//------------------------------// // Ch. 4 // Story: The New Guard Order // by colt alchemist //------------------------------// Shira was racing through the forest with Tacitus close behind her. She could feel herself getting tired already, panting endlessly for her second run of the day. She knew cardio was good for her but was starting to regret her morning jog. It wasn’t like she could’ve skipped it even if she wanted to. She looked to her right and noticed some other guards gaining speed. Crusher was only a few feet away but was starting to run ahead of Shira, with Grassy Fields following close to him. She was sweating a lot, for a moment Shira thought that the sweat forming on her face looked like tears. She turned to her left and saw Selune and Terra were also close by too. She could barely see them through the passing trees and bushes but still saw that they were about to pass her as well. She didn’t give up yet. Gotta get those points! Gotta win this program! She thought. “Hey wait up!” Tacitus called. Shira came to a halt and swerved around. She waited for her partner to catch up, and when he did he was panting more than a tired dog. “Why….do you….run…..so……fast,” he coughed. “Oh Luna. “C’mon! You can’t be out of energy now!” she exclaimed. “I already went for a jog today and I’m still holding on. Sort of.” “I’m not exactly,” he breathed. “Made for running.” “Ya gotta keep up or else we won’t make it,” she reminded him. “I’m sorry. I don’t practice cardio a lot.” “Well, you better get a move on, or else-“ Growl! They both froze at the loud noise. They could hear something moving in the nearby bushes. Rustling branches and faint snarling was the only thing that filled their ears. They were alone with whatever mysterious creature was hiding in the bushes. They both hoped it was only a squirrel. “Or else whatever’s in those bushes will eat us!” panicked Shira. “I’m convinced!” Tacitus sped off leaving a small breeze in his trail. Shira could feel the wind nearly messing up her mane. “Hey!” Shira sprinted after her partner and far away from the growling sound. Soon after they departed, Short Fuse came running out of the bushes, panting from all the catching up he had to do. “I-Is somepony here?” he panted. He then heard a monstrous growl coming from his stomach. “I knew I should’ve eaten more for breakfast.” Meanwhile, Spinout was having the time of his life above the forest. His wings were spread out and was soaring gracefully above the trees. He had a wide smile of his face and was going faster than a jet plane. The wind hit his face like a paper fan, but he didn’t care. “Yahoo!” he exclaimed. He zoomed by tree after tree, leaving a large gust of wind in his trail. Whenever he got close to the branches, he would flap his wings once and be shot right back up into the air and above the forest. He would eventually come across some bigger trees. He approached one now and slowly leaned to the left. He dodged it just in time. He looked down and noticed all the other ponies racing down below and laughed. “Haha! Good thing I’m such an awesome flyer, otherwise I wouldn’t be able to gain such an awesome and beautiful advantage!” He looked forward and looked down at the forest below. He could see nothing but trees for miles. He felt very proud. With his birds eye view, he could find the castle in no time. He searched for a while but couldn’t spot anything that looked like a castle, or anything that stood out in the slightest. He looked all around and saw nothing but trees. Trees, trees, and more trees. Spinout’s brow started to furrow and his smile slowly decreased. Annoyed he couldn’t spot the castle for miles, he flew off to search elsewhere. Chill out was speeding through the forest on hoof. He decided to wait for the right moment to use his wings. His spear didn’t weigh him down and he made sure to have it ready when the time was right. He lost his partner, Artemis, along the way but kept his focus on the forest. He suddenly heard a loud snarl and came to a stop. He found himself in an open area surrounded by bushes and trees. There were rustles in the bushes and the strange growls kept on getting louder. He never took his eyes off of the bushes around him, he knew something was there. Waiting, stalking, ready to attack. What he saw next was bad, a pair of gold eyes glowing in the bushes. Pretty soon, he became surrounded by glowing eyes. Not showing any fear on his face, he flapped his wings until he was floating in the air. He pulled up his black scarf until it covered the lower half of his face. He equipped himself with his spear and held it tight within his hooves. He was now ready to fight. Without warning, a large Timberwolf leapt through the bushes and swiped at Chill. He flew back and countered with a swipe of his spear. He struck the Timberwolf’s paw, but that didn’t stop him. The Timberwolf kept on leaping but Chill dodged every attack and countered every time. He heard more growls coming from behind. Timberwolves started leaping out of the bushes from all different directions, one by one. Chill Wind was not afraid. He jabbed, stabbed, swiped, dodged, and slashed any wolf that attacked him. His reflexes were incredible, he even stabbed a wolf that was about to pounce right behind him. He spun his spear and kept on slicing and dicing, slashing off little chunks of wood with every strike. His expression never changing from focused. Then, one wolf came out of nowhere and swiped the spear right out of his hooves. It knocked it over to the side so that Chill couldn’t reach it. Chill grew a stern face, he needed to retrieve his spear. His attacker kept on swiping and slashing at him with it’s claw. Snarling every time. The Timberwolf attempted to chomp down on the red and blue Pegasus, only to be stopped by him just in time. Chill caught the wolf’s jaw before it could land the finishing blow. He struggled to keep the wolf’s jaw from closing on him, it was even forcing him to the ground. He flapped his wings some more in order to stay in the air for a little longer, he was starting to sweat. All he could see was the Timberwolf’s wooden daggers and throat, and all he could smell was its foul breath. He began to think that his scarf wasn’t covering his muzzle enough. “I think I need a better mask,” he grunted. “It’s not helping block your revolting breath.” The wolf just growled in return. He looked past the wolf and spotted his spear in the ground. He had to make a move. He gathered up his strength and prepared himself. Once he felt the tip of his hoof touch the ground, he let go of its jaw and flew straight for its neck. He wrapped his hooves around the wooden beast’s neck and held on tight. With a powerful scream, he lifted the wolf right off of the ground and flipped it’s on his back. It lost a few branches, but the force was not enough to break the wolf. The predator soon squirmed back up to it’s legs and spotted Chill flying to his spear. It wasn’t going to let him get away that easy. It started to sprint after Chill. The pegaus was only a few feet away from his weapon. With one final flap of his wings, he zoomed by and yanked his spear right out of the ground. The Timberwolf leapt at Chill with its jaw open. However, that was a mistake. Chill spun around just in time and slammed his spear right into his attacker’s eye. The Timberwolf wailed in agony and shook it’s head to try to get the impaled spear out of its eye. Chill wasn’t done yet, he flew up into the sky and got a bird’s eye view. Once he was several feet in the air, he sky dived. He was aiming right for the Timberwolf he just impaled. At the last moment, he spun around and dive kicked his spear. His dive attack forced the spear to fire right through the Timberwolf’s head, causing it to explode with branches and twigs everywhere. The spear flew another Timberwolf, impaling it onto a nearby tree. The wolf on the tree soon collapsed into a pile of twigs. Chill landed on the ground and retrieved his spear once more, yanking it from the tree. He floated and started to clean the sap off his spear. He turned towards the two wolves he just brutally killed, not changing his expression one bit. One wolf dead, another without a head. He landed on the ground and decided to bow to the deceased wolves. “Forgive me,” he said. He then turned towards the other Timberwolves, who just growled at him angrily. Seeing no time to rest, he floated to the air and readied his spear once more. Rainbow Dash saw the entire thing up above where nopony could see her. Her jaw dropped and her pupils the size of needle-points. She couldn’t believe what she just witnessed, and now she can never un-see it. She flew off before she could witness another bloody, or tree-sappy, fight. “Oh my Celestia, that was brutal!” she exclaimed. She was about to fly off to the finish line to inform Twilight on how some of her guards were doing, until she spotted something else. From high in the sky, she could see Selune heading for a huge cave. Selune was running through the forest desperately trying to find her partner and friend. They also got separated along the way and now she felt like she was completely lost. She had no idea where she was going. “Terra! Where are you?” she called out. “Is anypony else here? Tacitus? Shira?” Nopony answered, and Selune wasn’t paying attention to where she was going and ran right into the large cave. She soon noticed that everything had become darker and came to a stop. It felt really cold and damp inside. She turned around to find the opening. “Huh, guess I wondered into a cave,” she said to herself. Then something caught her eye. A small glimmer caught her attention and she turned around. There, right behind her, was a huge pile of gems. Her jaw dropped at the sight of it. She couldn’t believe what she was looking at. A whole large pile of gems and crystals of all colors, red, blue, green, yellow, just sitting there glimmering in the cave. They were just so shiny. “Jackpot!” Selune yelled. She sprinted towards the large pile. When she reached the pile she was already filling her hooves with gems. She had hardly seen so many in her life in one place. It was too hard to believe. She didn’t even know how to carry most of them. “If only I had my bag with me,” she said cheerfully. She was just going crazy over the sight, grabbing one gem after the other. Until, she noticed one was different. Her happy smile soon descended once she spotted a particular gem. This one was big and green, but the strange thing about it was it had a bite mark on it. Selune lifted it up with her magic to examine it. She squinted at the sight of the bite. “Why would a gem have a bite mark?” Her eyes suddenly shrunk and her smile completely gone once she realized what this meant. “Uh-oh.” She felt a warm breath over her shoulder. It had suddenly become much more humid in the cave. She slowly turned around to see who it was. Oh please just let this be a secret sauna she thought to herself. She turned around and was disappointed at what it really was. Looming over Selune, was a big, cross, green dragon. It was huge, slender, and growled at Selune. The mare didn’t have any words for her own. She simply put the bitten gem back into the pile. She then let out a sheepish smile. “Hehehe. Uh, hi,” she said. “What are you doing in my cave?” snarled the dragon. “I got lost,” she admitted. “First another dragon comes in here and eats my gems, now a unicorn zebra is here trying to steal them?” “First of all, I’m not a zebra. I’m just a normal unicorn,” she corrected. “Second, I just got lost. And I’ll be making my way out, thank you very-“ “I don’t think so,” interrupted the dragon. He then opened his mouth and let out a large breath of fire. The fire was aiming right towards Selune. The flames soon engulfed her, seemingly burning her to a crisp. Once the fire died down, there was nothing more than a burned spot in the ground. The dragon grinned at his kill, but soon his grin disappeared once he heard the sound of running hoof steps. He turned around to see Selune trying to make a run for it. The dragon wasn’t going to have that and shot fire from his mouth once more. The flames blocked Selunes only way out. She stopped at the flames and turned around. She saw the huge dragon about to perform another attack. “Alright, I guess we’re doing this,” Selune said as a small smile appear on her face. The dragon shot more fire from his mouth but Selune dodged it. Every time the shot fire at her Selune dodged it every time. Left and right, left and right again. She just kept on going. It was then she felt like she had to perform one of her signature moves. A purple aura soon engulfed Selune. The dragon looked confused by this and tilted his head. Selune then sidestepped to the right, but once she did another Selune stayed in place. The dragon was shocked by this, he was seeing two of the same pony now. “What?” he exclaimed. The two Selunes then jolted in opposite directions. They were both running to both sides of the dragon. One Selune shot a magical beam at the dragon’s face while the other launched his own gems at him. The dragon was being hit on both sides, he couldn’t decide which one to attack. He decided to swing his tail and hit both. However, they both jumped up in time. They both bounced off of the cave walls and shot themselves right for the dragon. One Selune left hook the dragon while the other spun kick. They kept bouncing off of the walls performing the same attacks. Selune was having fun trying out her cool moves, but she knew she had no time for this. She needed to escape and complete the mission. The dragon had enough too and swiped at one of the Selunes. He swung his claw at the left Selune, but once he made contact she shattered into tiny pieces. His eyes widened at the shattered mare. “What is this?!” “That is my project mode!” Selune proclaimed. “And this, is me escaping!” She shot a magical beam at the dragon’s face which in turn launched Selune towards the cave’s entrance. The dragon roared in pain as he received yet another blow to the face. Selune landed right over the fire and ran towards the exit. She ran right out and was engulfed in the sunlight once more. “Yes!” she cheered as she could feel Celestia’s warm sun. She was soon stopped when a large stalagmite landed right in front of her. She swerved around to see the angry dragon run out of his cave and towards Selune. “Oh, C’mon!” she yelled and prepared herself. “You’re not going anywhere!” The dragon inhaled to release one last and large fiery attack. Selune’s horn started to glow as she prepared her next move. However, before the dragon could exhale with fire, he was shot back. An unknown force came out of nowhere, struck the dragon in the chest, and sent him flying on his back. The dragon landed on the ground and grabbed his injured chest. Selune didn’t understand this. Something landed right in front of her. Selune was surprised to see Terra Lionmane land right in front of her. The dragon sat up and snarled angrily at his attacker. Terra wasn’t going to take any of that. He slammed his front hooves into the earth, which shot up a huge boulder from the ground. The dragon stopped growling and stared at the boulder the earth pony just constructed. “Go back to sleep!” Terra ordered. He spun around and gave the boulder a hard buck. The boulder was sent flying towards the dragon. It slammed right into the dragon’s gut which sent it back to the dark cave from where it came from. A loud crash was heard from the inside. Terra soon lowered his guard once he knew the fight was over. He turn around and faced Selune. “I had him,” she smiled. “Sure you did,” he replied. He then wrapped his hooves around her. “But I’m glad I found you.” “Aw, you don’t have to get all sappy for me,” she teased but then returned the gesture. Terra soon broke up the hug and smiled at his partner and friend. “C’mon, we have a mission to complete.” Selune nodded and started to follow Terra through the forest again. Rainbow saw the whole thing and smiled. She was glad to see that this fight wasn’t as brutal but was just as awesome. “So cool! Those two are going places,” she said and soon flew off. Meanwhile, Shira came to a stop once she knew there was no danger. She was running in place as she waited for her partner to catch up. He was out of breath, again, and looked about ready to give up. “Can we take a break?” he begged. “Please. I could feel my lungs about to dry up.” Shira didn’t know how to feel about this. She really wanted to complete this mission, and get to the castle to gain extra points. But she felt like Tacitus was holding her back. Shira liked Tacitus, he seemed like a good friend and shares her level of awkwardness, not to mention he does have a good sense of style. But she could tell this was not the best for mission for him. He looked so scrawny and out of shape, he didn’t look like he could defend himself. Shira was confused. What do I do? Should I just leave him behind? She mentally punched herself in the face. Don’t say that! It’s part of the mission to arrive at the finish line WITH your partner. Plus, he’s my friend. I can’t leave my friends behind. Right? Then again, I did only meet him yesterday. There’s still a lot I don’t know about him, as well as the other guards. What should I do? I need to finish this mission! “Shira?” “Huh?” she gasped. “You’ve been standing there for five minutes starring at the ground. You Ok?” he asked. “Hm, I should be the one asking you that,” she chuckled. “But yeah, I’m fine. Don’t worry about it.” “Can we rest for a little bit?” he asked. “I guess. But after its back on the trail. We can’t afford to waste any time.” “Why? I mean, as long as we arrive as a team we’ll still get ten points.” “Were you not listening?” she exclaimed. This made Tacitus jump a little. “Huh?” “Rainbow Dash said that whoever makes it to the castle first gets double points! You can’t pass something like that up, especially on the first mission!” she pointed out. “I don’t know Shira. I’ve heard Rainbow Dash is best known for her ‘practical jokes’ and pranks. She could’ve just been messing with us,” Tacitus theorized. “What? No way!” She didn’t want to believe it. It’s not like there was any evidence to back it up. “Think about it. She’s one of elements of harmony and co-rulers of Twilight’s kingdom. Why would she lie to her recruits on the first mission? That just doesn’t add up.” “I’m just saying. Out of all of the elements, she’s the second most immature. Next to Pinkie anyway.” “Yeah, that’s true.” Shira didn’t want to believe it. Was Rainbow just screwing with them? Did she really lie about the extra points on their first day? That’s just a jerk move right there. “But still. Being an element is a professional job.” “I wouldn’t say it’s a job, more like her destiny or something. After all, she was chosen to represent loyalty. At least, from what I heard from the stories,” he mentioned. Loyalty, huh? “I still think we should-“ Growl! They both paused at the noise, unable to move or to react in time. But Tacitus knew something like this would happen again, so he knew what to say. “Not again,” he groaned. Only this time, something DID pop out of those bushes. A large, ferocious manticore jumped out of the bushes and attacked the two ponies. They both jumped back in time and witnessed the monsters loud and scary roar. Loud enough to leave an echo in the forest. Tacitus was scared stiff, he couldn’t move a muscle. “What do we do now?!” “Don’t worry. I came prepared,” proclaimed Shira. She levitated her metal guitar case off her back and took out her guitar. Now both case and guitar was floating in mid-air. Tacitus didn’t know what this meant but allowed Shira to do her thing. The young mare concentrated for a long time and kept her eyes on the beast. She then used her magic to slam both her case and guitar together. There was a bright flash that engulfed the ponies and manticore. Once the light died down, Tacitus rubbed his eyes and waited for them to readjust. When he opened them, his jaw dropped. Shira was lifting something with her magic. It wasn’t the guitar and it wasn’t the metal case. Instead it was something completely different. There, pointed at the manticore, was a giant sword. “Whoa,” said Tacitus. He had hardly seen anything like it, and it had a freaky design. It was the same size as her normal guitar, but the arm was replaced by a long handle and the head where the guitar part would be was replaced by a giant blade. It was like a huge blade with a really long handle. It looked similar to her guitar but it was now turned into a weapon. “Time to see what this thing can really do,” spoke Shira confidently.