Chapter Ten
The three moved as quietly as they could through the rocky badlands terrain. They couldn't move very fast; the two ponies kept tripping on rocks in the dark, though a glow on the horizon heralded the coming sunrise. They quickly adopted a method of movement where the human would forge ahead and take station, waiting while Rainbow and Twilight caught up to him.
They'd only been walking for about ten minutes when the first problem arose. Rainbow heard an eerie wailing echoing across the hillsides, and Duran cursed quietly, dropping to one knee.
"Okay, ladies. You're hearing a pack of shriekers, and they're getting closer. We're going to try and avoid them; they're stupid, they're not all that dangerous, and their senses aren't very good, but as you can tell," he gestured in the direction the sound was coming from, "they make a lot of noise, especially when they're in a fight, and that can draw worse things. Dash, you need to stand close behind me, and keep me in between you and the shriekers. The armor will help block your arcane signature."
Dry-mouthed, Dash nodded and moved closer, taking comfort in the presence of Twilight beside her and the solid armored bulk of Duran in front. She whispered, "S- should I be ready to do something?" Twilight shot her a look, but she ignored it.
Duran answered quietly, "No. No gunfire unless we absolutely can't avoid it. The noise will draw attention that we can't afford at this point." Dash nodded and fell silent, waiting.
The wailing rose and fell in volume, but it was clearly drawing closer. Finally, the shriekers came running around a large boulder, and Dash, peeking out from behind Duran, got a look at them.
They weren't pretty. A bit larger than a pony, they ran unsteadily on four clawed legs, and it looked like they could stand on their back legs to attack with the long, clawed toes on their front feet. Their skin was knobbly and glistened in the dim light, looking like it was coated in mucus. Their heads were the most disturbing part, though; it looked like the creatures' necks simply ended in a six-part radially symmetrical mouth full of backward-pointing teeth that dripped a nasty drool. There was a large nostril-like structure in the creatures' chest area that was emitting the wailing shriek they'd heard approaching. The pack wasn't headed directly for them, and Dash breathed a quiet sigh of relief as she realized the creatures would pass a fair distance away.
The pack of monsters ran past them, not even glancing in their direction, as Dash and Twilight looked around nervously for anything that might be coming from another direction and Duran knelt, still as a stone. Just as the last of the creatures was about to move out of sight, it paused. Dash felt the tension ratchet up as it sniffed the air with the nostril in its chest, halting its howl, then turned and slowly began walking in their direction. Its howl resumed as it stopped sniffing, and Dash realized it was headed straight for them.
"Blast," Duren spat quietly. "Okay, here's how we're going to do this. You two back up as slowly as you can, and get behind the boulder over there." He didn't move, but Dash turned her head and spotted the rock he was talking about. She estimated that it was just big enough for the two ponies to hide behind. The human continued, "Stay behind it while I deal with this shrieker. The instant it stops making noise, you two run as fast as you can to the hill ahead and to my right. Get over the crest and wait for me," he stayed rock still, not pointing, and Dash guessed he was talking about the closest hill. She hoped so, anyway. "Go, but stay quiet, and keep me between you and it until you get to the rock so it doesn't see you." The two ponies eased away, moving with what Dash thought was agonizing slowness so as not to make noise. They reached the rock and huddled behind it as the shrieker's howling got louder.
The howl stopped abruptly with a wet crunch, and the shrieking of the pack over the hill redoubled. Twilight bolted out from behind the boulder, with Dash close at her shoulder carefully matching her pace. Dash's head swiveled around as they ran, watching for any other threats, but she didn't see anything moving other than Twilight and Duran, who was lumbering with surprising speed in the same direction the two ponies were headed. Dash was impressed anew by the harness Duran had put together; nothing thumped, nothing rattled, and the control yoke didn't bounce into her face as she ran.
They got over the hill before the returning shrieker pack spotted them, but it was a near thing. Pausing to wipe thin, pinkish fluid off of the heavy three-fingered claw at the end of his suit's right arm, Duran spoke up quietly. "Blast. The pack's roused. We're going to have to pick up the pace for a few minutes to get clear." Beckoning for Dash and Twilight to follow, he set off down the hill at a slow lope. Twilight stood for a moment to catch her breath after the sprint and had to hurry for a few paces to catch up. Dash followed her, having barely noticed the extra exertion.
What she did notice was a sudden movement on a hill to her right. She caught it out of the corner of her eye, and it was gone when she turned her head to focus on it. Worried, she kept glancing in that direction, and saw motion again a few moments later, closer this time, but she still couldn't spot what was moving.
She picked up her pace a little bit, moving past Twilight to draw abreast of Duran and tell him what little she'd seen. He looked off in the direction she'd indicated. "You didn't get a good look at it?"
Dash shook her head. "Nope. But I've seen it twice now, and it was closer the second time."
He grunted. "Sounds like something's shadowing us. Okay, thanks for telling me, but all I can tell you right now is to keep your eyes open." The human looked around briefly; the sound of the shrieker pack was getting fainter. "We're going to need to slow down again in a minute to keep quiet; if something's after us, it'll probably hit us then." Rainbow paused, allowing Twilight to pass her again, and resumed her position trotting along behind the unicorn.
Dash was doubly cautious when they slowed moments later, Duran telling them quietly that they were about an hour from their destination. Nothing leapt out at them immediately, though, and she couldn't see anything moving. Remembering his warning, she was being extra-wary, careful to hold her rifle's controls in her teeth, even though adrenaline was making her jumpy and she was a little worried about shooting by accident.
Even with her caution, the attack was a total surprise when it came. The creature had evidently gotten ahead of them and hidden next to a rock. It was amazingly well-camouflaged, as Duran and Twilight passed by within two bodylengths of it without seeing it. When Dash got close, it lunged out with shocking speed, taking her completely by surprise. She had just enough time to register a low, wide, lizardlike body as it jumped. She ducked low and to one side, trying to avoid accidentally triggering her weapon, evading the thing's initial rush and turning to face it as it landed. It whipped around, giving her the chance to see the big triangular head and long, whipping tail before it leaped at her again, before she could line up her rifle. She saw it spread its forelimbs, which suddenly unfolded an array of long, barbed hooks, and realized she wouldn't be able to dodge the same way again, and she was having trouble bringing the laser to bear in such close quarters. Instead, she spat out the control yoke to avoid possibly damaging her teeth, ducked low, and rolled, using the creature's powerful jump against it by going underneath its reach. The battery pack dug slightly into her side, but it wasn't painful, and it didn't impair her movment. Dash's roll allowed her to bring her back hooves into play, and she did so; giving the creature a powerful kick to the belly that boosted the height of its jump and sent the thing sailing through the air out of control. Bet you wish you had wings, chump!
Twilight had frozen in surprise, but Duran had already started to move before the creature launched its second pounce. He'd wheeled around and taken a step in Dash's direction, but when she launched the creature he reversed himself, moving past Twilight to intercept the thing before it landed. His right arm shot out, the heavy claw grabbing the creature where its forelimb met its body with a crunch of breaking bone. The human turned, swinging the creature around and slamming it to the ground on its back, then smashing his left elbow into its ribs in a fast, savage motion. More bones snapped, and the creature writhed in agony as the human released it and stood, only to send his heavy armored foot stomping into its skull with a sound like a melon being crushed. The creature spasmed and went limp.
Duran pulled his foot from the ruin of the ambush predator's head and turned to Dash, who was standing and adjusting her hat shakily while checking to see if she'd damaged the battery pack. "Very well done," he murmured, "You handled that as smoothly as anyone could have asked. Either of you hurt?" Dash shook her head, and Twilight made a small, shocked sound. "Twilight? Are you all right?" His voice stayed quiet, but it sounded concerned.
"Y- you killed it!" The unicorn's voice quavered. Uh oh, Dash thought, and spoke up before Duran could.
"It was gonna kill me, Twilight. I tried to shoot it, but it was too close and too fast." The pegasus looked around nervously, trying to see if any more creatures were around. "Duran stopped it. And we kinda need to keep moving, I think."
"But… but couldn't you have just driven it away or something?" Twilight was sincerely upset. Dash was, too; the sudden explosion of violence had been shocking.
"I'm afraid not, Twilight. It saw Dash, and was going to try to grab her and drag her off so it could eat her. It probably would have kept her alive for a while too, so it could get more magic out of her." Dash shuddered, but Duran ignored her, "Even if I'd been able to somehow chase it off, it would have just followed us and waited for another chance. The two of you have become my friends; I'm not letting these things hurt you if I can stop it." He paused to let her speak, but she just stared at him, breathing hard, and he finally continued. "I'm sorry if the way I do that upsets you, and you can hate me all you want, as long as you do it from the safety of your home." His voice was sad. "Come on, I'd like to get where we're going before the sun comes up. It'll be safer that way."
Twilight lowered her head, "I- I'm sorry, I don't hate you. It's just…"
"Twilight, we need to move." The human interrupted, an urgent tone in his voice, "I'm really sorry, but we can talk about this later."
The unicorn looked angry, but she nodded curtly and the three set off again.
Dash's stomach was tying itself in knots as she followed the other two. The sudden violence had shocked her, but so had the attack when they'd first arrived. She got over that shock pretty fast. What was really upsetting her was the potential rift she was seeing between her two friends. Guys, please, don't fight now!
Unable to stay silent any longer, she moved up alongside Twilight so she could speak in a whisper. The words tumbled out, her tension making her a bit incoherent. "Twi, please, don't be mad at Duran. The things around here… h-he won't be dangerous back home. Please, you're still gonna let him come with us, right?"
Twilight sighed, her ears back, and whispered back to Dash, "I'm… upset but not really mad. I know I said you'd listened to too many, but I've heard some of his stories, too, Rainbow, and I know he had to do what he did. I was just upset. It doesn't change the invitation I extended him yesterday."
"Does he know that?" Dash hissed. "You said earlier that he was a bad influence, and you just spazzed out at him again! He's not a pony, Twilight! They remember stuff like that!" Twilight looked confused for a moment before her eyes went huge, and she looked frantically from the pegasus to the human's back. She drew her breath to speak, but before she could Duran's metallic tones interrupted.
"Ladies." His voice was so quiet they barely heard it, but the flat tone of command was strong. "I know you're not used to this place, but when I say we need to be quiet, I mean we need to be quiet. Please don't speak unless something urgently needs to be said."
Twilight shot an agonized glance at Dash. "Duran, I-"
"I'm serious. Noise could get us all killed. Please, whatever you two are talking about can wait for later."
Twilight bit her lip and looked at Dash helplessly. The pegasus shook her head and fell back behind her friends. This is bad. I'm really, really worried he's going to refuse to come through the portal with us. She knew it was his call if he wanted to stay in this world, but at the same time she didn't think she could just leave him to go crazy with loneliness again. She decided she'd talk to him when they stopped, to make sure he knew he would still be welcome.
Unfortunately, as it turned out, she didn't get the time. The sun was starting to peek over the horizon when the human crested yet another nearly-featureless hill and announced, "Here we are."
Dash and Twilight moved up on either side of him. The small valley before them looked exactly like a dozen others they'd passed. "You sure about that?" the pegasus asked.
"I am." He replied with certainty. "And we've got a problem."
The two ponies studied the landscape in front of them. Seeing nothing threatening, they glanced at one another, then up at the armored human. "Um… what's the problem?" Twilight asked.
The human pointed at one of the hills near the end of the valley, a good bit smaller than most of the others. "That."
Dash had no idea what he was talking about; all she could see was a hill. "The hill?" she asked quizzically.
"That's not a hill." His voice was grim. "There was no hill there when we were here before. That's a Tank Bug."
Twilight clearly had no idea what the human was talking about, but Dash knew. The pegasus gasped in horror, asking, "Are you sure? Is there anything we can do? Do we need to go back?"
The human's sigh sounded odd with the metallic overlay. "Yeah, I'm sure. And at this point, going back would be a bad idea. Everything's starting to wake up." He paused, thinking. "I think I might be able to deal with it, with this suit. The short-range missiles should mess it up pretty bad; they're designed to destroy armored vehicles. Problem is, I'll need for it to come out from under all that dirt and rock…" He trailed off.
Twilight spoke up. "If this is the place we arrived, I think we'll need to be on the opposite side of the valley from that hill. If there's something hiding there, you should have time to do something if it comes out. Rainbow can keep an eye on it, and tell you if it changes."
Duran snorted a bitter laugh. "If it moves, we'll know it, no real need to keep an eye on it." He paused again before speaking up decisively. "Okay, let's do this. Twilight, let me know when you start casting your spell. Dash, help me keep an eye on the surroundings, and sing out if you see anything, even if you think I already know about it. If anything gets close to Twilight while I'm dealing with something else, see if you can distract it. Are you ladies ready?"
Both ponies nodded.
"Then let's get you home."
The three made their way down the hillside, Twilight leading as she searched for the spot where the portal had originally formed. She found it quickly, but there was a problem.
"The congruency's decayed more quickly than I expected."
"Can you still form the portal?" Duren asked, facing towards the suspicious hill while Dash bit nervously at her control yoke.
"Yes… but it's going to take me time."
"Time, time, anything but time…" The human turned to Dash. "Are you ready? This could get ugly."
The pegasus nodded. She was nervous, terribly so, but she trusted her friends. "I'm always ready!"
He turned back toward the suspicious hill. "Alright, Twilight. Cast your spell; we'll keep you safe." The unicorn nodded. Her horn glowed as she began weaving the energy she needed.
Dash heard horrible cries echoing from every direction. Faintly, under the savage sounds, she heard the human speak in a quiet voice, barely above a whisper. "…And thus the gates of Hell opened, and forth poured the dark, icy Hosts to snuff out the Flame." The hill he watched remained still.
Dash's head whipped back and forth, trying to train her weapon on every side of the valley at once. The first predators to come bounding over the hills were a group of six big bearlike creatures sporting six limbs and grotesquely oversized mouths. "Duran! Behind you and left!" she called, voice slightly muffled as she spoke past the grip in her teeth. She trained the weapon on the nearest bear-thing quickly, waiting until the dot was relatively centered before pushing the trigger button with her tongue.
The weapon spat lines of brilliant light through the air with a rapid crackcrackcrack and a smell of ozone. The beams snapped into the bear creature, blasting seared craters into its hide and dropping it to the ground, bellowing. Startled by the noise and flash, Dash jerked her head back, sending bolts flashing into the sky before she remembered to take her tongue off the trigger.
The human wheeled about, bringing his left arm into line and firing a thunderous blast from his machine gun. These projectiles were much larger and heavier than the ones he'd used the day they'd met, and the bear things were nearly torn apart in an explosion of blood. The rolling blast of the gun was so loud Dash actually felt it as an impact in her chest and wings. "Nice shooting, Dash!" The pegasus heard Duran shout through the ringing in her ears, "Try and leave the bigger ones for me! You take the little ones!"
He turned again as a trio of monstrous armored beetle forms came thundering over another hillside, unleashing more thunderous fury into them. Dash, trying to keep watch, saw a tide of chitinous beasts, smaller than a pony and armed with long, flashing talons, come pouring through a valley near her. "Little ones, my side!" She shouted, "I've got 'em!" Settling the dot on the center of the mass, she fired again. This time, she was ready for the sudden light and noise, holding the weapon steady as a storm of light burned into the middle of the pack. She fired for several seconds, before feeling heat on her left side, and a small yellow flame icon began flashing in her visor. Dash released the trigger, but there were still a few of the creatures left from the pack. They were clearly intimidated by the blinding assault, checking their charge and milling momentarily, but they rallied and drove on. Fortunately, their hesitation gave Dash's weapon time to cool, and when she resumed her attack she tried to mimic the firing pattern she could hear from Duran, firing a short burst, letting up, then firing again. She burned down the last of the chitinous pack this way, and felt a flood of elation as she looked at her work. These creatures had wanted to hurt her friend, to kill her, but Rainbow had stopped them short. She felt powerful. Woah, Rainbow, back it down. That's not a good way to feel right now.
Those were the first creatures, but far from the last. As Twilight fought to keep her concentration on her spell, monster after monster poured into the valley, sometimes one at a time, sometimes in shrieking hordes, while Duran tore at them with his machine gun and Dash burned them down with pure light. The human and the pegasus fell into a rhythm of motion, almost a dance, moving around Twilight's position to keep the monsters clear. The two worked together well, Dash lending extra fire against the larger monsters when she had no smaller targets to strike, and Duran wading in to hordes of smaller beasts with his claw and mass to help Dash scatter and destroy them. Eventually, the yellow lightning bolt the human had warned Dash about began to flash, and she glanced nervously back at Twilight, to see the disc beginning to form. There was nothing more she could do, so she fought on, though the red lightning bolt followed quickly on its heels, and the torrent of light finally ceased. Anxiety rose in the pegasus's throat as she realized the weapon was now useless. She heard Duran shout over the thunder of his gun, "Good work, Dash! I've still got plenty of ammo; drop the gun and concentrate on distracting them!"
Regretfully, Dash hit the quick release the human had shown her, and the beautifully engineered weapon fell away to land in the bloody dirt. The cord pulled away from her visor, but the visor itself stayed in place and clear, and she didn't have time to remove it as she dove into a pack of snarling, octopedal dog beasts with mandibles. She danced among the pack, enticing it to follow her with kicks and bites as Duran tore at the creatures with his gun. The two continued, falling into a new rhythm as they defended the purple unicorn and her slowly-forming portal. At one point, Dash found herself darting around a group of shriekers, maybe even the same pack they'd seen earlier, trying to tie them up while Duran hammered at a pair of huge mantis-things. She actually found the shriekers to be quite fragile, (unlike the horrifically tough 'murderpedes' she'd encountered on her first day) killing several with kicks that sent them flying into their packmates. She flew amongst them, striking, kicking, even biting, (they tasted foul) but there were so many that she couldn't handle all of them. Her fight was interrupted when a huge dragon-like beast reared up on a hill, spreading its wings and taking off, nearly blowing Dash and the shriekers out of the valley with its downdraft. She heard Duran shout, "Look away!" and managed to avert her eyes from the creature just in time.
An impossibly brilliant light, brighter than the sun could ever be cast incredibly sharp shadows on the ground beneath her. She thought for a heart-stopping second that the dragon had blown her up the side of the hill and into the air, where the fire would take her, but though there was an intense crack of thunder and searing heat scorched her fur and feathers, she found herself uninjured about halfway up a hillside, while bits of roasted flesh rained down. The dragon was just gone, blown to pieces smaller than her hoof by the fury of the sky.
Regaining her feet, Dash launched herself back into the disoriented pack, killing several more before Duran finished his opponents and turned his weapons, both the heavy machine gun on his left arm and a smaller version mounted on his right forearm that Dash had somehow not noticed before, on the surviving shriekers.
There was a short lull after the last shrieker fell. Dash checked on Twilight, but the unicorn's face was scrunched in concentration, and the pegasus could see the disc-shape of the portal forming in the air. It was taking way longer than it had the first time, and Dash hoped somewhat desperately that it wouldn't take Twilight much longer.
The thought heralded the arrival of six more creatures. Dash glanced at them, but saw them unfurling wings and launching themselves into the air to attack. Warned, she looked away without getting a decent look at the creatures, and there was a deafening rapidfire crackcrackcrack as the impossibly intense light flickered and burning heat washed over her again.
Blinking, Dash looked up just in time to see the hurtling piece of scorched meat and bone flying towards her at frightening speed. She dodged, but wasn't quite quick enough to get completely out of the way. The smoking piece of flesh slammed into her side, hard, and the pegasus felt an intense spike of pain in her right wing as she was thrown spinning off her feet and sent rolling.
"Dash!" She could hear fear in Duran's metallic voice. "Dash! Get up!" There was another blast of thunder, from the human's gun this time, as she heaved herself shakily to her feet. Her right wing sagged, and as she tried to fold it she felt the sharp pain of a bad sprain. The ground shook.
Dash looked at the hill Duran had warned them about to see dust billowing away from it. The dirt and rocks slid aside as the colossal bulk of the Tank Bug heaved itself clear. Duran hadn't been exaggerating about the size of the things in the slightest. Its six legs were thicker than any tree she'd ever seen, and its carapace looked harder than rocks. It shook itself, wiping at its face with a pair of vast crab claws, and the dozens of chitinous limbs on its back rattled. It focused several of its window-sized eyes on Twilight, opened its incongruously mammalian-looking jaw with a deep rumble, and started running ponderously.
The pegasus didn't even think Twilight realized what was bearing down on her. The unicorn was utterly focused on her spell, and Dash could see the interior of the disc starting to rotate, but it was clear that the spell wouldn't be completed before the juggernaut reached her. Dash, wincing at the pain in her sprained wing and goggling at the immense monster, planted herself between her friend and the beast and froze. She had no idea what she could do, but it would have to go through her to get to Twilight.
Fortunately, Duran was swift to act. Pivoting with surprising lightness, considering the heavy suit he wore, he planted his feet solidly in the ground facing the Tank Bug. Fire blossomed in the boxy, swollen shoulders of his suit, and four flame-ended darts shot out and flashed down the valley. They struck the Tank and detonated in thunderous fireballs. One of the monster's claws went flying, and it crashed to the ground as another severed its right front leg. The remaining two punched deep craters in its thick, hard carapace.
Dash's breath caught in her throat, but the monster wasn't dead. It let out a basso scream, lifting dust from the valley floor. Its scrabbling legs kicked boulders larger than some of Ponyville's homes out of the ground and sent them tumbling as it heaved itself to its remaining feet, multiple eyes rolling as it sought to locate whatever had harmed it so grievously. Duran took a few paces backward towards Twilight as the monster stumbled forward, then planted his feet again.
This time, the darts shot out one at a time. The first hit at the base of the monster's other claw, blasting it away to join its partner. The second impacted the titan's left front leg, severing it and sending the monster thundering into the dirt with another incredibly deep howl. The third went wild, corkscrewing harmlessly off into the air.
The fourth augured into the Tank Bug's head, blowing nearly a third of it away.
The Bug went limp. Its forward momentum caused it to slide along the ground, building up a dam of earth in front of it. It came to a stop maybe fifteen bodylengths from where Duran was standing.
Dash's jaw nearly dropped off of her head. He killed it! I didn't even think it could be killed! After a moment of shocked silence, she let out a banshee cheer of triumph. "Whoooooo! Duran, you did it!"
Even with the bulky armor masking his body language, Dash could see Duran's shoulders sag with relief. She looked around, but there weren't any creatures in sight at the moment, so she cheered again, pumping a hoof in the air. "Dude, that was AWESOME!"
Before he could say anything, Twilight's voice rang out. "The portal! The portal's up! Come on!" Dash whipped her head around, seeing a perfectly clear disc in front of the spellcaster, except instead of the dry, dusty badlands around them, there was a rain-soaked forest on the other side. Were we scheduled to have rain today in Ponyville? The utterly irrelevant thought skittered through her mind as Twilight hopped through the portal. "Come on! I can't keep it up forever!"
At Twilight's shout, Dash let out a giddy laugh, and turned to beckon at Duran. "Come on, let's blow this joint!" He started lumbering across the short distance to the gateway, and Dash, settling her hat firmly, ran to join the unicorn. "Way to go, Twilight! Celestia's gonna be proud!" She didn't thump the academic on the shoulder, though she badly wanted to, as she could see her friend was still concentrating hard, and she didn't want to disrupt the spell by accident. Instead, she turned to welcome the human.
Her grin fell off her face and her heart plummeted as he halted a few paces short of the gate. Oh no, no, NO! "Duran! Come on, dude, it's just a few more steps! Come on, you can do it!" He stood still for a moment, then raised his foot and took a step, shaking so badly she could see a tremor through the armor. Merciful Celestia, he really is terrified. She shouted encouragement, running back toward the portal.
With a screech, something small cannoned into the armored human from the side. He spun, teetering, as something small and heavy with incredibly long claws raked at his back. His arms flailed, but he couldn't reach the thing sitting on his suit's backpack and trying to find a chink to ram its talons into.
Dash felt a sudden rush of pure hate for the world on the other side. "Twilight! Hold the gate!" She yelled. It's trying to keep him there! Screw. That. She was accelerating before she could even think about it. Her wings, even the sprained one, beat strongly as she hurtled back through the portal, forehooves extended. She smashed into the small creature on Duran's back hard enough to shatter its exoskeleton, driving her hooves deep into its flesh. She felt something snap in her right wing. Duran spun around and they both fell, the human barely missing the cyan body that landed next to him. Dash feared for a moment that she'd broken both legs. She hurt, all over, but that was a secondary concern. She dragged herself on top of the supine human, putting her face inches from his eyepiece.
"Get your metal butt OVER there!" She screamed at the human's helmet. "If you stay here, I'm staying here, too, and I hate this place! I'll never forgive you if you get us both stuck here!"
"You're going through first." The metallic voice shook a bit. "I give you my word, I'll be right behind you." He rose and helped her gently to her feet, and she limped heavily back through the gate, watching suspiciously over her shoulder.
The human was following her, though, watching her carefully to make sure she didn't stumble.
It was because she was looking back that she saw the immense shell move again.
NO! "Duran! Watch the Tank!" Her warning came an instant too late. The human spun, backpedaling, as the ravaged hulk thrust itself forward on its four remaining legs. It didn't even bother to stand, just propelled itself along the ground. Duran fell backward through the portal, but the Tank Bug's immense jaws closed around his foot, holding it fast on the other side.
Lying on his back, Duran extended both arms toward the titanic head holding his right foot in its jaws. Both guns roared, hammering the Tank Bug's broken head, but the gunfire stopped suddenly with a series of dry, ratcheting clicks, and the Bug's injuries seemed no worse than they had been. Its remaining eyes blinked blankly; it looked to be stunned, but it wasn't letting go of the human.
Screaming in denial and heedless of her injuries, Dash wrapped her forelegs around the human's metal-encased upper arm as he struggled to push himself backwards. She dug her rear hooves into the damp earth and heaved with all her might, desperate to wrench her friend out of the jaws of the titan. She even beat her left wing in an attempt to exert additional force, though her right wing hung limp and unresponsive. Rainbow Dash strained with every muscle in her battered body, sobbing as she realized it wasn't enough.
"Dash! Dash, let go!" The human was yelling, "There's no reason for you to die, too!"
"Not. Gonna. Happen." Rainbow growled out between gritted teeth, and pulled with renewed fury.
The Tank on the other side of the portal blinked, and one of its vast eyes focused on Dash. The limbs on its back stirred, unfolding into the immense scythe-claws she'd seen from the mountain. Dash ground her teeth harder and closed her eyes. Oh, please, let it be quick. But she didn't let go.
"Twilight!" Duran's voice boomed out, "Close the portal! NOW!"
The unicorn let out an explosive breath as the glow engulfing her horn died. The portal shrunk swiftly, lifting the human whose lower leg was still partway inside off of the ground as it did. It closed around his armored shin, and then vanished along with the Tank, the badlands, and Duran's lower leg with a hideous cracking, rending sound as it sheared through armor, flesh, and bone. Duran let out a high-pitched, agonized shriek, made horrific by the metallic distortion imposed by his helmet, as he dropped to the muddy grass. Blood poured from the severed stump of his leg, and the shriek cut off with an anguished sob as his remaining heel drummed against the ground. Even then, he used his arms to prop himself up until Rainbow released him, refusing to drop the armor's weight on the injured pegasus, and only then did he fall full-length into the grass.
"Ohmygoshohmygoshohmygosh," Rainbow babbled in horror, trying to shove herself back up on all fours, "Twilight, you gotta stop the bleeding! Where are we, I'll go get the doctor!"
Twilight's horn glowed softly as she walked up next to Duran. "It's okay, Rainbow." The blood pouring out of Duran's stump slowed and stopped, and his harsh breathing eased. His armored body relaxed as he lost consciousness, but the two ponies could hear him still breathing. "We're at the edge of the Everfree Forest, close to Fluttershy's house." Twilight's horn glowed again, and a brilliant star shot up into the sky, exploding like a firework in a brilliant purple burst. "There, I've called for help. Just relax. You two have taken such good care of me over the last few weeks, it's time for me to return the favor." Rainbow's pains started to recede as Twilight started healing her. "It's okay now, Rainbow Dash. We're safe."
Dear Princess Celestia.
Today I learned that friendship is sometimes about sacrifice. Sometimes, to keep a friend safe, you have to be willing to get hurt, or give up something important to you. Rainbow Dash was willing to batter herself until she could barely move to help her friends, and our new human friend Duran Thirk was even willing to sacrifice his friends' good opinion of him, something I know was of truly tremendous importance to him, in order to get us home safely. I am sincerely looking forward to seeing you again in person, so that I can tell you the whole story. It's a long one!
Your Faithful Student (Newly Returned From the Dead!)
Twilight Sparkle.
*Author's note: Ok, folks, this is pretty much the end of the story. You can end it here if you want, but I've got a bit more in the epilogue, so if you don't want more, you can stop reading here and make up your own end, or just leave it as-is, and thanks for reading!
If, on the other hand. you want to find out how *I* ended the story, just click on the next chapter.
As a side note, Dash tore a tendon in her wing at the end there. It hurt, and it took her a bit to recover, but it's not a permanent injury; she recovered fully. I'm sick to death of stories where Dash dies or is permanently crippled.