MLP FiM
The Mechanics of Harmony
By: Kestrel
Upon the announcement of the matchups for the finals, it was determined that the first fight would be between Team Rainboom and Applejack. One of the most senior members of the club with years of experience against the new pair that showed brilliant potential. Twilight couldn’t help but wonder if the selection really was random since this kind of match was always a very popular trope in sporting programs.
Twilight and Rainbow Dash met up with the other teams in front of where Iron Will was standing to receive his instruction now that he had finished his speech to the roaring crowd above. With an athletic jump off of the stage, Iron Will landed with great form, putting his hands on his hips and beaming a huge smile at the turnout for the finals.
“Congratulations to all of you for making it this far!” Iron Will cheered to the group of students. “But Iron Will is afraid this is where things are gonna get more interesting. Unlike the preliminary rounds, you’ll have to win this one by knockout. There will be no time limit either, with no breaks! So be prepared when it’s your turn to fight!”
Each team looked to their partners, as if mentally asking if the other was ready for the upcoming match, all except for Applejack, who tipped up her hat and rolled up her sleeves. As the teams broke apart to head to either their mechs or the participant stands, Rainbow Dash pulled Twilight to the side in order to discuss an important point. After all, being a match against her rival Applejack, this was no ordinary fight for her.
“Alright, Twilight…” Rainbow began. “I want you to give me your very best, but if I look like I’m in the zone, don’t bother me!” Twilight’s face contorted in confusion.
“But Rainbow, how am I supposed to judge that? I mean, I can’t see you from all the way in the control tower!” Twilight answered back with a grimace. “I’ll do my best to help you, but you’ve got to make sure to keep a level head for this. We both know that Applejack is a fair fighter, but she’s going to taunt you, your job is to not lose your temper.”
Rainbow Dash stared Twilight straight in the face, to the point where Twilight could see the fire crackling in her eyes. She was going to give her all in this fight, and Twilight would do her best not to disappoint.
Without another word, Rainbow ran off to the loading area to mount up in the Rainbow Raider. Twilight followed suit by making her way to the control tower elevator. On the ride up, she calmed her nerves by reciting all of Neighton’s laws to herself.
As she entered the control tower, Twilight prepped the equipment, switching on the diagnostic equipment and radio. She began by running a quick scan over the Raider; all green. Good. Next, she tried to reach Rainbow by radio.
“Rainbow, are you there?” Twilight asked.
“I’m here, let’s do this, Twi!”
So that worked too. All systems were go. Twilight pulled the switch that lit up a green light on her tower, signifying that her team was prepared. She looked over to the Mecha Mac, standing on the opposite side of the field. It was moving toward the start position. Rainbow piloted her own mech to the center of the arena as well.
The countdown to the match started on the display above the arena, with the crowd counting down with it in a chant. As the number hit three, Applejack beckoned for Rainbow Dash to come at her. Twilight immediately reacted to the provoking gesture, radioing to Dash. One…
“Rainbow, don’t you—“
As the countdown ran out, Rainbow charged headlong at the Mecha Mac, chakrams drawn out for a slashing attack. Having provoked this, Applejack knew exactly how to counter it. She snatched one of the Raider’s arms during its motion and threw her opponent behind her, turning around as Rainbow hit the ground with a thud.
“Rainbow!” Twilight shouted over her feed. “What did I tell you about not losing your head!?”
“Twilight, she was asking for it! You should have heard the stuff she was saying over the radio just now!” Dash replied with an angry grunt.
As the Raider was regaining its feet, the Mecha Mac took a step forward and outstretched its arms to its sides, hammer extended up, as if appealing to the crowd while cocking its head from side to side. Another angry rumble of noise came in over the radio as Rainbow vented her anger out toward Twilight.
“Oh, ‘Well, what is it?’ I’ll show you what IT is!” she spoke in a quiet voice in a half-crazed manner.
Twilight was doing her best to try to calm Rainbow down. This behavior was getting their fight nowhere fast. A glance at the diagnostics screen already showed some damage to the arm that had been grabbed in the opening maneuver.
“Rainbow, you’ve got to calm down, she’s taunting you so you don’t think when you attack,” Twilight explained. “If you keep on falling for her taunts, you’ll pay the price every time. If you want to win, play smart!”
No sooner had Twilight finished her sentence had Rainbow once again charged for the Mecha Mac. This time, going for an aerial maneuver, Rainbow began a jump, using the propulsion system to add some unpredictability to her attack. As Rainbow circled around to her back, Applejack launched a cannonball from her mech’s mounted cannons straight up. Rainbow rushed in before AJ could turn around, but met with the head of the hammer, stopping her attack.
“Rainbow! Get out of there now!” she yelled into the radio.
Twilight had quickly recognized the immediate danger Rainbow was in, seeing gravity take its toll on the cannonball. As the ball fell back to the ground, Applejack took a step forward while twisting her mech’s body to spin the hammer back around. With the blocking force leaving, Rainbow lurched forward and dealt a weakened blow to the underarm of the Mecha Mac, where there was some opening in the large plating.
Applejack’s plan had come into full effect as the cannonball fell on top of where she had been standing, now occupied by the Rainbow Raider. The cannonball crashed down, sending sparks flying from the head of the Raider and disorienting its systems. Next came another punishing blow, this time from Mecha Mac’s hammer. The shock of the impact sent the Raider flying across the field.
As the blow had fallen, Twilight checked the scan of the Raider, it showed very heavy damage to the torso. It was clear that the Raider couldn’t take much more direct hits before its emergency barrier kicked in to save Rainbow. Once the Raider had managed to once again get up, there was a sizable dent in the front of the mech. The crowd roared their approval at the punishment dished out over the match already.
Twilight was formulating her strategy hurriedly in her mind. Things weren’t going their way right now. She had to find some way to get around those defenses. Running a scan had yielded results on the surface of the Mecha Mac, showing heavy armor covering most areas, the only place that lacked a great deal of armor was within the joints of each piece. But as Rainbow’s second attack had displayed, simply aiming for those wouldn’t be enough. AJ had a few tricks up her sleeves to make up for the lack of speed in her mech. Her experience showed.
“Rainbow, this isn’t working,” Twilight called out over the radio. “We’re taking too many hits. We need a better plan to hit the weak points of that mech. For now, just play safe while I think up something.”
While Rainbow would usually fight her back on this, it seemed that her recent beat down had humbled her somewhat.
“Yeah… I’ll do that for now,” Rainbow replied. “Twi, she’s really good. I need you to think up something awesome right now. I can’t let her win!”
It was nice to see that Rainbow still had her spunk even after being dealt such a blow, especially to her ego.
The Raider kept its distance from the Mecha Mac as Rainbow loosed a few aimed shots toward her opponent. The other mech took a defensive stance, minimizing the damage her shots dealt. Some still reached the exposed parts of the armor, but looked to have little effect on such a sturdy machine.
In retaliation, another cannonball came flying toward Rainbow, but she easily dodged it, having seen it coming straight at her. At least the agility the Raider had over the Mecha Mac would allow the team a fighting chance at buying time to come up with a real plan.
As these little exchanges went on, it became clear to Twilight that Applejack’s entire strategy revolved around knowing the attacks coming at her. That made sense, considering how great of blows she had dealt in the first few minutes of the match. Twilight realized she would have to formulate some more creative solutions to find a way around AJ’s prediction strategy.
“Hey… Rainbow…” Twilight began. As soon as she had finished her muttering, Rainbow immediately picked up on her voice.
“Tell me you’ve got something for me I’ll like,” Rainbow answered.
“Well, I think I’ve got an idea for how to get at least one hit in.”
“Yeah?”
“You know how AJ’s been predicting or reacting to where you’ve been during this fight?” Twilight asked.
“Uh huh… where are you going with this?” Rainbow returned the question.
“Well, it’s a dangerous thing to do without having a way to really keep sight on your back. So I was thinking… get her attention and then attempt to maneuver around to her back.”
Rainbow huffed at the idea. While not a master strategist, even she could see the problem with it.
“Twi, you just said that she’s been reacting to my position. She’ll just clobber me again if I try that!” she snarled back. Twilight giggled slightly over the feed.
“That’s why you change it up. Do something she won’t predict.”
“Alright… I’m trusting you here. If you make me look stupid, it’s on you!” Rainbow shouted determinedly back.
With their little strategy session out of the way Twilight saw as the Raider began to charge toward the Mecha Mac. As their opponent raised its hammer, Rainbow piloted the mech to dash to the side and slide around out of Applejack’s view. Predicting this, Applejack began to swing the hammer in a circular motion to contact Rainbow at the end of her dodge. As she slowly turned her field of vision around, Applejack noticed that the Raider was missing!
As she had rounded the side of the Mecha Mac, Rainbow jumped high above where the hammer would be swinging, following the plan Twilight had laid out for her. Twilight pumped up her fist in the control tower, cheering on her partner as she landed her first real hit on a bewildered Applejack. With one chakram, Rainbow successfully dislodged a heavy armor plating with a heavy strike, and with the other, she smashed a chakram blade into the arm. The oil blood of the Mecha Mac joined the sparks created by the clash of steel from the hit.
Before Applejack could recover, the Raider took swift action and used all of the power it was capable of to wrestle the hammer away from the Mecha Mac. However, the action came a bit too slowly.
As the hammer left the Mecha Mac’s hands, the arm that had lost its plating swung around to connect to the back of Rainbow’s mech. The Raider once again was sent sprawling to the ground. It landed on the hammer, snapping it in two and rendering it more or less unusable.
Twilight’s eyes flew back to the screen showing the scan of her team’s mech. It only registered minor damage to the back. Twilight heaved a small sigh of relief as her ploy had paid off. They had removed one of the Mecha Mac’s threats!
But her celebration would have to wait. As she shifted her gaze back to the battlefield, Applejack had launched another cannonball at the prone form of the Raider. Twilight yelled over the radio for Rainbow to dodge the attack, and her request was narrowly granted with a well-timed roll. It seemed that Applejack was far from done.
The Mecha Mac took up a boxing stance and throwing out a few mock punches to her opponent. The people in the crowd let out a collective moan, recognizing the taunt. Rainbow had gotten up at this point and had redrawn her shuriken shooter, blasting AJ with several shots, though just like the first time, AJ put up a guard and blocked most of the damage, returning to her stance once the onslaught of shurikens had dissipated.
Twilight figured that this was a way of Applejack calling Rainbow to a challenge. She took action with a warning to Rainbow.
“Okay Rainbow, good job. We got rid of her hammer. But she’s still ready to fight,” Twilight started. “You’ll still have to be careful. She’s been at this as long as Big Mac has. And she’s bound to know all of his moves. And according to what I’ve read on him, he was quite good at boxing and wrestling.”
Twilight glanced back to the Mecha Mac to see it start to charge at the Raider, having broken off another piece of its armor to regain symmetry and weight distribution. It was now moving faster. Executing a flip and using an air burst from her propulsion system, Rainbow quickly widened the gap to give Twilight more time to talk to her.
“You know martial arts, right?” Twilight asked.
“Yeah, don’t worry, I’ve got this!” Rainbow shot back confidently.
“You still need to watch out. If she grabs hold of you, she could do some serious damage.”
Switching back to the chakrams, the Rainbow Raider adopted a karate stance. Twilight let out a small laugh. Leave it to Rainbow to let her pride sort out how to fight. If she was gonna win, she was going to do it her way. But Twilight had full confidence in Rainbow this time.
As the two mechs closed the distance, the Raider threw the first punch. The Mecha Mac made a quick block, following up with a light jab to counter, catching the Raider in its already damaged torso area. The puncture left in the body of the mech deepened, bringing Team Rainboom one step closer to defeat. Some of the crowd was now on their feet waiting for the final blow.
Applejack now took the offensive and led with a quick combo of punches. Rainbow Dash bided her time, retreating a step at a time until she saw her opportunity. As one of AJ’s punches came rolling in, Rainbow caught it in her mech’s hand, resonating with a sound like a thunderclap. As she came into contact with her opponent’s arm, she spun around, pushed on the Mecha Mac, and sent it spiraling to the ground by using its own momentum. She followed up her throw with a heavy stab to the back, cracking the plating.
The crowd was now fully active, cheering fervently for their fighters, expecting the match to come to a decisive close soon. A beat of hands clapping and feet stomping pervaded the arena. Twilight could feel the energy, even way up in her little tower.
“Alright, great job, Rainbow!” Twilight cheered over the radio. “Now you just need to play smart and keep it up for a few more good hits like that, and we may just pull this one out of the water!”
Rainbow gave a confident laugh in return.
“See? Nothing’s good enough to beat the awesomeness I bring to the stadium!” she said back.
Retaking her stance, the Raider stood ready for the next clash as Applejack had regained her composure and formed her own stance. Both fighters watched and waited for the other to make a move, creating a tense atmosphere as they moved in a circle together. With little to no noise by the mechs, all the noise in the room was caused by the excitement of the crowd.
Suddenly, at the same moment, both mechs led with a single punch aimed straight for each other’s faces, with both connecting, sending them reeling back with the force. The crowd erupted into more cheers. As Twilight looked around, she caught a glimpse of Scootaloo waving her rainbow colored flag wildly while Fluttershy just had her head tucked between her knees, trying to plug her ears.
Both mechs sent out a flurry of attacks, each meeting fist or chakram in a struggle for dominance, wearing on both machines. The fatigue levels on the metals on the scan screen began to soar. Twilight hoped that Rainbow could pull it out soon, or else they’d be in real trouble.
Applejack led the next meet of deadly force with a punch, which Rainbow quickly caught. Though having learned from the last time, Applejack countered with her own spin, swinging another fist at Rainbow. Having predicted this action, Rainbow put the Raider into a sweeping motion with a leg, dodging the attack while attempting to lash out with her own strike.
The Mecha Mac jumped over the sweep and came in for a cleaving motion. With a warning from Twilight, Rainbow executed a roll, taking her out of danger. Capitalizing on the precious time won from dodging a haymaker move like that, Rainbow switched back to her ranged weapons and fired shots into the visor on the opposing mech, muddling its visual systems.
In a panic, Applejack began wildly lashing out with punches and kicks going everywhere, even firing a blind cannonball into the mix, but Rainbow was too fast for it. She closed the gap and prepared for one last strike. Switching back her chakrams, she sidestepped the cannonball, jumped over a sweeping kick, rolled past a punch, finishing the maneuver with a forceful stab to the back, piercing the back plating.
Suddenly, the Mecha Mac ceased to move. From her position in the tower, Twilight could see a faint purple glow emanating from the cockpit of the Mecha Mac. The emergency barrier had activated! They had won!
“Great job, Rainbow Dash! That was amazing!” Twilight congratulated over the airwaves to her partner.
“No problem! Just look at me kicking butt and taking names!” Rainbow replied. “Oh, and, uh, you actually helped me out pretty good that one time. So, thanks for that too.”
Twilight puffed out her chest, swelling with pride. She had finally been given a bit of recognition by her partner. She was helping too! Twilight ran back to the elevator and began her descent down into the battlefield to join her partner and exchange words with Applejack.
As Twilight exited the elevator of the tower, she ran out to the center of the field with a big smile plastered to her face. She saw Rainbow Dash running toward the center as well with a similar expression and her fists raised to the heavens celebrating her glorious victory. The two girls met and gave each other a big hug and congratulated each other.
Adding to their reunion was the cheer and roar of the crowd, all pleased with the outcome of the match. It had been a thrilling experience for them too.
“Nice job, Rainbow! I was really worried at the start there, but you sure brought it back!” Twilight exclaimed.
“Heh heh, yeah, it got a bit hairy there at first, but nothing can bring this girl down!” Rainbow shouted. “But seriously, thanks for the advice. I’m not sure I would have seen those things coming or those openings if it wasn’t for you. I guess it’s not so bad having a partner,” Rainbow admitted.
As the two girls continued to talk, Applejack climbed out of the Mecha Mac and readjusted her hat. Once she had gotten to the ground, she slowly sauntered out to the center of the field. She had lost and was somewhat frustrated at the outcome, but she took the defeat in stride and approached the victors with a graceful composure.
“Whoee! That was some fancy moves back there!” Applejack called out. “I guess I might have underestimated y’all a mite.”
“Thanks, Applejack,” Twilight responded happily. “I’m glad you didn’t take it easy on us just because we’re your friends. That was hard fought, and I’m glad that everyone’s still happy.”
Rainbow Dash and Applejack exchanged a fist bump and a chest bump before going on with their post-match banter.
“Hey, AJ, now the score’s eight to five!” Rainbow jeered.
“What!? No it ain’t! It’s more like four to eight in my favor!” Applejack retorted. “Ya got lucky this time! Well… not really, you’re really good. But you had help!”
Rainbow and Applejack just laughed together, continuing on with their chat. Twilight stopped and appreciated the trust Rainbow had placed in her and how it was well-placed. She had just gotten to proving things, she was useful, and she could be a big part of things.
The girls all walked back to the rest area together. As they left the arena, the scoreboard showed the picture of the Rainbow Raider move up into the final bracket for the championship while the Mecha Mac fell back down to the third place bracket. Next up would be the Noble Warrior versus the Femme Fatale.
As the girls of Team Rainboom reached their garage to prep for the next match, the Raider had been sent back as well. It was waiting for them in the test area as usual, as if it had never left. The only thing that stood out on it were its fresh battle scars. The chest plating was dented in horribly and the damage to the head was clearly visible.
Rainbow Dash spoke up at the carnage that lay before her with a grimace.
“Dang… so that’s how hard she was hitting me? How the heck are we going to be able to fix this thing for the next match!?” Rainbow exclaimed.
Twilight shook her head slightly. Despite all her drilling on the subject of mechs, it seemed that Dash had still managed to forget some of the points she had made. Twilight walked over to the command module in the center of the work area and hit a few buttons. A light screen appeared over the module showing the blueprints of the Raider prior to their last fight.
“The answer is easy, Dash. We just use magic, it’d take forever to use science to fix this,” Twilight explained.
As she hit one more button and threw a switch, the damaged pieces of the Raider popped off the body and hit the floor with a dull clang. Then, each piece of discarded armor was spirited away to a recycling chute. Twilight threw another switch and a conveyer belt in the workshop began to move, bringing in sheets of metal.
With the command of a new button, the sheets of metal were cut and bent into the shapes of the pieces of armor that had just been recycled. The shavings were sent to the recycling chute as well, while the newly created armor pieces were sent back to the mech. Each of the new pieces attached to the mech, looking like it had never been damaged, identical to the design that Twilight had pulled up.
Dash watched the entire process with her jaw unhinged. Twilight smirked back at her with a triumphant grin.
“This, Dash, is why it’s good to know what all of the buttons do.”
Dash could do nothing but nod her head slowly while her mouth continued to hang open. With the mech now fixed, Twilight beckoned her over to give it a test run on the safety mode. Rainbow obliged and went up to the cockpit and turned on the mech.
Twilight coached her in doing basic commands, and when they found a system that wasn’t working properly, Twilight took the time to fix it back up to perfect condition. Her mind floated back to Applejack, who piloted alone. How the heck did she fix battle damage all on her own? It would be an exhausting task to do with only one person.
Soon enough, the Rainbow Raider was as good as new, with full testing involving the weapon and propulsion systems. Satisfied with their work, the girls reconvened at the work area and took a break.
Before they could really relax, they heard the cheer of the crowd from above, even all the way in their garage. That most likely meant that the other match was over. It was time they returned to the tournament and saw their final competitors.