System just snarled and charged. Charged straight into a pale yellow forcefield that cut through the grass between him and Pinkie, causing it to buckle and squeak rather loudly before repulsing him. He spun neatly in the air and stuck the landing with ease, before giving Princess Celestia a confused glare.
"Why do you interfere?" he asked, "You have no love for chaos."
Celestia's lips twitched for a moment before she schooled her face, and she said, "I see not chaos or order but an ancient power threatening my subjects. Did you really think I would let that stand?"
She reached into her collar and pulled out a green gem, which she leveled at the male alicorn. "This is my kingdom, and all within it are under my protection, even from you." The gem lifted into the air and began to glow as Celestia focused on her opponent. The glow brightened and strengthened before it sputtered and went out, dropping onto the ground with a dull thud. Celestia's eyes followed it as they widened in disbelief.
"Your loyalty to your subjects is commendable," System said smugly, having not bothered to dodge, "But I see you do not have the right virtue to wield that Element against me. And with the Spectrum out of control, it appears your magic has left you as well. A pity." His horn flared, and Celestia stared in shock as her legs turned to stone and fused with the ground below her, before the expression froze on her face as the rest of her body followed suit. "Now," he said dismissively as he turned back to Discord and Pinkie, who were busily stacking pie dishes, "Where were we?"
"Turn my marefriend back this instant!" Discord roared, unleashing a swarm of locusts that blackened the sky.
"Your marefriend?" System blinked, "The situation is even worse than I thought if that's the case, but don't worry," System said smugly, "I only needed her out of the way. She'll be back to normal after I crush you. Now where were we?"
"Preparing to kick your flank," Pinkie said as she squished a mushroom in one of her tails and began to grow, "Because it's-a me!" She shouted as she leapt into the air and landed on top of him. "Pinkie Pie!"
Discord turned the dirt into chocolate pudding for good measure, causing the pair to sink up to their necks. That is, until System's horn lit up and reality reasserted itself, forcing Pinkie off of his back and his body out of the ground.
"I'm going to enjoy this," System growled as he strode forward, a swarm of razor sharp triangles forming around him before spinning like saw blades and lashing out at the pair, "You've had this coming for far too long."
Pinkie and Discord twisted away from each other and the oncoming attack, Pinkie ducking low to the ground before shoving her left hoof forward, forming a pillar of earth that missed System by two hairs as he sidestepped it while Discord pulled out a bendy straw and peppered the Guide with spitball hornets.
System responded with a shout that disoriented the pair followed up by two perfect spires of stone that Pinkie and Discord had to scramble to avoid. During the following battle, if an unbiased observer had been present to watch, the word he or she would have used to describe System's fighting style would be precise. Every action did exactly what it was supposed and not a hair more. No energy was wasted, no time spent poorly, no step unmeasured. He had total control over every move he made, every spell he cast, and used that control with brutal efficiency.
Pinkie's pastries bounced off a forcefield, Discord's attempts to cut off his air supply led to the discovery that System didn't need to breathe, and soon the air around them began to warp in protest. Order and chaos clashed, and order seemed to be winning.
"I don't get it!" Discord said as he rained hammer wielding frogs on an unmoving System, "Last time I fought you a standstill! What changed?"
"Why are you even asking?" Pinkie shout back as the anvils she'd dropped down a tunnel flew up out of the earth into System's stomach, only for him to shake the blow off. "It's not like he's going to tell you if he knows, and I know I don't."
"Well, it's got to be something," Discord replied, ducking under a laser beam before tossing a waterfowl in System's face, "Either he's stronger or I'm weaker, and I don't think he's been spending the past 1500 years working out."
"The Elements!" Twilight shouted, startling the fighters, "Could they be responsible?"
System flicked his ear contemptuously and sent Twilight sprawling as he neatly dodged a column of ice cream, then said, "Stay out of this, youngling, it doesn't concern you."
"Pinkie Pie is my friend, so yes, it does concern me!" Twilight growled as she got back to her hooves. "Discord, is it possible the Elements stripped you of some of your power?"
Discord stifled a curse word as his tail caught fire. "Maybe, I'm a little busy to check right now," he said, coating the limb in a sheet of ice.
A snap of his fingers multiplied the effect of gravity on System by over 1000, then another snap inverted that pull on only System's front half. It worked for about half a second, forcing System to focus on holding himself together before reality snapped back into place.
System retaliated with a mesh of stun spells, driving Pinkie and Discord back as he stalked forward, flicking his ear again and knocking Twilight out of view.
Pinkie and Discord shared a look, then shouted, "Dance off!"
"What?" System said, almost stumbling in surprise.
Pinkie and Discord struck matching poses and started shuffling towards each other, "Fu-sion ha!"
CRACK
The glare was so bright Twilight had to look away from inside the bush she'd landed on, although System stared unflinchingly into the heart of what was basically a tiny star.
"Ahh," said a single voice from the center of the glow, "Let's see how you deal with DiscoPie!"
Twilight had to rub her eyes at this. The blended result of a merging spell stood before her, with Pinkie Pie's tails, mane and right forehoof and Discord's everything else radiating more power than either of them could use alone. He (She?) snapped a finger, and all of System's limbs fell off before zooming away into the undergrowth.
"It looks like you could use a hoof," DiscoPie said, and Twilight facehoofed at the bad one-liner.
System just looked annoyed before his horn glowed and restored him to normal. Then DiscoPie tried to steal his horn too, only for it to completely negate the attack. System responded by impaling the fusion on a sharpened stake as thick as a tree trunk, forcing DiscoPie to teleport off of it and repair the hole in their chest.
"Psst!" a voice behind Twilight said, making her jump and yelp, "It's me, Flash."
"And Spike," Spike said as Twilight looked over her shoulder, spotting the dragon sitting on the guard's back, "What in Celestia's name is going on here?"
Twilight filled them in as System and DiscoPie continued to exchange blows, and soon both Flash and Spike were glaring at the Guide with barely restrained fury. Flash started to head out of cover and towards the fighting, only for Twilight to grab his tail in her teeth and yank him back hard before she blushed furiously and let go.
"You can't go out there, you'll get killed! You saw what happened to Princess Celestia, and without my magic I'm more of a liability than an asset! System doesn't seem interested in anypony who isn't fighting him, so if you just stay here you'll be safe!"
"Twilight," Flash said calmly, "it's my job to protect you, even from stuff like this, and if I can't do that then I'm a pretty lousy guard. Besides, I doubt he's going to stop with just those two." Spike nodded solemnly, "You can stay here if you want, but I don't think you do. If you change your mind I'll be up to my ears in magic." He spun and walked out without waiting for her reply as a stuffed bear the size of a house holding a jar of hunny upended its contents all over the battlefield.
Twilight wavered for a few seconds before her resolve hardened and she tried to stand up. Key word being tried. Twilight barely had time to glance down, realize what was happening, and let out a scream of terror before she too was turned to stone. Outside, for a moment so short DiscoPie might have imagined it, a ghost of a smile passed over System's lips.
88888888
"Twilight!" Spike shouted as he jumped off Flash's back and ran into the bush, and Flash considered following him before realizing that he had bigger things to worry about, such as the 5 foot wave of honey bearing down on his position. Flash took to the air for a few seconds to leap over it, but was unable to sustain his flight and he soon returned to earth. Getting to the heart of the battle was a challenge in and of itself, as the fabric of reality seemed to be coming undone at the seams. Space and distance varied from one spot to the next, flowers bloomed, withered, and turned back into seeds, and in some places magic itself stopped working altogether. It took time, skill, asking directions from a flying fish, and no small amount of luck, but soon Flash had managed to get close enough to help.
System, meanwhile, teleported through the center of his own stream of energy bolts, catching DiscoPie by surprise as he bucked them in the chest hard enough to cause them to separate with a pop. However, before System could deal the final blow, Flash leapt in between them, spreading his wings in both challenge and protection.
System paused, staring down at Flash Sentry in confusion, "Step aside mortal," he rumbled, "I have no desire to harm you but I will if I must. You know you cannot defeat me and that my cause is just, so why do you bar my path?"
Flash stared him right in the eye, matching glare for glare, "Because it's the right thing to do," he said simply, as if that explained everything.
System's gaze hardened, and he said, "As you wish," before striking him with the same curse that had petrified the Princesses, but a flash of green intercepted the spell before could it connect. Flash blinked in surprise as an emerald, which had morphed to match the shield on his flank, hovered in front of him, the eye in a storm of chaos. He reached out to touch it, and it responded by brightening, filling him with a sense of purpose, faith, and most of all, courage. For that was what it was: the element of Courage.
As Flash lifted off the ground and began to glow with the power of harmony, System's eyes flashed white in preparation of an unknown spell, only to let out a high-pitched squeal and leap into the air as Spike breathed his newly enhanced dragon fire all over System's rear end. By the time System had recovered his wits it was already too late.
The rainbow slammed into him, obscuring him from view even as his bellows of pain could still be heard. However, before Flash could fully understand what had just happened, the Element of Courage cracked, splintered, then shattered and crumbled to dust, leaving Flash panting and vulnerable on the jiggling blue grass covered dirt.
System didn't look much better though. He'd shrunk considerably under the rainbow's influence, now merely able to look Celestia in the eye instead of towering over her. Discord and Pinkie carefully stood up, brushed themselves off, then smiled as they eyed their now weakened opponent.
"I think it's time to end this, don't you agree my dear?" Discord said.
"Quite," Pinkie replied, and they charged. Discord opened with a "Ha-doooo-ken!" as Pinkie grabbed the still staggering System with her tails, first forcing him to take the energy blast full in the face before slamming him into the ground, the sky, a random passing stream, and a couple of anvils left over from one of her last attacks, before finishing off by tossing him into the air and grunting, "Puny Guide."
Discord was waiting with a baseball bat made out of a pine tree when System came down, swinging for the bleachers and sending the alicorn flying. Pinkie flew up and strapped a firework the size of a house to his back, then lit it and watched and he soared into the skies and exploded in a shower of pink, blue, and green.
Spike, not wanting to be left out, used his fire to send Pinkie one of her signature party cannons (her personal mane of holding had dropped a few items during the fight), which she fired into System's face just as he was about to recover, sending him flailing out of control and straight into Flash Sentry back hooves. System's head snapped back as the buck connected, and he tumbled across the ground before coming to a stop just in front of Celestia's statue. Pinkie and Discord leapt into the air and hovered over him, cupping their forelimbs together as they channeled one last attack.
"KA-ME-HA-ME-"
"ENOUGH!" System bellowed, and a wave of order blasted out from him, passing through both Pinkie Pie and Discord without harming them and restoring reality in a short radius, "I surrender."
Discord let the energy he'd gathered dissipate as he used a q-tip to clean his ears, "Come again?"
"I surrender," System spat out, "Your power is greater than mine now, and while I may not be beaten yet you will win eventually. It's better to end this now."
"But if you've still got some fight in you," Pinkie asked, "Then why aren't we still fighting?"
"And ravage more of this world in the process!?" System said as he gestured at the devastation around them, "My first priority has always been the safety of my charges. I've made compromises to prevent collateral damage before, and I can and I will do it again."
"In that case," Discord said, "Could you be a dear and unpetrify the Princess? I think we'll need her to oversee the peace talks."
System nodded as his horn glowed, and after it faded he said, "It is done. They are both restored to their normal forms."
"Both?" Pinkie said as she heard Twilight's hysterical screaming, "Oh. I should probably go help with that bye!"
She vanished in a pink blur, leaving Discord, System, and a moment later Celestia all staring at each other. Finally, Celestia turned to Discord and said, "I don't think I can ever be sorry enough for what I did to you. After spending a mere few minutes in stone," she shuddered, "I can't imagine what it must have put you through."
"We can talk about that later," Discord said, and System nodded, "Right now we need to forge another compromise, one that won't threaten to break the world this time." He glared at System as he spoke, causing the alicorn to flinch ever so slightly.