The steady drumming of several thousand hooves, and the rush of multitudes of flapping and buzzing wings filled the air, the sound gently rattling window panes and kicking up concrete dust in a thick, grey cloud that threatened to choke the breath from those who dared to open their mouths. The Equestrian armies had left very few behind to guard the portal home, as there was not much point in doing so. Spike had volunteered for the job, saying that his increased size and strength made him the ideal guard. Celestia had agreed. As he had little experience in fighting with a large number of smaller allies, his size and strength would be more of a liability on the battlefield, since his lack of experience robbed him of true effectiveness. With a smaller list of allies, he would do far better.
And so it was with very little in the way of words, that the Equestrian armies had set out.
The few humans scattered among the Ponies, Gryphons and Changelings looked almost lost, the tallest creatures in the fighting force that marched towards the enemy that morning. A great many of them held their modified rifles and pistols in shaking hands. They weren’t soldiers, but they were about to be part of an all out war, and the fear that brought was tense and palpable, thickening the air and quickening the beating of their hearts.
In truth, while they did not show it, nearly every creature present had those same fears, their jaws clenched and steps rigid as they marched ever closer to their destination.
They saw the army of humans ahead of them, with their guns and hastily made swords. They saw the smaller, but no less terrifying swarm of Blackshell Changelings hovering in the air above the humans. They saw the tower that rose up from the cold waters of Vancouver Harbor, thrumming with energy, little bolts of lightning-like energy leaping between spikes and spires in flickers of green against the near black material. They saw the Changeling Queen standing there, ready for them. They all knew that this was going to be a brutal struggle. They knew it was going to be difficult.
They kept marching towards it anyway.
Celestia, Luna, Cadence, Twilight, Thorax, Pharynx, and Gilda the Gryphon all marched at the head of the Alliance army, leading by example as they put themselves on the frontline. Marching with them were the element bearers, Spike, and Allan.
Spike was still massive, his size apparently the result of a growth spell, and not natural at all, which explained why it had happened in the space of a week, when his last had taken several. Still. The dragon was an impressive sight, as were the Alicorns, and the bearers in their personalized armour.
Allan felt his armour clank and shift with every movement, and took comfort in the familiar weight on his back, shoulders, head and hips. The extra protection would serve him well today. It would serve them all well.
He glanced to his left, to see Twilight as she walked steadily forward, mouth set in a grim line. Applejack walked behind her, her own face a mirror to Twilight’s, a deep frown shared between them. Her stetson had wide slice missing from the brim on the left side, and her armoured harness was still dirty from the bus ride. On Applejack’s far side was Rarity, who primly trotted in time with the army’s thunderous rhythm, her mane bouncing underneath her hat. Her once pristine outfit now sporting several rushed repair jobs, the darker thread standing out against the white cloth. Beyond her was Dash, her guard armour dented and charred in a few spots but otherwise intact. Her mane had been blackened on one side, just below her ear, by a spell bolt, and she looked pissed off, ready to return the favour with lightning.
On Alan's other side, was Fluttershy, her bow tucked into its protective sheath between her wings, while her arrow pouch was securely fastened to her hip. Her ranger style cloak was ripped and shredded towards the bottom, but she herself was unscathed. She gave a pale faced smile, trying to conquer her own terror at the sight ahead, and Allan was grateful for the little boost of love that drifted over to him. Pinkie pronked behind Cadence, her mane bouncing wildly and her ever present smile still firmly in place. Her party distribution hammer jiggled in its own sheath, ready for some fun. The pink mare seemed to be humming the music piece called “Ride of the Valkyries” as she hopped along.
The Princesses were stoic and imposing as they strutted towards Chrysalis, while Pharynx looked almost ecstatic at the thought of a real fight. Thorax, on the other hoof, was twisting his mouth into wiggly lines and trying in vain to look like he wasn’t scared out of his wits. Gilda seemed to agree with Pharynx, a pair of hand axes hanging from her waist. She took a quick glance back at Rainbow Dash, and the two exchanged a nod.
Allan turned his gaze back ahead. His eyes swept over the crowd of humans, and he was dismayed to find that there were a few he recognized. None of them were Anna.
His eyes sought her out, of course. Why wouldn’t he look at her? She stood tall, and imposing, menacing, a cruel smile on her lips. Seeing her now, knowing what he did, didn’t make him angry anymore. He just felt sad, knowing what she had gone through, and what had been forced upon her. He wished he could help her. He wished he could turn back time, and fix what had been broken. But he couldn’t. He could only release her.
“You are more stupid than I thought.” Chrysalis smirked. She stood upright, trying to make herself look imposing by standing as tall as possible, stretching herself a little too much to make the pose look natural- which hampered its ability to actually make her more intimidating. “Your army may be better armed, but mine is so much bigger.”
There was no denying that. The Equestrian army was about two thousand strong, the Changeling hive had brought approximately three hundred drones, and the Gryphons had only managed to gather one hundred and eighty seven warriors. And with only a handful of humans in the ranks as well, they didn’t even come close to Three thousand.
Chrysalis had twice that when they counted the enthralled humans alone. Add in her Changelings, and there was another thousand.
But that was not a good mix. The Resistance had managed to stay ahead of Chrysalis for eight months, even with Kate’s unwitting betrayal, and that was mostly due to the fact that the humans effectiveness when under her control was severely limited. There weren’t enough weapons in Vancouver to arm them all, and human senses were easy to trick.
The Resistance had only had issues when faced with Changelings.
This meant that an army of two thousand-four hundred and eighty seven, headed by four Alicorns and the bearers of the elements of harmony would have little trouble against the humans, save for the fact that there was so many.
Once again, the drones above were the real threat.
Celestia clucked her tongue. “And if it were a straight up fight, we would still claim victory.”
Chrysalis had never been good at controlling her temper, so Allan was hardly surprised at the sudden spike of vitriol he felt coming off of the Changeling Queen.
Twilight leaned closer to him, and murmured. “Hang back. You’re still not fully recovered. Leave the bulk of the fighting to us, or you’ll burn your magic out entirely and die.”
“Wonderful. That’s exactly what I wanted to hear before charging head first into battle.” Allan griped, shifting uncomfortably where he stood. The waiting was killing him…..or, he was waiting for something to start trying to kill him. He clenched his jaw as Chrysalis threw another accusation at Celestia, trying in vain to get a rise out of the Alicorn.
“How does it feel, Celestia? To be so very far away from the ones you’ve spent your life protecting? Are you miserable yet? Try to imagine how it felt for me when you all chased me out of the hive!”
“You brought that upon yourself.” The Solar Princess returned. “You invaded us, twice, plotted several more invasions, have left nothing but misery and heartache wherever you go, and treated your own people- nay, your own children, like slaves- and expect the world to just kneel in submittance before you. It is you who are the fool, to believe for a moment that we would simply allow you to walk all over us.”
“Thou hast threatened our subjects, our lands and our way of life for the last time.” Luna stated, her voice rising high and clear, with an intense unwavering steadfastness. “Surrender. It will be better for all of us. Including you.”
Chrysalis just laughed, the sound emerging from her mouth was false, and deliberately harsh. “I would rather die a thousand deaths, than surrender to you.”
Allan tuned out the rest of the Princesses pleas for surrender. It was useless. She wasn’t going to surrender. She never would. “So be it.” He growled, perfectly in time with Princess Luna’s own sad rendition of those very same words.
“PONIES!! MAKE WAR!!!!” Captain Spitfire screamed, leaping into the sky, followed by a thousand other pegasi. “SHOW THEM HOW IT’S DONE!!”
“WINGS OF STEEL!” Screeched Gilda, and her warriors gave a resounding cry in return. “CLAWS OF FURY!!”
Allan leapt into the air too, wings buzzing furiously and his sword springing from his gauntlet. The Earth ponies and Unicorns charged beneath him, to crash into the human hordes with a sound like thunder, answered with the dynamite blasts of gunfire, the shots ricocheting off of Unicorn shields and glancing off of the thick, heavy armour of the Earth Ponies in showers of sparks and, occasionally, blood.
The changelings swarmed forth, Chrysalis vanishing in a burst of magic, leaving behind nothing but a scorched patch of concrete and a wicked laugh. She appeared again, several meters to her left, and let loose a blast of magic so powerful that the concrete beneath it instantly melted into a thin puddle of slag.
Celestia and Luna’s blades flashed in front of them, deflecting the blast upwards in a massive arc, where it struck Chrysalis’s shield and sent massive ripples of energy outward across the green surface.
Allan swooped down, intent on getting in Chrysalis’s sights, and drawing her attention away from the Alicorns, but she knew he was coming the moment he started, a dozen changelings swarming between them, each with slit eyes and grinning faces that matched their mothers.
Twilight and Applejack fought back to back, Twilight focusing on deflecting magical blasts and Applejack punching anything that got close in the face until it stopped squirming.
Ponies and Changelings clashed in bitter struggles above, and ponies and humans threw themselves at each other with reckless abandon down below, all pretense of organized combat having flown out of the window the moment negotiations broke down. The street became a bloodbath, with Chrysalis’s hordes trying to capture of kill their opponents, while the Equestrian soldiers, Thorax’s Changelings, and the Gryphon warriors all attempting to keep from harming the humans under Chrysalis’s control.
The battle at street level wasn’t going well from the very start.
The ponies lost ground and soldiers by the dozens in the first few moments of the melee, with Celestia, Luna, Cadence and Pharynx having to intervene despite needing to conserve their energy for Chrysalis.
The battle in the sky was a different story. With so many flying soldiers on their side, the Equestrian forces held their ground, with Spitfire shouting orders to counteract every move Chrysalis made almost before she could make it, and Rainbow’s immense speed tearing holes in the swarms formation.
And that was where Allan knew they had the advantage. If they could drive the Changelings out of the sky, the battlefield would change very quickly, the aerial units of the Equestrian army would hammer the human thralls from above, while the ground forces would force them back.
Taking the sky was the first objective. If they did that, they would gain an upper hoof.
Allan and Dash used speed and deception to get inside enemy lines time and again, Allan shape shifting out of sight and sneaking into a cluster of Changelings, only to sweep his sword through several and take them out in one shot, before speeding out of sight and repeating the process. Rainbow just flew fast and hit hard, her wings blades passing by too quickly for a shield to be raised to deflect them.
The other pegasi used clouds to conjure lightning bolts, most of which were avoided, and not deflected, by their dark opponents. The changelings fought back with blasts of magic that forced flying formations to split apart in order to avoid them, causing the entire aerial battle to become an ever shifting, sprawling conflict that wove itself between buildings like the threads from a million needles.
Spotting Rarity on the ground, dueling six Changelings at once, and still looking fabulous while doing it, Allan left Rainbow to her business, and dropped down to his alabaster coated friend, eager to lend her a hoof.
Only to find Kate there, still wrapped half in bandages and screaming insults as her shotgun (he had no idea where she found it), spat out blast after blast of heavy slug rounds that punched through shields like tissue paper. His sister saw him coming, and blasted a Changeling close to him, before giving a quick wave and a nod.
Allan returned to the fight up above.
Meanwhile, Celestia, Luna, Pharynx and Cadence all focused their attention on Chrysalis, whose out of control attacks threatened entire squads of ponies at a time, as well as numerous humans and changelings, regardless of whose side they were on. Celestia and Luna worked in tandem to protect everyone else from the Queen’s attacks, conjuring up a shield to protect Cadence as she was distracted by a group of Changelings rushing her, then hauling Pharynx out of the way when he wasn’t quite going to escape the beam of energy his mother sent towards him.
Chrysalis hadn’t stopped laughing the whole time.
The plan was still in place though, which meant the Elements needed to do their bit.
Pinkie broke through to Chrysalis first, leaping up over Celestia as the Solar Diarch parried Chrysalis’s attempted decapitation, leaving the Queen exposed. Pinkie capitalized on the opening beautifully, bringing her hammer swinging down from overhead, and smashing it onto Chrysalis’s shoulder as the Queen tried to dodge. Chitin cracked and Chrysalis howled, spinning on Pinkie Pie and slicing the air in half where the pink mare had just been.
Pinkie vaulted over her easily, and was whisked away by Rainbow Dash, who appeared out of nowhere to catch her. Chrysalis tried to send a blast of magic their way, only for an arrow to stick deep in her side, punching through her green armour. Fluttershy, barely holding back her fears, and whimpering quietly, let loose a second arrow at the Queen, only for it to be deflected.
The Queen stalked closer, deflecting arrow after arrow, before getting close enough to strike with her blade-
BAM! Applejack charged in, and span around, bucking the Queen in the flank, hard. Her amour and Chitin cracked again, and blood seeped through, green, and practically glowing with magical energy. Chrysalis screamed, staggering away, only to receive a nasty slice across the face as Rarity leapt in and whipped her rapier rapidly from side to side, slicing open the Queen’s face in multiple places, including a horrid, deep gash on her cheek, despite the protection offered to the Changeling by her helmet.
Twilight joined in, her staff hammering away at the Queen’s armoured body with Earth Pony strength and Pegasi speed, each blow fragmenting the armour even more, until the helmet shattered entirely, revealing the bloodied and bruised muzzle beneath, twisted into a snarling mask of rage.
Another arrow sank into her leg, and Dash whisked by, opening a great rend in the Queen’s neck that threatened to bleed her out.
Celestia had had enough of this though, emerging from the scrum of combatants like an angel from on high, and swung her gleaming, sunlit blade with all her might.
And sent the head of her enemy flying free from its body.
Everything went quiet.
Very, very quiet.
Too quiet.
A pair of hooves started clapping, amid the sounds of buzzing wings. “Bravo, Celestia. You’ve beheaded me. Are you having fun yet?”
Celestia turned to face the source of the noise, her eyes settling on the airborne changelings, all flying in a tight ball. The body lying in the dust burst into flame, revealing a simple, headless drone lying in its place.
All eyes turned to the Changeling swarm, hovering just meters above the human crowd. The larger, darker form of Chrysalis slowly emerged from the center of that scrum, her twisted grin and prominent fangs sending a shiver of fear down Allan's back.
Her Chitin had devolved even further than when he had first seen her, the chitin on her legs jagged and misshapen, and riddled with even more holes than she had had before. Her mane was longer, too, hanging down past her knees, and it was tangled, matted and frayed.
Rarity’s left eye was twitching as she held back the urge to drop her rapier and pull out a hairbrush.
Chrysalis’s tail was in a similar state of disarray, and her chitin was unclean, dull and covered in small pits and divots, as if she had been hit by a lot of small objects at incredible velocities, or had been sprayed with acid.
If what they had been told about her experimentations with Changeling resins was true, then Allan's bits would be on the latter.
But perhaps the most disturbing thing was her eyes. Where once they had held a terrible, yet undeniable resolve and focus, now they were anything but. They flicked this way and that, her pupils shrunken and the whites of her eyes criss-crossed with deep green veins, giving her a nasty, bloodshot look that revealed just how little sleep she had allowed herself. It was altogether possible that she literally couldn’t let herself sleep, else her control over her armies may slip, allowing the humans to run, and her children to start developing minds of their own...assuming they even could.
“Yes, yes…...yes. All of you. All of you will have lots of fun when I’m done!” Chrysalis cackled. “You’ll march beside each other at my command! And you’ll always do whatever I say! You’ll never question me, EVER AGAIN!!!”
It was an odd contrast to the Chrysalis they had seen not moments before, whose composure had still been intact.
Twilight’s eyes were hyper-focused on the Queen, before she gasped, and her eyes drifted to Celestia. “Princess. She’s using her own brain as the focus of her Hive mind! Even with all the support she has, it’s putting too much strain on her! She has to use another body just to cope with the pain!”
In Allan's mind, he heard Chrysanthemum’s voice again. “Thanks to the pain, she is becoming more unhinged by the minute. Be wary. She will try to kill all of you.”
“DIE!!” Chrysalis screeched, and raised her horn. There was a flash, and the Queen vanished, but just a dozen meters above where she’d been, a skyscraper emerged from nowhere, to plummet down towards the armies below.
Every single unicorn horn present lit up with the light of a million stars. The skyscraper shuddered to a halt as the Alicorn’s joined in, but the sheer weight was too much even for them, and it slowly began to sink again.
The pegasi went to assist, but found there way blocked by the swarm again, Chrysalis once again leading them with a mad cackle. “You’ll enjoy this, my pretties! Watch!!”
A beam of energy as wide as a school bus blasted out from the end of her horn, and several unlucky pegasi were vaporized instantly, while the others scattered to the four winds, trying to escape the abomination that laughed overhead.
“We have to get her into that damn tower!” Allan called to Twilight, eyes tracking the Queen’s movements. Celestia and Luna nodded in agreement, all of them straining to keep the tower afloat. They called out for their troops to get clear of the building, before they too moved out from under it, before settling it down as gently as possible. Unfortunately, several load bearing walls on the far side collapsed, followed by more on the side facing the Equestrians, until the entire apartment building collapsed down on itself in a thick cloud of dust.
The Equestrian forces charged forwards, heading around the new rubble pile, before tearing into the human lines again, sending hundreds falling to the ground, unconscious, in mere seconds.
With a brief reprieve, the Alicorns and Elements took the time to regroup and strategize.
“I concur with Allan's plan. The troops are far too exposed here! If we can get her to follow us to the tower, then we should be able to keep her contained! She won’t risk accidentally destroying everything she’s worked for!” Luna grunted as she parried a lone human that had slipped past the army, as he attempted to hit her with a crowbar. She casually whapped the side of his head with the flat of her scythe blade, knocking him out.
“Yeah, you wanna bet?!” Rainbow said as she came to a screeching stop besides them. “She’s gone completely nuts!”
“We have to try, or she’ll kill them all!” Fluttershy gasped, panting a little as she caught up, having heard Dash’s exclamation.
“Ugh! Fine! I’ll get bug-brain’s attention!” Dash sped off again, zipping up in front of the queen and starting to pull faces at her, before dropping straight down to avoid the Queen’s annoyed blast.
The Alicorns and the Elements put away their weapons and started galloping, and flying, towards the tower, Celestia calling for a squad of guards to spearhead the way through the humans as Dash kept the Queen distracted long enough for them to make some major headway.
They cut a swathe through the human forces, their enchanted blades slipping through defenses and taking dozen after dozens of humans out of the fight.
Finally, Celestia let loose a concussive blast of magic, knocking the remaining humans that stood between the group and the tower, down, before breaking into a gallop. The company followed.
“Hey Queenie! Look behind you!!” Dash yelled, darting out of the way of several bolts of magic that refused to miss her, instead following her trail and trying desperately to stay ahead in a deadly dance.
Chrysalis took the bait, and twisted her neck around, spotting her most hated enemies entering her tower. A rainbow coloured blur sped past her to join them, waving mockingly as she ducked inside.
Chrysalis screeched, and abandoned the battle, choosing to take this opportunity to exact her revenge.
***********************
They galloped and flew up the stairs as fast as they could, not daring to look back, for fear of spotting the enraged Chrysalis behind them, something that not even the staunch and steadfast Alicorn sisters were particularly interested in seeing.
The tower was little more than a massive, conicular, empty space inside, with two winding staircases leading upward in a twisted, double helix of cold green resin, towards what they could only assume, was the control room for the massive spell matrix. Far below them, the sound of the doors being smashed in made them double their efforts, with those who could fly picking up those that couldn’t.
The stairs rushed by, the walls closing in on them, forcing them to fly closer together, and then into single file. Allan heard a rush of displaced air below them, and yelled. “SCATTER!”
The group split, and several bursts of magic flew after the divided group, with Rarity screaming at the top of her lungs that Chrysalis had just “made fabulosity her mortal enemy, by messing up my mane!!”
If he hadn’t been trying to dodge death, Allan would have probably laughed.
Looping over and under the stairwell managed to get the magic blast that had been chasing him in his sights, and he countered it with a quick beam of his own. Seeing Chrysalis hot on Twilight’s heels, he tried to spot as many of the magic, tracer missiles as possible, before he hurled spells at them too, causing them to detonate in midair.
Twilight reached the top of the stairwell, and used her magic to throw the huge double doors she found there wide open, and zipped through before Chrysalis could get to her.
Celestia, carrying the still seething Rarity, chased the Queen in, with Luna close behind her and Cadence as well.
Dash and Applejack burst into the chamber next, then Allan, Pharynx and Pinkie, just in time to save Twilight from a spell blast that would have atomized everything from her wings to her hindlegs. Celestia cast a shield between Twilight and Chrysalis, blocking the spell in mid-flight.
The chamber was massive, layer upon layer of magic permeating the room, a feeling not unlike that of the hive making Allan's mind hum with a buzzing that he knew had to be from Chrysalis’s swarm. There were six pillars holding up the ceiling, intricate carving all over them in spiralling patterns that spread out from their base and all over the floor, the thrum of magic pulsing through the grooves. A massive spell circle, carved into the room itself. It had to be what controlled the big one. And in the center of it all was a cage, the terrified face of Anna Rois staring out at them.
Chrysalis turned to look at them all, one by one, and grinned at their tired, sweaty faces.
“You might have stood a chance before all that fighting down below, but I’m afraid you just aren’t going to be enough, this time.” Chrysalis cackled. “It’s game over for all of you!!”
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