It had been two days since the incident at the river. Ponyville remained subdued, but the residents were beginning to return to the streets regularly. Foals were allowed outside, though they were still strictly watched and never allowed to stray far from their homes. The ponies who’d been training themselves had come out early in the morning to begin their exercises and were still practicing as midday approached. Fluttershy rested on a bench in the park, watching them idly. She was exhausted from all of the work she’d been doing for the animals passing through as they fled the fighting to the west. Though fewer had been arriving recently, she still had her hooves full with the ones already in her care. Now she was taking a much needed break.
The tension in town was starting to twist itself into her subconscious. Like persistent vines in between stones, she could feel it push and pull at her until she must finally fall apart all together. She found watching the volunteers train to be soothing. It offered a reassurance that ponies hadn’t given up on themselves or each other, as some of the talk amongst the refugees was beginning to indicate. These twenty three ponies were preparing to do what was necessary to protect the rest of them. Fluttershy’s heart ached with pride and appreciation for them. She knew she couldn’t even consider doing what they were doing. She also knew that they were doing it for precisely that reason. It only made the ache more potent, thinking how much she owed to them for being willing to face the danger.
Other than the emotionally uplifting effect of seeing them train, she enjoyed watching their rhythmic motion, marching first to one end of the park and then back again. They had been getting better at staying in formation under Open Skies’ instructions and were beginning to work on keeping their weapons pointed outward and ready while they moved. Fluttershy thought they looked nearly as professional as the Royal Guard now, their armor clanking as they moved and their weapons catching the sun with brilliant flashes. Their voices rose and fell as they called out to each other in coordinated signals. She was lulled into a calm by it and her worries fell away until she only saw movements in front of her, all of it losing meaning in the rhythm, like waves on a shore.
So when shouts interrupted the orderly pattern, she was jarred back to reality with a gasp. The volunteers had stopped and were looking north, pointing and whispering to each other in hushed, worried tones. When Fluttershy saw what they were looking at, she had to suppress a shrill yelp of fear. Smoke rose from the spires of distant Canterlot, the black clouds filling the sky above the mountainside city. There were specks of movement and tiny flashes of what might have been fire or magic. Everypony knew what was happening: Canterlot was under attack. Ponies congregated in the streets as word spread. Once again, as at the river, the whole town stood in silent witness.
Fluttershy couldn’t make out what was happening with the battle taking place so far away. The faint signs of movement were inaudible, playing out beyond the ability of anypony to discern in any detail. They couldn’t know what was happening, and couldn’t do anything to affect it even if they did. It was a dreadful feeling, to be so helpless. She watched until she couldn’t stand it any longer. So she took off to the southwest, to do the only thing she could think of: find a friend.
~*~*~
Along the southern edge of Whitetail Wood, the symphony of wind and birdsong was occasionally punctuated by the dull echo of metal on wood and a pony’s determined grunts of effort. Applejack paused to catch her breath as she completed another bout of rigorous exercises with her sword. The sweat from her intense workout made her coat glisten and her mane cling to her back and neck while each breath was loud and labored. She’d been out since dawn and she didn’t intend to stop until she could hardly stay standing. As it was, she just needed a breather before she began again, despite the trembling in her legs.
She wasn’t put off by her discomfort too much. She’d seen hard days of work before. Even more, she was glad for the physical signs of her efforts. Zacon had told her that she only needed to be set on the right path for her to push her own improvement, and so far, he’d been right. She could feel the strength in her muscles building with each passing day that she trained. She reveled in the knowledge that she was growing faster and more skilled. Each drop of sweat felt well earned.
As her breathing returned to normal, she picked up her sword again and advanced on the next set of trees. Behind her, five had been cut through and lay abandoned on the forest floor. Others were disfigured around their whole trunks and cut with gashes so deep that the inner most rings were exposed. Her more recent work had left the bark at least half way around untouched to spare the tree and give it a chance to survive.
Applejack lowered her head as she prepared to attack. She glared outward from under her mane, and tightened her grip on the hilt. With a huff, she charged. She came alongside the first tree and swung with a downward stroke. The blade bit into bark, causing chunks to fly away. Applejack twisted her head as she followed through so that the blade wasn’t stopped by the hard wood beneath, instead stripping the bark off completely and leaving a wide gash. Without breaking stride, Applejack kept going, headed for the next tree in line. She ducked a low hanging branch and leapt over the bush that rested at the roots. With her rising action, she raked her sword along the tree, using a twist of her head to strike hard enough to penetrate the bark but letting it glide along as she passed by so that the blade sliced a long, clean ribbon through the bark from one side to the other.
She landed and somersaulted. When she regained her hooves, she twisted her entire body to strike out at the tree in front of her. She put her whole weight into the strike and the sword sank through the bark and cut deeply into the wood. Satisfied with her improvement, she tugged at the hilt. It wouldn’t budge. The sword had been buried as deep as the width of the blade and then some. She frowned at the hilt, examining it from other angles to find a way to dislodge it. She knew she’d need to get it out eventually, since it was one of the only two she had to work with. She also knew in the back of her mind that losing her sword like this in a battle would be deadly.
That thought jumped to the front of her mind when she heard something rapidly approaching. She gripped the hilt in her mouth and yanked on it desperately but to no avail. The sound of running was getting closer. Panic gripped Applejack and she looked around for her other sword. It lay a fair distance away and in the direction of whatever was approaching and she could already spy movement. She was far from town and all alone. She looked from the approaching sounds, to her spare sword, to the one in the tree. She turned away, reared up and kicked the stubborn sword with both hooves. It popped out of the wood with a sharp crack that sent splinters flying. She scooped it up in her mouth and turned to face her assailant.
Fluttershy burst through the screen of trees and stopped short with a scream at the sight of Applejacks murderous glare. The glint of Applejack’s blade and aggressive stance were enough to leave the poor Pegasus in a trembling heap, a soft whimper escaping the hooves she was using to cover her face. It took Applejack a second to realize that only Fluttershy was coming and that nothing actually threatened. She spat out the sword and moved to comfort her friend.
“Sorry there Fluttershy. But you kinda startled me too.” Applejack chuckled as she helped Fluttershy back to her hooves. “What are you doin’ out here?”
“I came looking for you,” she squeaked.
“Is somethin’ the matter?”
Too shaken to answer with words, Fluttershy pointed north. Applejack peered up through the leaves and branches that blocked her view until she caught sight of the column of smoke that was rising ever higher above Canterlot.
“Sweet Celestia,” she breathed in awe. “Is the city really burnin’?”
“I noticed the smoke and came to find you right away,” Fluttershy said.
Applejack retrieved her hat, which she’d put to the side while she’d been training.
“We’ve got to get back to town, quick. Somethin’ needs to be done. Come on!”
The two of them raced back into town together, headed for town hall. When they got there, they found an emergency meeting was already concluding. Applejack stopped the first pony she reached, whom she recognized as Bon Bon.
“What happened?” Applejack asked breathlessly. “What did ya’ll decide in there?”
“We decided we couldn’t do much except to keep to our tasks and be watchful,” she replied in a monotone.
“So Canterlot’s bein' attacked and we’re just gonna sit here and watch?!” Applejack balked.
“What are we supposed to do from here that the Army and the Princesses couldn’t do for themselves?” Bon Bon countered crossly. Before Applejack could retort, she went on in a more even tone. “Look, we just got done discussing these options. Somewhere around sixty ponies from Ponyville have gone north with the Army, so they’re already out there doing what they can. We have twenty more in town who’ve said they’re willing to take some sort of action, but they’re basically untrained, plus we’ve got nopony to lead them. So until we see or hear something that changes the situation, we’ve decided our best bet is to sit tight.” She gave a frustrated huff. “No matter how much I might feel we should do more.”
“Sorry for snappin’ at you,” Applejack apologized, realizing the other mare was feeling more or less the same frustration she did. “I’m so worried about my brother out there I forget other ponies might be goin’ through the same things.”
“It’s fine,” Bon Bon said with a dismissive gesture. “I’m a bit on edge myself. My marefriend joined up too. Knowing that she’s risking herself for me while I’m here doing next to nothing is the most aggravating feeling ever.”
“I know that feelin’,” Applejack nodded. “But I suppose we don’t have a whole lot of choices in the matter. Like my brother told me, we’ve got to make sure the town’s still functioning when they get back.”
“Or…,” Bon Bon said slowly, looking after a particular group of stallions who were headed toward the park. “Or we can prepare to defend it while they’re away.”
Applejack followed her gaze curiously. When she saw that some of the stallions were wearing armor, her eyebrows shot up.
“I admit I haven’t been paying close attention, but how long have ponies been training in town?”
“Just since yesterday afternoon,” Flutteshy spoke up, hovering at the edge of the conversation until now.
“Are they fixin’ to join the Army then?”
“They would,” Bon Bon replied. “If the Army would send somepony out here to sign them up.” Bon Bon took a deep breath and looked Applejack dead in the eye. “I didn’t even want to think of the possibility, but with what we saw in the river and now the attack on Canterlot, it can’t be denied any longer. The Army is either too busy or too dead to send anypony.”
“They ain’t dead,” Applejack replied fiercely.
“I want to believe that, I really do!” Bon Bon said, putting an earnest hoof on Applejack’s shoulder. “But that doesn’t change the fact that our best option is to be ready for an attack to find us here before we hear from them.”
Applejack frowned in grudging acceptance. “I’ll be ready, make no mistake.”
“You will?” both Fluttershy and Bon Bon asked simultaneously, though the latter was more skeptical than shocked.
“Absolutely,” Applejack replied without hesitation. “I’ve been trainin’ myself for seven days now.”
Bon Bon glanced at the armored stallions and gestured for Applejack to follow. Fluttershy tagged along. Bon Bon lowered her voice conspiratorially.
“If you’ve had any kind of serious training, maybe you could give them some pointers. They haven’t got more than two clues what they’re doing between the lot of them.”
Applejack thought it over critically. She knew Zacon’s training had been enough for her to start down the path of the soldier, but she didn’t know if she was in any position to teach anypony else. She recalled Zacon’s words when he’d agreed to train her. He’d made it clear that he knew she wouldn’t be truly ready, but he also accepted the fact that his help would mitigate her disadvantages. She figured whatever assistance she could give was better than nothing.
“They’ve made the choice to defend their homes,” she said, paraphrasing the warrior’s words. “I can’t see a reason that they shouldn’t get the best chance to survive that I can provide.”
Bon Bon regarded her choice of words quizzically but let it pass.
“Good. We should get them started immediately.”
“We?” Applejack asked.
“Sure,” Bon Bon said casually. “I’m not going to sit on the sidelines through all of this. If anything, I want some training myself. It’s been a while since I’ve had to handle anything more than a few angry neighbors.”
“You’ve got to know fightin’ ain’t gonna be easy. The stallion who trained me made sure I was clear on that.”
“Don’t you worry about my expectations, Applejack,” she replied with a sharp glance and a frown. “I might have a more realistic grasp of what a battle is like than you do.”
Applejack would have pursued the subject, but something in the way Bon Bon’s eyes had hardened told her it would be a bad idea. They caught up with the volunteers as they were gathering in the park again. None of them looked the least bit enthusiastic though, hardly making an effort to collect their equipment to begin practicing again. Clearly, the attack on Canterlot had dampened their confidence. Applejack could tell this would be a testing point for those who were truly committed to becoming soldiers. She cleared her throat loudly when she was close enough to speak.
“I heard you were trainin’ yourselves up to join the Army,” she said casually. “No better time than now to get ready.”
A few exchanged uneasy glances.
“We might have been at first, but now…?” one pony said, trailing off.
“But now, we’ve got some urgency to it,” Applejack finished.
The volunteers regarded her skeptically.
“Look ya’ll, let’s get a show of hooves. How many of you know somepony who went off to fight?”
Every one of them raised a hoof slowly, some being mildly surprised when they saw that all of them had.
“And how many know more than one somepony?” Applejack went on.
Only two hooves went down.
“Family?” she pressed.
One hoof came back up while five others went down.
“See, we’ve all got somepony we care about out there right this minute,” Applejack said, gesturing for them to put their hooves down. “This ain’t a question of if we want to or not. It’s a matter of if we’ve got the grit to do what’s necessary. We’re not ready now and we can never be completely ready. But darn it all to Tartarus if we ain’t gonna try!”
The volunteers seemed somewhat heartened by these words and they stood a little straighter as they waited for her to go on.
“Before he left to fight, a warrior gave me some training,” Applejack said. “I’d like to share what I learned from him with ya’ll. We’ll be needin’ some space for us to work and see where we’re all at as far as everypony’s skills. Follow me and we’ll get set up.”
They headed north to where Applejack had been training herself. Fluttershy excused herself to return to her cottage and the animals, but Bon Bon stayed with the volunteers. When they arrived, Applejack had them gather around one of the trees that was yet untouched. She took a sword and buried it in the wood with a solid chop. The blade barely protruded from the gash in the bark. The other ponies regarded the depth with mild surprise that turned to uncertainty when they realized the implications of the demonstration.
“I’m not gonna sugarcoat this,” Applejack began. “Ya’ll need to be able to strike with the power to kill if you mean to win a fight against something that means to kill you. We’ll be working on raw strength throughout the training, but you need to keep this in mind in everything we do here: going through the motions isn’t enough. You need to intend to kill the enemy when you strike them.”
Apprehensive silence greeted her until Bon Bon stepped forward.
“May I try?”
Applejack passed a sword to her and stepped back. Bon Bon sized up the tree, picked a spot and swung with all her might. The sword cut through the bark and stopped dead when it reached the inner wood. Bon Bon backed away, scowling at it.
“Why don’t everypony have a go at it?” Applejack said. “It’ll give us a starting point and let us know how much we need to improve.”
One by one they all took their turns swinging at the tree, with varying degrees of success. As soon as they’d all had their chance to test their current ability, Applejack launched them into an intensive exercise, having them run courses through the trees, both sprints and relays. They drilled hard for half an hour before she let them rest. She filled the down time with tips and pointers about armor and weapons, where the weak points were and where the plates and blades were most effective. Most of her knowledge had come from Zacon’s instruction, but some she’d discovered herself while she’d practiced. When they’d caught their breath, she had them practicing striking, using the trees to build strength and sparing with wooden swords to practice form and footing.
After they’d all settled into a rhythm, she stepped back to observe them at work. Open Skies continued to oversee practice with forming lines and moving as a cohesive unit, though he’d broken them down into smaller groups of five ponies each. With the new instruction in the use of their weapons, they were beginning to look like an actual fighting force. Of all of them, Bon Bon was pushing herself the hardest, picking up the lessons quicker and showing the most improvement even in this short amount of time. They were all driven by the will to protect their homes and inspired by the bravery of those who had left before them. Applejack smiled to herself. Jason’s parting words played back in her mind.
I’m fighting for you: You, and your friends, and every pony in Equestria. I fight because you are special to me; because you are worth any amount of danger.
She felt his kiss on her forehead and her cheeks burned pleasantly at the memory. She was following his example, standing ready to risk herself for those she cared about. Seeing these ponies doing the same filled her with a tingling of pride and gratitude toward them. She looked north to where the smoke still rose from Canterlot. She wondered if Jason was well, if he was fighting right now to protect the mountain city. She felt in her heart that he was and that he would come back one day. Until then, she knew she would have to be strong, and be ready to do what was necessary to keep her home safe.
She took a deep breath and stepped back amongst the volunteers, calling them together to discuss their next lessons. She led them in their training until dark, when they returned to town, deposited their equipment at the blacksmith and went home. In the morning, they came together at the forest’s edge again, but more ponies came than before. Some in the refugee camp had heard of the mare training troops to defend their town and had decided to join them. As days passed, their numbers swelled until one hundred fifty ponies had volunteered and taken up training under Applejack. She led them as best she could, even beginning to organize them into squads.
All the while, she kept her reasons for committing to this task firmly in mind. Whenever she had a spare moment, her thoughts were centered on those major influences in her decision to throw so much effort into this. Jason’s dedication to defending others; her own determination to live up to Zacon’s expectations for her; a sense of obligation to repay the foreigners for readily going to the defense of a land that was not their own; Jason’s way of thanking her for everything she did; the renewed sense of duty to contribute in a meaningful way to the war effort, just as her friends and brother were doing; the memory of Jason’s kiss has he departed; the understanding in his eyes when she’d spoken of her parents; the sense of peace she’d felt as he lay beside her on the porch and watched the rain; the cute way his mane had fluffed up as it dried…