Iron Wings

by Select Few

You Will Be

Time: 3:34 P.M., 06/29/4 PHA
Location: Alliance Armed Forces Command Headquarters

“Oh please, that name doesn’t do justice to our majesty. Call us instead the Nightmare Queen!” Cue even more insane and downright disturbing laughter. Franz was sure that the name they chose was adequate, if only for the chills that laugh sent down his spine.

“I don’t know about you, but that laugh angst die Hölle aus mir.” Franz removed his soaked vest and held it in one hand. “Oi, Kleine Prinzessin, Ich habe eine Idee.”

Twilight tore her eyes away from the Nightmare Queen long enough to glance at Franz. “Ja? Was ist das?” Franz lifted his vest a little to draw her attention to it. “Ich werde dies auf sie werfen, schießen Sie einige Feuer auf sie und teleportieren uns hier raus. Kannst du das tun?”

Twilight thought for a moment, going over the calculations in her head. Finally, she nodded. “Ja, ich denke schon.”

“Lass es uns tun.” Franz flew up high and, spinning around as fast as he could, launched the jacket at their foe. At the same time, Twilight fired a ball of fire at her, and then covered herself and Franz in a magical field. When it was at full strength, she teleported the two of them 5km away, on top of a hill overlooking the compound.

“Do you think that will be enough to stop her?” Twilight asked, only to be shushed by Franz. He seemed to be counting on one talon, and pointing at the compound with the other.

“…drei…zwei…ein…” He extended his arm all the way, then pointed it up at the sky.

“Bang.”

*Kra-BOOM!*

The explosion completely decimated the eastern half of the structure, and the force was so strong that, even from 5km away, Franz and Twilight where knocked back a few feet.

Twilight was the first to recover. She shakily stood up and surveyed the destruction.

There were micro-explosions going off at the site of the explosion, though all the smoke made it impossible to tell if the Nightmare Queen survived. Seeing the immense destructive power they had unleashed, Twilight severely doubted that she did.

Twilight tried to walk over to Franz, but as soon as she took a step pain shot up her left hindleg. “I really, really hope that isn’t broken.” She said, mostly to herself as Franz was still on the ground a few feet away. She limped over to him and started shaking him.

“Franz! Franz, wake up!” She nudged his side, and when that didn’t work, and idea wormed its way into her head.

“Payback time…” Twilight raised her left foreleg, being careful not to put too much weight on her injured hindleg, and carefully aimed.

Then she punched Franz in the face.

“OW! Okay, I’m awake! Geez! Was ist los mit dir?!” He rubbed his face where she had hit him.”

“That was for slapping me. Twice.” She limped towards him a little. “Now that this is over, can we finally go home?”

“Zwei Dinge: “Ein, I am home and Zwei, Es ist nicht vorbei, bis die fette Stute singt.”

“I really don’t think she’ll be getting up after that, Franz. She took enough explosives to level a high-security compound directly to the face. I don’t see how anypony could survive that.” Twilight said, taking a moment to inspect her leg. It wasn’t broken, but it looked to have a very bad sprain.

“Tell that to her.” Franz pointed a little off to the left of Twilight. Flying above the city, in a swirling vortex of smoke, dust, and debris, was an enraged Nightmare Queen. When she spotted the two who had dared to defy her, she flew towards them at speeds reserved for a certain rainbow-maned pegasus. While she did go beyond the speed of sound, she did not create an ever-expanding orb of darkness that could only be described as a rainbow made of stars. If Franz ever says that she did, he is exaggerating the details. Again.

She was upon them in a second. While Franz figured that he could outmaneuver the Queen, he wasn’t so sure about Twilight with her injured leg. Quickly developing a plan, Franz flew right past the Nightmare Queen, grabbed Twilight, and made a mad dash towards his ship.

It was hovering in midair, while the building it had been parked on had collapsed to the ground in the explosion. When he was about halfway to the ship, however, the Queen flew past and knocked him to the side. He was able to recover, but not before getting a long slash along his side. The suddenness of the pain caused him to nearly drop Twilight, but she opened her wings and helped steady them.

The Queen wasn’t done with them yet. Every time he would try to get to his ship, she would knock him to the side or towards the ground. Instead of gaining ground, he was actually losing it. After being pushed back past the point they had started from, Franz had had enough.

“Prinzessin, Can you teleport us to underneath that building over there?” He yelled, pointing at a part of the compound that had collapsed onto its neighbor in an inverted ‘V’ shape.

“It’s a shorter distance than earlier, but you’ll have to hold still for a couple of seconds.”

“Not sure how long we’ll have. As soon as-“ He dodged backwards just in time to avoid being slammed into a wall by the Queen. “-as soon as I stop moving, we’re sitting ducks!”

“I only need a second, Franz!” Twilight built up the magical energy required, though she lost a little bit every time her flying chauffer changed directions because of the pain that shot through her leg when it bumped against her other ones, and had to build that energy back up again. Every bump was a second wasted, but she knew that if Franz stopped at the wrong time, it wouldn’t matter how much energy she had saved up.

“Ready… JETZT, TWILIGHT!” Franz stopped just short of being impaled by the Queen’s Horn. Twilight took the chance to release the energy all at once. The result was a very rough teleport that ended up with Twilight upside down.

“Well, that could have gone better.” Twilight joked, flipping herself right-side up. And looking around for Franz.

“You think?” A voice from above caught Twilight’s attention. “What are you doing up there, Franz- FRANZ!”

The griffin had been impaled by a rebar through his back leg. Blood was beginning to pool around it, and spilling through his feathers.

Have you ever been impaled? Not a fun experience, let me tell you. There was this one time I-

Ah, but this is not my story. It’s Franz’s. And right now, he needs all the attention he can get.

“Prinzessin…” Franz began to speak.

“Shh, Hold on, Franz! I’ll think of something!” Twilight began to pace around the broken building, being careful to avoid getting under the blood slowly dripping from above her.

“Prinzessin, I already-“

“It’s okay! We’ll find a way out of this! We’ll get home, get patched up, and be okay!” Twilight began to pace faster across the floor.

“Prinzessin, I just need to-“

“Oh, why didn’t any of my books prepare me for this?!”

“Prinzessin, there is-“

“I mean, I could at least have taken a first aid class!”

“Prinzessin.”

“Then I would know what to do in this situation.”

“Prinzessin.”

“There must be some way, something I’ve learned that can help here!”

“TWILIGHT!”

Twilight stopped pacing and looked up at Franz. “Yes, Franz? Is there something you need? Something I can do to make you more comfortable?”

“I just need to know if you know any heilzauber.”

“What? I mean, yes, but they require the wound to be free of any objects.”

Franz grit his beak. “Kein Problem.”

Twilight raised an eyebrow at Franz. “What do you mean, no problem? There is a three foot pole sticking out of your-“

*SCHLLLUUUUUUCK*

Twilight stopped in midsentence as Franz slid his leg off the metal rod. Blood began to spill a lot faster out of the wound.

“Now would be a good time for the heilzauber, ja?” Franz said, grasping his wound to stop the blood from spilling so freely.

“Heilzauber. Right.” She put her horn up next to his leg. “This may sting a little.”

He raised an eyebrow as if to say “Seriously?”

“Heh heh. Sorry.” She zapped his leg with short burst of magic, and when it was over all that was left of the wound was an angry red mark. “Well, that will do for now. Why don’t you use the Heilzauber on yourself? It would make travelling easier.”

But Twilight shook her head at this suggestion. “It doesn’t work like that. My Healing magic can only fix flesh and muscle, not bone or other hard substances.”

“Wessen Idee war das?” Franz asked, then shook his head. “No matter. I have a plan as to how we’ll get out of this.”

The mention of a plan made Twilight perk up. Anything was better than randomly flying around and hoping not to get hit, and the longer they stayed here, the higher their chances of being discovered.

“Okay, we’ll make our way to the versenden. Then, We’ll set a course to Ponyville. That is where the rest of the bearers are, ja?”

Twilight was unsure of how to answer that, but the Queens shadow passing over a window made up her mind for her. “Yes, the others are in Ponyville.”

“Gut, then that part will be easy.” Franz straightened up a little. “We’ll go to Ponyville, round up the bearers, and use the Elements on the Queen. I doubt that she’ll survive a second blast of that size, especially with the prügel she took with that first one.”

“One small problem, Franz:” Twilight said, limping over to a window. “Aren’t the Elements buried somewhere under all this rubble?”

“Nein, Kleine Prinzessin. Not the real ones, anyway. The real artifacts are hidden onboard the ship, in the cabinet beside where you were bound.”

Twilight’s eye twitched. “You mean I was beside the Elements the entire time?”

“Ja.”

“…Anything else I should know?”

“…It really was boiled over a goats tongue. The Hydra tongue is optional.”

“I’m never drinking anything on your ship again.”

At that moment, the Nightmare Queen burst through a wall behind them.

“Gotcha.”

And the chase was back on.

Now that both knew the goal, Franz was able to focus on flying while Twilight kept an eye on the Queen, and even took potshots at her when the moment allowed. She managed to hit the Queen once, and while she was stunned Franz and Twilight made it to the ship.

They both crawled inside, with Twilight verifying that the Elements actually were in the ship and Franz setting in a course to Ponyville.

As he was lifting off, The Queen recovered from Twilight’s spell and rammed the ship.
Everything was thrown around as the ship was tossed through the air. Once he got everything steady, Franz checked the damage.

The Queen had knocked out one of the engines. There was no way they could outrun her know.

Not unless she was distracted.

Franz needed only a moment to decide what to do. He set the ship into autopilot, grabbed a spare set of talon guards from the wall, and flew up to the door.

“Hey, Prinzessin!” Franz called out to Twilight.

“What is it, Franz? Have we already left the compound?”

“Nein, Twilight.” He took a deep breath. “You’ve got to continue on your own, Kleine Prinzessin.”

Twilight noticed that he was standing right beside the door. “Franz… What are you doing?”

Franz opened the door and jumped out. He said only one thing through the door before seeing his ship, and Twilight, for quite possible the last time.

“Erinnere dich an mich zärtlich, Kleine Prinzessin.”

Then he shut the door and flew away, directly at the Nightmare Queen.

Author's Note:

Achievement Get: Used *SCHLLLUUUUUUCK* as a sound effect.