//------------------------------// // A call to action // Story: Shouldn't have enslaved humanity [OLD VERSION] // by NoobMaster69 //------------------------------// “General Onyx!” One of the soldiers knocked on the door and entered his makeshift office once he gave the go ahead. General Onyx was the overseer of the scouting operation, tasked with locating the First Humans. He was the only soldier who had known who they were truly after, and what their capabilities were; he had been informed by Celestia herself when he was tasked with overseeing this operation. “Ahh… have a seat, have a seat. Mr…” He trailed off, indirectly asking the one who had entered for his name. “Colonel Sweeper, sir,” he answered, before taking a seat. “Alright colonel, how may I help you?” General Onyx asked. “I have been sent to inform you that the scouts should be returning soon sir,” he replied. “Soon? How soon?” Onyx inquired. “In about five to ten minutes,” the colonel answered. “Excellent! I’ll be out in just a moment, just have to finish writing my letter to the princess,” said Onyx. “Would you like me to wait for you sir?” Colonel Sweeper asked. “No, that will not be necessary, you go on ahead. Dismissed,” the general replied. The colonel then gave a salute and exited the room. “Agent Sweetie Drops!” General Onyx walked up to her. “General Onyx,” Sweetie Drops greeted.  “I decided to head on out of my office to come check up on how the operation went, and you’re the first one I spotted. So, tell me, which party are you waiting for?” Onyx asked. “I’m waiting for group eight. It’s being led by Lieutenant Sharp,” Sweetie Drops informed. It was at this point that the other scouting parties began returning to Ponyville. It was a good thing they were all in one piece as well. It had been around ten minutes, and most of the other groups had already landed. A few of them were late, however, and group eight was one of them. Neither the general nor Agent Sweetie Drops had thought that anything had gone wrong yet. It had been only ten minutes after all. But then, they spotted something moving in the distance, coming out of the everfree forest. “What is that?” Agent Sweetie Drops asked. “What’s what?” General Onyx asked, still not noticing the figure moving in the distance. “T- thats a pony!” Agent Sweetie Drops observed. “What’s a pony doing in the Everfree Forest?” The general asked, sounding quite surprised. “Not just a pony. It’s one of the guards, from the direction she’s heading from, it looks like she’s from Lieutenant Sharp’s group. But what’s she doing alone?” Sweetie Drops asked, as the both of them began to make their way towards the guard. “Excuse me, soldier?” The general addressed her while the duo walked towards her. “What were you doing in the forest? And where is the rest of your squad?” The unicorn soldier looked towards the general. She was now out of danger, she had managed to lose the drones the humans sent after her by giving them the slip. She had even managed to destroy one of them when she levitated a large log and rammed it into one of the rotating fans that functioned as its propellers. She had managed to down another one by throwing a boulder at it, though the large rock only managed to slow it down, the damage was clearly visible. She knew who he was, and knew she shouldn’t have made such a display in front of such a superior officer. But now that she was safe, she had time to think of all that had occurred. She could no longer stay strong, and she just broke down into tears. “Hello? Excuse me, are you alright?” The general asked with concern. “What happened? Where’s the rest of your squad?” “T- they’re all… all… “ She couldn’t finish her sentence as she once again started sobbing uncontrollably. “Hey, hey,” Sweetie Drops tried comforting her by putting a hoof on her back. “It’s okay, you’re safe now. But we have to know what happened. Where’s the rest of your squad?” Sweetie Drops asked. “They’re… they’re dead. They’re all dead! Every single one of them!” She said in between sobs. “All ninety nine of your squad members are dead?” The general asked in disbelief. “How?!" Sweetie Drops asked. She doubted a human rebellion could accomplish this. "W- we were slaughtered. B- by two metal dragons!" She said, still crying her eyes out. "Metal dragons?" The general asked, now worried. "I know what I saw! They had weapons the likes of which I've never seen!" She then began to take on a tone of regret. "Th- they warned us. They warned us twice! They showed us mercy! We should've listened." "Now soldier, I need you to listen to me very carefully. I don't know your name, nor your rank, and I don't know what happened at all. But I really, really need to know what happened, very urgently. We might come under attack very soon, and I need to assess the situation," he then took on a more understanding tone. "I know all this is a lot for you. I can't imagine how you must feel, losing your friends like that. But we can't afford another minute of wasted time. I do understand your plight, however, and I'll give you ten minutes to mourn, although I shouldn't. And after that you better be ready to tell me exactly what happened, detail for detail. Understand?" The unicorn soldier just nodded her head as she continued crying, with Sweetie Drops still comforting her. "Thank you. Agent Sweetie Drops, I trust you will take her directly to my office?" General Onyx asked. "Yes, of course," Sweetie Drops replied. The general then headed back, about to write to Celestia about how they had found the First Humans, and how the scouting party they had sent had been attacked, with only one survivor remaining. "Celestia, we just had a meeting less than a day ago," King Talon said, "Why have you called us back?" "Well, we've located the First Humans. They're set up nearby Tartarus, and I think they've destroyed it," Celestia explained. "What? What do you mean destroyed?" King Steel Horn asked, confused. "I mean they've demolished it, and for that reason, we believe that the First Humans are currently working alongside Tirek and Cozy Glow," Celestia explained. "What? How do you know this?" King Rutherford asked. "Well, the only reason they would have for destroying Tartarus would be to break Tirek and Cozy Glow out of prison. And I believe they could've easily dealt with Cerberus," Luna replied. "Right, then when are we attacking?" Ember asked, "The longer we leave them to fester, the more powerful they get. And God help us if they are able to once again rally the slaves to their cause." "That's exactly why I've called all of you. We wish to assault them as soon as possible, however, I think they've gotten more powerful over the years," Celstia stated.Ember asked. “Well, Tartarus is a rather large landmark. I think it would be rather obvious if it just randomly disappeared. But if you want to know the more intricate details, we tried to spot it in the distance, but we couldn’t,” Luna stated, “So it’s either the first humans, or Tartarus just vanished with no discernible cause, and I highly doubt the latter is the case.” “And how exactly would the First Humans have been able to accomplish such a thing in the first place?” Ember asked, still skeptical. “We believe there are two possibilities. The first, is that in the last thousand years, the surviving Vega Corporation employees have been biding their time and getting stronger, and that they are now either back to take over the world and attempt to gain immortality once again, or that they are back just for revenge. Knowing the First Humans however, they are both intelligent and efficient, so the most likely scenario is that they have reemerged once again to do both,” Celestia explained, before Luna took over. “The next possible scenario, and the least likely, is that these are First Humans, but they’re not from the Vega Corporation. As we’ve already discussed, the First Humans’ society was very much like ours, with their extremely advanced technology replacing the need for magic in their daily lives. As such, we can assume that this Vega Corporation was not the only one to try to build an underground fortress to try and escape the radiation that was brought upon them during the second flood, and we can assume that among all the billions of First Humans that there were, the Vega Corporation was not the only faction that had the required resources to build their ‘doomsday bunker’. They had other corporations as well, bigger corporations. And that's not even taking into account the fact that, before their betrayal, the First Humans told us that they used to nearly two hundred independent nations, all of which we can assume were probably capable of much more than what the Vega Corporation was capable of," said Luna. "I think the second option seems more likely. Why do you think it's probably the first?" High Priestess Ada asked. "The explosion that killed them was as big as the badlands itself. I don't think they survived," Prince Rutherford stated. "If a mere company was capable of creating a bunker, obtaining the technology required for a million year slumber, and nearly ending the world, I shudder to think of what actual First Human nations would be capable of," said Queen Novo. "But if these really are just surviving Vega Corporation members, we must prepare to both launch an assault against them and defend our countries!" Said King Steel Horn, "Now that they know that we know of their whereabouts, there's no doubt they would try to attack us before we attack them! So we must attack them before they try to attack us before we attack them!" "Yeah, what he said," Ember agreed. "Umm, Celestia?" Thorax got her attention. "Why exactly did you say that the First Humans got more powerful? What exactly led you to believe that?" "You mean other than the fact that they were able to demolish Tartarus? Well…" Luna then explained what happened with the scouting party that they sent. She retold the story of how they used missiles, both large and small, to utterly decimate the scouting party, and the fact that their magic was completely useless against their aircraft. "That… does not sound like the Vega Corporation," King Talon stated. "The Vega Corporation did have those metal dragons which you said they used, and although they had extremely powerful guns mounted on these vehicles… they didn't shoot our large, metal arrows that follow you around and then explode upon making contact with you," King Steel Horn added. "The Vega Corporation never had weapons like these! They had guns, bigger guns, throwable bombs, and bigger guns that shoot out explosive arrows. But they never had aircrafts that shot out explosive arrows, let alone explosive arrows that follow you!" Prince Rutherford raised his voice. "The Vega Corporation has grown in strength. Either that or we are facing an entirely new threat altogether," said High Priestess Ada, stating the obvious. "Well, it's clear what we should do. We should strike now! Before they attack us first! Even with their upgraded weapons, I highly doubt they would be able to contend with us if we overwhelm them with our numbers. Seeing as they've just emerged, they probably haven't indoctrinated the other slaves yet, and I still stand by my opinion that we should strike them before they are able to grow their numbers by indoctrinating the human slaves," King Steel Horn proposed. "Well, that could work, but what if they really are a different faction of First Humans? What if they're not Vega Corporation?" King Talon asked. "Then we'll be able to catch them by surprise! They won't know much about our capabilities, nor our numbers. If we let them fester, they'll become a much larger threat, but if we strike now, en masse, we should be able to take them by surprise, and overwhelm them with our numbers," King Steel Horn suggested. "Yes, well, there's a small problem with that," said King Talon, "We don't know anything about their capabilities and their numbers as well. For all we know, the moment we show up, we will be the ones getting taken by surprise by their weapons and their numbers. As Celestia had told us, they only sent out two metal dragons to deal with the scouting party, which I remind you, was a force of a hundred ponies strong. Yet, the metal dragons utterly decimated them, although they outnumbered the metal dragons by fifty to one. And not only that, but they took no damage whatsoever, not even a scratch. These metal dragons were similar to the ones the Vega Corporation had, but much more powerful. So we can assume that whoever they are, they are much more powerful than the Vega Corporation when we fought them a thousand years ago." "Well, even if they are more powerful, how many First Humans can really fit in one of their doomsday bunkers anyway? From the knowledge we have gained from the Vega Corporation members themselves, we know that these bunkers were extremely difficult and expensive to make. Even the corporation's bunker apparently costed over three hundred billion bits to build, just put that into perspective. The construction costed more than all of the money in Equestria's royal vault combined. And even with their construction machines, it apparently took them nearly ten thousand humans to construct the bunker. They definitely couldn't have built one big enough to house too many humans, and they probably wouldn't have been able to fit too many metal dragons either," King Steel Horn countered. "King Steel is right," Luna agreed, "Considering the cost and effort that was required to build a bunker that housed just three thousand individuals was already so high, I doubt they could build a bunker to house much more than that, and have enough space for their metal dragons and other weapons." "But all of you are forgetting one factor. The most important factor," Cadence finally spoke up, "The world ender." "She's right. What if they use the world ender on one of our kingdoms?" Thorax asked worriedly. “The world ender? They won’t use it,” King Steel Horn said confidently. “How do you know that?” Thorax asked. “I think the only reason that they didn’t use it a thousand years ago is because they only had one of these devastating weapons. If this is the Vega Corporation, how do we know that they haven’t made more of these weapons over the past thousand years that we have left them to their own devices? And if the threat we are currently facing is not the Vega Corporation, how do we know that they don’t have any world enders at their disposal?” “Because through the information that we have gained through Discord infiltrating their ranks, we know that their world enders are extremely hard to make and obtain. Only a select few of the strongest First Human nations out of the hundreds they used to have had world enders at their disposal. So I highly doubt that whoever we are up against have more of these weapons,” Cadence replied. “That is the reason that they probably don’t have any, but let me tell you the reason that they won’t even use them if they do have them,” King Steel Horn took center stage. “Firstly, even if they do have these weapons, if they use them, they would be killing their own people as well. All of our nations use humans as slaves, so they would be killing a lot of humans alongside us,” he said with a confident tone, “The second is that even if they do have let’s say three of these weapons, the moment they use them, we will have nothing left to lose. If they use all of their world enders, we will be able to launch a full scale assault against them without fear of any possible repercussions. Basically, they won’t have anything left to blackmail us into leaving them alone.” "I think you're missing another important detail, King Steel," Cadence spoke up? "What?" He said, annoyed, "What is it this time?" "The Crystal Empire doesn't condone slavery. In fact, it's illegal there, although we immediately deport any humans that we find within our territory," Cadence answered. "Yeah, so?" He asked, still not understanding what she was getting at. "So, the Empire would be the perfect target for the First Humans to use their world ender on," Cadence explained. "Well, the Empire doesn't have to worry as well. You're probably even safer than the rest of us," King Steel Horn replied. "What? And why is that?" Cadence asked, now confused. "Because you don't enslave the humans," King Steel Horn replied. "What? But, according to what you literally just said, slavery is the only thing that can - " she was cut off as King Steel began to explain his reasoning. "They wouldn't even attack you with such ferocity in the first place. The knowledge of the First Humans had been passed down through generations of monarchs, and despite their extremely violent nature, my forefathers passed down a very specific detail. The First Humans are a fair and just society, which, although hypocritical, always punishes crime, and the severity of the punishment always match the severity of the crime, they have an 'eye for an eye' policy. Sometimes even 'two eyes for an eye'. Once they learn of the fate of their species, they will most definitely want vengeance against the rest of us. In fact, they will probably try their very best to leave you out of the war as a form of 'reward' for what they consider proper conduct," King Steel Horn explained. "I… never thought of it that way," Cadence replied. "Of course. You ponies hippogriffs, and changelings value peace and harmony above all else. The rest of us value strength. I'm not trying to offend you, but a pony would never match a minotaur in terms of military tactics and analysis," said King Steel Horn. "Well, that I can agree with," Cadence replied. "Well everycreature, I believe this meeting has gone on long enough and we have already gone through every possible scenario," King Talon said, "Now, since the First Humans have been found on Equestrian soil, I believe our course of action should be decided upon by Princess Celestial and Princess Luna since they have the final say on what we should do. So, princesses, could you come to a decision?" "We already have," Luna replied. "We shall take King Steel Horn's advice on the matter. We will launch a surprise attack, and overwhelm them with our numbers." "But Equestria cannot do this alone," Celestia took over, "This is a threat to all of us, and as such, I believe we need to make this a combined effort. So, who will join us, and put an end to the First Human menace once and for all?" "Well, of course, the minotaurs will join you in your crusade. Frankly, we would've been offended if we weren't invited," King Steel Horn said with a chuckle. "The Crystal Empire shall assist Equestria in this time of need, to put a stop to the First Humans once and for all," Cadence answered the call. "The Dragons answer the call to action," Ember said simply. "The changelings will not help in direct combat, but we will join the war and assist the Equestrian forces in terms of infiltration and information gathering," said Thorax. "The yaks will not assist in the first assault, but we will assist if things escalate into a war," Prince Rutherford answered. Then, there were a few more moments of silence, before Celestia finally broke it. "So, I assume the zebras, griffons, and hippogriffs will not be joining Equestria in the upcoming battle?" Celestia asked, and received confirmations from their respective leaders. "Very well then, for the rest of you, ready your forces. We attack under the cover of the night!" Said Luna. "Umm, how exactly are all of our forces gonna get here by tonight?" Ember asked. "Well, I'm glad you asked," Celestia replied, "With the help… of… Discord..? Where is Discord?"