//------------------------------// // Act 5, Chapter 6 - Loyalty // Story: Hoof and Claw Versus the World // by Chythar //------------------------------// Two Elements of Harmony down, four more to go. I appeared in the middle of a cloud bank high in the sky, and immediately began to plummet downwards. "Oh shit!" I panicked and flailed around as I plunged to my inevitable meeting with the ground. My heart leapt into my throat when I realized I was going to die. I fell an embarrassing amount of distance before I remembered that I had magical wings. In a flash, my wings appeared and caught air. I easily soared out of my fall, and my wings let me glide effortlessly across the sky. Even though I was no longer falling, my heart was still racing in my chest. To calm myself, I took several deep breaths and tried to let my mind go blank. While I practiced Twilight’s breathing exercises from the show, laughter rained out of the clouds above me. I couldn't stop my face from blushing out of humiliation, and the burning heat on my cheeks just made it worse. It didn't take long to track the laughter down to a small little cloud floating high in the sky. My embarrassment bled into anger, and I flapped my wings hard to climb to the cloud and confront this jerk. But before I got to that lone cloud, I knew who was laughing at me. My guess was confirmed when I arrived; the merry mirth was from Rainbow Dash. She was still laughing, tears streaming from her face and soaking into the Equestrian cloud she was lying on. It was easy to see her Element necklace and the smaller one embossed with Celestia’s cutie mark. "Wahahaha! Oh, that was great! What, did you forget you had wings or something?!" "Yeah, yeah. Laugh it up. I wasn't born with these wings, you know." Dash stopped laughing and leaned back into her cloud, her head resting on her forelegs. "That's obvious! You're such a rube." "Whatever. You got a big mouth, but no skills." Dash immediately sat up on her cloud, an angry look upon her face. "That's minotaur droppings, and you know it!" "Pfft. All you know how to do is fly fast. While that's something, there's a lot more to flying than that." "I've been flying longer than you have, smart donkey!" "Well then, you must learn slow 'cause I know more than you do Straight Line." "THAT'S NOT MY NAME!!" "No? Then, what is it? Rainbow CRASH?" "THAT'S IT!" I let my wings go limp, and my body dropped out of the sky. I looked up, and saw Rainbow Dash take off from her cloud. Just like on the show, her trademark rainbow contrail stretched out behind her. She shot out in a straight line, then circled around towards me. I opened my wings to catch air, then tried to dodge the mare with a sharp turn to my right. But I wasn't fast enough. She clipped my left wing and I spun out of control. It didn’t take long to break out of that death spin, but I still wasn’t fast enough. Just as I leveled my flight, something clipped my right wing and I lost control again. This time, I heard Dash's comment. "Gotcha!" I regained control once again, but this time I dodged Rainbow Dash's attack. Her shout of "Darn!" was music to my ears. Before she could turn around, I made a beeline for a nearby cloud and hid in it. Alright. Clearly, all Dash needs is speed to take me out. And even if she decided to run instead of fight, I'd never be able to catch her. So, it's time to cheat. In a flash, my Shadowcats appeared in front of me. They were all wearing their Shadowbolt outfits, and both Kusac and Bastet immediately unfurled their wings to hover in place. But poor Isis didn't catch on in time, and with a yowl she plummeted out of the cloud and out of sight. I was about to fly out and catch her when she reappeared, her wings flapping to take her place next to her fellow Shadowcats. She looked quite embarrassed, and the other two cats snickered at her. "Alright, that's enough. We need to trick Rainbow Dash into letting her guard down so I can steal her necklace. Like the orange pony, she also has a necklace that will shock you if you try to grab it. So we're going to confuse Dash by hitting her wings, or just ram right into her. This should tire her out enough for me to get her Element of Harmony. And we're going to confuse her even more, by making her think she's seeing quadruple." When one had entered, FOUR of me left our hiding place. The other three were my Shadowcats, under illusion spells of course. We all scanned the sky for our target, when Bastet let out a yowl. "There, Master!" I turned to look where she was pointing, and saw our sky-blue pegasus hovering in mid-air. Her back was to us, so I saw the chance for a sneak attack. I signaled for my Shadowcat-clones to spread out, and I made a beeline for Dash. I got closer, closer, and closer. But just as I was about to strike her, she spun out of the way. "Ha! I heard your feathers from a mile-OOOF!" One of my clones had slammed into Rainbow Dash's side, knocking the wind out of both of them. I took the opportunity to hide behind a nearby cloud. "Hey! How'd you get over there so fast?" My clone broke off and flew into a cloud. Just as it disappeared, another clone slammed into Dash's back. "OW! That hurt! Wait a minute, weren't you just over there?" The future Wonderbolt tried to fly away, but it was Dash’s bad luck that she flew past my hiding place. I shot out and slammed into her! I grabbed her fur with a hand, and shocked her with a blast of paralyzing lightning! "Yeowch! That smarts!" She lashed out with a hindhoof and smashed me in my right shoulder. I spun out of control and fell through a cloud. It took me a bit to recover, but by then my alicorn magic had healed the broken bones that Dash’s hoof had smashed. Wow, that mare has a hard kick. And that lightning should have paralyzed her immediately. Do pegasai have resistance to lightning? Probably. It would make working with storm clouds really dangerous otherwise. I'll have to up the wattage. I poked my head out of my cloud, and saw that Dash hadn't gone far. My clones were keeping her busy, though she had caught on that there was more than one of me. She was managing to dodge most of their attacks, but now and then one would clip her wings. That gave another clone a chance to slam into her, tiring her out just a little more. After watching for a little bit, I decided it was time for me to try my new trick. I hid behind some clouds as I snuck in close, then waited for Dash to turn her back to me. Once she did, I zipped in and zapped her with a double-dose of lightning! "AAAAHHH!!!! That bucking HURT!" I ducked into a nearby cloud to hide and think. The lightning isn't paralyzing her, it’s electrocuting her instead. Not cool. Gonna have to just grab her and take her Element from her. I popped back out of the cloud, and pantomimed grabbing Rainbow Dash to my Shadowcat-clones. They each nodded their understanding to me. The next clone to catch Dash off-guard grappled with her instead of ramming her. This gave the other two clones a chance to engage her and grab her fore hooves and wings. After a short struggle, the three of them managed to immobilize Rainbow Dash. Though it didn't stop the mare from struggling and yelling out loud. "Hey! Lemme go! This isn't fair!" I flew up behind the trapped mare, and deftly removed the Element of Loyalty from around her neck. Dash tried to twist her head around to see what was going on, but couldn't quite see me. "Give that BACK! That's MY Element!" "Mine now, Dash. Finders keepers! "Keep her here while I return to the Mistress." My clones acknowledged my command by nodding, then held Rainbow Dash even tighter. I turned and flew away from the group. The Element necklace was slipped into my pocket dimension for safe keeping. I then used my magic senses to find the teleportation node, so Nightmare Moon could call me home. The spot found and the signal sent, I waited for the Moon Mare's magic to take hold. As soon as I felt its familiar tingle, I de-summoned my Shadowcats so I wouldn't leave them behind. That was almost a fatal mistake. Dash was now free, and she wanted revenge. I watched the mare frantically search the sky for me, then she blasted off in my direction. The teleportation spell took me away an instant before Dash slammed into me! I can still see the grimace on her face, and the bugs in her teeth, to this day. The teleportation spell returned me to the park in Washington DC. As soon as I arrived, I screamed and collapsed on the ground with my arms covering my face. "Captain, your assistance would be greatly appreciated!" Huh? I slowly uncurled my body, and realized that I had arrived in the middle of a war zone. In one fluid motion, I stood up and raised my shield. In front of me, my Moon Mistress was holding her own against a bombardment of bullets. However, her gritted teeth told me that her survival was not easy. I turned to face her attackers, and saw two military-styled SWAT trucks parked behind the four police cars from earlier. Some dozen or more officers in riot gear were taking cover behind the vehicles, and were firing rifles of some sort at Nightmare Moon. One of the armored officers pointed over at me, and I knew it was time to act. I threw a blast of paralyzing lightning at a nearby armored officer, and caught one in the chest. But the officer was only stunned for a moment. He/she shook their head, then aimed their rifle at me. Nonplussed, I put more power into my attack then tried again. This time, a large ball of lightning flew from my hand and hit the same officer. They dropped their gun and shook, lightning arching all over their body. I was also surprised to see officers to their left and right also spasming under the electrical barrage. Area effect? AWESOME! I ignored the bullets striking my shield as I tossed balls of lightning at every officer I could see. When I couldn't see any more, I threw a couple at the SWAT trucks themselves. Electricity arced all over the vehicles, and I could hear faint screams from inside. In moments, all was quiet. "Your composure under battle has clearly suffered." I turned to see my Queen had dropped her shield, and was panting slightly. I knew that if she dropped her shield, it was safe to drop mine. So I did. "What?" "Thou arrived and immediately collapsed on the ground in fear. Your bleating was unmistakable." "Oh, that? The Bearer of Loyalty was about to slam into me right before you teleported me away." "Ah, that explains it. I have had a similar experience in the past, so your reaction is understandable. "Now that that matter is settled, I thank thee for thy assistance." "Yeah, well. Us against the World, right?" "Indeed." "Next time, maybe you shouldn't stand in one place so they can focus their fire." "I was confident I could withstand their attacks and still defend myself, but I was clearly mistaken." "You did better than last time, there were a lot more of them than we faced at the police station." "Agreed. But it took all of my focus to maintain my shield this time, I did not feel I could hold it even if I tried to fly away. I was barely able to trigger the teleportation node when I felt your signal. "What does my Advisor recommend?" "Take to the air immediately and weave around, don't let them focus their fire. You should have enough time for a potshot or two." "I am not certain that is helpful advice." "Well, your problem is that you can't focus on your offense when you're busy with defense. Right?" "I must sadly concur. It has been an issue ever since I learned offensive magic." "So, keep moving so you don't have to focus so much on defense. And poorly-aimed attacks are better than no attacks." "I see." "And if your attacks aren't working, try something else - anything else. Using the same attack that failed will just give you another failure." "How did you know that a stronger attack would be effective?" "I didn't. I just noticed that the lightning affected the officer a little bit. So I tried a stronger one. Since the new one worked, I kept using it. You would have had similar results if you used fireballs or rocks or just dropped a tree on them." "Your non-lethal methods must be affecting my judgement. I had not considered more lethal means." "Well, if it's a choice between 'them' or 'me' I always choose 'me'. But if I don't have to choose, I won't." "I cannot fault your reasoning. "Now, it is time to send you out to procure another Element." Nightmare Moon's spell sent me flying across the country yet again, on a date with another pony. Only two left to choose from.