//------------------------------// // The Last Two // Story: [Forlorn Ascension]|[Rites of Dominion] // by Desrium //------------------------------// "But I suppose there is no point in delaying this any longer. Not when it will be over so quickly regardless." The chimera took on a more stout pose, somewhat hunched over, his shoulders seeming to bulge underneath his armor. His tail lashed the floor, the sound of the whipping echoing in the room caught in disarray, overtaking the eerie rattling hiss that escaped his umbra maw. "I want answers," Phineas said as he readied himself for this confrontation: the definitive end to the Hoof-Talon war on the galaxy. It would be all too easy to rush into the battle, giving it his all -no, not even that- more than his all to bring this abomination down to its knees, but what he wanted to know while he still had the ability to find out was: what the hell this thing was planning. Why was it so damn smug, even now? Even after seeing him fight up close and personal? "We all want answers, pony," the hybrid snarled. He started sidestepping to his left. Phineas did the same and in no time the two were circling each other, just over ten feet in between them. "ironically, the matter of getting them comes down to a question all its own." "And what's that?" Phineas asked, keeping his guard up. No matter how eloquent this monster spoke, no matter how roundabout he replied, no matter how enticing his words were; Phineas would not be taken by surprise. Either he would be the one to strike first or the one to turn his enemy's attack against them. "How far are you willing to go to know?" Phineas' back was to the ship's viewing screen when the chimera's horn flashed. Without warning, Phineas found himself hurtling through the air, tossed effortlessly over the central control terminals, the floor sloping downwards and increasing the distance of his drop. He twisted around in the air as his jetpack engaged, coming to a hover over the incline. The Hoof-Talon started to laugh again, voice deepening more and more with each chortle. "Earn your answers, Federation pony!" the chimera boomed, his voice matching the draconic attributes of his blended body. "Magic," Phineas thought. "Of course the fucker has magic!" "No retort? What is the matter? Not so witty when facing a true opponent?" "Sorry, I'm easily distracted by shiny objects! Keep waving your horn around!" Phineas yelled. In response, the bodies and debris littering the room was sent flying at him, even the corpses of the chimera's minions. One by one, shards and bodies missed him by margins of feet and inches, the pony jinking around in the air, thrusters constantly swiveling. "Dance! Dance! It pleases me greatly!" "I'm not even gonna crack a joke about that shit!" "Fair enough!" The chimera held out a clawed hand and the glowing of his horn intensified greatly. Phineas found himself frozen in the air caught in a jade aura, his forelegs forced to his sides. Two bodies smashed into him and he was held in place, left with no option but to take the pain that came with the impacts. "You might as well not waste your breath speaking, anyway. With the pain I will bring you..." The chimera's chilling laughter returned. "With the pain... you will only be able to scream until you can't scream anymore." "I'll have you know... I was part of the Royal Canterlot Opera. I could hold one hell of a high note-" The chimera swung his arm to the side and Phineas was thrown with the motion, smashing into a computer screen and held there to feel the electrical jolt as sparks leaped before being driven into the floor. "Tsk, tsk. What did I just tell you, pony? Do not waste your breath." "Lesson... learned..." Phineas staggered to his feet, his HUD flickering in his view. When he looked to where the chimera was, he saw only empty space and a shadow looming over him. He didn't even get a chance to look up before the chimera's fist hammered down onto his back, flooring him without any resistance. His clawed feet came down, shaking the floor beneath him with a heart-shuddering thud. Phineas felt a pressure around his head and found himself lifted by it, the chimera's face centimeters away from his own, the hybrid's neck coiled around itself like a snake waiting to strike. "Do you not want your answers, Federation pony? Too bad... I was almost looking forward to this from how you-" "Do not fucking patronize me!" Phineas roared, nailing the chimera twice with a right and left hook. The hybrid screeched, not expecting such strength from something so small. He released Phineas and before he fell, his boosters flared up again. Hit after hit thudded against the chimera's snout and the sides of his head. Punches, kicks, Phineas unleashed his pent up anger in the most primal of ways. The grief he had for the destruction of his homeworld... the ire which burned for the Hoof-Talons' retribution... they all blended together in that one moment. "ENOUGH!" The chimera boomed, grabbing Phineas' rear leg as it shot out towards the chimera's neck. With a vicious swing, the stallion was tossed to the ground and stomped on. A scowl was on the hybrid's face and his eyes were ablaze... but then he calmed again, chuckling. "It appears you have earned your first answer." The chimera raised its foot and kicked Phineas away with it. The silver pony rolled over a few times before stopping on his hooves. He shakily stood up, the Hoof-Talon unaware of the rage marring his expression underneath the helmet. "Where do I begin? I suppose... after the Great Ascension," the hybrid started to say, tapping a claw against its chin thoughtfully. "our God gave me greatness and with it I led my chosen into the stars. There, they evolved into their true forms by the blessing of the God and we went on to claim what was ours. At the beginning, we indulged in the powers and pleasures of the lessers... but then we wanted them for ourselves. We advanced further, our fleets becoming stronger. We took the weak and rebuilt them as our warships. We went on to conquer many, driving the pitiful to extinction and the pathetic to banding together to stave off the inevitable." "But it wasn't inevitable," Phineas spat. "not by a long shot." "Your vision is too short sighted. What is time to us, beings centuries old? The Polymerization might have fallen this time, but it will return stronger than ever... because of you." "What the fuck do you mean by that!?" "Ah ah ah." The Hoof-Talon wagged a finger chidingly at Phineas. "Must I remind you of the rules already?" His horn brightened, a bright circle appearing underneath the stallion's hooves. Phineas dashed to the side aided by his boosters, a plume of terrible green fire spiraling up split-seconds later. The scorching flames were uncanny. It was the chimera's power encapsulated inside of the arcane grenades! The columns of fire sprouted up from all around Phineas. He took to the air, strafing and diving to dodge the grid of burning emerald, only to be caught once again in a telekinetic vice. "Think quickly!" the chimera boomed. And Phineas did. His hover platform rifles deployed, the guns going off with their firecracker display. The hybrid bared his teeth, releasing Phineas in favor of manifesting a magical shield in front of him, the bolts deflecting into the floor, walls and ceiling. "Block this!" Phineas called out as he rushed forward, busting through the shield and wailing on the chimera with renewed fury. "You fucking horrible, greedy, murderous piece of ever-loving shit!" he shouted with each swing and kick. The chimera snarled, returning the sentiment. He slashed his claws through the air and lashed out with his neck, the agile pony winding in between his blows and striking with devastating precision. One misplaced lunge had the chimera's head rocketing toward Phineas and he was strafing to the side, the hybrid's eye caught in the exhaust of the booster. The chimera bellowed in pain and outrage, throwing his burly arms up and knocking Phineas away. His neck stretched and contracted, winded in on itself and looped around with the advanced hybrid's throes of anguish. He fell into a half-crouch, knuckles bracing against the floor, head drooping. He was panting after his mournful scream had ended, but not for long. "... Very well then," he rasped, looking up at where Phineas had landed, the pony standing in his combat stance, rifles aimed at the chimera, jetpack primed for action. A large area at the side of the chimera's face had been turned from stark obsidian to a pasty reddish color, lopsided and deformed like clay allowed to melt but then cooled before it became nothing but a puddle. Barely visible in this was the striking blue eye, now milky white and all but consumed in the dead flesh. Coupled with this visual, the chimera's chuckling that ensued was very disturbing to the silver stallion. "Another answer for you, Federation pony." The hybrid stood up. "With every victory, the Polymerization grew stronger... but we were not content with what the lessers had to offer us. So we built our own ships with our own technologies... some of which were derived from the Old Equestria..." Phineas bristled, but said nothing. He only braced himself for what the Hoof-Talon might throw at him next as punishment for taking out his eye. "Our reach across the stars grew exponentially then... it was clear that we were a kind meant to dominate... though we were finite. It became apparent that we needed the lessers, if only to carry on our legacy of conquest! So we took them... experimented... reaped their greatest attributes like we did with their technology before and made them us, as we learned how to perfect the mixing of species..." "As you killed and violated millions, you mean," Phineas deadpanned. "They were fodder. They should have simply accepted their fates, perhaps they would have fared better." "No, they wouldn't have. Now what does this have to do with me?" The chimera's reply was a horrendous roar, a deep otherworldly howl with hints of all sorts of things which made Phineas' blood curdle. Green fire collected like spittle at the corners of the Hoof-Talon's maw, its claws splayed, tail thumping the floor, its toes boring into the floor plating. "Aw FUCK!" Phineas opened fire while the chimera belched literal flames, washing everything in front of him away in a funnel of green heat. With the the fires blanketing the ground below him, the silver stallion kept firing his searing bolts of magic. Several shots landed and passed through the chimera to no visible effect until the magical barrier appeared again, repelling the shots. "Brace yourself for the suffering, pony. There will be much of it in your future." Phineas knew he was moments away from being caught in another mental net cast by the chimera and he had a gut feeling this one would be the worst. Due justice, an eye for an eye; or him getting a limb torn off, slowly while he was still fully conscious to feel each agonizing rip of flesh and break of bone. He retreated into his mind. "Think! Think! Thin-... DUH!" The hybrid's horn flared. Phineas pulled out his Magi-Flux Harmonizer in a quickdraw, generating a magical field. The chimera's own magic was entangled within this field, which shifted from simple telekinesis into observable energy, rolling and undulating where two beams met, one projected from the Harmonizer, the other from the chimera's horn. "What is this!?" "A good engineer always has his tools ready, bitch!" Phineas replied, though a bit too soon. The chimera's power was quickly overtaking the Harmonizer's own. As useful a tool it was, it just could not stand up to the raw power the chimera had at its disposal. "Oh damn, damn, damn!" Another bright idea. With his other hoof, Phineas pulled out one of his remaining grenades and tossed it at the chimera's end of the magical ray. It entered the stream and reacted exceptionally violently, the pressure wave caused by the destabilizing forces sending Phineas into a wall again, thankfully one that was devoid of console screens. He slid down it and fell onto his haunches at its base. The hybrid, however, was caught in an inferno which came over him in a torrent of green fire and electricity, overwhelming the already bright lights in the command room. The green and blistering heat remained for many moments before dying down, a huge blackened swath left where the chimera once stood. And there he continued to stand, burned black by the fire, the membrane of his wings gone, the tuft of hair at the end of his tail gone, most of his armor vaporized. But yet, still the chimera remained, taking slow, deep breaths. Again, he started to chuckle. "And I almost saved myself, too..." His voice was hoarse. His charred lips arced into a smile. "Time to answer your question, Federation pony. Is it ironic that the one you have been most adamant to answer is the one with the shortest answer?" "How about a trade? I'll answer that when you get on with your own explanation." "After I am done killing you, I will use your corpse to create my next generation of soldiers. Ones derived from the greatest warrior I have ever faced. Your progeny will carry your memory into the future! Those who admired your actions will rue the day their... false messiah, appeared!" The chimera's eye narrowed at the floored pony and he hissed, "You should have died during the Great Ascension." "My answer: go fuck yourself." The chimera's magical aura burst into existence with a thundering boom. Inside it, he was a figure only of shadow, lifting off of the ground as arcs of energy shot out and exploded against the floor. The hull of the spaceship began to groan as the chimera's power manifested, getting stronger and stronger with each passing moment. His bare wings spread as a leonine roar erupted from deep within him... "Regardless of what you say to me, pony, it changes little. You. Will. DIE."