Six scratched his 9'o'clock shadow and pulled his helmet back down. He then went crouched on the ground and brought the stock of the hunting rifle onto his shoulder. From this distance, he would have trouble aiming at any particular target on a hostile. Thankfully he wasn't there to pick out a single target cleanly but to help bring down any hostiles he could. It also helped that his friendlies were all multi-coloured Quadrupeds. Huh, what a fun word... Quadrupeds, He had no idea where he remembered that one from. It didn't matter, trouble was just a few minutes away and he was rusty. Behind Six was a small group of pegasi, who apparently had keener eyes than most. They were scanning the treelines for movement the only sign they were there being the subtle flapping of wings and the occasional brush of wind on what little skin six had exposed. He looked down the hill to the rest of the waiting group below. Ponies dug out shallow trenches to allow themselves to be hidden from the coming ambush while the few who had arrived in armour stayed low to avoid being spotted early. Six also spotted below two men, two princesses and 3 ponies in a conversation.
"Once I've placed each Spell rune, I will get as close to the ditch as I can. If all goes as planned, the ghouls will be unconscious and the guards can restrain them. If something does go wrong, I can cast my protection spell and walk back. Luna can blast the field while my shield keeps me safe." Twilight covered one last time to the others. While most of the faces had her confidence, John and Luna seemed unsold, Most likely because she was the one pulling the plan off.
"Do we have any fallback plans?" John asked.
The question stung, The human had only known her for barely two days and had judged her as incapable. She didn't blame him, in that short time he had seen her nearly get her friend killed. Then she signed herself up for a war she had no idea how to fight.
"Yes, multiple. Our unicorns will also be ready to provide offensive spells and I can Teleport if the worst case happens" Twilight replied.
She waited as each of the ponies and humans in from of them agreed with the plan.
"It is agreed then, Sergeant Rapid Fire, single the pegasi to begin" Luna Ordered.
The Sergeant gave a snap salute from the air and shot off to alert her subordinates. Luna watched her meet with the other Pegasi in the sky. Within the second Twilight heard the explosions and flares going off over the field. The humans had said that while the first flare may have gotten the horde's attention, This would get them moving.
With things now underway, and no means of turning back, Twilight readied herself. A light refractile spell would hide her body, a sound muffler spell would mute her sound. With a muted breath, Twilight claimed out into the field.
The battered human watched the light shimmer go across the field, The binoculars he had been given helped him see what would otherwise be a completely invisible pony. Stealth boys had certain signs you could trace, and apparently, the same flaws existed in the Lavander pony's spells.
John didn't like this, no, he hated it. Risking his own skin was something he could manage, but sending out what he understood as a future leader of this land was plain stupid. It was made even worse by the fact that she was an idealist with little to no combat experience. Even if the plan seemed sound from what little he understood of magic, things can always go wrong. Why would you risk such an important person in a military engagement?
"You don't think she can do it, do you?" Nate asked John.
While the others had left to busy themselves, Nate had stayed.
"Even if she could, she shouldn't risk it. From what she told me and what I've seen, she's supposed to become one of the rulers around here. She spent most of the time sounding like an egghead in a lab coat, now she's making us take risks we don't need to. She's not ready for this and it's going to end badly" John Answered.
"Sometimes you need to have some faith in people" Nate replied.
This caused John to stop following Twilight and look at Nate.
"Didn't you say you're pre-war? seems like you would know first-hand why that's a dumb idea" John said.
Before Nate could respond there was a wave of murmurs from the scouts. A bird whistle sounded off, and the silence was deafening. All the ponies had stopped what they were doing and hidden. The lookouts had dove into the simple ditches dug into the old creek bed. Nate and John exchanged a look before crouching down themselves, now aware of the meaning. The horde was here.
John observed the treeline before finding ghouls bleeding out into the open. The Zombie-like creatures shuffled aggressively onto the open field, not quite breaking into a run. From the treeline, John could see light bouncing off the tree trunks.
"There's definitely a glowing one," John stated as he handed the binoculars to Nate who looked for himself.
" I'll warn Luna to keep that one separate from the others, Princess Twilight seems to have already laid down a few of the spells," Nate commented, handing back to binoculars and pointing out to a certain spot on the field.
Feint blue markings could be seen glowing in small patches across the designated spell array area. Twilight herself was currently unseeable, the area too large to pin her down. The Ghouls, however, were slowly entering the area under the flares.
Two to go, Twilight thought to herself. With twelve laid down, Most of the array was already placed. It was under the red glow of the flares above that the feint runes carved themselves ethereally into the ground. Her left ear twitched as she heard something making its way towards her. When she looked at the commotion, she froze.
The creatures looked closer to humans than any other creatures she had seen, but they were wrong.
They walked with none of the fluidity of the three humans she had seen but shambled and staggered. Their skin and flesh seemed to be necrotic, a theory made stronger by the horrible stench slowly getting stronger. As they got closer, Twilight could see the sunken shrivelled eyes of each Ghoul. There was no intelligence behind the eyes, no spark of self-awareness; they were just like the humans had described, feral. Twilight held her breath as they passed, she could feel her heart going haywire in her chest, The blood pumping in her veins was like zebra drums being played. As the Ghouls slowly walked up to her, she flinched in fear.
As they passed her, she noticed they were completely fixated on the flares above. She let out a sigh of relief, realising she had stopped breathing in the moment. She slowly continued on her course towards the next rune location. Taking care to stay out of the way of the monstrosities, Twilight reached the next location. pointing her horn to the ground, she cast the next rune. A quick zap from her horn and the rune began to crack into existence, forming the necessary symbol out of magic.
One to go, She thought to herself. As she looked around to make sure she was clear of any ghouls in her way, she had to double-check what she saw. One of the Ghouls was even more malformed than the others, it was glowing green with pustules of fluorescent liquid. Walking past it made her whole body feel wrong, and her horn felt numb. As she walked slowly to the final location, she watched the last of the ghouls reach the ground beneath the flares. Casting the last rune, She watched as crackled into place. The hard part was over, now to reach the border of the array nearest to the creek bed,
*Moments earlier*
John looked out across the field as the last of the Ghouls entered the remarked area, all of them staring up at the flares that were beginning to die out. Watching the Glowing one lurch behind the others, John noticed a shimmer appear near the glowing one. pulling up his binoculars, he saw a pony-sized ripple like water as the Glowing one passed. The ripple subsided, with no ghouls having noticed. Whatever 'magic' Twilight was using, it had nearly blown her cover. John picked up the Combat shotgun that he had placed next to him on the ground. Something was wrong.
Once Twilight had reached as far as she could before the magic link was weakened, she stopped. She turned around to face the horde and had a quick check to make sure they were all inside the array. As quick as she could, Twilight dropped her charms and just as the flares finally died off, Activated the Array. She watched as the runes burst into light and after a flash, saw the ghouls being to collapse. Twilight looked back to the cheers of all the guards, smiling with pride. She had stopped anypony from being hurt and had done so peacefully.
Twilight's pride turned to confusion when the cheering was replaced with shouting. The ponies were flaying wilding and shouting words that she couldn't make out. One sound Twilight could make out was the sound of something running up behind her.
The Glowing one was charging at her, its arms stretched out to swipe her. Twilight pulled up a magic dome just in time to stop the attack, the ghoul stumbled at the defence She had put up. The ghoul recovered and began thrashing at the shield, each hit causing damage. What shocked Twilight was that the damage was not the shield cracking from stress, but the shield's magic unweaving itself. She could only watch as the Ghoul stood back and raised its arms, the glow terminating from it getting more intense. What happened next was nothing short of feeling cooked alive, as the green glow burst forth and obliterated her shield. As she collapsed on the ground, the world faded to black on the periphery of her vision. Her ears rang and sound lost focus, but she was still lucid. In defeat and unparalleled bafflement, she could do nothing but watch as the rest of the ghouls began to awake. The Glowing one once more stormed up to her, and she realised she had failed. With nothing left to do, she tried to teleport out and failed. Her horn sparked uselessly and simply sent back pain.
In her final moments, she remembered all the friends and family she was letting down, and words flowed back of promises and warnings she had made and received. What she hadn't expected was to hear the voice of John, the human she had just met. It seemed out of place, not that it mattered anymore. Just as Twilight was about to black out and the ghoul's swipe was about to take out her throat, a thunderous boom brought the world back into focus.
John wasted no time jumping out of the ditch the moment the Glowing one had failed to drop. Ignoring Nate shouting at him to stop, he sprinted across the field. The glowing one released a wave of radiation and Twilight fell over, John didn't know if she was unconscious or dead. The Ghouls soaked in the radiation and recovered from their bout of unconsciousness, the glowing one then went back to attack its now vulnerable prey. The good news was that the pony was probably still alive, the bad news was that if he didn't hurry, he would probably lose his only way home.
John doubled timed his sprint, his shogun close to his chest. He used every last second he could to get close enough, once the time was up, he screeched to a stop, aimed, and pulled the trigger. The thump of pressure on his shoulder nearly knocked him off his feet, exhausted at the distance he had just covered. The Glowing one stumbled back as the buckshot hit it in the chest, buying John the time to recover. He fired two more shots into the Glowing one, knocking it over with the force. Jogging the last leg, John stopped and knelt down to check on the princess in his care. He lifted her chin with one hand while his offhand held the shotgun.
Twilight's eyes were hazed but she was very much awake. She squinted at him, her eyes beginning to focus.
"John?" Twilight asked weakly.
Looking into her eyes, John noticed his reflection. When a ghoul showed up in the reflection, he threw his weapon-bearing arm backwards and pulled the trigger. The sudden force on his arm from the point-blank shot was excruciating, the wrist was nearly broken from the act. His hand in shock, he dropped the combat shotgun. Letting out an all-mighty "FUCK", John stood back up and took the gun with his other hand. The shot had cleanly taken the head of the closest ghoul, but now the rest were beginning to charge towards them. With the combat shotgun now resting on his shoulder, he began to pick targets. The following two shots took out the heads of two ghouls, buying time for Twilight to recover. A third ghoul came at John from the side, giving him no time to react. The ghoul dropped however as a bullet crashed into its torse from the side, coming from behind John.
John turned his head for a moment to see Nate charging toward him, his 10mm Sub Machine gun out. Nate shot a burst of rounds at the closest ghouls, hitting them in the legs and crippling them. When he reached John, he stopped and did so again.
"What the hell were you thinking, They could have taken a clean shot if you hadn't done this!" Nate chastised John, both of them sending lead at the incoming ghouls to slow them down.
"Shut up and help me!" john shouted back, Grabbing Twilight by one of her forehooves.
Nate followed suit and they began to slowly drag her back towards the creek bed. After a few steps, spells and crossbow bolts started to rain down on the Ghouls. The beams of magic did little to slow the horde, while fireballs turned them into moving pyres. Armoured ponies climbed out to attack the non-Flaming ghouls themselves, and pegasi rained whatever they could down on the enemy. One unfortunate pegasus tackled a ghoul coming straight for the three and was swiftly torn apart by three other ghouls. While occasionally a small bang would be heard behind them with a ghoul stumbling from the shot.
The courier reloaded as fast as he could, repeating a mantra to himself of "Shit, shit, shit, shit" before slamming the bolt on his rifle shut and continuing to take marked shots at any target he could.
Nate continued to heave as John and himself made their way to the backlines with the barely conscious Twilight. Looking back, he could see Luna Flying above, taking careful shots into what clusters of Ghouls she could see. As he looked back towards the carnage in front of him, he saw another blast of green energy coming from the battle. The Glowing one was still alive, John had failed to finish the job and it had recovered. The dead ghouls began to rise once more, extending the battle and costing more lives.
Nate cursed himself internally for not checking, then John for rushing out in the first place. Luna had stated moments after John had rushed out that she couldn't save Twilight because she no longer had a clean shot. His lack of discipline had gotten people killed today.
As both humans reached the edge of the ditch, Nate called out to Princess Luna.
"Princess, We need to stop the glowing one, It can revive the others!" Nate exclaimed.
With a nod, Luna swooped above the battle scene and targeted the glowing ghoul. Her horn began to glow as she materialised 3 swords from nowhere and fired them downwards. The Princess began to fly back, signalling her success in doing so. Nate could only watch as something brown was launched at the princess and struck her. The princess began to rapidly fall from the sky, Barely gliding to the edge of the battle. With a crash, Luna landed but a few meters from the trio.
With Twilight in John's care, Nate rushed over to Luna. Battle Bowler and Leveé had also raced out to aid their princess of the night. Luna struggled to her hooves, covered in dirt and slight bruising. She winced as she walked towards the trench line, not stopping when Nate was next to her.
"Our Magic, Something has happened, We cannot use our magic," Luna told the three.
"You have lost your magic?!" Leveé asked, dumbfounded.
"Nay, not lost, We can feel it, but use it we can not" Luna Clarified.
Nate didn't understand what was happening, but things were going south fast.
"Sergeants, Get your soldiers out of there. You're faster than your enemy, Use that to your advantage. Pick them off slowly while keeping a distance, aim at their legs and slow them down. Try to spilt them apart, they're stronger as a group" Nate Ordered to the Earth pony and unicorn.
Battle Bowler seemed taken back by the command but before he could talk back, Leveé clubbed him on the head with her hoof. His helmet sounded like a gong as it vibrated on his head.
"Hoof and hoof it, understood!" Leveé responded, dragging her peer with her.
Nate took the opportunity to look back out to the field, things were not good. Try as the ponies might, the ghouls were too difficult to face in a melee when in this number. What success had occurred was from ranged attacks and opportunists taking out stragglers, yet just as many had died trying to directly take the horde down.
Nate looked around for John, seeing him in the ditch with Twilight. Nate jogged over to the edge of the ditch and jumped down. John was looking over Twilight, seemingly trying to find any sign of trauma. He noticed Nate looking down at him and got up.
"What the hell happened, everything has gone to shit!" John announced.
"Fight now, complain later. They need firepower up there!" Nate Demanded of John, gesturing to the field above.
"Fine!" John Answered, grabbing his gun.
Nate climbed out of the ditch alongside John and they both made their way to the fight.
Nate fired a burst into three ghouls that were running in across the field in front of them, getting their attention. John then took the head of two of them before needing to reload. Nate finished off the third and reloaded as well.
"The Legs, Not the heads!" Nate Emphasised.
"Fine!" John Roared back.
The two finished reloading just as four ghouls took notice and sprinted at them. The two humans stood side by side and mowed the ghouls down, the last ghoul going so fast that as its knees turned to buckshot-caused paste, its rolled a few meters away for the inertia. John waited for more ghouls to get closer while Nate sent single shots out to any ghouls chasing ponies he could see. Eventually, one or two Ghouls would bite and come after the two humans, only to lose their legs.
Time went on and Ponies began to tactically retreat from the fight, leaving the pegasi to rain lightning and rocks down on the Ghouls. Unicorns and earth ponies used hit-and-run tactics to thin out the other ghouls. The ghouls began to lose interest in the fast prey and switched to Nate and John, who as a result stood back to back and took out any Ghouls that were in range. The occasional Ghoul would be dropped by the courier rifle, helping to keep the pressure off the other humans.
Once most of the Ghouls are dead or legless, the guard returned to clean up the rest. A coordinated charge dropped most of the standing ghouls while guards went around with spears to skewer the remained heads.
Finally, the fighting ended. twenty-three ponies were dead or wounded, a pyrrhic victory that left no one celebrating. Rapid Fire had raced back to the forward camp to bring reinforcements, their arrival slowed by the terrain. They did however bring medics who tended to the wounded, and the chariots to bring the Canterlot forces back home. The local forces would be on clean-up duty.
While the expedition prepared for the trip, John wandered the field. Something had gone wrong, and he needed to know what. His boots would occasionally squelch from the thin layer of blood that pooled around the dead. The smell was as horrible as he had remembered, blood and necrosis. John stopped as he reached the corpse of the glowing one, mangled by three swords. He thought about why this ghoul, in particular, caused so much harm, this one had stayed awake, this one had broken the Princesses defences.
He noticed that the swords were wavering the closer they got to the ghoul's flesh, like visible heat from a fire or molten metal. John reached out with his right hand to see if they were hot but stopped as his Geiger counter went off. 'Idiot', he thought to himself, he doesn't have any rad-x on him. he can't afford rads at this point and of course, glowing ones would be...
He stopped.
John shot up and scanned the battlefield. Nate had told him Luna had had a 'Performace issue' mid-battle after being hit by something brown. He had seen where she had landed and where she was coming from, so he followed the trajectory. Finding the brown gunk in a pile on the ground, he knew what it was. The Rever's flesh, ripped out of its own body as a projectile. He brought his pipboy down to it and listened as the ginger ticked away.