Chapter 4 – Back to Outer Space

It was about time; he thought the two would have never met. With Discord thinking there were only four Princess Ponies in Equestria at the time he teamed up with Tirek, it kept Princess Riida safe from persecution at the time, but now, the two of them had officially met. And with Discord's best impression of an open-mouthed fish. The fact that Discord's mouth had actually hit the ground when he saw Riida for the first time probably put him on her good list, a list Blade would have wanted the draconequus to be on instead of another of the shapeshifted Shimmer's lists. "So, you wish to attempt to use some of our tech to attempt to reach out to a possibly chased spacecraft being piloted by one of Rainbow Dash's old friends from the Genesis Ark?" the now alicorn asked the draconequus.

"If I'm right, then I can get a dead accurate first attempt with this message." Discord responded, and with that, he turned, causing a target to appear, and pointed one of his tiger claws at it like a pistol, and with a jerk of his elbow, a scorch mark appeared dead center. He then blew the smoke from his claw to accentuate the shot.

"Are you sure you can make a shot at the distance required?" Spiral Chain asked, and then turned, "I think Breeze shout make the shot."

"Me?" the unicorn asked, "I haven't made a long shot like that since I beat you in that exam that one time!"

"Very descriptive!" Spiral said in disdain, "But you still made the shot on your first try remember? Yes, it took me several extra seconds to make the same shot, but you made it without really thinking about it, plus there won't be any falloff with this."

Discord let his face fall, "But this is my idea!" he complained.

"And a great idea it is." Riida said to him, "However, I do believe Breeze has much more experience than you do firing a weapon."

"I still wanted to shoot it." Discord mumbled to himself and grabbed a few things from the burlap sack, and with a bit of his magic, and a snap of his paw, he created a device that looked like a long rifle that ended in a small dish. On the top was a small box-shaped scope, and the entire thing looked like it was made of scrap parts and below it, he plugged the EX40 in like a clip.

"Are you sure this will make the shot?" Breeze asked as the draconequus handed it to him.

"She may not look like much but she's seen her fair share of delivered messages." Discord said, somehow dressed in a green army outfit.

"Famous last words!" Breeze said to himself, and lifted the device, placing his eye against the scope. He moved the sight across the sky, "I can't see past the sky." he said, and Discord reached to the scope to twist a dial, Breeze whistled as his vision zoomed into outer space, "Nice scope!"

With another snap of his paw, Discord produced a set of red visors that he placed to his eyes. The two stayed silent for a while, until Discord spoke up, "I see him!" he said.

"Point me at him." Breeze said almost automatically, and without him knowing, the area around him changed, they were now on top of what looked like a castle battalion, and he was garbed in grey camouflage.

"Third star on your left, up twenty degrees." his partner said, and Breeze adjusted his angle.

"Third star...third star!" the pony spoke to himself, "Wait!" and used his hoof to spin the dial and zoom in again, "I got the target in sight, and there's his receiver!"

"Director, this is Paper Boy Team One, we've got visual on the target, permission to take the shot?" Discord said into an old-fashioned walkie talkie.

The rest of them looked as if they had been formed into a military team; Rarity, Blade, Applejack, and Rainbow Dash as guards around both Riida and Spiral Chain as the two in charge. Pinkie and the others were placed in front of computers. Riida reached her hoof forward and pressed a button, "Permission granted, good luck!" she said.

"You heard her, take the shot." Discord said, and Breeze moved ever so slightly until he pulled what he thought was the trigger. The green beam of light shot forward, and almost instantly hit the disk on the ship.

"Got him!" Breeze called out and dropped the scope from his eye, only to realize the scenery Discord had placed them all in.

Discord smiled, at him, "Nice shot kid!" he said, and snapped, everything going back to normal.

"That…was…kinda…" Rainbow started saying as she tried to rearrange her thoughts.

"Fun!" Riida suddenly said.

"FUN?" Spiral Chain asked in shock.

"Yes, I enjoy playing games such as this." the alicorn repeated.

"Oh really?" Discord asked his interest piqued.

Breeze quickly grabbed the EX40 from the bottom and tried to switch it on.

"Use your magic Breeze." Blade suddenly said, "Trust me."

With a simple bit of concentration, the unicorn powered the device. The group watched the screen, waiting until a response came in. "I'm gonna be coming in hot!" Tusks' voice said over the device.

"He got the message!" Rainbow Dash called out in excitement.

As the group cheered, Breeze turned to Discord, "What did I tell you!" the draconequus said as he patted the gun in his paw, and when he let go, it disappeared, "She never fails!"

"Thanks for letting me use her, and you're right." he said, "Don't ever let her get dirty!"

The two of them smiled and began to laugh as Rainbow Dash grabbed Breeze by his hooves and flew him in a circle in her joy. "I get to see Tusks again; I get to see Tusks again!"

It took several hours of waiting. Rainbow Dash continuously made an effort to keep the sky both clear and use the clouds to her advantage. She would shape some of them into arrows or signs that for some reason she wouldn't be satisfied with and reshape them or just disperse them entirely with a kick and go to grab another one that might drift in on the wind.

When the ship came in, it burned a hot white as it entered in. The fire spreading around the hull as he descended to the surface of the planet. Rainbow looked up as she was finishing up one of the arrows she was working on, "There he is!" she said, and darted to the ground, causing a Sonic Rainboom as she did.

"Was that necessary?" Breeze asked as she landed.

"I couldn't help it, I haven't seen him in so long!" she admitted, "And the first thing we're going to do is race!" She was so sure of that, and her coltfriend knew it. "You'll join in too, right?" she quickly asked, "The more racers, the better the race!"

Before he could answer, the wind from the ship picked up. Dust and grass being kicked up from the pressure of the ship as Tusks' set his ship down gently. It looked flat in the front but bulged in a multisided shape while the sides curved in an almost round fashion up to the back, a large flat angled space that looked as if it were made of vents. The top made from what looked like a hot orange metal, while the now scorched bottom looked the color of dark grey mixed with a deep-sea green. The spots of what could only be described as the heat shield were a cream white and looked to be slowly growing back. "HOW IS THAT THING SPACE WORTHY?" Blade suddenly shouted just before the door opened along the side of the bottom.

From out of the ship came a pig-faced man, green skin adorned his body where you could see it, but something was different about him, instead of having a straight blue mohawk, his hair had grown a bit, and it was now colored exactly like Rainbow Dash's mane. He sported a thick brown leather flight jacket with long black pants made from thick material, and his hooves were more than twice the size of Rainbow's hooves. His hands planted firmly on his hips and a broad smile with a small pair of tusks poked out from his bottom lip. The tusks themselves were no thicker than a fang on one of Fluttershy's wolf friends. "Tusks?" Rainbow Dash asked as she tried to put her memory of him to the current him.

"Nice to see I'm remembered by the {snort} Fasted on the Genesis Ark!" the alien said.

She remembered the voice, it matched the one she remembered perfectly, "TUSKS!" the rainbow pegasus shouted and raced to him. Tusks instantly opened his arms, and let her slam into his chest, knocking him over as they embraced like old friends.

"I guess you're really excited to see him huh?" Breeze said as he appeared silently beside them, a ring of dust being pushed away from his hooves.

"Sorry if I'm taking your cuddle time!" Tusks suddenly said as he turned to the pony. Then lifted an eyebrow, "Wait…is that really you?"

"You can skip the number, I'm Cosmic Breeze now!" Breeze said with a glare that said not to repeat it.

"And I'm known as Galaxy Blade." they heard from the ramp to the ship, and again, he saw a pony, the dark-colored pegasus wearing an exact copy of the coat he remembered seeing on another of his classmates.

"Wait…how?" Tusks asked, and then with a squeal from his throat, started to worry, "Wait, is this a side effect of this planet's atmosphere?"

"No!" Rainbow Dash said quickly, "It's not. It's… hard to explain."

"We'll fill you in later, but for now; why are you here Tusks? And why did you change your hair?" Blade asked, his face once again stern.