Paranoia

by Valorousspectre

Combat

Chapter twelve: Combat

Rage.

All encompassing, all devouring, all destroying black, merciless rage. There are many creatures in the world upon which Equestria rested that could boast a powerful rage, but none of them could stand to this. In comparison, even the rage of the great Harlequin Hydras of the bog ridden North East paled to almost insignificance. The sheer presence of Demonheart as he made his entry was terrifying, the look in his one visible eye was deadly and their expressive nature made them very, very angry. His lips had curled back into a snarl. Even Fluttershy, with three deep scratched on her face, was staring at him in abject terror. Skuld, on the other hoof, was the only one who didn’t back down.

“Finally arrived then?”

“You go too far Skuld.”

A sick hacking sound came from the female Manticore and it took a moment for the ponies to realise she was laughing at him.

“No, I’ve only just begun.”

The elder suddenly spoke up in a roar.

“What is the meaning of this?! This interruption cannot be tolerated!”

Demonheart rounded on the Manticore with a face like thunder.

“SHE IS NOT A FIGHTER! Fluttershy is not a warrior, this trial is unfair and Skuld KNEW it!”

There was silence. AJ, Pinkie, Rarity, Spike and Rainbow all looked at Twilight for translation, but she shrugged, not knowing anymore, just as riveted as the others. Eventually, the leader growled. Demonheart’s ears heard it all.

“Skuld, is this true? Did you know?”

Skuld seemed to shrug.

“No. I was never told. I assumed Demonheart would pick a warrior for his mate.”

Demon whirled on her, snarling in the guttural language. This was by far the first any of the girls had seen him well and truly angry.

“DO NOT LIE SKULD! I told you! The day we met in the forest I told you! You yourself wanted to know! And in your jealousy you challenged the most peaceful mare in the town to combat! You’re a coward to not await my arrival to champion her! Now renounce your stupidity!”

Skuld’s voice went low and dangerous and she glared at the angry stallion. Her ‘success’ from earlier had bolstered her confidence and she failed to note any sort of warning sign from the big stallion.

“Why don’t you make me coward?”

“Leave Fluttershy out of it then!”

“Fine. That’s normal anyway. Or have you spent so long with these hopeless simpletons that you forgot the rules of a combat trial?”

“We shall see.”

~*~

“Twilight Sparkle. Get Fluttershy out of the way.”

Twilight was startled out of her rapt attention by the sound of her name and it took her a moment before she registered what the deadly voice said and she nodded quickly, then mentally facehoofed. His back was to her, he couldn’t see her.

“O-Of course!”

Fluttershy was swiftly whisked over to be with the others as they fussed over the deep scratches on her face. They were bleeding and whilst they were deep, Twilight was quite sure they wouldn’t leave any scars. Demonheart simply continued to watch his new opponent with an intensity rivalling that of the sun itself. Skuld, on her part, did not back down from the silent challenge. The pair almost simultaneously shifted stance and, for a chilling moment, Rainbow was reminded of the race she’d lost to the big stallion and she shuddered. Two sentient creatures, one predatory by nature, one predatory by necessity, faced off in the glade by the Everfree Forest.

Skuld moved first.

With a roar she leapt forward, both paws outstretched. Demon ducked under her pounce and spun around to keep his eyes on her. A standard tactic for one trying to measure up an opponent, Demonheart tried to keep a grim smile from his face. That she even bothered meant she wasn’t nearly as confident of facing him as he thought. The two circled, a low growl emanating from Skuld.

If she’s trying to intimidate me, it won’t work.

His lips peeled back as well and a low growl of his own rolled out from between his teeth. The pair stopped their circling and Demon opened his wings partway, the feathers puffing up to look bigger. A typical, instinctive reaction of all pegasi.
Again Skuld charged. This time, Demon galloped to meet her. The pair met at roughly halfway, more to Demon’s side than Skuld’s and separated just as swiftly before whirling into a series of strikes. Skuld swung her left paw at him and he dodged under it. The face was a common target for Skuld, she liked to disorient her foes. Her claws remained stubbornly in their sheaths, which told Demon she didn’t really want to hurt him. Yet. Three attempted strikes later with her paws and she spun around, tail held low. He barely jumped in time to dodge it and his wings snapped open. Hanging in the air, he started beating off her assault there as well. Manticores were large creatures, so combating one wasn’t particularly easy, even in the air. Dodging and weaving, Demon was only just managing to stave off her attacks. Until she clipped one wing and he spun out of control, hitting the ground hard. He was up almost instantly, but the twang of pain in his wing told him that flying was quite out of the question at the moment.

So, a battle on the ground it is then.

Warily, Demonheart kept pace with Skuld’s circling once again. His eyes flickered from her paws to her shoulders, her shoulders to her eyes and everywhere in-between, searching for a clue to her next move.

“What’s the matter Demon? Playing defensive now? Too scared to attack?”

Demonheart ignored her. He knew she was just trying to goad him into an angry assault. It was typical of her really. A smart move, should it ever work. This time he was adamant that it would not. She said something else, but again he ignored her. Nothing she said mattered, only what she did.

There!

She growled and rushed him, swiping at him once more and again he ducked it, feeling the wind as the paw passed mere millimetres over him and he brought his hoof across her face in a stunning and cold slap.

The thunderous sound echoed across the glade and for a moment, Skuld looked shocked. Demon wasted no time in pressing his advantage. Strike after strike, punches, kicks and even once a head butt which almost left him dazed as she staggered back from the barrage, trying to protect herself as best she could. Finally, enraged, she roared her defiance at him, making him flinch away from the sound just as she rammed her head forward. The collision knocked him off his hooves it was that strong and he hit the ground hard, trying to shake off the fog from his mind.

“You lose Demonheart! You are mine, not hers!”

The words only vaguely registered before Demonheart finally got to his hooves and turned to face…

Empty air.

The collected roars and growls of outrage and several cries of fear and one of pain drew his gaze to the ponies that’d come here to support their friend Fluttershy, who was now in the jaws of the very creature whose jealousy had overcome her.

“NO!”

He galloped, flat out, and knocked Skuld off of her, but the damage was done. The low growls coming from the pack grew louder, but it didn’t even manage to register to Demonheart as he looked at Fluttershy, the wounds on her back and neck from teeth and claws, the blood matting her fur….

Are you angry yet Valour? Do you want vengeance♫?

Rage. Black, uncontrollable rage rose within Demonheart, and all of it directed at Skuld.

“Skuld…”

The word spoken was dark and dangerous, and whispered. The manticores had swarmed around Skuld, the disgraced Manticore who’d broken the laws of the clan, Trial by combat. Demon rose back to his hooves, His face a mask of rage and he turned. The other ponies recoiled from the sheer aura of his rage, almost tangible. His voice rose as he shouted his rage out to the Manticores.

“LEAVE HER!”

They all flinched. Every single being in the vicinity flinched away from the terrible voice and the Manticore tribe looked at him fearfully.

“She’s mine to punish this time.”

His voice was dreadfully quiet now, and the manticores backed away from Skuld, who looked rather confident despite her predicament. A growl left Demonheart’s throat before he spoke once more.

“Twilight Sparkle.”

Twilight flinched away from the animalistic aggression in that once silky smooth voice and stammered out an answer.

“Y-Yes?”

“You once asked me what would happen, should my other side come out.”

Twilight gulped.

“Y-yes, I did..”

“Now you find out.”

Then, as Twilight, Applejack, Pinkie Pie, Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, Rarity and Spike watched, a violent shudder almost threw off the big stallion’s balance and he grunted in pain.

“Run. Run away. Now.”

And he shuddered again. None of the mares could bring themselves to look away as the skin at his sides bulged and then split, cut from the inside as a finger of bone sprouted out of his side. They watched in hideous fascination as the bone multiplied, three more long, ‘finger’ like protrusions sprouting with a gut wrenching grinding noise. The blood from the wound congealed and ran up the bones, Spreading out and changing form, turning to muscle. His lips curled back in agony and rage, revealing two inch long and growing fangs as his eyes were swept up with red, erasing the iris, pupil and whites until all that was left was a glowing red. The red markings on either side of his neck swept up his neck and down to his wings, curling up his ears and around the wing joints. The two fledging wings started sprouting feathers just as his normally scarlet mane and tail were swept into a deep, deep purple, almost black again. A terrible crunching noise accompanied by grunts of pain made them all cringe back as his body started to grow. His legs lengthening, torso following suit, all of him simply growing. His muscles bunched up, tensing at the pain as his neck lengthened and his skull literally cracked and ground itself into a new shape. And finally he cried out in pain and collapsed as a horn easily three times the length of Twilight’s burst from his skull with a sickening sound of bone grinding on bone. Spikes lined it where normally the flutes that assisted in magical focus was.

He opened his eyes.

Getting to his hooves, he grinned and evil, twisted grin and Twilight hesitated before speaking quietly.

“Demon..?”

She cringed away as he looked at her, that same smile on his face.

“Sorry little pony. Little Demon has stepped out, would you like me to take a message?”

The Manticores seemed to melt away, vanishing back into the Everfree, leaving only Skuld to the mercy of the creature that once was Demon. It looked at Skuld and its grin turned vicious on the trembling Manticore.

“You’ve been a bad little girl Skuld♪”

His sing song voice was, somehow, even scarier than if he spoke threateningly or darkly and Skuld mewled pitifully at him, begging him to leave her alone.

“Oh but Skuld, it’s too late for beg-ging♫. You might have gotten the best of Valour, but Spectre has your number now♪”

Spectre blurred and suddenly was gone before violently coming back into view as he slammed, shoulder first, into Skuld. The Manticore was thrown off her feet like a ragdoll and slammed into the ground hard, skidding some few meters before stopping with a yowl of pain. Spectre merely laughed at her.

“I remember you being tougher little Manticore! Much tougher!”

The smile vanished, replaced with a look of such hatred that it seemed the world itself recoiled from the creature before it.

“I’m disappointed!”

The playful tone had vanished as well, replaced with one full of such malice, such hatred, that it seemed to literally strike the Manticore and the mares left in the glade. There was the blurring again and once more he was gone. An explosion of earth erupted from underneath Skuld and she was flung into the air and, an instant before vanishing again, Spectre was visible on the ground, hoof leaving in a spray of dirt and dust. His sudden disappearance heralded the next strike. And the next. And the next.

Faster than even Rainbow Dash’s trained eye could follow, Skuld was tossed around the sky like she was nothing, howling in pain before she was struck from above and the pair turned into a streak of tawny brown and black before they hit the ground. Spectre stood victorious over the beaten and broken Skuld. She was still alive, but only just. Callously, his horn lit up and she was lifted off the ground and flung back into the forest from whence she came, then turned to the trembling elements of Harmony.

He was massive, at least twice the size he used to be, and His wings had bloomed in accordance to that. The four massive wings were dark, the primaries easily the colour of dried blood. He grinned once more, his fangs dripping saliva.

“Ah, that was invigorating. Now, which of you shall be next?”

He went to take a step forward and faltered, then froze altogether. His eyes bugged out.

“No.. No! Just a few more minutes, gimme jus a few… More… Minutes..!”

Specte screamed, an unearthly sound, with more than once voice as, with a sickening crunch, he started to shrink. The transformation back was jerky and disjointed. His wings burst into flames as they shed the added size, and set of wings, his mane and tail shrank back to normal, his eyes were flickering rapidly from purple to red and back again. The horn, however, remained where it was. He staggered forward and the five ponies and the dragon (and Angel, but he doesn’t really count does he?) stepped in front of the injured Fluttershy to protect her. Almost effortlessly it seemed, a spear of red magic ripped its way out of his horn and forced the six beings away, leaving Fluttershy cowering in the dirt as he approached, now normal sized, and purple eyed, struggling under the unaccustomed weight of the horn upon his head.

“I’m… Sorry…”

The temperature in the glade dropped a good ten degrees and dark, magical energies started to swirl around Demonheart. Twilight’s heart almost stopped.

Dark Magic!?

Demonheart grabbed Fluttershy’s head and forced her to look at him. The fear in her eyes was more akin to terror than fear, and he felt a stab of guilt and pain at the look. His magic, or rather Spectres’, forced her mouth open and he leaned forward and opened his own.

There was a strange rushing sound that reverberated through the glade as a fine, red mist flowed from Demonheart to Fluttershy. Fluttershy’s eyes went wide and she started squirming, trying vainly to escape as the others beat ineffectually at the barrier that had seemingly erected itself around the pair. Twilight was preparing a spell when she was taken by what he was doing, and she felt the magic fade.

Fluttershy’s injuries were healing.

Literally before the eyes of all the witnesses, Demonheart was healing Fluttershy. The last of her wounds closed as his barrier and magic weakened, flickered, then went out all together. His grip loosened, Fluttershy tore herself away from the stallion, who was now flagging as the horn on his head cracked and shattered into billions of sparkling red dust. He looked at her, and felt his guilt return at her terrified look.

“Miss… Flutter…”

She bolted. He held out a hoof after her, and went to take a step only to collapse on himself. With a cry the other ponies ran to him with the exception of Rainbow, he went after Fluttershy. Demonheart looked up at the concerned face of Applejack and his brows knitted in confusion.

“Why… Aren’t you.. run..ing..?”

Applejack smiled hesitantly.

“Shucks Sugarcube, takes more than a little scary stuff to scare us off. Yer in good hooves Demon, we’ll get ya all fixed up.”

Demonheart remembered those words before he finally and mercifully blacked out.