//------------------------------// // 163. Collapsing // Story: Azure Edge // by Leaf Blade //------------------------------// Y’know, for a dragon? Trixie wasn’t all that impressive. The first thing Applejack noticed as she and her brother rescued Pinkie Pie from the pale blue dragon was that Applejack was almost the same height; Trixie only had a few inches on Applejack, and their eyes were almost at the same level. Applejack may have been slightly handicapped cuz she needed to hold the injured Pinkie Pie in one arm, but she was confident that she and Big Mac were more’n enough to deal with one tiny dragon. “Ugh,” Trixie groaned and let her tongue flop outta her mouth. “Neither of you are Twilight Sparkle.” “Not last time I checked,” Applejack snarked, raising her fist as she clung to Pinkie with her other arm. “Nope,” Big Mac added with a shrug, standing next to Applejack in the middle of an empty road in what had been a really crowded row of restaurants and shops before Trixie showed up. “Then you’re not worth my time!” Trixie screamed, and she inhaled to build up a burst of flaming breath, but Applejack wasn’t about to have any of that. So she punched Trixie hard in the chest; hard enough to make the dragon recoil and cough up blood. Trixie tried to breathe her fire and all that came out were a few coughs and a puff of smoke; frightened by this, she buffeted her wings to disorient the Apple siblings and then took off into the air. “Wh-what happened to me?!” Trixie gasped. “I disabled yer magic,” Applejack scoffed. “Thought that was obvious.” “Yeah! You’re no match for Applejack, you big meanie!” Pinkie stuck out her tongue and blew a raspberry at Trixie, getting a laugh outta Applejack. Pinkie’s spirit in the face of danger was one of her many admirable qualities. “Well that may be,” Trixie grinned and bared her fangs, “but I’m still a dragon!” Trixie launched toward the ground at shocking speed, swiping with her claw against Applejack’s side— specifically the side she was holding Pinkie on. Her attack never reached Applejack or Pinkie though, since Big Mac came in and blocked Trixie’s claw with his bare hand. “Barely,” he said casually. Trixie snarled and took off into the air again, but Pinkie was quick to stick her with a knife, allowing Applejack— after she had handed Pinkie safely off to Big Mac— to warp up to Trixie and grab ahold of the dragon’s tough scales. Applejack wasn’t about to just let Trixie go without a fight. Applejack crawled up Trixie’s neck and slammed the dragon as hard as she could muster with her fist, pounding Trixie in the cheek, in the eye, in the nose— just wherever her fist would land. Trixie tried to claw at Applejack and tear her off, but she underestimated Applejack’s stubbornness… and her grip strength, to be honest. Eventually though, Trixie had gotten quite enough; and while Applejack had managed to land a few good punches, Trixie was still a dragon and ‘a few good punches’ wasn’t gonna be nearly enough to slow her down. So Trixie folded her wings and careened toward the ground; she wasn’t able to tear Applejack off of her neck, but if she landed completely flat against the ground then she could crush Applejack under her considerable body weight… which is exactly what happened. And Applejack couldn’t lie; it hurt! Being pressed between the concrete ground and a dragon was no walk in the park, and Applejack felt like she’d been put in a garbage compactor that she was just a size too big for. But if Trixie wouldn’t be slowed down, neither would Applejack! She just… needed to figure a way to push Trixie off of her now. Luckily for Applejack, Trixie was happy to get off her on her own. Unluckily for Applejack, as Trixie leapt off of her, she slammed Big Mac with her tail and sent him flying, and grabbed Pinkie Pie in her claws. “You know, I was going to rip your little arms off,” Trixie hummed as she held a terrified, quivering Pinkie in the air by her arms. “But now I think it’d be much funnier to just eat you in front of your friend!” Trixie flicked Pinkie into the air, snatching her out of the air in her jaws and clamping them down on Pinkie. Applejack gasped, but she had no time to be shocked; she needed to rescue Pinkie now. Applejack leapt to her feet and grabbed a fistful of Trixie’s hair, the dragon reacting with a shocked yelp as Applejack violently yanked her head down below Applejack’s eye level, Applejack then grabbing Trixie’s maw and forcefully prying it open, Pinkie flopping out of the dragon’s mouth with only a few bloody puncture wounds to show for it. “I’m okay,” Pinkie said weakly, sounding anything but okay. Applejack moved to pick Pinkie up and shield her, but Trixie chomped her fangs down on Applejack’s arms, Applejack hissing in pain as she looked Trixie in the eye. “You’re pretty attached to those arms of yours, huh?” Trixie said, every movement of her lips digging her fangs deeper into Applejack’s arms, Applejack gritting her teeth and trying to ignore the pain and focus on coming up with a counterattack. Thankfully Applejack didn’t need to think too hard, cuz Big Mac was already back on his hooves, and he grabbed Trixie by the tail and yanked her off of Applejack, who only got a couple nasty scratches on her arms for the trouble. Applejack took a deep breath to channel her magic, before running up and slamming Trixie with a flying drop kick. She could only disable a dragon’s magic for a few moments with her punches, but that kick had enough force to lay Trixie out for maybe an hour— at least, that was the hope. Trixie threw up blood onto the snow and concrete, and Applejack could see her starting to sweat. Her physical abilities weren’t anything to write home about, least not compared to the Apple siblings, and her magic was a no-go. She was rapidly running low on options, and she knew it. “Okay, eff this! EFF THIS!” Trixie whimpered and took off into the air again, Applejack clicking her tongue cuz she was starting to get a mite tired of chasing her down. “You okay, Pink?” Applejack knelt down to check on Pinkie, who was lying on the ground and coiled up into a ball. “Yeah, yeah,” Pinkie nodded, tears brimming her eyes but still fighting through it to give a shaky smile. “Just don’t let her get away, okay?” “I’m on it,” Applejack nodded confidently and stood tall, pointing to her brother. “Big Mac! Gimme a boost!” Applejack ran up to her brother, who laid his hands down for Applejack to jump onto, and between him and Applejack’s little bit of magic, she got just enough boost to jump up and grab onto the side of Trixie’s chest in the air. “What the hell?!” Trixie screamed. “Don’t you know when to quit?!” “Yeah,” Applejack chuckled, climbing up Trixie’s scales onto her back. “And it ain’t while I’m winnin’! And the last thing I’m gonna do is give you a chance to get yer magic back!” “Ah,” Trixie looked back at Applejack with a sinister grin, “so your little disruptor trick isn’t just temporary, it’s really temporary. I thought as much, but it sure is nice of you to confirm that for me.” “Whatever,” Applejack scoffed, her cheeks burning a bright red cuz she was ashamed to admit she slipped up and gave the enemy info. “You ain’t gonna be able to do much with th—” Applejack yelped as Trixie wrapped her tail around Applejack’s leg and dragged her quickly off of Trixie’s back, holding Applejack upside-down by one leg in her tail, before tossing her into the air. Applejack gritted her teeth and refused to yell or scream or anything like that; she just crossed her legs and braced herself as best she could for the impact. “Not so fast,” Trixie grabbed Applejack’s hands and held her up by her arms, sneering at her. “You don’t think I’m gonna let you just rejoin your little friends and come up with a new strategy, do you? Please, I’m not that dense.” “Could’ve fooled me,” Applejack smirked, and Trixie let out a guttural groan under her breath. “Cute,” Trixie hummed, before crushing Applejack’s hands in her claws, Applejack letting out a piercing scream as blood trickled down her arms and her body was wracked with searing pain. “But how’s about I just rip you in half—” A sudden gust of wind tore past Trixie and Applejack, and once it was gone Trixie had a massive cut across her nose. “How d—” Another gust of wind left another bloody gash across Trixie’s nose, and now she was looking around frantically for the source of her mysterious attacker. Applejack just smiled; she knew she was in good hands now. While she was too quick for Applejack’s eyes to follow her movements, Applejack knew for certain that it was Rainbow Dash who had shown up to help, and she felt confident that Rainbow wouldn’t let her down. Trixie flailed at the air to try and hit Rainbow as she zipped past, leaving another cut on Trixie’s face, but Rainbow was far too quick. And after another zoom past, and another cut, Trixie let out a furious groan and threw Applejack as hard as she could toward the ground. Applejack definitely didn’t see that coming, so she tried to brace herself as fast as she could, which unfortunately mostly just meant closing her eyes, gritting her teeth, and hoping for the best. Luckily for her, ‘the best’ was getting caught out of the air by her super sexy girlfriend who, despite their stark size difference, was able to catch Applejack in a bridle carry and gently float toward the ground. “My hero,” Applejack whispered as she gave Rainbow a kiss on the cheek. “S-stop that, I’ll drop you,” Rainbow giggled bashfully. Their cute little moment was stopped dead in its tracks by Trixie collapsing top of them, crushing both of them against the concrete with her body. Applejack was able to squirm just enough to get her own weight off of Rainbow, but that didn’t help the fact that there was a damn dragon on top of them still. Applejack could just barely see past Trixie’s body to view the fight going on around them, and it didn’t look good. Big Mac tried to run to Applejack and Rainbow’s aid, but Trixie pinned his head to the ground with her claw, and now she was inching toward a helpless Pinkie. “Heh, so now what?” Trixie sneered, audibly out of breath as she dragged herself along the ground by her claws, grinding Applejack and Rainbow painfully against the pavement as she moved. “All that fight, and you still can’t even—” Trixie suddenly floated into the air; and judging by her shocked expression, and the aura of raspberry magic around her body, it wasn’t by choice. She was thrown into the street, away from Applejack and the rest of her party, and Applejack and Rainbow jumped to their hooves immediately and moved to protect Pinkie Pie, Big Mac following suit. And then the last member of their crew walked up beside them, sighing listlessly. “Hey everyone,” Twilight Sparkle said, cricking her neck and running a hand through her mane. “Sorry I’m late.”