"Crud crud crud cruddy crud crud!" Eagle Eye spat.
"Less crudding and more running!" Josho shouted, though his voice was scarcely discernible over the sound of trees, rocks, and crystal shards exploding all around them. The tank treads of the Killas' enormous transport was bearing down on the two unicorns, and it wasn't giving the local wildlife any mercy.
"Come on!" Eagle Eye shrieked, hopping over a fallen log and struggling to keep within rhythm to the larger stallion that he was bound to. "Port us again!"
"The fuzz?!"
"Y'know! Teleport us! You can do it!" the lavender pony stammered.
"Nnnngh!" Josho grunted, concentrating. His horn flickered, flickered again, then pulsed.
With a flash of light, the two fugitive soldiers disappeared and rematerialized... only ten meters forward.
"Oh for the love of mare sweat!" Josho hissed.
"Wh-what's the deal?!" Eagle's whimpering voice rang beneath the rising tumult as they both continued sprinting. "You call that a teleport?!"
"Something in our manacles is screwing with my horn!" Josho snarled. "I feel like my leylines are all busted up!"
"You're kidding me!" Eagle Eye gasped—only to be struck in the head with a falling pinecone. "Owie! S-so you can only jump us a few feet?!"
"Why the heck else didn't I try it all those times before, huh?!"
"I dunno!" Eagle Eye panted, hopping over a rolling boulder. "I just thought you were fat!"
"Your nose will be fat if you say that one more time—"
"Look out!" Eagle Eye shrieked, for a giant cedar tree was falling straight towards them, shaken off its roots by the heavy tremors.
"Uhhh-Uhhh..." Josho sweated profusely.
Eagle jumped into the bigger stallion, practically clinging to him. "Do something!" his voice cracked.
"Sonuva—" Josho's face tensed as if he was giving birth. His horn pulsed, and the two stallions rematerialized... a few feet backwards. "Whoops. Wrong direction."
"Aaaaaaah!" Eagle Eye flailed beneath the oncoming rush of the tank treads.
Josho's eyes darted up. He caught notches in the hulking vehicle's front end for tying on drilling equipment. "There! Grab ahold!"
Eagle Eye's quick reflexes responded. He jumped straight up and crasped the crook of his hooves within the notch. Josho did the same thing on his end of the tire treads. Soon, both unicorns were clinging to the front right side of the massive vehicle, their dangling tail hairs curling away so as not to get caught up in the treads.
"Now what?!" Eagle Eye murmured.
Josho's forelimbs quivered from the effort of holding his rotund body up. "Now... uhhhm... I think of something."
"Pffft. So we hang here forever?"
"Oh shut up!" Josho howled over the sounds of trees falling on either side of them. "Like you're of much help, my little pipsqueak!"
"Nnngh!" Eagle Eye grunted as a swath of branches swatted his side. "I can think of a thousand different ways we might have gotten out of that situation instead of with busting heads!"
"Actually, I think we exploded one or two heads."
"Same difference!"
"Why should you care?! You should be thanking me!" Josho spat. "Minutes ago, you were limp as a noodle. Now you can move like your flank is on fire!"
"That's because we're away from the crystals!"
"And who do you have to thank for that?"
"Wait a second..." Eagle Eye squinted, glancing around. "Why are we still moving?"
"Huh?"
"I said, why are we still moving?!"
"What?!"
Eagle barked, "The tank!" He slapped the metal hull with a dull ring while snarling above the noise. "It hasn't stopped since we stopped running!"
"Yeah, so?!"
"So..." Eagle Eye gulped. "I don't think it's actually chasing us. Do you?"
Josho blinked. He tilted his bearded face up towards the cockpit of the large vehicle. There was no way to spot the canine pilots from that angle. "Well..." He glanced over at the lavender unicorn. "There's only one way to find out." His horn started to glow.
Eagle Eye's gaze went thin. "Just what are you—" A bright light flashed. "—doing? Gah!" He fell, suddenly not clinging to anything but air. He landed on a pale boulder nestled in a crook of fallen branches. Josho stood above him, panting for breath as he watched the full body of the Killas' mining tank surge by.
"Heh... Never put a dog at the wheel," Josho muttered. "They do nothing but chase sticks with a vengeance."
"Th-they're probably clearing out stretches of the forest to make a highway to their quarry," Eagle Eye wheezed while stumbling up to his hooves. He lurched at the end of the manacle's purple binding. "Ungh... Why anyone would want to take a manacart out through this madness is beyond me."
"You don't have to thank me but would it kill you to turn the volume on the smartflank?"
"Yes, it just might!" Eagle Eye stood up and frowned at the haggard enforcer. "What's the next bright idea and how many more dogs are you gonna stab with my horn?!"
"You wanna know what I'm planning right now?!"
"Fill me in, you psychotic bag of jerkface!"
"I'll show you what I have in mind—" Josho snarled, raising an angry hoof.
Just then, the boulder beneath them shifted weight.
The two wobbled on their hooves. They blinked at each other. In icy motion, they tilted their gaze down to regard the huge rock.
Soil shifted. Twigs cracked. At last, the rock gave way. The two were suddenly ridiging the gigantic stone down a steep path revealed to be west of where they had avoided the tank.
"Aaaaack!" Eagle Eye clung to Josho.
"Nnnngh—For spark's sake!" Josho roared, fumbling to peel the petite pony off him. He fell on his flank as the two absurdly rode the boulder down the wooded hill. "Get off me, ya mangy dressflouncer! I gotta port us off!"
"We'regonnadieWe'regonnadieWe'regonnadie!"
"Darn it—Knock it off!" Josho bucked Eagle Eye off him and looked west. "We are not going to—" His voice collapsed in the back of his throat. He and Eagle sat up, perched on the rock as their coats took on shades of pale.
The stone was careening straight towards a steep cliff-face overlooking a three hundred foot drop, at the bottom of which were raging rapids.
"Okay," Josho droned, his eyes thin. "So maybe we are going to die."
With that, the stone launched itself off the cliff and fell murderously towards the base of the chasm below. Both stallions were sent flying—and screaming—like two ends to a shattered, violet boomerang.