It was early the next morning in Canterlot when Shining Armor got a report from a scout saying that Baltimare was in ruins, Fillydelphia had been overtaken, and Manehattan was currently undergoing powerful blitzkrieg attacks.
“What!?” exclaimed Shining Armor in a panic, “But we all thought that they were going to attack Canterlot! From what Nick said none of those cities have anything that the humans would want!”
Before the scout had a chance to reply Shining Armor took off down one of the castles many corridors. Only one thought raced through his mind and that was that he had to inform the Princess! Could it be that all along Nick knew that the humans would attack the other cities? Did he set them up? Was he really on their side? All these thoughts pounded through Shining Armor’s head he approached the throne room where he and Cadence had been married. Without hesitation he galloped into the room.
“Princess! Princess Celestia! Three major cities around Equestria have been hit hard by the humans! Baltimare is in ruins, Fillydelphia has been overtaken, and Manehattan is currently undergoing powerful blitzkrieg attacks!” stammered Shining Armor out of breath.
Celestia gasped, “But the Elements of Harmony are in Canterlot, not any of those cities!”
“Yes, this leads me to believe that Nick lied to us; the humans were never after the elements. They want something else, Nick must be a spy!”
“Are you sure?” asked the Princess circumspectly.
“Well, uh… I can’t think of any other explanation,” replied Shining Armor.
After a little consideration Celestia requested Nick’s presents in the throne room. He arrived a few minutes later.
Nick bowed before asking, “Is there a problem? Your messenger said that it was vital that I report to the throne room immediately.”
“Yes!” replied Shining Armor taking a step forwards, “We have reason to believe that you are a spy.”
“What? Me?” stuttered Nick clearly taken aback.
“Yes you,” replied Shining Armor, “You said that Canterlot would be the humans’ prime target so we gathered up the bulk of the Royal Army here. But, just yesterday, three other cities were attacked and overtaken by the humans, how would you explain this!?”
“I-I don’t know!” stammered Nick in surprise, “From what I heard the captain only wants two things, the elements and my head.”
“Then why isn’t he attacking Canterlot!?” countered Shining Armor heatedly.
“Please, calm down,” ordered Celestia, “Obviously Nick has no idea what’s going on and from what I have observed he is not a spy.”
“But-”
“No buts,” interrupted Celestia, “I want you to dispatch the Royal Army all throughout Equestria. We clearly have no idea where the humans will strike next. But I still want you to keep a fair amount of guards here. Oh, and dispatch the Elite Special Forces Unit to the four cities that have already been overtaken; we need to win them back!”
“Elite Special Forces Unit? What’s that?” questioned Nick.
“It’s a group of highly trained unicorns that are qualified both in fighting and powerful magic,” replied Shining Armor.
“Oh.”
“I’m also going to be holding a meeting in the war room tomorrow morning,” informed Celestia, “I want both you and Nick to attend.”
“As you wish your highness,” replied Shining Armor with a bow.
With that Shining Armor trotted out of the throne room.
--The following day--
Nick walked aimlessly through the castle corridors as he tried to find his way to the war room. The Princess had said that she would be holding a meeting and that she wanted him to attend but he had no idea where this room was. He was just about to give up and ask a guard for directions when he suddenly spotted a door labeled “War Room”. Nick jogged over to the door and opened it; he knew that he was late.
“Sorry I’m late,” he said awkwardly as he entered the room.
Nick quickly found a seat and sat down around a big round wooden table.
“It’s okay,” replied Celestia as she waited for Nick to get situated.
Nick glanced around the room to see who else was at this meeting. There was Celestia and and also a blackish purple pony with a starry mane.
“That must be Princess Luna, Celestia’s sister,” thought Nick. He remembered reading about her back in the library at Ponyville.
There was also Shining Armor and a pink alicorn sitting next to him.
“That must be Princess Cadence,” thought Nick, “Twilight told me about her.”
There was also Twilight, Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, Rarity, and Fluttershy; not to mention himself. That made a total of eleven at the meeting.
“…Anyway,” picked up Shining Armor were Nick must have cut him off, “Like I said there has recently been yet another attack on another major city. Unfortunately, it has also been overtaken as well. Our forces just seem to be no match for the humans.”
“Anything else?” questioned Celestia.
“Well, the with the help of the Elite Special Forces Unit we were actually able win back Fillydelphia but the humans seem to be attacking it with all they got and we’re afraid that it will soon be retaken again.”
“What do you suppose we do?” asked Luna with concern.
“I truthfully have no idea,” replied Shining Armor grimly, “We are fighting our hardest and the humans are crushing us as if we’re nothing more than a fly.”
“Anypony have any ideas?” asked Celestia to the meeting in general.
Nick took the chance to stand up, “What type of attacks are they using?”
“Huh?” responded Shining Armor turning to face Nick, “Well, from what the scouts have reported huge metallic flying crafts will descend out of the sky and then smaller crafts will deploy out of them. Humans will then dive out of the smaller crafts as they zip throughout the city. It is also reported that the bigger crafts can shoot out fire balls that will completely destroy a building. Not to mention that the humans are armed with strange magical weapons that kill without contact and the target city usually falls within hours.”
Nick pondered over what Shining Armor had said for a little while before coming to a conclusion, “The captain seems to be sending down carrier crafts armed with heavy missiles. Carrier crafts are huge ships that transport other smaller ships like hoverjets, F-56 starplanes, and hyperplanes. From what you’re saying the carrier crafts seem to be deploying hyperplanes. Hyperplanes are a very small crafts and look somewhat similar to jet-skis. The only difference is that they can fly through the air and can reach speeds up to 600 hundred miles per hour. The humans must be parachuting off of them and into the city. By the way, those magical weapons are guns.”
Nick scanned the room satisfied with his explanation. Everypony in the room was giving him a wtf face. Nick suddenly turned bright red as he realized that they had no idea what he was talking about. So for the next hour Nick explained to everypony what a gun was and how it was used and also what a starship was and the different types of crafts it contained like hoverjets and hyperplanes.
“So, if we can somehow destroy the Atropos then we would win the war,” exclaimed Shining Armor once Nick had finished explaining.
Nick winced at what Shining Armor had said.
“Yes, but I will not let you destroy the Atropos!”
“And why is that?” asked Shining Armor as he studied Nick suspiciously.
“Because although I’m fighting on your side I still care for the humans, I have friends aboard that ship. Also, I never wanted war in the first place and by destroying the Atropos you will kill over 30,000 people!” exclaimed Nick, “Not to mention that destroying a federation starship will only make your problem worse. The Starfleet Federation Headquarters gets a signal if a starship is destroyed and they will send another one here to investigate. But I don’t see how you could possibly destroy the Atropos in the first place anyway so that option is out.”
“The Elements of Harmony would probably work,” said Cadence suddenly.
“Yes they would…” replied Luna, “But didn’t you hear what Nick just said? We will not destroy the Atropos.”
Celestia nodded in agreement.
“Then what else are we supposed to do!?” cried Shining Armor in defeat.
“We need to somehow get leverage over the humans,” said Rainbow Dash speaking up.
“How are we supposed to do that?” asked Shining Armor.
“Umm, I don’t know…”
“Oh, I know! We could release Discord!” proposed Shining Armor.
“Are you being serious!?” exclaimed Twilight.
“Who’s Discord?” whispered Nick to Fluttershy.
“He’s the spirit of chaos and confusion,” replied Fluttershy softly, “And he’s mean and scary.”
“No, we will not release Discord!” countered Celestia, “He wouldn’t help us and he wouldn’t help the humans either. We are currently in the middle of a war and Discord would love every second of it. He wouldn’t stop it; he’d probably just use his mischievous powers to extend the war as long as possible and make everything complete chaos again too.”
A long silence pursued as everybody continued to think.
“Maybe…Maybe if we could somehow threaten or kidnap the captain,” proposed Nick, “But we’d have to find a way to somehow get aboard the Atropos.”
“I think that I would be able to teleport you there,” replied Celestia.
“But Twilight said that you can’t teleport that far?” questioned Nick.
“I am a lot stronger than Twilight,” chuckled Celestia.
A few more moments of silence followed.
“Yes but… There’s no way we’d be able to abduct the captain and bring him down here,” sighed Nick.
“Why is that?” asked Shining Armor.
“Because the crew would know the second he’s gone; not to mention that they would recognize me on the spot. I wouldn’t be able to get within fifty feet of him before being captured and most likely killed. It’s almost as if we’d need an exact copy of the captain to replace him with so they wouldn’t know that the real one was missing…”
“What if I said that we could do that,” informed Celestia.
“Well even if you could we’d probably need some crew members that would be on our side and we’d have to do it during the sleeping hours,” replied Nick thoughtfully, “I wish it was possibly. Could you imagine the leverage we’d have if we held the captain hostage?”
After a few moments Celestia replied, “Nick, your plan is possible…”