Quantum Tech had to bob and weave her mech a little more than it was designed to handle, especially in frigid weather, to avoid oncoming shards of ice. She had her force field erected as insurance and was letting her magic turrets fire at will whilst she tried to lock her railguns’ aim onto its joints. All the while, she kept an eye in Spiral Galaxy, who was brimming with cosmic light. She looked ready to birth a whole other galaxy right before their eyes.
<BOOM!!!>
“EEK!!” Spiral shrieked, causing her to lose focus.
“What the devil-” Quantum started before seeing an inexplicable explosion rock the head of the icy behemoth, causing to roar in agony. She and Spiral looked back in the direction of the initial blast and saw a plume of gunsmoke fuming from one of the guard towers. “The cannons?”
“Must’ve been Shadow Shroud!” Spiral said. “Sorry. I’ll refocus.” As she did, a swarm of ice bat-scorpions divebombed towards her. Before she could blast them, a dizzying burst of smoke overwhelmed them, followed by a small figure slashing between them at mach speed before leaping high above them and landing in front of the two fillies. The swarm was left in a heap of glittery shards.
“Miss me?” the cloaked figure asked.
“I think our friends on the front lines miss you more, darling!” Quantum said. She fired her railguns simultaneously to blast away a horde of ice bobcats to clear her sneaky friends path, which Shroud did promptly, vanishing into the raging snow. “Now then, maybe I can focus hitting it’s weak-”
<BOOM!!><BOOM!!>
“GOODNESS!” Quantum said. To her surprise, two more cannonballs were fired from the guard tower. One missed the ice titan, but the other grazed its shell, leaving a sizeable wound. She looked up at the tower. “Are those three… Oh, to hell with it! It’s helping!” She took a sudden pause. “Goodness, that was quite out of character…”
*****
Back on the front lines, the assault team continued to face the glacial tortoise head-on. The beast had just shaken off the pain of the cannonballs and was ready to resume its rampage. It emitted an icy aura that made approaching it akin to braving a blizzard. It was only thanks to Fire Fight’s ferocious flame flying along with his fists that they were able to keep at least decently warm in the otherwise lethal environment. The scorching scrapper pummeled through ice cats one after another; he uppercut one and jumped to finish it with an explosive axe kick, through which he rocketed into the air and unleashed an infernal blast that reduced a swarm of bat-scorpions to vapor.
Frostbite, being a dragon, was completely unbothered by the extreme cold, but that didn’t stop him from being watchful of his comrades; he noticed Turf War struggling against a swarm of bat-scorpions harassing him from above, and all the shielded street thug could do was accurately predict when the pests would swoop towards him and smack ‘em out of the air while blocking whatever he couldn’t hit in time. “AIN’T GOT TIME FOR Y’ALL B**** A**!!” he bellowed.
When an entire storm was swooping down at him, Frostbite vomited a blast of ice-fire that froze the icy fiends together. He then rocketed towards the falling iceberg and shattered with a single punch, prompting him to swoop down and shield Turf War from the falling shards with his wings. “You okay, twerp?”
Turf War smiled confidently. “Yeah, man. Good lookin’ out. Don’t worry ‘bout me though. I ain’t got wings to fly me up to that b**** face.”
Frostbite looked up at the titanic tortoise and could feel its predatory gaze right on him. He smirked. “Aww! Does somebody want a knuckle sandwich!?” he taunted, mocking baby talk. He soared up towards it, cracking his knuckles with a toothy grin on his face.
The behemoth roared as a beam of light blasted from its mouth, too fast from the drake to react, and he was frozen solid. Mere seconds later, he burst out of his encasement, shrugging it off like it was nothing. The titan then snapped its maw at him, but he quickly flew up and body slammed into its nose. It yelped, and then it retaliated by summoning a fierce ice tornado.
Frostbite tried to freeze the raging vortex, but to no avail. A sudden flash of golden light sliced the twister, causing it to dissipate. When he looked over, there was Valkyrie cloaked in the light of her talisman, ready to wreak havoc. “<SCREEEEE!!!>”
Crazylocks flew up next to her. “The wheel of fortune shall spin, Valkyrie!”
Valkyrie rolled her eyes. “Good conversation. Now go smash-” She then noticed her shield and its chain tether. “Oh! I see watcha did there.” She held out her shield, and Crazylocks clung onto it, morphing back into an earth pony. Valkyrie then launched her shield towards an oncoming ice boulder launched at them, and Crazylocks’s reinforced hair easily smashed it. The shards of the ice ball transformed into a swarm of bat-scorpions. Crazylocks sprouted her horn, and Valkyrie furiously spun her around. The manic mutant’s horn acted as an effective conduit for Valkyrie’s ancestral light, and it created large phasic extensions of Crazylocks’s hair maces, decimating the swarm.
“RING AROUND THE ROSY, PLUCKING UP YOUR POSY, CUTTING OF YOUR TOSY, UP UNTIL YOUR BONY!!” Crazylocks sang.
Once all the bats were glittering dust, Valkyrie kept spinning. “Alright. On ‘three’!” she said. “One…” she moved closer to the ice titan. “Two!...” Crazylocks startled cackling like a monkey high on mushrooms. “THREE!!” Valkyrie flung her crazed comrade at the monster, who tucked her horn in while still charged with Valhalla light. She impacted in its neck area at the edge of its shell. The titan screamed like an infant that had fallen on its head as a chunk of its shell was blown wide open, revealing its core if slightly.
“IT’S OPEN! SOMEONE, HIT IT!” Fire Fight ordered. He got his wish when another cannonball came soaring at it aimed right at its weak spot. However, the beast quickly lifted its leg and blocked it. Much of its leg’s armor was blown to smithereens, but it allowed the behemoth enough seconds to freeze its shell closed again. “Rrgh! At least we know it’s not indestructible!”
The behemoth then slammed its leg down. The shockwave was so great that it threw him off-balance, and a surge of cryo energy overwhelmed the immediate vicinity and caused glacial spires to erupt everywhere, one nearly impaling Fire Fight. “WHOA!!” Knowing what could potentially come of them, he sprayed the column down with fire and punched it into wet dust. He then noticed ice spiders growing from a column behind him
Just before he could destroy it, a sudden flurry of slashes left it in countless shards. In the wreckage appeared a familiar cloaked figure, who unveiled her face and playfully sighed. “One of those days, huh?”
Fire Fight smiled warmly. “I’ll say.” He shot a flame that weaved around her and struck an ice cat pouncing at her. She then finished with a kama to the head. “We just gotta keep the pressure going. We need to take out both legs and its shell fast enough for us to land a finishing blow!”
Suddenly, more of the ice spiders spawned from the columns, and Shroud clutched her kama while quivering. “O-Oh crap…”
Fire Fight stoked his horn and readied for more melee. “Shroud, stay with me!”
Shroud gulped and braced herself, staring them down like prey. “Only for you, Fire Fight.” She said. Before they could do anything, a hail of meteors pummeled the area around them, obliterating the crawling horde within seconds. “Oh… Awesome.”
The unmistakable thuds of Quantum Tech’s mech could be heard quickly approaching, and the two looked over to see Spiral Galaxy accompanying her. “Things are getting too hairy for us to sit in the back!” Spiral said.
Quantum had to use her electro blades to slice away at a couple of stragglers. “We need to coordinate! Any ideas?”
Three more cannonballs whizzed right over them and struck the beast, cracking it’s shell, but it was still able to mend its wounds quickly. “Ok, who’s doing that?” Fire Fight asked.
“Our guests. They’re thankfully quick studies in the art of mischief.” Shroud explained.
“Really!?” Spiral said.
“They… did kinda leave that impression on me back in Ponyville.” Fire Fight said. “Whatever. They’ll keep it distracted. We need to focus on breaking its legs first. Then we can go for a direct attack. Hmm…” Fire Fight quickly scanned their foe. “Shroud, everyone else is flanking it from the side. Go see what they’re up to and let me know.”
Shroud donned her mask. “On it.” She disappeared into the driving snow.
*****
Meanwhile on the sidelines, the strike team had their fair share of difficulty with the many swarms overwhelming them by sheer numbers alone. The carriage guards were doing a decent enough job holding their own, even if they had to combine their strength to match at least one of their hosts. The mare would sometimes smash the cats and bats to stagger them before her male colleague could dice them up, or he would have to spar with one or a few at a time while she was able to smash them apart.
Regardless, the flow of their fight hadn’t changed. Fire Fight may not have been there, but Greensprout was able to produce vital pulses that promoted everyone’s body heat just enough that they kept warm while not running a fever. She could only hope that Zebota’s magic kept him warm where she couldn’t.
Kickback’s new sonic whip proved to be a handy newcomer. When he wasn’t occupied shooting down bat-scorpions, he blasted icebergs apart with his newfound skill before they could crash into him and his friends.
Shrapnel was wreaking havoc, but the sheer cold was beginning to slow him down, even with Greensprout’s pulse. The cats were able to scratch his wooden hide, and the bat-scorpions stung him in a couple places. Air Slash and Bullseye had to protect him while their resident monk did what she could help keep his strength up.
“Hey, what happened to your friend that took a dip?” the stallion guard asked.
Air Slash launched a huge dual sword beam at a horde of oncoming cats that blasted them into shards. “What indeed?” He let himself get distracted by scanning the water out of worry, and he got pounced by a bigger ice cat. “GYAH!!” He barely managed to hold it back from biting his face off with his sword, but a dark figure suddenly appeared on its back and jammed a kama into its neck, forcing it to release its grip and allowing the samurai to slice its head to pieces.
The cloaked figure stood in the heap. “Stay on your toes, Bladerunner.” She stated.
Air Slash brushed off some dust. “You have my thanks.”
Before anything else could be said, the frozen ocean behind the behemoth suddenly erupted into an enormous wave that flooded its body like a tsunami within seconds. The water almost instantly froze, but it had cocooned around the beast, and it struggled to move. Of course, it shattered the ice within seconds.
Tidal Wave splashed right next time the two warriors. “Did that help?” he asked before seeing that the monster was still rampaging. “Guess not…”
“Actually…” Air Slash said. He looked back and forth between the titan and Zebota, who couldn’t have appeared more focused trying to tap into their foe’s energy, prompting Air Slash to explain to Shroud what he was attempting.
“Interesting…” Shroud said before vanishing back into the snow.
“Who were talking to just now?” the mare guard asked out of nowhere.
“Oh! Uhh… N-Nopony!” Tidal Wave said.
*****
Back in the guard tower, the CMC were scrambling to keep their cannon fire rolling. The excessive amount of gunsmoke was proving to be enough of a nuisance to slow their progress apart from the cannonballs being a little heavy. With some willpower, they managed to load all three cannons.
“Light ‘em up, Sweetie Belle!” Scootaloo said. The white filly did just that, alighting all three cannons simultaneously.
<BOOM!><BOOM!!><BOOM!!!>
They coughed and fanned the smoke away as it cleared. “Golly! Mah ears r’ startin’ to ring somethin’ fierce!” Applebloom said. They could hear their ammo impacting the beast followed by its agonized roars.
“Alright, <cough><cough> let’s load ‘em up again!” Sweetie Belle said. Just as the smoke totally cleared, a swarm of the bat-scorpions stormed through the windows. The three of them screamed and cowered in the corner together, dodging stingers fired at them in the process.
“PLEASE NO!! WE JUST GOT OUR MARKS!!” Scootaloo begged.
One of the bats was suddenly impaled by an icicle launched from the direction of the windows. The others looked back, and a violent gust of icy mist shrouded them, freezing them together. The iceberg was shattered to reveal Frostbite as their savior. “You guys still able to move?”
The CMC just stared blankly at him. “Uhh… Yeah.” Applebloom said as they all got up. “Thanks.”
“Cool.” Frostbite said. “Now listen up! We gotta plan to finally cook this scrub, but we’ll need you to hold your fire until we’re ready. You’re gonna see a huge wave flood under it; that’ll be your cue to blast away. Got it?”
“Err… Got it.” Scootaloo said.
“Cool. In the meantime…” As Frostbite flew out, he exhaled over the windows so that they had a shield of transparent ice that went down just far enough that the cannons could still peak out. “Better get ready, twerps!” And off he flew.
“Rude…” Sweetie Belle commented. “But whatever. Let’s load ‘em up, girls!” And they did exactly that.
*****
“Ok, everyone in position?” Fire Fight asked. His assault time, including Shadow Shroud were back at the front and nodded firmly.
“So are the sideliners… sir.” Shroud said with a wink.
Fire Fight smiled. “Alright then. Follow my lead!”
At that command, Shadow Shroud threw a multitude of smoke bombs in a line which Fire Fight ran through towards the monster, charging his horn as discreetly as possible. When he emerged just under the behemoth’s nose, he unleashed his fury.
“HRAAAAHHHHH!!!!!!”
A serpentine flame erupted from his horn and furiously spiraled in the air before crashing into the ice titan’s face. It staggered to the point that it nearly thrown off balance.
“THROW ME, DOG!” Turf War shouted to Frostbite. The drake quickly formed a long ramp of ice and took his friend by the hoof. He whirled him around like a hurricane and flung him. Turf War then slid up the ramp on his shield and flew towards the beast’s shell. “CANNONBALL!!!!” he called. Valkyrie and Crazylocks pulled the same stunt from earlier, but aimed the right leg.
Meanwhile, a massive glyph appeared underneath the beast and began noticeably sapping energy from the beast. “Go… now… I cannot… maintain this… for long!” Zebota said. The behemoth fired an ice beam in retaliation, but a water spout burst from the ocean and tanked the hit.
It tried to step its left leg onto the team, but Kickback sonic whipped it and shattered the hoof, allowing the fliers to soar up to the thin knee area. Shrapnel cleared away any remaining ice cats. The male guard and Air Slash combined their swordsmanship to swat away the oncoming swarms of bat-scorpions with the mare and Bullseye patiently waiting in the back. Once they were at the knee the mare firmly slammed her mace into it. “HYARGH!!” She continued to smack it in multiple areas.
“Arrows ready!” Bullseye shouted. Everyone moved away, and Bullseye fire three explosive arrows around the knee. “BOOK IT!” They all dove back to the ground just in time for the arrows to blow. The behemoth shrieked in agony as its leg fell off.
At the same time, Crazylocks managed to shattered the other leg off, and Turf War slammed his hammer into the shell on impact, causing it to crack and ripple violently. Frostbite soared in to catch him. Tidal Wave then caused a vicious wave to surge underneath the beast as it fell on its face, causing the water to instantly freeze around and hold it in place.
*****
“THAT’S OUT CUE, CRUSADERS!!” Scootaloo shouted.
Applebloom hurriedly pushed the last cannon into place. “FIRE!!” Applebloom commanded.
Sweetie Belle alit her horn, but for some reason, the fuse wouldn’t light. “Huh?” She frantically tired again and again. “Oh, no! Please! PLEASE!!”
*****
“What’s taking those idiots so long!? I told ‘em when to blast away!” Frostbite said.
Fire Fight gazed at the tower in disappointment. “Just… be patient. We’ve still got Quantum and Spiral!” Said fillies laid their assault. Quantum fired her death ray while Spiral fired her supernova laser, each at one of its legs. However, the cracks on its shell were beginning to mend. “C’MON, CRUSADERS!!” Fire Fight bellowed.
Almost as if on cue, the cannons fired simultaneously and hit the softened shell, blasting it wide open just in time for Quantum’s death ray to power down and Spiral to get fatigued. “They… They didn’t seriously fire all three, did they!?” Spiral asked.
“Oh… crap.” Frostbite said. “I… totally forgot to tell ‘em to not fire at least one… My bad.”
“YOU IDIOT!!” Valkyrie said. “Rgh! Well, we better go hit it!” The shell was already started to slowly freeze closed again. “Like RIGHT NOW!!” And they all charged forward save for Spiral.
Meanwhile, the flanking team was already much closer, but they were just as anxious as they watched the shell closing up again. Thinking of an obvious solution, Bullseye reached into her quiver. “Oh, crap… CRAP! NOT NOW!!”
“What’s wrong?” Greensprout asked.
“I’m outta blast arrows!!” Bullseye answered.
Everyone looked at her startled, hoping they didn’t just hear her utter that sentence. “Well, heck n’ darn…” Kickback said.
The carriage guards looked at the monster, the foals, and each other. Both were scared, ashamed that they couldn’t do more to help the mightiest soldiers they’d ever seen, to perhaps save their homeland. That window was about to close, and even the mightiest of the foals would have difficulty subduing it completely. “Should we…” the stallion asked.
The mare took a big gulp. “We… we should…” she said. The two shared a warm smile. “It’s been an honor… Rising Air.”
“You too, Breezedrift.” The stallion said. He then turned to their young hosts. “Good luck, Battle Foals!” And the two rocketed into the air aiming right for the core.
“What!?” Air Slash said.
Before the assault team could reach the monster’s face, Rising Air and Breezedrift dove into the shell just as it had closed. Seconds later, the behemoth screamed and roared like a giant fuming teapot. Cracks formed all around its body with light pouring out, it’s eyes shined abundantly, and then… it exploding like a cryogenic superbomb, being reduced to shards of ice and snow…