In the dining car, the ponies hid in the corners and behind the tables as Valiant faced off with Graya. The two clash fists, pushing them both back from the force. Valiant shakes his hand a bit, due to the hardness of Graya’s gauntlets. Silverstream stood at the side, making sure not to get caught in the crossfire.
“You’re pretty tough!” Graya commented. “I really wanna see if I can sell you off big when we hit Khugetown!”
She attacks once more with a fast right. Valiant grabs her arm and throws her whole body over him and onto the ground. The ponies were shocked to see such power, but Silverstream knew all too well how dependable Valiant was and began cheering.
“Yeah! You got this Valiant!”
Graya rolls away and gets back on her two feet. She looks at the human and smirks. “Valiant, huh? That’s a pretty Equestrian name you got there. That must mean you’ve been living around these parts, huh?”
Valiant remains focused and untalkative. Graya shakes her head at him. “Hey, I get it. Rude to talk about names when you don’t have mine yet, huh? It’s Graya in case you were curious.”
Valiant speeds down the room and throws another punch, only to be blocked by Graya’s gauntlets. Graya then took the chance to grapple Valiant and knees him in the gut, causing him to cough from the impact. She went even further and smashed his back with her elbow before grabbing his waist and throwing him to the wall. Valiant coughed some more as he struggled to get up from the combination of moves. The wolf girl walked up to him and leaned over, looking down at the injured boy.
“What? Still got nothing to say?” She belittles the boy. “Come on, if you behave, maybe I’ll give you a walk after I tie you up.”
Valiant slowly rose up and said, “I hate those gloves.”
He goes on the offensive again, but this time at full throttle. He strikes at Graya who blocks his attacks with her gauntlets. He doesn’t let up and continues hitting harder and faster, not letting her do anything else but shield herself from his attack. Underneath his clothes, his markings glow and his fist finally breaks apart the gauntlet. In her shocked state, Graya was unable to do anything as Valiant struck her stomach and sent her flying across the room. Graya was down and out. The ponies cheered as Silverstream went to check on Valiant.
“Are you alright?” she asked him.
“I’m fine,” he sighs. “Those gauntlets took some getting used to.”
The car from the back rumbles, catching their attention. Silverstream and Valiant knew this wasn’t the end just yet.
Ocellus transforms into a giant bear to attack Shade. The violet cat doesn’t falter and rams his shoulder into her, causing the transformation to cease. She’s thrown backwards before being caught by Gallus. Yona charges at Shade only for him to dodge it and be pushed by his foot, making her hit the floor. Sandbar and Spike jump at Shade, but are swept aside by his two hands.
“Quite remarkable how different each of you are, and yet work together so well,” Shade compliments them. “Yes, you’ll suffice. Your unique traits will net you a fine price.”
Smolder breathed fire at Shade, forcing him to back off.
“Stay away from my friends you creep!” Smolder tells the cat.
Shade smiles at the dragon girl and gestures her to go at him. She takes the taunt with claws swiping at him. He takes a step back to dodge the attack, but Smolder flaps her wings to catch up to him and manages to dig her claws into his arms. He flinches as he swipes back to force Smolder to retreat. He looks at the gashes on his coat’s sleeves and nods at this.
“Oh yes, you’ll be perfect,” He tells her.
Smolder flies at him again, believing she had the upper hand. She swipes her claws, but he swerves to the side and hits her with his claw, pushing her aside. Smolder attempts to make a comeback with fire, but as she inhaled in the brief moment, Shade took out a ball and stuffed it in her mouth. The ball pops and releases a mist down her throat. She falls on the floor and on her knees, coughing harshly.
“That stuff is great at extinguishing a fire,” He tells her before snapping his fingers. The lizardfolk responded and picked up Smolder off the ground, tired from the sudden mist release. “Put her in the ship.”
As the lizardmen were following orders, the car’s door suddenly opened. Valiant analyzes the room to see his friends have been downed and Smolder was being carried away by the lizardfolk with a cat man standing in the center of the room. His eyes burn red with fury as he aims for the two lizardmen. Shade gets in his way and strikes his head, sending him up in the air. Valiant crashes down as Shade blocks him away from the Lizardmen who are currently climbing up the hole in the ceiling with Smolder in tow. He breathes heavily as he looks at the situation.
“Listen here, creature,” the violet cat tells him. “I want that dragon. She’s a good fighter, and I don’t plan to sell that.” Shade leans in close to Valiant and says, “I plan to keep her. Strength like that is more useful in my crew. If you don’t want to get sold in Khugetown, you best stay down.”
Valiant grabbed his collar and kneed his face in. As Shade winced in pain, the human boy quickly grabbed the cat’s coat and threw Shade at the lizardmen, causing them to fall down. Valiant rushes over and grabs Smolder before she could even hit the floor. Smolder coughed into her claw and looked at Valiant weakly. “Val…?”
“It’s okay,” he tells her. The lizardman however was back up, and grabbed Valiant’s throat before throwing him to another lizardman to hold him in place. He was then punched repeatedly in the stomach before Shade held up his hand to get them to stop. “Send him to me,” he ordered them.
The lizardmen complied and pushed Valiant towards Shade. He looks up from his daze as the catman gestures Valiant to fight. “Well, what are you waiting for? Go at me like you just did just now.”
Valiant shook his head and refocuses on the violet cat. He takes a deep breath and digs deep to pull out all of the stops. He rushes at Shade, quickly punching left and right. When Shade countered, Valiant zips past him, appearing behind him instantaneously. Valiant strikes the cat from that back of his neck. The captain turns around, holding his neck in pain. He was smiling, almost enjoying this. Valiant went in further and attacked his face. Upon the cat backing up to dodge the blow, Valiant quickly ducked and performed a leg sweep to trip him. When the cat fell to the floor, he could see Valiant flipping in the air before diving his knee at him. Shade dodges and watches the human’s knee burrow into the floor. Valiant stands up with no broken knee on him.
“Impressive!” Shade compliments the human. “Marvelous combination! A rare species with a unique flexibility in combat! You’ve passed.”
Valiant raises an eyebrow at Shade’s comments. “Passed?”
“You’re perfect for my crew,” He explains. “It’d be wasteful to sell you off for a bit of coin.”
“You sound so sure you’re going to take anyone here under my watch.” Valiant sneered.
“Oh, believe me when I say I’ve done this a while,” Shade informs him. “Everyone here thought they wanted nothing to do with me. But I worked with them long enough to reach an understanding. You’re no different since you are capable of so much more.”
“Not going to happen,” Valiant stated as he readied his fists.
Shade smiles as he snaps his fingers. The lizardmen suddenly grab Valiant and hold him while Shade punches him in the stomach once more. Valiant was holding out as Shade kept trying to render him unconscious. In moments, Silverstream smashes a chair at one of the lizardmen, releasing Valiant from his grasp and allowing him to continue fighting Shade. The other lizardman tried to go after Valiant but was rammed by Yona and kicked in the face by Sandbar’s drop kick. Spike got behind Shade and blew fire at his buttocks. The Captain yelped as he jumped away only to get his face thwacked by Gallus flying at him. Shade held his face in pain and realized the kids were up and about, causing a pandemonium. It was impossible to go on anymore than he had planned. As the kids fought the attackers, Graya emerged from the door.
“Captain!” she calls out. “We’ve taken two ponies, but we also spotted royal soldiers headed this way!”
Shade clicks his tongue at the news. “Then let’s retreat.” He says as he goes to the other side of the car. He opens the door and cuts the chains between the cars. The passengers from the cars in the back were screaming as they were being disconnected as Shade and his men left the car. Valiant quickly grabbed onto the other car and held the two together, glaring at the smiling Shade as Graya got onboard the ship in possession of two innocent snobby ponies.
“They’re taking the passengers!” Sandbar called out.
Valiant was too preoccupied to hold the trains together. The other students, seeing this dilemma, take action. Yona helped Valiant hold the cars together. Sandbar went to the conductor and alerted him to slow down the train while Silverstream flew Ocellus to the roof of the train. She mustered her energy and transformed into a Hydra, each mouth grabbing hold of the escaping ship. Shade and his crew struggled to even keep the two ponies as Smolder and Gallus closed in on them. The royal soldiers seemed to be getting close and the train was slowing down to a nearing halt with the Hydra hanging onto both the train and air ship. With the damages to the ship and being pressed on time forced, Shade was forced to release the ponies who fell into the talons and claws of Gallus and Smolder. With the two ponies successfully rescued, Ocellus released the airship right before the crewman tried to attack her. The ship flees, while not empty handed, frustrated at what they had left behind.
The train makes a full stop, rescuing everyone and preventing the cars from the back from being left behind. The wealthy duo who had insulted the students from before looked up to see the kids stand triumphantly.
Smolder leaned in close and teased the slanderers. “Aren’t you glad we saved you before you got sold to a zoo?”
The rich folk nodded furiously in gratitude. The kids gave a weary smile at their victory.
The train finally reaches Manehattan. The kids had waited at the train for it to make repairs to the chain to reconnect the cars. Hours longer than they had expected the ride to be. Even Valiant was exhausted to the point of collapsing on the floor with everyone else. As they lay down with little energy remaining in their bodies, Chewka drags the Diamond Dog, pig, and lizard to the authorities with Spike resting on Chewka’s shoulder. Their faces were full of pulps and black eyes. Once that was taken care of, chewka went over to the students.
“It’s time to rise and shine,” He informed the group. “Your bags aren’t going to carry themselves to the carriage.”
They all groan in misery as the day wasn’t even done yet.