Two Changelings, in a World of Foes

by Orkus

Chapter 10: The Pursuit Comes to an End

Chapter 10: The Pursuit Comes to and End

Through the blistering snowstorm, the practically frozen Thoraxis could just barely see the shapes of Longinus and Luna ahead of them from where he was riding on Petra (or holding onto for dear life). They had begun to descend from the sky, and the albino wyvern followed them, where they landed on the ground, in front of what the changeling could see was a cave. Thoraxis quickly hopped off of Petra, and ran up to the two alicorns, and instantly noticed that Longinus was wearing a grim expression of deep worry.

"I... I don't sense her anymore," Longinus spoke fearfully, the words filling Thoraxis with dread. "I haven't been able to sense her for nearly ten minutes. This is the last place I felt Skia... Oh dear..."

"She has to be in the cave," Petra replied. "We must hurry!"

All of them ran to the cavern, each fearing the absolute worst. As they approached it though, they each witnessed a bright, green glow coming from the entrance. An enormous, dark shape, that looked like a perverse, bug-eyed, wingless mixture of both changeling and dragon suddenly burst out, breaking parts of the cave's roof in its haste to emerge, causing all of the would-rescuers to stop in their tracks.

"What in the name of the moon is that?" cried Luna, saying the question they were all dying to ask. Thoraxis bolted up to it without thought, a rage-filled glare on his face.

"Where's Skia? Where's my daughter?!" he shouted, unafraid of the looming creature.

"She's alright, but your precious little girl comes later, Thoraxis. Now? Now you face me, Vile Faux..." Vile bellowed in a deep, echoing voice, rearing to his full, enormous height, claws outstretched, as his own body became briefly enveloped by a demonic wisp of balefire.

"...And all the powers of Hell!"

Opening his mouth, a stream of green, smoldering liquid fire was spat forth from the dragon-changeling's wretched mouth, headed in Thoraxis's direction. Grabbing him in her claws before he could react, Petra jumped out of the way with the changeling, the hissing sound of melting snow and ice coming from behind them as the fiery breath hit it. While this went on, Longinus and Luna flew forward, beams of offensive magic sent forth from their horns.

Responding in kind to the alicorn's attack, and laughing insanely, Vile sent a pillar of his own magic headed their way, his horn lighting up like a candle as his power was discharged. The two spells hit, and a blinding explosion went out, throwing Luna and Longinus back a far distance, while Vile's superior weight and stability kept him grounded.

"Alicorn or not, I'll crush you all the same!" Vile laughed, not noticing the white shape stealthily approaching him from behind.

Petra, targeting Vile's left arm, slowly crept further, until she was with several feet of him. Meanwhile, Thoraxis had lunged forward, and sent a small blast of balefire at his enemy, the attack accomplishing absolutely nothing as it bounced harmlessly off of his hide. Vile laughed at his pitiful effort, and merely lowered his right hand, flicking the stubborn changeling away with a finger with as much effort as shooing away an insect.

"You're so... WEAK!" he shouted at the changeling, just before Petra pounced on him.

Petra's long, crooked fangs, each one dripping with a virulent poison, distended from her mouth, and she clamped down on Vile's arm, piercing his chitinous skin. Noticing the attack right off, Vile looked away from Thoraxis, and instead focused on the wyvern, sending his other arm over to swat her away like a gnat. Petra responded by raising her stinger tail forward at a lightning speed, and letting the dragon-changeling impale his own hand on its envenomed tip, causing him to retract it in pain. When she had sensed that enough of her venom was in Vile's bloodstream to do its job, Petra flew off, leaving Vile with his now-limp limb.

"My venom should keep him from using that arm for a few days..." she whispered to Thoraxis and Luna, the only two within earshot of her words after she landed near them.

"Wyverns..." Vile muttered, as he rubbed his numb, unmoving arm. "So full of surprises..."

He was suddenly sent forward as a bolt of magical lightning struck the back of his head. Angrily spinning around, he spotted Longinus charging for another shot. His mouth opened, and another stream of scalding liquid fire flew out, forcing the former king to dodge it instead of attack.

Behind Vile, Luna had already telekinetically lifted a large, house-sized chunk of dirt, rock, and ice from the ground, and hurled it against his back, shattering the object to pieces, and forcing him to stumble back several meters. Vile looked at the princess and her companions with a frustrated expression. He lifted his only usable claw as high as he could, preparing for another attack.

"Will you pests just... STOP?!" the dragon-changeling roared, finishing his sentence as his claw slammed into the ground with all his might packed into it, sending out a powerful shockwave that pushed up ice, snow, and whatever happened to be on the ground at the time.

---

The feeling of the ground trembling shook the Pursuer back into whatever it knew about consciousness. Its visor glowed red as it sat up, and an arm went to the hole that lied in the front of its chest armor.

A dark mist seemed to bleed out of both ends of the wound. Unhindered, the Pursuer stood up, but suddenly stumbled forward, weakened by the loss of its power. It let out a strained gasp, but instead of giving up, it resumed its task, and reached the few feet it tried to walk to at last. After hearing the commotion going on just outside the cave, the Pursuer looked around, and spotted its sword and shield lying nearby.

Without a second to lose, the Pursuer went up to collect its personal items, formulating a plan for how to deal with such a creature in its semi-autonomous mind.

---

The sheer, unbridled strength that Vile Faux had used in his last attack sent Luna flying, where she slammed into the ice shelf that rested next to the cave. Unhurt, she instantly got back up, and was about to reenter the fray, but halted herself as she sensed something bearing a dark presence nearby.

Turning her head, she nearly jumped back in startled surprise, as she witnessed the tall, intimidating figure of the Pursuer exit the cave right next to where she stood. With its sword slung behind its back, the massive shield it possessed was currently being held in both of its hands. The Pursuer turned its head and looked down when it itself had noticed Luna, and knowing she was fighting the same thing he was fighting, gave a small nod of understanding, before looking back at the target creature in question.

The Pursuer floated forward and, while holding tightly onto its shield, began to spin, until its shiny, blurred shape had built enough speed to fling the shield at Vile's head, all with a supernatural accuracy.

Like an overgrown frisbee, the shield whistled through the air at an unmatched speed. Vile turned his head just in time to see the thick slab of metal speed towards his face, where it impacted with an unpleasantly loud, gag-inducing crunch on the dragon-changeling's nose. A scream of pain sounded from the villain, and he forgot about everything else, grabbing at his broken snout, and continuing with his howls of agony.

Finally with a clear advantage, Longinus, Luna, Petra, and Thoraxis charged forward, each one using every attack they had at their disposal to take down their adversary. Luna sent a blast of pure moonlight at his damaged face, knocking him off-balance. Petra raced forward, and spat forth a jet of clear acid, which sizzled against the chitinous skin of his leg, causing him to stumble. Thoraxis and Longinus pressed their attack on the same area, attacking it with balefire and lightning, respectively. Proving too much to handle, the colossus fell to the ground, where he landed on his back, with the sound of ice crunching under his extreme weight.

As Vile was just beginning to regain his senses, he saw a large, blurry shape rush up to his head, and rose to alarm as he felt something grab his horn.

The Pursuer pulled and twisted on the horn with all of its unholy, vengeance-induced might. Vile roared, and shot his claw upward at the Pursuer, only for it to be deflected by a backhand. After two resounding, metal-gauntleted punches to the face brought the dragon-changeling back into numbed submission, the armored creature swiftly planted its foot on Vile's broken snout. Ignoring the pained moans it brought, the Pursuer used its newfound, living leverage to continue its assault on the twisted, pointed projection, while the ponies, changeling, and wyvern could only watch. With a lurching bellow, and a sudden snap, the horn was finally, and brutally ripped completely off Vile Faux's now-screaming head, leaving a broken stump. After making an uninterested glance at the object in its hand, the Pursuer threw it aside like a spent toy, and took its foot off of Vile.

The second the dragon-changeling's horn was removed from his head, he slowly began to shrink and morph back into his real shape, his power gone. Before Vile could do something, he was grabbed by the scruff of his neck by the Pursuer, and found himself being chucked forward, where he landed face-first into the snow. When he looked up, a dazed, half-conscious expression in his eyes, he saw the grimacing visage of Thoraxis looking down upon him.

"Where... is... my... daughter?" he growled. Vile responded with what sounded like a low gurgle. It didn't take too long for Thoraxis to realize the evil thing was laughing, as the horrible, guttural noise grew louder.

"She decided t-to go for a walk!" he laughed out loud. "But in this kind of weather? I'd try to find her, and quick if I were you."

"We need to search the surrounding land!" Longinus spoke up, to his companions. "Look for footprints, signs of life, anything!"

"I'll search north," Luna said. "Longinus, you search west, Thoraxis, you search east, and wyvern, you search south."

Both Longinus and herself took off in their directions. Petra and Thoraxis were about to as well, but stopped as Vile began talking again.

"And I... guess I forgot to mention something..." he said. "I'm sorry to say that even if you do find her alive, storm or not, I'm afraid she won't recognize you..."

Thoraxis looked at him, confused. "What? What do you mean by that?"

"I guess you could say I specialize in... taking away memories..." he said, weakly, but clearly mockingly, a smug grin of victory on his face. "And hers, I took as easily as everpony else I've done it to. Your "daughter" won't even know who you are anymore, or ever again! Oh goodness, you wouldn't BELIEVE how she acted after she forgot everything."

"Sh... shut up!" Thoraxis boomed, visibly shaken by his words.

""Oh father, why couldn't you save me in time?"" Vile responded instead, imitating Skia's voice to the letter. ""I don't even know my own name anymore because of you! Oh, somepony help me...""

"I said shut up!" Thoraxis screamed, lifting his hoof in preparation to hit the insolent fiend, but refraining as Petra suddenly grabbed his leg, stopping him. He shot her an angry glare, which became slightly more relaxed when he looked into her red eyes.

"We need to find Skia. That's our number one priority, Thoraxis," the wyvern spoke in a calm voice, as her grip loosened. Thoraxis, tears falling from his face, slowly nodded back, and lowered his hoof. The two quickly left in their respective directions as Vile continued his taunts, which were quickly descending into mad ravings.

"I TOOK HER MEMORIES! I TOOK HER MEMORIES! HAHA! AND SHE'LL NEVER GET THEM BA-"

Vile was finally silenced as the Pursuer shot its hand down, and clasped it around his face. He tried to break out of it, but was too weak to do anything, and merely battered his hoof against his armored foe, uselessly. Turning about, the Pursuer, dragging the hornless dragon-changeling behind itself, began to walk up to its shield, picking it up with his other, remaining hand. With its prey now in its possession, and mission completed, the Pursuer, and Vile, both slowly vanished into thin air.

The last thing Thoraxis heard as he rushed off into the storm, forgetting about any of his own personal safety, was the sound of Vile's hideous, chittering laughter still ringing in his head.

Author's Note:

Though this chapter may seem a little sad, I hope you all have a happy Thanksgiving!

Comments

[Gargon94]

Wow, that was sad. I hope tht Skia is all right. I can't wait for the next chapter.

[Skye Mist]

Awww....he didn't die.
Sorry, I just read a violent and dark story, so I'm a little on the murderous side today. (Or maybe I've always been this way.)

[Grekoy]

Was that a sleeping beauty reference in the beginning?

[ViktornovaMk2]

When Thoraxis figures out that it was Chrysalis behind everything he is going through, "I veel give to jew pain vith-out end!"

[Orkus]

6672216 You are entitled to a cookie.

[Dimensional Librarian]

I have a feeling Dimensional Technologies needs to come and set some ponies straight XD

Plus we have ways of returning memories just find the crazy mad pony in the Everfree and ask for help

[Grekoy]

6672526 Yay!

[Falx_of_Lume]

I was kind of hoping to see Vile get brutally eviscerated by the Pursuer, since his crime would have given it more power to do this:

[Pseudonymous]

6671885
Death would have meant getting out of his punishment. Smart money is on him being turned into another pursuer.

[Skye Mist]

6672893
Eh...I don't see how he's gonna even try to listen to anyone so...yeah. I don't see it happenin'.
Oh well, we'll find out soon enough!

[Pseudonymous]

6672902
Did you see the part about where pursuers come from? He's got an incoming petard hoist.

[Skye Mist]

6672911
True, true. Either way, we'll probably find out in the next 2 chapters.

[Orkus]

6672917 I heavily dislike to burst your bubble, but... uh...

[Skye Mist]

6672987
Don't even tell me. I can pretty much picture what you're saying.

[Dreadknight garen]

Hmmm, is pursuer a pony shaped ghost, or a human looking thing?

[Vitae]

7407708

A pursuer is a human that, so warped with dark stuff, cannot die but with the last bit of their conscious mind, gave themselves to the deity of justice and abolition to seek penance for their sins against sapient life.

[Cursed Quill]

hole that lied in the front of its chest armor.

that lay