As soon as Twilight said 'Pinkie', Praeratus went for the door. Usually he would have done so in a normal way, but he was so furious that his stomps shook the observatory, which wasn't the smartest thing to do since it was now riddled with bullet holes and therefore in danger of collapsing and falling to the city below. Praeratus didn't care though; somebody nearly killed the leaders of two countries with his car. A car that the pink pony shouldn't have been able to open for the simple fact that she wasn't him.

In another instance he would had just jumped out of the observatory with a psionic charge and land near the Wedge, but he didn't want to bring down the tower (even a stomping, two hundred-kilogram storming out of the place might had the same effect,) with the others still inside.

“Praeratus where are you going?” Asked Celestia with the other a bit far behind, practically running behind Praeratus down the tower due to his stature and legs making him walk faster than them by a fair amount.

“To teach that pink girl a lesson about touching touching my stuff and nearly getting you killed.” He said without even turning his head while cracking his knucles at the same time. Twilight, hearing this, did what she did best.

“No!” Screamed the purple alicorn, flying and landing in front of Praeratus, who stopped. “Please dont' do it!”

“Do what? Do you even have an idea of what I may do to her?” He asked. Seeing her shake her head, he continued. “Besides, I didn't plan on killing her.”

“Really?” Said Twilight with a hopeful smile.

“Yes, I'll just beat the life out of her to make clear what will happen if she does it again.” He said before restarting his march, leaving a wide-eyed Twilight behind.

And then Celestia did the very same thing.

“What now!?” Screamed Praeratus, now angry.

“Praeratus you can't do that!” Said Celestia.

“Why not!?”

“Because it would be wrong!”

“'Because it would wrong'!?” Repeated the xeno-hunter. “Haven't you realized that you haven't been turned into a flour sifter by sheer luck!? No, forget that, there wouldn't be nothing left of you except a pair of legs and a gory stain in the ceiling!” He ranted, knowing very well the effects of an 4-inch round going at a speed of 3 kilometers per second hitting a body. Energy weapons left either burnt bodies or ashes, and melt through armor like butter, but kinetics were much more grisly and hit shields like freightrains, although just like energies that was mostly for space battles. Inside the atmosphere of a world, weapons' roles were slightly iffier since bullets could pierce armor better thab flesh-burning lasers, but for the most part followed the rule of 'Energy for armor, kinetics for shielding' that naval weapons had.

“Yes, we could have died, and what she did was wrong, but still, that doesn't give you the right to brutalize one of my ponies!” Replied Celestia.

Praeratus grabbed her by the shoulders with care and looked at her straight in the eyes.

“Celestia, she's a goddamn, adult in her twenties, not a baby nor a kid, I already you that before in the throne room. She has to be accounted for what she did.”

“Please Praeratus, she probably was just trying to see what was inside, she's a curious mare.”

“And because of that you, Luna, Novo, Twilight and Neighsay could have died, and for you it would have been permanent; even if your body stayed intact, the Med-Pod only works once.” Technically he was wrong and right at the same time: wrong because the pod could revive a dead body as long as the head was whole, and right because after two or three times of coming back to life the user ended up addicted to it, wanting nothing more to use the thing time and time again until they become irreversibly insane... and then, dead. “And there's another thing: how the frack did she get inside my car. There's no way that a pony could force their way in.” He said in a much calmer tone before resuming his march in an slower pace.

Celestia, seeing that he had calmed donw a bit by talking to her, had an idea to save Pinkie Pie's life, or at least not put her in Canterlot's Hospital Intensive Care Unit. Since she knew she couldn't talk him out of it, and that to fight him would be a 'bad idea' to put it simply, she decided to calm him down by talking. If she kept stalling him by talking, he might calm down further to a point that he won't want to brutalize the Element of Laughter, just threaten her and scare her to deaht, which despite her still not liking it was a much better alternative than actual death or being beaten to a pulp by a super strong alien soldier.

“Well, earth ponies are the strongest breed of ponies.” Said Celestia while walking next to Praeratus.

“I'm pretty sure that not even the strongest zoklap would be able to rip the doors, and for your information zoklaps are on average twice as tall and thrice as strong than therawyrms, and we in turn are stronger than most other races whose maximum height never surpasses eight feet without acromegaly.” Said Praeratus.

“Acromegaly?” Twilight asked from behind them, having never heard of that word before.

'It's working!' Thought Celestia triumphantly

“Unnatural height for an species, like an eight feet tall therawyrm, due to an excessive production of growth hormones by the anterior lobe of the pituitary gland after the growth plates have closed. Basically being too tall for an individual of your species, but without the strength to support your body. It's also called gigantism by most non-physicians.”

“Do you think I have gigantism?” Asked Celestia, and this time it wasn't just to make him calmer, she really wanted to know. Being much taller than most of your subjects helped your image of being a motherly monarch, but sometimes (mostly when she had to get inside houses with ceilings made for much shorter ponies) she wished to be shorter.

“Nah, you're average at best compared to medium-sized species, and I doubt you weight more than a hundred pounds.” Said Praeratus in a nonlachant tone, earning a huff from a now blushing alabaster princess and laughs from the other monarchs. He didn't know it, but she actually weighed a hundred and thirty pounds; and since her own sister, who was only half a head shorter, did indeed weigh only a hundred pounds, she felt ashamed. Oh well, at least it seemed like Praeratus had finally let go of his intent to 'punish' Pinkie Pie. “That said, given the gravity of Equus you guys should be much taller and thinner than me. Think of yourselves like Discord, nine feet tall yet barely wider than you already are.”

“Why would we be like that?” Quizzed Neighsay.

“Gravity. The stronger it is, the shorter and stouter a lifeform becomes, and the inverse is true, with lower gravity worlds having tall yet thin wildlife and flora thanks to the reduced strain. ” Explained Praeratus. They had already walked down the tower, and were now walking through the corridos that would lead them to the gates to the castle. While in the way they were greeted by the palace's staff and guards, whose smiling faces turned into expressions of fear or scowls of disgust when they saw Praeratus... and got terrified when Praeratus glared back at them.

She didn't understand what got them so spooked. Sure, Praeratus was quite intimidating thanks to his appearance and sheer size, but she knew that he wouldn't attack without a good reason.

And then she saw something in her mind that explained their attitude.

It was like one of those 'imagination spots' many ponies had, her included, but this one showed images of filth-covered ponies living in ramshackled huts and either fighting each other for no apparent reason and screaming in an incoherent language, or watching in wonder and despair as spaceships of all kinds and shapes flied over their huts and around a kilometrical skyscraper hovering in the air well above the ground... before a giant ship, resembling one of those Celestia had seen on that 'documentary', aimed a giant cannon attached to its underbelly to the village and obliterated it. It was obvious what it meant: Praeratus made them think that he saw equestrians as primitive, brutish and utterly defenseless.

Luna and the others didn't receive those telepathic images, and so kept talking among themselves, but Celestia, who thought she had finally calmed the xeno-hunter down with her tactic of talking, had received them too.

“Praeratus.” She said to the therawyrm in a serious tone. “I saw that.”

'And I heard what they thought about me, thinking of me as a damn savage monster that shouldn't be here.' He said in her mind, clearly angry at what they had thought about him. 'I simply showed those pricks what I MIGHT think of their species. You know I don't really think of you like that, but they don't, and maybe they'll try and not think when a psionic they don't like and who in turn likes them even less is near them. '

'That doesn't mean !'

'Girl, there is simply no way for you to make me let a bunch of primitive morons that do not even have cars get away from insulting me without consequences.' He said in a tone that made clear he wouldn't speak more.

Celestia sighed, but didn't press the topic further. Even though Praeratus had a point, that didn't mean he could go inside her ponies' minds and scare them with fake visions that depicted them as savage beasts without a hope of advance.

Eventually the group reached the gates of the castle... and saw something that would have made them laugh, but Praeratus growling made them think against it.

As it turned out, it wasn't Pinkie Pie who breached inside the Wedge and fired the machine gun, but Discord. Said draconequus was freaking out inside said vehicle because Cyranus, who somehow had been reduced in size to be barely bigger than a stallion, had turned it upside down. Said gorgonops was roaring at him from outside and trying to get inside to no avail and pushing the car around at the same time, with Fluttershy trying fruitlessly to pull the smaller yet still powerful gorgonops away and the others watching on, either not realizing or not caring what would happen to Discord if Cyranus managed to get inside the Wedge.

Without even saying a word, Praeratus marched towards the conmotion, and when he was at a short distance he shouted.

“Cyranus, come here!”

The gorgonops stopped to attack the Wedge and trotted to his owner, with Fluttershy still holding onto him.

'What the frack happened to you boy?' Thought the xeno-hunter, slapping himself to make sure that, yes, Cyranus had been shrinked

Praeratus, petting the now dog-sized gorgonops, turned to Fluttershy.

“What the hell happened.” He asked, and it was clear by the glare he was giving her and the tone of his voice that a simple 'It's complicated' wouldn't suffice.

“W-well, as you know, when you told us to leave you guys alone, Cyranus dragged Discord away when he threw a fit for not being invited.” Stuttered the yellow pegasus. The others, including random citizens of the city had noticed the presence of Praeratus and the group and promptly bowed, although it was obvious they were scared or angry at Praeratus' presence.

“Continue.”

“Naturally, Discord didn't like that at all, so he decided to teach him a lesson.” Fluttershy explained, whispering this last part. A normal pony wouldn't have been able to hear her, but when you are a super soldier hardened in a thousand battles, your hearing ends up so damn good that you are able to hear a tiny insect flying several decameters away, and even if Praeratus hadn't had that, he was still a purple psionic and could have just probed her brain to get the information without raising any suspicions.

“And why, may I ask, is Discord hiding in my overturned car?”

“Well” Said another voice behind Fluttershy. Therawyrm and pegasus turned to see Rarity and the others approaching them.”, Cyranus didn't take well being shrunken, since he inmediatly chased Discord around Canterlot before teleporting inside your vehicle and activating the weapon. For some reason he can't get out by teleporting again.”

'Weird. Celestia could use her magic' Thought Praeratus before shaking his head and walking towards the overturned vehicle and turning it right with his psionics, after which he opened a door. The draconequus didn't waste time in getting out.

“Thank you Praera-” He had barely open his mouth when Praeratus grabbed his neck and slammed his head on the hood of the Wedge. The locals, mouths agape and eyes widened at this, didn't even move.

“Change him back.” He said, referring to the shrunken Cyranus. “Now.”

“Hey!” Complained Discord after recovering from the daze of being slammed on a metallic surface, feeling brave even with his neck on the line. Literally. “It's his fault that he's like that, biting me like a chew toy and dragging me out like I were a mere sack of potatoes!”

“I don't care who started it, but you were the one who did that to him, and if you don't fix it, I'll shrink you, and believe me, it would be quite different to doing it with magic.” The tone on Praeratus' voice and the way he was glaring at the draconequus made clear he was serious, and neither Discord nor the others wanted to know how could Praeratus do that.

Discord had powerful thanks to his magic, and unlike previous threats to Equestria like Chrysalis or Lord Tirek, that magic was his own and didn't come from outside sources; Sombra had powerful too, but it was dark magic, magic Discord refused to mess with, and even then he preferred brute force whereas Discord would rather mess with others. He could do a lot of things with it: mess with the planet, turn a mosquito into an Ursa Major-sized freak, move the Sun and the Moon at the same time, shrink a bull-sized predator to a more 'manageable' size (although he wanted to make Cyranus as small as Fluttershy's rabbit Angel; somehow not only was he size of a big mastiff, he was still strong enough to overturn a large metal carriage). He was also pretty old, so old he didn't keept count,

But he had seen what Praeratus could do; namely, lift an entire horde of manticores, bugbears, cockatrices and hydras and turn them to ice statues, kill an Ursa Major by throwing a house at it, and wrestle, and eventually kill, a magic-proof, practically invincible monster that annihilated the Royal Army and nearly killed Celestia. And just like that monster, magic was useless against him. Heck, just having physical contact with him rendered magic useless: Discord would have snapped his fingers to get away from the irate alien, but a combination of a lack of air and Praeratus' hand grabbing his neck stopped him from doing so.

Not wanting to find out, Discord restored the gorgonops to his original size. Fluttershy found herself dangling from the neck of the now huge Cyranus, who was sitting like a dog and therefore was taller than the tiny pegasus.

“Done, now what?” Discord asked in a bored tone, thinking that Praeratus simply got angry because he made his 'dog' smaller. After all, he didn't even hur him!

How naive he was.

“This.” With that Praeratus opened the door of his car, put Discord's head in the opening, and began to close the door with his head in the middle.

“DISCORD!” Screamed Fluttershy, watching in horror as Praeratus brutalized the draconequus she had spent a lot of time in redeeming, which paid off when Tirek betrayed him. The others, despite being Discord's friends too, didn't even move from where they were: most were utterly terrifed of Praeratus's disproportionate punishment (they didn't know where the bullets hit) and the fact that Discord, who was the Spirit of Chaos and arguably the most powerful creature in Equestria, was utterly helpless against it. Luna, Novo and Neighsay, while also scared, knew that it was a struck of luck that Discord antic's hadn't killed them, although they didn't think he deserved THAT. Celestia, who would have been the most furious and outspoken if it had been done by another creature, stayed silent.

After slamming the door on the draconequus' head for an entire half minute, Praeratus grabbed lifted Discord and threw him rather harshly to the ground. The Spirit of Chaos shakily stood up, allowing the Elements, the royalty, the children and the ponies of Canterlot to see the beaten Discord. While it was much tamer than they thought, the state he was in was still quite disturbing

Discord's entire head had swollen, with his two eyes turned black and a small trickle of blood coming from his mouth and left ear, and his remaining fang was nowhere to be seen. Given how strong Praeratus was this was a much better outcome than a bloody smear on the ground and a headless corpse, but they had never seen the usually happy and confident (and sometimes overconfident) Spirit of Chaos look like he lost a boxing match with a minotaur or a yak.

“Mommy I don't wanna feed the horse, it's gonna poop some more.” Mumbled Discord before falling to the ground in a heap, with Fluttershy practically jumping to his aid. Fluttershy looked up at Praeratus and went from horrified and sad to furious, standing up as fast as she could and glaring up at him.

“WHY DID YOU DO THAT!?” She screamed at the top of her lungs to the alien. In another instance she would have refused to even speak for fear of her life, but she refused to let the alien get away with nearly killing her friend. She inmediatly regretted it when Praeratus looked down at her and reminded her that he could simply slap her head off (which, given how fragile pegasi were even for ponies, and that Praeratus was exceptionally strong, was a strong possibility), or worse.

Which is why him grabbing her shoulders, turning her around and making her look up surprised her.

“See that?” Asked Praeratus while pointing to an observatory in the palace. Even at that distance Fluttershy and the others could see it was covered in holes and looking like it could collapse in any moment. “We were talking about what to do when your friend Dildord the freak of nature fired the machine gun of my Wedge, which so that you know is a weapon that can kill anything on this planet. And he aimed it at us.” He said that in a calm tone, but it was obvious for everypony present he was angry.

And he was, to put it mildly. Not only the rulers of the country, an important figurehad and the ruler of another could have died due to the stupidity of an idiot, said idiot had messed with his friend and actually thought (literally, he probed Discords' mind before beating him) he could get away with it! And Fluttersy had the gal to think of him as a monster! His punishment of Discord was brutal, but the goat-like fracker shouldn't have pissed off his friend nor touched something that looked dangerous and that nearly killed Celestia and the others!

Still, he got easy, since instead of just smashing his head he wanted to break his back, but there were children in there, and as much as he disliked to acknowledge it Discord didn't deserve to die just for touching what he shouldn't had. Of course, that didn't mean he could get away scot-free after what he did. If Discord had been a soldier of the military, he would have been physically punished (garrisons flogged, assault armies did the same but with scourges, and the Navy spaced for five seconds; most considered the naval punishment the worse of the three) and dishonorably discharged. But he wasn't a soldier, he was technically a civilian.

The Element of Kindness looked down to avert the therawyrm's gaze, partly because of the shame for not realizing that Praeratus had a very good excuse for what he did, but also in fear because she simply wasn't used to being stared down, since usually she was the one who did that.

“Hey!” Screamed a familiar tomboy voice in the same obnoxious tone. Praeratus barely turned his head to look at the annoying blue horse, who was still in casts. “He may be an idiot, but he's our idiot!” Oh well, at least she didn't scream at him for some stupid reason. “And you have to fix this!” She said, while motioning to her her casted wings and her body.

“Why.”

“Because you did this to me!” Screamed Rainbow Dash.

“THAT'S WHAT WHAT YOU GET FOR ATTACKING A FRACKING VETERAN, BITCH!” Roared Praeratus, his shout echoing throughout Canterlot like thunder. He then stomped towards her, teeth bared and eyes glowing violet. “That's it.”

Rainbow Dash, still covering her ears, went from angry to terrified when she saw the 7 feet tall, dragon-like alien going straight at her with murder in his eyes, and given what they all saw him do, it could be more than just an expression. Twilight, Fluttershy and the rest, including Skystar, the CMC and Spike, shook off their fear and made a semicircle in front of their friend, trying to look angry and determined and yet utterly failing at hiding their fear when it was obvious that Praeratus wasn't stopping.

And then Praeratus looked down and saw Spike looking at him with fear.

Celestia, Luna, Novo and Neigshay looked on, unsure of what to do. Luna wanted to help her friends, but at the same time, and much to her shame, didn't want to face Praeratus wrath again.

“Say” Began Luna nervously. “, shouldn't we do something about this? I mean, Skystar is with them.” She said to Novo.

“I know, but something tells me that Praeratus will not hurt them.” Replied the hippogriff. “Plus, if he really wanted to, well, do that to them, do you think we could stall him by fighting him, let alone stop him?”

Luna swallowed hard at that; Novo had a point, nothing they could do would work, and angering Praeratus even more would only makes things worse, and the last thing they needed was a furious alien warrior killing them instead of the monsters he was supposed to hunt.

Chancellor Neighsay decided for once to follow the advice of a non-pony.

And Celestia, who was frowning at the scene, was utterly dejected and angry, but not at Praeratus. She had managed to calm him down by talking, and comes Rainbow Dash and makes him angry again. Of course, given the state Discord was after being 'punished', she didn't know if her tactic actually worked.

The sight of the young dragon (the first being on the planet to ask him for help) being scared of him, made Praeratus stop in his tracks and sigh in irritation... and shame.

'Praty, your anger is getting the best of you in a crucial moment' He thought to himself.

'Blame the aliens, not me! They've done nothing but press my buttons!'

'Doesn't mean you have to react like a bomb about to go off! Just scream at them and leave it at that!'

'I'm a veteran of the Hegemony War, remember? In a sense, I AM a bomb! And Discord had it coming, for nearly killing Celestia and making Cyranus as big as a damn dog! No one messes with Cyranus and gets away with it, no one! And if Celestia dies again, nothing would bring her back!'

Just like the previous day, he was so angry he thought outloud and other could heard him. Celestia in particular was taken back by the way he said her name.

'One thing is beating up someone for good reasons, another is nearly crushing their heads for a sad but understandable accident, just like with Twilight. Your're going to end up making them think of you as a hot-tempered brute'

'I don't give a damn what a bunch of stubborn, primitive and stupid technicolor freaks of nature that have done nothing but give me problems think of me as long as they obey and get out of my way when the bioweapons end up coming to kill them all!'

“What did he call-” Started to say Rainbow Dash, angry again, before her friends covered her mouth. They felt insulted too, but they wanted to hear more, and not make him angry again.

“Shush!”

'Not all of them, remember?' Continued Praeratus. 'Twilight has been quite friendly to you you know, her stupidity not withstanding'

The purple alicorn would have frowned hadn't she been busy hearing Praeratus' 'debate'.

'And what about Celestia and Spike? Do you care about what they think of you?'

Praeratus looked down to see Spike, who wasn't looking at him with fear anymore, and then to Celestia, who was staring at him sadly.

Praerauts sighed again. What the hell was happening to him? Since he arrived to Equus he suddenly became easier to anger. Maybe the planet's atmosphere had something to with it, or having been unable to do his job, or something else.

In any case, he couldn't take it out on these aliens.

“You know what?” He said to the group. “I think I got a little carried away by anger.” With that he grabbed the unconscious Discord and laid him inside the Wedge. “You guys coming?”

This time, he did see Celestia's happy smile.

Another chapter.

If what happened to Discord puts you off, I can explain why I did it:
A) As you have seen, Praeratus is not exactly a forgiving guy, much less when he's somewhat right. Plus, Discord did have it coming, althought Praty did take it too far.
B) Makes clear how outmached the natives the Equus are.
C) Just like Celestia and her trauma, Praeratus has problems, only it's about controling his anger.

Thumbs up and faves if you like, and if you see something wrong tell me so I can fix it or change it.