SAPR

by Scipio Smith

Rising Sun (New)

Rising Sun

Neptune whistled. “Imagine being able to get the Amity Colosseum for a private event?”

“I mean, you make it sound like she’s throwing a party up here, dude,” Sun said. “Although now that I’ve said it, I’m kinda surprised that they don’t do that.”

“They do,” Neptune said. “It’s the tournament afterparty. How did you not know that?”

“Because I grew up without TV, and nobody told me anything about this,” Sun replied. “You’re lucky I even know what the Vytal Festival is.”

The two of them were stood in the tunnel, the same tunnel in which they had stood that same day, together, preparing to go out and fight their two on two match.

Things were a little bit different now. It was dark, for one thing, with night having fallen outside. It made the tunnel darker than it had been when they had been waiting before, without the sunlight coming into the corridor from outside. The only light now came from the floodlights around the edge of the battlefield itself, and they were all pointed inwards, towards where the contestants would be — if there were any contestants — and they didn’t send a whole lot of light in the direction of Sun and Neptune.

There were lights in the tunnel itself, but they weren’t that bright, and anyway, Sun preferred sunlight to artificial lights; it just wasn’t quite the same to him. They were too cold, for one thing.

The other big difference was how quiet it was. Back then, earlier today, the arena had been full of people, more people than Sun had ever seen before in his life; the stadium had been heaving with them. They’d been packed in tighter than the popcorn was stuffed into the cardboard tubs that they were selling it in — and that was saying something, because those tubs could hold a lot of popcorn — and all of those people, all of that huge number of people like Sun had never seen before, they had all been making noise like…

Well, like Sun had never heard before either.

When Sun had first come to Mistral, he had thought that it was huge; it was huge, it was so much larger than Vacuo City; even the most packed location in downtown Vacuo had nothing on any market in Mistral. And he had thought that Mistral was loud too, as loud as it could possibly get, with so many people crammed together in one place making noise.

And then this tournament had begun, at which point, Sun had realised that he hadn’t seen anything yet.

Those crowds sure knew how to raise the roof.

Not that the Amity Colosseum had a roof, but, you know.

The point was, they were loud. This tournament had been loud. It was a good thing that some of the crowds out there making the noise were cheering for him, or it might have been a little intimidating.

But now, the crowds were silent.

The crowds, in fact, weren’t even there at all, so it was the arena which was silent.

Because there was no one there.

Which was a big change from earlier today. It was … kind of weird. Just Sun and Neptune, waiting in that tunnel, in the dark, with no sound outside. No one singing that Mistralian song, no one cheering, no one yelling.

No sound at all but what they made.

Yeah, a little odd, after the last couple of days.

But, at the same time, like Neptune had said, it was kind of impressive that Councillor Cadenza had been able to pull this off.

“Must be nice being an Atlesian Councillor,” Sun said.

Neptune nodded. “Must be nice being any kind of Councillor.”

“Nah, being a Vacuan Councillor kind of sucks,” Sun said. “Nobody takes any notice of anything you say, and everyone knows that the headmaster of Shade is the guy who’s really in charge.”

“Really?” Neptune asked.

“Yeah, really,” Sun said. “I mean, there’s no police, there’s no military, there’s no … nothing. There’s nothing but huntsmen, and they can’t even fire the headmaster.”

“Yeah, you’re right, that does suck for them,” Neptune muttered. “Sounds like barbarism to me.”

“It would to a Mistralian, sure,” Sun replied.

“Isn’t it?” Neptune asked.

Sun thought about it for a moment. “Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, it pretty much is. Although Headmaster Theodore talked about sorting things out a bit. Not sorting things out so much that he wouldn’t be in charge anymore, but sorting them out. Making things a bit more—”

“Civilised?” suggested Neptune.

“Normal,” Sun said.

“I can see why you didn’t want to go to Shade,” Neptune said. “Who does want to go to Shade? How do they have any students?”

“So,” Sun said, “you know how you told me that rich Mistralian aristos who don’t like their own kingdom enough go to Atlas because they think it’s everything that Mistral isn’t?”

“Because they think that it’s organised and disciplined and people there still have some respect for authority and breeding,” Neptune confirmed.

“Right, yeah, that,” Sun said. “Well, Atlesians who don’t like their kingdom go to Shade because they think Vacuo will be everything that Atlas isn’t: wild and free with nobody to tell them what to do.”

Neptune was silent for a moment, looking upwards a little bit as though he was thinking over what Sun had just said. “So … if the Mistralians are going to Atlas, and the Atlesians are going to Shade, doesn’t that mean that you should have gone to Beacon with a bunch of other Vacuans?”

It took Sun a moment to work out what he was talking about. “You mean … and the Valish would go to Haven?”

“Round and round in a great big circle,” Neptune said. He folded his arms. “But talking about you going to Atlas—”

“We weren’t—”

“Yeah, but let’s talk about it anyway,” Neptune said. “Are you sure you wanna do this?”

“Do I wanna go out there and fight this guy, or do I wanna move to Mantle?”

“Both,” Neptune said, “but you could lose the fight — in fact, you probably will lose the fight —”

“Hey!” Sun protested.

“What?” Neptune asked. “No offence, but you’re up against a qualified huntsman, a guy who won the Vytal Tournament in his year—”

“And a guy who's been guarding a door in Atlas for years since,” Sun pointed out.

“Okay, sure, maybe he’ll be rusty,” Neptune granted. He hesitated for a second. “Do you really wanna do this?” He scratched the back of his head with one hand. “I mean, dude, I know she’s hot—”

“Blake is not hot; she’s gorgeous.”

Neptune frowned. “What’s the difference?”

“I don’t know,” Sun said, “But there is one. Calling her hot feels, I dunno, kind of … I can’t explain it; it just doesn’t feel right, you know?”

“No,” Neptune said. “No, I don’t know.”

“Well, I know, even if I can’t explain it to you,” Sun said. “But, anyway, the point is that it’s not about that.”

Neptune’s eyebrows rose sceptically.

“Okay, it’s not just about that,” Sun said.

Neptune’s eyebrows remained in their raised, sceptical position.

“It isn’t!” Sun cried. “Yeah, it’s some about that, but it’s also … it’s also about doing some good, you know? Doing some good for people who haven’t had much good done to them, or many people to do good to them.”

“And you can’t wait another three years because—”

“Because bad stuff is happening all over now, and it’s not waiting for us to graduate!” Sun cried. “Kidnappings, robberies, slavery, it’s all going on right now, this instant, and if I wait around for three years, who knows how many people will get hurt in the meantime? People that I could have helped. And that’s the point, really … say I waited and stayed at Haven until I graduated, then … Mistral has tons of people who can fight for it, and who will step up and fight for it when the time comes? You, Sage and Scarlet, I guess; Team Auburn, Team Jasmine — Pyrrha! Mistral has, or it’s gonna have, or it has and is gonna have, a ton of heroes. Who does Mantle have right now?”

Neptune was quiet for a little bit. “All valid reasons,” he said. “But also because of Blake, right?”

“Oh, totally, yeah,” Sun agreed, nodding his head vigorously.

Neptune chuckled. “Well, I guess I can’t blame you too much. But I will miss you, though. I can’t believe you’re leaving me with Scarlet.”

Sun laughed. “You’ll be fine. Hey, without me around, Scarlet might actually sweeten a little bit.”

“I don’t think Scarlet has any sweet in him,” Neptune said. “He’s as sour as grapefruit with no sugar. And you know how much I need sugar on those in the morning.”

“Yeah, I know,” Sun said. He hesitated. “I’m gonna miss you too, man.” He grinned. “Hey, you could come with me! We could—”

“Thanks for the offer, dude, but from what I’ve heard about Mantle, it doesn’t seem like my scene, at all,” Neptune declared.

“Why, what’s it like?”

Neptune’s jaw dropped. “Seriously? Are you … are you kidding me right now?”

“What?”

“Wh—… sometimes, I think Scarlet might be right about you,” Neptune muttered. “Have you not done any research, anything at all, about the place you’re going to go and live in? You haven’t even opened a book?”

“I know it’s in rough shape; that’s why I want to go there.”

“'Rough shape' is putting it mildly,” Neptune said. “I … I don’t know, I’m not an expert, but you should probably try and become, maybe not an expert, but at least not an idiot about it in the next few days before you move there! Gods.” He shook his head. “The point is that post-industrial derelict style is not my style.” He grinned. “And besides, I’m not sure how your new Atlas friends would feel about two of us moving to Mantle to become vigilantes together. I think they’re only tolerating you because they like Blake so much.”

Sun thought about that for a second. “Yeah,” he admitted. “Yeah, that’s probably fair.”

“Plus,” Neptune went on. “You know that if I did decide to drop out of school and move to Mantle, my mom would absolutely flip her lid. Like, she would actually kill me.”

“She wouldn’t be able to reach you in Mantle.”

“I wouldn’t put it past her to hire the Iron Grenadiers to black bag me from Mantle back to Argus so that she could throw me into the harbour herself,” Neptune said. “And that’s nothing compared to what she’d do to you for talking me into it.”

“Yeah, you should probably stay in school,” Sun said. “Hey, listen, dude … I’m sorry that I wasn’t a great team leader over the last year.”

“You weren’t around much for a lot of the last year,” Neptune pointed out.

“So it was pretty much impossible for me to be a good team leader, wasn’t it?” asked Sun. “All the same, I’m sorry. Lionheart should have chosen … well, you probably.”

“Me?” Neptune said. “You…” He pointed at himself. “You think I should be team leader?”

“Yeah, sure, why not you?”

“Why me?” Neptune asked. “What about Scarlet?”

“Scarlet? No way,” Sun said. “Scarlet wants it, sure, but that doesn’t mean that he’d be any good at it. He might try, but … he’d follow you more easily than me, so you’ve got that going for you, Sage likes you, everyone likes you, you’re like Yang that way, and that’s why you’d make a good team leader.”

“But…” Neptune trailed off. “Where would I even start?”

“How would I know?” asked Sun. “I was a terrible leader, remember?”

“Yeah,” Neptune said. “Yeah, you were.” He held out one hand. “But you were an okay friend. Now get out there and try to kick his butt.”

Sun clasped Neptune’s outstretched hand and arm, squeezing Neptune’s wrist. “I’ll do my best,” he said. He pulled Ruyi Bang and Jingu Bang — linked together in their combined staff form — off his back, and twirled it in his hand.

I mean, if I lose, I can still go to Mantle and be even more of a vigilante than I’ll be if I win.

Or lose while still impressing the guy, I guess.

But I’ll try and win, 'cause otherwise … why wouldn’t I try and win?

He stepped out of the corridor and into the silent arena.

“Woohoo!” cheered Mrs. Belladonna. “Go, Sun!”

Sun turned and walked backwards towards the ring itself, thankful that the colosseum was not completely silent. “Thanks, Mrs. B!” he yelled out to her as he waved. “Or Lady B, sorry.”

“Either’s fine,” Mrs. — or Lady — Belladonna called back to him. “Just focus and do your best, honey.”

“Will do,” Sun promised. It was really nice of her to come up here — or stay up here — and cheer for him. He kinda wished that Blake could have done the same, but she had to work tonight, protecting that Amber girl. Sun wasn’t entirely clear on why Amber needed protecting, but Blake said it was important, so … it was important.

And maybe it was better this way. He’d be able to surprise her with the news of whatever happened up here tonight, rather than being distracted by her being up here watching him.

The arena was bare; there were none of the biomes that had risen up out of the arena to provide terrain to fight on during the day — of course, even during the day when he and Neptune had walked out here, the terrain hadn’t been ready and waiting for them; it was just that, tonight, it wasn’t going to come up either.

They were going to be fighting on the flat tonight, upon the white surface, with the symbols of the four academies on the floor and the metal struts criss-crossing it.

That was the surface that Sun walked across, his footsteps so light that they made no sound at all, adding to the quiet of the colosseum.

The air was crisp tonight, but he’d had colder nights by far back home. This was nothing at all.

He wondered briefly how a night in Solitas would compare to the desert cold of a Vacuo night. He probably should have asked Blake how cold it had gotten for her in Atlas.

Sun reached the hexagon in the centre of the arena, the same hexagon where he and Neptune had waited for their match to start today, with half the crowd cheering them on.

Unlike then, his opponent now wasn’t here yet.

Yet.

A clanking thud echoed out of the tunnel on the other side of the arena, the tunnel that Sun could only just make out thanks to the lack of light. But he could hear the sound just fine; he could hear all the clanking footsteps coming, heavy footsteps, almost like a massive grimm but too metallic, pounding footsteps echoing out of the dark.

Until eventually they weren’t coming out of the dark, and Sun could see what was making the noise. Shining Armor — because Sun could still see his head, which was bare — was wearing something that reminded Sun a little bit of Twilight’s armour, only it was a lot bulkier and blockier and not at all sleek or rounded like the suit that his sister wore.

Still, it was armour, and fancy armour too. A lot of Haven students wore some kind of armour, but it was all the old-fashioned kind, metal or linen or metal and linen, like the kind their ancestors had worn since way back when, back before the Great War, back when Mistral was young. Shining Armor was wearing modern armour; he was wearing better than modern armour, armour that let out little whirring noises when he moved — Sun could only hear them now that he was getting closer — like the whole thing was powered.

It probably was.

The armour was blocky, with lots of square parts to it; the centre over his chest and stomach was segmented, so at least he could move his waist, but his shoulder pauldrons were big and boxy with what looked like little guns mounted on them, and the armour that completely covered his arms and hands was square too, with joints only at the elbows, until you got to the fingers, which were segmented again. The legs didn’t even have that; it was like … honestly, it was like a kid wearing cardboard boxes and pretending to be a robot.

Only Sun, who would never say that out loud, thought that this armour was probably a little tougher than cardboard.

Also, cardboard boxes didn’t have pipes like engine thrusters sticking out of the back of the legs — well, you could use toilet roll tubes for that if you really wanted to — and what he thought looked like more thrusters on his back, with two exhausts visible sticking up past his shoulders.

The armour was purple, with gold outlines surrounding each individual piece where it joined with another — gold around the knee where it met the two leg pieces, gold around the armour, gold around the shoulders, everywhere, there was gold surrounding purple. Sun was kind of glad that they were doing this at night; he might have been blinded otherwise. In the centre of the chest piece was a six-pointed lavender star on a shield, which Sun guessed was Shining Armor’s emblem.

Shining Armor had a shield, a kite-shaped shield, resting on his left arm, while strapped to his right arm, there was a grey rifle that would have looked like a pretty normal Atlesian rifle — one of the ones with a scope — except that it was about as big as Ciel’s rifle, and that was huge.

Also, from the way it was glowing, Sun guessed that this rifle shot lasers.

“Hey,” Shining Armor greeted him. “Sorry to keep you waiting.”

“Um … yeah,” Sun murmured. “Is that … are you gonna … you’re gonna wear that to fight?”

“I wouldn’t have put it on otherwise,” Shining Armor replied. “It’s pretty neat, huh? Twily made it for me. I haven’t had the chance to wear it in a while; I ought to thank you.”

“You don’t, uh, you don’t think it’s a little much?” Sun suggested.

“I want to see what you’ve got,” Shining Armor said. “It wouldn’t be much of a test if I went easy on you.”

“I guess not,” Sun agreed. “So … does this thing fly? Because I know that Twily—”

“Made Rainbow Dash’s wings, yeah, she did,” Shining Armor agreed, “but as you might have noticed, Sibling Supreme is a little bit heavier than the Wings of Harmony, so all I can really do is—” He stopped talking as his armour lifted about a foot off the ground, lifted up by jets coming out of the soles of his feet.

“That’s pretty cool,” Sun said. He paused. “Sibling Supreme, is that its name?”

“Yeah,” Shining Armor replied. “Something wrong with that?”

“No,” Sun said quickly. “No, no, nothing at all. That’s a great name.”

He stopped talking and tried to start thinking instead. That armour, even assuming that there weren’t any other tricks in there like hard light shields or nothing, would combine with aura to make Shining Armor tough, strong, and probably fast as well. Sun’s only hope was to, well, hope that it wasn’t too manoeuvrable on top of all that. If he could stay in Shining Armor’s blind spots, then maybe he could hammer him from the back and sides, use his semblance, just stay out of the guy’s way.

It would have been easier if the biomes were active — some of them anyway — but never mind.

He’d have to do his best.

“Go for it, honey!” Cadance shouted.

“Take him down, Sun!” yelled Mrs. Belladonna.

Shining Armor grinned. “Nice to have at least one fan, right?”

“Kick his butt, dude!”

Sun grinned right back. “I think I’ve got one more than you tonight.”

Shining Armor chuckled. “Yeah? Well, you’re gonna need the support.” He descended back down to the surface of the arena, landing with a thump upon the metal. His head disappeared from sight, concealed beneath a helmet that emerged with clanks and rattles out of the chest to cover up his head. The helmet, too, was square and blocky, with a pair of purple eyes blazing out of it and a pair of horns coming out of the sides like a bull.

“Are you ready?” he asked, his voice coming out kind of distorted compared to what it had sounded like before.

Sun twirled Ruyi Bang and Jingu Bang in one hand. “I guess I am,” he said.

“Okay then,” Shining Armor said. “There’s no commentator to count us in, so what’s say we get started?”

“Sounds good to—” Sun was cut off as the rifle strapped to Shining Armor’s arm detached itself, floating in the air for a second before Shining Armor grabbed it by the grip, lifted it up with one arm, and started shooting.

Blue laser beams — yep, called it — leapt from the barrel of the gun, forcing Sun to dive out of the way as the bolts zipped past him to slam into the shield surrounding the battlefield.

“You could have waited until I said I was ready!” Sun yelled as he dodged out of the way of Shining Armor’s hard-light beams, the fire from the huge rifle tracking him as he jumped and rolled.

“Think of it as a test of your reactions,” Shining Armor said as he kept on trailing Sun, turning in place, always keeping Sun under fire.

Worse, he sounded like he was having fun as he said it.

Sun gritted his teeth as he jumped out of the way of a couple of blue bolts, bolts which flew through the space where he’d been to slam into the shield behind him.

He didn’t know whether Shining Armor was deliberately letting him dodge or whether he really couldn’t hit him, but he also knew that he wasn’t going to impress anyone by just not getting hit.

Probably not; he didn’t know what Shining Armor’s standards were like.

It wasn’t a chance he was prepared to take.

But he might need to take a chance of a different kind.

Sun stopped running, clasping the first two fingers of both hands together above his chest — just below the point at which Shining Armor’s bolt of hard light slammed into him like a hammer blow. Sun felt a tingling like a static charge, like rubbing a balloon against his hair then sticking it to his hand, running through his chest and all over his body, the vestige of the pain making itself felt through his aura as he was thrown backwards and onto his back on the ground.

He felt a prickling sensation everywhere, like his hand sometimes felt when he woke up having slept on it, but his aura was still up, so he didn’t have a hole in his chest or nothing.

He lay still on the ground, because being still was the price for using his semblance.

There was a faint chiming sound as four clones, insubstantial but golden, shining in the darkness, burst out of Sun and scattered in different directions, breaking off to the left and the right, circling around the battlefield before charging towards Shining Armor.

Shining Armor shot at them, his rifle blazing, bolts erupting out of the barrel as he walked backwards over the metallic surface of the arena, retreating to open up more ground between himself and Sun’s clones. Sun grinned a little bit as he directed his clones like a puppeteer directing his puppets, having them leap and roll out of the way just like he had leapt and rolled out of Shining Armor’s fire, all the while closing the distance upon his opponent.

Shining Armor hit one of the clones anyway, in spite of Sun’s dodging, making it dissolve into motes of light and making Sun wince in pain — he could feel a little bit of what the clones felt; it was the price he paid for being able to direct them like this — but before he could take any more shots at the others, they were right on top of him.

All three clones leapt upwards before descending down on Shining Armor with fists and legs drawn back to strike.

Shining Armor took cover, turning his body and bringing his shield up to protect himself.

Sun’s clones hit the shield, and all of them exploded at once, bursting into blazing balls of light that engulfed Shining Armor — for all of a couple of seconds before Shining Armor burst out of the light, still holding his shield before him, gilding over the surface of the arena, levitating a couple of inches off the floor while using the thrusters on his back and legs to hurl him straight towards Sun.

Sun summoned two more clones — he still had time for that, just about — which threw themselves between Sun and Shining Armor, both of them grabbing at the Atlesian, trying to hold him backwards.

It didn’t work, the two clones weren’t strong enough, Sun could feel them being pushed back, just like he could see them being pushed back, like objects caught in a tide.

He summoned two more clones — he was kind of stretching himself here; he could feel his aura dropping like a rock — but hopefully, he wouldn’t need to keep this up for very long. Those two more clones rushed to join their fellow clones and were just enough to slow Shining Armor down, bodily holding him back.

The fifth clone — Sun gritted his teeth and hoped that his aura didn’t give out on him — burst out of Sun’s body to rush straight towards Shining Armor, his movement slowed, held back by all the other clones.

The fifth clone launched himself at Shining Armor with a flying kick that struck the Atlesian squarely in the chest, knocking him backwards and off-balance — just as all five clones exploded all at once.

Sun breathed a sigh of relief as — finally able to move again — he sat up and saw Shining Armor tumble backwards towards the—

The thrusters on his back fired before he hit the ground, lifting him up and righting him, setting him down again on his feet with a solid thud.

A thud that sounded a lot like Sun’s chances in this fight.

“Oh, come on,” Sun protested.

Shining Armor didn’t reply, he just let his shield drop from his arm — it hit the floor heavily, landing upon the Haven Academy symbol where it was painted on the surface — as his rifle transformed in his hands into a giant two-handed sword, as big as Shining Armor himself or maybe even a little bigger, single-edged, with that edge being a beam of hard-light.

Kind of overkill, don’t you think?

Shining Armor’s rockets launched him up into the air, maybe only a few feet up but enough that he could drop down again right on top of Sun, his enormous sword hefted up.

Sun remained where he lay as the sword swept down, but he brought his staff up to take the blow, the soft blue beam clashing with the bright red staff as Shining Armor landed, straddling Sun, his impact making the floor under Sun tremble.

Sun grunted, the muscles on his arms standing out, his veins bulging under his skin — if only Blake could see this, huh? — as he struggled to hold back Shining Armor’s sword. Dude was strong. Or maybe that was just the armour. Or it was a little bit of both.

Either way, it was taking a lot out of Sun to hold him off. In fact, he wasn’t really holding him off, his arms were giving way, they were starting to shake, his elbows were bending; Shining Armor’s sword was getting closer to his chest.

Sun lifted up his legs and lashed out sideways with them both, a scissoring kick aimed at the back of Shining Armor’s left knee, coming in just over the top of his thrusters. It didn’t cut Shining Armor’s leg out from under him, but it did bend his knee, made it jerk forwards and off to the side a little.

Made his sword break off for a second.

Sun launched himself through the gap in Shining Armor’s legs, passing between them and spinning around as he passed so that he was looking up at Shining Armor’s back, able to see all the rockets attached.

Able to see Shining Armor turning around a lot slower than Sun had moved.

Sun split Ruyi Bang and Jingu Bang into their component halves, the nunchucks whirling in his hands as he raised two of the nunchuck-shotguns and unloaded them into Shining Armor one after another with a pair of roaring bangs. He flipped the weapons in his hands, switching from the empty to the loaded halves of the weapons, and fired again, two more blasts echoing in the silent arena.

Sun really wished that he could see how much aura Shining Armor had left. But then, Shining Armor would be able to see how much aura he had left as well, and that didn’t feel like much.

Sun leapt to his feet, using his nunchucks as, well, as nunchucks, whacking Shining Armor on the side a couple of times before leaping away as Shining Armor finished turning, backflipping across the arena surface out of reach of even that gigantic sword.

Sun reformed his staff out of both his weapons; it still didn’t give him reach against that two-hander, but it was better than nunchucks.

Shining Armor looked at him for a moment, then levelled his sword at Sun like a lance. His blade didn’t have a hard-light tip, but Sun guessed the metal would hurt him a bit if it hit him just the same.

Shining Armor thundered towards Sun, sword drawn back but still looking pretty outstretched with how big it was. Sun sidestepped, batting the sword aside with a swipe of his staff. Shining Armor set one foot down especially heavily and converted his thrust into a sideways slash aimed at Sun’s midriff. Sun parried with his staff, blocking the blow even as it pushed him sideways, his feet sliding along the slick metal surface beneath him. Shining Armor turned in a circle, and Sun was turned in a circle too, whirled around Shining Armor until he dropped down, letting the enormous sword pass over his head.

Shining Armor dropped the sword, just like he had dropped the shield earlier, letting it fall down at his feet like it was nothing at all.

Sun leapt up, staff spinning in his hands as he rushed—

The guns on Shining Armor’s shoulders opened fire. Yep, they were machine guns all right, and they were spitting bullets right at him. Sun braced, spinning Ruyi Bang and Jingu Bang in front of him in a swirling red circle, rounds deflecting off of the spinning staff to fly in all directions, slamming into the shield that protected Mrs. B and Councillor Cadance.

Shining Armor kept up the fire as he produced what looked like a tube from out of his wrist.

A beam of hard light, like the one that Trixie had used in her fight against Sunset, emerged from out of it.

The motors of Shining Armor’s suit whirred as he drew back the sabre.

Sun gripped his staff tightly in both hands.

They stared at each other for a moment, then attacked, each at the same time, rushing towards one another. Sun whirled his staff, lashing out with it, meeting the slashes and the thrusts of Shining Armor’s hard-light sabre. Shining Armor slashed at him, but Sun parried it away before bringing his staff down on Shining Armor’s shoulder, a blow Shining Armor took on the forearm before brushing Ruyi Bang and Jingu Bang aside. He slashed again, upwards and diagonally, but Sun parried again, countered only to have his own hit blocked.

Shining Armor retreated and thrust at him, Sun turned the blow aside and tried to take advantage, but Shining Armor pulled his sword back just in time to protect himself.

And so it went, back and forth, slash, parry, counter, parry again, break off for a second, then one of them would attack again, and so, the cycle would restart, with a blow from the left or right, up or down, always countered. Neither of them was strong enough to break through the other’s guard, neither of them could—

Shining Armor swept Sun’s staff out of his hands with a flick, sending Ruyi Bang and Jingu Bang skittering away across the surface of the battlefield.

Shining Armor’s helmet retracted with a set of clanks and rattles, revealing his face. “I think I’ve—”

Sun hit him, punching him square on the nose, sending his head snapping backwards as far as the design of his suit would allow. He drew back his fist for another blow.

Shining Armor grabbed him by the neck and lifted him off the ground.

“That’ll do,” Shining Armor said. “I’ve seen enough.”

Sun’s legs kicked at the air. “Were you holding back?”

“Of course,” Shining Armor said. “I wanted to see how good you were, not how fast I could take you out.”

Sun was silent for a second, legs still kicking, tail shaking this way and that. “And?” he asked.

Shining Armor was quiet for a second. “You’re pretty fast, pretty fast with your hands or your weapon too, quick thinking, and you can handle yourself in a fight. Your semblance burns through your aura, doesn’t it?”

“Yeah,” Sun admitted. “It’s a pretty cool semblance, don’t get me wrong, but I think it would have drained me out if I’d tried to use it again. I probably used it too much.” He paused. “But I wouldn’t have had to use it if you hadn’t been wearing all … that.”

Shining Armor snorted as he set Sun down on the ground.

“Overall, I’d say you’re all right,” he said. “In fact, I’d even say you’re pretty good. I can see why your team decided to send you into the finals, although I wouldn’t put money on you taking the crown at the end of this tournament.”

“That’s … not exactly encouraging,” Sun replied.

“Kid, I’m not saying that you’ll definitely be knocked out in your first one-on-one match; I’m just saying don’t be too disappointed if you are,” Shining Armor told him. The hard-light sabre in his hand fizzled out, the beam retracting back into the tube. “As for your future plans … are you sure you wouldn’t rather stay in school for three more years?”

“Do you think I’d learn much if I did?” asked Sun.

“Learn to fight? No,” Shining Armor said. “I doubt you’d come out at the end of your fourth year much better than you are now. Would you be wiser, a better leader, more tactically proficient … probably, yes.” He paused. “But Cadance says you’ve made your choice, no matter what anyone says. Is that right?”

Sun nodded. “I know what I want, what I want to do, where I want to go. Back to school isn’t it.”

Shining Armor raised one eyebrow. “I hope she’s worth it.”

“It’s not—”

“There’s nothing to be ashamed of, if it is,” Shining Armor assured him. “What you’re doing … I think it’s pretty cool, even if it is also dumb as a bag of rocks. After all, what’s the point of being a young man if you can’t be dumb for love?”

“Were you?” Sun asked.

Shining Armor grinned. “I was so dumb I almost let love slip right through my fingers without ever realising it. I don’t blame you for wanting to be close by for the next three years, but Atlas—”

“I want to be close by, but I don’t want to smother Blake either; I don’t want to…” Sun hesitated for a second, thinking it through, putting his words in order. “I will always be there for Blake, but I don’t think Blake needs me to be always there, you know? She’s got so much going on in her life, so much that she wants to do and that other people want her to do and to be, so many plans … I don’t want to be the clingy guy, the guy who has to always have her close—”

“The guy who sends an a capella troupe round to his girlfriend’s work because he feels neglected?” Shining Armor suggested.

Sun stared at him.

Shining Armor smiled. “At first, I was puzzled when I saw Twily’s friend Rarity in the Council building, along with some people who I didn’t know. Then they started singing to one of the secretaries.” He paused. “They were pretty good, but you probably won’t be surprised to hear the relationship didn’t last.”

Sun chuckled. “I’ll always be there when she needs me,” he repeated. “But she doesn’t need me all the time; she’s got … so many other people to help. And there are so many other people who need someone to help them, because Blake can’t do everything by herself.” He hesitated. “One of the weird things about this year has been watching this place change. Vale, I mean, not Beacon. I never really stuck around in any one place to see it change before, or if I did, I didn’t notice because I was still getting to know it. But Vale … I’ve seen Vale change, and for the worse. I think it might be kind of nice to see a place change for the better, especially if I could say that I had something to do with that.”

Shining Armor nodded. “I can see the attraction,” he agreed. He sighed. “I … I can’t say for certain that you’re the saviour that Mantle has been looking for, because I’m not sure that you’re that good … but also because I’m just not sure that any one person can save Mantle. But I also think, based on what I’ve seen, based on my judgement, that you won’t die the moment you set foot in Mantle, so I will tell Cadance that you are up to this, and in the morning - because this should be done in the light of the sun, not in darkness - you can take the oath to me, and Cadance will sort the paperwork out and you will be a huntsman. Something that Blake won’t be for another three years.” He smiled. “Congratulations, Sun Wukong.”

“Really? I passed! Yeah!” Sun cried. “Thanks. Thanks a lot. I won’t—”

“The only person you can let down, the only person you should worry about trying not to let them down is yourself,” Shining Armor told him. “Just … don’t have any regrets.”

“I won’t,” Sun assured him. “I won’t have a single one.”

Comments

[Mastermind4892]

Never change, Sun. Never change.

[Stet709]

Nice, Sun's on his way to become a fully fledged Huntsman.

too bad his Mantle plans go sideways

[Sovks]

Sun, my boy... let's gooo!!!

[Wargod642]

It was a good fight but damn, I did not expect Twilight to build a small Gundam for Shiny. Keep it up, Sun!