Blindsided

The entire facility was built into the side of a mountain. Now that Lazuli thought about it, it was both the stupidest and most ingenious spot that a nation could put their capital. An enemy with enough firepower could simply topple it and send it careening down the mountain with virtually no chance of survival from its occupants, surely, but they would never do such a thing when their own soldiers were in it. There was no land outside the walls of the base itself, so siege tactics wouldn’t work – in all honesty, Ayize’s decision to drop her soldiers in via airship was the smartest tactic she could use. The base’s defenses were centered around stopping attacks via the air, but those defenses relied primarily on highly antiquated types of airships – the type that were made out of wood and flew on balloons. The ones that Ayize used were too quick and nimble for the cannons to shoot down before they made it over the wall and dropped off the soldiers, and shooting them down while they hovered over the base was just a horrible idea.

Ayize had realized, however, that a great deal of the military’s personnel was out in Canterlot. At the news of the attack, they were no doubt preparing to head to the base so they could assist, but Ayize was ready for that. Once she made sure all of her troops were in, she had two of her remaining airships blast the bridges asunder so several lengths of solid concrete and metal simply rolled down the sheer cliff below. No one could get in or out via land now – a fact that her troops would no doubt be disheartened by if they knew, but they were too busy fighting.

Lazuli, likewise, was too busy trying to both stay away from the fighting hotspots and get into a fight herself. She needed to find one of Ayize’s troops that would know where she was – and luckily it wasn’t as difficult as it seemed, since while Ayize’s soldiers were trained well, their discipline wasn’t nearly as honed. They flew and ran around practically begging to be picked off, and Lazuli targeted an earth pony who seemed not to have any visible augmentation aside from his eyes, which looked like camera lenses painted blue.

The stallion was itching to do his part, it seemed, but Lazuli was going to make sure he couldn’t. She dashed towards him, zig-zagging to throw off any attempts at predicting what she was going to do before throwing herself at him. Surprisingly, he side-stepped her, countering her lunge with a strong front-leg kick to her chest. His strike wasn’t overly powerful, and the padding of her suit protected her from the worst, but she was still knocked back substantially.

“Didn’t think they let mutants into the army! No wonder they weren’t ready for us.” The stallion taunted. Lazuli didn’t bother to offer a retort. Instead she rolled back to her hooves, lifted her tail and fired, the bolt of magic striking the pony in the chest and making him lose all semblance of breath before toppling to the ground. She ran forward, ramming her shoulder into his neck before he fell, knocking him onto his back and pinning him down with a hoof.

“Where’s Ayize going?” Lazuli snarled. Her voice was rougher than usual, mainly due to her not drinking enough, or speaking much at all. Luckily instead of making her sound stupid it added a bit to her intimidation factor, but the stallion just grunted and tried to shove her off.

“Piss off, hybrid.” He growled. “You think she’s sticking around?”

“I know her kind. She’s here.” She folded her leg, pressing her elbow into his throat. “Where is she?”

“G-ggrrkk…” The pony choked, his hooves scrambling to try and pull her leg away. “Nn-nngh…sh-she sai- she said she-“ He struggled to speak, and Lazuli eased back very slightly. “Sh-she said…sh-she needed…to tie up l-loose ends…”

Lazuli’s mind had to warm up for a second to figure out what that meant, but once it clicked she looked back down at him. “Thanks.” She pushed down even harder on his neck, waiting until his frantic squirming stopped and his head flopped to the side before letting go and dashing in the direction of the holding cells.

At this point she wanted to avoid all contact with other ponies, both on her side and the other. When she found herself running in the direction of a metal-hoofed zebra clashing with a struggling Pegasus, she leapt over them both – and in the process turned her tail towards the zebra, firing a blast at his face that knocked him backwards and gave the Pegasus a chance to shoot. She didn’t look back, especially as she nearly reached the building that housed Kiama.

But both fate and Ayize seemed to know she, or someone, would be coming. Before she reached the door, a large and very familiar frame landed in front of her with an angry glare. The synthetic zebra she had fought on the rooftop stood before her, his side looking remarkably un-stabbed and his circuits apparently working just fine. On his body he wore a combat vest with the name “Lead Lined” emblazoned across the left side, which she could only assume was his name.

“I was wondering when you would come running.” Lead said, his voice somehow even more threatening. Maybe she had damaged his voicebox somehow. “I wanted to repay you for ruining my creator’s hard work.”

“You look fine to me.” Lazuli hopped back a few feet, tail raised over her head. “This is just going to end the same way.”

Lead was apparently just as susceptible to anger as any other pony, as he charged at her without warning. This time though, instead of going for a simple headbutt or a tackle, he leapt overtop of her. Despite his body being bigger than Lazuli’s, he was nimble, and as he jumped the bottom of his right hoof slid open to reveal a metal ball. Lazuli quickly jumped forward to avoid it, but he fired before she could move completely out of the way. The ball struck her in the back, where her suit was torn, and stuck to her fur like glue before jolting her entire body with a powerful, crippling electric shock, not unlike a taser. She couldn’t even scream as she fell to her knees, her whole body jerking and muscles frantically trying to get into any position besides completely tense.

Lead then swept her legs out from under her and, before she hit the ground, spun her in mid-air and slammed her down on her back. This only increased the contact between the ball and her skin, and although the charge in the device ran out only seconds later, Lazuli was left gasping and scrabbling at the ground.

Not one to be overly honorable in a fight, Lead gripped her tail in his teeth. He hadn’t realized she had a projectile weapon attached to it, though, so Lazuli managed to capitalize on the chance by firing a magic bolt right into his jaw. Lead was blown backwards, staggering for long enough that Lazuli could get to her hooves.

“New toy.” Lead wiped his jaw, though it was almost like it was a mannerism he had picked up rather than something he actually had to do. “Shouldn’t have wasted it on a cheap shot.” He lifted his left hoof, which slid open to reveal what was undoubtedly a gun barrel set inside. Lazuli ducked just in time for the bullet to whiz over her head, taking the chance between the first and second shots to dash forward and slide underneath him. She was suddenly glad he was taller, as she worked her whole body beneath him and tried to throw him over her back.

Lead apparently knew that trick, though. As he was about to be lifted off the ground, he wrapped his hooves around her, rolling backwards and slamming her head into the concrete. If she hadn’t caught herself by clenching her hind legs around his neck, she would have snapped her spine. Using her slight leverage she swung herself upwards, delivering a strong punch to his face – but being a synthetic, he felt no pain, and took little damage. He reeled back and threw her to the ground again, letting her roll back and stand up again.

“Close quarters…” Lead grunted, picking himself up. “You use your opponent’s body against them.”

“Shut up.” Lazuli grimaced, raising her tail over her head and firing at him twice. The bolts struck him in the chest and neck, but did nothing except make him skid back a bit.

“Magic resistant skin.” Lead bragged, thumping his chest with a metallic thunk. “Just like you, if my memory serves.”

“I said shut your mouth.” Her next shot, Lazuli aimed more carefully – this time directly at Lead’s face. The magic went right in between his upper and lower jaw, exploding against the back of his rubber throat and blowing open the back of his neck.

Lead’s eyes went wide, and though he felt no pain to accompany the damage, he knew it wasn’t good. His inner wiring was exposed, and the blast had clouded his vision with smoke. Before he could switch to thermal vision – which Lazuli snidely realized wouldn’t work anyway – she leapt into the air, swung around with her hind legs around his neck and used his body weight to drag him to the ground. With his head locked against her stomach, she raised her tail and dug it into his neck, starting to rip and slice at the wires that held his head to the core of his body.

Lead couldn’t speak. Most of what came out of his mouth was garbled, confused, his eyes flickering and sparking erratically as he tried to use his strength to pry her legs apart. She held firm, her tail continuing to destroy whatever she could, until his ramblings and sparking stopped entirely. At that point she paused, then gripped his head as hard as she could and ripped it clean off of his body.

Immediately his struggling stopped, and the lights in his eyes went out. Lazuli dropped his head next to his body, taking deep, slow breaths – it was at this point that the pain properly set in, the adrenaline of the fight wearing off and letting her realize that electricity coursing through her body was undoubtedly not good for her already tired muscles. With a pained wheeze, she forced herself to stand up. Moving was the best way to shake it off, she knew, but before she went anywhere she ripped the metal ball off of her back – taking a bit of fur with it – and stumbled towards the door.

Lazuli threw the door open, her muscles aching and throbbing, but starting to get better with each step she took. The problem was that Lazuli didn’t know what cell Kiama was in anymore, or if she was even still there. She didn’t care for her as much as she cared about finding Ayize, but she knew that if she found one, she would find the other. She was also prepared for the possibility that Ayize would make herself look like Kiama to confuse whoever came in, which was perfectly likely at this point.

She decided to follow the trail of noticeable claw marks on the floor. Ayize hadn’t retracted them, it seemed, so it made it a lot easier for her. Her staggered, confused walk became more coherent, then turned into a light jog that turned into a gallop. She eventually was dashing down the hall, occasionally whipping around a corner or jumping down stairs to continue following the trail. She almost didn’t even stop when she saw the marks entering a cell, presumably Kiama’s, but the trail then kept going. Kiama wasn’t in the cell. She kept running, until she burst through a pair of double doors into an area mostly unfamiliar to her – the cafeteria, where prisoners who weren’t constantly confined to their cells could eat.

It was eerily quiet in the cafeteria. Most of the tables had been moved in a straight path that ended in the middle of the room, with two zebras in the center. Ayize still had her scraggly mohawk and long braid, as well as all of the other features that distinguished her from Kiama, who was on the ground, barely even breathing. Lazuli could tell she was alive though, for at the sound of the doors bursting open she made a small croaking noise. Ayize, who had been standing over her with a sneer, turned her head to look.

“Oh, and the hero arrives.” Ayize spat. “I’m surprised you snuck past Lead.”

“If you count ripping his head off as sneaking.” Lazuli’s vision was framed with red, and it wasn’t from her lack of breath. The mere sight of Ayize was making her chest ache, her nostrils flaring angrily.

Ayize’s eye twitched, and she took a deep breath. The cafeteria shook slightly as another explosion rocked the complex, the sounds of gunfire and fighting still audible. “I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that, because I think this is our first time properly talking, isn’t it?” She stepped forward, kicking Kiama in the side of the head with her hind leg while she walked past her. The claws of her right hoof scraped menacingly against the floor. “Lazuli, right? I always have trouble remembering Dracony names. They’re nice, though.”

“You shot my wife.” Lazuli said through gritted teeth.

“Oh that’s right, that’d explain the angry eyes.” Ayize batted a hoof as if she was teasing, but her expression was just pure cockiness. “I’m sorry, I really am, but I’m sure you understand how it is in this business. All the loose ends, the easy-to-track-down wives, uugh.” She placed her metal hoof over her chest, stopping her advance about ten metres away from Lazuli. “Say, what was the part that hurt the most? The initial realization, or the slow acceptance that she was gone?”

“She’s still alive, you heartless bitch.” Lazuli snarled.

“Wh- oh. Well that’s disappointing.” Ayize frowned. “Should’ve used the shotgun…mmm…that’s really disappointing, actually, but hey…I know that means it’s just going to be so much harder for her to survive without you.” Her right hoof lifted up, the bottom already open. “So, Laz – you mind if I call you Laz? You got anything else to say? Any smart remarks or last-minute quips about something that’s about to stop me from shooting you?”

Lazuli gritted her teeth, slowly sliding her tail down between her legs. “…No. I don’t have anything to say to you.”

“Really? Usually your type is the kind to give the big dramatic line about how there’s an airship crashing through the skylight or something.”

“No.” Lazuli worked the tip of her tail up under her stomach, the weapon attached to it glowing bright blue. She didn’t say anything as it fired, and Ayize fired at the same time.

The shimmering blue bolt struck Ayize in the chest, knocking her off balance and throwing off her aim. The gunshot echoed off the concrete walls while the bullet harmlessly struck the floor, and the zebra turned her head angrily. “You bitch, going for cheap sho-“ She started to say, before Lazuli’s front hoof impacted right in the center of her forehead, throwing her backwards, sliding across the hard floor before flipping back to her hooves. “I was having fun, but you’re dead.”

Lazuli said nothing, again. Ayize grabbed a chair with her metal leg and hurled it at her, but she moved to the side and ran forward again. Her next punch was caught by Ayize’s claws, crushing the hard blue surface of the underside of her hoof. She tried to swing with her other hoof but it was blocked as well, so she brought her tail up and fired it at Ayize’s face. The blast still didn’t have the force to kill, but it burned the fur off of one side of her face at such close range, and sent her staggering back with a pained yell.

Ayize was anything but a coward, though her next move seemed to say the opposite. She turned her back and leapt into the air, electronically reinforced muscles carrying her up to the ledges surrounding the cafeteria and over the railings. It was there that she lifted her right leg and it started to shift, the bottom folding apart and opening much wider while other parts twisted and clicked into place. Lazuli spread her wings and launched herself in the same direction.

She hadn’t been expecting a missile, though. Ayize’s leg poured exhaust out of her shoulder while the rocket shot out of it, just barely grazing Lazuli’s side as it whipped past and struck the ground below. Kiama’s limp body was thrown like a ragdoll in the explosion, sliding over to the far corner while Lazuli grabbed Ayize by the arm and slammed her face into the metal railing in front of her.

“You’re going to die for what you did.” Lazuli growled as she held her, then swung upwards to stab her tail forward. Ayize managed to jerk her body to the side, dragging Lazuli up onto the ledge and folding her metal leg back into its normal shape before trying to strike her with it. Lazuli moved her head to avoid it, then rammed her forehead into the bridge of Ayize’s nose. She howled in pain as her muzzle was broken, blood pouring out of it as she staggered backwards and allowed Lazuli to stand back up.

“You bitch!” Ayize repeated, rearing up on her hind legs and swinging her metal limb to the side, causing a long, sharpened blade to slide out of the side of it. “You want to do it this way, then fucking come at me, mutant.”

Lazuli didn’t need to be told, but she quickly made note of the blade and changed strategies. With Ayize on her hind legs, she was easier to knock off balance, so she jumped into the air, kicked off the wall and swung her body so her hind leg collided with the side of her face. Ayize was knocked backwards, but somehow remained standing, stabbing forward with he blade.

Lazuli lacked the leverage to react properly. She tried to turn herself in mid-air, managing to keep the blade from hitting her chest, but instead it buried itself deep in the flesh that connected her wing to her body. The joint was shredded, muscles torn to pieces as Ayize wrenched it back, grinning with evil delight. Lazuli only hissed, teeth gritted and eyes glaring into her opponent’s.

She grabbed Ayize’s metal leg, but that only gave her the upper hoof. She swung her leg, which was far stronger than the rest of her limbs, to the side and hurled Lazuli over the edge of the railing. With her wings unable to break her fall, she dropped nearly twenty feet to the floor below with a painful crunch as both of her wings were completely shattered, sending waves of agony up and down her body.

Ayize dropped to the ground beside her, metal-reinforced bones allowing her to land without injury. “Damn, you know how to fight.” She said, walking on an odd angle with the blade still sticking out of her leg. “Kinda wish Kiama was half as good as you, could’ve actually had some kind of struggle before I beat the shit out of her.” She was breathing heavily, wiping the blood from her nose with her left leg. “But you broke my nose, and burned my face. Otherwise I’d consider taking you prisoner, breaking you down ‘til you wanted to be my punching bag or something.” She lifted her right leg up, violently stabbing the blade down through Lazuli’s left side, but purposefully missing any vital organs – she just made the Dracony scream in agony.

“But hey, don’t worry. After I’m done taking this place down, I’ll head to whatever place they’re hiding that wife of yours and make sure she joins you in whatever weird version of the Other World you Draconies believe in.” She pulled the blade back, smirking evilly, with such horrid intent that it made Lazuli’s blood boil – though not literally, since it was seeping out of her side.

“You…stay…” Lazuli wheezed, her breath still shaky from the fall. “Away…from her…”

“Actually, to be honest, she was pretty nice.” Ayize nodded. “Kinda be a waste to kill her, but she’s probably braindead at this point anyway. Shame.”

Lazuli didn’t know where the extra stamina came from, but she found it somewhere. She drove her tail right up, impaling Ayize through her left hind leg with her tail blade. To add extra damage to the injury she fired her weapon, making the zebra’s eyes bulge out and her throat to elicit a raspy, wheezing scream that would have made a sound if it hadn’t taken her voice immediately. She fell back, and her yell turned into a much more painful scream, falling back on her rear as Lazuli struggled to stand up herself.

Spitting out a bit of blood, Lazuli shook the dizziness out of her head. Blood loss, lack of sleep, dehydration and hunger were bad on their own, but combined all together they were starting to take their toll. She managed to stave them off for now, while Ayize staggered to her hooves. “You…” She growled, her voice no longer even a bit sarcastic, purely enraged. Her left leg barely even worked anymore, only barely able to support her thanks to her augmentations. “I’m going to take your tail, rip it off your ass, and cram it all the way down your throat so that fucking blade rips up your stomach and makes your guts digest your other organs.” She spat through gritted teeth. “And then I’m gonna find your wife, rip her legs off, make her feel every imaginable bit of pain I can before I rip her heart out and crush it with her own teeth. You’re never going to see the fucking light of-“

Lazuli’s body welled up with energy that it really shouldn’t have had. Before Ayize could finish, she lunged forward, her tail stabbing at the zebra’s chest. Ayize blocked it with her own blade, and the two of them struggled in a deadly and extremely sloppy dance between the two of their deadly instruments. Lazuli fired, Ayize dodged. Ayize swung, she parried. Both of them dodged, parried, ducked and dove as much as possible – it got to the point that the concrete floor became slick with blood, both of them slipping and falling when they tried to dodge, but the other one also falling over themselves in their attack.

Ayize tried something desperate. She wouldn’t lose – she couldn’t. Her injury was so much worse than Lazuli’s, though; for every unit of Lazuli’s blood on the floor, three were Ayize’s. The zebra retracted her own blade, waiting for Lazuli’s next strike…then clamped her jaws down on her tail. A loud, angry growl came from her as she tried to yank her forward, though based on her last threat it was clear she was trying to rip her tail off, apparently ignoring the immense pain of the sharp blade slicing through her lips and her tongue, but Lazuli stood firm and concentrated.

Ayize had only milliseconds to realize the error in what she had done. Her mouth glowed bright blue momentarily, before an explosion of blood and flecks of skull and vertebrae bones spewed out of the back of her head. The zebra’s eyes flickered, the artificial pupils going dark as she slid forward, Lazuli’s tail breaking through her spine. In an effort to bring her tail back, Lazuli ended up ripping the top of her head clean off, leaving only a jawbone and blood pouring from her neck as the dead body slumped to the floor.

Lazuli’s vision was swimming. She staggered backwards, bumping into Kiama’s body nearby and falling backwards into a pool of blood that mixed with her own and Kiama’s. She couldn’t tell if the other zebra was alive anymore…but she knew that she had won. Ayize was dead. Her eyes fluttered, trying to stay open. She needed to get back and tell Cirrus…she needed to be there for when she woke up.

But her body wouldn’t let her. She went limp, eyes falling shut as she passed out, the cracking of gunfire much quieter now – though that might have just been her senses dulling.