Once again, Havoc was in a meeting with Drogur, Shining Armor and Attila. They were sitting around a table in Black Diamond, in a room where the previous Alpha used to held his own meetings. Said Alpha was there, too, since they had found him as a prisoner in one of his own cells. From what Havoc had gathered, when Aio had “revealed” himself as the Diamond Wolf, Alpha of Alphas; Black Diamond’s Alpha had called him a liar and ordered him imprisoned. The Alpha, Wartooth, was then betrayed by his own Beta, who knocked him out and surrendered Black Diamond to Aio. He had spent the last three months in a cell, refusing to follow Aio’s orders.

However, that did not mean that Wartooth was their ally. Before Aio got involved in the war, Wartooth had been their most dangerous enemy. Old and vicious, he considered diamond dogs a superior race destined to lead all others, so Drogur’s alliance with ponies was an abomination for him.

“Everything would be easier if you were found dead in your bed,” Drogur taunted Wartooth.

“Then you would face a civil war, just like the griffons,” Wartooth replied. “You are from the South. You barely know what dragon raids and cold winters are. North dogs know me, and they will follow me.”

“They seemed keen on following the false wolf instead of you, though,” Attila intervened.

Growling, Wartooth got up and bared his teeth. Attila instinctively leaned away, momentarily intimidated. Wartooth, despite his age, was among the largest and strongest living diamond dogs, after all. “You won’t be an Alpha for long. Only the strong last in this position.”

Shining Armor tapped the table with his hoof twice, prompting Havoc to forcefully sit Wartooth back on his chair with magic. “I would expect this kind of behaviour in a gathering of angry farmers, not here among the leaders of a nation! The war is over, and now we must rebuild and establish fair rules and laws.”

“Drogur, you know your kind will be more willing to follow laws created with Wartooth’s help; since he supported their previous lifestyle until the very end. Wartooth, if you won't yield on anything we will never make progress. You say power makes might, but it’s us ponies who are the most powerful right now. You would do well to remember that.”

Havoc zoned out for the rest of the meeting. He had lost count of how many meetings he had suffered since they conquered Black Diamond two weeks ago. He was considering suicide when Shining Armor finally decided to call a short break. Just as he was about to teleport away, Shining told him to accompany him to a different room.

“When we conquered Black Diamond, I said to myself ‘well, the war is basically over, now comes the easy part, right’,” Shining explained when they were alone. “Turns now that was the easy part and now comes the hard and long-”

Havoc smirked at those words, making Shining frown. “Now comes the difficult part in which we must rebuild and rule, ensuring that we create a nation where both ponies and diamond dogs can live and prosper without suffering discrimination or slavery.” Shining Armor seemed older as he said those words, as if the amount of work and effort that awaited him made him age.

“But that doesn’t really concern you,” Shining continued. “You came to help us win the war with your magic, and now that the war is over you have no reason to remain here. A group will depart for Canterlot with the sunset. The group is made of those we took as prisoners who will be judged by their crimes, including Aio. A company of the Royal Guard will travel with them, but I want you to be there, too, just in case.
After the prisoners are safely confined in Canterlot’s dungeons, you’ll go to the castle. Princess Celestia has stated that she wants to meet you and reward you for your efforts.”

“Oh yeah! No more of those abhorrent meetings with you, Drogur and the other two!”

“Indeed, and I won’t have to deal with your silliness. It’s a win-win situation.”

“Well then, I’ll go back to my room and pack my stuff.”

Before Shining could add anything else, Havoc teleported to the room in the underground section of Black Diamond that they had assigned him. Yet, once he appeared there, he realized he didn’t really have stuff to pack. “Huh.”

“How was the meeting?” Screwball asked as she appeared on Havoc’s right shoulder.

“Shining ordered me to escort the prisoners as they are taken to Canterlot. I was going to pack but there’s nothing here I really care about.”

Before Havoc could finish the sentence, Screwball was inside a pet carrier, looking at him with sparkling eyes. “I… I thought you had noticed me, Havoc-senpai. Uguu~.”

“That’s right! How could I forget my precious Screwball-chan!” Havoc replied while locking her pet carrier with his own magic and picking it.

“Niggawatt,” she said just as he rushed out, wildly flailing the carrier with her inside as he did so. “Let me out you son of a bitch before anypony sees me!”

After a few more seconds, Havoc returned to his room and released Screwball. She crossed her forelegs and pouted. “You know nopony can know I exist.”

“You really should demand Discord to stop beating around the bush and tell Celestia about you.”

Those words sparked an argument between both, which soon devolved into a boxing match that lasted several hours. Only when Screwball punched Havoc so hard that he lost all of his teeth did they stop. When they realized how badly had they messed up each other’s face, they laughed so hard that they barely managed to heal themselves.

“Wow, we boxed the day out,” Havoc realized. “Now we have to hurry or the caravan will leave without us.”

“You really need to improve your right jab.”

Ignoring Screwball’s advice, Havoc became intangible and moved straight to the caravan’s location, phasing through walls and solid ground alike as if they weren’t there. The captain in charge of the Royal Guard company, a grey unicorn of few words, approached him as soon as he returned to “normal”.

“We were expecting you. We are going to travel south for a week to a meeting point with low levels of dragon activity. There, a zeppelin will be waiting for us and travel straight to Canterlot. My twenty soldiers will deal with any foe they can manage so you won’t tire yourself, since we’ll rely on you against dragon-sized threats. We have three wagons. The first one holds Aio, we keep him apart because he killed another prisoner with his feet as soon as we put them together, the remaining seven prisoners are on the second wagon, the third has our luggage. If you need anything you will come to me directly. Understood?”

“Yes, captain. Before we leave… What happened with Aio’s weapons?”

“They are on the third wagon, too, safely locked in a magic-sealed chest… I think it is an unnecessary risk, but orders are orders. Now that you are here, we can leave.”

In a few minutes they were leaving the city. Havoc had seen very little of it, preferring to spend the time fooling around with Screwball in his room; so he regretted abandoning it without having explored properly.

When they stopped to sleep for the first time, after fifteen hours without barely any moment to rest or eat, Havoc realized that nopony hadn’t taken into account the most immediate threat to the caravan: his own boredom. The guards and prisoners alike didn’t like to talk to him, and the captain had forbidden him from playing pranks or doing anything that could slow them down. To make things worse, Screwball couldn’t become visible or speak to him without revealing her presence, so she could only tickle or punch him at random times to keep extreme dullness at bay.

“Hey, captain. Why don’t we just teleport all the way to the meeting point?” he asked the next morning. “Between the thirty or so unicorns in the company and me we have enough power to do that.”

“We can’t do that as long as we are transporting Khal’dun the Antimage.”

“Who?”

“One of the mercenaries in the second wagon, the one with the blue fur. He is to be sent to Tartarus as soon as we get to Canterlot for the murder of a dozen ponies. He is magically inert, so any spell that touches him is destroyed, including teleportation.”

A quick peek was enough for Havoc to identify Khal’dun, an uncommon creature whose species he had seen before in the show. Khal’dun was almost identical to Azuihotl, with a hand at the end of his tail and all, but his fur was a lighter shade of blue and he wore no clothes.

“So was he born like that or…”

“He probably found an ancient relic that did that to him, his kind lives deep in the dark jungles, where temples built thousands of years ago hold such artifacts; but he will tell you that he was chosen by some god, who blessed him with that power.”

“Huh, do the others have unusual powers, too? I would like to know in case I have to fight them.”

“They all have fought in countless battles and survived them all, but other than that they aren’t special. Oh, and then there’s the zebra,” he added, pointing at a male zebra wearing a straitjacket and an iron mask that didn’t let him see nor speak. “I would have placed him on a different wagon, too. He can do… things to a pony’s mind.”

Since that had been the longest conversation Havoc had maintained with the captain so far, he decided not to press his luck and stop bothering him. To stave off the boredom, he spent the rest of the day painting dragons having sex and giant rabbits eating ponies. Most of the guards frowned when he showed them his pieces of art, but the prisoners on the second wagon complimented him.

“Why would you use rabbits, though?” a large griffon with scars all over his body asked. “Ponies eating ponies would have been much better.”

“Or ponies eating diamond dogs,” Khal’dun added. “Because that’s pretty much what they have done.”

“You two are fun, I’m honestly considering helping you escape,” Havoc replied.

“Yeah, right,” a massive green minotaur snorted. “Like you could stop licking pony ass even if you wanted to.”

“Ooooooooh! You gonna let him get away with that?!” the others teased.

“Meh, if I had to confront all the people with all bark and no bite I would spend my days beating weaklings.”

“I am the one chained for your safety, so it seems to be that you are the one who is all talk.”

“Oh, please! You got captured by a couple of pastel-colored ponies while I defeated adult dragons and the guy who is so dangerous that we are carrying him in a separate wagon so he doesn’t have you for dinner.”

“Well, at least I was defeated by a score of veteran soldiers, not by a bunch of police officers without any sort of combat experience, unlike someone I know.”

Havoc raised an eyebrow. “What are you talking about?”

“I heard that you were forced to flee from Fillydelphia to save your life because the local force overwhelmed you.”

Havoc grabbed the iron bars that made the walls of the wagon and, magically enhancing his muscles, bent them so he could poke his head through them and put his face less than an inch away from the minotaur’s. “Where did you hear that?”

The minotaur smiled in defiance as he held Havoc’s stare and refused to answer. Havoc’s orange irises began to glow powerfully, smoke billowing out of them as he reached for his power. He was about to blast the minotaur’s head off when a powerful magic pulled him away from the wagon.

“What do you think you are doing?!” the angry captain of the company demanded, as all of his soldiers formed a circle around Havoc.

“Who is this minotaur?” Havoc hissed.

“His name is Fugde Silver Hoof,” the captain warily answered.

“Fudge?”

“No, Fugde. Now step away from the wagon. Talking to the prisoners or approaching the wagons is now forbidden to you.”

“You forbid it to me?!” Havoc roared, causing the grass under his feet to wither. “Who are you to dare to talk to me that way?! I won this war for all of you! I have killed enough diamond dogs to rise a mountain as large as Canterlot with their corpses. I could kill you all if I wanted. From now on, you won’t tell me what to do, unless you want me to bring these three wagons to the meeting point on my own and tell them about the terrible dragon who killed you all before I could defeat him.”

“I knew it. Under all your lies about selflessness and allegiance to Equestria, you are just a bloodthirsty monster. Are you so delusional that you think anyone will believe your words? We all know what you are. You are everything that Equestria isn’t. You don’t belong among us, you are a disgusting abomination and your place is in Tartarus, where you can’t harm good ponies.”

Shaking with barely contained fury, Havoc managed to talk back instead of attacking. “So this is your true face. A racist unicorn filled with ignorance and hate to those who aren’t like him. I won’t stoop to your level, though, and while I do more good for ponykind that you could ever hope to imagine I will rejoice knowing that you will lead an unsatisfactory life filled with bitter-”

A black arrow suddenly appeared on the captain’s neck with a wet noise. The unicorn’s eyes lost all expression as he collapsed.

“The draconequus killed the captain!” one of the soldiers shouted. “Seize him down!”

“What. I. No. Wait.” Havoc stuttered as the horns of twenty unicorns sparkled with magic. “Shit!”

Their binding spells hit Havoc simultaneously, leaving him paralyzed and unable to use magic. “Hmmmmmph…”

“First platoon, maintain the magical bind!” a lieutenant ordered, replacing the fallen captain. “The rest, find if that arrow was fired by someone else!”

Havoc noticed that the ground seemed to grow darker as the lieutenant talked, but there were no clouds to block the Sun. When the unicorns looked up, they started screaming and raising barriers. A few moments later thousands of arrows fell all over the area, taking out anypony who wasn’t fast enough to cover behind a barrier. The few that landed on Havoc bounced off the spells that kept him immobilised, but half of the unicorns holding him down were incapacitated by them.

“Release Havoc!” the lieutenant ordered as he struggled to remain on his hooves, having two arrows stuck to his belly. “We have been tricked into fighting each other...”

A second barrage of arrows fell, this time piercing through the unicorns’ barriers and spells, harming them and Havoc. Unable to channel magic, Havoc couldn’t heal the wounds caused by them. He immediately noticed that he hadn’t been hit by regular arrows: the heads had barely pierced his skin and he could already feel the effects of some sort of sleeping drug. Meanwhile, the remaining soldiers had spotted the source of the arrows, a dark figure atop a hill two hundred meters away. The solitary archer fired arrow after arrow as the unicorns teleported in random patterns to dodge them. The archer then opted to fire at Havoc’s location again, taking down the few remaining unicorns who were trying to undo the spells on him. Only then, when nopony could see her, did Screwball appear in front of Havoc.

“Well, it seems that you need my help. Let’s see...”

She reached towards Havoc’s back with her hooves and pulled his black axe from his own hammerspace, then used it to destroy most of the magical bindings with one vertical slash. As soon as he overwhelmed the remaining ones and healed himself, the arrows stuck to his body turning into ash and the sleepiness disappearing, he grabbed Screwball’s head and gave her a big kiss in the lips. “Thanks for saving my ass, now I’m gonna give that archer a piece of my mind!”

Havoc flew towards the archer, noticing that it had dealt with all the ponies already. The first arrow that hit him was a regular one, not the sleeping arrows that had been used against the ponies, and it went right through his right eye. A second arrow immediately destroyed his left eye. As soon as he healed them, two new arrows blinded him again. “You freaking asshole!”

In order to avoid being damaged again, Havoc teleported right behind the archer, finally getting a good view of her. The archer had the lower body of a large black panther, but a well-endowed humanoid torso sprouted from the place where the neck and head should be. Her head was that of a panther, too, but her eyes shone with the intelligence of a human or a pony. The only piece of clothing she wore were two golden bracelets.

“I’m not here for you,” she stated, her voice deep and solemn. “Hand me your prisoners and nobody will die today.”

“That’s not happening.”

“Then I will have to get rid of you, Havoc the draconequus minor,” she replied while pulling a single hair from her lower section, which magically grew into an arrow as she placed it on her white bow.

“What’s with all of you knowing so much about me?!”

“You do realize that you have been the spearhead and superweapon of Equestria’s army for about half a year, right?

“Your point being?” he asked as he drew his dragonbone hammer.

“You were pretty low-key before, but that time is over. Now anyone who isn’t clueless knows about everything there is to know about you. For example, your absolute reliance on chaos magic and how losing it makes you harmless.”

As she said those words, she released her arrow faster than Havoc could react. He tried to hit her, but she jumped a few meters away and darted towards the wagons. Havoc attempted to teleport ahead of her, but then he felt a painful pull against his chest. He looked down and found the arrow stuck to his belly sucking all the magic he had released for the teleport. When he tried to fly, the arrow also stole the magic that allowed him to fly. Worried, he tried to pull it out, only to find that moving it made him feel a disproportionately large amount of pain, which he couldn’t just stop from reaching his brain without the help of his magic. “Ugh! Wait you fucking cunt!”

Havoc ran on all fours after the archer, but his mismatched limbs were no match for her panther legs, so the distance between them quickly grew. By the time he reached the wagons, she had released all the prisoners from the second one, save for the zebra.

“Great job, Jackeuline,” Khal’dun said as he caressed his sore wrists, a big smile on his unusually-shaped face. “You too, Fugde. I can’t believe you managed to make them fight each other so easily.”

Fugde shrugged as he tore the third wagon’s door out of its frame and went inside.

“Well, I know for a fact that your ass will be mine in exchange for this rescue,” Jackeuline said to Khal’dun, making his smile be replaced by a worried frown. “But before that, would you all mind killing the draconequus? He can’t use magic now so it should be a piece of cake. I have a pending business with Aio.”

Cursing, Havoc grabbed his hammer with both hands, ready to smash it against anyone who tried to get close. It was then that Fugde walked out of the wagon, wielding a single-edged battle axe as massive as he was, its center shining with a purple glow. Fugde approached the other five prisoners and, without warning, beheaded the griffon who suggested Havoc to draw cannibal ponies with a single horizontal blow.

“Hey, what was that for?!” Khal’dun cried, jumping away as the blood sprayed everywhere.

“He enjoyed raping underage slaves, I heard him brag about it the other day,” Fugde replied. “He got what he deserved.”

“You could have waited until Havoc was dead,” another prisoner, a brown earth pony with a spear cutie mark, complained as they all began to approach Havoc.

“We are five against him, and he can’t use magic,” a sickly-looking yellow unicorn with a burning tree cutie mark added. “This will be a piece of cake.”

The last prisoner, a one-eyed changeling, simply hissed at Havoc.

“Can’t we just talk this-” Havoc began, then suddenly threw his hammer at the surprised unicorn’s head, breaking his horn and making him collapse and froth at the mouth, while violent seizures shook his whole body.

Roaring, Havoc jumped on Khal’dun, bringing him to the ground. As soon as the arrow on Havoc’s belly touched Khal’dun, his magic-destroying properties made the arrow turn back to its original form: a single strand of hair.

“You are soAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!” Havoc screamed when Fugde severed his diamond dog arm with a powerful attack.

Since he was still touching Khal’dun, he was as vulnerable as if he still had the arrow stuck to his body. Khal’dun also decided to fight Havoc back, his powerful claws mauling his body. Roaring, Havoc grabbed Khal’dun by the head with his remaining arm and threw him at Fugde. Finally regaining full access to his magic, Havoc teleported away and focused on healing. He became worried when he realized that regrowing the arm cut by Fugde’s weapon took more energy than regrowing a dozen of them would have taken under normal circumstances.

Meanwhile, Jackeuline had reached the first wagon, prompting Aio to speak to her. “You aren’t here to rescue me.”

“As a matter of fact, I’m here to kill you.”

“Can I at least know why you want me dead?” he asked, sighing.

“It’s nothing personal. You have scored a lot of points already by taking over Gem Fido and killing all the others who tried to stop you. Also, your fighting style counters mine, so this is the best chance I’ll ever have at taking you down.”

“Points,” Aio deadpanned. “You want to kill me because I have a ‘high score’.”

“As I said, it’s nothing personal, just business. I won’t get paid if anyone other than me wins this game of gods; and you are the most likely to win.”

“Then do it.”

Closing his eyes, Aio awaited death. His keen ears could hear how Jackeuline’s bow tensed and then released an arrow. However, something soft hit his face instead of a deadly arrow. Opening his eyes, he found a large marshmallow on the floor in front of him, and a pink pony between him and Jackeuline.

“Back off, we got him first.”

“And who are you supposed to be?” Jackeuline asked. “You are not a piece.”

“I’m Screwball, and you just messed with my boyfriend. Only I can do that.”

“Pony, if you know what’s best for you, you will leave me alone.”

Grinning, Screwball transformed. Her body grew to twice her former size, her forelegs turning into an eagle claw and a lion arm, while her tail became longer and covered in scales. One of her hind legs was covered in scales, too, much like a dragon’s, and wings and horns sprouted from her back and head. Her head also changed, the muzzle becoming longer and her jaw developing carnivore’s canines. “Let’s see what you can do, dickgirl.”

Screwball vomited a swarm of wasps that attacked Jackeuline, forcing her to retreat and fire explosive arrows at the thousands of wasps to reduce their numbers. Laughing, Screwball led her away from the wagon by summoning more and more insects.

At the same time, Havoc was struggling to defeat his opponents. The earth pony was picking the spears from the unconscious soldiers, which had been enchanted to pierce through magical shields, and throwing them at him with deadly accuracy. All of them made sure to stay within arm’s reach of Khal’dun, so Havoc’s spells couldn’t hit them directly, and any heavy object he flung at them was deflected by Fugde. Flying around them while being impaled by spears wasn’t his definition of fun, so he turned his back on them.

“Fuck it, I’m going to help Screwball kill the panther bitch first.”

“Then we’ll start killing the ponies!”

“... Fuck you all.”

Landing, Havoc used his magic to levitate a dozen of spears and throw them all at once at the prisoners. The changeling then increased its size until everyone could cover under his belly, and the spears harmlessly bounced off his exoskeleton.

“Oh, come on! Since when can changelings do that?!”

“Do you think I would be a mercenary wanted in Equestria if I was just another changeling drone?” the changeling asked, its voice sounding as if a little girl had just inhaled helium. “I am a praetorian, second only to Queen Chrysalis herself.”

“Yeah, whatever.”

The elephant sized changeling charged towards Havoc, who met him with his hammer. The impact made Havoc’s bones fracture in several places and his wooden arm explode, but the changeling’s head was also heavily damaged. Returning to its normal size, the changeling praetorian clumsily walked a few steps away before collapsing, a puddle of green blood slowly forming around his head.

“You guys just don’t realize I’m the top dog here.”

“Ha!” Fugde taunted. “I can see you are struggling to heal your arm. What do you think will happen if I behead you with Infernal Soul?”

“Your axe has a name? You named your axe?”

Fugde proudly nodded, but his smirk turned into a confused frown when Havoc laughed at him.

“What a faggot!” Havoc shouted, tears running down his cheeks as he laughed even harder.

“He’s trying to make you mad, ignore his words,” Khal’dun warned.

Still laughing, Havoc levitated spears again, now that the changeling couldn’t block them all. Then he felt a sharp pain on his leg and found that Jackeuline had hit him with another anti-magic arrow. “For fuck’s sake!”

“Hey, I’m your opponent, HERMione!” Screwball said when Jackeuline shot a single arrow at Havoc.

“I’m multitasking.”

Screwball summoned a rabid cat on Jackeuline’s face, distracting her long enough to take her bow away from her.

“Ha! Now what?!” Screwball boasted as the cat exploded in a burst of confetti.

Frowning, Jackeuline pulled out one of her whiskers, which turned into a brand new bow in her hands.

“That is so unfair!” complained Screwball as she teleported in order to avoid a barrage of arrows.

“If you think that’s unfair, I don’t want to know what you think about THIS!” Jackeuline replied as she aimed at the chained Aio.

Screwball shrieked, making Jackeuline’s arrows stop mid air and drop harmlessly on the ground. After that, she pulled a strand of her own hair and used it on the bow she had stolen from Jackeuline, making the hair turn into a rotating drill ten times Screwball’s size.

“GIGA… DRILL… BREAKEEEEEEEER!!!” she cried, releasing the humongous drill, which rose a cloud of dirt and dust when it destroyed a large portion of the ground Jackeuline was standing on.

The amount of magic spent on that attack left Screwball panting. Confident, she waited for the cloud to clear up and reveal Jackeuline’s mangled corpse.

Her smirk turned into a grimace when an arrow hit her neck. Luckily, it cleanly passed through so its magic-blocking power didn’t affect her. After noticing that Jackeuline was intact, minus one of her golden bracelets which seemed to be evaporating, Screwball teleported behind a wagon as she feverishly worked on healing the lethal wound on her neck, her self-healing being weaker than Havoc’s.

“Hey,” Aio called her. “Release me and I will defeat her. I won’t try to run away or attack any of you.”

“We don’t need you, we have this under control.”

As she said that, Screwball heard a loud noise behind her. Turning, she saw Fugde raising his axe a few meters away from her. He ignored her and ran in a different direction, chasing Havoc.

“Stop running you coward!” Fugde bellowed.

Havoc replied by screaming like a little girl. Since Jackeuline had blocked his access to magic for a second time, he had been running away from an increasingly enraged Fugde, while Khal’dun stood behind the minotaur to avoid destroying the arrow’s effect on Havoc by mistake. At the same time, the earth pony kept on throwing spears, which were much deadlier now that Havoc couldn’t simply heal the wounds they caused. The draconequus was running on all fours, but a lance stuck on his cheetah leg allowed Fugde to outrun him and try to hit him. He had managed to dodge everything so far, but he was certain that a direct blow would kill him.

“Maybe we could use your help,” Screwball recognised as she turned Aio’s chains into earthworms.

As soon as he was released, Aio sprinted towards the wagon with the weapons, deftly dodging a barrage of Jackeuline’s arrows. Once he got inside, he quickly found the chest that contained his weapons. Frowning, he raised his put his left hand on it, and his fingertips glowed with blue fire for a few seconds until the chest’s lock opened with a loud click. Satisfied, Aio opened it and retrieved his handgun and katana. When he exited the wagon, he parried an arrow with a flick of his weapon, and replied with a shot from his gun. Jackeuline’s remaining bracelet glowed and the bullets disintegrated a few centimeters before reaching her. Frowning, he darted towards her, easily avoiding her arrows until he was close enough to release a cutting gust of wind with his katana. Jackeuline dodged it by jumping to a side while her bow turned into a quarterstaff with a blade on each end, just in time to meet Aio’s blow.

Screwball watched how Jackeuline struggled to keep up with Aio, barely managing to avoid his blade, so she decided to help Havoc before he got himself killed. Havoc seemed to be doing fine, all things considered. He was beginning to resemble a porcupine with all the lances stuck on his back, and both he and Fugde seemed to be too tired to sprint, so they were just walking at a brisk pace. Screwball teleported behind the spear-throwing earth pony and began to punch him so fast that her fists were just a blur.

“ATATATATATATATA!” she shouted for the ten seconds she punched her opponent. By the time she was done, the earth pony was unconscious and covered in bruises and blood.

“Great, we lost our numerical superiority,” Fugde said as he wiped the sweat off his forehead.

“Finish Havoc, I’ll keep the pony busy,” Khal’dun replied. “Once we get rid of these two we’ll take care of Aio.”

“Weren’t you supposed to be Aio’s allies?” Havoc panted.

“It was more of an ‘enemy of my enemy’ thing.”

With that said, Fugde resumed his chase while Khal’dun charged at Screwball. She hurled spears and rocks at him, but the nimble azuihotl dodged them all. This continued for a whole minute, until Khal’dun got close enough to graze Screwball’s tail with his claws, turning her back to her pony form. Surprised, she teleported right between Aio and Jackeuline, who stopped their fight in confusion.

“Need this, kthanksbye,” Screwball said as she took Aio’s handgun and teleported away.

Reappearing a few meters in front of Khal’dun, she emptied the weapon’s cartridge on him, a lucky shot going through his leg.

“Uaaaaah! You cunt!” he cried as he curled into a ball. “I give up! Stop shooting! Goddamnit!”

“Now stay there and think about what you have done, young mister.”

That said, Screwball floated towards Havoc, who was running towards her whole Fugde got closer and closer to him. She pulled his axe from hammerspace once again and aimed for the arrow on his leg. Just as she was going to hit it with the axe’s edge, she felt a sharp pain on her torso. Looking down, she saw that everything below her rib cage was lying on the floor, covered in the blood that sprayed from her still floating upper half. She realized Fugde had bisected her with a blow from his axe moments before he swatted her with a blow from the flat side of his weapon.

Roaring, Havoc punched Fugde in the face, dazing him long enough to take his own black axe from the ground, where it had fallen along Screwball’s lower half, and hit the magic-blocking arrow with it. Healing the several wounds caused by the spears taxed Havoc’s already low magic reserves, leaving him too weakened to simply make Fugde explode. Due to this, he resorted to trying to kill him with his axe. When Fugde parried the attack aimed at his neck with his own axe, both weapon’s powerful properties fought for dominance, creating blue electrical sparks around them. Enraged by what Fugde had done to Screwball, Havoc attacked with wild abandon, combining his blows with fire breathing and creating illusions that blinded Fugde, forcing him to fight defensively. Eventually, Fugde grazed Havoc’s wooden arm, but the attack was slow enough for Havoc to grow vines around the axe’s handle, immobilizing it. Defenseless, Fugde could only watch as Havoc’s vertical slash cut off his horn. The pain loosened Fugde’s grip on his weapon, so Havoc yanked it away from his hands and cut the other horn with it.

Fugde fell on his knees, seizing his skull as he cried in pain; but his crying was cut short when Havoc brought down both axes on him, cutting him in two from head to waist. Already forgetting about him, Havoc ran towards Screwball and kneeled by her side. He found that she had managed to crawl back to her lower half, and was trying to connect both halves with her shaking hooves, so he helped her with it.

“Ouch,” she faintly complained. “Be gentle, please. I have a boo-boo.”

“Everything is going to be alright,” Havoc said, tears building up under his eyes. “Just you see.”

Screwball’s magic made her two halves join back into one, but that didn’t seem to improve her condition.

“Have my magic, use it to heal yourself.”

“I can’t heal as well as a draconequus... I’m just a pony…”

Shaking his head, Havoc poured his energy into her. However, he was near his own limit, which wouldn’t budge no matter how hard he tried to give a bit more of his chaos magic. When he gave her as much as he could, a shadow covered her. Looking up, he found Aio standing over both of them.

“If you harm her, I will make you suffer the most painful death imaginable, even if it means the end of me,” Havoc threatened.

“I always keep my word, and I promised her that I wouldn’t harm any of you,” he said as he placed both of his hands on her head. “She has saved my life, so now I’m going to try to return the favour.”

His now burned and hairless hands glowed with a green light as his eyes became foggy. Havoc watched in silence for the four whole minutes that Aio did this, until the glow disappeared. Blinking, Aio’s eyes returned to normal and he began to pant heavily.

“I have done as much as I could, but that weapon’s killing power is just too much for me. Her own magic will have to do the rest.”

“What happened with the archer?”

“She managed to escape, carrying Khal’dun on her back.”

Havoc got up, using Fugde’s axe as support. He noticed that, when its head touched the ground, the grass immediately died. “What the heck is wrong with this weapon?”

“He told me once that the purple glow is the soul of an ursa major trapped inside of it. I don’t know if he was saying the truth, but the weapon is so powerful that it can smash a dragon’s head like a ripened tomato.”

They remained in silence for a few minutes, Havoc watching Screwball closely while he felt her magic fight Infernal Soul’s effects on her body. Eventually, Aio spoke. “Watching her won’t change a thing. Wake up the ponies and explain them what happened. I’ll keep watch just in case Jackeuline returns.”

Havoc did as Aio told him, trying to ignore the pain that refused to abandon the wounds caused by Fugde’s weapon, even though he had healed them all.

Author's Notes:

For fuck's sake this chapter took forever.