Pilate galloped and galloped. To his right, the world was a whirling tapestry of red streaks against a black canvas. Before long, crimson bodies surged in and out of the finely woven mess.
Holding his breath, he dashed behind a pillar and pressed his body against it, hugging the mana-powered rod to his chest with trembling forelimbs. He found that the longer he sat in one place, the clearer an "image" he got of the architecture dead ahead of him. Dozens of winged equines were converging upon one spot, and his ears detected the sound of an ongoing structure.
Just then, his Oracular Array fluctuated all over. He winced, sensing a surge of mana feedback through his helm. As soon as the pulse of energy dissipated, he detected six bodies pressed against a wall. From their movements and jerking patterns, he guessed that they were fighting off the waves of equines ganging up on them. One was a unicorn, significantly bigger and more muscular than the rest. Another was a creature of slender, lithe built with a thick tail—a naga, Pilate guessed. Last but not least, he sensed an obese equine lying prone to the ground and a winged figure hovering directly above it.
"Rainbow..." Pilate's lips slurred.
The fight carried on and on. The sound of mana blasts and whizzing crossbolts filled the air.
Pilate hugged the energy rod to his chest. He closed his eyes, but the red lines and crimson figures did not vanish. That's what finally made him frown, summoning a guttural snarl from deep within his striped being. Hooves clopping across the wet granite, he pulled himself into a heavy gallop.
"Josho!" Rainbow Dash exclaimed, shaking and jostling the collapsed stallion's shoulder. "Come on, ya big lug! Say something!"
"Mmmfnnngh... bordello..." Josho's eyes rolled back in his head while his horn pulsated at random. "One night in the red room, pl-please," he gurgled. "Not much R&R left, darling..."
"He's pooped!" Seclorum shouted, smacking away a changeling. "Do your door-thingy, dammit!"
"Rrrgh!" Rainbow Dash spun about and slapped her hooves across the center of the Urohringr symbol. "Just keep them off from us a little bit longer!"
"Jaat'sanna kraddit threem!" Arcshod shouted as the fellow Xonan warrior joined his side, fighting off the shape-shifting waves with her scimitar.
"Right! Easier said than done!" Seclorum howled.
"It's... st-starting to budge!" Rainbow Dash said between panting breaths. Sure enough, the barricade began its slow descent downwards. Rainbow's pendant glowed as her essence gradually overcame the spell that her doppelgangers had put on the barrier. "Hey! Can you guys on the other side hear me?!"
"Loud and cl-clear, Dashie!" Props' voice faintly squeaked.
The engineer stood up on her hind legs, balancing the manacrystals on her flanks as she shouted through cupped hooves. "It's about enough space now to slip and slide through!"
"Just h-hang on!" Rainbow grunted against the howl of hurricane winds and thunder. "I'll get this thing open all the way soon!"
Props would have answered, but just then a decapitated pegasus head splattered against the wall beside her, forcing her to shriek. She spun and looked down the corridor.
A solid line of galloping undead equines had formed. Razzar, his comrades, and a line of survivors with crossbows were firing wave after wave of projectiles at the rampaging hoard. Their charge refused to buckle. Sloshing waves of purple muck swept from wall to wall, rolling towards the group like pulsating lava flow.
"Uhhhhh..." Aatxe sweated profusely, glancing back and forth from the line of death to the thin space at the top of the doorframe. "That's good enough!" He motioned to several ponies, then propped his body against the base of the door, straightening his back. "Hop on and hop over! Move! Move! Move!"
"Ya hear that, Dashie?!" Props shouted. "We're sending p-ponies through!"
"Sounds good to me!" Rainbow said.
Sweating, she flung a glance over her shoulder. "Tell 'em to get ready for a fight!"
"Hraaaaaugh!" Arcshod charged a throng of rainbow-maned doppelgangers, headbutting them with his massive horn. The winged shape-shifters surged back, swung around, and grabbed at his neck and flank.
"Hnnngh!" The Xonan mare charged to her superior's side, swinging the scimitar and lopping off a length of green carapace. The wounded changeling fell—hissing in agony—while Arcshod threw the rest of the bodies off him. Shape-shifters flailed in the air, momentarily losing cohesion of their blue coat and feathers.
P-Pow! The naga's manarifle shot through two of the airborne changelings in one blast. He cocked his weapon and glanced over his shoulder. "More from the upper clouds! Incoming—" A pair of changelings rammed into his side. "Ooof!" The naga fell hard to the floor, his manarifle rattling loosely to the side.
Panting, Rainbow Dash glanced over from the door while ponies slipped through the frame, one at a time.
Several prismatic doppelgangers galloped over the conked-out naga and attacked Seclorum's side. They shoved the aged stallion up against a pillar and wrestled the crossbow from his telekinetic grip. He yelled and struggled with them, but was swiftly overwhelmed. A cluster of changelings pulled at his forelimbs and lifted him skyward—flailing.
Rainbow Dash bit her lip, glanced at the door hanging halfway open, then clenched her jaws. Planting her hooves against the Urohringr symbol, she coiled her muscles, kicked off, and propelled herself like a missile towards Seclorum's plight. "Rrrrrrrgh-Haa!"
Wh-Whud! Rainbow bowled mercilessly through the shape-shifters. Their bodies turned black as they spun into the whipping-winds. Breathless, Seclorum plunged towards the depths of Stratopolis.
Grip! Rainbow clasped onto Seclorum's forelimbs, spun completely around, and tossed him back towards the balcony.
Arcshod twirled, gasped, and activated his telekinesis just in time to catch the thrown Ledomaritan. The two slid back to the wall while more and more ponies poured out, joining the battle with crossbows and makeshift bludgeons.
"Wh-what?!" Seclorum glanced up, blinking. "Oh, great!" He blanched at the sight of a virtual dogfight of blue coats and rainbow manes. "Now who do we know which one is the real deal?!"
"I'm the only one who's awesome!" Rainbow Dash's voice cracked. She was too busy flinging her hooves, elbows, and leg-joints into any body part that presented itself. Spinning like a blue top inside the floating melee of gnashing changelings, she shouted at the group. "Don't worry about me! Just make sure the rest of the survivors get out and—"
A savage uppercute silenced the pegasus, and she flew back into a granite pillar, hard.
"Aaaugh!" Rainbow slumped down. She trembled, spitting up blood. Looking up, her ruby eyes narrowed on a solid line of diving doppelgangers. Stealthily, she rubbed a hoof around the front of her pendant. Then, just as they descended on her, she stood up straight, tilting her neck back and dousing the group with an unmitigated blast of enchanted light. "Say cheese!"
Several of the doppelgangers instantly flinched, hovering backwards in midair as they covered their eyes and groaned. One by one, their bodies morphed from blue coats to black shells.
The naga glanced up through his mask. "That works..." Clakka-Clak! He took aim and fired a mana pulse at the thick group of exposed changelings.
Pow! The resulting blast showered black limbs and green blood over Rainbow's figure. She flew back, collapsing by Josho's side with a grunt.
"Nnnngh!" Sputtering, she wiped her muzzle clean of the insectoid slime and snarled. "Dang it! Did Razzar at least teach you a thing or two about—"
Th-Thap! Three glaring Rainbow Dashes landed directly in front of the real-deal, glaring down at her with identical, devilish smirks.
Rainbow's ears folded. "...bad end."
The doppelgangers crouched, preparing to leap all at once. It was precisely then at a red energy blast sailed in, smacking one changeling across the skull and sending it reeling against the others.
Breathless, Rainbow Dash looked up—then did a double-take.
"Hnnngh!" A striped stallion in a black helm landed. He snarled into a glowing staff gripped in his muzzle. Twisting his whole body, the zebra knocked the legs out from beneath all three shape-shifters and fired an energy blast into their collapsing sides for good measure.
"Pilate!" Rainbow Dash gasped, her smiling jaw hanging wide open. She hopped up, ears perked. "Omigosh omigosh omigosh! You're..." She blinked, her eyes contorting. "...a friggin' cyborg."
Pilate's whole body twitched. He spun sideways and shouted—muffled—into his staff. "Behind you!" Z-Zap! His energy rod fired a crimson blast at a pair of blue changelings descending on Rainbow Dash. Without a second breath, Pilate galloped, leapt over her and Josho, and mercilessly pummeled the stumbling creatures into submission.
"Uhhhhhh..." Rainbow Dash stared numbly. She gulped. "...Derp?"
"It's..." Josho wheezed, slowly becoming cognizant again. "It's... one of the br-broodlings?"
"I highly doubt it."
Josho coughed. "How do you kn-know?"
Rainbow slowly shook her dumbfounded expression. "I don't think there's enough imagination in 'em..."
"Hraaaugh!" Pilate shouted before slamming his staff into another hopeless skull.