Octavia paced back and forth with Varia active, waiting for Dynamo to arrive. Off in the distance, she could see the Enigma being gutted and repaired, preparations still in place for when everyone brought back the needed parts to upgrade it to fire on the Eurasia colony. Further back, she could see the shuttle undergoing modifications as well, just in case it was needed. Her suit hummed as the new anti-viral tech generated a unique energy shield around her, surrounding her with a white aura that she'd already confirmed caused the viral clouds to disperse on contact. Out of habit, she checked the readout on her buster for how much longer it would last before she had to recharge.
Another half hour, she thought to herself. Well, he's sure to show up before then. And if he doesn't, I'll dock his levels anyway. Teach him to keep me waiting. It's the same rules for being late without contact to sessions.
As she thought that, a teleport signal caught her attention. She turned and hid her smile as Dynamo warped in. "You're late," she grumbled.
"You've still got half an hour before you need to recharge, Tavs," Dynamo replied easily, leaning back against a pillar with a wide grin, crossing his arms behind his head and one leg in front of the other.
"Ahem," Octaiva replied bluntly.
Dynamo winced. "Octavia," he grumbled. "I still don't get why you only let the ladies and Zero give you a nickname."
"Oh, I'd let you get away with it if you got the nickname right," Octavia countered as she hid a buster charge.
"But I want to be different!" Dynamo complained.
"You're still too humanoid," Octavia replied blandly.
"Tsk!" Dynamo grunted, kicking at the ground. "Well, ya can't blame a guy for trying, right?"
"No, but I can penalize his character's charisma rolls."
"Come on!" Dynamo complained. "I worked hard to make Astarell a good face for the party!"
"Yes," Octavia agreed. "You put a lot of work into her, especially with her backstory and how her 'early development' led to a great deal of social heartache that shaped her character." She then gave Dynamo the stink eye. "And exactly how long did you spend trying to argue that she should get a Charisma bonus from that due to having backstory-justified big knockers?"
Dynamo rubbed the back of his head nervously. "...can't blame a guy for trying?" he offered with a bit less confidence.
"Weren't you here to cause some damage?" Octavia asked curiously.
"Only if someone - you, specifically - wasn't here to fight me," Dynamo countered, getting some of his swagger back.
"Then we should get started on that," Octavia replied, spinning around and kicking out with her hind legs, releasing two fully charged plasma blasts.
"Yow!" Dynamo yelped out, backflipping over the blasts, only to have to twist in midair to evade the first of the follow up blasts from her left forehoof as Octavia completed a backflip of her own, the second follow up blast from her right forehoof catching him and knocking him backwards. "Ouch! What gives?"
"Surprise attack," Octavia replied blandly. "Your reflex is high, you only caught one blast. Now roll for initiative." She immediately lunged to the side, holding one buster up to strafe as she raced around.
Grinning, Dynamo began dodging between the blasts, hauling out his double bladed beam dagger and hurling it like a discus, making Octavia leap over it on the way out and duck under it on the way in. "You are a tricky little fighter, aren't you?" he called out as he spun the weapon to deflect the next volley of shots.
"Of course!" Octavia shouted back as she raced in, switching to her B-Saber subweapon. "I knew I'd be fighting you! I practiced a few new tricks!"
Dynamo lunged in, blocking the first saber strike with one of his weapon's blades, twisting it to catch Octavia's other saber on the other blade. "But I'm tricki-yowch!" He leapt straight up as a beam saber from one of Octavia's hind hooves came a little too close to an area he preferred to keep undamaged. "Fighting a little dirty, aren't you?" he called out as he backflipped away.
"I'm trying to make sure the world is saved!" Octavia shouted out, charging the beam saber in one hoof before charging in, cutting through the pillar behind Dynamo as he leapt out of the way, making it fall towards him.
"And you think I don't have a good reason for coming out here like this?" Dynamo shouted back.
"Well, what is it?" Octavia demanded angrily as Classic beamed in at her summons.
"Whoa!" Dynamo called out. "Save something for next round like I am, birthday girl!"
Octavia froze, blinking. While the crisis had overshadowed it, it was, in fact, her birthday. "While it's nice that you remembered," she called out, "what does that have to do with anything?"
"I'm a registered mercenary!" Dynamo called back. "So I can't get access to Maverick Hunter HQ resources. And as a Hunter, it's against policy for you to engage in unofficial fights in your battle armor."
"And?" Octavia demanded with a scowl.
"Well, you're the one who wanted to see how we'd do against each other in combat after I shared my record!"
Octavia's jaw dropped as she began to see what Dynamo was saying. "You mean...you took a job to attack the HQ's construction site when I'd be the only defender..."
"So that we could have an excuse to fight once I'd disabled the security cameras!" Dynamo replied. "Figured that'd make a good birthday present. And if it didn't, I could always buy you a new cello with the money I'm making from this job."
Octavia quirked an eyebrow up as she heard that, then shook her head, chuckling. "You're incorrigible. And you'd also better get out of here before the others get back."
"Consider me gone!" Dynamo replied with a smirk, beaming away.
As Octavia turned to recharge the new systems, she chuckled and shook her head. "If only he had a tail...it might be nice to give romance a try."
A tail, and the ability to beat X. Am I the only one picturing X as an overprotective father?
7045331 no, because its already been shown that he IS an overprotective father...
7045331 You do remember what x did to the 2 robot dudes in the first "game" when tavi was incapacitated during the fight and X went apeshit? He would redefine overprotective.
By the way Tats, wasn't there a rule passed stopping X from doing any field work without tavi in the field with him?
7045368
7045385 Um, minor misunderstanding, that's X being a poppa bear, I would like to see him sitting on the porch shining his buster while a prospective date shows up.
Thousands of years into the future...
Volnutt: "What's up with all the pony imagery in these ruins?"
How old is Octavia physically and mentally at this time?
*Hands Dynamo a tail attachment* There you go Octi, now go get him!
Ah, that Dynamo. Didn't think Octavia was attracted to him
7045398 "Hey, Dynamo! Guess who else is late?"
Considering his character, and the types of antics she has to put up with canonically, perhaps he would be a good fit.
He would need to dial back the ego just a bit though.
7045385
It was only that he couldn't go out in the field without her if she was injured.
7045419 "Attache."
7045705 Right. Thank you for clearing that up for me.
I was actually reading a book on DnD... it had nice pictures. I only read the character creation steps page. It got me thinking...
"Dungeons and Dragons" to (FallOut: Equestria) "Fallout and Friendship" or (in Tat's case) "PWNY and Prophecy." The last one is worded that way because- Let's face it. These stories are prophecy and build up to the final PWNY-verse story, the PWNY-verse itself with every player and their links being pulled to one spot.
In a fight Chrysalis and Pinkie will win due to the fact that they can't be killed so that makes Fluttershy second to them unless original and TF2 Fluttershy being one messes with her skills in some way. My guess can include Rarity's stealth being a possible unknown to whether she can beat Fluttershy is a good question. Then we have Tavi and the DJ fighting each other or becoming strange friends. I'm not sure on the others and I'm not updated with Cadence... yet Moony is an unknown too.
You know, a tail could probably be arranged. Just need some mechanical work, and Octavia knows plenty of reploid engineers.
Really, in hindsight I'm fairly surprised that there haven't been able to few pony model reploids anyway. Octavia has been around as a model for such since day one, after all.
Another enjoyable chapter. Good work.
Pony reploids...I think Vinyl might have left stuff aside from the capsules.
I can't find any Dynamo as a Pony art. I am both shocked an appalled by this turn of events.
7046111 I've got two words for you: Cuteness Overload.
... Or Tatsurou just never thought of it...
I ship it! I ship it so hard it's not even funny!
I suppose that Octavia needed a replacement Vinyl since they're not the same generation.
One of the few things I never got about Dynamo: WHY DOES HE HAVE THOSE GREEN GEMS ON HIS HELMET??? When I first saw sprites of him I thought those were his eyes!
And doesn't he technically have a PONYtail already???? If he grows it out a bit I can see Octavia watching avidly as he walks away and X's eye twitching and he tries not to blow Dynamo away in front of Octavia. But yes, I want to see X go for the full intimidation factor if Dynamo ever comes to pick Octavia up for a date. And if Zero gets in on the fun, it's like in Bad Boys 2 when Reggie gets intimidated by Mike and Marcus as shown below.
Warning, strong language.
7046002 What about Twilight?
7045427 "Say yer prayers, boy"
7046953
7046993 Did he make a story for Twilight? All I know from what I've read so far is that it won't just be chaos when the ponies meet. DeadPool's morals align with the TF2 Mercs... being mercenaries and all. There will be 2 Dr. Wileys with two different Zeros to boot. Old Bruce Wayne is a pony... and possibly married to Luna so meeting President Moony is going to be awkward. Bruce and Tony Stark are geniuses, but will they want to one-up each other to challenge Dr. Wiley? Iroh and Engineer will stay out of the whole mess and share some wisdom.
PWNY-verse is going to be crazy.
7047906
Twilight is in "The Sparkle in His Eye", literally the second of these stories I ever wrote.
7047906 he's made one for each of the mane six.
7048067 I just now learned that, but thank you. Though, I have no ideas regarding Twilight since I barely know anything about Rachet and Clank. If he had- I don't know -a pony with Sly Cooper then I would have an idea and he would have the "Playstation Heros" as an arc... though I haven't read his Twilight or Shining Armor stories to know if he has already. Probably has feels. Still sucks that Daxter abandoned the communicator Bentley and Clank made.
Heh....Tavi is so used to reploids being humanoid she seems to have forgotten that they can change their form if they want to. Dynamo might have some issues readjusting his fighting style to a pony body though.
For pete sake, please at least MENTION Vinyl in the story ONCE! For crying out loud!
7058125
Vinyl was a hologram in the capsule that gave Octavia the Classic Adapter. It was a frikkin' Vinyl Capsule.
7058143 What chapter because I went through them all with Vinyl's name only coming up in the comments.
7058282
"2: Rolling Along".
She wasn't mentioned by name, but a hologram of a white unicorn wearing a helmet like X's (a Mega Man helmet) and purple shades silently indicated for Octavia and Classic to enter the capsule.
And a couple chapters later, the Light hologram refused to identify her beyond saying she was an ally, and anything from her capsules could be trusted.
7058300 Oh, so that's why I couldn't find her when I pressed Ctrl + F and then typed in her name.
7059590
Yes. The name was deliberately not used.
7059967 Okay, by the way, I just finished your 'There's Nopony I'd Rather Be Than Me' story and it made me realize that you never did a crossover for Blue Blood yet. Maybe the crossover could be the one you mentioned in the story?
7060074
Nope. I'm not planning on doing one for Blueblood.
7060094 Why not? You have been doing it for almost ever other pony so far.
7060105
Because he doesn't meet the criteria I use for selection.
7060114 Which issssssssss?
7060162
1. Has a major role in multiple episodes (or movies, since I will be using Sunset Shimmer, in Star Fox).
2. Has a strong connection to one of the main characters.
3. Lives in Ponyville.
4. I like them.
Must meet three of four, but I might allow two if they meet the fourth. Blueblood does not meet the fourth.
7060182 But in your story where his new name was Black Blood, it seemed like he was a more likable character. I really wanted to read what happens when he comes back.
7060211
Sorry, not something I intend to explore.
Is Dynamo Bass?
7060382
Would the dazzlings meet your criteria?
They technically qualify for at least two of them... One at the very least.
7407168
Fails on 2 and 3, and only Sonata passes 4.
7407295 Sonata also succeeds for the first rule as well.
7583792
To my knowledge, Sonata has only been in one movie.
Nice.
7583809
While true when you made this comment, it might not be true now. Depends on what constitutes "major", but the latest EQG special does feature Dazzlings in a plot-relevant role. If it were my evaluation, it would be just shy of qualifying for that rule.
a duel between friends, and a happy birthday is had with them both, though what comes next may not be as joyful...