) so I had to wait until it passed. Thankfully, it has, and my next one-shot story is planned to be out on either Friday or the weekend.Chapter 2 sample maggots! · 2:31am Apr 22nd, 2023
Okay you maggots/turd sandwiches/readers, hear this!
If you have read my last blog, you'll know about the emergency rewrite for part of chapter 2 of 'Drill Sergeant Luna' that I had to do, which threw a wrench in the editing for the chapter as a whole and slowed everything down. The chapter would have been out either today or tomorrow, but since it will instead be about another 3 or 4 days, I decided to give a sample here of it here as a consolation of sorts. It is roughly the first fourth of the (estimated) 3,900-4,800 word chapter 2, so this chapter will be much longer than chapter 1 which barely cracked 1,000 words. Since this part of the chapter wasn't part of the emergency rewrite, it is currently the most edited part of the chapter (though still not 100%) and theoretically could have even been released tomorrow if it was the whole chapter.
That will be all. Now I'm off to do a little work on the story before Luna shows up in this blog and think I'm here being lazy again.
Ta-ta, maggots/turd sandwiches!
He better go! There might just be hope for that lazy human yet.
In the training grounds outside of Canterlot Castle…
Canterlot Castle’s Royal Guards had gathered in a huge group. Princess Luna stood tall in front of them, bearing a stern scowl and wearing a green hat on her head. Despite the importance of this new training, the weakest guards had been chosen to not join. That way, a few guards could continue to carry out duties such as supervising regular citizens who visited the castle or stood watch in front of the castle’s front and back doors, while most guards would be pumped into buff, mean, fighting machines.
“All right, you lot, listen up and listen well, because I will only say this once!” Luna lifted her head, her scowl radiating firmness and authority. She paced back and forth as she continued, “I will not mince words; your performance as Royal Guards when Canterlot faced danger has been horrible, so I will be in charge of your training to fix that. But before we start, hear this: I will not coddle you in the slightest as my sister might. In my camp, you will be pushed to your absolute limits and beyond. Every muscle in your bodies will beg for mercy–and they better not count on getting any. I will be so hard, some, if not all of you, might start resenting me, and I will bear you no judgment if you do. However, you will thank me in the future, because once you complete my training, you will not just be guards. You will be buff, mean, fighting machines capable of standing against anything that dares attack Canterlot! You will be what current and future guards will aspire to be! Understand?!”
The guards answered in unison, “Yes, Princess Lu-”
Luna’s scowl sharpened. “No! You will address me as ‘Sergeant Luna’ when I am training you! Is that clear?!”
“Yes, Sergeant Luna!”
“Speak up, you lot! I can’t hear you!”
“YES, SERGEANT LUNA!”
“Better!” Princ–uh, Sergeant Luna eased her scowl. “First, I trust you have already warmed up a little beforehoof, but the true warm-up for your training will be to perform 200 push-ups in a row.”
“200?!” a guard asked in alarm. “For a warm-up?! Princess Celestia never made us do more than 200 in a whole day!”
“Is that so?” Sergeant Luna tapped her cheek. “If Celestia made you do no more than 200, then you are going to perform 250 in a row as a warm-up under my training.”
“250?!” all the poor guards shouted.
“Do I hear 300?”
“No!” they answered with many shaking their heads as another “No!”
“Then get started!”
The guards dropped to the ground. They pushed their bodies up, then down, and up, and down. Up. Down. Up. Down.
“Not fast enough! Push like you mean it! One two, one two, one two!”
The guards’ push-up speed wisely bumped up on the spot. As the number rose to over 50, then 100, and then 150, sweat rained down their foreheads. Their grunts and strains of effort grew louder and more frequent.
“That’s it! Pour that sweat! Feel the burn!”
A guard, a gray pegasus with a gold mane, wheezed as his movements slowed. His eyes grew glassy. He forced one more, slow push-up, then collapsed on his stomach and panted, his sweat still raining.
Luna stomped to the guard, a scowl once again burning over her eyes. Towering over the pegasus, she yelled, “Colt! I thought I ordered you to do 250 pushups! I only counted 214!”
“Can’t that…be close enough…Sergeant Luna? I’m tired!”
She leaned to the guard, glaring down at him. “Well, are you tired of always failing to protect Canterlot with barely a fight? Are you tired of giving a bad name to who should be the finest fighters in Equestria?”
“No, but–”
“‘But’ nothing!” The Sergeant stomped her hooves, shaking the ground. The other guards all collapsed, but Luna already had an idea of how to get them to resume their warm-up. “Your performance has been so poor, even the weaker members of a group of six young untrained mares can outclass all of you combined in combat! That is unacceptable!”
The scolded guard’s ears wilted. The shame of being utterly beaten by girls – battle performance-wise – drowned any complaints he could throw out.
“Where is your pride as a Royal Guard–no, where is your pride as a stallion?! Are you really going to keep allowing yourself to be inferior to a few mares,” in her royal Canterlot voice, Luna bellowed, “JUST BECAUSE THOU ARE A LITTLE TIRED?!”
He gritted his teeth. “No!”
“Then prove it by finishing your warm-up!”
He sprung off his stomach and resumed his push-ups with extra vigor. The other guards, either due to their prides of being a Royal Guard, – or a Royal Guard and stallion for the male guards – being indirectly called out, also sped up.
Luna smirked, nodding her head in approval. “Yes, that is the heart I was looking for. You just might become our top guard.” She surveyed the other guards and how they seemed fired up in their task, and thought to herself, ‘My speech worked on the others as well. Good.’
One guard reached 250 push-ups, and collapsed while panting. More and more reached their 250th push-up and followed the first guard’s lead by collapsing and panting.
“That was a half-decent warm-up. I will allow you to take a fifteen-minute rest, then you are going for a nice march to Equus Park where you will perform the drills I have arranged for you. These grounds are not suitable for all that you will do under my supervision.”
All of the guards’ eyes widened, gasps flying out of their mouths.
“What?! All the way to Equus Park?!” The possible future top guard asked. “It would take close to an hour to get there by train, and we have to get there on hoof?!”
“You lot heard me! I said it before; your muscles are going to scream for mercy during my training. Take a good rest, but in fifteen minutes, you march!”
The insults are lacking bite and humor. Gunny said it before: the best drill instructors are borderline stand-up comedians.
I read one story where the lousiest recruit was told to take care of the Sergeant's pet rock (just a random rock on the side of the path). Recruit put it in his pocket for the rest of PT, and the Sergeant was like "ya killed my pet rock!" He made the recruits perform a funeral for it. (Probably one of the funniest PT stories I've ever read.)
I almost feel sorry for those guards, but they NEED the training!
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Duty noted.
That already sounds like it was a funny story!
Alas, Luna in this story wouldn't do anything like that, since everything she will do, including punishments, would be done with the added benefit of making her guards better fighters. Although, she might would have them dig a ton of graves or something as both a punishment and to build up their strength, since digging grave after grave by hoof would make for pretty tough exercise.