“That isn’t good…” Bonbon said. Around us, the soldiers who had been eating were rushing to put back on their armor and galloping towards the north side of the camp. “That bell means we’re being attacked.”
“Finally!” I shouted eagerly, shooting up to my feet. Maybe a little too eagerly based on the others’ looks. “I mean, oh no what a disaster.”
Jess’ look of surprise quickly turned into a cheeky grin. “You certainly changed your tune.”
“Well, I’d hate to be in ponyland regularly, but ponyland at war? Ponyland at war and I’ve got the power to do something about it?” I said, waving what I’ll refer to as a “ticket” in front of me. “No offense to current company.”
“Some taken.” Bonbon said flatly.
Nodding, I turned around and ran towards wherever the rest of the soldiers were heading.
“Wait!” Lyra called out. I didn’t stop. “That’s just a prototype!”
“Rule of cool, Lyra!” I called back. “Just gotta make this flashy!”
Lyra started galloping after me, and due to her superior number of legs, quickly caught up. I ignored her though, more focused on what had just come into view: the enemy. The Crystal Empire’s soldiers did not look all too different from ours -though that could just be because all ponies in armor look alike to me. Their armor was all colored black and had significantly more spikes, but I think the biggest difference was the full, face-obscuring helmets each one wore.
Also, frankly, they had better weaponry. The Crystal soldiers carried no spears or swords, but their helmets each had a winged crest on the forehead that fired out a beam of sickly green magic that seemed to immediately incapacitate any pony it struck. I saw a few of our Unicorn soldiers put up forcefields, but most cracked after blocking just one laser.
Watching the battle, I could feel my heartbeat throughout my entire body. A deep pounding in my chest that I couldn’t quite attribute to any one emotion.
“How exactly are you at a stalemate with these guys?” I asked.
“The lasers are new.” Lyra answered, sounding worried. “Sombra must be getting as impatient as we are.”
As I looked over the newly formed battlefield, I noticed a few of the crystal soldiers were lagging behind the line they had attacked in, and were levitating unconscious soldiers onto carts.
“What are those guys doing?” I wondered aloud. If Lyra was going to answer that as well, she didn’t have the chance to. The line had gotten close enough to the camp that where we were was now within their firing range. Lyra stepped in front of me and put up a shield to block an errant laser.
“Every soldier we lose just adds to the Empire’s forces. Sombra does… something to ponies that makes them completely loyal to him.”
I could feel my teeth grit inside my mouth, and let my hands curl into tight fists. I could accept something as dark as war mixed with that sunshine and rainbows world Jess described to me once… but I draw a line at brainwashing.
“Lyra.” I raised a hand and gently set it on her head. “Let me handle this.”
“Trevor?”
I started walking again, and Lyra dispelled her shield before I could walk through it. I continued until I stepped on top of a large snowbank and could properly look down on the enemy. I took a deep breath, and then roared.
“HEY CRYSTAL EMPIRE!” Every pony on both sides stopped, and looked at me. A group of crystal soldiers broke off from the line and galloped towards me. “Let it be known… I AM TAKING YOU DOWN!”
I jammed the ticket into the slot on top of the Driver.
“[Initialize!]”
“[Human Mode]”
The hemeted ponies fired their lasers. A button that was previously flush with the side of the Driver popped out. I slammed it back in.
“Henshin!”
With a guitar riff and a sound like grinding gears, the Driver spat out three balls of multicolored light, which blocked the lasers. The balls of light then spun around me, forming armor panels floating in the air. Then the armor compressed onto me, and with a feeling like being dunked into a warm, viscous liquid, some kind of undersuit formed between them and my body.
“[Full-Steel Superiority! Buster Man!]”
Steam shot out from between the various segments of armor, melting some of the snow around me. But the process wasn’t quite done yet. The three balls of light returned to right in front of me, and each changed to their own color and formed some kind of symbol. One was red and looked like a lightning bolt, another was blue and was made of three circles with lines coming down off each, and the final one was an almost-white and was three diamonds. The three symbols stayed for a moment, before swirling into each other and creating a new symbol; One I knew well: a red symbol that one might be able to call a flower, made of three triangles and a diamond. This symbol split in two copies of itself then moved to rest at either side of my hips.
I brought up my hands and looked down at myself. My armor looked incomplete almost, with asymmetrical plates, some of which were missing to show off some pretty neat mechanical greeble. Everything was a uniform gunmetal, save for a few glowing blue orbs like the one in the Driver.
“Steel Superiority, eh? I’m getting some serious Roidmude vibes from this design. Well, Lyra did say it was a prototype.” I muttered. “And with that symbol, there’s only one thing I can possibly call myself.”
I looked back up and saw that the three leading crystal soldiers had gotten close, though I had to wonder why they stopped shooting lasers at me. I raised one foot.
“I am Kamen Rider Tekketsu!” I slammed my foot back onto the ground, sending out a shockwave that rippled throughout the entire battlefield, knocking the crystal soldiers away.
Despite the stabbing pain creeping up my leg from doing that, I smirked under my helmet. Stupid AT.
Out of the extended peripheral vision the helmet’s HUD gave me, I could see a lot of the pony soldiers snap out of their surprise at my intro, and charge into the halted enemy line with renewed vigor. In the other direction, I could see the kidnapping soldiers turning their cart around and starting to run.
“Oh no you don’t!”
I started towards them, but before I could take even five steps from the spot I transformed in, a rope wrapped around one of my wrists. Looking back, one of the Crystal soldiers I knocked over was back up, and was casting a familiar restraining spell from his helmet’s emblem. Seconds later, a second rope was around my other wrist.
“I don’t have time for this!” I growled, wrapping my hands around the two ropes.
I dug a boot into the dirt and twisted my upper body. I could hear the hissing of pistons, and feel as a few armor panels shifted in anticipation of my next move. Then, like a spring suddenly and explosively uncoiling, I spun. Both crystal soldiers were ripped away from the ground, and the centrifugal force was great enough that it lifted me about a foot off the ground! Still spinning, I brought both arms together and twisted my entire body, and slammed them down. Dirt and snow flew everywhere from the impact, as well as a few sizable shards of the two ponies’ armor.
I climbed back to my feet and tore the magically conjured ropes from my wrists. The prickly feeling had now enveloped my entire right leg, and a band just above my waist too. I’m not the most experienced with sessions of long, drawn-out pain, but I have a pretty good idea what I’m able to take.
“Running out of time… gotta stop that wagon.”
So, I ran. A couple crystal soldiers tried to jump in my way, but I just plowed right through them. As I slowly gained on the cart, my HUD began to light up with various mathematics I didn’t have the piece of mind to decipher, before showing a “lock-on” on the cart, and a word. I smirked.
“I like the sound of that.” Still running, I reached down and pulled the Ticket out of the driver, then quickly put it back in. “Hissatsu!”
“[Hissatsu! Buster!]”
I planted both feet onto the ground, then jumped, my momentum carrying me up and far over the cart. Once I reached the apex of my leap, at what had to be at least 10 meters off the ground, several large vents opened on the back of my armor and forced me straight down. I impacted the ground directly between the two crystal soldiers pulling the cart, shattering it and sending pony bodies flying in all directions. The ground rippled like the waves of the sea.
“[Epoch Finish!]”
Epic indeed, Driver. Wait, that sounded like a different voice than usual?
I didn’t have time to contemplate that at all, as pain suddenly overtook my entire body! I fell forward and rolled onto my back writhing, and I could feel something warm running down the center of my face. It hurt worse than death, but I managed to pull the Ticket from the Driver. A few agonizing seconds later, the armor disappeared, as well as the pain. I reached up and wiped my face with a hand.
Blood, naturally.
I sat up, breathing heavily, and took a few careful moments to let everything just… wear off. After that, I turned around and saw one of the Crystal soldiers’ helmets laying a few feet away. I leaned and reached over to grab it, managing to get ahold of the wings of the crest. But, as I dragged the helmet back over to me… something slid out of it.
[[Kamen Rider Harmony]]
I sat in the snow just outside the bounds of the camp. I had been watching Trevor fight, until he jumped into the sky and plunged down out of sight.
“Looks like he’s having fun,” I muttered to myself. “But the battle as a whole is winding down.”
Lasers and magic bolts were no longer flying. Whatever it was those Crystal Soldiers were casting with must have had a limited charge, because whenever one stopped firing they would fall back and join the team picking up unconscious guardsponies. Now though, enough of them had stopped fighting that the army was starting to fall back collectively.
Doesn’t look like they’ll be leaving with their prize though, since Trevor just Rider Kicked their wagon.
I heard a pony walking up behind me. I didn’t need to turn around to know it was Sweetie Drops.
“This “Rider System” is pretty impressive. Your friend Trevor managed to scare off the entire army.”
“I don’t think Trevor’s assault was the only factor in their retreat. They were already-”
“AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!”
“Some mare’s in trouble!” I yelled, leaping to my feet. I started running in the direction the scream came from, and could hear Sweetie Drops’ hooves pounding against the snow as she followed.
As I approached I could see shattered bits of wood and steel laying in the snow, and large potholes where it looks like some of the debris was launched deep into a snowdrift. Finally I could see Trevor sitting in the bulk of the wreckage, his back turned to us.
“Trevor? Did you just scream?”
“Jessica…” His voice was quivering. He flung himself around to face me, tears flowing from his eyes like waterfalls, and held something up right in my face.
“I KILLED HIM!” He wailed.
It was the severed head of a crystal pony.