//------------------------------//
// Manehattan burning 
// Story: Raining Metal 
// by thecakeisalie 
//------------------------------//

	Midnight’s horn was a covered in the deep black of magic, and had been for minutes. He was attempting a spell that fleshed skin and muscle together, but it wasn’t designed for massive wounds like the ones Rainbow had. The magic always focused on the worst wounds first, due to its design, so he was healing a ripped lung. Rainbow’s torn capillary had already been fixed, taking a shockingly massive amount of energy. It hadn’t even started to wear on him yet, but if all the wounds required that energy, he’d be dipping into the supernatural side of his powers before he’d finished. Shaking his head, flaring his nostrils, Midnight went back to work. He needed to concentrate; just to get to the point that med-packs would become useful would take more magic than anypony but himself, and maybe the goddesses of day and night, possessed. His body and Rainbows became encased in deep black as he redoubled his efforts.


Icescape levitated another piece of rubble, passing time. He was half way through crushing it with magic when a shout came from around the corner, followed quickly by an explosion. A horrific scream, a cross between a screech and a hiss, filled the air briefly. Icescape levitated his rifle onto the placement he and Applejack were behind, grabbing the yoke in his mouth. More explosions came from around the corner, then a rush of gryphons. Icescape bit down on the yoke at the same time he heard the machine guns open fire behind him. The Battle of Manehattan had reached the financial district. 


“Wait until they think they’re in the clear before jumping them,” Captain Thorn whispered into the walkie-talkie. He got nods and many a “Yes, sir,” in response. The gryphons walked and glided into Central Park, moving slowly, carefully, at first, but relaxing when nothing jumped them. A gryphon Major gave the ponies an unbelievable gift, calling for his troops to halt in the Park. Captain Thorn grabbed a rifle, supporting it with his fore hoofs, then sighting down the barrel; he focused on the gryphon Major. With a quick grin, he grabbed the gun’s yoke and opened up the firefight.


Twilight as the gryphon naval fleet made it towards the harbor, a sharp frown spreading across her muzzle. The harassment planned by General Ironhoof had only been partially successful, wounding some of the heavy cruisers, but not touching the smaller, faster ships, or the capital class Carriers and Destroyers. “Aim for the incoming ships,” she barked in a strangled voice to the gun operators. The smoke from the dock fires made this a difficult task, but they quickly complied; anticipating the order to load, unicorns loading armor-piercing rounds into the breaches of the big guns. “Fire,” Twilight’s voice had been brought under control; now it radiated complete calm. As the rumble of heavy artillery once again filled the air, Twilight picked up her binoculars with magic, waiting for the shells to hit home.


Multiple heavy armored divisions headed south, into Manehattan proper. Pinkie sat in her gun turret, hair flat, mouth already on her machine guns yoke, ready for whatever they encountered.
Farther back in the column were some Armored Personnel Carriers. The drivers had been instructed to stop at the hospital and pick up anypony trained as a field medic. That was how Rarity had come to be sitting in the back of an APC, saddle bags full of tourniquets, morphine, and other necessary medical supplies. Her stomach was doing flips, an unseemly terror hiding in her eyes.  


Fluttershy had watched Rarity being picked up and taken away to the battle field. She hid her head in her mane and trudged back to the on call room, waiting to do what wasn’t possible in the field. The bright lights of the hospital seemed obscene at such a time, but the white of the walls fitted the place well. 


Midnight finished stitching together Rainbows lungs and got to work on blood vessels. The tiny tubes took seconds to complete individually, allowing him to complete this task much quicker than the previous two. Taking a second, Midnight opened a med kit and found a small vial of hemoglobin; he injected it into Rainbows foreleg. Reigniting the magic, he took a swing at the last serious wound he could fix without shifting to a whole new spell. As the black aura of Midnight’s magic sank into Rainbow, her skin slowly started stitching together.
Midnight noticed as Rainbow’s breathing slowed dramatically. Good, all I have to do is fix the bones and she should live, he thought, relieved. A magic aura lit up his horn and pierced into Rainbows body, targeting broken ribs; when it receded, Midnight became aware that he hadn’t managed to fully heal her, inside or out. Blood was still leaking through small gashes in the pegasus’ chest. Worry ate away at Midnight as he debated the costs and benefits of teleporting Rainbow directly to a hospital, instead of attempting to fix her broken body with magic another time. The realization hit him that he couldn’t do anymore than he already had. He picked up rainbow gently, draping her across his back, and disappeared in a flash.


The gryphons wouldn’t stop pouring around the corner, and Icescape was running out of ammo. Getting fed up with the measly power of his gun, he chucked his extra ammo to Applejack, tapped into the magic, and used it to set a group of gryphons in the distance on fire. With a savage grin, he sent more pulses of magic into the oncoming swarms.
Applejack had stopped paying attention to Icescape as soon as gryphons had started moving towards their position. She bit down on the yoke of her gun again, sending another Gryphon spiraling to ground, a bloody hole in its chest. She was about to take down another enemy when a bright white orb flashed out from beside her, and exploded into flames, taking down her target, along with several others. “Ha!” The savage cry left her lips before she even realized she was making a sound. Applejack got the kind of look she’d had at the Iron Pony competition, getting back to work. Crack!  Another gryphon went down, this one missing part of its face.


The gryphon Major fell, a red stain spreading out from the dime sized hole in his chest. Captain Thorn kept grinning, even with the yoke in his mouth. Turning, he started shooting panicking gryphons at random. A deadly light sparked in his eyes, traces of madness clear in his joy. He was killing with joy, with a zeal that wasn’t natural. As the gryphons finally recovered enough to start trying to find targets, Thorn reloaded, switched to automatic, and let the bullets rip through those unfortunate enough to be in front of him, whether they were gryphons or ponies. He cackled as he reloaded yet again. One thought had managed to form in his head - Finally, he had a chance for revenge!


The armored unit found its way to the city center, and Central Park, right as gunshots rang out for the first time. Pinkie pulled her helmet on, checked her gun, and got into firing position. It was no party, but she would do her best anyways. After all, her friends were all depending on her. And so was just about everypony else. 
As the PT- 35 rolled around the corner, it was met by a scene much worse than hoped. Despite the initial slaughter the ponies had managed, the gryphons had managed to regroup and quite much of the resistance. A lone machine gunner was still hidden in the trees, as were some normal rifle men, but the gryphons were able to catch them one by one. Some they would just shoot, but occasionally, they would drag the poor pony out and rip him apart with their claws. Pinkie felt a rare rage coming over her as she swiveled her gun into position. Her first burst took out six unwary gryphons, leaving little of them behind. The rest of the force was alerted, but it was too late for those in the parks. Between the soldiers in the trees and the tank gunners, they were eliminated quickly. 
On a rooftop above, a gryphon scout waves on the incoming force. Hundreds of gryphons take to the air, rifles in claw, headed to Central Park. 


Midnight appeared outside the hospital, the magic glow retreating from around himself and Rainbow. He forced the sliding doors open with magic, saving perhaps a second, but time was critical. He’d forgotten how screwed up a body could get during a teleport, especially a damaged one. The gashes in Rainbows chest had opened back up some, and several of the veins and arteries he’d healed had burst again.
He marched into the hospital, blood leaking from Dash being absorbed by his coat. The nurses and doctors had stopped doing what they had been, mouths wide, with wide eyes. Grabbing a gurney with magic, Midnight deposited Rainbow face up. Taking a quick glance around, seeing all the medical staff frozen, he shook his head. “Is anyone here a surgeon?” He asked the question with force, making it sound more like a command than anything else. A red unicorn stepped up, nodding, and took the gurney from Midnight.
“All right,” the surgeon commanded, “get me some hemoglobin for the operation, and hook her up. I’m heading to OR #1, understand?” A quick nod from the nurses confirmed they’d heard him so far. One nurse took off, down the left hall, returning quickly with an IV and multiple bags of what looked to be blood. The surgeon headed back down the hall, still shouting orders. “I’m going to need stitches and some plastic tubing, I think it’d be smart to get a few unicorns who know how to keep a body in stasis in here, too, or else she’s going to bleed out before I can finish.” With that, the surgeon rounded the corner, disappearing deeper into the hospital, nurses and doctors following. 
A yellow Pegasus walked up next to Midnight, becoming even more timid than usual at the sight of blood all over him. “Umm… what happened? If you don’t mind telling me…” Fluttershy barely got the words out, and hid behind her mane.
Midnight couldn’t place her for a few seconds. When he did, he immediately had an internal struggle if he should tell her or not. Figuring she’d find out eventually, he looked her in the eye, despite her best attempts to shy away. “Gilda attacked us, Fluttershy. Well, her. She couldn’t react in time to defend herself.”
“Where is… Gilda?” Fluttershy started to back away from Midnight, slowly but surely. “If you’re ok with me asking…”
“I put her down, Fluttershy.” Midnight had to struggle to come up with terms that would make sense to Fluttershy, without upsetting her anymore, if that was even possible. Judging by the horror on her face, he guessed he must have failed horribly. Fluttershy gave a strangled squeak and sprinted away to whom knew where.


Icescape let another blast of white magic go. He was unleashing some incredibly powerful spells, and it didn’t seem to be doing much to stop the gryphons from advancing. He was sweating heavily, his ears were pressed flat against his head, his sides were heaving, and he still hadn’t put a stop to the waves of enemies. He knew he had to have killed at least ten with that last blast alone, but the holes he made were filled up seconds later. The ponies at the front had already been pushed back, at least those who had managed to retreat in time. The roofs had been held, but the pillbox had gone silent almost twenty minutes ago. The earth ponies had become useless, all but a very few having run out of ammo long ago. Now the unicorns unleashed magical assaults on the gryphons, and the earth ponies stood with knives in their mouths, ready for close combat.
The Major who had organized the defense had called in for Pegasus support almost an hour ago, but they had been denied. Apparently, all the pegasi still able to fly had been called to a major battle in Central Park. The artillery wasn’t willing to fire on the area, fearing they would hit the ponies on the ground. So it was that a handful of unicorns, a couple of wounded pegasi and many earth ponies waited for the inevitable end, all while watching the sun slowly slip below the horizon.


Captain Thorn left his hiding just as the first few gryphons came over the rooftops and rushed towards the ground. Before he could react, a machine gun roared out, taking them down. Good thing I just reloaded, Thorn thought to himself, else I’d be screwed. Then hundreds of gryphons flew over and around the buildings, some opening fire in the air, some streaking for the ground. 
Thorn laid himself on the blood soaked grass, steadied his gun with his fore hoofs, and opened fire on the flying terrors. He knew that without more support, the battle was hopeless, but it was his job to die for the country. Plus, he could deliver some hard vengeance on the race which had produced the creature that had killed his family. 
Focused as he was on suppressing the waves of gryphons, he didn’t notice the APCs enter the park and divulge the soldiers inside. As the remaining infantry from the battle in the park was joined by hundreds of fresh troops from other areas, the gryphon assault was slowed. The addition of tanks and their machine guns gave the infantry the ability to hold their positions, at least for the time. 
Pinkie sat in her turret, slowly moving her machine gun back and forth. She was fairly sure that every bullet took down another gryphon, or at least wounded them, there were so many of them. It wasn’t long before she ran out off ammo, having to take a second to reload. The second nearly cost Pinkie her life, but the gryphon aiming for her was taken out by an infantry soldier with a mad gleam in his eyes. Pinkie gave a shudder, hoping she never got like that, and got back to firing. The sun was only now starting to go down, and she’d been in the tank for half the day. She just wanted the battle to end.
Rarity made her way out of her APC, along with a few other combat medics and a large unit of infantry. She got her first case almost immediately, a soldier who had been jumped by a gryphon he’d thought dead. He’d killed the gryphon with a kick to the head, but not before getting a nasty beak slash along the left foreleg. Rarity cleaned out the wound, taped it up, and gave the unfortunate infantryman some pain pills, before heading off to the next case: a soldier who was still alive, despite having lost an ear and bleeding profusely on the red grass.


Luna looked up from the scenes of horror shown in the magic mirror. Taking a quick glance at her sister, she realized this wasn’t any easier on Tia than it was on herself. Lines creased Celestia’s normally smooth face, unnamed emotions played behind her eyes. “Should we help them, sister?” Luna asked, wondering privately if it would make a difference at this point.
“No,” Celestia answered wearily, “No, wait until night falls, then we will help wherever we can.”
“Yes, sister,” Luna replied, looking back to the mirror.