Several of Ponyville's residents, as well as several others are abducted by aliens and forced to fight in a gladiator arena.
Everything was peaceful, Chrysalis had been stopped, the changelings had learned how to share love, and the CMC were spending time with their sisters. Then a group of aliens (yes aliens) decided to kidnap over a dozen individuals from six different species. Now the CMC, Applejack, Fluttershy, Rainbow, Rarity, Gilda and countless others will have to survive the extraterrestrial coliseum that is, Ark Royal. teen rating and Gore tag because of some degrees of violence.
It was around 10:00 when Rainbow and Scootaloo got back from the Wonderbolts show. Rainbow had gotten permission for Scootaloo to watch the show from the box seat. To make matters even better, the girls would spend the night at Rainbow's cloud house. Needless to say, Scootaloo was extremely hyped.
"You were completely awesome Rainbow Dash! The way you pulled up at the last second and made that burst of light! It was absolutely amazing! How'd you do that anyway?"
"Sorry kid, but that's a trade secret." She said ruffling the filly's mane. "Anyway it's really late, so we should be getting some shuteye."
Rainbow carried her adopted sister upstairs so they could prepare for bed. The two pegasi ended up falling asleep quite quickly, due to the late hour and the stress of having performed that day in Rainbow's case. Scootaloo crawled into the sleeping bag she had used so many times before, the rush from the day finally taking its toll on her.
Scootaloo knew something was wrong. Instead of her sleeping bag and the semisolid floor of Rainbow's house she felt hard metal beneath her. When she raised her head she could barely see a thing, just a smooth metal floor beneath her and a lot of black open space.
When her eyes started to adjust to the darkness, she saw that she wasn't alone. Nearly a dozen other ponies were there as well, some lying on the floor, others wandering around in a daze. Upon closer inspection, Scootaloo saw they were all wearing the same outfit, including herself. It was some kind of tight fitting material, green with a pale blue upside down star on the front. The garments for the stallions was shaped into a simple shirt, while the mare's were shaped into a leotard-like garment, with the bottom point of the star reaching all the way down the orange filly's barrel.
Scootaloo continued looking around the dark area (she had yet to see a wall or ceiling) when she saw a familiar rainbow colored mane. She ran up to the still unconscious Rainbow Dash who was also wearing the weird leotard. When she tried to wake her, she saw something else was amiss; there was a yellow line running over her left eye with two small dashes crossing that line over her eyelid.
"Scootaloo?" a soft voice said from behind her. She turned around and saw the stare master herself, Fluttershy, also in the blue and green leotard.
"Fluttershy! You're here too!"
"I guess, but where is here?"
"I don't know. Rainbow Dash still hasn't woken up."
The two mares lifted Rainbow into a sitting position, which helped to bring her round. "Ugh," she said holding her head, "What happened? Scoots? Fluttershy? When'd you guys get tattoos?"
Scootaloo paused, "Tattoos?" She checked her reflection in the floor. Sure enough, there was a yellow line running under her right eye, when it reached her cheek it turned on a 45° angle and came to an abrupt halt. She looked over a Fluttershy, it was difficult to tell with her fur color, but she had the same kind of mark as the rest of them, a yellow 'C' shape to the left of her left eye. In fact looking around, everypony had some kind of yellow tattoo printed on their face.
"Where are we?" Rainbow asked.
"We don't know." Fluttershy answered, "The last thing I remember was going to bed after making sure my animal friends were safe and asleep. What about you?"
"Me and Scoots had just got back from my Wonderbolts performance."
Scootaloo decided to let the two elements try and figure the situation out. She started wandering around the space, trying to see if she could recognize anypony else, by this point everypony was on their hooves. She saw Flitter and Cloudchaser from Ponyville off to one side, as well as her classmate Rumble and his older brother. "Wait a moment", Scootaloo did a double check to make sure she was right, everypony here was a pegasus.
Suddenly the floor started to glow different colors: gold, blue, red, green and white. Scootaloo quickly ran back to where Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy were.
All around the ponies gathered, lights began coming on reveling that they were not in a room, more like a wide metal pit. Above that pit was a ring of ponies dimly illuminated by the lights. In the center of the pit was a tall podium reaching far out of the pit, standing on that podium was a, something. It looked like some kind of dinosaur, it was orangeish brown and had three curved horns on it's face, one on it's forehead and one on each cheek.
"Greetings! I am Galthron." It sounded like the creatures voice was in Scootaloo's head. "And welcome to the first annual, Ark Royal!" The ponies outside the pit erupted into cheers. She saw several camera like devices being pointed at the crowd.
It was here that Scootaloo realized where she was, a stallion off to one side voiced her realization, "This is a stadium." Rainbow Dash spread her wings and flew at the creature at the podium, hoping to get some answers. She barely made it off the ground before her body was suddenly seized by an electrical shock. Scootaloo and Fluttershy ran to their friend, she was alright but the mark on her face was glowing slightly.
"For those of you who are not familiar with the Royal, let me explain." the creature on the podium continued, "Long ago, our ancestors would pit creatures against each other, even entering the ring themselves to test their own strength. We are here to bring you the same entertainment that the emperors and kings of old enjoyed.
"As a special treat, parliament has given us permission to use the primitive creatures of the 'off-limits' worlds." More lights began coming on, these were pointed inward at Scootaloo and the others. Several insect-like creatures took to the air above the stadium, each with a camera in it's arms.
A red light from the floor illuminated a group of, not ponies, on the far side of the arena. "Creatures from Alkriss," Some of the creatures in the light began roaring. One actually tried climbing the walls of the pit, only to falling in a fit of electrical shocks.
"Trilaok Two," a blue light in the space next to where the ponies were standing. Scootaloo saw what looked like a group of large snakes and weird looking bat things.
"The third moon of Vlidorian," It was a white light this time, Scootaloo couldn't see anyone in it, but she knew they probably didn't belong there.
"Orbicalous," The floor under Scootaloo's hooves suddenly glowed green, the area holding the ponies bathed in the light. They could now see a much larger number of ponies that just the group of pegasi; there were earth ponies to one side, a group of minotaurs, unicorns, what Scootaloo thought were changelings, and griffons.
One of the griffons looked over at the pegasus group, "Dash?" Rainbow looked over when she heard her name.
"Gilda?" The blue pegasus ran over to the brown and white griffon, only to be stopped by a wavering field of some kind.
"And finally, Thrindhas!" A gold light erupted from the only unlit area illuminating the final group of creatures. Scootaloo saw one that sent a shiver down her spine. It looked like a manticore, large muscular lion-like body with a barbed scorpion tail. Except this creature's tail had spines sticking out of it, not just a stinger. And it's eyes, it's eyes were cold, like something that kill you if you breathed the wrong way.
"For the next few days, you will see these beasts fight against each other in feats of strength, speed, endurance, and even creativity. Be here tomorrow for the first day of..."
"ARK ROYAL!!!!" the crowd of creatures screamed to the reptile on the podium. The beings in the stadium could finally see what would be watching them, aliens. Some looked like ponies, others looked like birds, some insects, still others looked like monkeys.
The base of the arena suddenly began sinking, a covering sliding in to replace it. A few of the pegasi and griffons (and other assorted creatures) began flying upwards to try and escape, only to meet the same fate as Rainbow Dash, an electrical shock from the marks on their faces.
Several large aliens in full body armor suddenly emerged and began taking the ponies away. Scootaloo could only walk along with the crowd, the full weight of her- no everyone's situation hitting her like a ton of bricks. She had been kidnapped by aliens, and was being forced to fight for their amusement.
Rainbow couldn't believe it. Did these creatures really think that they were only animals? She saw several ponies protesting and shouting at the guards, only for the marks on their faces to shock them or get pushed aside by the guards.
Rainbow went back to scanning the crowd, she had gotten separated from Fluttershy and Scootaloo. She still hadn't seen them or Gilda since they were taken away. She had caught sight of her fellow Wonderbolt, Fleetfoot, for a brief moment but had lost her in the crowd as well.
She overheard one of the ponies protesting to the guards, "A'm telling you, we're not animals! Y'all got to understand that!"
"I know that accent." Rainbow thought to herself. Sure enough there was her fellow element, Applejack, as well as Apple Bloom and another filly Rainbow didn't recognize. The guard they were speaking to was a large two legged creature, it's body obscured by bulky, futuristic armor. The guard pushed AJ back into the group with it's hoof- thing, roughly causing her to fall over.
Rainbow quickly placed herself between the armored beast and her friend. "Hey! Why don't you go pick on someone your own size!" The guard made his opinion on that subject known by activating Rainbow's face mark, shocking her again.
Applejack helped her friend back to her hooves, "Rainbow, they got you to?"
"Yeah," Wow did her face hurt, "They got Fluttershy and Scoots to."
"Do you know what's going to happen to us Miss?" the other filly asked in a Manehatten accent.
"No. Don't worry though, you stick next to ponies like me or AJ. We'll keep you safe."
The filly smiled. Rainbow would have stayed with them, but she was pushed aside by another of the creatures guarding them. The ponies were moved along into a large hexagon shaped room where they were corralled into cage like cells.
Applejack and the others were moved to an upper level with empty cells. There she was shoved inside, where the door was shut behind her.
"AJ!" Applejack turned around fast; Apple Bloom was still outside the cell and being pushed along with the other ponies. Applejack called out to her little sister, all-the-while pounding on the bars with her hooves. "Don't worry. I'll come find you!" A familiar deep red mane caught her eye. "Roseluck! Please, look after my sister!"
The cream colored mare nodded and pushed her way through the other ponies so she didn't lose sight of the yellow filly. Every so often, the guards would shove four ponies of the same tribe into a cell. Soon she and Apple Bloom were pushed into an empty cell along with two other mares. It was a trapezoid shaped room, the walls were a grey metal. There weren't any chairs or other furniture, just a pile of hay in one corner and a toilet in the other.
"Apple Bloom?" The red haired filly turned around. To her surprise she recognized the other ponies in the cell. One was a slate grey mare with her grey mane cut short. The other was a green-grey mare with a long, dull green and gray mane and tail.
"Limestone? Marble?" The young Apple embraced the Pie sisters, glad to see a friendly face, but also sad that they were going to endure the same pain that the rest of them would be going through. Tears stared to run down her face, making the yellow mark on her face (a line running down her right eye to end in an "O" shape just above her chin) becoming more visible as her fur darkened.
= = =
At the bottom floor in another cell, another pony was crying, though more dramatically than the southern mare above her. Sweetie Belle had been staying with her sister when both of them were snatched. Now Sweetie was lying on a pile of straw in the corner of the cage, Sugar Belle was consoling a blue colt who hadn't even earned his cutie mark yet, and her sister was, well...
"You monsters! You've ruined my fa-a-ace!"
"Sis, you have three tiny dots under your eye. I'd hardly call that ruined."
"Maybe not, but do they honestly expect us to fight monsters in these get-ups?" She indicated the green and purple leotards that they were all wearing. "I mean really. These colors don't go together at all. And they're so, revealing." her tail moved to cover her exposed flank and legs
"Rarity please, we have bigger things to worry about then our looks right now." Sugar Belle said before going back to trying to comfort the young colt.
Rarity paused, then sighed, "Your right. I'm sorry, I- I guess I'm just scared and trying to deal with this." She punctuated her sentence by making a sweeping gesture over the cell.
A banging sound came from the gate. The mares saw one of the guards. Unlike the others, this one wasn't wearing a helmate, so the mares could see it's face clearly. It looked like some kind of reptile, yellowish scales covering it's body. Two long, thin, black horns curved downwards from the back of it's head. It's eyes were pale green with thin black slits in the center. Oddly, it had four small nostril holes on it's snout.
"Quite in there." It said in a rough, tenor voice. "Now get some sleep. Tomorrow begins the initiation round." The guard grinned at this last remark, several small, sharp teeth could be seen in it's mouth. The creature then left the unicorns, joining the rest of the guards who were leaving the chamber. As they did, the lights in the chamber began to dim.
Sweetie Belle moved over to her sister, "Do you think Mom and Dad know what happened to us?"
Rarity pulled her sister into a hug, "I'm sure they do. And I also know that Twilight, Luna, the other princesses, and our friends are doing everything in their power to find us, and to rescue us."
Sweetie began crying there. Rarity just pulled her closer, a few tears of her own wetting her sister's mane. The two of them stayed like that for a while, before joining Sugar Belle and the colt on the hay pike to sleep.
Throughout the chamber, and other chambers like it, ponies and other creatures were letting sleep claim them, unsure of what the next day and the days to follow would bring.
Scootaloo half hoped that it was all a bad dream, but when she woke up to find herself on a haystack, she knew it was all real. She, along with dozens of others, had been kidnapped by aliens and was going to have to fight in some kind of gladiator area.
She looked over at her cell-mates. Fluttershy was sleeping next to her, Cloud Chaser had finally fallen asleep and was mildly snoring. The fourth occupant was another mare with a white coat and an ice blue mane and tail. She hadn't spoken with the others last night and was already awake and pacing in front of the cell door.
Scootaloo stretched and walked over to her. "Morning." she said. The mare didn't respond and just kept pacing. Up close Scootaloo could see that the pegasi's eyes were the same color as her mane. Adding in that the yellow mark on her face looked like three slash marks running across her face made her look all the more intimidating.
"I didn't catch your name last night." Silence. "Well, I'm Scootaloo. I wish you luck in, what's about to happen." Still silence. She went back to the hay pile. Fluttershy was starting to stir.
"How can they be so calm?" She turned around, the mare had stopped pacing and was staring out through the bars.
Scootaloo joined her. In the opposite cell across from theirs were four burly looking male griffons. Scootaloo caught a few words of what they were saying, some of them being 'crush,' 'cream,' and 'pile-driver'.
"They're acting like they're going to the gym. Don't they realize that they could very well die out there?"
"A friend of mine knows a few griffons." The mare looked at her in surprise. "She says that they are usually very proud and competitive creatures. I guess to them this is just another chance to prove their strength." She looked at the mare. Behind her fierce features, Scootaloo could see softness in her eyes; fear and amazement seemed to pool together. She wrapped her hoof around the older pony's. "They aren't going to let this bring them down. We shouldn't either."
The white pegasus looked back at the griffons. Her mouth briefly turned into a faint smile. "Maybe you're right." She looked back at the filly, "Hello Scootaloo, my name's Snow Storm."
From the other side of the cell, Fluttershy watched the exchange. She smiled, glad that the filly she used to foal-sit was growing into a fine young mare.
Then the guards returned.
= = =
Emerald Glade was not having a great night. First she got into a fight with her sister, then she got lost in her own grain field, then she got abducted by aliens, then a tattoo was planted on her face, then she was sentenced to this death fight thing, then she was thrown into a prison cell with a bunch of womanizing bulls, and to top it all off, she was stuck wearing this leotard which was exposing way more of her body than she was comfortable with.
"I swear, when I find the jerk who is responsible for this I am going to tear him limb from limb." She thought to herself. Fate then decided to step in in the the form of the returning guards.
"Alright!" One shouted to the others, "The Bovineoids are up first. And keep on the alert, the report on those guys say they can tear through iron if they're angry."
One of the guards began unlocking Emerald's cell. His first encounter with minotaurs was getting punched in the face by one, which sent him flying across the room. Emerald was then immediately surrounded by guards trying to subdue her. It took five of them to place some kind of hoof-cuffs on her, and another three to get her out of the prison room. Some of the other minotaurs resisted, but many of them seemed cowed, almost afraid.
Once the group was moved into the area, the guards removed Emerald's bonds. Unlike before, the bowl of the stadium was decorated with several raised platforms.
From somewhere above, the announcer's voice rang out. "For the first match of the day, we bring you the Bovineoids of Orbicalous! These creatures posses incredible strength, one of them could could tear down a wooden shed as easily as you or I would pick a flower."
"That is a gross exaggeration and you know it!" another she-taur yelled next to her. Not surprisingly, no one seemed to hear her. If anything they cheered louder.
"And as their opponent, the Tripods of Trilaok Two! These terrible titans are notorious for toppling tall trees!" Emerald couldn't see her opponents from where she was standing, but thankfully, several screens set up for the audience were displaying images of the other group. They were tall creatures, two long appendages ending in hands hung on either side of their torso. Below that were three bent legs ending in finger like claws. Their heads were round and devoid of hair, two large black eyes sat on either side of their skulls. All in all, a very disturbing looking species.
"I think I'm going to be sick." a calf moaned from somewhere in the back.
Starlight awoke early that morning. When she entered the kitchen, she was surprised to find Twilight up as well. "Morning Starlight, what are you doing up so early?"
"Nothing, I just woke up. What about you?"
"I was going to help Applejack out with some of her chores. And she likes to start work as soon as the sun rises."
Starlight looked at the stain glass window, it was giving off a soft glow. "In that case you better get a move on." Twilight swallowed the last of her breakfast then hurried off, leaving her dishes behind for Spike to clean up. "I don't know when I'll be back. Have a good day, Starlight."
She smiled as her mentor left, then proceeded to pour herself some cereal. = = = Gravel was in a lot of pain. His face and fore arms were covered in scratches and bruises. The griffon had locked talons with what the annoying announcer had called, a Bueato Viper. Attached to those talons was the coiling, brown body of a snake. It's huge feathered wings continued to beat at his head. He leaned forward and clamped his beak down on one, the winged snake letting out a sharp hiss.
They might have stayed like this for a while if they weren't suddenly hit by another of the creatures which had been thrown by another griffon. As Gravel rose from the floor, he felt a pain in his hind leg, his assailant had bitten down on his leg. He unsheathed his hind claws and began kicking and scratching at the snake repeatedly until it let go. Now the left side of it's face was decorated with both the two yellow lines going down it's face as well as several long red scars criss-crossing them.
Gravel and the winged snake began circling each other, both their wings spread threateningly out. The snake's head bobbing around, looking for an opening. Then lunging at each other, they continued to brawl. = = = Twilight arrived at Sweet Apple Acres just before seven. But instead of seeing her friend and her family hard at work in the orchard, she found Big Mac and Granny Smith wandering the farm grounds.
"Good morning Granny Smith. Where's Applejack?"
"Oh Princess! Ah wish I knew. When we woke up, both AJ and Apple Bloom were missing."
"Missing?" Twilight repeated, "Do you want me to help you look for them?"
"Oh, that's alright Princess. I'm sure she's just helping Apple Bloom or one a her other friends out with a problem."
"I'll check around town anyway, just to make sure." As she waved goodbye to the elder Apple, she couldn't help feel a little worried. For any of her friends to go missing without leaving a note of any kind was weird, but for AJ it was practically unheard of. 'I hope she's alright.' = = = Fluttershy decided the best thing to do was to hide in a corner until it was all over. Unfortunately, two of the creatures they were forced to fight had the same idea. They were about the size of a small foal, one having yellow fur and the other having more cream colored fur. They looked like some kind of rodent, with larger front teeth and long skinny tails. The fur on the back of the rodents head was much longer, almost like a mane.
Fluttershy fully intended to just back off and let the creatures alone. But the cream colored one jumped her and bite it's incisors into her foreleg. She took to the air, trying to shake the creature off, but it held on tight. The yellow one started making high pitched sounds which Fluttershy couldn't understand.
She found that she couldn't fly to high or her mark would start sparking, so she returned to the ground where the rodent finally let go, Fluttershy's blood staining the corners of it's mouth and teeth. It lunged again, this time aiming for her throat. She used her wings to gain some distance on the creature, only for her efforts to prove pointless as the other creature stopped it's companion short. They exchanged a series of squeaks before the cream rodent backed down.
She let out a sigh of relief, only to realize that something behind her was growling. Turning fast she found another of the rodents, this one blueish black and a head taller than she was. She barely even processed this before the behemoth grabbed her in it's jaws and threw her towards one of the 'hills' in the ring. = = = Pinkie Pie woke with a start. She had the burning sensation that something was wrong, terribly wrong. She looked around her room: same bed spread, same pile of laundry she needed to take care of, same Gummy sleeping in the morning sun, same fishy chew toy being gummed by Gummy, even the same spider sitting in the corner of the ceiling building a web. She moved over to her balcony, making sure to keep to tip-hooves so not to wake anyone.
Outside looked pretty normal as well, a few ponies out and about, some shops opening for breakfast. All in all it looked like business as usual in Ponyville. Yet she couldn't shake this feeling of dread that something was terribly wrong. = = = As the tiny angry creature plowed through the changelings in front of him, Adze couldn't help but notice that his primary thoughts were: 'Thorax, you're an idiot!' If that coward hadn't 'shared' love with the Hive, they'd all still have their light, quick, agile bodies; instead they were stuck in these bulky, lumbering eye-sores.
He moved to one side just before the creature could run him over. Despite it's smaller height, it was a formidable looking creature. Standing on two legs like a Minotaur, but with less fur and more armor plating. It's lower torso and legs were covered in grey plate-like armor pieces, while it's upper body was just exposed skin. Or it would have been, if it wasn't also stuck in a white and grey leotard. The creature's head was round with pointed ears and nose, as well a very angry red eyes. The amount of anger pouring off this creature was tainting the taste of the air so much that Adze wanted to throw up.
The small creature pounced on the red changeling with lightning speed, only to find a pair of teeth dig into it's throat. The changeling tried to drain the anger from the creature, turning it's strength into his own, only to find that the mark on his jaw was restricting not only his magic and changing skills, but his ability to feed as well.
The creature kneed him in the neck forcing him to drop it. It adopted a defensive stance with it's hands balled into fists. Adze began circling the wounded creature, pretending to look for an opening. After nearly ten seconds of this, the creature learned why he was only pretending, two other changelings had snuck up on it from behind and now had it surrounded. It spun around quickly, trying to keep all three of the insectoid creatures in sight. Unfortunately, the moment it did, Adze headbutted it from behind. Just before it hit the ground, it saw one of the other changelings jump to meet it halfway. = = = Twilight flew back to her castle as quickly as possible. She threw the doors open with her magic, sending a loud thud throughout the castle. She found Starlight in one of the empty rooms and Spike licking the wall of the kitchen.
"Spike! Starlight! We have a major problem!"
"Whoa Twilight, calm down. What's the problem?"
"They're gone! All of them! Applejack. Fluttershy. Rainbow Dash. Rarity. They've all gone missing!"
