What does a Hero Truly Need? Vol. 1: A New Age of Heroes

by zelkova48

Chapter 24: Invasion...

        Queen Chrysalis was nervously pacing herself, while disguised as Princess Cadence, in her room as the hour of her supposed wedding drew nearer and nearer with each step that she took.

She was incredibly worried, and even though it was incredibly breezy in her room, she was breaking out in a cold sweat as her frazzled nerves began to grab hold of her composure. Something was wrong, Princess Cadence was missing and she was the one who had to take her place.

        “I don’t understand, where is she?” Chrysalis said to herself “This wasn’t suppose to happen...” she continued to pace around to the point where she was welling a groove directly into the floor.

        “The plan was so simple... hide as the princess whenever she was away, gather the love energy from her fiance and feed the hive until we could reform ourselves...” said recited as her movements slowly grew more and more sporadic “What went wrong? What did I miss?” her train of thought was rudely interrupted by the sound of the doorknob jingling about. She nearly jumped out of her chitinous exoskeleton as Cadence’s chambermaid entered the room.

        “Ah! There you are, Princess Cadence” said the chambermaid “I have been looking all over for you!”

        “Y-you have?” Chrysalis shakily replied as the chambermaid came over and began pulling her towards the door.

        “But of course!” she exclaimed so that the whole world can hear her “Come now, otherwise you’re going to be tardy for perhaps the most important day of your life. Your wedding!” she unnecessarily shouted as she continued to drag the nervous queen around “Now I know how nervous one can be hours just before their own wedding. But I can assure you that there is nothing for you to be afraid of!” again, she continued with the overzealous shouting.

“W-wait! I-I’m not ready yet!” Chrysalis shouted as she did her best to stay entirely in character “Please, just give me a bit more time!” she protested, but to no avail as she was being forcefully pulled down the stairs and out of the castle’s front door.

Before she knew it, she found herself steadily walking down the aisle and towards the altar where her fiance and almost every single pony of great importance in all of Canterlot were waiting for Shining Armor and Princess Cadence to be joined together in holy matrimony. She felt faint, very faint, towards the point of collapsing as she could feel the grim reaper breathing his icy cold breath behind her neck as she took steps towards her own execution.

“This is it... our extinction...” She thought to herself as she finally reached her future husband and did her best to fake a gentle smile as her mind shifted from a panicked overdrive to a state of sorrowful acceptance. This was the day that the changelings would be wiped off from the face of Equestria. But...

Somewhere, far across the room, hidden behind the eager crowd of ponies was Prince Blueblood, High Horse, and the rest of their self righteous associates. It was a little too early to propose a toast for the marriage of Princess Cadence and Shining Armor, but it was the perfect time to propose a toast to the prompt annihilation of the entire changeling race. Prince Blueblood pulled out a flask from the inner pocket of his vest and took a big swig from it.

“Today truly is a great day isn’t it?” he asked as he placed his flask back into his pocket.

“You said it” said Speeding Bullet as he took quick glance around the room “When all of this is over and the real Cadence gets married, I think I’m going to try my luck with the rainbow maned way all the way by the front over there” he pointed over to Rainbow Dash “Once we get this imposter and the rest of her disgusting bugs turned to ashes of course. By the way, how is the real Cadence anyway?” he asked.

“Don’t worry, she’s fine” said High Horse “I had a few of the boys drug her meal this morning. She’s in a cozy safehouse far away from here. We’ll retrieve her when the imposter dealt with, we’ll tell her how she was maliciously capture by the changelings so that she’ll be on our side the whole time. Simple, really”

“All that hard work of driving them out of their hives is finally paying off” said Fast Hoof “Hey, Chain. I think it’s time to put the final nail on their coffin, don’t you think?” she asked with a smirk. A subtle yet victorious grin found it’s way onto each of their faces as Chain Warden brazenly walked out towards the center of the room and shouted at the top of his lungs:

        The loud almost unbearable sound of metallic droning and buzzing filled the streets of Canterlot as a swarm of changelings swept across the vast city of Canterlot like a black storm. Ponies were panicking like there was no tomorrow and mass hysteria kicked in within only a matter of seconds. While the stalwart members of the royal guards were doing their best to make sense of the situation as well as to contain it, their combined efforts were all for naught as they all eventually found themselves rounded up like cattle.

        Elsewhere, towards the front gates of Canterlot, the loud high pitched sound of screeching and the sharp discharge of and electricity echoed in the background of all the buzzing as bright green and yellow bolts of energy danced about the earth and the sky in a wondrous display of light. The smell of charred flesh and fear was evident by the scorched remains of several changeling drones that were piled around the area like sand bags.

        A brilliant yellow light flashed from Rhasta’s wards as his ether shock branched in front of him like a spider web and electrocuting around fifteen poor drones that were unlucky enough to get caught by him. Their exoskeletons chipped and cracked under the high voltages that was being forced upon them until their chitinous armor bursted off of them to reveal their fleshy interiors as they all spiraled out of the air towards a smoky crash landing.

 A snake like stream of wild green energy discharged itself from the end of Rubick’s staff and struck another changeling mid air as the bolt continued to travel to each of the other changelings around it. As the bolt continued to snake its way throughout the sky, the destructive power of the fade bolt began to slowly fizzle out, however, the strength draining effects of the bolt maintained itself as several fatigued changelings dropped out of the airs like flies.

        “Well, Rhasta, old friend. It looks like you were right about the future again” Rubick praised as he hopped over a changeling that had the courage to barrel straight at him.

        “Those princesses laughed at me when I told them about the bugs” Rhasta jeered as he turned a poor unexpected changeling into a little chicken “I wish to see the look on their faces now, ah ha ha ha! Never doubt the power of a shaman!” he let out another ether shock as his joy reached it's peak.

 Just as Rhasta and Rubick were starting to get in sync with themselves as the fight drew onwards, a large mass of around a hundred changelings had teamed up together in an attempt to overpower their enemies. The changelings had successfully surrounded the two unicorns but they were not deterred by the numbers, Rubick only had a smile on his face as he finished his conversation with Rhasta.

        “Ha! Indeed!” Rubick exclaimed with vigor as he planted his staff on the ground and willed an incredible amount of magical energy from himself into the very earth. As he began to concentrate, a brief afterimage of Leviathan, the Tidehunter, glowed from behind him. Rubick picked his staff up and raised it to the sky, as he did so, the image of Leviathan let out a great roar and flashed his wicked, needle like teeth as water began to makes it way up from the cracks in the ground and the drains of the streets.

        In the blink of an eye, the ground and just about everything around the two heroes cracked and gave way to a violent torrent of water as pillars of liquid destruction erupted all around and catching the changelings in a tidal wave of unimaginable devastation. The resulting shockwave of water sent each and every changeling around the two flying into the clouds and back onto the ground painfully as they all collided into the stone roads.

        Unfortunately, the buildings and all of the establishments around Rubick and Rhasta also suffered from the magnitude of his spell. Several buildings had collapsed and the main gate along with the railway to the city were all reduced to rubble in the process when Rubick unleashed ravage. He could feel a rush of heat on his cheeks as he blushed from his own overzealous blunder.

        “Oh dear... I may have cause more damage than the insects have” he huffed as his inherent mood turned sour “Well that’s just dendi... ahem, I mean dandy. Honestly, what is with me today?” he asked as he and Rhasta surveyed the area round them. Aside from several injured changelings and some destroyed buildings, most of which were Rubick’s fault, nopony was harmed or was even present near the city gates. Although as Rubick began to further examine the black insects, he came across an interesting revelation.

        “Hmm, that’s odd. I don’t remember this pony being here. Excuse me sir, but are you hurt?” he said as he touched the injured individual. However, upon touching the pony, he began to violently convulse and wash itself in green flames while transforming in various ponies of color and sizes as it spazz out in pain, eliciting a pained screech with each spastic motion. Eventually, the pain was too much for the shapeshifting changeling, and the shock ended up putting the changeling into a coma while in its average state.

“What the devil? How peculiar, these insects have the capability to shapeshift at will” Rubick said as he looked over the changeling “That’s funny, if these creatures have the ability to shapeshift like this, then what’s the point of a head on invasion? You would figure that they could’ve infiltrated the ranks of the Canterlot nobility and destroyed this city from the inside out. If you were to get caught by these things, whose to say that you were really missing at all if they took over your life?”

“Hmm, who knows. Perhaps they aren’t too bright” said Rhasta with a brief scratch of his head “Regardless, we should meet up with everyone else and see just how much this city has suffered” he suggested.

“I agree, although we can’t just be walking around in broad daylight with all of these bugs around now, can we?” with a quick wave of his staff, a shroud of moonlight energy washed over the two heroes and bathed them in an ethereal glow.

        In only a matter of seconds, both of their bodies became clear and transparent, until they were completely invisible to the naked eye. It was a neat little trick that he learned from Mirana, it always came in handy whenever he and his teammates needed to walk around unseen or if they wanted to set up a great gank.

        “There we go, this should help us get around unnoticed” said Rubick “Well, this city isn’t going to save itself. We have to find everyone else, including the girls. They might know what’s going on” without missing a beat, Rhasta and Rubick entered the very heart of Canterlot under the guise of invisibility in hopes of finding the true cause behind of the invasion. Like a thief in the night, the two heroes stealthily made their way through the streets unseen and undetected by the buzzing invaders.

        After a couple minutes of running, Rubick and Rhasta found themselves on main street where the setting was eerily quiet and untouched by the changelings. For some reason, all of the buildings remained intact, and any stray pony that got caught, whether guard or civilian, were simply glued to the ground or the walls with some sort of sickly looking substance. The changelings around the area also looked dormant, they were standing watch for something as they guarded their prisoners.

“Why aren’t they doing anything?” Rubick quietly asked Rhasta as they walked down the street “This doesn’t look like a very efficient method of occupying a city. Also, no one appears to be hurt in any way. The insects only subdued the ponies. After the way they attacked us, I figured there would be at least some casualties, but so far, nothing too serious in regards to the well being of the ponies here”

“Maybe these insects are more than meets the eye? Who knows, maybe they’re not occupying the city either. Insects like these don’t normally have a structure of individuality, do they? Someone has to be in charge” said Rhasta as he strolled down the street “They are like obedient soldiers now, waiting for their leader to command them”

“A queen then, perhaps?” Rubick replied “It sounds plausible. Most insect society usually has a queen within it. Although I can’t say much now unles-” Rubick stopped himself when he and Rhasta entered a part of the city that looked as if it was hit by an earthquake. It was entirely different in contrast to main street and that was only a block away.

All the buildings in the area were either partially damaged or had been completely leveled into the dirt. There were corpses of changelings everywhere, scattered around the destroyed area like dust in the wind. The changelings in this one particular area looked as if they all ran into a hurricane made out of knives and other sharp objects.

Some were beheaded, others bisected right down the middle. Many were missing several of their limbs while others appeared to have had grotesque bite mark on them by a predatory mammal of sorts.

“Oh dear, these poor creatures” Rubick said as he and Rhasta carefully trekked through the ruins of a Canterlot street corner “They may be all over the city, but they don’t deserve this”

“I do not believe that the guard could’ve have done this. Even if there were a hundred guardsmen it is not possible to cause this much destruction” said Rhasta as he examined one of the changeling corpses “My guess, it would take only one powerful individual” said Rhasta as he and Rubick looked at each other with a look realization before uttering one word.

        “He must be near here, and Jackal as well” said Rubick “I mean, who else could make a bite mark this nasty?” he pointed to a changeling with a large chunk of his abdomen missing “We must be heading in the right direction. Quickly Rhasta! Follow the trail of bodies!” Rubick exclaimed before the two set off again, following a pathway that was lined with the dead.

        The trail of destruction that Sven left behind spanned for about four city blocks of demolished buildings and more changeling corpses. How they were ever going to explain all of this to the princesses once it was all over was a question that the two heroes didn’t want to answer. As they continue to run down the road, a loud childlike scream echoed throughout the air as both of them attempted to find the location of the noise.

        “Say, isn’t that Spike?” said Rubick “Where is the little fella?” he asked. The two looked around but found nothing that even remotely resembled the purple and green dragon, yet the yell of abject terror only grew louder as the duo continued to find the source of Spike’s yelling. And then it hit them. With a slight tilt of their head, they managed to spot Spike who somehow flying through the air. The only problem with that picture was that he didn’t have any wings.

        “Hold on little one! I got you!” Rhasta shouted as he broked his invisibility to rescue the poor drake from landing flat on his face. With a bright glow from his wards, he brought forth his shackles to leash Spike from out of the air. As the bright yellow electrical tethers gently caressed the dragon in it’s tingly embrace, Rhasta pulled with all of his might and yanked the little guy right onto his back with acrobatic precision “Aha! Success!”

“Buwuah! What happened!?” Spike shouted as he struggled to maintain his frazzled nerves “Rhasta? How did you get here?” he asked.

“Oh, he’s not the only one who’s here, Spike” said Rubick as he uncloaked himself “I’m here as well”

“Whoa, how’d you do that?” Spike asked, all remnants of his previous bout of terror disappeared in a flash when he was met with the Grand Magus.

“Never mind that now. Spike, how did you end up in the sky?” Rubick asked.

“Well... that’s not really important now!” Spike exclaimed as he became incredibly nervous again “Monsters are attacking the city! We have to stop them and help the girls find the elements of harmony so that we can banish the changeling queen!”

“Easy there little one, start from the beginning. What exactly happened at the wedding? ” Rhasta asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Princess Cadence isn’t Princess Cadence!” he shouted “She’s been kidnapped by some evil changeling queen!”

“A what?” Rubick asked.

“A changeling! The monsters that are attacking the city!” Spike exclaimed “They can change into other ponies and impersonate them!”

“Hmm, that explains a lot of what we’ve been seeing actually” said Rubick “But these creatures aren’t particularly evil as they are naturally violent. If this invasion is really a command from this queen, then why attack at all?”

“Huh?” Spike replied with a confused expression “What do you mean?”

“Listen closely, if these changelings can impersonate someone. Why would they risk exposing who they are by engaging in an all out invasion” Rubick explained.

“I’m not sure that I follow you” Spike replied with a scratch of his head.

“Spike, these changelings managed to successfully impersonate Princess Cadence without anyone noticing, correct?” Rubick asked as Spike nodded in return “Then think about it, the changeling had the power to destroy Canterlot from the inside out, without leaving so much as a trail behind. Doesn’t it sound strange that these creatures of deception would compromise their own secrecy by revealing themselves?”

“Actually, somepony managed to see through their disguises and expose the queen’s plot” said Spike.

“Really now? What kind of pony would outright expose a woman's rear at a wedding?” said Rhasta with a disapproving shake of his head “How shameful, even my master would never stoop as so low as to commit such a heinous deed”

“Wha.... no, no, no. You got it all wrong. The pony exposed her plan” said Spike with an exasperated sigh “Her plan to take over Canterlot! Come on! We gotta hurry!”

“ *Sigh* fine, if you insist. Although Rhasta and I still find this whole whole invasion to be a bit fishy” said Rubick as he conceded to the words of the baby dragon “Well then, Spike. Where do you think we should head off to?”

“The bridge nearby where the wedding’s being held is our best bet. Last I checked, the girls were headed to the chamber to find the elements before I uh... I got flung here” Spike said rather meekly. Both Rubick and Rhasta gave Spike a brief stare before chuckling with an amused look on their faces.

“You were... flung here?” Rubick asked with a raised eyebrow “Oh, do tell!” Rubick teased.

“Ugh! Long story short, a changeling tackled Twilight on the side of the bridge and I got knocked off. Somehow, I fell atop an old catapult and got flung all the way over here. Anyway, that’s how I ran into you two” He explained as he covered his red face “Look, let’s just forget about how I got here. We have a city to save!”

“My, my. That is quite the story my little dragon friend. Very well, we’ll fly on over there. Please wait for a bit” Rubick replied nonchalantly with a shrug of his shoulders.

Spike’s mood quickly shifted from embarrassment to joy in an instant as he was about to save the day alongside the heroes, something that he rarely gets to do since Twilight and her friends always dismiss him from their adventures. His thoughts of a heroic rescue was thoroughly interrupted however, when he finally took in all of Rubick’s words.

“Wait, we’re going to fly there?” he asked “How?” he asked as Rubick walked out into a clearing and began to charge his magic. Spike was confused at first, but was interested as Rubick began to glow a bright green “Huh? What’s going on?

“Pay close attention little one” said Rhasta as he placed his hoof on Spike’s shoulder “This will be quite the show” he said with his signature grin “It is going to be great!”

Rubick gently swayed his staff to and fro, a bright green glow illuminated from his staff as an eerie green smoke flowed from the tip of his staff. Rubick waved his staff around some more, each subsequent motion more vigorous and powerful than the last. The green smoke then came to life and began to wrap itself around Rubick’s form, engulfing him in a thick cloud of magical essence.

The cloud then expanded into a miniature fog, yet there appeared to be something giant moving in the mist. It was hard to see, Spike had to squint his eyes just to make out the most basic of shapes in the haze. Soon, a low growl could be heard in the fog, followed by the cool blue glow of biting Ice. Spike’s heart was racing at a thousand miles an hour as he continued to stare at the fog. He could feel something powerful moving in there, something wild, something familiar...

        An earth shaking roar bellowed from the mist. A long stream of ice filled the skies causing freezing winds and light hail to overtake the clearing. Two massive wings flared up from out of fog and took off, leaving behind a powerful gust of wind in it’s wake. From out of the fog, a massive dragon with aquatic blue scales rose into the air, majestically soaring through the sky before diving down and hovering just above the two excited individual.

        Rubick had just assumed Sir Davion’s elder dragon form, the body of the legendary eldwurm, Slyrak. He was a massive four legged dragon, roughly around several meters in length, with a wingspan that was was the equivalent to his body from head to tail. He was a tad smaller in comparison to Sir Davion’s dragon form, but the amount of power that Rubick could draw upon was about the same.

        “Well, what do you think?” Rubick asked without a change to his voice.
        
Spike was speechless, his mind had literally imploded within his tiny noggin after witnessing an awesome transformation of such magnitude. His breathing stopped, his pupils dilated before he fell over and slammed his face into the ground. He was out cold from seeing Rubick go from being an average run of the mill unicorn into a massive noble dragon from his wildest dreams.

With every ounce of willpower left in his subconscious, he straighten himself up and broke out of his awe induced stupor. This was too good of an opportunity to remained passed out on. He struggled to let so words out, but only air and small sparks left his mouth. He found that his tongued had tied itself into a knot and he couldn’t speak properly. The only thing that could be heard from him was:

“Abububuahuahau......” he babbled on with a spastic twitch in his left eye as Rhasta broke out into a fit of jovial laughter.

“Ah ha ha ha! What did I tell you little one! Is it not great?” Rhasta shouted at the top of his lungs “Hop aboard, Spike. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity” he said as he climbed on Rubick’s back “Well don’t just stand there, there’s an invasion going on and it’s up to you to save Canterlot!”

“Yes, we don’t have to time to dilly dally” Rubick spoke with his usual voice, which was hilariously unfitting for a dragon of his stature “Come now, just climb upon my wing and ride on my back. We’ll get to the bridge in no time”

Spike had the biggest grin on his face, perhaps the biggest in all of existence even when compared to Pinkie Pie. With a childlike squeal, he quickly climbed aboard and struck a pose atop Rubick’s head.

“Alright, let’s do this!” Spike exclaimed with great vigor as the three ascended into the blackened sky and towards the bridge on the horizon “Whoo! This is the best! And worst... day of my life!”

        The flight towards the bridge wasn’t particularly a long one, however, it was filled with various obstacles in the form of attacking changelings. It was a bumpy ride, but Rubick and Rhasta managed to successfully defend themselves from the swarm long enough until the bridge came into view.

        “Hey look! There’s Twilight!” Spike shouted “And there’s Rainbow Dash, Aiushtha, Fluttershy, and Sven, and Rarity! And... Rainbow Dash?”

        “Spike, didn’t you already say, Rainbow Dash?” Rubick asked as he drew closer to the bridge.

        “No, really. Look! There’s like twenty Rainbow Dashes and thirty Applejacks down there!” Spike pointed out on the ground.

To Rubick and Rhasta’s surprise, a massive battle was being held right below them. And everyone else was caught right in the center of it all with various duplicates squaring off against each other in perhaps the confusing fight ever. More confusing than running through Ish’kafel’s wall of replica over and over again with Azwraith and Meepo on their respective team.