the other stuff like these buildings, their carts, oh! even their armor!"

"Lyra..."

"This is going to be incredible. Ok, That means building and smithing and magic forging and getting to the bottom of all we have available to us. No problem. All we need to do first is re-purpose the library-"

Twilight was gritting her teeth. Her eye twitched.
"Lyra!!" She yelled at the top of her lungs.

Lyra blinked as she was yelled into silence.

"I asked you to not fool around with this stuff. it's dangerous. We used this cannon and I appreciate that you thought you were doing the right thing trying to fix it but this is where I draw the line. We are through playing around with the humans' technology and we are most definitely not going to try to engage them!"

"But there's so much to learn, so much to try and gain and we'll never get an opportunity like this again and... you're... you're not mad are you?"

"So help me Lyra this is going to stop and I will stop it. I will get mad, I will yell and as Celestia is my witness if that's what it takes I will banish you if that's the only way you'll listen!"

"B-Banish me?" Lyra spoke up. "Banish me to what?! There's no moon here, Princess, and even if there was you can't just up and banish me to it. There's... laws... and stuff... and I've got rights!"

If Twilight's mane could catch fire, this would be the moment it happened again.
"That does it!"

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Trixie opened her eyes and rustled in her chair.
So far she was the sole pony with an unblemished name on the sleeping room door, she had been spending her days and nights here. Twilight Sparkle had been smart; she went through the primary rooms of the military base and taken up residence in the most imposing and document-rich niche available.

So far she had overheard enough to know that Twilight was in the Inquisitor Lord's office.
By rights that meant Twilight occupied the brain; Trixie therefore decided to co-opt the heart.

She pulled off her hat and produced her key, a small device of silvered steel carved in the shape of an 'I'.
The exact same ornate 'I' that sat behind Twilight's desk. It was the Inquisitor Lord's rosette, and it's circuitry over-rode every single piece of technology into compliance.

When Lyra had gotten caught breaking the quarantine on the Imperium crypt nopony had stuck around to see Trixie sneak into the room, identify the Inquisitor's clothes, and obtain the rosette.

Trixie sat up on the command chair, smacked her lips as a result of seriously needing a drink of water, and made her first command. "Status."

"Yes Inquisitor. Holo-log initiated."

"No not that again."

Trixie sighed even as she massaged her temple with her hoof.
As the 'Inquisitor Lord' she had complete access to all technologies, but that didn't mean that they would work properly. For the third time she found herself the captive audience to a hololog she couldn't skip or speed through, only rewind.

Idly she wondered if she could make the log serve as her wake up call. She could easily snooze through the first twenty minutes, now thirty, until she got through the new information.

That particular section of the log was currently playing.

A holographic Trixie (herself several hours ago) forced up a floor panel and found herself in the army commander's war deck. She didn't know what the room was but she instinctively understood its importance. Machines and seated workstations galore lined the room but the center was not the strange hexagonal table that dominated so much of the floorspace; it was the chair, the central chair that was permanently bolted to the ground, fixed solid in place, the throne that rotated to face every station.
This was the stage, this was where the maestro commanded the floor-to-ceiling wall-to-wall orchestra pit.
This was where she needed to be.

She looked about her at machines no different from the sound and light boxes Twilight had already found, their information consumed. Propaganda, Twilight had declared. Trixie knew there was more.
"The great and powerful Trixie demands answers" she declared to the empty room as a formality, not actually expecting anything to reply to her demand.

"Vox print not recognized. Authority declined. Input command key.."

Trixie yelped and looked about her, trying to find the source of the command.
"Show yourself, the great and powerful Trixie demands you reveal your presence at once!"

"Command not recognized. Input command key."

"You are an... odd thing. <hmph> The great and powerful Trixie is bored with you. You will answer the questions now."

"Vox print not recognized. Authority declined. input command key."

"Stop saying that. the great and powerful Trixie is the only authority present, you have no choice but to answer to her."

"Command declined. Authority transfer requires formal transfer. Input command key."

"The great and powerful Trixie does not lower herself to satisfy the standards of machines."
Trixie continued arguing that way with the disembodied voice for several minutes until she realized there was no point arguing with a lock; the only argument it would accept is the intrusion of a proper key.

But what could that key be? The walls and doors were plastered with dozens of symbols. Two-headed eagles, Space Marines, the Vorpal Swords' crest, the cog with a half organic/ half metallic skull...

And it hit her. The symbol behind Twilight's back. the 'I'. Every icon was repeated indefinitely in several parts of the fortress except the 'I'.

So she entered the room, searched through clothes and found the rosette. The 'key' was recognized immediately by the hologram scanners of the command throne and underpowered command consoles transferred authority from the dead Lord to her and began answering her commands.

Trixie sighed as she watched upload feeds that showed ponies sleeping, Lyra shooting a device a holographic display labeled 'heavy stubber'.
"One new thing. Please show me something I haven't already seen a hundred times before."

"Improper command, please restate."

"Older images. Show."

"Improper command, please restate."

"Human images. Show me."

"Improper command, please restate."

"Oh for the love of Celestia this is absurd. I have to say everything verbatim?!"

"Command acknowledges all commands exclusively in High Gothic."

"Or a unicorn's magical translation into High Gothic." Trixie muttered.

"Please restate."

"That is so... infuriating! This is going badly. At this rate I'll have to bring in Twilight Sparkle herself to figure it out.
And I hate having to admit to somepony else I need their help, no matter how clever. <sigh> She'll probably know too. What I would give to have had the kind of tutoring she had."

"Command accepted. Initiating console tutorial basic."

Trixie blinked.
"Oh... yesss."

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Lyra was sitting on the roof.
Bon Bon and Octavia stared up at her from their spot at ground level. The teal colored unicorn hadn't moved in a while, deep in thought. She was sitting, on her spine, helmet on her head, with her eyelids half closed in an expression that said 'yeah, I totally walked into that one'.

"Explain to me why Lyra is up there Bon Bon?"
Octavia asked.

"Lyra messed up, in a pretty bad way. So Princess Twilight Sparkle banished her. To the roof. For five hours.
Roseluck promised she'd come out and tell Lyra the minute her sentence came to an end."

The two earth ponies noticed the approaching shapes of Vinyl Scratch and Berry Punch. Rarity wasn't too far behind them.

They also noticed what their friends were dragging behind them.

"You found more of them?" Bon Bon asked worried.

Berry nodded. "These and a few guardsmen in a trench. Ambushed them before they got to the headquarters."

"The marines did?" Octavia asked.

"No, the guardsmen. They were pretty well hidden and that's probably the only reason they managed to take these two out before they got killed. The bodies are still out there."

Octavia nodded. "I'll inform Fluttershy. They'll be prepared and interred with the other Chaos Marines."

Up top Lyra came to life. "Bon Bon, could you handle that? I need Octavia and Vinyl together for a second."

Vinyl gave Berry a look and Berry replied: "Don't worry. I'll keep the Princess and everypony else off the gear until you get in."

Octavia thanked Berry, who vanished indoors with Rarity and with the help of levitation from Vinyl and Lyra found herself on the roof. "So what can we do for you?"

With a twist of an exposed dial the vox-hailer's choir became louder, so much louder that it began to echo in the distant hills. Lyra lowered the volume and explained.
"Music's up and we're alive, music's dead and the ground's alive. What do you think about their singing Octavia?"

"Hmm... heavy alto and sopranos. Very high. There might not be any boys in this choir."

"You remember that Twilight wanted to keep the music even if it meant we might risk something finding us? I think we can get both. All we need is a magic shield attuned to high pitched noises."

"But that'd be even more visible."

"It doesn't need to be a strong shield, just something for everything in a very narrow range."

"We are almost all mares here Lyra." Octavia observed. "You do realize that if you put that shield up the only ponies who will be able to yell out warnings from in here are Blueblood and MacIntosh."

"Maybe less." Vinyl added, joking at Blueblood's expense.

Octavia gave Vinyl a look, then cocked her head in a gesture that said 'hmm, you're probably right'.

"We could see if we can do it first and then propose it. No harm done if we know it works right?" Lyra asked hopefully.

Vinyl and Octavia exchanged glances.
"I admit, I would sleep easier at night." Octavia added.

Vinyl put aside her burning desire to mess with Noise Marines and said "Ok Heartstrings. Let's get harmonizing."

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

SIX HOURS LATER

"Lyra!"

The unicorn in question bolted up from her space on a workbench and turned to face Twilight meekly. She'd spaced out again, not listening to anything and anypony else around her. She turned to see Twilight with her five friends and Cheerilee in tow.

"Please don't hide what you're tinkering with behind you."

busted Lyra thought.
She presented what she had been working on, a Vorpal Swords helmet she had been altering with her magic.
Lyra had succeeded in reshaping most of the frame but the optics were delicate and shattered into glass and metal fragments when she tried to expand them to suit a pony's eyes. The mass of plasteel had also been stretched thin to accommodate a muzzle. So thin it broke into two pieces: skullcap and muzzle guard.
Nothing Lyra did would make the two halves connect permanently and that didn't even begin to address the idea of making the internal devices work.

"It's been a long day Lyra, and you're tired from setting up the vox-shield. Get some sleep, you can get back to that in the morning."

Lyra nodded and went onto the sleep room, leaving the helmet on the workbench. Then she realized what Twilight had said and her mood brightened. She thanked Twilight and rushed to bed.
Nopony had any reason to believe Twilight would do anything so petty as confiscate or destroy it.

Applejack was the first to talk once they were in the Inquisitor's office.
"She keeps fiddling with that stuff, and she's not the only one. That first pony-sized bucket helmet she was wearing wasn't something she made herself and she wasn't lying when she said she just found it. She hadn't even seen a human before. Somepony else got that helmet from one of them Guardsmen and widened it to fit on a pony head."

"Why would anypony go to all that bother making it just to get rid of it?" Fluttershy asked.

"Let's point out the obvious, ok. We don't have tools and we'd have heard if somepony tried to blacksmith here. the walls echo everything. That helmet's the result of unicorn magic." Rainbow Dash chimed in.

Twilight nodded.
"Agreed. I didn't do it and I assume you didn't either Rarity?"

"I did not."

Twilight went on.
"Lyra didn't make it. That leaves Vinyl, Amethist Star, and of course Trixie."

"Don't forget that Blueblood feller." AJ pointed out, trying to remind everypony of that one pony they kept overlooking.

"Right."

They exchanged glances. Despite Applejack's point everypony agreed to rule out Blueblood as a suspect.

"When ruling out the unlikely, only the obvious remains." Twilight pointed out.

"But why would Trixie fool around with human armor and then just leave it be?"
Dash tossed out, punching her hooves into the Inquisitor's lumpy chair before resting her head on it.

"I think the real question is if we should be meddling with such dangerous material in the first place... but that's just what I'm wondering." Rarity said, pulling down a drape and setting down on it on the floor.

Twilight sighed.
"Girls. there's no way around it. We have to get off-world and so far nothing I've thought about will take care of that. We're going to need to do whatever it is the humans do and we're going to need to understand their technology, science and magic to do that. We're stuck for time. We can't stand in the way of curiosity and we're going to need everypony's help.
That's... why they're here.
Get the stuff that's clean from the mausoleum. Tell Berry, Vinyl and Octavia they can start tinkering."

"And Lyra?" Fluttershy asked.

"Lyra too, Celestia help us. Lyra too."

They turned to the suspiciously quiet Pinkie Pie.
When Pinkie turned around she was wearing a triple monocle version of her night vision goggles.
Lyra's Space Marine helmet was in her hooves.
"I'm way ahead of you."

Author's Note:

One of the biggest challenges I realized I would face with this project was the idea of canon characters acting in ooc ways. That was something unavoidable because the source material is just so G rated in many ways, and the world I'm tossing them into is the complete opposite of that. Still, when you learn and try and put a lot of love into something you'll usually come close and if the Duskrunner interpretation of the Mane 6 isn't quite the Lauren Faust interpretation, or the Meghan McCarthy interpretation, or any of the other wonderful people who write for the show, at least it would (hopefully) be recognizable.

No, the real challenge I realized would the the background characters. Like Lauren's memories of play inspired her for the series, my experiences in 40k told of a pattern of sergeants and independent characters or special weapon troopers who were supposed to get a job done and everyone else in the squad served as ablative wounds. The Trekkie red-shirt phenomenon.
It's an old problem and not new-millennium old; as far back as the Illiad you have people with names whose only contribution to the story was two lines before someone who was an actual main character stepped in and killed them demonstrating how much of a bad-ass he was.

That's not going to fly with me here. On so many levels.

I'm not going to grab a whole team of pegasi just so they get shot to pieces and Rainbow gets to show off how awesome she is by being the one to survive because she's the best. Off the bat that's not what happens in battle, especially not modern and futuristic combat. Second, it's unnecessary. Everyone already knows RD is awesome, and it's not because she's got plot armor. And thirdly, it's annoying (and maybe offensive) to the fans of the bg characters who get put in the squad position and everyone know they're gonna bite it. It's telling them RD is a tier one character and you bg's are expendable. That's not the kind of story I want to tell and that is ESPECIALLY not the kind of story our cast would write as they go along their adventures.

Our ponies would choose the harder path, completing their mission without sacrificing anyone.
Which means as a writer I have to chose the harder path, and every bg pony has to have a real part to play.

The hard part there is that now I have to make a bg character complete. Do I lift an interpretation, borrow from others, re-interpret or re-imagine who this pony is from scratch? Nevermind the downvotes from the die-hards who -will- hear about what I did to their beloved bg, these personalities will influence interactions and those interactions will have to provide the situations that will make or break this story.

Our first real example is Lyra and boy did I delay on finding the voice for her. There are a ton of awesome attributions to Lyra's character and I'd be lying if I said none of them hadn't left a mark on me, but when the moment of truth arrived I had to go off fanon and trust my gut.

Tara Strong is the Queen of the Bronies. Lauren Faust is our God-Empress. Derpy Hooves is our mascot.

And Lyra Heartstrings is our reflection.
She is the one pony that looks towards humanity, sees our best aspects, and alternately wishes she could be one of us, be around one of us, or share with her friends the joy she gets from being a fan of us. She's the brony in her universe of ponies. So I've chosen to focus more on how a brony would be treated in her universe as opposed to ours.
Without distance-closing technology and a community of similar interested ponies I imagine Lyra would register to her friends and neighbors somewhere between the extremes of 'ordinary pony with an obsession that is surprisingly not linked to her cutie mark', and Rubeus Hagrid. You know, 'loves magical creatures so much he's mental not realizing they're bloody dangerous' Hagrid. Hopefully that version of her will keep you all satisfied enough that it doesn't ruin the experience.

Please comment if you want more of these musings or development diaries or if you prefer I omit them so the analyst bronies have something to play with.

-Duskrunner

Comments

[Plaguenumber3]

Read your tidbit about the illiad logic with 40k.

Well some "good" news in that regard, the black library books (some of them, don't really follow that as for a normal human in 40k a badass like that would just get torn appart. So instead the red shirts last half the book and the main guys get one upped by dirty fatsos...until the Astartes centric books show up and well Homer meet Illiad.