Yeah, we all know... It's been done to death... Lonely guy goes to a convention dressed up as something from their favorite game or show or even comic, then they get transported to Equestria to learn the magic of friendship... Well, this is a bit different.

My friends, Nick, Geoffrey and Brandon, are all sitting in my car... Yeah, it's like the opening to a terrible joke, but there we were as I checked the flat on my car. I was pissed, swearing up and down the street. My twenty-fifth birthday, and we were just on our way home from BronyCon. We had all decided to dress up as Space marines from the Deathwatch section of the Ordo Xenos, except instead of having the typical black color of the organization we went with a midnight blue with midnight purple trim. Trust me, the colors looked pretty badass.

We replaced the roman numeral two on the shoulderpads with a crescent moon though, well... Brandon and I did, while Nick and Geoffrey went with white armor that had gold trim and a sun for their shoulder sign.

Right now though... It was hot as FUCK! I mean seriously, how many people do you know that would stop on the highway and help out a shouting dark angel space marine. Not a single one... And now... Well... I'm nearly dying in my space marine suit. The worst part was that it was getting dark and I did NOT want to be stranded out on the highway at night. I sigh as I lean up against the car and slide down into a sitting position with my helmet on the ground next to me.

“Why? Why now?” I say to no one in particular. “Why must I have horrible luck like this? Phone without reception... no spare... If it was just me I'd drive on the flat because I'm stupid, but I got the lives of my friends to think about.” I start to rant just because it's a habit of mine.

Might as well get it out of the way since I'm just sitting here waiting for something to happen. I'm dressed up as your typical tactical marine, Brandon is dressed as a Techmarine, his backpack actually was programmed himself to do simple movements in order to make him look cool. The pack itself is currently stored in the trunk with the weapons we brought, Nick was an Apothecary, His Narthecium was stored with Brandon's backpack... and finally, Geoffrey was dressed as a devastator marine, weilding the most badass weapon of all, the heavy bolter. For each of us, except geoffrey, there was a boltgun custom-fashioned out of wood and we all had a ceremonial Dark Angel sword and combat knife, Geoffy was pretty good when it came to woodworking.

I looked up as I began to see a light above me, was it strange? Hell yeah! The highway was to my left and right, so a light above me was really weird.

To say I retained my composure would be stretching the truth a bit, and as the others got out of the car we all couldn't help but stare in at least a little bit of awe and fear as we saw the light get closer and closer. I shielded my eyes once the light got too bright to look at... which was only a few seconds before I realized that I no longer felt the ground beneath me.

-{DW}-

Sparks flew and sputtered out between the two Alicorns and their small entourage of mages, six unicorns... yeah, you read right, unicorns... that stood about five feet tall surrounded two winged unicorns that were noticeably taller than them. All of the equines that participated in the spell were breathing heavily with exhaustion

One of the unicorns, a stallion with a deep blue coat and... very oddly enough, a beard... looked to the larger ponies, making the bells on his outfit jingle as he moved. “Princesses...” He says between labored breaths. “Do... You think... The spell... Worked? Will we get... help?”

The larger white pony, about six and a half feet tall, looks at him with slightly sad magenta eyes, “We do not know yet, young Starswirl... Thou must be patient for spells such as this... For they do not show results after casting until they deem it necessary.” She says as she begins to control her breathing.

The dark blue one, only about five foot nine, takes a bit longer before she begins breathing easier.

Starswirl looks to her with concern, “I understand your majesty... It is just that time is short... And if our help does not arrive soon... We may have something to test thy strength...” He grimaces.

-{DW}-

I groan as I open my eyes realizing that I'm staring at the ground through green-tinted plexiglass lenses. I shift my position so that I can push myself up from the ground and begin looking around. I immediately notice a few things... First: was that I didn't have nearly as hard a time breathing as I used to, having a bit of a weight problem from being chubby did that... Second: upon standing I realized that I was standing much taller than I used to... And finally: I actually saw a legit Heads Up Display on my visor.

To be honest, I was scared and overjoyed at the same time, because everything felt so real, like the suit had actual weight to it instead of just a set of paper mache and cardboard. I could see evenly through both eyes instead of just one eye with a fuzzy view out of the other.

What did I want to do? I wanted to leap for joy because I just felt that much energy, but I also began to look around because I had no idea where my friends were.

Imagine my surprise when I saw my sword, combat knife, and the bolter that Geoffy had made only a few feet away from me. I quickly moved over to them to pick them up just before I saw why I was so tall... My armor was a lot bigger than it used to be, but, it didn't feel like it hindered me. Actually, it felt so much like a second skin that I had barely noticed it.

I quickly pick up my gun and add the sword and combat knife to my waist as skillfully as if I had been doing it my whole life. I smile a little as I begin looking around a little.

-{DW}-

One hour later

An hour... A fucking hour... I wasted an entire hour searching, and I knew that I wasted an hour because there was a digital clock in my HUD, I actually facepalmed so hard that I thought I was going to break my helmet. I brought my left hand up to the side of my helmet to activate the Vox Caster that is supposed to come with each suit... And pray that my friends are in range. “Uh... Nick? Brandon? Geoffy? ...Anyone on this frequency?” I said a bit awkwardly.

After waiting almost a whole minute a symbol of a plus sign shows up on my HUD as I hear Nick's voice over the vox. “Kris!? Dude! Where the hell are you?”

Only a few seconds later a picture of a heavy bolter appears and I hear Geoffy, “Guys... I think the car is trashed... Sorry Kris... Your insurance is going to be a big problem...”

I let out a groan and a small whimper before I start looking around, I raise a brow as I see smoke in the distance.

I saw a gear symbol flash on screen and heard Brandon's voice, “Guys... If you can see the smoke, lets regroup there...”

I immediately raised my hand to the vox again, “Dude! Why the hell would we do that!? Smoke means people that might try to kill us!”

Without missing a beat, which also leads me to blush in embarassment, Brandon replies with admittedly the best retort he could at the time. “Kris... As far as we can tell, we are legit space marines right now... If they can hurt us... it will be pure luck if we're still on earth. The worst they can do is... Maybe... scratch our armor.”

“How the hell can you tell that?” Nick asks.

“Because, by the way I woke up... I woke up in a position that should have broken my neck... but if it weren't for my armor and the strength I feel in me now... I would have died.”

“Point taken...” I reply. “Fine, lets go towards the fire.”

-{DW}-

Just at the base of a hill the forest begins to clear and I see the others. It was a bit jarring to see that they did change, not just height wise... but... the shape of the helmet was almost, horse-like. I had definitely seen space for horse ears and an elongated snout, and I'm pretty sure I looked the same way because we had all had a sort of confused posture before the HUDs registered us on screen as friendlies.

After getting a plan of action around and assessing the damage, we all came to the conclusion that pretty much the only thing that survived... Whatever the hell happened to us... was our weapons. Which meant everyone except Geoffy had a boltgun while he had a heavy bolter, Nick had his bolt pistol and everyone had a sword. Brandon's techmarine backpack was attached to him, but his wasn't really set up for combat in the moment, more towards construction and crushing.

We took stock of the available ammunition, all the boltguns had three extra magazines so it was one hundred and twelve bolts per boltgun, Geoffy had three extra heavy bolter packs, giving him about two hundred and forty rounds, and Nick's bolt pistol had an extra magazine for a total of twenty eight rounds ready for that. Sure, it sounded like a lot of ammo... but all of the guns were able to be set on automatic, which tended to eat up ammo very quickly. Aside from Geoffy, we all set our guns to semi-auto and began to move up the hill, trying to see what the plume of smoke was about.

When we got up there, we ALL had to do a double-take, just to make sure our eyes weren't messing with us.

Geoffy was the first to speak. “Uh guys... Is that the castle I think it is?”

I nodded, even if we were all too busy on the castle to notice anything else, “Yeah... That's... That's...”

“...The castle of the pony sisters...” We all said together, admiring the castle itself, oblivious to the source of the smoke as we felt the elation flow through us. It was like a dream, a lucid dream that you never wanted to wake up from.

It took us three seconds to notice the fires though, and what we saw made us angry... I'm not saying nerd rage angry, I'm talking burning passion of a thousand suns angry... We saw the battle, we saw the griffons, we even saw the minotaurs as their ground troops... what we wanted to do, was tear them all apart, limb... from limb.

We didn't even have to confirm with each other as we each began to raise our weapons, I saw the targeting reticule of my bolter as I aimed downrange, and from there... everything began to be an adrenaline-fueled blur. The beautiful roar of the boltguns raining down on the heretics, who dared to attack the holy empresses, cut them down with ease, their pathetic armor shredding like paper against the adamantine rounds. Nick, Brandon and I mag-locked our guns to our sides and drew our swords as we rushed into the fray.

What can I say? The battle... it was... enlightening, in those few moments as I cut down minotaurs and griffons alike, terror on their faces as their weapons and armor broke, their morale shattered, and their numbers retreated. It was beautiful, everything felt so clear, so... Right... I never wanted to stop, and neither did my friends, neither did my battle brothers.

-{DW}-

When I finally brought my blade down through the chest of the last heretic who had not died or fled I began to make sense of the world around me, no longer was everything a haze of metal and blood, now there were bodies strewn about the battlefield... and we stood among them, triumphant in the face of overwhelming numbers. I should have felt bad, no, I should have felt terrible... I had taken the lives of other intelligent beings, beings who could think and talk like me. The thing was though, I didn't, I didn't feel bad, I actually felt good... as if that was what I was supposed to do in life, that this... was my new role.

I stood with an unseen smile and began to survey a bit more of the surrounding area. Most of the bridges that led to the castle walls were broken, only the one that led to the main entrance of the castle remained, and I wasn't exactly going to test how good the strength of the rope was. The four of us regrouped in the center of the battlefield, realizing that we had only expended a minimum amount of ammunition. We all turned as we heard several sets of hooves coming from the bridge and... well... I hate to admit it... but... I nearly fangasmed when I saw how adorable Princess Luna looked when she was only about half my size, fortunately we all had enough combined adrenaline and self control to not just throw ourselves at their hooves the moment we saw them.

All of the guards tensed as we turned and even the alicorn sisters looked a bit shaken, admittedly, four eight-foot tall suits of armor covered in the blood of the creatures that fell like grass to a lawnmower tended to be a bit intimidating to creatures smaller than them.

Celestia was the first to speak, her voice quite calm considering what she had just gone through. “...Who... Are you?” She asks with a curious look. Her eyes seem to widen just a little as she notices the symbols on our shoulders.

The soldiers group a little closer around the princesses as Geoffy draws his sword and puts away his gun. I take the first step and plant my sword's tip in the ground, kneeling to the alicorns and try to keep my voice even despite the elation I'm feeling. Oh, and by the way, we had decided to just generate our names when we created these characters to role-play, so if any of the names appeared in one of the books, it was purely coincidence, fair warning.

“I... Am Brother Astelan, Tactical marine of the Dark angels, and these are my battle brothers; Brother Magron... our Apothecary.” I say as I point to Nick, “Brother Elyas... Our Techmarine.” I indicate Brandon, “And Brother Cadmus, our devastator marine.” I point to Geoffy. I turn my attention back to the princesses, “We are Space Marines, devoted in mind, body, and soul to the service of our empresses...” I let my hand indicate them, “We are your weapons of war, forged to slay any who oppose you.” We bow our heads and wait for her response. Honestly, I had just let myself speak unfiltered, not a single thought was given as I spoke so I just said what came naturally.

It took a while for her to speak again, and there was quite a bit of uncertainty in her voice. “You may rise... Dark Angels...” She says quietly. Once we stand she tilts her head to silently tell us to enter the castle. It was... nice, quiet, and beautiful as we traversed the magically reinforced bridge to enter the castle. The damage to the outside was apparent, but the structure remained intact as a whole, it was good, definitely good, to see the decorations and the intricate stonework.

We were flanked by the remaining soldiers that were able to be spared as the princesses took their positions upon the throne, Celestia elegantly placed one forehoof over the other and smiled at us. “Battle brothers... Please remove your helmets...” She asks politely. Seeing no problem with doing so I reach up and detach the clasps that secured my helmet with a practiced hand, the helmet made a slight hissing sound as the neck area depressurized. I had to blink a few times as I began to see the world as more vibrant colors than a monochrome green. We each removed our helmets and I felt a little surprised when I saw that we were all ponies, Nick was a dark green with a black mane, Geoffy was almost a bright purple with a mane that was only a few shades darker, and Brandon was slate-grey with a brown mane. I had found out later that my coat was a midnight-blue similar to Luna's coat with a slightly lighter mane color. The rest of the day passed in a bit of a blur, we were given accommodated housing within the castle barracks, and we spoke at length with the officers. Although one of the soldiers was stupid enough to try and use my bolt gun, poor guy couldn't even lift it with his magic. It wasn't so easy to remove the armor plating without another marine to help. Once we were all down in just the bodysuits we sat in the large room set aside for us.

“So... I don't know about you guys... but... I'm stayin' here...” Geoffy says with a smirk.

I don't know what he was expecting our reactions to be, but we all agreed with him, already we had a better time than back home, and I couldn't wait to go out and slay for the empresses... I mean, princesses... again. However, that night, we did make a few... adjustments to the space marine code... nothing really combat-changing, but more along the lines of how our R&D was going to work.

Author's Notes:

So, I finally got my idea for a warhammer 40k story out there, I don't currently have an editor so I apologize if I have a few mistakes, constructive criticism is much appreciated.

P.S. I AM ALIVE!!!! Finally, after such a big funk of having massive writer's block and a busy as hell schedule I finally was able to submit a story!