//------------------------------// // Chapter 45: Salvo // Story: Evening Star Also Rises // by Starscribe //------------------------------// Icefalls cannon crews were prepared for this moment. In a way, they couldn’t have hoped for a better opportunity. The Grand Fleet’s attempt to use their sight against them would certainly work in Icefalls’s favor. Hayden saw the first explosions before she heard them. A brief flash of light, and a roar as closed containers of oil were ignited by their concussive shells. Weapons meant to ignite her city and burn its residents in their homes would now do the same to the ones who had planned on using them. They don’t even have trebuchets. They bomb by tossing them over the side while they fly overhead. That means they’re all on the deck. Hayden squinted through the window, wishing she still had access to the Excellus’s cameras. She could almost make out the massive containers of oil tumbling over the edge of some of the ships—some hit, others struck by the shockwave of their neighbors. At least one unlucky vessel happened to be flying below another, and the deck burst into flames. Ponies all around her cheered as the victims of the first volley tumbled from the sky. But for all that some of the ships had caught fire, the rest of the fleet kept coming. So much for the griffons being too intimidated by our devastating first attack to continue advancing. She couldn’t help but feel a little respect for the mad birds—facing weapons most of them would’ve never seen before, that were exploding their own ships before their eyes, shaking the world with sound—yet still they came. The second volley went off a moment later, with even more devastating results. The enemy was now within their ideal range, such that almost every shot would be a hit. The city had 39 cannons in all after losing the one over Seaddle. If each one fired unerringly, and destroyed their targets with each shot, that would still be not even ten percent of the enemy fleet destroyed. And they aren’t all doing that. It looked like half the first volley missed. Still, there was more cheering in the Tower. Even Princess Luna joined in from behind her. “Truly, if Equestria had known weapons such as these, we would never have lost a war!” Hayden turned to face her, voice low. “This is the only war Equestria will ever have a strategic advantage like this, Princess. Even if we destroy this enemy completely, the spies of all your other enemies will have learned the secret of gunpowder and cannons before the next one. The only way to keep your advantage is to keep advancing, keep spending more on your weapons. My kind almost destroyed themselves by following that path to the end.” That sobered her. Princess Luna’s excitement faded. “Perhaps… we should do the reverse, then. When this is over… destroy all record of it. Burn the forges, shatter the mortar of the alchemist and turn it into bricks.” “Perhaps,” Hayden answered. “I was… already anticipating spies, though I thought your sister would send them. There are exactly five ponies in my ranks who could make black powder through every step of the process.” And every single one of them is a Blackwing. “If you could secure their silence, you might be able to prevent the knowledge from escaping… “But even that probably won’t be enough. Black powder isn’t hard to make. Once you know it’s possible, it doesn’t take too much effort to unravel the secret.” Or so it had been for humans. Maybe they could hope that the races of Equestria just wouldn’t be as good at reverse-engineering. There was another volley. The enemy was much closer now. They might get one more shot before they passed over the city, if they were lucky. Hayden watched closely. None of these ships were armored, not like the Equestrian vessels. But then, they didn’t have siege engines like Equestrians did. Maybe there was nothing to armor their ships against. Or maybe they just lacked the skill to make so much metal up in the frozen waste. While the lead ships had kept a steady pace, Hayden could see a larger group in back, slowing down and losing altitude by the moment. Angling down towards the towers. Bombers and troop carriers. The bombers are soaking up cannon fire while the rear ships move in to attack. “Signal to ignore the bombers!” Hayden screamed, her voice suddenly urgent. “Aim for the ships in back!” The signal-pony spared her a single, desperate glance. That wasn’t exactly a simple message she was asking to send. “They’re going to burn Icefalls to the ground!” Lodestone shouted, though he didn’t try to stop the signaler. “Most of those have oil, Marshal! If enough of them fly overhead…” Most of the city was made of wood, and they didn’t exactly have a fire service. Weatherponies were usually used to extinguish large fires like that. But if she sent her weatherponies out now, they would be slaughtered. And wouldn’t be available for when she really needed them. “It’s a good thing we evacuated everypony,” Hayden said. “They’ll be safe in the mines.” Princess Luna rose to her hooves again. Her eyes moved very rapidly as she gazed out the opening, darting from one attacking ship to the next in quick succession. “Hayden, do you know what you’re doing? Icefalls is… an ancient and proud city. Are you prepared to let it burn? All you have built here, the triumph of your survival through winter…” “My triumph is that these ponies are still alive,” Hayden said. “I don’t care if every factory and farm I designed is ashes so long as the people survive.” She didn’t remark on the use of her real name, though she could see from the confusion of some of her generals that they’d noticed. “The ships in back are bringing soldiers. They’re going to attack my cannons. Every pony in my army who isn’t on reserve is already assigned to one of those forty cannon emplacements, or defending the castle. But I don’t think we’ll have enough. Even with their carriers destroyed.” Princess Luna nodded solemnly. Her horn flashed, and Achelois appeared hovering in the air beside her. “Then I will thin the bombers. Make sure your cannons fire true.” She vanished. Another second later and they fired their last volley before the enemy arrived. “Keep those guns firing as long as possible,” Hayden ordered, striding forward towards the front of the room. With Princess Luna gone, it felt like the weight of command was again firmly on her shoulders. It seemed as though many of her generals were more comfortable with the princess gone. All the bats, for sure. Even Lodestone looked like he was going to be sick. It’s weird they’re all that frightened of her. But she was the ruler of Equestria’s military, ostensibly. And they were fighting for the very survival of Icefalls. It was natural to be anxious about that. “Keep focusing on the landing ships,” Hayden continued. “Keep the northern cannons pointed over the city, don’t worry about the bombers. We shouldn’t be shooting at them with Princess Luna up there, anyway.” The night princess had terrible power—probably far beyond any of her cannons. But it wouldn’t be good to put that power to the test with an oil explosion. The next volley came a moment later, sparse and ragged compared to all those that had come before. Not even half the guns had managed to get off their last volley before the landers closed in. The “under attack” beat sounded from a dozen different places at once. Hayden could see the technique—ships were slowing down over the cannons, or else coasting right up to the wall to throw down ramps. But most of the attackers came from the air, buzzing out of their ships like flies from a rotting carcass. “I need a messenger to the northern cannons!” Hayden shouted, voice suddenly tense. “Make sure they don’t fire on any of the ships hovering above our wall!” “They already know that!” It wasn’t Lodestone, but the general representing the wall-guard. Primary Hues. “That was in the handbook Honed Edge gave me to instruct them.” Several ponies burst down the ladder at once. There were ten up there in all, each one assigned to a different light. Not only that, but they’d be watching for signals from four cannons each. It was about as dense as she’d managed to pack them in before messages got garbled beyond recognition. “Heavy casualties at Blue-3!” “Red-1 reports their tower has been breached!” “Green-4 says griffons are ignoring them and flying into the city!” Hayden couldn’t respond to all of that at once… but she didn’t have to. She only nodded to her generals, and at once the different tasks were delegated. Mostly through Lodestone, who had fought the Stonebeaks before, defending Defiance from smaller incursions many times. This was no longer her war to micromanage. The unique tactics for artillery would matter far less once the enemy’s ground-troops had engaged them. Now we see just how much of an advantage an arquebus really gives. Not one of her Blackwings were out there guarding the towers. All those that weren’t guarding the castle were held in reserve, keeping their unit undamaged for when some critical moment came. I hope you weren’t lying to us, Celestia. Icefalls is going to need you. Hayden had little to add to the commands flying through the room. Her ears rang from the shouts, and the drums, and the now-irregular blasts of cannons. But she’d forgotten about the bombers. The first distant explosion far away reminded her pretty well, and many of her generals too. The first blast had landed somewhere in the Glacier quarter, the slums where some of her most disadvantaged ponies had lived. Hopefully there was nopony down there now, because the ramshackle affair of scrap wood and stone went up like cloth soaked in gasoline. Dozens more casks rained down over the city. Most of them landed with a dramatic explosion on a street or a stone roof, doing very little in the way of harm. But for three that landed uselessly, another one hit something dry enough to burn. Hayden could almost feel Princess Luna’s presence far above the city, intensely focused and burning with magic. There was surprisingly little anger in the emotions the Alicorn felt. Only a distant sadness, a pity for the lives she was taking. Princess Luna did not enjoy what she was doing. Hayden was no longer squinting at different boat-shaped toys floating in the distance. She could see them clearly now—see the massive bomber floating over the market as a single red line appeared across the deck. Wood creaked and roared in protest, before one half went careering down onto the city. The other shot up, spinning faster and faster and flinging birds and barrels alike from its deck. The battle for Icefalls had well and truly begun. Hayden did her best to follow it all, but the truth was that she hadn’t been trained for high-level tactics like this and didn’t have the mind for it. There was a reason she’d chosen all these generals to do most of this—they could handle thinking about so many lives at once. They could keep track of the ever-changing state of the city, mark the fires on the map, which cannons were still firing and which were under attack. But just because she had a staff of ponies who knew what they were doing didn’t mean Icefalls had much of a chance. There really were something like a thousand ships attacking them. The enemy might be half-blind in the dark, but there were still enough of them to block out the moon when they flew together. For every ship they’d destroyed, there were dozens of others. Do they fight like a human army? Do griffons keep going until they suffer too many losses, then break? Or will they fight like animals, and keep killing until they die? Ponies were definitely the former. Icefalls would surrender long before it suffered critical losses. But we’re fighting for a better purpose. Our wives, our children, our lives. They only want to enslave us. “Equestria will come,” Hayden muttered, repeating what Luna had said so many times. “We just have to hold on two more dawns.” They could do that. It was that or die.