A Journey Unthought Of: Revival of Chaos

by Hustlin Tom

Chapter 60 - The Battle of Canterlot Part 4

“Come on, ponies! Dig your hooves in!” General Blitz Hammer yelled to his troops as he fired his war saddle’s guns, “If Canterlot falls, Equestria falls with it! We are not letting these bugs take our capital from us; not on my watch!” One Changeling stumbled, and then another, but the ballistics were only slowing them down; they had each adopted an iron-like carapace.

Lieutenant Swiftfeet took to the air, gaining just enough altitude to come right back down and divebomb the insectoid army below, all guns blazing. As he glided back up from his strafing run he could see that his and the General’s forces were being overrun, despite their best efforts. He was about to dive back into the fray when a group of a half dozen drones flew up to engage him. He quickly flew backward and turned his guns on them, but they just kept coming. From behind him he heard a distant whistling punctuated by a crackling sound.

Just as he was about to be caught by his six pursuers, blue and yellow streaks blasted past the Lieutenant and intercepted them, each arcing back over the skyline of Canterlot. The bugs were tossed against the marble walls of the city or slammed into the ground, either option eliminating them from play.

“Many thanks for the save,” Swiftfeet declared with a smile on his face as the Wonderbolts reassembled before him, “Lieutenant Swiftfeet, RSD field commander.”

“Captain Spitfire,” a mare with a fiery orange and yellow mane replied as she flew forward to greet him, “Looks like there’s no time for small talk. Where do you want us?”

“We need to get rid of a lot of these drones in a short amount of time. Anything you ponies can do to keep them off of us so we can regroup would be appreciated.”

Spitfire’s nodded and her lightning quick mind cycled through several strategies. She turned to her squad, “Fleetfoot, Wave Chill, Cloudchaser, you’re on hit and run routine. Grab their attention and get them in the air. Soarin, Silver Lining, you’re with me. Make me a strong, tight cyclone. Break!”

The squadron of pegasi split into their assigned groups, three descending on the losing battle below, and three climbing higher into the air.

“Hey you!” Cloudchaser yelled at a drone as she clipped it from behind, causing it to spin in place. Once it had recovered and had whirled around to find its attacker, the purple mare gathered small thunderclouds around her forehooves and grinned cockily, “Quit wasting your time with these chumps and take on a real mare of action!”

Fleetfoot did her part by skipping across the tops of her targets heads, having no trouble at all attracting the attention of those drones she leapt onto.

Wave Chill used his power over the cold to tag any Changeling that he could. With each touch of his hooves he left behind an angry squad of bugs with patches of frostbite on their armor.

Emerald blasts of magic filled the sky. Having returned to her accustomed appearance, Pupa was flying through the air flinging volley after volley at her two pursuers. Falena weaved around the attack, twirling through the skies to try and intercept the one who had taken her place in the Hive. Papillon stretched like taffy as she fluidly dodged Pupa’s assault, and she began to return the favor with her own hexes. It was now a battle of wills between the two parties as to who would control the Hive. The drones themselves didn’t have a say in the matter, and so they continued to fulfill the command their Queen and her chosen representative had given them: distract the ponies until Chrysalis’ return.

Pupa landed on one of the large marble walls found throughout the city, turned to face her enemies, and unleashed a shockwave of magic directly into their path. Falena transformed into an amorphous blob that split into two masses, avoiding the attack altogether. Papillon exploded into a dark colored gas made of billions of particles that funneled down to land in front of Pupa. With her magic the diminutive Changeling Candidate constructed a large mace that swung in an underhooved arc. Pupa created twin katars and sidestepped Papillon’s swing, quickly launching into an aggressive offense past her opponent’s defenses. A swift but solid blow hit her on the head, and she staggered back. Falena drew her schoolmaster’s rod back, caused it to grow into the shape of a Bo staff, and then swung again.

“You’ve lead our Hive to ruin,” she yelled as her weapon struck Pupa across the face. “You were at the Queen’s side in all this; you knew her plans, but you let her continue on with her suicidal delusions, and for what?”

“For what was meant to be rightfully ours all along,” Pupa replied as she spat out green blood and swung her katars at her opponent, “Changeling dominance.”

“Falena had years to study these Equestrians,” Papillon budged into the conversation with a swing of her mace, “But you pushed her out, convinced she was a double agent. We went to war with no intelligence on our enemies-“ she leapt over Pupa’s blades as they swung at her hooves, “and we did it on the hope that a genie could solve all our problems.”

Pupa blocked a swing of Falena’s staff by crossing her blades, and then swung for Papillon again to only have it batted away by a flick of her sister’s mace.

“We were never meant to be conquerors,” Falena continued as she glanced down at their drones before blocking a flurry of Pupa’s blows, “We were meant to share this world, not take it for ourselves. If it weren’t for our shapeshifting abilities we wouldn’t have this second chance at all! We can’t waste it or our lives so frivolously, not when there are so few of us left!”

Above the skirmishes taking place between the many factions beneath them flew Soarin and Silver Lining, the both of them helping to create a small but powerful windstorm that grew and grew as they flew in their circular formation. The three groundside Wonderbolts flew up towards the funnel: behind them flew a group of almost fifty drones. “Aaaand now!” Fleetfoot called out, and the three air champions dove back towards the city below. The Changeling horde tried to follow, but suddenly they found themselves being sucked upward beyond their control. The cyclone had become too strong to escape, and they were drawn into it.

Each of them could see the blue sky at the other end of the windstorm as they were forced into the vacuum. The blue was quickly replaced by a steady red glow. As they drew closer they could see a single pegasus mare ready to meet them, her hooves, wings, and mane lit up with crackling flames. As she dove towards them she began to spin, and the heat she was producing began to radiate off her. Speeding like a bullet down the wind tunnel, Spitfire left behind a trail of fire in her wake, and the Changelings screeched as they tumbled through a vacuum filled with fire and pain. As she exited the other end of the cyclone and pulled up the other two Wonderbolts disengaged from their task, and the cyclone rapidly began to collapse.

Burning Changelings were flung in all directions, and their pain reverberated off the minds of their nearby Candidates. They each turned to see their drones falling scattered across the horizon, and they each saw the one who had done the deed. Spitfire caught her breath as she held position: her back was to them.

Pupa’s vengeful anger exploded out of her with a scream, and she fired a jagged bolt of emerald lightning into the sky.

The hex drilled straight between Spitfire’s wings. She plummeted towards Canterlot’s streets below.

“Captain,” Soarin yelled in horror as he swooped to save her. He strained to catch up with and intercept her only a few dozen feet before she hit the ground. The two of them spiraled out of control towards a thick marble wall before he was able to pull up. Soarin held his Captain in his hooves: she wasn’t breathing.

He flew down closer to the battlefield, looking all around while shouting ‘Medic’ as hard as he could. Everypony who saw him fly over, Spitfire hanging limply in his hooves, stopped in numb shock. Their attention was swiftly drawn toward the Changelings they were fighting, and they were split up into smaller and smaller groups. Even with the loss of their leader and second-in-command the Wonderbolts strove on to try and buy the troops time and chance to regroup, but their attempts were proving ineffective. As the soldiers under the General and Lieutenant’s command were bested, they were taken alive but unconscious to be put into hastily made pods around the edges of the battlefield. The Equestrian army’s troops numbered less than thirty active ponies, and they were being divided up fast.

“Cloudchaser, get over here!” Soarin called out as he landed on the marble wall surrounding the city, his squadmate not behind. He gently laid down the Captain in front of him. His squadmate set down across from him, and quietly looked down at their commanding officer.

Soarin glanced down at Spitfire, then looked up to his squadmate with steely resolve, “Shock her.”

“You sure?” she asked with a little hesitance before she summoned up a small thundercloud between her hooves.

“It’s the only chance she’s got,” he fired back, “now give her the jolt!”

Cloudchaser drew her hooves up into the air and pressed the thundercloud into her Captain’s chest and discharged it. Spitfire’s chest heaved upward, but she remained unresponsive.

“Again.”

Another discharge. No response.

“Again,” he snapped.

“Soarin,” Cloudchaser bleakly looked back over to him.

“Just do it again!”

The thundercloud pulsed again.

Spitfire spluttered and coughed.

Soarin gave a sigh of relief and put his hooves over his face, “Oh thank Celestia, she's alive.” After a few minutes of just letting her catch her breath, Soarin gave another sigh, “We can’t stay here. She needs real medical attention.”

“Canterlot Medical is on the upper terrace,” Cloudchaser threw Spitfire’s right hoof over her shoulder, and Soarin took her left, “We need to get there or as far from here as we can!”

From out of the west came a deep blue and purple light, so large and bright that it temporarily caused the battle to cease.

“Insects!” roared a sharp, deep voice, “You dare attack my city not once, but twice?”

From out of the light sprang a dark form, its form both beautiful and terrifying.

“You planned well by removing me the first time you were here, but there is nothing to avail you now!”

Nightmare Moon landed hard in front of the largest mass of Changelings, her hooves cracking the weak cobble beneath her. All attention was turned on her, and she relished it. From out of nothing she created a large purple straight bladed broadsword. It then subdivided, creating one and then three identical copies. She flashed her fangs and twirled her four swords in oscillating patterns before bringing them to a stop, each blade pointed to her nearest foe.

“Come on! Pit yourselves against me! I need the sport,” she yelled with a cackle before she charged the drone army head-on. Leaping into the thickest cluster of the swarming Changelings, Nightmare Moon didn't so much best her enemies as she destroyed them. Her swords sliced through drones like they were made of gelatin, each orbiting her like an arm of a galactic cluster, with herself as the black hole at the center. It didn't matter where they stood; in front of her, above her, or even behind her, she never broke her stride as she continued to push straight through the Hive. Green sludge flew everywhere she walked.

Those few Equestrian soldiers left standing looked on aghast. The mare that had been the monster under their beds during foalhood, the one that legends had spoken of as an apocalyptic bringer of darkness was now fighting on their side.

Initially left speechless by her arrival, General Blitz Hammer remembered Prince Shining Armor’s words from earlier that morning.

He looked to his troops, then back to the dark alicorn, “Regroup around me, mares and colts! We’re backing her up!”

Taking his twenty-five soldiers the General galloped to the east, doubled back around, and charged the larger army.

“Drive as many of them as you can into Nightmare Moon’s path!” Lieutenant Swiftfeet called out as he intentionally collided with a drone, swing it around by the shoulders, and then let it go in an arc that crossed between her swords.

“You underestimated the Equestrians by a very large margin,” Falena declared as she lowered her Bo staff and dissipated it, “Outnumbered two to one and they’re now turning the tide of this battle. Sound a retreat now and we can avoid more casualties!”

“You can’t keep yourself from praising these lesser races, can you,” Pupa spat, “They must mean a great deal to you, but what are their lives worth to you?” Pupa flew up and readied her katars, “Drones! I have new orders: no prisoners. Kill everything that is not one of us!”

The drones blinked as they received their orders, and then turned to those podded Equestrians that were closest to them. Others began to look menacingly at the soldiers near them, and venom dripped from their fangs.

“No! Stop!” Falena yelled in a panic as she rushed to the wall bordering the battle below, “Killing them solves none of our problems! Retreat!”

They looked up again at the new commanding voice invading their minds and ears, and then looked back to Pupa in confusion. They had never experienced a countermanding of orders before, and their efforts screeched to a halt. As they continued to scrutinize Falena, the drones realized that she was giving off enormous amounts of fear and uncertainty. The fact that she was emoting at all astounded them.

“Listen to Falena,” Papillon blurted to them as well as she darted around through the air, “She still remembers you! She hasn’t left you behind like the Queen or Pupa! We still care about you! Pull out and return to the Hive immediately!”

Pupa screeched in anger as she rounded on Papillon. “You don’t care anymore about them than she does!” she roared before she grabbed the smaller Candidate and slammed her on the nearby wall face. Blinded by her fury, she threw her sister against the wall again and again and again.

Before she could begin another round of beatings, a dull thump impacted against her.

Pupa slowly glanced down at her chest. Her wings began to beat erratically.

An emerald javelin stuck out from the left side of her chest, its blade nearly sunk all the way through her outer plating.

Green sludge pooled from out of the wound and fell a long height to the street below.

Pupa blankly looked down from where the javelin had been cast to find Falena’s horn glowing and eyes full of tears.

“I’m sorry, Pupa,” she yelled up to her with a wavering voice, “I really do wish this could have ended another way.”

The spear dissipated, the mad Candidate went limp. Pupa’s body fell to the street with a crunch. Even though she had been dead in the air her limbs still sporadically spasmed and twitched, the effect of her insectoid physiology.

Falena quickly flew down to Papillon from the top of the wall. Her sister was badly beaten and crushed, and her sliding down the wall to the cobbled street below had injured her even worse. She was battered beyond belief.

The entire Hive had stopped what it was doing and turned to look toward their scene.

Falena quietly lifted up her sister with her magic.

Four drones offered themselves to serve as a stretcher for Papillon, and she placed her on their backs.

“Please, for the love of the stars, hang on,” Falena whispered as she began to silently cry, “I don’t want to lose two sisters today.” She then signaled for the drones to take the injured Candidate somewhere safe.

Just as she was about to give the order for a full retreat, Falena recognized a presence that hit her like a train. It was a presence she had hoped to never have to feel again.

“He’s risen,” she whispered in horror as she now saw red flashes of light coming from the terrace above, “The Queen has doomed us all.”

Comments

[Alan Smithee]

60 chapters in, we've finally got to the "Revival of Chaos" part...

[Hustlin Tom]

4552509
It only took forever, but we got there! At last! Only a few more chapters to go before this gets wrapped up!

[Luckyfanisaac]

As she exited the other end of the cyclone and pulled up the other two Wonderbolts

“Oh thank Celestia, she’s alive.”

Pupa’s body fell to the street with a crunch.