The crystal mare rushed forward in a mad dash towards the sandbags. Her aqua crystal coat glittered, regaining some of its shine as she ran. She approached from the side, and the Changelings reacted too slowly. She flung herself over the low barricade and grappled with an officer. The changeling’s cap fell away as he pushed the mare down.
It was not an even fight. She was malnourished and her strikes were weak. The real threat was the bundle of dynamite clutched in her teeth. It had a short fuse, and the mare's eyes were grim with determination and savage satisfaction. The explosion blasted apart the encamped position and cleared the street.
The former slaves cheered and rushed forward.
Flurry Heart watched with horror behind a flat shield at the end of the street. She summoned it when the gunfire started and planned to slowly push down the street, but the army of former slaves moved forward implacably. Her ponies drove their shovels and picks into the dying changelings scattered around the destroyed checkpoint, then stole their weapons and kept moving. They left their dead and dying behind.
“I’ve told them,” Flurry repeated softly. “I don’t want this.”
“They do,” Spike answered. His green eyes stared down the street. “You didn’t see the mines, Flurry.” He dropped the empty heavy machine gun. “They made them live down there, in shackles and chains. There are thousands of them too weak or hurt to move. The Drop Groups are trying, but we can't help and push forward.”
Flurry closed her eyes. It didn’t shut out the image in her mind. “How are you okay with this?”
“I’m not okay with a lot of things,” Spike admitted, “but I can’t change this. Let’s go.” The dragon gestured to the shield. Flurry dropped it and galloped down the street. Spike followed with long strides, and several squads of her soldiers trailed behind.
The crystal ponies freed from the mines were not supposed to lead the charge into the inner city, but Flurry’s proclamation sparked a mass revolt. It seemed like every crystal pony still alive in the city had taken to the streets with whatever they could grab to fight. And they were dying. Flurry leapt over a dead stallion, stomach churning, and turned down an alley to cut across to the next block. Sporadic gunfire rang out across the rooftops. Flurry flared her wings and unslung her submachine gun to land on an occupied roof, but Spike held up a claw and went first.
Flurry summoned a bubble shield around herself and whirled up, attracting dozens of shots that pinged off her magic. Spike poured fire from his mouth across a rooftop littered with sandbags, then dove into an alley beside the house. Flurry passed over a squad of burning Changelings and dropped her shield to land with him.
Spike landed in the middle of a squad of Jaegers. Only one was still alive.
The Jaeger fired his shotgun point blank against Spike’s stomach as the dragon turned to face him. Spike grunted in mild discomfort, then reached a claw out, bending the shotgun barrel to the side. His other claw punched into the Jaeger’s stomach, tearing through the armored uniform and easily piercing the chitin. Spike hauled the changeling up by his embedded claw; the Jaeger shrieked incoherently behind the gas mask.
Spike growled and breathed a jet of red flames, melting the gas mask to the changeling’s muzzle. The screams fizzled out and the fire spread down the body. The dragon slammed the burning corpse down to the cobblestones and pulled his claw free. He shook blood from his talons with a grimace.
Flurry whipped a stick grenade through a second-floor window with a burst of magic, then gave the dragon an even look. “You have no right to call me reckless.” The explosion rained crystal shards, and a pegasus leapt through the window with a shotgun to clear the room.
“I’m a dragon.”
“I’m an alicorn.”
“I’m bulletproof.” Spike picked a pellet from his belly scales. “These’ll take forever to get out,” he muttered, then glared at Flurry. “It’ll take an armor-piercing rifle round to punch through dragonscale.” He scratched behind an ear fin and retrieved a flat bullet. It looked comically small in his large claw. He snorted and flicked it against the crystal wall.
“They can’t break my shield,” Flurry replied with a sparking horn.
“That’s not my point,” Spike sighed. “You can do a lot more than clear houses. Ponies need to see you, hear your voice. They need to have hope. You can’t give them that if you spend the whole battle just fighting.” He swung at the crystal wall and his talons carved a chunk off it. “A squad could do this on their own.”
“This is my fight as much as theirs.”
“What about the battles they can’t fight?” Spike tapped his wrist as a reminder. Flurry charged her horn and the detection spell swept through the area. Not that it seems to be needed anymore.
The crystal ponies seemed to have a way of finding disguised changelings. Her ponies developed their own code and language down in the mines; ear twitches, hoof knocks, and tail twists to communicate nonverbally. Flurry had seen a crystal pony look at another, twitch their ears in a pattern, then drive a pickaxe into their throat when it wasn’t returned. The other crystal pony always fell to the ground as green flames revealed their true form.
Flurry snorted. “Fine, Sir Spike, the Brave and Glorious, please save my city again. Once the frontlines are in place, we'll call a meeting."
Spike smiled. It look threatening next to the burning corpse. “Of course, Princess Flurry Heart.”
Flurry flapped her wings and lifted above the street. She brought her shield up again, but the gunfire was dying down. She scanned the city, spotting more columns of green smoke. She turned in place. Every direction. We’ve encircled the palace. Flurry flapped her wings towards the east trainyard. The fighting surged around there several times according to every radiomare the alicorn demanded a report from. The Changelings were pushing hard to retake the train station. Probably to try to stage an evacuation. Flurry wings flapped unevenly for a moment. Or reinforcements. The storm wall outside hampered any attempt to simply flee, for both sides.
As Flurry passed over a secured area, her ears pricked up at the whinnies of a massive crowd of crystal ponies. Flurry diverted and swept over a street. She spotted one of the armories and a herd around it. The armory was a three-story red crystal building with reinforced windows and doors. Griffons with rifles lined the rooftop and entrance, pushing back against a crowd of unarmed crystal ponies. Flurry dropped her shield and cast the detection spell again, but no changelings appeared.
Flurry landed on the steps and folded her wings. Her sudden arrival quelled the crowd and the ponies stumbled back. “What’s going on?” she asked the griffon lieutenant; she didn’t know his name, but he was one of Duskcrest’s soldiers.
The griffon had a fresh black eye and rubbed at it. “They want in the armory, Princess.”
Flurry grimaced. I’ve had enough of ponies flinging themselves to their deaths. “Denied, unless they have experience as former veterans.”
“It’s not about the guns, Princess,” the griffon replied. He waved a wing at the door and shuffled aside for the large alicorn to pass through.
Flurry heard the screaming before she entered the building. One of the rooms on the first floor had been cleared out, and dozens of changeling foals were gathered together in a heap. They clung to each other, screaming senselessly as their bodies shook. Some of the older ones looked more collected, but still pushed themselves against the far wall and away from the street.
One of the griffons guarding the room pulled his snow hat tighter around his head. “What in Maar’s name is wrong with them!?” he screamed. He had to shout to be heard of the hissing, sobbing shrieks.
In that moment, Flurry remembered everything Thorax had ever told her about changeling grubs. They feel the hate outside. They know my ponies want to kill them, and they can’t shut it out. She stared blankly into the room. A few of the calmer ones registered the alicorn in the doorway and joined the shrieking on reflex. Flurry reared back.
“It’s the crowd,” she explained to the guard. “They feel them.”
“What?” the guard shouted.
Flurry shook her head and returned to the entrance. The herd outside resumed aggressively shouting at the guards while she was inside. Some shouted towards her.
“Princess!”
“They’re protecting those parasites!”
“Kill them!”
“We’ve already radioed for another team, but this is going to get violent,” the lieutenant advised. “If they see another griffon squad flying in to the rooftop, they might rush the building.”
Flurry glanced at him, then raised her wings and stood straight. “Enough!” she called out. The crowd quieted down to hear her. “The changelings inside are no threat,” she continued in a loud, clear voice. “They are foals.”
“Parasites!” a voice in the middle of the crowd screamed back. Flurry didn’t see who shouted it, but it sparked a wave of other condemnations.
“You’re protecting them?”
“They deserve it!”
“Changeling!” That one sparked the crowd to rush forward, but Flurry summoned a square shield and shoved it back against the charge. The crystal ponies crushed against it and stumbled back.
“You wish to murder foals?” Flurry shouted again. “Because they killed yours? There are thousands of Changelings in this city that deserve your wrath, and you choose helpless foals? You disappoint me,” she sneered.
The mob wilted with pinned ears and tucked tails, and for a moment Flurry believed the matter settled.
A stallion stepped forward. His mane was a brittle gray, and he leaned heavily to one side. His left foreleg was badly scarred. “They took everything from us," he implored with raspy voice. "They worked my wife to death, then my sons and daughter." His eyes were a cold, hard blue. "We deserve to take everything from them.”
“I said no,” Flurry answered. “We have to be better than them. I am so sorry for your loss, but this is not justice.”
The stallion’s muzzle spasmed and he bared crooked teeth. “Y-you don’t know what loss is!” he managed to shout. Some of the crowd looked at him with wide eyes, but a few looked just as angry. Angry at me. “What have you lost, Princess?” The title sounded like an insult.
“Everything,” Flurry screamed back. “My mother, my father, my aunt. My entire family is gone.” She descended the steps and advanced on the stallion. He wilted back into the crowd. “I have given everything to get here.” The entire herd was pushed back by her voice. “This is my home. I dreamed of it every night. I dreamed of your suffering every night.” Her bloody golden crown bounced against her curls and she stepped into the street. “I woke to Celestia’s sun with nothing but guilt for years.”
Flurry reared up as her horn burst into blue flames, and she smashed through the cobblestone street. “Leave. I will not let you kill children.”
The herd slowly dispersed, starting from the back. Some ponies moved about aimlessly, but most broke into groups and began to loot the surrounding buildings. The elderly scarred stallion was helped up by another two crystal ponies and disappeared into a group moving into a storefront. Flurry turned around. The lieutenant lowered his claws from his ears and blinked owlishly. “The entire city probably heard that.”
“Good,” Flurry snorted. “Tell them I will come back if they attempt to rush you, and...” she looked to the storefront and hesitated.
“And?” the griffon prompted.
“And I will kill them if I have to,” the alicorn finished. She snapped away in a flash of light. Flurry reappeared above the building and kept flying west towards the train station. Several green columns of smoke spread from the surrounding blocks, but she spotted several flying black-uniformed figures going from rooftop to rooftop towards the crystal station, moving atop warehouses. A few griffons and pegasi engaged them on balconies and flat rooftops.
A rainbow contrail slammed into one of the changelings mid-flight and crashed onto a flat rooftop. Rainbow and the Changeling rolled and fought in hoof-to-hoof combat amidst large crates on the roof. Another changeling buzzed towards them to intervene in the brawl.
Flurry kept her bubble shield up as she pursued. The soldier realized the alicorn was on her, and tried to weave between the buildings, but Flurry sped up and crashed her shield down on top of the slower mare. The shield crackled with energy and the changeling’s black uniform burst into blue flames. The flaming changeling screamed and spiraled into the street below while Flurry moved back to the rooftop to help Rainbow.
It wasn’t needed. The Pegasus and the Changeling circled each other with knives out. The Changeling used his horn and gripped the blade in green magic, and Rainbow used an extended blade strapped to her hoof. Rainbow danced nimbly on her rear hooves and parried the wild strikes, then rushed in with her wings. The Changeling buzzed his own wings to dodge to the side. Rainbow reared her hoof back and knocked the Changeling’s knife away, but extended her metal wing and swept the sharp feathers across his exposed throat.
Blood sprayed across the roof. The Changeling fell to all fours, and Rainbow bucked him off the roof and crouched behind some wooden crates, chuckling to herself. She noticed Flurry watching from above. “You enjoy the show, Princess?” she called up with mirth.
“Figured you might need a hoof, old mare.”
Rainbow flexed her metal wing to flick blood off the artificial feathers. “Think I like this wing better than the other one. Guess that Jaeger did me a favor.” She retracted the blade at her hoof. “Least I learned to actually knife fight.”
Flurry landed on the roof. Rainbow’s eyes widened and she waved at her. “Hey, don’t drop the shield!” she shouted. “Get down first. There’s snipers in the inner city. I know they got a bead on you, Princess.”
Flurry looked towards the taller buildings near the Crystal Palace. “You where they are?”
“Yeah, the double-spired one and the one with the purple steeple. That entire area is infested with bugs.”
The buildings weren’t that tall, at least compared to Equestria, but the Crystal Empire was a thousand years behind in architecture. Both buildings were only about six stories; from the windows and balconies, Flurry guessed they were the old noble quarters her parents turned into administrative centers.
“We haven’t pushed that far up, right?” Flurry asked.
“We’re good, but we’re not that good,” Rainbow scoffed. “I can’t be everywhere.”
Neither can I. Flurry crouched and dropped her shield. A bullet whizzed over her head and her ears folded back. She laid down on the roof and awkwardly crawled over to Rainbow. “I got another idea,” Flurry whispered.
A bullet slammed into one of the nearby boxes as the snipers tried to shoot through them. Flurry glanced through a hole in one of the boards and smirked. The boxes were full of large purple crystals. Good luck piercing that.
“Lay it on me,” Rainbow said.
“Is your wing bulletproof?”
“Which one?”
Flurry gave her a look.
“Uh, yeah." Rainbow looked sheepish. "Yes?” she guessed. “I mean, it’s not going to stand up to a tank or anything.”
“Stick it up to draw fire when I say so.”
Rainbow fluttered her metal wing and crouched. Flurry crept to the edge of the boxes and closed her eyes. Her horn burned with energy. She kept charging the spell until a drop of blood fell from her nose. “Okay!” she called over her shoulder.
Rainbow stuck her wing up and a bullet ricocheted off her feathers. She grimaced at the vibrations that ran along the wing. Another shot went wide. Flurry stuck her head up and swept a laser across the buildings, then dropped back down. Rainbow copied her and crouched again.
The pegasus opened her mouth to say something, but whatever comment she wanted to say was lost over the distant rumbling of crumbling crystal architecture. The noise escalated into a low roar and individual sharp cracks as larger crystals snapped and broke apart. Flurry waited a moment after the noise stopped before she summoned a shield in front of her muzzle and stood up.
The buildings had been cut in half by a wide horizontal beam at the third floor. Crystal architecture could endure a lot, but if it broke from force, it tended to shatter and utterly collapse. What little remained was on fire; blue flames spread to the smaller surrounding buildings.
Rainbow poked her head up. Flurry extended the shield so she could stand up as well. “Damn,” the pegasus remarked. “I didn’t know crystal could burn.”
“Magic-infused fire,” Flurry answered. “It’s not natural. It’ll go out once the magic burns out.”
“How long will that take?”
Flurry shrugged. “Usually less than an hour, but I put some more juice into it.”
Rainbow shuffled her hooves. “Uh, I thought you wanted the city intact?”
Flurry closed her eyes. “I want to end this, Rainbow. Ponies and griffons are dying. The crystal ponies are killing every changeling they get their hooves on, no matter how young or old. We have to end this soon.”
She opened her eyes and turned to face Rainbow. Several other squads on nearby rooftops had stopped to watch the distant fire and destruction. “Push them towards the center, towards the fire,” Flurry ordered. “Once we complete the encirclement of the Palace, I’ll call a meeting.”
“I’ve talked to a couple crystal ponies,” Rainbow said. Her eyes flicked over to the distant spire stretching high above them. “Everything that bug said to Thorax was true. There could be a lot of ponies in there.”
Flurry nodded. “We’ll do what we can.”