Canterlot Academy Trials

Bullet slowly opened his eyes. The primate had slowly begun to recover from the blow he was dealt but a few moments prior and was able to witness Lee fighting her father.

“Dammit…I can’t…agh…” he groaned as he tried to force himself to get up but the intensity of the pain he felt in his chest caused him to buckle over and fall to the ground again. “...what’s wrong with me…why can’t I protect her? Am I really this weak…?”

Meanwhile, as they fought…

Hei grabbed Lee in a chokehold and was about to slam her into the ground, but she managed to kick him in his face in order to force him to let go of her. After which, she dodged a slash from his spear and grabbed ahold of his free arm, twisting it until she heard it snap.

But her father was unyielding. He smacked her away with his spear, leaving a small wound on her body in the process. Once she landed, she clutched the side of her body while her father continued to taunt her.

“Bah. I still can’t believe you’re a product of my wife and myself,” he boasted with a laugh, “You’re a disgrace. I should never have allowed you to run away from home when I knew this would eventually happen.”

Lee winced as she shut one of her eyes. She knew well that she wouldn’t be able to match her father in raw strength like she could with her mother. Due to this, she knew she had to figure out a way to outsmart him instead.

As her father continued talking, Lee leapt backwards until she was close to Bullet who was still lying on the ground. Hei took note of this and fired a few shots from his staff in her direction. Lee dodged them and actually started to shoot back with one of Bullet’s handguns!

‘I can’t outmatch him in close combat. That much is certain. I’ll have to bait him in.’

“What’s wrong?” Hei shouted from afar, “Too afraid to face me? To think I raised a spineless coward!”

“No!” she shouted in return, “You’re simply upset because you failed to put me under your thumb!” Lee screamed up a rebuttal on the spot, hoping it would be enough to enrage him, “You wish you could have me as your feeble-minded puppet. But in reality, you are the incompetent one. You and that pathetic whore you call a wife!”

It seemed to work. Hei grit his teeth with his eyes turning bloodshot with rage. “What?! How dare you speak that way of her, you ungrateful insect?!”

Her words cut deep and caused her father to bum rush her without any sense of logic--even dropping his weapon in the process. Now she had only one shot to put him down or else she would be the one facing the wrath of an unstoppable, angry primate.

She readied Bullet’s handgun in her left hand and her rope dart in her right…

In Canterlot…

Various students had begun to assist the royal guard in fending off this demonic threat. Atomic Nebula and Luster Dawn in particular were near the front lines clearing out as many as they could before the demons could reach any more citizens.

“Well I didn’t predict this wouldn’t happen!” Nebula shouted as he blew into his flute to generate multiple music notes that granted enchanted shields to everyone around him so that they’d be able to fend off attacks from the hopping demons more easily.

“We spent all that time studying it and couldn’t figure it out until it was too late!” Dawn bemoaned in the midst of battle, flinging various pink axes at the demons to slice off their heads and cause them to explode into a fine mist.

“Don’t worry about that now,” Nebula replied, “Just keep fighting until you don’t see anymore. It’s just like the princess predicted. We’re being distracted from something going on elsewhere!”

Dawn gave an annoyed huff as she swung one of her axes with her teeth to stop an incoming demon from her left and used another to attack one to her right by lodging the axe into its head, and levitating it to fling it towards another group of demons to send them all flying and exploding into nothingness.

“Dammit! I hate not knowing things when they’re important!” she stomped her hoof and yelled, “What’s the plan now, maestro?”

Nebula’s ear flicked as he heard the sound of screams from a nearby home. “I’ll go check this one out. You watch my back.” With that, he galloped off before Dawn could even muster up a reply.

“Alright--wait--hang on!” she yelped before bucking another demon away.

Nebula raced into the house and heard more screaming. To his right in the kitchen, he saw a hippogriff stallion fighting off multiple demons that had invaded his home while the filly hid under the couch.

“Sir! Hang on!” Nebula shouted, but before he could react, he was met with the hippogiff filly being flung onto his back, much to his confusion. “W--?!”

“Get her outta here!” the stallion yelled. “Save her and destroy this place!”

“Daddy, wait!” the filly tried to fly back towards him.

Nebula was intent on saving them both, and was just about to play a note in that split-second the hippogriff filly flew away from him. But fate had other plans…

CRASH!

Another dozen demons had burst into the room via the back door. It was too much for Nebula to reasonably deal with at once. At best, he could have tried a paralysis spell, but it only would have restrained the demons for a few seconds before he’d lose the rest of his magic in reserve.

“...”

With a heavy heart, he regrettably made the difficult decision of leaving the stallion behind and force-levitating the filly out of the room and eventually the house.

“DADDY!” the filly screamed and tried her best to wriggle out of Nebula’s magical grip to no avail. “Let me go you idiot! My dad’s in there!”

“He gave me an order and I’m following it!” Nebula huffed in response, knowing there were far too many demons in that house by now. The stallion had most certainly perished, and there was nothing else he could do but honor his final wishes. “With all I’ve got…”

The filly’s eyes shot wide open as she noticed Nebula’s horn light up. “...no…NO! STOPPIT! DADDYYYY!!” she cried and cried, but was helpless as Nebula restrained her via levitation.

Eventually, the entire home would have the same magical aura as Nebula’s own lavender one. He shut his eyes and played a somber melody from his flute. Each note would travel through the air and cause the house to crumple in on itself as if a force from above had pressed it downwards, then crushed into flattened pieces of rubble and dust that fanned outwards in a circular radius around the house. Essentially forcing it and everything inside of it to implode.

After which, Nebula sighed and allowed the filly to go free, to which she tearfully screamed as she flew up to the house.

“Daddy…? He’s…you’re…gone…” she grasped the rubble in her claws and grimaced with a painful frown as she let the dust slip through her fingers.

Nebula simply sighed and sat down on the ground as he watched the filly grieve. After putting his flute away, he looked up and noticed her fierce gaze that was directed to him from over her shoulder.

“...I’m sorry. I simply did what he asked,” the unicorn mumbled in a low tone, unable to look the filly in the eye as she flew up to him. “I wish I could’ve saved him, bu--”

Smack.

“You weren’t strong enough,” the filly coldly cut Nebula off with a slap to his face, “...and you call yourself a hero.”

It wasn’t enough to hurt, but Nebula rubbed his hoof against his cheek afterwards. “...I was only--”

“Shut up,” she grumbled as she wiped the tears out of her eyes, “I don’t want your pity. Or your excuses. Just leave me alone and go accept the glory for saving me or whatever it is you’re supposed to do in this situation.”

Nebula’s jaw hung open as if he was about to say something, but the filly simply flew away towards the nearest hospital, leaving him alone as the dust settled.

“...What was I…supposed to do?” was all he could ask himself as he watched her leave.