“Here’s the plan,” I started, spinning back to face the others. “Rainbow, you and Luna are gonna work on taking out those floating healing thingies. Be careful though; they explode when you take them out.”

“That’ll be a piece of cake!” Rainbow exclaimed. “Luna, I got the right side of town! You take the left!”

“That doesn’t even make any sense,” Luna replied. “Whose left? Yours or mine?”

“Later!” I yelled, cutting Rainbow off before she could say anything. “Twilight and Fluttershy, you two are the distraction this time! We need to keep him away from the houses so he doesn’t break anything!”

“You can count on us!” Twilight said confidently.

“What about us four, Karen?” Pinkie asked, waving at the rest of us. “What are we going to be doing?”

“We get to figure out how to use a bow and arrow!” I replied happily. “And then we get to shoot him out of the sky with them!”

“I guess I’m going to be teaching all three of you then,” said Shieldy with a sigh.

“No, I did archery before!” I stated. “I know how to shoot at stuff with a bow!”

“Oh, well there’s something we’ve got in common, I suppose,” he said with a smirk. “Maybe we’ll go do that when this is all over too!”

“Quiet, Shieldy! You’ll make her faint again!” Pinkie yelled, jumping onto Shieldheart’s back and clamping his mouth shut with her hooves.

“No he won’t, I already know I’m going to go out with him,” I explained.

“Well, you can chat about all your love life after we save the town again!” Rainbow yelled. “Luna, you take the east side! I’ll take the west!”

She flew away before I could say anything else. Luna watched her go and stayed where she was, jaw dropping a little.

In about five seconds, however, Dash was right back in front of me.

“Uh, quick question; how do we take them out if they explode?” she asked.

“Just punch them or something I don’t think they do much damage to you they just knock you back,” I said quickly. “I think so anyway. But just in case, throw a rock or something at it. It breaks if it’s hit by anything.”

“You got it!” Rainbow yelled, shooting off to take care of her side of the town.

“I suppose I’d best be on my way too,” Luna said dully. “What do I do when they’re all taken care of?”

“Uh… I guess you could come help us out fighting the Ender Dragon… You’d probably need a bow or something though because he moves pretty fast.”

“Then wouldn’t it be smarter for me to just chase him rather than waste arrows and potentially put ponies in danger even more?”

“That’s... actually not a bad idea.”

“Then I will join you once my task is complete,” Luna said, nodding at me. “Good luck, everypony.”

She took off and soared towards her side of town. I watched her go before remembering one fault in my genius plan.

We still needed bows and arrows.

“Where exactly are we going to get bows and arrows from?” I asked stupidly.

“I’ll go get some from the guard weapons locker…” Shieldy muttered, galloping off towards where I assume the guard place was.

When he was gone, I looked back at the other four. “Everyone know what they’re doing?” I asked.

“I don’t know how to use a bow and arrow,” Pinkie said, ears flapping back against her head.

“Neither do ah,” said Applejack. “Ah mean… ah get that ya pull a string to shoot an arrow at somethin’, but ah don’t get how earth ponies are s’posed to use ‘em safely while they’re movin’.”

Yeah, I hadn’t thought of that either.

“Oh, for…” I muttered. “What do we do now then?”

“Ooh! I have an idea!” Pinkie exclaimed.

“Do tell,” I said dejectedly. What, were you expecting me to be ecstatic about it? My super genius plan had been put down by the fact that ponies don’t have fingers. Leave me alone. “At the moment, I think anything will be better than my plan.”

“How about we lure him away from the town and shoot at him there?”

“That would probably be safer,” said Twilight. “I know earth ponies can use bows and arrows, but if you’re not trained to use them, it would be a lot safer if we did this out of town and away from other ponies.”

“Alright, so when Dash and Luna finish up their quest, you tell them we’re headed out of town, Fluttershy!” I exclaimed, pointing at Fluttershy.

“Okay,” she replied, staring at my finger that was only an inch from her face. “Um… which way out of town?”

“Which way out of town is best, Twilight?” I asked Twilight.

“The way between here and Canterlot is most spacious,” she replied.

“We’re going slightly to Canterlot!” I exclaimed, spinning back to Fluttershy. “Wait, are you going to be alright distracting on your own, Twilight?”

“If I distract this dragon just to keep it away from the houses, you can hit it with an arrow to distract it from me!” Twilight replied. “You are good with a bow and arrow, right?”

“Eh, mostly,” I said. “I mean… yeah, I never got the bull’s-eye before, but… I’m kinda alright.”

“Oh, what am I saying?” Twilight said, slapping her forehead. “You don’t need to be that good! We’ve had some scientists create arrows that follow their target!” She frowned. “Don’t ask me why, I can’t remember myself.”

“Well then,” I said blankly. “That… kinda makes things easier. How do they follow the target?”

“You just aim at what you’re trying to shoot at and they’ll follow it until they miss it completely.”

“Because that makes perfect scientific sense.”

“They’re magical, not scientific.”

“Yeah that still doesn’t make any sense at all.”

“Ah think you girls best hurry up with your discussin’,” said Applejack, pointing at something behind me. “Because ah think that dragon thing you were talking about is on its way here!”

I turned to see what she meant and, sure enough, the Ender Dragon was on its way towards Ponyville. Why it had spawned so far away, I don’t know. I guess one good thing about that is that we got to see where it was before it came and murdered us.

Yes, murdered us.

I had very little faith in myself fighting the Ender Dragon, okay?

“Alright, Princess Distraction!” I yelled, pointing at Twilight. “Do your thing for a little while! This guy doesn’t do anything except fly towards you and then heal up and then turn around and fly at you again!”

“Got it!” Twilight replied, taking off. “I’ll try getting him to head away from the town!”

As she flew up to meet the Ender Dragon, I glanced around anxiously to search for Shieldheart, who still wasn’t back yet.

“Oh, come on, Shieldy…” I muttered.

“Didn’t know you missed me that much, Karen,” he said from right behind me, making me jump. When I spun to face him, I saw another guard with him helping him carry all the bows and arrows. “I’m here now though.” He waved at his friend. “This is Longshot. He specialises in teleportation.”

“Honour to meet you, ma’am!” said Longshot, saluting at me as he dropped the weaponry he was carrying. “Good luck saving the town, but if what Shieldheart says about you is true, you won’t need it!”

“Uh… thanks?” I replied.

“As you were, soldier,” Shieldy said, hovering a bow and a quiver of arrows over to me.

Longshot saluted and teleported away. I took the bow and arrows and put the quiver over my shoulder, onto my back. When I was sure it wasn’t going to move, I turned to look at Shieldy.

“Yeah, we had a change of plan,” I said. “Come on, I can explain on the way.”

Once Applejack and Pinkie Pie had got their bows and arrows sorted out, I started running towards where we would actually be fighting the Ender Dragon. The other three followed and Fluttershy flapped up to keep an eye out for the other two. Shieldheart picked up his pace a little to match mine, and he looked up at me as he ran beside me.

“I take it we’re going for a slightly safer option than fighting a thing that could destroy buildings in the town,” he said.

“Pretty much,” I replied, looking up to see if Twilight was still okay.

The Ender Dragon had only just reached her, I saw. She dodged above an easily avoidable swoop and spun around to face it. I could see her gasp even from this far away, most likely because of the Ender Dragon healing up beside one of the undestroyed healing thingies.

I thought it was a really stupid thing when I first saw it too.

“Did you figure out that the other two might have some trouble with these things as well?” Shieldy asked, glancing back at Pinkie Pie and Applejack.

“They kinda pointed out that flaw in my plan…” I answered quietly. “But that’s slightly not important right now Twilight needs help from the Ender Dragon attacking so much!”

“You should’ve just said something,” he replied, readying an arrow in his bow with his magic.

Before I could say anything else, he leapt up and spun around in the air so his stomach was facing upwards. In about half a second, he pointed his bow and arrow at the Ender Dragon and fired the arrow. I know he didn’t need that much of a good aim, but it still looked cool as he spun back around and landed back on his feet at a run.

I get it, life. He’s super cool and you want me to see that. Lay off it a bit, will you? I have already fallen for him, after all.

I turned my head to see the arrow hit the Ender Dragon in its blocky stomach. It whirled around in the air and started soaring towards us, but Twilight got its attention again by catching up to it and kicking it in the side.

“You make this bow and arrow thing look easy!” Pinkie yelled happily.

“That’s because I am a unicorn with the ability to manipulate a bow and arrow using magic, Pinkie Pie,” he replied, pulling another arrow out of his quiver to ready his bow again. “It’s… It’s kinda supposed to be easy for me.”

“I think she meant the spinny thing…” I muttered. “But who cares?! More super awesome anime moves later! Let’s get out of town and shoot Ender Dragon’s butt off!” I looked down at Shieldy again. “We’re gonna…” Oh holy wow I just had a super genius idea. “Oh… Oh oh oh. I got an even better plan!”

“What’s an even better plan than shooting stupid-dragon-head from really far away out of the way of accidentally hitting another pony?” Pinkie asked.

Hm. Good point.

But not good enough to out-plan me!

“It involves yelling at Twilight to bring ol’ Endy down here so we can use him as a training thingy!” I exclaimed, springing up a little bit. “We get to slay a giant monster without damaging anything but my sanity and I get to learn how to slay other me without getting too pissed off with myself!”

“Actually, that is a better plan,” Shieldheart commented, smirking a little. “Training would be pretty useful for some of the less experienced members of our group. I could even coach you a little, if you’d like”

“Alright!” I yelled happily. “We get to learn how to make stuff die better!!”

“Is that really so awesome?” asked Pinkie Pie. “I mean, yeah it’ll save the day quicker, but making stuff die isn’t fun for them! The dying stuff, that is.”

“Well who cares about them? If they didn’t wanna be murdered then they shouldn’t have been so dumb and stupid and evil!”

Oh look we got here wow that was quicker than last time we ran out of town towards Canterlot.

Or was it? I’m not really paying attention to real life right now.

I’ve had a long and annoying day, okay?

“Alright! Set up time!” I yelled, pulling an arrow out and holding it like you were supposed to in a bow.

I’ve done this before and been mildly good at it! Yay for knowing stuff!

“Right then,” said Shieldy, marching towards the other two. “Now to teach earth ponies how to shoot with a bow.”

“You do that and I’ll teach me how to do other stuff!” I aimed at the Ender Dragon before shouting, “HEY, TWILIGHT!!”

“What?!” Twilight yelled back from where she was easily flapping just above Endy’s swoops each time. I already said I’m in a nickname-y mood today, okay? “Is it another plan change?!”

“KINDA!!” I screamed back, firing the arrow that I could see wouldn’t have hit Endy at all if it weren’t for the homing missile mechanic built into it. “WE’RE GONNA USE HIM AS A TRAINING DUMMY!!”

“Isn’t he going to have to be dead for that?!”

“HE’S A DUMMY AND WE’RE USING HIM FOR TRAINING SO THERE!!”

Endy was on his way towards me now anyway.

“You can handle him while I teach the others how to shoot, can’t you, Karen?” asked Shieldheart, looking back at me.

“I wanna deal with him anyway!” I answered excitedly. “Time to try some stuff that’s probably gonna get me killed again!”

“Ooh! Wait a second!” Pinkie yelled. “What do we do if you do die and your stuff stays here?”

“I got it!” Rainbow yelled, suddenly right beside me. “What are we doing again?”

“We’re using that dummy as a training dragon!” I replied. I was so excited about this for some reason. “And you get to join in however you want! All he’s going to do is fly in circles and try to hit you!”

That’s all he did when I fought him anyway.

“Nah, I’m good,” Rainbow replied, waving a dismissive hoof at me. “I’ll just keep you alive because I already got the killing part down.”

“NO TIME FOR TALKING NOW IS FOR DODGING!!” I screamed frantically, diving to one side to avoid Endy’s swoop.

GUYS GUYS GUYS GUESS WHAT I JUST DID THAT WASN’T DIE!!!

I ROLLED LIKE FIVE FEET OUT OF ENDER DRAGON’S RANGE!!!

It was kinda like a Halo Reach evade, but I wasn’t complaining about that at all. Halo Reach was awesome.

“That didn’t look easy,” said Voice. “You should be proud of yourself for accomplishing that.”

“YES I AM, IMAGINARY VOICE!!” I squealed, spinning around and (gasp) stabbing my spear into Endy’s tail. “OH MY GOD I AM JUST DOING LOADSA AWESOME STUFF TODAY!!”

Hey. I’d just dived out of Endy’s range, rolled to my feet and then stabbed him before he could get out of my range like some kind of super awesome… thing! That was like the second biggest achievement of my entire life so of course I was going to be hyper/squealy/just plain stupid about it.

“Nice moves, Karen!” Rainbow complimented. “Is that all you’re gonna practice though?”

“Of course it is!” I replied happily. “I need to learn how to be a superhuman superhero that knows how to dodge stuff! I’ll be… Dodge-girl!”

That superhero name is now mine forever copyrighted by me for use only by me but I have no way to enforce that so I guess you can take it if you want.

I’m not gonna get mad or anything.

“You know what I think you should try?” asked Voice. “You should try jumping over it next time it comes around. I bet Nerak can’t do that, and you want to be better than her, don’t you?”

“F?*% NERAK!!” I shouted, making Rainbow jump a little.

She quickly recovered and smirked. “Yeah!” she added. “Do that!” I cringed. “Wait, what does that mean?”

“I’ll tell you later and then you’ll realise why what you just said was not a good thing at all.” I turned back to the others. “How are you three doing so far?”

“I learned how to shoot stuff while you weren’t looking!” Pinkie replied happily, bouncning up and down excitedly.

“They’re doing fine, Karen,” said Shieldy. “While Applejack is getting there slowly, Pinkie is… well, she’s Pinkie.”

“Alright then!” I yelled, pointing up at Endy. “Pinkie, you are now distraction helper! Shouldn’t be too hard!”

“Yeah! I got this!” she replied happily, readying another arrow to shoot at Endy.

Yeah, she was stood up on her back legs to do that. I’m going to go out on a limb and just say that she was a very dextrous pony. Yep, now she was stood on one leg.

Pinkie Pie = Best dexterity pony.

As I thought of what dark souls characteristic would be best for my whole party, the Ender Dragon drew ever closer again. He seemed to be going for Pinkie Pie; the group archer. Remembering that I wanted to do another thing, I ran up to stand beside her.

“Alright, we’re gonna jump over him!” I told her with a big, stupid smile on my face. “That sound okay?”

“I was made for jumping over stuff!” Pinkie replied as Shieldy and Applejack backed away from us. She blinked in realisation. “Wait, no. I was made for other stuff. Jumping is just one of my secret special talents!”

“OKAY NO TIME LET’S DO IT!!” I screamed as Endy swooped down at us.

I ran towards him and used the surprisingly sturdy spear to pole-vault up and over him. I spotted Pinkie just freaking backflip over him like it was nothing, but I was more focused on a new opportunity that had popped up.

With a deviously devious snigger, I spun around in the air to hit Endy with my spear. It stabbed him in the tail before he could get away and kinda stuck there. Still holding that spear, I was pulled along behind him and was sent tumbling to the ground. On the bright side, at least I rolled to my feet!

“Aw, I liked that stupid weapon,” I whined, watching it fly away, stuck in Endy’s tail. “Now how am I gonna kill stuff?”

“Oh, gee, I don’t know, maybe that bow and arrow you’ve got just sitting there on the ground after you just abandoned it?” Voice suggested.

That plan was dumb.

“Here,” said Luna, appearing right beside me suddenly. Maybe she was always there and I just didn’t notice, I don’t know. I still jumped. “Use this. You would use it much better than I.”

“Alright, back to killing stuff!” I yelled, snatching her spear out of her magic. “Ooh I got an idea!”

“Another one?” asked Applejack. “What is it now?”

I leant in to whisper something to Luna. You’ll find out what in a second, don’t worry. She gave me a confused glance, but I just smiled and nodded at her. It was going to be amazing because she was dragonborn and it was an awesome dragon shout.

“Well this can’t go wrong in any way, shape or form,” said Voice.

“This is going to go brilliantly,” I whispered, smiling.

Endy soared around in the distance before making a beeline for us again. Luna stepped towards him slowly, putting on a determined expression. I just cackled maniacally in my head. As Endy got closer still, Luna crouched down a little to ready herself for the most un-fail-able dragon shout ever.

As he was about to collide with her, she inhaled and roared, “COMETH AT US, BROTHER!!”

I actually felt the shockwave of that definitely real and amazing dragon shout, and Endy did too. He was knocked back in the sky and went hurtling away before recovering and gliding away to look for more healing thingies.

“You know, I really thought that wasn’t going to work,” I said bluntly, smiling mischievously.

“What?!” Luna yelled, spinning to face me. “I could have died if it didn’t work!”

“Yeah but you didn’t,” I replied innocently. “So there’s no harm done. You wouldn’t have been that hurt anyway he just swoops at you and doesn’t attack you properly.”

“Well I would appreciate it if you told me your ideas might not work in future!”

“He’s coming back again!” Pinkie yelled, pointing behind me.

“Time to practice!” I yelled, spinning to face Endy again. “I think the roll-y stuff is more important, so let’s do that!”

“I’m right with you, Karen!” Pinkie exclaimed happily. “Let’s show this guy how we do it!”

“Ah’m real glad that some of us are gettin’ somewhere…” Applejack muttered.

I looked over at her and spotted that she was having about as much trouble with a bow and arrow as I was when I first used one. At least she was trying, I guess!

“You’ll get there, Applejack,” said Shieldy, patting her on the back. “I guess you’re really just support at the moment anyway, so it’s not mandatory for you to learn yet.”

“Luna take over shooting stuff we’ll need him dead eventually!” I yelled quickly as Endy swooped at us.

Before she even said anything, I leapt to one side and WOW I DID IT AGAIN rolled to my feet. I was getting good at this! The only problem this time was that I didn’t get far enough to avoid him completely.

Fun fact: getting hit by the Ender Dragon in real life doesn’t damage you, it sends you flying like you’ve just been hit by a train or something.

I was wondering what just happened when I hit the ground far away from the others. ‘Landed’ was probably a bad choice of wording. I crashed into the ground and rolled along for a few seconds. When I stopped, I realised that I was still alive and in one piece.

“Ouch,” I said when I remembered I could speak again.

I stood up and looked over at the others fighting Endy. They probably would need my help, so I started tromping back towards them. It was probably going to take a while to get over there, but luck was on my side today.

“Oh, you’re still alive!” said Dash, appearing above my head. Wow, she was fast. “Come on! The others need your help!”

“Can I have a lift?” I asked innocently. What? Riding a flying rainbow pony was awesome.

She frowned at me and flapped down to my level. “I guess…” she muttered. “But you’re not gonna be getting this that often.”

“I don’t care,” I said as I jumped onto her back.

Yes, childish squeals ensued again.

Author's Note

This chapter only took so long because I didn't have fun writing it ~~and I was working on another thing~~