Deadman stared at her, trying to wrap his head around what exactly she just said. Where did she get ‘lord’ Deadman from?
Who exactly did she think he was?
“I apologize, but I regretfully have to decline your offer, it goes against protocol, after all,” he said, sighing.
“You are more strong willed than I thought,” she said, her tone changing in an instant to a snarl.
In what way? All that he heard was possibly the least convincing lie he heard in a while. If she was trying to influence him with magic, the spell probably wasn’t designed with a human target in mind.
“You are going to either be captured or killed, make your choice,” Deadman stated, rapidly becoming aggravated with her.
“I pick the third option, in which I take Canterlot and feed off the love of all Equestria for eternity!” she yelled, a sheet of a green material from nowhere materializing over her eyes.
Squeezing the trigger once, he launched a three round burst into Chrysalis. She did pick the second option, after all.
The bullets pounded into her chitin, but they did not puncture, the sections of her carapace he hit becoming even darker and more metallic looking for a brief moment before fading back to normal when struck. A growl of minor pain was the only reaction he got from her. This was going to be harder than he thought.
“Were it that simple it would have been done a long time ago, agent,” she laughed as she began to fade from sight followed by the rest of her disappearing in a flash. Great, cloaking.
Deadman turned on his HRV and looked for her. The area in front of him was clear. Either she could teleport or her invisibility was somehow HRV-proof despite no such technology existing here before he arrived. This was now truly a perfect day. Whirling around, he saw her orange highlighted shape in the HRV blocking off where he came from, and it appeared she was charging a spell to fire at him.
Flicking his HRV off, he watched the spot he saw her in, and the very faint green light from over there.
A blast of green fire launched towards him in a jet, prompting him to dart off to the side and begin charging forward. No matter her abilities, the threat would be eliminated. He was a member of the Blacklight Agency, and the Blacklight Agency was on a whole other level than some particular nasty insects.
As he closed in on her at a rapid pace she turned the jet of green flame towards him, causing him to feel oddly ill at ease inside of his armour. Feel that something was not right about that fire, he raised up his LMG and fired a few rounds towards her.
She yelled out in pain and ceased the stream of fire as the bullets impacted her invisible form, splotches of the same dark shade appearing where the rounds hit. She appeared to take more damage when her attention was otherwise engaged, he noted.
“You little wretch!” she shouted, launching a blast of some sort of green energy from her horn that he had no time to avoid.
Slamming into his armour, the blast felt like it was directly searing his nerves as well as his armour, blowing him off course and backwards. He grunted in pain as his back hit the ground, but he felt his augments almost immediately distribute a few powerful painkillers to his body, dulling the pain quickly.
Seeing the flicker of distortion at the edges of her invisible form as she moved closer, he instinctivity rolled to the side, an invisible hoof impacting where he was and cracking the floor beneath it. Whether or not she knew it, she gave him a perfect chance to engage. Deadman grabbed the hoof which was where he previously was and yanked hard while getting on one knee, causing her to stumble as she attempted to get away and giving him chance he needed to put away his LMG and grab his tomahawk.
Deadman swung his axe towards the leg he held, hoping to server it with a single strike. He knew from back home that hardening based reactive armour tended to not fare too well against ultrasonic blades and, in addition, if she was bleeding she would be easier to track.
A piece of the shattered flooring encased in a green glow levitated in front of the his swing, slowing down the strike considerably right before the impact. However, although the strike contained less power when it did hit, it was still an ultrasonic blade.
Upon hitting her flesh there was a brief momentary hardening of the invisible chitin before, with the sound of a blade cutting into meat, it bit into her flesh below.
With blood in the air and her struggling against his grip, he smirked and pulled the axe free, before bringing it back to let loose a second strike.
Before he could swing again, she disappeared and reappeared back on her feet a few meters away from him. The cut on her leg was still visible, making it quite easier to spot her. Swiftly, he got back up and put away his axe and drawing his LMG again as he saw her charging up another magical attack.
He traced up towards her chest area, and prepared to fire, he was going to put as many rounds into her as he needed to.
His aim was thrown off as he saw from the corner of his eye a green glow forming on a section of wall.
Stepping backwards quickly, he got out of the path of the projectile by taking a single step backwards, making the chunk of stone hit against the wall opposite its original position with a crack.
“It is a shame you had to deny my kind offer,” Chrysalis said “You are a fine warrior.”
Saying nothing, he did not respond, he knew that she was trying to distract him with conversation before going in for a kill. What sort of madman would engage in debate with his adversaries while they were fighting?
He took aim at her again but she disappeared in a flash of green before he could get a shot off.
Quickly, he pivoted on the spot to see if she was going to attempt yet another surprise attack, but he saw nothing, not even the blurring around the edges of her motion or the slight green glow that shone through her cloak when she cast magic.
Flipping on his HRV, he saw her on the other side of a nearby wall preparing another spell.
Chrysalis certainly got her credit for trying, at least, he hadn’t had a fight one on one like this in too long.
Pulling out his breach hammer, he ran up to the wall before hitting it with a thunderous crack, the familiar sound of the captive bolt resounding alongside the sound of stone crumbling as the wall in between them fell.
“What!” she shouted through the dust, giving him her exact location as he recocked the hammer.
Swiftly shotting out a hand a foot below where he heard her voice come from, Deadman wrapped his hand around a section of chitin he was fairly certain was her neck.
As he swung the hammer towards where he was reasonably certain her face was, a hoof shot up and deflected the attack above the top of her horn.
The limb then shot out towards his gut, causing him to dodge to the side as he saw its surface shimmering and changing shape.
He lashed out with one of his legs towards we wounded front limb, the heavy foot impacting the joint part way up with a crunch. The chitin breaking just the same as the bone underneath, caused Chrysalis to yell in pain, teleporting away in a flash.
It was obvious to him at that moment that her joints appeared to be more vulnerable than the rest of her, even more so than the rest of her when she was distracted.
When he heard the sound of stone cracking behind him, he immediately jumped out of the way on the incoming rock. It never came.
Instead, as the cracking noise spread beneath him he realized what it was.
Sprinting back towards the impromptu entrance he made, he was just a touch too slow to get out before the floor fell away.
As he prepared to land to the rubble landing on the cell below, she came out of nowhere and smashed into his chest, knocking him on his back and increasing the speed at which he hit the ground below.
He grit teeth as be felt a small piece of something metal pierce through his armour as well as his biological arm and go and out the other side. Not even the most skilled could aim with something like that in.
She stepped off of him and took a couple more steps back, before taunting “So there is some flesh in that suit of armour after all. I hope that you have seen the folly of resistance and are ready to comply now.”
A glimmer appeared briefly around her wounds on her leg before they began to knit back together before his very eyes.
As he rolled over and got up onto one knee he could not help but muse that If she wanted to play like that, he would as well.
Putting away his hammer he instead reached behind his back and pulled out his health injector, grunting in pain which he pushed past.
“Not even able to stand up? How sad. Just give up already, you won’t get any closer to winning than you were before I renewed my physical strength,” she taunted once more, sure of her victory.
With a small grunt of pain, he lifted his arm and grabbed the small silvery piece of metal which protruded from his body before yanking it free without a word and instead electing to press the heal injector up to his wrist and depressing the button, dispersing the repairing fluid into his body.
Dropping the piece of metal, he drew his weapon again as he felt his armour repair itself as his flesh below was rapidly regenerated by the gel.
“You insolent little- Gah!” Chrysalis was cut off as he leapt towards her and smashed her with his shoulder into the ground. Now was the time. He had his chance to neutralize her and the knowledge to do so. However, it had to be fast.
Deadman pulled out his LMG and fired a quick, three round burst into where he saw the silhouette of a frontal leg join. Ignoring her screech of pain, he fired another quick burst into the middle joint of her other front leg, crippling it too.
She disappeared in a flash again, annoying him, but the fact he heard the buzzing of wings behind him alerted him to her presence far more easily than before.
His gun stabilized as he took aim. This ended here and now.
As she charged up a particularly nasty looking spell, if the sparks coming off her horn and diverting off into the environment were any indication, he took aim at the center of her mass and held down the trigger.
The first few of the bullets flew through the air and impacted her like the ones earlier, but the inevitable stress of the impacts gave birth to a new sight as her chitin cracked and the bullets began entering her flesh properly.
Counting out the rounds carefully, he managed to the recoil of the gun to make sure the majority of his shots hit.
Her spell dissipated rather rapidly as her wings stopped and she fell to the ground into a bleeding heap, green internal fluids splattering the ground below her.
Cautiously, Deadman kept his gun trained on her as he flashed his HRV. She was still indicated as orange in the visor, she was out like a light but alive.
Turning his HRV off, he watched as the cloak she had previously dissipated, leaving her broken form in full view.
Deadman edged closer to her, keeping his sights trained on her head, nothing that her chitin also appeared slightly more smooth looking now.
As he prepared to finish her off with a couple of bullets directly to her skull, just to make certain that she wasn’t retrieved and healed, a thought came to him. She could be a valuable bargaining chip to get further aggressions by the changelings to cease if he knew his politics correctly. She may actually be more valuable in regards to protecting civilians alive than dead.
Deadman struggled with the the choice for a few moments. On one hand, she could be a good bargaining chip. On the other hand, if the changelings made a deal for her safety and did not follow through on their end of the bargain, they could be even more dangerous than ever.
Coming to a decision, it was decided that it be best to capture her and give her over to the Equestrian Government to do what they would with her. If he were to take such action, it would have to be fast; however, she was losing quite a lot of blood.
Bringing his hand to his wrist and switched off the friend or foe identification as well as cranking the sensitivity up as high as it would go. This may make the HRV nigh useless for his regular purposes, it was perfectly usable for this.
He turned on the HRV and immediately saw her internal structure and not much else beyond it, the rest of the area beyond the room obscured from his vision.
Inside her wounds he saw several small shapes which he recognized well; bullets in her flesh.
Luckily, he hadn’t wasted too much ammo on her once her armour was punctured, so he only had a few to remove. With a sigh, he put away his gun and took out his ultrasonic tomahawk, turning off its edge. It was a good enough prying tool.
Using the thin, long edge opposite the side used for cutting, Deadman gently navigated it into the bullet wound while holding the wound carefully open with his other hand.
Chrysalis shifted and let out a small cry of pain while she did so, but remained otherwise unconscious.
Deadman continued without regard to her discomfort, dragging the first bullet free of her body, it sliding from the wound covered in blood. Quickly going on to the next wound, he repeated the process in silence with the only sound in the room Chrysalis’ whimpering alongside the weak movement of her limbs.
Soon enough, he had managed to remove all the bullets and placed them in a pile beside him.
Putting away his impromptu surgical tool he drew his heal injector, and toggled a twitch on its side to put it into low dosage mode. She needed to be in stable shape, not full fighting condition again.
Pressing the injector against her side he depressed the button and felt a needle shoot out of it and into her flesh as it went to work.
The injuries on her rapidly healed as the gel travelled through her bloodstream, expanded in her wounds, and then promoted the regeneration of her flesh inside of the wounds. He still had yet to figure out how exactly it worked.
Stepping back, Deadman drew his LMG and aimed it at her once more, but not before switching his HRV back to its normal mode. Given a bit of free time before she woke up, he flashed the HRV to check on how the ponies were doing. Judging by the blobs of colour throughout the castle, most of the changelings were gone, most likely retreated given the lack of a significant number of corpses. It had seemed that his information had helped the ponies greatly.
“What hap-” she said, but cut herself off as she spotted him, eyes rapidly widening.
“Get up,” Deadman commanded, “If I see any magic you are going back down.” An odd feeling said that the LMG pointed at her made his point nicely.
She got to the ground on unsteady legs, fearful eyes never leaving him.
He turned towards the open door of the cell they had fallen into. “Out that door and to the…” Deadman said, trailing off as he checked for directions in the HRV, “left. Maintain a steady pace without attempts at escape or suffer the consequences of your actions. Remain silent unless asked a question.”
That seemed to have scared her into line, as she made no effort to go in any other direction than the one he directed her in as she left.
He made his way to the door immediately after her, tracking her carefully though the scope the whole time, occasionally saying directions that were obeyed by the distressed changeling queen without any challenge.
Around the time they left the dungeons he decided that it would be for the best to not make contact with any groups of ponies until it could not be avoided for handing her off.
They could react poorly and neutralize her on reflex, going against his plan. Granted, if they chose to execute her on the spot after he handed her over, deciding she couldn’t be used as a bargaining chip, he wouldn’t particularly have a problem with it.
Soon enough, he saw her tense up even further as she went turned around a corner which he knew was the one leading towards the staircase to Celestia’s room. In addition, he heard the shuffling of armour and weapons being repositioned.
“Hold your fire!” he shouted as he rounded the corner after Chrysalis, weapon still pointed at her.
At the base of the stairs the entire group of ten ponies present there flinched, likely both from the volume and what his voice sounded like run through the speakers on his suit. They were all standing at ready, with spears pointed in their direction. It reminded him of earlier in the evening.
“I have a captive. Get someone authorized to deal with prisoners of war now,” he commanded.
The guards at the end of the hall neither moved or said anything, further reminding him of earlier tonight.
“Get someone or I get someone,” Deadman threatened, causing a few uneasy glances back and forth before a pony broke off from the rest, going up the stairs. That pony made a good choice.
Deadman looked back towards the changeling queen, who was staring at the ground in front of her.
Now all that he had to do was wait.