Pony of a Different Color

by Sparky Brony

Chapter 20

It wasn't supposed to go like this. We were supposed to storm Canterlot and kill the invaders. The Mane six are with me, Celestia is with me. The soldiers haven't figured out how to get our armor off. Thank Celestia for that. But I've got a ring encircling my temples, blocking me from seizing Saidin. Every unicorn has charms on their horns, removing their power. Every Pegasus has their wings bound. We all have chains hobbling our legs as we are marched slowly towards the castle. I'm not even certain how we got overwhelmed. I do know that once we got into the city proper, several buildings exploded around us. Killing nearly a third of our Guards and griffons, and knocking the Mane 6, myself, and Celestia unconscious. I woke up with this damned ring on my head. I'm glad that the armor requires cooperation from the pony wearing it to be removed. I did plan for that at least. I'm trudging in misery. At least Rainbow Dash is next to me, hers and my chains are connected. I look at her. Tears are in her eyes.

“I'm sorry.” I mumble. “I have utterly failed us all.”

She looks at me. “It isn't your fault Sparky. They just beat us. But we are alive, right?”

I look down. “For now. Once we get to the castle, you will die, and I will be enslaved. I will have to use my power to do their bidding.” I sigh. “I've failed.” Two tracks of tears stain the ground as we shuffle through the city. Celestia is every bit the warrior princess though. She is acting as though the ponies around her are merely escorting her to the castle. She maintains her royal presence as though the humans turned ponies around her are nothing but dirt under her hooves. I wish I could do that. I look back at Twilight. She's trudging along as well, she keeps her sobs quiet. Her purple armor gleams as she shuffles along. Dust coats us all, giving us an ethereal look. The soldiers push us occasionally to keep us moving.

After a few minutes we enter a large square. Apparently they are using it for a staging area. Nearly thirty attack helicopters are being fueled from fuel bowsers shuttling through a gateway. Soldier ponies are lounging around the tanks. HMMWV's are moving around. One screeches to a halt in front of us, and a gray pony gets out. He looks like a mid level officer.

“And what do we have here?”

The sergeant in charge of us salutes. “Sir, the main gate trap was activated. When we arrived, most of their force was stunned. We attacked, and killed plenty of these ponies, and also a lot of... uhhh, I don't know what they are, but they looked like eagles combined with lions.”

“Griffons, sergeant.”

“Uh, yes, sir. Griffons. Well, we killed a lot of griffons as well. Many did recover from the explosion, and retreated. These were mixed among the rubble. Three of them were on our list of high priority targets. The Princess, the adept we've been searching for, and the purple unicorn with wings that decimated our force the last time we were here.” He indicates the morose prisoners. “We captured all of them, hobbled them, and all the unicorns have those devices to prevent their magic. And the adept has a dominion band.”

“Good job sergeant, you can expect a good bonus for capturing them. Call to the troops, these vermin might try to rescue their royalty.”

The sergeant salutes. “Yes sir.”

The officer comes up to me. “You have been almost more trouble than you are worth, adept. But you belong to us now. With that dominion band around your head, you belong to us. And you will help us hunt down the rest of the adepts.” The grey officer pony cuffs my head. Hard. I see stars for a moment. He growls, “And now that we have you, and that pesky purple unicorn” he smiles at the joke he just made, “we can leave this God damned hell hole. I have no clue why you decided to come to a world with pretty colored ponies in the first place, but I really don't care. We have you.”

I stand there, in mute rage. So that's what they have around my head. A dominion band. I've never seen one, I've only read of one being described. It's a device that can control adepts, even by non adepts. They are exceedingly rare. They aren't perfect, but for now, there is nothing I can do. I hear a gasp from Twilight. I glance back at her. She's looking at the officer, then at me. I feel tears well up in my eyes. They are going to do the same for her that they did to me. She's going to be a slave to them.

The officer pulls out a radio, he speaks into it, I can't hear everything he's saying, but do hear the words La Rouche, throne room, and immediately. He turns to me. “Alright you scum, come with me.” With soldiers all around us, carrying weapons, it's not as though we have any choice. We trudge ahead. As we get to the end of the square, a red form comes out from between two buildings. The form resolves into a dragon. I know that dragon, from one of the episodes. I have to think for a moment. Then Garble speaks.

“You let those ponies go.” He bares his teeth, and snorts flame.

The soldiers bring their weapons to bear. The dragon looks at them. Then he smiles, and emits a piercing whistle.

That is when all hell breaks loose. A half a dozen helicopters are hit with fireballs from above. Others are crushed as large dragons land on them. It's absolute pandemonium. The soldier ponies are shrieking, firing their weapons everywhere. For a moment, we are safe. Garble reaches down, and bites the officer pony, he throws the gray pony against a building. I wince, with the way that pony's head is hanging, his neck is broken. A purple streak hops off of Garble's back, bounding through us and attaching itself to Twilight. Another pony comes around from behind Garble. She's wearing red armor. It's Cloud Kicker.

“Oh thank Celestia you are okay Twilight.” I hear Spike's voice. He's hugging Twilight for all he's worth. She nuzzles him. He reaches up and removes the charm on her horn. Immediately it glows and our chains dissolve. We're free! Celestia and Twilight come up to me. Their magic flares as the band around my head shatters.
I go up to Cloud, “What happened?”

She smiles, “When we were ambushed, I played possum and then once you were led off, I flew my flanks off to get to the staging area. Spike was there with the Dragons. Garble here is the one who came up with the idea on how to save you guys.

The dragon looks down. “Princess Celestia, you raise the sun and moon. We may not like ponies very much, but having these creatures here capturing you is worse than us staying neutral in this. I was able to persuade some dragons to help.”

Celestia comes forward. “We are eternally in your debt young Garble. Thank you.”

The teen dragon smiles. “Now, we can cause some destruction. He flares his wings and takes off to join his friends wreaking havoc among the invaders.

Celestia turns to me, “Are you ready Sparky? We need to finish these creatures off.”

I seize Saidin. “Now let's show them how Equestria wages war.”

I feel the chill down my back as Twilight embraces Saidar. I move up next to her. “Let's start with lightning.” She nods.

Lightning strikes down from the clear night sky. Sizzling as soldiers are hit, a tank explodes, a second. The lightning is coming down faster than you can clap. I join in. The deafening explosions multiply as more tanks explode. The dragons swipe and kill many of the soldiers. Twilight and I are careful to keep from hitting any dragons, and in a few minutes, all that's left is burning vehicles, and a lot of dead bodies. We cease our attack. One of the other dragons comes up to us.

“These soldiers have places like this all over the city. We will take care of them, I know you need to save the moon Princess. Hurry.” The dragons take off. I can hear the muted roar of a flying Apache helicopter. I slap hit it's rotor with a hard fist of air. Suddenly devoid of lift, the helicopter plunges to the ground. We start heading towards the castle in a full on gallop. Apparently the griffons and guards ponies that had survived have regrouped, some of them join 0-us as we dash down the streets.

“To the left.” A voice calls out. An M1A1 Abrams tank rolls into the street in front of us. Before I do anything, Celestia's horn glows and the tank simply disappears. We continue on. I look up, three attack helicopters are lining up to hit us. Just as I'm about to hit their rotors, dozens of griffons swarm around the helicopters. They land on the faces of the attacking machines, using their claws to rip through the armored glass cockpits. In moments the Apache's are falling objects. They crash into buildings. The night is going to be alight with fire apparently. We continue.

The castle is getting really close. Another staging area, the dragons haven't gotten there yet. I hear the high pitched whine of the turbine engines of the tanks. They are ready to go. One of them levels it's main gun tube at us. With a crashing boom, it fires. The building behind me explodes. I let my armor take the brunt of the shrapnel. I spread my wings and dash to the tank. I feel a presence next to me. Rainbow Dash isn't letting me out of her sights. The two on each side are glowing as Celestia and Twilight take care of them. I fold my wings and flip on my back just as I'm get up to them, I let my momentum carry me underneath the tank. With a blast of fire and air, I cut through the armored floor of the tank. The loader is immolated as I slam the piece of cut armor into the tank. I climb in. Decapitating the driver with a flow of air. Rainbow clambered into the tank with me. She whips around and bucks the gunner in the head, three down, one to go. I see the tank commander trying to get out of the hatch. I smile grimly. I give him a push, hard. His body flies up and into a building with a sickening smack. I reach through the hatch and pull the .50 caliber machine gun off the powered mount. I jump off the tank. I was wondering where the rest of the soldiers were. They are marching towards us from the castle. I take my appropriated weapon and attack them.

As my hoof starts to squeeze the trigger, I feel an armor clad hoof on my shoulder. Rainbow Dash is there.

“Sparky, let the guards handle the soldiers, we have to get to the castle, for Luna.”

I nod, drop the weapon, and we take off. I look back, Twilight folds her wings over Pinkie and Applejack, they teleport past the bulk of the forces. Rarity teleports herself. I didn't know she knew that spell.

Fluttershy, Rainbow and I dive bomb on the few guards at the gates. I can hear Flutters crying as she attacks. But despite how sad she is, how many tears she sheds as she's attacking, she furiously attacks the soldiers. As I'm coming in, I snatch my sword off my back. I cleave into the soldiers. Thrashing back and forth with my blade. Cutting off limbs and heads, and whatever gets in range. With the mono molecule blade, it cleaves their armor, bone and flesh equally. In moments. We are in an open spot, I shake blood off the end of my blade and re sheathe it.

Twilight comes up next to me. “The gates are enchanted, Sparky...” she is cut off as I weave a massive amount of Air and Earth into the gates. They shatter and fly back. “Well, that's one way to do it Sparky,” she says as she smiles at me. Cloud Kicker bumps her shoulder into me.

“Let's get going Sparky. We have a Princess to save.” I take the lead into the castle grounds.

We only get a few steps into the grounds of the palace when we hit a wall. I see it as it forms in front of us. It's made of Saidin! I skid to a halt in front of the wall. This is a massively powerful wall. I could build one, but I've never met another adept that can make one that strong. I turn to the rest. “Stop, there's an wall here.” They skid to a stop as well.

A room off to the side of the grounds opens. A light green pony with a brown mane and seven stars on his rump comes out. A golden band encircling his temples.

“Hello my apprentice.” He says. My eyes shrink down to the size of pinpricks as I recognize that voice.

“Carter.” I whisper.