> Millennia: Beginning
>  by Thunderblast
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Prologue
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"So, let me go over this one more time for clarification, and do excuse my reiteration. Enlisting will provide all types of benefits, including higher pay than the Royal Guard, but, I am required to serve for up to six years?"

"That is correct, sir."

Here I sat in the Ponyville recruitment office for the Lunar Marine Corps, a branch of the military created under the former name of the Equestrian Marines by the princess of the night herself after her reformation four years ago. Ruling alongside her elder sister once more, she legally took the helm of the armed forces’ latter branches and brought along change. A change for the better.

No less than an hour was spent at the recruiter’s desk, discussing every minor detail there was to learn about enlistment. I had even made sure to write questions down on a piece of paper so as to not forget them and, as suggested in advice from a friend, try and stump him a bit. Evidently these recruiters are known to exaggerate some aspects.

The option of enlisting in the Royal Guard was out there, too, though it stood out as a bit sketchy for me, and too... medieval, old fashioned. I had heard some things about this branch of the military, and how far more modernized it was compared to other branches. That piqued my interest the most, going back to when my father served.

Admittedly, deciding whether or not to dive straight into enlisting was something that took me the prior few months to decide on thoroughly and, after settling on it at last and some research into locating the nearest office, here I was. My friend, the one who managed to talk me into doing this to be more precise, had given me a short written quiz to test my knowledge on the military, with a few random math equations mixed in between to throw me off. Though it wasn’t my greatest subject in school, the questions weren’t all too difficult.

My stomach quivered anxiously and felt as if butterflies floated about inside, twisting into many tight knots while at it. I had not bagged myself an actual job just yet, even though I made a promise to myself that I soon would, and there I sat with the enlistment paperwork right in front of me. I knew a second, longer test would be in my future should I sign these forms, known to some as the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery. Apart from its name, I knew nothing about what it was, or what it contained.

The neatly-uniformed stallion seated on the opposite side of his desk stared right back, the calm, collected expression he donned held steady. The clothes he wore were of matching camouflage. Darker colors, too. The camo pattern was digital and included multiple alternating shades of grey, with bits of greyish-tan mixed in between. My guess was a sort of ‘urban’ type of pattern. Below his shoulder displayed three white bars on a dark blue patch, above a crescent moon. Those bars copied onto his eight-pointed cap, minus the moon. He is a sergeant.

I worried if my slow thinking was steadily beginning to annoy him, though I could not tell for sure. He looked like the kind of pony that I did not want to be on their bad side for a few solid reasons, beginning with his stoicness.

Gulping softly, I steadily lifted a lightly-trembling hoof, taking with the pen in it. With a deep inhale, I filled in the blanks on the papers as neatly as I could. First, my name, followed by my age and gender, in case it wasn't already plenty obvious, concluding with some other information. This went on for a little while longer, and two more pages later.

It felt like forever it took me to finish up, but apparently only three minutes had passed, the time it took me to read everything on the papers and write down everything they wanted to know.

I set the pen down with a shaky hoof and slid the filled-out work to the stallion. He went through the papers, taking his time, too, which I didn't mind, though it didn't help my anxiety one bit. Rather it worsened, wondering to myself, is this pony judging me?. After he was finished, he filed the papers neatly and put his hooves together, then narrowed his light green eyes on me into a very faint glare, which hit like an arrow and made me want to shrink down and hide, but this wasn't the time.

Instead of jumping across the desk and decapitating me, like one part of my mind believed he would, he rose to all fours from his chair and reached a hoof across the desk and halted it halfway over. I also stood up and nervously stretched my hoof to his, shaking it firmly. It was mostly him doing the gesture.

"Welcome to the Lunar Marines, Star Shooter," he gave a faint smile. That is a good sign, I think. “I will contact affiliates in Canterlot and share your information. They will handle your processing, and arrange an appointment to take your ASVAB exam at an Entrance Processing Station in Canterlot, as well as begin physicals in preparation for basic training. You should receive a letter in a few days.

"Yes, sir," was my response, just narrowly averting a cracking voice. What have I done?

No more than a few moments later, I found myself outside of the recruitment center, occupying a one-story storefront in the heart of town. Before now, I never truly had a reason to visit Ponyville, and I could see why the more laid-back migrated here for its peaceful, friendly atmosphere.

The air outside today was quite warm, and the sky glowed a beautiful light blue with the bright yellow sun shining high in the sky. It was the definition of a perfect day, and I had all the time in the world to enjoy it. That is, before it is due to set. A gentle breeze brushed through my navy-blue coat and light blue mane, bouncing a little, but not too much to be made messy.

The gentle breeze flowed between my feathers, tingling them a little. I wanted so desperately to spread them, but didn't for some strange reason that I could not quite put my hoof on. The day was nice, yes, though I had more important things to be concerned about, such as being home in time for MEPS, study for the ASVAB, and prepare for my eventual trip out east.

I’d heard great things about Manehattan and wanted to visit badly, but I never had much of a chance to, or the funds. That is where the joint base was situated, and where my friend has been stationed for years, even before the Navy title gained a word ahead of it.

The trip back to Canterlot was rather short, I must have taken the express train by accident. After arriving, I didn't think much of it, and  was greeted into the city by none other than the conductor of the same train, who stood on the platform welcoming everyone else. I made my way through the streets, enjoying the warm summer day while at it. Though, simultaneously, I hated summer for how many ponies it brought out to pack blocks beyond their intended weight.

Having to weave through endless crowds had me longing to get back to Ponyville so soon, more so the option to be stationed there if a base were ever to be constructed nearby. At last, I exited the thick crowd, heading into the more-residential sectors of Canterlot and soon coming across my second story apartment, situated above what many would call a cute little flower shop.

Climbing the stairs on the side of the building between another, completely separate from the shop below, I pulled out my house key to unlock the door. Twisting the key in the hole, instantly hearing the faint click of the lock opening, I entered, taking in the scent of my apartment, which smelled like sweet orchids. I wonder why?


***


After a somewhat unsettling two-day wait, the letter came. In short, it was more of a “congratulations for joining, now come to this location so we can move along with the steps”. Thus, early that morning, I headed out to find the address listed, where early processing is due to begin. I didn’t know what to expect out of this.

Though I would likely regret it today, wearing a light zip-up seemed to be most suitable upon stepping outside. Mornings in Canterlot, while in the middle of summer, typically saw chilly temperatures right after sunrise due to the city’s altitude, and sometimes heavy dew left over from mountain moisture. If any vigorous physical activities were on today’s agenda, my choice of clothing will certainly bite back later on.

Eventually, I found the place. A two-story office situated on the lower south side of town. Getting there was one thing, and that was simple in itself. Getting inside? Another story. It isn’t like the place is on a normal block. No, it was past a fence, and a heavily-guarded gate. On either side of the entrance stood a pair of gold armor-clad unicorns, stood statue-still with spears in their hooves held vertical.

Right here is where I locked up, halted in the middle of the street and staring at these two stallions fearfully without a clue of what to do next. Best option would be to talk to them about why I was here, and why I needed to be allowed inside, but almost all of my body refused. I’d never been a social pony, and having to ask such important questions became more of a chore in my case.

But, I could not turn away now. I needed to do this. There were risks of skipping these appointments, and higher ones for dodging boot camp should I be cleared for it. So, I took in a deep breath, let my muscles ease up after exhaling, and strolled up to the guards.

“Excuse me, sirs,” I began. This grabbed their silent attention. “Hi, uh, is this the processing station? Lunar Marine Corps?”

Both replied with a nod, the one stood on the left spoke up. “You would be correct. Do you have an identification pass?”

I blinked. “Wh- no. This is my first time here. I was not given any sort of pass. I do have this, though,” producing the letter and handing it over to the guard, who took it and read quietly.

He soon looked up to his companion, nodding, returning the paper.

“All right, you may enter,” he responded, horn glowing a faint yellow, encasing the wrought iron-bar gate and swiveling it inward with a creak.

I nodded once. “Thank you,” before heading in.

Behind me as I passed through, my ear caught one of them mumble the words, “Good luck.” I was certainly going to need it.

Almost to my immediate left was the door into the building, taking me into a hall that stretched from one end to the other. I stopped at the first door, looking around, unsure of where to go next. The letter had not stated where exactly to meet these ponies upon reading over for the fourth time.

I jumped at somepony whistling, snapping my gaze up and forward to see a uniformed earth pony stood mostly through a door, waving for me to come. Tucking away the folded piece of paper in a pocket, I walked to the stallion.

“You must be Star Shooter,” he said with a single tip of his chin, tone and volume neutral. “Good to have you here.”

“Great to be here.” I returned the nod, looking around him in the room he stood part way out of, where a few others had gathered. “So, this is where the magic happens?”

His brow furrowed at that slightly. “This is where you will be spending the next week and a half, bidaily,” he then gestured his head for me to follow him inside. Once in the room, he closed the door.

The few ponies on the floor, all of which donned civilian clothing or none at all, stood up. I joined their side as the Marine moved ahead of us, beside a corner desk.

There, he went into explanation of what we would be doing. Activities comprised of workouts to test agility, strength, and flexibility. The first thing to tick off the list was the ASVAB exam—short for Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery. That was just for today. In a couple of days we would begin exercises on a field beside the building, shared between the processing station and the Canterlot Palace. Evidently this place handled ponies of all military branches to have recently enlisted. Hell, even the Royal Guard occupied this place.

The three Marines each went into explanation about the ASVAB, what to expect, what we should know to look out for in certain questions and answer in most responses, and every other little detail there was to comprehend. They then proceeded to talk about other such physical examinations, such as personal health, meaning a trip to a nurse situated in their own specialized space in this office, and also blood work. That thought alone made me shudder. I could just hope that he or she would be gentle with the needle.

Last but not least, swearing in; the end of MEPS. Each of us individually would stand before a Marine, place one hoof on a book and raise our other, and take an oath of service, one that will seal the deal.

Around thirty minutes of listening later, we were led to a separate room built much like your average school classroom. It evidently had multiple purposes other than for taking this test according to what was written on the chalkboard before the staff sergeant erased it.

Seating ourselves at individual desks, spread apart from each other done to avoid cheating (which I would not, either way put), we were given two pencils, scrap paper, and the test booklet itself. Seeing it brought me back to my final years of high school and the terrible, over-the-top-long tests that shot out of a cannon every week. Thankfully, upon closer inspection of the pages, it seemed to be shorter than previously thought—in exchange for loads of questions per page.

Two full days of studying would soon pay off. At least, I could only hope. While a certain criteria existed as a bottom line for those who can and cannot follow through with enlistment, what one scores on a test can also determine their rate—or, to us civilians, duties. If we were to flunk the test, they offered retakes should we still be interested in enlisting after processing concludes.


***


Glancing toward the rug at the foot of the door, I noted the mail still had not yet come, even three days later. Instead of going to relax, I knew there was much work to be done. I trotted into my bedroom and opened my closet. It wasn’t the tidiest, but, it could be worse.

After a brief search of sorting through some junk, I grabbed a small red backpack, moving on to packing small belongings to keep in my locker at boot camp, if I would even have one. If not, I'd definitely be screwed. I didn't think much of it, and went along with packing a couple of novels, and my laptop.

Wait a minute. They don’t allow electronic devices in basic. Why am I even packing this? the voice in my head criticized my thinking.

Figuring it would be easier to purchase a ticket at the train station, rather than to go online and go through the hassle of having to venture out somewhere to have it printed off and risk losing it on the way home, which is why I packed my computer in the first place.

Excitement began to build within, and with it, twice as much anxiety. I soon started to think to myself, what if I'm nowhere near being fit to be a Marine?

It was already evening when I finished packing, and the western sky was beginning to shift to a brighter shade of orange as the sun lowered. I had to admit, sunsets from Canterlot were beyond stunning. Though, being able to afford a bigger apartment—or even a house closer to the western edge where they are more clearer would be nice, though, I was satisfied with what I had.

The place I settled in was a pretty decent size in itself. Although, no more than two ponies could live comfortably in it, considering it was a only one-bedroom apartment. It wasn't junky, either. In fact, it seemed rather new, and almost fit in with the flower shop situated a floor below.

By the time the sun actually set, my stomach was growling. I stood up off of my couch and made my way into the kitchen. I’d pondered whether I should order out or not earlier, only to remember the food I still had that would need to be taken care of before I leave.

Opening the fridge, I mentally said to myself, I'd hate to make myself fat before I go through boot camp. The refrigerator remained predominantly full with many different assortments ranging from raw manticore steak, to vegetables and fruits, and my personal favorite that I had yet to take the time to prepare: seafood.

With the choices before me, an immediate decision kept its distance from my mind. I knew for a fact that I couldn't take it all with me—that is, unless I manage to find a new place in Manehattan, which I likely couldn't afford anyway. One other thing that concerned me is just how long I would be gone, likely leading to all of this food going bad as a result.

Some word picked up from a friend told me that military training lasts upwards of three months depending on the branch chosen, but can last up to six or seven if one is not faring well. That lifted my spirits a bit knowing I didn't join the Royal Guard instead, remembering a pony who spent around two years in after joining at a younger-than-regulation age. Regardless, it would have been different for me either way, knowing I am in my late teens and legally an adult; a solid two years past the enlistment requirements of seventeen years old.

Minutes after staring blankly at everything in my fridge, I gave in to making myself a bowl of shrimp scampi, my absolute favorite out of everything seafood, and quite simple of a dish as well: angel-hair noodles, butter, garlic, and lastly, steamed shrimp. I thought, I'd better enjoy myself a little bit before I start getting used to base food and probably puking it up after tons of intense workouts.

Setting out a steel pot and filling it with water, I waited until it reached the point of boiling, opening a box of angel-hair noodles and dumped them in. They stuck out of the pot due to their length, but soon fell limp into soft, edible noodles after some time in the water. In another pan cooked the shrimp, the sweet aroma of them filling my apartment with a mouthwatering scent.

More minutes passed, and then both the pasta and the shrimp were done. I mixed both with melted butter and garlic, then mixed it all together into the final piece and bowled myself, then sat down to eat my dinner, enjoying every savory bite of the two mixed dishes. Upon cleaning my plate to the point where I could probably get away with putting it back in a cabinet, it came to my relief to learn not much of what was made remained in the pot. Despite that, however, finishing it was far from the boundaries of possibility. I normally go for seconds, I remarked, mentally.

Shrugging it off after a moment, I walked into the kitchen to clean up, starting with the few dishes already in need of washing. Besides, it was better to have everything clean by the time I got back—whenever that may be in the near future. Cleaning didn't take long, as did putting everything where it needed to be.

However, it still stumped me on what I would do with the remaining food in the fridge. I pondered again, then remembered the mare living upstairs; she mainly lived on takeout and never truly thought of buying and cooking for herself. It would be the best way to clean out my fridge while helping somepony out in the process.

I sat down to think of what I could pack the refrigerated goods in, only to decide on a small portable cooler hardly ever used by me as an option. Standing up, I trotted to the pantry and grabbed it out. It was mostly empty and only had a few canned foods sitting inside, things that I didn't have to worry about expiring—not for a few hundred years, that is.

Dragging the cooler into the kitchen and reopening the refrigerator door, I carefully packed everything inside the cooler neatly with some strategy to make sure everything fit tidily, then shut the lid. Better take this upstairs, my inner-voice mumbled, then I made my way to the door. The cooler was light to where resting it over my back wasn’t any hassle, and thus started my way upstairs.

The metal stairs we had to reach our apartments obnoxiously emit loud clanks under my hooves which, the closer I came to her door, I hoped the noise wouldn't startle my upstairs neighbor. Arriving at the foot of her door, I set the little red insulated box down beside it and a small hoof-written note to let her know just who it is from.

I knocked on the door, then began trotting back to the stairs to walk down. Before I could reach the first step, however, my ear swiveled to the creak of her door opening, and the tan-coated earth pony mare immediately spotted me.

"Star Shooter?" she cooed, sounding mildly surprised.

Now it was awkward to have been caught in the act. Halting in my tracks, I turned around with a small, friendly smile. "Oh, hey there, Rose."

"What is this?" the mare, Rose Shine, turned her attention down at the cooler, then picked the note up in a hoof to read over it.

"Just some food. Thought you could use it. Besides, I know how much you eat take out every day," was my answer as I sauntered up to her.

"What makes you say that?" she proceeded to question in a slightly awkward manner.

"I always see some sort of take out food guy walking to our stairs, and the only thing below me is a flower shop. You need something real to eat," I commented, smile growing.

Rose opened the cooler with a hoof, letting off a soft gasp at the sight. "Is this... all of your food?" The amount of items within shocked her.

"Maybe..." I responded as vaguely as possible, her query causing my cheeks to heat a little.

She closed the lid, fixed on me with a concerned look. "Star, you'll need to eat, too. Please, take all of this back. You need it more than I do."

"No, no, I'll be just fine. Reason why is because I’ll going away for a while, so... I figured it would be better to give you everything I had that doesn’t already have my germs on it so I don't come home to a fridge of spoiled food, and maybe a pack of rats in my walls."

A giggle came out of her, followed by a smile that curled the auburn-maned mare’s lips. "That's so sweet to think of me like that. Come here, you!" she held a hoof out.

I moved up to her and she hugged me tightly. Without making the moment too terribly awkward, I returned the embrace by looping my one hoof around the back of her neck gently, smiling.

"So, where are you off to?" Rose asked, drawing back from the hug.

"Manehattan. I, er, have business... there. That, I need to... leave for the next couple of months. Rather soon, actually."

"Couple of months?" her eyes grew wide with both surprise and confusion. "That's a very long time. I didn’t know you had a job like that, either! What is it for, might I ask?"

There was no excuse now. I had to be straightforward with her. "Well, I... It's for the military.”

A sharp gasp escaped the mare’s mouth as she was taken aback. "You enlisted?" she said, voice low in an almost whisper. I simply nodded in response. "Oh, dear... That is… wow.” She went silent and gently scraped her hoof along the metal floor, before glancing up with a meek smile. “Well, I hope all goes in your favor."

"Thanks." I simpered faintly with a small courteous nod. There was embarrassment deep down for dumbfounding the poor mare over a shopping cart-sized load of food. "I will certainly try my best."

"I would have thought you were the kind of pony to go into the Royal Guard or something. But, that's even better!" she smiled big, flicking a curl of her mane out of her eye. "But wait, I thought you said you would never enlist in the military?"

"Well, I suppose something made me change my mind. A friend, mostly."

Her ears perked up with curiosity across her countenance. "Oh?”

"I met him quite a while ago. He is the commanding officer aboard the Eclipse."

Rose cocked her head a little in question, growing more curious. "The Eclipse? What's that?"

"The New Lunar Republic's largest aircraft carrier." I grinned enthusiastically. "The newest, baddest, and largest ship ever to sail the Antlertic."

"Ooooh." Her eyes sparkled with wonder. "That must be quite an honor to have met the captain of a naval ship!"

"It is." I smiled proudly. "He is a pretty cool stallion, too. Extremely friendly from my experience. Not something you'd expect really from a sea dog."

Rose giggled at that. "Is that what you're going to be, a sea dog?" she joked.

"Probably not. I enlisted for the Lunar Marines. The best branch of the military, or so I have heard. Most Marines deploy on ships nowadays since there are no conflicts as of right now."

"Oh, even better!" she laughed more. “I remember when they were just the Equestrian Marines. So much must have changed since then!”

"Ehehe." I blushed softly, scratching in the back of my mane with a hoof. "Anywho, I should probably get back downstairs. Still have a few things to work on before I head out tomorrow."

The smile on Rose’s muzzle faltered into a disappointed frown. "Aw, you're leaving tomorrow?"

"Sadly, yes. But, don't worry. Like I said, I'll be back. You know, in a couple of months or so."

"But, if it is in Manehattan, doesn't that mean you'll have to move there?" her head lowered.

"In time, maybe. This is just for training, I don't exactly know where I'll be stationed." I shrugged. “Only time will tell, I suppose.”

"Oh. Well, all right. Thank you, Star," she hugged me tightly a second time.

Blushing harder than before, I repaid a gentle hug. Touchy-feely stuff wasn’t exactly my thing, though it was nice from time to time. Just not in awkward situations such as these. "Anytime, Rose."

"And be careful, you hear? We've still never had movie-dinner night yet,” she added, prodding a hoof at my chest fur.

"Oh, I will. Trust me." I smiled warmly to her. "We have got to have that when I get back."

Rose giggled and nuzzled into my neck a little. "Of course."

The pink on my cheeks grew brighter and more profuse, and I smiled some more as we pulled back from the embrace. "Well, I'll see you around."

"I'll see you later, Star," she winked.

A smile was sent her way one final time, then I walked to the steps and down to my door. I paused halfway, still in her line of sight, waving a hoof. She waved back, still with a bright smile on her muzzle. I chuckled, then continued down the metallic steps, my hooves clanking softly on the surface that echoed in the dark and vacant space below the platforms. Afterwards, she went back inside with the cooler full of food carefully dragged along.

I went back into my apartment, only to stop once more as my hoof planted onto a single envelope sitting atop my doormat. I froze, gently kicking the door shut with a hind leg, sweeping up the letter and carefully ripping into it.

Inside sat a neatly folded, typewritten note. Dropping its paper casing onto the floor, my eyes examined the writing carefully. With each word, my heart beat quicker and harder. Eyes widening, I stared forward blankly, jaw hanging open in shock.

It was my letter of acceptance into basic training. More so, I was due to arrive in Manehattan tomorrow morning, along with those other recruits from MEPS.

By the time I grew aware of my surroundings and senses once more, the sun had completely disappeared from the horizon. Some faint light remained around the western sky, and the outside temperature had cooled significantly, though not too much. It was perfect, likely the last peaceful evening I would have to myself for a while.

I shrugged and trotted around my apartment, opening every window in the place and allowing the soft, cool breeze to blow through. After doing so, I took a deep whiff of the air, scenting of a mixture of every flower's sweet aroma from the shop below, smelling even better and clearer with the windows welcoming the outside air. For the rest of the night, I spent the time watching television, flipping through almost every channel until something interesting could eventually nab my attention and distract me.

Later on, glancing at the clock hanging on my wall above and to the left of my television, it read 10:15. I wasn't too terribly tired, though my mind was set on the notion that it would be best to have as much rest before the long trip tomorrow.

Off went the television, followed by the lamp in the living room and the kitchen light. The brief journey finally ended in the bedroom, where I crawled in and pulled the blankets over, shifting about to snuggle myself into a comfortable position.

Normally, a tower fan set up off to the side intermittently turned side to side, maintaining a steady flow or air circulating about. It remained off tonight, allowing the cool breeze from outside as a refreshing replacement. This night was absolutely perfect in every way imaginable, and it only added to my excitement to serve for the mare who made it possible.


***


By early dawn, I rose slowly to the beautiful singing and chirping of morning doves out the window in the small trees that lined the street, adding to the harmony of birds awakening throughout the magnificent capital. Focus shifting to the alarm clock on my nightstand, I'd noted it had not yet gone off, prompting me to lay back down for an extra few minutes. To my disappointment, it wasn't enough, and I was already too wide awake. Instead, I sat up out of bed and pondered the first question of the day to come to mind. Breakfast first, or shower?

...

Shower.

Remembering I had donated pretty much my entire fridge to Rose, I instead thought it would be easier to eat on the train or something. Besides, hunger hadn’t fully taken over yet. Not typically being a morning pony, most days it wouldn’t become a nuisance until about noon and so breakfast never truly tickled my fancy apart from maybe once or twice a month.

Trotting into the door adjacent to my bedroom and walking inside, my apartment’s single bathroom included a small closet on the side where I normally stored fresh folded towels and cleaning products and tools. I opened the door, taking a tan-colored towel and hanging it beside the shower for easy reach once I get out.

Shutting the door, I slid the shower curtain just enough to reach in and start the water, accidentally at first starting the faucet down to the tub. After a quick correction, cold water began pouring from the shower faucet. I held a hoof in under the steady flow, feeling the water until it warmed to a comfortable temperature. My preference was borderline scalding hot, enough to burn one’s coat off if sensitive enough. Not quite, though, but it was still decently hot.

Stepping inside, hoof after hoof, until the steaming water streamed through my mane, I jumped a little, but soon adjusted to the sudden temperature and shut my eyes as water beat down on my messy blue mane, which quickly drooped over my face.

I lifted a hoof, moving my mane out of the way of my crimson eyes. It was then that I actually hoped buzz-cut manes were mandatory in the Lunar Marines. While I enjoyed keeping my mane long, the way it was currently, it would be nice to get a cut once and awhile, or have a change of style.

Assuming my shower took about twenty minutes long, just how I liked it, I soon shut off the water and reached for my towel, grabbing it in my hoof and stepping out of the tub, drying my mane and navy-blue coat. Once finished drying myself off, I picked up a comb and weaved it through my mane so it was no longer messy from the towel, but the way I usually keep it.

Lastly, picking up my toothbrush and a tube of mint toothpaste, squeezing it and squirting some onto the brush, I briefly ran it under some cold water before setting the tube down. A good minute of brushing later, I spit into the sink and ran the water again to flush it down the drain, then wiped whatever remained along the corners of my mouth with a cold wet cloth.

Looking and now smelling completely fresh, I trotted out of my bedroom and walked to the front door, picking up my backpack and throwing it over my shoulder, glancing around the living room and kitchen one last time.

"I'll miss this place," I mumbled to myself, sighing softly before opening the door and walking out, locking the door behind me for the last time in a couple of months. Lightly, I patted the knob, then made my way to the stairs, my hooves faintly metallically clicking against each step as I trotted down and onto the street.

Starting down the cobble road, I drew in one last breath of the flowers’ sweet scent as they opened up to the warm sun, noting of a very light coating of dew droplets along the vibrantly-colored petals. Even the sidewalk itself was damp slightly, a result of mountain humidity.

Only a few roamed the street at this hour, and the flower shop wasn't even open yet. That surprised me a bit, knowing it was way past eight-thirty in the morning. I shrugged it off, trotting into the denser parts of town on my way to the train station, where I hoped the next train to Manehattan was due to arrive soon or was already boarding.

Along the jaunt, I stopped briefly at a café and picked up a couple of bagels and a coffee with hazelnut creamer for the ride, or to tide me over if the train hasn’t arrived yet and I grow hungry. Upon coming up to the train station, I trotted to the ticket counter and bought a one way ticket to Manehattan, already forty bits spent. None of the other recruits were there, much to my surprise.

Luckily, the train was just pulling into the station once the process was complete, and I was among the first of the narrow few waiting to board to seat myself. I slid my half-packed bag under my seat, then opened the brown paper bag full of my breakfast and bit into one of the bagels, toasted to perfection and complemented with plenty of cream cheese—just how I prefer it.

Following a thirty minute boarding process, the doors were shut and the whistle on the locomotive blew loudly, signaling its imminent departure, followed by the jolt of it pulling the passenger cars forward one by one.

By then, I was down to just my coffee, which I occasionally sipped while watching as the city disappeared behind me and the train made its way down hill, into dense forest and racing eastward. As the minutes ticked on by, I began to picture where the base was located in my head. I couldn't have imagined it to be directly in the city of Manehattan and rather in one of the surrounding areas, although I could have been wrong. My mental expectations often deceive me when the time comes to see the real thing.

Many hours and a transition of time zones later, the train began to slow as it crossed a long, tall suspension bridge with horseshoe-shaped towers over a massive river bustling with small, expensive private schooners, tug boats, and ferries. The reality of what time it actually was had escaped me, though I was for certain that it was somewhere between mid and late afternoon, as noting the sun no longer sat at its peak position in the bright blue sky.

On the opposite side of this expansive, busy waterway, countless high rises and skyscrapers of varying height and old and new construction stood proudly, dominating the horizon as far as the eye could see. They shined in the gold of the sun with the glass on each and every one of them reflecting the glow gorgeously, albeit in a moderately-blinding manner if I stared for too long.

From the looks of it, I had arrived at last. Manehattan, the city of opportunity. And that is the sole reason for this venture of mine, to kick off a new, promising chapter in my life.
> 1. Getting Comfortable
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I reached for my backpack and stood from my seat. The door’s hydraulics quietly hissed as they went to work, sliding open and letting ponies off the train. Stepping out of the car, I met with pure shock and awe, stopping to take in the sheer size of the station. It was definitely at least four times as large as the one operating in Canterlot and occupied twice as many platforms.

On the north and south faces of the station were tunnel openings for the trains to roll through, seeing as each of the platforms were built inside the station with a large walkway constructed, stretching above each of the tracks to a tall corridor that led directly into the entrance hall with ticket counters, a food court, some small shops, and seating areas.

Clocks and schedule boards stood along sections of railing or in center of the walkway, or hung from the ceilings around the station. In the hallway separating the entrance from the tracks sat rolling advertisement boards, displaying popular products of a business or food from the city’s famous restaurants. Taking a brief moment to look at them made me a little bit hungry, might I add.

Down the split-path staircase to the wide open floor of Manehattan Central, I stopped in the center as ponies walked and weaved around each other in all directions. Revolving doors constantly turned as more filed in from the streets or out. I glanced all around me in attempt to locate those recruits from Canterlot back at MEPS. A few in the crowds looked like them, but with notable differences.

Eventually I decided to shrug it off, heading to a row of wooden shelves displaying brochures, booklets, magazines, and newspapers. You name it, they probably had it. Thankfully they had maps of the city as well. Taking one, I unfolded it, slightly recoiling upon discovering simply how big it was—unnecessarily big, if you ask me.

It wasn’t hard to make out where I needed to go. Along the south mainland shore of the north river sat a large, restricted space: a military installation. While not too detailed of a map, other than streets, and many widely-known locations labeled here and there; the shape by which the area took further gave it away. It even included piers where the navy ships presumably moored to.

The route from the station, which was situated near the center of the city on Manehattan Island, all the way to the base would be somewhat of a hike. Of course, a taxi carriage was likely a quicker option, though I figured the walk would make for good exercise.

I took a few minutes to sit and examine the map and grow familiar with it a bit, pointing out key spots to scope out along the way or at some point in the future. In all reality, I had the day to myself to explore for a bit, seeing as evidently the memo for a pickup to the base aforementioned never reached. Heck, the other recruits were no-shows. That isn’t bound to sit well on their descriptions in the long run.

Getting up and heading out onto the street, I once more stopped, this time to bask in the warm afternoon sunlight and take in a deep, refreshing breath of concrete and steel. That is definitely a new scent I would have to grow accustomed to.

So, with a map in-hoof, following the street to the left of walking out of the station, every so often I would check to make sure there wasn’t any wrong turns taken or that I had missed a crucial one in order to reach the Manehattan Bridge, the nearest crossing that leads into Bronclyn, the borough in which the base was located.

A few sights to be seen popped up along the way, even from afar. One for example was Trotterdam Tower, the tallest structure in Manehattan, topped with an enormous art-deco spire taking the shape of an equine’s head. It was what stood out against the vast majority of the metropolis’ extensive skyline and watched over the lower east island, and across the glimmering ocean until the horizon’s end.

After some time of keeping a steady pace, making turns around corners and at the end of other blocks, my path brought me to the Manehattan Bridge, at long last. About an eighth across came the realization that this bridge was far longer than depicted on the map. Stupid, not-to-scale maps.

It couldn’t have been less than eleven or twelve minutes later when I finally reached the other side, where the bridge sloped down to meet an intersection. There, I veered left. According to the map, while at this point only having partial trust in its accuracy of the street layout of the city, this road would curve into another, which would pass by the base, where a branch off led directly to the front gates.

The architecture around Bronclyn, while far lower in terms of height as compared to Manehattan proper, was far unlike Canterlot. Central parts of town had mixtures of architecture in high rises and skyscrapers, from anywhere between modern steel and glass frames, to old-fashioned brick and stone.

Bronclyn consisted mostly of this brick and stone and is evidently one of the oldest boroughs. Each building was like a uniform—unchanging, equal to one another, and bland without any diversity. Canterlot was more of a melting pot for architecture all around Equestria, and even far away lands in smaller numbers.

Much of this area accommodated brownstones and a few newer apartment projects, especially towards the base. Every so often there would be a roundabout in the street with a fountain or a statue in center, or nothing at all. Just a plain circle of cement with nothing interesting to it whatsoever.

Though, it seemed the further west I went on approach to the base, the less developed it became. Soon I found myself heading down a vacant cobble road with trees on all sides, coming up to a clearing where the path intersected with another. Lifting my gaze a bit, my eyes moved across a sign made of brick with silver wording on the side, reading: Joint Naval Station Manehattan.

I could breathe a sigh of relief, tucking my map away in a backpack zipper and turning onto the path. Further down, beyond a surrounding fence line and an open cover and guard box on the road, from what I could make out stood large, ten-foot concrete walls surrounding an all-steel barrier gate, continuing towards it. This was definitely the place I needed to be.

Tension in my muscles built the closer I came to the first checkpoint. Stepping out from the guard box was a unicorn in camouflage like that of my recruiter. Around his neck hung a rifle by a strap, which on its own was somewhat intimidating and had me freeze in my tracks for a split second as he emerged.

“Good afternoon,” he said. “May I see your service ID?”

“ID?” I blinked. “No, I…” my hoof gestured randomly. “I’m new here. Sent from the Canterlot processing station. I was told that I would be picked up from the train station, but, it seems that never came.”

“No information you can give me?”

“Well, er, I have this,” I reached for my wallet, opening it to show him my normal identification. He studied it before returning it.

The stallion brought a hoof up to a radio receiver on the shoulder of his vest. “Are we due for recruit shipments today?”

A garbled response that I could not make out the words to returned with static feedback. Evidently the Marine understood what he said. “Copy,” he then looked at me again, gesturing, “Come with me.”

He started down the cobble path, toward the secondary gate that stood between us and the base itself, where more uniformed ponies stood.

My heart pumped, nerves tingling with worry. Something about this did not seem right.

“Ey, Corporal! Get down here, I got a question for you!” he shouted up to a pony on the wall.

Carefully, that stallion climbed down a ladder, trotting up to the both of us.

“What is it, Private?” he shifted his attention to me. “Who is this?”

“Claims the processing station in Canterlot sent ‘im here. Whadda we do?”

The corporal focused on me a second time. “You are from Canterlot, you say?” I nodded. “Where is your pickup?”

I shrugged, not knowing whatsoever. “I do not know, sir. I was told to expect one at the station. No one was there, and none of those in Canterlot made it on the train.”

“Hmmm,” his eyes narrowed. The corporal turned back to the unicorn. “Hold him here. I will have a word with the lieutenant.”

Thus began a long wait while the one Marine wandered off to talk to… someone. To me, none of this made any sense. I know I hadn’t made any mistake on where I needed to go. They had told me Manehattan!

“If they really did send you from Canterlot and nobody here was aware of it, it sounds like somebody done screwed up,” the unicorn joked.

I chuckled lightly, showing much nervousness in the way I laughed, which he didn’t seem to detect. Oh, man. Did I just wind myself up in a heap of trouble on my first day?

Much to my relief, some more time later, the gate opened, and the Marine from before waved for me. The unicorn I sat with turned to me, saying, “Looks like you’re all clear,” before returning to his post at the checkpoint.

Facing forward, I stood up, strolling over to the corporal with a light tremble in my body. He led further into base, toward a large brick building positioned adjacent to a five-story steel highrise, stopping just outside the door, beside a bench.

“My orders are to keep you here until the rest of your fellow conscripts arrive later tonight. Sergeant knows you are here and will collect you when they arrive and take you inside. Is that clear?”

I nodded in understanding. “Yes, sir. Thank you.”

“Don’t mention it,” he replied lowly.

I looked around, eventually taking a seat on the bench. Tapping my hooves on my lap, I then gazed up. There were still a few hours left before sunset, and who knows how long until the others were set to arrive.

This was going to be a long evening.


***


Somewhere around three hours into the wait, I had fallen asleep where I sat on the same bench, backpack hugged in my forehooves and placed in my lap. The Marine I was with apparently did not care and left me to my nap.

Snorting as I jolted back to consciousness, I leaned my head forward from the rear of the bench and shifted on the seat to straighten my back. A small groan escaped my muzzle, lifting a hoof to my eye to rub it. Upon a glance around, I took note of the Marine still there, unmoving like his body is purely made of stone. I had to admire his dedication to make sure I would not wander off and cause trouble, not that I would anyways.

My vision remained blurry for a few short moments until it adjusted. The orange glow of a nearby lamp illuminated the area around us instead of the sun. Without a clock nearby, and me not owning a watch, I hadn’t a clue of what time it was. It had to be late judging by my usual sleep patterns.

But, right as my senses returned, the collective noise of hooves clicking on cobble drew nearer with each passing second. My eyes darted off to the left. Silhouetted by many other street lights around the area marched a pack of ponies toward the very building I have been waiting beside.

The Marine, lids slightly bagging beneath his eyes, looked over his shoulder, saying quietly, “I would say that is your queue.”

Nodding, taking my pack and throwing it over my shoulder by the strap, I stood, waiting for the group as they approached. Much like those at MEPS, these mares and stallions wore light clothing or none at all, carrying with them luggage similar to mine. One thing was off, though—neither of them were from Canterlot.

Another Marine, a light-coated mare with a shortened mane came out through a glass door beside us, standing off to the side and holding the door open. In the dark of night, her true colors weren’t as simple to point out.

One by one, the recruits began to silently file into the building. I walked to the end of the line as it came closer and joined up behind them. However, about to march inside, the mare held a hoof in front of my chest to stop me.

“Early arrival,” the Marine who accompanied me said. “He’s with them.”

Nodding, the mare lowered her hoof. I turned over my shoulder to the stallion, nodding once to him in thanks before joining the others inside.

In the center of the halls waited the other recruits, neatly organized into three rows and stretching back five. I filled in as the final piece in the final row on the right. To our left, the mare strolled ahead, joining an oxford pegasus stallion, his cold blue eyes scanning over us individually, criticizing our posture and everything else in between.

“You all want to be Marines?” he asked, though coming off more as a statement than a question.

“Yes, sir.”

“I do not hear much enthusiasm in you. Shall I ask again, do you want to be Marines?!”

“Yes, sir!”

“That’s more like it.” He gave a single firm nod. “Welcome to Joint Naval Station Manehattan. This is where all of you have come to shed your innocence as civilians and unlock your inner potential as warriors. I am Hardstaff, but you will address me as Sergeant Hardstaff, or sir. This is First Lieutenant Wind Fury, but you shall address her simply as First Lieutenant, or ma’am. Is that understood?”

“Yes, Sergeant.”

“Good. Very good. First Lieutenant Wind Fury will be around throughout your time here. I will be here every step of the way. We will be training you, teaching you to be cold blooded killers like your ancestors, bringing your inner killing machine out of you for when the call orders you to.”

“You may have all stepped off of your planes expecting the toughest time of your lives. We can assure you that time shall soon come. This is merely a warm welcome on behalf of the Lunar Marine Core,” a deceiving smirk crossed his muzzle.

“In five minutes, I expect all of you to have collected your gear, but not before a call. It is expected of us to give you sixty seconds to phone home, your marefriends, your coltfriends, somepony you know that is worried about you. You want to make sure they know you made it here safely.”

“Booths are in there,” he pointed to a doorway on our left. “Bits are provided to use. If you have a cell phone, be sure to use it. That may be easier to get a hold of your parents or family. Leave anything of yours right where you are standing. Get a move on.”

Filing into another line, each pony headed into the room one right after another. Those including myself with baggage set it down on the tiled floor and headed in. Ponies inserted coins and picked up phone receivers, or stood off to the side to use their mobile phones, dialing loved ones. Out of the fifteen of us there total, I was among the two to not phone home.

Collected chatter filled the room. Around me, everypony spent this minute to inform whomever they called of their arrival, say final goodbyes until the end of basic, and ‘I love you’s. Only a couple out of the group were unable to reach anypony and sorrowfully hung up without a word spoken.

As soon as ponies finished their calls, we moved back out into the hall, returning to where we previously stood and keeping silent as we did so. But, being one of the final few out of the room caught the sergeant’s attention. He lifted a hoof and pressed it to my chest, stopping me.

I froze, immediately panicking internally. Had I done something wrong? What have I screwed up already?!

“You are from Canterlot, yes?” he questioned in a low volume to direct the query just to me.

I nodded shakily but firm in my response. “Yes, Sergeant.”

“There have been changes to the plan. Your former unit, the other ponies you tested with in Canterlot, have been shipped out west to Los Pegasus due to a change of command. You are to be reassigned to the new 25th Battalion here in Manehattan. Those are these ponies right here.”

A second nod of comprehension followed. He set his hoof down to let me pass, and I returned to formation at the rear.

Shifting his attention to everypony, Hardstaff raised his voice to address us all. “Has everypony made their calls?”

“Yes, Sergeant.”

“No troubles?”

A few including myself kept silent, while others replied with, “Yes, Sergeant!” once more.

“Good. Now, clothing,” he began to step slowly around the right of us. “For training purposes, we are required to provide clothing. As some of you might be aware, Manehattan weather can change in the blink of an eye. One minute, it is a balmy eighty degrees under cloudless skies, next minute, it’ll be pouring with lightning everywhere around you. That is why we must keep you well stocked on clothing.”

“T-shirts, hoodies, jackets, all of you shall receive two of each! You might ask, ‘oh, my Sergeant, where will I ever get all of that?’” he said in a mocking voice, before stopping in front of us and pointing to the next door on the right, raising his voice. “Through that door. You will come across a couple of Marines in there, and they will size you up and make sure your blouse fits the way it should. Everything else, remember what sizes you wear in normal clothing! That will be what you select for your shirts and hoodies.”

“Should not take any of you more than five minutes. Make sure to grab a knit bag to carry all of it in, they will be on your right as you walk in. Once you are done!” he raised his voice prior to a pause. “You will regroup out here with anything you have brought with you. Make sure to line up properly. Smallest at the front, tallest in the rear. All of you will take a seat and wait for my word, and we will get you to your racks for the evening. Go!”

Like before, one by one, we marched into the room, collecting net-like sacks on our way in. Tall boxes piled up with many assortments of clothing lined up against each other in rows. The line moved along the first, looping around at the end to the next.

In my bag stuffed a couple of dark blue t-shirts that were a couple of shades darker than my coat itself, followed by two thick hoodies and sweatshirts, one a precise color of blue as the shirts, the other a lighter tone of grey. Both on their chests showed the word ‘Marines’ alternating in white or blue with the branch’s emblem—the silhouette of an alicorn with its wings fully extended, a crescent moon in center, and a near-sideways anchor beneath the moon. Each one I double checked its size for good measure.

Next up were uniforms. Ours did not have camouflage and were instead a plain tinge of greyish blue, lighter than the tints of the undershirts. A trio of Marine unicorns held measuring tape, determining sizes by wrapping around waists and necks, before quickly collecting a pony’s pair of jackets from a rack along the wall.

Encasing them with magic, each jacket either drastically or minimally altered in width or height, depending on the pony. That was rather impressive to watch, spells that grow or shrink clothing. These ponies in particular certainly were not new with their job, especially with how quick they had us out in the hall again.

Like clockwork, in those five minutes given, not one pony took too long. By then, fifteen ponies—myself included—sat down on the cold tile flooring with our belongings, having rearranged to account for size differences. Most of us there were practically the same in height, so I was in the middle, while there were a couple of draft stallions in the back. All but one of the mares sat in the front row.

Thus began another uneventful wait. I noticed a few others around me were beginning to doze off. Looking up, the nearest clock along the wall above the phone room read eight past one. Even after a nap for Celestia knows how long, fatigue crept its way for a second round. Sitting in one place for this long—going on twenty minutes since collecting our gear—had me yawning with my fellow recruits. Why is that so contagious, anyways?

But, the bigger question stood on top of all.

Where in the hell did the sergeant and first lieutenant head off to?
> 2. P-Days
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Up, up! Come on! Get up!”

I jolted upright at the sergeant’s shouts, briefly checking my surroundings in a small panic before facing forward. His voice echoed in the hall, amplifying his volume to startle anypony who closed their eyes.

Regaining my senses, I rose to all fours with the others, looping an arm through my backpack strap and taking the top of my knit bag in the same hoof. I blinked heavily every couple of seconds to temporarily quell the lethargy-induced itching in my eyes.

Quiet, sharp inhales emitted from ponies fighting a losing battle against drowsiness. While many became immediately attentive in the sergeant’s presence, there was, of course, those few that struggled to keep their eyelids parted, even while they were standing up.

“Everypony wake up. It ain’t bedtime yet,” Hardstaff commanded sternly, wearing a hardened glare. “All of you, on me. Single file.”

The front row recruits lined up, grabbing their things and carrying them over their backs as the sergeant headed out through a set of double doors on the opposite end of the hall. Off to the side observed the first lieutenant, staring at recruits individually as we went by.

Along a sidewalk we marched, the sergeant leading us toward the training barracks on the far west end of base. The one in particular that he led us to was boldly labeled in white with the number ‘19’ above the door.

First to the door, he took the knob and twisted it, pushing inward and heading in to hold the door as the fifteen of us filed inside, claiming any vacant bed that called our names. Rather than bunks, or racks as the sergeant referred to them, many single, narrow cot-like beds occupied the space. At the end of each bed sat all-black hooflockers, numbered respectively on their sides. The locks on the doors were simple press-and-slide-downward mechanisms. Easy to use in a hurry, too.

“All right! Everything you have brought along, and what you picked up at the shop, I expect all of that to fit nicely into your trunks. That is what we in the Marines call hooflockers. What ever takes up too much space, it will be gone! Is that clear?”

“Yes, Sergeant!”

“Five minutes, that is what you have to unpack. I’ll check all of your trunks when you are finished. What ever I see that I do not like, you will pack it up and ship it home. There is NO room whatsoever for picture frames, computers, tablets, anything of yours that you may have brought along for the journey, including weapons especially! If I find any knives or something that can be used to potentially harm your team mates, I will personally see to it that it is melted down and sold for scrap metal! Understood?”

“Yes, Sergeant!”

“Good. Get a move on!”

Almost all at once, locker doors flew open. Before putting away my clothes, I took time to quickly fold them for easier storage. Everypony else did about the same in their own way.

Everything was organized rather tidily. T-shirts sat atop blouses, and beside them, hoodies and sweatshirts in their own neat pile. Even then, plenty of space remained free in my trunk; enough to double what we had and pile that in, too. Really, it all depended on how one arranged their belongings.

I then shifted to my backpack, grabbing it off of my bed and digging inside, withdrawing both books I had packed. Come to think of it, would I even have a free moment read these while I'm here?

Shrugging, setting them down in the locker, followed by my backpack, I stood off to the right of my bed, waiting for the sergeant to make his rounds.


***


“Who here volunteered? Raise your hooves.”

At his question, every pony present lifted their hoof.

“Good, put your hooves down.” All hooves followed suit quietly. “Now that you have volunteered, I don’t want to hear no crying, no whining, no swearing, and most important of all, no take backs! Want to know why?” he paused, then stopped walking. “Do you want to know why?!”

“Yes, sir!”

“Because, repeating from earlier, we are a team. We are here to help you every step of the way, and each of you are here to help your fellow conscripts. Why? Because one day, you will lead each other into the heart of battle, through a rain of bullets, and drive us to victory over evil.”

“These ponies around you are your battle buddies. Remember that for as long as you are here, for as long as you are with them. Whether or not by the end of these next eleven weeks you all stay put as one platoon, my platoon, keep in mind that every pony here is your friend, and you will aid each other whenever it is necessary. Is that understood?”

“Yes, Sergeant.”

“Is that understood?!”

“Yes, Sergeant!”

“Lovely. Now, listen up! Let’s talk food.” Please don’t. I can’t possibly think about eating something right now. “You all have had a long day traveling here, all of that without eating presumably. Three meals a day, that is what you will have for every day you are here! You are not required to eat what is provided. Either you eat, or you don’t. That is completely up to you. Come on, let’s get you fed!”

The sergeant made a full one-eighty and started toward the door. Nobody but him moved. As he was about to head through the open door, he stopped, looking back.

“Well, are you coming?!”

Immediately ponies scrambled into formation behind him. As soon as everypony had fallen into line, he nodded, continuing his way outside.

Despite the fluttering of wings of butterflies floating around, my stomach lightly rumbled, growling with hunger. Come to think of it, the last time I had eaten was back on the train, well over twelve hours prior. Actually, to be more precise, that was about fifteen hours ago. Hopefully what the mess hall had to offer wasn’t nearly as awful as I expected on the way there.

Thankfully, that was not the case. Instead of a putrid, smelly green slop as one would expect, we were served marginally-fresh carrots wrapped in crisp, juicy lettuce, a fruit cup, and a little milk carton—the polar opposite of disgusting. Maybe I could actually eat this, presuming my fretful state didn’t have something to say.

First bite I took was meh. Second bite, more so, albeit not by much. The carrots themselves hadn’t much moisture or taste to them. Without the lettuce, I would have simply left the carrots alone. Then again, I only managed to get into one and a half of them before having enough and moving on to the fruit cup, which I ate with a little plastic spoon and gulped down the milk rather quickly.

Nopony was really allowed to talk in the mess hall, either. The only noises to be heard were cups being placed down on tabletops and some shuffling from the kitchen. Honestly, I’d have preferred this type of a lunchroom in school.

Soon after our group came another, and then a third, both led by different ponies—one a Marine, the other a sailor. My assumption was the sailor-led pack consisted of Navy recruits. Even with my civilian knowledge I had a sneaking suspicion that they would not leave a sailor alone with soon-to-be Marines.

At the end of our meals, we dumped any leftovers in a series of trashcans and piled up our used trays along the metallic lip of the kitchen. Then we filed back into a line with Hardstaff leading us out and back to our barrack, where he began barking in a somewhat tipful manner.

“Get a good night's sleep. I expect each and every one of you to be up and alert early tomorrow. There is still much to be done and so little time. I ask nicely this one time for your cooperation this week. Consider these the easiest days of your life, because believe it or not, they will be!”

Without ado, we got comfortable in our racks as instructed. For an unofficial first day, this went along smoother than I anticipated. However, I knew that was bound to bite me in the rear later on.

Walking to the door, on his way out, Hardstaff set his hoof on the light switch and held it there. “Lights out! Goodnight.”

“Goodnight!” responded everypony else in placid unison, seconds before the barrack went dark with the creak and click of the door gently shutting in his exit.

Something regarding that dismissal didn’t set right with me. There is just no possible way a sergeant just told his recruits goodnight. But he did, and that is what ruffled my feathers the most.


***


Waking so abruptly never quite terrified me as much than this time alone that not even the loudest, most annoying of alarm clocks could do. So much energy had collected that I shot straight up within mere milliseconds of the door opening and the sergeant’s hoof first stepping onto the tile flooring beyond the door frame. All that gathered from sleeping for only a few hours, wasted in a record amount of time.

Needless to say, one fleeting glance at Hardstaff had me momentarily thinking that my jolt had startled him as well. There wasn’t much visibility in the room to devise any such confirmation until the lights came on, inducing migraines all around at the sudden brightness. By then it was too late, and the stern outward appearance he wore strongly said otherwise. He definitely noticed my panic, though, there isn’t any denial there.

“Up and at ‘em, conscripts!” he addressed. If it wasn’t the intense glare from above, his volume certainly did the trick to get everypony out of dreams and on their hooves in ten seconds tops.

For a minute at the least, his shouts rang out through my head, worsening the throbbing ache that gripped it and had me internally begging for ibuprofen or something of the like. It wasn’t until then when I realized that Hardstaff was not in uniform and rather in a nightgown, much to some ponies’ amusement.

“Gooood morning, shitheads! Hope you all had at least somewhat decent sleep. Did you?”

“Yes, sir!”

“That is wonderful. Just magnificent! You want to know why I agree?” he queried, met with a silence as he came to a halt halfway down the aisle between our beds. “Because I, for one, did not! Do you know what it means when a sergeant does not achieve his or her beauty sleep?”

His brief description of a sergeant’s rest time brought quiet chuckles out of many, and smiles out of more, but were instantly shot off by a hard stomp of his hoof.

“I did not fucking warrant any laughter in here!” he roared. “Call it a pissy mood all ya want. If I miss sleep, all y’all do! That’s why I am here two and a half hours ahead of schedule! Who is ready for some PT?!”

No one replied at that point, which probably was not the right choice.

“Too-fuckin’-bad, let’s go! All of you! Shirts on, let’s go!” he commanded, repeating loudly as every pony immediately dug into their trunks, throwing on t-shirts, hoodies, whatever they grabbed either first and foremost or thoughtfully.

I wasn’t sure of what to expect outside that door. Regardless if early summer mornings in Manehattan are brisk or not like they sometimes are in Canterlot, with vigorous physical activity that is due to change. Without hesitation, I slipped into my shirt and lined up with some of the others.

The sergeant tread heavily up to the pony ahead of me to yell in his ear, shouting, “Hey! I didn’t ask you to line up, either! Return to your fucking racks, conscripts!”

Once more, the yelling threw me off, even after he had finished. I about tripped over the edge of my neighbor’s trunk returning to my bed to properly await his order. Man, jumping straight to the mind games it seems. Can’t exactly say I did not see that coming.

Before I had time to think, Hardstaff was at it again. “What are you doing? Get in line, conscripts!”

“Yes, Sergeant!” God, please, don’t be like this all morning, I beg of you.

When we first stepped outside, apart from my own realization, a sense of everypony present becoming chilled by predawn temperatures swept across our group like the breeze itself.

From being snug and warm in our beds merely minutes previous to marching in the dark and cold came as a shock to the system. My entire form convulsively quivered from head to tail, I kept my teeth grit gently to prevent them from chattering. A few were unsuccessful in their own attempts, going ultimately disregarded by the enlisted at the front.

In the two and a half minutes after leaving our barrack behind, Hardstaff halted us beneath the flagpole in the heart of the base. A soft light from the waning moon above splashed down upon us, bathing us in a silvery-white luminescence in continual, silent battle with the orangish-gold gleam of central Manehattan.

How locals could cope with the regular glow of the city at night I would never truly understand. Somepony trying to sleep would require curtains thicker than solid concrete in their bedrooms and a pair of all-black wraparound shades. Known by virtually everypony as the city that never rests, I can imagine the nickname can be taken with literal meaning.

One thing I can say for sure, this view will never grow old on me. At least, I would hope it stays that way. It bore similarities with Canterlot in regards to the radiance they both emit, albeit Manehattan’s was authentically far stronger and wider in magnitude due to its density and sheer size. However, the biggest notable difference between the two cities was in their general appearance.

Overall, Manehattan had a far more modern aesthetic to it. That, to me, is what felt separate from Canterlot; an archaic, majestic town built remarkably on the side of the tallest mountain in Equestria with an infrastructure dating back many centuries. Being here will certainly make for an enormous change of perspective, literally and emblematically.

“All right! Column formation, on me!” the sergeant instructed, as if presuming us to know what precise arrangement he meant immediately, which at least half of us did understand.

Without delay, the fifteen of us repositioned into rows three wide, five long. The accordance and speed of our response, needless to say, might have impressed the oxford-blue stallion just a bit judging by the look and the satisfactory nod he gave when everypony ceased moving about.

But, instead of complimenting our staunch performance—the last thing to be expected from Hardstaff, he remained particularly quiet and marching down the southern-pointing cobble road with us in tail.

“Get loping, fillies!” he then ordered, picking up his pace. Like the rest of my fellow recruits, I followed suit. Soon, we gained a stable trot while retaining a fairly decent formation behind the sergeant.

At first, each step was more or less out of synchronization, though this slowly changed the longer we held our gait and took the likes of marching soldiers; jogging in unison, the concurrent clicks of our hooves on hard cobble becoming music to our ears.

“Have any y’all experience with our cadence?”

The response was a mixture of yeses and noes, with mine the latter. The ponies in Canterlot did teach me the formation types and their names, but never any cadences. Apart from the princess of the Crystal Empire, that is.

“No?! Today is the day you learn, conscripts! Come on, after me!” he paused, clearing his throat. “One, two, three, four hey!”

“One, two, three, four hey!”

“Here we go!”

“Here we go!”

“On the move!”

“On the move!”

“In the groove!”

“In the groove!”

“Here we go!”

“Here we go!”

“All the way!”

“All the way!”

“Every day!”

“Every day!”

“Hooouuh!”

“Hooouuh!”

“Ha-ha!”

“Ha-ha!”

“Hoooouuuh!”

“Hoooouuuh!”

“Ha-ha!”

“Ha-ha!”

“Rock me, rock me, rock, rock steady!”

“Rock me, rock me, rock, rock steady!”

“Roll me, roll me, roll me ready!”

“Roll me, roll me, roll me ready!”

Much to my astonishment, and probably everypony else’s, too, neither of us combined sounded like cats caught in the blades of a running lawnmower. To say the least, with our voices loud and proud, it helped shove the uncomfortable conditions aside and had my heart pumping with motivation. If this is how we will start every morning, I can get used to this.

Hardstaff’s lead took us to the docks where three idle warships silhouetted by the dark sat moored to individual piers, each with turret-like gun mounts on their fronts—destroyers.

A bit further down from them sat similarly-shaped boats, except they did not have the gun mounts. I presumed them to be guided missile cruisers. Opposite of them, significantly smaller boats, something on the terms of a coast guard patrol boat, albeit under the Lunar Navy’s possession, and two cutter-like ships.

Where is the Eclipse? I wondered to myself, as we turned to loop back around into the base. Perhaps she was at sea. It’s been awhile since I last heard from my Navy friend, that could be the reason why.


***


I take it back. I take all of it back. Oh, god. Oh, fuck! I regret everything I have said and done. I retract my statement earlier. This is something I could not get used to every morning!

After that mile-long trot, Hardstaff brought us to an open grassy courtyard sided either right or left by dormitories and office buildings—or administrative facilities as they were called in the military. Here, we dropped into an almost-prone position with our hinds stuck straight out behind us, with only our forehooves propping us up, and thus begun executing push ups to our best ability.

He wasn’t anticipant of any amount done, therefore all but three in our group quit before the ten mark. The three who continued, however, their bodily appearances told they were ready for the exercise portion of boot camp. Thankfully the sergeant only considered this a ‘test’ to determine where everypony’s physical boundaries sat, and judging by the grimace he had on his face the whole time, he was far from dazzled.

“You call those push ups?” he yelled, directing it particularly to us twelve but not leaving the three out of it. “A three year-old could do ‘em quicker and better than you pussies! I better see each of you pulling fifty at a time by the end of this week! Is that clear?!”

“Yes, Sergeant!” Fifty? Holy shit, I went in my mind. I can hardly reach six now! There is just no feasible way fifty is going to happen. Not for me, anyway. The first push up alone had veins popping out of my forehead and sweat slicking the back of my neck, and it wasn’t a thin layer, either. Hell, I was merely standing here and droplets simply kept on rolling with my t-shirt damp and clinging to my coat.

After a few moments of pain, I set myself a pace: two push ups at a time, separated by a second to catch my breath. It worked, though not as well as initially planned. Over the course of a minute, my limbs felt as if they were becoming pasta noodles in boiling water. Strain radiated in every muscle as each one alternated between relaxing and stiffening at each push-up, and my lungs were burning with every breath I drew in.

It wasn’t for much longer where I kept myself propped up, until my arms went completely limp, and I fell flat to the grass, huffing and struggling to regain a steady pattern of breathing. Fatigue from a severe deprivation of sleep imbued my weakened form, withholding all leniency. I can’t have slept more than three or four hours, and it was beginning to take its toll on me.

A pair of dark hooves came to a halt a foot from where my head lay, silhouetted by the moon above and blurring out as consequence of exhaustion. Despite this, I could still make out Hardstaff’s voice loud and clear as it rang out. “That’s it, Conscript, you’re done for!”

Above the adrenaline of exercise, his words had me in a state of panic. My head jerked up from the ground, making direct eye contact with the sergeant. “S-sir, please, I-I can to this! Just give me a chance!” I begged.

The dark pegasus cocked his head a little. “What, do you think I’m kicking you out?” he then burst into a fit of laughter. I simply stared, bewildered by the context. “Get up,” he ordered. I did as told, grunting under my breath as I fought feeble hooves from giving out under my weight.

“You ain’t out of the Marines, kid. You got heart from what I saw. Twenty push-ups in two minutes ain’t bad for a newbie, but I expect that number to be higher by the end of week three. Is that clear?”

Twenty? That’s more than I thought I counted. Good thing he kept track of it, otherwise I would have had to make something up. “Yes, Sergeant,” I responded behind breaths.

“Very good.” Hardstaff bobbed his head in a single nod, raising his hoof to point off to my left. “Go get some water so ya don’t pass out.”

I glanced over to where he was pointing, seeing there to be a few other recruits gathered at a fountain station off along the edge of the grass, taking turns. I shifted back to the sergeant, nodding in return, “Yes, Sergeant,” before making the bitter journey.

Water never truly struck me as sounding so refreshing in my entire life. That is, right up until this specific point in time. As a pony whose preference of beverage oscillated between milk or pop, I never thought I would see the day—or night in this case—where water was the sole commodity I thirsted for the most. I don’t even know how long I hunched over that fountain, maw wide open and gulping down every last drop that streamed from the tap.


***


Day four of the P-Days began like the ones before it. Wake up before sunrise, jog around the base, then perform a repeat of fifty push-ups in front of Sergeant Hardstaff. While it likely wasn’t me adjusting so quickly to the routine, exercising on day two and day three went far smoother than the first.

The sergeant had decided to go easy on us today. Only fifteen push-ups, which virtually every pony accomplished with little issue, followed by running from end-to-end in the grass. No one understood his intentions, although a few predicted we were in for something different later on, something we weren’t accustomed to.

Consequently, those ponies weren’t wrong. Just past dawn and before breakfast, Hardstaff gathered us at some drinking fountains and ordered each of us to take long swigs. It came across as peculiar at first, but within a few minutes after the fact, it made more sense as we approached the medic’s ward; a two-story, hospital-like clinic run by both sailors and Marines with rates in the medical field.

He brought us in back, into a widened corridor where one entryway in the somewhat darkened hall sat open with light from within spilling out across the floor. An earth pony mare, periwinkle in color with a jet-black mane tied up in a bun, took in one recruit at a time and let them out a few minutes later to assist the next.

It was when the first few stallions emerged that an anxious tingle plagued my essence. I became fidgety in the chair I sat in along with a few others, and my hooves developed a garish quake in response. I suppose part of that would concern having not yet eaten, although I knew it was strictly because I had a pretty clear concept of what is to come.

Some of my fellow recruits read magazines piled on end tables during the wait, and ponies were called in by name in alphabetical order, which would put me near the middle. I had this time to prepare myself, although it surely would not suffice regardless. The best I can hope for is to not once make contact with the needles they will use.

One prominent rumor I had caught wind on was that, in basic training, the medical exams were by far one of the worst parts. This was due to the infamous ‘peanut butter shot’, where they supposedly inject a large dosage of penicillin and study your physical behavior in the days after to see how one reacts to it. The name originates from the fact that the viscosity of the penicillin is comparable to peanut butter, and that it can be a nuisance for up to two days, depending on how you might tolerate it.

That, of course, is just one of many shots part of the procedure and by far the least I am ready to take. God, I hate needles. With a passion. Thinking about it brought me back to my colt days where my former pediatrician would surprise me with two or more shots per visit. What would normally take five minutes went on for thirty or more, depending on my mother’s patience.

Of course, before medical insurance was something affordable, she would have to pay out of pocket for each shot, and every minute I wasted of the doctor’s time. Those were some embarrassing times, ones I can laugh at nowadays. At least now I have more control over my fear, even if it eats away at my core and renders me frozen if the anxiety is fierce enough.

As the final stallion before me went in, I grew more tense than ever. I resorted to deep, heavy breaths in attempt to quell the sense of antipathy rising out of control. A part of my mind repeated every so often, saying, “You’re scared of a few needles, but not the fact that you practically signed your life over to the country’s will, that you could potentially become gravely wounded or killed in battle?”

The respiratory pattern did its work over the course of a couple of minutes, and while my muscles still had not eased up, I was somewhat calmer than I had been. Nonetheless it wouldn’t prepare me, but if it can reduce tension… perhaps the process will be less painful.

“Next!”

Oh, shit.

I gulped, pressing up from my seat and standing with a wobbly comportment. Glancing to my left, at the door, I saw the periwinkle mare peeking her head out and briefly made eye contact. She motioned her hoof for me to come, disappearing back into the room. With a shaky breath exhaled, I followed her in.

My eyes maintained separation from the left side of the room, where a small counter was situated and, presumably, the syringes as well. With little hesitation, I climbed up onto the exam table, dangling my hinds off the edge and pressing my forehooves at my sides as the mare closed the door.

Trotting over to the counter, the mare, whose uniform resembled the Navy’s upon closer examination, swirled her hoof on a small tablet’s screen. The glow illuminated her face for the most part against the lukewarm, and rather eerie shadowy nature of the meagerly-sized room.

I simply sat there in silence, keeping my focus elsewhere while she tapped away. When the mare placed the device down, the thump of it on the counter top was enough to make me almost jump out of my skin. In that instance, my head had jerked toward her, and my reaction startled her in return.

“Bit jumpy this morning, are we, Star Shooter?” the mare amiably remarked, taking a couple of steps closer. “Looks like you could be my biggest patient thus far.”

“W-what?” I sputtered. That could mean a multitude of things, and my mind was already jumping to too many conclusions for me to suitably handle.

The mare medic offered a reassuring smile. “Your records show that you are, in fact, four years behind on proper vaccinations. Thankfully, most of which are what everypony is due to receive. That said, while I cannot give them to you today, I’ll inform your division leader that I will have you back in a couple of weeks while I order in what you need.”

My eyes grew wide as saucepans, “What… I n-need?” uttering nervously.

“Don’t worry, it isn’t anything too serious. On the bright side, we will get most of that done today! How does that sound?” she asked, beaming.

I didn’t quite share her enthusiasm. “Sounds great!” was my reply, returning a distinctly fake smile.

“Perfect,” she nodded, reverting her genuine smile. “First off, I’ll need to weigh you,” she said, gesturing toward a weighing pad by the door, adding afterward, “Please, step over here. Take off your shirt while you are on it, clothes can add a little bit of extra weight.”

I did as told, leaving my t-shirt on the exam table and stepping up to the pressure plate. It sank almost unnoticeably under my hooves as I fit all four of them into the space, and the two of us watched the spike on the meter move further to the right, into the two-hundreds. My jaw absolutely dropped to the floor.

“All right, two-thirty-six. Not bad, not bad,” she nodded to herself, likely taking note of it on her tablet.

“That’s horrible!” I shouted with wide-eyes, unable to remove my stare from the gauge. “Am I that fat?!”

The mare lifted a hoof to her muzzle, hushing a nicker and taking in a breath to regain her composure. “For a stallion of your size, not so much. How old are you?”

“I’m nineteen!”

“Oh.” Her ears stood up, one flicking. “Well. I imagine it will not remain for much longer.”

Her and I simply stared at each other for a full minute in silence. Mostly it was just me looking like I had learned the worst news possible. Technically speaking, I suppose it was in a way.

“Anywho,” she began, poking her hoof toward the table. “Have a seat. We’ll get started shortly.”

Here we go. Control yourself, Star. Don’t look at all costs.

Climbing back up, I settled into a comfortable position and stared ahead, ignoring what she was doing. After a few seconds, I heard the snapping of medical gloves conforming to her hooves. She turned my arm over and began feeling the inner crease thoroughly, likely in search of a vein to draw blood from.

The gentle rip of a packet tearing open sent a small shock to my chest while she slipped out a wipe of alcohol to rub along a spot in that arm’s crease. It wasn’t much, literally just one swab before she discarded the wipe.

“All right, you’re going to feel a little pinch in your arm. I need you to bend your hoof back like a dragon’s fist and take a deep breath, can you do that for me?”

I nodded briskly, twisting my hoof back to point toward myself, inhaling deeply. Within a moment’s notice, a pinch and a shiver-inducing sensation of cold steel sliding into the skin came from the middle of my arm.

“Go ahead and breathe out, and relax your hoof.”

My head leaned back a bit, emptying my lungs completely and letting my hoof relax as told. I kept looking everywhere else but my arm as to avoid seeing my own blood as it snaked through a thin tube to a vial at the other end, filling it up.

“Ooookay, perfect!” the mare said, plucking the needle out painlessly, promptly placing a cotton ball on the inject site. “Hold that there for me, will ya?”

I nodded again, slower this time, lowering my gaze to press gently on the cotton ball, dabbing it every couple of seconds until minuscule droplets of blood no longer collected. My attention momentarily shifted to the medic, who capped off the reddened vial and placed it neatly in a slot along with some others of blood drawn from fellow recruits.

The sight itself, along with the rubber tube that still tinted red with blood as she placed it in a container with a black toxic symbol on an orange sticker label, had me both cringing and on the verge of sickness. For a few moments, a cold sweat slicked my forehead, and my heart raced. Down below, my stomach churned, and I gently grasped it with a hoof, hunching over the edge of the table a bit.

“I… I think I’m going to…” Before I could finish, my throat retorted in an enormous gag. My cheeks puffed out, and a horrid taste filled my mouth.

“Trash can!” the mare barked, pointing immediately to a small trash bin in the corner.

I practically leaped off of that exam table and landed myself right in front of the bin. Without a moment of hesitation, I let the torrent go. Yellow, perhaps greenish fluid shot from my maw as I hurled loudly, coughing mid-vomit.

It wasn’t much, in all, that came out. Mostly just that thick goop with an unpleasant scent and even worse taste lingering in my mouth that had me trying to spit that out with it. Stomach acid, more than likely, considering I hadn’t yet eaten today and have been running on an empty tank since five this morning, and it was now nearing ten o’clock.

A hoof rested along my shoulder, near where my neck and back met one another, rubbing gently. In her other hoof, the mare held a little paper cup of cold water from a fountain down toward me.

“Drink this. You will feel better,” she offered.

Shakily, I looked over at the cup, then up at her, taking it gently and gulping the water down in a single swig, panting after swallowing. “T-thank you.”

With her beside me, the mare brought me back to the table, where I climbed up for a third time and proceeded to lay down to breathe. I felt weak, like my energy had gone with the blood she drew. Is it normal to feel like death after having your blood drawn?

My head turned a bit, looking over while I lay on the table. “Would… it be possible to get the big one done last?”

The mare blinked. “The penicillin shot? I’m afraid that must come next. Regulations call for it.”

A groan released from my mouth. Reluctant to do so, I rolled over onto my stomach and lifted my head shakily, wiping at my lips. “Fine. Let’s get it over with.”

“Hmm…” her eyes narrowed a bit. “Tell you what. How about I administer a sedative, so you won’t feel it as much?”

“Let me guess, that needs to be injected too?!” I squealed out, voice cracking.

“Well, yes, but it is a very tiny needle. You won’t feel it go in at all, just the fluid. That will be cold,” she said, digging into a small drawer and producing an assortment of items.

As she did, a slight dose of dizziness set in. I felt as if the room were growing in size and spinning all around me, and keeping my head elevated became a chore. “M-miss?”

“Hmmm?” she answered, clenching a terrifyingly large syringe in her teeth and filling it with a bluish transparent liquid to the brim.

Upon seeing the needle, hysteria took over, but I felt myself weakening. I felt almost too tired to really panic, prompting to lay my head down and blink slowly with heavy breaths. “I-I don’t know if I can do this.”

She placed the syringe on the counter and took another alcohol swab, wiping it along my flank an inch behind my cutie mark. “You can. It all won’t last very long. See, I mixed the sedative with that water, because almost everypony thinks they need it after the blood draw. It’s just setting in.”

Taking the syringe in her hoof, she moved up behind the table. “Now, take a deep breath and count to seven. I promise I will have finished by then.”

Closing my eyes, bracing myself for the imminent pain to shroud my flank, I drew in a sharp breath and buried my muzzle into the cold surface and began counting.
> 3. Boot Camp - Part I
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

In a surge of adrenaline, I jolted awake to a multitude of sounds occurring all at once. First was a nightstick banging against the door frame loudly, each hit sending a startling crack through the lengthy room. Behind that was a cadence of trumpets outside, significantly quieter than the racket in here.

“Wake up, wake up, wake up!” grunted a hardened stallion standing in the door, continuously smacking his baton until he saw everybody was stirring. Right then and there, every light imaginable blasted our eyes with a migraine-inducing glare that had me squinting for some time.

After a few seconds, I was up and out of bed, choosing to and regretfully ignoring the fact that my sheets were now halfway off and draped across the floor as a result of my hasty movement. Some others in the barrack suffered a similar fate, which at least provided some sense of hope that I would not be alone in the coming lecture.

I could have whipped around and threw the blankets back on quickly, but the risk of being caught out of line was too great while everyone else is stood at attention on the right of their beds beside their trunks.

It wasn’t more than a couple of moments when the roughened, uniformed, ranger-like hat-wearing stallion strolled slowly down the aisle between our racks. With disgust, he groused, “Pah, look at all a’ya! Ya know what I see, Conscripts?!”

“Sir, no, sir!” replied everypony in unison, including myself. It was as if all of the lethargy from having been abruptly woken had vanished in exchange for a fear-fueled vigor, which took varying forms per pony.

“What was that?!” he roared, the volume of his voice practically vibrating the floor beneath our hooves.

“SIR, NO, SIR!” was our response; energetic, motivated, and proud.

The fury-filled, hate-bent stallion raised his voice by many decibels. Each word spoken was like the combined barking and snarling of an angry pit bull, primed and ready to tear into someone’s flesh mercilessly. “Ah see a pack of pussies, that’s what! All of ya! Every. Single. One of ya! Disgusting!”

Thankfully, he failed to notice my mess for a different target. Instead, his enraged cores set solely on a light yellow unicorn, whose every muscle locked up at that moment forward as the incandescent pony neared him. “Ya look like yer in the wrong place, Conscript. What’s yer name?”

“Conscript Solar Wave, SIR!” the unicorn responded, keeping his tone even but firm. Judging by a brief glance in his direction, he looked less intimidated by this pony.

“What in the hell kind of fancy-prancy, sunshine and rainbows name is that?! This is the fucking Lunar Marine Corps, not Celestia’s Sunny Sunshine Cupcake-fucktards!” retorted the menacing pony, practically looming over that unicorn with his shadow, who managed not to flinch.

But that all changed when the larger earth pony winded his hoof back and thrust it directly into the unicorn’s cheek, knocking his head completely to the side and, with enough force as a result, hurled his form to the floor with a thud and a pained groan. “On your fucking hooves, Conscript!” he demanded afterward.

“Y-yes, sir…” As instructed, the unicorn, Solar Wave, shakily rose to all fours and returned to a feeble attention posture.

When he redirected his scowl, the relief I momentarily felt faded. “You! Don’t think I didn’t notice you first thing!” he pointed toward me, stomping over. “What in the holy fuck is this?!” he hollered, gesturing now to my bed in its disarrayed state.

Against what I hoped to do, I stuttered out, “I-I’m sorry, sir—”

“I am sorry, Conscript, did I give you permission to open your fat trap?! Speak only when spoken to properly, dipshit! Clean up this god forsaken atrocity at once!”

I threw myself around and grabbed my sheets by the fallen end, tossing them into the air and snapping back to face the furious-looking pony before they could fall flat to the bed, no longer splayed on the tile below. All of this while he shouted into my ear. “Move it, move it, go, faster, GO!”

“Now, you look like Lunar Marine material! State your name and rank!” he demanded, face only inches apart from mine.

“Star Shooter, sir!”

“What, Star Shooter, sir?!”

“I—” Right then and there, I froze with confusion, my jaw hanging slack as words failed to leave my mouth.

This garnered a blow equal to that dealt to the unicorn across from me. It might have been part of my expectation after watching that, not to say it still didn’t hurt like hell regardless. The cuff was powerful enough to completely jerk my head sideways, but not throw me off my hooves like it did the other pony, which I soon found to be to his annoyance.

“That’s Conscript Star Shooter, sir! Rank before name, you uneducated pile of shit!” he barked, inadvertently sending droplets of his spit onto my now-bruising cheek. Now that is just plain gross. “Don’t think ah’ll go easy on ya just ‘cause ya look like a night guard straight from Canterlot, ya filthy noble!”

That wasn’t much of an insult. Not to me, anyway, for the simple fact that I could not be farther from the title of a Canterlot aristocrat.

“What, are ya gonna cry? Are ya sad that yer fancy father in his coat and top hat ain’t here t’save ya? Or ya diamond necklace-wearin’ bitch of a mother? Well, cry me a fuckin’ river, ya degenerate!” he continued. He’s relentless! This came only because my nose twitched! “Fuckin’ disgusting-ass regal!”

None of that really made any sense. Maybe he was blind to race? Last I checked, I had wings, not a horn, and pegasi are also typically not considered nobles in Canterlot if there are any. Man, if these are his insults for the next three months, I could do better than that!

After leaving me, he strolled back down the open floor between us. “Conscripts, ah am Gunnery Sergeant Huss, yer senior drill instructor. You shall address me as Gunnery Sergeant, or sir at all times! Is that clear?!”

“Yes, Gunnery Sergeant!”

“Fan-fuckin’-tastic! Ah’ll be extra careful to make this yer most painful, most stressful, most miserable time you will have ever endured, for that is the duty ah have been put on this earth to carry out!”

Oh boy.

“Now, get yet shit on and line up on me! We are headin’ out!”


***


Irides of essentially every pony contracted upon taking in the sight of an enormous dirt loop, similar to that of a track made for racing. It boasted lengthy straightaways and 180 degree turns at both ends just like one, as well.

Just moments prior, one of the other recruits had spoken without permission, and of course it drove the instructor into doubling the number of laps to two hundred. That is, he did right before he threw the pony to the ground with a cuff to the snout. Way to go, other conscript. You earned yourself that one, and now you screwed us all over.

While the distant horizon showed signs of approaching sunrise, it was still particularly dark outside overall. A good portion of the eastern sky illuminated with brightening shades of blue that gradually darkened the further west you look, so there was that, and we could see where we were going without the need of spotlights.

As we stood there in formation, a shock hit me the moment my stomach rumbled. It managed to grab the gunnery sergeant’s attention, much to my alarm. My still-aching muscles tightened further than they already were in an attempt to straighten my posture out a bit and avoid attracting the gunnery sergeant any further in my direction.

In the middle of his lecture, he stopped upon hearing the noise and began scrutinizing our group. One or two beads of sweat collected along my temple as a result of this intimidating stallion making his way down the right side of our formation. Thankfully, he soon returned to what he was doing before. Wait a minute, I haven’t been listening!

“Is that clear?!” he bellowed at the top of his lungs, piercing the air with that terrifying voice of his.

“Yes, Gunnery Sergeant!”

The grizzled stallion’s chin tipped in a single nod, before he said, “Good.” He started toward the back, only to pause halfway and turn over his shoulder. “Well, what in the fuck are y’all still doin’ here? Go, damn it!”

Hooves scrambled on the dirt surface as every pony there then began galloping down the track as fast as their legs could move. My start had me maintaining a respectable pace, although as I rounded the first corner the energy feeding my hooves the speed necessary to run was already depleting. On the second straightaway, I succeeded in regaining some of my momentum and using it kept me going, sticking with a few of the faster recruits who were also giving it their all. This, in turn, left well over half of our division in the dust.

Coming around the second corner and reaching the start point, once more I found myself struggling to maintain that particular speed and thus placing more distance between me and four others who remained ahead from the start. My breath demonstrated a light pant to it, quickened to keep up with the gallop.

"Come on, sissies! Faster, faster!" the drill instructor shouted to one pony as he rushed up beside him, then darting past to catch up with the next pony in front of them. "Faster! FASTER! It'll be next year by the time y'all reach lap ten!"

He probably wasn’t kidding there. For how long of a track this was, I couldn’t imagine completing two hundred laps, especially in a short time period like what the gunnery sergeant presumably expected. I didn’t see myself accomplishing that. Not today, not tomorrow, not ever. There is simply no feasible way.

By lap twelve, my neck was drenched with sweat and I was on the verge of losing my breath. I had managed to prolong a steady pace that, while slower than some of the others, wasn’t awful. If this is what I need to get through this, to persevere through 188 more laps, it will have to suffice.

For how cool the morning breeze was, it had no effect on the heat my body radiated. I felt as though my body would melt away like a bag of ice left out at noon under a mid-summer sun, except the sun still had not yet crest the horizon. The idea to slow down when I am far away, or Gunnery Sergeant Huss isn’t looking sat up above, yet it went neglected by a louder voice telling me to keep pushing—and it didn’t belong to him.

Somewhere around fourteen, I lost count of the laps due to exhaustion. My legs were beginning to lag behind, thus losing pace. At this point I nowhere near expected to make fifty, let alone a hundred, or even two hundred. As I rounded the fourth turn, a lower-ranking Marine stood beside the gunnery sergeant called out to every pony that ran by, “Lap forty!”

The words hit me as a complete shock, having thought to only be nearing twenty by now. It provided little comfort nonetheless. I still had 160 to go, without any clue as to how I would accomplish that.

As I turned to look over my shoulder, I did so just in time to witness one of my fellow conscripts quite literally collapse into the dirt after his forehooves seemingly latched on and wouldn’t let go. He tumbled forward, landing flat on his back as a result. That was it for him.

I pitied the colt, contemplating for a moment or two whether or not to turn around and help him. For as much as I did, the disadvantages far outweighed the positives, despite the policy of leave no stallion behind. It pained my chest a little to abandon him, especially since no one else helped him for a short while until an enlisted Marine came down to haul him off the track.

Just past the 42nd lap, I momentarily blacked out, shaking my head in attempt to keep myself alert. My own weaknesses were getting the better of me. Aches lingering from the week prior, as well as strain in seemingly every joint caught up at last. I crashed to the ground between losing perception a second time, and the next thing I knew was I now lay flat on my stomach, with all hooves out from underneath either behind or spread on my sides.

In that instance, everything was a blur; like an artist had taken a brush to wipe the world off their canvas and smeared the color in the process. My chest heaved with every deep breath I drew in, torturing my air-deprived lungs from previously rapid respiration, to now long, full inhales. Without the ability to properly move any limbs, without any energy remaining in my system, I felt like closing my eyes and dying right there.

What noise there was had gone muffled too, like somepony had put on noise canceling headphones. All that could be made out was an overbearing pounding of a heartbeat in my ears. I blinked slowly as something cold and wet trickled through my sweat-dampened mane and down the back of my neck, as well as over my eyes and down to my muzzle. I tried lapping at it and did manage to gulp some of it down, mere moments before I passed out right there on the ground.

A strong, nagging hunch I had persistently told me that I wasn’t dead. Of course, I would imagine the first thing you see upon death is a white light. That wasn’t the case here, as everything was pitch black. Is heaven dark, or am I going to hell? I thought to myself. These judgements carried on for some time in my head, right until I felt a pinch in my left cubital.

Almost immediately afterward, a cold sensation circulated through my veins. Once burning with immense heat, my body drastically lowered in temperature over the course of a few minutes. At least, that’s what it felt like when I did finally come to.

My senses didn’t take long to recover from the shutdown, and I recognized my surroundings rather quickly. In my arm stuck a needle attached to an IV bag hanging on a pole above the cot-like bed I was laying in. Upon scanning beyond the bed, I took note of three others in the room, each occupied with one of my fellow recruits in a similar situation.

I made a slow attempt to adjust myself upright, but found I could not move a muscle. Literally. Every inch of my body ached and stung. At this point, even a habitual task such as breathing was painful, like a billion tons of quick-hardening cement had been poured over my chest and gut. I could not possibly name off what parts of me didn’t hurt. As I fell back, I bellowed a heavy grunt, followed by a low groan.

Pained screams from an adjacent room pervaded above a faint thumping in my ears, and the gentle breathing of four ponies combined. The sudden noise instinctively made me jolt, which in turn amassed further pain throughout my body. I cringed utterly upon catching on to what sounded to be either bones snapping in or out of place, or breaking altogether. Recollection of memory confirmed it was former, as one pony behind did dislocate his leg when he tripped somewhere before the tenth lap. The sound was likely caused by medics relocating the joint in the only manner possible.

Shifting attention to myself, I took notice of the fact that my shirt was missing, and the sheets didn’t cover any part of my body, presumably due to my body temperature being so dangerously high whenever I was brought in here. Then, a thought hit me: Did anypony even make two hundred laps?

Followed by another: What kind of insane-in-the-membrane pony thought it was a good idea to force newly-enlisted conscripts run two hundred laps on their first day?

Of course, there was always the possibility that it was merely a test to see where everypony’s limits were, like what Hardstaff had been having us do during P-Days. Last I recall, I made roughly forty laps in all. I think. My mind was still in a thick fog from it.

The door to the room swung open as the handle twisted downward, sounding a rather loud click throughout. I snapped my head to the right to see who it was, watching as a pure white pegasus Marine—not a medic, one bit—entered and strolled up to my bedside.

The first thing he said took the form of a question. “How are you feeling?” he flatly asked.

What words did I have to reply? I couldn't think of the best possible term to describe my state of pain.

“Horrible,” was the more appropriate way I could conceive.

“I must say, you did quite well out there, for a conscript. Do you practice?” he asked.

I really didn’t. Before now, and MEPs, especially. That did not mean I never walked around Canterlot a few times, although that was usually to run errands. “Yes, sir.” Why on earth did I say that?!

The pony didn’t smile, nor did he frown. “How often?”

“Four times a week.” No, no, I didn’t. Stop it, mouth!

“For how long?”

“An hour and a half.” The urge to throw a punch at myself and risk potentially breaking my own jaw from how fragile my bones felt was rising with each passing second, and every word I uttered.

“That would explain you making forty-five laps,” the Marine began, pulling out a chair to sit beside my bed. “You retained a decent pace, and you were one of the last to give up.”

“Really?” I blinked, surprised.

“Yes. That said, Gunnery Sergeant Huss ordered me to inform you that he is not impressed, and that you can do better.”

“Oh," was all I could say to that.

“Of course, this is only the first day. Nothing stupendous is to be expected of you regardless, although more effort would be greatly appreciated.” I honestly didn't know how to reply. For once, my mouth kept shut. “Now, rest up. You will be back at it again in a few hours.”

I nodded slowly in response, watching the Marine get up and quietly leave, before facing forward—in my case, that was straight up at the ceiling. At that moment, I felt myself heating up again. Not just because the room was unnecessarily warm, but for the fact that my blood had begun to boil like magma inside a volcano, furious at myself for agreeing to sign up for such torture. I couldn't move at all, and after today, I upheld the belief that I would not be able to move for a whole week, perhaps less if I'm lucky.
> 4. Boot Camp - Part II
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Today already sucked. Not because of the extensive exercises forced on us day after day with more presumably to be expected within the next few minutes, but simply due to the soreness plaguing every square inch of me from the moment I woke.

Every crucial muscle in my body, in addition to Celestia knows how many I have never in my life used prior to now, seared with the anguishing pain of a thousand fires, minus the part where my flesh melts away. No singular movement I made, not even the most minor, went without sending a deep, jabbing ache that internally creaked my tendons.

Hell, not even gym back in elementary was this awful, and I strongly loathed the teacher of that class. Now, here I am, wanting him back. I wanted all of it back. Why did I have to grow up? Better yet, why for the love of all things good did I sign six years of my life away for this shit, again?

Catching decent sleep at night was no simple task, either. While the constant exercising drained the final ounces of energy in me at the end of the day, it had its consequences. The same routine every morning, afternoon, and evening did my ailing body no justice. By lights out, five minutes was spent slipping into bed alone. Any quicker and I felt as if I might disintegrate, and shifting to new comfortable positions woke me to more surges of pain.

The one-minute showers granted to us twice a day, while not borderline scalding hot to my personal preference, did help somewhat, albeit for a brief period of time. Standing beneath lukewarm water as it came out of the head on the wall provided relief in the form of relaxing my throbbing muscles to the point where I developed a light tremble lasting until it was time to get down and dirty once more.

Granted, the perpetual aching was also a good thing; an indication of physical development. As mentioned by Hardstaff a day ago, pain is just weakness leaving the body. While motivational, it did essentially nothing to aid the inflicted suffering.

Day two of week one and eight days after arriving in Manehattan, the comfort of my bed at home never sounded so lovely. The peace and quiet will be long missed, I knew that from the start.

Every morning thus far has kicked off with a three-mile jog from the east wall to the west, followed by a half-mile run to the chow hall for breakfast. Turns out, there were two separate mess halls to occupy recruits for either branch occupying the base, and the only reason we saw a pack of Navy recruits the first night was once in a blue moon, such as when one place is closed for maintenance reasons. Sailors referred to theirs as the Galley. Ours was just called the Chow Hall. Damn seaponies and their fancy jargon.

After the fiasco that was P-Days, we were told to expect anything, whether that be laps around the track or fifty crunches in the Dunes; a large flat area filled with sand solely for training purposes, built to simulate desert conditions with gigantic fans along the edges. When I say the weather has been in our favor thus far, I mean for us conscripts. For all I know, Hardstaff and Huss probably pray every night for a freak monsoon so the Dunes turn into a thick, goopy mess that can swallow a pony whole. Maybe that is their plan all along, so they don’t have to put up with us any longer. Either way, here’s to hoping we will be long finished with it by the time the first storm of boot camp rolls through.

On top of the physical stuff, we had tests in the form of written exams to be concerned about. As compared to the ASVAB, which tested basic subjects covered throughout grade schooling, the advancement quizzes, consisting of thirty questions each, asked about basic military knowledge, the eleven general orders, as well as Equestrian military history centering around the Marine Corps. It was later brought to our awareness that these tests would return near the end of boot camp, so our performances now didn’t hold much significance—although, a reasonable score would be satisfactory. It just gives us more of a chance to study, barring the few or majority that did so for some time prior to enlisting.

Given I didn’t know much apart from the Marines being the most respected branch of them all, this helped quite a bit. If anything, I had more knowledge on the Army from Dad’s experiences, and how he handled the household in the years after his discharge. Even then, it wasn’t a whole lot to run by.

Come day four, when slowly waking at the reveille’s patriotic wail, as if by queue, the sergeant’s commanding tone rang out across the barrack, sending a shock to my crumbling system. “Conscript Star Shooter! Get your ass moving, on the double!”

Yep, today already sucks.


***


Like the gears of a machine working nonstop, I felt as though my joints desperately needed oiling in order to avoid locking up. The cracking of my bones itself was embarrassing as I moved in formation, and every gentle stride I took met with newfound soreness from hoof to shoulder, even past my chest and back to where respiration itself gradually became more difficult, albeit not to the point of straight-up suffocation, and the mere pulsating across my body deprived of what energy I had regained overnight.

I wasn’t old, but reaching my teen years determined I wouldn’t nearly have the exuberance of a foal. It doesn’t mean, at nineteen and slightly out of shape, that I should be popping all over like an elderly mare, either. If this doesn’t turn me into a laughing stock at some point, even if it is just to the sergeant or our instructor, I don’t know what will. To my relief, however, it seemed to alleviate the aches a little. Eventually, most of the pain throughout my body utterly vanished, bound to return this evening in yet another one-two punch. For now, I was regenerated.

Led by Hardstaff under the soft blues, yellows, and oranges of daybreak, we lined up over symmetrically-placed white markings in the cement before our barrack. They were there for the ponies who had more trouble figuring out their position in formation, though no one in our training unit really needed them anymore.

Upon halting, to our surprise, there was no sign of the gunnery sergeant anywhere. Yet, that is. Typically he meets us out here at the end of our base-wide march, leading to some suspicions as to what was going on. But, of course, all good things must come to an end. The older, emerald-coated stallion, donning his dark brown, leather campaign hat and uniform seemingly emerged from the early-morning shadows, gradually approaching from the left to pull up beside Hardstaff.

“Well, lookie, lookie. A bunch of little pussy fillies who think they’ve got what it takes to be stallions and stand up to fight for their country. Disgustin’! And y’all still haven’t quit. Fuckin’ perfect!” he spat, the wad of his saliva landing short of the hooves of the stallion on my right.

“Admittedly, y’all did somewhat decent yesterday,” he added, letting his tone soften. Based on what we’ve seen so far, that is almost never a positive sign off the get-go. At that, I numbly tensed.

The gunnery sergeant then started down the line, menacingly glaring down each pony he passed before halting in front of one for a good few seconds in attempt to break him. It didn’t work, and he moved on. 

“But ah ain’t done with y’all yet,” he snickered in a rather sinister manner. “Today, y’all move on to sit-ups and crunches to go with yer push-ups.”

Blinking in bewilderment, the very same light yellow unicorn to have garnered an honorable punch from Huss days ago, spoke up. “Sir, aren’t sit-ups and crunches one in the same?”

In a flash, the gunnery sergeant was up in poor Solar Wave’s face, looming over the much younger stallion. If the sun were up and behind Huss, his shadow would have cast completely over the unicorn. “Did ah give ya permission to speak, Conscript?!”

“N-no, Gunnery Sergeant!” sputtered Solar, struggling to maintain attentive posture and prevent from looking up into Huss’ wrathful cores and probably fearing for his life right then. I saw it in his stance, the faint tremble he sported, he expected to be struck down.

“That’s what ah fuckin’ thought!” the gunnery sergeant shouted, backing off a moment after, much to everypony’s surprise. “Let this be a lesson to you dumb fucks. As so stupidly and incorrectly pointed out by yer fellow conscript, no, they are not one in the same! I don’t wanna hear no moanin’, no cryin’, nothin’ when ya start.”

Standing just a couple paces ahead of a smirking Hardstaff, the gunnery sergeant’s terrifying violet irides scanned across our group. “Y’all will see just why they ain’t the same.”

“Conscripts!” called Sergeant Hardstaff as soon as Huss finished. “On me, single file!”

Lovely, more walking. Just what I need right about now.


***


“Conscripts! What is the first general order?!” barked Hardstaff, taking long, slow strides up and down the line.

“To take charge of this post and all kingdom property in view!” we answered in near-perfect unison. There were a few who needed reminding, and hearing others speak served as that to where they joined in mid-sentence.

“Good! What is the fourth general order?!” he shouted, turning around to walk the other direction. He was testing us, checking whether or not we were studying.

“To repeat all calls from posts more distant from the guard house than my own!”

“Eighth general order!”

“To…” there was hesitation between everypony. “To talk to no one except in the line of duty!”

“Wrong!” he yelled, whipping around and stomping his forehoof into the dirt. Even I felt the strain in his vocal cords. “That’s the seventh general order! Drop and give me twenty!”

At that, a collective groan emanated from around. The night-blue pegasus’ ears stood up. “Shall I make it forty, conscripts?!”

Without any hesitation, we dropped at our own pace, making an effort to synchronize our push-ups to where we could call out in a non-confusing manner. First time this happened, we had ponies shouting the number they were currently at while others addressed differently. It was a total clusterfuck. With some practice, we called, “One, Sergeant!” with much improvement in timing compared to earlier in the week.

Upon finishing at twenty, we rose to all fours at firm attention. Boy, if I don’t pull any more muscles by this evening…

“Third general order, go!”

“To report all violations of orders I am instructed to enforce!”

“Excellent! Ninth general order!”

“To call the Corporal of the Guard in any case not instructed!”

“In any case not covered by instructions!” Hardstaff corrected. “I’ll let that one slide. Fifth general order!”

“To quit my post only when relieved!”

“Second general order!”

Out loud, I yelled, “To walk my post in a military manner, keeping always on the alert, and observing everything that takes place within sight or hearing!”

However, the majority of the group responded with, “To salute all officers and all colors and standards not cased!” completely drowning out my answer.

“Wrong! Drop and give me thirty!”

Damn it, you screwed us all! was what I wanted to call out, but knowing if I did would result in punishment in the form of an extra number being tacked on. At least I was gradually improving on my push-ups it seemed.

A film of sweat coated every last area of my body from forehead to flanks, dampening the single t-shirt I wore with a notable wet stain down to the midpoint of my chest with two more in my pits. Flames ran up the length of my arms to my shoulders, pulsing between intensities every time I pushed up and grunting softly as I did so.

Hunger-induced weakness was beginning to settle in, and each push-up gradually slowed as a body-wide tremor left me struggling to keep up with the others. While I can imagine breakfast wasn’t too far away, the incremental passage of time made it seem so. 

The movies made this exercise seem so much simpler than it actually turned out to be. Even though I found myself churning out more each day with less effort, I simply could not understand how anypony is able to make fifty in one minute, let alone double that in twice the time, the universal requirement for all recruits by the end of training in a little over ten weeks. Thirty was pushing it in my case!

“Faster, faster!” the gunnery sergeant barked, trotting up on my side. My attempts to pick up the pace were abruptly cut short by the older stallion’s hoof kicking into my wing. 

The blow, while admittedly not as strong as I took it to be, came off as a shock to my system and forced my hooves to completely give out from underneath. I fell flat to the dirt, heaving for oxygen. Two more knocks, this time to my shoulder, turned me almost on my right side. 

Withdrawing a step, the emerald-coated instructor snarled, “Pathetic! Get up, Conscript!”

Shakily, I turned upright and returned to push-up position, only to receive another hard smack to the muzzle that I barely managed to prevent from knocking me down again.

Dipping his head, putting his muzzle near my ear, he yelled at the top of his lungs, “On your hooves, dipshit! On your fucking hooves!” causing me to wince.

Without a moment spent hesitating, I leaped up and stood tall, despite my body’s persistent tremble. I was in trouble now. At least, he had me convinced that I was.

“Look at me, Conscript!”

The second my gaze shifted to him, a powerful blast of frigid water initially struck my chest, before moving up to my face. It caught me so terribly off guard that I lost all sense of awareness for a good half-minute.

I fell backwards, forced onto my flanks while attempting to fight off the relentless stream from a fire hose held by a Marine corporal on the gunnery sergeant’s side. Turning my head away did nothing in my favor, and the water kept on coming. At least now I could breathe this way, though now I basically exposed my bruised, albeit healing cheek to the violent jet.

Grunting, clenching his teeth, the gunnery sergeant shouted over the roaring torrent. “You weren’t supposed to fucking look, damn it! Get yer ass back up and take it like a stallion!”

Holding just one forehoof out in front of my face to deflect at least some of the water as it pushed against me, whilst also spraying a few of the surrounding recruits as consequence, I did reluctantly manage to stand back up against the current. Without getting back on all fours, however, I immediately returned to what I was doing.

While slower than I had hoped for, my pace held steady, even with the constant spray of icy water splashing against my forehead. Though, I must confess, the cold sensation against my burning skin worked wonders and prevented me from overheating. However, with each push-up, my limbs felt more like cooking pasta in a boiling pot the longer I persevered. They wanted to give out on me for good, even when the stream of the hose redirected to another troubled recruit. But I wasn’t about to let that happen. By now, I was determined not to fail.

Soaking wet and dripping into a larger puddle around me, I pushed on. “Come on…” I mumbled to myself, making attempts to quell my strain-induced grunts. My pace had gained ground as my muscles readjusted to the rhythm of my exercise, leaving the pervading tenderness in my body behind in the dust.

“Time’s up!” called the gunnery sergeant, nodding to the corporal beside him, who pulled a lever on the nozzle to cut the flow of water.

At his word, I fell flat to the ground once more, face pressed against the soft, drenched grass. Each breath I drew in was deep, but burned my lungs as if they had spontaneously combusted. My heart beat at such a rate that, if a medic were to check right this second, he or she might not even detect a pulse. Worse yet, it throbbed in my ears, drowning out the sounds of other recruits struggling to their hooves and the combined yells of Sergeant Hardstaff and Gunnery Sergeant Huss.

Just barely did I make the instructed count, and the pride within fluctuated above the amount of pain I now lay utterly motionless in. It was one step closer to the set goal. And I would have to do it yet again this afternoon, and tomorrow, and the day after that, and so on. But by the end of this week, I’d be ready to take on fifty.

“On your hooves, conscripts! It’s time to hit the chow house!” shouted Hardstaff, glaring his ice-blue cores across all fifteen of us at once.

Quite honestly, I didn’t want to move for a few minutes. Or a few hours. Why not a few days? Yet I couldn’t disobey a direct order. Fighting against my knees that ultimately felt like noodles, I succeeded in being able to sustain my own weight just a little while longer.


***


The ten-minute break that was our breakfast could not have come sooner for me. Before we could head inside and grab our food, Hardstaff and the gunnery sergeant held us short of the door so we could one by one enter, calling our number in line ahead of addressing them.

Being as hungry as I was, that spiked the impatience in me, and I so desperately wanted to just run in. That would have ended disastrously for me, though, and it would be my stupidity that costs my fellow recruits.

My stomach had been rumbling since the moment I woke—or, more like, was abruptly woken. Thankfully, the only line between me and the pony serving up trays of hot and ready oatmeal with a small side of fresh fruit was four of the recruits ahead of me, being ninth in line into the chow hall.

What we were provided with would suffice, just until lunch rolls around in some four and a half or five hours. I couldn’t be bothered to keep track of time anymore. It didn’t matter much, given the amount of micromanagement put into our daily routine to make sure everything ran accordingly and that we were on track for graduation in mid-September. Anything I did, the fifteen of us in all did as a group—no, a squad. That’s what we were. That’s what we are set to become in due time.

Like usual, I took a seat at one of the emptier tables, minding the gap placed between myself and the other conscripts. Even though nopony interacted with one another, I still preferred keeping distance. For some odd reason, outing myself from the rest in free time such as now was a preference of mine.

Smacking a pack of plastic utensils by their ends and removing the wrapper they sat in, I took the spoon, dipping it into the steamy brown goo. To most ponies back home in Canterlot, they would absolutely freak at the sight of this dish. Of course, the food at boot camp isn’t exactly meant to appease the aristocrats. Not that I cared, anyway. As long as it keeps me fed and alert on the training grounds, it goes on in the pipe.

While not exactly like glue, the oatmeal here had a kind of viscosity that most would find utterly nauseating, especially the nasty, squishing noises it makes every time you move your spoon around; not to mention the thin little sticky tendrils that stretch between the two surfaces as you lift it to your mouth.

In fact, I’m sure television food critics would have a hayday in regards to virtually every meal at the chow hall, not just the oatmeal. But, on the plus side, it wasn’t an MRE.

I chewed slowly. Somehow, without using it for more than responding to name calls and yelling 'Sir, yes, sir', which wasn't very often mind you, my jaw was in similar amounts of pain as the rest of my aching body.

“H-hey there,” came a docile-esque, quiet voice from just in front. Looking up from my breakfast, on the opposite side of the table stood a beige-coated unicorn with a two-toned greyish-silver mane, roughly my size in height and of similar build, holding his own food tray in a deep crimson hue. “Can I… sit here with you?” he questioned at my mere acknowledgement of him, smiling innocently.

I stared for a good couple of seconds, blinking twice. “Be my guest,” was my response, done quietly so as to not attract any of the instructors watching over us. Roughly two weeks in and conversing between recruits was still prohibited.

“Thank you,” he whispered, gently lowering his metal tray before seating himself directly across from me. Anxiously, the beige pony carefully studied his surroundings. “I think I’m in the wrong place.”

“What makes you say that?” I queried, shoveling in a spoonful of cinnamon-flavored oats before taking notice of the ‘NAVY’ in small, bold white lettering across his right breast. There’s the obvious answer to my question. 

My hoof froze just before I could take another bite, gaze lifting to meet the young stallion’s magenta irides. “How in the hell did you screw that up?”

At that, he turned dead pale with angst. “I-is it bad?”

Damn it, look what you did, Star. Now he looks like he’s gonna flip out over a slight mishap. Wait a second, you would, too. “Well…” I began, offering a bit of a sheepish smile in return. “This is the Marines’ hall.”

In swift response, the unicorn’s face fell flat to the table with a thump, gently shaking our trays. Into the flat surface, he let off a muffled groan. “Damn it all, Silver, you did it again…”

I cocked my head a little at his remark. “Not your first time winding up in the wrong spot, eh?”

He gave a slow shake of his head against the table, only lifting it when he finished, sporting a saddened, worried look on his countenance as he made steady eye contact. “Twice in three weeks. My RDC is going to skin me alive for the others to see.”

“RDC?” I questioned, puzzled. “Navy version of a gunnery sergeant, I presume?”

“Recruit Division Commander,” he nodded. “We get more than one. Actually, we get three. I hear they’re pretty well balanced between mares and stallions here as far as RDCs go.”

“Huh, you learn something new every day,” I commented lightheartedly, hoping to lift the poor soon-to-be-sailor’s mood.

The unicorn brought his head up off the table, giving the faintest of simpers in response, lifting an orange slice in his magic. “Heh, yeah.” With that, he softly chewed on the small portion, though that did not stop him from talking some more. “What’s your name?”

Unlike him, I took a brief moment to completely swallow. “Star Shooter. You?” I replied, taking my own peeled orange by the hoof and splitting it down the center to begin pulling apart the individual slices.

“Silver Edge,” he answered. Oddly fitting, considering the off-center silver streak straight down his stone-grey mane.

“Pleasure to meet you,” I said, retaining a low volume and keeping to short responses. It was small talk mostly, though I suppose it is a start for making friends here. Not like I have many to go by back home anyway.

At that, he beamed a little. Only a bit. His demeanor definitely changed after our little exchange. I suppose that counts as my good deed for the day. Now, hopefully, he doesn’t speak for the duration of breakfast. It would be nice to stay out of more trouble today.

“S-so…” he began meekly. There goes that wish. “Where are you from?”

I didn’t rush as I forced the bite of oatmeal down my tube. “Coltlumbus.”

“Oh! I hear that is a nice city.”

My gaze flicked up at him, coming off in a way that might have startled him inside. I shrugged to retain an approachable appearance. “It’s alright, I guess. I wouldn’t recommend living there. I live in Canterlot now.”

“Oh.” A faint blush lit up on the beige unicorn’s cheeks, seemingly in embarrassment. At that, he went quiet for a few moments to catch up on eating, before another question arose. “So, what made you join?”

Having returned my attention to my food, I only partially processed the query. “Pardon?”

“What made you choose the Marines?” he repeated, offering a thin, friendly smile.

I blinked a couple of times, setting my spoon down on the edge of the glass bowl. For only a moment or two, I mused over my answer, then gave another shrug of my shoulders.

“I don’t… really know, honestly,” I said, meeting his magenta sights softly with a primarily neutral countenance. “I guess, I kind of needed a job, and something to get me out of the house more often. I got fed up with being lazy and relying on unemployment pay to get by, even if it was plenty.”

I then curtly and quietly chuckled. “I sound like the exact opposite of what any normal pony would die to have for their lives; be comfortable and not have to work without a worry in the world. But it’s just not fulfilling. I feel like I was born for a purpose other than to sit around and be lonely.”

The last part said was completely unintentional and rather out of the blue. Yet it felt strangely relieving to unravel and say it at last for what it was, and that was the truth of my life.

However, despite the somewhat dark turn of the discussion, Silver simply perked his ears in curiosity rather than droop them in pity. “Oh. So just seeking a change of perspective, huh?”

I let myself relax a little, slumping gently over the table and my tray. After a moment, I nodded. “Yeah, that sounds like a decent explanation in short words.”

The unicorn smiled once again, raising up his fruit cup with his hoof. “Well, good for you! It’s that kind of initiative that sparks something great in ponies.”

I gave a third shrug, but simpered in my own indiscernible way. His outlook on the world was something, and I could only appreciate it and him. “You’re right, it does.” While I might not have shared his apparent enthusiasm, seeing his added a pinch of confidence in my case, albeit insignificant.

He tipped his chin in what I could assume was a kind of nod. “So, what’s it you want to major in?”

“My… major?” I blinked, puzzled a tad at first.

“You know, your rate!” he added just a second ahead of plopping a tangerine slice in his mouth. “I don’t know if that’s what you Marines call your jobs, but hey, we gave birth to you!”

“Right…” I nodded in partial acknowledgement. “Uh… I don’t know. Tracking? Radar stuff? If I’m going to be on a ship, that is. I hear Marines go on sea tours now and then.”

“Oh, yeah! The vast majority of all Marines go on ships at least once in their enlistment, because there isn’t much else to do in peacetime! That, and you guys serve as a secondary defense force.”

“So… maybe?” I cocked my head with a sheepish look. Frankly I was clueless as to my direction in the service right now. Hell, I didn’t exactly give myself enough time to decide. “I don’t know. Weather stuff seems cool, too. I used to be real passionate about it as a colt. Still kind of awes me today.”

“Well, if they put you with a radar screen, you will surely be at least taking some climate data here and there. That’s a given,” he said, taking a two-gulp swig from his own milk carton.

“I suppose,” was my response. Damn, he knows his stuff. But, please, stop talking before somepony calls us out, went my conscience. “What made you join the Navy?” I returned, as the huge hypocrite I was.

“I kind of have a passion for the ocean. Not a big one, but enough where I don’t mind it. My dad thinks I’m crazy for finding a slab of region with water miles deep and thousands of square miles across even somewhat attractive a view, but I think it’s more than that. Oh! And my uncle, the youngest of them, he’s a chief petty officer on the Gibbous!”

My head tilted again, this time out of genuine curiosity. “The Gibbous?”

“Guided missile destroyer, one of many in the Lunar Fleet,” beamed Silver proudly. “I wanted to tour it way back, not long after its first or second tour below the Zebrican Peninsula, but… I never got the chance,” he faltered, only to perk again shortly after. “But since then, I’ve wanted to serve with my uncle, or perhaps even under his command one day!”

“Heh. Well, that’s an aspiring dream.” Sadly, I don’t think it works that way, though I could be wrong. I wasn’t about to break that news to him here. “I hope you make it.”

“So do I, man. So do I.” He smiled warmly. “But, if not, I’ll happily settle for a submarine or something.”

At that, a sudden chill crawled up my spine, causing me to shudder. “Submarines…”

Silver’s eyes widened just a little, and he frowned, taking the appearance that he had been offended when, quite clearly, he wasn’t actually. “What? You don’t like them?”

“They creep me out.” I shivered some more, ruffling my feathers and re-sparking the aches in my tendons. This time, I disregarded the pain to continue. “The idea of being a few hundred feet under the ocean in a dark, cold pressurized tin can just doesn’t sit right with me, especially when we don’t know all that is down there.”

“Hey, it can’t be that bad! They’re actually quite large with plenty of room! Hell, you’ll probably forget about it after a while! Just probably have to get used to sharing a tiny room with three others, but that’s with all vessels. They’re big. Small, but big.”

For a moment, I had trouble computing what he had just said, so I simply nodded in response. “Well, to me, it’s not natural. None of it.” I insisted, but in a moderately playful manner to where he could tell I wasn’t trying to strike him down. “And I refuse to get near one, not even in drydock.”

He shrugged. “Suit yourself. I think it would be pretty damn cool!”

A last shiver of my body was the icing on the cake, going back to my food. I could tell he wanted to talk more about subs with the amount of restraint I noted on his mien. Fear or no fear, it was best if he went quiet now. I think somepony was getting on our case at last.


***


Any time now, and I can quit hurting all over. Any minute. Any second. Any hour. I begged, and begged, though unlikely at this point that my cries will be answered, let alone heard. Yet I had to constantly remind myself that, despite being here for eight days already, today was only the second damn official day. September was quite a ways off, regrettably.

It was a few minutes from bedtime, at long last. After yet another long day of workouts, it was on to… yet another long day jam packed with, you guessed it… workouts! Showering did little to quell the aches this time. By now my nerves have probably passed the point of no return in terms of pain, and it was just a constant thing that will never go away. I didn’t even know what it is like to be completely normal anymore.

Sergeant Hardstaff was hard on us off the get-go. Now I long for those days to return. Maybe they will, should something absolutely terrible happens to the gunnery sergeant.

Yeah, like a train accident. No, wait. Training accident. That’s more like it. Maybe somepony will grow fed up and shove him off a platform to his death or something. It’s bound to happen.

Wait a second. Did I just let myself get on a roll with intrusive thoughts? I wouldn’t actually kill somepony, even in self defense. Why would I? What good would it do for me? The old prune probably has foals—ones that are probably in their twenties or thirties by now, but foals of his own regardless.

Those contemplations were fairly and oddly common with me. Heck, weren’t they with everypony from time to time? If not, that is concerning. But I’m pretty certain that I am not the only one to get intrusive thoughts now and again. At first I worried I took a wrong turn and was slowly working myself to becoming just a psychopath. That was, until one night when I did a little bit of online research and discovered that I might not be one just yet.

But if anything does drive me to absolute insanity, it will be these next few months. Maybe to the point where I don’t feel pain anymore. Isn’t that how all ponies are molded into soldiers, sailors, and Marines? I sure hope so. Otherwise, I’m screwed.

“Yer clothes are as wrinkly as mah granny’s ass cheeks! Hell, even she has less wrinkles!” I heard from a few racks down, before my attention was really grabbed. “Conscript Star Shooter, get yer ass over here and help out yer comrade!”

Not a second after swiveling my body to face the two, my gaze met with the stabbing glare of the gunnery sergeant; but more importantly, the icy, menacing look of the pony presently taking the brunt. He was a tall, dark brown earth pony. Draft, to be precise, and he had hazel cores with a mane as black as tar. Two seconds spent briefly examining this stallion from afar told me he was somepony not to trifle with his family. Or anytime.

Then I refocused to the gunnery sergeant’s command. Hesitating none, I marched down to the other conscript’s rack and discovered just why Huss was furious and made such a vulgar declaration—and quite frankly, it wasn’t all too inaccurate; most of the conscript’s clothes were simply tossed into his hooflocker with no thought, and those that had been plucked out for inspection were wrinkled to hell and in desperate need of a quick run in the dryer. 

Unfortunately for him, we ourselves did not have access to such a luxury. That’s another thing I wouldn’t have expected, to not have to wash our own clothes. Just fold and store them properly. Why is that difficult for this guy? He is clearly an adult like the rest of us; surely he should know how to.

Without so much as waiting for the gunnery sergeant’s order, I brought out the rest of the conscript’s tops and laid them out across his bed, folding and piling each one by one atop the other until a single short neat stack stood on it. Upon finishing, I placed the stack gently into his hooflocker, allowing to fit snugly inside with a little bit of room to spare, where Huss smacked the lid shut mere inches from my own hoof as I pulled it away.

“Nice t’ see somepony wasn’t raised in a damn barn!” the gunnery sergeant grunted with a snort, stomping away as we both snapped to a semi-attentive stance.

We broke posture to return to what we were doing prior, and as I turned to head back to my own rack, the draft stallion bumped me intentionally. Had he been around my size, I wouldn’t have stumbled over a couple of feet like I did, immediately snapping my head to flick a cold glance at him.

As condescending as can be, he muttered on his way past while dipping his head slightly to my eye level, “You better watch your back, boy.”

For some odd reason, it wasn’t exactly his size that intimidated me. Perhaps the tone of his voice? I dunno. I would have thought he’d be thanking me for being voluntold to save his ass. Instead it seems I have made an enemy already.

Before I knew what to think next, the room went dark, and the gunnery sergeant’s voice rang out one last time. “Light’s out, maggots!”
> 5. Boot Camp - Part III
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The next day consisted of even more track all day long, followed by insanely sore nerves and joints at night. Though, I'm happy to say that I didn't pass out like the first time, but I didn't make the full one hundred laps because of time restraints. At that point, things already weren't looking good for me and the two others who didn't make the time. I'd be lucky to pass.

That night, a well overdue rain shower was lingering in the skies over Manehattan. Dark, nasty storm clouds coated the sky as the sun began to set. Just an hour after the clouds rolled in, the first drops of rain pattered the gravel paths of the naval station, but the normal activity didn't cease. That all changed when the spring sprinkle turned into a raging monsoon with near-gale force winds. Had they been any stronger, and it might have been considered an inland-formed hurricane.

I sat in the mess hall at one of the tables, slowly lifting a spoonful of bland mashed potatoes into my mouth while listening to the low roar of the rain beating on the roof. I ate slowly, hoping the rain would let up a bit so I could make my way back to the barrack with some ease. But, that break never came. In fact, the storm worsened. Soon, lightning crackled in the sky and struck the antennas of Manehattan's numerous towers across the river.

I sighed and eventually finished my meal, then took my jacket and slipped it on, buttoning it up tight. I walked to the door, but was stopped by a familiar voice.

"Star Shooter!"

I glanced behind me, galloping across the room towards me was no one other than Silver Edge, the unicorn I met two days ago. He looked a bit panicked, but happy to see me at the same time.

"Hey," I cracked a smile. I guess you could say I was down like the weather.

"So, uh, my barrack is way across the base. Would you...I dunno...mind if I stayed at your barrack?" He blushed a little.

I thought for a second, then shrugged. "I doubt the D.S. would mind."

He smiled big. "Thank you...thank you Star, you're a real life saver."

"I don't know how that's the case, its not like I own the place," I chuckled.

Silver chuckled at that. "Very well. Out into the rain we go."

I sighed. "Out we go."

We walked out of the doors of the mess hall and under a small canopy that shielded us from most of the rain, but with the winds whipping around, we still got soaked pretty quickly. We ran out in the open, fighting against the storm's blinding rain and towards Barrack 19. Puddles were already built up from the heavy rainfall we had gotten in just the last two hours, I could only imagine what it would be like tomorrow. 

Finally, we ran into the barrack, our manes, coats, and uniform soaked and hooves slightly muddy. I shivered, as did Silver, until he cast some kind of spell on himself that got dried him off almost instantly. I looked at him, then trotted up to a vacant bed. "Here, you can sleep in this one."

Silver smiled. "Thank you, Star," he then wrapped his hooves around me in a hug.

My eyes opened wide, I stood completely still as he hugged me, it made me laugh inside knowing he would be wet again just from hugging me. I slowly and awkwardly hugged back, then he dried himself off once more with the same spell. For Luna's sake, he didn't even bother to remove one drop from myself, let alone dry me completely off!

I let it go after a few moments and went to shower. It relieved me knowing we were allowed to have a shower before bed if we wanted one, and not only did it warm me back up, but I felt a bit refreshed. Warm showers usually helped me relax some if I felt sore, which I was extremely achy after another day of training. It was just going to get much worse too.

Just after I got out of the shower room, the drill sergeant called for lights out, and I surprisingly dodged a lecture for allowing Silver to sleep out of his assigned barrack. But, I wasn't cold hearted. Besides, I wasn't one to make rules there.

I crawled into my bed with some pain still circulating through my tense body, laying down and getting comfortable. The rain beat down harder on the roof outside, loud enough to drown out whispers if there were any. As I shut my eyes, it hit me that tomorrow, if the rain had subsided, it would still be much harder training. From what I had heard, post-storms during military training were hell, especially because of the deep mud that one could easily get stuck in. If we were supposed to do more track tomorrow, that would be especially tricky, knowing the entire track was dirt, and tomorrow would be equivalent to walking through drying cement.

I didn't let the thought get to me, and quickly drifted off into a quiet slumber.


***


The next morning was the same as the last two. Drill sergeant bursting in, we get dressed and line up, and then we head outside. And just as I expected, after last night's storm, the ground was wet and squishy, and whatever areas that weren't grass were just wet gravel, or deep pits of mud. It slowed down the activity in and around the base, but it slowly picked back up again after some time. And, just like that, we were assigned to even more track.

Again, as I expected, the entire track was nothing but mud, knee-deep in some spots. I knew I'd be lucky to avoid that. And just like the days before, we were expected to complete a hundred laps in thirty minutes. This would be especially hard to do, and since the sun wasn't going to be up for a while, the mud wasn't expected to dry up either.

We started around 0600 hours, earlier than before, and I'll tell you, that day was extremely hard. Even after the last couple of days and getting somewhat back into shape, running—or should I say trudging—was next to impossible. Most of the others got stuck a couple of times and didn't have anypony else to help them either. I was more focused on getting through at least the first fifty laps so they wouldn't make me come back later. Believe it or not, the entire time they had a requirement of fifty to pass on to the next day. I wasn't behind, thank Luna.

Then, somewhere after lap thirty, I was in one of those spots. I moved over just a little bit to pass by another recruit—I mean conscript—who was having some trouble but still made an effort, and wouldn't you know it, I immediately sunk to my wing midline, and the mud gripped my hooves tightly, almost sealing them down. I had been stuck in mud a couple of times before, but nothing compared to this. It sucked, that was for sure.

Even though we weren't granted any help, after some time the trainers watching us at the end of a lap realized I hadn't passed by and went to check. They found me struggling and squirming and actually sinking further into the track. It was even wet enough that it gradually conformed around me and made the situation worse.

"Bloody hell!" I shouted in anger after ten minutes. I then noticed a unicorn in Lunar Republic cammies standing on the edge of the track, he lit his horn in a silver aura that soon surrounded me completely. He lifted me out of the hole, then set me back down in the middle of the track. My hooves sunk in again, but not as deep and I could move again. I nodded in thanks and began trudging—again.

Fifteen minutes later, the time limit was up. I made it to fifty seven laps. A close call, but I was relieved to have passed. Even all of the others, some of who were behind in their training by a day or two made it, even in those conditions. And out of everypony else in the group, I was the dirtiest. From my hooves up to almost the top of my wings—that being almost up to my back—was turned brown, and with the breeze that always blew in from the ocean, it was drying quickly and I needed a shower.

The drill sergeant let us off to have showers thankfully, and each of us took at least twenty or thirty minutes in the shower rooms. Though it was awkward, I was happy that four at a time shared the showers, so we could help each other get clean. I was also happy that nopony had any ideas.

By the time we were all done showering, the sun was just a bit above the horizon, and we were all sent to the mess hall—the others called it the chow house—for breakfast. Eggs and bacon with a cup of black coffee. I personally liked cream in my coffee, but I didn't have a choice, so I hesitantly drank it—a little bit of it. As for the food, it only took a couple of minutes to disappear. 

I waited until everypony else finished, knowing we would be heading back out for more exercises. To my surprise, twenty minutes later, no one came to collect us. It was beyond strange, and soon questions started to go around the mess hall about what was going on. I heard one of the conscripts sitting at my table talking about how it could be a surprise training exercise. I didn't think we would be getting to those yet, but it was the Lunar Marines, anything could happen.

I could tell everypony in the room was tense, even I was. But, none of us knew what to expect. I heard some things saying a tear gas attack, I heard others say what the vets—the ones who have been in training or even the Lunar Marines longer—called a battle exercise, a training session that acts as if an attack were happening and we would need to scramble to battle stations to fight back.

But, nothing happened. After some time, we were all finally collected by the drill sergeant and taken outside for another physical test—which meant more push ups and sit ups.

I have to say though, thank the princesses for the rain we had the night before. It was a cold front that brought cooler temperatures to the region. But, it had clouded up again, which meant no sun—and even cooler than expected temperatures. With the breeze, it felt kind of chilly. Especially since I was forced to hand my jacket over to the dry cleaners, I was about the only one just wearing a t-shirt.

We started the first session of push ups—fifty at a time—and then sit ups—another fifty. We transitioned between the two exercises until we reached about two hundred and fifty each. As exhausting as it was, it actually felt good to get my heart pumping again. I was gradually looking up to the rest of training, but I knew it wouldn't all be these exercises for the next seven weeks.

"Conscript Star Shooter!" The drill sergeant shouted to me as I performed sit ups. My normal habit would make me stand up—or at least stop to look at him. I remembered what happened last time and I just kept going. He continued to shout at me, I sneakily noticed the hose in his hoof. I think it surprised him when I didn't stop to look at him, because he didn't spray me. Or, he was just being nice to me today—I doubt it was the second reason.

After we finished, the drill sergeant asked for everyone to carry on. He let everypony leave—excluding me of course. He walked up to me with a hardened glare. I tensed up and remained at attention.

"Now what in the hell is wrong with you, boy? Ah told ya to look at me, and ya didn't! Disrespectful as hell!" He threw a hoof into my chin. It popped, and I let out a groan of pain but remained still. He clenched his teeth angrily, I braced myself for a hard beating, but that never came.

"You were smart," was the last thing he said before leaving. I was surprised to say the least.
> 6. The Welcomed Day Off
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I slept soundly in my bed, one hoof hanging off the edge of it. I wasn't much of a snorer, but apparently I got loud at night. Of course, the barrack I stayed in had about eight others inside of it. I could have been mistaken for somepony else's snoring. The training we had the day before left me exhausted and sore yet again, nothing a hot shower wouldn't help.

Out of nowhere, I shot awake. My heart raced a hundred miles per hour as I sat up. I glanced around as quickly as I could and quickly realized everypony else was gone.

"Shoot, I missed the morning call!" I threw the sheets off of myself and stood up. I apparently didn't throw them off in the right direction and I fell face first onto the floor after getting my hind leg caught. I flailed and kicked the blanket off of my hoof and jumped to all fours. I darted to the door and ran outside. It was worse than I thought. 

The sun was up. Even more so, it was high up. I looked to my side, and suddenly the drill sergeant was standing there with the worst glare I've ever seen. I jumped in surprise then snapped to attention.

"What the hell are ya doin' boy?! Ya slept in, bloody disgrace!" He hissed.

"I-I'm sorry, sir! It was a mistake!" I shook in fear.

"We don't accept mistakes like you!" He shouted into my face. Then, all of a sudden, his voice turned demonic. "And you won't see the sun again."

The next thing I knew, his teeth had grown into massive, sharp fangs, his eyes black and bloodied, and his tongue like that of a snake. My eyes opened wide and I pinned my ears to my head.

"S-sir...I..." I stuttered, now terrified.

Then, everything went black. I thought I was dead. I knew I was dead. And I was going to hell.


***


I woke up screaming, loud enough to wake up the entire barrack, perhaps the one beside ours too. I stopped and panted, then slowly looked around me. To my surprise, nothing was that different, except more of a golden glow flowing into the barrack through the front windows, and most of my barrack mates were there, scattered around the room doing their own thing. I think once I started screaming, I unintentionally brought all of their attention to me.

"Star Shooter, what's wrong?!"

I glanced up, Solar Wave stood there, looking down at me in concern. I then stared forward, quickly calming myself down. "N-nothing. Just er," I moved the blanket off of my lower body. "Bad dream is all."

"Are you sure?" The unicorn tilted his head and was still staring at me.

I nodded and rose from my bed. "A hundred and ten percent."

He sighed in relief. "Your screaming almost gave me a heart attack. What scared you?"

I wasn't sure if I wanted to talk about it. "I dreamed that I slept in."

Solar Wave tilted his head with an eyebrow cocked upwards. "Wha?"

"...I slept in here?"

"I still don't get it."

I sighed. "Forget it. I'm awake now. Did I miss anything?"

Solar shook his head. "We just got up ten minutes ago. Our CO came in and said today's a day off due to the drill sergeant coming down with the flu."

"Don't they have somepony else to train us?" I asked, a bit surprised.

"Guess not," Solar shrugged. "I guess today is a day to hit the town. If...you want of course," he smiled sheepishly.

I smiled back. "Sure, why not? Anything to get me out of this base."

Solar Wave smiled big and flicked his tail happily. "Great!"

He seemed pretty shy asking me to go. Maybe he wasn't that much of a social pony either. I could finally relate to somepony else. It had already been a whole week since I left my home in Canterlot for the naval base in Manehattan. Life has never been so different. The entire week was spent inside the base perimeter, doing all kinds of exercises on the track and the workout field, some conscripts called it the Brickyard. I'm not sure why, considering it was all grass.

Me and Solar Wave grabbed a quick shower and breakfast at the mess hall, before we were given lanyards to keep on us for when we returned. For some reason, gate guards did not accept dog tags. Solar thought it was because it was easier to make fake dog tags and slip inside to wreak havoc, which made sense but we still didn't know.

Tucking my lanyard into my uniform pocket, me and Solar left the main gate where we caught a taxi carriage. I paid the stallion pulling the carriage fifteen bits to take us where we wanted to go—Batterneigh Park on the eastern tip of the island. I wasn't sure why we chose a park to go, but I just went with it.

The taxi trip lasted approximately ten or eleven minutes. The stallion was quick in his gallop, which was fairly nice. And with all of the track I had been doing in the last few days, I could have easily gotten a job as a carriage puller for the Manehattan taxi service.

Me and Solar Wave arrived at Batterneigh Park—or the Batterneigh as he also called it—around nine in the morning. A perfect breeze flowed between the trees and up the streets of the city from the ocean that brought a fresh smell of saltwater. Believe it or not, it was a good smell—and it was also something I would have to get used to, not that I really minded it.

"Here we are, the Batterneigh!" Solar Wave said happily as we stared towards the park from across the street.

It wasn't anything special. Just a park that was squeezed between the street, a bunch of tall skyscrapers, and the ocean itself.

"Come on!" Solar grabbed my hoof and dragged me across the street. Luckily, no taxi carriages were coming.

We trotted quickly directly through the park and soon walked up to some standing binoculars that lined against the edge of the water facing eastwards. Solar ran up to one and looked into it, his face lightening with joy.

"Star, you've got to look in here!"

"What is it?" I didn't know.

Solar Wave stepped back and motioned for me to look through with a warm smile. I walked up and leaned my head closer, looking through the binoculars. Staring through it, I turned it a bit and realized I was staring directly at the Statue of Harmony, a tall, green statue of a mare wearing a crown and holding a tall torch in her hoof while standing on her hinds. It was a popular landmark to Manehattan.

I gasped a little and smiled. "Whoa, that's cool!" I pulled back from the binoculars. "Now I see why you wanted to come here."

Solar Wave nodded and smiled big still. If I didn't know any better, he was a foal in a stallion's body. Not that I had anything against it, he was just energetic about his day off. Today was the first time he smiled that week too.


***


The day couldn't have been better. After the two bad weather days, we've had so far, the sky had almost no clouds floating about. If it were warmer, and if the city had a beach, it would have been a good day to lounge. But, at the same time, it was an even better day to explore this magnificent metropolis I would call home for the long while.

At the same time, however, there wasn't much to the city. Mostly office towers and high rises with the occasional famous tourism spots here and there. When I had originally arrived in town, I had pretty much seen everything the city had to offer. Assuming Solar Wave hadn't seen much, I pretended to be seeing the landmarks for the first time. I hated pretending just to make ponies happy, but I didn't want to break the poor colt's heart. Unlike myself, he was far more energetic. Give or take a few weeks and I knew he would be a different pony, as would I.

Later on around lunch time, we found a decent hayburger joint to eat that we both somehow knew of beforehand. For the price, it was quality—but also greasy—food, and a good amount of it too. After we finished, me and him basically agreed to stay away from restaurants like those for a while. For all we knew, we likely gained back the weight we lost in the week of physical testing in just a few minutes, and that wouldn't make the drill sergeant happy at all.

Pretty much after that, we jogged a bit up and down the streets until we grew tired and were eventually ready to head back across the river.
> 7. Boot Camp: Physical Test
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The taxi carriage ride back across the river was more than just eventful. To start it off, every cab we tried to hail ended up either running past us, or somepony else jumped in before we could move a muscle, leaving us pissed off beyond belief. Solar Wave and I finally caught one three blocks from where we were, but of course, there was that Manehattan trouble: first an incident involving a unicorn who, apparently, had a string of bad luck that day and somehow managed to blow up the lobby of an office tower which, had it collapsed, could very well have taken out a sizable portion of the city in whichever direction it might have fallen. 

After we got past that, a carriage had struck another on the bridge and blocked the entire street. We eventually were fed up and decided to walk the rest of the way, but not before handing over some extra bits to the carriage puller for all of the inconveniences.

When we arrived at the joint base, we were asked for identification of course. As careful as I was with things, I somehow didn't have either of our lanyards given to us that would grant us immediate entry. Luckily, one of our trainers, Sergeant Hardstaff, was passing by the gate and spotted us in a steadily-heating discussion with the officers stationed at the gate. He consulted the guard and brought us inside, but not before lecturing us over our badges. I ended up taking the blame for Solar. I knew he was more mentally unstable when it came to getting yelled at for a reason, let alone without one.

Dinner came and went in the blink of an eye, and very soon we would be heading to our barracks for bed. But, we were kept in the Chow Hall. Just then, the doors opened and in came our drill sergeant, alongside Sergeant Hardstaff.

"Listen up! Y'all better get some good rest tonight, tomorrow is yer physical exam! Y'all have had these since ya first came here, but this one is different. Each and every one of your sorry asses will be tested to your limit in terms of physical capabilities! You will be working yourselves non stop, without break."

A collective groan gathered in the room, then was silenced when the drill sergeant slammed a hoof into the floor that echoed loud enough to startle us all.

"Y'all are a bunch of pussies," the drill sergeant grumbled and miraculously left without another word.

Just after dinner, we immediately went to our barracks and did our best to go to sleep early, but the same lights out schedule made it difficult. 


***


We were all shaken awake by the loud banging of a baton on the door jam far before the trumpets were supposed to play. The lights remained off, and the thumps of two others probably falling out of their beds from being startled could be heard clearly. Just then, a blinding beam of light shined on all of us one at a time.

"Get up, ya pussies, and get yer asses out the door!" the drill sergeant ordered at the top of his lungs. "We've got a power outage, no lights until sunrise!"

Perfect, a power outage. To add to it, the sky was overcast which meant no moonlight. It would be hard to navigate the place without flashlights, and for once I hoped the drill sergeant would be shouting the whole way. If one couldn't see something, they could very easily use their hearing to get around. At least I could.

Shortly after, we arrived at what I initially believed was the dirt track. I couldn't have been more wrong. The giant towers built for climbing? Yeah, we were here. Except they were part of a massive obstacle course that sat between more barracks, an armory, one of the many spots where ships were normally parked, and some smaller office buildings.

"Y'all think ya have been pissin' and moanin' for the last five weeks? Then ah don't wanna hear any of it when y'all are navigatin' this course!" The drill sergeant shouted across the line. Moments after, the bright beacon lights turned on, likely the help of a generator, or the whole time the power was on and it was just for exercise. The lights lit up the whole of the course and the area surrounding it. What we all saw horrified us.

Four massive towers, each taller than the other sitting in the middle of a massive course that started with an untouched mud pit, followed by coil wire fences built for climbing under, each one lower to the ground by an inch. Then after that, a mud pit topped with coil wire fences. Then poles that got skinnier that were used for hopping over. I didn't really know why we any of that would be necessary in a real world situation, but that wasn't my main thought.

"Listen up," Sergeant Hardstaff called from the front of the line. "You all are expected to give this your all. This is your final physical test before you move on to hooves-on weapons training. Whoever does not make the time limit or perform as well to meet our expectations, those will not be passed on in the Lunar Marine Core."

I gulped. This meant if I messed up in the slightest bit, I would be screwed, and I would rather not have to go through everything I have been through in the last month all over again.

"You all have fifteen minutes. Either make it, or don't," Sergeant Hardstaff put on the hardest glare I have seen yet on his face, and it was directed at all of us. "GO!"

We weren't taking turns either. We all dove straight in.

The mud pit was significantly deeper than the track was after that storm washed it out. It was very deep. Deep and sticky. Almost instantly after sinking my hooves in, I became stuck and it took me a few moments to get free. The others were fairing the same as I, which came to be a bit of a relief. Though, at the same time, it wasn't. A minute after, we were out of the muck, and each of our coats were painted brown halfway up our torsos. 

Next up were the coil fences. The first one was already a tight squeeze, but we were doing much better than the last obstacle. The second one grazed my ear tufts. The third one compelled my ears to pin back when one of the wires lightly cut the skin on my left ear and made me yelp. It bled a bit, though not terribly. The fourth one grazed the top of my mane, and I dipped as low as I could possibly get. Unfortunately, there were three left.

The fifth wire fence caught my mane and pulled on it. With a yelp, I threw a hoof up and yanked my mane free with the cost of losing a tiny patch of it in the fence. I rubbed my head and quickly continued. By then, I was towards the back of the others. 

I felt bad for the larger ponies of our group. Glancing back briefly, I noticed a pegasus wearing square glasses, as well as an earth pony trapped under the fences and were both whimpering in pain. I cringed to the painful-looking sight of blood dripping from where the prickly wires cut into their backs and stained the dirt beneath them with red. I couldn't go back to help and, with much reluctance, kept going.

The sixth fence caught on to my mane again, but thankfully, I didn't have to yank it free. Then, finally, the seventh was right at my forehead. It was more than a tight squeeze, and I had no real clue of how the others managed to pull it off when they were the same size as me, if not a bit bigger. I settled on doing it another way.

Rolling onto my back and pulled myself underneath the final fence, my wings were laying flat against the dampened ground, and I slipped beneath with the coil just barely touching my stomach. With a sigh of relief, I stood up and ran to the next part of the course.

I leaped directly into the mud of the next obstacle. It wasn't as deep, but still deep enough to make it hard to move. That being said, it was easier to move under the coil fences. The mud was, however, more hardened, thick, and extremely tough to move around in which didn't help the situation, and it meant I would have to crawl instead of make a path through the sludge. This time, the fences were all at the same height and it was a quick crawl to the end.

Thus, all good things must come to an end. As I moved to get out of the mud, a wet spot caused it to form around my legs and quickly harden like fast-drying cement. I grunted as I struggled to move, but it was to no avail. "Bloody... hell...!" I grunted in anger.

I then looked up to the same earth pony I saw stuck under the wires before who hopped out and was just about to climb the net to the top of the first tower. "Hey, could you uh, help me out here?" I asked with an awkward chuckle.

"Sorry, bub. Remember what they said, it's everypony for themselves!" the earth pony laughed and continued climbing.

My blood boiled. "Screw you!" I struggled to move some more. Just moments later, I watched the last pony hop out of the pit and jump onto the net. I was left behind. At this rate, I wouldn't make the third tower.

I was about ready to give up and accept that I wouldn't make it.

With a sigh, I glanced over to the drill sergeant and Sergeant Hardstaff, who were both observing me from the side. The drill sergeant glared and raised his hoof to look at his watch. My eyes then went to Sergeant Hardstaff. He said something under his own breath. He didn't seem to be angered, but instead... concerned? The way his lips moved, I made it out that he was saying 'you can do it, buddy'.

I looked down at my chest where the muck had come up to. Then, with more grunts of struggling, I yanked one hoof free, and soon the other. I grabbed onto the edge and gradually pulled myself out of the pit, leaving a large body-shaped hole where I was stuck. The sergeant smiled out of the corner of my eye, and I didn't hesitate to start climbing the net.

It was a long way up, and gravity wasn't on my side. My morning hunger was beginning to get to me already and I was still exhausted from my horrible night's sleep. If the mud didn't get me, this would. Then, I got the idea of looking down. I sadly did, and my heart was racing. My fear of heights was quickly kicking in.

I wasn't ready to let this stop me. Not now. I couldn't. There was no going back at this point.

Looking back up and resumed climbing with my remaining strength. After an unknown amount of time, I reached the top. No one was up there with me, I was just that far behind. I ran to the edge and went to grab for a net to climb back down, then stumbled a bit and almost fell. I pulled away from the edge with a racing heart and quickly realized I had to jump to the next net on the second tower. Looking down, it became evident that the net didn't go that far down. If I missed, I was dead. What the hell was I getting myself into?

I backed up against the other edge where I climbed up, and after some quick moments of thinking my life decisions over, I galloped towards the other edge and leaped across, tightly grabbing the net. I opened my eyes and looked down and found myself to be where I wanted to be. I was becoming confident, especially when I saw the others still climbing above me.

I reached the top of the second tower and jumped to the third with the same results, but cutting a little close to falling. Each tower was further and further apart and the nets were higher. Each time didn't give us much of a window of catching on and it had me shaking as much as the height.

Then came the last tower. I had to nail this one perfectly or it was lights out for me. I stepped to the edge opposite of the one I was jumping from, and with a deep breath, I ran and jumped. I couldn't say what happened, but I blacked out, and when I woke up, I was hanging on for dear life. Down below, other Marines had gathered and were watching with horror, while the drill sergeant looked like he didn't care if I fell.

I was already weakened from the climbing and had the wits scared out of me knowing I was in a life or death situation at this point. I think it was with whatever will to live I had left that pulled me up completely onto the net. I kept climbing and was eventually at the top. The timer was running out, and the last thing we had to do was zip line down into a pool. I watched as the others splashed down, then turning to me. My heart thumped hard in my ears and my breath was becoming shallow, but I had to do it. Either that, or I could have just cannon balled right into the ground to take the easy way out. Even then, I would probably show up in Tartarus for giving up too easy.

I took the final zip line at the top and took one final deep breath. My hooves were sweaty, and it meant I could slip at any moment on the way down.

With thirty seconds left, I ran and jumped. I shut my eyes, feeling the wind rushing through my mane and feathers as I slid down towards the water. Then came the relieving splash of cold water that woke me back up. I jumped up to the surface of the pool with a large gasp for air. I frantically swam to the edge and climbed out, then fell on my back. My chest heaved hard and was expanding and contracting exactly the speed my heart was. 

I didn't know what to think. Was a light shining down on me, or was sunlight shining down on me? Did I make it into the pool or did I fall to my death, and my wake up call was in a pool of healing tears so I wouldn't feel pain?

"Conscript!"

Nope, not dead still.

My eyes shot open, the drill sergeant and the others were all standing around me.

"W-what happened?" I panted hard and looked at each and every one of them with widened eyes.

"You made it," sergeant Hardstaff smiled. He was actually smiling. "With two seconds to spare."

"Two...seconds?" I was more than surprised.

"And with that, y'all passed. Unfortunately," the drill sergeant grumbled.
> 8. Boot Camp: Target Practice
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

After passing out three more times due to exhaustion and mental stress left over from the time limit of the final physical test earlier, I thankfully sat down in the Chow Hall with a decent tray of lunch. I had been used to eating roasted carrots and a MLTM (Manticore, lettuce, tomato, mayonnaise), minus the tomato. Even after breakfast, I was still hungrier than ever and lunch really hit the spot.

I didn't know if there was anything else we were supposed to do today to stay active, but apparently one of the ponies was sent to the hospital in Manehattan after falling from one of the climbing towers. He was a pegasus, but he ended up clipping his wing on the way down and broke one of his hinds. Thankfully, nopony fell to their deaths that morning.

My body still felt strange after lunch, and there was a thick pain in my right forearm towards my joint. I probably pulled a muscle or two, and that would be even more sore tomorrow. Other than the pain, my body felt pretty loose—and in a good way. I felt more fit, I felt lots of energy. I felt like doing it again.

"Afternoon!" Came a voice from behind, I turned my head and saw Solar Wave trotting to my side from behind.

With a smile, I nodded once. "Afternoon."

"Did that food make your stomach feel strange?" Solar's smile went away quickly, he moved a hoof to his stomach.

I shook my head. "No, why?"

"It made mine feel weird," Solar's face looked a bit more pale than usual.

"You're not going to puke, are you?" I looked at him with concern.

"Eh...I'll hold it in," he chuckled a bit, then it turned into a brief sob of pain as his stomach ached.

"Well, there's a trash can over there if you need it," I pointed my hoof towards a small bundle of silver trash cans.

He gave me a funny look, then we both smiled and laughed. Out of all of the ponies I've met in my life, other than Rose of course, he was probably the best and most open stallion I've been around. He's still skittish around others, but when I talk to him, he's someone completely different.

And I don't mean it in a bad way, but I think he's a colt cuddler. Not that I had a problem with it, but occasionally he did get a bit close when we hung out those few times in between training. I picked on him playfully about it and he denied it. Who knows, maybe he isn't and he's just clingy sometimes. Not that I minded still.

The day gradually came to a close, but after the sun went down, it wasn't much of a relief. It was still hot and humid and extremely uncomfortable, especially in a uniform made with cotton. Thankfully, we had fans and dehumidifiers set up in all four corners of the barrack and it left the room at a much cooler and comfortable temperature.

Lights out came and went at the same time as usual, with tomorrow's assignments not shared with any of us. I'll say, I don't think anypony has fallen asleep that fast in the month that we had been in boot camp.


***


Much unlike the previous mornings, the drill sergeant did not burst through the door banging against it with his black baton. Instead, the trumpets woke us. Some ponies stayed in bed, a couple still snoring and drooling on their pillows—I never understood how others could be heavy sleepers—while the rest of us got up and looked around in confusion.

The door opened, and instead of it slamming against the wall, it opened halfway and in walked sergeant Hardstaff in his usual dark blue digital camouflage uniform. We clicked our hooves and went to an attention stance, heads up and eyes straight.

"Morning, conscripts, sleep well?"

We moved our eyes to each other, then forward again. "Yes, sir!" We said in unison.

"Very good, you will need that energy for today," the sergeant stopped at the other end of the line with a smirk crossing his muzzle. 

Walking back towards the door slowly and puffing his chest out just a bit, "Today is the next phase of your training, conscripts. Today, you drop your civilian knowledge and become familiar with your future weapons and will know how to use them. Today we will start with pistols, and eventually, you will be worked up to the big guns. Rifles, explosives, and eventually you will know how to fire weapons from a ship."

This brought a slight smile to my face. I always thought the cannons on destroyers and other naval ships were badass and not meant to be messed with.

"Remember this, conscripts, this is only part two of your training. When you are done with this, you won't have seen anything yet," the sergeant stopped by the door, he looked over us. "Get a shower, get your uniforms on, be at the flag pole at 0740 hours."

Sergeant Hardstaff left the barrack and we were dismissed to get ready. A wave of excitement swept across everypony, one or two of the ponies actually started cheering briefly before being shut down by some others. Then I noticed Solar Wave, who was the least enthusiastic in the room. I walked over to him.

"Hey, everything alright?" I smiled innocently.

"Y-yeah, sure," Solar Wave nodded, obviously nervous.

My smile faded. "What's up?"

"I hate guns."

I tilted my head and furrowed an eyebrow. "Then why for the love of Celestia would you join the Lunar Marines?" 


***


After a quick shower, I dressed myself in a dark blue t-shirt that was almost the same color as my coat, followed by the lighter-shaded blue button-up jacket I picked up on day zero. I was one of the first in the shower and the first to get ready. I decided to wait for the others, which was probably what we were supposed to do to begin with, but the others following me out of the shower went out to the flag pole at the center of the base without thinking of waiting.

Shortly after, I met up with Solar Wave and we followed the group to the flag pole where we lined up and waited for whoever was supposed to take us to the shooting range.

Just as I expected, sergeant Hardstaff had brought the same drill sergeant along over to us. But instead, the drill sergeant didn't do anything. If anything, he stayed off to the side of the sergeant. What a relief.

We still got a short lecture from the sergeant, but by now we were all used to it. Right after that, we were all taken to one of the larger buildings on the base that had a glass entrance with a massive skylight above. There were two see-through elevators that went to the second floor where I assumed there were offices for some of the higher ranks. 

We went around the elevator shafts and into a much larger room where a couple of other ponies stood, leaned against a short wall with pistols in their hooves. One wore a dark blue baseball cap with earmuffs on to block out the loud pop of the weapon firing, the other pony just wearing earmuffs.

Getting in line, we took turns two at a time walking up to a wooden table where we were given a gun known as an Automatic Colt Pistol, or ACP for short, some ear muffs to protect our ears, and clear glasses to shield our eyes. It was a forty five caliber pistol much like the average pistols you see in movies. It was interesting to say the least and we were each given two magazines that clicked into the handle with a simple slap on the bottom and were ready to go. I had never used a gun before in my life and I was a little nervous about it.

"Cock your weapons, conscripts!" Shouted sergeant Hardstaff from behind.

I reached one hoof to the top of the pistol and slid it back with a click that sounded exactly how I expected it. Now holding the gun in both hooves, I waited for the order to fire.

"One at a time boys. Fire!"

Many loud pops which were thankfully mostly muffled by the ear muffs rang through the room as pistols fired, as did mine and it struck the target far from center. In between the weapons firing, I heard the drill sergeant shouting at a pony who presumably let his weapon get the best of him and he fell back when he shot it. 

Taking aim for the simple round target many feet away, I shot another bullet towards it. Again, far from center, if not farther than the first one. Then again. And again. Each one got closer by a hair but still didn't come close to center. Eventually I ran out of ammunition and reached for the second magazine but had no idea how to remove the first.

Shortly after, everypony else was out of ammunition in their first clips and turned to the instructor.

"Y'all better find a way to get that mag out, 'cause yer enemy ain't gonna give ya a chance."

I quickly looked over the handle, and towards the top of the pistol at the butt end of the barrel, I found a small knob and flicked it back. 

Jackpot.

The mag clicked out and fell to the floor with a small clatter. Quickly I reloaded the pistol and took aim again as two others fired their fully reloaded weapons. I took a careful aim towards the bulls eye and pulled the trigger, one bullet shot out and hit closer to the center, but still not even close. I wasn't that worried as it was my first time and from what I could tell, none of the others were doing that well on their aim either.

Bullet by bullet, they stayed far from center. I didn't know what it was, but my aim was getting shittier by the moment.

Then, it was almost done. I had one bullet left. I took a deep breath and adjusted my aim by the slightest pulled the trigger. The final bullet flew into the target, striking just right of center. With widened eyes, I pushed the glasses up over my eyes and stared towards the target as the others ran out of ammunition. How I ever made that one bullet strike close to center was beyond me, but I wasn't unhappy either. With a smile, I turned to the sergeant and handed him my weapon.

When the others were completely done with their practice, the sergeant brought us back to the table where the drill sergeant and another pony were standing. Now sitting on the table were many different assortments of other pistols, shotguns and rifles with one of their respective ammunition sitting up beside their barrels.

This was going to be fun.
> 9. A Change in the Season
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

With the days of weapons training seemingly flying by without much hassle, the weather in Manehattan was gradually growing cooler and breezier...and cloudier. I've always loved cloudy weather for some strange reason, my parents thought I was a vampire when I was a colt, and my mother took it seriously. It felt relaxing. The weather changing meant Fall was coming, my favorite season of all.

But with it came weekly rain showers that were freezing to the touch and quite frankly very uncomfortable to stand around in. I was thankful that the shooting range was in a large facility on the base rather than a cold, wet, and muddy field like I thought there would be.

One cool, breezy and overcast morning, we were allowed to get up on our own time—with our sleeping schedules now, it was still fairly early in the morning, just before or after sunrise. Each time, however, I felt like I was losing sleep. I wasn't sure if it was because we were no longer doing physical training that wore us out, or if it was the bed I slept on—likely both.

I took a quick, warm shower to start the morning, then put on my blue jacket and buttoned it up completely. Unlike past years, I had believed military-style jackets weren't good for colder weather. Boy, was I wrong. It was now my favorite jacket and I didn't go anywhere without it, off and on base.

Stepping outside into the cool, breezy air, I took a long glance around to see all that was going on. Nothing seemed to be that different with the usual activity of newer recruits jogging by with their drill sergeant who was shouting at them the entire way. It made me smile in the slightest way for some reason.

That morning was extremely cloudy and misty and I could just barely make out Manehattan's distinct skyline across the river from the fog. In the distance, a low roar of a fog horn blaring gave me a cold chill up my spine, followed by the horn of a ship trying to navigate the harbor somewhere. I wasn't a fan of nautical horns one bit. In fact, the fog horn itself was enough to spook me.

Before I could do anything else, I was struck down by a hoof to the back of the head and fell flat onto the ground, stunned from the hit and disoriented. I quickly turned over onto my back and looked up with wide-eyes which met those of a taller pony who had a smirk crossed his muzzle. My look of surprise quickly turned into a glare and I growled up at him.

"Awww, what's wrong, Star? Lost your balance?"

"Piss off, Nightpath," I replied in an angered tone.

"And why should I do that, huh?" The dark coated earth pony stepped closer and pulled me up by my jacket's collar.

I squirmed in his grasp and tried to get a grip onto the ground so I could stand properly, but instead Nightpath held me in a tighter grip, just above the ground where I couldn't reach. His smirk grew as he leaned his head closer to mine. Soon, I could feel his breath on my neck and it caused my feathers to ruffle.

"What are you going to do?"

I struggled a bit more in his grip and clenched my teeth. "Buy you some mouthwash, because you sure as hell need it."

Nightpath's smirk faded into a scowl. "Keep joking, you worthless excuse of a soldier. You won't be laughing when I push you into a whirlpool when we get out to sea."

"You wouldn't," I grinned.

"I would," Nightpath leaned even closer, his muzzle was now pressed against mine.

I felt uneasy, but I kept my cool just long enough for me to drive one of my forehooves into his neck in attempt to escape. The dark earth pony immediately dropped me and wheezed, followed by many hard coughs. His light blue eyes focused onto me and he spoke in a raspy voice, "You're dead!"

"We'll see about that," I tossed him a glare and stood in a defensive stance.

Nightpath coughed more and eventually charged towards me like a bull. Knowing just his momentum would be enough to injure me, I jumped to the side, allowing him to run right past me. He slid to a stop and I whipped around to face him while some other soldiers on base walked towards us to watch, not to stop the fight which surprised me.

He clenched his teeth and huffed loudly, charging towards me once again. I put my weight onto my hinds and stood on them, not moving out of his way. Instead, I pulled my right hoof back, and just before he could hit me, I slammed it into his jaw, just barely managing to clothesline him but also throw me onto my back from his own force. My hoof hurt, and Nightpath's jaw hurt more. At least, I hoped it did.

I got back on all fours and looked at the downed earth pony, who laid on the wet dirt with a bloodied chin and was groaning loudly in pain. He was stunned, just like I was when he hit me from the start. Since he was a bigger pony than I was, he wasn't down for long and got up to hit me again.

Before he could, a loud whistle rang through the air, and the few ponies watching stepped out of the way and at attention as sergeant Hardstaff angrily stomped up to us. Both me and Nightpath stood up straight as well.

"Now what in Celestia's bright sun are you all doing?!" He shouted at the top of his lungs.

"Sergeant Hardstaff, sir," I started. "Conscript Nightpath here knocked me down and—"

"Conscript Star Shooter thought it was necessary to knock me down out of nowhere and beat on me, sir!"

My blood boiled. Of course I figured he'd lie about it to get me in trouble.

Sergeant Hardstaff immediately turned to me and gave me the deadliest glare I've ever seen out of him. "Conscript Star Shooter! Is this true?!"

"Sir, no sir!"

"Why for the love of Luna is Nightpath's jaw bloody?!"

"Sir, conscript Nightpath knocked me down and I fought back, sir!"

At this point, I was certain the sergeant wasn't sure who to believe. I hoped it would be me, but with my luck, that wouldn't happen.

"Both of you, fifty laps on the track. GO!"

Well, at least with physical activity, I'd hopefully sleep good tonight.


***


With fifty laps of track complete, another shower and a change of clothes later, I went to the Chow Hall for lunch to hopefully meet up with Solar Wave—and hopefully not have my face smashed into my food like two days ago.

Today's lunch was pretty simple: a salad sandwich with crispy bread and mayonnaise with a side of baked beans. Depending on how much I would be doing after that, it would certainly hold me off until dinner. As I ate, I looked around for my yellow unicorn friend but didn't see him. Unless there was some kind of training session today that I wasn't aware of, he wasn't in the Chow Hall, which surprised me because he loved to eat and talk with me on most days.

I finished with my food and took the tray back to the Chow Hall's kitchen and handed it back to the cleaning mare, then made my way back out onto the base grounds with nothing to do. As I did, I froze when a large, cold drop of rain patted onto my muzzle. I shook my head to get it off, then looked upwards at the sky. It was still overcast and the Manehattan skyline was still mostly fogged out, but what it really was now was an approaching downpour. More drops patted down, one managing to painfully hit me right in the eye.

Soon, it picked up and was very quickly turning into what it was downtown; a heavy rain with a strong gust blowing in from the west, with another blowing in from sea like always. Prior to the downpour arriving, I ran into my barrack with a couple of others and quickly shut the door as the roar of the rain coming down overtook the barrack's heater which normally let off a building-wide low hum.

None of us were soaked, but we did have wet spots on our jackets from the rain drops that did hit us. Those of us in the barrack at the time went to the windows at the front by the door to watch the rain, which was coming down hard enough where we could barely see out the door. We certainly weren't going out for a while.

"So, since the weather's too nasty to go out and do anything in town, how's about we just camp out here?" Spoke up one of the other conscripts.

Silver Edge, the other pony I knew at boot camp, raised his eyebrow and gave the conscript a funny look. "This is where we stay, how is it camping out?"

I gave him a gentle elbow nudge. "Just go with it."

The beige unicorn replied with a nod, and the two of us went over to the other conscript. I truly didn't know what there was to do in and around the barrack.

"So, how's about we exchange stories?" The conscript asked.

"Sure, why not?" Silver shrugged and smiled.

"Stories of what?" I asked.

"Anything. Funny moments, where we originated from, anything you can think of that you remember."

"You start," I said, walking around the conscript's bed and sat on the vacant one beside it, Silver following suit.

"If you say so," the conscript cleared his throat. "I'm from Whitetail Woods, born and raised. Always been intrigued by the Royal Guard and the military. My mom is a stay-at-home taking care of my little brother. Dad was a first sergeant in the Equestrian Army and had one and a half tours in the Griffon Empire."

"One and a half tours?" I asked with a grin.

"Yeah! One tour, he was about halfway through a second but came home early when he was struck by shrapnel when a mine went off. He's okay now, but most of the metal wasn't removed. I guess when the wounds closed up, they conformed around the metal and it hasn't bugged him since. Now he works at the post office in town," he shrugged. 

"He wanted me to run the courier route for him, but I thought it was too much work. When I first got here though, I regretted every minute I wanted to enlist. But, that's changed again. It's just peachy now. Oh, right. My name's Storm Lancer. Now, what about you two?"

Silver perked up a bit. "I come from Las Haygas. My dad's a blackjack dealer at one of the casinos."

"What about your mom?" Storm asked innocently.

Silver paused, his ear flicked. "I've never met my mother."

"Oh..." Storm and I both said.

"I'm...so sorry, I didn't—"

"Don't worry about it, according to my dad, she isn't dead. She just...left."

We both paused. "Still, I'm so terribly sorry," Storm said.

Silver just nodded. After a pause, he looked towards me, and I soon realized he wasn't going to continue.

"Me?" I asked, pointing to myself. The two nodded in reply. I cleared my throat.

"I'm from Coltlumbus. Dad was a sergeant in the army, mom's a receptionist working for the law enforcement agency in the city. At least, I think she is. It's been so long since I've seen them. Too long. And they don't ever write to me."

"That's harsh man..." Storm frowned. "Why don't they?"

I shrugged. "They must not know my address, even though I told them and haven't moved since. It's not like I ran away, I just left the nest a little early, you know?"

"What age did you leave?"

"Fifteen. I've never had a legitimate job, I've just been living off of unemployment money. I got tired of everything being so boring, and here I am."

"True that. Having no job and still making just enough money to live doesn't feel right either, especially when you know you can get a job somewhere," Silver shrugged.

"Still, that's harsh about your parents. Were you picked on, or were they good?" Storm asked, Silver punched his arm. "Ow!"

"They were good parents. Very strict though. My dad bugged me about forcing me into the Army if I didn't go to college. I did end up going to a small university in Baltimare, but my dad cut my funding because I didn't have straight A's. That was part of the reason I left and went to Canterlot to live. He was really expectant of me. So, I still haven't been able to finish college because he didn't like that I had a C in Math."

"Sounds like it," Storm rubbed his now-bruised arm. "I hated every minute of college. My grades were shit too."

"I never went to college," Silver crossed his arms and sat against the wall at the back of the bed. "I think it's stupid. I mean, you already waste ten years of your life in school, then you have to go and spend another two damn years in the same snotty classrooms each and every day and expected to have straight A's just to get a degree? No thanks, that is not for me. If I'm going to specialize in anything, I want it to be something related to the military."

"What are you shooting for?" I asked, turning to Silver.

Silver let out a soft, content sigh. "I don't know yet, I'm thinking about it. What about you? What do you want to be?"

I paused to think for a few moments. "In the Lunar Marines?" Silver nodded. "I don't know. Right now, I just want to graduate boot camp. Bigger dreams can come later."

The two nodded. "That's a good idea. Hopefully we all make it," Storm fiddled with his hooves.

"As do I. We've come so far, it would suck if we didn't make it now," Silver said.

"Yeah, well...I hate to break it to you guys, but the hardest part is still coming according to sergeant Hardstaff." Both Storm and Silver let out a groan of distress.

"Whatever it is, and after we finish with weapons training, we'll be ready to face it. They won't want us to expect something, but we should expect everything. Everything in the book that they can throw at us. For all we know, this might be the one time where they are trying to kill us, to see if we're worthy enough to make rank," I paused. "And I'd say we're getting close to that day. Weapons training doesn't take as long as physical training."

"That's the problem, they don't want us to know when any of this will be coming so we aren't prepared for it," Storm laid down on his bed and stared at the ceiling.

"But we are prepared. They've spent the last two months beating us into shape, spraying us with water, forcing us to run like we were being chased by a crazy pony with a knife, and now showing us how to properly fire a gun, reload it, and be quicker with it. I'll be damned if they're training us to be soldiers, and then throw something at us that we can't handle," I explained. 

"They're training us to be fighters. To be warriors for our country. They're preparing us for everything that could be thrown at us in the future. And ready or not, they're going to try and break us. You hear me? We're all going to make it through boot camp, or die trying."

"That's relieving to hear," Silver rolled his eyes.

I let out a sigh. "But it's true. It's either make it or die at this point."

"If you say so," Storm looked towards the window. "Hey you guys? I think the rain calmed down."

I got up off of the bed and walked to the door, opening it and standing under the small canopy that shielded a small square in front of the door from any rain. The concrete was soaked, as was all of the ground around the base. Multiple puddles of all size were scattered around with tiny rings of disturbances from raindrops still coming down. The rain wasn't a downpour anymore, but was a steady shower—still very cold.

"It did," I said from the door, shutting it. "Still raining though. And the temperature's cooled a lot."

Silver sighed in some frustration, laying back on the bed. "Bundle up boys..."

I looked at him, as did Storm. "Why?"

"We're in for a long winter, and it's coming early. I can feel it."
> 10. Boot Camp: The Last Week
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The next morning sent a cold chill up everypony's spine. A strong cold front had blown through overnight, bringing stronger breezes than normal and much cooler temperatures. While still in bed, I shivered, despite being completely covered up to my neck in the sheets. I woke up to the unfortunate news that the heater malfunctioned, leaving our barrack at a brisk forty-seven degrees. Cold enough where I could see my breath.

It was bad enough under the blankets, once I pulled them off, I immediately put them back on and was shivering even more. Most of the others occupying the barrack were already up and either taking longer, hot showers or were out and about. Since there was a short line to wait to shower, I got dressed in the same blue jacket and cadet cap. It wasn't that warm and didn't cover my ears at all.

Instead of waiting for the shower to be vacant, I grabbed some money and went out of the barrack, into the freezing breeze that caused my wing feathers to ruffle and out onto the base. I embraced the briskness of the air and made my way to the small surplus store on-base where I hoped hats for colder weather were sold. Luckily the place had a working heater and was warm, but I wasn't going to stand in there all day soaking up the heat. 

I trotted around the shop, looking carefully around at the different assortments of gear ranging from vests to jackets, to folding knives and gun-cleaning kits. The shop had a small section with gloves and beanies hanging on the wall, and pairs of black boots that were apparently optional with the uniform—which might explain why not many Marines were seen wearing them.

I decided with the money I had brought that I would buy a pair of extremely dark blue and dark grey gloves and a beanie of the exact same shade of blue—combined costing about twelve bits—and put them on before walking back out into the cold. This time with the beanie sitting snug on my head and around my ears comfortably and kept them warm without blocking out my hearing, while my hooves didn't get cold against the wet ground.

That morning, a thick grey layer of clouds shrouded the sky which made for another dark and gloomy day. Even with the strong winds blowing through, the clouds didn't seem to go anywhere. It wasn't as foggy as the day before, yet I could still hear the blare of the fog horn in the distance that sent a different kind of chill up my spine again. It was followed by a loud ship horn which sounded fairly close and startled me. At the same time, I had noticed some ponies were making their way to the shipyard of the naval station.

I made my way back to Barrack #19 and went inside, finding the place was still cold and the heater was now being worked on by a pony working for the technical team in the Lunar Marines. But with my luck, I also discovered the hot water tank had gone out shortly after I initially left for the base shop and forced the remaining conscripts to take cold showers.

I didn't want to be caught smelling like a sweaty stallion in uniform and sneaked over to Barrack #20 where I got a warm shower and very quickly re-dressed myself and went back outside to meet up with the other conscripts. To my surprise, I couldn't find anypony from my barrack around. I became nervous and searched for a higher ranking officer that knew about conscript training classes and their schedules.

Just under an hour later I came across a greyish-green earth pony with an auburn-brown mane dressed in Navy blues, but instead of a dress uniform, it was tactical. The color was the same as my uniform, and the pony held a navy-blue helmet in his hoof to his chest, and for some reason he wore black military sunglasses despite the clouds blocking out the sun. 

The pins on his uniform collar weren't ones I have seen before, but they immediately made me assume he was some sort of high ranking officer in the Lunar Navy. I stood at attention and saluted. "Sir."

"Yes, conscript?" The greenish-grey pony replied, turning to face me.

I dropped my salute a moment after he spoke. I opened my mouth to speak, and it was taking me longer than I wanted to figure out the best way to ask my question without sounding lost. My eyes widened when I realized just how long I was taking to think.

"Sir, what is the schedule of class of late fourteen for today?" It finally came out.

The pony tilted his head a little. "The conscripts of late fourteen you mean?" I nodded. "Nothing as far as I know. But your class is in it's final week before the selection is made for graduation. I won't say what is on your schedule, but if I were you, I would enjoy the day while it lasts," he immediately turned and walked away.

I just ignored the fact that he left and eased myself. Another day off almost, but I wasn't going to waste it inside. Wasting a day inside doing nothing just wasn't me anymore. That, and I didn't want to deal with Nightpath if he was back at the barracks already. At the same time, I wasn't for going into town to spend the day. I wanted to stay on base.

Bored out of my mind, I instead went to the base gym to get a good workout in. It wasn't busy when I got there, but there were a few other stallions doing their own workouts. One cantered on a treadmill with earbuds in his ears, listening to jams from a music player, another sat up on a bench and lifted a smaller weight with a hoof and curled it inwards. He was a more muscular stallion than me but not the most buff I had seen in my time in training. The other three ponies lifted larger weights. One with his wings, one with magic, one with his bare hooves.

It confused me with the magic part, but then I remembered it takes some physical strength to lift heavy objects with magic—which would technically make magic almost pointless to use.

I went over to the treadmills and started one up, working the speed of it up to a canter, and eventually to a slow gallop. By then I was used to running a lot faster than I was going at the time and it would be a little while before I would begin to have sweat bead up on my face.

I kept a steady pace for a long period of time before I snapped out of my trance when a hoof smacked the off button on the treadmill, a moment later I tripped up and stopped. I snapped my head to the side and saw sergeant Hardstaff standing there.

"Heellooooo? Conscript? Do your ears work?" He waved his hoof in front of me.

My heart raced for a split second after the treadmill stopped and I stepped off of it. "My apologies, I was zoning out sir," I saluted the dark blue pony.

"At ease," he motioned a hoof. "Carry on if you wish," he then turned to walk away.

"Is everything alright?" I watched him begin to walk away.

Hardstaff stopped and looked back at me with a stone expression. "Yes, conscript, everything is alright."

"Then why did you try to get my attention for Luna knows how long?" I furrowed an eyebrow. It felt like he was suddenly reluctant to speak.

The dark blue pony turned back to me and blew a strand of his jet black mane out of the way of his eye. "I simply came to see how you were doing. I didn't catch you at your barrack and asked one of your mates where you might be. So, I came here."

I nodded. "I'm doing fine. A little nervous, but fine," I turned back to the treadmill but didn't turn it on.

"Are you sure?" He walked back to me and stood between my treadmill and the one beside it, staring at me.

"Yup," I pressed a couple of buttons and turned the treadmill on a normal walking pace.

"Hmm..." Hardstaff stared at me still. "You've changed a bit since you first arrived."

"Pardon?" I turned to him curiously.

"You've become a bit more serious about things," he smiled. "I like that in a recr—conscript."

I smiled a bit at his correction. "Who's to say I wasn't before?"

"Well, you're not very interactive with fellow conscripts other than those two unicorns."

He was right, I wasn't one who enjoyed talking to ponies unless they were ponies I liked and knew. "I've always been that way, sir," I pushed the treadmill's speed up by two, just slower than a fast walk.

"How many ponies did you talk to before that?"

I just walked for a bit on the treadmill. "Just a few," I replied after a lengthy pause.

"Hmm," he narrowed his eyes onto me. "You really should interact with the rest of your barrack mates, or others. It's good for you."

I hated hearing that, but I wasn't going to show my bad side to the sergeant. "Yes sir."

Hardstaff smiled and patted my shoulder. "Atta colt. Carry on," he turned and walked away.

After he left, I decided to think about what he said. Maybe it would be good if I opened up to the others. Especially in the military, it would be good to know who's watching your back. But at the same time I was hesitant because I wasn't the social kind of stallion. It brought a bunch of new questions to mind that made me nervous.

Hopefully I could hold them off until after graduation.


***


I spent just about the rest of the day doing light to moderate workouts involving the treadmill and small weights. Nothing special, but something to make my muscles ache after I crawled into bed that night. Lights out came, and soon after, so did another rain shower. It wasn't bad like the last few Manehattan had seen recently and was instead a steady rain that gently patted against rooftops and the already wet ground.

But for some reason that night, I was slipping in and out of sleep and at one point ended up staring at the ceiling for a full hour. Something was off that night that was keeping me wide awake. I hoped and prayed to Luna that something bad wasn't about to knock the door down. Fortunately, nothing and nopony came in guns ablazing.

The trumpets sounded a few hours later, I slowly opened my eyes, and they itched in exhaustion. I guessed I only got about three and a half hours of sleep that night and I expected my eyes to be bloodshot. Of all of the mornings I was used to being up early, that one I didn't want to get out of bed. But since the trumpets hadn't been going off the last couple of days, I figured today was the beginning of the end—of our training I hope.

We showered, got dressed, then ran outside into the pouring, freezing rain to get lined up. I couldn't have been happier to have decided to wear my beanie and gloves that morning.

As usual, sergeant Hardstaff trotted out in front of the line—except this time he wore the drill sergeant's hat. I as well as the group gasped a little as the dark blue pegasus walked out, he immediately turned and glared at us.

"What, never seen a pegasus in a drill sarge's hat?" He snapped at us and stood in front of the line. "Today, you pack of bunched up, conceited fillies, begins the second to last day of your training before graduation. You've all come a long way. You've all made mistakes, you've all proven yourselves...so far," he muttered at the end. 

"Today we begin part one of a real life emergency. But, there's a catch. It will be a simulation. Which means, nopony's gonna die, but that does not mean anypony should act stupid. Is that clear?!"

"Sir yes sir!"

"What was that?!"

"SIR YES SIR!"

"You will all NOT be graded on just your performance today, but tomorrow as well! Which means, if you do well today, and you don't do well tomorrow, or vise versa," he stopped and got into one of the conscripts' face but didn't break him. "You can say goodbye to your career in the Marines. Is that clear, conscripts?!"

"Sir yes sir!"

I had to admit, after that, he turned into a really crappy drill sergeant—and I actually missed the old one. After our lecture, we were told he was acting drill sergeant for the last days of our training while the other was out sick. That's right, the drill sergeant was out sick.

"Now, listen up conscripts, and listen good. Very soon will be the first of many tests to come today and tomorrow. All of you will be shuttled to the island here shortly and we will march to the Urban Combat Facility in West town where you will be going through real life situations, such as a prisoner rescue, ambush, you name it. Each will be tested on performance and the passing grade for each test is an eighty five. Don't make that, it affects your day's grade. Now, line up, on me!"

The group moved into a two-rowed line behind the sergeant as he turned to face away from us. We stood at attention but prepared to move. Moments after, we began marching towards the docks. Once at the docks, we split up in three groups and all were seated on three black dinghys and began making our way across the river.

"Whoa, look at that!" One of the conscripts shouted, standing up and pointing to the left side of the boat. We quickly turned in the direction he was pointing and gasped.

Sitting in the middle of the water far to our side was an extremely large ship with the Lunar Army's colored in a splotchy camouflage on the stern of the ship, with the name in a bright white paint that read L.R.S Eclipse. I stared in pure awe as smaller boats tied themselves to the gigantic aircraft carrier and began bringing it to port beside the naval station, whilst behind it, Navy cutters, destroyers and other naval ships waited to enter the harbor and dock. I was particularly excited, because it was my friend's ship.

We made port on the other side of the river and regrouped in a line where sergeant Hardstaff marched us along the street westward into the lower parts of Manehattan where the training facility was supposedly located. That morning, the rain still came down, but was more of a drizzle than the heavy shower it was when we woke up. Nonetheless, it was still cold as ice, and I wouldn't be surprised if it started snowing after that.

Many more minutes after getting off of the dinghys, we marched up to a chain link gate, standing beside it was a slightly taller watch tower with a light blue earth pony in Lunar Marine camouflage standing guard with an AR-15 rifle strapped around his neck.

"Oi, open up!" Sergeant Hardstaff shouted up to the guard.

The guard moved a hoof onto presumably a small panel where he flicked a switch, allowing the gate to slide into the concrete wall beside it and granting us entry. Sergeant Hardstaff nodded to the guard and brought all of us inside. The gate shut behind us, then was locked up by another guard standing by the entrance who moved back to his station against the wall.

We looked around the place curiously, only seeing rusty debris lying around on the edges of the place. Towards the center was a large grass patch where few trees were planted and had grown large, beyond that was an abandoned building with mostly boarded up windows that was being used for the facility. It was something I hadn't seen before, and it was smack-dab right in the middle of the city just west of Center Park.

After a quick briefing, we were each given paintball guns of different color, while three other soldiers who worked at the facility had the same colored red paintball guns. I assumed it was to tell who hit who, and that would go towards our grade for the test. We were also given black military masks to wear over our faces to shield them in case one of the 'enemies' decided to be a prick and shoot one of us in the face, as well as black vests. That would have left a mark, but with the mask, that wouldn't happen.

The first test started with one pony at a time going lone into the forest, as the facility workers called it, and each were forced to make it out of an ambush coming from the building with four hits or less. I watched Solar Wave go, the poor unicorn took five hits and only managed to hit one when his mask was covered in paint. He didn't pass for that reason.

After that came Silver Edge. He fared more well than Solar did, but still took a good four hits to his chest and shoulder. Luckily he managed to 'kill' the ambushers and passed. Following the two of them came many more conscripts who half and half did and didn't do well, one of them actually got angry and ran up to one of the enemies after he was finished and kept shooting the poor pony at point blank before he was restrained by the facility guards.

Then I was next. I gripped my weapon tightly and entered the forest with the others watching me closely. I went a slightly slower pace than the others and anticipated the ambush—probably something I wasn't supposed to do, since ambushes were meant to be unexpected.

First came a red paint ball that whisked my ear and exploded against a tree beside me. The noise of the air rushing out of the way was enough to catch my attention and I whipped to my right to find one of the ambushers had changed positions—and anticipated my anticipation, if that makes any sense.

I dove against a tree and waited for him to reload before I whipped around the tree and took a quick and careful aim and unloaded three paint balls onto the enemy pony without remorse. The pony dropped onto the ground and pretended to be dead. I breathed a sigh of relief and kept moving towards the building. Unlike the previous conscripts' tests, nopony came out of the building which led to questions as to where they were. I expected that if I stepped into the building carefully, I would either be grabbed and put in a choke hold or I would be gunned down by the two remaining enemies.

I approached the building and stopped many yards from the door, leaning against a tree to take a deep breath. I peeked around the corner and looked over the building, spotting a smaller entrance to the side. I moved quickly to the door and tried to open it. Locked. I briefly glanced towards the others as they watched me, as if I was waiting for them to say it was okay to smash the door down.

But when no one answered my mental question, I turned around and drove my hinds into the door and bucked it open anyways. I whipped back around and moved into the building, aiming my gun around for trouble. Nothing to be seen. Of course I figured since I was the last one to go in, that I would get the brunt of it.

The building was poorly lit and the only light that came in was through broken and dirty windows that even then still didn't change the lighting much and didn't help my situation one bit. Then came the scuffle of hooves moving into hiding. I raised my gun and looked around quickly for any signs of my ambushers. Still, nothing could be seen.

"Come out, come out wherever you are," I muttered under my own breath and went further into the building.

As I walked past some crates, one of the ambushers jumped out from behind one and opened fire on me. Paint balls flew past me, one managing to explode in bright red onto my vest and marked one hit. I dove behind another crate and waited for the pony to reload. Much to my surprise, that calm never came and I had to take a chance at that point.

I stood up on my hinds, just above the second stacked crate and began shooting from there. Another paint ball grazed my ear, this time actually touching it, but didn't explode and couldn't be considered a hit. My ambusher wasn't as lucky and took four sloppy hits to his vest and fell 'dead'. Two down, one to go.

I was doing good at that point, up until I took another hit right in the wing that seemingly came out of thin air. There was almost nowhere I could take cover while at the same time being able to shoot back. Instead of doing so, I went right for the source and soon found the final ambusher and surprised him from behind.

"Peek-a-boo!" I shouted. He quickly turned around and fell onto his back in surprise, shooting blankly—and still managing to hit me. When he did, his ammunition fell out of the tube on the paintball gun and rolled away. He scrambled to grab at least two more paint balls, which would have ended my test with a big fail all over it.

Without hesitation, I unloaded all but two paint balls onto him and 'killed' him. I walked out of the building full of pride. I had taken three hits and had managed to get all of them. That was, until I took a hit to the back of the head and was knocked down. 

I turned onto my back and stared in the direction the shot came from and saw the final ambusher approaching with a big grin crossing his muzzle.

"Four shots kill, you only got me three times. Say goodnight," he raised his paint ball gun to shoot me again.

Out of reflexes, I raised mine quicker than he could and shot blankly. Since he was so close, it exploded all over his mask and he fell back screaming. I grew a small grin and stood back up.

"That's four," I removed my mask and held it in a hoof.

And just like that, the simulation was over and I passed with an eighty five percent—minimum passing grade. I felt good, but we weren't close to done yet.

Next came a group ambush, this time the enemies had higher powered paintball guns and paint grenades—and so did we. Except now there were more enemies than before and we were outnumbered by four. Eight against four weren't good odds, and especially since they were more likely to win the test with their toys.

It took longer than expected, but we managed to just barely pass the test and moved on so the next group could go. By then we were all slowly turning red from all of the paint ball hits from the enemy. I was happy to hear that it could all be washed out in the next shower too, because I didn't want to have a sudden coat color change.

Then the final test of the day came. All of us against a whole platoon of ambushers—still very much outnumbered. But luckily, we were given a leeway. If two of our stallions were taken out by the enemies, we could still pass—that is, if we made it past the others. However, it meant those ponies wouldn't pass this test, and everypony was required to pass at least two of today's tests to officially move on. If not, they would be going home. 

For a moment, I thought all was going well. But, something was bound to go wrong. And it did.

I took four hits all of a sudden out of nowhere and was immediately out of the game. I wasn't happy but I simply went to the sidelines to watch. Solar Wave took three hits, Silver Edge took two, the rest took one or two. But, the rest of them passed the test.

I couldn't stay unhappy forever, and I was happy for the two of them for passing and gave them hoofbumps when they returned to sidelines. We lined up shortly after and were given our scores on paper. Since the final test was a failure for me, I had just barely made passing grade and to my relief, I was going to make it to tomorrow.

Solar Wave and Silver Edge got the same score as did many others, except for one, who actually broke down sobbing on the ground in front of sergeant Hardstaff. Then something surprised us all; sergeant Hardstaff picked the pony up and actually gave him a hug to calm him down.

To see a pony who is supposed to be training others into soldiers, especially an acting drill sergeant hug somepony else was a once in a lifetime occasion. Man, I wish I had my camera with me, because it made me smile seeing he wasn't mad. 

Following the hug, sergeant Hardstaff nudged the pony's shoulder. "Get back in line," he said to him.

"Sir...?" The pony sniffled and wiped at his eye.

"Get back in line," he repeated.

"I don't...understand?"

"Just like the other conscripts I've helped train before, I always say you must pass two of the tests to make it to the final day for a reason. An objective is by far the only way to get ponies to work hard and use what they've been taught to save them. You all passed. But, there is always tomorrow. I expect you all to perform your best tomorrow and to not let anything get in the way. I expect each and every one of you to graduate. Is that clear?"

"Sir yes sir!"

"Very good. Fall in, boys. Let's head home."

We fell into a two-rowed group again and marched behind sergeant Hardstaff back to the docks where we were shuttled back across the river. The entire time, none of us had noticed it stopped raining and the thick layer of clouds were lightening up slightly. When we arrived at the naval station, the Eclipse was tied to the dock and whatever cargo was on the ship was being unloaded, the sailors and few Marines on board were reunited with their families—a sight that always brought a smile to my face. 

All of us took showers and washed our clothes, grabbed late lunch, then relaxed for the remainder of the day. Before we knew it, it was time to go to sleep. Tomorrow was a big day for us, and I couldn't have been more ready to face it.
> 11. Graduation
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

With day one of our final tests out of the way, we all went to bed early that night, ready to face tomorrow, and hopefully all of us would pass in flying colors. I was nervous to say the least, but it wasn't going to get the better of me. Over the past month and a half, I had been through heat exhaustion after running, I have climbed net-walled towers with my bare hooves, I've been in two fights with another conscript and I've been through days of straightening up my aim with pistols and rifles. Whatever was to come tomorrow, I was ready.


***


The trumpets went off the next morning, waking us all up simultaneously. My eyes shot open and before my brain could process it, I was standing up. But with that came a problem. Two moments after, I very briefly blacked out and my head throbbed in a headache. I raised a hoof to my forehead and rubbed it gently.

"Headrush..." I muttered to myself as my vision returned.

The conscripts rushed to get in line to shower, I wasn't in a hurry and fell in behind them where I waited patiently. The line went quick and about fifteen minutes after waking up, we were all showered and dressed in our training uniforms. I looked around the room after I finished buttoning up my jacket. I saw the looks of fear, the looks of confidence, and just blank expressions. Inside, I was both nervous and confident—mostly nervous.

Not long after we finished getting ready, sergeant Hardstaff burst through the door, the drill sergeant's hat still on his head. In his mouth sat a lit cigarette that let off a thin trail of smoke that slightly waved upwards. It only surprised me because in the entire time I was there, he wasn't seen with a cigarette anywhere. Either it was a new thing, or it was a drill sergeant thing that the hat gave him. I couldn't be too sure and I wasn't going to question it.

"Look at all of you...what a bunch of disgraces," his light blue eyes moved across all of us, we stood at attention beside the end of our beds.

If we were all given a bit every time he or the drill sergeant said that, we'd all be rich. The dark blue pegasus walked down the median between our beds, glaring at each and every one of us as he went by. I didn't budge and neither did the others. By now we were used to his glare, which even then wasn't as bad as the drill sergeant's. I expected a lecture that morning, but instead, sergeant Hardstaff just inspected us closely without saying a word. It surprised me and I'm sure it surprised the others too.

"All of you, fall in!" He shouted from the door, which he walked back to after about five minutes of walking around, glaring at us.

I fell into line with the other conscripts and we marched out of the barrack in a double-file line. It made me wonder what we would be doing today that would count as our passing exam. It couldn't have been exercise, and it couldn't have been a test to see how well we were with our weapons. After yesterday, it had to be something none of us would expect.

We were taken back to the docks and shuttled back across the river like yesterday. While we were on the dinghys, many of the other conscripts kept their focus on the Eclipse, which was docked still and void of activity. Well, mostly void.

We drove up to the same dock as the day before and unloaded one by one onto the safe, dry concrete. Us as a group got back into a double-file line behind sergeant Hardstaff, where he led us out onto the streets. We headed back in the direction of the training facility a few blocks west of where we were. It made me think we were going to be re-tested on everything from the day before. That was, until we got there, where we found out the whole place had a giant underground facility that spanned at least two blocks under the city and was twice the size of the block used for the above-ground training center.

We were all given paintball guns and masks again and given a quick briefing over what we would be doing in the basement area. It turned out each half was two different areas used for training and we would be tested and re-tested on everything possible—an operation that would last the entire day.

Test after test, each one getting harder by the round, I worked my way to the final one.

The final test was the same as before but harder; a solo session going against five attackers with the four-shot kill rule as before. This time, the ponies going against us were better trained and had more hiding spots than we did and a far better aim than most of us. It made me nervous after the first three conscripts to go failed almost immediately.

This time I wasn't last in line and my turn was next after five others went, the last two ahead of me didn't have much luck with them but managed to just barely pass the test with the lowest allowable score. Butterflies were floating in my stomach as I went into the facility, being watched by everypony else from upstairs. The ceiling above me was actually another floor, where everypony watched. I don't know how it was possible, but it was some kind of one-sided glass. They could see me, but I couldn't see them. Which was probably a good thing.

I started out in a small concrete room, the steel door separating me from the stairs up to everypony else shutting and locking behind me. The lights let off a low buzz from the amount of energy being pumped into them. The one above me flickered a bit and intermittently stayed lit before briefly going out. It was creepy but it wasn't a sign of anything, just a faulty light.

I walked through another doorway, gripping the paintball gun tight in a hoof while I scanned over the room with my eyes. In it in the corners were presumably empty crates while paint stains from previous exercises could be seen splattered in different spots of different colors on the rainbow. So far, everything was going good. No one was in that room.

I then went out into a poorly lit small hallway that led to four other much smaller rooms, each with open or no doors at all. A creeping feeling was crawling up my spine and made me feel uneasy. This was probably where I was going to be ambushed—or maybe not.

I walked quietly through the hallway, peeking into each doorway carefully and scanning over every inch before moving on. Once again, it seemed like nopony was there. When I reached the fourth room in the hallway, I peeked inside, then quickly whipped my head back as two paint balls shot past my muzzle and splatted against the wall across from the doorway. I tensed up and went back against the wall to protect myself until my attacker was ready to show himself, or until I was ready to show myself again.

I kept peeking my head in and out and barely dodging the paint balls. One hit the corner as I peeked around and I got paint spots on my mask, but it wasn't counted as a hit thank Celestia. When my attacker finally ran out of paint balls and went to reload, I rushed into the room and moved through a skyline of crates prior to finally locating the bastard. He wasn't willing to give up, however. He grew a grin on his muzzle as I aimed to shoot him, and he reached behind himself and grabbed a small rounded object. My eyes widened as he pulled the pin and I took off running for the door.

I ran out of the room and into the adjacent one across the hallway just as I heard the pop of the paint grenade exploding, a small wave of the red goo sloshing into the room I was in and had left the whole entire other room covered. One down, four to go.

It made me think of what to expect in the heat of an actual battle—an enemy growing hopeless and eventually deciding to take himself along with the ponies charging in on him if he were lucky enough to not have them see the grenade and run out in time. Thankfully this was just an exercise.

I walked out of the room I took for cover and peeked into the paint-covered room. Some of the crates had been knocked over and the whole room had a paint job. I then proceeded to the end of the hallway where a much larger room, the width of the whole course sat. I didn't know for sure how big this part of the facility was, but I could only assume it was as big as the surface one if not bigger. I didn't even realize the fact that I was tracking red hoofprints after stepping in the paint, not that I would really care until that night when I would likely shower.

It was another mostly empty room but instead of crates had concrete street barriers scattered around. I tensed up again and scanned over the room once more. My ear twitched, and soon after it did, I dove behind a close barrier just as two attackers jumped up and began covering the wall and doorway where I was with red and yellow paint. For some strange reason, they didn't stop shooting and just kept unloading their paint balls.

"Automatics..." I muttered under my breath and waited for their ammunition to run out.

While one of them shot, the other took a paint grenade, pulled the pin, then threw it towards me. My eyes widened when it landed right in front of me and I had little time to react. The attackers ducked behind their cover and waited for the grenade to explode. I stood up and ran as fast as I could across the room just as the paint grenade exploded behind me, covering a bit of my rear in paint. I guess that would have qualified as a slight hit, but no one counted it still. The rule was for paint grenades to have killed or count as a hit, I would have to be covered halfway in it's paint, which I thankfully wasn't.

After it exploded, the attackers stood back up and shot at me more. I quickly slid onto my back, into cover where I quickly sat upright but remained low and waited for the fire to stop again—and hopefully not have to deal with another paint grenade when it did.

I thanked the heavens when a paint grenade wasn't thrown my way and I was given a five second window to take at least one of them out. Instead of staying where I was, I ran out in the open and shot with one hoof towards them. Somehow one of the paint balls managed to hit one of them in the mask, which was counted for a kill in all, while another struck the other pony in the chest and side—still two more hits until he was dead.

I slid into more cover, now much closer to him and the other doorway that led to a final, larger room. I waited and waited, and to my surprise, the other pony didn't shoot. Instead, I heard clicks and soon a groan of anger. With a grin growing I stood up and gave the pony two more paint balls to the chest and thus gained another kill. Two more to go.

And this was it. They had to be in this final room. This was also where the last two ponies to go in for their exams nearly failed. I wasn't about to fail, not now.

I walked into the last room and looked around. It was the biggest room of all, and instead of more crates or barriers, it had skinny paths with squares scattered around, with a two foot drop into hot, dirty water that probably acted as acid or lava, whichever would probably hurt.

I walked onto one of the paths slowly and looked around, then stopped when I looked up and saw the final two attackers standing in plain sight with grins on their faces. There weren't very many places to hide either.

One of the ponies lifted up a small remote control and pressed a button. I stared at it, then looked around. Nothing seemed to happen. Then, suddenly, the floor beneath me opened up, and out came metal claws that held one of my hooves down and prevented me from going anywhere.

"Shit!" I said out loud, struggling to get my hind out of the claw's grasp, but it was no use. I returned my attention to the two remaining attackers who approached slowly, guns drawn. 

The one with the remote pressed another button, and shortly after he did, the section of floor beneath me began slowly sinking down into the hot water. My eyes went wide again and I struggled harder to get free. I quickly gave back up and took aim for the one with the remote. With two shots, I knocked the remote out of his hoof and sent it flying across the room. It didn't break, and he went after it while the other began shooting at me with an automatic paintball gun.

Paint balls flew past me, one striking me in the shoulder hard and causing me to yelp a bit. One hit. I kept pulling on my hind leg but still couldn't move. The water was gradually growing closer to me and if I completely went in, I think that would have knocked me out of the exercise.

I raised my gun slowly and took a careful aim for the pony with the remote who was scrambling to get it. Two more shots. Both missed and hit beside him. I grumbled and shot two more. One hit him in the back of the head and he fell to the ground, playing dead to count for the kill. One left.

I struggled more, and finally I began kicking at the metal claw with my other leg. It soon sparked and I snapped it out of where it was built and kicked it into the water. Now free, I jumped back up onto safe floor and shot at the advancing pony before getting into cover behind a small concrete barrier to reload.

Then, the fire stopped. I waited a moment, then stood up and took aim for the pony. Much to my surprise, there was no one there. I looked around quickly and didn't see anypony. Then came what I dreaded. Two more hits from behind. I was almost dead.

I snapped around to find the final attacker trying to reload. Since he was at point blank, he scrambled to get his weapon reloaded but ended up dropping the pack of ammo, most of it rolling away into the water where they popped and colored the water. I raised my gun and unloaded three more onto him, which pushed him back. He kept backing up, eventually his hinds slipped and he fell into the hot water, acting as if he was burning alive, but in reality he was probably enjoying the dirty hot tub.

Then that was it. Nothing happened after that. I looked around.

"Did...did I pass?" I looked all around me. No response. "Hello...? Anypony?"

It took a minute before a door across the water opened, leading to an elevator. I walked across one of the paths leading across the water and went into the elevator where I was brought up to the others. I walked up to them nervously and looked at everypony. They all gave me strange looks and weren't cheering. This made my ears fall back. I must have taken one more hit than I thought I did.

"I'm sorry..." I said quietly, my head lowering.

"Sorry for what?" Sergeant Hardstaff said as he walked up to me. "You passed."

I quickly looked up at him with wide-eyes. "Sir...? But why isn't anypony...nopony said so."

Just then, the room burst into cheering. The others congratulated me, and I couldn't have felt better. But, my mind was off and I hadn't realized something. After a few minutes, I was handed a piece of paper of my scores by one of the facility workers. My eyes shot open when I saw my final score—a 95 percent.

My score turned out to be the second best ahead of the group and couldn't have been happier to say I was going to graduate.


***


By the time we came back up to the surface facility, the sun was down and there wasn't much activity in the part of town we were in. With sergeant Hardstaff leading us, we marched back to the docks and boarded the dinghys. Even when we weren't on the water speeding across the river, the night was very cold that night and some of us were shivering. Drops of water that flew up from the boat's movement pelted us once and a while and the water from what we could tell was even colder than the air itself. I hoped for the remaining few minutes of the trip that something wouldn't knock us all off into the ice cold river.

We disembarked the dinghys and quickly formed a double file line. Then, much to our surprise, "Dismissed everypony. Head to your barracks, or do whatever. Tomorrow is your day off. Saturday is Graduation Day," sergeant Hardstaff turned to us. "Spend the rest of your free time while you have it, graduates."

Some cheering broke out in our small group as sergeant Hardstaff trotted away, then we began walking out of formation. Others talked to each other while we walked to our barrack.

Silver Edge trotted up beside me with a big smile across his muzzle, bigger than the others.

"Excited?" I smiled to him.

"More than. We all passed, Star! Damn...we're all going to be Lunar Marines!" Silver squeaked happily.

"Heh, yeah," I said, not intending to sound as least excited as possible.

Silver thankfully didn't notice and we talked for a bit more before we went into our barracks and got out of our uniforms. When I put my uniform in a small laundry basket, I noticed as I walked back towards my bed, a few small laughs were directed towards me. I looked around at everypony curiously, they immediately stopped when I did. I shrugged it off and went to my bed, before the whole room erupted in laughter.

I quickly turned around and tossed a glare towards everyone. I noticed even Solar and Silver were laughing at me. I didn't even know what it was.

"Okay, what in Luna's blue moon is so funny?"

"Look at your hooves!" Solar snorted as he laughed, only causing him to laugh harder.

I turned my attention to my hooves, which were still red from the paint. A small smile came across my muzzle and I started laughing with them. "Very funny," I then went in the back of the barrack into the bathroom to shower and hopefully get the paint off.


***


Following a good night's sleep, we were awakened by the trumpets around seven in the morning and all got up minutes after. That morning was a new feeling. I wasn't completely sure what the feeling was, but all I knew was, it felt good.

With a whole day to waste on whatever I wanted to do, I decided to head out of the base and go into the city to explore the rest of it. If Manehattan was going to be my station for my whole military career, I thought it would be a good idea to memorize where things were on the island.

I was disappointed when I couldn't find Solar Wave or Silver Edge to go with me, so after breakfast, I caught a taxi carriage a few blocks away in North Manehattan, as the district was called.

Despite the morning being fairly nice with little clouds scattered around the sky, and the sun shining over the eastern horizon, the temperature was a chilly forty degrees. Then with the ocean breeze, it felt more like thirty, either one still cold. I'm glad I wore my beanie and gloves.

After I paid the taxi carriage puller, I stepped onto the street just a block away from the Equestrian Trading Tower, two blocks from Batterneigh Park. The city was still fairly busy with at least a hundred ponies walking about in suits carrying briefcases, or thick winter-like coats, and even ponies with strange, fancy hats. Manehattan was certainly a high-class city, similar to Canterlot's population, except it had at least six times the amount of ponies inhabiting it and was a far larger slab of land where the city spanned out around the rivers, where Manehattan Island sat square in the middle.

Long before I did move to Canterlot, I didn't travel much. Mostly around my own home town and to nearby communities, never once did I travel long distances, mainly because my father wasn't much of a traveler. But now that I was going to be a soldier in the Lunar Marines, I could only imagine the places I would be going elsewhere in Equestria, or beyond.

My day in the city mostly consisted of walking around and going in and out of stores that interested me, but I didn't buy anything. Most of the money I had was spent and I couldn't afford anything—even then, I didn't know what I could buy that I would be able to take back. I hoped that after graduation, we would be allowed to still live elsewhere. I still had an apartment in Canterlot that I couldn't just leave behind.

I took a taxi carriage back to the mainland and walked the rest of the way to the naval station and was let in after showing my identification—which actually was just my dog tags.

After dinner I went back to Barrack 19 and walked inside. Nothing was different and most of the conscripts were there, either chatting or doing their own thing.

Since I had nothing to do, I just laid down and listened to conversations—and later on joined into one.

When lights out came, we all went out like the lights in the room. We all had a big today tomorrow.


***


I woke up earlier than everypony else that morning for some strange reason. I didn't question it, but I was up and I might as well get ready for the day ahead. After a quick shower, I went back to my bed. No one else was awake still, surprisingly. The one problem that kept crossing my mind was if we were supposed to have dress uniforms for the graduation ceremony or not. Usually when ponies graduated a military academy, they dressed nicely and one by one went onto a stage to be given their patches and what not. Of course, it could have been different here.

Not long later, the others started to get up and take showers, while I sat patiently on my bed, under the blankets. The heater still wasn't fixed and it was extremely cold in the room. Others shivered as they waited in line to shower. Luckily the water heater had been easy fixed, it turned out the only thing wrong with it was the pilot light went out on the heater and needed to be quickly restarted.

While some of the others showered, a soldier none of us had seen before walked into our barrack to let us know when the graduation ceremony was, which it wasn't until later that night. Just perfect, another day with nothing to do until tonight. Before he walked out, he stopped himself and told us that we would be wearing our training uniforms to the ceremony, and that tomorrow or Monday we would be receiving our actual uniforms and having our patches sewed on.

The pony walked out, and then the chatter in the room began. Some talked about what the ceremony would be like, others talked about how good they would look in the uniforms we knew we were getting. While they did, I remained mostly silent, occasionally replying to questions that they asked and others didn't know the answers to. At least, I tried my best to answer them.

Breakfast came and went like a flash, and so did lunch. Afterwards, we were advised by the same soldier from earlier to get our uniforms on and be ready to be picked up. Without hesitation, I got dressed. First the dark blue t-shirt, followed by the lighter blue jacket we all had during boot camp. It made me think too. This would be the last day I would ever wear this jacket in my military career. By tomorrow, I would have a brand new look.

Just after sunset, while we spent the time either chatting or other things in the barrack, the doors opened and the room instantly went silent. We all turned to the door, and standing in it stood a somewhat taller pony, a dark grey unicorn dressed in the usual Lunar Marine camouflage. He looked over us slowly with a hardened look on his face.

"Ten-hut! All of you, line up! Double file!" He shouted.

We scrambled into a perfect double file line in front of the unicorn. His eyes moved over us, then he turned around. "On me. March!" He began out the door and onto the base grounds.

As a group, we followed close behind the unicorn, keeping good formation without losing posture. We marched through the base, and soon to the main gate where numerous taxi carriages waited. It surprised most of us, and two were put on each carriage before the pony pulling them galloped away with the carriage and making a right turn towards the bridge.

I was lucky enough to be put with Silver Edge when we got on the taxi carriage and sped away. Not me or him knew where we were going. But when I saw we were heading for the bridge to cross over into downtown, a little bit of excitement hit me.

We pulled up behind the other taxi carriages in front of a tall building near the center of the city that was made of tan brick, with large squared glass paned windows that spanned up most of the building's height. Large spotlights stood from the ground up, bright yellow rays of light emanating from them stretching up into the sky. Ponies in suits and dresses stood in a moving line outside of the building going through two of the doors, while the third was open for our entry. From what it looked like, the building seemed to be a giant theater or something like that with the way the spotlights and fine architecture were.

I hopped off of the carriage with Silver and we were brought into the building and taken to a side room where we were told to wait until everypony waiting to get in was seated. It was beginning to feel like we were part of some sort of play, and they were going all out with our graduation ceremony. Was it always like this? Only one way to find out.

A few minutes after we arrived, a light blue stallion in a black suit and tie with a neatly combed jet black mane walked into the room we were in. 

"Everypony is seated. Now, when your names are called, which they will be alphabetically, you will all one at a time walk up to the stage, up the main aisle and stand in two groups on the podium where everypony can see you. Sergeant Hardstaff asks that you all stand at almost attention, and when he comes out, you know what to do. Is everypony ready?" He spoke in a slight eastern accent.

We all nodded, some cheers of excitement broke out as well. The pony smiled and opened the door for us, and one by one we trotted out of the room into the main hall of the building, just outside of the ball room. Some of the others checked themselves in mirrors and made slight adjustments to their manes or uniforms, while I stood and waited patiently. At first, I was excited for the ceremony. But now that I knew it would be in front of a ton of ponies, the excitement quickly faded. Oh how much I hate stage fright. Thankfully, we weren't supposed to be doing any kind of speeches on the spot.

The tall double-wooden doors into the ball room swung open slowly at the will of unicorn's silver magical aura, and instantly we saw ponies were seated at round dinner tables, being served different types of wines and fancy Manehattan dishes. It was then that the same pony that collected us was on stage.

The pony cleared his throat and gently tapped a hoof on the microphone. It made a brief high pitched noise that caused many to wince. He blushed in some embarrassment and cleared his throat again.

"Mares and gentlecolts, I would like to thank you all for coming to the annual Lunar Marine Corps Graduation Ball! My name is Sergei Tobbletop, and tonight, we are here to celebrate the young ponies who have given it their all in training for the last two and a half months, all training to become guardians of our fair nation. To protect us and keep our country in the long peace we have had for three centuries. Tonight, these young ponies become soldiers."

The room erupted in collective, loud claps of hooves that lasted a few moments, before Sergei took a small piece of paper out of his suit pocket and unfolded it. He stared at it, and began calling names of our group alphabetically.

One by one, the others walked up the main red carpet aisle to the stage, each being clapped for the duration of their walk up until the next name was called. Each conscript first standing on the top podium until it was full, standing straight and tall but not waving or looking around. Then, they began standing on the lower podium.

"Conscript Star Shooter!" Sergei called with a smile.

With a second of hesitation, I walked casually down the red carpet as ponies clapped. I couldn't help but smile slightly to the ponies in the audience and did so until I reached the stage. I wiped the smile away and stood on the bottom podium towards the center where the next spot was.

I stood beside Solar Wave, and beside him stood Silver Edge. I was happy to be beside my two friends for the ceremony. Just a couple of minutes after the first pony walked out, the last stood on the podium.

"Mares and gentlecolts, I give to you, the princess of the moon herself, Princess Luna!"

The room burst into cheers and claps as the Lunar Princess walked onto the stage from the side, dressed in a magnificent silver and dark blue gown, her styled mane sparkling like the sky on a cloudless night. Between the claps, I could hear some of the ponies talking about just how beautiful her dress was. I had to agree, it was something I had never seen before. Sergei bowed to the princess, taking her hoof in his and kissing it softly. Princess Luna nodded once to him with a smile and responded with a thank you, before she stepped to the side.

"And finally, Sergeant Hardstaff of the Lunar Marine Corps!" Sergei then stepped to the side on the opposite side of the stage of Princess Luna as the extreme dark blue pegasus dressed in a dark blue dress uniform with Luna's cutie mark as a patch on his shoulder and silver buttons trotted out, he shook hooves with Sergei, then bowed to Princess Luna and gave her hoof a soft kiss as well.

After doing so, Hardstaff stood beside Sergei and motioned his hoof in a circle for Princess Luna to take the microphone with a bow. The princess nodded once to him with a smile, walking up to the microphone and staring over the crowd as it quieted down. She cleared her throat.

"Mares and gentlecolts, it is a great honor for us to be here in the wonderful city of Manehattan on this beautiful August evening. As Sergei said, we are all here to celebrate the graduation of these fourteen fine stallions here behind me. Each stallion has proven themselves worthy enough to be a soldier, to be a part of my military branch, to be called a Lunar Marine. Before we get to the special part, we have some things to say."

Princess Luna paused for a moment. "As some ponies know, the Lunar Republic back a millennia ago was created by myself, Princess Luna, when a great darkness took over my soul. When I had had enough with ponies shunning the beautiful night. I wanted ponies to love my job as much as they loved my dear sister, Princess Celestia's. The Lunar Republic was used for bad, to destroy all that my dear sister had created. Her guard, and anypony that worked for her cause." 

"It is a grim thought, but it brings me joy that after all of these years, just two of them ago we decided to re-establish the Lunar Republic, but as the New Lunar Republic. Not for any terror or rebellions, but to protect our great nation for what it is, to keep the harmony that my sister fought to keep one thousand years ago. And these ponies, these fourteen stallions behind me, are the next ponies to serve as a part of Equestria's military. They have spent their blood, sweat, and tears, fighting to become what they will be shortly. There will be no more rebellions, there will only be fighting for everypony's freedom. There will be no more wars, just battles for Equestria's future. And most importantly, there will be no more rivalry between the sides." 

"No more rivalry between the sailors and Marines of the New Lunar Republic, and no more fighting over who's best on my sister's side and mine. It may be a different name, it may be a different uniform, it may be different technology, but overall, our military is all one, no matter who's side who is loyal to."

Princess Luna stopped. Immediately after, more loud clapping and cheering broke out in the room, and it remained that way for a full minute before she cleared her throat again, then turned to a soldier in a similar uniform to sergeant Hardstaff's walking out, carrying small wooden boxes.

"May I have the patches please, kind sir?"

The soldier nodded once, opening the box slowly, revealing many of the same military uniform patches laid atop one another but not in a pile. Each patch had Luna's crescent moon facing upwards in the rounded center, with two large white bars sticking slightly upwards out of the side of the circle, connected by white that edged the entire patch.

Princess Luna began going by ponies at the bottom of the podium, the one I was on. Each conscript walked up to her and sergeant Hardstaff, saluting to the both of them. Sergeant Hardstaff saluted back proudly, and after exchanging salutes, Princess Luna lit her horn in a blue aura and pressing the patch on their shoulders on a velcro spot she magically added to their uniforms, then bowed her head to them, the conscripts—now privates—bowing in thanks.

I was third to walk up to the princess. My heart was beating fast but I didn't show any signs of being nervous in front of her or the sergeant. I saluted Hardstaff and the princess, receiving one back from the sergeant before Princess Luna pinned the velcro patch onto my shoulder. I bowed to her, then walked back to my spot on the podium. Next was Solar Wave, and then Silver Edge, and finally the rest of the group.

When the Lunar Princess finished, she walked back up to the microphone as the soldier with the wooden box stood beside Sergei and Hardstaff.

"Mares and gentlecolts, I am proud to give to you, the new privates of the Lunar Marines."

The crowd erupted in cheering and clapping once more, much louder than the other times, most standing from their seats. We stood perfectly still with mostly blank expressions, but deep down, I was ready to burst with excitement.

Following the ceremony, we were taken offstage and to a fancy buffet in the room where we were left to eat. Some of the conscripts—I mean privates—went to family members they had in the crowd. It was a heartwarming sight, but then it made me think of home. It made me think of my parents who would probably never know where I was now.

But I was certain they would be proud. I was a Lunar Marine now.
> 12. The Surplus Store
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The festivities of the graduation ceremony went on until about midnight that night, before we were taken back to base on taxi carriages. I was exhausted needless to say, and being up until midnight was definitely going to screw around with my sleeping schedule. By the time we arrived at the naval station, I as well as a few others went back to our barrack while the other graduates stayed out and about, some going to bars in the area to hang out.

Sergeant Hardstaff had informed us before that following graduation, we were given about a week of leave time to spend on whatever we desired. I decided to use one of my days for tomorrow to give me time to sleep in after the long night, and the rest of the day to spend relaxing and maybe hitting the town again.

That night, I went straight to Barrack #19 and dropped onto my bed. I couldn't say for sure how long it was between me collapsing onto it and falling asleep. I didn't imagine it to be any longer than a minute.

Around a quarter before nine the next morning, I woke up feeling fresh and fully recharged after the previous night. I yawned and stretched my arms above my head prior to sitting up and pushing the blankets off of me. I looked around, seeing all but a couple of the others were still there. Both of the other ponies there in the barrack were still sound asleep, and I imagined they were just as tired as I was if not even more tired. For some reason, I was feeling sore in some spots.

I got up out of bed and went into the bathroom, bringing a towel with me and taking a nice, hot shower. The steamy water beating against me eased some of the soreness in my muscles and helped me relax just a bit. Long showers were nice and I deeply missed them from before I enlisted.

I dried off and dropped my towel off in the laundry basket before going to my bed and taking my hooflocker out. The night before, we had been paid graduation money—four hundred and fifty bits to be exact—some of which we were advised to use to buy our new uniforms with. I took a good portion of my money, put on my old training uniform, then went out to the on-base surplus store where I assumed was where we would be getting our uniforms.

I walked into the shop and looked around. Three of the others were already there, waiting at the cashier counter. One of them turned and looked at me, it was Silver.

"Hey Star, coming to get your uniform too?" He smiled.

I nodded and smiled back, walking up to him. "Sure are."

"The cashier is getting them out of storage in the back. He'll come and get us to get our sizes fitted," said one of the others.

I stood behind them, waiting patiently. But just after a few moments I decided to look around the small shop. Nothing new was in there, but I was still interested in looking around for anything I might need.

Just then, the cashier walked up in the front and called out to us. "Alright everypony, come in back," he motioned his hoof.

I walked back to the others and went with them into the back of the shop where a large fitting room was. The shop keeper determined our sizes with measuring tape, then each handed us our uniform jackets in the sizes we needed. I took my jacket out of the plastic bag it was wrapped in and held it in front of me. It was a brand new jacket with the exact same urban-style digital camouflage as the rest of the Marines on base. On the shoulder, the 'Private' patch was already sewed on, and the only thing that was missing was our name tags on the uniform.

Luckily, the shop keeper had our name tags laid out for us. They were velcro name patches, but we were told to put them on as straight as possible for they didn't come back off that easy. I carefully placed my name patch onto the velcro spot on the right side of my jacket and pressed a hoof over it to make sure it was down all the way. I then unbuttoned the jacket and carefully put it on. The jacket was stiff at first and kind of hard to fit into, then shortly after I buttoned it up, it felt like the perfect fit. With an adjustment to the jacket's collar, I walked up to the mirror and looked myself over.

I smiled at myself in the mirror, looking over the brand new uniform, heart racing in excitement.

"Hey, looking good there!" Silver said with a smile as he fixed his name patch onto his jacket.

"Heh, thanks," I smiled to him, then turned around but was met with the shop keeper holding a hat in the same camouflage style in his hoof. His sudden appearance startled me a little and made me jump in the slightest bit.

"You'll need this as well," he put the hat in my hoof. "This will be your patrol cap, also known as your cover. Rank is already on it, all you need is to try it on."

The patrol cap had squared edges and had about seven sides. It wasn't like a regular hat or a type of military hat most ponies knew of, but in a way, it fit the uniform better. I slid it on my head—a perfect fit. I looked at myself in the mirror and grew a grin. Now I really did look like a Marine.

"Really looking good now, Star," Silver said with a widened smile.
> 13. The Final, Final Test
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Two days had passed since graduation. Other than receiving my official uniform, both Sunday and Monday were extremely slow with nothing to do but sit around the barrack. Great, right?

After lunch Tuesday afternoon, and bored out of my mind, I went to the gym to work out to pass the day. With nothing on my schedule, I was beginning to wonder just what the use of privates were.

At the gym, I started off with a half an hour of treadmill and another half hour with lifting smaller weights and working my way up gradually. My goal was to be able to lift heavier things so I would be able to in a time of need, whether it be lifting debris off of somepony, or something else related to lifting, whatever it would be.

After my workout, I returned to the barrack to find everyone was gone. I searched the barrack but found nopony at all. It concerned me a little, but what was I to do?

Just then, Solar Wave trotted in through the door and stopped beside it with a hardened look on his face.

"Ah, there you are. What's—"

"Star, come outside. We've been looking for you," he said flatly.

I blinked. "What for? What's going on?"

"I'll explain on the way. For now, get your uniform on. Meet me outside when you're done," Solar then turned away and trotted back out.

I stood there for a moment, before going to my hooflocker and getting my new uniform out and buttoning up the jacket almost all of the way. I took the patrol cap out as well and slid it onto my head, knowing that day was thankfully warm enough where I wouldn't need my beanie and gloves. It was much relief and it was nice to have one possibly last warm day before winter was to come in a couple of months. I walked out of the barrack to Solar and we began walking.

"So, Star. I've been needing to talk to you about something," he started.

"Yes?" I looked at him, fully curious as to what was going on.

"...Are you ready?"

"Ready for what?" I stopped and stared at him.

Just then, I was bum-rushed by two other ponies. They came seemingly out of nowhere and I didn't know who was tackling me. I yelped in surprise and spun onto my back, cap flying off of my head onto the ground. I delved my hinds into one of the ponies and kicking them off of me. The pony was a pegasus and stopped himself with his wings, and fell back down on top of me even harder than before, while the other still held on to me tightly, holding my wings to my sides.

Not much of an advantage to them, because even at the age of 19, I was still flightless. With my forehooves still free, I drove my left hoof into the muzzle of the earth pony holding my wings down. He barely budged and the hit he took left him with blood running from one of his nostrils. He growled and gripped me tighter and managed to squeeze some of the breath out of me, he was just that strong. I resumed trying to punch the pony off of me and went on to kick my hinds aimlessly and hitting the earth pony square in the stomach. Even with all of my resisting, I was unable to get free.

"Solar..." I grunted and squirmed around in their grasp. "Help!"

I laid my head back and stared upwards, watching Solar walk above me with a concerned look. He sighed. "I'm sorry it had to come to this Star," he said, levitating a rock and forcing it into my head. 

Everything went black at that point.


***


"Wake up..."

...

"Star, wake up."

...

"Star, god damn it, wake up!"

My eyes shot open wide, met instantly with a blinding white light that shone in front of me into my face. I winced and squinted, waiting for my eyes to finally adjust to the sudden, bright light. I went to get up from the chair I was sitting in, only to look down and see my hooves bound to the armrests by tightened ropes. I pulled on them and squirmed about, also finding my torso tied tightly to the back of the chair.

"Argh...what the hell is this?" I kept struggling for a bit and finally gave up a few moments later when nothing happened.

I quickly glanced back up, my attention now away from the position I was in to what was going on. The bright light still shined onto me, a lamp sitting on a wooden table in the middle of a dark grey, windowless room. Standing against the wall in a line were Silver Edge and Solar Wave, as well as two others with corporal patches on their shoulders. In front of me stood sergeant Hardstaff, who stared at me with a hardened glare on his face.

I recoiled back slightly and tilted my head. "Sergeant? What's going on?"

"You know exactly what's going on, tell us everything, damn it!" He shouted, slamming his hoof on the table and nearly knocking the lamp over.

I jumped a little. "No, I don't!" I tugged on my hooves some more, still nothing happened. 

Silver walked up beside the sergeant with an equally-hard glare that got to me a little. "For Luna's sake, Star. We're not that stupid, tell us why you're working for the griffons!"

"The...griffons?" I stared at the both of them, confused as ever.

"You heard us. Talk!" Silver stomped his hoof on the floor. "Or should we get it out of you ourselves?" He turned to one of the corporals standing behind him and nodded once. The pegasus trotted to a table on the edge of the room and unfolded a cloth, revealing many sorts of knives, syringes, and other weapons I presumed were for torture.

"Shit..." I thought to myself when I first saw the pegasus pick up a butcher knife, followed by a regular hunting knife. I relaxed a bit but was still nervous. "But, I'm not working for the griffons?"

"Bull. We know everything about you. You think we haven't been watching you from the start?" Sergeant Hardstaff stepped closer and leaned towards my face.

"Watching me...? But, sir, I—"

"Butts are for sitting on, talk already!" Silver levitated the knife from the corporal's hoof and held it aimed towards me.

I gulped at the sight and struggled a bit more. "I-I swear, I don't know anything about any of this, and for the love of Celestia, I am not working for the griffons!"

I was quickly met with sergeant Hardstaff's hoof that went directly into my cheek. I yelped in pain, and my head was thrown to the side and I was left with a swollen bruise on my left cheek. I snapped my head back to them and struggled against the bindings even more.

"The hell?!" I winced, my cheek still hurting from the punch.

Sergeant Hardstaff punched me in the same spot again, only adding to the amount of pain my cheek was feeling. I yelped again and this time very slowly turned my head back, blinking a few times. My cheek was a light shade of red from the bruise and I could feel it swelling up even more.

"I swear..." I started, panting a little. "I know nothing of this."

"Bull. Private, give it to him," sergeant Hardstaff turned to Silver, who still had the knife in his magical grasp.

My eyes went wide as Silver walked closer. The knife was levitated closer, the sharp part of the blade was pressed against my neck. I gulped, only to feel it press harder. I tried to pull my head back but it remained at my neck the entire time. My eyes moved back up to Silver, who now stood with his teeth clenched in front of me.

"I swear on my life, Silver, I am not working with any griffons. Griffons are not our enemies. And if they were, there is no way in Tartarus I would work for them, and sell every one of you out to be assassinated by mercenaries. I swear to all of you, I'm not a traitor!" I shut my eyes quickly afterwards when I felt the knife press further against my neck. Any further, and it would cut into the skin.

"Do you have anything you want to say before you go?" Asked Solar Wave.

"Uh..." I started nervously. "O-okay—uh...I-I just want to say, Silver, I'm so sorry for putting whipped cream in your hoof and tickling your nose with one of my feathers, that was completely immature of me...and Solar, I'm...so sorry I haven't been that good of a friend to you. I-I'm not a very sociable pony, and that's all my fault!" I was in a bit of a panic. "Please, make this quick..."

I shook gently in the chair I was tied to and expected my neck to be sliced open any moment now. I wasn't sure what any of them were talking about. I wasn't working for any griffons. I didn't even know any griffons! I was extremely nervous. Whatever I had done to tick them off, they were about to get the better of me and I was just going to be a blood stain on the floor—and no one would know. Then a question came to mind. Were my friends not really my friends?

After a few moments, the knife pulled away and the light shut off, allowing for other smaller ones on the ceiling to turn on. The others in the room then began chuckling. What did make me open my eyes, however, was the knife being set down.

"You actually thought we were going to kill you?" Laughed sergeant Hardstaff, who walked up to me with a big grin.

"Sir... I-I... I don't understand?" I shook in my chair still.

"Torture interrogation test, Star. Every Lunar Marine has to go through one or two in the event that they are captured on the front lines. And for your first go on it, I'd say you handled it pretty well. Buuut, I'll leave you to deal with Silver now that you admitted you did make him splatter cream all over himself."

My eyes widened and I looked around the sergeant at Silver. "S-sorry."

"Aye, don't worry about it. My face tasted pretty good," Silver chuckled.

Just then, I heard the snap of the ropes breaking, followed by my body lurching forward just slightly. I looked down and found the rope holding my chest to the back of the chair was broken, and the pegasus corporal was untying my hooves from the chair. Once he finished, he stepped back and I rubbed my hooves where the ropes squeezed against them.

"So...I passed?" I asked, ears pinned back.

Sergeant Hardstaff nodded. "Yes. But, over time, we will work on you. When you least expect it. Just like a real life situation."

"Yes sir..." I nodded slowly and got up out of the chair as the sergeant and everypony but Solar left, the yellow unicorn trotted up to me and nudged me with his elbow.

"I was scared shitless too, but don't worry, you ain't gonna die in our hooves."

All I could do was nod and smile weakly.


***


Later on that day, and after a quick visit to the on-base clinic, I walked up to the flag pole at the center of the base. At full staff flew the Equestrian flag, a blue flag with the royal sisters in a bit of a yin-yang position with the sun and moon in front of their respective princesses. A few others stood below the flag, their hooves raised to their foreheads. I looked at them briefly, then up to the flag. I raised my right hoof to my forehead and saluted, watching the flag wave in the calm, but cold breeze.

Just a few moments after, I lowered my hoof and cracked a smile up at the flag. My eyes moved back down to where the other soldiers were and found they were no longer there and nowhere to be seen. It was amazing how quickly everypony there moved.

I felt a hoof tap against my shoulder and I turned my head to the pony. Immediately I saw the rank patch and silver bar pins of a commanding officer on the stallion's uniform and I instantly stood at attention and saluted him. It was the same commanding officer as a few days ago.

"Sir," I said.

The greenish-grey pony saluted back, then removed his black shades. "Private Star Shooter."

"Yes, sir?" I lowered my hoof and remained at attention.

The earth pony grew a faint grin on his muzzle. "About time you got in. But, why for the love of Celestia did you choose the Marines and not the Navy?"

I tilted my head a little. "I didn't have the option."

"Ah," he nodded once. "Makes sense. Still, about time."

"...Shadow?" My eyes widened just a bit.

"You guessed it," he smirked. "Still interested in being a part of my crew?"

"I—yes, of course!" I smiled. "Unless the position is filled already?"

The pony, Shadow, shook his head. "I wouldn't offer somepony a job opportunity and have them accept just to let somepony else have it. I'm not one of those ponies."

"Aha, funny," I smiled. "Just return from a deployment?"

"Ooooh yeah, a long one," Shadow exhaled, his lips flapping a bit. "The desalination filter went out about two weeks in and we had to have bottled water airlifted from the eastern colonies for a hefty price."

"Why hefty? There's plenty of water everywhere."

"Not in Prance, they're in a drought right now."

My eyes widened. "Prance? In a drought?"

"Yeah, shocking, isn't it?"

"Very. They always get rain."

"Well, not recently. And they're inexperienced with manipulating the weather. So, they're just about screwed until the next rainstorm comes."

"Dang. So, was the filter fixed?"

"Took a while, but yes, it was. The last one was old and needed replaced anyways, so we should be good for the next deployment and the many ones after that," Shadow replied.

"Well, that's good. When do you expect your next deployment?" I asked.

"Mmm, in a month or so, I presume. I assume you will be joining us on our oceanic journey as well?" Shadow smiled.

"You bet I will. But, if I may ask, just what will be my position?"

"Well, you will need the extra training for it, which should last about a week, I am putting you in charge of the weather and traffic radars on the bridge," he stopped. "Do you drink coffee?"

I nodded. "Yes, why?"

"Better get used to it, your shifts are long. Which is why the last radar operator left, he couldn't take sitting in a chair for sixteen hours a day."

My eyes widened. "Sixteen...hours?"

Shadow nodded. "Think you can handle it?"

Some thoughts went through my mind, but after a few moments of silence, "Yes sir."

"Very good," Shadow smiled again. "I've also got somepony for you to meet, come our departure. A lieutenant in the Marines and a very good friend of mine. I think you'll like him. But, I should warn you as well, he's kind of...strange."

"Strange?"

"Well, maybe not strange, just...not that talkative."

"Neither are you really," I muttered quietly.

"Huh?"

"Nothing."

Shadow narrowed his eyes on me, then shrugged it off. "Alright then. I'd best be on my way. I will see you in a week or two, alright?"

"Yes sir."

"Remember, radar training. I won't be teaching the classes, but I can get you signed up for one."

"If you could, that would be great, sir," I smiled to him.

Shadow nodded once. "Alright, I will. See you around, private."
> 14. A Marine's Night Out
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The days that followed the torture interrogation test only got colder and shorter. It was only the beginning of September and winter was already coming in like a lion. Thankful to own some issue gloves and a watch hat, they kept my hooves and ears toasty against brutal oceanic breezes.

That week, I was assigned a temporary station along the northern wall to a stretch between where a couple of watchtowers were situated. Basically, my job for the time being was to patrol back and forth along the wall from near the water line to about one sixth of a mile inland, armed with an M16 hanging around my neck by a strap. It was far better than staying in a barrack all day, and certainly more so above a desk job, but with fall almost in full swing, it was one of the worst positions.

Every day passed with no action, and every night after dinner was spent sleeping until my shift that started at 0600 every morning. I kept it in my hopes that somepony would approach and finally tell me whether or not I am cleared to begin the classes necessary to work a radar which, by then, I would finally be able to serve aboard the Eclipse.

When Friday morning came, I stepped out into the frigid, breezy air, dressed fully in uniform, complete with the wool watch cap that nestled atop my crown and shielded my ears from the cold, along with an M16 around my neck. It was about a five minute trot from the barrack to my station on the far northern end of the base, which would then be followed by a ten hour stretch of patrolling roughly thirty yards of solid concrete separating an area of brush and trees, Bronclyn to the east, and the inside of Joint Base Manehattan.

I strolled over to the ladder that led up to the top and began to climb. The wall itself was at least two and a half times my height, and thus the climb was fairly short. About halfway up, however, I was stopped by the sound of somepony whistling for me. I paused where I was and glanced back down to the ground. There stood Sergeant Hardstaff, with black shades over his eyes.

"Hey, Private, come down here," he called, gesturing while staring directly at me.

I stared back momentarily before sliding down the ladder and landing on all fours. "Yes, Sergeant?" I threw up a firm salute.

Sergeant Hardstaff waved his hoof. "At ease." I lowered my hoof. "So, a little birdy tells me you've already been offered a rate on the Eclipse. Is this true?"

I nodded without hesitation to the question. "Yes, sir. It is."

"Radar and SONAR position?" he added.

My head cocked a bit. "Er... Sonar?"

"Sound Navigation And Ranging," the sergeant explained. "It's about the same thing as a radar but it is only used on the open ocean. But, as I was saying, is that your position?"

"Well, if the Academy would let me in before the Eclipse ships out in a month, yes," I waved, nodding.

Hardstaff suddenly dug into his uniform pocket and produced a folded note, then slapped it against my chest. "Boom, you're in. Carry on with your duties."

I took the folded piece of paper and looked at it, then up at the sergeant, who was now trotting away without another word spoken.

"Er... thank you?" I said just loud enough for him to hear.

"Don't thank me, thank your commanding officer! Now, read it!" he shouted back without stopping.

I shifted my attention back to the piece of paper and carefully unfolded it.




To: Private Star Shooter, New Lunar Marine Corps.
25th Battalion, 4th Marines

From: The Lunar Naval Academy of Radar and SONAR Tracking.

We are pleased to accept a newly-graduate into our three week classes that will teach those who take them what to do in the event of being put in the position of a Radar Operator. In the three weeks beginning September 7th, you will be taught the basics of weather tracking, as well as identifying blips of objects on radar whether they be fishing vessels, merchant ships, or even an enemy in the event of warfare at sea.

On behalf of all of us at the academy, welcome aboard, Private Star Shooter.




I stared at the letter for a full two minutes in disbelief, all before a big grin widened across my muzzle. I was accepted into the Academy! I was officially going to be a part of Shadow's crew, on the Eclipse! But then, I began to ponder just how difficult these classes might be, especially around the start.

Choosing to shrug it off, I tucked the letter after folding it back up into my uniform pocket and climbed back up the ladder to the top of the wall. It shouldn’t be too hard, I thought, remembering the classes on meteorology that I had taken back in the sixth grade. Needless to say, weather fascinated me as a colt, and to this day it still did. Hopefully it wouldn't be too much different in the coming class.

The thought remained fresh on my mind the rest of my shift, and even after I exchanged with the night watch officer who covered for me during the night hours, I started having mixed feelings about the Academy—which classes started on Sunday. Anxiety of both the excited and nervous kinds took firm hold on me as a result. I didn't know which of the two I was most of.

That night was fairly clear with little clouds off in the distance. Up above, stars that blinked and twinkled far above the world and for once that day, it made me think of something other than the Academy. When I was younger, there were few nights I went outside just to look at the sky, and every night I did was beyond enjoyable. As I stared up, all I could do was smile, even if it was faint.

Smiling wasn't much of a thing I have been doing lately, not that I really put much thought into.

Thus the remaining distance of the walk back to the barrack was spent staring forward with the blankest of expressions and little thought.


***


Saturday morning couldn't have come any later, and it felt like just five minutes from the moment I fell asleep where I already found myself waking to the warm light of morning. I winced at the bright rays flooding into the room, reflexively throwing up a hoof to shield my eyes for a full minute while they adjusted, where I then sat up steadily. My mane was like an untrimmed bush with thick and thin strands of sky blue hair standing or curled in all directions. A good shower would likely rid of that.

Everypony else was either showering or already out and about doing Celestia knows what. Not all of us shared the same days off, and a few of the other privates had their respective shifts. Thankfully, I didn't. Today was a relaxation day, probably the last one I would have for the next three weeks. I wanted to make the most of it as best as I can, though at the same time I wasn't in much of a mood to go venture too far.

With going into the city out of the question, I laid back on my bed and stared upwards at the ceiling, thinking of what I could do to spend the day.

But as I did, somewhere in between, I closed my eyes and ended up falling back unconscious.

My lids opened once more some time later. Instead of bright sunlight flooding into the barrack, it was no longer sunny outside. Strangely enough, I wasn't even in the barrack anymore. I was laying on the bottom of a bunk bed inside a small room, closed off by a watertight door beside my hind hooves. Beside my bunk sat a wooden desk, across from it, a mirrored bunk-like bed, except the beds were inside of a wall. I was on a ship, and outside, I could hear the faint wail of an alarm going off.

I pushed a thin blanket off of me and carefully stood up, studying the room for a moment and walking up to the small rounded window above the desk. I looked through it, immediately seeing there to be sizable white-capped waves slowly drifting by the window, one crashing against the hull and splashing up. It scared the hell out of me initially, enough to where I leaped back instinctively and put a hoof to my chest, relieved moments later to find the wave hadn't caused any damage to the bulkhead.

Turning and walking to the door, grabbing hold of the lever, I tried to pull it open. It didn't budge. I kept working on it with all of my might, only to be met with the same result. Finally, I pulled the lever upwards. It moved, and the loud screech of steel rubbing against more steel pierced the air and made my ears pin back just a bit. I held the lever and pulled the door inwards, stepping out under a swirling red light flashing on the wall across from where I had emerged.

I walked out into the passaged and looked up at the light. At that very moment, a pony who I presumed to be the commanding officer came on the public address system. The voice didn’t precisely belong to Shadow, but sounded awfully similar.

"All hooves on deck, I repeat, all hooves on deck. We are being boarded on the starboard side, and they're taking our deck ponies!"

My eyes grew wide in shock when a sudden rush of sailors and Marines rushed down the hallway around me towards the front of the ship when, out of nowhere, a bright flash of yellow and orange immediately followed by an eardrum-bursting blast, then the screeches and straining of metal threatening to break, and a shockwave that forced me onto my back. My cover had fallen off and now was laying on the floor upside down some inches above my head.

I pressed myself up on my elbows and stared down the hallway where the others were running to. Instead of seeing an extensive wall extending down for two corridors, a massive, gaping hole where it looked like a torpedo had gone right into the side of the ship and blew it completely into the water took its place. Severed beams of steel and snapped, sparking wires hung from the jagged rim of the hole on each level, while the debris that had been blown off now floated in the rough seas outside while some waves splashed their way into the corridor.

I stared in absolute shock, watching as pony after pony fell into the water as more of the upper decks collapsed, pancaking on top of one another. I was too horrified to move, realizing none of the sailors that had fallen were resurfacing. I sat there helplessly as some type of jet slid backwards off of the upper deck and slowly sank into the water, with someone inside screaming and beating on the windshield in an attempt to break it, but to no avail. I watched helplessly as the pony, as well as the craft that trapped him disappeared under the frigid white-capped surf.

Then, finally, a loud bang, followed by an extremely powerful surge of pain that raced through my nerves stemming from my chest. My gaze lowered slowly to a bloodied hole in my chest, having cut effortlessly through my clothes and flesh. My heartbeat even hurt. The hole had opened my chest so much, I could hear my heart beating outside of the throbbing in my ears. I could even see it, with the bullet lodged in it. Eventually it pumped hard enough where the bullet was pushed out, and blood gushed from the wound.

My ears pinned back at the sight as the ichor then dribbled out of my mouth. I hacked excessively and wiped a trembling hoof over my lips, finding it to have been soaked with the amount of blood I had coughed up. Then my vision began to fade in and out, along with my entire sense of perception.

A shadow loomed across my weakening form, compelling me to look up. In that instant, a large yellow claw pressed against the floor beside me, the other holding up a type of rifle I had never seen before in my life. The creature's hinds appeared as if they belonged a cat. More specifically, a big cat. A lion, perhaps.

Above the screeching and straining of steel from the ship struggling to hold together, I could hear the dark chuckle of the creature as it grinned sinisterly down at me. It strapped the rifle around it's neck and took out a revolver pistol and pointed it at my head and soon pressed it against my forehead. My pupils shrunk to pinpricks and I slowly shook my head, begging silently that it wouldn't end my life. Not now. I was too young.

Surely enough, the creature pulled the trigger with a sharp finger pressed downward, and right as the loud explosion of the gun firing could be heard, everything turned black.

Then I woke up, panting and sweating.

I scanned my surroundings, still cautious of them. I was back in my bed, in the barrack, and the bright sunlight shone into the room. It brought great relief to my chest upon coming to the realization that it was all just a dream, and I had simply fallen back asleep.

I brought my hoof up to my chest, finding my heart continued to beat rapidly; quicker and harder than what would be considered healthy, and my chest heaved with deep gasps caused by pure adrenaline, fueled by gripping fear that permeated my essence. Finally, some moments after jolting, I managed to very gradually calm myself down and bring my mind back to thinking straight again.

"Some dream..." I muttered to myself as I rubbed with a hoof along my temple and climbed carefully out of bed.

"About time you're up," chimed in a voice, causing me to jump and snap my head to the side in surprise. I saw it was Silver Edge, dressing himself in his own blouse. "You look like you've just seen a ghost."

I glanced at him and relaxed myself once more. "Close. I saw myself turn into one."

"Really?" he started as he buttoned his jacket and stared at himself in a mirror. "It's rare to have dreams of yourself dying in them, you know. At least, that's what I hear. It's not common for ponies to dream of themselves dying."

"You've said that twice," I remarked, steadily rising to my hooves.

"Well, it's true. What was it about?" Silver turned to me, finishing the last button on his jacket and sporting a genuine smile.

I stopped and gazed forward, then at him after a moment. He still stared at me, head tilting. "Uh... I got hit by a train."

Silver bit his bottom lip and inhaled sharply. "Ooo, ouch. Fast train or slow?"

I furrowed a brow at him suspiciously.

"Fast, then? Sometimes in dreams you can actually feel pain, and when you wake up, it's gone."

"Uh... huh..." I nodded slowly in response. Hopefully I change the subject some time soon.

"Anyways, I've been meaning to ask you. Since I hear you're going to be at the Radar Academy for the long while, want to hit a bar or something later on?"

"A bar?" I looked at him and blinked. "I can't drink."

"Aaah, come on. They won't ask for an identification if I'm buying for you! You’re 19, aren’t you?" His grin grew.

"Silver, I don't want you to do that. Even if I could drink, I wouldn't let you buy drinks for me," I smiled a bit sheepishly.

"Hey, I do what I want for a friend. Besides, don't ya wanna let go a little bit before you hit the classes?"

"Hmm..." I raised a hoof to my chin and tapped it. A few moments later, I shrugged. "Oh, all right. I'm cool with that."

"Great!" Silver smiled as he trotted past me, gently nudging my chest with his elbow playfully. "Eight tonight?"

"Sure thing. But..."

"But what?"

"I won't drink much. And I'm not going to stay late. I have to be up early tomorrow, you hear?" I poked a hoof towards him.

"Affirmative. I'll be sure to get the little colt home before his curfew," he chuckled. "I'm joking."

I tossed a fake glare his way and smirked. "You'd better be. See you later."


***


That evening, I sat waiting on my bed, still dressed in uniform, excluding my cover. It rested on the sheets next to me the whole time I waited, and even though I was off duty at the time, I was unsure if I really needed to wear it or not. With how cold temperatures dropped to at night in Manehattan this time of year, the beanie I had would be more suitable... and comfortable.

Just after a quarter 'til eight, Silver trotted into the barrack, laughing with two other ponies who were all also in uniform. One of them wore Marines camouflage, the other donned a uniform with dark blue and grey camouflage. The devices on his collar stood out predominantly above the different color, and unlike those worn by Marines in dress blues were complete an anchor patch above it. Navy. "Hey, Star. Ready to go?"

I stood up and grabbed my beanie rather than my cover, slipping it snug over my ears. "You bet," I responded with a smile.

"Oh, by the way." Silver shifted out of the way of the two stallions behind him. The Marine was a taller and more muscular greenish-grey earth pony, while the sailor was a pegasus and frankly less built than the earth pony. "Meet Ashfall and Anchorage, my brothers from other mothers. And guys, this is Star Shooter."

I trotted up to them and shook their hooves individually with a warm smile. "Pleasure to meet you both."

"The pleasure is all mine, Shooter." Ash smirked as he shook my hoof firmly, but then was punched in the shoulder by the white pegasus. "O-ow, prick!" he rubbed his shoulder and glared right at him.

Silver chuckled softly. "Easy, you two. I'd hate to see a fight break out away from the bar."

"It's his fault, he punched me!" Ash rubbed his shoulder with a hoof and glared back at Anchorage, who glared right back with daggers.

"Quit bein' a baby. Ya gotta take a hit if ya wanna be who ya are, Corporal," Anchorage spoke with an accent. An interesting accent, to say the least. My guess was he originated from somewhere up north.

"Shut it, mutt," Ash muttered.

"Oi, I'm not a mutt, I'm a sea dog! Two different things!" Anchorage snarled.

“Right. A Prench-speaking, sea-mutt.” The Marine retorted.

The pegasus sailor flashed Ashfall a dirty look. “Sucer le clitoris gauche de votre mère, douchebag,” he responded.

All I could do was snicker, even though I hadn’t a clue of what he just said. Silver simply rolled his eyes and let off a groan of annoyance.

"Can we just go, please?" Silver pushed the door open with a hoof and stared at them with a cocked eyebrow.

"Ugh. Yes," muttered Ash, who pinned his ears back and trotted out of the barrack, still rubbing his shoulder.

Anchorage scoffed, rolling his eyes. "He is such a baby," then walked out after him.

I followed suit, walking side-by-side with Silver. "They always like this?"

"Occasionally they butt heads. A couple of times a week, I'd say. They'll be talking to each other like brothers again once we get there, maybe sooner."

I shrugged. "I'd hope so. Speaking of which, do you know where we're going?"

"Oooof course I do! The place isn't far. It's not exactly in the city but it's still outside the base. Just a couple of blocks down in the town is all."

"Well, I trust you on getting us there," I smiled to him. "Remember, I'm not staying late. Big day tomorrow. And after that… and after that."

"I know, I know," Silver waved his hoof and grinned. "Off we go!"


***


Following a thirteen minute walk, we approached a three-story structure, old and built up with brick. The first floor occupied the whole tavern, the floors above were presumably apartments or a management office and a storage room, whichever. The place maintained a decent crowd and many tables and booths everywhere.

The bar itself was fairly large and above it sat numerous flat-screen televisions broadcasting different channels, whether they be local news or sports or weather. In there were a couple others from the base kicking back, but much to our surprise, they didn't notice us. Or they pretended not to. Either way, that was an immediate relief.

We sat down at the bar and Silver promptly placed ten bits on the counter. Shortly after, ciders poured into tall glass mugs that fizzed and bubbled to the top slid our way from the bartender further down. Immediately, Ashfall and Anchorage began downing their drinks like they were in some sort of competition, while Silver sipped politely at his and watched the television broadcasting a sports talk show, which was discussing the upcoming hoofball season, among other stuff I didn’t care too much for.

I looked at the drink the moment I caught it in my hoof and proceeded to take a very small, careful sip. The taste was bitter and sent a chill up my spine. I swiftly put the mug down and threw my head to the side, wiping at my tongue. "Blech..." I spat quietly.

When the taste settled, I turned back to the drink and stared at it, then I turned to Silver who didn't notice me cringe at the taste. I didn't want him to feel bad, and began slowly, and hesitantly, taking a few small gulps of the cider.

The second time wasn't as awful. In fact, it tasted quite good! I took some more sips and happily gulped them down, with lots of the alcoholic drink still left in the mug.

"Taste all right?" Silver threw a smug grin my way.

"Sure does!" I sipped again, surprised at this sudden change of taste. Why was cider so damn good?

"Better get used to it, we'll be doin' this more often," Anchorage flatly commented as he gulped down the rest of his drink, then set it down hard onto the table, turning to the bartender. "Can I get another?" he requested, who took his mug and began filling it again.

I sipped more and more of the beverage until half of it was gone, enjoying the taste of alcohol-infused apple juices as it slithered down into my stomach. I didn't have one care in the world about my age or what the legal drinking age was. I was having a good time!

I finished my cider quickly after, and proceeded to order another.
> 15. Radar Academy
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Four tall-mug ciders later, me, Silver Edge, Ashfall and Anchorage made our way back to base. I felt funny as I walked and my stomach growled—and not in a good way. Ash had passed out just outside the bar and Anchorage was carrying him over his back. It was kind of a funny sight to see, considering Ash was the bigger pony out of all of us.

The cold of night didn't help either and I was shaking like a leaf in the wind. I stumbled a bit as I walked and occasionally let out one or two hiccups. I couldn't have been that drunk, I only had four! Four mugs. Four...really big mugs. I just needed sleep at that point.

We walked into the base and went right to our barracks. My head was throbbing with a pounding headache by the time we walked in the door. Thankfully the lights were off and there was just enough from the moonlight outside to guide me to my bed and hopefully not trip over somepony's bed on the way there.

The moment I reached my bed, I collapsed onto it without bothering to take my uniform off, and went right to sleep.


***


I was startled awake the next morning by the shouting of somepony right beside me. It rung in my head for a while and I groggily opened my eyes to see who was waking me up. I rested a hoof on my head, still feeling the same headache I had before I fell asleep, but this time it was much worse. My eyes moved to the side of my bed, and immediately they met those of Solar Wave. He stared at me with concern and had his hooves on my side.

"Shoot... Don't do that to me, Star. I thought you were dead!"

I murred softly and turned onto my back. As I did, a sharp pain pierced the nerves on my stomach. I yelped softly and stared up at the ceiling with wide eyes. My stomach growled angrily and threatened to shoot some of its content back up where it came from. I held both hooves to it and groaned softly. I wasn't sick, was I?

"Are you alright?" Solar asked, still standing there and watching me with worry all over. His voice was slightly muffled for some reason.

"Noooo..." I groaned tiredly and in distress. "Fuuuudge..." I squinted my eyes and tried to get a bearing on the light on the ceiling right over my head. Of course, staring at it only made my migraine worse and it forced me to shut my eyes.

"It looks like you had some night..." Solar kept staring at me.

"I did..." I strained to get just those two words out.

"Star, you've got to get up. It's past eleven."

"I don't wanna..." I literally didn't. I felt if I moved an inch, I would cover poor Solar in whatever my last meal was. But I felt like that even if I didn't move. It felt like the flu, but worse.

"Star," he nudged me with a hoof. I let out another groan as he did and wanted out of annoyance to slap him, but I didn't. "You're going to miss your first day of Radar Academy. I wouldn't be surprised if you already did."

His words immediately hit me. "Shit, Radar Academy!" I thought to myself, eyes opening wide and worsening my headache. I was meant to be up much earlier than I was, and after the night I had, I was sick.

Solar sighed and shook his head slowly. "And that's why you shouldn't drink before important days, Star. You get hangovers," he turned and walked away, the clops of his hooves ringing in my head along with his words.

So I wasn't sick, but I had a really bad hangover. This was a first. But I couldn't let anyone know that's what it was. At the same time, I couldn't afford to miss a day of my radar training classes. I pushed myself to get up after a few more minutes and managed to do so without losing my dinner from the night before. And as quickly as I could, I showered and re-dressed myself in my uniform, which much to my luck, smelled like alcohol and cider. I'd have to be a lucky son of a gun if no one at the academy caught that.

The academy, much to my surprise, was not on base, and was east of it, in the denser areas of north Manehattan. It was a good fifteen blocks away and I wasn't going to run the whole way. I quickly grabbed my bits and ran out the front gate and hailed a taxi carriage like a psycho pony. I wasn't specific on where to go, but luckily the carriage driver knew and raced down the street towards it. It was nearly a straight shot and before I knew it, we were in front of the small campus. It was three buildings with a large fountain park in the center, each building labeled differently, meaning it wasn't completely a radar academy. The whole place was right up against the rocky shoreline, with a beach about an eighth of a mile north.

I thanked and paid the carriage driver prior to running onto the campus and stopping in the center. The building I needed to be in wasn't hard to find, and the giant glass atrium above the door had a silver radar symbol printed onto the glass. I ran towards it, and immediately slowed my pace going into the building while still rushing to find where I needed to be.

The building was the smaller of the three and didn't have too many rooms in the halls. The room I needed to be in was 14B. I went to one side of the building, then the other. The classroom was upstairs somewhere. Immediately I raced to the spiral staircase leading up to the second floor and went down the southern hallway. Jackpot. 14B was at the very end and the door was still open.

I ran up to the door and stopped without breaking a sweat. I trotted into the room and looked around, panting slightly from the adrenaline rush. "Am I late?!" I shouted.

The room had five others in it, three sailors and one Marine, two of them were standing up and talking. They all looked at me when I walked in, and one replied, "Nope. Teacher's late."

I let out a deep sigh of relief and eased my muscles, and went to my seat. My heartbeat pumped hard in my ears and made my already bad headache worse, the hangover was still there in full force. The seats had metal bars that extended forward and curved, with polished wood for desks in front of them—typical school room desks. I sat down and eased myself into the hard wooden chair. Not the best seat I've sat on but it was nice to get off my hooves after running around trying to find where I needed to go.

"Teacher's late huh?" I asked again.

The Marine nodded. "Late for this bloody session. Got caught up with another class and forgot us today," he grumbled, resting his head on his hoof, elbow on his desk.

"One of the other teachers is home with a cold so she's busy taking care of 2A," one of the sailors added.

I nodded. "Thank Celestia.. I thought I was late."

"Nnope. We just got back to class a few ago."

I let out another sigh of relief and looked forward to the chalkboard. There was writing in large letters on it, saying 'Welcome to Radar Academy!'

To me, it seemed like an average school classroom, but with decor dedicated to remind those what its purpose was. On one wall hung a detailed map of Equestria, one beside it was a geographical map of the Manehattan region, showing the depths of the ocean and the height of the small hills to the north. Beside them both sat a world map, with all of the known islands and continents on it in green, tan, dark orange, and each color in between. Equestria, of course, sat in the center of the map, with the northern Griffon kingdoms above the Crystal Empire, and Yakyakistan above that. Below Equestria sat a kingdom I've never heard of, followed by a small island nation to the southwest. 

East of Equestria, far across the ocean, was the Griffon Empire, the home of all griffons. It was a large country that covered most of the continent, the rest belonging to Prance, Germaney, the Allied Kingdom, and to the south, the unnamed dragon colony, a large, but small on the map, slab of land untouched and left for dragons to live and grow.

There were more countries west of Equestria, across the Western Ocean, with names that I couldn't pronounce even in my head. I could only assume one of them was the country Zebras come from.

I turned back forward the moment I heard hoofsteps fast approaching from down the hallway, the loud clops echoing in the open atrium. Soon after, a tan earth pony mare dressed in a dark blue dress uniform with gold buttons and a white undershirt, complete with a nearly-adjusted black tie. Strange for a mare to wear a tie I thought.

The mare stopped at the door and rested a hoof on the side of the frame, letting out large, audible gasps for air. She turned to us and opened her mouth to speak, only making her breathing louder. When she didn't, she raised her other hoof, signalling to wait a moment. She leaned her head down and very quickly caught hold of her breath before she trotted into the room, shutting the door behind her.

"So very sorry, students, I am not used to handling two classes at once. Thankfully they are done until later. I do hope all of you have been here for only a few minutes?"

The others shook their heads, I nodded.

"Oh dear," she looked disappointed. "My deepest apologies. I should have told you all to come around this time so you wouldn't be waiting all morning! But...now that we're all here. How's about we get started, hmm?"

The two ponies standing up and talking sat at their desks and picked a pencil up in their hooves, as did I. The mare trotted up to her desk and sat down in the chair, taking a pair of squared glasses in her hooves and sliding them onto her muzzle. Afterwards, she reached a hoof up and gently bounced her bun-tied auburn mane to make sure it was holding together, which it was. She quickly went over a couple of papers and looked up at us, silently taking attendance and writing it down. The tan mare stood up, turning to her chalkboard and picking up the eraser and wiping it clean.

"Alrighty. For those of you who don't know," she began writing with a stick of chalk on the board. "My name is Lieutenant Kosec Ping, but if you want, you may call me Mrs. Ping," she then turned to us with a smug grin, her name written on the board behind her. "And don't worry students, I've read your name tags. There's no need to introduce yourself."

The moment after she said that, one of the sailors slammed both of his hooves on his desk and let out a grumbled "Aw!" that drew a laugh from everyone, even the teacher.

Calming her laugh with a smile, Mrs. Ping turned and erased her name, then began drawing a circle with lines in it that easily resembled a radar screen. "So, students, what do we know about radars?" She turned back to us. "Anypony?"

The others looked at each other, I looked around at them, then I stared forward in some annoyance. "Seriously?" I said to myself in my head and raised my hoof.

"Go ahead, private Shooter."

"Radar is used to determine weather conditions in a certain area or to determine distance between aircraft or watercraft," I lowered my hoof.

"Very good, that's exactly what it is! Somepony's done their homework," she winked at me. "As private Shooter said, it is used by aircraft and watercraft, big and small. But, could somepony tell me what SONAR is?"

Aw shoot, what did sergeant Hardstaff call it? I remembered SONAR was abbreviations for a few words.

"Sound Navigation And Ranging!" called one of the sailors.

"Right!" Mrs. Ping smiled. "And what is it used for?"

"It is used to communicate with or detect objects on or under the water. It is only used by watercraft and submarines."

"Very good! Better write that down everypony, because those two things are what we are here for. Radar and SONAR," she said as she wrote the two words on the board, with SONAR broken down beneath it. She then turned back to us. "And I know for a fact, each and every one of you is hear to learn for a very special reason. We only accept those into the academy looking to man a radar on one of our many ships. Please, tell me, each and every one of you, which ship would you like to be, or will you be stationed on?"

"The Lacus," said the Marine.

"The Zenith."

"The Sinus."

"The Harpy."

"The Eclipse."

Everypony quickly turned and looked at me in surprise. I sat there looking forward, then when I realized everyone was staring at me, I looked around at them. "What?"

"The Eclipse, hmm?" Mrs. Ping walked around her desk and up to me. "You must be one lucky pony to get a position on that carrier."

If she was trying to intimidate me by walking up to my desk, it wasn't working at all. "Yes ma'am," I replied.

"And what got you to convince commanding officer Shadow to allow you to handle a position you know nothing about?" She stared straight at me, hoping to make me flinch.

"I have my ways," I couldn't tell her it was because me and him knew each other.

A quiet snicker came from the pony beside me, while the others just grinned.

"Your ways, huh? Explain," Mrs. Ping didn't seem to like my response.

"I'm afraid I can't."

"Why not?"

"That's...classified information."

"Shouldn't be classified from a lieutenant, but okay, I'll take your word for it," she walked back to the board.

My eyes widened in some surprise. She didn't care that I just denied her, a much higher rank than myself? Surely there must be a catch somewhere. Much to my surprise, she went back to teaching.


***


A good three hours of the history of radar and SONAR and how they work later, we were dismissed for a late lunch. The five of us were given saddlebags with our respective branch insignia to keep our books in. Each of us had two books, and a notebook to write other things down in. But since it was just a break for lunch, we left our things in the room and went to get something to eat. The campus had a small cafeteria, more like a branched cafe that only those in the Marines and Navy, as well as friends and family could go to. 

The cafe had a wide variety of coffees, teas, and other drinks, as well as donuts, bagels, sandwiches, and salads. I ended up buying a water and a salad with ranch dressing to avoid the mostly unhealthy food the cafe had there. I wasn't one for eating healthy all the time before I enlisted, but every once and a while I enjoyed a nice, fresh salad. Today was one of those days.

I was the only one to eat something healthy as well, as I noticed the others got a bunch of donuts and were pigging out on them. I shrugged and went along with eating my salad like a civilized pony.

After we finished, there was still time before we were supposed to go back to class. Not enough to do much, so the five of us decided to stay around the campus and explore a bit. Other than the building our classes were in, the other two were much larger and were dedicated for different classes. The second largest one held classes for those who are looking to become ship gunners, and the largest building on campus was the Officer School, and by far the hardest class to go through. At least, that's how the others described it.

About twenty minutes after lunch, the five of us returned to room 14B where thankfully Mrs. Ping was there to greet us and wasn't busy with the other classroom. Once we were all seated, the door was shut and class began again.

With this routine, I knew this would be a long three weeks.


***


Class ended at around six-thirty that evening, shortly before sunset, and all of us with our saddlebags on took the long route home—by walking. It felt good to walk rather than taking a taxi. Of course, I was more tired from walking and would do anything to crash in bed.

The others talked, telling each other short things that happened in their lives previously, or during boot camp. They were interesting to listen to to say the least, but my usual self was preventing me from joining in on the conversation. And to be honest, I didn't feel bad about it either.

We entered the base through the main gate and split off to go to our own barracks. I went straight to Barrack #19 and walked through the door, straight for my bed.

"How'd it go?" Asked a voice that startled me.

I must have been that tired where anything in particular could scare me. I jumped and snapped my head to the side. It was Silver Edge, levitating a book in a magical aura. "Good, actually," I replied, unbuttoning my uniform jacket and setting my patrol cap down on my hooflocker.

"Learn anything new?"

"A lot of stuff. Today was just talking about the origins of radar and SONAR and what not. Mrs. Ping, our teacher, said we'll be getting to the other stuff this week, then next week we'll have a test on what we learned, same for the week after that. And then an exam," I shuddered.

"Good luck with that," Silver said, not taking his eyes away from his book. He must have been zoned out to the point where he wasn't listening to everything I was saying, or he was listening and he just didn't care.

I didn't question it and immediately crawled into bed.

I had a long three weeks ahead of me. And I meant long.
> 16. When September Ends
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The many hoof-biting and face-desking days of Radar Academy went by slower than ever, but before I knew it, the final days of class were upon me. I was elated that the classes were almost over with, but not for what was to come. With two days left, we were expected to write down everything we've learned in one massive essay. My high school memories flooded back to me the moment we were given the seven pieces of paper needed to finish the assignment. Seven pages I needed to squeeze everything I've learned in the last three weeks, neatly and in order.

Maybe it would have been better if I took the janitor position on the ship instead.


***


The 25th of September was a brisk and breezy Thursday morning, much like the other mornings over the last month or two, and was not much of a rush to me. Unlike the first day of the academy where I ended up late after a long night of drinking, I was keeping good with the times and even arrived at the campus a few minutes earlier than the others. That day and Friday we were to spend on finishing our essays and not have to worry about picking up anything else in class. What surprised me the most was we were required to work on it in class.

Going over the notes I've kept in an almost-full binder notebook, I worked through the essay very slowly, putting down the important things about everything we've learned—which was beginning to come together more like an explanation as to what radar and sonar were.

After each sentence, I went back over my notes and the pages itself to make sure nothing important was left out. So far so good. Until I realized I only had two pieces of paper left, and still a very large amount of information from my binder that needed to be put down. I had two options—either find a way to squeeze everything in neatly in the two remaining pages or less, or worse, erase everything and go back to square one.

I went with the first option and prayed to Celestia I would make it by skipping the less-important-but-still-important things, such as rock density and marine life that can be picked up by radar or sonar. I wasn't one for cutting corners, but here I felt the need to for the sake of fitting everything on the amount of paper we were given.

My attention bounced back and forth, from writing down a sentence to moving back to my notes to make sure I worded them correctly. I literally felt like I was in high school again.

Then, around four in the afternoon, I wrote down the last words on the final piece of paper, just barely fitting onto the remaining space there was. It was a great relief, though I was sure the moment my pencil was laid down, the others wanted to tear me apart, seeing they were still working. Well, two of them that is. One of the sailors had already finished and had gone home. 

I scanned back over the essay carefully to check for any mistakes one final time, before I filed it neatly and in order and stood up and walked to Mrs. Ping's desk where she was reading a book—ironically it was about a radarpony going through tough times. At least, that's what I had heard about the book.

I set the essay down on her desk, the noise itself making her look over her book and see it, then me.

"You finished quick. You sure you didn't cheat?" she said to me with sarcasm that I failed to catch.

"You said we were allowed to use our notes," I grimaced and reached a hoof to take the essay back, annoyed.

She placed her hoof on mine and pushed it back. "Sarcasm, Private. Good job. Sit back down and I'll give you your final grade once I finish reading, alright?"

I nodded and threw up a salute to her, then turned and went back to my seat where I waited patiently.

About ten minutes after turning my essay in, Mrs. Ping filed the papers back together and set the small pile down on her desk and looked directly at me, motioning for me to come to her desk. I stood up and walked to the foot of her desk. I was nervous to hear what my grade on the essay would be. Who wouldn't be?

"Private Shooter."

"Mrs. Ping."

She held the essay up and waved it gently. "A-minus. Good job. I noticed some things were missing in the essay, but you still did a good job," she cracked a smile to me.

My brow furrowed. "I tried my best. There wasn't enough room to fit everything in my notes."

"You do know you could have asked for more paper, right?" she grinned. "The pony before you did the exact same thing," she then turned to the other two ponies in the class. "That goes for the rest of you. If you need more paper, just ask me."

All I could do was facehoof at that moment. It brought a small laugh out of Mrs. Ping and she picked up a stamper, pressing it into some red ink and stamping my essay at the top corner with an A- on it, then stapled the papers together. "You'll make a great radarpony, Shooter," she stood up from her chair and saluted me. I saluted back with a smile.

"Thank you, Mrs. Ping," I replied, then we both dropped our salutes.

She slid the essay across the desk to me and sat back down. "Go home, Marine. And thank you."

I took the essay in my hoof and my eyes darted side to side in confusion. "Thank you... for what?"

"For attending my class, silly Marine," Mrs. Ping giggled. "I'll see you around."

A small blush grew on my cheeks and I smiled. "Heheh, all right. I'll see you around, too, I guess." I turned and walked out of the classroom, shutting the door behind me. I stopped right there, as if I was frozen in time.

Two moments after the door clicked shut, I let out a deep exhale and looked down at the essay in my hoof, right at the A- on the top left corner of the first page. A great wave of relief came across knowing I was done with radar academy. I could officially inform Shadow that I would be reporting on the Eclipse come the next time it sets sail.

After that, I went back to base.


***


"You passed?!" squealed a joyful Solar Wave.

I replied with a nod and a smile. "A-minus. I got nervous on it though, I had so much to write down but so little room. Turns out all I had to do was ask for more paper. But, I still passed."

I was then met with a lung-crushing hug that made me drop my uniform jacket onto the floor after taking it off. I grunted and squirmed in the hug as the light yellow pony squeezed my waist area to the point where little if any air was still in my lungs. I eventually turned and bopped him on the tip of his horn. Not hard enough to hurt him, but enough for it to signal him to let me go, which he did. He fell back onto his rump and rubbed his horn.

"Ow! What was that for?"

I coughed and inhaled. "I couldn't breathe..."

"Oh, sorry," he chuckled innocently.

"Don't worry about it," I picked my jacket up off the floor and neatly folded it, sliding it under my bed on top of my hooflocker. "I'm getting closer, Solar."

"Closer to what?" Solar asked, climbing into his bed and yawning slightly.

"Closer to sailing the seas as a radarpony," I smiled, crawling into my own bed and laying my hooves behind my bed as if I were daydreaming.

"Oooh yeah, yeah. That Shadow pony who said he's looking for a radarpony on the Eclipse's bridge, right?"

"You got it," I let out a sigh of both relief and content, but then frowned. "And you and Silver will be somewhere else... Possibly on another ship or a submarine. Or here..."

I didn't look down to see Solar's reaction, but I could only guess it wasn't a good one. Boy was I wrong.

"Hey, that's no problem. Because even when you finish your deployment, we'll all be in the same place again. Besides, you're going to be living your dream. There's no reason to be sad about it. In fact, it would feel awkward if I'm the only one happy about something that isn't even nearly related to me," he chuckled. "But I am certain Silver is happy for you as well."

"Maybe, maybe not," I sighed quietly. "Now I feel bad for bragging about me moving on to a new position..."

"You weren't bragging. Well, maybe just a little bit, but still!"

"Doesn't help, Solar," I turned onto my side.

"Sorry."


***


At breakfast the next morning, me, Solar and Silver sat together in silence. Most of the room was quiet, except for the small groups of other Marines or sailors talking to each other. It wasn't common for us to not converse during any meal of the day. I didn't think much of it and ate my oatmeal. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Solar eating, while looking between the both of us as if he was waiting for one of us to say something. I was tempted to, on the contrary, my mind was in a fog for some reason and had been that way from the moment I woke up.

"So... passed Radar Academy, hm?" Silver spoke with a half-full mouth.

Solar nudged the unicorn's shoulder, swallowing down his own food. "Manners."

"Shut up, Solar," Silver glared daggers at him, then looked back at me.

"Uh, yeah, I did," I said, followed by a short drink out of a small milk carton.

"Congrats," he said flatly.

"Thank you," I replied. I could already tell the beige unicorn wasn't in a good mood that morning.

He didn't reply, and went back to eating. I didn't say anything else either.

"Sooo..." Solar broke the silence a few more moments later. "I hear this winter's going to be a real doozy."

"Where'd you hear that?" I asked, mixing my oatmeal with my spoon a bit.

"Manehattan Times. Farmer's almanac is calling for most of Equestria to get some nasty weather."

"Pfft, those farmers don't know shit," Silver snapped.

"I wouldn't say that, Silver, they've been right since the early years," I said, putting a small scoop of oatmeal into my mouth.

"Let's be realistic, does anypony really listen to those idiots anymore? After that one pony a year or two ago called out that the world would end?"

"That was not a pony. That was a disgruntled griffon looking to cause a panic," I corrected him.

"I'm pretty sure it was a pony, Star."

"Look it up, it was a griffon. To be more precise, one of the many griffons that holds a grudge on all of us. One that wouldn't hesitate to bring our nations into conflict if they aren't already."

Silver slammed his hoof down with his milk carton in it, a couple of small drops spilling out onto the table and floor upon impact, the emerald green aura that originally held it to his mouth fading off of it and his horn. "I'm telling you, those earth ponies think they know everything. All they know is how to plant seeds!"

"Hey, there's no need to yell, and for the love of Luna, there's no need to be racist towards fellow Marines and shipmates."

"Bullshit, they're useless and you know it!"

"I'm sorry, what?" chimed a dark moss-green earth pony dressed in Marines camouflage trotted over with a hardened glare on his face, aimed directly at Silver.

"Oh shit..." Solar muttered to me with wide eyes.

"You heard me," Silver turned and glared towards Ashfall. "Beat it."

Ash slammed his tray down and rested his hooves on the table beside it, leaning across towards Silver. "Who pissed in your milk?"

"No one, thank you very much," Silver didn't flinch.

"Because it suuuure seems like it. I don't like the way you're talking about me or the others. I suggest you cut it out before you're left bleeding on the floor."

My eyes widened slightly and I watched as Silver leaned his muzzle closer.

"Try me."

"What was that?" Ashfall's glare hardened.

"I said. Try. Me," Silver clenched his teeth.

"Silver... stop," I moved a hoof to push him back into his seat.

"Stay out of this, Shooter," he slapped my hoof away and ended up hitting me in the chin.

My head jerked to the side a little and I yelped, putting my hoof up to my chin to rub it. I turned back to Silver slowly and threw a deadly glare at him. "Was that necessary?"

"Guys, stop!" Solar sat up.

At that moment, both Silver and Ash were engaged in a deep glare directed at each other. Neither flinched, until Silver picked up Ash's milk carton and held it over his head in an emerald magic aura, squeezing it until the bottom popped and rained milk all over the larger earth pony. Others watched, some gasping. Both me and Solar's jaws dropped.

Ash's mane was mostly soaked in milk, as was his uniform. It dripped from strands of his mane, and he slowly opened his eyes, blinking once. "Really?"

Silver gave a gentle, single nod, still glaring.

Much to our surprise, and probably the whole chow hall's, Ash didn't jump across the table to drop him dead. Instead, he picked up his napkin and wiped himself off with it, then carried his tray away, stomping his hooves.

Both me and Solar watched Ash leave, and eventually turned back to Silver with wide eyes.

"Silver...what the hell?" I said to him in a somewhat quiet way.

Silver sat back down in his seat. Both me and Solar could easily see the fire burning in his eyes. There's no way this could be our friend.

"He shouldn't have butt in."

"None of that was necessary, Silver. What the heck is your problem?" I threw my hooves up.

"My problem is all of these bloody earth ponies getting in my face, that's my problem!" He turned and glared at me.

"Who the hell are you?" I stared at him, glare somewhat fading. "This isn't the Silver we know."

"Get over it," he raised his spoon to his mouth to take a bite of his oatmeal.

Right out of nowhere, Silver was knocked off of his seat onto the floor following the loud clang of metal hitting his face. Many others watched with wide eyes, as did I. I looked up slowly, seeing Solar was breathing heavily and was holding his food tray while staring down at a stunned Silver.

"That's what you get for being an asshole!" Solar growled.

I stared at the yellow unicorn with widened eyes. Not once had I seen him angry or taking anger out on somepony. But, I had to admit, now was the right time. Silver deserved it whether he was in his right mind or not.

"Shooter, Wave!" Came a loud voice from across the room, grabbing both of our attention.


***


"Not ONLY was he knocked out cold, but the both of you say he DESERVED IT?!" Sergeant Hardstaff slammed his hoof on his desk hard, causing it to shake upon impact, before standing up on his hinds, pressing his forehooves down on the wooden surface. "What have you two got to say for yourselves?!"

The both of us stood at attention, not flinching once at the sergeant's rant.

"Sir, with all due respect, you are misled on this. If you would please let us explain, it might become more clear."

"I do not like you speaking to a superior that way, but by all means, go ahead," he sat down in his chair, retaining a hardened glare aimed for the both of us.

"For starters, sir, Silver was not acting like himself at breakfast," I started.

"Do elaborate, Private."

"He was far grumpier than normal and after that... well, he started to make racist remarks towards earth ponies. After that, Ashfall walked over and confronted him. Silver proceeded to dump Ash's milk on himself and he went his own way. When he started going again, Private Solar Wave here hit him with his tray," I continued.

"Is that all, Private?"

"Yes, sir."

"Hmm..." the sergeant eyeballed us for a few moments. "I don't know either of you to lie, so, I suppose I have no choice but to believe you. I will have to question Corporal Ashfall after you two. If he says the same thing, I'll have a word with Private Silver," he then sighed. "If it is all true, I would hate to have to get rid of him already."

My eyes widened and I'm certain Solar's did too.

"Get... rid of him?" I repeated.

"Racism towards other ponies is not tolerated. It is one of the biggest rules in our branches. This goes for Celestia's boys, too."

"Sir, please, do not discharge him," Solar suddenly said.

"Enlighten me on why I shouldn't, Private?"

"He is not usually like this. Please, give him another chance. He may not be in his right mind today. I mean... ponies make mistakes. They say things they don't actually mean."

Sergeant Hardstaff eyed Solar closely, then sat up. "Very well. I will still have a word with him about it, whenever he wakes up. You hit him pretty hard."

"I am sorry, sir."

"If what you say is true, don't apologize. Now, both of you, get back to your barracks."

"Yes, sir."

We saluted each other and walked out.


***


The days that followed were quiet for the most part. After finishing radar academy, I was back to my normal shifts patrolling on the wall of the base. Over the days, I hadn't seen much of Solar Wave, and had not seen any of Silver Edge. I was beginning to wonder if the sergeant did actually discharge him and was going to hold that out on us.

The final day of September was upon us and I couldn't say how fast the month has gone by. It has been a month since I graduated boot camp, and just a few days since radar academy. I still hadn't managed to track down Shadow to let him know that I had finished the academy between my shifts, and I was worried he may not find out before his next deployment.

That Tuesday afternoon was anything but warm and sunny, and overall, wasn't comfortable one bit. I was bundled up in my uniform jacket, a dark blue undershirt, gloves, and a matching beanie covering my ears. Even then, I was still shivering and I could start to see my breath in the air in front of me. The farmers were right, we were in for a long, cold winter.

I took a ten minute break off my shift to warm up a bit, thus heading to the chow hall where hot chocolate was being served for the first time that year that I knew of. Other than coffee, it was my favorite warm beverage and it was the only thing I liked about the colder days.

I sat down and blew into the styrofoam cup to cool my hot chocolate enough where it wouldn't burn my tongue, and once it was cool enough, I took a small sip. Instantly, my body began to warm back up, and soon my wings were dripping with water. I didn't notice before, and there was some ice or light snow covering my feathers and it had started to melt. That was a first.

Before I finished, a shadow loomed over me from in front—literally. I glanced up, my eyes meeting those of Captain Shadow, who stared right back with a mostly blank expression like always.

"Sir!" I raised a hoof and saluted.

"Private," he returned the salute and took a seat in front of me with a cup of hot chocolate for himself. "A little birdy tells me you passed in flying colors."

My ear flicked and I blinked, puzzled. "I was just about to... who told you?"

"Lieutenant Kosec Ping."

I blinked again. "Mrs. Ping?"

"Well, she does send her class grades to me. I go over them with a few others and decide what ship those ponies go on. I kept yours to myself so I could file your grades to the Eclipse," he cracked a small smile.

I eased myself a bit and smiled back. "Thank you, sir."

"Don't mention it. You may want to mention this though," he took a folded piece of paper out of his uniform pocket and slid it to me, then took a sip of his hot cocoa.

I took the piece of paper in a hoof and set down my cup, unfolding it and reading over it. My eyes widened a bit and I looked up at Shadow halfway through. "Already?"

"Already," he stared right back at me, firmly this time.

I looked back at the paper and kept reading. "So we ship out on Thursday?"

"Thursday evening, yes. 1830 is when we leave port. I'd like for everypony to be there at 1600 to help with the final preparations. But, for you, I want you to come at 1530."

"What for, sir?" I folded the deployment notice back up and slid it back across the table to Shadow.

"Well, for one, I want you to get familiar with the lieutenant on the ship. He is my second-in-command, and on the ship, he will be second-in-command of you, so, I hope you like him."

"We'll see about that," I grinned slightly.

Shadow chuckled softly. "I guess we will."


***


"Deployment?" Solar Wave's eyes went wide as he unbuttoned his jacket, stopping halfway to stare at me in shock.

"Yup. Thursday is when we leave port," I replied.

"Man... already? Didn't they just get back?"

"They did, but I guess that's how it is. Maybe. Unless something is up."

"Let's hope not."

"Yeah, let's not."

Moments after, the door to the barrack opened. A beige unicorn with a grey and single silver-striped mane walked in slowly, eyeing the both of us. We turned to the pony and froze.

"Silver?" I blinked.

He didn't appear angry, and instead looked... depressed. The beige unicorn didn't say a word and walked over to his bed, immediately climbing into it and throwing the sheets over himself, his horn the only thing visible and sticking out of the edge of the blanket.

Both me and Solar stared at the large lump under the sheets in the bed that belonged to Silver as it started to shake like a leaf. Solar finished taking his jacket off and trotted over to Silver's bed, dog tags clinking together on his chest as he did. He raised his hoof and nudged the pony. "Silver?"

"Go away..." came a quiet mutter from under the sheets.

Solar looked at the not-so-well hidden unicorn with a frown and sat down beside his bed. "I won't leave your bedside until you talk to us."

"You'll be up all night..."

"Nonsense," he raised his hoof and yanked the top of the blanket off of Silver, uncovering his head and shoulders. The beige unicorn turned and glared at Solar.

"Do you mind?" His head was still laying down.

"Come on, Silver. Talk to us."

"Why should I?" He turned onto his other side.

"Because we're all friends, aren't we?"

Following a lengthy pause, Silver replied, "After what happened on Friday, I'm surprised you're still saying that."

"That's because we told the sergeant to give you a second chance. He was going to discharge you," I said from across the room.

"You shouldn't have said anything. I made a huge mistake that I can't fix," Silver's voice began to crack. "I can't do this for long."

Solar set a hoof on Silver's shoulder and turned him onto his back. The beige unicorn stared upwards at the ceiling with tears sitting in his eyes. His ears fell down moments after.

"Then apologize to Ash," Solar said.

"What makes you think he'll want to speak to me after that?"

"Show him you mean it. You didn't actually mean all of those things you said about earth ponies, right?"

"N-no! I wasn't in my right mind... I don't know what came over me. I felt like I was being mind controlled to say that!" He said loudly with more tears building, his chest beginning to heave.

"Then you must apologize to him. If you don't, he might hate you forever."

"But... I... can't."

"Yes, you can. You have to. You can't let the friendship you built up with him be destroyed over a mistake. Everypony makes mistakes," I said, walking over to Silver's bed.

He sniffled and wiped his eye with a hoof. "F-fine... I'll try."

Solar and I both smiled. "Good stallion," Solar said.

"Thank you guys... for giving me another chance," he turned and looked at us, cracking a faint smile with tears resting in his glassy eyes.

"Anything for a friend," Solar smiled back, then gave Silver a tight squeeze.

Silver's eyes opened wide and he let out a grunt from the hug. "Too tight...!"

I watched and chuckled, before Solar swung a hoof around my neck and brought me into the hug, squeezing me as well. Damn it, now I was going to be choked to death before I deploy out to sea.
> 17. Deployment - Part I
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

In the blink of an eye, it felt like Wednesday was long passed and Thursday was upon us. It was a big day for me. I was deploying out to sea on the Eclipse with a couple hundred other ponies, all with important responsibilities aboard the ship.

The day started like any other—showering, getting dressed, and then breakfast. Me and Solar sat down and ate together and talked for a bit without a guess of where Silver was. Deep down, we hoped he was out apologizing to Ashfall. Either way, his absence was suspicious, but not much thought was put into it.

Over breakfast, I explained to an interested Solar the basics of tracking and dumbing-down some of the harder bits and pieces that we learned about. I stopped a bit early when I noticed he was beginning to doze off, and we just laughed about it.

After we finished eating, Solar left to work his patrol shift, but not before promising to say goodbye when the Eclipse leaves port. Meanwhile, I returned to our barrack to pack my sea bag.

I didn't have much to pack. Extra uniforms and t-shirts and that was it. Within minutes I was completely packed and left with lots of time to kill.

Taking my seabag and slinging it over my shoulder, I trotted out of the barrack, likely for the last time in quite a while. The base had the same amount of activity going on as it always did. Nothing seemed to be that different. A new class of recruits had just come in and the drill sergeant was already eating away at their souls from what I could tell.

Beyond that, others did their own thing or were on patrol. Luckily while I would be gone, another Marine would replace my position along the wall. A change in position was going to be weird, though I was more excited for this one.

Once at the docks, sailors and Marines were busy loading and fueling the Eclipse. One thing I noticed was the temperature seemed to differentiate in just the few hundred yards I walked to get there, and it wasn't warm either. Standing there observing was Shadow, dressed in his usual dark blue Navy uniform and a matching cap. 

Beside him was a stallion just an inch or two taller than Shadow, and though it could have been his uniform, from what I could tell he had a slightly more muscular build than the both of us. His uniform was intriguing as well; a black and extremely dark grey uniform jacket and matching pants as well as boots, a black shemagh around his neck up to his chin, and the average black military sunglasses. His coat and mane colors made me look closer a bit from where I was and fooled me into believing it was somepony I knew back in Canterlot.

I walked closer, hoping not to disturb their conversation and greet Shadow and ask where my sleeping quarters were aboard the ship.

"Ah, Private Star," Shadow had turned and noticed me walking towards them. He gave a small smile and turned to me, as did the pony beside him.

"Good morning, sir," I smiled right back and stopped in front of him, saluting.

Shadow saluted back with the same smile. "So, excited you came early?"

"What can I say? Early bird catches the worm. If... that's the right term for this," my cheeks heated a little in embarrassment.

Shadow let out a soft chuckle. "Close enough. Hey, Private, I've got somepony I'd like you to meet, as I mentioned before," he turned to the grey earth pony. "Star Shooter, meet Arc Nobis. Nobis, meet Shooter."

The grey pony, Arc, scanned over me for a few seconds before sticking a hoof out to shake. "It's a pleasure," he said with the blandest expression on his muzzle.

I took his hoof and shook it back. "The pleasure is all mine, sir," I smiled to him faintly. Directly on his uniform over his chest was a Lieutenant's emblem between his name. Another patch on his shoulder pointed towards he was a Marine. His uniform colors still had me puzzled.

"So, Shadow here tells me you're the new radarpony on the bridge," he turned to Shadow and then back to me.

"Yes, sir."

"Fixed your sleeping schedule yet?"

I blinked. "Sir?"

"Did you?"

"I don't catch on."

Arc turned to Shadow. "He hasn't," he muttered, turning back to me. "I wish you luck. Most radarponies want to quit after the first week."

I blinked again. "But I drink coffee, sir."

Arc stared at me without saying a word for probably a full minute. "So did the others. I still bid you good luck, Private."

"Thank you...?" my head cocked a little at that.

Arc nodded once, then Shadow spoke up.

"Now that you two have met, I should let you both go to do whatever that is needed to be done. Star, I assume you are taking your taking your bag to your quarters?"

I shrugged. "I am, but I was not told where to go, sir."

Shadow blinked. "The Sergeant didn't tell you?" he then grumbled. "All right, come on."

Shadow turned around and began trotting towards the steel elevated bridge that led to a hatch just below the flight deck towards the front of the ship. Once we entered, the hallways on either side of us were long. Few sailors walked about the halls, checking the rooms while others had checklists, probably for preparing the carrier. Shadow turned and went down the left hall with me following close behind. The sailors that were in the halls noticed him coming and immediately stood at attention and off to the side in doorways to let us through.

"Carry on, all of you," he said to the sailors that moved out of the way, and so they did.

We came up to a steep stair well leading to the level below us, which was no different than the one we were just on. It was a bit of a hassle to climb down, especially when carrying a seabag over my shoulder, but over time I would grow used to it. 

Once off the stairs, Shadow went right and down a few doors before stopping outside a closed steel door with bolts on the outline. He took the handle in his hoof and pulled it open. It made a faint screech that made us both wince, and he stepped to the side, allowing me to enter first. I walked inside and looked around.

"Here is your berthing. Choose your bed and lay your bag on it," Shadow said.

The sleeping quarters were extremely cramped: a narrow room with two bunks build into the walls on either side, and a wooden desk in the center with a small rounded, bolted window sitting just above it. The room had a simple light bulb for a light, and it was switched off for the time being.

"Seems comfortable enough," I chuckled a little, as did Shadow. I walked to the bunk on the right and set my bag on the bottom bed. "No bed bugs, right?"

Shadow shrugged. "We've had a couple of cases, but they went away quickly. Probably froze to death. Everyone has long shifts on this ship. Same for the rest of the fleet."

That was reassuring. "Oh," was all I could say.

Shadow nodded once. "Now, come, I'll show you to the bridge so you don't wind up lost," he winked and walked out of the doorway and back towards the stairs. I followed him, closing the hatch into the berthing behind me.

We walked back up the stairs, going up two flights before coming to the small tower where flight operations and the bridge were located. Another rounded flight of stairs later, both me and Shadow stepped onto the bridge where only a few of the computers were on and operating. No one else was on the bridge, likely due to the fact that most of the crew had not boarded yet. Shadow moved ahead, right up to a station with three digital monitors displaying individual maps. Beside it was a small space to walk, and across from that was another smaller monitor on a desk.

"This is your station, Private. I would give you a look at the radars, but the systems go off when the ship is docked. Take good care of all of it, or Nobis will have your head," he joked, chuckling.

"Yes, sir," I responded with a grin.

"So, know where to go?"

I nodded once. "Yes, sir, I do."

"Very good. I expect you at your station before we depart, is that clear?"

"Yes, sir."

"Good," Shadow lifted a hoof to his forehead in a salute. "Temporarily dismissed."

I returned the salute proudly, only dropping it once Shadow stepped off of the bridge. I followed him out a few moments later and down to the bulkhead hatch to disembark the ship for the time being.


***


Time quickly passed, and soon enough, there was just an hour left before the Eclipse was scheduled for departure out to sea. Of course, typical autumn Manehattan weather came about, and rain showers were building in the region due west. The skies over the city grew completely overcast and the air took the form of a soft mist. Nothing bad was expected out at sea, but the weather out there changed in a heartbeat from what I heard from other sailors.

At the time, the Eclipse was boarding, and those with families were allowed on-base to say goodbye to their loved ones. It was a heartfelt moment knowing my parents didn't know where I was, or that I would be deploying out into the ocean in just an hour's time.

As I got in line to board the ship, I glanced over and noticed Anchorage and Ashfall standing side-by-side in front of a mare and stallion, and by the looks of them, I assumed they were Anchor's parents.

"Ohhh, Ancy, don't go!" sobbed the mare, a hazel earth pony mare with a styled brown mane and diamond earrings hanging from her ears.

While she sobbed, Anchorage rolled his eyes and huffed, cheeks turning pink with minor embarrassment. "We're not going to war, Mom. We'll be back in a few weeks."

"I know, that's why I'm crying!" His mother sobbed more and brought Anchorage into another lung-crushing hug that made me snicker at the sight.

Anchorage grunted and struggled to breathe for the full minute his mother embraced him, then he gently pushed her off and took a deep inhale, followed by a cough. "Please, don't. This is just like last time."

"Now, Ash, take good care of my son. Do you hear?" said the stallion accompanying Anchor's mother, a pegasus almost exactly Ash's size. The stallion was middle-aged from what I could tell and had a short mane, and a pair of dog tags around his neck. Must be former military, and his father, presumably.

Ash nodded once. "I will, sir," he raised his hoof to salute him respectfully.

His father saluted back. "Good stallion," he then lowered his hoof and the two shook hooves.

Afterwards, the both of them received two more lung-crushing hugs from Anchorage's mother before being allowed to leave. By the time they did, sailors and Marines were boarding the carrier. The process was long and slow, and an hour or so later, tug boats were sent to tow the Eclipse away from the dock. The majority of us gathered on the flight deck as the carrier was pulled towards the center of the river. Meanwhile, the families and friends of everypony on board were against the water line and were waving at us.

I stood between two sailors stereo-typically waving cloths to their loved ones. I looked over the crowd below and in front, searching for two familiar faces. Soon enough, I found them. Solar Wave and Silver Edge were waving at me with big smiles. I smiled back and waved to them as the tugboats detached themselves from the Eclipse.

Just a few minutes later, everypony on shore left, and everypony on the boat went off to their stations. I followed suit as the others, but instead made my way up to the bridge where Shadow stood along with many others, going over and finishing up engine startup procedures. At that time, I sat down at my station and slid my chair closer to the radar desk.

"Air pressure?"

"Thirty PSI, 'Cap."

"Alright, boys. Let's start her up."

"Aye aye, Captain," spoke a sailor who began flipping switches on a control panel. Moments later, the low roar of the engines whirring to life could be heard audibly throughout the ship.

"Take us out, Skip," Shadow ordered as he sat down in his chair and sipped a cup of coffee.

"Aye, Captain," the throttle master slowly pushed the lever forward, the engines gradually speeding up and kicking up some water behind the ship.

Soon, we began gradually moving towards the mouth of the river and the ocean. The ship paced at a slow speed of just seven knots, or eight miles an hour. The Port Authority of Manehattan strictly controlled any and all vessels and their speeds moving in and out of the harbor and limited us to that speed, but once we were past the Manehattan Bridge and onto open waters, any speed required to get us where we needed to go was granted.

It was about thirty-five or forty minutes later before we crossed under the bridge where ponies were gathered to wave goodbye. Some of the sailors on the flight deck stood there and waved to the civilians, and just before the entire ship could finish clearing underneath, Shadow gave two long horn blasts to signify the ship's departure, as also required by the Port Authority.

For a while, I stared at a blank radar screen as the green line spun around in a complete circle every ten seconds or so. Both the weather and traffic radars were completely empty. Every time I glanced up, however, I could only disagree. A light drizzle was falling onto the flight deck and making beaded spots of water all across the windows of the bridge. Either the radar was malfunctioning, or whatever was above us wasn't being picked up by it—likely the latter.

Thankfully, just a few minutes later, a light blue spot slowly moved onto the top of the screen. Despite the direction we were traveling was east, it showed up on what others described as the 'northern' end of the radar, which in reality was just the direction in front of the ship. It would be confusing to some without having training on a radar.

The rain slowly picked up, and soon Manehattan could barely be visible behind us thanks to the fog between the Eclipse and the skyline. Meanwhile, the weather radar kept picking up blue, and eventually lighter and darker shades of green as we continued east.

"Shooter, weather report?" Shadow said from his chair, sipping on his coffee afterwards.

I straightened my back and looked over the radar thoroughly. "Light to moderate precipitation over us now, not much else," I glanced over to a computer between the weather and traffic radar. "Waves are calm at point-six meters. South-southwest winds are at fourteen knots."

"Very good," Shadow turned to me and winked. "And if it isn't evident already, boys, we've got a new radar pony. Better get used to him."

After that, I got a few short glances from some of the others on the bridge, one nodding once to me with a smile, before all returning their focus to what they were doing. 

"And Star, if anything abnormal pops up, you let me know at once, or anypony else here should I be absent for any reason."

"Aye, Captain."

The only thing I was concerned about at that point was the massive waves storms usually came with out in the ocean.


***


Just before sunset, I was dismissed from the bridge to go to the chow hall aboard the Eclipse for dinner, as were a few of the others and we were replaced by the next shift of sailors. Down in the mess hall, the cooks were serving hot mashed potatoes, roasted carrots, and green beans—a good dinner to kick off deployment. 

Each of us got in line with dark blue plastic trays and were served dinner, two by two. I sat down at one of the tables with a growling stomach and began eating. As I did, I started to think about Anchorage and Ashfall. Where were they, and what were they doing?
> 18. Deployment - Part II
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

After finishing my dinner, I went immediately to my sleeping quarters to relax for the night. It took a short while to get there from the mess hall and on the way, I somehow ended up in the engine room before finally finding the right hallway the room was in. I really had to get used to being on the Eclipse.

I walked into the room and shut the door behind me as regulated and walked over to the small window hatch where we could see the ocean outside. The seas weren't any different than they were when I walked off the bridge to eat, and it relieved me knowing I wouldn't be seasick in the middle of the night to keep me awake. I took my cover off and hung it on a coat rack by the door, or what was now being used as a hat hanger. Or it could have been that from the start.

I laid down on my bed on the bottom of the bunk and relaxed into it. For a bunk bed, it was fairly comfortable and I felt as if I could just doze off right at that moment. But not before I got bored a few minutes later and decided to take a book I brought with me out of my sea bag.

It was a newer book written by the same mare that wrote the Daring Do series, and was a mystery story set in older times in Canterlot. I don't know what it was about the mystery genre, but it was... satisfying to read. A good mystery once and a while was nice, and especially coming from A.K. Yearling. Over deployment, it would be a good boredom-killer whenever I had free time, which I knew after speaking with Shadow would be rare starting tomorrow.

Time slowly passed, and one very long chapter later, the sun was setting and it was time to turn on the room's light so I could see better. Before, there was just enough natural light from the window where I could read. It was a common issue my parents thought I had when I was younger where they didn't think I could see when I read and ended up turning on every light even though I didn't need it. The dynamic changed once the sun was down.

The light was just a bulb with a hanging metal beaded string as a switch. I reached up and yanked down on it gently, the light instantly flicking on and brightening up the room comfortably. I laid back down on my bed and picked the book up off of the desk sitting between the bunks and continued reading.

A few more minutes later, faint clumps of hooves echoed down the hallway and slowly approached, assuming it was some sort of hallway patrol or just a pony walking by. They stopped just outside the door and it was pushed open. I glanced around the edge of my book to see who it was as the pony walked in.

"You're my bunkmate?!" Yelled the dark brown earth pony, who's eyes locked right onto me with an angered look on his face.

"Nightpath?!" I sat up, closing my book and laying it on my bed beside me.

He grumbled and walked closer. "What the hell are you doing? Get out of my room!"

"This is my room too, genius," I glared up at the taller earth pony. "And I thought my first day of my first deployment was going well."

"As did I!" He glared right back. "You're lucky we're sharing the room with two others, otherwise I'd make you pick your own teeth up off the floor right now."

"Oh come on, what did I ever do to you, huh? Never once have I done shit to you, and I still get treated this way for no apparent reason."

"Just shut the hell up, alright? I can't stand your whining," Nightpath rubbed his forehead with a hoof, then climbed up onto the top bunk.

"Whatever," I motioned my hoof in a 'go away' gesture and picked my book back up to keep reading.

Right at that moment, a white pegasus and a muscular green earth pony walked into the room. They both stopped at the door and looked around, their bags over their shoulders.

"Not too bad, eh?" The white pegasus said, walking into the room.

The earth pony kept looking around and shrugged. "Not at all. A little cold though."

"Oh, grow up," the pegasus muttered and set his bag down beneath the opposite bunk and turned around. "Oh, hey Star."

My head snapped to the side and towards the pegasus when my name was said. "Anchorage?" I blinked and stared at him.

"What are the odds?" He smiled.

"Star's in here?" The green earth pony said from the top bunk, peeking off the side and down at us. "He is! Hey there."

"You too?" I chuckled.

"I thought we were all in different rooms to be honest," Anchorage removed his cap and set it down on his side of the desk beside his bed.

"Could you all be quiet?" Said a disgruntled Nightpath from the top bunk of my bed.

I immediately stared up at the bottom of his bed. "Could you quit being so damn salty? I know we're out in the middle of the ocean and all, but you need to chill."

This caused Ashfall to chuckle, as well as Anchorage who did quietly. "You two know each other too?"

"Oh, I know him alright," I rolled my eyes. "Wish I didn't."

"Shut up, Shooter," Night said from beneath his blanket.

Ashfall then rolled his eyes. "How about we swap beds, Night? So you two don't have to share one."

"I'm not gay, damn it! I'm not sharing a bed with anyone!"

"You kind of are right now, to be fair," Anchorage said flatly.

Night stuck his head out from under his blanket and grumbled loudly. "Fine! Anything to get me away from this guy!"

"Yes, please, swap beds. I'd rather have somepony worth talking to sharing a bunk with me," I shut my eyes and laid back, then they shot open and my cheeks turned a faint red. "Not in that way of course..."

"Sure, whatever you say," Night grumbled and hopped down from his bunk with a loud thump of his hooves hitting the floor, which startled me. Both him and Ashfall switched beds, and I relaxed back into mine.

"You still never explained what I did to you," I said in a calmer tone.

"Here we go again," Ash muttered.

"You annoy me, that's what you do," Night replied in a frustrated tone as he laid on his side, back facing towards me.

"And just how do I annoy you?"

"You're annoying me right now! Just shut up and go to sleep!"

I rolled my eyes. "Whatever you say," and got up to turn off the light before taking my jacket off and laying back down. For once, he was right. It was time to get some sleep. I was going to need it. We all were.


***


What seemed like just a few minutes in the trance of sleep, I was woken up by a familiar voice being raised. My eyes shot open and my heart raced for a few seconds as I was jolted out of a deep slumber.

"H-wha?" I muttered and yawned.

"Star, wake up, it's time to start our shifts," whispered Ashfall.

I blinked and squinted, trying to look around. "Am I blind or something...?"

"No, it's 0430 hours."

My eyes opened wide and I sat up, nearly hitting my forehead on the bottom of the bunk above me. "0430 hours?!"

"Get up, get a shower, get ready, then head to the chow hall."

I reached a hoof up and rubbed my eye. "Yeah...give me a minute," I yawned again. A moment later, I stood up and grabbed my jacket as well as cover. "Where are the showers at?"

"Down the hall to the left. First door on your right. And please, for the love of Luna, don't drop any soap bars."

I raised an eyebrow and stared at him as my eyesight adjusted to the darkness. "Why would it matter?"

Ash brought a hoof up to his muzzle and facehoofed. "Just don't...it's not a good experience," he said, then walked out of the room. Once he did, light flooded in from the door.

I shrugged and followed suit, but instead went to the shower room down the hallway. It was a large room that held at least ten or twelve small showers that could fit one, maybe two ponies inside of it. 

I hung up my jacket and cover on a rack in a small room between the hallway and the showers themselves and waited for an open shower. At that time, many sailors and a few Marines were showering before breakfast or their shifts, and a line was slowly building outside the door behind me. I had to thank Ash later for waking me up early enough to be one of the first in line to shower.

A spot finally opened, and I went into it. Each shower had regular bottles of shampoo and a bar of soap to use, and thankfully, every shower had curtains that locked in place so no one could sneak in behind you. I turned a knob and warm water flowed out through the shower head, and my mane fell down upon the water's touch. Once I felt soaked enough under the water, I took the shampoo bottle in my hoof and squirted a small amount, but enough to wash my mane, into my hoof where I then ran it through my hair back and forth while the water washed it out.

Shortly after, I took the bar of soap in my other hoof and began rubbing it across my chest, shoulders, forehooves, and back to my wings and hinds while the water continued to wash it all out of my coat. It was a slightly longer process than if an earth pony or unicorn were washing themselves with a bar of soap. Then again, I was used to using body wash and a shower puff and not a bar of soap. Something else I would have to get used to.

Once finished, I stepped out where a sailor stood with the grumpiest of expressions as he handed out clean towels to others. He handed me one and I begun to dry myself off. Afterwards, I took the towel to a laundry trolley where the others left theirs, and went to put my uniform on. With my uniform buttoned up and cover on top of my head, I went to the mess hall for breakfast.

It wasn't a very long walk now that I knew where I was going. It was safe to say that I wasn't alone on my way either. A few others walked behind and in front of me on the way to the mess hall, each one of them looking like zombies from the lack of sleep. On the outside, I probably looked the same way. I was pretty tired. After all, it was a quarter until five in the morning. 

Me and the other sailors walked into the mess hall to find it pretty busy with many having sat down and were eating breakfast—or for some, it was dinner. No matter who was eating what, the mess hall was full of chatter. I got in line with the others and waited patiently. The mess hall, for breakfast, was serving peppered scrambled eggs and buttered toast with small cartons of milk, and there was plenty to go around. 

Once I was served, I went back out to find a place to sit down and eat. It was easier said than done and I assumed my food would be cold by the time I did manage to find some place to sit at a table. Thankfully, it wasn't. But as I ate, I glanced up and caught an angry look from a dark brown pony.

"Do you ever leave me alone?" Growled Nightpath.

"Excuse you?"

"Well, do you?"

"It's not my fault everyone on the damn ship is here to eat," I glared at him and shoveled a spoonful of scrambled eggs into my mouth. 

"I'm going somewhere else," the brown earth pony stood up, grabbed his tray, and walked off. It wasn't long before he returned, setting the tray down rather hard.

I glanced up at him and tilted my head, a grin crossing my muzzle. "Do you ever leave me alone?"

"Shut up. My morning's already gone to shit, if you haven't noticed."

"Why's that?" I kept eating.

He grumbled and rubbed his forehead with one of his hooves. "Dropped a bar of soap in the shower..."

I almost choked on my food at that point and took a moment to swallow, then regained my posture. "How did that go?"

"Is that a serious question?" He glared daggers at me.

"Possibly. You tell me."

"No, it didn't go good! If soap bars weren't so flipping slippery, it wouldn't have happened!" He motioned his hooves about in an angered gesture.

All I could do was grin as I ate. "Sucks for you."

"Just shut up..." he murmured and took a small bite of his toast, staring down at his tray while resting his temple on his hoof above the table.

I wanted to laugh, but that probably would have gotten me a black eye or worse. I couldn't wipe away the grin for the first minute or so and eventually it did go away by the time I was finished with my meal. Following a quick trip back up to the kitchen to drop off my empty food tray, I left the mess hall and went upstairs to the bridge to begin my shift. My sixteen hour shift with only a lunch break and quick bathroom breaks. This was going to suck.

I stepped into the doorway leading into the control room and stopped there at attention, where I then saluted. "Permission to enter the bridge?"

"Permission granted," Shadow replied with a salute, having turned around and again had a cup of coffee in his hoof and was sipping it tiredly.

I dropped my salute a moment after and went up to my station where I sat down while the previous shift left to go eat and then rest. Upon glancing up to look out the window, there was literally no light, not even on the flight deck. Not even the bridge had lighting on at the time, the only thing illuminating the room being our computer screens and nothing else. Though I'll admit, I'll take the pitch-black over blinding lights all around me right after waking up any day.

My eyes gazed back down to the radar screens, both empty with no activity anywhere on the screens. For once, it wasn't raining, but the winds were strong in the direction we were moving and I assumed they would be followed by nasty waves.

"Weather report, Shooter?"

I quickly checked over all of the information the computers gave me. "Winds are at fifteen knots to the northwest. Waves currently at two meters. Wind speeds are picking up to our one o'clock and waves are expected to crest at five meters. Other than that there is nothing in our general vicinity."

"Better have the jets tied down then, don't you think?" Shadow said to the others, the two sailors by his sides that were seated at their own computers nodded in agreement. The green earth pony sat forward and set his coffee down before picking up a microphone that connected to the ship's public announcement system. 

"Attention all hooves on the flight deck, waves in our general path are expected to crest five meters or higher. I advise all on-deck aircraft to be strapped down until further notice. Carry on," he then put the microphone back down.

Surely enough, a little while later, the winds did pick up to twenty-five knots and the waves increased in height. Soon, the Eclipse was bobbing up and down in massive waves as we traveled to the east-northeast. A few minutes into the rougher seas, my stomach started to feel strange—the bad kind of strange. I strove my best to ignore the sickness slowly growing ailment in my stomach and kept my eyes steadily watching over both radar screens. But even that didn't help. In fact, it made me feel worse.

Soon, I felt as if everything I had just eaten for breakfast was going to come back up completely. I wrapped a hoof around my stomach and let out a soft, quiet groan that didn't catch anypony's attention thankfully. It quickly became recalcitrant and I needed to get to the restroom immediately.

"Sir..." I gagged a little. "P-permission to exit the bridge for a moment...?"

Shadow turned his head and looked at me. "What for, Shooter?"

I could only assume my face was turning green from the sea-sickness I was suffering from for the last few minutes and caused him to jump to a conclusion.

"Don't say a word, just go. Come back when you're feeling better."

"Thank you... sir..." I gagged again and immediately shut my mouth as I felt my cheeks begin to puff out. 

I hastily got up from my seat and ran to the restroom in the room just behind the bridge, parallel to the doorway to the staircase. I shut the door and ran up to the toilet where I knelt down and gagged one more time before spitting out a heavy amount of yellow-tinted saliva. The smell of it was even worse, and is what did the trick. Without a moment to spare, there went all of my breakfast. And just like that, I was feeling a lot better.

I walked out of the restroom after flushing the vomit and possibly half of my insides down and sat back down, looking as if I needed to rest again.

"You okay?" asked Shadow.

"Just a little sea-sickness, sir," I replied in a slightly weakened tone.

"Happens to all of us. If it comes up again, just go to the restroom."

"Y-yes, sir..." I sat down at my station again and exhaled deeply. Today was going to be a long day. A very long day.
> 19. Rules of Engagement
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sunrise came just a few hours after I woke up, but of course, there was no visible sunrise. Just gradual increase in light, thanks to the amount of clouds that were stationed above and around us for miles. Over the course of the morning and afternoon hours, intermediate and brief rain showers rolled overhead without signs of stopping. Each time seemed to gain in intensity as well, starting off with a light drizzle or a misty rain, then stopping, followed by actual rain showers and then another area of calm air, then finally a heavy downpour with stronger wind gusts than normal.

And as much as I loved rainy or cloudy days, they made me drowsy. There was something about the rain that made me want to roll over and fall asleep no matter where I was. Thankfully, the bridge had a coffee machine between the stairwell down to the flight deck or lower levels and the restroom. Whenever it was emptied, everypony took turns to refill it for everypony's convenience. 

Up until about one that afternoon Manehattan time, I hadn't poured myself a cup of coffee until I felt the effects of waking up at half past four hitting me like an oncoming freight train. No matter what anypony said, coffee was a lifesaver to those working long shifts like I was starting today. The only downside was there was no actual creamer, just small packets of sugar and a few gallons of milk in the small refrigerator built into the counter the machine sat on. It was also where Shadow kept his lunch from what I found out.

Never in my life did I expect to find myself drinking coffee with just two small packets of sugar and maybe a sixth of a cup of milk. It was extremely bland and I missed having actual coffee creamer to go along with it. But it was something to keep me awake, and quite possibly, alive as well for the remainder of deployment.

Despite the awful coffee, I managed to keep awake once I the boost of energy from the caffeine kicked in and I was back to my usual alert self. Then, once my cup was empty, I went back for a refill. I had a shift to finish, not a nap to catch.

Lunch came and went in the blink of an eye, and even then I still had a while before my shift is supposed to end. When it did end, it was raining. Again.

For the next couple weeks, it was the same routine over and over again. 


***


Three weeks into deployment, the sky outside had magically cleared for the time being but storm clouds could be seen in the distance. By this time, we were halfway through our course after turning back towards home. It was much relief knowing in just a week, we all would be back home. I couldn't have been more happy myself.

That Saturday evening, I was sitting at my station with my eyes very gradually looking back and fourth between the weather and ocean traffic radar screens. As expected, there were storms west of us moving in our direction. It was going to be a bumpy night, that was for sure. Another sleepless night it seemed. 

I sipped a cup of fresh, hot coffee that still had its bitter taste. After three full weeks of at least four cups a day, my taste buds had grown completely used to the awful taste, and to be honest—it wasn't really bitter and awful anymore. Still to this date, coffee is a lifesaver that I cherished with every drop. Shadow and the rest of the crew would agree it seemed, seeing how much they drank over the sixteen hours we all spent in the same room, staring at the same computer monitors.

As time slowly passed, clouds did build back up overhead and the last air patrol was brought back in due to the deteriorating weather. From the bridge, watching the jets land and take off was an awe-inspiring sight. The Eclipse was literally a floating airport used by our own aircraft. The thought that somepony came up with the idea of mixing a naval vessel with an airport was preposterous in itself, but they made the idea a reality. And it had been for over a decade.

I snapped out of my trance of thought when I heard the faint ping of something coming from one of my screens. There had been passing ships over the weeks we had been out that were within a 15 mile radius of us and they kept their distance, but this seemed...off. A small blip was picked up to our south—in reality, the northwest of our position on the globe. As a few minutes passed, it kept its course and was still approaching the Eclipse from behind.

"Captain? I'm picking up a small vessel about fourteen clicks northwest of our position and closing in at a speed of about..." I stopped to check. "Thirty one knots."

"Is it following us?" Shadow got up from his seat and walked over to my station to examine the radar.

"It appears so, sir," I replied right as the radar updated. Whatever it was and whoever was driving it, they were after us.

Shadow kept staring at the screen for a moment. "Let me see if we can contact it to warn it of our position."

"Yes sir."

He walked back up to his seat and stood beside it, picking up the radio and scanning a 15-mile radius around the Eclipse, which was as far as both radars went.

"Unknown vessel, this is the L.R.S Eclipse, please state your identity and change course immediately or action will be taken," he spoke into the microphone. For a minute, nothing but static came back, and he repeated himself but in a more stern voice.

More silence, until a foreign voice returned the call minutes later.

"Eclipse, das sind unsere gewässer. Wenn sie es wagen zu kommen näher an unser land, werden wir handeln!"

"What...?" I tilted my head in confusion.

Shadow listened closer as the voice on the other end continued. "Wir werden maßnahmen ergreifen, Eclipse. Merk dir meine worte."

"What are they saying, cap?" asked one of the sailors who stood beside him. At that point, we were all staring at Shadow.

"It's one of the Griffon languages. They are threatening to take action if we do not stay out of their waters."

"With all due respect, sir, we are not in anyone's waters. We're in the open ocean. Even in our furthest position from home, we still weren't halfway to their coastlines."

Shadow sighed and sat down on his chair. "They are likely Griffonian pirates. They think the whole ocean belongs to them when it doesn't. For some reason, the Griffon Kingdom still has yet to handle the situation. We've already lost many shipping vessels to them."

"You think they're pirates?" I looked down to my screen to see the blip on the radar moving away.

"It's safe to assume so. As far as we know, they're the only ones to this day that still use the Gerffin language. Today they use what everybody calls Grench. The Kingdom changed their language about two centuries ago and today, even the princesses have trouble communicating this one fluently. Most do. It's a dead language basically."

"How do you know it so well, sir?" Asked the navigation officer.

"Training. Take note boys, if you ever look to be the next captain of this ship or another one, you're expected to learn world languages to communicate with other vessels if needed. For now, I suggest we forget about this for the rest of our journey. Not a word to the others. There's no need to cause a panic. For all we know, it was probably some mischievous fisherponies."

"Yes, sir," we all replied and carried on.

Needless to say, there was already a bit of a panic kicking in inside of me. Unless Shadow was right, and there was no need to worry about it. It was then where the rain began to pour down seemingly out of nowhere with the crackles of thunder and lightning all around us. Yep, a bumpy night ahead indeed. 

By the end of my shift and dinnertime, the storm was still raging and the Eclipse was bobbing up and down in the large waves that came with the heavy rain and howling winds and was making it somewhat harder to focus straight.

About halfway through our meal, I felt seasickness trying to work its way back to me and I did my best to hold it back. One thing Anchorage had suggested was whenever I felt my stomach beginning to swell and ache, that closing your eyes and counting to 10 would drive it away, even if it was for a few minutes. Over the week I knew the tip, it was working better each time and gradually I was driving it all away.

"So, anything new?" Ashfall asked the both of us with a mouthful of food.

Anchorage rubbed his temples and then snapped his head to stare at the manner-less earth pony, hitting his hooves on the table and shaking it briefly. "For the love of Luna, could you nawt talk with your mouth open?!"

Ash rolled his eyes and then swallowed the whole ball of chewed up mush down his throat. "I'm a Marine, I don't play by the rules of a sailor."

"This is my ship you're on, buddy, a ship run by sailors," Anchorage poked his hoof at his own chest. "It would be much appreciated by me and our shipmates that you use manners!" With the light accent Anchorage had, it made their argument even funnier.

"Soooo?" Ash leaned closer with a smirk crossing his muzzle.

"Should I remind you that your branch is just a department of mine?" Anchorage leaned back a few inches.

"So?!"

"So, we must respect their rules. This is, after all, their ship that we are on," I jumped in and winked at Anchorage.

He just blinked and stared at me as if he didn't get why I was winking to him. "Yeah, sure, whatever you say," Ash grinned at the both of us and resumed eating. "So anyways..." he once again spoke with food in his mouth.

Anchorage then proceeded to slam his face right into the table and nearly into his half-empty tray. This only made me and Ash laugh, except Ash nearly choked on his food.

Then, unexpectedly, everything slid towards the back of the ship and most of us were knocked off of our seats. Astoundingly, our trays remained on the tables. Well, most did. Others weren't as lucky. Once everyone was back up and everything shifted back into place, the chatter in the room picked up again.

"Damn these storms..." Anchorage said flatly.

"No kidding," I replied, adjusting the cover on my head.

"I mean, don't get me wrong, I like a good storm once and a while, it's the waves I can't stand," Anchorage motioned his hoof, his focus shifting back down to his tray of food where he picked up his metal spork and kept eating.

"Thank Luna we'll be home in a few days..." I said before taking the final swig of my water. And just like that, I was hit by a rush of weariness from my long day. "Alright, I'm out you guys. See you tomorrow," I stood up off of the table-long attached seat and took my empty tray and glass in my teeth and began walking back to the kitchen to drop them off.

"See you," Anchorage nodded once, while Ash waved a hoof, motioning 'peace out' with it while still eating like the hungry stallion he somehow still was.

Exhausted, I made my way back to our sleeping quarters where I hoped to go drop right down onto my bed and go right to sleep. Thankfully, Nightpath wasn't back from his shift just yet which meant, for once, I could go to sleep without dealing with his drama.

And just as I hoped, I fell right down onto my bed and was out like a light.


***


Despite the ship constantly shifting about in the grip of the raging storm outside, I slept throughout the night without stirring once. And admiringly when I did wake up the next morning, I found the storm to have let up some but rain still poured outside the small rounded hatch the room had for a window that was placed perfectly above the wooden desk. Another day of drowsiness it suggested.

Subsequent to breakfast, I immediately went up to the bridge only to find the coffee maker was down for the time being. A supposed lightning strike on the bridge fried the few appliances on it and a couple of the unimportant computers and temporarily left one of the crew members without a reason to sit on the bridge until the system was fixed. Even on my end, I found my monitors somewhat off as well with the weather radar feeding information five minutes behind what it normally did.

Thankfully, the traffic radar was up and working functionally. Prior to yesterday's brief incident with the threat from possible Griffonian pirates, watching the radar wasn't nearly as nerve-racking as it was today. Though, we were now further west than where we were when the threat was received, and hopefully us on the bridge wouldn't receive a similar message today.

With the winds somewhat dying down, we finally gave the go-ahead to the flight deck to launch the first air patrol of the day. First one jet, then another. Eventually two more went up and that was usually the most to be on patrol at one time, covering different sectors of water around the Eclipse. And especially following yesterday's events, Shadow and the rest of us decided it was a better idea to cover as much area as possible and keep on the lookout for any suspicious activity—for all we know, that vessel could have been still following us but from beyond our radar distance. Surely those manning it couldn't have been that stupid to not know we had eyes in the sky as well.

Each minute that ticked by perceived to move slower and I couldn't understand completely why. It was until I heard another ping noise that made me immediately snap my eyes over to the traffic radar monitor. I scanned over it, only to find nothing was registering on the screen. I then look up to see Shadow walking back with a coffee mug, and a moment later, began pouring himself a steaming cup of coffee.

That was going to have to be fixed somehow so I wouldn't mistake the coffee machine for something appearing on radar. But then I was relieved that it wasn't something coming into view.

As he poured his coffee, a new noise filled the room above the constant low hum of the engines. It was a fast ticking, mixed with faint beeps at every click. It caught all of our attention and we instantly turned to the source of the noise—the Morse code machine on the far right side of the bridge, on the same long desk that Shadow and one other sailor were seated. All of us, including him, stared at it as the lever moved on its own, letting off the noises. It was an incoming message of some sort.

"We haven't had to use this machine for years..." Shadow said as he walked up to it. The machine paused for about a minute before continuing in a similar pattern as before. "It is only meant to be used in an emergency by our own fleet."

"Then... what do you think it is?" asked the bluish-green earth pony that was always stationed beside him.

"No idea, Sea Watch. Let the automatic translator do it's job since our living one is absent today."

"That could take a few minutes to an hour, sir."

"We have plenty of time. We're still a good six-hundred miles from home," he walked back to his seat and sat down, sipping from his coffee mug.

"With all due respect, sir, it could be something important and you expect us to do nothing about it?" Sea asked. 

"Yes, I am. It would take too long to locate our own translator when the automatic one does its job just fine. Until then, I suggest we carry on and hope it is not a distress call."

Yeah, let's hope. I said mentally and returned my focus to my radar monitors while waiting for the Morse-code translator to type up the message it picked up.

As expected as it was, the computer finally did print a small piece of paper with the message on it and the navigation officer took it to read. Once his eyes met the piece of paper, his head cocked back slightly in confusion.

"We are come for our vessel, warned be. Run, run, little ponies. What...?" He tilted his head.

"Okay, this isn't humorous anymore. Whoever is sending these messages to us is either doing it just to throw us out of focus of our jobs, or it's a legitimate threat," Shadow said, setting his mug down and leaning down below the counter top and opening a small cabinet filled with many hoofbooks of instructions on different subjects. The one he pulled out was black, and the title read 'Rules of Engaging'.

"It says right here, the first rule when threatened is to tighten up the ship, and increase air patrols. Second rule—keep close eyes on your radars," he then threw a glance towards me and I nodded once. "Third rule—if the threats continue and no action from whomever gave them is taken, the threat can be considered non-credible and us as a crew are advised to carry on. Fourth rule—if action is taken by whomever threatens our ship, I, the captain, must call for all hooves on deck and to man our battle stations for an attack. And the fifth rule—" Shadow then stopped and gulped. "—if we are boarded, the ship must go under complete lockdown and a special team aboard the ship will go after the attackers."

He then closed the book and put it away.

"When we are back within radio contact with port, we'll advise them of what is going on. But that is still at least two and a half days away, meaning we're all alone out here for the time being. That being said, if the threat is credible, we are closer to our own land than theirs. And we will take action if they do. We are much stronger than they are."

"Hooyah, sir," Sea Watch smiled and turned back to his computer screens.

"Now carry on, everybody."

And so we did.
> 20. Port Sweet Port
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"There she is. Land, ho!" said the quartermaster, gazing out through the front windshield of the bridge with binoculars in his hooves. In his sights were the distant, foggy skyline of Manehattan rising over the horizon.

Grunting softly, Shadow glanced over to him, an eyebrow raised. "You going to say that every time home is in sight?"

"It's quite fitting, sir," he returned with a smirk. I rolled my eyes, and Shadow did as well.

Earlier that morning, we had sailed through numerous clusters of heavy rain showers that hampered operations on the flight deck, and thankfully, at the current time, we were out of it. According to the screen, however, it appeared Manehattan was in for it. Stormy weather was not anything new for this area, it seemed.

Shadow reached his hoof forward and picked up the microphone of the public address system and clicked it on. "Listen up, sea dogs, we're almost home. Give or take a few more hours and we'll be back in the port of Manehattan."

I couldn't have been more happy to be so close to home again. On the flip side, I still had a job to do, and so did everypony else. Below deck, everypony helped prepare the Eclipse for making port, meanwhile us on the bridge prepared to send most of the jets and helicopters to a joint air base shared by Air Force and naval-owned aircraft.

As we approached the coastline, one by one, we catapulted the jets off of the deck and into the air where they raced south. Afterwards, the HELOs took to the skies, and later the jets at a much slower pace. Soon, very few aircraft remained on the flight deck.

Some more time passed, and more of the distant city emerged from the fog that typically rested over it on a norm. It wasn't long before we were in range with the Port Authority dispatchers and given immediate clearance to enter the harbor via the Manehattan Bridge. It would still be a while, and other smaller, faster vessels were allowed in ahead of us. Certainly, they wouldn't halt all marine traffic for an aircraft carrier.

Coming even closer to the mouth of the North river, many sailors were allowed onto the flight deck as the Eclipse sailed past the  Statue of Harmony. We weren't too close to it, but at the same time, on both sides, one could make out the ant-sized figures of ponies. Some of the sailors waved towards the tourists on the island, but quickly after, they ran back inside when it began to rain for the hundredth time.

"Final report, Shooter?"

I checked over the monitors again. "Light scattered showers across the harbor and region, waves are calm, wind speeds are at five knots, and I'm picking up those other boats moving ahead of us."

"Very good. Listen up, Shooter. We're almost home. You may head down and get your things ready if you would like," Shadow then sipped his cup of hot coffee.

I glanced up at him and blinked. "Sir?"

"You heard me, go get ready. We'll be docking in about twenty minutes."

I kept staring at him for a few moments, then nodded. "Yes, sir," and got up, leaving the radar monitors running, and walking off the bridge for the final time that deployment. It was a bit strange, but I accepted it and went downstairs to the deck my sleeping quarters were on. From there, I began packing my book and other uniforms. It was a short process and very quickly I was left without anything to do for the remainder of the journey.

CRASH

That changes everything.

I was knocked to the floor by the jolt. In an instant I was back on my hooves and ran over to the window hatch. We had hit something, and it was on my side of the ship. And since the initial impact, a loud screeching noise could be heard coming from the bow of the carrier. We definitely hit something big.

I quickly went to the door and out into the hallway, where multiple sailors were running towards the source of the noise just before it stopped, and moments later, the ear-piercing alarm went off. Out of instinct, I raced back up the stairs to the bridge and burst through the door, stopping just inside the room and peering around at everypony, who were all trying to get back up from the impact.

"Damn it, I'm off the bridge for five minutes and we hit something!" I went over to the radar monitors and stood there, staring at the screens. "What did we hit?"

"Not sure, but no one is reporting any damage to the hull or water coming in. We'll have to see when we dock," Shadow was noticeably shaken and was up on all fours.

I grumbled. "Until then, I'm not going anywhere."

"Fine with me."


***


We maintained our speed going into the harbor and reported the collision to Port Authority. It wasn't long before we reached the naval station and smaller boats were sent out to push us up to the shoreline to be docked. Meanwhile, the families of those on board waited anxiously on the edge and were gathered in a large group near where we would be disembarking from. On the flight deck stood numerous sailors and a few Marines, waving to their families.

Whatever had happened earlier must not have been that bad, especially if no one down below seemed to notice anything towards the bow. That was a relief.

Minutes later, the Eclipse was tied to the pier and the metal walkway was attached to the hatch on the side of the ship, and soon, everypony on the ship gathered by it, crowding the already narrow halls and anxiously waiting to get back with their families.

The door opened, and the first sailors walked down the walkway, right into the open hooves of marefriends, wives, mothers and or fathers. It was a heartwarming sight. I had seen videos of military homecomings, but witnessing one was even more amazing. On the contrary, I knew no one, not even my parents, would be here to say welcome back. But I had friends, and that was enough for me. Besides, I saw Solar Wave and Silver Edge waiting behind the crowd patiently.

It was a long wait, until I was finally on the walkway down to the pier, my sea bag slung over my shoulder. I wasn't sure where Ashfall and Anchorage were. For all I knew, they were probably already down and reunited with their families. Or, they were still on the ship and were still waiting.

I stepped hoof on the concrete for the first time in a month, and even stomped my hoof a couple of times to make sure I wasn't dreaming. It brought a smile to my face.

"Shooter!"

I glanced up and saw Solar and Silver trotting towards me. My smile grew a bit and I trotted towards them, and soon enough, we were face to face.

Silver extended a hoof. "Welcome back, Marine."

"Great to be back," I took his hoof, only to be pulled into a chest-bump and quick hug. I'd expected a hoof-shake, but that was okay. Solar did the same, it was a good time.

"So, how was it?" Solar grinned big.

"How was it?" I stopped to think of a proper word. "Interesting, yet boring. In fact, it was probably more interesting just in the last hour or so."

"Oh?" They both tilted their heads.

"I don't know what, but we hit something. A shoal maybe."

"A shoal?" Solar didn't catch on.

"Yeah, a shoal. You know, an area of shallow water?"

"Ooooh."

"Wait, so you ran aground?"

"Perhaps. I don't know, I was dismissed off the bridge just before it happened. What I said was, I go off the bridge for five minutes, and that happens."

The both of them laughed at that, and Silver wrapped a hoof around my neck, and the three of us began walking.

"How about we go somewhere tonight? My treat," Solar smiled.

"Noooo, you don't have to do that," I smiled back.

"Come oooon! You just got back, we have to celebrate your first deployment!"

"Yeah, come on, Shooter. You need some time to kick back! We can bring Ash and Anchor too!" Silver insisted.

"I don't know," I stopped and looked back towards the ship, seeing Ashfall and Anchorage embracing their families. "I think we should let them spend some time with family."

The two of them looked back with me, then smiled. "Well, if you say so."


***


The three of us all went to a sports bar in Bronclyn after dropping my bag off at the barracks. We were seated at a booth there and quickly we were given our drinks. Silver ordered a hard cider, Solar ordered cola, and I ordered some lemonade. The restaurant itself was decorated from wall to wall with sports novelties, such as picture frames with famed sports players' jerseys, metal posters advertising sports teams, and basically electronic product logos that a crazy collector would have in his or her basement.

The restaurant was busy at the time, and the bar was completely full, and each of the flatscreen televisions that were in the place had sports highlights or live games on, and occasionally there would be the loud cheering of stallions across the room as a team scores.

"So, Star, tell us everything! What were you doing? What was your routine?"

"My routine?" I turned to them, having paying attention to one of the televisions for a few moments. "Get up early, shower, eat, then start my sixteen hour shift. Then lunch, and back to my shift. And finally, the end of my shift, dinner, bed, repeat," I picked up my drink and took a sip. The lemonade was quite bitter and made my lips pucker a bit while sending a chill up my spine.

"Sixteen hour shift?" Silver's jaw dropped. "How much sleep do you get?"

"Eight hours. On stormy nights, four, maybe five. It's not easy trying to sleep in a ship that's bobbing back and forth. Thank Luna there's a coffee machine on the bridge."

"That's...not too bad I guess," Silver furrowed a brow, seemingly disappointed. "Is that literally what your deployment was?" before being nudged harshly by Solar's elbow.

"Be nice, he just got back!" Solar whispered.

"It is," I nodded.

Silver rubbed his arm and nodded as well. "Nothing happened?"

"Nothing at all," I took another sip, then a thought came to mind. "Actually..."

The two of them looked towards me and waited for me to continue.

I stared back, then shrugged. "Nevermind, it was nothing." I lied. I didn't know if the incident between us and the Griffonians making threats would be something I could just bring up to them. Whichever the case, I didn't want to panic them.
> 21. Beneath Luna's Moon
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Just two days after returning to Equestria after my first deployment, I was told to head to the Lieutenant's office to have some post-deployment paperwork done. I didn't have a clue what it was for, but I went with it.

The lieutenant's office was situated in the same low-rise office building I came to when I first arrived after enlisting and was a couple of floors up, near the top of the building itself. I took the stairs up and quickly I found myself on the third floor where I walked down the main hallway in search of his office. No one had told me anything about where his office was other than the building and floor number, so I simply went with looking over the whole floor until I found it.

Since the building itself was half atrium that one could look off of the edge of the floors and down to the lobby, with the wall of windows facing out towards the Manehattan skyline, it wasn't difficult to find a certain office. Soon, I found a small thin gold plate bolted into the wall beside a door with LT. ARC NOBIS on it. Bingo.

I lifted a hoof and gave a gentle but audible knock on the door.

"Come in," came a voice from inside.

I opened the door and stepped inside, shutting it behind me before standing at attention and saluting the lieutenant. "Good afternoon, lieutenant."

Arc looked up from his desk, standing up and saluting back. "Good afternoon, private. What can I do for you?"

I dropped my salute. "I was told to come here to complete post-deployment paperwork."

"Ah, yes, that's right," he sat back down in his chair and picked up a pen. "Have a seat," he pointed to chair opposite of his.

I pulled the chair out and sat down in it. "If I may ask, sir, what is this paperwork for?"

Arc scribbled on some paper, then said, "Its a processing checklist. We require it from everypony that goes out, whether they're on a ship or going into another country," he slid a few pieces of paper neatly filed across the desk to me. "I just need for you to go over it and fill out what ever needs to be finished and you'll be good to go."

"Yes sir," I picked up a pen and gently tapped the top of it on the desk to click the head out, turning it over and reading the first page carefully. It was mostly a congratulations for my first official deployment and not much else. The next page was different and asked many different questions, such as if I had any sicknesses during the time I was out to sea.

Well, seasickness couldn't qualify I'm sure. So the answer to that question was a no. The rest mainly had to do with my position and hours logged. Then a couple of minor questions about the quality of my roommates, the air in the ship, the water, and the food. I didn't know I had to give my deployments a rating. It seemed silly but I went with it and carried on to the third and final page. It was short and also mostly reading, with the questions mainly being self-signatures.

Then, after some more reading parts, I set the pen down and re-filed the pages neatly and in order and handed them back to the lieutenant.

"Great, thank you," Arc replied blankly, taking the papers and sliding his rolling chair over to the tall filing cabinet that mostly covered the wall behind his wraparound desk and put them in one of the drawers, then slid back.

"Is that it?" I asked.

"Sure is," he answered and was now focused on typing on his desktop computer.

"Oh, well," I cleared my throat. "I do have one final question."

"What might that be, private?"

"Is it possible to take some leave time for the next few days?"

"What for? Are you sick?" He peered away from his computer screen to look at me with an eyebrow raised.

"No sir, but I would like to take that time go home."

"Hmmm," he sat there, narrowing his eyes on me and thinking about my request. "I don't see why not. I'll send a letter to Shadow and Hardstaff and let them know you'll be leaving for a few days."

"Thank you sir, that is all."

"Very good," he replied, then saluted from his chair as I got up, and I saluted back before walking out of his office.


***


Out of the central office building and back out on the base, and the chilly, breezy Manehattan air, I made my way to Barrack 19 to prepare for my leave. It somewhat shocked me that it was that easy to take leave time. I had always thought it required paperwork. Perhaps not anymore.

Once inside the warm barrack, I went to my bed and took my seabag out from underneath it and unzipped it where I began packing my uniforms and anything else I took with me and put in my hooflocker. I knew they had locks on them, but there was always that someone that could pick locks in the group. I didn't want to be the victim of that.

As I packed my bag, the door opened and a cold breeze swept through the room before it was closed again, followed by the sounds of hoofsteps walking down the middle of the barrack before stopping beside my bed.

"Hey Star, whatcha up to?" asked a familiar beige unicorn dressed in the usual Marine uniform as well as gloves on his hooves and a blue beanie—what a copycat.

I turned around and stopped packing my bag, smiling to Silver. "Hey, nothing much, just packing."

"Packing for what?" He furrowed a brow.

"Leave. Just for a few days. You know, to go home and relax for a little bit," I waved a hoof.

"Oh, alright then!" He smiled. "I'll tell Solar next time we cross paths. When are you leaving?"

"Once I get my packing finished. I want to waste no time getting into the city and on the train out of this cold. You know what I mean?"

Silver chuckled. "I do. Well, I better get back to it then. Just checking to see how you were doing. Enjoy your leave, Star," he said as he walked back towards the door and waved to me.

I waved back and smiled. "See you, Silver."

"See you, Shooter," Silver then walked out of the barrack and shut the door behind him, yet another cold chill sweeping across the beds.

It wasn't long after that where I slung my bag over my shoulder and left the barrack with a beanie snug on my ears and gloves on my hooves to keep me somewhat warm. I decided this time, instead of taking a taxi carriage, I would go myself into the city. It was a long walk, especially with the days becoming more brisk, and for most ponies it was something they wouldn't do willingly. 

About halfway along the walk, I began to shiver. Along the bridge, the ocean breeze was strong and only made it worse. If I could take a guess, I would say the temperature was probably only thirty-five or forty degrees. That was without the wind chill. But my head and hooves were warm. That was all that matters, right?

When I finally made it into the city, I found that it was slightly busier than usual. Even the train station was jam-packed full of ponies with long lines at the ticket counter. I wasn't in much of a hurry to get home so I waited in line patiently. Though it was hard to do, especially with screaming and crying foals in front and behind me with their parents trying to calm them down. I may have been trained to tolerate the shouting of a drill sergeant, but never a foal's cry.

But as I waited in line, I started to think of something else. What would I do by the time I do reach Canterlot? I had way more friends here in Manehattan than I did there. The few ponies I did talk to in Canterlot were usually busy. Then I thought—Rose.

It had been a good few months since me and her last talked. I promised to come back once boot camp finished, but that never came to pass. I guess being a Marine was a bit far more overwhelming than I expected. I guess it didn't matter at that point. I was finally going to go home and spend some time there. Not home home, not back in Coltlumbus home, just home in Canterlot.

The line moved slow, and finally I did make it to the counter where I bought my ticket and waited for the train to arrive. At this rate, I expected to be in Canterlot by late that night, or later. On the up side, that gave me plenty of time to think of what to do.

But as I waited, Rose re-entered my mind. What was making me think of her so much? All I knew was she is a great neighbor. Quiet, but great. Reclusive, but friendly. Did I just miss seeing her that much?

Then something else hit me. Not like a train hit me, but more like... a strong breeze. Was I in love with Rose all of this time?


***


Following an uneventful but crowded train ride home, I disembarked in Canterlot around nine that night, during that time of year it had been dark for a good three and a half to four hours. The city was almost exactly how I left it in June, apart from the Nightmare Night decorations being hung on street lights and in store windows. It wasn't that time of year already, was it? I guess it was.

I stopped at my favorite cafe on the corner for a cup hot cocoa and something to eat before I made my way to the less busier parts of town where my apartment was. Along the way, I hoped the pony I rented to remembered the reason for my lack of rent payment as well as utilities.

I took the keys out of my uniform pocket as I walked up the metal stairs between the building I lived in and another brick building beside it. Reaching the second floor level, I wasn't paying attention and bumped into somepony, inadvertently dropping my keys.

"Shoot!" I shouted as I saw them fall towards the floor. It was more like a giant metal grate that could be walked on and was built in a way where keys could easily fall through and be lost.

I reacted quickly to try and grab them, but they stopped just before the bottom, and before I could catch them, caught in a hoof that wasn't mine. The hoof moved towards me and I stood up straight again.

"So terribly sorry, I should r-really watch where I'm going," spoke a slightly frightened mare as she handed my keys back to me.

I looked up, and our eyes met. The mare gasped, and so did I.

"Rose?"

"Star?! Oh my gosh!" The tan earth mare squealed and lunged at me, nearly knocking me down as she wrapped her arms around my neck tightly.

I wheezed slightly, but then took Rose in a hug.

"You're back!" She looked up at me with a bright smile, eyes sparkling with joy.

I chuckled softly. "About time, right? Heh heh."

"Of course! Of course. Oh my gosh...look at you!" She pulled back from the hug and looked over me with the same big smile. "Looking good, Star!"

A faint blush came across my cheeks. "Thank you," I smiled and tried to hide the blush. "How have you been?"

"I've been good! Nothing much has happened lately. I did finally take your advice and stopped ordering out though!"

"Really?" I smiled. "What made you change your habit?"

Rose's smile then faded, and she sighed. "Your absence."

"My... absence?" My smile disappeared as well.

"I had no idea when you would be back. You've been on my mind pretty much every day since you left for Manehattan. I stopped literally two days after you left. I was starting to order a lot more food than I normally ate and I was gaining a little bit of weight. Not only that, it was hurting me financially. So I started buying food from the market and, well," she then smiled. 

"My older sister visited for a little bit and she taught me how to cook. I don't know if I've told you before or not, but she works for a fancy restaurant in San Prancisco. She's one of their most creative and well-respected chefs. The food she makes is absolutely divine!"

I chuckled again. "Sounds like you two had a great time. I'm... sorry I left for so long. I didn't expect to be away for much longer than how long boot camp lasted. Being, well, processed into being a Marine, followed by my shifts and then deployment, its taken a bit of a toll on...me," my eyes then widened and I slowly looked back down at her.

"You were... deployed?" Her mood was changed dramatically.

"Did... I say that?" My eyes were still slightly widened.

Rose nodded slowly. "Are you okay?"

It took a moment for me to reply. "Y-yes, of course. I... didn't go into any wars, Rose. Honest. I'm stationed aboard a ship now."

The tan mare sniffled and wiped at her eye with a hoof. "Are you sure you're okay?"

"Yes, Rose, I am," I smiled faintly to her. I could tell she was actually worried. If I knew anything about Rose, she was an easy mare to upset. Not that I wanted to.

"If you say so," she looked down. "I know what wars do to stallions like you."

"Stallions like me? What does that mean?"

"Eager, young, fearless soldiers. First ones to go, last ones to leave. My mother's friend was a military nurse. She dealt with ponies suffering from PTSD."

"PTSD. Post-traumatic stress disorder, right?" I wanted to make sure I knew what it was.

She nodded. "Its different depending on the pony, but everypony who has it usually suffers without mental help. Its where somepony can't get the traumatic experiences of war out of their head and it comes back to haunt them again and again. She was the mare that talked to those recently returning from a fight or ones that have been home for a while and finally reached the breaking point and decided they needed help. Or... they... do something else," she paused and looked down. 

It didn't take long for me to catch on, and my pupils shrunk when they did. "Oh..."

"With you being a Marine now, I worry. I worry about anypony I know that joins up. I don't usually agree with their decisions, but its theirs and only theirs, and I respect that. And I respect those that serve, nothing will ever change that. But I hate to see them suffer," she paused, her eyes shutting tightly. "I wouldn't know what to do if I knew you were suffering too," she shuddered.

My eyes widened again and I froze completely, a tear drop falling down her cheek and down, being sliced in half by the metal grate floor beneath our hooves.

"Rose..." I spoke quietly.

"Y-yes, Star?"

I sighed and pulled her into a warm hug. "Thank you... for worrying. And I know how you feel. But I promise everything will be okay. And if the time does come where I'm needed in battle, just know that I'm going for a greater good. So you and everypony else are safe. Even if I don't—"

"Please... don't say the rest..." she whimpered and held on to me.

"Alright..." I replied and gently rubbed her back with my hoof.

"I just don't want you to get hurt... or captured... or killed."

I didn't know what to reply with at that point. I had to change the subject somehow, in a way that would be a comfortable transition from the darker thoughts. But all I did was stand there and comfort her.

"Star..."

"Yes, Rose?"

"You've been a great neighbor since the day I moved here, and you've always been there for me when I needed somepony. You're a great friend, you know that?"

"You really think so?" A faint smile crept its way back onto my face.

"I know so," she smiled back, nestling her head beneath my chin and nosing at my neck. "I am sorry for nearly having a huge breakdown just now..."

"Don't worry about it, please. Its nothing to stress over."

"But Star, its just..." she pulled back and looked me in the eye, then sighed. "You've always been here for me. None of the other stallions I've known have been that close to me as you are. And... well..." Rose slowly looked away as she started to blush.

I simply looked at her curiously. "Yeah...?"

She stared at the wall beside us for a moment, then squeaked. "I like you for that. I... like you for being you. I like you!"

My irises grew when she finished, and my cheeks heated up. "You... you like me?"

Rose slowly nodded, her muzzle wrinkling in embarrassment and blushing even harder.

"I've... never had anypony tell me that before. Other than my parents of course," I scratched the back of my head nervously, cheeks still a pinkish red.

"I-I'm sorry, I'm just... well... its just mixed emotions! You're back, you're okay, I know you're safe," she rambled. "You're dressed in uniform and standing before me right now. That's a little hard to take in, Star. N-not in a bad way of course!" Rose squeaked.

"Hey, hey," I then smiled. "Calm down. How about tomorrow we catch up from here, hmm? Its getting kind of late out."

"O-oh, of course!" She smiled, no longer blushing almost instantly after. "Yes, of course. You've come a long way and you're tired. Yes, definitely, let's do that. Earlier than now tomorrow at uh, your place?"

I shook my head. "How about we go someplace and talk? Like, I dunno, a restaurant or something."

Rose blushed again. "You mean, like, a date?" then slowly looked up at me.

I froze again and my cheeks were now probably as red as my eyes. "S-suuuure?"

Rose was still blushing softly, then she giggled. "Alright. That sounds lovely, Star."

I smiled as we embraced in another hug. "How about seven tomorrow we meet each other downstairs and we walk there together?"

"I would love that," Rose smiled.

After that, we remained in a close embrace for a few minutes before we said goodnight to each other, and went into our respective apartments. Once I closed my door, I tested the light switches to make sure my power wasn't cut during my long vacation to boot camp. Luckily it wasn't, and right after that, I went back into my bedroom and unpacked my bag, folding up and putting my uniforms away in my dresser and removing the one I had on to wash later. 

I was home, I was happy, I was tired, and it was time to call it a night. After being used to sleeping in a barrack, the time difference of an hour in Canterlot made it seem like I was going to bed on time, when in reality I had been used to falling asleep in Manehattan around nine at night. But in Manehattan at this time, it would be ten. Damn time zones.

Leaving just my dog tags on, I crawled into my bed and pulled the sheets completely over me, smiling as I did so. Oh, how much I missed my bed. It was a shame I had to abandon it again in a few days time.


***


"Fifty two... Fifty three... Fifty four..."

Shortly after waking up bright and early the next morning, I found myself on the floor doing a morning workout. A workout of nothing but push ups. The most I did in boot camp was somewhere over sixty. Sixty two I believe. I wanted to at least try and break that, and over time, work my way up to a hundred. 

I broke sixty fairly quickly, beginning to grunt softly as I counted to myself with sweat beginning to bead on my forehead. My hooves begun to feel weak but I wasn't quite to the point of collapse, and thus pushed on, breaking my presumed record and going even further, up to sixty seven before I couldn't do any more. Perhaps I was simply jealous of Ashfall, he could do somewhere around a hundred and twenty, or more. He was a big stallion, so it made sense.

Upon standing back up straight, I took a small kerchief I had folded on my dresser and wiped my forehead off with it. Then I trotted out of my bedroom and into the living room and kitchen to get something to eat and drink. I opened one of the cupboards above the counter closest to the couch and poured myself a glass of cold water, once finishing I took a large swig of it, nearly finishing off everything that was in the cup.

After that, I turned to the fridge and opened it, only to find it was completely empty. Stupid me, I forgot to buy some groceries the night before prior to coming home. I guess that's what happens when you get off of a long train ride late at night and don't feel like going anywhere else.

But yet I still had ground-up coffee in a white sealed bag that I could make. I took a small scoop out from the bag and put it in the small compartment within my coffee machine and refilled it with fresh water, then waited as it brewed in the pot. Obviously a pot for one pony like myself would be too much, especially if I planned on doing things today. Including going out for dinner—wait a minute, Rose! I was having a date with Rose tonight. 

Sitting down with a cup of steaming plain coffee, I started to think of restaurants me and her could try. I didn't know too many within Canterlot proper that were reasonable and still had good food. Typically before I enlisted, I was used to cooking on my own and occasionally going out to my favorite cafe on the corner, or diners with a friend or two. 

So that was my goal for the morning and afternoon—look for high quality restaurants and make sure I wouldn't go completely broke just by taking Rose to dinner. As I had said before, very few restaurants in Canterlot were reasonable. Most within the busier parts of town were high-end places that served small plates of 'fancy food from Prance' and costed a hundred bits a plate and were considered to be whole dinners. Definitely not within my price range. But I still wanted to take her some place nice. Somewhere neither of us have been.

After showering and putting on a zip-up hoodie, I left my apartment and set out for the market downtown. It wasn't far of a walk, but usually in the morning, the place was hectic. Thankfully I had arrived just as ponies opened up their stands and was one of the first ponies there—for once.

I trotted down the long line of stands, most of which having hoof-made souvenirs and knickknacks, with few produce stands mixed in between. Along the way I picked up lettuce, carrots, some cans of soup, and other things I needed to at least get me through my short time here.

As I got ready to leave the market, I stopped to buy some apples from a taller red stallion with a blade of wheat in his mouth and presumably his daughter? No, they looked more like siblings. The little yellow filly with him was stocking the wooden shelves with fresh apples, and I picked some juicy red ones out and went to pay. Right as I set my bits down, the red stallion's expression changed and he narrowed his eyes onto me.

"Is... something wrong?" I asked.

"Not at all. Are you military?" The stallion asked. He had the accent of a farmer as well. 

"Er... yes, I am. What gave it away?"

"Them there dog tags behind yer hoodie. Ah only know of one neck piece that uses them metal beads for the string. What branch are ya in?"

"Did somepony say military?!" The yellow filly jumped up on the red stallion's back and had a huge, excited smile.

"Marines. Lunar Marines to be specific," I answered proudly and smiled back.

"Lunar Marines, huh? Ah've heard of 'em. Y'all serve Princess Luna, right?"

"Well, technically yes, but we do serve the whole of Equestria and Princess Celestia too. Just like the Equestrian Army, we serve the whole country with the purpose of a greater tomorrow. Though, our branches still rival with Celestia's side. Its more like playful competition though, if you get what I mean."

"Ah see. Ah've wanted to get a taste of military life for a little while now, but ah've got a purpose too, mine being buckin' apple trees and sellin' apples for a livin'. Ah guess it will have to wait. But in honor of our country's veterans," he pushed the bits I put down back to me. "This one is on Sweet Apple Acres."

I looked back up at him. "No no, I insist, take my bits," and slid them back to him.

"And ah insist, this one's on the house," he chuckled. "Some of y'all pay the ultimate price to protect us all, the least we could do in return is pay for yer apples," he then winked.

I smiled, then slowly took my bits back. "In that case, thank you kind sir."

"Not a problem," he smiled, then put his hoof up in a salute. "And thank you."

I saluted him back. "For what exactly?"

"For yer service. You have yerself a nice day, sir."

"Thank you, you as well," I smiled, then took the small bag of apples the filly had prepared for me and trotted off.

I had never been thanked for my military services, up until now. It made me feel good, not only about myself, but that somepony realized Princess Luna's forces weren't what they used to be a millennia ago. It made me proud to be who I am now.


***


Along the way home, I looked around for restaurants. Most of which I passed appeared fancy, and those seated inside from what I could tell were wearing suits and dresses. I hated wearing a suit. The only time I did wear one was when I was a colt, and my parents practically forced me to look like somepony from their time when everypony, and I mean everypony, dressed up super nice to do anything. I knew some time in the near future, however, I would need to be fitted for my dress uniform for certain events. At least that wasn't that bad.

I trotted into my apartment and begun putting most of what I had bought at the market away and leaving some things out to make some late breakfast or early lunch, which for me, would just be a salad. I was fine with that anyways. I didn't need to gain any extra weight before I'm set to go back to Manehattan.

Once the noon hour passed, time flew by, and it wasn't long before, due to the clocks changing, the sun was setting just after 1730 hours. Or 5:30 in the evening. Around an hour after that is when I felt it was necessary to shower again. I wanted to look as best as I could for dinner tonight. Not that I was trying to impress Rose—well, maybe a little bit—but I wanted to feel fresh as well. 

After showering, I went into my closet and grabbed a slightly heavier jacket than the one I wore earlier. It wasn't any different, other than missing the hood, and was comfortable for how cold it was outside. It wasn't unusual for late October either. Hell, the year before, by this time it was snowing for some reason.

Once that was said and done, I grabbed my keys and wallet and walked out of my apartment. I was a bit early, and I didn't mind waiting. Usually mares took longer than stallions to get ready and I was respective of that. I sat down halfway down the flight of stairs to the ground and waited patiently. Then, after ten minutes, I heard the door to Rose's apartment open and a set of hooves walking down the stairs. I stood up and turned around, watching the tan earth pony mare gracefully walk towards me with a smile and stop at the top of the steps.

Rose had styled her auburn mane into a bun with thin strands of curled hair hanging neatly down the side, and she wore a beautiful light blue and silver dress, as well as hanging diamond earrings. 

"Too much?" Rose looked at me somewhat nervously.

"Not at all," I smiled. "You look amazing."

The tan mare blushed softly, then waved a hoof at me playfully. "Oh, stop it, I look ridiculous."

"You do not," I smiled and walked up to her side. "Ready to go?" I held my hoof out in a hook for her to take.

Rose smiled and wrapped her hoof around mine, and we walked adjacently down the stairs and onto the street.

"So, where are we going, Star?" She looked at me with a soft smile.

"I thought we could take a little walk around and see what there is. I don't know too many places around here."

"You mean you've lived here for how many years and you still don't know the city?" She furrowed a brow and giggled.

"I..." I paused briefly. "Do you?"

"Of course I do, silly. How about I show the way?" She protested playfully.

"No no, I'm the one taking you, I have the lead," I smiled.

"Oh, don't be so stubborn," she gently poked my side with her hoof. "Come on, I know a great place where we can go."

I gave up fighting her protests and walked with her. It wasn't exactly what I hoped would happen tonight, as I wanted to take us somewhere neither of us had been to, but I was fine with Rose showing me the way. After all, I really didn't know the city that well, despite calling it home for the last few years.

It wasn't long before we stopped in front of a three-story brick building towards the middle of one of the streets that had an outdoor patio with vines and leaves hanging up like a natural rooftop with decorative lights strung in between. No one was sitting and eating outside due to the weather, obviously, but the restaurant itself was magnificent architecture. 

"Here we are!" Rose smiled.

I looked at the sign. "Restaurante de Itaily?"

"Its one of my favorite restaurant chains. I'm pretty sure you will like it too," she turned to me.

I turned to her and smiled. "Even though I'm supposed to be the one taking you out, I wouldn't mind eating here."

After that, we walked in through the front door. The interior was perfectly lit with multiple small chandeliers scattered around the ceiling, with a beautiful giant one in the center of the whole restaurant, sitting above a small fountain. To the far back sat the bar, then off to the back right was the kitchen itself, and the rest being seating for the restaurant. 

Then, a waiter pony walked up to the small counter that was set up to accompany patrons. "Just two tonight?" he asked, speaking with an accent I couldn't put my hoof on.

"Yes, just two," I smiled, then looked at Rose.

The waiter picked up two menus in his hoof and stepped around the counter. "Right this way," then started walking to the left, towards an empty booth and stopping beside it, setting the menus down on either side.

"Thank you," I nodded once to the waiter and took a seat, while Rose sat on the other side of the table.

There were empty wine glasses and silverware already on the table, as well as salt and pepper shakers against the wall part of the table, as well as a small plastic napkin box. It seemed fairly simple for such a place.

Both of us picked up our menus and looked them over. Well, mostly I did. Rose had been here before and knew the menu already I'm sure. I flipped it onto the other side. Wines. Why have a whole side of a menu just for wine? They had a bigger wine selection than food itself. Oh well. Apart from the huge wine selection, the menu mainly had different pasta and soup entrees. Everything that was described on the menu nearly made my mouth water and just deciding what I wanted was difficult.

"Can I start you two off with something to drink this evening? Perhaps some of our signature wines?" The waiter stood beside our table and looked between us with a small notepad and a pen in his hooves.

"Do you have any tea?" Rose asked.

"Iced and peach tea, yes."

"I'll have peach tea, thank you."

"And for you, sir?" he turned to me.

"Water is fine," I smiled to him.

The waiter wrote them down. "Alright, I'll be right back with your drinks," then trotted off. I returned my attention to the menu.

Rose giggled, watching me stare at the menu harder than anypony else in the restaurant. "Can't decide?"

"Not at all... everything just sounds so good!"

Rose giggled some more, and from there, it took me another minute and a half to finally decide what I would settle with for the evening. After having our drinks brought to us, the waiter trotted back.

"Are you two ready to order?" he asked with a smile.

"I think so," I chuckled awkwardly. "I'll have lasagna," then handed him the menu after he wrote it down.

"And for you, miss?"

"Fettuccine alfredo, please."

He wrote that down as well. "Alright, let me know if either of you need anything else!" then trotted off to deliver our orders to the kitchen.

"For a busy place, they have some good service, I'll say," I said before taking a sip of my water poured into a wine glass.

"Good restaurants know how to handle the crowd of a dinner rush and still whip up good food," Rose winked. "Something my sister told me while you were gone."

"Well, I don't question that one bit," I smiled. "You know Rose..."

"Hm?"

"I uh," I paused, my cheeks growing red a bit. "I never thought we would actually go out together. Like this that is."

"As in on a date?" She smiled. "Neither did I. Well, maybe a little bit," she giggled.

"Heh heh, really?" I smiled still. "This whole idea was stuck on my mind on the train ride here yesterday."

"Was it really?" Rose blushed. "How sweet."

"Yeah. I just didn't know how I would ask you out. And then I figured... it wouldn't work because technically we didn't know that much about each other apart from what we look like and... yeah. Just basic stuff."

"Then I guess tonight is a perfect opportunity," she laughed and took a small swig of her tea. "You said you're from Coltlumbus, right?"

"Right," I nodded. "And you're from... uh..."

Rose smiled warmly. "San Prancisco."

"Right! Right. San Prancisco," I chuckled and blushed in embarrassment, all while Rose laughed some more. "Have you lived anywhere other than there and... here?"

"I moved to Vanhoover once. Less than a year I stayed before moving back home. It just wasn't somewhere I could see myself living full time. Don't get me wrong, it's a beautiful city, but San Prancisco is home to me. Just like Coltlumbus is home to you, right?"

I nodded, slightly hesitantly as my smile faded a bit. Unfortunately Rose did notice.

"Something wrong, Star?" she looked at me with concern.

"Hm? Oh, no. Its just, Coltlumbus has good and bad memories for me. It's where I grew up. But I didn't exactly go to the best schools there," I looked down.

Rose gasped. "Oh no... what happened?"

"I was picked on. Partly for my eyes, but mainly because I befriended just about everypony in my class. They thought I was purposely trying to get all of the fillies when I wasn't even interested in that kind of stuff back then. Hell, I just wanted to be friends with anyone. After that, well..." I stopped.

"Yeah?" Rose looked at me, nodding gently once for me to continue.

"I lost trust in ponies. That's why I don't have many friends now. Sure I met some nice ponies in boot camp, but apart from them, you and another stallion I talk to occasionally are literally the only friends I have," I eyed her with a void expression. "I taught myself before I ran away for Canterlot that I shouldn't trust anypony. That later included my parents."

Rose's ears fell a bit as I finished. "I'm sorry to hear that. I really am, Star. But... about the thing you taught yourself. Don't you—" she cleared her throat. "—trust ponies that prove their trust... or are willing to?"

After a few moments of silence, I shook my head. "I guess I never thought about that. But I went along with it long enough to meet my other friend here. He's a royal guard. He's one among a few I would expect to be able to trust easily. You're one of the few," I then smiled.

Rose smiled as well, then waved a hoof at me. "Silly colt, of course you can trust me. You can trust me with anything. If you ever needed to keep a secret, I'm always open to keep it for you. Or if you need somepony to talk to in tough times. That's what friends do."

"That's true," I smiled a bit more. "I'm glad I met you, Rose."

"I'm even gladder I met you, Star."

I chuckled. "That's not a word!"

"Yes it is!" She playfully nudged me.

"I'm messing with you," I chuckled more and rested my elbow on the table, chin in my hoof as I smiled at her. 

Rose did the same, but with both hooves propping her head up. The two of us eyed each other with warm smiles. And it must have been a long stare too, because by the time we finished, the waiter was bringing our food on a metal tray on his back.

"Fettuccine alfredo..." the waiter said, setting Rose's plate down in front of her on the table. "And lasagna," then mine, as well as some buttered rolls in a small wooden basket in the center of the table. "Enjoy!" he smiled and trotted off to handle other patrons.

We both took bites of our food, and it was safe to say that we were both delighted with what we got. My taste buds had erupted with the flavor of spaghetti sauce, different cheeses and the flat wavy pieces of pasta itself. All in all, the place had the best lasagna I'd ever tasted. Then as we ate, we gave each other small pieces of each others dishes to try them out, then we laughed about us ordering opposite dishes next time we came. 

When we both did finish not long later, the waiter stopped and asked if we were interested in dessert. My stomach said otherwise, and so did Rose's. After that, the cheaper-than-expected bill was sorted out and we made our way back home.

And for a first date, it went pretty well. We both enjoyed each others company, on the way, while there and on the way back. It was a fun night. Along the way, we discussed a second date, but not much was spoken of it other than it happening when I come back to Canterlot in the near future. I hoped that by the time that happens, it would be close to the holidays and I could surprise her.

But that was still a good two months away. In the mean time, I was just going to take it slow.
> 22. Snow Storm
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

With the final day of leave now upon me, and after a long previous night of calming Rose after telling her my leave was almost over, I was on my way to Manehattan in the early morning with a raised spirit and ready to return to my patrol shifts. With a dark blue sea bag over my shoulder, I boarded the train and left Canterlot fifteen minutes later. The ride itself would bring me into the city around noon or so, and I figured today would be the perfect time to spend at the on-base firing range, perhaps with Solar and Silver if they were available. It would be better than sitting around and doing nothing for the remainder of the day.

I arrived in Manehattan four past noon and trotted out of the station, into the frigid, breezy east coast air. It was at that moment when I was extremely thankful for putting my winter things on before getting off of the train. The first thing I did after stepping outside was hail a carriage, and from there I rode across the bridge and to the Manehattan naval station. Upon arriving, I paid the carriage puller and trotted up to the front gate where a military police officer stood.

"Identification?" The guard asked, walking up to me. I pulled my identification card out of my wallet and showed it to him. "Alright, you're good," then we saluted each other and the door beside the main steel door opened, allowing me inside. I walked through the door and found nothing was any different than when I left for my leave earlier that week.

Or maybe not nothing, as I walked further into the base I found the drill sergeant shouting at a new group of ponies I hadn't seen around base previously. It was a slightly smaller gathering than mine and the ponies looked a lot more nervous than we did. I hoped for them that they wouldn't let their fear get the better of themselves like I thought it would a few times back in boot camp.

After that, I made my way to Barrack 19. Once inside, it felt great to be in the warmth of a building again, though it wasn't going to last. When I finished unpacking my sea bag into my hooflocker, my stomach growled and I chuckled to myself. I guess focusing on getting to the city took over my mindset instead of eating that morning, and now it was afternoon. It was time to eat anyway.


***


The mess hall was fairly busier than it normally was, this was most likely due to the new recruits' arrival and meant more ponies were in line to get food. This also meant the base needed to invest in either a separate mess hall or to make this one bigger. Hopefully it would even be considered by those running the base. 

Next up in line, one of the chefs in the kitchen put mashed potatoes, carrots, and green beans with a small carton of milk on my tray. She handed my tray back, and I went to find a table with enough room to sit at, but I was hungry enough where I would settle with sitting on the floor in a corner just so I could get something in my stomach.

Eventually, I did find a spot and squeezed in with a bunch of sailors, all oblivious to the fact that I wasn't. I mainly ignored their conversations and focused on eating. Towards finishing my meal, I lifted my milk carton to take a swig of it, when suddenly a hoof slapped me in the back of the head and I quite nearly swallowed the carton itself. I jerked forward and spit half of the milk in my mouth onto the sailors sitting across from me. The two of them glared daggers at me and I coughed hard, finally wiping my mouth.

"The hell was that for?" I turned to the stallion beside me and glared at him.

"You're not a sailor, get the hell out of here!" He motioned his hoof for me to leave.

"I didn't think it mattered, asshole," I kept glaring.

"Hey, ALL of you!" shouted a new voice.

The whole table turned and looked the other way, Sergeant Hardstaff stood there, staring coldly at all of us. "Leave him be before I report each and every one of you—" he paused and looked at me. "—not including you—" then back to the others. "—to your commanding officers. We're a team, there's no room for deciding who sits where at the lunch table. And if I hear of any more discrimination, I will see to it that demotions are laid down. Is that clear?!"

"Yes sir!" All of us replied, everypony else fearful of the sergeant now. He didn't say one more word, and stomped off. From there, I just resumed eating quietly. 

I finished a couple of minutes later and took the trash on my tray and dumped it in a trash can before returning the tray to the kitchen, and then walking outside into the cold that hit me like an oncoming train. Next up was to hit the firing range for some practice.


***


The firing range was the second largest building on base and was at least three stories in height. Inside, it was actually two stories, and it both floors were partitioned off with their own shooting facilities, most likely for training in different environments. Then, with all of them, there was the basic room with simple moving and stationary targets.

Before entering, I took both an M1911 pistol and an M4 rifle along with some training ammunition. Then, after picking a row in the near-empty room, I slipped on some noise-canceling headphones, as well as clear safety glasses, and leaned on a barrier wall just shorter than me and took aim for the target. 

I pulled the trigger once, then twice, then thrice and so on, stopping halfway through my magazine and then continuing. The pistol's slide clicked back, signaling the barrel was empty and I needed to reload, but not before seeing how I did. The target moved up to my row and I pulled the piece of paper down and looked it over.

"Damn..." I muttered, seeing how badly I missed. It was almost as if my target practice training went down the drain already. Then again, it had been a little while since that.

Crumpling the piece of paper up and throwing it in a nearby trashcan, I then patiently clicked a new clip into the handle of the pistol while a new target lowered from the ceiling. Once again I rested myself on the barrier and took a more careful aim with my face closer to the back of the gun. It wasn't the smartest thing to do either. Nearly halfway through my second magazine, the slide jerked back and struck my safety glasses, cracking and nearly shattering them. I jerked back, inadvertently shooting the target over and startling the pony focusing on that target.

"Aw, fuck!" I shouted, quickly setting the pistol down and reaching up, pulling the glasses off and seeing just how close I was from possibly losing my right eye. My hooves shook as I held the glasses in them and I sighed.

Just then, a pony ran up from the side, stopping just behind me. "Whoa, is everything okay?" he asked. 

I turned around to face him. "Yeah, yeah. Close call," I held the glasses out to the white pegasus to show him.

He took the glasses in a hoof and pushed his own up onto his mane. "Damn, you gotta be more careful. Good thing you wore these," he glanced up at me. "You sure you're okay?"

"I'm fine," I replied in a bit of an annoyed tone and turned back to face the target, it had come back and the results were even worse than before. Most of the bullets didn't even make it onto the red bulls eye, and those that did were on the far outer rings. I huffed and yanked it down to get a closer look. "What a load of shit."

The pegasus, who had gone to go back to firing his own weapon, turned back to me. "Hey, you need some help?"

I looked up at him. "No, no I don't."

"Come on, you look like you need it," he walked back up, taking his glasses off and handing them to me.

I pushed his hoof back to him, refusing to take his glasses and shaking my head. "I'm done shooting for today anyways."

The stallion peered to the side, seeing a box of different ammunition and the untouched M4, then back to me with an eyebrow raised. "Come on, let me help you," he then took the rifle in both hooves and loaded the magazine completely, before standing beside me and raising the rifle as a new target fell from the ceiling. 

"Hey, what are you—"

He pulled the trigger, then let go after five bullets fired from the barrel, leaving many holes close to the center of the target. My eyes went wide and I simply stared at the bulls eye with shock.

"Just like that. You try now!" he put the rifle in my hooves, and then slid his glasses over my eyes. I nodded and then leaned on the barrier.

I inhaled deeply, then exhaled, and then shot the rifle. Again, the bullets missed the center of the target. Angered, I nearly threw the rifle. "What the hell?!"

The stallion sighed and patted my shoulder. "Calm down, its not the end of the world. But I can see what you're doing wrong here."

"What am I doing wrong?!" I turned to him.

"Well, for one, you're too focused."

I blinked, not quite catching on. "Too focused?"

"Yes. You're too focused on shooting the weapon rather than hitting the target. Not to mention you're getting yourself too comfortable leaning on that wall. In the battlefield, you won't have any of that. In the heat of war, you're either crouched down or standing out in the open with the enemy shooting from nearly all directions. This isn't anywhere close to reality, private. Now let's try again. Try standing up straight this time."

I listened closely, then nodded and turned around, seeing the same target was there. "Reload?"

The pony nodded. "Yes, reload."

I took the magazine out and added more ammunition on top of what was left in it and then clicked it in place, and finally took aim without leaning on anything.

"There you go..." he said quietly. "Good posture, not shaking at all, try shooting now."

With another deep breath, I shot the rifle again. Six bullets this time, and still not centered on the target but closer than before. My eyes widened slightly and I turned to the pegasus, who was smiling. "You're getting it. Wait for the target to change and try again. Then this time, let go."

I tilted my head slightly. "Let go?"

"Let go. Ease your muscles. Your aim improves when you're not as tense," he motioned his hooves.

"If you say so..." I turned back and waited for the target to change, while the pegasus pulled my last target paper down.

"Not bad at all. Still room for improvement though. Like I said, let go."

I nodded once and kept my eyes ahead of the barrel of the rifle, then as the target dropped, I unloaded the little remaining ammunition on it. I opened my eyes after taking a long blink, watching the target come closer. Each one was on the second inner red ring, closer than before but still not accurate enough.

"Damn it..." I lowered the rifle, now out of ammunition and turned back to the pegasus. "I thought you said letting go would help?"

"You didn't. I watched your body movement before and while you shot, you were tense as a rock the whole time. Don't you know how to ease yourself?"

Throwing a hoof up in the air after taking the glasses off, I slightly glared at him. "Just how am I supposed to let go? You never said how I'm supposed to! And for the sake of Luna, no one ever told me any of these things!"

"I wouldn't suggest shouting to a lieutenant," he sighed. "Alright, alright, we'll get to that later. I'm afraid even after boot camp, you still have a long ways to go. That's the thing about recruits these days, they don't get the full effect like I did," he then looked at me. "Silly me, I never introduced myself. My name is Lieutenant Snow Storm, but for right now I would prefer you call me Lieutenant, aye?"

I nodded, calming down when he announced his rank. "Yes sir."

"Good," he nodded once. "And I know you are a private. What is your name?"

"Private Star Shooter, sir."

"Ah, Star. Fitting name for your appearance," he winked for some reason. "How about we go somewhere else to talk? I'll explain what I meant about the 'full effect'."


***


"You see, trainers in recent years, well, they're not as hardcore as they used to be. They're still tough and extremely hard to break now, but, they don't get to ponies like when I was in boot camp. But when I was in training, the drill sergeant actually showed us how to do things properly rather than shouting and expecting them to do the right thing without correcting any minor problems they might have. It's partially everyone's fault, though. The military's, the princesses, everyone. I doubt it has to do with cutbacks because there have never been any since the Great Griffon War," Snow explained.

"And, well, its safe to say that there aren't too many Marines left that know what's up. Now, I've got nothing against what you've been taught. You know your stuff and I respect that, but you don't know everything. Of course, it all comes to somepony at a different time. Perhaps that might be why drill instructors don't teach it anymore. I guess the more experience somepony has, the easier they find it to do what they were trained to do."

"Of course," I nodded. "So, how long have you been a Marine?"

"Six and a half years. You?"

"Damn. Just a couple of months."

Snow chuckled. "Just as I suspected. No wonder."

"No wonder what?"

"Oh, nothing."

"Come on, tell me."

"Nope."

"Please? I would really like to know."

"No wonder you suck at things, no offense."

"Oh, thanks," I replied with sarcasm and looked down.

"Hey now, its not bad. You'll get used to things pretty quickly once you find yourself ready to do so. If you want, I can help you get there."

"Really, how?" I glanced back up at Snow.

"By being a part-time trainer in between deployments. I'm sure you'll have one soon, won't you?"

"Probably, but I don't quite know. I just got back from one a week ago, so I can't be sure."

"Oooh, then probably not for at least another month or so. I see."

"Unless something happens of course. I guess we will just have to see. I doubt there will though."

"Hmm, and why do you think that?"

"Equestria is a peaceful nation. War isn't something we like to think about... right?"

"Depends, Star. I myself just got back from deployment two weeks ago. Had to deal with an immigration issue in the western nations that was leading to kidnappings and every little bad thing that can lead up to something as bad as a civil war. Not everything is cupcakes and rainbows like everypony thinks it is, and no disrespect for our princesses, but..." he leaned closer. "Princess Luna is comfortable with the idea of sending troops to fight more than her sister. Hence how they got into that power argument all of those hundreds of years ago. It might have had something to do with trying to help out a fellow nation or protect our own."

I looked at him, taking a moment to think it over. "You think the reason Celestia banished Luna to the moon was actually because... she wanted to protect Equestria?"

Snow nodded. "Perhaps. But we all know it was really because Luna didn't think she was cherished enough like her sister was. I'm just saying that could be one of the reasons, maybe she believed she didn't have enough power in Equestria to do things," he leaned back. "But now they are closer than ever, and Celestia lets Luna do things, of course with her prior knowledge. That's why I was deployed, because Luna ordered me and my squad to take care of the situation."

"...And your point is?" I looked at him.

Snow sighed softly. "My point is, Star, that Luna has always been more willing to deal with situations other than making peace. Now don't get me wrong and think what I want is a revolution against Celestia, because that is certainly the last thing I would ever wish for, but you get what I'm saying, right?"

I nodded. "I do."

Snow sat back, smiling. "Good. Then I guess we're finally on the same page together. Now, how about we go someplace warm? It may be in my name but I actually hate the snow and cold."

I chuckled. "Yes sir."
> 23. Conflicts
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Alright, listen up everypony!" shouted Sergeant Hardstaff from the door of the barrack. "We've got a new squadron of recruits coming later tomorrow. I need all of you to spend the afternoon clearing out your hooflocker and packing it up. Each and every one of you are being moved to a new barrack and will be given separate rooms to sleep in, and each of you will have a roommate to share the room with. I also want you to choose who your roommate will be, and choose wisely, because you'll be with them until either you die, you reach the end of your time as a Marine, or you get yourself a nicer place than the shit we have," everyone then laughed a bit, the sergeant only grinned. 

"When you're all done, meet me at the flag pole at 1400 hours. I'll take you to your buildings from there and you'll get settled in. So I suggest you all get packing."

"Yes sir!" We shouted in unison.

The sergeant trotted out, and from there we went to our hooflockers and began taking things out and stuffing them into our bags. All of us as a group didn't have much to pack and were waiting outside within a minute or two of the sergeant's orders in a neat line.

"Well this is interesting," Silver said, standing behind me with his bag over his shoulder.

"I'm excited, what about you guys?" Solar smiled and looked at the both of us.

I nodded to him. "It'll be nice to have a better bed... hopefully."

Silver chuckled. "We won't all be in the same room though. I mean, maybe one of us will. It'll be different."

"Well, its not like we'll be that far away from each other. Just different buildings," I said.

"Unless one of us goes and buys an apartment. But that won't be that much of an issue, same workplace, am I right?"

"True, but I already have an apartment, remember?" I said to Solar.

"Oh yeah, in Canterlot. Hey, do you think you'll move here now that you're out of boot camp?"

The idea wasn't fresh on my mind but it wasn't something I was ready to think about just yet. It wouldn't rest well on Rose's mind either. "I haven't decided yet."

"Well that's alright. But hey, there's something else I've been thinking of. What if one of us gets transferred? Like, I dunno, out west?"

"Out west?" Silver turned and stared at the yellow unicorn.

"Yeah, Los Pegasus or something like that. No, wait, San Dineigho. That's where the other base is. What if one of us gets sent there?"

"They would have sent us there by now, Solar. Besides, they decide where ponies go depending on what they are interested in. Since I'm part of the Eclipse crew, I'm stuck here unless I get discharged."

"Huh, I never thought of that," Solar tapped his chin.

About fifteen minutes later is when sergeant Hardstaff could be seen trotting towards us, and those out of formation quickly fell into the line we created and all stood at attention while the night-blue stallion stopped in front of us.

"Well then, it seems all of you finished up quicker than I thought... Good job," he nodded once. "I checked with some of the other living barracks, the two I inspected have enough rooms for you all. Again, two per room, and when we get there, I expect you all to split up with your roommates and pick your designated room. When you do, stand inside the door and I'll come by to mark where you all are staying. Is that clear?"

"Yes sir!" We replied in unison.

"Good. Let's move."

From there, the sergeant led the line towards some two-story buildings about the length as the normal barracks. Though both were considered barracks, the ones we were moving to would be our permanent living quarters. The march was short-lived and upon reaching the new barracks, the first half of the group went into one building while me, Solar, Silver, and the others went to the barrack beside it. The vacant rooms had their doors cracked open with bricks being put in the way of the door to hold it open. 

I trotted up the stairs and to a door towards the center of the building, labeled Dorm 5 in Building #3. I stopped just outside the door and set my bag down beside it, then turned to Solar and Silver who had followed me upstairs.

"All right... now is the hard part. Who stays with me?"

The two unicorns exchanged looks, then turned back to me. "We're... sorry Star. We decided along the way that we're going to share a room together," Solar said with a concerned look.

"Oh..." My ears fell and my head lowered. "Alright..."

"I'm sorry... It's nothing personal. It's more like... I'd rather be with Solar rather than leave him with somepony, you know?" Silver added, motioning a hoof as he did so.

"So I get left with somepony..." I kept my head down.

"I... guess."

"That's fine..." I turned around. "I'm cool with that," I really wasn't, and they surely could tell.

Silver sighed, turning to Solar. "Let's go."

Then, they trotted back downstairs to one of the vacant rooms, while I stood facing the barely-opened door, feeling as if I'd been betrayed by my own friends. I understood Silver's reason, but coping with it would be harder. Just then, I heard hoofsteps walking down the hallway towards me.

"Private?"

I turned and saw the sergeant stopping a few feet away. "Sir," I then wiped my expression clean of any sadness and faced him.

"Where is your roommate?" he asked, writing down on a clipboard.

"I uh... don't have one sir."

"You do now," he looked up at me with a smile.

Right after that, I glanced behind him and saw Nightpath walking up the stairs.

"Oh hell no, anypony but him! Why him?!"

"Because, private," he emphasized my rank grimly. "Apparently somepony in his group can't count for shit and he was left without a roommate as well. So, he is with you."

"I beg of you sir, don't put me with him," I said as the taller stallion walked up beside the sergeant.

"Sergeant, why put me with this lonely disgrace?" Nightpath grimaced and looked towards Hardstaff as well.

"You know the reason, private. Let's also consider this a chance for you two to make up and work together for once. Any further discussion will result in consequences. Do you two hear me?"

We both groaned. "Yes sir."

"Good. Now get settled in," said the sergeant before he trotted to the staircase at the other end of the building.

I then turned to Nightpath and gave him a faint glare. "You heard him..." I grabbed my bag off of the ground and pushed through the door of the dormitory, then caught on to the dark brown pony mocking what I had said just seconds before. I decided to ignore it.

Upon walking inside, there was a small kitchen to the right, then the bathroom, which was cramped but had everything we needed, and finally the bedroom that had two wooden framed beds against opposite walls with nightstands beside them, and between that was a single window as well as a column heater, and a simple desk against the wall at the end of one of the beds, and beside it, a small closet. With a deep breath, I walked up to the bed on the right and set my bag on it.

"That's my bed..." growled Nightpath.

I turned and tossed a glare back at him. "The beds are literally no different..." but picked up my bag and went to the other one and began unpacking the little things I had while Nightpath did the same. The bed frames had a built-in drawer under the mattress, and we folded our uniforms in there. When he finished, Night hopped onto his bed and rolled around in the covers much like a dog would in a pile of dirt.

"I can't believe I have to live with you," he muttered.

"Get over it, you big baby. There are worse ponies you could be living with right now," I replied, putting my bag away in the closet.

"Not from my point of view."

I shut the closet door and turned around, staring the brown pony right in the eye. "Okay, what is it? Seriously. You never give me an answer as to why you hate me. Why do you? And don't think you're going anywhere until you tell me."

Night sat up, eyeing me for a few moments in silence. I stood there, unfazed. "Isn't it obvious? You're friends with the sergeant. I'm surprised nopony else hates you to be honest."

"That's it?" I gave him a funny look. "You're upset over that? Of all things, you're ticked about me having somewhat of a friendship with the sergeant?"

"And what's wrong with that?"

"Everything is wrong with that. There's nothing bad about befriending your sergeant. Wouldn't you rather know who you're going to be fighting alongside one of these days? Surely we're not joining just to wear the fancy camouflage and yell 'oorah' all day every day. Do you get my point?"

Night sighed, then nodded twice. "I do. But that doesn't mean I won't dislike you still."

"Then do what you want to do."

"... What?"

"Throw a punch at me. Do what you want to do to me. I won't fight back. If it is something that will make you get over your constant salty mood, then by all means, beat me up," I gave him a serious look.

Night simply stared at me. Neither of us moved, and I expected him to stand up and pin me to the wall at any minute. Much to my surprise, he didn't.

"I'm not wasting my energy on you..." is all he said before he laid back down and turned to face the wall.

I stood there, blinking a couple of times. "Am I hearing you right? You don't want to beat me to a pulp?" I grinned.

"Keep talking and I'll consider rethinking my decision."

"What ever," I said with sarcasm in my tone and wandered back to my bed. Before I could lay down, a knock on the door caught my attention.

"Who is it?" Night muttered tiredly.

"I don't know," I walked to the door and opened it, seeing Shadow standing there. "Sir!" I said in surprise and stood at attention.

"At ease, am I interrupting anything?"

I eased myself and shook my head. "No sir."

"Alright. I received a letter and I came to look for you. It turns out the princess and the general of the Lunar Republic Military are on their way to Manehattan."

I blinked and tilted my head. "What? Why?"

"Apparently we're being interrogated for what happened last deployment."

I shook my head slightly. "I don't follow?"

"The warning," Shadow said, much quieter than before.

My eyes widened slightly. "Oh..."

Shadow nodded. "Everypony on the bridge is being questioned. Its nothing bad, but I would appreciate if you came with me to the meeting."

"Yes, of course, sir."

"Then we'd better get moving."


***


The both of us seated ourselves in the situation room inside the main office building on base. There were few ponies already in the room, most of which were the rest of the bridge crew who stood up to salute Shadow as we walked in. Noticeably, the important guests still hadn't arrived yet. 

A short amount of time later, a dark grey pegasus dressed in her highness' personal guard's armor stepped into the room and spoke up.

"All rise, and welcome miss Princess Luna," he said, stepping off to the side as the Lunar princess walked regally into the room. 

When she did, we stood to our hooves and saluted her, then in walked a unicorn stallion a couple of inches shorter than her wearing a black-and-blue uniform with medal ribbons pinned on the left of his chest, and the stallion wore square-framed glasses as well. Then, finally, my former teacher, Lieutenant Kosec Ping walked in, much to my surprise. We kept our salute until they seated themselves and asked us to sit as well.

"Thank you all for gathering here today..." Princess Luna started, then muttered afterwards, "not that you had much of a choice." She then cleared her throat. "We understand that your vessel, the Eclipse, received a threat last deployment, yes?"

Shadow nodded first, as did we. "Yes, your highness."

"And though I do not know much about this threat, was it provoked on their part?"

"No, your highness."

"Would you care to explain what was happening?" asked the stallion, leaning forward onto the table and looking at Shadow with the blankest of expressions.

"It was a clockwork day, colonel. We had just turned back towards home, and out of the blue we received a threat in the Griffonian language. Private Star Shooter here—" he motioned to me. "—alerted me of an anomaly on the radar picking up a boat much faster than ours approaching at a high rate of speed. After a short while, it turned and went back where it came from after we responded. There is not that much else to it."

Both the colonel and Princess Luna nodded. "Was there any visual contact of the vessel?"

"No sir."

"Were there any air patrols at the time?" Princess Luna added.

"Yes, your highness. Though the day was extremely overcast and somewhat foggy, it is likely that the weather may have contributed to a lack of visibility of the vessel."

"It is also likely that it could have been a Griffonian battleship that wandered off-course and thought of your ship as a threat," the colonel said.

"With all due respect sir, I believe that theory is ruled out. The Griffonian sailors speak our language as well, they would not contact us with their own. After all, English is the international language of which all aircraft pilots and ship captains must speak to communicate with each other."

"The captain has a point, colonel," Princess Luna said, turning to him.

"Yes, but how do we know it wasn't them mistaking the Eclipse for an enemy vessel thinking it was in their own waters?"

"Griffons do not lack that much intelligence, colonel. This is a threat likely issued by Griffonian pirates. They are indigenous to that region of the ocean, and let's not forget the last time our ships were unable to defend themselves from being boarded. We cannot afford to lose hundreds of sailors and Marines for them to dispose of at their will."

Princess Luna then stood up, those in the room watched the blue alicorn and listened closely as she cleared her throat.

"Witnesses in the room, we highly suggest thou spend the night preparing."

"Preparing for what exactly, your highness?" Shadow asked.

"To be shipped out to investigate the waters. If thou encounters the mysterious vessel again, thou should issue threats and engage if necessary. Commander Shadow, gather and brief your ponies tonight. I can imagine it will be hard for them to leave home on such short notice and right after returning from another deployment."

"Yes your highness," Shadow bowed his head to her.

"Dismissed," Princess Luna scanned over us, then walked out of the room with her guard, followed by the colonel, while the lieutenant stayed to have a talk with Shadow.

"All of you, head back to your barracks. I will brief you all later."

"Yes sir," we said, also leaving the situation room and heading to our rooms at the barracks.

I opened the door and walked inside, finding Nightpath to still be half-asleep.

"Who was it?" he muttered tiredly, sounding as if he wasn't awake at all.

"It was my commanding officer. Uh... Night?"

"Hmm?"

"We're being deployed again."

His ear perked, and he shot up out of bed, giving me a somewhat deadly stare. "You're kidding... who told you this?"

"Princess Luna," I said, walking over to the closet and pulling my bag back out. "We have all night to prepare. Tomorrow is when we leave."

"But... why? We just got back."

I sighed and turned to him. "Something's up. So get your bag and start packing. Shadow will be briefing us later on."
> 24. On The Bridge
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Star, wait up!" Nightpath panted, galloping down the stairs outside of our barrack and then slowing to a steady walk once he was by my side. "Okay... Star. You've spent the last twenty minutes refusing to tell me what's going on. Please, I want to know why we're being deployed again!"

I turned to face him with a slightly annoyed expression. "And as I've said the last fifty-four times, Night, Shadow will be briefing all of us. Which is why we need to get over to the docks at once and not be late to hear what he has to say," then kept walking, seabag sitting comfortably on my back.

"But you already know, don't you?" Night eyed me.

I didn't stop to look back at him. "I have a hunch."

"A hunch... is that it?" He kept following.

"Nothing more, nothing less. Now please be quiet."

"Okay... okay."

For once, I actually did something to make him stop. I hoped it would stay that way.

While we walked, I found myself to have completely ignored the outside temperature, having left my gloves and beanie back at our barrack. It wasn't until I noticed tiny snowflakes beginning to drift down from the grey overcast sky where I realized just how brisk it really was, nonetheless I still ignored it. I was too tense to care about the weather.


***


We reached the docks following a very short trot. Many confused sailors and Marines stood in an unorganized group, chatting and wondering what was going on. Thankfully Nightpath wasn't stupid enough to ask me again out loud and attract everyone's attention to me, knowing I was one of the few that actually knew the reason as to why we were being deployed for the second time in just over a week.

Some time of standing in the cold later, the commanding officer walked around the side of our group and stood in front of us, between everypony else and the water itself. Everyone quickly turned and stood forward, hooves clicking together in unison as everypony stood at attention. Shortly after Shadow came the lieutenant. And then—the other lieutenant? 

Both Arc and Kosec stood on either side of Shadow while he cleared his throat. "Attention everypony. I know this may seem confusing to many of you, but please, hold on to your questions for the time being. I need everypony to take into consideration that once again, we will be out to sea for quite possibly a longer time than before, and, me as well as a few others have not been all that honest from the time we arrived in port to this very minute," he then paused.

"The truth is, and well, we kept this secret to avoid a panic among all of you, but the truth is, during our last deployment, we received an anonymous threat, presumably from a nearby Griffonian vessel. We still aren't sure who exactly sent the message to us via radio communication, but the language they spoke is almost perfectly identical to Griffish. For now we've assumed it is Griffonian pirates wandering into the open waters away from their own. That is why we are being sent back out, we are going to investigate this thoroughly, and hopefully put an end to their reign on Equestria and Griffonia's trading system."

Shadow then sighed. "And yes, I understand it is hard for each and every one of you to think about leaving your families again, as I have one of my own. And right now, it may seem spiteful to say, but, this is what each and every one of you signed up for. We exist to defend our country, our friends, our families. What we are shipping out to take care of is exactly that, and I ask nothing more of you all to perform your tasks and follow orders, and if it does come to it, we defend our own vessel and eliminate any threat thrown our way."

"Hooyah, sir!" shouted a sailor from our group. Nobody turned to see who it was, not even Shadow, who actually smiled at that.

"Yes, hooyah," he smiled faintly, then wiped it from his expression. "But also, on our next voyage, not only will my good friend and second-in-command, Lieutenant Arc Nobis be joining us, but also Lieutenant Kosec Ping. Some of you may know her from the Lunar Naval Academy. She will be helping me and anypony else on the bridge during our trip and will provide visual aid."

Just then, somepony's hoof raised in the middle of the group. Shadow motioned his hoof to the pony to lower it, and he did. "And yes, the Eclipse was damaged in our previous deployment, but since our return, the damage has been repaired and the ship is once again fully operational, so no, we will not be taking somepony's boat out for a spin in the Antlertic," he added, and almost everypony started chuckling. 

"Now, lieutenants," Shadow looked between the two standing on either side of him. "If there is anything you two would like to bring the crew up to speed on, now is the time."

Lieutenant Arc remained his usual, quiet self, and not a word was heard from the stallion. Shadow turned back to Kosec, who seemed to be caught off guard. "Oh, erm, yes. As Shadow said before, we understand it will be tough to be deployed again, nevertheless our presence is required out there in the open ocean, and I can assure each and every one of you, this will not be anything more than a search and possibly destroy mission." 

"Now, I spoke with Shadow about this earlier, and I received word that the Eclipse is stationed approximately eleven nautical miles off the coast. There will be helos flying in to pick each and every one of you up. Because of the deadline, there is no time to bring the ship into the harbor and board it manually, so consider this to be an exception," she continued. "I suggest keeping your questions locked away until we're on the carrier. Is that clear?"

"Yes, ma'am!" we each answered in unison.

"Very good," Kosec nodded her head once. "It will be a short while before the choppers arrive, so I hope each of you packed a lunch. I don't want any of you leaving this spot until they do get here."

Stepping back some, she nodded to the captain, and he turned to face us. "You heard the lieutenant. Nopony goes anywhere 'til our rides fly in, whether that be a few minutes or an hour's wait."

Now I really wish I grabbed my beanie.


***


Each of us had taken a seat on the cold cement, and most of us were shivering from the frigid air blowing in from the ocean and the snowflakes that continued to drift to the ground. I sat towards the center of the large group, rubbing my hooves together and occasionally blowing hot breath onto them to keep them warm. Much of the others did their best to pass the time by chatting with each other, while those including myself simply wanted to prevent ourselves from turning into uniformed blocks of ice.

It wasn't until the grayness of the sky began to dim when me and a few others caught onto the approaching whirring noise of helicopter blades slicing through the icy air. I turned while shivering, and much to my relief, there they were, five black UH-60s approaching from over the coastline and were beginning their slow descent towards where we waited. Before long, the even brisker breeze they kicked up blew across every one of us. Those who weren't shivering before most likely were now.

Each of the helicopters landed on their own landing pads close by, while one of them had landed on a dock beside the one we waited on, and one of the pilots of the choppers hopped out to gather us up and have us boarded in an orderly fashion.

"Listen up!" Shouted the pilot above the loud engine as he flipped the black visor up into his helmet. "I need twelve of you on each, the rest of you will be picked up by following helos, understood?"

"Yes sir!" We answered at the top of our lungs, and in groups of twelve, we boarded the helicopters and strapped ourselves in while the pilot shut the sliding door on the side. Despite the cabin being small, we packed in comfortably with our bags, and within minutes we were lifting off of the ground. Inside was still an uncomfortable, freezing temperature, but thankfully there was no breeze, which was the real killer.

Staring outside of the window, I watched Manehattan disappear as we began to pass through a snow squall, and from there, the ride became slightly turbulent, and it was at that moment where I could completely comprehend that I absolutely hated being in a helicopter, and the weather only made my fear worse.

On the contrary, the flight was fairly short, and after nothing but a total whiteout with the only thing visible being the choppy ocean below us for just over fifteen minutes, we began to circle around the Eclipse as the pilots waited for the go-ahead to land on the deck. All the while, the blackhawk continued to be battered with fierce winds that were enough to make somepony nauseous—well, enough to make me nauseous, and here I was thinking seasickness was the worst possible thing I'd have to deal with medically-wise.

Our chopper did manage to land without a hitch, and like clockwork we disembarked onto the safety of the flight deck, where I noticed two green-faced sailors galloping to the edge of the ship and puking their lunches into the sea for the fish to take care of. I felt queasy myself, but I was at least able to keep my insides... well... inside. 

We all were taken into the ship where it was extremely toasty. Wherever a heater vent was found, there were groups of up to six or seven ponies gathered around it fighting over the warmth. It was an entertaining but short-lived sight when our bodies did finally reach a safe temperature and the blood had thawed. Furthermore, me and Nightpath met back up in the hallway and made our way to our sleeping quarters to drop off our bags. Being at sea already, our shifts had begun the moment the blackhawks landed, and granted, this meant longer shifts. Not just for a few of us, everybody on board.

I trotted back out into the hallway and went right, making my way to and up the stairwell that led up to the bridge where I assumed Shadow waited. Upon walking up to the door jam, I stopped and stood at attention.

"Permission granted, private," said Lieutenant Arc before I could speak up, standing and facing out the window towards the open ocean. With much surprise, I eased myself and stepped into the room.

"Er, thank you sir," I stopped just before my desk and peered around. "Where is everypony else?"

"They're either just arriving or are on their way," Arc replied, standing perfectly still like a statue, focus locked outside of the ship.

Blinking with some confusion, I slowly took a seat in front of the radar panels, which were already switched on and operating normally. It still got to me just how the lieutenant knew I was about to request permission to enter the bridge. I figured he may have heard me come up the stairs, but him knowing it was me was another story, and with it being him, I was hesitant, instead I decided to go with it and ask questions later, yet when I glanced up from the screens, I now saw the lieutenant standing opposite of me on the other side of the desk, his black shades pushed up into his mane, the shades nearly completely blending in. I jumped in surprise, chair rolling back slightly, and I quickly regained my posture as I eyed him. "Sir?"

Arc's considerably fearsome, bright purple eyes were now completely focused on my every movement, and his expression was about as blank as a pony's face could get. He remained silent for at least five or six seconds prior to finally saying something. "Judging by the tone of your voice after you entered, you would like to know how I knew you were coming, right?"

I gulped somewhat nervously, then nodded a couple of times while sitting back in my chair. "It... wasn't on the top of my mind, but affirmative, sir."

After my response came an unexpected light chuckle from the grey stallion, followed by a toothy smirk. "Don't worry, you're not the first I've given the creeps to," he raised a hoof up, pointing to his eye as he closed one and kept the other wide open. "Vision like an eagle," then moved his hoof to his ear. "Hearing like a hawk. Two of the key elements to being a great soldier. I study everypony I meet's body language, the way they walk, the noises they make, everything. That's how I knew you were there."

Impressed, I nodded with a polite smile. "So that's why you were checking me out last deployment." Poor choice of words. Damn it, Star. Instantly his smirk faded, and overall his expression had dropped into a faint glare, and just with that I felt a wave of fear sweeping over my soul.

"The only things worthy of checking out, in the way you put it, are guns, namely rifles," Arc then put both hooves on the back of my desk and leaned closer to me, I reclined back with widened eyes. "And even if I were attracted to stallions, you would be the last one I would think about. Is that clear, private?"

I nodded, pupils still shrunk to pinpricks. "Y-yes sir," I stuttered. The stallion leaned back, then took his hooves off of the desk and walked back up to the front of the bridge, and any sweat that had beaded up on my forehead was wiped off by a simple swipe of my hoof and a quiet sigh of relief.

"There's a reason we're back out here, Star. Do your job and I'll do mine. If that isn't simple and you screw up, may Luna have mercy on you when we get back to port," he threatened with a rather sinister voice.

"Aye, sir," I replied nervously, feeling my body begin to ripple and tremble in my seat. Never had a pony, not even the drill sergeant, intimidated me as much as the lieutenant did. Upon seeing the color of his eyes and the way he stared at me was enough, it was much worse hearing what he would most likely do without hesitation if I did the slightest of things incorrectly. First it was Hardstaff, now it was Arc's bad side I was fearful of being on.

Shortly later, the last of the blackhawks landed on the flight deck, and minutes after it did, the rest of the bridge crew trotted into the room and took their seats while the lieutenant continued to stand almost motionless at the front of the room with nothing but a steaming cup of coffee in his hoof. And last but not least, the commanding officer was there. Just before he entered, the lieutenant shouted. "Captain on the bridge!" 

We all stood up at attention as Shadow stepped onto the bridge. "Good evening, all of you. It is nice to see each and every one of you here already. At ease," he said as he walked up to the front to stand beside Arc, and we all took our seats a second later.

"Captain, where is the other lieutenant?" Arc asked, turning to Shadow.

"She is in the mess hall grabbing something to eat. She'll join us in a little while," Shadow answered, then turned to everypony else in the room. "Just a reminder, Lieutenant Ping is only here to help you all out. Above anyone, she knows more about tracking than even the best of the best, that's why they made her a teacher at the Naval Academy. Private—" he moved his attention to me. "—she'll mostly be by your side, so be wary. But she won't be somepony you should be afraid of asking for help. If anypony, lieutenant Arc is the one to be afraid of," he rested a hoof on the pony's shoulder, Arc snapping his head towards Shadow and glared daggers towards him.

"Yes sir," I replied, returning my focus to the radar monitors. It would be wonderful to have somepony else monitoring the computers by my side, especially if I were to get up to use the restroom or anything else. On the contrary, I didn't like being watched by somepony while working either—it was always an uneasy feeling, and it threatened to lower my performance if something were to be thrown at the ship.

Yet despite that, I was already unsettled. Not just by the lieutenant, but the whole reason we were back out at sea. Something about our mission did not sit right with my mind, and all I could do was sit back and do my job. Only the next few weeks could really determine if my fears are correct. Only time will tell.
> 25. We've Been Boarded
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The days that followed had only become much colder than when we left the city, and though technically the days were becoming shorter, to everypony on the ship, they felt like they were getting longer. Not a single sailor was receiving the amount of sleep they were used to on normal deployments thanks to extended shifts. Throughout the first week, not even coffee could preclude me from yawning once or twice and finding myself to be nearly passing out on the radar screens. 

The second week of deployment was only just beginning, yet still, none of us knew how long it would be until we would turn around and be on our way home. With how exhausted I and everypony else were, there seemed to be absolutely no hope in sight. Even on our short breaks to eat, the mess hall wasn't nearly as loud as it normally was. At breakfast, me and Nightpath sat side-by-side without making a peep, and quite frankly, from the look on his face, Ashfall was stunned to see me and him sitting together.

"Are you two—"

"Yes," Night cut in, still focused on eating. Ashfall's eyes darted between us.

"But don't you two—"

"Yes," I cut him off, also focused on eating but much slower than Night.

"Alright," Ash shrugged and returned to eating his breakfast. 

Looking up, and finally realizing my surroundings as my mind started to actually function after waking up, I glanced around. Ash glanced up and caught me peering across the room.

"What is it?" He blinked, staring at me.

"Where's Anchorage?" I asked, then turning my head to face him.

He stared at me for a full moment before replying, "About to finish his shift, why?"

I blinked a few times with confusion. I had been so tired in recent days that I had neglected to notice Anchorage hadn't been joining us to eat breakfast or dinner when it came around, and that the change in shifts moved his around completely. "Oh, er, just wondering."

Ash's brow furrowed, he kept staring at me with worry. "He hasn't since the last time we were out here, dude. Are you alright?"

I stared back, then sighed tiredly, resting my head in my hooves on the table. "No... no, I'm not alright. I don't know anyone on this damn carrier that is right now. I haven't lacked this much sleep since the nights before finals in high school. I think I'm slowly losing my mind."

"Oh, grow up, Star. You must have never been woken up at three in the morning and been thrown onto the floor by your own stepfather, then—" Night grumbled, then stopped himself, eyes moving up to see me and Ash looking at him.

"Then... what?" Ash asked curiously, wanting the brown stallion to continue.

"...It's-it's nothing. Continue," he looked down towards his food and proceeded to eat slower than before.

I eyed him suspiciously, but then I too returned to eating without saying a word. Then, it made me wonder things that I most likely should not have been putting thought into, yet it was too late.


***


"Permission to step on the bridge, Lieutenant," I stopped at the door and stood at attention.

"Permission granted, Private," Lieutenant Ping replied, raising a hoof to salute.

I returned the salute and walked to the coffee machine in the back of the room and poured a nearly full cup of scalding-hot coffee. I didn't care much for how it tasted anymore, if it could keep me awake for a substantial amount of time until the end of my shift, I was all for it. By the time I stepped onto the bridge, the sun was barely up. 

Of course, with the crazy weather the ocean always had, the sun was not visible at all, and I was already very much used to the grey sky. Then again, for some very odd reason, grey skies and rainy days had always been a comfort for me. Most colts and fillies had stuffed animals for comfort, as did I, but rainy weather like I've experienced a lot of lately gave me a sense of a good feeling, a feeling I couldn't explain without the help of a psychiatrist.

"Lieutenant Ping, if I might ask, what are the whereabouts of Captain Shadow and Lieutenant Nobis?" asked Sea Watch, the main navigation officer.

"Captain Shadow is checking on a cooling circuit in the reactor chamber. He will be back in twenty, maybe thirty minutes, give or take. Lieutenant Nobis, however, Celestia knows where he's at," Lieutenant Ping answered.

Reactor? The ship had a reactor? Apparently I said that out loud as well.

"Yes, Private, the ship has a reactor. Nuclear reactor, actually. Much of the newer models run on nuclear power. The Eclipse just happened to be lucky enough to be built with one," Ping replied with a wink directed towards me. "Is there anything else I can get you up to speed on about our ship?"

The others in the room chuckled softly, while I lowered my head in chagrin. Why did I have to speak out loud? I felt stupid. Mainly because I was, and didn't know all that much about the carrier itself. "No, ma'am," was all I could reply with. I picked up my coffee cup and took a nice, long, refreshing sip of it. Out of embarrassment, I decided to keep my mouth shut to ensure I wouldn't become a mess hall discussion later on. 

That was until I heard the all-too familiar beep of my tracking radar showing signs of life. I nearly spat my coffee everywhere in surprise, but to avoid further embarrassment I gulped it down quickly and gave my full attention to the screen, which showed the ship's location in dead center, and a small, unidentified light blip on the top left of the radar and approaching at a significantly high rate of speed, nearly the same speed of the Griffonian vessel from a few weeks before. It was worrying, and I had to speak up. "Lieutenant?"

The tan mare made her way from the front of the room to my station. "Yes, Private?" she pulled a chair from across the room to sit beside me and did so.

"I'm picking up an unidentified watercraft approaching from the north-northeast at approximately thirty-nine knots on a direct course for the Eclipse," I turned to her. "Should we issue a warning?"

Scanning over the screen and seeing the blip herself, Lieutenant Ping nodded shortly afterwards. "I'll try and make radio contact. If they don't reply or keep coming, we'll get the captain up here and have him put the ship on full alert," she replied, standing up and walking to the radio in the front of the room, the navigation officer eyeing her worriedly while she did. She picked up the communicator and pressed the button on the side to speak into it. "Unidentified vessel, this is the L.R.S Eclipse. Divert your course immediately or hostile action will be taken."

We all stood by without moving a muscle, those in the room including myself either staring at the lieutenant or at the radio. There was no reply, and after a full minute of silence, the lieutenant repeated herself into the radio, but with slightly more hostility in her tone. Another minute passed, and still no response. My eyes moved back to the screen, seeing the vessel had slowed its speed yet hadn't changed its heading. I glanced back up at Lieutenant Ping with concern. "It's still coming, Lieutenant."

"Right, let's get the captain up here. He'll know what to do," Lieutenant Ping said, hanging the communicator up before pressing a button on the radio, changing the frequency to the ship intercom. "Captain needed on the bridge, repeat, captain needed on the bridge."

It was no longer than two minutes later when Shadow stepped hoof into the room, and each of us rose and stood at attention. Lieutenant Ping saluted the muddled captain. "Captain, sir, we are detecting an unidentifiable vessel approaching at a speed of thirty-three knots from the northeast and is about twenty-one nautical miles from our location. I've attempted radio contact but have been unsuccessful."

Just then, another beep from my monitor, and I looked up at them. "Make that two headed our way," I added.

"Sweet Luna, they're back for us," Shadow said, trotting up to the lieutenant. "Alright, everypony, we're going into alert status one. If they keep approaching, or if we make visual contact, we will lock down the ship and engage. Private—" he pointed to me. "—keep watching their every movement. Lieutenant, I need you to help Private Star with the radar monitors. The rest of you, prepare to engage our fighters. It may or may not be necessary, but it doesn't hurt to have air support."

"Aye, sir," the others said, Lieutenant Ping trotting quickly over to my side and sitting down, while Shadow walked up to the radio and spoke over the ship intercom. "All hooves on deck, I repeat, all hooves on deck. We are going into alert status one. Keep alert and don't let your guard down, and if we go into alert status two, I'll need everypony to man their battle stations. This is not a drill," he then turned off the intercom and turned to us. "I'll try and get in radio contact with the rest of the fleet. They're quite a ways away but if it comes to it, we'll need their help."

The dire tone in Shadow's voice was mind-boggling. I knew him to be a tough stallion, yet at the moment and under the current circumstances, he didn't sound the same. It might have been fear of being under attack taking over. Then, he turned to me.

"Star, if we do go into alert status two, I need you to get geared up," he said, walking up to my station.

"But... sir, this is my position. I don't have a battle station," I shook my head while speaking. "I don't even have a helmet!"

"I'm afraid you do now. But all Marines on the ship are here for the ship's main defense. I'll have Lieutenant Ping take over for you," he then sighed. "This is the real deal, Star. We'll get to experience it for the first time together," Shadow eyed me.

From my point of view, and especially the way he stared at me, my suspicions were correct. He was nervous. I couldn't say I wasn't either. All I could do was nod, then take a large gulp of my own saliva. "Yes, sir."

Shadow nodded once, then went back up to the front of the room, picking up a pair of binoculars and holding them up to his eyes, scanning over the ocean around us, mainly in the direction the vessels were supposedly coming from. "No visual yet, they're still in the fog somewhere." 

He wasn't kidding. The one day whoever decided to attack us picked the worst day—or the best for them. All of us were tense, and I could only imagine what the others on board were thinking when Shadow made his announcement in all corridors of the carrier. My heart had begun to beat faster and my muscles were noticeably tense. Whoever was coming, was coming fast, and still neither of the blips on radar had changed course. While I watched the screen, Shadow took hold of the radio and threw another warning at both of the vessels.

"Unidentified vessels, this is the L.R.S Eclipse, divert your course immediately! I will not repeat myself, we WILL engage if approached any further!" he almost practically shouted into the radio.

Then, what seemed like a miracle, the closer blip began turning sharply to the right, putting it in a course that would have it pass in front of the ship by a good distance, but yet the second, further beacon did not turn away. "Captain, the closer vessel is turning away," I said, keeping my eyes locked on the screen.

"What about the second one?" Shadow asked, turning to look back at me and the lieutenant while he held binoculars in his hoof.

"Still coming and picking up speed, now moving at about thirty-seven knots and is eleven nautical miles out," Lieutenant Ping answered.

The greenish-grey stallion let out a light sigh of relief. "Dealing with one is better, but I still have my concerns," he turned and looked back into the binoculars, outside at the foggy ocean.

"Sir, if I may take this time to speak," I then paused and glanced around the room briefly. Lieutenant Ping nodded for me to go on. "From what I've seen, you have one hell of a crew. If what you are concerned about happening does, I believe we as a team can handle it."

Lieutenant Ping smiled while Shadow kept his focus through the binoculars. "I concur with the Private. The Eclipse has the utmost well-trained crew of the Lunar fleet. They are trained for these kinds of situations."

"My sailors are, the Marines are not," Shadow lowered his binoculars and looked back at the both of us. "Marines are trained for ground attacks, not for a skirmish on board an aircraft carrier."

"With all due respect, sir," I started. "It's still fighting. It doesn't matter whether we're on land or on a massive hunk of steel floating in the middle of the ocean. It's defending ourselves. We are the ones being threatened here. And if worse comes to worst, I wouldn't mind having to put a few bullets in some griffon ass, excuse my language."

Shadow simply stared at me, then after a few moments of silence, he nodded. "The heart of a Marine sits well inside you, Star," he smiled softly. I smiled back before returning my attention to the monitors in front of me, Shadow doing the same but with his binoculars.


***


After minutes of an eerie silence in the room, Shadow spoke up, now sitting down and looking out the window of the bridge. "Private, what is their current position now?"

Checking the radar, I replied, "Eleven nautical miles and still approaching at thirty-eight knots," I glanced up to Shadow with worry.

"That's it, we're going into alert status two," Shadow said out loud, picking up the radio and switching to the intercom. All of us in the room minus him exchanged looks before watching the captain. 

"Attention all on board, we are moving to alert status two. Grab your weapons and man your battle stations. There is an unidentifiable vessel approaching from the north at approximately thirty-eight knots and is eleven nautical miles from our current location. Warnings have been issued and the vessel has refused to comply. Again, we are moving to alert status two," he hung up the radio.

At that, I knew what to do. My help was needed down below preparing for an attack. I stood up seemingly out of nowhere and said to Shadow, "I'll head down, captain," before saluting to him. Shadow saluted back.

"Yes, please. And be careful. Lieutenant, I'll need for you to take the private's spot," Shadow said. Lieutenant Ping nodded and sat in my spot, while I turned and left the room. "And Private," Shadow added, stopping me. I glanced back at him. "Shut that door. I don't want anypony we don't know coming up here."

I nodded. "Yes, sir," before walking out and shutting the door behind me, as I walked down the staircase, I heard the click of the door locking above the faint wailing of the alarm down below. Upon reaching the level of the armory, I trotted quickly down the hallway while sailors and Marines scrambled to their battle stations, most with rifles in-hoof or strapped around their necks and helmets on their heads. 

The ship's armory was situated towards the rear, closer to the the engine room and reactor and was by far one of the larger rooms on the Eclipse. I entered the armory, finding sailors and Marines lined up while those who worked in the room handed out rifles and ammunition left and right, and all were given bulletproof vests and helmets for extra protection. I got into line as more ponies piled up behind me, some in a rush to get their gear and get to their battle stations like Shadow ordered.

I picked up an all-black helmet, removing the cap I had on and strapped it onto my head before being given a waist pack to hold extra bullets, and for weapons, a desert eagle with an extended clip, as well as an AR-15 rifle with an advanced scope attachment, which I took a moment to quickly click on and test the sight, then left the armory and started back down the hallway where I came from. Still, I wasn't sure where I was needed most. The captain hadn't made it clear where my exact battle station was, and I could only assume it was on one of the upper decks.

As I trotted, a sailor ran up from down the way I was headed and stopped me. "Hey, listen up, there's others that are still sleeping. If their doors are closed, can you help me out and knock on them as you go? We need them all awake, and I need to get geared up."

I nodded. "Yes, sir," and kept moving down the corridor while the sailor galloped back to the armory. As I moved along, I began pounding on closed bunk room doors. "Everypony wake up, we're on alert status two! Everybody up!"

While I went along, doors I knocked on behind me opened, and confused, tired sailors and Marines stepped out wearing just their t-shirts and nothing else. I kept going, knocking on doors as I went by. Then, something hit me mentally. This felt all too familiar. I stopped and stared down the near-empty hallway as two sailors galloped my way.

Then, out of nowhere, I was thrown backwards by the force of a massive explosion, the heat of the fire sweeping down the hallway and a wave of smoke filling the air, my rifle lay on the floor a few feet from where I was. I opened my eyes gradually, vision blurred. As it slowly cleared up, the ringing of the ship's fire alarm echoed in my ears, hearing mostly shot from the blast. 

I instantaneously sat up on my elbows, staring forth as the smoke cleared away. Where two sailors had been running before, was now a massive, gaping hole in the floor leading down to the level below and up to the level above, and the rooms on the side now completely gone with debris floating in the ocean beside the ship, and water was beginning to pour in to the level below.

Sparks popped from cut wiring and spots on the walls severed from the explosion had flaming spots on them. Much to my surprise, the sailors running towards me were no longer there, and one of their caps laid on the floor beside me, the bill of it set on fire and slowly curling up as it burned. I stared at it with widened eyes as a sudden surge of grief swept over me. Not only had the blast most certainly wiped the sailors out, but those still in their rooms where the blast had taken place were gone as well.

I coughed a couple of times from smoke inhalation and then turned my attention to my rifle sitting further from the hole than I was. I reached for it and grabbed it by the end, dragging it closer and hanging it by the strap around my neck while I stood to all four hooves. I hacked more, taking steps away from the gaping hole, right as the ship's intercom came on, followed by Lieutenant Ping's voice.

"They're attacking on the starboard side, the other bogey is attacking! We've been boarded!" 

It was all coming down to this. The Eclipse was being bombarded by unknown enemies from seemingly everywhere, and now they were slipping on board on the same side I was on. I heard shouting from down below, and over the roaring of the ocean down below and yelling from down the hallway, it was hard to tell who was who.

In addition to the shouting, a new noise had caught my attention from directly above. The loud straining of steel as it bent and twisted made me wince, and as I looked up, I had only seconds to move out of the way of debris falling from the deck above. I gasped and jumped back as the large slab of steel and concrete slammed down where I was previously standing. My heart raced, realizing had I not moved I likely would have been crushed to death, but then a new sense of fear hit me. 

I sat up on my elbows, rifle sitting to my side, and found it impossible to move my leg. I looked down to my hinds as the dust cleared, seeing it was stuck beneath the debris that had fallen. "Oh shit..." I muttered, trying to yank my hoof free, but to no avail. Despite nothing happening, I kept attempting. 

Then, a shadow began to loom over me entirely, and it wasn't smoke. My pupils shrunk to pinpricks as I slowly looked up from my hoof, eyes now locking on to a much taller figure with the barrel of a shotgun pointed directly at my chest. I felt my heart sink, finally realizing just why what was happening at that moment seemed to be like deja vu. But this time, it wasn't a just a dream; it was a nightmare coming true, and the next moment, I could only prepare myself for what came next, seeing the figure's sharp-ended finger begin to pull back on the shotgun's trigger.

I shut my eyes tightly, waiting for the small pop that would most certainly put an end to my life. I jumped, hearing the first pop, then the second, and then the third. But instead of feeling the sharp pain of the weapon's ammunition be unloaded into my chest, there was nothing. I was still alive.

I opened my eyes, seeing the figure, a tall, almost fully-armored griffon covering his bloodied chest with a talon, prior to stumbling backwards and tilting back, falling off the edge of the floor and into the hole, a splash heard a second later. Then, the fast-approaching sound of hooves could be heard. I looked up, seeing two earth ponies, one grey and one military-green, taking the heavy slab of debris pinning my leg down and sliding it off and down into the water below. The grey pony reached a hoof out to me, and I took it hastily. 

"Are you okay? Did he hurt you?" Lieutenant Arc asked, panting softly, his gaze locked onto me.

I couldn't have been more relieved to see the lieutenant, my heart slowly stopped racing and I nodded. "Yes... yes. Thank you. Thank you both."

The other stallion, Ashfall, smiled and handed my rifle to me. "Don't thank me, the lieutenant here had a feeling you'd wind yourself up in trouble when he saw you running from the armory," he winked.

I took my rifle and hung it around my neck. "Still, thank you both," I smiled to them, then looked down to the cap on the floor, the small flame burning the cap having put itself out, leaving much of it burned to a crisp. "Some others weren't as lucky. They were running... and... the whole side exploded," I felt heartache while I spoke, head and ears lowering.

"Hey, Star," Arc lifted a hoof and brought my chin up. "Even if you saw it coming, you wouldn't have been able to save them either way. I'm sorry."

I lifted my hoof and wiped a tear from my eye, then sighed. "You're right, Lieutenant... you're right."

"They're on the flight deck! All hooves are needed on the flight deck, we can't let them take control of the ship!" Shouted a slightly-panicked Shadow over the ship's intercom.

"Shit, we'd better get up there," Ashfall said to us both, then began galloping back the other way.

"Hey, wait up!" I said, running after him, the lieutenant by my side. Upon reaching the staircase, it was almost crammed with sailors and Marines running up to aid those on the flight deck.

Just getting up the staircase was chaotic enough. Ponies were shouting orders, and the further we went up, the clearer we could hear pops of gunfire erupting on the flight deck as those rushing to help scrambled out of the staircase and outside. It was at least a minute before me, Ash, and Arc reached the deck, and when we did, Arc led the two of us to some crates where we took cover. Bullets flew in all directions, but most were coming from the attackers. 

I quickly loaded a magazine into the handle of my AR-15 and snapped my head to look at Arc, shouting over the sound of gunfire. "Lieutenant. Orders?"

"Stay well covered, take aim, kill as many as you can. With how many there are, there is no possible way we'll be able to capture them. On my count! Three... two... one!" Arc counted down, then stood up and crouched over the crate, me and Ash following suit and beginning to open fire on the griffon assailants as they advanced closer. But, not only were there griffons opening fire on us, there were ponies mixed in as well, and most wore either armor similar to that of a royal guard's, or Equestrian Army fatigues. It nearly made me think twice about shooting at them.

"Damn it, there's too many!" Ash shouted, ducking back into cover to reload, before sitting back up and shooting an armored griffon dead with just three bullets. "We need backup!"

"Somepony say backup?" shouted a white pegasus as he swooped in beside Lieutenant Arc from the side.

"Anchorage, thank Luna! Where the hell were you?" I asked as I too reloaded.

"Got woken up when I heard an explosion, I grabbed my gear and came as soon as I could!" He answered while Arc and Ashfall shot at more griffons and ponies approaching from the starboard side of the ship and the stern. Quickly, Anchorage stood up and took a careful aim, one of his bullets flying right through a stallion's forehead and out the other side, the pony dropping dead in a pool of blood on the spot. "Woo, buddy!"

"Atta boy, get 'em!" Ash laughed as two more griffons fell to their gunfire. I took a quick breath and leaned over the crate I sat against with my head mostly down. The advice Lieutenant Snow Storm had given me was about to pay off—I hoped.

As some more sailors and Marines gathered on the flight deck, we were almost no longer outmatched by the assailants, yet they still were not intimidated. But then, the tables had turned. While I went back into cover to reload, I briefly glanced to my left, watching a bullet fly right into a sailor's shoulder, and just before he could fall back, another went right into his head with enough force to send his cap flying off. I winced at the sight. By now, my adrenaline was really going. 

"Damn it, Star, get back in the fight!" Lieutenant Arc hit me on the shoulder as he reloaded and sat back up, a bullet suddenly bouncing off of his helmet. Angered, he turned in the direction from where the bullet originated and shot the griffon right in the beak, the griffon dropping to the ground instantly after.

"Fucking pricks, go back to Griffonia where you bastards belong!" Anchorage shouted with rage, unloading yet another one of his clips on more approaching griffons. When he ran out, he reached down to his waist and unhooked a grenade, bringing the pin up to his teeth and yanking it out, tossing it forward. "Frag out!" 

The grenade fell beside a missile rack on the other side of the deck, only adding to the explosive range as it completely blew a couple of griffons climbing up the side off and down into the water, and fragments of debris striking another but not killing him. When the smoke plume cleared, those left still approaching were shot dead by Arc and Ashfall, as well as the others fighting back, and things quieted down. By the moment it did, Arc stood up straight and scanned over the deck. "I believe we're clear."

At his word, a collective sigh of relief could be heard from me, Ash and Anchorage as we too stood up. As I turned around, a bullet whipped past my shoulder and struck the wall of the control tower behind me. I snapped my attention to where it came from, seeing an injured stallion in silver armor with a revolver in his hoof laying on the middle of the deck. I removed my desert eagle from its holster and shot four bullets into the stallion, his hoof dropping and a new puddle of blood forming around his head and chest area.

"Fucker..." I said aloud, slipping the gun back into the holster on my left hoof and panting softly as I looked around at all of the gore left to clean up, my every breath steaming up in the cold air. "Think that's all of them?"

"Looks like it," Ash replied, also peering around. At the sound of Anchorage letting out a groan of pain, he snapped his head to the side and saw the white pegasus lying on the ground with a wound in his lower shoulder. He gasped and ran to him, kneeling beside him. "Shit man, did one get you?"

"Y-yeah..." Anchorage winced, the wound on his shoulder lightly bleeding and staining his blue uniform. "Damn those pirates to hell..."

"Hey, look at me, Anchorage!" Ash motioned his hoof to his eyes. "Keep your eyes on me, and don't black out!"

"He's not going to die, you idiot," Lieutenant Arc said as he walked up, examining the pegasus' wound. "He'll be just fine as long as the bleeding is stopped and the bullet is removed."

"Aaand you ruined it, good job, Lieutenant," I added, standing beside Arc and looking down at Anchorage, then looked up. "We need a medic over here, pronto!"

Within minutes, Anchorage was taken downstairs by two sailors. We followed, but stopped to aid with those on board stunned by the attack. The entire carrier was still chaotic, not just from what had just occurred above deck either. The number of how many were injured was still unclear and neither of us knew how long it would be before we could find out. The medical ward had been overwhelmed, both in stallionpower and resources. 

As the three of us made our way through the corridors, we passed distraught sailors and Marines, a couple of them were sitting and sobbing into their hooves or another sailor's shoulder. I was heartfelt and didn't know what my job would be to help out. I was only there for defense, I had absolutely no clue about medical procedures and therefore I was useless to the ship's medics. Instead, I figured my help was needed on the bridge.


***


I gave a gentle knock on the door of the bridge and waited for it to be unlocked. Instead, the click of it unlocking wasn't heard.

"Who is it?" Came the slightly muffled voice of Lieutenant Ping.

"Private Star Shooter, ma'am. Radarpony," I answered.

Instantly after, the door unlocked and opened. Lieutenant Ping stood there and sighed with relief. "Well, at least you're okay. With all of the chaos we saw going on, we weren't sure where you were."

I nodded. "I'm fine. A bit shaken, I'll admit, but I'm fine. What's it looking like?" I asked, entering the room.

Shadow hung up the radio communicator and turned to face me. "We've had to seal off the bottom deck. The explosion flooded much of it completely, and the engine took a small hit. Thankfully though we're still operational technically-wise. Also, we've turned around and begun our way back to port. It'll be at least six or seven days to get back, but I think we're in the clear now, and if we aren't, there is a destroyer and a sub in the area to defend us until we're back in our own waters." 

"And we're certain that there aren't more coming in waves? Or perhaps those that did get on board were all killed?" I wanted to be sure.

"Radar is clear," Lieutenant Ping said. "It was down for a minute after the explosion then rebooted instantaneously, along with everything else in the room."

"That doesn't mean it couldn't have screwed up the system too," I added.

"We have a technician looking into it. So far we haven't heard anything back," Shadow said reassuringly. "There isn't much word on the casualty count, however. Right now it is looking to be in the thirties range."

I looked down slightly and sighed. "And the death count?"

Both Shadow and Kosec went silent, forcing me to repeat myself. "The death count. Do we know anything about that?"

"Two were killed on the flight deck, apart from that, we're unsure. The crew is still being accounted for. But... I'm afraid this all is only just the start. It will be tough to explain to their families when we get home," Shadow said, the look he gave me showed the overwhelming amount of distress he had on his shoulders. For a moment, I believed he was on the threshold of breaking down in front of us all. "Carry on, Marine..." he then turned and trotted back up to the front of the room, me and the lieutenant watching him.

"Yes, sir..." I replied quietly, exhaling deeply and taking a seat at my station, Lieutenant Ping walking over and resting a hoof on my shoulder.

"Private, I know this must be your first time in combat," she started, I sat perfectly still, eyes set on the empty monitors. "I am sorry you had to go through this so soon into your military career. But, of course, it is not easy for anypony to go into combat for the first time. It is hard to think of afterwards as well. And, well..." she paused for a long moment, I turned my head slightly and looked back at her as she let out a soft sigh. "If you decide you need it, I can assign you to a counselor."

I went over the thought in my mind for a few seconds, then nodded twice. "I will think about it. Thank you, Lieutenant."

She nodded back, then smiled. "You handled well," is all that she said, and seconds later she was back up at the front with Shadow.

The thought of seeing a counselor so early in my career was tough to go over. I wasn't willing to accept that I needed one just yet, but after today, it would be hard to get sleep tonight, and every night that would follow until we were back home. Instead of thinking about it more, I gently pushed it to the back of my mind and served myself a fresh cup of coffee, and went back to work.
> 26. Withdrawal
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"I'm fine, damn it, let me up!" Anchorage protested while one of the ship's medics attempted to calm him down.

"Sir, please, just stay still for me. You need this last dose to allow for tissue to grow back!" The unicorn medic replied, a syringe with a terrifyingly long needle levitating between him and the white pegasus in a magical aura, his hoof raised and motioning to get Anchorage to at least not move. "You know how much I hate having to do this, but you leave me no choice."

Anchorage was then struck in the forehead by a very quick burst of energy that knocked him back into the bed, eyes spinning. Both me and Ashfall, seated on chairs at the end of his bed watching with widened eyes as the doctor injected the serum into his upper arm, Anchorage chuckling and slurring words as if he had been drinking all night long. 

I cringed and turned my head away while the needle pushed into his skin, while Ashfall simply watched with wide-eyes. Moments later, what ever spell had been used to sedate him had worn off and he quickly put a hoof to his forehead. "What the hell just happened? I blacked out for a second."

The medic grumbled, dropping the now-empty syringe into a medical waste bin. "This has happened twice a day for the last three days since you were shot, Anchorage. What do you think happened?" He turned and glared at him.

"Oh, so it was you knocking me out! Prick," Anchorage sat back, crossing his hooves and pouting. "When am I allowed to get out of this hoof sanitizer-scented place and get back to my job?"

"And as I've told you," the medic turned, stomping his hoof as he did so, teeth clenched. "For the last six hundred and forty-seven times, you won't leave this infirmary until we're back in Manehattan! And if you ask me one more time, I will go to the captain myself and beg for permission to strap you to this bed and tape your mouth shut if it saves me a headache!"

Anchorage simply huffed and turned away, gazing out the window that faced out towards the open ocean as drops of rain pattered onto it while the medic left the small room. For the first minute of total silence, he didn't remove his focus from the rain-soaked glass.

"Come on, buddy," Ash started, moving his chair beside Anchorage's bed. "You took a shotgun shell to the shoulder. You're lucky the bullet itself didn't do what it was supposed to."

Still looking outside, Anchorage pouted more. "But, I'm fine. The bleeding was stopped days ago. Why, for the love of Luna's royal behind, do I need to stay here?"

"To make sure you won't do anything stupid and end up hurting yourself again. Clearly this medic knows who you are just as much as I do, and I agree with his decision to keep you here. Do you understand me?"

"And I can tell you for a fact that I'm not clumsy or stupid enough to pull such a thing off, do you understand me?"

"Okay, Anchorage," I stepped in. "I've only known you a couple of months, and even I know you're somepony who takes risks," I then turned towards Ashfall. "But I see where you get it from."

Ashfall nodded, then his eyes widened and he glared at me. "Hey! What is that supposed to imply?!"

"Don't worry about it," I waved a hoof and sat back in the chair. "Anchor, just be happy you're alive. Four others didn't make it, and three of them I saw die right before my eyes. But I know the real reason why you're angry."

"Oh yeah? And what might that reason be?" He turned and stared at me, hooves still crossed.

"You're heated about the pirates getting on board. Just like me. Just like everypony else on this blasted ship. They blew a hole on the starboard side and killed four of our own. What isn't there to be angry about?"

"No, Star, I'm..." Anchorage stopped, glare fading, he turned back towards the window, now laying on his side. "Fine, you're right."

I nodded. "Usually I'm not," I sighed softly and looked down at the floor. "I should probably get back to the bridge. The captain's already likely plotting to slay me for staying a few extra minutes."

"Yeah, you might want to before he kicks you off the flight deck," Ashfall said.

I stood to my hooves and stretched, groaning as my muscles loosened from the chair I was seated in. "Alright. I'll try and stop by when my shift is over, if you're not asleep by then," I said to the both of them.

"Y'really don't have to, Star," Anchorage said. "You have an important job. The last thing we need is more pirates hitting us from behind because you weren't up there watching the radar."

"Hey, Lieutenant Ping is on board, remember? She has more experience with radars than me. In fact she's the one who covers for me when I'm not up there."

"If anypony, she'd be the one to slay you," Ash chuckled, Anchorage punching him in the shoulder playfully.

"Her? Nah. She's actually a very laid back mare, even in class she didn't have a problem with anypony," I smiled and opened the door. "See you both later."


***


I made my way up the metal staircase to the bridge, where as usual, I would stop and stand at attention. "Permission to step onto the bridge, captain?"

"Permission granted," Shadow said, him walking up towards me with a smile on his muzzle. Something was up, seeing as how since the attack he hadn't smiled once.

I raised an eyebrow and took a step closer. "Captain, you're smiling? Is something off?"

"Well, why can't I smile every time you step on the bridge?" he chuckled.

That sounded creepy. But that was just Shadow trying to keep himself happy. "Okay..." I slowly nodded. "But is that the reason?"

"Part of it, actually," he kept smiling. "But the other reason is, it turns out one of our sailors managed to get a hold of one of the pirates. He's somehow still alive and we have yet to get anything out of him. I was wondering if you could be of any help talking to him?"

I blinked a couple of times. "Me? Help with interrogation? With all due respect sir, I don't speak Gerffin. You're the only pony I know who does."

"That's why I'm going to accompany you as a translator. You ask the question, I'll translate it to him in his language. It won't take more than twenty minutes."

Thinking it over, I nodded, yet I knew it would be hard to stop myself from killing the prisoner on the spot. "Alright sir, but what about my position?"

"Lieutenant Ping will take over. She happens to enjoy your position," Shadow chuckled and made his way out of the bridge and downstairs with me following close behind.

"Well, I am sorry for what ever I did that makes you want to discharge me," I joked while we walked down the metal staircase.

"Hey, I'd never replace you. You're already one of the best radarponys I've ever had. It would take a lot for you to lose your job, and at worst, I'd have you doing janitor work until the end of our deployment," Shadow smiled reassuringly.

"That makes me feel somewhat better," I laughed a bit while we reached the bottom deck of the ship. "I guess while we're talking like normal ponies however, now would be a good time to bring this up to you."

"Yes, Private?" Shadow turned to me.

"I know Lieutenant Ping isn't a permanent addition to our crew. Say we're attacked again in the future, who will be sitting where I usually am?" I asked while we walked down the long corridor.

"We typically keep as many as four radarponies on board. One takes over for you while you're sleeping and the other two are usually in the primary tracking station. All of them are tracking sailors, meaning they don't have much experience with weaponry or combat. In fact, you, Private, are one of the first Marines I've had operating radar and sonar. Consider yourself lucky."

One of the first? That made me feel somewhat lucky, not that it made much of a difference however. I was just happy to be a part of the crew and nothing more. It was an honorable experience to work alongside a friend of mine, that friend undoubtedly being the commanding officer of the ship, and including new ponies I'd befriended after boot camp, yet I didn't want to feel like I was the minority Shadow would likely go easy on because of our ties. In my mind, that just didn't settle quite right.

We stopped near the bow of the ship and entered a windowless, steel room where Lieutenant Arc was seated in a chair at a table opposite of a griffon with his talons cuffed behind his back and around the chair to prevent him from lunging at anypony. 

The griffon's armor and weapons were mostly stripped of him and sat in a neat pile in the far right corner of the room, and because of the lack of armor, two patched-up and blood-stained areas were clearly visible just beside his stomach and barely beneath his chest. He trembled like a leaf, not because of fear but due to the weakness his injuries left him with. 

Even then, his beak was also slightly bloody, and the red fluid on it appeared to be new. Looking at Arc, I noticed more blood on his hoof, likely due to the griffon's inability to cooperate leading to the lieutenant giving him a quick beat-down in an attempt to get information out of him, none of which worked from the looks of it.

"Ah, perfect, you're both here. I can't understand a word he's got to say," Arc said, standing up.

"That's alright, leave it to me and Star. You did your best," Shadow replied, patting the grey stallion's shoulder while he went to stand in the corner and watch from there. The greenish-grey earth pony then turned to me and motioned for me to take a seat while he grabbed another chair for himself. I took a seat across from the griffon, as did the captain. The griffon eyed us both suspiciously and didn't say a single word.

"Now, let's get started, shall we?" Shadow began, glancing between me and the captured griffon.


***


The interrogation took much longer than all three of us had originally planned. What Shadow expected to take around twenty minutes lasted just over an hour, with still nothing from the prisoner. It surprised me as much as it did Lieutenant Arc when at that time, Shadow decided to call it quits and give up completely on retrieving any key information from him, and instead it was decided that the prisoner would be locked away in the dungeons of Canterlot and interrogated by the royal guard there. 

Yet, following another long shift on the bridge, I found myself to be too exhausted to even sit down at the mess hall and eat, and on a second thought in my mind, I set hoof back into the corridor and started towards my shared sleeping quarters. I yawned heavily with my eyelids bent on shutting completely while I walked, my mind begging for them to remain open just long enough for me to reach my bed.

I stepped up to the white steel hatch-like door and gently yanked on the handle, dragging it open and finding the room to be pitch black. I stumbled inside, closing the door behind me and allowing for the light through the small rounded window on the top of the door to guide me through the dark. That was, until my eyes shut for a split second and causing me to lose track of where I was, thus making me trip over my own hooves and hit my chin on the small desk that sat between the two bunks in the room.

I let out a yelp of pain after my jaw met the edge of the desk and reached a hoof up to rub it gently. At that moment, the light in the room was switched on, and a considerably shocked Nightpath peeking over the side of the top bunk with the sheets tangled on his ears as if he were wearing some sort of hood to cover himself. "Star? What the hell? You scared the lights out of me."

Tiredly, I replied, "Yeah, I noticed. You had the room light off and I hit my jaw. What are you doing?" Then another thought hit me. "And where have you been? I haven't seen you... no. No one has seen you since the morning before the incident!"

I noticed his pupils shrink to pinpricks and dart from side to side. "I've been... er... around. On the upper decks working primarily."

"Nightpath, do I look stupid? The way your eyes shrunk and looked around like that, that was a very poor lie on your part. Now, I'll ask you again. Where the hell were you?" My mostly-baggy eyes narrowed onto the brown stallion while he slowly hid himself beneath his bed sheets once more. "I already know you're there, there is no point in hiding."

"I was... er..." He soon became more quiet as he spoke, and what he said was almost completely inaudible.

"I'm sorry, come again?" I glared up towards his bed, his head peeking back out and eyes locking onto me while I sat on the floor.

"I was sleeping! You know I'm a heavy sleeper!" He shouted, staring back down still.

"That's a load of bull! You were gone that morning when I woke up. Where were you actually?" I jumped to my hooves, glare hardening.

"Damn it, Star! I was in the reactor chamber!" Night snapped, tossing the sheets off of him and standing up to his hooves quickly, inadvertently hitting his head on the ceiling with a loud dong that echoed throughout the room. Stunned, he stumbled off of his bed and onto the floor before me with a grunt and a thud. "Ow..." he groaned in pain.

"I... w-wh..." I stuttered at first, eyes narrowed onto him. "What for the love of Luna were you doing down there?"

"Haven't I told you? I-I work down there now..." he rubbed his forehead as he slowly sat up. "The explosion was enough to make the reactor shut down for a few minutes. We evacuated the room believing there was some sort of leak. I volunteered to go back in and check it out. No hazmat suit, no mask, nothing. If there was a leak, I would have been killed within minutes. But the reason I did it is because I knew if there was actually a leak, I could stop it and prevent the radiation from spreading throughout the ship. It would have killed everypony."

Night's eyes slowly moved up to mine while I stared directly at him, his hoof still rubbing the small bruise on his forehead. "I knew that..." he stopped and sniffed as his voice proceeded to crack. "I kn-knew that it would kill you and the others. And nopony would ever know what happened to us. I thought of you and the hundred-other sailors and Marines on board, all of you who had families waiting. And the reality was... w-well... I volunteered because I knew I didn't have anypony waiting for me back home."

My ears drooped slowly as my previously furious expression softened significantly. "Surely you've got to have somepony worried about you..."

Night slowly shook his head, staring down at the floor. "Not a soul. If anypony it would be a colt I knew at the Baltimare orphanage. But he's been with a family for years."

"Orphanage...?" My eyes widened. "What... about your family?"

"Father abandoned me when I was three. According to the head of the orphanage, h-he said he made a mistake," he sniffled again, a tear streaking down his cheek. "And that he couldn't afford to take care of me. He said I was a mistake and meant it..."

I was at a loss for words. All along, Nightpath didn't care much. Now I knew why. Slowly I lifted a hoof up to lift his chin so he could look at me, and I smiled as best as I could. "Hey..." I spoke softly. "You're not alone. My father thinks I'm a mistake too."

"But did he happily pass you off to an orphanage to live the entirety of your colthood...?"

"Well... no. I moved away as soon as I could, didn't leave a note or anything. Just took what I could and ran away to Canterlot where I've lived ever since. It was a rough start but I got along eventually. But now I'm here," my smile was slowly fading but I managed to keep my lips pursed to look like one. "Hey... I'm sorry about everything. I really truly am, and honestly... I'm happy for you now."

"W-why is that?" Night wiped a tear from his eye.

"You talked to me about something that has been hurting you for years. It's good to speak your mind from time to time, even to friends," I answered while I slowly stood.

"B-but... I've always shoved you away. I've beaten you down. We're not friends..." He watched as I stood up.

I smiled warmly down at him. "We are now..."

Night softly and very inaudibly whimpered. I held the smile for a couple of moments before removing my cover and hanging it up on a small hook attached to the poles of the bed specifically for that use. "On a side note, we both should really get some rest. Long day tomorrow, and tomorrow evening we should be back in port."

Night nodded slowly and stood up. "Right... You're right," he said before climbing up to the bed above mine slowly and crawling back under the covers, sighing softly. "Goodnight, Star."

After removing my jacket and also hanging it up, I yawned and switched off the room's ceiling light, nestling into the warm sheets of my bed. "Goodnight."


***


Around nine the pursuing morning, Shadow stepped onto the bridge alongside Lieutenant Arc. Those of us in the room stood up at attention while he entered.

"Good morning, everypony," Shadow said, walking up to the front of the room where he normally seated himself while the lieutenant poured himself a steaming cup of coffee. "Won't be much longer until we're back to civilization. I recognize each of you are anxious to recoup with your families," he continued while he settled into his chair.

Lieutenant Arc strutted by, resting himself on a chair beside the captain's, taking a long sip of his coffee prior to relaxing into his seat. Like usual, not a word was said by the impassive stallion while he locked his gaze out on the open ocean ahead of us. For once, there were hardly any clouds in the sky, and much of the dense weather was left far behind us, and it seemed as if we would finally have a routine trip back. 

Even more so, within a few minutes of them entering, the nearby L.R.S Lacus was within view in the distance to escort us into our own waters as Shadow requested. If we were to be attacked again, we had another line of defense to help out, but at close proximity they would not be much of a help, as any weapons fired from the Lacus would further damage our already-crippled ship.

The hours passed faster than usual, my attention not once removed from the screens of either the weather radar, and the sonar. Since just less than a week before, I made it my personal mission to report any disturbances as early as I possibly could, and not once did I think of myself beginning to go insane from that and the lack of sleep I had been getting.

Very soon, the sky behind us was beginning to darken while the sun set ahead of us, an array of breathtaking colors mixing throughout the sky and spotty clouds around it, also outlining the distant skyline of Manehattan as we approached it. From here, Shadow made contact with the Lacus and dismissed them from our escort to return to their position further to the north that they were forced to abandon to come to our aid.

The closer we came to the city, the more beautiful it became. The buildings were almost completely lit up, and the tallest of them, Trotterdam Tower, had been lit up in the colors of the Lunar Navy, which only pointed to the story of the Eclipse being attacked becoming nationwide. That also meant annoying media reporters harassing everypony to try and get a scoop of information to publish for the rest of the world to hear. It was frankly the last thing I wanted to deal with when we got back.
> 27. A Little Favor
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Within ten minutes of the city coming into view, Shadow was in constant contact with the Manehattan Port Authority as they redirected other nearby vessels to make way for our arrival, all the while the flight controllers ordering a few of the pilots we had on board to hop in their jets and depart to that same air base near the city they usually went to when we wrapped up deployments. One by one, the jets were catapulted off of the flight deck and at the speed they traveled, were out of sight within half of a minute. 

Just then, Shadow hung the bridge's phone up and turned to all of us, clearing his throat. "Listen up, I've been told ponies from local news stations are waiting on base. They won't leave until they each get their own share of the story. I'm not fond of lying, but I recommend to all of you that if somepony asks to interview you, tell them the opposite of what happened or just walk away. If the real story gets out, panic will spread like the plague, and everypony will think we're going to war again."

Our orders were as clear as they could get; just avoid any paparazzi that will come out of this. As easy as it sounded, I figured it would be difficult. After speaking, Shadow seated himself back down and returned his attention to the approaching metropolis. Minutes after the sun had completely set, the ship slowly passed beneath the Manehattan bridge, where we saw tens of hundreds of ponies were standing, watching our damaged vessel make it's way into the harbor, assuming they all had word of the incident in some sort of way.

"Private," Shadow said, grabbing my attention. I looked up and saw him staring at me. "Just saying, you're welcome to leave the bridge. We're home now."

I stared for a full few seconds, and shook my head slowly. "No sir. I'll stay until we dock," and so I did. 

A few more minutes had passed, and by that time, the Eclipse was fully docked and in the process of shutting down. Upon being tied to the pier, I shut off the radar and SONAR screens with the click of a button, and each of us in the room left one by one, Shadow and Arc being the last two to leave. Me and the rest of the crew split up on the level in which our sleeping quarters were located and went in either direction to our rooms.

The door to my shared quarters was already wide open, and as I walked in, I came across Ashfall and Nightpath finishing up packing, Ash whom was packing two bags.

"Hey," I smiled softly to them both as I walked inside. "Where's Anchorage?"

"Getting checked out from the medical ward. I'm packing his things for him. He won't be able to carry his bag so I'm taking it with me, I'll give it to him when we get back to our barrack," Ashfall said while he zipped the bags shut and checking to see if he forgot anything else.

"How's he doing today?" I asked, walking up to my bunk and pulling my bag out from underneath, it being already packed from that morning.

"Still the same northern grump..." Ash chuckled softly. "He's ecstatic to finally be out of that confined space. I would be too to be real honest with ya."

I chuckled as well. "I betcha five bits he'll jump into a snow mound the moment he steps hoof off the ship."

"Hey, no one has to bet. We all know that's what will happen," Ash turned towards me and grinned, then looked up at Nightpath. "Finished yet?"

"Nearly," Night replied, his tail swishing slightly as it hung off the edge of his bed and in my face while I sat on mine. Recoiling back, I glared up at him, specifically his annoying tail. Soon after, a grin crossed my muzzle and I motioned for Ash to watch, which he did. Then, I opened my maw and bit down on Night's tail, causing him to yelp with surprise. "Ow! Who's doing that?!" He reached back and began swatting down but not hitting me.

Ash immediately began wheezing with laughter, slapping his leg and cackling as I spat out Night's tail and began chuckling myself. A moment later, Night's annoyed face popped down and stared directly at me, but the way he looked upside down only made the situation more amusing. I expected him at any moment to swing a hoof around and knock me into the wall just inches behind where I was sitting, but much to my surprise he just pulled himself back up and resumed what he was doing, mocking our laughs while doing so.

Less than a few minutes later, we vacated our room with our belongings and made our way through the slowly-overcrowding hallways as sailors and Marines stepped off of the damaged carrier and reunited with friends and family members. Once we were finally back on solid ground, the three of us were surprised to find Anchorage was already off and being mauled lovingly by his mother who from a distance appeared to be squeezing the air from his lungs, and quickly after, it wasn't just his mane that was blue anymore.

Me and Ash chuckled, watching Anchorage's father pry the mare off of the poor pegasus, Ash walking over to the three, Anchorage's mother then latching onto the green earth pony but not-as-easily crushing the breath out of him. It wasn't until a moment later where I realized the atmosphere wasn't nearly as bittersweet as I believed it would be. Those who were sobbing at our return weren't letting out tears of joy for a melancholy reason. Sailors were lost on our voyage, and despite my constant efforts to forget what happened, I still found it difficult to cope with the memory of watching two of the four lost that day disappear right before my eyes, their lives taken, the sons of a waiting family torn from them. 

I now truly knew what my own father experienced during his time. I always believed it to be awful, but no one could truly picture in their mind from the point of view of the soldiers around at the time of their death just how awful it actually was, yet now I veritably could. Seeing my fellow Marines and sailors once again back with their families, and how they appeared to feel, it made me, for once, feel grateful my parents weren't there. My mother nearly lost it when my father came back, to have me go back to her from a similar incident would devastate her to the point of death most likely.

Snapping back to reality, I peered over at the taller brown earth pony standing beside me, his ears fallen limp on his head while he scanned over the ponies all around. His nose wrinkled slightly as he choked tearfully. I could almost literally feel my heart sink as I stared at him. He was close to a mental breakdown, and to at least show I was there, I gently looped a hoof around his neck. Night slowly turned and looked at me, tears sitting in the corner of his eyes, I looked right back with an abetting stare.

"You're not alone here..." I spoke softly so only he could hear, the moment only becoming more depressing the longer I eyed the visibly heartbroken stallion. Without a word, Night took hold of me in a tight embrace, the once rough pony now weeping into my shoulder while I wrapped both hooves around him. So much had occurred over a short period of time, and to speak for the both of us, we were thankful to still be alive, but dispirited at what was now absent.

I had closed my eyes for a brief few moments while I held the distressed stallion, and when I did look forward, I saw a white pegasus in Marine camouflage standing before us. I glanced up at him, seeing it was Lieutenant Snow Storm. He looked over the both of us with a not-so confused look, and more of a stare of concern with one brow furrowed.

"Is uh... everything alright over here?" He asked innocently. 

I shook my head and admitted, "Could be better. The mood around here isn't exactly the best."

Snow nodded, then sighed. "I understand. I'll give you two some time, but when you're done I expect to see you at my barrack. Alright?"

I nodded back. "What's your barrack number, sir?"

"214," Snow said. "I'll order some food and we'll talk," he added.

"Sounds good to me," I said. "See you in a bit."

"Likewise," he replied, turning and walking away.


***


It was a good twenty or so minutes before I left Night alone after walking him to our barrack. At the time he seemed rather needy for my presence than usual, but the lieutenant was interested in talking to me as soon as possible. It took a couple of more minutes to convince him I would be back later, and when I finally managed to, I was on my way to Snow Storm's barrack situated farther across the base, where the one-occupant dorm rooms were. I figured it must have been nice to have a room just to himself with no one to pester him other than his fellow high-ranking neighbors.

Trotting through the open-central and fully lit corridor of the two story building, I stopped at the door with the number 214 placed in fine silver right beside it and knocked politely. A few moments later, the door opened, and there stood the uniform-less lieutenant with a warm smile. "Ah, Star. I was wondering when you would show up. Come on in!" He stepped off to the side.

I smiled softly back and stepped inside, out of the brisk air. "Thank you. Nice place you got here."

"Ah, thank you," Snow said, shutting the door behind me. "For a military base, one would expect less-luxurious housing or none at all for ranks above First Sergeant. Typically they keep things tight in such a small space the city granted to the base commanders, seeing how they fit two or more ponies in one barrack room now. But aside from that, grab a plate in the kitchen. Pizza got here a couple of minutes ago and I didn't want to eat without you."

"You really didn't have to order food just for our little talk, but, thank you," I smiled and did as Snow suggested, opening the cardboard pizza box and taking a couple of steaming hot slices and putting them onto a paper plate.

"Well, I know you're probably sick of the crap they serve on the ships. Plus, I didn't know how long you would want to stay. I know some of you privates get anxious around ponies of my rank and make excuses just to leave," Snow chuckled, grabbing some pizza for himself before taking a seat on the recliner in his small living room.

"I would never unless I actually had a good reason to fear you," I grinned and sat down on the small adjacent couch. "Besides, you're somepony who is a bit more open to talk to which is a huge relief to somepony like myself."

"Hey, you're not that much of a quiet pony. At least, not from what I've seen. Apart from the fact that you aren't fond of seeking others for help," he took a bite.

"Aw, come on, around other ponies I am typically not that good with communication. I sound the opposite only due to me being around higher ranks frequently," I chuckled and also began to eat. Damn, this was some good pizza.

Snow gulped down the bite he had taken, "Well, you're respectful around ponies with higher power. That's always a good thing," he waved a hoof, then sat up straight. "But now let's get to serious matters."

I nodded for him to go on, still chewing as I ate the first slice halfway.

"Alright, Star, here's the deal," Snow started. "One of my ponies picked up on a cryptic message sent over the internet and a phone line that traces all the way back to a town called Griffonstone. It's a pretty secluded town in the Northern Kingdoms that, as far as we know, can only be reached by train," he explained before pausing to take another bite of his food.

"Okay, so, Griffonstone, cryptic message, internet. What was it all about, and how did you get word of it?" I asked, too inquisitive in the information to eat any further.

"My team specializes in cyber threats, such as detecting them and preventing something before it happens. My first sergeant was tinkering with a new program she introduced to us and picked up on the message. The tech itself is the most advanced our military has ever seen and so far it has proved itself to be worth the thousands of bits put into it. Anyways, like I said, she was messing around trying to pick up on anything that would provide a lead on the piracy issue in the central Antlertic when she caught hold of said encrypted email," Snow explained further.

"The email itself contained a code linked to a page elsewhere that she unfortunately was unable to crack, but the message apart from the links itself is ominous. She printed it off for me to give to you, and then to your commanding officer," he said, taking out a small piece of folded paper and handed it to me.

"Thank you very much," I took the piece of paper gently and unfolded it, and once it was fully unraveled I began to read.

Operation is a go. Our teams did what they could on the Eclipse but failed miserably. Nonetheless, one of them survived and is in custody. He's still feeding information on the status of the ship. It is being decommissioned for repairs and won't be setting sail any time soon. Once the last package arrives, we'll be set. Get the word to the general, he will be pleased. Equestria shall no longer treat us as weak fools when they watch their great cities fall to our will.

I read over the message carefully for a good couple of minutes before handing it back to the lieutenant. "So the attack a few days ago was a diversion?"

"If our suspicions prove correct, then yes. Those griffons and ponies are part of a much larger militia that formed a couple of years back. Their mission is to bring Equestria and Griffonia back into war and conflict. That's literally all they want. The reason they formed was when Princess Celestia met with the Prime Minister of the Northern Griffon Kingdoms and signed a peace and trading treaty. But they don't just fight for the northern kingdoms, they do it for all of the Griffon race."

"And... the ponies that accompany them. Why are there ponies fighting with them?" I queried, giving him a puzzled look of concern.

"They're mainly ponies that have been deported for hate speech against the princesses, a couple of them having issued actual threats towards them and high-ranking members of the royal cabinet. Basically traitors against their own country. The worst part is, what you saw was nothing in comparison to the actual size of their combined militia," Snow sighed, sitting back into his chair.

"Okay. But, sir-"

"Call me Snow, I am not in uniform," he waved a hoof.

"Alright, Snow. What is this militia's name? I'd like to know everything about them."

"They call themselves the Great Gryphon Constitution. It is currently unknown how many members they have under their influence, but with their weaponry and tactics, they would very easily overwhelm the Royal Guard should they attempt an assault on our capitol. However, according to this message, they seem to be picking a bigger fight. They want us Marines to go to war with them. That's why they're planning to hit us in some way."

"So, they're planning some sort of attack. We won't be caught off guard in any way now that we know they're plotting something. From the sounds of it, whoever is in charge isn't that bright."

"I wouldn't question their intelligence, Star. Look how many vessels they've boarded over the last year, stealing weapons and other goods to help their cause and hiding the contraband wherever they hide out. Who knows, they're probably already here and we're just not seeing them. If they have ponies on their side, surely they're blending in with the crowd. But listen," Snow then sat up to retrieve something. "I have a little favor to ask you."

"Of course," I relaxed some, then remarked in a slight sense of sarcasm, "Let me guess, more practice on my aim?"

Snow chuckled softly. "Not quite. I need you to deliver this intel to the palace in Canterlot. Your best bet at arranging a briefing is to talk to a guard, ask to meet with one of the princesses or somepony of authority that can help our cause. Feel free to read over what is in there so you have an idea of what the hell you're informing them about, just make sure no one is a shoulder glance away from spreading bad news. Last thing we want is for mass hysteria." 

He then handed a somewhat hefty manila folder with an assortment of paper information within. "Besides, the little trip will give you some time to let go. In the meantime, I'll speak to the head of your command to let them know you are running errands for me."

"Good enough for me," I placed the folder down under my wing to hold it close. "I won't let you down."

"I trust you won't," Snow offered a smirk. "Now, since I believe you need to know more about the Constitution..."


***


With my bag by my side and an express ticket in my hoof, I waited patiently at the Manehattan train station first thing in the morning for my ride to Canterlot to arrive. The night before was spent mostly talking and learning more about the band of griffons and ponies behind the attacks and discussing the message one of his squad members got a hold of, the same note I was on my way to deliver. I yawned softly, eyelids slightly baggy from a near-restless night of sleep.

I expected the lieutenant to have only given me a couple of days to travel and come back, meaning I'd have at least one night to spend at home to relax, knowing over time, relaxation would become something less common in life, especially under the current circumstances. The train pulled into the station, and once those of us waiting were allowed to, we boarded the train and some more time later were on our way to Canterlot.

As I sat watching trees race by, a strange sense that I was being watched crept up my spine, and a couple of times I found myself to be looking at my surroundings and shift about. The car I was in was empty for the most part, aside from a couple of chatty and giggly mares exchanging stories across the aisle from my seat, and a businesspony reading a newspaper a couple of rows down. It took a third look around to fully ease my muscles and focus on the day ahead. But maybe a little nap first.

I closed my eyes for just a short bit, and seemingly minutes later I was shaken back to consciousness by the jolt of the train coming to a halt in Canterlot. I stretched my hooves in my seat and stood up on all fours, taking my bag and trotting out the open door where the conductor was welcoming passengers to the magnificent capital city. Upon standing outside, the freezing air was enough to wake me up completely to a point where I didn't need a cup of coffee to focus anymore. As I trotted out of the train, I glanced up to the clock that sat above the platform and realized it was late-afternoon, giving me plenty of time to drop my things off at my apartment and head over to the palace.

Of course, with it being as cold as it was outside, I had thankfully remembered to grab my cold weather things before leaving and dug into one of the smaller pockets of my bag, pulling the dark blue beanie snug on my head and protecting my ears from the bitter, stinging air, then continued my way into the city.

Much of Canterlot had significantly high piles of snow sitting in certain spots on the edge of the streets, the cobble ground having noticeably being cleared of the same snow recently, only implying a storm had blown through the area lately, most likely a day or two beforehand. Nonetheless, there was little issue getting to my apartment apart from few icy spots I came across on my way there.

I had my keys ready while I walked up the somewhat slippery metal staircase that led to my second-floor apartment. I stopped at my doorstep, setting my bag down and inserted the key into the lock and twisted it, a faint click making my ear twitch as the door unlocked and I pushed it open. I picked my bag back up and moved to step inside but was stopped by the squeal of a mare and the loud metallic thud. I snapped my head backwards, dropping my bag and running around the staircase to a tan mare laying on the ground, groaning softly in pain.

"Sweet Celestia, Rose. Are you alright?" I knelt down to her, eyes widened.

She gently shook her head as she regained her surroundings, then slapped a hoof to her forehead, eyes opening wide. "I... I think so," she muttered, taking the hoof I reached out to her gently and standing with wobbly hooves, stumbling once only to be caught by me this time. "Oh!" Rose gasped then stood up straight, sighing and laughing a bit. "I'm so sorry. I keep forgetting to page the Staircase Services and have them come get rid of the ice."

I chuckled softly. "I didn't know that's a thing. On the other hoof, are you sure you're alright?" I rested a hoof on her shoulder, staring at her with concern still.

"I've had worse falls," Rose smiled. "I had no idea you'd be back in town so quickly. Everything going fine?"

"For the most part," I shrugged. "I'm only here today and tomorrow. It's mainly work-related stuff, but that I'm going get done today while I have the time."

"Work-related things, huh?" Rose smiled and brushed a strand of her mane from her eye. "What kind of things? Recruitment?"

"Oh, er..." I paused for a moment and wrinkled my muzzle, debating whether or not I should tell her. "I don't believe I have the freedom to say."

"I understand that," Rose smiled and giggled softly. "You military stallions are always mysterious yet so adorable. Well then, I won't let myself get in the way of your duties."

"Oh, no no, you're not. I just came by to drop my things off then head out. I don't think I'll be doing what I need to do for too long."

"Hmm, well, in that case... whenever you finish, would you care for some dinner at my place?" Rose asked gleefully and smiled warmly, her eyes twinkling at the same time. 

"Sure, why not?" I smiled back. "I'd love that."

"I only figured you would since you've been on the train for so long, you're probably exhausted," Rose gently nosed my neck and giggled.

"A little, yeah. Heh heh," I chuckled a bit awkwardly this time, feeling my cheeks heat up slightly despite the frigid winter air. 

"Perfect!" The tan mare gave my cheek a quick peck and hopped a couple of times in front of me with a sparkling smile. "See you later!" then trotted happily but carefully down the stairs.

"Right, I'll see you later!" I answered, laughing a bit more in some embarrassment as I watched Rose hop down the stairs and gallop onto the street, nearly knocking over a poor mare carrying a bag of groceries. My smile then faded as I remembered what I was about to do before Rose literally fell into view.

I trotted back around the staircase and to the door, bringing my bag inside and setting it on the couch. I opened the zipper and pulled out a freshly cleaned uniform from it, changing out of the warm hoodie I had on and buttoning up the heavier-than-usual camouflage jacket built for colder climates, then took the small folded letter from out of the bag and sticking it into one of the pockets on my uniform and buttoning it up. I made my way back outside, locking the door to my apartment and trotting carefully down the ice-covered staircase with a hoof on the railing to ensure if I do fall, I wouldn't bang my head like Rose did.


***


The palace seemed to sparkle in the sun even more than it normally did having snow coating the golden spire-rooftops, the enormous building itself being decorated for Heart's Warming both inside and out. As I walked at a steady pace through the hallways, I peered around at the different decorations as they were hung up by palace decorators with the help of a couple of unicorn guards.

I stopped at the end of the entrance's hallway and looked either way, deciding which way to go to find somepony I could talk to, turning down the corridor to the right and coming across a much larger room with two rounded staircases leading up to a balcony within the room with another hallway behind it. The room itself seemed strangely familiar and I found myself trotting up the staircase and down the smaller hallway which then led to a massive room that was rounded with glass overlooking Equestria at the end with a massive statue of two alicorns standing opposite of each other, where I then realized I was in the palace's ball room.

My eyes widened slightly as I looked around. "Whelp, wrong room," then turned to head back out of the room and start over, instead instantly froze in my tracks, seeing a tall, all-white coated alicorn mare standing there, her multicolored mane waving gently in a breeze that just wasn't there, her light pink eyes gazing over me as I stood practically frozen in place, staring right back at her. 

Instinct of respect then hit me like an oncoming freight train, and I bowed down directly in front of the regal alicorn. "P-Princess Celestia! I-I... I am so terribly sorry, I do not know my ways around the palace a-and... well..." I sputtered

The mare let out a soft laugh as she sauntered up, a gentle smile shining over me like the sun itself as the princess stopped just in front of me. "No worries, this happens quite more often than you think with tourists. It is absolutely no issue with me," she looked down and smiled more, only then taking notice of my attire while I stood up straight. "Your uniform, it strikes me as familiar. Which branch are you attached to?"

Staring up with awe and a bit of nervousness, I swallowed a lump blocking my throat and spoke. "Lunar Marine Corps. 24th Battalion, 5th Marines, based in Manehattan."

"Ah, so my sister's side of the forces," Princess Celestia retained her warm smile. "She has made some impressive work raising her new military to be as well-trained as you ponies are today. I am relieved it hasn't gone to her head again yet," she joked, then let out a soft chuckle. "That aside, what can I do for you, my little pony?"

I gently eased myself, then reached into my bag and extracted the folder out, holding it out in my hoof. "Your Highness, I apologize once more for arriving without notice, but... well, I was previously expecting to have to go through somepony to speak to you directly."

I drew in a breath, shaking off any fear I had in me. Snow wanted the job done, I was going to do it. "I have information of deep urgency for you to be briefed on, ordered by Lieutenant Snow Storm, Lunar Marines. It is imperative that you arrange a meeting, sometime today, to discuss the matter amongst your peers."
> 28. Dirty Little Secrets
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Intel suggests the known terrorist group, the Great Gryphon Constitution, is plotting an attack within the coming week in any one of these cities, but Baltimare seems the most likely candidate despite such close proximity to two major bases.”

Six pairs of eyes fixated on me throughout the briefing. Much of the group gathered scribbled down notes while Princess Celestia listened in silence, only to be broken by one of her cabinet members in query. “If this information was discovered on behalf of Lieutenant Snow Storm, why is he not here this evening?” 

I grunted at that. Of course I had to anticipate such a question. “Due to other pressing matters, he was unable to make the journey and instead asked me the favor of delivering this to the table for him. Under the current circumstances, it is not hard to understand why.”

The suited stallion gave a questionable look at my answer, but went no further to pry.

The princess of the sun, however, spoke for the first time since this gathering began. “And this… Constitution… it is believed they are the culprit of last week’s boarding of the Eclipse?”

I nodded once firmly. “Yes, Princess, that is correct. If any consolation is needed on the matter, just know I was there, first-hoof. These are not your average pirates that raid trading vessels for valuable goods, these are highly trained individuals with coordinated plans to wreak havoc on our country. They are absolutely nothing to joke with.”

“Hmmm…” Celestia thought, her attention shifting between me and the paperwork spread out over the table for all eyes to gawk over. After a few moments, she rose from her chair, her multicolored mane elegantly waving in a nonexistent draft. “On my sister’s return from her trip to Hoofston, we shall discuss this and what our next move should be.”

Her eyes settled on me, a warm smile pursing her lips. “Thank you, Private First Class Star Shooter, for bringing us up to speed on this situation. Do share these thanks to the lieutenant as well, both of your service to country is greatly appreciated.”

My cheeks warmed. Who else can say they have been personally complimented on their efforts by Celestia herself? Not many, that’s for damn sure.

“As for us, we will continue to look into this information until anything new arrives, and if there are any questions… do not hesitate to voice them. Otherwise, I hereby dismiss this meeting.”

Once more, the princess’ focus returned my way. “I will see to it that a guard shows you the way out without a hitch,” she winked. Ha ha, she’s got jokes, too.


***


I followed an earth pony dressed in finely-polished golden armor where he led me to one of the many ways out of the palace. I thanked him and trotted outside, the bitter cold catching me completely off-guard. Why for the love of Celestia did I have to live all the way across town? The walk home was rather lengthy and cautious. I wanted so desperately to run the whole way, but knew the ice glazing the ground would prohibit that.

It wasn't until I was just outside of my apartment when I realized how long I was at the palace. I still had a bit of time before Rose expected me upstairs, leaving me with plenty of space to change into something far more cozy than what I had on at the moment.

Once again having my keys out, I unlocked the door and stepped into the toasty living room, seconds later feeling as if ice that had built up during the walk was melting from my hinds and rear. I let out a comforted sigh and removed my beanie, hair slightly messier from doing so. I picked my bag up off of the couch that I set down there earlier and went back into my bedroom.

There, I unbuttoned my jacket completely and laid it gently on the bed, then reached into my bag to grab out a lighter yet warm and more comfortable hooded zip-up jacket, sliding my hooves through the sleeves and adjusting it so it was on comfortably, then pulled the zipper all of the way up. "Much better..." I said to myself and repacked my other jacket.

I walked steadily into the living room and took a seat on the couch. The room was considerably cooler than my bedroom and was just another reason to wear the jacket inside. Over the years of living in Canterlot, I was never sure that it was an issue with the heating system in the building, or it wasn't decent at all. It was only November and even for a city built on the side of a mountain high above the land below, the temperature was exceptionally frigid. That included Manehattan too. It was really just a glimpse of what was to come in December and eventually January.

Soon enough, the sun had vanished beneath the distant horizon, and what little light was left over slowly faded, and to the east, the twinkling stars came to life, and yet it was only just past six-thirty. I sauntered out through the door of my apartment and locked it behind me, then made my way cautiously up the half-frozen metal staircase that led straight to Rose's apartment, her unit being the only one aside from mine, and the shop that sat on the first floor.

Stopping inches from her door, I raised a hoof and knocked gently twice, followed by a short wait for the mare to open the door. Either she was still getting ready, or Rose wasn't home and was on her way back from somewhere. But yet, there was one window far to the left of the door, the light on and shining a ray of tiled light onto the building opposite of this one. It was unusual for ponies to leave their lights on when going somewhere. At least, for me it was. It could have been because when I leave, I typically don't return for a few weeks.

My ears perked as I left the thought of what was taking so long and snapped back into reality the moment the click of the door unlocking caught my attention. It swung open, and standing there with a completely gleeful smile was Rose in a little cook's apron that had a very small splatter of pasta sauce on it. All I could do was grin, followed by a quick chuckle.

"Whaaaat? Don't like my apron? Too bad! I don't like to get messy," Rose playfully pouted and pulled me inside. "You get in here and get out of the cold."

I chuckled some more, stepping into the noticeably warmer apartment. "I never said I didn't like it, I've just never seen you in one. Or anypony for that matter," I said as I shut the door and looked around. "This is a very nice place you got here," I then smiled to her.

"Ah, thank you! Although I admit, before you came over, it was quite messy. I spent most of the day picking up and running errands," Rose smiled back and gently poked my chest with a hoof before returning to the small kitchen area.

"What, from takeout boxes?" I joked. "Only kidding. Still, very nice. Mine isn't nearly as decorated as yours."

"That's what I've been saying! You really should get some pictures or... or some plants to give your apartment some modern taste! Not that anything is wrong with what you have of course," Rose giggled. "You just need to get some decorations."

"I'll consider it," I then took a seat on the couch. "When I get the bits that is. A lot of it has been going towards traveling back and forth from Manehattan. At this rate I may as well ask to ride in the baggage car to save some money."

Rose giggled some more. "No kidding. Taking the train is so expensive these days! Especially between where you work and home."

"I know," I exhaled deeply as I spoke. "Makes me consider moving to Manehattan, or somewhere in that area where I can take a carriage or something."

The moment I finished speaking, there was a loud crash of glass shattering, making my ears perk up more than before. I sat up and peered at Rose from the couch, seeing her staring with surprise down at a wine glass that shattered at her hooves. She quickly turned and eyed me for a brief second, then grabbed a dust pan and cleaned up the glass shards carefully.

I stood up while she cleaned the glass up and stepped closer. "Need some help?"

"N-no, it's alright. I got it," she said with a noticeably different tone in her voice as she dumped the broken glass into a trash bin. Her tone was quite familiar, seeing as the times I've met her, she had been either happy or worried, and now she sounded like the latter. I stood just behind her, watching her as she finished and turned back towards me, jumping when she didn't expect me to be right there. "W-what?"

"Are you alright...?" I asked in concern, eyeing her softly.

"Of course, of course," Rose faintly smiled with a hint of lie in her tone. "Dinner is almost ready. Have a seat and we'll eat."

I looked at her suspiciously while she returned her focus to the steaming metal pot on the stove, stirring the pasta in the boiling water with a wooden spoon. I took a seat on a stool at the small island that sat at the edge of the kitchen, separating it from the living room. I kept watching her as my suspicion changed to worry. It must have been what I said about moving away.

"Y-you know," I stuttered a bit at the start. "I... was joking about moving to Manehattan," I continued and paused, Rose not responding as she kept stirring the pot. "I couldn't afford a place in Manehattan even if it were the size of a janitor closet. That, and I like Canterlot too much," I weakly chuckled in hopes of lightening the mood. Instead, Rose kept stirring.

"Come on, Rose. I didn't mean it," I frowned, ears drooping. "I'm sorry."

Rose's hoof left the spoon, letting it sit against the edge of the pot as she stopped stirring and turned down the heat setting knob on the stove. With a quick sniff, she turned and smiled at me, this time much more convincing. "But that's up to you to move, Star. If it helps you out financially, then go for it."

"It really doesn't though. Like I said, Manehattan apartments aren't cheap. I was lucky enough to find this place here in Canterlot. I'd have to be a leprecolt from the end of a rainbow to find an affordable place out there."

"But, aren't you sick of sleeping on a cot? Or... you know, what ever beds are used in barracks?" Rose tilted her head.

I shook my head. "The sergeant had us move to dorm-like barracks to make room for new trainees. Much nicer beds, but the place is uncomfortably small, especially when living with somepony else."

"Oh, a roommate? You never did tell me about the ponies you've met," Rose smiled.

I chuckled softly. "There's a lot I haven't told you about, silly mare. Perhaps tonight would be a good night to talk some more."

"Yes, definitely," Rose smiled, the tone of her voice sounding extremely curious, but also slightly sinister. Something was off. Maybe it was just me. "Ready to eat?"

"Definitely," I smiled back, a few moments later, Rose slid a slightly steaming plate of fresh pasta covered in a dark red tomato sauce that only added to the amazing appearance and smell of the dish. "Thank you for having me over, by the way," I picked up a fork that was already left neatly on the counter as Rose walked around with a plate of her own.

"No problem!" Rose smiled big and set her plate down on the counter. "What can I get you to drink? Some wine? Water? Milk?"

"Water is fine," I motioned a hoof gently and twisted my fork through the pasta, roping it around it politely and taking a bite. Not only did the dish look and smell magnificent, but so did it taste. "Mmm..."

Rose giggled softly and brought a glass of water to me, then poured herself a glass of purplish-red wine and took a seat on the stool beside me. "The sauce is a bit of a personal recipe. I was afraid I would screw it up since I've never made it before."

Once I swallowed the bite I took, I turned to her and smiled. "It's amazing. Some of the best sauce I've tasted."

Rose's cheeks heated in a blush. "Oh, hush you! You should taste how my grandmother made it. It beats mine by a mile."

"I'll believe it when I taste it," I winked, then returned to eating. Rose giggled and soon began to eat as well.


***


After dinner, there was a short argument between me and Rose as to who would wash the dishes—with me, eventually, coming out to be the winner. Cleaning up was the least I could do for her in return. As soon as the dishes were washed and put away, I joined her on the couch where we spent much of the evening exchanging stories. We were both intrigued with each others tales, though eventually it just turned into me being the one talking as Rose didn't care much for talking and wanted to listen in more.

"So then, I ask Nightpath... What's wrong with you?" I grinned as I explained. "Want to know what he said?"

"Yes, yes!" Rose's eyes twinkled with a big grin.

I snickered. "He said he dropped a bar of soap!"

Rose's smile faded, her eyes darting briefly as if she didn't understand. My grin disappeared as well. "You know... drop a bar of soap in the shower, get fucked?"

She stared at me for seemingly a full minute before it noticeably clicked in her head, when her ears perked and eyes widened. "Oh!" then burst out into a fit of laughter. "I am so sorry I didn't get that!"

I chuckled softly and waved a hoof. "That's alright. I don't expect everypony else to," I winked.

Wiping a tear from the corner of her eye, Rose finished laughing and simply smiled at me, her chin in her hooves like a foal daydreaming, except she was looking right at me. "You truly are a riot, Star."

"You think so?" I smiled warmly. On a normal basis, I found it to be difficult to be funny. It could have been the lack of proper sleep in recent days finally catching up too of course, hell if I knew. I already realized about a week ago that I'm beginning to go insane just from that. At least somepony seemed to laugh with me.

"Of course!" She grinned, poking my nose with a hoof, then sat up straight in her seat. Rose stared forward, her smile once again fading, this time seemingly for another reason. I furrowed a brow and kept my eyes locked on her for a full minute.

"Hey, is everything alright?" I asked with concern.

"Hmm?" Rose's head snapped towards me out of what ever trance she was in. "Oh, pfft, yeah! Just thinking is all."

"Thinking of...?" I tilted my head. Once again her smile vanished.

Rose sighed gently. "I'm... afraid I can't tell you that."

My head still tilted, I slowly nodded. "Al...right. What would you like to talk about now?"

"The letter," she replied almost instantly.

"The what?"

Her eyes opened wide and she shook her head. "O-oh, I mean. I dunno."

"No, don't correct yourself. What did you say?" My suspicion for the mare grew incrementally.

Rose's eyes slowly narrowed on me. "Follow me," then stood up off of the couch and made her way to the bedroom.

I watched her stand and soon followed suit, walking at a steady pace into her bedroom. The room had inward-slanted walls on two sides due to the design of the roof of the building, and white rays of moonlight spilled through one side, leaving squares of light on her bed and the floor. The room's light flicked on, providing a full glimpse of the room around me. Though her apartment was slightly smaller than mine, she had a much larger bedroom.

The door shut rather quickly just inches behind me. I whipped around, immediately seeing Rose locking the door handle with a key and setting it on the dresser. At that, I could feel my heartbeat slowly increasing. "Rose, what's going on?"

"Sit down. Or lay down. Whichever you prefer," she pointed to the bed with a deadpanned tone.

Looking between her and the bed, I nodded and slowly sat on the edge. I glanced up, just one second before she tackled me onto the bed with a grunt. For a mare slightly smaller than me, she was pretty strong. "Rose?!"

Her hoof covered my mouth. "Ssshhh..." My pupils shrunk to pinpricks while she hushed me up. She leaned her muzzle down, just an inch from my own. "There's a lot you don't know about me, Star. I would prefer if we keep it that way."

I raised a hoof to remove hers from covering my mouth. "No, you're going to explain everything to me right now! What the hell are you doing?"

Sighing, Rose reached over to the nightstand beside her bed and picked up a small cloth. "I apologize in advance, but you leave me no choice."

She pressed the cloth to my muzzle and held me down while I squirmed. I let out a short scream, completely muffled by the cloth. Within seconds I felt myself becoming more and more drowsy until everything went dark.


***


What felt like an eternity later, my eyes cracked open, vision impaired from the chloroform cloth putting me to sleep. I groaned quietly and tried to look around. Everything was black, which then made me briefly panic, believing I was now blind. That was until a cloth tied around the back of my head was pulled up, with Rose sitting right above me, blinking slowly down at me. My vision cleared, and I glared straight up at her.

"Rose, what the hell was that for?" I tried to sit up but found it hard to. I kept attempting to move before realizing my hooves were bound behind my back. I grunted, struggling to break the bindings, only to be stopped by Rose slapping my cheek.

"Quit struggling already, you're not going anywhere. At least, not right now," Rose hissed, and I stopped. She eased herself and sat up. "And I'm not going to hurt you, so rest assured."

"Hard to believe when you knocked me out with chloroform and tied me up," I kept my gaze locked on her. "What's this all about?"

"I was hoping this wouldn't be a problem tonight, but you've caught me," she hopped off of the bed. "I know about the letter, Star."

"Letter? What letter?" At the moment I had no idea what she was talking about.

"The one you brought from Manehattan. The one you gave to the princess," Rose turned and glanced at me.

"So you're telling me you have been stalking me? I knew you were a crazy mare but I didn't know you were this crazy."

"Will you just listen!?" She snapped and I went quiet instantly. "I know you won't like it, but I also know you want the truth. And the truth is, Star," she stopped and walked back over to me, sitting me upright on the back board of her bed, against the wall. "I've been watching you since day one. Well, maybe not day one. Since the day you told me about your father's military career, but you know what I mean. Would you like to know why?"

"Yes, yes I would!" I growled and glared more at her, blood now boiling with anger.

"Because, everypony I know who has told me about their parents being in the military ended up joining themselves. It's no coincidence. Ponies with family members in the military usually try to follow their hoofsteps. You're no different than them."

"I didn't join to follow my father's hoofsteps. That's not what I wanted to do at all," I said, struggling some more.

"It is, Star. Accept it. Your father was never pleased with what you did. Most hardcore fathers like those who have served usually are extremely expectant of their foals. It's a sad reality, honestly. But I've seen this all too much to think it is any different. You want to impress your father, you want him to finally respect you. You want him to love you like he should."

My ears slowly drooped. Maybe she was right. Perhaps the reason I joined was just to make my father happy. He never was when I lived with him and my mother. No, it couldn't have been. I joined because I wanted to do something productive and special, I don't care what my father thinks anymore. He's not a part of my life. Apparently I had said the last bit out loud, I looked up at Rose, my ears flattened out.

"Star, I'm trying to protect you," she said.

"Protect me from what?" I did my best to appear less heartbroken and more angry.

"From life. From the reality of the world. You're a wonderful stallion, but you're living a dangerous life. You already know I know everything about you. What's to stop you from believing I don't keep in touch with those who know about where you've been and what's been going on?" She sat on the bottom of the bed. "Star, I work for a secret organization that deals with international threats, but recently I've been assigned by one of my colleagues to look after you, even if I have to keep you tied to this bed to do so."

"So you're a spy. Is that what you're trying to tell me?"

"In a way, yes. Please just listen—"

"I'll listen, but only if you promise to let me go when you're finished explaining," I spoke in a rather dark tone, flashing my eyes towards her and hopefully giving her the idea.

She slowly nodded. "Even though it's against what I'm supposed to be doing, I will."

"Then continue," I eased myself slightly.

Sighing, Rose did so. "I know about everything that happened. I know about the Constitution. I know about what happened to the Eclipse. The attack, the sailors killed, everything. I know what's going on. And I've said it before and I'll say it again, I would be devastated if something happened to you. Something could have happened to you. That's partially why I'm doing this. I'm doing this for you."

"Then do something else for me and untie me."

"I... but, Star."

"No buts, untie me!"

Rose sighed after a few moments of a pause, she grabbed a small knife off of the nightstand and turned me over, cutting the plastic zip ties holding my hooves together, freeing them. When she turned me back over, she was met with a hard slap that forced the knife out of her hoof. She slowly turned her head back with tears building in her eyes and rubbed her cheek with a hoof. "O-ow... what was that for?"

"That was for lying to me," I growled, raising my hoof again. "And this..."

Eyes widening, Rose turned her head and waited to be slapped again, eyes shutting as a tear crept down her cheek. Even with how furious I was, I didn't have the heart to hit her again. I was raised to never hit a mare. Now just happened to be the time where I believed it was necessary. I sighed and slowly lowered my hoof, then stood up off of the bed.

Rose opened her eyes and turned to me. "W-where are you going?"

"Home," I grabbed the key and jammed it into the doorknob, unlocking it and walking out, leaving the key in the door. I stopped just outside the door and looked at her. "Manehattan."

The word hit her hard. But it was true. Manehattan was steadily becoming my new home. The tan mare got up off of the bed and followed me out, tears still sitting in her eyes as I walked towards the door.

"S-Star, please. I need to tell you why I'm doing this..." Rose whimpered softly.

"No, Rose, I've had it. First, you tie me up and interrogate me for whatever reason, then you tell me you never actually had feelings for me, after all I've done for you? No way! I'm out," I snapped at the startled mare, then stomping out through the door, slamming it behind me, a couple of thuds from things falling due to the force audible moments afterwards.

Letting out deep breaths, I stopped outside the door, hooves shaking as my head slowly bobbed and my mind tried to calm myself down. Truthfully, there was no calming down. I needed to lie down.

I needed sleep.


***


Just before sunrise the next morning, I boarded the train to Manehattan. I wanted out of Canterlot completely. At least, for a while. Even with the stress of possibly going to war with a large group of rogue ponies and griffons, there was now something else fresh on my mind that was slowly eating away at my mentality. To even think that I trusted Rose hurt even more than it probably should have, but what did I know?

Around noon, I stepped off of the train and took a taxi carriage to the naval station and hastily entered after providing the guard with my identification. It was still considered to be a day off for me, much to my relief. From the main gate, I immediately made my way to the barrack.

Trotting inside, Nightpath was just putting his uniform on when he peeked out of the bathroom at me. "Hey, Star. Where have you been?"

"Canterlot," I replied blankly, eyelids baggy. The night before didn't provide me with much sleep.

"Oh. Everything alright? You look awful."

"Just lacking sleep is all," I replied, trotting back to our beds and throwing my bag on the floor. I didn't bother to take my clothes off and dropped down onto my bed as the brown earth pony watched with a brow raised.

"If you say so. I'll uh... I'll leave you alone then."

I didn't bother replying. I just wanted to sleep. That, of course, wasn't going to happen.

There was a knock on the door just before Nightpath was about to walk out for his shift. He opened the door and saluted. "Oh, lieutenant! Fancy seeing you here."

"Is Star back yet?" Lieutenant Snow Storm asked.

"He just walked in. Why?"

"I'd like to talk to him."

"Tell him to wait!" I said aloud from the bedroom.

"He's really tired. I've never seen him this tired before."

"Star, it's urgent," Snow spoke up.

Grumbling, I sat up slowly. "Let him in, Night."

Night stepped to the side, letting Snow inside. "I'll see you later, Star," then walked out.

"Alright, see you," I rubbed my eye and looked at Snow. "What's up?"

Sitting down on Night's bed, Snow looked at me. "I've got some news. About the message we intercepted."

I nodded for him to go on. "Yeah? What is it?"

"The message... it was sent from somewhere in southern Manehattan. They're already here."

My eyes opened completely for the first time that day. "Just like you thought."

The lieutenant nodded. "Who did you speak to in Canterlot?"

"Princess Celestia. By accident, actually," I answered.

"How is that?" Snow tilted his head.

"I got lost in the palace and ended up bumping into her. From there I told her about the message."

Snow nodded. "Well, I was hoping you'd talk to Princess Luna about it, but Celestia is fine. She'll inform her sister and they'll know what to do."
> 29. A New, New Start
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sitting down in the mess hall with Solar and Silver the morning after, initially we found ourselves to be stuffing our muzzles into our trays of breakfast, each of us were just that hungry for some strange reason. Eventually as we got some food in our stomach, the three of us began to converse. While doing so, of course, took our minds off of finishing our meal and only meant we'd get to our shifts slightly later than the sergeant preferred.

"Oh yeah, I nearly forgot. Have you guys heard the news?" Silver spoke up, focus shifting between me and the yellow unicorn seated beside him.

Shaking my head, I replied, "No. What's up?"

"You're getting promoted?" Solar guessed.

Silver shook his head. "Nope!"

"I'm getting promoted?" Solar's smile widened.

Brow furrowing, Silver once again shook his head. "Afraid not."

"Oh. Are we getting deployed?" Solar's ears lowered slightly.

"No! Will you just-"

"Hi, guys!" Anchorage cut in, floating over to our table with a tray and sat down beside me. "Did you all hear that Lieutenant Arc is being promoted?"

Silver, at that moment, facehoofed while shaking his head slowly, while me and Solar were focused on the white pegasus to my side. "No. What's he going to be now?"

"Second lieutenant," Anchorage answered, then took a sip out of a cup of water. "Others are saying first lieutenant, but, that wouldn't make much sense. Second lieutenant comes before first."

My eyes widened slightly. "Huh. Well, good for him. What did he do to earn it?"

"My assumption would be his role during the gunfight we had over a week ago," Anchorage shrugged. "The stallion already has a Silver Star medal and Celestia knows how many ribbons for his service just mainly in scuffles from around the world."

I raised an eyebrow at that. "What do we get?"

Anchorage blinked, looking at me directly. "Come again?"

"What do we get from that? We were there, too," I repeated myself, brow raising further.

"Well, those who we lost are getting medals of their own, and of course funeral ceremonies. I suppose us that lived through it don't get anything but a pat on the back and a thank you for handling the situation. To be fair, Star, it really could have ended up much worse. For all we know, if there were more pirates, chances are we'd still be on that ship and tied up somewhere in the ship's hangar being watched over carefully, on our way to Celestia knows where to most likely be tortured, or worse."

"But yet, don't you notice how only the higher ranks and those who didn't make it are the only ones to be recognized by... well, anypony?"

"You just realized that?" Silver tilted his head. "Star, while I don't care if the deceased get more attention, which I'm sure you don't either, this is to be expected. Let's be realistic here, have you ever seen or heard of a high-ranking officer out in the middle of a gunfight?" Before I could answer, Silver shook his head and raised his hoof. "I didn't think so. Yes, they got more recognition than us. Who cares? Our job isn't about fighting, then expecting public attention the minute after. Where's the honor in that?"

Easing myself, I nodded. "I suppose you're right. But you get my point though, correct?"

The others nodded in agreement, Anchorage replied, "We do, Star. That's just how it is. And it's not like we're getting shit on either. We still get paid, we still have the benefits, and unless we go out and spend our paychecks on fancy places to live, they provide us with not only little apartments, but food and recreational activities too. It really isn't that bad when you think about it."

Anchorage was right. Despite the fact that the higher ranks did get more recognition for not doing much, we still did have it easy compared to some ponies. I simply nodded again and returned to finishing my breakfast.


***


Once outside and in the cold, I walked along the icy cement towards my post across the base. Remarkably I found it to be slightly warmer here than in Canterlot, likely due to a massive change in altitude, yet surprisingly the breeze was very much absent that morning.

Walking up the ladder of the wall, I was met with the night shift guard standing there, hooves and torso shivering with tiny icicles hanging from his chin and bags beneath his eyes. I chuckled softly. "Go get some rest, Halberd. I got it from here," then nudged his shoulder.

"Th-thank y-you... S-Star..." the light bluish grey earth pony stuttered, handing his rifle over to me, then making his way down the ladder. Considering where Halberd was from, I could only feel bad for him for being stuck in a much colder climate than what he was used to.

From there, my shift had already started despite me being late by a few minutes. Poor Halberd was used to it, and in return he did the same to me, not that I minded much. 

Just a few minutes into my patrols, I felt something fly right into my cheek, making me jump slightly as I looked down at the random object and saw it was a paper plane. Assuming from the direction it came from, thankfully, it wasn't a bomb or poison. I reached down and unfolded the plane, it being a brief hoof-written note on a full piece of paper.

Come to meeting hall in 5 minutes. Announcements will be made.

Looking down towards the ground, nopony was there. I shrugged it off, but now I had to convince somepony to take over for me until I could return. Thankfully I was able to convince somepony walking by to do it by offering him some bits in return. Leaving my post, I started towards the main office building on base where I noticed a couple other ponies on their way as well.

At least three other ponies of a rank higher than my own entered before me, and each of us quickly came across the meeting room where Lieutenant Arc sat, eyeing each and every one of us as we stepped through the door and settled into our chairs. Only a few individual ponies were there before he stood up and shut the door.

"Now," he started, turning towards the group. "I called each of you here on short notice because I've got some announcements to make to all of you specifically. Yes, rumors have spread of my promotion to second lieutenant, and it is true—" Before he could continue, we clapped for him. We stopped when he raised his hoof up. "No need to congratulate me, Marines. In fact, I should be the one congratulating you."

All of us exchanged looks, before returning our attention to Arc, where he then cleared his throat. "In light of my promotion, I would like to explain why you all are actually here for, and the truth is," he stopped and eyed us one by one. "You all have performed outstandingly in your tests, a couple of you having doing so during the recent boarding attack of the Eclipse. For this, I'm referring everypony in this room to the Lunar Marines Officer School."

A light collective gasp filled the room, and once again we were exchanging looks, now even more confused but also surprised.

"I'll be talking to some other ponies about this as well. But yes, all of you have proven yourselves worthy enough to earn my respect, and thus you will be attending the academy in as little as a few days. The classes themselves last approximately one and a half, and in some cases, two months, depending on your rank, meaning there's a high chance many of you will be there long past New Years," he explained. 

"But also, I don't expect all of you to pass either. The Officer School is extremely picky on their students, and the least I can do is bid you all good luck, as these classes will test your mental strength and less your physical strength like boot camp did. I expect all of you to come back stressed as a single parent, if not worse."

His words weren't exactly reassuring. In fact, over top my excitement, worry began to set in quickly. "However... there is something else I must inform you of," everypony's ears perked suddenly. "If you pass your classes, you're guaranteed a promotion and will be fast on your way to leading your own squadron if you break the rank of Sergeant. Any questions?"

The room remained silent for a few moments, then I raised my hoof and Arc eyed me. "Where is the school located, sir?"

Arc stared directly at me for a second in silence. "Baltimare. Or rather, close to it. It is the only Officer School us as a branch have, and everypony from all over Equestria seeking classes at the academy must go there. And on your way out, Marines," he gazed across the room at the others. "I will personally give you the paperwork you need to take to the school to show proof of your referral. Is that clear?"

"Yes sir!" We answered jointly. 

"Very good, men," Arc started towards the door. "Dismissed. And remember, pick up your paperwork, because if you don't and you get declined, I'm either going to not refer you again, or just straight up whoop your ass, and believe me, you won't like me when I'm angry," he threatened, just the look on his face was enough to startle all of us let alone the grim tone of his voice. When he did leave the room, the rest of us stood up and followed suit. Without hesitation, all five of us lined up at the lieten—second lieutenant's office, where one by one he handed a few long pages of paperwork to look over.

"Check over the papers, then do it again. If anything is off that you can see, let me know and I'll change it for you," said the second lieutenant as he handed the last pony their papers. "You all leave at the end of the week. 'Til then, you are to resume your duties like normal, and I will contact your platoon sergeants so they are informed of your absences. Carry on."


***


"Officer school? But you just got back!" Night said, voice echoing slightly while showering.

I stood in the bedroom, once again packing my bags. "I know. Seems like I'm going places non-stop," I chuckled. "What sucks most is, the second lieutenant said we'll most likely be there past New Years depending on what classes we choose, though that confuses me slightly."

"Choose your classes? I thought they only did one class, and that was to teach ponies into becoming officers?"

"So did I, I guess not. That, or he just worded it wrong. I don't expect for him to have been to Baltimare in a while, he's an old stallion."

"I don't think he's old. But, he's definitely older than us. Didn't Sergeant Hardstaff once say that Arc was in his late twenties or something like that?"

"I don't know, I wasn't listening if he did say that," I replied. "The papers also said it's best to get there earlier during the week period they give us to get ready and go there, which is why I'm leaving today. No harm, no foul right?"

"Right," Night answered, the shower shutting off and the brown earth pony hopping out, grabbing a towel to dry himself off prior to stepping out of the bathroom. "Still a shame you have to leave again so soon."

Zipping up my bag, I turned to him with a sly grin. "I thought you hated my guts, Private Nightpath?"

He rolled his eyes and punched my upper arm near my shoulder, walking past me to his bed to put on the uniform he laid out in preparation for his shift. I chuckled, rubbing my arm with a hoof. "Only joking."

"Oh, I know you are now, because now I don't have a reason to hate you," he said.

"What's that mean?" I stopped and turned towards him while he buttoned up his uniform jacket.

"Meaning I don't hate you. I was stupid to to begin with, you know?" Night glanced back at me with a reassuring smile that allowed me to ease up.

I nodded, Night returning his focus to finishing putting his uniform on with him noticeably struggling with the buttons still. I tilted my head and watched. "Why don't you turn around?"

Night did slowly, appearing rather frustrated with the buttons. I shook my head and proceeded to slide them into their little slips one by one until his uniform was completely buttoned up. He relaxed once I finished. "Thank you..."

"Don't mention it," I gently punched his upper arm with a smile.

"So... Baltimare. I guess maybe its a good thing you're going and not me."

I nodded, understanding what he meant by that. "I've never been either, so this will be fun."

Night shrugged. "It's an okay city, not nearly as crowded as Manehattan and has quite a few poorer areas on the outskirts. Nothing real special apart from that."

Shrugging, I nodded again. "I'm not going to be exploring the city either. As far as I know, the school isn't even in the city and is somewhere close to it. I guess I'll have to find out."

"Right. And uh, if you bump into my father, could you do me a favor?"

"Sure, name it."

"Give him a big ol' knock on the head for me, will you?" Night grinned smugly. 

I laughed and waved a hoof. "I'll see what I can do. But for now, I best be on my way."

"Of course," Night nodded once. "Hey, good luck."

"Thanks," I nodded back. "I'll need it I'm sure. I don't expect this to be any easier than my last classes."

"Only time will tell," he shrugged. "But look on the bright side, if the Second lieutenant is referring you, you know what that means."

"I'm afraid I don't?" I tilted my head, eyeing Night with some confusion. "What does it mean?"

"It means he likes you. Not in that way of course, no. He must see potential in you as a leader of a squadron. Nopony goes to officer school and doesn't come out a Sergeant first class with a group of Marines at their helm in a few years time. You're on your way, Star," Night gently nudged my shoulder.

"I suppose so. It's weird though, considering the other day, he was shouting at me for not fighting back much. Unless, of course..."

"Your commanding officer might have brought it up to him," Night finished after me, and I nodded in return.

"Would make things more clear, although what you say could also be true. I highly doubt that though."

"Oh, quit being negative. You're always nagging at yourself. Why not be positive about moving your way up in the Marines?" Night frowned.

Shaking my head slightly, I replied, "I don't know. I just..." then sighed quietly and made slow eye contact with the taller stallion. "Ever since the incident I've been having trouble staying positive about anything. Not only that, but some things went down in Canterlot while I was there."

"What things?" Night asked out of curiosity, looking right back down at me.

"I'd... prefer not to speak about it. Not yet at least. Likely I'll wait until I'm over it and I start sleeping normally again," I picked my bag up and slung it over my shoulder and onto my back. "Maybe I'll be ready when I get back, who knows," I stopped once more and made my way to the door of our dormitory, pausing as I opened the door to walk out. "Oh, and Night?"

"Yeah, Star?"

"Since I doubt I'll see them on my way out, let them know where I'll be and how long I'll be gone, aye?"

Night understood and nodded. "Will do. Come back the same pony."

"No guarantees," I winked at the brown stallion. "See you in a few weeks."
> 30. Lunar Marine Officer School
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The train raced southwards out of Manehattan towards the smaller city of Baltimare, sleepy neighborhoods and eventually snowy forests passing by the windows at incredibly high speeds, while everypony on the train sat comfortably. The other Marines sat opposite of the aisle of my seat, chatting up a storm and by far making the most noise in the car, though thankfully at the station we learned it was completely rented out to ourselves and meant we didn't have to be concerned about mothers of young foals or businessponies complaining about their rambunctiousness. 

On the other hoof, I sat perfectly still in my seat, elbow on the windowsill and chin resting on my hoof and eyes locked on the outside world as it passed by in a blur. Aside from the others and their constant talking, the only thing settled on my mind was none other than the future. There was plenty to be stressed about, all the while not all of it was centered around the upcoming stress of being transformed into a leader—if that were possible at all for me.

About halfway through the ride, a mare behind a snack cart made its way through our car. Food-wise, there were small bags of potato chips, candy and granola bars, and even cookies, though not freshly baked. For drinks, there was the option of water, coffee, and cans of soda. I gave the mare a few bits, which she exchanged with by pouring a cup of steaming coffee and sprinkling it with a tad bit of sugar before handing it to me and turning to serve the other Marines, each ordering more than I did.

Keeping my focus out the window as I sipped my coffee, my thoughts once again transitioned elsewhere, and being an idea I hoped to put away for the time being. Rather than contemplating more about my classes, the only thing on the top of my mind was the thought of Rose—how she lied to me—how she spied on me—how I even trusted such a suspicious and mysterious mare as herself. I had to have gone wrong somewhere for it to have happened, and the issue I faced mentally was now where I screwed up.

Beside that, however, I already knew well that it wasn't good to stress myself over something that wasn't a problem, yet I couldn't convince myself that it wasn't just yet. Perhaps I handled how things went down between me and her wrong—or maybe I did the right thing, but did terribly by not giving her a second chance. Was I really that stubborn? No, that was Anchorage. He was a stubborn pony. If I were slowly reaching the title he earned months ago, then there must be some serious problem.

No, wait. Back to Rose. Perhaps I should have given her a second chance and just let her know when I would be ready to speak to her again. Of course it would take a lot either way for me to even ponder about regaining her trust, even if she did change just for the sake of me wanting to be in the same room as her again.

What felt like just a few seconds of thinking later transformed into a good half hour or longer of me thinking about the situation, going back and forth with an imaginary voice within my mind in a mental argument thinking about if I really hurt Rose that bad, or if I didn't at all and she didn't care about having me gone—I'm certain one side of the fight was killing the other.

Shortly later, I jumped back into reality and looked back outside the window, taking a nice, long sip of my drink. Despite the added sugar, it was still quite bitter although by then I was used to the previously awful taste of plain coffee. I continued to stare out the window, the types of trees having noticeably changed, as well as the depth of the snow in some areas compared to Manehattan, which had just barely two inches covering the ground. 

Baltimare, however, was another story. Seeing as it was located against Horseshoe Bay, this meant it was in more of a snow belt of Equestria than Manehattan was, surprisingly. Just from a guess and a peek outside, there was twice as much—or more—snow covering the ground with some drifts a third of the height of an average sized stallion.

"Next stop, Baltimare-Horseshoe Station," spoke the conductor of the train through the intercom, just moments before a few brief screeches of the wheels beneath the train as it began to brake, entering the outskirts of the city and down a very slight incline. This served as a reminder that Baltimare was somewhat situated within a valley between some larger hills to the north, and the horseshoe-shaped bay situated south and east of the city.

Sooner than later, the train chuffed slowly up to one of the central platforms of a station similar to, but larger than the one in Canterlot and wasn't enclosed like the main one in Manehattan. Compared to both of them, Baltimare's didn't compete. It didn't even come close.

As the train stopped, I stood up and grabbed my bag, lifting it over my shoulder while holding the now-empty beverage cup in one hoof, in need of a trash can to dump it into and hoped one would be on the platform or in the building somewhere. Then, with a final glance outside, I noticed two stallions dressed in uniforms rigorous to our own, though noticeably bulkier for the purpose of keeping warm. Both of the ponies, one a Sergeant Major and the other with a rank patch I had never seen before stood there, waiting ever so patiently for us to exit.

The doors opened, and in a single file line we stepped out onto the platform, the icy air immediately nipping at the exposed parts of ourselves and even enough to make the toughest-looking pony out of the group shiver, whilst the Marines waiting weren't affected by the weather. Obediently, the five of us fell into line and stood at attention before them.

"Good afternoon, Marines," the first stallion asked, the one with the strange rank emblem. "On behalf of Marine School Baltimare, I would like to personally welcome all of you here. Second Lieutenant Arc Nobis has spoken well of each of you, which only makes us happier to accept you into our school. To start off, my name is Warrant Officer Dustoff, and this beside me is Sergeant Major Snivel, but you, recruits, will refer to us by our ranks. Is that clear?"

"Yes, Warrant Officer," we answered in complete unison.

The warrant officer turned to the earth pony standing beside him. "Well-disciplined. We should make quick work of them," he stated, the sergeant major chuckling and nodding afterwards. "Now, I'm sure many of you have been informed that Officer School is basically military college, which it is, but there is a catch."

Oh, great. A catch. This should be good.

"All students of the Lunar Marine Officer School are required to enter a physical course to fully determine your strength that should very well have been built up in you during basic training, and if we notice one strength lacking, you will be sent back to undergo what us higher ranks refer to as a 'fresh session'. This also doesn't guarantee you a spot back in our school. If you fail to meet the requirements, you will have to try again next year."

The sergeant major nodded, then spoke up, "I will be managing your physical tests within the Platoon Leaders Class for the next few weeks. If you did well in basic training, this should be no problem and I would expect you to perform outstandingly and excel in your class. As Warrant Officer Dustoff has said before, this is your one and only chance for the next twelve months to get your butts into high-gear if you all wish to become officers within the Lunar Marines."

"You all will undergo similar conditions you faced during basic training and any exams that may have followed. After the first three weeks of being here, those of you who make it, granted all of you pass, you will be moved on to your normal classes that will teach you into becoming full-blown leaders," he continued, walking up and down the small line slowly. 

"It is a rather tricky course, and I pray to Luna that each and every one of you are prepared for the load of stress we will toss your way. Should I remind you all that nothing you will endure during your time in Baltimare will be easy. One other thing we look for in Marines is effort, which credits you extra points in your class and can bring you closer to passing."

Snivel concluded and trotted back to stand beside the warrant officer, him shifting his focus onto us from the sergeant major. "More will be explained once we're back on campus. For now, everypony on me, we're taking taxis," Dustoff added, walking stoically beside the sergeant major and into the station, each of us in a single file line behind them all the way to the front door.

The warrant officer raised his hoof to his mouth and whistled loudly, just a few moments later, four pony-driven taxi carriages rushed up and stopped before us. Him and the sergeant major hopped in the first one, a couple others in the second, me and another Marine in the third, and the final Marine in the last one. Thankfully the taxi ponies knew where we needed to go and didn't need to ask us to be sure. 

Compared to what Nightpath described, Baltimare didn't appear to be all that bad. The architecture of the city's surrounding neighborhoods didn't nearly have the outstanding design as those where we came from, yet they weren't junky and appeared to be rather new compared to Manehattan, which had at least two-hundred year old buildings, aside from the city's massive skyline which couldn't have been around for longer than fifty or so years.

Eventually, we pulled up to the front entrance of the place, the entire school being surrounded by a brick wall with one main wrought iron two-sided gates that were operated electronically by a gatekeeper, whom allowed the taxi ponies to take us inside onto the campus, which was massive in size and had multiple large buildings beyond two massive snow-covered fields in which the cobble path we traveled down went straight between, leading up to a fountain statue of Princess Luna, the water in the fountain not running and what was in it sat in the bottom cement bowl, completely frozen over.

The carriages stopped before a large two-story brick building, covered neatly with half snow-covered dark orange wavy tiles that made up the roof. Above the main doorway, engraved in a large stone block sitting in the place of a window, was the Lunar Marines emblem, an alicorn-like figure standing over top the moon, with a large anchor leaning sideways behind it, and the figure of a unicorn with slits for eye pupils, very much eerily resembling what her highness used to be known as for a millennia, Nightmare Moon.

Hopping out of their carriage, the warrant officer and sergeant major made their way up to the door, the sergeant major waving his hoof for us to follow. "Come on, all of you."

We followed suit, forming another line and entering one by one, out of the chilly weather and into a large open hallway that led to another door out the opposite side of the building into a courtyard that appeared to be like a small park. Between the two doors in the center cut two more long hallways on either side, us stopping in the middle. 

"Alright, now listen up. You'll be briefed shortly, then be assigned to your barracks. Yes, you will all have roommates, if not be roommates with each other as our rooms have two bunks. Chow times are at 0600, 1100, and 1830. Each barrack has it's own mess hall so there's no need to go to a whole other building just to eat. You will not be let off campus until either you graduate, you fail, or there is a national emergency and your presence is required elsewhere," Warrant Officer Dustoff explained.

"I'm assigning Sergeant Major Snivel to showing you all around so you know where to go. Starting tomorrow, you will begin Platoon Leaders Class, and yes, it will be cold. The sergeant major will collect you and others on campus and bring you outside to begin your first physical exam. After that, you will begin your Officer Candidate classes, and by the end of that, and I speak for the both of us when I say we hope by then, you will have earned the title of a Marine officer," he continued. "Also, I advise you leave your bags here. They will be picked up, inspected, and brought to your assigned rooms."


***


"Now, as Warrant Officer Dustoff stated, tomorrow will be your physical exam. It will be a short series of tests to see what you can handle and show us if there is room for improvement, and if there is anything we can teach your ourselves without having to send any of you back where you came from," Sergeant Major Snivel said, standing at the front edge of a small room with us seated in chairs, eyes locked on him.

"That is also why there will be three weeks of this in total, it will be to get you up to speed on the physical necessities of an officer, which as said before, will be followed up by your actual classes. You will be tested mentally on what you know about being a leader in a quiz, and everything will be gone over in class for the remaining four weeks, and in that final week, you will be tested once again, this time on paper and in reality to determine if you truly have what it takes." 

"I can't stress it enough either, none of this will be easy for any of you, but rest assured it will not be held against you if you fail, even in the slightest bit. You have already proven your loyalty to the Marines for being referred to our school, and there is no denying that you are already great soldiers. With that, all I expect from you today is to get settled, and please, please do follow orders and go to sleep tonight when we advise you to. While you aren't punished for staying up late, it doesn't serve you any good in the long run when it comes to the next morning and you become too groggy and exhausted to reach your full potential."

The sergeant major then trotted to the door. "All right, I've kept you five around long enough. I'd better get you settled in before Dusty does things I would prefer not to disclose to any of you," he said, eyes shifting from side to side and hoped none of us would catch on to what he was suggesting. As always, that wasn't the case and the others chuckled in response while I remained silent. Snivel rolled his eyes, then opened the door. "All of you, on me, on the double."

At his word, we stood up and formed a line behind him, the sergeant major leading us out of the small class room and down the hallway towards the main one, and out the opposite door we entered from, into the courtyard that sat between multiple similar-sized buildings that one could assume were the school's barracks. Then, at a quick steady pace, we marched across the courtyard to one of the further barracks, leading us inside through the northern door and stopping before a couple of rooms with the doors not entirely shut.

"So, since there are five of you, four will be in this room, 13B, and you—" he pointed right at me. "—will be in this room, 14A. Questions?"

I raised my hoof, the sergeant major nodded for me to go on. I lowered my hoof, asking, "Who will my roommates be, sir?"

"I'm afraid your room has no other ponies occupying it, therefore you have it to your own until somepony else comes in. And please, private, just because you will have the room all to your own does not grant you permission to do your own personal stuff in it. I've had to clean up so many others' messes in the past that I can't warn you enough."

The others burst into a chuckling fit for a short moment while I stood there, somewhat dumbfounded. I wasn't sure whether or not to be relieved about not sharing a room with anypony else. Sure, I would enjoy the peace and quiet, yet it was nice to have even just one roommate to chat with every so often when neither of us were busy. The idea of being alone for the next two months didn't help much either, and meant I would most certainly be spending Heart's Warming and New Years pent up in a small twin-bunked dormitory room. 

The sergeant major then left us to go into our rooms, mine sitting across the hall from the others'. Pushing the door open, I entered the much cooler room, a chill running up my spine as I did so and immediately buried my neck into my shoulders and shivered lightly. It was almost as if the room didn't have that much heat, if any at all, until I realized the space heater sitting just beneath a single window that looked out towards a large snow-covered training field where some Marines were performing rapid push ups, and then sit ups, with a higher-ranking officer standing over them, observing their every move.

I sighed, stepping forward after shutting the door behind me, then stammering on my hooves as I tripped over my bag that somepony else brought to the room while the sergeant major briefed us. Letting out a soft groan prior to standing back up on all fours, I rubbed my forehead, having dinged my forehead on the side of the space heater, and out of a brief sense of animosity I kicked my bag hard with my forehoof, further hurting myself as I struck something hard as a rock stuffed in the bag.

I yelped in pain and then glared pointlessly down at the lifeless object, then noticing a strange square-ish shape on the edge of the bag, what ever it was not supposed to be stuffed in with the few uniforms I did bring along. Lifting the bag up onto my bed and undoing the zipper, I began taking my other uniforms out neatly until I reached the strange object and found a rather thick hardcover book, pulling it out to take a closer look.

"Hey, I never packed this..." I murmured, holding the book in my hoof, turning it over when I realized it was being held upside down, then reading the title.

The Life of a Lunar Marine by C.W.

Eyes expanding with bewilderment, I stared right down at the dark blue-colored book, the emblem of the New Lunar Marines the main picture of the book, the front cover having the camouflage pattern of the branch as well. It was one thing to not remember packing a book, yet it was another, much stranger discovery by finding out it was a book I never purchased—or rather, heard of to begin with. The author's initials and hoofwriting on the rear cover had, however, slightly rang a bell in my mind and that was as far as it went.

I repacked my bag neatly but left it unzipped, next removing the jacket, gloves and winter cap I already was wearing and hung them up beside the bed, leaving just the dark blue t-shirt and dog tags underneath, then finally settling down on the bed without bothering to flick the room heater on and opened the front cover of the book, finding a small folded piece of paper that slid out onto my chest. Picking it up and unfolding the note, I began reading.

To: Star Shooter
From: Nightpath

Heard you were leaving before you told me, even though the second lieutenant told you that day. I knew beforehand and decided to get you a little something to take with you, then found this. I haven't read it, but judging by the author, it's bound to be a good story. Who knows, it might even make you feel better after what you went though.

Enjoy buddy, and good luck with Officer School.
> 31. Cadet Star Shooter - Part I
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The first week of advanced fitness tests, inspections, and physical exams was brutal, with the weather added. Not a single day out of the seven that week was used for a break. There was no day off on the weekend. Two days after I arrived in Baltimare, a massive winter storm blew through that lasted another three and a half days and dropped an extra fifteen inches of snow and a quarter inch of ice to top it all off. That didn't hold the sergeant major back from dragging us out into the heavy snowfall and below-zero windchill. The others thought he was an insane pony looking to get us all killed, yet to me, I felt different about it. He was, after all, testing us physically. 

Soon enough, the first week was behind us and the second week of physical examinations and training was already long underway. The five of us, after a quick cup of coffee and without a bite to eat in our hungry stomachs, gathered outside early that morning. The sunshine beat down onto the crystallized, icy-glazed flat terrain of the snow, it only adding to the already excruciating, blinding brightness of the morning after a short night of sleep. If there was anything we needed more than something to eat, a pair of sunglasses was definitely on top of the list. It was a shame the only ones Marines used were pricey and, for the moment, unavailable for purchase.

"All right Marines," Snivel began. "The temperature is real low today. Nothing different in terms of exercises, but I would like one-hundred and fifty push ups, and sixty sit-ups from each and every one of you. I would also very much appreciate no whining or bitching about it either, before or during, because should I remind you, you're a Marine now. This should not be anything new to you all. Now, down on the ground!"

The five of us immediately dropped into the usual push-up position, awaiting the sergeant major's word to continue. By now, a hundred and fifty push-ups were nothing, it was simply the extreme cold that hampered things. 

"One-hundred and fifty, go!" The sergeant major leaned back on a leafless tree, clicking the small tab on top of a pocket watch that began timing us as we all began performing push-ups with ease.

The first fifty went by quicker than I could count aloud and soon, I noticed the others slowing down just a tad with myself included. Over the last few days, I found doing these exercises in the snow to be rather uncomfortable, not in a cold or wet way, but in terms of stability. With the snow, it made the ground we stood on unbalanced, meaning my hinds were holding up more of me than my forehooves were during the exercise and keeping me level. It's a hard concept to explain, but anypony in my current position would probably understand.

One-hundred and ten were down, then one-hundred and twenty, then one-hundred and thirty. I still felt myself slowing down, all the while the cold breeze rushing up my back in a small gap between it and my jacket and made me almost literally freeze for a split second, a split second more than what I needed on the exam.

"That's it, one-hundred and fifty. Up!" The sergeant major ordered.

And so we did. Within a moment of completing the amount he asked for, we were back on our hooves yet less stable than before the exercise. Mine trembled gently with weakness, shaking even more along with the rest of my body from the nippy weather.

"Huh," the sergeant major lifted a hoof to push his black military sunglasses up into his mane. "A few seconds quicker than last week's record. Two minutes and fourteen seconds," then slid them back down over his eyes and closed the pocket watch, slipping it into his uniform pocket. "When I'm done with you, that better go down to just two minutes, or less! Remember, you have a week left to make that happen! Is that clear?"

"Sir, yes sir!" We answered in unison, already bracing ourselves for what was next.

"Perfect, now. Sixty sit-ups, go!" He once again leaned back against the tree trunk and watched us over as we dropped backwards, hooves behind our heads and sitting up before relaxing momentarily and doing it again. 

I grunted each time I sat upright, spine aching simultaneously and feeling as if it was ready to just break on the spot. Beyond push-ups, sit ups weren't my thing. I was at least a couple of seconds slower than the others and wouldn't make it to sixty before Sergeant Major Snivel would stop the watch.

Twenty passed, followed by thirty a quarter of a minute later, then forty with an extra second added on. I must not have been that far behind if the others were still going. By the time I reached fifty, my body found it to be necessary to simply shut down altogether, as I went to go back down and sit up once more, I gave out altogether into the snow, hooves falling flat in the snow beside me and chest heaving, my breath turning into thick steam as I exhaled heavily. 

Next thing I knew, the sergeant major called out sixty, and within a couple of seconds of the others stopping and standing up, Snivel was standing right above me, staring right down at me with disappointment and most likely disgust.

"Did I or did I not order sixty sit-ups, private?" He asked, tucking the watch in his pocket again, the others silently chuckling behind him.

It took a couple of moments for me to catch my breath enough to speak, which I then replied, "I'm sorry sir," and not a word else.

"I hope so," the sergeant major huffed and began walking away. "Even if you pass the two-minute push-up challenge by the end of this week, I still expect you to at least reach sixty sit-ups. They are another part of your grade," he then stopped and glanced back as I weakly got up. "I'll admit, you did well enough to reach fifty. Try again later. You have all week."


***


Two long hours of push-ups and sit-ups later, we were served breakfast in the mess hall. Compared to the mess hall back in Manehattan, this place put it to shame by a mile at least. Each morning we had the choice of selecting what we wanted, whether it be eggs and toast or a couple of buttered pancakes, with this morning being scrambled eggs again. I assumed since this place had exceptionally less ponies occupying the school that they were able to cook simple but tasty dishes for us to have.

The mess hall was much smaller than the one at home base as well and had much less ponies eating in it. In fact, half of the Marines in there were campus staff, many of which being security guards on their lunch breaks despite it being nearly ten in the morning. 

After receiving my tray, I sat down at a table with the others in my class squadron—as the sergeant major referred it to—and began eating while the others chatted up a storm about training, their favorite weapons, and everything in between. I still felt a sense of hesitation to add to the conversation, believing they'd come back with an embarrassing statement about how badly I failed at one of the physical tests earlier. Maybe it just wasn't a good idea to sit with them at all. I then began contemplating ways of sneaking to another table without any of them noticing.

Or... I could just get up and walk to the other side of the room with my tray and sit down without a word. I really should think things through without doing something and possibly make things worse, which to my luck, wasn't the case this time. The others didn't notice my exit, thankfully, but now I found myself sitting around where some higher ranking officers were enjoying their meal, somewhere most ponies of my rank tended to avoid. Not that it was an offense or anything, it was just frowned upon by some higher ups.

"Hey, private," said a voice directly in front of me from across the table. "Is this table taken?"

I glanced up from my tray, catching onto the taller figure and seeing it to be the warrant officer. "Morning, sir," I replied with a salute. "Not at all. It's just me."

"Ah, good," he said, setting his tray across from me and taking a seat. "Something wrong, private?"

I glanced back down to my tray and gently poked at my food with the white plastic fork in my hoof. "Just tired is all. I'm lucky if I get six hours of sleep anymore."

"You're not the only one to tell me that," Dustoff said, shoveling a bite of his breakfast in and chewing for a couple of seconds and then swallowing it down. "Is that really why though?"

"Come again?" I moved my eyes back up to him, head gently tilting.

"It seems to be a lot more than just a lack of sleep," he paused for a moment to take a swig of water. "Then again, insomnia affects everypony differently. Hell, I had it for a while even before I enlisted. You know what I did to fix it?"

"No sir," I answered, taking a bite of scrambled eggs.

"Emptied my mind twenty minutes before bed, then told myself to focus on the stresses of the future tomorrow. That, or I read a pop culture magazine to bore me to sleep," Dustoff shrugged. "That works too."

"I guess I could try it," I smiled weakly. "It'll have to wait until I'm back where I belong though."

The warrant officer chuckled. "Of course. But really, private. What's the issue beyond that?"

I furrowed a brow, smile immediately falling into a frown. "What keeps telling you something else is wrong?"

"The look in your eyes. The look of distress. The last time I saw somepony appear that way was right before they were deployed into an active war zone," soon, the warrant officer's somewhat stoic look faded as well. "And yet they didn't come back either. None of them did."

My ears noticeably drooped a bit. "I'm sorry."

"So am I," Dustoff sighed. "Correct me if I'm wrong, but, you're stationed on the Eclipse, yes?"

"Yes sir," I replied with a gentle nod.

"I heard about the pirate attack, not so much about the condition of the crew. Not much information was given from main command nor the newspaper. Is that it?" He asked innocently.

Slowly I nodded after a short pause. "Two sailors killed in an explosion right in front of me, another shot in the head a few yards away, then my friend got shot as well. But, he's okay now. Still making a bit of a recovery but he's back to his old salty self."

Dustoff chuckled at that. "I take it he's a sailor?"

"Bingo," I said. "The first day left him woozy, then the week after that he was cussing out the doctor trying to get him to heal faster. Every time, the doctor won the battle."

The warrant officer chuckled again. "Sounds like he was pretty lucky then."

"Yeah..." I smiled weakly again, returning my focus to eating without saying another word.

"You're... happy he's okay, aren't you?" Dustoff's gentle smile once again disappeared.

"Of course I am," I said with a half-full mouth, then swallowed. "Apologies. But yes, I am. I couldn't be happier that he made it out in one piece. It's just..." I stopped.

"It's just... what?" Dustoff motioned for me to continue.

I let out a very gentle sigh after a couple of moments of complete silence. "I can't get any of it out of my mind. It's probably the reason why I can't sleep much anymore, because I'm afraid of it all coming back to me in a nightmare."

"I understand," the warrant officer nodded once. "But don't you think it's time to see somepony?"

"The sergeant major?" I sighed again. "Yeah, he probably wants to lecture me on the sit-ups that I can't do."

"No, no. I mean, somepony. A psychiatrist. One that specializes in helping current and former soldiers with post-traumatic stress. It sounds like you really need that talk."

"I don't need to put my problems onto somepony else, sir. That's just—"

"That's not a suggestion, it's an order. From the bottom of my heart, I'm ordering you to see somepony when you get back to Manehattan. I won't hesitate to tell your commanding officer and section sergeant either, because they'll push you to seeing one more than I will," the warrant officer glared at me slightly.

My ears and head fell slightly, and I slowly nodded. "Yes, sir."

"Good," Dustoff nodded. "Now finish your breakfast, you've still got a long day ahead of you."

As Dustoff went to continue eating, I did as well, remaining silent and not making eye contact throughout the rest of breakfast.


***


Once the five of us were finished eating, the sergeant major collected and brought us back outside as a slight breeze blew across the area. With the current temperature, even a gentle breeze was enough to make it feel five degrees colder than it actually was. Sergeant Major Snivel once again had us in the snow, loading more and more push-ups onto us until eventually we did reach the one-hundred and fifty mark, all of which we did with much ease, but again the sit-ups were a problem for me. 

"Come on, private. The clock's ticking," Snivel sighed with annoyance, focus shifting between the stopwatch in his hoof and me while I strained to reach the goal.

This time I slowed myself down, not going at it like before to avoid completely giving out. I wouldn't make the time limit like he wanted but the least I could do was make sixty, and I was already just over halfway there, although I was still taking much more time and the others were long finished. Quickly I reached forty, then forty-five, and then fifty, every time another small clear bead of sweat formed on my forehead. Man, was I really this pathetic?

"Getting close, private. Don't stop now," the sergeant major pressed. With soft grunts, I kept going, passing fifty-five quicker than I did the last five. Then I felt a strange surge of energy, and within an instant, I kept going. And going. I wasn't stopping. I didn't notice the sergeant major's eyes opening as well as the other Marines standing there watching with awe.

"Private... private..." The sergeant major tried to grab my attention, his attempts not working. "Private!" he then shouted at the top of his lungs, and I stopped.

I panted quickly and stood up. "I-I'm sorry, sir..." I wiped my forehead, slowly catching my breath.

"Incredible... how did you do it?" Snivel asked, looking at the now-paused stopwatch and me back and forth. "Earlier you were barely able to crack fifty, now you broke seventy. What the hell?"

Immediately I tilted my head with confusion. "Say that again, sir?"

"Seventy sit-ups. Even then you were slowing down. What happened?" The sergeant major repeated himself, tucking the stopwatch away in his uniform pocket. 

"I... don't know. I just felt energetic and kept going. It's not like me," I shrugged lightly. "But thank you for giving me some more time."

"Don't mention it. At least you did make it to sixty this time," Snivel winked. "That's it for that, Marines. Head back to your barracks. Today is a short session because I learned while you all were eating that the base lieutenant is out sick, and his class is in need of a teacher, so I am the only one available for the job. Just take the rest of the day to relax, alright?"

"Yes sir," we answered in unison, then falling into line as the sergeant major led us back to our barrack. 

Sergeant Major Snivel dropped us off at the barrack, leaving us to go to our rooms while he galloped off to get to the other class waiting for him. I walked into the building and down the hallway to my mostly-vacant room and put my hoof on the knob to step inside when I was stopped by a hoof resting on my shoulder.

"Hey uh... Star, is it?" Said the unicorn Marine who stopped me, the dark red unicorn having squared glasses on.

I turned around to face him, then nodded. "Star Shooter, yes. What's up?" I eyed him, a bit dumbfounded that he even bothered to speak to me.

"So... about that burst of energy you said you had..." The unicorn smiled nervously. "That was my doing."

My irises shrunk to pinpricks when the words hit me, and instantly after I glared daggers at the stallion. "You did it?"

Fearfully, the maroon unicorn nodded and gulped deeply. "You were struggling and I couldn't sit back to watch you. You wouldn't have made it to your goal."

"Yeah, but now the sergeant major and whoever else is going to read my file will think I can do seventy sit-ups when in reality I can't even make sixty! How is that even cool?!" I scolded the unicorn, who recoiled back a step.

"Hey, hey, there's no need to yell. Please, let me explain—"

"No, no explanation. There is no explanation! You do realize that we have to do this all over again tomorrow and for the rest of the week, don't you?" I cut him off, glare becoming only colder and my face leaning closer towards his own as he took another step back.

"I-I'll just give you more bursts of energy... I-it's no big deal, Star!"

"It's a big deal to me because you just made me lie to everypony!" I quickly turned tail and swung the door to my room open, stomping inside.

"Star, wait—"

I slammed the door shut, the sound echoing throughout the entire hallway and locked it. With a frustrated groan, I slid my back down against the door and I sat in front of it, hooves over my face and now almost completely still with my body trembling with anger. I then took the cap right off of my head and threw it across the room, shouting in that direction and my blood boiling to dangerous levels within. Now I had worse things to worry about.
> 32. Cadet Star Shooter - Part II
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Four more days later and I still couldn't come across any sense to keep myself calm. How would I? I initially unknowingly cheated an exam thanks to somepony else. Because of that, I desperately needed more time than what I had to practice and be able to make sixty or more sit-ups. Gratefully that time did come. Sergeant Major Snivel was the next to call off sick, leaving us with nopony open to watch us over and meant we had all day today and tomorrow to do what ever we pleased. The others hung out in their room, as did I, but I spent much of the day trying to prepare.

On the floor for the third time that day, I pulled myself up without moving my hind legs or rear, crunching my body into a curl and grunting as I did so, then easing myself and slowly falling backwards where I started the process again and again. "Forty-five... forty-six... nngh. Forty-seven... forty-eight," I counted to myself.

It was around here where I usually started to slow down and eventually stop altogether. Enough was enough, I wanted to beat sixty. I needed to beat sixty. I had no other choice. To at least reach the classes necessary to become an officer, one must pass every physical exam. Right now it wasn't looking all too good.

"Fifty... Fifty-one... fifty-two... fifty-three... Ghh, damn it," I grunted and strained more. "Fifty-four... fifty-five... fifty-six... Fifty-sev—"

My exercise was cut short not due to myself but a knock at the door. Sighing with minor frustration, I wiped some sweat off of my forehead and stood up and unlocked the door, opening and peeking outside through a gap wide enough to fit my head. Standing directly outside was the same maroon unicorn that made things worse. 

I glared daggers at him and didn't make another move. "Can I help you?" I asked in a deadly tone.

The unicorn nervously gulped and hesitantly made eye contact. "N-no, Star. But... can I help you?"

"Help me with what, exactly? Screw me over again?" 

He shook his head, keeping his light green eyes locked onto my own. "I want to help you with sit-ups."

"Oh, what, are you going to give me another burst of magical energy and make me cheat the test again?" My voice raised slightly, surprisingly the unicorn didn't recoil this time.

"No... that was a huge mistake of mine and I want to fix things. Just let me in and we'll get things done. If anypony shouldn't pass the final physical exam, it's me for what I've done," the unicorn's ears pinned back slightly.

I eyed him for a half of a minute at least, then with another gentle sigh of annoyance, I opened the door completely and stepped out of the way. "Be my guest. Just know that I won't hesitate to toss you out the window."

Gulping, he nodded and strode inside with me closing the door behind him completely.

"Now, what have you got?" I asked, turning to him with a bitter look on my face.

He glanced around the small room slowly, ears further falling back. "You're here all alone, aren't you?" Then he peered back at me.

"Yes, I am. Is that a problem?"

"No... Well... I guess—" he sighed and turned to face me directly. "Never mind that, I suppose we could get started. You can go as far as fifty under your own strength and without any aid, correct?"

I nodded in response. "Close, fifty-seven. I was trying again before you came and that's as far as I got."

"Hey, now that's not too bad. You're already improving since... you know," the unicorn chuckled in innocence. "Any who, why did you stop there?"

I narrowed my eyes onto him. "Because you knocked," I answered grimly.

"Oh, heh, of course. But that is still good, we might not have to do much here. Can you go again, like, right now?"

"I can try. No guarantees. I've been taking breaks in between."

"Then show me what you've got."

Slowly I got back down into position on the floor, placing my hooves behind my head and laying back flat. There, I begun by sitting upright and easing back down again while the maroon pony watched, and I stared right back up at him to ensure he didn't try anything with his horn. A minute passed and I reached fifty, and was noticeably starting to sweat again. Still watching, the stallion motioned for me to keep going each time as I grunted my way through fifty-five, then fifty-six, then fifty-seven, then fifty-eight. 

"Sixty!" The unicorn threw his hoof up and smiled big. "What did I say? Not much work after all."

I sat back up, giving him a gentle stare of exhaustion mixed with bemusement. "Where did you go to school at? I counted fifty-nine."

The unicorn shook his head and lowered his hoof to pull me up with a continuous smile. "You counted number twelve twice, I heard it in your mumbling. I counted sixty."

I took his hoof and stood up straight, eyeing him with further bewilderment. "Then what did I do wrong before?"

"Well, you were pressured to do it. Here you just did it because you wanted to."

"What does that have to do with anything?"

"It has to do with the whole deal. When the big test comes, ignore the sergeant major and go for it like you want to impress some mares on the beach!" The maroon pony's eyes twinkled with glee. 

"But... why would I be trying to impress a bunch of mares on a beach?" I tilted my head.

His smile faded and next I took a gentle punch to the shoulder. "Just pretend that's the case, please. You can't screw this up any more. You made sixty sit-ups no problem, just keep it up and you won't have any issues."

I sighed, then nodded. "Right, sure," followed by a light smile. "Thank you."

"Don't mention it," the unicorn grinned. "Just keep it hushed up and we'll both get out of here in one piece, alright?" He said, making his way to the door and opening it to walk out.

"No problem," I nodded once and watched him go. "Hey, uh, I never got your name."

"Javelin Charm," he winked back my way. "I already know yours, so it's no use telling me again. I'll see you at the end of the week."


***


I woke over an hour prior to sunrise with an exhausted groan feeling my muscles refuse to loosen up and allow me to move. The last couple of weeks had finally caught up to me, and with my luck it just had to be on the last day of physical examinations. At least if I could get up and take a warm shower, simply moving around would be just a tad easier. 

I slowly pushed myself up, hooves trembling beneath me and threatening to give way with gravity desperately hoping to slam me back down onto the bed. My muscles creaked and had spasms at every little movement I made, and more soft whines of pain came out while that occurred. 

The struggle went on for at least five more minutes and remarkably I was able to stand up. It was like the beginning of boot camp all over again. Now I was up. What next? I needed to get to the bathroom.

My hooves and hinds continued to threaten collapse, while every tendon and muscle cramped harder and made the ever-so short walk to the shower extremely difficult. Finally I did enter the bathroom and reached weakly past the shower curtain to start the hot, steamy water to soak under for as long as it took to ease the pain.

Raising one hoof and stepping inside, followed by the other, then came my hinds. At last, the water shot out through the shower head and patted down on my mane and coat, the warmth doing it's gradual job and softening my body enough to move about comfortably with only minor shots of soreness catching on every so often.

Compared to recent showers I took, this one was much longer and was I ever happy to make it so. I stepped out of the shower carefully over ten minutes later and dried myself with a raggedy white towel, trotting out with it around the back of my neck and changing into my uniform in preparation for the day ahead.

Today was the big day. It was uncertain when the sergeant major would collect us. I assumed it would have been earlier than he had been over the last couple of weeks and felt it was a good time to get ready while I had the time, although another possibly long bathing session would be necessary later on.

I pulled the string connecting to the lamp in the room to turn it on, giving the room much needed light although it wasn't that much overall. I reached under the bunk bed and pulled out the novel gifted by Nightpath. Between the time I first started reading it and now, not much progress was made in terms of reading thanks to training and I only made it through the first couple of chapters. The premise of it already made it seem to be a great story to read, although so far it covered the protagonist's life before enlistment.

Sitting back carefully on my bed, I started where I left off within the book in hopes of doing so peacefully until Snivel planned to get us outside to finish off our two week-long physical examinations and training. At long last, the end of the body torment was here. Assuming every one of us passed on to the officer classes, that left the mental stress yet to come.

Very soon, as I continued to read, the story itself became more enthralling the further I went. The third chapter passed quickly and moved on to a much longer fourth chapter with me too focused on reading it to realize some gentle light was peeking up from the eastern sky, the direction the room's window faced.

Just a few minutes over an hour passed after the book was picked up with still no audible signs of Sergeant Major Snivel coming to wake us up—well, wake everypony else up. It shocked me. I anticipated the sergeant major to be stomping down the hallway to drag us outside by now seeing as it was, after all, the last day of his side of things before moving on to the next class.

More and more minutes passed with me reading the story further, now at the end of the fourth chapter finally. In it, tension rose as the protagonist had to face his drill sergeant father after receiving a rather good grade on a school assignment, though not high enough to please the older stallion. Why did this scenario feel so strangely familiar? Have I read this book before? No, I couldn't have. It was a newer book. 

My eyes widened gradually as they gazed upon the final paragraph, the arc of the first conflict within the story. The pony's father had thrown him against the wall and left him pinned there by his own bare hooves, their muzzles less than a hair apart and the older stallion staring into the protagonist's soul in a figurative way. Then it came. The pony was off to boot camp. Just like that.

I snapped back to reality hearing the polite yet audible three knocks from the door. I grabbed the small plastic bookmark off of the bed beside me and left it where I stopped reading, closed the book, and stuck it back beneath the bed. "I'm up!"

The door opened and in stepped Sergeant Major Snivel. I hopped up off of the bed and stood at attention. The stallion looked me over carefully. "That's surprising. Everypony else is just waking up. What's up with you?"

What was up with me? "Motivated, sir," damn you, stupid liar of a mouth and mind.

"That's the spirit, Private," Snivel grinned softly. "Come on out, help me round up the others and we'll get to work."


***


Upon the other Marines waking up and coming out into the hallway, we filed up and followed the lead of the sergeant major as he took the five of us down the barrack hallway and outside where the sky was mostly overcast with thick, grey clouds. Thick, grey snow clouds and nothing else. That time of year it was easily evident what type of clouds they were. The air wasn't any warmer than it had been lately either, this time without the whipping, frigid breeze thankfully. 

We marched down the now-shoveled and salted walkway to the same spot we'd exercised every day for the two weeks previous to today. By now I expected there to be marks of mud in that spot from how much it was being used. It wasn't so, thankfully, and saved us a trip to the on-base dry cleaner.

"Alright, Marines. You know the procedure, but today I'll be mixing it up a bit. Sit-ups first, then push-ups. More push-ups this time. Let's go with ninety," Sergeant Major Snivel grinned as he said this, a collective, exhausted groan between the five of us instantly causing that to be wiped away from his expression. 

"I can make it one hundred if you would like," he added. My eyes widened and the rest of us shook our heads quickly, hoping and praying he wouldn't dare to do so. "That's what I thought. Now, sixty sit-ups. Go!"

We dropped backwards into the sit-up position and proceeded to perform the exhausting exercise, this time with me being able to keep up with everypony else.

Counting mentally, I passed forty with ease. Fifty came not long after. I was in the final stretch. This was it.

Fifty-two—fifty-three—fifty-four—fifty-five—fifty-six—fifty-seven...

Out of the corner of my eye, suddenly, I caught Javelin completely giving out on the ground opposite of the pony beside me, chest heaving and cheeks noticeably pink above his maroon coat color. Was he finished already? I couldn't check. I had to finish. Three more to go.

"Sixty, that's it, everypony stop!" Snivel ordered, stepping up to us, primarily the maroon unicorn and stared down at him with disappointment as I stood up with the others. "Unless you, corporal, can convince me that you beat everypony else to sixty sit-ups, I'm afraid to say you're done here."

The others gasped. My eyes opened wide. Javelin's ears pinned back and tears began to swell in his ducts. Last but not least, the sergeant major stood there, still looking him on directly with little emotion showing aside from his disappointment in the stallion.

"Sir, I—"

"No excuses. If you can't finish a task as simple as this, I don't see how you could do well in the field of leading your own squadron. That is just sad, son," Snivel cut him off with a rising tone of annoyance, then eased himself. "I'll arrange a taxi to pick you up and take you to the train station."

"Sir, wait," I stepped forward. "I didn't make sixty either. Not because I gave up, but because you didn't give the rest of us time to finish. You called sixty when the first pony reached it and left it at that. You can't expect everypony to finish at the exact same time."

"I'm sorry, Private, did I ask for your opinion on this? Get back in line and get your nose out of it," Snivel pointed back towards the other Marines, him speaking with once again a ticked-off tone.

"You could also call it standing up for fellow Marines. Isn't that what we're all supposed to do, stand up for each other no matter the situation? What you're teaching here is that the first to finish everything you throw at us is who gets to decide for you who needs to go, not only that, but somepony who came so close to finishing the exercises you ordered, sir. 

"I don't know who else didn't finish aside from me and Javelin. All I know is, if somepony makes the slightest error in a physical exercise rather than a decision made mentally, you're the first to jump on them. Advanced physical integrity isn't even something Marine officers require if they have already been through basic training. Why is it such a big deal here? I could have sworn officer school was about teaching us leadership, not what our bodies can handle."

The sergeant major's expression turned cold the further I went. "Private, I do not appreciate your tone. Unlike Javelin here—" he then shot the maroon unicorn a deadly look. "—you did what you were told and didn't question it. You didn't give up like this poor excuse of a Marine did. Now you shut the hell up before I write to your commanding officer to have you dishonorably discharged."

"Do it for all I care, sergeant major. Just know that a train is faster than a mail courier. He will know the truth far faster than you can get the letter in the outbox," I paused, then took another step closer. "Sir, you are a disgrace, to us and the rest of the Lunar Marine Corps."

The stallion let out a soft growl when I stepped back into line. The other Marines' eyes were shrunk to pea-sized pupils while they looked at Snivel. Deep down I realized this could very well be the end of my career. What did I care? I said what I needed to say. Javelin would have done the same, as with the others I hoped. 

"Then so be it. Tell your commanding officer what you would like to, assuming he would even care about what a private has to say. Good luck explaining to him why you're back so early too. You and Javelin had better be gone by tonight, you hear?" He poked his hoof towards us, glare softened slightly but not gone.

"Yes, sir," me and Javelin said in unison, then trotted off back to our barrack.

This was it. This marked the end of officer school. But why did I feel so... happy? It was over. I could go home. Not as an officer, not as a leader. No, I could go home and still be a Marine.

Me and Javelin walked side-by-side to the barrack while the others resumed. My posture was far apart from Javelin's as his was slow and sluggish, and his head was drooping. I moved my eyes over to him, raising a hoof to rest it on his shoulder.

"Don't take this too hard. I did what needed to be done, even if it screwed us over in the end."

"I'm just shocked you did that... that you stood up for me after you hated me just a few days ago."

"What can I say? You helped me out, I owed you," I smiled softly, as best as I could to try and comfort him.

Slowly his eyes met mine. Then a small smile crept across his muzzle. "Were you being serious about reporting him?"

"I don't fake that stuff. I meant it. When we get back, he's screwed."

"Don't screw him over too much, alright? He'll want revenge. Karma is a real bitch when she gets you."

"You can say that again," I said, pulling the door open for him and following Javelin inside.

The both of us separated to go into our rooms where we commenced packing the few things we brought. I looked around the small room once I was finished and took a deep breath, exhaling quietly. I wasn't going to miss this place, not one bit. In fact, I yearned my old barrack. My old barrack with my stubborn, slightly annoying, but also emotionally scarred roommate. 

Javelin knocked gently on the door frame, standing in it with his bag over his shoulder. He was smiling carefully despite his undoubted heartache of being exiled from officer school. "Ready to go?"

"More ready than I'll ever be," I answered honestly and carried my bag over to the door, shutting off the room's light and closing the door behind us. "To Manehattan we go."

In front of the main building on campus waited a single taxi carriage, the pony driving dressed in a thick grey winter coat that went as far back as his hind legs and black snow boots on all fours reaching up just above his knees. Me and Javelin hopped up into the carriage and took a seat and off we went to the train station without a single goodbye from anypony.


***


Soon, Baltimare was long behind us with endless pine trees and snow-covered fields dashing past the train window, moving quickly northwards. Manehattan was a short ride away from Baltimare unlike it was from there to Canterlot. Within a couple of hours the train pulled into Manehattan Central station and we were off the train searching for a taxi within the mix of crazy congestion in the city due to the holiday season.

Almost everywhere we went, buildings and street lights alike were decorated to the very tip with red-ribbon wreaths with red and green as well as white decorative lights strung through them. Shops advertised in big-lettered signs of the sales and deals on merchandise they offered with huge-lettered, colorful signs on their storefront with ponies in scarves, coats, and everything in between for cold weather swarmed inside and stood in long lines hoping to find what they want to purchase without it being sold out. It was even crazier than Canterlot this time of year.

We managed to catch a taxi after chasing it a block and a half in the wrong direction as to where we needed to go, and finally me and Javelin were happy to say that we were home, although for me it was just an exaggeration. The taxi dropped us off in front of the base's only gate and discounted us when we paid. 

The guard granted us entry upon checking our identification and we trotted inside, finding the place to be the same as it had been when we left. Nothing was different. Everypony else on base followed the exact routine as every other day. Then, Javelin turned to me and extended his hoof.

"It was a pleasure, Star," he smiled softly.

I took his hoof and shook it firmly. "Likewise. See you sometime soon," I smiled back.

"I hope so too," Javelin winked, trotting off presumably to his own barrack.

I watched him leave, exhaling deeply. Snowflakes had begun to gently fall as yet another storm was pushing its way in from the southwest. I glanced up at the sky, watching slow-moving, thick, grey clouds float overhead. With a final sigh, I started towards my barrack.
> 33. Hearth's Warming Amnesty
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Walking up to the door of the barrack, I took the keys from my bag's side pocket and stuck it into the lock, and with a click, the door unlocked and I stepped inside into the warmth of the dormitory. I let out a sigh of comfort as I entered, shutting the door with my hind leg and taking the royal blue bag to my bed. Unpacking took just a couple of minutes and upon hanging the uniforms I had brought up in the small two-sided closet, I slid the bag beneath my bed and set the book just beside it.

It felt good to be home. Home away from home, that is. While I was plenty accustomed to Manehattan after half of a year of being here, Canterlot remained to be my place of housing. But now I pondered the idea of searching for somewhere to move around here, at least somewhere comfortable and not too pricey aside from the fact that I hopefully wouldn't have a psycho upstairs or next-door neighbor. That could wait a bit, however. 

Just minutes after unlocking the dorm's door, I was back out again to speak to the second lieutenant. I didn't enjoy the thought of explaining why I was back from Baltimare early but it wasn't like I could hide the truth either. I just hoped this wouldn't end in some sort of punishment. 

I walked straight to the base's main office and went upstairs to find Arc Nobis' office, expecting him to hopefully be there. Stepping up to the door, I took in a deep breath and raised my hoof up to the door, knocking gently twice. 

The deeper, chilling voice of the Second Lieutenant exuded opposite of the door, asking me to enter. I took the knob in my hoof and twisted it, then pushed inwards as I stepped inside, stopping and stiffening up to attention. "Second Lieutenant, sir."

The Second Lieutenant's head raised, his gaze meeting my own as his brow lifted with a small look of bewilderment seeing me standing before his desk rather than being at the very officer school he sent me off to.

"Back so soon, Private?" He asked, keeping his eyes locked onto mine. "You're well over a month early. How did it go?"

"I did not finish, sir," I answered honestly. "Sergeant Major Snivel ordered I return to Manehattan at once. Not due to any emergency."

"Then why did he really send you back? Failure to pass the test?" Arc's head tilted slightly.

"Yes sir." How was I supposed to bring up what else happened? This was harder than I previously thought.

"There is more than to what meets the eye. What are you not telling me, Private?" The second lieutenant asked. That helped.

I shifted a bit to remain at attention comfortably. "Sergeant Major Snivel imperiled to fail a fellow Marine for almost reaching the goal but not quite. I did the same but the sergeant major overlooked and proceeded to go after Corporal Javelin Charm, sir."

Arc eased back into his chair, still eyeing me with suspicion. "Go on, Private."

"I stepped forward to defend the corporal and thus exposed the sergeant major for nitpicking only certain ponies for the littlest mistakes. Rather than helping, he lectures Marines for just nearly performing a certain number of exercises which I found to be absurd, sir," I explained.

"State your reasoning. A pony of your rank should not bombard one of a higher rank and authority," the Second Lieutenant stated with a slightly growing scowl accompanying him.

I gulped softly. "Sir, with all due respect, physical integrity has absolutely nothing to do with the mentality of a Marine officer. One should not have to be physically strong to be a platoon leader. If that is truly the case then I believe something is wrong. Sir."

The second lieutenant stared at me for a full minute in silence. An uncomfortable silence. Afterwards, he sat forward and crossed his hooves on his desk.

"While I am still questioning your logic to have such an incursion with the sergeant major, I can't say I don't concur with you. Sergeant Major Snivel, for a while, has his beliefs that to be the leader of a platoon, you must show great physical strength and agility whether or not you have it. His job is to push Marines to their limits and weed out the ones not capable of doing so. 

"Where he goes wrong is that he also maintains the concept that all stallions of any shape or size share the same strength as, let's say, a stallion who bucks apple trees for a living. That kind of pony is almost guaranteed to show off similar vitality to that of a bull, primarily in their hinds but everywhere else as well because of heavy lifting. Not everypony can do something like that, and that's where you were in the right with this," he paused and sat back again.

"Excuse any agitation I may have shown towards you, private. You are excused for your actions. For that, I will recommend you back to the school in the future and I will see to it that he is not to have any interaction with you. I will have him be relocated and or possibly return him to his home base. I see to him as unfit to be a teacher at the Lunar Marine Officer School," he continued, then stood up. 

"Personally, I do not get along with him. Not once has he shown respect towards higher ranks as well as lower ranks and aside from that isn't friendly overall. If I were in the same position as you, I would have done the same, if not worse, although that would have had me discharged," Arc chuckled. He actually chuckled.

I grinned slightly. "Yes, sir," then wiped it away to keep my respective posture.

"But either way, I was planning on having you promoted," Arc added.

My eyes opened up a bit more. "Sir?"

He walked around his desk to face me up close. "You've shown yourself worthy in the heat of battle even at such a young rank within the Marines and even stood up for your fellow soldiers no matter the consequences," Arc rested his hoof on my shoulder. "I will call in and have your uniform prepared as well as your new rank patch so you don't have to get new ones altogether."

"Yes, sir. But, what other uniform?" I asked.

"Dress uniform. Everypony when they reach private first class receives one," he winked. "It helps you appear more formal at special events and might get you a mare or two. But apart from that," Arc went back to sit down. "I will let you know in a letter when the fitter wants to see you, so expect that in a week or two as he has to get the whole uniform ready. So, sometime between now and after Hearth's Warming."

"Yes, sir. Thank you, sir," I replied. "Hearth's Warming? I thought it was Heart's Warming."

"It goes either way," Arc shrugged. "I hear ponies say it both ways all the time. Do you have any further questions?"

I shook my head. "No, sir."

"Then you are dismissed," he stood and saluted.

I followed suit, then turned and exited his office, the door shutting on it's own slowly behind me with a gentle click. Walking down the hallway to the building's elevator, my stomach growled. It was time to eat.

Much to my surprise, the mess hall still served ponies for lunch although it was over an hour after lunch time. I stopped inside, collecting a tray and was then plated with green beans, a couple of baked potatoes, a cup of mandarin oranges soaked in their own juice, and a small carton of milk to drink. I trotted to an empty, cleaner table and took a seat. There were few others eating in the mess hall and plenty of places to sit down—not as many in terms of cleanliness. 

My stomach noisily growled the moment my tray was set down on the table and within a moment of me settling down, I began eating for the first time that day. Nothing felt better than munching down on a still-warm lunch following a busy morning, and yet it wasn't even two in the afternoon.

It couldn't have been more than two minutes since I sat down, and by now my food was long gone. It sure hit the spot, too. 


***


"Roll again, Silver," I called out with a grin.

The beige unicorn moved the plastic figure resembling a unicorn stallion in Royal guard armor two spaces ahead of where it once sat and left it there, now taking the pair of dice in a shiny silver magical grasp, shaking them profusely a few times in the air and tossing them back down onto the board. They rolled a couple of times, then came to a halt, the numbers on both adding up to seven spaces, taking him to a space where it required the player to pull a card.

Silver gently took a light blue card in his hoof and held it up, narrowing his eyesight to read it carefully. "Water main burst on 82nd street. Go back four spaces."

With a grumble, Silver moved his figure back the four spaces as stated by the card. Both me and Solar chuckled while Anchorage watched in amusement, a widened grin crossing his muzzle.

"Better luck next time, ol' chum," Anchorage gently nudged Silver's shoulder, the beige unicorn once again grumbling in an inaudible language under his own breath. It was then his turn, his figure being none other than a pony in a naval crackerjack uniform. He scooped the dice up with his wing and closed it around them, shaking the dice and tossing them gently onto the board, then moved his figure ahead five spaces and overtaking my figure.

"Damn you!" I shouted, taking the dice in both hooves and tossing them down. Ten spaces to go ahead, putting me once again ahead of Anchorage and now Silver. I took my figure, a firepony, and moved it forward.

The game we were playing I considered to be an early shared Hearth's Warming gift between them and was something we could play in our free time. The game itself was named City Escape and was based around exactly that. The setting itself was in a partially destroyed version of a slightly altered Manehattan after the events of a devastating disaster with the true cause of the destruction mixed around multiple natural disasters. Anchorage believed it to be an earthquake followed by a tsunami, since parts of the city were collapsed and underwater, Silver and Solar assumed it was the result of powerful magic in the wrong hooves, while I just thought it was a fun game.

The objective of it was quite similar to Monopony, in which the players had to survive for as long as they could in the city and even try to get lucky enough to be able to escape without being killed by the environment and the spaces around the board were endless. Some spaces could be landed on that meant instant death, such as falling into a pool of magma or being crushed by a collapsing skyscraper, and even areas of sunken street now full of water with said space having a small stack of cards, there being a two-thirds of a chance of survival where your figure could swim to the other side, be miraculously rescued, or just drown instantly, it was up to the cards to decide. All we knew was, the last pony on the board wins.

Solar's turn was next. He took the dice in a golden aura while taking a sip from a can of soda, then threw them down on the board. Six spaces, which took him right to a chance card. He moved his figure, then picked up the card to read. The next moment, his pupils shrunk to pinpricks. "Killed by a grenade?! What the hell!" He shrieked.

All of us minus Solar burst into a fit of heavy laughter, the shriek of anger in the tone of his voice only adding to the humorous moment. He glared at us, Silver laying flat on his back and holding his stomach with tears squeezing out. Solar crossed his hooves, using magic to flick his figure off of the board as he was now out of the game for good. 

Over a minute after was when we did finally settle down, although Silver found himself to still be still softly chuckling from time to time as he caught his breath and wiped the tears out of his eyes with a hoof. "Oh man... haha! My sides hurt."

Solar, scooting back away from the board, continued to pout. "Screw this game! Killed by a grenade... who even threw it?!"

"It's just a game, Solar," I grinned. "No need to rage on about it. Besides, you'll be the one laughing when one of us dies, just give it some time."

"Hmph!" He turned and looked away, staring towards the blind-covered window while we kept on playing.

"Hey, Star, you really never did tell us. What made you come back early?" Silver asked, taking his turn on the game and moving his figure.

"Well, to put it short," I paused briefly to take a sip of water. "The sergeant major there was a total dick and was nothing less than that."

"What happened?" Anchorage grinned, looking up from the board as he shook the dice.

"Let's just say he was extremely harsh on ponies because they missed a couple of sit-ups. I mean, if he were a drill sergeant at boot camp I would see why, but it's officer school! It's where they teach you to become a Marine officer, not to become more fit than you already are. I told Arc and he thought it was ridiculous."

"You told the Second Lieutenant?" Anchorage's grin grew.

"Oh, yeah. I even said I would, not that the sergeant major cared. Arc asked why I was really back so early and he got just that," I shrugged. 

"Huh. What is he going to do about it?" Silver glanced up to me.

"Well, he says he's going to handle it one way or another. Supposedly he still wants me to finish the classes, so there is another chance that I will be going back there. I have no clue when though."

I paused to take my turn in the game and moved my figure a couple of spaces forward. This could go on for a long time.


***


Just like that, Hearth's Warming was in the past. The craze of the holiday settled slightly, allowing for not only us but the rest of the city to adjust back to normal, although New Years was still in the near future. Thankfully it didn't attract as many ponies as Hearth's Warming did. Then with the holiday behind us, I was back to my normal shifts. 

Within the two days after, Ashfall returned from holiday leave to see his father in Whitetail Woods. Even then when he did step hoof on base, almost none of us recognized him. The stallion walked in with a red plaid flannel button-up shirt on, work gloves, a dark blue beanie, and even a five o' clock shadow visible on his chin and lower cheeks. Definitely unrecognizable to everypony but myself. If I hadn't known any better, I would have said the poor pony looked like a stereotypical lumberjack. Then again, it wasn't like he was ashamed of it. He grew up on a lumber mill.

"So, how was your trip?" I asked him with a grin as he walked up the steps of the barrack carrying his bag.

Ash grumbled and set his bag down beside him. "At least you recognize me," he stopped to glance around then turned back to meet my grin. "It went well. Me and my father got each other up to speed on either side and we spent one day chopping up wood. Compared to my old self, I'm rusty when it comes to that," he said with a chuckle.

I laughed a bit in return. "Sounds like fun. Run into any bears along the way?"

"For once, no. I guess they're all hibernating or something," he shrugged. "Hey wait a minute, you're back already? What happened to officer school?"

"Long story short, I got screwed over along with somepony else but I took care of that situation. Well, as best as I could anyways," I sighed. "Better luck next year I guess."

"I suppose so. Any who, you look like you're heading out for your shift. I'd better let you go," Ash winked. "Plus I'd better get unpacked and stuff."

I chuckled softly. "Alright, Ash. I'll see you later."

"Likewise," Ash smiled, picking his bag back up off of the floor and carrying it around me to his room further down the hallway.

For once, there were numerous breaks in the cloud cover above and sunlight seeped through in bright beams that illuminated the Manehattan skyline and gave it a slight glow. That was one of the first things I noticed leaving the barracks to begin my daily shift. The second was just how busy the base was. The place seemed to be much busier and bustling with Marines and sailors than I had ever seen. I could only assume something was up, but I couldn't stop to ask anypony.

I trotted across the base to the side of the concrete wall where I walked patrols and climbed up, exchanging spots with Halberd who this time wore heavier winter gear to conform to the cold. I commemorated him for that before he left. As I climbed up the ladder, I was stopped by a voice calling out for me down below.

"Oh, and, Star?" Halberd had stopped and was looking up at me. "I uh... have a doctor's appointment tonight and could be gone a while, and I have nopony else to cover for me, so could you possibly do it?" He smiled innocently.

Cover for him? That would be almost a 24-hour shift. No way. 

"Of course," I smiled. Stupid mouth.

"Great, thank you so much. I owe you big time!" Halberd smiled big, then galloped off to the mess hall.

I rolled my eyes and continued climbing up to the top of the wall. Outside of the base, everything was quaint and silent compared to the hustle and bustle of the inside. I still wasn't sure what was going on, unless another ship was preparing to make port.

I began my shift, walking along the wall to the very end of where I patrolled and back. As I did so, I took a misstep and set my hoof down right on a patch of ice not yet melted away by salt Halberd laid down overnight. My eyes opened wide as I slipped and fell backwards, the rifle around my neck flying off and the back of my head slamming against the concrete painfully. As the world stopped spinning a moment later, I caught the silhouette of the gun falling off of the side of the wall.

Quickly I jumped to my hooves and looked over the edge, breathing quickly and still a throbbing headache left from the blow to the back of my noggin. Great, now I had to go get it. I climbed up on the edge and jumped down, my hinds first dropping in the snow to slightly break the short fall as I landed with a grunt. I walked over to my rifle and lifted it out of the snow, wiping some of it off of the barrel and handle. Now I had to walk all the way around to the gate since I still can't fly. I couldn't imagine this day to get any worse.

"Star?!"

Quickly it was about to.

I looked up from the rifle and to the side, seeing a tan coated, auburn-maned earth pony mare galloping through the tree line towards me with just a scarf around her neck. It was Rose. The one mare I hoped never to bump into again, even worse it being right here rather than Canterlot.

"Rose?" One brow raised and my pupils downsizing to pinpricks, I took a step back as she stopped directly in front of me, panting heavily. "What in Celestia's name are you doing here?"

"I-I came... to..." she paused once more to catch her breath. "Whew... Long run. I came to talk to you."

Slowly my look of surprise faded and transformed into a small glare. "Oh yeah? About what?"

"A-a lot of things..." Rose's ears fell, her chest still somewhat heaving and cheeks red from the cold added to being worn out.

"I don't care. I have a shift to return to. A long one at that," I said, turning to walk away, only to be grabbed by her hoof latching onto mine to spin me back towards her. My rear fell back into the snow and both of her hooves took hold of my shoulders. The mare was stronger than she looked because I could hardly move out of her grasp. One movement meant pain as well as she had her hooves over one of my pressure points.

"Star, please. We need to settle this, and we need to settle it right now. Do you hear me?"

I grunted and tried to escape her hold, then yelped in pain and immediately stopped. Slowly I made eye contact with her and nodded in response.

She gently eased her grip but didn't let go. "Good. And if somepony yells at you, I'll get them off of you. Now, as I said, there is a lot we must talk about. Are you willing to talk this time?"

"Do I have a choice?"

"Not really."

"Then I guess I am."

"Good stallion," she eased herself back, removing her hooves from my shoulders. I gently rubbed the spot that felt pain on my shoulder, still eyeing her with suspicion.

"How did you even find me?" I asked, still rubbing my shoulder.

"You forgot already, haven't you?" Rose tilted her head.

I sighed softly. "Right, right. So, what is there to talk about?"

"Everything. Start from the very beginning all over again if we have to. I guess I'll do the starter," she inhaled deeply, then sighed it all out. "I announced my resignation from the Equestrian Intelligence Agency."

I grinned slowly. "This is some sort of joke, right?"

Rose, however, didn't. "I'm not kidding around, Star. I told my boss that I am quitting as soon as this whole Constitution thing settles down."

Suddenly, she snapped her head to the side and gasped, hoof pointing as well. "Star, look out!"

I snapped myself to the side to see what she was talking about, but before I could, I was knocked back and down by a large feathery mass, stunned once more. The next thing I knew, I was pinned to the ground.
> 34. The Beginning
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I squirmed aggressively in the snow on my chest beneath the larger figure who I quickly recognized to be a large bird of some type the moment its talons locked around my hooves to spread apart like a cross. The more I shifted about, however, the tighter the talons clamped around my arms and the claws beginning to gently dig into them with just the cloth of my uniform shielding the skin, not that I expected it to last much longer. 

Rose ear-piercingly screamed, having jumped back and was just standing back up on all fours. I glanced back, just barely catching the shadowed shape of a feline leg. It was a griffon! A large, one at that and was growling deeply down onto me, and it had me in a death grip in which under my own strength I wouldn't be able to escape. The only limbs I could move about still were my wings, which were utterly useless in this situation, and my hind legs which I could just barely kick upwards.

Once again the weapon I held was knocked away and miraculously fell out of reach of the creature. The tan mare ran up to it and yanked it up out of the snow. Rose panted heavily and then ran towards the assailant, raising the rifle and beginning to hit the butt end of it on the griffon's head. It yelped and took one talon off, allowing for me to rear my elbow up and ram it into its beak. 

The blow combined with the hits Rose got on it forced the griffon to let go of my other hoof. Quickly I jumped upwards and threw my head backwards to headbutt the griffon but just barely managing to. I slipped myself out from underneath it as it sat backwards, swinging a talon and smacking the rifle out of Rose's hoof and shoving her away slightly and leaving her with a long, shallow scrape on her cheek. He didn't focus on attacking Rose and kept his eyesight locked onto me. 

I fell into a defensive stance and prepared for the griffon to lunge. A stare down occurred before so, until the brown-feathered griffon opened its wings and let out a terrifying screech and charged at me, his razor-sharp claws opened. I fell backwards to dodge the attack and scarcely avoided being stabbed by the griffon's talons. 

The griffon flew just inches over me and landed a few feet away, whipping himself around as I jumped up to my hooves and glared the griffon down. This time I had somewhat of an advantage and leaped forward, body smashing against the larger creature and knocking him backwards. The attack shocked me as much as the griffon seeing a feeble pony such as myself finding the ability to throw the bigger, more stocky griffon onto his back though not able to pin him like he did me.

Now the one on top, my hoof reeled back and sprung forward, crashing directly into the griffon's beak to stun him momentarily. The griffon raised a claw and swung it through the air in hopes of striking me off into the snow off to the side but missed by a hair or two. I lurched to the side and drove my other hoof into him, bashing into the griffon's lower neck, although I imagined the hit to have been lesser due to his thick feathery coat. 

The griffon in retaliation reared his hinds and sprung them up, kicking me off of him completely and sending me flying back towards the wall. Out of reflex, my wings flew open and prevented me from slamming into the concrete but not from coming down onto the ground. I grunted upon impact but was right back up within a second, as was the griffon whom pushed himself up. He was bleeding from his beak slightly due to the many hits both me and Rose gave him, though he didn't appear ready to give up just yet. It was a fight to the death.

While the enemy regained his attack posture, I turned to Rose who cowered behind some shrubs. I panted softly and pointed off to the side. "Go, get somepony else. I'll keep him back," I returned my attention to the griffon who now stood in place with a light tremble in his stance. Surely the punches I threw would have weakened him enough for me to handle.

"W-what about you?" Rose squeaked in fear, peeking over the shrubs and shaking like a leaf.

"I'll be fine. Just go! Get anypony you can!" I ordered, this time not looking at the mare and instead keeping my gaze focused on the griffon.

The poor frightened mare galloped off to do what I told, although it would very well be over a minute before somepony could come to my aid. My eyes narrowed on the griffon, watching him brace to attack or be attacked. Seconds after, he jumped forward and took me by surprise. I took the full force of his momentum and fell backwards, the griffon landing atop me but rolling off uncontrollably and landing in the snow just above me. I wheezed, turning over and pushing myself up. 

Suddenly, his talon locked tight around my neck and cut off any way of me breathing. I gasped for air, but none entered my lungs. I gasped more and winced, being gradually lifted off of the ground. I grabbed onto the griffon's wrist cuff with both hooves and struggled to pull it off only for nothing to happen. The longer I couldn't breathe, the quicker I felt myself weakening and close to passing out completely. The griffon chuckled rather darkly and squeezed my neck tighter. If it physically could with my coat color, it would be a lighter but dark shade of blue.

Soon everything started to black out and any noise became muffled, with the only thing I could hear was the sound of my fast-pumping heart within my chest. Slowly my hooves dropped away from the griffon's arm as I felt myself going limp. Now the griffon could decide whether to let me live or not. At that moment I hoped and prayed Rose was on her way with somepony else. At least another Marine would have had better luck stopping the griffon than I did.

As quickly as the world faded and the only thing visible was darkness, I felt my body fall to the ground and fresh air rush back into my lungs. My eyes shot open, pupils downsized to the size of pinpricks as I wheezed and coughed, relieved to be able to breathe again. I even felt the cringe worthy feeling of blood rushing up to my head as I regained consciousness. I weakly pushed myself up after a couple of moments of catching my breath and caught eye of the griffon being knocked to the ground by a fellow Marine, who hit the griffon with the butt end of his rifle and pushed him against the wall.

Rose galloped up while the Marine kept his rifle aimed towards the griffon. He raised his talons and sat up with his back to the wall, beak still bleeding as well as a bloodied talon. He trembled and glared at the Marine, though thankfully didn't resist any further. Rose grabbed me in a hug, once again stealing the breath from my lungs except she didn't squeeze my neck this time. I looped my hooves around her and gently embraced the mare, her nuzzling against my neck and tears grazing against my coat. 

"It's okay, it's okay. I'm fine," I gently patted her back and kept holding her while Rose sobbed into me. I reached up and stroked her mane to calm her.

"You could have died, you idiot..." She sobbed and squeezed me tighter. "I-I could have shot him for you."

"You don't know how to use a gun..." I protested.

"I don't care..." Rose sniffled and pulled her face away from my now-soaked neck, eyes glassy with tears. "I'm just glad y-you're okay."

"Because you got somepony right in the nick of time," I smiled softly, rubbing at the faint ring mark the talon left on my throat. "Now..."

I turned and walked up towards the griffon. I rested a hoof on the Marine's shoulder, signalling for him to lower his scoped rifle. I glared daggers at the injured griffon and reached my hoof to the side, Rose handing my unmodified weapon over. I took it and held it in one hoof, then with both hooves aimed towards the griffon who trembled further now.

"Open your wings," I ordered, keeping the barrel of the gun pointing at the griffon. "Now!"

The griffon's head sunk into his neck the moment I shouted and he trembled harder, slowly complying and opening his wings out to full length. I aimed towards his left wing and shot one bullet into it. The griffon yipped out loud, and before he could shut the other, I shot the other wing, leaving them bleeding.

Next, I hung the gun back around my neck with the strap and turned to the Marine to my side. "Do you have cuffs on you?"

The pony nodded and took some from his belt pocket. "Cuff him?"

"Yes, please," I returned my attention to the injured griffon who now tended to his bullet-wounded, bloodied wings. The Marine trotted up and forced the griffon to give him his talons, then locked the hoofcuffs on. "Let's get him inside for interrogation."


***


"You caught a griffon that attacked you, I heard?" Snow Storm sipped a cup of piping hot coffee afterwards while we sat in a small lunch room within one of the base's offices.

I nodded in response, relaxed into the chair and rubbing my temple gently with a hoof to ease a small headache left from the near-death experience. I too had a cup of coffee sitting on the table in front of me. "Yes."

"What was it like?"

"I don't want to talk about it... Not now at least."

"It's alright, I understand. Are you feeling alright? Do you need to see a medic?" Snow asked out of concern, a brow raised while he eyed me.

"I just have a headache, that's all," I kept rubbing my temple, then moved my hoof to my forehead to rest my head against it and shut my eyes. Some aspirin would have been great right about now.

Finishing up speaking to a sailor in the room, Rose walked over with a cup of water and took a seat. Both me and Snow changed our focus to her. She was noticeably shaken from the incident and only stared down at the cup with both hooves on it gently.

"I'm sorry you had to go through that, Rose," I said softly.

The tan mare's head snapped upwards to look at me. She delicately smiled. "Don't worry about me, Star. I have seen much worse in my day."

"Are you feeling okay, Miss Shine?" Snow checked. He was pretty caring for anypony, especially civilians.

"I've never felt better," Rose kept her gentle smile, even when she looked back down at her cup and took a little sip of water. "I do have a small question, Star."

"Name it."

"Why shoot his wings and not him directly?" She asked.

"I did it so he couldn't fly away. It's a well known procedure even in hunting. At least with a wound to the stomach per se, he could retaliate and make it out of custody. But the best part is, rather than a body, we have a captive. We can get him to talk."

"Oh. That explains that then," Rose smiled again. "I am just relieved you're safe."

"Because of you, Rose," I weakly smiled back. "If you would have been a minute later, I would have been a dead blue lump on the ground."

She kept her small smile and scooted her chair closer to mine. She then gently shifted her cup about, allowing the water to gently circle around in it. "I just hope now that you can trust me enough to fix things between us, even if we go back to just being neighbors."

I shrugged gently. "I don't see why not. It will have to wait until things settle, however. If that's okay of course."

Rose bobbed her head in a nod. "I suppose that will work. I now know just how stressful this is, especially right n—"

The door swung open, the Marine standing beside the door moving to the side to avoid being hit as a maroon unicorn with black squared trotted inside, pieces of paper levitated in a sky blue aura.

"Lieutenant, sir—Star?"

"Javelin?"

Javelin blinked twice. "I didn't expect to see you here."

"Ditto," I turned to Snow. "Is he a part of your platoon?"

Snow nodded. "That's correct. Javelin here is my coms officer."

"I work with coordinating air and sea evacs as well as other times of need, say backup is needed. I know, it's a small world," he then turned to the lieutenant. "Sir, I have some new information. May I speak with you in private?"

"If it's about the Constitution, corporal, I would prefer it be said here while we are in private," Snow stated in a stoic tone.

Javelin blinked once more, focus shifting between Rose, then back to Snow. "Yes, sir," he set the pieces of paper neatly down on the table in front of the lieutenant.

"Now, what is this, corporal?" The white pegasus sat forward in his chair, setting his cup on the table and exchanging it for the paperwork.

Javelin took a seat in the final open chair, sitting beside Snow and scooting in. "We now have reason to believe there will be a major attack in an eastern Equestrian city within the next couple of weeks."

At that moment, everybody's heart sank. Snow froze and glanced over to the maroon unicorn. "Which city?"

"Baltimare."

"And this is confirmed?"

"Not yet. But the probability is... somewhere around eighty-five percent. Maybe ninety at most," he exhaled deeply as he stopped. "As a result, high command is ordering all Marines deploy to Baltimare at once. The Navy will stay in Manehattan but patrols will be increased. We're being sent out as well."

"High command said this?" Snow looked back at the paper.

"No one else," Javelin sighed quietly. "We're told to gather our gear and weapons tonight and ship out tomorrow. The railroad is setting up a mobile command station for us to use as well as transport us with."

"Now hang on a minute," I sat forward. The others turned their attention to me. "This doesn't seem right. Where does it say Baltimare will get hit?"

"Right here," Snow turned the report around. I gently took it from his hoof and examined it.

Recent threats and a sudden drop in rate of crime within the Baltimare Metropolitan Area, as well as suspicious shipments to and from the city suggests a possible attack by the militia, The Great Gryphon Constitution as they refer to themselves, may take place within city limits. Princess Luna in agreement with Princess Celestia have determined that deployment of up to 2,500 Lunar Marines is necessary in this situation. Evacuations may be ordered as well in the event of the city becoming a war zone.

My eyes moved back up to the lieutenant and the corporal. "But where is the proof? Nothing there said anything truly pointing towards an attack. All it is is..." I waved my hoof. "Coincidental effect." 

"Then where do you stand on this, Star?" Javelin tilted his head slightly.

"Snow, didn't you say before that a strange email was sent originating from Manehattan?" I asked, pressing my hoof on the table.

Snow nodded. "I did, why?"

"Who's to say they aren't still going to attack Manehattan? How do we know that... this... isn't some sort of elaborate plan. A diversion. That's it! It's a diversion to get half of the city's defense away. Why else would a griffon attack me here? The Navy couldn't handle a large-scale attack, nor the city's police department," I stood up. "Sweet Celestia, we need to tell somepony."

"Now calm down, Star," Snow motioned for me to take a seat. I did so slowly and uneasily. "If that were the case then my team would have been on it by now."

"But lieutenant," Rose jumped in. "This group has been known in past times to have outsmarted any military operations formed to foil them. Star might be on to something. I believe we should take his thoughts into consideration and at least be prepared in the event that he is right."

"And if he isn't?" Snow leaned forward, crossing his hooves on the table. "If we hold back and he turns out to be wrong and they do go after Baltimare, it won't be just me put on death row for abandoning high command's orders," he then sighed. "It's too risky either way you put it."

Gradually I eased back into my seat. "I fear myself being wrong and right."

The room went silent from that moment on. Nopony said a word. 

"Hey wait a minute, Star," Javelin turned to me. "Did you say you were attacked by a griffon?"


***


The four of us were escorted into the basement where some prison cells were situated. Down there was primarily vacant aside from the jail guard who, for the moment, was on his lunch break. The sailor leading us stopped before a locked cell near the end of the hall. I walked up alongside the others and stared into the block, spotting the griffon stripped of the little armor he had on. His wings were bandaged, and part of his feathers were stained a dark red from when his beak was bleeding. The on-base medics sure did work fast.

"This is him," I said to Javelin. "This is the bastard."

Javelin looked over the griffon. "Wow..." he muttered under his own breath. 

Snow put his hoof on the cell door and grinned at the griffon. "How is this cell treating you, huh?"

The griffon simply looked at him, then let out the coldest of chuckles. "It is quite luxurious, I must say. Definitely better than my former home of Detrot," he answered with a slight Bitish accent.

"With that accent, you're not even close to being from there. Why don't you sit and we have a little talk, hm?" Snow said. "That's not a suggestion. It's an order."

The griffon sat in silence for about a minute, eyeing the white pegasus carefully before moping over and plopping himself down on his haunches opposite of the door from us. "What do you wish to talk about?"

"Everything. Who you are, what you are to the Constitution, and what they're plotting," Javelin jumped in.

"Ah, yes, the Constitution," he chuckled once more. "They do not miss me. I was no one important to them. But I am afraid a lot of their intentions are kept from even me."

"Then at least tell us who you are," Snow sat down on the floor.

"My name is Crius. I am just a soldier, rest assured. The Northern kingdoms are where I originate. Before the Constitution, I spent much of my time doing work and trying to make a living. Four jobs, just barely making enough money to eat and have a comfortable place to sleep. That, however, changed," his tone changed dramatically and sounded more grim.

"My griffon twin, Aius, was more of a troublemaker from our school days on. He always wreaked havoc in little ways, until that one day. That one day six years ago. He set off dynamite in the very market I worked to pull a prank on me, on the busiest day of the week. He placed it beside a tank of a highly flammable fluid when no one was looking. The next thing I knew, the whole shop was blown to pieces, as were many others around us. Twenty-three griffons killed in the explosion, and about thirty more injured or severely injured.

"Of course, with Aius looking exactly like me, I was taken into custody and given two options of how to fulfill my sentence. Either be executed, or exiled. I chose exile. A couple of months later, I was loaded onto a military airship bound for Equestria where I was to be placed in a criminal reformation home. Again, my twin struck. 

"He was slowly growing stronger. A whole shipment of dynamite aboard the aircraft that could be triggered with the littlest of turbulence. That day was not the littlest of turbulence. A massive snowstorm was blowing through the region and hampered efforts to avoid it. Then, kaboom. The whole airship exploded. I just happened to be furthest away from where the dynamite was located down below in the cargo hold.

"I was falling. Too stunned from the explosion to slow my descent and regain altitude. I ended up falling into a large pile of snow just north of what you ponies now call the Crystal Empire, long before it reappeared. Eventually I was picked up by some ponies and griffons I believed to be the Equestrian Royal Guard from what I have heard about them. 

"But then I realized, griffons were not allowed to be a part of the guard. They took me in, kept me warm, fed me, gave me a place to sleep. They introduced themselves as The Great Gryphon Constitution. They vowed to train me, to help me become stronger, for them and the rest of my race. They knew who I was. They knew who my twin brother was. They promised to aid me in getting revenge.

"Because after I was deported, Aius later became a high-ranking military member. No one knew he was really behind all of the attacks. From then on, he changed. Although then, he convinced the whole of the Northern Kingdoms that I was the top-wanted criminal of the nation. It was then that I determined revenge against my twin would not be enough, but the whole country would. 

"Then, when Equestria became involved, our works spread against it as well. That is why we find what we are doing necessary, lieutenant. We are doing this to rid the planet of corruption within the world's superpowers, with Equestria on top of our list," Crius finished, sitting back.

Me, Rose, and Javelin exchanged looks, Snow kept staring at the brown-feathered griffon. "So, this is more of a revolution? To unite and overturn the monarchy?"

"It is not that. A revolution would be if we united the citizens of Equestria to fight for our cause. As I've said, we wish to rid the world of scum. This includes the population," Crius laughed. "Not you or your fancy military can do a thing about it."

Snow's hoof slipped through the steel bars and grabbed onto the griffon's neck, tugging him closer. "Tell us where you are going to strike, damn it!"

Crius recoiled back, reaching up and yanking Snow's hoof off of his neck with ease. "You tell me. You should already be well aware by now."

"Baltimare..." Javelin said.

Crius simply looked at Javelin. He didn't nod. He didn't shake his head. He just stared.

"Run and hide while you can. We will find and kill each and every one of you until there is no one left to fight for your precious country," Crius grinned weakly, then stood up and went back over to the small dirty bed in the far corner of the cell.

Snow Storm slowly stood back up and turned to both me and Javelin.

"Both of you, get your weapons and gear ready. We'll be going to Baltimare tomorrow."

He then trotted back down the hallway towards the staircase. Me and Javelin exchanged looks, then followed him. Rose, however, stayed behind. She looked at Crius, who was grinning evilly again. She shuddered and trotted after.


***


That evening, I stood in the bathroom of my dorm, brushing my teeth before bed. Tomorrow would be a long day. I took some water in my mouth and gurgled it, then spit into the sink to get the foamy toothpaste completely out. I washed off my toothbrush afterwards and trotted back out into the bedroom to finish packing. On my bed sat an AR-15, multiple magazines of ammunition, a combat knife within its belt-attachable sheathe, some body armor, a new uniform, an all-black helmet, as well as a mask for cold-weather use.

It was everything I needed to pack, and any more would be brought along and be available to grab once the command is set up in Baltimare. Just then, the door unlocked and in walked an exhausted Nightpath. He let out a sigh the moment the door closed behind him and he removed the cover from his head. "Hey, Star—"

He immediately paused the second his eyes caught onto the massive load of combat gear on my bed. I froze and looked at him, halfway in the process of packing my bag. Gradually, Night walked closer, looking over everything. "What is this...?"

I set my bag down on my bed and turned to face him. "I don't know if you have heard, but every Marine is being deployed to Baltimare. There's a high chance that some sort of attack by a Griffonian-based militia will take place. That's why we're being sent there."

Night eyed me carefully, ears slightly pinned back as he did so. "What else?"

I remained silent for a couple of moments. I then returned to packing. "I'm staying put."

"Star, you're abandoning orders?"

"For this time, yes, I am."

"Why so?"

"Because, Night," I glanced back at him. "I don't think there will be anything that will happen in Baltimare. I believe it will all happen here."

"In Manehattan? Why do you think that?"

"Duh, it's a bigger city. A larger population packed into a tight area only means more civilian causalities and deaths. Not to mention, sending the military to Baltimare just increases their chances of success. I mean, the Navy is staying here but they won't have the stallionpower to handle this. If the Constitution is truly as big as it sounds, Manehattan could be lost within hours," I rambled on as I packed quicker.

"Wait, wait, hold on. The Constitution?" Night's head tilted with confusion.

Soon I realized I was talking too much without an explanation. I once again set my seabag down and made eye contact with the taller brown stallion again. "They call themselves the Great Gryphon Constitution. Their mission has been and will be to quote-unquote destroy evil in the world. By evil, they consider the monarchy of the Griffon Empire, Equestria, as well as the whole population of Equestria to be a part of it. They want to kill us all off."

"That can't happen, can it? I mean... even without the military, there will be ponies that won't go down without a fight, correct?"

"It would be futile, but yes," I sighed softly.

Night's ears further fell backwards and his head dipped. "Star, you can't stay here by yourself."

I stared at him for a full minute, then nodded gently in response. "I suggest you head out and get stocked up. The surplus store will only be open for so long tonight."

Night kept his gaze locked onto mine for a full minute, then he nodded slowly. "O... okay. I will," he turned back towards the door gradually. "I'll be back in a bit," then was out the door.

I realized this was slowly turning into a situation similar to that of the one we had just before our last deployment. I began to ponder how Night would handle it this time. Then my thoughts shifted to Silver and Solar. They hadn't seen combat yet. 

This was going to be awful.


***


I woke around a quarter until eight the next morning. Strangely enough, I slept good. For once, I hadn't tossed and turned like normal when put under stress. I gently pushed the covers off of my lower half and let out a deep breath after I had sat up straight. Nightpath had already been out of bed and was in the shower, meaning once again I'd have the cold shower. Not that it mattered much to me anymore. I'd let him off this time. After all, he was going to go. Not me.

Upon him getting out, he dried himself off and let me in right after where I hopped in. Much to my surprise, the water was still very warm. He mustn't have been in for that long. Either way, my mood was not one to be changed.

I spent much of the time after the shower helping Night finish up packing. Not much was left and made it rather quick before the both of us got dressed. Shortly after, we took our bags and were out the door. Possibly for the last time. The vibes between us both were very much new. It was eerie.

But yet that wasn't the strangest part. What was, is by the time we stepped hoof in the open, the only ponies to be seen were sailors. Not a single marine as far as the eye could see.

"Shit, Night..." I peered around the base with concern. "Where are they?"

Night, also worried and bewildered, galloped up to a sailor walking by. "Excuse me, sir, where is everypony?"

The sailor glanced upwards at him, somewhat startled by the significantly larger stallion appearing beside him. "The Marines have already shipped out to Baltimare, I'm afraid. They did around five o'clock morning."

"So... we're the only ones left?"

"I wouldn't say that..." I said from off to the side, a gentle, relieved smile creeping onto my muzzle as I caught three familiar faces approaching, side by side to each other. I trotted up to the group. "How come you guys—except you Anchorage—are still here?"

"We didn't see you in the squadron and decided to wait. This meant missing the train," Silver Edge shrugged. 

"Sergeant Hardstaff told us to wait behind for you guys, so we did," Solar smiled gently.

"I hope you have a good reason for staying here," Anchorage said with a slight glare directed towards me.

I nodded to him. As I opened my maw to explain, a jolt followed by the distant pops of explosions made the six of us stumble, and everypony else on base to look towards the city. Smoke was beginning to rise towards the lower parts of Manehattan, the fireballs billowing upwards with glass on some of the buildings shattering. A collective gasp formed between us as we watched in absolute horror. 

Then it hit me. We needed to go in there. Manehattan needed a line of defense. My look of shock turned into a look of determination.

"Get ready, you guys. We're going into the city."

This was it. The war for Manehattan had begun.
> 35. Manehattan Liberation - Part I
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The skyline of Manehattan was erupting into chaos in the blink of an eye. Distant pops and crackles of explosions quickly became the only thing to be heard for miles. Thick, black plumes of smoke billowed skywards and drifted towards the west because of the oceanic winds pushing inland. This was it. This was zero hour.

"I was right..." I spoke to myself softly, standing beside my group of friends who stared towards the chaotic metropolis. One thing was for sure, we all had the same look of terror. My own look shifted and became hard-nosed. "We have to go in there."

The others' attention moved to me. They all looked at me like I was crazy. I probably was.

"Just us?" Silver Edge's head gently tilted. "That's suicide!"

"I'm sorry, do you have any better ideas?" I replied.

"Star, you're going insane. I know you were right to stay here and all, but we as a group can't take on a whole army!" Solar put as a matter of fact.

He wasn't wrong. Just the five of us, added to probably however many sailors left on base, couldn't possibly change the odds. It was suicide.

"Now hang on," Nightpath trotted up beside me and stood tall. He looked down over the others sternly.

"Star is right. We can't just sit back and let this happen. Yes, the rest of our brothers and sisters are hundreds of miles away and have been mislead to the wrong place. It could be hours before they realize what is going on, and by then, Manehattan will have long fallen. We're Marines—"

"And sailors," Anchorage added, looking rather unamused.

"And sailors," Night nodded once to the grayish-white pegasus. "It is our job to run towards the sounds of tyranny. It is our job to defend the country and ponies we love and care for, and if we do nothing, what does that make us?"

Anchorage, Silver, and Solar exchanged looks, before Silver stepped forward. "It makes us cowards."

The taller brown stallion nodded once to the beige unicorn. "It makes us cowards. It makes us appear that our own lives matter more than those in the path of danger. It makes me ask this question. Why are we Marines? Why go through all of the trouble of training, aim practice, and everything else in between if when the call of duty comes upon us, we all turn it down?"

Night's body noticeably tightened, as did his expression. He scanned down upon the others with the look of a sergeant. "I'm ashamed to be a Lunar Marine if much of my teammates are cowards. Come on, Star, Silver" he looked to his side down at me, and to Silver. "We have work to do."

The three of us turned tail and begun walking away, when two sparks of magic latched onto our shoulders gently and stopped us.

"Wait a minute," Solar sauntered over, dissipating the magic. "I'll go."

I gave a gentle nod to Solar and cracked a very small smile. I then glanced behind him to Anchorage, who stood there with worry and appeared unsure of himself. A short silence later, he stepped forward with a sigh. "Impeccable speech, but I hope you two have a plan."

"What plan could there be other than to hold them back? We can't exactly develop something until we know for sure that backup is on it's way. Like Night said, it could be hours, or worse, even days, before another Marine steps hoof into the city," I waved a hoof. "But we can't exactly go in and expect to ride it out from there."

"We should probably gather somewhere and form something, just to get us started off. Because yes, it is better than going in guns-a-blazing."


***


Rolling out a map of the city, Silver held the sides down with his magical aura, then pressed his hoof towards the lower end of the island.

"All right, so from just how it looks from our point of view, they haven't gotten too far into the city and are so far around this area—" he ran his hoof in a circle around the lower tip, including Batterneigh Park. "—For us to cross into the city without immediately being shot at would take a lot of precision with this movement There are only two bridges on the north side that we can access in time. There's the Manehattan Bridge—" Silver pointed it out on the map. "—and then there's the 23rd Street Bridge."

"Its unfinished," Anchorage cut in, his tone flat. The four of us looked up from the map at him.

"It's what?" I asked.

"Its not finished yet. The bridge has been under construction for months and still they haven't laid down all of the steel beams or connected them and what not. The weather has been taking a toll on progress," Anchorage sat himself on the floor. "Unless you have a better plan to get us across that bridge, the Manehattan one is our only shot."

"Now hang on," Silver stiffened, eyes situated on where the bridge was on the map. "If it's not too far of a gap, we can jump across, right?"

"I there wasn't a gap at all, it's nowhere near safe to cross. Even the littlest of a breeze would knock you off balance and you'd fall into the water, or on the concrete slab where the pillar sits if you're lucky," Anchorage answered grimly.

"Why would we be lucky?" Solar tilted his head.

The grayish-white pegasus turned to him with a brow furrowed. "Would you prefer a slow, painful, cold death from hypothermia, or instant death upon hitting concrete from a hundred feet up?"

The yellow unicorn shuddered. "Forget I asked."

I stood slowly. "Either way we put it, it will be risky. Crossing the Manehattan Bridge has the possibility of Constitution troops being at or near the other end, meaning we'd have to blindly time it and hope we don't all get bullets to the head in the long run. And, as you said Anchor—" I glanced at him. "—we'll be lucky to make it across the 23rd Street Bridge without one of us taking an arctic plunge."

"So, which is it? We have to pick one of the two," Silver said, looking between each and every one of us.

We all exchanged looks for a couple of long moments. I spoke up first. "I vote 23rd Street."

Anchorage was next. "Manehattan Bridge."

Solar shifted uncomfortably where he sat and sighed. "23rd Street."

All eyes turned to Nightpath afterwards. He was still tense but didn't appear nervous. "Manehattan Bridge."

Silver was left yet to put in his vote. He would decide for us which route to take. At that moment I could feel my chest pounding slightly on the outside the faster my heart pumped.

"23rd Street. That's where we're going," the beige unicorn stood up. "Beyond that, what do we do?"

I looked over the map, primarily between the two bridges in the east-central part of the city. I picked up a marker off of the table and removed the cap, making a line mark on one of the streets.

"We form an invisible barrier to hold the line at. A barricade. Surely they won't be going westwards individually. They're large enough to send small squadrons per street. If it goes down the shitter, then we will fall back and form a line elsewhere, or set up positions in buildings and rain hell down upon them," I set the marker down. "But first..."

The others looked to me.

"We must send a distress signal to Baltimare. Even if it reaches a news station, we must ensure the message is delivered to who we want it to be delivered to."

"And that would be... who?"

"Lieutenant Snow Storm."

"Just how do you plan to communicate with him? They most likely aren't finished setting up, if they've even started at all," Anchorage stated as a matter of probable fact.

"Anchorage, don't you know a fellow sailor good with Morse code?" Silver added.

"I do, why?" He asked, followed by his eyes widening. "Let's go."

Anchorage was the first out of the room, flying out rapidly into the hallway. Silver folded the map back up and tucked it away in a small waist pack, galloping out after him, the rest of us following suit.

In less than a minute, all of us were outside and attempting to keep up with Anchorage. He was a faster flyer than he appeared to be. Not that it was an issue of course. I considered this to be a workout. As would the next couple of weeks or more.

Before I realized it, we were just in front of the base's primary communications hub. It was a massive one-story building, on top being a five-floor tall steel antenna tower with red lights pecked on the edges and one at the very top. The building was situated on the far north side of the base and was barely noticeable from the main gate, let alone where I was stationed on the opposite side.

Anchorage finally landed, pulling the door open and galloping inside. We ran up just a bit behind him, having lost ground along the way due to his breakneck flying. The door slowly shut, allowing for all of us but Night to slip inside without crashing through the door. The glass shattered and the three of us came to a complete stop, staring back with parted jaws at the destroyed door. 

Nightpath groaned softly and pushed himself up, some bits of glass sliding off of his back and landing on the floor in a shattered puddle beneath his hooves. Somehow he wasn't cut anywhere on uncovered parts of his body, much to his luck. 

"Are you guys coming?" Anchorage called from further down the hallway, waving a hoof for us to follow and head peeking around a corner.

Once Night was up, we continued quickly after Anchorage and turned left at the corridor where he waited. At the end of the small corridor was another glass door that was held open by an earth pony mare dressed in the uniform style of a Marine. She pulled each of us inside, then shut the door. I stopped to catch my breath, head dipping and chest heaving. We had run clear across the base in the time frame of just a couple of minutes. 

"It is bad out there, isn't it?" The mare asked, walking up to a small panel on the wall and flicking a few switches upwards.

"Very," I answered. "Not here though. Yet." I finally did catch my breath a second after and stood back up straight, fully seeing the purple-colored mare. "You're a Marine. Why are you still here and not in Baltimare?"

"You should ask yourself the same question. It seems four of you should as well," she closed the panel up and locked it with a key. "I was told to stay put and ensure order in the base, as well as look after this place." 

"Is Circuit Breaker still here?" Anchorage trotted up. "Please, tell me he is."

"Beats me," the light purple mare shrugged. "I haven't seen him for a couple of days. He might have taken vacation leave like he's been talking about a lot lately."

"Damn it," Anchorage muttered. "Are you any good with Morse code?"

"Sort of. Why?"

"Do you have any experience with distress signals?"

The mare shrugged. "Varies on what kind of distress signal."

Anchorage breathed a gentle sigh of relief. "Good enough for me. Let's get to work."


***


From the personal memoir journal of Lieutenant Snow Storm
3rd Lunar Marine Battalion, 82nd Special Operations

I stood a block from the Baltimare train station where the temporary command shelter was being placed. A nearby hotel was friendly enough to offer the remainder of its vacant rooms to those of us there, packing in six ponies in the two-bedded rooms. Sleeping mattresses were brought along to provide for everypony to ensure no one was left out of a warm place to sleep. 

Two trainloads later, every Marine called into the city was unloaded and aiding with evacuations of Baltimare, as well as setting up our command base. It would be at least a day before communications would be fully set up. As always, however, the machine built specifically for Morse code was the first to be set up in the event of a change in plans or simply to communicate with home base, over two-hundred and twenty three miles to the north. 

With our tent set up, the process of bringing in portable computers, radios, and every little thing in between had started while I was to oversee it. Javelin Charm stood to my right, a clipboard and a pencil in his magical grasp as he wrote down on it. For all I knew it was a checklist of everything being brought in. There would be multiple tents. This was just ours.

As soon as the first crate was put down, a faint ticking sound caught my attention. My ear swiveled slightly, picking up the noise. I turned my head in the direction and saw the Morse code machine springing to life. My eyes slightly widened and I turned to Javelin, nudging him gently. "Corporal, the Morse code is going off."

Javelin gasped softly and dropped the clipboard, running right up to the machine and putting on the small pair of earphones to listen closer. He took the pencil he held and began writing down on a clean piece of paper to decode the message while I stood behind him, watching with a look of concern. We hadn't been here an hour and information was already coming in.

Then, the pencil dropped from Javelin's hoof onto the ground. 

"What is it, corporal?" I asked. There was no immediate response.

Javelin sat there, staring down at the piece of paper with shocked eyes, jaw hanging open. "No... I-it can't be!"

"Can't be what?" I stepped closer. "Corporal. What is wrong?"

Slowly, his head turned and he made eye contact with me. The look on his expression told me everything.

"Sir, Manehattan is under attack," he said with a deep gulp. "Star was right."

It was at that moment where I froze. I don't remember for how long, but long enough for the rest of my squad to surround me and try to break me out of my trance. This was every Marine's worst nightmare. Being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

I snapped back to reality and put a stern look on. I had to make an order. Not just to my squadron, but the rest of the Marines. "Everypony, pack it up, we're going back!"


***


The purple mare, Heart Line, removed the earphones from her ears and set them down beside the machine, turning in her chair. "Message sent. Now let's all just pray they get it in time, or at all."

Anchorage gently patted the mare's shoulder. "You're a true hero, Hearty," he smiled gently.

"Don't make me blush, and don't call me that forsaken name," Heart responded firmly. "What are you all planning to do?"

"Somewhere on the lines of forming a barrier in the city. We won't be able to stop many but their efforts will slow down," I stepped forth, answering her question.

"What if they flank you from another direction?"

"We will be covering all directions around us. Primarily the east. If things get out of hoof, we've determined taking up positions in some of the surrounding high rises will not only give us some cover, it will make our job easier when it comes to aiming. I hope, that is."

Heart lightheartedly chuckled. "Good luck. I would tag along, but this seems like a job for a group of stallions, not a group of stallions and a mare."

"If ya can shoot a gun and have at least an aim of seventy, you're as good as the rest of us," Anchorage rested his elbow on the back of her chair and grinned slightly. 

Heart swiveled her chair around, forcing Anchorage to lose his balance and fall over with a thud and a grunt. Looking up from the floor, he gave a light pout to her. "Hey, what was that for?"

"Don't get me wrong, you're cute, but sailors aren't my thing." Heart stood up, raising her nose and walking to the other side of the room.

"Ooooh ho ho!" Silver whooped at the burn. Anchorage pushed himself to his fours and dusted himself off, shooting a deadly look at the beige unicorn who backed off immediately.

Heart stopped before a digital map of the city, then sighed. "You boys aren't going to last an hour out there if it is truly as bad as you tell me it is."

Slowly, Night and I walked up beside her to look at the map. "Staying put and not taking action isn't an option, I'm afraid."

"Its a suicide mission." Heart peered at me.

"More ponies will die if we don't do something," I said flatly. "I won't lose anypony. Not on my watch."

She simply stared at me while I kept my gaze focused on the map, remaining silent. Her eyes moved down, then forward once more. "Then do us proud."

"Us?" My eyes slid over to her.

"The Marines. Manehattan." She paused. "Equestria."

I nodded after a short silence. "The offer is still open if you want to come with us."

Heart waved her hoof. "I have to worry about telling the others on base what to do. I'm afraid I can't."

"Then do us proud and keep the waters safe."

"Copy that," Heart nodded once. "You five best be on your way."

I nodded again in return. "Good luck, Heart."

"You worry about yourself, PFC," a gentle grin crossed her muzzle as she gave me a wink.

I gave a small smile back, before wiping it away and turning to Nightpath, nodding to him and back to the others behind us. It was time to go.

The five of us made our way out of the building in a rush. Once the skyline was back in sight, it was not evident all that much that the attackers were advancing aside from more towers of smoke spreading elsewhere. We reached the center of the base and stopped, and I turned to Anchorage.

"Do you have anything on you?" I asked hastily.

"Just a knife," he replied with a light pant.

"Head to the armory, grab what you need. We'll get ready out here. Hurry!"

Anchorage nodded and took off again, racing in the direction of the armory. The rest of us ran up to where we had left our bags and proceeded to unpack them. I started with slipping on body armor over my uniform and strapping the velcro to keep it on. Next, I switched out my cover for a black combat helmet with goggle attachments and clicked it on top of my head tightly. Lastly I snapped a holster and waist pack on the bottom half of my uniform, between the jacket and pant lines.

I took my unloaded desert eagle and shoved a full clip in the handle, cocking it and holstering it on my belt, as well as packing a combat knife in a separate, smaller holster. All that was left within my bag was spare ammunition, and my main rifle, the AR-15, laid carefully on the ground beside it. I picked up the rifle and hooked the strap around my neck for easier carrying.

Less than a few minutes after, Anchorage zoomed back with much in his hooves. He had also exchanged his patrol cap for a helmet and wore body armor over his chest. On his back sat a medium sized dark blue backpack, a holster on his waist that held a black combat machete an M1911 pistol, and around his neck, hanging by a strap, swung a scoped version of the M16. As he landed, he dropped four other backpacks of the same color and size. 

"These will be easier than seabags. Carry your ammo in them and anything else you may pick up along the way," Anchorage said, panting half heavily while he caught his breath. Surely flying back and forth at high speeds while rushing to grab all of the gear he needed in the span of just four minutes would have been tiring. "I also grabbed some water and snacks. They are already in there."

"Thank you." I nodded once and proceeded to pack the ammunition magazines I had already in separate pockets. Finally, I put one hoof through the strap and lifted it onto my back, then the other, shifting slightly for the backpack to rest comfortably. The others followed suit and, soon, the five of us looked exactly alike, apart from our colors of course.

I let out a deep sigh and looked between them. "If there is anything else any of you would like to grab, please do it now. We may not be able to get a hold of anything useful for a while."

They stayed put. I nodded once. "Operation Liberate Manehattan is a go."


***


Outside of the base, even though the action was isolated to the island of Manehattan, the surrounding areas were eerily silent. Not a single pony trotted the streets. The lights in shops were shut off and windows were shrouded with curtains that were tied shut from the inside. Aside from the weather, a different type of chill was running up my spine. Although we could thank the lucky stars that nopony was out panicking or rioting in the streets.

I trotted rather quickly ahead of everypony else, but just by a few feet. The others kept a pace behind me without falling out of the group. The 23rd Street bridge construction site was just ahead of us to the left, near a rather large luxury shopping area that I hadn't previously been to. Much of the city remained to be fairly new to me despite being here for half of a year. Apart from the famously-known business center, there was still lots of city to explore.

I turned at the small street that led onto the north end of the bridge and weaved through construction signs that told ponies not to advance any further. Going up, the bridge seemed to be a lot more stable and constructed than Anchorage had said it to be. Pavement was, in fact, down and crossing appeared easier than predicted.

"Star, stop!"

I froze at Silver's word, eyes opening wide. I looked down slowly, seeing I had stopped just inches from the edge of the finished part of the bridge. My eyes gradually moved upwards, seeing the expansive length of the incomplete overpass that crossed much of the width of the frigid Manehattan River. Down below, small but visible pieces of ice floated rapidly out to sea with whirlpools of power churning around the concrete platform that held the giant steel pillars.

The frame of the grass-colored bridge was mostly complete, and the two steel towers on either end stood tall with giant hooks at the top to attach suspension cables. Unfortunately, none were there, and were coiled up near the bottom. What I found to be strange was, not one construction crane stood near the site. The work must have really been on hiatus for a long time. And just as Anchorage stated, the breeze was gusty and would most certainly hamper crossing. There was no other choice.

"Well, who's first?" I questioned in a flat tone, brows lowering the longer I scanned over the structure's incomplete parts. 

Towards the center of the bridge was a noticeable gap where the beams had not yet been linked and riveted together, in which the wind was making either side bounce and sway gently. The thought of jumping across was nerve-wracking. Only one of us actually knew how to fly, which was the scarier part, unless Silver or Solar knew some sort of teleportation or levitation spell. That I didn't expect.

Following a lengthy silence, Nightpath stepped forth. "I'll go. There's nothing to worry about." He said out loud. The tone of his voice was enough to tell that that wasn't the case.

Slowly, Night worked his way onto the left beam. It was wide enough where he could walk normally, although stability remained necessary. The weather was not contributing to that at all. He shakily stepped forward every couple of seconds, all of us gathered at the edge and watching with pounding hearts and Night keeping an eye on every step he made carefully. One wrong move and we likely would have never seen him again. 

The brown stallion reached the edge of the girder and stopped there. He took in a few heavy breaths and swallowed a lump in his throat, just before making a leap of faith. The gap was less than a few feet, though I could imagine fear had a factor in how far he could jump. He didn't make it far, but grabbed onto the pillar with all of his might.

I gasped, jaw dropping and seeing him slipping on the icy surface, Night scrambling to pull himself up. Not once did he look downwards or give up struggling. With a loud grunt, he caught further hold of the bar and was up on it, allowing each of us to breathe a huge sigh of relief. That was one across. Four to go.

Solar was reluctantly next. Being significantly smaller than Night made crossing the bar easier, and now Night was there to catch him as well. He stepped up to the edge and jumped across the gap, landing on all fours but with his hind hoof slipping. He gasped and froze in his spot, looking back and seeing some small stones beneath his hoof fall out of sight. He ran further down the bar to wait.

"Silver, you're up," I nudged him gently.

The beige unicorn trembled heavily. Not because of the cold, either, and his pupils had shrunk to the size of marbles. I sighed and lifted a hoof to his chin to make him look at me.

"There's two ponies to catch you if you fall. It will be alright."

Silver slowly nodded in response and hesitantly made his way onto the girder, taking extra precaution at every step but having a couple of close calls before reaching the divide. He stopped there and didn't make another movement.

Solar called out from the other side. "Come on, Silver, jump! We'll catch you!" Just as his horn lit up, preparing to grab him.

Suddenly, he squealed in fear and clenched his eyelids shut the moment he felt himself lift upwards. When they reopened, Silver stood to the side of Solar as the aura of magic faded off of him. The golden tan pony smiled gently at him.

"Alright, you next," I turned to Anchorage.

"No way, I've got these," he pointed back to his wings. "You go."

I sighed with minor frustration and rolled my eyes. I stepped over onto the green steel pillar and sauntered delicately over. My stomach twisted as I made my way across. I came up to the edge and looked down, then up at the others on the opposite side, waiting for me. Pushing my weight down onto all fours, I sprung forwards and flew across the gap, landing on the other side by just a few short inches and letting out a deep breath. Afterwards, Anchorage floated just barely in the air and across with ease. I glared at him as he landed.

"Showoff," I gently punched his shoulder.

"Hey, you're a pegasus, too, I don't know what you're mad about."

"Humph!" I turned my nose up and walked onto the finished concrete, everypony else by my side while we entered the city.

The worst part of getting into the city was now in the dust. All that was needed now was to find a decent spot to hold up. There wasn't much time, either.
> 36. Manehattan Liberation - Part II
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Kicking in the previously locked door of a cafe, the five of us entered with our weapons drawn and flashlights shining into the dark place.

"Lunar Marines! Anypony in here?!" I called out, advancing into the back storage room to search for anyone who might be hiding.

Following a quick search, I determined the place was clear and hung my weapon back around my neck, trotting out to the others as they too eased themselves. 

"All right, the place is clear. We might be better off grabbing any extra food while we are here. What ever you can find, take as much as you can carry in your bags, at least enough to live off of for the day more until we can find a source to survive for a long period of time, assuming our visitors don't torch all of it," I said, removing my backpack and opening a small, empty zipper area to store food in.

"Hang on a second, Star," Anchorage stepped forth. "Who put you in charge?"

I stopped and moved my eyes up to meet Anchorage's. "No one did, and I'm not trying to be. I'm simply suggesting we stay on the safe side and not starve."

"Well, by default, I outrank the four of you, therefore I should be in charge. Unless any of you have a reason not to put me in such a position," he stated, looking between the others.

Silver shook his head. "That's not an issue. Normally, though, ponies of the Navy don't get put in charge of squadrons of the Marines. At least, that's what I've heard. Then again, today is not a normal day, and there's nopony else around to judge that. So, yes, you are in charge."

Anchorage nodded once. "Though, I concur with Star. What we have on us really isn't much. If help will not be coming for at least three days, we can surely ration until then." His chest slightly puffed outwards. "Take and pack what you can, but keep it equal. If anything, take more water."

"Yes, sir," we replied in unison and each went back to the small storage area, searching taped-up brown boxes for supplies.

"You don't have to call me that," Anchorage muttered, a brow raising.

"Its respectful. Deal with it." I said, cutting open a box with my combat knife and opening the flaps. Inside was full of smaller fresh bottles of water, plenty to go around between the five of us. "Hey, you guys! I've got water over here."

"Same here!" Solar called, levitating his box down from the top shelf. It was already opened and not full of bottles like mine was. He began stuffing a few into his backpack while leaving room.

We partitioned the water there was between each other. Now there was more than enough to last a few days which was plenty relieving. Afterwards, everyone took small packages of snacks of candy bars and small bags of potato chips. They weren't the best things to survive off of but it was all we had.

Suddenly, Anchorage raised one wing up to stop all of us from moving. Each of us froze, while he stared out towards the open part of the shop, ears perked. He gently whispered, "I hear voices."

He moved gradually towards the doorway, one hoof resting on the handle of his gun. Anchorage leaned against the edge of the doorway, just barely peeking out into the shop. As he did, what he could hear quickly became audible to the rest of us. To make matters worse, it wasn't Equestrian language.

"Sind Sie sicher, das ist immer noch eine gute Idee? Ich habe nicht gesehen für mehr als eine Stunde." 

"Nur den Mund halten und in Bewegung zu halten. Wir sind verpflichtet, etwas zu finden. Es gibt keine Weise, die Stadt hätte dies schnell evakuiert."

"What are they saying?" I whispered to Anchorage.

"Something about scouring the city, I think," he replied quietly. "They are scouts. We should take them out before they get any further."

"Good idea." I nodded once.

Anchorage motioned me over to the doorway where I rested opposite of him. The both of us peeked out towards the cafe's windows, seeing a pair of armed griffons walking past. Much to my surprise, they wore modern combat uniforms and armor, complete with fitted helmets and visors and long-range shotguns. They meant business when it came to weapons it appeared. Then again, they were just the scouts.

"Ready?" Anchorage whispered.

I nodded in response. The grayish white pegasus raised his hoof, signalling to hold. As the griffons passed the shattered glass door, he moved his hoof down and whipped around the corner, rifle raised and aimed towards the scouts, pulling the trigger and engaging. I followed suit, not necessarily spraying in their particular direction but not the best aim either. The windows of the place shattered instantly and coated the ground in shards of glass.

"Ambush!" The left griffon screeched, just prior to taking a couple of speedy bullets to the side and neck, collapsing down. 

The one on the right whipped around to find where we were. He didn't go for cover and went to shoot back, only to be killed instantly by a bullet to the forehead, as well as many that pierced his body armor. In just a few seconds of one-sided gunfire, both were dead and laying in a pool of blood that spread outwards.

I lowered my rifle and blinked a couple of times, then carefully made my way out of the storage room towards the bodies. Anchorage came out as well and stopped me, resting a hoof on my shoulder. "Don't go out yet, there might be more," he spoke quietly.

I nodded and stood back, watching Anchorage raise his gun once more and scanning the streets outside. Upon finding it clear, he waved his hoof and kept his barrel drawn forward. I hurried silently to him, standing just behind as he stepped through the door and up to the adjacent, bullet-strewn bodies. The sight sent a gentle chill running up my spine. Very few of our bullets missed and dotted either griffon. Neither breathed nor moved. Neither had much on them, either.

"Definitely scouts," Anchorage lowered his weapon. "All they have are G-three's, not even a knife. Decent armor, but not good enough. They both appear young as well, not as well trained."

"I can't imagine the rest of them being this way," I put out as I kept an eye around us. "Did you also notice that they spoke English when we shot at them?"

Anchorage nodded. "Yes, I did. Very strange if you ask me. And, well, you're not wrong. There will be more, less-trained troops, yes. However, they have much more heavy soldiers with great training, and most likely better weapons. We will have to be extremely careful. Not to mention, they may have snipers set up anywhere east we may go," Anchorage explained. 

"Good thing we have helmets, right?" I gave a weak smile.

"Not that it helps much, but yes." Anchorage shrugged. "All right. Silver, Solar, Night, it's clear. Come on out."

At his word, the other three sneaked out of the cafe and stood around the griffon bodies, Solar looking as if he was ready to hurl. He ended up looking away to prevent doing so.

"We need to find a proper location to set up a perimeter and hold off any Constitution troops they may throw at us. This is where it will get tough, but everypony will be needed here." I said to them, turning to the pegasus beside me. "Anchorage, what can we use?"

"Taxi carriages and any large movable objects we can hide behind. We'll build a wall and keep it together. It will block off an intersection entirely and give us plenty of cover. At the same time, it is imperative that we ensure not a single griffon or pony can jump or fly over with ease. Anyone with wings are our number one priority.

"We will also need to watch our flanks. I can't imagine they will be too ignorant to realize they can slip around us on another street and hit us from behind. This will be tricky as there's just five of us. And, if all doesn't go to plan, there is always Plan B."

"And that is falling back to take positions in buildings, correct?" Nightpath asked.

Anchorage nodded in response. "Yes, exactly. Either way how it goes, we cannot let them past where they are now. Is that clear?"

"Yes, sir!" The four of us answered at once.

"Darn it, I said stop calling me that!


***


Within just over ten minutes, we found ourselves just a few small blocks east of Trotterdam Tower. Further down the street, one could make out a slowly intensifying blaze breaking out on one of the upper floors of an apartment building as well as the gaping hole it seeped out of. The damage itself appeared to be induced by some sort of high-power explosive weapon, allegedly a rocket-propelled grenade. I figured that would be another danger to look out for.

Soon, Anchorage stopped at a T-intersection where numerous vacant taxi carriages sat, some flipped on their sides and others marginally damaged in the panic that ensued when the attacks commenced. There were more than enough scattered around to form a wall for cover and to hold in position, with metal mailboxes, trash cans, and other things that could be used to strengthen the integrity of the wall and aid in preventing one of us from being killed—hopefully.

The five of us equally assumed it wouldn't be long until we would see the first round of troops make their way towards us and tossed aside some of our gear neatly to begin work as quickly as possible. It was a huge shame that Ashfall wasn't there to help. Moving most of the carriages was easier said than done, especially with them not being sat upright and off of their wheels when doing so. This, however, was to stop oncoming fire from piercing the wall and injuring one of us, again with other objects helping with that.

Around twenty or so minutes later, by my guess, the wall was finished. It did not completely span across the street but the gaps on either side were too narrow to allow anything to slip by. As the last object was set into place, Silver hopped down from the top and stood beside the rest of us, all panting and sweating slightly. Even with the help of Silver and Solar's magic, as well as Nightpath's muscle, moving the carriages remained to be the toughest part of building the barrier. But it was done now.

Anchorage stepped in front of us and turned back. "All right. Step one, build the wall, is complete. Now, step two. Star, Silver, you'll be watching the front in the direction they will be coming from with me. Night, Solar, you watch our six. If we get overwhelmed on our end, feel free to help, and vice versa. Clear?"

The four of us nodded in response.

"And don't you say it!" Anchorage's hoof poked towards us as he tossed a glare our way. 

We remained silent this time, each splitting up to grab our gear and settle into position. Anchorage did too, resting his weapon on top of the wall while remaining mostly hidden. Despite all of the cover the wall gave us, I was sure that the enemy would be able to tell what this wall was for. That would certainly harden things.

I set up on the right end of the wall, whilst Silver was on the left side, and Anchorage in center. We left our backpacks within reach in the event that we needed to grab more ammunition. Thankfully there was plenty of it for all and we hopefully wouldn't run out for a long period of time. 

Both Solar and Night went back to their own small wall area on the adjacent street that split off southward from the one we were situated on, and that way, we were covered from almost all sides, granted no one flew overhead or into a building.

Before any of us knew it, the whole city went strangely quiet. Not even the far-off bursts of shotguns or other guns shooting further east could be heard. Along with nopony else to be seen for blocks. I could only hope that any civilians still in the city were in hiding somewhere. It made our job easier when it came to causalities. 

Off to the side, my eye caught onto Silver struggling to get a good posture. He grumbled and growled, shifting about.

"Damn this gun. I can't see shit!" He muttered audibly.

"Need a scope, Silver?" Anchorage turned to the beige unicorn, sitting back.

"I wish I had grabbed one," he looked back at the grayish-white pegasus.

"Trade guns?" Anchorage offered.

"Huh? No." Silver shook his head. "Keep yours. I'll be fine."

"Come on, Silver. I grabbed mine in a rush. I'm less accustomed to scopes. Take it."

Grumbling, Silver nodded. "Fine," then levitated his gun over to Anchorage in exchange for the scoped M16. "Thank you."

"Don't mention it," Anchorage nodded once and settled back into position, as did Silver, adjusting the scope on the rifle to see further down the street.

Silver scanned around slowly, keeping his eye peeled for any signs of enemy griffon or pony troops that might be coming. However, none could be seen. 

"It's awfully quiet, you guys."

"Yeah, no kidding," I replied, also looking for signs of trouble. "You don't think they are going around us, do you?"

"If they are, we would have seen them on our end," Nightpath added in.

"He's right, we've got nothing," Solar said.

Damn these sneaky griffons. What if they were creeping around us and we had no clue? No, shut up, Star. No more what ifs. Why did I have to worry so much?

"Grenade!"

Suddenly, a small explosion rocked the area just in front of us. I ducked into cover as quickly as I could. Pieces of rock and cobble flew upwards in a shower of pebbles and debris, the force of the explosion shattering windows for a whole block. I peeked up, and now just a few feet from the wall sat a freshly made crater formed by a thrown grenade. 

My eyes moved up, and just past the cloud of dust approached multiple silhouettes of what appeared to be ponies and griffons in modern military-grade armor with weapons similar to ours in their hooves or talons.

"Shit, there they are. Light them up!" Anchorage shouted, sitting up from out of cover and opening fire on the advancing squadron of assailants. 

From just the looks of them, the approaching griffons and ponies were seemingly caught off guard by the sudden revolt and scrambled to cover. There was not all that much for them to hide as most of the objects they could use were a part of our wall. This turned out to be better on our end as the three of us had a clear shot. 

I took aim on one smaller stallion running towards the safety of a building off to the side. With a short, deep breath, I let myself go and shot at the stallion while he was vulnerable. The first couple of bullets buried themselves in his hooves, another two in his side. He collapsed, allowing me to finish the job. One final bullet, right to the cheek. 

Off to the side, a normal-sized griffon with a tan mask covering much of his face minus his eyes shifted to the side, all the while firing back towards Silver and Anchorage. At first, the bullets that did hit him were embed in his body armor. He grunted at every hit, until falling backwards with a small spurt of blood popping out either side of his head as Silver's shot killed him. 

Four others, three griffons and one pony, also made their own cover out of any debris that was on the street or inside of buildings with little places to shoot from without being out in the open. My eyes locked onto a taller griffon reloading in a small shop, back against the small pillar between the door and window with his arm and beak sticking out. 

I narrowed my eyes onto the tiny cross hair at the end of the barrel, moving it carefully to take aim for his elbow. With a few more shots, the griffon screeched and dropped his weapon, collapsing to the sound and out of sight for the moment. With that, I shifted my focus to another griffon preparing to throw one more grenade. This time, at his distance, it would make it inside.

"Careful, grenade!" I called out. To my side, Anchorage sat up from reloading his weapon and shot the griffon's talon just after the pin was pulled.

The multi-shaded grey figure screeched out in pain, the grenade dropping to the ground at his feet, completely ignoring it as he tended to his bloodied talon. As he realized the grenade was just below him, it was too late to run. The grenade burst, this resulting in the other grenades following suit on the griffon's body strap and killing him instantly. Much of the gore was shrouded by the dust and dirt cloud that followed the explosion, whilst shrapnel from the grenades being set off flying in all directions and just narrowly missing Silver's head.

"Whoa, shit!" He yelled, ducking back down briefly and sitting back up right after. Upon the cloud fading out, the remaining two left had come out of hiding and were now shooting with an actual aim as opposed to them before blindly shooting while seeking cover.

Bullets pelted against the bottoms of the carriages, threatening to break through, though on the other hoof thankfully didn't. The moment one paused to reload, I sat back up out of cover and shot the approaching pony, not directly killing him but enough to injure him to the point of no longer being able to fight back. This left the griffon beside him to fight, and the three of us converged on him. 

He noticed this, and in turn ran back to grab the fallen pony who lay there bleeding out on the damaged cobble street. His likely mindset was to retreat with the pony to try and save him. That wasn't the case. Before he could even lift the severely injured pony up, Anchorage shot him until he was no longer breathing.

Three bodies laid motionless in the street in pools of blood, as well as bits of another body blown to pieces by grenades, and the two remaining dead or dying. With that, the three of us peeked out from behind the wall to see if anyone else was coming.

"Silver, you picking up anything?" Anchorage glanced over to the beige unicorn, staring through his scope and scanning the street further down.

"Not that I can see. It looks like we're clear." He answered, sitting upright and wiping his forehead free of sweat. "That was wave one."

"You don't say?" I shot Silver a brief look. "I'm sure they know we're here now."

"To hell with them if they don't. They'll know sooner or later," Anchorage added. "Good work, boys."

"Now, what do we do, Anchorage?" Silver questioned, switching out his empty magazine for a fully loaded one.

"We wait. There will be more coming. And when they do—"

With a shout of surprise, both Nightpath and Solar Wave lit up with gunfire seemingly out of nowhere, shooting at something from out of our line of sight. Their faces lit with the light of their weapons shooting, before stopping just a few moments later. Solar panted heavily, turning to look at the rest of us. "Three of 'em just tried to come from our end from above. They're dead."

Anchorage nodded to them both. "Good work. Keep looking out above too. A lot of them will be flying." He turned back to me and Silver. "At some point, we will need to go somewhere else. We'll work that out later, though."


***


Little action came in the hours that followed. More small waves of scouts in twos and threes came around, each being taken down with ease, and after we were sure it was clear, Nightpath would slip around the wall to bring the bodies inside the little fort and keep them well hidden. Each scuffle reminded us to check our ammunition in our backpacks as well. Solar was the lowest out of the five of us and Anchorage, obviously, had the most to spare. It would still be at least a day before we would need to find a new source of ammunition within the city. That was a new challenge the five of us faced. A substantial one at that.

"Frag out!" Silver called aloud, yanking the silver pin from a grenade and tossing it towards the corner of a building where a couple of hostile ponies took cover. Me, Anchorage, and Silver ducked behind the bullet-riddled wall of taxi carriages and other objects to shield ourselves from flying shrapnel.

Before the ponies could move out of the way, the grenade completely blew the first floor corner away, leaving a gaping hole in it that stretched all the way up to almost the third floor of the stone high-rise. One pony was killed by the grenade burst, the other cut open by the fragments that exploded outwards and slowly bleeding to death. 

By now, there was extreme damage to the small area around us caused by forward and returning fire, including some grenades tossed back and forth between us and the Constitution troops. The wall continued to hold strong, although it was plenty evident that wouldn't be the case in the long run. Finally, there was another break. The five of us could move about once more without the fear of being caught in the open. It seemed as if the waves were growing further apart.

Anchorage stood up on all fours, gun strapped and hanging from his neck and brought us to center. "We're doing good, Marines. Knock on wood, this was a very good idea. However, I must also add, we have no form of communication in the event our fellow Marines make it back, meaning we cannot call for backup if we find ourselves in a sticky. I've said this before and I'll say it again. At some point, we will need to find somewhere else to hold up."

"There's a news station about seven blocks from here, I think." I stepped forward, taking a street map of Manehattan out of my backpack. "Yes, seven blocks east. It's a radio news channel we could use. If anything, it doesn't hurt to grab the attention of the Equestrian Army. Isn't their base about twenty miles from the city?"

"Yes, but should I remind you that Fort Fetlock has old tech. Out of all of the bases, theirs is the most outdated," Anchorage replied flatly. "Unless..."

"All radio stations hold onto their old ways of communicating in the event of a breakdown, just like the emergency services use tactical channels to let each other know what is going on in time of city or countrywide emergency. All we can do is hope there will be still some ponies there to help us out. I'm no good with that stuff," I said back, tucking the map back away. 

"All right, so the radio station is our objective now. When do you advise we go?" Nightpath turned to Anchorage, as did the rest of us.

"Now would be best. But hold on, Star," Anchorage moved his attention back over to me. "You said east, correct?"

"I'm afraid so," I nodded. "We'll most likely have to fight our way to it."

"Then so be it. We have the weapons, we've handled their squadrons up to now. There's no saying we can't make it further. Although, we must also consider the fact that..." Anchorage trailed off, noticeably stiffening his posture.

My head tilted quizzically. "The fact that what?"

"We should consider the requisite perception that our enemies may have total control over the station." Anchorage finished, rather hesitantly with a tone of worry in his voice.

The four of us each stared at the grayish-white pegasus timidly, Solar stepping forth and speaking up, "Are you questioning our competence, sir?"

Anchorage's look perked, eyes expanding marginally with bewilderment. "No, negative. I am simply suggesting that we may be unwelcome visitors is all, and if we are, I don't deny the fact that we'll have a struggle getting to the place and inside if that is the case."

Solar bobbed his head in a nod, understanding. "Then lead the way, Anchorage. You're our squad leader."

"Actually," he glanced towards me. "Let's leave this up to Star. He has the map."

What? Why me? I'm not a leader! "Yes, sir."

Anchorage tossed me a glare, opening his wings and flying up over the short-in-height barrier. I sighed, looking towards the others. "Let's move, Marines."

I trotted back towards the wall and put much of my weight into my hooves, springing upwards and on top, then landing back on the other side with a light clump of my hooves digging into the dirt of a small grenade crater. Silver, Solar, and Night followed one by one, Anchorage having landed and waiting for me to take the lead. I reached behind into my backpack and removed the rolled-up map, taking it and unrolling it. I had marked where our current position was to aid in movements we would make and pinpointed our destination mentally. 

The station was situated seven blocks east, and another three south. Much to our dismay, the path took us right into Constitution territory of the city where we knew the majority of the militia swarmed in groups. The further we walked, the more I could feel my chest tightening. Now I knew how it felt to be a leader—a literal leader that is—and be out in the open, vulnerable, and ahead of my group. Then again, I preferred my life to be taken over my friends.

A couple of blocks down from where we set up post, a new thought crossed my mind. I wanted desperately to ask it, only to remember neither of them would be capable of answering. The only ponies who could were hundreds of miles away. Since the day before, I had not heard from or seen Rose. I could only hope she was safe and sound back at base, or better, on her way home or already there. 

I returned my attention to the map, checking street signs as we walked past and comparing where we were on the map. Within a few minutes we reached our turn and I led the others in the direction of the station. It wasn't clearly visible due to smog and dust, but it was there. I kept my map up in case we ended up going too far. Then, suddenly, multiple loud explosions, quickly followed by the whine of jet engines from above made all of us freeze in our tracks.

"Airstrike!" Silver shouted just hardly above the ear-piercing loud noises.

Anchorage, taking a pair of tactical binoculars from his backpack, held them up to his eyes and looked at the two jet fighters flying southward before darting out towards sea, behind some buildings. "Not to worry, they're ours. Lunar Navy fighters. It's good to see we have air superiority."

The rest of us breathed a huge sigh of relief. So it seemed the Navy was in the fight anyway. Airstrikes helped and didn't simultaneously. If they were accurate, they would wipe out targets with little issue. At the same time, it weakened the city's integrity as well as putting any innocents stranded in the taken-over sectors in harms way.

Continuing down the street and through a thick cloud of cough-inducing grayish-black smoke, the radio station was just to our left. I tucked my map away in my pouch and grabbed hold of my rifle. "There it is. Everypony inside!" I motioned my hoof telling them to advance into the building.

I crouched slightly as I ran into the dual doors. One was already opened and much of the glass on the front face of the building was shattered and riddled with bullet holes, as was the wall inside. Paper was scattered across the floor, some being blown about by the frigid breeze seeping inside. Aside from the gentle rustling of the papers shuffling around with our movement, all was quiet. I walked cautiously up to a wooden door and opened it, the door leading into a hallway, to the side being an open elevator shaft and an emergency stairway.

There was little debris in the hallway, although some of the lights had been shot out or were damaged, one of which hanging down and spurting electrical sparks, while some of the others flickered and eventually went out, leaving little light in the hall. I moved towards the staircase, Anchorage just behind me and keeping his eyes peeled for any movement, whether it be hostile or not.

"Star, what floor is the communication center?" Silver asked with a gentle whisper from behind.

"I'm not sure," I whispered back, stopping at the second floor's doorway and checking around. The lights were completely off and much of the floor was vacant, despite multiple packed boxes as if those occupying it were moving their equipment in. "Not this one. Keep going."

From there, Anchorage took the lead and advanced slowly up to the third floor. There, most of the ceiling lights were still on, a couple flickering. The floor had multiple rooms, presumably offices. Once again, it was not what we were looking for. We continued upwards to the fourth floor, where I peeked out and out of luck, spotted the studio room at one end. Beside it, surely, would be where the connections were set up. 

Looking down the small cross hair peg at the end of the barrel of my gun, my eyes moved across, finding where we needed to go. "Bingo."

As I crept out into the hallway, a bullet whipped past my ear. The quick movement startled me and I snapped in the direction it came from, just before taking a hit right to the chest, then another. I wheezed and fell backwards, Anchorage gasping from above and dragging me back into the stairwell.

"Star's down, enemies at our nine. Take them out!" He shouted, Silver and Solar running out into the heavy gunfire to cover, where they could easily engage the assailants.

Down the hallway approached two bulky uniformed griffons, one with a high-powered shotgun, the other with a modified MP5, the one that shot me. Nightpath remained in the stairwell with me and Anchorage, whom laid me on my back on the floor with my gun off to the side to check for any severe wounds.

"Star, are you alright?!" Anchorage asked hastily, chest heaving as he panted.

Slowly I nodded, then coughed heavily. "These vests work..." I answered in a somewhat stunned tone.

Anchorage exhaled deeply, then grabbed my rifle and returned it back to me. "Get up, Marine." He ordered, offering a hoof.

I took his hoof hastily and brought myself up to all fours, taking my gun up off of the floor and leaning against the wall in cover, looking out into the hallway. "Silver!" I shouted for him.

"What!?" Silver called back, turning around a corner and firing back at the approaching griffon troops.

"Got any grenades on you?!" Anchorage called. I quickly snapped my head to look at him with wide-eyes, them saying are you nuts?!

"A couple! Why?" Silver replied, slipping back around the corner.

"Use it!"

"Are you sure?!"

"Positive! Throw it!"

Hesitantly, Silver took a small grenade from his pouch and yanked the pin out with his teeth, tossing it around the corner. It bounced off of the wall, rolling slowly afterwards up to the griffons. One screeched, both shuffling to get away. It was too late for them. The grenade was set off, and blew a massive hole in the wall on either side of the hallway, as well as a gaping pit that collapsed onto the floor below, and the floor below that. Above, pieces of the ceiling came down much like a ramp, blocking the hall with a loud crash.

Dust filled the air, leaving each of us coughing and wheezing. The griffons were not nearly as lucky, either killed by the explosion or crushed by debris. Thankfully it seemed the rest of the building's integrity wasn't jeopardized aside from the area that was highly damaged. Cracks lined the floor, ceiling, and walls but weren't showing signs of growing. Electrical wiring sparked, having being cut completely, and a pipe had snapped, pouring water in large quantities down into the hole. 

Above the gentle rumble of water flooding out of the pipe came a new sound. It caught the full attention of my ear. It swiveled, and I turned to look where the sound was coming from. It sounded like muffled cries. "Do you guys hear that?"

"Mmmmhmmf! Hmmmph!"

"Barely, but yes." Night nodded. His head snapped toward the room we were headed to. "In there!" He ran past us, then smashed his body into the door and fell down on his side. The wooden door exploded inwards with a loud crack, and was smashed to bits with splinters covering the floor. 

Night pushed himself back up, the rest of us galloping inside. The room highly resembled the one back at base but was much larger in size. And, in dead center, sat a pony beneath a flickering light in a chair, trying to rock side to side. "Hmmph! Mmmph!"

I gasped, running up to the figure. The light flickered on for a short period, revealing a pony in a hoodie with the Lunar Marines' main emblem on his upper right chest. His hooves were bound to the armrests with duct tape and had some also covering his mouth. Over his eyes sat a white blindfold. He struggled hard and trembled. I quickly removed my knife from my belt and cut the tape from his hooves, followed by the tape on his mouth and blindfold.

The pony's pupils expanded and he calmed seeing who we were. He panted heavily and sat up out of the chair, bringing me into a lung-crushing hug. He wasn't all that bigger than I was, which came to my surprise feeling how strong he was.

"Thank you... t-thank you for coming. I thought they were going to kill me." The pony sputtered, backing off of me after a couple of moments. He looked around at the rest of the group. "Is this all of you?"

"Afraid so," Anchorage nodded once and stepped up to the pony. "Circuit!"

"Anchorage!" The pony gasped loudly. "It's great to see you, squid. What the hell are you doing here?"

"Helping take care of this little griffon problem we're having, that's what. We came to attempt communication with the Equestrian Army. What are you doing here?" Anchorage's brow raised, staring at the dark blue earth pony questionably.

"I was just asked to come downtown for the day and help out setting up a new system. I didn't see any of this shit coming, but thank Luna you're all here. But you all need to listen, they are sending more."

"They're what?" I blinked.

"They communicated the rest of them. There is more on the way. The whole army. You won't stand a chance against them."

"You're kidding. This isn't all of them here in the city?" Solar's eyes went huge.

Circuit shook his head in denial. "They've been planning this out in waves. When they grabbed me, their intention was to use this place to call the rest of their cronies. They are en-route. Hell, they might already be here. The ones you're seeing now have been in the city for at least a month. Its just been extremely hard to keep track of them. That is why they've avoided captivity. Now they're launching their full attack."

"Shit..." I muttered, slowly exchanging looks with the others, then back to Circuit. "Have you got any weapons on you?"

"I had a pistol, but they took it. No clue where they put it. If I can get a hold of something, however, I'll sure as hell give you guys a helping hoof," Circuit offered sternly.

"Not an option. You have no armor let alone weapons. It's best if you evacuate and take anypony else that might also be caught in the open," Anchorage said back.

Circuit's stance hardened. "Then it is that I shall do. Although, I have some bad news for you boys. The towers and satellites on the building over were destroyed by an airstrike. Their signal made it out, but we're cut off. You will have to go somewhere else if anywhere is still up and running."

"Damn it." I stomped my hoof.

"Although..." Circuit started. "Word was spreading that the military is coming back. An S.O.S was sent out and received while they were setting up. It won't be long before backup arrives."

"What a relief," Night exhaled heavily.

"Yeah, but until then, you five are on your own," Circuit said as a matter of fact. "Now, I say we get the hell out of here before the others come."

"The others?" Silver's head cocked.

"There's more in the building." Circuit answered grimly.

Just a moment after, shouting could be heard from a few floors up, emanating from the staircase, as well as foot and hoofsteps rushing downstairs.

"That's our cue. Come on," Anchorage's hoof waved in motion for us to leave.

Night, Silver, and Solar ran back out through the broken door, across to the staircase, Anchorage, myself, and Circuit close behind. Just a couple of floors up, the enemies were fast approaching.

"Go, go, go!" Anchorage shouted at the top of his lungs, all of us rushing down the stairs as hastily as we could.

Once back on the first floor, the six of us were immediately met by heavy gunfire from a few different rooms and the hallway down. With the others coming from above, it left us trapped. In turn, I ran back up the staircase about half of a flight and set up, waiting for the oncoming enemies to reach us. Meanwhile, Silver Edge, Nightpath, and Anchorage returned fire on the attackers down below.

"Protect Circuit!" I called out, reaching to my backpack to click in a fresh magazine, cocking the rifle and aiming upstairs as a smaller stallion in military camouflage turned to meet me with a knife in his hoof. 

Swiftly, I pulled the trigger and lit up the pony, his body tripping and tumbling down the steps to my hooves where he lay bleeding and dead, while the griffon soldier behind him, wearing a heavy vest and an eye patch, screeched down towards me and whipped a pistol out of his holster. He shot towards me, bullets ricocheting off of the concrete and the floor just barely missing while I shot back. 

One hit my helmet and sent me into a quick shock though not penetrating, while doing so I sprayed aimlessly while I stumbled to regain posture. As I did, I watched the griffon collapse to the ground, his pistol bouncing down to my hooves.

I grabbed the pistol up off of the staircase and handed it to Circuit. "You'll need this, for sure!"

"Hey, my gun!" Circuit shouted, nodding once and cocking the pistol after taking it.

With the targets upstairs down, I shifted my focus to my friends downstairs, still engaged in a heavy gunfight with multiple enemies surrounding the stair corridor. We were still pinned in, and from what I could tell, no one was winning.

Then, out of the blue, I heard two light metallic bounces I never wanted to hear. Looking down towards Anchorage's hooves, I caught sight of a grenade, pin pulled. Solar, also catching eye of it, gasped and looked up towards Anchorage. "Grenade!"

In a last ditch effort, and in the blink of an eye, Solar shoved the grayish-white pegasus out of the way and jumped down onto the little explosive. My pupils shrunk to pinpricks, and seemingly time slowed itself significantly. There was a loud pop, Solar's body jumping upwards with a light flash emanating from beneath him, and shredded bits of his armored vest flying outwards. He landed back on the ground, completely motionless, head pointed to the side.

Within a couple of moments of the explosion, a pool of blood formed out from Solar's chest. I watched with absolute horror as the scene unfolded. Anchorage, having fallen to the side, was up on his hooves within a couple of seconds, looking down towards the severely injured unicorn. He screamed, dropping his gun and running back to the yellow pony. "Solar!"

The pegasus shook Solar, desperately trying to get him to stand back up. His efforts were of no use. Anchorage then took the strap of Solar's helmet and cut it off with a knife, his helmet rolling off to the side and wobbling as it came to a stop. Solar's eyelids were just hardly cracked, with little trickles of blood seeping from either side of his mouth. 

Helplessly, I watched Anchorage try to sit Solar up. He was beginning to break down himself with the sounds of combat drowned out around us. It seemed like the whole world was quickly slowing itself. I watched Solar blink slowly, coughing once and a bit of blood dripping onto the floor beside him. Just seconds after, his head rolled over to the side. It was then where the color was noticeably fading from him.

I hadn't even noticed my rifle had dropped out of my hoof as I was too focused on Anchorage and Solar half of a flight of stairs below. I slid onto the wall, sitting completely with my back pressed against it, staring through the steel barriers protecting the rim of the steps down at the two. Anchorage now held Solar tightly in his hooves and was getting some of his blood on them. Solar had multiple severe wounds to his chest where the grenade completely vaporized a small section of his body armor, as well as piercing his chest with pieces blown out from the explosion.

My eyes swelled with tears, chest heaving quickly as I felt myself succumb to emotion. This was all happening too fast. This could not be happening. My heart pumped hard and ached with a new type of pain that echoed throughout my veins. Mental pain. 

By the time the gunfight stopped, one thing was clear.

Solar was gone.
	
> 37. Manehattan Liberation - Part III
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Trembling and bawling his eyes out of their very sockets, Silver Edge clung tightly to the lifeless body of a uniformed yellow unicorn before the rest of us. Tears streamed down his cheeks and soaked the fur down, all the while hyperventilating as he squeezed the corpse to his chest. No amount of effort was put into attempting to fix Solar's terrible wounds and save his life. His body was far too damaged, and it was far too late for any of that.

I stood just to the left of Silver, my chin pointed down and helmet held over my chest with a hoof. Tears built up and squeezed between my shut eyelids, one finding its way off of my cheek and patting against the concrete floor at my hooves. On the outside I was just hardly able to hold back from a total breakdown. Not that it would have made me any less of a stallion either way it went. Loss was loss. If tears came, you may as well let them flow. 

It was even harder, too. Me and Silver both knew Solar to be frail at the start. Frail, but willing to try. Scared, but brave. If it wasn't evident prior to this very moment, it couldn't have been any less now. Without his sudden, selfless act, Anchorage would have been dead. So would Silver and Circuit Breaker. Possibly myself and Nightpath included. There would have been no time to get away before detonation. That's why Solar did what he did. 

All the while, behind the anguish of losing a good friend and a great soldier, my blood boiled. Fury filled my soul. Physically, I could feel my body beginning to tremble with the imminent rage. No, Star. Hold it in. Keep it contained. Don't take it out on your friends, I thought to myself. With a deep breath, nearly instantly I eased. This would not remain so for long. Now I longed to kill something. I needed to kill something. 

I cracked my eyelids open, watching as Silver reluctantly laid Solar's remains carefully on the floor. He sniffled a couple, wiped at his eye with one hoof, and stepped back. At any moment I expected him to break down again. That wasn't the case. Instead the beige stallion turned to look away and shut his eyes. His cheeks were visibly marked from the tears he shed. Off to the side, I caught Night wiping one away, too. Among him was Anchorage and Circuit, although they stood still with their heads down respectively.

A couple of more long moments passed, before Anchorage raised his helmet back to his head and clicked the strap into place under his chin. "That's enough of that..." he spoke quietly, in a rather somber tone.

"What about h-his body—" Silver paused to sniff deeply. "—Anchorage?"

The grayish-white pegasus stared down towards Solar, his ears falling slightly. "We will come back for him. H-he will get the funeral he deserves." Anchorage then turned tail to face the four of us. "But for now, we have a mission to complete."

"Is that all you care about?" Nightpath muttered under his breath.

Unfortunately for him, it was audible enough for us all to hear.

"Is what all I care about?" Anchorage shot Night a look of question.

"Nothing, sir."

Anchorage took a couple of slow steps toward the brown stallion. "No, it wasn't nothing. What did you say?"

"He said, 'is that all you care about?'," Silver repeated for him. "He's... questioning if you even acknowledge what just happened."

Night shot a quick glare at the unicorn, his gaze shifting back to Anchorage who was beginning to form one of his own.

"If I didn't care about our comrade, I would have walked away without any respect. Did I do that? No, I didn't. I care about Solar as much as you do, and it pains me that he's now gone. But aside from that, we do still have work to do. We have to make them pay for what they have done to us, to our city, and to Solar. The least we can do is f-finish this off. For Solar," Anchorage's voice was beginning to break while he spoke. 

Night's ears drooped slightly, as did his head. He didn't say another word after that, and Anchorage was able to ease himself just enough to return his attention to the remainder of us.

"It's just a matter of time before the Marines reach Manehattan and we will not be the last line of defense these ponies have. Until then, we must do what we can, and efficiently," Anchorage paused, looking back at Solar's corpse. "Normally, a squadron would take ammunition off of fallen soldiers to partition off of, but that is disrespectful. Leave everything on him." He then gulped down hard and wiped at his eyes. 

"Let Solar have one last fight, wherever he may be."

We nodded understandingly. The fight we had ahead of us, we knew, was for Solar. No remorse for the enemy. Not after what they have done now. We were all pissed.

"Now... Let's head out." Anchorage ordered with hesitation. He started out the doorway of the staircase and into the small lobby of the station. The others slowly followed, giving Solar's body one last look.

I walked behind Circuit, being the last one out. I stopped beside Solar's body and stared at it for a couple of moments. Briefly looking towards the others, I then knelt down to the body and reached into Solar's collar, yanking his dog tags from his neck and tucking them away in my uniform pocket. Next, I buttoned it up to keep them safe. I was not going to leave them.

Outside of the building stood Anchorage, peering either way down the street and trying to decide where to go next. Snow continued to gently fall from the grey skies above. Eerily enough, there was absolutely no breeze. It was as if it stopped the second we moved out to the street. 

In an instant, the silence was broken by two far-off explosions. They must have still been close as the ground shook both times. It was a sure sign more troops were close. 

Turning to face Circuit Breaker, Anchorage patted his shoulder. "Get yourself to safety. Take anypony you can find and get them out too. Don't come back until you know it's safe, aye?"

Circuit nodded. "Oorah. Stay safe. All of you." He said, tucking the pistol I handed him and galloping off.

The four of us watched Circuit run around the corner, after he did, more gunfire erupted further into the city. At that, Anchorage looked up at the sky. Time had passed a lot quicker than we thought, and the sun was beginning to set in the west. The pegasus moved his eyes back down, between me, Night, and Silver. 

"Maybe it's time we find a place to hunker down for the evening," Anchorage suggested.

Between all of us, we were all equally exhausted, both mentally and physically. At least, I knew I was. I couldn't exactly speak for the other two.

"Hang on, hang on. You want us to stop now?" Silver stepped forward.

"Just for a few hours. Enough to eat and get some rest. We're long from being done here. And... I know you're all tired. It's been a long day..." Anchorage sighed softly.

Night and Silver exchanged looks for a few seconds, I nodded at Anchorage. The other two did so as well. With that, Anchorage started in the direction we came from in hopes of finding a warm place to rest. That was if any of us could rest.

Within a time frame of twenty minutes, or less, Nightpath found a sturdy brick building with a multistory basement in which the four of us could rest. The building belonged to a company, by the looks of the furniture and appliances inside, which handled in making clothing. As each of us split up to search for anypony else who might be hiding here, all each of us could find were more rooms of storage for dresses, sewing workshops, and design studios with different pony names on their doors. In the workshop, paper and other things lay scattered around as if everypony left in a hurry.

Aside from the mass amount of fancy dresses, no one else was occupying the place. Down in the basement was just more storage. Primarily crates and unopened boxes and equipment for moving them with ease. The basement wasn't nearly as messy as the other floors were when it came to things being tossed around carelessly as workers evacuated, although it was still very much clear that once the attacks started, the building was emptied in minutes.

Anchorage led us down to the second floor of the basement, the first having partially being above ground as it was a room where freight carriages loaded and unloaded. It was not particularly the best place to camp out, notably in the event the building was searched by enemy soldiers. I'd imagine that somehow, word of our presence was moving around between the squadrons.

After ensuring the doors were barricaded and there were no other means of entry, we took bits of unused cloth to make beds out of on the cold cement. They weren't the most comfortable things to lay on but it was certainly better than the floor itself. We removed our helmets and much of our gear, such as waist packs and body armor. The food that each of us grabbed consisted of bags of chips and other small things, as well as a few MREs. 

The others exchanged short stories while we munched on a rather unhealthy supper. Most of which were attempts at humor to lighten the mood. Soon I realized I was the only one who hadn't laughed once. I felt left out. At the same time, I felt I couldn't catch on. Solar was still fresh in my mind. That likely was not going to change for some time. A long time.

As best as I could, I faked amusement to prevent Silver or Night acknowledging something was wrong. To be quite frank, it surprised me they weren't down like I was. Anchorage I presumed would have been accustomed to loss with him being in for a longer amount of time than me, Silver and Night combined. I couldn't be sure. Maybe I just needed to sleep. Yes, maybe that was it.

Some more time passed. I decided to wait until everypony else to call it a night. That felt less rude than to up and go to sleep while they talked without a word coming out of me. It would be fine, though. We would be back up in a few hours and on the move.

Now if only falling asleep was easier done than said.


***


"Star."

...

"Star!"

...

"Star, wake up!"

CRASH


***


My eyes shot open, meeting nothing other than total darkness all around. The room had no windows as it was underground and no moonlight—if any was even shining down through the cloud cover—could come through. I adjusted to the blackness gradually, calming my breathing as I realized nothing was going on. I looked around me, seeing the others were still fast asleep. Anchorage with his helmet over his head, Nightpath on his back like a dog playing dead, and Silver was—hugging his rifle?

I wasn't at all certain what time it was. Perhaps that was an indication that I needed to invest in a watch, namely a digital one. Many Marines on base, I knew, had one. And again, I could not take a look out of a window as there were none. Damn basements.

The moment my heart stopped attempting to pump out of my chest, I laid my head back down on the makeshift cloth bed. For some strange reason, I felt I hadn't slept for that long. In recent weeks before, even though I slept maybe six hours at most which was not nearly enough to be considered healthy, I was still rather lethargic despite the fact, just moments ago, I'd been plagued with nightmares of being in the heat of battle. Unless I wasn't dreaming. Where was Princess Luna when I needed her?

I let out a gentle yawn and shut my eyelids in hopes of drifting back to sleep, as if that would ever happen. I laid there motionless, turning once onto my side and another back with my chest pointed upwards. Neither time aided that effort. I was up for the long term now.

Sitting upright once more, I stretched my hooves out and exhaled deeply. My body was sore. Not nearly boot camp-sore, just mildly achy. I reached over to the side to take a swig of water from my canteen, removing the cap and doing so. The water itself didn't taste the best thanks to the container, but water was water. It was refreshing nonetheless. A refill would be necessary soon, however. Perhaps I would be lucky enough to find something upstairs.

Quietly, I turned over and pushed myself up and eased the aching muscles throughout my body. I picked up my canteen, as well as my waist pack just in case, and calmly made my way to the staircase and up while doing my best to muffle my hoofsteps. Then I felt my muzzle nudge against an object blocking the doorway and instantly remembered a barricade being put up. Thankfully, on our side, it was remarkably easy to move. Doing so without making noise was trickier but it was done.

Once upstairs, I closed the door by twisting the handle and letting go of it carefully to let it shut completely and looked around at the almost-equally dark room. The loading area had just a couple of smaller windows with steel bars over them for outside protection, and out through them I could just hardly tell that the sun was far from rising. I returned to my focus: Find water.

I moved up to the first floor, searching the few rooms it had cautiously. Most if not all workplaces had at least mini refrigerators that would have something in them, whether they be dinner leftovers or awful lean frozen meals that some ponies sadly could only afford. The first floor wasn't any luck. It was time go to even further up, all the while hoping somepony else wouldn't wake up and think someone took me.

Up on the second floor was mostly offices and smaller studios, as I had said earlier, then a lunch room. With the help of street lights outside the windows, I trotted to the refrigerator and opened it. It was an older model and therefore the light inside no longer worked, although inside I discovered a few of smaller bottles of water and a couple of cans of soda. No food, however.

I took a couple of the bottles and opened my canteen, gently pouring the contents into the stainless steel container until it was almost full. I twisted the cap back on and started out into the hallway to go back to the others in the basement. As I did, one door to my side swung open all of a sudden, and a hoof pulled me inside with great force, tossing me onto the floor.

I grunted softly, moving to push myself back up, but freezing the moment I heard the sharp ring of a knife, followed by the blade being pressed to my neck. The door slammed shut, and I was further pinned down by a hoof holding itself down on my chest with some pressure. I let out a low growl to who or what ever was on top of me and didn't make any further movements.

"Who are you, and what are you doing here?" Came a quiet but deeper voice than my own from just above.

My ears perked realizing the pony spoke perfect english. This came to be a slight relief that it wasn't a Constitution-turned stallion.

"I am just getting water. My canteen was running low," I responded momentarily after and kept calm while doing so.

The knife pressed further against my neck, causing me to wince slightly and my head fall further back until it was on the wooden floor.

"That does not answer my question, soldier," this gave away almost everything. "Who are you?"

"...PFC Star Shooter. Lunar Marine Corps."

"Sweet Luna, Star?"

The knife pulled away from my neck and was tucked away. I sat up on my elbows, looking up at the darker figure. "Who are you? How do you know me?"

In an instant, the room's light flicked on. The light was blinding at first and made me squint and cover my eyes long enough to adjust. When I did, I moved my hoof out of the way and caught sight of a bluish-green, brown-maned earth pony removing a mask from the lower half of his face and keeping it around his neck.

"Shadow?" My eyes opened wide. I stood up straight to face him. "What the hell are you doing here, sir?"

"Looking for your crazy ass! What were you thinking coming out here to fight these bastards? You could have gotten your or somepony else killed!" Shadow scolded me.

My ears pinned back slightly. "Somepony did die, sir. Solar Wave, to be exact."

His pupils grew as Shadow's head recoiled back. "Oh. I am... I'm so sorry. Shit..."

"Yeah. So, I would prefer if you hold off the commanding officer bull for a little bit right now. You're right, however. I'm stupid for coming out here. But I wouldn't have gotten as far as I have without my squad. We've held our own all day. Mostly. Now, why are you out here by yourself?"

Shadow's head shook. "Not by myself. I brought a team with me. They're searching the building for anypony else as we speak."

"Well, everypony else is in the basement sleeping. They're probably—"

"Shadow! Sir," then, in ran a stealthily-dressed white pegasus, bursting through the door. His attention focused to Shadow. "We've found a sailor and two Marines in the—Star?!"

My gaze shifted to the white pony. The pegasus removed his mask. He had dark facial pant over his eyes to match his gear. It was Lieutenant Snow Storm.

"Snow? You're back already?"

"The first to be," Snow nodded once. "Shadow collected us at the train station and we rushed in just a few hours ago. How long have you been out here?"

"Since ten-something this morning," I answered with a gentle smile.

"That long? Wow. I remember just before that, a message of Morse-code came in while we were setting up our command tent in Baltimare. Due to evacuations of the outer city, it took us a lot longer than usual to get here. The Marines are aiding in the evacuations as of right now, and thankfully we still have air superiority with the Navy's help.

"Now, listen, Star. The Marines are coordinating a large-scale attack on the Constitution later today, somewhere in the late morning and early afternoon. Intelligence says enemy troops are occupying some of downtown's offices near Batterneigh and plan to send in infantry to handle them, while squadrons will take care of any still on the street. Unfortunately, we still have no clue where their leader is," Snow explained.

"Probably in hiding in another city, like the coward he is," I said in a tone of seriousness. "Are we staying put?"

Shadow shook his head. "Negative. Our mission was to find you and the others and get the hell out before the shit storm starts. I'm afraid this means no more fight for you. Come on, we're going," he said, turning tail to walk out of the room.

"Sir, wait," I grabbed his shoulder to stop him.

Shadow turned around, a brow raised. "Yes, Star?"

"You're taking us... out of the fight? Away from it all?"

"I won't repeat myself, but yes. Orders are to evacuate unnecessary ponies in Manehattan and let the Marines do their job."

"Am I not a Marine?" My head tilted quizzically. "Or Silver Edge? Nightpath, too?"

"You are not infantry. That is why you are being taken out."

"Sir, give us a chance. At least let us help out," I pleaded. No, why was I doing this? "Or, better yet, order the others back. I'd rather them be out of harms way."

The lieutenant stood between the two of us and shifted his attention over to Shadow, who pondered carefully.

"I will consider it. I still would prefer you all leave. You have served your time here, and I honor your efforts," Shadow raised a hoof to salute.

"Th... Thank you, sir." I returned the salute and gave a weak smile. 

"Now, get back downstairs."

"Meet up on the first floor," Snow added.

"Yes, sirs."


***


Once where I was ordered to go, I came across Silver Edge, Nightpath, and Anchorage with their gear gathered up, along with a few other Marines in stealth gear. One of which, a maroon unicorn, waved to me but didn't say a word. I gave a nod towards him as well as a smile as I regrouped.

"Where did you go? You worried us," Nightpath breathed a sigh of relief, seeing me walk up.

"My apologies. I went to refill my canteen." I scratched the back of my head with a hoof. "Had trouble sleeping."

"Don't scare us like that, aye?" Anchorage gently punched my shoulder. I nodded in response.

Shortly behind me came Shadow and Snow Storm. At that, those of us in the room stood to attention as they stopped just feet away.

"Listen up, Marines, and fellow sailor—" Shadow nodded once to Anchorage, then cleared his throat. "As I have informed Private First Class Star Shooter, the current situation occurring in the city of Manehattan will soon be under control, and by the end of the day, we expect the extremist militia, the Great Gryphon Constitution as they are called, to be eliminated from their current position in the lower parts of downtown, and wishfully be either killed or captured."

"Which ever way this goes down, we are all in this together and we will prevail. A good sixty percent or more of the Lunar Marine Corps will be joining the fight. Every street from west to east will be swept thoroughly of any remaining enemy until none are left. We will take back Manehattan. We will make each and every one of them pay for the countless lives that have been taken and the property of our great nation that they have destroyed."

The focus transitioned over to Lieutenant Snow Storm.

"The Lunar Marines will be launching a full-scale invasion that will take the fight to the Constitution in hopes of driving them out or eradicating the militia completely. They are currently on the outlying areas of the city, preparing for said attack. Princess Luna is even offering to send her royal guard to help, although the general was indecisive on that as much of the Royal Guard is not trained for weapons beyond melee. The Marines are also evacuating civilians further out and providing medical attention to those who need it," Snow further explained.

"Why evacuate ponies not on the island if they're not affected?" Nightpath blinked a couple of times.

"It's a just in case procedure. In the event more action needs to be taken. This likely will not be so, but it doesn't hurt to be on the safe side," Snow Storm nodded to Night. "I am also putting this out there. Captain Shadow and I have been ordered to extract you four before this takes place later on. There's an offer I am here to give you as well. Those of you who wish to stay and fight are welcome to. I will assign you to my squadron just for this once. If you choose not to, I will not dishonor anypony."

With a sigh, Snow looked down slightly. "In a time like this, I can't guarantee all of you a ride home. Make it so, and you shall."

I glanced to my left to Anchorage and Nightpath, then to my right at Silver Edge. I looked ahead to the lieutenant, and eased my body slightly, taking a couple of steps toward him. Snow gave one nod, eyes moving to the others. "Anypony else?"

I didn't look back to break posture. All I could assume was one of them, most likely Silver or Night, were ticked at my persistence to stay in the fight. Even more I believed that when Nightpath walked up to my side, also standing at attention. Next came Silver to my other side. After a few more moments, Anchorage started up as well.

"Hold on, Anchorage," Shadow spoke up, walking to him. "Sailors are ordered back to Naval Station Manehattan at once. I'm sorry."

The pegasus' ears drooped and his head fell just a bit. "Yes, sir."

"You will come with me. No questions asked," Shadow added. Within a few moments, the two were out the door.

"You three," Lieutenant Snow Storm stepped forth. "Welcome to the team. Although, if you have any last minute mind changes, please speak of them now."

Not a word came from Silver nor Night. The entire room was silent enough to hear a pin drop from upstairs.

"Good enough for me. All right, everypony get geared up." 

Piece by piece, we followed the lieutenant's orders. First came our body armor, followed by helmets, and then our backpacks. Within a minute, we were ready to go.

"If anypony needs any more ammunition along the way, there is plenty to go around," Javelin added, cocking his suppressed and scoped rifle. 

"We're Oscar Mike. Everypony, on me," Snow held his gun in one hoof, waving the other in a motion that we were to move.

His squadron of six including himself formed a perfect line behind him, with Nightpath, Silver Edge, and myself behind. Snow moved over to the warehouse door, pressing a large red button. The door lifted, just outside being the small alley where the loading dock was. Some empty carriages sat outside, not yet touched by anything but snow. Overnight, a good inch or so blanketed the ground. With no one to clear the streets, around every corner there was nothing but white.

Only street lights kept the city well-lit. In lower Manehattan, there was word power had been cut entirely. Upon coming across one of the few lengthy streets that could look in either direction of the city all the way to the end, that could be seen clearly. Total darkness was all to be seen just a couple of blocks east of our position. With the snow still coming down, not much could be seen either way. Over the lieutenant's radio, I could hear Marines call it the Dark Zone.

For the first time, too, there was absolutely no sound. No distant blasts, no gunshots, nothing aside from the gentle crunch of hooves in the snow as we marched to the meetup point less than a klick away, about a half of a mile west. There, we planned to meet up with another squadron to plan out the final attack, as well as a search for the Constitution's commander, if he was even in Manehattan.

Eventually, we reached where we needed to go: a small command tent. Standing in it was none other than Sergeant Hardstaff. Walking up, we saluted to him. The sergeant was our real squad commander in a time when we aren't separated.

"Good morning, Privates," Hardstaff returned the salute. "Fancy seeing you three out here."

"It's a long story, sir," Silver replied with a grin.

"Well, you will have to tell me another time, because now certainly isn't that time." The sergeant gave a grin back. He took the map he had in one hoof and rolled it out across a table. It was a city map with markings towards the east side of the island. "Alright, intelligence tells us they have eyeball on enemy guards in these locations," he moved his hoof in a circle over the markings.

"What is central command saying?" Snow asked, looking over the map carefully.

"Command hasn't said much other than they appear to be staying put. Nothing has pointed towards them advancing any further than where they are currently," Hardstaff explained. "It almost appears like they are waiting for something."

My ears perked, as did my eyes widen. I stepped up to the table quickly to speak.

"Yes, Private?" Hardstaff glanced up.

"Sir, we rescued a captured Marine from a radio station about six or so blocks from here. He said he overheard that enemy troops used the station to communicate with the rest of their company. What we're seeing now isn't the big wave. They are on their way as we speak. That is what these troops are waiting for."

"Intelligence says there is no more than what they have now. If what you tell me is true, then we are looking at—"

"A full scale invasion of Manehattan, yes." The second lieutenant cut him off as he walked up. As always, the stallion was dressed in all-black gear, including a mask he had down around his neck and helmet strapped onto his head.

The sergeant turned and stood at attention, as did we. "Sir, I... I did not know you were here. My sincerest apologies." Even Hardstaff was afraid of Arc.

The grey earth pony waved a hoof, then rested his forehooves on the table. "Don't worry about it. Formality is not important right now," he walked up to the table to look at the map. "If Star's information is credible, perhaps it is a wise idea to have birds in the sky keeping a look out for anyone trying to sneak in, especially by boat."

"That won't work at this hour, Lieutenant. Not in this weather, either. They would be lucky to spot a seagull five yards away, let alone a dinghy or two a few hundred feet down," said Snow Storm, eyeing the stallion cautiously.

"Then we shall wait until dawn to engage our aircraft. There is no use in not receiving warning and being unaware of where to go. I would prefer our Marines stay safe and not be sorry. Enough has been lost as it is. Until then, it is only a matter of time before the cavalry comes in." Arc removed his hooves from the table and stood up straight, his eyes scanning across the ten of us across from him. 

"I do not care what anypony has to bring to word, this will be over today."

"Oorah, sir," Nightpath nodded once.

"Exactly. Oorah. Let's get to work."


***


Within just a few hours, the sun had risen. It remained mostly blocked out by the heavy snow clouds above. Another storm was moving in soon as well. Here was to hoping it wouldn't hamper our efforts.

The final plans were exchanged between our outpost and the large one on the outskirts of Manehattan just an hour ago. Now, numerous squadrons of Marines marched onto the island from behind. They stopped where we stood by. The plan was that Lieutenant Snow's squadron, myself, Silver, and Night included, would storm in first just before jets would come in and carpet-bomb a line for us to defend. No one would be allowed to cross that line without being killed first. By now, we assumed civilians still stuck were in hiding as much of Manehattan's offices had bunkers beneath them.

After the bombs would come the infantry, in which we would lead them into the heart of it all. I understood there would be more bloodshed. Likely worse than the boarding of the Eclipse incident. This would be much worse.

Around 0720, Snow Storm gathered us off to the side. In a neat rectangle of eight, four in one row and four in the other with us in the second, we stood close. Hooves together, chests tight, gaze forward. As we did, the lieutenant stood opposite of us, a hardened look of determination set on his expression.

"Listen up, Marines. This is it. This is where all of your training kicks in. All of those hours of agonizing physical tests, included with many more weeks of advanced weaponry training. This is where it will all pay off. Our city, our coast, our country has been stormed by enemy soldiers who do not belong. They have caused severe damage to our nation's infrastructure and have taken too many lives to date.

"Innocent lives that cannot be returned to us. Lives of ponies trying to go about their own with no trouble. Lives of ponies attempting to defend those trying to live their lives. Now is when we say enough is enough and take from them what they have taken from us. And that is, Marines, that is the morale of us all. Not just us as a group, us as a community. We will destroy every single one of those griffon and pony-traitor bastards. We will make them regret ever pondering raiding our country. 

"And I know what many of you are thinking. Not all of us will make it out of this. While this may be true, you should not let the possible outcome get in the way of what you can make it to be. The future is only set for those who make it that way. I wish you all remember those words carefully." The lieutenant paused, his eyes scanning across the line of ponies in front of him. 

"Today will be a tough day. There will be much death that will follow. Let it be on their side. Let them pay for their heinous actions they have done upon our fair Equestria. We will make them pay. Is that clear?!"

"Sir, yes, sir!"

"WHAT WAS THAT?!"

"SIR, YES, SIR!"

Snow eased himself just slightly. "On me, Marines." He started around us. We turned and took hold of our weapons, getting into line behind the lieutenant as he began walking east.

Bizarrely enough, no snowflakes fell. There was no trace of a breeze. Nothing. It was as if a barrier was formed around the city to shield us from the elements. Maybe there was. Nobody could be certain.

Javelin had a small tracking chip on him in which it could be tracked down to notify air support when we would be reaching the line. The best part was, the chip could not be tracked by anyone else without a computer system programmed to be attached to the chip. It was virtually foolproof. 

Turning down one street, and about halfway down, Snow raised his hoof to stop us. We did so, looking all around us and listening for any commotion.

Instead of hearing any of that, no, this was much worse. We heard jets. Snapping my head to look behind us, I caught sight of two fighters dipping out of the clouds, aligned with the street we were on. 

"Shit, airstrike! Everypony down!" I called out.

Within seconds, everypony else scrambled into buildings as massive blasts lined the end of the street towards us. One missile inadvertently struck a building I was running toward and debris rained down on top. I felt multiple strikes to the head by bricks and shards of glass, thankfully shielded by my helmet. Except the hits were hard enough to knock me off of my hooves.

What I found to be worse, was when I tried to stand back up, except I couldn't. Looking down, I saw my hoof pinned beneath a section of brick wall. Not again, I thought to myself. The memories rushed back, but before they could completely, the strike was over. I snapped my head in the direction the jets were heading, watching as one of them turned around and was beginning to come back our way.

"Shit, Star's pinned!" Night shouted, jumping through a shattered window pane of a store and galloping up to me, trying to free my hoof as the roar of engines grew louder with every passing second. 

His efforts to pull my leg out from under the wall were to no avail. Instead of running back, this time, he jumped on top of me altogether. Within that second, I felt the air rush out of my lungs as his huge torso landed on mine. I would have been damned if I didn't squeak in the slightest way like a dog's toy when being stepped on.

The secondary strike was primarily muffled, the first one having shot mine for the most part, as well as having a much larger stallion crushing me. Except he did it to shield me from the bombs and any more falling debris, like more bricks and glass.

Once it ceased again, it stopped for good. The jets zipped away and were out of sight in seconds. The street all around was in total ruin, but it worked. Miraculously, the intense shaking moved the debris off of my leg with ease.

Slowly, I moved the huge lump of a dirt-colored stallion off of me, also taking a massive gulp of air. "Damn it, Night. Don't do that! Enough ponies have died today!"

Rolling upright and pushing himself up, Night yanked me up with a hoof. "Exactly, I wasn't going to let you be the next one!"

I stood up and shook my hind leg slightly, ridding of the strange feeling from having my hoof pinned. I wiped my hooves on my sleeves to remove dust from myself. "Well, thank you, Night. But that was very stupid. Don't do that again, you hear?"

"I can't make a promise," Night nudged my shoulder rather hard. His hoof recoiled as he nearly knocked me back over. "Sorry."

I rubbed my shoulder and threw a glare up at the brown pony, then shifted my focus to the others as they came out of cover. "Everypony alright?"

"A bit shaken," Javelin replied. "Damn it, damn it to hell. They screwed up on the positioning. They're two blocks short."

"You're kidding," Snow blinked a few times, giving Javelin a look mixed with aggravation and anxiousness.

"I wish I was, sir," Javelin glanced right back at him. "There's no changing this now. We have to work with this."

Sighing, Snow nodded in understanding. "Alright. Call the outpost, let them know we're clear."

"Yes, sir," Javelin removed his helmet and slipped on an earphone with a small microphone attached for communications, then sat his helmet back on his head. "Osprey main, this is Osprey actual. Operation Deliverance and Liberty is a go. How copy."

"Copy that, Osprey actual. Hold position for Marine squadrons. Open fire if you are engaged. Copy, over," the communicator on the other end, Arc Nobis himself, replied.

"Acknowledged. Hold position and open fire if engaged. Wilco."

"Wilco?" Silver blinked.

"Will comply," Snow answered.

Switching off his radio, Javelin turned to us. "Ten minutes. We wait here."

"Roger. Everypony inside, we will hold up some of these shops and keep watch until they arrive." Snow ordered, motioning his hoof.

Some of his squadron split up, heading to a shop, Snow flying up to the second floor where the airstrike made a gaping hole in the wall. Me, Silver, and Night took up a position in the building beside it, remaining on the first floor and in cover while I watched over, scanning over either direction. Our orders were clear: engage if engaged.

While we held position, all was quiet. It was unbelievable that in just a few minutes that a war would be breaking out. For the first time in a few hours, snow began to flutter down from the heavens. It was gentle and sparse. The breeze was even more so or even nonexistent. 

At the outpost, each of us were given single earphone devices shifted over to Snow's battalion's frequency to communicate with each other easily in the event one or two of us were split up somehow. Every so couple of minutes, Javelin or Snow would whisper to us to check in. This changed after about six or seven minutes.

"Heads up, naval air patrol reports seeing three to four militarized dinghies approaching the city from the west-northwest at approximately twenty-four knots," Javelin reported. All of us could hear it.

"This is it. This is the main wave, boys. Batten down the hatches." Snow added. "Check your ammunition and prepare. Cavalry should be here any minute."

"Copy that," I replied, peering back at Silver and Night. "Get ready."

"I was born ready," Silver shuddered shortly afterwards.

"Sure looks like it," I gave a gentle grin, turning back to looking out of the building. "All looks clear—"

I was instantly cut off by multiple bullets striking the pillar beside where I rested and the wall inside, through the shattered windows. It came from slightly above as well as both directions.

"Contact! Open fire, boys!" Snow shouted through the comms. From either building we were situated in returned fire at the advancing enemies.

Sitting over the ledge to my side was Night, pointing in the opposite direction of the street than me while Silver ran upstairs to get a better view and take aim. On my side, I caught sight of at least ten fully armored griffons moving towards us. Possibly more than ten. It seemed like they kept coming.

"They're everywhere!" Silver called from upstairs, shooting almost continuously at the group I focused on.

"Take 'em out!" Night shouted. I didn't once look to see how his side looked.

The nine of us in the squadron separated where we shot to focus equally on either side. After one dropped on my end, another two appeared to take his place. Within an instant, another three collapsed due to wounds. Fire was briefly focusing toward them before one of Snow's ponies called out for a grenade just a second prior to it being thrown.

The grenade did almost no damage but one griffon did end up injured and pulled off into cover in an alleyway. Once the whole group was killed off or badly injured, another came around the corner. This one was far more careful with their aim and forced me and Night to reside in cover and come back out only in increments while they reloaded.

A couple of small blasts immediately took them out, however. Neither explosion originated from a grenade thrown by any of us and left a few of us puzzled, that was, until the shouting of other Marines was heard from down the street. In an instant, they came into view and were opening fire on the other enemies further down on the northern end of the street. Finally, we weren't pinned anymore.

One marine galloped up to our building and inside. He was a taller, military-green earth stallion decked out in full gear. He stopped, seeing the both of us. "Oh, hey, you two!"

"Ash! Get upstairs and help Silver out!"

"Roger!" Ashfall replied, running up the stairs to Silver.

Suddenly, a massive explosion blew some of the coming Marines up and in all directions. One very disgustingly had his hoof visibly dismembered with the explosion, a couple others not moving at all. I snapped my focus upwards to a glass skyscraper across the street.

"Up there, tenth floor! RPGs!" I called out.

At that, everypony's focus changed to the tower. Another rocket was fired down towards the street, striking a couple of floors above Silver and Ash. Glass and brick rained down onto the street as well as some of the floor coming down around the two, although they were uninjured.

I shot up towards the pony reloading his launcher, not a single bullet reached or aimed his way. Shit, not now. I couldn't lose my aim at this moment. I had a perfect shot.

Ease yourself. Let your mind control the weapon, let your muscles go, and shoot.

Snow's advice came back within that instant. No, I couldn't do that. The moment was far too intense. No, I had to give it a try. 

I relaxed slowly. My eyelids shut. I took a deep breath in, my muscles loosening up. Then, I reopened my eyes, gaze moving up to the pony as he prepared to shoot towards the building the lieutenant and the remainder of his squadron sat in. I narrowed onto him and exhaled. The trigger was pulled.

The rocket launcher dropped out of the pony's hooves, dropping down to the ground below. The rocket exploded and shattered much of the building's glass and wiped out the tower's lobby. Any further damage would have resulted in a total collapse most likely.

Looking up toward where the pony was, I watched as his body fell over, slumped against a desk and motionless. I killed him.

"Star Shooter! Great fuckin' shot!" Ashfall called from upstairs.

I stood up out of cover and looked around. All was quiet for a moment. Marines walked carefully across the bomb-damaged, bullet-riddled remains of the block. My chest expanded and contracted as I breathed quickly, not fully realizing what was happening at the moment. Was it over?

Ash jumped down, Silver following a second after. They walked out where the other Marines were. Down to the right, a couple of medics tended to the injured. The dismembered pony's bleeding was stopped altogether with the help of unicorn magic. He would be okay. The others, no one could be sure. Both were knocked out cold in the explosion.

"Good work, Marines," Snow called over comms channel. "Our work is done here. Report back to base at once."

My breathing didn't slow at all. I reached a hoof up to my ear to speak back. "That's it? We're done?"

"We are. The others aren't. We were just to lead them into the fight. There is still one ahead, but we are leaving that to the infantry. Captain Shadow and Second Lieutenant Arc Nobis are ordering that we return to Naval Station Manehattan." Snow replied. "Our fight is over."

And so it was. The nine of us packed up and marched out while the remaining Constitution troops fought back until the very last one. Some surrendered. Within a couple of hours, Manehattan was free of the enemy. Even then I felt I could have stayed in the fight a bit longer. The lieutenant insisted I go with them. No, he didn't insist. It was an order. I couldn't abandon an order.

Not again at least.
> 38. Somber Days
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Star..."

"Hmmmrr... What?"

"It's time to get up."

I opened my maw and yawned silently, rubbing my eye with a hoof. "Already?"

Nightpath nodded. He had already been long awake and was drying himself off from the shower. "Afraid so, Star."

With a soft murr of sleepiness, I turned over from laying on my chest and sat up, blinking slowly as I adjusted to the light shining from the bathroom. I winced the moment Night flicked the lamp on in the bedroom. Once my body was booted up, I pushed the sheets off of my lower half gently and stood completely out of bed. I needed to get washed up and ready. Today was going to be a long day.

The long, cold days that followed the end of the war were anything but bittersweet. I may be repeating myself here as well. It's been no different than returning on the Eclipse. This was on a much larger scale. The ponies of Manehattan were allowed back into what was left of the city. Damage estimates have been put in the millions of bits and to date was still climbing. It was expected to reach nine-hundred million bits by New Years.

In the last few days, I had attended four funerals of ponies lost. One of which, a Marine, passed hours after the rocket struck the ground beside him while I was there. The others before that were the sailors lost in the Eclipse attack. Due to the chaotic schedule, there could only be one funeral per day. This meant we would be attending funerals for days to come. 

Today would be the worst though. Today was Solar's turn.

My body ached slightly as I moved into the bathroom to shower. I reached inside and twisted the knob until it was on the warm side, then stepping into the shower when the water began to form steam. I hoped the water would ease the pain in my muscles, but it didn't. Maybe it was stress. Maybe it was lack of sleep.

Since returning to base five days ago, Night and I combined couldn't have gotten more than three hours of sleep. So this is what it was like to have post-traumatic nightmares for real. Before, they were minor and we could still sleep. Added with the remorse and despair that came with the past funerals was a deadly combination. After today, I could not come to myself to go to any more. I simply couldn't.

After the shower was followed by brushing my teeth and combing my mane. I didn't typically style my mane and simply brushed it to where it was no longer looking like I had recently woken up. These past few days I felt the need to appear as nice as I possibly could. Thankfully, my dress uniform arrived at the base outfitters recently and allowed me to wear that.

Walking out of the bathroom, I found my uniform laid out for me by Night while he also got himself ready. We were to meet up with the others at the train station where we would take a train to a somewhat secluded place north of Manehattan, just east of Hollow Shades. The place was well-known within the military as well as the ponies of Equestria. It was where soldiers were buried with the highest honors, no matter their rank. The place was known as Valor Lake.

At the start of the week, my uniform felt tight to fit in, though as the days went by it quickly became more comfortable to wear. The uniform was an all-black jacket, our ranks in white and dark blue on our left shoulders, and shiny, silver steel buttons lining up the center. The collar went up a bit higher, about halfway up our necks, the outside matching the black of the uniform but the inside being Luna's dark blue. The collars around our hooves were also a royal blue with one silver button on opposite hooves of each other. 

The uniform also included a pair of pants, tightened at the waist with a black belt with a silver buckle. The belt had Princess Luna's moon in center and wrapped around the lower half of the jacket. The pants themselves matched the dark blue on the coat absolutely perfect and were that all the way down, with a silver stripe down either side of our legs. We were also given polished black short shoes to fit on our hooves to keep them from becoming dirty. 

What each of us found to be strange was, despite it being late December going into January, a very randomized wave of heat swept across the region, melting away the ten inches of snow coating the ground within a couple of days time. This winter had been a strange one indeed.

Now the forecast called for persistent rain showers over much of the northeast of Equestria—almost completely fitting to the mood. The world worked in mysterious ways at the right time, it seemed.

Following a couple of minutes of adjusting and fixing buttons to fit neatly, I was ready to go. As was Night, I hoped.

I stared blankly at the other dark blue pony opposite of me. He stared right back with the same expression. The exact, flat, tedious style. Through increasingly blurred vision, I watched him raise a hoof to wipe his eye free of a tear that formed in his ducts, then his muzzle scrunch briefly as he sniffled heavily.

"Star, is everything okay? Are you ready to go?" Night knocked gently on the door prior to asking.

I stiffened my posture a moment after. "Y-yeah, I'm ready."

"Alright, well, come on. The train leaves in twenty."

Giving myself one last look over in the mirror, I turned and took hold of the doorknob, twisting it and pulling the door inward and shutting off the bathroom's light. Standing just out of the door was Night, neatly dressed like myself. His ears weren't necessarily drooping down but were noticeably lower than they should have been. The look he had was more of a bitter, dismal one than my own. Simultaneously I knew how tough it was for him to hold back.

Slowly I gave a couple of nods, and he started toward the door, picking up a basic umbrella along the way. I followed him out the door, locking it behind us as he opened the umbrella. Outside, the rain came down in a gentle shower in which it pattered off of the tin roof and trickled off cleanly.

Down the steps we walked and Night held the umbrella above the two of us. We walked along the concrete path instead of through the grass as a shortcut, the rain having making the grounds muddy. 

The base around was relatively calm. Much of the Marines on base had volunteered to aid in setting up temporary housing for those displaced after the attacks, as well as extended patrols to ensure no remaining Constitution troops were hiding out. Much to our relief that wasn't the case.

Outside of the main gate waited a closed taxi carriage to take us to the train station. We hopped up into it and relaxed for the short ride across the river. 

Despite all of the destruction left in the wake of the Constitution, life gradually was returning to normal. For everypony else that was. It would still be a long time before the rebuilding process is completed. Even then, everypony from almost every corner of Equestria pitched in to get the city back on its hooves.

The taxi stopped outside of the train station. During times of emergency, despite me insisting to pay the driver, taxi services were available with no charge. After a short argument with the driver, we trotted up into the deco-art styled building. In the station was mostly occupied by janitors, some construction workers clearing the final bits of debris and worked on rebuilding what was damaged. Night collected our tickets while I went to grab something quick to eat for the both of us.

I ordered a couple of coffees and a breakfast sandwich for myself, an omelet for Night, and walked with him to the platform where the train was already boarding. The conductor stood beside the door, checking tickets one by one as ponies entered the train. We were a couple of the last to have our tickets checked and be allowed on board, and once we were, we took a seat in a typical passenger car rented out for those traveling to Valor Lake.

Stepping through the inter-car door, Night walked first and took a seat. I followed close behind, but froze once my widening eyes caught sight of a tan earth mare dressed in all-black facing the reverse direction. I walked up and took a seat beside Night, opposite of the mare. I glanced over at her. "Rose... I didn't think you would be coming."

Her head slowly turned to look at me. She gave a soft smile. "The least I thought I can do is come and pay my respects. I know this is your friend."

My head bobbed in a nod. "He was a good friend. He didn't deserve what came to him. Not one bit."

"Then do him a favor when the ceremony begins and pay your deepest respects. Be there to say goodbye to him one last time."

My eyes slowly moved down to the floor. I nodded once again in acknowledgement. "Then it is that that I will do."

Rose smiled gently some more, then looked forward. Within a couple of minutes, the train pulled out of the station. Next stop, Valor Lake.


***


The northeast Equestrian countryside, along with the city far behind, remained to be gloomy and rainy. It didn't appear to want to let up any time soon. Nonetheless the funeral would not be called off, no matter the weather.

Valor Lake was situated, as suggested by its name, beside a lake that rested between the thick pine forests east of Hollow Shades. Its history went back as far as one and a half-to-two millennia ago. There were ponies buried there from every single branch from then up to this very day. As some others stated, the place was dubbed as a military burial ground by Commander Hurricane's son himself. Royal guards, Equestrian Army, and honorable members of Luna's army were all buried together there. 

The place wasn't necessarily a major tourist attraction, although ponies from all over came to pay respects to the fallen soldiers of Equestria's past. This included current military members coming annually to remember their deceased comrades. I would have to as well now that Solar was being buried there.

Two long hours following departure from Manehattan, the train slowed into the small station on the far east side of the cemetery grounds. The station had a small rain cover topping it, as well as an all-stone sign with Valor Lake Station engraved in it. Above the sign flew proudly the Equestrian flag, waving gently in the breeze.

The conductor stepped off, opening the door of our car and welcoming us here as we each stepped off. Along with myself, Night, and Rose, Silver Edge and Anchorage disembarked. The train conductor re-boarded, and within that minute the train pulled away. Once it did, we walked off of the platform onto the cobble pathway that crossed the tracks and led into the cemetery.

Me and Night huddled beneath his umbrella, Silver formed a small shield that covered over Rose and Anchorage while they walked, the raindrops rolling off of the edges and onto the ground. Two cobblestone pillars on either side of the path, a white aluminum sign connected the two with the words Valor Lake National Military Cemetery plastered on it.

Entering the cemetery, it was a melancholy sight. Tombstones and graves as far as the eye could see, downhill toward the coast of a small lake. Normally, the forests of Hollow Shades could be seen on the opposite side, though visibility thanks to the weather conditions made that impossible.

Far down the path and closer to the lake was where Solar's body is to be lowered into a previously dug-out grave. Chairs beneath a small tent were set out and some ponies were already there. Among them were Hardstaff, Ashfall, and Javelin decked individually in their dress uniforms. Two other ponies, a stallion and a mare in black, stood at the casket at the end of the aisle. They were Solar's parents. The mother was an orange unicorn, the father a lighter yellow earth pony. 

My heart sank deep at the sight of Solar's mother sobbing while in a tight embrace with her husband while he shed some tears himself. To their side stood the others. The funeral pastor, for the moment, was absent. He would be coming at the last couple of minutes before the ceremony starts.

We walked up to the sergeant and exchanged salutes, then individually met the parents to give our condolences. My turn came to pass mine to Solar's mother, Solar Shimmer.

"Miss Shimmer," I gave her a gentle hug. She returned it. "I express my deepest compassion to you and Mister Flare. Your son was... an amazing stallion. He had the heart and bravery of a true Lunar Marine. He was a great friend as well as a respectful soldier. We spent boot camp together as well as much of our time after that as much as we could, and... it pains me severely to now have to be here for a final farewell. I cannot imagine how it must be for you or Mister Flare. I am so terribly sorry for your loss. He will be missed."

Shimmer levitated up a cloth to wipe her eyes with, then sniffled and replied with a quiet voice. "Thank you, k-kind sir. Your word truly means a lot to us." She gave a nod, then a kiss to the cheek before we parted ways to sit down.

The parents sat opposite of the aisle from us at the front row, myself including Anchor, Silver, Ash, and Night seated at the front, Hardstaff, Javelin, and a couple of other Marines a row behind. In that minute, the pastor stepped up to the small podium between us and Solar's casket. He wore a type of black and maroon robes from a temple in Canterlot that believed in a second life after death. From my knowledge of the group, it didn't have to do with religion, but more of a different type of magic than what most ponies knew.

The pastor levitated a pair of rounded reading glasses with a chain attached to either end up to his eyes and rested them on his muzzle comfortably. He then took a book and flipped through it a few pages. Behind him, two Marines stood silently with their heads pointed down, a musket in both of their hooves. They positioned themselves on either side of the polished wooden casket.

"Now... before we start off," he glanced up to the parents. "On behalf of the Order of the Canterlot Unicorn, I would like to express my most sincere condolences to the family and friends. Loss is... as I understand well, possibly the worst thing to experience. Forgive me for breaking code also."

The stallion spoke with quite conceivably the calmest, most innocent-sounding tone I'd ever heard in my life. It was reassuring that somepony experienced as himself was put in position of a funeral pastor, especially this one. How someone managed to find him was beyond me.

He cleared his throat before continuing. 

"We are gathered here on the greyest of days to pay our tribute and respects to a stallion of our dear creator, our brother, Solar Wave, as well as show our love and support for his precious family he has left behind as the result of a selfless act of bravery to protect others in harm's way. Finally, we are all present to seek and receive comfort. We as a group would be less than honest if we said that our hearts have not ached over this situation.

"Solar, best known to his family for his shy nature, his gentle laugh, but more importantly, his dream of defending ponies who cannot defend themselves. Solar, best known to his friends for his courage, his strong will to keep fighting, but will now be known for the sacrifice he made to ensure his comrades' safety, to provide protection to allow them to complete their heroic, gallant mission. While we honor him for his valiant actions toward Equestria, he will be severely missed by the ponies who meant the world to him."

The pastor continued on for a short amount of time, talking about Solar's heroism, as well as mention some things likely Ashfall or Solar's parents informed him about to speak of. It was very touching in the least. Moving my gaze over, I noticed Shimmer wiping her eyes with a cloth some more, Flare's head down along with everypony else's. I looked back forward, down to my hooves and the ground beneath. I felt a single drop begin out of my ducts and roll down my cheek, hoping to find its way to the ground. Before it could, I took a hoof and wiped it away.

When he finished, the two Marines behind him stepped out of the small temporary structure into the rain, perfectly sequenced as they loaded blank cartridges and cocked their muskets and took aim for the sky for the three-volley salute. First shot rung through the air. The second it did, a memory flashed. The Marines cocked again and fired a second time. Another thought raced by. Finally, the third and final shot. The final memory, a still of Solar after graduation. A memory we made together. Now it came to me that such milestones were to be cherished.

The Marines returned to their positions beside the casket, water beading up and rolling down their uniforms harmlessly as a result of unicorn magic. Their faces remained unknown as their caps covered them up as they stared downward. Either ponies were sergeants, their name tags behind the medals they had earned.

After the salute, we stood and positioned up to the casket with our heads down, and remained in silence for a minute at the least. A minute to remember. 

Sergeant Hardstaff, resting his hoof on my shoulder, caught my attention. "Private. Would you care to do the honors?" He whispered.

I glanced at him slowly, then noticing a triangle-folded flag of Equestria in his other hoof. My eyes moved back up to him. "What honors?"

"Give this flag to Solar Shimmer, say a few words, then return to your position."

It took a couple of moments to acknowledge the request and nodded once. "Yes, sir. I would be honored to."

The sergeant nodded back, motioning the flag closer. I gently took it in my hooves and looked down at the folded piece, then up toward Solar Shimmer, stepping up to the mare calmly and kneeling slightly before her, resting the flag in her hooves over her lap. I made gentle eye contact, in the quietest yet audible voice, I said, "Keep this as it is. Hold on to it as a piece of Solar. This flag will bring much needed peace to your home, as long as it is kept in good hooves."

The mare's trembling hooves carefully held the flag, catching a mostly silent breath and nodding a couple of times. "Thank you..." She whispered.

I stood back up, returning to the others as we gathered around Solar's casket. The body was dressed in a uniform like ours, the one he would have worn on special occasions. His hooves lay crossed over his chest and held together by each other, a calm expression left on his muzzle as he slumbered peacefully. The sight no matter how it appeared was dispiriting, though all could agree on one thing. Solar was harmonious.

Due to the rain, eventually picking up in intensity, the burial was called off until a later date. This meant only his parents would be able to watch their son be lowered into his grave. Perhaps I was angry about that. Either way, I could not be angry. Why?

I've said my goodbyes.
> 39. Semper Fortis
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

With a polite knock on the stallion's door, he spoke up from inside.

"Come on in, it's open."

I took the knob in my hoof and twisted it, pushing inwards and entering the small office of Doctor Haywalker. He worked on base as a military psychologist and handled Marines and sailors with post-traumatic stress or other issues affecting their mentality. I was paged earlier to stop by and have a short talk with him.

The sky-blue unicorn peered up from his laptop on his desk. "Ah, good morning, Star. I wasn't expecting you until later."

"I prefer to get things done as soon as possible," I let out a very gentle chuckle and took a seat opposite of his desk. "What was it you wished to see me for?"

The doctor closed his laptop where it was and put his hooves together on top of it, making eye contact. "I have heard of your presence in Manehattan, a week back when the Great Gryphon Constitution invaded our shores. You and a few others decided it would be best to stay behind in case something happened, and sure enough, it did. And while I commemorate you for your success, that is not I brought you here." He then paused to clear his throat.

"In case you do not know prior, I work with..." he motioned his hooves a bit. "Ponies, mainly Marines, who need a bit of advice to work around social anxiety, or worse, post-traumatic stress. Now, I've yet to come across somepony who has been in the heat of battle who does not have the slightest of abnormalities in their personality or mental health."

"So, pretty much, you're saying you have me here because I have PTSD?"

"Not necessarily PTSD, I have you here to take some information and work with things you have told me. Then I will determine, over time, if you have it, and if you do, I'm here to help. Now..."

Doctor Haywalker then reached down to a desk drawer and pulled it open, digging through some papers and grabbing a pen as well. He soon took out a couple of pieces of paper and set them down before me along with the pen. The papers were a mental evaluation.

"Go over the questions carefully, write down anything else in the blank spaces you may have concerns with. No pressure."

I nodded, taking the pen in my hoof and holding up the first page to look over it carefully. Some of the questions were just a tad strange and therefore I left them blank, not knowing what to answer. Much of the questions had to do with conditions I may have been feeling and asked me to check them if they were an issue. 

The next page was much of the same thing, but included half of a page worth of allergies and other things such as past surgeries that I could check off.

I finished the evaluation around ten or more minutes after and handed it over to the doctor, while sticking the pen back in the small cup he kept utensils in. Haywalker put on some rounded reading glasses, looking over what was answered carefully. I waited patiently, resting my hooves on my legs. Despite the calm atmosphere, however, it was an uneasy feeling.

Slowly, the doctor's eyes moved up from the evaluation and made direct contact with my own. He set the papers down and exhaled in a strange way. This wasn't good...

"Star."

"Yes, doc?" I could feel my ears pin back.

"While my initial look tells me you're free of post-traumatic stress, it appears you have the slight warning signs of dysthymia."

"Dysth—what?"

"Chronic depression. It is in the milder range and is not too terrible, but it is evidently still affecting you. You put on your evaluation," he picked up the papers. "Trouble sleeping, short-term memory loss, fatigue, loss of appetite, sluggish thinking, and minor agitation, plus recent loss. These are just a few of the signs that you have what you have."

My ears remained fallen backwards as I stared at the doctor. "De—depression?"

"It is, however, curable."

I leaned forward, putting my hooves on the desk. "Please, tell me."

Haywalker grabbed his glasses with a silver magic aura and cleaned them off with a cloth, setting them down on the desk. "You need to take a vacation, whether it be to go home and spend time with friends and family, or go somewhere you've never been for a little bit. You are too focused on work, and ever since the attacks, you have been more restless than ever. This is the best cure I have for you right now. If this doesn't work out, I'm afraid I may have to switch you over to anti-depressants, and that isn't something I can guarantee will cure you."

"A vacation? Sir, I—"

The doctor put his hoof up to shush me, which I did. "Exactly my point. Your work means a lot to you and you're dedicated. That's not a bad thing. What is bad is, you're too obsessed. You use your work to hide from something. What is it?"

"Doc, I..." I stuttered, then sighed. "I don't know what I'm trying to hide from."

"Your parents?"

"... Perhaps."

"I see." The doctor stiffened his posture in his chair, sitting up straight. "I do have another option for you, though I will need to speak with your commanding officer and platoon sergeant, but... I have much doubt you will not enjoy it."

My head tilted just slightly, giving the doctor a quizzical look. "What is it?"


***


Tonight was a big night for the whole world, as today marked New Year's Eve. It was time for a fresh start. In less than an hour, 2014 would be in the past.

Along the riverfront was open for Marines and sailors to gather and watch the fireworks display Manehattan normally set off at midnight. Despite the city still rebuilding, the show was ordered to still go on. Many ponies thought of it as a symbol of hope for recovery from the terrible chain of events. It gave ponies the opportunity to come together once more.

I walked up to one of the piers, up to a blanket laid out with Ashfall, Silver Edge, Anchorage, and Nightpath all gathered on it in warmer clothes, as well as some food to enjoy. If I had to say so myself, I would say most if not all of the base's occupants were here. From what others have told me, the festivities in Manehattan for this time of year were stupendous and unlike anything anywhere else in Equestria. Only one way to find out.

"Happy New Year's Eve," I walked up and took a seat beside them on the checkered blanket.

"You too, Star!" Anchorage gave a soft smile. "For a moment I thought I'd have to come and drag ya out here."

"Nah, I wouldn't miss this for the world." I replied warmly. 

"Hot cocoa?" Silver levitated up a kettle of the steamy beverage, as well as a styrofoam cup.

"Sure, fill me up." I smiled to Silver.

The unicorn poured a cup, levitating it to my hoof. "There you go."

"Thanks," I nodded once and took a sip. It burned my tongue a bit and made me wince. Going back for a second time wasn't nearly as bad. "Hot!"

"Well, it is in the name..." Ashfall nudged me in the shoulder. 

The others chuckled at that. I did too. All of us then turned to look toward the cityscape opposite of the river from us. The lights shone bright and reflected off of the wavy surface of the water while above, there was a gentle glow. A rumor had also been going around that for this occasion, Manehattan would go dark for the fireworks display. This would be a whole new sight to see no city at all. Not without the building lights that is.

I felt my smile begin to fade a tad as I remembered something. Something important. Something important that I needed to bring up to everypony else.

"Hey uh... you guys?"

Their heads turned to look at me, eyes focusing on mine. "Yeah?" Night asked.

I set my cup down. "So, I spoke with Doctor Haywalker today. He called me into his office for a little while."

Night and Anchorage's heads cocked. Silver's brow raised. "What did he say? Is something wrong?"

I looked between the four of them for a couple of short moments, then sighed. "I took a mental evaluation, he thinks right now I have chronic depression."

They gasped softly, eyes widening. This wasn't going good so far...

"Is it because of Solar?" Anchorage whispered audibly.

"Not necessarily," I shook my head. "He believes it is long term, and that with my symptoms, I have had it for a few months at least. So, what he is suggesting is, I take a vacation. Two weeks at the least."

"And are you going to?" Silver asked halfheartedly. 

"Well... he gave another suggestion, too..."

The others went quiet. Then Ash asked, "What is it?"

"Honorable discharge."

Immediately, I was knocked back by Silver leaping on top. "No, you are not doing that!" His voice was beginning to crack. "D-do you want to?"

With a grunt from being pressed to the cold concrete, I looked up at the beige unicorn distressfully. "I told the doctor I would think about it. I... really would not like to. But, he said I cannot stay like this."

Gradually, the unicorn pushed himself off. Looking up at him, I could see tears were building.

"But I can't bear to leave any of you behind either."

Silver's ears perked and he lowered his head down to mine. His pupils were huge. Mine widened slightly as well as he did, and I squirmed beneath him.

"I'm not... going... to leave. I can't. I won't."

"It's a pretty big decision," Anchorage said, pulling Silver off of me and yanking me upright. "Either way, we respect what you choose. It is your life, after all."

I nodded to him. "This is my life. This is what I have become. There is no going back to normal any more." I then moved my eyes across the others. "Once I signed those papers, I decided this is who I will be. There won't be anything that will change that. I will stay put."

Anchorage gave a small smile, nodding once. "Then we are glad to keep you."

"Truly, you four are the greatest friends I have ever met in my entire life. To leave on such short notice and having only known you all for a few months would be..."

"Rude?"

"Uncivil?"

"Crude?"

Anchorage glared at everypony else, then returned his focus to me. "It would be disheartening, but we would understand either way. Mental health is nothing to joke around with. If you decide it is your time to leave, or go on a vacation, if it is for the better for yourself, then by all means you should do it. Like I said, this is your life we are talking about. We don't make decisions for you."

"I hardly make my own life decisions as it is," I grinned softly. "My last one was enlisting."

"Oh, hush up," Anchorage punched my shoulder and grinned back. "You get my point."

"Hey, it's starting!" Shouted a sailor from behind.

In that instant, all lights on base, followed by a wave of lights shutting off in Manehattan sent the area into total darkness. Nothing could be seen, aside from the twinkling stars above, now visible without the glow of the cityscape. Behind a cloud sat Luna's beautiful, bright moon. Far aside from the cold temperatures, the night was absolutely perfect.

One single beam of light was still shooting up from the city, where Bridleway was, as well as the massive array of jumbo-trons. In the distance, cheering of many ponies could be heard. The countdown was over. A second after, fireworks shot up high into the sky and exploded with magnificent color and size differentials above the city and river. Some took different shapes, such as flowers, hearts, then a sun and a moon right beside each other to symbolize the princesses. Initially, the pops and kabooms left me startled, my heart beginning to race.

Then, I felt a hoof rest on my shoulder. With only the flashes of the fireworks giving light all around, I could not tell for sure who it was, although it appeared like no one was there, yet I still felt somepony's hoof. But at the same time, I calmed. A strange sense of comfort swept across my soul. It allowed me to watch with no fear, and no memories of the fighting. The words of the Lunar Navy ran through my mind as well.

Semper Fortis.

"Happy New Year, you guys," Nightpath said with a smile, watching the display with pure awe.

And so we hoped for it to be.


***


"Now, have you made up your mind?" Doctor Haywalker asked, making perfect eye contact.

With a determined, stern look, I nodded in response. "Yes, doc."

"Then what might it be?"

"I will stay a Marine. I won't give up on this opportunity just yet. Not if it has changed my life this dramatically."

"Dramatically, in what way?"

"A good way, doc. It really has given me a new outlook, as toward helping others out and keeping Equestria safe, even if my efforts are minor. I feel good about this."

Haywalker cracked a small smile. "Very well. I will get a hold of your commanding officer. We will arrange your leave, but, it will take some time. Until then, I want you to keep it easy on your shifts, alright?"

"Yes, doc."

"Good. Now, you are dismissed. Have a nice day, Private."
> 40. One Last Ceremony
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"So, I have spoken with Doctor Haywalker," Shadow began, filing some papers neatly and setting them down on his desk off to the side. "He's filled me in about your... condition." He gave me a strange look at that word.

I nodded. "I would have guessed he did, sir. He has suggested personally that I take one to two weeks of leave, or more depending on how I am feeling. Otherwise, he has not made it too clear what I do after that." I paused.

"Well, if you truly do have dysthymia, and as the doctor has said, this is just his preliminary thoughts. He still would like to make some final examinations before he can confirm your condition. Nonetheless, vacation may do you some good," Shadow then picked up a blank report and a pen. "I will put in for the second lieutenant that you will be taking fourteen days of leave, full pay. How about that?"

"That sounds good, sir. In spite of all of this, I hope you don't believe I'm mooching to get some time off." I gave a faint smile.

"Not in a million years would I conjure that up in my mind, not with you. Others, maybe. But not you. I know you too well." Shadow gave a reassuring smile and a nod. He took the pen in his hoof and started writing down on the commanded leave form. "What do you think you'll be up to on leave, Star?"

"Well," I took in a deep breath and let it out. "Most certainly relax at home, in Canterlot. Not really any other places for me to go. I know the doctor said take a vacation, but I don't think he truly realizes how expensive it is to go to luxurious and pristine places to unwind."

"I understand that completely. You could try just exploring central Equestria, like Ponyville, Whitetail Woods, Rainbow Falls, etcetera. Simply places that are reasonable to take a few days off to visit and check out what's in the area," Shadow replied, returning his focus to the paperwork.

"I'll consider it. Thank you, sir."

"No need to be formal, it was a friend-to-friend suggestion."

I chuckled softly. "Copy that."


***


With the leave papers signed, I left Shadow's office to begin a later-than-usual shift. I would only have another one after this tomorrow before my leave would officially kick in. Then I would be off to Canterlot, or wherever else I decide to go that wouldn't hurt the budget I'm on. 

Grabbing the gear I needed, I made my way to the north wall where the guard post was. From there, I took Halberd's position while he went off to rest. I still felt bad for the poor stallion having to put up with the elements. Luckily for him, as of lately, the weather hadn't been all too bad. Cold, still, but not rough.

I took up post on the wall, for what I now remembered to be the first time since prior to the attacks. I never missed such a harmless job as much as I did now. It was very nice to be back on a normal job once again, all the while giving me somewhat of a view of the reconstruction occurring across the water.

For once, the afternoon went by like clockwork. No hiccups or disturbances, nothing. Maybe the doctor was wrong, this was very relaxing. No, wait. He wanted me to take time off to relax from work in general. Damn it.

An hour after lunch, the rain had started up again. As usual, it was a gentle shower. A gentle, cold, shower. Any colder, and it could have turned into tiny pellets of hail. Luckily this didn't occur, and even then if it did, the hail would have been more annoying than anything else. 

Walking back to the small heated structure on the interior side of the wall and out of the rain, I took a seat in the chair and looked over the multiple computer monitors showing live security camera feed. All appeared normal. As I stood up to continue my rounds, however, the phone rang. I stopped and looked at it for a moment, then picked up. "Private First Class Star Shooter, to whom am I speaking?"

"Huh, I didn't think you would answer, honestly," Shadow spoke from the other end. "Anyways, how is your shift coming along?"

"Aside from the rain, it is going well. Is er, is something wrong, sir?"

"No, not at all. However, I called to let you know I've received word that both Princess Celestia and Princess Luna are coming out to Manehattan. Celestia wishes to make a speech to the city, while Luna is to visit home base. Her intentions are... unclear as of right now. But, I thought I would make you aware."

"So, another busy night tonight?" I sighed quietly. "Great."

"Don't sweat it. They will bring their own guards, we will just be here to welcome them. Carry on, Marine."

"Yes, sir."

Shadow hung up, allowing me to as well. I sighed once more, lips flapping this time as I did, and trotted out of the small watch tower to continue my shift for the remainder of the afternoon and early evening.

Somewhere near seven-thirty is when I clocked out and replaced by the night shift. I turned in my rifle and headed to my barrack to take a quick shower and put on a dry uniform rather than the rain-soaked one I had on. At that time, it remained to be unknown exactly when the princesses would arrive, nor what Princess Luna was going to do when she got here. My assumption was it had to do with how the situation a week ago was handled.

I yawned softly, slipping on a blue t-shirt and taking a hanger with one of my coats from the closet, undoing the buttons and I slipped my hooves into the sleeves. Sooner than I could button up and head back out, the door opened and in trotted a rather excited-looking Nightpath.

"Star! Star!" He galloped up to me with a big grin. "Have you heard the news?"

I nodded, fiddling with the first couple of buttons on my jacket. "The princesses are coming to town. Supposedly Princess Luna is holding a meeting or something here."

"Not a meeting, Star. She is here to congratulate us." Night waved a hoof.

"That's to be expected. They usually—"

"No, Star," Night rested a hoof on my shoulder, stopping my actions. "She is congratulating us. Us, as in, you, me, Silver, and Anchorage. Somepony... leaked word of what we did and that is why she is coming with Princess Celestia. We are getting promoted as well."

My eyes widened just slightly. "A ceremony for us? Promotion? Surely there's not much truth to that. Who told you?"

"Arc Nobis. Well, he pointed toward it. What I got out of what he said told me that is what will happen. Either way, isn't that exciting?!" Night's grin grew further.

Eyes still widened slightly, I then looked away. "I mean, it's cool, but..."

The brown stallion's smile faded, he moved his eyes and narrowed them onto me carefully. "But what? Aren't you happy about that?"

"Well, I..." I stopped, keeping my mouth open to speak, but no words came out. I looked floorwards. A second later, I faced Night.

"This is no cheerful ceremony, Night. While we may be getting promoted, if that rumor is true, it still won't be a good time, and definitely not one we will want to remember. She is just going to give us our patches, say a few words about us and then the ponies we lost in recent months, and then it will be over."

Night stared concernedly a moment, then with a deep nasal exhale, he looked down, gulping softly. His gaze slowly worked its way up towards mine again.

"Won't it be better to go with it? The sooner you accept the ceremony and what ever is given to us, if anything, the quicker we can move on from all of this."

I felt a shy bit of anger form in my chest. Like a small spark from a cut wire. My teeth clenched slightly and as I spoke. "There is no moving on from this. Can't you see that, Night? What we have witnessed will never be unseen. There is no reverting for our minds. Both attacks, the ponies being killed, we cannot go back to our old selves anymore!"

Night took a slight step back, his ears pinning as well. "Star, I... That... was not what I was talking about. At all."

The realization struck me like a brick. My eyes grew wide and ears perked up. "Oh... I'm... sorry... I'm so sorry, Night."

"I... um... I'm going to pretend we never had this discussion," he walked further into the room, then to the small closet to take his dress uniform out. "Let's just... get ready. The princess is expected to be here in an hour."

I eyed Night carefully and nodded shortly afterwards. Changing my focus, I removed the jacket I had on and too grabbed my dress uniform to put on. The both of us changed into them, and checked over ourselves carefully prior to heading out.


***


The service was to take place at an on-base entertainment center. Believe it or not, this place had plenty of accommodations even I wasn't aware of. Heck, the entertainment center, or movie theater, whichever one it was, stayed out of my knowledge for this long. 

We walked in with the crowd of others gathering the see the princess, upon doing so, Sergeant Hardstaff met us in the main theater and showed us to the front row where we were asked to sit, alongside Anchorage and Silver Edge. Both sat patiently, dressed nicely with us. Then again, everypony else was, apart from a couple who must not have received the memo for the dress code. Not that it mattered to anypony.

While the theater was not too terribly large, it managed to pack just about everypony with the exception of some having to stand toward the back until more chairs were brought in. Any moment now, Princess Luna would enter through the front door with her own guards and stand up on the wooden stage. At the same time, I kept repeating to myself mentally that it would be just like graduation again. Same circumstances, minus a few extra ponies other than ourselves being honored, and certainly not as big of a crowd.

Over the course of a couple of minutes, the room filled with chatter as Marines and sailors exchanged conversations throughout the duration. I remained speechless, as did Night, Anchorage, and Silver. All had small smiles on their faces, though. Not exactly fake, but not completely genuine either. I still saw pain in their looks, their postures, everything. Maybe it was best if I wore a plastic smile, too.

Minutes later, the door to the theater opened and in walked a dark grey pegasus in her highness' purple and royal blue-colored armor, a helmet on his head unlike the others and resembling that of Canterlot's city guard's helmet build, except it matched his hoof guards and breastplate perfectly. The mane piece was a lighter purple on the bottom, which a short stripe of dark purple on the top. Just hardly visible, the stallion had slight fangs sticking from beneath his upper lip, and ears just barely with fluffier tufts than that of a normal pony. The insignia on his armor also told he was a captain. Likely the captain of Luna's personal guard, or second in command, one of the two.

Clearing his throat, he spoke up. "All rise! I present to you, Princess Luna!" He called out, walking up to the stage and standing off to the side, the dark blue alicorn mare following just a little bit behind. Everypony in the room stood up, watching carefully as the princess approached the podium. Following her was another guard, this time, a grey unicorn mare.

Unlike the graduation ceremony, the princess wore the most beautiful of dresses I'd ever seen in my entire life. It was a silver-and-night blue dress with tiny diamond-like gems all down to the bottom. It sparkled strikingly alike her wavy, night-sky mane, also like the stars of a calm night. She wore matching shoes of pure glass with the pointed tips reaching up to knee-level, each with the moon on the front. The train of the dress rested just an inch off of the floor to ensure it would not snag on anything, not even the stage as she walked up.

On top of it all, her mane was put up in a bun and wrapped by a ribbon of her coat color perfectly, as well as a more fancier version of the necklace she normally wore. This one was silver rather than black, and the moon was made of pure crystal that shone brightly in the light, even giving her body as a whole a gentle glow. 

Over all, the princess was dressed impeccably. She surely had a great taste for clothing. I'd imagine she looks like this at the Grand Galloping Gala.

"Thank you, everypony," Princess Luna cleared her throat quietly. "Please, be seated." At her word, every pony in the room did so, excluding her and her guards.

Spawning seemingly out of thin air with magic was her speech script. She flipped through the pages carefully, then setting them down on the small podium below the microphone. 

"It is an honor to be once again in the city of Manehattan, even more so to be surrounded by the mares and gentlecolts that have fought for the freedom and safety of our fair nation since day one. We have come to honor each and every one of thou, as well as present awards to a special group of ponies who, despite how despising it may sound, went against their orders to be a last line of defense when all went wrong just across the river from this base.

"Not only did they stay behind when all others deployed to the city of Baltimare, a far distance away, they marched into a city under attack, into the rain of bullets, and the hail of destruction caused by a tyrant army of griffons and ponies, known well now as the Great Gryphon Constitution. Without these ponies' contributions, it remains to be unlikely that any of us would be sitting here tonight to commemorate these fine stallions." She paused to flip to the next page.

"Without these brave actions of valor, more innocent ponies may have been injured, or possibly brutally murdered by said militia. They stood up for the ponies, fighting back against the invaders with no hesitation, and no remorse. Unfortunately, however, one of their own had fallen in their efforts. This pony, Private Solar Wave, sacrificed his very life to protect the ponies he loved and cared for, to provide a shield for them when none was available. He will be remembered, and both me and my dear sister have distinctly determined that he will be awarded with the Celestia Cross."

At her last two words, my jaw parted slightly. The Celestia Cross was the highest of awards. Ever. Nothing stood above the Celestia Cross. This was because it was only ever awarded to ponies lost in battle. But Solar deserved it. He most truly did.

"The medal, will be personally given to Solar's dear guardians by myself and Princess Celestia. While we were unable to attend his funeral, nor anypony else's, we are deeply honored to personally meet with the parents of those lost." She stopped once more to swap papers. "And we ask of everypony to take a moment to remember the ponies whom had fallen in these terrible acts against Equestria."

The princess' head lowered, eyes closing. Her guards followed suit, then myself and everypony else occupying the room. Beyond the beat of my heart, a pin could drop outside and it would sound crystal clear. The moment itself was long. A couple of full minutes at the least. I liked that.

Glancing back up to the crowd, the princess continued softly. "Second importantly, we are all gathered tonight to meet those ponies who have contributed to Equestria's very freedom, and the liberation of Manehattan from enemy control. Furthermore, all four will be provided with their own service medals, including promotion from their current rank. They will come up beside me for all to see." Princess Luna flipped to yet another page, her eyes running over the names listed.

"Petty Officer Third Class Anchorage, Lunar Navy." She called first. With a deep breath, Anchorage, in his fancy naval crackerjacks, stood slowly and stepped up to Princess Luna's side.

"Private Silver Edge, Lunar Marine Corps."

Next was Silver. He stood and made his way up beside Anchorage, both standing at attention.

"Private Nightpath, Lunar Marines."

After Silver went Night, standing on Anchorage's opposite side.

"Finally, Private First Class Star Shooter, Lunar Marines."

I eased myself slightly and rose up out of my seat, strolling up to the stage and positioning beside Silver. 

"Lieutenant, would thou care to bring the medals and patches?" Princess Luna said, glancing over toward Lieutenant Snow Storm.

The white pegasus nodded, bringing a couple of small cases up. He stopped just beside the princess, opening the top case. It contained four rank patches that went with our dress uniforms. One a Lance Corporal patch, two a Private First Class patch, and the final one, Petty Officer Second Class. 

Taking one patch at a time from the case with a light blue magical aura, Princess Luna turned to us respectively. Using her magic, the current patches were removed, and thus replaced with the new ones. Private First Class for Silver and Night, Petty Officer Second Class for Anchorage, and finally... Lance Corporal for myself.

Upon finishing, Snow swapped the steel cases and opened the second one, four shiny medals waiting inside. The princess took one, a blue-white striped suspension ribbon with an attached stainless-steel cross with twin crossing anchors engraved, the Navy Cross. She took it carefully with her magic, Anchorage lowering his head slightly as he faced her, and Luna moving the ribbon around his neck to rest it there. When it lightly tapped against his chest, he raised his head once more, still at an attention stance.

The remaining medals were all of the same. All silver crosses, this time with twin-crossing rifles rather than anchors on them, with dark blue and silver suspension ribbons. Each one, Princess Luna levitated up and rested around our necks, hanging them there. When finishing, we turned to face her, saluting simultaneously. The princess gave a salute back, as well as a proud smile.

"What you four have done for this country shall be remembered for generations to come. Your story will not go untold by many. More importantly, you all will not be forgotten. We will make certainty of that. Justice has been served, and I as well as my dear sister, and the rest of Equestria, are grateful for your heroic actions. We are forever indebted to you four."
> Epilogue
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The alarm on the nightstand went off, jolting me from a deep slumber. My eyes, part bloodshot, gradually opened. Without a window in the room, I could be thankful to that and not be blinded like at my own apartment back in Canterlot. It gave me something easy to wake up to, especially after the long night.

Reaching my hoof out from under the bed sheets, I lightly tapped on the snooze button of the clock to silence it. I groaned softly and yawned as I sat up straight. I blinked slowly, then my hooves landing on the floor with a muffled clop on the carpet. With that, I moved into the bathroom to bathe.  It was somewhere just before ten in the morning by the time I was out of the shower and drying myself off. 

Today marked the first day of medical leave. As part of it, Doctor Haywalker and Captain Shadow both suggested I go home to Canterlot, allowing me to adjust away from Manehattan. The doctor determined that raised activity in my mind he detected had to do with every time I would look and see the recovering city, as well as other things on my mind when performing a type of spell that allowed unicorns to look into a pony's brain without attaching vast amounts of wires. It was pretty plausible.

I'd decided it would be best to leave my clothes apart from a couple of non-uniform pieces, but take a couple of books I purchased or had gifted to me back home to read during leave. Certainly I would find it to be quite peaceful, with the exception of boredom for sure. Reading was just one of the couple of pastimes of mine, even if I had to re-read some of the novels if no new ones caught my eye.

I packed up my backpack with said books and an extra hooded jacket while wearing a dark blue hoodie with the emblem of the Lunar Marine Corps printed over the left of my chest. It was quite comfortable, then again, I hadn't owned one hoodie previously that wasn't. With that, I slipped my hooves through the backpack handles and set it on my back comfortably, lastly, grabbing a matching beanie and fitting it over my ears before walking out of the barrack for the last time for two weeks.

Locking the door behind me as I walked out, I stepped up to the wooden railing along the edge of the building and out toward what I could see of the open part of the base. A week and a half later, all went along as if nothing had happened at all. This went with civilians, too.

Knowing the others were busy, we'd said our goodbyes the night before when we left the bar. It pained me to leave them behind, though on the contrary, I'd been away for longer. This was still different, however.

With a gentle sigh, I trotted down staircase to the cold concrete and onto the cobble path that led out to the main road running out of the base. The guard allowed me through a door to the side of the gate used for personnel only rather than having to open the entire gate for one pony. It was one of the numerous small renovations occurring around Naval Station Manehattan. 

Out in front of the gate, I waited patiently as a larger stallion wearing a thick leather coat galloped up with a yellow carriage hitched to his waist. I climbed up, then set off for the train station.

The carriage pulled up out front of the massive art-deco building and I hopped off, handing over the bits to pay for the ride to the carriage puller. Turning around, I looked up at the building, staring with a worrisome look. I breathed in deeply, trotting up the steps and through the revolving glass doors and into the massive main hall. 

Inside, repairs were still being made but it was noticeably close to being completed. Aside from that, some of the waiting areas were being changed up but were blocked by temporary walls with posters plastered on them.

I walked up to the rounded ticket counter, in hopes of purchasing a one-way ticket to Canterlot.

"Sorry, sir. Sold out currently." The ticket agent replied, smiling innocently.

My eyes widened a bit. "Sold out? What for?"

"Post-holiday rush? There is uh, leftover tickets to Ponyville, however. Or Whitetail Woods, if you prefer."

Sighing, I paused to make a decision. "Whitetail Woods, please. One way."

"That will be twenty-five bits, sir," the mare said, typing up on a machine and handing the ticket through a small hole below the window after printing the ticket, exchanging the ticket with the bits provided. "Thank you, sir. Enjoy your trip."

"Thank you, have a nice day." I said with a bit of heat in my tone, trotting off to the platforms to sit and wait.

Whitetail Woods was near Canterlot, about thirty or so miles south-southeast. The town from what I'd heard and seen of it was not nearly as big as Ponyville, which made it extremely small. It probably was not even a town and more like a village. Either way, I'd be stuck there until traffic on the trains lightened up and I could make it home. This wasn't a good start so far.

The train arrived a couple of minutes later than it should have and those on board disembarked quickly to make up for the time. I stood up from the waiting area on the platform and boarded along with a few others. It was a remarkably shorter train with less passenger cars than the one that I typically rode to Canterlot in. I suppose it was because Whitetail was such a small town, it didn't need a big train to carry too many ponies.

Sitting down by the window, I removed my backpack and set it down on the seat beside me. I relaxed back into the seat and glanced out the window, watching as another train came to a halt on the track opposite of the platform and loads of ponies stepping off. A light jolt signaled ours was departing, and gradually the speed picked up. 

I rested my head on my hoof, staring out the window and watching as the high rises and skyscrapers passed by, followed by the Manehattan Bridge as the train crossed the river onto the mainland.

I knew I would return. Yet something in my mind told me that this was a forever goodbye.


***


The Equestrian countryside flew past the window in a few blinks of an eye, later replaced with endless forests of pine trees and just green altogether. It marked the far eastern edge of the Everfree Forest, with Whitetail Woods situated to the central-northeast, below Canterlot. Partially why it even was a stop from Manehattan was because the quickest and by far the safest way to get there is by train. Not many ponies dared venturing through the Everfree. Those who did were lucky enough to escape, or didn't at all.

A few hours passed, near four in the afternoon, the train slowed as it entered the small village, then finally screeching to a stop at the log cabin-architectured station. I picked up my backpack and slipped it back on before trotting out onto the platform. The air outside was just slightly warmer than in Manehattan, this time without the oceanic breeze blowing onshore. That was a huge relief.

I stopped inside the station to grab a coffee, knowing it would be quite a while until I could actually get to Canterlot by train, meaning I would have to spend the day in the little community. Walking out of the station, I gave a nice, long look around at the little square I had walked into. Many of the buildings consisted of log architecture, much alike the station itself. It was certainly a new sight to take in—a new, beautiful sight.

Beyond the town's small assortment of structures sat the rim of the Everfree Forest in which it surrounded Whitetail Woods in nearly all directions. One could assume the area was cleared out some one or two hundred years ago to make way for the village, by which they used the trunks of the trees to build with. 

One other thing I remembered too as I started out into the town's square was that Ashfall was from here. By chance, I could probably accidentally bump into his father. Not many ponies could live here with how little the place was, so that was a huge possibility, even more so with the clothing I wore giving it away.

Sipping the cup with every little caution to avoid burning my mouth, I took in the heat of the beverage to help keep warm while I toured around, with still not a clue on my mind of what I could do around here. It seemed to be more of a logging town than anything else with only a couple of small inns here and there.

"Oh shoot!" Called a voice from just beside me, followed by a very sudden force that caused me to stumble and nearly fall over. The half-empty cup of coffee fell to the ground and spilled out across the dirt as I regained my posture, shaking my head and unsure of what just hit me.

Snapping to my side, I caught sight of a golden-coated pegasus, rubbing his forehead on the ground and sitting up, having just barely pushed himself to his forehooves. I reached towards him, offering my hoof to pull him up. He gave mine a quick look, then taking it. I pulled him up to all fours gently and he let out a relieved sigh.

"I am so terribly sorry, I was not watching where I was going. Are you okay?" He asked worriedly.

"Ask yourself that question, you're the one who fell," I gave a soft grin at that.

"Yeah, yeah I'm okay. How did you not fall?" The pegasus' head tilted quizzically.

"Well, I had to catch my hoofing again for a minute, but aside from that, I'm not quite sure. I'm not that strong of a pony." I replied as a matter of fact.

"Right, of course," the pony smiled. "Hey, are you from around here?"

"Just visiting for the day, actually. Why do you ask?"

"Oh. So, I suppose you don't happen to know where the recording studio is, do you?" He asked sheepishly.

"Recording studio? With a town like this, I wouldn't expect to find one." I chuckled. "Are you sure you are in the right place?"

"This is Whitetail Woods, correct?"

"It is, but—"

"Oh, shoot," the pony said aloud, having taken out a letter and looking at the address with his ears pinned back. "It said Silvertail Summit. Damn it."

"Silvertail Summit, where is that?"

"I know about it just as much as you do. But, I am in the wrong place," he sighed. "Damn it, Ray." He murmured to himself.

"So, your name is Ray, huh?"

"Hmm?" He glanced up at me. "Oh, yes, silly me. Ray Blitz, to be more accurate. Pleasure to meet you... er..."

"Star Shooter," I extended my hoof.

Ray took my hoof and shook it firmly. "Star Shooter. Huh, for a moment I thought I was going to have to call you Marine colt."

"Marine colt?" It hit me suddenly. "Oh, my hoodie. Heheh, I get it now."

Ray chuckled. "So, you're a Lunar Marine, what are you doing here? Coming home or something?"

"Ah, actually, I just started my leave and, well, tickets to Canterlot from Manehattan were sold out, so... I'm stuck here for the time being." I rubbed my hoof up my knee.

"Oh dear. That sucks. That sucks a lot. I'm sorry."

"No need to apologize. This town seems rather nice. Small, with probably nothing to do, but it's peaceful and definitely a big change from the big city."

Ray laughed a bit. "Of course. While I like small towns, the big city is just home to me."

"Ah, where do you live? Canterlot? Los Pegasus?"

"Er..." Ray's cheeks heated. "Ponyville."

"Ponyville? I wouldn't call that a big city," I nudged him gently and grinned.

His face turned an even deeper shade of red. "It's not, I'm simply saying that... well, I enjoy the city. I don't get to go to them often, and it's only when I have assignments."

"I see. What is it you do?"

"I'm a voice actor. Basically that's why I'm running around searching for the recording studio," he smiled innocently. "It's a fun job, but it takes quite a bit of practice to be good."

"I'd imagine," I chuckled with a warm smile. "So, what do you plan on doing now?"

"I don't know. I'll have to hurry if I want to make it though. I have to be at the studio today. We'll have to meet up again sometime, maybe go to lunch or grab a coffee, since..." Ray smiled back, then looking over at the spilled cup. "But for now, I'd best be on my way."

I laughed and waved my hoof. "Very well. I'll let you get going. See you soon, Ray." I nodded once.

"Likewise." He nodded back, then gave a wink and trotted off quickly.

Perhaps we would meet again. Perhaps not at all. Either way it went, there was something strange I felt about this particular pony. Not exactly suspicion, nor was it something I could understand. Maybe I should put it off until the next time we meet. Maybe we will, maybe we won't.

Only time will tell.