Gladiator

by Not_A_Hat

10 - Confront

CRUNCH.

The sound of breaking glass echoed through the room. I recovered my stance, fighting a dozen small wounds to bring my war hammer into the ready position again. We were fighting for our lives. Twilight stood behind me, the magic from her horn playing across the door, pitting her formidable brain against the ancient enchantments in an attempt to escape alive.

I took a step backwards, trying to bottleneck the golems between tables so they couldn't flank me. From what I'd seen so far they had excellent strength and dangerous speed but they were severely lacking in creative tactics. They would have been simple to disable, even two against one, if they had any vulnerable points at all.

Hah. Can't crit constructs. I thought. At least bludgeoning overcomes their DR! I risked a glance at the door. Twilight's magic crackled across it like purple lighting. I could see the spells, ancient layers of enchantments laying across the ancient wood and steel flare like neon spiderwebs. She was slowly ripping the carefully woven lace into shreds but it wasn't going as quickly as I would like.

I ducked a blow and slid in from underneath to plant the head of my makeshift mace in my opponent’s chest.

Even though it was an unfeeling construct, like anything with legs it had to balance, and I managed to stagger it. Taking advantage of it's momentary hesitation, I followed with a blow to the knee. I smiled in victory as the cracks spider-webbing it spread a bit more. Maybe I could take its leg with a few more strikes.

Working with a war hammer had a certain brutal euphoria to it. It wasn't the sort of weapon that someone who wanted to look elegant used; it was all about effect. I dodged another blow and blocked a third, waiting for an opening. Working with a heavy weapon and no armor meant I needed to be certain of each attack. Getting caught out could be potentially devastating, since the extra weight slowed my reactions considerably.

Seeing the constructs stance open slightly, I punished its mistake brutally. The war hammer lashed out, the spiked end crunching deliciously into the glassy front of its skull, a killing blow on a normal pony.

Despite the inch-wide hole in its skull, this construct was unaffected. I groaned at the useless hit; I should have been been trying to focus my blows on its limbs.

"Twilight, ETA?"

"Two minutes!" Her voice was strained. We had no idea how long Sombra would be distracted, but we were reaching the limits of our estimates. If he returned to find us fighting we would lose by default. I dodged right, rolling over a table. My two opponents followed, splitting and attacking from the sides. I groaned, estimating the space I had left for retreat. I was getting dangerously close to Twilight. I dashed clockwise around the table, thinking to intercept one of the constructs.

I met it half-way with a fierce blow. My weapon really made a difference in this fight. Without it i’d have been at a distinct disadvantage, but as it was I was slowly taking these golems to pieces. A quick dodge pinned my assailant between me and the table and I choked up on the haft of my hammer. I spun, sinking every ounce of twist and weight I could into the stroke. The spike landed directly on its knee and sunk deep into the crystal.

I whooped with excitement as the construct’s next step faltered. Its shattered leg bent oddly, and its stance crumbled. It hobbled a step, trying to move on three legs. I darted away. I was nearly between the still-moving construct and Twilight when the damaged one exploded.

It didn't have much force. Its cracks began glowing blue, and instantly spread across its whole body with a sound like ice dropped in warm water. The glow pulsed once, and shards of glass were thrown across the room. There was a WHOOMPH! As a pony's worth of black sand hit the floor. I barely took this in before I was fighting again, dancing away from blows and blocking strikes. I was searching for an opening when frost began forming on my war hammer.

At first I ignored it, but when it started chilling my fingers I glanced around, searching for the source.

In place of the construct I destroyed, a vaporous cloud of blue gas was forming. The shattered glass of its body was exuding azure mist, which streamed upwards and hung in a swirling mass. I wrenched my eyes off the spectacle, but I was a second too slow. The moving construct caught me off guard with a lashing forehoof, the sharp glass edge crushing the bicep of my arm. I dipped with the blow and managed to avoid dislocating my shoulder, but the muscle was severely damaged.

"Buck," I swore. It wasn’t the first blow I'd taken, but it was the first with potential to turn the flow of the fight. I winced as I tried swinging my mace, my damaged arm fighting the motion. My body was in overdrive and adrenaline numbed most of the pain, but if I didn't end this soon I’d be in trouble.

"Twilight, threat assessment on that cloud?"

"Seems to be the animating spirit. It's less dangerous than one with a body. We'll deal with it after!"

"Ok, thanks." So, it was better to break them.

I grit my teeth and pushed myself hard, squeezing the last few drops of power from my screaming muscles. I stepped into the fight, working desperately hard to finish this before I succumbed to attrition.

I groaned as the construct let me take the initiative, holding back and playing conservatively. Maybe it could sense my desperation? Either way, I needed to end this as fast as possible.

I screwed up my courage and started taking risks.

Normally, I would play this as safe as possible. But we were on a timetable, and sometimes sacrifice was necessary. I purposefully opened my stance, daring the construct to take a shot. As long as I didn’t overcommit, I should be able to dodge...

The expected hoof flashed in. I jerked to the side, barely scraping by, and narrowly missed being disemboweled. Darting in behind the blow, I attacked with my entire body, rotating from the ankles and hips. My war hammer smacked into the golem’s head so hard it practically exploded into a shower of glass.

Sagging in relief, I let my hammer fall and stepped back. The golems body disintegrated as I watched. The pile of sand began smoking just like the other. I retreated to where Twilight was.

"Um, no pressure, but-"

"A minute. Or less."

"Ok." We stood in silence.

"What...what are those things?" I looked over to the shattered glass golems. Above them, the blue mist was forming coherent shapes. The first one I killed was noticeably firmer than the second. They looked almost like horses; larger than the average pony and with much fiercer, with straighter body-lines. They seemed to exude cold, the vapors and fumes from the their bodies settling on the tables and floors nearby as frost.

"No idea. No time to look," Twilight ground out between clenched teeth.

"Right."

Then I heard Sombra returning.

The lab was surprisingly still. There was Twilight's magic, its eldrich crackle loud in the air, and a swishing, tinkling sound from the golems....reforming, or whatever they were doing. Other than that, nothing. So when Sombra's hoofsteps sounded in the passageway, I heard them clearly.

"He's back. Hide." I pushed Twilight behind a table. She crouched, still concentrating. The doors defensive enchantments looked ragged. We would be ready to go any second. I debated: wait with Twilight, and hope she was fast enough? Or hide by the door, and try to distract Sombra so she could run?

I took a position by the door, hammer raised.

There was a nerve-wracking pause as the hoofsteps paused, before picking up speed. I tensed, waiting.

Twilight gave a tiny whoop as her spells finally ate through the enchantments. She dashed for the door, throwing it open just as the charcoal gray stallion dashed into the room. I swung my hammer as soon as the tip of his horn appeared in the doorway.

I never stood a chance.

He flicked his eyes towards me, hardly taking more than a moment to assess and dismiss my threat. His magic, a purple shadow with a green penumbra, flickered around me. I was frozen.

"Wes!" Twilight had glanced back, saw my predicament, and spun to face Sombra. "Let him go!"

"No." The reply came instantly. My friend lowered her head, horn sparking to life as she faced him down.

"Windigoes!" Sombra's ethereal voice lashed out. The two clouds, now completely free of their corporeal shapes, moved towards Twilight. She backed up slowly, trying futilely to draw a bead on either as they dodged and wove, light as the breeze. They were circling her in seconds. Ice began forming under her feet. It crackled upwards, engulfing her with shocking speed. In moments, her only sign of life was her panting breath steaming in the cold air.

I hung limply in Sombra's aura, projecting an attitude of complete defeat. A chance for reprisal required complete surprise.

The act wasn't hard; I already felt pretty discouraged. But I hadn't gotten here by giving up. Not that I really wanted to be here. Maybe a little giving up now and then would help...?

I grit my teeth and banished the thought.

"What do you want with me?" Forcing a tremble into my voice was easy.

"Well." My captor paused for a second, and his horn glowed. I flinched as the aura around me thickened. "Let's see what you have to offer. A human body in its prime, trained as a gladiator. Knowledge of human science, math, and technology, inaccessible here on Equus. Hands." As he spoke, Sombra was imprisoning me. The aura spread away from my skin, slowly solidifying into a dome. It crackled charcoal gray. "But the most important part is that empathic crystal nodalized into your numosic matrix. Oh, what a gift!" He threw his head back and laughed. My eyes narrowed, mind racing furiously. His words tickled the half-buried knowledge I was slowly leaching from Twilight.

"How do you know about my crystal?" I challenged, trying to extract more info from him.

"Your crystal?" His tone was suddenly menacing. "YOURS? Those filthy insects may have welded it to your soul, but it is not yours. I created it. It has been, and always will be, mine.” He took one slow step towards me, and then another. "Soon, I will take it back. And soon, I will have a body again. You asked what I wanted from you?" His eyes narrowed, and a horrible hissing laugh filled the room. "I want you. I plan to eat your soul and possess your body."

I shivered and hunched over, twisting my hands into my hair.

"You made this thing?" My voice came out mangled, growling deep in my chest.

"The crystal soul room was one of my masterpieces. I'll have to reckon with those bugs one of these days, taking my research, and even my old fortress, and using it without my consent."

"This is all your fault?"

The unicorn smirked at my powerless fury.

"Maybe? I don’t care what you blame me with." He was obviously baiting me, but I still couldn't stop rage from welling up in my heart. I smashed a hand against the shield, feeling the skin on my knuckles split and bleed.

My anger swelled, and I screamed something unintelligible at his laughter. I smashed my fists into the barrier again and again. It snapped and sizzled, burning black the blood I smeared on it. My vision was clouding. I'd been captured by the person who created the instruments of my torture. It was him! Because of this unicorn, I'd been trapped. I'd bled. My friends had died. All because of the evil he created.

I wanted to kill him. No, I wanted to hurt him. I wanted to cause him the same pain I'd carried. I wanted him to burn. To burn like Splinter. Like Fallen Leaf.

I scrabbled at the gem. I didn't even notice until my fingernails started drawing blood from my chest. It hurt, but I ignored the pain as I tore away the surrounding skin and began to pry. The blood made it slick, but I persevered. I didn’t realize the implications until the magic began burning my fingers, but at that point I'd nearly grasped the gem.

A jolt ran through my hand. My fingers were still black from absorbing a magic-suppression crystal.

The feedback started as a raw magical discharge. I felt it crackle up my arm, down my wrist, through my heart, and back into my arm. I tried to yank my hand away, but it seemed stuck, caught in the current.

My actions caught up with my thoughts as time suddenly seemed to slow.

What was I doing? This would trigger a burn-out!

My arm burned as runaway magic circled through my body. Sombra's laugh shook through his lean frame in slow motion. I was planning to kill myself, just to hurt him? Had I gone completely insane?

I must have, at least for a second, because my next thought hit like a sledge.

I was planning to kill Twilight just to hurt him?

Sickened, I tried again to pull my fingers away. Still stuck. Concentrating on my feelings of regret and frustration, I tried to feel the pulse and sting of magic in my arm, willing it to slow, to quiet. I concentrated on the buzz, the surge, as it crackled around the circuit. I felt each separate bone in my hand vibrate. As I concentrated, the magic seemed to still slightly. Encouraged, I tried harder, imagining the results I wanted; the magic would be re-absorbed into the gem, the feedback would cease. I pictured it in my mind, pretending to feel the circuit stilling.

It didn't happen quite like I imagined.

As I watched, I was surprised and worried when the smoky patterns on my skin swirled and started feeding into the gem.

There was another crackle as my abused crystal started to absorb the magic-nullification spell I'd leeched off of Twilight earlier. My eyes widened in shock as I tried desperately to reverse whatever I'd done, but to no effect. The magic feedback lulled for a second before increasing quickly. There was a sharp crick as a flicker of purple flame shot from the gem and licked my hand.

Suddenly, I could feel Twilight's power.

The purple flame burned away the black on my skin and sunk in, leaving a lilac stain and somehow connecting me to the unicorn encased in ice.

She was just as tired, scared, enraged and confused as I was.

There was an instant of surprise as our consciousness' touched, and then a firming of resolve.

She was scared of what was happening to me and the details she picked up from my mind didn't make it any easier. However, as soon as she began to grasp what was happening, a plan snapped into place, nearly full-formed. With a thought, I quickly dismissed that it might kill me outright. There was a burning, rending feeling in my chest as I let Twilight take what she needed to implement the plan. Uncertain death is better than certainly having your soul eaten.

We jumped into action instantly.

My hand fell off the gem. Purple fire flickered over it for a second, fusing the cracks closed as the destructive feedback was destroyed. I raised a fist, clenched it as hard as I could, and slammed it one more time into the shield around me. The last remnants of the magic leaching spell stained my fingertips and knuckles, concentrated there by the flow of magic and my own visualizations. There was a flash of smoky purple flame and the shield dropped with a resounding crack. I leaped, whirling my weapon in a vicious arc.

Sombra barely had time to look surprised before he was intimately introduced to round two.

My war hammer caught him between the eyes. He roared and staggered in pain as the club sliced through him. I barely felt any resistance as the heavy chunk of metal dissipated the mist of his body. I staggered in shock, critically unprotected as I tried to absorb the unexpected momentum, but the physical assault wasn't important. It was just enough to disorient him so Twilight could land one good shot.

As his attention refocused, her horn flashed in her prison of ice.

I'd seen the spell when I touched her mind, but I still wasn't sure what she'd based it on. She had spent several seconds of our shared bullet-time putting it together, before tasking me with distracting Sombra. Considering his misty nature, she must have had a better idea what we were up against than I did. It looked like multicolored lighting, but then, just about every third spell I'd seen looked like that. The effect was impressive, though. It didn't ground out when it struck Sombra, or arc to another target. Instead, it hovered near him, slicing back and forth repeatedly through the space he occupied, cutting his wispy body into streamers again and again.

I watched for a second, impressed, before the second spell caught us up and whisked us away.

---

"Why...why didn't you do that before?" I asked, as we collapsed in burned, frozen, crushed, exhausted slumps onto the library floor.

"Farrierday cage warp defenses. All that crystal. Any prison would have one," Twilight replied. "Also, I had to pull some of that magic out of your gem. After the door, I didn't have enough power to do that myself."

"Oh. That's why it hurt so much. At least we're alive."

"...yeah."

Comments

[Public Reader]

3520353 yeah, I sorta like cliffhangers in a way. Also keep using a wide variety of vocabulary, it keeps from boring someone.its annoying when people use the basic word.

[Public Reader]

Also I have no grammer issues and im loving the story and plot

[damnaion]

hummmm dan dan dannn

[Allstar13521]

It wasn't the sort of weapon that someone who wanted to look good used

I dissagree, what is more badass than a guy running at you with a huge hammer! Probably the scariest, and last, thing the guy he's running at'll ever see, I'll tell you that!

[Not_A_Hat]

4224354 Sure, but not elegant. I mean, how uncivilized!

[BeardedRedMane]

flame shot of tout he gem and licked my hand.

meant to post that one last night, I'm on ch 18 ;D

[Not_A_Hat]

5034715 Fixed, thanks!

[Lupus]

"I want you. I plan to eat your soul and possess your body."

"Devour" would have been more menacing

[Blaze Song]

Humanity, volatile, handle with care... aka.. don't piss off the human, we do cazy shite when trapped..

[Lovecraftia]

3809780
um WHAT?

[8bitmadness]

8620065
DAN NICKY YOUR BOBBIE S