XGRA: Ultrasonic Rainbow

by Brotato

Ch.1: First contact

Chapter 1

First contact

Rainbow Dash enjoyed the view as her forehooves hung off a cloud that rested above Ponyville. After the recent Sonic Rainboom, the town turned into a bustle of energy as they stared up in wonder at the streak of rainbow flying across the sky. She never got tired of flying, nor pleasing other ponies with her stunts for everypony to see. Being the center of attention was like one of Pinkie pie's cupcakes to her; once you've tasted it, you cant stop.

Now that I think about it, one of Pinkie's cupcakes does sound pretty good.

Jumping off the cloud, she lazily floated down towards Sugarcube Corner. Several ponies could be seen already entering and leaving as the breakfast rush was still going on. Already she could smell fresh baked goodness wafting through the air as she landed just outside the doorway.

She entered the building and quickly spotted Pinkie Pie and Ms. Cake rushing around the counter to take care of customers. To say the place was packed would be like telling Pinkie she likes to throw parties. The lines were only ten ponies long and Pinkie was handling two of them at a time with ease. It only took a minute before Rainbow was at the front counter.

"Hi Rainbow Dash!" Pinkie greeted with her usual cheery attitude. She didn't even look winded as she continued purchases while talking.

"Hey Pinkie. Think I could get one of your c-" A chocolate cupcake with simple vanilla frosting was placed in front of her before she could finish her order. "Uh, wow. That was quick."

Pinkie giggled at her comment and pushed the treat towards Rainbow with a grin. "Yep-a-roonie. Oh! I almost forgot." She disappeared under the counter for a second, returning as she pulled out a pink box. It had a small loaf inside with icing on top of it. "Could you do me a teeny-tiny-itsy-bitsy favor and gives this to Twilight? She placed an order for this lemon pound cake yesterday, but we've been so busy this morning I don't think I'll get a chance to give it to her."

"Sure thing, Pinkie," Rainbow said between mouthfuls of cupcake. She paid the two bits for her treat and trotted out of the building with the parcel. She spread her wings to take flight, but thought it would be best to not risk dropping her package. With a sigh, she stayed on the ground with a brisk trot toward Twilight's library.

When she was a block away from her destination, she could see the top of Twilight's home already. appeared above several of the houses before she actually saw the home itself. The lights were on and she could see the shadow of either Twilight or Spike running around inside. Moving towards the door, she gave it three heavy knocks.

"Just a moment!" A voice called out from inside the tree. The sound of footfalls on wood were heard far before the door swung open. "Oh, hey Rainbow. What bring you here?" He asked while motioning her to come in.

"Just got a special delivery here for Ms. Egghead herself.." Rainbow grabbed her friend's parcel and gave it to Spike. When he took it from her hoof, she looked around the room. The entire place was spotless from top to bottom. No sign of dust or loose books could be seen laying anywhere. The only thing missing was a certain purple unicorn "Hey, where is she anyway?"

Spike came back from the kitchen after putting the parcel away. "Oh, she's on the balcony. Said something about an object falling from the sky, but I think her late-night studies are finally getting to her."

Rainbow laughed. "Yeah, I wouldn't doubt that. I'll go check on her." Giving Spike a quick farewell, she went up the stairs leading to the balcony on the second floor. Sure enough, Twilight was switching between three different telescopes set up on the balcony. Each one pointed in a different direction towards the sky as she desperately looked for whatever had her in such a fuss.

A wicked grin formed on her face as she quietly inched towards the unicorn. It was a difficult task with hooves, but by taking it slow, it quieted the clip-clop sound enough to sneak behind her target. When she was right behind Twilight, she let out a yell. "Hey Twilight! whatcha doing?"

"There's no need to yell ,Rainbow Dash," Twilight stated calmly while turning the telescope she was looking through.

Rainbow Dash's brow shot up from failing to scare Twilight. "How did... Never mind, you need to get away from that telescope. You really need to stop staying up late."

Twilight let out a disgruntled groan and turned to face Rainbow, her mane having an unkempt look. "Spike doesn't believe me and now you? Why would I make up that I saw something fall from the sky? I'm positive I saw something. I just know it!"

"Easy there, Twilight. Look," she rested a comforting hoof on her friend's shoulder. "Why don't we go check where the thing crashed. If there's something there, great. If not... you stop staying up late at night studying. Deal?"

Twilight stared at the ground a moment longer before matching Rainbow's gaze. "Deal."

---

A human roughly in his thirties with jet-black hair and wearing a white lab coat threw his hand of cards on the poker table. "Royal flush, baby!" He grinned as the others in the main cabin of the spaceship groaned and started to leave in frustration. His grin only grew wider as his earnings increased from collecting their bets. When he reached over with both hands to scoop up several loose chits, another man stopped him by firmly planting his hand over his.

"If I didn't know any better, I'd say you were cheating." His other hand settled on a sheath located on the outside of his right thigh. His entire body language was screaming out that things were about to get ugly. "I don't like cheaters."

"Vicks! stop trying to intimidate Professor Miles."

Both men turned their heads to see a woman with her arms folded to her chest in annoyance. The insignia and badges on her sleek grey uniform clearly pointed out she was the boss of the ship, and also the pilot. So unless they wanted to be stranded in space, they'd listen to her orders. "We have ten minutes before we reach our destination so I don't want any of your crap. Now, get your ass back to the engineering deck before I punt you down the stairs myself."

Not another word was spoken between the two as Vicks roughly released his hold on Miles' hands before disappearing towards a stairwell. "As for you," looking at Miles. She walked over, grabbed his wrist, and pulled down his coat sleeve to revealing a small device strapped to his wrist; full of cards. "Smoking isn't the only bad habit that can get you killed." She chuckled at his flabbergasted expression and patted him on the shoulder. "I'll see you on the bridge." She pressed a keypad next to the door and left the room; the door closed behind her with a quiet hiss.

"Of course, Captain." Miles muttered to himself. He wasn't sure how she knew he was cheating, but her instincts were as sharp as a tack. It was one of the many reasons she's the best pilot ever known. At least for him anyway. He hastily collected the credits from each chit into his account with a small handheld device. When he was done, he dumped the empty chits into the trash and followed the Captain to the bridge.

The ship was small with only six rooms. It consisted of the bridge, "off-duty" room, engine room, sleeping quarters, cryo chambers, and the cargo bay. The trek to the bridge didn't take long since a single hallway linked all six rooms, minus the cargo bay and engines which were down a flight of stairs. He pressed a button on the door's keypad and strode in.

The bridge wasn't anything special. The captain's chair stood out proudly with its hundreds of buttons, switches, and other devices for controlling the ship. Outside the canopy a swirl of colors made him dizzy from staring too long as they traveled through slip space. To the right sat the airlock out of the ship, and to his left sat another man.

"Professor," he greeted.

"Jacob," Miles greeted back to his collegue leaning in a chair right beside the doorway. Jacob and him were best friends since mars; when they were still in college studying zoology. While the study of alien and other-worldly lifeforms didn't fit his cup of tea, he was getting paid none-the-less for this job. He didn't question why the XGRA funded the trip, nor cared why. All he knew was this alien life form resembled a species on earth needed to be studied.

A steady beep came from the captain's console, which she quickly silenced with a button push. "We're coming up on the planet now." Soon as she said that, the swirling colors outside the ship seemed to pull away; revealing a blue planet in front of their ship. "Wow, they weren't kidding. It does look like earth." She flipped several switches and the HUD lit up, pointing out a trajectory to land the ship. She turned her head to look at Miles. "Might want to find a seat, Professor. It's about to get bumpy."

Miles woke up from his trance from looking at the blue planet in awe. Seeing another planet which could possibly hold new and interesting lifeforms would of course be a zoologists dream come true. He took a seat next to Jacob and pulled down the restraint bar that covered his sides and chest. The planet was all that he could see now as they closed in on their landing point.

Suddenly the ship shook violently as the atmosphere pummeled the ship like a violent storm at sea. Outside the canopy it looked like the ship had been set on fire from the extreme friction; threatening to tear the ship apart. Luckily, the pilot knew what she was doing and the correct angle prevented such a thing from happening.

The shaking stopped as sudden as it came, leaving Miles' heart racing and hands aching from clinging to the restraint. His head rested against it as he caught his breath; not realizing he was holding it half-way through the planet entry.

"We're here," the Captain sang. The idea of danger and near-death experiences always put her in a chipper mood, which the rest of the crew knew would kill them one day. "Huh, would you look at that. Seems this planet has civilization after all." Miles and Jacob joined the sight from behind her seat and noticed the cloud-shrouded village far below them. "The probe beacon is setting us down behind a large hill near a forest. It should be far enough away from the village to not cause a ruckus."

Jacob could hardly contain his excitement. "This is fantastic! If they can create a society, they have to be intelligent in some way," He stated enthusiastically.

"True," Miles began. "But we should still be cautious. How do we know the natives wont turn hostile on our presence?"

The door opened behind them and both men turned around to see a man wearing a black business suit. Just standing this close to him felt intimidating. He was the representative the XGRA sent. No one knew his name or anything else about him, and his voice always held a dull tone, like every subject was tedious and uninteresting. As he stared towards the canopy, Miles still felt his gaze through the dark shades he always wore.

"Quite simply, Mr. Miles, that's why we brought you along."

---

The landing went smoothly and everyone gathered in the cargo bay to start the trek towards the nearby village. Miles looked over his equipment. A radio to keep in contact with the others, a video recorder which looked like a pair of normal glasses, a computer pad for writing down notes, and a small backpack full of scalpels, tweezers, and other laboratory equipment for studying samples of tissue. While he didn't think they would stay for long to do any real research, it never hurt to come prepared.

He looked over at the group of three near the bay doors. All of them marines. While Jacob and himself were to prevent hostilities from breaking out, they were here to make sure hostiles were taken care of.

"Interesting. Sensors read the atmosphere to be breathable. Only three percent more oxygen compared to earth. The captain spoke over the radio.

"Fantastic, I hate those damn atmosphere suits anyway," a marine spoke up. The others nodded in agreement.

"Quite... opening bay doors now.

A loud clang rang out as the locks unhinged from the door. When it started to open a rush of cool clean air rushed into the room, filtering out the air from the ships air scrubbers. The light that came from the world caused everyone to take a momentary hand-raise to cover their eyes. When everyone lowered their hands to take a good look at the world, they stared at the pair of creatures looking back at them.

"My god," Jacob whispered next to Miles. "They do look like the equines from earth. Only shorter and..." Jacob struggled to find the right word. "More... cutesy."

The six humans and two ponies continued to stared at each other as they waited to see who would make the first move. After about a minute, the purple pony spoke in clear and plain English. Although her voice held a sense of apprehensiveness as she whispered.

"So... does this mean I win the bet?"

Comments

[OddDreams]

Faved just because you know of XGRA's existence XD

[Brotato]

1647700 It was my favorite racing game EVER. Sadly my PS2 kicked the proverbial bucket, and the PS3 isn't accepting the disc either. D:

[OddDreams]

1647991 I had it for the old Xbox, I cried when I realized my bro decided to be a dick and raid my games for trade ins >.> Then I bet his sorry ass when he wouldn't admit it.

Was by far my favorite racing game, including all NFS games I've played

[AppleTank]

Hmm. I was expecting Ponies to have a different language. Oh well, I guess it doesn't matter too much.

[TheMainManeMaineBrony]

1649084 Well, thank god for emulators!