The Runaway Bodyguard

by scifipony

Chapter 55 — Fight Cute Fight Smart

Hard to know whether to count that strike as a KO considering that I regained consciousness while still being pushed forward on the cobblestone street by the momentum I'd given the cart. The cobbles struck my shoulder, and wore at my fur, as my unraveling sweater and my abused hide acted as brake for my entire kit and cart. I saw naught but purple and blue phosphenes. My ears rang and my horn hurt. Yes, I'd struck my horn, too.

I heard yells. I heard a thump and a whinny I thought might be Safe. The next thing I knew, my hitch tugged me upward. The quick release triggered. Between the traces and strap catching under me, the motion flipped me from my right to my left side, tossing me high enough that I came down hard on my ribs. That punched the air out of my lungs. I'd been hit hard enough that I barely noticed smashing the side of my head down, even as I flailed to prevent that, and at least lessened the impact.

My vision cleared enough to see my ten pony weight five gold-bit pony cart whirl through the air like a kite caught by a gale. Ponies shouted. I heard desperate galloping, then heard whinnies as the cart crashed down. I heard the pine carriage works splinter and crack, then slide into things my eyes at the moment were too traumatized to resolve into images.

A moment later, "Stay away!"

"Or what?" asked a brusque voice that I thought I recognized.

Broomhill Dare didn't get to answer. I heard a meaty thud. Hooves connected with flesh. Somepony collapsed.

"Stupid mares. I hate unicorns. They think they're better than any pony."

My brain felt addled, but I knew I had heard that prizefighter before. It was pony instincts trying to shock a muddled pony back to her senses, to recall previously escaped danger.

I couldn't see well, but everything in me cried run! I stumbled, fell, stumbled and got up, then scrambled away as fast as I could.

I needed my magic, but all I got were sprays of fizzing sparkles and stabbing pain in my head. The bright clouds of whirling blue and purple had started to clear, but the fog inside wasn't dissipating so quickly. I hit a mailbox on a post with my shoulder, bounced off, then brushed a tree as obstacles directed me on to a sidewalk. I blindly raced forward, tripping but catching myself on a frost-heaved piece of cement.

"She went that way!" a second familiar voice cried out: a mare with a discernible Baltimaren accent. "Our crazy-mare."

"She's mine," cried the other pony. A stallion; I could tell by the tone of his voice. A big pony, too, by the thudding of his hooves.

He had a limp, and a dragged hoof, but the power in his stride was unmistakable.

Despite needing to concentrate on not running into something or tripping on the uneven path ahead of me, I glanced back.

The last time I had seen this big blue pony with a red crested mane, I'd tricked him into taking a path along a curb on a busy street. He had been shouting. He had wanted blood. Mine.

He'd walked into my trap.

I'd tripped him.

He had slipped into the busy street and gotten all four legs run over.

Cyclone Beaujangles.

And Mustang.

"I'm dead," I stated, and pushed myself almost up to a fast trot before I stepped on a wooden toy pull-horse left out by some foal. My hoof slid from under me and before I knew it, I lay sprawled out on the grass.

I wasn't getting away. I knew that.

Breathing hard, I gathered my strength and tested my magic. My horn kept sparking, sending lightning to poke and hammer me behind my eyes. My rushing blood made my head throb in time with my heart.

I concentrated on using my physical strength.

Against two earth ponies... riiight.

I'd kept myself in fighting form, however.

My sight cleared further. Unfortunately, no pony had come out to see what had caused the commotion. Ponies were still at work, the foals still in school. I gauged the slight uphill grade of the lawn—and the tree roots of a decades-old elm in the middle of it. I dragged up the pull toy with a hoof and gauged my distance from the stairs up to the house and the sidewalk I'd rolled away from.

Would Mustang attack me?

No. Were I her, I'd let Beaujangles beat me into a pulp before hitting me, assuming anything was left worth hitting.

My heart raced. Fright and being startled did their work, driving up my adrenaline levels. I practically buzzed, my legs starting to shake. My rib cage heaved. My body screamed for me to gallop away but I couldn't. I saw a smile creep over the prizefighter's muzzle; my catching breath was all that kept me from screaming and missing what was.

He saw fear in my eyes. He saw me shrinking away. He looked where I hoped he would.

He didn't see me loop the pull rope for the toy around my left rear hoof. He didn't see me making it a long reach to punch or buck at me from the stable cement platform of the sidewalk, weakening any attack he could make.

His eyes centered on my horn. In the shade of the elm and other trees that rustled in the breeze, he clearly saw that no aura pulsed around it.

Likely, he thought the only advantage a unicorn had was her horn. He forgot I had a brain, too.

I asked loudly, "So this was about getting me all along?"

Mustang put a hoof on Beaujangles flank, halting his incipient charge.

She told him, "Carne Asada is losing it. There's ponies not happy with her leadership. The right words in the right ears, and leaks in her organization, got our team inserted in place against Gelding's team." The mare shrugged, lowering her head to address me directly with a grin. "Don't know how those featherbrains couldn't hit you with their javelins. They'd promised me. It could have been embarrassing for the Doña had they gotten you on your first real mission. Ohhh, well. In any case, best we finish you here. You just knocked my boss out cold. He's got a thing about drowning ponies who hurt him. He'd likely encase your hooves in cement at low tide for what you and your unicorn mare friend did to him. Throwing pony carts around! That should be illegal."

"I see you're still full of yourself, aren't you Mustang?"

Her smile vanished. "She's an ingrate. Make it quick, anyway."

The prizefighter stretched his neck left and right and made a crackling noise. "Don't wanna."

Mustang chuckled. "You pay 'em good, but do they listen? Nah."

Beaujangles leapt at me, leading with a right hoof. In the arena, we wore gloves. Hooves are hard, and edged. Dangerous. He expected my guard to come up.

As three of his four hooves went airborne, I rolled away from some gnarled roots that protruded from the patchy grass and soil. Doing so, I swung out my rear leg, whipping it aside. My attacker could see I would clearly miss as he continued toward me.

The toy horse on yellow carved-stone wheels didn't care. This wasn't magic. It followed the laws of motion, gathering leveraged momentum as I put everything into it. The rope went taut. The toy curved up and hit the stallion square on the muzzle.

Teeth and cartilage both cracked loudly. The toy split apart. Wheels got flung aside to bounce into the street; the wood horse shot upward.

The stallion landed hard on the roots I'd just vacated. He made an oof! as he landed. I heard a rib pop, too. He had an instant to flail and correct himself, but he also jabbed his right hoof into the resistant soil instead of my compliant pony flesh.

He yelled. I didn't hear something break, but he would sprain something.

The horse part of the toy landed between his withers. Yeah, it didn't have much mass, but he yelled and flipped aside as if attacked by another foe. I got a twofer: He threw himself hard into the tree trunk.

I was wrong about Mustang.

She'd come around and charged up the stairs. I'd gotten myself to all fours when she landed a jab to my ribs.

I heard a sound like a walnut cracked: a pop and crackle. Not something you want to feel resonate against your heart.

Beaujangles lifted himself up and came at me, forelegs out for a one-two at my stomach. I had to choose.

I bucked him in the chest. I'd aimed for the neck, but I had essentially been KO'd once, so give me a break.

Mustang landed her second jab, this time at my left eye. She, however, wasn't a trained fighter, or trained in any way, I surmised. Her bronze shod hoof hit the outer edge of my eye and a bit of my brow. It dragged my head up, but not in a snapping motion. I felt blood well out of a new cut.

Beaujangles, a hulking mountain of flesh, landed across my flank. He'd gained a lot of weight during his recovery, hopefully loosing some of his muscle. His mass shoved me forward. My head came down just in time that I managed to turn my motion into a head butt, square into Mustang's muzzle. Sadly, my horn missed both her eyes. That could have been ironic.

I hit the lawn. It was softer than cement or tree roots, but I found myself without breath as the three of us rolled down the shallow hill to the sidewalk.

That left me on top of the pony pile. I scrambled up. No way was I going to survive if Beaujangles tried a wrestling pin on me, and in my state, no way could I actually pin him.

I stumbled back into the street. He got to his hooves and stomped toward me.

Mustang remained limp. KO'd in one strike.

If the stallion turned and bucked, he'd kill me. He'd also be exposing his stallion parts and he knew I knew that—and that I would delight in taking the shot.

He took a swipe at me.

I barely dodged and he grazed my shoulder, sending me spinning.

He followed with a left hook, but I reared and he got my chest instead of my neck, and with nowhere close to full power. If he could follow through and undercut to my stomach, he'd lay me out flat where he could trample me with all four hooves.

"You broke my horsey!" wailed a toddler with lungs of steel.

The prizefighter jerked his head around to look back at the house.

Yeah, Coach had said that while Cyclone Beaujangles could destroy an opponent, he wasn't a particularly smart fighter. He fought with ambush tactics and pure mean physicality.

You don't look away during a fight. You don't get distracted.

I didn't.

I let my momentum fully spin me around. That would have exposed my flank to a combination of left and right hooks that could have hit behind my ribs, shocking my kidneys, paralyzing my breathing, guaranteeing unconsciousness.

But... he had looked away.

It took a fraction of a second for me to spring into a buck and execute.

The stallion helped by turning his head back my way as my hooves hurled toward his nose.

The crackling sound was followed by a satisfying thump very much like a sack of flour hitting the pantry floor. When my rear hooves returned to the street, they were slimed. Between being hit earlier, probably by Beaujangles having jumped out from behind a tree, and just having been hit, I wasn't particularly stable.

My legs went right and my body left, laying me out in the gutter. Rotting leaves hid a trickle of water, but at least the fluid wasn't red or sticky.

Prone, I heard the sound of a dozen set of hooves.

I screamed my frustration. Of course, my nemeses weren't alone. Broomhill Dare had thrown the cart at them, but hadn't mowed them all down. I flopped and flailed, flipping myself on my stomach. Gritting my teeth, I levered myself up and planted all four hooves.

I would make every last pony pay. Aurora Midnight, the Earl of Grin Having, would not go down easily. Had I had my magic, I would have set the entire street on fire: trees, wagons, and pavement. Likely not ponies, but smoke and fire could be just as deadly.

Sadly, that was not happening right now.

Author's Note:

Next: Starlight doesn’t feel right. It will be a day of change, follow by more of them.