“GRRRRROOOOOOAAAAAARRRRRHHHH!!!” The giant red bipedal dragon roared, completely enraged. Ruby and the others stared in horror at the towering beast as it bellowed into the sky, filling the air with noise. The draconic monster looked out at the surrounding area before roaring once more, and then leveled its arm cannon at Ponyville. A massive shot of magical energy fired out into the center of town, building up into a ball before it exploded, the blast causing the very earth to rise up into a huge pillar of fire, a good section of it getting destroyed in the process. It roared once more and began stomping towards the town.

Sapphire and Lyric were shaking at the sight of their father, refusing to believe that anything they were seeing was true. Sapphire snapped out of her delusions and pulled out the RYNO 2 and aimed it at the back of Rage’s body. She pulled the trigger and multiple energy rockets were fired at the huge dragon-robot hybrid.

The blasts caused Rage to grunt in annoyance as he turned his attention towards the group and away from the damaged town of Ponyville. He leveled his cannon at the group and began to build up energy.

Ruby held up her hand and created a large red shield around the group as the blast was fired. The blast didn't make it through the shield but caused it to shatter on impact. Ruby gasped in pain as her magic was destroyed so suddenly.

Zane ran up to get and began pumping Nanotech into her body, healing her wounds. Lyric just fell on his rear as he watched his monster possessed father approaching with a bloodlust so deadly it made his skin crawl from even a mile away.

Sapphire and Ruby looked to each other and nodded, bring out their RYNO's and firing at the beast approaching. ”It's ok to shoot him! The damage won't affect Dad, only Epidemic!” Ruby yelled as she aimed for the head.

Rage charged the group, fire burning from his body as he sped towards them at an alarming rate. Most of the group were able just barely dodge except for Thane who ended up on the opposite end of a large burning steel foot, sending him flying into a mountain taking heavy damage. The group spread out and fired from multiple directions to distract Rage, who instinctively targeted the last person to attack him, but with the amount of attacks taking place he couldn't decide on a target.

His anger rose and he glowed a violent red, the ground shaking as his energy built up. He then released the energy in a huge blast that blew everyone away, damaging them as well as knocking the squad members of Phoenix offline, leaving Ruby, Sapphire and Lyric to deal with the threat.

Rage bellowed out in anger once more before setting his sights on Sapphire. Slightly remembering that she was related to the being that had given Rage so much anger, he attacked her first. He brought up his arm cannon and prepared to fire a blast that would have most definitely killed her had Ruby not intervened. She shot a blast of magic at the arm cannon, causing it to slightly shift to the left and barely miss Sapphire. Glaring at the one that messed up his attack, Rage let out another monstrous roar before aiming at her and firing. Ruby was just barely able to escape the blast radius of the giant beam that was fired outwards, taking a large section of the Everfree with it. Immediately she knew, one shot from this thing, and she could die.

”I need to find a weak point. There has to be some way for me to hurt him.” Ruby kept up her offence by blasting him with more magic. These attacks did fuck all to Rage, and mainly kept his focus on her. He raised his arm cannon again and fired. Ruby was once again barely able to dodge. Seeing that a lot of his powerful attacks were range based, the best strategy would be to get up close and personal.

Oh how wrong she was.

When she flew close to Rage, he would attempt to grab her, most likely to drain her of her power before he killed her. She dodged all of his swips, ensuring that her energy wasn’t stolen, as she tried to come up with some idea in order to beat Rage.

’Let me see. So he has Dad’s skill with ranged weapons, and Epidemic’s skill in close combat and magic.’ She thought over her predicament. ’I've certainly got my work cut out for me.’

‘Ruby, can you hear me?’ A voice spoke to her.

She stopped and her eyes widened in surprise. ”Symbol? Is that you?” She asked in surprise.

‘Yes, it is. I can't help but notice that you are trying to stick to MY fighting style when I had told you to use your own, and I have already instructed you on what to do in an event like this.’ The voice said with a hint of sarcasm. ‘I thought I taught you a few things that would allow you to win something like this, especially against Epidemic.’

Ruby barely dodged a large claw trying to grab her before she blasted it with magic. ”It's a little hard to get those techniques ready at the moment!”

‘You're forgetting that you aren't alone, there is your siblings and then there is Metal, start using that magnificent brain of yours and show me that my time on you wasn't wasted.’ Her teacher told her.

Ruby nodded and looked back to Sapphire, not happy to put her sister in danger but knew what had to be done. ”Sapphire! I need you to distract him for awhile!” Looking around she had saw that Lyric had disappeared, probably scared out of his mind.

Sapphire nodded and aimed the RYNO 2 at her possessed father. ”HEY!!!BIG FAT AND UGLY, OVER HERE!!!” She yelled before firing a small wave at him, causing him to turn his attention towards her. ”YOU DONT WANNA KEEP A GIRL WAITING DO YA?!?! HIT ME WITH YOUR BEST SHOT!!!” She exclaimed in a mixture of rage, anger, joy and excitement.

Rage gave out another roar and began to fire rapid blasts at Sapphire who was too quick and agile to be hit, able to dodge much easier than her sister even while holding the RYNO.

As the attention was now off of her, Ruby pulled back and stood still, closing her eyes and relaxing herself.

She held one hand out and slowly raised it into the air, focusing a small fraction of her life force into the palm of her hand. ”Here we go…” As she focused her magic onto the piece of life force a small ball of light formed above her palm that began to grow and form the shape of a four pointed star before locking itself in the shape and turning into a red gem which she held in her hand. ”Reality Star...lend us your power.”

The gem glowed and was absorbed into Ruby's body, her power rising as the Stars energy began to become one with her own. With her power rising, she looked to see that Rage had returned his attention back to her, his eyes having a slight tinge of blue before they returned to normal. Ruby could only assume that her rising energy had attracted the Psychotic portion of Rage’s mind. She had power, power that he wanted.

Ruby was confident that she was more than a match for Rage now. She was proven horribly wrong when Rage charged at with blinding speed, fire once again coating his body. She just barely dodged the attack and looked at Rage in shock.

’How in the hell does something that big move that fast?’ Ruby didn’t have time to think for an answer as Rage aimed his arm cannon at her before firing. Ruby dodged and fired her own attack. It hit Rage in the face, causing him to roar in pain. Now that she knew she could hurt him, Ruby fired off another attack. Rage however was ready for it this time, as he countered it with a blast of flame from his mouth. Ruby fired off more attacks, but Rage kept blocking them. Growing tired of this little game of theirs, Ruby rushed, summoned two blades of purple fire, and stabbed them right into Rage’s side. He roared in pain once again, his glare intensifying. He fired more shots from his arm cannon, but Ruby managed to dodged. She then flew away, putting quite the amount of distance between her, and Rage.

”Hope this works!” She then flew at Rage at high speeds, surrounding her body in purple fire. Rage tried to stop her, but every attack he sent her way was avoided. She kept increasing her speed, getting faster, and faster, and faster, until…

“GRRRRROOOOOOAAAAAARRRRRHHHH!!!” She went right through him. Rage had froze, a clean hole in his chest, creating a sizeable smoke cloud. He then slowly fell back, and collapsed. Ruby smirked as she threw up her arms in triumph.

”WHOO! That’s right! Nobody messes with my family bub!” She did a mini victory dance. failing to see something moving in the giant dust cloud. From the massive plume of smoke, came something big, and it was blood red. The massive object knocked her out of the sky and onto the ground. After a couple seconds, she slowly sat up to see what hit her.

Her eyes widened in shock. There before her, she saw Rage getting up, the hole in his chest repairing itself, and a massive blood red scythe in his right hand.

The weapon was huge! It was as big as Rage was, and definitely added to his terrifying appearance.

“GRRRRROOOOOOAAAAAARRRRRHHHH!!!” Rage roared into the sky, clearly ready for round two.

{Mindscape}

‘Huh? What happened?’

‘Where are we?’ Plague and Amnesia woke up with huge headaches. They looked around the red emptiness that surrounded them, wondering where they were, and how they had gotten there. They were both in these weird, transparent orbs, both being held in the talons of a blood red two headed dragon, which looked exactly like Epidemic did when he went full dragon. They banged on the orbs, hoping to somehow break them, but it was all in vain. The two looked around and finally noticed three figures way in the distance. “Help!”

“We appreciate it if someone could get us out of here!”

“Hello?” Their calls landed on deaf ears, as the three figures didn’t seem to notice them. They looked around once more, trying to figure out what on earth had happened to them.

Suddenly, the strange world around them shook, and a monstrous roar broke through the silence. The Twins covered their ears at the deafening sound, desperately trying to find the source. Soon though, the roaring stopped.

“What was that?” Amnesia shrugged, not knowing the answer. They looked around once more, trying to find any clue as to what they were doing there, or how to get out.

That’s when they saw him.

Far below Plague and Amnesia, was a giant robot in chains. It was big and blocky, had a cannon for a left arm, and a big orange oval which they assumed was its eye. The Twins slightly recognized this mechanism, but from where they were not sure.

“Where have I seen him before?”

“I don’t know, but I get the feeling that Epidemic wouldn’t like him.” Then it hit her. “Of course!”

“What?”

“He was the guy Epidemic was fighting when we went into that other universe!”

“Really? Weird. Well what’s he doing here? Last thing I remember, he and Epidemic were fighting!”

“Do you think Epidemic won?”

“I don’t know. Last thing I remember was Epidemic getting hit with this giant magical blast, before splitting back up into us.”

“Yeah, and then we went unconscious and woke up here.”

“So then that means that this place is...” The Twins froze as they looked at each other.

“Oh no.” Plague and Amnesia, now knowing they were in their mindscape, look out to see what was happening. They saw that Epidemic was in some strange new form, and was fighting Ruby, another person Epidemic was fighting before. Ruby was clearly struggling and if that was any indication, then this battle wouldn’t last much longer.

“We need to do something!”

“But what?” Plague thought for a moment before smiling as an idea hit him. “I got it! We just need to get that guy to either find the strength to break free or get this strange fusion weak enough so that we can forcefully separate it!”

“It’s better than anything I can come up with.”

Plague nodded and took in a deep breath. “Wake up!”

The robot seemed to move slightly in response but only by a few millimetres.

“You have to wake up mister! You have to stop this!”

He head seemed to jut slightly.

“If you don't wake up then those people will die!”

This got a bigger reaction out of the robot who hunched a little as it tug on its chains slightly.

“You have to save them! Please! Don't let our brother do this! Stop him from killing everyone!”

The robot tugged slightly harder. “S-Stop...fr-from...killing…” It spoke in a whispered voice. It tried to pull further but started panting and eventually gave up, falling limp in the chains.

“The fusion’s hold is too strong! We need it to be weaker, we can't give him the motivation.””

Just as they were about to try to call out to him again they stopped as they heard a voice from the outside. ”DAD!!!” They both looked through Rages eyes and saw that Sapphire was standing in front of Ruby with her arms spread out defensively. ”DAD, PLEASE, STOP THIS!!!

They both looked down to the robot that had steadied itself again. “S...S-Sa...Sapphire?”

”DAD PLEASE, FIGHT THIS LIKE YOU FOUGHT THE NIGHTMARE FUEL, THE MANIACS, HOW YOU BEAT JACK OF BLADES, PLEASE JUST WAKE UP!!!

It was reaching the robot, but it wasn't giving him enough strength, Rage needed to be weakened, the fight still had to go on.

Author's Notes:

I am so so sorry for the wait! This is only a part of the complete chapter that my buddy and I are currently working on, it's just taking longer than expected. It's been almost a month since the last update, for that I apologise.