//------------------------------//
// Chapter 24 
// Story: The Adventures of Trixie if Her Father Was a Badass Alien 
// by totallynotabrony 
//------------------------------//

	Trixie faced off with Starburst in the belly of the ocean liner.  The two mares circled each other slowly.  Trixie held out the switchblade borrowed from her father, mindful that if she wasn’t careful Starburst might snatch it away.
The grey mare with the multicolored mane and ugly cape did not seem to be armed.  She also did not seem to mind that fact, and that worried Trixie.  Why was Starburst suddenly so intense, and, well, careful?  Her gaze remained fixed on Trixie’s blade, but her interest seemed to be more academic than anything pertaining to not being stabbed by it.
Trixie carefully adjusted her magic, floating the switchblade subtly away from herself.  She was going to have to time her ruse carefully to avoid Starburst catching on.  Positioning herself carefully, Trixie jerked the knife back and drove her forehoof forward, catching Starburst on the side of her face, over one of her tattoos.
Starburst stumbled and Trixie reversed her position, whipping her back legs towards her opponent.  One of her hooves hit the other side of Starburst’s face.
Taking advantage of Starburst’s off-balance stumble, Trixie lept forward and knocked the other mare to the deck, pinning her.
There was a brief struggle, but Trixie had the top.  Her wrestling effectiveness might have been much enhanced by having eight legs, but Trixie shrugged that idea off.  She pushed Starburst’s horn back, the tip touching the metal deck.  It was a trick Valiant had taught her, grounding a unicorn’s power.
While a pony like Twilight would have figured a way around it, rerouting energy or simply using more power than could be grounded, the maneuver was enough to keep Starburst at bay.
Trixie brought the switchblade close to Starburst’s throat.  A strike to the back of the neck through the spinal cord would be the quickest, cleanest way to kill her.  Rather than figuring out how to easily get Starburst on her back, however, Trixie swept her own cape out of the way to avoid getting blood on it and prepared to deal the final slice.
“Just give me the knife and I’ll never bother you again,” Starburst croaked from under Trixie’s hooves.
Against her better judgment, Trixie paused.  “What is so special about this knife?”
“It is not of this planet.”
Trixie frowned.  She knew she was getting distracted, but was nonetheless intrigued.  “What do you mean?  My father made this himself, out of scrap metal.”
Starburst shook her head as much as she could.  “No.  There’s only one thing that calls to me quite like that.  It has to be meteorite iron.”
“I don’t believe this,” Trixie shook her head.  “My dad never mentioned it before.”
Starburst quirked an eyebrow.  While her face still showed pain and slight suffocation, her point got across.  “Where did he find this supposed scrap iron?”
Trixie hesitated, dredging up an old memory. “At the bottom of a crater in the ground.”
“There you go.”  Starburst wiggled slightly, trying to gain a small bit of comfort in her uncomfortable position.
“And why do you know about meteors?” Trixie prodded.
“It’s kind of my job.  Does Starburst ring a bell?  I do lots of things in space.  This is my first time dirtside, though.”
Trixie blinked.  “Wait…you’re from outer space?”
“That’s right.  What’s your father’s name, by the way?  He may have been the one who I learned the directions to this planet from.”
Pausing for a long moment, Trixie finally gave the name.  “Valiant.”
Starburst nodded.  “Oh yes, him.”
A few seconds passed.  Starburst was not forthcoming, so Trixie demanded, “What about him?”
“Well, I kicked him out an airlock and that was the last I saw of him.”  Starburst shrugged.  “I rigged a nearby star to explode at about the same time.  The blast radius was so large I had to leave quickly.”
Trixie was frozen for a fraction of a second, but then she sprang into furious action.  She slammed Starburst’s head against the deck, cracking the other unicorn’s horn violently on the steel.  The tip broke off, drops of blood appearing, and Starburst screamed in pain.  Striking her again, Starburst fell unconscious.
Breathing hard through gritted teeth, Trixie got off Starburst, stripping the ugly cloak from her and tying it around her neck.  She unceremoniously dragged the limp mare through the ship, up ladders and along decks.  Her head lolled around and hit everything along the way.  Several minutes later, Trixie arrived on the main deck.
The night sky was clear tonight with lots of stars, but Trixie did not stop to admire them.  Walking over to the railing, she heaved Starburst overboard.
The full-body immersion of cold salt water seemed to wake her up.  Starburst sputtered and coughed, having evidentially swallowed some water.
Trixie yanked her back onto the deck and kicked Starburst in the face before she could recover.  She bent down.  “Tell me that my dad is all right.”
“Well-”  Starburst paused to nearly cough out a lung.  “It was a really big star explosion.”
“He’s survived blasts before.”
Starburst managed to look up.  “Have you ever seen a star explode?  Even when they aren’t going all supernova, every star out there is many times larger than this planet.  Hotter and more nuclear, too.”
“I’ll show you nuclear, bitch!”  Yanking her by the cape around her neck, Trixie dropped Starburst in the water again.  The salt only added to the apparent agony from her cracked, bleeding horn. 
Trixie began reaching deep within herself, to a place she didn’t like thinking about.  There was a reserve of very distinctive magic that she had not ever wanted to use since becoming reformed.  Oh, but it was going to get used now.
Pulling Starburst up the side of the ship again, Trixie pointed her horn at the drenched mare.  Her magic flashed green, different than its usual color.  Due to Cherenkov Radiation, it theoretically should have been blue, but this was magic radiation after all.  Trixie began to focus it, preparing to unleash as much power as she could muster directly at Starburst.
And that was when Trixie became aware of so many other ship passengers watching her little performance in shock.  She glanced backwards and her heart jolted as she realized that her legs had doubled.  Trixie had lost control, and her original objective of killing Starburst quietly had long since gone out the window.
She put Starburst down on the deck, where the battered mare lay, her only movements to cough up more seawater.  Trixie glanced around, spotting security ponies on their way.  “Uh, thank you all for attending Madam Trixie’s Incredible Improv Magic Show!  Refunds are available in the ship’s ticket office.  Have a good evening and thank you for attending.”
Trixie backed up until her extended hindquarters bumped into a bulkhead.  Then she trotted as fast as she could for her cabin.