Coop and M.E.G.A.S (the giant robot wepon) end up in Equestria. Leaving may not be as simple as getting there. A Megas XLR MLP:FIM crossover
Coop is the expert pilot of a giant robot built for epic combat. His best friend Jamie, thinks he's an expert with the ladies. Due to Jamie's big mouth and a not so gentle arrival in Equestria, it may take some time leave this strange colorful planet. With M.E.G.A.S stuck in a new civilization to screw up, how will the ponies cope with the mayhem? Princess Twilight will certainly need the help of all her friends to watch over the human visitor who consumes all before him. Not to mention a red headed woman claiming to be the last human resistance soldier. At least the skinny jerk doesn't pose much of a threat, right?
If you haven't seen the show, this will still make some sense, but you should go watch it. If you don't like giant robots and screaming awesome then shame on you.
I do not own Megas XLR or My Little Pony Friendship is Magic. They belong to Cartoon Network and The HUB respectively.
Space, where our not so strong, not so honest, not so handsome hero was in a pitched battle against the alien scum known as the glorft. This man may be just as likely to blow up the Earth as save it, but at least he wasn’t trying to conquer earth and enslave the human race.
A large number of giant green robots and a massive starship encircled a single blue humanoid mech suit. Off in the distance, Earth’s round form could be seen amongst the star speckled black expanse of space. While the lone warrior’s machine was similar in size to the alien mechs, it was but a dust speck compared to the alien dreadnaught set in high orbit.
A gravely voice rang out in the human’s cockpit. Judging from the hostility of the voice, the transmission was clearly coming from the enemy. “We have you surrounded Earther scum. It’s my 150 mechs versus your one. I would say It’s been a pleasure, little monkey man, but that would be a lie. Surrender know and I will make the deaths of you and your friends quick and painful, instead of slow and...”
The pilot of the lone robot turned his head away from the projection of the squid faced alien and asked his two passengers, “So after I wipe the floor with these guys, you wanna go get some Philly Cheese Steaks?”
“Pay attention to me Earther!” The holographic head persisted. The short tentacles hanging like a beard jiggled with contempt. “I want to see your face before you explode in a—” The Glorft Warmaster was once again interrupted by talks of fast food from the plus sized driver.
“Anyway, if we hurry, we could also make it to the all you can eat Taco Shack. Eh ? Eh?” The fluffy man asked excitedly.
The ugly alien’s image seemed to grow larger, and its rough voice with it. “You overgrown, greasy, blubbering, buffoon! Don’t you ever think about anything besides...”
“Hey, I’ll tell you once and I'll tell you... how does that saying go?” He scratched his spiky blond hair with a large finger. “This ain't blubber! It’s fat! You got that, fat!” He punctuated this by grabbing a roll of his stomach and jostling it up and down in front of the cockpit camera.
“I’m sure we've’ covered this like a hundred times already. Get it through you slimy brain or write it on a sticky note!”
The hungry man smashed his fist onto one of the hundreds of buttons on the highly modified dashboard for emphasis. The area beneath the pilot and his two passengers rumbled and whirred away. The right arm of the giant blue robot promptly started unloading some sixteen barrel mini gun fire into the crowd. The giant bullets littered the enemy bots, mowing them down before exploding seconds after being fatally shot. The pilot brushed some orange cheesy puff dust from his ripped black and red vest, before deflecting return fire with an energy shield on the left arm of his robot. The blue disc shield rippled with impacts sending them back from whence they came. In a clockwise sweep the shield dissipated and a little projecting device folded away.
“Coop!” a chick’s voice exclaimed from the back seat. The young redhead had a futuristic laptop-like device sitting across her legs. The screen displayed the enemies and threats around the mech, as well as the status of all the systems. She was now noticing a large missile closing on the rear of the 1970 Plymouth Barracuda. The old, but clearly awesome automobile made up the ‘cockpit’ or ‘head’ of the highly advanced prototype mech suit.
“Kiva, if you don’t feel like Cheesesteaks, we could go to the new burger bar?” Coop said, mistaking Kiva’s cry of distress as a protest for his food choice. The pilot behemoth mashed a combo on his gamepad, which caused his mech to grab a nearby foe. With a swift rotation of a joystick, his foe was spun around for a devastating spin-attack.
“Raaaagh!” He screamed as the sharp crunch of metal signaled the defeat of yet another half dozen foes.
He released the barely recognizable mech into another rushing enemy, before speeding in the direction of another squad of the snot-green, dime a dozen robots. The roar of the back mounted rockets was in full thrust, though they were muffled from inside the car. Coop was keeping just ahead of the homing missile behind them, still oblivious to its existence. There must have been at least one hundred enemies left, minus the fifty or so he had just blown up with the minigun, deflected bullets, dominated with cheap wrestling moves, and the allies he threw at their compatriots.
“Coop!” This time it was Coop’s other companion; a lanky punk cowering in the passenger seat. One would think the skinny young man would feel more at ease sitting atop the giant mass of servos, plate steel, and wires, all while flying through space hacking apart extraterrestrial robots, but not this coward. His scream was more girly than any of the numerous girls he failed to pick up, including those not from Earth. He had also noticed the heat seaking death device behind them in the side mirror. The little ‘OBJECTS IN MIRROR ARE CLOSER THAN THEY APPEAR’ message was not easing his stress one bit.
The giant steel fists of Coop’s robot met together as if grabbing the oar of a boat. The huge hands then pulled apart to reveal an energy sword. The robot took a two handed stance with the glowing blue blade. Coop was ready to wield it like any self respecting samurai movie fan would.
“Fine Jamie, burgers it is,” Coop said, mistaking the display of unmanliness as another objection. He noticed the terrified expression of his skull cap wearing friend, and finally the giant missile just about to close in on them all. Holding the sword out in front of his blue mech in a overhead pose, Coop screamed and charged at the explosive. The fiery energy sword cleaved the missile and it’s two halves flew past the Plymouth's windshield. The explosion of the bisected ballistic projectile blew up more snot green mechs that had closed in behind him.
The unorthodox move didn’t come without a cost however.
“WARNING, REAR THRUSTER PACK DAMAGED. 96% DECREASED SPACE FLIGHT SPEED AND MOBILITY,” an artificial female voice echoed throughout the cockpit.
“So Kiva. You always tell me the status of MEGAS. Why is this computer chick doing it now?” The fat man asked.
The computer voice was soon followed by the red head in the back seat. “I was getting tired of telling you the same things repeatedly, and Coop, what did I say about slicing missiles in half?!”
He scratched his chin. “Oh, I remember! That it was amazing that it worked last time.”
Kiva pursed her lips before facepalming.
“...and that they explode, so I shouldn’t do it,” He added, before backfisting another alien robot. At this point many of the alien mechs were charging at Coop and company without formation or tactics at all. They were soon brutally beaten into oily, sparking, scrap, by more outrageous wrestling moves.
The woman in the back seat looked up at Coop. “Maybe I can train you before you doom all of humanity.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure Kiva. Lo... look at THAT!” The skinny punk known as Jamie screamed, while pointing a shaky finger into space.
“I told you Earther!” The squid faced alien flickered back on the holoprojector. Columns of smoke rose up behind his head and sparks flickered on his control panel. The Warmaster’s solid red eyes were filled with pure hate. He had a devious grin on his face despite the obvious damage to his rig. “You're no match for the mighty glorft army!” The sounds of servos and clanking metal could be heard over the intercom.
Coop maneuvered his beaten robot towards the enemy armada to come face to face with a giant gun of some sort.
“While you were fighting my distractions, I was able to combine my forces into my most brilliant design yet. Feast your eyes on the B.F.G! It stands for—”
The glorft Warmaster was interrupted by the snorting laughter of his fat nemesis.
“What is soo funny Earther. You are about to be obliterated!” The alien demanded.
“Three things. One, this is what, the fifth, maybe the sixth time you've tried the big gun transformation thing against me. You know I’m just gonna smash your ship thing’s big cannon again. Two, do you even play video games? You just named your big transformer rip off a ‘B.F.G’ for crying out loud! Three, you actually think you're going to win.”
“I am going to win Earther, and for the record, B.F.G stands for—”
“Listen here you disgusting excuse for a slug thingy! You interrupt my favorite show to fly into some lame space battle, try to kill me with another lousy bunch of tin can robots, call my fat blubber...”
“Actually Coop, I think fat and blubber are pretty close—”
Kiva scowled at Jamie’s pale hand that covered her mouth. “He’s on a roll here,” Jamie said, before ‘encouraging’ the driver some more. “Though Coop, maybe you should listen to the big green alien guy this time?” Jamie eyed an arc of electricity coming off of a spot in the hood of the car, along with an obvious oil leak. Some hydraulic fluid was dribbling from MEGAS’s left shoulder as well. Jamie pushed the little lock button on the door.
Coop didn’t hear the meek voice of his ‘co-pilot,’ and continued his rant.
...and now you dare rip off a great video game without giving credit or even understanding the meaning!” The sweating fat man pulled some levers and twisted some knobs. His mech emitted a videogame-like chime. “Well, face my giant Space Cannon Attack Thingy!”
The chest plates of the giant blue robot flung open, and a telescoping barrel extended outward to an impossible length. Some loose wires dangled from the sides of the weapon that was still dwarfed by the giant gun facing them.
Kiva leaned forward from the back of the Plymouth convertible. “Is that the quantum mass accelerator from that M class mech robot AI we fought last month?”
Jamie cut in. “Wait, did you call this a ‘Space Cannon Attack Thingy’? Jamie asked. “You know what that spells right?”
Coop either ignored him or didn’t hear. “You bet Kiva. I finished the modification this morning,” he said with a pat to his beloved machine.
The Glorft veteran would have laughed, had he not known what a powerful weapon he now faced. “How could a bumbling ape like you possibly compress that weapon into your mech? Hurry commander, fire the B.F.G!”
“Warmaster, it’s still charging,” the voice of an underling said in the background chatter.
“Actually, I was about to ask the same thing,” Kiva said with concern. “How did you compress the internal dampening field to counteract the driver recoil upon firing?”
Coop scratched his head. “How now the what now?”
A compartment on the back of MEGAS opened up to reveal a growing blue vortex. The vortex started to pull in all debris from the trashed robots behind it. It seemed to compress them into some sort of chamber.
“Coop, you need to stop it now, before the cannon collects enough mass to fire at full capacity! Without the dampener, the opposing force could tear MEGAS apart, or send us flying endlessly through space. You did install a deactivation button right?” Kiva asked with an anxious and annoyed tone.
“Probably...” Coop scanned the many video game controllers hooked into the controls, along with the instrument panels. His eyes settled onto a hole with wires sticking out, under which, “S.C.A.T weapon deactivation,” was printed neatly in stenciled letters.
“Oops, what's the worst that could happen?” He said, with a wave of his hand.
At that, the end of the Space Cannon Attack Thingy started to glow with built up energy. The glorft tried to retreat, but all the mechs were linked to form the B.F.G.
“EARTHER YOU’VE DOOMED US ALL!” The slug like alien yelled as his forces were obliterated in a bright flash. The Earther’s weapon carved a devastating chunk out of the Glorft Command Ship as well.
The resulting shockwave from the fat man’s robot radiated outward, sending many of the destroyed mechs into Earth’s gravitational field. A severed robot arm smashed a satellite with ‘POP TV’ painted on the side. The mighty blue mech was sent flying back at an ever increasing speed. It’s three occupants started screaming in terror. Earth disappeared from their view in a few seconds and they vanished into empty black space. The only trace of them being a giant blue beam with a double helix stretching through space.
---XLR---
Somewhere else and some time later...
“Either we are alone in the Universe or we are not. Both are equally terrifying,” a purple alicorn read aloud to herself, before closing the book on the desk before her. It would be some time before the light of dawn would creep into the windows of Ponyville library. What little light there was came from a streetlamp, which cast small rays of yellowish light through the window and across the floor. Most of the candles on the desk had fizzled out in a pool of wax.
Twilight Sparkle, ruffled her wings and chuckled. “Ha, aliens. What a joke.”
Just then, her ears shot up at a crash from within the kitchen. She approached the room slowly, from which she could here some shuffling sounds accompanied by more clanking.
“He... hello? Is anypony there?” No answer came.
“This had better not be another prank Rainbow Dash!” No answer again.
Her horn grew bright, preparing a good sized stun spell. “I’m warning you,” Twilight said in a shaky voice.
The young alicorn quietly made her way through the threshold that lead into the dimly lit kitchen. The brightest light was the pink aura coming from her horn.There was food littered all over the floor, most of which had a single large bite taken out of it. There was a bitten cucumber, a gnawed head of lettuce, an untouched apple and a smashed carton of eggs.
She could see something moving in the back of the kitchen. It’s large back end protruded from her refrigerator. At first she thought it could be a bear. She would need Fluttershy to safely get it out of her house. She then realized this ‘bear,’ had a bluish rear end, and it’s legs ended in large, elongated, black blobs.
“COOP! GET OUT OF MY KITCHEN!” Twilight yelled.
The monster raiding her food stuffs didn’t budge.
“COOP!” You might be a guest in Ponyville, but this is my house!” Her warning was met with a carrot to the face.
Twilight whipped her head around, swearing she heard a voice. Having seen nothing in the dark, she turned her attention to bigger matters at hoof.
Twilight walked up to the raider’s side and hooked her hooves over his back. She attempted to pull him away with all her might. Surprisingly, the large being swayed towards her, and to Twilight’s regret kept falling until she was pinned upside down to the floor. All the air was being pushed from her body and she started squirming and gasping to no avail.
She heard the voice that had distracted her earlier, except this time it was closer and it sounded like laughing. Twilight blindly released the stun spell from her horn towards the new presence.
“Woah!” The laughing being yelled as it barely deflected the spell with a shiny frying pan.
Twilight was slowly losing strength under the immense weight. Just when she was about to give up, the deflected stun spell hit the refriger-raider right in the rear. The large being jumped up in surprise, giving the princess enough time to teleport to the other end of the kitchen. She reveled in the ability to breath again. The unicorn yelped as a rainbow colored being fell from above.
“Rainbow Dash! are you okay...”
“BWAH HAH HA HA! You should have seen the way you squirmed!” The pegasus wheezed, rolling on the floor.
Twilight sighed in annoyance. “So I’m guessing you have something to do with this?” She asked, pointing a hoof at the large man in her fridge. Said fat man was twitching on the floor, with drool quickly collecting on the kitchen tiles.
“No, I’m pretty sure that was you shooting him in the butt,” Rainbow said failing to suppress more giggles.
A hair of Twilight’s mane sprang up, as she started grinding her teeth.
“Yep that’s how it happened,” Dash said twitching her ears.
The multi-colored mare broke under Twilight’s hardened stare. “Ugh, fine. I was watching over Vinyl’s. You know, because I wanted to make sure he didn’t start any trouble. Then he came here and raided your fridge...” Rainbow cracked again under Twilights critical gaze. “Jeez, you make a scary princess. I tried to wake him up, but all he did was repeat “I must have meat,” over and over again.”
Twilight interrupted the nervous pegasus. “So you told him there was some “meat” in my fridge and now he’s unconscious on my kitchen floor.”
“How, how did you figure it out?”
Twilight smiled warmly. “You just told me Rainbow. Now, have fun getting him back to Vinyl’s house. Oh, and I’ll need you to come by tomorrow for a list of groceries I’ll be needing.
Rainbow Dash looked from Coop, to the door, and back to Twilight. “I wanted to go see the metal giant with you and you still haven't told me how he got here. How am I supposed to move him all by myself? Can’t you just move him with magic and get spike to get the groceries?” The pegasus folded back her ears as she pouted and complained.
“You should have thought about that before sending him over here. I could move him, but then you wouldn’t learn anything.” Twilight smiled contently. “I wouldn’t be a good princess if I didn’t help educate my subjects. How about you go shopping with me tomorrow and I’ll tell you all about it, though it should be obvious by the looks of the town.”
Rainbow relaxed her eyes and dropped the fake puppy dog routine. “Fine, Your Royal Snootiness,” Rainbow replied with an overly dramatic bow.
As Twilight went up the stairs to get some sleep, she turned to the young Wonderbolt. “Don’t worry Rainbow, I don’t think he'll be getting up anytime soon, so you'll have plenty of time to buy me new groceries. Why are you so interested in that thing anyhow?”
Rainbow Dash looked at her like she was crazy. “Everypony digs giant robots, duh.”
“Right, good night Rainbow Dash.”
“You’re seriously not gonna help me with this guy? He’s so heavy.” The pegasus called upstairs.
Just a week and a half ago Twilight had suddenly sprouted wings. Luckily, the things complicating the life of Princess Twilight Sparkle finally seemed to be shrinking in number.
Rainbow Dash finally seemed to understand that she couldn’t spend every waking minute of her life learning to fly, Rarity had thankfully run out of dress ideas for every situation (though it took eighty-seven ideas to get there), Applejack and Big Mac had finally ceased addressing her as your Highness, Pinkie Pie had stopped wearing her cardboard wings and horn, and Fluttershy was well, as timid as ever.
Everypony else, however, seemed to insist on being ridiculous. Some historical organization was already trying to declare the Golden Oaks Library a national heritage site, despite the fact that she still technically lived there. Newspaper ponies were always trying to get an interview with her, which meant paparazzi pegasi everywhere. Everypony was always bowing, letting her cut in line, and apologizing for nothing and everything.
Celestia had told her that she could keep living in Ponyville and she would be sent information about how to conduct her princessly duties from there. However, some day she may need to move to the capital to assume a more “permanent role” in the government. Even though she was assured that day could be decades if she chose,
Twilight had recently packed up crates of books and supplies she would want to bring to Canterlot.
She finished hammering a nail in the lid of the last crate. Twilight hung the hammer on a wall of tools, stepping back to admire the stack of alphabetically organized boxes and crates sitting in her underground lab-basement. She noticed the corner of one box was not quite aligned with the others, but as she reached a hoof out...
“SURPRISE!” The lid of the crate flew off with a shower of confetti and Twilight was left staring at the ceiling, panting for her life. She lay on her back, slowly regaining her breath.
“So Twilight, were you surprised?! Were ye, where ya where ya?!”
“Yes Pinkie, very surprised.” Twilight slowly rubbed a hoof down her face. “Why does this seem so familiar?” The princess put it out of her mind and continued her checklist of the stack of crates. “Not that I don’t enjoy the company, but what are you doing here Pinkie?”
“Well this morning my Pinkie Sense was telling me somepony new was showing up in Ponyville; actually many new someponies, so I’ve been practicing my surprise entrance all over town. I just know there is something super big about this one so I wanted their surprise party to be super surprising!”
“Uh huh,” Twilight half heartedly replied. “Well, it looks like everything down here is in order. It leaves me with just enough time to have lunch with all our friends, before I need to get back to work.”
Pinkie Pie looked doubtful. “How can you have time for lunch with all our friends? Octavia is at a concert in Canterlot, Braeburn is in Appaloosa...”
“Pinkie.”
... Soarin is at an airshow, and Derpy disappeared with The Doctor. I mean, unless you have like a week to eat lunch, but then it won’t be lunchtime anymore.”
“Pinkie Pie!” Twilight yelled for the mare’s attention. Learning the Royal Canterlot Voice had made getting Pinkie's attention twice as fast. “While you may be friends with everypony, those are acquaintances to the other girls and I. I was just talking about lunch with the girls.” She never could explain to Pinkie the concept of meeting somepony and not being friends, and it didn't look like that was going to change.
“Did you bump your head or something Twilight? Those are ponies, not aquainta-what-you-ma-call-its. Besides, even if we only had lunch with the girls, where can we fit all those ponies for lunch, and won’t all the stallions in Equestria feel left out?”
Twilight had already beat her head on a nearby crate a few times before noticing Pinkie’s tail twitching like never before. Somehow her tail was causing vibrations to travel over Pinkie’s flank and all the way to the tip of her nose and hooves. Twilight quickly jumped under her chemistry table and covered her head with her hooves.
“Pinkie Pie! why aren't you hiding? Isn’t something going to fall?” Twilight asked as she noticed the party mare hopping in a circle with her usual smile.
“Yessiree, but that little sciency table won’t do you any good. We're all doomed! Doom d-d-d-doom doom dooom d-doom doom doom...” She sang with apparent delight, as she continued her hopping.
“You do realize doom is a bad thing right?” If Twilight were asking any other pony, she would have thought she’d lost her mind.
“Yep, but it’s such a fun word that I made a song in case the end ever came. Doom d-d-doom doom—” Twilight yanked Pinkie Pie off her hooves with her magic and raced out of the basement.
When the front door of the library flung open, they could hear a faint roaring sound above Ponyville. Twilight slowed to a stop in front of her house, noticing something streaking towards them. Pinkie plopped to the ground near Twilight, the earth pony’s eyes bulged as she stared dumbly up at the sky. At the moment, this thing could have been mistaken for a Cloudsdale delivery van, but Twilight could tell it was far bigger. Besides that, there was no post on sundays. She thought perhaps it was a dragon that had lost control or maybe a meteor.
Twilight grabbed the entranced mare once again, teleporting to her balcony. Through her telescope she could see the falling mass getting larger by the second as it raced for the planet’s surface. From what she could tell, it appeared blue, and looked metallic. It was hard to make out the details because a flaming cone was forming around the front of the mystery object. It was likely nopony had ever seen anything like it before, but she could tell atmospheric friction from re-entry was taking its toll.
“I wish for my very own pony.”
“Pinkie Pie, you are a pony, and that is not a shooting star,” Twilight said in a snarky tone while estimating the object's size and mass, among other things.
“Oh yeah,” Pinkie said before hugging herself.
The Unidentified Falling Object must have been at least four hundred hoofs tall. Whatever this thing was, parts where breaking away and scattering across the landscape, trailing streaks of smoke and flame.
“Hmm, it doesn’t look natural, and yet it’s certainly not pony made.” Twilight scribbled something on paper. So Pinkie’s Pinkie Sense says new ponies are coming, then this U.F.O shows up. “Pinkie, I think this thing might have something to do with those new ponies you were preparing for. Now the question is, how do we stop it?” She pointed a hoof past her telescope.
“Oooh let me see, let me see!” Before Twilight could object she was hip checked out of the way. Twilight’s world was spinning with little pink ponies circling her head.
---XLR---
One would think that careening uncontrollably through space at ludicrous speeds would be terrifying, and one would normally be right. However, after hours of this sort of thing, fear becomes angst, boredom, and eventually hunger.
Kiva ran her hand through her red bangs and got up from the back seat. Normally she would be monitoring MEGAS’s systems or finding a solution to whatever trouble Coop and Jamie had caused, but there was not much she could do now.
They were running on manual auxiliary power, which would never be enough to drive the thrusters even if they weren't broken. The best she could do was fire the minor adjustment rockets to slow the mech down little bits at a time. To make things worse, Coop was too out of shape and Jamie too much a scrawny wimp to crank the auxiliary dynamo within MEGAS. This meant that Kiva, a former resistance soldier, was the only one capable of going below the cockpit to keep life support running. At least the back seats of the Plymouth Barracuda were surprisingly comfortable for napping between her shifts. Although, it would be much more restful if her two companions would stop yelling right now.
“Coop, hand it over! I deserve the last one!” A scratchy shout could be heard from the passenger seat.
“Jamie, I need to maintain my figure! How am I supposed to pilot MEGAS if I get all skinny?”
“Wait, did you just say last one?” Kiva leaned forward, snatching the half wrapped food ration from Coop and Jamie’s sweaty hands. “We may be stuck out here for weeks or longer and you two have eaten almost all our rations?!” She raised her hand and shook the food parcel.
“Well don’t blame me, I tried to stop him. It’s Coop’s fault we’re even in this mess,” Jamie said defensively as he swept a food wrapper off of his lap to the car floor.
“Hey, I didn’t ask for the glorft to attack us. Besides, I was going to save that last food bar thingy for Kiva. They taste nasty anyhow,” Coop said as he frowned at one of the many wrappers in his lap.
“The glorft didn’t make you install another faulty upgrade to MEGAS either,” Jamie quipped while looking out the window with his arms crossed. “If you let me drive, I bet we wouldn’t even be in this mess.”
Coop couldn’t keep from laughing. “You, drive MEGAS? You were barely able to pilot my robot, even when you had Kiva’s help. Besides, this is my robot.Mine.” Coop poked a finger at himself.
“Maybe if you let me drive more you would see that I could be an excellent pilot,” Jamie whined.
Coop was silent for a few seconds before turning to the back seat. “Hey, Kiva. What are our chances of surviving all this?”
The redhead opened her holographic laptop-like device and started analyzing their situation. “I appreciate that you at least thought about me before eating all the food Coop, although I have no idea how you managed to eat so many highly concentrated food supplement packs.”
Kiva broke of a small corner of the ration and popped it into her mouth. “These packets are meant to serve six people for three days, they're not meant to taste good.” She paused in her typing. “Based on my calculations and on MEGAS’s condition, I’d say we have less than a twelve percent chance on finding our way back to colonized space, and less than a seven percent chance of living for longer than a week out here.”
Coop scratched his head, not quite understanding. “So are we all going to die or what?”
“Yes Coop, we’re all going to starve to death in the cold vacuum of space,” Kiva deadpanned. “We don’t have enough energy to get anywhere, we're in uncharted space with little food and water, and we have no way to call for help.”
“Great!” Coop exclaimed, before turning to Jamie. “If you think you can do a better job, then here!” Coop pressed a button labeled ‘never in a million years, or when we're all going to die anyway.’ There was a whirring of gears and hiss of pistons before Coop was relaxing in the back seat, Kiva now riding shotgun, and Jamie appeared in the pilot’s chair.
“Awesome. Now watch and learn as the great and powerful Jamie saves us all with his expert giant robot skills,” He said, adjusting the driver’s seat for his small frame. Just as he set his hand on the wheel...
“WARNING, CAUGHT IN GRAVITATIONAL FIELD OF UNIDENTIFIED PLANET. PREPARE FOR EMINENT REENTRY.” The feminine computer voice rang out through the red convertible.
Jamie started mashing buttons and jerking around joysticks at random. Luckily there was no power for most of MEGAS’s main weapon systems. “Coop! What do I do?!”
“You're the pilot now, Great and Powerful Jamie, ask Kiva if you want help.”
Jamie looked over to the passenger’s seat to see Kiva buckling up a six point harness and bracing for her life.
Coop was strangely content. They may have been falling to their doom but he had turned over MEGAS just in time for this not to be his fault, and he wasn't all that hungry. The only problem was that Jamie wouldn’t stop screaming like a little girl, oh, and they were all going to die.
---XLR---
Ponies all over town stopped to look at the glowing streak in the sky. Some remained frozen in fear, while others ran around in a panic. The roaring intensified as the large object got closer until... BOOM! A shock wave radiated outward, the falling mech going supersonic.
A dull roar continued to emanate from the falling robot. Some of the loose pieces of MEGAS were also heading for areas of Ponyville. Twilight made her way to town square at a full gallop, while Pinkie hopped close behind. In the short run, Twilight started making plans in her head along the way. Even with her vast knowledge, she felt she was grasping at straws.
Spotting the princess, an orange pony in a leather hat came running from a nearby apple stand. The mare had been in the middle of packing up what she could.
“There ya are Twi. Ya gotta do something!” Applejack said, her ears folded back as she clutched her hat nervously.
“I... I don’t know what to do!” It’s too fast; it’s too big!” The young alicorn covered her face in her wings and sank to the ground. Ponies nearby all looked at her with pleading eyes. “I can’t even fly that well yet.”
Suddenly Twilight felt a warm breath in her face. Pinkie had appeared within her feathery vail. “Just use your crazy new princess godpony powers!” she blurted out, before being pulled away by her tail.
“Now Pinkie, you can’t just demand Twilight to use her magic. She’s one of our friends, and a princess no less.” Applejack laid a comforting hoof on Twilight’s back. The purple mare smiled slightly, just before one of MEGAS’s damaged thruster rockets crushed a house not thirty feet away. Eeverypony nearby jumped for cover.
“Hey Twi, would you please just use your magical princess powers and save us all?!” Applejack pleaded.
Twilight looked from Applejack lying on the ground, to the other ponies. Most of their faces were covered by their hooves, but she could see them trembling. The few fillies and colts around stared at her with big puppy eyes.
She couldn’t take it anymore. All this attention was driving her crazy. No wonder Luna felt overwhelmed when she had come to visit. There was no time for a good plan and she knew it. She also knew she was the town’s best chance of making it out of this. “Being a princess... sucks!” she grumbled, disappearing in a flash.
It didn’t take long for Applejack and other ponies to find where the princess had gone. A small spark of light appeared at the uppermost walkway of Town Hall. Ponies shielded their eyes as the magenta glow from Twilight’s horn continued to intensify.
“Alright Twilight. Let’s give this your best shot,” she whispered to herself.
The princess reared up to brace her front hooves on the small wooden railing, spreading her wings wide. Her eyes changed to luminescent orbs as she tapped into her magic. She was commanding arcane forces the likes of which few ponies had witnessed before.
---XLR---
“Jamie! MEGAS is burning up! Deploy the flaps and shift power to the heat shielding!” Kiva unsuccessfully yelled at Jamie. Her words were drowned out by the sound of the alarms, the deafening roar from re-entry, and Jamie’s continued screams of terror.
MEGAS’s arms and legs were uselessly pointed outward while the mech fell towards the foreign continent in a swan dive. They had already lost several parts, including one of the shoulder fins, what had remained of the thrusters, a few fingers, and everything from the knee joint down on the right leg. All three occupants were pressed firmly against the seats by the g-forces of their descent.
Jamie was the first to black out, followed by Coop. Kiva was used to harsh g-forces and clung onto consciousness. Slowly, she stretched a hand towards one of the many game controllers nearby that were plugged into the main controls. There was no way she could die now. She had to stop the glorft. The fate of humanity was at stake.
“Almost... there–” With a screech of metal, MEGAS lost it’s right arm and flew off to who knows where. The sudden shift in weight pinned Kiva further away from the controls.
Kiva could feel consciousness slipping away, along with a strange tingling sensation throughout her body. She figured she must have been hallucinating when she saw a pink glow enveloping the dashboard and herself. MEGAS seemed to be slowing down. The fire obscuring the windshield dissipated with the reduced speed. When the view outside was no longer blocked, Kiva became certain she was seeing things. They were heading for some sort of primitive tower, in the middle of a small, archaic, brightly painted settlement.
---XLR---
Rarity, Pinkie Pie, and Fluttershy gathered near the base of Town Hall. They all watched Twilight perched on the upper walkway with anticipation and fear.
“I... can... do this!” the alicorn grunted under the strain of her telekinetic power working to slow MEGAS.
“We believe in you Twilight! Just be careful dear,” Rarity shouted from the base of the building. She had a parasol saddle on, as if it would protect her from the rain of destruction fast approaching.
Fluttershy covered her eyes with a wing. “I... can’t watch,” she squeaked.
“Go Twilight!” Pinkie cheered, shaking pom poms all of the sudden. “We won’t be able to have any parties if Ponyville is pulverized into a pancake!” She licked her lips at the thought of pancakes.
The young princess could tell her crude plan was working, she just needed a bit more time. She was simply using telekinesis to slow and alter the course of MEGAS. She didn’t have to lift it, just slow it down and give it a constant nudge. Amongst the immense weight of whatever this thing was, there were signs of life as well. Twilight considered the loss of potential scientific research, and of course the lives of potentially sapient life forms. She couldn’t let whatever, or whoever was in there get hurt.
Applejack came galloping back into town after evacuating ponies to the edge of Ponyville. “Celestia help us.” She paused beside the central fountain to catch her breath, only to start running once more. The giant metal wreck was heading straight for the center of Ponyville and all her friends. “Twilight, move!” she yelled at the top of her lungs from across town square.
It was too late for her to move now. Twilight looked straight at Applejack, fast approaching across the square. Time seemed to slow as she stared at the fear stricken earth pony. There was only Applejack, her friends below, and the tremendous pressure on her horn. Within mere moments, Twilight charged one last teleportation spell, her friends disappeared in a pink flash, and re-appeared to cut off Applejack’s desperate charge. Twilight could almost make out Applejack's look of surprise and anger before she collapsed in exhaustion, and time resumed its unrelenting course.
MEGAS slammed into one of the many streets at a semi steep angle, raining dirt, wood, and rocks everywhere; the mech’s shoulder demolished a small house on impact, before MEGAS bounced off of the street and did a semi graceful twist in mid air. The robot crash landed upon its back, sliding headlong through the town center. MEGAS continued to carve a trough right through half a dozen stands in the market and obliterated two more buildings before slamming into the side of Town Hall. Finally the beast came to rest, sitting on a throne of wreckage. Its girth now took up the space previously occupied by the large rotunda.
A plume of dust obscured the scene, mixing with the smoke billowing from the wreckage of the mech. The remains of Town Hall collapsed onto MEGAS and slid off the robot’s marred metal plating. Only the rattles and thumps could be heard from beyond the obscuring clouds. Soon townsponies started filling the square, their curiosity having overpowered any remaining fear. The four Elements of Harmony waited anxiously for the smoke to clear, hoping to reveal any signs of Twilight Sparkle, and fearing whatever horrors had descended from beyond the stars.
Jamie groaned as he rubbed his aching head. He was still in the driver’s seat of MEGAS when he felt someone grabbing his shoulders and speaking to him. Jamie kept his eyes closed and just listened.
“Jamie! Thank goodness you're okay. You are okay right?” Kiva started checking him for injuries.
“Kiva, is that you? I... don’t know if I’ll make it. Everything is so hazy.”
Kiva started to put on a spacesuit to head outside. “I’ll get you some help. We seem to have landed in some sort of settlement. Don’t give up on me Jamie. There has to be something I can do?”
“There is. Just hold me until... the end.” Jamie leaned into the space marine’s chest. Kiva reluctantly wrapped her arms around his back to comfort him in his final moments.
“There's one other thing you could do for me Kiva. Could I... could I...”
“Yes Jamie?”
“...get one kiss,” he whispered.
“What! Are you serious?” The redhead would have pushed him out the window right then, had he not been dying in her arms. That and the air outside could be poisonous.
“If I’m going to die, I want to have kissed a pretty girl my species one last time.”
Kiva blew one of her bangs around with a heavy sigh. “Fine, just one, but only because you’re so pathetic.”
Jamie stood up to Kiva’s eye level with her help. Slowly their faces drew closer. Kiva’s blue lips puckered for the regrettable kiss until...
“Hahahahah.” A loud laugh could be heard from the back seat. “Damn, Kiva. I can’t believe you fell for that one.”
“Coop! I would have gotten away with it too, If it hadn’t—” Kiva smacked the punk in the face with a solid back hand.
“Ow! Did you have to hit so hard? I didn’t even get a kiss.” Jamie rubbed the red hand print on his cheek. He moved his sore jaw around in front of the rear view mirror.
“Why don’t you call yourself lucky. Back in the Resistance Army, I would have broken a man’s arm for pulling a trick like that.”
“Well sorry,” Jamie said in complete sarcasm. “You can’t blame a guy for trying.”
Kiva gave him a cold, dead stare. “I can and I will. You just won’t know when it’s coming.”
Coop leaned forward between the front seats. “I don’t mean to interrupt, but what the heck is sitting on the hood of my car?” He pointed at a purple mass on the hood of the Plymouth.
“I was going to check that out after I made sure you two were okay. It looks like some kind of alien life form. I can't tell you much more from looking at what I presume is the creature’s hindquarters.” Having seen many aliens in her time, Kiva didn’t seem fazed by the sight of this purple thing.
“Can’t you just say butt?” Jamie asked bluntly.
Kiva just stared at him, unamused and still angry.
Jamie didn’t pay her any heed. “Do you think it’s... you know, dead? Why don’t you scan it with your fancy laptop projector thingy?” He asked, pointing a shaky finger towards the windshield.
“My holo computer was busted in the crash,” Kiva said, indicating a cracked red device in her belt buckle. “I can’t even tell you where we are... what are you doing?”
Jamie had turned on the windshield wipers, which were repeatedly hitting the unidentified creature just above its tail. “I was just checking if it was alive.” Nothing happened for several moments. Suddenly Jamie started rolling down the window, much to Kiva’s horror.
“Don’t open that! Is there air?! You don’t know!” She said as she donned a helmet and thrust the only spare helmet to Coop. Saving the pilot was not so sadly more important than a skinny, squeamish, simpleton.
Jamie took a few breaths of air, “Seems okay to me.”
The space marine double face palmed and contemplated how she got into this whole mess. She needed time to think. They were on an alien world and she was their best bet of getting off alive. She decided the best way to cope, would be to ignore them.
“Hey guys, I’m going below to see if I can get power to MEGAS. If Jamie starts bloating or turning yellow from the poisonous atmosphere please hesitate to get me. Oh, and try not to do anything stupid,” Kiva said, disappearing down into the giant robot. As soon as the sounds of the maintenance lift became silent a big grin formed on Coop’s face.
“Hey Jamie, I dare you to touch it,” Coop said.
“No way! I ain’t touching some weirdo alien.”
“I double dare you, and raise you a Mega Slush,” Coop challenged him.
Jamie shook his best and only friend's hand. “You’re on!”
He slowly reached out around the side of the windshield with his skinny left arm and poked it. “Hey this thing is super soft.” Jamie started petting the foreign creature with his fingertips.
“Bring it in here. I wanna see it before Kiva gets back,” Coop said excitedly.
Jamie grabbed hold of it’s tail and pulled it off of the hood. “I can’t pull it up!” Jamie wheezed while the furry thing dangled outside the car door.
Coop grabbed him by the shoulders and together they pulled it into the car like landing a big fish.
“Well, we're not getting power anytime soon and... What the heck is going on here?” Kiva had climbed up to find the two young men petting the crap out of what appeared to be a plum-violet, winged unicorn.
The two looked at her like a pair of deer in headlights, then frantically tried to shove the thing back out the window.
Kiva joined the wrestling and seized the mystery lifeform. She settled back into the passenger seat before leering at her companions.
“What are you going to do with it?” Jamie asked while he rolled the window back up.
“I don’t know, but it looks like it has some sort of identifying mark on its flank. Maybe it’s someone's pet.” Suddenly Kiva found herself clutching it in her arms. It lay upside down like a cradled cat. She looked down at its little fuzzy face and couldn’t stop from smiling.
“Aww, It’s so cute and fluffy. How could you guys be so heartless?” She said as she played with one of its purple ears.
Jamie and Coop looked at her like she had lost her mind. Never had they ever seen the the warrior badass act ga-ga over anything. All three passengers were too distracted to notice one of their ‘guest’s’ legs twitch.
Kiva looked indignant. “What? Just because I lived in a military base for most of my life, doesn't mean I never wanted a pony like normal earth girls.”
Jamie and Coop continued to stare at her, then burst into laughter.
She sighed deeply. “This is because I kill aliens for a living, isn’t it?”
Kiva noticed the weight in her arms shifting and looked down, only to come face to face with a set of impossibly huge violet eyes.
In just a split second the inside of the car became a flurry of wings, hooves, arms, and legs, as the winged beast frantically tried to find a way out. The three humans were left to dodge its flailing limbs and cover their ears from shrieks of fear.
Jamie started pulling levers and pushing buttons in a panic, until a clank of metal and a lurch of the car stopped everyone from moving. The hot rod rolled forward then tipped over the edge of MEGAS’s torso. It stopped there just long enough for everyone in the car to simultaneously say, “Uh oh,” before it roughly rolled down the front of the giant mech. The car launched off a ramp made of wreckage and landed miraculously upright in town square. Sometime in the mass panic, the purple creature had either fainted or been knocked out.
Coop broke the silence not a minute after landing. He pulled off the space helmet and squeezed between the passenger and driver’s seat to get to the door. “Well I’m hungry. I think I saw a giant gingerbread house on our way down.”
Kiva stopped the scrambling behemoth by grabbing hold of his arm.
“Hey, what gives?”
She simply pointed out the window. Coop just now noticed that they had been surrounded by an entire town of multicolored little horses, and two larger but still weird looking equines with crowns and necklaces.
“They look perfectly harmless to me,” he said nonchalantly.
“Yeah, they're just a bunch of girly little miniature horses. What are they gonna do, shoot rainbows at us?” Jamie chimed in. “Though, those two bigger ones look kinda mad.” The three passengers took a moment to look at the aliens in the front of the crowd.
One of them was a dark blue color, with a mane that looked like a snapshot of the night sky. The other one was slightly taller than her counterpart and had a white coat with a multicolored pastel mane. Both beings looked thoroughly displeased.
Coop continued to shuffle towards the door. “C’mon Kiva, I’ll get you guys some giant gumdrops. Ooh, and maybe some giant candy canes!”
“Coop, don’t forget to check for some licorice,” Jamie said as he tried to avoid getting squashed by Coop’s fat.
Kiva finished massaging her temples. “I’m starting to think these beings are more than just simple animals,” she said, eyeing a goofy eyed grey pony with what appeared to be a bag of... muffins? “If you're leaving MEGAS to get mauled by the populace then count me in. There isn’t much else to do around here.”
They all exited the car. Coop and Jamie clumsily spilled out from the driver’s side door, followed by Kiva, carrying the little lavender unicorn in her arms.
The herd of animals around the car all scurried away except an orange one with a cowboy hat and a bright pink one, which pulled out a tub of popcorn. The town’s occupants galloped around looking for any shelter they could find. One closed the door to a structure that lacked an entire wall.
If that wasn’t enough weirdness, the large blue horse, which was wearing what resembled a dark crown on its head, started yelling in... Shakespearean English? “WHAT HAST THOU DONE WITH MY SISTER’S STUDENT?!”
Looking from the big horse to the little one in her arms Kiva said, “What, this? I think she just fainted from all the excitement.”
“Do you take us for foals?!” The white one added, nodding her head to a nearby group of golden armored equines.
In seconds, the humans were surrounded by a small army of armored bat winged ponies, gold clad pegasi, and angry unicorns. One, with a fancier helm than the rest stepped forward from the circle.
---XLR---
“Put the Princess down and your hooves in the—” The Lunar Guard Captain was interrupted as Luna whispered something in his ear.
“Thy enemy does not have hooves.”
“I can see that your Highness, but I think they get it.”
“Dost thou see thy enemy surrendering Night Barb?”
“Well no, but if I start over now, I won’t seem as scary. When did Princesses become damsels in distress anyway your Highness? The mere thought is silly.”
While they seemed to argue, they didn’t notice the tall red-headed one reach behind her back for something.
“Surrender the princess, put your arms in the air, or prepare for defeat!” Night Barb said, as they closed in on the strange invaders.
“Well which is it? Should we put our arms up? Should we give you the princess, or should we prepare for defeat?” Coop asked, surprising even Kiva with his astute remark. Night Barb seemed to be thinking through the question.
“Kiva, do something!” Jamie urged.
She backed up against the red car, as ponies continued closing in around them. “Let’s not be too hasty here, this is all a misunderstanding. I’ll give you your Princess back, we’ll repair our giant robot and be on our way. We just crashed on your mini horse planet on accident. We mean you no harm.”
“Likely story,” The bat winged pony huffed. “Seize them!”
“HALT! Give them a chance to speak on their behalf. Who is the operator of this monstrosity?” Luna asked, gazing at each of the humans.
“Don’t look at me, Jamie was driving,” Coop said while pointing under the car at the cowering little man-child.
“Is this true, fiery maned stranger?” The pony asked.
Jamie looked to Kiva for help. “Bail me out here, please. You're not gonna hold that harmless little joke against me now? Oh yeah, Coop you still owe me ten bucks.”
“No, the bet was that you could get Kiva to kiss you some day,” Coop said with a smug smile. “We agreed lip to lip contact.”
Kiva just shook her head. Jamie sighed and waited for Kiva’s badass plan to save him. She smiled at the little punk.
“That’s him. He’s the pilot of that giant robot. I’m just the navigator. Coop there is the mechanic...”
Suddenly the animal in Kiva’s arms leapt from her grasp and glided to the other two winged unicorns. “Don’t trust any of them. The red maned one is an alien assassin! She’ll kill us all!”
The two regal sisters became rigid.
“Is this true? Have you ended the lives of other alien life?” Celestia advanced forward a few steps as she spoke.
If there was ever a time Kiva wanted her two companions to keep their traps shut, it was now.
“Oh yeah, she’s killed countless aliens with us. We even blew up a few planets, usually on accident. Like this one time, I accidently destroyed an entire ring world thingy that happened to be a giant library...”
“A WHOLE LIBRARY WORLD?! DESTROY THEM!” Luna and Celestia looked between them to see Twilight’s mane on fire and backed a few steps away. The lunar and solar guards charged on their princess’ command.
“Come on Kiva, you can take them. That girly one over there has pink hair,” Coop pointed and laughed.
“I’m a stallion.” No one seemed to hear the poor chap amongst the thunder of hooves in Ponyville square.
Kiva pulled a taser from behind her back and aimed at the nearest opponent. “Why do you have to be soo cute?” she asked no one in particular as she struggled to pull the trigger.
“You think we’re cute—” The guard was silenced.
She had fired at the guard’s exposed belly. An electrical current surged through his body as he writhed on the ground.
Using her cat like agility, she pounced onto the hood of the hot rod. The soft top bowed under her weight, but held firm. Coope didn’t protest, as he was focused on the two sets of furry legs sticking out from under his wide frame. Jamie screamed and ran laps around the Plymouth Convertible, a half dozen guards hot on his heels.
With a spin kick, Kiva dropped two more incoming foes. They landed in the growing pile of ponies around the 1970 Plymouth Barracuda. One of the pegasi charged from the sky. Kiva dodged to the side at the last second and grasped its front hooves. The pegasus was easily thrown to the side with his forward momentum. KIva cracked her knuckles and gestured for more.
Luna watched with sincere interest as Kiva shoved another cartridge in her taser, backflipped off the metal chariot, and nailed another one of her loyal guards. She was pleased that at least four more of her sister’s solar guards had fallen than her fearsome Night Brigade.
The Night Princess could tell her ponies were left largely unhurt by each of the alien’s attacks, something she could respect in these invaders. She was beginning to think that they may have been telling the truth about coming in peace. She would need to see something for herself first hoof.
“Lu Lu, what are you doing?” Celestia asked with concern.
“We thought you agreed to never address us that way amongst the common populace... Tia.” Luna strode off.
“Tia, Lulu, really?” Twilight snickered, her mane slowly returning to normal.
---XLR---
Luna strode through the battle scene, easily dodging the occasional flying body, stopping thirty hooves from the raging red ravager known as Kiva.
At some point, what Luna now figured was a female amongst these aliens, had gotten out a long metal polearm. She was swinging it with dexterity beyond any being on equestria.
“It seems that females are also the superior sex on your world”, she said, as Kiva rolled onto her back thrusting her feet into the golden chest plate of one of Celestia’s door guards.
“Ha, that’s mostly because most of the men died in battle against the Glorft.”
“It is nice to see our guards get some well needed practice. ‘Tis hard to get field experience when threats most serious only come around every thousand years or so." Luna watched as Kiva grabbed a unicorn’s horn and used it as leverage to hold them out in front of her. Kiva’s fluffy shield absorbed two incoming stun spells before she dropped him.
“Does that mean you think I’m a serious threat?” Kiva asked as she planted her collapsable bo-staff in the ground, vaulting onto the back of a pegasus guard and skidding to a halt in front of Luna.
“That is to be seen, one they call Kiva.”
The Lunar and Solar Guard knew better than to get involved and concentrated on the fat and skinny duo. Luna simply blocked a taser bolt with a shield and advanced.
“So you have TK abilities, hardly seems fair,” Kiva said throwing away her spent taser. Grasping her metal bo-staff in both hands, she steeled herself for the oncoming fight.
Luna circled her new opponent. “I won’t need my magic to defeat the likes of you.”
Kiva looked from her captured friend and a half, and back to the dark unicorn before her. She extended her hand palm up, then twitched her fingers towards herself. “We shall see. Come at me.”
Luna, the Artist of the Night Sky, and Kiva, Intergalactic Defender of Earth, stared into each others’ eyes. The two fighters paced around an invisible point in the ground, panting in exhaustion from the fierce hoof-to-hand combat.
Kiva’s bo-staff had been stomped clean in half and kicked away not moments ago. The Lunar and Solar guard encircled the fighters and the red metal space chariot. In the very unlikely event that this alien beat their princess, Kiva wouldn’t be getting very far.
Luna snorted once before dashing towards the human. Kiva readied herself to dodge the princess’s horn, but was surprised to find her opponent changing direction.
Luna had planted her front hooves and spun around at the end of her charge. She struck out with both her back hooves making contact with one of them. Kiva managed to catch the hoof in both her palms, but the force of the buck rammed her hands into her gut, sending her sliding back a few feet. Kiva worked to regain her breath while Luna repositioned for the next strike.
The alicorn pushed her advantage and came in for another charge.
“Not this time,” Kiva panted.
As Luna went for another buck, Kiva dived to the ground and rolled underneath her adversary’s dark body. She delivered a solid kick to Luna’s underside. The princess coughed and lost her balance, falling to her sore belly.
Kiva tried to get up quickly for a follow-up, but her left leg was caught under Luna’s heaving chest.
“You lookest to be tiring out,” Luna said, continuing to stare at her opponent's emerald eyes.
Kiva raised her guard a few inches keeping her view of the dark horse inches above her fingertips. “Yeah, well you don’t look so hot either, but it has been a good fight.”
“What dost thou mean has been?It has been over one thousand years since we have fought like this. We are how you say, ‘just warming up.’”
“Just how old are you?” Kiva asked.
The winged unicorn smiled at her in pleasure, showing off some fangs she somehow missed spotting before. In a few wing beats Luna was off the ground and out of reach. Luna released a ferocious growl, charging again at Kiva with her horn lancing forward.
Kiva twisted her torso at the last second of Luna’s charge, causing her horn to pass harmlessly by. She grabbed grabbed the spiraling appendage, ready to throw the princess with her forward momentum.
The Alicorn's wings spread wide to slow herself, having seen through her opponents plan. Luna tossed her head upwards as soon as Kiva grabbed hold, expecting the alien to go flying or at least loosen her grip. Instead, Kiva was launched upwards still holding firmly to the horn. The human twisted around and landed squarely on Luna’s shoulders.
“You look really good for your age by the way,” Kiva quipped.
Princess Luna’s eyes widened at the prospect of an alien riding on her back. No one had ridden on her highness's back in centuries, especially not in public.
---XLR---
By now most of the town had come out of hiding to watch the Moon Princess fight with the alien.
“Princess, shouldn’t we go in and help or something?” Twilight asked as she watched Luna trying her hardest to buck the alien off of her back. Some of the surrounding guards started to move in, but Luna motioned them to stay put.
“Just let her have her fun; my sister can take care of herself.” Celestia grabbed some popcorn offered by Pinkie Pie. “Remember that she hasn’t used an ounce of magic yet.”
Twilight was shocked. “Fun? FUN! How can fighting extraterrestrials that crashed in from the sky be fun.” Twilight’s ears folded back as she looked up at her mentor, her nose scrunched up in consternation.
“You know you can just call me Celestia. Princess is just so formal for the two of us.”
“Can I call you Tia?” Twilight giggled, only to get a stone cold stare form Celestia.
“No, you can call me Celestia.” The white alicorn smiled warmly at Twilight. “Only Lu L— I mean only Luna gets to call me that. Back when we were young and adventurous like you and your friends, she used to call me that.”
Twilights violet eyes lit up. “You two had adventures! Did you fight changelings, wrestle dragons, and save everypony with your magic?”
“Indeed we did, Twilight. All three of us.”
“All three?” Twilight had lost focus on the fight completely.
“A young draconequus tagged along and gave us great ideas for pranking the castle staff.”
“Are, are you saying you used to hang out with the God of Chaos... as friends?” Twilight sputtered.
Celestia turned back towards the circle of guards. Luna had taken flight above the town’s center, using aerial maneuvers to try and free herself of the foreign passenger. “I think it is about time we got to know these aliens. I’d like to talk to them all together.”
“But you didn’t answer my question,” Twilight grumbled, catching up to Celestia.
“Discord and I... may have dated for a while,” she said quietly, so only the little alicorn could hear.
Twilight never noticed the slight blush on her mentor’s cheeks. She was too busy grimacing at the images in her head.
“Eww. You don’t still like him; he’s kinda old and stuff, isn’t he?.”
“Twilight! Are you calling me old?” Celestia looked affronted, holding a hoof to her chest.
Twilight instantly bore a frantic expression. Her ears twitching wildly. “What, no! Of course not! I... just meant... you know... being an alicorn and...”
Celestia just giggled in her princess-y way and continued to the center of the crowd forming in the middle of town.
“Hey, that wasn’t funny!” Twilight huffed. She followed after Celestia, just now noticing a riot had started in Ponyville.
---XLR---
A few minutes earlier...
“Of all the planets to be marooned on we had to land on talking horse land.”
“They can’t be all bad. That crazy pink one gave me this tray of cupcakes before the guards dragged her away,” the larger of the two prisoners said.
They had only captured the two aliens ten minutes ago and the skinny one had been talking non stop. Night Barb walked closer to the two prisoners who had been secured back to back in a sitting position. “What are you whining about this time, Jammy?”
“For the last time it’s Jamie! Jay-meee. Say it with me, Jamie. And I’m not whining, I’m complaining. Why do you care anyway?”
“The princess’s orders were to treat you well until they decide what to do with you. As well as prisoners anyhow. Unfortunately, that means I have to pretend like I care for you two,” the Night Guard Captain deadpanned. Jamie just grumbled under his breath.
“You’re just sad we didn’t get stuck on the planet of the space chicks or something,” Coop said, spewing crumbs of cupcake all over his lap.
Night Barb’s eye twitched slightly. “What would be so good about being stuck on a planet of alien baby chickens? You must be truly sinister beings.”
“Not chickens, hot babes?” The guard just stood confused. “Swankalishous? Hot stuff? Foxy fems? C'mon man, you're killing me. Far from good, good from afar?” Jamie tried to lift a hand to his face only to be stopped by the iron cuff attached to a chain. As far as shackles went those were pretty comfortable. They even had some sort of padding to prevent chaffing.
“I mean pretty women!” Jamie yelled. Anypony nearby that wasn’t staring at them before was now.
The bat pony raised a brow over one eye. “Are you saying that our mares are unattractive?”
Jamie tried to throw his hands up, but was again foiled by the restraints.“Yes, that’s exactly what I’m saying! You’re a bunch of rainbow colored talking horses. I can barely tell the difference between you fuzzballs.” There were many feminine shouts of protest from the crowd, as well as upturned noses.
“So you're not only calling our females ugly, but you’re saying that you can’t tell the difference between a mare and a stallion?” By now Night Barb had his muzzle inches away from the space invader.
“Hey, Jamie, I think you may want to quit talking now,” Coop whispered anxiously, eyeing the crowd that he guessed was mostly females.
“You heard this guy, he can’t touch us unless the namby pamby princesses say they can. Kiva’s gonna beat that dark one any minute. Then there’s only one more until we can get the heck outta here.”
“Did you just insult the princesses!?” The guard flared his leathery wings.
“Jamie, normally I’d be all over stringing insults against aliens holding me prisoner, but I still need to fix MEGAS.”
Jamie was too lost in his rant to hear Coop’s pleas.“Yeap, I think the fat white one with the rainbow hair—” The rest of Jamie's words came out as unintelligible mumbling. Coop had plugged his friend’s mouth with a half eaten cupcake, but the damage had already been done. Not even the ring of guards could save them from the tide of irate mares and angry townsponies.
---XLR---
Celestia craned her neck upwards. “LUNA. I THINK IT’S TIME TO STOP PLAYING WITH THE ALIEN AND COME DOWN HERE,” she said in the Royal Canterlot Voice.
“WE ARE NOT PLAYING. THIS IS A COMBAT MOST SERIOUS.”
“So, youre name is Luna, huh? I knew you must have been holding back.”
“As were you, visitor.” The princess dived steeply downward then opened her wings like chutes, sending Kiva flying forward.
Kiva looked up, grasping the end of Luna’s starry mane. “I’m guessing you don’t want your... ponies to think you were just playing with the ones who crash landed in your little town, huh?”
The princess nodded, causing Kiva to swing a little.
“And I’m guessing your citizens don’t normally fight your guards to pumble prisoners, do they?” She said as a last ditch effort to distract her opponent.
Luna took the bait and looked down upon the ring of guards who were trying to hold back a mass of ponies without harming them.
In other words they were being utterly useless, asking them to nicely disperse and standing in the way while the crowd tried to clamber and fly over them. In the midst of the mayhem, stood Celestia, working with the guards to restore order.
Kiva found herself floating in some kind of energy field as she and Luna raced towards the ground.
“ENOUGH!” Luna landed amongst the angry mass, which froze at her command. A number of guards crawled out from under a pile of mares, while others were stopped in the middle of dealing with ponies wrestling, biting, and flailing about.
The two humans stopped trying to crawl away from the scene and Kiva found herself floating over to her companions to be quickly shackled as well.
“What is the meaning of this?” Luna asked, stomping her hoof. “You, the one with the three carrots cutie mark, what hath occured here?”
Carrot Top recoiled from the attention. “What, me? Well th-the sickly skinny one wearing the blue hat called all the mares ugly.”
“Since when has it become excusable to form an angry mob over such subjective name calling?” Celestia broke in.
A small white and brown colt stepped forward from a guilty looking crowd and up to Celestia. He spoke in a Cockney accent. “Excuse me princess, but he also called you some not so nice things.”
“And what would those things be?” Celestia smiled and leaned in so Pipsqueak could whisper in her ear.
Celestia's ears slowly folded back, her face contorting into a teeth clenching rage.
“They called me fat! FAT! Luna, you said you couldn’t tell!?” She pointed a trembling gold clad hoof at Jamie. “You! One thousand years dungeon!”
“Great job, Jamie,” Coop and Kiva said in unison.
Luna draped a wing over her sister and nuzzled her side. “Now sister, we must review the crime reports first. A nearby guard took that as his cue to pass her a stack of papers, which she read aloud.
“The charges on the ape-like beings are as follows:
Disturbing the peaceDestruction of property, both public and private, including but not limited to:Two houses: of One Ms Doo and One Ms HeartstringsSix market standsPonyville Bowling Alley: private businessQuills and Sofas: private businessTown HallBridle Street and Green Pasture AvenueInciting a riot or public disturbance”
Kiva noticed the purple alicorn blush at that one, having been guilty of that one at least once.
“Verbally insulting ponies, including her Royal Highness, Princess Celestia
Luna finished reading the charges and rolled up the scroll. “Well, this is certainly quite a list, but unfortunately does not equate to anywhere near one-thousand years in the dungeon. We think it would be a waste of resources to house beings for such a time anyway.”
There was an audible sigh of relief from the aliens and a fist pump from Coop.
Celestia spoke, having calmed down quite a bit. “What sort of punishment is in order?”
Some ponies in the crowd took this as their cue to give suggestions.
“Make them eat one hundred carrots!”
“Hey! Carrots are good,” protested Carrot Top.
“Then make them explode, then explode again!” said a fat little colt.
“How about... two-thousand years dungeon!”
“Or locking them in a room with Pinkie Pie for a week!”
“Yeah! Lock me in a room with them so I can make new space friends!” all eyes shot towards Pinkie Pie.
---XLR---
Luna finished reading the latest book on Equestrian law from the library. “Eghemm! We have chosen a righteous punishment,” Luna declared, releasing the bonds from Coop and his friends.
“We have, sister?”
“The punishment, for all the crimes listed and unlisted, shall be... community service!”
Coop walked over to his car and leaned a hand against the hood. “So what, you want us to pick up trash off the streets for a day and we can just leave? I don’t really do the whole cleaning thing very well.” He emphasized with finger quotes.
“You misunderstand. You will restore Ponyville to how it was before your arrival. You shall stay here until that task is complete.”
Jamie brushed the dirt from his jeans and hoodie. “Can I be excused from this? I have to go save Earth and stuff. You know, giant robot business.”
Kiva interrupted before Luna could speak. “What Jamie is trying to say is that we can’t stay here. The fate of our planet hangs in the balance. Once we repair MEGAS, we’ll leave your planet in peace.”
“Yeah Kiva, you tell ‘em. There is no way I’ll be sticking around this stinking horse planet. Things are way too girly around here,” Jamie said folding his arms.
“THIS is not a request!” Luna stomped the ground. “You will be stuck here as long as your monstrosity needs repairs, and your ‘pilot’ can not fly it. Is this not the case Jammy?”
Kiva had a good idea of where this was going. She almost decided to warn Jamie, but this Luna character had a point. They were stuck here until repairs were complete, so they may as well help clean up their mess. Besides, Coop could still pilot MEGAS despite what might happen to his punk friend. How could she refuse those adorable faces anyway?
“For the last time, it’s Jamie! Can’t any of you fuzzballs get it—”
A gold beam struck the mouthy teen’s body and he erupted into a bright sphere of light.
“Sister!” Luna yelled in panic.
Celestia shrugged with her wings and shoulders. “What? This is what you were implying, right? Now they can’t leave until they repay their debt to society.”
“I was implying that he be put under guard and kept away from his companions, not blasted... away...” Luna trailed off as the light from Celestia’s spell started to recede.
Jamie was suddenly aware of all the eyes on him. “What is everyone looking at?”
Luna scratched at her muzzle, while everypony and human watched Jamie trip over himself while attempting to hold up his pants. “This will keep them from leaving. Even if the other two could operate their machine of destruction, they will need us to reverse the spell.”
Celestia smiled. “Perhaps he will learn some humility and respect as well.”
The skinny idiot tried to walk upright towards Kiva and the Plymouth convertible, but he continued to trip over his baggy jeans. “Kiva, why do I feel all funny?” He looked down where his hands should be, but they were covered by his long jacket sleeves “I can’t feel my hands. I must be dying. Kiva, help!” He begged at the woman’s feet.
Kiva silently turned him towards one of the car’s side mirrors. What Jamie saw was a yellow furry thing staring back at him. What the crowd saw was a scrawny pony stallion wearing a green hoodie under a black jacket, oversized jeans, and a worn blue skullcap on his head.
Jamie clumsily pushed the hat off his head and poked at his ears, which gave a little twitch at his prodding. What came next was arguably the most girly scream anypony (including both princesses) had ever heard in Equestrian history
After his wail of shame, Jamie held his hairy face in his hooves and declared,
“I've become a furry!” Before fainting next to the red convertible.
Sompony finally broke the uncomfortable silence. “What a drama queen,” Rarity proclaimed.
Luna inhaled sharply. “Well, sister, this just leaves us with finding a place for our guests to stay. Perhaps—”
“HA, HA HAH, hee hee, HOO, wowee... sorry, big horse lady, this is just too funny,” Coope bellowed while wiping a tear away with a fat finger. “Were you saying something about a place to crash?”
Luna ignored the human’s odd custom of pointing at one’s friend and laughing at their misfortune. “The title is Princess Luna to you.” She coked her head slightly. “Haven’t you already crashed here?” Luna stood tall, letting her mane flow freely for a few moments. “We have been informed that the inn is full at the moment and the barracks only has room for two. Would any of our fair Ponyvillians be willing to house these visitors? Anypony who is not willing should step back now.” Most ponies moved to the edges of the square so they could still observe.
“Well they ain’t stayin’ at my farm that’s fer sure.” Applejack crossed her forelegs.
“Their fashion sense is terrible. They would simply disrupt my work.” Rarity moved beside Applejack in the crowd.
“I could let them stay at Sugar Cube Corner...” The Cakes vigorously shook their heads at Pinkie. “Nevermind. Ooh, they could stay at the library in Twilight’s mad mare lab! There’s lots of space there! And she can totally study them and learn their alien secrets.”
Twilight’s eyes flashed with excitement, but as she stepped forward, Celestia held up a hoof. “Why would I let these strangers and potential threats to the nation stay with my student, or any of the Elements for that matter?” Fluttershy actually looked disappointed. “We still need a volunteer who is willing to harbor these three.” By now, only a white unicorn with a spiky blue mane remained standing in the middle of Ponyville Square. She wore purple shades and stood bobbing her head to an inaudible tune.
“We will provide two of our top guards to protect you and any family or friends you reside with,” Luna added.
Celestia walked up to the volunteer. “Is there a particular reason you are willing to take this risk, Miss...”
“Just call me Vinyl. As for why I want to let aliens live at my crib, who wouldn’t? This will do wonders for my street cred on tour next year. And I bet these dudes have some sick music from space to spice up my tracks.”
Luna smiled at her sister, having only understood every other word from the musician. “This is DJ Pon3, the one who plays at my favorite night club and played at the royal wedding.”
Celestia couldn’t tell if this mare was even looking at her with those dark shades. “You do realize they could be dangerous and will be basically under your care until further notice?”
Vinyl shrugged. “I’ll take ‘em,” she said like she was at an auction house. “That red maned girl has got serious guts to take on one of you, but she didn’t really hurt anypony. The big guy seems pretty chill, too; and I ain’t even scared of the guy who just passed out.”
The princesses started a hushed conversation to the side. Coop and Kiva were bent over their transformed friend, poking and prodding away. Finally, Celestia cleared her throat to get everypony’s attention.
“Very well. These three strangers, Coop, Jamie, and Kiva, are hereby sentenced to community service until Ponyville is restored to its former state. They will be staying with Vinyl until their sentence has been served.”
Celestia and Luna took to the air. “Farewell, for now, my little ponies.”
“Wait! You’re just going to leave Megas in that building? We can’t exactly move it ourselves, let alone its missing parts. We’ll need construction equipment to even get started,” Kiva protested.
Luna turned back towards Ponyville. A blue aura enveloped Megas, slowly rising from the wreckage. The giant robot’s body floated over the town and out of view. A distant thud could be heard where it was deposited it in the local park. “If you require more assistance, we suggest you speak with Twilight Sparkle. We will be seeing you again Kiva... the Red Terror.”
With that Celestia and Luna flew for the capitol, chatting amongst themselves. All but one Lunar and one Solar guard followed behind their respective leaders.
WARNING: This chapter contains many character introductions, exposition, and regrettably very little MEGAS. We are currently working to rectify the issue and add more explosions, giant robots, and cheap wrestling moves into your future reading material. Please stand by.
---XLR---
“Another national security threat and another late train!” Octavia Melody shook her hoof at the moon.
First there was the railroad lockdown for Nightmare Moon’s return, then the train had literally flown off the tracks during Discord’s escape; customs closed stations during the parasprite infestation of ponyville, and the changeling invasion caused all the train traffic to stop for five days.
The taxi fare was murder for Octavia every time the trains stopped. At one time, Octavia had gotten an invitation to the Crystal Empire. She was delighted to use the ever reliable Crystal Line, but her hopes for smooth travel were devastated by an ancient evil king rising from the depths of the Frozen North.
Octavia complained to the Board of Transportation on many occasions, even going so far as to propose an underground rail system that could run even if the sun exploded, or something else crazy but not really unexpected happened.
“Oh, we assure you Ms Melody, this sort of disturbance will not happen again,” the Board had said. They had promised.
“Never again my hoof!” the musician snorted in indignation as she stepped off the train at nearly 3:00am. She refused the help of the bellhop, instead lugging her cello case down the steps off the train herself. Octavia tipped him anyways, considering it wasn’t his fault the trains were always late.
Walking through town, it was easy to spot all the destroyed buildings and foreign debris, but all Octavia cared about was sleep. Before long she stumbled through the door dragging her cello case inside. It was only a short trot from Ponyville Station to her duplex. Octavia deposited the case in the corner and stuck her fedora with pink ribbon on the hat rack. She was exhausted, her hair a mess, and her bow hung undone around her neck, but she was home at last. All she had to do now was conquer the stairs and collapse on her bed, only to be reborn to do it all over again next morning.
Octavia Melody sighed, before crawling up to the second floor. She passed Vinyl's door and opened up her own. With the flick of the lights, it was readily apparent that some giant blond haired creature had fallen asleep on her bed. Octavia just sighed a little deeper. This sort of thing wasn’t uncommon when living with Vinyl Scratch. They were both busy mares, so they agreed on a non-exclusive relationship to fill the gaps between each other's absences. This meant sometimes there could be any number of “guests” laying unconscious around the duplex.
But when she got home, her bed or the couch must be available for sleeping. That was the number one rule between her and Vinyl. Octavia had once fallen asleep on the couch, knowing a minotaur was flattening her box spring mattress upstairs, but by Celestia, she had the couch to sleep on!
“Just find your center and breath,” Octavia grumbled as she went back down to the living room. She didn’t even need to flick the lights on to know that somepony was on the couch. This was due to the horrendous snoring. Why Octavia hadn’t heard it before was anypony’s guess.
With the lights on, she walked around to the front of the couch to give the stallion a good thrashing, only to realize there was a Celestial guard sleeping right next to the yellow stranger. He had cotton stuffed in his ears. In the easy chair there was some strange creature sleeping away. It had red hair and some device covering both its eyes and ears. The lights went off with a exhaustive sigh from the earth pony.
“Stupid law ponies preventing my righteous thrashings! Back upstairs it is!”
This time Octavia noticed the note on her love’s door.
Sup Octy,
So like, these aliens crashed into town and I invited them to live here until they repay their debt to society or whatever. The moon guard guy is probably patrolling outside and the sun guard dude passed out on the couch. You can sleep with me tonight.
~ Vinyl.
Octavia pulled the note from the door, quietly walked into the room and up to the bed. She pulled the covers back on the small bed, before stuffing the note in her marefriend's mouth, pushing her to the side and tucking herself in.
To her credit, Vinyl only thrashed a little bit as she coughed down the dry paper. The DJ turned her head towards Octavia before wishing her a good night.
“Good night, Vinyl.” It was going to be one of those nights.
---XLR---
Coop hunched forward, sniffing the smells of food coming from below. He made his way downstairs and shambled through the living room. His eyes seemed slightly sunken and his limbs moved lazily as he trudged through the living room towards the modest sized kitchen.
Yawning, Coop acknowledged Jamie with an unintelligible grumble as he passed by the worn blue couch. His friend was just as skinny as ever and still wore his signature get up, though his blue jeans were now way too long for Jamie’s more stubby legs and he was practically drowning inside his leather jacket. Jamie’s face was hidden by his green hoodie, but Coop could see a tuft of yellow fur on his friend's exposed neck. Jamie made no sign that Coop had even seen him.
Coop was pleased to see three plates of food set up at the table, along with a huge pile of pancakes and something that looked like bacon. Two of the seats were taken up by Vinyl and some grey pony Coop didn’t recognize. The beaten oak table was tucked to one side of the kitchen near an open window.
“Come sit down right here!” Vinyl waved him over with a mouthful of pancakes.
“Vinyl Scratch! How many times have I told you not to talk with your mouth full,” the grey pony scolded. “In front of guests no less.”
Coop took a seat at the front end of the table. Even if the other two seats weren't already occupied, he doubted his size would allow him to squeeze in the chair between the wall that separated the kitchen and living room, or the seat between the dishwasher and table. Coop’s tiny chair creaked in protest under his girth.
Octavia cleared her throat and stood straighter in her seat. “This is Vinyl Scratch. You must have met yesterday. She’s a mare of the musical variety and my roommate. And you must be Mr. Coop, the alien, I presume? My name is Octavia Melody, professional musician and co-renter of this abode.” The word professional, was exaggerated as she glanced at Vinyl. Octavia extend her hoof towards Coop.
Instead of reaching out for her hoof, Coop grabbed the maple syrup and dumped it on the main stack of pancakes meant for everyone. After sliding the stack closer to himself he stuffed an entire flapjack into his mouth. Only when the bite was broken down enough to make air noises around it did Coop shake the pony’s outstretched hoof.
“Yeah, that’s me. I’m Coop, professional... giant robot mechanic, video game guru, and intergalactic wrestling champ.”
“I get the giant robot part, and the wrestling thing maybe, but how exactly does one become a video game guru, let alone what does that even mean?” Octavia looked halfway between confused and not really interested.
Coop grasped his belt with both hands, giving it an up-down shake. “I've played and beaten, more video games than anyone in the greater Tri-State Area, and probably all of New Jersey. I bet I've at least heard of, if not laid my hands on every game on Earth, minus the new gen stuff. The old school is where it’s at.” Coop started naming off consoles on his fingers like Atari, Dreamcast, and N64.
“Um, sorry, I didn’t understand any of that, which I suppose makes sense, you coming from another world and all,” Octavia said. “All I understood was “play” and “games.”
Vinyl smiled deviously at the dedicated gamer. “One of the clubs I played at just got a new arcade console. How would you like to expand your title to greatest gamer in Equestria as well. Of course you'll have to beat my high score first.”
Coop eyes twinkled with excitement and the two fist-hoof bumped. “You’re on!” His face scrunched up in thought for a moment. “Wait, you guys have video games? But I haven’t seen any T.V. dishes or screens anywhere.”
Vinyl sighed, setting down a glass of orange juice. “Celestia was worried that ‘if used irresponsibly, television could poison young minds and cause ponies to become lazy and uncouth.’ This videogame is a test of the technology on the public.” Vinyl threw her hooves into the air knocking a pitcher of juice over a plate of hay bacon. “Seems silly to me.”
Octavia retracted her hoof from the soggy hay bacon.
Coop nodded. “I mean, we humans have had T.V for decades and I turned out just fine,” he said grasping a handful of hay bacon and shoving it in his mouth. Octavia's face turned green as she watched grease dribble down Coop’s chin.
The man chewed once, twice, then three times, before spewing partially chewed bacon bits all over the table.
“WHAT IS THIS!?”
Coop had eaten some weird things in his day. He had tasted dishes from across the galaxy. However, there was always one constant, one thing he could pick out about any meal, and that was what real meat tasted like. Even soaked in citrus juices, Coop could detect that this was some vile excuse for the pan fried animal flesh he loved so dearly. This was on the same level of sinister darkness that is... vegan cuisine.
He rushed to the sink to wash his mouth out, only to collide with the grey musician. They were both sent sprawling to the kitchen floor. Coop landed on top, while Octavia held one hoof to her mouth frantically waving her free forearm towards the sink. As soon as the two were untangled she let loose the contents of her stomach into the stainless steel basin. Coop gasped between mouthfulls of water.
Vinyl just laughed hysterically, leaning further and further back in her chair.
“Woah!”
The unicorn pitched backward and she and the chair punched through the cheap drywall. There was a moment of silence before she continued laughing from the other side of the gaping hole between the kitchen and living room.
---XLR---
Coop and company had finally settled back down around the table, though a DJ sized hole in the wall still remained. Vinyl and Octavia had just finished explaining that while ponies are capable of eating meat (and some did), that most stuck to a vegetarian diet. The explanation was long, boring and not worthy of hours of unnecessary explanation.
There were tears and self induced hair pulling, but it looked like Coop might pull through. As long as he never had hay bacon ever, ever again.
“So there’s no meat around here?” Coop made a hopeful fat puppy face.
“Well there was that one guy, right Octy. You know the guy who traded with griffins?” Vinyl asked.
“I do recall, but he closed up shop a few weeks ago.” Octavia cleared her throat. “We are getting side tracked here. The point is, you’re living under our roof now, so it’s our rules or you find a new place to stay.”
Vinyl rolled her eyes. “Here we go.”
The cellist took in a deep breath. “First, when I get home I want my bed or at least the sofa free for sleeping. Mayor Mare said she could bring in some cots and another bed soon.
“In addition, wipe your hooves before entering the house and no hooves on the tables or ceiling. No mattress surfing on Tuesdays or Thursdays. Drunken fighting matches are only allowed in the ring down in the basement. No preening your wings on the couch. If you get in trouble with the Manehattan black market you’re on your own for three days or until you lose the heat. No manticores, nagas, cockatrice, or wolf bats allowed. I would say no wild animals allowed, but that would leave Vinyl with very few friends.”
“Hey! But Wolfie was just—”
“No, Vinyl! For the last time, Wolfie was not just trying to suck out the manticore poison!” Octavia exhaled through her nose. “Did you get all that.”
Coop nodded. “Seems pretty reasonable to me. I just have one question. Is betting allowed on the drunken fighting matches?”
“Why, naturally of course, but don’t talk about it. Now, I don’t know much about you people.”
“You mean humans, or Earthers if you prefer,” Coop interjected. “But you have to yell Earther in a gravelly voice or it just wouldn’t be appropriate for my culture.”
Octavia continued. “Right, humans. No biting or impaling, that includes stinging and stabbing with massively long claws. No sucking of bodily or spiritual fluids, including blood, aqueous and vitreous humour, spinal fluid, love or other emotions, magic, souls, chi, auras, and/or life giving metaphysical energy. You only get three warnings about this, so tread carefully.”
“But sucking the fun out of everything isn’t against the rules,” Vinyl said, leaning dangerously in her chair once again.
The grey mare ignored her. “And the last, most important rule.” Coop felt like something feral was staring into his soul, not unlike his mother back home.
“Never, under any circumstances, may you ever touch my Cello.”
“Trust me, Coop, don’t mess with the Cello. Even if Queen Chrysalis herself says ‘play me a tune or I’ll suck all your life juices leaving you a husk of your former self’, just let it happen.”
Octavia broke her stare and hoofed a quill to Coop. Considering the duplex classified as town property, the mayor had written something up regarding the additional tenants. He signed his name on the roommate agreement as ‘Harold Cooplowski,’ right under ‘Kiva Andru.’ Coop shook hooves with both ponies and Vinyl gave him another hoof tap.
Octavia smiled. “Alright, everything seems to be in order. That just leaves the blood pact that you won’t touch my Cello.”
Coop started walking towards the knife block. The last thing he wanted to do was anger another planet of seemingly peaceful beings and leave it in fiery rubble. Octavia held him back.
“Wait, you didn’t think I was serious about the blood pact did you? Only Vinyl has had to sign that contract.” Octavia squinted one eye, inspecting the fat man before her. “You seem pretty unfazed by all this? Most ponies go running and screaming at the start of our rules.” Octavia was honestly a little disappointed.
With a shrug, Coop uttered, “Eh. What did you expect from an awesome guy with a giant robot that can travel through space? I’ve been around. Speaking of MEGAS, I better go start those repairs.” He started for the door, but stopped at the sound of another question.
“What about your friend Jammy?” Vinyl asked. “He needs to sign this, but he’s been staring catatonically at nothing since we tried to wake him up this morning.”
“Oh, he'll be fine. This isn’t his first time. I got this.” He grabbed the roommate agreement and quill. Coop held the quill in one of Jamie’s hooves and signed ‘Jamie.’ He promised to explain the rules to him once Jamie stopped staring into the drywall. Finally Coop walked out the door to salvage his precious machine.
The door clicked shut and Octavia looked to her roomie. “What have you gotten us into Vinyl Scratch? The red-maned one, Kiva was it? She was fighting with royalty, and one of them got changed into a pony as punishment. Coop seems somewhat normal, except he’s obviously grossly overweight and he freaked out about not having meat!”
“I know. Isn’t it great!” Vinyl reached across the table and pulled Octavia over the ruined breakfast and into a crushing hug. “We're going to be so famous!”
If there was one thing Octavia couldn’t resist it was Vinyl’s enthusiasm and winning smile.
“I guess, but Coop and I are going to have a discussion about diet and exercise. I don’t want to be famous for living with the fat alien.”
---XLR---
“Halt, Alien! Where do you think you’re going?”
As soon as Coop got out the door, he noticed an armored pony stationed just to the side of his exit.
Coop waved his hands in front of himself. “Look, little pony bat thing. I don’t want any trouble. I’m just gonna go fix MEGAS, so we can start fixing the town.”
“Oh no, you’re not getting off that easy.”
Coop noted the dark batwings, reptilian eyes, dark fur and armor. In his travels he had seen many similar creatures, and there were always a few things he could count on.
“I take it you are either some sort of evil villain, or some dark mysterious character that is really just a stick in the mud? Let’s just make a truce right now, and we don’t need to get in each other's business.” It was just like that red demon guy with the black armor. That guy had thought Coop was evil and invited him to join in galactic conquest. Only someone completely full of themselves would wear black armor and have red skin.
“Peace?! It’s too late for that. Your evil metal monster almost killed Princess Twilight. I, as a lieutenant of Princess Luna’s Lunar Defense Division am responsible for any misconduct you and your friends cause.”
So it was the stick in the mud routine? He wasn't going to dismiss potential evil villain yet. Coop decided to nip this in the butt before things got out of hand. “Hey, just because MEGAS smashed up your little town, almost killed one of your leaders, got in a fight with another, and my friend called your big horse lady fat, does not mean we’re criminals. I mean, we didn't do the first three on purpose.”
Coop extended his hand to the guard. “Put ‘er there, bub.”
The guard stared at the hand for a moment, he knew the gesture from the red-haired one. He had shaken her hand in part because he didn't want her starting more trouble just because of a cultural misunderstanding and because she was utterly terrifying. Finally he shook Coop’s hand firmly. This was the monster’s mechanic, it was the pilot he should really be mad at after all.
“I’m Coop, what’s your name? Is it Dark Fury or Dark Night or something?”
“No, Dark Fury was my great grandfather. My cousin Dark Night works in another city.” The pony let go, whipping hay bacon grease off his hoof. “My name is something you will earn the right to know. Once you complete your punishment, I may tell you.”
He eyed the pony for a moment. “The name’s that embarrassing huh?”
“Well not that emb— I mean of course not.”
“I don’t know if I can work with someone who doesn’t even want to tell me their name. I don’t work well with people I don’t even know breathing down my back.”
The guard sighed. “I will tell you, but only if you promise to stay composed.” The human nodded noncommittally.
The pony spread his bat wings and held his head high. “My name is Honey Lily, second son to Victor Fury and a lieutenant of Princess Luna’s Lunar Defense Division.
The pilot was rolling with laughter not two seconds later.
“I will not be laughed at.” Honey Lily stomped his hoof in protest. “My parents decided to pass on my mother’s family name. She comes from a respectable long line of aquatic landscapers!”
“You’re killing me here. Just stop while you’re ahead.” With a name like that, maybe this guy deserved to become a villain and exact revenge for his name. Still facing the disgruntled guard, Coop moved towards where his car was parked last night.
“I guess I’ll be seeing you around then Mr. Lilly.” He lifted his hand to open the door, only to find his hand grasping at air. “Dude where's my car?!”
“You mean that red chariot with the corny flames painted on it?” the guard asked.
Coop started grinding his teeth. “Those flames are classic, and I painted those on myself.”
The guard gave no recognition to Coop's unrest. “Your friend Kiva said something about the central control module missing.” Honey Lily looked up at the clock tower. “She left about an hour ago with Lieutenant Stonewall to go find it.”
A roaring sound filled the air. Coop knew the sound as his custom V8 engine with 4-barrel carburetor, and dual exhaust. He turned just in time to see a lavender and rainbow blur leap from the open car doors and roll in the dirt. Within a moment, his precious car stuck itself through a nearby storefront.
The young man fell to his knees next to the tire tracks in the primitive dirt street. After lifting up a stray hubcap in one hand, his face shook with rage and he screamed into the heavens.
“CAAAAAAAR... CAAAAAAR!!!”
---XLR---
Somewhere, far away...
Gorrath watched over his minions and soldiers at work. He stood at the edge of a huge open scar in his ship’s hull with his arms crossed behind his back. The Earther’s weapon had nearly cut his flagship in half. Temporary energy shields were the only thing separating the glorft leader from the great vacuum. Wires hung down from the damaged sections of the ship, some still sparking with power.
One of Gorrath’s generals strode up beside him and handed him a holo-clipboard.
“Warmaster, repairs are on schedule.” The general’s tentacled mouth jiggled as he spoke.
“Very good general. And what of the scouting party?”
“We were able to track the weapon’s particle discharge trail. We have taken the data to form the most likely vector the Earther and prototype took. The trail appears to go deep into uncharted space.”
General Grogg cringed as The Warmaster raised an armored arm. “For once you bring me good news.” Gorrath patted the general on his slimey back. “Good news indeed.”
“No, no, no! You stay away from me!” Stonewall yelled as he flew to the top of MEGAS's core containment chamber. With the mech laying supine, the ceiling was actually the wall of the reactor room. He flapped furiously around the compartment, bumping into machinery and getting tangled in a web of wires. Meanwhile, the red headed she-witch ran around the room trying to pull him down with her grubby claws.
It was just like Shining Armor had said: aliens would come one day to enslave the pony race.
He had made fun of the Captain when Shining voiced his concerns about aliens, chided him when Shining submitted an alien incursion contingency plan to The Crown, and laughed when he found out the source of all the Captain's paranoia were some comic books lent to him by Princess Twilight’s dragon assistant. But here he was, backed into a literal corner, inside the bowels of an advanced alien spacecraft.
Stonewall heard rumors of forced labor in ancient Griffin history, but how could humans brainwash little girls into wanting their very own pony? Why would such an advanced society condone such a thing?
“You’ll never enslave me alive!” He shouted, and dive bombed towards Kiva.
The human had a welder’s mask pulled down to protect her face from a barrage of aerial hoof strikes.
“What are you even talking about? You're going to kill us all if you don't—” Kiva reeled back from a glancing blow to her mask.
She didn’t understand what had gotten this guy all riled up. One minute he was just watching her make repairs to MEGAS and talking about Earth, then he was flying around like a bat out of hell. Though now that she thought about it, the expression would be better associated with the bat-like pony back at Vinyl’s place.
“That is it!” Kiva picked herself off the floor and prepared for Stonewall's next charge. The next time the guard swooped down, Kiva took a knee and met his tackle. She wrapped her arms around his back and wings, before pulling her prey to the ground.
For a moment neither moved nor spoke.
“Are you, are you giving me a hug?” Stonewall asked the panting red headed alien.
“What?! No,” Kiva said quickly, almost letting go.
"Then what are you doing?"
"I needed to stop you from flying around and I didn’t want to accidently kill you in a chokehold.” Kiva noticed her ear was pressed against the side of Stonewall’s neck. “Jeez, you guys are even softer than you look.”
Stonewall cringed, then continued thrashing around for dear life. If he had known that following an alien into their giant robot would turn out so badly, he wouldn’t have bothered getting off Miss Octavia and Vinyl’s couch this morning, let alone volunteered for this mission.
---XLR---
Earlier that morning...
Rainbow Dash reluctantly shambled alongside Twilight Sparkle. Grocery shopping had to be the most boring thing in the world, just after clothes shopping and modeling with Rarity. The only clothing she would ever wear willingly was a wonderbolts’ flight suit.
Speaking of which, Twilight finished filling in Rainbow on what she had missed while at Wonderbolts flight practice.
“That’s pretty cool using your magic to save...” Rainbow Dash passed by three stands crushed by one of MEGAS's lost fingers. “...well mostly save the town. But I think I could have done it better, or at least cooler.”
Twilight forced a laugh. “Just like you didn’t get Coop out of my kitchen last night? How would you have done it ‘cooler,’ let alone at all? I stopped that blue death machine with the most powerful anti-gravity-well I have ever cast.”
Rainbow shrugged with her wings. “Thunderlane owed me a favor and got the alien out like you asked. As for your second question, you always use your magic. It’s like, totally expected. I would have done something more awesome.”
Twilight sighed, handing Daisy some bits, for a bunch of daisies. “And you would have stopped the giant falling robot how exactly?” Twilight interjected just before Rainbow entered full on boast mode. “As if it has nothing to do with you flying up there and trying to push it back with another Sonic Rainboom.”
Rainbow froze, her wings locking up. “How did you know exactly what my plan would have been?” Rainbow stopped to gasp. “Did you use that time travel spell again, without me!?”
“No, ‘you flying, it’s like, totally expected,’” Twilight mimicked Rainbow flawlessly. Though, deep down the crime against the Equestrian language she had just committed was piercing her very soul. It was well worth the defeated look on Rainbow’s face.
Rainbow opened and closed her mouth for a comeback. In a fit of desperation she pointed behind the princess’s head.
“Hey, look over there! That group of ponies is playing with the alien spacecraft!”
Any other day Twilight wouldn’t have fallen for one of the oldest tricks in the ‘Book of Simple Pranks,’ but then she remembered there very well could be trouble with the humans’ red metal space chariot they left in the street. “I guess I should go stop that or something?”
With her ego crisis averted, Rainbow darted into the crowd of bystanders towards the red metal space chariot. “Sounds good to me. I could use a break from all this shopping.”
“Rainbow, we've only been shopping for ten minutes!” Twilight yelled ahead. “And you still owe me twenty bits!”
“Yeah, I know. Don’t remind me,” Rainbow replied from the top of the muscle car.
Princess Twilight executed one of her famous face hoofs, earning a few gasps from bystanders. Copying the exact gesture was catching on within Canterlot and only the most refined ponies could pull it off like the princess.
Not long ago, a string of stores started selling “Like a Princess” garments and everything. This week, for a limited time only, you could get two shirts or hats for free with the purchase of a Twilight Scepter.
The clothing came with the phrases: “Lecture ponies, like a Princess.” “Read a book, like a Princess.” And last but not least, “Nerd out, like a Princess.” Sales went down recently once ponies realized the manager for the chain store was the God of Chaos. That, and the recent “Turn into a jet and fly into the sun, like a Princess” shirt wasn’t selling so well.
---XLR---
The crowd parted as Twilight approached the 1970 Plymouth Barracuda. “Alright everypony, disperse. This alien device could be dangerous.” She said with what Rainbow called Twilight’s mom face.
Rainbow flicked her wings at lingering ponies in a “git” motion. "That's right everypony! The fun police have arrived."
Twilight's hoof met her hardened forehead once again, this time throwing in her infamous Groan of Shame.
Four hours had passed since the pair of ponies finally found a way inside the metal deathtrap. Much to Rainbow's dismay, Twilight found the car manual in the glovebox. And of course, Twilight insisted on reading every page before letting her touch anything.
Twilight removed some stale french fries, before placing the manual back inside the glovebox. She carefully dropped the stale fries into a bag and labeled them for later study. The unicorn sat uncomfortably in the driver’s seat with Rainbow riding shotgun. “You know Rainbow? I meant everypony should leave the area in case of danger,” Twilight said while taking more notes.
“I know, I just didn’t listen. Now, which button do you you think starts it?” Rainbow asked, pressing a few random buttons.
The first, sent a rush of air from vents around the car and Twilight quickly covered her head in a magic bubble. The second, caused the words, “MISSILE LAUNCH FAILED. INVALID TARGET." to pan across a monitor in the dashboard.
“Are you crazy?! This could be a poison gas trap or something!” Twilight flailed in her forelegs in excitement, accidentally flipping the sun visor down. The car keys slid off and looped around Twilight's horn with a small jingling sound.
Rainbow took a few sniffs of air. “Eh, seems okay. You read the book thingy, can’t you just start this baby up already? At the pace you're going, I'll die of boredom before we get poisoned or blown up.”
"One, it’s called a manual, not a book thingy. Maybe if you read non fiction sometimes you would know that. Two, I need to insert the keys into the ignition, which I’m not going to do. Three, I have no idea what these other buttons do." Twilight fished what she assumed to be the keys off her horn.
“I’m just going to lock the doors and keep these safe." Twilight popped her seat belt and started to open the driver's side door.
Rainbow nabbed Twilight’s tail in her teeth. "And where do you think you're going? You know you want to see this thing in action just as much as I do."
Twilight stopped halfway out of the car. "No, no I don't. This thing is far too dangerous to mess with.”
Rainbow Dash wasn't about to give up. "Well if this thing is so dangerous, we can't just leave it here, where anypony can mess with it. We should move it somewhere safe, like Applejack's barn.”
“I’m sure she would love that. ‘Hey Applejack, we thought it would be a great idea to hide an extremely dangerous extraterrestrial device in your barn!’ I mean, that would end almost as well as asking Fluttershy if we could put it in her shed!”
“Awe common. We can ask Applejack when we get there. You can’t resist. You know you want to... for science—”
Twilight’s ears popped up like twin cobras ready to bite into new juicy discoveries. “How dare you use the ‘S’ word?”
Rainbow leaned in with a half spent ballpoint pen in her mouth. “I also found this space pen you could record all your science notes with. For science.”
"Shut up, shut up, shut up!" Twilight clapped her hooves to her ears.
She was desperately trying not to imagine the combustion engine firing away under the hood. It would be so simple to put the keys in and watch the engine at work. Next she found herself dreaming about shifting gears and the thrills of mirror adjustment.
“Fine. You win. I’ll drive, but as a Princess, I have to be responsible so we’re going to take this nice and slow. Put your seat belt on.”
Rainbow turned away to hoof pump. “Yes! Oh, and what’s a seat belt?”
---XLR---
Back in the present...
“And then Twilight crashed your spaceship into Quills and Sofas here. And your stupid seat belts made it really hard to jump out of your chariot.”
“Hey, I panicked and mistook the accelerator as the brake,” Twilight said in defense.
Rainbow snorted. “No one besides you would be such a spaz and drive into a store.”
“Ha ha! That’s really funny coming from the pony who crashed into the library on thirteen separate occasions.” Almost everypony in town knew Twilight had started a tally sheet by the library window.
“The library isn’t a store. You only let ponies rent books.”
Coop stopped making peek-a-boo motions with his hands in the hope that his car would magically appear good as new. He wedged his arms between the ponies to break up their shouting match.
"Woah, woah, woah! Girls, you are girls right?” The angry scowling answered his own question. “There’s no need to fight about whose’ fault this was, because both of you are helping me fix this.”
“We are?” Both mares asked in unison.
“Yeap. Besides, this is obviously Rainbutt’s fault.”
“It is?” Twilight asked, somewhat surprised.
“Yeah, it’s not your fault that you’re so nerdy you can’t help yourself.” Coop said as he took the keys from the stunned unicorn. “Plenty of clumsy people on earth mix up the brakes and accelerator.”
Rainbow pointed at her blushing friend. “HA!”
“Laugh it up now, because taking advantage of your friend's weaknesses for personal gain is uncool,” Coop said wagging a fatty finger. “I know, because I’m an expert at it.”
“He’s right Twi. I’m, ugh, sorry for taking advantage of your, whatever you call a disturbing attraction to science.” Rainbow said, sulking.
“The word you want is obsession, Rainbow. More importantly, did he just teach both of us a Friendship lesson and get you to apologize?” Twilight asked.
Coop re-adjusted his seat and backed the car out of Quills and Sofas. Glass shards and wood bits clunked to the shop floor. He noticed his two helpers were just sitting in the road like speed bumps.
“Well, are you getting in or what?” The alien asked with his arm hanging out the open window.
Princess Twilight placed a hoof on Coop’s door. “First of all, I don’t trust you or your friends, especially your friends. Second, where are we even going?”
“Well, usually by this point there’s some catastrophic emergency that can be solved with a giant robot fight or at least we try to solve the problem with a giant robot.”
Just then a computerized voice sounded from the distant park. “WARNING! MULTIPLE QUANTUM POWER CELL RUPTURES IMMINENT. EVACUATION ADVISED!”
“Uh, I don’t mean to interrupt whatever it is you’re doing, but are you open?” A passing pegasus asked.
Kushy Pen coughed and turned his sign from closed to open. “You aren't going to evacuate like the strange voice said to?”
The potential customer shrugged. “This is Ponyville, need I say anymore?”
“Nope. Welcome to Sofas and Quills!”
---XLR---
Kiva still had Stonewall pinned to the floor, when the loudspeakers blared.
“What in Tartarus was that?”
“That was MEGAS's automated warning system, which was tripped because someone has been flying around destroying very delicate equipment!”
“I’m assuming that's bad?” Stonewall asked.
“Unless you ponies like being vaporized, then yes.”
“Oh.”
---XLR---
Coop smiled. “Ah, see? I told you there would be trouble. Now get in.”
At Coop’s command, Rainbow Dash swooped through the window into the passenger seat. “See Twilight, he’s cool.”
“How do I know this isn’t some trick?” Twilight didn’t trust any of these aliens as far as she could throw them. Without magic that wouldn’t be very far. She’d almost suffocated under Coop’s weight in her kitchen. She certainly wouldn’t be winning any hoof wrestles with Kiva, either.
But she could totally buck that skinny punk to the ground. She smiled with the satisfaction of being able to beat up the wimpy teen, who had apparently destroyed a whole library world. She wasn’t about to forget that.
During her fantasy of beating up a teenage delinquent, she didn’t notice an approaching crowd of pegasi.
One of them was wearing a “press” hat and swooped down to the scene holding a microphone. They were followed by a sound crew and more paparazzi.
“Hello Canterlot! Tangled Web from Canterlot News Radio here with breaking news on the alien visitors. Some disembodied voice just yelled something about an evacuation. I’m sure Princess Twilight here can explain.” Tangled Web shoved his mic into Twilight’s face.
“Princess Twilight. Is it true that in order to keep peace with these aliens you let them eat somepony last night? You have been involved with the destruction of Ponyville at least six times now. If the town gets blown up today will you be taking advantage of your diplomatic immunity once again? What is your plan to deal with the magic-stealing centaur demon once he shows up here?”
Twilight teleported into the back seat of the car. “It’s the press! Drive, drive, drive!”
Coop put the pedal to the metal and covered the news crew in a spray of dust.
Tangled Web turned away from the speeding car, back to the unicorns taking pictures and broadcasting to radio. “There you have it, folks. Princess Twilight is fleeing the scene with guilt in her eyes.
“On another note, sources say one of the aliens was seen entering the Princess’s library late last night. Was this the fat alien’s attempt to take out our leadership or the beginning of an intergalactic love affair with our favorite librarian princess? Stay tuned!”
---XLR---
Once Coop and company arrived at Ponyville Park, it wasn’t hard to track down MEGAS. The ultra weapon was set lying on its back against a large grassy hill as if enjoying the lovely weather.
When Coop pulled up closer, Kiva shot out of an access shaft near the ground. Not a second later a white blur burst out of the shaft and tackled the fleeing human. The two hit the ground tumbling. They stopped rolling near Coop and two ponies as they exited the car.
Stonewall managed to pin Kiva to the ground with his hooves. “Thank goodness you’re here, Princess Twilight. The humans are here to enslave pony kind and give us to their female children! We need to—”
Kiva elbowed the guard in his exposed stomach. “Coop, MEGAS's power cells got overcharged somehow. We need to drain them now!”
“I’m on it!” Coop started towards the car, when he was lifted off the ground in a violet glow. “Hey! What gives?”
“I knew you aliens were up to no good. I won’t let you near your blue death machine.” Twilight said while she added Kiva to her magic bubble. “Stonewall, let's get these two to Canterlot. Rainbow, you can get Jamie from Vinyl’s place.”
“Wait, wait!” Rainbow swooped in to interrupt. “You have to say something cool, Like, ‘your reign of terror ends now’ or, or ‘you never stood a chance against the likes of us!’”
“You guys are wasting time!” Kiva yelled. “Any minute MEGAS's power cells are going to explode. Just ask your knight over there.”
“Is this true? Stonewall?” He shied away from Twilight’s “oh no you didn't” glare.
“I may have accidentally destroyed some stuff in there, before the big loud voice happened.” He tapped his front hooves together bashfully.
“Alright, I’ll let you two go. But after you fix this you’ve got some explaining to do, all of you!” Twilight said letting the humans go.
Soon the princess, the guard, the fastest flier, and the two humans piled into the red Barracuda. Coop took the car around the grassy knoll, then launched it over the top onto MEGAS. With the cockpit in place, the robot was ready for action.
Kiva continued to monitor the power systems on a nearby console from the passenger's seat. “Alright Coop, what’s your plan? I’ve got nothing.”
“Well the problem is too much energy right? Well, I’ll just shoot a bunch of energy based weapons until it’s safe.”
Kiva scratched her chin. “That... might actually work.”
Coop laced his fingers and cracked his knuckles. Now he was ready to work his magic. With the right arm and leg gone, his choice of weapons were limited. A minigun sprouted out of the mech’s left arm and a spray of energy blasts shot towards the sky.
He found his hands being slapped from the controls by Twilight’s familiar magic. She scowled from the back seat. “You can’t just shoot energy blasts into the sky, pegasi fly up there.”
“Okay, I’ll just shoot at that creepy jungle over there then.”
Twilight swatted the human again. “Don’t shoot that either! You might hurt some innocent creature or wake up an eldritch abomination!”
Coop turned around to face his back seat ponies. “Well excuse me, princess, but I need to shoot something so we don’t all die. What do you want me to do?” His question was answered by a small tremor. Followed by a series of tremors growing in severity.
“GREETINGS PONYVILLE. DO NOT BE ALARMED. I'M JUST HERE TO DRAIN ALL YOUR BODIES OF THEIR MAGIC!”
“Shoot that guy!” Twilight demanded, as she pointed to a giant demonic centaur creature.
“But you just said—”
“I don’t care! Just shoot him! Shoot him, shoot him, shoot him!” Twilight started mashing the minigun controls with a combination of magic and hooves.” The small projectiles just bounced off with little squeaky sounds, like a line of rubber ducks being stomped on at ludicrous speeds.
“You’ll have to find something more powerful. That single T-98 minigun isn’t draining the power fast enough. It also doesn’t look very effective,” Kiva added.
“I’m confused, tired, in life threatening danger, there’s a weird nerdy unicorn touching my robot, and worst of all I’m hungry. But giant monsters, I know exactly how to deal with this,” Coop said, ceremoniously slamming his fist onto a button.
Two telescopic barrels extended from the tops of MEGAS's shoulders. A blue sphere of light at the end of each cannon grew while the giant monster closed in.
“I SEE YOUR TOWN HAS A METAL GUARDIAN. NO MATTER. YOUR LITTLE TRICKS WON’T HELP YOU DEFEAT THE GREAT TIREK! I WILL DE—”
The first of two multi story tall energy spheres pelted Tirek in the jaw. He raised his guard to intercept the second before releasing a spit slinging “ROAR!” right onto the windshield.
Coop turned on the windshield wipers to clear the spittle. “Oh, come on! Someone already crashed my baby and now you have to go spitting on my ride too?!”
“Hey, what’s the S.C.A.T. cannon? Is that some jazz based musical weapon?” Twilight asked while pressing the big red “Activate” button.
Kiva and Coop both yelled in protest, but it was already too late. The chest compartment on MEGAS opened to unleash the enormous multi section barrel. The barrel physically pushed Tirek back from the mech, which he didn’t seem too concerned about.
Triek simply laughed at his pathetic competition and presented his chest. “GIVE ME YOUR BEST SHOT!”
The back of MEGAS opened up to suck in matter, just like it had before the cannon’s recoil sent them hurtling through space to this mini horse planet. Little did anyone know, but Spike the dragon had been burying a growing jem stash right in this very hillside.
The stash of gems and surrounding rock quickly filled the mass reserves. A beam of blue energy wrapped in a double helix of super heated plasma was sent right on target. The force of the blow lifted Tirek off the ground and flung him out of sight along a graceful arc. Where he landed, nopony knew.
He may have been yelling something like, “I’ll get you next time!,” but it came out more like, “AHHHRGH!”
It was probably just “AHHHRGH!”
The cannon kept sending a light display into the distance until MEGAS had further embedded itself into the hillside and all the power had been completely drained from the mech.
Twilight wiped her brow and sunk back into the hump seat in the back of the convertible.
“Well, it looks like that bought us a little bit of time. Rainbow, you’ve been really quiet this whole time. Are you okay?”
The princess trailed off upon seeing Rainbow’s bulging eyes and wide open jaw.
“Uh, Rainbow, say something?”
The pegasus grabbed her purple friend's face in her hooves. “That... was... so... AWESOME! Let’s do it again! He was all ‘I’m here to take your power!’ Then you and Coop were all pew pew zap, explosion! Tirek was all ‘give me your best shot,’ and you blasted him into oblivion!”
Twilight sighed. “We know, Rainbow. We were all there. I’m glad your okay, but I’m sure nothing like this will happen again.”
---XLR---
“... And that’s when we crash landed here in your little town. I know it’s hard to believe that we just happened to hit your settlement. However, the last thing we wanted is to be marooned on an alien world with no way to leave.”
Kiva finished explaining their origin story to the solar guard. Their goal now was repairing the main systems and collecting essential parts that crashed around town. In other words, the same thing Kiva was trying to do before her wrestling match with Stonewall and the impromptu battle with a demonic centaur thing.
Twilight had been summoned to the capital for some important meeting and Rainbow Dash was ordered to leave and stop pressing buttons in the giant robot. It was more like she was ordered, then dragged off by Twilight, kicking and screaming like a school filly all the way.
Stonewall gave Kiva a momentary glance as they walked back towards town. “Well, thanks for not killing me, even if Tirek might come back and destroy us all anyway.”
“I didn’t want to start an intergalactic war with yet another species. Besides, you guys are just too cute to kill.” Kiva cleared her throat. “Forget I said that.”
Stonewall huffed. “I am not cute! I am one of Celestia’s most trusted warriors and protectors. I am a Celestial Guard! But I guess I can’t expect someone from a planet full of brainwashing slave drivers to understand.”
“You're being weird again. I already explained that bit of history about little girls from human past. Although I guess that would be the present, considering I’m from the future.”
The pegasus snorted “The time traveling two-legged creature with blue lips is calling somepony else weird?”
“He has you there. You are pretty weird Kiva,” Coop said offhandedly.
The space marine let out a heavy sigh. “Can we just focus on how MEGAS's power cells got overcharged? I mean, the main reactor was damaged before we even entered this planet’s atmosphere?”
“Or did you purposefully set your robot to self destruct before you invaded the planet?” Stonewall accused. “I still think you guys are up to something. Princess Twilight doesn't trust you either.”
Coop either ignored the guard or didn’t hear him at all. “Unless the girly pony magic from Luny and Sparkle-butt somehow infected my robot, then I have no idea what’s going on.”
Kiva put a hand on Coops shoulder. “You’re a genius! I think I know what’s going on here, but I’ll need to run a few tests to check my hypothesis.”
Coop and Kiva halted in their tracks once they noticed their pegasis companion had stopped several paces behind.
“Your fat companion has said, ‘my robot,’ a few times now. He also knows his way around your death machine's controls.” Stonewall narrowed his gaze at the humans. “Coop is the real pilot here, isn’t he? You just lied so you could leave for reinforcements, didn’t you?”
Coop held up his hands. “Hey, let’s not get too hasty here.”
The pegasus charged right for him, but Kiva socked Stonewall in the gut before he could touch the blond behemoth. The smell of burnt hair filled the air at the edge of Ponyville Park and stonewall slumped to the ground.
“Jeezes, Kiva. What did you hit the poor fella with?” Coop lifted one of the guard’s legs, which flopped to the ground like a wet noodle as he let go.
“Think of these as a sort of electrified brass knuckles, she said holding out a handheld device with four finger holes and some metal studs for each knuckle. “I noticed this guy likes close quarters combat and he moves too fast to hit reliably with a projectile.” Kiva smiled as she flipped a switch causing electricity to arc over her knuckles. “Nothing says "get down," like a fist full of lightning.”
“Nice!” Coop slung the pony guard over one of his wide shoulders
In a bush nearby, three small creatures gasped in shock at what they had seen. The trio snuck out of their cover and made a beeline for the town library.
Kiva could hear the faint sound of someone yelling from over the next hill. The shout was followed by a brief horrible screeching sound.
Coop and Kiva were heading to the general location where MEGAS’ missing arm should have landed. Besides obviously needing the arm back, there were some tools and spare parts stored in the 150 foot metal appendage. Coop still had Stonewall the pegasus slung over his shoulder, as they plodded along through an oddly Earth-like apple farm.
As strange as finding familiar fruit on a foreign planet may have been, what Kiva saw next was even more out of this world. She stopped at the top of the hill overlooking vast fields of apples. A couple hundred feet ahead, three earth ponies and a pegasus were pulling on thick ropes with their teeth. The ropes were secured around the curled fingers of MEGAS’ severed arm.
“Well, that’s something you don’t see everyday,” Coop said. “I’m gonna go watch them fail miserably to move that.”
Kiva quickly grasped Coop’s free hand. “You can’t just waltz over there with one of their law enforcement officials draped over your shoulder unconscious!” Kiva panicked. “Who knows how many laws we’ve already broken?”
“Relax Kiva. We can just tell them what happened. What’s the worst that the little ones could do, anyway? And if this place is anything like Earth, we would probably only be charged with assault and battery of an officer, kid... pony-napping, and maybe conspiracy?” Coop finished counting off on his fingers. “Besides that, the dark-horse-lady already read all of the other charges against us, and those were pretty much the usual.”
Kiva scowled “You did not just ask “what’s the worst that could happen?””
“Okay, okay! I’ll just hide him in that small apple tree over there until we’re done here.”
“What? What if he wakes up? You can’t just leave the poor little guy in a tree all alone. He could be hurt,” She said, in a nearly motherly tone. “I just feel somewhat responsible for what happened back there.”
“What? The mini horse attacked, you defended me, that’s it.” Coop pointed into the tree ahead of him. “Look, there’s even a small blanket and pillow on this branch. He’ll be fine.”
Kiva sighed and conceded to the “hide the body plan,” except this time the body was still alive. “Sure, fine, whatever. I just never felt this bad about wiping the floor with a world’s species before.”
Coop hoisted Stonewall into the tree with the little sheet and pillow. The pony’s legs dangles off the sides of the branch and stuck out from the bottom of the sheet draped over his back. The guard's chin rested on the pillow at an awkward angle.
“Well, that looks good enough.” He turned around right into a face full of rainbow.
“Whatcha doin’? Why is there a guard sleeping in my napping spot?” Rainbow asked with no respect for personal space, before prodding at the “sleeping” pony. “Are you guys up to no good or something?”
Kiva froze up in momentary panic. “Uh...”
Coop quickly stepped in. “We just found him like that? Why do you have a napping spot in a tree anyway? Isn’t that more of a bird thing?”
“Hey! I am not like a bird!” Rainbow Dash hovered with her hooves on her hips.
“You could have fooled me. You have feathered wings. You apparently spend time in trees, and you’re loud and obnoxious,” He said failing at holding back a smile as the mare grew rigid with annoyance. “You even get your feathers ruffled and your chest puffs up just like a bird.”
“I’m Rainbow Dash!” she proclaimed. “Fastest flyer in Equestria. No bird could ever get close to my speed! These wings are better than any puny bird wings.”
“That’s kinda racist,” He said.
“No it’s not! I’m not racist!” She turned to Kiva. “Right red-headed-lady?” Kiva just shrugged. She was still wallowing in guilt.
“Whatever you say, little birdie.” Coop had already started walking down the hill towards MEGAS’ arm, leaving behind a flustered pegasus. Rainbow had swallowed his diversion whole, like Celestia and a frosted triple layer carrot cake. Kiva followed along, feeling bad for successfully beating up the poor little ponies both physically and emotionally.
“Aghhh! I don’t have to take this from aliens. I’m taking a nap somewhere else!” Rainbow yelled as she snatched her pillow and blanket. Stonewall fell out of the tree with a small thud as he hit the dirt, but Rainbow was already gone.
“You know this is all going to bite us in the ass later, right?” Kiva asked raising her brow.
“Yeah, but that’s a problem for future Coop.” Contemporary Coop stopped walking for a moment. “But not that skinny version of me from the alternate future. Although that guy does deserve to be bitten in the ass.”
“Can we just move on?”
---XLR---
Applejack had just about had it with this metal thingamajig from space. What with it’s giant metal claw and boxy forearm covering what used to be many healthy apple trees. There was days of work ahead before these plots would see any trees growing again.
The only solace was that she would make those no good space monkeys pay the Apple family back in labor until everything was back the way it was, just as the Princess had ordered. That was better justice than letten’ them sit in jail while she was left to fix things.
Applejack let the thick rope tumble from her mouth.
“Speak ah the shmooz and he shall appear.” There were the aliens now, at least two of them.
Big Mac and Granny Smith were standing beside the farm-mare. The three ponies waited for the humans to get within speaking distance before fixing them with stern looks.
“Hello, my name is Kiva Andru, and this here is Harold Cooplowski.”
“Hey! It’s Coop, just Coop.”
None of the ponies accepted Kiva’s outstretched hand once Applejack refused to extend a hoof. Applejack would like to think of herself as tolerant, but this guy obviously wasn’t a hard worker or he would likely be smaller. He was huge compared to his skinny friend, Jammy.
Many moments of awkward avoidance of eye contact followed, until Kiva tried to break the ice again.
“So, uh, I couldn’t help but notice you were trying to tow one of MEGAS’ arms with that rope? I don’t think you’ll have much luck considering it probably weighs upwards of 100 metric tons. It’s also pretty dangerous technology.”
Applejack snorted, causing the human girl to cover her mouth for some reason.
“Don’t tell us what we can and can’t do. We already moved it off of the destroyed plots,” Applejack said, head held high.
“Wow! That’s impressive!” the soldier exclaimed.
Silence...
Kiva looked to Coop for help, but he just shrugged. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to insult—”
“I’d say welcome ta Sweet Apple Acres, but I’d be lyin’ if I said you were a welcome sight. Y’all messed up the farm pretty good and ya could have really hurt ma family. But, if you’re ready ta help move this metal junk and fix the damages, then we Apples can... tolerate you for... what the hay is wrong with her?” Applejack snorted again, pointing to a now trembling redhead.
Kiva had her fists held up to her cheeks and a small smirk on her face soon transformed into a Pinkie-esc grimace.
“She, she has, she has a country accent! And, and she makes little horse noises when she’s angry!” Kiva practically whispered and exclaimed at the same time.
“Lady, yer makin’ about as much sense as tits on a lampost.”
Applejack’s confusion grew to worry, as the human stepped towards her. Coop had no idea what was going on either, but it sure was entertaining to watch.
Kiva couldn’t stop herself from mumbling under her breath. “She even makes southernisms. That’s not even fair. Must... resist... giving... hugs.” Kiva averted her gaze from the unbearable adorableness.
“Hey, I’m talkin’ to you! You better not be makin’ fun of my family.”
“Sorry, I have to go, now, I just, yeah.” KIva turned to leave, but didn't get the chance.
Many things happened in the next few moments. None of them making a lick of sense to anyone involved.
Three shrill screams filled the air, yelling things like,
“There she is!”
“It’s them! Blast them!”
“Get em’ now!”
Rarity came galloping over the nearby hilltop, blasting away with her eyes streaming with tears of passion. Three fillies charged in ahead of her.
Bolts of blue light came flying into the fray hitting pony and human alike as Rarity fired her horn. Granny smith dove for cover behind the nearest tree trunk. Big Mac was on his way to stop Kiva from leaving when he was struck right in the face by Rarity’s magic. He hit the ground like a four hundred pound sack of potatoes.
Kiva collapsed to the dirt when her legs were stunned to numbness by the surprise attack.
Coop fumbled for a phone while the spells just disappeared into his belly fat. He quickly remembered his mom wouldn’t let him get a smartphone, or any phone for that matter. He usually borrowed Jami’s phone, but his mom stopped replacing all the phones Jamie lost due to increasingly ridiculous “stories.”
Her magic spent, Rarity collapsed onto the cleanest patch of dirt she could stumble to.
The Cutie Mark Crusaders jumped into the fray to save the Apple family from the killer aliens. Sweetie Bell, Scootaloo, and Apple Bloom were ready to try everything from hair pulling, to wet willies, but the Red Terror just fainted as soon as they crawled onto her.
Their rainbow makeup war paint and fearsome war cries were obviously too much for the alien to handle and she just whispered, “Too kawaii!” before falling unconscious.
The Crusaders turned to their next foe. He towered over them, and to the sides of them, but they would not be swayed by the monumental responsibility of the task—
“I give up! You little guys win,” Coop said raising his hands.
“Yay! Cutie Mark Crusaders Anti Alien Attack Assault Squad is a success!”
“But we’re not little or guys,” Scootaloo complained.
“I told you it sounded a little redundant with attack and assault. We should have picked one.”
“Redundant? There you go being a dictionary again?” Appl Bloom crossed her forelegs. “Sides, Triple A was taken by that Flim Flam cart and chariot repair service. We get to be quadruple A! It’s one whole A better!”
“For the last time, that does not make it better!” Sweetie Bell complained.
“Sorry to ruin your little moment, but I really stopped because of her.” Coop pointed behind the three fillies.
“Alright, which one o’ you aliens is gettin’ the first spankin’ off our land!?” Said an elderly green pony with a large board drilled full of holes clenched in her mouth. Coop cringed at the striking resemblance to his wrinkly mother and her almost identical instrument of punishment.
Coop reluctantly, but compliantly bent over and braced for his punishment. It just seemed like the instinctively right thing to do.
---XLR---
Back at the duplex...
“Vinyl, I’m heading out.”
Vinyl Scratch bobbed her head to her beats, as usual. Octavia knew her roomie was listening, by the way Vinyl nodded yes or no offbeat to the music escaping from the turned earcup of Vinyl's headphones.
The cellist lifted her bow tie from a hook and started fastening it around her neck. “I’ll be out later than usual.” Octavia sighed. “Blueblood bought the seats to all my concerts so he could impress some up and coming nobles... again. He wants me to stay afterwards to meet them at some new restaurant.”
Vinyl’s body tensed slightly, almost missing a beat.
Octavia didn’t take her eyes off of her fumbling hooves and her tie. “Yes, I know you don’t like him. Neither does any mare in this town, but we need the Bits.”
An abrupt record screech came from DJ Pon3’s turntables.
“Don’t get short with me Vinyl. I didn’t literally bring down the roof at my last concert. And no, I’m not going to refuse the job.”
Her body and music halted. Vinyl’s signature glasses blocked any expression in her eyes. They also blocked the sun, and paparazzi flashbulbs. She couldn’t survive the bright mornings after a late night drinking without them.
“Vinyl, I am doing this job and that is my decision!” Octavia punctuated with a proper hoof stomp.
The unicorn snorted derisively.
“Come on Vinyl. I can’t rightly perform knowing I left you as such a grumpy gal.” Octavia quivered her lip and blinked away fake tears.
Vinyl tried to turn away and cross her arms, but Octavia got her with a quick peck to the cheek. She tried to hide her blush, but Octavia’s relentless dreamy eyed stare had her smiling in no time.
“I’m glad we could have this conversation. See you on the other side.”
Octavia had almost slipped out the door, when an electric blue coil of magic halted the door from closing. The grey mare spun around to the house.
Vinyl energetically pointed to the Cello sitting at the base of the staircase. That or she was performing some pop-and-lock dance move. When Octavia didn’t seem to understand, she levitated the cherished cello to it’s owner.
Octavia shuffled uncomfortably still halfway out the door. “Uh, yeah, about that. Blueblood, sort of, wants me to use a custom cello sponsored by him... bye!
Octavia wasn’t fast enough to stop herself from being dragged back inside by her tail. Vinyl released her magic and and the audible click of the door bolting itself shut echoed in the entryway. The shades lifted, revealing Vinyl’s critical stare.
“You know I don’t play politics, but if I don’t take this one, I’ll be sending an involuntary message of dissent against the royal family. And we all know what happened last time?”
Vinyl sighed. She did know. In fact, the two of them were still paying for the damages. It had also landed them on the Royal Intelligence Watch list. Not only for what they did, but for their own protection. Protection from those that might hold a grudge against Miss Melody and the House of Scratch.
She nodded in understanding. The door latch unlocked once more and Vinyl let her non exclusive fun time grey gal walk out the door. Out to entertain perhaps the most shallow, narcissistic oaf in Canterlot.
Octavia peeked back in a second later. “Don’t get abducted by the aliens while I’m out, because I’m making up for this Bluebutt business when I get back,” Octavia said in a sultry tone, before winking to her roomie and hustling to the train station.
For a while, Vinyl continued running through her set lists for later that night. She worked on mixing some new beats, adjusting her speakers, and contemplating the destruction of all the noble houses as per the usual. She thought she had accidently added some samples of Octavia playing her cello to the mix, but she could still hear it when all her equipment was muted.
Then she had a horrifying realization. The sound was of her roommate's precious instrument, which she left... by the couch... where the alien turned pegasus had been staring catatonically at the wall since that morning.
Except, now he was holding the forbidden instrument, drawing the pernambuco bow across the cello strings just as Octavia would surely draw a knife across this poor stallion’s throat. She didn’t even know what a pernambuco bow was, but it was fancy, and precious to Tavie.
The only rational thing to do was tear the instrument away from the alien, place it back in the case, set it next to the staircase, then stare at it while loudly hyperventilating like nothing ever happened. She sank to her haunches.
“Okay, that was weird even for this place.”
Vinyl Scratch slowly turned around to the yellow pegasus still drowning in his baggy clothing. She held a hoof to her mouth while pointing the other at Jamie.
“Um are you—” Jamie found himself inches away from this strange girl’s face. He said the only thing he could think of.
“I don’t mean to be rude little horse girl, but could you back off? Your breath smells like pancakes and... booze? They have alcohol here? Wait, don’t answer that. I have a bunch of better questions.”
The little horse didn’t let go and instead started shaking Jamie violently. “You need to get out!” she whispered almost inaudibly.
Jamie held up his, arms? No, that one horse obsessed chick he dated called them forelegs. He raised his forelegs in surrender.
“Look, I’m sorry I did, whatever it was I did, but this is the only place I have to stay.”
Vinyl shook her head. “No, you need to leave town, like on the next train.”
This is what he gets for getting off the couch; just five minutes of not staring at the wall feeling miserable and he already pissed off a girl.
“Look, I said I was sorry. Also, why are we whispering?” It was very strange feeling his elongated face being grabbed by some alien chick’s hooves. Now that he thought about it, being grabbed by hooves at all was it’s own kind of weird, but not as weird as actually getting nonviolent female contact for more than thirty seconds.
Jamie was so distracted he didn’t hear half of what this pony was saying.
“...so I lose my voice almost every night. That’s how Octavia and I have gotten really good at nonverbal communication. The annoying part is, some ponies think I’m mute, but that’s not the important part. Why are you whispering and why do you keep moving your tongue all weird like that?” she asked in a raspy tone.
“I was just whispering like you. Also, I swear the stupid fuzz on my lips is getting in my mouth constantly.”
“Well, maybe it wouldn’t if you weren’t licking them like a maniac?” They were wasting time. Vinyl ran upstairs and returned with a small bag of bits. She shoved them in Jamie's chest until he grabbed them. “Get the next train out and never come back. If she can’t find you, then she can’t beat you within inches of your life.”
Jamie was starting to panic. “Wait, who’s going to beat me up? What the heck is happening? Is this about the cello? Is it cursed or something?”
“I’ve said too much already. Just go!” Vinyl’s voice was very horse in her exclamation, as she started ushering Jamie to the door.
Jamie tried pushing back, but found the unicorn was pretty strong, compared to a weakling like him anyways. “What is this? Some sort of spy movie? How could telling me more make things any worse?”
“No, I... I literally... can’t talk much.” Vinyl couched.
Vinyl picked up the roommate agreement form the floor nearby and showed Jamie the last page. He scanned over the part about no wolf bats or stealing bodily fluids, then settled on the last lines.
“If you so much as touch my (Octavia Melody’s) cello, I will beat you within an inch of your life and you shall rue the day you laid your (insert apandage here) upon my instrument, which has now become your undoing.
Don’t ask how I will find out, I just know.”
Jamie noticed his name was signed at the bottom with Coop’s surprisingly decent handwriting, and dropped the paper to the floor.
“Oh, I see.”
She stopped pushing for a moment, before her ears perked up for some reason. She rummaged through a closet before coming out with one of those digital word boards that flashes messages across them.
It didn’t take Jamie long to figure out what she was doing. It took a minute or two for Vinyl to charge it with magic power and set in a new message.
I’m sorry man. I should have been paying more attention. The red letters scrolled.
But If you’re going to die, the least I can do is get your cloths retailored to fit you. The message started again.
Vinyl wrapped an arm over the trembling punk. She used her magic to tap the message buttons again.
Come on. Let me introduce you to a fellow white unicorn of mine.
Jamie mumbled a response and followed along. This was it. He must be the most undesirable male in the universe. He could get women to swear vendettas against him without doing anything. Well, not women. Little horse girls that played string instruments. Damn this was a messed up planet.
Vinyl unplugged her headphones from her turntables, hanging them around her neck before they left the oddly decorated duplex together.
