Amor stood before his soldiers. Hundreds upon hundreds of ready bodied changelings stood before him, thousands of them, ready to fight. There were some casualties, but none too major, other than the few dead. Amor wanted to grieve for them, but not now. This was his final chance to rid them of the filth known as Hornet, and more importantly, save Chrysalis from the torturous state she was in. A soldier approached Amor, bearing news from their army.
“Sir, that’s just about everyone. The uh, hive, was cleared out. Most of our soldiers returned safely, and the remaining from Hornet’s hive, whether hostile or not, were set free to their own devices. Where they go from here is their decision.”
“Good. Let’s hope they don’t make a foolish decision by heading to the camp, it would make our job easier. If that is all, you are dismissed.”
“Yes sir.” The changeling scurried back into the crowd, lost among the many faces of his kind. Amor had one last speech to give before they left.
He cleared his throat and spoke in his loudest voice. “Well, it looks as if many of you are eager to get this done, almost as eager as I. I know many of you are tired. I know you’re sick, you’re hurt, angry, and sad. But we must put all of that aside for one last time. We’ve lost too much to quit now. The other changelings, they attacked our home, our families, friends, our people. If we let them go now, what will they do? Come back and do it again? Not while I’m still alive and breathing! So are you all ready to finish this fight and return to our loved ones once and for all? WHO’S WITH ME?” In reply, every changeling standing before him began to cheer, various weapons floating above their heads. “We will survive to fight another day! For the hive! For the queen!” Once again, the crowd began chanting, repeating Amor’s final words as they always would. Amor turned his back on the crowd and whispered, “For Chrysalis.” Amor spread his wings and aimed straight for the West, for the Badlands. His wings began to hum and buzz violently as he shot as fast as he could into the air, followed by every soldier left in his army.
……….
“Hurry it up! If he catches up with us, he’ll kill all of you!” Hornet was hovering over a small surviving group of his soldiers. His left flank was still torn wide open to the bone, and the leg hung limp, dangling without order. His wings beat to keep him off the ground Below, two dozen changelings limped back to their last surviving camp, moving at a much slower pace than was to Hornet’s likings. Two still clung tightly to the paralyzed body of Chrysalis, doing their best to keep it off the ground, but she was very slowly regaining control over herself. Her eyes, while still heavy, began to open, scanning the area they were in onc half open. Her head was throbbing, and the rest of her body was still very numb, so she had no control over what the drones did to her at the time.
Hornet pulled ahead, followed by the two carrying Chrysalis. “Fine! Any of you able to keep up, do so. The rest of you are going to be left for whatever it is that lurks out here. Good riddance to the lot of you!” Hornet flew forward, followed by less than half of his remaining soldiers. Within another hour, they could see the camp ahead of them. “Yes! I’m alive!”
The team quickly rushed to the campsite, where they were greeted by a single soldier. “My king! To what do we owe the pleasure?”
“Where the hell is everyone?”
“Sleeping. we haven’t seen anything out here.”
“Well wake them up. The hive was taken, everyone else is dead. They’re heading this way right now, and if we don’t-” Hornet cut himself off when a massive shadow covered the land. He looked up to see a large swarm of blackness overhead, and it didn’t take long for him to figure out what it was. Amor was out for blood. “Wake them up! NOW!” The soldier scrambled towards the tents, yelling at all of them, causing dozens of changelings to stick their heads out to see what the cause for all the ruckus was.
“ATTACK!” Amor was leading the group to the small camp. Hitting the ground running, all of them drew swords and spears, charging forward. Hornet was scared. He couldn’t fly away, no that would make him an easy target. Landing on his three working legs, he tried to quickly limp away from the crowd as the remainder of his soldiers readied themselves.
Amor pulled his sword up, scanning for Hornet, for Chrysalis. He didn’t see either of them, but before he could react, two changelings appeared before him. They were quickly struck down, one across the neck and the other on the backhand while Amor was recuperating. He buzzed his wings and hovered above the crowd, still desperate in his search. Three more met him in the air. Amor charged his horn and shot one down. The other two charged at him. One was kicked back into the crowd below and never came back up. The other was met with Amor’s sword right in the chest. Then he saw something. A slow moving black figure pulling something larger behind him. “Chrysalis,” he said to himself. “Chrysalis!” Amor flew straight toward the changelings in the distance. Two more tried to intercept him, but were quickly struck down.
“Damn it. Cmon’. Cmon’ you bitch, cmon’!” Hornet did his best to drag the half paralyzed royal changeling away on his three good legs. He realized the larger figure flying towards him faster than a bullet and quickly dropped the body, reaching for a sword he recently fastened to his flank. Amor landed a short distance away, advancing slowly until he saw the sword. “Stay back...or I’ll kill her this time.” Hornet held the sword pointed downward at Chrysalis’s neck.
“Let her go.”
“No. She’s going to be my ticket out of here. You get any closer, and I ram this sword through her throat.”
“Why? She has done you no wrong. It’s me you want to kill, so face me!”
“Ha! One on one with you? In this state? I’ll take my chances with her.”
“Coward. If you don’t live with honor, you are not worth enough to lead.”
“Are you trying to guilt me? To enrage me? It won’t work, I’m not that foolish. Now back away, and put the sword down or I wi-” Hornet felt an excruciatingly sharp pain in his flank, causing him to lose his balance and throw his sword to the ground. Amor looked down to see Chrysalis, her hoof stuck into Hornet’s bad leg before suddenly collapsing to the ground. “AH! Ah...you...you bitch...I’ll kill you...for that.” Hornet began scanning the area for his blade. Amor saw is opening. Quickly, Amor charged into Hornet’s side, sending them both tumbling onto the ground. Amor quickly was to his feet, while Hornet stumbled trying to keep his bad leg off the ground.
“I’ll make you suffer.”
Hornet quickly grabbed at the hilt of his sword as Amor drew his. Amor unhed forward but was blocked. Hornet was at his feet at this point, and began his assail. Amor did his best to block the fury of blows and swings, the best of them biting into his armor’s neck piece. In a last attempt, Hornet gave an arduous attempt at an attack, thrusting his sword forward. Amor easily evaded the attack, and countered with a blade to Hornet’s bad flank. Hornet fell to his knees.
“Damn...damn it.”
“Hornet, you are guilty of treason, murder, war crimes, torture, attempted assassination, and rape. You are going to pay for your crimes.”
“N-no.” Hornet tried to crawl away, but Amor easily caught him. In a final fit of rage, he stomped his hoof right into Hornet’s spine, pinning him and nearly breaking him in two. Drawing his sword, Amor stabbed as hard as he could at Hornet’s neck, but the blade didn’t stop until it hit the dirt and sand below. The ground was stained with blood, as a severed head fell from it’s original place. Amor left his sword at the neck of Hornet’s corpse, where the head used to be. He forgot all the pain when he turned to see Chrysalis lying on the ground, breathing heavy. He was quickly at her side. He pulled his helmet off, setting it beside himself, letting his hair down for the first time in a long time.
“Chrysalis? Chrysalis, are you alright? Please, tell me you’re alright.” Amor gently rolled Chrysalis over to see her smiling face looking back at him.
“I knew you would save me.” She wrapped her hooves around his neck and pulled Amor close. He in turn wrapped his hooves around her before pulling back and looking into her eyes.
“That’s it, we’re done. I thought you were dead three times since this started. I don’t want to lose you, so from now on, retired means retired. Okay?”
She smiled and kissed Amor. “Of course.”
Amor looked over to see the ongoing battle slow to a halt as the last of the blue armored changelings was struck to the ground with a deadly blow. “It’s over. We can go back home.”
“Thank goodness.”
“What happened to the quiver in your voice?” Amo said as he smiled.
Chrysalis smiled back. “I guess I regained my strength upon seeing you again. Enough being playful, let’s get back to the rest of them.”
Amor stood, and Chrysalis attempted to follow. She was shaky as she rose, but when she reached halfway, her legs gave out from under her. “Are you okay to walk?”
“I’ll be fine. I just need some-hey!” Amor didn’t wait for her to finish. He lied back down and pulled Chrysalis onto his back. “I said I’m fine!”
“And I think you’ve been through too much. The last time I saw you, you were bleeding. A lot. If you can’t walk, I won’t make you.” Looking over her, Amor could easily see many open wounds and bruises. Tattered wings and matted hair turned brick red from the blood. “You’d never be able to make it anywhere like this.”
Chrysalis sighed. “Always want to lift my burdens. Alright. But be careful! It still hurts a lot.” Chrysalis playfully wrapped her hooves around Amor’s neck as he levitated his helmet beside himself and walked towards the gathering crowd of changelings. All bowed before Amor and Chrysalis, parting down the middle to let them pass. They were finally one again.