Chapter 5: Reach
The arrival at Reach had been relatively uneventful, the Captain and crew had maneuvered the Dawn into a repair and refit station for small repairs to the hull and restocking. But it was only a matter of time before the reports on the two new passengers had been processed and when they were the ponies were immediately called down to the surface. Alpha-Three and the ponies now on board a pelican headed to the surface, Scootaloo had once again taken up a seat near the cockpit so she could watch the flight from the main viewport.
"How much information did you put in those reports, Mack?" Twilight asked, "I'd like to know what kind of questions we can expect."
"Pretty much everything, so you should expect questions about things like magic, that medical procedure for Scoots, your willingness to fight, etcetera." Mack answered, "Just answer the questions they ask truthfully and treat them as a superior officer, it'll make you look more serious about joining the military here."
Moments later Zoey's voice could be heard from the cockpit, "Entering the atmosphere, Mind the bump!" After a few seconds, the pelican started shaking violently and flames started licking the fuselage.
"Zoey! Why is the pelican ON FIRE!" Scootaloo shouted over the noise that the pelican was producing and slightly panicking about the fact that the spacecraft seemed to be on fire.
"Don't worry about it squirt, when you hit the atmosphere at speeds like this the air heats up a lot so these things have heat-shielding to protect them from that. It'll go away when we've slowed down enough!"
"O-okay." Scootaloo stammered as she tightly held on to the safety harness she was secured in but sure enough, the flames died down after a few minutes and gave way to a stunning sight, a city that would make Manehattan look like a small village. Ten minutes later the pelican flew up to the roof of one of the tall buildings and landed on it, as the ramp lowered a squad of armed marines was waiting for them. "Alpha-Three?" A woman dressed in a black suit asked the group that was now standing on the ramp of the pelican.
"Yes, Ma'am." Mack said as he stepped forward from the group.
"Good, follow me. There are some people with some questions for you all." she stated as if that wasn't clear enough already.
The team cleared the ramp with Mack and Lucy in front followed by Twilight and Scootaloo and closing the group were Tyler, Woods, and Zoey. The moment Twilight and Scootaloo came walking off the ramp the soldiers that were supposed to escort them visibly tensed up before relaxing a bit as they saw the two ponies wearing their bodysuit with UNSC logo's printed on them. The group got led through a hallway until they got to what seemed like a waiting room.
"Sergeant Cross, The council wants to see you immediately." the woman said as she pointed to a large door further down the hallway.
"See you guys on the other side and good luck." Mack quickly said before walking off to the door.
Twenty minutes later the woman that had led them off the roof came back to get Lucy who also wished the rest good luck and walked off to the door as well, Twilight had anticipated that Scootaloo would get bored quickly but she seemed more nervous than anything else. Wrapping her wing around Scoots in an attempt to comfort her, "Don't worry, they only want to ask some questions." after finishing the sentence she looked up at the guards that were all staring wide-eyed at the pony that had just talked. "Did you just talk?" one of them asked, apparently the soldiers hadn't been completely briefed on the specifics of their escort duty.
"Yes, I did." Twilight replied as confidently as she could manage, "You know you can all stop staring, it's kind of freaky." She added with a nervous smile at which the marines regained their composure. Ten minutes later the woman came back but this time she didn't want one of the ODST's to come with her, "Miss Sparkle, the council wants to see you now."
Twilight giving a comforting last glance at Scootaloo got up and followed the lady to the large door at the end of the hallway, walking through the door she found herself in a large dark room with a lit up podium and on the back side of the room a group of humans sitting in the shadows.
"Welcome miss Sparkle, it's a pleasure to meet you." A man with a deep voice said.
"Pleasure is all mine, Sir." Twilight replied.
"As you might be able to imagine the council is extremely curious about your species yours being the first to initiate peaceful contact." The man stopping to clear his throat before continuing, "Subjects like the sub-species of ponies you have on your world."
"Yes, of course! I'll also write up a comprehensive report later if you want?"
"That would be appreciated. If we want a better explanation of any of the subjects that will come up we'll send a request." A woman told Twilight.
"Right, Pony society is made up of mainly three races Earthponies, Pegasi, and Unicorns, there are some sub-races but their numbers are irrelevant with the exception of alicorns. Only four alicorns are currently known to be alive, Princess Celestia, Princess Luna, Princess Mi Amore Cadenza or Cadance, and lastly me."
"So if you're an alicorn you automatically become a princess?" one of the humans asked.
"Essentially yes, but to become an alicorn you have to perform an extraordinary feat of magic. I, for example, was born a unicorn but by discovering a new magic field and finishing a spell I ascended to alicorn status gaining wings." Twilight explained.
"Let's switch subjects, further information will probably be requested on your society in a report." The male voice stated, "We're also interested in how it is you can speak our language and how it's possible your species and other you have described show up in our mythology."
"My understanding of how that's a possibility is still not complete either, my working theory is that a being called Discord made a rift with chaos magic connecting our worlds. I can't verify that theory since it would require me to travel to your homeworld which I would understand you would be apprehensive about seeing the current circumstances."
"Could you tell us more about chaos magic and magic in general? Since humans don't have access to magic we don't have any understanding of it." One of the humans asked.
Twilight thinking about how to explain magic to non-magic users for a moment, "Magic flows around in a field of some sort, regular magic users can guide the flow of it gracefully to accomplish a task like levitation for unicorns, Flight for pegasi, or extra endurance for earthponies. Note that an alicorn has all three types of magic as we represent all races. Chaos magic, on the other hand, is like brute forcing the magic field to tear up to accomplish tasks, this makes chaos magic really powerful but with the side effects being that it causes the user to go insane. Discord is really powerful with chaos magic which promptly caused him to go insane"
"Could this 'Discord' become a threat sometime in the future." The woman asked her voice giving away a hint of worry.
"As of this moment Discord should be petrified in the castle garden in Equestria's capital held captive by wards placed by Princess Celestia and Luna." Twilight replied trying to quell the worry the humans might have had.
"We'll also ask any further questions about magic in reports, next topic we would like to bring up is your proposed surgery on miss Scootaloo. we presume the disability is magical in nature?" The man asked.
"Yes, the scans of her body you have undoubtedly seen shows two patches of tissue connected to the base of her wings which are restricting magic flow, pegasi wings have similarity with unicorn horns although unicorns consciously manipulate magic pegasi magic is more tied to emotions. Essentially what's happening is that magic can't flow to the wings and without magic the 'spell' that allows pegasi to fly isn't cast. A side effect of this is that the wings also remain under-developed."
"We'll make our decision on this matter after we've spoken to miss Scootaloo herself, thank you for enlightening us on the subject." The man commented, "Now we have one last subject matter to discuss, your request to fight alongside our troops."
Twilight tried to hide her nervousness at this subject as she suspected that this would be the hardest to convince them off, "Yes, I'm sure you've read my justification already but my homeworld has a relatively peaceful society and if the covenant would find our world they could either just destroy it or assimilate everyone on it into the covenant. Neither option is one I would want to see happen since one means death and the other means joining a religious group that wants to kill a species because their gods demand it."
Twilight hoped that explanation would be good enough as the man responded, "We were considering to just deny your request outright but when we looked into your performance in the training regime Alpha-Three had run you two through."
"Excuse me but sergeant Cross hasn't informed us on how we performed in the training compared to humans." Twilight interjected.
"He hasn't?" the man sounded slightly surprised, "Well then, your performance was comparable to that of our top performing ODST's. Although alpha-three did a superb job with their tests we want to more thoroughly train you under real training circumstances, not the rag-tag set up course Alpha-Three gave you. If the results are reasonably satisfactory this council will consider your request to join our military. We thank you for your cooperation, if any more questions come up we'll send an inquiry."
Twilight being led out of the room by the woman that had also led her into the room but instead of the large doors she was led out via side door into a room where Mack and Lucy were waiting, "And the princess joins us! How did it go?" Lucy asked, "hope they weren't too tough on you, Ackerson is known to be a bit of a dick."
"I have no idea who Ackerson is but they were very respectful, they'll probably want a lot more information on my homeworld but that'll come later." Twilight responded before looking at the tablet Lucy was holding, "Lucy what are you doing?"
Lucy looking up from her Tablet, "X-Com: Enemy within" she stated with a grin, at which Mack groaned.
"If anyone would play a five-hundred-year-old game it would be you, wouldn't it." He stated dryly.
Lucy's grin widening even further, "A game about an organization that fights off an alien invasion of Earth, I don't think I can play anything more appropriate."
Twilight looking over at the tablet before starting to ask questions and getting invested in the game with Lucy. Over the next fifty minutes, the other ODST's joined in after they had been dragged through the council leaving only Scootaloo.
"How was she doing when you left Zoey?" Twilight asked the pilot, hoping Scootaloo wasn't too nervous.
"She seemed to be doing a lot better in the end than when you left." Zoey replied, only for Scootaloo to be led into the room the moment the pilot finished her sentence.
The woman accompanying the little filly spoke up, "The council has approved the request to perform surgery on miss Scootaloo, medical teams will be prepped in one of New Alexandria medical facilities after doctor Melton and you miss Twilight have come up with a viable procedure." The woman pausing a moment before continuing, "Your other request has also been approved under the condition that if your performance in training is exemplary. Alpha three, your unit will be sent to a training facility to prepare it for the arrival of the ponies as they will remain here in New Alexandria for the medical procedure. One of your units soldiers will be allowed to remain with the ponies as they wait for the procedure, you'll have to choose among yourselves who remains with the ponies." After finishing her sentence the woman turned around and left the unit to decide who was going to stay behind with the Equestrians.
"So, who's going to stay with our new squadmates?" Tyler asked after the door closed behind the woman.
"Whoa, squadmates? we're no soldiers yet Tyler." Twilight responded surprised at his comment.
At which Mack responded, "I don't know how much they told you about your performance on the Dawn but it was hella impressive, I don't think you two should worry too much about not getting admitted into the ODST's so to us you're already squadmates."
"Thanks, all of you. But we should probably figure out which one of you stays with us."
"I'll stay with you two if you want Twilight." Lucy said before adding with a grin, "Plus you can play video games with me"
After finishing their conversation the two groups split up either in a separate pelican the rest of the team headed towards a training facility and Twilight, Scootaloo and Lucy were being flown over to New Alexandria Medical Center.
Somewhere along the ride, Lucy had introduced Scootaloo to the games on her tablet and they were apparently something that they could do together. Twilight had also been given a tablet but hers had Dr. Catalina's proposed medical procedure on it, having read through it for the third time she had found that the doctor had been extremely thorough. Everything had been accounted for from what type of drugs could be used to adapted surgical procedures for Scootaloo's equine build.
After a short flight, the pelican landed on the roof of the facility where they were greeted by a new squad of marines and doctor Catalina herself, "Hello Twilight!" she happily shouted over the roar of the pelicans engines, "Did you get my notes?"
"Sure did, You've been very thorough!" Twilight replied as they walked into the building away from the roaring pelican with Scootaloo and Lucy hot on her tail, "Do we know when we can perform the surgery?"
"Depends on when Scoots last ate, we need her to have at least six hours without food and two without liquid to safely operate." Catalina explained, "Remember when you last ate something Scootaloo?"
"About one and a half hours ago" She replied, "So you can operate in four and a half hours?"
"More like five hours to be sure, that'll also give me and the other doctors some time to prepare." Catalina replied, "Just take some time to relax, I'm going to see the team of doctors and brief them so I'll be back half an hour before the surgery." She added before leaving the group to visit the surgery team.
"So, Scoots you nervous?" Lucy asked the filly that had taken a seat on one of the couches in the room.
"What, of course not, they're going to fix my wings! What in Equestria should I be worried about?" She practically squeaked not nervous for the operation at all.
"Just remember that it'll take some time before your magic and wings develop enough to actually fly." Twilight said after picking up a book and using her hooves to flip the pages.
"How are you doing that! I've seen you pick up stuff in ways that shouldn't be possible but flipping pages with hooves is just flat out impossible!" Lucy shouted while trying to figure out how Twilight was flipping the pages of the book.
Twilight chuckled a bit before explaining how she could flip the pages, "Ponies have small telekinetic fields in their hooves to allow them to easily pick up items or manipulate objects like the pages of the book... or pulling the trigger of a gun." The image of the dead elite flashing in Twilights mind.
"Oh, I guess that makes sense in this situation. Anyway, I should probably warn you that Tyler has been thinking up silly catchphrases and unit nicknames so don't be weirded out if he suddenly shouts 'The Cavalry has arrived' when we reach the training fields."
"So we should think up our own nickname then?" Scootaloo asked but immediately getting an idea, "How about we call ourselves the Shadowbolts?"
Letting out a small laugh Twilight replied, "That would be funny if the others agree to it."
"Uhm? First, what are the Shadowbolts and second why would that be funny?" Lucy having no idea what the two ponies were referencing.
"The Shadowbolts were the special forces Luna used in the lunar rebellion, they were the most effective unit Equestria has ever seen. If you became a target of one of their ops you could be sure you were done for, their motto used to be 'Timent ac Tebernas' or fear the darkness as they mainly operated at night and were masters of stealth." Twilight taking a deep breath, "As for why it's funny to me, the Shadowbolts were a unit that fought against my teacher so me being involved in a unit that bears the same name as them is something I find amusing."
"Wow that actually sounds pretty awesome, we should propose that to the rest of the team they'd probably be on board with it." Lucy replied with a smile, " 'Fear the darkness' definitely beats 'the cavalry is here.' Anyway, Scoots want to play a rematch to kill some time before the operation?"
"Oh, you're going down." Scootaloo replied as she hopped on the couch and the two started playing some game together, Twilight, on the other hoof, had found a physics book and was reading up on everything she could in an attempt to gain the knowledge required to find their way back to Equis. The next four and a half hours passed relatively quickly as Scoots and Lucy were playing games and Twilight was studying, twenty minutes before the five-hour mark the Doctor came walking back into the room.
"Are you ready Scootaloo? The other doctors want to meet you first before the operation so we're going to get you prepped a bit sooner than planned."
"Yup! I guess this is it then. See you on the other side after they fixed my wings!" She said to Twilight and Lucy as she walked over to Catalina.
"How long will the procedure take, Cat?" Twilight asked the doctor who was on the verge of leaving with Scootaloo.
"About two-hours if everything goes smoothly, but don't be surprised if it'll take longer." Cat answering Twilight's question as best she can.
"Alright, see you when you wake Scoots. Good luck!"
At that, the doctor and the filly walked out of the room towards surgery leaving Lucy and Twilight alone again.
The following two hours seemed to drag on forever as Twilight was nervous about how Scootaloo was doing, She and Lucy had some conversations about pony society and their friends. At the two and a half hour mark, Catalina came walking back into the room with a smile on her face, "The operation was a success! Scootaloo should wake up in about half an hour. If you two follow me then I'll take you to the room she's currently in."
The group of three walking over to the room were Scoots was sleeping, "She looks so cute sleeping like that!" Lucy squealed.
"Don't tell her you said that." Twilight replied with a chuckle, "She'd be so embarrassed."
Lucy also chuckling at Twilight's remark, "What? It's true! I can still say that now because she'll be a lot less cute after she's been through training."
Twilight looking over at the filly lying in bed, "One of the many things I'm afraid of Lucy"
Silently hoping that both of them would be ready for the trails ahead.
next up: Bootcamp. I'm also going to use a character from canon Halo for the training scene.
See ya all next week! 
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sergent johnson sergent johnson sergent johnson sergent johnson
i.ytimg.com/vi/_HPGEwvbGsg/maxresdefault.jpg
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not yet good sir, not yet
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DAMN IT ALL
Roughly six weeks to prepare for what's coming...
I wonder if they'll meet either Noble team of Blue team? I really want to see how they react to 7 feet of armored badassness.
Gunnery Sergeant Stacker!
That actually got an audible laugh from me. Not a small feat.
Hm.. I seem to have found another great Halo fic. OwO So hard to find good ones. Perfect Halo fics have great grammar, decent knowledge of the Halo series, and good pacing. Hopefully this will be one of the good ones. Well, I'm gonna get reading. Bai pones! I'll be sure to check back every Saturday for an update if I like it. 😄✌
Your one order as a spook is be vague!
If only they knew that it'd happen soon.
If you still don't understand how ponies can hold things with their hooves I have a dumbed down version.
They have glue on their hooves.
I'm confused did Lucy asked the doctor then you accidentally say that cat answered Twilights question or did Twilight really ask the question but you said Lucy by accident.
Either way this needs fixed
This is a rather serious continuity error. Discord was reformed BEFORE Twilight ascended.
Since Twilight is already an Alicorn, Discord should be free.
I bet Twilight gets VERY deep into XCOM
10916456
She would get so frustrated at the percentage chances. 99%? Miss.
Ackererson is still a bastard
Twilight in the near future:
W8 i thought fluttershy "reformed" discord b4 twi got alicornified