Several floors above, in the hangar stretching inside the large gaping mouth of Searo's Hold, the alarm was blaring the loudest. Metal mares ran to their stations, barking orders at one another.
Along the furthest edge of the loading platform, a mare ran between two or three parked manaships to join a guard who was looking out upon the mountainous landscape lit up by sunset.
"What is it?!" the mare shouted a she came to a scraping halt. "Why's the alarm going off?"
"There is an object approaching rapidly," replied the other mare, gazing out through a pair of binoculars being gripped in two metal-laced hooves. "It's flying faster than regulated approach speeds. That's why it set off the alarm."
"Then why not blast the vermin out of the sky?!"
"Because it's not vermin," the guard said, lowering the goggles as a dark shape loomed in view along the north horizon. "It's one of ours."
The mare looked at her. "One of our sisters is returning?"
The guard nodded. "The mana signature matches Searonese technology."
"Then why is she approaching so quickly?" The other mare's brow furrowed. "Could she be injured? Being chased?"
"I'm going to go with the injury."
"I see..." The mare smirked as she produced a blade from her forelimb. "Then I suppose we are fit to punish her for her failings."
"She could put up a good fight." The guard gestured. "See the markings on the ship?"
"What about it..."
"It's Aeterna's vessel."
"Aeterna? Pffft. She does nothing but pick on farm ponies in Aurum! She deserves to have some sense flayed into her!"
"If she could land the thing first."
Both ponies stared, their ears flicking.
The sunlight glinted off the swiftly approaching vehicle.
"Uhhh..." One of the mares blinked. "She isn't... She isn't slowing down..."
"Strange..." The guard squinted. "From the looks of it, all of her armaments are loaded—"
Just then, the air lit up with a dozen different bursts of steam. Rocketing on mana-propelled thrusters, a salvo of missiles flew into the wide entrance of the hangar. Ships exploded. Chunks of ceiling support beams fell. Fuel tanks lit up in flame. The air echoed with screams of metal mares being flung left and right.
The two mares at the edge of the platform threw themselves to the ground. Without stopping, the slender manaship throttled into the flaming passage. It landed as well as a stone could skip across a lake, grinding to a stop and knocking aside bundles of fragile loading equipment. With a spray of sparks, it finally slid to a stop, but not without firing off another spray of missiles into the far corner of the place.
Yet again, more chunks of rock fell from the inner throat of Searo's Hold. Metal mares scampered to put out the flames. All was chaos and smoke.
It was under this veil of mayhem that the side doors to Aeterna's manaship slid open.
Grunting, the two closest mares stood up and energized the lengths of their suits. Bright beams of light shimmered from their leg joints as they protruded weapons of every imaginable shape from their limbs and approached the vessel.
"Aeterna!" the guard yelled. "Explain yourself before we cut out your tongue and make it dance for us!"
With a grunt, a muscular stallion leapt out of the manaship. Landing on three limbs and a wooden crutch, Crimson glared at the two mana-powered warriors.
The mares blinked, then seethed.
"I don't know how in Searo's name you infiltrated a bounty hunter's ship, breeder, but you're going to pay with every inch of your skin."
"You'll find that I'm severely wanting of a damn," Crimson retorted. With a stomp of his hooves, he shouted to the wartorn air. "Mr. Tweak! Anytime you're ready!"
"Right..." Tweak climbed out of the ship, along with three fellow crystal ponies from Aurum, all armed with translucent manarifles. "I hate the look of this place already. Come on, boys. Light's out on this crudhole."
Then, joined as one, all four crystal ponies concentrated. A brilliant aura danced between them. Then, with a great pulse, they expelled their energy outward in all directions.
The lights above flickered and died. Parked manaships lost all power. At last, several of the surviving equipment along the fire-lit resources of the hangar fell like limp tree branches.
"Gaah—What—?!" The guard suddenly collapsed to the floor, her heavy armor spitting up sparks. "What is this sorcery?!"
"Nnnngh!" The mare beside her struggled in vain to lift her weapons. "Can't move... what...?"
The guard glanced up at the crystal ponies... and at the natural glow wafting off of them. She gulped. "Awwwwww crud."
Crimson spat and charged her. "You said it, lady." His one good forelimb flew like a mallet across her mouth full of fragile teeth.
Hate it when your armor dies and there is a huge hulk of a stallion bearing down on you
Crimson should have stopped to get some sunglasses before pulling off this feat of badflankery.
Hot damn, Crimson. You can take one from me. Careful, though, it might scald you.
Nice to see the "fragile teeth" line crop up again. I remember liking it in one of Petra's rough drafts.
They saw the bright shinies...
...and were promptly beaten to a pulp.
This chapter was awash with sufficient levels of awesome. Can't wait to see where you take things from here, IC.
Good job Crimson, thats how you assault a hanger full of Metal Mares. I approve of this tactic.
Goddayum, Crimson doesn't mess around, does he? It's refreshing to see badassery like this from someone other than Rainbow from time to time. But knowing IC, the next few chapters aren't going to be this neat and efficient. The big question is, where will Roarke fit into everything that's about to happen?
'Ere we go, 'ere we go, 'ere we go!
2458721
Oh Great and Powerful Turnip!
What proficies do you have for us to bear witness to???
What is this sorcery?!
2458542 You said it, Moony.
EMP FTW!
Flash To Bang Time - Accept
2458915
more correctly, what is this anti-sorcery.
Crimson just needs to find a pneumatic hammer, or a mana hammer, or something similar, and then we'll need a log chart to illustrate his level of bad-assery.
2458551 or a berret
Yes! So glad to finally have someone show those arrogant Metal Mares that having better tech than your opponent does not mean you are automatically a better fighter than them.
The way they all seem to think that they are the best and super-special and not that they just have better toys than their opponents kinda annoyed me, but then they are kinda the villains anyway so whatever.
Wait. If the Crystal Ponies could EMP, why didn't they do it to Aeterna while she was attacking their homelands?
Action hero Crimson, here to save the day.
2459363 because they didnt know they were capable of doing such thing until they jacked Aeterna's ship. otherwise, Aeterna wouldn't have been a problem to begin with. hope this helped
2458542 sounds like rape bro
I read the chapter title in Mario's voice. I'm still debating whether or not this is appropriate (Crimson is red, after all). And holy crap, it is Crimson. With some magic negating friends in tow. Hope they bring Imre along for the ride, and that we get some actual answers out of Roarke before Searo's left behind for good. Well, until tomorrow!
Finally Crimson has arrived!
Ditching the manaship in favor of far superior magic-negation tactics. I approve of Crimson's attack strategy.
Badass mode - activated.
I read the title of this chapter like this:
http://youtu.be/tpKCqp9CALQ
Yeah they're a bit screwed.
- four crystal ponies and a cripple attack searo
- searo stands helpless.
muahahahahahuahaa
2460125
Don't count them out yet. If Aeterna knew about the crystal ponies' EMP capabilities, which is likely given her divide-and-conquer tactics, Queen Slug-For-A-Butt knows, as well, and almost certainly will have prepared some ace-in-the-hole countermeasure against just such a contingency.
Well somepony certainly knows how to make an entrance. I rate this 60% cool.
2460396
So tempted to use 20% cooler in reply to that...
The Badass meter....it's off the charts
Don't they have several vital organs replaced with machinery? Imagine all of Searo suddenly going all i0.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/000/044/032/heart-attack.jpg
Yeah! Didn't see that one coming, ya mutton-headed bunch o' butches!
Ceterum censeo Searinem delendam esse.
Yeah, it was actually Crimson.
Yeah, I was wrong again. Shaddup, all of you.
I guess of the few things I can speculate: a lot of metal mares are going to die. I don't think it's going to be quite as simple as glow and shoot for Terra and Lady Pestiferous however.
I gotta wonder what they're going to do with Roarke. She was willing to kill Dash and Imre right there (no matter how reluctant she was), and she's definitely still loyal to Searo. It's going to be very interesting indeed.
2459530 probably
2460495 And you are therefore 27% percent cooler for resisting.
The ho-smacking commences.
Urge to laugh maniacally...
Crimson, you're nearly par with Rainbow dash in the badass category for this stunt here.
2458725
2457310
To both of you: have you considered that summarizing something that can generally be read in five to ten minutes might not be the best idea? There seriously isn't that much to analyze in any one chapter, and I've always wound up skimming your comments because they don't add much to the proceedings. If either of you want to keep going, I'd suggest commenting every five or ten chapters, or maybe whenever the point of view swaps. Then, you might have enough material to create something worth reading.
2460770
Go get a Log scale. For those of you who don't know what a log scale is...
imgs.xkcd.com/comics/height.png
Right click it, and then open image in new tab. You can then zoom, and read it.
This is Australia...
2458725
I see Dashie has returned. In this case, I'll let the pro take back over, I was just missing the reports and wanted to try my own luck at something like it. Glad to have you back Lt!
These numbers are not in favor...
...Of the Searonese.
IIIIIt's Dashie's Kentucky Derby Special Evaluation Time!
Well, I was right this time! Awesome! Very nicely described as well, Imploding. You'd think that the metal mares would have some sort of backup plan if their whole place got shut down like that. But I suppose they were either too proud to consider the possibility or we'll here about that backup plan next chapter. These are my thoughts so far.
-MASH
P.S. Eight left! YEAH! Let's do this!!
Ha. Sometimes, organics > machines.
Go Crimson! I knew you'd come eventually! And you have lots of Crystal Ponies on your side, too! Goodbye, bad ponies of Searo.
Blood, Blood, Blood, Blood, BLOOD!
-SPirit
The irony is so rampant that I just can't take it!
Needless to show...
memestorage.com/_nw/52/23082190.jpg
Well, I was wrong. Hello, Crimson!
Also, I love your affinity for punching teeth out, Skirts.
It is time for payback.
Crystal pony EMP attack!