A Journey Unthought Of: Revival of Chaos

by Hustlin Tom

Chapter 57 - The Battle of Canterlot Part 2

In the very first few minutes after the incapacitating of the larger Changeling army, Falena and Papillon finally arrived. Stopping short in the air, the twenty-two stragglers looked down at the city beneath them.

“What the hell happened here?” Papillon exclaimed when she now saw a maze-like city armed to the teeth, “Last time we were here it was all beautiful, and now it looks like someone in the Urban Renewal department went on a war binge! Are we already too late?”

Falena shook her head, “No, we’re not. If we were, you wouldn’t even have to question it: reality as we know it would have already checked out.”

Before they could even blink, thunderclouds began to form in the air around and rumble threateningly.

“Evasive-“ Falena tried to yelled out, but lightning was already coursing through all of them. She and the others all tumbled out of the sky, striking their own sets of buildings like their more hostile peers. Falena bounced off one of the few remaining steeply sloped towers in the city, her fall breaking the shingling loose as she slid off the edge. She did recover in midair, however, and began to slow her fall until she made an ungraceful but safe landing on the street below.

Papillon fell onto the edge of one of the high marble walls and slipped off to another thirty foot drop nearby. Before she hit the ground she changed her substance into a sludge-like form, and she splattered across a very large grassy area.

“Are you alright?” Falena yelled out as she galloped up to her.

“Oh, peachy!” Papillon replied as her upper body emerging out of the congealing dark pond that gathered beneath her, “Let me just pull myself together.”

Falena looked all around them now: the imposing white walls, the skies above that hid magical traps, the sight of what she could almost swear was an artillery station on the top of a ruined tower. “This isn’t the Canterlot I know,” was all she could think to say.

“That doesn’t change anything,” Papillon declared as she fully reformed herself, “The Queen’s around here somewhere, and we have to find her and take control of the Hive against her.”

“Which is going to be even harder now that everypony is on the lookout for all Changelings, not just the bad ones.” The two Candidates quickly shifted into a gaseous state and drifted away, following their connection to the Hivemind back towards the physical location of the nearest commanding psychic broadcaster.

The many ponies that had remained in Canterlot Square could not adequately express their dumbfounded shock at the city that now surrounded them. Even those who had been trained for and expected the change, like Prince Shining Armor and his troops, were staring up in wonder at the transformation apparent around them. The moment was short lived, though, as the Changelings that had fallen into the city around them began to recover groggily and become hostile. Bon Bon was scared stiff by one such monstrous invader that had landed near her. With no pretext in disguise any longer, the bug shook its head to refocus, hissed at her menacingly, and pounced. Without being conscious of what she was doing, she abruptly swung her broom up at the creature and caught it by its abdomen on the broom handle. It tried to maintain its position in the air by flapping its wings erratically, but Bon Bon continued to try and beat at it. Eventually she struck it on the head, and it fell to the ground unconscious. The earth pony took in ragged, nervous breaths as she was momentarily mesmerized by what she had done to her assailant. A scream forced her back to consciousness of her surroundings, and she saw a defenseless stallion and mare struggling against a group of four Changelings who were trying to create pods around them. Her righteous fury was piqued by the desperation of her fellow ponies, and she rushed off to free them.

Trixie, star tipped Arcanium staff twirling in her hooves, swung this way and that as her enemies rushed in on her all at once, attempting to dogpile her. It eventually became too crowded for her to be able to move around the stage she was mentally performing on. She channeled a powerful telekinetic spell into her staff and slammed the blunted end down into the ground. The shockwave of her hex knocked the encroaching Changelings back, sending them stumbling over each other. She scoffed at them with an inflated show of confidence, “Can any of you possibly approach the triumphant skill and ability of the Great and Powerful Trixie? One wonders why I bother wasting my time on you!”

Fancy Pants held his own against his foes, but just barely. Rather than ganging up on him as was the case with most of the other fighters, these Changelings tried to stay just out of his reach while extending out iron hard appendages to attack him like many sabers. He was managing to side-step or jump over most of their assault, and was parrying the rest with his twin conjured cutlasses. There was a momentary opening in his pattern though, and before he could comprehend what he saw he felt a searing pain on the left side of his face. He gasped loudly from the burning sensation and realized he couldn't see well out of his left eye. His monocle fell to the street, where he heard the initial bounce of the glass on brick, but which was also followed by a heavy crunching sound. His swords dissipated when he was hit from his blindside, and he was heavily shoved to the ground. He saw two blurry Changelings standing above him. He quickly concentrated again, squinting as he did, created a single cutlass, and swung at the closest black blob he could see. There was a shriek of pain from the creature, and a flurry of blows rained down on him, rendering him unconscious.

Before any sort of finishing blow could be struck, a canister bounced in among them. An orange gas began to expel from it after a few second’s delay, and the bugs were all enveloped by it. They quickly began to feel as if their bodies were on fire as they succumbed to the effects of the Marigold Option. As they emerged from the dense cloud, the Changelings each began to stumble, wheeze, and then slowly collapse. Their entire bodies began to tremble and as the imaginary fire inside them began to burn its way out. After a few more seconds, the light left their eyes, and they were completely still. The Changelings in the nearby area felt the deaths of their brothers, and they all turned to look where the deadly chemical agent had come from. The tank, which had been motionless since its arrival in the square, began to come to life in an unexpected way. It produced a low grumbling sound, and the treads towards the front of the machine came undone. Slowly rolling backward, the entire structure of the vehicle began to realign into a new configuration. Armor plates moved and shrank, and the gigantic drums that drove the tank forward began to draw the treads back inside their own structure. From out of the space where there had once been large treads now sprouted two large mechanical arms with four digits on each hand. The hands pressed against the ground, bracing against it, and pushed the half transformed machine into the air. From what had once been the back of the machine sprouted two large cloven hooves, the hydraulics of which vented small jets of steam as they helped to support the rest of the mass of the monstrosity. From out of its central column shifted an enclosed rotating gunner’s seat, attached to which was a long barreled rotating repeater rifle and grenade launcher. Finally, the minotaur’s head and armor came down to rest on the titan’s newly acquired shoulders. As everything locked into its final positions, the metal minotaur’s eyes glowed yellow, and steam vented from its nostrils.

“Changelings,” the gravelly voice of Bunsen Burner boomed from out of the machine, “I offer you this one and only chance to surrender. Refuse, and you will receive your prompt and utter destruction.”

Princess Cadence, amidst her own battle, looked up at the hulking Mechataur, and her heart froze.

Why is he here now, she wondered momentarily, why did he come back?

She was forced back into her own combat by the shouts of her overwhelmed husband, who was batting away his enemies with a magenta sword and shield.

A large number of the dutiful insectoid soldiers began to fly towards the gigantic Mechataur: if it could kill them so easily with its weapons, then it had just become the highest priority target. As they approached, panels in each of the Mechataur’s arms opened, and its tank treads uncoiled outward. The exo-golem turned and swung its left arm in an exaggerated arc, and the coiling treads followed after it. The four Changelings that were caught up by the tread flail and pulverized against a nearby building never saw it coming. The machine gun revved up and began to fire, cutting a line through the air as it locked onto its insectoid targets. Most of the bugs were able to evade the barrage of lead, but seven were not so lucky. Those that made it past the line of fire latched on to the machine and began to crawl towards the gunner’s seat to rip the weapons located there free of their mountings. A gas grenade was already loaded and fired directly at the ground by the time they got anywhere near their target, and orange plumes began to rise up around the titanic guardian. The bugs retreated, quickly rising up and out of the fog before it could affect them.

“Nicely done,” Bunsen Burner yelled back to the Maiden as he lifted the visor to his telepathic helmet up and retracted the tread flails, “but be careful: no civilian casualties.”

“There’s no need to worry about my aim,” she replied from the control panel of the gunner’s seat with an audible smirk, her green and yellow particles possessing the triggers and other instruments, “I don’t have to worry about twitchy fingers or sweaty palms.”

“What was that?” the old stallion shouted back over the loud thrum of the exo-golem’s internal systems.

Before the Maiden could reply, the entire vehicle lurched suddenly to the right. The Mechataur began to fall, but Bunsen Burner managed to bring the machine’s arm down into its own path, making a small crater where the splayed palm struck the cobbled road to steady itself. From outside the now fading orange protective cloud Bunsen Burner only just caught a glimpse of a large black appendage. It flew toward them faster than either pilot could respond to, but suddenly an enormous dark mass lunged into the dissipating Marigold Option and launched the exo-golem completely off the ground.

As the forty ton giant flew through the air, the old stallion bellowed to the Maiden, “Thrusters!”

Two sets of Arcanium plates, a large one for maximum lift and the other for attitude and control, deployed out of the Mechataur’s back and lit up with a powerful anti-gravity spell. The force provided by the hex was not enough to counter the machine’s backward momentum, however, and it still ended up crashing into one of the large nearby sections of marble wall, creating a large crater and enormous cracks in its structure. The gigantic exo-golem wasn't even superficially damaged, and as it pulled itself out of its hole, broken fragments showering down around it, its pilots finally saw their enemy in full.

An enormous arachnid abomination with a large set of gorilla-like arms and two smaller arms protruding from its chest slowly walked towards them on two pairs of long, thin cricket legs. It stood like a centaur, its long plated tail and barbed stinger helping to provide it balance. From out of its back sprouted a set of membranous wings, which hummed menacingly when it moved them. Its head was featureless apart from four compound eyes and its snout.

A lone Changeling drone ran towards the monstrosity away from the greater battle around them and leapt onto the hideous chimera. Once it landed on top of its larger compatriot, the drone turned into a liquid state and sank into the gaps between the plates of armor on the creature’s back, and was completely absorbed by it into its substance. The final soldier now incorporated into its mass, the insectoid chimera’s lower head split into a five mandible structure: one where a pony’s chin would be, and two jaws on each side of its face. Its exoskeleton was molted and cracked on its upper right arm, as well as on other scattered portions of its body from where it had entered the cloud of the now fully dispersed Marigold Option.

Initially stunned to silence by the disgusting looking creature in front of him, Bunsen Burner shook himself back to reality and thought aloud to himself, “You may have a new form, bugs, but that doesn’t make you any less vulnerable to my chemicals!” His confidence growing, he arrogantly yelled at the chimera, though he knew it couldn’t hear him without the loudspeaker, “If I could trick and even beat Equestria’s gods with my mind and potions when they were still here, what hope do you have against me?!”

The arachnid juggernaut shrieked, its blood curdling wail sending shivers along the spines of everypony who could hear it, and charged its titanic mechanical foe. Responding in kind, Bunsen Burner slammed the Mechataur forward into a large striding gait with his own furious yell, and the two giants engaged in their own battle.

Comments

[Alan Smithee]

The arachnid juggernaut shrieked, its blood curdling wail sending shivers long the spines of everypony who could hear it, and charged its titanic mechanical foe. Responding in kind, Bunsen Burner slammed the Mechataur forward into a large striding gait with his own furious yell, and the two giants engaged in their own battle.

(SCENE MISSING)

"Gee, that sure was an exciting battle!" said Twilight

[Hustlin Tom]

4361114
Lol Inorite? The part with the narwhal was so unexpected too!

Don't worry, there'll be more fighting someday.

[Luckyfanisaac]

It eventually became too crowded for her to be able to move around the stage

There was a momentary opening in his pattern though,

From out of the its central column shifted an enclosed rotating gunner’s seat,