//------------------------------//
// The Good, The Bad, and The Mask 
// Story: Puppets of Tragedy 
// by Iridescence T Wind 
//------------------------------//

The explosion had popped the gut of Android 21 like a balloon.  But out of it flew a mask about a quarter of an inch big, which expanded rapidly to full size. It was easily recognizable from the white coloration and blue flames where the eyes should be.  The fact the rest of the body didn't follow after it, was worrisome. For the Puppet Master however...

The feeling of suffocation, despite being able to breathe, disjointed and spinning rapidly like a frisbee didn't help. Fresh air and escape from the oppressive environment that was that gum tunnel only felt more amplified as the rest of my body fell back to the floor, unable to land properly due to loss of most senses except for hearing and touch. Weirdly enough, I could still hear from the mask, but at the moment I was too blinded in worry and panic to care. This had been a really awful idea. I had just left my body blind inside the enemy after all. Outside things didn't look much better for my chances. With Android 21 almost immediately reaching for me. Though she was currently full of white glowing arrows.

I opened my mouth to scream. But then everything took on a shade of blue and I was given the distinct feeling of uncontrolled flight to make me regret opening my mouth. Instead, I shut it and swallowed hard as I was magically flung into the hooves of another. The pink menace whined as she pulled herself out of the pin-cushion she had become, "Give him back!"

"There aren't a second course for thou! Thou needs a diet!" Another voice, familiar and enraged rang out as my holder brought me face to face with my rescuer, "Are thou alright Puppet Master?"

"As well as I can be, separated from my body." I  chuckled worriedly as Celestia raced by the edges of my vision, ten energy based constructs to what would be the equivalent to Zweihanders flying alongside her before she passed my range of vision.

"What can you tell me of this creature?" Luna was straight to the point, she had a slight expression of worry, but it was marred with the concentration required for our current combat.

"Well shes from another world where the laws of physics don't really app-" Luna yanked me to the side, as pink fingers tried to nab me from her, "-lyyy-eeeek."

"Noted, what else?" Luna took a stepping lunge backward as her horn lit up, more arrows raining down from above her.

"Physical attacks short of complete disintegration won't work very well, but she is mentally unhinged it seems. Capable of manipulating energy to form explosive blasts and if shes relevant to either Androids or Majin Buu, two villains from her verse. Capable of destroying planets rather easily."

"Oh." Luna's actions were jerky, as Android 21 appeared behind her before getting blind sided by Celestia again. There was something satisfying about a Zweihander braining her. Android 21 just shrugged it off like all her other injuries before being knocked out of my sight-line again. "Any other weaknesses?"

"She gains energy off eating people, but I'm going to see about reversing that flow a bit more." I quietly intoned, "Long term if you can keep her from leaving or touching her forehead for an Instant Transmission, she should eventually run out of energy as long as she can't eat anyone else."

"What do I do with you?" Luna asked, and I shrugged before realizing that, again, my body was still inside the alien-robot-girl.

"I don't... know..." I replied after a second, feeling the yanking feeling as Luna tugged my disembodied face out of the way of another beam. 

"Well what happens if I wear you?" Luna asked, and I pursed my mouth.

I stared at her.

I started to blush, a combination of embarrassment and something about how she phrased it, "I... D-don't know?"

The mask turned away from Luna before the blush could fully form and she mentioned, "Wow, its bigger on the inside? Well here goes nothing."

"What? Wait a mo-" I started to reply but I was cut off as I let out a small "Eep!"

Fur unseen, bristled across my edges, a muzzle slipping into place, somehow despite my flat surface. I could the oddest sensation of her fur brushing into place almost like the mask was made for her. With that, however, my vision distorted and my own noise was drowned out by the sudden loss of control over my jaw. I could still feel my body, and hear my surroundings but my other senses had withdrawn. It was like I was now taking a backseat to my own senses. An alien sensation of a heartbeat that was not my own, as well as the movements of a body that I had no control over overlapping with my own awareness. I wanted to shudder, as though someone had just shoved a lizard down the back of my shirt.

I was also distinctly aware that my mind was no longer my own. It was in a field of flowers oh so familiar to the night we spent together in my dreams.  There was a massive mirror, showing the reality from our shared point of view, Luna pacing mentally as time progressed slowly on the outside. Upon my appearance, she had given a momentary pause and looked to me, as though for ideas. I shrugged, and she sighed. On the outside Android 21 was not idle. Instead of waiting patiently she was firing a beam at us, but it was a combined effort to dodge out of the way. As though two minds shared each others body.

Power that I siphoned from Android 21 being a contribution to the effort, but it was pitiful in comparison to the massive moon overhead. I simply couldn't drain fast enough against a similar energy absorber. While I could make progress, it was slowed by the progress she in turn gave. Consuming a considerable amount of effort on my part, but watching Luna in action suddenly gave clarity to just how the horned casters did magic.

With similarity to a magical circle, an overlay would emerge from the mirror, and Luna would sequence in a long stream of icons that each had individual meanings. Some of which I knew thanks to Trixies teachings, most unknown. However, as I watched, it seemed almost intuitive as each icon matched up to a particular element of a spell. Her concentration providing complexity. It reminded me of a pianist on their craft, a song in the works for each spell. Some as simple as a few notes, others as long as a grand orchestra. Eventually even Luna's hooved hands had to stop playing though, and as the movement stopped, even if it was just for a split second... The spell would then go off.  This gave me an idea.

Luna was using something she called her trump card, the formula which was repeated again and again. Channeling the power of the moon through herself like a wire. For lack of a better term, I plied myself in like a splice and donated my own efforts, not in the form of raw power... 

But as a processor for multitasking.

On the outside, things had seemed one sided. No matter what they threw at her, Android 21 just kept coming back no worse for wear. But as the first few seconds of time flowed forth, there was a certain change in the atmosphere of the fight. Android 21 fired at near point blank range. This was near impossible to dodge at this range. Given that the shield wouldn't be able to come up in time to block it, and that dodging a beam moving roughly the same speed as light. But given the circumstances, she shouldn't of been surprised when the first action of the newly masked mare was to create a portal diverting it away. This gave her just a seconds pause, enough time for the princess of the sun to scorch her raw like a flamethrower.

Another new problem that was solved this time with a kick to the face, hard enough to daze the solar monarch but not enough to kill. She had bigger problems now that two of her treats were working together. The white mask wasn't moving with uncertainty anymore, instead the stern expressions of Princess Luna guided it. The flames of bright blue now becoming dark as a new wave of star-styled projectiles came into existence and fired.  She began the dodging game again. Bored. It seemed both parties hadn't learned their lessons when it came to damaging her. If anything her aim had gotten worse! When she saw two shots going far wider than normal, she couldn't resist the taunt, "What? Your aim get worse with that fire vision?" Too late did she see the trap.

I had altered Luna's spell, taking some of the many arrow templates and having linked them together and removed the homing parameter in her complex designs. It had momentarily caught Luna off guard as the spell went off, but then results made it clear what had just happened. A thin string, barely a millimeter wide had strung themselves up between the two now linked spells. When they flew to either side of their target, the string caught on her gut and caused the momentum of the arrows to bend their trajectory. Drug by their tethers, they circled around Android 21 before impaling themselves into her sides. Securing her arms. Already another three of the altered spell then impacted, reinforcing the arms and capturing the legs and tail with their impacts.

Luna nodded to me, and I nodded back, "I'll create"

"And I'll upgrade!" I agreed, as her next volley of spells queued, dozens of similar arrows being processed the way she normally did it. I cracked my mental fingers and started to experiment.

Android 21 for her part was now trying. After the first wave of altered arrows she had dodged expecting more of the same. Unfortunately for her, each arrow was now given the alterations individually in ways that only a mad man who'd puppeteer dozens of different puppets at a time could give. Fire arrow, Ice arrow, Toxic arrow, explosive. Arrows that split into more arrows, others that chased her about like a flock of angry piranhas. Chaos and pandemonium added into an otherwise orderly saturation firing of spells. Her concentration was slipping with all the new factors. Then the Puppet Master had figured out how to add his own constructions to the mix. Just as she was about to fire off a beam, a energy construct had formed, just a fist, but a fist none the less and socked her in the jaw from out of left field.

The impact would of shattered her, but the realization of the fist and the time between its travel and impact had realized a shield behind her to catch the splatter before it spread. With her forced regeneration, however. The time left just enough of a gap for several more arrows to rain down. Ice encased limbs, and more tethers tied themselves around her, holding her in place. 

Luna looked upon the scene, "This won't hold her for long."

I winced, "It's a fair bit more holding than what we've been doing yet."

"She can't teleport away at least. What do we do now?"

I could still feel my body chipping away at her reserves bit by bit. Luna felt it too, it seemed now that we were connected. That meant total obliteration was out unless-. Luna gave me an odd smile, the kind that made me worry for my future dreams at night. Suddenly I was the conduit for the moons power for a split second.

Android 21 was focusing, with all the things going on she needed to get free. Thus it was a total surprise to her when the caster of magic, instead of staying back away from her like normal, had decided to teleport in front of her, and hit her in the one way that she hadn't expected.

A straight curb stomp into the gut.

Like any creature with a gut when dealt a tremendous impact. The urge to hurl becomes near overwhelmingly strong. Coupled with a new explosion chaining out of it into your mouth and well... You get the idea. The resulting vomit caused several things to spiral out.  First and foremost was a large amount of partially digested sweets, which reverted forms and disappeared back to the various dimensions of which they originally belonged as soon as they appeared. The second of which was the Puppet Masters body, covered in vomit and slime. The worn out thing looked like it had just walked out of a fireworks factory that had caught aflame. Robes charred and cindered, as well as gloves now ash from the latest explosion. 

Heck it, and the mask on Luna's face fell to the ground first thing the former was clear of her mouth. Clearly having spent far more than it was capable of channeling at once. But the kicker was what was the third thing that fell out of her mouth. Was a far more human version of her. Shivering and in a wreck. Wearing a red and blue four checkered long bottomed shirt. The next impact had sent her flying upwards. Where now she could suffer from the missing party of this battle.

Celestia hadn't been idle. As the monarch of one of the most destructive celestial bodies imaginable short of a black hole. She had collected the suns fire into a ball of energy about three times as big as she was, balanced precariously on the tip of her horn. Now that both Luna and the others were free from the crossfire, and that she was bound unable to escape. The Solar monarch had decided to live up to her butt-mark and give her the ultimate burn.

The evil Android 21 perished in a blazing ball of light that would make Kid Buu of dragonball flinch. Her other half, still a shivering unconscious wreck, being dragged back through the dimensional portals it came from. The Puppet Master, now in the embrace of the uncaring ground, gave a small cheer before passing out from a combination of pain, stress, and exhaustion. That dark side of hers swore she'd be back, even if it took dragging herself through the gates of hell. Hell be damned, whichever one she ended up in anyway.