The humanoid Changeling slowly approached the Rangers and Tyler met him halfway, inspected this self-proclaimed Mimesis.
“You must be this guy Shiria talked about…”

“Mother, huh? And I take it you are the real Tyler Jones? Care to proof it?” Tyler never once let this humanoid Changeling out of sight. A gut feeling told him that this would be a very bad idea. He accumulated some of the magic inside of him and let the magic flow on the outside. However, he only used a fraction of the spells inside of him. He didn’t trust this new Changeling one bit, even more because he imitated him and committed murder in his name. With a sudden flash, the magic surrounded him and his body began to glow like a light bulb.

The other rangers looked at Tyler in quite a surprise. Rachel only shook her head.
“What’s going on, folks? How can Jones have this… this aura thing?”

Lyra peeked over behind Sam.
“It’s like a horn glowing!”

“Lyra! You say that his entire body is filled with magic?”

“Not entirely, I guess. That would overcharge him. But my guess is he’s charging up the outer layers of his body with magic in order to utilize it. Some stronger unicorns can do something similar with their horns, too. The charge then becomes a so-called ‘supercharge’. Twilight did that once while vanquishing an Ursa Minor!”

Rachel blinked at Tyler in disbelief.
“We humans actually can do that?”

Flynn grinned.
“At least Tyler can do that…“

With an impatient expression Tyler arched a brow and looked at Mimesis.
“Satisfied with this?”

Amazed and excited, the humanoid Changeling smiled like finally finding someone worthy of being on equal stand.
“I am! Shit, how awesome! I never saw so much magic from the outside in!”

With his expression growing grim Tyler narrowed his eyes.
“Alright… Now what, Bug-man?”

Mimesis now grinned in a demonic way.
“Now we’re both be super-charged…” With a grin of madness, Mimesis showed his accumulated magic potential like presenting his hunting trophies. A similar glow now surrounded him, but with a more noticeable tone of green. Tyler’s brows arched for a moment before his expression grew grimmer. Mimesis was just as strong as he was, maybe even stronger.

“That guy can do that too???” Sam grimaced terrified. “I wonder how many unicorns he sucked dry for this result… Lyra! You retreat!”

“What? But Sam!”

“No discussion! With that guy around I can’t fight concentrated enough while worrying for you. He is a hazard that can and will kill you if he gets the chance.” Reluctantly, the unicorn nodded and retreated.

Flynn meanwhile shouted over to Tyler.
“CAREFUL, TYLER!!! HE’S A MAGIC VAMPIRE! HE SUCKS OUT ALL YOUR MAGIC!!!”

From the corner of his eye, Tyler looked over to the others for a split second before his eyes watched Mimesis again.
“Now I get it… The two mares in Equestria, the rumors about disappearing unicorns in Zebrica… You didn’t take what others were willing to give… You just took what you wanted! Even if that means they’re dying!”

With a smirk Mimesis shrugged.
“Privilege of the predator, don’t you think?”

Tyler’s face grew very angered as he heard that and the overcharge in his body ceased.
“I think I’ve heard enough! I thought you could deserve the benefit of the doubt, that you could use your powers to do good. But it turns out you’re just like Chrysalis. A vile brute taking what he wants by force.”

“Oh please, no compliments. I know it doesn’t show on these dark plates, but you make me blush!” With a chuckle, Mimesis waved it away. “Alright… Enough with the curiosity… You guys are my next victims before I go back to Equestria. I have a date with a certain lavender unicorn and I don’t want to be late!”

In an instant Tyler went into fighting stance, gritting his teeth.
“You lay a finger on her and I’ll rip your fucking heart out!”

Laughing dirty, Mimesis only shrugged
“Afraid I don’t have one… You see, Tyler: Being a Changeling is a good choice, it has lots of advantages to offer…” Losing his patience, Tyler hauled off and delivered the punch into Mimesis’ chest, only to grimace at the hit. The pain was almost breathtaking for Tyler. It felt like punching a wall. Yet Mimesis didn’t even flinch. More so, his grin only widened, before he grabbed Tyler’s arm. Arching a brow in surprise, the human Changeling looked at the arm in wonder. “What? Why can I drain only so little from you?”

Spinning around, Tyler freed himself of the grip and delivered a kick to the head, sending Mimesis on the ground for a couple of seconds. The others looked at Tyler, seriously concerned.
“Are you alright?”

“I am… But that guy tried to do with me what he tried to do with these poor unicorns. Watch his hands!”

Rachel looked over to Mimesis.
“He tried to suck magic from you as well, didn’t he?”

“Yes…”

When Mimesis stood up, he looked at Tyler, puzzled for a bit.
“Why can’t I drain magic from you? You are filled with magic!”

“Seems like I miss the most important part for you to kill me that way, sucker!” With that Tyler face palmed himself in front of Mimesis.

The human Changeling growled in anger. Of course! Tyler had no horn and without horn, he would have to suck magic from every cell of his body.
“Clever… But this only means that this won’t be over quickly!” Now he approached the Rangers, his intentions clear to see. In his eyes lingered the will to kill each of them. Rachel shot two magic rounds right into Mimesis’ face, but he only kept grinning as he slowly approached her. “What now, girl? Think you can shoot me down with magic? Is that all you can do? Try harder!”

“Oh? Uh… OK!” With that Rachel rammed the stock of her gun directly into Mimesis’ face, causing him to sway back in pain.

By now his grin was gone.
“Well played… HA!!!” In the next moment a pressure wave sent Rachel flying through the air. It didn’t hurt her at all, but she had to come on her feet again. “Too bad you humans have no horn in order to access your magic. I guess I’ll just have to beat the shit out of you!”
But just as he had said that, Grinko jumped at him. The Masar pinned him down and tried to get a good hold of him, but his razor sharp claws only scratched at the chitin plates. As he tried to bite into the neck, the plates began to crack, just as Mimesis delivered several heavy blows into the Masar’s stomach, and managed to get him off from him. “Accursed flea bag!” With a quick jump, Mimesis was on his feet again.

In the next moment, Flynn was before him.
“You’re fast, but I’m faster!” But just as he delivered the punch, Flynn yelled up in pain as he shook his hand. “SHIT!!! That guy is made out of what? Steel?”

Shaking his own aching hand, Tyler looked at the grinning Mimesis.
“His body seems to be covered in chitin armor… It won’t be easy to take him down without magic.”

Rachel gritted her teeth.
“Yeah… But he can’t do that to us either!”

Flynn spat to the ground and went into fighting stance again.
“Fuck! It seems today is the day I’ll find out what limits my new regeneration has!” With this he ran at the Changeling and pummeled him merciless. Several cracks and crunches became audible, before he had to stop. By now Flynn’s fists were bloody and blue.
Huffing heavily he looked at Mimesis, who got back into normal standing position.

The Changeling’s armor plates steamed a bit, but he just smirked and waved his index finger.
“Bad boy…”

Flynn’s angered expression, however, turned into a broad grin as he looked up.
“Yeah… Time to squish that insect like the bug he is!”

“What?” As Mimesis turned around, he just saw Tyler levitating and smashing a giant boulder onto him.

Approaching the boulder, the Rangers stayed on their toes.
“Tyler, what do you think? Is he dead?”

Tyler shook his head and spat on the ground.
“He’s not dead… He’s pissed off now!”

Flynn and Sam looked at him in disbelief.
“You can’t be serious!”

But Tyler only looked at them and built up a force field for two seconds before stopping the magic at once.
“If he would throw a giant rock to squish me… that’s what I would do.”

In this moment the rock was catapulted into the air and landed meters behind them. Mimesis now stepped outside of the crater. Dirty, but unhurt.
“You can’t do that forever, you know… Throwing rocks at people is a bad habit.”

Tyler grinned.
“And every cockroach eventually gets squished!”

As the Rangers walked up to Mimesis in a straight line, the Changeling went into fighting stance.
“This ought to be good…”

Tyler had his eyes locked on Mimesis as he lowered his voice.
“Flynn?”

With a grin Flynn nodded and held up his healed fists. “As good as new…”Rachel narrowed her eyes as she played with her rifle as if it were a club while Grinko growled and revealed his claws again.

As the Rangers stormed at Mimesis, Flynn and Tyler suddenly vanished. This made the Changeling halt in a moment of surprise, just as they reappeared at the sides of him. Tyler had teleported himself and Flynn slowed down to strike. With Tyler’s kick to the head and Flynn’s punches to the other side of the face and into the belly region afterwards, Rachel then slammed her weapon into the face of the Changeling, bringing the creature off balance, Sam stormed at Mimesis, jumped and kicked him down. But just as Grinko and Rachel stormed at him again, the humanoid Changeling performed a somersault and took their exposed limbs, hurled them around before throwing them away.

Landing meters away, Rachel slowly got up from Grinko, who growled angrily.
“If only I could get a hold of his neck for a longer time, then I could bite him to death.”

Getting up, Rachel gritted her teeth.
“Join the Rangers, he said… it’s going to be fun, he said…”Looking over to Grinko, she arched a brow. “You OK, kitty cat?”

Getting up, Grinko nodded.
“I was lucky. I almost landed in these sharp parts of the citadel’s debris.

Looking at the bent rifle run in her hand, she looked at the blade-like shards of metal.
“I can’t wield those… But Flynn should be fast enough…”

Giving the shards a glance, Grinko shook his head. “Even if he’s so fast… We both know we won’t get one of these shards loose. And even then they’re heavy. They would slow him down.”

* * * * *

Meanwhile Mimesis’ fist slammed tight into a wall of desert rock, barely missing the evading Tyler. With a mad grin he turned his head to Tyler and slowly approached him, leaving a hole in the rock. It was in this moment that Tyler understood that they had to think of something else and fast! Beating Mimesis like crazy wouldn’t bring anything except broken hands and magic usage was out of the question.

As Sam stormed at Mimesis, jumping at him to attack, the Changeling whirled around, grabbing Sam at the throat, held him up and choked him. Sam, however, punched against the armored arms, trying to loosen the grip. Gritting his teeth with an evil grin, Mimesis choked on. “Time to end you… Father!” But just as Sam and Mimesis looked into each other’s eyes, a sudden flash of memories went through the Changeling’s mind, causing him to halt. Events from earth, where Sam and his team won the first prize in a paintball tournament: The thrill to fight, the joy of winning, the friendships of his teammates, the fun at the party afterwards. Then memories from Equestria appeared. Kissing with Lyra, being with her in the boat on the lake, playing music with the others, Lyra’s confession…
Mimesis now held his head, seemingly in pain and screamed. His pupils became tiny dots as the flood of emotions became too much. The ongoing inherited memories from his father gave him an insight of the nature of emotions, a principle he couldn’t understand. It were so many alien feelings, paralyzing, terrifying…

Sam, however, fell down to his knees and gasped for air. While Mimesis was still occupied with getting a grip on himself, Tyler came to Sam’s side and held his upper body up.
“Sam! You alright? Listen, something’s on! Changelings seem to inherit their parent’s memories! He can’t suck any magic from you since you have none charged, so you can attack him without losing anything! Can you do that for me?” Now with fresh oxygen in his lungs, Sam nodded while recollecting himself. Getting on his feet again, Sam then cracked his knuckles and began to pummel Mimesis. Every punch bombarded the Changeling with another flood of emotions. A birthday cake, Christmas presents, time with the family… A flash of memories followed every hit and sent the Changeling reeling around. With a scream he kicked Sam away, now visibly afraid of him. Maybe they didn’t weaken his armored body, but mentally Mimesis became noticeable weaker, showing fear for all these alien emotions. One thing was quite clear to the Changeling. He had to get rid of Sam. And fast as well. Jumping high onto a rock formation, the Rangers surrounded him in pursuit. Tyler looked up to Mimesis, shouting up to him with a determined face. “Come on, Mimesis! This is the real fight! Tell us what you are!”

Looking down to the Rangers, the Changeling’s face seemed unsecure.
“I am… I am…” With this his suddenly eyes grew as cold as before. “I AM FOREVERMORE A CHANGELING!”
With this Mimesis teleported down to them and grabbed Sam’s throat as a pressure wave went through Sam’s body, only to return to Mimesis. Sam screamed in pain; it felt like his life was drained from him. As he went limp, Mimesis slammed Sam right away with a powerful thrust towards the chest, sending him flying over a hill.

“SAM!!!”

Just as the Rangers tried to run after their friend, Mimesis teleported right into their way, blocking it.
“So much for this!!! No more interruptions from him and his damn memory attacks! Now I’ll turn my full attention to you three…”

Tyler gritted his teeth.
“You get the hell out of our way!”

“Tsk! Jones, you’re all talk and no action! You mustn’t be concerned about your friend who is probably dead by now!”

“I’LL SHOW YOU ACTION!!!” With that the Rangers stormed at him again. It was in this moment that Grinko reappeared and slammed his fist into Mimesis back, aiming his claws for the joints between the armor plates and Mimesis’ eyes.

“WHAT? You’re still alive, kitty?” With this another fierce brawl between the Rangers and the human Changeling began.

* * * * *

Meanwhile Lyra galloped towards the place she saw Sam went down. In her mind, all possible scenarios went loose. Broken arms, legs… Maybe a broken neck! 'Be alive! Be alive! Oh, please, Sam! Just be alive!' Looking around in haste, she tried to find her special somepony. Standing between the wreckage parts of the citadel, she yelled out for him. Sam wasn’t dead though. He was lying on the desert sand in midst of the wreckage, unconscious. In his mind, memories about his father took place.

“Son, your fists are those of a boxer, yet your fingers are those of a pianist. You can do great stuff with them, if you use them wisely.”

“What do you mean, Dad?”

“I mean that every one of us once gets his calling. We all sooner or later learn of who we truly are. These fists of yours might become strong enough to hurt people, but it is up to you to decide who you are facing them with. And never forget that fists could always return to a gentle, loving hand.”

“Dad, I don’t understand…”

“One time you will understand, Samuel… Sometime in the future you will…”

* * * * *

After beating the Rangers up quite good, Mimesis grinned and levitated above the ground in front of them, his white hair waving in the wind.
“Here’s my offer: Forget these pathetic ponies and return to your own world, otherwise I’ll destroy you!”

Wiping some blood from his bottom lip, Tyler shook his head.
“Fuck off, bug-face! There’s no chance we’ll let someone like you on the loose!”

Rachel spat to the ground, remembering her nightmare.
“I know precisely what would happen if you would gain more and more power! You wouldn’t stop on this world, you would come over to ours! I will stop you before you have the chance to harm anyone again!”

This made Mimesis smile.
“Aha! Very good, at least there’s plenty of fighting spirit in you… That’s what I admire most about humans…”

Storming right at him, the humans gritted their teeth.
“GET OUT OF OUR WAY!!!”

Readying his magic, the Changeling grinned.
“YOU STUPID FOOLS!!!”

* * * * *

More memories filled Sam’s mind as he still was unconscious.
“I can’t believe you did that! Samuel! You broke this boy’s arm and jaw!”

“But he started it, Dad! And he was actually much stronger than I was! Aren’t you proud of me for standing up for myself like you always told me I should?”

Kneeling down to the young Sam, his father shook his head. “I am… But there’s more to strength than muscle power. You beat up a boy twice the strength as you, but that doesn’t make you a better person!”

“But I…”

His father only shook his head. “There’s more to strength and being a better person than to beat up someone who’s stronger than you. You must give thought of your target, that boy’s just a weak minded goon who doesn’t know better. Is that really the kind of evil you want to fight? You should raise your fists against the real evil, Samuel!”

With this his father stood up, leaving his son puzzled. “The real evil? What are you talking about, Dad? Dad! Explain this to me!”

As his father turned around, Mimesis’ face grinned at Sam. “I’ll explain it to you, ’Dad’!”

With a scream Sam regained consciousness. With a gulp he came back to his senses.
“Fuck this bastard, he’s even messing around with me while not being around!” As he stood up, Sam’s legs suddenly hurt and gave in. “FUCK!!! My equilibrium sense is ruined!” The Changeling… He had to be responsible for it. The energy wave that went through Sam and back to Mimesis… It had to be some sort of special attack. Maybe this was the fully powered sucking attack or some other move, but whatever the Changeling had done, it had immobilized Sam quite good. “MIMESIS!!!” Rage filled Sam’s mind as he felt so useless right now. Tyler was the magic wielder of them, Rachel the gunslinger. Grinko was sheer muscle armed with razor sharp claws and teeth and Flynn… Well, Flynn could let his fists pummel Mimesis with great speed to irritate Mimesis. But he… He did have no special talent to contribute into this fight other than these memories. Angered, he slammed his fist into the ground. “DAMN IT!!!

Hearing his curse, Lyra galloped over to him.
“Sam! Oh thank Celestia you’re alive. After that attack I thought you were dead!”

Looking over to the unicorn, Sam shook his head.
“Lyra, you shouldn’t be here… He might kill you!”

But the mare frowned at him.
“And I suppose risking that he kills you instead is so much better? I will help you! Come on… Get up!” With this she helped him on his feet. “You know the meditation routine I use for walking on two legs?”

“I saw you do that several times now, Lyra. But I don’t know what that’s supposed to help now.”

“Come on, Sam! You aren’t crippled! Your legs are fine! He just crippled your mind! You must become one with yourself now!”

Chanting the words Lyra usually used during that meditation, Sam closed his eyes.
“Breathing, spirit, discipline...” In this moment Sam collapsed as his shivering muscles failed again. But with iron will, he gritted his teeth and managed to get up again.

Lyra got on two legs as well, went into stance and her horn began to glow.
“Focus the mind, cleanse the soul, keep sight of your target… Concentrate… Focus… Don't lose it now!”

As the magic energies of the unicorn began to billow around him and Lyra, their thoughts began to synchronize as his body began to feel light.
Be prepared for the unexpected... Concentrate, mind and body as one… Achieve tranquility through movement. Integrate spirit and flesh. Channel the powers! Focus the mind. Cleanse the soul. Release that which is negative!

Like master and pupil their thoughts then began to converse as Lyra looked over to him, her mane slightly floating in her magic.

Separate darkness and light…

Give birth to yourself…

Define your existence…

Create your divination…

Again, her thoughts synchronized and Sam's swaying ceased more and more.
From strength, learn gentleness! Through gentleness, strength will prevail!

As the pain in him ceased completely, her voice echoed in his mind. Sam, what dwells deep within your spirit? Sam… Awaken!

When his eyes popped open again, the pain of weak muscles was gone. Once again, his muscles obeyed his every order with their former strength. All the harm Mimesis had done to him was undone; he was synced again with his body. Only one word sprang to his mind. “Harmony!” It was them, when he recognized the mark on his left biceps. “What the…?”

Jumping up in excitement, Lyra pulled the arm down.
“Sam! You got your cutie mark!” Narrowing her eyes with a frown, she looked up to him. “A gear?”

Inspecting the mark now thoroughly made him chuckle.
“Metal… Gear… How fitting for a mechanic!”

Lyra smiled up to him, before her smile faded to a serious expression.
“Now go help the others!”

* * * * *

In the meantime Tyler levitated a boulder up in the air and pushed it towards Mimesis, who opposed the pressure with magic on his own. While Tyler put his entire might into the attack, Mimesis only grinned and shook his head.
“What’s wrong? You’re tired already? Ha! Is this everything humanity has to offer? Maybe you should have taken some more spells from these unicorns, eh Tyler?”

Noticing a shadow above him, he turned around and teleported away, as Sam slammed down with a roar causing big crater in the sand. Small lightning bolts jetted over his arm as Mimesis reappeared in front of the Rangers. Sam’s attack gave them the short pause they needed to recollect their minds to form an attack front against the powerful Changeling. Tyler arched his brows in wonder.
“Sam! You’re all right!”

Kneeling in the crater, Sam’s voice was quite angered.
“Hey folks… Sorry for being so late, I was busy… Forget about my wellbeing, we’ve got other things to do first…” Standing up from the crater, Sam looked at the other Rangers, grinning widely. “Like squishing this big cockroach!”

Recognizing the cutie mark on Sam’s biceps, Mimesis was foaming in anger. His plan to get rid of his father backfired, leaving him in an even stronger state than before.
“You humans truly are a persistent bunch of vermin! So be it! I’LL KILL YOU ALL!!!”

With a roar, Sam stormed at Mimesis, his fist burrowed deep into the Changeling’s torso plates. It hurt awfully for Sam, but it delivered even more shock moment for the Changeling as the punch delivered electric energy right into his body, prompting Mimesis to gasp for air. The next punch knocked his face to the side, sent his sight flashing and his ears ringing. How could this man have so much power in his punches? But with a powerful blow, he slammed Sam back to the others. Now Flynn tried his luck again, throwing more punches at the Changeling to keep him occupied before Rachel grabbed the Changeling to throw him to the ground.

But Mimesis levitated himself and landed unharmed on his feet, laughing all the while.
“Ha, ha, ha, ha! Even though you all amuse me with this wonderful brawl, I must stop here! I have unicorns to suck dry and I’m not a patient Changeling!” He then yelled up into the sky. “I GUESS I’LL START WITH THE SNEAKY LITTLE BITCH THAT HELPED OUT MY FATHER!!!” Lyra’s face grew grimmer. She couldn’t fight alongside the others, but hoped with all her might that they would succeed. Her role in this fight had been played, she had helped her special somepony and helped him get stronger than before. A thing that filled her with personal pride. Go get him now, Sam!

Tyler now wiped some blood from his chin.
“He’s perfectly armored! We need to concentrate our attacks if we want to crack that armor open.” With a nod, the Rangers continued their brawl, each with his or her special talent or weapon.

Rachel Higgins planned to jump at the humanoid Changeling from behind to pull the barrel run from her weapon into his throat in order to choke him to death.
“Asshole! Why won’t you fucking DIE?!?”

it seemed like a decent plan. He needed oxygen as well. Maybe they couldn’t crack that armor open so fast but deprivation from oxygen seemed lethal to most life forms. But just as she had jumped at him, Mimesis grabbed her neck and slammed her to the ground.
“You first, bitch! But maybe I’ll just knock you out to have my fun with you later…” With her throat in his hand, his other hand hauled off to finish her. But just as Mimesis tried to give Rachel the finishing punch, a green bolt of magic right into Mimesis face slammed him off from her. As the others looked into the direction of where the bolt came from, they saw Shiria standing on a hill, her horn still smoking and charged. When Mimesis saw her, he arched a brow. “Mother! What is the meaning of this? Are you siding with the prey?”

Looking at her son, her face grew grim.
“Oh, I haven’t saved her in good will! I just don’t want YOU to kill them for they are MY prey! And I don’t want another thing to happen: That they kill you, you treacherous beast! I want to do THAT as well!” Now she stepped among the Rangers, visibly siding with them against Mimesis.

Tyler arched a brow, yet gave Shiria a smile.
“The enemy of my enemy is my friend, huh?”

With an arched brow Shiria looked up to Tyler.
“Don’t get cheeky, Tyler Jones… We both know that under other circumstances things could have been different.”

Mimesis began to chuckle and this chuckle turned into a manic laughter.
“So it is like this… Four human defenders, a unicorn magician, a Masar and a Changeling Queen… And now I can kill seven of you at once…”

Rachel slowly regained her breath, wiping some sweat from her forehead.
“What a nightmare! We’re almost out of breath and he’s still standing there as if nothing ever happened!”

Tyler shook his head, having an epiphany.
“I just thought of something we forgot this whole time.”

Flynn looked over to him.
“Oh, yeah? What?”

“You see he’s part Changeling, but he’s also part human. He’s still vulnerable to overcharge. And with Shiria we have a powerful way to charge him.”

Pointing at Shiria Flynn arched a brow.
“You mean that Changeling Queen? How?”

“Queen Shiria may be a Changeling as well, but she’s on our side in this fight.”

Shiria rolled her eyes.
“Only for the time being… I can’t face him alone and won’t expose my swarm to his danger.”

Tyler nodded.
“Ok, here’s the plan: We four charge Changeling magic and unleash it on him.”

“Tyler! You once said Changeling magic was poisonous and could kill us if we overdo it!”

Shaking his head, Tyler Jones looked at his fellow Rangers. “Not necessarily! Remember that we are four Rangers, he’s alone. We could each endure a moderate charge, but four moderate charges make more charge than he could handle on his own.”

“I won’t do it!”

Looking over to Sam, Tyler grimaced for a bit.
“Sam! To defeat him we must work together! We need her to-”

“I WON’T WORK TOGETHER WITH A RAPIST!!!” Sam now snapped back at him, only to storm out on Mimesis on his own.

But the Changeling got him in a headlock with a swift move and raised his fist. “RRAARRGH ONE!” With this his fist slammed into Sam’s face. “TWO!!!” Another punch went down into Sam’s face. “THREE STRIKES, YOU’RE OUT!!!” Lifting his father up, Mimesis now slammed him into the others, and came sliding with some magic directly through them, smashing every one off their feet.

As they got up again, Tyler looked up to the others before looking at Sam.
“Sam, I know you’ve been wronged, but there’s more at jeopardy than personal revenge! If we fail to kill him, he’ll kill more unicorns! Starting with Lyra…”

Sam clenched his teeth together. He didn’t like that at all, but there was no other choice if he wanted to save Lyra and other unicorns from harm.
“Fine… I’ll help as well…”

Annoyed and impatient Mimesis interrupted their conversation.
“Is anybody of you pesky mammals starting to fight? Or are you going to scheme your little plans until tomorrow? Nothing you can do can hurt me!”

With that the human Changeling attacked the Rangers once more, rushing right through them, slamming them off their feet. But Flynn jumped up and in his ultra-speed delivered a heavy blow to Mimesis, who was taken by surprise. The blow was so hard Flynn’s knuckles cracked on the hard chitin plates. But Flynn didn’t care anymore. Biting his teeth together, he simply began to hit the Changeling before him and roared in pain as more and more his hands broke and regenerated in an enormous rate. As his hands were numb from pain and swollen, he began kicking the Changeling, before his legs gave in. Huffing and puffing, he now stood in front of the Changeling, whose armor plates now glowed red hot. Readjusting his jaw, Mimesis looked at Flynn, only to simply punching his chest, sending the fast human down to the ground.

With the Rangers down, he huffed himself, closely at his limit. While his body not showing it, the pain inside this strong and sturdy plates had grown with every step on the Rangers took. If they would have continued this fight any longer… No! He mustn’t allow himself thinking like that. He was a Changeling, the apex of evolution! And he was the strongest Changeling there ever was! “Those little maggots… No one can ever hope to beat me! But I clearly let them too close to me… They might have become-”

“MIMESIS!!!” Shiria now jumped at him, attacking him with her perforated hooves and her horn.

While he defended himself against her fast attacks, he didn’t noticed that Grinko had grabbed his legs, holding the Changeling in place. “FOLKS! NOW!!!” Too late did Mimesis recognize the true meaning of this, they were simply playing dead with him. Now the Rangers jumped at him and while Flynn and Tyler delivered enough punches to bring him off balance, Sam’s haymaker with electricity in it was enough to send the human Changeling flying.

“Let’s finish this!” Tyler shouted and the four Rangers jumped up high, all jumping away from Mimesis who just landed on his feet, trying to get an oversight over the situation. But just as he looked up, Shiria nodded and her poisonous Changeling magic split up into four, charging the four humans in midair. As soon as they had landed, the four of them ran towards Mimesis. “NOW!!!” From four sides, the humans jumped at Mimesis, ramming their poisonous Changeling magic charges into his torso. With an echoing, agonizing scream the humanoid Changeling took the blows and was engulfed in a poisonous storm of lightning strikes as the charge of poisonous Changeling magic was transferred to him. The four rangers jumped back shortly before the massive amounts of lethal energies exploded.

The detonation was almost deafening and Tyler held his head hidden under his arms. He was still alive. No magic nuke ignited, the magic simply cut its way through the body? Too late he realized the flaw in his plan, but it turned out OK. Even with a magic detonation of atomic proportions, there had been a chance for them to survive. Maybe... Looking at the smoking and burning crater, the Rangers watched in awe.
“Is he finally dead?”

Tyler nodded with an arched brow.
"Who could have survived such an explosion in the epicenter? Besides me that is. And…” With that he took a an partially charred eyeball from Rachel’s shoulder, who grimaced at this. “That’s a nice souvenir, eh Rachel? He blew up to pieces.” He then threw the eyeball to the ground. “Man… That was some combined move…”

Flynn smirked as he and Sam high fived.
“It’s a real cutter slam…”

“Yeah… We ripped him into shreds!”

Rachel grinned.
“Maybe we should call it that way. Cutter Slam has a nice ring to it.”

It was then when Sam looked over to Shiria, before his smile died. His fist clenching, he approached the Changeling Queen. Tyler took immediate notice of this. “Sam, what are you up to?”

“I’m going to kill that rapist bitch!”

Standing in front of Sam and the others, Tyler blocked their way to Shiria.
“No! Not while I’m here!”

Sam’s eyes widened.
“No?”

Spreading her arms, Rachel now shook her head.
“Tyler, she raped Sam! She’s responsible for Mimesis coming to be! She’s responsible for your banishment!”

“And you folks think killing her would correct anything of this? That it would undo anything?”

Sam gritted his teeth.
“No… But I would feel better!” Just as he wanted to go for Shiria again, Lyra stepped in front of him. The unicorn looked up to him, her eyes partially pleading him to stop, partially afraid what had happened to him. In front of her Sam fell to his knees and both embraced each other. “She deserves it, Lyra! She deserves it! She caused both of us so much misery!”

Lyra closed her eyes, tears running down her cheeks.
“You don’t owe me her head, Sam… The nightmare’s over… I want my old Sam back. Don’t turn into a monster because of her.”

“N-never!” Both now embraced each other even tighter as they cried.

Getting up, Shiria sneered at the crater. Begetting a human Changeling was such a terrible idea. In hindsight, she should have thought this through for quite a bit more.
“Well, that went pretty-” Before she could end her sentence, Tyler whirled around and bitchslapped the Changeling Queen so hard that she fell to the ground.

Flynn arched a brow now.
“Hey! Whatever happened to ‘We won’t kill her?’”

Tyler stood before Shiria with an unforgiving glare.
“Get up!” Spitting blood, Shiria looked up and got on her hooves again. As she stood before him, he waited until she reclaimed some dignity in her stance before he grabbed her neck and choked her a bit. “You know why I did this, don’t you? You know you deserved this, DON’T YOU???”

“Yesss…”

“You’ve breached our agreement, Shiria… I have every right to punish you for this…”

Gasping for air, the Changeling Queen looked at Tyler.
“What are you going to do with me? Pain? Mutilation? If you want to fight, I’ll fight you next! But then my entire swarm will be after you as well.”

But Tyler’s grip on her neck now became gentle and soft as he shook his head.
“Pitiful creature of darkness… What kind of life have you known to do all this?”

Shiria wanted to say something, but Tyler pulled her in suddenly, prompting her eyes to open wide. As she looked up, she saw his face above hers, placing a gentle kiss right beside her horn on her forehead. The others cocked their heads as Tyler’s hand now slowly went through her Changeling mane and caressed her left ear. If it would be visible on her chitin plates, Shiria would had blushed in this moment as Tyler whispered into her ear. “Thought I give you a bit of love in gratitude for helping us defeating him… And to compensate for the pain you felt when we killed him.”

Closing her eyes halfway seductively in the way only she could, Shiria smirked as she held her head high to whisper back into his ear. Banished, he could be of great use of her. A little nudge into the right direction and he could be all hers. And what a fine prize he would make then.
“Truly a delicacy of emotion… Love for oneself is so much more powerful. If I would feast upon you for a longer duration, the satisfaction would be better as sex… Why don’t you prolong your stay in my hive a bit? I would see to your comfort in person…”

Tyler chuckled; she truly knew no shame flirting with him like that.
“You’ve improved, girl… But you’re far away from good.” With this he left her standing there and went to the others. “We go! With your memories about Mimesis, I have all the proof I need to wash my name clean!” He once more turned to Shiria with a smirk and a wink. “Oh yeah… Your highness! If human love is so damn good, you better go and do some more good with your swarm! I might love you for that someday!”

Now the Changeling queen snapped out of it. What a dirty trick! Shiria now turned around, foaming in anger. How dared he to do this to her once more. Not only did she now long for his love now that she had tasted it… No, now he wanted her to do good in order to EARN more love from him. What an outrage!
“TYLER JONES! YOU KNOW I CAN DEFEAT YOU! YOU’RE MERELY POSTPONING THE INEVITABLE! JONES! JONES!!!”

Tyler didn’t flinch as more and more room got between the Rangers and the Changeling Queen. Once again his emotions were victorious over her mind games, a fact that filled him with pride and satisfaction. He would always fight her. Well… almost always. Even when she was nothing more than a tiny speck on the horizon, they could see her angered Changeling magic at work as she probably fumed and raged over her last defeat. Lyra looked back to her for a moment before looking at Tyler again.
“Do you think she will attack us?”

With a brief shake of his head Tyler looked at the unicorn.
“Unlikely… She will return to her hive and continue to hunt down the Descendants. And the fact that she wants to be loved as a Changeling and not as somepony else is giving me reason to hope some change has occurred in her.”

Sam grumbled.
“Yeah… But change for the better or for the worse?”

Grinko only frowned at Tyler. “You had the chance to kill her! Why didn’t you do it? It would be a fierce battle and you would have earned yourself glory and honor!”

Tyler shook his head. “I wanted to punish her, not to kill her. And these unfamiliar emotions, coupled with her repeated defeat will infuriate her even more and maybe will result in a change of thinking. And there’s no glory in killing a species for good. If she dies, her whole species would die as well.”

Grinko stared at Tyler for a while before he nodded.
“Now I see why she couldn’t kill you, even if she tried… You truly are a great warrior and a cunning one as well. You don’t mutilate an opponent’s body; you mutilate his heart with stabbing a needle into it. It is wise to fear your anger…”

Arching a brow, Tyler grimaced on that comment.
“Uh… sure… Well, I think for now the victory over the human Changeling is something worthy of a decent amount of honor. Grinko? Would you say that your aid in the fight was enough to repay your debt?”

But the Masar only grinned.
“Not even close… I couldn’t defeat him on my own, you know…”

Chuckling now, Tyler shook his head.
“Well… it was worth a try…”

Back in Mareitius the old Zalala greeted them welcome with a laugh.
“We knew you would return to us, friend Tyler! With your victory the storms of darkness are bound to leave these lands.” Tyler nodded and knelt down to the old zebra, giving him a warm hug before Zalala brought a hoof on Tyler’s chest. “I can see it in your eyes, friend… You’ve defeated the face in the mirror that tried to harm you.”

With a smirk Tyler nodded.
"Yeah… we defeated that bastard.”

“Good… then come! You shall rest for now after the battle. Today, we celebrate your victory over the evil that roamed these lands!”

When they reached the coast the next day, the port of Mountania laid before them. Looking back, Flynn grinned widely.
"You know what this desert needs? Needs more sand!”

Tyler and Sam chuckled, but Rachel arched a brow.
“More sand? We’re surrounded by sand!”

Now Tyler and Sam began to laugh and Flynn grinned.
“So… You’re eager to get back to the herd, Tyler?”

“You bet! I can’t wait to prove my innocence and get back to my girls. I bet they are worried sick for me. And I miss my little Appleseed. I want to hold her in my arms instead of a weapon for a change."

* * * * *

Meanwhile in the Manehattan harbor a young stallion approached the harbormaster.
“Boss, there’s an incoming ship that communicates with communication crystal. They say there’s trouble in the Amasian Enclave and they are refugees asking for political asylum.”

The harbormaster, an old stallion of gray coat, nodded and looked at the stallion before him.
“Then we should see that they’re arriving good and safe, don’t you think?”

As they went outside, the ship was only 500 meters away from the harbor. Taking a telescope out of his saddlebag, the harbormaster hummed thoughtfully.
“I don’t like that…”

“Oh? Why’s that?”

Shaking his head, the old stallion inspected the ship through the telescope.
“If they’re so in trouble… why isn’t there anypony on deck?”

“May… Maybe they’re below deck to be in the shadows? They’re shadow ponies after all.”

The harbormaster looked at the young stallion besides him and shook his head.
“Son… it’s in the middle of the night! It’s dark anyway!” After looking again, he then hastily lowered the telescope and looked at the ship with his bare eyes. “The ship is sinking!”

“WHAT?!?”

Sinking slowly as it approached the port, the ship’s wooden body began to moan. The ship sank halfway, until it was catapulted out of the water. The harbormaster could only watch with wide eyes as the ship flew through the air, only to get smashed into the harbor buildings behind him. Then the water rose like becoming a tidal wave before light emitted from below the water. Now three giant spheres of magic force fields ascended from the water and inside were three war citadels. As they hovered in the air high above the harbor, magic accumulated in the middle section of them and balls of fire slammed from the citadels as they began bombarding the ships that lied at anchor. While the crews were fleeing in a panic, every ball of fire detonated in a ship. The ‘Coby’, the ‘Nifilia’, even the flagship of the equestrian navy, the ‘Celestia’ was destroyed in that way and the flames in the harbor bathed the citadels in a hellish light.

With tears of anger, the harbormaster, hidden in a small warehouse apart from the burning big halls, looked at his destroyed harbor and the ruined ships before looking back to the other ponies who also escaped the blazing inferno.
“What are these things? So much destruction…”

A sailor pony shook his head.
“Whatever or whoever they are, they knew where to hit us!”

“Who? Who knew where to hit us? And why?”

“One thing is for certain, a few unicorns in the harbor are not enough to penetrate shields that big. These are flying fortresses! The guards must fight them!”

“The princesses! We must inform the princesses!” They were however interrupted as one of the citadels sounded off a loud noise. It sounded like a very, very loud horn and the war citadels now began moving away from the harbor.

Without hesitation two of the war citadels flew straight towards Canterlot while the third approached the Wonderbolt Academy. The watchful guards of the Academy rang the alarm siren, but already the war citadel was hovering over the barracks, obscuring the light of the moon and a shield dome came down onto the academy ground, imprisoning the cadets and instructors. Rainbow Dash above all, tried her best with the others to kick at the dome from the inside, or to find a way out, maybe to find a tiny spot to slip into freedom for the others. But their efforts were all in vain against the strong unicorn magic.

Meanwhile on the ground, the ponies looked out in wonder about the entire ruckus outside. As two earth pony guards looked up, they were blasted from behind as another unicorn guard attacked them. “Hail Tacitus!” More and more ponies of the Royal Guard turned at each other and violent street wars began to start in every city of the country. The insurgence only showed the vast amount of infiltration the Descendants had prepared. Now their time seemed to be there. As every city slowly turned into a complete warzone, the other two citadels had reached the outskirts of Canterlot. But Luna alarmed Celestia and while the princess of the sun maintained a shield to protect the entire city from bombardment, Luna protected the throne room with a shield of her own as firefights began to echo throughout Canterlot. A hail of fire and magic rained down on the shield above the city, but Celestia, despite the sudden concussion for the shield, didn’t flinch. Fire ran down the shield like raindrops on a window and scorched the ground at the city limits.

Both sisters were now sitting before the throne, imprisoned in this room with their most loyal guards while the rest of the city and land was falling into the chaos of battle. Celestia looked to the ground.
“I… I was fooled… I banished our protector, so they could get at us in our weakest moment…”

Resting a hoof on her big sister’s shoulder, Luna tried to comfort her with a smile.
“They will come to the rescue…” in her mind, Luna hoped that the freshly reformed Discord wouldn’t misuse this incident to make things worse. Where was he, after all?

For centuries the Descendants were behind the scenes, ever-watchful lurking from the shadows… studied Equestria and infiltrated its weaknesses. Now they were right in the open, marching through equestrian cities, taking over. In a swift and decisive move the three war citadels had surprised the Equestrians in the middle of the night as the traitors turned against the Equestrians in their sleep. With Rainbow Dash among the Wonderbolt Academy hostages, the separated Elements of Harmony were forced to go into the defensive. And while the Descendants in Ponyville besieged the library, their remaining ground forces started incursions in every major city. Applejack tried her best to calm down little Appleseed as she looked at the others.
“Ah wish Tyler would be here…”

Granny Smith and Big Mac looked at each other and nodded, before each one of them took out a rifle.
“ Don’t ya worry there, ma girl! If any one of these rascals tries to harm the Apple family, they’re up for a surprise!“ Applebloom nodded, a pot from the kitchen on the head and armed with a slingshot and some marbles. No one was going to hurt her big sister or her newborn niece. Big Macintosh and Granny first frowned at her, but that frown soon turned into a smile and they nudged the young filly for having the heart at the right spot.

While Fluttershy comforted Scootaloo, Rarity looked up from Sweetie Belle, who embraced her big sister frightened.
“Twilight…”

But the librarian simply nodded as she stared out the window.
“The Rangers will return with him… They promised!” Twilight also thought of Spike and was worried for him, since she teleported him right to the edge of the Everfree Forest on a mission towards Zecora’s hut. And while the lavender mare looked outside, the Descendants marched through Ponyville. Confident of their victory, they spread their propaganda.

Not yet proofread, my proofreader seems busy with other stuff.