X-COM Ponies

by Sneaky Breeze

Terror's end.

Chap 16: Terror’s end.

-Crow’s nest. Engineering wing.

Doctor Shen darted quickly among his engineers, doing his best to ensure that his presence was calming and helped his workers with their projects. He turned away from two pony sized Vita-tanks and walked over to one of his engineers named Hammond, a born and raised Texan who was eager to work all day. Shen would find Hammond working in the engineering workshop, along with a few others, late at night, fine tuning the combat team’s weapons to be just right. If it was broken or out of tune, one would usually find Hammond working on it eventually.

“Hammond, are the S.H.I.V.s ready?” Shen asked as he travelled over to Hammond who stood with two other engineers, one of which was underneath the robotic combat drone with a blowtorch.

The SHIV was a new version of old and defunct prototypes for robot combat drones on the ground. It carried a short minigun that could fire the standard NATO 5.56 round. The minigun allowing it to fire at a near constant rate. Its gun was connected to a crane like neck that then was connected to a metal plate bottom with four tank treads that allowed it good and rapid mobility. On the side of the gun was a command and control device to allow the SHIV to take orders and supposedly react to threats automatically.

Hammond did not hear Shen at first but then turned around when he felt a tap on his shoulder. “Yeah?”

“What is the progress?” Shen asked while Hammond rubbed his chin before giving a reply. “Slow, and frankly I think we should'a scrapped this project from the beginning,” Hammond said and placed his hands on his hips while shaking his head.

“But you gave me your assurance the SHIV would be operational.”

“In theory they should work. All the pieces fit but it just doesn’t work. I don’t understand why,” Hammond said and turned around, slowly pacing around his machine while the engineer with the blowtorch took a break to keep from getting too hot.

“We have other options on the table at the moment, but keep working on the SHIV. What about the HWP variant?”

Hammond looked to Shen with an eyebrow raised. “You mean the one with grenade launchers? That one is slightly more effective but it moves too damn slow and I don’t trust the targeting system yet.”

Shen decided to agree with his engineer and backed out.

“Alright, good luck and keep trying, I have a feeling we may need these in the coming days. I have an old colleague from my schooling that I could give a call. He is odd, but he did have some good theories,” Shen then began walking away to try and find the number for his old colleague, Professor Able Standard.

“I just hope he isn’t still stuck on that insane deforester or employer, whatever the hell that robot soldier project was called,” Shen said and made his way up a series of stairs to his office.

-Supply transfer tunnel

The Crow’s nest had originally been a secret part of Area 51. Its intent was to be another nuclear shelter/command centre should the day have come when mankind decided to end its brief existence and the gods, whatever and whoever they be, turned their backs on humanity. But when the alien invasion came it was quickly switched to be an X-com facility and the tunnel meant to connect the two facilities was now used to ferry supplies to the Crow’s nest. At the moment it was carrying in a small built in monorail system an injured group of soldiers and an object of immense tactical and scientific value.

Sneaky Breeze let out a pained groan as one of Doctor M’butu’s assistants gave him a shot of painkiller. In the train car behind them another doctor worked on Jack’s injury while Trixie sobbed and whined about her hat and hair. Derpy tried her best to cheer her up while Lewis just sat back and stared at the crystal shard of the outsider they had captured, his rifle trained on it at all times in case it suddenly decided to reactivate itself.

“Oh, that feels good,” the injured Pegasus huffed, almost laughing when the burning pain decreased a noticeable fraction.

“Don’t worry, boy, we’re almost there. Just hold on for a little more,” Rock Fist said to Sneaky as he held his hoof, his mind travelling back to the day Sneaky had arrived at the Canterlot base for training, a day after Rock had gotten a three page letter from Sneaky’s father Brick Layer, pleading with Rock to keep an eye on his son and to keep him safe.

The memory made Rock shake his head for a moment as he held Sneak’s hoof harder, as if willing him to heal faster in order to keep his word to the boy’s father.

They were in a small train that was carrying them quickly to the Crow’s nest at its top speed. They would arrive within five more minutes.

The assisting doctor began looking at Sneak’s injury once more, before eyeing his white fur.

“Who has been giving you dye? This looks very permanent.” The doctor remarked as he rubbed some of the non-burnt fur on sneaky and found it odd how natural it looked.

“What do you mean? I thought….” Sneaky took a moment to huff and puff air into and out of his lungs before turning his head to look at the human doctor.

“I thought it was in that soap we use when we come back from a mission,” Sneaky said, misunderstanding human hair and skin tones. The doctor shook his head after Sneak’s response and looked to Rock.

“I don’t know, I just assumed he requisitioned more from you guys.”

The doctor then got on his communicator.

“I need to report this.” He said and relayed what he found to Dr. M’butu, who was currently switching clothes, as he had been eating some food when the emergency call came and he ended up spilling some on himself.

“He lost coloration in his fur naturally? Is it due to sickness or the injury?” M’butu asked.

“No, Doctor. He says it has been turning white for a while now.”

“We can worry about that later; we need to focus on the plasma burns before they can become infected. I hope you gave him something for the pain, I will check on him after he is in the tank and his injury has been cared for.” Mbutu hung up and made his way to the medical wing to help install as much information as possible into the vita tanks about animal surgery and other important veterinarian info that could help heal the injured pony.

“Sorry about this, kid. Sergeant, please hold him down for me,” The doctor said as he pulled out his bag and slipped his hand inside to grab something that he didn’t want Sneaky to see.

“What? No! What is it!?” Sneaky yelled and tried to struggle as Rock held him down, the older and stronger Earth pony holding down the Pegasus with ease.

“Sorry, kid. Doctor’s orders. Trust me, it’ll hurt but you need this,” the older colt said and remembered the disinfectant that had been applied to his flank when a diamond dog clawed a significant portion of the flesh off, leaving three permanent scars.

“No, let me go! No please I'll be fine! No,no!”

In the back of the train Sneaky’s cry of pain could be heard over the sound of the engine as the doctor helping him applied something to keep the wound from being infected by whatever alien, or Earth based, bacteria he might have come into contact with during combat, as well as causing him a horrible amount of pain that kept the private shouting with tears in his eyes as a fresh eruption of pain lanced across his back.

-Science labs.

Vahlen tapped a foot impatiently as she read reports from the science teams under her while sitting in her office. She sat with her chair turned to the electronic window was of forest in winter, with snowflakes gently falling from the sky and gently blanketing the forest. She'd removed her shoes after walking around the base constantly and currently had one leg crossed over the other, allowing her to rub her sore feet together as she worked.

Vahlen scrolled through her recent updates from her science team, she wanted results immediately, anything to help the fight. Despite an interesting discovery a few hours ago, she wanted more. Vahlen needed to contribute and putting forth her part to help the war effort, especially today of all days. Her team researching alien cadavers had gone over data from the South American engagement, with the S.A. X-com team running brute force experiments with the Snakeman cadavers they had made some interesting discoveries. Her team had reviewed their findings and come up with an idea that could only have one response from Vahlen.

“Ludicrous,” she said, nearly slamming her data-pad down, that is if it wasn’t her favourite and she was sure Shen would be quite cross with her if she damaged something while they were in the midst of a crisis.

“Making Snakemen clones from their own eggs using my Vita-tanks,” she said and felt her blood pressure rise, the Vita tanks were her inventions, making life threatening injuries heal within days, and they wanted to pervert it with alien cloning. Something she felt would make them similar to the alien’s using a slave race of clones to do their bidding.

“No,” she simply said and raised a finger to delete their theories and wipe the algorithms and possibilities of the plan, when she felt something tell her she might need it later, a woman’s intuition. She saved the file and sent back a message to tell team to go back to instead prepare for the outsider crystal that was about to arrive.

“We have more important things at the moment,” she said and rubbed her aching ankles, hoping Cotton was alright and that her Alloy armour designs kept the teams safe.

-Skies over Nevada.

Chelsea couldn’t help but feel as if someone had gotten hurt back at base while she flew with the other plane from the Crow’s Nest, Raven-2, and a group of American fighter jets to catch up with large UFO that had deployed the invasion force. She shook off the odd feeling and continued flying while looking around at the gathered group of pilots

“Attention all pilots, this is AWACs two-oh-five-oh. We will be providing you with tactical input and electronic support for this mission. Call sign is ‘eagle eye’,“ A voice reported as a safe distance away a radar plane with its own escort was getting things ready for the attack force.

“Understood, Eagle eye. All pilots prepare for engagement the alien ship is coming into view. Remember to make every round count since these bastards have some kind of protective shield over them,” The flight leader at the head of the force said and was greeted with acknowledgements from the rest of the force.

The Eight F-16’s had been joined by the two interceptors from the Crow’s nest and two other heavy models from the west coast along with three ‘tomcats’ the U.S. air force had lent them for the attack.

The pilots watched as they cleared through some clouds to finally have full visual contact with the alien ship. The large transport seemed to be carried by only four engines and had with it a group of twenty or so alien fighters.

“Everyone knuckle up, it’s time to engage!” the flight leader said. Chelsea let out a huff of air into her oxygen mask as she felt her training kick in and her mind switch over to her more serious personality.

While Lyons was gearing up to even the human/alien casualty count. Jones, Lyon’s co-pilot, wished he could go home but forced himself to calm down.

“Eagle Eye to combat wing, you are in range and electronic support is active. You should be able to lock onto the alien crafts.”

“I got a lock!”

“Me too.”

“I got tone...”

Many voices proclaimed to have some UFO or other was targeted.

“Prioritize the big one and focus on the fighters when they engage you.”

Chelsea felt saliva collect in her throat as her interceptor moved at immense speeds and she could feel the g-forces pulling on her body. It was exciting, to feel every inch of her body defying gravity and zooming high above the ground, but also terrifying.

“Engage!” she heard someone shout and countless missiles streaked across the sky, leaving trails of smoke as they raced towards the larger ship and impacted against a green hued energy shield. The shield flared up in the areas that had been hit, while the other areas of the ship were visible. The missiles exploded a safe distance away from the ship and made no penetration through the shield.

“Fighters incoming, evasive maneuvers!” The swarm of crafts all dodged and weaved out of the path of each other as the fight began. Chelsea pulled a hard U-turn and got onto the tail of one alien fighter, now codenamed “Fireflies”.

“Fox three!” she said, hearing the comforting echo of her own voice in the oxygen mask as she pulled the trigger on her control stick, targeting a fighter. A moment later she watched three trails of tracer rounds come out from her fighter and impact the alien. Its shields flared up for a moment before being overwhelmed and the mini UFO soon exploded in a purple flame and debris rained out of the sky.

“Scratch one,” she said and swung her fighter around to see two F-16s try to re-engage the invasion ship. They fired every last one of their missiles at the invasion ship, all but the last of their shots hit the energy shield, a breach being made as a missile made its way through, causing a detonation that seemed to make the alien ship shudder at the proof that it was not invincible.

The pilots who had made the attack cheered loudly over the airwaves before one of the two exploded from a plasma blast that came from the ship itself. Small plasma cannons hidden around the ship began firing at the two humans that had been foolish enough to attack it and injure it.

“Look out, its got defe...aaah!!” The other pilot who had engaged the ship screamed his death as a Firefly destroyed him with two plasma blasts that caused an explosion in the centre of the craft and engulfed it in flames. The alien Dart flew through the fiery debris of the humans plane like it was fog with no damage to itself.

“Friendly plane down.”

“I’m on fire! Ejecting!”

“I need help there’s one on me!”

“How can they move like that?”

Chelsea blocked out all the noise from the others as she prioritized targets and turned her plane around to find one of her own being chased by two Fireflies. The ground underneath her speeding by as with all the other planes flying around it made her think of driving a race car through a swarm of birds.

“Don’t worry. I got you,” she said over her radio and her much faster plane was easily able to catch up to the two UFOs that had slowed down to target the human. She avoided colliding with other ships and looked like she was performing aerial tricks for a show before finally getting within accurate range of the two fighters. She made sure to switch off her nose gun and only kept on the cannons attached to her wings.

“Engaging.” She pulled the trigger just as she got within range and felt the vibrations running through her fighter as the Vulcan cannons fired. Her rounds slammed into both of the UFOs as she carefully tried her best to avoid hitting her friendly unit when they suddenly moved upwards in a smooth arc and were behind her in a flash.

“Shit, now I need help,” she reported and began making ‘S’ turns and random maneuvers to shake the aliens off her tail. She looked at a small mirror to the side of her canopy that was angled to show her engines; sure enough the aliens were there.

“Damn, I really pissed them off,” she said and quickly pointed the nose of her craft downwards when some plasma bolts barely missed her cockpit. She kept up her descent, as if in a race with the aliens to who could hit the ground first, when she was within the danger zone of impact she grabbed the throttle and adjusted course.

With a loud grunt she pulled the plane up and performed a maneuver that flipped upwards seconds before she hit the ground. The Fireflies kept going down with one slamming into the ground and leaving only a small puff of smoke in its wake, but the other one stopped in the middle of the air before smoothly adjusting course and continuing the chase of Raven-3

“Raven-3, I am on the way,” a voice said with an accent she could not recognize as another H model interceptor soon caught up with the duelling trio.

“Fox two.” Four missiles raced out from the two pods on the interceptor’s wings and the alien fighters were soon reduced to nothing but debris and fancy colored flames.

“Thanks for the help, Nomad-6 ,” Chelsea said as she saw the craft’s name on her HUD when the Xcom craft from the west coast flew past her and tipped his wings to both sides in salute before moving on to engage the larger UFO.

“Attention combat wing, only two alien fighters left, anyone not otherwise occupied engage the invasion ship.”

“This is Raven-2, engaging the Fireflies.”

“Raven-3 joining you.” Chelsea said, never leaving her friends without backup.

Lyons watched as his ship moved to catch up with the two fighters that seemed to be trying to escape the battle while the rest of the group engaged the invasion ship, missiles impacting it all across its body and tearing holes in it. If a fighter ran out of rockets then they began making strafing runs with their guns firing hot lead all across the ship’s body.

Lyons kept his eyes on the Fireflies as Jones lined them up for the attack, with Chelsea on his flank in case they split up.

With a reassuring tone in his ear Lyons watched two green boxes appearing over the fighters that quickly turned red with a missile lock.

“Fox two,” Lyons growled and three Avalanche Missiles raced out of his fighter and to the Fireflies.

But one of them quickly moved down while the other fighter sacrificed itself by purposely slamming into the missiles, all three of them.

“What!?” yelled Lyons when Chelsea suddenly pulled away, just missing being slammed into by the suicidal alien fighter that moved by so fast it took a moment to register what had happened.

“Look out!” she shouted as the alien fighter made an impossible switch of direction and re-engaged Raven-2

Jones decreased speed so rapidly their craft almost stalled on them, luckily it caused the alien to overshoot them and fly by, but it stopped suddenly and turned around, continuing its chase before the human fighter could move and it fired four plasma blasts.

“Moving to engage,” Chelsea said while at the edge of her vision she saw the engines of the invasion ship explode and the ship begin to fall out of the sky as it bled smoke from the dozens of ragged holes ripped through it.

The crosshair of her HUD was not on the UFO in time to stop it from firing at Raven-2. The heavy interceptor took a hit right on both of its wings. A heartbeat later there was a sicking lurch as the wings tore free with the scream of tortured metal.

“Mayday! Mayday!” Jones yelled as smoke trailed from their fighter and they plummeted to the Earth.

Chelsea watched as the Interceptor fell, her heart pumping with fear over her wing-mates, when the canopy shot open and two seats flew into the air. The pilots were released from their chairs and began floating calmly when their chutes deployed.

Chelsea did not take this time to relax and kept her eyes open for the last fighter.

“Raven-3 to Eagle Eye, do you see the last contact?”

“Positive confirmation at high altitude above you, it’s in the atmosphere now.”

“Dammit.” She said to herself and promised to do better next time.

‘This was fucking sloppy, do better next time, your friends were almost killed!’ she internally yelled to herself and joined up with the rest of the wing for new orders as Search and Rescue vehicles were already being sent out to find survivors and recover downed pilots. While a group of about seven Humvees filled with very pissed off US marines who were armed to the teeth were racing towards the downed UFO to make sure nothing survived the crash. And if there were any aliens unlucky enough to live from the aerial battle, then the marines were going to show them why other humans nicknamed them ‘Devil Dogs’.

-Las Vegas, over Caesar’s palace.

“Commander Fahreed, are you at the first assault zone?” General Franklin asked the leader of his primary combat team, all veterans outfitted with the most expensive and best gear that could be provided. Fahreed looked for a moment to his squad mates; they were all outfitted in a much slimmer version of the carapace armor designed for aerial drops. The 'squirrel' armor offered less protection but was extremely light and came with webbing built between the arms and legs to allow them to glide for a short time.

“Yes sir, we are at the AO and are about to jump,” Fahreed said as he checked his assault rifle. While a laser rifle was more powerful and did not need ammo, a projectile rifle could have a silencer attached and did not blow your cover like a big red beam would.

“Understood. Get as many civilians out of there as you can and eliminate all the aliens you can. Main army and marine forces will be pushing up as soon as you get those civilians out of there,” The General said and watched the battle lines slowly changing on a large monitor back at the NORAD base.

“Copy that,” Fahreed said and the door opened at the back of the Sky Ranger.

“Move it!” he yelled and the five members of NORAD alpha team jumped out into the sky their ‘wings’ opening automatically and their body movements allowing them to control where they flew. The world underneath the five humans seemed so tiny for a moment but was rapidly increasing as they glided down and within a matter of minutes were at the roof of the famous casino, the parachutes on their backs opened up and they were pulled upright.

Fahreed rolled across the rooftop when he landed and pulled out his XM9, checking the roof as the others did the same.

“Chutes off!” he ordered and his soldiers quickly removed the straps of their parachutes and tied them down so as not to be noticed blowing in the wind.

When they were done they made sure that the X-com symbols on their armor were perfectly visible as their primary mission was to rescue a news reporter who was broadcasting from inside of the building, giving the people the heroes they needed.

“Sir, wouldn’t we be better off rescuing civilians in deeper combat zones?” asked a soldier from India as he checked the Arc-thrower on his side in case they had contact with anything worthy of capturing and bringing back to the NORAD base.

“Don’t worry, they sent in other teams to do that,” Fahreed said and then made a hand sign for them to all go silent, just after one trooper had made a comment that the council shouldn’t have sent the ‘B-teams’ to handle that.

As Fahreed prepared to move into the building with his men, he could not help but agree.

-Laser Squad. ETA: 8 minutes from the civilian holdout.

Sato looked down at the family he had saved earlier, they were afraid and filthy, covered in a mix of ashes and other debris shards. The looks on the parents faces betrayed the true fear they felt and the uncertainty they felt at these strange men in what must have looked like spacesuits to them, taking them to some promised ‘safe zone’. But the child they held in their arms did not seem fully afraid. While he did have fear, his eyes were also full of wonder as he looked to these heroes that had saved him from the ‘monsters’.

Sato wanted to go and sit over by them, to try and calm the civilians down, to give them a sense of safety, but he couldn’t and he was unsure of how they would react. And the best safety he could offer them was his laser rifle blasting anything that threatened them.

At the front of the truck Ramos made a sudden sharp turn, that sent everyone in the back of the vehicle nearly tumbling over as Cotton himself nearly hit the side window.

“The fuck, trooper?” Cotton yelled as Ramos altered their course.

“Sorry, I think I passed it.” He said, blushing underneath his helmet as the civilian location was finally within view. Cotton wasted no time and got on his helmet comm.

“Chavivi, get up front and look through your scope at the building,” Cotton ordered and nudged Ramos before telling him to slow down.

“Why are we stopping?” The father of the family in the back of the truck asked while looking around at the soldiers.

“No worries, just making sure it’s safe,” Sato replied and changed places with Chavivi as he pulled out his long barrelled laser rifle and Boris moved to allow him a clear view.

The view through the scope was reassuring to Chavivi as he kneeled down and with one hand held the rifle, moving it slowly as he scanned the building and with a free hand altered the magnification of the electronic scope.

The civilian controlled building was boarded up in multiple places, burnt out cars and the corpses of aliens and an ungodly amount of civilians. In some spots the corpses were piled three people high and seemed to have been torn apart and shot with, oddly enough, bullets instead of energy weapons. The American flag that hung on a pole next to the clinic was hung upside down, a silent call for rescue.

“Looks empty but they might be hid... negative. I got movement.” Chavivi altered his statement quickly as he noticed the glint of another scope and zoomed in on where he saw it. He caught sight of the barrel of what he guessed to be some type of Remington rifle just barely poking out through a window on the third floor of the building. The shooter was covered by a large blanket that obscured him more in the already dark room inside the building. Instinct and experience, Chavivi could tell that it was not aimed at him, but at the rear of the truck, likely the family since they had no armor on to protect themselves with.

‘Does he know I see him?’ Chavivi wondered as he contemplated whether or not to prime his weapon since it might give the sniper reason to shoot.

‘Fuck, the bullet would get here before any of us could even move.’ With that he reached a hand away from the controls of the scope and over to the mechanism to prime the laser. With a whine it activated as parts of it glowed.

“Chavivi, report?” Cotton asked and glanced back to the man.

With a slight movement of his jaw, Chavivi turned on his microphone.

“Sir, there’s a sniper in the building aiming right at us.”

The sniper in the building made no movements to load his rifle, leading Chavivi to believe he may have already placed a round in the chamber.

“What is happening?” the mother of the family asked as she could sense the soldiers around her getting tense. She could see it in their body language.

“Gladys, be quiet,” the father said and held his wife, more afraid than he was letting on.

At the front Cotton wasn’t sure if he should move or not, but he did so anyway, switching his radio over to the general band.

“Attention. To the civilians inside of the Coulson free clinic, this Commander Cotton, US army special operations division six,” he said, hoping they didn’t know that there was no such thing.

“We are in a vehicle to your front and we may look strange but I swear to you we are here to rescue you,” Cotton let go of his radio to let them reply.

It was a set tense moment before Cotton nearly jumped up and cursed when Chavivi broke the silence.

“Sir, he just loaded a round into the rifle.”

“Please respond, we mean you know harm. We are here to help. Cease hostilities or we will attack you as the aggressors,” Cotton said, turning his head slightly over to Ramos, who seemed to understand his intention without words being spoken and with a movement as slow as a grandfather snail , he reached over to prepare to put the vehicle in reverse.

“Don’t move,” a voice finally replied back over the radio.

“Who is this?” Cotton asked but there was no response. “You got a man in there aiming a rifle at civilians, care to explain?” Cotton said, feeling the hair on his arms, legs, neck and unmentionables suddenly tense up. He felt that fear again, only this time it was coming from somewhere very close by. He could only compare it to that feeling a person had when they were alone in their home but felt that an intruder might be inside with them.

“You guys make too much noise,” the voice on the other end said and there was the sound of a nearly unearthly scream, a blood filled death rattle followed by the thud of a body and the crack of a rifle as the bullet travelled faster than the sound wave.

The sniper in the clinic was lucky that Chavivi turned to look at the civilians behind him and had not taken the shot. Because they were uninjured.

“Move! Get out of there, more will be coming,” the voice from the clinic said as suddenly more people began to appear from the clinic.

“Sir?” Ramos asked not moving until his commander told him so.

Cotton looked behind him, making sure his laser was primed, whatever feeling he had of impending doom, it wasn’t coming from the clinic.

A distance from them a zombified human lay dead, its chrysalis egg dead from lack of a living host to fully incubate it. The small greenish thing was the size of a soda bottle and would have grown much bigger until it ripped its way through the host, had it not been for the incubation being interrupted by a high calibre bullet. With small vein like structures that connected the chrysalis egg to the vital organs of the host it needed a fairly intact host to give it life and from which to feed off of until it hatched.

“Go! Drive to the clinic,” Cotton yelled as he pulled his rifle out of the vehicle and took two rapid shots behind him, at something. It had only been there for a split second but he knew he had seen... something.

He turned to Ramos who had not moved the truck and shouted out.

“Drive, motherfucker, drive!”

Ramos slammed his foot down on the pedal after making a quick switch to drive it forward. The vehicle lurched towards the building with the survivors as its engine roared, the noise echoing form the nearby buildings.

“Sir, what are you doing?” Sato yelled from the back as the truck moved around piles of bodies and other wreckage.

“Trust me, its safer here,” Cotton replied, feeling the sense of danger fade more and more, but it was still present.

“Sir I think this is a bad idea,” Ramos said and yet still pulled the truck up to the clinic where a garage door was slid open by two men in police uniforms and he adjusted course, the deuce barely fitting inside as the door was clicking slid back down and the officers aimed their weapons at the X-com team.

“Those weapons won’t hurt us,” Boris said, translator going through his helmet and making his voice come out as if he were speaking English, the translator working its magic instantaneously, with some help from Boris throwing in the odd word in English.

The two officers did not respond and kept their weapons pointed at the Laser Squad, Boris made sure to step forward so his much larger and more armoured frame would give the civilians cover.

Cotton opened his door and hopped out of the truck, hands up where the police officers could see them.

“Hey, calm down guys. We are on the same side,” he said and took a leap of faith, removing his helmet to let them see his face.

“See?” After a moment the officers finally lowered their weapons and one of them got on his radio.

“Yeah they’re humans. Not like the skinny guys,” the officer said and the team knew he was referring to the Thin-men. Cotton placed his helmet back on and sealed it before getting on his own radio.

“Central, we are at the evac site. We are going to secure the area first then you can send in a Sky Ranger,” he said and received no response until Central came on sounding like he had run a mile.

“Sir, Lyons and Jone’s fighter was shot down but besides lyons having a gash on his arm they will be fine. We just captured an outsider, Sneaky is injured but on the way to the med bay, and we lost a security officer.” Central let out all in one breath as he tried to find space in his own mind to process everything.

“Say again, we have a KIA?” Cotton asked, pulse rising.

“Yes sir, Jaever Savage. He was killed by a cyberdisk, we are currently putting the body down in the cryo morgue,” Central said, referring to a portion of the base were bodies would be stored to keep them fresh and able to be examined by the base science staff while also keeping the deceased in a place where they could be laid to rest without jeopardizing need to know info.

“Fuck. I'll handle the memorial ceremonies once this is all over. I'll repot back to you in thirty minutes.”

“Understood, good luck,” Central cut the signal and Cotton waved his team out of the truck.

“Who’s in charge here?” he asked and approached the officers, who in turned shrugged.

“No one really. We’re all just doing what we can,” one with a large moustache said and took a seat on a wheelchair while his partner walked over to a hole blown into the metal door from a shotgun blast and looked through, keeping watch.

“You’ve all done very good for yourselves,” Sato said as he turned back to the civilians and helped them down to the ground.

“Not as well as we could have, we lost like twenty people already.”

“What are the defender’s status?” Chavivi said, wanting to see the other sniper.

“Just one SWAT sniper, a couple local gang boys who could be convinced not to run away or raise hell, a few dads who want to keep their kids safe and one trigger happy mother with .357.” The officer shuddered visibly at the last one.

“She is scary accurate with it,” the officer at the door said and moved away to talk to the civilians the Laser Squad had rescued.

“Good. Tell your sniper he is getting help. Chavivi, head up to the roof and secure it. Boris, Ramos, head out front and keep the front of the building secure. I'll join you soon. Sato, head up and start helping any injured in here,” Cotton said in one long breath as he and his men all moved to their ordered locations, knowing the drill, save for Sato who was going to ask where the injured were kept.

Before Sato could move he felt something pressing against his leg that had been shot and turned to see it was the child of the family they had rescued along the way.

“How can I help?” the little boy asked and held up a limp hand to his head, trying to imitate how the army saluted. His parents then looked and noticed where he was.

“Jeremy, leave the uhh…nice man alone,” Gladys said as the father blushed realizing he was the last person to have been holding his son’s hand and should have been more watchful.

“No, it’s alright,” Sato said and knelt down to the kid to put a hand on his shoulder.

“You can help by staying close to your parents and keeping them safe, little trooper,” Sato said and was about to move when the kid suddenly gave him a hug.

“My mom and dad never said thank you for saving us Mister.” Sato felt an uncomfortable warmth in his chest as he returned the hug and lifted the boy up, carrying him to his parents.

“Be sure to watch this little trooper, he seems like a natural born ninja,” Sato said and moved away from the civilians, giving one last wave before moving into the clinic with a purpose, forgetting that he did not remember to ask where the injured were kept.

-----
Discord yawned as he watched the proceedings from his extra dimensional realm, despite still being trapped in stone, his mind, powers, and influence were free to roam as he wished.

“You humans and your kindness and ‘sentimentality’ are so boring,” he said and slammed a fist down onto his throne. In truth feeling hurt because he couldn’t remember the last time someone had given him a hug. Though Discord would never admit it, one of the reasons for his in general rudeness was his lack of affection and how most of the chaos he caused was in fact a cry for help as he craved attention and affection from anyone who would give him the time of day, especially a certain princess of the sun.

“What!? Why would you write that!?” Discord said with a blush as he reached an arm through the screen and slapped the writer upside the head.

“I don’t need a hug, I’m Discord! All I need is chaos and panic and people so confused it leaves them insane. Aahahahahahahaa….ha…” he said and fell back deflated.

“I need a hug,” he said with his head low and snapped his fingers, quickly producing another version of himself which gave him a big bear hug with bear arms before letting him go and disappearing.

“Well that wasn’t so bad, but now I need something to do, and yes I know I’m interrupting the flow of the story but, honestly would you expect anything less of me?”

He snapped his fingers and the scene changed to Celestia in her private chambers who looked exhausted as she signed countless papers and documents while Deep Thought prattled on in front of her. He was no more than 9 years old in body but close to 1019 years in actual mental age.

“Princes Celestia, we need to send a mission to the other world. We cannot allow those ponies to remain trapped over there. Please, your highness, I beg of thee to let me see my old research notes and files,” the younger version of Deep Thought said as he brushed back his green mane and presumed to speak to the monarch of the sun as if she were his equal, though she didn’t mind it much.

“I am sorry, Deep Thought, but I cannot allow it, it is much too dangerous,” she said as she remained seated behind a large well-furnished desk, with her chair surrounded by a weaker version of the spell that was allowing Luna to conduct her spells without Discord sensing her.

Discord rubbed his eyes as he looked to the last sentence above and could only see blurry smudges where the words would have been.

“I must be getting old, after four thousand years I might need a pair of glasses,” Discord said and rubbed his chin as the scene continued.

“But your highness, just a week ago you were all for sending rescue to those pon-“

“Enough!” she shouted and stomped a hoof onto her desk with such force it might have shattered if it wasnt protected by magical spells to prevent such a thing.

“My word is law, and until I decree when to open a portal to the Roman world, we will not make any attempt at opening passage to their world! Do you understand me?” Celestia said in a raised voice that she never liked to use. She never liked it when her subjects, her little ponies looked at her as if she were one of the monsters that plagued the land and not the motherly figure she always tried to be.

Deep Thought fell to the floor, bowing and speaking in the old dialect.

“Oh mighty Celestia, forgive thy humble plebeian for his foolishness. This unworthy peasant did not mean to misspeak or question thou eternal wisdom,” he said, his head bowed to the point his forehead was touching the floor with his unicorn horn scraping the floor, his eyes closed as if he had sinned and was unworthy of looking upon the glowing form of Celestia. She sighed and released the quill she was holding in her magic grip and looked upon her court mage.

“Deep Thought, please rise. I did not mean to yell at you,” She said in a much calmer tone as Thought rose and bowed his head once again before lifting it and looking at Celestia.

“A thousand pardons still, your highness,” he said and then resumed his speech.

“While I do not know why you have changed your mind, I will respect it. But what of Twilight Sparkle, your apprentice? She knows of the portal and is familiar with two of the missing ponies.”

“I will deal with Twilight. I will send her for a time on a good-will mission to Zebrica to meet with the council of the Zebra tribes. As well as the husband to my niece, her brother, captain Shinning-Armor will be going along with her to make sure her mind is only on the coming magic potion and crystal trade agreements. That will keep her busy for close to a month, in that time I wish for you to keep studying the portal remains and finding out why it is different from your own.”

“Understood,” he said and bowed again.

“Take your leave and good luck,” Celestia said, bringing the matter to a close as she tried her best to keep everyone from doing anything that might have tipped off Discord that she and Luna knew he was up to something.

“There it is again!” Discord shouted and scrubbed furiously at the blurry sentences before wearing the clothes of Billy Mays and methodically trying every cleaning product he ever sold.

“What does it say?!” he screamed as he tried to find out what was being kept from him and scrubbed so hard there was a terrible screeching coming from the cloth he was using.
-----------

-Crow’s Nest, medical wing.

“Mmnn ma…mama…” Sneaky murmured into the mask tied over his snout as he breathed in sleeping gas while the doctors operated on his injury, which allowed them to do more tests on the pony.

The doctors took their time to make sure that no foreign objects such as shrapnel from his damaged armor was inside of his wound, as they didn’t want the new skin to heal over a piece of metal and lead to a more lethal injury. While they examined the wound they made sure to run as many scans and tests as they could, taking whatever information possible, short of dissecting the pony before Sneaky was finally carried via medical gurney to a vita tank which had been updated with terabytes of information on ponies and anything else that could help in healing.

The last thing Sneaky saw before dreaming were the doctors standing over him, holding a mask to his snout and telling him to count down from ten. The world blurred and time sped by as Sneaky sensed a cool liquid running over his body as he was entered into the tank, floating in the center of it with his head held up by a mask to give him oxygen and horse tranquilizers in very specified amounts to keep him asleep while his body healed. An IV was hooked into him as well to keep his body sustained with nutrients.

The doctors typed in his healing schedule and he was set to take two days to heal from his injuries. In the meantime the team would take advantage of this opportunity to study and scan the Pegasus and gain as much scientific research as they could with the nearly unmoving Sneaky Breeze.

-Free clinic.

“Move it, troopers! I want this place defendable before the Skyranger gets here,” Cotton said while dragging bodies out of the line of fire, stealing a glance at a watch on his wrist, the digital readout telling him he had ten minutes until his next report to Central.

Boris and Ramos had managed to move several burnt out vehicles to form a semi-circle around the front entrance and entrance to the garage with their Deuce being in the middle. They then made sure to drain the oil from the cars to decrease the chance of them exploding, as well as to make improvised firebombs, just in case. None of the civilians inside had wanted to leave their fortified clinic but were more than eager to let the X-com troopers do it.

“Status update,” Cotton said and stood next to Ramos while Boris set up his heavy laser in the center of the car semicircle, laying in the back of the truck they had come in on and aiming downrange with his heavy laser ready to fire at a moment’s notice.

“This is Chavivi, up on the rooftop and ready. The rest of the area around us seems empty but that could change at any moment.
“Sato, I'm helping the civilians here and burning through my med-kit charges pretty quick.”

“Understood. Team stay where you are and keep an eye out. Sato, if you can spare yourself then come out front to help us defend the building.” Cotton finished and stood with Ramos who was looking at his own weapon.

“How come we can have laser rifles and shit that never run out of ammo, but now we can't have free energy and make bigger guns?” Ramos asked.

“It was somewhere in the report Vahlen sent me later, but I honestly don’t have a clue what any of it means,” he said and shuffled around, kicking an empty can away.

Boris sneezed into his own helmet and let loose a string of curses, bringing a few chuckles from the team before Ramos tapped Cotton’s shoulder.

“So we report in about three minutes then if everything seems safe for a little bit longer we order the Skyranger to pick us up?” Ramos asked, shuffling from one foot to another as the armor prevented him from scratching an itch on his stomach.

“That’s the plan, Ramos,” Cotton said and primed his laser rifle, keeping an eye out for anything suspicious.

“Permission to speak freely, sir?” Ramos asked, leaning his side against some shot up hybrid car and rubbing his laser pistol to make sure he still had it.

“You know me, Ramos. You and the others can always speak freely,” Cotton said and rubbed the neck of his armor, feeling the nano-fibers through his gloves and wishing it wasn’t so hot for a moment.

“Sir, this is a stupid plan,” Ramos said, deadpan and cotton felt an odd twitch.

“Explain.”

“We are out in the open, behind a car moat, waiting for pickup in a hostile zone,” Ramos said and waited to be blasted at by his commander, but nothing happened.

“You know, you could have worded it more appropriately, trooper. And I think the plan is fine, we have cover here, if we need to pull back the cars will still give us some cover and slow down any ground forces while they climb over it, giving the defenders inside a chance to shoot while we fall back into the building if we have to,” Cotton said, defending his plan but seeing the holes in it. Such as if they were attacked by a group of Floaters or cyber discs tried to assault their position.

‘I need to have my guys start carrying some kind of launcher,’ Cotton mused and noticed Ramos was speaking.

“…and those were my thoughts, sir,” Ramos finished, feeling good after being allowed to vent on his commander.

“I'll take note of it Ramos, but I’m in charge and we are sticking to my plan,” he said and Ramos sighed, accepting it.

Cotton made sure to inspect his watch and knew it was time to call Central.

“Laser Squad to Crow’s nest, can you hear me, Central?” Cotton asked while Bradford was in his quarters, removing a sweaty shirt and spraying himself with body spray after a hectic day that still wasn’t over. When Brad heard the sound of his earpiece ringing he knew it must be Cotton, he stole a glance at the nearby clock in his room and his suspicion was confirmed. 2:30 P.M.

“This is Central,” he said after snatching his earpiece and putting it on, while waiting before slipping his shirt on.

“Its time, send the Skyranger now while it looks all clear. What’s the worldwide status?”

Central took a moment to grab his data pad for updates. Quickly scrolling through the data.

“The invasion in China is stalling, their X-com team has succesfully pulled off an attack against the battleship and the regular Chinese army is hitting the aliens, but it looks like the damage will be extensive.”

“I can imagine, what with a battle ship floating over their city.”

“Sneaky is in the med-bay and inside of a Vita tank. Lyons and Jones were recovered and I’ve put in an order for another H-interceptor.” Central continued to scroll through the data pad, his index finger sliding across the screen to get the info he wanted.

“Wait a moment, sir,” he said as something new popped up, confirmation in China of the rumored, two new aliens.

“Sir, there is confirmation on those two new alien types we heard of.”Cotton cursed.

Central cleared his throat as he looked at two blurry snapshots with fairly distinguishable silhouettes. “Commander, there is no exact information yet but one looks like a Spider of some kind and the other..uh…I can't describe it. Like a crab?” Central said, unsure of how to describe what he was looking at as he turned the datapad around in his hands, trying to get a better look.

Cotton shook his head in disbelief but put whatever thoughts that were in his head to some other place for later.

“That’s fine, get to work on other things. We have about 36 civilians in total, so let’s try and get them out in shifts of 18. Some of them can’t be removed from stretchers or are other special cases so the team is going last. Try and see if you can get Trixie to come back to us on one of the transports, we could use her shield ability,” Cotton said, planning ahead in case the civilians came under fire.

“Understood, sir,” Central said as the connection was broken and he got to work getting things underway. Though it took some coaxing for Trixie to be convinced to go on the mission, they succeeded by telling her that if she went she would become famous for her heroism. Rock Fist and Derpy on the other hand were incredibly relieved that they had not been called for, both of them already pushed to their limits and in need of a rest.

Cotton and the others waited at the clinic, a mix of boredom and nervousness as they could still hear the sounds of combat, but ever more distant. When the Skyranger arrived it slowed down and hovered close to the roof and dropped its ramp, letting Trixie out who wore a security helmet.

The security helmet for the base security force was basically a leftover Kevlar helmet that had no HUD and just served to protect a person’s, or in this case ponie’s, skull.

“Fear not, civilians! The Great and Heroic Trixie is here to save the day!” she yelled and hopped out of the Skyranger, only to find Chavivi standing there.

“What happened to your hair?” Chavivi asked, noticing the obvious lock of her hair that was gone.

“Nothing, I just felt like getting a haircut.” she said and walked quickly past him to the door way.

“Commander, this is the great Trixie. I have arrived and am ready for orders,” she said after activating her earpiece by moving her jaw in a way that touched the device and let it know she wanted to speak.

“Understood. Sato, get Trixie to the emergency cases and have her either teleport them or levitate them to the ship.”

Trixie smiled and went down the stairs to meet with Sato, thinking to herself that by the time she was done, the human race would declare her the first pony hero and award her with riches beyond her dreams.

As if by miracle, the evacuation went smoothly with the emergency cases and children being evacuated first. Sato made sure to wave goodbye to the little boy who had hugged him.

When the Skyranger had left there were only 18 civilians remaining, and the 6 X-com members.

All seemed quiet at first until the sound of engines filled the air again.

“Lock and load! We got incoming!” Commanded Cotton ordered as he took cover behind the car moat and turned his rifle upwards, watching the sky for the familiar form of a Floater.

Trixie ran to the nearest window she could find, accidentally hitting her helmeted head against a table but did not feel anything.

The sound of the Floater’s engines increased and it was difficult to identify how many there were.

“Keep steady,” Cotton said while Boris and Ramos also turned their weapons around, searching. Sato remained inside to keep the civilians calm and to make sure nothing sneaked in from anywhere else.

Then with frightening speed three Floaters suddenly fell from the sky behind Cotton, Boris and Ramos, catching them off guard.

“Where the fuck did the-“ Ramos began as he turned but did not finish as a plasma blast from one of the floaters struck him on his side where his kidney was while another hit his helmet, making him feel as if he had just put his forehead on a hot grill. The powerful plasma round burned a hole in his helmet, right were ‘El santo’ had signed it but not passing through the Kevlar/metal/nano-fiber combination. But he was knocked hard against a car and to the ground by the force of the impacts.

“Monster!” Trixie yelled as time seemed to slow down and with her horn aglow she focused on one of the Floaters, using her magic instead of her laser pistol as it came to her much more naturally.

The Floater that had shot Ramos was shrouded by her magic and forced to turn and aim at one of its fellows. It pulled the trigger and its plasma rifle fired with each pull of the trigger. A ball of plasma sailing through the air with a circular puff of energy coming from the front of the barrel as it slammed into the other floater like a baseball and melted into its body, igniting the fuel inside of it and making the floater explode, showering the area with bits of metal, blood, and other things inside of the floater.

Cotton and Boris took no moment to rest as all this occurred. They turned their weapons to the two remaining Floaters and fired. Boris missed his shot completely but the shots made the floater duck and cower on the ground for a few seconds as someone fired from the building, a shotgun blast. The bullets flying into the back of the Floaters head and opening it up like it was an egg and someone had stabbed group of toothpicks through it.

The last remaining floater roared and struggled against Trixie’s magical hold as Cotten took a focused shot at it that blasted through the aliens chest and ended its life. The floaters plasma rifle opening up and sparking furiously as it self-destructed, destroying many but not all of its vital components.

“Dammit, maldito!” Ramos began cursing in a mix of English and Spanish curses as he tore his still sizzling helmet off and threw It away, rubbing his tan face and checking in a nearby mirror that he wasn’t hurt too bad.

“Ramos, report in,” Cotton said, moving over to the floaters to make sure they were dead.

“I’m good, sir!” Ramos yelled out since his helmet-com was fried and kicked the car he was near, more than a little mad he lost the signature of one of his personal heroes.

“Sir, more incoming!” Chavivi yelled as he looked through his scope and saw four more Floaters coming towards them.
“Fire!” Cotton yelled and rushed back over to the car moat, taking cover and switching his laser rifle to R mode.

Chavivi looked through his S.C.O.P.E and targeted the alien at the head of the pack. He fired without waiting for the computer in the scope to give him a chance at the percentage, going by faith and trust in his own skills.

The laser beam raced through the air and struck the Floater as he flew towards the clinic, a large red line being burned across its back before it exploded.

“One down, three more!” Chavivi yelled and heard the other sniper in the clinic take a shot and miss, other civilians also did the same and one of the floaters was also downed, its body slamming into the ground and spinning like a loose tire before it remained dead on the blacktop, its face similar to ground beef.

The last two floaters switched up tactics, one of them actually tossing its Plasma rifle to the other before pulling out two grenade shaped objects and holding down a button on each one.

“Fuck! Kamikaze!” someone shouted and Boris let out a shout as he stood up and fired wildly at the Floater as it came closer and closer, hitting it twice but only managing to graze it while the floater with akimbo plasma rifles fired at him.

“Boris, no!” Ramos shouted and watched Boris take four shots to his chest, letting out a pained shout as he felt his skin burned and fell, he had some burns but nothing too serious for the moment.

“Bastards,” Ramos shouted while Cotton fired wildly at the floater with two rifles. Striking it multiple times until it fell from the sky and slammed into the road with a thud.

Ramos hopped out from behind the car he was using for cover and ran full speed at the suicide floater. The floater did not seem to care about the trooper and instead tried to fly at the clinic, until Ramos fired two bursts from his scatter laser, hitting the floater all over its body and causing one of its fingers to slip, detonating the grenade it held and leaving the floater as nothing but falling pieces. The people in the clinic cheered and hollered, even Cotton wanted to congratulate the trooper, despite him taking a near suicidal move, but then he felt odd. Dejavu, he felt the fear in his spine again, something was coming.

“Ramos! Move it, get back here!” he yelled and got on his comm.

“ETA on pickup!” he ordered.

“Sorry sir, we ran into a problem, ETA 16 minutes,” the pilots said and yelled at the refueling crew to hurry up and finish filling the skyranger's tank up.

“Dammit!” Cotton yelled and slammed a boot into the side of a car, nearly leaving a dent.

Ramos was on his way back when Cotton finally saw what it was that his apparent sixth sense had warned him about. A group of what looked like the living dead. Humans with bodies so torn up and bloody it was easy to tell they were zombies. But what was more frightening were the four legged spiders which moved among the zombies easily and seemed to constantly chitter and rub themselves with frighteningly humanlike hands. And at the back of the group was a being that did not belong in the world.

Cotton did not know how his helmet camera came on but somehow it was on and recording what he had was seeing.

“Fall back! Fall back!” Cotton shouted, the terror racing towards them at ungodly speeds had awakened his primal fight or flight instincts, and his flight instinct had won out. Cotton had never felt so much fear in his life, he wanted to slow down and put fire on the new alien, to order everyone in the building to run, open fire, but he was too afraid, as if someone else had taken over his body.

Heartbeat racing and the deafening sound of blood pumping in his ears, Cotton turned, sprinting breathlessly towards the relative safety of the clinic. Behind him he could hear the spider-like tick-tick-tick of the chrysalid's many feet.

For the first time in his life Cotton felt the soul chilling certainty that he was prey. Something in the cold, hungry eyes of the aliens told him surer than anything he'd ever known that they saw him as nothing more they prey. The only thing he could do was run into the building to seek shelter, despite everything else telling him to fight on.

“Come on! You want some! Come take some oh this!” Ramos shouted while he slammed the butt of his laser pistol into the forehead of a zombie and shoved the barrel into its mouth, pulling the trigger three times.

“Ramos! Pull back! I cover you!” Boris yelled as he held his laser pistol in his right hand, his heavy laser overheated and needing a moment to self-replenish its own power cells.

“No, I’m not leaving you, bro.” Ramos said, both hands holding his laser pistol and firing at the big Crab like alien until it pulled back and seemed to disappear.

The sound of laser firing behind him was loud in Cotton's ears as he skidded around the door of the clinic, almost losing his footing in the heavy armour.

A high-pitched, inhuman cry seemed to tear the world apart.

Turning, Cotton watched as something that had once been human fell to the ground. The stump where its head had once been was nothing but a charred wreck.

‘They can still die,’ he whispered to himself.

No sooner was his heartbeat coming under control than the body of the dead, zombie like creature began to twitch. Cotton had to hold back from vomiting as another one of the spider-like creatures erupted from its gut, spraying viscera and putrid guts into the air, squealing in a loud note that made his teeth hurt and shaking itself free of the remains of its former host.

Narrowing his eyes, Cotton lifted his rifle to rest against his shoulder.

“Stay dead,” he whispered.

A brilliant scarlet beam lit the air, striking the newly born spider before it could struggle from it's former host. It was dead.

This time it stayed dead.

A deep breath and Cotton found his voice.

“Pull back,” he ordered. Boris and Ramos were laying down suppressive fire, trying to keep the aliens from advancing.

“Now!” he shouted.

The two men broke and ran into the building, Cotton doing his best to cover them.

Far in the back he could see the third creature. The spiders and zombie like creatures were attacking, but a hulking, black, bipedal crab like... thing stood in the back.

Watching, waiting, craving.

Cotton stared straight into its eyes and had to hold back a tide of terror. He felt his hands move on their own as he lobbed a grenade at the incoming zombies and continued moving with his soldiers up the stairs, thanking the people inside for already having moved up to the Skyranger.

The three of them dashed up the stairs to where the Skyranger was waiting on the roof, slamming into walls and doors on occasion. Sweat puddled in Cotton's suit as he pushed his body as hard as he could, making his motions heavy and his breath ragged.

“Trixie?” he called into his comm, gasping for breath.

“Yes?” the pony responded. There was a quiver in her voice. She'd been watching the horror outside.

“A shield!” he yelled, “A wall, whatever it is you do! Do it! Keep them from getting in!”

From the corner on his eye Cotton could just see the glimmer of a barrier forming over the front doors to the clinic.

The hiss of the creatures as they struck it could clearly be heard as the troopers climbed to the building's third level. In fact with each level they went up the noise increased as the monsters feared losing their prey.

Pausing for breath, Cotton found Trixie standing by a window, her helmet down by her side as she stared outside, her blue fur stained with tears as her face remained expressionless.

“We're leaving. Get to the Skyranger,” he ordered.

The pony simply stood there and looked over the desolation of the city and the creatures that threw themselves mindlessly against the barrier, one of them staring right at her.

Cotton could see the crab-like creature in the back. It watched, not acting mindlessly like the others.

Still the pony didn't move.

“That was an order!,” Cotton yelled

Trixie turned towards him. Her eyes were wide.

“I don't want to be a hero anymore,” she whispered, too low for him to hear. “I... I want to go home.”

Taking a deep breath, Cotton reached out to her. She was stiff as a statue.

“Home... I want to go home!” her voice rose to a wail. An instant later Cotton could feel the barrier below them fall.
Wrapping his arm around the pony, he lifted her into his arms and made a run for the stairs as she held onto him tightly the same way she used to hold onto her father after she had a very bad nightmare.

“Skyranger! This is Cotton. Get ready to leave. Now!” He ordered as he made his way finally to the roof and kept up the pace to the Skyranger so Trixie could finally let him go.

“Chavivi! Let’s move it!” Cotton yelled as loud as he could while Chavivi took one last shot, ending the existence of one last undead monster, figuring out that it was through them that the spider creatures were born. He failed to notice that underneath his ledge lurked the alpha Chryssalid, its crab like pincers stabbing into the wall of the building like a climber’s hook as it pulled itself up to a treasure trove of food and bodies to breed.

Chavivi closed the bipod on his rifle and turned to start moving after Boris and Ramos lobbed all of their grenades down the staircase they came from, blowing it apart and whatever else had followed them, all of this preventing the others from warning Chavivi of what loomed behind him. All he heard was the last part of his name being called.

“...vivi!” He saw where people were looking and turned his head for just a moment, to see a pincer coming down at him. He brought up his laser sniper to deflect the coming blow but had forgotten the weapon’s strap that was around his body.
The Alpha pinched down upon the middle of the weapon and shook Chavivi violently in the air as he shouted in surprise and pain as the dull part of the pincer repeatedly slammed against his armored chest.

“Shoot it!” Chavivi yelled as loud as he could as he was shook around like a rag doll but no one could fire since it would potentially hit him as well. The Alpha then moved and slammed Chavivi against the roof, opening up another pincer and in one smooth motion, slicing through his rifle and pulling upwards, slicing through his arm with such impossible ease, as if he were made of paper. His arm flew off and away from his body, disappearing from sight as it went over the edge of the roof. Chavivi went into a state of shock as he saw the red and bloody stump of what had once been his arm, cut so cleanly he wondered if it was an illusion. The Alpha reared back a claw, preparing to remove Chavivi’s head when suddenly Ramos and Boris slammed into the thing from behind, knocking it over the edge with a loud nightmarish groan.

“Boris, hurry!” Ramos said and Boris let his heavy laser hand by the strap that kept it tied to his armor before picking up Chavivi in a fireman’s carry and rushing him back to the Skyranger, with Ramos about to join him when he heard the monster suddenly land behind him, having grabbed onto the ledge and jumped up.

Turning, Ramos felt his eyes go wide at the inhuman demon that had landed behind him, he rapidly pulled his laser pistol out of its holster, hoping it still had a shot left in it..

The alien's expression was inscrutable, but it almost seemed to smile back.

“Hasta la vista, mother...” he raised his pistol to all but touch the creature’s stupid, yet terrifying, grin. Ramos hoped to blow it off as he pulled the trigger.

Nothing happened but a tiny beep that kept repeating, the weapon had been overheated and needed to be serviced.
Ramos' eyes grew wider but he did not let fear overcome him, he pulled out a combat knife and thought only of buying his friends more time.

Almost off handedly the creature swung a claw tipped hand. It sunk into Ramos' alloy armor like tissue paper.
A lance of fire raced up his gut. His cry of pain shredded the air just as his stomach was shredded. Boris turned to see his closest friend in danger.

“Ramos! No!” He shouted and held up his heavy Laser and fired at the Alpha’s legs as everyone else stared in shock, Trixie crying and screaming as she held onto Cotton and Sato trying his best to keep Chavivi from bleeding to death while the civilians tried to run deeper into the cramped space of the Skyranger.

“Boris! Boris! Boriiiaahahhhhh!!!!” Ramos cried out as he was held over the Alpha and then forcefully split in half, his blood and organs spilling everywhere like a horrific gruesome piñata as they spilled out and coated the Alpha Chrysallid, the terrible snapping of his spine ringing in Boris’s ears as he froze, watching his friend’s torso be tossed away by the Alpha chrysallid before it threw Ramos’s legs at him and knocked him back.

Boris stared in terror as he was coated in his friends blood and the Alpha came closer and closer, raising its large pincers to stab and tear him apart until somehow a big blast of energy similar to Trixie’s magic Knocked the monster back, slamming it against an Air Conditioning unit so hard its exoskeleton cracked.

Cotton looked down at his hand, all he had done was reach out to shout out ‘no’ when he suddenly felt energy transferred from Trixie over to him, and somehow he had shoved the giant crab away.

Boris wasted no time and stood up, aiming the heavy laser at the creature and holding the trigger down. Time seemed to pass so quickly until the barrel of his weapon was bright red and slightly melted, but so was the crab. The Alpha had been turned into a puddle of goo and twitching feet by the time Boris had finished it, and yet he was still not satisfied, he wanted to stomp the remains of this thing out of existence.

"Boris! We have to go!” Cotton ordered and snapped Boris from his spell. The large Russian man moved back to the transport quickly, seeing that Chavivi’s injury had been sealed by some foam from Sato’s medkit and the civilians were all aboard. As soon as he got on the Skyranger took off and Boris took a seat with his back to a wall. His mind was empty and his body felt heavy as every time he blinked he saw the image of Ramos being torn apart. He did not even notice as Cotton shouted and yelled at Central to have the clinic bombed and failed to notice when said bomb slammed down into the clinic and turned it into a crater, turning whatever other monsters were there into ashes.
All Boris could feel and register, was that they had lost Ramos, that he had lost his closest friend.

Commander Cotton held onto Trixie as the Skyranger raced back to the evacuation zone, his eyes staring at his hand that had somehow knocked the crab away, wondering how he was able to have done such a thing.

Author's Note:

Author's note: I would like to take this time to thank my new editor. He has been a great help in making my story better. He is also a writer himself so if you please could, go and check out his stories. He puts alot of effort into them and they are pretty good.

Please click this link to go to his page: WWolf's Page.

Comments

[Knightmare Neko]

Cotton now has psionics
Or hes aaaa....
FAIRY!!!

[Sneaky Breeze]

2761336 *Flips out like Mister Crocker*

FAIRIES!!!!!

[Juggalomalice]

Trixie and Cotton.
I'd ship it!

In all seriousness, it seems the two may have some strange bond which was only lightly conveyed due to that whole "poltergeist" event they had back at the Christmas party so many chapters ago. Perhaps some questions will finally be addressed.

[Sneaky Breeze]

2763947 All in due time. There are multiple universes out there so perhaps there is one where Cotton finds his interests with Trixie insteaad of vahlen.

I will explain their bond once i cannfully plot it out but i will give you a free hint. You may be able to figure out the connection from the conversation between Rock Fist and Central, when the ponies were being examined by the science lab.