Chapter 8
Four hours after defeat of Anarchy
Champion broke contact with the monster of a man, flying backwards and stared the man down. His costume was shredded, just hanging off of him at this point, and his body looked battered and bruised.
Loric floated ahead of him, looking just as bad, with his clothes shredded and body just as beaten as the stallions.
The two have barely spoken a word to each other the entire time they’d been fighting, putting all they had into the fight. This marked the first time they’d actually stopped fighting.
“You are incredible,” Loric said, his serious look fading back to his naturally relaxed look. “Too bad you chose the wrong person to work for.”
Champion spat into the air between them, “yeah, I know I’m incredible.”
This caused Loric to laugh, shaking his head, “a bit of a narcissist. Can’t even return a complement.”
“You haven’t earned a compliment from me,” Champion sneered, pulling out a piece of food from his pocket dimension and eating it. His body flashed as he returned to a fully rested state, back to one hundred percent.
“Aww, I didn’t know we were allowed to use things like that,” Loric chuckled, wagging a finger at Champion. “I may have complimented you too soon.”
A growl was heard from Champion as he looked into his pocket dimension, seeing the item Kal had given him. He’d refused to use it, as he knew he didn’t need it. But this guy was pissing him off. If he uses it, he’s just using it to end this fight sooner rather than later, not because he can’t handle Loric.
“You’re annoying,” Champion grumbled, flipping the little item around his hoof. It resembled a dagger in shape, but felt too light to be used as one.
The man laughed at this, shrugging his shoulders, “so, we using weapons now?” He held up his fist, causing two Cyan gauntlets to appear on his hands. “I guess it's time to end this.”
“I guess it is,” Champion said as the pair began to float towards each other. As they neared each other, they disappeared, only to reappear for a second as Loric blocked a punch from the stallion and returned one of his own, having it blocked as well.
They repeated this a few times, flashing around the sky, pressing their attacks against their opponents' guard. However, the scale began to tip towards Loric as he began to actually start breaking through Champion's guard, his Ego Gauntlets increasing his attack power to incredible levels.
Champion let out a frustrated growl as he blocked an attack and raised his eyes to stare into the calm stare of the man. A smirk flashed on his face as he twirled the dagger-like item and activated it.
Ego tendrils shot out of the device and snagged onto multiple points on the man's body. His eyes went wide, as this seemed to actually catch him off guard.
With his Ego turned off, he began to fall.
But Champion had other plans for the man as his eyes glowed purple and fired a beam right for the man. The beam pierced through the man's chest, causing him to gasp in pain for the first time during the fight.
Raising his gauntlets, he deflected the beams back at the stallion, catching him in the face.
“GAH!” he yelled in pain, stopping his attack and grabbing his face. He opened his pocket dimension and pulled out a mirror, holding it up to see the damage. The entire right side of his face was scorched, his ear and face bubbling from the beam. He still had his eye, but his MANE!
“YOU PEASANT!” He roared, looking back to the man. But he was gone now, no longer in view. “You coward! Come back here and die!”
He took off, determined to find the man and make him pay for ruining his beautiful face.
ooo000<^>000ooo
“Are you sure about this?” Annabel asked me as I came out of Doc’s office and back into the waiting room where she and my friends sat.
“I am,” I assure her as I give my chest a few hard hits, testing to make sure my ribs were fully healed. “You heard my mother, she told you Calypso helped her face her past trauma and got her to where she is today. She’ll do the same for you.”
“I’m just not buying it,” she mumbled, hugging herself in her seat. “I’ve been to all kinds of Doctors, but they all just throw meds at me. I don’t think I can do this.”
“Well that’s not her style,” I say, walking over and holding out a hand to her. “So? Trust me?”
She looked at my hand, a conflicted look on her face. After a moment, she reached out and took my hand, “I do.”
“Perfect, come on.” I pull her up to her hooves and lead her to Calypso’s office. Pushing the door open, we find the mare was already there, waiting in her chair with a notepad in her hooves.
Calypso looked up at us and gave a warm smile, “ah, Annabel, I was starting to wonder if I’d have to come out there and get you myself.”
“She just needed a little help,” I say, leading her to the couch and helping her lay down. She immediately went back to hugging herself as she pulled her legs and tail into herself.
“Don’t worry,” Calypso said in a sweet voice. “We’re not going to go to hard today, we’re just going to get to know each other. Is that okay with you?”
“Sure,” she said with a weak smile.
“First up, can you tell me your full name and age?”
Annabel bit her lip as she thought for a moment, “huh… does my time on the moon count?”
“Were you conscious the whole time you were up there? Did your body age?” Calypso asked, writing a few notes down.
“Uh… no to both questions,” she muttered, frowning.
“Then just your age when it happened.”
“Erm, I’m Annabel Fletcher. I was twenty two when I got banished to the moon, which was about five years after the Rapture,” she said as she started playing with her mane.
“You’re a lot younger than I thought you’d be,” I commented, getting Calypso to frown at me.
“Shayla, thank you for helping her, but this will go better if its just the two of us.”
“No, I want her here,” Annabel said, starting to look anxious.
“Trust me, the things we’ll be going over, you may not be able to be fully open if a friend is present,” Calypso warned.
Reluctantly, she nodded in response.
I frowned, but I took the hint and backed out of the room, giving her a thumbs up as I closed the door.
“So we good?” Dude asked as he and the others walked over to me.
“I think so,” I replied, smiling at them. I waved for them to follow me and we walked out of the clinic, then I turned to them. “We did it guys! We stopped our first real threat!”
“I mean, did we though? We kinda cheated with these,” Nightstreak said, tapping the Element around his neck.
Waving him off, I slap my Element, “it's not cheating if we win.”
“I don’t think that’s how that works,” he said back, but I just struck a pose and smiled at them.
“Picture for the newspaper?” someone said from behind me.
Spinning around, I found myself face to face with a stallion wearing a Press hat.
“What?” I asked, cocking my head.
“Picture for the paper!” he repeated, jiggling a camera at us. “We’re running a story tomorrow about the new Bearer’s of the Elements and how they saved us all from the Bitch in the Moon!”
“You probably should change that name,” Dude chuckled. “Kinda deeming now that she’s like she is now.”
“No can do! It’s been the Bitch in the Moon for the last twenty years, so that’s how ponies will recognize her,” he said as he jiggled the camera at us again. “So? Picture?”
I look at my friends and shrug. “Sure, just make the story good, ‘kay?”
“That I can promise!” he exclaims, waving for us to group up.
We all got together, looking at him.
“Come on! You’re Hero’s now! Pose!”
Roxxy and I put our legs over each other as the others posed up around us.
“Perfect!”
I smirked as I gave Roxxy bunny ears, just as he snapped the picture.
Front row: Dude, Shayla, Roxxy, Summer Breeze.
Back row: Flippy Dew and Nightstreak.
“Excellent! Look at the front page of the newspaper tomorrow!” he said as he quickly took his leave, running off into town.
“Hero's,” I said aloud, a wide grin on my face.
“Oh crap, that’s going to go to her head,” Nightstreak groaned.
“Oh no…” Flippy Dew muttered, rubbing her shoulder nervously. “We’re going to have to do more stuff like that, aren’t we?”
“You know it!” I yell as I jump forward and start strutting down the road. But before I could get in the groove, something slammed into the ground ahead of me. I stumbled back, startled as a very beaten and battered Champion stood there, breathing hard as he glared at us.
“Oh shit, man! What happened to your face?!” Dude exclaimed as we all stared at him.
The right side of his face looked gross, worse than the burns on my mother, that’s for sure. Then again that could just be because these ones are fresh. Even his ear was ruined, and he was missing some mane on that side of his head.
“Have you brats seen a man around here?! Looks worse than I do!” he yelled, stomping towards us.
“Nah bro, just you,” I said, causing him to stomp up to me and get face to face with me.
“You lying to me?!” he screamed, causing me to raise an eyebrow.
“Why the fuck would I lie about that?” I snapped back, pushing my face into his face.
He pushed back, our foreheads connected as he growled fiercely at me. “If you’re lying to me, and you know where-”
“Get ahold of yourself, asshole!” I growl back, pushing back against him, but I was unable to move him as I only achieved pushing myself back a bit. “We’ve been dealing with our own shit while you’ve been up there getting your ass kicked.”
His eyes began to glow, but I held my ground, staring into his eyes as they increased in brightness, the purple harsh light flashing around my face.
“Do it, I fucking dare you,” I said in a low voice.
He sneered and snapped his head to the side, firing a purple beam straight up into the sky. As he finished his little tantrum, he turned back to me with a look of absolute rage and hatred, “call me if you see him.”
“I won’t,” I said back, flipping him off. “Now fuck off.”
This only enraged him further, but instead of saying anything else, he just exploded into the sky, rocketing away faster than anyone could keep track of.
The force of him suddenly taking off like that sent me flying backwards violently. Just as I was about to slam into a building someone caught me.
“Gotcha!” Flippy Dew yelled, holding tight to me as she struggled to slow us down with her wings. Thanks to her efforts we only bumped into the building instead of crashing through it.
“Whew!” I yelled out as she placed me back on the ground. “Thanks, Flip, that coulda been bad.”
She smiled at me happily.
“You fucking idiot!” Roxxy screamed as she and the others ran towards us. “Stop provoking that psychopath! One day he’ll-“
“He ain’t gonna do a thing to me,” I assured her, smiling confidently at her. “He knows better, his mom and mine would kill him.”
She just groaned and rubbed her face.
“So!” I yell as I reach out and ruffle up Flippy Dew’s mane, “let’s get a move on!”
“To where?” Summer Breeze asked.
Walking through them, I flared my wings, “clubhouse! Gotta add today’s win to our achievement board!”
ooo000<^>000ooo
As we flew towards the clubhouse, I saw the door was ajar. Damn it guys!
“Okay, who forgot to close the door?” I asked, frowning at them.
“Dude was the last one out!” Nightstreak called out.
“Snitch!” Dude exclaimed, the sighed, “but I closed it. I remember slamming it shut and making a stupid joke about to.”
“He did,” Flippy Dew confirmed.
“Well, it’s open now,” I grumbled as I landed at the door and pushed it open. “You guys need to-“
I lost my train of thought as I saw blood all over the floor, leading to the other side of the room where we piled up our bean bag chairs. There lay a human with bandages on his chest.
“Oh… yo,” he said weakly, giving me a peace sign.
“Guys, we have a problem,” I said over my shoulder, keeping my eyes locked on the man.
“What kind of… oh you gotta be kidding me,” Roxxy groaned as she and the others squeezed in past me.
“Sorry for the blood, kinda was in a hurry,” the man said, placing a hand over the bloody bandages.
“Let me handle this,” I said, flexing my muscles and taking a step towards him.
“Wait!” Flippy Dew suddenly yelled out, jumping past me and standing between us.
“Why? He’s a bad guy,” I stated, raising an eyebrow at her.
“I don’t think he is!” She said, looking at him.
“But he was invading our world,” Dude said in an unsure voice.
“Actually no, I was just looking for an old nemesis of mine and that horse man attacked me,” the man stated.
“He’s telling the truth! He helped me push my cart up a hill before Champion showed up,” Flippy Dew said as she carefully walked over to him.
“Hmmm,” I mumbled, then shrugged. I walked over and stood next to Flippy Dew as she reached into her bags and pulled out some water.
“Oh thanks,” he said as he took it and drank half of it in one go.
“Why did Champion attack you?” I questioned, wanting to make sense of everything.
“He’s working for the guy I’m after,” he replied as he took a sip from the water.
“Kal?” I asked, raising an eyebrow.
“That’s the name he’s using here?” He asked, then chuckled a bit. “Yeah, Kal. That guy I was fighting has some real issues.”
“Yeah, believe me, I know,” I say with a smirk. “Guys an asshole.”
He laughed then began to cough, spitting blood all over the two of us.
“Eh, sorry,” he muttered, holding his chest.
“Uh… you good?” I asked, using a wing to wipe my face.
He looked me right in the eye and grinned, “I’m going to be straight with you, I’m not doing so good.”
“How bad is it?” Flippy Dew asked in a worried tone.
“I'm dying.”