The Three Warrior Friends

by Duckyworth

Who Do You Want To Punch In The Face Most?

Author's Note:

Here’s the second part of my Pharynx, Fizzlepop Berrytwist and Ember fanfiction.

I know that this part is shorter than my last part, but I was just wanting to split this story up into sections so that I could update it regularly, and the end of this part goes into a time skip that will move onto the next part so I decided to stop it there.

As always – please comment with thoughts on how I'm writing the three characters' interactions and whether you think I’m keeping them in character.

‘Fifty…seven…. Fifty….eight…. fifty….nine…..SIXTY!’

The sound of heavy breathing and panting was carried on the wind as Pharynx and Ember were doing push ups on the cliff. Both of them were hard at work – the cold air atop the cliff and the rough ground was only familiar to them, where other creatures would prefer to carry out their exercise in a gym. But the toughest of the tough didn’t settle for comforts that they felt would hold them down – they preferred to workout raw and rugged.

‘AND…. A HUNDRED!’ Pharynx relaxed by lying on the ground, as he felt a burning sensation through his limbs – his limbs were stinging from the heavy exertion. ‘Phew… and that’s my piece done…. how… are you doing there, Ember?’ Pharynx looked to his left and saw the blue dragon had decided to keep her armour on throughout the workout… and as such, was paying the price for it. She usually only wore it for formal events, but the proud dragon could not afford to be upstaged.

‘Grrrngh…. One…. Hun….dred, Phew!’ Ember collapsed on the ground panting, her helmet rolling off her head as she felt her arms give out. ‘Fine! Just fine… just gimme a second to get my breath back – I’m not used to doing heavy workouts in this thing!‘

Pharynx gave a laugh as he looked at the exhausted dragon. ‘Heh, guess you shouldn’t bite off more than you can chew! The best armour you need is your bare scales, skin or chitin!‘ Pharynx proudly showed off the scars he had on the back of his neck – raw and rough marks he got from the last time he fended off a maulwurf from the changeling hive.
Ember gave a pout as she rolled her eyes, but retorted with a snarky comment. ‘Well, I was able to match your hundred push ups with this full body armour on, so there, maggot!’

Pharynx replied with a simple punch on the shoulder, but in a playful manner between warriors. ‘Well then, we’re all finished with ours! Are you managing to keep up with the experts over there, Temp-‘ They looked over towards the third soldier among them, but they quickly realised that perhaps stopping to talk wasn’t a good idea, as nearby, their friend was trouncing their record.

‘Onehundredandfortyfiveonehundredandfortysixonehundredandfortysevenonehundredandfortyeightonehundredandfortynineonehundredandfifty!’

‘…..est.’ Pharynx and Ember looked over at Fizzlepop with bewildered expressions on their faces. It crossed their minds earlier, but of course SHE would be able to do so many push ups with a full set of armour on – she had been a right hand pony for an invading king for such a large portion of her life and they had heard about, and they heard of the flips and kicks she could pull off with it holding her down too!

Not even breaking a sweat, the purple pony stood up slowly, slowly rubbing her hooves across the floor in front of her and tossing her mane back in triumph.
‘Looks like I win today!’ Fizzlepop beamed as she turned to face their wide eyed expressions, chuckling.

‘…..well, I think we’re well and truly warmed up now.’ Ember slowly stood up, putting her helmet back on, now that she had regained her breath, stretching her behind her head. Pharynx stood up, unfolding his wings for a second before folding them back in again. ‘You may win the push up contest, Tempest, but we’re only just beginning.‘

‘Okay then, you two – as a recap - today’s procedure is step #5 – Bring a model of the being you want to punch in the face the most and destroy the ever loving Tartarus out of it. You have the models with you Ember?‘ Fizzlepop asked.

‘Heh, sure thing, Tempest – here you are, you two, I’ve been safekeeping them.’ Ember reached into the special backpack that had recently been fitted into her armour and began to pull out the three models. Looking down into the bag, she stopped as she looked at the first one she came to, making absolutely no effort to hide her smirk.

‘I think…This one’s yours, Pharynx.’

The first model was a rather crude looking wooden carving of what vaguely resembled the former queen of the changelings herself. Battered and chipped wood adorned by blue cloth making up what was meant to be the mane, wings and tail. The wood didn’t even look like five seconds had gone into picking out pieces of wood to make it, and more like it’s creator had simply pulled up the first few sticks they came across and just rammed them into each other. The face had been purposefully made in an unflattering manner, with a goofy expression with big bulbous eyes and a tongue hanging out, as if to mock the banished former queen further. Stapled to the back of the model was a piece of paper with the words ‘kick me’ written on it.

‘I see that SOMEONE hasn’t been paying attention to their brother’s craft fairs.’ Fizzlepop chuckled to the changeling.

‘Oh, like I’m going to allow myself to be graded by how… ahem, ‘pretty’ it looks. PRETTY doesn’t protect a hive from attackers – I built it in the same way I’ve built my hive’s reinforcements. Try and break that thing. Go ahead, and you’ll see just how much I really HAVE been paying attention.’ Pharynx scoffed, with a smug grin on his face.

Sure enough, Fizzlepop looked down at the crude model, and tried pressing her hoof down on the body on its wooden head hard….. It didn’t even seem to budge! She then tried kicking it. Still nothing! How could such a poorly crafted figure be able to resist one of her kicks? ‘I… take it back… you know your stuff!’

‘And I don’t know what Tempest was talking about earlier – this model’s face is a definite improvement from the real thing!’ Ember added. 'The 'kick me' is a nice touch too...'

‘See? Told you so. Now then, what are yours like?’ Pharynx went over to Ember and levitated one of the next of the models out of her bag with his magic, and as his antlers crackled, his magic almost faltered when he saw what he pulled out, as he could barely hide his laughter.

‘And-AND you thought MINE was badly made?! Wh-What in Tartarus is THIS supposed to be?!’ Pharynx held up a weird green model out of Ember’s bag made out of discarded dragon scales… the head and body were rather huge and bulbous, but the legs and arms were little more than sticks that had been poorly rammed into the sides of the shell.

Pharynx managed to fight his laughter long enough to try placing the model on the ground….. only for it to fall over no matter how much he tried to make it stand up. After a few dozen attempts, Pharynx gave up and let it flop over and rock about on its back. Staring at the extremely lopsided scale model in silence for a few seconds, Pharynx attempted to maintain calm, but with recent changes in his life, and thanks to his brother influencing him to try to not be as much of a stick in the mud, he found it less embarrassing to have a laugh.

The flood gates of laughter burst open, and Pharynx lost it, holding his sides as his legs flailed about as he rolled about on his back. He and Fizzlepop both couldn’t help but be in hysterics at the even worse display of craftsmanship that Ember had donated. While Fizzlepop’s emotions were more contained and less over the top than Pharynx’s, it was clear she was in high spirits too.

Eventually, Ember had decided to break up the laughter at her expense by coughing up another burst of flame, which managed to partially disperse her two laughing friends – even if they still had wide smirks plastered on their faces.
‘Oh, okay, so we don’t have many real artistic crafting classes in the dragon kingdom! Everyone’s a critic…’ Ember puffed out her cheeks as a blush came onto it. ‘But you DO know how tough dragon scales are, don’t you? Why, to even DENT it is awesome enough – never mind make a crack in it.’

‘Y-yeah, sure…. Whatever you say, Little Miss Artist.’ Pharynx’s sides were hurting from his laughter, tears forming in the corner of his eye, as he scrambled to his hooves.
‘And if you knew exactly who mine is supposed to be a model of – you’d know he deserves this even MORE than that hag you used to call a queen…‘ Ember sneered at the model, unpleasant thoughts coming to mind about the dragon that her model was a crude representation of.

‘This freak’s a wanted criminal even among dragons – that kid Smoulder told me that he tricked our pal Spike into thinking he was his father, stole Princess Twilight’s stuff, tried to take over her castle for himself and even managed to get away without getting his butt kicked to the kerb! Even with that jerk Garble around, SLUDGE here makes HIM look like a flippin’ saint! I swear, if I was the one who had that fat jerk in front of me, I would have shown him EXACTLY where he can shove that stuff he stole!‘ Ember punched the ground, just inches away from the Sludge model’s head.

‘……wow, what a creep.’ Pharynx had stopped his laughter, and now that he had heard the tale of Sludge the dragon, he could agree that such an unflattering depiction of him was well deserved.

‘Last but not least – here’s yours, Tempest.’ Ember pulled into her bag and tossed Fizzlepop her model – it didn’t take a genius to figure out who this one was of. And indeed, Fizzlepop’s broken horn gave slight sparks as she looked upon it…. It was a doll resembling the Storm King.

‘It’s time to remove the last of the traces of that tyrant.’ Fizzlepop slowly growled as she held up the doll in her hoof. ‘Capper and Captain Celaeno told me that they had tossed all of the boxes of that yeti’s…. ‘merchandise’ into the first volcano they could find, but they saved me this one just for today. Never again will anyone have to see this lying despot’s face….’ She sneered as her magic illuminated the button eyes of the little plush toy.

‘Never again will he plague our world with shoddy merchandise with ridiculous pricing…’ Pharynx gave a poor attempt at a joke, which he hoped would cheer Fizzlepop up. Thankfully, she cracked a weak chuckle at this.

‘Pfft, yeah, not only was he using me and lying to me about the whole… horn incident, but the guy had absolutely NO idea about commerce. I mean, LOOK at this THING! What self respecting child would want a toy of THIS looking at them every single night, besides a masochist?!’ Fizzlepop pulled a disgusted expression as she squeezed the toy, the button eyes bulging slightly.

‘All right then - these three represent everything that we’re fighting against, and what we’re protecting Equestria from.’ Fizzlepop stood her model up against the other three.

True, they didn’t have a model representing the one who had just a few weeks ago threatened to drain Equestria of its magic and enslave the whole of Equestria into her pawns, but they all knew that if they had a picture reference for her, they would have wilfully made an effigy of her and burned her to the ground. They had heard that the Princess of Friendship HERSELF removed every single picture of that filly from the School of Friendship - the crimes committed by that individual was so heinous that even the PRINCESS OF FRIENDSHIP HERSELF believed that she was a lost cause and whose picture had no place in the School of Friendship.

They couldn’t have been there to help stop her, but as they said earlier – that was in the past. Cozy Glow was in Tartarus now, and while she may not ever return to harm their companions again, they could make sure no similar threat would be there to endanger Equestria again. And if she did return…. they had promised they would take turns in teaching her what would happen if they put any of their friends in danger ever again.

All of these models in front of them were merely substitutes for the real threats Equestria was under fire from, but they would be suitable for them to test themselves against. Despotic rulers who corrupted or harmed their loved ones and remained at large still. Those who were willing to lie and scheme and whose crimes still had scars that ran deep, even if the committers were long gone. Heartless individuals who would wilfully walk into someone’s life and take advantage of their kindness.

Comments

[Juria]

This story is so awesome! It needs more praise!

[Yoshifan30]

‘This freak’s a wanted criminal even among dragons – that kid Smoulder told me that he tricked our pal Spike into thinking he was his father, stole Princess Twilight’s stuff, tried to take over her castle for himself and even managed to get away without getting his butt kicked to the kerb! Even with that jerk Garble around, SLUDGE here makes HIM look like a flippin’ saint! I swear, if I was the one who had that fat jerk in front of me, I would have shown him EXACTLY where he can shove that stuff he stole!‘ Ember punched the ground, just inches away from the Sludge model’s head.

Wow when she said garble is more of a Saint you know that sludge is the worst one

[Luna-my-favorite-pony]

10305882
Ho yes