• Published 29th Jun 2013
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The Strongest There Is - Onomonopia



Banner (and Hulk) in Equestria. What else to say?

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Darkness Rises

The ponies arrived in Canterlot a few minutes later, heading towards the castle infirmary to see if any of the ponies there had the gamma sickness. Most of the ponies were quiet in their beds as the princesses and Elements passed by, and they (most of them) were still upset about the loss of Banner. The group then headed to the castle in generally somber spirits. The guards saluted as the group reached the castle, then opened the gates and let them in. Celestia and Luna led the group through the halls, finally reaching the throne room. They opened the door...to reveal Discord and Chrysalis sitting on the throne.

"What in Equestria is this?" Celestia shouted as Discord snapped his fingers to shut the door behind her.
"Why, this is an ambush, dear Celestia," Discord said with a chuckle, turning himself into a bush at the same time. "As a former ruler of Equestria, you should really know these things when you see them." While Celestia was still stunned, Luna went right into 'battle mode' and started to fire at the two. Discord snapped his leaves and her attacks turned into kittens that smacked Chrysalis in the face. She scowled at Discord, who was laughing.

"Girls, the Elements!" Luna yelled at them. Before they could move, two guards came out from behind the pillars and tackled Fluttershy and Rarity to the ground, taking the Elements off of them and tossing them to Chrysalis.

"Why, thank you my dears," she hissed as the two guards transformed into changelings and flew over to her. "I just don't know what I would do without them."

"Give us back the Elements, Chrysalis," Twilight threatened. Chrysalis laughed at her while Discord changed himself back to 'normal'.

"I think not. You see, these are rather annoying when a pony is trying to take over the world," she explained, tossing one of the Elements to Discord. "But without them, you're mostly useless. And without Shining Armor and Cadence here with their power of love, none of you could possibly defeat us."

"We've beaten each of you before, we can do it again," Twilight growled. Discord and Chrysalis both looked at each other with a smile and stood up, advancing towards the group.

"Oh? Is that a challenge?" Discord asked with a grin, cracking his knuckles. "Because to challenge me without the Elements would just be...insane!" Luna roared and launched herself at him, Discord knocking away each of her spells with relative ease.

"Come on, let's go help her!" Rainbow Dash yelled as she, Pinkie and Rarity chased after them. That left Celestia, Twilight, Applejack and Fluttershy to deal with Chrysalis.

"You're a foal if you think that you can beat us all on your own," Celestia told her, to which Chyrsalis just motioned for Celestia to 'bring it'. Celestia fired a beam of magic from her horn that struck Chrysalis in the chest, but the Queen of the Changlings went up in green flames to reveal an ordinary changeling instead of her. Celestia was immediately struck down from behind, but when the ponies turned to see who had hit her, they saw seven Chrysalis's smiling at them.

"So, ponies, do you think you can handle fighting me...?"

"Myself...?"

"And I?" the multiple Chrysalis's asked. Twilight opened fire on the multiple queens who cackled and split apart, each of them heading for the group. Fluttershy hauled flank as three of the Chyrsalis's started to chase her, while Twilight and Applejack tried to fight two of them, with mixed success. Twilight's advanced knowledge of magic allowed her to counter any of the spells thrown at her, whereas Applejack was tough enough to shake off most of the spells that hit her. The battle with Discord wasn't going much better.

"Watch out, my friends! I am not in control of my actions!" Luna yelled as she began to fire at the three Elements, while a snickering Discord sat above her pulling some strings. RD flew around the two of them and slashed through the strings with her wings, freeing Luna. She spun and fired at Discord, who whipped out a mirrior to reflect her attack back at her.

"Princess Luna!" Pinkie yelled as Luna's own spell threw her across the room and slammed her into a wall, where she slid down and landed at its base, unconscious. The three prepared to attack Discord, but he held up a hand to stop them.

"Hold on a second," he muttered, looking into his mirror as he fixed his hair. "There we go. How do I look?"

"You look great," his reflection said with a thumbs up. "Watch out, they're attacking." Discord snapped his fingers and the mirror turned into a umbrella that he used to deflect Rarity's swarm of gems. He then pulled a sapphire stone the size of his head out of his pocket and threw it past Rarity.

"IT'S MINE!" she yelled as she shoved Pinkie and Rainbow out of the way.

"You ponies are so simple," he said with a chuckle. RD growled and flew at him, trying to hit him multiple times. Discord continued to dodge each hit until a cake hit him in the face.

"I hope you like almonds, because this is going to drive you NUTS!" Pinkie yelled with a maniacal laugh as her party cannon started firing balls of peanut butter at Discord. He whipped out a party cannon of his own and started to fire blobs of jelly at her in return. Neither Pinkie nor Discord got hit, but one unfortunate Rarity got covered in peanut butter and jelly, turning her mane into a chocolate mess.

"NOOO! Not my mane!" she screamed as she tried to get the glob off of her. Pinkie had engaged Discord in a battle of epic proportions as they attacked eack other with giant hammers. Discord knocked the hammer out of Pinkie's hooves, but a blast of magic in his back brought him down to a knee, giving Pinkie enough time to take his hammer and hit him on the head with it.

"Yeah, high score!" she yelled as numbers started to appear over Discord. "Thanks Luna."

"Not a problem, my friend," Luna said with a smile, getting back to her hooves. Twilight and Applejack had teamed up to battle the other Chrysalis's and had managed to defeat five of the imposters, leaving only two left.

"Now then, which one of you is the real one, and which should we not bother with?" Twilight asked them.

"Do you honestly think that we would tell you that?" they both asked. "You are bigger foals than we-" Both Chrysalis's screamed as two bolts of magic hit them in the back, knocking them both over. One turned back into a changeling, whereas the other one stayed Chrysalis.

"It is easier to blast them both instead of asking," Celestia told Twilight, who nodded and wrote it down in her note book. Fluttershy came out from behind the throne and looked over at the two.

"D-did we win?" she asked.

"I think we did," Twilight said with a smile as Luna and Celestia floated over the two villains and landed next to each other.

"Alright my ponies, let us use the Elements of Harmony to...wait, where are the Elements?" Luna asked. The ponies looked between Chrysalis and Discord, but neither of them had the Elements on them. "Where did they go?"

"I suppose that I am the one that took them."

"No..." Luna whispered as she heard the familiar voice. All the ponies turned with a gasp to see a pony that they thought would be gone forever...Nightmare Moon.

"It has certainly been awhile. Celestia has gotten fatter, I see," she said with a smirk, causing Celestia's face to turn red. Nightmare Moon levitated the two Elements up to eye level and spun them around, smiling as she looked at them. "Now then, I believe that these are what you wanted so badly?"

"Give them back," Luna said in a cold voice. Nightmare Moon smiled...and immediately roared in pain as Celestia blasted her in the face with a blast of sunlight magic, driving her back. Twilight caught the two Elements with her magic and tossed them back to Rarity and Fluttershy, the six of them forming the circle that was needed to fire the Elements.

"This ends now," Twilight said as she closed her eyes and waited for the power of the Elements to flood through them...except it never did. Twilight looked up at her Element in confusion, the other ponies doing the same. "Why aren't the Elements working? They have never failed us before, only when we-" Then Twilight realized what happened. The elements only worked if all of the ponies were staying true to their Element and there was a pony there that hadn't been acting like her Element. She looked over at Pinkie, who was looking down at the crack on her Element with wide eyes.

"Oh how delicious," Nightmare Moon laughed as she fired a spell at the group, trapping them all in a sphere of darkness. Celestia and Luna tried to combine their powers to break free, but a green fire encompassed the sphere as well, followed by golden chains that wrapped around it all. Celestia turned to see Chrysalis and Discord getting back to their hooves. "The Elements have failed you because one of you had their heart ripped out. Don't worry dear, I know how that feels. But it would not have mattered anyway. Because I," she began as she showed the ponies her glowing green eyes. "Am now the strongest there is."

"How did you get the power of the Hulk?!" Pinkie roared, slamming her shoulder against the sphere. "What did you do to him?!"

"I didn't do anything," Nightmare Moon said with a grin. "You did Pinkie. You broke the monster's trust and drove him away."

"I might have been a bit responsible for his leaving, though," Chrysalis said with a smile. "It is possible that I unleashed my changelings upon your home with the gamma poison that claimed so many ponies."

"And I my have been the one to screw with the Elements to make them think they were firing at me," Discord said with an innocent face

"It was you two?" Twilight whispered. "You two were the ones who drove Banner to leave because of his guilt? You're the reason he left?!" she screamed, slamming her hooves up against the sheild.

"You drove Hulky away!?" Pinkie screamed, slamming herself into the shield with no effect. Chrysalis chuckled at Twilight's and Pinkie's pain.

"We should put them in the dungeon," Nightmare Moon said. "Keep the barrier up of course. Tomorrow we tell the ponies that there has been a change in leadership."

"And what if they resist?" Chrysalis asked.

"We must remind them of our power," Nightmare Moon replied with an evil smile, looking through to Celestia. "Tell me Celestia, how long has it been since we had a public execution?" Celestia's eyes widened as she realized what Nightmare was saying. Chrysalis chuckled as she levitated the sphere out of the room. Discord watched them go, not sure how he felt about this. Capturing them to take over Equestria, sure...but killing them?

"Do not worry ponies," Chrysalis said with venom, as she brought them down into the castle dungeon. "You will be safe down here. No one will be able to reach you. You'll be perfectly safe."

"You cannot win, Chrysalis," Luna said, evenly. "You must know that Nightmare Moon will turn on you the moment this is over. She wants the night to cover the planet. Would endless night benifit the changelings in any way?"

"Actually yes. See, without the sun, ponies will have an even harder time identifiyng us when we infiltrate their homes. Eternal darkness works great for us," she replied with a smile, opening the largest cell and placing the ponies ensnared within the shield inside. "Now you be good and get some rest; you all have a big day ahead of you."

"What's the plan, Twilight?" Fluttershy asked, once Chyrsalis had left.

"I don't know," she muttered, spinning her magic around her horn to try and drill her way out of the barrier. "But if we can't get out of here by tomorrow...odds are we aren't going to make it." The ponies all sat down and tried to figure out a plan for getting out, leaving Pinkie alone to stare out the window into the now-night sky.

"Hulk, where are you? We need help," she whispered.

---=-=---

Banner woke up the next morning with a crick in his neck, but he ignored it, stood up and jumped out of the tree where he had taken refuge for the night. He took an apple out of his backpack and quickly downed it, getting back on the trail he had been walking and continuing on his way. A small village greeted him as he reached the top of a hill a few hours later. He walked in and received a few glances, but most ponies knew who he was by now. A small cafe captured his attention, and he sat down outside at one of the tables. A waiter walked over and gave him a menu.

"Just tea please," Banner said as he returned it to the waiter, leaning back in his chair and closing his eyes.

'So this is how you repay those that gave you shelter and helped you.' Banner eyes shot open and he looked across the table at a silver mare, one that he hadn't seen in quite a while.

"So you're back, huh?" he muttered before closing his eyes again. "I have nothing to say to you."

'Then allow me to speak while you listen. Do you think that you got here, to Equestria, on accident?'

"So you're the one who brought me here?" he muttered. "Makes sense; that metal shouldn't have come off like that to begin with. So you decided to doom hundreds to die by bringing me here. I don't know if you're a god or what, but you're terrible at your job."

'I brought you here so that you could help to improve this world, much like the champion of lightning did or the armored father,' she said calmly, but Banner could feel an underlying rage in her voice. He knew rage when he heard it. 'And up until you gave up on yourself, you were actually succeeding.'

"Gave up? I left to protect the ponies!" he spat, his rage boiling back up. He sat up and glared at the silver mare, not caring that the others couldn't hear her. "I left to save them from me and the Hulk. Do you honestly think I like having to always leave a place that I come to call 'home'? No, but I do it to protect the inhabitants. They're safer without me," he said with a small sigh.

'You have the potential to be so much more,' she said with a bit of heat. 'You have a special talent inside of you. You have the ability to make others smile. But because of your hatred towards yourself, you have not been able to achieve it.'

"All I do is cause pain," Banner said with a smirk. "I can't make others smile. So unlike your other little champions, you picked a dud with this one. Now leave me alone." Banner slumped back in his chair. The silver mare looked at him with what seemed to be sad eyes before shaking her head and standing up.

'You were supposed to be an inspiration, to show the ponies how not to give up no matter how terrible things get. I see now that I truly did pick the wrong hero.'

"I'm not a hero. I'm a monster," he growled. "Leave me alone."

'...Very well, but I will leave you with this. If you return to the ponies today, there will be hard times ahead of you, but the reward is great. But if you leave them now, you will never see them again. You will finally be alone because they will all die.' Banner took a sip of his tea, noticing that she had vanished when he hadn't been looking. What had she meant that if he left them now, they would die? He had given them the cure for the gamma poisoning and knew that the princesses were strong, so they should be fine. But he could go back if they needed him, couldn't he? Of course he could.

'No, puny Banner won't.'

"And I just got rid of the other one," he growled, turning to see the Hulk standing behind him. "Don't tell me that you of all people are going to tell me to go back? You're the one who always wanted to be alone. Well guess what, because I'm a poison to the ponies, you get your wish. We get to be alone."

'Hulk always wanted to be alone to be happy...but Hulk was wrong. Hulk know that happiness come from friends now.' Banner turned to face the Hulk, completely stunned. Did Hulk, the monster that smashed any one or any thing that got close to him, just admit that he needed someone else?

"So you're saying that we should go back?" he said with a laugh, figuring that this was a bad laugh. "Doesn't anything get through that thick head of yours? We don't get to have friends! We smash or hurt anyone who's foolish enough to get close to us! And even if we do decide to make friends, they will simply betray us in the end--or have you already forgotten about what happened with Pinkie?"

'Hulk...choose to forgive Pinkie,' Hulk said, his words nearly knocking Banner out of his chair.

"What?" Banner asked him. "You? The beast of rage and hatred, are going to forgive her?"

'Pinkie tried to be friend to Hulk, even though Hulk hurt her and her home,' Hulk said. 'She tried to be kind to Hulk even after Hulk destroyed her home and attacked her friends; she forgave Hulk...And she was truly sorry, Hulk know sorry when he hear it. If Pinkie can forgive Hulk for what Hulk has done, then Hulk can try to forgive her. It what...friends do.'

"Well you finally managed to get rid of that rage of yours, but our blood nearly killed them all," Banner reminded him. "I'm not going back. I refuse to put their lives at risk again."

'That's because puny Banner afraid,' Hulk said with a growl. 'Hulk used to be the same as Banner. Hulk used to think that all wanted to hurt Hulk, so Hulk have to smash! But pink pony show Hulk, that Hulk no need to always smash; that Hulk isn't a monster! Hulk is what Hulk chooses!'

"Well whoop de do for you then!" Banner yelled, scaring some of the early birds. "You found something that makes you happy! Good for you! But don't you remember what happens every other time we find a planet where you think that you'll finally be happy? They all end up destroyed and everyone on the planet dies. It's happened before and it will happen here."

'No. Hulk swear to protect ponies. Hulk no let ponies get destroyed,' Hulk said with conviction. 'And Banner want to protect ponies as well, Banner just too cowardly to go back when things go wrong.'

"Because I'm trying to protect them!" he yelled. "If I go back, things will get worse. They always do." Hulk glared at him, the other half that he didn't want to be in him, and that he considered weak. All his life Hulk had been considered the monster, while Banner was the man. But Hulk knew that wasn't always true.

'You know difference between Hulk and Banner?' Hulk asked him.

"You're a brainless wrecking ball while I'm a cursed scientist?" Banner replied smugly. Hulk moved in closer until he was glaring right into Banner's eyes.

'When things go bad, Banner runs, Banner hides. But no matter how many times people hunt Hulk, no matter how many times Hulk destroy cities or smash puny humans...whenever they need Hulk, Hulk go and help. Because strong do what is right. And Hulk is strongest there is.' Banner didn't know how to respond. He had always considered himself the smart one, the good-hearted one, but Hulk had just left him speechless. Hulk was being the human of the two, willing to put himself in danger to go back, even though they might hate him. How was it possible that Hulk was the more virtuous of the two?

"But I can't go back," Banner whispered. "I'm not strong."

'Banner not as strong as Hulk, but Banner no need to be,' Hulk replied with a laugh. 'Banner constantly getting hurt, getting attacked. Always trying to save world. But in past, no matter how many times Banner fail, Banner still find way to stop Hulk or monster.'

"That was always because of my guilt guiding me...I'm not that good a person," Banner whispered. "I can't be strong all the time. I'm...the monster." Hulk looked down at Banner, who looked completely defeated, and sighed, getting down on his knee so he could look Banner in the eye.

'Then let Hulk be monster. Banner can be strong one this time.' Banner thought about what Hulk was saying, not sure what he should do. Every time this situation came up, Banner always failed in the end. He could never contain the Hulk or stop the monster completely. And at the end of it all, Banner always found himself in the same place he started...alone.

'Banner no need to be alone,' Hulk said, reading his mind. 'Ponies become Hulk's friend, showed Hulk he not a monster. They will be Banner's friend.' Banner smiled a bit, not believing how surreal it was that Hulk was giving him advice. 'And Banner will always have Hulk, for better or worse.'

"Hey, Hulk...?" Banner began.

'What?'

"Want to go smash some villains?" Hulk gave Banner a grin that normally gave him nightmares, but Banner knew that he wouldn't be the one with the nightmares. Whoever was hurting the ponies would...And they would never know what hit them.