//------------------------------//
// …The Harder they are to Crash into. 
// Story: Swooping Pegasus 
// by FenrisianBrony 
//------------------------------//

	Rainbows rear hooves firmly connected with the creatures head, but instead of feeling even the slightest bit of give, she felt as if she had just bucked a brick wall. Crying out in pain she turned around to see the damage she had done to the creature. The Carnifex stared right back at her, a single drop of blood glistening on its forehead.

The Carnifex let out a mighty roar, and brought up one of its massive pincer like claws to swat Rainbow aside. Rainbow avoided being gutted for about the fourth time that day alone, but her luck had finally run out. Instead of the sharp side of the claw catching her in her underside, the large blunt side smacked into her instead, knocking the wind out of her and sending her crashing down into one of the defensive walls. Rainbow landed in a pile of Eldar guts, although the Eldar who they belonged to didn’t seem to be anywhere around, and judging by the amount of his guts that where here rather than in his body, Rainbow doubted that he was alive. Instead of dwelling on this thought however, she rolled over and stared up at the now advancing Carnifexs’. Small arms fire was bouncing off their armoured skin, and one of the beasts was returning fire with its own deadly cannon, doing much more damage than anything the Eldar could survive.

Rainbow Dash desperately tried to get away from the oncoming Tyranids, but was still dazed from the blow to her chest. She managed to get to her hooves, but almost instantly slipped over on the corpse of a dead Tyranid, falling back down, and splashing blood and ichor all over herself, adding to the grim she had already accumulated from the battle.

She slowly turned around again, intent on at least starring into the face of the creature as it killed her. The Carnifex advanced down the trench, scraping along the sides, killing anything that got within its reach. Rainbow starred up at it as it got closer, each foot fall feeling like an earthquake to her. Suddenly, a feeling of calm overtook Rainbow, and the sounds of fighting and death were drowned out by Elariques’ words.

“I regret having to ask you to do this Rainbow, but I have no other option.” 

The voice rang in her head, and surprisingly, she felt herself smile. She had no regrets, and didn't even hate Elarique for getting her into this mess. She had saved lives, and given those who couldn’t defend themselves more time to get away, and that was all that mattered to her now. She opened her eyes, and got shakily to her hooves, facing down the oncoming Carnifex, her entire vision becoming focused on the charging beast, its great fanged maw open wide, and emitting a terrible bellow.

‘Down’ came a voice, but it was not spoken. Instead Rainbow heard it within her very mind. She didn’t know why, but without even thinking about it she dove back to the ground, just in time to avoid the massive spear that was flung over her head, impaling the Carnifex through its gaping mouth. The Carnifex roared in pain, the spear sticking out of its mouth, before a bolt of pure white light struck the spear, and the creature dropped to the floor, dead.

Rainbow looked round, and saw Talvan crouched down on one knee, one of her hands outstretched as she seemed to will the spear back to her.

“Rainbow.” She said, with a curt nod of her head. “I trust you can see yourself to a weapon?”

Rainbow reluctantly nodded, the feeling of calm fading away, and the sounds of dying meeting her ears, unfortunately, the sounds were was mostly coming from Eldar.

“We’re losing, aren’t we?” Rainbow grunted, picking up a pistol, and retrieving a sword which had been stuck in the body of a fallen Tyranid. The sword was just like the one she had dropped after she had been hit by the Carnifex, and she briefly remembered seeing the ease with which that sword had cut through armour, she prayed that this one had the same ability.

“Badly.” Talvan answered, her voice wavering for just a second. “The Megadon riders should have been here, we need the reinforcements.”

She stared at Rainbow, before turning to face the Tyranid swarm, which was now pouring into both ends of the Trench, cutting off any avenue of retreat. Rainbow stared at the number of creatures infront of her, and realised that they couldn’t have won, this was never a case of unlikely victory. This was a case of certain defeat. The Tyranids would always have over-run them, and the planet would fall. No matter what they did, and no matter how many of the bucking Tyranids they killed, they would never have won.

“Looks like this is it.” Rainbow whispered, not even trying to keep the fear from her voice. She raised the sword, before realising she had next to no experience with it. Not that she had much experience with any weapon though.

“True.” Talvan stated, backing up against Rainbow, anxiety thick in her voice, “I could think of worse ways to go, but not many.”

The two prepared to fight the swarm, standing back to back to each other, ready to take on the world, an island of defiance in a sea of Tyranids and death.

Eldar and pony, no longer adversaries bickering over everything, but rather comrades.

Sisters in arms. 

Sisters till the end.




The oncoming swarm crashed with both sides at roughly the same time, charging straight at the two bold creatures. Rainbow ducked, allowing Talvan a clean strike at one creature, while she fired a hail of shots into another, wounding it, but not fatally wounding it. She corrected this with a weak slash, cutting one of its legs off, allowing it to be trampled as the other Tyranids fought to get to Talvan and her. Talvan was fighting like a being possessed, killing any creature that came near, lashing out with fists and psychic blasts, her spear embedded in the stomach of a creature, but even with all her skill in combat, Talvan was losing. She was bleeding from cuts all over her body, her armour looking like a ragged cloth rather than a form of protection. Rainbow wasn’t doing so well herself. She had already got cuts all over her body from being thrown to the floor, but the wounds she was getting now were something else. It was only because of her speed, and Talvans’ prowess that she was not dead, but even if she had been as skilled as Talvan, there was only one outcome. Continuing to lash out, Rainbow wounded another creature with a slash across its stomach, before firing the rest of the clip from her pistol into the mouth of another creature, blowing the back of its head out and making it collapse onto some of its own, pinning them beneath its mass. 

A faint rumbling sound was suddenly heard across the battlefield, which was no longer filled with screams of the dying, although in this case this was probably a bad thing, as it meant the battlefield would now be full of the dead instead. The rumbling got louder and louder, until it drowned out most of the sounds of the battle. Rainbow listened to it for a spit second, trying to figure out what it was, and received a claw to the side as punishment for her distraction. 

Ironically, this actually saved her life, as she fell to the ground as another claw passed through the air where her head had been only seconds before. She stared up, seeing Talvan finally falter under the assault. Rainbow cried out, desperately trying to come to her new found friends’ aid, but found herself unable to rise, the feet of the Tyranids crushing down upon her, blocking out her sight, burying her underneath a pile of living and dead flesh.

From underneath the pile of bodies, Rainbow heard a faint roar, not a sound like any Tyranid that she had heard, but familiar all the same. She also heard the distinctive sound of shuriken fire, and lots of it, before the sound of pounding feet starting up again, and fading away.

“Rainbow? Rainbow!” Talvans’ voice sounded out, she sounded like she was in pain. The sound of moving bodies assaulted Rainbows ears, as the armoured shells scraped against each other in a sound like running nails across a chalkboard. Rainbow finally managed to move one of the bodies away, and was greeted by light, and the bare face of Talvan, covered in cuts, and bleeding heavily.

“Rainbow,” she breathed heavily, helping her out of the mound of bodies, “we have to go.” She struggled, coughing up blood as she spoke, “Another swarm. Bio-Titans. Elarique ordered…a retreat.” She said weakly, before collapsing onto Rainbow.

“Talvan?!” She screeched, desperately trying to help her, “Stay with me, please!”

Talvan smiled up at her, coughing more blood onto Rainbows now mostly crimson coat. A group of three Megadon Riders sped past the Trench, but skidded to a halt when they saw the pair.

“Survivors!” shouted the lead one, jumping off his mount and rushing to Rainbow and Talvan. One of the other riders helped the first lift Talvan, while the third stayed on her mount, spraying fire from what looked like a larger version of Rainbows old rifle. Talvan was helped onto a Megadon, which sped off, while the other rider came back and lifted Rainbow onto his shoulder, carrying her out of the trench, and placing her on the back of his ride.

For the first time since the Carnifex had broken though the lines, Rainbow got a good look at the battlefield, and gasped. The area was littered with Eldar dead, as well as Tyranid dead. From the looks of things, the majority of the Eldar who had fought in the trenches had died there too, giving their lives for their comrades. She also saw the Megadon riders, some still fighting, some retreating, but most lying beside their mounts. Their charge had been foolish, and had ultimately cost most of them their lives. As she was carried away from the scene of death, she could still see some Eldar, fighting desperately to keep the swarm occupied while the rest slipped away, surrounded on all sides, and slowly being overwhelmed. 

Rainbow wept, imaging the thoughts going through each of their heads. Were they like hers had been? A scared inexperienced fighter, lacking any real skills. Or where they hardened warriors? Facing down death with pride and courage, till their breath finally left their bodies. Rainbow would never know. Nobody would ever know.

Turning away from the scene of Carnage behind her, Rainbow wearily looked around her. She saw the retreating forces, and balked at the scale of it. Less than one hundred Megadons were still alive, some had two Eldar on, and some even seemed to be running along with the pack of their own free will, with no riders guiding them, but all in all there could have been no more than seventy Eldar retreating with her. With a pang of guilt, she saw that the majority were not injured much, having been in the Megadon group rather than the trenches. She felt guilty that she was still alive, and had gotten through that hell, that had claimed so many other lives.

With those thought, she slowly drifted into unconsciousness. It was not peaceful, and was plagued by nightmares, but it allowed her to rest all the same.

***

Rainbow now had tears running freely down her face, remembering the images like they were still happening. Almost immediately, her five fiends were around her, pulling her into a big group hug. No words were exchanged, they weren’t needed, and the group just held each other, tears running down all their faces. Even the princesses had tears in their eyes. Equestria had once seen its fair share of battles, the Griffon war, the Minotaur rebellion, and even the sea pony uprising, but he scale which Rainbow had experienced, it was something else entirely. 

And so the group sat there. Six ponies and two princesses. They sat in the room, the silence only permeated by the sobs of famously stoic Rainbow mare, and the soothing sounds her friends made, in an attemt to comfort her.