//------------------------------// // Book Four: Chapter Two // Story: Unity: A Tale of Arcadia // by Kieva Lynn //------------------------------// Book Four: Our Worlds At War Chapter Two New York City. Twilight Sparkle cocked her head slightly as she listened to Rarity. "So, you just thought about needing a shield and one appeared?" She asked. "Oh yes darling. Like this." Rarity concentrated for a moment and the shield appeared on her foreleg again. "Mythril." Twilight said, examining the shield. "I guess we know why Gandalf wanted it now." "Yeah, but here's the big question: Can the rest of us do that too?" Applejack wondered. She closed her eyes and muttered "Shield shield shield" under her breath. In moments another shield just like Rarity's appeared for her use. "Well that's right useful." Twilight looked around and saw that Pinkie, Rainbow Dash, and Fluttershy had also tested it and found they too could summon shields at will. "Jim? Your armor already has a shield right?" She asked. "So I assume Claire and Toby do too." "Right." Jim said, and demonstrated. Rainbow Dash said "Okay, shields are cool. But did they give us weapons?" "It stands to reason they would have." Claire said. "What kind of weapons would a pegasus use though?" Applejack answered "Well, wingblades for starters. You wanna test that Dash?" "Yeah!" Rainbow Dash focused her thoughts, and it took only a second for a pair of shiny mythril wingblades to appear, already fixed to the leading edge of her wings. "Aw Yeah! We're ready to take down blobby now!" "Not so fast Dash." Twilight said. "We've got to be careful here. You saw the acid that monster was using. Mythril is extremely resistant to corrosion, but it's not totally immune even to normal acids. What the monster is making is still a threat." "Yes, I expect we'll need to strategize." Rarity agreed. "But first, we need a good look at it." Jim said. "Let's at least go ahead and find the thing." Everyone agreed, and they continued on their way. They found their target twenty minutes later. It was hard to miss given the sheer amount of damage it was causing, tearing things apart with it's powerful tentacles and continuously opening portals that spewed forth acid. Taking shelter to observe from behind a wrecked car, they could hear that the monster was muttering to itself with both mouths, but what it was saying was too faint to be heard. "What in the world is this thing?" Claire wondered. "We need more intel." Twilight mused. "But how to get it?" Then Pinkie Pie said "I've got you covered Twilight!" And before anyone could stop her, she bounded out of hiding and trotted right up to the creature. It turned to face her, and even in the distorted features of it's 'face' Twilight was certain she could make out an expression of shock that anyone would approach it like this. "Hi! I'm Pinkie Pie! What's your name?" The pink one asked. To the utter surprise of everyone but Pinkie, the creature actually answered her, it's voice a deep tenebrous rumble. "I am... Cuchulainn... The Impure... Eater of sin... Devourer of worlds... Servant of the Quiet Darkness..." "Sin sounds like a really unhealthy thing to eat." Pinkie mused. "Empty calories. And entire worlds? That must go straight to your hips. No wonder you're so husky." Cuchulainn roared in anger and struck, lashing out with tentacles and opening portals to spill acid atop where the pink mare was standing. "Pinkie!!" Everyone exclaimed. "Yes?" Pinkie asked, popping up unharmed from behind them. "We thought it got you!" Fluttershy cried. "Oh nonsense silly filly! How could it get me when it attacked over there and I'm over here?" "But..." Toby said, confused. Twilight said "Let it go! We've got a bigger worry!" Cuchulainn, alerted to their presence by the shout when they thought it had crushed Pinkie, was coming right for them. "Behind me!" Twilight yelled, and created a magic shield around the group, potent acid spilling against the outside of the shield and washing down to where it began to eat away at the ground. Including the ground beneath the hemispherical shield. Soon they would have no safe place to stand. "Claire can you get us out of here!?" Jim exclaimed. "I'd need an emotional anchor to lock onto!" The girl answered. "Pinkie?" Applejack said, "Can you do... Whatever you just did again? We need you somewhere over that way!" She pointed behind Cuchulainn's back. She then looked around, but Pinkie was nowhere to be seen. "I think she already did it Darling." Rarity said. "Claire, take us to wherever Pinkie went." "Right." Claire answered, and opened a portal. The other side proved to be a half mile away, on the outer perimeter of a temporary army base. Pinkie was already there, speaking with a befuddled guard. "Oh hey you guys!" Pinkie waved, "I figured we could get help here since these guys have already been working with ponies!" "They've been what?" Rainbow Dash started to ask, but before she could say more they were interrupted by a single word from another voice: "Twily?" "B.B.B.F.F!!" Twilight shouted, racing to embrace her brother. "This is the 'deployment' Princess Celestia sent you on? I suppose I should have known." "Sorry Twi. It was a rush thing or I would have contacted you." Shining said. "Hello Miss Sparkle. It's nice to see you again, though I wish it was under better circumstances." "The same here Agent Marsh." Twilight replied. "Can you tell us anything you've seen about this Cuchulainn thing that might help us beat it?" "Maybe." Marsh answered. "Come inside with me, I'll show you all the data we've gathered. It's not much, but maybe you'll see something we're missing." They passed the still confused guard and went into a large tent divided into many rooms. At the end of a hall was the largest room, where there were multiple screens showing a variety of views of what was happening throughout the city. Shining and Marsh explained that, elsewhere in New York, combined human/pony task forces were managing to drive back to more normal orc and changeling troops. It was only the Cuchulainn monster itself that was giving them a fight they couldn't handle. All around the room there were video screens showing images of the monster, most of them with overlays of varying kinds giving information being gathered by specialized sensors. "It looks like you're getting a lot of data." Claire said, looking around at the screens. Marsh nodded. "Yeah, but none of it's anything we can use yet, unless one of you see something." They spread out around the room, looking at the screens, though of course only Twilight and maybe Claire had any idea what they were seeing. Rainbow Dash, of course, put up a big show of understanding the data but no one was fooled.After several minutes, a particular screen caught Twilight's attention and she trotted over to it, saying to the technician running the screen "Is this a spectroscopic analysis?" "Um, yes. But it makes no sense whatsoever." The young woman answered. "According to these readings, the thing shouldn't even be alive, it's made of inanimate organic matter." "That could be magic. Pour enough power, especially power from wild or chaotic magic, into something and it'd be more surprising if it didn't come to life, at least for awhile. Though, I doubt we'll be so lucky as to have him just fall apart when an enchantment runs out." Twilight mused. A thought crossed her mind: "What kind of organic matter?" The woman replied "Oil. The thing's entire body is just a mass of crude oil... Can I assume the magic is also what's allowing it to hold a form instead of just oozing across the ground in a puddle?" "Yes, almost certainly... Hmmm... I wonder.... Crude oil..." There was something about the idea of the monster being made of oil that was tickling the back of her mind. Something about crude oil and a monster and a- "I have a dumb question!" Twilight finally shouted. "A dumb question? You? Surely you jest." Applejack joked, and the other ponies, Shining included, couldn't help but snicker. "We're listening. What's your question?" "Okay, is it true that there is a type of bacterium that eats crude oil?" Twilight asked. "See, I ask because a few months back I read a human suspense novel in which the monster was a creature made of compounds similar to crude oil. The heroes stop it by infecting it with a crude oil eating bacteria. So, was the author yanking my hoof or does that really exist?" "It does exist!" Marsh said, clapping his hands. "But even if we got some here, how would we manage to get close enough to infect the thing?" "We'll have to hit it on all sides, make what looks like a concerted conventional attack but is actually just a whole lot of distractions to create an opening to slip in with the bacteria." Twilight said. "We're good at distractions!" Rainbow Dash said, putting a hoof around Pinkie. "You know it!" Pinkie agreed. "I've got nothing better. I'll see what I can requisition." Marsh said, and left to make some phone calls. "Okay everyone, gather in. Let's figure out how we're doing this." Twilight said... XXXXX Agent Marsh's calls bore fruit in record time. It was barely more than an hour later that a rack filled with a dozen vials of an enhanced form of the oil eating bacteria had been delivered. Each vial was six inches long, shaped rather like a oval pill tablet, and made of a plastic tough enough to not break accidentally, but weak enough to shatter on a hard impact. "Hopefully we'll only need one of these." Marsh said. "Yeah, especially since we don't know how many will miss before we get a hit." Shining agreed. Applejack said "I hate 't be a party pooper, but even if we do get this 't work, how long's it gonna take for the thing 't get sick from it? I mean, don't most bugs take awhile 't make you sick?" "A valid concern." Shining agreed. "We don't have any other option though." Twilight said. "We'll just have to hope it goes as fast as it did in that book." They set out together from the base, and located Cuchulainn again quickly. The monster had returned to Central Park, and seemed to be intently hunting the civilians who had taken shelter there. "Let's do this." Dash said, eyes narrowed, and the attack began. The first thing Cuchulainn became aware of was Rainbow Dash buzzing past at high speed. It turned to follow her progress, trying to open acid portals above her, but she was too fast for it to keep up. As it's body rotated, Pinkie Pie came into view. "Hi! Listen, I'm sorry if we got off on the wrong hoof with the 'husky' comment!" Cuchulainn opened both mouths and spewed forth a black bile that drenched the entire area where Pinkie had been standing. When it stopped, it saw that she was gone. Again. Confused, it began to turn in a circle, seeking. The first vial of bacteria, launched by Rarity's magic, nearly made it. Cuchulainn saw it coming and destroyed it with acid just in time. "Drats!" Rarity cursed, as Jim made his own attempt, slashing with his sword at a tentacle that got too close, but being forced to retreat by rivers of acid. Then another vial, dropped from above by Claire opening a portal above and dropping a vial through, came within inches of landing directly atop Cuchulainn's head before it was swatted away with a tentacle. "Fools." The monster rumbled, "I echo in the darkness... Older than eternity... Ageless as the wall... And I serve one far more terrible... Dare you stand before me?" "We do!" Shining Armor exclaimed, as he made his own attack run, chucking a vial at Cuchulainn from point blank range. The monster dodged it, the vial splattering uselessly against a tree trunk. "Three down." Marsh sighed. "And nine to go." Twilight said. As she tried to decide how best to proceed, Fluttershy nudged her in the shoulder. "Twilight! Look!" Fluttershy pointed to the tentacle Cuchulainn had used to knock away the vial Claire had dropped. Apparently, the vial had cracked when the monster struck it, and a little of the bacteria had gotten onto the tentacle. Which was now rapidly becoming a festering mass of open lesions. "It does work!" Twilight cheered. "Yeah, if we can just get one full vial on him, we'll have this licked!" Toby agreed. Pinkie Pie suddenly said "And I know what to do! Applejack, Rarity, each of you grab a vial and follow my lead! You too Jim!" While Pinkie began to put her plan in place, the others found themselves with a different task: Cuchulainn had found a large concentration of evacuees and was determined to eradicate them. Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy began flying them to safety one at a time while Twilight teleported others away from the danger, Shining Armor's shield holding the monster at bay. "Move fast Miss Pie! I can't hold him off for long!" Shining yelled. And then Pinkie was indeed ready. "Is this because I implied you need to go on a diet!?" She shouted up at Cuchulainn. Unable to puke the black bile at her again, since it's face side was busy trying to break Shining's shield, the creature resorted to acid portals. But Pinkie just dodged those. "So, I was thinking, you don't actually need a diet! You're made of oil right? We'll build a derrick on your head and drain the excess off!" Cuchulainn roared, louder than ever before, and struck at Pinkie with the closest tentacle. Which, just as she had planned, was the diseased one. As soon as the massive appendage struck the ground, Pinkie yelled "Jim!" Jim leapt into view from behind a pile of rubble and cleaved the tentacle away from Cuchulainn's body. "Applejack! Rarity! We're up!" The three ponies rushed towards Cuchulainn, by now both distracted by the loss of a limb and unable to defend itself in their direction. They struck as one, three vials of the bacteria shattering on the ground at the monster's base, the fluid infecting the main body and rapidly spreading through the entire mass. It worked even faster than Twilight had expected, especially after, in an act of mercy to make it end faster, the rest of the remaining vials were used as well. Cuchulainn melted away like the wicked witch of the west, it's delicate internal chemical balances shattered by the bacteria. "No, this cannot be... I am Cu... Chu... Lainn..." And then it was gone.