“Um… what?” Pepper tilted her head and asked sweetly. She was not a pony experienced in dealing with bad guys.
“I’m not here to indulge your curiosity.” The likely leader told her. “Now come with us and do what I asked so we can get this done with as simply and peacefully as possible. Otherwise I am perfectly willing to hurt some ponies to get this done, so what are- whoa!”
Quartz lunged forward at him with lightning speed, swiping at him. But he was able to leap back to safety, the hoof just barely missing him. Some of his comrades came to his side while the others formed a semi-circle around Applejack’s party. The one carrying the bag held back behind them all.
“I hadn’t heard you had gotten yourself some protectors.” The leader said to Pepper as he eyed Quartz. “Could you tell things were getting more dangerous in these towns?”
“I-I don’t know what you’re talking about! What’s going on here? Why do you want to destroy the dam?” Pepper was shaking her head in confusion, completely surprised by the turn of events.
The leader frowned. “This is some set of coincidences, I planned for us to just come here and get rid of the dam today. Only for us to spy the leader of Mountain Town heading there. I thought that was perfect, you could help us finish this even easier. But now as it turns out you were coming here with a completely unaffiliated and unknown group of ponies. And fighters too at that. We didn’t think you would be here at all today. Too many coincidences.”
Applejack furrowed her brow, this was weird. Ponies from out of nowhere who want to destroy the dam? Why? And if what he was saying is true they didn’t have anything to do with Applejack, Pepper or the disciples, they all just happened to run into each other through random chance and timing.
“I can see this isn’t going to be as simple as I hoped. Should’ve just ignored you and gone to the dam.” The leader spat out and backed up as the other disciples formed up around Quartz. “Whatever, if that’s how it has to be then so be it. Everypony, kill these stooges.”
The leader and the pony carrying the bag backed up with three other ponies while the remaining ten formed up in line and faced down Applejack and the disciples. Pepper frantically looked back and forth between the two groups, legs shaking in fear.
For a moment it was just a standoff, neither group attacking.
Applejack was tense, a bead of sweat rolling down her face. These ponies were bad news but she really didn’t want to fight unless she had to.
“Look y'all, I’m sure we-”
Her attempt to talk them down was the trigger as both the enemy ponies and the disciples leaped at each other.
One of them struck Bedrock in the face with a hoof, only for him to nonchalantly smack him aside as if a fly had struck him. Marble’s small frame dodged under two other attackers, he delivered quick strikes to their barrels and Applejack winced as she could hear their forelegs snap, sending the two screaming to the ground.
The leader saw this and nervously licked his lips. Quartz and Obsidian were stuck dueling against other opponents that continuously dodged their attacks after seeing what a single touch from Marble could do, but it was obvious who the superior fighters were and it was just a matter of time before the disciples could take down the whole group.
Applejack heard another scream as Bedrock snapped the leg of a different attacker.
She gritted her teeth and ran forward, trying to run right to the leader. One of his underlings came to meet her, not lunging forward over-confidently like Sandstone but taking a measured stance. Applejack wasn’t sure enough about her skill in Hoof of the Earth to not accidentally kill anypony she used it on, she’d fight the same way she had her whole life.
She ducked under a wide swing but found the other hoof coming right for her face, she tried to backpedal but still got hit on the edge of her snout, the attacker didn’t give her any time to recover as they pushed forward. Darting to the side they kneed Applejack in the flank and when her knees buckled they kicked under her stomach.
But Applejack was tough, she let out a wheeze and acted like she was about to fall over, her attacker struck a hoof out straight at her face that Applejack slipped away from. Pulling her head back so that the enemy’s hoof went less than an inch in front of her face she leaned back forward and bit the pony right on the hoof.
Not finished yet she held down with her teeth and raised the pony in the air, swinging them around like a sack of flour before throwing them back to the ground.
They made a hard “whud” on the ground and Applejack heard them painfully cough as all the air was knocked out of their lungs. This one was down for the count.
The noise of the fighting had seemed to draw the attention of some of the ponies who worked and lived at the dam. Applejack saw several at the top of the dam coming down the pathway and many more that were poking their heads out of the homes to her right. Since Pepper was here some of them might see her and try to help out but Applejack didn’t want anypony else to get in danger.
She turned to the leader and began running towards him, he scowled and kicked his hooves against the ground, kicking up a big dust cloud. Appplejack put on the brakes but still skidded into it, coughing and rubbing at her eyes. When it cleared and she got her vision back she saw that the leader, the bag carrying pony, and two others were running up to the dam.
“Shoot, hey y'all! We gotta go get them!” She yelled to her friends.
Looking back at them she saw that they had made short work of their assailants, the ones fighting Quartz and Obsidian were lying in a heap, Marble left a trail of broken limbs and moaning ponies in his wake and Bedrock had turned his foes into pancakes.
But Bedrock still…
“Hold on.” He said as he walked up to one of the unconscious ponies. “Let me just finish this.” Bedrock raised a hoof to the skull of the pony.
“What are you doing!” Applejack screamed as she ran up to him, knocking away his hoof and putting herself between him and the pony. “Were you gonna kill him or something!?”
“Of course.” Bedrock stated simply.
Applejack stared aghast, she couldn’t tell what the others behind her were thinking but obviously they didn’t have a problem with this if Bedrock was going to just do this without any complaint from them.
“You can’t do that! It’s wrong!”
Bedrock just cocked an eyebrow at her. “What are you talking about? They attacked us. And you heard what their leader said about hurting ponies, they’re bad guys.”
“And we’re good ponies. And good ponies don’t kill! Especially not some helpless fella who’s already out cold!” Applejack stomped her hoof angrily.
“Applejack, please.” Quartz called to her. “I believe we can talk about this later.”
Applejack scowled but she knew he was right, they had to get to the dam. Glaring at Bedrock she ran down the path, Quartz and the others following her.
“Uhh, why are we even stopping them from destroying the dam now?” Marble asked. “That’s basically why we came here.”
“No! If we let these ponies destroy the dam now it wont fix anything, the ponies of Mountain Town will be even angrier! They might even think Valley Town had something to do with it and then they’d march down there and-” Applejack stopped mid-sentence, suddenly realizing something. “They’d march down there and find Thistle’s fort and all those soldiers waiting for them...”
Quartz perked up. “You think that’s what’s going on?”
“Yeah, think about it. If the dam was suddenly destroyed the ponies of Mountain Town would naturally suspect Valley Town did it. They’d fly down there in a rage. But they don’t know about the fort and they have no weapons. Thistle would easily fight them off.”
Quartz nodded. “Yes, and they’d see it as an act of war and take the fight to Mountain Town, possibly even using it as an excuse to take it over completely. I think whoever hired these mercenaries was counting on that sort of reaction, it would also create a lot of panic among the normal ponies in Valley Town and likely change their views on Mountain Town.”
“And I can think of exactly who might have planned this.” Obsidian said.
“The sheriff.” Everyone answered at once.
Applejack gritted her teeth and ran faster, they were almost to where the dam began, the top level of it being wide enough that all five of them could walk across side by side. A metal railing that was twice as high as Applejack rose on the side that faced the valley, another railing half its height was on the side of the artificial lake.
Several hurt and groaning ponies lay on their path, obviously the workers, Applejack was happy to see that none of them looked too bad.
Going through an archway built on the edge of the dam they finally made it to the top side, steel grating now below their hooves. They galloped further along the top of the damn for a second-
“I suggest stopping there.”
Applejack looked forward to see the hired ponies midway on the dam. The big bag that one had been carrying was now sitting on the steel grating, one of the other underlings also sported a black eye. Seems the workers here didn’t let them pass peacefully.
“It’s obvious any fight wont go in our favor.” Their leader said to them. “So you’ve forced me to do this.” He tore the bag apart to reveal its contents, a large metal cylinder with wires attached to some other doohickey on top.
Applejack had no idea what she was looking at. It looked like the kind of gadget Flim and Flam or Twilight would make.
“A bomb.” Quartz ground out.
Applejack looked to her side at him, his eyes were narrowed in hate at the object before him, she had never seen him so angry.
“That’s right. And although I’d really prefer not to, I will detonate it right here and now if you don’t back away. Otherwise I’m willing to give you the opportunity to leave, take the workers and other ponies with you and give us enough space to set the timer and get out of here. Then we’re all out of your mane. You’re all not even from Mountain Town anyways are you? No sense losing your lives over it right?” He inched his hoof closer to the contraption on top of the bomb. “Now make your choice. Leave, or I blow us all up.”
Applejack’s eyes met his. She saw…
“What should we do?” Marble whispered to Quartz.
“I might be able to send a tremor into them from here, but I don’t know if it will incapacitate them all quick enough.” He replied, Obsidian and Bedrock wound up as tight as springs, ready to move at a moment’s notice.
“All four of us could try it at once and-” Marble tried continuing on but was cut off.
“Not necessary.” Applejack said and walked forward. Face expressionless. Staring right at the enemy ponies.
“Did you hear me?!” The pumpkin colored leader yelled at her. “I can flip one switch and blow us all up. Step back!”
Applejack stared right at him, unperturbed.
“Then do it.”
The other mercenaries looked at her like she was insane, jaws dropping wide they nervously shared a glance with each other, sweat starting to pour down their faces. The leader growled and narrowed his eyes at her, hoof reaching to one of the switches.
“Applejack! What are you doing?!” Obsidian yelled at her.
Applejack didn’t want to break her gaze with the leader but she imagined the other disciples were similarly flummoxed and perplexed by what she was doing.
His hoof was right on top of the switch, a single ounce more of pressure would flip it and send them all to the moon. Steel eyes met Applejack’s emerald gaze, the leader not making any signs of fear like his underlings. There was no sweat on his brow, no nervous glancing, his hoof was steady as a rock. Applejack as well was unwavering. Neither of them reacted to anything else around them, they might as well have been on a deserted island. Two ponies and a bomb. One daring the other to flip the switch and blow them both up.
No blinking. No words spoken.
He didn’t sigh, his expression didn’t change, but the leader removed his hoof from the switch and stepped away from the bomb.
“Alright, you win.”