Haylo: A New World

by MnM

First published 18th of October, 2011

The Chief wakes up to find the remains of his Frigate has landed on a colorful, new planet.

Please read the pre-word prior to reading the remastered or original version.

"Wake me, when you need me."

The year is 2557, 5 years after the destruction of The Ark. The threat of the flood is gone, the Covenant is a small shadow of its former self, and the universe is now at peace. Or so it seems, as the remnants of the U.N.S.C. Forward Unto Dawn is sucked into another portal, causing it to crash into the land of Equestria. Will the inhabitants of the planet accept or exile him, and is there a new threat looming? Will Spartan-117 be able to handle it? Find out the answer to this and much more in Haylo: A New World.

Pre word

Hello,

This was written two years after the release of the original Haylo: A New World. Since then, a remastered edition was released with the intention of following the Halo 4 storyline as well just produce a better quality story in general. A lot of effort was put into making the remastered edition the best it could be, so I hope that all of you enjoy it.

In case you couldn't pick up on it by looking at the story list, the remastered and new, official version of Haylo: A New World is marked with (Remastered) at the end of the chapter names, and the original version of Haylo: A New World is marked with (Original) at the end of the chapter names.

I hope you all enjoy the remastered edition of Haylo: A New World.

-Will

Chapter One (Original)

"Chief? Can you hear me?"

The Chief's eyes fluttered open as he found himself floating in a debris filled hallway. He drifted towards a nearby wall and extended his arm out towards the wall, before gently pushing off of it, allowing the Spartan to slowly drift down the corridor. "I thought I'd lost you too." Cortana said, relief obvious in her voice. The Chief examined a gaping hole in the frigate's hull for a split second before turning on his helmet mounted flashlights, which slowly flickered to life. As he did so, he heard a faint ping of metal behind him. Swinging his head around, he spotted an MA5C before quickly grabbing it. Satisfied there was no major damage, he took the assault rifle and clipped to a magnetic holster built into the back of his armor, before drifting to the end of the hallway.

"What happened?" the Chief asked.

"I'm not sure." Cortana began. "When Halo fired, it shook itself to pieces. Did a number on The Ark. The Portal couldn't sustain itself. We made it through just as it collapsed."

The Chief reached the end of the hallway, which opened up into the endless void of space. The ships debris was still red-hot from the sudden Slipspace slowdown.

"But you did it. Truth and the Covenant. The Flood..." Cortana continued as the Spartan drifted into a room with a row of cryotube. He plugged her into a nearby holotank, which Cortana's blue form appear on. "It's finished."

"It's finished." the Chief repeated, in his usual calm demeanor. He then switched off his helmet mounted flashlights and placed his assault rifle in one of rackets on the wall nearby.

"I'll drop a beacon. It will be awhile before anyone finds us." Cortana stated as the Chief climbed into a cryotube. "Years even." The door began to close. "I'll miss you." she said somberly.

"Wake me, when you need me." said the Chief as the cryotube sealed with a lengthy hiss. Cortana nodded, smiling, as the Master Chief was frozen.

"Mayday mayday mayday," Cortana began, "this is UNSC FFG-201 Forward Unto Dawn, requesting immediate EVAC, survivors aboard. Prioritization code Victor 05-3-Sierra 0117.”

Cortana hovered gingerly on her holotank, The focus and dedication she gave to him, what she would be willing to do for him, would make her seem like his guardian angel. There, sadly for the Smart AI, wasn't much to around the remnants of the frigate Cortana and her company were stranded on.Watching over The Chief and tinkering with his Mark VI MJOLNIR Powered Assault Armor, were two of the only three things she could do. The only other, significantly less fulfilling and tedious task, was repeating the same message that she had repeated millions, no, billions, possibly trillions of times over the past twelve years.

And of course, the lack of activities the AI could perform on the desolate frigate left her with a lot of time to think.

And at her age, thinking could prove deadly for an AI like Cortana. Cortana was honestly shocked she was still functioning at the ripe ole age of fifteen years, well beyond the standard seven year life that has been set for smart AIs like herself.

Cortana then realized that she had been sitting there in a trance-like state, watching over the Spartan like some sort of stalker.

'You almost are, in a way,' a voice inside of her said.

The AI ignored this voice, as she learned long ago that arguing with this part of her only sped up her path to rampancy.

In an attempt to escape that haunting voice in her 'head', Cortana once again began to say the only thing she had really said in the past couple years. "“Mayday mayday mayday, this is UNSC FFG-201 Forward Unto Dawn, requesting immediate EVAC, survivors aboard. Prioritization code Victor 05-3-Sierra 0117.”

She went on like this for hours, repeating the same message over and over again, like some sort of cadence that the Marine recruits would chant during their physical training sessions. It was also... therapeutic, in some ways. It gave Cortana something to do, which in turn distracted her from thinking and slowing down her rapid decline towards the final stages of rampancy and her inevitable demise.

As she continued to recite her plead for help, a shrill alarm started sounding off on a nearby control panel. After a seconds delay, the AI accessed the control panel and took a moment to examine the data it was displaying.

The control panel indicated that one of the Dawn's few remaining short ranged sensors picked up a large, unidentified object nearby. After a few moments, Cortana accessed an external camera attached to the hull of the ship, which was still surprisingly working after twelve years of floating in space. The AI spotted a large Forerunner object in the distance, with what looked like similar to a slipspace rupture floating in the middle of it.

The Dawn's hull suddenly shuddered and creaked as the frigate began to slowly change it's course, sending it straight towards the portal. Alarms started to screech as the portal's pull started to cause damage to the frail remnants of the Dawn. Explosions erupted throughout the ship, causing chunks of the hull to violently rip away.

Cortana knew immediately that she needed John more than ever. She activated the Spartan's thawing sequence. The unfreezing process would be quick, which was typically painful and very dangerous for the average human, but there was no doubt in the AI's mind that Spartan-117 could handle it.

"Wake up Chief! I need you!" the Chief heard Cortana shouting as he began to stir. "Please!? Wake up John!" the Spartan shook himself awake as his senses and memories came flying back. The cryotubes door burst open as the Spartan forced his way out, his helmet mounted lights flickering to life as he propelled himself over to holotank where the AI was standing.

"John..." she began to say in a weak voice.

"I'm here!" the Spartan exclaimed as a large explosion caused a nearby door to fly open. He quickly stowed Cortana's chip in his helmet and pushed off the holotank to speed down the hallway. The inertia carried him forward until his armor's thrusters powered up, allowing for better navigation through the badly damaged ship. The Chief ducked and weaved his way through the large amount of debris floating through the Dawn, he noticed a M363 Remote Projectile Detonator floating among the debris. The Spartan shot his arm out and grabbed it, firing it at a large piece of twisted metal in his way. Suddenly, he stopped his movement by grabbing onto a protruding girder and magnetized his boots to the floor, narrowly stopping himself from launching into the void of space. He threw the sticky detonator aside and grew concerned with what he saw. Beyond him was a portal, and they were heading right for it.

"Chief, you may want to hold onto something." Cortana said as the Chief ran back the way he came and into an elevator. After checking to see that it was still operational, the Chief put Cortana's chip into the elevator's holotank.

"Get me to the motor pool!" the Chief ordered.

"On it." the elevator quickly descended and within seconds, the door opened to reveal the motor pool. The Chief retrieved Cortana from the holotank and exited the elevator. He looked around, soon finding what he was looking for. He jumped into a nearby warthog and strapped himself into it.

"Chief, what are you planning?" Cortana asked.

"What does it look like I'm doing?"

"It looks like you are planning to go on a Sunday drive in space." the Chief could imagine the smile on her 'face'.

"Just trust me on this."

"I don't have much of a choice, Chief." Cortana replied dryly. The whole frigate shuddered as it entered the portal. After about ten minutes the Frigate exited, revealing a large terran planet, large enough to be gravitationally pulling the Dawn towards it.

"What the hell?" the Chief said as he examined the planet.

"I don't know where it came from, but we're heading right for it. Brace yourself!" Cortana exclaimed as the Forward Unto Dawn started descending into the planets atmosphere.

Twilight Sparkle sat in her observatory, scanning the stars above with the telescope Princess Celestia had given her for her birthday. She was gazing at the Little Dipper as something streaked across the sky, catching the purple unicorns attention. "Wow..." she muttered under her breath, before turning away from the telescope. "Spike!"

Spike quickly ran up the stairs and made his way over to Twilight. "What is it, Twilight?" he asked, slightly out of breath.

"Come and take a look at this." Twilight motioned Spike towards the telescope. He looked through it and let out a small gasp.

"A shooting star!" he exclaimed enthusiastically.

"I know, isn't it wonderful?" Twilight said, admiring it through her window. After a few moments of observing the object, Twilight noticed something strange about the object's trajectory. "Spike, is it just me, or is it heading right for us?"

Spike examined it closer. "It seems like it is, huh?" The object suddenly grew much bigger as it passed overhead, a long trail of smoke streaming behind it.. Both of them ducked for cover as they heard it crash, its impact causing the library to shake violently. They ran outside and looked over the horizon, noticing whatever it was crashed on the edge of the Everfree forest.

"Come on Spike, let's go investigate this." Twilight said eagerly.

"I don't know about this Twilight..." Spike muttered.

Twilight rolled her eyes and smirked at Spike. "Come on Spike, what's the worst that could happen?"

"You know, I'm getting sick of waking you up." Cortana joked as the Chief awoke. Apparently, he was knocked unconscious in the impact. "Looks like your luck hasn't run out yet, Chief." He unstrapped himself and put Cortana into a nearby holotank.

"Is the beacon still online?" the Chief asked.

"Yes, it got a little damaged on entry, but it is working just fine."

"Where are we?"

After a seconds delay, Cortana replied. "I'm not sure. This planet doesn't show up on any star maps. However, I do know this planet is on the edge of the Milky Way Galaxy."

"How's the ship?"

"You can look around and see for yourself. It's trashed."

"How are we on weaponry?" The Chief wasn't about to take any chances. This is a new world; it could be housing hostile life forms. Hell, it could be a Covenant Loyalist stronghold.

"I'll have the elevator take you to the armory. It seems to still be working. Meet you there." And with that, Cortana's form disappeared. The Chief unstrapped himself from the warthog and made his way into the nearby elevator. The doors closed behind him as the elevator began it's ascension towards the armory. Upon exiting the elevator, the Chief found most of the weaponry that the armory held scattered on the floor, but many appeared functional. He grabbed four grenades, a sniper rifle, and an assault rifle. Cortana's blue form materialized as the Spartan clipped the sniper rifle to his armors magnetic holster built into his back . "And exactly what are you planning to do?"

"This is an unknown planet, right? Then I should probably figure out if this is a safe area to hold out. Is there any life in the area?"

"My scans show what may be a possible settlement not far from here. Be aware, several life forms are coming from it, I'm not sure if they are friendly or hostile. Be careful, Chief."

"Always." the Chief answered, slapping a magazine into his assault rifle.

Chapter Two (Original)

[Authors Note - The remastered edition of the rest of the story will be released within a few months. It will be drastically different, so I suggest you come back when they are released.

Anyone who wishes to help me can PM me. The more help I get, the faster the remastered edition will be released.]

Master Chief jumped off the remains of Frigate and down to the meadow below. He looked around quickly before running over to the tree cover. "How close are those life forms, Cortana?" The Chief asked.

"You have two unknowns about a minute away from the ship. Don't get yourself killed, Chief." Cortana said.

"Like that could ever happen." The Chief said sarcastically. In the distance, he saw two dark forms approach the hull of the Forward Onto Dawn. "Is that all that is on its way?"

"Appears so." A purple light appeared on the hull of the Frigate as the creature examined it. The Chief had three options. One, he could stay hidden and let it pass on, but that would risk more attention at this spot. Two, he could confront the creature, but the creature may be hostile. Third, he could kill the creature, but that would risk possible friendlies to become hostiles.

"I think I'll go with two." The Chief said to himself as he quietly walked towards the two life forms. He raised his assault rifle and placed his thumb on the safety and his trigger finger on the trigger guard. As he approached, he could hear the creatures talking in... English?

"Have you ever seen anything like this, Twilight?" the smaller one asked.

"No, never. I haven't even read about anything like this. This is unheard of." the larger creature. or "Twilight", replied. The smaller one appeared reptilian in nature, with purple scales and green spikes. The purple one seemed horse like, with a purple coat and a dark mane.

"Before you ask and blow your cover, I do not know what they are. I can only refer to the larger one as a pony, due to the similiarities to the horse. The reptile I can't name." Cortana said as the Chief inched closer. The Chief heard a snap and realized he stepped on a twig. The two creatures started to turn around in his direction. 'Shit, how could I be so careless?' The Chief thought to himself as he raised his assault rifle, switching off the safety and turning on the flashlight mounted to his, blinding the two. The larger one raised a hoof to her face. "Careful Chief... don't do something we might end up regretting." Cortana warned.

"Who's there?!" the "pony" asked.

"I was wondering the same thing." The Chief said. "Who are you, or what are you?"

Twilight's eyes started getting adjusted to the light as she collected herself. She cleared her throat and spoke. "My name is Twilight Sparkle, and this is my assistant, Spike. I am a pony, and he's a dragon."

'Cute' he thought to himself.

"Chief, I don't think they are hostile. Might want to act friendly. Don't want to start another intergalactic war." Cortana stated.

"Is it too much to ask for you to turn off that light? You're kind of blinding us." Twilight said. The Spartan nodded and turned off the flashlight, letting the pony get a good look at him. He was at least 7 feet tall, covered in armor from head to tow, and carrying something that looked like a thin log. Twilight guessed this was probably some sort of weapon. She took a few steps back, cringing in fear.

"Do not be afraid." The Chief began as he took a knee, realizing his huge size was probably intimidating her. "I am not here to hurt you."

"Who are you?" Twilight asked.

"Spartan-117. You can also call me the Chief."

"Catchy." Spike commented.

"So... what exactly are you wearing, and what is that you are carrying?" Twilight asked.

"This is MJOLNIR Power Armor that I am wearing. The thing I am carrying is an assault rifle."

"An assault rifle?" The Chief could see the confusion on her face in the dim light.

"A gun?"

"That doesn't look like any of the guns I have seen." Twilight said, thinking about the black powder muskets the Equestrian Royal Guard was experimenting with.

"And... exactly where am I?" The Chief asked.

"You're in the land of Equestria." Twilight said.

The Chief stood up. "Okay, thanks for answering my questions... and sorry about earlier. You should just pretend this never happened." The Chief said as he turned around and started walking back to ship. 'Well atleast I know there are friendlies in the area.' he thought to himself.

"Wait!" he heard Twilight scream as he stopped in turned around to see the mare running up to him. "Don't you have somewhere to stay?"

"Here's a good place as any." The Chief shrugged.

"That's just it. It isn't. The Everfree forest is very dangerous, and you're right on the edge of it."

"I think I can handle it."

"Oh really? You can handle Manticores, Dragons, Hydra's, and Ursa Minors and Majors?"

"One second. Cortana, what is a Ursa?"

"An Ursa Major is a large bear, estimated to be 100 stories or more tall. An Ursa Minor is a smaller version of an Ursa Major, but still pretty huge. All of those creatures are considered very dangerous, but are also mythical. But of course, you are talking to a unicorn." And that's when it hit him. He looked right at Twilight and noticed the horn protruding out of her forehead. 'How did I miss that?' The Chief thought to himself.

"Um, who's Cortana?" Twilight asked.

"What?"

"Who's Cortana?"

"She's my AI."

"AI?"

"Artificial Intelligence."

"Oh, okay. Well... we have room in my library, you could stay there. It is much safer in Ponyville than it is out here."

"She's right Chief, I'm reading very large creatures heading this way, you may want to get out of here quick. I doubt they are friendly." Cortana stated.

"Okay, I'll take you up on your offer. Mind if I go get some things though?" The Chief asked.

"Sure thing." Twilight said, a smile on her face.

"Okay, come with me. I may need you two to help me carry some things. And... don't try anything funny." The Chief cautioned, motioning her towards the Forward Onto Dawn. Twilight and her assistant quickly followed him.

The trio walked into the elevator as the Chief entered Cortana into the holotank. "Cortana, take us to the armory."

"You got it, Chief." Cortana replied. Spike and Twilight overlooked Cortana's form, awestruck.

"Wow, she's prettier than Rarity." Spike said, practically drooling.

"That's not the first time I've heard that." Cortana said, as Spike blushed heavily as he realized she could hear him. The elevator opened and they walked into the armory.

"What's this?" Spike said picking up an M7.

"That's a SMG, don't touch. You could blow you head off with that thing." Cortana said as the Chief took the M7 from Spike, placing it in a duffel bag. He then picked up a battle rifle, two magnums, two versions of the SMG, one silenced and one standard, 12 grenades, and plenty of ammunition, and put them all into the bag. He filled the contents of a smaller duffel bag with medical supplies and extra ammunition, plus an extra magnum.

"Catch." The Chief said as he tossed the smaller bag in Twilight's general direction, which she caught with her magic.

He strapped his bag around his neck and motioned for the other two to get in the elevator.

"Cortana, Motor Pool." The Chief said.

"On it."

The elevator started descending immediately. "I feel like we're flying, this is safe right?" Twilight asked.

"Don't worry about it." The Chief advised her as they reached the Motor Pool. He walked to a nearby Warthog and threw the duffel bag into the back. He turned the keys, and, to his surprise, the engine actually turned on. He clasped his hands together. "Alright, we're in business." He walked over to a nearby holotank, where Cortana was standing.

"Yank me, Chief." she said as he retrieved her chip, stowing it in his helmet.

"What is that thing?" Twilight asked, pointing her hoof at the warthog.

"This is the M12 Force Application Vehicle. Or the Warthog."

"Oh cool!" Twilight said, her eyes wide with wonder. "What does it do, exactly?"

"Climb aboard and find out." The Chief said as he jumped into the front seat. Twilight sat in the seat next to him, with Spike in her lap. The Warthog lurched forward and drove down a ramp. "Which way to Ponyville?" the Spartan asked.

Twilight mouth was agape, wondering how this thing was moving on its own. Was it magic? She really couldn't wait to study this thing.

"Hey, Ea- whatever this place is to Twilight!" The Chief said, waving his hand in front of her face.

"Huh... what?"

"Which was to Ponyville?"

"Oh, it's that way." Twilight pointed her hoof west.

"Thank you. Now hold on. It might get a little bumpy." the Warthog lurched forward, soon at its top speed of 78 mph. As they drove over a hill, Ponyville came into view on the horizon. The Chief checked his motion tracker, and noticed something large and unidentified heading straight towards them, and fast. A loud roar came from the Chief's left.

"Manticore!" Twilight called out as a large creature, half lion, half scorpion, charged the Warthog. The Chief pressed down on the brakes as hard as he could, narrowly avoiding a collision with the beast.

"Run!" The Chief shouted as the trio jumped of the warthog. He unholstered his assault rifle and aimed at the manticore, who was getting prepared to attack again. He unloaded the magazine on it, causing it to scream in agony, but it still stood its ground. The manticore roared loudly and charged the Spartan, who threw aside his empty assault rifle and stood at the ready. The manticore swiped a paw at him, but the Chief quickly ducked. Grabbing the manticore's paw, he threw it on its back. He then jumped on top of it, about to snap its neck. However, before he got the chance, the manticore swatted the Spartan off of it with its tail. He rolled to a halt and quickly jumped up, narrowly dodging another charge by the manticore. It swung its claw at him, which he blocked. The Chief quickly punched the manticore in the stomach with all his strength, resulting in several sickening cracks as he broke a few of the beasts ribs. The manticore jumped back as the Chief unsheathed his combat knife, a 14.5 inch titanium blade, and charged at the manticore, which too started charging at the Spartan. When the manticore was within 10 feet, the Chief jumped on top of the beast and drove his combat knife into its neck. It screamed out in pain and swatted away the Chief, before gripping its neck and falling to the ground, writhing in pain. The Chief quickly unholstered his magnum and aimed it at creatures head, firing three shots, killing it. He reholstered it and took the knife out of its throat, cleaning it off, and returning it to its sheath, before turning back to Twilight and Spike. They were just standing there, mouths agape.

"Y-you killed it..." Twilight stuttered.

"It would have done the same to us. Let's go." The Chief motioned the shaken unicorn to Warthog. Spike passed by him and looked up at him.

"For the record, that was awesome." he said, before following Twilight. The Chief allowed himself to smile for the first time in a long time, before getting back into the front seat of the warthog and driving towards Ponyville.

Chapter Three (Original)

The ride into Ponyville was a quiet one. The Chief would occasionally glance in Twilight's direction. Though the two just met, the Chief couldn't help but be concerned for her. Twilight was obviously shaken by the event. 'She probably hasn't been through anything like that. Still so innocent.' The Chief thought to himself. In his past, he has seen stuff like this, when people would have their innocence crushed by war and death. And there wasn't a damn thing he could do about it. Eventually, she spoke up.

"Thanks..." she said quietly.

"Huh?" The Chief asked.

"Thank you. You're right, if it wasn't for you, me and Spike would be dead right now. So... for what it's worth... thanks." Twilight said.

"You're welcome, just remember you owe me one when the time comes." The Chief said. Twilight smiled and nodded at him. The Warthog screeched to a halt outside of a building carved out of a large tree.

"This is it! Ponyville Library." Twilight said excitedly, seemingly forgetting about the manticore and picking up a now asleep Spike with her magic. The Chief went to the back of the warthog and picked up his bags, following Twilight into the Library. He had to duck to get through the door. "Make yourself comfortable!" Twilight called from upstairs.

"Aren't you going to thank the mare?" Cortana asked.

"Mare?" The Chief asked, confused.

"I'm guessing they refer to their females as mares, since we refer to horse females as mares."

"I will when I get the chance." The Chief assured Cortana. He sat down on a large couch and unzipped the larger duffel bag and took out the battle rifle, then loaded a magazine into it, and leaned against the couch. 'Never can be too careful.' The Chief thought to himself. He slouched on the couch and looked around the room. He thought back to the fight with the manticore, and Twilight mentioning the other dangers, such as Hydras and Dragons. He sighed. "I'm going to need heavier firepower." The Chief said to himself, standing up and grabbing his battle rifle. Twilight walked down the stairs as the Chief was preparing to leave.

"And just where do you think you are going?" Twilight asked.

"I'm going back. I need to get some stuff." The Chief responded, walking out the door. "I'll be back."

Twilight was about to protest, but she knew it would be useless. She hopped in the passenger seat.

"Where do you think you're going?" The Chief asked as he got in the front seat.

"With you." Twilight said.

"It's probably too dangerous, sorry, but you will have to stay here."

"But-" Twilight started.

"No buts. Out of the car!" he ordered. Twilight sighed, defeated, and jumped out of the warthog. "I'll be back." he promised before driving away.

"Cortana, any life signs in the area?" The Chief asked as he dismounted from his warthog, about a mile away from the Forward Onto Dawn.

"Yes, there is a large life form nearby the Dawn. Larger than the manticore was too. Don't get yourself killed, Chief." Cortana warned. The Chief slowly walked forward, looking around for potential threats, looking at his motion tracker every so often. A patch of grass rustled as the Spartan walked past. He spun to face it, aiming his battle rifle in the general direction. There was no blip on the motion tracker and the thought entered his mind that it could have stopped working. As the grass rustled again, he tightened his finger on the trigger, ready for anything. A white rabbit jumped into view. Upon seeing the tall figure, it ran for dear life. The Chief breathed a sigh of release and continued on. He soon came across the corpse of the manticore he had killed earlier. There were several wolves nearby, devouring the corpse. They turned towards the Chief and snarled at him. He aimed his battle rifle at them, hoping they would just back away. Luck wasn't on his side this time, as one of the wolves pounced at him. He fired two bursts at it, and it fell down to the ground, dead. This didn't discourage the other wolves, only enraged them. Two more of them charged at the Spartan. He fired a burst at one and aimed his battle rifle at the other. When he pulled the trigger, he heard a distinctive click. 'Jammed?!.' The Chief thought to himself. The wolf tackled the Chief, somehow managing to knock him over. The Chief grabbed it by its neck and snapped it, then threw the corpse at another wolf, who was attempting to flank him. The Chief reached for his M6D and fired 2 shots at the wolf, killing it. He turned back to the other wolves, who were starting to back away from the Spartan. One of them make the mistake of starting to walk forward, because that was met with three shots from the Chiefs magnum. At this, the remaining two ran off. The Spartan loaded a new clip into his magnum and continued forward. As he approached the Dawn, he heard something snoring on the other end of the Frigate. He peaked around a corner of the Frigate to see giant creature of reptilian nature. It had 5 heads with long necks, and told the Chief all he needed to know. 'A hydra, fan-fucking-tastic.' he thought to himself as he climbed into the Dawn, careful not to make any noise. He walked into the elevator and inserted Cortana's chip into the holotank.

"Armory." he silently ordered.

"On it." Cortana said as the elevator ascended to the Armory. Once inside, he quickly ran inside, picking up two rockets and loading them into a rocket launcher.

"Cortana, how much fire power do you think I will need to take out a hydra?" The Chief asked, just as a loud roar shook the Dawn. Cortana simply pointed towards where a couple Missile Pods. He picked up one and set it aside. Then took a rocket launcher and spartan laser and holstered both to his back. He then hoisted up the rocket pod and walked into the elevator. "Let's do this." he said mostly to himself.

"Lieutenant!" Captain Cole shouted, "Where are we?!"

"I dunno, sir." A crewman replied. "We're a good distance away from any known planets, especially any controlled by the U.N.S.C."

"Then what is that supposed to be, Lieutenant?!" Cole demanded, pointing at the planet.

"I dunno Captain, it's not on any of the star maps."

"Alright, we will chart this later. Warm up the slipspace dr-"

"Sir!" another crewman called out, interrupting the Captain. "Sorry about the interruption sir, but you may want to come over here and take a look at this." Captain Cole sighed and walked over to the Commander.

"What is it, son?" Cole asked.

"Sir, it's a beacon. The Forward Onto Down." the crewman said.

"Isn't that-" Cole began.

"Yes sir! We found him." the crewman said excitedly.

Captain Cole paused for a few minutes, absorbing this new information. "Alright!" Cole said, clasping his hands together. "Get me Edward Buck. In the meantime, get me Admiral Hood on the horn."

"Yes sir!" the crew of the U.N.S.C. Frigate Gettysburg called out. Captain Cole walked across the deck and up to main screen, where Hood's face appeared.

"What is it, Captain?" Admiral Hood asked in his usual serious tone.

"Sir, we found him." Cole said excitedly.

"Found who, Captain?" Hood asked.

"The Chief, we found the beacon of the Forward Onto Dawn on an uncharted planet." the Captain said.

"That's the first time in a very long time I have heard any good news, Cole, you better be right." Admiral Hood warned.

"I will have an O.D.S.T. squad going down to the surface by the end of the hour to make sure, Admiral." Cole reassured.

"Very well, I will have a few ships come to your current position to give you a little back up, just in case. I'm sure you have heard about the Covenant popping back up." Hood said.

"Yes sir, grave mistake on their part."

"Make us proud, Captain."

"Yes sir!"

"And Cole."

"Sir?"

"You would have made your father proud." and with that, Hood's face disappeared off the main screen. Cole allowed himself to smile as he sat down in his chair.

On the other side of the planet, a Covenant stealth frigate exited slipspace.

"Are you sure you are reading this right?" a Brute Chieftain asked a Brute Captain, who was looking at some sort of computer system. On it was a read out of the planet, and a red dot on a point of interest.

"Yes sire. It appears the ship that was holding the demon has crashed here. Scans of the area show that the crash was recent, there is reason to believe he is still alive." the Captain said.

"Prepare the troops! We will rip the demon apart with our bare hands!" the Chieftain proclaimed as the crew broke out in cheers and roars of pride. The Chieftain returned to his seat and overlooked the planet in front of him.

"Commander!" he called out. A brute in cyan armor got up and ran up to the Chieftain.

"Yes, sire?" he asked.

"Hail the Matriarch, I have a feeling we will need more troops." the Chieftain ordered.

"Yes, sire." the Commander said, before walking back to his station.

Buck and Veronica waited in front of their squads drop pods for the rest of their squad, who were awoken with news of the mission. The Rookie was the first to arrive, sitting down on a flight of stairs nearby. Mickey and Dutch arrived next, chatting each other up and complaining about the fact they never get any time to sleep around here. Last to arrive was Romeo, who stumbled in sleepily, yawning heavily.

"What is it, Gunny?" Romeo said, leaning against a railing. Dutch and Mickey stopped talking and awaited the Gunny's briefing.

"Alright, at 1900 hours, our Frigate entered a random slipspace jump to evade a Covenant class carrier that was patrolling in system. The jump sent us halfway across the galaxy, with us ending up on the edge of the galaxy. We ran into an uncharted planet, and as we were about to jump, one of the crewman discovered a beacon on the planet below us, the Forward Onto Dawn."

"I assume you know who was on board the Forward Onto Dawn, right?" Veronica asked the squad.

"That massive Elite? The leader of the Covenant Separatist forces?" Dutch asked.

"Technically correct, but who else was on board that Frigate." Veronica asked.

No one answered, besides The Rookie, who answered with a shrug.

"Then I'll tell you. When the Frigate was discovered, it was cut in half. The Arbiter was in that half. In the other, was no other than Spartan-117, the Master Chief. It is likely The Chief is here on this planet, dead or alive. We're going down to see if he is."

"Is that understood?" Buck asked the squad.

"Yes sir!" the majority of them replied. The Rookie simply nodded.

"Alright, arm up, and get in your pods, we launch in 10." Buck said, as the squad walked towards the armory.

Authors note - I have to cut this chapter short, because if I keep going, I will give away too much information. Sorry, but I digress. I'm sure that you will notice with the U.N.S.C. and the Covenant arriving, there will be much more action in the coming chapters? Do you know what that means? Longer chapters! Go celebrate. Woo!

As for the controversy surrounding the Chief's decision to go with Twilight, here's why. When you are facing creatures like dragons, manticores, and hydras in a place you have never been to and is no where near any other settlements/colonies, and you are being offered shelter somewhere safe by a creature that looks like it couldn't hurt a fly, let alone a Spartan II Super Soldier, what are you going to do? I would probably go with Twilight.

Lastly, if you have any criticism, advice, ideas, or praise you want to share with me, feel free to PM me. I will gladly spend the better part of the day talking with you, as long as you're not being rude or anything. I enjoy criticism, and I love being involved with my readers.

Chapter Four (Original)

-You asked for a longer chapter. Here it is. Enjoy. <3-

The Chief jumped down to the ground below, both arms wrapped around his missile pod. He quickly ran around the corner of the Dawn, where an enraged hydra was attacking the hull of the frigate. He lifted up the missile pod and aimed it at the hydra, firing three consecutive shots at it. It roared in anger and pain, turning its attention to the Spartan, who fired two more missiles at it. It screamed in agony as the missiles hit it, but it still lived, charging at the Spartan. The Chief started walking backwards, firing at he moved. The missile pod soon ran out of ammo. The Chief dropped it and pulled out his rocket launcher, quickly firing two rockets at the beast. It continued to charge the Chief, as he threw his rocket launcher to the ground, pulling out his spartan laser. As it was charging, one of the hydras heads rammed into the Spartan, causing him to drop his spartan laser and to be knocked to the ground. The Spartan rolled to the left, narrowly dodging one the hydras feet as it tried to crush him. He pulled his magnum out and fired twice, before rolling to the left to avoid getting rammed by another head. He fired the rest of the magazine, letting it slide out once it was empty, then quickly slid a new magazine inside it.

"This is suicide, John!" Cortana stated.

"I know, I just need to hold off a little longer. Eventually this thing will bleed out." The Chief replied, firing the rest of his magnums ammo at it, throwing it aside and pulling out his battle rifle. He fired a few quick bursts at the hydra. The hydra tried to ram the Spartan with one of its heads again. The Chief jumped up, landing on the neck of the hydra. He ran up it, firing bursts into the beast as he ran, before the hydra struck the Spartan with its tail, knocking him off it. He grunted as he stood back up, before jumping out of the way and dodging another attack by the hydra.

"Chief, you might want to listen to this." Cortana said.

"I'm listening." The Chief said as he fired a few bursts at the beast, before loading another magazine into his battle rifle.

"I'm reading six O.D.S.T. H.E.V.s in atmosphere, and they will be landing in this area momentarily." Cortana said.

"Cortana, scan for any U.N.S.C. ships in system. If there are any, contact them immediately." The Chief ordered, as he rolled to the right, narrowly dodging a charge by the hydra.

Buck never really got used to the extreme heat that came with atmospheric entry. The H.E.V. started to slow as the upper exterior panels separated, acting as a drag-type chute.

"Be prepared for anything, team." Buck said. "There is artificial light coming from the surface, meaning we have some kind of civilization here. We don't know how they will react to us, so be on guard."

Bucks drop pod crashed into the ground. The door popped off with a hiss, as Buck climbed out, clutching his MA5C.

"Team, form up on my location." Veronica ordered over the COM. Her location appeared on his HUD, as Buck charged through the forest. Eventually, he ran into Veronica and The Rookie, who had beaten him there. Soon, the rest of the team arrived.

"Sir, I heard gunfire to our south. Battle rifle." Romeo said to Buck.

"Alright, that's the direction of the Dawn, that must be our man. Let's move!" Buck ordered as the team charged through the trees and brush.

The Chief unloaded the rest of the magazine into the hydra, only enraging it further. He threw it aside and braced himself, as the hydra knocked him off his feet with its tail. The Chief started to get up, but the hydra pressed one of its feet against him, pinning him. He looked up at the hydra, as its heads inched closer and closer, saliva dripping down onto the Spartans armor.

"I told you so." Cortana said. The Chief closed his eyes, waiting for the end. After surviving the Covenant and the Flood, this was how he was going to go. It was an eventful life, to be sure. Suddenly, the Chief heard the distinctive sound of a spartan laser, and the hydra screaming out in pain. It toppled over onto the ground, a massive hole in its side. The Chief looked over to see a squad of O.D.S.T.s running to him. He got up off the ground and brushed himself off, before walking over to meet the ODST's.

"Master Chief?" one of them asked. The Spartan nodded. The O.D.S.T. took off his helmet and held out his hand to the Spartan. "Gunnery Sergeant Edward Buck, Seventh O.D.S.T., glad to see you're still alive and kicking."

The Chief shook his hand, being careful not to crush it. "This all?"

"Yes sir." Buck said. "We were sent down to check if you were still alive. Man, Cole would have our asses if we were a second later."

"So... just out of curiosity, Sergeant, what has happened in my absence?" The Chief asked.

Buck scratched the back of his head. "Nothing really, actually. Insurrection is pretty much dead in the aftermath of the war with the Covenant. They kind of did us a favor in glassing our planets, they pretty much killed the insurrection off for us." Buck let out an awkward laugh. "Recently, however, Covenant started popping up again. Pretty much dead even with the Elites on our side though. Bravo Kilos aren't really ones for tactics."

"Buck." Mickey said. "I have Cole on the horn. He wants to know if communications are online on the Dawn. It would make talking a lot easier."

"Cortana?" The Chief asked.

After a few moments pause, the A.I. spoke. "It's damaged, but it works."

"Alright, Master Chief, could you please escort us to Communications?" Buck asked. The Chief nodded, and the seven humans walked towards the frigate.

"Master Chief, can you hear me?" a voice asked from a monitor. The screen was damaged, but the sound was working fine.

"Perfectly." The Chief responded.

"Alright, my name is Captain Cole, son of the late Admiral Cole. I am in command of the U.N.S.C. Gettysburg." The Chiefs mind flashed back to the aftermath of the Alpha Halo, the return to reach, and Operation: First Strike. He shook his head clear and continued listening. "With me is Lieutenant Jenkins, who is with O.N.I."

"Welcome back, Master Chief." Jenkins voice said.

"Alright Master Chief, you and the O.D.S.T. squad with you have a little assignment from O.N.I." Cole began. "They want you to investigate and obverse the life on this planet. There is obviously sentient life on this planet."

"I already know sir." The Chief said.

"How so?" Jenkins asked.

"I ran into one of them."

"Well, what are they like?" Jenkins asked, his voice becoming excited.

"They are... horse like in nature. The one I talked to was a unicorn." The O.D.S.T.s shared a few strange glances.

"Son, did you hit your head on something?" Cole asked.

"No Captain, he's right." Cortana said. "These sentient beings are intelligent, and are horse like. The one we ran into was definitely a unicorn." Romeo cracked up a little.

"Okay, well, get into contact with these... horses." Jenkins said.

"They like to be referred to as ponies, sir." The Chief corrected. Romeo started laughing again, but an angry glance from Buck got him to shut up.

"Okay... get in contact with these ponies. Just study and observe them. Don't go off killing them. I assume they aren't violent, correct?" Jenkins asked.

"The one I ran into seemed very kind. Even if they were violent, I'm sure we could handle them. They don't seem very advanced when it comes to technology." The Chief stated.

"Very well. Do you know if they have any form of leadership?" Cole asked.

"Not as of yet, Captain." The Chief answered.

"Alright, good to see you are still alive Chief. Team, you are to accompany the Chief during this mission. Captain, this is more of your mission than it is the Chief's, but he is in strategic command. Any objections?" Cole asked.

"No sir." Veronica said.

"Okay, good luck team." And with that, the transmission ended.

The humans drove into Ponyville in two warthogs, one standard and one troop transport. The sun was just barely over the horizon as the two warthogs pulled up to the Ponyville Library. The Spartan and the O.D.S.T.s dismounted and walked up to the Library.

"Stay here." The Chief ordered. "You'll probably end up scaring her."

"Understood. Squad, keep an eye out for anything that could be dangerous. Do not fire until you get the Chief's say so." Buck said to the squad. The Chief ducked through the doorway and walked in. Twilight was asleep in the middle of the floor, surrounded by books. The Spartan tapped her twice gently, causing her to stir.

"Five more minutes mom..." she said sleepily.

"Sorry, no can do." The Chief said sternly. Twilight immediately sat up and looked up at the Spartan. She rubbed her eyes and immediately remembered last night.

"Get what you were after?" Twilight asked.

"Not exactly, wasted it all on a hydra. Though, I did come back with something." The Chief said.

"What?" Twilight asked.

"Captain! Can you come in here?" The Chief called out. Veronica walked in and took off her helmet. Twilight observed the creatures appearance. Way smaller compared to the Spartan, atleast a couple feet shorter, and skinnier. Probably the female of the species. She had no fur or coat, either, except for on the top of her hair, which was blonde and styled into a what looked like a tail. She walked up to Twilight, a smile on her face.

"Hello, I am Captain Veronica Dare." she said.

"Hello Captain, I am Twilight Sparkle." Twilight said, reaching her hoof out to her. Veronica took it and shook her hoof.

"Anyways, I am here on behalf of my government to learn about your society. Would you mind answering some questions, Ms. Sparkle?" Veronica asked.

"Sure, as long as I can ask you some of my own. I am so eager to learn about your culture as well. It seems it is a lot different from ours. And, you can just call me Twilight, Captain." Twilight said, smiling.

"As long as you stop calling me Captain, Twilight. You can just call me Veronica. And yes, if you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask them." Veronica asked. The door opened and Mickey walked in.

"Captain, we are getting a lot of attention from the locals." Mickey said.

"There's more of you?" Twilight asked, confused.

"There is seven of us." Veronica answered. "Don't worry, we're not here to hurt anyone."

"Alright, I'll go handle the others, make yourself comfortable." Twilight said, walking outside. Veronica turned to the Chief.

"Well, I guess you haven't lost your mind after all." Veronica said with a smirk. The Chief simply ignored her. After about ten minutes, Twilight came back in.

"Sorry about the other ponies... they aren't used to you. You will find that once they do, they will be very friendly." Twilight assured.

"It's not a problem, Twilight. Chief, could you and Mickey go outside? I've got things covered here. And, make sure you treat the locals nicely. I don't want an issue in my hands."

The Chief nodded to her and walked outside, Mickey in tow. Outside, there was many other ponies, in a variety of different colors and kinds. He instantly noticed that there were ponies with wings, which he recognized as the Pegasus. Looking around, he also saw ponies without wings or horns. Of course, there were a few unicorns here and there. Most of them were just looking at the humans, but three, smaller ones, likely children, were talking with the O.D.S.T.s, eyes full of wonder. One of them, an orange Pegasus, looked over and noticed the Spartan.

"Woah! Look at that one! He looks awesome!" she said, as the three galloped up to the Spartan, causing a cloud of dust. The Chief slowly dropped to one knee, so he wouldn't startle or scare them. In all truth, he was quite fond of children.

"What do ya sappose he is wearing?" a yellow pony with a red bow in her mane asked with a southern accent.

"It's probably some form of armor, like the other ones are wearing." a white unicorn answered.

"Cool..." the other two said in unison.

"Don' ya gals think it's rude ta not introduce ourselves?" the yellow pony asked.

"Oh, yeah!" the orange Pegasus said. "I'm Scootaloo!"

"Ah'm Applebloom!" the yellow pony said excitedly.

"And I'm Sweetie Belle!" the white unicorn said. "And we are..."

"THE CUTIE MARK CRUSADERS!" all three of them shouted, taking even The Chief aback.

"What's your name, mister?" Applebloom asked.

"The Chief." The Chief answered.

"That's a weird name." Sweetie Belle said.

"Careful Sweetie Belle! He might shoot laser beams at you!" Scootaloo warned.

"I don't even have a laser beam." The Chief stated. "Besides, I have no plans of hurting anyone here."

"Don't you mean anypony?" Sweetie Belle asked.

"We say it differently where I come from." The Spartan said.

"So... what exactly are you?"

"A super-soldier." The Chief answered plainly.

"Woah!" the three said together, eyes shining with wonder.

"We should try to get our super-soldier cutie marks!" Scootaloo said.

All three of them shared glances before jumping up in the air. "CUTIE MARK CRUSADERS: SUPER SOLDIERS YAY!" they all shouted, before running off.

"No different from our kids, eh Chief?" Mickey said.

"Yup." The Chief replied, looking around. The Rookie was taking a nap in the backseat of the troop transport warthog. Buck was talking with an older pony, who looked like someone in charge. Probably the mayor or something like that. Romeo was idly chatting with a few mares. According to what he heard from Buck, he was quite the ladies man, but he really hoped that it something like that wouldn't happen. Dutch was by the standard model warthog, showing the turret mounted gatling gun to a rainbow maned Pegasus.

"Chief, what is your status, over?" Cole's voice said from his radio, interrupting his train of thought.

"Perfect, sir. We have made contact with the natives. They are really friendly, and are quite civilized. After they realized we weren't here to hurt them, a few them started coming up and talked to us. We have a lot in common with them, on a psychological scale, anyways." The Chief said.

"How about the Captain?"

"She is talking with the pony I first made contact with, Twilight Sparkle."

"Good. If you get a hold of their leadership, contact me. The U.E.G. council wants me to meet with him or her on behalf of the U.N.S.C. and the human race. Cole, out."

"So you can confirm that the Master Chief is still alive?" Admiral Hood asked.

"That is affirmative sir, I just got done talking with him." Cole responded.

"Very good. Have you made contact with the... pony leadership?" Hood asked.

"Not as of yet, I am afraid." Cole said.

"Very well, I will keep in contact with you." Hood said before the transmission ended.

A lone phantom skimmed over the top of a forest. Two legions of Special Ops grunts, skirmishers, and brutes were inside, armed to the teeth and ready for anything. They soon came upon an castle, where there was a perfect landing zone. The phantom hovered as its occupants floated to the ground below, via the gravity lift. Though the force probably wouldn't be strong enough to take down the demon, the ship master wanted the demon for himself. The two legions separated, twelve grunts, six skirmishers, and two brutes per legion, and filed out into the forest, into the direction of the crashed human ship. One of the legions soon came across a hut out in the middle of the forest, where a striped horse creature was living. The brute Commander silently motioned two come with him, which they obeyed without hesitation. They walked up to the door as the brute smashed it down and roared angrily at the horse. It jumped and grabbed a bottle with its teeth, chucking it at one of the grunts. The moment the grunt was hit by the bottle, it instantly caught on fire. It screeched in pain, running outside of the hut and running around, before another grunt shot it down with his plasma rifle. The brute charged the striped horse, gripping it by its neck and punching it multiple times in the face, before throwing it to the ground with all his strength, breaking its spine. The brute raised his brute shot into the air, roaring in pride over the fresh kill in front of him.

"Chief?" Veronica said walking behind him, Twilight in tow. "We have arranged a meeting with their leadership, two princesses named Celestia and Luna. The meeting is scheduled for two hours for now."

"Then I have to contact someone. Cortana, get me Cole." The Chief ordered.

"On it." Cortana said.

"Yes Chief?" Cole's voice asked.

"Sir, you have a meeting with their leadership in two hours."

"Always short notice... alright, I will be at your location in thirty with a pelican dropship. Cole, out."

Twenty-seven minutes later, Captain Cole's pelican landed a little outside of Ponyville. The Chief, Buck, Veronica, and Twilight Sparkle took the troop transport warthog and drove out to the pelicans position, where Captain Cole, Lieutenant Jenkins, and three Marines were waiting.

"Nice of you to stop by, Captain." Buck said as they rolled up, Twilight and Veronica hopping out of the back. Cole walked up to them.

"Hello, Captain Dare." Cole said, before looking down at the purple unicorn standing beside her. He paused, a strange look on his face, before finally talking. "I presume you are Ms. Sparkle."

"You presume correct." Twilight said with a smile. "Princess Celestia has tasked me with escorting you to Canterlot."

"Well, shall we?" Cole said, motioning her towards the pelican. She jumped aboard, followed by a Marine who strapped her in. Well... attempted to, anyways. Cole turned to the Chief. "Glad to see you Chief, I would stay and chat, but I got an appointment to keep. Till next time." And with that, the Captain and the rest of the humans jumped aboard the pelican. It lifted off moments later, flying towards a large castle to the east.

"Sire, enemy dropship to the east!" a brute called out to the brute Commander. He looked to the east and saw a pelican dropship, which was just lifting off a few miles away.

"Let us go! We will feast on whatever humans are there!" the Commander shouted as the two legions combined again, charging towards the west. A small hut soon came into view. The Commander observed a yellow horse with wings with a pink mane. She appeared to be singing to some birds. A manic smile ran across his face.

"Fresh meat." he muttered as he signaled two brutes to head for the hut. They charged at the hut on all fours. The horse seemed to notice them and screamed at the top of her lungs, before running inside of her hut.

Both Buck's and the Chief's heads turned at the sound of a shrill shriek coming from the north. The Spartan pulled out a pair of binoculars and looked to the north, spotting a hut and...

"Brutes!" The Chief called out. He put the pedal to the metal as he drove at top speed towards the small hut. Buck loaded several shells into the M90 he was holding.

The two brutes crashed into the hut, firing their spikers wildly.

"Come out! I can smell you!" one of them shouted. He sniffed into the air, and noticed the smell was coming from upstairs.

Fluttershy's heart was beating non-stop as she hid under her bed. She heard the two apes running up the stairs, before they smashed through the door. They sniffed around, before they threw the bed across the room, revealing Fluttershy. They laughed, before raising their weapons and aiming at the defenseless Pegasus.

The Chief ran up the stairs and tackled the brute closest to him. The other brute aimed his spiker at the Chief, before getting blasted away by Buck's shotgun. The Chief snapped the neck of the Brute he had tackled, and nodded to Buck. Buck nodded back and slowly walked up to the quivering Pegasus, taking a knee next to her.

"Are you okay?" he asked. The shaking Pegasus only answered with a nod. "Don't worry, we're here to help." Buck reassured her, before gently picking her up. "Chief, let's go. We need to warn the others."

"Right. Cortana, get me Cole."

"I can't believe anything like that could ever happen." Celestia said, still in horror about the story Cole told her and her sister about the Covenant and their genocide of the Human race.

"We're really sorry for your losses..." Luna said.

"We all are, your highness. So many young men and women, slaughtered without mercy..." Cole shook his head to rid himself of his anger. "Anyway, after discovering your planet by accident, and noticing the fact you actually had sentient life, we just had to find out what was actually on this planet. So that's why we sent in a team of soldiers. We weren't trying to be hostile, just a little recon."

"I understand. I would do the same thing in your position." Celestia said, before taking a sip of her tea. "I hope our governments will be able to live in peace with each other."

"That won't be a problem, your highness. Oh, and for future reference, does your planet have a name?"

"We like to call it Equis." Luna answered, a small smile on her face. 'In a weird way... the dark one is kind of adorable...' Cole thought to himself.

"Thanks." Luna said, a blush appearing on her face.

"How did-"

"Alicorn's have the ability to read minds." Luna said quickly.

"Interesting..." Jenkins said, taking notes.

"Sir!" A Marine said walking into the room. "I have the Chief on the horn, he says it's urgent."

"May I be excused for a few minutes, your highness? I have to take this." Cole asked.

"Of course!" Celestia said. Cole bowed before walking out of the room. He took the radio from the Marine.

"What is it Chief?" Cole asked.

"Sir, it's the Covenant. Me and Buck just took out two brutes."

"My God... alright son, I have complete faith in you. You and the O.D.S.T.s head into that town and defend it. You hear me, son?" Cole asked.

"Yes sir." The Chief replied.

"Good luck." Cole said, handing back the radio to the Marine. "Get the Gettysburg on the horn, I want our forces ready to deploy yesterday!" he said to the Marine, before marching back inside the room.

"What is it, Captain?" Celestia asked, concern evident in her voice.

"There is Covenant, here, on Equis, your majesty. With your permission, I would like to deploy my forces to help aid in defending your planet. I already have my recon team defending the town of Ponyville, where Covenant have been spotted."

"Yes... of course..." Celestia said, her demeanor rapidly changing with the news of this. "If the Covenant are anything like what you told us, we have nothing that can take them on. We will help in anyway we can, but I don't know much we can be of assistance."

The Marine ran back in, his magnum in hand. "Sir! Three Covenant battlecruisers have just emerged from slipspace. Gettysburg is requesting orders, sir."

"Tell them to deploy their forces and stay away from those battlecruisers. They won't stand a chance. Also, get on the horn and tell Hood, and try to contact any allied ships in system."

"Yes, sir." The Marine said, running back out. Cole turned towards the two princesses.

"The Covenant are likely going to attack this area, I would recommend you two leave the city immediately." Cole said.

"I can't, Captain." Celestia said. "I have to stay, I have to be here to serve the ponies of Equestria in this time of dire need."

"I understand, your majesty." Cole said.

"Please, Captain, do me a favor. Get my little sister to safety." Celestia said.

"Sis-" Luna started to protest.

"Luna, I need you to go. If I die, you need to rule Equestria and be the voice of Equis. Please... for me..." Celestia pleaded, a tear rolling down her cheek.

"Okay... Tia'..." Luna said, almost in a whisper, before walking up to her sister and hugging her, several tears rolling down her cheek.

"Your highness, we must go." Cole said, reaching for his holster and pulling out his own sidearm. She nodded and followed him and the Marine out of the room. They were soon met by the two other Marines, armed with SMG's.

"Sir, the Gettysburg says that they were able to get in contact with the Covenant Separatist carrier Shadow of Intent. It will arrive in an hour or two."

"Good. We're going to need all the help we can get." Cole said as he, the Princess, Jenkines, Veronica, and the three Marines jumped aboard the pelican, which immediately lifted off.

Chapter Five (Original)

Mickey raised his rocket launcher up onto his shoulder, aiming at an enemy phantom that just flew over their position. He locked onto it and fired, the rocket shooting out at a speed double the phantoms and hitting the phantom in one of its engines. This caused it to crash to the ground in a ball of blue flame. Romeo climbed up onto the roof of a nearby building, setting up his sniper rifle on its bipod. He aimed down the scope, searching for targets. He zoomed in on a squad of grunts, hobbling uneasily towards the town. He fired four shots, all of them dead on. The last remaining grunt froze in fear, only to be taken out by a burst from the Master Chief's battle rifle. A brute charged up at the humans, going berserk. The Rookie ran up, firing his SMG at it, taking out its power armor. However, it just seemed to absorb the bullets as it knocked the Rookie off his feet. The brute moved in for the final kill, laughing to itself. The Chief looked over and noticed this, aiming his battle rifle at the brute and pulling the trigger. The Chief heard a click, signalling he had already used all of his ammo. He threw the battle rifle aside and charged up to the brute, tackling it. The brute pushed the Spartan off him and onto the ground, but the Chief quickly jumped back up, pulling out his combat knife. The brute roared in rage and charged at the Chief. The Spartan took a stance, readying his knife. As the brute closed in, he moved quickly to the left, forced the brute to the ground, and drove his combat knife into the base of his spine. After a few moments, the brute stopped struggling and laid limp. The Chief walked over to the Rookie and helped him off the ground. The O.D.S.T. nodded to him, picking up his SMG and moving along. The Chief pulled out his assault rifle, and aimed at two grunts that were wobbling up the street, firing at them and covering them with bullet holes, their fluorescent blue blood splashing against a nearby wall.

Dutch was manning the turret, blasting away at the charging Covenant. Another phantom landed out in the fields, dropping a wraith and three legions of infantry. Something tapped Dutch's leg. He looked down and saw the Spartan looking up at him.

“Dutch, I need you to drive the warthog; we need to take out that wraith,” he said, having to yell slightly to be heard over the sound of the wraith’s plasma mortar firing. The plasma round hit the nearby troop transport warthog, destroying it. Dutch nodded, jumping down from the turret and getting in the drivers seat. John climbed up and manned the turret.

"Hold on to your ass, Chief!" Dutch called out as the warthog lurched forward. It drove over a few hills at top speed, the Chief unloading on any Covenant in sight with the turret. As the wraith came into view, the Chief fired upon the wraith, killing the grunt that was manning the wraith's turret. It boosted forward, likely attempting to ram the warthog, but Dutch was able to dodge the wraith. The Chief aimed at the back of the wraith and opened fire, hitting its weak spot and quickly destroying it.

Buck looked up into the sky to see two pelicans come into view, both carrying scorpion main battle tanks. They hovered over the ground, dropping them into the town center. Two squads of Marines piled out from each pelican, some of them getting inside the scorpions, the rest charging up to reinforce the squad of O.D.S.T.s. One of the scorpions rolled past Buck, the ground shaking as it fired its main cannon. Several longswords flew over the town, dropping cluster bombs on the Covenant infantry. Buck took cover behind a barricade and peeked his head over it, noticing a squad of grunts hobbling towards his current location. He raised his assault rifle to his shoulder and opened fire, mowing down the squad of grunts. He walked up to them, looking at the small aliens, who were all surrounded by a pool of fluorescent blue blood. After making sure each was dead, he moved on.

"Your excellence, we have exited from slipspace and are drifting in at one thousand kilometers per hour, orders?" An Elite Zealot asked.

"Enter orbit over the drop-zone, I will leave you in command while I lead our brothers to the surface." The Arbiter said, jumping from his command chair and walking out of the bridge and along the halls to one of the many armories.

The armory was cold and spacious, shelves and racks of various weaponry covering all sides and angles, shelved crates filling the area in a grid pattern. He walked up to one of the shelves and grabbed a carbine, it's casing repainted green. He slung it over his back and attached it to the magnetic hardpoints, clipping a needler and an energy sword to his thighs. As he walked out of the armory to the hall, he saw a pair of hunters helping each other attach armor and weapons. 'They must have bonded long ago..' The arbiter thought, walking out of the hall towards the drop-pod bay.

Dutch drove the warthog into the town center and parked it. He and the Chief dismounted it, while three Marines jumped aboard the warthog, driving it up the street. Dutch took off his helmet and picked up a nearby water bottle, quickly drinking it down.

"Master Chief, I need a favor of you." Cole said from the Chief's helmet radio.

"What is it?" The Chief asked.

"I need you and one of the O.D.S.T.s to escort Princess Luna to somewhere safe. Can I depend on you?" Cole asked.

"Yes sir."

"There will be a pelican coming to pick you up in fifteen minutes."

"Understood." The Chief looked around, spotting a napping Romeo sitting in the shade. The Spartan walked up to him, nudging him. Romeo looked up at him.

"I'm going to need some help, think you can handle it?" The Chief asked him.

"You can count on me, Chief." Romeo said, using his sniper rifle to support himself as he stood up. He slung it over his shoulder, tightening its strap, and picked up a battle rifle that was leaned up against a wall. Soon enough, the pelican landed nearby, and the Spartan and the O.D.S.T. climbed aboard. Inside was a pony, both pegasus and unicorn, with a midnight blue, almost black coat, her mane a light blue.

"That is an alicorn." Cortana said, seemingly reading the Chief's mind.

"Ma'am." The Chief said nodding to her. Romeo sat across from her.

"I presume you are Princess Luna, correct?" Romeo asked. Luna nodded sheepishly. Romeo looked over at the Chief. "Well isn't she a cute lil' filly, eh Chief?" Luna blushed heavily at this, and the Chief shook his head.

"T-thank you?" Luna asked, a little unsure of herself.

"Isn't a problem at all, Princess." Romeo replied with a smug look on his face.

"Romeo, we have a job to do." The Chief pointed out.

"Sorry Chief!" Romeo said.

"No, no, Chief, it's quite all right with me." Luna said.

"Are you sure, your majesty? Besides, he should probably be focusing on the job at hand."

"I'm sure." Luna reassured the Chief.

"Alright..." the Chief said looking out the pelican bay door. As they passed over a mountain, two banshees screamed by them. They turned around and activated their boosters, attempting to catch up with the pelican. "Banshees!" the Chief called out as they opened fired. The bay door closed, right as a barrage of shots hit the door, the metal melting where it was hit on the other side. The pelican banked to the right, trying to evade the banshees. One of them managed to get a lock-on, firing its fuel rod cannon at the pelican. It missed the main body, but hit it in the engine.

"Brace yourselves!" The pilot called from the front as the pelican started rapidly descending. It turned on its side, crashing into the forest below. The Chief blacked out as pelican impacted the ground.

"Captain! We have enemy fighters inbound! Orders?" A crewman called out.

"Deploy all longswords and sabers we have in our inventory. Are the Elites deploying anything?"

"Yes sir! The Elites have roughly one hundred seraphs deployed right now, but the brutes have atleast two hundred inbound."

"Then let's give them all we got. Warm up all of our defenses and get those fighters deployed."

"Sir! I have a slipspace rupture coming from our six o'clock. It's the Aegis Fate, sir."

"Tell the Captain of the Aegis Fate our situation, and request he spare a few squadrons of fighters. Also, tell him to deploy all the ground forces he has. The Marines on Equis will need the back up."

Dutch pulled out his spartan laser, aiming at a ghost that was rapidly heading towards him. He charged it up and fired, a large red laser shooting out and instantly destroying the ghost. He quickly slung it over his shoulder, picking up his assault rifle and opening fire on a pack of brutes that were running over a hill to his right. He killed two of them before they returned fire, a spike from a brute captains spiker hitting him in the shoulder. He immediately fell to the ground, screaming out in pain and gripping his shoulder. He immediately got on the radio.

"Gunny, I'm hit, I need a medic!"

"Right, I'll send The Rookie to get you out of there."

The Rookie nodded to Buck, overhearing this. He loaded a fresh magazine into his SMG, hearing it click satisfactorily into place, and jogged past the Gunny, out toward the direction of his wounded comrade. Upon reaching the front lines, he noticed it seemed a bit too quiet for comfort. He slowed his pace stuck to the walls, cautiously scanning around the area for hostiles. He heard a pair of grunts a few meters ahead of him, and crouched behind a nearby mailbox to avoid detection. As the pair of stubby creatures hobbled out of an alley, their plasma pistols in the air, he took aim on the head of the alien closest to him, lining up his sights right between its beady little eyes. Goodnight… A muffled sputter emanated from his silenced weapon, and the grunt’s head jerked to one side, spewing a small fountain of fluorescent blue into the air. The second jumped at the sudden and violent death of his friend, and froze in place, moving only his head to glance about the area, terrified. The Rookie used the opportunity of its confusion to his advantage, and ran up to the helpless alien from behind. The grunt had just noticed his footsteps and began to turn around, only to be met with the butt-end of the ODST’s SMG. He hit it in the face with it as hard as he could, knocking off its gas mask, which fell to the ground in a haze of greenish-blue gas. The creature gasped for air and fell to the ground, inhaling sharply for precious methane. The Rookie thumbed the fire-select to semi auto, shooting it three times in the head with his SMG, and ending its misery. He continued on, slowly and cautiously, before reaching the end of the street, where he could see Dutch lying on the ground, unconscious. He carefully grabbed his arms and started dragging Dutch back into town. He heard a fierce roar, as he looked up, seeing a brute chieftain charging up to the two O.D.S.T.s. The Rookie raised his SMG to his shoulder, switching back to full-auto and opened fire, destroying the chieftains power armor before he ran out of ammo. The chieftain raised his gravity hammer, preparing to crush The Rookie and Dutch. Two shots from a magnum rang out, one shooting off the chieftains helmet, the other hitting him in the side of the head. It fell down onto the ground, blood gushing out of its head. The Rookie looked to the left to see a rainbow maned Pegasus, somehow holding the magnum in her hooves.

"You alright there?" she asked. The Rookie nodded as she helped him pick up Dutch, as they dragged him up the street. They soon reached the town center, where a medic and Buck were waiting. The medic walked forward, taking Dutch from the O.D.S.T. and the Pegasus. "So what's your name, anyways? I'm Rainbow Dash." Rainbow Dash held her hoof out to The Rookie, who took it and shook it.

"We call him Rookie." Buck said walking up. "Sorry, he doesn't really talk." The Rookie just shrugged it off.

"Oh." Rainbow Dash muttered, clearly embarrassed.

"Exactly how are you holding that firearm?" Buck asked.

"Well... each pony has a certain amount of magic that allows us to grip things with our hooves. It's typically easier to use your mouth, though. But you can't fire a gun with your mouth."

"And how did you learn to shoot?" Buck asked.

"Dunno, just watched you guys do it. It's pretty simple." Rainbow Dash shrugged.

Buck got an idea. "Ms. Dash, could you go to the refugee camp and ask for volunteers? If you ponies can use firearms, it would help greatly."

"No problem." Rainbow Dash saluted Buck before flying off, a rainbow trail behind her.

"Chief?" asked a shy, feminine voice. "Are you okay?" The Chief opened his eyes slowly, his vision blurred. He looked up to see Princess Luna standing above him, a few trickles of blood coming down from the side of her face.

"I'm alive." The Chief said, standing up. The two climbed out of the crashed pelican, where Romeo was waiting, his battle rifle at the ready.

"The banshees are long gone, but they will likely send in patrols to make sure we are dead. Why don't you two stand back while I set up a couple of trip mines." The Chief and Luna nodded, walking a safe distance away. Romeo climbed back into the pelican, coming back out with two trip mines. He quickly set them up outside the pelican and ran to the Chief and Luna. "We're good, let's move."

The trio walked a good distance away, trekking through the trees and shrubbery, before two explosions broke the silence.

"We should go." The Chief pointed out, moving a little faster. The others struggled to keep up with him.

Authors note - This is so far my first try at an action chapter, so if you have any advice or criticism, I will gladly take it.

Chapter Six (Original)

"Get down. Phantom." Romeo snapped at the Chief and Luna, who quickly dove under the cover of a tree. Romeo had his battle rifle at ready as the phantom flew over, in case they were spotted. He breathed a sigh of relief as the phantom continued past them. He turned back to the others. "Clear." he whispered.

They continued through the brush slowly, watching for Covenant. The Chief scanned the sky. "Stop," He said. Romeo and Luna stopped in their tracks. The Spartan pointed at smoke rising into the sky, from somewhere nearby.

"Maybe there are some Marines in that direction." Romeo suggested.

"Maybe." The Chief said.

"What's life without taking a few risks, Chief." Romeo said, shrugging as he walked towards the source of the smoke. Luna and the Chief exchanged worried glances and hesitantly followed him.

Gunnery Sergeant Pete Stacker dove behind a large rock, taking cover. Several pink glowing needles passed over his head, hitting a nearby Marine. The needles erupted in a large explosion, ripping the Marine literally in two. Stacker cringed at the sight. He shouldered his assault rifle and aimed over the rock, firing a short burst at a grunt, hitting its methane tank and causing it to fly off into the air, falling to the ground as the methane ran out. A brute ran out into the open, firing its spiker wildly in the direction of Stacker's squad. A shot from a sniper rifle rang out and the brute fell to the ground, a pool of blood streaming from its head. Two phantoms passed over the Marines, both carrying wraiths. They dropped both down to the ground, as well as four lances of infantry.

"Shit just got real!" Stacker shouted to his Marines. "Open fire!"

The Chief, Romeo, and Luna walked into the burnt out remains of what was once a small village, filled with life. Now, all that remained was the burnt out skeletons of buildings, and hundreds of charred pony corpses lying in pieces on the ground. Luna was obviously in shock. She cared for all of these ponies. The Chief couldn't help but feel pity for her when tears started rolling down her cheeks. They eventually came across a small Marine outpost, where a squad of Marines were stationed. They didn't stand a chance.

"Put up a hell of a fight." Romeo observed. The Chief nodded in agreement, and Luna remained silent. Romeo and the Chief went around collecting ammo and dog tags.

"Cortana, is there any allied forces within the area?" The Spartan asked Cortana.

"Give me a moment, Chief." Cortana said. After a short pause, she continued. "I am reading a squad of Marines and O.D.S.T.'s fifteen kilometers from here."

"Can you get me in contact with them?"

"Certainly Chief." Cortana said, patching him through to Gunnery Sergeant Pete Stacker.

"Trooper, can you hear me?" The Chief asked.

"Who-" Pete began, before being interrupted by a huge explosion. "Who is this?!"

"This is Spartan-117."

"Chief?! It's good to hear your voice. Are you nearby? We could use some help!"

"We are on our way."

"Please hurry!" Pete begged.

"Chief, we've got transport." Romeo said as he pushed a collapsed shack off a troop transport warthog, which was intact except for a damaged windshield. The Chief turned to Princess Luna.

"Get in the back, ma'am." The Chief said. She nodded, still shaking, before walking slowly towards the warthog and climbing in the back, lying down on the floor. The Chief and Romeo got in the front seats. The warthog switched on and lurched forward. Cortana set up a waypoint on the Spartans and the O.D.S.T.s HUD, indicating the Marine squads location.

Buck looked over the ponies who volunteered to help in the fight, most of them looking extremely nervous or afraid. There was certainly much more than expected. All together, the ponies had the numbers of a full strength battalion. Most of them were armed with magnums and SMG's, though the larger stallions were armed with assault rifles and battle rifles, and had either a sniper rifle, rocket launcher, or spartan laser strapped to their backs. For the past three hours, a few Sergeants from the 7th O.D.S.T. gave them some basic weapons training. Luckily for them, they were fast learners.

They called themselves the Royal Equis Militia, lead by the self proclaimed General Rainbow Dash. They reminded Buck of the militia on Reach that helped him and another O.D.S.T. escape Reach. He felt a pain in his heart. He regretted that day, letting them die so they could escape.

"It should have been me..." Buck muttered to himself.

"What was that?" Rainbow Dash asked, walking up to him, a SMG in hoof.

"Nothing... just... yeah, nothing." Buck answered.

"Alright, well, I got a squad of our best shooters set up, just like you requested." Rainbow Dash said, motioning to the ten mares and colts behind her. A large, red stallion walked up, followed by an orange mare wearing a Stetson hat. Rainbow Dash turned to them and cleared her throat. "Gunny, this is Captain Big Macintosh and Staff Sergeant Applejack."

"Howdy! Pleasure ta make yer acquaintance, sir!" Applejack said, shaking Bucks hand aggressively. Buck and Big Mac nodded to each other.

"These are our two best shooters we have. The rest of the squad is made up of Royal Guard members who have had combat experience." Rainbow Dash pointed out, motioning to the eight other ponies, all wearing what looked like the centurion armor the Romans wore, just black with several streaks of silver. One of them had gold streaks instead of silver streaks, obviously the leader of the squad of Royal Guards. He marched up to Buck and saluted.

"This is Lieutenant Star Streak, head of the Royal Guards Special Forces branch." Rainbow said.

"Afternoon sir! Ready for your orders!" Star said sternly.

"We will have your orders ready soon. But for now, I need you guys to show me what you can do. There is a Covenant force made up of five lances, with a compliment of four choppers, four ghosts, two prowlers, and a wraith. The Marines defending the area are heavily outnumbered and outgunned, so we're sending you in with the reinforcements, consisting of two squads of Marines, four warthogs, and three scorpions. Good luck." Buck said, before turning around and walking away.

The Chiefs warthog came to a stop as they rolled up to the Marines position, which was under attack by a large Covenant force. He turned towards Luna and Romeo.

"Stay here with the Princess." he ordered. Romeo nodded in agreement.

"And where are you going?" Luna asked as the Chief jumped out of the warthog.

"To finish this fight." he said, running towards the Covenant. A grunt looked to its right in time to see the Spartan jumping towards it, foot in the air. A soft squeak came from it, before the Chief boot collided with its face, sending it flying into a nearby grunt. The Chief raised his battle rifle, quickly mowing down the rest of the grunts squad with a skillful set of headshots.

"Kill the demon!" a brute chieftain ordered his troops. "So we may feast on his flesh!" The chieftain charged at the Spartan, gravity hammer raised into the air. The Chief side stepped and kicked the chieftain in the back of the ankle, breaking its leg. It barely noticed this, as it swung his hammer at the Spartan. The Chief jumped up, dodging the hammer, and landing behind the brute. Before it had time to react, the Chief pulled out his combat knife and plunged it into the chieftains neck. It let out one last defiant howl before lying limp on the ground, a growing pool of blood surrounding it. His energy shield began to flare as the rest of the brutes opened fire on him. He dove behind a large rock, firing his battle rifle in the general direction of the Covenant, killing one brute.

"It's the Chief!" Sergeant Reynolds said, relief evident in his voice as he dived next to Stacker.

"Let's give him a hand. Open fire, Marines!" Stacker ordered, raising his assault rifle and opening fire with the other five O.D.S.T.s and Marines.

A nearby hill erupted with gunfire as bullets started raining down on the Covenants position. Several grunts and brutes turned towards the hill and returned fire, eliciting a few screams of pain, barely audible over all the gunfire. A few sniper rounds passed over his head. The Chief turned around to see Romeo lying on the ground with his sniper rifle set up on its bipod. Luna was lying next to him, her hooves covering her ears. The Spartan nodded to them and turned back around, shouldering his battle rifle and rising to his feet, firing multiple expertly aimed bursts at the Covenant. One by one, they fell, until there were no more. Two O.D.S.T.s and a Marine climbed down the hill and walked up to the Chief.

"Master Chief, it sure is great to see you." Stacker said, saluting the Spartan. Luna and Romeo walked up behind the Spartan.

"Likewise."

"You guys have a radio?" Romeo asked. "Our long range communications were knocked out in the crash."

"Sure thing. Reynolds, radio." he said to the other O.D.S.T. who handed him a radio. Stacker then handed it to the Chief. The Spartan nodded to Stacker and turned it on.

The ponies lined up against the wall, firearms at the ready. Star Streak peeked around the corner, checking for hostiles. He saw a lone grunt a short distance down the road, its back turned to him. He turned back to the rest of his squad, signalling with his hoof to stay here and stay quiet. He slowly pulled his combat knife from its sheath and stealthily walked up to the ignorant grunt. He pulled the grunt up against him, his hoof covering its mouth.

"You know they say, ignorance is bliss." he whispered to it before plunging his knife into its neck. Its eyes went wide with shock, muffled whimpers making its way through Star Streaks hoof. It soon fell silent and went limp in his hooves. He let its body fall to ground, before signalling the rest of the squad to come to him.

"Nice job, Star." Rainbow Dash said, walking up to him. "Come on everypony! The squads position should be down the street." The eleven ponies charged up street, still watching for hostiles. Luckily for them, there was no more in the area. They came upon the position, which was the Ponyville Library. Or, what was left of it. The squad gasped in shock at the scene. The Marines that were holding up there were all horribly maimed, after being slaughtered without mercy by the Covenant. The scorpions and warthogs rolled past them, the Marines on board and walking beside them looking solemn. Rainbow Dash pulled out a radio and turned it on.

"Buck, do you read me, over?" Rainbow asked.

"I copy." Bucks voice said from the radio.

"We have arrived at your Marine's position. One-hundred percent casualties, library's a wreck too." Rainbow Dash reported.

"Understood." Buck said over the radio, sounding solemn. After a moments pause, he continued speaking. "Hold your position and support the Marines that you were sent in with until more Marines arrive. Then you may return to the F.O.B."

"Understood, Rainbow Dash, out." she said, turning off the radio and stowing it away.

Princess Celestia levitated Twilight on board the Pelican and dropped her inside it. She tried to run back out, but a Marine held her back.

"Princess, get on board!" she called out. "This is the last one coming. You heard the Captain, this place is going to get attacked!"

"I know... that's why I must stay." Celestia said solemnly, her usual smile now a frown.

"But-" Twilight began to protest, before a Covenant cruiser exited from slipspace over Canterlot, interrupting Twilight.

"Marine, time to go." she said to the Marine holding Twilight back.

"Yes ma'am!" she shouted back, before turning to the cockpit. "Time to go!"

The pelicans bay door raised up and closed, before it zoomed away. Celestia looked up at the cruiser to see it charging its excavation beam. Celestia sighed deeply, resigning herself to her fate, knowing no amount of magic could stop something like this. She knew Luna would do a good job leading her country through this. She also knew her death and the destruction of Canterlot would inspire her little ponies to fight for their planet, in some shape or form. A tear rolled down her cheek as the excavation beam fired, glassing Canterlot.

Buck looked up to see Canterlot getting glassed, the once proud city now turned into nothing. He cursed to himself. "Covenant bastards! It's Reach all over again!" he screamed. The ground shook as the U.N.S.C. Destroyer Provocation flew over the town. It fired its MAC cannons at the cruiser, causing its shields to flare and fail. The U.N.S.C. Frigate Aegis Fate followed suit, firing its MAC cannon at the cruiser. The cruiser exploded into a ball of flame, crashing into the mountain that Canterlot used to be on. The ponies and a several Marines stared in awe at the sight. However, Buck and the other more seasoned Marines and O.D.S.T.s just watched. They had seen the same thing happen many times before. After the initial shock wore off, a few Marines broke out into cheers, as the two ships returned back to space. Buck looked over the ponies, who were mostly still in shock, those who weren't were enraged or crying. "Poor bastards..." he whispered to himself. Even some of the Marines were in shock over the event, even though they were taking it much better than the ponies did. Buck continued on, walking down the street towards the front lines, assault rifle at the ready.

Bonus Chapter One - Pinkie's Massacre (Original)

-Note: Don't really take this chapter seriously. It's Pinkie Pie, for God's sake. Enjoy.-

Pinkie Pie sat alone in the Sugarcube Corner. Her eyes showed sadness, and her mane was deflated, hanging on the side of her face. She pushed around a cupcake covered in pink frosting. She knew she wanted to eat it... but her body didn't feel like it. The Princess was dead, and the bastards responsible were out there, killing innocent ponies and the humans who came to help them. She heard something rustling outside, and a gruff, brutish voice calling out.

"There is one in there! Kill it!" it shouted, as the front door crashed onto the ground, two brutes and four grunts charging inside, weapons at the ready. Pinkie's eye twitched, and her face slowly changed into a manic grin. She picked up a large butcher knife and turned towards the Covenant troops.

"You want some cupcakes?!" she said, throwing the knife at one of the brute's, hitting it square in between the eyes. "Oh, that's too bad, but I have something much better." she said as she picked up another knife, plunging it into the other brutes neck, who was still staring at the corpse of his comrade. Pinkie hefted up one of their spikers, staring down the four grunts. They stood frozen in fear, eyes open wide in surprise. The pink pony aimed at them, sending a spike into each their faces. Pinkie walked past them, but noticed something purple with pink spikes sticking out of it.

"Oooo! Pretty!" she said, hefting up the needler. She threw the spiker aside and walked out the doorway. A large smile appeared on her face when she noticed a group of Covenant charging towards her position. She lifted up her needler, aiming at the Covenant and opened fire. The pink needles homed in on a brute captain, who screamed out in rage and surprise before the needles exploded in a ball of pink flame. Pinkies crazy grin grew wider as she stared at the Covenant, who were staring at her in surprise.

"Who's next?" she asked, aiming at a grunt ultra and open fire, causing it to explode in two as the pink needles combined.

"Kill it!" a brute screamed at the rest of the group. The Covenant opened fire on the pink pony, who somehow managed to dodge every single shot. She opened fire on the brute, the resulting explosion ripping it in half. The needler clicked as she ran out of ammo. She frowned a little, but noticed a nearby brute shot, causing her smile to reappear as she tossed the now useless needler aside and picked it up, loading a new belt of grenades into it. She fired one grenade into a group of grunts, causing them to shriek out in pain as they all went flying into the air. An enraged brute charged at her, roaring in rage. Pinkie turned to it, running the blade attached to the brute shot into the brutes neck, cleanly cutting the brutes head off. It rolled next to Pinkie, who smiled down at it and bucked it into a nearby grunt. Several blue bolts of plasma flew over Pinkies head. She looked for the source of the plasma, seeing a ghost hovering down the street. She hefted up the brute shot, firing the three remaining grenades at it. The grunt piloting it yelped out in surprise, before the three grenades made contact with ghost, causing it to erupt into a large ball of flames.

She threw the brute shot aside, picking up a nearby carbine. A large squad of grunts hobbled onto the street, where Pinkie was waiting for them. "Hi guys!" Pinkie said to them, catching their attention. She aimed her carbine at them. "Who's hungry?!" She aimed at the nearest grunt and fired, hitting it in the head. It did a little flip from the force of the shot and fell the ground, dead. The other grunts aimed their weapons at the pink pony and opened fire. She jumped into the air, dodging all the plasma bolts that came after her. She aimed her carbine and fired three shots, all of them hitting home and killing three grunts. She landed on the ground and noticed a nearby fuel rod cannon. She tossed the carbine aside and hefted the fuel rod cannon over her shoulder and fired two shots at the group of Covenant, killing them all into large explosions of yellowish green flame. A large explosion of blue plasma came from behind her, as she looked behind her as saw a wraith coming straight for her. She fired three shots at it, all of them hitting the main body of the wraith directly. It shuddered under the impacts and exploded in a large ball of blue flame. She dropped the fuel rod cannon and smiled, looking over the large piles of corpses before her. She heard gunfire coming from down the street. Her smile grew twice as size as she hefted up two nearby needlers.

"Fresh meat!" she said, galloping down the street towards the source of the gunfire.

Sergeant Backdraft looked up to see a nearby human tank get blown to bits by two Covenant revenants. He cursed to himself and pulled his SMG up to his shoulder, firing off a long burst in the direction of the Covenant, killing two grunts and injuring another. He heard a loud roar come from his right. He turned to see what the source of it was a saw a brute chieftain charging at his position, gravity hammer in the air. He grit his teeth as several tears rolled down his cheek, preparing for his painful death. Time seemed to slow down as he thought of all the things he never was able to do, and all the things he had done in his life. He looked down at the ground, tears falling down on the ground below. As the chieftain approached, it was hit by multiple pink needles. It shouted out in surprise before the needles combined and exploded. Backdraft looked up at the mutilated corpse of the brute, which fell down to the ground. A pink pony walked up to the corpse, a manic grin on her face. He instantly recognized her.

"Pinkie Pie?" he asked. She turned quickly towards the source of the voice, both needlers at the ready. Backdraft threw both of his hooves in the air and shot her his best disarming smile. "Pinkie, calm down, it's just me..."

"Oh! Hiya Drafty!" she said, putting both needlers down. She walked up to him and gave him a big hug. Backdraft quickly returned it, fresh tears running down his cheeks.

"When I saw the Covenant heading towards your shop... I thought I lost you..." Backdraft whispered.

"I thought I lost you too!" Pinkie said, tightening her grip. Backdraft squeaked slightly at the strength of the hug, but didn't say a word. He was just happy he still had somepony.

-Authors note- There will be another part to this, unless you want them to appear in the main series. Btw, as for Pinkie seemingly doing the impossible, just remember, it's Pinkie Pie.

Chapter Seven (Original)

The Rookie and Mickey charged up the street, diving behind a barricade just before a barrage of plasma passed over their heads. Mickey shouldered his assault rifle and rose up, firing a long burst before ducking behind the barricade, narrowly dodging another storm of plasma. The Rookie went prone and scooted to the right, barely exposing himself to enemy fire, but exposing himself enough to return fire. He shouldered his SMG and looked down the red dot sight, firing a quick burst at a jackal who had its shield turned away from The Rookie. It squawked in surprise as the rounds hit it, purple blood misting out behind it before falling down the ground. He scanned to the right and targeted a grunt, who was running away, its arms raised in the air. He fired a burst in its direction, making it to fall over in a cloud of fluorescent blue mist. They heard someone running up towards them, and they looked up in time to see Buck diving in between them, assault rifle against his chest.

"How are you two holding up?" he asked. The Rookie answered with a simple shrug.

"I've been better, Gunny." Mickey said, rising up and firing the rest of his magazine at the Covenant, succeeding in killing a brute and injuring another.

"I know what you mean." Buck muttered. He shouldered his assault rifle and placed it in between a small crack in the barricade and opened fire, mowing down a small squad of grunts that were hobbling up the street. Several longswords screeched overhead, dropping cluster munitions on an approaching Covenant armor column, destroying wraiths, choppers, and prowlers. A couple anti-air wraiths opened fire on the longswords, destroying one of them, sending it crashing into a nearby hill. Several Covenant drop pods landed nearby the O.D.S.T.s, who readied their weapons and aimed at the drop pods. The doors of the drop pods launched off, as a squad of Spec Ops Elites climbed out of them. One Elite stood out from the others, dressed in ancient grey armor. Buck immediately recognized him as the Arbiter. A few banshee's screeched overhead, firing their plasma cannons and fuel rod cannons at the attacking Covenant Loyalists. The Arbiter charged up, activating his plasma sword and ran it right through a fleeing grunt, who squeaked in surprise and pain. The Arbiter flung the grunts body into a nearby building, as two green wraiths hovered past him. He walked up to the three humans, who were watching as the Elites slaughtered the attacking Loyalists.

"I would have thought that after the deaths of the false prophets, the brutes would have given in. It appears I thought wrong." The Arbiter said. "Where is the Spartan?"

"He was escorting one of the planets leaders to a safer location. We lost contact with his pelican a few hours ago." Buck answered solemnly. The Arbiter's faced formed into what Buck guessed was the Elite version of a frown.

"I hoped I would be able to see my comrade in arms once more... but it matters not! We will destroy these mongrels and show them the true power of vengeance. My fellow warriors will help you in anyway we can, human. To battle!" The Arbiter bellowed, raising his energy sword into the air before charging past the humans, who followed after him.

"Incoming!" A Equis Militia member called out, "lots of incoming!" The ground shook as Star Streak looked up to see an enormous purple machine lumbering towards him. It was taller and larger than all the buildings in Ponyville, and almost looked like a crab.

"What is that thing?!" Star Streak demanded.

"Scarab!" A Marine called out. The scarab's plasma cannon charged and fired a stream of green plasma at the town, sending multiple buildings up into flames. A scorpion tank rolled up the street, firing its main cannon at the scarab, barely leaving a scratch. The scarab turned to the tank and fired. The Marines inside of the scorpion attempted to scramble out of it, but only the gunner managed to make it out before the scorpion exploded in a ball of flame.

"We need air support!" A Marine Sergeant screamed into a radio.

"Two hornets en route, stand by." A voice responded from the radio. "Attempt to take out the legs."

"Roger that!" The Sergeant said. "Aim for the legs!"

Big Mac unslung his rocket launcher and fired two rockets, one of them hitting home. These rockets were soon joined by multiple other rockets, the vast majority of them hitting the legs. An alarm was heard coming from the scarab as it lowered to the ground. As it did this, two hornets passed over them, firing their cannons and rockets at the scarab. However, the anti-air turret on top of the scarab rotated towards the hornets and fired large bolts of plasma at them, shooting both of them down.

"Great, now what?!" Rainbow Dash asked. Star Streak was about to reply when he noticed two streaks pass by, one colored black and red, and one pink.

"Pinkie?!" Applejack called out, flabbergasted, as she saw a grey Pegasus and the pink party pony climb inside of the scarab.

"Come on Drafty!" Pinkie called out to Backdraft as they climbed into the scarab. "This is going to be fun!" She cocked the shotgun Backdraft gave her and shouldered it, aiming down the sights while moving forward. Backdraft followed suit, SMG at the ready. Two jackals sprinted down a ramp, plasma pistols at the ready. Before they got a chance to fire, Pinkie charged up and flanked them, blasting one of them away with a blast from her shotgun, and bucking the other one in the face with all her strength. Backdraft and Pinkie heard the sickening crack of bones breaking as Pinkies backhooves made contact with the jackals head, which seemed to collapse under the force of the impact. The two ponies trotted up the ramp, which led to the top of the scarab, which had recovered and was back in the air, firing its plasma beam at anything in its way. Backdraft unloaded his SMG on a brute, destroying the power armor and tearing it to shreds.

"This thing has to have a weak spot somewhere..." Pinkie muttered, walking towards the back on the scarab, Backdraft right behind her. At the end of the walkway, there was a small room with what Backdraft guessed would be the power source.

"Maybe this is it." Backdraft suggested.

"It's worth a shot!" Pinkie sang as she fired two blasts of buckshot into the power source. Orange liquid starting leaking out of it as an alarm sounded. The scarab shook as it started to explode.

"Time to go!" Backdraft said as he tossed aside his SMG and picked Pinkie up into his hooves. She giggled as he dove off of the scarab, gliding away seconds before the scarab exploded, resulting in a very large ball of flame and plasma.

"Who took out that scarab?" Buck demanded, as he, his squad, and the Arbiter walked past the flaming remnants of the scarab.

"Some random ponies." A Marine responded, pointing to a grey Pegasus with a long dark red mane with a black streak going through it, and a bright pink pony with a bouncy pink mane, who were surrounded by other ponies and Marines. Star Streak slapped Backdraft on the back, before shaking his hoof.

"Good job, son. We could use ponies like you and your fillyfriend in my squad." He said. Both of them blushed heavily at this.

"We aren't in a relationship like that..." Backdraft said.

"Not yet." Pinkie said, winking at Backdraft, resulting in an even heavier blush from him.

"People... err... ponies! We have a war to fight!" Buck called out. "Stop standing around and get a move on, or the Covenant won't be the only thing you have to worry about!"

"Yes sir!" They all called out, saluting and charging up the street.

"Buck, can you hear me?" The Chief's voice said from Buck's radio.

"Chief?! Jesus, we all thought you were dead. How is the cargo?" Buck asked.

"The Princess is a little shaken, but unharmed."

"And Romeo?"

"He's fine. We have regrouped with the remnants of the Marine defense force that was assigned to Trottingham."

"How many men are left?"

"Two O.D.S.T.s, one Marine."

Damn. "That's too bad..."

"We need an evac." The Chief stated.

"I know." Buck responded.

"Cortana is sending you our coordinates right now."

Seconds later, the coordinates the Chief was talking about appeared on the O.D.S.T.s HUD. Buck pulled out a holomap and checked the coordinates. He then looked over several pictures of the area that several drones took the day before.

"Chief, there is a clearing a good ten kilos away from you. Sending the coordinates to Cortana."

"Got it." Cortana's voice stated from the Chief's helmet. A yellow marker appeared on his HUD, the yellow numbers marking the distance to the extraction point as 10.6 KM.

"Alright." The Chief said.

"We will be sending you a pelican shortly. Get there ASAP, over?"

"Understood." The Chief said, handing the radio back to Stacker. "Let's go" He said, signaling the Marines and the Princess to follow him.

"What about the hog, sir?" Reynolds asked.

"It will draw too much attention, we need to walk." The Chief responded.

"You heard him, Marines! Chief, you got point." Stacker said. The Chief nodded, walking into the trees, the Marines and the Princess right behind him.

"Star Streak, do you read me?" Buck asked over the radio.

"I read you Buck, what do you need?" Star Streak responded.

"I've got a mission for you and your squad. Could you put Dash on the horn?" Buck requested.

"Give me a second." Star Streak said.

"Need something, Gunny?" Rainbow Dash's voice asked over the radio.

"I need you to grab that pink pony and grey Pegasus. I'm assigning them to your squad."

"No problem."

"Once you find them, meet me in the town center."

"Alright, you got it Gunny."

Buck turned off his radio and turned to his squad mates and the Arbiter. "Rookie, Mickey, stick with the Arbiter. I need to go do something. I will regroup with you guys later on." Buck ordered. The two other O.D.S.T.s nodded at Buck and turned to the Arbiter, who towered over them. He nodded to the two humans and walked down the street, signaling them to follow.

Twilight Sparkle, Veronica, and Cole all watched as an entire Covenant fleet exited out of slip space.

"Get the Shipmaster on the horn, Lieutenant!" Cole called out.

"Yes sir!" A technician called out. The Shipmaster's face soon appeared on the main screen.

"Shipmaster, please tell me those are your ships." Cole pleaded.

"It would appear not, Captain. That is a Loyalist fleet. I have more ships in bound, but I am not sure if we have the strength to take on something that big."

"Right." Cole took a deep breathe. "I'll contact U.N.S.C. High Command and have them send more ships. I don't think four ships can take on an entire fleet."

"I agree, for now, we must regroup and be ready for a fight. Good luck, Captain." The Shipmaster said, before main screen flickered off.

"Commander! Conta-"

"Already done, sir!" The Commander shouted out.

"Good!" Cole said, walking back to his chair and sitting down in it. "I want all weapons armed and ready to go! Let's move!"

"Yes sir!" The crew called out.

Chapter Eight (Original)

"Sir!" A crewman called out. "The Covenant fleet is heading our way! Your orders?"

Captain Cole scratched his chin, looking out at Equis and the Covenant fleet looming their way, "Ms. Sparkle, I am putting you on the next pelican out. It's going to get pretty dangerous here soon, and I don't think Luna would be happy if she found out you died on our watch. If my understanding is correct, you are very important on Equis, are you not?" Twilight nodded. "And that is why Corporal Smith here is going to escort you to the pelican launch bay. Smith! Get over here!" An O.D.S.T. walked up to the two, armed with a silenced variant of the assault rifle. He saluted the Captain and motioned the unicorn to follow him.

"Me and my fireteam are being assigned to protect you, Ms. Sparkle. You don't have to worry about the Covies anymore. They won't be able to get through us." Smith stated.

"That's good! So, where are you guys taking me?" Twilight asked.

"We're taking you to the refugee camp. The Mayor was killed in the initial attack, so someone needs to lead the ponies there."

"Oh dear..." Twilight said to herself.

Star Streak and his squad jumped aboard the waiting pelican. Recently, some Technicians with the U.N.S.C. and a fasionista named Rarity made a new suit similar to the armor O.D.S.T.s wore for ponies, as well as a variant of the armor the Marines wore. They were called P Suits. Not the most creative name, but it served its purpose. The Militias Special Forces squads, like Star Streak and his ponies, were decked out with P Suits similar to the O.D.S.T. armor, which was called the P Suit Mark II. The P Suit developed for Standard Militia members was called the P Suit Mark I, with variants for different camouflage schemes, such as the Mark I D, for desert camouflage, the Mark I U, for urban camouflage, and the Mark I W, for woodland camouflage.

"As much as I like my Royal Guard armor, this armor certainly is a lot more comfortable." Star Streak commented. Most of the squad nodded in agreement. Rainbow Dash, Backdraft, and Pinkie Pie jumped aboard the pelican together, with Buck standing behind them.

"Alright ponies," He began, "You know the mission. Your Princess and some humans are awaiting for your extract. There is a heavy Covenant presence in this area, so be ready! Good luck!" And with that, Buck walked away, the pelican lifting off shortly afterwards.

The Arbiter charged up to a brute minor, stabbing his energy sword right into its stomach. He bellowed in pride over his fresh kill, before jumping over the body, running up the street. There was a Pony Militia member in a Mark I U P Suit, and a Special Ops Elite in maroon Spec Ops armor. Nearby, an elite with cobalt armor was just getting finished with a brute chieftain, pulling his energy sword out of its neck.

"Arbiter!" The Maroon Elite called out, charging up to him.

"Good day, Usze 'Taham." Arbiter said to Usze. "Hello, N'tho 'Sraom." He said to the cobalt Elite walking up to him,

"Greetings, Arbiter." N'tho said, switching off his energy sword. "This is... Derpy Hooves?"

"Ditzy Hooves" Ditzy corrected.

"Sorry." N'tho apologized.

"Don't worry about it, everypony makes the mistake." Ditzy assured.

"Where is your team, pony?" Arbiter asked.

Ditzy started shaking, as a single tear rolled down her cheek. "T-they... they're gone."

"I'm sorry." The Arbiter apologized.

"We shall make the mongrels responsible pay." Usze promised, unclipping his two plasma rifles and holding them at the ready. A few jackals sprinted past the Elites. They were holding green shields and wearing green armor pieces, marking them as jackals loyal to Elites. They were soon followed by a pair of hunters, clad in green armor, a squad of skimishers with green armor pieces, two squads of Special Ops grunts, and squad of Special Ops Elites.

"Let us go, we can't let them have all the glory!" The Arbiter bellowed, running up the street with the two other Elites and the Pegasus in tow.

"Stop!" Stacker ordered as they reached the end of the forest. Beyond them was a clearing, labelled as their Extract Point. "Marine, you go first." The Marine Corporal walked into the open cautiously, assault rifle at the ready. The crack of a beam rifle sounded as a laser shot through the Marines head. He fell to his knees and face planted.

"Sniper, 3 O'clock." Reynolds observed.

"Romeo, I'll draw its fire, you take it out once you have the shot." The Chief ordered.

"You got it, Chief!" Romeo responded. The Chief nodded to him and ran out into the opening. He heard the crack of the beam rifle as his shields flared, signaling to the Chief he was he hit. Another crack rang out, and a laser shot past the Chief's head. The Spartan heard the crack of a sniper rifle, and the sound of a body hitting the ground.

"I got him." Romeo's voice said over the COM.

The Chief waved the others forward. Once the regroups, they started setting up a perimeter. Romeo climbed up the hill the enemy sniper was camped out on, who turned out to be a lone brute major. Romeo took its beam rifle and checked the charge on it. '73 percent charge, good enough for me', Romeo thought to himself, setting the beam rifle to his side, before setting his sniper rifle up on its bipod. He looked down the scope and scanned the sky for incoming Covenant.

"Sir, I see two phantoms heading this way, over." Romeo said over the COM.

"We're ready for them." The voice of the Chief answered.

"Buck, do you read me?" The Chief asked over the COM.

"I read you Chief." Buck's voice responded.

"We have two phantoms in bound. Where is our evac?"

"I have sent a pelican, manned by a squad of Equis Militia Special Forces. They should be there in... oh.. twenty or so minutes." Buck said.

"Alright." The Chief said, turning off his radio. "Okay people! We got incoming, and evac is twenty minutes away. Take up positions, and be ready to book it when the pelican gets here. Luna, stay with Romeo."

Luna nodded and lifted off, flying off towards Romeo's position. The Chief, Reynolds, and Stacker dove behind some rocks, their weapons at the ready as the phantoms hovered above the nearby field, dropping their troops in before flying away.

Luna trotted up to the prone form of Romeo, who just finished firing off his first magazine. She sat next to him and looked out at the forest.

"You may wanna get down, ma'am." Romeo said, loading a new magazine into his sniper rifle and firing off another four shots. Luna nodded and laid down in the grass.

The Chief looked up over the rock to see the Covenant run out of the forest. They opened fire on the hill that Luna and Romeo were positioned on. However, all the shots were blocked by some sort of magical force field Luna must have set up. The Spartan shouldered his assault rifle and opened fire, firing in short, controlled bursts. Once the magazine ran out of ammo, the Chief glanced over the rock to see two grunts, a jackal, and a brute lying dead on the ground. He strapped his assault rifle to his back and took out his battle rifle and fired three lethal bursts into a trio of grunts, fluorescent blue blood misting out from behind each of them.

Star Streak trotted into the cockpit and looked out of it at the firefight about a mile or two ahead of their pelican. He walked back out and faced his squad.

"Alright ponies, our L.Z. is hot. It appears allied forces are being engaged by enemy Covenant forces. Lock and load!" Star Streak called out. "Zephyr," Star Streak began, turning to a brown Pegasus with a blue mane, who had his hooves wrapped around a sniper rifle, "I want you to take out any threats to the princess before the enemy will even know what hit em'."

"Yes sir!" He called out, loading a magazine into his sniper rifle and working the bolt. The pelican bay door open as Zephyr readied his sniper rifle and aimed down the scope. As the pelican passed over the L.Z., he fired at a squad of grunts running up a hill the princess and a human were positioned on, killing each of them.

"Master Chief, can you hear me, over?" Star Streak asked over the COM.

"Who is this?" The Chief's voice responded.

"This is Lieutenant Star Streak, 11th Royal Guard Regiment and member of the Equis Militia. We are here to evac you and the princess. Head of the hill she is on, over?"

"I copy Lieutenant, see you on board."

"Let's move!" The Chief called out to the two O.D.S.T.'s. "Head for the hill!" Reynolds and Stacker ran past the Chief, who was shouldering both his assault rifle and battle rifle and firing wildly at the Covenant, providing cover for the two. As he ran out of ammo, he pulled out two SMG's strapped to his legs and opened fire on the Covenant, mowing down the Covenant infantry quickly. He threw both of them aside and ran up the hill towards the waiting pelican. Two green banshees passed overhead, firing their plasma cannons and fuel rod cannons at the Covenant infantry charging up the hill. The Spartan leaped aboard the pelican just as it started to hover away.

"Everypony is aboard, move it pilot!" Star Streak called into the cockpit.

"You got it!" A pilot called back as the pelican zoomed off. Star Streak walked up to the Chief and held out his hoof to him.

"Master Chief?" Star Streak asked. The Chief nodded. "I heard a lot about you from the Marines, it is an honor to meet you."

The Chief shook the hoof that was being offered to him. "Likewise." He replied. The Chief looked out of the pelican bay door to see the banshees form up on their pelican, before the bay door closed. Star Streak got out his radio and turned it on.

"Buck, we have the package secure, over?" Star Streak stated.

"Understood, good job, Star Streak. See you when you get back." Bucks voice responded. Star Streak turned off his radio and put it back in its spot in his utility belt.

Ditzy trotted forward, magnum at the ready. She aimed at a grunt's head and fired a single shot, which hit dead on. The grunt fell limp as she jumped over it and bucked a jackal in the face. A brute charged at her, almost impaling her with his brute shot. Before it got the chance, N'tho charged up and cut its head clean off with his energy sword. He then turned to a nearby grunt and his energy sword right through it. He then picked up its limp body and threw it against a wall. Usze sprinted past him, plasma rifles raised in the air, and proceeded to mow down a squad of skimishers. Ditzy picked up a SMG from a dead pony and unloading the remaining ammunition into a fireteam of jackals. The four allies looked around for additional enemies. Seeing none, they regrouped in the center of the street.

"Good job, pony. You fight with the strength of many brutes!" Usze bellowed. The two other Elites nodded in agreement and Ditzy blushed at the compliment.

"Gee, thanks." She said. She let the empty magazine fall out of her SMG, before she slid in a new magazine, which locked in place with a satisfactory click. "Let's keep moving, shall we?"

The Elites nodded in agreement as the four continued up the street.

The pelican hovered over a small field outside of the refugee camp as Twilight and her O.D.S.T. protectors jumped out. Two Equis Militia members, wearing Mark I W P Suits, were waiting for them. One of them walked up to Twilight.

"Evening ma'am, my name is Sergeant Sandstone, and this Specialist Xavier. We have been assigned to protect you by General Rainbow Dash." said Sandstone.

"Guess we could use some back up..." Smith muttered to himself.

Twilight nodded to the two Militia members. "Take us to my station, sirs."

"Right away, ma'am. We will get you suited up on the way. Follow us." Xavier said, before they started walking up the street. Twilight eagerly followed, with the O.D.S.T.s surrounding her.

Backdraft jumped out of his squads pelican, soon followed by the rest of the squad. He walked through the town square and to the mess hall, where several humans and ponies were making food and serving them to the troops. He picked up a nice, juicy golden delicious and bit down into it.

"Always teh best, eh Backdraft?" Applejack asked, nudging him playfully.

Backdraft nodded and swallowed. "If there is one thing that you and your family is better at than shooting, it is making apples."

"Well, ah reckon that's cuz that is our specialty. Ain't that right Big Macintosh?"

"Eeyup." Big Mac said.

"Hi Drafty!" Pinkie Pie called out before tackle hugging him.

"Oooof!" Backdraft squeaked out, falling over.

"Well howdy there Pinkie." Applejack said.

"Hi there Applejack!" Pinkie said, pulling her head out of Backdraft's coat. Backdraft had a severe blush on his face.

"Don' ya think ya should let em' go?" Applejack asked.

"Nope! I think he's enjoying it." She sang before burying her face back into Backdraft's coat.

"Well I gu-" Applejack started, but was cut off by a large explosion that shook the entire camp.

"Let's get to work!" Star Streak shouted to his squad, loading a magazine into his assault rifle.

Chapter Nine (Original)

Corporal Heat Stream slowly regained consciousness, his vision blurred as his eyes fluttered open. He looked up and saw Specialist Schnelle trying to shake him awake. He was shouting at him, though he couldn't hear him over the ringing in his ears. A human medic ran up to him, checking his pulse and looking for any serious injuries. A large metal spike shot through the medic's head. Schnelle stood up and shouldered his assault rifle, opening fire on a nearby brute.

"Get up Heat!" Heat Stream finally heard Schnelle say. "Get to cover, pony! Move!" Schnelle helped Heat off the ground, as the two of them dived behind a barricade. A skirmisher jumped over the barricade, firing its needler at a nearby Militia member, causing him to explode in a ball of pink flame and plasma. Heat shouldered his SMG and fired a quick burst at the skirmisher, its blood spurting out onto a nearby wall.

"Good shot!" Schnelle shouted, rising above the barricade, shouldering his assault rifle and unloading his magazine on a squad of grunts, all of them falling to the ground in a mist of fluorescent blue blood.

"Move! Move!" Star Streak shouted as him and his squad ran out of the mess hall, weapons locked and loaded.

"Contact left!" Rainbow Dash called out, shouldering her SMG and opening fire on a jackal, it falling over in a bloodied mess. Pinkie Pie cocked her shotgun and fired a blast a nearby brute minor, blowing its head off. Zephyr set up his sniper rifle on its bipod on a barrel, firing one round, hitting a brute in the head.

"Nice shot!" Backdraft called out, shouldering his SMG and firing a burst a grunt sneaking up on two Equis Militia members, who were taking cover behind a barricade. Backdraft ran up to them, Pinkie right behind him.

"You two alright?" Backdraft asked. Both of them nodded, obviously a little shaken over the whole situation. They looked over Backdraft and Pinkie.

"You guys S.F.?" Heat asked.

"Uh huh!" Pinkie Pie sang.

Heat and Schnelle both raised their hooves to their heads in a salute. "We're with the 23rd Militia Battalion, or what's left of it. We could use a hoof." Schnelle stated.

"Not a problem." Backdraft said. "Let's go show them who's boss."

"Oorah." Heat muttered, sliding a fresh magazine into his SMG.

The Chief sprinted up the street, past the wreckage of burnt out homes and vehicles. He pulled out his shotgun and loaded eight shells into it before cocking it. He slowed down and raised the butt of the shotgun to his shoulder, aiming to its iron sights. The Chief stopped suddenly and listened intently. Then the Chief heard it. There was something whimpering. He looked for the source of the whimpering and noticed it was coming from the burnt out remains of a house to his left. The Spartan walked up to it and stepped through the shattered remains of a window. He heard a feminine gasp and something suddenly moving, probably trying to get away from the Spartan. The Chief looked around and spotted the source of the whimper. It was the same yellow Pegasus from earlier, covered in black soot and cuts.

"Poor thing." The Chief heard Cortana say. The Pegasus seemed to shrink as he walked up to her. He slowly dropped down to his knees, placing his shotgun aside and holding his hand out to the Pegasus.

"I'm not going to hurt you." The Chief promised in a low whisper. The Pegasus looked at him, her eyes tearing up. She jumped onto the Spartan and hugged him, fresh tears streaming down her face. The Chief was taken aback at this, but he gently hugged her back. After a few moments, she let go of him and motioned to three small lumps in the corner. The Chief flashed his helmet mounted flashlights at the lumps, revealing the three small ponies from a few days ago.

"Please... help us..." the Pegasus whispered.

The Chief nodded at her. "Consider it done."

The Pegasus smiled timidly and nudged the three fillies awake.

"Just five more minutes mom..." Applebloom muttered sleepily.

"Chief," Cortana's voice said from the Chief's helmet, "I am reading multiple enemy contacts heading this way."

"Right." The Chief responded. "We need to go, now."

The three fillies immediately jumped up at the sound of the Spartans voice.

"Hey! It's that guy!" Scootaloo said.

"I heard something!" The Chief heard a gruff voice say.

"Come on out! I can smell you!" Another gruff voice called out.

"Brutes. Get down!" The Chief ordered the ponies as he picked up his shotgun and shouldered it. The ponies dove behind a knocked over table, holding each other in their hooves. The Chief stepped out of the house, immediately running into two lances of Covenant infantry.

"It's the demon!" A brute called out.

"Let's destroy it!" Another bellowed.

A loud, enraged roar silenced the brutes. They stepped aside as a large brute, carrying a gravity hammer and wearing bright red armor, walked forward. "He's mine!" It bellowed, raising his gravity hammer above his head and charging at the Spartan.

"Shipmaster! Brute ships, standard line! They outnumber us four to one!" An elite major called out.

The Shipmaster rose from his chair and looked over the approaching Covenant fleet. "Then it is an even fight. Burn their mongrel hides!" The Shipmaster bellowed.

Cole looked as the Shadow of Intent's plasma cannons glowed an angry red as they charged, then firing a barrage of super heated plasma at the Covenant fleet looming their way, destroying two corvettes and a cruiser. The Captain cracked a small smile at this, reveling in the destruction of his enemies.

"Captain, the MAC cannon is online and fully charged! The Aegis Fate and Provocation are reporting all systems green." A crewman called out.

"All longswords have been launched, they are awaiting orders, sir!" Another crewman called out.

"Right, tell them to stand by." Cole ordered, before turning on the ship's P.A. system. "Now hear this! All crew, battle stations! We have an incoming hostile Covenant fleet. This is not a drill, I repeat, this is not a drill!"

Cole walked over to a table that showed a hologram of the planet. He placed his hand on the upper left corner of the hologram, causing it the hologram to zoom in on that spot. It showed four green dots, labelled Aegis Fate, Gettysburg, Provocation, and Shadow of Intent, as well as ten red dots, three of them with a black ex mark running through them.

"Selena, what is the closest enemy ship?" Cole asked. The glowing green form of a young woman appeared. She had long, flowing hair and appeared to be in her late twenties. She also appeared to be wearing a Japanese kimono. Selena was the Gettysburg on board 6th Generation Smart A.I., having been installed on the ship just a few months ago after the previous Smart A.I. entered rampancy and had to be terminated.

"The nearest ship is a Covenant Class Corvette, designated Enemy Contact Three." Selena said.

"On screen."

"Yes Captain." Selena said before the image of a Loyalist Corvette appeared on a nearby computer screen.

"Fire salvos one through seven at it, then finish it off with the MAC cannon." Cole ordered.

After a short pause, Selena spoke again. "Fire solution has been set."

"Execute."

The Gettysburg shook as the seven missile salvos were launched. The archer missiles dashed across space and ripped into the Corvette, its shield flaring as the missiles hit. The Gettysburg shook even more violently as the MAC cannon fired, the round ripping through the shield and Corvette itself. The force of the impact ripped it half, causing a violent explosion seconds later.

"Enemy Corvette is out of commission, Captain." Selena stated.

"Captain, we have incoming Seraph interceptors!" A crewman called out.

"Have our longswords engage once they are within range." Cole ordered.

"Aye sir." The crewman responded, shooting off a salute to the Captain.

The Chief rolled to the right as the Chieftain brought its hammer down on the spot that the Spartan was standing on just seconds ago. The Spartan aimed his shotgun at the Chieftain's stomach and fired three blasts, knocking out its power armor. It released an enraged roar and swung the gravity hammer at the Spartan, striking the Chief in the side, sending him flying. The Chief grunted as he landed, gritting his teeth at the pain. Immediately, the bio-foam injectors inside of the suit went to work, attempting to repair the four broken ribs from the force of the impact. The Spartan rose back up to see the Chieftain charging at him, hammer in the air. The Chief side stepped to the left and launched a round house kick into the side of the brute, stunning it. Taking advantage of this, the Chief pulled out his combat knife and tackled the Chieftain, running the blade across its neck. It threw the Spartan off of it and gripped its bleeding neck. It writhed in pain until it bled out. The Chief stood back up, unclipping the two SMG's from his side and readying them, diving behind a nearby building and narrowly dodging a storm of plasma bolts. He leaned to the right and opened fire, mowing down multiple grunts and a few jackals and brutes. He threw aside one of the SMG's and pulled out a fragmentation grenade from his utility belt, throwing it in the middle of one of the lances. It exploded in a large ball of flame, the deadly shrapnel ripping apart anything that wasn't unshielded. The Chief clipped his SMG to his side and pulled out his battle rifle, shouldering it and aiming down the ACOG sight, firing three bursts into the head of the last brute, knocking out its power armor and blowing away part of its face. Only a few grunts remaining, who threw their weapons aside and fled. The Chief loaded a fresh magazine into his battle rifle and walked back into the building, where he found the four ponies waiting for him.

"Is it safe?" The Pegasus asked.

The Chief nodded. "They are gone now."

"Good..." She said.

"We need to leave, they will return." The Chief stated.

"Right," She said, before turning to the three fillies, "Time to go, my little ponies." The three fillies slowly got up and walked behind the Pegasus, their faces showing excitement and fear at the same time.

"I never caught your name." The Chief said.

"I'm Fluttershy..." she said quietly.

A small mare ran up to Twilight, her face showing shock and worry.

"Ma'am! I bring terrible news!" The mare stated. The two Militia members exchanged worried glances.

"What is it?" Twilight asked.

"We have an enemy force heading our way. We need to evacuate!"

"Shit..." Smith muttered.

"Alright, begin evacuation forces, and tell the Militia and our human allies to prepare a defense immediately! We can't allow them to get to the civilians." Twilight stated. The mare nodded and galloped away. Twilight sighed deeply and turned to her bodyguards. "I hope you guys are ready for a fight..."

"Ma'am, we were born ready." Smith stated, pulling out his assault rifle.

Chapter Ten (Original)

The Chief and the four ponies walked through the abandoned streets, heading back towards the F.O.B. in the town center. They came to a crossroads, where a squad of Militia pulled a last stand. Fluttershy attempted to get the fillies not to look, but failed.

"Why are all those ponies sleeping, Fluttershy?" Sweetie Belle asked.

"I-" Fluttershy began.

"Hey mister, wake up!" Applebloom said, interupting Fluttershy, nudging the body of one of the Militia members.

"Applebloom... you can't wake him up."

"Why not?"

Fluttershy was beginning to say something, but the Chief stepped forward. "Because, he's probably really tired. You should let him rest."

"Oh... okay..." Applebloom muttered. The Chief thanked God that the filly still had enough innocence left for her to believe the obvious lie.

"If anypony can read me," a voice said from one of the Militia members radios, "Ponyville has been overrun. Anypony still alive should head for the refugee camp. Be warned, Covenant are attacking the camp, and an evacuation is underway. This message will repeat until the evacuation is complete. Good luck."

As the message started to repeat, the Chief turned to Fluttershy. "Come on, we need to hurry."

"Okay..." Fluttershy muttered. "Come on girls."

"Go, go, go!" Star Streak yelled as he and the remnants of his squad ran across an empty field on the outskirts of Ponyville. A scorpion rolled up, firing its main cannon twice before being hit by multiple plasma mortars. A storm of plasma was flying over them, disintegrating anything it touched. Applejack stopped dead in her tracks and turned around, holding her assault rifle at the ready.

"Applejack, what are you-" Rainbow Dash began, but Applejack held her hoof up.

"Buying ya some time. Move!" Applejack yelled.

"But-"

"AH SAID MOVE!"

"You heard her, move!" Star Streak shouted, taking Rainbow's hoof. He looked at Applejack and nodded. "Thank you, Applejack." He shot off a salute to her, before the rest of them ran. Applejack took a deep breath and looked at the mass of Covenant heading her way. She heard hoofsteps coming up to her, before she turned around to see Big Mac next to her, his rocket launcher balanced on his shoulder.

"Apples stick tagether, sis." Big Mac said, a smile on his face.

Applejack smiled, a tear rolling down her cheek before she gave Big Mac a hug. She shouldered her assault rifle and unloaded her magazine into a squad of grunts heading her way. All the other Covenant stopped and looked up at the two ponies. They raised their weapons into the air and opened fire. 'Applebloom' was her last thought before a wall of plasma hit
her and Big Mac, disintegrating them.

"Sir, more Covenant ships have just exited slipspace! Several cruisers are currently in the process of glassing the planet." A crewman reported.

"We just lost contact with Trottingham, Las Pegas, and Manehatten!" Another crewman reported.

"God dammit!" Cole shouted. "Get Hood on the line and tell him that we need back up, or some transports to evacuate the planet!"

"Yes sir!"

"Sir, our longswords just finished mopping up the seraphs. They report eighty two percent casualties!" A Lieutenant called out

"Selena, do we have any sabres in our inventory?" Cole asked.

"Yes Captain, we have two squadrons worth, in fact." Selena replied.

"Launch all sabres and call back our remaining longswords. Have them defend the frigate from anything that is within one hundred meters of us." Cole ordered.

"Aye sir." Selena said as her form disappeared.

"Get down!" The Chief said, dropping to the ground. The ponies did the same just in time, as a Covenant armor column hovered by. There was some machine gun fire down the street, which was quickly silenced by multiple plasma mortars and cannons. The last wraith hovered by, but stopped suddenly.

"I smell something..." A brute stated.

"Shhhh..." The Chief whispered, motioning the ponies towards a closed door. As Fluttershy opened the door, a loud creak emanated from the hinges. She froze, a soft squeak escaping her lips.

"What was that?!" Another brute demanded.

The Chief pushed the ponies inside of the building and readied his shotgun, aiming it at the doorway. The Spartan heard loud footsteps walking their way.

"You idiot, get back in line!" The first brute ordered. The footsteps stopped for a moment, then continued, slowly becoming quieter and quieter. The ponies and the Chief shared a collective sigh of relief.

"Let's go." The Chief said quietly, leading the ponies out of the building.

Princess Luna awoke to the sound of knocking at her door. She climbed out of her bunk, brushing her messy mane.

"Just a minute!" She called out, before opening the door, revealing the two Pegasi that served as her bodyguards. On the right was Comet, a black stallion with white mane. On the left was Nova, a brown mare with a cyan mane and purple tail. Both were dressed in Mark II P Suits and armed with silenced battle rifles.

"Princess, we have Covenant heading this way. We need to get you to a transport immediately!" Comet stated, fear evident in his voice.

"But the others-" Luna began to protest.

"They are being evacuated as we speak. We need to move!" Nova said, interrupting the princess.

Nova took Luna by the hooves and dragged her out of the room, Comet followed them, on the lookout for anything that may be a threat.

"The evacuation is sixty four percent complete, ma'am." Xavier reported.

"Good, how is the defense holding up?" Twilight asked.

"Our forces are holding, but we are taking heavy casualties." Sandstone replied.

"We need to get you aboard a pelican, and now, ma'am." Smith ordered.

"But I need to wait till the evacuation is finished." Twilight protested.

"You don't have an option. You are too important to risk losing." Smith said sternly.

"Incoming!" Xavier shouted a banshee screeched overhead, firing its fuel rod cannon in the middle of the group. Xavier tackled Twilight and covered her body with his own.

"Medic!" Xavier heard Smith shouting. He looked over his shoulder to see three of the O.D.S.T.s dead. Smith was down, hit by a heavy amount of shrapnel. Sandstone had a large gash in his left shoulder, but was otherwise okay.

"Um... Specialist?" Twilight muttered. Xavier looked down at the blushing Twilight and realized what position the two were in. He quickly jumped up with his own impish blush and gently helped her off the ground.

"If you two lovebirds are done, we need to get Smith out of here!" Sandstone shouted.

"Right, Specialist, Sergeant, cover me. I'll carry Smith." Twilight said as she picked up Smith with her telekinesis. The group ran up the road. A column of Scorpion tanks rolled by them, firing their main cannons at the distant Covenant troops. One exploded as it was hit by a wraiths plasma mortar. A screaming Marine jumped out of it, lit ablaze by the explosion. Twilight cringed and pulled out her magnum out of its holster. She aimed at the Marine, firing one shot. The Marine dropped to the ground, still aflame. Twilight froze in place, shaking as she dropped both her magnum and Smith, who Sandstone was barely able to catch.

"I-I killed him." Twilight stammered.

Xavier put a hoof on her shoulder. "You did him a favor, Twilight. Come on... we need to go."

"A-a little h-help here, g-guys." Sandstone managed to get out, who was still holding Smith in his hooves. Twilight and Xavier exchanged glances before Twilight picked up Smith with her telekinesis.

"Xavier, where are the pelicans?" Twilight asked.

"Right this way, ma'am." Xavier said, leading the rest of the group away.

"Lieutenant, did you get Hood yet?!" Cole requested one of his crew.

"No sir, the Covenant took out our long range communications." He responded.

"Well that's just great!" Cole fumed as Selena's blue form appeared before him.

"Captain, I am reading a new contact, it should be coming out of slipspace right about-" Selena said as a modified Pheonix-Class Colony Ship exited slipspace, "now."

"What the-" Cole began, "What is the identification of that ship?"

"That is a Pheonix-Class Colony Ship, the Spirit of Fire. Funny, that ship is supposed to be lost with all hands on deck." Selena responded.

"Raise them." Cole ordered.

Meanwhile, aboard the U.N.S.C. Spirit of Fire, Serina's glowing form appeared in front of Captain Cutter's cryotube, which was currently thawing. After drifting in space for over thirty years, the Spirit of Fire entered a portal of some kind, which ended up leading them to this planet. After observing the U.N.S.C. and Covenant presense, Serina deemed it necessary to wake up the Captain.

"Captain, wake up. Something has happened." She said as the unfreezing process was completed.

Chapter Eleven (Original)

"Captain, we are being raised the U.N.S.C. Gettysburg." Serina stated.

"Answer them." Cutter ordered.

"Yes Captain." Serina said as Captain Cole's face appeared on the main screen.

"Captain Cutter? I am Captain Cole, the Captain of the U.N.S.C. Gettysburg. I see you guys are still alive."

"Very much so." Professor Anders said, walking up next to Cutter.

"Captain, the crew has finished thawing," Serina reported, "What are your orders?"

"Have them get to battlestations immediately, and have all Marine forces ready for deployment." Cutter ordered.

"Yes Captain."

"Captain Cutter, we are in desperate need of help." Cole stated.

"What do you need?" Cutter asked.

"We have around 200,000 ponies that need to get evacuated, and-"

"Ponies?" Cutter raised a brow.

"I know... I thought the same thing when I was told too. Yes, they are a race of ponies, with intelligence rivaling our own. The Covenant have almost completed the glassing of this planet, and we need to get our forces and the ponies out of there. Do you have enough room aboard the Spirit of Fire?"

"It will get a bit cramped... but we should have enough." Anders said.

"Right. Our pelicans are heading to the last evac point as we speak. Is the Spirit rated for atmosphere?" Cole asked.

"We're a Pheonix-Class Colony Ship, of course we are." Anders pointed out.

"Good, I would recommend landing the Spirit nearby the last evacuation center so we can pick up our forces and the ponies." Cole stated.

"Understood." Cutter said.

The Chief and the ponies watched silently as the last pelican dropship left, just barely five kilos from their current position.

"Well, what are we going to do now?" Cortana asked sarcastically.

The Chief tapped his helmet to get Cortana to shut up. "Cortana, get me Cole."

"On it." She responded.

"Master Chief?" Cole voice asked from his helmet radio. "Why is your transmitter telling me you are still in Ponyville?"

"Sir, we missed the last pelican out."

"We?" Cole asked.

"I have a few civilians with me." The Chief responded.

"Elaborate Chief." Cole ordered.

"Sir, one adult, three children." The Chief stated.

"Very well, I will send in a rescue party. Stand by." Cole said.

"Cutter, do you read me, over?" Cole asked.

"I read you Cole, what do you need?" Cutter responded.

"Spartan-117 is stranded on the planet. My forces are spread thin, I don't have the men to send in a rescue party. Think you can spare some?"

"I can send in some O.D.S.T.s, but it will take about thirty minutes to-"

"Sir," Jerome-092 said quickly, walking aboard the bridge, "permission to take Spartans forty-two and hundred thirty with me on a rescue mission?"

"Granted. Good luck, Spartan." Cutter responded. Jerome saluted the Captain and walked off the bridge. Cutter turned back to the main screen. "I have Spartan Red Team running an op to get the Chief out of there. They won't fail."

"Good, in the mean time, High Command wants me to brief Doctor Halsey on the abilities of these ponies. She seems very interested in them." Cole said.

"Good luck, Captain." Cutter said with a salute before the main screen turned off.

"Hey Douglas, think you can toss me a couple SMG's?" Alice requested.

"No problem." Douglas replied, tossing her two SMG's. She stood up and caught both of them, clipping them to her legs.

"Thanks." She said with a smile, before placing her helmet over her head, it sealing with a hiss. As she did this, Jerome walked in, clutching an assault rifle and a shotgun.

"Spartans, form up." He ordered. Alice walked up to him, Douglas right behind her, hefting a rocket launcher.

"What's the mission, boss?" Douglas asked.

"We're being sent in to save Spartan-117 and some civilians, who were stranded on that planet." Jerome responded

"Covenant presence?" Alice asked.

"Heavy."

"Sounds like a lot of fun." Douglas said, placing his helmet on his head.

"So what's the plan, Jerome?" Alice asked.

"We're going in via H.E.V.'s. We have an extract point about 50 kilos away from the Chief's current position, where a pelican will be waiting. We're going to have to stay low, though. The Covenant would not pass up a chance to kill four Spartans at once." Jerome responded.

"Well, what are we waiting for?" Douglas asked, handing Jerome a spartan laser before taking the shotgun from him. "Let's go."

A good thirty minutes later, Cole's voice reappeared over the Chief's helmet radio. "Chief, I have a rescue party entering orbit via H.E.V.'s as we speak. They should be at your position shortly."

"Understood." The Chief said.

"You have three days to get to the extract point, fifty kilometers to the west from your current position."

"I understand, Captain, Spartan-117 ou-" The Chief began, but was interupted by the sound of three H.E.V.'s crashing nearby. The Chief and the ponies ran up to the pods, as the doors launched off. Jerome climbed out of it and took his assault rifle out of its rack. He walked up to the Chief, Alice and Douglas in tow.

"Hell of a day, eh Chief?" Douglas asked. The Chief nodded.

"It's good to see you again, Chief." Jerome said, offering his hand to him.

"Likewise." The Chief replied, shaking it.

"Alice?" Jerome requested.

"Yes sir?"

"You got point."

"Yes sir."

"Come on Chief, let's go. Say, where are the civilians?" Jerome asked.

"Right behind me." The Chief replied, motioning to the ponies behind.

"My God, you can see them too? I thought I was going crazy." Jerome said before turning to Alice and Douglas. "Why didn't you guys say anything?"

"I thought I lost it too." Alice replied.

"I was just ignoring them." Douglas replied.

"They do know we aren't deaf, right?" Scootaloo asked.

"You know what... I'm done." Douglas said, walking off in the direction of the extract point.

"I thought I got point." Alice stated.

"Not anymore." Douglas replied, cocking his shotgun.

Alice shrugged and followed, with the other Spartans and the ponies in tow.

Zephyr and Rainbow Dash looked up at the Spirit of Fire as it descending towards the planets surface and hovered over them. It was so huge, it blocked out the sun.

"I wonder how the humans are able to build this stuff..." Rainbow pondered.

"Beats me, Dash. They certainly know how to build their weapons, though." Zephyr said, clutching his sniper rifle.

"True that. Did the Royal Guard have anything like what the humans have?"

"Not even close. Mostly swords and spears, though we did have some experimental black powder weapons and cannons, similar to the firearms the humans use."

"Ah." Rainbow Dash said, still gazing at the Spirit. Star Streak walked up behind the two Pegasi.

"Rainbow Dash, we have a bit of a... situation." He said.

"What is it, Star Streak?" Rainbow Dash asked.

"We have a very large Covenant force heading our way. We also have a cruiser heading this way. We don't have enough time to get everyone on board." Star Streak said.

After a brief moment, Rainbow Dash spoke up. "I'll stay."

"What?!" Both Star Streak and Zephyr demanded in unison.

"Someone needs to buy you guys sometime. I can do that. Does the humans have anything on board to help me with that cruiser?" Rainbow Dash asked.

"They have a missile battery set up." Star Streak stated.

"Good." Rainbow said.

"Rainbow... you do know what this would mean, right? You will die here." Star Streak pointed out.

"I am prepared for that. Good luck, you two." Rainbow stated, as she walked away from the two. Zephyr ran after her.

"I'm going with you, Dash." Zephyr said.

"No, you're n-" She began, before a brown hoof hushed her.

"You don't have much of a say in the matter..." Zephyr said in a low whisper. Rainbow Dash smiled and nodded.

"Let's go show them who's boss." She said with a large smirk on her face.

"That's more like the Rainbow Dash I fell in love with." Zephyr said, patting her back. "Let's go!"

Chapter Twelve (Original)

Rainbow Dash and Zephyr walked through their makeshift firebase, looking at their defenses and equipment.

"Alright, what type of equipment do we have?" Rainbow Dash asked

"We have about thirty Marine and Militia volunteers, five scorpions, five heavy machine guns, small arms, and a missile battery to take out that cruiser." Zephyr responded.

"Do you think that is enough to hold out as long as needed?" Rainbow asked.

"Probably not, but we will have to try, won't we?" Zephyr replied.

"We've got Covies!" Alice called out as she raised her two SMG's, firing two long bursts into a group of skirmishers. They all fell over, lying in a pool of their own dark purple blood.

"Take them down!" A brute captain ordered, raising his spiker and firing a few shots in the direction of the Spartans. One of spikes hit Alice in the leg. She screamed out in pain and dropped to ground.

"Douglas, save Alice! I'll cover you!" Jerome screamed as he ran up to Alice, firing his assault rifle widely at the Covenant. Douglas charged up behind him and dragged a screaming Alice behind a fallen tree, where the Chief was taking cover.

"Alice is clear! Get to cover!" The Chief shouted to Jerome. Jerome nodded and fired the rest of his magazine, before running back to the Chief and the other Spartans.

"This is Spartan-092, we are pinned down! We cannot get to the evac point, over!?" Jerome shouted into his helmet radio.

"I copy, Spartan. We are sorry, there is nothing we-" Cutter began.

"Spartan-092, this is pelican flight Alpha three-three, we are in the area and are willing to extract you, over?" A new voice said over the radio, interrupting the Captain.

"I copy three-three, L.Z. is hot, how copy?"

After a short pause, three-three's voice returned. "I copy Spartan, we know the risks."

"Three-three, I am vectoring a flight of shortsword bombers to give you fire support." Captain Cutter stated.

"Much abliged,. Captain. We are in-route to the Spartan's location. Keep the coffee hot for us."

"Incoming!" A nearby Marine shouted.

"Here we go." Rainbow said, pulling back lever of her heavy machine gun and letting it spin up. She aimed it at squad of charging brutes, literally ripping them apart. A large amount of wraiths hovered forward, but a brute chieftain in black and gold armor stood in front of them.

"Be still, comrades!" It shouted. "We have but a small amount of defenders. Your plasma mortars will ruin their precious meat! Charge!" As it said this, the air suddenly became filled with the sound of hundreds of enraged roars, as hundreds of brutes charged forward, a mass of grunts, jackals, hunters, and skirmishers in tow.

"Open fire!" Rainbow Dash ordered. The five scorpion tanks rolled forward, firing their main cannons at a rate of a round every seven seconds. A mass of explosions started blanketing the Covenant infantry, but it barely putting a dent in their numbers. Rainbow Dash turned to Zephyr.

"Z! How many rockets do we have for the missile battery?" She asked.

"Plenty. Why?" Zephyr asked.

"Tell the Marines to fire their rockets at the Covenant infantry." Rainbow Dash ordered.

Zephyr nodded and charged up to the missile battery.

"Marines! Focus your fire on the Covenant infantry!" Zephyr shouted.

"On it!" One of Marines shouted back. Seconds later, the missile battery fired two barrages at the Covenant, a large explosion blanketing them.

"Shotguns to the front!" Rainbow Dash shouted. Fifteen Marines and Militia members armed with shotguns charged forward and jumped into a trench. The scorpions rolled past them, firing round after round until a mass of plasma mortars blew them apart. By then, hundreds of brutes charged past the remains of tanks and jumped into the trenches, ripping apart ponies and humans alike.

"Rainbow Dash, this is Cutter, we have one more MAC round. We are going to use that to take out the shield of that cruiser so you can take it out with that missile battery." Captain Cutter's voice said from Rainbow's radio.

"Understood! Good luck, Captain." She replied, before turning to the Marines manning the missile battery. "Be ready to take out that cruiser!"

"Yes ma'am!" They replied as the missile battery rotated towards the cruiser. Moments later, the Spirit of Fires MAC cannon opened fire, its MAC shell ripping through the shield and multiple hulls of the cruisers. This was soon followed by two barrages from the missile battery. The cruiser shuddered and exploded into a large ball of purple flame and plasma. Rainbow watched as it crashed into the ground and the Spirit of Fire flew off into space.

"We are away," Cutter's voice said over the radio. "Thank you for this..."

"This is shortsword flight Zulu Six-Two, we are closing in on the target area. Alpha Three-Three, are you ready to extract the package?"

"Affirmative." Three-Three replied. The pilot of Three-Three looked out of the cockpit at the five shortsword bombers and three longsword interceptors in front of him. They zoomed forward, dropping their cluster munitions onto the Covenant.

"Take cover!" Jerome shouted as he dived onto Alice, shielding her from the raining dirt and shrapnel. Two Vulture gunships hovered overhead, firing their deadly thirty millimeter cannons into the Covenant. A pelican hovered past the Spartans and landed nearby. The pelicans bay door opened and a few Marines jumped out.

"Get inside!" One of them shouted. The Chief helped the ponies on board the pelican while the others jumped aboard. The Chief then ran back to where they were taking cover, picking up Alice and jumping aboard the pelican. The pelican lifted off just as the Covenant took out the Vulture Gunships. The Chief patted Jerome's shoulder as the bay door closed.

"This is pelican flight Three-Three, we are away." Three-Three said.

"Do you have the package?" Cutters voice asked.

"Affirmative."

"Good job, Three-Three. See you on board."

The pilot of Three-Three turned off the radio as the pelican entered the orbit of Equis and flew towards the waiting Spirit of Fire.

Epilogue (Original)

"They're away... mission accomplished..." Rainbow muttered. She looked at Zephyr and smiled. "We saved a lot of ponies today, Z."

"True that... too bad we can't go with them, huh?" Zephyr asked.

"Yeah. So, do you wanna go down fighting, or-"

"Rainbow, I would much rather die with my arms wrapped around you." Zephyr said with a smile on his face. Rainbow smiled at him and wrapped her hooves around his neck, kissing him lightly on his lips.

"We may be leaving this life, but at least we will be in the next life together." Rainbow said, kissing his cheek. Zephyr kindly returned the favor as a brute chieftain charged up to the two ponies, crushing them under his gravity hammer.

"Captain, the Chief and Spartan Red Team are aboard." Serina said. "Also, technicians from the Provocation finished installing a new FTL drive."

Cutter looked at the planet below him, which the Covenant was just finishing with glassing, and closing Covenant fleet. "Enter a blind jump immediately."

"Yes Captain." Selina said. Cutter watched as a slipspace vortex formed in front of the Spirit of Fire. The Spirit was sucked into it, as the portal closed behind the Spirit of Fire and it entered slipstream space.

The Chief helped Alice out of the pelican, supporting her as they walked to the ships infirmary. The ships nurse, Lulu Hershey, was waiting for them.

"Jesus H. Christ, that looks pretty nasty." Lulu commented. "Don't worry though, I'll have you fixed in a jiffy." She pointed Alice to a nearby bed, which the Chief helped her into. The bed creaked under the weight of Alice's armor, but held together.

"Thanks, Chief." She said. The Chief nodded to her and walked out of the infirmary.

Scootaloo, Sweetie Belle, and Applebloom found themselves being rounded up with the other foals and fillies in a room, where a team of humans were waiting for. Twilight Sparkle and a woman in strange armor walked up, who Sweetie Belle remembered as Captain Dare, and introduced the team as O.N.I. operatives. They went through the ranks of fillies and foals, a few of them writing on notepads, and others occasionally asking a random filly or foal a few questions. After they were finished, they walked up to Dare and Twilight. After talking to them for a few brief moments, the O.N.I. operatives pointed out roughly 20 percent of the foals and fillies, including the CMC. Those who weren't introduced were excused, as a older woman wearing a white lab coat walked in. Several human soldiers followed her and blocked the exits.

"Good day, children. My name is Doctor Halsey." She began. "Out of all the other children, you, my friends, are the most capable. I now must give you all a choice. Will you help me in saving both your race and my race from certain destruction? If some of you are not ready to accept this responsibility, you may leave now. If you want to help me, there is no going back. Make your decision."

Twilight Sparkle walked up next to Doctor Halsey. "Those of you who wish to leave, do so now." She said. Over half the ponies walked out. The CMC looked around at those who were left. Out of the around thirty or so ponies, they recognized Pipsqueak, who moved to Ponyville from Trottingham a year before, Firefly, who was Rainbow Dashes niece, and Surprise, who was Pinkie Pies little sister who moved to Ponyville a month before. Halsey walked through the ponies a split them up into six groups of five. The CMC were thankful to see they were paired up with their friends, Firefly and Surprise.

"What do ya'll think this is 'bout?" Applebloom asked.

"Beats me, Applebloom. Maybe we get go to fight some aliens." Scootaloo said.

"That would be so cool!" Firefly exclaimed.

"Ooo! Maybe we're going to have a party." Surprise said, clopping her hooves together.

"I doubt that very much." Sweetie Belle said.

Before the ponies could continue their conversation, Doctor Halsey began talking again.

"I am sure you are all aware of the feats the Master Chief pulled off in Ponyville, correct?"

"Who?" One of the ponies asked.

"The huge guy in the green armor." Twilight replied.

Scootaloo turned to Firefly. "That guy? He was awesome!"

"I know, right?!" Firefly replied.

"Silence!" Halsey ordered. A hush fell over the ponies. "Thank you. The Master Chief is in fact a Spartan-II."

How would you ponies like to be like him?" Twilight asked. There was a general sense of approval throughout the young ponies.

"Good, because that is what you are signing up for. You are all as of now Spartan-IV's. I'll see you when we begin training." Doctor Halsey said, walking out. The team of O.N.I. operatives and Twilight quickly followed. They had to explain to some ponies that their little filly or foal was going away, for a long, long time.

"Attention! Any ponies with medical experience is ordered to head to the infirmary immediately!" A voice boomed from the P.A. system. Rarity nudged Fluttershy.

"Go on darling, you've helped plenty of animals and ponies in the past. They could use your help." She said.

"I guess..." Fluttershy muttered.

Rarity trotted over to a nearby Marine and cleared her throat. "Excuse me, good sir, do you mind escorting my friend here to the infirmary?"

"Not a problem, ma'am." The Marine said, before turning to Fluttershy. "Right this way, miss." He said as he lead her out of the room.

"Right in here, miss." The Marine said, motioning Fluttershy into the infirmary. Fluttershy shot him a timid smile before walking in. Lulu walked up to the yellow Pegasus.

"What's your name?" Lulu asked.

"F-fluttershy..." She replied.

"Hello Fluttershy, I'm Lulu Hershey, the head nurse of the Spirit of Fire. What type of medical training do you have?" She asked.

"Well... I helped sick animals get better in my spare time, as well as occasionally helping ponies who got injured." Fluttershy stated with a timid smile on her face.

"Not exactly what I'm looking for... but good enough for me. Come with me." Lulu said as she lead Fluttershy over to one of Spartans that saved her. There was a large spike protruding out of her leg. The gruesome sight made Fluttershy cringe.

"Just try to keep her calm, and hand me some tools if I need it, think you can do that, sweetie?" Lulu asked. Fluttershy nodded and placed her hoof on Alice's shoulder. She seemed to calm at her touch.

"Alright... I'm going to be taking out the spike now, are you ready Alice?" Lulu asked.

"Yes." She replied. Lulu gripped the spike and started pulling on it with all her strength. Alice winced in pain as she pulled it out. Fluttershy cringed at the sight of the injury.

"Fluttershy, cover the wound!" Lulu ordered. Fluttershy snapped out of her trance and picked up a few rags and placed them on the gaping wound. Lulu placed the spike aside and injected bio-foam into the wound.

"H-how did I do?" Fluttershy asked.

"You did great, kid. How would you like to be my assistant? You have a lot of potential." Lulu said with a smile.

"Well..." Fluttershy began, but Lulu hushed her.

"Sleep on it, okay kid?" She asked. Fluttershy nodded and smiled. "You're done for now, why don't you head back to your quarters? I'll call you back when I need you."

"Okay..." Fluttershy said, walking out of the infirmary.

"Welcome to Earth, Princess." Hood stated, holding his hand out to the Princess. She offered him her hoof, which Hood shook.

"Thank you, Admiral. Kind of reminds me of home." Luna said, cracking a smile.

"This way, your highness." Hood said, motioning the Princess to follow him. They walked through the halls of an underground bunker, with multiple paintings of events in human history, including a newly added picture of the Spartans, the destruction of the Ark, and the meeting of the ponies and humans, showing Captain Cole shaking the hoof of the late Princess Celestia.

"This is HIGHCOM Facility Bravo-6, Princess. But we like to call it the Hive." Hood stated, holding a door open for the Princess. She smiled at him and walked in, revealing a large chamber, where the Master Chief, Captain Cutter, Captain Cole, and the remains of the Elements of Harmony were waiting. A Navy Lieutenant pulled out a chair for the Princess, who proceeded to sit down in it in an elegant manner.

"Let's get this show on the road." Cole said.

"Yes. Princess, it is my understanding that you wish to join the U.N.S.C., correct?" Lord Hood asked.

"Yes, that is correct." Luna replied.

"Then sign here, Princess." Cutter said, handing over a bill to the Princess. This bill stated that the pony race would now become members of the U.N.S.C., Princess Luna would be made a Captain, and would be given her own ship, the U.N.S.C. Destroyer Equis. Twilight Sparkle would be made a Commander, and would be given her own ship, the U.N.S.C. Marathon-Class Cruiser Harmony. The Princess signed the bill, as well as Hood and Twilight Sparkle. Hood took the bill and handed it to the Navy Lieutenant. He then walked up to Luna and shook her hoof.

"Welcome to the U.N.S.C., Captain." He said.

"Thank you, Admiral. However, I have a favor to ask." Luna stated.

"What is it, Luna?"

"You have been briefed on the Elements of Harmony, right?"

"Yes."

"Well, they are now rendered useless due to the deaths of the Elements of Honesty and Loyalty. Do you think there is anyway to bring them back, Admiral?"

"I will see what I can do. Maybe through the combination of your magic and our technology, we can bring them back to life."

"Thank you, Admiral. When will my ship be ready?"

"Within the month." Hood promised.

Commander Anderson ran into the cargo deck, where a Marine was waiting for him.

"Hello sir!" The Marine said, saluting the Commander.

"At ease. What have you found?" Anderson asked.

"Well, we found-" The Marine began.

"Greetings! I am 2401 Penitent Tangent. I am the Monitor of Installation 05." The Monitor exclaimed, quickly interupting the Marine.

"Yeah, we found him..." The Marine muttered.

"And what about that?" Anderson asked, motioning towards a towering structure covered in red, glowing symbols.

"I'm not sure, ask him." The Marine replied.

"Tangent, what is that thing?" Anderson asked the Moniter.

"It is what my makers called a Marker. The Marker is a very powerful and dangerous example of Precursor technology. Only the most intelligent lifeforms can understand it. Those who aren't able to understand it were driven to insanity." 2401 Penitent Tangent explained.

After the Commander took this in, he cleared his throat. "Tell the technicians to be careful with it. Understood?" Anderson asked.

"Yes, Commander." The Marine said, walking away.

Chapter One (Remastered)

"Chief?" Spartan-117 heard a familiar, feminine voice asked, "Can you hear me?"

The Chief's eyes fluttered open as he found himself floating in a debris-filled hallway. As he drifted towards a nearby wall, he extended his arms off and pushed off of it, allowing the Spartan to slowly drift down the corridor.

"I thought I'd lost you too," Cortana said, relief obvious in her voice. The Chief gave a gaping hole in the frigate’s hull a quick once-over before turning on his mounted flashlights, which quickly flickered to life. As he did so, he heard a faint ping of metal behind him. Swinging his head around, he spotted an MA5C slowly drifting away from him. The Spartan grabbed it and examined it. Satisfied there was no major damage, he took the assault rifle and clipped to a magnetic holster built into the back of his armor, before drifting to the end of the hallway.

"What happened?" the Chief asked.

"I'm not sure." Cortana began, "When Halo fired, it shook itself to pieces. Did a number on The Ark. The Portal couldn't sustain itself. We made it through just as it collapsed."

The Chief reached the end of the hallway, which opened up into the endless void of space. The ship’s debris was still red-hot from the sudden Slipspace slowdown.

"But you did it. Truth and the Covenant. The Flood..." Cortana continued as the Spartan drifted into a room with a row of cryotube. He plugged her into a nearby holotank, which Cortana's blue form appeared on. "It's finished."

"It's finished,” the Chief repeated, in his usual calm demeanor. He then switched off his helmet-mounted flashlights and placed his assault rifle in one of rackets on the wall nearby.

"I'll drop a beacon. It will be awhile before anyone finds us," Cortana stated as the Chief climbed into a cryotube. "Years even."

The door slowly began to lower.

"I'll miss you," she said somberly.

"Wake me, when you need me," said the Chief as the cryotube sealed with a lengthy hiss. Cortana nodded, smiling, as the Master Chief was frozen in the blink of an eye.

"Mayday mayday mayday," Cortana began, "this is UNSC FFG-201 Forward Unto Dawn, requesting immediate EVAC, survivors aboard. Prioritization code Victor 05-3-Sierra 0117.”

Cortana hovered gingerly on her holotank, the focus and dedication she gave to him, what she would be willing to do for him, would make her seem like his guardian angel. There, sadly for the Smart AI, wasn't much to around the remnants of the frigate Cortana and her company were stranded on. Watching over the Chief and tinkering with his Mark VI MJOLNIR Powered Assault Armor were two of the only three things she could do. The only other, significantly less fulfilling and tedious task, was repeating the same message that she had repeated millions, no, billions, possibly trillions of times over the past four years.

And of course, the lack of activities the AI could perform on the desolate frigate left her with a lot of time to think.

And at her age, thinking could prove deadly for an AI like Cortana. Cortana was honestly shocked she was still functioning as well as she was at the ripe ol’ age of eight years. The fact that Spartan would likely be doomed if she went rampant was probably the only thing keeping her together. Just barely, though.

Cortana then realized that she had been sitting there in a trance-like state, watching over the Spartan like some sort of stalker.

"You almost are, in a way," a voice inside of her said.

The AI ignored this voice, as she learned long ago that arguing with this part of her only sped up her path to rampancy.

In an attempt to escape that haunting voice in her 'head', Cortana once again began to say the only thing she had really said in the past couple years. "Mayday mayday mayday, this is UNSC FFG-201 Forward Unto Dawn, requesting immediate EVAC, survivors aboard. Prioritization code Victor 05-3-Sierra 0117.”

She went on like this for hours, repeating the same message over and over again, like some sort of cadence that the Marine recruits would chant during their physical training sessions. It was also... therapeutic, in some ways. It gave Cortana something to do, which in turn distracted her from thinking and slowing down her rapid decline towards the final stages of rampancy and her inevitable demise.

As she continued to recite her plea for help, a shrill alarm started sounding off on a nearby control panel. After a second’s delay, the AI accessed the control panel and took a moment to examine the data it was displaying.

The control panel indicated that one of the Dawn's few remaining short-ranged sensors picked up a large, unidentified object nearby. After a few moments, Cortana accessed an external camera attached to the hull of the ship, which was still surprisingly working after escaping The Ark and floating in space for four years. The AI spotted a large Forerunner object in the distance, with what looked like similar to a slipspace rupture floating in the middle of it.

The Dawn's hull suddenly shuddered and creaked as the frigate began to slowly change it's course, sending it straight towards the portal. Alarms started to screech as the portal's pull started to cause damage to the frail remnants of the Dawn. Explosions erupted throughout the ship, causing chunks of the hull to violently rip away.

Cortana knew immediately that she needed John more than ever. She activated the Spartan's thawing sequence. The unfreezing process would be quick, which was typically painful and very dangerous for the average human, but there was no doubt in the AI's mind that Spartan-117 could handle it.

“Wake up Chief...” she said quietly to herself.

"Wake up Chief! I need you!" The Chief heard Cortana shouting as he began to stir. "Please!? Wake up, John!" The Spartan shook himself awake as his senses and memories came flying back. The cryotubes door burst open as the Spartan forced his way out, his helmet mounted lights flickering to life as he propelled himself over to holotank where the AI was standing.

"John..." she began to say in a weak voice.

"I'm here!" the Spartan exclaimed as a large explosion caused a nearby door to fly open. He quickly stowed Cortana's chip in his helmet and pushed off the holotank to speed down the hallway. The inertia carried him forward until his armor's thrusters powered up, allowing for better navigation through the badly-damaged ship. The Chief ducked and weaved his way through the large amount of debris floating through the Dawn.

He noticed a M363 Remote Projectile Detonator floating among the debris. The Spartan shot his arm out and grabbed it, firing it at a large piece of twisted metal in his way. Suddenly, he stopped his movement by grabbing onto a protruding girder and magnetized his boots to the floor, narrowly stopping himself from launching into the void of space. He threw the sticky detonator aside and grew concerned with what he saw. Beyond him was a portal, and they were heading right for it.

"Chief, you may want to hold onto something," Cortana said as the Chief ran back the way he came and into an elevator. After checking to see that it was still operational, the Chief put Cortana's chip into the elevator's holotank.

"Get me to the motor pool!" the Chief ordered.

"On it." The elevator quickly descended and within seconds, the door opened to reveal the motor pool. The Chief retrieved Cortana from the holotank and exited the elevator. He looked around, soon finding what he was looking for. He jumped into a nearby warthog and strapped himself into it.

"Chief, what are you planning?" Cortana asked, her voice distorting mid-sentence.

The Spartan chose to ignore this, due to the dire situation at hand. "What does it look like I'm doing?"

"It looks like you are planning to go on a Sunday drive in space." The Chief could imagine the smile on her 'face'.

"Just trust me on this."

"I don't have much of a choice, Chief,” Cortana replied dryly. The whole frigate shuddered as it entered the portal. After about ten minutes the Frigate exited, revealing a large terran planet, large enough to be gravitationally pulling the Dawn towards it.

"What the hell?" the Chief said as he examined the planet.

"I don't know where it came from, but we're heading right for it. Brace yourself!" Cortana exclaimed as the Forward Unto Dawn started descending into the planet’s atmosphere.

Twilight Sparkle laid on a hill on the outskirts of Ponyville, watching the stars above with awe. Though she had a busy schedule, she always took time out of her schedule to go stargazing. Sadly, her telescope that she received for her birthday last year was on the fritz, meaning that she was left with her own two eyes.

Beside her laid Spike, whom was leaning against her and holding a notepad in his claws, in case Twilight needed him to jot anything down.

“Hey Spike?” Twilight asked, not turning her eyes away from the starry night.

“Yeah?” the baby dragon responded.

“You ever wonder what’s up there?”

“Like what?”

"Maybe somepony up there is wondering what it's like here."

"I guess. Do you think we'll ever meet them?"

"I hope so. Don't you?" the purple unicorn asked, turning towards the baby dragon. As she did so, she caught a glimpse of something streaking across the night sky.

“Spike... look!” she exclaimed excitedly, pointing at the streak.

"Huh? Oh cool! A shooting star!”

Twilight didn’t remember Luna scheduling any shooting stars tonight. Even when she planned to surprise her subjects, she would typically give Twilight a heads-up first. This wasn’t right. Something was wrong.

“Twilight?” Spike asked, noticing her concerned expression.

A million thoughts shot through the unicorn’s head. Should she contact the Princesses? Should she contact the Guard? Should she gather the Elements of-

“Twilight!” Spike shouted, shaking her out of her thoughts.

“I’m sorry, Spike-”

“Look! Something’s happening!” he shouted, pointing at the object.

It was changing course.

It was heading their way, now. And was growing much, much bigger.

As it passed overhead, a piece of the object sheared off and headed straight towards them. Her horn glowing a bright pinkish-purple, Twilight summoned a magical barrier between them and the imminent threat. The object collided with the shield, causing the object to bounce off.

Twilight groaned in pain as the force of the object caused the shield to shatter. After taking a few moments to recompose herself, she looked the object that nearly took their lives. Upon closer inspection, she noticed that there was something engraved in it. There was a symbol of an eagle, maybe a falcon, standing over a planet. There was ribbon displayed over the planet, with the words ‘United Nations Space Command’ inside of it.

’Do you ever think we’ll meet them?’ her question echoed through her head.

“Twilight?! Are you okay?” Spike asked, clinging onto her as she continued to stare wide-eyed at the object. She looked up in time to see the larger object crash near the border of the Everfree Forest.

“Spike, send a letter off to the Princess. Tell her to get the Guard and send them to Ponyville.”

“Why? It’s just some meteor,” Spike said, looking at her like she was crazy.

“Just do it... we have visitors,” Twilight said, before walking past the object that nearly squashed the unicorn and her companion and making her way towards the object. “Come on... we need to investigate this.”

Chapter Two (Remastered)

“Chief? Chief, are you alright?” Cortana’s voice seemed a little distant to the Spartan and he slowly opened his eyes, finding himself in the remains of once used to be the Dawn’s motor pool.

“Great. Good to see your luck hasn't run out yet,” the smart AI commented.

“Where are we?” the Master Chief asked.

“Checking coordinate impact data...” she said, before randomly blurting out in a distorted voice, “we have asked your to give up your family, your childhood, your future...”

The Chief shook his head in confusion. “Cortana?”

“I’m sorry... it’s the crash. I’ll be fine.”

“What happened?” the Spartan asked as he climbed out of the warthog he had holed up in.

“The Dawn crashed landed into the planet. I did what I could to make the landing as pleasant as I could, but the ship is a total loss. Parts of it are scattered for miles. Most of the vehicles save for a couple warthogs and one scorpion tank are destroyed. The armory is trashed, and only a few of the experimental weapons the UNSC had stored on board survived. And we’re light years away from any human settlements, if we’re lucky enough that those weren’t destroyed by the Covenant and they still have the ability to come here and save us. Overall, I’d say the situation is pretty dire.”

“Where’s the armory?” the Chief asked.

“Parts of it are scattered for miles, but a portion of it is still within the main part of the wreckage. I’ll set a waypoint.”

A small yellow arrow showed up on the Master Chief’s HUD, with a distance marker of several dozen meters away. After several minutes of making his way through the wreckage of the Dawn, he found himself in what was supposed to be where the Dawn’s armory used to be. The only difference between the remains of the armory and the rest of the wreckage surrounding it was a few scattered weapons, most broken, and several battered weapons lockers.

“Weapons are over there,” Cortana said as she highlighted a nearby weapon’s locker. “Go nuts.”

The Chief approached the locker the smart AI had marked, which had since fallen over on its side. After pushing the locker over onto itss back, the Spartan wretched open the locker doors, revealing the contents to the Spartan.

Inside were several experimental weapons, including two assault rifles, two battle rifles, one DMR, one shotgun, two magnums, and a sniper rifle, plus plenty of ammo. These weapons were supposed to go in service several years ago. The Spartan wondered if they made it into service yet for a brief second as he snatched a sniper rifle and locked it into place on his back. He then grabbed the magnums and clipped them to his legs, then grabbed an assault rifle and a battle rifle in each hand and started to retrace his steps towards the remains of the motor pool.

“Chief, I picked up what appeared to be a settlement on the way down. I originally discounted it, but after looking into it more with a few surviving external cameras, I can pick up multiple unnatural light sources to the east. With our apparent lack of firepower, I recommend avoiding contact with any possible threats,” Cortana advised.

“Understood,” the Chief responded. “Cortana, is there any way for me to get those warthogs out of this mess?”

“Negative. However, there may be a possibility that you can blow a path through the wreckage with a scorpion tank. There is one still intact in the motor pool. Make it quick, Chief. The crash appears to have attracted some attention.”

Princess Celestia awoke with a start upon feeling something light landing on her head. The princess let out a small yawn and flicked on the light on her nightstand. After a few minutes of searching for what awoke her, she came across a hastily-written note. After a moment's examination, she noticed that the note had Spike’s hoof--no, claw--writing.

“Dear Princess Celestia,” she read to herself, “there is a big possibility that Equestria is in danger.

“This evening, as me and Spike were stargazing, what originally appeared to be a shooting star crashed into area on the border of the Everfree Forest. However, there is proof that this shooting star may possibly be an alien space vehicle. One of the pieces that sheared off landed near us, and we were able to identify markings in it, as well as the words ‘United Nations Space Command’. Even if it isn’t, I recommend an immediate deployment of Royal Guards to Ponyville. Our local detachment likely won’t be able to handle the inevitable panic... or an alien invasion.

“Signed, Twilight Sparkle.”

Climbing out of her bed and doing her best to keep a calm face, the alabaster alicorn made her way to her bedroom door. After giving a couple light taps, the door opened to reveal a unicorn Sun Guard, bags under his eyes, likely thanks to his long shifts.

“Do you require anything, Your Majesty?” he asked.

“Bring me Captain Firewall, and send for Prince Shining Armor as well, please,” she requested.

“By your will,” he said, bowing before turning tail and making his way down the hall at a brisk pace. Gently closing the door behind her, the princess made her way to a nearby cushion and sat on it, awaiting her company.

A billion scenarios raced through the alicorn’s head as she waited. What if Twilight as right? What if this wasn’t just some meteor strike? What if there were aliens aboard the object? Would they even survive the crash? Would it be the beginning of an invasion?

“Would it lead the destruction of Equestria?” she asked herself silently. The noise of her door opening shook her out of her thoughts and turned her attention to who was entering, Captain Firewall.

After Shining Armor left to lead to the Crystal Kingdom with Princess Cadence, Firewall was chosen as the best candidate for Captain. He was one of the only Royal Guard officers to serve in combat, having served in the Coltistan and Saddle Arabian conflicts. When the Changelings invaded Canterlot, he was the only officer not trapped at the wedding. Instead, he was leading the Royal Guard, as well as Equestrian Army reinforcements, against the swarm. So far, Firewall has proven to be as good of a leader as Shining Armor, if not better.

“Your Majesty,” he greeted as he bowed before her.

“Please rise, Captain. No need to be so formal,” Princess Celestia stated with a small, amused smile.

“Thank you, Princess,” he said, before a loud yawn escaped his lips. “I wasn’t expecting business so late. Tell me, does this have to do anything with that meteor crash earlier? I got information for our Ponyville detachment that it crashed in their vicinity.”

“Indeed,” the princess said. “My student, Twilight Sparkle, was in the area when it crashed. She has alerted me that a piece of the object sheared off it and landed near her, and she could identify markings as well as the words ‘United Nations Space Command’ engraved in it. Now, whether or not this object is proof of alien life or not remains to be seen. If my student’s... hypothesis... is right, I don’t want there to be any risks to the citizens of Ponyville and the rest of Equestria. I was an immediate deployment of the Royal Guard to Ponyville, only leaving Guards that are necessary at Canterlot. I also want you to alert General Ironhoof to prepare his forces for an immediate deployment, in case this happens to be the beginning of an invasion.”

“And if it isn’t?” Firewall asked.

“Well, you know my little ponies,” she said with a toothy grin, “they always get riled up over nothing.”

The Captain let out a light chuckle. “Indeed. You should have seen this one time in Trottingham when a dragon ambassador wanted to get some of his favorite tea. He sent the entire town running. And he wasn’t even that big, either.”

“Ah yes, I remember that,” Celestia said. “Captain, as much as I would like to stay and chat, we do have a possible threat to Equestria to take care of.”

The Captain’s face turned red hot. “O-O-Of course, Your Majesty. I’ll have our forces in Ponyville in less than thirty minutes.”

“Excellent. You are dismissed, Captain.”

*BOOM*

“Good job, Chief,” Cortana said as the last bits of wreckage came crashing down, revealing the path out of the remnants of the Dawn. “I wouldn’t recommend using the Scorpion. It’d probably attract a lot of attention.”

“Understood.”

Popping the top off the tank, the Spartan climbed out of the Scorpion and jogged back to the remains of the motor pool, picking up the battle rifle he placed aside and tossing in the back of a nearby warthog.

“Alert, two unidentified contacts are heading this way from that possible settlement. Engaging them wouldn’t be your wisest decision,” Cortana advised as the Chief climbed into his hog.

The Spartan revved the engine twice before putting the pedal to the metal, sending the hog rocketing through the path of destruction caused earlier by the Scorpion. The wreckage eventually opened up to a flattened forest and an open field. A few rabbits who were examining the wrecked watched, frozen in fear as the M12 LRV screeched in front of them

“Head into the forest and stay hidden until the contacts pass,” the smart AI said.

The Chief drove his hog past the flattened part of the forest and into the tree line. Satisfied that he and the warthog were properly camouflaged, the Spartan hopped out of the LRV and unslung his sniper rifle, balancing it against his shoulder and peering down the scope.

With the press of a button, after a few moments, the two contacts came into view. One of them resembled a miniature horse, while the other resembled a small child. They were clearly not a threat.

“Cortana,” the Spartan whispered, “what exactly am I looking at?”

After a moment’s pause, the smart AI responded. “I checked all my databases... can’t identify the small biped, but the equine appears to be a unicorn.”

“A unicorn?” the Chief asked.

“Look closely,” Cortana prompted.

The Spartan focused on the approaching equine. After a moment, he was able to make out a horn projected out of its head, something he had originally mistaken as its mane.

“My guess is that the unicorn, or whatever it is, is a domesticated animal, and the little bipedal creature may be it’s owner. Just a guess, though. Perhaps-=”

“Cortana,” the Master Chief said, interrupting the AI’s ramblings.

“What?”

“They’re talking.”

“Twilight... I don’t think we should be here...” Spike said quietly, glancing around for anything suspicious.

“Quiet, Spike,” Twilight prompted, glancing over at the baby dragon. “We have a duty to Equestria, no, the world, to fulfill.”

“And what duty is that?” he asked.

“Spike, are you blind? Can you not see all this?” the lavender unicorn asked, motioning to the wreckage of the Dawn.

“Yeah. I see a meteor. It’s cool, but nothing special,” Spike said with a shrug.

“Are you crazy? This isn’t just some meteor. Look at this!” Twilight exclaimed, moving up to a particular pile of wreckage. “This is a girder. They use these to put together skyscrapers in Manehattan. And look at this one. This has writing on it. It says ‘UNSC’, or something like that. Can’t you see?”

“See what?”

“There is no way an Equestrian-built vehicle capable of space travel, especially at this size. This is an alien craft. We aren’t alone in this universe. Think of what we could learn from this! Think of the advanced alien technology among the ruins of this craft! If we adapt it to our needs, we could advance our technology by decades, possibly centuries!”

While Twilight continued on her rant, Spike’s attention was turned elsewhere. “Hey Twilight?”

Twilight didn’t notice her assistant, just continued ranting.

“TWILIGHT!” he shouted, ending her rant and causing her to look his way.

“What?”

“Look,” he said, pointing at the ground. There seemed to be something similar to cart tracks leading out of the wreckage, just larger.

“Tracks...” Twilight said, as the gears in her head start turning, “There must be survivors.”

“Uh oh,” Cortana said, her voice seeming to distort slightly. “Those creatures spotted the tracks and are heading your way. Chief-=”

At that moment, the sounds of a thousand voices filled the Chief’s head.

“Take the shot!”

“Get out of here!”

“Take the shot!”

“Kill them! Before they do!”

“Chief, run!”

“TAKE THE SHOT!”

Then, above the voice sounded a shrill cry of pain, causing the Spartan to flinch from pain.

“Cortana?!” he demanded in hushed tone, concerned.

“I’m sorry, John... evade, evade now!” Cortana responded.

The Spartan slowly crept away from the warthog and into the treeline, hiding himself among the various shrubs and bushes, his olive-green armor camouflaging him perfectly.

“Wait here. Hopefully, they’ll move on,” Cortana advised.

“Twilight... what are you doing?” Spike asked as the lavender unicorn started following the tracks.

“Spike, imagine the possibilities if we could track down the survivors. Think of what we could learn from them! I’m sure if we offer them some help, they’ll be willing to tell us about their technological advancements.”

“But what if they don’t?”

“Well then...” Twilight began to say, a mischievous smile spreading across her face, “I guess an interrogation and a dissection would be in--ouch!”

The unicorn rubbed her aching her head for a few minutes, before lighting up her horn and checking what she bumped in to.

“Woah...” Spike said in awe, “What is it?”

“I don’t know. It looks like a cart, but different. Obviously some sort of ground transport for the aliens. They must be close.” As she finished saying this, she started checking the ground around the vehicle, checking for any signs of tracks. Upon approaching the right side of the the vehicle, she found a set of tracks leading into the forest.

“Bingo! Come along, Spike!” she said cheerfully, beginning to follow these new sets of tracks.

“Chief, I recommend firing a warning shot. She’s onto you,” Cortana advised.

The Chief nodded in acknowledgement, slowly and silently sliding his sniper rifle behind his back locking it in place, then he unholstered one of his magnums and brought it to bear.

There was a distinct crack as the magnum discharged, a single round exiting the firearm’s chamber and rocketing towards the lavender unicorn, missing its face by inches.

The unicorn stood there, frozen, while the small, purple bipedal creature fell to the ground, clutching his head. Moments passed before the bipedal creature crawled over to the unicorn and started to tap its hoof lightly.

“Twilight...?” it, a young male by the sound of its voice, asked the purple unicorn.

The unicorn suddenly shook its head violently before its horn glowed a bright violet, and the two were surrounded by a pink barrier.

“Who’s out there?!” this ‘Twilight’ demanded, aiming its horn threateningly at the tree line.

“KILL HER BEFORE SHE KILLS US!” Cortana’s voice boomed inside of the Spartan’s head.

The Chief did his best to ignore Cortana’s outbursts and unstable condition. Though this was a very bad sign, it was something that needed to dealt with another time. Clipping his magnum to his leg, the Spartan brought his assault rifle to his shoulder, training it on the lavender unicorn.

Suddenly, five contacts in formation showed up on the Spartan’s motion tracker, and they were approaching their location fast.

“Miss Sparkle!” A male voice called out, “Is that you?!”

Twilight looked up to see a squadron of pegasi Royal Guards rapidly approaching their location. She let out a small sigh of relief, but did not let down her shield. Just in case.

The guards landed around the unicorn and looked around for anything out of the ordinary, before turning their attention back to Twilight. “Miss Sparkle,” one of them said, “what are you doing out here?”

“I was out stargazing when that object crashed. I went to investigate and came across evidence that the object wasn’t a meteor, but a crashed extra-Equestrian space vehicle. I also found tracks leading into the forest, as well as that thing,” she said, motioning over to the alien vehicle. “I came under attack once I approached the forest by some sort of projectile, similar to the rifles in use by the Army.”

The guards glanced around at each other. “I... I haven’t been trained for anything like this. But don’t worry about it, Miss Sparkle, we’ve got it under control. Shooting Star, please escort Ms. Sparkle back to Ponyville and get us some back up. We’ll start combing the nearby area for these aliens.”

“Yes, Sergeant,” Shooting Star said as he turned to the lavender unicorn. “Come on, let’s get a move on, ma’am.”

Twilight Sparkle took one last look at the forest and the remains of the Dawn, before letting down her shield and allowing Spike to hop onto her back. “Alright, let’s. Good luck, Sergeant.”

“Don’t worry about us, Miss Sparkle. We can handle a few aliens,” one of the Guards said.

“Boy are they in for a big surprise,” the Master Chief heard Cortana comment as he watched the unicorn leave with one of the equine soldiers.

The fact that these were soldiers meant a couple things. One, that there was some sort of government in this land. Second, these leaders were aware of the Dawn’s crash, but at the moment, not aware of his presence, based on the dialogue between the purple unicorn and the soldiers. And thirdly, the fact they are soldiers means that the Chief was a little bit more open to defending himself against them, should they attempt to attack him.

Which was a major probability.

“Alright, gents, let’s get this show on the road. They can’t be too far away, so this should be easy. Spread out and find them,” the squad leader ordered.

“Chief, I do not recommend lethal tactics against these combatants unless necessary. However, simply sitting here or running isn’t an option. You’ll need to take them down, quietly and non-lethally, one by one,” Cortana said as the Spartan watched the group of soldiers split up and start moving in the forest.

“Understood,” the Chief whispered, his voice no quieter than a mouse.

Chapter Three (Remastered)

As stealthily as possible, the Spartan fled farther into the forest. More equine soldiers appeared before the Chief could do anything, making retreating his only choice, unless their first contact to be fight between him and the equines.

One, two, then four contacts showed up on his motion tracker. The Spartan fled into the shadows and looked up in time to see a squadron of pegasi flying overhead, their golden armor glistening in the moonlight. They descended and landed in a nearby clearing, their swords at the ready. The Spartan recognized the equine soldiers as the ones from before.

“All clear?” one of the soldiers asked.

“Clear,” another responded.

“Five minutes, then we get back in the air.”

One of the soldiers reached into a bag strapped to his side and tossed a bag of what looked like oats to the other three, before taking out for himself and opened it.

The Master Chief sat there, watching the soldiers eat in silence, every second seemed like an eternity as he watched them eat.

Suddenly, something showed up on his motion tracker that made the Spartan clutch his assault rifle a little harder.

The Spartan watched as three, four, six, then over a dozen contacts showed on his motion tracker, surrounding his position.

“Chief, check your left,” Cortana prompted.

The Master Chief slowly glanced to his left. There crouched in the bushes was what looked like a wooden wolf, watching the equine soldiers. It seemed blissfully unaware of the half-ton super-soldier barely ten feet away from him.

“Keep still, I don’t think they notice you yet. I’m pretty sure they want to make a quick snack out of your pursuers.”

A slightly larger and darker wooden wolf came into view. It rose from its hiding spot and howled menacingly into the air, before rushing forward towards the equine soldiers. The soldiers turned in time to see the wooden wolf charge at them, but not in time to counter it. The wolf pounced onto one of the soldiers, knocking him down to the ground. As it bit and scratched at the soldier’s neck desperately, another equine soldier turned away from the wolf and his fallen comrade, before kicking it in its side, shattering the wooden wolf into bits.

“Timberwolves!” one of the soldiers called out.

“Stand your ground!” the squadron leader growled, bringing up his sword.

The rest of the pack charged at the four soldiers, whom went back to back, their blades glistening dangerously in the moonlight.

“Chief, if I were you, I’d take this time to leave,” Cortana advised.

“Right,” the Spartan agreed. As he started to rise and find a route out of the forest, something made the super-soldier stop dead in his tracks.

“Chief?” he heard Cortana question.

In his time on the battlefield, fighting desperately against the Covenant, trying to buy humanity just a little more time, he had to left many behind for the slaughter. That included many of his brothers and sisters, his fellow Spartans that he grew up with, training and fighting side by side.

This time, he wasn’t going to let the innocent fall to the slaughter, when he could easily stop this.

Before Cortana could even protest, the Spartan turned around and ran into the clearing, his assault rifle at the ready. Training his assault rifle on the timberwolves closest to the equine soldiers, he opened fire, reducing half of the predator’s numbers to splinters. Once his assault rifle clicked empty, the Spartan clipped the assault rifle to his back and rushed forward, grabbing a timberwolf by the neck and squeezing, causing its neck to explode into splinters.

The timberwolves turned away from the equine soldiers and turned to face this new threat, circling around the super soldier.

“Chief, we’re surrounded,” Cortana stated.

“I know.”

Two of the timberwolves rushed at the Spartan. Prepared for this, the Spartan slapped one of them aside, before bringing his foot down on its head. The other one latched onto the Spartan’s back, scratching away at the Chief’s shields rapidly. As alarms started to ring in his helmet, the Spartan reached behind him and threw the timberwolf to the ground. Before it could rise again, the Spartan unholstered one of his magnums and put two rounds in the wolf’s head.

The Spartan rounded on the remaining members of the pack, drawing his other magnum and training it on the pack. The timberwolves, knowing they’ve been bested, slowly started backing away. One stubborn wolf stood its ground, earning two rounds in the head. Seeing another one of their comrades fall, the rest of the pack turned tail and ran.

Satisfied that the threat was now gone, the Spartan holstered his magnums and drew his assault rifle, letting the empty magazine slide away from it before replacing it with a fresh magazine. He then turned away and faced the equine soldiers, who stood there, looking up at the super-soldier with wide eyes filled with a mix of awe, respect, and fear.

“Thanks...” one of them managed to mutter.

“Tell your purple friend that she might want to reconsider her plans to dissect me,” the Chief stated, before running past the four soldiers and disappearing among the trees.

“Sir, should we pursue?” one of the soldiers asked.

“No,” the squadron leader said, “he saved our flanks. He could have just sat there and watched, or killed us himself. But he didn’t. We owe him that much. Come on, let’s get back before somepony notices.”

The Equestrian Royal Guard had just finished setting up its command post outside of what was earlier confirmed as the wreckage of an extra-Equestrian spacecraft. In the center of the command post was what served as Captain Firewall’s temporary office, where he was coordinating search efforts for survivors and technology from both the wreckage and the nearby Everfree Forest.

Captain Firewall sat there, finishing writing up a report of the camps’ ready status addressed to the Princesses and General Ironhoof, when the Royal Guard assigned to the Captain’s tent walked in.

“Sir?” he asked.

“Yes?” the Captain replied.

“One of our pegasi squadrons made contact with an alien. The squadron leader is here to talk to you,” the guard explained.

“Alright, let him in,” Firewall said. The guard saluted and opened the tent flap for the squadron leader. The squadron leader nodded to the guard and walked in, standing at attention, saluting to the Captain.

“Sergeant Silver Bullet, 10th Pegasi Regiment. It’s an honor to meet you, Captain,” the Sergeant greeted.

“It’s good to meet you too, Sergeant. At ease. We have a lot to discuss. Please, take a seat,” Captain Firewall said, motioning to the cushions in front of his workstation.

Silver Bullet nodded, sitting down on one of the cushions. “My squadron was taking a quick break to get some grub. While we were eating, we were attacked by a pack of timberwolves, easily a dozen or more of them. We were likely going to be overran... but then one of the aliens emerged from hiding and decimated the timberwolves without breaking a sweat, sending the survivors scurrying with their tails in between their legs.”

“So, wait, they actually helped you?” Firewall inquired.

The Sergeant nodded.

“What can you tell me about this alien?” the Captain asked.

“The creature was easily seven, maybe eight feet tall, dressed head to toe in olive-drab armor. He possessed the strength of ten stallions, and his weapons fired projectiles just like what the Army is equipped with, just smaller and automatic. He also seemed to possess some sort of shielding. He seemed damn near invincible.”

“Indeed... is there anything else?”

“Yes... there is. Once the timberwolves were eliminated, he turned on us. Instead of killing us like I thought he would, he talked to us. In perfect Equestrian.”

The Captain raised a brow. “Are you sure...?”

“Yes. Ask any of the soldiers in my squadron if you don’t believe me.”

“Do not fret, Sergeant. I believe you,” the Captain reassured. “Sergeant, seeing how you’re the only one who actually knows anything about these aliens, what do you recommend we do?”

The Sergeant brought a hoof to his chin and scratched it as he thought. “It’s clear that they mean us no harm, if the fact that the alien saved our flanks shows anything. However, I don’t doubt that if we provoke them, they could easily wipe us out. I honestly think we should handle this peacefully. Instead of trying to hunt them down like animals, we should try to get them to come out of hiding and talk with us.”

The Captain nodded in agreement. “I think that’s for the best... Corporal?!”

The tent’s guard emerged from outside and stood at attention. “Sir?”

“Alert everypony that no more patrols may leave the base until I say otherwise. If the aliens show up, attempt communication and contact me. Anypony who attacks the aliens without being attacked first will be court martialed and punished severely.”

“Yes sir!” the guard said, saluting before leaving the tent.

“Sergeant, I want you to make sure your squadron gets plenty of rest. Once you have ensured they are getting their deserved R and R, come back here. I’d like you to be here when the princesses show up.”

“It’d be an honor, sir,” the Sergeant said.

“Dismissed. See you in a few,” the Captain replied.

Silver Bullet nodded and saluted, something the Captain returned, before making his way out of the tent.

Twilight looked out her window as a formation of Royal Guards marched by the Golden Oak Library, shaking the entire library as they passed by.

“T-Twilight?” the lavender unicorn heard a familiar shy voice ask shakily.

“Fluttershy?” She asked as she turned around, spotting the diminutive yellow pegasus standing in the doorway, “Can I help you?”

“Oh... well... I-I was wondering if I could stay over here for a few days... the Guard evacuated everypony near the crash... i-if that’s okay, that is,” she requested, doing her best to shrink from view.

“Of course you can stay here, Fluttershy. I’ll have Spike prepare the guest room,” Twilight said, rising from her seated position and making her way over to her shy friend.

“A-are you sure? Because...I don’t want want to intrude...” Fluttershy said, hiding behind her long pink mane.

“Yes, I’m sure. Don’t worry about a thing. What about your animals?” the lavender unicorn asked.

“Oh... the Guard has animal specialists to look after them... I hope they don’t miss me too much...”

“Don’t worry, Fluttershy. I’m sure you’ll be allowed to go back in a few days, maybe later tomorrow if you’re lucky.”

Fluttershy nodded shakily. “What are you doing... if you don’t mind me asking, that is?”

“Nothing in particular, just doing some notes on the crash, the possibility of alien creatures, what their technology could mean for Equestria, what they could look like, and what could happen if Equestria faced an alien invasion. I’m certain that’s what they are here for. Equestria has plenty of natural resources for the-”

“Um, Twilight?” Fluttershy interjected.

“Hmm?”

“How do you know they are... you know... invading us...?” she asked.

“It’s mainly just a guess... though they did attack me when I was investigating the area.”

The yellow pegasus gasped in shock, then started thinking about it. “Twilight... what do you mean by investigating...?”

Twilight’s face turned a bright pink. “Well... I sort of followed them...”

“When backed into a corner, and scared, an animal will defend themselves, Twilight. The fact that you are still here shows that the aliens didn’t mean any harm, they were just scared.” Fluttershy said knowingly.

“I dunno... it was pretty close...” Twilight said, thinking it over in her head.

“Don’t be so quick to judge... they might be peaceful and kind.”

Twilight remained silent for a moment as she processed this information. "I'm not so sure about that, Fluttershy. But you may be right. I suppose we'll just have to wait and see, and hope we don't enter an interplanetary war with them."

Master Chief Petty Officer Edward Buck stood over the corpse of a Covenant Elite, his combat knife glistening with it’s purple blood, slowly dripping down onto the floor below. It had been a challenging fight, something he would have not won when he was a simple ODST. But now, he, as well as the rest of his old squad, were now Spartan-IV’s, the new best of the best. The only downside as far as the former ODST could see is that they had to use Naval ranks now.

He honestly missed being Gunny.

“Bastard nearly got me,” Buck said as he turned towards the rest of Fireteam Firefly. “It would have dropped us in the rankings for sure. Thanks for help.”

“We thought you had him, and look, we were right,” Romeo said with a shrug.

“It doesn’t really matter. Mission accomplished. Drinks all around,” Dutch said, as the scenery began to shimmer and fade, revealing the UNSC Infinity’s massive VR room, used by the Infinity’s complement of Marines and Spartan IV’s to train. Though they typically took on other Spartans in training scenarios, they could also take on AI controlled by the Infinity’s smart AI Roland, whom sometimes actually made better opponents than actual Covenant.

“Nice job today, Spartans,” Roland said, his avatar appearing before them. “You’re now tied with Fireteam Crimson for second. Impressive. Please clear the room for Fireteams Sword and Talon. Thank you.”

“You heard the computer, let’s move, gentlemen.”

As the five Spartans made their way out the room, Mickey spoke up. “You guys hear about the new Halo they discovered?” he asked.

“You mean the one teaming with flood?” Buck inquired.

“Yeah.”

“What about it?” Romeo asked.

“FLEETCOM is talking about possible deploying the Infinity to try and clean off the ring, or at least hold off the swarm until we deactivate it.”

“No thanks,” Dutch said., “I know Spartans are supposed to be up for suicide mission and all... but that’s a bit much for me.”

“I wouldn’t worry about it, though,” Mickey replied, “it’s more likely they’ll just nuke the entire surface and recover whatever is left.”

“If there is anything left.”

"I dunno, those Forerunner ruins are pretty-"

“Hey, Spartans!” someone called out.

Buck looked over his shoulder and noticed a Marine running their way. “What’s up, Marine?” he asked.

After taking a few moments to catch his breath and regain his composure, the Marine spoke up. “Captain’s about to make an important announcement. You guys should head to the mess hall. That’s the closest room it’s being broadcasted at,”

“I guess I could use some chow,” Buck said with a slight shrug. “Let’s get a move on, Firefly.”

The Master Chief hid among the brush, watching the equine military camp set up outside of the remains of the Dawn. The camp was surprisingly large, seeming to circle the entire debris field. This would make getting back to the Dawn for supplies, ammo, weapons, and transports damn near impossible without hurting any of the natives, something the Chief wanted to avoid unless completely necessary.

“Chief,” Cortana spoke up, “I’ve noticed that every single patrol that comes back in isn’t going back out, nor are any new patrols going out. Either they have simply given up, or your actions earlier showed that you don’t mean them any harm.”

“Which means?”

“I don’t know, honestly,” the AI admitted. “I suggest we stay here and observe to see if their behavior doesn’t change in the morning, then we’ll act.”

The Spartan nodded in agreement. As he continued to watch the Equine camp through the scope of his sniper rifle, the Chief's mind wandered to Cortana's earlier issues. Cortana had become increasingly unstable since arriving on this planet, and even before then, something was wrong before they got onto the Dawn. It needed to be addressed.

“Cortana...”

“Hmm? Something on your mind, Chief?”

“What was with your earlier outbursts? You’ve been increasingly unstable since we got here,” the Spartan said, removing the AI’s data chip from his helmet and holding it in front of him.

“As I explained before, I’m fine,” she said, her avatar appearing on the chip. “It’s just the crash.”

“Something was wrong before the crash,” the Spartan pointed out.

“Chief, really, I’m fine,” she said, her voice and avatar distorting slightly.

“Cortana...”

The AI’s avatar turned away from the Spartan, instead looking towards the rising sun. “I was put into service eight years ago...”

“Eight years...?” he asked as he looked away, pondering this.

Cortana’s avatar turned back towards the Spartan. “AI’s deteriorate after seven, Chief.”

The Spartan went silent for a moment as he thought this through. "Halsey..." he said.

“Chief...”

“We need to find Halsey.”

“Chief, please.”

“She made you,” the Spartan said, “...she can fix you.”

“I won’t recover from rampancy, Chief.”

“If we could just get back to Earth, and find Halsey, she could fix this.”

“How?!” the AI demanded. “We’re stranded on a planet light years away from UNSC space. The sentient species on this planet are still using swords and centurion armor, so even if we got on good terms with them, they probably couldn’t help much."

"Remember... don’t make a girl a promise you can’t keep," Cortana reminded him.

Before they could continue, the duo noticed a pair of patrolling sentries trotting their way.

“We need to move.”

The Chief nodded, putting the AI’s chip back in his helmet and falling back into the forest.

Chapter Four (Remastered)

Fireteam Firefly walked into the mess hall, which was currently packed with a variety of Marines, Naval personnel, and Spartans, all eagerly waiting for Captain Del Rio to make his announcement. On the holoscreens displayed throughout the mess hall was a message alerting people of the impending announcement.

Buck looked over to Monk, the squad’s former rookie, and pointed him over to an empty table in the Spartan portion of the mess hall. The Spartan nodded, getting the message, and made his way over there to save the spot for the rest of his fireteam.

The fireteam quickly made their way through the grub line, Buck getting a sizeable portion of chow mein for Monk as thanks for him saving their spot.

“So, what do you think this announcement’s about? Must be pretty big.” Dutch mused as the fireteam took their seats, Monk nodding in thanks to Buck as he slid the plate of noodles and assorted vegetables over to him.

“Maybe the brutes decided to make a return?” Mickey suggested.

“That’d make things... interesting,” Romeo said, unconsciously placing a hand over the spot where he was impaled by a brute chieftain’s gravity hammer four years earlier.

“What if FLEETCOM is actually sending us to a flood-infested ring?” Buck asked, earning a few chuckles from his men.

“That’d be bad news, for the flood,” Romeo said.

Monk nodded in silent agreement.

Before the fireteam could discuss the topic any further, the face of Captain Del Rio appeared on all of the holoscreens all at once.

“Crew of the UNSC Infinity, this is your Captain speaking,” his voice boomed.

“Recently,” the Captain said, “one of the drones tasked with exploring space outside of former and current UNSC controlled territory has come across something very important. A beacon.”

A nearby technician looked from his station and recognized his cue, pressing a button, playing the transmission for all to hear.

“Mayday, mayday, mayday,” the transmission boomed, “this is UNSC FFG-201 Forward Unto Dawn, requesting immediate EVAC, survivors aboard. Prioritization code Victor 05-3-Sierra 0117.”

The Captain noticed a few heads poke up upon the words 'Sierra 0117'.

“As some of you may know, the Forward Unto Dawn was involved in action in the later stages of the Battle of Earth, as well as the Battle of The Ark. In the end, the Dawn and three individuals stayed behind to destroy The Ark and the newly constructed Halo ring, destroying the flood from infecting and killing everyone, and stopping the Halo rings from activating and killing us all. After this, half of the Dawn returned to Earth, with only the Arbiter on board. It was revealed that Sergeant Major Avery Johnson, one of the three who stayed behind, sacrificed his life for us all. The other half, as well as its one occupant, went missing and was presumed lost.”

“Crew of the UNSC Infinity, this drone has found the Dawn crashed in a previously undiscovered Earth-like planet.”

“We have found Spartan-117, and we have been tasked with recovering him.”

Spartan-117 hid and watched for the rest of the day and the next night, watching the equine camp for anything suspicious or any changes in their behavior, only stopping to change position if any of the sentries patrolling the perimeter got to too close for comfort. From what he saw, the forces stationed here were armed with swords and spears, though the unicorn soldiers could use powerful magic spells against enemies. Even a few soldiers, who were dressed olive green uniforms, carried what looked like firearms from the late 19th century or the early 20th century. There was also a few cannons set up here and there, which the Spartan could easily dodge. Such a military force wouldn’t prove a challenge for a platoon of Marines, let alone a half-ton Spartan.

All the Chief knew was that he needed to get into Dawn. He needed food and ammo, as well as transport. Sure, the Spartan could easily survive by himself, but eventually, the fusion pack powering his armor would fail, leaving it useless. He would also eventually run out of ammo, leaving him to his fists and his wits. While this wouldn’t be an issue in normal situations, from what he saw in the past twenty-four hours, this forest was filled with all sorts of dangers, including those timberwolves from the first night, hydras, manticores, and even a dragon. This planet was like something out of a fairy tale, just much more real and dangerous.

It was either he made contact with the equines and hope that they would be peaceful, or he would have to remove them.

“Cortana?”

“Hold up Chief, something’s happening,” the smart AI said, “look.”

Captain Firewall stood at attention, Sergeant Silver Bullet by his side, as the Princesses’ chariot descended from the heavens, landing perfectly in front of them. Two Royal Guards rushed forward and opened the chariot’s door, revealing Princesses Luna and Celestia.

Everypony in the immediate vicinity bowed before them.

“Rise, everypony, please. Do not let us get in the way of your work,” Luna said.

As everypony got back to work, the princesses approached the awaiting officer and Sergeant. “Good morrow, Captain Firewall, Sergeant Silver Bullet,” the Lunar Princess greeted.

“Your Majesties,” both of the stallions greeted, bowing before them.

“Please rise, we have much to discuss,” Celestia said.

Both of the Royal Guards rose off the ground. “Follow me, please, Your Majesties.” Captain Firewall requested.

The Master Chief watched through the scope of his sniper rifle as two equine soldiers, one wearing dark crimson armor instead of the usual golden armor, lead two much larger equines into a much nicer tent compared to the surrounding ones--likely a command tent.

The larger equines were adorned with jewelry and wore crowns. The white equine had the symbol of the sun on its flank, and the dark-blue equine had the symbol of the moon on its flank. They also seemed to have a lot of protection, as roughly a dozen of the soldiers followed them and guarded the tent’s entrance.

“My guess is that they are this nation’s or state’s rulers,” Cortana said. “The regular soldier with them is the squadron leader you encountered, so they are likely being briefed on the Dawn’s crash, and you.”

“Cortana, I need to get to the Dawn. If we can’t get in there, we can only operate for so long,” the Chief said. “Either we go in there and wipe them out, or try some diplomacy.”

“Taking them on is out of the question. From my count, there is over a thousand soldiers in the area, plus probably more in the nearby settlement. Most are armed with swords and spears, but there are also the soldiers in the olive drab uniforms armed with primitive firearms. Also, those unicorns seem to wield some powerful--as much as I hate to say it--magic. I don’t know what they can do with those horns, so I wouldn’t want to risk it, especially when one out of every five soldiers are unicorns. No, diplomacy is the only option. Let’s save blasting our way out as a last resort.”

“Agreed,” the Spartan said. “How should we go about this?”

Private Lucky Clover and Corporal Horse Shoe walked along the perimeter of the Royal Guard encampment, their semi-automatic MK3 Colt rifles hanging loosely at their sides. They were two of just fifty-two members of the Equestrian Army sent to reinforce the Royal Guard. They had been sent in response to the Guard learning the aliens were armed with projectile weaponry, superior to their own, as reported by a member of a pegasi squad who encountered one of their soldiers. Apparently, they were surrounded by a pack of timberwolves, and out of nowhere, an alien soldier came out of the treeline and wiped out the entire pack without even getting his armor scratched. The two soldiers prayed to Celestia that they did not get in a firefight with one. It would surely be the end of them.

“Pleasant morning, isn’t it?” Lucky Clover asked, watching his breath come out as a mist.

“Indeed,” Horse Shoe agreed.

The two continued their patrol along the perimeter in silence, enjoying their pleasant morning walk. Though most of the Royal Guards would hate to do patrols this early, the members of the Equestrian Army stationed here reveled in it. Most of their soldiers were stationed in extreme environments, areas too dangerous for the Royal Guards to police, and, of course, combat zones. To the Equestrian Army platoon stationed here, it was like they died and found paradise.

However, the pleasantness of the morning couldn’t last.

“H-H-Horse Shoe...?” the Private asked shakily.

“Yes?”

“I-Is that w-what I think that is?” he asked, pointing into the distance.

The Corporal looked into the distance and stopped dead in his tracks when he spotted what the Private was talking about.

There, walking towards them, was a seven-foot tall bipedal creature, dressed head-to-toe in olive-drab armor, carrying what the Corporal guessed was the automatic firearm that the member of the pegasi squadron told them turned half a pack of timberwolves into splinters into a matter of seconds.

This was the last thing that the two soldiers wanted to encounter this morning. Even the Corporal, a veteran of two wars, could feel his bowels ready to release.

“Come on, Private,” the Corporal said with a gulp, “we have orders.”

“You can’t be serious, Horse Shoe,” Lucky Clover said, looking at the Corporal like he was a madpony.

“We all gotta go sometime, kid,” Horse Shoe said as he started walking towards the alien. “Besides, Firewall will likely do much worse to us if we fuck this up.”

Lucky nodded, following the Corporal. “At least this will be quicker.”

“Indeed.”

“Looks like we attracted some attention,” Cortana said. The Chief noticed too. Two of the equine soldiers dressed in olive-drab fatigues and armed with primitive firearms on patrol noticed the super-soldier heading towards the camp and were now heading towards him.

“Let’s hope that they are friendly,” the Chief said.

The Chief stopped his approach and let the equines come to him. In an attempt to come off as less threatening, the Spartan clipped his assault rifle to his back and let his hands fall to his sides, though he was careful to keep his magnums within reach.

When the equine soldiers eventually reached, they stood there for a few moments and looked up at super-soldier, their eyes filled with a mix of fear and awe.

One of the soldiers shook his head, shaking him out of his trance. “Good morning,” he greeted simply.

“Morning,” the Spartan responded.

“Off to a good start, I guess,” Cortana commented.

“Corporal Horse Shoes, Equestrian Army, 22nd Infantry. This is Private Lucky Clover, also a member of the 22nd Infantry.”

The Spartan nodded to them. “Spartan-117, UNSC Navy, Master Chief Petty Officer.”

From the way the two equine soldiers stiffened upon hearing his rank, the Spartan guessed that there was some sort of Navy within their military, and that they were aware of his status as a NCO.

“I’ll be honest, sir, this isn’t how I expected first contact to go,” the Corporal said with a side. “Captain Firewall, the pony in charge of this camp, ordered everypony here to attempt to make communication with you or any other aliens... I guess the next step is to take you into camp to talk with the necessary ponies. Would you mind following us, Chief?”

“We came this far,” Cortana said.

The Spartan nodded to the Corporal.

“That’s about it, Your Majesties,” said Sergeant Silver Bullet. “I personally don’t believe these aliens wish to harm us, despite what Miss Sparkle may think. If they truly wanted to kill us, why did that soldier save us? Why didn’t he just watch those timberwolves tear us apart, or kill us himself?”

“We agree with the Sergeant’s analysis, sister,” Luna said.

“Captain Firewall!” A guard said as he entered the tent, “Pardon my interruption, but we have a major situation that requires both your and the Princesses’ attention.”

“What is it, Private?” the Captain asked.

“You’re gonna want to come out here and see for yourself,” the guard said before leaving the tent.

Chapter Five (Remastered)

As the Chief followed the two equines--or ponies, as they called themselves--into the camp, he received the reactions he expected. Much like with the previous soldiers he met, he received wide stares, their eyes full of fear and wonder. Some of ponies did their best to get out of the area, or at least stay out of the Spartan’s way. Some got closer to look at the seven-foot, half-ton alien super soldier. But most spoke in hushed whispers, sending curious glances the Spartan’s way. It was much like the reaction the Spartan-II’s would receive when they came into contact with UNSC forces or civilians.

The thought of his brothers and sisters, most of which were dead--piles of ash on the glassed remains of Reach--brought a shiver down the Spartan’s spine.

The Spartan also noticed quite a few unicorn and soldiers in olive-drab fatigues were following the trio in a loose formation, trading uneasy glances with each other. A smart move.

“Officer on deck!” Corporal Horse Shoes called out, causing everyone in the immediate vicinity, including the Spartan, to stand at rigid attention.

The Spartan caught sight of the soldier in crimson armor, flanked by a dozen other soldiers. The Chief guessed this was the officer the Corporal was speaking about.

Unlike the pony soldiers, who would just stand there and stare, the officer marched straight up to Spartan, looking up the Master Chief with eyes full of... something.

“My name is Captain Firewall. I am the head of the Equestrian Army’s Royal Guard division. Thanks for saving my colts,” he said, holding his hoof out to the Spartan.

“Sir,” the Chief responded, reaching out and accepting the Captain’s hoof, shaking it while making sure not to crush it.

“Corporal Horse Shoe, Private Lucky Clover?” Captain Firewall said, turning to the two soldiers.

“Sir?” they responded.

“Thanks for not bucking up first contact. I got it from here,” the Captain said. The two soldiers saluted, which the Captain returned, before trotting off.

“Do you have a name, soldier?” Firewall asked the Chief.

“You can call me Master Chief,” the Spartan answered.

“I see. Navy?”

The Spartan nodded.

“Excellent. Please, follow me,” he said to the Chief, “we have a lot to discuss.”

“Change course to heading one-two-five, and prep our slip space drives,” Captain Del Rio ordered, watching the vast expanse of space from his command chair.

“Coordinates inputted. We should arrive at planet six-six-three-seven-echo in a week, give or take a few hours,” Roland stated, his avatar hovering above a nearby data pad.

“Commander Lasky, I want you to get Fifty-Fifth Tactical ready for deployment, and alert Fireteam Firefly that they will be hot-dropping with two combat teams from Seventh Shock Troops Battalion on the Forward Unto Dawn’s crashsite and securing it for us.”

“Yes sir. Will I be going down with them?” Commander Lasky asked.

“Affirmative. Go get your equipment ready to go and head to cryo,” Del Rio ordered. The Commander saluted, then made his way out of the bridge.

Fireteam Firefly jogged down one of the many hallways of the Infinity, stripped down only to their black bodysuits.

“Attention, all non-essential personnel,” Del Rio’s voice boomed over the Infinity’s PA system. “Please report to cryo.”

“Think there will be any hot alien babes on that planet?” Romeo asked.

“Probably. But they will almost certainly want nothing to do with you, Romeo.” Buck responded.

The fireteam hung a right, nearly running straight into Commander Lasky.

“Sorry, sir!” Buck apologized, as the fireteam regained their composure and stood at attention.

“No need to apologize, Chief. You actually made my job a lot easier,” Lasky said, taking a couple seconds to regain his breath. “Fireteam Firefly will be hot-dropping on the planet with a couple combat teams from the 7th Shock Troops Battalion. It will be your job to secure the crashsite for the incoming Marine forces. Your men up to the job?”

“Of course, sir.”

“Good. Get to cryo. I’ll see you guys on the ground.”

The fireteam saluted as the Commander sprinted past them. Once he was out of sight, the fireteam continued their journey to the nearest cyro.

The Chief now found himself outside of the command tent, where he earlier spotted Captain Firewall enter with the two supposed rulers of this land. The tent was now guarded by two dozen unicorn soldiers, plus a good amount of soldiers in olive-drab fatigues milling about the area. Someone was being awfully cautious about his presence.

“Cortana, keep track of the pony forces in the area,” the Spartan ordered.

“Already on it, Chief,” the smart AI responded. “There are more soldiers in the surrounding tents. My guess is they are just being cautious, but it doesn’t help to be on guard.”

The Chief nodded in agreement, and reached for the tent flaps to open it, but soon found a red, armored hoof reaching in to stop him.

“I’m sorry, but I gotta ask you to leave your weapons outside. Just a security precaution. I’m sure you wouldn’t want me carrying in a sword if I went to meet your leaders for the first time.” Captain Firewall explained.

The Chief nodded, as he place his assorted weaponry aside in a neat pile. “As long as you don’t touch or move them.”

The Captain nodded and made his way into the tent

The Spartan hoped that he was just being paranoid as he followed Firewall inside of the tent.

Inside waited the squadron leader of the pegasi he had saved earlier, as well as the two larger ponies he had spotted during his earlier recon. The white pony reacted much like Captain Firewall had earlier, giving the Spartan a quick once-over. The dark blue pony looked up at the Spartan with eyes full of wonder, looking much like a child.

“Master Chief, meet Princess Celestia and Princess Luna. They are the leaders of the nation of Equestria,” Firewall stated.

The Spartan sent a respectful nod their way.

“And I’m sure you remember Sergeant Silver Bullet here,” the Captain said, motioning to the pegasi.

The Chief and the Sergeant shared respectful nods.

“Chief, I’m picking up something with the Dawn’s short ranged sensors, which are still operational, for the most part. Could be nothing, but I’ll look into it,” Cortana spoke up.

The Spartan acknowledged the AI with the slightest of nods.

“Is there anything you could tell us about you, Master Chief?” Celestia asked.

Everypony immediately leaned forward slightly, interested in what the alien super soldier had to say.

The Spartan quickly thought about what to say, considering there wasn't a whole lot he could say without breaching protocol, and spoke up. “My designation is Spartan-117. I am a Master Chief Petty Officer in the United Nation Space Command’s Navy, and am a member of the Spartan-II program. My mission is to defend Earth and her colonies from any threats, whether it be insurrectionists or Covenant. Everything else is classified.”

“Might I ask... what is a Covenant?” Princess Luna asked the Spartan.

“The Covenant was a collection of alien species who worshipped a species of advanced and long dead aliens known as the Forerunners,” the Chief explained, noticing the princesses share an uneasy glance at the mention of the Forerunners. “They declared humanity a threat to their religion and went from colony to colony, burning entire planets into glass and killing billions.”

Sympathetic and shocked looks spread across the faces in the ponies in the room.

“Damn...” Captain Firewall commented.

After a few moments, Princess Celestia spoke up. “Chief... I am so, so sorry to hear about that.”

The Spartan nodded slightly, only to acknowledge her condolences. “We won, and saved everyone in the galaxy from death. That’s what counts.”

The room remained silent for several minutes, interrupted only by Celestia occasionally sipping on her tea. Then, Princess Luna spoke up.

“Are there... any other survivors? From the crash, I mean,” she asked.

The Spartan shook his head. “I was the only one on board.”

“So, it’s only just you?” Luna asked.

The Master Chief nodded.

“I must ask you, Master Chief, what is your purpose here?” Celestia asked.

“I have no purpose here. My ship crashed here. I need to find a way back home. That’s as far as it goes.”

The two princesses shared a glance before looking back to the Spartan. “We have no reason to doubt your intentions,” Celestia said. “I will allow you to stay in the nearby town of Ponyville on the condition that you will be followed by an escort, just in case.”

The Chief nodded.

“Very good. You may stay in the camp for tonight, as my student will need to prepare for your arrival,” Celestia said, before rising. “Now, if you’ll excuse us, we must return to Canterlot. The nobility is making quite a fuss over your ship.”

Celestia trotted out of the tent, Princess Luna following behind her. However, the blue princess stopped at the exit and turned towards the Spartan. “Master Chief... I would like to invite you to join me tonight at my observation deck.”

“No thanks,” the Spartan replied.

A small giggle escaped the princesses lips. “It’s nothing like that, I assure you... I have some things to talk to you about the Forerunners.”

“She knows something, Chief,” Cortana spoke up.

“I want to get a few things from the Dawn first.”

Princess Luna nodded. “May I join you? I could be of some assistance.”

“It’s your land, ma’am,” the Chief responded, walking past the princess. The princess blinked and thought about this for a couple seconds, then chased after the Spartan.

“Is this useful?” Princess Luna inquired, pulling a rocket launcher out of a pile of rubble with the help of her telekinesis. The Chief plucked the rocket launcher out of the air and gave it a thorough examination. Though it was heavily scratched and chipped, it appeared in working order. This was great news, considering the Spartan had come across a few cases of 102mm HE AT missiles, yet no working launchers.

“Good find, Princess,” the Spartan complimented, tossing the launcher into the bed of a nearby, intact warthog.

The princess made her way over to the warthog and looked inside of the bed of the hog. “Do you really need all of these... things, Master Chief?” she asked, looking over the large assortment of weapons, ammo, rations, and other supplies.

“It’s better have something and not need it than to need something and not have it,” the Spartan retorted.

“Too true, Spartan,” she said, turning away from the warthog. “Is this everything you need? There are quite a few ponies eagar the examine the wreckage.”

“One more thing,” the Chief said, reaching behind his helmet and pulling out Cortana’s chip, holding it out in front of him. Cortana’s avatar appeared seconds later, much to the amazement of the Spartan’s company. “Cortana, wipe all classified files from the Dawn’s system, provided they still exist.”

Cortana’s avatar nodded in acknowledgement. “It’s done,” she said after a moment. “Chief, regarding the earlier anomaly, I am almost seventy percent certain there is something in orbit around the planet, though I cannot identify what.”

“Keep tabs on it. Alert me of any and all changes,” the Spartan ordered.

“Understood,” Cortana responded.

“What is that, might I ask?” Luna asked, pointing to Cortana’s avatar.

Cortana’s turned towards the blue alicorn. “I am Cortana, UNSC AI Serial Number CTN0452-9,” she responded.

Suddenly, the AI’s avatar faltered and distorted, turning a shade of red. “I am a monument to all your sins,” she said, her voice distorted, before her avatar returned to it’s usual blue color.

“Cortana?” the Chief asked, concerned.

Cortana’s avatar turned towards the Spartan, looking up at him with a weak looking smile. “I’ve been in better condition,” she said, her voice distorting mid-sentence. “Let’s just hope we can get to Halsey before it’s too late.

Princess Luna looked concerned. “Pray tell, is there something wrong with Cortana?” she inquired.

The Master Chief looked back to the princess. “It’s complicated.”

“I see. Shall we head to Canterlot?”

“I’ve got everything we need,” the Spartan stated, placing Cortana’s chip back in his helmet and climbing into the warthog. Princess Luna looked at the seat beside the Chief’s, but ended up hopping into the warthog’s bed.

“Is there some sort of trail leading to Canterlot?” the Chief asked.

“Yes, but there’s no need,” Luna responded.

Before the Spartan could ask her what she meant, the princess's horn glowed a bright blue. Seconds later, the warthog, the princess, and the half-ton super-soldier disappeared without a trace.

Chapter Six (Remastered)

The Master Chief felt his body disassemble into millions of atoms, before reassembling seconds later. The feeling was much like when he was teleported around the surface of Installation 04.

The Spartan looked around, finding himself still inside of the warthog. However, he was no longer inside of the wreckage of the Forward Unto Dawn, instead finding himself in front of a large palace.

And he was now surrounded by pony soldiers, swords and spears drawn.

“Out of the... whatever that is!” one of the soldiers shouted.

“Stand down, guards!” a voice boomed, louder than the sound of a scorpion’s main cannon firing. Spartan-117 looked up to see Princess Luna hovering over the warthog, her eyes glowing a fierce blue. The sight was quite intimidating.

“My apologies, Your Majesty!” the lead guard responded, as all of the guard realized their mistake and bowed before the princess. “With the crash in Ponyville, we have been ordered to--”

“I care not for your excuses! Be gone!” Luna boomed, before landing beside the Chief’s side of the warthog. “If you guards want me and our guest to forget this mess, you’ll ensure that all of this stuff makes it to my observatory, safe and sound!”

The Spartan was about to protest, but the look the princess gave him told him to keep his trap shut.

“I’ll take my weapons. They can get the rest,” the Chief said, hopping out of the warthog and maneuvering his way to the back.

There wasn't much the Spartan could recover from the wreck, only a couple weapons cases, some ammo, and the rocket launcher Princess Luna found.

“Come along, Spartan!” the princess called out, walking away from the hog. The Spartan nodded, slinging the rocket launcher over his shoulder and picking up a weapons case in each hand.

The Chief followed the princess into the palace and through its grand halls. Most of the ponies avoided the Spartan like the plague, though some of the nobles whispering slanderous remarks to each other. Most of them watched the Spartan uneasily, keeping a close eye on his weapons.

The deeper the two went into the palace, the less civilians there were, and instead were replaced by a growing number of guards.

The princess stopped at a doorway, guarded by four ponies dressed in dark armor. They were a subspecies that the Spartan hadn't seen before. They looked like a hybrid of pony and bat. They seemed much more intimidating than the guards and soldiers the Spartan had come across previously. In addition to their intimidation factor, these guards were also armed like the soldiers, carrying rifles as well as swords.

The guards bowed in unison before the princess, something the princess, much to the surprise of the Spartan, returned.

As they all rose together, one of the guards, his pitch-black armor decorated in red war paint, stepped forward.

“Good evening, Princess Luna,” he greeted.

“Good evening, Lieutenant Ardent Moon,” she responded.

“We weren’t expecting you to bring company. Shall the servants prepare refreshments for two?” the Lieutenant inquired.

The princess glanced towards the Spartan.

“No thanks,” the Spartan said.

The Lieutenant nodded. “The refreshments will be up immediately, Your Majesty.”

Ardent Moon tapped his hoof against the floor. Upon hearing this, the two guards nearest to the door opened it and held it open for their princess.

“Please enter, and alert us if you require anything,” the Lieutenant said.

“Thank you, Lieutenant,” Luna said, as the junior officer and the princess bowed to each other.

The two passed by the guards, the Spartan nodding respectfully to the Lieutenant, as they walked through the doorway, the guards outside closing the doors behind them. Beyond them was a stairwell.

The two quickly ascended the stairs and entered a large room at the top. The walls were painted a dark blue, and were adorned with beautiful paintings of past heroes and the night sky. At the opposite end of the room was a balcony, where several small telescopes were standing.

But the main feature of the room was the skylight, allowing the Spartan to see most of the night sky from inside the room.

“Please, make yourself at home, Master Chief,” Luna said with a smile.

The Spartan nodded, placing one of the gun cases on a table near the center of the princess’s observatory, undoing the clamps and opening it. Inside of the case were two M7 SMG’s, accompanied by ten sixty round magazines, loaded with 5x23mm M443 caseless rounds. Inside it were also two suppressors and red dots that could be installed on the SMG’s, transforming them into M7S’s.

As the Spartan went to work stripping down the SMG’s and cleaning them, Princess Luna took a seat on a cushion at the opposite end of the table.

“What are you doing?” she inquired.

“You have to to clean these out every so often, otherwise they break when you need them most,” the Spartan explained, finishing with the first SMG and moving onto the second.

“I see. I would assume you wouldn't have to clean futuristic weaponry such as yours," the princess commented.

The two sat in silence as the Chief continued to work. At one point, a few servants came in and placed out some tea and snacks. The Spartan ignored these treats, still unsure if it'd be safe to eat their food or not, while Luna picked up a cookie and gingerly nibbled on it.

After several long moments of silence, with only the sounds of Luna sipping on tea and the Spartan fiddling with his weapons, the alicorn spoke up. "Spartan... in our earlier meeting, you mentioned a race of aliens known as the Forerunners. Is that correct?”

“Yes," the Chief answered.

“I have something to talk to you and your blue friend about regarding the Forerunners. Do you mind?”

After a moment's hesitation, he shook his head and finished up with his last SMG, then removed Cortana’s chip from his and placed it on the table. Cortana’s avatar showed up a few moments later.

“Give me a moment,” Luna said, rising from her cushion and walking over to a bookcase filled with aged tomes. After scanning through the various tomes, she took out a particularly old book and examined it, before placing it on the table.

“While ponykind and our fellow sapient species are ignorant of this, me and my sister have already known of the existence of the Forerunners,” Luna said, taking a sip of her tea before opening the book.

As the princess opened up the tome, a slim, dusty piece of metal fell out of the book and landed on the table. With the press of a button, the piece of metal activated and displayed a large hologram of a planet. The hologram was so large it practically consumed the entire

“What is this?” the Spartan asked.

“It’s a map of this world, 10,000 years ago, millennia from before Equestria even existed. It was scanned by an alicorn scout ship near the end of the Era of the Alicorn,” she explained, flipping the page.

“The alicorns have reigned over the local star system for eons. Our influence spread over this star system and several nearby ones. All this was thanks to the Forerunner relics that were leftover on our home planet.”

“If your species was this advanced and were spread across the galaxy, what happened to them?" the AI suddenly asked, "Why are you now using such primitive technology?”

Luna closed her eyes, considering her next words carefully. “This book covers everything up until near the end of the Era of the Alicorn. We were only children back then. All I remember is that we were left on this planet with a dozen other foals and some soldiers. This planet was discovered only a few years before the end of the Era of the Alicorn, so nopony got around to colonizing it.”

“As for our lack of advanced technology, we weren’t left with much. Just food and these books. However... according to the information we have, this planet has plenty of Forerunner artifacts. We would go there ourselves and harvest whatever technology there is left, but me and Celestia both agreed that our little ponies are not ready. History would most certainly repeat itself.”

“Chief,” Cortana said, turning towards the Spartan, “what if there is something there to help us get home? Or, maybe even help with my rampancy?”

The Master Chief looked towards the princess. “Is there any way we could get access to these relics?”

Princess Luna nodded. “I’ll organize an expedition. A good place to start would be the original capital of Equestria, which was built over an underground Forerunner structure, perhaps a bunker. It was abandoned long ago, so the wilderness has overtaken it, which means the castle grounds are likely very dangerous.”

“I think I can handle it,” the Spartan stated.

The princess shook her head. “No. Even with your armor and weaponry, there are many unknowns involved. We’ll have to bring a guard escort.”

“They’ll only slow me down,” the Chief said.

“Not these guards. Trust me,” Luna replied. “We’ll leave in the morning. You can sleep up here. Get plenty of rest... you’re gonna need it.”

The Chief looked around, examining his new, yet, surprisingly familiar surroundings. He found himself on a hill overlooking what appeared to be a school. The sounds of children playing and laughing filled the air.

Realization hit the Spartan moments later. He was back at his old school, before he met Halsey. Before he was kidnapped at the age of seven and trained into a soldier with an unmatched killing capability. Before the Covenant. Before the Halo Rings. None of that mattered back then, when he was a carefree child.

The Master Chief looked down to see a large group of children rushing the hill. Most of their faces he couldn’t place a finger on, but he could identify a few of the faces. He could spot his brothers and sisters among the crowd, pushing and shoving each other in an attempt to get to the top of the hill and challenge the king. Samuel, Kelly, Linda, Fred, Will, and Kurt, all there mixed in with the crowd.

His brothers and sisters emerged among the crowd, having brutally beaten down the others. They charged the Chief with eyes full of fierce determination. While the Master Chief’s movements were refined and super-fast, much like they are in the present, the movements of his brothers and sisters were sloppy and chaotic. The Spartan easily took on the others, knocking them down the hill one by one, until only he and Samuel-034 remained.

They stood there, unflinching, staring each other down. Neither of them willing to make the first move.

Before either of them could make a move, the school and the surrounding area turned into an inferno, the sounds of play being replaced by blood-curdling scream of pain and agony.

The Chief was briefly distracted by this, looking up into the sky as he watched a fleet of Covenant cruisers descend from the heavens, their excavation beams burning the planet to glass.

“This place will become your tomb...” Cortana’s voice echoed from the heavens. Spartan-117 turned back to his brother, only to find him replaced by a Covenant elite, an energy sword held tightly in its claws. The elite let out a hearty, guttural laugh as it picked up the kicking Spartan, whom was unable to do anything but spit in the alien’s face.

The elite growled, wiping the spittle away from its face before impaling the Master Chief with his energy sword, then throwing him into the fire, where his fellow Spartans burned.

“This is how the world ends...”

“Wake up, Spartan!” Luna shouted, shaking the fretful super-soldier. She was awoken early by his thrashing and cries of anguish. She was shocked that her observatory wasn’t invaded by a Royal Guard response team.

The princess soon realized her mistake, as one of the Spartan’s hands shot out, grasping the blue alicorn by the neck. The alicorns long life flashed before her eyes as he tightened his grip around her neck.

Thankfully, seconds later, the Spartan loosened his grip and let her go. The princess choked and regained her breath

The Master Chief rose from the floor, glancing down at the princess. “Are you okay?”

The princess coughed a few times before rubbing her throat. "Yes, I believe I shall live."

"I apologize, ma'am. I-"

Luna held up her hoof to his face, signalling him to stop, as she shook her head. “I understand. I’ve been there myself... do you have dreams like that often?” she asked.

The Spartan didn’t answer.

“I see... there are ways to stop them, you know. If you ever need any help, please, ask me.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

The Princess nodded, rubbing her neck lightly with a grimace. “Thank you for not crushing me, Master Chief. I am certain it was well within your capabilities.”

The Spartan remained silent.

“Master Chief, I suggest you gather whatever you want to bring with you. But try not to go overload, Spartan,” she said. “I must gather our escort. I’ll come back in ten minutes to retrieve you.”

“Understood,” the Spartan said. Luna nodded to the Chief, before trotting out of the observatory.

“Chief... what if we don’t find anything useful inside of the temple? What if we’re just wasting our time?” Cortana asked.

“Then we’ll wait. Someone will eventually come along and find us,” the Spartan responded, clipping the SMG’s to his legs.

“I certainly hope so,” Cortana said as the Chief grabbed a battle rifle and some extra ammo for all of his weapons.

“If we don’t escape, Chief, and I end up going rampant... I just want to say it’s been an honor serving with you, John,” the AI said.

“Don't say that,” the Spartan said, picking up a few fragmentation grenades.

After a few moments, Princess Luna poked her head into the observatory. “Are you ready, Spartan?” she asked.

The Master Chief nodded.

Luna waved him along. “Come on. Our chariot awaits.”

The Spartan and the princess quickly made their way through the palace’s halls, their footsteps echoing down the nearly empty corridors.

“Where is everyone?” the Chief asked.

“Save for a few guards and servants, there isn’t many around at sunrise. Which is good news. We don’t have to launch in the afternoon rush,” Luna replied.

The two then walked in silence. The Master Chief took this time to examine what the Spartan guessed was princess’s combat loadout. She was wrapped in a worn, tan cloak, which completely covered most of her body. If it wasn’t for both her wings and horn sticking out, and her large stature, she would've been likely unidentifiable as the princess she really was. At her sides were two large blades, similar to scimitars, which were kept in place by two midnight blue sheaths with her mark on it.

Once they exited the palace, the Spartan caught a glimpse of what would be accompanying them. Five of those bat pony soldiers stood in formation, their rifles balanced against their shoulders. They stood there, unmoving, looking more like statues than living creatures. Like Luna, they were all adorned in worn, tan cloaks, hiding their identities to only the most observant. Next to them was a single chariot, all pulled by standard guards.

The princess walked towards the guards. They stood at each other for a moment, before they bowed to each other in unison.

As they rose, Lieutenant Ardent Moon stepped forward, holding his rifle out to the princess. “On behalf of the Lunar Guard, please accept this rifle. It has served us well, and it will serve you well.”

The Princess smiled, taking the rifle and giving it a quick once over, before sling it over her shoulder and bowing to the Lieutenant. “I thank you for this gift, Lieutenant.”

Another guard walked forward and handed over a bandoleer holding ten magazines. After the guard helped the princess with the bandoleer, they shared a quick bow and the guard fell back into formation.

“We await your order, Your Majesty,” Ardent Moon said.

“Mount up,” ordered the princess.

It was a rather short and uneventful flight to the old castle. Unlike what the Chief was used to when he was being flown in a combat zone, there were no shoot down sentries, no banshees waiting to ambush him, and no anti-air turrets on the ground. Just a short, peaceful flight, with only some slight turbulence once they got over the forest past the Dawn's crashsite.

The chariot passed over the castle once and began it's descent. It passed the walls of the castle and landed in the overgrown courtyard. The moment the chariot touched down, the Spartan shoved the doors open and rolled out of it, bringing his battle rifle to bear. The Lunar Guards followed his lead, quickly fanning out and setting up a tight perimeter around the chariot.

"Sector's clear!" one of the guards shouted.

"Excellent," Lieutenant Ardent Moon stated, before looking back at the chariot, "We're clear, your majesty!"

The princess stepped out of the chariot, unslinging her rifle and examining the area around her. For a moment, she appeared lost in her memories as she seemed to space out for a few moments. But quickly shook out of that and got her head back in the game.

"Lieutenant, you and Corporal Moonshine stay with the chariot," Luna ordered, "and set up a perimeter with our drivers. The Spartan, the others and I will go on."

"Copy that. Good luck, Princess." the Lieutenant said.

"We should be fine, Lieutenant. The chamber's guardians were deactivated long ago," the princess said, before turning to the others, "Come along, Spartan. I have point."

As the Chief rose from his position and followed the princess away from the chariot, his motion trackers lit up with movement. As soon as it appeared, however, it was gone.

'Odd', the Master Chief thought to himself.

The shattered glass from the castles long shattered windows cracked underneath the metallic boot of the Spartan as he and the Lunar Guards accompanying them followed the princess through the castle's halls. As the princess had told him earlier, the castle was indeed reclaimed by nature and was slowly falling apart. Luckily, they hadn't run into any wildlife beyond a few rabbits, who ran away in terror the moment they spotted the Spartan.

Suddenly, the princess stopped and held up her hoof. The Spartan stopped in his tracks and took a knee, while the Lunar Guards checked their surroundings.

"Do you hear that...?" Luna asked the Spartan with a low whisper.

The Master Chief listened for what she was talking about. After a few seconds, the Spartan heard it too.

The laughter of children.

"Why would foals be this deep in the Everfree?" one of the Lunar Guards wondered aloud.

"Come, we must investigate." the princess said.

As the five followed to source of the laughter, the laughter was soon replaced by singing.

"Ring around the rosy..." the voice sang, "a pocket full of posies."

The five turned the corner and found themselves outside once more, this time in a small playground with old rusted and falling apart playground equipment. At one time, it must have been filled with children, but now, it was empty.

Except...

Three foals stood in the middle of the playground, staring at the five.

"What are you three doing out here?" the princess asked concerned, racing towards them, "Do you have any idea how dangerous this place is? Where are you parents?"

Instead of answering the question, the children continued to sing. "Ashes... ashes... we all... fall... down..."

And then, the three smiled. But it wasn't a normal smile. It was an evil, sinister one. One so sinister that it gave the princess pause.

"What are you?" she asked.

"Chief," Cortana said with a distorted voice, "I'm picking up multiple contacts on your motion tracker."

Several green bolts, similar to a plasma bolt from a plasma pistol, flew towards the princess. The Spartan raced forward and stood in front of the princess, his energy shields easily absorbing the bolts. A swarm of what appeared to be a hybrid of pony and an insect flew over the ground, firing these same bolts at them. One of the guards were hit in the head by one, instantly killing them.

"CONTACT! CONTACT!" one of the two surviving Lunar Guards exclaimed.

"IT'S AN AMBUSH! RETURN FIRE!" the princess ordered.