Piece of Parchment

by Metemponychosis

Planning to Fail

It was difficult knowing for sure, considering how long they remained completely closed within the airship and the artificial lighting messed with him. It was so different from the typical ‘pony stuff’ he had grown used to in the last months. Of course, being stuck inside a cell didn’t help either, but he had a rough idea that it was before morning and too soon to be up, even for one used to waking up with Celestia every day.

However, as he supposed the airship prepared for combat, their boss decided to move him to another cell. Maybe one closer to wherever they would drag him out to make the exchange Grigory planned with Twilight. He just hoped that the Princess wouldn’t be so stupid.

Nah. Who was he kidding? Twilight being stupid? It would be easier for her to turn his plan on his head. It simply upset him that they took away his armor.

For the moment he simply followed the griffon in black and golden armor around the narrow and dimly lit corridors. At least the weird magic that thing’s engines radiated didn’t bother him with the inhibitor hornring on.

“Watch your step, pony.” The griffon tried to sound intimidating, but he was a bit too young and came of more as childish with his not yet fully developed voice. “I don’t want to be responsible if you break a leg or something. I hope you get used to wearing the hornring though. You and your princesses will be using them all the time once we get them removed from the throne.”

He concluded with a chuckle before he went on. “Though it will probably be worse when we put you in the pens, like the cows.”

Chocolate simply uh-hu’d mindlessly as the guy prattled on and they entered the gun deck through a crew access door. It was a rather spacious room that spanned the entirety of the gun deck and the whole width of the airship. Large cannons lined both sides behind armored shutters to the outside.

It was barely lit for reasons that escaped the alicorn and it smelled of griffon because those damned confused birds who thought they were flying cats exuded a characteristic aroma that in the past hours started to profoundly aggravate him! Or maybe Celestia’s dislike of the griffons finally started ingraining itself on him and they simply smelled different from the ponies.

But since he was there he decided he should pay attention and try and learn something rather than indulging in righteous fury at the mission being more annoying than it warranted.

Indeed, the gun deck was lined with cannons. Not the typical muzzle loaders the entire world used, but the griffons had come up with breech-loading design to arm their big airship. The whole thing seemed like a bizarre combination between a flying submarine and an ironclad of sorts. Griffons carted around cloth cylinders he supposed were full of gunpowder and also shaped shells. If not for magic, they would be decades ahead of the ponies and their crystal ball ammunition for naval guns.

Anyways, they brought both materials from the deck below and stored it all in the center of the gun deck where there were adequate shelves and niches.

Another thing that drew his attention, more than the rest was that an officer and a soldier caused a scene, discussing in the middle of the organized chaos. They didn’t notice that the griffons tending to the guns and ammunition discreetly paid attention to their tempestuous exchange and the dumbass escorting Velvet didn’t notice his slowing gait to listen in.

It was difficult to see the details in the dim light, but one was definitively a grunt, with the typical black and gold armor of Griffindell and the other wore an elaborate, dark steel and silver armor with a blue and white cape. The first’s shrill voice sounded weird and his armor clashed with his bright green coat and tan feathers. The other was less aggressive on the eyes, with shades of metallic gray and a graver voice.

Green one was frustrated and seemed to have called the other ‘Gon’. Then he went on what sounded like a long-winded and frustrated explanation of something. Chocolate wondered if he was a staff sergeant or something of the sort trying to explain something to a superior officer who refused to see common sense.

Taking the word, the officer spoke worryingly and looked around at the soldiers but failed to see the big brown alicorn listening in the middle of the mess. Then said something else, but his voice denoted sorrow.

The first seemed to angrily accuse the officer of something and that hurt him. He defended himself with quite a few words. Chocolate was sure he heard the name ‘Grinolf’, also something that sounded like ‘Grigory’ and ‘Wonderbolts’ as he tried to explain or justify something. He concluded mentioning the Wonderbolts again and seemed to plead.

The other was frustrated though. He sat and gesticulated widely and angrily. Chocolate was sure he heard the name Griffindell, but their pronunciation was weird. As tough the real name wasn’t Griffindell as he knew it, but the word was close enough when ponies spoke, and it stuck for the outsiders.

The officer was shocked at what his subordinate said, and his feathers almost jumped out of his head on a surprised reply where Lady Gwendolen’s name appeared. Then he made soothing gestures and said something else.

Green one answered furiously and pushed the officer’s chest. Chocolate hadn’t ever seen ponies do that to an officer and that would get them expelled from the Royal Guard, save for intervention from the Princesses. He couldn’t imagine a griffon officer would be more lenient if they weren’t friends, or something.

The officer though shook his head and said something in his defense, to which the first pointed a finger and accused him of something, and that finally got the officer angry.

He pointed a finger himself and unleashed a long tirade where he mentioned Lady Gwendolen’s name again, then the Wonderbolts and Grigory too. Then he made an angry gesture with words that ended the conversation.

He raised his voice more than he intended, but the soldiers all around pretended not to have heard anything. Yet both looked at Chocolate Velvet this time, and both seemed to become flustered about it, but the green one Chocolate supposed was Grinolf looked more ashamed than anything else.

It took his escort little time to figure out Chocolate Velvet had left him talking alone though. “Hey, pony! What do you think you’re doing?”

He poked at Chocolate’s chest with his musket. “I’ll bet you’ve never seen anything like the gun deck on the Skoll, but this isn’t a sightseeing trip. Get moving.”

And so, he did. But kept what he saw on the back of his mind. At the least, it would be something to tell Celestia and Luna. It was such a shame he didn’t understand their language. It was the changeling language he studied, but maybe he should branch out.

***

Twilight and her friends slept through the rest of the night and waking up right before dawn she worried because the crew of the Magic of Friendship hadn’t. She hoped that the shifts they had implemented were effective. But then again, she knew little about ‘airshipping life’ and that was the reason she hired a professional crew. Also, she couldn’t say that she was that well rested: sleeping with her barding on was hardly the most comfortable thing she’d ever done. But she managed to rebuild her energies for the coming battle. Fortunately, taking a gander at her friends as they too woke up, they seemed to have rested. A quick breakfast was perfect.

Going outside, greeted by the sun as in an ominous foreshadowing, her airship’s crew seemed to be just fine. Maybe she worried too much.

The Captain met her right outside the door to the private room. “Morning lass! Ship’s ready to rumble! She’s got no guns, she’s got no armor, but she’s got one dedicated crew! We even built a protection ‘round the wheel!”

She giggled at his surprising enthusiasm. “Great! At least they won’t be able to say we didn’t try our best!”

Taking a second to look around the deck, she located the clouds they were supposed to reach just before dawn. It had come and they still hadn’t reached the clouds. “Huh. How is our plan going?”

Not exactly as it should, apparently, but close enough, she supposed. The point was to use the clouds to block their vision in the lower visibility and maybe throw them off course, but the clouds seemed to have drifted. The thunderstorm was still there, though. She could swear that thing followed them. Though it also made sense that it would drift in the same direction as the clouds.

He shrugged and pointed at the clouds with a wing. “Not much we can do, lass. Either it works an’ earns us some extra time, maybe let us escape, or it doesn’t, an’ we have to fight’em… I’d rather we had reached’em already, but it can’t be helped now.”

“I see…” She nodded pensively. “I’ll make sure the girls and Shinny are ready to fight.”

“I asked some of the lads to bring up our gun racks… We got some loaded muskets, enchanted crystal balls, o’ course, an’ some stun batons. I asked’em not to use swords an’ the lads be concerned they’ll be too easy a target. But I’d imagine they’d be more effective than with real weapons. I figured that now we’ll be fighting real soldiers things could get hairy if we don’t reign’em in.” He said plainly. “I’m afraid we’re short on options an’ all we can do is deal with them as best as we can, but I’d rather we not provoke the Wonderbolts by injuring’em.”

“I suppose.” She sighed. “What can we do to help? I am sure that the girls and Shinny can hold our ground, but this is my first fight in an airship ever.”

“Just make sure they don’t grab ya, lass. They be Wonderbolts. They’ll board us an’ force us to hoof-to-hoof. It’s gonna get hairy. Ye got a horn. Use it however you can an’ leave the shooting an’ maneuvering t’us. Till then, I’ll be at the helm. Should get yourself tied to the main mast, lass. Fighting in these airships be like a storm at sea. She’ll throw ya ‘round, unless they force us to’stop. I rather avoid that.”

She nodded and he walked off, replaced by one of the pegasus crewponies with a rope for her. It was the one she talked to last night. The one that was going to tell her about their life as pirates before working for her. “’Scuse me, princess. I’ll tie this thing for ya.”

Cadance approached them while she sat and the pegasus passed the rope around her chest and shoulders like a harness. Cadance didn’t seem to like the rope very much, and she stared in a weird way that Twilight didn’t fully understand. She was so weird after that dream of hers, but Twilight did understand when she voiced her complaint. “Is this really necessary? I should be able to fly, and we’ll end up tangled in one another.”

“Better than getting yer wings caught in the wind an’ getting dragged out the airship when she maneuvers, princess.” He explained while he worked. “We’ll be turning an’ banking in speed to evade‘em. You’d have to catch up to the ship if the wind tosses you out, then you’re easy picking for’em Wonderbolts.”

Cadance examined her own improvised rope harness. “I guess so, then… But… How don’t you get tangled?”

“Ya gotta be mindful of yer place in the airship, princess. Shouldn’t be a problem though, cause the ship is gonna be flying fast an’ we won’t be fighting, unless they catch us. If they do, they’ll have us hooked an’ their ship is gonna stop ours. Then we’ll cut the ropes and fight. Till then, best keep to yer place.”

Cadance blinked. “But their ship isn’t that much faster.”

The pegasus shook his head. “Engines that go faster aren’t necessarily stronger Princess. Those’ll usually be slower, but more powerful. An’ any ship that’s got ballistas nowadays ought ta have a separate engine just to pull with those things. Assuming that’s the Wonderbolt’s strategy. It’s what the Guards do. An’ Wonderbolts be Guards.”

Cadance frowned and made a funny face. “Guess we should run, then. So, fighting in an airship is like being in a storm at sea, without the fighting.”

“Aye.” He nodded.

“Sounds like we either shouldn’t be fighting, or we shouldn’t be flying.” Twilight giggled.

“Pretty much, Princess. ’Scuse me… I got stuff to do.”

He nodded a small reverence and turned to leave while Twilight lightly tested the rope with her hooves, but she noticed that Cadance snapped her head toward the pegasus walking away with her ears perked up.

“Did he just say something?” She asked, confused.

Having heard nothing and distracted by the curious knots the pony had used, Twilight simply stared calmly at her. “Hmm?”

Cadance frowned. “Never mind. I think I’m just on edge.”

Finally, she smiled at Twilight after he had distanced himself and she was sure he was out of earshot. “You’re very popular with your airship’s crewponies, aren’t’ you?”

“I guess I’m good at making friends.” She chuckled and Cadance gave her a sarcastic laugh.

“I wish that my guards would be excited about me, like yours are or Luna’s and Celestia’s, but I swear they are more excited about Captain Armor than about me.” She tried not to show it, but Twilight saw her drooping ears. Then she waved a hoof with a sigh. “I suppose I ask too much of them. I used to think that we were the reason they joined the Guards. You know… Protecting the Princesses. Doing their bidding.”

Twilight turned to her and stared at her to get her full attention. “I’m a bit worried about you, Cadance. You’ve been talking in a way that makes me think you’re not happy, you know, being who you are.”

She recoiled a bit, raising a hoof at the recollections of her past discussions with Cadance. “Not that I think that you are necessarily wrong… I mean, with the things we’ve found there may be some space for adjustments… But…”

“Don’t worry, Twilight. It’s okay. I just feel a bit lost. I can’t help feeling like there is something that was stolen from me. And at the center of it all are Celestia and Luna. And this secret of theirs. About us. Why don’t you feel the same?”

She did. It’s just that… “I get the feeling that this idea of goddesses is a wrong interpretation. We keep talking about this thing about our creation and of being gods as though we understood it. Discord told us to be aware of these impressions. If I started acting like I own ponies and their ‘friendship’ or something… I fear I would become like Discord did in your dream vision. Throughout my life Princess Celestia taught me that my being a powerful unicorn didn’t put me in a position of being served, but it put me in a position of serving others. Because I could do things they couldn’t, I should do it for them, and they would repay by doing for me things that I can’t. Not like we would owe each other, but rather… We’d enjoy helping each other and revel at being able to help. Am I making sense?”

Cadance listened quietly to her so Twilight pushed further. “It was the lesson I got from the story of Nightmare Moon. Princess Luna acted as though she owned the night and that ponies owed her something for it and for protecting their dreams. It almost cost her everything.”

Cadance nodded at that, but she didn’t seem too convinced. Maybe it was a good idea to stop for a while, sort out their thoughts and talk about what they felt before going on. Maybe without the others. The timing couldn’t be worse, though, with the Wonderbolts hunting them. Perhaps it would be a good idea to get caught and let Princesses Celestia and Luna do some explaining. That whole thing seemed to be getting out of control.

The problem was… Could she even trust them?

So, she changed the subject with a soft murmur and thankfully Cadance didn’t oppose. “We need a shield. Think you can envelop the airship in a shield?”

“Easy.” Cadance shrugged. “But they’ll shoot cannons on us, won’t they? I guess I can hold for some time, but I’m not sure for how long. Won’t the shield slow the airship down, though?”

“You would have to shape it correctly. Hardly an issue for you.” Twilight shrugged too, but Cadance had other thoughts.

“Maybe we should go on the offensive.”

“Just… Attack them?” Twilight blinked at her.

“We’re not good at airship combat, Twi. But I bet that you and I could rip their ship apart if we tried.”

Twilight had to agree with her. If they wanted, they could. It might take a while, but they would be able to defeat whatever spells enchanted their hull and rip it apart. The problem was doing that while they were shooting at them and at their friends. And there was also the problem that it was possible, and likely, that their ship had unicorns in its crew compliment. They had to have at least one unicorn onboard to work the magical systems. It just seemed like a bad idea all around, but it was best not to say it like that. “We have to be careful not to hurt them, though.”

“They’re pegasi… They can just keep flying.” Cadance didn’t seem very worried, or simply didn’t think the same as Twilight. “I mean, if their airship wasn’t so fast and we could simply escape… But in this situation, I think we should attack first. You and I.”

“We should have discussed this with the others first.” Twilight shook her head and let her ears fall. “If we do things we haven’t planned for, we’ll end up messing the whole thing for our friends.”

The other seemed convinced. “Alright. But if things start to go wrong, that is a possibility.”

Twilight nodded in agreement and not a second later one of the pegasi, one standing in the bow, watching the clouds they were moving into screamed and drew their attention.

“There’s an airship in the clouds! It’s an ambush! Captain! It’s an ambush!” He pointed frantically at the clouds, and everything happened too fast. Twilight barely saw a large airship with a metallic hull peeking out of the largest cloud and the Captain yelled for everypony to hold on. Then her airship banked violently, and her engines sounded like angry monsters while she barely kept her balance, jumped and grabbed the railing with a panicked flurry of pony legs.

It was a sharp turn towards the left that avoided the collision. They came so close Twilight could see the rivets holding the metallic plates and the rust on their edges. She heard her friends screaming and for a second, she feared one of the wingless ones would drop overboard with how much the ship banked and vibrated. But fortunately, they had all tied themselves to the main mast as the crewmembers had told them and they also managed to hold on to whatever was close.

Shining held on to his rope slinging it around his leg and kept on his hooves despite it being tied like a harness around his shoulders. His horn shone and a curved white magical shield with his cutie mark manifested itself next to the airship right on time to glance off a ballista bolt the shot from one such weapon on the pursuing ship’s bow. It seemed it could be swiveled in a turning table or something. Interesting, but fortunately they missed thanks to her brother.

“Good job Shinny!” She grinned and turned to see his angry and pained grimace.

“Those things are enchanted with armor piercing magic! They’ll melt through the hull if they hit us!”

“Let’s not get hit then!” The Captain shouted, turning the wheel like a roulette and caused the ship to bank even further, turning and turning to the left. Twilight managed to hold onto the railing of the right side and was sure that her weight and momentum would’ve hurt, but her barding’s padding protected her. To her distress, she saw that the other ship not only could turn much faster, but also had cut the rope and let the bolt that failed to connect fall, which could only mean they were preparing to fire again. And it had two baslistae on its bow. She tried thinking of something to do, but nothing came to her head that wasn’t holding on.

And that the diamond dog crew seemed very well adapted to the task with their bulky frames and opposing thumbs. Wait… Diamond dogs in an airship? What the hay?

Then the Captain shouted again. “Other side, Captain Armor!”

That was when she heard thunder.

That was her first thought. That she had just thunder, but the thunderstorm was too far. Then explosions ripped across Shining’s shield in the air and she screamed at the scare with her friends. Magical energy rippled through and she finally realized that the wonderbolt airship had turned their broadside to them and left a trail of smoke. Worse, not only the magical wave gave her a headache, but her ship’s magical engines made a weird noise that Twilight could only compare to coughing. Or sputtering.

“They actually shot cannons at us!” Cadance shrieked next to her, holding on to the railing next to Twilight.

“Get a hold of yourselves!” Shining shouted at them with his ears pulled down and a weary expression. “This is gonna get hairy! They’re firing magic disruption balls at us!”

“They’re trying to shut off our engines!” The Captain screamed over the airship’s howling engines and the wind messing with her mane and her robes. “We gotta lose them now!”

“That’s a thing?” Cadance gasped at her. Twilight supposed it made sense since Princess Celestia would never allow them to fire real ammunitions at them.

Then the engines ‘coughed’ again. Twilight actually felt it and knew exactly what happened. The Wonderbolt airship had a team of unicorns that was trying to interfere with their engines too! She didn’t even know it was possible, but if lightning could do it, then she supposed trained unicorns could too. So, on top of firing rounds at them that would shut off their engines and give them a headache, they were casting spells on her airship. They really didn’t want them to escape!

“They know exactly what they are doing! It all happened too fast. They must have a whole strategy planned out.” She took a second to appreciate just how stupid her comment was. “Well… They are professionals.”

The airship finally leveled out, putting the strange rusted metal airship astern, but Twilight also realized that the golden hulled Wonderbolt airship followed them on their turn and kept facing it with their broadside.

“We gotta do something!” Cadance called, finally on her four hooves again.

“We gotta escape is what we gotta do!” Shinning shouted back. “We only fight if they manage to stop us!”

“Can’t you all shoot magic at them or something?” Applejack called back at Twilight, from the other side of the deck, holding to the railing with a leg and holding her hat with the other hoof.

Twilight blinked. Yes… They could! “Starlight! Help us! Try to hit the wonderbolt airship on their engines!”

“I’ll try!” She shouted back and galloped as fast as she dared in the uncertain floor and over the ropes towards the railing, soon followed by Twilight and Cadance.

Shining though looked to one side to see the metallic, somewhat rusted airship and then at the other. “We gotta do something about that other ship!”

Twilight looked back at him. “The Wonderbolts are going to keep chasing us!”

Then she turned her attention back to the wonderbolt ship. It was far away. Too far for them to hit anything with magic and still cause some damage. Both Cadance and Starlight proved this fact when they shot magical beams and missiles at the airship and neither managed to hit or simply didn’t have enough power to damage the magical components at a distance, after all, a military airship ought to have its magical engines protected.

Something hers didn’t. The more she thought about the situation, the worst is seemed to get.

“At least we tried…” Cadance frowned next to her.

“Could’ve bought an airship with guns, couldn’t you, Twi?” Rainbow leered at her from her other side.

“Actually, those are regulated. And way more expensive.” She shot back. “So, no. I couldn’t have bought an airship with guns!”

“You are a princess!” Rainbow insisted. “Possibly a goddess.”

“Not now, Rainbow!” Twilight pulled her ears back to match her friend’s.

“They’re firing again!” A crewpony shouted over their arguing and Shining’s shield manifested again with white light and his cutie mark, rippling with magical energy where the ball shots dispersed their magical effect into, but they still screamed at the noise and magical energy those things radiated.

He put a hoof on the side of his head once they were safe and he lowered his shield. “Damn…”

Suddenly the ship shook with a crunching noise. “What happened? Oh no!”

She looked back and sure enough, the metal airship that popped out of the clouds managed to hit their stern with both of their ballistae. Instants later the ropes tensed, and the airship rocked so hard it threw Twilight and the others around the deck. She was glad they had taken the time tie themselves to the main mast.

“Ooow…” She and Cadance whined with their backs to the railing.

If that wasn’t enough, she could hear her airship’s engines struggling and the coarse noise of the other airship’s engines fighting against it.

“They’ve caught us!” The Captain yelled from the wheel. “Somepony do something ‘bout those ropes or we ain’t going nowhere and their unicorns aren’t gonna keep failing to turn off our engines forever! And they’re bound to hit us eventually. Situation ain’t good in multiple ways!”

Shining Armor galloped past her, Twilight jumped to follow him, and Cadance wasn’t too far behind, both trying not to trip in all the ropes in the deck, when they reached the aft railing of her airship and could see both heavy and girthy ropes connected to the heavier airship. The bolts seemed to have fully penetrated her ship’s hull and lodged themselves in the underdeck.

“We gotta cut these ropes or get those things out!” She cried with her legs on the railing. Then she grimaced at the next thought. “I hope they didn’t hurt anypony or damage any important component.”

Worse, the ropes shone with a pink light that indicated they were enchanted. Twilight couldn’t properly analyze the spell from that far away, but she doubted getting rid of those would be easy. Then she turned her attention to the airship that trapped them.

“What is that thing?”

“It’s a converted griffon whaling ship.” Shining told her. “They’re pulling us to them!”

She noticed it too. It made sense if it used to be a whaling ship. She just didn’t want to think too long about whaling ships though. Instead, she stared at the thing, trying to figure out something about it. Find anything to exploit, but despite being rusted out in some places, her hull seemed solid and the ballistae on her bow seemed sturdy, metal-reinforced wood. She couldn’t even see where the ropes were fixated. That was when she saw a pony she thought she might never, ever see again. A grape colored obese earth pony with a brown mane put held on to the railing with his legs, glowering fiercely at her wearing some sort of backpack over his leather barding.

“We’ll get you now!” She blinked a couple of times at the sight. At least his coat did seem a lot healthier than before… “You’re not getting away this time!”

“Hum… Do you know him?” Cadance asked on her side.

“It’s a long story… Let’s just say that he doesn’t like me very much.”

Then some of his ponies showed up on the railing. With muskets. She and Cadance screamed but fortunately Cadance thought fast and summoned a bubble shield around them. Their barding might protect them, but better safe than sorry.

“Shoot back!” Shinning yelled at them, while Starlight Glimmer dived to hide behind Twilight and Cadance.

He also shot magical missiles at the ponies, but with the ship swaying one way and the other with the Captain trying to escape, more than that, the other ship’s railing had been reinforced with metal sheets. And to make things even worse, their ship was slightly above theirs. They really couldn’t be on a worse position and he kept hitting nothing but metal, and by the time her own crewponies started shooting back, Shining had already been hit a few times and only remained standing because the magic in his barding protected him.

The problem remained though, that they couldn’t hit any of their attackers.

“This is not working! We have to get ourselves free before the other ship comes in!” Her brother shouted and Twilight convinced herself they should’ve prepared better rather than keep talking about things they don’t really understand. “Twilight! Cadance! Get down there and see if you can get us free!”

Finally, Shining Armor put his shield spell on her airship’s railings and created some level of survivability for their ponies to fight back, and her ship’s crewponies gathered there to shoot their muskets other than awkwardly hiding by the stairs to the raised deck above her quarters or the protection they put around the wheel.

It didn’t surprise Twilght to see her brother taking command, but it was funny seeing Applejack and Rainbow Dash also taking command of the crew. She had never figured it out, but Rainbow actually had training on how to shoot their lever-trigger muskets. She really needed to stop underestimating Rainbow Dash.

And Applejack was Applejack. The practical farmpony that got things done.

“Come on, girls!” No time to think about that, though. Twilight cut the rope she was tied with and rushed towards the stairs down the main deck.

Cadance and Starlight mimicked and followed, fortunately avoiding the shots from the attacking airship, but the first growled loudly next to Twilight as they made their way. “We should be on the offensive! They just can’t hold their own against us!”

“We’re only two, Cadance!” Twilight shouted back over the sound of muskets and the magical engines. They passed two crewponies still using the elevated roof of the private room as cover and rushed towards the stairs to the underdeck. “They’ll overwhelm us!”

“We’ll be overwhelmed when Princesses Celestia and Luna show up! If we do something now, we’ll have a chance at escaping!”

“We’re not invincible, Cadance!” Twilight stared at her for a second before going down the stairs. Fortunately, Cadance came with, right behind Starlight Glimmer. “We won against Ponyville’s militia, but they didn’t have the Wonderbolts helping them, and neither were we on a flying airship!”

“I wasn’t there!” Cadance insisted, but Twilight ignored her.

And on her way down, she almost fell face first on the crystalized metal wall when the airship maneuvered. Once down she could immediately see the magical systems of her airship past the pantry, including the giant, pink crystal shinning blocks that were the mana batteries on either side. On the back wall the harpoon bolts pierced the hull and their four bladed broadheads secured them in place. Their unicorn crewmember, the one responsible for the magical systems used his telekinetic magic to try and dislodge the things but didn’t have a lot of luck. Looking closely the head blades were retractable and expanded well beyond the point where they pierced the hull. It seemed simply impossible to remove them without cutting them apart or around them. And they were, of course, enchanted.

“Princess!” He was a white and blue unicorn with a small cluster of stars for cutie mark and a short mohawk mane. “This thing is stuck for good!”

“Yikes!” Starlight looked at the star-shaped points. “Almost hit one of the mana batteries.”

“Can’t we cut these things out?” Twilight immediately analyzed the enchantments and didn’t waste a lot of time on it. She saw it would take a long time to dispel one of those, much more both of them! Breaking would be just as hard as they were also enchanted with all sorts of protective spells.

“These things have got to have come from the Royal Armory!” Cadance complained. “I doubt we can cut or break these in practical time, Twilight! Maybe we can cut the hull around it?”

“It is also magically reinforced, Cadance!” Twilght grimaced. “Maybe if we knew the right spells.”

“Then we’re out of options, Twilight.”

She grimaced and agreed, then she frowned because her patience was limited too. “Alright. Looks like you got your wish.”

“Let’s kick their rumps.” The other princess grinned wildly at her and turned to rush outside leaving Twilight to see her robes flowing behind her. While she followed Cadance back up, she could feel a creeping headache encroaching and Starlight was right behind her.

Almost reaching the top of the stairs she remembered they were shooting muskets with stunning magical ammunition and even if her barding would protect her, it was just stupid to rush outside like Cadance had just done.

“Cadance! Get back here!” She really felt that headache while Starlight screeched to a halt next to her and she wished she had the slightest idea of what was going on inside Cadance’s head. “Cadance!”

But she simply jumped the last two steps and hopped on the deck, beating her wings and spinning while drawing her magical bow from her back. She focused her magic through it for a second and let several fast-flying pink magical missiles that dented the metallic hull of the other airship. At least she caused the ponies and a griffon to hide behind the railing for a while and a few seemed to have pierced through and may have hit the others on the other side. But she just exposed herself!

“Riveting…” Twilight grumbled. No strategy, no preparation, just dumb impulse.

As soon as they felt safe, they went back to shoot a whole volley at her, but Cadance had already prepared herself and Twilight had to admit that the way Cadance snaked around and dodged mid-flight was rather impressive, even if she seemed to have been hit a few times.

She dove behind the airship next, though and Twilight saw a big white and gray griffon in leather armor jump off their ship, followed by two pegasi, and flew to meet her under Twilight’s ship. Cadance would have to take care of herself though because Twilight had some actually thought out and strategic spellcasting to do.

Similarly, she flew up and summoned her staff, focusing her magic through it. Her horn and the staff released six purple magic missiles, but instead of hitting the hull, hers exploded right above the railing where ponies and diamond dogs hid to reload their muskets and covered the entire front of the deck with sticky bubblegum. It was one of her favorite combat spells because it was effective, and it was a variation of a spell she had used to good effect before with those ponies.

Hopefully it would jam the firing mechanisms in their weapons, confuse and delay them a little and at least they would be forced to change their guns, and it seemed to have worked. It gave her some time to think and for her ponies to regroup.

While they angrily tried to free their weapons and rid themselves of the bubblegum Twilight turned her attention to the Wonderbolt’s ship. It still maneuvered to keep her airship under its guns’ aim, and it worried her that they hadn’t moved in to board them yet.

Suddenly her ship’s engines ‘choked’, for lack of a better word and it simply stopped under the whaling ship’s pull. She sighed and pulled her ears back. The Captain simply shrugged at her from the wheel. Fortunately, Starlight still was hunkered by the stairs to the underdeck.

“I’ll see if I can do something about it!” She yelled before she turned to go back down the stairs and Twilight took a moment to see that she was rather vulnerable and grimaced at the fact that it was sheer luck that she managed to keep flying above the airship like that. It seemed like a really dumb thing to do when everypony had firearms.

Her friends fought along the crewponies and Rainbow thankfully hadn’t done anything too rash. It was rather funny the way Rarity angrily carried a musket in her magic as though her anger might make it more powerful. At least Twilight had given then a moment or two to breathe.

Then a griffon on the whaling ship drew her attention, as he walked behind the ponies and diamond dogs trying to clean their muskets. “If you want something done right, you have to do it yourself.”

Not only his boastful, puffed up chest and haughty gait amused Twilight, but also the reactions from the ponies and diamond dogs with the collective ‘not this again’ expression. It was a small yellow furred griffon, with black spots and a white head. He wore a belt holding a pair of griffon golden adorned revolvers and many bullets.

“What do you say, Princess?” He smiled all smug at her, while drawing and spinning his revolver on his trigger finger. “Shall we dance?”

“Nice gun, I’ll give you that. But the engraving gives you no tactical advantage whatsoever.” She smirked at him and he growled.

“I keep hearing that…”

Then she tried telekinetically grabbing his revolver from his paw and he almost lost it, with big surprised eyes while she still grinned at him.

“Whoa! Hey!” He did not like that. “I’ll show you!”

He aimed his gun at her, but Twilight acted just as quickly, anticipating him. She dropped to the deck and covered herself with her wings and a shield spell. She underestimated the effect of the stunning bullets and while she was fine after he unloaded the gun on her, the spell the bullets caused her head to feel empty. It was simply hard to connect her thoughts.

She shook her head and looked just in time to see that the griffon had jumped at her and came down with his claws first. She screamed and drew her sword out of the air to protect herself, despite her magical shield. His claws rasped on her shield and it collapsed. She was sure he would’ve reached her if her sword wasn’t in the way.

Her head was still fuzzy, and she didn’t quite know how to react next when he used his revolver to bat away at her sword and reached with his other forelimb. What saved her was Rainbow Dash, tackling the griffon away and into the floor but he distanced himself with a beat of his wings.

Next thing she knew, Cadance was back in the airship, on her back against the floor with the big griffon on top of her while she kept him away with her legs and he tried jabbing her with a crystal stun baton. She looked furious and the two pegasi just arrived seconds later.

The whole thing was not going as planned at all!

Or wouldn’t be going had they actually planned at all!

“Twi! You okay?!” Rainbow asked, still glaring at the smaller griffon, who casually reloaded his revolver and twitched it closed. She just realized she stood there doing nothing!

“Yes. Thank you.” She shook her head again and the griffon curiously holstered his weapon, which caused her to hold her next attack. It was funny when griffons used that stance, standing on their hindlegs. Their forelimbs and fingers made it a lot more practical and she remembered reading that the act of pointing was just more natural to them. Maybe that was why they were the ones that invented guns. His posture seemed that much more balanced, not to mention that griffons seem to have it easier balancing themselves with the way theirs muscle mass seemed to be distributed. Not that it would be easy, but…

What was she doing studying the griffon’s form in the middle of a fight?

“This…” He pointed a finger at her and she lowered her stance to a fighting one. “Is not going to end the way you think it is. Surrender before it gets ugly and someone gets injured for real.”

Then his finger pointed behind her and she turned to see that the Wonderbolt airship was maneuvering to approach them side by side. Fast. Her ponies still fought, though. Thanks to Shining Armor’s shield spell on the railings. Musket fire was near constant and fortunately they were too busy shooting at each other to bother with her and Rainbow Dash.

Applejack sat with her back to the railing. “This really ain’t gonna end well for us, Twilight! We gotta do something in a hurry!”

As she spoke more of the enchanted musket balls exploded against the shield spell, and it seemed to hold, but Shining Armor wasn’t fighting anymore. He just hid next to the door to the private quarters and focused on his spell with Twilight’s two guards next to him, armed with muskets and their halberds. He got the brunt of the impact and the stunning effect that ammunition would have and he just wouldn’t be able to hold much longer.

“Last chance, Princess.” The nimble griffon insisted.

A pink flash showed Cadance was done playing with the bigger griffon and he yelped, flying past them and drawing the smaller griffon’s attention. Twilight took the opportunity to cast her personal subduing spell at him. The small magical missile hit, and he screamed his surprise when he found himself enveloped in a ball of bubblegum.

It was rather amusing to see the griffon glowering at her as though she had cheated or something, or at her superior grin.

She found the other griffon with his back to the foremast, and Cadance ran at him with the bladed edge of her bow which dented into the mast with a sickening crunch after the griffon ducked and then punched Cadance in the muzzle.

“Dude! Did you just punch my wife?” Shining yeleld at him from his hiding place and the griffon stopped for a second looking at Shining Armor and then Cadance rubbing her muzzle, and then back at Shining Armor.

“She almost killed me!” He gestured at Cadance’s bow still stuck to the mast.

Instants later she thrust her horn on his chest with a shock spell that sent him sliding on the crystalized metal deck all the way to the magically enhanced railing.

“Uh… My bad…” Shining added.

Meanwhile Cadance angrily pulled and swung her enchanted bow at the female pegasus that jumped out of the way and the other kept his distance, both rearing to attack her with those stunning magical rods. She was about to join Cadance when she heard the unmistakable raspy laughing of the Wonderbolt commander and turned to see her flying above them with several of her colleagues wearing a streamlined version of the Royal Guard armor that Twilight had never seen. It seemed lighter despite the additional armor and… Weapons attached to forelegs and their sides.

“You’re going down, Rainbow Crash!” She laughed while she and her wingponies zoomed above and threw something that Twilight didn’t quite see at the distance.

Shining rose his shield spell again and covered most of the ship with it. Little balls exploded one by one on his shield. It lasted for a few seconds more before Shining collapsed to the floor.

“Captain Armor!” White Leaf dropped her musket and yelled at him, shaking him in her hooves as Twilight and Cadance rushed to them. The later called his name and the others gave her space. Just to be sure, Twilight took one last look around. Rainbow had come with them and both griffons were still out. The two pegasi rushed forward when Shining collapsed and Cadance was distracted, but they didn’t seem confident enough to attack when Twilight’s crewponies came to help with their own stunning rods.

The worst part of it was that Shining’s spell on the railings collapsed and that caught her friends and crewponies unaware. They started dropping too fast for her to follow, hit by the musket fire from the whaling ship. Thank goodness those were stunning bullets.

Then Cadance growled angrily while her shorn charged up with power and unleashed a wave of magical energy that coalesced into a bubble shield enveloping the airship.

Things immediately calmed down as the Wonderbolts outside couldn’t get in and the shield stopped the musket balls from reaching them.

“This is bad!” Rainbow shrieked next to them. “The engines are out, and we’re stuck in here! Cadance can’t keep this up forever!”

As though answering to her, the obese pony on the converted whaler ship pointed a hoof at them. “Keep shooting! They can’t hold forever!”

And adding to that, Spitfire signaled to their airship while hovering above them. Twilight didn’t need to understand their signal language to know she was ordering the ship to go back to pummeling them.

Her friends seemed to be fine, though, staring at her, grouped together while the pegasi carried their stunned crewmates to the underdeck and Starlight stared at her from the stair downwards.

“Can’t do anything, Twilight.” She shook her head, all defeat. “Our unicorn says the ship engines are out for at least three hours until he’s cleaned them of the magic disruption.”

“Can we help?” Cadance asked, sitting on the floor and holding Shining Armor who snored, peacefully and softly.

“I don’t think that you can, Princess! This thing is complicated, and he is the only one that knows how to purge the magical systems without damaging the imprinted spells.”

“I should have studied about it at some time…” Twilight grumbled to herself.

“Well, we’ll hold our ground!” Rainbow shouted, all determined and hoofing at the floor. “They may beat us, but it won’t be without a fight.”

Just as soon as she closed her mouth the cannons in the Wonderbolt airship sounded again. Much closer. Twilight didn’t have a clue if the distance influenced the effectiveness of the magical disruption enchantment in their ammunition, but Cadance yelped with the impact on her shield, and glared at the airship.

“That hurt! It wasn’t as bad when King Sombra tried to enter my shield!”

“They’re using magic disruption. It’s a wide-spectrum form of counterspell rather than trying to overwhelm your magic.” Twilight walked to her. “It’s how you’re supposed to do it, actually. King Sombra was the one that didn’t know what he was doing.”

Rarity frowned. “Is it not illegal to shoot at sentient beings with magical disruption ammunition?”

“They’re not shooting at us!” Twilight explained. “They’re shooting the airship with shells that explode before impact. It you shoot a magical bullet of that sort at a creature… We don’t know what happens, but it can’t be good. The thing is that the exploding shells release the spell in a wide area, and it messes with your magical senses. The intention is to overwhelm your magical senses so much that you shut off… Or something like that. It’s the same with the ship’s engines. Like casting a stunning spell to disrupt the imprinted magic that makes them work.”

“Thanks Twilight…” Pinkie walked closer too. “We really, really, really needed to know all that. Now, how do we deal with it?”

“Well, the thing is that we can’t.” She glowered at the pink pony. “That is why it is a good strategy: they force us to attack because it’s going to drain our defenses, but we can’t attack.”

“Maybe it is a good time to surrender.” The small griffon casually reminded her from his bubblegum prison and the bigger griffon, tied next to him stared blankly at the horizon. The two pegasi that had followed him were also tied next to them and the colt seemed dejected, while the mare seemed passively angry.

“We ain’t talking to you all.” Applejack pulled the rope, finishing to tie up the male pegasus. “Are we seriously just gonna stand here and hope Princess Cadance can hold the shield for long enough?”

“We may not have a choice, AJ.” Twilight insisted.

“I’ll go see if I can help our unicorn crewpony anyway.” Starlight said and turned to go back down. “You better stay here and keep things under control.”

Twilight nodded and looked around. Things seemed to be under control inside Cadance’s shield: her crewponies took their unconscious mates to the safety of the underdeck and now hurried to defensive positions, her friends surrounded her, Cadance kept the shield up and sat on the floor with Shining Armor sleeping peacefully in her hooves. Outside the shield the ponies and diamond dogs in the whaling ship kept shooting at them, certainly trying to wither down the shield which unfortunately didn’t break the ropes.

She grimaced. She ought to be thankful the ropes didn’t disrupt the shield in any noticeable way.

Spitfire retreated back to the Wonderbolt airship, which was closer, but simply kept in its place, and shot volley after volley of enchanted ammunition at them.

It was just an awkward situation. “Uh… Does anypony have any ideas?”

“Did we really go to the Changeling Rock, and then ran all the way from Ponyville to Baltimare just to get stuck inside a shield?” Spike lashed out with open arms. “Come on! You guys gotta do something!”

“Don’t you worry, Spikey.” Rarity waved a hoof at him, unworried. “We have been in worse situations and found a way out.”

“Why don’t we ransom them out for our freedom?” Cadance nodded at their prisoners. “It was something that was done liberally in the past.”

“Because we’re not in the past anymore?” Twilight raised an eyebrow at her. What was she thinking? That Princess Celestia was going to pay gold or something for her griffon… Who were they?

She approached the group. The big griffon definitively looked like some sort of ex-military with that ugly scar of his. Most likely, a veteran from the Second Griffon War. The other griffon was smaller and younger, with a completely different coat pattern and Twilight didn’t think they were father and son. Probably simple partners in profession. The two pegasi were another story. They didn’t seem like Royal Guards either. Maybe they were from the Ponyville Militia since she saw Lord Grape Donut in the airship. The mare’s muzzle looked a bit awkward. “What happened to you?”

“What do you think, genius?” She barked. “Your stupid friend broke my muzzle! They gave me a healing potion and sent me to catch you!”

“Hey!” Rainbow approached them. “First of all, calling Twilight a genius is an actual fact. And second, you asked for it!”

“Who are you guys?” Twilight insisted.

The big griffon answered. “We’re mercenaries, Princess. Bounty hunters most of the time. These two pegasi are with Ponyville’s town militia. Princess Celestia hired us to help train the militia and part of it is apprehending you and your cohorts. So, could you please? I’m not even getting paid for this, but to train them.”

“He’s the one that tried to arrest me in my house.” Rainbow chuckled.

“Really cool trick you did with the ice, Rainbow Dash.” The griffon complimented her. “Griffons can’t do that.”

Rainbow took a moment to bask in her ego and Twilight nodded at the information, then the griffon spoke again. “Flying Snake, Princess. That one is Ocelot.”

“I don’t know you.” She put a hoof on her chin, staring at the griffon and he wasn’t exactly worried.

“You only know royal sponsored knights, Princess. They aren’t real mercenaries. They want fame and recognition more than money since the Crown sponsors them.”

“Mercenaries you say?” Rarity approached with what Twilight supposed was a seductive grin. “What if we pay you extra to leave us alone? Maybe even distract the Wonderbolts for us? Hum?”

“It doesn’t really work like that ma’am.” The smaller griffon deadpanned. “We have a reputation to keep.”

“They’re mercenaries, Lady Rarity, but we are with the Ponyville militia.” The pegasus colt said proudly and the mare huffed. “We are loyal to Princess Celestia.”

“Shouldn’t you guys be loyal to Twilight?” Spike grunted. “I mean… You live in Ponyville. And she lives there…”

“It’s not like that Spike. Princess Celestia’s, authority kinda trumps mine. Actually, I’m only the fourth Princess of Equestria. Ponies usually don’t care about that, but it’s apparently kind of important when we’re fighting against each other.”

The Wonderbolt airship fired its guns at them again and Cadance’s shield held, as did she, if she did groan angrily again and stared at the ship as though she could murder it.

“Are you gonna be okay, Cadance?” Twilight worried Cadance’s recent experience might impact on her ability to keep focus. She might end up hurting herself, but regardless, Cadance nodded at her.

“Not exactly what I intended to do, but this is what we got.”

“Will you guys just give up? This whole mess is your fault!” The pegasus mare lashed out. “And you’re screwed. You can’t just hold this thing forever.”

“Actually, it’s all Celestia’s and Luna’s fault.” Cadance glared at her.

“Whatever.” The pegasus rolled her eyes. “It’s ‘you’ princesses. I just want this mess done with so that I can go home, get my muzzle fixed, sue the Royal House, buy a mansion in Cloudsdale and never see these losers or you alicorn jerks ever again!”

Twilight’s ears flopped and her cheeks seemed so hot. “It that what ponies think?”

“No, it’s not, Princess!” The mare was going to say something else, but the colt cut her off. “I mean, we think you’re wrong, but it’s not like that. She’s just callous.”

Then he turned to her. “Come on, Candy! How can you say that? Things are finally looking up to us!”

“Just shut up, Flight Worthy! It’s not looking up for us! We still live in the same dump of a little town where nopony gives a Bit about us and we’re still stuck fighting a fight we can’t win because some jerk princess that doesn’t give a damn about us can’t sit her flank in her throne and not create trouble!”

Twilight’s eyes pointed to the deck and she hoofed mindlessly at it. “It’s not my job to worry about you guys. I’m sorry. I never knew that my being there was such a stress for you. Nopony ever complained about anything to me… I would’ve helped if I knew there was a problem!”

Twilight felt too awful to say anything else and Applejack came to her. “Stop defending yourself, sugar cube. That pony there is just angry.”

“Do you want to know what the problem with you is, Miss Crush?” The griffon, of all the present spoke. “You think that everyone is wrong so that you don’t have to see that you are wrong. If you want things to get better, you have to change too. You are not good at your work, certainly not better than the others, but your Lord Protector at least is trying his best. All of them are. That is why I am helping. That is why Princess Celestia gave you guys another chance. You are surrounded with good ponies but you can’t see past your petty bullshit.”

It helped hearing that, but Twilight almost gasped when Cadance approached the tied-up mare and her ears fell at the stare she received from the Princess.

“You should be quiet.” Cadance stared down the little pegasus. “You don’t understand what you’re talking about. But even more because you are offending me and my friends while you are not in a position to be rude. And your griffon friend is right.”

The other airship fired its cannons again and Cadance winced when the magical balls exploded against her shield, but she held it, giving the belligerent mare a final stare before returning to Twilight and friends.

“She’s right, though…” Applejack spoke first. “I reckon Princess Cadance, as powerful as she is, just plain can’t hold the shield up forever.”

“Yeah…” Rainbow agreed. “We gotta do something!”

“Even if the crewponies manage to restart the engines, we’re still stuck to the whaling ship and the Wonderbolts won’t let us leave!” Fluttershy didn’t strike Twilight as very confident in their ability to deal with the present situation. “What are we going to do?”

“I’ll tell you what we’re not going to do!” Twilight tried her best at sounding brave, it was the least she should do for her friends. “We are not going to give up! We’ve come too far and the more we learn, the more we need to learn. There is just no stopping now!”

“We like your enthusiasm, Princess…” White Leaf told her, all worried and most of the others agreed. “But I don’t think that we are in a good position.”

She seemed to mean to speak more, but the Wonderbolt airship fired again and distracted them. Though it seemed too soon, and it sounded different too.

“That sounded different.” She turned to the railing and the golden-hulled airship didn’t seem to have fired just yet.

“That was thunder!” Rainbow followed her more closely than the others, also looking past the railing.

“I could swear that storm is following us…” Rarity mused as they stared at the storm they had seen last night.

“Against the wind!” Rainbow confirmed.

Past the Wonderbolt’s airship the dark clouds definitively had moved to place the former in between them. Then something poked out of the storm. Long black polished metal hull, the airship had a flat top with what looked like a large entrance in the rounded-flat top and above it a series of windows. Its hull widened in the rear in two short and fat wings that seemed to house the thing’s magical engines. It had a pair of white and black wings painted on top of it, following its hull and a jet black ‘beack’ that made for a wicked battering ram. As it shed the storm, like a snake shedding its skin, its hull attracted lightning that run on it and released on the ground bellow with its engines roaring louder still, like an angry storm when they spun up to give it speed.

And it was big!

“What is that thing?” Rarity gasped.

“That is a Ragnarok class warship, Lady Rarity.” The older griffon obliged. “That one in particular is the Skoll. It seems that The Lion wants to chat. You really should be worrying about leaving. As fast as you can.”

“On the contrary.” Cadance grinned. “I think we might want to indulge.”

“What do we do, lass?” The Captain stared at the flying monstrosity and then at Twilight.

“Not much we can do; stuck the way we are.” She shrugged, even if she had been thinking that things are going a bit too far. “I suppose we’ll see what happens for now. Maybe the griffons will help us.”

“I don’t think you’re giving the situation the seriousness it warrants, Princess.” The griffon complained. “Those are the bad guys that want a war to separate Griffonia from the Equestrian Confederacy. And in case you haven’t noticed, they have a monster of a warship coming straight for you!”

“That is not what they want, though…” Rainbow approached.

“For feather’s sake!” Snake cried. “You don’t know what you are dealing with! They are nuts! Princess Celestia thinks that The Lion wants to be friends, but these griffons are biggest nutcases in this world and that is not a good thing as you might think!”

“It sounds as though you know something…” Twilight mused. “Why don’t you tell us?”

“It’s complicated!” The griffon told her, but rather than pressing further, Twilight’s ears perked up when she noticed that Wonderbolt airship had stopped firing at them.

It started maneuvering to deal with the much larger and heavier griffon airship, but it was already on a position of disadvantage because it seemed that nopony had been paying much attention to the clouds that day!

In their defense, nopony expected an airship to come out of a storm.

While a magical beacon shot up from the Wonderbolt airship, the side on Skoll’s armor opened and cannons started firing. The former was a much nimbler airship and, despite the bad start, was already on a position it could fire its cannons from the port side at the griffon warship. They fired at each other at the same time and while the shots exploded on the warship’s hull its own shots exploded on a golden shield that manifested around the other airship upon impact.

Twilight really didn’t expect to see anything like that today and this griffon airship completely changed everything. She needed some time to think.

***

Bored out of his mind, Chocolate Velvet still sat at the deep end of his new cell. He could feel the airship vibrating when its engines spun up and hear the cannons firing. He sighed. Not knowing exactly what was going on sucked and he at least hoped that Celestia would pluck him out of there before scuttling that smelly airship.

He almost startled when the door on the corridor outside his new cell opened and a griffon came inside. It was the green griffon from before.

He grinned internally… Well, well, well… What do you know?

“Do you have the authority to accept a deserter for asylum?” He seemed so serious and wasted no time, going straight to business with his whistling accent.

“Yes…” The alicorn’s eyebrow raised. “I do. And Celestia is bound to listen to me, anyways.”

“Excellent. I’ll help you out of the warship and you put up a good word with the Mare for me.”

“Sounds like a deal.” He grinned, though the griffon didn’t.

Regardless, he did open the cell with no delay using the keys he produced from under his wing. Chocolate walked up and lowered his head, looking up at the hornring. The griffon took a second to understand, but he reached with his paw and effortlessly slid it off.

“Thanks.” Chocolate offered him a hoof and the griffon hesitated for a second. Bumped it with a closed fist, but seemed like he was going to puke. Curious, but something for another time.

“There. Let’s go. It’s a contained chaos, but the crew is bound to notice an alicorn roaming free. I assume you can melt faces off with your magic?”

“I would be more comfortable with a weapon.” The griffon was ready and handed him a griffon-made revolver from under his wing. Plain black metal, six bullets, none of which felt non-lethal to his magical senses. “I guess not killing is not an option.”

The griffon simply gave him a blank expression. “Shoot them where it hurts, not where it kills.”

His medically trained mind objected, but he didn’t think the griffon would care as he was about to open the door after peeking from it.

“So, do you actually have a plan?”

“Yes. Fly to the Princess’ airship and say you accepted my defection.”

“Well, at least it is a simple plan…” Chocolate grumbled.

“Simple works best of all. Especially because plans are bound to fail anyway. Let’s go. I told the idiots guarding this door that I needed additional soldiers to take on the Wonderbolts and they fell for it like milking cubs.”

“I get the feeling there’s a story behind this…”

“No.” He turned and stared sarcastically. “I simply woke up this morning feeling like it would be fun to betray my race.”

“What about your friend?” Maybe he was a bit uncertain about the griffon and his motivation, but he felt like probing it just a little.

The griffon stopped for a second and stared blankly at the door. “I suppose we’re not quite as friendly as we once were. Let’s say that your pony friendship magic doesn’t quite work when your kind thinks of you as inferior.”

Chocolate decided it would be better to save his questions for later, the griffon finally opened the door to an unguarded corridor, and they left.

***

“Are we gonna do something or not?” Rainbow fidgeted next to Twilight.

They still watched as the two flying ships maneuvered circling around, up and down, with the lighter and nimbler airship leading the dance and staying ahead of the big warship’s firing arc most of the time. It seemed that the griffons managed to mount heavy cannons in a way that they could be swiveled and that gave it an advantage that allowed to take potshots at the Wonderbolt airship a lot more frequently that Twilight was comfortable with, even if they never managed to fire their full broadside at them. Every shot exploded violently though.

Another thing she noticed is that the griffon airship seemed to be a bit more advanced than she’d expect. She was used to seeing pony ‘technology’ as the most advanced. That was why they invented the modern airships, the modern spells that allowed for all sorts of industrial applications. It worried her that nothing in that airship seemed particularly ‘pony’ to her. From the way she was built, all closed-up, to the weird magic her engines radiated and the way her cannons sounded different. In fact, that thing didn’t look at all as one of the more usual converted airships she’d expect warships to be.

Not to mention that even if her own airship wasn’t built from scratch it followed that same philosophy of the naval vessels. The griffon airship followed a completely different idea.

“I don’t like this. They’re firing real ammunition at the Wonderbolts, aren’t they?” She turned the Captain.

“They sure are, lass. Never seen anything like it either. They’re firing explosive ammunition like I’ve never saw; faster than any crew I’ve ever met. Also, that thing doesn’t like to turn, but it’s got so much armor everywhere that it can just sit still and take punishment. Reminds me of the mares o’ war they used in the war, but that thing is a lot scarier. An’ can fly.”

“Twilight?” Rainbow insisted.

“I don’t know if we can do anything, Rainbow.” Applejack answered for her since Twilight still had her worried stare over the griffon airship. She had heard Rainbow, but the situation seemed to have gotten a bit out of hoof. Or a lot. Could she be responsible for any injuries those Wonderbolts suffered? Not directly, of course. And not like she feared legal repercussions, but she didn’t want anypony being hurt because of her.

“Are we safe in here?” Fluttershy sounded worried too.

“Well, we are under Cadance’s shield, sugar cube. It is a bit like it was in the Crystal Empire… But I suppose we ought to do something soon… I’m just not sure what.”

“Why don’t we try to talk to the ponies and the diamond dogs in that ship?” Pinkie pointed at the griffon whaling ship. “Now that the griffon ship showed up, they might be willing to talk!”

“They’re way more loyal than that.” The big griffon chuckled. “If anything, they want to get this job done quicker. And if I were you, surrender would be preferable to ending on those griffons’ claws.”

“Who are they?” Twilight asked.

“It’s either The Lion or his kid. And neither are exactly friendly to your kind, Princess.”

“How do you know so much about that airship? And you keep saying that they are bad. Princess Celestia said that him becoming king of the griffons is fine.”

“I don’t work only for you ponies.” The mercenary said. “About two years ago, I was hired to find out what the northerners were doing with the iron they plucked out of the mountains. During that mission I happened upon a changeling spy from a team that Chrysalis had sent to figure out what was going on in the north and he shared some information his team had found. They built that monster in a secret shipyard under a crazy bitch called Gallensa. We told the changelings who that was since they wanted to extract the location of the shipyard from her and sabotage the place. We were going to help, but they followed her trail to Griffindel, and after that we never heard from them again.”

“The changelings probably left you and went back to the Changeling Rock.” Twilight mused. “Not to mention that even with Celestia’s support the Griffonian Standing Army might side with the Chancellor. They may have to fight a civil war. They are preparing for it.”

“We found their heads outside of Griffindell!” The griffon shook his head. “This is not a game, Princess! You ponies don’t understand what is going on! Those griffons have a weird personality cult around the Lion and his mate and some weird ideal about the purity of their blood! I don’t know what their ultimate goal is, but they don’t need a monster like that to take a city like Griffonstone! Wake up!”

His words caused ponies to gasp and Twilight reeled back a step. “Maybe… Maybe they want to use it as a deterrent! To ensure that no one will resist The Lion being crowned king.”

“How come I’ve never been involved in this?” Twilight jumped, startled with Cadance’s anger. “They have probably been buying raw materials for magical components from the Crystal Empire for years and this is the first I’ve heard of this!”

“Cadie, calm down. Please.” Shining was awake, and approached her, but didn’t look too well, despite his attempt at calming her. “I understand why you’re angry, but now is not the time.”

Cadance cried his name and hugged him while he smiled a bit groggily and petted the back of her neck with a hoof.

“Are you okay, Shining?” Twilight asked him in the meanwhile.

“Yeah… Their magical disruption shots put me down for a while, but I’m fine.” Then his ears perked up. “Whoa! What is that thing?”

“A griffon warship…” Twilight pointed. “It came out of that storm.”

“Oh boy… they’re fighting the Wonderbolts?”

“Hey, Captain Armor?” The older, bigger griffon called with a smirk. “Will you convince your dear sister and you lovely wife that thing is trouble, and we should be trying to leave?”

Shining didn’t look very excited at the angry stare he got from Cadance and Twilight stared at him, but inquisitively. “Yeah… I’m inclined to agree.”

“Princesses, when you left Ponyville, Princess Celestia hired me and my team to train the militia. We ended up coming after you and Princess Celestia had my airship teleported in on Baltimare. Well, a few hours later I got a message from her saying that griffons had hijacked the facility and teleported in that monstrosity. And it went after you. We teamed up with the Wonderbolts to ambush you guys here because we wanted to catch you before that airship and Princess Celestia had a fleet searching for it, but they seem to have missed it. Princess Celestia had also sent Prince Chocolate Velvet to flush you out before the griffons arrived at Haybale.”

“Oh… Yeah…” Cadance stared at the floor and rubbed her legs together. “I should have mentioned that…”

“You think?!” Twilight squeaked. “That was what happened in Haybale?”

“Chocolate let me go in Haybale… I thought it wasn’t important or that we should try to contact the griffons, especially because Celestia didn’t want us to come into contact with them and I figured at the time they could have information about the Harpy and the Alicorns.” She said sheepishly, and Twilight was about to tell her how much she screwed up and she didn’t understand why she had done that, but Fluttershy spoke sooner.

“Guys! Look!” Fluttershy’s wings flared as she pointed at the griffon airship and it took Twilight an instant or two before she realized what she was seeing. Flying creatures, most likely griffons, ran from under the raised part on the aft and took flight. Countless black dots. All the while their airship was hit repeatedly by the Wonderbolt airship.

“That looks dangerous with the airships shooting and moving around.” Pinkie said, and it was quite obvious, thus nopony else said anything. Instead they simply watched powerless to do anything as the griffons swarmed the gold hulled airship and it seemed as though there was a fierce exchange of musket fire as the smoke that was already forming up because of the cannons firing started becoming like a mist. Then Twilight and her friends gasped as black dots started falling from the sky.

“Calm… Calm down girls.” Her stomach felt like a cold pit at the sight, but Twilight knew that they ought to be using non-lethal ammunition too. “They’re using stunning bullets and their instincts will force their wings open to soften the fall… At worse they’ll be a bit hurt…”

Then a voice called from the whaling ship. A white female griffon with yellow head pointed at the skirmish in the distance. “Snake! That is messed up! They won’t be ignoring us for long!”

“I know!” The big griffon tied down on her airship nodded to her and friends. “Get these stupid ponies to understand we gotta go!”

“No.” Cadance frowned. “I want to talk to them. Twilight?”

She let a gasp escape at the sound of her name. She hadn’t even noticed until it hurt, but she bit her lip, looking at Cadance and then at the big griffon. Then she looked at Cadance again and her friends. What was she supposed to do? Ideally, they should escape, but that didn’t seem likely with the Magic of Friendship stuck to the heavy whaling ship. Not to mention that if the Wonderbolt airship fired off a magical beacon, they expected reinforcements. Princess Celestia was bound to show up at any time. And what Mister Snake had said resonated from the back of her mind.

“They don’t want to talk, dumbass!” The white griffon lady shouted from the other ship. “They hijacked a teleporter to bring a warship! For feather’s sake!”

Rarity approached Twilight, still wearing her stylish gambeson, and with her sword drawn. “These griffons are with The Lion. They must have information about Emperor Grigor. Maybe even about what caused Princess Celestia to decide for changing our historical records. They may even have more information about the griffon invasion to Equestria, about what happened to Star Swirl and the others and how did the Princesses come to rule Equestria. This is flirting with danger, but it is quite exciting, and we have been doing that for quite some time now. It could get us some answers.”

“They may have something that will force Princess Celestia and Luna to open up about all that!” Cadance insisted.

“Twilight…” Applejack seemed serious. “Cadance and that ‘Snake’ griffon told us that Princess Celestia sent Chocolate Velvet to spook us from Haybale, where you met a griffon with stuff that interested you. Then this here warship showed up and they came after us. They must have known we’d be in Haybale. They used Miss Goodread and Sunburst to set this up, for crying out loud!”

“Applejack is right!” Shining grimaced. “I told you guys it was a trap!”

“Because they wanted to meet us!” Cadance hoofed angrily at the floor. “It doesn’t mean they mean us harm!”

Then Twilight realized something that worried her even more. “What if they have Chocolate Velvet?”

“Oh, crud.” Applejack pulled her hat to her face and grumbled some more. “He can take care of himself! If anything, he put himself in danger so that you all insane ponies don’t get hurt!”

Someone knocked on the shield and they looked up to see a rather big griffon wearing an intricately adorned armor with gray fur adornments and a greatsword on his back. Purple coat and mustard head with golden eyes full of superior glee, he hovered just outside of it. He was also surrounded with mean looking griffons in black and golden armor carrying the griffon revolver muskets and other weapons. He was also accompanied by other more distinctive griffons, but the one that really drew Twilight’s attention was the yellow and white one with a light, form-fitting armor of golden plates and several crystals attached to it. She waved wiggling her fingers, and Twilight really didn’t like her grin one bit.

“Well met, your highnesses.” He smirked and spoke with an accent. “I would have presented myself more formally, but the present situation is rather unorthodox, and I believe better presentations can wait. I am Grigory, Heir to the Lion, and this beautiful griffoness here is my mate, Lady Gallensa. May we perhaps be of assistance?”

“Uhhhhhhhh….” Was all that Twilight managed to say as her ears gradually fell to the sides of her head. “Yes… Greetings? Uh…”

“Can you get us rid of that thing?” Cadance pointed at the whaling ship, where the ponies and diamond dogs stopped firing, and the griffon lady looked ready to murder somepony with the way she stared at them.

“Yes.” The griffon replied casually, then directed his attention at their griffon prisoner. “Greetings, Master Flying Snake.”

“Go fuck yourself.” The other said with the same murderous stare, but Grigory ignored that.

“I believe it would benefit all of us if you told your associates to release the Princess’ airship. You see, the Skoll’s cannons cannot be loaded with magical disruption shells and it would make for a poor first impression with the Princesses if I ordered those ponies and diamond dogs killed.”

“I have a better idea, you brat!” Spitfire showed up with an escort of some twelve pegasi with the same armor she wore, also carrying weapons. “How about we sit our asses here, until Princess Celestia shows up with the rest of the fleet and then you can go home with whatever is left of your dad’s airship once she’s done whooping your ass! I mean, I would do it myself, but I don’t want the political mess and it is the Princess job to keep you noble plotholes in line anyways!”

Of course, griffons pointed guns at pegasi that did the same and neither side seemed particularly intimidated while Twilight regretted more and more past events that led to that point.

“Captain, with all due respect, I believe you will find that the Skoll is quite formidable and more than prepared to hold its own against any of your antiquated converted airships.”

“How about we throw a party?” All of them stared at Pinkie Pie, who grinned widely. “A Let’s Not Kill Each Other Party?”

After a short silence, attentions returned to the impasse.

“Anyway… It’s your funeral, chicken-head.” Spitfire turned to leave, but then she faced Twilight and Cadance. “This is all your fault. Just so you know, this is all your fault!”

Fortunately, instead of shooting each other right there, Spitfire retreated towards her airship. Twilight could still see them fighting in the distance and it seemed bad. She had to keep reminding herself that they weren’t actually injuring each other too much. At least the airships stopped firing at each other, and that was something good, she figured.

“Regardless, I believe it is a better idea for you both to come aboard the Skoll. I intend on escorting you to an ancient site that would be related to your research.”

“I would rather go there on my own airship if that would be possible.” Twilight did her best not to show but she didn’t like that idea and hopefully Cadance wouldn’t do anything stupid. She didn’t fully trust that griffon and while the ‘bait’ was very good, she feared that Mister Snake’s argument was too good to ignore. Not to mention that if she left her friends behind, they would be at the Princesses’ mercy and she couldn’t fully trust them either. What a situation to be in… Not to mention, Naminé. Discord was adamant they must see her. “I would rather stay with my friends. The situation with Mister Snake’s airship notwithstanding for the moment.”

Before Grigory could answer an intense itch enveloped Twilight’s horn. So much that she simply couldn’t hold the impulse to scratch it with a hoof. “Ooow! What is this?!”

A quick glance around let her see that the other horned ponies felt the same and the pegasi shuffled their wings as though they suffered from a similar predicament and so did the griffons. In fact, it got so bad that Twilight’s entire body seemed to itch.

“Oh no!” Her eyes shot wide open as soon as she understood what was happening.

A deep boom followed, and the ensuing shockwave cleared away the clouds. It pushed the griffons away, but they controlled their flight soon enough. What really worried twilight now was that the area to their right, or starboard as The Captain would insist, where there once was empty space was occupied by an entire fleet of airships with golden hulls, except for one monstrosity of a white airship with golden ornaments and the sun on her sails that could only be Celestia’s.

Cadance’s right eye trembled just a bit and she squeaked like a terrified bathtub duckie. “Did she just teleport the entire fleet?!”

Before freaking out Twilight turned to the griffon prince. “I hope you have a plan because mine was running away as fast as I could!”

He seemed unconcerned. “Not to worry. I have a prisoner I intended to use for something else, but I should be able to use him to force Princess Celestia to capitulate.”

“I imagine you wanted to use Chocolate Velvet to force me onboard your ship…” Twilight gave him an unfriendly stare, but he met it casually.

“The thought never crossed my mind, Princess.”

Then Twilight counted exactly half a second when they looked up at the sound of frantically flapping wings and saw the brown alicorn flying overhead accompanied by a green griffon in armor. Going straight to the newly arrived airship fleet.

There was another moment of silence until one of Grigory’s companions, a white owl-looking griffoness with caramel markings spoke with a raspy voice and a level of astonishment. “Wow. That plan crumbled on multiple levels and faster than Gewehr’s pickup lines.”

Despite the seriousness of the situation Cadance giggled at that and Twilight figured she would like to meet that Gewehr guy.

“First time for you guys?” Rainbow actually looked bored. “Twilight could probably write a book about all the times we planned for something and it all went south.”

Another griffon said something that Twilight didn’t understand. The big one, almost black fur under his black and gold armor and with a white head told him watching the pair flying towards the fleet.

“We have to get out of here!” Twilight shrieked. “Now!”

“Things have changed.” Grigory was not too worried. “I will order the Skoll to open fire. Get your friends out of the way if you want them to live, mercenary.”

Grigory was going to say something, but Celestia’s amplified voice interrupted him. “Good morning, Master Grigory! Would you mind not hurting my ponies, please?”

The griffon sighed and muttered something under his breath while one of the crewponies brought her a spyglass and she could see the princess on the big ship holding a megaphone with her telekinetic magic and waving with a wing, next to Luna and Chrysalis. “Also, if you surrender, I promise I will not tell your father that you took out his secret airship that should not exist!”

Grigory’s mate told him something, but unfortunately Twilight didn’t understand, because she looked and sounded angry at him despite his calm response.

Then Luna poked at her sister and said something. Celestia nodded and spoke again. “I also promise I will help you pay for all the money EQMagical wants to charge your family for the illegal use of the teleporter, damages and lost revenue! Including all the charges of conspiracy and treason! Oh! And damages to the young mare your girlfriend hurt. Was there anything else Luna?”

She turned to Luna and the three of them started discussing over something. Chrysalis wings buzzed and she stomped the floor while Luna made some gestures with a hoof, but Celestia shook her head and said something. It seemed like they would be entertained for some time.

Again, there was silence around Twilight.

“Seriously, dude?” Rainbow screeched and the two griffons on the deck started laughing.

Twilight worried though. That griffon didn’t look happy at all. He scowled and grabbed his big friend by the gorget of his armor to speak angrily in that language she didn’t understand. It did sound like the common Griffonese, which was exotic in itself but she could understand enough. This language of theirs sounded very different and at the same time similar. She exchanged a glance with Cadance and she shrugged.

“Grigory, you’re acting like a damn child!” The mercenary Snake called him. “Admit you’ve made a mistake and earn some of Lord Gilad's honor for yourself by actually acting like an adult!”

“Silence, mercenary. Lest I remind you degenerate traitor to your race of all the ways I can hurt you!” He roared back and Twilight worried even more that not only they seemed to be in a bad spot, but the big scary griffon was starting to lose his composure. Mister Snake, though, fell silent but didn’t seem very happy.

To make things worse his big friend told Grigory something in their language, but he only shoved him and yelled at him, pointing at Princess Celestia’s airship. That was no way to talk to one's friend and never a good sign. The big griffon made a series of complex signs with his paws at the airship and Twilight imagined they would be watching from there with a spyglass or something. Then Grigory ordered the others around and they followed him around Cadance’s shield.

“What’s you all’s story with that griffon?” Applejack asked the two stuck on her airship’s deck, but Mister Snake wasn’t on a very agreeable mood.

“Not willing to share stories right now, farmpony.”

“Sheesh… Salty griffon.” Pinkie complained. “What do we do now, Twilight?”

Twilight turned to the Capitan. “We run. Full-speed as soon as we’re free and our engines are running again.”

He nodded and rushed back to his position controlling the helm while Twilight turned to her friends. “Be ready to defend the airship again.”

She took a second to look at them acknowledging her direction and they seemed fine. Cadance seemed a bit tired, but she was holding the shield and she was sure that she would be fine for some time yet. The others weren’t as tired as they were during the fight in Ponyville so they should hold for a while. The problem was that if Grigory couldn’t hold back Princess Celestia’s airship they’d be several times out of their league.

For the moment she’d focus on watching Grigory’s griffons taking care of the Mister Snake’s airship. They flew underneath it, far from the reach of their guns and then jumped onboard from the sides. It seemed like an effective tactic, even if the big griffon lady onboard the ship had everypony and the diamond dogs retreat underdeck rather than defend the airship.

“I swear, if they hurt my mate, I’m going to lean all I can on Princess Celestia to get you to pay.” The big griffon told her, but Cadance answered before Twilight could.

“Well, there was nothing stopping you guys from giving up.”

The griffons with Grigory chased them as three of them entered the small hut-like house where the wheel was located, and they dragged out a diamond dog they threw to the floor and Twilight couldn’t see anymore. Meanwhile the remaining ones grabbed axes from the ship’s own supply of tools and started hacking at the support structures for the ballistae and whatever held the ropes secured.

“I’m sorry, Mister Snake.” Twilight turned to him but made sure to keep a serious expression. “Our mission is important.”

He didn’t answer, but his expression did soften up a bit. Twilight couldn’t really read what his thoughts might be, but the pegasus mare was livid.

“I hope you get your crowns taken away, and then that you get arrested! Although I bet that Princess Celestia would still protect you two!”

Finally, the griffon airship, the Skoll, opened fire against Princess Celestia’s. They heard the resonant boom of cannons firing and Twilight could swear she heard the shots whizzing by, but they collided with a magical shield rather than the airship itself.

“How come these airships have magical shields and yours don’t Twilight?” Rarity turned to her after watching the fireworks of the shots exploding midair.

“Hum… There wasn’t a box named ‘magical shields’ in the form when I bought mine?”

The large white and gold airship fired back with a thundering roar of its own and a series of magical flares shot up. The fleet started maneuvering with the increasing noise of magical engines spinning up. Twilight realized she was in the middle of what likely was the first real airship battle in history. Also, her first time seeing warships firing for effect. A single salvo of those would likely reduce her airship to a collection of crystalized metal splinters and main her friends. That would be enough, but beyond that, each one of those airships was filled with creatures.

She was scared.

“We have to get out of here!” She blurted. “We’ll get caught in the crossfire!”

“Engines be down, princess.” The Captain sounded almost bored from the wheel. “We ain’t goin’ nowhere. Much less stuck like we be.”

“Twilight, let me see the spyglass.” Shining beckoned with a hoof and she gave it to him. Stood close and looked in the same direction he did, at Princess Celestia’s airship. “The Break of Dawn isn’t firing with all her cannons. Lower gun decks are closed.”

He gave it back to her and she used it too. Indeed, the little windows where the cannons were supposed to be sticking out were closed. Not only that, but unlike she would have imagined the gun decks weren’t removed. The ship has had additional armor added and the gunports were an example and the ship fired, but only with the main deck worth of guns.

Other ships fired under Twilight’s and it was a cacophony of thundering guns and another when they hit the larger griffon ship with disturbing metallic noises along with the explosions at impact. The smell of spent gunpower was quick to arrive but the noises of firing guns and exploding ammo didn’t subdue. There were ships of several shapes and sizes. She recognized most of them by the number of decks and sails as their individual classes, and she could even understand their function. A large and long ship with no weapons drew her attention, but she felt it wasn’t important, as it stayed further away.

“Why aren’t they using all their guns?” She returned to the subject of Celestia’s airship and lowered the spyglass, looking up at her brother.

“They could be protecting the lower decks, but their target would be one for full broadside. The only reason I can think why they aren’t using all cannons is that Princess Celestia isn’t showing all her cards…”

Twilight hummed. “I remember you telling us these griffons developed new weapons… It would be silly to imagine Princess Celestia wouldn’t be doing the same… I suppose that I simply don’t know everything that is going on.”

Curses… More and more that whole quest of theirs started to feel misguided.

“What does that mean for us now?” Fluttershy asked while the others simply stared.

“Nothing right now. We still have to escape.” She shook her head.

Then the Skoll fired its cannons again. She seemed to have less cannons, but they seemed to reload faster. How, Twilight had no idea, but the salvo hit a ship that had maneuvered under the larger ship. The explosions skirted her magical shields, but it seemed as tough one or two shells got through and exploded in the golden crystalized metal hull. It literally tore pieces of armor out. Another salvo literally tore the airship in half and sent pieces of crystalized metal in all directions. Twilight and the others screamed and ran to the railing in time to see the two disjointed halves collapsing from the sky while golden armored pegasi jumped out and flew away from the were they used to be connected or jumped off the broken deck.

The Skoll remained under constant bombardment though. Twilight could see places where its armor had deformed, but it didn’t seem to be serious.

“Is this how naval combat used to be?” Rarity whined. Twilight could imagine Rarity would have a romanticized idea of naval combat and the sight would have disturbed her. Just as it did Twilight and she understood that cannons firing was only fun when Pinkie was involved.

“Nay.” One of the crewponies said. “You’d usually shoot the other ship fulla holes and the water would take’er down. Or ya’d jump onboard and take’er over. This thing the griffons made is a monster.”

Twilight put her hoof on the railing and looked over her shoulder at the Wonderbolt airship. It seemed to not fire at the Skoll anymore, but there was enough smoke in the air that she thought that they were still fighting onboard and that the griffons managed to land on it.

Looking back at the large white and gold ship, Twilight saw more magical flares shooting up in patterns of colors and it was difficult to gather it all at once. Ships maneuvered faster than she expected, and all the smoke stung the eyes as much as breathing itched her nostrils and inside. The griffon airship didn’t turn so well and started taking shots from all directions. Twilight grimaced and wondered if Grigory hadn’t overestimated what a single airship, large as it might be could do on its own.

Then one of her crewponies, the one that stayed at the top of the mast cried at them. “Look lively! We got flyers hoay! Starboard low an’ they look like business!”

That time Twilight looked in the right direction and a… Squadron? Yeah, she’d call them squadron. A squadron of big black changelings flew towards them from below, rose above her airship…

“For Queen and Swarm!” One of those weird tall changelings in barding screamed, and then they splatted against Cadance’s shield.

They literally threw themselves at Cadance’s shield. Again. And again. Quite a few times more.

“Hum… What are they doing?” Pinkie grimaced.

“I think they’re trying to break the shield…” Twilight mused a little worried. “Be careful. It could be some weird strategy to catch us off-guard.”

Then she heard Chrysalis voice from Celestia’s airship. “What are you doing, Bossy, you idiot?”

The tall changeling that seemed to be in charge looked at the airship and shouted back. “I’m supposed to learn strategy from past battles! Tis the Canterlot Siege Strategy!”

“I can’t hear you from here, you retard! Use your magic at her shield before I go there and…” It sounded as though she had more to say but somepony took the megaphone from her.

The big changeling shrugged and pointed a hoof at Twilight’s ship. “Hit’em with magic for all you’re worth!”

Her soldiers wasted no time in hovering around the shield, buzzing their wings and shooting magical beams of green changeling magic at it. Twilight let her jaw hang and looked at Cadance. Her ears were flat on the sides of her head and she didn’t look very happy, but she barely winced. The griffons on Mister Snake’s airship were busy fighting off the wonderbolts and Twilight hadn’t even seen them arrive!

“Captain, now would be a great time for our engines to restart!” She shrieked at the pegasus at the helm, but he simply hung his weight at the wheel, looking bored.

“Not me call, lass.”

Twilight huffed and walked past her friends watching the shield for any failing and went down the stairs where she saw Starlight Glimmer looking over the unicorn carefully casting a spell over an open panel on the crystalized metal wall. Inside were golden wires and some pink shining crystals.

“Well?” She cried.

“It’s a mess!” Starlight cried back showing her frazzled mane when she turned.

“It’s a slow process, princess.” The unicorn turned at her too.

“Well, get it done or it won’t matter because things aren’t going well. And you come back up. We may need your help to fight the changelings!”

Both nodded and her friend followed her up just in time to see that the two griffons had set themselves free and the big one, Snake, jumped at Cadance and surprised her. She cried, but it was too late. He tackled Cadance and she screamed. Holding her down with his weight he hit the tip of her horn with a finger and her shield collapsed with her shriek.

“Have at’em!” She heard the changeling commander yelling along with their buzzing wings. She turned in time to deflect a magical beam and jumped to the side with a flap of her wings. She didn’t see where her sword ended up when the griffon attacked her and her mind was slow, but it returned to her when she summoned it and she screamed, pushing at the changeling with a quick swipe of her sword that caused it to dodge back, landing on his hindlegs.

Just then she realized she was angry!

“Alright! You want a fight; you will have one!” She cried and her horn shone fiercely along with the jewels in her Element of Harmony before releasing a beam of purple light with a crack and the changeling screamed crashing through the crystalized metal railing of her airship. He fell backwards and Twilight turned with a growl when a magical bullet snapped against her barding.

The small, black spotted griffon shot again at her with his revolver and she would never forget the panicked stare in his face when she actually batted the shot away with a wing and then summoned her staff, shoving it towards him, channeling the magic from her horn and wrapping his gun around his paw.

She didn’t really care if he screamed from pain or the scare. What mattered was that he jumped back and fell on his back. She jumped with a flap of her wings and her front hooves came down squarely on his chest. She wasn’t very heavy, but when the pommel of her sword hit his jaw, it sounded like it was.

“Get them under control already!” The changeling commander screamed, drawing her double sword from her side and lunging to the deck. With another look around, Twilight saw Rainbow grappling with one of the changelings, but she moved way too fast for the large and heavy creature to hit her with her hooves and instead got kicked several times on her face. Applejack threw one at the wall of the private room and kicked the air out of the changeling. Pinkie dragged Fluttershy inside and Twilight’s head dodged down right in time when a changeling tried hitting her with the flat of her double-bladed weapon. One simple spell encased the changeling in a bubblegum prison.

She screeched at Twilight and proceeded to bitting the thing. What the… Creatures had never done that! “Stop that!”

All the changeling managed was to get her mouth stuck and Twilight rolled her eyes.

The Skoll shot its cannons at another airship, on her other side since it was almost surrounded by then and much like the other ship, its port side exploded and pieces of it flew everywhere as it started capsizing on its side and her crew abandoned her.

“Oh gosh, this ain’t good, Twilight.” Applejack looked like she was going to be sick and Twilight understood. Nothing she could do, though.

“Just fight the changelings, AJ!” She yelled.

She saw Shining Armor and her personal guards fighting next to the Captain at the wheel and her crewponies shot muskets at the Wonderbolts as they had already returned. Spitfire shouted orders. Why the heck wasn’t she defending her own airship?

Another changeling came at Twilight with his sword and she batted away his one-two strikes with her own, stepping back before dodging under a third swing and hitting the changeling’s underside with her magically charged horn with enough force to cause it to lose its weapon and collapse on his side with a long grunt.

She saw the large griffon that was mister Flying Snake clawing at Cadance to have his paw batted away with the dull side of her bladed bow so hard she was sure something broke. Then she stood and kicked at his face with her hooves, and not satisfied, she jumped up, enveloping him on her telekinetic spell and shoved him into the floor with her magic and her own momentum.

It almost scared Twilight how much force she used, but the big and grizzled griffon seemed like he would be fine. He actually rolled to the side when Cadance came hooves down on him and dented the floor.

“Cadance! Hold back just a notch? Are you trying to kill that griffon?!”

“YES!” The other alicorn galloped past her after the griffon that retreated with a flap of his wings.

She knew Cadance didn’t really meant it, and she was going to nag at her some more, but a pair of wonderbolts shot Twilight with something. They seemed to have multi-barreled firearms strapped to the forelegs of their armor, like a series of pistols to fire in sequence. Two or so shots connected before she formed a magical shield in front of her. Further impacts hurt less, but still annoyed her. They tried flying away but she hit one of them with a salvo of magical missiles from her horn and he barreled out of control until she lost sight of them.

Her eyes fell on Skoll again just as it fired again, but rather than its cannons on the sides, it shot a pair of what looked like magical missiles from the front edge of its wings. They turned in wide arc and trained on the large white and gold ship. They flew fast leaving behind a trail of lightning in the sky and collided with the magical shield, exploding violently in a show of sparks and lightning bolts, but failed to damage the actual ship beyond some of the armor that flew off her side.

A changeling screeched and drew her attention to herself before she shot a magical beam at Twilight that she effortlessly deflected away after catching it in her horn. Then she held one of the changeling’s hooves in her magic and caused her to trip and spin out of control under the railing and out of the airship, trying to grasp at the edge like she had forgotten she had wings or something.

Rainbow landed next to her scraping her hooves on the floor, dodging a tall changeling with a long staff with green crystal point that sparkled with magic. Twilight smacked the changeling in the face with the flat side of her sword and put him out of the fight.

“This isn’t going very well!” The pegasus yelled over all the noise, putting herself in a fighting stance on Twilight’s side, but towards the other side. “Wonderbolts are kicking our butts with the changelings pestering us!”

Twilight hadn’t noticed, but it was a proper strategy… Changeling weirdoes in large numbers distracting them with the elite wonderbolts doing the real damage.

“We should be running away, not fighting!” Twilight growled and promptly batted away with her sword a prod from one of the changelings with spears. Then she followed with a cut and broke the changeling’s weapon, but he flew away. “They’re tiring us!”

The griffon airship fired again and overwhelmed another airship’s magical shields. Tore it asunder with a loud crack and boom.

“I don’t like these griffons blowing up our ships either!” Rainbow did not sound happy. “They’re not holding back and there’s no way everypony is surviving, Twilight!”

“I know, but there isn’t anything I can do about it!” Twilight’s blood boiled. It was the fight and what Rainbow had just said, but she couldn’t do anything about it!

Smaller warships had maneuvered closer to the griffon warship and trails of light shot from certain points in its hull and they seemed to pick apart the crystalized metal in those airships, but it didn’t seem to be too serious and their own cannons shot at the opening in the larger airship’s armor. Several pink explosions followed and despite the easy targets, the Skoll’s cannons didn’t shoot back.

“I think they got their cannoneers, Twilight.” Rainbow mused. “They’ll turn their attention to us if they put that thing under control.”

Twilight deadpanned to herself at Rainbow’s brilliant tactical advice and in the meanwhile other ships approached the Wonderbolt’s. Pegasi in golden barding flew in as the smaller ships also fired their cannons at Skoll. Pieces of its armor flew off the raised part of its hull and there was an explosion, a real one, inside as cannons fired against the closed doors.

The constant barrage was causing real damage to the griffons’ monster. Large plates of armor flew off when something exploded where the right wing connected to the main hull and her engines started sparking on that side.

Then Twilight heard a griffon screeching angrily in the language she didn’t understand. She and Rainbow looked over to the whaling ship on the other side to see Grigory’s girlfriend, or whatever she was, making angry gestures at the griffon ship. Then she looked and sounded like she complained to Grigory who was next to her fighting off two wonderbolts with his longsword.

Then they started shouting at each other and the ponies stopped to stare until she actually lunged at him, flailing her claws, in his face and pointed at the airship, screeching some more before pointing at it again. Twilight and Rainbow gasped and the two Wonderbolts flew away as fast as they could.

“Well, that is no Gabby…” Twilight said plainly.

“I wish I could understand what they’re saying! Oh! Gotta go!” The other chuckled and then flew away towards the aft.

No changeling threatened Twilight for the moment, so she stared at the whaling ship again. Grigory’s big friend stayed with his ‘mate’ while Grigory jumped up and made a series of signs to the airship. Then he landed close to her in a wing beat. She jumped away with a squeal.

“Any snipers in your team, princess?”

“Snipper?” What? “As in somepony that cuts manes? Rarity is good with that.”

“Never mind.” He wasn’t impressed and simply hovered a few hooves above the floor flashing a few more ‘paw signs’ at their airship.

Twilight watched curiously until something flew off the airship into the sky above and a set of small parachutes opened, holding a long black box.

“Kindly grab that for me, please. Before the others notice.”

She looked up at the thing again and charged her horn. The thing disappeared and reappeared on her airship’s floor. Then she kept watching while Grigory quickly removed a harness from it. It looked like a gun case to Twilight.

“Is that a weapon?”

“No Princess…” He grinned widely. “This is an exquisite tool for an exceptional artist.”

He blew a two-toned whistle, looking up and threw the whole case up. “Elle!”

His white and caramel friend zoomed by and grabbed the case, soon letting go of it and staying with the long firearm that was inside, circling around. Then she snuggled with it and kicked her hindleg.

“She really likes that thing, doesn’t she?”

Suddenly his smile vanished. “Gracielle sleeps with the damn thing and its inventor…”

“Quirky much?” Twilight smirked and he answered with a mirk of his own.

“I suppose we have a bit of a gun culture among some griffons. They do help us survive, after all. Nothing too extreme compared to your ‘magic culture’.”

“Friendship culture, you mean?” Twilight raised an eyebrow while he flashed yet a couple more signs to his white friend and she nodded before flying away. “What did you tell her?”

“I told her to find their leaders and take them out of the battle.”

“Sheesh. Last time I tried something like a sign language with my friends it ended up with a sign that Rainbow would use to make fun of me behind my back.”

“You should discipline them better.” He just said it so casually Twilight though she had understood him wrong, but he didn’t wait to hear her and flew away.

Her wings flared. “Wait! What do you mean ‘take them out’?!”

“Don’t worry, Princess!” He smirked from above. “I’d trust her to shoot an apple on my head from over a thousand cubits!”

“What is a cubit?!” She stomped the floor. “Grigory!”

She meant to go after him, but two wonderbolts that just arrived had other ideas. The first attacked her head on with a magical stunning prod attached to his armor’s foreleg as he landed in front of her. The other circled around while she batted the weapon away with the butt end of her staff and she swung her sword on his other leg just as he raised it to strike. The metal in his armor bent and he screamed, falling on his side.

Then she cried with the shock at her back, and it made her head spin, but she kicked with both hindlegs and hit something she supposed was the other wonderbolt. How did she let him hit her like that?

She teleported, reappearing a little distance away facing the opposite direction rather than turning on her hooves, just in time to see the surprised pegasus in golden armor confused at having hit nothing but air with second strike. And then her sword hit his armored head and it would be the last thing he’d see for a while.

It came as a surprise when a surge of magical energy hit Twilight and she gasped. It came from one of the airships next to Celestia’s. No idea what that was, but when Skoll finally fired its cannons again her shots exploded everywhere but on their target.

Twilight stared curiously. It was a sort of repulsion field magic. Did one of the ships have a team of unicorns that cast that spell?

Another salvo on another target met the same fate. And then another. Next the airship fired its strange magical missiles, but they flew past their target, one in each direction and exploded harmlessly.

“Wow…” She whispered. It seemed that Royal Guard Thaumatoengineers had been really busy while she wasn’t looking. She doubted the griffons expected that.

Then she grimaced to herself when she remembered she was on the same side as the griffons and not the Royal Guards.

The Skoll started turning while her engines seemed to speed up even more, banking to the left and she closed her gun decks. Trails of smoke flew from her sides and exploded into clouds of white smoke with lightning that drew them to the airship. Twilight noticed that griffons fighting in the Wonderbolt airship took off and flew towards it, but it didn’t look like they’d make it, and they just stopped. The constant cacophony of shooting cannons didn’t diminish either.

In the middle of all that, she heard Grigory yelling furiously, hovering above the whaling ship again and making paw gestures with his fingers. Then she was sure he swore when he didn’t get the answer he was hopping for. He and his friends shouted at each other.

“They just left their friends behind!” Twilight gasped.

It took several minutes, and nopony bothered Twilight, probably because they were watching it too, but the airships that arrived with Princess Celestia’s pursued the griffon airship, as did the Wonderbolt’s and they kept firing leaving trails of smoke that persisted for some time in the slow winds.

She gasped at a bright flash when the entire right wing of the Skoll exploded and sent burning pieces everywhere, like small fiery balls falling over the grass field below. Seconds later the bang reached their ears and scared Twilight out of her trance.

Then three things happened. The Skoll started losing altitude and letting off a significant plume of black smoke, gaining more and more speed towards the ground; Celestia’s ponies cheered on the airships and in the fight around her; and Grigory’s girlfriend held her face and shrieked on the whaling ship, watching their airship going down.

“Oh no!” She looked frantically around to see the fight still going strong in her airship, despite that, but the griffons just lost all their wind and closest to her was Rainbow Dash, surrounded by downed Wonderbolts while she grappled with one of them and got hit with a stun prod that sprung from the vambrace of another one of them from behind. Her friend screamed and lost balance on her hindlegs.

“Rainbow!” She screamed and pushed forward with a flap of wings. Both wonderbolts turned to face her. One of them still on his hindlegs, ready to use his weapon again, but her sword cut it in half and her body slammed the pony against the wall of the private room. She wasn’t very heavy, but the pegasus was lighter still. The other attacked her with a similar weapon, but she anticipated it and her staff batted his leg away for her to hit him with a magical blast that sent him spinning on the floor.

“Rainbow?!” She cried again, but her friend was out cold in the floor despite her pushing at her.

No time to reanimate her. A changeling cried and came at her with her horn shining in green magic, making a magical long bladed spear she swung at Twilight. It hit Twilight shoulder and glanced off to her head and the magical shock, more than the concussion stunned her.

Reflexively she retreated a hop and scowled at the changeling, shooting magical missiles at her hooves. The changeling skipped with a scream and that dispelled her weapon. Then she slammed on the wall, legs flailing on the air right next to Twilight with a pained and sorrowful “Ooow…”

Twilight tapped her on the forehead with the flat of her sword and she shrieked more from the scare than any damage her weapon might have done, then she jumped over the changeling.

She saw Applejack grappling with a wonderbolt, standing on her hindlegs with a rope she used to deflect this stun prod and then tied him like he was a hog. Another came at her and she got her war hammer which she shoved on the pegasus face and caused him to fall backwards. Instead of following with the hammer down on him, she jumped over him, hopping on his belly and rushing towards Rarity who found herself shoved against the floor with a ring on her horn and her enchanted sword on her side with an armored wonderbolt on top of her, holding her with a hoof until Applejack hit him like a speeding train.

Twilight meant to go help, but she was forced to defend herself from a pegasus Royal Guard in full combat barding with a closed helmet and heavier plates attacking her with his armored foredleg. She batted the attack with her sword and dodged the second spinning on her hindlegs, leaving her robes trailing behind her and brought her sword down on his leg as he overextended in another strike.

“Oow!” He screamed from inside his helmet and she stopped back on her four hooves. “Geez, Twilight! I’m trying to talk to you!”

“Flash Sentry?!” She shrieked.

“Uh…” His eyes shifted inside the helmet. “Hi babe. Princess Celestia asked me to tell you to stop… So… Uh…”

She scowled and the guard of her sword came down on his face with a clang.

With him out, she looked around to see Cadance still fighting the griffon. They both looked furious and he had cuts on his face with blood on his fur and feathers. She kicked at his face, but he held her leg and his claws almost swiped at her face. They glanced off a magical protection spell she seemed to have cast on her because her barding’s was gone already. Then she charged her horn and they heard a loud bang that scared both of them. Even more when the griffon collapsed with a cry.

“I didn’t do anything!” Cadance shrieked. And then again when they saw the hole in his leather armor and the sprinkled red on the floor.

“Damnit!” He grunted and Cadance charged her horn with magic again.

“Don’t move! I’m going to cast a healing spell!” She squealed and Twilight was sure she was more scared than the griffon, who just chuckled at her. “Fluttershy!!”

“Don’t worry Princess… I’ve been shot more times than I can count in my paws.”

Fluttershy didn’t come, and while she fussed with her magic over the griffon Twilight frowned and looked around the sky, expecting to see a certain white griffon female, but couldn’t find her. Maybe she was judging too fast. They were in the middle of a fight.

Then she heard Shining Armor screaming. The halberd he had been using fell from the top of the private room and he fell on his back right after it with the pieces of the railing. Spitfire jumped after him, but he kicked her hard with his hindlegs against the private room doors and she slammed on her back against it.

Not that it stopped her. She pushed against the door to lunge at him.

“Hey! Canner-bolt!” A raspy and cruel laugh distracted her and Twilight, followed by a loud shot that rang much higher than she was used to.

Spitfire fell on her back with a scream and Twilight took some time before she understood what had happened. She finally found the white griffoness sat on the lower yard of the main mast, like a stupid bird perched on it with a devious grin, looking up from the scope on her weapon.

“Give me that!” Twilight yelled at her and teleported to hover in front of her, grabbing the gun with her magic and pulling while beating her wings for leverage. The griffon didn’t let go though, even if she almost lost her balance.

“Hey! Quit it!”

“Let go!” Twilight insisted. “This thing is dangerous!”

“It’s a gun, grassbreath! Of course it’s dangerous!”

“Your airship was downed! You’re just hurting others needlessly! We have to get my airship working instead!” She still pulled at the gun and griffon screeched holding on to it.

The screaming match stopped when Applejack called Twilight from below. Collapsed on the bow, next to Rarity with a hornring, laying on her side and looking disheveled and also Spike with his arms tied behind him with his tail and wings. Their weapons nowhere to be seen and two Royal Guards in full barding watching over them.

Twilight wailed and let go, diving the distance and reaching them sword-first. The first deflected her sword with his barding on his foreleg, as she expected, then she spun her sword with a flourish in her magical grasp aiming at his armored head. But she was tired. She was too slow, and the other guard tackled her by the waist, and dropped her with his weight.

She teleported a few hooves away and hit his head with her sword before he even realized what had happened. The other stood on his hindlegs with a halberd and prepared for her attack. Then Twilight felt a presence behind her and spun cutting with her sword.

It struck an exquisitely adorned magical armor made of pure solidified golden light and white embellishments over a tall white foreleg. Her sword flew away from her grasp at the forceful magical feedback and the flash scared her. And both caused her to sit on her haunches and shake her head only to finally see Princess Celestia grinning at her.

She panicked. “Cadance! Starlight! Help!!”

In her panic she teleported away, but rather than that, she found she had reappeared roughly in the same place. Inside a cute golden bird cage with a soft purple cushion.

“Oh, come on!” She whined to herself.

Celestia was about to say something when Twilight saw the glint in the scope above the griffon’s weapon. It was a mere instant and the same bang from before ringed followed by Twilight’s terrorized screaming even louder while covering her eyes with her wings and hooves.

And then shrieking again.

“She’s fine, Twilight…” Spike mumbled with the irked sigh of a drake that’s had enough of that day.

She opened her eyes to see Celestia giggling. “Thank you for the concern though.”

Her golden magical aura picked up a squished lead bullet on the floor and then she turned, looking up to see the white griffoness hugging the weapon and mumbling something as insecurely as a mother determined to prove the innocence of her little baby after being caught doing wrong.

“She called for help… I just… Hum…” Her fingers strummed nervously along the gun’s elegant caramel wood frame and her eyes shifted until she grinned and frowned at the same time. “I mean… I knew it wouldn’t hurt you.”

She giggled nervously.

“You cannot be trusted with that toy, young lady. I will take it from here.” Her horn flared up and golden light yanked the weapon from the griffon. She yapped reaching futilely and almost losing her balance on the yard.

After that the Princess removed all the ammunition from that thing, which was a process Twilight didn’t really understand, but even if it couldn’t be that complicated, she thought it was curious that Celestia did. It struck Twilight that it was similar, but certainly different from a musket since the bullets she saw on the floor were nothing like the ammunition they used.

“Now then, may we consider this altercation resolved?” The Princess looked around at fighters on both sides that stopped on their tracks when she showed up. “Thank you kindly.”

Then she turned to Twilight, who just realized she merely sat there, stupidly looking up at the tall princess from inside her cage. Of course, she did though, because Twilight had never seen her like that!

Her mane shone brightly like the sun’s corona such that it hurt her eyes staring directly at her. Her body was covered in the magical armor made of golden light with white beautifying lines and the few golden pieces of her traditional regalia. Her wings, she carried open, shone with the same light and had bladed protections and she also wore a large golden crown that framed her head like a helmet that let her horn out and made a crown of six bladed spikes behind her head that made her look like the sun, especially with her mane shining like that. She even had a translucent cape of golden light.

“Hello, Twilight! I have finally caught up with you.”

“Hum… Hi…” She tried grinning, but her voice broke a little too much. There was simply nothing she could do but stare away when her eyes burned, as the princess herded her with her wings to sit next to her friends and the spell that formed that armor was so complex it made Twilight’s head hurt just trying to figure out the formulae for the layers of protection.

She had never done that in their sparring sessions! Twilight felt cheated!

“Kindly take care of her.” The princess told the guards, turning to the others.

“Cadance! Shining!” She whispered to herself, looking for them. Chrysalis’ changelings had shoved Cadance to the floor and held her before the queen. Shining and two of her pegasus sat before Luna, wearing a similar magical armor as Celestia’s, but all white and silvery, with an arch above her head rather than the spikes.

Fluttershy was with Spitfire by the doors to the private room. The wondebolt seemed to be in pain, but Fluttershy wrapped her wing closed. She didn’t see the others, but Royal Guards brought Starlight, the unicorn crewpony and Pinkie.

“Sorry, Twilight.” Starlight sighed when they put her to sit next to her.

Ponies just gave up next to Celestia and Luna. Surrendered to the Royal Guards and Wonderbolts that accompanied them, but the griffons were still fighting, flying around the airship and on Mister Snake’s rusty airship. But they seemed in a bad shape all around. She found Grigory’s girlfriend cornered on the airship’s bow, worryingly quiet and with quite a lot of blood on her feathers while he fought fiercely with his longsword and his big griffon friend used a heavy spear to fight off the changelings with their double-bladed weapons.

Celestia seemed more worried with ensuring nopony was too injured on Twilight’s airship and dispelled the bubblegum ball, freeing the changeling inside.

Grigory looked around and he didn’t seem to like what he saw. He told his big friend something and flew up. His girlfriend cried his name which sounded much more melodic in their language, properly pronounced.

“Dity Harpiyi!” He cried above the airships, lunging up his sword.

“Whoa!” Twilight’s spine felt like she had just been hit with a lightning spell. There was powerful magic at work and it twirled around in the air like a hurricane had met a thunderstorm to the point it caused the physical wind to blow around them.

Celestia looked up at the griffon with giant surprised eyes and Luna’s jaw dropped. The present griffons stared up, about as surprised as she was. Maybe they didn’t expect Grigory would try to cast a spell, a la his father as a last-ditch effort, a desperate attempt to snatch victory from defeat?

She also had never seen Chrysalis so scared in her life. “Stop him!”

The queen cried and pointed at the griffon completely forgetting Cadance. “Stop him now!”

Chrysalis’ changelings scrambled to attack. His big friend stayed with the female griffon and her jaw hanged, staring up with giant eyes as though life returned to her. The others that were too disheartened by the loss of their invincible airship stood as they could to witness.

His sword hovered in the air in front of him and shone with the luminescence of lightning. His clawed fists clenched as though he channeled some emotion with all his might and his eyes shone with the same light.

Thunder sounded around them and it stirred a strange fear in Twilight, but she couldn’t tear her eyes from the griffon and could swear his claws crackled with lightning. His voice echoed and he pronounced every syllable with the intensity of a storm to end the world.

“Aya Harpiya, matha beir, imperatrytse desh pochuymiy krahah!”

It sounded like an eagle screaming and it echoed with cracking thunder. Magical energies, more powerful than the magical radiation from the airships’ engines tensed and stretched reality, but nothing happened. Like a spell that failed, but rather than exploding from somepony’s horn, its magical energies dissipated harmlessly. It sure felt like a spell though. A powerful spell that failed to connect, or something. It was difficult to understand. Different. Even more alien than the bizarre changeling magic she felt in Chrysalis’ Spawning Pool.

Thus, when the magical effects ceased gravity got a hold of him again and the griffon screamed and grasped at the air, flailing, trying to grasp his sword and flapping his wings to keep from falling. His girlfriend shrieked his name again and everypony was too stunned to react.

Princess Celestia teleported next to him. She secured his paw in her hoof and grabbed his sword with her telekinetic magic. Then she teleported back to Twilight’s airship and carefully let him rest on his back, with the sword right next to him.

He just laid there, staring at the sky. Twilight wasn’t sure what he felt. Shock? Disbelief? Disappointment?

“Harpiya dekesh pochyah, Greigorei… Sekesei ya.” She told him softly. She didn’t hesitate or stumble upon the words.

His eyes changed ever so slightly. His stare hardened and he frowned. Celestia seemed so sad too. And everything had stopped, but Celestia finally looked away from him and turned to the others that kept staring like they watched a theater piece. It was a combination of shock and disbelief. The griffons definitively expected something and it disappointed.

Then Celestia used that voice she used when she wanted things done already. “What are you doing standing around? There is much work to be done! Find the injured on the ground and on the airship’s remains! Take them to the hospital airship with the utmost urgency!”

Twilight recognized Crucible Wings inside the heavier armor, staring at her, and then at the griffon on the floor. Stunned until the Princess raised her voice. “Now!”

They resumed their tasks immediately and the Princess walked off to meet Chrysalis that didn’t seem happy, but Celestia took her somewhere else. They flew and headed towards her airship.

Twilight wrapped her hooves at the bars of her cage and looked at the griffon. He had several cuts, nothing serious and they didn’t seem to bother him. He was big and strong, with large and sharp claws that ‘normal’ griffons didn’t typically have. He did have a very distinctive… ‘Griffon-like’ face but Twilight couldn’t see what made it look so. Rugged? No, he was young. Maybe ‘feral’ would be a better word.

And he just laid there, but she didn’t dare speak to him. In her mind’s eye she pictured Emperor Grigor, maybe a giant griffon, a terrifying rugged monster screaming words charged with magic and bringing a terrible spell over his enemies. By the way things went… She didn’t what he was trying to do, but it wouldn’t have been pretty.

A strange dread she had never felt before crept from the back of her mind, and at the same time it kindled her curiosity. She hoped she would have the opportunity to talk to that fascinating griffon.

In the end, Cadance was right, but they never really stood a chance against Celestia, did they? Perhaps if whatever Grigory wanted to do had worked they would. It spooked Chrysalis, after all.

But she didn’t dare speak to him. She didn’t dare breathe too loud next to him.

***

Even if he had to wake up way too early, it gave him a giddy feeling, racing the big griffon across the sky under the stormy clouds. A small stream bellow brought fertility to a black soil below and the ubiquitous mountains wrapped up the picture with their mighty elegance. Discord started seeing why they liked the mountains so much. The cold wind was a bit uncomfortable to him though, used to the warm pony lands and comfortable homes during winter.

Geez… Winters must be downright cruel in that place.

Discord liked Lord Gilad a lot more than he expected and that was probably a good thing. He was meant to build a bridge, after all. Despite the silly situation with that Gwineth, things had been going wonderful on his mission. He met interesting griffons, a cute child (or cub as they called them), learned a few things that would help and actually became a bridge to build a friendship with The Lion. Flutthershy would be proud of him!

Halting to a stop in mid-flight, he listened to the voice in the wind. It was gone. For a second that intricately woven spell vanished, and the clouds above calmed themselves. The serene, but haughty and eerie voice changed to a furious cry of pure wrath. It chilled his blood and caused him to look around in surprise. Long and piercing, it echoed in the wind.

The Lion hovered next to Discord, beating his wings and waiting. Discord frowned. “Did you hear that?”

“I felt it.”

Then the voice resumed and the whole spell caused its effect all over again, from tempestuous clouds to magical wind.

“What happened?” He asked Gillad as though he might know. He had the impression that he would.

“We must hurry.” He did know, Discord figured, but chose not to disclose it just yet. He chose to trust the griffon. Add that Gilad seemed worried, Discord agreed.

“Let’s go then.”

Comments

[Flora Blossom]

This took me three days to get through this fiction... Time to review it.

I say that this is clearly a 7/10 there are some grammar that could be better, some punctuations are missing on all of your chapters, the story is long and interesting and you must of put a lot of hard work to make it right. Well, in the first chapter isn't United Kingdom post to be in capitalized? some of the chapters the sentence of beginning you used so. If you used so in the beginning of a sentence it needs a comma.

Grammar is a 7/10

pros
Interesting characters so far. Because it's not completed yet.
The feel of the story is par.

Cons
Like I said before capitalize and punctuations.

Also I'm in authors helping authors.

[Metemponychosis]

10497543
Thank you for taking the time.
Yeah, I knew grammar would be an issue. I'll hunt for those mistakes in previous chapters. Punctuation too. I'll try to find a proofreader. Same for my uses of 'so'.

To be honest, I'm glad that it came out as a 7/10. I feared worse.

Twilight stuttered a bit. “I-I mean… He’s not in the records for griffon rulers, and they have detailed records of all dynasties, of all the independent kingdoms and of the united kingdom, up to the Equestrian Confederacy. They don’t even acknowledge this Holy Griffon Empire… It is as though it never existed.”

Initially I thought that capitalization wasn't necessary since it referes to a union of kingdoms, not to the name of the the nation. Though I have to admit that I'm not sure.

I have two questions, if you will. Are the action scenes easy to understand and compelling? What about the humor?

[Flora Blossom]

10498311
the action scenes are pretty understandable and the humor is pretty good.

[Kevin Lee]

I now know why they all lost to her...
Celestia doesn't play chess.
She plays Fizbin!

But so does the Harpy....

[Jinnchin]

Uh oh, sounds like Momma is pissed one of her kids just broke their fancy new toy!

Can only assume this means my original theory that Grigory was being used as an unwitting distraction was not the case. Now I'm wondering if it was Grigory's idea or his father/The Harpy's idea to take that hulking behemoth of an airship when realistically speaking a faster and more discrete vessel would have been a better fit for a mission of this type. At the very least it shows more ego than common sense may have been involved with this decision.

Regardless, that was a heck of a battle scene! Sorry Twilight, but you've got some explaining to do!

[Metemponychosis]

11831496
I'll just let you read the next chapters.