//------------------------------//
// Chapter 94 - Fateful Campaign 
// Story: Off The Mark 
// by Goldfur 
//------------------------------//

Trixie snarled at Grogar.  “I wasn’t talking to you.”  He blinked and frowned.

My wife shifted her head to scan across the other villains. “Grogar will take anything he wants from you then move on to conquer other worlds.  There’s nothing you four also-rans can do about it.”  She stepped to a point roughly between Twilight and myself. “Because you have the Triarchy surrounded, I have no choice but to comply with your demands.  What do all of you want?”

The four collaborators tried to talk at once.  The Storm King’s amplified voice drowned out the others.  “My lands will be returned to me after I take care of some personal business.”

Trixie shrugged.  “Those countries are merely protectorates of Equestria.  The Triarchs have no way to compel them against their will, and none of them want you back as their emperor.”

“Ahhhh.  Emperor! I do like the sound of that.”  His arms dropped their aim slightly.  “I would have you order your troops to conquer them for me…”

The Storm King again pointing his wrist weapons at my wife. “… but they would refuse to carry out those orders, wouldn’t they? You will not deceive me by promising me this.”

The armored yeti lowered an arm and condescendingly patted Chrysalis on the back.  “Instead, you will take possession of all Equestrian hives and order their armies to do my bidding.”

The changeling queen raised an eyebrow. “Even if I captured every queen and princess, no drone would follow the order of another hive’s queen.  They would choose to die first.  It’s an unfortunate trait of my people. Ironically, the Southern Wastes Hive accepted your orders because you were not a changeling.”  She turned away from him.  “When my hive is strong enough, I will support your conquests.”

Tirek snorted.  “And how long will that take?  Decades?”

Grogar said, “These trivial details can wait until—”

Chrysalis ignored her boss.  “Four years, with the resources I will get from being the absolute monarch of Canterlot.”

“What?” exclaimed Cozy Glow.  “No!  I will be the sole ruler of Equestria, ruling from my castle as all alicorns have done before me.”

Chrysalis laughed and turned to face Cozy.  “I have subdued alicorns on multiple occasions. Do not overestimate your importance or power.”  She waved a hoof.  “You may have the rest of Equestria for all I care.”  From Cozy Glow’s snarl, she did not take the suggestion well.

The old goat raised his voice, “Enough!  This bickering can wait until—”

Tirek stood as tall as the Storm King.  His voice boomed in the same way it had when the two of us fought outside of Ponyville.  “But why?  We’ve already won.  I recognize my greed led to my downfall.  I won’t make that mistake again.  I’ll settle for the eastern seaboard.  No further than a hundred miles inland.”

Trixie interrupted.  “But I thought Cozy Glow controlled the rest of Equestria.”

“Everybeing wait,” said the new alicorn.  Unlike with Grogar, the other villains did not try to talk over her.  Cozy Glow narrowed her eyes.  “Something’s wrong… Princess Trixie is stalling.”

My wife gasped.  “Stalling?”  She knelt until her head nearly touched the ground.  “I already acknowledged that you won.  You have the Triarchs under your control.  Please don’t—”

The Storm King didn’t wait for an answer, sending a projectile hurling toward my wife.  At the same time, Grogar activated his bell, and its dark magic shot outwards… to pass through Trixie and wash over me.  Nothing returned to the bell.

When my wife stood up, a foot-long metal dart stuck out of the ground just behind her.  A second impacted next to it, likewise leaving my wife unharmed.

“… kill us.” Trixie finished her sentence with a sigh, turning around to walk away from the villains.  “Like I said before…” Her eyes glowed red and a nasty smile formed on her lips.  “… you have us surrounded.  What could be worse than that?”

Trixie’s form faded and disappeared in a whiff of smoke.

“No!” yelled Cozy Glow, turning towards Grogar.  “I told you that something was fishy about this!”

The armored yeti resumed his fire, targeting spots behind me.  I heard the sounds of metal striking rock and stones tumbling against each other.  A moment after he pointed my direction, the world spun wildly in front of my eyes and everything turned black.

I felt the stasis field surrounding my body dissipate and I took a deep breath.  I pulled off my goggles to get a bearing on my surroundings.  I felt grass beneath my hooves though it appeared I was floating a hundred feet off the ground.  My wife stood next to me, the red gleam from the amulet around her neck matching that of her eyes.  She was sweating profusely and her breath hissed through clenched teeth.  She was maintaining I didn’t know how many illusions. No need to distract her.

A line of guardsponies and changelings walked past us, shedding their goggles as they went.  They faded from view and I could only hear their hoofbeats and wings buzzing until that stopped somewhere ahead and below Trixie and myself.  Similarly, I knew no outside observer more than thirty feet away would be able to see me.

My pegasus vision picked out our five adversaries a little over a mile away.  Monstrous beasts surrounded them in a ring over two hundred feet wide.  Nobody else could be seen.  That was about to change.

Diadem hoofed over a helmet.  I put it on while Steady Flight draped something over my back. Looking behind me, I saw an interlocking sheet of calcite crystals formed into a loose robe.  These were similar to the sheet used to detect dark magic in Colonel Dusky Wings but these had been enhanced with an entirely different set of enchantments.  I felt the clasps connect around my barrel and legs, then my neck.  With luck, this would deflect the effect of Grogar’s Bewitching Bell.  Only a few of us received this crystalline armor from the Plague Dimension before the portals went offline and this was my first time wearing mine.  The rest of the troops received a thin, sprayed-on layer of crystal that might or might not turn back the magic-stealing beam.  The crystal floor of the caves under the Castle of Friendship had reflected the bell’s magic, now we would find out if scaled-down versions would do the same.

I turned on my headset to hear Fluttershy feeding information to everyone on the channel.

“… looks awfully hungry.  It’s breeding season for chimeras and… yes… all three of these are males. Umm.  The rounded insects will like rotting flesh more than anything.  And… that’s it.  Over.”

After guiding my armor to seal around my forelegs, my valet clonked me on the helmet.  Penny hoofed over the Staff of Sacanus and we took off – Steady on my right and Penumbra on my left.  As we moved away from my wife, she faded from my view, but through my headset, I heard her say, “Three, Two, One, Showtime.”

The empty fields all around us shimmered and warped. In just a few seconds, thousands of Equestrian troops materialized into view.  Ponies, griffons, hippogriffs, zebras, changelings, minotaurs, sphinxes, several juvenile dragons, and even two sea serpents.  Oops.  Stephen Magnet’s unmistakable form appeared in a couple of other spots as I rotated in place.  I talked into my microphone, “Trixie, remove all the sea serpents.”  Right on cue, they vanished.  I had to hope our opponents did not notice this mistake.

There was no sign of the daggerscale portals that brought everyone here.  So far, so good.  I would oversee the battle until the illusion covering me failed or I needed to get personally involved.  “Advance,” I ordered. The sounds of wings and the thrum of steps filled the air.

Grogar spoke to Chrysalis and she nodded then took off.



The changeling queen’s horn lit and she disappeared with a flash.  Crap. I was too slow.  I cast the long-distance hearing spell that Cadance had taught me.

The Storm King waved his hands.  “No retreat!  Attack! Attack now!”  The warlord pointed his arms in random directions, causing Tirek to duck.  However, no projectiles shot from the warlord’s wrists.

The armored yeti turned back to face Grogar.  “Where is my ammunition, goat?  Do not try to control me by—”

Grogar waved him silent then touched a glowing jewel on his collar.  “Move forward!  Kill!” The ring of beasts slowly trudged outward, their footfalls adding to the din.  They moved with military precision, without a screech or a roar, slowly spreading out into a well-organized skirmish line.  The ram looked at Tirek.  “Check the caverns.”

Tirek turned around and made a gesture with his hand. A portal to the cave system appeared in midair.  I saw scores of diamond dogs running through the cavern.  At the far end of the underground room, a large chunk of the ceiling dropped toward a console of machinery.  The rock stopped perhaps a foot above the equipment, the protective shield glowing purple.  Three dragons flew down from above, grabbing the stone with their claws and their wings a blur of motion.  The shield exploded with a bang, followed by a hollow crunch as the boulder fell the rest of the way.  The crushed machinery spewed sparks in all directions.

Tirek built up a ball of magic between his curved horns only to stumble backward as two dragons matching his size leaped through the portal.  One breathed fire onto the centaur’s face while the other bit into his foreleg. Tirek roared in pain as the portal collapsed.

The Storm King charged ahead of the monsters, crushing ponies and griffons with his sheer strength.  Then he disappeared from view, replaced with the illusion of another pink-furred ape that roared and pounded its chest.  The real ape on the battlefield shuddered for a couple of seconds before snarling.  He answered the challenge with a roar of his own.  One more howl that drowned out the armored yeti’s protests was all it took for the pink ape’s territorial instincts to override Grogar’s commands. It leaped through the air and, after two bounds, slammed into the Storm King, knocking him off his feet.  With Pink Kong keeping the yeti busy, our forces could deal with the rest of the horde of monsters.

Celestia and Luna had described in great detail the multitude of creatures and the many ways they had been put to use in the other dimension.  They had been the major reason why it had taken the two alicorns so long to defeat Grogar and we were under no delusion that it would be any easier this time. Garnering four powerful allies was merely the ram’s insurance policy for his latest attempt to conquer a world. We had spent an awful lot of time and effort planning ways to deal with every one of the possible beasts Grogar might call to his side.

Swift ground creatures led the charge.  A dozen pukwudgies fired a barrage of spines at our soldiers but their armor was sufficient to cope.  Several cipactli (crocodile-frogs), orthros (two-headed dogs), cragadiles, and an ophiotaurus (half bull – half serpent) were a greater threat, but our shock troops consisted mainly of well-trained earth ponies whose strength allowed them to wield immense weapons that inflicted massive casualties among their foes.  The gigantic timberwolf was another story though.  Despite our troops breaking off large portions of its body, dark magic always reassembled the beast for further attacks upon our allies.

“Pull back from the timberwolf,” I instructed over the headset.  “Operation Barbecue!”

This was my code to Trixie.  As soon as the warriors were clear, a ring of raging fire sprung up around the timberwolf.  It seemed that our intel about its vulnerability was correct because it shied away from the illusory flames, rearing up on its hind legs to get as far from them as possible.  I heard Grogar’s magically amplified voice directed its way.  “Jump over the flames.  Now!”  The wooden animation shook its head emphatically, pulling its forelegs even tighter to its chest.  The giant timberwolf’s fear of immolation allowed Trixie to herd it towards a portal that was set up behind it.  A blast from a unicorn horn made it stumble through the gateway onto a deserted island where it could harm no one.  A few of the other smaller monsters that had been caught up in the trap were similarly disposed of before the portal collapsed.

Not everything was going our way, of course. Giant spiders were both fast and deadly. The Equestrians that they did not attack with their mandibles were instead rendered helpless with webbing. Two could play at that game though. The Wonderbolts arrived carrying nets holding several globes in each.  They bombarded the spiders with those and the shells shattered on impact, releasing a rapidly expanding foam that quickly hardened, trapping the arachnids and rendering them helpless.  I directed a squad of changelings to help out a company of unicorns that was under attack by slime creatures that appeared to be immune to all magic offensives.  Polistae’s hive had developed some nasty defenses against the slimes which included some kind of powder that made their gelatinous bodies fizz and break down amidst high-pitched keening.

One monster stood out due to its erratic behavior.  Focusing on it, I identified it as a chimera, and it was… arguing with itself?  The best that I could make out from this distance was the goat head was screaming at the tiger head to stop fighting.  “Are you trying to get us killed?!” The tiger part strained to obey Grogar’s commands but the goat part evidently had some control of its shared body and it kept jerking to a stop.  The snake head kept busy apologizing to every being in the area. “Ssssorry, everyone! Ssssorry!  I don’t know what got into him today.  No, really!  He’ssss ussssually not like thisssss.”

Looking across the battlefield showed me another chimera was not having the same multiple personality issues.  How exactly was Grogar controlling these monsters?  Regardless, I judged that this chimera posed no threat and turned my attention back to the next problem, and it was a doozy.

An Ursa Minor waded into the midst of the battle, its gigantic paws batting away all combatants within reach, some of them its allies.  The part physical and part ethereal nature of its body made it a difficult threat to cope with.  Fortunately, there was a way of dealing with the creature that did not involve violence, one that Twilight and Trixie had worked out together due to previous experience with one.  Ursa Minors were basically big children which is probably why it was so indiscriminate with the warriors and monsters it was ‘playing’ with.  What we needed was a parent to take charge.  No problem!  Operation Babysitter commenced with an illusion of an Ursa Major stomping up and glaring sternly at the Ursa Minor.  Once the cub had stopped and cringed under her gaze, momma Ursa motioned with her head and started to walk away, the child dutifully following.  The Ursa Minor would be taken to the cave where Zecora had a sleep mist prepared for creatures like these.

While we had made a big dent in the attacking horde, there were still countless other beasts to deal with.  To help even the odds, we had chosen this area for the battle because of the terrain and we intended to make full use of it. While Trixie was disrupting the attacks of the ground-based monsters with her illusions of perilous cliffs and searing lava pits, there were real treacherous gorges and traps hidden beneath an apparition of an innocuous field of grass and wildflowers.  I saw a twenty-legged horror appear to fall into the ground leaving nary a trace.  A cyclops and two gegenees (six-armed giants) chased a phantom squad of ponies only to discover the camouflaged river ravine the hard way.

Of course, many of the monsters quickly figured out the dangers and started avoiding them to take safe routes that some of their numbers had already found.  Too bad that I was directing earth pony and diamond dog teams to create new crevasses in their path under cover of normality.  Our forces were not having everything go their way though. Maulwurfs were the biggest problem. Their digging claws could tunnel faster than a diamond dog and were a terrible weapon to face.  Fortunately, Thorax’s changeling soldiers were familiar with this threat and I directed Pharynx to come to the digging team’s assistance.

The air wasn’t safe either.  Harpies and Pyrausta (four-legged insects with filmy wings and a dragon's head) attacked our aerial forces.  We had traps for them too.  A grove of tall trees had been strung with enchanted nets and disguised as an almost completely open meadow.  The two visible trees were an illusion too but, when lined up, they served as a guide for the safe path for the pegasi and griffons who lured in their pursuers. The Wonderbolts played their part too with more classic dogfighting.  Between their flawless maneuvering and tight teamwork, they knocked a mob of winged monkeys out of action in the space of a few minutes.

Several bugbears were a threat too, but they were cumbersome and slow compared to our troops.  A squad of griffons armed with bolas, weighted ropes, and nets dealt with them one by one until they were all helplessly tied up and out of the action.

The biggest aerial threat was the roc.  This giant bird with slate for feathers was virtually immune to both physical and magical attacks.  It also seemed to hate dragons.  But even that gargantuan avian was brought low when it flew at full speed into an invisible cliff face to which I guided Dragon Lord Ember who played bait.  Rocs are almost impossible to kill but I was willing to bet this one wasn’t going to play a part in the rest of the battle.

It seemed like Trixie and her amazing illusions were winning the day for us, but there was still a huge amount of action on the ground due to the sheer number of monsters.  Swarms of myrmekes (gigantic ants) were causing huge problems as two replaced every one that was cut down.  On the other hoof, a flock of cockatrices was not as big a danger as they normally would be.  Special lenses in the helmets of our battle armor filtered out the magic effect of their gaze.  Only those beings who refused to wear helmets were at risk. A few statues dotted the field that would have to be depetrified later.  Just like during the battle against the Storm King’s forces, retrieval teams rushed in to carry away our allies that had been injured or turned to stone.  Tempest Shadow flew past me laughing up a storm, riding the back of a huge beetle which she was herding with bursts from her restored horn.  The insect didn’t seem happy about its passenger but it had no say in the matter.  The Pillars of Equestria and Stygian had more experience than any of us at corralling monsters.  They worked like a well-oiled machine neutralizing anything that got near them at the south edge of the battlefield.  The Emergency Response Squad from the House Path world arrived before the interdimensional portals had been rendered useless.  They were backing up the changeling forces from all the hives, not to mention the dragons under Ember’s command.  Between them all, they were doing a fine job of combatting and controlling the monster horde.  That just left the major players to deal with.

All the villains were spread out over the battlefield. Chrysalis was still unaccounted for but I couldn’t worry about that now.  Near the center of the clearing, I saw Cozy Glow performing the same job as me for Grogar’s forces – directing their combatants with the Royal Canterlot Voice and throwing out the occasional hex to briefly dispel an illusion. Nullstone tracking bands occasionally flew her way but she countered each with a quick spell that left them inert. Even when one of the bands approached from directly behind her, somehow the mare knew and neutralized it without any apparent difficulty.

I flicked to a new channel on my headset.  “Operation Behemoth – you’re up.”

The ground beneath Cozy Glow shook and she took to the air.  The fighting to the north paused as the ground quaked in a repeating rhythm.  The disturbance grew closer to the center of the battlefield, made obvious by which combatants lost their balance, both friend and foe.  A gigantic form appeared as a dim outline, then a silhouette, and with a final step, came directly in view.  Torch rose to his full height, loose-fitting armor plates covering his entire body. His bladed gauntlets rose high in the air then started downwards, slowly at first.

Cozy Glow screamed and teleported repeatedly.  Each time she reappeared, she loosed another horn blast that didn’t so much as dent the former dragon lord’s armor.  His fists impacted the field, throwing Grogar and Tirek to the ground.  When the gauntlets rose again, there was no damage to the grass.  Would Cozy notice?

“HA!”

The curly-haired alicorn shot out a wide beam and Torch seemed to fold in on himself and disappear.  In his place, I saw a small adult yak facing away from Cozy Glow, a conductor’s baton in one hoof.  Three large male yaks stood to her left and three to the right.  The yak cow waved her wand saying, “Clementine say left yaks all together… jump!”

The six large yaks gaped at Cozy Glow who looked directly at them.  The alicorn let out a magic blast that charred the grass where Clementine had been standing a moment before.  The smaller yak had been thrown onto the back of one of the fleeing adults who said, “No! Yak say yaks run now!”

Cozy charged her horn and started to follow, only to stop when her mane blew forward as I heard a deep huffing sound.  The mare turned around as another Torch materialized out of thin air.  This dragon stood on his hind legs and wore nothing but bladed gauntlets.  He glared down at the alicorn balefully.

Cozy laughed.  “Trixie, you really are an idiot.”  She sent out the same wide beam of magic.  “If you think that trick will work…”  The alicorn’s expression changed just before the gauntlets slammed together with her in the middle.  When Torch opened them again, she dropped like a stone.  For emphasis, the huge dragon stepped on Cozy Glow and ground her into the dirt with his heel.

A pulsing sphere of light floated upward.  I thought I recognized it from my training session with Crimson Boulder.  I screwed my eyes shut as I yelled into my microphone, “Torch! Close your—”

Even through my eyelids, everything went white for a moment.  Looking down again, I saw Torch bellowing in pain as he stumbled backward, one huge hand covering his face.  I perceived a blue magic field lifting Cozy Glow out of the dragon’s footprint just before a cylinder of magic encased her.  Her end of the tube shrank at startling speed until the mare was ejected from the far side, skidding to a stop in front of Grogar.

Good!  He was distracted.  I threw one of my four nullstone tracking bands.  Penumbra’s followed directly behind mine. Before they reached their target, they burst into flame.  A hemisphere twenty pony-lengths wide solidified around them, cutting us off from the pair.  I heard a blood-curdling scream come from inside the dome.

Blast it!  I said into my microphone, “Grogar is healing Cozy Glow with a bone-knitting spell.  She’s still in the fight.  Also, Grogar has an invisible immolating shield that extends ten body-lengths in all directions.”

I saw a changeling fly up to Torch’s right ear. He growled and raised a clawed hand to bat the drone away.

“Wait!” I heard through the open channel.  “It’s me, Moon Dancer!  Let me help you!  I can be your eyes!”

The dragon’s snarled with even more viciousness. “That pony was a unicorn.”

“My true identity is a changeling.  In the Dragon Lands, I told you no Equestrian Laws forbid the ownership of banks by dragons.”

Torch held his breath for a couple of seconds.  Then he let it out.  “Very well.  Point me to a monster uglier than ponies.”

Timpani surveyed the field.  “Which do you prefer?  A gigantic crustacean or the biggest tatzlwurm I’ve ever seen?”

The former dragon ruler smiled.  “I choose both.”

“Good.  Turn to your left and take three steps forward.”

I was not able to follow all of Scorch and Timpani’s tag-team battle because Tirek could no longer be contained.  Despite instructions to avoid getting too close to the centaur, he had managed to steal enough magic from our troops to recover from earlier attacks and grown considerably both in stature and power. The nets and changeling resin bombs could no longer impede him for more than a few seconds.  The dragons that had pounced on him at the cave had been his first victims, but I could see several others strewn along his path.  Grogar’s monstrous minions kept forcing our allies within range of Tirek’s magic-consuming ability.  However, two could play at that game.

Under cover of the horizon-wide overcast, clouds had been enchanted to create solid platforms, not unlike those found in Cloudsdale.  Stockpiles of munitions had been gathered ranging from mere boulders to enchanted bombs. While some of them were to be used on the monsters, the primary target was Tirek.  Under the guidance of pegasi outside of the centaur’s range, unicorns launched a barrage at him.  Rocks had no magic to steal and, when falling at terminal velocity, they were a lethal threat to Tirek, so he wasted no time blasting them away.  Pegasi and griffons had spent much of the day building up the stockpile, so the bombardment kept coming, forcing him to burn through power at a prodigious rate.  He hadn’t stolen enough magic yet to cope indefinitely, so instead of standing his ground, he started retreating.  Time for the next phase.

“Operation Gopher,” I instructed.

The barrage was not random.  We had anticipated that Tirek would try to avoid the bombs and had deliberately left a weak spot in our attack.  Naturally, the centaur took that route but we had a team of diamond dogs on the job.  Unseen beneath the ground, large shafts were dug with just a thin layer of clay and dirt left covering them.  Inevitably, one of Tirek’s forelegs fell through a concealed pit and he collapsed, his forward momentum causing excessive strain on the limb.  I heard his cannon bone snap from where I hovered, followed immediately by the centaur’s scream of agony.  We had no intention of leaving him like that though. Tirek was still dangerous as long as he was conscious and able to steal magic to accelerate his healing.  That’s when the enchanted munitions came into action. Tirek was now a sitting duck and projectiles rained down on him.  Nearly all of them were mana leeches, clinging to him and drawing his magic out. His talent was unable to affect them, so his best defense was to try to blast the weapons before they reached him. Many were destroyed but enough got through that he could not pull them off his body quickly enough and the centaur was weakening fast.  He was visibly shrinking and his beams were fading.  Then a boulder hit him on the head and he went limp.

“Halt bombardment and secure Tirek,” I ordered before turning my attention to the rest of the battle.

Grogar was proving to be an issue.  All his gimmicks were giving a hard time to any being that tried to get to him.  The armor coating was proving to be of little benefit as evidenced by the number of our allies that had been rendered helpless.  I wondered if even Torch would be immune to the Bewitching Bell.  Then I heard a sound that hadn’t met my fuzzy ears in a long, long time – a noise that had resonated only once before through Equestria’s crystal blue skies.  I heard jet engines.  Or at least, something very similar.  As my aural appendages swiveled to track the sound, my eyes followed to pick out two very large ponies in bulky armor cutting through the air on a course for Grogar. The ram must have heard it too because he turned to face the new threat, his bell at the ready.

As Equestria’s new sky knights drew closer, I could see the dark blue feathers of the wings of one of them and the pearly white ones on the other.  I afforded myself a smile.  It seemed that the Royal Sisters had gotten the hang of their magitek armor just in time. Each alicorn was fully enclosed in the House Path technological wonders, with only their wings free to maneuver, their vulnerable leading edge also protected.  The jet sound was just that – a magical version of the more prosaic ones that I had known since I was a kid.  And the thrust that they gave would leave the average pegasus in the dust. The power for them was provided by a battery pack on their backs which Techbird said were good for two to four hours of use, depending on how much work they did.  It wasn’t just the jet that the batteries powered, of course.  A whole slew of weapons was incorporated into their armor.  Fortunately, these were off-the-shelf items back in Techbird’s dimension and she merely had to hook them up to the custom suits of armor which she had put together in a ridiculously short amount of time.  Tony Stark – move over!  Iron Mare is here.  Both of her!

Naturally, Grogar’s first instinct was to try to steal the magic from the rapidly closing alicorns.  Too bad for him that they had no magic left to steal and the battle armor’s battery was well shielded.  They were almost on top of him before he hastily teleported away.  I spotted him reappearing amidst a group of monsters that had remained to guard the ram.  Slingtails started hurling boulders at their aerial enemies but the Royal Sisters easily evaded them.  The rocks proved to be more of a menace to the soldiers who were coming in to back up Celestia and Luna.  Giant pill-bugs were also a major impediment; their segmented carapace was virtually impenetrable, so when they rolled into a ball and hurtled at a soldier, there was only one course of action and that was to get out of the way fast!  However, the real threat to the two knights in magitek armor was the hydra.

If my memory served me correctly, the hydra of Greek legend had nine heads.  This one had only seven, which was still six too many.  Between them all, they could track the movements of both sisters, spitting highly corrosive goo at every opportunity.  Several dracanae, monsters with the upper body of a human female and the lower of a sort of dragon, flew in to harass the alicorns, but the simple-minded hydra was proving to be a problem to them too.  I waited until Celestia disposed of the last of the dracanae before I activated my headset.

“Fluttershy – are you and your team in position yet?”

Her hesitant voice came back.  “I… yes, I believe so.”

“OK.  Start Operation Dinnertime.”

A couple of the hoof-soldiers peeled away from the squad. Moments later, they opened a gigantic portal.  Through it, I got a view of a swamp and a huge pile of fish on its shore.  Because we had intentionally positioned the portal downwind of the rotting heap, I was quickly hit with a god-awful stench.  It must have smelled like ambrosia to the hydra and pill bugs though because they both stopped fighting and stared longingly at the free meal.  Green rectangles glowed on their bodies, one on the head of each pill bug and one on the neck of every hydra-head which now waved in apparent agony.  I recognized them as control blocks and ordered them destroyed.  Fluttershy flew in and hovered in front of the monsters to get their attention before unleashing her Stare.  They all ceased thrashing about and were fixated on the small mare.  How she could do that to so many sets of eyes at once, I don’t know, but it worked.  It gave the unicorns and earth ponies in her team the time and opportunity to shatter the enslaving devices by horn blasts and crossbow bolts.  The moment that Fluttershy let up her Stare, the hydra and pill bugs charged through the portal which was then promptly shut down. Suddenly, Grogar was left without some of his strongest defenders.

Judging by his frantic activity, the ram was calling in backup from the monsters he previously sent marching to battle. Celestia and Luna had no intention of waiting for that help to arrive.  Still, they could use some assistance.  Only when I keyed on my microphone did I notice that all I could hear was static.  I switched to the army-wide frequency, then a few others.  All channels were down and what I said into my microphone did not get echoed back to my ears.  

I heard Penumbra cry out, “Head’s up!”  

My batpony guard shot upward, colliding with a flying serpent three times her size.  The green snake sported a ruff of colorful feathers which also adorned its undersized wings.  The pair spun out of sight as they battled.

I turned to Steady.  “Communication is down.  Order the flyers to stop Grogar’s reinforcements.”  Without a word, my valet sped off on a mission more suitable to his original career.  I was about to gather more flyers for the task when I heard a familiar demented laugh. A trail of broken bodies led to the outskirts of the battlefield, starting with the massive, pink-haired ape. At the end of the bloody trail, the Storm King charged forward, his rocket-assisted boots allowing him to chase down any ground-based foe.  Before my eyes, the yeti picked up an earth pony soldier and slammed him into the dirt. The armored foe followed this up with punches that shook the ground and unquestionably ended the guardspony’s life. Still more thundering blows rained down. This only ended when a yak ran horn-first into the back of the Storm King’s knee.  The yeti fought to keep his balance, then pivoted around and slapped the yak away with a backhand, causing our ally to tumble head over tail.  

I growled.  Nothing we threw at him even slowed the Storm King down.  He would just go on slaughtering our troops with impunity, one by one.  Half our traps were rendered ineffective by his strength and the other half by his ability to fly short distances.  I looked closely at his armor, only seeing a few small dents.  The only thing that could penetrate his armor…

My eyes went wide.  I stored the Staff of Sacanas in its pocket dimension as I dived down to the central field.  Quickly, I collected six of the Storm King’s darts, putting five in my saddlebags.  I held the last in both hooves as I gained altitude, looking it up and down.  The stake was made of a hard and dense metal.  The projectile tapered to a point on one end and flared out into thick stabilizing fins on the other.  There was no hole for propellant so it must be fired some other way, maybe a magnetic railgun.  

I glided as silently as I could toward the back of the armored suit.  A second before I got to him, the Storm King stopped moving.  

On instinct, I flapped hard and started a climb. I felt the air whoosh underneath me as I gained altitude, avoiding his attempted strike.  Grunting with effort, I banked hard until I spiraled downward. Looking below me, I saw the yeti holding up a hand where he expected me to fly.  Instead, I turned harder and passed inside of his reach.  I locked my elbows and used my momentum to drive the metal stake into the gap between his helmet and neck armor directly above his back. 

I pulled out two more darts as I circled the yeti. I stayed at a safe distance while I sized up my enemy, being careful not to come anywhere near his reach.  The helmet was now stuck looking ahead and to his left – once again reduced to using one eye.  The yeti tried to reach the spike but could not touch it with the power armor’s reduced flexibility.  Power armor… where could his power source be?  Only his chest and back plates extended far enough out to enclose anything like a battery.  

There!  A thin line showing an access plate of some sort on the front.  That had to be it.  

I dived to the ground in front of the yeti, landing hard. I pulled rock up from the ground to encase both of his arms.  He braced his legs as he twisted and strained.  The Storm King grunted then said, “You won’t—”

I wasn’t listening.  I flew forward, my forehooves outstretched with my elbows locked again. When the access door opened and something shot out, there was no time to dodge.  A net covered me and threw me onto my back.  Electrical shocks ran across my body.  I heard the yeti’s amplified voice. “Eaaaaasy.”

The powerful shocks might have incapacitated a different person, but my affinity for lightning meant I could move freely. I dropped the spikes and tried to access my unicorn magic, then my earth pony magic.  Nothing.  Reaching upward, I grabbed and pulled.  A weight at the end of the netting hit my head, but at least that was free now. The sound of rockets came from somewhere above me.  I looked up to see the flames shooting from the bottom of the Storm King’s boots cut out and he started to plummet downward.

Again, I tried to cast unicorn and earth pony magic and again I failed.

With a screeching cry, a roc slammed into the armored yeti, sending both crashing to the ground by my side.  They rolled further away, giving me more time to extract myself.

CRACK!

I looked up as I tried to pull my rear legs free of the netting.  The roc hung limp with the base of one wing gripped by the Storm King’s fist.  The bird’s neck hung at an unnatural angle. Blue-green flames enveloped the roc, leaving my advisor in its place.  I gasped.

“Sister!” I spared a glance to see Queen Apicula a half-mile away, flying directly toward us.

I turned back just as I pulled my tail free.  My advisor gave me a slow head shake before the Storm King shifted his grip, catching her barrel in his fist and squeezing. I heard popping sounds as her eyes went wide.

The yeti said, “If you recall, I made you a promise.” He pulled his arm back over his shoulder as I yanked two more of the metal darts from my saddlebags.

I turned my anger into concentration, focusing every bit of my will into a single purpose.  When the armored warlord threw Diadem’s body at me, I poured my magic into the mystic equation in my mind.

The world turned white for a moment and I smelled burnt hair and feathers.  Most importantly, I was standing behind the yeti.  I pushed myself upwards with a spire of rock and drew earth pony power into me.  With a yell, I plunged the two spikes into the middle of the Storm King’s back armor. One cracked the metal sheet but the other only made a small dent.

The yeti backed up, slamming into my nose and carrying me off the spire.  He toppled backward, doubtless trying to crush me beneath the armor’s weight.  I reached my rear legs for the ground while trying to hold the two darts steady.  The moment a rear hoof touched, I shot two thick spires of rock past both sides of my head.  They struck the back end of the darts, embedding them deeply into the armor. Unfortunately, they also crushed my forelegs and front hooves.

I screamed in pain, only to scream again as the yeti rolled to the side and I hung on with my broken limbs.  My head swam as he paused for a moment after getting to all fours. It had to be now.

I shorted as much electrical energy as I could through the darts.  I couldn’t last more than a second.  The pain shooting up my legs from my broken pastern and hooves broke my concentration and all I could see was blackness.  Dimly, I heard someone screaming as I felt metal slide along my barrel.  Was I falling?

With a jolt, I felt some being's legs wrap around me. With another impact, the ground connected with my back.  Earth pony magic flowed into me.  Belatedly, I wondered why nothing seemed to hurt.  Above me, I heard a changeling call out, “Lady Rarity!”  That was a queen’s voice.  I think it was Apicula.

My vision slowly returned.  The blur of purple, yellow, and green couldn’t be anyone else.  A thumping noise drew my attention.  Muffled sounds of coughing came from the Storm King.  As my vision cleared, I saw a small amount of smoke curling out of multiple places on his armor.  He was alternately pounding and twisting at his helmet but it refused to budge.  A glance showed that the dart I shoved into the gap between helmet and body was still in place.

“Coming!” called out a familiar sing-song voice. Rarity galloped in from the other direction, blasting a pack of timberwolves that got in her way. Needing to try my magic, I sent out a spell from my horn.  Obligingly, the scattered branches caught fire. 

Rarity came up to my side and her horn lit again. That’s when agony returned.  I hissed in pain as my herdmate examined and manipulated my crushed limbs.  

After taking a deep breath, she said, “Mark, there are multiple compound fractures in both legs.  I can’t heal these properly.”

I snarled.  “Then heal them improperly.  I’ll get them re-broken later if that’s what it takes.  Hell, I’ll cut them off myself then jump into one of Twilight’s healing pods if I have to.  Right now, I need to get back in the fight.”  Rarity gaped for a moment then took a deep breath.  Her eyes hardened and she stared at my right foreleg, a frown etched on her face.  Apicula gripped me tight around my upper body.  I hoped that wouldn’t be needed.

It was.  The bone-knitting spell hurt worse than when Starlight Glimmer used it after my last battle with the Storm King.  I was left panting and unable to speak when the white mare finished. Instead, I nodded and looked down at my other foreleg.  Another eternity of pain later, I was left shivering in Apicula’s grasp.  After I don’t know how long, I clopped my forelegs together.  No pain. Didn’t feel quite right, like something didn’t line up correctly, but I could live with that.  I still felt weak and nauseous from the battle and subsequent healing.  Now I had to wait until I felt well enough to stand again.

“Mother?!”

Apicula’s outburst made me look up at her and follow her gaze.  A dozen paces away, another changeling queen strode past us.  She had the same mixture of yellow and green chitin, but a mane and tail that shifted from a deep midnight blue to gold.  She wore a confident smile and a blue-green aura surrounded her horn.  Her crown was a match for Apicula’s.

I said, “Queen Dactylia?”  The one from the Plague Dimension?  I had put entreaties out to every changeling queen in every realm where we had allies.  Did that mean our dimensional portals had been restored?

The changeling walked up to our prone foe, who still tried to remove his helmet, but with slow and sluggish movements. 

PING!

The queen’s magic surrounded the spike that I had jammed into the base of the neck and tore it away.  The same magic twisted and detached the helmet, causing a cloud of black smoke to emerge and rise into the sky.  The Storm King coughed weakly and the queen used her magic field to pull his chin upwards to see his rescuer. 

Two of the metal darts floated into view from Dactylia’s far side.  She gripped them in her hooves and I heard a hissing sound.  That’s when I noticed the metal spikes let off a red glow.

The yeti warlord blinked away tears then laughed between hacking coughs.  “I thought that I had –”

Dactylia hissed out, “Be the last thing they see.” She then plunged the red-hot metal into both of the Storm King’s eye sockets.

The Storm King let out an ear-splitting howl of agony. When he dropped limp, an unnatural quiet fell over the battlefield.  That silence was immediately filled with laughter.  Not insane guffaws but joyful laughter.

Dactylia skipped and cavorted in front of us.  “I did it!  Finally, the long night is over!  I’m finally free!”

I threw one of my nullstone tracking bands and Rarity did the same.  They both hit their target and wrapped around the changeling queen’s horn.  With a slow-spreading wave of green fire, the larger form of Chrysalis appeared.  Even as a pair of bolas flew past me to spin out and wrap around Chrysalis’ front and rear legs, the queen’s delighted laughter continued unabated.

Penumbra landed next to me saying, “There were four of them.  All better now.”  She glared down at me.  “Stop having Rarity shine your hooves while Apicula cradles your head.  They have better things to do.”

I blinked.  Is that what it looked like we were doing?  While Rarity huffed, I realized Apicula hadn’t said anything. Through my neck and back, I felt her shivering.  I rolled to my hooves and looked at her.  She stared open-mouthed at Chrysalis.  Of course! The shock of seeing and hearing her mother again and witnessing the death of her sister.

I shuddered.  No.  I couldn’t think about that now.  I had to keep moving .

With my hooves, I pulled the queen’s head to look me in the eye.  “Apicula! Listen to me!  Do you need us to take care of you?”

The Southern Wastes Hive queen blinked and focused on my face.  “Wha…? Mark Wells?  Do I…”  She shook her head and the steel returned to her expression.  “No.  I am… No.” She took off without another word.

I delayed just long enough to give Rarity a quick peck and a “Thanks.”  Then I returned to the air.

When I reached my former observation spot high over the center of the battle, Penny and Starlight glimmer came up to my side.

“Your wife reinstated our proximity illusion,” my bodyguard informed me.  “As long as no one gets close, or you don’t go gallivanting down to the ground again, you should remain hidden.  Ah! Here’s Steady Flight.”

My valet reappeared out of thin air as he drew closer. He smiled.  “Message delivered, ready for the next.”  He looked at the expression on my face.  He had known me long enough to recognize my incredulous look. 

“What did I miss?”

I rolled my eyes.  “Later.”  I turned my attention back to the field of battle.

Despite the massive inroads our forces had made, there was still a plethora of monsters keeping the majority of our forces busy. Many of the creatures had grown wary of traps but Trixie kept the illusions changing so often that they still were being caught.  That didn’t mean that our warriors were getting off easy.  Grogar was still pushing the monsters to both defend himself and attack everyone else to a suicidal degree.  Worse still, the ram had allowed Cozy Glow time to recover and teleport to the eastern edge of the battlefield.

The mare stopped being subtle and began using her stolen magic far more aggressively.  She blasted sweeping beams of raw power at the visible foes, gambling on some of them being real.  Sadly, she was right.  I think we lost most of a squad of earth ponies in just one hit and another took out half of a mixed squad of unicorns and changelings.  It made my blood boil to see her laughing at her success.  She resumed her tactics, aiming for the aerial troops this time.  Fortunately, those were illusions but the next targets were not.  These were saved by Prince Cadenza and Shining Armor who were working in tandem to protect our allies from harm.  Shining’s shield was fortified by alicorn power and not even Cozy’s strongest beam could penetrate it.  However, they could not cast the shield fast enough to stop the mare’s attack on other targets, so they changed tactics and tried to englobe the alicorn in an unbreakable shell.  Unfortunately, Cozy could still teleport and she disappeared, only to rematerialize mere yards from my vantage point, too close for Trixie’s illusions to hide me. The alicorn spotted me and a nasty grin spread across her face.

I had intended to stay out of the combat for a while to recover from my fight with the Storm King, but that plan went straight out the window.  Almost without thinking, I hurled a lightning bolt at her but she dodged and fired a beam back.  It was promptly blocked by a magic shield generated by Starlight.  The unicorn had been using a cloud-walking spell to stand by my side and her superior levitation ability to keep up with me when I maneuvered to better observe the combat.  While her magic might not have been as powerful as Celestia’s, Starlight had the advantage of the knowledge of a wide array of spells plus experience. A second bolt was just as easily stymied.  I retrieved the Staff of Sacanas from the pocket dimension and loosed a larger shaft of lightning.  Again, Cozy teleported.

With a yell, Penny shoved me to one side as a searing beam passed through where I had been hovering a moment ago.  A few feathers on my right wing were burnt to a crisp, but I was still able to fly, so I wasted no time worrying about that. I leveled the Staff of Sacanas and fired bolt after bolt of lightning at my foe, disrupting her ability to target me accurately.  Meanwhile, Penny and Starlight commenced a two-pronged attack that split her attention. If the alicorn teleported, Starlight immediately threw up a spherical shield to stop the inevitable follow-up strike from a different direction.  Then Cozy fooled us.  Her next teleport took her behind Penny instead.  The batpony reacted instantly which, along with her armor, probably saved her life.  A desperate dive to one side resulted in a glancing blow that sent my herd-mate fluttering to the ground, her left wing damaged almost beyond usefulness.  That could be healed but I was more worried about her crash-landing.  Or at least I would have been if I hadn’t had to focus on not being the next victim.

Without Penny to split her attention three ways, Cozy was able to put more effort into fighting us.  I kept wishing for more backup, but any Equestrian ally who headed our way was promptly met by one or more of Grogar’s monsters.  It was clear that I was being purposely isolated so that Cozy could get her revenge on me.  In the meantime, Starlight and I kept up our aerial dogfight.  As the combat drew out, I could tell that Starlight was flagging.  As powerful as she was, she was not an alicorn with their superior reserves of power. She was burning through hers at a prodigious rate due to having to defend against Celestia-level magic beams. Not even Twilight had put that much strength behind her attacks during our time war.  This fight was taking too long.  Then the inevitable happened.

One too many blasts shattered Starlight’s shield and blasted her off her cloud perch.  The feedback disrupted her ability to cast spells and she plummeted down. I hurled a bolt of lightning at Cozy to distract her and dived after my friend.  I managed to snag her with my telekinesis in time to lower her to the grass unharmed, only to get blindsided by a barrage from the alicorn.  My armor saved me again, but the Staff of Sacanas went hurtling out of my grasp.

I slammed into the ground, my crushed right wing making me scream in agony.  Despite tears of pain half-blinding me, I hastily struggled to my hooves in time to dodge another beam of raw magic.  I drew on my talent to hurl bolts of lightning at Cozy but I kept missing and she responded with more blasts which I evaded or blocked with a shield.  This happened again and again and it was plain that she was playing with me now.  With no one to protect me or fight on my behalf, she had the upper hoof and she knew it. She kept alert to my incipient lightning attacks and ducked or teleported as needed.  Then I ran out of stored electrical power and my final bolt fizzled.

Cozy alighted about ten yards away, a sneer of contempt on her face.  “Not so smug now are you, Prince Wells?  Thought you had us with your clever little ruse, didn’t you?  Well, you never had a chance.  We’ll whittle away your defenses steadily.  Equestria will be ours soon,” she gloated.

“Do you truly think Equestria will bow to you, Cozy Glow?” I growled.

“Think?  I know.  They will acknowledge me as their Princess or they can suffer without their magic,” she replied smugly.

“You’re all about taking what isn’t yours, aren’t you?”

She smiled cruelly.  “No – sometimes I prefer executions.  Any last words, former Prince of Equestria?”

I gave her my best grin.  “Yes.  Lovely weather we’re having.”  I looked skyward.

She blinked at my non sequitur.  “What?”  She followed my gaze.

The field of combat had been blanketed by clouds to provide concealment and a platform for our winged troops.  However, while Cozy and I had battled, a special squad of weather pegasi had compacted a lot of this cloud into the biggest, blackest thunderhead you had ever seen directly overhead.  Before the mare realized that she had fallen into my trap, I cast a temporal static spell that prevented her from teleporting and launched my ultimate attack.

I am the Alicorn of Lightning.  I had spent months perfecting my special talent, much of it while in other dimensions where I could not be watched.  I did not have to rely on stored power, nor draw on any thrown at me.  I was the absolute master of this element and I could feel the cloud’s pent-up potential as if it was a part of me.  I called upon it and it responded.  A lightning bolt far greater than any I had previously wielded arced down and crashed into Cozy’s hastily erected shield.  It was even less effective than Luna’s had been and the electricity sliced through it and into the mare before slamming into the ground.  Grass, dirt, and rock exploded from that point, momentarily blinding me before it showered to the ground.  With my ears still ringing from the thunderclap, I approached the crater that it had left.  Half buried in the rubble was the unmoving form of Cozy Glow.  She was dead or unconscious; either was a possibility because I had not held back one iota.  While I had no real desire to kill her despite everything she had done, neither I nor Equestria could afford half-measures at this time.  I had learned a harsh lesson and I wasn’t about to forget it.

Aware of my plan to trap Cozy, Prince Cadenza and Shining had stayed out of the fight. They had not been happy about the gambit but I had insisted because I needed to have her close to me and not moving or dodging other attacks.  I had needed Penny and Starlight with me though because the evil genius might have smelled a set-up.  While there may have been a chance that they could have overcome Cozy, their main goal was to distract her from the thundercloud formation.  When she had apparently disposed of them before ‘defeating’ me, it had played to her major failing – she was unable to resist gloating. That had allowed me to spring our trap. To be absolutely certain she was no longer a threat, I took a suppressor ring from a pouch attached to my armor and put it on the unresisting false alicorn.  I could no longer guarantee that the tracking bands wouldn’t be deactivated. Then I turned away to assess the status of the combat.  Cozy Glow was no longer relevant.

The fact that Grogar was still in the fight was a testament to the difficulty that Celestia and Luna must have had when battling him in the other dimension.  We had hoped that the Royal Sisters’ non-magical assault would turn the tide against him but that had not been the case.  Dozens of creatures had been sacrificed to defend the goat against the power armor’s weapons.  The arms were now depleted but there were still more monsters.  And Grogar was not limited to those.  While the Bell kept other warriors away, the enchanted gems on his collar twinkled as he manifested various other assaults on the alicorns and a shield to protect himself from ranged attacks.  Eventually, the Royal Sisters pulled back to deal with the creatures on the eastern side of the battlefield.  Only one thing was unsettling Grogar now and that was the team of Mi Amore Cadenza, Shining Armor, and Twilight Sparkle.

Freed of the task of battling Cozy Glow, they had turned their attention to the chief villain. While they still had to fight out of range of the Bewitching Bell, they were three of the most powerful beings in this world.  They combined their horn blasts into volleys that were wreaking havoc on the monsters and causing Grogar’s shield to waver.  He solved this problem by teleporting away, reappearing close to the trio.  Before he could activate the Bell though, Twilight teleported them away and they resumed their assault.

Steady Flight landed next to me, hoofing over the retrieved Staff of Sacanus.  Without taking my eyes from the battle, I asked, “Thanks… and how are they?”

I didn’t need to clarify.  “Starlight’s exhausted but otherwise okay.  Penumbra’s bitching about her wrecked wing.  The bones are healed but her flight magic isn’t cooperating.”

“They’ll be fine then,” I said with a nod.  Once again, I used the staff’s power to splint my wing.

“You look like horseapples.”

“I feel like it too.”

“What are we going to do about Grogar?”

I smirked. “We’re already doing it.”

The ram didn’t realize it, but he was being led into an ambush.  Each time he teleported to try to get to his foes, he ran the risk of falling into it.  Eventually, his luck ran out and he appeared almost dead center of the target.  A daggerscale portal that had been set up in concealment was activated remotely by Rainbow Dash who had been circling high overhead.  Finally, we had direct access within his shield.  Out of the portal bounced Pinkie Pie who threw a glowing satchel at the ram in a high arc before pronking back through.  Grogar reflexively blasted the bag before looking down, only to find his assailant gone.  The satchel broke apart, releasing dozens of starving parasprites that immediately set about eating everything organic that wasn’t alive.  That included Grogar’s leather collar.  Within moments, the Bewitching Bell fell off the disintegrating neckpiece and Grogar’s shield winked out.  The goat reached for the bell but Rainbow Dash zoomed in to snatch it from under his nose.  Grogar wasn’t helpless yet though.  A hoof touched one of the enchanted gems that now lay on the ground and a wall of magic appeared in front of the pegasus.  Dash’s reflexes were amazing and she pulled up immediately, but not in time to prevent a teeth-rattling collision that jarred the bell from her grasp. Grogar’s horns glowed and the Bewitching Bell zoomed back towards its owner.

“Not so fast, Sugarcube.”

While the ram had been focused on getting his prime weapon back, Applejack had come through the portal.  Grogar turned to the earth pony just in time to see two hind hooves heading for his face. I reckon she bucked him at least twenty yards.  Judging by the way the monsters all suddenly lost interest in fighting, I was confident that he was down for the count.  After a buck like that, I wondered if he even survived.

I wearily flapped over towards the scene of Grogar’s defeat, wincing with each beat of my injured wing.  We Triarchs, Thorax, the Royal Sisters, and several others gathered about Grogar where he lay guarded by warriors and bound with an almost comical amount of manacles and ropes, not to mention several nullstone bands around his horns to neutralize his magic.  A groan escaped his lips.  Well, that answered the question as to his survival.

The Bewitching Bell lay where it had dropped when Grogar’s levitation had cut out.  I picked it up in my magic while Twilight gathered up the enchanted gemstones.

Trixie spoke up.  “Take the prisoner to the dungeon and keep him under heavy guard until we can deal with him appropriately.”

“Yes, Your Highness!” responded the earth pony soldier in charge of the squad.  A unicorn levitated our vanquished foe while another set up a daggerscale portal.

I didn’t wait for them to leave.  “Come on.  We have a few more problems to resolve before this is all over.”

I headed across the field with everyone else following until we came to the crater blasted by my massive thunderbolt.  At the bottom, still covered by rocks and dirt, was Cozy Glow, alive but very much more frazzled than Luna had ended up. Although the evil mare had only been knocked out by my thunder-strike and supposedly rendered helpless by the nullstone ring, I nevertheless still considered her dangerous.  However, a couple of unicorns posted around her had been tasked with keeping her unconscious until now.

“Do you want me to do this?” Twilight asked nervously as I prepared to strike the Bewitching Bell.

I smirked at her.  “Don’t you trust me, Twi?”

“Of course I do!” she protested.  “It’s just that you and magic…”

“Don’t worry – I’ve got this.”

I tapped the bell with my hoof and aimed it at Cozy. Just as it had done to me when I fought her in the caves, it drew the magic out of the mare.  Her form shrank and horn faded until she was a mere pegasus once more.  I doubt that I left her enough magic to even fly any more.  I turned to face the Royal Sisters.  “I’m not certain which of your powers she ended up with, but I’m pretty sure it’s Celestia’s, so I will try you first.  We can always change it around later if I’m wrong.  Unless you want to swap responsibilities?” I raised an inquiring eyebrow.

“Nay, I wouldst have the more challenging work of managing my moon and stars,” Luna replied with a pointed look at her sister.

“I’ll stick with the far more difficult task of controlling the sun,” Celestia said with a smug smile.

Even now, they couldn’t resist getting in some good-natured jabs.

Just as I pointed the bell at the solar alicorn, Penumbra jumped in front and spread her impressive wingspan.  Her eyes were closed and a smirk pulled on her lips.  

I couldn’t help but match her smile.  “Penny, what are you doing?”

My herdmate shrugged.  “Well, Equestria is a meritocracy, isn’t it?  And the only flyers with wings bigger than mine make the Dragon Lands their home.”

Celestia let out a delighted laugh as she came up behind Penumbra.  “Let’s check that, shall we?”

The two stood on their back hooves, both reaching out their right wings.  Despite the batpony’s stretching and straining, the outcome was clear.  

Luna said, “A laudable attempt, but my sister doth triumph by dint of her primaries.”  

My herdmate hammed it up, stomping off to the side to be enveloped by one of Luna’s wings.  “Be brave, young one.  Forsooth, wing-envy is a terrible thing.”

I tapped the Bell and mentally directed the stolen power to Celestia.  Moments later, her mane regained its normal flowing aurora.

“Thank you, Mark.  I feel my connection to my sun restored.”

I nodded in acknowledgment and then addressed the unicorns watching over Cozy.  “You can allow the prisoner to regain consciousness, but gag her before doing so. Take her to the dungeon now.”

“At once, Your Highness!”

Next up was Tirek.  I looked above everyone’s heads to find him, only to have Penumbra poke me in the flank.  After she caught my eye, she pointed to a spot much closer to the ground.  Across the battlefield, I saw the centaur was back to his wizened, unpowered self.  Tirek’s body shook as he retched again and again – his dry heaves punctuated with the occasional scream as field medics attempted to splint his shattered foreleg.  A puddle of the familiar multi-colored spew covered the ground in front of him.  As I watched, two changelings dropped a limp pegasus soldier into the pool of pure Equestrian magic.  Seconds later, the stallion flew out of the mess as if his tail was on fire.  Well, good. Ponies were getting their stolen magic back.  

I considered Tirek for another moment.  No point speaking to him yet unless I wanted to get thrown up on again, not that he was in any condition to talk.  I supposed he could wait.

My gaze shifted to another figure a hundred yards away. I sighed.  This was going to be tougher.  We headed off in that direction.

Queen Chrysalis was lying on the grass in relaxed repose despite her bindings, a contented smile on her face.  While I had seen her when she had arrived with Grogar, this was my first opportunity to take in her enhanced appearance since she had been imbued with Luna’s power.  She had to be the first alicorn changeling to ever exist and she looked magnificent.  Her glossy black chitin was devoid of holes and her natural emerald armor contrasted beautifully with it.  Her lacy wings sparkled with delightful iridescence and her mane and tail shimmered.

Her grin turned mischievous and she stretched luxuriously, letting me see her body in motion.  I swallowed and forced myself to look only at her eyes. She pantomimed biting something in the air and slurping the love from it.  Chrysalis followed this by waggling her eyebrows.

Damn emotivores.

The changeling queen had three tracking nullstone bands wrapped around her horn but several warriors surrounded her just in case. She ignored them completely, looking up to smile as I approached.

“I formally surrender,” she said.

I cast my gaze around me, noting the dead and wounded being attended to, then looked back at Chrysalis.  “Are you finally satisfied, Your Majesty?”

“You knew my price, Prince Mark Wells.  You were unwilling to pay it, so I had to make… alternative arrangements.”

“Many creatures died today because of a battle that you enabled by stealing the Bewitching Bell.”

“Oh, are you referring to the battle where you ponies chose the time and place thanks to your little deception?  A final attack would have happened with or without that tawdry artifact.  All it did was provide more assurance to the self-absorbed fool that he was invincible. Besides, it is not my fault that you ponies are so gullible.”

Ouch.  That hurt because it was so true.  “Nevertheless, you provided aid and comfort to the enemy just to have an opportunity to get your hooves on the Storm King.”

Her brow lowered and she stared at me intensely. “No, I did it to avenge my only friend.”

I was stunned.  The old Chrysalis would not admit to having or even wanting a friend.  I could see that Twilight was shocked too.  As the Princess of Friendship, she had formed her philosophy around doing things in the name of friendship.  That Chrysalis went to such lengths in the name of the being she cherished most was disconcerting.  And yet, it showed so much promise too.

Trixie said, “Queen Chrysalis, you are under arrest as a prisoner of war and will be returned to your cell.  The Triarchy will determine how to deal with you at your trial.”

The changeling queen beamed. “Outstanding!  It will be good to see my grandnymph again.”

As I brought the bell up, Twilight put a hoof on my withers to get my attention.  “Be sure to take only Luna’s magic.  If you take everything, you will kill her.”  I blinked in surprise.  I had seen changeling bodies near where Grogar had fought but hadn’t made the connection.  

My co-ruler held out that same hoof.  “Do you want me to do it?”

As I hesitated, Chrysalis said, “Don’t trouble yourself, Hive Mother.  I trust Prince Wells to perform his duties flawlessly.”  The queen had a relaxed smile on her face and gave me an encouraging nod. 

I took a deep breath and focused all my will on exactly what I wanted to achieve.  I held up the Bewitching Bell and tapped it.  As it drew out Luna’s power, Chrysalis’ form shrank and her armoring faded. She retained the sparkling wings although they had reduced to their normal size, and her mane still shimmered as it did before her escape.  I then returned the magic to its proper home and the Alicorn of the Night regained her starry nebulous mane.

“Bind the prisoner and take her back to her cell,” Trixie commanded.

A unicorn guardspony stepped up and locked two inhibitor rings around Chrysalis’ horn before removing the three tracking nullstone bands which he passed to Penny.  The soldier then cast a spell that produced magic shackles that bound the changeling’s legs and wings but allowed her to walk.  Only then did he remove the bolas that had been tying her legs together. We watched as a squad of guards took her through a daggerscale portal and it closed behind them.

Our next stop was at the triage site.  Battlefield medics had gotten to work immediately and more doctors were being portaled in as we watched.  One group of mixed species looked unharmed but appeared to be faded and exhausted.  These were all the ponies, griffons, and other species that had tried to attack Grogar and had their magic stolen as a result.  Sorting out which magic was whose seemed like an impossible task, but having used the Bewitching Bell twice, I had a hunch that the stolen power would have an affinity for its original host.  With no practical alternative, I decided to try a group restoration.  Unlike with Luna and Celestia, I did not attempt to direct the magic to the individuals. Instead, I envisioned the cloud of power hanging over the group and allowing it to flow naturally to where it belonged.  To my great relief, this tactic worked.  No magic was left floating in the air after the last of the victims recovered.  That told me that there weren’t any unknown cases, which was very reassuring.  Similarly, Twilight cured all the petrified soldiers and I received a report that the last of the troops drained by Tirek had been healed by taking a bath in the centaur’s vomit of pure Equestrian magic.  Whether they wanted to do so was a moot point as none were strong enough to object.

I reported this news to my friends.  “Not bad,” Twilight said with a begrudging nod. “You did a great job returning everybeing’s magic.”

“I had a great teacher,” I admitted.  I held up the Bell, “So, what are we going to do with this?  It’s far too dangerous to keep around, but it’s indestructible.”

Celestia said, “I have a solution if you will permit me?”

A glance at Trixie and Twilight showed no objections and I was curious.  “Okay, I’ll bite.  What is it?”

The white alicorn smiled.  “This!”  She took the bell in her magic, turned her head to face the sun, and shot a torrent of power in its direction, carrying the enchanted object along with it.

I blinked a bit before asking, “Did you just shoot the bell into the sun?”

Celestia looked at me smugly.  “Yes.  It can’t be destroyed by anything in this dimension, but neither can any being ever reach it in the heart of the solar fires.”

I slowly nodded as I thought it over.  That was a brilliant solution.

“What about the enchanted gems from Grogar’s collar?” Thorax asked.

Luna said, “Unlike the Bewitching Bell, they cannot steal any being’s magic and are much akin to all the other sorcerous weapons in Equestria’s armory such as the Alicorn Amulet.  Verily, with the loss of the Elements of Harmony, we most sorely need replacements.  I counsel that they be securely studied for the benefit of our nation.”

“I agree with my sister,” Celestia said.  “It has been quite obvious that the magitek devices and other enchanted weapons helped win the day.”

They looked at me and I shrugged.  “Don’t ask me about magical artifacts – I’m the idiot who lost the Bewitching Bell, remember?  However, if Twilight and Trixie think it’s a good idea, I’ll back them.”

Affirming nods from my co-rulers seemed to settle that debate.

“And now,” Twilight said, turning towards my wife, “there’s one last thing to take care of.  The Alicorn Amulet, please, Trixie.”  She held up the artifact’s jewelry casket.

My wife’s eyes glowed red and she grinned and chuckled. “Trixie has enjoyed using its power. Perhaps she should keep it.  Then everypony will know who truly is the Greatest and Most Powerful!”

Twilight and the Royal Sisters tensed up and lit their horns.

I poked my wife in the ribs with the edge of my hoof. “Knock it off, Lulu.  Now’s not the time.”

She winced and then pouted.  “You’re spoiling the climax to Trixie’s greatest performance, Dowser.”

I narrowed my eyes.  “You say every new performance is your greatest.”

“Indeed.  You understand me well.”  She sighed, levitated the amulet from around her neck, and placed it in the waiting box. “Trixie said she could control it this time and you all doubted her.  Never underestimate her Great and Steadfast Will again!”

One thing that I liked about becoming an alicorn was that I had grown bigger and matched my spouse’s height.  With the power of the Alicorn Amulet imbuing her, she had grown a little taller than me again.  Now that she had relinquished it, she should have resumed her normal stature. She didn’t.

My wife tilted her head and furrowed her brow. “Why are you staring at Trixie like that, Titlark Knells?”

“Love, can you feel the earth power still?”

She frowned for a moment before her eyes opened wide and her mouth gaped.  “I… I can!”

Trixie had to be flabbergasted to forget to use third-person.  I embraced my wife.  “It seems you have been judged worthy and ascended to full alicornhood.  Congratulations, you’re bigger than me again.”

“Trixie thinks you mean Greater and More Powerful,” she replied with a grin.

“Oh, shut up and kiss me.”

She did.  Lengthily.  When we finally parted, Thorax, Twilight, Celestia, and Luna added their congratulations in a lot less intimate way.

When everyone was done, I said, “Time to go back to Canterlot and get to work.  We have the aftermath of this battle to contend with, especially a few prisoners of war.”

It was a much more sober group that stepped through the daggerscale portal that Twilight opened to Canterlot Castle.


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