> A New Misson > by itsjustteal > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- > Chapter 1: Sad endings, New beginnings > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Year: 2018 Date: 12/25/47 Location: Afghanistan "Wind is 24MPH, range is 1300 meters. Target is walking. Adjust your sights for the lead, fire when ready. Aim high, and let's make history." Said a voice on my right.. I knew who he was, of course, I mean, didn't I read the mission briefing? My mission. Many missions I've had, most had been on my own. This is one of the rare occurrences when I actually do get a spotter, and someone who would watch my back. The Spotters name for this mission: Corporal Mark Durkinscoff. In the briefing, it had said that he was a recent graduate from a sniper school back in the states. He'd been on a few missions, and had even had to take the sniper position a few times. But hey, I wouldn't trade him for any other spotter in the world. Now, my part in the mission was the assassin. I don't like putting it that way, but its basically what a sniper does, other than help his fellow troops in the field. Besides that, the 'target' just happened to be an old friend of mine. He left the U.S and joined the Al-Qaeda, thus earning the title of 'traitor'. The names Christopher Kennedy, a high ranked member of the group. "Nah man, another head shot? If this is gonna be in the books, we gotta make it presentable. Where do you think I should shoot?" I grinned, looking at him. He looked back, and grinned with me. "All I'm gonna say, aim for the torso. The bullet will tear him up anyways. A shot from a .338 Lapua round in an M98? Fella's in for a bad time, no matter where you hit" He said, looking back into his scope. I loaded the magazine into the clip, bullet in the chamber, and took my aim. As Mark said, aim for the torso. That's exactly what I did. I closed my eyes. The next thing I knew, the bullet was making its way down range. I waited for the response. ... ... ... "Shit! I must have misread the wind speed! The shot went to the thigh!" He yelled. Immediately, my eyes snapped open, and I looked back into my scope. My eyes went straight to his leg, which seemed to be perfectly fine. But how? I looked up and locked eyes with his. I swear, he was looking straight at me. The next thing we knew, he was smiling and shouting orders and pointed into our direction. "Corporal, they new we were coming!" I shouted to him, he looked at me, and I could tell he was worried. " We need to get the fu-" I was cut off by an explosion behind me, then a searing pain in my right arm. I yelled out in pain. "Sergeant!" He yelled, taking out his M4A1. I looked back and saw an enemy bird, preparing for another shot. "Don't worry about me! Its just a bit of shrapnel! Look, as much as i'd like to stay and have some tea and crumpets, we need to get the fuck outta here! Follow me, Mark!" I yelled, slinging my Barrett M98 over my back and taking out my M4. I stood up and started running to the back of the building, where we had rappels waiting. Making sure he was following me, I hooked up to the repel and jumped the wall, Mark right next to me. "Reppel!" I yelled over the bombardment of bullets. Using one hand to hold onto the wire, and the other on my M4, we began to repel down the building. A few moments later, we touched down on the pavement below. I ran to a nearby car and took out my radio. "Command! This is Echo-2-1! We are compromised! Say again, we are compromised! Need immediate evac!" I yelled into the thing. A scratchy voice came back seconds later. "Roger that Echo-2-1, EVAC is on the way ETA 5 minutes. Out" "Shit! We gotta book it to the rendezvous or we'll be left behind" I crouched down and put the radio back on the hook. I got back up " Let's g-" A bullet grazed the top of the car, inches in front of my face. "Enemy positions to our front and right flank!" Mark yelled half a second later and immediately pulled up his M4A1, firing at the enemy, hoping to buy us some time. While he was spraying on them, I was focusing on the enemies to our front. I unloaded magazine after magazine unto the advancing troops, some bullets hitting its mark. Right as I loaded another mag, a searing pain shot through my right arm again, but the adrenaline pretty much blocked out most if the pain. I let the contents of the magazine soar through the air, receiving screams in return. "Sir, you've been hit!" I heard Mark yell. I took cover behind the car and assessed the damage. I looked to my right and saw that a bullet had hit almost exactly where the shrapnel had hit, which only led to it bleeding more. "It doesn't help that its the same spot as the shrapnel! Never mind that! We need to move now, follow me!" I yelled to him, moving from cover to cover, holding my gun up to my shoulder. We finished the last of the enemies, and made our way through the parking lot, and into an apartment building. I looked over my shoulder. "Suppressors on. We don't need anymore distractions" After loading the suppressors, we started moving quietly through the building. As soon as we cleared the first room, my radio went off. "Echo 2-1 this is Command, ETA two minutes" "We're oscar mike, out" I replied, tucking my radio away. A faint shuffling caught my attention, and I turned to my left, gun ready, to see an enemy soldier and noticed hes had better days. A knife was sticking out of his neck. I looked to my right and saw Durkinscoff smirking at me. I smiled back and nodded my head. "Keep moving" We strolled threw the rest of the building, and exited through the back. Our EVAC site was only one hundred yards away, and the sound of the Chinook was getting louder. "Sir? Its too quiet" I nodded in agreement. "We're almost there, lets book it" I said, taking off the suppressor, Mark doing the same. I stood up, and made a bee-line for the clearing. We arrived a minute later, and took cover behind a dead mule. Yes, a dead mule. We are in a clearing, aren't we? Meanwhile Mark took cover behind a rock, barley able to keep him cover. He glanced at me, and I glanced back. Something's not right. No more enemy contact, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, it just puts us on edge. We did just try to assassinate a high valued target. I took a glance at my watch and noticed that the chopper was supposed to arrive over 30 seconds ago. I fished for my radio as fast as I could, but to no avail. I couldn't find it anywhere. I looked at my spotters gear, and saw that his radio was busted completely. Our eyes met once again, and he motioned with his head out in the open. My eyes darted to the open, and there, lying right on the ground, was my radio. I looked back to Mark and said the words that might be my last. "Cover me" And with that, I bolted from cover and ran as fast as humanly possible towards my radio. When I reached the radio, I hastily bent down and fetched it, and as soon as I got back up, I was knocked to the ground in pain. I tried to open my eyes, but everything was just a blur mixed with a side order of pain, and there was a lot of it. The realization dawned on me, I was shot. I felt all over my body for the shot, and my hand brushed past an increasingly wet spot on my chest. I focused looking at my chest, and my eye sight slowly turned back to normal. What I saw, actually scared me. A small hole through my chest, which let out a profuse amount of blood. "Sergeant!" I heard Mark yell from behind. While he was running to me, I gingerly rose up to my knees, clutching my chest and my arm, which now bled more than it should have by now. Seconds later, I felt a pair of arms pulling me up, and realized it must have been Mark. When My arm was draped over his shoulder, I saw that it was not him, but another marine soldier. In the time I went to get the radio, the Chinook arrived. Man did I feel stupid. I collapsed to the ground once more and was now being dragged to the open helicopter door, firing my weapon on the arriving enemy troops. About halfway through, I dropped my gun, for I was too weak to hold it. Every few seconds a little cloud of dirt would spring up besides me. In a final attempt to get out of here, I drew my M9 and fired away at the enemies. There must have been about thirty or so, but it didn't matter. Everything counts. What seemed like hours later, I was being pulled into the Chinook, and being propped up on one of the seats. A few of the other marines were gathering outside the door, taking a few of the enemy soldiers before climbing aboard. I was looking out the door, just staring at the death, not even thinking anything about it. Suddenly, I felt a hand placed on my shoulder and looked over, seeing Mark screaming at the other men for a medic. I was no doctor, but I was guessing that I lost too much blood. I don't think they would be of help. While the medic was checking for my vitals, I clutched Mark's hand as the pain was too much. I got close to his ear and whispered, "I think that tea would be lovely right now" I said, giving a weak smile. "The crumpets too". He chuckled, finally. Another wave of bullets gets thrown at us from all directions and we returned fire seconds after. The medic seemed to have stopeed the bleeding in my chest and arm, and had gone to tend to another injured soldier. I looked over and found that it was Mark, his hand clutched over his stomach, face wretched in white hot pain. "Mark!" I yelled at him over the gunfire. He looked back at me, tears forming in his eyes. "Man does this hurt!" He yelled. With the strenght that I had left in me, I pulled myself over to Mark and clutched my hand with his. "Why isn't this bird in the air yet!" I yelled out. I looked back to Mark, him looking back up at me. "Mark, you're gonna be fine, do you understand?," He gave a slight nod. "Everythings gonna be alright, were gonna get outta this soon," I looked back up, "Get this chopper in the air now!" My command was soon heard as the chopper painstakingly stated to rise in the air. I looked to my left and saw that one of the soldiers had gotten my Barrett off the ground. Like that'l make a difference. Seconds went by as I crouch next to Mark, speaking soft and soothing words. I lift his hand up and saw two bullet holes that had gone straight through his stomach, inches apart. I looked out the open back of the Chinook and saw that we were almost out of the war zone. The gunner was still going ham on the enemies below us with his mini gun. " Can you stop the bleeding?" I yelled over the gunner. He looked to me with a smile. "I've already stopped the bleeding, we just need to cover the wou-" "RPG incoming!" The pilot yelled out to us. > C 2. Landing > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- The gunner of the Chinook immediately turned his mini-gun left towards the incoming projectile. The pilot had just started to close the door to the back of the chinook, and the men in the back raised their guns to attempt to take the rocket down with gunfire. The gunner had opened fire on the missile, but none of the bullets seemed to hit. Instead, the bullets flew around the missile, and had hit the man who had shot the weapon. The next thing to release was our weapons. Both Mark and I had raised our weapons and fired with hazy, unfocused bullets. Again, none of those bullets seemed to hit their mark as the RPG slammed itself into the back rotor of the Chinook. “We’re hit! I say again, we are hit by enemy RPG! We’re going down!” I hear the pilot yell from the cockpit into his transceiver. Not even a second later, the red emergency lights began to flash uncontrollably. I saw the pilot try to stable the helicopter, but to no avail. We started spinning and we were bound to crash at any moment. The fear was evident in everyone’s eyes. We were spinning so fast it was hard to see where in the sky we were. I looked back to Mark with eyes wide, and he looked at me with the same expression Fear A new sound flared through the helo, and I guessed it indicated we were getting very close to the ground. I saw the Pilot look back and yell “Brace!” over and over again. Instinct took over and I shielded myself over Marks body, that’s when everything turned black. I woke up with a breath of fresh air, eyes wide, and looking around violently. My vision was again hazy as I looked around, trying to get a sense of where I was. I immediately found Mark lying on the ground unconscious. I rushed over to him to see if he had any open wounds, and thankfully, he didn’t. What shocked me more was the demolished remains of the Chinook we were in what felt like seconds ago? I rushed back up and stumbled over to the bird, and checked the cockpit for the pilots. Using my hand to clear off the dust that gathered on the wide window, I found that there was no body there. The pilots were gone. Dumbfounded, I ran around back to the open hatch, hoping to see the other Marines in there. My hope was shattered in seconds as I saw nobody. I went to gather supplies inside the Chinook, but a faint grunt stopped me in my tracks. I snapped my head backwards and saw Mark, struggling to push himself up. I ran over to him and sat him up against a nearby tree. His eyes shot open and he grabbed me by my vest, pulling me in close to him. He looked straight into my eyes, “How the fuck are we alive, Brandon?” I pulled his arms from me and sat back and put my elbows on my knees, trying to take everything in. I ignored Mark and looked around us. We were surrounded in a forest. From what I could tell, it was a huge ass forest. “Brandon,” Mark yelled, getting me back to attention. “What happened? Where is everyone else?” He said, stretching out his muscles again, starting to get feeling back. “Well, you may not believe me until you see for yourself, but I went and checked the Chinook, and found no traces of any of our fellow Marines. Also, I don’t know how we’re alive. Shouldn’t be, really. Crashing a helicopter isn’t something you really come out of crystal clear, you know.” “Well then what the fuck do we do now?” He said, gathering himself up to his feet now. “Honestly, I think were SOL on this one. We have a helicopter with plenty o’ guns in it, plus our own. There is also survival kits that are still intact in there too. When we get them, I would like to think that we make a small and suitable camp.” “Alright, that sounds like a good idea to me, let’s do it,” He got up and stood in front of the Chinook. “There is one thing that needs to be done though. I’ll get started taking out the survival shit.” Without further ado, I went to gather all the weapons scattered inside the Chinook. About an hour later, I had gathered every weapon I found out in a small patch of earth. Next to it, was the survival gear that Mark had found. I found a small notebook and pencil and wrote down what was on the ground. 2x M4A1 4x M4A1 Magazines 1x RDS Sight 3x Blocks of C4 2x Medical Kits 1x .338 Lapua Round Cartridge 1x M249 SAW with 1 drum mag. 8x Grenades 2x Flash Grenades I put the small pencil in the loop and folded over the notepad. I heard Mark walking over to me and I looked up. “Hey can I borrow two sticks of C4? This is what I was talking about earlier.” He said. Rubbing my hand on my chin, I walked over to the C4 on the ground. I took two slabs of C4 and handed them to Mark. “If you really think you need it, then sure. Take it” And with that, Mark first went to the tarp that held all our supplies, picked it up, and slowly dragged a good distance away from the fallen chinook. He snatched up the two slabs of C4 and walked calmly over to the Chinook. “Uh, you know what you’re doin’, right?” “Fuck yes I do. Before I became you’re spotter, I was an EOD bomb specialist. Defused bombs in Afghanistan. While defusing one, I set off the timer and ran like hell. Got caught in the afterblast, and knocked me out pretty good. Decided that was not to my liking, and moved to being a spotter.” “Huh. I’ve was an ARMY Ranger, but as soon as I knew I qualified, I went straight to sniper boot camp. I guess I just love the feeling of helping my fellow Marines out on the field,” Mark went back to doing what he was doing, and I put my hands on my hips and turned around. I looked back to Mark to see him crouching over something. Looking back in front of me, I slowly walked out into the thick woods that surrounded our little patch of land. Minutes of walking later, I got the same results. Endless forests, from what I could tell. I turned around to walk back to camp and then a loud explosion rocked the earth. I looked up and saw the black smoke and flames and immediately sprinted back to Mark. When I got there, the whole Chinook was blown to smithereens! Nothing was salvageable anymore from that thing. Not even if you tried. Rustling from behind caught my attention and I whipped backwards, looking for the source. Mark came out seconds later, coughing up a little smoke. “The fucked happened here?” “Isn’t it obvious?” He told me with a slight smirk on his face. He dusted himself off and looked over to the gear lying on the ground. “Yeah I blew that up because if we die, the enemy won’t be able to use anything valuable in the bird. And don’t worry, I found some walkie-talkies and a few extra pairs of combat clothing” “Alright, makes sense to me,” I looked up into the darkening sky,” it’s getting dark, Mark. We should probably get going and setup a small camp somewhere. Take as many things as you can carry, we may or may not be coming back for the rest” I said. “Also, keep your ghillie suit on during the night. We’ll get them clean tomorrow.” Mark nodded in agreement. I took the sniper mag, one M4, two M4 mags, the RDS sight, the last block of C4, both flashbangs, and the medical kits. Mark took the other M4 and mags, the SAW, and the 8 grenades and hooked them onto his belt. It was really starting to get dark now, and we were ready to head out. Mark and I stood side by side, gun in hand, and walked on into the darkness. > Chapter 3 > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- About an hour later, Mark and I had gone a decent distance from the crash site. We made sure our tracks were covered behind us. “Mark,” I said in a hushed voice, “let’s set camp up here. Go set your weapons by the willow tree. I’ll set them by this Red Oak” Mark crouched over to the willow and quietly set down his gear. When we were both done setting our things down, Mark walked back over to me. “I don’t know about you, but I’m gonna get myself comfy” Dismissing himself, he walked back over to his gear and took out a combat knife. He climbed half the willow, and started to tear the long vines from it. Cutting a few more, he came down and made a makeshift hammock for himself. “We’re taking shifts, you know,” I smiled. He froze for a second and then sighed, and picked up his M4 and started to walk over to me. I stopped him, however. “Don’t worry, I’ll take the first shift. You’ve had a rough day” I said, retrieving my M4 off the ground. “Danke, Brandon” I heard Mark say as he slowly walked over to his newly made hammock. He gracefully lied down and covered himself with what he could. I could already tell he was asleep. I rested my M4 against the tree closest to me and sat down and put my hands on my knees. This makes zero sense whatsoever. How are we even here? I mean, the both of us got set up, we get severely wounded and then I get pulled into the Chinook. Seconds later, the chopper gets severely damaged by an RPG and we spiral out of the air. Right when we were about to crash, everything went black for me, and apparently Mark, too. “This doesn’t add up,” I mutter. I took off the bottom half of the ghillie suit and used it as a head rest, cause you know, the tree fucking hurts. I closed my eyes. A crack in the distance made me open my eyes in annoyance. “But that couldn’t be a..no.. That sounded way too much like an M9” I whispered. I quickly got up and grabbed my gun and an extra magazine. I searched my gear for anything else that might be useful, and found a pair of night vision goggles. Most have forgot that. Another cluster of shots clattered through the silent night. I stood up with my gun raised and kept a steady pace towards the supposed M9. Another crack ran out and I saw a flash of light in my goggles coming from the left. I instinctively twitched my aim to the left and stared into the night. I faintly saw a figure on the ground holding what looked like a pistol. Another figure came out from the bush behind it and pounced it. I heard a clear scream and ran towards the two. I stopped about thirty feet from them, steadied myself, and took the shot, sending a STANAG round right through the head of the wolf like creature., and then exploded into twigs and leaves. Strange. I stood there for a second with my gin still drawn as I looked at the bipedal figure I saw sprawled on the ground gasping for air. “You okay?” “Sergeant Duffy?” The man said as he quickly stood up and half gave me a salute. He wore a gritty pilot’s uniform, and his helmet was on the ground. I saw his legs buckle beneath hum as I quickly put my gun to my side and took his arm over my shoulder as he fell down. “Yeah man, don’t worry, I gotcha,” I steadied him over me as I bent down and picked up his helmet. We then started to slowly but surely walk back to base. “Can you tell me where you’re from?” “G-gainesville, Minnesota” He muttered. “Boston Massachusetts. Okay now how about your name?” “The names Nick, rank SrA in the air force” He said. “Alright, Nick. I want you to tell me everything that happened from about five hours ago all the way up to this point. Okay?” I asked. “Of course sir,” I could very faintly see the makeshift camp that Mark and I assembled. “Sorry, sir, but I can only remember certain parts. All I really remember is flying from the base to pick you two up. We get there a little late because of enemy resistance. From the cockpit I saw you get shot in the chest and fall to the ground like dead weight. Corporal Durkinscoff ran after you but quickly got hit. He clutched his stomach and went down. I landed the bird as fast as I could and had the marines disembark and get you guys. Once you two were finally loaded in, I started to “ascend from darkness”” He let out a small laugh at his joke. “Minutes later we get shot by an RPG and go spiraling through the air,” Nick let out a small cry of sadness. “I’m s-sorry, sir. I-I tried to steady it.” “Listen, don’t worry about it. From what I could tell, only us three made it out. We couldn’t find any other bodies” I told him, almost to the camp. “Three? We? Who else is here?” He asked, clearly happy that another had survived the initial “crash”. “It’s just my spotter, Corporal Mark, and I. We haven’t seen any trace of any other marine in these woods,” I could now make out the camp clearly. “Alright, enough chitter chatter. We’re al-“ A scratchy voice pushed itself through the Walkie on my shoulder. “Sir this is Mark! Where are you?! I heard a shot!” He whispered to me. I held down the red button and told him everything is fine and that I found the Pilot, Nick. Speaking of him, he stopped talking and slowed his effort in moving. I glanced at him and his face was pale as fuck, so that’s when I hoisted him over my shoulders and booked it over to the camp. “Mark! Need help over here man!” I yelled, jolting him awake. He instantly got up and stood at attention. I put Nick up against a tree and felt his face. When I say freezing, I mean freezing! “Help him in any way you can!” I yelled and went over to my gear to try and find some sort of blanket for him. “Sarg he’s losing blood fast! Got a large gash in his right thigh!” I heard mark yell from behind. I found a blanket seconds later and some surgical ropes. I turned around and handed the blanket over to Mark, who put It on Nick with haste. I went to his leg and wrapped the rope above the hideous gash that spew a constant line of blood. Finishing the knot, Mark and I both realized what had to be done. “Mark, you and I both know what needs to be done,” I turned to Nick, who looked at me with noticeable fear. “You’re not gonna amputate are you?” “Fuck no! I was just thinking we need to burn the wound shut!” “What! I’m already in too much pain asshole!” “We could just clot the blood right Brandon?” Mark spoke up. Huh. When I was in college taking medical practices, I never did think of that. “You know what? You’re right Mark. Go fetch the gauss and some medical tape!” While he went to the gear, I applied as much pressure to the wound as I possibly could. Mark came back seconds later with the supplies and handed them to me, his hands trembling in fear for the wounded pilot. I quickly wrapped the gauss around the leg over the wound a few times, making sure it was secure, then taped tight. “Here, let me go get you some water,” I offered, and went and got some for him. While I surfed through the gear, I also found an MRE, and brought it to him. I quickly heated up the MRE and gave the rest of the water to Nick. “Eat up man, you’re going to need it” “Mark, you’ve had a little bit of sleep, I’m taking my turn. Wake me up in an hour or less” I grabbed a blanket for myself and lied down a few feet away from the two. “And one more thing, keep an eye on that wound” I yawned. Seconds later I fell asleep. A flash of light appeared in front of the beings face, and after a second’s freefall, it appeared to be held up by some type of force, and began reading aloud; “My Dearest Twilight Sparkle I trust you enough to complete this task, Twilight. You have permission to search and locate what caused that explosion yesterday. Celestia out. Till next time, Princess Twilight “Yes yes yes yes!” ‘Twilight’ yelled out of joy. A small bipedal figure could be heard walking down the stairs, walking up to Twilight. “I’m going to take a wild guess and say that Princess Celestia said yes?” Twilight began shaking her head up and down vigorously. “Ah. Nailed it. So…tell me again why you won’t let me come with?” The small being asked. “Because, Spike,” Twilight responded, getting the best poker face in response. “ugh, its because a baby dragon such as yourself shouldn’t be going on potentially dangerous adventures such as this one!” Twilight proclaimed. “Yeah that makes sense, seeing as I have done them before. Don’t you remember when I single handedly saved the Crystal Kingdom!” Spike fist pumped. Twilight brought a hoof to her chin thinking similar to a detective. “Well I gue-“Twilight was cut off as another flash of light exploded in front of her, and, seeing Celestia’s royal seal, quickly unraveled the scroll and read aloud with haste. “I will also be sending a small group of my Guards to aid on yor task, Twilight. Your teacher and mentor, Princess Celestia “Alright, Spike. Pack your bags, we leave at noon” > Chapter 4 > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Princess Twilight." A guard pony, covered in golden armor, and an iron short sword in its sheath to its side, stood at attention. Twilight looked up from what she was doing and looked at Sergeant Red Hoof. "Yes, Sergeant ? Is everything ready to go?" She stood up and walked over to the window. "Yes, Princess. Our supplies have been gathered, were ready to go, just waiting for the go." He replied, still at attention and as stoic as he'll ever be. "Alright. I suppose Spike and I have all of our needed necessities, why don't we go outside then." Twilight suggested and proceeded to walk outside, with Red Hoof following behind. With the sound of the library door closing behind Twilight, she smiled at the sight in front of her. There was about twenty to thirty Royal Guard troops mulling around, talking to each other. One of them just happened to look Twilight's way, and snapped to attention. The other guards were quick to notice, and in seconds, all of them were at attention. Twilight tried to cover herself with a hoof, and chuckled sheepishly. She heard footsteps behind her, but did not look back. "So, are we ready to head out?" Twilight heard Spike say from her left. She looked towards him and smiled. "Not quite, Spike. We're still waiting for a few ponies." She replied. "Don't tell me, are the gi-" Spike was cut off. "Yes, Spike, they are coming." She said with an air of finality. Spike wisely decided to keep his mouth shut, let he be told to stay behind instead. One by one her friends started to show up until all of them were present. In total, there were six of her friends, including Spike. Twilight had gone over what the situation was and told them what they would be doing and what role they were to play if something bad were to happen. Twilight turned to Sergeant Red Hoof. "Alright Sergeant, we're ready to go." "Yes, Princess," Red Hoof turned to the rest of the men. "You heard the princess, boys! Double time it, move out!" ~ "Alright boys, what's our game plan?" I asked, while the three of us were sitting around the remains of the morning's fire. Mark raised his hand first. "I don't know why we never tried this before Sarge, but we could try the comms? Maybe we could get a hold of the guys at command." Hm. Gotta hand it to him, not once did I think of using the radios we gathered in the Chinook. "Alright that'll be first on the list," I looked over to Nick. "What about you? Got anything?" "Sorry, but I don't know what to do in these situations. I trained to be a pilot, not ground forces." "Understandable. Alright Mark, hand me over the Walkie. Lets try hitting up someone." Mark fished the walkie out of his bag and tossed it to me. I raised it up to my head, held down the button on the side, and spoke. "Delta 4 this is Echo 2-1 come in." I held down the button and was met with the sweet sound of nails scratching on a chalk board. I switched channels rapidly to try and get a signal, but nothing happened. I brought the Walkie back up to my face. "Command this Echo 2-1, I say again this is Echo 2-1, how copy?" I desperately tried to scan through the channels, and as I did, our faces grew with worry. "You think that it was busted during the crash?" Nick asked. "Yeah, I would like to hope that. Better than what I'm thinking." It better have been from the crash, because it's that or the Walkie wasn't picking up channels, obviously, but its highly unlikely that it would happen, because it is transmitted and received through satellite. "I had really hoped that it didn't have to resort to this. Men, we've been forced to go dark. We have no way of contacting Command. If we are lucky, we should be able to find an enemy patrol around here." I sighed. "I think we should move, sir." Mark softly announced, probably not wanting to bring anymore attention to us than we already did. ~ "Princess, we think we found something! Come quickly!" The sergeant called out. Twilight raised her head from Celestia's most recent message, and quickly started to trot towards Red Hoof. What Hoof had found startled the girls. Lying in a clearing was a scorched wreckage of some kind, and it looked like somepony had thrown metal all over the clearing. "What is it?" Twilight questioned Red Hoof. "I'm not too sure, Princess." He answered with a frown, wondering if it was safe enough to get close. "But whatever this is, somepony didn't want us to get anything from it." Anything the girls would've said was cut off by loud roar far off into the distance, causing all eyes (and weapons) to point towards the general location of the sound. "Who's there?!" Dash yelled out, flying upwards a few feet. Due to the thickness of the trees and foliage around the clearing, she couldn't get a clean line of sight on whatever caused the noise. ~ "I think that's the edge of these bloody trees." Mark quietly called out, having taken point. After a moment, he let out a curse and quietly backed up. "What is it?" I whispered once he returned. "...I don't even know what that thing up there is, sir." He answered, looking behind him. "But I know for damn sure it's hostile. Almost walked into it eating a deer." "Right. Let's get around this clearing as quietly as possible." I muttered, causing Mark to return to his position and lead us away. A roar behind us told the three of us that we'd been found. "Run!" I yelled, not wanting to become some creature's lunch. Mark stopped long enough to grunt and lift Nick over his shoulder, before running. I ran after him, ready to help him should he fall. We saw a light ahead of us and we both ran faster, breaking free of the forest and hopefully losing whatever was chasing us. > Chapter 5 > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Rainbow Dash had floated higher into the sky, her wings beating faster than they ever had done before. She began to fly forward ever so slowly, keeping watch for whatever or whoever had made the insanely loud cracking noise. She shook her head clear and bolted forward towards the sound, but was quickly put to an end by Twilight's magic that tightly gripped her tail. "Dash, don't!" She ordered, but Dash didn't get the hint. "But Twilight! Don't you want to know what made that sound? No animal in the Everfree can make that sound!" She protested. "And how would you know that?" Twilight questioned, smirking. Rainbow instantly replied. "Seasons one through five of the Daring Doo books, of course! Nothing could have made that loud a noise, and you know it too Twilight." Rainbow shot back, putting on a smirk of her own. "Red Hoof, send out a three stallion search party please." Twilight sighed and continued investigating the scattered metal. Some of the wreckage was still aflame, and she made sure to stay out of that area. Her eyes darted across every nook and cranny of the metal, hoping to find some clue of what it might be. Seconds later she tilted her head in confusion, as she found a strange piece of material draped over a rather large piece of metal that stuck up from the ground. Twilight closed her eyes and illuminated her horn in a sparkly purple light and concentrated on lifting the material. When she thought the object was directly in front of her, she opened her eyes and saw nothing. Surprised, she looked to where she saw it first, to find that it was still resting there, not giving a single damn. She trotted forward and picked up the material to see that it was covered in what looked like leaves. Not even seconds later, she felt all of her energy release form her body and she reeled back, dropping the object and falling over herself. A guard pony was quick to aid his twilight princess up, making sure she was fine. The other elements were quick to follow as well. "What in tarnation happened?" Called out Applejack in her thick accent. Twilight started to speak, but all that came was a garbled gibberish sound. After taking a few deep breaths, she regained her composure, but only slightly. "I-I don't know, I've never seen anything like this before!" She pointed to the strange energy stealing material. "Whatever that is, It felt like it drained all my energy! I can't even use my magic on it!" Twilight turned to Red, stumbling a bit. "Red, could you try picking it up with your sword?" Five minutes ago... "I don't know what the hell this thing is man! Just keep running!" Nick and Mark were a few meters ahead of me, while I was lagging behind to keep the monster/beast on my ass instead of theirs. Hearing an extremely loud roar, I instinctively turned my head around and saw the beast in a full-on sprint towards us. As I turned back, my leg caught a tree stump and I went toppling over face first into the mud as my M2 fell off its sling on my back. "Holy shit!" I yelled as the beasts whipped its pointed tail at me, missing by a few inches and embedding itself in front of my shoulder. I quickly snapped my head back towards the beast and it stared straight into my eyes. My eyes flashed before my eyes, so to speak, as I saw everything that led up to the moment. Still looking into its eyes, I saw a faint glimmer in its left eye and it turned to look at the source. I heard a soft click of metal and less than a second later, an extremely loud bang came from behind me, and the beasts head shattered into pieces! I looked back, ears ringing, and tried to get a look at who saved my life. I blinked a few times and saw that it was Nick, holding up my fallen friend, the Barrett M82. He stood there, smiling. "Holy shit Nick! You saved my life!" I said, getting to my feet. "Heheh, yeah no problem." He smirked. "You realize you owe me now, right?" I shook my head. "Whatever floats your boat." Nick handed me my gun and I slung it on my back again. "Alright, enough with that thing. Let's keep moving. Keep it low, we are on the edge of the forest." "Roger dodger." Mark spoke up. In silence, the three of us followed the tree line until we came upon a straight dirt path. One end had gone into the forest, and we scratched that off immediately. Doing a quick scan of the area and finding nothing, I motioned to start moving inland, making sure to stay off the path so no enemy walking down it would see us. "Sir?" Mark silently piped up. "Go ahead." I whispered back. "Ever take a look at the scenery? Doesn't it look a bit strange to you?" He asked. I had us stop by a nearby bush and I looked around. Sure there were your average run of the mill trees hangin' around, but nothing seemed too off about them. But then a thought struck my mind like wildfire, which frightened me. We were in a colorful field full of the most vibrant colors, and besides that, we had a nice meet up with a manticore in the forest. Those things are supposed myths! Adding on to that, where we were stationed in Afghanistan, we were in a villa surrounded by a vast desert, no trees for miles. I heard a grunt from behind to find that Mark had set Nick down. "Yes Mark I do believe that this landscape is insanely different than what we were previously in." I said. "Yeah and what about that fucked up creature? I'm pretty sure that isn't supposed to exist. Just a theory though." Mark added. I was going to reply, but the snap of a twig caused all three of us to swirl in that direction. Mark rose his SAW, I rose my M4, and Nick unholstered his pistol. Emerging from the treeline in front of us was probably the last thing we expected; three white horses with golden armor in a Roman style fashion; the helmets had a blue plume sticking out of the top. One had wings sticking out of its back while the other had a horn sticking from its forehead. One had a spear levitating above it while the others were somehow holding them with their hooves. "Are... Those horses?" Nick said, looking up at me from his position on the ground. "We're certainly not in Kansas anymore." Mark grunted, slightly lowering his weapon. "What the hell?" I asked, looking at him. From what I saw they were wearing, the golden Roman style armor, they were obviously intelligent. The horses seemed to not pay attention as they were eying our weapons and stood ground. They saw us as a threat. All three of them started yelling at us... to get on the ground? The one with the spear seemed ready to throw. The three of us rose our weapons and started yelling as well. {-} Rainbow Dash ventured far off from the others and had gone closer to the edge of the forest, ignoring her princess's requests. While her mind was waging war on itself wondering what to do, it stopped when she faintly heard yelling, and lots of it. She flew a bit lower so that she was hovering just above the treeline and continued onwards with haste. In a few moments, she was bordering the edge of the forest and could hear the yelling much more clear. She recognized some of the yelling to be from the Guard that was sent out as a search party earlier. Staying above and out of the verbal fight atop the trees, Dash had gone parallel to whoever the guards were yelling at, and, for the first time in her life, she was actually scared at what she saw. > Chapter 6 > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- "US Marines! Drop the weapons now!" "This lil' thing will tear you a new one if you don't put those down!" Both Mark and Nick had yelled beside me. With the three of our guns raised, obscenities spewed freely out of our mouths towards the three equines in front of us. One of them had its spear hanging over its head while the other two had their swords unsheathed, the three of them started to move in a half circle around us. The constant annoying yelling was getting both sides nowhere. Fed up with the situation at hand, I let my M4 hand against my chest as I took the Barrett from my back. While I was moving the large weapon comfortably into my hands, two of the three horses pointed their weapons at me and had been giving me death glares. The shouting had calmed down a small bit, leaving Mark and Nick still commanding them to stand down or to be met with force. I stared at the eyes of the two horses trained on me and pulled the bolt of my rifle back, letting out its intimidating screech against metal. The one with the spear visibly shuddered and cowered away while the other stood wide eyed. The talk has almost ceased at this moment, save Mark, as I raised the beast to my shoulder and aimed at the sky, eyes fixated on the three horses. Now that I think of it, ponies would be a more fitting word... Not waiting a second longer, I pulled the trigger, letting out an ear shattering crack as the round traveled through sky sky at lightning speeds. The shock from the explosion made the three of the ponies drop their weapons and stare at the abomination in my hands, their pupils the size of pin pricks. I swear I saw the unicorn trembling. One of the regular ponies craned its head to the other, and whispered into his ear. The receiver bobbed his head up and down with vigor, picked up shop, and high tailed it away from us, the unicorn following quickly. "Man do I love this thing!" I laughed, watching them flee, switching back to my M4 and looking at Nick and Mark. I was about to say something when I felt something soft land on my head... I reached my hand up there and grabbed at whatever it was. Bringing it to eye level I saw that it was... hair? Rainbow colored hair? I brought it close to my nose and gave it a good sniff. Smells like rain clouds. I put the hair in my pocket and looked up to the sky and saw nothing. Strange... "I hate to say it, but we need to go back into the forest. We cannot roam around this field with those ponies running around. No doubt they ran off to their superiors." Said Mark as he began walking back to the forest. I slung Nick's arm around my shoulder, helping him walk back to camp. "I'm not too sure if you guys know this, but we stumbled upon an unknown specie-" Nick began to say, but Mark cut him off. "We know they're ponies, Nick." "Obviously, but they're sentient beings. I don't think we should be running from them. We should confront them." He suggested. Mark stopped a few feet ahead of us and draped his leg over a fallen tree. "I'll give you a few reasons on why we should do that, and why we shouldn't. Firstly, you are correct. They are sentient!-" he yelled, throwing his hands in the air. "-but they are clearly hostile towards us. I'm sure the President would hate for us to much up first encounters, so this needs to be thought out. I'm game." He finished, putting his hands in his pockets. "What do you think, sarg?" Nick looked up to me. I found myself in quite the situation... Mark is right, we should definitely try to be peaceful with them, but they are also hostile. "They know we blew up the helicopter," I said sternly. "That is why they sent out patrols, looking for any clue of what could have made such a big explosion." I looked at Mark. "You're right." He looked at me quizzically. "We're certainly not in Kansas anymore, I mean, how obvious could it be? We encounter a goddamn lion scorpion thing-" "Manticore." Mark butted in. "-manticore, sure, and also meet some little ponies, and one of them was a damn unicorn!" I laughed. "I'm game." "If ya'll are in, I am too." Nick said while Mark stood back up. "Mark, help Nick out back to the camp. I'll go ahead, make sure its clear." "Yes sir." ~*~ "Very interesting! Thank you Red Hoof." Twilight exclaimed, busting a wide and bright smile, while jotting down a note on her scroll. Red Hoof had picked up numerous items with his sword, finding it held nicely, not bettering him in the slightest. Red Hoof currently had the original cloth that Twilight had touched, inspecting it closely. Not soon after he had done that, I gust of wind blew past Twilight, ruffling her mane, and blowing the cloth straight into Red's face. "Red... Hoof?" Twilight yelled at first, but her worries shifted into a high confusion as Red Hoof hadn't moved a muscle or collapsed. Red slowly brought a hoof to his face and grasped the cloth carefully, and brought it off from his face. “Red, are you alright?” Twilight asked as she moved towards him. “I don’t feel anything, Princess. It is nothing but an average cloth.” “Let me see. I have a hard time believing what just happened to me wouldn’t happen to you as well.” Twilight proclaimed as she reached out to grab the seemingly harmless cloth in front of her. Seconds felt like minutes to her as she grasped the cloth in her hooves. Surprisingly, nothing happened to her. Red Hoof was right, it was just an average cloth… There’s got to be something else to this… Twilight thought, as she tried to pick it up with her magic. She was amazed yet again as nothing happened. Nothing at all. It was simply just a piece of cloth. “I do-“ Twilight started but was cut off by an extremely loud crack of thunder. All of the ponies around her looked up into the sky, but it was clear as day. Not a single cloud in the sky. “Dust, Berry Gust, Windseeker, front and center!” Red Hoof shouted to a group of guards. The named guards, all pegasi, broke free from the group and quickly trotted over to their superior. "Listen here, colts. I want the three of you in the air to scout the surrounding area. Fly in a triangle formation and stay fifteen feet away from each other. Report back in ten minutes, if you see anything hostile, do not engage. Report back to me with your findings." The three of them brought a hoof to their head in a salute, and flew off into the sky without a word. Red Hoof had turned back to Twilight but before they could talk, a ravaged Rainbow Dash was flapping her wings vigorously above the two of them before letting them go limp, her body plopping on the ground while breathing heavily and looking up at Twilight. "Rainbow Dash? What happened? Why is part of your mane missing?" Twilight looked at her with concern. Rainbow wiped her forehead with a hoof before speaking. "M-monsters are here Twilight! I saw them! They were attacking three guardsponies!" She spoke at an unnatural rate. "Don't ask how, but they cut some of my mane off!" "Calm down, Rainbow." She put a relaxing hoof on her shoulder. "What do you mean by monsters? Animals of the Everfree?" "Nothing like that, Twi. Remember that first loud crack?" She nodded her head. "Yeah, well, I found the monster that made it." Rainbows eyes widened and her pupils turned to pin pricks. "Twilight! We have to get to the guards! There were three of those things and they are about to fight!" Twilight brought a hoof to her chin for a few odd seconds before turning back to Rainbow and Red Hoof. "We have no time to waste then. Rainbow, show us the way." -*- "So we're just going to hide the guns and surrender then? Thats the damn plan?" Mark spoke, his voice rising with every word. "Thats ridiculous! How are we going to defend ourselves!? What if they attack!?" I lightly smacked his side and smirked. "Don't worry man. We're just going to get some of the big leaves and cover our supplies, keep them well hidden. I think its safe to say that no other human would randomly waltz around here." I reassured him. "Plus, we'll be keeping our combat knives." "I want my gun as much as you do, Mark, but this is pretty much our only option at this point. We're obviously not home anymore, and we've got to deal with an unknown species. Wouldn't you think President-" "To hell with what the president thinks! We're not on Earth anymore! Humans have been scoping out planets in space for a long time, none founded with intelligent life. We are SO FUCKING far away from home right now. I bet its safe to say we will never be able to get in contact with anyone ever again!" He cut off Nick and brought both his hands to his shaking head. "This is sofucked..." Letting the mood hand for a small bit longer before getting Mark to look at me. "We are going to do this, for our own sake. We all know we won't last long out here in this forest, there has to be more of those... manticore things roaming around here, and we do not want to end up being its lunch," I stood up from my stump I was sitting on. "Plus, we wouldn't want those unicorns, you know, like the one that was levitating that sword, to just grab the weapons after we surrender. Additionally, Nick here needs proper medical attention. They have to have hospitals, I mean, they had golden armor that had intricate engraving on it, so it would make sense that they do." Mark gave me the thousand yard stare. "You better be right."