Chapter 5
"Um, Cornelius?"
"Yes Pip?"
"Are we really going to fight that thing?"
"Yes, Pip."
"Will we die?"
"Most likely. But, I wouldn't worry about that. If you do die, at least you won't have to regret coming with me. And falling to your death in an airship turned fireball probably only hurts for a few seconds. That is, if you survive the original attacks and explosions. But enough of that! Let's go destroy a ship that's four times the size of our own, shall we?"
"Great pep talk Cornelius."
"I try." Cornelius ran over to the ship intercom on the nearby wall, and summoned his crew to their self-proclaimed battle stations once again. He then ran out the cockpit, heading for his gun. As he climbed the ladder up into the turret, he heard Zach run behind him, heading towards his own gun. He buckled himself in and spun up his weapon, preparing for what was likely to be the last fight he ever participated in. He chanced a look over at Zach in his turret, and saw him staring slack-jawed at the Iron Curtain. Cornelius allowed himself a slight chuckle, before turning back to the target. Well, he thought, at least I won't have a hard time hitting it. He decided that he wasn't going to let them give him a chance to surrender. If he was going down, he was going down fighting. An idea came to him to use the same tactic on this thing that they had the small fleet earlier, but decided that the air-bag was too large for bullets to have much effect. They would have to target hardpoints, such as the engines or their cockpit. Cockpit doesn't sound right for that massive thing... 'control room'? Nah, hm...oh! How about 'command deck'? No, 'bridge'? N- actually, that one isn't too bad. Bridge it is then. Well, now that that trivial matter has been solved, let's go destroy a... behemoth? Destroyer? Battleship? I really need to stop doing this. Oh look, there's a pony on the deck offering us a chance at surrender! No, sorry, gonna have to kill us. Cornelius motioned to Zach to shoot the pony on the deck. Zach quirked an eyebrow back at him, but Cornelius just nodded and pointed again. He shrugged, and fired a single, precise shot over the great distance. Cornelius couldn't see exactly where the bullet hit, but he saw red mist fly out when it did hit, and he noticed the pony standing on top was no longer there. He shrugged, accepting the fact that his friend just vaporized a pony. He took aim with his own gun, for he had dropped it during his naming rant, and opened fire.
He noted with a smile that The Normandy and Home One had also opened fire, their weapons being much larger. After a few moments, nothing seemed to be happening, so Cornelius stopped firing so he could assess what had been done to the large ship, without the flash from his gun obscuring his vision. Nothing, absolutely nothing. Well that's just great. They hadn't even scratched it from what he could tell, and he had no clue how to stop it. Suddenly, an idea popped into his head, and he climbed down out of his turret, just as the massive ship began to unload it's hanger. He galloped to the cockpit, startling Pipsqueak, and ran to the radio.
"Shepard, Akbar, we aren't doing anything to that monstrosity out there, it's outer armor is too strong, but I have an idea."
"Shepard here. What are we gonna do? Shoot the air-bag?"
"No, we destroy all the ships coming out of it first, then, when it brings out it's own cannons we destroy those. With me so far?"
"This is Admiral Akbar. I understand your plans, but how do we destroy it? Simply taking out it's weaponry will not keep it out of enemy hands. They will simply retreat to Canterlot, repair their weapons, and return with more help."
"They can't return to Canterlot if the ship isn't in their possession."
"What the hay do you mean, 'not in their possession'? How are we gonna'- no. Oh-ho no. I refuse to do that. Sorry, but I'd like to stay alive, thanks."
"What? What is he proposing the you are so determined not to do?"
"The kid want's to board the thing! I mean, how crazy is that?!?!?!"
"That, actually is not a bad idea. Perhaps we can even convince some of the crew to join our side?"
"Wait, Akbar you aren't actually considering-"
"Yes Shepard, I am. So then Cornelius, what would you have us do?"
"Like I said earlier, take out the smaller ones coming out of the hangers first. Then, they will have no other choice than to use their own weapons, which we will promptly destroy. After they cannot retaliate, we move in and take the ship by force. It can then be piloted back to Cloudsdale, where it can be repaired and used against Blueblood in the, well, I guess it's a war now huh?"
"I still say it's a suicide mission, but hey. Why not? Let's do this." Cornelius smiled, dropped the radio, and ran back to his gun, stopping at Zach's to tell him the plan. As he climbed the ladder up into his turret, he noticed that the Iron Curtain had finished unloading it's hangers. In the air around it where around fifty of the larger ships from before. Only fifty? This shouldn't be too hard. Cornelius rolled his eyes at his own sarcasm, and began to fire on one of the ships that had just exited the hanger. He implied the same tactic as before, targeting the air-bags, and dropping the ships with their own weight. The two ships from Cloudsdale hadn't caught on just yet,and where instead firing on the enemies engines. This caused them to explode and fall back down to earth in gigantic fireballs. Hey, whatever works. After twenty minutes or so, they where just cleaning up the few remaining ships that were still flying. Once they had all been destroyed, Cornelius took a quick moment to assess the damage they had taken. Home One was in a rough state, one of it's propellers was destroyed, and there where a few smoking holes here and there across it's blue hull. The Normandy seemed to have fared better. Only about a dozen or so small holes dotted the front. His own ship, was almost unscathed, mainly due to the fact that it was smaller than the other two and didn't pose as much of a threat. He looked back towards the massive ship in front of him, still not a scratch on it. But now, it had a sizable number of large, square openings in the front and back of the ship. The middle was purely a hanger, so no canons where in that area. The large rectangular holes where the hanger was provided a distinct separation between the canons, making it easy to tell where roughly to aim for. Wait, they left the hangers open? I think I just got myself a plan 'B'. He smiled, knowing he had a backup plan always made him feel better. He opened fire on the forward canons, taking out one of them before the others followed suit.
After about half an hour, they had destroyed the forward canons, and were now working on the ones in the rear. The Imps had yet to fire their main weapon, so they decided to leave it alone for now. After a little while, the enemy was on their last few canons, and their where hundreds of smoking holes, peppered throughout the hull of their ship. Home One had taken a few more hits, but it was still flying, so they were still shooting. There was only three or four canons left on the rear, and they where about to finish them off when Iron Curtain began to turn it's front toward them. Cornelius knew exactly what this meant: they were going to fire the main gun. He couldn't move, he was locked in place, frozen with fear. Fear for his life. Fear for his friends lives. Fear for the lives of the ponies on the ships to his left and right. Fear for Apple Bloom. He finally came out of his daze, and began to fire at the main weapon of the enemy ship. The effect was nil, not a single thing to keep it from firing. And it did fire, with catastrophic results. A bone rattling, ear splitting BOOM was heard as a shell the size of a barn came rocketing out of the canon. A shockwave sent avalanches tumbling down the nearby mountains. The shell was a large black blur as is flew through the air at super-sonic speeds. Right towards Akbar. Celestia no, NO! Cornelius's ship rocked to the left as the shell passed on their right, and flew behind them, tearing through Home One as if it was made of paper. A few moments later, what was left of the ship's engine exploded, killing anypony who had survived the impact with the shell. The air-bag floated away as the flaming splinters of wood fell to earth like rain. The shell, however, continued to travel and wound up smashing into a mountain. The peak of the mountain crumbled, and was sent falling down the far slope, taking out any animals or plants that where unlucky enough to be caught in the rock-slide. Holy crap. How the hay are we supposed to fight that! And... and Akbar, he's... he's dead. For the sake of spared heartbreak, I hope he didn't have a family. How do you tell a stallion's kids that their daddy died? How do you tell his wife that she has been widowed? How do you tell his parents, that their son died before they did? Cornelius almost broke down right there. He hadn't known Akbar long, but he had seemed like such a great stallion. And now he was dead, all because Blueblood was too much of a selfish bastard to let the princesses keep the throne. Cornelius decided right then and there, if he survived this battle, he would head straight for Canterlot and put a bullet in Blueblood's head. He turned his attention back toward the massive Imperial ship that loomed ominously nearby. He still had a rough fight ahead of him, and he wasn't sure if he was up to the task.