The Dog Days Are Over

Chapters

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7

Chapter 1

The sky would light up in a brilliant shade of orange as the sun began its timely ascension into the sky, just like every other morning. The birds would tweet. The trees would absorb the dew of the night. And ponies around Equestria would rise to a new day, refreshed and happy.

The diamond dogs apparantly do not deserve such a simple bliss.

Six dogs trudged their way towards Canterlot at a steady pace as the sun rose behind them. Four of them were Skydogs, diamond dogs outfitted with steampunk-esque wings that could keep them aloft indefinitely. One of them was a great brute encased in absurdly thick armor that ended at his head, which was completely exposed and rather bruised and scarred. The last dog, the one leading the group, was a simple grey diamond dog 'Foremutt', a form of diamond dog that was often hyper intelligent in comparison to their more common brown Hound brethren. This dog was one such blessed individual, although if you asked him about it now he'd laugh in your face.

'Why we walkin' anyway?' the Skydog who went by the name Stingbeat asked of the lead dog.
'For dramatic effect.' the lead dog, Huski, grumbled in reply. The six of them continued in silence for a moment before another, Wingbeat, spoke up.
'What does that mean?'
'Spies everywhere, is means of intimidation.' the largest of the dogs told them. He was Brickfist. A third Skydog moved ahead to move next to Huski.
'Why didn't we just take the train up here?'
'Spark's probably got eyes on every transport moving in and out of Canterlot waiting for us to show up, Railspike. If we took the train it'd be begging to get blasted off the tracks and down the mountain.'
'Do not have deathwish.' Brickfist added.
'Exactly.'
'But we's walkin' on the tracks now anyway.'
'We're walk-' Huski looked down. Metal and wooden train tracks were under his paws. 'Whoa. Didn't even notice we were this close. Let's pick up the pace, boys!' He began sprinting up the tracks into a tunnel ahead and his 'boys' followed him eagerly.

What felt like an hour of running in the dark and tripping over each other later, they spotted a light source up ahead. 'The light at the end of the tunnel! We's almost there!' the fourth Skydog, Featherburn, shouted. As they neared the opening, Huski heard dull explosions in the distance. He sprinted ahead and came to a sudden stop when he saw Canterlot. The others stopped too, taking it in.

Two huge flying disc-like structures lined with weapons were bombarding Canterlot. A number of almost as large ships surrounded them both, trading shots with them, but failing miserably. One of them suddenly exploded in the middle and lost altitude quickly, falling for several drawn out seconds before slamming into the base of the mountain Canterlot was built on, joining what appeared to be even more wrecks from earlier crashes. Huski squinted at them, recognizing some of their names: 'Starburst', 'The Great Wind', 'Skylight', 'Forward Unto Dawn'... and now the 'Dusklight' took its place among them. Crews of at least a hundred ponies for each of them, the Great Wind having been a Pegasus carrier even. Now they were an airship graveyard beneath what used to be the capital of the world.

Railspike tapped Huski's soldier as he looked on. 'Boss... look.' he said, pointing down below. There, sprawling across the plains beneath the rails, was the most powerful ship ever, the 'Endless Challenge' as it was dubbed by the ponies tasked with creating it, an immense beast of a skyship that could put even sci fi movies to shame and was lined with magical protection the likes of which the world hadn't ever seen before it was built... sliced in two. Bodies littered the crash site and a few of them had clearly only just survived the impact only to die of blood loss afterwards. Even from this distance they were noticable.

Huski pondered looking for survivors for a moment before remembering his mission. 'Come on. We have to get to Canterlot or they all die for nothing.'
'Shouldn't be dead.' Brickfist mumbled in his broken accent.
'There's nothing we can do for them now.' Huski moved into the next tunnel, which would open up to a train station in Canterlot.

Aboard the modified Hammer Of Dawn, which was making short work of everything attacking it, an earth pony reclined happily as he watched the battle through a moniter. 'Oh, His Majesty is going to make me His warlord for this! I just know it!' he chuckled to himself. He did a double-take when he spied something moving along the train tracks a few miles away through one of the external cameras. 'Trouble?' He picked up a microphone. 'All ground units in the vicinity of the train station, keep watch on the tunnel. We may have some unwanted guests coming through.' He placed the microphone back on its stand, resuming his observation of the battle. He laughed as one of the decks of an opposing ship exploded and ponies were blown from it and ignited, falling to the city below.

Chapter 2

The city guard were being slaughtered... that much was obvious. Going toe to toe with a Steel Dog always proved suicidal, even under the best of circumstances. Their armor was nigh impenetrable too, which didn't exactly help anypony fighting them. Huski knew this long before his forces were turned against him but it still appalled him to see it happen.
'If I make it to the Hammer Of Dawn, then even the gods won't be able to save Spark Lens from me...' he growled to himself as Brickfist surveyed the carnage of the station. Steel Dogs were pulling apart an engine in one of the terminals and grinding ponies to pulp.

One of the Steel Dogs turned to see the group and suddenly all of them were closing in, ignoring the ponies they were previously beating on. Brickfist roared at them and charged into them, taking one in a headlock. They started pounding against his armor and jabbing him with massive combat knives but it held long enough for him to launch a roll. Wrecking servos and crushing joints, he rather quickly reduced everything around him to mangled piles of metal. He looked around at the faceless mooks he had dispatched and spat.
'Weak like pups.' Huski moved over to him as the ponies they had saved gathered nearby to regroup and tend to any surviving wounded.
'Nice job, big boy.'
'That's a bloody understatement, that is! You buckin' wrecked 'em!' Featherburn exclaimed.
'More.' Brickfist stated.
'Yeah, come on you lot. We gotta get underneath the Hammer while it's occupied!' Huski told them, running on all fours to the outside. They followed, the Skydogs taking flight. 'Stingbeat, you brought the tools, right?'
'Yeah, boss!' Stingbeat replied over the sounds of battle in the streets, shaking a bag he was carrying.
'Good! Drop it off when we get up there!'
'You got it!'

Encounters with Steel Dog forces were short and brutal, usually with Brickfist coming out on top without breaking a sweat. Occasionally one would get the better of him after he had blazed through its comrades and the Skydogs tore its exposed rear apart. All in all they traveled fairly quickly through the city. They had almost reached the heavily shadowed area underneath the Hammer Of Dawn when a very loud explosion shook the city and its skies. Huski looked up to see a massive ship bearing down on them.
'INCOMING!!!'
Everypony and dog in the area dove for the ground as the ship hit the mountainside, crushing buildings and soldiers mercilessly. The Steel Dogs were largely unperturbed and took ready advantage of the prone soldiers, throwing them about and pulling them apart. One such group of golems bore down on Huski and his boys.
'Toss me the supersaw!' he shouted, and a small chainsaw landed in his waiting paws. He mounted it on his paw and revved it up, ducking under a swing from a Steel Dog. He shoved it up under its chin in an exposed zone, taking the head off in seconds. He laughed triumphantly. Then another one smacked him across the street.

Brickfist had met a match with one of the Steel Dogs, who had him pinned against a wall. Both were trying to strangle the other. Brickfist was having much less success. So instead he applied pressure to the underside of his opponent's helmet until it cracked at the neck and came right off, taking most of the Steel Dog's face with it and allowing Brickfist to breathe again. He did so with gusto and regained his bearing in time to have one of his teeth knocked out by a large metal pipe to the face. It swung again and he caught it, pulling his new foe towards him and wrapping his paws around its head, squeezing it like a lemon. It caved with a satisfying if loud crunch. Picking up the pipe, he tossed it at an approaching Steel Dog, whom it barreled right through, but barely slowed down.

The Skydogs were busy assisting ponies on the ground and helping crewponies out of the crashed ship. The captain of the ship was fending off several Steel Dogs at once. He was almost grappled by one but some of his crew came to his aid. They were eventually pushed off the side of the platform by some powerful magic from his First Mate. They survived the fall, but couldn't escape the pit they were in, having lost the common sense to start digging thanks to their programming.

Huski pushed over another headless (And armless.) Steel Dog, panting from all the action and bludgeoning he had taken.
'They just don't let up...' he mumbled. He whistled over to Brickfist and Stingbeat, who closed in to him. 'Alright look, these bastards will keep swarming this position until the cows come home. If we don't get to Spark Lens soon he'll turn his attention to us. And then we all die. So we're blowing this joint! Stingbeat, lift me! Brickfist, I'll see you on the flip side!' Stingbeat grabbed him by the shoulders and flapped his artificial wings, launching them both into the sky. Brickfist looked for the tallest building and started climbing the rubble to reach it, occasionally reaching out to slap a Steel Dog that followed him.

After several minutes of climbing, he stood at the top, a few hundred meters from the hull of the Hammer Of Dawn. He stood rigid and two jet engines unfolded from his back armor. After a second of charging they activated. He flew up faster than any living creature should be able to endure and smashed right through the bottom of the Hammer, going up through several floors before coming out of the main platforms. The engines sputtered and died from the damage they took on the way through and he tore them off, tossing one of them at an approaching Steel Dog squad, blowing them apart. The other he heaved at a small tower situated at the base of the antenna spire in the center. Most of the guns on the station suddenly shut down as the tower broke apart and collapsed to the deck.

'What the-!' Spark Lens sat upright and started clicking away with his mouse until two screens came up. One showed his control tower collapsing to rubble and the other showed a helmetless Steel Dog that he recognized as Brickfist. He growled a pathetic little growl at this troublesome brute and began assigning everything on the Hammer to his position, oblivious to the Skydog and diamond dog that entered the Hammer through Brickfist's entrance hole.

Chapter 3

'Chrysalis' Tits, this place is massive.' Huski observed as he wandered inside the Hammer Of Dawn's corridors and warehouses, alone and armed with a small vial on his belt and his supersaw on his paw. 'I knew Spark Lens did some serious renovating when he took this thing, but WOW. Crazy bastard.' He continued to himself, almost impressed by the scale of the architectural overhaul. He stopped for a moment and scoffed when he saw what appeared to be an oval symbol with a lightning bolt on it.

He was largely unconcerned with the lack of crew, attributing it to good luck. When he reached what seemed to be some hyper advanced power core, he started worrying about the level of technological superiority Spark Lens possessed. Trying to ignore the impossibility of the bottomless pit below him, he scampered along the catwalk that circled the blue glowing power core. A security camera tracked him the whole time as he occasionally sneaked a glance down at the blue, spazzing power core. A Steel Dog turned the corner ahead of him and started moving down the catwalk. When he finally stopped looking down into the dark depths below him he almost wet himself.
'Oh shit.'
It charged forward and took a swing at him, which he narrowly dodged, almost losing his footing on the catwalk.
'This is a very bad place to do this!'
The golem ignored him and took another swing, which Huski ducked under, but then knocked him with an uppercut, sending him sprawling back and almost losing his supersaw. The Steel Dog stepped forward and tried to grapple Huski, who scrambled to get away from both the edge and the golem.
'Shit shit shit!'
He got to his feet and the Steel Dog swung down, trying to squash Huski, but he moved back and the catwalk was torn away. The entire section shook dangerously and Huski saw his life flash before his eyes briefly before regaining his balance. Seeing an opportunity, he slammed his own fists down on the catwalk and the area beneath the Steel Dog caved. It got a hold of the section in front of it and Huski jumped over it, stomping on its head as he went. It tried one last time to grab him and subsequently let go, tumbling into the abyss. Huski watched it disappear, waiting for something. Finally, after several very awkward seconds of uncertainty, it hit a bottom with a loud 'wham'. The core shook and pulsed violently for a moment, shaking the rest of the catwalk loose. Huski nearly wet himself, again, and sprinted for the other end, only just making it before it collapsed to hang limply against the wall.

Brickfist fought hard to remain alive and divert attention from Huski, but he was slipping up and the Steel Dogs' organized attacks were leaving him weaker and weaker. As more of them surrounded him, he reflected upon his past battles, feeling very accomplished. Then the entire station shook and the Steel Dogs lost their unity, stumbling and looking about in confusion. Brickfist laughed at them and a few of them, not all, charged at him angrily. He beat them to death in seconds. They were much weaker than their predecessors, by far, and this made Brickfist very happy. He would live to continue killing things after all. Of course, when they started breaking out the boltguns, he lost some of his joy.

'I've fought muckcrabs more fearsome than you!'
Another swing from Huski took his opponent's fingers off and they clattered to the floor. It retaliated by trying to punch Huski, but he dodged and gestured rudely at the Steel Dog. It didn't seem any more or less offended and took another swing. It connected and cracked his ribcage, throwing him against the wall. He coughed and sputtered.
'Guh! That all you got, you tin plated freak!? Ah!' He spat a glob of blood onto the floor and revved his saw again. The Steel Dog came at him and he forced it in between its shoulder and its arm. The limb came off and hit the floor with an audible clatter and clank. Huski swore he heard the metal beast growl a little bit as it tried to reattach its arm. Not wasting any more time, he leapt up onto its back and brought the saw under its neck, killing it. He jumped off it as it collapsed to the floor and bolted back down the hallway.
'No more distractions...'

'Where is he?? Where is he?? He was there a minute ago, he couldn't have just vanished! He's a dog, for Sun's Sake!'
Spark Lens scrolled through the countless cameras he had placed trying to locate the intruder, but only found wreckage and dead Steel Dogs. An alarm sounded as several of the Hammer Of Dawn's guns were blown apart.
'Damn it, damn it, damn it...' he muttered as he brought up the bigger guns to compensate. While he wasn't looking, Huski just happened to whip past one of the cameras.

Chapter 4

Huski heard the cannons on the main deck and the sides of the Hammer firing constantly the further down this new corridor he moved. Eventually he came to a large room with a massive engine of some kind strung up in midair with cables streaming out to the sources of the cannon fire. He quickly pieced together what this was and decided to delay his revenge a few minutes more. He ran over to a ladder going up and began climbing it.
'Maybe Luna'll give me a medal for this! I'm only saving Equestria here!' he told himself between breaths. 'I mean yeah, I kinda caused this, but nopony has to know that! If Celestia comes back, she'll probably figure it out though!'

A Steel Dog moved into the great room and eyed Huski. It drew a large weapon and took aim.
'Agh! Hey! What the buck!' Huski shouted as the wall next to him was struck by a large metal spike. Two more hit the ladder below him. 'Stop that!' The Steel Dog firing at him did not heed his command and took another shot, this one going right through Huski's free paw and nailing it to the wall. 'AAAARGH, SONOFABITCH!!!' he screamed. He put his supersaw in his mouth and started tugging on the spike to free himself. The Steel Dog put the weapon away and approached the ladder. With an agonizing tug, Huski pulled the spike out of his paw and almost fell from the ladder, grabbing onto it with his good paw.
'Those bucking boltguns...' he growled through the supersaw between his teeth. He looked down to see the Steel Dog nearing the bottom of the ladder and started climbing faster with both forearms. He reached the top as the ladder was suddenly torn away from the wall.

He placed the supersaw back on his paw and performed a running jump onto the engine. It swayed a little bit and he struggled to hold on. Once his grip was solid, he started climbing to the top of it. The Steel Dog down below dropped the ladder and drew his boltgun again, taking aim. Huski swore when another spike smacked into the engine next to him.
'Are you bucking kidding me!?' he yelled at the Steel Dog. He turned back to his task, vautling himself over the top of the engine. He gave an experimental tug on one of the chains that kept the engine suspended above the floor and a spike blew through it, taking it in half and dropping the front of the engine a little bit, causing Huski to fall. He grasped desperately for something to keep him from falling off and latched onto a pipe.
'Thanks, mate!' he called to the Steel Dog as he reacquired his position and held his saw next to the other chain. He revved the saw and pressed it against the chain. It cut right through it. His victory was incredibly short lived, however, as the engine dropped forward, one of the rear chains breaking off as well, and the engine swung through the air, cables popping out of it in bursts of electricity. Huski swore loudly and grabbed onto the last chain.
'Oh, shit, I didn't think this through!'

The engine soared around the room, the chain creaking threateningly and the Steel Dog below taking as many shots at him as possible. He started shifting his weight to direct the engine towards a wall that cannons were likely placed on the other side of and moved back and forth to keep it on target. Once it was perfectly aimed, he moved up the chain and prepared to saw off the part below him. It gave out on its own and the engine fell, plowing through the wall and out of the Hammer itself. The cannons on that corner of the ship were now not only deactivated, but gone. He could actually hear the cheer wave from whatever broadside skyship was targeting that spot. Another bolt whizzed by him and he lost his grip, falling to the floor with an great thump and crack.
'OH! Those ribs had just healed five minutes ago, damn it!' he complained, massaging his side. The Steel Dog walked up to him and picked him up, pushing him against a wall and crushing more of his insides and bones, causing massive agony. He held in a scream and revved his saw.

'I have not come this far to die now!' he spat at the enemy dog's visor and shoved his blaring saw into its head. The solid metal absolutely destroyed the saw but at the same time it was getting through; one half of the visor exploded and blood spurted out but the Steel Dog was still unfazed. Something underneath the antenna on the side of the helmet sparked and suddenly the Steel Dog recoiled from Huski, roaring in even more garbled agony than Huski himself was in and grabbing instinctively at its face for a moment before falling onto its back, dead. He looked at the dead dog.
'Well, that's... different.' he remarked before ambling down the nearest corridor and dropping his saw.

As luck would finally have it, the next corridor he took led him right to Spark Lens' office. By the time he reached the end of the corridor his ribs and organs had reset themselves. He strode into the room with all the haughtiness of a Canterlot unicorn.
'Alright, Spark Lens! Your time is up! I have wrecked your stolen ship, slaughtered your enslaved lackeys and repurposed your illegal technology for my own uses! And now, it's your tur...' he trailed off as the figure hunched over the desk in the main part of the room turned around and gave him a twisted smile.
'Hello, Logan.' said the diamond dog before him.

Chapter 5

'... what?' Huski said at last, breaking the silence. Spark Lens frowned.
'I said hello, you stupid mutt.'
'No, I heard that, it's just... what? Since when were you a diamond dog?'
'Oh. I collected samples of genetic material from several diamond dogs, both male and female, before I burned your filthly little villages to the ground. I compiled them to make a bisexual compound that, if ingested, transformed the drinker into a male and female diamond dog cross. A sort of genetic storage, if you will.'
'Why would you do that?'
'Well, you can't have a new world without a slave army, can you?' Huski shot forward and pressed a paw against Spark Lens' neck, pinning him to the wall by it.
'You sadistic, self righteous, two timing, griffon sniffing, shit eating, pus licking, motherbucking little hellspawn bastardite!'
'Ooh, foul mouth.' Spark Lens wheezed through his closing windpipe.
'It's not enough that you reduced us to a memory in a matter of days, you were going to bring us back as a slave clone army!? WHY are you alive in the first place? What possible reason could there be for your existence??'

Spark Lens gagged quietly as Huski waited for an answer. He did not relent. Finally Spark Lens grabbed something on a bench nearby and smacked Huski in the eye with it, making him stumble. Spark Lens sucked in air as the other dog glared at him.
'I don't know how I didn't spot you out from the beginning! The very air around you is grey and poisonous!'
'I believe it's because you dogs have brains about the size of an eyeball.'
'Shut up!' Huski charged forward and belted Spark in the face. Spark retaliated with what turned out to be a solid glass bottle, hitting Huski over and over. Eventually it shattered and cut his face open. Spark laughed triumphantly but was interrupted by the broken glass bottle being shoved into his jugular. Huski stepped back as the evil mutant dog dropped to his knees and gurgled. But the broken bottle fell to the floor and the gurgling stopped. Huski stared wide eyed at Spark as he stood back up, the wounds on his neck sealing back over in seconds. He chuckled sinisterly.
'Did I mention from whom I took the samples?'

Brickfist twisted the head of one final Steel Dog and dropped him, looking around. Big metal bodies littered the entire platform. Placing one foot on the body before him, he lifted his head to the sky and howled long and loud, the call of a warrior. The sun being blocked out did not stop him and he continued even as the Hammer Of Dawn 2.0 positioned itself above the Hammer Of Dawn.

Thump. Thump. Thump. That's pretty much the sound Spark's head made every time Huski pushed it against the desk. Spark elbowed Huski in the face and rolled over him, pushing him against the desk and strangling him. The suffocation did not do much so he took a ruler and started jabbing him in the face with it. Huski yelped angrily and blocked the ruler. Realizing that he did not in fact have to breathe forever, he used his other paw to grab a lamp sitting on the desk and shatter it over Spark's head. Spark stumbled away. Huski grabbed a pipe off the wall as the other dog went to charge him again and smacked him with it, sending him reeling. He tried to recover, but was met upside his head by the pipe again. And before he could so much as fully turn back around to challenge Huski again, the pipe went between his legs. His eyes crossed and his mouth shot open without a sound as he curled up on the floor.
'And THAT'S why I'm in charge.' Huski declared, seemingly proud that he literally had no balls while Spark Lens did. A massive heat beam tore through the ship before he could take another shot at Spark and the balance shifted, putting everything on a slight angle. 'What the hell was that!?' Spark Lens just wheezed in response. 'Well... there's no wind and snow filling everything and I didn't meet any endearing lasses on this ship, so it's probably not a reenactment of the Titanic. You just wait there.' he told Spark Lens and moved over to the central moniters and keyboard, picking up the typing sticks. Spark raised a paw to try and stop him feebly but returned to his fetal position.

'Let's see... crap... crap... crap... mega crap...' Huski muttered, sifting through the piles of priceless research data and historical/military records. All of it was being transferred into a large device he had plugged into one of the moniters. Something caught his eye. 'Cornerstone Retrieval Project'. He clicked it. His arms dropped to his sides when the screen changed and a wave of relief washed over him.
'Son of a bitch...' he mumbled incredulously. He plugged another device into the moniter in front of him and diverted that specific data into it, then pocketed it.
'Nnnnoooo...' Spark Lens cried pathetically as he tried to stand. Huski ignored him. The last of the data was stored on the larger device and he pocketed it, and then snapped the keyboard in half. He turned to Spark Lens, who finally managed to stand and recover from the pipe to the groin.
'I never thought you could be so cruel.' he told Spark happily. 'So cruel so as to lead me on that all along we couldn't have not only recovered the Zebranni Cornerstone but that we knew where the Equestria Cornerstone was. So cruel as to keep both of them from me and keep my people imprisoned and have me believe they were gone. So, so cruel.' he continued, shaking his head in a mocking fashion.
'What are you so happy about?' Spark growled. 'Even with the Cornerstones I am your only hope for further breeding! You have to clone MY tissue to make more of your disgusting kind.' Huski put a paw to his chin in mock thought.
'Mm... no, no I don't.' he said, smiling.
'Pardon??'

'Well, my fake, falsified, fraudful, felonious fink of a friend, Canterlot is well known to be the most well supplied hub of air traffic in Equestria. There are only two possible reasons you would come here. One is to refuel and restock in order to track down and finish off my people and the other is to cripple the military of the Royal Sisters. And when one spends enough time talking about you behind your back, one learns that you prefer to kill as many birds with one stone as possible. Ergo, you're here for both.' he explained.
'Speaking of two birds...' Spark mumbled.
'Beg your pardon?' And then the heat beam hit again. 'HOLY SHIT!' Huski shouted as the desk disintegrated. The beam moved towards him and he dove out of the way. The floor behind him was melted and split, and the walls had ignited. Spark Lens laughed from across the divide the beam had made.
'Unlike you...' he called, an elevator opening up behind him. '... I always have a plan!' Huski just roared at him in response, making Spark laugh again as he stepped into the elevator. 'Say "hello" to dear Sheila for me!' he taunted as the door closed and the elevator ascended.
'NOOOOO!!!!' Huski shouted, jumping across the large divide and forcing the door open.

Chapter 6

With the Hammer Of Dawn now defunct, the surviving skyships focused on the inactive guns. When the Hammer Of Dawn 2.0 started blasting it, they shrugged it off and kept at it. The First Light, Celestia's capital skyship that, along with Luna's capital Beacon Of Hope and the heavy frigates Hoofaestus' Pride and Endless Challenge, was kept aloft by massive turbines on the four corners, moved underneath the Hammer Of Dawn when the 2.0 stopped firing and was met with a helmetless Steel Dog jumping down onto it. After a very brief melee with no casualties and no serious injury, he was declared an ally. At his request it stayed there a little longer, even as the 2.0 fired again, narrowly missing the First Light.

The elevator peaked at the top of the Hammer Of Dawn and Spark Lens stepped out, breathing the fresh, cold air in as a diamond dog. He grimaced at the amount of smells he could now detect. Making a mental note to remove that capability somehow, he moved towards a small experimental VTOL craft, his own personal transport. The sound of screeching metal made him turn and his hidden skin went pale at Huski tore through the bottom of the elevator.
'SPARK LENS!!!' That was all Spark needed to go into a clumsy sprint. Huski dragged himself out of the elevator shaft and also went into a much more coordinated sprint. Spark made it to the VTOL and climbed into the cockpit. He fumbled with the controls for a moment.
'Oh no... oh no!' he panicked, remembering that it was designed for ponies. Huski tackled him out through the other door and the two of them traded blows as they rolled across the platform. They reached the edge and an explosive shot blew apart the VTOL, sending out a shockwave that pushed them over the edge. Huski latched onto the edge and, without thinking, caught Spark Lens by the foot. Spark screamed as he looked 'up' at the massive turbine beneath him. Huski looked between Spark and the turbine. The other dog noticed this and gave him a vicious look. 'Don't you dare!'

Huski let go. Spark Lens let out a horrid scream as he fell, which was quickly drowned out by the roar of the turbine, and disappeared in a splash of red when he reached it. Huski looked on for a moment, a satisfied smile on his face, and vaulted himself back up.

It would be reported several weeks later that a large amount of hairy fungus had spontaneously grown at the bottom of that one turbine. And it smelled like wet dog.

With the VTOL gone and the First Light pulling away, Huski considered his options. He chose 'do something incredibly stupid'. As usual. He backed up several meters, took a running approach to the edge and jumped. Then the 2.0 fired again right down the middle of the Hammer Of Dawn and it exploded, sending him flying much further than he anticipated. His life flashed before his eyes for a second time that day as he fell. 'My only regret...' he told himself. '... was that I never got to punch Prince Blueblood.' He closed his eyes and awaited his fate.

Chapter 7

'You want to retire?' Huski asked his last soldier. Brickfist nodded. 'Why?'
'Gear Shift warned me about frail heart. Do not want to risk being felled by own weakness.' Huski grimaced.
'He told you that, did he?'
'Yes.'
'Right... listen, I'm sorry for not letting you know earlier.'
'Is okay.'
'Really?' Brickfist smiled.
'Was good fight.' Huski smiled.
'Well... lemme jot up a resignation form for you.' he said, sorting through his new desk and pulling up a sheet of paper. Brickfist took it and pressed it against his nose, thus marking it with his scent. He handed it back to Huski. 'It's been a pleasure, big boy.'
'The pleasure is mine. I am sorry too.'
'... what for?'
'Making you nervous.'
'Twelve years, mate. For twelve years you milked that power over me.' Huski deadpanned. They both laughed. 'So what'll you do now?' Brickfist put on a coat over what was left of his armor while he thought.
'Find a place. Nice, little place. Quiet. Maybe build a house, settle down.'
'You? Settling down?' Huski laughed. 'Well, whatever floats your boat I suppose. Keep in touch, mate.'
'I will.' Brickfist said with a nod, then left through the front door. Huski looked over his new Office contentedly.

After a few minutes of observation, he picked up a phone. He dialed a number and waited for whoever was on the other end to pick up. 'Hello? This is Logan... have you got any plans for dinner?' On the other end, a grey cat smiled.
'I do now.'