Chapter 30
"Rook! Do you read me Rook!? Dammit Rook! Answer me!" Linus shouted through his cuff. There was only static. "Rook! Are you there?! Rook!"
"Linus...He's dead. Rook is dead." Blaze said. He was shocked. He's gone. Gone in a blink of an eye. Blaze thought.
"Linus, Blaze, do not move forward. I repeat, do not move forward." Luna ordered through the cuff.
"Linus do you hear her? Don't attack." Blaze said. The cuff only returned static. "Luna, he's going in. We can't let him in there alone. Me and my soldiers are moving in with him. I can't let him get himself killed!" Blaze said and tore his cuff off and threw it into the forest.
"Let's go. We can't let him go in by himself and we need to see if there are any survivors from the blast." Blaze ordered. They ran into town towards the blast in search of Linus. When they arrived at the blast zone, they saw a wounded pony who was gripping his arm.
"Blaze! We have wounded!" Randall yelled. "Stay still. How did you survive the explosion?" he asked.
"Rook. He read the note and pushed me out. He saved my life..." the wounded pony said.
"What's your name?" Randall asked as Blaze rushed over.
"Troy. My name is Troy. Will I be alright?" he asked.
"You'll be fine. I just need you to sit still so I can patch up your wound." Blaze said. "Randall, go inside the house and see if you can find any other survivors." Randall went into the house as Blaze worked on Troy's arm. "Was there anything out of the ordinary when you came into the town?"
"The only strange thing was how empty the place was. When we went into the house, there was this mare tied up with a note around her hoof. The next thing I knew, I was being shoved out the door with a huge explosion behind me." Troy said.
"Well I'm glad you are all right. Randall! Did you find anything in there?" he asked.
"Nothing but what's left over. And Linus. He's in there." Randall said. "I can handle him from here. Go talk to him."
Blaze let Randall work on Troy while he went into the destroyed house. He found Linus sitting next to a destroyed comunicuff. "Linus? You ok?"
Linus picked up the cuff and held it in his hooves. "He's gone. He really is gone." Blaze walked next to his friend and put a hoof on his shoulder.
"I'm sorry Linus." Blaze said. He didn't really know what else to say. He hadn't really known Rook. They didn't meet until Linus introduced them. They were friends, but they weren't close, and they were always in different areas during the war. They just rejoined the same division two months before Blaze was imprisoned.
"I sent him in here. I sent him to his death..." Linus said. "This is all my fault."
"No it's not, Linus. You didn't know that there was a bomb here. You had no way of knowing what was going to happen. Don't blame yourself." Blaze said. He had seen this happen before. Leaders blaming themselves for something that wasn't their fault. But this was his friend. It pained him to see this. He took Rook's communicuff, helped Linus up, and led him back to the group.
Rainbow flew down from the sky and landed in front of them. "What happened? I saw the explosion and when I asked for you guys, nopony answered." She said. "Where's Rook?" She asked slowly. Blaze looked at her and shook his head. Her eyes grew wide. "He can't be... Rook...dead?" she couldn't believe it. He was alive and joking around with them last night and now he was gone.
"Let's get everypony back to camp. Linus and I got rid of our cuffs to go in and see what happened. Luna is probably having a cow over that." Blaze said.
When they arrived back at the camp, Luna was there waiting for them. "What the hell is wrong with you two? I thought I told you to not enter the town?"
"I didn't have a choice Luna. I couldn't leave Linus out there not knowing what else was out there." Blaze replied.
"I understand, but you must know that you two could've fallen into a trap. What if they detonated the bomb to draw us in?" she said.
"Look Luna, now is not the time. If you want to gripe at me, do it later!" Blaze shouted as he walked up to her. "Rook is dead and Linus is not handling it well. I know we disregarded orders, but you need to forget about that for the moment. Linus needs somepony. You are the only one who can really comfort him. He loves you, and you love him. So help him out." he said sternly.
Blaze walked away from her and went over to Rainbow. "Come on. We're going to find Shining Armor." Rainbow looked back at Luna and they left.
Once they were gone Luna looked at Linus. "You ok Linus?" she asked. He didn't look up, lost to the world. She went over to him and sat next to him. "I'm sorry about Rook. He was a great soldier and a wonderful thinker. He helped us a lot." He still didn't respond. She put an arm around his shoulder and pulled him close to her. She realized he was crying silently. She never had seen him cry.
"He's dead...I sent him in to investigate and he died. I killed him..." Linus said. He weeped harder. He put his face in Luna's mane. She held him close, trying her best to comfort him.
"Linus, you didn't kill him, Chrysalis did. You had no idea what was going to happen." she said. He didn't respond. She gave him a kiss on his head as a single tear ran down her cheek. "Linus look at me." she said. Slowly he looked up at her. His eyes were red and puffy. "You didn't kill him. You didn't. Ok?" she asked quietly. He nodded his head. "Come on. Let's find Blaze and Shining Armor."
She leaned down to him and gave him a kiss, not on his forehead this time and he returned it. Linus was the first to pull back. "Luna? Can I tell you something?" Linus asked. He didn't wait for a response from her. "I've been wanting to tell you this for a while now. You remember all those years ago, when I jumped in front of that bolt Chrysalis threw at you? I've always said it was because I didn't want the army to lose a strong leader, but it was for something more than that. Something more than just the army. It was for a selfish reason." he said.
"For the longest time, I've been thinking about how I should say it. Everypony who knew what it was about, told me to just say it, including Rook. But it took me till now to know what to say." he hesitated before starting the next sentence. "Luna, I-" she cut him off.
"Don't. Not now." she said. Linus looked away from Luna and nodded his head. "You can tell me after we take Canterlot. Ok?" she knew what he was going to say, but she didn't want to hear it right now. She gave Linus another kiss on his forehead and kept him close. "Tomorrow, this war will end. One way or another."