-Time: During Pom’s assault on the train, Location: Far side of the forest, Person: ???-
I slashed at another lizard and sent them flying, then looked up at the airship in the distance for a second. Why were they dropping soldiers over there?
I dodged a blade and then retorted with my sword biting through the armor another lizard lackey. I should not let my guard down, especially not while on a moving machine.
I would make my way over there and see what the situation was, once I’m finished here dealing with one of our stolen machines.
Once I find out what is going on over there, I will continue my quest to find the magic swords. I had better end this problem quickly or else we were all going to be in trouble.
- Edge of the forest next to a lake, present time, Pom-
The train hadn’t finished its transformation, it did that when the fire it released stop coming from the cabin. Said cabin shifted upwards and pulled inwards around the central mass of its torso to look like the sort of chest plate you’d see a knight wearing.
“Pom, Ocellus isn’t looking too hot!” Smolder said while clutching at an awful looking Ocellus as Dodo continued to back away and I was doing the same.
“That thing is causing her pain to even be near, stay with her and see what you can do about freeing the people from those train cars Smolder. Ocellus will be better off a lot further away from it than she currently is. I know that some of them are in the last train car at the back, find out what other cars have villagers in them and get them out of there!” I was about to claim that I’ll take care of that thing, but then I realized how in what world would that happen?! I had my bare hooves and possibly bark blasts for damage, my fluffmancer talents so far were either defensive or utility. That thing was more than twenty feet tall and had several tons on me, what could I possibly do to damage it?! “I’ll… distract it.”
“I be sending Dodo to help as soon as I can.” Shanty offered as she shivered at the sight of the monstrous machine.
“Please do.” I answered back. That’s the best idea we could come up with.
Looking towards this things weakness, what I assume to be the large red round jewel like structure acting as an eye, it was staring back at me through the knight inspired faceplate made from the train’s cowcatcher.
The machine monster started to slowly stomp forward and was slowly picking up speed.
I reluctantly charged forward to meet it. All alone… by myself… what am I thinking?! This thing was going to absolutely kill me!
Despite knowing this, I still kept going forward. All the shockwaves from the various explosions I took over the last hour or so didn’t do my body any favors and I was going to be doing nothing except evasive maneuvers for most of this in the hopes I’d actually survive.
Still raring to go do something stupid for my friends and the people trapped on those train cars.
-Terror Train vs Pom-
Once I was close enough the train tried to stomp down on me with its left block shaped leg as an opening attack, I hopped back once managing to evade the shockwave it cause and then I jumped back again as it dug several furrows in the ground with a single swing of the claws on its right limb.
Swallowing hard, I paid attention to what it was doing now, the left set of claws fanned out and then they started to rotate so fast that they looked like a circular saw. Which thrust it right at me creating powerful winds as it continued forward.
I narrowly rolled forward under the arm onto my back and then rolled onto my side to look at the ground behind me. The spinning claws shred its way through grass and dirt, the wind it was generating also sent everything in its path flying.
That’s why I went under the arm instead of away from it, I would have been buffeted by all that and wouldn’t have been able to...
I heard a whirring and rolled sharply to my left and in the direction of the lake as the other arm stretched out to ram its way into the ground.
I started immediately backing away from it watching the free arm as it swung around send dirt and grass flying in my direction to keep me away from it while it freed itself from the ground.
When the machine’s right arm finally pulled free, I saw that the claws on the right arm had closed together to form into a drill shape and it just made a pretty deep hole.
It was slow to turn towards me, but as it did so it whipped around the spinning saw in a horizontal slash. I leapt over it and after landing from having it pass beneath me, I quickly scrambled backwards as it jabbed at me with the spinning drill again.
So far it seemed simple enough to do… whoa! It seemed slow, but it was actually deceptively fast.
It had turned the spinning saw blades to the right so that the spinning blades edges were pointing towards me as they spun. It proceeded to leap forward and brought the saw down on me vertically stretching the arm out suddenly.
Stumbling to the left I avoided the saw, now I was getting blasted by dirt, grass and rocks blinding me in a vortex of wind come from the spinning blades slowly dragging themselves towards me.
I tried to go to roll out of the sudden cloud of debris, only to hear the spinning drill trying to spear me from the left through the center of the vortex.
I panicked and jumped straight up high enough to land on a portion of the right limb beyond the spinning drill which deflected off its makeshift circular saw without damage it.
Clutching onto the right arm with my hooves, I looked up at the round red jewel through its faceplate and was met with the distinct feeling that it was glaring at me.
That’s when it brought its left arm up to what passes for the train’s right shoulder and swept the upwards facing spinning claws downwards at me.
Bringing my hooves under me and I kicked off as hard as I could onto the left arm and, with very little hesitation on my part, I immediately leapt from the left arm straight for the chest plate that used to be the cabins roof.
Clinging to it I looked left and right, then quickly started scrambling up towards the machines head avoiding the two tentacle style limbs formed drills that tried to stab at me from both sides.
Once I could get a good enough grip on the top edge of the chest plate with both hooves, I heaved myself up and into the air for the faceplate and latched on to it.
Looking back the drills were passing through the place I was a second ago in a second attack, there was not much time to think. I looked at the cowcatcher faceplate and reared back my left hoof while clutching to the top of it with my right hoof.
I lashed my left hoof forward and between the bars, my leg was long enough to smack solidly into the red crystalline structure. I doubted I could fit a bark blast through the bars as easily, but I could have damaged the cowcatcher with them.
The entire machine groaned and stumbled backwards as if it was a real living being that just got punched in the eye.
The damage from what I could see in my position was quite minimal… I could see the faintest bit of a very tiny crack. That was with me putting my all into that blow.
A hundred more hits like that and I might be able to beat this thing, provided that it stood absolutely still and didn’t fight back.
I wasn’t that strong and my stamina wasn’t anywhere near capable of such a protracted battle with something this large, my speed was the only thing keeping me alive.
I heard a clunking noise and a whirring noise followed soon after, the red eye of the monstrous machine brightened its light on me through the knight style faceplate.
Barely sensing the motion, I tried to leap away and armored up my fluff while. I felt an immense agonizing ripping pain in my side as I fell to the ground in agony and rolled closer to the nearby lakes water.
My right side was bleeding badly with a fairly alarming gash in it. Whatever it just did went entirely through my wool, while it was armored to the best of my ability.
Whimpering, I quickly put my right hoof over the wool nearest the wound and I pressed it over the wound to staunch the flow. I’m glad I figured out how to make makeshift bandages out of my fluff, but the pain and the bleeding alone was almost enough to knock me out.
This was a small reminder that I am small and weak being, one that didn’t have very much blood in my body. I was beginning to feel woozy and lightheaded from the excruciating blow I was just dealt.
I looked up at the train and saw that the wheels that made up the upper arms of the machine separated to create two smaller stick thin arms covered in the train’s wheels to protect its head.
The larger tentacle arms ending claws looked limp, at least until the smaller arms reconnected with them. It needed the smaller arms to act as braces for the larger tentacle arms with the claws to operate. Good to know if I ever met another one of these and survived this.
The wheels of the smaller stick limbs were now bladed and some of them along the right arm were slowly coming to stop and were freshly coated with red splatters. The vicious spike on the train wheels receded, explaining why I hadn’t noticed the wheels of the train being bladed before.
The realization struck me that with my wool bandaging my side, I wouldn’t be able to create a functional glider if it decided to start spewing fire at me. Going into the lake was a bad idea, unless I wanted to be boiled alive and if any water seeped through my wool into my wound… I had to move away from the lake.
The machine spread out the claws on both its limbs and they started spinning and was moving to shove them into the ground in front of itself, I looked behind me at the water and then at the legs of the machine as they started making a noise.
I struggled to pull myself into a standing position to start running, I prioritized my second wool bandage while releasing the one currently running over my injured face.
The machine slammed its two spinning claws forward into the ground while charging forward.
I shot off to the left putting my all into galloping out of the way of the two vortexes spinning into each other and launching all forms of debris at me with deadly velocity and force.
A flat rock slapped me across the nose of my already abused face, it bruised my right eye and causing me to incidentally tumble forward. I swiftly turned my tumble into a controlled roll out of the path of the spinning blades of the train’s right arm still creating clouds debris as it passed by me.
Taking a quick look in the direction of the train cars, I started to move away from them at a partial gallop as the loco locomotive slowly turned to face me again.
I at least still had its attention, not that that was an entirely good thing, but I had to keep it away from the people the girls were currently freeing from the cars.
The train monster, having turned towards me, leapt and brought both its arms above what passed for its head. I dove forward as it slammed both its claws down, I avoided getting hit by them directly and was subsequently sent me sprawling from the pressure wave.
I grunted and slowly got up again, fighting the soldiers and the smaller machines was easier, can we go back to that please? I was in a lot of pain and that wasn’t conducive to my further continued survival.
The train launched both its arms launched forward with the claws forming spinning drills.
I quickly galloped out of their path as they both swung outwards and the train continued to stomp forwards after me and it was picking up speed.
I ran to the side slightly and past some trees, when it turned to keep me in its sight it immediately slowed down.
It was faster at moving in a straight line the more time it kept doing so? Given that it’s a train, it made some sort of sense I guess.
Both its arms transformed the claws into saws again and swung the left in a wide sweeping blow as I ran past a few more trees with it giving chase. The other arm then buffeted the trees with a powerful blasts of wind sending them falling and flying at me.
Seeing that I couldn’t outrun the trees I curled up on the ground, quickly armored myself and was struck with a thunderous force no less than three times for the ten or so trees it sent my way. Uncurling I found myself surrounding by the trees it cut down in a single sweep.
Yet, it wasn’t where I last saw it, it was now standing next to the coal it had dumped earlier… what was it going to…?!
The train scooped up a large amount of coal with both claws and stuffed it all down the smokestack sticking up from its back.
Why in the world would it… an explosion of smoke erupted from the smoke stack, then it made a loud train whistling noise and it started to spin its splayed claws while pointing towards me.
The breeze I felt coming off the spinning claws was warm, looking at the center of the claws I could see a glow building up in the holes, that weren’t there a second ago, at the center of its claws.
Realizing what was about to happen, I tried to quickly climb over the trees surrounding me to get out of the way of what was coming.
The machine tracked me and a huge and wide burst of fire blasted outwards at a speeds I couldn’t even begin to comprehend, a veritable bright and blinding wall of death came at me.
I closed my eyes and… felt a light pinch and my body moving through the air.
That was it? I could hear the explosion and the ensuing roar of the flames, but I couldn’t feel myself being lit on fire. While my wool was heat resistant there was a level of tolerance I could handle and a flame fueled air blast was a well beyond that.
I only felt a little warm from all the heat.
I opened my eyes and looked in the direction of the noise, which was now behind me? My eyes widened at what I saw, I was outright horrified by what I was currently seeing.
The landscape in the direction the train was facing had been utterly destroyed, the attack barely left anything but dust and charcoal within the attacks range. The burnt husk of several stumps were beyond the attacks range of where I had been told me how powerful that attack was.
My gaze slowly slid to looking over my shoulder at the metal beak clutching at wool on the back of my neck, it moved to lower me into what was now a comforting seat to rest.
Dodo followed up this action by nuzzling me gently, he warbled in a strange tone that sounded worried.
“Dodo… I think…” I was in shock, of course I was, and hyperventilating was definitely a warranted reaction in this situation. This machine just ran in front of a firestorm for me. Said firestorm decimated an entire area leaving very little left other than stumps that were just outside the range of the attack, and he managed to grab me before it hit. “You just saved my life...”
The train’s red orb glowed at the corner of its helmet from our position to its left and it slowly turned towards us.
Dodo warbled and cowered as he backed away from the train.
“Dodo, run towards it.” Despite the cowardice we were both feeling, my request was immediately followed by Dodo doing what I said. “Circle to the left around it!”
Dodo avoided the two elastic tentacle swing downwards in an attempt slice us apart with its claws curling inwards. Dodo managed to maneuver past them without taking any damage.
As the train turned to track us, I thought about our next move.
“Dodo… turn around and… fire for that red jewel thing…” I started coughing and could see flecks of red in my right hoof, signs of minor internal injury. That… that wasn’t good and my adrenaline was wearing off.
Good thing we asked those pandas for plenty of medical supplies, I was going to need those herbs soon.
Dodo skidded and turned on a bit, he opened his beak and fired several blasts of energy for the faceplate. I’m lucky he could understand me, language was thankfully one of the things he obviously got from his familiar bond with shanty. I don’t know how an alien mechanical ostrich would know what I was saying otherwise.
The blasts of energy from his beak did a small amount of damage to the faceplate, causing it to crumple slightly after five or so blasts out of the fifteen he fired struck it.
“Dodo… run backwards and keep firing…” That got me an odd look from Dodo, but his head snapped back to paying attention to the train monster. He avoided it charging forward and slashing its claws for us.
I’m glad that it could only do the coal fueled attack thing once, unless it went back to the two piles of coal to load up for another one. Dodo’s constant attacks were to prevent it from doing just that, it was actually keeping up with Dodo’s running backwards and it was gaining speed.
“Dodo… when I signal, run forward and right past it as fast as you can.” I don’t know if Dodo heard me, at this point he was weaving and dodging around the trains constant attacks and trying to outpace the train’s forward momentum. The monster machine raised its right claw and I narrowed my eyes. “…. now!”
The train slammed its spinning spear claw down on the after image of Dodo running forward, that we left an after image amazed me as I looked back.
Dodo was much faster at going forward than backwards and we were behind the train now. No weakness on its back as far as I could see.
“Stop, turn and fire at the edge of the faceplate, we need to knock it off if we’re going to do any real damage to it Dodo!” My orders were followed as Dodo skidded to a stop, turned and started to fire on the train monster again as he retreated.
The train terror was halfway into turning around counterclockwise when Dodo opened fire, the blasts of energy spraying from his beak started ripping into the left side of the cowcatcher.
Eventually under the hail of fire the cowcatcher fell halfway off missing a lot of bars and left the eye of the machine exposed, Dodo started trying to attack that without my prompting.
The few shots that hit the eye directly didn’t do much damage to it, comparable to when I struck it directly with my hoof. It started to charge forwards towards us and Dodo running backwards towards the train cars blasting away at the large red glowing eye of the machine.
This wasn’t working, we weren’t going to be able to stop it as even Dodo wasn’t powerful enough to slow it down. We were quickly approaching the train cars and the train monster was catching up with us.
The train started to form drills with both its arms as it charged straight at us and it thrusts them forward ahead of itself with its malice filled eye shining upon us. Dodo warbled and leapt backwards past the blown open hole of the train car with the supplies, the two drills rammed into the train car and got stuck.
Dodo charge forward and launched a damaging kick with the bottom of his right foot right into the large red eye. That that did more damage than the energy blasts that Dodo could shoot was confusing.
Once Dodo got his left leg propped up against the breastplate, it kicked us off of the devastating machine using both legs and to the left leaving a noticeably cracked jewel.
Dodo back up a bit and was about to charge forward for another attack, but backed off when the shoulder arms activated and swung for us. Dodo looked back at me and thought better of attacking as he backed further off.
A loud bursting whining noise sounded, both Dodo and menacing machine that was almost free of the train car it trapped the end of its limbs in froze.
That sound was vaguely familiar to me, it almost sounded like a…
A spiraling blue streak shot towards the menacing machine. Said streak, upon striking the red jewel eye thing, the sound of glass rapidly breaking could be heard in a series of clinking noises as the blue figured spun against it and then blasted out the backside of it in a shower of metal and parts.
Now there was a hole through the center of the train’s eye and it sat there limp for a second, it soon fell over backwards lifeless.
“What… was…” I started coughing into my right hoof to see a few more flecks, yeah I needed help and soon. I’m surprised I’m even awake with the kind of pain I’m in.
“Hold on Pom!” Ocellus flew forward with several raccoons following along behind her looking at me in worry and looking beyond us in awe as a blurry blue figure walked up to us. Well there goes my vision.
The figure said something in the strange language that the locals spoke as Ocellus lifted me from Dodo with her magic and laid me out on the ground.
“What… is he saying?” I coughed and saw a bit of red dribble from my mouth, was everything getting colder?
“He said welcome to... fell...born...no Elhorn?" Ocellus turned and asked something of the blue blob.
"He welcomes us to the world of Elhorn... and expresses marrow... sorrow... for not being able to get here quicker and that you had to face the... I can't translate that yet... in his place while helping the citizens of the realm. Hold still Pom and don't talk, you need to rest.” Ocellus elevated my head and place something soft underneath it. “Can you let up on whatever you are doing to cover the wound, we have a doctor here and they need to get at it to help you.”
“Right…” I let up on my wool bandage and heard gasps about how nasty the wound obviously looked. “I wonder if… Tianhuo… would hate the scars?”
"I'm sure she won't mind Pom." Exclaimed Smolder as I was starting to pass out.