//------------------------------// // Chapter 2- Rollin' Tower // Story: My Little Steam: Punk Is Magic // by Novel Idea //------------------------------// My Little Steam: Punk Is Magic Chapter 2- Rollin’ Tower. Ironcloud punched and kicked wildly at the controls of his rig, dislocating the large driller from the circle she had dug herself. The dragon was miles beneath him still but it had noticed the light and the gaping hole in the ceiling; Ironcloud wasn’t about to wait long enough to decide what to do next. Scrambling from the cockpit he climbed his way to the back of his drill kicking open the rear door with a powerful bulk; panting hard. He paused for a moment and looked back the drill that had been his life for so long, leaning down he kissed her softly. “Give ‘em hell,” he whispered softly to the dead metal. Wrapping his leg around the miner evac cable he punched the signal to let them know that he was attached. With the mechanical cough far above the tunnel resting on the surface the machine sputtered to life and began lifting him up at a blazing speed. His free leg smacked a button on the terminal’s side opening another bugle like communication device. “Boss!” he bellowed over the rushing air of himself being pulled up, his eyes strained down trying to see past Delilah to the cave beneath; the visor on his helmet illuminating the cave bright enough for him to make out just the edges. “What Iron? What is it?” the Supervisor’s harsh voice rang out sharply; followed by the massive roar of the green and purple beast far below. The entire tunnel gave a jerk that almost dislodged Iron from his emergency wire as the dragon leapt to the mouth of the long chasm. “DRAGON! Drop Delilah! Drop her now!” he yelled roughly, though the words pained him greatly it was the only course of action. “Do it!” he screeched, and was rewarded with the aching mechanical twang of tension being released. The five, pony thick chords which had been lowered to help suspend Delilah lest she fall down into the chasm gave way with all of their tension being slacked in an instant. Ironcloud felt the machine whooshing far beneath him as it dropped; he could taste the rage in the dragon when the drill, with its spiked front crashed down into it. He could hear the monster’s roar of anguish over the rushing of air and the pounding of adrenaline in his blood, and then there was light. Iron gasped hard and looked around at the scurrying companions that were the fellow miners and the emergency crew. Pyremane was there beside him feeling his pulse, looking to a watch she kept wrapped around her fore-hoof. Ironcloud was sure that if one looked close enough they would be able to clearly see his pulse throbbing all throughout his body. “Iron? Iron!” he heard a voice yelling too him over the pounding of his ears, his mind returned to him and he became consciously aware of the vibrations echoing throughout the town. “Get to the bunker!” he gasped roughly, pushing away from the concerned hooves; they weren’t out of this yet. “Evacuate everyone, I’ll get the tower going.” Panting he sprinted off away from them; if there was one thing that the ponies of Little Whinning had learned over the years since Ironcloud had arrived in their settlement was this: when he orders an evacuation, for any reason, evacuate. The collective of Little Whinning began to evacuate to the thick iron coated bunkers on the edge of their larger town; children and mares in first while the stallions armed themselves with their shoulder mounted repeaters along the wall, training back into the town. Pyremane kicked out a hoof once she got on the wall with the men and revealed as golden gun the length of a house with six long barrels bee-hived together with two thick chains of rounds being fed into it by a massive ammo box. While everypony was evacuating, the ground was shaking, and Ironcloud? Well Ironcloud MacHoof was running home as fast as his four legs would carry him. Get to the tower, get to the defences. That was all that was looping through Iron’s head as he sprinted. He paid no heed to the empty streets, how there was no kindly face to greet him when he reached the central tower, or any of the other changes in scenery that on a normal day would have made him quite worried. He got to the pole in the center of the floor and locked his foot into a rail projected from its bottom, giving a nearby switch a kick the water tanks beneath the floor boiled up and launched him up the tower which was his home. Jumping from the lifting apparatus, Ironcloud found himself in the center control room for the tower. It was a massive, openly windowed room centered halfway up the massive structure; it viewed the entire town from its panoramic front and was the only place to fully control the tower. The sound of gunfire came back to his ears as her noticed the ground over by the mining stalks beginning to surge with the diggings of the mighty dragon; jumping down into the control seat; the only piece of furniture in the room, Ironcloud took a deep breath and began to emergence sequence. The floor parted and from within lifted a mechanical throne, on which Ironcloud sat himself and leaned his body back; the chair moved easily beneath him, changing shape, its pieces moving to shape themselves to Ironcloud’s form. The once chair had now shaped to an almost exoskeleton like shape around Iron who pushed his arms, strapped with the bronze metal and thick leather, forward to punch the button which was now crossed his chest. If anypony were to look at Iron in that moment as he hit that button he would look rather ridiculous, a half suit of armour lining his back; levers and nobs sticking out from the metal which coated his back, with long levers pushing them out in front of his chest almost giving him a tree like effect. The front of this “suit” was a plethora of straps and latches which magically snaked over his body as the Arcanyte belts called their counter-parts to bare. There at the pinnacle of his chest was the main activation key, the power button that fueled all of Little Whinning’s Arcanyte structures; the main tower and surrounding apartments would be his to control. The tower barreled to life all around Ironcloud as straps poured from the ceiling to coalesce around his armour and limbs. Each part of the building was fitted with Arcanyte tanks which would magically burn water for steam to push objects as well as act as a ballast to control movement; half the tank enchanted to create water the other to burn it at the command of the wielder. Thick iron walls ensured that the transformation process would not damage the rooms too much as long as Iron didn’t go overboard. Transforming the building would take time, time that Ironcloud was fearful he didn’t have. The up third of the building split itself in half as the line of Arcanyte burned to life sending fast amounts of steam down the seam pushing them apart, swinging on steel hinges the two halves of tower swung low to form “arms” of the machine that the tower was becoming. The arms swung and with the force of this motion the base of the tower broke off and split, the two bottom apartments inverting on an axis to form a circular like dome to act as a wheel. The massive purple dragon had torn through the earth’s floor now and the drill beams and support towers which could be seen looming over the minefield were being tossed and turned by its thrashing, scaly hide. Iron could make out the faint claps of gunshots and the occasional lightning flash of a weapon going off from the tower but if any of the attacks connected the dragon showed no signs of it. Ironcloud stretched out his arms and the tower follow suit, the apartment towers on either side of it connecting at the top to the “arms” and dislocating from their bases, extending the machine’s attack radius. A flash of brilliant green fire forced panic over Iron as the dragon unleashed a torrent of the flames onto the wall of the town. “Hurry, hurry, hurry!” he yelled within his mind, a piece of his consciousness breaking away. To another pony it would have looked as if Ironcloud’s body had fallen asleep but still wished to move; his eyes were vacant orbs and his limbs paused for a moment to hang in the leather straps. It was at that moment that a part of Iron, a part he didn’t know was there kicked in. His left arm shot out and the tower followed suit; wrapping some of the leather straps around his limb he pulled viciously. Ironcloud’s actions were rewarded with the tower raising its long, apartment made arm and through a dual explosion of steam caused by burning Arcanyte sent a large rectangular block of iron building rocketing through the air, a powerful exhaust of steam pouring behind it like a rocket. The make-shift missile struck the purple dragon in the right shoulder, its body giving way to the powerful wad of iron, its flames being misdirected into the sky. The beast now noticed the massive construction of steam and let out a mighty roar of flame in its direction, a challenge that was accepted with a violent erupt of steam as the machine began its dance. Using the water tanks to upset the balance the hotels and circular room began to swerve and spin in different names, the weight of their motion carrying the machine forward towards the dragon who was charging in kind. As the two titans were about to meet, the rolling tower, moving on its spinning access, did a move quite similar to that of and octopus but instead of spraying his opponent with ink the machine erupted in a massive smokescreen of steam as all its tanks magically evaporated then magically refilled. Lost in the inky smoke the two combatants howled and moved attempting to get an edge over an opponent that neither of them could see; a surprisingly hard feet. The dragon’s claw would occasionally find hold and tear at the buildings comprising the talons and the building’s limbs would crash down and find scaly flesh as the mecha whirled this way and that on its ball axis. Ironcloud moved the machine with an emotionless expression his thoughts a chain of commands; he had slipped into a form of Arcanyte control coma which allowed his body to move at a speed and with reflexes that the everyday miner had no idea he had; he felt as if he was one with the Iron and Arcanyte which was acting as his vessel, as if he was the very metal itself. He swung out the center of the tower, avoiding a bone shattering chomp of the dragon’s fangs, the machine twirling around to the right its arms going straight out like a helicopters blade and turning to provide the moment for the sharp spin, the right hand catching the dragon just beneath the jaw on its return swing. The dragon roared pushed back by the building’ hard swing, lashing out with its tail catching the construct mid-height; upsetting the delicate balance and gyrations keeping it upright. The tower spun out of control for a moment, crashing through one of the stores which littered the town as the dragon took advantage of this moment and leapt onto the machine biting at it with its claws. Ironcloud flexed back and hit one of the steam valves releasing a violent plume of steam from the back of the tower, rocketing it back right and the dragon to the ground. Taking the opportunity he spun the machine around in front of the dragon and delivered a vicious chop to its back keeping the spinning motion to deliver a frontal assault on the dragon’s weaker underbelly, lifting the monster up on by the force. Vicious fire struck out at the tower as the dragon unleashed a torrent of green flames across the central room, the massive window resisting as best it could; the brilliant green light blinding Ironcloud as he pulled at the controls in an attempt to end the jet of flame. What followed next could only be described as a sky scraper tall boxing match as the tower controlled by Iron and the dragon circled and swung at each other, dodging and weaving through the combat as lightly as these two heavy-weights could. For every hit another hit landed to balance the field, to the onlookers watching from the wall; guns poised, it was as if time itself was standing still. Both dragon and machine were looking spent and damaged after a few more minutes of their fight, damage was building up far faster than Ironcloud had hoped, not sure if his machine would be able to outlast the dragon. It was at that moment that a blaring light erupted from the whole in which the dragon had clawed his way free, a light which had no equal. It was at that moment that for the first time in their lives, everypony on that side of the wasteland saw it. It was the first time any of them had seen the true sun of Equestria, which burned brighter in the sky than any artificial source or light ever could.