“Beep, boop, beep- -SPLOOSH!”

Scootaloo rubbed her forhead, and watched Carrot Top slowly revolving on her chair, tapping on the orange construct around her left hoof.

“Do you have to do that here?” she asked, exasperated.

“Hey, you’re the one who wanted me to help Roseluck calibrate the auxiliary scan.”

“That’s not what you’re doing.”

“It isn’t what she was doing before,” groaned Roseluck. “I’m not sure what I expected. Trixie is way better at this than you.”

“Well, what do you expect?” said Carrot, shrugging. “I’m a hydroponics engineer. I couldn’t tell a scanning discharge node from a hole in the plot. And check it out, this thing has games!” she pointed it toward Scootaloo. “Look at this one! You match crystals that are the same shape and color, and then the drop! Why don’t we have this in Equestria?”

“Loss of productivity?” sneered Roseluck. Carrot Top glared back at her and then stuck out her tongue.

“You shouldn’t be playing with it,” said Scootaloo. “It’s alien magic, and we have no idea how it works or what it’s even for.”

“They’re probably going to dissect you when we get back to Equestria,” taunted Roseluck.

“Hey, if the stallion’s handsome enough, I’ll let him put his hooves in my innards all night long.”

“You weirdo,” laughed Rose.

“Can you two PLEASE take this seriously?” demanded Scootaloo. “I mean, come on! I’m half your age and I’m STILL being the mature one in the room.”

“You’re right,” said Roseluck, turning back to her controls. “Sorry, Captain.”

“A report, then?”

“Scans indicated that the EQX went erratic for a few minutes, but it has since stabilized.”

“And what do you make of it?”

“I don’t know,” said Rose.

“I do,” said Carrot. “My guess would be that it got injured. I mean, I feel pretty erratic when I hurt myself.”

“But with those readings, it would have been pretty bad…” Roseluck’s eyes widened and she turned to Scootaloo. “You don’t think they’re trying to interface her to their systems, do you?”

Scootaloo had not considered that, but she felt her nervousness beginning to rise. “There’s only two ways that could end.”

“How?” said Carrot, seriously not knowing.

“Either she dies,” said Scootaloo, hyperbolically slowly, “or they do it. And we never catch them.”

“So, what, we attack now?”

“Trixie is fully integrated into all systems and prepared for battle,” said Roseluck.

“No, not yet,” said Scootaloo. “Maybe if we got closer.”

“They don’t have windows on the top of their ship,” said Roseluck. “I could come in near there…but of course, I have no idea where their sensors are.”

“Maybe if we- -” Carrot jumped as her omnitool began suddenly beeping and flashing loudly. Scootaloo turned to her angrily. “I thought I told you to stop playing games!”

“That isn’t me!” cried Carrot. “I don’t know what- -”

“Captain!” cried Roseluck.

Scootaloo looked up at the magically enhanced image of the enemy ship just in time to see it turn rapidly and accelerate to faster-than-light speed.

“We’re had!” she said, frantically pulling open her panels. “All hands, brace for acceleration! Rose, FOLLOW THAT SHIP!”

“You don’t have to tell me twice!”

Roseluck leaned forward on the controls, and the ship began to rattle and shake as its internal systems flooded with magical energy before it suddenly lurched forward in pursuit of their target.

The ship shuddered from the impact, and Starlight was thrown into Zedok, nearly pushing both of them over the edge.

“What was that?!” cried Zedok.

“Impact off the starboard bow,” said Armchair, cheerful even though he had just been shot. “Polyharmonic induction shields are proving ineffective. Hull damage sustained.”

Starlight burst into one of the upper chambers of Armchair’s body, and as she did, she caught a glimpse of boxy, asymmetrical vessel passing just outside one of the windows. It paused for a moment, and Starlight understood what that ship held and what it had come for. Then, as quickly as it came, it accelerated again, its ball turret strafing along the side and leaving cracks and pits in the windows.

“Our windows are being damaged,” said Armchair, sounding disappointed.

There was another strong tremor as Armchair was struck again, and Starlight felt the ship tilt.

“We are losing pressure in sections seven, twelve, and eight…and maybe nine?” suggested Armchair. “We are closing bulkheads.”

There was a distant mechanical sound as the gaps between rooms on either edge of the hallway began to close, dropping to the floor. Suddenly, just before the farthest one closed completely, Jack rolled through the bottom.

“Why aren’t you fighting back?!” she demanded.

“We are trying, but it is impossible to detect the attacking vessel. There is no- -” he paused for another barrage from outside, this one causing a small explosion somewhere on board. “- -mass signal. We cannot get a read on its element zero core to track its position.”

“Is it releasing a gravity field?” said Jack, quickly.

“Gravity field?”

“A biphasic gravity field!”

“No. No it is not.”

“Then there’s still some hope.”

Another wave rocked Armchair, and Starlight braced herself against the ground. Once it was over, one of the bulkheads hissed open. Air was sucked outward in a torrent as Sjdath clawed her way through from the vacuum on the other side.

“Just when I think I have a buyer,” she hissed, sealing the door behind her with a command from her omnitool. “Now this…”

“Armchair!” yelled Starlight. “They have an omnitool on board! Lock onto its position and use it to track them!”

“That won’t work,” snarled Sjdath. “Not unless they had completely turned off all the security settings. And only a complete moron would- -”

“We have locked on target,” said Armchair. “Returning fire.”

“Forget returning fire!” said Sjdath. “Get us out of here!”

“We cannot. Their ship is faster and more maneuverable than we are. And with only an omnitool signature, we cannot target neither their weapons nor engines.”

“They’re going to blow us out of the sky if we just sit here!” shouted Zedok. “Do something!”

“We do not currently have the freedom of motion or processing to perform that action. However…”

“What?”

“Our maneuverability would be improved if we were perform motions that would overwhelm the inertial dampers.”

“That’s called making pancakes!” cried Sjdath. Then her eyes widened, and she turned toward one of the cracked windows. A reddish, cloudy planet was visible rapidly approaching. “You wouldn’t…”

“It’s the only way.”

“Fine. Fine! See if I care!” Sjdath opened her omnitool. “I’m clearing the path to the primary cargo bay.”

“We had suggested that you installed escape pods.”

“We don’t need escape pods!”

“Escape?” said Zedok, confused. “No, wait! You’re not saying we should RETREAT?”

“It’s not like we can do any good here,” said Jack. “We’re leaking air like a sieve.”

“And what’s to keep them from just attacking us when we get down there?”

“We will distract them,” said Armchair. “Disable them, if we can.”

“But you can’t even see them!” cried Starlight.

“We do not need to. We have windows.”

“Got it,” said Sjdath as one of the bulkheads opened, hissing form the pressure equalization. “Move, now!”

The group rushed forward, even though Starlight was not sure where they were going.

“Where’s my dad?” asked Zedok, nervously.

“Fenok is stocking up on medical supplies and bringing the auxiliary suits,” said Sjdath, who was continuing to turn her respiratory valve all the way to the open position. “Si’y is- -”

“Right here,” said the hanar, drifting into the main hall just as the ship shook with another impact and then seemed to slide as Armchair took evasive action. Si’y, of course, did not move in the slightest; he just hovered where he was, loaded down with weapons. “This one does so enjoy planetary landings.”

“Ever tried one when you’re getting shot at?” asked Jack.

“No.”

“Well, you’re about to stop enjoying them.”

The group started moving in unison. Their speed was brisk, perhaps too brisk for Starlight, until they came to a hallway that was blocked by a large organic mass.

Starlight gasped; it was the first time she had ever seen Arachne in the light. She had not known entirely what to expect, but what she found was an enormous insect, a quadrupedal red-brown creature with a pair of tiny arms held high above its four legs and a set of winding antennae.

Arachne seemed to largely ignore them, and as they pressed against the sides of the hallway, he stepped past them.

“Wait! You’re going the wrong way!” cried Starlight.

Arachne turned and released a long, eerie melodic sound.

“Arachne will be staying,” said Armchair. “We need someone competent to repair the damage. His body is not as susceptible to g-forces or loss of atmosphere as the rest of you. He will be the one who looks out the windows.”

“Fat lot of good those windows did us,” grumbled Sjdath.

Arachne turned his numerous eyes toward Starlight. His tentacles moved, and he produced something that he had been carrying. Starlight watched, and realized that he was handing her something- -and that that something was a landing suit.

“For…for me?” she said.

He did not respond, but laid the armored suit over her back before turning around and lumbering off.

“Thank you!” she called from behind.

“Yeah, custom made, real nice and all, we know. Now, if you’re done, our ship is kind of getting shot down.”

“Yeah…right…”

Starlight hesitated, but then began to follow the others. They eventually reached the cargo bay, the windows of which were heavily cracked and pitted. Outside, Starlight could see the pony ship circling, handily dodging Armchair’s weaponfire. Fenok, likewise, was already waiting for him.

“Please tell me you have a shuttle in here somewhere,” said Jack.

“Don’t need a shuttle,” said Sjdath, stopping and directing her attention toward the far wall. The group looked up, and Jack turned to Sjdath.

“You can’t be serious.”

“I am. I am also pretty sure I patched at least eighty percent of the bullet holes. Who cares, though. The vacuum of space doesn’t affect me. Now get in.”

A blast shook the Rainbow Dash so hard that Scootaloo was nearly knocked out of her chair. In her haste, she had forgotten to attach her security belt, and, hoofs shaking, latched the band of fabric around herself.

In the Academy, she had trained numerous times in battle simulations. She could not count how many virtual pirate vessels, warlock cruisers, or even Crystalline drones she had attacked, sometimes in formations with nearly one hundred other cadets. Nothing had prepared her for this, for the blasts of energy or the swooping curves that Roseluck expertly produced, as though she knew exactly where every enemy shot was going to be before it was even fired. Or, rather, almost any.

“What was that?” cried Scootaloo. “What just hit us?”

“They’re using some kind of projectile cannon!” said Carrot, perhaps too loud. “Our shields are designed for magic, not for having hunks of metal lobbed at us! We have a hull breach somewhere downstairs!”

“Specifics are helpful!”

Lyra clutched the edge of Scootaloo’s chair, bracing against the impact. “That thing moves like a bloated cow!” she said, almost on the verge of laughter, her one functional eye lit with a fire that Scootaloo had never seen in her before. “They’re trying to hide in that planet’s exosphere- -Return fire! Target their Core!”

“We can’t isolate any- -”

“Captain!” cried Roseluck, pointing. Scootaloo looked up to see the part of the enemy ship shift. Something smaller burst out of the side, descending rapidly toward the dingy looking planet. Scootaloo did not see it clearly, but was aware that it must have been some kind of landing craft.

“No!” cried Lyra, slamming her metal-coated hoof down on one of Scootaloo’s armrests. “No no NO!” she pivoted quickly and galloped out of the room.

“Lyra!” cried Scootaloo.

“Captaiiiiin!” shouted Carrot. Scootaloo turned back to the window just in time to see the enemy ship suddenly accelerate sideways at an impossible angle, instantly accelerating to several times its previous maneuvering speed.

“What the- -it was a trap!” she cried. From the window, she saw the ship dip below her own, releasing a plume of fast-moving beads of light from its underside.

“Torpedoes inbound!” cried Roseluck. “Taking evasive action!”

Lyra dashed through the halls of the ship when it rocked suddenly. The gravity system lurched, and she felt herself sliding sideways. From deeper in the vessel, there was a sound of rending metal and a burst of sound as the hull somewhere ruptured. On one side of the hall, Muffins was trying to douse a small fire with an extinguisher while wearing a respirator mask against the rapidly dropping pressure.

“Lyra!” cried Scootaloo through the comlink system. “What are you doing?”

“That landing craft- -the Core is on it! I can feel it!”

“Lyra, it’s too dangerous to land right now! Stay on the ship! That’s a direct order!”

“No dice, Captain,” said Lyra, pulling an emergency handle to open the sealed bulkhead to the main cargo bay. “You’re just going to need to cover me.”

Before the lights could even flick on, Lyra crossed the room and climbed into her one remaining possession. She pulled herself into the narrow cockpit and shifted on the seat, putting her legs forward and leaning back. Then, taking a deep breath, she charged her magic and activated the device.

The machinery hummed to life, and the back of Lyra’s armor opened, exposing her spine. She winced as the machine interfaced to her spinal implant, and then smiled as the magical coils began to charge of her own bodily energy, ringing with orange light as the gears and cylinders began to come to life, motivated by her and her alone.

Lyra inserted her hooves into the slots for them and interfaced with the controls. As the cockpit closed, Lyra raised her mechanical hands, flexing the immense fingers outside her canopy of enchanted glass.

The ship rocked again. “LYRA!” cried Scootaloo.

“Just deal with it, Captain,” said Lyra, prepping her final systems for emergency descent. “Prepare for Lyrafall in three…two…one…”

Far below, on the unnamed planet’s rocky surface, a six-wheeled vehicle tried to slow its descent with a number of small thrusters only to slam hard into the ground, its poorly lubricated joints creaking and its mass effect core skipping from the blow.

“See,” said Sjdath, who was clinging to several internal metal objects with enough force for her claws to leave marks. “I told you it wouldn’t burn up on reentry.”

“This one thinks that it threw up in its suit,” said a rather queasy sounding Si’y, who was crammed tightly between a wall Starlight.

“Oh, you haven’t seen anything yet,” said Fenok, crowding out Jack and Zedok, his already enormous shame made much larger by the full body armor that he was wearing. He sounded even more nauseous than Si’y.

“A little cramped, don’t you think?” said Zedok, trying to push away from her father and forcing Starlight into Si’y’s tentacles.

“It’s designed to fit six humans!” said Sjdath. “Or…three? I don’t know, I didn’t build it.”

“This think is a relic,” said Jack. “And by the way, if you’re expecting to go through space, don’t patch the holes with bondo.”

“Did you survive?” asked Armchair, his voice transmitted through the vehicle’s speakers.

“Yes,” said Sjdath, pushing forward and pressing the communication button.

“Interesting. We were expecting at least thirty percent fatality.”

“Do you have a reason for bothering me, Armchair?”

“Yes. The enemy ship has fired something at your position. It is using a long decent pattern. You will need to move as far as possible as quickly as possible from the drop sight to avoid it. We will be reducing unnecessary processes to improve our combat experience. All further questions can be directed to Arachne.”

With that, the transmission ended.

“Arachne can’t talk, can he?” asked Starlight.

“He can,” said Fenok. “The rachni are actually extremely intelligent creatures.”

“Yeah, but only Armchair knows what he’s saying,” said Sjdath, sliding out of the driver’s seat.

“Um, cap?” said Zedok. “Armchair said we need to go fast. As in, you know, DRIVE.”

“I know,” said Sjdath, tapping on the screen of her omnitool. “We need to go fast. I bought this from a baterian trader for a pack of bacon because I thought it was hilarious. Never thought I would have to use it, though.”

The omnitool activated, and a translucent human figure appeared sitting in the chair. He was male- -at least as far as Starlight could tell- -and dressed in some kind of military armor.

“VI 1.7 AGB active and ready for duty!” he said. His head turned toward Sjdath. “The extranet says that you are not alliance navy. You can therefore shove a- -”

“Sjdath,” said Jack, leaning forward. “Why do you have a VI of my dead boyfriend?!”

“Reasons,” said Sjdath. “Commander Shepard, do you know where you are?”

“Analyzing…I am in an M35 Mako.”

“You are.” Sjdath clicked rapidly at her omnitool. “I am patching you into the automated systems.”

“Wait, what?” said Jack, sounding concerned. “Oh shi- -Ashley warned me about this!” She started to stand up, trying to open the top hatch. “Let me out! NOW!”

“I can predict the driving habits of the real Commander Shepard with seven percent accuracy!” cried the VI. His foot lowered on the gas pedal, which immediately dropped entirely toward the floor. The Mako lurched forward, half of it immediately bumping over a rock almost as tall as it was and sending the occupants flying about.

“Seatbelts! It doesn’t have seatbelts!” bellowed Fenok.

“Oh! Si’y, don’t put your tentacle there, that’s sensitive!” cried Starlight, her armored suit catching on his as they were jostled together.

“I want to sit next to the hanar!” exclaimed Zedok.

“What the hell was I thinking?” cried Sjdath.

The front of the vehicle shifted, projecting an image of the outside. Starlight nearly vomited when she saw the landscape outside rushing by at immense speed. The planet was covered in rocks and small trees, but the VI refused to go around them. Instead, it just leered like a madman, leaning over the control wheel and refusing to release the accelerator even slightly.

“THRUSTERS!” it cried, and suddenly, for no apparent reason, the Mako blasted into the air.

“This one is too young to die!” squeaked Si’y, wrapping Starlight in a crushing embrace.

“Too…tight!” she wheezed.

“Just- -why? WHY?” asked Jack.

“There’s nothing this galaxy can’t beat if we all work together! Except the Reapers. I mean, have you seen the size of those things?” said the VI. “They did kill me, after all. But not before I strangled twenty of them to death with my bare hands!”

“Definitely Shepard,” said Jack.

“It’s weird that you call your boyfriend by his- -OOF!- -by his last name,” said Zedok as the Mako slammed into the ground and then promptly jumped off a small incline, slamming into the ground.

VI Shepard turned to Jack. “Anyone ever tell you you’re one hell of a looker, soldier?”

“We’re going to have to have a talk about this,” said Jack to Sjdath, who was by this time on the floorboard, desperately holding onto the base of the driver’s chair as she was thrown about by the motion of the vehicle.

“Now is the part where I fire the gun randomly at things!” cried the VI as the cabin was filled with the overpowering explosive force of the mass-effect gun firing.

“Why?” said Sjdath. “Why would you even- -”

“During the Geth Insurrection, I defeated twenty armchairs with my bare hands- -and a bigger gun!”

“That doesn’t even make sense!”

“I think I’m going to throw up,” said Starlight, putting her hoof over her mouth.

“Not on me!” cried Zedok. “This place already smells bad enough!”

“We have bigger problems,” said Zedok, sounding faint. “Look!”

The others turned, and Starlight gasped. The digital image that served as a windshield showed a towering sheer cliff in front of them, a threatening rocky crag extending high into the air.

“What…what is it now,” said Sjdath, slowly sitting up. “Did we level out? Am I dead yet?”

“No,” said Jack. “Look.”

Sjdath looked at the window, and her eyes widened.

“No! NO! Don’t do that! Bad VI! Stop!”

“Commander Shepard never stops! Unless, you know, I die.”

“Captain Sjdath!” squeaked Si’y. “Stop it! The honorable hologram of Commander Johnathan Shepard, please STOP!”

“I can’t turn it off!” said Sjdath.

“Crap,” sighed Jack.

Starlight closed her eyes, and the Mako hit the cliff at full speed. Instead of crushing or even stopping, though, it tilted to a nearly vertical angle- -and started to climb.

The occupants were immediately thrown to the back of the cabin on top of Fenok. Starlight was knocked free of Si’y’s strong grip and slid into the krogan, only to have Jack land on top of her next to Zedok. Sjdath, meanwhile, remained dangling from the bottom of the driver’s chair. VI Shepard did not react remotely to the change in orientation; as a hologram, he had no mass or physical being. He just kept pressing forward as if he were driving on a flat surface that was horizontal instead of vertical.

“How is this even possible?” asked Zedok, who took advantage of her position in the pile to wrap her arms around Jack’s lower torso.

“The mass-effect core generates an artificially low center of gravity and- -I don’t even know,” muttered Fenok. “I think I’m going to puke in my helmet, though.”

“This one already did that,” grumbled Si’y.

Starlight looked up at the window toward the cloudy red-yellow sky. In a way, it was pretty, as if she were looking at a horizon- -but it was also wrong to be suspended in this way. Worse, the vehicle was starting to slow. Then it ground to a halt, as if finally realizing that it was proceeding in a direction in a way that was physically impossible.

“Sjdath?” said Starlight, pushing her way out of the pile. “What happens if it stops?”

“I can answer that,” said Shepard. He turned back toward Starlight, an insane smile on his face. “THRUSTERS!”

The Mako burst off the wall of the cliff with a surge of rocket-powered energy, and started to fly backward through the air. Released form the cliff, it now started to fall.

“Sjdath!” cried Zedok. “What happens if we land- -if we land upside down?”

“Well,” said Sjdath, weakly. “A vorcha buys the vehicle for scrap, scoops out the skeletons…and…well….”

Starlight felt Fenok’s arms close around her. His grip was not as tight as Si’y’s, and he was shaking. Starlight imagined that she was probably shaking too, considering that they were plummeting toward the ground in a vehicle made mostly out of rust and driven by a mentally incomplete hologram of a dead human.

As they tumbled through the air, though, Starlight suddenly shivered. She looked up through the window- -a nauseating experience indeed- -and saw something distant moving through the air, a streak of orange light crossing the sky. For just a moment, she was confused as to why she felt the way she did about it, how it seemed like something she knew- -and then she realized that it was coming straight toward them.

“Sjdath!” cried Starlight, “incoming!”

“Incoming WHAT?” spat Sjdath. “The ground? Or my mortality? Or- -”

Her statement was interrupted as the Mako was slammed backward with tremendous force. Sjdath was knocked from her perch and the others jostled as the Mako was rammed into the ground by the impact.

For a moment, Starlight was dazed. She heard the sound of VI Shepard yelling something, and of the others reacting to something. She pulled herself back into consciousness in time to see the front screen. On it was as projection of what must have been right in front of them: a pair of metal arms from an appropriately sized armored robot grasping the edges of the Mako, holding it as VI Shepard attempted to reverse. Starlight’s eyes widened when she saw what was in the center of the robot’s transparent chest: the face of a teal colored unicorn, her horn glowing with orange energy as she smiled broadly and cruelly into the camera.

“Open fire! Shoot it!” cried Sjdath.

“The cannon is currently overheated,” said Shepard, shrugging.

“Then- -”

A sickening crunching sound filled the cabin as a set of metal fingers tore into the side of the Mako. Then Starlight felt a surge of magic.

“Duck!” she cried, just as a beam of orange energy cut through the top of the Mako, slicing it open like a can.

The teal pony pulled away the roof of the Mako, and Jack stood. She raised her arms and sent numerous blasts of energy directly into her face. The blasts themselves rebounded off an orange shield that surrounded the vehicle, but the pony did take a step back.

“MOVE!” cried Jack, jumping free from the wreck. Zedok followed, as did Sjdath. Starlight looked over the edge and hesitated.

“I- -I can’t!” she said. “It’s too far!”

“Come on, little pony” said Fenok, picking her up easily and jumping down.

Si’y was the last to leave, gracefully floating out as he drew all his weapons and began unloading into the heavily armored robot. His bullets either metlted or ricocheted off the armor, and as Starlight watched, the pony reached down, picking up the remnants of the Mako in her enormous hands and throwing it.

“Incoming!” cried Starlight. “Swerve left!”

Fenok and the others moved just in time to barely dodge the incoming hunk of metal. Starlight closed her eyes as it landed with a profound crash and began to smoke, the wheels still turning despite no longer being connected to the ground. Then she looked back and saw the vaguely humanoid robot walking toward them, its metal feet pounding against the ground as it pursued.

“Over there! To cover!” cried Jack, pointing to a rock formation.

They had barely made it in time when the pony opened fire, sending a barrage of narrow orange bolts toward their position. Jack jumped over and behind the rock, pulling Zedok down with her and barely managing to escape. Fenok held Starlight in front of him, blocking several powerful bolts with his shield and armor. Si’y and Sjdath took up the rear. Si’y continued to fire, absorbing several of the biotic shots in his shield before it eventually cracked and failed while he took cover.

Sjdath was not so lucky. She did not make it to cover in time, and several of the orange bolts struck her in the back, piercing through her body. Her eyes widened and she gasped before falling

“No!” cried Fenok, setting down Starlight. “Cover me, Jack!”

“Right.”

Fenock ran out into the oncoming fire and grabbed Sjdath by the leg, pulling her limp and bleeding body back to cover.

“Is it- -is it bad?” said Zedok.

“Yeah,” said Fenock, simply, pulling a medical kit off his back and opening his omnitool. “I’m on it, though. Si’y, you’ve been hit! Take your medigel!”

“Not while she still needs it,” said Si’y, removing part of his medical module and passing it to Fenok. “The blow to my form is minor. As a hanar, this one cannot sustain a broken bone.”

The orange discharge suddenly stopped. There was a moment of pause as the damaged ground steamed, where the only sound was that of the wind and the sound of the Mako burning. Then an amplified female voice called out.

“Attention primitives,” said the pony in the robotic suit. “I am Lyra Heartstrings of Inverness. You are currently in possession of Equestrian government property. Now, frankly, I don’t have any qualms about killing you all, but I’m feeling generous today. I only came for the Core. Give me the Core, and you will be allowed to live.” She paused. “Of course, I will be severing all of your hands. I intend to hang them on my wall. But you’d still be alive.”

Starlight peeked over the rocks and saw the other unicorn standing fifty yards away, just watching them. For a moment, Starlight considered the offer. Before she could think of what to say, though, Jack raised her torso over the rock.

“You can go suck a horsedick!” she shouted, lobbing a singularity at the same time.

Lyra raised one of her robotic hands and caught the dark sphere. Her metal fingers produced a surge of orange biotic energy as she closed them, crushing the singularity into nothingness with a resounding explosion. “So be it.”

At Lyra’s command, her exoskeleton raised its hands. Several mechanisms deployed from the forearms, and orange energy burst out of them as she began to walk past the now flaming Mako.

Jack ducked behind the rocks, and Si’y produced a long rifle, setting it over the top of the rocks and returning fire.

“Damn it,” said Fenok. Starlight turned and to her horror saw that Sjdath had gone into convulsions, her wounds pouring out black fluid onto the rusty ground.

“What’s happening?” demanded Starlight.

“I don’t know!” said Fenok, holding Sjdath down. “I think- -I think she’s adapting, but I have no idea what was in that blast!”

“This one is encountering a problem,” said Si’y, falling back behind cover and adjusting his rifle. He sounded slightly panicked. “Phasic ammunition is unable to break her armor, and armor-penetrating rounds prove futile against her biotic shield!” His speech was accelerating. “This one- -this one does not know what to do?”

“Don’t get shell-shocked on me now!” yelled Jack, lobbing several blasts of biotic energy over the rock as Zedok tried to fire her useless pistol without getting her head too far out of cover.

“Si’y,” said Starlight, looking him where she anticipated his eyes probably would be. “It’s going to be okay.”

“No. No it is not. This one- -this one has never fought something like that! This one- -we need to retreat!”

“Do you think Blasto would retreat?”

Si’y froze. “N…no. The venerable Blasto would never run from such a fight as this one.”

“Then what would he do?”

Si’y reached behind him and removed a weapon from his armor, one so large that he needed to hold it with all six tentacles. It was yellow, with a prominent nuclear symbol painted on the side.

“Blasto would win.” He turned to the others. “Friends. This one’s face-name is Sianiris, but its soul-name is ‘The One Who is not Shackled by Aversion to Deviancy’. You have become as family to this one, and should it not survive, please remember its name.”

Before Starlight could stop him, Si’y floated out from cover. Lyra did not hesitate to fire upon him, each impact slowing him only slightly as it depleted his shield as he raced forward. It only took three hits before the sheild was gone, and the forth struck him in the main body, sending bits of metal flying away from him. As he twisted through the air and started to collapse, he leveled his weapon at Lyra’s chest and fired.

There was a brief pause as the projectile moved toward its target- -followed by an impossible explosion that was so powerful that Starlight momentarally thought the world around her was cracking apart. She was facing away from the cover, and she saw the land covered in bright light from a rising blast of energy.

The force of the explosion sent Si’y flying backward, and he collapsed near Starlight. She reached out with her magic, grasping his limp body and pulling him back. As she did, a second explosion went off. This one was different, producing a powerful surge of blue lightning that made Starlight’s horn ache. The Mako, she realized, had just exploded.

“Si’y!” she said, turning him over behind cover as bits of metal and a tire went flying over the rock. His armor had been badly damaged, and the enormous hole in it was leaking copious amounts of clear fluid. Si’y had gone limp, and Starlight feared the worst- -until she saw that he was still clinging onto his weapon.

“This one…this one’s mass-levitation device has been damaged,” he said, his already electronic voice heavily distorted by the damage to his armor. Starlight saw something pink inside the armor quiver and flash with light. “This one…this one cannot move.”

“I think you got her,” said Zedok, standing up. A beam of orange light nearly struck her head and she ducked back down.

“For what it’s worth,” added Jack.

Starlight looked through a crevice in the rock, and saw that despite the blast from the weapon and the explosion from the Mako’s mass core, Lyra had not been stopped. She had been knocked back and a small hole had been produced in the shoulder of her armor leaving her left arm paralyzed. Despite that, she was standing again and marching forward, shooting from her remaining arm.

“What is that thing made of?!” shouted Zedok. She turned to Starlight. “Star, pick up that BFG and hit her AGAIN!”

“You can’t,” said Si’y, weakly. “The M920 Cain only fires one shot…”

“Great!”

Jack stepped back from the cover. “Alright, guess it’s up to me.” She turned toward Zedok. “I’m going to go all-out on this, but it’ll take me a few seconds to charge. I need you to cover me. Slow her down!”

“Yeah, about that,” said Zedok, holding up her pistol. “I’ve got five shots left before I’m out of clips, and I don’t think this thing is doing didly!”

“Then take this,” said Fenok, reaching behind his back to where his medical kit had formerly been and pulling out a worn, heavily used firearm almost as large as Zedok was. He threw it to her and she caught it with some difficulty. As she looked down, her eyes widened.

“This…this is a Graal Spikethrower!” She looked up at her father. “Where- -where did you even get this?”

“On Tuchanka. When I was your age.”

“I thought you were a pacifist!”

“I am, but you’re not! Just aim for the robot parts, not the pony!”

“Aim? With a Graal?!”

“I’ll do it if you won’t,” said Starlight.

“Hell no!” said Zedok, smiling more broadly than Starlight had ever seen her smile before. “Besides, hoofs!”

She leaned over the top of the rocks and charged the shotgun before releasing a baragge of spikes with enough recoil to nearly knock her back. Jack, meanwhile, pulled down her goggles and began to charge her entire body, surrounding herself in blue energy.

“Magic, really?” said Lyra, pausing from her barrage but still stomping forward at an almost lazy pace, as if she felt no need to advance quickly. “You think that you, a primitive, can stop ME, a Questlord, with MAGIC? No amplifiers, condensers, resource valves, no conduction maintenance system, no coils, not a SINGLE piece of magical technology, and you think you can even dent me?”

“Who needs magic when you have a SHOTGUN?!” screamed Zedok, firing a blast of enormous spikes into Lyra’s face. Most of them evaporated against her magic shielding, but several stuck into her glass-like cockpit window, cracking it.

“Oh, I will enjoy taking your hands,” said Lyra, marching forward slightly faster. “Rubbing them through my mane…all over my body…”

“Jack said to SLOW her down!” yelled Starlight.

“What do you think I’m doing?!”

“All this for a Core,” said Lyra. “Trust me, there is no way you could figure out how to use it without killing it. You don’t have the sophistication. You might as well give it to me. It belongs to us.”

“The only thing that belongs to you is a facefull of spikes!” Zedok promptly fired several rapidfire shots directly into Lyra’s robotic body, which was now less than ten yards from the cover. The spikes did nothing. “Oh come ON! Dad, I thought this was designed to hunt THRESHER MAWS!!”

“Does she look anything like a thresher maw to you?!”

Jack suddenly lifted her head. “You’re gonna want to move.”

Zedok pulled the heavy shotgun down from the rock and jumped back. Fenok shielded Sjdath with his body, and Starlight had no idea what to expect.

Then, with an animalistic scream of rage, Jack stood, spreading her arms. The blue energy burst from her body like an explosion. Biotic force burst out from her, and Starlight was terrified. The energy that poured out of her was unlike anything she had ever seen, barely controlled and directed toward anything in particular. Starlight had never realized just how powerful Jack was, and she could not help but be as awed as she was frightened.

The explosion of Jack’s energy burst outward and forward as a series of explosions. Starlight had though that Si’y’s explosion had been enormous, but it did not compare to these: the ground shook with each blast as they crept forward, explosions of blue energy one after the other, a shockwave extending outward from Jack’s body. The rock that they had been using as cover atomized as the energy moved through it, flying into pieces.

Lyra looked down at the stream of energy, and for just a moment, Starlight saw her one working eye widen. Then the shockwave hit her, the explosion tearing the ground beneath her and coating the robotic armor in corrosive blue energy that swirled and sparked as the strike passed through her.

Then the noise faded and all at once stopped. Starlight looked up, and saw that Lyra had been pushed back slightly but otherwise undamaged, her body glowing with orange energy that had shielded her. Inside the suit, Lyra smiled, and the exoskeleton took another enormous step forward.

Jack sighed, and then dropped to her knees.

“I’m going to enjoy reducing you to red paste,” said Lyra, now standing where their cover had been. “Assuming you bleed red. I actually don’t know.” She lifted her remaining metal fist into the air, and it ignited with orange energy. “So let’s find out.”

Lyra struck downward, but as she did, Jack raised her hands, projecting a dome shield that blocked Lyra’s first strike. Lyra, undaunted, lifted her fist and struck again. The shield shimmered and faded in places, and Jack groaned as she was pushed back.

“Jack!” cried Zedok, throwing down her gun and raising her own hands, adding to the biotic shield just as another blow came down.

Starlight could not do anything except watch. The entire situation seemed to drift away from her, becoming quiet and distant, just as it had on that day on Omega. She laid down in the alien dirt and covered her head with her hooves, confused and scared.

“Starlight!” cried Jack. The urgency in her voice pulled Starlight back to reality, but only slightly. “We can’t hold this bubble forever! Don’t let us down!”

Starlight lifted her head and looked around. Fenok was still tending to Sjdath, even as Lyra was bearing down on them. Sjdath’s wounds had started to heal, and her skin was darkening and thickening, but she was breathing rapidly, gasping for breath in pain. Si’y lay as a limp mass of tentacles, vulnerable and unable to even try to defend himself. Jack and Zedok were doing the best they could to protect the others, but they were starting to weaken.

“I have to…I have to protect my friends,” said Starlight, standing. “I have to protect them!” She focused her energy into her horn, and ignited her spell.

Lyra watched through her cracked window as the magical bubble started to crumble. She raised her fist for one more strike, which she knew would break it and quite possibly kill the wizards producing it. Before she could strike, though, the bubble shattered, and Lyra smiled, knowing that she had won.
] Her smile quickly faded, though, when she saw that the dome had not broken from her side, but rather from the inside- -and that an exponentially more powerful dome was expanding from beneath it. Lyra momentarily saw the core, dressed in alien armor, begin to float in the air, lifting herself with her own telekinesis. That view did not last long, though, as the sudden surge of magic forced Lyra backward.

“I don’t think so,” she said, digging her digitigrade feet into the soil and erecting her barrier spell- -only to see it instantly shatter against the oncoming surge.

The Core’s shield spell engulfed her, and Lyra watched as it warped on contact with her armor, spreading around the metal surface of her mecha- -and to her horror, she saw the spell change. It cut into the metal, burning it away, corroding it into dust and seeping into any cracks or fissures that the battle had been produced.

“No- -NO!” said Lyra. “You’re not going to take me that easily!” She charged her horn, producing an internal defensive spell and distributing it through the systems of her suit, dumping the whole supply of stored magic into a single attempt to produce a feedback purge. She fired it- -a blow that should have shattered any shield- -and then screamed as it blew back on her, tearing into her horn.

Eyes watering, Lyra looked through the cockpit window. She was surrounded in blue light- -but then she saw something different. She saw the Crystals, and the deformed, soulless Crystal ponies, clawing at her, pursuing her without stopping, clawing at her body.

“No,” she said, shaking her head and trying to force the flashback away. “Not now!” She summoned all of her magical strength, driving her suit’s one functional arm forward, but found that it would not move. The shield spell morphed around her again, bursting forward, grasping her robotic body, freezing her, lifting her arms.

Outside, Starlight floated over what had been a battlefield, focusing her energy on the robot, lifting it into the air. It was surprisingly simple. Too simple, even. Every second she held out the spell, she only seemed to get stronger as her mind connected so many new ideas about the workings of her power and as she came to realize just how much potential she truly had.

Starlight smiled, and then grasped the robot’s arms with her magic. With one swift twist, she pulled them free of its body, trailing threads of torn machinery in their wake.

“Jack,” said Starlight. “How much do have you got left?”

“Enough,” said Jack, standing and cracking her knuckles. “Zed? Think you can give me a boost?”

Zedok smiled and put her hands together, forming a foothold for Jack. Jack charged her, and Zedok poured what was left of her own biotic energy into tossing Jack forward. Jack flew through the air, charging one of her fists.

From her cockpit, Lyra glanced at the readouts. Her armor was severely damaged and continuing to corrode. She had lost both arms and the internal systems were failing. Then she looked up to see a human flying toward her.

The human rammed her fist into Lyra’s suit, just below where Lyra’s glass was. The metal should have hold, but in its weakened state, the human was able to punch through, pushing her hands into the metal and tearing it open, peeling back the Equestrian steel to reveal the pony inside the suit.

With a sudden jerk, the human pulled, and the force shattered Lyra’s glass canopy. She covered her eyes, but then saw herself looking into the face of an human clad in grayish soft-armor.

To her credit, the human mare did not hesitate. She slammed both fists into Lyra’s interface, overloading the systems with her own magic. The sudden surge of magic caused Lyra to lose her connection, and her suit lost power, dropping first to its knees and then falling backward.

Lyra braced herself she fell to the ground, and opened her eye to stare up at the human and the red sky. The human pulled back her glowing fist, and Lyra understood that this would be the last thing she would ever see. Strangely, she did not feel afraid. It was a day she had been waiting for, waiting for so long.

“Go ahead, human,” she said. “You’ve won, and you have the right to take your prize. Kill me.”

Jack held her fist over the pony for a moment, looking down and realizing just how small it was beneath all that armor.

“Wait!” cried Starlight, drifting through the air to Jack’s side, floating under her own power. “Please, Jack! You can’t kill her!”

“Yes I can,” said Jack, looking down at the teal face beneath her. A face not unlike Starlight’s, except with severe scarring on the right side that rendered this pony soldier half-blind. “You know she deserves it.”

“I do,” said Lyra. “If I had won, I would do the same to you.”

“No,” said Starlight, dropping to the ground. “She’s a pony, like me!”

“And do you think I haven’t killed humans, Star? What she is doesn’t matter.”

“But you’ve defeated her! There’s no need to kill, Jack!”

“There is always a need to kill.” Jack raised her fist, and the teal pony closed her eyes.

“Do you want to see her face in your dreams, too?”

Jack froze. She looked down at the pony, and knew that Starlight was right. For just a moment, she was reminded of a similar situation, when someone else had told her that there was a better way, back on Pragia.

“You know,” said Jack, lowering her fist. “I hate paragons. I really do.”

Lyra opened her eyes and, seeing Jack look away, pulled one of her hoofs out of its housing. The metal shifted, producing a blade, and she lunged at the human’s throat.

Jack dodged the blade easily and grasped Lyra’s hoof. “I gave you a chance, didn’t I?” she said. Then, with one swift motion, she pulled it free of Lyra’s body.

Lyra screamed in agony as her foreleg was removed, the wires and gears that connected it to her body splattering across her damaged exoskeleton. With her remaining leg, Lyra grasped the now empty metal joint, writhing in pain.

“My leg! Oh CELESTIA why does it hurt so much?! You motherbucker!”

“What did you do?” cried Fenock, running up to the side of the fallen armor and climbing to the side.

Jack looked at the still twitching hoof in her hand, turning it over. “What the hell?”

Fenok looked down at Lyra. “Hold still, pony,” he said. “I am going to administer some anesthetic.” He quickly lifted his hand, and then swiftly struck Lyra directly over her horn. Lyra’s eyes widened and her body twitched, and then she went limp.

“Fenok!” cried Starlight, putting her hoofs over her mouth.

“She’s just asleep,” he said. “Probably.”

“And what about Sjdath?” said Jack, flopping down exhausted on the defeated armor.

“I’m right here,” said an even more tired and disgruntled voice. Starlight and Jack both turned to see Sjdath limping toward them. The wounds in her chest were still visible, but they had mostly been healed- -and in addition, her body armor was already growing thicker and becoming increasingly mottled. “Damn…I hate getting shot.”

“If you had been a human, you’d be dead.”

“If I were a human, I’d probably have killed myself years ago.”

Zedok approached them as well, lugging Si’y, who was still clinging to his excessively large gun.

“This stuff better not be hanar blood,” she said, looking at the fluid that was saturating her with a look of disgust.

“It is the water lining of this one’s suit,” said Si’y, weakly. “With a small portion of blood, however. Indeed that is true. This one...hurts.”

A distorted voice crackled through Sjdath’s omnitool. She lifted her hand- -somewhat painfully- -and opened the channel.

“Armchair?” she said. “I really hope you are having more success than we are.”

“No,” said Armchair, his usual cheerfulness replaced with an ominous monotone. “The enemy ship has been badly damaged, but so have we. Systems are failing. We are not even sure which ones.”

“You can’t defeat them?” said Starlight.

“No. We do not have adequate processing power to ensure victory. We do not have enough geth.” Armchair paused, as if thinking. “We have generated a solution. We need you to return immediately.”

“What?!” said Sjdath. “First you send us down here, and now you want us back?! You are aware the Mako doesn’t have that much power?” She turned to the crater where it had been. “And…well…it kind of blew up.”

“It’s not a problem,” said Starlight. “I will move us.”

“Move us?” said Sjdath. “What is that even supposed to mean? You want to lift us all into space with your biotics? Because I would rather get back in there with THREE Shepards than try a fool thing like that.”

“No,” said Starlight, smiling. “You misunderstand.”

She lifted her horn and charged it with blue light. Space around her distorted, forming a sphere around the others and around Lyra, just like the shield spell she had used before- -except this time, she collapsed it inward, pulling space itself around them as she saw fit.

With a sudden surge of energy and a loud electrical pop, the teleportation spell engaged, and the group was gone from the planet’s surface.

Far above, Scootaloo stared out her ship’s frontal window at her enemy. The window itself was cracked and hissed as the air escaped into space. The ship floating outside was in horrible condition; its surface was cracked, broken and burned, and it appeared to be adrift. A few small fires could be seen through its windows even with over a kilometer between them.

According to the diagnostic screens, though, Scootaloo’s ship was not in much better shape.

“We’ve just lost pressure in the rear section,” said Carrot Top, her own screen flickering as the ship began to lose power. “We’ve lost connection to the ball turret, too.”

“Rose, position the frontal cannon.”

“Engines are not responding,” said Roseluck, looking back. “And we don’t have enough power left to fire the cannon anyway.”

Gravity fluctuated slight, and Scootaloo winced. The two vessels had fought to a stalemate, and now drifted in orbit of the red-brown planet below them. Both were too damaged to continue fighting; from what the scans showed, the enemy ship’s weapons had either been destroyed or depleted their supply of ammunition. As far as Scootaloo knew, though, its engines were still functional.

Scootaloo tapped her flickering interface and linked a channel to the engine room.

“Bengie,” she said, hurriedly. “I need more power!”

In the decks below, Bengie put her paw to the comlink in her ear and spoke over the noise of the engine. “I can’t give it to you, Captain! She can’t take much more!”

“Then reroute all systems to the engines,” said Scootaloo, her voice crackling over the failing communication line. “Weapons, shields, gravity, engines, life-support! Cut it all, and give it to the engines!”

“Captain, it might still not be enough. She’s on the verge of flatlining already!””

“It has to be!”

The communication closed with an angry click, and Bengie looked to Muffins who, now covered in soot, was doing her best to help with the failing central core. Muffins looked as worried as Bengie felt, and Bengie turned her attention to the liquid-filled glass tube that occupied the center of the room. The yellow fluid was glowing blue with magic, but it was now also tinted with red. The Core inside was dying. Blood was seeping from her eyes, ears, and from between her legs as she grimaced in pain, pouring out what little magic she had just to keep the ship together.

Bengie was actually surprised that Trixie had lasted as long as she had. Bengie had studied Core-interface engines for years, and she had seen hundreds of models, designs, and customizations. She probably knew more about them than most pony engineers aboard flagship vessels. In her time, she had seen many powerful Cores- -and this was not one of them. Trixie was barely enough to power a minor interstellar freighter, let alone a deep space vessel in the midst of battle.

What was truly amazing, though, was how long she had lasted. Stronger Cores would have given out already, but Trixie refused to. Bengie knew what that meant. It meant that she was not simply part of the system. In there, somewhere, she was truly trying, giving it everything she had.

Bengie turned to Muffins. “You heard the Captain! We need to jump the primary conduits! I need a spanner- -a SPANNER this time, not a wrench! Go!”

Muffins hurried off through the rumbling, overheated machinery in search of the worn tools. As she did, an alarm called Bengie’s attention. Trixie’s heart had momentarily stopped again, and the gravity in the ship fluctuated. Bengie expertly activated the necessitation system, bringing the Core back from the brink, if only for a little longer.

“Damn it,” she said, looking up at the pained unicorn in the fluid, her blue light returning. “You just won’t give up on us, will you?” She looked down at the controls, trying her best to optimize a weak core in an obsolete ship. “Maybe you really are a pony after all.”

“Captain,” said Carrot Top, turning toward her controls. “I just saw something.”

“Specifics, Carrot?”

“I don’t know, it looked like- -”

“It was a teleportation signature,” said Roseluck.

Scootaloo’s eyes widened. “You don’t mean- -”

She did not have time to finish pondering the imlications of what a teleportation spell meant. She could see on her screen that the Core was indeed on the enemy ship, and watched as the damaged vessel suddenly turned in space and broke orbit, fleeing as rapidly as it could.

“No you don’t!” cried Scootaloo. “Rose, don’t let them get away!”

“Let’s hope the engines hold,” said Roseluck. She entered the manual coordinates, and the Rainbow Dash did indeed turn.

“What about Lyra?” asked Carrot.

“We can come back for her! If we lose them now, we’ll never catch up!”

The ship shook and convulsed as it accelerated. Gravity failed, and the lights flickered and went out, leaving the bridge in near-darkness lit only by the light of the stars outside and by the glowing of the control projections.

The scenery outside shifted until the escaping vessel was in the exact center. It’s engines were functional, but it was limping. Scootaloo’s ship was gaining, but not by much.

“Come on, Trixie,” said Scootaloo under her breath. “Come on, just a little bit more…”

“Captain,” said Carrot Top. “I’m detecting something really weird on the front scanners!”

“I see it,” said Scootaloo, looking at her own readings. She froze for just a moment, and then looked out the window. “What in Tartarus is that thing?”

In the far distance, an object appeared to be growing closer. It was a tremendously, long object the size of a space station or even a small moon. From the readings and even visually Scootaloo could tell that it was mare-made, and that it was some kind of machine. Two long prongs stuck out to one end, and a bluish gyroscope swirled in the center.

“We’re getting some real weird magical readings off that thing,” said Roseluck, sounding nervous. “Captain?”

“KEEP GOING!”

“Alright,” said Rose, pushing her controls to their maximum as the ship shuddered and convulsed in attempt to keep up. “Let’s hope today isn’t the day my luck runs out…”

“I don’t get it,” said Scootaloo, mostly to herself. “Do they think they can hide in that thing? Or near it?”

“What even is it?” said Carrot. “It looks…it just looks wrong…”

Their question quickly answered itself. Just as they were finally within range to overtake the enemy ship, it flew into the center of the moon-sized station.

“Detecting magical field on the order of- -PULLING UP!” shouted Roseluck

“No!” cried Scootaloo. “Follow them- -”

Something in the station suddenly changed. The massive gyroscope suddenly ran faster, and the enemy ship accelerated between the two rails, appearing to stretch from the sudden burst of speed- -and then in a blinding flash, it was fired out the end of the device, vanishing.

“Follow them!” cried Scootaloo.

“We can’t!” shouted Roseluck back. “We have no idea how that thing works! If we try to go in blind, a magic field that powerful could tear us to neutrons! I think they teleported, but there’s no way- -”

“Can you calculate where they went?”

“Y…yes, but I don’t- -”

“Just do it!”

Scootaloo opened several more holographic projections and began typing madly on them.

“Captain, what are you doing?”

“I’m authorizing an emergency tactical teleport,” said Scootaloo.

“Teleport- -but you don’t have the authorization for that! It would take months for you to get approval!”

“Yeah, I know,” said Scootaloo, opening several channels that led back to Equestria. “But the Fleet Commander can order one whenever she wants…”

“You can’t be serious!” Roseluck turned to Carrot, and then back to Scootaloo.

“‘Wonderbolt12345’…enter…” Scootaloo leaned back, smiling nervously, knowing that she had probably just ruined her career. “Authorization accepted. Teleport inbound.”

The bridge was suddenly filled with pure white light as Celestia herself reached across the cosmos, taking their ship into the glow of her infinite magic. A force of magic billions of times stronger than any unicorn who had ever lived surrounded them, and Scootalooo felt the characteristic hum of space distorting. She gripped her seat, feeling the hair all over her body stand on end.

“Brace for teleportation,” she said, closing her eyes. This process had never in recorded history failed, but it terrified Scootaloo every single time.

Space around them suddenly detonated with white light, and then imploded around them. There was a brief moment- -an infinitesimal fraction of a second- -where Scootaloo was aware that they were not in any particular location, but rather nowhere at all and somehow everywhere at once.

Then they burst into a new area with a resounding pop, their ship still moving as it emerged from the void. The two-pronged station was gone, and the stars had changed. Scootaloo felt disoriented and confused, but did her best to focus.

Outside, she could see the enemy ship. It was not even trying to escape; it had just stopped.

“There they are! Prepare to open fire!”

“Um…Captain…” said Roseluck, weakly.

“What is…it…” Scootaloo looked up, and realized that there was no longer just one ship. There were now hundreds of silvery, insect-like starships floating throughout space, surrounding them on all sides.

“Oop!” said Carrot, her arm beeping. She extended her foreleg and summoned the interface for the alien device that was implanted inside her. “I just got an update! Hmm…what do you think ‘Perseus Veil’ means?”