"Grnnnghhh!" Rainbow Dash—sword gripped in her teeth—swung the burning weapon up high.
Razzar ducked, twirled athletically to his side, and sprang forward on two rear talons.
Rainbow dropped the blade lengthwise in her hooves, rolled backwards, and used Razzar's momentum to vault him across the control room.
He flew, twirled, and landed in the center—skidding to a stop just an inch before coming into contact with the purple muck trickling down from above.
Meanwhile, Rainbow flapped her wings, flew in a circle, and barreled towards him with the sword dragging in two hooves. Grunting, she spun her body and slashed the burning blade in the process.
Razzar ducked inexplicably backwards, his body bending grotesquely as it balanced on his tail. He dodged the blade, then lifted one lower leg, its talons clasping around the tip of the sword. With one twist, he sent Rainbow's body jerking aside from her grip to the hilt.
"Ooomf!" Rainbow rolled across the ground.
"Hresshaaa!" Razzar jumped her from behind.
Pressing the sword against the floor like a pole, she thrusted her rear legs backwards, uppercutting him savagely across the chin. A sharp tooth or two flew as she hopped up to her hooves, spun around, and swung the blade as hard as she could.
Cl-Clank! Razzar readied himself with a pair of forward talons, blocking her swing and pressing back. The two struggled for dominance while sparks occasionally spat from the contact of his claws to the Sword of Solstice.
All the while, Pilate scurried from platform to platform with the skystone shard in his grasp. He panted, ears twitching to the sound of the frenzied combat behind him.
"Which one is north... which one?!" The stallion hissed under his teeth while his helm rattled. "Blast it! If only I had normal eyes, I might be able to determine..."
He paused, his head jerking towards the shard. Through the red-and-black field of his technologically facilitated senses, he detected a fluctuating concentration of lines across the skystone. It only changed in frequency whenever he swiveled around, tilting the skystone in random directions.
As the battle rattled on, Pilate muttered quietly to himself. "This is amber skystone... which, according to Roarke, was harvested from the north field." He gulped. "Placing it on the north pedestal will bring us to where we need to go. But we're so close to the north edge of the world as it is." He tilted his helm up, then glanced back at the shard with pursing lips. "It... It would have to resonate the strongest with the north platform... for the leylines would connect quickest. That means..."
To test his theory, he trotted in a circle—much slower and with greater concentration—all the while keeping his helm trained on the skystone as he endeavored to measure the intensity of its glow.
In the meantime—
"Hresshaaa!" Razzar shoved against Rainbow Dash and pounced on her.
"Ohhhhh learn a new tune already!" Rainbow sputtered, slashing high.
She grazed his shoulder with the burning blade.
"Haaauckkktshh!" Razzar plummeted to the floor, gripping his bleeding shoulder.
"Haaah!" Rainbow Dash capitalized on the situation by slashing her blade straight down... and severing Razzar's long tail. THWACK!
"Aaaaaa-gaaaaught!" The naga tilted his skull to the ceiling and howled, his frill fanning spasmatically outward from his neck.
"Ghnngh!" Rainbow limped back, sweating heavily as she leaned her body against the Sword of Solstice. "That's what you get! Try to lay the smackdown on me and my friend?! Not in Commander Hurricane's hood, ya overgrowned suitcase—" Something writhed and jerked in her peripheral vision. "Wait... what the—?" She glanced down.
Razzar's severed tail jerked, flailed, and suddenly launched itself at her like a python.
"Oh ICK!!" She chaotically flailed with the Sword of Solstice, trying desperately to slice the thing to ribbons. "Die die die die!" Cl-cl-clank!
The tail wormed around the blade, slithered up, and launched itself like a noose around her neck.
"Hckkkkkt-t-t-t-t!" Rainbow wheezed. She dropped the Sword, stumbled back, and clutched at the meaty appendage, fighting to dislodge it.
Trailing blood, Razzar slowly got up, wobbled from a slight lack of balance, and lurched towards her. "Let's see if your wings like to grow back..." Chiiing! He bore his claws at full length and prepared to swipe her face.
Rainbow fell to her knees, hissing for breath as her fuzzy blue face turned bluer. Her nostrils flared and flared. At last, she clenched her eyes shut, shuddered, and reopened them with red-on-yellow fury. A halo of ruby light pulsed around her neck, until—
FLASH! Her pendant fired a crimson beam, mealting straight through the ensnaring lizard's tail. The appendage fell loose, only for her to catch it, spin with a snarl, and fling it like a leather flail straight up Razzar's snout. WHAP!
"Gaaaaugh!" He stumbled backwards, spitting blood.
"Hah!" Rainbow hopped straight up and hovered on flapping wings. "Not everyday I kick someone's ass with their ass!"
"I will tear out your heart and f-feed it to you!" Razzar spat.
"Yeah, good luck with that." FWOOSH! Rainbow glided straight into him, spearing the reptile down the center.
Lifted by her flying figure, he tried slashing at her wings, but she swiftly jerked to the side until the two of them were gliding in a swift circle along the granite circumference of the room. Tangled together in mid-air, Rainbow wrangled her hooves around Razzar's skull and slammed his face against the blurring wall, grinding his scales into the stone surfaces. Razzar winced and hissed, smoke forming from the friction of his constant contact. At last, he found the strength knee her hard in the chest, and the two went sprawling across the platform behind Pilate.
The zebra in question had finally stumbled upon a pedestal where the skystone shard glowed the brightest.
"Finally! This is it!" Concentrating, he held the shard in two hooves, lowered it to the pedestal, and watched as bolts of archaic energy shot between the stone dais and the crystalline "key." The entire control room shook, and the stallion stumbled backwards with a nervous breath. He looked left and right, his helm detecting movement in the circular room's walls.
Clak-Clak! Something snapped. Suddenly, whistling winds barreled into the room. Pilate watched as the room lowered down on twelve descending columns.
The control room, as it turned out, was situated in the very belly of Stratopolis, and activating the pedestal lowered it by its twelve support struts so that it gave those situated on the platform a three hundred and sixty degree view of the hazy gray world in every direction.
Rainbow Dash tumbled backwards from the wind, rolling to a pained stop besides the Sword of Solstice.
Razzar, caught of guard, stabbed his forward claws into the stone floor and held tight as air pressure tugged his body in random directions.
In the meanwhile, Pilate anchored himself by the north pedestal, his helm being overwhelmed by the glowing energy of the shard. He tilted his head away—facing west—and gasped as soon as he noticed the clouds along the horizon dissolving.
"What in the frig is happening?!" Rainbow stammered above the noise of howling winds.
"What else?!" Pilate grinned wide. "We're moving!"