//------------------------------// // Chapter 12: Thunderclap // Story: The Humans in Equestria Club // by billymorph //------------------------------// “Breathe! Why won’t you breathe?” There should have been pain, but there wasn’t. “Pinkie, she’s gone.” There should have been a great light, the roar of the angelic host, and the pearly gates swinging open, but my world was still and empty. “We have to go. We have to stop Chrysalis!” Only sky. “I’m sorry.” And air. And a soft place to lay down and just-- Stop. “I’ll be back for you, Alex.” Confusion. I couldn’t remember where or when. A blur of fire sat where my memories should have been. There was just a name, and a gaping void, and-- Stop. I could feel her eyes, malevolent green eyes. A flare of sickly green magic and then... then... Stop. The end of the world. I needed to move. I needed to get to Chrysalis I had to stop her.  Breathe. The world shifted beneath me as I fanned my... wings? Yes, wings seemed familiar. Breathe! I stood before a barrier. Lightning and wind barred the way, and the storm ripped away my breath as I tried to muscle through. I had to push through. There was nothing else. BREATHE! “Gah!” Air and aether rushed into my lungs, searing like fire. For a moment, the fog clung to every part of me. I couldn’t remember where I was, or what I was doing; who, when and why seemed equally elusive concepts. Did I have wings? Yes, definitely. Legs? How many remained undecided, but I was sure I had at least one. Hands? Maybe. I decided to get back to that one. Head? That sounded like something I’d need. I shook that head and flapped my wings, hovering a foot or so above the ground. Around me, pipes, cables, computers and machinery lay in ruins. A grey haze crept across the floor, burning everything it came in contact with. The bodies of ponies and drones littered the shattered space, along with the odd human and an unfortunate pegasus mare that lay broken at my feet. She hadn’t made it. An empty space opened in my mind as I stared at the body. Chrysalis had done this-- I knew that, at least --there had been a battle and then... She was going to destroy the world! The fog cleared in an instant, and sudden clarity burned through my mind. Gunfire and screams echoed through the halls of the power plant. A surge of magic swept across my wings as a distant detonation rattled the building. Dust and the odd pipe rained down from the ceiling. A voice echoed through the halls: Maynard. “Holy shit!” The lieutenant leapt backwards as I arrived. Her rifle barked once, sending a bullet screaming down the corridor, and a dozen guns swung in my direction. “Hold fire! Hold fire!” She held up her hand to stop them filling me with hot lead, though none of the guns dropped. “Miss Kingston, is that you?” I frowned. To be fair, I doubted I looked my best after my face’s brief altercation with a wall. Still, there was no need to open fire. “Yeah, it’s me.” With a flap, I hovered closer. “What did I miss?” Maynard took a step back, the small team of soldiers tracking me with their guns. A group of ragged looking civilians sheltered behind them. If anything, they were trying to climb the walls to get away from me. I guess changeling hospitality hadn’t left the best of impressions. “You don’t remember?” “I remember a fight..." I scrunched up my eyes as flashes of memory assaulted my senses. I shook it off. There were more important things to worry about. “What happened to Chrysalis and the Element bearers?” “They kept fighting after you died.” A look of pity flashed across Maynard’s face. "And we lost track of them. We’re going to get the civilians clear, but the plan was for them to get to the--” “Roof,” I cut in. Another bolt of memory burned across my mind. “Right. Good luck.” “Alex, wait. You--” The world trembled as raw magic lashed at the foundations of reality. Chrysalis’ portal was vast, a great yawning hole in reality, a ring of green fire that lead to an infinite blackness. The sheer amount of magic tied up in the spell was incredible. My teeth buzzed, and St. Elmos’ fire played along my outstretched wings as the magic washed over me. For a moment I stood, slack jawed, staring at the sheer arrogance of it all. Chrysalis, for all her faults, never dreamed small. An explosion of heat and light lashed against Chrysalis’ magic, solar fire pouring from the heavens as Celestia raged against the titanic spell. The building trembled, flames licking over the edge of the roof, magic and chemistry clashing in a multicoloured inferno. I could see the Queen fighting against the Element bearers at the far end of the building. A legion of drones stood between her and them, great gouts of magic erupting from their horns and carving furrows into the concrete as Twilight and Co. tried to fight their way through. Twilight radiated a glow, nearly impossible to look at, with her halo of magic encompassing the group as she dueled with Chrysalis. The spell above us had reached the final act. Growing wider and wider, it stretched across the sky, darkness falling beneath it. Runes began to kindle all around me, the shattered rooftop shining a vibrant emerald under their light. Rainbow Dash leapt into the air, accelerating away from the power plant before sweeping back around, lightning trailing in her wake. I hovered there, my wings keeping up a lazy beat as I watched in horror. They weren’t going to make it in time; I could see it all unfolding as clear as day before me. Superheated plasma from the heart of the sun would rush through the portal in an uncontrollable flood, and Twilight would have to retreat. Chrysalis wouldn’t be able to control more than a fraction of the power she had called down upon my world, but even that tiny fragment would be enough to make her the most powerful entity Equestria had ever seen. Humanity would be gone in an instant, expunged as the rules of reality fell away. Act two would be fought on the shores of Equestria. “Save the world,” I said. Imploring, daring, begging the Element bearers to drive forward. They had to do something, anything, to rescue Earth from its fate. It was not going to happen. Magic roared around me, threatening to sweep me away like mist in a storm. Everyone was doing everything in their power to save the world, but it wasn’t going to be enough. There was nothing I could do to help. Even so, I had to try. Shaking my head to clear the visions of doom that swirled around me, I dropped to the roof. I set my-- hands(?) the word seemed wrong, but I didn’t have time to question it --on the concrete and then stopped. Breathe. For a moment, I stared at Chrysalis. She was too much to fight, here at the center of her power. We’d always intended to fight her in Equestria, though, and there was nothing wrong with that plan. I could try and force her to cross the barrier; the last time I’d tried, I recalled it going badly. Deadly. But then, I was just one little pony, and that hadn’t been my best shot. Distant lightning flashed in the storm clouds, as if nature was annoyed that mere mortals dared to ignore its splendor. Inspiration struck like a bolt in the blue. Why not use the storm? Forget subtlety. Forget clever plans; when had they ever worked on the show? Just throw more power at it. Save the world. Rainbow Dash. “DASH!” I roared, wings straining as I fought through the turbulent skies to keep up with the lightning weather pegasus. “WHAT?” Rainbow Dash shot a withering glare over her shoulder. It evaporated the moment she saw me. She slammed on the brakes, spreading her wings wide, and I almost crashed into her. Lighting boomed around us as it escaped her wake, but she didn’t seem to care. “Oh, Alex,” she said, her face sallow and drawn. “I’m so, so sorry.” “About what?” I snapped, then held up a hoof to forestall the answer. “No, don’t tell me; there’s no time. We need to stop Chrysalis.” Dash slumped, seeming to hang from her wings. “Alex, you don’t have to do anything any more. You--” “I don’t care!” I cut her off, getting up in her face. “I can do this, Rainbow Dash. I know how to stop her. We can still win this.” For a moment, she just stared. “Don’t ask for what I think you’re asking for...” she said, her voice barely a whisper. “I need as much aether as you can get! We can punch Chrysalis straight back to Equestria.” I smacked my fists(?) together. “Come on!” Dash glanced back at the conflagration of magic. Twilight continued the assault on Chrysalis, but for every step forwards she slipped two back. “Ponyfeathers!” She rounded on me. “Keep up.” She exploded into motion, her wings a blur as she shot straight up towards the angry clouds. I gritted my teeth and hurled myself after her, catching her rainbow-coloured slipstream and sticking tight on her tail. Lightning flashed above us, and the rain seemed to fight our passage, coming down in great sheets and clawing at my wings as we fought for altitude. A bass roar shook the air as Celestia’s sun raced through the sky, the light eye-searing as Celestia hurled herself again and again at Chrysalis. “Come on, Alex!” Rainbow Dash was a mere hoof-length away and beckoning me onward. “Stay with me. Whatever happens, stay right with me!” We hit the clouds, and the world went black. I had expected some resistance, but what little magic they possessed didn’t do much more than jolt me around. Lightning tore the air apart mere feet away, the electricity playing along my wings and down my tail. Rainbow’s contrail intensified as bolt after bolt struck her. She accelerated like a rocket, and I barely hung onto her wake. My wings blazed as the electricity of the storm poured through us, leaving my own pure white trail through the ink black sky. We entered a void in the storm, a massive cavern in the sky lit from below by the intensity of Celestia’s sun. Rainbow Dash began to level off and, somehow, accelerate off to the west. It was hauntingly beautiful, like a cathedral in the sky. I could almost hear-- “ALEX! STAY WITH ME!” Rainbow Dash roared over the howling wind and rain. I hurried to catch up, aether flowing through me like my blood had been replaced with liquid fire. A conical shockwave erupted around Rainbow as she pushed faster and faster. “Just a few... more... miles!” “Where are we going?” I bellowed back. “Nowhere. We need the run up!” A supercell loomed before us, a jet-black wall cast into sudden brilliance by the flare of magic. Rainbow punched through, the storm hurling more lighting our way as if offended by our trespass into its domain. The wind tore at us, tossing us about like rag dolls, and it took every ounce of will just to keep Rainbow’s tail in sight. An explosion of rainbow-coloured light tore the storm apart as Rainbow Dash hit the rainboom barrier and smashed through. The rush of power was electric, invigorating, awe inspiring, and I poured even more power through my wings to catch up as Rainbow tore through the sky. She went into a steep dive, spinning on her axis as we went accelerated to aweinspring speeds. “ARE YOU WITH ME?” Her voice seemed to shake the sky. Aether was pouring from her, and I tucked as tight and close a I could, not trusting myself to speak for fear the wind would tear me to shreds. We leveled out going east at a terrifying speed, the sea just a couple hundred meters below. Another concentric ring of displaced air exploded around Rainbow as she showed her sheer contempt for the laws of physics and aerodynamics. The emerald fire above Hinkley Point leapt over the horizon as we closed at supersonic speed, and... and... I missed a beat, dropping back into the turbulence of Rainbow Dash’s wake. The shockwave almost tore me apart, but I surged forwards, clinging to the rainbows streaming off the mare. I was going supersonic. Supersonic! That wasn’t something I could do. Never in my life had I dreamed of flying at such a speed. Rainbow Dash was a once-in-a-century talent. Even keeping up with her on a slow day had nearly blown my wings off. There was no way I could match half of what we were doing. “Rainbow!” I shouted, my voice tinged with sudden desperation. “How am I doing this?” “Don’t think about it!” She shot a terrified look over her shoulders. “Just stay with me, and don’t look back!” I looked. There was nothing there. No body. No mane. Just a pair of hazy, ill defined wings, a blazing cutie mark and a pair of misshapen hooves. It hit me. I’d died. That battered body had been mine. Chrysalis had already won. “ALEX!” My attention snapped back to Rainbow Dash. She reached back with a hoof, imploring. “I’m dead,” I said simply. The world faded away before my eyes, colour washing away until there was just a single bright rainbow streaming from Rainbow Dash. She starred in horror, then her teeth clenched in anger. “SO WHAT? ARE YOU GOING TO LET THAT STOP YOU?” No. No, I wasn’t. The world snapped back just in time. We were hurtling towards the shoreline, and I dropped back into Rainbow Dash’s aether stream, soaking up magic like a sponge. Black lightning began to flash behind me as I tested the barrier, holes in reality that spread wide and then vanished in an eyeblink. “It’s all yours, Alex! On three. THREE!” Dash flared her wings and dropped out of formation. The aether rushed over me, burning and freezing as I fought to kept my wings flapping. Power, raw unfettered power of the like I’d never felt before, flooded my senses and sparked behind my eyes. Ahead, Chrysalis’ spell burned ever brighter, hints of red fire licking through the portal as the spell built to its conclusion. The aether tore at my ephemeral flesh, consuming me from the inside out. I could feel myself expanding like a balloon, all pretence that I was still inhabiting the body of a pegasus dropping away. A black wave cleaved through the sky before me as the barrier between Earth and Equestria melted away. I flashed over land, and let go of the spell. And then-