//------------------------------// // Hunted (1.0) // Story: Fear of The Unknown // by Lazy_ //------------------------------// Flood jumped to his hooves, his heart beginning to pound as he realised that he was being hunted. He stood up quickly and whirled around to check and see if any parts of his body were exposed to the outside. He turned to the street side of the barely standing platform and saw that several windows lined the wall. He looked out of each one, systematically working his way from right to left. Each of the windows to his right were out of the equation, as judging by the angle of which the hunter's shot had hit the wall, none of the buildings looking out from them would have provided the proper angle to make the shot possible. Then he came the to the leftmost window, and as he looked outside he saw something different from the others. Through this window he could see a bell-tower residing at the other end of the town at the suburbs. He scoured the tower for signs of a hunter and came to an opening near the top of the tower, on a porch where the bell was visible. There he saw a collection of tan coloured bags arranged at both sides of the porch that could be used for cover to hide behind. Then something clicked in his head. Hunters... Hiding... "Buck!" He exclaimed louder than he really should have done, and threw himself to the floor to break the line of sight. Just as he did so, a second projectile narrowly missed his head and another high pitch pressure wave hit his ear drums followed by the loud gunshot that he had come to fear. The shot hit the wall at the other side of the second tier and blew out a small hole in the wall, allowing some rays of light to shine through into the room, making the floating dust visible in them. For a second he thought he was safe as he started to collect his thoughts. But the feeling was mislead, as another gunshot racked the air and blasted a hole in the already weak brick-work underneath the window. Pieces of brick and mortar showered him as he covered his face with his hooves, the shards of hardened clay bouncing off' his worn gold shoes making tinkering sounds as they ricocheted away. One particularly hard piece of shrapnel collided with his armour and made a rather large dent before sparking and bouncing off. After the third shot Flood came to his senses and started to crawl away from his position. Another shot hit the crippled section of wall and traveled through to embed itself in the floor and kick up a small plume of dust, causing it swirl around before coming settle. The shot caused enough damage to the half destroyed section of wall for it to fall away. Bricks crumbled behind Flood and dropped off to the ground outside to reveal to the hunter that he was no longer there. The air fell silent apart from the sounds of armour scraping and scratching against the brick-work as Flood crawled up to the wall and sat down. His 'sit' was more of a lean and he rested all of his weight on the wall. Some of the bricks were loose and shifted under his weight, causing him to become apprehensive about it. He slowly introduced his weight back upon the wall, and when he was happy it would support him, he fully leaned against it to get his breath back. His heart was beating frantically and it was showing no signs of coming back to normal anytime soon. He took some deep breaths and at least managed to normalise his breathing patterns, even if they were a little panicked. After he brought his lungs back to a reasonable pattern, he started to think about his action plan from there on. "Ok, ok..." he said to himself. "The hunter is probably in the bell-tower, I know that much at least. But... what now?" He questioned as he desperately thought of a way out of the situation. He would have to get out of the unstable house he was in first, as if he stayed, the hunter would eventually contact some support and he would be surrounded. And as he had seen, these soldiers were not taking prisoners, at all. "Damn, why can't they just accept our surrender!?" He cursed and thumped the ground under him with a fore-hoof. "It would make this so much simpler!" Flood shook his head in frustration. He glanced around the room and saw that where the stairs should have been, had collapsed and left a drop into what looked like a mixture of glass shards and rough rubble. His mind said 'Nope' to jumping down there and looked elsewhere. The only other method of escape other than leaping into the sights of a trained hunter or slicing himself to pieces was a large section of the wall which now had an extra hole in it, was partially down due to a small chunk that was missing from the corner. He pushed himself to his hooves and walked over to the missing area of wall. Leaning down to get a look outside he saw nothing but a dark alleyway and a few bins scattered around here and there. His face broke out into a relieved smile. "About time I got somewhere at least semi-safe." He said to himself as he took one last look around to make sure there was no other way out. Once he was satisfied with the fact there was no better way out, he started to squat down and try to fit through the gap. The sniper's eye covered every tiny section of available space that the second story room had inside. After blasting at the pony and barely missing again, he tried to fire through the weak wall to either hit or expose it. When the wall section came down and he was happy that it hadn't worked, he gathered that the pony must have been hiding in the corner and trying to find a way out. The sniper had to find some other way of getting the guard out into the open. He looked down at what was left of the houses supports. Almost the entire front of the house's walls on the ground floor had fallen away and lay in a crumpled mass that covered a small amount of the street. He used his sights to look inside the building and examined what was there with a keen judgmental eye. Unless he missed a tank of flammable gas or petrol hiding among the collection of bricks and wood, he found no way of dismantling the building from the inside out, and so he turned to his spotter. "You got any Anti structure munitions left?" He said in his native russian tongue without taking his eyes from the scope. He heard a rustling as his spotter checked the back of his hips and patted the pouches to check for any remaining explosives. His hand found the right pouch and he brought the hand back to the tactical binoculars. "2 HE grenades, 1 LASM. What you thinkin'?" "The lower floor looks like it would collapse if we took the back wall out." He said. The spotter thought for a moment until he saw what the marksman was getting at. "Clever." He mumbled with a smile. He brought the long metal tube out from a sling on his back, the angular object reflected a small amount of light for him to see the two tone olive drab green weapon which was now laying out on the floor in front of him. He reached into a pouch and took out his last 66mm explosive rocket. Flash Flood reeled back as he realised that with his armour, he was far to big to fit through the gap. He didn't want to take it off though, because if he met any friendly guards in the area he may not be recognised as a guard, which could cause him problems. However he was pressed for time and couldn't afford to stand around waiting to be ambushed while thinking about his armour. "To Tartarus with it." He said to himself as he started to undo some straps holding the shredded armour together. As he undid the chest piece, it fell into his waiting hoof and he set it down quietly so he could remove the side plates extending from his shoulders to his abdomen. Once undone, they to came free and Flood set them down with the remains of his chest piece. He quite literally felt like a weight had been shifted from his back as he breathed a deep breath, now free from the weight of his armour. Flood picked up the rifle and slung it around his body, and doing the same with his crossbow bayonet. He reverted his attention back to the gap and took a step forward when he was stopped by a strange noise that suddenly struck out. At first he thought it might have been gunfire, but then he decided otherwise. It sounded like rushing air with the sound of a fierce flame in the background. It quickly got louder as it neared and before he knew it, the noise stopped and something exploded underneath him. The platform lurched to one side with a terrible cracking and threw Flood off balance, making him fall to his belly with a *Thud* as he closed his eyes by reflex. He reopened them to see the side of the floor was beginning to lean in the direction of the street. He started to slide backwards and scrambled to try and regain grip, but to no avail. As the floor hit the ground with a large amount of noise, a cloud of dust was thrown into the air and a crack emerged in the middle of the floor as it was broken in half by it's own weight. The floor split in half and Flood slipped off the edge of the break and fell to the ground, on top of the resulting rubble. His blood was filled with adrenaline and the fall felt like only half of what it should have been as Flood collided with the shattered flooring. The fall stunned him and he was still coming back to his senses when the floor behind him started to break up and collapse, threatening to crush him. He looked back at it dazily and the crumbling supports instantly struck a chord in his brain. He forced himself to his hooves and leaped away from the falling wreckage. He jumped clear of the destroyed structure and rolled sideways to cushion the collision. The rubble fell on top of where he would have been had he not been so sharp and crushed everything underneath with a dreadful malice comparable of having a pack timberwolves jump on you at the same time. The cloud of dust extended and pushed itself over him, covering his body but also leaving his lungs tickled and making him cough and hack. When he started to come out of shock, he came to realise that if not for the sandy coloured cloud he would once again be laying in plain sight. If the hunter had seen him then it would simply just shoot at where it saw he was originally. With a groan he pulled himself up and began to walk away. He turned and started a walk to where the other side of the street should be. But when he stepped on his left hind leg, an ache crept it's way up the bone. Each step increased the feeling more and more, and by the time he made it to the other side of the street, still covered by the choking dust, the ache was translating into a sharp pain. A missed shot rang out and Flood jumped from the sound, making him land on his now apparently bad leg and causing a jolt of pain to shoot up from the hoof and to the primary bending joint. He screamed and juddered forward allowing him to trip over a small pile of debris. This made him fall face first to the ground and shock him again. He lay on his back, the collective and repetitive collisions along with his leg adding up to drive him to disorientation. His eyes rolled around in their sockets in time to an unsteady breathing pattern as Flood slowly came back around and directed his dizzy vision down to his pained leg. Looking at them side by side he saw something not quite right in the lower half of his right hind. The bone structure looked... off. He remembered he was still being stalked and looked behind him to check for cover. Luckily he was behind a small section of wall left behind after the destruction of the home at an unknown point in time. Back to his leg, he retracted his hurting hind to feel the bones for damage. He gently squeezed along the length of bones and didn't come across anything too painful. That was, until he came to his ankle, at least. He barely touched the joint and a searing pain awakened in the bone. His hooves instantly came away and he flinched, the side of his face contorting and his breaths quickening. His eyes started to water as he he looked down at the belt of pouches around his chest on the bayonet's sling. Opening one, he took a ragged cloth and placed it in his mouth, still debating what he was about to do. He grudgingly returned his fore-hooves to the damaged joint and apprehensively started to feel it again, trying to find what the problem really was. As the hooves worked slowly, he flinched when they started to return to where the pain was most apparent. He took a deep breath through the cloth and began pressuring the area, causing a sickening 'squelch' and a quiet 'click' to hit his senses. The pain returned just as bad, if not worse and his jaws clenched as hard as they could around the cloth. He let out a loud mixture of a growl and a moan as he pressed harder, feeling for a problem. Which he thankfully found quickly. The bones holding the joint in place had twisted and dislocated from their original position. He retracted his hooves like they were dipped in scolding water, and rested his head on his chest. His eyes were crying from the intense pain and he breathed so unevenly he could start to feel a small burning in his lungs as they were unable to get sufficient oxygen. The cloth fell from his mouth. *BANG* The hunter took a shot at the wall to try and see if it could kill him through it. The shot blew away a small portion of the wall and chippings were sent flying all around him. He tried to ignore the danger so he could tend to his injury as fast as possible and escape. "Buck me..." He grunted under his breaths and looked back at the joint. "Ok... only one more time." He said to himself uneasily and he placed the cloth back in his mouth with shaking hooves, which then moved back to the dislocated ankle. He mentally pepared himself for the pain again... but this time he hesitated. He did NOT want to touch the injury, the pain was way too massive. But then again, just like removing his armour, it was that or get ambushed. So for a final time, the hooves moved in on their target and made contact. Before twisting... *C-crick* ... and pushing. *Crack* "MMRAAAAGH-HA-HAAA!" Flood howled and started to roll around an the floor, thrashing left and right with his eyes clenched shut, tears pouring out. A good hoof thumped the floor un uncontrollably while he was doing so, and eventually the stallion stopped. He rolled onto his side and rested there, his breaths more steady but much quicker as he shook with the feeling of manually relocating his own ankle. The pain had been reduced, but that didn't mean it was anywhere close to bearable. He lay there for a few moments and allowed the ankle to simmer down. "Shit." He said to himself with a light hearted chuckle. His dust filled lungs hacked, spitting out a small puff of material. "Now I really can say I've done it all." He opened his eyes and rolled onto his belly. Flood slowly pushed himself to his hooves, the pressure on the bad hoof made it feel very weak, and it felt like it may come out if he forced it even a little bit. The pain was still present and was relatively cringe-worthy, but at least it was bearable. Instead what was left was a small case of shaking and aching, making him wobble with a sense of apprehension while he pushed up. As he gently started to rest more weight on the hoof until he was somewhat normally stood, he sighed in relief as the worst was over. *BANG* Another shot blasted away a large part of the wall near his head and sent a collection of brick splinters his way. Flood ducked to try and avoid most of them, but some found their mark and cut his skin to introduce a sting that covered his side. Once he realised this he moved away from the wall and instead opted to hide among the rubble of a building once more, being careful not to damage his weak hoof. Once he leaped into the wreckage, he broke the line of sight again. He stumbled on his bad hoof and toppled to the ground, before spinning around cautiously to look at the relocated joint. Thankfully, it had caused no damage. Flood immediately began looking for a way out, and he searched left, right and forward, making sure no stone was left un-turned, metaphorically and literally. The only escape route lay ahead of him was a tight gap in the rubble where a large piece of concrete was leaning against another, leaving a small space underneath that looked like a squeeze, but not too claustrophobic. He lay down and crawled over to the gap. Pushing himself through a small bit, he tested the space given. He decided that he would fit and carried on. Having the space reduced to such a little amount was very un-nerving for the stallion, especially when he was crawling through something that could collapse and crush him at any moment. It made him feel vulnerable and provoked a lot of nervousness that accumulated in his stomach. His body scraped along the ground, the butt of his rifle creating the sound of grating as the surprisingly durable material was dragged forward against the floor. His skin, not so. The shards of brick were pulled out forcefully by his movements, even though he was only traveling a few feet, it was enough to pull most of them out. He endured the stinging. After all, it was nothing in comparison to relocating his own ankle. Now that was painful, and he could say he had experience now. This allowed him to bear the worst of it and try to shake it off, which he did. Flash Flood pulled himself from the confined space and stood up on his hooves. He looked around to see where he was at this point, finding himself placed behind the building with an alleyway to follow. One blocked alley went off in another direction and he would have taken it if it were not blocked by collapsed buildings. He stepped from the ruins and leaned around the corner to take a good look down the alley. It was dark, and stopped at an opening into the street beyond. He smiled at the thought of finally having a safe way of covering more than 100 meters without having to risk breaking bones or jump across 2 story gaps between structurally un-sound houses. So he took it as a blessing and carried on his way. Walking down the alley he kept glancing left and right at the walls surrounding him. The backs of those particular buildings were still intact, meaning there must have been some combat that involved infantry leveling the fronts of them only. Maybe there were guards hiding in the buildings and the humans, not knowing so, simply blew up the fronts of the houses anyway, just to be sure. Which brought him onto another point. He came to start wondering how many bodies there were under the buildings. He could have passed by 100 dead ponies hidden beneath the monotone grey rubble that seemed to line the streets like some sort of twisted pathway leading ponies to their deaths. A depressing thought that encouraged his spirits down into the pits of sadness. These thoughts were interrupted as his hoof landed on something that went 'Crunch'. He craned his neck down and noticed that he had stood on a portrait. A golden frame that housed a picture inside. He picked it up to have a look. A grey pegasus mare with off centered amber eyes smiling joyfully while standing besides a brown earth pony, wearing a bow tie and collar who looked equally as happy. And in the center sat a grey/purple unicorn who looked only to be 6-8 years old, holding what looked like some sort of silver device with a blue light on the end in her mouth. Flood was charmed by the discovery, brightening his mood. And he looked at his patches that were attached to his bayonet belt, finding a particular one, he opened it. "Sorry precious stone collection..." He tipped the pouch of crystals onto the floor and they bounced round, causing a tinkering noise. "...not as precious as this picture. I'm sure somepony can get this back to the family, they look a happy bunch." He squeezed the picture into the pouch and did up the button to lock it shut. "Nothing is as precious as family." He finished. The find bumped his mood up a little after thinking about the trapped bodies, and thoughts of returning the picture to the family kept him smiling until then end of they alleyway. He almost forgot he was being hunted for a second and very nearly stepped out into the open for all to see. He pulled himself back and checked left and right for any dangers. The only thing present was another rattle of gunfire that sounded from across the town. Flood noticed that he could only see the spire of the belltower from his position as this part of town seemed to be somewhat slightly less destroyed than the rest. "Maybe this side saw the armies coming and escaped?" He questioned to himself. But then he remembered where most of the guards were near the center of town, still making their way over to his current position when they were first contacted. It was likely the humans just never caused much conflict in that side because there was no fighting to be had there. Which would explain why a structure such as a belltower was still standing among the wreckage of everything else. If it had been different then surely it would have been destroyed just like the rest of the town. He ran across the street, surprisingly un-noticed by anything that may have been around at that time. He made it across to the other side without incident, but that only made him more uneasy. Flood was not a firm believer in karma, he didn't want to temp fate by letting his guard down due to gap in his bad luck. So he stayed vigilant. He reached the houses on the other side and carefully walked in through the doorway. The door creaked open as he pushed it on it's one hinge. Breaking fully into the grounds of the house, the door fell of it's hinge and fell to the floor with a loud 'Crash'. Flood froze solid, but no return came. So again, he carried on. Here he decided that if he was going to make it away from the hunter, he was going to have to be fast and un-predictable to make up for the closer range. It was now or never. The sniper surveyed the row of houses in front of him over and over again, searching for the pony who had narrowly escaped death for the 3rd time in one hour. He knew that the pony had been injured and was actually able to hear it's cries as he guessed it was popping a joint back into place. He could sympathise, as he had once been forced to relocate his shoulder on an operation in Ukraine after a run in with an angry local. Relocating a joint was not a pleasant experience at all. "Hey." His spotter said to him in a hushed voice. The sniper only responded with a 'Mmhmm'. "Think we lost him?" He asked to the sniper who started yet another sweep of the row of buildings. "No. The only way out is this way, and the pony knows so. We have been told to cover this area for that one reason. We can't have any ponies reporting back to their base in that direction before we advance. They could fall back and regroup with the rest of their forces in Canterlot and along with the diarchy they would make an actual challenge, unlike the force sent to this town. We've annihilated an 800 strong force in nearly two days. That has to be a record." After he finished, the spotter simply nodded and went back to the binoculars. The sniper knew his hunch would turn out correct. The buildings in this part of the town were more or less mostly intact. What escaping pony against an opponant who relies on open spaces could resist hiding in that? After a small amount of waiting, his hunch proved true. A head popped out of a window in one of the buildings as he scanned the rows of houses. He rushed to place his crosshairs over it, but as the pony saw it was being exposed, it hid away again. "Dimitri, he's in the pale yellow building, 2nd from our center, 2nd row from our position." The sniper told his spotter the pony's position and waited for him to align himself before settling back into his shooting mode. The game was back on. The pony then darted from one side of the window to the other, the sniper's scope followed just as quick, however there was not enough time for him to shoot as the window was far too thin to get an accurate shot before the pony re-entered cover. Hs crosshairs hovered over the cover and he debated pulling the trigger and seeing if he could shoot through the wall and kill the pony. It had not worked prior, so he doubted it would work then. But you never knew... He started to squeeze the trigger, allowing his finger to slowly pull it all the way to the bottom. And as he clicked it all the way down and the gun was set to jolt back into his shoulder, the pony rounded the corner of the doorframe to run across the street and enter the other side and get a mere 150 meters away from the bell tower. With a loud 'Bang' his bullet missed again and struck the wall where the guard would have been had he not moved, blasting a small hole through to the other side. The angle of his fire was getting steeper, and that meant that the pony found it much easier to escape his line of sight because closer up and on a higher angle, the buildings appeared to cover more space. The sniper grimaced as the pony escaped his sight and inevitably entered the building that seemed so close to him right there. He pulled the bolt up and back, ejecting the final casing from his magazine as it flew across and over his spotter's body. He lifted the butt of the rifle and pulled out the magazine to place it next to him. "First empty mag'." He commented and his spotter replied: "Been a lonely couple of days, eh?" The sniper placed a full magazine into the slot and gave an assist to check it was in place properly. He brought the butt back down and shifted it into his shoulder before pushing the bolt back forward and then slamming it down to chamber a round. "Yes it has." He replied. He looked down the glass once more and focused on the house he knew a pony was hiding inside of. He checked all of the windows and stayed locked on all the points of exit there was, but for a short time he didn't notice any movement at all. The pony was obviously getting wise to the methods of avoiding death at the hands of a sniper. However it was a guard, trained with spears. He knew it was bound to make some slip ups somewhere. It was to be these he would capitalise on. However, unknown to him, while he was reloading the pony had planned to finally retaliate. He watched the pony roll out into the doorway, laying down on it's stomach. It appeared to now be holding the rifle it had obtained in it's hooves, and for a split second he frowned, as he didn't know if ponies could fire a gun with their hooves. This didn't distract him too much though, and he was on the case incredibly fast. His crosshairs hovered over the pony and his finger started to squeeze the trigger. His shot was cancelled as a flash came from the rifle and three collisions pinged all around him, one making a strange 'Thud' and a splattering sound. Some dust was thrown out and the sniper blinked to avoid getting some in his eyes. When he re-opened them, the pony was up and running at the tower, full speed with a slight limp. He tried to get a shot but the angle became too steep and he found it impossible to keep his eye at the scope because of it. He turned to his spotter who still had his face buried in the floor to hide it from the dust. "Come on, Dimitri." He shook the man profusely. "Get your face of the ground and get that detonator!" When the man did't respond, he frowned deeply. He then turned his head and saw a crimson red hole going all the way from the front to the back of his head. Looking behind him, he noticed a large splatter of blood peppering the wall and floor on his level. "Shit!" He shouted and thumped the floor with an angered fist. "I know you're in there!" A voice shouted out at him. "Come down and face me like a real warrior, 'hunter'!" He heard the taunts coming from the pony and he reached for his grenades. "This is between you and me, 'hunter'. None of these gun things, just you, me, and our blades!" Alexei paused in his movement as he considered the taunt. "Yes..." He whispered under his breath, reaching instead for his heavy styled Tanto in it's sheath. "Like a real warrior." Flash Flood waited for the hunter to reply, and after a few tantilising moments, he heard the tell tale footsteps of a human slowly coming down the stairs. His heart began to race. Maybe it would have been easier if he had just gone up and killed him from behind. But then again, he thought he had hit something squishy up there with the rifle. There must have been two of them. For a second the steps softened as a flat spot was reached and then they became heavy again at another flight of stairs. Flood waited with increased nervousness as a rattle of gunshots filled the air once again. His heart rate started to soar, and he wondered if doing this was really the right thing to do. "-I'm gonna' die aren't I?-" He questioned his own actions with a self anger. "-Shit!-" He mentally kicked himself as the footsteps came closer. He had effectively tempted a predator from it's lair instead of trying to bypass it under cover. It was too late for regrets, now. If he was going to go down then he should at least try to act confident in the face of his enemy, it might help him out if he wasn't being scared and portraying himself as weak. Another set of heavy footsteps, those ones were much closer and he thought they could have been no more than a few seconds away from possibly meeting his doom. Still he waited, shuffling backwards until he got a good 10 meters away from the entrance/exit to the tower where his final challenge would approach him. The footsteps came to an abrupt halt as a jagged silhouette stopped at the bottom of some stairs. It paused for a moment before turning and beginning a slow walk out into the sun light. And when it did, Flood was met with a sight that could be described as nothing but or short of terrifying. A tall human wearing a drab grey and green outfit stood before him. The outfit looked like it was made from a collection of bushes, dust and concrete and the human stood out in the light. The face was covered in shadows from the hood and the boots it was wearing on it's feet were a tan colour, lined with dirt. The human's hands slowly reached up to the hood and clutched it in it's hands, before pulling it down to reveal the face. The skin was mostly coated in some sort of camouflage paint and only some of the pale tan/pink skin was bare and visible. A large scar ran from one side of it's face to the other and created a sort of rift that separated the stripes of paint that lined the features. He stood in front of the pony with a relaxed posture and waited for him to say something, but when Flood found himself unable to think of something to say, the human started for him. "Well one of us is going to die here. So before we begin..." The human said in a strange accent. "...May I at least know your name?" He said calmly. "Flash Flood, Spears-stallion in the Equestrian Day Guard." He said simply. "What about you, hunter?" The human smiled and lifted it's arms to gesture to itself. "Alexei Petrenko, marksman in the Spetsnaz Special Forces of Russia." He said with a smile. "It has been long time since I have seen a foe as lucky as you." Flood kept a straight expression as the human began to circle him. Flood went along with him and together they walked a perfect circle, their steps mingling together. "It will be an honour to fight you. Maybe your luck will bring you victory, huh? Or maybe it will not." He said as he reached to a sheath around his chest, and pulled from it a large knife that looked like it could maybe count as a sword to some ponies. The blade was 2 inches in depth and was less than 5 millimeters thick at the widest point. The sharpened edge carried straight on and did not make a curve until 12 inches along where it made a sharp turn to angle off and create an extra 2 inches of angled blade. This formed a deadly stabbing point without compromising the cutting surface's ability to hack. There was a small part behind the point that was sharpened to further enhance the stabbing power of the weapon. The metal was well polished and Flood could see enough of the handle to determine it's deep black colour. Flash Flood reared up and raised himself to a standing position that allowed him to stand on his hind legs. This was something his bad hoof dis-agreed with, and the ankle felt a little strained by the extra weight. "Maybe..." Flood unsheathed his bayonet. A darker coloured metal made up the ornamental style of the weapon, which was sharpened on both sides and carried on for 14 inches before tapering off at the end to form a triangular shaped weapon. Near the end on both sides was a set of jagged spikes no more than a single millimeter in size, but in large enough number to worsen any wound and render it un-heal-able. The sub caused a huge reflection to shine off both of the weapons, almost as if Celestia herself was watching the stare down and trying her hardest to dramatise it. "...But that is yet to be seen." The two stood there, staring each other down in a dramatic stand off as the sun cast their long shadows down the street with an ominous lack of colour. They looked into each other, as with Flood now on his hinds, the were of a similar size and could easily stare into the others eyes. Giving each other one last judgement before one had their final battle. "A wise statement." The human said before dropping his back leg into a wide stance and taking the weight away from his front. He flipped the weapon around so that he was holding it inverted, the blade pointing behind him. Stretched his front arm out with a semi-opened palm while reeling his weapon arm back to a high up position. Flood held his bayonet forward, the opposite way to his opponent as he too widened his stance. Extending the forward fore-leg out and his weapon leg allowing the bayonet to align parallel to his stretched forward leg. "Let's dance!" The human said before lunging forward while swiping with the inverted blade to try and slash at Floods neck. The guard figured quickly that this human was no slouch with a blade, and performed a fast dodge to duck under his attacker's arm. Alexei saw the pony move around him and after he had traveled past Flood he hopped back to remove himself from the pony's range of attack. Flood jabbed forward with trained control. The blade was on target to hit it's target, but Alexei used his tanto to deflect the attack and as Flood's body came toward him, he rammed an elbow into his ribs. Flood staggered back, hopping to avoid pressuring the bad hoof too much. Alexei took his chance and made a diagonal hack from Flood's 'shoulder' to his waist, hoping to end the fight quickly and split the pony's body wide open. Flood was stunned and un-able to dodge, so instead he raised the bayonet to protect himself. The tanto hit the bayonet, chipping into it slightly and the human's strength forced it away, swinging Flood's leg back down to his side. Alexei responded by flicking his wrist around to angle the blade up and slash across Flood's body again. However the guard saw this coming and threw himself at the human in a barge. Alexei was launched backwards, swing his arms to try and regain his balance while Flood prepared his next move. "My turn!" He shouted as he pointed the blade forward and charged the human with the aim to skewer him through the chest. Alexei attained natural balance just in time to twist his body sideways with the blade still backward facing in his hand. He used his free left arm to catch Flood's blade leg and push against the primary joint as his right elbow came in and butted his stomach. Flood was forced to drop the bayonet as his leg was about to be broken. Alexei tried to then shank the pony but Flood pushed his waist sideways so that the tanto missed it's mark and instead run down the side of his body. Flood then utilised his free hoof and punched Alexei in the gut, causing him to double over and bring his face in closer. Flood then punched Alexei in the center of his face and a light crack was heard as his nose broke. He freed himself from Flood's advantage and staggered back again, covering his nose, tanto still in hand. He walked back 3 paces when Flood dropped down onto all fours and aligned his hind legs with the human's body. He then reared up and thrust the legs as powerful as he could, allowing the injured hoof to aim lower at the softer belly rather than hit the bone in his chest. The 2 point kicked worked wonders, inflicting great pain on Alexei as he screamed and fell backwards, clutching his belly area. Alexei dropped his tanto amidst the pain and once he had already hit the floor, he averted his gaze to Flood. Who had now retrieved his bayonet and was skipping over to him with good pace, ready to stab straight through him. Flood came in fast and lunged down to stab Alexei, but the human used his long legs to kick out and knock him back as they connected with Flood's body. Alexei used the opening to roll over sluggishly and pick up his tanto in the normal forward position before standing back up. The two combatants stood staring each other in the eye, and having both dealt painful blows to one another, they were filled with only one thing: The desire to kill. It was the first time Flash Flood had ever felt such a feeling, and as he stood filled to the brim with hatred for this one human, he took the time to savour it's sour effects. It was the exact thing Equestrian values sought to prevent in it's ponies, and he could see why: It was amazing. He felt energised, he felt alive, his breaths were fast and his brain was focused. Flood had never been so pumped in his life, and if anypony was allowed to feel this way it could end up in heightened killings. After their duel staring, the duo made a final charge at each other. Time felt like it had slowed down slightly to Flood, enough adrenaline was running through him for him to feel as if it really had. And as his foe approached, he noticed every detail. Every inch of shine on their weapons, every jagged section of the hunter's cloths and every feature in his immediate surroundings. The tanto came in fast, slicing at his shoulder in a diagonal cut. It came closer and closer until it was about to cut his chest in half, destroying every organ that rested there. Flood acted at the final moment, dodging with a spin and making his way around the human's body, away from the attack. When he came out of the spine, he shoved the blade of his bayonet against the side of Alexei's waist and then finished his spin by letting the momentum push a hind leg back to make a long stance. Then he twisted his upper body and brought his weapon hoof with it, slicing through the human's lower body and sending a wave of crimson liquid flying away which splattered onto the ground to make a crescent moon of blood. Both of them stood like statues for a second and their breaths were the only things that filled the air, lungs slowly lowering their pace until they had reached a reasonable level. At that moment Alexei collapsed onto his knees and dropped his tanto. The cut had run deep enough into his body to slice through a quarter of his waist. A large part of his internal organs had been deemed destroyed and large amounts of blood poured from the wound. Alexei's breathing picked back up again once realisation kicked in and he slowly became shaky. His right hand traveled down to the wound to wipe against the exposed flesh, and he brought it back up to stare at the blood covered palm that he then owned. He started to chuckle lightly, but it was interupted as the job was finished. Flood ran him through with his bayonet and the blade traveled all the way through Alexei's chest and heart. The human's body went limp on the blade and fell, pulling Flood down with his dead body. Flood stood tall and instead allowed the body's weight to pull itself from the weapon where it fell flat and lay quietly on the dusty floor. Flood never spoke a word, only looking down on the dead body of what was once his bane. Taking one final deep breath, he lifted the blade to the sheath and pushed it into the depths of it's metal holding until it was completely covered, before letting out his breath and closing his eyes. He twisted his body to see how far he had left to go, and beyond the tower he could see a gap in the final row of houses. The end of his hell was only a mere 50 meters away, and he was so close to forgetting everything that had happened in the Alicorn-forsaken warzone. He let himself drop down to all fours. He turned, and he walked.