Worth Less Than a Fly

by nightshade745

Chapter 14: An Uncertain Future

If you don’t like reading a battle, I hate to tell you this, but there are a lot of them coming up…

Most ponies were going home, which meant most of the restaurants were closing. There were only a few that stayed open late. The two ponies that had been in the alley two days ago and seen Butter take something to the castle were enjoying one of those late night restaurants. The older unicorn had a golden coat and hair that was just touched with white from age. Wrinkles lined his eyes but he sat tall and prideful. The other was a pegasus with a baby blue coat and dark blue eyes. His wings were kind of thin, but they were extra-long. He had that gleam that radiated from younger ponies. Both of them were eating as the city was going to bed.

“So what do you want to do tomorrow?” the blue pegasus asked with a friendly voice.

“Want to sneak into the castle and figure out what that pegasus dropped off?” the unicorn offered with his eyes closed and his head tilted down.

“REALLY!?” the pegasus was excited by just the idea.

“No.”

He pouted, “Don’t tease me like that.”

“You know what FireThorn said Skipper.”

“Yeah, yeah I know.” He sat back and left his sandwich on the table. “I want to go out and do something Bore.”

“I hear you there. I want to go out and have some fun, but not right now. For now I want--“ He suddenly tensed and looked up toward Canterlot Castle.

“What’s wrong?” Skipper was a little worried by his uncle’s reaction.

“You don’t feel that?!”

“What?”

“That magic buildup?”

Skipper looked around and tried to detect what it was he was talking about. When he sensed it, he tensed too. “What is that?! It feels like a black hole of magic!”

“It is. Somepony has got a massive supply of magic, but it’s unstable and out of control.” Bore’s eyes narrowed as he looked up at the castle. “Something’s going on up there, something big.”

“Is it Discord?” Skipper leaned forward on the table.

Bore looked at him like he was an idiot, “no.”

“King Sombra?”

“He’s dead.”

“Chrysalis?” he hissed slightly.

“Definitely not. It’s obviously black magic dominant.”

“Is Nightmare Moon back?!”

“Keep your voice down, remember that normal ponies can’t sense this energy at all. And to answer your question, maybe.”

Skipper looked around, nopony was looking at them. “Should we report this?”

“Can you not think for yourself?” he asked harshly.

“It feels like the magic is stabilizing, but I think it still deserves reporting,” Skipper looked down the street for a moment.

“A little, it feels more like its just done growing. Dear Celestia that’s a lot of power, and at this distance…”

“Who’s that strong?”

“Nopony. It’s probably just some lunatic with a whole bunch of amulets amplifying his magic.”

“You can do that?” Skipper whispered like it was an ancient secret.

Bore mocked him by whispering back, “I don’t know, can I wear more than one article of clothing at a time?”

“Very funny,” he grumbled. The streets were almost empty. Nopony was aware of the danger until a massive bolt of lightning blazed into the sky through the roof of the castle!

“It really is a battle,” Bore gawked. “Maybe we should--is that what I think it is?” he pointed a hoof at a green unicorn walking down the street.

Skipper brightened up, “yes it is!”

“Hey, Cryling, what’s up?!” Bore insulted.

The green unicorn froze. His head slowly creaked around to look at the two of them, “what did you call me?”

Skipper kept taunting, “What’s a little Cryling doing in Canterlot all by himself?”

“What’s a Cryling?” he asked innocently.

Bore rolled his eyes before allowing his golden pupils to flash red. The green unicorn’s eyes lit up with understanding. Bore then addressed him only slightly more formally, “where are you going?”

“Work, I have to gather some intelligence and deliver it to the queen,” he answered forcefully.

“Your queen,” Skipper rudely corrected.

“Yes, my queen.”

“Does it have to do with the castle,” Bore asked pointing with his head.

“Yes,” just as he said it, there was an explosion in the aforementioned building. “More information than I dare get close enough to verify.”

Guards throughout the city were running to the castle and locals were starting to emerge in the streets to see what the commotion was all about. Skipper eyed all the action and came to a dangerous conclusion. He leaned over to Bore and asked him quietly, “no guard ponies around?”

“So?”

“There are two of us and only one…Cryling here.”

Bore realized what he was proposing, “You know we can’t fight in public.”

“Everypony is distracted by whatever’s happening at the castle. Come on, let’s have some fun,” he gave Bore a small nudge.

He smiled evilly, “it’s been a long time since I’ve gotten to be in a beat down.”

“Then you’ll enjoy this.”

The green unicorn hadn’t been paying attention to them. He was too busy listening to the distant battle coming from the castle. It must be an intense fight, he thought. He suddenly heard movement off to the side and turned to see it. Just as he did, Skipper’s hoof collided with his face. Before he could do anything, Skipper was delivering a series of blows to his face. A right, then a left, another right, and then an uppercut that sent him into a flip. He couldn’t land on his hooves and flopped down on the ground.

Bore walked up to him and levitated him up so his belly was exposed. Bore got up on his hind hooves and delivered a powerful punch with his right hoof. The green pony flew back a few feet before the magic keeping him up died. He tried to stand, but Skipper landed on his back and pounded him into the rocky road beneath him. The air was shot out of his lungs again. Skipper reared up and forced his front legs down on his skull. His head was rattled and he was forced to take a rock into his nose as his chin was scratched by the rough surface.

Skipper jumped off him and landed beside Bore. The two stood there and waited for him to stand. As soon as he had, Bore had delivered a blow to his left cheek and sent his vision spinning. Skipper charged forward and tackled him to the ground again. This time his stomach was facing the sky. Skipper held his head in place with his right hoof while he pounded away at his nose with his left. Bore stood in the background watching patiently.

The battle up at the castle was still going on, but they were too focused to even care. Skipper was finally satisfied with the damage he had caused and stopped. “We’re not going to kill you, we’re just going to rip you apart!” Skipper was suddenly engulfed in red flames and became a changeling! But he wasn’t like the changelings that had attacked Canterlot. He had big orb eyes, insectoid wings, and tattered ears, but the color of his eyes and wings was a bright hotrod red. His legs were also different. Instead of being riddled with holes like a normal changeling, his legs were solid like a pony’s, but covered in razor sharp thorns! Like rose thorns except they curved downwards just slightly.

Bore soon followed his lead and dropped his disguise as well. Bore’s wings were definitely more worn then Skipper’s, his fangs were a little longer, and he was a little wider around the waist…but not fat of course. The green unicorn under Skipper’s hooves decided his didn’t matter anymore either. He too turned into a changeling, but he was the classic type, with hole-riddled legs and greens eyes and wings.

Skipper turned his right leg sideways and eyed his own thorn covered appendage. “I wonder how much this will hurt.” Skipper began pressing his leg into the changeling bellow’s throat. He quickly began choking and tried to push the spiked limb away. His neck was instantly cut open and bleeding green blood from every square inch of skin. He pushed as hard as he could and he was getting some room to breathe.

“You’re doing it wrong,” Bore said calmly.

“What?! I am so doing it right!”

“Let me show you how it’s done.” Skipper got off the abused changeling and Bore levitated him up against a wall before he slammed his own leg up to its neck.

“How’s that any different from what I was doing?!”

“I’m using his own weight to strangle him of course.”

Skipper scoffed and looked away. The ponies had run off, fearing they would be attacked if they stayed. “Cowards,” Skipper insulted. He looked back at the changeling Bore was about to finish off. Serves those wimps right, they need to learn to stay off our territory.

There was a sudden crash behind him that sent smoke and debris into the air! Bore dropped his victim who promptly began holding his throat. Bore and Skipper both gazed into the fading dust cloud in the middle of the road only to see nothing, but at the same time, something. Both of them could tell that somepony was standing there in the shallow crater, somepony who was big. The space above the crater was wavy and distorted like heat waves coming off of a hot dry road. The creature that stood there might have been ten feet high, but they couldn’t be sure. It had landed only a few dozen feet down the street from them and they couldn’t make out anything substantial.

Bore suddenly realized what it was. “Skipper, get away from it!” Skipper had wandered over to it to try and figure out what it was. Right when Bore shouted his warning, two glowing blue orbs appeared near the top of the distortion. Arching bolts of electricity danced in a straight line just above the orbs before being unleashed on Skipper. Like a fly in bug zapper, his wings shot out and he screamed as he was thrown through the air and crashed through the wall of a building. Bore watched him fly, but quickly looked back at his attacker.

Bore knew what it was and went to confirm it. He sent a quick red twinkle of light at it. The beast didn’t move and let its invisibility spell be broken. Bore’s eyes grew wide as the monster came into view. Standing at a terrifying 12 feet, a changeling that dwarfed the very street it inhabited loomed only a few feet away. His legs were solid without any holes and as big around as trees, his head was the size of a cart, his horn was like a lightning rod, his eyes the size of basketballs, his fangs like swords, his wings would have been bigger than most houses, and his mere standing there was cracking the pavement apart. Unlike the previously mentioned changelings, his wings and eyes were a bright blue color.

“Oh shit…” Bore commented as the giant changeling began to approach. With a single swipe of its massive hoof, Bore flew through a wooden stand on the side of the road. He was no match for a creature like this. He contemplated just lying there until it left, but Skipper had other ideas as he emerged from the building he’d been thrown into.

“You can’t,” he took a gulp of air, “push us around!”

In a very deep voice, it belittled him. “Do you really believe you can take me?”

Skipper was taken off balance for a second, “maybe.”

“The world around us is changing. The very course of history is about to take a turn for the worst,” he looked towards the castle where the fighting had calmed down. ”And you seek to continue old grudges?”

“It doesn’t matter what’s going on, I can still kick your flank, Stompling!”

The large changeling scowled at the insult. It was considered offensive to call his kind Stompling, as it was also offense to call Chrysalis’s children Crylings. ”Seems you need a lesson in humility.”

Skipper propelled himself into the air in a mad charge straight towards the behemoth. He threw his right hoof forward in a pathetic attempt to punch. With a simple lifting of his hoof, the larger changeling had actually caught the punch! Skipper was stopped dead in mid-air, his hoof pressed into the beast’s. “School is in session!” The behemoth tilted his hoof slightly so Skipper’s entire leg was beneath his one hoof. Then, he forced his hoof downwards and crushed Skipper’s leg into the road.

The pavement cracked and parted as Skipper’s leg was buried into the ground. A horrid scream got Bore to jump up and run to his aid. The bigger changeling walked towards the beaten and abused changeling from earlier. His throat was still bleeding. “Don’t mistake this as an alliance or an act of friendship. I just don’t like bullies.” Bore looked over at him while he said it. Skipper’s leg was destroyed. The bone probably resembled mulch more than it did a leg. The skin looked like it had gone through a shredder. Skipper’s leg was useless, he’d never fully recover from an injury this serious. He might as well have had his leg cut off.

The behemoth spoke again, “you should get home now, before I resume my teaching.”

The four changelings were suddenly looking up at the castle as the entire roof was blasted into the sky by a volcanic sized explosion! A column of flames, ash, and smoke billowed through the castle’s newest skylight and lit up the city like it was day. The entire city froze and stared at the fireball as it rose higher in the sky and slowly broke up. Even Skipper forgot his pain as he watched the most incredible display of raw power he’d ever seen.

“That’s something you don’t see every day,” the huge changeling commented. “You should take your wounded and get back to your king.”

Skipper remembered his destroyed leg and began howling again as Bore talked back, “You’ll regret this, all of your hive will! With this latest,” he looked at the smoke filling the late night sky, “development, there’s going to be big shifts in the balance of power!” With that, he teleported him and his partner away.

The behemoth snorted, “Your hive is all talk anyway. At least mine isn’t afraid to come outside the cave and kick some ass now and then.” He turned towards the injured changeling from before whose neck was still bleeding slowly, “I’ll take you home.”

“What?!” he gasped and blood squirted out of his neck.

“I know your queen and my king don’t get along, but I’m sure she’ll make an exception.”

“Our kind our enemies, remember? We’re supposed to hate each other.”

“You know my hive has never been one to hold on to the old grudges and mistakes our forefathers made. And, I think current events are going to affect our political positions.” He looked at the now clear skies.

“Is the fight still going on up there?”

“Yeah.”

“How--who can fight the princesses for this long? Who has this much black magic?”

He didn’t respond for a while, “why were those little Pricklings beating on you?”

He almost chuckled, Prickling was the offensive term for the changelings with legs covered in thorns. “Don’t know, it was just the old grudges I guess.”

“Well, let’s go. It looks like Canterlot is about to go to hell…”

*****

“TWILIGHT!!!!” Rainbow screamed as she burst into the room.

“Rainbow! Where’s the fire?”

“In Canterlot!” Twilight’s face was filled with horror in a second. Rainbow had never seen Twilight run so fast. Now outside with a few other ponies the recently formed town watch had told, they all stared towards Canterlot. A massive column of smoke drifted high into the air. Canterlot was burning down! Twilight was petrified with worry for her teacher, and she had every right to be.

**********************************************************************

Several Minutes Earlier...

Time literally froze as the four screws came out of Shadaico’s back. The rods of metal spun slowly as they drifted through the air at an half an inch an hour. Nash couldn’t understand what was happening. His brain was running so fast that time just seemed to stop for him. Which was good, because he needed all the time he could get to realize how bad this situation was about to become.

Shadaico hadn’t had access to his magic in over a year. That much time without it meant his brain was no longer use to keeping it under control. In other words, with so much raw power being poured into him all at once was going to be way too much. Shadaico could die from the shock...or he could go on a maniacal killing spree as his animal side takes over to dissipate the massive energy overload. Nash felt the cold fingers of fear grip his heart as time seemed to resume.

The screws spun in mid-air and were imbedded in the doorframe behind Celestia and Luna; there was one screw in each corner. It was a narrow flight path, but they had pulled it off. Shadaico landed on his paws with his head pointed straight down so nopony could see his eyes. Blood only dripped out of the holes left in his back and nothing else seemed to have change. He stood there, absolutely still, not a muscle so much as quivering.

Celestia didn’t understand what was happening, she was feeling something. A dense magic beginning to form around the wolf, but the density was increasing at an incredible rate. How was that possible? Luna looked to her right at the screw above her head imbedded in the top of the doorframe. She scanned it gently and realized quickly what the screws had been and why the wolf was growing a dense magic field so fast.

“Celestia, the screws, they were magic seals!” Luna screamed to her sister even though she was right next to her.

Celestia turned to her with wide eyes and then back at the wolf. “All guards get back!” It was too late…

Shadaico lifted his head…his eyes were pure glowing red! He no longer had pupils or irises, just a mass of red light. A gale began to pull everypony towards him as a dark cloud appeared and encircled him. Nopony could see what was going on as the cloud thickened and almost looked like flowing rock rather than a cloud. The density of the magic was still increasing and it was becoming a crushing presence to the weaker unicorns. It wouldn’t actually harm them luckily. It was just like an extra sense that warned them of danger, but it was being overloaded and not functioning properly with so much power so close by. Like an overwhelming smell making you dizzy.

The tornado pulling all the air to the center of the room was strong enough to tare the drapes above and pull the guards closer despite their efforts. It was amazing; Luna had never seen something like this before. “This power, it’s incredible!” she shouted over the roar of the flowing air. She didn’t know if Celestia had heard her.

“How much more powerful can this thing get?!” Celestia cried out.

And just like that, it ended. The gale vanished and the cloud began to break up into the air. Celestia, Luna, Nash, and all the guards stared at the thing in the middle of the room. The wolf who wore a platinum chain was gone, in its place was a creature the ponies had never seen before, but Nash had. Shadaico had somehow returned to his original form, granted, a little more animal like. He was like a jackal, but some of the proportions were wrong.

His shoulders were too wide and his head too large. He had way too much fur around his neck, his hands were topped with charcoal black claws, and his pawed feet were obviously meant for a creature with wider legs then him. He looked muscular and feral by the way his mouth hung open and drool leaked out. His eyes were still as solid red as a stoplight. His posture was low to the ground and bipedal and his arms were shaking slightly as he held them in front of his snout like he was analyzing them.

“Luna?” Celestia almost whispered.

“Yes.”

“Take the small changeling somewhere safe. Then get back here as quickly as possible.”

“You want me to leave you alone to fight this thing?!”

“Luna!” Celestia looked over at her, “Do this for me. Please.”

Luna looked at Shadaico as he continued to stare at his hands, “be careful.” Luna galloped out of the room with Nash in tow.

Nash couldn’t believe what was happening. The return of his magic had definitely overloaded his brain. There were only three solutions available now: let his animalistic side dissipate enough of the energy that Shadaico could get control of himself, give him enough time that his brain could reconfigure and rope in that immense power, or put the sealing screws back in. Waiting obviously wouldn’t work. With how powerful Shadaico was and the fact that his conscious mind was absent at the moment, Nash only hoped the ponies already had plans to rebuild the castle.

The guards that surrounded Shadaico quivered. The immensely thick dark energy that just oozed out of his body into the air was sickening and evil. Celestia could tell at one glance this creature’s very body couldn’t handle this much magic. It was trying to get rid of it. With every second, an immense amount of magic was being wasted. But the creature’s power was still so great that even Celestia could feel it push against her. She was in for a tough fight.

Shadaico finally came out of his strange daze and eyed the room passively, as if looking for threats but not finding any. He soon turned his thin gangly hands on the platinum chain around his neck. It was tight and buried in the excessive fur, but he ran his claws over its surface with low growls. Celestia could tell the chain was also a seal. That’s not possible! He’s even more powerful than this!? But how can anything be this strong?

Shadaico began pulling on the chain as he tried to take it off with raw muscle power. Celestia couldn’t afford to let him do that, there was just no way they’d be able to hold him if he got any stronger. With a quick flick of her head, Celestia fired a lightning bolt at him. Celestia didn’t even see him move, the lightning bolt went right past him! The electrical bolt continued through a wall and into the night sky outside. Celestia couldn’t believe he dodged it, especially at this close range and the fact he had been looking down.

Shadaico turned his attention towards Celestia slowly and growled menacingly with his mouth wide open and his fangs on full display. The longer Celestia could keep him from attacking, the weaker he’d get. But it was too late now. Shadaico lowered to all fours and braced himself against the floor. He closed his mouth and pointed his snout toward the ceiling. Celestia could feel magic being concentrated. When he flung his head towards Celestia, there was a ball of lightning in his mouth! Shadaico fired his own lightning bolt at her and she had a hard time holding it off with her shield.

The guards immediately went in for the kill. Various spears, spells, and other projectiles came at him from all sides. As the attacks came close, a dome of fire sprang up around Shadaico and burned away all their attempts. The dome promptly dissipated and Shadaico stood up. He growled with a smile as he lifted his hands to about shoulder height, a dark sphere formed in each. He let out a bark as he turned his hands downward and slammed them both into the floor.

A wave of black magic tore through the room. Well over half the guards were thrown aside like ragdolls and even those that had put up shields in time found out how powerful this thing was. Celestia was able to cut a sliver in the dark wave and protect all the guards around her as it parted around them like water parts around rocks in a river. Celestia waited for the dark magic to pass, which wasn’t long, it had all happened in a flash anyway. The massive window behind her thrown on the opposite side of the room had shattered in the explosion as well.

Celestia gave the signal and all the guards at her side fired beams of golden energy at Shadaico. Shadaico quickly threw up his hands, creating a dark shield. Even he couldn’t just pass off an attack from 10 unicorns and one Alicorn when they were all coming in at the same time. Before, the attacks had been out of sync and he had burned them as they came in with fractions of a second between arrival times. This time he had to block all of it at once.

Celestia was unleashing a lot of power and so were her guards. The creature was struggling to hold it off. His footing was starting to slip and he was sliding backwards. Shadaico noticed this and dug his clawed toes into the tile floor to try and prevent it. It didn’t work. His claws scratched through the floor as he was pushed back inch by inch. He snarled and grunted as he put more muscle into holding them back, that’s when his small shield plate started to crack!

He had seconds at most before it broke. He made a quick move and let himself fall over as the shield shattered. The combined beam of the ponies erupted over his form as he lay on the ground. The beam hit Celestia’s thrown and destroyed it in a hail of stones and water. The explosion was very loud, it could probably be heard throughout Canterlot. Shadaico kicked himself up to his paws. Shadaico looked like quite the badass with fire and explosions going on behind him.

*****

Luna could hear the battle raging back in the throne room as she raced to the one pony she trusted more than any other when it came to protecting something. She made the trip faster by teleporting to the barracks. She appeared in the lobby area and went straight to his office. Shining Armor was there with Cadence having an argument. He was putting on his armor as she begged him to stay. Luna broke up the argument quickly by arriving.

“Shining, I need you to do something for the Kingdom!”

He stood at immediate attention, “I’m ready to serve however is needed.”

“I need you to keep this here, secret, and safe.” Luna levitated the lantern into view.

“What?!” he asked in slight shock.

“Is there a problem?” Luna didn’t want to talk for long. She needed to get back to the fight.

“I thought there was a battle going on, I want to take part.”

“There are multiple parts to a battle. We need you to do this part.” She pushed the lantern towards him forcefully before she turned to leave.

“But I--guard this!” Shining passed the lantern to Cadence and chased after Luna.

“Shining, she told you to--oh never mind.” She shook her head. He loved serving Equestria and he wanted to do as much as possible. Cadence looked down at the lantern and gasped. A changeling with a white mane, tail, and eyes was sitting inside. “What is this?” she asked herself.

The changeling was sitting there moping, it didn’t take notice of her at all. At first, Cadence’s anger almost made her smash the lantern outright. But, she recalled what Luna said. They wanted this safe, that it was part of the battle going on in the castle right now. She forced down her anger and decided she would have to protect it. “Oh Shining, you left me with a heavy burden this time.”

*****

Her guards had been thrown aside and Celestia was barely holding her ground. Shadaico was hitting her with a continuous stream of dark magic and her shield wasn’t holding well. Her hooves were grinding against the tile floor and making a horrible screech. But she couldn’t hear it over the roar of power slamming into her shield only a foot in front of her face. Celestia had to do something soon or she could lose her footing and take serious damage. At the last second, Luna flew over her head and fired a lightning bolt at Shadaico! Shadaico ended his attack and did a backflip to get away unscathed.

“DON’T YOU DARE HURT MY SISTER!” she bellowed with the Royal Canterlot Voice.

“It is only an animal now Luna. If it could understand us before, it certainly can’t now.” She explained as she trotted up next her. Celestia was sweating.

“Are you alright?”

“I’m fine, but this creature is far stronger than any normal opponent. We need to hit it with something extra powerful.”

Luna looked over at Celestia with a gleam in her eyes, Celestia returned it. The beast stood there watching them. It looked angry and its breathing was exaggerated. Celestia and Luna jumped to the sides, putting some distance between the two of them. Shadaico glanced from one to the other now that they were too far apart to be seen in one glance. Luna and Celestia began charging their next spell…a powerful one.

Luna created a large empty circle, a bubble shield in the space between them, and then she began juicing up its shell. She made the skin of the shield as hard and thick as she could. Then Celestia began filling the space inside the shield with her own powerful spell concoction. The shield vibrated as the energy inside continued to build and push against it. Shadaico meanwhile stood patiently waiting. It was like he couldn’t grasp that they were preparing to attack him, or he just didn’t think it would hurt him and saw no reason to stop them.

The spell combination complete, they unleashed it. The bubble suddenly turned into a giant blue torpedo with golden energy as its payload! Shadaico quickly made a fist and put as much magic as he could into it. He lashed out with a left hook to try and take the attack head-on…

The explosion ripped the throne room apart. The tiles were ripped up in the shockwave, the columns dented in, and the ceiling began to crumble, and the path the spell had traveled left a ditch down into the foundations of the castle. The smoke made it impossible to determine the fate of the wolf monster. Celestia took in gasps of air. The fight had been draining, yet not very long. Luna was pretty spent, but she had only done that one spell. It had been a long time since they’d used that combination, a spell fusion so strong that only Discord had been capable of deflecting it. But even he had a hard time doing that.

Luna walked over to Celestia and wrapped a wing around her as her legs shook from the traces of adrenaline that had run through her. She didn’t look too bad. Her mane was a mess and she had dirt in her coat, but she was otherwise unhurt. “Will you be okay?”

“I’ll be fine, I just need some rest.”

They both froze when they heard a growl. Looking up through the thinning smoke, a bipedal figure was clearly standing…with all his limbs still attached too. They couldn’t make out the finer details yet, but he looked largely undamaged from the spell they had used. “That’s. Not. Possible.” Luna staggered. The smoke parted enough to see how much damage he had taken. It wasn’t much. His left arm looked like it had been poorly skinned and all his fur and been ruffled, but nothing more.

He raised his damaged left arm and inspected it. He turned it over repeatedly, squeezing his hand closed and popping each joint in his fingers. His right arm stayed at his side while he flexed his left. Blood dribbled out of it at an alarming rate, but Shadaico didn’t seem to even notice. He acted like his arm didn’t even hurt, like you’d act if it was someone else’s arm entirely.

Satisfied that he still had full range of motion, he let his arm drop and looked at the princesses. He smirked at their shocked and terrified faces. They couldn’t believe he had taken the full force of the attack and escaped with such minor injuries (compared to how powerful the attack had been). He twisted his neck a little and popped it. Then he twisted it the other way and popped the joint again. Then he smiled wickedly. Celestia knew what he was saying, it’s my turn now.

Shadaico brought his hands together as though he was squeezing an invisible ball. His arm muscles strained as he held them just in front of his abdomen. Suddenly, a ball of fire appeared in his grip that was no bigger than a melon. Shadaico raised his snout to the room again and gave his hands a quick flick. The fireball began rotating in a moderately sized orbit around him as he went to make another. In moments he had eight little balls of flame circling him.

Celestia had regained her composure and watched with curiosity, she had never seen this technique before. She identified the fire aspect easily enough, but this style was unheard of. Celestia desperately searched though her memories of advanced fire magic for a match. Luna gawked at the sight. It was like a fire juggler, but the flames were going in a circle around him rather then up into the air. Shadaico suddenly threw his hands straight up, like he’d just scored a touchdown. Celestia found a match at that moment too.

“Luna! It’s the Eight Directional Volcano!!!”

Just as she screamed it, the eight fireballs stretched into long thin poles of fire. Shadaico roared as a massive wall of fire filled the entire room and spilled out into the halls. A column of fire also blasted right through the roof and into the night sky, lighting up the city. The halls around the throne room acted as channels that the rivers of heat flowed through to barbecue as many carpets, paintings, plants, and ponies as possible. The shockwave from the explosion shook the entire castle and blew out windows throughout!

*****

Shining Armor was currently racing through the courtyard when the roof of the castle went off like a volcano. He ground his hooves to a stop and stared at the sight as his ears rang from the bang. He couldn’t believe what he was seeing. It was like the end of the world or something. The flames were still sweltering up into the clouds and it almost looked like they were setting them on fire too. Shining caught a glimpse of some guards running by and stopped them.

“Get every pegasus in the city down here now! And get every guard in the city up here ASAP!” he ordered them. Then he looked back skyward, “please let the princesses be okay.”

*****

Elsewhere, Cadence was staring up into the sky in horror. The windows had rattled from the explosion and she was pretty sure the windows in the room next door had burst. She looked at the changeling with fear in her eyes, “what have you brought down on us?”

*****

Back in the shattered remains of the throne room, fires raged on every flammable object that hadn’t been completely incinerated already. The marble pillars and most of the tile floor had been reduced to molten slag. Shadaico stood in the middle of it all, laughing like a madman.

*****

A cloaked zebra stood on a nearby hillside as the roof of Canterlot was blown off in a spectacular explosion. “This night is turning into a real mess,” the zebra sighed in a tired old tone. “Guess I should pick which side I’m on now before things get any more complicated…”

Author's Note:

For those of you who got a little confused back during the changeling confrontation, this should clear things up.

As for the Shadaico fight, it's far from over...

Comments

[nightshade745]

I'm not really satisfied with the term Stompling. if anyone has a "good" alternative suggestion, I'd love to hear it.

[Zephyrus Scary]

Mm-HM! Interesting development!

I'm guessing the existence of these various Changelings indicate Nash is not just "a Changeling, except tiny," but one of yet another hive... perhaps a hive of... Squishlings?

Why are Chrysalis's Changelings called-? Hmm... Chrysalis... Chrys > chry > cry?

Nice battle scenes. I'd never be able to write something like this! (My skill lies more in battles of words...)

[Zephyrus Scary]

1867562
I had a think and have a thought: Trampling!
...
Trample-ling!
...
Get it?
Okay, seriously this time: How about Heftling? -or Bulkling? -or something else that emphasizes size in a negative way?...