The Fast, Dangerous and the Furious

Chapter Nineteen: Assault on District Twelve

CRACK! CRACK!

A Reaper hit the ground in front of me without any signs of life in his eyes. All five of us galloped down the leaky pipeline listening to the sounds of gunfire going on in the District. Each shot made me twitch with adrenaline filled anger. There was no point in even looking out the vents to see what was going on, I could have seen what was going on even if my eyes had been closed. We took another pipe coming face to face with a wall.

“A dead end?” Oceans put his hooves on the wall looking for some sort of secret entrance.

Like Silver Shoe used to tell me, not every earth pony would think to look up. I got to work telekinetically moving every crate above us into a makeshift staircase. Rusty tapped Oceans shoulder, turning his attention to the makeshift stairs, and galloped up with me. Sheriff and Deputy galloped behind us being extra cautious for Reapers trying to follow. I let every crate just drop. I bolted in front of everyone, taking the group straight to a stack of crates. My horn lit up again, blasting all of them apart with one well-placed shot. Each one of us scrambled up the ladder towards the light shining through a crack between the wall and bookcase.

Shoving the book case out of the way, I jumped up into Oak Tree’s apartment while the others followed behind me. The place was still a mess. My hoof stepped on top of some cookies that looked like they were made for Hearths Warming Eve. I stand corrected, either I didn’t notice how bad this place was before or it had gotten worse and somehow came with wrong seasonal food. Oak Tree was taking cover in a poorly made fort which consisted of an overturned bed, chair and comforter laying on top of it all. The old goat jumped out with a rifle pointed the wrong way, “I’ve got a gun!” I don’t have time for this.

I telekinetically ripped the gun away from him. “Runner! Is that you?” I actually miss him calling me Silver Runner. Kind of.

“How did they get in?” I asked cautiously, only to see part of an explosion out the corner of my eye.

The old goat brought a hoof to his long chin and stroked his beard. I swear if he was thinking about asking for a hoofout I’d be the one to take him out, or at least send his little fort toppling down. “I saw one of them run by my door holding a map.”

I inhaled very slowly to the point every pony took a step back.

Damn it, Silver Shoe.

I paced back and forth wondering what they were supposed to be doing here to begin with. It’s not like this place has anything worth stealing from it. Even if it did there’s a matter of it being locked in the armory. I turned to the window focusing my attention on the fights below. Buildings burned like the inside of a fireplace with sheering flames spouting from several dozen concrete walls. Ponies scrambled out from them using spells to put the roaring flames out.

Sheriff looked out the other window and put a hoof against his chest out of sheer shock. I wasn’t sure if it was from seeing a District for the first time or for the fact that it was being blasted to bits by Reapers. “Sweet Celestia,” he said softly while his stone wall expression was let down a little. Deputy whispered what sounded like a prayer under his breath. My attention was drawn to the pegasi Reapers attaching sticky bombs to the walls surrounding us. Several explosions went off but only managed to give it a slight crack.

Whatever’s going on here is going to be put to a stop. “You guys think Daring will really show up for this, we didn’t exactly have the best goodbye.” Rusty put his hoof around me and gave me a pat on the back while he assessed the situation. His eyes practically lit up like a computer trying to analyze everything at once. “Besides, we’ll need all the help we can get.”

“Relationships can be,” Rusty started.

Oceans finished with “Yeah.”

“But they can also,” Rusty spoke directly at me.

Oceans finished with, “That’s right.”

I don’t … what … I don’t … stop finishing each other’s sentences! How does Daring put up with these two? For Celestia sake please tell me. I groaned and looked at a tall building close to the middle of the city. “Rusty, that’s your building. If you run into trouble there’s a tunnel right below there that the Reapers probably used to get in. Use it to go there,” I pointed my hoof at another tall building where the pipe would take him to. Rusty hummed and took his hoof away from me. Oceans gave me a walkie-talkie. “If you guys get hurt, hurt them back, you get killed, walk it off.”

I pushed the button down. “Not Important, where are you?”

“You’re going to want to jump out the window,” was her blunt response.

I turned and gave Sheriff a hoof shake wishing him luck while mentioning to give any spare weapons they could find to any allies in the area. He trotted out the door with Deputy ready for action. My attention was turned to Rusty and Oceans. I opened my mouth, but Rusty spoke. “Runner, it would our genuine pleasure.” Both con artists galloped out the door ready for action. With a deep inhale I looked at the window. My horn lit up and I watched the window slide open. Galloping at full speed I gave myself a good push from the ground, squeezing right through the narrow space.

The moment I jumped out the window I fell straight down. Not Important flew past me as I arched my back a little. Candle Light’s Integra hit my back and I strapped it on telekinetically, simultaneously hitting the gas pedal. Letting the wings take me up into the air I took a look at what was going on. District residents were being beaten up in the streets, being yelled at. Not Important unloaded a clip into several of the Reapers.

No sign of Bolt Action.

I banked right and saw a few pegasi Reapers attempting to put bombs on the wall again. They all just dropped out of the sky. “Good job, Rusty.” I descended down to the street and touched down into a gallop. My hooves slid across the dirt while my eyes locked on Silver Shoe’s house. The stands ejected out, keeping my glider propped up, while I slid out from underneath the machine.

Silver Shoe’s mother, pressed against the ground by a Reaper, his hooves deep in her neck, sent every hair in my mane up. My hooves galloped forward as I scooped up a wood plank from the ground. Smashing the board down on top of the Reaper made the thing break in two as well as knock the insufferable bitch unconscious. Before Silver Shoe’s mother had time to react I helped her up. “Runner, what are you doing here,” she said between gasps for air. I looked around for Silver Shoe’s father.

“I’m here to send these guys packing.”

Two loud cracks went off into the Reapers back undoubtedly killing him right away. Silver Shoe’s father stepped outside with a rusty pump action shotgun in his mouth. Oh yeah, I forgot most of the weapons here were pretty old. Kind of makes me appreciate my magic even more.

Both parents started looking around for something. My horn lit up and my pistol levitated around looking for a target. “Where’s Silver Shoe?” They asked together. Everything around me came to a sudden halt.

I had lost track how many days had gone by, how many times I just wanted to stay on the ground, give up since then. I realized now that I had almost completely let go of what had happened. “She didn’t make it back with me,” I found myself saying softly. Silver Shoe’s mother stared at me and sat down in a chair. Her father exhaled slowly as if accepting what had happened. “Showering Stones is still alive.” They both looked at me surprised. A few blocks behind me, a loud explosion went off making a building topple down onto a street. I looked at the smoke, relieved to see it wasn’t the building Rusty was stationed at. “I’ll fill you both in later.”

“You’re right, we’ve got bastards to kill, come on!”

I admired Silver Shoe’s father’s enthusiasm. We galloped into the driveway and I slid under my glider. It took less than a couple of seconds to get everything started back up. I backed away from the house then galloped off to where my house was supposed to be. The walkie-talkie went off a few times alerting me to the group’s location. Everyone was in position. Sadly there was no sign of Daring yet, which was starting to upset me. We needed more back up because what we were doing just wasn’t enough.

It took me a couple minutes to find my way around the streets back to my old house. Once I found it I came to a light trot before stopping completely in front of the garage. The front door was bucked in. My horn lit up and rolled the garage up a little while I unstrapped myself from my glider. I rolled under the garage, letting it fall back into place just before coming face to face with my beast … that I realized wasn’t as much of a beast as I used to think it was. “Good to see you again,” I called out quietly to the machine as I trotted up the stairs.

Gently nudging the door open, I was greeted to the sound of gunfire going off in both directions of my house. Taking a slight hoof step forward, I looked at the living room just in time to catch my mother popping up from behind the couch with a revolver in her mouth. My pistol levitated up and a chunk of wall blasted apart right next to me. I stumbled into the bathroom startled. My mother came back up and pulled the trigger. The gun clicked twice. She dove back down while the Reaper fired a shotgun round at the couch tearing part of the furniture off. I got back up off the tile floor galloping around the corner aiming my gun at the fridge. The Reaper jumped up at me, taking me down against the table just before it collapse under our combined weight. My back hoof bucked the son of bitch in his face. Wrapping a hoof around one of the broken table legs I swung it back into the stallion’s face.

He yelled out in pain while I bucked him away from me. My mother jumped back up and unloaded the entire revolver into his chest. “Thanks,” I managed to say between pants. Another reaper came galloping into the room from the staircase. He pounced at me forcing his hooves down on my neck. In the panic to get her revolver reloaded my mother dropped the gun. I put my back hooves against the Reapers stomach and rolled him back into a window making it shatter while he went into it.

Three more reapers came in guns blazing only giving me enough time to levitate up the broken table top as a terrible barricade. A pony wielding a shotgun shot part of the table off. My mother came back up firing off two rounds into the chest of that very same pony. I galloped over to her, jumping over the couch while the table top exploded into chunks. A heavy lifting Reaper reloaded an RPG aiming straight for us. I ducked my head down with my mother.

CRACK! CRACK! CRACK! CRACK!

We both froze for a second before looking at each other. I carefully lifted my head up to the sight of smoke rising out of a pony’s pistol. The mare under a pith helmet pushed it up and put the gun back in her holster. “Sorry little buddy, I didn’t mean to get trigger happy on you.” Daring rolled her eyes at the dead Reapers while having a look around. She scoffed. “Where do you need me?”

My mother looked up and then turned her attention to me. She nudged me and, not so subtly, told me to never keep a mare waiting. I silently wished she would shut up. I missed this back and forth with my mother … huh, never thought I’d say that. Jumping back over the couch I approached Daring and just gave her a big hug. “Thank Celestia you’re a badass.”

Daring Adventure pushed me back. “Whoa there, just because I saved your flank again doesn’t mean I’m forgiving you for what you said about my not-so-family family.” I chuckled with agreement. Daring reached inside of her saddle bags, dropping some rolled up papers down that had been inside. She mentioned that she knew I liked to read interesting things. I read the title on the papers. Alicorn Sphere Schematics. I looked at Daring. She gave me a half smile. “Now where do you need me?”

I was almost speechless at the sight of what she was giving me. This could be given to a pony that could actually get this shit done! Some pony could have found a cure by reverse engineering that machine. Now there’s no need to track it down. “Alright, take to the skies and keep any Reaper backup out of here and away from the outside wall. Think you can manage that?”

“Bring it!” She flapped her wings and jetted out the front door leaving a greyscale trail behind her.

My mother trotted up to me with her jaw dropped. She asked me who that was. I responded with, “The most amazing mare I have ever met.” My mother had a look on her face. I mean a look. Ponies would know what look I was talking about if they saw it. That look. “I’ve got a team to lead. Board up the windows and if a stallion with a rifle cutie mark shows up, hide.” She slowly nodded sending her horn aglow. Several planks of wood floated out of the garage followed by a trail of nails.

My mother put her hoof down on my shoulder with a pained expression. “I’m sorry.” I took a step back. What was she apologizing for? “The night you left, Runner. I let the police chief into your hideout. I made a deal with him that would keep yours and Silver Shoe’s sentence down to a minimum.” All I could do was back up. How could she do that to me? To us? “I had to do what I thought was best,” I put my hoof up. I shook my head and just let it go. This was the mare that brought me into this world and it was about time I started treating her with the respect she deserved. “There are a lot of cops being held in the armory. Be careful.”

I galloped back into my garage with the schematics in my mouth. All I have to do now is survive this gunfight, get back to Ponyville and find a scientist that can use this for good. Grabbing a few rags from on top of the counter I wrapped them around the schematics before putting them down inside of my saddle bags. Can’t risk these things getting shot up … you know what on second thought. I put them down inside of my Mustang’s trunk. Something rolled around in my bags. Taking a quick peak inside of the ammo portion of the bag I saw three grenades sitting inside. Thanks Daring. “I’m coming back for that,” I spoke to my Mustang. Using my magic to lift the door open, I slid underneath the garage letting it fall back in place behind me.

Three Reapers came running around the corner. They looked right at me while I pulled the pin from a grenade with my magic. Within the blink of an eye I tossed it over to them. “Catch!”

KA-BOOM!

I looked away not paying the slightest attention to the three Reapers. Sliding underneath the Integra I used my magic to strap me to it before heading off down the street. My hoof gave the gas pedal a kick and then the gear shifter. Once I was in second, I flew up into the air lighting up my horn. Several buildings became transparent. I dove down towards one of the streets they were running towards with my pistol raised up. Then, without mercy, unloaded the clip at them while they ran out into the streets. Each one fell down with wounds. I had just enough time to catch a glimpse of District ponies running out from a nearby alleyway with a couple wooden planks and lead pipes.

The building a street away from me exploded at the base making the entire structure topple to the ground like a domino. I glanced at my wing speedometer clocking in at ninety wing power. Too fast to stop or bank into a sharp turn. My hoof pushed the gas pedal back as a gust of wind blasted my mane around. I galloped along the side of the collapsing building while randomly firing off rounds at the Reapers scrambling on rooftops. As I got to the end of the structure I pushed off the brick and soared down the street listening to shattering windows behind me. Clouds of dust rose up in the buildings wake while I banked around another turn, reloading my pistols as fast as I could.

A sharp burning pain zoomed past my ear. My fore hoof went straight up to my ear. I went to take a look at what had hit me, but instead found a sample of my blood. Several pegasi flew down towards me open firing on anything they could get their sights on. My walkie-talkie crackled a little. “Runner,” it was Not Important, “in front of you!” I snapped my head forward and saw that exact mare flying towards me.

OH CRAP!

She had the same look on her face as she bucked the side of a building using the moment to flip herself upside down.

Time felt as if it had begun crawling to a standstill as he flew straight for one another. Not Important lifted up just enough so that when we reached each other, the tops of our gliders scrapped against each other sending sparks flying everywhere. As we pulled away from one another I saw her levitate a gun up and somehow take down each pegasi with one shot each. Time felt like it returned to normal as I pulled away.

Once I put a blocks distance between me and Not Important, I let out a breath that I didn’t know I had been holding. I bet life is never dull living with her.

Sheriff and Deputy were down below taking out as many Reapers as their guns would allow them to. We still needed more. Now that Daring was here we should have been seeing more ponies helping us out. That’s if they can get inside … damn it. I didn’t think about that until now.

A pegasus Reaper came diving toward me. My horn lit up and I threw a grenade out of saddle bags. Without so much has slowing down, the reaper pony caught it in his hooves while I flew off not once looking at the explosion left behind. I levitated my second pistol out and started unloading clip after clip at the dozens of reapers occupying the streets. With my horn glowing even brighter I made a few more buildings transparent. The surrounding area was clear. I let out a low sigh as I landed on a street that gave me a clear view of the wall.

There weren’t any more ponies scaling it. In fact it had been a while since I saw any pegasi trying to put some bombs on the wall. A Reaper came running up from a nearby building with a pipe in their levitation field. I fired two crippling rounds at his legs, exhaling slowly. A walkie-talkie fell out of his bags and it gave out a crackle.

“Hey, boss. I’m bringing down the doors.”

The device cut out after a second then quit working all together. I looked over at the giant doors that had remained shut for an unimaginable amount of time. With a low exhale I focused a little more. Sparks began twinkling around my horn as the entire wall surrounding District Twelve became transparent. I felt my heart sink down to the deepest depths it could find. I couldn’t breathe. Sticky bombs were inside every single pipe, and it wasn’t just a couple of them. It was like every other hoof step had a series of bombs clustered near it. Hundreds upon hundreds of red lights blinked around the interior making me lose focus. After a moment of being awestruck I heard something explode. The doors that were supposed to remain shut forever, came collapsing down in a fiery bombastic eruption.

Without time to think of a plan, I took flight. It took me a matter of only a minute to hover over the front gates that had literally been blasted to tiny chunks. Large wagons covered with thick armor plating rolled into the District like a small army of thunder. They looked similar to the diagrams I had seen in Bolt Action’s office. I levitated over the walkie-talkie. “Sheriff, meet me at the building overlooking the doors.” I put the walkie-talkie up and dove down to the armory. With any luck the District police could hold these mobile armories off long enough for me to get a big gun.

I took a look down below spying several Reapers standing guard outside the armory. Only one thing I can do. I went in as quietly as I could, landing on top of the roof. Unstrapping myself from the glider, I slid out from underneath it going immediately over to the fire escape. Good thing this wasn’t a major heist, it was just a simple get-in-blow-the-doors-wide-open-with-an-RPG kind of thing.

My hoofs clattered against the metal steps until I came to a stop in front of a small window. The security system was turned off. I pressed my muzzle up against the glass until three Reapers came into view. They were keeping the other cops held in a jail cell.

I levitated up my two guns up, telekinetically smashing the window in with both barrels. Rolling into the building and across the ground I tried to focus on where I was aiming. Once I came to a stop my guns open fired at the three Reapers, but not before one of them locked us inside. They tried to run, but each one took a crippling shot through the neck by some miracle. With any luck that was all of them.

“GOT YOU!”

One of the Reapers got up, tackling me against the wall with an unbelievable amount of force. I bucked him in the face as he shoved me into the steel door keeping us all inside. His fore hoof found its ways into my neck keeping my head pinned to the metal.

The stallion grabbed a knife ready to gouge my eyes out. I telekinetically threw him into one of the support beams. Pulling the safety pin on one of my grenades I kicked it over to him. The stallion’s hood fell down. Revealing. A. Horn.

Oh no. Oh crap!

The grenade floated back to me. Trying to throw the grenade back with my own magic we stood our ground. It was an even telekinetic battle of strength. With my hooves forced, I jumped up smacking the grenade like a ball up to an open window above the locked door.

It hit the window ceil.

NO! Fall away. Fall away from us!

The Reaper looked at me. I looked at him. We started looking for places to hide while the stupid thing began to tip to our side. With a bit of luck on both our sides the grenade tipped over and fell out the window exploding on the other side. Once the Reaper knew we were safe, he got up. My horn lit up and I brought a rifle butt to his face, knocking him out cold. I galloped over to the steel bars keeping the cops in to find the chief staring at me. “You,” his eyes narrowed. “What the hell are you doing here you little runt. Siding with the enemy.” I looked over at him, but spotted something rather interesting. Keys.

They floated over to me and I put them in the chief’s hoof. “For the record, you never had me. You never had Silver Shoe.” I floated an RPG with several projectiles for it out from their resting places. These would do nicely. I loaded one into the RPG and aimed it right at the front door. “You guys might want to stand back,” I said softly. Pulling the trigger back with my hoof the projectile ejected out from the weapon striking the wall. Tearing it apart. Piece. By. Piece. Reapers lay dead on the other side.

It took me a couple minutes to climb back up the fire escape with the RPG in tow. Once I was on the roof I strapped myself to the Integra ready to deliver the RPG. I took back to the skies.

Reapers were starting to dwindle in numbers from the looks of it, but on the other hoof the mobile armories were ripping the cop force to pieces. I descended down to the roof top below to meet with Sheriff. “Brought you a little gift,” I spoke confidently while setting the weapon down in front of him. Sheriff picked it up and took a projectile from me. He aimed it right at one of the units. The projectile flew out from the weapon and blew the son of bitch clear off the face of Equestria. “Damn!” I set the rest of the projectiles down before taking off for the dense portion of the city.

Several pegasi flew straight for me once they saw me in the air. They each followed me giving me no other choice but to confront them head on. My guns levitated up, hungry for action. They clicked several times and nothing came out. I levitated out nothing but empty ammo boxes from my saddle bags. “Oh, shit.” I banked to the right and tried to get some distance between me and the pegasi. They were glued to me like cheese all over macaroni. Not Important was galloping on the ground towards us. I hit the coward pedal and dropped down to the street.

My hooves clip clopped against the ground as I shouted to Not Important. “I need to reload!” Not Important charged at me as I took back into the air.

I kept low enough to her that we managed to reload each other’s guns without having to stop. Time felt like it had slowed while I barrel rolled my guns so that Not Important could slid in more ammo to my bags. As I landed back on the street I could see Not Important killing the pegasi chasing after me. Time slowly began to feel like its normal pace again as we parted ways.

I came to a sliding stop near a reaper who had been killed by a grenade. This was turning into a bucking street fight the way things were going down. From where I was standing I could make out several fights to the death with lead pipes, wood planks, or some other form of makeshift weapon. Slowly letting out an exhale I looked up at the walls while the Reapers walkie-talkie went off.

“Bring down the wall in three. Two.”

I neighed. There was no way those walls were going to crumble. Ponies already tried bringing them down today and that turned out to be a failure. My eyes were locked on the wall.

“One.”

Explosions ripped the giant chunks of rock down with almost little to no effort whatsoever. Large chunks of debris came crashing down on top of Oak Tree’s apartment before the entire wall collapsed down on every building within a couple dozen hoof steps of it. The ground beneath my hooves shook like an earthquake. Smoke rose up all around what was formally known as District Twelve.