Destiny's a Bitch

"What's the word?" asked a voice.

"Some terrorists holed up in a cave, go in and kill us some bad guys," said another voice.

Gabriel opened his eyes slowly, having been asleep for several hours now. He hung his head low, breathing slowly and evenly, an old habit before every mission.

"Hey, he's awake, you all right Gabe?"

He remained utterly silent.

"Gabe ain't talkin', just ain't him, when was the last time you heard Gabe speak real English, Michael?"

The one he was addressing looked up, "Never," he said with a shrug, "either Korean or nothing, mostly nothing," Michael looked at his cousin, "unless you count his pointless screaming," he finished with a smile.

Gabe couldn't help but smile too. He proved to be extremely aggressive, once cracking an enemy's armor with a powerful, rage fueled kick. With his reputation, he was the small team's avenger, always unleashing hell when they needed it most.

"Man it's almost inhuman, the way Gabe turns into superman as soon as some bastard pisses him off," said Tevin, a soldier who worked with Gabe and the group.

Tevin was a big African-American man. He was armored in a bulky carbon fiber suit, the new standard for military. His helm consisted of a mask with bottled oxygen and a hard, rounded military helm, meshed together to make a full head cover. At the moment, however, his mask hung below his chin, with the hard cap hanging back behind his head. All the others adopted this method of showing their face with their helm still nearby.

"Bro, it is inhuman," said Jack, another soldier in the group, "ever seen a soldier pull off that many head shots in a row?"

"Remind me, how many is that many?" said Michael.

"Y'know, bang-bang-bang-bang bang! Five dumb shits didn't know what hit 'em,"

Gabe remained in silence, biting his lip slightly. The two others glared at Jack. The white man shrugged, trying to defend himself from their silent scolding.

"Ah, shit, Gabe, you're not a bad person for doing what you had to," said Jack.

Gabe looked up skeptically.

"Besides, how can a hardcore brony like you be a bad person?" reasoned Jack.

Gabe smiled once again, pulling out his rifle. He pointed at its stock, showing a sun plastered onto it.

"Celestia's cutie mark," Michael laughed.

Gabe then pulled out his pistol revealing a moon on its side.

"There's Luna's cutie mark," said Michael.

Finally pulling out his tactical bow, he showed off six distinct symbols crawling across the bow.

"And now we have the mane six, an exemplary brony,"

Gabe then lifted himself from his seat, walking towards a tank strapped down to the metallic floor. He leaped onto it, pointing down to a drawing of the Cutie Mark Crusaders trying to be soldiers. The whole place jerked, and Gabe was thrown off the tank.

"Alright marines, get your asses forward, get some warm clothes and parachutes on, your dropping into an abandoned part of Russia to get to that cave. Get some bottled oxygen ready, you're gonna gas that place," said a man on the intercom.

"We're gonna what? We can just mow 'em down," said Jack.

"Not my decision, you guys gotta gas that place, drop in thirty seconds," said the man.

"Screw that, gas 'em only if you need to, I'll deal with command afterwards," said Tevin.

Gabe got to his feet, rubbing his head ruefully. He pulled his helm over his head, and lifted his mask to his mouth, sealing all foreign air out. he then pulled on a long, very thick, coat over his body armor, then a parachute over the coat.

"ten seconds to drop, get ready,"

The four friends gathered near the the back of the plane they were on, ready to dash for the jump. The seconds passed by, bringing tension to the crew, when suddenly the back dropped open.

"Time to go!" shouted Tevin, running to leap out the plane.

The three others followed close behind, Gabriel being the last one out. Wind roared past their ears despite their helmets. Snow blinded, they plummeted downwards in the raging blizzard, only aware of the ground beneath them through a heads-up-display built into the goggles over their eyes. Hardly a hundred meters from the ground, they pulled their chutes, landing safely, yet roughly in the deep chill reaping snow.

"Can't see shit, where are we?" asked Tevin.

"Er... right in front of the cave," said Jack.

"Really?" said Tevin.

"Apparently, yes," said Michael, "you can just barely make out the entrance, and looks like the dumb bastards didn't even leave someone to watch,"

Without question, Gabriel began trudging towards the cave. He was followed closely by his comrades, given their preference of a cave over being knee-deep in freezing snow. Upon reaching the cave, they noticed no lights at the entrance.

"What the hell? Why is it dark at the entrance?" asked Jack

"Not just the entrance, man, it's dark as far as I can see,"

"Great, anyone got a torch?"

Gabe lit the flashlight on his gun, illuminating the cave.

"Alright! Thatta boy, Gabe,"

Traversing the cave, they didn't find the slightest sign of life. A dark, damp, and deceiving aura filled the cave, almost shrouding its secrets while trying to consume the soldiers.

"Is it just me, or is this cave really low on terrorists?" asked Michael.

"Maybe this is the reason to gas the place," said Jack.

"Why would we gas the place when no one is here? What the shit is going-- what the," said Tevin, stumbling over something.

"Hit a rock there, Tevin?" asked Michael.

"Yeah, probably just a-- what the hell!" shouted Tevin, pointing his gun at a fresh human corpse.

"Whoa, the hell happened to him, man? Looks like someone just ripped him apart like a savage," said Jack

"Just don't touch him, keep a sharp eye, we're not alone," said Michael.

They trekked further into the cave, finally coming to a large, open space, with a pool of water in its center. Gabe approached the pool, feeling it resonate an aura of nostalgia. What it was born of, he didn't know.

"So..." began Jack, "anyone getting the feeling of-"

Suddenly a dark figure dropped onto Gabe. Upon shining light on it, a ghastly creature was revealed, bearing huge knives for arms, prying red orbs for eyes, and a black, shiny shell for a body. Without hesitation, the crew opened fire on the monster, aiming carefully, lest they hit Gabe, who wrestled the beast off and had his pistol ready to be unloaded on it. They all fired relentlessly at the alien. Without much trouble, the creature fell to its knees, leaking black blood and lead through a cracked and crushed shell. With almost no effort, the beast was disfigured and destroyed by brutal firearms. Brushing off what had happened, Tevin examined a nearby corpse.

"Hey," he said, "these aren't terrorists, these are explorers, our boys in fact,"

"What? An American expedition? Out here?" asked Michael coming to check on the body.

"Okay, anyone wondering what the hell tried to eat Gabe?" asked Jack.

"Biological experiment, probably was some kind of ape," said Tevin.

"You don't know that," said Jack.

"And why would I care to know?"

There was a distant growl.

"That's why, this is turning into colonial marines really fast," said Jack.

"Nothing we can't handle," said Tevin.

They looked into the direction of the growl, seeing perhaps hundreds of glowing red eyes suddenly open up to see them.

"Okay, now I believe you," said Tevin, "Hightail it!"

One by one they leaped into the pool of water, hoping to find an exit within the liquid crystal. Gabe stalled a bit, throwing a small cylindrical canister onto the floor. A thick green gas began to filter out of the canister, which the beasts began to choke on. He leaped into the water, swimming to the bottom to find his friends. No one there. He looked back at the water's surface, watching the creatures amass by the water's edge. Strangely, he felt the water's surface behind him. He looked back, and pushed through, finding himself in the same cave, but no monsters, just his friends. Michael fished him out of the water, and pulled him ashore.

"Hey man, what the hell? first mythical monsters now some double sided pool? What the hell!" shouted Jack.

"Shut up, Jack, we're still alive. What do you boys say we go and find an evac, now that those things are gone,"

Both Gabe and Michael nodded vigorously. Finding their way out was a simple task, given no one fell into a hole to his death. Emerging to the surface, the four found themselves on a mountainside.

"Damn, where are we now?" asked Tevin.

A young pegasus flew past them, startling Tevin. When the pegasus saw the soldiers, both stared, jaws dropped as low as it could.

"Uh... Hi," said Michael.

"AHHHHH!" shouted the pegasus, soaring away from the four soldiers.

"Something I said?" asked Michael.

Gabe tapped on his cousin's shoulder roughly, pointing behind them. Standing above the cave was a figure only Gabe and his cousin could recognize... Chrysalis.

My Little Nuclear Platform

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The four were almost paralyzed in shock. An insect-like mare standing over them, probably considering how they'll taste. Chrysalis had little interest in what they were, surprisingly. What she did have an interest in was if they could love, given their sentience. She began to form a plan within her twisted mind. But when Gabe, through instinct, shot a nearby rock as a warning, Chrysalis denied the plan of deception and chose brute force.

"Attack!" she shouted.

Snapped back to reality, Gabe grabbed his friends and tried to drag them with him down the nearby mountain path. Behind them boomed with activity as they rushed down the mountain with changelings in hot pursuit. Gabe's armor proved to be heavier than what his friends were wearing, and they gradually sped ahead of him, but that didn't keep Gabe away from the changeling jaws chasing after him. He suddenly tripped on an imperfection in the mountain slope, sending him tumbling down, and bringing the whole human crew with him. With their speed greatly increased at the cost of comfort, they reached the bottom of the slope within a few moments. Fortunately for them, their armor absorbed the shock of the tumbling, allowing them to continue running without injury. They charged head first into the deep Everfree Forest, oblivious of the greater dangers hidden within its vegetation. Chrysalis pulled her army back, not wanting to lose any in the vast forest.

"They won't survive in there..." she muttered under her breath, and turned back to continue her true goal.

The armed four sprinted headlong into the thick Everfree, hardly watching where they were going. For a few long minutes they continued onward, to finally stop and rest. The crew was exhausted, having spent more than they had in avoiding a fight even they couldn't win. Jack leaned back on something, though it was... harder than everything else, and... bulkier.

"Jack, what are you sitting on?" asked Michael.

Jack looked back at the strange structure he was sitting on. It resembled a giant machine, a mech to be precise. Upon mechanical haunches sat a large platform with the cockpit placed beneath it. The machine bristled with heavy weaponry, with two arms hanging down serving solely as cannons, with even larger and more impressive Punisher Cannons mounted on the shoulders. Below the cockpit hung two intimidating gattling guns that seemed to almost boast about their high caliber. On the platform laid several hatches, two of which led to large silos built into the mech's back. The other hatches housed smaller, yet still deadly, tomahawk missiles. The silos housed, as any human could guess, tactical nukes.

"Damn... how'd this get here?" asked Tevin.

"That's not all I'm concerned about," said Michael, gesturing to a human corpse next to caches of ammunition.

"Other people have been here? For how long?" asked Jack.

"Er... I... have a theory," said Michael.

They all turned to listen to Michael's thoughts.

"Humans may have been coming here since, well, since the first episode aired. Lauren Faust may have come here, lived those episodes, then made some story about development to cover it all up, that's probably why we were to gas that cave," claimed Michael.

"Why would the government care about this place? Keeping it safe and secret?" asked Jack.

"Resources, research, there are many things here, which is becoming harder to find back at home,"

"Then why the military force?"

"Natives probably aren't too excited about us taking their resources, went hostile and we needed to fight back," claimed Tevin.

Gabe whistled to get their attention. They all turned to see what the supposed mute wanted, who pointed at the towering mech.

"Gabe's right," said Michael, "since this huge thing is here, why not use it,"

"Yeah, how're we supposed to get in without the keys," said Jack.

Gabe held up a small glittering object.

"We'd have to worry about that if we didn't have a Gabriel in our ranks," laughed Tevin.

Climbing up the gargantuan machine, both Jack and Gabriel manned the mech from the cockpit, while Tevin and Michael sought refuge within the walking fortress' living area. All around both Jack and Gabe were enough instruments to make even an experienced jet pilot dizzy with confusion.

"You know how to use this?" asked Jack.

Gabriel nodded confidently.

"Good, you work the leg assembly, I wanna kick ass with these arm-cannons," said Jack.

Sparking the war machine to life, Gabe took a few small steps on the machine's chrome legs, testing its locomotion.

"This one may be a newer one, she's running pretty smoothly," Jack looked at Gabe with an excited look, "think you can pull off some those crazy leg tricks?"

Gabe nodded vigorously to his companion. Making some adjustments and pulling some switches aggressively, the whole mech ducked down, balancing on a single leg, while twirling the lower body to swing the other leg around in a neat sweep. The sweeping leg was then flipped from the back overhead to land neatly at the mech's side, which was no longer ducked down now.

"Jesus, Gabe, you need to take the time to show me how to make that move, saved our asses more than once,"

Gabe nodded again, a large smile creasing on his face. Jack picked up a small microphone and switched it on.

"Alright, boys, where to now?" he said into the microphone.

"Simple," said Tevin through the comm, "we find those bug-horses, and kick their asses now that we got some heavy duty for the job. By the way, Jack, what model nuke platform we got?"

Jack checked the platform's logs, looking for the platform's identity.

"Says here that we got a Minotaur-Class Nuclear Attack Platform, way I hear it, there's only one of these that were ever completed, and that's a prototype," Jack said with tremendous glee, "alright, Gabe, lead her away,"

Gabe carried the walking nuclear platform through the forest, trampling trees underfoot, which appeared as no more than ferns to them from the controls of the mech. The two pilots bounced up and down from every step of the engineering wonder, limited to how well they could recognize what was in front of them. Reaching the forest edge with in less than a minute, they saw a long line of black shapes moving towards a castle hanging off the same mountain they had emerged from.

"Whoa, how'd we miss that?" asked Jack.

Gabe ignored his comment and focused on the small shapes, which seemed to be attacking the huge castle. He pointed at them for Jack, then made a gesture to strike.

"What?" said Jack.

Gabe face-palmed, then pointed out the cockpit at a set of long, durable barrels, then at the small shapes. Jack understood and armed the large Punisher Cannons, while Gabe closed the distance between them and the changelings.

"Come on, Gabe, get us in range already, it's time to kick ass, insect ass,"

Gabe moved the machine to the point of being a threat to their foes, then held up a fist to them, cuing Jack to unleash the cannons.

"Chew on this, fuglies," Jack muttered, pressing the trigger. Concussive shells rapidly peppered the sky, knocking score by score of changelings out of the air.

"Haha! 'Merica! Hell yeah!" shouted Jack.

Changelings retaliated by rushing at the huge machine, only to crack to their skulls on the platform's thick armor made to shrug off the force of even anti-tank rockets. Seeing the machine's near impenetrable armor and devastating weapons, they had no choice but to leave Canterlot for the metal beast. With surprising speed, the entire swarm retreated behind the mountain, leaving all of Canterlot to admire the beast who had climbed the mountain in a few steps and at the same time, scattered an entire changeling army.

"So..." began Jack, "think we're screwed now that they've seen us?"

***

Celestia stepped forward to see the great mechanical wonder. Having been taken by surprise with the sudden changeling invasion, she was very grateful for some alien to clear them out so easily.

"Strange..." was all she could say. She spread out her wings, ready to fly towards the sudden, yet unnecessary, savior.

"Uh, Princess," said a guard, holding her back, "are sure that's a good idea? Looks like some more of those aliens,"

"If this alien meant us any harm, it would've done so by now," she said, pulling loose and beginning to fly to the metal giant. She reached the cockpit, flying some distance from it.

"Hello," she said, "we are grateful for your intervention, is there a way we can repay you?"

No answer.

"Hello?" she said again, beginning to feel foolish. She looked closer at the cockpit, seeing strange shapes inside moving around. They seemed to be... Arguing?

***

Gabe was speaking a mile a minute in Korean, debating with Jack as to what to do. Michael and Tevin had squeezed themselves into the back of the cockpit to put some feedback into the situation.

"I'm with Gabe, let me speak to her!" shouted Michael.

"You want to talk to some flying unicorn with the sun tattooed to her ass? Let's just get out, now!" said Tevin.

"I say, we try and get some supplies from her, she is very hospitable, y'know," said Michael.

"Screw that, I say punish the bitch then hightail it, like Tevin said," said Jack

"You want to do what with her?!" shouted Michael.

"I meant blow her up, Michael, I got better things to screw with back at home, we all do!"

"SEEEEEEYYYYAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!" shouted Gabe, reducing the crew to their minimum. He began to speak rapid Korean to his cousin, who translated everything to the letter.

"This is a peaceful and magical land... we may never be found here... find freedom from fate here... not a soldier forever," said Michael.

The crew sat in silence, considering Gabe's proposal.

"Anyone... anyone tired of soldiering?" asked Tevin, seating himself against the wall.

His only answer was Gabe opening the cockpit to step outside and show himself to Celestia. He lifted himself into her sunlight, allowing every inch of him to be bathed in its golden rays. Celestia flew closer to Gabe, curiosity eventually driving her to get close enough to land on the huge machine. There they stood, man and pony, slowly reaching out to each other, Gabe with his hand, Celestia inching her muzzle forward. Gabe stopped, then reached into a pack on his waist, pulling out an apple and offering it to Celestia. She knew right there, that this alien wanted peace with Equestria, and she was willing to give it. However, everything has a fee to go with it. And she was developing one in her mind.

Hydrogen Fury

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Michael climbed out of the machine after Gabe.

"This was a bad Idea," he said, "Celestia may have killed him,"

Hoping to find just Gabe up there, he was shocked to see the Sun Princess up there with him.

"Ah," said Celestia, "these are your comrades?"

Gabe nodded.

"Do you speak? It seems this one can understand but cannot respond," said Celestia.

"Oh, uh... yeah, that's Gabe, my cousin," Michael stuttered. In years before, Michael would've loved to meet the Princess of Equestria, but now, with the circumstances, he wishes he could hide from her.

"Is there a reason he cannot speak?" asked Celestia.

"Wha? Oh, oh, Gabe, Uh... well... he, uh... he does speak, jus-just not in English, uh... I don't know why he won't speak English..."

Tevin and Jack had poked their heads up out of the cockpit, getting a glimpse of what was unfolding. Jack had tried to cram a huge rifle with him to get a shot at the princess when needed.

"Jack, what the hell? Put the goddamn gun down," Tevin whispered to him severely.

Michael had heard what was going on behind him, and hoped the princess had no idea what a gun was. They sat in an awkward silence for some time.

"Some very impressive technology you have," Celestia suddenly said, "could we perhaps organize a meeting, within my walls where it is more comfortable, we could use more of your help,"

Gabe nodded, blindly agreeing to her offer.

"Gabe trusts her?" Jack asked Tevin.

"Oh yeah," replied Tevin.

"Well, we're screwed," Jack muttered.

***

They were led into a small room with a long dining table in the center. Spread out across it was a large banquet of various vegan entrees.

"Great, we're eating like grass-eaters," Jack said. His remark made the whole human crew smile, Gabe included who wasn't quite looking forward to a meal without meat.

They sat down to eat the surprisingly delicious food on the table, as Celestia pushed aside her food and began to speak.

"Without your help with the changelings today, Canterlot may have been weakened quite a bit. Our forces could have fended them off, but at a cost," she said, "I would be grateful if you could perform another task, for the betterment of our society,"

Tevin leaned forward, "Well, Tia? That your nickname? Tia, well, anyway, I'll have to ask what and why you want us to do whatever you're going to ask us,"

"Your leader Gabriel seems to be excited for this service," Celestia said, gesturing to Gabe who was, quite literally, bouncing in his seat.

"Tia," began Tevin, "Gabe ain't the leadin' officer, I am, my word is law, and my priority is keeping these knuckle-heads alive, so, what's the job? What's the danger? What's the benefit?"

Celestia raised an eyebrow, then said, "I would like for you to go into the Everfree Forest, there have been rumors of dark magic there,"

"Why would we risk our lives for some damn rumor? Might as well send some guards or mercenaries," said Tevin.

"I did," said Celestia, "they never returned, in one piece, that is,"

"Then why would we be interested? I've read Cupcakes y'know, and don't want that shit finding my team,"

Celestia gave a questioning look at the mention of cupcakes. Little did she know that it was a dark and very disturbing story. She brushed the comment off, then said, "The human troops that have been hostile to us have been able to take down scores of us before we can eliminate them,"

"Really?" Tevin said sarcastically, "not interested, we're not geared for whatever the hell this place plans to throw,"

"Actually," Michael interjected, "Gabe... might have the tech and skill,"

Tevin rose from his seat, nearly shouting, "That shit is highly experimental! Gabe is more likely to blow up than to better survive on the field!"

"We don't exactly know that, Tevin, we never tested it when we were supposed to,"

Celestia cleared her throat, drawing the attention of the arguing group.

"What is it that is so experimental and dangerous?" she asked.

Tevin turned to Gabe, gesturing him to get up, "Come on, Gabe, they won't learn anything to replicate it even if I showed them the schematics,"

Reluctantly, Gabe rose and began to strip himself of his coat and military gear, including his camouflage, revealing a pearly white, armor suit beneath it all.

"The ARX Immortal Power Suit, closest we can get to an iron man suit," said Tevin.

Celestia leaned in, noting every strange protrusion and listening to the human's every word.

"Unlike the military standard, this thing is made from carbon nanotubes, so it's next to indestructible," continued Tevin, "the suit is sealed, so Gabe can literally go into space with that thing. It also boasts improved shock absorption, and at least four hours worth of bottled oxygen. In the helmet there's some sensors for brain wave activity, with them, it determines the condition of the soldier, allowing intervention when needed,"

Jack also leaned in, saying "There is also a cloaking mechanism, provided by an EM emitter. Finally, the main feature is plasma engines strategically placed all around it. The wearer can use these engines to make them run faster, punch harder, jump higher, y'know superhuman stuff,"

Celestia was leaning very far forward now, her chest nearly dipping into the food in front of her. She tried to remember every feature mentioned in the suit, though most of it, she didn't know about.

"So, tell me, Tia, can this kind of hardware survive your world?" asked Tevin.

"Are there other details on this suit?" asked Celestia.

"The suit improves combat survivability by around sixty-eight percent, and that's all we're willing to share, now, my first question,"

"Hm? Oh, yes, this armor will very easily be able to stand up against the threats within the Everfree," said Celestia.

"What's in it for us?" asked Jack.

Gabe looked at them with a dark glare, reminding them of their goal in Equestria.

"Nevermind," said Jack, avoiding eye contact with Gabe, "we'll leave as soon as we're supplied,"

***

"We've been sittin' here for hours, man, give the goddamn order already!" shouted Jack, slumping in a padded chair built into a metallic wall.

All around their war machine's living area sat the four, Michael was mixing himself a drink, while Gabe and Tevin played a game of chess. Michael poured a glass for himself, then grabbed a nearby bottle of scotch for his cousin.

"I remember when he told me how he fell in love with scotch, sad story really," said Michael.

Tevin moved his knight to abolish Gabe's rook from the game. "We all heard it, we all know he needs it... why we all need it really," said Tevin, accepting Gabe's offer of a glass. Gabe moved his bishop across the board, knocking over Tevin's king in the process.

Jack took notice of this and said, "You can never win a game against Gabe, bro, guy was a freakin' prodigy in everything he did,"

Gabe shrugged and drank deeply from the bottle he was given. He savored the slow burn on his throat, as the liquor slid down and boiled in his belly. He smacked his lips appreciatively, clearly enjoying what the bottle had to offer.

"Alright, enough pissin' in the wind, let's get to work," said Tevin.

"Finally!" exclaimed Jack, rising from his seat and heading in the direction of the platform's controls.

"Gabe, up front, I wanna give a quick brief before you charge into hell,"

Gabe stood at attention before Tevin, anxious to start his service for Celestia.

"I want to go over your suit a little more before you go out there," said Tevin, "alright, those sensors are gonna tell us whether or not your heart is still going, and how much physical and mental stress your going through. Push that stress too far, the suit will automatically inject you with endorphins, adrenaline, norepinephrine, dopamine, and finally some aggression enhancers, so be sure to use those to your advantage. Now, there is no external backpack for the hydrogen in your suit, it's all condensed inside the nanotubes of your armor. That means, that if the suit takes enough damage, it'll explode, and nothing will be left to bury, so watch your ass, Gabe,"

He nodded vigorously, ready to be sent out.

"Dismissed soldier," Tevin finally said.

Gabe located a hatch that led to the top of the platform. Exiting from there, he was consumed in utter blackness. He lit a flashlight on his gun, then closed the hatch behind him.

"There should be a ladder off to the side of the platform, it runs right next to the cockpit," said Michael through a comm.

Gabe followed his instructions and climbed down the ladder, reaching the forest floor safely.

"Gabe, we're pretty far deep into the forest, nobody, or nopony, as Tia put it, has gone this far and come back. Watch yourself, things here could range from bandits to rampant ursa majors," Michael warned.

Gabe made a mental note of those things, having seen an ursa major in the show. He shuddered at the thought of having to fight one, then continued on. He eventually stopped and checked his gun, he fingered the trigger of his masterkey, then the laser sight on the side. He finally checked the sight on his weapon, a simple reflex sight, useless in the dark he was in. He stashed the rifle and pulled out his Luna pistol, which would prove more useful in close range.

"Gabe, we're getting movement on the sensors, infrared shows multiple hostiles, they look like griffins. They're packin' huge bows and javelins for arrows, keep low,"

Gabe spoke rapid, panicked Korean to his cousin.

"No, the cloaking is a fail, doesn't quite agree with the nanotubes, sorry,"

Gabe went prone, staying out of sight behind overgrown roots and shrubs. He turned off his flashlight and closed his eyes.

"Gabe, they're circling around you, what the hell...?"

Several torches on sconces lit up, unveiling half a score of griffins circled around the human.

"Look, another one!" shouted one of them.

"Its head is mine, I've already claimed it!" shouted another.

"Uh, Gabe, this is a good time to try out those hydrogen thrusters," said Michael, panic evident.

"Shit man! Go wild! Kick ass! Kick ass!" shouted Tevin through the comm.

Gabe leaped up, replacing his fear with a burning rage.

"It's awake, get it!"

Gabe began to sprint head first towards the griffin in front of him, thrusters on his legs propelling him faster. He leaped upward, bringing both legs together for a decimating kick aided by the thrusters on his legs. A sickening crack was heard from the griffin's skull, as its body slammed into the ground, limp and still. Another bandit flanked Gabe, holding a javelin in its eagle claws. Gabe blocked a downward swing with his left arm, then readied his right for an uppercut. Small hydrogen fueled thrusters poked out of the forearm of the suit, accelerating Gabe's punch dramatically.

"HHHIIIIYYYYEEEEEEAAAAAAAAHHHHH!" Gabe's uppercut beheaded the griffin, creating a minor fountain of blood from the body. The head plopped down in the moist grass, a bloodied spine snaking out behind it, split and pouring nerves like angel hair pasta. The other griffins stared in horrified awe of Gabe's ferocity.

Gabe inhaled deeply, "HHHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!" he screamed mindlessly, scattering the remaining griffins. He lowered his arms from his fighting stance, then sat down in a relaxed position on the soft dirt.

"That, my friends, is why we don't piss off Gabe," said Tevin through the comm.

"Y'know, if it's at all possible, Gabe, do you think you could keep yourself and that billion dollar suit out of the heat? If you get injected with those aggression enhancers, you'll get delusional and really hot headed cause Tevin hasn't adjusted the chemical dosages yet. Just keep a cool head and don't get shot, alright?" said Michael.

Gabe smiled at his cousin's scolding, then rose from his dirt seat. He found a path worn into the ground, the tracks certainly not belonging to a pony nor human. Gabe followed the tracks, hoping to be led to the rumors he heard. Though, at the same time, he hoped they would just be rumors. He reached an opening to the confined spaces of the forest, finding a path running a long way down into a large basin. The entire basin was illuminated with Luna's light, casting a haunting, luminous glow across the tall grass and trees. Gabe followed the narrow path, reaching the moonlight veiled bottom within tens of minutes.

"Gabe, Tevin is letting me release some limiters on the ARX, you should be able to get a lot more thrust from those engines now, hydraulics and skeletal actuators are coming online, so you should also be stronger and able to move more freely now too. And, if you happen to get killed, there's a defibrillator to get you outta la-la pony heaven, and back into the fight, but remember, that also means you'll get injected with the enhancers, so... just don't die on us," Michael informed.

Gabe face-palmed at Michael's antics, sure he was older and was only looking out for him, but Gabe was a full grown adult with better accuracy in the field than Michael. Ignoring this, he carelessly ambled through the field of shrouded gloom. Within moments of being exposed to this, Gabe felt the place resonate the same feeling of nostalgia as the pool of water in the cave.

"Hey, uh... Gabe, do you see any uh, strange activity in your area? I'm seeing the trees moving here, but uh, scanners say there's nothing in them, and there is no wind tonight,"

Gabe spewed agitated Korean at his relative.

"Bro, you're not the only one kinda freaked out here, it's been a rough day for all of us, just do us all a favor, will ya? Check your surroundings, make sure that there really is nothing to worry about,"

Gabe rolled his eyes at the thought of staying still while a hunter is loose and after him. Regardless, Gabe pulled out his Luna pistol and lit the flashlight on the bottom of the gun's rail. He swept the light across the trees, finding nothing. A bush rustled near him, and Gabe shined his light on the source of the sound. Nothing.

Rustle, Rustle, Rustle...

Gabe was sweeping his light over the trees again and again, seeing nothing hidden among its branches. He checked the bushes around him, still nothing.

Rustle, Rustle... Crack!

Gabe jumped at the sharp sound. He turned to check its source, an entire tree ripped down.

Rustle,

Gabe stood dead still, slowly peeking over his shoulder. The same creature as was in the cave, staring like a maddened beast at Gabe. He slung his pistol around, shining light on it when it vanished.

"Gabe, am I seeing what I think I'm seeing?" Tevin asked.

Gabe brusquely told him to shut up in Korean as he searched for the missing monster. He stopped and looked over his shoulder again, seeing the same demon, closer this time, in the moonlight. Gabe slowly switched his flashlight to off, cutting off the beam of light, then pointed his weapon at the creature. It continued staring at Gabe, its mouth agape and slowly widening. Slowly wider and wider, then, an ear-piercing shriek. Gabe knew there was going to be an attack soon, and loosed a bullet at its head, splattering its brain all over the grass. Suddenly, popping from the trees were the same demons, all with prying orbs and knife limbs.

"All limiters released! Go man! Go!" shouted Michael.

Gabe stashed his pistol and ran for the nearest creature, performing the same devastating kick to the head, only this time, shattering the entire skull. They all swarmed Gabe, who was a whirlwind of lethally hard and precise strikes of material harder than even diamond. Gabe easily beheaded some, others simply smothered by crushing blows. He cleared them out with surprising force. He turned to confront one behind him, but was knocked several meters back by a single, larger beast. Gabe struggled to his feet, having the wind knocked out of him from the strike. He looked up at the larger beast, bearing witness to its blade arms heralding down on him. He leaped out of the way, aided by the hydrogen thrusters. He dashed forward, performing a thruster aided back flip kick to the creature's chest, sending into the air. He then leaped with it, spinning in the air then dealing a colossal kick to its torso. The force of Gabe's kick was truly decimating, forcing the intestines out of the demon's mouth, splintering the spine, and splitting the creature by the area of impact in two! Gabriel, and the two pieces of the monster dropped heavily to the ground, landing on a grass overflowing with black blood.

"Jesus Christ! Jumping spinning 1080 round-house kick, aided by hydrogen thrusters! God damn, Gabe! You wiped the floor with those bastards!" shouted Michael in disbelief.

Gabe was shrugging his shoulders after the fight. He was exhausted, spending all he had in the fight, when he suddenly heard a soothing voice calling out to him.

"Here... here..."

Gabe turned to the sound, seeing a dark shape in the distance, standing over the shallow end of a lake down with the basin. Gingerly, he approached the shadow, eventually making out the figure of a woman.

"Come... here..."

With more confidence now, Gabe quickened his pace to the figure, curiosity driving him closer.

"Gabe... Gabe! Stay away from that thing, we don't know what it is, Gabe listen to me!" shouted Tevin.

Gabe cut Tevin off, causing them to go totally blind. Now, it was only Gabe and the strange shadow that had appeared. Upon getting closer, the image of a woman faded, and a single, large dark orb floated in the center. Gabe stood toe to toe with it, inching his hand forward gently. He has almost touched it, he was that much closer to revealing its secrets. He rested his fingers on the orb, suddenly being grabbed by dark boneless limbs, that coiled around him. Gabe struggled against his bonds, turning to run, and grabbing wet soil beneath the water as he was pulled down and towards it. The restraining tentacles had a firm, foolproof grip on Gabe, lifting him up and pulling him into the orb.

Gabe could only let out one cry into the moonlit forest, "AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!!" he shouted being pulled into oblivion. The orb vanished into the night, leaving none to witness to what had happened to the soldier in the deepest Everfree.

The Chronomancer

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Gabriel opened his eyes to a small cave. He glanced around, seeing roots crawl down the earthy walls around him, with some light penetrating the spaces twixt roots. Gabe followed a path out of the roots, finding a curtain of hanging moss as thick as a tapestry. Before pushing through, Gabe pulled the magazine in his gun out, checking the number of rounds inside. Plenty, he hadn't loosed a single shot from his rifle in a few days now. Refastening the clip inside the gun, he brushed the curtain of moss aside, cautiously moving forward while scanning the area multiple times. He was in a rather beautiful place, moss and other various vegetation grew on and near boulders lining the outer edges of a very shallow pond. Looking down, Gabe was only ankle-deep on the deepest end of the pond, and could see smooth river stones beneath his boots through the clear water. A warm, brilliant sunlight made the whole place glow, almost radiating a soothing magic.

"Found what you're looking for, Traveler?" asked a voice.

Gabe couldn't deny it was the voice of a mare, only much more familiar than he would prefer. Gabe whirled around, looking above where he just came from. Nightmare Moon.

"I'm surprised you made it passed the guardians, were they too little a match for you?" asked Nightmare.

Gabe opened fire at the creature of nightmares. She vanished with a flash of blue magic. Gabe whirled back around, expecting her to flank him. A heavy blast caught him square between the shoulder blades, sending him sumersaulting forward, and landing hard on his chest.

"Allow me to fix that," said Nightmare, flipping Gabe over with her hoof. Her horn glowed dangerously with powerful magic about to be blasted at Gabe's head. He had to act fast, he didn't know how the armor would react to magic. His legs were free, and he used them to push Nightmare off, throwing off her aim and blowing a crater into a boulder. Leaping to his feet, Gabe took a moment to witness the damage to the boulder. The whole thing was smoldering from the blast, tinges of blue showed within the smoking rock.

"I knew you'd come!" she shouted, sending another blast of magic Gabe's way, which he dodged with a neat hydrogen round-off.

"I know your intentions!" she sent another blast in the form of a huge wave, forcing Gabe to slide beneath it.

"But if you cannot wield the Elements of Harmony, you can do nothing!" she fired a huge beam of electrifying, azure magic, catching Gabe and sending him across the pond and into the boulders.

The weight of the ARX peeled Gabe from the crumbling boulder's surface, bringing him to his knees before Nightmare moon. Gabe could see her shadow overhanging him. He took advantage of this by clenching both fists tightly and readying the hydrogen thrusters. In one quick motion, Gabe lunged upward to his feet and delivered a heavy uppercut to Nightmare's chest. Now it was Nightmare's turn to be sent flying backwards. Gabe rushed her, all hydrogen engines exposed and ready for the fight, while Nightmare struggled to her hooves and conjured a magical great sword. She swung low, as Gabe caught the blade on the forearm of his armor, effectively blocking it. They were then engaged in a deadly dance, Nightmare swinging the magical sword along with some punches with her hooves, while Gabe blocked, parried, and dodged them neatly and gracefully. Nightmare was getting faster, and Gabe found it difficult to keep up. He tried his hardest continuously though, going faster and faster, until he couldn't notice the water droplets frozen in the air in front of him. A little longer, Nightmare was showing fatigue. She made a heavy downward slash, a chance! Gabe threw the sword aside as it came down, holding his fist up and building pressure in the engines of the hydrogen engine.

"AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!" with an upward kick, Gabe threw Nightmare onto her hind legs, unleashing the augmented punch with deathly accuracy into her belly. Nightmare retreated back onto a boulder, resorting to magical blasts again. Gabe ran the opposite direction of Nightmare, sliding at the last moment to dodge her magic, then finally pulling out his tactical bow and notching an arrow to it. In the midst of his slide, Gabe leaned back and loosed the arrow for Nightmare, striking harmlessly on a rock behind her. Having his plan set, Gabe walked casually away from Nightmare.

"That's it?"

Gabe pressed a button on his bow, causing the arrow he launched to detonate. He stopped for a moment, listening for life. Nothing. He turned around, checking that his work was surely done. Smoke was still clearing up, and bits of rock were flung everywhere from the blast. Gabe stared into the smoke and rubble for some time, when an electrical blast came from the smoke, making contact with the water near Gabe. The electricity surged through his suit, spurring red notifications of an EMP assault in his HUD. Nightmare came gliding in for a final strike, guiding a mass of magic into an upward slash that sent Gabe through a stray tree at pond level. He was jostled around inside the suit, which landed very hard on the tough floor, skipping across it like a rock with water. He finally slid into a haphazard hole in the ground, confirming unconciousness.

"Hm," said Nightmare turning around.

***

"Ugh...! Are we there yet?" groaned Rainbow Dash, "why were we called on such short notice to welcome these whats-its anyway?"

"Well," began Twilight, "the princess did say these ponies would be important,"

"Uhm... Twi? Ah don't think she called 'em 'ponies'" claimed Applejack.

"Yeah," squeaked Fluttershy, "I'm actually a bit worried about what they are,"

"I'm sure the term 'people' just means status, after all, she did also say they were from outside of Equestria," concluded Twilight.

"Whatever they are," shouted Pinkie with glee, "at least we'll get to welcome them with a party!"

"And the princess did say they had some items of great value, and could help with business all across Equestria," said Rarity.

"Honestly, I don't think we should put any of our trust in them!" proclaimed Rainbow.

"Now, Rainbow, why would you say that?"

"Didn't you read the whole thing?! Celestia said that Shining Armor and Cadence would be there!"

"Come to think of it, it is a bit odd for the princess to be asking them here just to welcome somepony here," said Twilight.

"Well, they must be some very important ponies," said Rarity.

The train they were on jerked slightly, slowing to a stop as they entered Canterlot. The girls picked up their bags and filed out of the train. Almost instinctually, they headed for Canterlot Castle, beginning to get anxious to meet these very important visitors. As they came across the gate guard, Twilight showed a document from the princess, admitting herself and her friends into the castle. Trotting eagerly towards Celestia's throne room, a fear of what they were to find began to creep over them, steadily quickening their pace. Upon entering, they were welcomed warmly, but the unique visitors were no where to be found.

"Hey! What's the deal? Where are they?" shouted Rainbow Dash.

"Princess?" said Twilight.

"They've gone to finish an important task for me," answered the Princess.

"You sent them away?! Weren't they royalty, or something?" said Rainbow.

"They weren't, actually," said Celestia, "they were warriors, alien warriors called humans,"

Twilight's eyes suddenly widened, as she searched for the term in many of her books she had packed along.

"I'm sorry, princess, I don't seem to have anything on humans, or aliens, or... anything like that,"

"You wouldn't," Celestia said casually, "their name is almost as much as we know,"

"Then why on earth would we trust them?" asked Applejack, shocked at the princess's decision.

A strange figure approached from the side.

"Cause we trusted you, and what a damn mistake that was," the figure said. Tevin ambled into the light, sending a clear shudder through the main six. His mask was down, but the rest of his armor was still on.

"Is that... is... that..." stuttered Rainbow.

"A human? Yeah, it's what I'm called, I believe Gabe called you Rainbow, he says you're his third favorite, huh, doesn't make much of a difference now though," said Tevin approaching Celestia, "I gotta tie up some loose ends, and... maybe do myself a favor," he punched the sun princess straight across the muzzle.

"Oh no you don't!" shouted Rainbow flying straight for the marine. Tevin ducked, then rose back up to strike Rainbow's front, throwing off her flying and causing her crash with minor injuries.

"I didn't just come here to kick all your asses! I have news too," said Tevin. He turned to Celestia, who was seemingly unaffected by his punch, "you're right, there is dark magic in the forest, Gabe went MIA, just vanished into thin air after he cut off comms and his armor cam. So, one, if I don't find him, I'll hate you, if I do, I'll probably just take my team and leave, two, at the moment, you're screwed,"

***

The black slowly faded from Gabe's vision, until he could notice light shimmering down on his goggles. His view of the outside was blurred, and what seemed like waves slid past his vision. He was in water, he finally realized. He lifted himself out of the crystal water.

"Shit, you hear that? Holy shit, it's Gabe!" shouted a familiar voice.

Gabe looked over to see Jack and Michael standing at the edge of the shallow stream he happened to be in. Michael and Jack rushed to his side, examining the soldier.

"We've been looking for you for days man! Look, this place is a mine field, while looking for you, American soldiers opened fire on us, we found Chinese, Russian, North Korean, all kinds of nations are here man. And the the fighting is just ripping them the fuck apart, and these ponies are caught right in the damn middle," said Jack. He looked closer at Gabe's armor, "Jesus, man, the hell was able to fuck you up that much?"

"You can tell how chaotic it's gotten, Gabe, we're already spilling fucks onto the field, they've brought N.A.Ps, mechs, unmanned machines, exo-skeletal battle suits, lots of nukes, autonomous electronic soldiers. We're just hammerin' each other like no tomorrow, just like the old days," said Michael.

Gabe nodded in understanding.

"Oh, also, you might want to reset the suit. Jack and I read the manual to that thing, and you'll need to reset to get the adaptive armoring online, it'll really help when you're getting lead flung at you," said Michael.

Gabe nodded again, accessing a user console to reset the suit AI. His entire suit shuddered, then sparked back to life, flashing warnings of suit damage in Gabe's HUD.

"Another thing," began Jack, "we got a present for you, I know you're already pretty well set for walking right up to the devil himself, but, that princess Luna wanted me to give you this as soon as she put some spell on it," Jack handed Gabe a very long rifle with a lethal blade extending across the entire bottom of it.

Gabe grabbed the over-sized weapon curiously.

"M-20 Electro-Magnetic Gauss Rifle, Luna just called it the LateDusk Lance, get a load of that shit," Jack laughed, "listen, the recoil on that thing will kick your ass if you're not careful, it's a cross of a railgun and an M82A2 anti-material rifle, that thing can shoot things through our platform no sweat, so put it to use,"

Gabe gave another nod, stashing the huge weapon on his back and groping around his armor for his Celestia rifle. He looked down, seeing the custom firearm floating in the stream he was in. Leaning down to grab it, he then checked the mag to see if any rounds were left. Washed out. He threw it aside and grabbed a new clip to load his rifle.

"Ready? Alright, let's go, glad that fission reactor worked out, filling up on oxygen and hydrogen from the water," said Jack.

They traversed onward through the Everfree, being in the edges, where many ponies and humans alike had explored. They stepped over logs and through short gentle grasses beneath tree branches reaching out to one another, creating vast networks and creating idyllic arches to witness. There was silence, not even a single bird breathed a note of sweet song.

"This is... pretty peaceful, I wouldn't mind staying here," said Jack, "now I see where you're coming from, Gabe"

Gabe smiled, when suddenly a sharp shock went across his shoulder. He was knocked off balance, his body forced into another direction. He looked forward, seeing glowing red eyes observing him. These eyes were different, though, and seemed more artificial than ethereal.

"Contact! We got clankers!" shouted Michael, sliding behind a log.

"Fucking robots!" shouted Jack, opening fire on the machines, "Come get some of this! I dare ya!"

Gabe grabbed Jack and threw him and himself behind cover, narrowly avoiding a deadly volley of lead fly overhead. Gabe rolled over to claim his own side of the fallen log serving as protection, readying his Celestia rifle for the fight. He poked his head over, loosing some shots into a clanker's head. Gabe was rewarded with a show of lightning and fireworks from the bot, damaging the other machines around the deceased target.

"In trees! Shoot them down!" shouted Jack.

Another clanker dropped from the trees behind Gabe, grabbing his head and throat with metal claws, trying to rip off his helm. He struggled with the artificial beast, trying to grab its optical sensors to destroy. He finally activated his hydrogen thrusters, burning the machine in its heat. Gaining some freedom, he freed his right arm, swinging it back at the machine, shattering the metal soldier in several pieces.

"Yeah Gabe! Show them clankers how to kick ass!" shouted Michael. A machine dropped behind him, grabbing him by the throat and raising up for an execution. Gabe rushed to his cousin's aid, grabbing him by his coat collar and rending him from the mechanical grip. He threw him towards Jack, twirling into a heavy punch to the robot's chest. Ripping his hand from the machine's chest, bringing a chunk of its motherboard with him.

"Shit, thanks man," said Michael.

"Uh, boys, we got one more," said Jack, hesitation evident. Across from them stood a very large mech. From its sides hung a heavy chaingun and a lethal claw.

"Tevin's team, huh?" said a man inside the mech, "too fuckin' bad you gotta die now,"

The crew leaped for cover as the chaingun hailed lead upon the trio. Gabe, hiding behind a tree, loaded his rifle with a fresh magazine, then stashed it for the gauss rifle. With what Jack described as 'having more balls than Master Chief' Gabe leaped from his cover and closed the distance between him and the mech, wielding the huge rifle like a sword with its long blade across the bottom. Gabe lunged for the machine, swinging the blade straight through the armored torso, splitting it, much more cleanly, in half. Gabe landed gracefully on the other side of the destroyed mech, kneeling down like a sword master after a fight. The mech exploded in a mess of metal and blood behind Gabe, confirming his victory over the manned machine.

"Shit Gabe! Is there anything that humanizes you?" asked Jack.

"I can think of a few," muttered Michael, "but now's not the time, we got plenty more clankers and god knows what else waiting for us, and from what I was told, Luna should be looking for us, now that we found you, phoned in to tell the news while you were busy,"

"Okay, then where the hell is our damn evac?" asked Jack.

Gabe looked around, getting startled to see the moon princess stalking them from a rock. He tapped his cousin roughly on the shoulder, pointing at Luna much like he did Chrysalis. Luna simply looked back down, a spark of discomforting interest aimed at Gabe.

"Is it done? You've found what you need?" she asked.

"Uh... Yeah, we're waitin' on ya to zap us home," said Jack.

Without a single word, bright azure magic radiated from her horn, teleporting the soldiers and a very confused Gabe to Canterlot Castle.

***

"God damn... How do ponies get used to that? It feels like my head is getting shoved up my ass," complained Jack.

"I'm with Jack, teleporting isn't all that comfortable," said Michael.

Gabe shrugged his shoulders repeatedly, trying to loosen up from the previous fight, and shrug off the feeling of teleportation. It had felt exactly like Jack had described, and with the ARX, it only felt much worse. Gabe was puzzled, the portal he had gone through didn't feel anything like this. The portal, Gabe remembered his experience through it. He grabbed his cousin and spoke sudden, fast-paced Korean to him.

"You saw Nightmare Moon? That shadow was a portal? And Nightmare called you 'the Traveler'?"

Murmuring rippled across the ponies in the throne room, as Tia and Luna exchanged quick glances, Tia's heavy with concern, Luna's with the same interest as before.

"Would you... please follow me?" asked Celestia.

Gabe and Michael followed both princesses into a small room with a large four-poster bed in its center, Celestia's bedroom. They were seated at a round coffee table set up in her room, and tea was poured for the two relatives.

"You spoke of a portal, that led you to Nightmare Moon, that was made of dark magic, correct?" said Celestia.

The doors to her room opened gently, with the main six ponies filing in, and many onlookers trying to get a glimpse. Twilight and her friends seated themselves around the the table, behind the two princesses.

"Well... yes, Gabe did say something very much like that," Michael was back in his professional manner, very different from his personality on the field.

The princesses exchanged glances, then Celestia said, "Gabriel, are you in fact the Traveler?"

Gabe spoke some Korean to his cousin, having him translate his response.

"Gabe says: I'm not sure, it was what Nightmare Moon seemed to call me, then again, how can Nightmare Moon exist, if Luna is still Luna,"

"Do you know what a Chronomancer is, Gabriel?" asked Luna.

He shook his head.

"A Chronomancer, or the Traveler as we call them, is a being capable of traversing planes even alicorns cannot to get to different events in time, even alternate universes," said Luna.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," interjected Rainbow, "you're saying this guy can do crazy things that even you can't?"

"Well, Rainbow," said Twilight, "a Traveler could be... well, anything with the intelligence to use it willingly and with control, so a human being a Traveler, well, as unlikely as it sounds, it's possible,"

A silence was kept in the room. Amid it, Luna seemed to be inspecting Gabe, and, though she was his favorite of all the ponies, he found it extremely unsettling.

"It seems," Luna finally said, "that you cannot leave Equestria, for a Chronomancer only appears when needed most-" Gabe's eyes widened "-they are the ultimate warriors, born and bred to fight until they die," Gabe buried his face in his hands. Where he thought he could be free, he was only shackled again. For the sake of his beloved Equestria?

Mahikari

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Gabe was miserable, he sat in the nuclear platform's living area pondering what Luna had just said. Each time he found his time as a soldier to be as long as he lives, no matter what. But for Equestria? This struck Gabe most. The ponies obviously had no weaponry beyond what Gabe could make with a few magnets and boredom, he could have simply walked away and even Tia would reconsider confronting him. But why would I leave what I must fight for? Gabe asked himself. He was lost, unable to comprehend his own decision of staying to guard Equestria and his assumption of needing to fight for it. What would I even be fighting?. This concerned him most.

"Finally got out of that suit, huh?" Gabe, dressed in simple jeans and a grey t-shirt, turned to see Michael coming in with a glass of his favorite scotch.

Accepting the scotch, Gabe explained his plight to his relative.

"You're really not sure, are you? Listen, there's an old hard drive with some StarForge on it, go and clear your mind with it. Meanwhile, Tevin will be collecting data from the suit memory banks, see what happened during your disappearance, Jack is making some upgrades to your suit too, trying to reroute the EM emitter to feed into the gauss and actually make the gauss rifle a part of your suit, some folding and assembling on the battlefield method he was working on at MIT. I got a conference with the princesses and the Mane Six, they wanna know a thing or two about us, and we wanna know a thing or ten about this Chronomancer business. Have fun, I leave...-" he checked the clock, "-right now," he rose to leave for his meeting with the ponies.

Gabe understood why Michael was chosen, his fluency in English and non-hostile nature to the ponies made him a prime diplomat. He got up and shuffled down to the computer, a simple laptop. He checked the hard drive on it, and sure enough, StarForge was hidden in its menus. In the matter of minutes, he was already consumed in the game's survival mode.

"NOOOOOOOOOOO" he shouted, falling off a cliff in his game.

***

"I've already explained this, Tia, we're just four soldiers, we can't fight that," said Michael.

"Gabriel seems able for this service, we believe he can-"

"Gabriel is not ready for this, for a human, this is a lot to take in, from what I hear, Gabe had his ass handed to him when fighting Nightmare, too" said Michael.

"Nightmare Moon," said Luna, "is a sign of the nightmare forces returning, think of the disadvantage we have without Gabe, we cannot warp time like the Chronomancers,"

"Tell me," said Michael as calmly as he could, "what makes the nightmare forces able to warp time like Gabe? Maybe he just stumbled upon Nightmare through some crazy accident activating his... powers... how the hell does Chronomancer magic work, anyway?"

"Chronomancy is the art of summoning and weaving time portals leading to alternate realities, different time events, and nopony knows what else. What we do know is that there are only the rare few born with the innate ability to use such magic," said Twilight.

Michael was rubbing his forehead in an attempt to keep calm against these impossible ponies, "God, you really are an egghead,"

"I'm just well read," Twilight huffed.

"Yeah, so am I, I read philosophy, discussed it, interpreted it, and that made some degree sense compared to this nonsense,"

"Look, sugarcube," said Applejack.

"Already using 'sugarcube' I see, though I don't see how you'd have the sudden trust," said Michael.

Applejack grit her teeth slightly, calming herself before response, "We can see that Gabe means something to you, and we don't wanna cause any harm to 'im, but if half of what ah hear is correct, we need him to help us,"

Michael scratched his head. Why are these ponies so persistent on us helping them? Don't they have the Elements of Harmony? he wondered. He looked up, seeing the moon princess' eyes open and her horn suddenly stop glowing.

"We can't use the Elements, the nightmare forces would be much too cunning to give us a chance with them," she said.

Michael pointed his finger at her, an intense feeling of violation filling Michael up, "You, stay outta my head, stay outta my team's heads, stay far away from Gabe's head, he's had enough shit in his life, and no one here wants him going ape-shit,"

Fluttershy asked "What happened to Gabe?"

Michael looked up, causing Fluttershy to cower down, "If you're okay with answering that, of course," she squeaked.

Michael looked around him, the ponies were very interested in the Chronomancer's story.

"Gabe," he began, "is not, shall we say, easy at letting go of things. It started years back, when he was hardly eight years old, I was ten at the time, and we all, including his thirteen-year-old brother, went for a little exploring. We all loved My Little Pony, and had some crazy idea of finding the double sided pool some old man told us about. Turns out it's real, we found it hardly a week ago, and that's how we got here, anyway, little did we know, where we explored in the jungles of I don't even remember, a tiger stalked us, and killed Gabe's brother, ate him alive on the spot. Now, Gabe refuses to lose any of his friends or family, that zealot would do amazing things, and was just too stupid to die during those great feats,"

"Sounds like that loss made him stronger," said Applejack.

Michael glared, then said, "maybe, but him always putting his life on the line for someone else's, it's hard to watch when you've helped care for him for years on end,"

"Ah see the problem, but if Gabe's doin' so well, why is it a problem?" asked Applejack.

"Because it's extreme, but it's best that I don't stop him, he had seizures almost every night after his brother died, anxiety attacks, depression, the same would happen if he lost any of us,"

"I'm curious," said Celestia, "would Gabe be so willing in serving Equestria like he does his friends? He is certainly, by our standards, a super soldier,"

Michael scratched his eye a bit, then said, "If you plant the right ideas, Gabe is relentless in protecting the ideas he has, working to make it happen. In the past, some of those more... persuasive to Gabe, have gotten him to do things for their own gain, some... pretty horrible stuff, that was only in school, we do well to keep that from him,"

The ponies exchanged some glances among each other, pondering the new information they were given.

"Well," Michael sighed, rising from his seat, "I am going to retire for the day, and Tia, if you'd be so kind as to send some rations to us, thanks," he left the conference table and headed back for his home within the giant mech.

***

Michael slid down a ladder into the machine, passing by Tevin as he made his way to the living area from the armory.

"How'd it go?" he asked.

"Damned impossible ponies, I would do almost anything for them, even Molestia probably, but putting Gabe, and ourselves, in the damned front lines of a war bigger than freakin' World War 2, does not sit right with me," Michael said vehemently.

"I hear ya, but this is something Gabe has has been looking for his whole life, and from the many shows he's forced me to watch, I don't blame him. In fact, I was even considering on staying here myself, maybe get a job as a doctor, like I've always wanted," said Tevin.

"What stopped you?" asked Michael.

"Same as most other people, got drafted, I was at least able to get my degree, finding a job, well, I just wasn't fast enough. What was Gabe's and your story again?"

"Oh, I was learning about nanotechnology and quantum-physics when I got drafted, second year of college too. Gabe, he got drafted when he was nearly finished with high school, I honestly thought the little bastard would become something big, like, I dunno, an astrophysicist, or... some damn entrepreneur that becomes a billion-air over night, yeah, academically, that sounds like him,"

"Mmhm, well, get Gabe off his ass when you find him, he's a fast learner and I want him knowin' about how his suit works, wearing that thing is like having a bomb strapped to your fucking body,"

"You really don't like that thing, do you?"

"What gave ya the hint? When you've gotten Gabe to meet up with Jack on the suit, get to the living quarters and mix me a drink, that embedded memory gave me a headache from watching it, all that damn movin' around like some retarded roller coaster,"

Michael laughed at Tevin's plight, "Why you have a headache: you can't pull that stuff off, cause you're not physically able,"

"No, it's just that I'm not Asian,"

Michael laughed out heartily, he knew Tevin for years on end, treating him like an older brother, and Tevin, watching over the team like the big brother should. Michael finished up his reminiscing and went to find his cousin, still playing StarForge.

"Nice economy, how many trade routes you got?" asked Michael.

Gabe held up four fingers.

"Four? Damn, lots of goods, huh? Anyway, Tevin wants you to take a look at the new upgrades to the suit. And, I think he also wanted to rename the thing, both lance and suit, given the major alterations to it. Got a name in mind?"

Gabe only shrugged. He saved his game and rose to find the fortress armory, where they found Jack working on a console.

"You done?" asked Michael.

"Yeah, just doin' a final check up on the hydrogen feed," said Jack.

"What'd ya do to it?"

"Made it better, but... also more dangerous, I released the forced limiters, ones you can't bypass by normal means, so, Gabe, listen up! You push the suit too hard without those limiters, Boom! Fuglies get roasted Gabriel for lunch... if they can find anything left,"

Gabe shrugged, unaffected by the warnings of imminent death while wearing the suit.

"But! on a happier note, check this out!" Jack punched some code into the console, "watch the cradle" he said pointing at the device which the suit was mounted on. On the suit's right arm, the cuff opened, as the armoring moved down along the arm, assembling itself into a long rifle with an over-sized bayonet stretching out across the bottom. Some thin mechanical manipulators poked out of the cuff, aiding in assembling the gun in the suit's hand. A grin flourished on Jack's face.

Michael whistled loudly, "You finally did it, that folding method, does it work with other guns?"

Jack's smile disappeared, "No," he said, "had to redesign the whole damn gauss rifle just to get this to work,"

"Did you have to weaken it?"

"Oh, no no, I just needed to have it put together in a different way, actually strengthened it. But, when it comes to mass producing weapons like that, it'd cost a damn fortune,"

"Yeah, I hear ya,"

Gabe tapped his cousin on the shoulder, the same rough way he always had. Getting Michael's attention, he pointed at the armor.

"Right, right, we're getting off topic, well, Jack, any other modifications you've made to the suit?" said Michael.

"Well... I redesigned the armoring, focused it in other places, replaced some of the hydraulics with carbon nanotube muscle fibers, they prove more natural and stronger too, actually. I also... well... remade the cooling function," Jack said with some hesitation.

"That's supposed to be good, right?" asked Michael.

"To a point, there's a circular vent on the back of the suit, between the shoulder blades, it was protected before, but now with the greater thrust output of the hydrogen engines, it must be exposed for faster cooling. The vent is Gabe's soft spot, get a bullet in there, he's a walking bomb then, but the new increased output can roast even the toughest armor, can provide a significant amount of more thrust, and the vent doubles up as a both an emergency thruster, and an emergency burn-off vent, so in case of a leak, he can burn off the hydrogen before something happens," explained Jack.

"I... don't know, Jack, it's still a problem that the vent is exposed so openly," said Michael.

"Another feature, armoring for the vent was added, it closes over it like some science fiction automated door, but it can only be temporary, otherwise it heats up,"

"Great, so that means Gabe is using hit and run tactics, unleash hell, fall back to cool off,"

"Sounds like a safer strategy compared to running in, guns blazing like he always does, this forces that, so...-"

"Yeah, yeah, can we get this thing out of the cradle and onto the field please? We gotta test these things,"

***

"Alright, Gabe, we've gotta test every new feature in the suit, any features I missed while back at the N.A.P. we'll cover while we're here on the field," said Jack through a comm.

Gabe stepped out into the middle of a flat field, not far from Canterlot. The grass proved short, and was wet from a short-lived sprinkle not too long ago. Looking up, Gabe could see the clouds still hanging overhead, threatening a heavy storm. He focused his gaze back on the fields, seeing what little light penetrating the clouds dancing on the moist green blades.

"Grass is wet, good, you won't start a fire when you engage, the ponies have no idea what we're doing and we'd like to keep it that way, to say nothing of wherever the hell hostile soldiers might be, be discreet and nothing too fancy, we just need to get the testing done, got it, Gabe?" said Michael.

Gabe confirmed his understanding with some casual Korean, then readied himself for orders on how to test.

"Okay, let's get to work, before we do anything with the thrusters, I wanna test out the carbon nanotube muscle fibers, see if it woks as a replacement to the hydraulics. Gabe, get you tactical bow out and adjust the spider silk string tension, with those muscle fibers, you're over two-hundred times stronger than your normal muscle, so don't hesitate on making the tension extreme," said Jack.

Gabe did so, turning some knobs on his bow to tighten the string. When he felt it was enough, he pulled out an arrow with a carbon tip and notched it to the string.

"fire it upwards, we're tracking it via UAV, so we'll get the data,"

Gabe pulled the arrow back, hearing some creaking and whining from his bow through the slow and difficult overdraw. He pointed upwards, loosing the arrow, as it whizzed past him like an angry hornet.

"Holy shit, that thing broke the troposphere," Jack said several seconds after the launch.

Gabe folded and stashed his bow, readying the hydrogen thrusters for testing.

"Yep, Gabe's got this, try out every thruster, including the emergency ones, do a little parkour, just stay outta sight," said Michael.

Gabe ran forward, having the engines propel him faster, while an audible roar of heat being exhausted rang from Gabe's back. He slid to a stop, boots gliding across the water droplets nestled upon the grass. He then ran the emergency thruster, having it propel him forward with a sudden force knocking him face flat. An idea came. Gabe rose, brushed himself off, then ran forward again, leaping at one point and landing on his knees, activating the emergency thruster and gliding across the wet grass at breakneck speeds.

"WWHHOOOOOOHHHHOOOOOOOOO" shouted Gabe in glee. He cut the engine, rolling forward onto his back, where he engaged the vent thruster again, being thrown into the air and landing expertly on the ground in a low crouch. Gabe rose upright, allowing large amounts of heat and steam to be released with a low hiss.

"Gabe, that's... that's just kickass, that's what, anyway, get the user console up, I fixed the cloaking, but at a cost, you're emitting heat waves to bend the light, so you are going to heat up, remember stay cool, otherwise, boom," said Jack.

Gabe went to the console, seeing a standalone option labeled 'cloak'. Pressing the button once, he watched his arm disappear.

"Oh, thank god, it works," said Jack, "that's all we really need, Gabe, you only really needed room for the thrusters, head on back, everything works, cloaking, cooling, and thruster output, just a reminder, that emergency engine can be the death of you, extremely useful, yes, but extremely dangerous too,"

"Actually, before you come back," began Michael, "I want to see something, I want to see if you are a Chronomancer. Can you replicate what you did a few days ago? Just to prove those ponies wrong, man, I wouldn't want you getting hurt,"

Gabe disabled his cloak and looked around a bit, "How?" he said.

Michael sighed, "You know there's a problem when Gabe starts speaking English,"

"Still not a complete sentence, so not really real English," said Jack.

"That's not the point, however, I was right, Gabe is not a Chronomancer, this war against the nightmare forces is not our war,"

"Whoa, whoa, a war? That's what you got called in for? I thought we came here to avoid that,"

"Relax, Jack, unless Gabe can pull off the mother of magic tricks, we don't have to worry,"

Gabe continued looking around, staring up. While aiming his gaze in an aimless manner, Gabe noticed the clouds parting slightly, then significantly. The day had passed, and only stars were visible in the sky. Gabe stared long into the stars, almost hearing a whisper, a whisper of a secret long unknown. His fingers twitched, and he saw the stars flicker. He looked at his hand, then the stars. He rose his hand to the stars, as if he were offering something to them, and curled his fingers inwards, causing the stars to burn brightly. His hand was feeling warm, he looked back at it, seeing it glow a blinding white. He kept his fist tight, holding it out in front of him, feeling something inside trying to get loose. Gabe opened his hand, seeing a white ball of light float in front of him.

"What the hell is going on?! Where's Gabe?! How'd he disappear?!" Gabe could hear Michael shout.

"I don't know! I can't get a reading! Energy signatures are off the charts! I've never seen anything like it!" shouted Jack.

Gabe moved towards the ball of light, feeling nostalgia, but at the same time, fear.

"Jack, we need to get this goddamn thing back online! This shit's for real!"

"I'm working on it! This thing is producing more energy than a high frequency laser! I need more-... Fuck!"

Gabe walked into the ball of light, seeing a flash of blinding light, before him. When the light faded, Gabe found himself in a desert landscape. The air around him was wavy, a sign of intense heat. He looked around, trying to comprehend what was around him, when the long barrel of a gauss rifle was pointed at his face.

"Who, the fuck, are you?" Gabe was asked.

Run Boy Run

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"I'll ask one more time, who are you?" Gabe was asked again.

Gabe slowly turned to see his oppressor, a military operative, armored in a black power suit, an older version of Gabe's.

"I'd hurry up and answer, the sun isn't too nice when you're in it too long," he said.

Gabe looked at his armor, the white metal was steaming and beginning to distort. He looked back at the man, standing in the shadow of a tall rock to keep cool.

"I'm still waiting, unless you want me to kill you right now," he said, stroking his gun's trigger silently.

Gabe was getting very hot inside the suit, and warnings of the suit overheating flashed across Gabe's HUD. He couldn't take it, he spewed quick Korean to the man, claiming to be the Chronomancer.

"Chronomancer?" the man pulled Gabe into the shade, stashing his weapon on his back and seating Gabe down against the rock, "What'd you doing here? Can you even control the time weaving properly? Speak up! Quick! Nightmare will be coming,"

Gabe explained what had happened, how he had gotten to Equestria then here, and finally asked about the man's understanding of Korean and knowledge of Nightmare Moon.

"Took a class, finally paying off, Nightmare, nearly raped me, not literally though," the man said, "but listen, everything here has gone to hell, and-" the man focused his attention on something behind Gabe.

Gabe looked behind himself, seeing a crate on parachutes floating down into an abandoned township.

"I'll fill you in with all the details on the way, but right now, we need that crate, it's got food, ammo, and medical supplies. If we go fast, we can get them without being caught, and probably get them all to ourselves, you game for some running? Good, keep up, or die," the man began to sprint headlong towards the township, through the scorching sun and onto a rooftop in a single bound.

"Keep up, or die, man! Your choice!" he shouted from the rooftop.

Gabe copied the man, leaping up to the rooftop using the suit's artificial muscle. He caught up with him, only to watch him continue running. Gabe broke into a full sprint, unaided by hydrogen thrusters. Even without the useful tool, Gabe ran faster than he thought possible, covering three human bounds in a single bound of his own. He tailed the man, using the suit and his dusty knowledge of parkour to mimic the man's actions through the township.

"Mind the sun! Stop in the shade every so often to cool off!" the man shouted behind him.

Gabe leaped off a tall mud hut structure, following the man down to a shorter one with a roof of wooden boards. Upon landing, the boards broke, having both Gabe and the man tumble into the short mud hut. Gabe lifted his head just in time to see the man strike a creature across the face with a metal pole. It was the same as the ones at the portals.

"Guardians, nasty little fuglies, product of the nightmare forces. Just don't let them touch you, they feed on fear," said the mysterious man.

Gabe looked back at his armor, seeing the metal solidifying back in it's natural form. He had to be careful, the heat was surely lethal, and it wasn't afraid to show it. He looked up, and continued chasing after the man through the house, watching him break through the crumbling wall and leap to a new house. Gabe followed through the hole, running into more guardians, which he beat to pulp with both his thrusters and new-found friend. They sped on, leaping up and through the roof of one house, continuing onward through the murderous heat of the sun.

"Alright, all the shit that's happened, this'll take a while," said the man, stopping to rest in the shade, "Tia's dead, so the sun's dying now, who knew? Shining Armor and Cadence, dead, Mane Six, probably dead, Luna, in hiding,"

Gabe fired several questions at the soldier.

"Well, we're in Saddle Arabia right now, this was a colony that started maybe a month ago, already gone to shit, this would be your future of... I dunno, six years, maybe, assuming the nightmare forces win,"

Gabe gave a questioning look at the man's accuracy, then dashed after him as he began to run again. He followed him across many rooftops, leaping onto fallen poles like street lamps, and swinging on haphazard, smaller poles that hung between and over the houses. The man swung off of one of these smaller poles, landing in a small courtyard. Gabe leaped and grabbed the same pole, having it snap moments before he was to let go. Gabe flew, pole in hand, with his chest facing the sky into the courtyard next to the man, landing hard on his back.

"Get up, we gotta break through,"

Gabe used the emergency thruster to leap to his feet, still holding the metal pole. The sky had darkened suddenly. He looked up, seeing Luna's moon eclipse the growing sun, cooling the earth and air around Gabe.

"Shit, we're late!"

Gabe looked around, seeing many, many guardians amass outside in the courtyard, eager to meet, and probably eat, the humans.

"What now?"

Gabe held the pole in his left hand, calling upon the hidden gauss rifle in his right hand. The long rifle unfolded, the long blade sending curiosity through the beasts, though some of those who were bigger, knew its dangers and retreated back slightly.

"Let's go," Gabe said with a thick Korean accent.

He rushed the nearest crowd, literally scattering them across the courtyard, most in pieces. Within moments, the force of Gabe's strikes proved too much for the metal pole, and it snapped after cracking a beast's skull with it. With the rod shattered, Gabe weld his lance with both hands, twirling the lethal blade at high speeds. He twirled it faster and faster, until it was nothing but a blur in the sight of those around him. To Gabe, however, it was not a blur, but the world around him seemed to be slower, the creatures floating through the air as if they were in jello. Gabe slashed through them, cutting them quite cleanly in pieces. The man watched Gabe in awe, seeing the whirling blade go speeds even he could not comprehend. He stepped back some paces, feeling a vortex of growing strength grow from Gabe's swordsmanship. He witnessed Gabe move across the courtyard like a phantom, moving faster than even Rainbow Dash after a sonic rainboom. Gabe stopped in front of one particular guardian, slashing the beast countless times, though he heard only a single splatter of blood on metal. The beast fell into multiple pieces, black blood squirting from its body and severed limbs. Gabe leaped from one end to the next, wasting the nightmare forces with the deadly edge of his blade. Gabe landed neatly in the center of the courtyard, not showing the slightest sign of fatigue.

"How... How did you do that...?" the man asked, his disbelief hidden by only his helmet, "uh... nevermind, the crate should be around the corner here, let's get it before something else comes, way I hear it, Chrysalis burrows her changelings all over the place, they come out during the eclipse, so we'd better hurry the hell up,"

Gabe and the man ran onwards, through the building across from the courtyard, and onto a small walled off space. The crate was there, but it seemed to be tampered with. Regardless, Gabe and the man celebrated their victory with a fist bump.

"Brohoof," said the man, "damn fine job, Gabriel, man, magic and machine, nothing greater in comparison. By the way, my name's Blade, figured I can trust you enough to know it,"

Blade checked the crate, looking through its contents and giving grunts of disgust.

"Water's poisoned, food's rotten, medical supplies are gone," he said, "what the fuck! what're are we supposed to eat?" he kicked the crate the aggressively. Blade suddenly grabbed his rifle and whirled himself around with inhuman speed, aiming it at another man Gabe did not see.

"What do you want? Piss off, there's nothing here," Blade said.

Gabe turned to see an African-American man standing there, his arms raised to show that he was no threat.

"I know there's nothing there, I saw the monsters take it all at the orders of some pony of darkness, but I know where another crate landed. I cannot get to it, but you have power suits, we can work together, the three of us can survive together," the man said.

"Where is this crate?" asked Blade.

"Some miles from here, but the area is thick with monsters during the eclipse, and changelings begin to emerge for food at this time too,"

"You expect us to get through miles of fuglies? Power suits are useful tools, but they can only do so much,"

"I have seen your work, and the white one's work too, you are chemist, yes? And the white one is an obvious sword master,"

Blade turned to Gabe, "You studied sword art?"

Gabe nodded.

Blade lowered his gun, "Alright, but don't get in the way, we'll go a bit slower for you, so keep up or die. You got a name?"

"They call me Sully,"

"Hm," Blade made a run for it, with Gabe and Sully in close pursuit.

"I can see the smoke of the crate's flare, we go towards that," said Blade.

They ran straight for it, with Sully lagging behind with Gabe helping him get along. Blade was getting ahead gradually, clearing out any changelings that sprouted from the ground as he went by them. The numbers were increasing, and Gabe fired his rifle in controlled bursts to keep them at bay.

"We don't have that much time y'know, now get your asses up here! Won't be long before-" the ground burst open with changelings swarming out of it, "... shit, shit! We're falling behind schedule! Pick up the pace you two!"

Gabe grabbed Sully and threw him at Blade, who caught him at the last moment, not expecting such an action. Gabe rushed forward leaping upward several meters with the thrusters, kicking changelings out of the sky as he landed heavily by Blade and Sully. Sully had a small handgun with him, contributing to the defense against the changelings. Blade used a small sub machine gun to clear their path. Gabe grabbed Sully by the arm pulling him forward to keep up with the speeding Blade.

"Underground! Now!" shouted Blade.

They leaped into a small circular opening, leading into sewer system. Blade stopped to set down a small device, C4 explosives.

"Clear out! Exploding right the hell now!" the C4 detonated, caving the entrance in and effectively blocking out the changelings.

The three let out a sigh of relief, suddenly feeling the entire sewer shake. They looked up, seeing the pipes rumble and shake loose.

"It's collapsing!" shouted Sully.

"Shut the hell up! Group together!"

The three huddled together, their backs to each other in a circle. Some pipes and large rocks fell from the top, crashing around the survivors. They were unharmed. Looking up again, they saw the largest pipe still intact, the exact pipe they were under.

"Keep quiet, these tunnels are unstable from the blast, and the changelings will try to burrow through to us," whispered Blade.

Carefully, they trekked through the tunnels, hearing the occasional creaking and some loosened chunks of rock falling from the walls and ceiling. Along with that, the sound of changelings trying to get to them was unsettling. Before any of the minions of Chrysalis could get close, something else got to them first, a rock falling on them, or some unknown beast that stalked the humans in the dark, almost waiting for the perfect opportunity. Little did they know, the paranoid superstitions of the humans was proving itself true, as sapphire slitted eyes observed them in the dark. Gabe looked behind himself, feeling the overwhelming paranoia engulf him with fear of the unknown. Much to his surprise, he thought he saw the same slitted blue eyes watching him from afar. He muttered panicked Korean to Blade, pointing him in the direction of the eyes. Nothing.

"Ease up, Gabe, I'm sure it was nothing, just your mind playing tricks," said Blade.

Blade looked back in the direction he was pointed after leading Gabe back on track. The slitted eyes were watching him. He looked back at them nonchalantly, seeing expectation glow in them.

"Hmph, just wait," Blade muttered.

The eyes closed and vanished without a trace.

With time, they emerged at an opening. Climbing out, Blade saw nothing in the way, the debris had been piled up off the path, and no guardians or changelings in sight.

"What the hell?" Blade murmured.

He fished the two other humans out of the sewers, pointing up at the top of a mud hut. The flare had stopped burning, but the crate was still there.

"How did you know the sewers would lead here?" asked Sully.

"When you live here for so long," said Blade.

They located a ladder on the side of the hut, which was quite tall. They climbed up, seeing the crate intact and untouched. Gabe removed his helmet, laughing slightly at the achievement. Sully was laughing too, approaching the crate to open the spoils of victory. Behind him, however, Blade pulled out an intimidating, high caliber pistol, shooting Sully in the back of the head, and sending a shock through all around him.

"Sorry, boy, but there's only enough for two," Blade said, rolling Sully's corpse off the side of the roof.

Gabe was wide eyed, mouth agape in utter disbelief. Blade went to the crate, cutting a string which held it down with his survival knife. He opened the crate, looking through the contents with great interest.

"Well, what're you standing there for? There's meds, ammo, and food here. I've been starved all day, so let's eat,"

Through the Fire and the Flames

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Gabe was greatly distracted, seeing the sudden murder of someone who had helped them survive. He played it over and over again in his head, wondering why Blade had done it. He could have shared, he would have loved to have shared, seeing the pain of little children on the field had trained him to enjoy such a thing.

"Haha! What a night! Only beautiful thing left in this god forsaken world, Luna really outdoes herself," said Blade. He wasn't tense like he was this morning. After a hot meal, some jokes and replenished supply of ammunition, even Gabe would be calm, if it weren't for Blade's actions some hours ago.

Gabe then looked up, seeing the sky around him darken with the sun's absence. He assumed that Luna had managed to move Tia's sun to cool the earth.

"Hey, man, I know you're still stressing about what I did with Sully, but there's only enough supply for two people," Blade said.

Gabe looked at Blade questioningly, he was obviously a man who kept many secrets.

Blade leaned back on the crate, "How much do you know about Chronomancy? Did they tell you any useful intel?" he asked.

Gabe hesitantly nodded, unsure of what he was taught.

"Ah... God, alright, most of what they tell you is bullshit, but I can tell you the real stuff,"

Gabe looked at Blade with great question and skepticism, his eyes blaring the question, How.

"Hmph," he said with a laugh, "I got reliable sources, Gabe,"

Gabe gave a smile, figuring it to be the greatest failed practical joke he had ever heard.

"No, it's true, I can tell you right now that you got here through a controlled singularity, I can tell that your insane speed today, or everyone's lack of speed, was a result of Chronomancy,"

Gabe was only left with more questions, leaning in to hear more on the magic.

"Well, looks like it's story time, Chronomancy was called that at first glance, when really, it's total control over celestial magic, magic that even alicorns are limited to. Anything with the mind to use it could become the Chronomancer, though mastering it is what is going to take forever plus a day." said Blade, "For humans, it's tricky, our bodies aren't used to the magic involved in this world, so without help, we can never master the magical art within our lifetime,"

Gabe asked a question in Korean.

"It can be random, uncontrolled and very dangerous. In many cases, Chronomancy is activated within us when certain emotions are evoked, along with some tweaking made by the personality of whoever is wielding it. A defect towards human Chronomancers, the mental strain on us can very easily become extreme and cause us to go absolutely ape-shit,"

Gabe asked more questions, wondering who he would have to go to for help on controlling Chronomancy.

"Sorry, but it's time to get some sleep, it's been a long day for both of us, mostly me, you get some shut eye, I need to run a perimeter check, make sure no fuglies come at us in our sleep," Blade rose to do his chore, while Gabe rolled over onto his side, trying to get some sleep. Blade leaped off the side of the small mud hut, walking into a clearing off to the side of it, out of earshot of Gabe.

"Alright, Nightmare, I'm here, what'd you want?" Blade whispered.

A mare of darkness formed in front of him, her mane a swirling mess of star speckled, silky mane. Nightmare Moon

"Blade..." she said in a deceptively sweet voice, "aren't you happy to see your princess of the night? Aren't you happy to see your queen of Equestria?"

Blade looked around him, seeing guardians amass around him, their fangs dripping with saliva and blood from the recently disposed corpse of Sully, "Do you have to bring your pets everywhere you go? I mean-" Blade waved his hand in front of one, causing it to salivate and eye his hand hungrily, "-it's bad enough that they're mindless,-" he grabbed the creature and bashed its head on his elbow, splattering blood all over it, "-and very inefficient, but, if a queen must be way, crude and unholy,"

Nightmare's horn glowed with magic, suddenly causing Blade to cringe in pain, finally collapsing to the floor and curling up in a ball.

"Stop! Stop!" Blade said, trying to keep his voice low, "don't... don't do that... you've gotten your point across," he panted.

Nightmare Smiled, "What does the soldier know of Chronomancy? What did you share?" she asked.

Blade struggled to his feet, cringing with every movement he made, "Only some basics, I gave some better understandings, no real lessons," he said.

"Good, nothing will stop me," she said, "I see it now in his dreams, he believes in Celestia and I ruling in harmony. He must understand that I am the true ruler, and that the night will last forever. How could I possibly do that? Hmm, Blade?"

Blade gave a look of disgust, turning away to hide his disgrace.

"Oh, perhaps a vision of his fate is in order," she said with a smile, "I'll be back," Nightmare vanished, appearing next to the sleeping form of Gabe on top of the mud hut.

She leaned towards his head saying, "Just a touch of nightmare..." her horn glowed with magic, allowing her form inside Gabe's dreams.

***

She found Gabe happily practicing with a sword inside his dream. He twirled it expertly around his body, having it barely the size of a large knife. The sky presented a serene dawn, the clouds were plastered with warm colors. A smile crept across Nightmare's face, as she darkened the sky around Gabe, disturbing his quiet practicing. Gabe turned, seeing the mare of darkness standing across from him.

"Do you see my wonderful night, Gabriel? Do you see how it outdoes that of Celestia's days?" Nightmare asked.

Gabe struck the corrupt alicorn across the muzzle, snapping Nightmare back to attention. Gabe was clad in his ARX power suit, his guass lance drawn and ready for a fight.

"Not enough for you?" asked Nightmare.

Gabe's eyes, his confidence, his smile of mischief, they all blared the same message: It's on.

Gabe whirled his sword at speeds equal to what he had done earlier today, catching Nightmare off guard and slashing her legs up heavily. Nightmare looked at her legs, the wounds closed up instantly, she still had control over Gabe's dream. Regaining her own confidence, she countered Gabe's onslaught with a swarm of various nightmares of Gabe's past.

"Thor is here!" shouted a voice.

Nightmare looked at Gabe, and much to her surprise, he had amassed his own army from the ranks of Starcraft soldiers. They all charged head first into the fray, shouting their assorted catch phrases.

"Oh, it's on!"

"Hit and ruuuuuuuun!"

"cauterize the area!"

"Get some!"

"ENOUGH!!" Nightmare shouted, vaporizing the mass of soldiers and knocking Gabe to his back. Nightmare leaped onto him, roaring a horrendous roar in his face.

"HHHAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!" Gabe replied, kicking Nightmare in her belly. She didn't move. He kicked again, hardly moving the vile mare.

"Your fear overwhelms you," she said. Her horn glowed dangerously, blasting Gabe through the chest. He gurgled aloud, unable to breath, unable to scream, unable to fight. He only heard Nightmare's uproarious laugh as he drifted out and into another dream.

***

Blade had finally climbed to the top of the old hut, observing Nightmare's work.

"What... what happened?" he asked, "what'd you do?"

A smile creeped across Nightmare's muzzle, "He's still in a nightmare, living out each of his fears separately, and feeding me in the process,"

Blade was still breathing heavily from Nightmare's recent torture. He felt his blood boil inside, his face scrunched up in a painful grimace beneath his helm, as his hatred grew exponentially towards Nightmare.

"One of these days, Nightmare, you'll be defeated, and we'll all be happier, even without your nights," said Blade.

Nightmare Moon's eyes glowed purest white, sending unimaginable pain rushing through Blade's veins. He tried to scream, but to avail, as if his vocal cords were clipped. Nightmare eventually stopped, allowing Blade to open his helm and vomit onto the floor uncontrollably. A small drop of liquid seemed to splash into the pool of fluids Blade had already made.

"Ohh... are those tears of joy I see?" Nightmare said in a mock sweet voice.

Blade wiped his mouth with his hand before letting out sigh. Before lifting his head into the light, he had his helm close over his face, hiding his expression from the night demon before him.

"Send him back to where he belongs, I've organized a surprise for him that I don't want him to miss," said the night mare.

A time portal opened, and Nightmare roughly flicked Gabe into the swirling void.

***

"What the hell!? Something's being warped in!" shouted a human voice.

Gabe was dropped into the center of Celestia's throne room, from where, he hadn't a clue. He rubbed his head ruefully, then checked his surroundings hastily. He surely was back in the right time period, with Tevin checking his vitals carefully.

"Glad you're still alive, and damn, was that fast, you were gone for hardly twenty minutes," said Tevin.

Gabe's eyes widened, twenty minutes, he'd been gone in Saddle Arabia for a day at least. Suddenly, Tevin was thrown aside roughly by Princess Luna. She pinned the soldier down, having her hooves restrain Gabe's arms.

"You're back, what have you seen? Was Nightmare there? What've you learned?" Luna blurted, her eyes wide with a greatly discomforting look in them.

Gabe looked fearfully into her crazed sapphire eyes, silent.

Michael came to rescue Gabe from the deranged lunar princess' assault.

"Whoa there, let Gabe breathe, then shoot all your questions, princess,"

Luna regained her posture, lifting herself from Gabe's body.

"Yes, of course, forgive me Gabriel," Luna said, obvious embarrassment streaked across her muzzle, "please tell Michael what you have seen, that he may elaborate on it,"

Gabe was ready to speak when he was stopped by a transmission on his comm. The three humans checked their comms, hearing a panicked message get through to them. It was Jack, reporting from the N.A.P.

"Guys, get back to the N.A.P. quick! Something big's gotten picked up by the UAV while doing a scan. It looks like a huge dragon, gold scales, green eyes, and some hella hot fire breath,"

The crew looked around, hoping for some insight by the ponies. They wondered at their own technology, contemplating the firepower they had, and the firepower needed to down a dragon.

"Please tell me you ponies have got a way of fending off a dragon," Tevin said.

The ponies shook their heads and looked hopefully at the soldiers.

"You got nothing? Luna? Tia? Anyone?" Michael pleaded.

Celestia stepped forward, "we've never encountered a dragon before, let alone fight a dragon," she said.

"C'mon, can't you turn it to ash or something?" Michael begged.

Hope was lost from the soldiers, which lead to the ponies losing hope, and slowly drift into panic. They became antsy, and seemed to be searching for something, anything of use, of danger, of escape. Suddenly, a stallion tackled his way to the door.

"EVERYPONY FOR THEMSELVES!"

Promptly, Gabe loosed some rounds into the ceiling, getting all attention for himself. They all watched him as if he were a prophet, holding their salvation to the crisis. Gabe thrust his fist into his palm, mischief and reckless bravery streaked across his eyes. Seeing his eyes through the red-tinted goggles brought courage to all those who saw them.

Michael tightened his fist, "Let's take the fight to this asshole," he said.

Gabe grinned, moving forward to his cousin and clapping his hand into Michael's in a gesture of brotherhood. Michael gave a hearty pat on Gabe's back. Time was now of the essence, and the trio sped their way along to the N.A.P. with Gabe outrunning his comrades excessively. He was first to reach the N.A.P. leaping to the top in a single, impressive bound. He stopped at the cockpit and nestled himself inside.

"Gabe!" gasped Jack, "The platform needs time before we can thrust it into a fight, some ponies poked around and broke something while you were gone. Listen man, I can't get this thing up and running before that dragon comes, you've got the ARX, and right now, as soon as that bastard pokes his head out, we need you to distract him until the job's done"

Gabe was shocked at such a request. He was only human after all. He shook his head quickly, denying the job.

"Listen Gabe, it's not just us at risk here, those ponies are gonna go down hard if we don't help, but we can't do that unless we have time, think of the others at stake here, Gabe,"

Gabe was dumbstruck, how could he have gone so blind? He gave one quick nod and turned his gaze to the Everfree. A thunderous roar broke out.

"Speak of the devil..." said Jack. The beast demolished the vegetation concealing it, revealing large emerald green eyes, with golden scales glinting in the intense moonlight, "Christ..." said Jack, "God help us..."

Gabe leaped out, launching himself a long way with hydrogen thrusters, then landing dangerously hard with hydrogen output slowing him scarcely. He gazed up at the awesome beast, standing hundreds of feet tall at least.

"This guy is huge, more huge than what we saw in season one. By the looks, the thing must be ancient..." Michael informed over the comm, "We'll need heavy firepower to bring it down, just don't piss it off too much and get eaten,"

Gabe gave a quick nod, then launched himself forward, getting closer to the golden colossus. Being Gabe, he loosed some rounds into the air, shouting various insults in Korean at the monster accompanied with some rather rude gestures. Eventually, he ended up aiming too low, and fired at the beast, catching its eye with lead. This was enough to anger it, as its attention was no longer on Canterlot, but on the lone soldier. Thunder clapped overhead, bringing sudden rain pouring in on the combatants.

"Gabe, looks like you got flame breath coming your way!" shouted Jack through the comm.

The dragon threw its head back, returning with a scorching blaze. Gabe activated the emergency thruster, using the wet grass to slide away from the inferno, which lit up the night into day. Gabe was sliding on his side, firing several rounds into it's hide as he circled it in amazing speeds. He stopped, still on his side to witness the dragon's work. The landscape was molten! He allowed himself too much time to gawk, and the dragon grabbed him in its huge claws. Gabe dropped his rifle, being hauled up to eye level with the scaly beast. An orange tinge grew around its lips, ready to roast Gabe alive. Gabe couldn't use the thrusters, the dragon was more fireproof than the ARX. Gabe saw a glint of pinkish flesh, hidden well beneath a scale that was peeling off. He summoned the gauss rifle, thrusting the blade deep into the dragon's exposed flesh. Its roar was deafening, dropping Gabe from the huge height it held him. Gabe softened his landing and grabbed his dropped rifle, fleeing from the monster as his ears were ringing mercilessly. As his hearing came around, Michael was screaming through the comm to get back to the N.A.P. Gabe was running 60 miles an hour to get back to the sanctuary in the N.A.P.

"Move faster, goddammit! That thing ain't slowing down!" shouted Michael through the comm.

Many missiles swarmed from the platform, catching the dragon off guard and buying Gabe a considerable amount of time as it fell into the mud. Gabe wasted all the fuel he had left, almost flying up to the cockpit of the nuclear platform. He nestled himself in again alongside Jack, ready to fight the gold scaled dragon.

"Alright, Gabe, let's do this!" Jack practically shouted.

Jack pressed a button, making giant sized bayonets spring out beneath the barrels of the arm cannons. The dragon spewed another column of flame at the machine.

"LEFT!" screamed Jack, as Gabe had the entire platform leap to the left of the column.

"Damn! Did you guys see what that did to the mountain side?" asked Tevin.

The dragon made another roar, which Jack replied to with an oversized blade impaling its tongue. Both he and Gabe tried to keep the blade inside its mouth and even plunge it deeper.

"WE'RE A LITTLE BUSY AT THE MOMENT!"

The dragon continued to struggle, eventually burying its claws into the machine's sides and shaking it around.

"AHH! DAMN YOU, YOU SCALY MOTHERFUCKER!"

Jack ripped the dragon's tongue out of its mouth, causing it to release its grip. Gabe then used the machine's mechanical legs to land heavy kicks into the monster's side, with his final being upside the chin. The dragon was knocked down.

"NOW GABE! FINISH HIM LIKE ALL THE OTHERS!"

Gabe had the whole machine leap up onto the the dragon, drilling its traction claws into the dragon's hide. Aside from the claws, the machine was very heavy, and this caused the dragon some agony. Gabe leaped off, allowing Jack to bombard the creature with literally hundreds of swarmer missiles. Their work was presumed done, and they turned to leave.

"Holy shit, the mountain side is..."

"Liquid? Yeah, we were wondering when you'd finally notice," said Tevin.

"Heh, well, give me a status report,"

"So far everything is fine," said Michael, "it was all strapped down before we got rolling, as for personnel, we got some bumps and bruises despite being strapped down, but we'll live. Exterior may have lost some paint or gotten some dents, no real damage,"

"Well, that's good news, now to clean up the dragon,"

Gabe turned the machine to check on the fallen dragon.

"Uh... Where's the dragon?"

The two heard faint shouting, and turned towards Canterlot.

"Aww, look, they're praising us and must've already cleaned up the bloody corpse," said Jack, "wait, what're they pointing at?"

The ponies were pointing behind the mechanical behemoth, eventually backing up and turning to run. Jack and Gabe turned the mech, seeing an oversized flying lizard soar their way and grab the mech. This jerked the whole machine, sending everything, and everyone, that wasn't strapped down ricocheting across the inside. The dragon was trying to lift the nuke carrier off the ground, but could only reach a few meters before having to descend.

"Argh! This isn't like Pacific Rim, jackass," Said Jack.

The dragon shook the machine heavily, clawing viciously at the armor and jerking the cockpit around savagely. The monster dug its claws beneath the machine's platform, flipping the entire thing over onto the platform. Gabe nearly blacked out, breathing deeply while struggling to retain proper vision. He looked over to Jack, unconscious. Still breathing heavily, Gabe took over control of everything Jack controlled, while switching some functions to automatic.

"Automated system management enabled," a feminine AI droned.

Gabe now had full control of the mech, though it was still upside down. For Gabe, it proved much less a problem than to most other soldiers, as he had the legs swing up and around, landing the traction claws beside the platform. Having the legs in position, Gabe hauled the whole upper half of the N.A.P. upright, restoring the war machine to its fighting state. Glancing over to Canterlot, the dragon had trudged most of its way there, having been injured badly and bearing dulled, gnarled scales and chipped claws. Gabe's eyes narrowed on sight of the lizard, as he closed in, arming the Punisher Cannons.

"Boom," he whispered, pulling the trigger.

Devastating projectiles shelled the beast in the back, having numerous explosions run up and down the creature's scales. This seemed to bring its attention back to the machine, with an expression sparking disbelief and slight fear in the dragon. Gabe had the huge war machine break into a run, engaging the dragon with a rough grapple with the arm cannon's blades. Haphazard slashing commenced on from both sides, with Gabe finally thrusting the blades up into the dragon's armpits, nearly severing the arms. Next to the cockpit were small six barreled cannons made to fire canisters of neuro-toxins. The dragon made a fearsome roar, in which Gabe used these cannons to fire several canisters into the dragon's gaping mouth. Gas leaked out the dragon's mouth, going around and between the dragon's jagged teeth. The deadly chemicals were already taking affect, and the dragon's resistance was weakening, and had ceased all attempts to breathe fire on the dangerously close cockpit. Gabe unleashed one final blow to the dying legend, firing the arm cannons still jammed into the dragon's arms, severing them completely. A sickly amount of blood poured from the remaining stubs the dragon could call arms, and its eyes rolled into the back of its head from the sheer pain of such brutalization. The event of suffering was short lived for the dragon, however, as the toxins finished off the dragon.

Panting heavily, Gabe spoke into the comms, getting Michael's attention.

"We're fine, Gabe, my arm's busted though, how's Jack?" Michael replied to Gabe.

Gabe confirmed Jack's condition to him, hearing Michael report this to Tevin.

"It's done, Gabe, let's get ourselves cleaned up," Michael said after alerting Tevin.

Gabe was relieved, exhausted, and shaky. He never experienced such a hell in his life.

***

Jack was awakened, Michael's arm bound, and the team's wounds cleaned, which consisted of cuts and bruises. The N.A.P. was "parked" at Canterlot, reducing the soldiers' walking distance. Upon exiting, they were bombarded by crowds of ponies.

"Heh, we got admirers, boys," Jack said. A rock was thrown, hitting him square in the shoulder.

"Ow! The hell?" he said.

The ponies had their hooves raised in protest, striking the soldiers left and right with them. Tevin and Gabe tried to defend their wounded brothers by pushing some away and shielding them with their bodies. They made it hardly ten feet when royal guards came to intervene. Gratefully, they allowed themselves to be escorted to Canterlot Castle, but were still pelted by some hooves and stones. The trip was long and painstaking, but they eventually found themselves in Celestia's throne room, where the doors were shut and guarded. Tevin addressed Celestia with a booming voice.

"What the hell was that?! We kill a goddamn dragon and this is how we're repaid? Screw that, we're packing, and we're leaving," Tevin shouted.

"But you cannot leave," Luna said, emerging from a corner, "Gabriel is the Chronomancer, thus he is needed,"

"Y'know what, Luna?" Tevin said, storming up to her, "I don't give a FAT RAT'S ASS ABOUT SOME WAR THAT WON'T EXIST!"

Luna used her hoof to shove Tevin many feet back. He was caught by his team, who helped him to his feet.

"Princess, we kindly ask that you be a little more careful with throwing us around, not good for relationships," Michael said.

Luna raised an eyebrow, "If you wish to leave, then you must leave Gabriel behind,"

"Sister-" Luna looked over to Celestia, her expression pleading. Luna sighed, then left.

Celestia looked at the soldiers, bloody and fatigued, "We are extremely grateful for your intervention, not many have the knowledge to fight a dragon,"

Tevin only glared in return, then spat at her hooves, "I'll make this easy to understand, go buck yourself," he said, raising a middle finger for her.

"Humans, please, I can explain," Tia said.

"What is there to explain? You guys fucking hate us, we're not safe here, or anywhere," Jack said.

"We do not hate you, I do not. My ponies, they are afraid of you, you are not like the humans they are used to," Tia said.

"We're soldiers, call it a burden, but that doesn't mean they have to kill us," Michael said.

"I'm afraid that regardless, all the ponies' opinions have changed, warrior or not" Tia said.

A silence was kept.

"Well, what do we do? Other than sit here and hold our dicks," Jack asked, "Gabe hasn't said anything, Gabe?"

He was found admiring a pot of flowers in the corner of the throne room, gently caressing the delicate petals. He looked back, still holding a petal. He took the flower from its pot, ambling over to Celestia and placing it in her mane almost lovingly. This plunged all in the room into confusion, when a realization came to Michael.

"Gabe, you are a goddamn genius" he said.

"Uh... I'm still lost," Jack said.

"Gabe wants us to prove ourselves to be better, they've seen the soldier side of us, time they see the common life side of us, that'll mend their thought process,"

"That's... actually really smart, I mean you two crazy fags love this shit," Tevin said.

"Still love it after the fag part," Michael replied.

"Show your love, then maybe we can live in peace, and I can be a doctor finally," Tevin concluded.

"Whoa, wait, what am I supposed to do? There is no DARPA nor ARX in ponyland," Jack said.

"We'll figure it out, Jack, but now, we need to integrate with pony society, freedom is just around the corner," said Michael.

The soldiers looked hopefully to Celestia.

"But, what about the war?" she asked.

"We got an N.A.P. ready to nuke the shit out of anyone ready to cause war, so, yeah, no need to worry on that," Tevin said.

"Oh, um... I'm sure my faithful student Twilight Sparkle will be willing to help you with this task," Tia said.

"And if not, you can send her to the moon!" Michael said, laughing heartily with his team (as only they got the joke).

Celestia was relieved, their spirits were high and were willing to stay. Now she only needed to protect them from the other ponies, if she could even do so.

Pony Style

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The three humans were packing necessities inside the N.A.P.

"I told those ponies, they can throw as many rocks as they want, it's not gonna put a dent in this thing," Jack said.

Tevin took a peak outside from the platform's top hatch, "Yeah, well, looks like they're using magic now," he said.

Michael looked worried, "Any damage?" he asked.

"Nope," Tevin said, closing the hatch and dropping down to their level, "their best is a little more than a cute light show magicians use nowadays,"

Gabe came clanking in, opening the back vent of the ARX to release some heat. He disconnected the breathing apparatus from his helm, then pulled his helm off.

"Any luck with those ponies?" Michael asked.

Gabe gave a blank look, then shook his head.

"Well shit, we're gonna get stoned for sure," Jack said, "Gabe, follow me into the armory so we can get that suit off and keep it locked up tight, no doubt ponies'll still go for our tech,"

"When you two are done, we need to get packing. gotta take some standard gear just in case some kind of shit goes down, y'know, nothing like power suits or guass rifles, the tactical bow'll be fine," Michael said.

"Sounds like a plan, why don't you guys pack for us, while Gabe helps me with the ARX, Michael, you're done with those arrangements with Tia, right?" said Jack

"Yeah, no one gets in here without our permission, not even the princesses themselves," said Michael.

"Good," Jack said, leaving for the armory.

"Alright, what's the plan as soon as we get to Ponyville? Not like we have any money to support ourselves," Tevin said.

"Tia has it all arranged, first thing we do, we go see Twiley, she's supposed to house us," Michael said.

"And she's okay with this?" Tevin asked.

"More than okay, she wants to run some tests,"

"Whoa there, I don't want any test tubes stuck inside me,"

"Relax, it's just some observations, no dissection or any of that,"

Tevin paced a bit, "What's she trying to get?"

"Behavioral data on humans, anything she can study, she'll study it,"

"God, does this pony ever take the time to get laid?"

"Depending on the accuracy of clop, probably annually to every day,"

Tevin had his eyebrow raised, "Next time, don't answer that, okay, you can have your fantasies, but I wanna keep them nice and innocent in my mind,"

"Mmhmm, do you think Gabe and Jack are done yet?"

"Doubt it, that ARX comes on fast, but taking it off takes time. Why don't we find a way to get to Ponyville while we're waiting, cause I guarantee you, there will be no parking for an N.A.P."

Michael thought for a moment, "Aren't N.A.P.s multi-purpose? There should be a cargo bay somewhere with tanks and hummers, maybe even a Jackal,"

"Forget the Jackal," Tevin said, "we'll take the hummer, we'll all fit that way,"

"Alright, as far as I know, Ponyville ponies won't be as aggressive, news there has been rather slow lately,"

"Even this kind of news? It's been spreading like wildfire,"

"I'm going off of what Tia and Luna said, and I trust them with my life, so far that is, let's find that hummer and get going, sounds like they're some minutes from finishing,"

***

The team was traveling at high speeds in a light-weight, armored Humvee. There weren't many roads, given the ponies preference of the trains over cars. Regardless of the rough terrain, they continued on without any problems, gliding over the hilly landscape with unparalleled ease. Jack was at the wheel, steering around steep hills and deep depressions.

"Man, I'm getting hungry," complained Jack.

"We'll all get a meal when we've arrived at the Ponyville library," Michael said, "Twilight is sure to feed us,"

Gabe smacked his cousin's shoulder, spewing quick Korean at him.

"We'll be guests, that means she'll be obligated to feed us," Michael responded.

"Great, more grass to choke down... Hooray," Jack said.

"You prefer to starve, honky?" Tevin spat, "then shut up and be thankful we're still breathing,"

Jack slowed and stopped the car, looking back with distaste.

"Do me a favor and feel your stomachs," Jack said.

The three did so, noticing slight pains from hunger.

"Yeah, now you see? Let's get a bite to eat, seriously, I'm starved,"

The team unpacked provisions and lunched through the noon, then pleasured themselves with an after lunch nap. Michael and Gabe stayed up to keep watch. Both Michael and Gabe had no interest in driving, so they stayed and fidgeted with their equipment for a time. Gabe found himself more comfortable this time, wearing the standard ballistic vest, but still had his ponified weapons with him.The troops lacked bottled oxygen, but had some tanks and masks stored within the car's cargo in case it was needed. Gabe was playing with his glove, and Michael his combat scope, when they heard some muffled laughter. The two were immediately alert, grabbing their rifles and making a plan.

"We're a sitting duck out here, take the mounted gun, I'll wake up the nodders," Michael said.

Gabe was aiming the turret in an instant, making a quick check on the three barreled chain gun's munitions. Tevin and Jack were awoken silently by Michael, then informed of the situation. They all took arms, and readied themselves, peaking over the horizon for anything.

"Contact!" Jack shouted, "It's... It's a giant dog,"

Michael groaned, "Diamond Dogs, either here to bargain or steal, let's just drive away,"

"Can they catch us?" Jack asked.

"Well, they're not a bullet, nor an RPG, so no,"

"Good afternoon," a growly voice said.

In the humans' discussion the hounds had converged on their position.

"Mow 'em down on my mark," Tevin whispered.

"Tevin, we got machine guns, we'll slaughter the poor fuglies," Michael said.

"Well what do you want me to do? Drive? We're surrounded,"

"Just tell 'em to piss off," Jack suggested, "we're not interested, and if they persist, then we mow 'em down,"

"Ahem, good afternoon," the growly voice said again.

"Piss off! No gems here! Get lost before things get ugly!" Michael shouted.

"Well, my dear sir, we're just here to make an offer," the dog said.

They moved closer to the hummer, nearly touching it.

"Get away from me," Jack said, pushing one away from his position.

"Don't shoot, Jack, they don't stand a chance," Michael said.

Gabe, who quickly became annoyed with the situation, began shouting pointless insults and threats at the dogs, taking his pistol and firing it several times into the air. The dogs put distance between them and the humans, as Gabe looked over to Jack. Jack understood that he was given a chance, and leaped into the driver's seat, almost casually flooring it and driving through the masses.

"Mental note, never take a nap in the wilderness here," Jack said, with the team responding in whole-hearted agreement.

"How far are we from the place? We've been out here for hours," Tevin said.

"Well, diamond dogs live around the outskirts of the town, if we've already come across them, we shouldn't be far," Michael reasoned.

"So what's the plan when we get there, I haven't been thoroughly informed," Jack said.

"Gabe and I are gonna see if we can do some shopping for tonight's meal," Michael explained, "you two just stick either with Twilight or at the library, get things set up and make sure our integration with their society will work, so that means to stow all the gear and put it in storage,"

"Well, why the hell did we drag all this shit along in the first place if we're just gonna put it away?" Jack asked.

"Well, there might be the chance of something or another going wrong and something threatens Equestria," Michael said.

"Right, right, I got that, but why put it away? Won't we need a quick response if this happens?" Jack said.

"A quick response would be good, yeah, but the thing is, we won't really need it, there are guards and fiercely loyal ponies in Equestria. The only time we step in is if everything goes to hell like the changeling invasion in... what was it, 'A Canterlot Wedding' I believe it was called,"

"What's the benefit in that?" asked Tevin.

"We won't be noticed as often," Michael said.

"I hear ya,"

Within moments, the town of Ponyville was seen in the distance. The ponies were busy with their chores, and the main six had returned there before the dragon incident, though they still had heard about it.

"What do we say when we get in?" Jack asked, he was obviously worried about making a better impression.

"Oh, just answer any question they have for you, you'll fit right in," Michael almost laughed.

They parked the Humvee outside the town, moving into it while trying to be as inconspicuous as possible. There were still some onlookers, but most seemed to give them a sideways glance then ignore them. They began to relax slightly, despite their confusion, when a little colt ran up to them.

"Hey, you're humans!" he shouted, "Why are you dressed all funny? And what happened to your arm?"

Michael noticed the colt pointing at his arm, "Well, you see, I hurt myself, so I need this to heal properly," he said, "and the reason we're dressed like this, is... because..." he tried to think of a plausible lie.

"We're adventurers," Tevin said, "so we need this to protect ourselves, it's very dangerous out there,"

"I could protect you! I protect my friends from Diamond Tiara!" the colt said.

"Man, I hate that bitch," Jack muttered.

Tevin hit Jack none too gently in the chest, then said, "I'm sure you can protect us, but, who's going to protect Ponytown?"

"Ponyville," Michael whispered severely.

"Ponyville," Tevin corrected.

"Oh," the colt said, "you're right, I gotta protect Ponyville, well, be safe!"

The colt ran off. Michael patted Tevin on the shoulder, "Where'd you learn to deal with children like that?" he asked.

"Ran two jobs since I was fourteen, one was babysitting," he said.

"And Burger King, too, right?" Jack said.

"Nope, Mcdonalds,"

"Man, I like BK better,"

"Screw BK, man, I like old Ronald better,"

"Guys," Michael said, "can we refocus here? We've gotta be careful for some ponies who'll draw attention to us, who know what this little hamlet has already heard about that dragon attack,"

They heard a long exaggerated gasp behind them.

"God..." Jack breathed.

"You must be the humans! Hi, I'm Pinkie Pie! What's your name?"

The four turned slowly, finding the party pony smiling hugely behind them.

"Uh, we're Jack, Tevin, Gabriel and my name is Michael," Michael said, pointing at the respective people.

"Really? Wow, human names are reeeeeeaaaaaaaaaallly weird! So, do you need help with anything?-" she gasped again, "-maybe you're looking for Twilight! Yeah, she told me you were coming here, well to find her you gotta gooooooooooooooo," she swung her tail around and pointed behind the humans with it, "thatta way!"

They looked in the direction where the tail pointed, seeing a large tree turned into a home of some sort.

"Oh, the library, who'da thunk it was right there?" Michael said, "thanks pink-"

She was gone.

"Uh, where'd she go?" Michael asked.

"Don't know, don't care, that was more weird than I could take in one sitting," Tevin said.

"Has she ever heard of decaf by any chance?" Jack asked.

"Can we just get to the damn library? This pack is getting heavy," Tevin said.

The four gratefully made their way to the tree house library, knocking heavily on the wooden door. The door almost immediately opened, with Twilight standing there, gawking at the aliens.

"Oh, um, hi there, come on in!" she said cheerfully.

The humans had to duck down a bit to enter. They scanned their new surroundings with a careful eye.

"If you'd like, I could take those bags for you," Twilight said, her horn radiating magic.

"No thanks," Tevin said holding onto his backpack tightly, "if you could show us where we're bunking, that'd be great,"

"Oh, well, I didn't have a lot of room to put you all upstairs, so I set you up in the basement, where it's completely empty for you to store your stuff,"

"And not have a curious purple pony looking through it, listen, for your own safety, do not touch our gear, it's taken more lives than you can imagine," Tevin said.

They located the stairs and made their way down, finding four beds and plenty of space to drop their gear. Gabe was already taking advantage of this.

"Okay, just follow Gabe's lead," Jack said.

Gabe hastily threw off the pack he was carrying, stretching out his shoulders and beginning to strip the military gear off his body. Eventually, it was just a grey t-shirt and camouflage pants on Gabe's body.

"Gabe, see if you can find a bathroom or closet, we'll designate that the place we change clothes," Tevin said.

Gabe ambled off to do his chore, finding Twilight waiting curiously at the top of the stairs.

"Looking for something?" she asked expectantly.

Gabe simply shrugged, continuing to search for a closet of some sort, while Twilight followed closely behind him.

"Getting hungry at all? I have some daffodil sandwiches ready in the kitchen," Twilight insisted.

Gabe politely denied with a gesture, then found an empty room with no light.

"Oh, that's supposed to be storage, but I haven't run out of room in my other storage room,"

Michael came striding in, relieved of gear.

"Could we use that room?" Michael asked, "so we can change our clothes from time to time,"

"Interesting, you need a private spot to change your clothes," Twilight said.

"Well, yeah, we don't anyone seeing us naked, so we change in private,"

"But, don't you have body fur?"

Michael was frozen at Twilight's question, and her assumption of humans having body coverage through hair.

"No," he said, "we wear clothes to keep our privates... private,"

"... Oh,"

Jack and Tevin came running in, "Hey, you guys need to check this shit out, we got something on radar," Jack said.

The two hurried down, with a particular purple pony in close pursuit.

"It's not very discreet, and it's coming from the Everfree," Jack said, trying to keep his reading on a small handheld device.

"The Everfree, it's always the Everfree," Tevin said.

"Well, get this, it's going off like a beacon, anyone could be getting this, and you know how many soldiers are hiding out there," Jack said, "whoever this guy is, he wants to be found, by who? I have no idea,"

Michael was standing awkwardly, "Uh, Tevin, I think we should look into this before the ponies," he said.

"Why's that? You said yourself, these ponies are fierce and fiercely loyal,"

"Yeah, but the thing is-" he looked back at Twilight, standing stone still at attention, "-I'll explain later,"

"Buddy, that guy may be a friendly, and he's left out there to rot with other soldiers, it's best we find him, pony following us or not," Jack said.

Twilight's face lit up, "Does that mean I can come with you?"

"Only if you've got a death wish," Tevin said, turning to Michael, "so why do you think we should go after it before the ponies?"

"Because we have no idea what's out there, I don't want any pony blood spilled on my account, and I'm sure you'll agree," Michael replied.

Gabe was already refastening his ballistic vest to his chest. The team followed his example, quickly wrestling on their equipment.

"You, stay, and keep quiet about this," Micheal said, pointing at Twilight as he exited her home.

"For Christ's sake, as soon as we arrive, we've gotta leave for a wartime effort, this plan of assimilating with society is working like a charm," Jack said.

"We'll get to that, Jack, we've just got some business to take care of," Michael said, "besides, this should only take a couple hours, right Gabe?... Gabe?"

Gabe slowed his run and dropped to his knees, enveloped with sudden nausea and a violent headache. Michael rushed to his side, checking his cousin for the problem.

"Tevin you see this? Something is really wrong with Gabe,"

Tevin kneeled by Gabe, removing the soldier's helmet and looking into his eyes.

"What the hell..."

His eyes were bloodshot, with the whites turned sapphire blue.

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"Gabe, c'mon man, not now," Jack said.

Tevin was still checking his vitals, trying to find the source of the problem.

"Goddamn, we take three steps and there's another magic problem," Tevin said.

Michael looked around hesitantly, watching ponies crowd around the downed soldier.

"We can't keep him here, we'll risk exposing ourselves, we'll just have to bring him with and keep him out of trouble," Michael said.

"If that's what you think," Tevin said, "Gabe, can you walk?"

The soldier nodded, rising slowly and stumbling to the Humvee. He crawled into the back and collapsed inside, overcome with exhaustion. Tevin went and tended to Gabe, while Michael, armed with his pistol, acted as a gunner in the passenger seat for Jack.

"Floor it, Jack, we've gotta find that signal before anyone else," Michael said.

"You got it," Jack said.

They sped off, kicking dust into the air from the wheels. They began to veer off into the Everfree, getting very close to the distress signal.

"How's Gabe doing?" Michael asked.

"Better," Tevin replied, "but still not good, he's sweating profusely,"

"Have you given him water?"

"You have some? I already gave all of mine,"

Michael wrestled his canteen off his vest with his functioning arm and gave it to Tevin.

"There should be a fair bit in there,"

Tevin issued Gabe the water, calming his heavy breathing and reducing the red in his skin.

"How close are we to that signal?" Tevin asked.

"We're right on top of it, but I don't see it," Jack said, slowing the Humvee, "God, I hope this wasn't a-"

An RPG caught the vehicle in the side, sending the crew flying and the car itself tumbling towards them.

"Tevin! Gabe! Look out!" Michael shouted.

Another RPG came hurtling toward them, but stopped midair. Tevin looked at the missile, inches from his face.

"What the..." he muttered.

"Whew, that would've been messy," a voice said.

Gabe struggled with himself to turn, seeing a figure in a black armor suit. Blade.

Blade flung the rocket through the air with a small flick of his wrist, sending it with deadly accuracy towards a mech marching towards them. He drew a black katana-like sword from his back, twirling in his hand at extreme speeds.

"Come out of hiding, you fuckers," he muttered, creating a vortex of air from his twirling blade.

He held the blade right above his head, forcing violent winds to whip the overgrowth savagely, slowly pulling anything not rooted to the ground towards it.

Tevin felt himself being lifted into it, and clinged onto a root to prevent himself from getting pulverized. Michael and Jack were wrapped around a tree, trying not to get sucked in as well. Tevin looked back at Blade, seeing a literal tornado being formed around him, while numerous other soldiers were unlucky enough to get pulled into the limb-tearing cyclone, getting shredded by the intense winds. Tevin looked around, trying to find Gabe. He found that he wasn't with Michael or Jack, and he was clearly too weak to be resisting winds like these. He continued looking around, panic slowly enveloping him, when Blade suddenly slammed his sword into the ground.

Time was frozen.

Gabe slowly rose from the ground, having passed out not long ago. He looked up, seeing the whole world around him standing still, as if a mere picture of reality.

"Powerful magic, I know," Blade said.

Gabe looked up, shaking from his unknown affliction. Blade offered his hand, helping off the ground and aiding him in standing. Gabe fired a question at him.

"You have distortional sickness, happens if you don't know how to control your power," Blade replied, "it's time you finally learn your power Gabe,"

Gabe asked another question.

"It's not just Nightmare's return, I'm tired of you being an absolute pussy,"

Gabe gave Blade a severe look shouting Really? Me a pussy?

"Gabe, you've got a lot more to do, your work is far from done," Blade said.

He cast a portal with his free hand and helped Gabe to it.

"Welcome to the Nexus, Gabe," he said, going through it with Gabe.

Almost instantly, Gabe felt cured of his ailment, feeling renewed strength rushing through his veins. He looked around, finding himself in a huge library, with books self organizing themselves, and perhaps hundreds of stories of floors to all these books.

"I know what you're thinking, Twilight would love this, you could take her here for her birthday, y'know,"

Gabe nodded slowly, taking in the huge surroundings about him. A strange, sharp abject suddenly embedded itself near Gabe's foot.

"Oh, yeah, you'll want to watch for monsters while you're here," Blade said casually.

Gabe looked up, finding his attackers, a group of atypical, armored creatures rushing towards him with their weapons raised. Gabe drew his tactical bow, fastening an arrow to it and aiming towards the creatures. He let it loose, missing one's head and striking their shoulder instead. But that didn't even slow them. Each of the three were ready to cut up Gabe with their weapons when they simply froze before him. They fell onto the ground in two pieces each, and Blade landed next to Gabe with his sword drawn and bloody.

"See, you should've been able to take those guys, so now, you'll learn your power and finally be able to fight like a real Chronomancer,"

Gabe let out panicked Korean.

"Oh, suck it up, Gabe, you're still alive and in one piece, that's more than what can be said for me my first time,"

Gabe looked at Blade in shock.

"Yeah... Wasn't pretty, anywho, let's get a move on,"

They ambled through the Nexus, keeping any invaders at bay with Blade nonchalantly slicing them up with his sword.

"Kami!" Blade suddenly called, "Kami? Where are you?"

"Oh, Askun omiticaya, oh Askun omiticaya, oh Askun omiticaya,"

"There's the old thing," Blade said.

He rushed to a corner, looking over it. Gabe followed, looking over the corner as well, finding just a wisp of smoke vanishing as he turned.

"Where'd he go?" Blade asked, "He was right frickin' here!"

"Blade..." the two heard.

They turned quickly, drawing their weapons for a fight. What they found was a rather ghastly looking creature.

"Oh, Bellus, it's you, I thought you were Nightmare for a moment," Blade said.

The creature was floating above the ground, being unlike any Gabe had ever seen. Two huge, beady eyes stared right at him, with an atypical mouth with pronged teeth at it's ends. Its skin was a sick gray, and it was wrapped in a black, swirling cloak.

"You know I don't like it when you shout," she said.

Gabe still had his weapon pointed at the creature, his sights aligned with it's head.

"Be calm, Gabriel Kim, I mean you no harm," Bellus said to Gabe.

He was dumbstruck, this creature knew his name and all. He asked Blade a question.

"She is actually among the first Chronomancers ever born, thus she also makes other beings Chronomacers, she's the reason I am a Chronomancer,"

"Yes," she said, "we choose who we deem worthy of the power of a Chronomancer, and you, Gabriel Kim, are worthy of such power,"

Blade looked back at Gabe, "Don't think this makes you a Gary Stu, there are many others who are Chronomancers, so you're nothing special in this realm,"

Bellus took a closer look at Gabe, closing the distance between them. Gabe backed up slightly, intimidated by such an alien creature.

"Come close, let me in," she said.

Gabe shook his head, taking another step back.

"Very well," she said, also backing up, "but at least allow me to gift you the knowledge of the Chronomancers,"

Gabe raised an eyebrow, still retaining his distance from fear.

"Please, let me teach you," she said.

Blade went to Gabe and placed a hand on his shoulder, "Gabe, it's all right, you need to do this to defeat Nightmare,"

Processing this, Gabe nodded.

"Okay, you ready for this? All kinds of things will happen, some things... well... you won't be able to let go of them," Blade said.

Gabe tightened his fist slightly, fears flooding into his mind, "You'll have to be strong for this, Gabe, I wasn't... and now I can't even hope to defeat Nightmare,"

Gabe bit his lip, struggling with the decision. He didn't know what he'd lose if he accepted, but he knew he'd lose everything if he refused. He thought about what he had, what he loved. He loved Michael, his cousin who acted as a brother to him, he loved his two friends Jack and Tevin, and he loved the new, peaceful home he could have.

Gabe folded up and returned his tactical bow, approaching Bellus, ready to obtain the knowledge of the Chronomancers. He bowed to show that he was prepared, and Bellus came closer to him.

"Let me in, so I may sow the seeds of might..." she said, placing her hand on Gabe's head, having the flame of gods fill his body to the brim.

He was flying through the cosmos, feeling waves of something surging past and through him. Space and time was at his will, he could go wherever he wanted, see everything no one else could adore.

"To control the greatest of things, you must first realize their beauty," He heard.

He had everything at his command, imagination was not a realm of impossibility anymore, merely a test of creativity. He was beyond everything, he was soaring like an unchained hawk. He knew something great, he now held the very flame of gods!

"Return, Promethean Chronomancer, your task awaits you," Bellus said, pulling Gabe from his vision.

Gabe's vision slowly faded into blackness, as he awoke on the floor of the Nexus.

"How you feeling, Gabe?" Blade asked.

In response, Gabe rose to his feet and summoned a blue fireball, as bright as the sun, within his palm, then flicked it down the long hallways, creating the equivalent of a nuclear exlposion on the far side of the Nexus.

"That's what I'm talking about, Gabe, now let's get you home and into the fight with Nightmare,"

Gabe nodded readily, feeling the great power and knowledge of the Chronomancers flowing freely within his body.

"Great, oh, and I can see that you have a sort of connection with that suit of yours,"

Gabe looked down, seeing his old standard armor replaced with the ARX suit. The suit itself was somewhat altered and had a different feel to it, as if it worked with his powers as a Chronomancer.

"Time to go home, Gabe, you're needed," Blade said.

He nodded, then opened up a portal, pumped with energy both natural and supernatural. Both he and Blade practically leaped through, being brought back to the time period of the present.

"Gabe, RPG!" Blade shouted.

Gabe stopped the missile mid flight, returning it to its sender with a flick of his wrist. He immediately drew his rifle, then returned fire to his attackers, Chinese soldiers. He and Blade were back to back, fending off the hostile humans while stopping their rounds mid flight. Gabe downed a soldier, forcing the others around him to flee, he concluded that he hit the highest ranking officer there. Gabe fired at a few more, intentionally missing to keep them running. He looked back at his team, staring at him as if he were an alien. Gabe went and offered his hand to his cousin, helping him up while the others got up on their own. They looked around, seeing carnage and blood everywhere, and Blade missing from it all.

"Gabe..." Tevin began, "we are in some deep shit,"

Gabe looked at his arm, a realization slowly coming to him. Ponies had mastered magical warfare, humans, technological warfare, and as for Chronomancers? They needed a balance of man, magic, and machine, the warrior man was not far from becoming a god man.

Time Soldier

by Havelock

Destiny's a Bitch

My Little Nuclear Platform

Hydrogen Fury

The Chronomancer

Mahikari

Run Boy Run

Through the Fire and the Flames

Pony Style

Accelerated