Prologue - Canterlot Invasion
“Thank you, have a nice day!”
I nodded over my shoulder and left the bakery with a happy tinkle of the bell, making my way against the crowd heading to the castle through various alleys and side streets.
Navigating the regularly remodeled and rebuilt architecture of the ancient city was difficult for those not used to it, but it was still quicker than the main streets as they were currently packed with revelers and well-wishers for the wedding between the Princess of Love and the Captain of Princess Celestia’s Royal Guard.
‘Good for them', I thought, trotting briskly, the happy mood of the city today affecting everypony.
With the influx of thousands of tourists all mingling with the already dense population, he had left the actual event early to find a place to sit and enjoy the festivities before the ceremony proper ended and all the best spots were taken.
Besides, it isn't like he would have seen much anyway and he was not particularly looking forward to fighting against the crowd just for a glimpse of the happy couple as they rode around after the wedding to wave to the crowd.
“This will be something we can tell our grand foals!”, she had said.
‘She', was Grandé Flash, the love of his life and the fuzzy ball of energy that had brought them both all the way to Canterlot in the first place, having booked the train tickets the moment she had heard and agonizing over what to wear for the event.
“It's not like you’ll be attending the wedding in person”, I said.
After talking her down from a gala gown that would cost more than we made in a year, she decided on the more practical attire of nothing at all, if only because it was a day trip and we would be spending most of it walking.
Not being as enthusiastic as she was about the whole event, I had left just before the beginning of the ceremony and just now, I was hearing what might have been the distant thump of fireworks.
‘That was quick', I thought.
Just then, I made it to the public park Grandé and I had agreed to meet at after the ceremony. The official after-wedding event was highly exclusive, but the entire city would be celebrating today. The park was currently light on ponies, and spotting an empty spot under a tree, I quickly claimed it. After sliding the picnic basket off my back and looking around, I saw everypony else looking up at the sky.
Looking up, the bag of baked goods I held in my mouth hit the ground, my jaw falling open in shock as I saw cracks covering the soon-to-be Prince's shield, before it shattered and a veritable cloud of monsters dove through as the bubble collapsed around the city.
I couldn't make out finer features at first, but that soon changed as they hurtled towards the city like meteors, an angry buzzing filling the air as pony-sized, blue-black insect monsters rained down on an unsuspecting populace.
After the first green bolt of magic slammed into the tree behind me, setting it ablaze, I bolted for the edge of the park and the safety of a café across the street, the doors open and inviting, even as the staff who had gone outside to watch the shield fail panicked and ran away screaming.
Just as I left the grass of the park and set hoof on the cobblestone sidewalk, the street in front of me exploded into a cloud of dust and debris.
Jumping back, I barely dodged the hissing monster as it lunged for me, diving and rolling to the side before sprinting past both beast and crater and in through the open front door, slamming it shut behind me.
Fumbling the lock with my hooves, I watched it to see if anything had followed me, backing up and into someone standing behind me. Turning quickly, I found myself face to face with a perfect copy of me, illuminated by the new skylight it made on the way down.
The tall, rose coloured earth pony smiled cruelly at me before turning and bucking me hard in the chest, knocking me through the glass picture windows where I landed heavily on a small, circular table that gave a concerning groan and a wobble, but held.
Groaning myself, I opened my eyes and saw another of the creatures rocketing down towards me from above, fangs bared. Thinking fast, I rolled off the side the table, the loose connections that made it easy to move and store giving way under my weight, making the tabletop flip with me just as the creature came into contact, smacking dead on into the side of the wooden table, causing it to land on me, heavy with unconsciousness.
On my back, I saw Myself quickly climbing through the broken window and coming closer, and judging from the buzzing all around me, I knew he would not be the only one.
Getting my hooves under the monster collapsed on top of me, I kicked hard with all four legs, launching the floppy creature at Myself, sending both of them crashing through the mostly glass front door of the café as Myself tried to catch their comrade.
I had barely rolled to my hooves and stood up when I felt four sticky hooves grip my sides and I watched the overturned café table fall away from me as I was lifted from the ground.
Craning my head up, I came snout to snout with another monster where it hissed in my face and promptly let go of me.
Hissing turned to a shriek when just as it let go, I twisted forward and wrapped both forelegs around its neck and bit into one of its tattered ears, something green and foul tasting flooding my mouth as I bit deeper and held on for dear life.
Thrown off balance and blinded by pain, the monster's wings buzzed hard in panic, overcompensating and angling itself downwards with speed, sending it rear first into the second story window of a nearby building.
We crashed into and through a plush couch with a great crash, the monster sliding the whole way across the room and hitting the opposite wall with a sickening, wet crunch. Disentangling myself from the pile of broken wood and shredded fabrics, I found myself alone in an expensive looking sitting room and pumping with adrenaline with only the whimpering and gasping breaths of the fallen monster for company.
In the two seconds that followed, a shout came from a blue pony that had opened a pair of grand double doors that lead into a hallway beyond, shouting at me, “What in the blazes is happening in here?”, when the remaining two windows facing the street exploded with bolts of green magic and more monsters flew in.
I dove into the blue pony, some elderly noble from the looks of the expensive waistcoat and a truly impressive horseshoe moustache, sending the both of us flying into the hall just as the floor behind us was ripped into by green bolts.
Getting to my hooves and slamming the double doors behind us, I turned to pick up the elderly unicorn and to make sure I hadn't terribly hurt him, only to barely catch a sword thrown to me in his rich, green magic aura.
“For her Highness!”, he cried, before grabbing both doors in the same aura and ripping them from their hinges and sending them falling into the room we had just escaped.
Judging from the cries of alarm quickly cut off by the sound of crunching, at least two of the home invaders had met a rather sudden and gruesome end.
I didn't have time to process this however as the elderly unicorn ran past me, a sword, a table leg and a marble bust of himself whirling menacingly around him as he dove onto the fallen doors and those unfortunate enough to be behind them when they fell.
Gaining a better grip on the sword in my mouth, I jumped onto the other door in the entrance to the room and quickly off again, meeting and dispatching a monster still staring at its crushed comrades by ramming the short sword into its side.
It let out a quick gasp of surprise before crumpling, the stiff hide of the monster taking my sword with it as it fell.
Looking to my sudden ally, the noblepony was busy fishing his bust from the bloody mess of the last creature and his sword from another. With both implements retrieved, he turned to me and shouted, “What are these monstrosities? Where did they co-'.
He never finished his sentence as another bolt shot in from the hallway behind him and he collapsed, his aura vanishing and his implements falling around him.
I turned to see Myself yet again, but this version of me had a horn and a look of absolute hatred marring my features that Grandé would not have-.
Like a thunderbolt, it struck me. My wife, packed in with a massive crowd around the castle, during all this.
Seeing Myself charging up another shot and with no way to reach him in time, I turned and quickly dove out the window I had crashed in through, coming muzzle to muzzle with a creature that had been hovering outside the window, seemingly afraid to enter.
I caught my forehooves around its neck and stared into its eyes as we both hovered outside the window. It grinned sheepishly back, looked over my shoulder and quickly dove down to avoid being blasted by a gout of green flame. We hit the ground, the monster obviously not used to flying with so much weight and I just left it groaning on the ground, breaking into a gallop back the way I had come not ten minutes prior.
Once again, I found myself going against the crowd as I made my way towards the castle and, looking up at the swarm of black monsters buzzing around the city, where the fighting was thickest.
Running on the sidewalk, I stayed off the street where the majority of the city's populace were fleeing, keeping an eye out for Grandé’s pale caramel coat or her rich, brown mane colour, but I saw none that matched among the crowd rushing from the castle.
As I hit the edge of the main street that led to the upper district, a city guard crashed into the wall across the street and stuck there, their sword clanging to the ground as some sort of green goo adhered them to the wall. They didn't even twitch.
Looking up again, I saw far fewer creatures than there were before, many of them having flown over to join in a truly large brawl towards the Hall of the Elements.
Fine by me.
Running up the street towards the castle, I saw there was still some resistance. Guards still yet manned the defences and the gates were thrown open for the massed citizenry to rush in and take refuge, but there was fighting everywhere and there were far too many to move quickly.
Finally, I reached the palace district where it met the edge of the castle proper and the crowd spilled out into the streets as they all tried to find somewhere to hide, be it the castle or any shopfront they could get into. Nearly two blocks up, I saw her. She was on the corner, dragging ponies into some fancy restaurant with thick doors. We locked eyes for a second, and she looked relieved, before I was thrown back by another explosion in front of me and another cloud of dust and debris.
I couldn't even get to my feet before Myself jumped out of the dust cloud and, snarling, bit into my neck and yanked me up and over its back, letting go at the peak angle and ripping a chunk of flesh from me. The momentum sent me sailing across the street, slamming me into a wall.
I heard something snap and my vision went dark for a second as I let out a scream of pain.
Staggering to my hooves, I nearly collapsed, looking behind me and seeing my rear right leg bent at an odd angle, numb and useless. Looking away and blinking back tears, I watched Myself, now equipped with insect like wings and that crooked, hole filled horn just getting to its feet after putting all its body weight into that throw, the creature having fallen onto its back in the process.
It saw my broken leg and it smiled wickedly, smugly, before charging its horn again. I had no hope of running now and ponies all around us simply ran away from the monstrous visage, so there was no help to be had, yelling from further up the street making me worry for Grandé.
‘Was it over for us?’, I thought.
I stood as tall as I could, staring eye to eye with the blue-black monstrosity, watching it charge its spell to dangerous levels, before out of nowhere, an empty taxi cart slammed backwards into the monster and took it speeding down the inclined street. Now I know what those yells from up the street were, they were a warning.
Looking for the source, I saw Grandé standing next to a taxi stand the next block up, breathing heavily from her sprint to make it to the stand in time to dislodge the cart and send it flying with her magic.
I made to walk towards her, but collapsed, gritting my teeth to stifle the cry of pain I had let out. She was by my side in an instant, helping me to my hooves and getting underneath me and lifting me onto her back. She strained at my weight, but she ran as fast as she could back where she had come from, passing the taxi stand at a gallop.
We were approaching the restaurant that she had been helping ponies into, and it was then I could see why. It was one of the original buildings of Canterlot, converted to a restaurant, but preserving much of the original structure, which made it just as strong as the castle in the near distance where it seemed the cloud of black had mostly descended for now.
We were two shopfronts away from the sturdy building where two guards were rushing lagging citizenry inside, when we were tackled sharply to the side and into a stand of flowers in vases, scattering them everywhere and filling the sidewalk with wet, broken pottery.
The pain of rolling to a stop with Grandé atop me nearly made me black out, but she was on her hooves in a moment, picking up dozens of surviving vases and pelting them at our attacker.
Rolling over with difficulty, I saw Myself again, but barely a façade anymore. Black ichor dribbled down from its fanged mouth and all over its front. A great many cracks formed over its left side where the cart had hit it and its left eye was swollen shut, but the hatred was still there and plainly clear.
Grandé was pelting everything she could pick up in her magical aura and sending them at the monster. Vases, broken wood, a spear seemingly fallen from the fighting above between the pegasus city guards and the invaders.
This last one, however, it caught in its magical grip.
The exchange quickly became a tug of war with the spear being the prize, and it was clear that Grandé was losing. Then, the two guards from the restaurant were there, one casting an immobilizing spell on the creature and the other swinging down with a halberd, aiming for the neck.
The creature let go of the spear and, despite its extensive injuries, twisted quickly and drew a quick ward and then dove under the wide swing of the guard. The ward reflected the spell back and the first guard locked up, bound by his own spell and helpless to watch as the much faster creature came up under their partners defence and thrust their horn up into their unprotected jaw.
The guard screamed soundlessly as their partner went limp and crumpled to the ground.
As the second guard collapsed, Myself picked up the halberd and used it to deflect the spear sent against it by Grandé who had taken advantage of the swift and brutal end of the guards to throw it.
Searching around her, she found nothing else she could use as a projectile. As the monster started walking over to us, she sat back on her rear hooves, puffing out her chest and staying between us, although I could see the tremors in her body. I begged her:
“Grandé, please, Celestia, leave me. Go!”
She shook her head, not taking her eyes off of the creature, even as tears fell down her face as she faced absolute doom, she would not abandon her husband.
She reached a foreleg behind her, stretching out her hoof to me. I crawled closer and pressed mine against hers, letting her know I was there.
As Myself raised the halberd to cut her down, there was a sudden, magnificent flash of light coming from further in the city. We all turned out of reflex and watched as a great wall of light rushed through the city and as it did, it expelled every one of the monsters. Hope blossomed in my chest.
I heard a squeal and looking up from my prone position, I saw that the creature had lunged and, instead of impaling Grandé or myself, it had pulled her close and pulled the halberd staff tight against her throat, cutting off her air and preventing her from escaping.
No…
It pulled tighter, the wall of light fast approaching. Grandé tried to choke out a word, any word.
NO…
The monster looked down and spat its final words to me, “You will feel my loss.”
I could not look away from Grandé, as she tried to speak to me. She looked into my eyes, desperate, afraid and-
-and then they were gone, my hoof outstretched to touch nothing as the creature was expelled from the city, taking Grandé with it.
“NO!”
The wave of light passed over me and I felt a sense of peace wash over me, combating the anguish and horror until I couldn't take it anymore, closing my eyes, I screamed.
Chapter One - Static Helper
Static Helper was waiting.
All Canterlot medical staff had been called in to work an extra shift in preparation for the Princess' wedding to ensure adequate care due to the influx of tourists and the residents partying all over Canterlot.
The older medics called it, ‘Unnecessary’. There were hundreds of the finest medical staff available at the Royal Canterlot Hospital, but if the injury was truly serious, and they could not get there themselves, that is where his division came in.
The Emergency Medical Recovery unit of the First Response Unicorn Division of the Royal Canterlot Hospital. Simply put, they received a call for aid, teleported to a location right near the where the call originated from, stabilized the patient and teleported them to the hospital emergency room or, depending on the severity of the injury or injuries, directly to surgery for the doctors to take care of.
Due to the sheer amount of extra help called in today however, and with local clinics and medical centres sending out their own ponies, setting up shaded stands and the like to deal with minor problems, any medical issues were taken care of fairly quickly as they came up and it seemed that nopony needed the emergency responders.
And so, Static Helper waited.
He was fiddling with the various pockets of his uniform, unpacking and repacking medical supplies, checking mana batteries for the eighteenth time that day, ensuring his respiratory saddlebag kit hadn't spontaneously run out of oxygen in the three minutes since he had checked it last.
Static was nervous.
This was his first day with EMR. Years of study and practice, months of hands on experience at smaller clinics and countless hours going over and over the standard practice had finally led him here, to the First Response Unicorn Division, the best of the best and his goal since he was a colt.
Sighing, he slid his shears into their special loop and fastened them down with his blue magical aura. The navy blue of the uniform matching his coat nearly perfectly. His black mane was cut as short as he could go with only a mirror and some scissors, and not nearly as neat as he would have liked, but he hadn't expected to be called in today.
Technically, he was employed here, but his first official day was a week away. They really wanted all hooves on deck.
Then, just as he thought he would stress out what remained of his mane, the little alarm attached to his collar went off. Jumping to his hooves, he galloped to the large teleportation bay.
When he got there, it was just in time to see two senior pairs of medics and the emergency doctor vanish with a flash of light from the outgoing teleport sigil stand.
He had missed his chance.
But no, wait, his alarm was still going off?
Looking around, he saw that the alarm of every medic was going off, nearly sixty pairs in all. That couldn't be right.
Spotting his mentor and senior medic, Quick Gauze, he trotted over and asked him, “What happened?”
Quick Gauze simply pointed out the window with a hoof even as more medic pairs flashed away behind us, disappearing only as fast as they could sign out on the outgoing jobs chart.
The scene outside was like something from a nightmare. Black creatures rained down on the city, green fire erupting wherever their green bolts of magic struck.
I watched rooftops explode into flame, despite the required fireproofing enchantments. Magical fire?
I think it was my own weird way of processing things, because I didn't see the creatures invading the city, I saw the dangers they represented as I sprinted away, shouting over my shoulder, “We'll need the enchanted burn pads!”
I never heard or saw my mentor respond, only running for the supply cabinets. Unsure, I just picked up the two large boxes containing the extra burn pads and carried them out into the main room.
Instantly, pairs started grabbing extras, throwing them to the still outgoing pairs even as they disappeared.
Only around thirty left. My mentor was itching to go out, but we all knew the rules. Normally, response depended on the type of report received, but during citywide emergencies, seniority led the charge. The older, more advanced teams went out first to quickly deal with situations and then return just as quickly where they were to restock and go to the front of the queue to ensure the quickest, most effective care.
The strange thing is, no teams had returned yet.
There were about twenty left now, although my mentor hadn't noticed yet. I went up to him as he watched the events unfolding outside. “Quick?”
When he didn't respond, I tapped him on the withers, making him jump. Taking a deep breath, he went over to the boxes and slid extra magical burn pads into his saddlebags.
He turned to face the sign out sheet, only five pairs left now, each of them similar to us, a senior medic mentor and a newer medic, when he hesitated. Turning on the spot, he vanished into the supply room and after some rummaging around, returned with a…fire extinguisher?
Strapping it to his back, he trotted up to the table and signed us out. No other teams were left, and no other teams had returned.
Walking up to the outgoing teleport sigil, we waited for the flash of light, and when it came, I closed my eyes against the brightness.
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Opening my eyes, I adjusted to the light, looking around where we were. Mane Street?
“Static!” I heard Quick yell.
I turned to look at him, before he shoved me sideways, sending us crashing to the ground together. Just where I was standing, a chunk of masonry twice my size landed.
Looking from it, to my mentor, I barely had the chance to stutter out a, ‘thank you', when he dragged me to my hooves and over to the side of the road.
His horn lighting up, he used a tracking spell to find our patient, the information sent up to the station being their last known location at the time of report.
Confused, he looked up. There, about four or five metres directly above us, was a pegasus guard. He was upside down and I could see his face. His eyes were closed and he appeared to be unconscious. This was a case for immediate teleportation to the hospital, as unconsciousness could mean a multitude of things, none of them good.
Quick Gauze's aura appeared around the pegasus who appeared to be stuck to the wall with some kind of green, goo like substance, before he quickly vanished with a flash of light.
Surprised, I turned to my mentor and said, "We didn't even triage! How will the hospital know what is wrong?”
Grim faced, Quick turned and said, “They will have to figure it out. We are going to be busy, so send any unresponsive patients straight to Emergency. And stay close."
Taken aback at this sudden change in protocol, I realized he would know better, he must, so I nodded.
Nodding back, he said, “We have to keep moving.”
Stepping closer, I felt his aura wrap around me and barely had time to close my eyes before we vanished from that dust filled street.
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Opening them again, my eyes were forced to readjust to a dark interior. Once a stately residence, it had been devastated by fighting. It was then I saw one of the invaders up close for the first time.
Then another, and another.
I counted three of them, plus, judging from the two green stains spreading out from under the fallen double doors in front of me, two others.
They had not fared well against whatever force they had come up against.
“Static!” I heard Quick yell, but this time, his tone was impatient.
He was kneeling by an elderly blue unicorn with his head lying on a discarded couch pillow.
Rushing over, Quick gave instruction, “Responsive, but barely. Oxygen and mask, now.”
As I complied, Quick expertly attached the connection points to the pony, each point having a lead that led to the defib strapped to his side. Sliding a pair of cuffs around the patient’s hooves, he checked the readout.
“Mask him. I will take him to the hospital and you restock the O2.”
Snapping the mask over the unicorn’s face, I nodded at Quick before they and the oxygen cylinder were wrapped up in his aura and gone again in a flash.
I was about to do the same, when I heard a wheeze from behind me.
Turning, I saw one of the black-blue creatures was sitting, leaning against the wall, and it was alive.
At first I recoiled, quickly setting a ward between it and myself. I saw a twisted gnarly horn, unnatural hole-filled legs, green blood dripping from a torn ear, wheezing breaths and, as I watched, a wet cough.
I had dropped the ward and was at its side in an instant, trauma kit opening in a flash of magic.
I worked as quickly as I could, taking whatever manual stats I could and treating with single-minded efficiency. Before I knew it, the creature was covered in dressings to stop the green blood from escaping the cracks in its carapace and I had just prevented a collapsed lung.
The creature was now breathing easier at least, and was watching me work, helpless to do anything about it.
A flash behind me heralded the return of my partner and he caught himself at the beginning of his tirade, “What are you still doing here, I told y-".
He had caught sight of the creature, and the injuries and then, my efforts to heal them.
He hesitated only a moment longer before he was there as well, attaching the magical cables from earlier, grumbling under his breath.
“Stupid do-goodering new blood making me do my job.”
After he had deemed my work acceptable, we stood there, unsure what to do next. “Surely, we could not take this one to the hospital, could we?” I said.
Shaking his head, he sighed and said, “We have to. It is stable for now, but who knows what’s happened internally. Ah horseapples, immobilize its neck and I'll take it to the ER myself.”
I wrapped a soft collar around its neck as it gazed up at me in fear and confusion before it too was whisked away in my mentor's magical aura, but not before a firm warning that I was not to dawdle again.
I closed my eyes and flashed away.
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Appearing on the incoming teleportation sigil in the medic bay, I moved quickly to the storeroom to replace the used equipment, frantically filling the bags and sorting them as quickly as I could.
I didn't know how long I had been there, but as I was fumbling with the seal on a new oxygen cylinder, my mentor appeared behind me and calmly took hold of the maelstrom of medical equipment I had whirling around me and slid it into my bags before coming around to stand in front of me, putting his hoof on my snout and telling me, “Breath.”
So I did. And again. And then I fell to my haunches, exhausted as the adrenaline left me. After a minute or so of breathing and after my hooves had stopped shaking, he nodded and asked me, “Ready?”
I nodded.
We went to the teleportation bay and we were still the only ones here.
“Where are the others, Quick?”
He swore and spat, "Most of them are hiding at the hospital, too scared to leave. The rest are missing.”
I blanched, turning fully to face him. “But why?”
He sighed, tension leaving his body. “Because this is an invasion and it is scary. Because technically, we are supposed to wait for the all clear before going out again. Because, technically, you should be kept safe and well away from this. This should not be your first day.”
I stood there silently with my mentor, processing this information. After little thinking at all really, I walked up to the sign out book and, right under our earlier signatures, signed us out again.
Walking to the outgoing sigil, I was quietly joined by Quick, before we vanished again.
I didn't close my eyes, I wanted to be ready.
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We appeared outside a residence and again, I was knocked aside by my mentor as we dodged a bolt of green magic, only his grip on my withers keeping me from falling over as he pointed forward.
Crashing in through the nearest doorway, I heard Quick yell, “Up!” and up we went, the doorway opening into an entry foyer that led to two other rooms and a staircase.
Up the staircase I went, Quick right behind me.
When we hit the upper level, there was a small sitting room with a door on either side.
“Left!” he cried.
We dove over couches and poofs and a good sized hole in the center of the room that led from the roof, all the way through the floor and into one of the rooms below.
Blood was around the edge of the hole and I got the impression of more downstairs as I jumped over it.
Crashing into the leftmost room, a mare in the corner screamed, facing her back to the door and curling into a ball, trying to make herself as small as possible.
Quick went straight to her while I slammed the door shut and placed all the wards I knew against it.
Turning, I saw that Quick had calmed the mare down enough to show him the unconscious foal she was trying to protect.
“Static, trauma!”
Ripping the kit from my side, I was by his side with it open, just as the banging on the door behind us started and the mare whimpered at the sound and clutched the foal closer while we quickly dressed the stump that had once been the foal's right foreleg.
“Are you her mother?” Quick asked and at that, the mare started babbling about how she was just the maid and that the masters of the house had been downstairs with their eldest while she was watching the little one play, when one of the creatures had burst through the ceiling and right through the floor, taking the foal's hoof off in the process.
She had time to tourniquet the remainder of the limb as best she could and hid them in the foal’s bedroom before the commotion downstairs had ended.
With a needle in the foal's remaining foreleg providing much needed fluid, the limp figure started to gain some colour back. Quick told me to go and take them both to the ER. I didn't have time to question him and could only throw my magic into his as his aura wrapped around all three of us and we disappeared, my vision being filled with splinters as the door exploded inward as my wards dropped.
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We appeared on the incoming ER sigil and I nearly slipped on the blood present on the ground.
Immediately, the mare and foal were whisked away by nurses and other medics acting as aides, slowing only to hear what we had done for them.
I didn't stay long enough to see more as I dove onto the spotless outgoing sigil and, ignoring calls from the other medics to stop, vanished just as quickly.
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I appeared on the street again, but this time, no green bolt came at me. I galloped back into the house and up the stairs again, turning into the room and no longer was it the clean, slightly damaged sitting room of before. Wreckage and writhing bodies were strewn all over.
Four of the creatures lay around the entrance to the foal's bedroom, the door burst inwards, each of them clutching their eyes and hissing and snarling, faces covered in white powder.
Another one lay beaten and bruised with an obviously broken leg, holding it and whimpering in the corner.
Another lay half-out of the hole in the floor, eyes closed and not moving.
No sign of Quick though.
Checking the other room, an empty master bedroom, I ran downstairs and opened the first door. I entered a larger family room and found Quick standing over the crumpled bodies of three ponies with three more of the creatures all around him, and these ones were far from salvageable.
The family downstairs must have been close together when the floor and monster came down on them at high speed as both they and it were smeared across the carpet.
The three creatures around Quick were equally smeared, but much fresher. A discarded fire extinguisher, the one Quick had taken just before they left, was covered in green blood and lying forgotten next to him.
I approached Quick, speaking quietly, "Quick?”
His ear twitched, but he didn't reply, just staring at the unfortunate family in front of him.
I walked up to him and placed a hoof on his withers, “Quick?”
He turned in my direction, green blood covering his face and no feeling left in his eyes.
I held back my horror and revulsion at the sight of my mentor, “We can't stay here Quick.”
He looked at me like he didn't even recognize me before nodding placidly.
Charging up my horn, I wrapped my aura around him and we both vanished.
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When we appeared in the ER, cries that a new patient had arrived gave way to confusion as I quietly led Quick to a break room behind the nurses station. Another pair came with me, and then went ahead of me to clear some space in the room.
After getting him there and setting him down on a blanket, he just stared ahead, motionless. I had never seen the like and I asked the senior pair what was wrong.
“Dunno kid, but more like him have been coming in since this started.”
The other spoke up, “Just dead to the world, drained.”
I looked at my mentor, and then back at the pair, “Please, take care of him.”
They looked confused again, before the closest one yelled to me to wait, diving to stop me as I ripped the guidance crystal off of Quick's uniform and flashed away to the next pony in distress.
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I appeared outside a restaurant and was immediately assaulted with the sound of panicking ponies and hissing, flying insect creatures from all around, as well as from a pair of ponies yelling at me to get out of the street.
Obligingly, I sprinted forward, barely dodging several green bolts as I dove in through the heavy front doors and met with two guards who were pulling anyone in that they could find.
Upon seeing my uniform, the guard on the right said, “Thank Celestia you're here, we have injured. Behind the counter.” She pointed.
I nodded and trotted to find them.
Finally, those extra enchanted burn pads came in handy. Six stallions, each with burns of varying severity from magical fire along their sides and backs, were sitting calmly behind the counter. When I tried to help them, they all pushed me back and told me to help the others, taking the burn pads and applying it themselves, concern for the other member of their group overriding their concern for themselves.
Apparently, a cart transporting magical fireworks for the celebration a block over had exploded and caught fire, trapping the two pulling it. The six stallions had coordinated to lift the wreckage off of the two occupants.
A pair of tradesponies it seemed, although you could hardly tell with their clothing blackened by soot and torn to pieces.
The stallion was fine, save for some cuts from when the cart exploded, but the mare was in trouble. Using the shears to cut away the last of her clothing, I found her chest crushed and she was clearly struggling to breath. The stallion holding her said that she had been hit by one of the heavy wheels when the cart went up and when I listened to her chest, I could tell she was well beyond my help.
Charging my horn up, I simply sent them on their way, not to the ER, but to the surgery.
The rest were suffering from mostly shock and the same emotional drain I had seen earlier, so I went back out to find the guards from earlier. As I approached the front door though, a wave of light passed through the building, and a sense of peace came over me.
That sense of peace lasted a few seconds before an agonized scream chilled my blood.
Going outside, I looked around, surprised to see no more monsters. It seems they had been repulsed by whatever that wave was as I watched it fizzle out towards the edge of the city and send a cloud of the creatures flying.
Following the sounds of the screams, I arrived at a sorry scene.
A stallion was on the ground, bleeding terribly from a hole on the back of his neck, screaming and unable to stand on an obviously broken leg, but the guards from earlier were there also, and while one appeared to simply be immobilized, the other was lying limply on the ground in a pool of blood.
Deciding that screaming meant alive and that alive was good, I rolled over the guard on the ground and saw that it was the one who had guided me earlier.
A jagged hole going right through her throat and into her head, combined with the sheer amount of blood I saw, I knew there was nothing to be done.
Cantering over to the stallion, I opened my bags and got to work. He was terribly bruised, full of glass shards and his fur was wet, making it hard to find any more potential injuries, and while that leg looked painful, he didn't seem to even notice, trying to stand and, failing that, crawl away down the street, crying for somepony to, ‘Come back!’.
“Sir, please, calm down, I need you to calm down.”
I packed the hole in his neck where it looked like something had torn a chunk out of him and the bleeding slowed considerably.
I had placed the splint and, when he had calmed down enough that he could hear me, I spoke into his ear.
“I have to set your leg. This will hurt.”
I set it, cringing at his muffled scream as he bit his foreleg to try to silence it, and quickly had the splint on and wrapped.
I was standing up to review it when I was suddenly tackled. Landing on the ground with an ‘oof', I felt somepony grab my tail and start dragging me away.
I was surprised when I saw the immobilized guardspony had gotten himself free and was now dragging me back to his fallen comrade.
Not wanting to be dragged through any debris, I quickly bucked him and rolled to my hooves, getting myself free only for a second before he tackled me again and, standing over me, screamed in my face.
“Why aren't you helping her?! She needs your help!”
I had no response. I knew the answer, but I could not bring myself to say it. I had never had to before.
Not being content with my silence, he began charging his horn.
“Help her or I swear I will kill you!”
Faced with this dilemma, I yelled at him, terrified, “I can't!”
He stopped charging his horn and his magic evaporated, his face turning confused, and then stricken.
“W-why?” he said, tears forming in his eyes and his forelegs on either side of my head starting to tremble.
I felt tears spring into my own eyes as I whispered the response in the newfound quiet in the streets of Canterlot, the injured stallion crying softly nearby, “She's dead.”
At my words, a flame of anger appeared in his eyes and his horn charged faster than ever, a great nimbus heralding my demise as he screamed, “Liar!”
He pointed his horn at me, the aura alone singing the hair on my jaw and I closed my eyes against the light and my death.
And then the heat dissipated, and I felt the weight of a pony collapse onto my stomach as he wrapped his hooves around me and pressed his face into my into my neck, sobbing, his city guard armour digging into my side as he said, over and over again through the tears, “Liar, liar, liar…”
I lay there and let him cry, still aware of my need to help the nearby stallion, but held in place by the weight of this distraught guard, and then, the exertion, the mental strain, the magical strain, all of the things I had witnessed, they all hit me at once, and so I held the stallion closer and placed my neck over his, silent tears coming to my eyes.
The all clear must have followed soon after, because that is how the other medics found us.
