And there I was… eighty-five days since I set hoof on the shores of home… one hundred and six days since I last saw my family… too many days since my story began in Canterlot Castle, I was there, running across a rocky wasteland as ash swirled around me, caught in the wind and kicked up by the cantering hooves. My head was filled with the sound of charging and of battle cries, but it all sounded so far off, like I wasn’t really a part of it, even though I was there in the middle. If I turned my eyes to the right or the left, I could see my allies spread out far to either side, but when I turned my gaze forward I saw the enemy…
The army of abominations was everything I expected and more, hideous monstrosities, revolting grotesqueries, I could call them names all day and it would never do justice to just how terrible they really were. They came in hundreds of varieties, it was hard to find any two that looked similar, so many shapes and sizes… every single one of them an insult to the ponies they once were, before they were augmented against their will until very little of their true selves shone through the unnatural façade. While the Dreadnaught, the great metal behemoth in the distance, maintained a fairly standard speed, encroaching steadily closer to us with every passing minute, the enemy army charged forward when they saw us rushing in to meet them.
And there we were… both forces moments from clashing… moments from the conflict that would end with only one side left standing. It had been a long road that brought me to that moment, a long twisting road, along which I saw many things, met many faces and did so much. I had journeyed to each major location in Panchea, from the five great cities and the smaller towns, to the secret and forbidden places, the Nether Vale and the Demon Shaft, the Isle of Serenity and the Covenant cathedral.
I had made enemies for myself, ponies like the Dishonoured, Starlight Glimmer, Typhoon and Spoon Bender, Iron Sights and Fleetfoot, Gaia and Terra, Crane and Blueblood… but I had also made considerably more friends. Hammerhead, Cirrus, Grass Snake, Big Mac, Cogs, Spike, Lily and Rose just to name a few, but most of all there had been Twilight Sparkle, Applejack, Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash, and that wasn’t even touching on the countless individuals I had encountered along the way, who had helped me in so many small ways.
I had brought my body to the point of collapse so many times, through starvation, exhaustion, mental collapse and physical injury. I had been tortured in the most brutal fashion for days, finally ending in my own death and rebirth. I had learned to fight and taken up arms, I had used them to fight and hurt others, I had taken the lives of my fellow ponies, sometimes in self-defence, other times in revenge. I had deceived and gone under cover, toppled power structures and destroyed war machines. I had sat with those closest to me and gazed up at the night sky and listened to the sound of the sea, together we had been there for one another and overcome challenges.
It’s hard not to be charging head first into the jaws of death, feeling more alive than you ever have since the day you were born, your heart thumping and your breath sticking, and not look back on everything that led you to that moment, wondering if there had ever been another way. Had my decision been set in stone? Could I have done something differently, and set the entire universe on a different track? But that was the past, and there was no changing the past, in that moment we could only look forward and wonder about the future.
Would we win? Would we lose, and everything we’d worked so hard for be for naught? Would we even survive to see the world our decisions helped shape? I believed in my heart that we had what it took to succeed, we could work together to overcome this final hurdle and lead Panchea into a bright new future. I believed that by all of us working together, we would triumph, that working in accordance with the spirit of the Elements was what we needed to do to guarantee victory. The Elements of Unity themselves were still an enigma to us, we had all six, but what did that even mean? They were created from the Elements of Harmony, the divine artefacts wielded by the Six, but in all we had learnt, we still didn’t know what precisely they were supposed to do or how we made them work.
Not to say my new Masque was little more than a stylish accessory, simply by wearing it I became faster and stronger, my endurance higher and my senses more focused. But was giving me that physical boost really what would see us through the day? I was about to find out as I galloped into the charging path of a huge beast with great hunched shoulders, a thick scally hide, long crooked claws, and a distorted face with crocodile like features. I sprinted right for it as it raised its claws and opened its jaws with a feral screech, as the distance between us closed to almost nothing, I leapt forwards, propelling myself off a small jutting rock so I was as high as the monster’s head.
Raising my rapier high, I brought it swishing down diagonally across the creature’s head, my blade raking through his hide and causing it to twist back in agony. My jump saw me hammering right into it, my sudden weight bringing it crashing to the ground after my initial slash had thrown it off balance. Once on the ground, I raised my sword once more, stabbing it down into the creature’s eye and piercing right through until my blade was buried to the hilt. As quickly as I had driven the sword in and the beast ceased moving, I pulled it back out and continued to rush forward without losing my momentum, seeking out my next opponent.
There were plenty to choose from; now that the two armies had met, I was absolutely surrounded by monsters, many of which were already locked in combat with my own allies. The closest fight taking place to me was with two light armoured ponies dodging out of range of the rapid head-butt attacks of a monster with hydra like qualities. The heads smashed themselves into the ground like hammers, with little regard for their own safety, by the time one had hit the ground, one of the other three were already swinging down. This resulted in neither of the ponies finding an opening to attack during, as they had to keep rolling and running out of the way of the heads.
Drawing two of my knives, I threw them with magic at the two heads that were most stationary, hitting them both in the eyes. The heads writhed and flailed around, giving a short enough break in their assault for one of the ponies to roll inwards and swing his glaive through the air, taking off one of the heads with a single clean swipe. I pulled my knives free of the creature, while the second pony moved in and began stabbing it in the torso with his sword. They had that particular fight in the bag, so I left them be and moved on. As I ran towards an ogre like creature, its rolls of fat literally rotting as it slouched its slow way across the battlefield, I felt the ground beneath my hooves suddenly rise up sharply, sending me sprawling onto my rear.
I looked around behind me in time to see a colossal worm burst out of the ground, it must have tunnelled right beneath me, which was what upset the ground. It had come out of the earth right beneath a pony in heavy armour, and was trying to ingest him into its circular mouth lined with teeth. I picked up the pony’s fallen battle-axe in my magic and hurled it at the worm, causing it to drop the pony as it spun around to face me. I hurriedly scrambled out of the way as it rose up out of the earth and leapt through the air in an arc, coming right down to where I had been standing when I threw the axe.
I got out of the way in time, lumps of dirt and stone showering up as the worn burrowed back into the ground. Taking my chances, I looked about for my sword, which I had dropped when the worm first tunnelled under me. I found it quickly enough, giving quick thanks to my improved vision as I pulled it over to me with telekinesis. Just as I took hold of it, I heard a low rumbling and turned in time to see the worm burst out of the ground a second time, diving straight for me. I readied myself to leap out of harm’s way, but found I didn’t have to, as a huge club came smashing down on the worm. I glanced about to see that the rather slow looking ogre had been moving in to attack me while I was distracted, and seemed to have struck the worm by mistake.
As the head end of the worm was flattened beneath the club, I quickly darted around behind the ogre, grimacing at the stench it gave off before taking a last gulp of precious oxygen, running up and grabbing on to his flabby flesh. The ogre began lazily shaking, sending ripples down its body to try and remove me. I held on, although it wasn’t easy what with how damp the skin was, if felt like it would peel right off if I pulled too tightly. Once on his shoulders, I began stabbing my sword down into his neck and head, but he didn’t seem to register it, just waving his arms at me as if I was nothing more than a pesky mosquito.
I heard somepony shout out to me and glanced around to see a soldier I didn’t recognise, running over with a bomb held aloft in his magic. I pulled my sword out of the ogre’s flesh and I leapt off as the pony threw the bomb, as soon as it made contact with the creature’s body and cracked, it went off in a torrent of flames. The ogre began to squeal, sounding an awful lot like a huge pig as it tried to put out the fire that was spreading over its body, apparently it was rather flammable. I shouted some praise over to the pony who threw the bomb as the ogre went down, its flailing becoming weaker until it stopped altogether.
I saw a monster; it looked like a shrunken, shrivelled pony with a cauliflower growing out its neck. It was running rampantly across the battlefield, no sense of direction, but I could see it was getting awfully close to a pair of ponies, one lying injured, while the other stood over her in a protective manner while shouting out for a stretcher. I sprinted across, cutting off the monster right as it was about to throw itself on the pony while his back was turned. We both fell to the ground together where it began bucking about madly, apparently unable to get up after landing on its back.
I stood up and brought its head off with a swing of my sword in a chopping motion. This turned out to be a mistake however, as the cauliflower head grew vine like legs and began to scuttle away. I managed to take it out from a distance with a single well aimed knife, but while I was aiming, I didn’t notice the monster that looked like a demonic bull charging towards me. Right after I let the knife fly, I was thrown to the ground, not by the monster, as that might have broken me in two, but by Spitfire who had flown in at the last second. She quickly helped me to my hooves again, uttering a short apology, before turning to face the bull as it turned to face us once more.
As it started running, I pulled my thrown knife free of the weird head, which now lay motionless, and spun it through the air, striking the bull right in the eye. It didn’t embed itself, which I had been hoping for, but it managed to glance off its brow, causing the bull to dip its head reflexively. This allowed Spitfire to sidestep it as it got close, and raise her double ended sword, spinning it through the air and decapitating the beast as it charged by, sending the head arcing into the air, while the body dropped forwards and skidded on for several metres.
I caught my knife before it flew off too far again and brought it back, sheathing it as I muttered a quick thanks to Spitfire, who offered to airlift me over to a point some ways west of our current positon, where they were having trouble. I agreed, and while we flew through the air, occasionally dipping down so I could swipe out a monster with Spitfire’s blade, which I was able to spin around us with magic, I heard what sounded like the cawing of a crow. I glanced up, half expecting to see Harbinger, but instead I saw a creature that had clearly once been a pegasus, but now resembled a vulture, its wings too big for its body and looking badly moulted.
Spitfire had to twist drastically in order to avoid colliding with it, but this resulted in me slipping off. As I started to fall, I hurled the doubled ended sword skyward and it impaled the creature in the chest. Almost instantly, Spitfire zoomed up and pulled the weapon free as the monster began to drop, retracting the blades back into the baton before speeding down to scoop me back up, before I was splattered over the ground. She kept me held beneath her this time as we completed our journey over to where Hex was leading a number of battlemages, trying to hold off the enemy horde while covering the escape of about half a dozen injured ponies on stretchers.
“Ah, perfect timing!” he greeted, sending a bolt of magic into one of the many eyes of a monster that seemed to be nothing but eyes. “Spitfire, can you cover the injured while they’re taken back to base?”
Spitfire nodded and sped after them, that left me to stay and help Hex in fighting the monsters that were encroaching on their barrier. The one that Hex had zapped, that resembled a blob of reddish brown muck covered in eyeballs, appeared impervious to their magical attacks, reaching the barrier and simply passing through it. Once it was on our side, all its eyes, which had previously being staring off in random directions, focused in on a single battlemage, paralysing him on the spot. I ran forward and tried to bring my sword down on the slime creature, but it just sank into the muck, the eyeballs rolling out of harm’s way, while I had to drag it back out before it was swallowed.
“Rarity, try this!” Hex called out, his horn glowing.
At first I didn’t know what I was supposed to be trying, but then the blade of my sword ignited with fire. I instinctively held it slightly further away from myself, worried that I might do more harm to myself than the monster with this new enchantment. I saw the eyes beginning to turn; releasing the pony it had captured in its gaze and rotating towards me, so I quickly brought the flaming sword down. This time I was satisfied when it scorched right through the middle of the slime. I slashed at it a few more times, repeatedly dividing it, until the pieces appeared too small to function independently and dissolve on the ground in a bubbling mess.
As I was busy finishing it off, a massive boulder was hurled through the shield, the battlemages holding it up were thrown off by the sudden impact and their concentration slipped, allowing the rock to break through and pummel into a pair of them. I wasn’t able to run back and check to see if they had survived the blow, as a new monster was scuttling towards me on long mantis like legs, dragging behind a body that resembled a fleshy sack of Hearths Warming presents. I moved in to meet it, holding my sword aloft with magic, just to keep the fire at a safe distance until it wore off, but then the monster propped its wretched body up using its legs, and began birthing dozens of fat, fly like creatures in a shower of bodily fluids, which buzzed towards me.
I froze and quickly started spinning my sword around me with magic, creating a whirlwind of fire that swatted the flies out of the air and left them twitching and singed on the ground. Beyond them I could see the monster that spawned them, already swelling up with more, but then it began to rise up off the ground in a green aura. I glanced about to see Hex running back over to help me, looking back in time to see him pulling the legs out one at a time, leaving the sack like body to hover in mid-air, connected to nothing. Aiming, I threw my flaming sword towards it, splitting the body open as it spun through, causing it to gush with rancid fluid and half developed flies, which wriggled and died on the ground.
I nodded in appreciation to Hex before running off after my sword, it had fallen not too far off, the fire enchantment having ended, leaving the blade as it once was. As I made my way towards it, another creature sped my way, it looked like a cluster of rocks and boulders orbiting a winking orb of magic, I noticed that some of the rocks resembled petrified pony parts, including one that was most definitely a face. I steered clear of it, rolling in the opposite direction of where my sword had fallen, and losing track of it while I tried to dodge the cyclone of flying rocks, as they tried to batter me to death.
While backing up, I wandered right into the path of something that resembled a walker, only it was mostly bones, with only a little tattered flesh hanging of its old pony form, levitating off the ground slightly and filled with a haunting light of pale blue. The creature hissed at me, and I felt ghostly shackles snapping around my forelegs, pulling me up off the ground and hanging me in front of the creature, as its skull cricked my way and the jaw opened wide. I heard it sucking and felt a rush of air tugging at my insides; quickly I focused my magic to my horn and began charging up, unleashing it as a simple blast. However, I was surprised that as I charged up the spell, I felt it resonating in my Masque too, specifically in my eyes.
When I released the spell it came out in three beams, one from my horn and the bottom two from my eyes, merging together into a greater triangular laser that decimated the creature’s skull as it passed through it. I felt myself drop back to the ground where I landed neatly enough, whereas the skeletal monster fell and its bones exploded into dust. Spinning around, I saw the rock cyclone had ceased its pursuit, now focusing its attacks on a familiar pony who was having much greater ease at dodging it than I.
“You can’t catch me!” Pinkie mocked in a sing song voice, as she danced out of the monster’s reach.
As the monster hurled itself in its entirety at Pinkie Pie, she dived forward, her body twisted as she stretched and slipped her way in between the speeding rocks. She dived right into its magical core, where her whole body warped and twisted around for a brief second before leaping out the other side again. The pile of flying rocks all fell to the ground, no longer animated, as Pinkie held the ball of magic in her own hooves, squishing it between her gauntlets. I trotted over, scanning around for my fallen sword as I did.
“Hiya Rarity!” Pinkie greeted, almost certainly smiling behind her own mask. “This is actually going pretty well, it’s even a little bit fun.”
“Don’t get relaxed just yet,” I warned her, glancing across the battlefield at the hordes that still lay between us and the Dreadnaught. “There’s a lot to go, and I’ve already seen ponies on stretch…”
Pinkie chose that moment to stop me in my tracks, by diving forward and tackling me to the ground. I wasn’t sure why, until I saw the ground where I had been standing explode in chips of stone and ash, as if something had struck it, although I couldn’t see what. Pinkie grabbed me and hauled me back to my hooves, tapping my own Masque and muttering ‘is this thing on?’. I frowned at that, wondering what she was meaning, but as I began to focus on it, the world around me started changing. It was as if I was seeing it all through a new filter, where I was looking, not at the physical constructs that made up bodies and objects, but at the magic that flowed within all living things.
In a place like the Ash Lands, using this ability could be a little risky as there was no life in the environment, the ground instead appearing as a cold expanse of nothing… I had a mental image of tripping over a rock, which made me anxious. This new sight did however, allow me to see what had tried to attack us; it looked like a great serpent, only its head was split open like a banana peel to allow half a mare to protrude from within. There was only so much detail I could detect when looking beyond the physical realm, but I saw enough to know what we were up against, and I was ready when the invisible monster began slithering towards us a second time.
The creature got close before it lunged out, the mare baring her fangs and raising her forelegs, which each tapered off into long, sharp scythe like appendages. Pinkie and I both rolled to either side, allowing the serpent to pass between us, as we each pulled out a pair of blades and stabbed them into the monsters side, its own momentum allowing us to remain stationary while our blades sliced along it. We almost got down the full length before the serpent was able to slow itself down and begin flipping and writhing in agony, forcing us to pull out our blades and jump clear of the thrashing tail.
I saw Pinkie’s own magical essence, which I could see was a huge amount compressed into such a small place, appearing quite frantic as she struggled to contain it all, as she back flipped her way back over beside me. She hurriedly asked me to keep it focused a moment, while she got the jump on it. I assured her I would, and a moment later her essence vanished, leaving behind only trace residue, no doubt she had blinked away somewhere. This left me to run up to the serpent, which was still trying to pull itself together after suffering the injuries it did.
I drew my three daggers and held them behind my back, as the serpent saw me and dived again, I sidestepped it and launched one of the knives. I heard it make contact and the creature shriek in pain again, but cursed myself as I had subsequently lost track of one of my knives as well as my sword. I couldn’t see it while looking through the Masque’s magic vision, but I didn’t want to turn it off, as I figured being blind to the serpent would be much worse. As the beast lunged and struck out at me again and again, I held onto my last two knives, I had an idea, but I was worried if it didn’t work, I’d be left with only one until Pinkie made her move.
I decided to take my chances, and when the serpent moved in to attack again, I threw my second knife, but this time using magic. The experiment was a success, the knife made contact and resulted in the monster rearing up in pain, but the knife was still giving off a small magical reading from when I held it. It was faint, but I was able to see it just long enough to retrieve it. I felt a little more confident after that, but unfortunately my confidence came to a swift halt when the serpent sprung forward again, but this time not aiming for me. The half mare head went right past me, and it was only too late that I realised what it was doing.
The serpent wrapped its whole body around me, and before I could move to escape, it constricted and I felt myself trapped within it. The head moved around to the front of me once more, appearing almost victorious as it surveyed its trapped prey, the mare scraping her scythe arms off one another, getting ready to strike. My own limbs were trapped, slowly being crushed by the steadily increasing pressure of the serpent’s body, so I couldn't get at my knives, even with my magic. The mare pulled back before lunging down upon me, but just as she was about to reach me, I saw Pinkie blink into existence right over her, leaving a cluster of magical residue resembling a portal behind as she did.
Whatever she did, the snake mare froze in an instant, her fangs mere feet from tearing into me. She had been vanquished, and as I felt her grip around me slacken, I wriggled free. Once I was outside the serpentine prison, I thought very hard about getting my Masque to return to normal vision, trying to simply will it, just as I had done to switch it in the first place. It worked like a charm, the world returning to normal to show a now visible snake monster with Pinkie standing on top of it; my own rapier plunged right through the mare’s head and body. Pinkie returned the sword, as well as the knife I had lost track of, which had managed to jam itself in her hip, the lowest part of her pony body before she merged with the snake form.
I would have liked for Pinkie to stay, but before ten seconds had passed of her giving me my weapons, she spotted a number of soldiers struggling to bring down a monster that looked like a walking tree, and dashed off to help them. That left me to gallop to the front line where our own troops were quite often finding themselves ganged up on by the enemy, as their numbers began to pile in on mass. Therw was one individual I quickly spotted, who was having no trouble handling multiple attackers on her own, even if those attackers were mutated abominations, and that was Applejack.
If anything tried to take her from behind while she was mowing down enemies with her claymore, you could be certain she’d notice it and give it a firm bucking with her new sabatons, one hit from which was usually enough to keep them down, and if not then it kept them down long enough for her to focus on them and put them down specifically. It also helped that another familiar pony was fighting not too far off from her, which I knew was no coincidence, thinning the herd that tried to approach her. Big Mac wasn’t even bothering with a weapon, he just got in close and personal and let his hooves do the damage, he didn’t even try to avoid attacks, soaking up damage like a walking tank.
This attitude however, I could see was about to prove very problematic for him, as a tall, spindly creature composed of shadows began ambling over to him. Naturally he tried punching it, but this time he found his hoof just flying harmlessly through its skinny torso. The monster responded by reaching down, almost lazily, like it was just trying to get his attention, and pushing its hand through his shoulder. It didn’t appear to do any physical damage, there was no blood or breaking of bones, but Big Mac’s whole body did seize up immediately, I saw his eyes go wide and breathing seemed to halt.
Applejack hadn’t noticed, but I couldn’t be sure she even knew her brother was there watching her back, so I rushed forward, charging up my horn and Masque as I did. The creatures turned its blank, shadowy face towards me, looking curious in a way as I launched my beam at it. It had the desired effect, forcing the monster to pull its hand back from Big Mac, allowing him to take a huge gasp of air, while the figure began writhing in the light, its shadowy flesh peeling away to reveal a much more physical looking body beneath. Big Mac didn’t hesitate in jabbing out at the hole my magic was making, his hoof connecting sharply with the monster’s exposed chest and causing a loud snap to be heard, like a whip cracking.
The monster collapsed instantly, apparently being quite fragile beneath its protective outer layer. I stayed with Big Mac for a little longer, helping him and Applejack cut through the enemy ranks, before I decided that they had everything well under control on this front, and to move further up the line to see if anypony else needed my help. It was Hammerhead who my eyes fell upon and decided to run towards next, he was crouched down beside one of his friends, who was bleeding profusely from several laceration wounds, a monster with limbs resembling bundles of razor wire lay dead nearby, none of his other friends were in sight.
I ran up, throwing a knife at a small yappy creature that Hammerhead was attempting to fend off with his maul as it tried to chew on his friend’s fetlocks. Glancing up, he saw me approaching and a look of relief swept over his face. Without stopping to speak, I helped pick up his groaning friend and lay him over Hammerhead’s back. We started running back towards the base, I covered our rear by giving a quick flick with my sword at any monsters which got too close, but then we were brought to a shuddering stop when a great hand burst forth from the earth and latched onto Hammerhead’s hind leg.
I heard a loud pop as it dislocated, followed by Hammerhead’s cry of pain. He fell to the ground, his friend rolling off his back while the hand dragged Hammerhead toward the hole it had sprung up from. I began sprinting over, throwing my knives at the hand while readying my sword, but they just scratched it, and it barely noticed. It started sinking back down, Hammerhead about to go with it, when another pony swooped down, bringing a battle-axe chopping down. The hand’s fingertips were severed, and the rest of it very quickly retreated, leaving Hammerhead breathing rapidly, probably still disturbed by what had almost happened.
I looked up; smiling when I saw it was Eerie who had come into rescue Hammerhead. Moments later, Cirrus and the others either ran or flew in. A quick discussion later and they worked together to get both Hammerhead and his friend carried back to safety, this allowed me to return the way I had come. I stopped briefly to admire the work of Holly and some of the other crusaders, they were absolutely tearing through the enemy, and they made it all look so easy with their precise, coordinated attacks, and enchantments that burned any and all monsters they encountered in a wave of holy fire.
The clearly didn’t need my help, so I moved on, finding a group of soldiers taking cover behind a large crag, as a monster which resembled a living, walking cannon, bombarded them with acidic projectiles, which began eating through anything they struck. I narrowly avoided one myself, dropped down and sliding to safety alongside the rest of the ponies, who looked pleased at my arrival. Among their number was two medium armoured ponies, a battlemage, and Gale, whose wing still looked to be out of commission.
“We can’t get through,” Gale told me. “The rest of our unit is further ahead, but this thing cut us off.”
“Can you make a shield for us?” I asked the mage, but he shook his head.
“I’m not specialised in shields,” he explained. “But if I got close enough, I could crush that thing into a cube. My special talent is using magic to warp metal, and there looks to be quite a bit on that thing.”
“Warping metal…” I repeated thoughtfully, before a metaphorical light bulb appeared above my head. “I have a plan, if you two could remove your armour…”
The other two ponies stripped down, and I instructed the battlemage to cobble the pieces together to make up four shields. He worked quickly, while one of the ponies who had taken their armour off, used their crossbow to protect us from any other monsters coming around the rock. Once the mage was done, we had four, very hastily made square shields. I gave one to each of the ponies except the mage, keeping the fourth for myself, as I explained my plan. The cannon creature barely let up in its assault, so we weren’t going to get any obvious openings, we would just have to try our luck.
We stepped out of cover in our designated formation, myself and Gale at the front, our shields held out before us to create a small wall, the other two ponies who had sacrificed their armour for this, were directly behind us, their own shield held over us to create a small ceiling. We began marching forwards simultaneously, having to stoop ever so slightly so the front shields covered everything from the acid shots. We had essentially become a tortoise, shielded from the front as well as the top, from any shots that came over head and dipped off. With the battlemage safely behind us, as we all marched together towards the enemy.
The shields would never have held out for very long before the acid started dissolving through them, but they lasted just long enough for us to get close enough, that the mage could step up and play his part. The monster had been almost mechanical, all its organic matter contained safely inside its own metal shell, although that had been its downfall as he compressed all the metal in on itself, crushing the biological matter within. We cast the now useless shields down, Gale and the battlemage thanked me before going to re-join their unit, while the other two retreated to get new armour, I wouldn’t have them on the battlefield without some kind of protection.
I looked around, trying to find other ponies who needed my help, or monsters that were making a push forward and not being challenged, when I saw a pillar of light erupt into the sky over to the west. I could feel the connection to Twilight and her crown through my Masque, and while that attack could have been seen as evidence that she was coping well enough on her own, I saw it as evidence that there was some kind of struggle at that end, that she would resort to such a large scale and presumably devastating attack.
I started making my way across there, along the way, I slowed down twice to help groups of soldiers in taking down a monster that resembled a minotaur with a steely exoskeleton, and another that multiplied whenever it had a limb severed or was cleaved in two. By the time I reached the crater where Twilight had presumably just been, I was starting to feel very thankful for that increased endurance that Masque lent me, but I was worried how the rest of the soldiers might be coping. I could see Twilight further up ahead, far away from our own front line and any allies, but considering how devastating her various magical attacks were, I guessed that was intentional for their own safety.
I didn’t like the idea of her being so isolated however, so I began running around the crater that had been left from that pillar of light I saw, before galloping across the plains towards her. Twilight sensed me before I reached her, sending the twister she was currently conjuring around her, hurtling into the enemy ranks and keeping them safely off her back for a moment.
“You shouldn’t be here!” Twilight shouted out to me, the orb on her sceptre opening up to allow a stream of power to burst forth and turn three monsters to dust. “I’m still trying to get the hang of my spellcasting with this crown; the new magnitude is a little… wild.”
To prove this, her horn flashed very briefly within its silver casing, causing a series of stalagmites to begin erupting from the ground in a trail from her outwards, impaling a couple of abominations somewhere along the way.
“I have faith you won’t hurt me,” I replied, swinging my sword to parry a bat like creature that swooped down on us.
After pushing it back, Twilight grabbed it in her magical hold and chucked it like bowling ball into a charging monster that resembled a wolf with two heads, one of which was more akin to a very hairy unicorn, its horn basically a shaft of exposed bone jutting out its forehead, and humming with energy. The bat and wolf monsters collided and both tumbled across the ground together, but as they did, the unicorn’s horn began emanating a violent, rippling aura. As we watched, the two bodies rippled for a moment, getting sucked into a vortex of the unicorn’s creation. Getting spat back out seconds later as a bizarre hybrid, the limbs and appendages of the bat monster now spliced onto the body of the wolf thing.
As it was released from the singularity, which promptly vanished, it landed on all four legs, which now no longer matched, as one was a claw that it half trailed behind it while running towards us. Twilight grabbed me and teleported us to a safe distance before we both lit up our horns and sent a beams of magic at the monster, each moving in from either side so it was trapped, unable to run either direction without getting incinerated by one of us. Of course, we should have predicted it jumping into the air and flying out of range, leaving our streams to cross before we allowed them to fizzle out. In my defence, I had seen the addition of the bat wings, and thought they looked so malformed that it couldn’t possibly fly with them, I was wrong it seemed.
Twilight raised her sceptre, launching several orbs of varying elements in rapid succession of one another; almost all of them hit their target, sending its smoking, charred body soaring to the ground. Unfortunately it hit the ground, its limbs breaking upon contact, near another monster resembling a wyrm, and the unicorn head was quick to create another vortex, drawing both bodies in and fusing them together. The result looked even more deformed and unnatural than the last, the body elongated, so now none of the three wings even lined up, the multiple ugly heads all vying for control and direction.
“We need to destroy it utterly before it can merge with anything else,” Twilight told me, sending out her sceptre to draw a ring of warding fire around us and the monster. “And that includes us, so don’t get too close when it feels threatened.”
I nodded and charged in; ducking beneath the jet of flames the wyrm head sent my way, rolling until I was knelt just below the collective heads. Before they had time to direct any attacks my way, I swung my sword upwards, slashing through the throat of the unicorn head, almost taking it clean off but it managed to hang on by a narrow chunk off flesh, leaving it to dangle aimlessly. I saw its horn beginning to charge up, but felt my whole body yanked back by Twilight’s magic to her side. Once I was safely out of harm’s way, Twilight aimed her sceptre at the unicorn head and conjured a ghostly chain with a gruesome looking meat hook on the end, to spring out and impale itself on the head.
She gave a hard pull of her sceptre, like she was trying to reel in a particularly defiant fish, managing the rip the head off whatever remaining bit kept it connected to the rest of the body. As it soared through the air, Twilight waved the chain out of existence before directing her sceptre at the spot where the head was flying, opening a singularity of her own for the head to get drawn into and pulverised. That just left the rest of the misshapen body, which was still managing to flail around randomly without the unicorn head. I ran back across to it, running specifically around its right side so when the wyrm tried to breath fire at me, it ended up breathing it all over the wolf head, which it appeared only tangentially connected to.
While the monster was busy doing more harm to itself than me, I managed to duck down around the back, and jump up on top of it. The wolf head was now busy retaliating by trying to tear off the wyrm head with its powerful jaws, while I went to the bat head located somewhere further down the half exposed spinal column and drove my sword into it. It didn’t take long to finish it off when it was doing most of the work for us, but once it was completely dead, Twilight lowered her ring of warding fire just in time to allow another several monsters to move in for a fight.
“Okay Rarity, now you really have to leave,” Twilight warned, as the exposed orb on her sceptre began overcharging, the glass petals struggling to keep it under control as they whizzed around it in orbit. “I promise you I can manage here, somepony else might need your help.”
I looked up to the sky, there were a number of flying monsters, not nearly as many as those on the ground, but enough that Spike had taken to the air and was now taking on about a dozen on his own.
“Teleport me up to Spike,” I requested.
Twilight nodded, as her eyes darted up to where he was and her horn flashed, my own surrounding vanishing to be quickly replaced. I appeared right on top of Spike’s scaly back, having to grip tightly onto one of the green spines so I wasn’t cast off by the powerful wind. Looking down to the earth in time, I saw the area I had just been at with Twilight explode, as another pillar of magic decimated the foes that had been encroaching upon us before I left. Spike had clearly felt something on his back and his head quickly reared back, looking ready to snap at me before he saw who it was.
“Hey big guy!” I shouted over the rushing air. “How’s it going?!”
“Not too good!” Spike roared back, his voice much more powerful following his sudden growth spurt. “I can handle these flying freaks fine, but that Dreadnaught keeps spewing them out, and they’re starting to gang up! I can’t get close to it either, those guns hurt!”
I noticed the large wound in his side, and that one of his wings was looking slightly tattered, but he was pushing on regardless, without showing any kind of discomfort.
“I can send some pegasi up to help you!” I offered, charging up my horn.
I quickly shot out a triangular beam of magic at what looked like a huge, floating brain, trying to swoop in on Spike’s left side, while he was snapping out at a giant moth pony on his right.
“No good!” he replied with a mouth full of moth wing. “They aren’t fast enough to get out of the way of my fire; I don’t want to hurt them!”
“I think I know somepony for the job!” I informed him, thinking of one pony who was fast enough to avoid anything.
I focused on calling out to Rainbow Dash through my Masque, I could feel her out there among the other soldiers, doing her part, and I knew she could feel me too and the signal I was sending her way. Whatever she was in the middle of, she quickly dropped and started moving towards us, it was only seconds later before I spotted the rainbow blur zooming across the sky our way.
“What’s up?!” Rainbow asked, flying alongside us.
“Can you help Spike here?!” I requested. “He’s getting overwhelmed, and he needs somepony fast enough to keep out of the way of his own attacks!”
“Sure thing!” Rainbow replied, before pushing forward to get closer to Spike’s head. “I’ve got your back kid! You go all out and don’t worry about me, I’ll look after myself!”
Spike nodded, just as a deep mewing noise echoed across the sky, cutting through the air that was drowning out almost all other sounds. All three off us glanced over at the Dreadnaught, which was starting to get dangerously close to our army on the ground, as something long and dark sank out of it. It looked like a cross between a whale and an eel, and it was floating rapidly our way, still making the low warbling noise that sounded so peaceful.
“And there’s our first target!” Rainbow declared before looking back at me. “Shouldn’t you get back to the ground?!”
“I’m working on it!” I called back, as I sent another signal through my Masque, drawing two of my knives and holding them in my hooves.
The leviathan picked up speed, not looking quite so relaxed and easy going now, as it sped toward Spike with its jaws open wide, looking like it was going to try and swallow him whole, despite not being that much bigger than him. Spike shot out a ball of fire while rolling out of the way, forcing me to grip even tighter. The beast twisted its face out of harm’s way, but still powered through the flames on its original path, and as we passed by one another, I let go of Spike’s back spines and threw myself across to the monster. I landed on the leviathans rather slippery body, driving both my knives in as grips, I don’t know if it even registered them as anything more than pinpricks, but it certainly took notice when the force of the air started dragging me back in the opposite direction the creature was flying, causing my knives to start slicing down, with me still hanging from them.
The leviathan began to flip around, no doubt to try and put a stop to me, but I chose that point, seeing my own ride getting close, to push against its body with my hind legs, in order to leverage my blades back out. As soon as my blades were loose, I began to drop, nothing left holding me in place as the leviathan finished twisting about in time to receive a face full of fire from Spike who was charging in to meet his opponent head on. I continued to fall however, sheathing both knives as I watched the pair of flying titans go at each other, with Rainbow darting about all around the leviathan and slashing at it with her spear.
Then, feeling her presence without actually seeing her, I turned in mid-air and stretched out my hooves, Fluttershy taking hold of them and pulling me in close as she flew us both safely to the ground. Once we were both safely down, she drew her mace and I brought out my sword, just as a heaving mass of living matter began squelching its way towards us, oozing a bile like substance and hissing clouds of toxic gas from many slopping orifices. There was already two soldiers trying to fend it off, jabbing out at it with pikes, but they didn’t slow down its advancement. Fluttershy called for them to get back, and as they did, she swooped in and brought her mace down hard into the throbbing mass.
Like all monsters and abominations created in the Covenant’s experiments, this one had a glaring weakness to holy weapons, Fluttershy’s mace rupturing the monster as it split through the body, while golden holy fire spread across and quickly incinerated the rest, like it had just been teleported to the surface of the sun. Not for the first time, I found myself really wishing there were more holy weapons available, and that just using them didn't require undergoing weeks of solid blessings and training. A real shame, if our whole army had that sort of power, then there never would have been any doubt as to who would win this battle.
With that creature defeated, the two soldiers quickly grouped with us as another monster started approaching. It came in very slowly, it resembled the tall creature that Pinkie had led into the bog near that solitary cabin, only this one didn’t appear to move at abnormal speeds, but rather, it had a major twitching problem. As it got closer and closer, it looked like it was having a seizure, its whole body was shaking and jerking so much. One of the soldiers with us offered to take care of it, if we could keep its attention on us. We agreed and started jumping about in front of it, allowing the pony to circle around and start edging his way up behind.
He was right up behind it, pulling back his pike to thrust it forward and stab it right in the back of the head… but then the creature stopped moving towards us. It was as if it knew he was there, but without even turning around to check, its skin began to wriggle and squirm, until out of nowhere, fleshy spikes shot out all over it like a puffer fish. The pony dropped her pike as the spikes extended as far as her and impaled her in several places, the other soldier and Fluttershy both cried out, I just gritted my teeth angrily and charged up my horn. I sent out a bean, which struck the monster in the head, it didn’t appear to do any damage, but it retracted all its spikes back into its body, allowing the pony to collapse in a pool of her own blood while the monster stood, appearing dazed.
Fluttershy took the opportunity to rush in and crack it on the side of the head with her mace, the skull practically exploding from the impact, leaving the rest of the body to crumble to the ground with a singing neck stump. All three of us hurried over to the pony, she was still alive, but bleeding profusely, her breathing coming in short sharp gasps, as a look of shock came over her. Fluttershy dropped her mace and quickly brought out her medical pouch, instructing the second soldier to go and fetch a stretcher team.
“Rarity, I need you to apply pressure to the wounds,” she explained, quickly going through her equipment.
I was about to ask how she expected me to do that, when there were too many for me to place my hooves down on, before I realised she probably meant to do it with magic. So while I focused on applying pressure with my magic to all the puncture wounds, Fluttershy went through each of them one at a time and bandaged them up tightly, just a temporary measure until she could be taken back to the medical centre to be treated properly. I was surprised at how calm Fluttershy was, even as we were fighting she looked terrified, and I noticed the slight tremble in her every movement, but now she was completely still and cool headed as she worked.
If anything, I felt more nervous than Fluttershy at the point, who appeared completely in her own element as she treated the pony. It was clear that when the chips were down and another pony’s life was hanging in the balance, Fluttershy would push everything else to the back of her mind and do everything she could for them. A part of me wondered if she wouldn’t be more suited to helping back at the medical centre, but when I thought back to how she dispatched those two monsters right after rescuing me, and was now there to help this mare, I realised she was exactly where she needed to be. Fluttershy finished her work and I was able to get back up, watching over the pair of them while Fluttershy spoke to the mare and assured her everything was going to be alright.
The second soldier returned with a third, and a stretcher between them. With our help, they got the injured mare on and Fluttershy offered to escort them back, leaving me alone once more. After a short tangle with an armadillo like monster, that managed to roll me some distance away from sight of any of my allies, I found myself sprinting back to the safety of others while being pursued by several new monsters from the latest wave dropped by the Dreadnaught. I was approaching an incline in the ordinarily quite level wasteland, just as a line of archers appeared, bows at the ready to fire a volley down on the monsters chasing me.
Thankfully their commanding officer was good enough to wait until I had put enough distance between myself and the monster by sprinting with all my might, before he gave the order for them to loose their arrows. Only the monster responsible for dragging me out that far avoided any damage, as its shell protected it. So while the archers readied another round to finish off the ones they had hit, which were slowed or injured, I was joined by a trio of soldiers as I turned to face the approaching beast. The monster saw me and my new allies readying our weapons, and it jumped a few inches into the air, curling its pony form up as it began to spin on the spot for a moment, before rolling in our direction.
I quickly relayed a plan to the others, so as the monster got close, myself and the two other unicorns used our combined magic to stop it in its tracks and hold it in place, while the much larger earth pony moved in, bringing his Warhammer down hard on its shell. The monster let out an indignant roar as the shell cracked, we held on tightly as it struggled against us, the stallion raising his Warhammer once more, swinging it down and breaking the back of the creature. With it dealt with, we turned and ran back to where the other monsters had fallen, the arrows had killed a few, but the others were still struggling onwards, despite the large number of arrow shafts protruding from them. We quickly put them down without much trouble, before regrouping with the archer unit. While they pushed further up, I moved on.
As I ran, I saw two figures fighting in the distance, surrounded by monsters and too far from the front line to expect any immediate help. I turned off my set route and started towards them, they looked like they were handling themselves well enough, but I wanted to be absolutely sure. As I got near, a slimy creature began making a move, its multiple tentacles reaching out to them, like feelers sniffing the air. I dropped down and forward rolled right beneath its rather bowed legs, stopping and swinging my rapier in a complete arc, severing all the tentacles from the monsters body.
The monster stopped moving, not making any noise, as it had no mouth or even face to speak of, but it moved as if looked down morosely at the tentacles, as they wriggled frantically on the ground, the life slowly leaving them. I stood up, and slashed diagonally across the creature as I did, splitting it rather cleanly in half without much trouble as its whole body appeared to be made of a soft, squashing material and completely lacking in any tough muscles or bones. I then turned to the pair as they each finished off their own opponents with equal ease, looking to me with looks of pleasant surprise.
“Nice to see you’re not dead yet,” Lily commented in the kind of voice that made it sound like she didn’t really care, although I knew she did, even if she might want to act tough and deny any such thing.
“Likewise,” I replied, nodding once to her and once to Rose, who gave me a small smile in return.
“You should know…” Lily began, stopping briefly to take the head off something that resembled a walker before continuing. “Casualties are low, we can thank the sisters for that, but they are building up. If this goes on for much longer, the troops will get too tired and the tide will turn, and that’s saying nothing of that Dreadnaught…”
“Is somepony managing the reinforcements?” I asked, standing back to back with Rose as more monsters pressed in around us. “You know, sending fit soldiers out to replace those that come in injured or tired?”
“Well of course, we have officers left in charge of that,” Lily responded a little snappy, as if it was obvious. “But clearly someone on the enemy side is doing the same thing.”
“Well I assumed…” I began, jabbing out with my sword at a two dimensional monster that looked like a shadow with a single red eye in the middle. “That Cogs would send word when the plane was ready.”
Rose took the head off a monster that still wore is embroidered Covenant robes, even after it had been completely swollen up with numerous large, unsightly boils until you couldn’t make out the pony beneath, only the mouth that couldn’t close because of the number of sharp teeth. As soon as he did so, he turned slightly to the pair of us and quickly gestured out a suggestion.
“He’s right, you two should fall back” I told Lily, getting a well-aimed pierce in the creatures eye that it hadn’t been able to dodge out of the way of. “If the death toll is picking up, then we need our hard hitters to stay and support the main body.”
“Alright, let’s wrap this up and…” Lily began before she was cut off, managing to sound agreeable and disgruntled at the same time in a way that only she could.
What she was cut off by, was the retching, heaving noise made by a new abomination slowly tramping over to us. It was a huge, lumbering atrocity, reminiscent of the tree back in Pivot as it was made up of dozens of whole ponies packed together, all wheezing and twitching, and staring blankly out their cold, dead eyes. The monster reached the circle of ever dwindling enemies surrounding us, it stood behind one particularly jumpy creature that growled and snapped at us, looking for an opening, until the huge monster slowly raised its arm like appendage. The legs of the ponies in its arm wiggled about, before curling in like digits folding down to form a fist, before the arm came sweeping through the air, catching the annoying little beast and sending it flying off to the side.
The great monster, groaning with the many hollow voices of the ponies that made it up, carried such an air of dread, that even its fellow abominations left us to find new prey. It was an interesting display of power and dominance I never thought existed among the abominable army, I wondered if Blueblood or another being was directing them like had been the case in Arclight, or if they really did have some lingering instincts, rather than being mindless beings of carnage. It was an interesting question, one I would have to address at a time when we weren’t about to be mauled by a walking jumble of corpses.
The monster raised both arms this time, hammering them down upon the ground, causing a quake to flow from where it struck, in a trail to where we stood together. We all dived, sidestepped or rolled out of range as the earth was ripped up along the line, stone cracking and giving way to dirt, long forgotten bones churning to the surface. The monster started forward once more, moving for Rose, who had dodged to the left while Lily and I moved to the right when avoiding the quake. Rose managed to avoid another strike of the arm, jumping up on the writhing limb before the monster could pull it back, running up the length of it until he stood on his head.
Rose jumped off the front, turning as he did so he fell facing the creature, both his blades directed outwards, slicing down the full height of the body as he fell back to the ground. The monster didn’t react in the slightest to his attack, the bodies he cut through looking completely unphased by the gashes that were not spilling any blood, despite the sickening depth of them. The monster didn’t have individual legs, the bodies that made up the lower half of its torso just spilled together, but the monster did place both arms on the ground in order to support it, as it lifted up its whole torso and tried to bring it down on Rose.
Naturally it was too slow, and he flipped his way back from the monster to a safe distance with acrobatic ease. Unfortunately, not being prepared for the quake that came his way when the monster struck the ground where he had been moments before. Just like the first one, the quake trailed out in a relatively straight line, but a straight line was exactly what Rose had move in, so when he came to a landing, he got the briefest of looks of what was coming his way before he was rocketed into the air by the force of it. He eventually stopped rising, reaching his peak before starting to return to earth, from a height that would almost certainly end in some broken bones at the very least.
Lily cried out in objection, running beneath him as if that would help, rather than just get them both injured, but thinking quickly, I whistled over to her and shouted a single command before sprinting her way. She had the sense to turn and face me, getting into position without questioning what I was planning. She crouched down and placed both her forelegs together, the moment I reached her, I placed a single hoof on the point where her own connected, before she boosted me up, launching me into the air with all her strength. Rose only had a few metres left to fall when I collided with him, focusing hard and channelling as much magic into my horn as I could… and praying that I could make it work.
As we both fell to the ground together, we vanished at the last second in a flash of blue light, successfully teleporting out of the air and back onto solid ground. I hadn’t been able to eliminate all the momentum we built up, but I got rid of just enough that we only felt slightly winded upon reappearing. Although we didn’t have time to celebrate our lucky break, as Lily called out an urgent warning to me. I rolled over where I lay on top of Rose in time to see the monster looming over us, this time it wasn’t moving to crush us beneath its limbs, but rather. the bodies that comprised its chest were separating to reveal a hollow space within.
From within that hole, long, narrow tendrils began unravelling, spindling down towards me and wrapping themselves around my own limbs before I could move to escape or fight back. With my legs restrained, I couldn’t use my sword and swiftly dropped it, but one of the tendrils also wrapped around my horn, sapping my magic. Then it began to lift me up, dragging my entire body inside the crevice. It almost had me inside, before I felt a pair of strong forelegs wrap around me and begin pulling me back. Lily gripped on to me and pulled me back by several inches, enough to expose the lengths of the tendrils for Rose to leap in and sever them with my fallen sword.
As the connections were snapped, Lily and I both tumbled back to the ground, but I recovered quickly, focusing my magic once more in my horn, before the monster could shift its bodies back and reseal the hole in its chest. I fired out my triangular laser, grinning behind my Masque as I saw that the monster was indeed weak on the inside, and following my attack, whatever force that held the corpses together was eliminated, and they began to flake off. Rose presented me with my blade, and the three of us made our way back to the front line to aid our allies. Along the way I was very glad for my Masque, while teleporting may have still been hard to pull off, I found my magic recovered so quick, I felt practically no effects of overspending or even draining.
We didn’t stay together long, Lily informing me that she would send a messenger to check on Cogs' progress, before her and Rose went their separate ways for the time being. This allowed me to continue along the path I had been cantering, before I saw them so far out on their own. I spotted a large unit making a solid push and doing quite well, they were being led by Typhoon, who was at the very front leading by example, behaviour I wouldn’t have anticipated of him, as he came off more as the armchair general sort, but I was impressed none the less. I hurried up in time to throw a knife into the head of a pony with insect legs, wings and a belly bursting with eggs, trying to make a move on Typhoon’s blind spot.
“Ah, Rarity!” Typhoon called out, turning around as the enemy hit the ground behind him. “My thanks. Keep moving soldiers, we are crushing the enemy beneath our hooves!”
The unit carried on the push, another officer taking over while Typhoon stepped out to see me.
“I’m surprised to see you here,” I admitted, hoping that my admiration came across.
“I didn’t get those medals from sitting in a tent, while the ponies under my command did all the work,” he replied as we both started a brisk walk further east, where we could see another unit wasn’t doing as well as the last one. “We’re doing well, the day will most certainly be ours, presuming the Dreadnaught is toppled before it gets much further.”
“We’re just waiting for Cogs to…” I began, before I saw that the unit we were moving to support, were now all fleeing.
“What in the name of Discord are they doing?!” Typhoon demanded, suddenly furious at the sight of the retreating soldiers.
He started flying forwards, and I ran to keep up. By the time we both reached the area, the remainder of the unit were too far back for even Typhoon’s shouts to reach them, but I was more focused on the number of dead soldiers scattered about the immediate area. I readied my sword and adopted a defensive stance; Typhoon noticed this and quickly did the same, picking up on what I had noticed. There were dead ponies all around us, but not a single monster, they were strangely absent from this entire section of the battlefield. Although if we looked further west and further east, and even behind us, we could see the enemy fighting with our own troops.
We both stood back to back, knowing there was something we didn’t see. I switched to my other vision with a quick thought, but I didn’t see any invisible monsters… I did however see the magical residue of what looked like portals all around us. I realised quickly what we must be up against, and cried out to Typhoon to duck, switching back to regular vision just as the monster blinked in next to us, in much the same fashion as Pinkie Pie. This one also looked like the monster Pinkie had led into the bog, but it was different again, with its head encased within what looked like a miniature iron maiden, while its right arm was severed at the elbow, with a long cleaver riveted in its place.
The moment it warped in, it pulled back with its cleaver and slashed horizontally, it would have decapitated both of us if I hadn’t called out at the last second. As it was, we both managed to duck down, feeling the blade whistle over our heads, and the assassin instantly blink away before either of us could think to retaliate. Typhoon and I quickly backed up, looking all around us as if we would see something that could indicate where it would come out of next. It reappeared a second time, this time targeting Typhoon specifically, but he was able to fly straight up into the air to avoid the attack. It disappeared and returned much quicker this time, reappearing right in front of me, while thrusting its blade forward within a split second.
I would never have had the reflexes necessary to dodge it; the blade came right in, striking me in the middle of my face. It would have stabbed right through, killing me instantly… were it not for the Masque. The blade couldn’t hope the scratch it, let alone break through to do any damage. It did however pack enough force to knock me to the ground, however it also threw the assassin off balance, giving Typhoon enough time to dive in and slash it with his own blade. I saw it begin to draw blood, but before Typhoon had even completed his swipe, it blinked away again… reappearing instantly behind him.
I opened my mouth to call out a warning, but it was too late. The assassin reached out with its left hand, the long digits wrapping around the back of Typhoon’s skull and lifting him into the air… then it thrust the cleaver through his back, the blade bursting out his chest, now soaked in his own blood. I couldn’t even scream I was so shocked, but the assassin retracted the blade just as quickly, before dropping him and vanishing. It reappeared in the air above me, falling with its blade pointed directly down at me, a mistake on its part, as I gathered power in my horn and sent out a beam of concentrated magic, almost without thinking about it.
The assassin’s limbs flew off as the torso was blasted apart by the force of my attack, leaving me to stare in shock at Typhoon’s bloody body for a moment, before scurrying over to him and taking hold of his body with trembling hooves.
“Typhoon… Typhoon!” I shouted, my voice shaking as I saw how dire the wound was. “Speak to me… say something… anything!”
“Rar… Rarity…” he muttered in a weak voice, cutting off as he began to choke up mouthfuls of blood. “Stran… strange… they don’t usually… get that clo…”
He stopped once more, as his throat made an awful retching noise, his eyes bulging slightly before they began to droop.
“Just… just don’t move,” I told him, looking around wildly for somepony who could help. “We’ll get you back to the medical centre and the sisters will…”
“No…” he interrupted in a faint voice, his eyes barely open now. “Too… late…”
“Don’t say that!” I chastised him, getting angry for some reason. “There’s never been a fight you haven’t waked away from; this time won’t be any different.”
“You… you made a good enemy…” he told me, his voice so quiet, I had to lean in close to hear him. “You’ll make a better leader…”
“I really hope you’re right…” I murmured, feeling slightly miserable, before I noticed he had become very still. “Typhoon?”
I felt a wave of coldness sweep over me, as I realised he wasn’t going to answer me. It was such an odd sensation, as I laid him down on the hard ground while his blood soaked into the ash. He hadn’t been my friend, not exactly; for the most part we had been enemies, so why did I suddenly feel so empty? I stood up and began walking, leaving Typhoon’s body behind as I drifted back into the battle. Things seemed to drift by in a bit of a haze after that, I fought a few monsters, helped a few ponies, but always moved on quickly, throwing myself into another fight.
I had just pulled my sword free from a pony with a venus flytrap for a mouth and dry, leafy skin, when I heard somepony calling my name. I turned on the spot and saw Feather Duster landing several metres away, as well as huge floating eyeball with gory, red tentacles coming out the back where the retina should have been, approaching him from behind. I shouted for him to drop as I pulled out a knife and hurled it through the air; he obeyed, quick enough to be well clear as my blade popped right into the slit pupil. Clear fluid began spraying out of the wound, as the eyeball started deflating and sinking slowly to the ground. As it did, Feather Duster reached across, pulled the knife free and threw it back my way while also shouting a warning.
I lent to the side, narrowly avoiding the knife as it struck the plant pony who hadn’t been as dead as I thought. It all happened so quickly, from the moment I threw the knife, to it hitting the eyeball, and Feather Duster taking it and throwing it back. I turned to look at him, blinking slightly, genuinely impressed at the quick action.
“Nice,” I complimented, pulling the knife back out with magic. “What did you need?”
“Cogs just finished his metal bird thing,” Feather Duster informed me. “He wanted me to come find you.”
I glanced up at the sky, at the Dreadnaught which had begun firing down into our ranks not long before with its cannons, finally close enough that it could start doing damage itself.
“About time,” I muttered, glancing back to see how far I was from the city walls, and reassuring myself that we still had time to bring it down. “Go find my friends and tell them all to rendezvous at Cogs' work area.”
“Most of them are already there,” he reported. “I just need to go find Lady Sparkle and the crazy one.”
I shut my eyes momentarily, sensing them out. They were both together, still fighting around the area I had left Twilight at. I just went ahead and called out to them from there, rather than send Feather Duster to fetch them.
“I took care of it,” I informed him. “Can you get me back to base?”
“Sure, uh…” he replied, hesitating slightly. “Rarity, is everything alright? You seem a bit… off.”
“Huh… uh, I’m fine,” I lied, trying to shake off the funk Typhoon’s death had left me in. “Let’s just go, we don’t have much time to spare.”
It didn’t take long for Feather Duster to get me back to where Cogs had been working; Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash and Applejack were waiting there for me. Applebloom and Scootaloo were running around the completed plane, tightening screws and checking rivets, from the looks of it. As we landed, Lily approached, and not moments later, Twilight and Pinkie appeared in a flash of purple light.
“Alright Cogs,” I called over, as the stallion stepped down from the open door. “What have you got for us?”
Cogs gestured us over to a nearby table, where we all gathered around. On it, was the same blueprints for the Dreadnaught I had stolen from Typhoon’s office so long ago.
“Zis is a bit outdated,” he pointed out. “But it is ze best we have, so it will have to do. Now I have already explained the plane to you, it controls in more or less ze same fashion as zee glider you once piloted.”
“So I guess that means I’m going on this mission,” I muttered, although I never had any doubt that it would be me, or desire to have anypony else go in my place. “And the other thing you were working on?”
Cogs reached under the table and produced a small black box with a control panel.
“Bombs,” he replied simply. “Six, very powerful bombs, to be placed in key locations around ze Dreadnaught, all rigged to be detonated remotely by zis device.”
“Six bombs eh?” I repeated, nodding slowly as I looked about at my friends. “I guess we’re sticking together, if you don’t mind that is.”
They each assured me that it was fine, and that they weren’t about to abandon me at this late stage.
“I sink that would be best,” Cogs agreed. “If you each take one, you can have zem all placed and escape much quicker. The locations zat you need to place ze bombs at, are zese four rooms, each of zem controls one of ze turbines keeping it afloat. Ze fifth will be placed in zee engine room, and ze last must go in zee command bridge. When I see ze plane taking off again, I will assume you are all safe and detonate zee explosives.”
“Alright, sounds simple enough,” I responded. “Let’s move out girls. Lily, can I trust you to manage things while we’re away?”
“Of course,” Lily replied. “Although, where is Typhoon?”
“He’s dead,” I replied simply, not looking back as I made my way across to the plane door.
I got into the plane without another word; I could hear Applejack and Applebloom conversing right outside the door, the latter sounding quite tearful.
“You promised you’d come back,” a small voice said suddenly.
I spun around on my way over to the cockpit, to see that Scootaloo had followed me inside and now stood staring at me.
“Do you still mean it?” she asked in a nervous voice.
“Of course I do Scootaloo,” I assured her, believing it myself as I crouched down in front of her. “We are winning this battle, pretty soon it’s all going to be over, and then things will go back to normal.”
“I… I just…” Scootaloo stammered, her eyes filling with tears.
“Don’t cry kiddo,” another voice jumped in, making Scootaloo jump slightly.
I glanced over to see Rainbow Dash climbing into the small compartment, her helmet off as she regarded Scootaloo with a surprisingly warm smile.
“Nothing bad is going to happen to Rarity so long as we’re with her,” she went on, walking over and playfully ruffling Scootaloo’s mane. “Not that she needs us foalsitting her, she’s like… one of the few ponies who’s nearly as awesome as me. If she says she’s coming back, you can bet she will.”
“You see Scootaloo,” I went on, smiling as Scootaloo looked up at Rainbow Dash with wide eyes. “With friends like these, there’s nothing that can hurt me… or you.”
I reached down and pulled Scootaloo in for a hug, for a brief moment I shut my eyes and imagined it was Sweetie Belle wrapped in my forelegs. When I finally let her go, I gently ushered her towards the door while made my way over to the pilot seat.
“So you’re Scootaloo,” Rainbow continued from behind me, as she led her out of the aircraft. “I’ve heard a lot about you, you snuck here in Applejack’s brother’s cart. I’ve gotta say, that’s pretty awesome kid.”
“Everypony else said it was dangerous and stupid,” Scootaloo replied, although I could hear the hope in her voice.
“Of course it was dangerous and stupid,” Rainbow replied, as she picked the filly up and hopped out of the plane. “That’s what makes it so cool, and only the coolest fillies pull that stuff off.”
I smirked at that, even more so when all my friends boarded, Applejack and Rainbow came in last, the former giving the latter a stern telling off for being an irresponsible role model. Cogs had been right when he said the controls were relatively similar to the last glider, the wiggly stick I had once used for steering, had been replaced with a Y shaped object that served pretty much the same function, but allowed me to hold on with both hooves. There was also considerably more buttons and displays on the dashboard, but many of these were already primed and ready to go, no doubt Cogs had started the plane up while waiting for me.
“Rarity, can you hear me?” Cogs voice asked, crackling out of a circular disc on the dashboard, made of what looked like tight mesh.
“Um, yes…” I said uncertainly, wondering if it would pick my voice up automatically.
“Do you see ze red switch next to zee speed gauge?” Cogs went on as the plane door was slammed shut from the outside. “If you flick zat, it will start zee engines. When you land on ze Dreadnaught, do not turn anysing else off and you will be able to get away quickly.”
I flicked the switch, hearing the turbines hum into life. Glancing back, I saw all my friends standing awkwardly around the main compartment, there were no seats or safety belts for them, only belt loops hanging from the ceiling for them to grip onto.
“Good luck Rarity,” Cogs said finally, as the crackling stopped and we were left with just the loud droning of the turbines.
I put on my own belt, before casting one last look back at my friends who all gave me confident nods, except Applejack, who looked like she was trying not to throw up. Turning back to the windscreen, I braced myself, pushing my hoof into the accelerator pad and starting the plane forward. Taking off had definitely been a smoother process back in the factory beneath Fort Mule, but I had been driving across metal flooring then, whereas now we were trundling over uneven rock and stone.
The whole plane trembled violently as we picked up speed, I didn’t attempt to start pulling back for a moment, I wanted to get as fast as we could before attempting take off. We were fast approaching a natural decline, the very area the Union army had gathered before the battle, when I delivered my speech. If I was going to pull up, it would have to be soon, or we’d very quickly find our new plane crashed and our hopes dashed. Pushing in the accelerator as far as it would go, I began pulling back on the steering sticks, feeling the whole plane begin to tilt nose up. For a scary moment, I thought I had left it too late, but as we reached the end of the makeshift runway, I felt the trembling in the aircraft stop, as the rear wheels lifted off the ground.
After that, we were soaring through the sky, flying across the battlefield and steadily picking up height. I imagined looking down and seeing our soldiers scattered across the battlefield like ants, but unfortunately the only window in the vessel was the front windscreen, and due to the angle of the aircraft, the only thing I saw out it was the endless expanse of grey cloud and cracks of golden sunlight. I could hear a mixture of noises coming from my friends, no doubt as they dangled helplessly in the near vertical compartment; they ranged from Pinkie whooping, to Applejack being sick.
Once we were high enough, I pushed the sticks forward again, bringing us more level and allowing my friends a break. As I did, I nearly lost my own meal as my sight was filled with the gargantuan form of the Dreadnaught, directly facing us as we sped straight towards it. We appeared almost level with the deck; it gave me the perfect view of all the guns turning in our direction.
“Brace yourselves girls!” I shouted back, knowing things were about to get messy. “It’s time for some evasive manoeuvres!”
“Please… no more…” Applejack uttered weakly.
Then the cannons opened fire on us, and I twisted the steering sticks to the left and caused the whole plane to spin wildly to the side, the air all around us filled with sound of explosions. Once the plane had righted itself, I started down around the underside of the Dreadnaught, the cannons on the hull searching us out as I did. I zoomed to avoid them all, dipping underneath the Dreadnaught and coming back up the other side, pointing skywards as I pulled ourselves back up to the deck while the cannons on the opposite side began homing in on us.
I soon found myself flying right past the deck, so I pulled back on the steering stick so the plane ended up flying over it… upside down. I was sure that couldn’t be good for it, so I managed to spin us around a bit, putting us right side up before we crashed right into one of the cannons. Turning sharply to the right I was able to avoid colliding, this set us on a path towards the bridge; I could almost imagine Blueblood somewhere within… I wondered what might be going through his head. Dipping low to the surface of the Dreadnaught, I circled around the bridge until I was at the back of the entire ship, which thankfully turned out to be a blind spot for the cannons.
Once we had a moment of peace from the enemy projectiles, I slowed down and flew around a bit, planning out my next move. We needed to land on the deck, but approaching from the front and sides was completely out of the question, there was only so much dodging I could do, and I didn’t want to test how many shots this metal armour could take before we were falling out of the sky. That left just one other option, so after a quick role call to make sure none of my friends had perished amidst my rather slapdash approach to flying, I started forwards once more, directing the plane up and over the back of the bridge.
We passed right over the top of it, the deck sweeping into view before us, before I started to steer us back down. As we descended, the cannons didn’t even attempt to shoot us, to do so would risk hitting the command bridge or some other section of the Dreadnaught. The landing proved to be much smoother, although I was still filled with dread as we touched down and began skidding and bouncing all the way up to the very furthest end of the deck, threatening to slide right off the bow. Thankfully we managed to come to a complete stop with a reasonable distance to spare, taking off again might be a bit tricky, but I was satisfied to cross that bridge when we came to it.
I unbuckled my safety belt and turned to look at my friends, only Pinkie Pie didn’t respond with a look of mild resentment. Rather, she popped her head out of the dogpile my friends had formed, and loudly requested that we do it again. I made a mental note to tell Cogs to install multiple seats and belts in his next design, before walking over to the metal crate tethered in place at the back of the plane compartment. Cracking it open and reaching in, I pulled out six identical black boxes, relatively similar looking to the detonator that Cogs had shown us. Twilight produced the blueprints of the original Dreadnaught and we quickly went over the plan, making sure each of us knew where we were going.
“Remember girls,” I said in a warning tone. “This one is much bigger, so don’t be surprised if the interior is laid out differently, just use your intuition.”
“And if any of y’all get into trouble,” Applejack added. “Just give one of us all a shout over the Elements.”
“And that goes double for running into Blueblood,” Twilight finished in a dark tone. “I don’t know where he’ll be, but under no circumstances should anypony attempt to fight him on their own. If you see him… run, forget about the bombs, just get yourself as far away from him as you can.”
“Everypony ready?” I asked one last time.
“Ready!” five voices declared.
Rainbow cracked open the plane door, and one by one we all jumped out onto the deck, the force of the wind hitting us so we felt ourselves being buffeted towards the bridge end of the ship. As Twilight jumped out last, she quickly cast a spell on plane, immobilising it in place, so we didn’t come back and find it had been knocked over or even thrown overboard by nothing more malicious than the wind. We all split up, Rainbow Dash and Applejack sprinting and flying their way over to the left side of the deck, Twilight and Pinkie teleporting their way across to the right, while Fluttershy and I went straight ahead in the direction of the bridge.
Once the other two pairs got below deck, they would each split up and go towards one of the four turbine control rooms, similarly, when Fluttershy and I entered the bridge, she would go down to the engine room, while I headed up to the command deck. We didn’t spend too long trying to run the whole length of the dreadnaught, quickly realising that would be a huge waste of time, so Fluttershy picked me up and flew us both there, the air current allowing her to move much faster while off the ground. At the base of the bridge, which I now realised was essentially a tower that we were right up next to it; we found a large bulkhead door, which I managed to open by heaving at it with magic.
Once inside, I didn’t bother to close it behind us, I’d much rather have a quick getaway. Fluttershy and I ran down the first wide metal corridor, quickly discovering the Dreadnaught still had plenty of monsters left to stalk its hallways and protect it from invaders like ourselves. We encountered two monsters ambling about, turning to face us as we approached, one was a huge, muscular creature with curving tusks and crab claw in place of one of its arms, the other looked like skeletal bird with dozens of pincer like arms growing out its back. Fluttershy swung her mace up into the bleach bone beak of the bird one, silencing its alerting screech instantly, while I jumped up and kicked myself off the wall, so I landed on the other beast’s back, driving my sword down where its head connected to its spine.
After we so quickly dispatched the pair of them, we continued forward until we reached a junction, the blueprints had said that in the original, one would eventually lead down while the other went up. Assuming it was the same case here, we both wished each other luck, before running off in separate directions. The interior of the Dreadnaught reminded me in many ways of the factory below Fort Mule crossed with the sewers in Arclight, for the most part it appeared like a technological wonder, like a floating fortress… but then occasionally, I would notice evidence of the abomination influence. These could be anything like coming around a corner to find a corridor filled with strands of sticky phlegm like substance, that forced me to look for another route, or finding a burst pipe hissing steam, which upon closer inspection is filled with cluster of egg like tumours.
Perhaps the strangest one was when I was fighting a monster with long, spindly arms which grabbed hold of me and threw me against the wall. The section of wall I hit cracked and crumbled, like the sheet of metal it had been made from was decades old. Behind it, I was able to see some of the inner workings of the Dreadnaught, and found them tangled up in a mass of invading tendrils and tissue stretched over the intricacies, almost as if something living was trying to take over. I cantered up stairwells, stepping in to dodge the corrosive vomit being choked up by a monster that clung to the ceiling. I managed to avoid a swarm of leaches that poured into the corridor I was running down, by hoisting myself up into the air vents.
I ran down a hallway, weaving and ducking beneath the hands, claws and hooves stretching out from the walls, trying to latch onto my clothes and drag me in. I fought one on one with a great suit of armour, animated by the grotesque pony face nestled within the breastplate, but finally I reached my destination. The final door that led into the command deck of the bridge, I knew I was at the right part, as it relatively corresponded with what I had seen on the blueprints, there didn’t appear to be any floors higher than this one, and outside it had been several walkers. These ones were more rabid than those at Brine, as they charged at me like savage dogs, but at least they stayed down when I killed them.
I walked up to the door, suddenly feeling nervous, I still hadn’t run into Blueblood, but nor had I received any kind of alert from my friends. I had predicted he would be there at the very head of his greatest weapon, it was why I had volunteered to go there myself, not that I had any intention of fighting him on my own, and now that I was here, I was starting to find it very hard to press onwards with the knowledge that he might be right beyond that door. Finally, I swallowed my nerves and began turning the valve handle of the heavy door, pushing it open with my magic, right before storming in.
The command deck was a very spacious room, absolutely packed out with consoles, each permeated with buttons and switched, lights and displays, that all came together to operate the Dreadnaught. There was a wide windscreen at the far end of the room, stretching from one end to the other, and allowing for a great view of the sky beyond. What really struck me about the room, wasn’t how mind boggling it all was, or how glad I was the plane was nowhere near as complicated as this, but how empty it was of life. Blueblood wasn’t there for a start, which I was eternally grateful for, but then there weren’t any abominations there either.
Presumably they didn’t want relatively mindless mutants to be allowed anywhere near such delicate machinery, but then that raised the question, who was allowed in this room? Who exactly managed the Dreadnaught, if not Blueblood, and all the Covenant members had been unwillingly transformed? Of course the answer was obvious, it was the only other feature of the room that I had omitted to mention, which was a little misleading of me, as it was easily the first thing that caught my eye when I entered. It was a pony, or something that looked quite similar to a pony… a pony that had been moulded out of jelly.
I knew immediately that it was the same kind of thing as the hive mind back in Arclight, the one that had been controlling the bug army from the pumping station. The major differences were, that while that last one had been a singular shade of green, this one was a swirling miasma of lots of colours, and it also appeared much more bloated than the last. Rather than having its form stretched far out to hold it in place, so the pony dangled in the middle, this one was focused to the very centre of the room, making it appear more tubular, like it was the support column, keeping everything else in the room from collapsing in on its self.
It still had the eerie face as the last one, that nightmarish grin plastered on and unmoving, while the eyes stared straight at me without blinking, like they were gazing into my soul. It was very unnerving and sent a chill up my spine, but at least it did explain one thing, as chaotic as the enemy had been during the battle, this thing must have been controlling them to some degree. That made me feel even better about what I was there to do, not only would we destroy the Dreadnaught, but we would cripple the remaining enemy force, making the leftovers that much easier to finish off. I had just started forward, levitating the bomb I had secured to my belt up, when a voice spoke up and caused me the jump in fright.
“And what exactly do you plan on doing with that?” the voice asked.
I felt my flood run ice cold, I knew that voice, there was only one pony that spoke in a nasally tone like that.
“Crane?!” I exclaimed, looking all around me for the Covenant leader. “How in Tartarus are you still alive?! Show yourself!”
“Oh, but I am,” Crane replied, and suddenly I felt another chill run up my spine as I turned to the hive mind. “Yes, that’s right… this is what I’ve become, thanks to you.”
I backed up from Crane as his face remained passive, the mouth not even moving as he spoke to me. I could hear the bitter, almost huffy tone, and knew he wasn’t pleased with ending up like his own test subjects.
“After our encounter,” he went on, the door slamming shut behind me as if he had just willed it. “When you threw me down into my own work station, my body was exposed to countless chemicals, I was changed irrevocably… thankfully, I was able to drag myself to one of my secret tunnels, and I reached the sanctuary of this vessel before I could perish in that place.”
“Technically, I didn’t throw you anywhere,” I corrected, beginning to edge around the room. “It was your little potions that melted the floor you were standing on.”
There was a loud crashing noise, as one of the ceiling panels was knocked down, a group of tentacles writhing down and wrapping their way around me before I could move to resist.
“Don’t test me,” Crane’s voice gurgled, as the tentacles carried me across so we were face to hideous face. “Although really, I should be thanking you for your actions. Who would have guessed that in the end, that random assortment of chemicals would result in making me my own greatest creation?”
“You don’t look like an alicorn,” I mocked, feeling the tentacles tighten around my limbs and throat in response.
“No… that accursed Blueblood took that honour,” Crane muttered angrily. “But I’ll be taking back what is mine soon enough… Blueblood thinks he is in control, but those creatures down there were once my followers, they obey my command. And while he was busy recovering after what your friend did, and completing his ascension, I have been habituating the Dreadnaught, so I can control every single function from the steering to the turrets from this one spot.”
“And where…” I bega,n before choking slightly from the increasing pressure around my neck. “Where is Blueblood exactly? Last I heard, you two weren’t on good terms, strange that he’d allow you anywhere near here.”
“The fool underestimates my new power,” Crane replied. “He believes I am brain dead, incapable of conscious thought, like the other hive mind was. As for where he is, he has claimed the core of the Dreadnaught as his private quarters, he is no doubt still there, pouring over those tomes he stole from Arclight. He has become so obsessed with power, so confident that he cannot be beaten, that he has failed to notice just how much of a failure his campaign has been so far… until of course, the Dreadnaught moves into range of the city, at which point your valiant, but utterly laughable defence will crumble in minutes.”
“Assuming we don’t stop you first,” I told him, attempting a smug smile.
“With that?” Crane questioned, no doubt referring to the fallen bomb. “Unless your friends plan on leaving you here to die in this ship with me, I don’t believe that bomb will ever detonate, and after what I saw and heard back at the cathedral, I know they will never allow that to happen. You see, your friendship will ultimately be the downfall of everything you’ve fought for.”
“And what…” I tried to say, starting to get light headed as breathing became difficult. “What if they were to come and rescue me? We would still escape, and the Dreadnaught would be destroyed… not that you’d be alive to see that.”
“Your friends all ran off to different sections of the ship,” Crane reminded me, laughing in a condescending manner. “They don’t know you’re in trouble, and by the time they begin to suspect something is wrong, it will be too late.”
“What if they already knew?” I asked, really grinning now. “What if we had a special way of communicating with each other… and I alerted them the moment you opened your ugly mouth…”
Crane was silent now, although I noticed that the smile on the gooey face shrunk by a few millimetres.
“And then, what if I was just keeping you talking…” I went on, coughing with laughter. “Because I knew they were already on their way… and were about to break down the door in three… two…”
The door exploded of its hinges; I was able to see Twilight from my peripheral vision, standing with her sceptre pointed straight out, Applejack, Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash gathered around her. I then felt the tentacles suspending me snap, as Pinkie blinked in behind me and severed them all by swiping out with both her daggers. I hit the floor and rolled back so I was safely out of Twilight’s line of fire, as she and the others stormed in.
“No!” Crane screamed in a furious voice. “I won’t be defeated again, not when I’m so close to…”
“Goodbye Crane,” Twilight interrupted simply, the orb shattering open to reveal the magic inside.
The beam she launched was almost twice the height of her, and just as wide, making me glad I had backed up. It travelled right across the command deck, ripping up the floor and going as far as the front window, shattering it and continuing for some distance beyond. Crane literally exploded, as the magic hit him like an oncoming train, causing thousands of little bits of Crane to rain down across the room. Pinkie helped me up and the others walked over to me, I thanked them profusely for their good timing, feeling greatly relieved when I learned that they had all reached their own objectives when they heard me calling out.
So with all six bombs placed somewhere within their designated rooms, we all hurried over to the broken window, looking down and out. We could see the deck directly below us, our eyes travelled up, passing right over our plane and the bow of the Dreadnaught, before looking out over the city of Cragsburg and the swarm of tiny specks that was the Union army still spread out before it, keeping up the battle.
“Come on,” I said to them, bracing myself against the rush of air streaming in through the open window. “Let’s get out of here and send this thing to oblivion.”
Twilight teleported Applejack right down, while Pinkie blinked with me, leaving Fluttershy ad Rainbow Dash to fly down on their own. Once we were all together at the base of the bridge, we began sprinting back across the deck. The sooner we got inside the plane and took off, the sooner Cogs could detonate the bombs, and then the battle would be over. We reached the other end pretty quickly, whether it was our Elements or our sheer excitement, something was offering us a huge speed boost. The plane was so close, I could probably have opened the door with my magic if I reached out, victory was within our grasp, when…
“Everypony down!” Pinkie screamed.
Pinkie Pie has a sense for certain things, that’s what she says at least, so when she said to get down, we all obeyed without question. I dropped to my belly as I saw a blinding, blistering ball of light careening overhead, coming right down on the plane and blowing it into shrapnel, which blasted outwards in all directions, easily killing us if we had been standing when they did. I stared in horror at the quite literally smoking remains of our plane scattered across the deck, a hole punched in the deck at the place where it had been stationed. Time seemed to slow down to a snail’s pace at that moment, a wave of dread sweeping over me as I rolled over to see what had launched the attack, even though I knew in my heart it could only be one.
He stood there, on the peak of the Dreadnaught, on the highest point of the bridge, his whole body shining like a star… a beacon whose light spread out across the world and beyond… a sun in the sky, that only made me feel cold to look at. I couldn’t tear my eyes away, although they stung to look at him… and I knew he was looking down at us too, his eyes boring into us. Blueblood stepped forward, right off the edge of the bridge, but he did not fall. Rather, he lowered his hoof down onto nothing, where it held firm, the air shimmering beneath it. He kept moving towards us, raising one hoof at a time and bringing it forward. Every time his hoof would land slightly lower than the last, so it appeared as if he was descending a shimmering, crystalline staircase, that only revealed itself when he made contact with it.
Every step he took was torturously slow and drawn out, like he had all the time in the world, like he was savouring this moment where he revealed himself to us in all his terrible glory. Blueblood’s transformation had certainly not ended with him receiving a pair of wings, although he did have those, and was taking the opportunity to show them off by spreading them wide as he approached. His body was now easily twice the size of Big Mac’s, perhaps even larger than that, and he was quite clearly all muscle, in some areas looking like it was going to rupture through his skin and coat, which now radiated a chilling white light.
His chest and barrel were a little different; less muscular and looking more like his bones had begun to burst free and expand to form a marble like exoskeleton. His rib cage and spinal column were particularly prominent, looking much more defined, and even slightly sharp along the points and curves. His legs, which looked strong enough to rend a full-grown dragon in half, were split from the knees down, in a similar way to how Lyra’s had been. Blueblood’s looked considerably better developed however, the three prongs fitting neatly in place on all four legs, so it didn’t disrupt his walking, each ending in a slight claw.
His wingspan was absolutely massive, seeing them spread out made me feel tiny and insignificant beneath him. I doubted even Celestia’s were as big as his, but then hers probably looked more angelic, and less like a demon masquerading as an angel. The feathers adorning them were easily the darkest part about him, white, but with a dark trim, resulting in a very haunting look. The exoskeletal features continued up and around his thick neck, even spreading as far as his lower jaw, giving it a rather chiselled look. His eyes were a cloudy white, like those of a blind pony; only they seemed radiate light, a power brimming deep within, emanating out.
His horn was elongated, curving slightly so it looked like a glaive piercing out his skull. Like the exoskeleton areas, it was just bone, the skin splitting apart around his forehead. The final aspects of his transformation was his mane and tail, they were still that hay shade of blonde, although now they were both much longer, an odd cross between physical and ethereal like Celestia’s, flowing out behind him as if perpetually caught in a light breeze… as opposed to the strong wind the rest of us were feeling on the deck. As he got near, I saw his lips peeling back in a sinister grin, showing off his rows of razor sharp teeth.
“I hope you weren’t planning on leaving,” he began, that same double tone sounding all the more nightmarish that we were hearing it from his own lips. “These last couple of weeks, you’ve been working so hard to build your little army and thwart my conquest, I’ve been looking forward to showing you how utterly fruitless it all was.”
“In case you haven’t noticed bud,” Rainbow snapped back, being the first one to get back to her hooves. “But we’re absolutely crushing your horde of freaks.”
“I have noticed,” Blueblood replied coldly. “I had higher hopes for this force, but it would seem if you want something done, you must do it yourself. Besides, you have actually done me a great service by staging this tenacious defence.”
“And what service might that be?” Applejack demanded, bracing herself.
“When I descend from the heavens and smite every last one of them,” Blueblood answered, his smile returning. “Then the citizens of that hovel you call a city, will go on to tell the world what they witnessed, and never again will anypony dare attempt to stand against me. So helpful of you to bring all my most radical dissenters to one place, so that I might eradicate them all without having to seek them out myself.”
“You’ll never make it anywhere near them!” I shouted, trying to quell the fear I felt as I drew my sword. “Because this ends now!”
“Such confidence,” Blueblood muttered as he regarded me, taking the final step and coming to a halt on the deck a few dozen metres from us. “It’s almost as if you’ve forgotten who you’re talking to, I am… a god!”
As he bellowed, his entire body flared with light, his voice sending out a wave of force that slammed into us. I was immediately reminded of when Gaia used the Heart of the Earth, the sheer power of Blueblood’s voice carried so much force that my every bone threatened to break from the impact, it was taking all my strength and determination just to stay standing. I could see that all my friends were in the same boat as me, their faces straining with the effort of staying upright, even Applejack, who had always stood strong against this kind of punishment.
“Give in,” Blueblood commanded. “Realise my power and crumble beneath it. There is nothing you can do to overcome me, this is where you will fall, and your pathetic Union will watch as their heroes are extinguished by my superior might.”
“No…” Twilight managed to growl, crouching low, but slowly pulling herself up. “No… we won’t be beaten… so long as we’re together… we will win!”
Just like Blueblood, Twilight’s voice bellowed out, sending out a hurricane that struck him and sent his whole body sliding back by a few feet, as he reeled from the sudden blow. At the same time, Twilight’s body ignited with power of her own, her horn and crown blazing with a magical aura, her eyes a dazzling white. As Blueblood was forced back, I felt the pressure leave me, and at the same time felt all my strength recover, simply from standing in Twilight’s presence. Our morale reaching new height, all six of us drew our weapons, assuming offensive stances as Blueblood snarled at us, his face contorted in fury.
Pinkie Pie moved in first, blinking across the deck and reappearing at Blueblood’s left side. He detected her instantly and spun around; striking out with a powerful foreleg, but Pinkie bent her body back in a full arc to dodge it, before sweeping around and giving Blueblood a firm uppercut with her silver clad foreleg. Blueblood clutched his shoulder as he stumbled back from her, but Rainbow Dash zoomed in, becoming nothing more than a multi-coloured blur as she homed in on him. Blueblood tried to keep up with her, his own speed was pretty incredible, but Rainbow’s was phenomenal, proven as she flew circles around him, avoiding every single attack he could throw at her, while stabbing in repeatedly with her spear.
Blueblood’s horn lit up and he pivoted his head around in a wide circle, creating a twister all around him, which caught Rainbow Dash and sent her tumbling away from him. As she soared through the air, she managed to right herself almost instantly, landing perfectly before giving her wings a powerful beat to send out two bright slashes through the air. As they connected with Blueblood, he was sent hurtling back, right into the path of Applejack who quickly galloped around into position, rearing up her hind legs in time to buck Blueblood right back the way he came.
Blueblood spread his wings, and with a single might flap managed to stop himself in mid-air, and with another flash of his horn he cast out several glaring, ethereal chains to wrap around both Applejack and Rainbow Dash… Pinkie as well, but she just walked right out of the chains as they tried to loop around her. The chains began tightening around my friends, Blueblood clearly wasn’t taking it slow or trying to enjoy it, he obviously wanted to choke the life out of them as quickly as he could. Unfortunately for him, that wasn’t nearly quickly enough, as I drew one of my knives and took careful aim, finding my mark in record time before sending it spinning through the air, the blade striking the very tip of Blueblood’s horn and interrupting his spell.
The chains vanished in clouds of pale yellow smoke, releasing Rainbow and Applejack who very quickly recovered. Using my magic, I guided my knife right around Blueblood and back into my possession, but by the time I did, Blueblood’s horn was already glowing again. Clearly he couldn’t be stunned for too long, perks of being an alicorn it seemed. Twilight teleported in behind him, her sceptre split apart into the six glimmering duplicates, each one she wielded like a blade made of pure light, controlled in perfect synchronisation with one another. Twilight moved incredibly fast, her body floating several inches off the ground, carried by the magic that surrounded her.
Blueblood responded by summoning a pair of ethereal blades himself, one extending from each foreleg, the three prongs of which had snapped open to resemble long, sweeping claws. They duelled relentlessly for a couple minutes, parrying and counterattacking, blocking and retaliating, all while floating around, dodging one another’s attacks and trying to out manoeuvre the other. They started out rather evenly matched, but Twilight’s flurrying of blades quickly began to overcome Blueblood’s, and he soon found himself getting beaten back. Finally, Twilight brought an end to it by knocking Blueblood’s blades clear with two of her own, before firing the other four right through his body.
They all impaled him, passing out the other side; I saw a brief flash of pitch black blood spraying from the wounds, before they very quickly healed themselves. Twilight was quick to press her advantage however, sending all six of her sceptres to diverging points from Blueblood, each one shrinking and compressing into a singularity. Blueblood’s body was pulled taught between them all, each pulling on him equally; Twilight took a step back and nodded to Pinkie Pie, who grinned at her before charging in. Once she got close enough, Pinkie jumped, allowing herself to be drawn into the closest anomaly.
As she got close, Pinkie drove her hoof inside the anomaly; gripping onto something only she could have felt, using it to spin herself around and around, each rotation picking up more and more speed. She finally let go, launching herself towards another singularity, but as she sped towards it she passed right over Blueblood, slashing out with her daggers as she did. She repeated this over and over again in so little time, bouncing from one singularity to another, cutting up Blueblood a bit more every time she went by. As I said, she did it all in an absurdly short space of time, Blueblood didn’t just hang there and take the abuse.
He managed to teleport out of the magical trap, reappearing further down the deck, stopping a moment to allow the dozens of lacerations to heal themselves. I noticed that with each regeneration, the recovery took a tiny bit longer each time. Twilight waved her horn, closing the singularities and reconstructing her sceptre, while Pinkie froze mid jump, as if she simply decided she didn’t want that momentum she built up to exist anymore, before stepping neatly to the deck. Blueblood’s eye was twitching now as he regarded us, his chest heaving as his breathing became more laboured, meanwhile we regrouped.
“Impossible…” he gasped, backing up even more as we started marching towards him in a line. “How are you able to stand against me? You should all be dead now!”
“We’re able to stand because we have the support of one another,” Fluttershy told him in a sympathetic voice. “You don’t have to be alone, if you surrender now, there can still be redemption for you.”
“Surrender? Redemption?!” Blueblood repeated before barking with laughter. “You think I want your forgiveness?! You think that means anything to me?! I will never stop until I have what is rightfully mine, and you are no more!”
We all hesitated a moment, looking to Fluttershy expectantly, who gave a little sigh followed by a shrug.
“I tried,” she muttered in response to our looks, sounding resigned. “Let’s finish this.”
Blueblood opened his mouth to respond, but very quickly found he had no words, when an angry Fluttershy was flying towards him at high speeds, her mace raised high. Blueblood raised his hooves reflexively, his horn lighting up and creating a magical shield around him, but it was no use. As Fluttershy neared him, she swung her mace down hard, breaking right through the shield, before the glowing head came hammering down across Blueblood’s face. His screams pierced the heavens as he was tossed to the floor, holy fire spreading across his face while Fluttershy landed at his side and pulled back for another strike.
As her mace swung down a second time, catching him in his undercarriage, his entire body was lobbed across the deck from the force, crashing down once before bouncing up again, before finally landing and sliding to a spot a short distance from us. We all rushed in, but Blueblood was quick to scramble back to his hoof claws, his face not appearing to heal after half of it was flayed from his skull, his left eye a charcoal black crisp. His horn glowed brilliantly, almost frantically in the way it flickered and flashed, four of the deck mounted cannons tore themselves up and flew across to the centre where Blueblood was.
Two he pulled to shreds, the resulting cloud of shrapnel he began spinning around himself to create a protective barrier or razor sharp metal fragments, while the other two he animated to begin shooting at us rapidly with ghostly projectiles, that I had no doubt would still hurt if they hit us. Rainbow flew up to one and began flying around it, cutting the gun barrels up into smaller slices with her silver wings. I ran towards the second one, jumping up and reaching out into thin air with my hooves, Pinkie blinking into place on cue, taking my hooves in her own before tossing me up the rest of the way.
She threw me just over the cannon, and as Blueblood tried to point the barrels upwards, I gathered my magic in my horn, charging and releasing a triangular beam which blasted the cannon apart. I dropped back to the ground, rolling as I landed, before looking over my shoulder to see Twilight pushing into the wall of spinning shrapnel, casting a shield bubble around her and Applejack. It was difficult to see beyond all the flying bits, but I was just about able to see them as they passed beyond the wall, and Applejack struck Blueblood with her claymore, ending his spell and sending him stumbling back, clutching the gaping wound in his chest.
As all the metal chunks dropped to the deck, I saw the wound on Blueblood was healing, but not nearly fast enough for his liking. He spread his wings and began flapping to safety, but Rainbow Dash swooped around to flank him, sending out another blinding X right into Blueblood’s back. He dropped back to the deck, his wings a mangled mess, hardly able to lift themselves up anymore, let alone fly. Applejack ran in next, ducking under the swipe of Blueblood’s foreleg, rolling forward and standing up once she was positioned almost back to back with him. She reared up and bucked out, her sabatons connecting sharply with Blueblood’s pelvis, a loud cracking could be heard echoing across the deck as his hind legs gave out.
Pinkie blinked in, appearing right in his face, leaning down to grin at him before slashing out with both daggers, severing both hoof claws from the rest of his forelegs. She cartwheeled out of the way as Blueblood screeched in anguish, sending out dozens of magical attacks after her. He wasn’t able to keep that up much longer however, as Twilight teleported in behind him, lowering her horn and sweeping her head quickly from one side to the other. It was as if she had sliced through the air with an invisible knife, Blueblood’s horn severing clean from the rest of his head. He didn’t scream at that, I think it occurred too quickly for him to register any pain, he simply stared in shock at the long, slightly curved bone that dropped in front of him.
Fluttershy flew in next, whispering a short word to her mace before it shone as bright as the sun itself, and she thrust it into Blueblood’s chest. The mace blew a crater at the point of contact, white holy flames spread right across Blueblood’s entire body, his screams quickly drowned out. As Fluttershy stepped back and his body very quickly extinguished itself, revealing a broken, bloody, charred husk of what he once was, I strode forward. I stood directly in front of him as I raised my rapier, the tip almost touching his one good eye which had managed to survive the combustion. He stared back at me through it, complete and utter hatred being the only thing it was capable of expressing… before I pulled back my blade and drove it through his head.
We all stood in silence, none of us really able to believe that it was over, that we had won. Well, we had almost won; there was still the matter of a war machine that needed blowing out of the sky. Wordlessly, we all began running back to the bow of the Dreadnaught; the plane was destroyed, so we were a little clueless as to how we’d all get off safely. Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash might have been able to fly, and they could certainly carry one of us each, but if Cogs saw them doing so, and thought to detonate the bombs…
As we reached the bow, I started pushing myself towards the edge, fighting against the wind as if buffeted against me and tried to force me back. We were so close to Cragsburg now; I hoped Hex and the battlemages would have the sense to raise shields to protect everypony from any falling debris once Cogs set off the bombs. As I peered out over the edge I could see our army down below, the fighting seemed to have come to an end, or else there was just considerably less of it going on, but I also noticed something else, an unusual purple shape flapping from the ground up to meet us.
“Need a lift?!” Spike called out as he swooped up over the edge, landing next to us with a loud thud.
We all praised his good timing, five of us clambering aboard and hugging the spines on his back for safety, while Rainbow assured us that she could keep up on her own. As soon as we were all set, Spike beat his wings hard and took off, flying fast and far from the Dreadnaught, Rainbow speeding alongside him. I turned my head and looked back at the Dreadnaught as it quickly got further and further away, mentally counting the second in my head until…
“Woohoo!” Pinkie screamed as the bridge was obliterated in the first of many explosions, raising her hooves into the air without any regard for holding onto Spike to avoid flying off. “We did it!”
I couldn’t help but grin beneath my Masque as Twilight hurriedly grabbed hold of Pinkie Pie, right as she began to fall off, holding her close with a startled look. The entire Dreadnaught was engulfed in flames and clouds of smoke, very quickly obscuring it from view entirely, as the sounds of the multiple detonations boomed throughout the Ash Lands and beyond. Spike dived towards the ground, landing a short ways off from where the Union army was gathered, making a solid attempt at cheering louder than the explosions. We all hopped off as Rainbow landed next to us, we then began hugging and patting each other on the backs, Spike said he would go and let the others know we were all okay, before flying off back to base.
I admit that I even shed a few tears as we stood there, drinking in the success. It was such a perfect moment, all of us standing there, basking in glow of our victory… but the moment was spoiled as the noise of blasting began to fade, replaced instead by a deep, booming laughter that reverberated across the battlefield. The cheering from the army in the distance died almost immediately, my friends all froze as looks of disbelief washed over them. Slowly I turned around; panning away from our allies and the city behind them, tilting my head up to where the Dreadnaught had been as the bombs went off… then the clouds of obscuring smoke began to clear.
The Dreadnaught remained defiantly in the sky, but it was no longer the war machine it had once been, now it had been transformed… warped and corrupted into something vastly more awful than we could ever have imagined, an abomination right out of the darkest of nightmares. The great hulking hull was now surrounded in masses of creeping, crimson tissue that spread out all around it, stretching out and sticking like invasive tendrils, only patches of the metalwork beneath was still visible. The creep pulsated and palpitated, like they were the blood vessels in some great living organism, spreading over the cannons completely, and morphing them into bizarre mockeries with unholy visages.
The turbines were motionless, more of the creep stretched across and dangling between the individual rotors; instead there were large webbed wing like appendages growing out each of them, looking almost like fins. The bow, relatively plain and featureless before, now bore a huge, gaping maw, opening vertically and running almost the entire height of the ship, with rows of sharp teeth within and strands of saliva dripping down. The main change however, was what now grew in place of the command bridge, a gargantuan figure, his lower half gone in favour of the new and enhanced Dreadnaught, which he now sprouted out the top of.
Blueblood looked more terrifying than ever, truly colossal, as his body had expanded to its new accommodation. His torso looked like it had been carved from a mountain, still all muscle and bones, his forelegs spread wide, split apart at the ends into five long, crooked prongs, which looked like they could cause earthquakes by piercing the ground and dragging them through. His wings were huge, but they appeared so unhealthy looking, tattered and stripped of feathers in some places, those that appeared whole looked oily and decayed. His entire body was no longer pearly white and brimming with a hallowed light, how his flesh was dark and stone like, stripped of fur while creep spread up, tangling and wrapping around his body and limbs.
His face was completely unrecognisable as the fairly good looking, pampered Duke I had once met in an office, the flesh around the eyes and mouth was pulled taut, and gave him the look of having a permanent snarl, looking like his entire face was about to snap apart at any moment to show nothing but a terrible black skull beneath. His jaws and set of shark like teeth were more pronounced than ever, making him looking like a savage animal. His eyes once a cloudy white, were now an inky black, great pools of darkness. The curvature of his horn was more dramatic now, the bony glaive now resembling a metal scythe jutting out his forehead. Like his fur, his mane was now completely absent, making his head appear slightly smaller in proportion to his body, which wasn’t much of a silver lining, when his nostril was still big enough for all six of us to squeeze inside.
“Pitiful fools!” Blueblood’s voice boomed, where once the demonic voice was the undertone, now Blueblood’s original voice came second to it. “Did you really think I could be vanquished so easily?! I am a god, I cannot be destroyed!”
I glanced back briefly, even from this distance I could see the soldiers quelling in fear, many running for the shelter of the city.
“Now you show yourself for what you really are,” I growled, turning my eyes back to Blueblood. “You’re no alicorn, you never were… you’re an abomination, just like the rest!”
“You continue to speak blasphemy to your new ruler?” Blueblood growled, appearing to lean in slightly, although his movement was severely limited in his new form “I think I will not kill you, I would rather keep you alive for all eternity at my side, in perpetual suffering. You will serve as an immortal reminder to all would-be heretics, a fitting reward for how you have helped me achieve this new state of transcendence.”
“Maybe you didn’t hear us earlier,” I called up to him, feeling a spark ignite in my chest. “We’re going to win this fight!”
“And how do you plan on doing that?” Blueblood questioned in a mocking tone. “You have nothing that can hope to match me, let alone overcome my perfection!”
“You’re wrong,” I told him, smiling around at my friends, who all nodded to me. “We have something that you will never have… something more powerful than any god or monster!”
“And what is that?” Blueblood asked in an almost bored tone.
“We have each other,” I answered simply.
With those words, I shut my eyes, my friends following suit, we knew exactly what we had to do. We had the tools to defeat him; all we had to do was awaken the power inside us to use them, the power that came from our connection with each other. As I shut my eyes and focused, I felt my friends there, closer than they stood to me physically, I felt the beating of their hearts and heard the echo of their thoughts. Then, all as one, we opened our eyes…
The skies opened up, the clouds swirling and churning to create a hole directly above us, a shaft of divine light plummeting down upon us, so the world all around us became nothing but light. I saw my friends rise up, saw myself rise up, as if I was nothing more than a spectator. All six of us were shining bright, our bodies permeating with a light from deep within. Slowly, all physical objects such as clothes and weapons began to fade away, until we were left with only the Elements of Unity, which sung out to one another, the exquisite voice resonating deep within our souls.
First was Applejack, the Element of Resolve, her whole body shattering into thousands of shimmering shards, which clustered together and were absorbed by her armour and sabatons. Second was Pinkie Pie, the Element of Conviction, as her body split apart and became one with her gauntlets and pauldrons, the armour pieces flew into place alongside Applejack’s. Third was Fluttershy, the Element of Compassion, her being seeping into her breastplate and gorget before they too were soaring across the join with the others. Fourth was Rainbow Dash, the Element of Valour, as soon as she became one with her wings, they quite literally flew into place, completing the body.
It was my turn after that, the Element of Inspiration. I both saw and felt my own body fracturing into countless pieces, feeling myself split across thousands of places at once, before all them came hurtling together and merging with my Masque. It felt as if I was diving through space before splashing into a liquid sun, only instead of burning, I felt a deep warmth in my soul as I sank in and allowed it to overcome me. I then saw as my Masque moved into position right over Fluttershy’s gorget, that left one final member of our group before we could be complete, Twilight Sparkle, the Element of Knowledge.
Twilight’s body disappeared, binding together with her crown, which began to lower itself onto our head, and as it made contact with my Masque… we became one. It was a moment unlike anything else… unlike anything that should be felt by mere mortals, as my friends and I were bound together in one body… our thoughts and feelings becoming as one… our hearts beating as one. The column of light that ascended into the heavens dissipated, allowing the new figure to slowly lower themselves to the ground. This new figure looked like a pony… a pony completely encased in silver armour, with liquid light flowing out the back of her helmet and tail guard instead of a mane or tail, this pony… was all of us bound together as one, we had become Unity itself.
Our Elements had remained more or less the same, the only slight difference being that Twilight’s crown had changed slightly, becoming a much fuller affair, while the pink crystalline star that had been on the back of her mind, was now on our collective flanks as our cutie marks. We turned our gaze up towards the Dreadnaught and Blueblood, our eyes met his, and we saw the fear and confusion in them. We looked back, seeing the faces of the Union army, a dwindle of hope reignited as they looked to us as their saviour. We spread our wings, crouched low to the ground, before rocketing into the air to meet our foe.
As we rose, the cannons began firing towards us, their rounds packed full of toxic chemicals, we dodged them easily as we continued upwards, until we were hovered level with Blueblood himself. He let out a feral roar as he opened fire on us with everything he had, all the deck mounted guns began bombarding us, while his horn radiated a magical aura that seemed to suck the light out from around it. A pair of large runic rings spawned over each of his shoulders, one glowing blue while the other was red, each of the were slowly rotating, shooting beams our way. Similarly he raised both forelegs, firing highly concentrated laser from the tips of each of his claws, these all came together so that sky was absolutely saturated with Blueblood’s attacks… naturally we had no trouble in dealing with it all.
We flew straight forwards, Rainbow Dash’s speed and flying skills guaranteeing our safety as we dodged all the attacks on our way down to the deck. Once we landed, we started galloping towards the first cannon, Applejack’s strength enabling us to punch right through it, decimating it instantly before moving onto the next one. We moved up the row along the right, destroying each and every one of the biological cannons, before moving in on Blueblood. He swept his claws down, the multitude of lasers crisscrossing all around us, trying to bisect us. Clearly he didn’t account for Pinkie’s Pie’s reflexes and agility allowing us to flip, roll and tumble under, over, around and beyond them easily.
We took off again, spiralling our way up Blueblood’s body, my own discerning eye picking up on his smallest movements, allowing us to predict his attacks and prepare counter strategies ahead of time. We noticed that the runic discs appeared to be automated, locking onto us and firing a steady stream, so using this information we purposely flew in front of one for a moment to get its attention, when it started firing its beam at us, we slowly made our way behind his own wing, the spell not stopping before it had almost completely burned through the limb. Blueblood screamed in fury and agony, shattering the runic disc with a wave of his horn, summoning instead a cluster of eldritch tentacles to burst out of the centre of his ribcage and begin swarming and snaking their way through the air around him.
We spun through the air, avoiding them as they homed in on us, as we dived down they gave chase. They weren’t quick enough however, we swooped down low and close enough to Blueblood’s shoulder that we were able to speed straight into it like a bullet. We heard the satisfying pop of dislocation before we dropped out of the way of the tentacles which splattered uselessly against the injured appendage, which Blueblood was too busy trying to heal, to notice as we flew back up to his head. Our horn glowed with a divine light as we began channelling our magic into it, Twilight’s expertise in magic allowing us to cast an abundance of spells in rapid succession of one another.
Blueblood’s head twisted back as our spells began ripping through his flesh; he thrust forward against the growing bombardment and snapped out at us with his teeth. We flipped backwards, narrowly avoiding it before he opened his mouth as wide as it would go, a blood red light brimming within his throat. A moment later, a massive beam burst forth from his mouth, packing enough of a punch to wipe us right out of existence, but we held our position, Fluttershy’s blessings allowing us to form a bubble shield around us that nothing could hope to penetrate. When the blast ended, Blueblood appeared triumphant, before seeing we were still there, completely unharmed. Before he could react, we shot in, uppercutting him in the jaw.
We watched in satisfaction as a few teeth flew out, careening down to the deck of the Dreadnaught and smashing right through due to their weight. Blueblood gave a loud groaning noise as he brought both of his claws smashing together to try and squash us like a fly, having recovered from the injury we dealt to his forelegs moments before, and already in the process of growing new teeth. His claws never connected with us, as we simply stopped flying and allowed ourselves to drop out of the sky right before his claws slammed together. We soared down carelessly, only spreading our wings when we neared our landing pad, the murky green tentacles still writhing from his chest.
We landed perfectly on the slippery writhing surface, starting to gallop down and along, approaching the ribcage and picking up speed as we went. As we neared out target we jumped and dived forward, focusing all our energy into our horn and using it to help blast our path clear and we punched through the centre of his chest, bursting out the other side in a shower of black blood and tissue. We kept up the pace, Flying high into the air and diving back down, repeatedly smashing our way through his body, and even the Dreadnaught beneath, until he was steadily becoming perforated with holes we had created using a combination of speed, strength and magic.
The pivotal moment came when we went hurtling through the back of his skull, bringing his entire upper body toppling down into the deck. As we flew away, reaching a good distance before turning to admire our handiwork, we saw him slowly picking himself up, the numerous wounds we had inflicted still persistently healing themselves, even if it was causing him a huge amount of energy to do so.
“It’s futile…” Blueblood breathed in a severely weakened voice. “You may have the power to cause me harm, but it is no use… I will never be defeated! If you injury me, I will regenerate… if you kill me, I will come back stronger every time!”
We surveyed him in silence, we didn’t doubt the sincerity of his words, after what he had done by merging with the Dreadnaught and how he healed his injuries, we were sure this fight would only carry on for all eternity with no positive result in sight… we would have to try a different tactic. We rose up, approaching the cloud layer as our body began to light up, until we were the beacon that shone across the world. When we reached our apex, we spread our body out wide, stretching our forelegs apart and focusing our magic through not just our horn, but through every inch of our body.
“What are you doing?” Blueblood demanded in a fearful tone.
We were doing the only thing we could… bringing an end to this battle once and for all… doing what could only be done using divine artefacts… opening the doors to realm where Blueblood would not be able to harm anypony ever again… to Tartarus.
The light shot out from us, flying from our core, all the way across the sky to a point directly behind Blueblood. The air rippling around the point for a brief moment, before a bolt of lightning passed down through it, and the walls of reality began ripping open along that line. The doors opened wide, we were the key, and our will was keeping it unlocked while it opened wider and wider, until finally it was a rift large enough to swallow Blueblood whole. We could see into it as well, the entire Union army could see into it, a window into the most nightmarish place in the universe… a place where we were damning Blueblood to.
Tartarus was just as we remembered it from Pinkie’s nightmare, an endless abyss of clouds tinted sickly green, while bolts of lightning flashed and the whole world trembled and flickered in and out of existence. We could hear the screams, they sounded so far off, and yet the sound still chilled us to the bone. Blueblood could hear them too, and he was paralysed in fear, his whole body twisted around to gaze in horror into the void. Then the chains came, the same kind that held Pinkie, only much thicker for their considerably larger victim. They sprung out of the door in their hundreds, wrapping around Blueblood or latching onto him with hooks.
He tried to fight against them, he tried to scream and cry out in terror, but nothing could stop them. Even when he began crying out to us, begging for mercy, we had none to give him. Even if we did believe it for a moment, it was too late, we had opened the gates and offered them a soul, and a soul they would have. Blueblood’s upper body was wrenched from the Dreadnaught, literally torn from it, his spine and entrails dangling from the gaping trauma. The rest of the organic matter was stripped from the Dreadnaught; peeling away as Blueblood was parted from it, until only the charred husk of the original was left behind, falling and smashing to the battlefield, free of the taint Crane and Blueblood had spread within it.
Blueblood never stopped fighting against his bindings, even as they began pulling him irrevocably in through the doors which started to close once more. We felt our connection to the gate starting to wane, a feeling of immense relief washing over us as the burden of holding the tear open was lifted from our shoulders, a far greater task than fighting Blueblood had ever proved for us. Blueblood had given up any attempt at feigning remorse for his actions, now screeching and shouting insults and threats up at us, swearing he would escape and make every single living thing suffer forever to punish us.
We paid his threats no heed however, he was defeated, the battle was ended, the day was ours. We allowed ourselves a moment to relax as the connection to the barrier between worlds began to thin, and the door started sealing itself along the line created by the shaft of lightning. It was a moment of foolishness on our part, to feel like we were out of the woods, to let our guard down even for a second. For at that moment, Blueblood gathered all his hatred and malice, all the negativity inside his heart, and used it to fuel his power, swiping out one last time with the tip of his foreleg, that was the last part to be dragged over to the other side.
A final desperate attack that could do nothing to save him, but the wave of darkness it sent hurling up at us, was enough to guarantee him some final, small act of revenge. The dark arc split across the sky, leaving a phantom trail as it shot towards us faster than anything we could have been prepared for at that moment in time. It struck us directly in the face, and suddenly… it wasn’t ‘us’ anymore, it was ‘me’. The Masque had been struck by the attack, my Masque had been broken, the connection binding us all together was shattered, and I felt myself fall out of synch with my friends. The pony contorted in the sky as I began flickering in and out of existence, jumping back and forth from being one with my friends, to being cut off.
When I was with them, I could feel them panicking, trying desperately to reach out to me, to reel in the power that we were still putting out. When I was separated from them, I was completely alone, as I was thrown into the firing line of the very power I had been helping to wield mere moments before. We had been using so little power as the door began to close, little in relation to how much we using when fighting Blueblood, let alone how much we had used to open the gate in the first place. But even the comparatively tiny amount my friends were trying so hard to put a stop to, was enough to make me feel as if every atom in my body was being systematically erased… only I wouldn’t have thought that atoms could feel pain the way I did right then.
I felt like screaming, and indeed sometimes when my physical form flickered into existence, still suspended in the sky alongside the silver armoured pony, I was screaming. Other times, I found my mouth too warped or deformed to do so. Everything was happening so quickly, I found the frequency of times spent connected to my friends was getting increasingly less, while the pain of existing apart from them was only increasing times fold with every exposure to it. It felt so unfair, to have worked so hard and come so close, mere milliseconds to absolute success, and to have it all ruined in the blink of an eye.
But then… was it really ruined? We had still won, hadn’t we? Blueblood was vanquished, banished to Tartarus where he could do no more harm. The Dreadnaught was destroyed, now a wreck on the battlefield, perhaps to stay for years to come as a monument to what occurred there. The abomination army was wiped out, the Union army I had helped to build from the bottom up standing victorious. Yes, victory had been achieved, Panchea and the world at large was safe for the foreseeable future. Everything we had worked and fought for had not been in vain, so was it right for me to suddenly declare it all unfair, that out of all the ponies who had not made it this far, I was now one of them?
No, I had gone into this battle knowing full well I would probably not walk back out again. But I pushed on anyway, because I knew it would all be worth it, if before my end I could do some small part in ensuring that the ponies I cared about were able to live in a safe world. I had achieved that much, so as I felt the various aspects of my being slowly get erased, I didn’t feel bitter or resentful, just content in the knowledge that in the end, I had achieved something good… something great. That was the last thing I was able to dwell on, everything else was gone… my thoughts… my feelings… my memories. All I had was the knowledge that it had all been worth it, but then even that left me… and finally there was nothing.
…
The next thing I knew… I was on a boat.