//------------------------------// // Chapter 10- Kelpie's Downfall // Story: The Beckoning of Nature // by Dragonborne Fox //------------------------------// Ponies and Q-hybrids once more started to scramble like there was no tomorrow. The reason? A giant stone unicorn marched right through towns, cities, forests and the like. Her destination? The Palace of Nature. ---- Shining Armor and Cadence were trotting happily back to their spare room of sorts. The whole while they were chatting like they were newlywed all over again. Chrysalis trotted alongside them also, occasionally throwing in her two bits. Suddenly, everything shook, but not like one earthquake. No, a series of small, rhythmic earthquakes, each only lasting about a split second before the next. "Again?" Chrysalis hissed. "Seems like." Shining sighed, rolling his eyes. Suddenly, the Elements of Nature ran past them, with Koto trailing behind. She however caused the couple and the Changeling Queen to spin in circles when she ran past. Their spinning in place lasted about three seconds before they stopped altogether. "I'm so dizzy...." Shining said, his eyes spinning in their sockets. "Me too....." Cadence replied, holding a hoof to her head. "The world is spinning......" Chimed Chrysalis, whose wings were buzzing. ---- "Who is THAT?!" Tenmei asked as he saw the giant stone beast approach the Palace. "Rocks. Wavy mane. Changeling goo. Unicorn. Hmm, let me take a wild guess." Yuuki said. "I know! I know! Vulnerable to wind!" Nagare shouted like a preschooler before taking flight. "Might as well follow the leader." Rekka said as he launched off the balcony like a bottle rocket. "Here we go again after ten bucking years." Koto hissed as she took off. Yuuki and Tenmei exchanged glances and simply shrugged before following suit. "Well, well! What have we here? A bunch of brats, that's what!" Shouted Kelpie, who was now more than pissed. "Your mother was a hamster and your father reeked of elderberries!" Shouted Nagare as his sword stabbed the stone beast. Despite it being huge and being forced into Kelpie's chest it did virtually nothing. "What?!" Shouted the green alicorn, who was now in panic mode. He kept trying to dislodge the sword, only for it to become stuck. "Looks like someone was reckless. Now, what was that about my mother and father?" Asked Kelpie as she merely flicked Nagare off his sword. "This does not look good." Tenmei murmured as he aimed his crossbow at the eyes of the beast. He fired fifteen consecutive bolts from the enlarged weapon. The beast stood there unblinking. She took the shots in the eyes without wincing! "Horseapples." Squeaked the tan alicorn. Kelpie flicked him off in the direction of the Gryphon Carnage. "Two men down! Koto, get your gears going!" Yuuki bellowed. Nagare had flown back to his sword and continued his fruitless attempts at prying the damn thing out. "Scratch that, one man down!" Yuuki hollered as her ball enlarged to behemoth proportions again. She kicked it where the bolts had landed, forcing them deeper into the beast's stony skull. The beast let off a yawn, then flicked Nagare and Yuuki in the direction of the Crystal Wreck. Yeah, this was not going anywhere. "Rekka. Aim for the mouth when she opens it." Koto said as her boomerang became huge. She threw it at the beast-- and the beast caught it mid-flight. "Awww. Even Water can't best me. You look so adorable. You know, it would be even better if Master made you his personal bitch before my eyes." The beast said before smacking Koto with her boomerang like it was a baseball bat. The blue alicorn plummeted into the ocean below, and the beast unceremoniously dropped the weapon as well as a sort of insult to injury. "KOTO! OKAY, THAT IS IT!" Rekka hissed as his gun enlarged to house-sized laser-firing monstrosity. "I'M TAKING YOU DOWN RIGHT HERE AND NOW!" "What are you--" The beast was cut off by a gun in her mouth. No, her weakness--! The laser attacked the insides of Kelpie's mouth. Her internal organs exploded from the inside out. Green blood rushed between all the crevices the rocks made in her body. A glowing orange-white peeked out in slim rays between the cracks in her skull. And then the coup de grâce: the stones making the entire body crumbled as though it were a landslide, with what made the head fly out in all directions. Yuuki, Tenmei, and Nagare had teleported next to Rekka to watch the spectacle. Each had re-obtained their weapons. But there was no sign of Koto. "Stay with the mare behind the stone statue. Koto's underwater!" Rekka shouted as he suddenly performed a peregrine dive into the cold ocean below. "What?!" The other three shrieked. ---- Rekka made a magic field of air around him so that he could explore the ocean. But there was a time limit to how long this bubble could last. He pushed the bubble down. He caught a glimpse of something falling deeper. He pushed onward. It was without a doubt Koto. "Koto!" Rekka cried in the bubble, continuing to go deeper into the ocean's depths. At last, he was at the bottom. On the sand bed lay the unconscious and quickly-dying Koto. Rekka pushed the bubble until he was just above her. He then levitated her with his magic into the bubble. He found the bubble was quickly being depleted of precious oxygen, and now it was too late to surface. At least, that's what he thought until he spotted another bubble approaching him. It contained..... Cadence? The bubbles merged together, forming an even bigger bubble. "Cadence!" Rekka shrieked. "We must surface now!" Cadence replied, helping her fellow alicorn push the bubble upwards. ---- "Pitiful........wouldn't you say so......brats....?" Saki coughed as blood escaped her mouth and nostrils. "To think.....I was.....beaten once more.....is there.....a light.....at the end......for ponies like you......?" "There may not be a light for us. Then again, the same is said about you, Saki. You've lost all hope." Tenmei replied. "Is....that so? When.....the Master.....comes around......you won't.......beat him....." Saki coughed as her eyes closed for the last time. A smile crept on her lips but stopped abruptly. Like Maki, her horn shattered into windswept dust and her corpse turned into stone, merging with the rock she was dragged onto. Strangely, she was dragged onto the rock Maki first petrified on as well via water. Suddenly, Rekka and Cadence emerged form the water nearby, both attempting to hoist a comatose Koto between themselves. "She needs medical treatment?" Asked Nagare. "Yeah, once we get out of the water!" Rekka replied.