Chapter 131: Words
Ranger
Chapter 131: Words
By Wanderer D
With a deep, mighty roar that actually surprised her, Alejandra leapt at the attacking vines, dodging out of the way of one, and slicing through another. Her beak snapped right through one of the thinner ones, and she spat the rancid ichor inside of it.
"Bleh, you're disgusting even on the inside!"
She jumped to the side to avoid another vine, and growled, bringing her hand down to grab her pistol, however, a vine snapped from under her, wrapping around her claw. She roared again, violently pulling way, but the vine held.
A second vine wrapped about her torso, pressing her wings tight around her and making the armor dig in into her skin. "Guh, so this is what it feels like when a viper catches you…"
She kept slashing and biting as more vines came at her, but it was futile to try to defend herself like that. She needed to somehow get loose and then recalculate her options. Unfortunately, her opponents would not allow that.
It took a moment of distraction. She snapped at a closing vine with her beak, not really able to bite through it, but the moment she faced back to glance around, one of the fly-trap-style vines hissed open in front of her, spraying her face directly with noxious fumes.
Her eyes stung and she gasped, immediately regretting doing so, as her lungs felt like they were on fire. She shook her head, coughing and facing away just in time for another vine to repeat the same attack.
The vines around her tightened, making her gasp and inhale a third attack. Her vision was blurry and she could feel her strength leaving her muscles.
'So this is how I'm going to die…' she thought, 'In another world, away from home… I wonder if…'
Her thoughts were interrupted by a blue blur slamming into one of the vines attacking her. As if sensing what was happening, the vines around her tightened the hold even more. She could almost feel her bones slowly starting to snap.
Shouts and explosions followed a few moments later. Something struck the vine holding her, making it go slack and she slammed onto the floor, grimacing in pain when she felt several ribs crack.
Gasping for breath, she took in huge mouthfuls of it as a pounding headache fought for dominance over the title of "most painful thing" on her body. She couldn't move much, just gasp and cough and wince in pain with everything she did or tried.
Despite the noises and chaos around her, it was difficult to hear much past the sound of her desperate heartbeats and a dim rushing sound in her head. She could feel other things, lying on her side, her wing felt twisted and uncomfortable and in pain.
The one on top didn't hurt as much, but thankfully wasn't flapping all over on its own volition.
A moment later, just as the world spun and she felt like she was fading, a yellow blur floated into her line of sight, and the last voice she wanted to hear made it past her throbbing headache.
"Oh my, oh no… why did you do something like this?! We need to take you back!"
There was only one thing to say to that.
Fighting the pain, she took a deep breath and glared at the blur.
Rainbow Dash had flown to the edge of the little valley and watched with trepidation as Alejandra fought beak and claw against the vines.
Her mind winced every time that she just knew that Alejandra could have dodged something more efficiently if she had known how to fly, and having seen Manticores and other Griffons, fight, she had to admit, for a complete rookie, she really did make them all look so much more efficient fighters.
Seriously. Those moves were pathetic, and from the grumbling coming from her mane, Tala thought so too.
At least it looked like she was having fun for now. "What do we do?"
"It's just a matter of time before something happens to her. She should have just used her gun, that is what we are supposed to used them for. Keep an eye out for her, and for yourself, I shall fly back to the others and guide them towards this location."
"Roger that!"
Tala gave her an odd look. "The other you also says that."
"Can't help it, it's just the rule of cool," Rainbow Dash replied in stride.
"I see. I will be back."
Rainbow Dash watched the battle as the breezie flew away. In many ways, she knew she should jump in and help, but the human-turned-griffon was really fighting in a brutal, probably therapeutic way. And to be honest, she wouldn't have many chances to kill things after this. Might as well let her relieve some stress.
It was then that things went sideways. Any griffon would have thought to slice and fly up to get out of the vine's grip, but Alejandra didn't know how to fly. She was quickly wrapped around, and in a second, a larger, evil-looking vine with snapping jaws of some sort was on her, spitting out some sort of fumes into her face.
Rainbow Dash was already charging, she flew straight at the large vine, knocking it onto the ground before turning to try and tackle the others that were spraying more poison at Alejandra. She flew and dodged, growling in frustration as her advance was halted by the several vines that were now wrapping around the griffon.
Rainbow Dash flew up, dodging other attempts to grab her, then dove straight down and clothes-lined two more vines, but without the time to crush them for good, they quickly whipped up, trying to catch her.
Unfortunately for the plants, she didn't remain alone long. A slimmer, black vine suddenly lassoed the two closest snapping ones and slammed them down, while Fluttershy and Rarity jumped in, drawing the attention of the vines.
In short order, they were contained and mostly destroyed by Twilight's magical blasts, but it was Fluttershy that was the most distraught.
She flew over to land gingerly next to Alejandra, gasping in horror at the state of the griffon.
Rainbow Dash grimaced. The left wing was broken, for sure.
"Oh my, oh no… why did you do something like this?! We need to take you back!" Fluttershy said worriedly.
The griffon barely lifted her head, but took a deep breath. "Go flannel yourself, you self-righteous beam."
"What does that even mean?" Spike asked, looking at the now-unconscious griffon.
"It means she doesn't like me…" Fluttershy said sadly. Her eyes hardened. "But it doesn't matter. We need to make sure she's safe, and then take her to my hut."
"It's just words, Fluttershy, don't let it bother you."
Tala fluttered down. "The journey back is long and perilous right now. But I saw a castle nearby. Perhaps we can secure a room there to protect Alejandra."
Twilight levitated the griffon carefully, and started walking. "If we're close to the castle, we might be close to the origin of the vines… the first vision showed me the castle… I thought it might just be the battle that I was supposed to pay attention to, but perhaps the magic was trying to show me something else as well."
"Well," Applejack said nervously as they reached the large ravine that separated the forest from the castle, "Ah think you might be right Twilight. The vines seem to be coming from there!" She pointed down to where massive, black vines emerged from a cave at the bottom."
"Great," Rarity said. "Now we only need to find a way down, and I for one—"
She was interrupted by several cries of pain and exclamations of surprise, ending with a painful sounding "oof!"
Soon enough, Pinkie's voice drifted from the bottom. "Found the stairs!"
o.0.o End Chapter 131 o.0.o
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*Missing Twilight.
Gonna take a heart to heart before Galejandra and Fluttershy can get along, or at least work nicely together.
9010320 Thanks, one day I really, REALLY need to write these in advance for long enough to actually have time to give them a good edit.
9010323 Nah screw that! Do it live!
But yeah thats the dream.
9010323
Surely you could have a prereader or two quickly read through each chapter? I mean, as long as they're online.
9010340 Um... I mean... the last few chapters I've finished literally on the 12 minus 5 mark.
And the idiot ball passes from Flutters to Alejandra, as she forgets what the guns are for and looses her temper in the middle of unknown territory. Granted, she’s got reason to be angry. But she’s the trained soldier who should know to wait until they’re out of hostile territory before venting.
Her and Flutters are both gonna need a long talking to after this.
9010345
But, if you were willing to let it marinate for an hour, someone could point out many of the errors. It's not like a lot of really bad errors get through most of the time though.
That's not even long enough for a bad edit.
She needed to somehow get lose and then recalculate her options
1. Loose.
"Her break snapped right through"
"Her beak snapped right through"?
"Her eyes stang and she gasped"
"Her eyes stung and she gasped"?
"blurry and and she could"
"blurry and she could"?
"that I was supposed to pay attention, but"
"that I was supposed to pay attention to, but"?
Alejandra made a rookie mistake by rage blindly engaging the enemy and in a body she isn't fully familiarise.
Twilight needs to find a way to have her team be able to use their regular human forms in the near future or I fear that more incidents like this are going to happen.
They're highly trained XCOM soldiers who have worked for years to master fighting using their bodies. Having them stuck as the significantly less useful pony forms for the entire time will make them more of a liability than anything else.
As a biased party favoring Fluttershy, I cannot speak from a truly neutral viewpoint. That being said, I can try my best.
Alejandra and Fluttershy both don't have much to be blamed for. Alejandra followed what would be the best course of action in normal (read: Earth) circumstances, and Fluttershy did what she's best at, which is probably what would have been best if not for the X-COM presence.
Gah, maybe writing this with a headache and a fever isn't the best idea. Well, I can always edit it later.
9010347
No one is right except Twilight, and it's hard to tell how much of that is her maturing and how much is everyone else messing up. Feels like a lot of both.
There's a certain irony in Alejandro almost getting herself killed by doing exactly what Fluttershy accused her off, attacking those vines to blow off steam.
Well, now there will be opportunity for them to make up!
Classic pinkie pie.
Always make sure your punching bag doesn't mind being punched. The alternative can be less than pleasant.
Also, I'm changing my proposal. Alejandra's callsign should clearly be "Catnip."
Turns out running off in a huff in the Everfree wasn't a great idea. Who could have guessed, other than probably everyone else on the scene.
So, is this Rainbow's fault for not helping sooner?
near the start of the chapter, when she bites the vine, it says Break instead of Beak.
9010382 9010387 9010501 Thank you! Fixed!
9010347 I actually intended (but forgot) to have her shoot at one of the vines right in front of her and miss in typical XCOM fashion .
9010955
You're welcome!
9010347
To be fair guns are not exactly all that effective against vines. The flytraps maybe, but not vines. you need a blade or fire for that.
9010832
i think you mean fluttershys fault, this is very much her fault and i do hope someone points it out to her.
9010592
i'd have to beg to differ, twilight isn't in the right either, i mean in this specific situation yes she is, but as noted she is still using a censoring spell literally denying them freedom of speech, one of the very rights Xcom has to fight for in there world, in one sense twilight isn't much better then the aliens right now.
9011502
No, Rainbow, for hovering back and doing nothing to help Alejandra until it was too late.
9011531 Fault lies entirely with Alejandra actually. For letting some mere civilians words get to her to the point where she engaged and underestimated a unknown quantity without back-up and got the poo-poo kicked out of her for her efforts. Especially egregious when all Xcom does is fight the unknown.
For such a hardened veteran, she is incredibly thin skinned.
9530504
To be fair, Alejandra is far from a "hardened veteran". She's still inexperienced enough to make poor choices that could get her killed.
Now if it had been Kelly, that would be another story.
W... why did you stop the F word titles? I was gonna wait for the end of the arc and make a silly joke! But it wasn't the end of the arc! You had me!
-GM, master of LSB #18.
9530504
?! Are we reading the same story here?
Hardened veteran
Or did you just go and skip a few (dozen) chapters?
9552264
Not to mention that she has that griffon pride, evident by the fact she used beak and talon instead of a gun.
That escalated quickly. The structure damage also known as bone cracked or broken will sure take her out for bigger actions...
Is the body effecting the mind or did Fluttershy really cut that deep with her words?
Either way, that former human turned feline bird is now flightless more than ever.