The Element of Willpower

by Redwolf15

Chapter Eighteen: [Title goes here]

Chapter Eighteen:
[Title goes here]

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I instinctively grab my sword and with a quick motion the alligator's head is lopped off. The giant gorilla-like body fell over limp as the head separated from the body. The girls were all shocked at my reaction and as to that thing that just appeared.

"What was that? And why'd you do that?" Rainbow asked, her flying got more rapid.

"I don't know what that was, and I did that because it would have killed us!" I retort giving the most logical explanation and re-sheathing Silver Fang.

"Well ya' didn't have ta' go an' lop its head off!" Applejack says looking furious. "We coulda' tied it up! That way none of us would have been hurt!"

"Um, excuse me." Light Flicker speaks too quietly to be heard.

"If he didn't kill that thing then it would have killed us." Flora defends me. "Doesn't matter how strong a rope it would be, one way or another, someone was going to die. And I prefer it not be one us us."

"And who might you be exactly?" Rarity asks the harpy.

"None of your damn business!"

"Well!" Rarity gasps in offence.

"Uh, guys?" Light tries again.

"Maybe it wasn't going to hurt us. We never really gave it a chance." Fluttershy passively suggests.

"Jesse's been through a lot and has always protected his us from harm. That's just what he meant to do. Protect us." Shining Armor tried being the reason of this argument.

"Look, he didn't mean to do that to, whatever it is, without thinking. It was all instinct." Sharla joined him, trying to help keep the peace.

"Hey. Everyone." Light tried for a third time, really trying to get her voice out there.

"Yeah right. You saw how he looked when he ran at Shining Armor when his sword went all firey. His eyes said everything." Dash glared at me, I felt like she was about to tackle me to the ground if I made a wrong move.

"HEY!" Light finally yelled loud enough for everyone's attention to be on her. She pointed at the gorilla-alligator thing. "What's happening to that thing's body?"

We stare at it in confusion. The body was smoking, de-materializing really. Soon there was nothing left of it, everything just blew away in the wind and travelled to Canterlot Castle.

"What happened to it?" Shantze asks confused as the rest of us as the moon appears. No one was able to give a proper answer. "And how come that was the only creature to appear from one of those pieces from the shield?" Shining Armor and I glance at each other, sharing the same look of worry when Shantze mentioned that. Why was it that that was the only piece to turn into a creature?

Suddenly all the pieces from the broken shield began moving. Their shape and form began shifting into creatures with mismatched body parts. This really isn't good. We were surrounded.

"Everyone group up. Cover each other's six. Don't let there be any blind spots." At the captain's command we did just that. Sharla unsheathed her axe and kept the kids behind her. We all stood back to back, huddled together. Shining Armor put a shield around, protecting us from all the creatures.

There were all different kinds of creatures, none of them were completely a single creature. They had anywhere between 3-10 different body parts. One creature catches my attention, it had a bat's body with bird wings, a dog's head, left leg of a crab, right arm of a bear, and left hand of a lizard. "Hey, don't these things kind of remind you of Discord?"

"Yeah, none o' them are a complete creature. Yeah think they're draconequi?" Applejack suggests.

I shake my head. "I think you're half right. A draconequus is a half dragon and half horse. Discord has both and a bunch of other parts to him. Look at them, none have either of the two. I think they may be draconequi, but they're lesser ones compared to Discord himself."

"So you mean these are like familiars? Like what that vampire Nosferatu did?" Sharla asks catching on.

"Yeah, so they probably won't be as difficult to handle, but with so many of them it will be a challenge."

"By my estimation we're down 75 to 1." Shining Armor pipes up.

"Great!" I let out an agitated sigh, I've learnt to never go against his better judgement.. "Okay here's the plan. Captain, you push them all back to give us room. Drop your shield for a brief second while me, Sharla, Flex, and Flora go out. Once we are, put the shield back up and keep the others safe. Sharla, you and I will handle the ones on the ground, you stay overhead of them. Flex and Flora, take care of the ones with wings and keep them off our backs. Everyone got it?" They all nod their heads.

"Now who made you in charge?" Rainbow Dash asks annoyed

"Because he's got a good plan." Shining Armor defends me. "And it's the only thing we have at this point."

"Captain?" Rarity says looking shocked "You can't possibly be agreeing with him? Didn't you just see what he did to that... thing before? He killed it in cold blood."

"That thing wasn't even alive." I defend. "I could tell when it turned to smoke. It was completely made from chaos magic. It was just a thing. It had no conscious, will of it's own, personality, nothing to make it unique in its own way. So basically," A cold glare comes into my eye. "They aren't even alive."

"Jesse," Sharla looks at me with serious eyes. "Don't do anything stupid."

"No promises." I murmur under my breath. "Captain, whatever happens out there, do not drop this shield!"

"Understood." Shining Armor was a soldier, he knows that sometimes personal feelings have to be cast aside if the primary objective is to be assured. No matter what happens to us, there's still a chance to win if the girls are safe. But that doesn't mean he has to like it.

'Hey you. I know you're there. I need your help. So will you lend me your power?'

"You do not need to ask for my permission. All you have to do is use me. All you have to do is show me your resolve. Show me your determination! Show me!"

I light flicks in my eye again and a burning sensation is in my heart, not chaos. No, this is the same one many times before that. When I fought Balto and Nosferatu, right before I brought back Corig and Krinox. This is my power!

"Ready?" Shining Armor gives me an affirmative nod, his horn glows brighter and the shield expands out. Flora, Sharla, Flex, and I rush with it and jump through as it was deactivated for a brief second and brought back up. Silver Fang flies in a horizontal arc and cuts two heads in half at the jaw, they instantly poofed into smoke and flew away. I'll never look at bats or owls the same way again. (Redwolf15: a little something to set the mood)

I rush past twenty of the creatures, all mixed and matched with different body parts from animals. Except for dragons or horses and ponies. Silver Fang catches on fire and I swing it straight and to the left, a wave of fire cutting through a lot of Lessers. This was fantastic, my heart raced, my muscles tightened, I got excited, it was like I was on an adrenaline high, just without the shakes. The fire extends to give my blade a longer reach going about half its size longer. I swing in a 360 degree circle, cutting seven of them in half. A lion headed bison with pig's, sheep's, and rabbit's legs charges at me. I split him in half going up the centre of his body.

Pieces and burned bodies were falling from the sky, Flex and Flora were doing their job excellently. A cougar with the body of a rhinoceros and wings of a bat charged at me while my back was turned. I turn around, too late to dodge or counter. I was going to get trampled. If Sharla wasn't a god send that is. She brings her axe over the neck, lopping it off in one clean swing. "Gimme a lift!" I outstretch my arm to her. She grabs it and tosses me up. I fly over the heads of many Lessers just like back in the Cave with the Diamond Dogs.

I land on a walrus body and shove my blade into its cat skull. I pull it out and point it at a group of of them, a great blast of fire torches them all. A dog with a bear body tries cutting me in half with its manits forearms. That's a bug part and I have fire, I'm sure I don't have to tell you how that ended.

Sharla, Flora, and Flex round up on me. "There's too many of them. We can't take them all on." Sharla huffs.

"Nah, we can keep going." I say optimistically.

"Sorry kid, but I don't think we can." Flora chips. Yeah, they're right, I'm short of breath as much as they are. I don't think we really can do it. We've taken out maybe twenty five each at the bare minimum. one hundred down, hundreds more to go. We're surrounded by them from every direction. "Anyone got any dying regrets?" She asks us all.

"Couldn't find my family." Sharla says.

"Nothing too regretful, but a lot that I still wish I could get done." Like kicking Discord's ass. "Well, enough of this depressing 'if only' bit, it's obvious that we'll come out of this alive. Whats say we go out in a blaze of glory?"

"Sounds good." Flora says giddy. Flex gives an agreeable crow. Sharla just nods her head.

I make a war cry suitable enough for Ares himself to follow, and the four of us charged at them, side by side. A loud horn is blown out in the distance just as the sun pops back up. Everyones attention was turned to the loud horn, in the distance we could see salvation. An army of minotaurs, zebras, and griffins lead by a handful of ponies in gold armour. They made it.

All the Lessers snarled at the army, they no longer noticed us. With another blow of the war horn, they charged at the Lessers. Minotaurs at the front stampeded in their huge, well built armour and carried huge weapons like maces, hammers, flails, and single or double handed axes. The Zebras looked like they were made in two divisions: the bigger, more well built ones up front with spears with the charge and smaller ones behind with pouches on their backs. The griffins took to the sky, they didn't wear much armour, I suppose it was to allow them mobility, but I see a breast plates and gauntlets. They carried bows and arrows, simple one handed swords, and axes like Sharla. Thank the gods they made it in time.

The Lessers completely forgot about us and charged at the incoming forces. The two forces collided with each other, the minotaurs bulldozed right through them. I looked at the others, I couldn't believe my eyes. They shared the same expression. Hope.

I look back to see how Shining Armor is doing. Lessers are still pounding at his shield. "Hey Flex, how about that new thing we've been trying?" I face the sword's edge down.

He lands on the blunt side of Silver Fang and braces himself. I pull the sword back like a batter playing baseball. "Phoenix Bullet!" I swing my sword as hard as I could, sending Flex shooting, like the name would suggest, a bullet. He lights himself on fire and punches a hole through a quarter of the Lessers around the shield. The three of us quickly take care of the rest of them.

"That was fun." Flora huffs with glee as we take care of the last of them.

"Yeah, it kinda was." I agree with her as Flex lands back on my shoulder. Something cuts into my leg. "Ow ow ow!" I look down to see a platypus biting my ankle. I kicked my leg up and the platypus biting me went flying to who-knows-where. Why did a platypus bite me? Wait a minute.

Platypuses are mammals, they have webbed feet, a duck bill, and they lay eggs. Is a platypus a Lesser? Because if they are, that actually explains a whole lot. Shining Armor dropped his shield, he looked rather worn out.

Shantze runs up to us, completely awestruck from our awesomeness. His words, not mine. I re-sheathe Silver Fang, most of the fighting is already over thanks to our new friends, and we've done our part.

"Aw man, I never carried this much stress in my back before I came here. I gotta stop doing this." I say massaging a sore shoulder.

"I know how you feel. My head hasn't hurt his bad since my wedding." Shining Armor rubs his left temple.

"Captain Shining Armor." A voice behind me is heard. It sounded rough and really husky. Behind us stood a white pegasus in the golden Canterlot guard armour saluting. I whistle in amazement at the quick work the others made to the Lessers.

"Sergeant Major Whitestreak, I see that negotiations went well." He says in a commanding voice.

"It did sir. But I don't see the Diamond Dogs with you. Did things not go so well for you?" He says as he sweeps an eye over us, a longer look over Flora and myself.

"Oh no, they went, well I wouldn't say fine, but the Diamond Dogs have agreed to lend us their aid. Even the dragons have agreed to help us."

"Dragons? Sir, how could you possibly have convinced the dragons to help us? They look out for no one but themselves." He's impressed at what he presumed was his Captain's work.

"Actually it wasn't I who was able to get either of them to join." He waves a hoof at me. "It was my friend here."

The Sergeant Major lifts an eyebrow. "Uh sir, what exactly is he?" He asks in a hushed voice.

"He's a human. And has been a very good friend to me."

"Well you always were one to go by your better judgement. If you say he's not a threat, then he's not a threat. I suppose I should introduce you to our allies." He lead the way to the large group where the other three species were with Shining Armor right behind him.

"All those griffins..." Sharla looks at them. I know what she's thinking.

"Go look." I say sternly. "I'm sure your parents there."

"Thanks." She begins to blush a little. "Come on Shantze! I bet Mom and Dad are probably somewhere there."

"Yay!" He says with giddy glee. "Hey Light, you wanna help us find our parents?"

"Um, sure." The three of them leave and go look for the griffins' parents.

"What happened to their folks?" Applejack asks me.

"Not sure. All I know is that those two were separated from their parents while Discord's influence expanded. I really hope they find them."

"And what about that filly? Why is she with you?" Rarity asks concerned.

"Her parents were killed by a vampire, an actual vampire. We saved her." My mood shifts to a darker state as I remember all those ponies turned into ghouls. "And in return I drove my knife into his heart." My hand motions to the knife strapped to my side, underneath the coat that once belonged to that bastard. Flex puts a comforting wing around my head. "Go ahead, say me killing him wasn't the right thing to do. But if you witnessed what we saw, you'd think that what I did was by far the right choice. Come on, let's go meet the troops."

Comments

[Redwolf15]

HAHAHAHAHAHA! If you love this story (And we all know you do! Don't try and cover it up, you know you wish you had thought of this idea before me!) then get a load of my new story: A Painful Past, Bleeding Heart. Have fun cleaning yourself up after reading that. Like, favourite, and keep your eye on me because I'm soon gonna come out with a few more awesome stories real soon.

[Flamewarden]

This is a great story so far keep up the good work will be interesting to see how the main 6 react too everything

[BronyGamer]

1607845 I knew the author name looked familiar.

[lolz anonymous]

oh... sweet!