On the Hunt

Now that my other claw is free, I can't afford to hold back. I've got no idea how long my healing factor is going to be out, but at the rate I'm losing blood I might not be alive when it kicks back in. I've got to finish her now without taking any more hits.

I tighten my focus before charging at her once more, making sure to watch her one good arm for any signs of movement. Just as I expect, she reaches back into her bag and pulls out a small sphere. The pony hurls it at me, but I'm ready for any of her projectiles. I duck out of the way of the sphere just in case it's another way to sheath my claws. Then I'm upon her. I extend my claws towards her head as I prepare to...

Instinct kicks in once again and I spin around and slash with my claw, just in time to connect with the sphere that I dodged. It sticks to my claws the moment they touch it and a second later the sphere explodes. The explosion tosses me back a bit and I crash into the ground, still unable to feel anything. I lift up my arm to see what damage had been done.

It's bad. Most of the skin and muscle that had been in my right hand is gone, leaving only the metal skeleton and my claws, along with the charred skin that was still attached to my arm. That's going to hurt later. I turn to face the pony in time to see her toss another sphere towards me. I duck out of the way of it once more, but this time I keep an eye on it. Even though I ducked out of the way, I watch as it seems to stop in the air for a second before it flies right back at me. Or more specifically, my exposed metal hand.

Magnets. That's how it's tracking me. Magnets and maybe a bit of their damned magic thrown in for good measure. I snarl as I begin to run from the magnet bomb, but my legs buckle slightly and I lose my balance temporarily. It's only for a second, but it's enough time for the magnet to catch up with me. I slash at it with my other set of claws, hoping that I can destroy it before it detonates. I don't.

Another explosion goes off and just like the first one, when the smoke clears all that remains is the charred remains of my left hand and the metal bones underneath. I roar with more fury than pain before I swing my head to the pony, who's tossing a third sphere up and down in her hooves. She knows I'm hurting. She knows that she has me on the ropes. I can't hope to avoid those bombs in the state I'm in and she probably has a few more in there. How do I stop her from...of course. The stupid way.

I roar at her once more before I charge towards her, doing everything I can to keep myself from falling over as I run. She tosses another one of her bombs towards me, but I don't slow down. In fact, I get faster. The bomb latches onto the metal in my ribs and I know that it's only going to be another second before it explodes. But a second more is all I need to leap right in front of the pony, who stares up at me with wide eyes as she realizes my plan.

"Ka-boom, bitch."

The bomb detonates, hurling me away from the pony and sending me crashing back down into the dirt. I taste blood and mud in my mouth and I spit out both, groaning wearily as I start to push myself back up. Out of the corner of my eye I see the pony slowly pushing herself up as well, blood dripping from her mouth and some of her body covered in burns. I can't give up this advantage. I have to get her before she can recover.

I stagger over to her, my breath coming to me raggedly as I try to walk a straight line. She glances up to see me standing over her, just in time fore me to plunge my hand down towards her body. But without muscles in my hands or wrist, it's pretty hard to aim where I'm striking. She just barely dodges my claws once again before she punches me in the face with whatever she has on her hooves.

I roar as I stagger back, moving one of my limp hands up to my mouth as I spit up more blood. Damn whatever she's wearing on her hooves, I actually felt those things...wait a moment. I felt that. That means that whatever she used on me is starting to wear off. I glance down at my hand to see little bits of muscles and veins starting to form over the metal. And I smile.

She knows my moves, that much is certain. But only the moves of the Wolverine, the Avenger and trained fighter. Let's see how she does against the more wild side of me.

||X||

No. No no no. He can't be healing, not already. But even as I wipe the dirt and pain from my eyes, even with the rain that's starting to pour down, I can see the wound on his chest slowly start to stich itself back together. It's what I feared the most. While the potion Twilight made normally lasts upwards of an hour, the creature's healing factor was fighting the magic the entire time. And the magic potion isn't going to last much longer.

I have to attack now, kill him before his healing ability returns to its full strength. If it does then I'm dead. I bite down hard before forcing myself through the pain, lunging at the healing creature. The moment I'm close enough I drive my hoof into his gut, knocking the wind out of him and slightly doubling him over. I then drive my hoof into his jaw and activated the Bolt, creating another controlled explosion that causes blood to spray from his mouth.

But when the creature recovers he slowly lowers his head to look down at me. My heart goes even colder as I realize that he's not snarling or seething with pain. He's smiling. He knows that the battle is his. I roar with defiance as I drive my hoof right into his face, causing another explosion that sends him crashing head first into the ground. He spits out blood as he starts to push himself back up, but I drive my hoof into his face once again to keep him on the ground.

I throw out three more of those punches before he turns around and starts to slash with his claw. I leap back in time, and time it just right so that his claw will barely miss me. I land on my hind hooves and wind up a punch so I can smash his face in when he misses...only for pain to burn through my chest as the tip of his claws slice through me.

I howl in pain while I stagger back, clutching at my chest wound with both surprise and horror. It can't be. I timed it perfectly. I knew exactly how far his claws could go. So why did they still...? I slowly lift my head to look at the creature, to look at his claw. And as I watch on in complete horror, he lifts his left hand and slowly extends the claws even further than they had been.

He had never extended them fully.

Every plan, every strategy, every bit of my timing on his movements went out the window. I had no idea now how long his claw were. And he could control their length. We lock eyes for a moment and then his smile grows even larger. He knows that I know. He knows that he's just ruined everything I've learned about fighting him.

He charges at me without an caution whatsoever now. He has me pinned. I leap back from his first claw strike, barely missing the tips of the slightly longer claws. The second strike comes down from above and I have to roll under it to avoid being hit. I jump back up to my hooves, forcing down the burning pain that's trying to consume me as I block the next strike with my arms. I manage to use my shoulder to catch his hand, so the claws barely miss me. The force of his punch is still enough to send me crashing backwards.

I'm out of options. All of my plans have failed and nearly all of my gadgets and weapons have been used up. I can't even fight him in hand to hoof, because with his claws and skeleton I can't do any real damage. All I have left...is the weapon that Luna gave me. The combined magic of her and Twilight. The just in case.

I reach back into my bag and pull it out, undoing the straps for the saddle bag at the same time. I toss the bag away and hold the sphere of magic with the spike on it close. The beast narrows his eyes when he spies my weapon and I can tell that he's wary of it. But he continues to walk forward, slow enough so that he's ready for any of my moves. And I tense up too, waiting for the moment that he decides to throw a punch or one of his moves.

In a flash he takes a quick step forward, almost as if he's preparing to attack. I leap back away from him as I bring the spike up, preparing to stab him the moment he gets-

I feel my back slam into something. On reflex alone I turn around to see what I hit, to see what could have attacked me from behind. But when I turn all I see is bark and leaves. I've backed into a tree...no, more than that, I turned around. I took my eyes off of-

SHUNK!

As the sound of metal going through flesh reaches my ears, I slowly turn around and look down to see three metal claws sticking through my stomach. I don't feel the coldness of their metal or the pain that I'm sure my nerves are trying to inform me of. I don't feel anything.

The creature then slowly lifts me into the air, like I'm some kind of kebab on the end of his claws. I feel blood well up in my mouth and start to pour from my lips. I'm done. He finally got me. I can see the blood seeping from the three claw strikes and I know that no doctor in all the land can heal that. The creature pulls me in close, so close that for a moment our eyes are only separated by a few inches. He then smiles at me before hurling his arm to the side to toss me off of his claws and to the ground.

I failed. I couldn't stop him. I couldn't protect Imp. I couldn't even protect myself. All I can do as I lay on the ground dying is watch as the beast stares down at me, with all of the wounds that I've inflicted upon him starting to heal up. He then turns and slowly starts to limp in the direction of Imp and Lyra. And there's nothing I can do about...

Imp and Lyra. They put their faith in me. They both believe in me. They both believe that I would protect them from this monster. This monster that has already taken so much from all of us. It took Imp from her home, from her friends and very reality, and dragged her here. And he has taken some of the closest friends that I have made. It's taken sisters and brothers in arms. And now it wants to take the pony I care about the most. And the human that I care about the most.

The single thought of those two and what they mean to me gave me a moment of strength, a moment that I blocked out everything except what needed to be done. With every last ounce of will power I could muster, I forced myself back up, forced myself to grab hold of Luna's weapon.

I then let out a scream, the loudest scream that I had ever mustered before hurling myself towards the creature. It turned around just as I went airborne, swinging the spiked orb over my head as I took aim one final time. I expected the creature to stab me or slice me out of the air, but for that brief moment he was too stunned to move. And I took that opening.

I stabbed the spiked end right into the eye of the creature, driving it as deep as I could. I then fell to the side and caught the edge of a small hill, rolling away from the creature as he bellowed with pain and agony. What little strength I had left I used to push off the dirt one last time, to get as far away from the bomb as I could. A moment later the magic detonated, creating an explosion so powerful that I was hurled across the grass and landed in a broken and bloodied heap.

That was it. That was all the strength I had left to muster. If that didn't do it, then I've truly failed. I watch as a torrent of rainbow power spired into the sky, drawing the rainclouds in closer. Then the magic slowly faded away and at the center of where the explosion had been all I see standing there is a metal skeleton, a skeleton that has his head reeled back as if he's yelling at the sky itself.

A small laugh escapes my throat as I realize that it's over. I actually did it. I managed to kill him. Maybe it's true that I can't be beaten by a monster. But I sure came damn close. I wanted to let out a cry of victory, but all I had the strength to do was lay there and bleed. But I didn't care that I was bleeding out. The creature was dead. I had managed to defeat the monster. Lyra and Imp were safe from-

Skin. There's skin starting to form on the skeleton. That isn't possible. Almost his entire body was disintegrated. There's no way that he can come back from something like that! But my worse fears come to life as not just skin, but also muscle, blood and veins start to reform along the metal skeleton. And with no strength left in me, all I can do I watch as the muscle, then the skin, then the hair and even the costume itself slowly start to repair themselves.

All I can do is watch as the thing I killed comes back from the dead.

It takes nearly ten minutes for him to completely heal, but there the creature stands on the hill above me being bathed in the raindrops completely born again. For a moment he stands there, just taking in a few breaths. Then he turns his head to face me, with eyes so red that they glow bright as stars against the blackness of the clouds.

SNIKT.

The creature turns and slowly starts to walk towards me, one claw slowly sliding itself out of his arm.

SNIKT.

The second claw emerges as well, accompanied by a guttural snarling that he's making. And when he gets close enough, I weakly look into his masked eyes to see there's no longer a trace of the intelligence or the mind that was once there. There is only the rage.

It pulls back one arm, taking aim at my head with his claws. I can't move. I can't even cry out for help. But what I can do is glare into his eyes one last time, to make sure that he knows just how close I came to killing him. And then I accept my fate.

The next thing I know the beast is tossed off his feet and sent flying back a couple yards. He lets our a roar of fury as he shoots back up and looks around for who attacked him...only for the rage to in his eyes to go cold when he sees who is now standing between me in him. It's a little girl with blonde hair.

I want to call out to Imp. I want to tell her to run. But I can barely keep my eyes open at this point. So all I can do is watch as the creature slowly walks towards Imp, the red in his eyes fading back to white. He says a few things to her, but Imp responds by blasting him in the chest with her powers. He digs his claws into the ground to keep from being pushed back, but when he rises back up he doesn't get closer.

The two of them begin to talk, with the creature speaking in a low but calm voice while Imp practically screams at him. Imp says something that causes the creature's eyes to widen and he slightly takes a step back. He then looks down at me with a look that I can't read. The creature lowers his head for a moment, looking like he's lost in thought.

Then, very slowly, he starts to walk towards Imp, keeping his hands up as he approaches. She moves in front of me and extends her arms, making it clear that she's protecting me. Once he's within arm's range, he slowly reaches up and pulls back the mask that's been covering his face. I'm a little surprised to see that he looks human beneath his mask. He then says something else to Imp with what sounds like...compassion...in his voice, before he turns to face me and kneels down.

For a moment, the two of us truly lock eyes for the first time. And I'm startled for a moment by what I see. Compassion, sorrow...regret? He then stands back up and turns towards the field, where a moment later a purple vortex of energy appears. The creature then extends a hand towards Imp one last time, but she shakes her head and crouches down next to me. The creature smirks at her response before he turns and starts to head towards the portal by himself. When he reaches it though, he turns back and locks eyes with me one last time.

'Take care of her.'

He doesn't say it aloud. Even if he did, I doubt I would understand his words. But I could clearly read what his eyes were saying to me. And I could also see the compassion and what seemed to be...concern for Imp. And for me. The creature then waves to the both of us before turning and walking into the vortex, which then closes behind him and vanishes out of existence a moment later.

Then everything goes black.