This story is a fan-fiction of MLP:FiM. I don't own any of it. It belongs to Hasbro, etc, etc.
Don't sue. Seriously. That would be so uncouth.
Chapter 5
After ten minutes and three turns through some hallways, Dagger and I stood in a square, metal box of a room with the other eight members of Puck Unit. Each of them had saddle bags, scarfs, and goggles on them. Luckily, we had been handed the same desert apparel, but we were also given the packs too. I quickly realized why each Lunar Soldier looked tough as I put my saddle bag on. Simply put, those bags were heavy, and I guessed they must have carried things much heavier than them because of the ease on their faces when they walked around with them on.
Soon, though, their jovial chatting ended at a quick command from Butterscotch. The whole unit assumed positions, which was to form a large circle in the middle of the room. They put Dagger and I into the center and I awkwardly stood there, shifting the weight on my hooves from the added saddle bags and my original ones. One of the twins, Nova, cast a glance over his shoulder and snorted at the sight of me dancing around, trying to get used to the weight.
“Bear with it, Bambino. The weight isn’t going away in the desert.”
“Yeah, it’ll probably be worse.” Sunburst chimed in with an evil smile. “Twenty bits says he gives it off after the first night.”
“Twenty bits says that he lasts to the second afternoon and then collapses.” Nova replied, mirroring the same smile as they shook hooves, making me bristle at their bet. Before I could answer though, I felt a gentle claw on my withers. I looked to see Dagger’s icy-white claw resting on me calmly. His eyes looked over the heads of the ponies in front of us and I saw Luna walking towards us with her horn glowing and her eyes glazed over with magical power.
“Good luck my Battalion. Ready yourselves for deployment.” She said, her voice magnified by magic.
The room lit up and we were gone.
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I opened my eyes just to throw a hoof into the air to block the sun from shining into them. The heat of the desert assaulted me from all sides, making the sun seem a lot less of a happy sight and more of a death bringer as I was able to catch a glimpse of the terrain around us. No green for miles. I already started to pant just imagining water.
“Let’s move.” I heard Butterscotch command, Puck Unit moving already towards the large mountain that loomed in the distance. My spirits rose as I saw it. Only a few days and I would be there and out of all this…combative stuff. How hard could it be? All I had to do was endure for a few days…
It soon became apparent I was way over my head. I was panting and sweating profusely even through the uniform, which was magically cooled. The heat and the sand were definitely effecting me, but my goggles and scarf protected me from the brunt of it. What was really getting to me was that I was ready for this sort of labor. Back home, I never had to do this sort of stuff, and if I had to do any “heavy lifting” or anything that really required labor, I would use my earth magic. I wasn’t completely out of shape though; I did still participate in games and other things like mage competitions. But I mostly used my magic for those too. Let’s just say the walking made me realize I could get sweat in places I never thought possible.
By the end of the day, I was soaked in my own sweat, but we didn’t end there. As the moon rose into the sky, we still pressed on. We walked further and further into the night and the desert became cold and harsh. I lost my footing on the sands often as my eyes became bleary and my body worn with tiredness. Each time I fell to the sand, the next soldier behind me would pick me up and force me to trudge on while Dagger tried to stay by my side. The single-file line we were traveling in made it easy for Dagger and I (who were in the middle) to be helped by any soldiers behind us, but it made it hard for us to talk to anyone further up in the line than us. So, I fell to the soft ground and gasped air in happiness when we stopped near a large rock-outcrop before the break of day.
Puck Unit got busy making small fires, meals, passing around the canteens, and rolling out sun-reflective beds near the rock. From what I heard on the ground and while I was drinking as Dagger helped me to some water, we would be staying there for most of the next morning, moving again near nightfall. I sighed and pulled myself up unsteadily and hobbled over towards where the rest of the Unit was, eating and conversing around a large communal fire.
However, my footing gave out once again and I fell short. I was pulled up into a sitting position before I could pull myself up and found myself face to face with Butterscotch. She looked into my eyes deeply and gave a small sort of half smile, half grimace.
“Well,” she said, a note of respect growing in her voice, “it looks like you made it through day one…but not without a lovely case of sun stroke. That and the walking is why you are so dizzy right now.” She explained, sitting down near me and pulling a few items out of her saddle bags. She procured a few gems, ones that I recognized as fire rubies and tried to make them react with a starter topaz, unsuccessfully.
“Watch out.” I whispered in warning, my voice dry and throat ragged. But she heard me and pulled her head away as I closed my eyes and connected to the earth and then to the gems. I could feel the flames inside of them wanting to come out, wanting to breathe and live again, so I just gave them a slight push. A gentle “oh” from Butterscotch told me my magic had worked. I sleepily opened my eyes to see a Butterscotch that didn’t seem any different, but her eyes told me she was impressed.
“Like it?” I asked quietly as I saw Dagger heading over towards us with a canteen and a plate of undiscernible food.
“I know your record, you know? Born March 21, nineteen years ago to Cinder Steelhooves and Rowan Root Steelhooves. Named in the fashion of your mother’s family, raised as an only child with your ‘brother’ Dagger D'Inferno, started magical training at age five, won the Equestrian Junior Mage competition at age eight, won the International Junior Mage competition at age twelve, Beat Grand Master Mage Arcus at age sixteen in an unregulated fight-deemed ‘untrue.’”
“That was just because the old bastard kept denying he lost.” I said angrily, making my throat hurt even more. Luckily, Dagger had arrived by my side. I took the canteen from him with an appreciative nod, he being quite as not to be rude.
“But that was right after you left your parent’s home at age fifteen. I find that pretty amazing to be able to do all that without any help.” She said animatedly, surprising me. I guess she was a fan of the Mage Competitions under all that serious military gruff. Huh. Everypony has their vices, I guess.
“Don’t ever say that.” I answered, my throat hurting less and my voice regaining its sound after a draught of water. I had used a little of my magic to keep a thin sheet of water on my vocal chords to keep them from chafing any more. “Dagger was with me the whole time. I would have never done any of it if it wasn’t for him…well, that and that Arcus was a jerk. But Dagger was the only one who could have convinced me to even go to the Academy. I don’t think I need it, but he does.” I said with a roll of my eyes.
“Why is that?” Butterscotch asked, a touch of worry in her voice.
“Because he believes he must cut all ties with his family.” Dagger cut in. “But that does not mean I will let him ruin his future for some feud, no matter how large or small it is.”
“Ah.” Butterscotch said, looking back to the fire with a look of comprehension on her face. However, there was also a look of something else I didn’t like: pity.
“So what about you?” I said snarkily towards her, targeting the wrong pony with my anger. “You know all about me, but all I know is that you’re the ‘great commander’ of the Puck Unit.”
Butterscotch looked up from the fire at me with her earlier stoic look. “That’s all you need to know.” She said evenly, getting up from where she was sitting. “You should eat and get some rest. We leave in twelve hours. It sounds like a lot, but it isn’t.” She looked off to the eastern horizon at the signs of the coming sun and she left us to talk to her soldiers.
“You didn’t have to be that way.” Dagger said.
“You saw the way she looked after you told her that!” I answered angrily back to him.
“Yes. Yes. Now eat up. We need to hit the sack in all of ten minutes.” He said looking back to the soldiers who were cleaning up and getting ready to nap.
“What about you?” I asked in between mouthfuls of crappy military food. But food it was and I was hungry.
“I can wait until the mountain before I go hunting. It’s been such a long time since I had something fresh from the desert.” He said with a lick of his chops. I laughed and reminded myself that sometimes my brother had to be a dragon too. However, he did grab the empty starter topaz and flick it into his mouth.
I quickly finished my meal, put the fire rubies out and into my bag, and then walked off in the direction of where everypony else was going: the sleeping rolls in the cover of the rocky outcropping. As I reached my bag and got into it, I slowly started to drift off. Right before I feel asleep, I saw a lovely silhouette in the rising sun. I knew it was Butterscotch, but now I felt something more than just affection for her; I also felt a certain animosity too. I didn’t want it to be like that, but she didn’t know what it was like living with my family. She didn’t know anything about it.
I fell asleep and had waking dreams throughout the whole time I should have been sleeping.
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The next night passed in the same fashion, the members of Puck Unit trudging ahead of me, I panting and struggling until we came to rest. Only this time, they didn’t allow me to collapse into the soft and welcoming sand. Instead, Grey Tail picked me up by my uniform and carried me over to the rest of the unit who were standing next to a large sand dune.
“We need you to form that dune into cover for the night.” Butterscotch commanded in a strangely gentle tone. I couldn’t see her as Grey had dropped me back into the sand and I didn’t have enough strength to raise myself. Yet, Butterscotch’s tone told me she knew this and it pained her to ask me to do something like this. Empathy rushed into my heart, but memories from the night before dammed them. I felt confused and sick and trying to do something like using my magic at this point felt like it would kill me.
“You are an Earth Mage, right?” asked some unknown member of the Unit as I laid in the sand. His remark made the members around him laugh and sending just the right amount of anger into my body to let it react with the other emotions of confusion I was feeling. I let it well up within me and I connected to the earth, shifting the dune into a hardened sand wall. The Unit went silent, but I wasn’t done there. I felt where the member that ridiculed me had spoke and I made the sand trap him in an upright coffin of sand, only his head poking out from the trap. He yelled in surprise and the others around him reacted, trying to free him from the sand, but they stopped as they saw me get up and stagger over to him. The whole unit was quiet as I spoke to the scared unicorn I had trapped.
“I am and Earth Mage.” I said to him, glaring into his scared eyes. “And much more.” I threatened with a jab of my hoof, before I threw up all over him and fell to the ground, my world suddenly becoming black.
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“Wake up.” Dagger said to me as he rolled me around in the sand. I was brought back from unconsciousness, but also back to a throbbing pain inside of me. I waved a hoof around in his direction giving him the signal to stop, but I didn’t move after he did so. I just laid there in the sand and tried to focus on breathing and why I felt so bad. It was the strangest ill-feeling I had ever gotten and I had been plenty sick before. Not only did I feel nauseous and queasy, but I also felt like something inside of me was…off. As I tried to get up, a barb of pain shot through me, leaving me on the ground again, ready to vomit.
“Are you alright?” Dagger asked, clearly worried.
“No.” I panted in answer. “I…I don’t know what’s wrong.”
“Can you at least get up?” Dagger said calmly, alleviating my growing panic.
“I could if the ground would stop shaking.”
“The ground isn’t shaking.”
“Yes it is.” I answered back sharply. “Don’t you feel it? It’s far away, but it’s getting…” I trailed off, realizing that I wasn’t feeling the ground shaking.
“RUN! RUN!” I started screaming, my adrenaline helping me get up, albeit being unsteady. Suddenly, the whole camp was all staring at me.
“RUN!” I repeated frantically. Butterscotch came over to me and put a hoof on my shoulder.
“Calm down and tell me what’s going on.” She said evenly to me.
I grabbed her face between my hooves, clearly catching her off guard. “I…I don’t know what it is, but something is coming, and fast! We need to run! It…it is evil, that much I can tell from what the earth tells me, but we need to leave! NOW!” I ranted and screamed, her face going from surprise to a mask of realization. She quickly pulled away from me and turned to her soldiers.
“Leave the camp, grab any essentials, we’re out of here yesterday, understood?” she commanded. The Lunar Soldiers saluted her and then started moving quickly. She turned back to speak to me quickly.
“I knew he would find us, but this…this was too soon.” She said grimly, making my heart race in fear. Him. The Mountain King. He had found us, found me, and was coming. We still had at least a few miles to the mountain looming in the distance and at the speed he was going, we wouldn’t make it.
“We’re not going to make it.” I said, my voice becoming a harsh whisper. “We’re all going to die.” I panicked. Luckily, Dagger was there.
“Yes we will.” He said confidently. “You forget I am a dragon, and not just any dragon, brother.” He said as he walked away from us. He tossed his spectacles back at me only to have them land in the sand at my hooves. He stood thirty feet away from me and smiled at me with a victorious look in his eyes. “I am a dragon of the Inferno Clan.”
He roared and his small body started to ripple, changing as he grew in size. His iceberg-like spines grew long and razor-sharp, his claws becoming the size of long swords and his thin arms and legs growing until they were thicker than tree-trunks. His body became massive and his tail became a barbed, coiling whip of death. He grew until the distance he walked away from us was nothing, as his increase in size made him just inches away from us.
“Puck Unit,” He rumbled, “Climb on. I will cover the distance in this dire situation.” His icy blue eyes rolled over the stunned soldiers and he snorted a gout of golden flame as he became impetuous.
“Well, what are you waiting for you fools? The Mountain King is neigh upon us!” he said as he lowered his left side and extended his two legs out in the sand, allowing the soldiers to board his radiant white scales. As they clambered onto his back, I grabbed his spectacles and held onto them tightly, poking the stunned Butterscotch to grab her attention.
“We should get going.” I said around the spectacles held firmly, yet gently, in between my teeth. She just nodded in a daze and followed me as I slowly walked up Dagger’s massive front leg and sat between his shoulder blades.
“Is everyone holding on tightly?” he asked, a note of humor in his voice.
“Let’s hope so.” I answered with the same chuckle.
“Ok…” he said as he started off slowly, everypony grabbing onto a spine that went down Dagger’s back as he started to walk. He then broke into a run for us, a trot to him really, but then started leaping and running across the sandy dunes in a long and eased gait. We were covering ground quickly and I laughed as I saw Puck Unit grab onto the spines tighter. I saw as the mountain became closer and closer and I relaxed, looking around and then over to Butterscotch, who had turned pale, and laughed.
“What? Never rode on a dragon before?” I asked playfully.
She was about to answer, but her eyes went wide. “WATCH OUT!” she screamed as a pillar of stone erupted from the ground and knocked Dagger square in the chest. We all went flying and I quickly connected to the sand, so that all of us were caught in a gentle bed of the stuff. However, our attacker saw what I was doing and quickly attacked, using my own maneuver against me. I didn’t know where the Mountain King was, but I knew it was his magic, because only he could even stand a chance to control the earth as I did.
He trapped about half of the Unit in my beds of sand and then turned them into coffins. The sand closed in on the surprised ponies and their screams told me that the constricting monster the sand was had also become their graves. I managed to save the rest of the Unit, only a unicorn I didn’t know, Grey Tail the timberwolf, the Blast twins, and Butterscotch. I raced over to Dagger and stood by his side, close to his body as I wondered in fear where this monster was attacking from.
Earlier, when I didn’t know who this freak was and was in a bad mood, I didn’t care what could happen. But now…now that I knew what he was capable of, now that I saw him kill ponies I had shared meals with not long ago, ponies that I knew were trained soldiers, I shook with fear. As I saw some sand shift in the moonlight, I launched attack after attack of earth magic. After I had settled down, sand drifted down from the heavens like snow in the middle of winter. It suited too, because I was freezing cold with fear and panic. Slowly, I heard shouting. I turned my head to see that it was Dagger and Butterscotch.
“…STOP!”
“ALDER, STOP!”
“Or just wet yourself while I kill your friends.” Said a powerful voice as my eyes widened and I saw him, or rather we all did, as he appeared out of nowhere in the midst of us. We all jumped back and readied to fight. Instead of making the first move, he simply smiled, his eyes grey from the use of his dark magicks. He lifted a hoof and we all tensed, but nothing happened, until we all saw the sand near his hooves rippling. At first I expected nothing, but then fear and revulsion set in as it came out of the sand.
Up rose the form of a pegasi wearing a Lunar Uniform. He was part of the group that was killed by the sand, but for some reason, he was kept intact, even though it was clear from the way his limp body moved in the sand and the way his neck was angled that he was dead. The Mountain King smiled as he knew this fact and saw all of us looking at him in fear. He made the pegasi (Thundershot, I think he was called) and one of his eyes turned black as he touched the pony. Viciously, Thundershot’s eyes opened with a start, only they were glazed over. The Mountain King cackled madly as the other Lunar Soldiers rose from the shifting sands and their once-dead bodies awoke with starts.
“Kill your friends.” He said happily as they rushed us. He simply stood back with Thundershot and walked around to his back. His horn glowed red and Thundershot’s wings were illuminated in a terrible, red aura. With a sickening crunch, the wings were ripped from his body and then floated above the Mountain King. I felt sick as I saw him magically fuse the wings onto himself with evil magic. I couldn’t focus for long though, as unknown unicorn-zombie attacked me.
I was about to fall to the zombie, my wits lost in the moment, but Dagger was there to swipe him away with his claws. The zombie was torn to ribbons, but it wasn’t done yet. Even as it was dead, it somehow still had control of its magic, obviously a power granted by the Mountain King. It sent a wave of electricity at me, but again, Dagger stopped it by shielding me. He growled at the pain, but flipped me onto his back with a deft turn of the head.
“WE’RE LEAVING!” he shouted amidst the battle, the remaining living members of Puck Unit hearing him and running to his side.
“You think I’ll just let…” the Mountain King started, but Dagger inhaled a deep breath and roared at him, sending the zombies tumbling backwards with nothing but the strength of his voice. The Mountain King stayed where he was and tried to say some villainous rebuke, but Dagger cut him off again, inhaling once more. This time, as he breathed, he breathed the flames a dragon of the Inferno clan should: Hellfire.
The Mountain King rolled around on the sand in agony as the fires burned at his body and soul. It was impossible to put out Hellfire without having the owner of the flames put them out for you, so Dagger simply turned around and sprinted towards the mountain. I hoped this would be the last time we saw the Mountain King, but I knew subconsciously that this thought was a lie. He would be back, but I didn’t expect him to attack so soon.
We were about a mile away from the base of the mountain and I could feel the magical barrier coming upon us. It felt like a giant bubble of strong magical aura. We were yards away from it when a wall of sand erupted in front of us, trying to block the path. I opened a hole in it, but golems made of hard sand and the bodies of the fallen soldiers were upon us. Soon, we were fighting hoof and claw against the monsters. I barely managed to escape from an attacking golem, mainly because I was able to make its legs become less stable and regain its natural state. However, this allowed me to get out of the middle of the melee…and right towards the Mountain King. He smile was that of a cat trapping a mouse and I certainly felt like one, even though he was still shorter and much lankier than I, due to his stolen body. His horn glowed red and his eyes flared black.
“Hello Steelhooves. Prepare to die.” He said as he flared his stolen wings, a strange pair of sunny yellow on a coat of blue.
Before he could attack, I threw everything I had at him. Waves of sand assaulted him, rocks blasted through the ground up at him, and great quakes in the earth tried to swallow him whole. However, he brushed these attacks aside and strode closer and closer to me, his eyes becoming darker and darker. I suddenly felt myself shrink in his presence and I could feel as his mental attack brushed against my psyche. While it couldn’t take over me, it certainly could transfer his thoughts to me. What tortures he imagined for me…they were worse than being taken over and being his puppet, though that idea caused him a great deal of happiness.
“Ready to die?” he asked me mentally.
“NO!” roared a behemoth from behind me as the Mountain King was again engulfed in hellfire. As he rolled away in agony, Dagger picked me up in his paw and threw me over to the rest of Puck Unit, all of which were heading towards the barrier. As I sailed through the air, I felt two pairs of hooves catch me, and knew the Blast brothers had me. That didn’t calm me though.
I saw the broken golems below near Dagger. I also saw the gouge marks he made in the desert from his attacks. But what held my view was the Mountain King rising from the sand, the hellfire disappearing into his horn with some arcane magic. He snarled at Dagger and then glared at me. Dagger took this moment to charge.
Swinging left and right, slashing the air, the Mountain King, and the Mountain King’s attacks, Dagger was a veritable weapon of destruction. I could feel the attacks from the air and I watched in horror as Dagger’s attacks landed but did very little damage. The Mountain King understood this too, so each nick and slice he made on Dagger had a lasting effect. Soon, Dagger was bleeding profusely from many slashes and cuts and he panted deeply.
I tried to fight against the brothers’ hold, but as soon as I started, they flew faster. I was torn by the distance between me and my brother in need, but a strange feeling combated that. I felt like I had just walked under a waterfall, only the “water” scoured through my innards. The brothers felt this too, and landed a short distance from the inside of the barrier, leaving me to get up and walk towards the edge, towards my brother, towards my only family.
But fate, and a giant timberwolf, had different ideas. I was tackled to the ground by Grey Tail, who held me inside the barrier as I watched the ongoing fight in terror. Dagger had fallen to the ground, a gaping wound in his left leg caused by some sort of dark attack. The Mountain King strode up to him and channeled his dark energy into his horn. Soon, an orb of crackling, evil magicks was at the tip of his horn and he pointed it straight at my brother. He fired and Dagger was hit. He erupted in light and shockwaves of power raced out of where his body had been, throwing the Mountain King backwards and making the barrier become visible for naught but a second.
Minutes passed as my broken mind tried to take in what had just happened. But my slow comprehension was stolen from me as I saw the Mountain King rise from the ground, bloodied, his flesh burned off in various places, and his insane smile glaring right at me. I screamed once and became even more insane than he was.
The ground shook with my rage, causing the desert to undulate like the sea. Flames and gouts of superheated water blasted out of the ground, simultaneously boiling and burning the Mountain King as Grey Tail was tossed from me. I galloped on the moving earth, the kamikaze wind I had somehow summoned helping my speed. Soon, I was upon him, cutting him in so many places, rending his body asunder, creating the same fear inside of him as he had inside of me. In little time, I made him nothing more than tatters of flesh and bone. I saw the fear in his eyes, but I also saw something else: sick enjoyment. His eyes laughed at my rage, my pain, and all my sadness, which made me just attack him all the more.
A blast of magic sent me flying away from him. Only when I regained my footing did I realize I was bleeding from my left shoulder, the muscle being torn from the magical blast. I snarled at the Mountain King and his smoking horn. He laughed even harder as his eyes both turned black with runes and his horn was covered in the demonic scriptures. I ran at him as he turned to ash, leaving nothing more than a chaotic laugh on the winds. I looked to the ground and saw a soul stone, glinting in the moonlight as it teleported away.
I howled my fury to the desert night and then walked back to the rest of Puck Unit. My adrenaline and powers slowly faded as I walked and my blood-loss and that same sickening feeling came back to me overwhelming me as I passed through the barrier. I fell to my knees and threw up repeatedly onto the sand, only dimly hearing the cries, shouts, and discussions of the lunar soldiers. I fell onto my front, only barely falling to my side as I realized I had something hooked upon the neck of my uniform. I wearily reached down and unhooked Dagger’s spectacles from my uniform, tears springing to my eyes as I held them gently. I cried and was sick and cried and was sick until I felt a gentle hoof on my shoulder and a pulse of magic that was telling me to go to sleep. Overcome with emotion, sickness, and tiredness from my actions, I willingly obliged, hoping to escape from my pain in the darkness that rushed up to me.
I fell asleep in the warm embrace of somepony, or maybe the darkness. Of that I was unsure.