Promontory
In the crowded ballroom, Twilight stood alone.
The crowd of guest swirled around her, senior officers and civic dignitaries, nearly all of them space ponies, plus a few unicorns invited for local colour. They walked around her like the waves of the ocean flowing around a rock, giving a decent birth to gown of midnight blue, but paying very little attention to her presence.
On the dance floor, couples were waltzing, Lightning and Starla amongst them. It half seemed to Twilight that whenever their eyes met Starla’s gaze was full of hostility but that…no, she was imagining that, surely. What did Starla have to be angry about?
She could see Princess – Queen Celestia on the other side of the dancefloor, standing beside the Grand Ruler. Occasionally their eyes would meet, and Twilight knew that she saw sympathy, and a plea for the same, in the eyes of her old teacher. She would have gone over, and offered what comfort she could, save that it was forbidden by Starfleet protocol, and a breach of same would only anger the Grand Ruler.
And so she stood on the other side of the room with a glass of punch in her hand and as the world moved around her and paid her little heed.
“Amongst my people, when a warrior has shamed himself in the eyes of his fellows, he is punished by being ignored by them. They will not speak to him, nor will they affect to hear his words, they will not even look at him. It is called the Living Death. Would it be too rude to ask what you have done to warrant such disgrace?”
Twilight looked around…and then looked up. Standing by her side was an enormous caribou, taller than Big Mac, looming over her like a mountain looms over the valley and casts its shadow over the surrounds. He had long blond hair, worn in brains hanging down around his antlers and down to his shoulders, and he had a glint of mischief in his brown eyes that belied the grim tone of his words.
Twilight’s eyebrows rose. “Um…Hey there. I don’t think we’ve met.”
“We have not, but I would have to be even more of a new arrival than I am not to recognise the famous Princess Twilight Sparkle, hero of United Equestria,” the caribou said. He was dressed in a tuxedo that – somehow – managed to be a size too big for his enormous frame; whether it was the size or just him, he was wearing it very awkwardly, as though he were not accustomed to the fit. He took her hand in a firm grasp, and raised it to his lips. “It is an honour to meet you, princess.”
Twilight’s eyebrows rose so far that they disappeared behind her bangs. With what she had heard about caribou this was not what she had expected. “I, uh,”
The caribou laughed. “I see that you’ve been reading the penny dreadfuls. Rest assured, Princess Twilight, that we’re not all harem-collecting barbarians. Not any more, anyway.” His expression left no clue as to whether he was joking or not. “My name is Arminius.”
“I’ve heard that name,” Twilight murmured. “You’re here to meet with the Grand Ruler, aren’t you?”
“His Majesty has been good enough to grant me some of his time while I am here,” Arminius said. “He has much advice to offer on how Starfleet may assist with the modernisation of my country and its people.”
“I see,” Twilight said softly. “Is that what your people want? Modernisation, I mean.”
“Change will come, whether we will nor not, it is as well that we should benefit from it,” Arminius replied. “After all, your own people have benefited, have they not? From the modernisation that Starfleet has brought to your own land.”
“I…guess so,” Twilight murmured. “But…stop me if I’m out of line, but let me give you some advice.”
“I would never be so arrogant as to reject the opinion of one counted so wise.”
Twilight ignored the flattery. “When you…modernise, don’t lose sight of who you are, okay? You…and your people. You’ll regret it if you do.”
Arminius thrust his hands into his pockets. “That sounded almost like the voice of experience.”
“I’d call it the voice of caution,” Twilight replied. “Starfleet has things to offer, true…but don’t become them.”
“Can it be avoided?”
“I…I’m hopeful,” Twilight said. “If we’re willing to work at it…I believe we can find the best of both worlds.”
Arminius smiled. “Well, I am no stranger to hard work, and if you think it can be done…I am willing to attempt it.” He picked up a glass of punch off a nearby table and raised it up. “To the best of both worlds.”
Twilight raised her glass. “To working hard.”
“Executive Captain Applejack,” Major Hayward managed the difficult feat of barking out her name and simultaneously making his every word drip with contempt at the same time. “That hat is not regulation issue, as I have told you on several occasions.”
Applejack pushed the offending hat back on her head slightly as she regarded the stallion who was, unfortunately, her commanding officer. “It helps keep the sun off mah face, it bein’ so hot here an’ all.”
“Sir,” Hayward snapped.
You don’t have to call me sir, Major. Applejack restrained herself from the brink of insolence. Her jaw tightened for a moment. “Major,” she said, compromising between his desire for respect and her desire to punch him on the nose. “My last commanding officer didn’t have a problem with the hat, the Supreme Commander never had a problem with the hat, the Grand Ruler himself never had a problem with the hat.” Not that she particularly cared if the Grand Ruler had a problem with her hat or not, but she would use every weapon to hand rather than take it off because, darn it, this was a matter of principle! “So what, exactly, is your problem with mah hat?”
Major Hayward had an extraordinarily long nose, all the better to look down it at those he perceived to be his inferiors, of her inclusion in which elite company Applejack was in no doubt. “I don’t need a reason, Executive Captain. That hat is not regulation headwear. We are not cowboys in this unit, we are disciplined professionals. Take it off, at once.”
“Major-“
“At once, captain,” Hayward barked.
Applejack snorted out through her nose, and removed her crumpled hat with obvious reluctance. “Yes, sir.” She tried to be careful not to mess it up any more as she put it in at the top of her pack.
Hayward nodded briskly. “Now, start the fellows up, Executive Captain, we’re about ready to start marching again. Fall them in and form them up and we’ll be off as quick as we can.”
“Sir, yes, sir,” Applejack didn’t trouble to keep the sarcasm out of her voice as she saluted him, not that Major Hayward seemed to notice as he turned his back on her and began to walk away, tapping his swagger stick against his thigh as he went. Applejack shook her head as she turned her back on him in turn, and redirected her attention to the soldiers of the 501st Mobile Infantry Battalion, of which unit she was supposed to be the Executive Officer in what was surely somebody’s – Lightning Dawn, perhaps, this was his idea after all – idea of a big joke.
The whole battalion, just under a thousand mares and stallions, was resting in and around a wide meadow the middle of the thick Rangiverian forests, with ancient oaks and knotted pine trees growing all around, reaching out for them with broad and muscular branches, choking out the sunlight with their over-reaching leaves so that the light fell only in dappled patches on the dirt track and the clearing on either side. The orders had come down to march to reinforce Fort William – this whole area was under the command of Rhymey’s father, General Stirskewer, and all the forts that Starfleet was establishing to keep down the restless caribou were named after his sons – and since all the vehicles that ought to have supplied this ‘mobile infantry’ battalion were being stripped for parts to support the big offensive elsewhere – you would think, or Applejack had thought, that an organisation like Starfleet that was so wont to swagger about talkin’ so big and fine and pickin’ fights with everypony that looked at it cross-eyed would have been able to keep itself goin’ and supplied like without cannibalisin’ itself to do it but apparently not, Celestia save them. Applejack wasn’t no soldier or nothin’ and never wanted to be neither but she knew that if you wanted to get those rodeo ribbons you needed to get to the ring in one piece first – and all the aircraft were being used for ambulance duty that left good old wearin’ out boots as their only means of transportation. And so here they were, resting after a few hours on the march in this place were the forest retreated from the road a little bit, just enough for some of the battalion to get off the road and rest their feet.
In the midst of all this nature, and all of this reminder of nature’s unstoppable will to overcome all obstacles as it overran everything in its path, the Starfleet ponies – and Applejack included herself in this, all dressed up in spandex and plastic as she was – looked even more artificial and out of place than they did in ordinary circumstances. The bright red that formed the majority colour of the armour-suits of the ordinary soldiers stuck out like funk music at a barn dance, and the white pants and sleeves weren’t much better in that respect either. In the midst of all this green, of all these trees, of all this evidence that nature would triumph in spite of all their efforts…the pretensions of Starfleet seemed even more pointless than usual.
Plus, would it have killed them to have made some effort to blend in a little bit? Maybe green armour instead of red?
Applejack scratched her head. Not that she could talk, in her orange bodysuit; it wasn’t as though she could offer anyone any lessons in camouflage.
Still, it wasn’t as though standing around ruminatin’ was going to get anybody moving. She opened her mouth to summon the company commanders.
“When I first encountered the forces of Starfleet, they seemed so formidable to me,” the voice came from behind her, soft spoken and quiet, just loud enough for Applejack to hear but not carrying at all beyond that. “So many warriors, and united in such purpose. They seemed…they seemed like a machine to me, an automaton made of flesh, all pieces moving in perfect harmony for the efficient performance of their duties. And yet, the more I see of Starfleet the more I see that it is not so. Not at all.”
Applejack turned around. Behind her, leaning against a nearby tree with his arms folded across his chest, watching her with a glint in his brown eyes and a small smile playing across his face, stood Arminius, their caribou scout. They were at war with the caribou, but Applejack didn’t like to judge anybody on the basis of their kind, and even Starfleet seemed to have gotten over itself to trust him to lead their troops through the Rangivar forests and get them to where they needed to go. She had heard that he had been to New Canterlot, and spent some time with the Grand Ruler, something which impressed some of her fellow officers in spite of their habitual disregard for anyone who was not a space pony, though Applejack confessed to herself that she was more interested in what Princess – sorry, Queen Celestia had thought of him.
Applejack’s eyebrows rose. “You’ll have to teach me how you sneak up on people like that.” It was especially impressive considering he was built like a freshly raised barn and twice as durable looking, stouter than some of these old trees and with arms like stout branches. The scarcity of his attire meant that most of said muscles were on display for the world to see, obscured only by some caribou warpaint that meant nothing to Applejack but probably carried some kind of significance to him, as well as being a lot more concealing than the bright red armour of Starfleet infantry.
Arminius smirked. “Caribou are just naturally good at sneaking up on people. But losing the orange might be a start.”
Applejack chuckled. “Yeah, I bet it would. So, is that a good thing or not in your opinion?”
He frowned. “I don’t follow.”
“The fact that Starfleet ain’t so much of a big machine as you thought it was when you first clapped your eyes upon it,” Applejack explained. “Is that a good or not?”
“Oh, I wouldn’t presume to comment,” Arminius said. “After all, I’m just a scout, I don’t need opinions on such things.”
“Some folks might think that, but I’d like to hear it anyway,” Applejack said. “Humour me.”
Arminius stared at her flatly. He blinked once, then again, and only then did he say, “When Starfleet is at its most efficient is when it is at its most terrifying. The destruction wrought upon…the armies of the recidivist caribou in the flat grasslands, the fools who refused to receive the Grand Ruler’s message of unity and prosperity, testifies to that. And yet, at the same time, machines…they can be so inflexible, can’t they?”
“Terrifying, well, that’s certainly a good word for it,” Applejack muttered. “But speakin’ for myself I think it’s good that we can still be who we are, even in a place like this. I don’ reckon I’d much care for bein’ turned into a part of some big ol’ machine.”
“Who we are,” Arminius murmured. “I have heard words to that effect before…usually from people who call me traitor, for serving Starfleet.”
“Does it bother you?”
“My path has always been clear before me. I have never doubted it.”
“I see,” Applejack murmured. “We’re goin’ to be movin’ out soon, are you ready?”
He smiled. “Quite ready,” he said. “Everything has been prepared.”
Applejack nodded. “Good, I’m glad there’s someone here who knows where we’re going.”
Arminius’ smile widened. “Trust me, Executive Captain, I know exactly where to take you.”
“Thanks,” Applejack said. She turned away from him, leaving him to his duties as she turned her attention to her own. “Okay company commanders, over here, to me!”
They assembled at a jog, her six captains or senior lieutenants commanding companies. Spike was the last of them to arrive, even a brisk jog couldn’t quite compensate for the fact that in his normal form – the form of a little kid – he had much stubbier legs compared with the rest of the officers or the soldiers under his command. It was just one of the many problems that the little guy faced out here if he didn’t want to spend his whole tour of duty in dragon knight form, and Applejack didn’t think that that was a particularly good idea given what Twilight had said about it, so he was stuck running to catch up. He arrived last, and he arrived looking bothered and embarrassed by the fact, though the other officers had learned not to say anything when Applejack was around. She smiled at him, and gave him a wink to show that she didn’t care, and that seemed to brighten him up just a little.
“We’re movin’ out again,” Applejack said. “Get everyp- get everybody up and in order, just like before. A line of…no, a column of threes, okay? Then get to it, all of y’all, quick as you can.”
The officers dispersed, all save for Spike, who was looking down at his clawed feet.
“You okay, Spike?” Applejack asked, knowing full well that he was not okay but knowing that she couldn’t drag the truth out of him.
Spike looked nervously up at her. “Do I have to give them orders again?”
Applejack knelt down in front of him, so that rather than towering over Spike she was at something closer to his own level. She hesitated a little, very aware that she hadn’t exactly handled this kind of situation very well with Apple Bloom and her friends, and now Spike needed advice in a much more pressing situation. “You…I know it’s rough, Spike, but you can’t let them walk all over you.”
“Don’t say it too loud, you’ll give them ideas,” Spike muttered.
“You’re their boss, Spike.”
“I didn’t ask to be,” Spike replied. “They don’t want me and I don’t want to be here.”
“I know,” Applejack said. “Believe me, I know. And…listen, I would do this for you, if I could, but is that gonna make any difference? It’s best if you can try and make them take you seriously.”
Spike scowled. “Maybe I should-“
“No,” Applejack said, before she realised that she had spoken too forcefully. “Well, it’s your decision, Spike, but Twilight didn’t think that you should overuse it for fear of hurtin’ yourself, and I think that she was a pretty smart cookie who knew what she was talkin’ about when it came to this stuff.”
“I guess,” Spike said. “But come on, Applejack, these guys are never going to take me seriously the way I am.”
“Well you’ve gotta start somewhere,” Applejack said. “Don’t worry, I’ll be right here to back you up.”
Spike looked at her for a moment. Applejack looked back, with what she hoped was encouragement on her face.
He took a deep breath. “Okay. You’re right. I can do this. I hope.” He puffed out his chest, looking a little bit like one of those birds that Fluttershy loved so much that flashed its plumage to attract a mate. Only Rarity was far, far away from here, out amongst the stars, and she would never know how hard her little Spikey-wikey was trying, or how little credit he was getting for it.
As the other officers roused their companies, Spike walked over to where the soldiers of B company were squatting astride the road and its immediate environs. He cleared his throat, but if he had intended to speak with authority it was unfortunate that what actually came out of his mouth…lacked it. “H-hey, fellas.”
Sixes, a trooper of B company so called because his registration number was just a string of uninterrupted and unleavened sixes, looked theatrically around. “You boys hear anything? I could have sworn I heard someone say something just now.”
Spike crossed his arms and did nothing to hide his irritation. That ‘joke’ hadn’t been very funny the first time around and it was getting pretty played out by now. “I’m down here.”
Sixes looked down, and gasped in amazement in the same theatrical manner that he had used to look around. “Captain Spike, sir! I beg your pardon, captain sir, I did not see you there. Oh I am so sorry, captain, sir! Whatever can I do for you captain Spike, sir?”
“Fall in, a column of threes, we’re marching,” Spike said.
Sixes stared at him. So did many other soldiers of the company. They all just stared at him, and said nothing, and did nothing.
Spike shuffled uncomfortably. “Please.”
They stared at him, with evident disdain and – in some eyes – even a degree of disgust.
“Um, that is, if you don’t mind,” Spike said.
“No, whether you mind or not,” Applejack said loudly. She strode over to the company. “You can see me I take it, private?”
Sixes swallowed. “Yes, sir, I can see you just fine.”
“Then get on your feet!” Applejack snapped. “Now! All of y’all!”
There was much rattling and stamping as the soldiers of B company scrambled to their feet and into a column of threes astride the dirt road that led to Fort William. They shouldered their spears, and formed up with eyes straight ahead facing forwards towards their eventual destination, however far away it was right now.
“Now that wasn’t so hard, was it soldier?” Applejack growled at Sixes, who was in the front rank on the right hand side, conveniently close to hand.
“Permission to speak, sir?” Sixes muttered.
Applejack scowled. “Go ahead.”
“You can’t protect him forever.”
“I don’ plan to,” Applejack replied. “Just until you knuckleheads remember to treat him the way you would any other officer.”
“With all due respect sir, he ain’t any other officer,” Sixes whined. “He’s some short stuff little lizard who-
Applejack grabbed him by the arm, for all that he was a head taller than she was, and hauled him down so she could glare right into his eye. “Let me tell you something, soldier, and you can share this around for all I care: that short stuff is worth a hundred of y’all, at least, and if you keep this up you and I are gonna have a big problem one of these days, understand?”
Sixes snorted. “So you’re his momma now, sir?”
“No.” Applejack said, as she let him. “But his mama ain’t around no more, so I reckon I’ll just have to do.”
They marched, for a good hour at least, down a path that seemed to get narrower and narrower as they went along. The trees grew closer and closer to the sides of the road, the branches grew thicker and more tangled overhead. Only Arminius seemed to know where he was going, as he strode along purposefully in front of the Starfleet column which, like some large but shambling creature, snaked slowly along behind him down the path, constrained by its formation onto the road as surely as though it were a cage, following along with the tramp, tramp, tramp of marching feet pounding the dirt in disciplined order, hundreds of boots moving in time, driven by hundreds of feet. It was just like Arminius had said, they were a machine…a machine that had no way of moving anywhere off-road even if it needed to but still, a machine grinding on, even on, driven by an engine of insatiable ambition, pulling everything into its maw: stars, planets, towns, cities, people…people most of all. It ground them up, and spat them out when they were of no more use.
It wouldn’t happen to Spike. She wouldn’t let it happen to Spike.
Don’t you worry about a thing, Twilight, I’ll see that he gets home safe. I promise you that.
Arminius turned back from the head of the column, and began to walk back down the dirt road the way he had come, passing by the side of A company as the troops marched past. Applejack frowned, but he didn’t offer any explanation as he passed her by and she didn’t ask him for one. She just turned around, and watched as he kept on walking.
“Executive Captain Applejack,” he said, and he looked back and smiled at her as he reached into his dark cloak for something. “I have to say, having thought about it, I think that you’re right.” He was almost level with the head of B company now.
“About what?” Applejack asked slowly.
“It’s very important to be who we really are,” Arminius said, as he pulled out a tomahawk and buried it in Sixes’ head.
Spike gasped. Several soldiers of B company cried out in alarm. One of them started lowering his pike as he turned to face the caribou scout. There was a loud bang, and a lot of smoke, and the soldier fell to the ground stone dead as Arminius leapt off the road and disappeared at once into the thick, impenetrable tangle of the undergrowth.
“What in-“ Hayward began, before he was interrupted by a brief flurry of loud, smoky bangs from out of the trees. Three more Starfleet soldiers cried out in pain as they fell to the ground, their blood mingling with the bright red armour that they wore.
The march had halted, not from any order but from the confusion that was spreading up and down the battalion as soldiers murmured in alarm, looked this way and that, turned outwards to face the forest as they looked for any sign of their adversary.
Was he always our enemy? Was he always plannin’ to betray us? Sweet Celestia, I’m such an idiot!
“Steady, Starfleet! Steady, soldiers!” Hayward’s voice, crisp and precise and authoritative, cut through the confusion. “Into line, to the right about face!”
The entire battalion turned to the right, changing from a column three ponies wide to a line three ponies deep with a single snap of their collective heels.
Their precision would have been impressive if another flurry of shots from whatever kind of weapons their elusive enemies were using hadn’t cut down another handful of soldiers where they stood in their nice, neat, red-clad ranks with their spears in the air waiting for orders.
“Front rank,” Hayward bellowed. “Spears down!”
The front rank of the line dropped to their knees, presenting their spears to the forest so as to present – in theory – an impenetrable fence to anyone wishing to charge their formation. As they did so, they let out a loud ‘ha!’ that was designed to intimidate anyone who might be facing them across the battlefield.
More shots rang out from the forest, and more ponies died.
Machines…they can be so inflexible, can’t they?
“Major,” Applejack murmured. “I’m not so sure that-“
“Your input is not required, thank you Executive Captain,” Hayward replied brusquely. “The drill book is quite clear on procedure in these situations. Rear ranks, present arms!”
“Ha!” with a great shout and a precise snap, the battalion moved like one pony, presenting their arms with fists outstretched in the direction of the trees, each mare and stallion readying to use their special attack, their inheritance of unicornicopian space pony magic.
It left Applejack, who had no such weapon, feeling rather redundant. She imagined that Spike felt much the same way. This was not a mixed battalion, there were no unicorns or pegasi amongst the ranks, nor other earth ponies aside from her. It was a space pony only unit, which meant that it could put out a tremendous quantity of space pony magic if required…but she wasn’t entirely sure that throwing it blind and in bulk into the trees was the best use to be made of it.
Still, she had to give them credit, the way those space ponies held their ground. Not a soldier was dismayed by the ponies falling all around them, felled by the sniping shots of the caribou from the cover of the woods and their loud, smoky weapons. They held their ground, they kept their faces forwards, they didn’t flinch as ponies died where they stood. They didn’t speak, they didn’t question. They waited for the word.
Like machines…which is just what Arminius is countin’ on.
“Major, I don’t think-“ she began.
“Executive Captain, I shan’t tell you again!” Hayward snapped. He tapped his swagger stick against his knee, and by Celestia didn’t he look smug in spite of everything that was going on, didn’t he look like he had the whole world in the palm of his hand, under his control. It was as if he was blind to what was really going on around.
As if? There’s no as if about it.
Applejack began to sidle closer to Spike, if this all went to Tartarus in a buggy she wanted to stick as close to the little guy as she could.
A sound echoed from out of the woods, from the hidden enemy where he lay concealed by all the thick tangle of greenery and trees that hid him so completely from the sight of Starfleet. It was a war cry, high pitched and keening, a chilling shout taken up by one voice, then ten, then a hundred, then more, maybe a thousand voices, maybe more, all of them making a noise somewhere between the shriek of banshees calling your name and the yip of a wild hunt in full swing that set Applejack’s spine to tingling.
Probably cause of…vibrations or something. Yeah, that was it, somethin’ fancy science like that. It wasn’t ‘cause she was scared of what she couldn’t see out there. No sirree.
“Steady boys, steady,” Hayward called out. “They’re only savages. Just cowards, hiding in the trees. They won’t stand against a volley, believe me, they won’t stand. This will all be over soon.”
A shot rang out from the trees and a soldier fell dead at Hayward’s feet, with blood leaching out of the hole in his chest.
Major Hayward glanced down at the dead pony for a moment, before he looked up without any visible change to his expression. “Battalion! Battalion will give volley upon command! Fire!”
The air was filled with shouting; a loud, impenetrable cacophony of sounds as every pony called out their attack at once in such a whirl that it was impossible for Applejack to catch so much as half of them. Storm Burst and Bolt Shot and Bubble Beam and Ice Breath and Rock Shock and a hundred other attack names alliterative or otherwise and then a hundred more that rhymed and then some all leapt from the lips of the surviving soldiers of the battalion and several hundred different kinds of unicornicopian magic flew from their hands or from their open mouths or from the weapons that suddenly – magically – appeared in their hands as fireballs and shards of ice and bits of exploding paint and leaves and rocks and lightning bolts and everything else that you could think of under the sun whether it was lethal or not all leapt out in a fiery line as the Starfleet formation exploded with space pony magic erupting from its tattered ranks. Some of the missiles that every soldier so eagerly threw forward exploded on contact with the weapons of a fellow soldier as they swarmed forth in a wide arc, others survived to strike the greenery directly in front of the line in a massacred of plant life that had the shreds of tattered leaves and the fragments of shattered branches falling to the ground…but Applejack did not see a single caribou struck down.
But she saw plenty of caribou as they swarmed out of the trees immediately afterwards with spears and tomahawks and long tubes of wood and metal that spat such fire out of them that struck ponies dead. With those tubes they poured forth a volley of fire more deadly than Starfleet’s magic, felling their ranks and leaving them a ragged mess all filled with holes.
And then they swarmed them, charging forward with a screaming cry upon their lips and weapons in their hands. The Starfleet spear line had been blown halfway to Tartarus, there were too many gaps to keep the caribou out, and the enemy poured in through those gaps and before you could say ‘I’ve got a real bad feelin’ about this’ they were all over the whole battalion.
Some of the space ponies tried to fire again, but before they could speak the words to unleash their magic a second time the caribou were on them. They tried to summon their close-quarter weapons, those who had a special one like a staff or a sword, but before they could speak the words to summon them a shrieking caribou warrior with a painted face had buried his tomahawk in their gut or split their head in two with a downward blow.
They were everywhere. Wherever Applejack looked she could see caribou and space ponies grappling at close quarters, rolling around on the ground as they struggled for supremacy, but it was a struggle in which the caribou always seemed to have an advantage, and a struggle which always seemed to always end with a space pony dead, and their blood mingling with the red of their armour.
She was watching the battalion die before her eyes.
And there was nothing she could about it.
Nothing except keep her promises.
“Spike!” Applejack yelled. “Where are you Spike, get over here!”
In this mess he’ll never get a chance to activate his dragon knight form before some caribou takes his scalp off.
“Applejack!” Spike yelled as he ran out of the press of desperate melee to half-stand, half-cower behind her. “What are we going to do?”
Applejack put her hat back on because who cared at this point? “I don’t reckon I know, Spike, but shut my mouth if I’m gonna make it easy for ‘em.”
And then they came for her.
Perhaps it was Spike they charged for, he was rare after all and killing him probably meant something to some of them, but Applejack made it pretty darn clear that if they wanted to get to the little guy they were going to half to go through her first, and so they came for her. They came whooping and hollering, brandishing their axes and their spears, while she waited for them with balled fists and legs well spaced and utter silence.
And one at a time and all together she took them on and took them down.
The first one she laid low with a punch. The second she grabbed by his long red hair and whirled him around like a hammer in an athletics contest to know down three other caribou before she threw him away like week-old trash. One almost brought his tomahawk down on her head as they grappled together, their bodies locked as she struggled to fend off that hideous strength; she had to grab the caribou’s own knife from his belt and stab him in the thigh – she didn’t like hurting any creature that way, but he wasn’t giving her much of a choice – before she laid him out with a punch.
The surrounded her, seeking to swarm her with numbers, but she punched and she kicked and she withstood them all.
“Applejack, watch out!” Spike yelled.
She heard the click a moment before she saw a caribou pointing one of those metal tubes right at her.
Applejack didn’t have time to move before the mouth of the tube exploded with fire. She felt pain in her left temple, felt herself being blow backwards off her feet, and then everything went black.
For a moment, Spike stood frozen. He was like a statue petrified in the royal gardens, some ancient monster bound in stone to keep Discord company as he watched Applejack pinwheel through the air, with blood spraying from the wound to her head. She spun lazily, like a rag doll thrown by an angry child, before she landed on the ground with a thump of terrible finality.
No. Please…please no. Memories flashed through his mind, memories he had hoped to shove into the darkest recesses of his consciousness and never see again: a broken body cradled in trembling arms, a sleeping princess lying in state upon a marble altar, never to awaken, a pyre, a funeral, tears. Tears and a body withering in flame. The finality of death.
No. No, this can’t be happening. This can’t be happening! Not again. Not again!
He stared at her, as if by staring he could will Applejack to wake up, to walk it off, to please, please be okay. Please be okay. Please say something.
Applejack groaned. It was the slightest sound, barely louder than the squeaking of a mouse, but he heard it nonetheless. She was alive. She was alive! She was hurt to be sure, but she was alive! If only he…
A caribou howled in triumph as he bounded through the last bitter remnants of the fighting, ignoring the few remaining Starfleet warriors who had yet to be dispatched, to stand over Applejack’s barely moving form with a knife in one hand and a tomahawk in the other.
“No!” Spike yelled. “Don’t…don’t you touch her! Get away from her!” An anger rose inside of him, a rage at everything that had happened to him and to her and to all of his friends ever since Twilight had gone and even before that…such rage as would have made a great dragon king cower in fear rose up in his throat like bile after a poorly cooked meal as he threw back his head and roared.
“DRAGON POWER!” a beam of golden light enveloped him, consuming him, making Spike cry out in pain, a pain that was obscured by the thunderclap sound of magic at work as the power of the dragon knight transformed him.
There were a couple of reasons Twilight hadn’t wanted him to use the power of the dragon knight too often, and one of them was that every single cell in his body changed every time he did and it hurt. He could feel himself being ripped apart and put back together again, every inch of him becoming something else, expanding, transfiguring.
It hurt, but it was worth it, for Applejack.
She’d do the same for me and she wouldn’t even hesitate.
The golden light faded, and a different Spike stood before the astonished caribou: a warrior clad in all-encompassing armour of burnished steel, with gilded paudrons on his shoulders and brazen greaves girded about his legs, and a helmet wrought in the image of a fearsome wyrm set upon his head and obscuring all but his eyes within by its shadow. A majestic longsword was in his hand, a round metal buckler was upon his arm, and he was as tall as any of them now, and better armoured than most.
The caribou attacked him, each one wanting the glory of felling this great warrior for themselves, but his armour was proof against their feeble blows, and he effortlessly knocked them aside with his shield or simply with his brute strength. He didn’t stop to fight them, though. His only concern was Applejack. He rushed to her, battering aside or trampling down any caribou who sought to waylay him, and then he knelt beside her like a knight seeking benediction of his lady before the tournament to win her hand.
She was breathing, barely. She had what looked like a cut along the side of her temple, though Spike didn’t understand why. But she was alive. That was all that mattered.
And so, as the weapons of the caribou clattered futilely against his armour, Spike picked up Applejack in his arms and cradled her there the way that Lighting had once carried…no, he mustn’t think about that. He mustn’t. This was going to be different. She was going to live. She was going to be okay.
Telling himself that, and trying desperately to believe it, Spike fled with Applejack in his arms into the depths of the forest.
“Look at that one,” Inguiomerus spat derisively. “He runs like a coward.”
“You sound like one of them,” Arminius muttered, as he finished cutting the heart out of the dead body of Major Hayward. “Courage, cowardice, these are the words of our enemy, which they use to brand us for not dying in their fire. Stand your ground and fight to the death, this is the way of our enemy.” He pulled the heart out of the chest, and stared at it for a moment, this bloody piece of meat. “The way that we shall use to defeat him.” He stood up. “Life, victory, freedom, these are all that matters. If there is a pony that grasps that then…she may make a worthy opponent yet.”
Inguiomerus frowned. “Shall we pursue them?”
Arminius considered it. It would be the pragmatic decision, considering that this whole exercise had been for the purpose of causing the death of Miss Applejack, with an entire battalion of ‘Starfleet’s finest’ as collateral damage. And yet…many warriors would die bringing down that beast, and it hardly seemed worth it to deliver the coup de grace to a mare who would probably die of her own accord soon enough.
A great pity. She had a kind of beauty to her, Applejack; her freckles, the way she wore her hair…in an earlier age he might have taken her for a concubine, as was a warchief’s right.
But that was another world, and vanished now.
“Why bother?” he said. “The mare is wounded and like to die. And where can they go, lost as they are in a strange land?”
Inguiomerus nodded, but Arminius noticed that his lieutenant still didn’t look very happy about that, or maybe about something else.
“Our great victory does not elate you?”
Inguiomerus shrugged. “There were many mares here. We should have taken them as slaves instead of killing them.”
“That is the old way.”
“Do we not fight for the old way against the new way of these intruders to our land?”
“We fight for the freedom of our land and our people,” Arminius replied sharply.
“The old way will not avail us against their strategies, their power, and their machines. We must use the best of what I have learned from them, and the best of what our fathers passed down to us, if we are to prevail.”
“Lord Titan may not approve of that mare being allowed to live,” Inguiomerus said.
Arminius frowned. “What Lord Titan doesn’t know won’t hurt us,” he said, and hoped that their ally was not as omniscient as he claimed to be.