Twilight Gets a Puppy
Season 5
By TDR
Twilight Gets a Puppy.
The Movie,
Part Three
[ Canterlot, Early Spring]
The chaos of the attack had started a stampede with the crowd, as ponies and other races tried their best to get away from the explosions and balista raining down on them.
Despite the mass of them easily seen and slowed in their mad rush to get away from the main pavilion the crowds were not the targets.
The airship docks were obliterated with the first few volleys from the descending ships, the guard stations at numerous points in the city were blasted apart soon after. With the main targets gone the ships picked secondary ones, destroying Guard training grounds, various roads and and paths out of the city, perhaps a good mile of train track and several trains. Some of them targeted roads and random buildings in the city cutting off paths of fleeing civilians and keeping the panic high and as many clustered around the event area as they could.
It was a targeted strike to cause as much chaos as possible to keep the Guards and any other threat busy for as long as possible.
Several other ships landed while most of the others played over watch for them. The landing ships opened up and disgorged a veritable army of yeti to rush out into various areas of the city. Some were armed with melee weapons, but most had odd firearms.
These guns however didn't shoot shrapnel or bullets like standard minotaur weaponry most ponies had heard of. These weapons fired gray spheres that when they hit their targets turned them to stone like the Sparkles had been, it didn't matter if the target was flesh or landscape, even some walls had large patches of gray stone where wild shots had gone.
After all, if your enemy is too busy trying to help those that are injured, they cannot effectively counter attack. As such, numerous guests and random citizens were turned to stone as the yeti surged through the streets, sowing terror and looting anything that caught their eyes.
Cadence screamed out in rage as she whirled on the attackers, though Tempest had not sat idle, before the alicorn princess could do anything another ball arched through the air and struck her, thrown from the broken horned unicorn who was now moving forward with the yeti from her ship to secure the area.
The gray mass engulfed the pink alicorn as fast as it had the others.
The yeti with Tempest fired at random, some trying to hit the other two alicorns, who had wisely scattered, the rest just aiming for those in the crowd who didn't seem to be running away fast enough.
Numerous guards were caught as they rushed forward to counter attack as well as a large number of civilians. The initial attack was already shaping up to be devastating in the ten minutes since Tempest had first arrived.
The street was awash with fire, the screams of the yeti as they burned or were forced to flee was drown out by the crackle of flames, as even the bricks along the walls sagged and seemed to melt with the heat.
Sunset Shimmer stepped out into the inferno that resembled the inside of a forge staring after the fleeing yeti, at least the ones that were not blackened husks.
She wanted to go after them, to burn the ships and drive the damn creatures from Canterlot, they had struck first after all so it was only fair.
A glance back into the building she had stepped out of showed why that wasn't going to happen.
The yeti had burst in and managed to take down one of the other caretakers with their odd guns before Sunset had reacted.
There were still two left to watch close to three score of kids, but neither of them were the sort to be able to deal with something like this, if the yeti came back.
Sunset cursed, stepping back into the doorway, keeping an eye out for anything else dumb enough to come this way.
She had a lot more fire to share.
Rainbow Dash winced trying to pick herself up from under a collapsed stall that sold peanuts, her newly healed wing hurt and she had a lot of lumber, and peanut barrels piled on top of her. The stupid thing was, the stall hadn't collapsed cause it was attacked, it collapsed cause she was pushed into it and the Abyssinia who set up the shop clearly hadn't followed building code as she hit one beam and it brought the whole thing down.
Granted she blamed Prince for this whole thing as he was the one who shoved her into the stall.
The moment the yeti had rushed into the market area she Gilda, Prince, and Thunderbolt were in, they fired off their guns into the crowd. Prince's horn lit up and shoved her aside into the stall before the report of the guns was even heard.
She growled shifting herself and trying to wiggle free of the wreckage only for a claw to grab the board over her head and yank upward forcing more of it off of Dash and allowing her to crawl free.
Glancing up, the annoyed face of Gilda stared down at her.
“Thanks G, that's two now.” Dash grumbled. “Where's that idiot who shoved me?”
“Seems we both are interested in the noble idiot type.” Gilda growled gesturing behind her.
Standing in the middle of the road where she had last seen them stood Prince and Thunderbolt, both of them stone statues.
“Fuck......wait, ' interested in', huh?” Rainbow questioned.
“Not the time dweeb.”
Saturnia growled, holding up a yeti with one of her four arms, blocking the stone balls the others shot at her.
As the yeti she held turned to rock, she flung it at her attackers before rushing them as they tried to dodge the statue.
She smashed into the first one, crushing him against the wall before two of her girilon forms arms smashed the other one and sent him flying into the air to crash down atop one of the few undamaged stalls in the area.
The culdasac she was in was shattered, the street damaged and covered with debris as the end of this road had once had a guard gatehouse into the castle. Now that was a massive pile of burning rubble that blocked escape to the possible safety of the castle.
The street was dotted with stone statues with a large number of civilians and dignitaries huddled in what cover they could find.
Saturnia let out a sigh, where were the Guards, the air was clear save the ships, there had been quite a lot of pegasi in the air a moment ago? What in Tartarus was even going on?
A growl from her left drew her attention to the massive manticore that was spitting out yeti blood as it moved away from the pile of bodies it had made.
Saturnia shook her head. Pharynx was not taking any alive like she was. It was clear who was the warrior changeling and who took more after an infiltrator here.
Not that she blamed him for venting.
She spared a glance back again to the statues behind them before she and Pharynx shifted to a gray pony form resembling statues to free in place at the beginning of the street. To deal with the next batch of yeti.
Behind her were quite a few statues that used to be alive, including Kevin, and Thorax
Maohk frowned at the gun shots, this was unacceptable.
Blades flew through the air, each one a perfect throw that hit the stone balls destroying them in mid air, before a second set of blades followed the first cutting down the shooters before they realized that their shots had failed to connect.
Rhede Pelt snorted as he moved in front of the buffalo cow scanning the street for any more threats.
“ I am not an invalid Pelt, I am quite capable of defending myself.
“Fuck that right out of the hoof ball park.”Rhede smirked. “ After the yelling from Iinii I had to endure when we got back for getting you stuck with me in the Empire? Ain't no way in Tartarus I'm going to risk you AND his kid in this place. I'm getting you out of here if I have to carry you.”
Rhede considered snapping his rear leg out and burying a blade in the eye of a yeti peering around the corner. A second blade ended the creatures screaming. The Crystal pony barely seemed to notice.
“Please don't make me carry you, I don't think I could have done it before, and now you're even bigger.” Rhede offered.
Maohk growled.” Are you calling me fat Pelt?”
“Why is that the first thing mares, and cows in this case go to with those words. You nearly doubled in size when that Companion spell was cast on you and you've got a whole new body in your belly right now. You . Are. Bigger.”
“ And yet you are trying to herd me to safety rather than letting me fight like a warrior.” Maohk frowned.
“That's because you're unarmed and unarmored and all it seems it one of these things touches you and you're a statue.”Rhede offered , the shrug noticeable even in the bulky red and gold of the ambassadorial robes he wore. “ You didn't even think to bring a knife to a gun fight like me.”
Another set of blades was loosened in a movement by the pony and a group of yeti fell back screaming at the steel now buried in various parts of their anatomy.
“Fine. But we will have words about this Pelt.”
“We are having words about it now, that's what speaking is.” Rhede smirked as Maohk moved further down the road .
Witch-Jack sighed as she walked down the alley out of the park, something weird was going on here, a buncha big white burly fellas had shown up and shot her with these strange gray balls.
There was a poof of powder, some weird magic and then she was a witch wolf again.
She had just gotten back to normal too.
She vented her annoyance on the idjits who shot her. The flavor of the balls reminded her of the basilisk she and Rahs had taken down that one time when it got too close to the farm.
Witch-Jack glanced up at the ships in the air and frowned. Yup never a dull moment, unfortunately. And it wasn't even Tuesday.
No wait this was Canterlot. What was the day here, ah right that would have been yesterday.
“There you are!”
Witch-Jack turned to see Pinkie Pie running towards her with Fluttershy on her heels, the pink mare was covered in soot, gray ash, and what smelled like blood to Witch-Jack, but it didn't seem to be Pinkie's.
“Pinkie Pie?” Witch Jack questioned.” What tha hay is going on?”
“No time. We need to get to the Hospital, there's a bunch of yeti headed towards it.”Pinkie Pie snapped.
“Mac and Bloom are there.”Witch- Jack growled, sparing only a glance to the other mares before she took off down the road with Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie chasing after her.
Some body was about tah be in a world of hurt.
Rarity dove for cover with a yelp as a barrage of gray orbs struck the overturned tables and chairs around her. She cursed to herself and pushed Sweetiebelle down back behind her just in case.
Her sister was screaming about Scootaloo and Firefly and struggling to get loose from the shadow tendrils Rarity had wrapped around her to keep her in place out of harms way.
Rarity glanced over top of the table spotting the pair of Crusaders, Scootaloo reared up as if trying to take off and Firefly in the form of a massive tiger, both of them stone.
She needed to get her sister out of here, and herself of course.
A tendril of shadow wrapped around a table, yanking it up to block a ball that almost got them, the wood turning to stone and becoming more than her shadow tendrils could lift.
Grabbing a few chairs, Rarity pushed Sweetiebelle to run towards a building nearby, it wouldn't be as protected as her shop with all the enchantments she had Twilight layer it with, but it was better cover than patio furniture and for the moment that's all that was needed.
Her protection was shot away from her as she ran, for the first time in her life she would loved to have a more subtle or darker coat, as the white and purple of her form, even darkened with the shadows still drew the attention as a target.
Maybe she could bring back camo in her next line.
She cursed as the last chair was turned to stone leaving her without cover only half way to the door of the shop.
Something that got even further away in her mind as a pair of large brutes moved before her bringing their weapons to bear on her and Sweetiebelle.
Oddly they didn't fire and in fact, both of them fell over with wet thuds, one of their heads rolling free.
“Stop staring mare and get moving.” Sombra snapped flicking the blood from his sword. The dark unicorn moved between the pair and the largest portion of the attackers.
Rarity surged forward practically flinging Sweetiebelle before her towards the shop. Sombra cursed smacking a number of the gray balls out of the air with his sword before they got close to the pair.
He frowned his magic was starting to strain as his sword became heavier and heavier with the layers of stone gathering around it until he could barely lift it.
Rarity pushed Sweetiebelle inside of the shop as the sword fell crashing to the cobble stones looking little more than a massive hunk of rock.
“I lose more blades due to magic bullshit...” Sombra growled looking back to make sure Rarity and Sweetiebelle were safe.
Whirling back around he cursed as several yeti's had locked onto him with the guns. Sombra winced at the sound of them firing his eyes shutting as he expected to feel the hit.
No hit came.
His eyes snapped back open, seeing his vision filled with dark blue feathers that were quickly turning gray. He was just able to see the yeti's fall as they were cut down by shadows before looking up and meeting the gaze of Luna, who shielded him with her wing.
She met his look sadly as the stone overtook her.
Sombra blinked staring at the statue of his mother, unable to process the situation.
Before any of the remaining yeti could target him a tendril of shadow wrapped around his middle and yanked him back into the shop.
Comet Trail surged forward laying waste to the yeti. His nose was still running from the effects of the White Heart Cherry Trees, but he could be sick when the city wasn't under attack.
The hospital was under siege and the collected Nox-cal there were fighting back, though the yeti were simply saturating the area with those odd stone balls of theirs. A group of the Ponyville Guard had punched through the forces to push out into the city forcing the yeti to fall back or be surrounded, though most of his command was making their way towards the center of this mess.
Comet Trail had another goal.
Ditzy and Dinky had gone out to the food court at the event to get lunch and were planning to bring something back for him.
They hadn't returned yet.
Comet Trail tore through the city, leaving a trail of broken, injured, and dead Yeti in his wake as he came across them, his meteor hammer screamed as it whirled around him. He avoided some groups and only felled those who got in his way not bothering to check if his attacks crippled or killed them so long as they were down enough to not stop him. His progress was still slowed as he was forced to fly low over the streets, the ships took pot shots at him if he flew too high.
A howl reached his ears and he pushed on harder bursting out to where the food court had been. The place was now filled with wreckage with a few of the stalls on fire, and a mass of statues. In the center of the area was a massive dog, howling into the air, with a large number of badly mauled yeti scattered around him.
Before the large dog was a pegasus mare clutching her unicorn daughter, both of them turned to statues.
“MOVE FORWARD!” Tempest bellowed, “We have three, there's one left. If it moves and it's not one of ours shoot it, I don't care if it's a bird a mouse or a wind blown piece of paper!”
The yeti filling the square marched forward with even more of them rushing out of the ship to go into the city.
Until they weren't.
Tempest blinked at the bright light, not even feeling the heat until she was thrown forward bouncing across the pavilion square as the ship she came in on was suddenly not there. The flash of heat marked the reduction of the armored craft to little more than vapor and loose atoms.
Tempest picked herself up next to the statue of Twilight Sparkle, her ears flattening to her head as all she heard was the crackle of the melting stone where her ship, and the yeti that had come out of it had been.
Looking back towards where she had been all that was there was a perfectly circular gaping hole in the ground that looked melted rather than exploded, and there was no trace her ship had even been there.
There was a faint crackle that sounded like something cooking and Tempest looked up, and watched as a orange beam swept across a number of the ships still in the air.
There was a brief second of silence where nothing happened, then every ship touched by the beam burst into multiple explosions as all the ammo in the crafts were cooked off at the same time filling the city with massive echos of their destruction, the detonations looking like clusters of fiery grape bunches that arced across the sky.
Another beam swept over the same area as debris started to fall, the second beam removed any trace there even were ships there, and prevented any of the falling wrecks from touching the city as anything more than dust.
Great swaths of the cloud cover were also boiled away by the beams showing the blue sky and a angry red sun that loomed in the sky as if staring at the world trying to decide what to burn.
Tempest blinked, pushing herself back to her hooves, only for a vice like grip to close around her neck, yanking her up from the ground into the air, her throat being crushed in the golden grip of magic.
The unicorn heard heavy hoof steps and was whirled around in the air.
Princess Celestia strode towards the kicking mare as she dangled from nothing but a vice like grip of magic around her throat, the alicorn's horn blazing with golden light.
Another beam came from the alicorn's horn, followed by a second a heart beat later and half of the Storm King's fleet was gone from the air, as if it never existed. Several of the ships sank lower hiding behind buildings.
This hardly seemed to matter to the Goddess of the Sun as the beams switched from coming from the alicorn's horn to raining from the sky itself, turning some of the hiding ships to ash.
There was a reason Canterlot never needed any real air defense.
The white alicorn herself was hard to see with the waves of heat radiating off of her, giving her a fuzzy look about her, though it was easy to see her mane and tail were not the calm cool colors of the dawn, but an angry red coloration of fire as it crackled and whipped over her form.
“Congratulations mare. You have made me angry.” Princess Celestia stated, bringing Tempest up to meet her nose to nose, the unicorn sweating heavily from the proximity, the fur closest to the alicorn curling as it smoldered.
Tempest made to grab for a ball from her armor only to wince as the pack and much of her armor was seared away from her with out the alicorn even looking. Her fur and skin sizzled as it burned with the melting metal plates of her armor, but surprisingly leaving her without too much pain.
“Don't get cute now. Given you seem to be the leader here you're only alive until I can find out how to reverse these effects. “Celestia snarled as another group of ships was turned to less than ashes they tried to slink off using the buildings as cover, the ground under the ships not so much as being warmed in case there were any civilians there. “But for the record, you would be very surprised what you can live through, and what body parts you do not need to survive.”
Tempest gasped trying to breath as the magic tightened around her throat.
“I have tried to be calm, tried to fix what I've seen as problems with my reactions and ruling alone for so long. In the span of minutes you have taken my niece, sister and a close friend and former student from me, as well as attacked my city for no reason.”Celestia snarled.”Suffice to say you have pissed me off to the point where I am quite willing to simply forget I was trying to hold back.”
Tempest gasped her hooves grabbing at the magic holding her.
“ Don't worry, there won't be much left of the Storm King when I'm finished with him either, I can't kill him, but I can certainly make sure that he will think Tartarus is a nice place before he's turned over to the council. So then, little pony, before I finish off your fleet and toss you to the Guard for questioning, do you have anything to say for yourself?”
Tempest gasped as the magic around her throat lessened allowing her to breath in finally. The unicorn panted a moment, during which even more of the airships were atomized, leaving the fleet a fraction of it's size.
Tempest Shadow narrowed her eyes, and met the gaze of the furious alicorn with an angry glare of her own.
“You talk too much.”Tempest growled.
Celestia frowned, though before she could say anything, she jerked in surprise and turned her head back to see gray stone start forming rapidly over her flank. She looked up, her eyes widened as she spotted a hedgehog crouched behind an overturned desert table with an open violin case at his feet, and a long rifle like what the yeti had been using.
Tempest dropped to the ground as the alicorn of the sun turned to stone, the temperature of the area dropping rapidly, though the angry red sun remained high in the air.
“Grubber what the stars kept you? Tempest snarled rubbing her throat.
“Sorry boss, you'd think with a flank that big she'd be an easy target, but that mare can move.” Grubber offered as he reloaded and trundled over to Tempest. “Did we get them all?”
“Yes that was the last one, though he's not going to be happy with these losses.” Tempest sighed lifting her head to fire another flare into the air, her horn sparking.
The scattered clouds far above the city that had managed to avoid the hot beams of death seemed to burst open and a massive battle ship larger than any of the other craft sank down towards the crater that was all that was left of Tempest's ship. Numerous other ships sank out of the cloud cover as well, less than what had been in the air, to start but far more than had first been seen.
The massive armor plated flagship of the Storm King's Armada landed hard, splintering the road and half hanging off the side of the mountain as the gangplank was lowered.
A loud klaxon sounded from the ship as the front split open releasing another wave of yeti.
“All four of them are here, hurry up and get them on the ship before anything else goes wrong.” Tempest snapped.
The yeti nodded and rushed out, picking up the stone forms of the alicorns and bringing them back to the ship.
Striding down the gangplank of the massive warship as the alicorns were carried aboard was another figure.
The towering yeti was a blue gray coloration that matched the color of the dark clouds roiling above them, his bright green eyes seemed a counter to the darker coloration of his coat, seeming to glow as he approached Tempest and Grubber, the latter hiding behind the pony.
The figure was heavily armored, with a massive sword across his back that was longer than two ponies. His gaze swept the pavilion and a smirk crossed his lips.
“Well. Seems you made quite a mess Tempest.” Squall chuckled.
“No thanks to you.”Tempest snarled.”Where the buck were you?”
“Setting fire to some fields and forests around the base of the mountain, tearing apart a few more miles of train line as well. The ponies can't counter attack if they can't eat and need to deal with a forest fire or four.” Squall offered with a shrug. “Besides, I told you I wouldn't risk my ship until the alicorns were dealt with.”
Squall gestured to the airspace above the city, only a few of the first ships remained and they were ones that had landed to release troops. Several were lifting off now, signaled by the alarm from the flagship to retreat.
“Near forty percent of the fleet gone due to just one alicorn. My father is not going to be happy about that.” Squall chuckled. “But at least you accomplished the mission, so there is that at least.”
Tempest growled.
“Aww don't be that way, I do rather wish I had a chance to land earlier, there was likely quite a bit of delightful fighting to be had here, perhaps I would have found a worthy foe.” Squall shrugged.” Ahh well. Let us be off. We have three days before we are back home and I see no reason to hang around here letting the rabble take pot shots at us.”
The massive yeti turned, and strode back up the gangplank without ever setting foot on the ground. Tempest spat to the side before she followed him up, with Grubber moving behind her. She would have rather walked back than flown on this fools ship, but she had to make sure the alicorns were secure.
With all four alicorns secure, the massive battleship lifted off, the gangplank closing as it rose, and the fleet, then turned south leaving the savaged city behind them as they returned home.