The shelling had been going on for seven days. For seven days the shield held. But with each successive shell the shield flickered and warped, each time flickering just a little less than before and warping just a little more. The hope and love feeding the Crystal heart slowly faded, and its reserves were drawn upon far more heavily with each day.
Twilight moved along a road to the siege workshop. She flinched and ducked as an iron ball struck the shield above her. She felt the inherent terror inside her bones, panic seizing control for a moment before she moved along again. She reached the temporary siege workshop and continued to make ballista bolts. Twilight’s ever-growing stack of bolts held hundreds of bolts that were waiting to be dragged to the outposts along the edge of the shield.
Once her duties were finished at the shop Twilight began a listless wander about the dome. Earlier in her life she may have talked with her friends or buried herself in the library. But now it all felt somewhat empty, a void hiding beneath every action, quickly swallowing up the emotions she felt. Only the most negative of emotions like rage seemed to overpower it, and Twilight noticed that she was feeling those emotions more and more often since Rarity died. She used it to fill that horrid void, so she’d be able to feel something. This rage had to be directed at something. Usually, it was the Prussians. But sometimes it was her fellows. Her friends, comrades and family. Ponies she should know not to lash out against. Yet she still did. It didn’t matter.
The listless wander and thoughts brought Twilight to the fields along the edge of the shield. Here the cold seeped into the dome. The chill made her shiver, and she watched the wind pick up grass and whisk it off into the city proper. Some fields directly on the edge of the shield were losing their color, slowly freezing as the cold seeped into the soil. Hay drooped. Tulips curled. Here the effects of the siege were visible, on display for anybody to see. Truly it was wonderous, Twilight thought, that the Heart hadn’t failed completely yet. One just needed to walk out to see the hopelessness of the situation.
Yet somehow some of Twilight’s friends managed to. Pinky never stopped trying to cheer up everybody in the city. She held parties to celebrate making it through the day. Little cards were distributed at her command for doing good works for their neighbors. Twilight was baffled by the effort Pinky put into this misplaced hope. Rainbow dash put everything into training the few pegasi the city had on weather control. She taught them how to break clouds in seconds. How to make it rain. How to heat up storms. Every manner of weather control somebody could need. As if that would stop the freezing chill of the artic from killing them all once the barrier fell. And Twilight was certain the barrier would fall. It was inevitable. It had to be.
Twilight was shaken from her defeatist musing as her eyes caught movement. Peering out into the storm she saw Prussian approaching the shield. Her eyes focused on them as she galloped to the shield to peer closer. She readied an offensive spell to drive them off, before seeing a white flag being waved by somebody behind the lead Prussian.
Seeing that they wished for truce, Twilight teleported to the castle, grabbing her brother and sister-in-law without warning and teleporting back to the barrier. The Prussians stood in the permafrost, waiting. Watching the barrier. Twilight dragged Shining Armor out towards them, Cadence following close behind the two.
Outside of safety the Prussians stood, one with the flag of truce, one the diplomat they had met before, one holding a watch, and one with a drum. A shell slammed into the shield just above and behind them, sending a wave of shrapnel down. The officer with the watch frowned and gestured to the one with the drum, who began playing a slow steady beat. The officer nodded to himself before poking the diplomate and telling him to continue in German.
“We come to negotiate.”
Shining Armor and Cadence both looked at each other confused for a moment, before Cadence said, “Negotiate what? A prisoner exchange? Peace?”
The diplomat simply laughed. He laughed for what felt unbearably long in the freezing temperatures before saying, “Exchange? Of course not. You hold no one of value to us. And we hold none of yours. We come to negotiate your surrender.”
Cadence looked taken aback and insulted puffing up momentarily before composing herself. She a took deep breath and said, “You have the audacity to ask for our surrender? When our barrier still holds? No. We shall not faulter. The shields will hold. You will die of old age before breaking into our capital.”
The diplomat sighed and said, “Empress Mi Amor Cadenza, we Prussians are a stubborn bunch. We will construct a city of our own around yours, existing purely to supply a siege forever more. You shall not win. But I doubt it would even come to that,” The diplomat looked towards the officer with the watch and nodded, “General Karlson will explain to you why.”
The General stepped forward, a cool passive look on his face as he said, “We can see that shield deteriorate. I have had our best mathematicians in camp estimate how many shells it would take if the rate of deterioration is steady. Six days. We just need to fire at this steady rate for six days. Personally, I would-”
“Thank you General Karlson,” the diplomat said, cutting him off with a wave of his hand before continuing, “If you surrender now the terms will be far more generous. Should you refuse, we will not accept future surrender. We will continue until we have seized this capital well and truly.”
Cadence shook her mane, thinking hard. Shining took her out of earshot of every creature and conversed quietly with her. Twilight stood and watched the Prussians. She considered how easy it would be to just capture them and break the siege. To decapitate their command structure with one slice. Just one slice. So simple and easy. Twilight nodded to herself as she ran through it in her head. The Prussians looked at her with concern but did not say anything.
Just as Twilight’s will to not remove them from power was reaching the end of the line, Cadence and Shining Armor returned. Cadence asked them, “May we call our allies to consider the surrender with them?”
And a single word reply came, “No.”
The shelling had resumed. Theodore Bundselt stood in his trench with his regiment, bayonet polished and bristling out of the top like a steel spout in a field with thousands. He stood beside his Colonel, Kurt Christoph Graf von Schwerin, preparing himself mentally for the assault. The Colonel smiled, not unkindly, at Theodore and patted him on the arm before turning to face the shield. The shells kept falling.
It took a moment, but Theodore noticed that the guns had fallen silent. He gulped, preparing himself. Soon. It would be soon. He thumbed the stock of his gun and adjusted it needlessly. All at once the cannons and howitzers began firing again. Dozens of shells shattering against the shield at once. Constant. Overwhelming. The booming and echoing shatters knocked Theodore off balance. Calming himself he peered over the edge of the trench and saw... just a city.
The shield had broken. That was the signal. The entire Prussian and Bavarian armies rose out of their trenches and began to charge. Theodore’s foot slipped, quickly being caught by his Colonel and hauled out of the trench. Kurt Christoph Graf von Schwerin started off at a steady pace, raising his swords and yelling at his men, “All Brave Prussians follow me!”
And then there was a wet thump and a swish of wind, and Theodore felt warm liquid on his face and cheek. He squeaked and looked beside him, seeing his headless colonel fall to the ground. Behind the colonel two men had been impaled on a ballista bolt and lay motionless on the ground. Theodore took a step back, trying to separate himself from the sight. But the Regiment wouldn’t allow it. The wall of men marched forwards, all but unaffected by the death of their commander.
The shelling continued. Howitzers screamed overhead, exploding in and around the city. Cannon blazed away, shrapnel shells shredding the fields and wooden buildings, while solid shot shattered the crystal buildings like glass. Another ballista bold was fired off, plunging itself into the regiment, carving a shallow cut. The hole sealed itself within seconds and the regiment pushed onwards, Theodore marched with it, pushed on by those in front and around him. He felt the regiment’s mood begin to fill him and raise his spirits from fear to confidence. Filling the terror with a sense of duty. He was a part of the Prussian regiment that marched.
The ballista was on fire. Theodore marched past it. A shallow crater was beside it, and shrapnel made of pony flesh and bones filled it. A pony in gold armor was slumped over the ballista, his armor glowing red hot, and his flesh charred away from his skull. Several bodies were scattered behind crumbling, cobbled together fortifications. They had stood no chance against a volley of muskets. The Regiment marched deeper into the rapidly freezing fields, his eyes seeing but not really. He marched perfectly in line towards the city center, prepared to face all from within his regiment.
The shields cracked. Then it fell. The bombardment had destroyed the city’s main lines of defense. Twilight watched as thousands and thousands of Prussians clambered out of their trenches and began to march towards the city. She watched ballista fire uselessly into it, before being promptly set ablaze by counter fire from the Prussian’s monstrous artillery.
Twilight teleported to the ground, where her friends and family were preparing their weapons and barricades to fight the Prussians at the castle. As she donned her armor, she watched hundreds of militia ponies and poorly trained recruits rushing towards the square, their officers trying to get them in some semblance of a fighting stance. Civilians flooded the square, only to be ordered back to their homes by anybody they reached out to for help. As she finished tightening the last strap of her armor she watched a small trickle of the experienced guard ponies, the ones that had been manning the ballistae, stumble into the castle‘s shadow.
Twilight‘s remaining friends all formed a kind of semi-circle around her, each wearing their specially colored armor. Her brother and sister-in-law were both directing their troops, arranging the more veteran units along the avenues of approach and holding the mass of recruits in reserve. They quickly ordered Twilight and her friends into the final line of defense, having them take position within the castle's legs. Inside the youngest and oldest of the soldiers stood with inexperienced officers, quickly preparing barricades beside the doors to slide into place. Crossbows were moved to windows and boiling oil was dragged to the staircase. Servants could be seen flitting up and down the staircases with food and water, giving them to everypony inside the castle and preparing to send out carts for the ponies outside the castle.
Dash fluttered up and down as she idled, muttering under breath and glancing out the window regularly. Applejack was switching from practicing her bucks to double checking her saddle bags several times a minute. Pinkie Pie was trying to make jokes and bounce, but her armor’s clanking drowned her out. Twilight was certain Pinkie had it on wrong. Fluttershy just sat in a corner, whimpering and covering her face with her mane. Twilight switched between watching the city slowly be succumbing to the hues of blue uniforms that slithered uphill like a snake, metal glinting like scales and chanting echoing up into the window she sat at, watching her friends and their reactions to the coming battle. Saliva, thick and overwhelming, slowly filled her mouth, forcing her to swallow often. Twilight could feel sweat pooling in her armor as she continued to watch, eyes glued to the scene, committing it to memory so she could record it in the annals of history.
Just four hundred yards short of the castle’s defenders the attackers halted on a dime. Within a second the long snakes shuddered to a complete halt. The metal daggers atop their weapons lurched forwards before being brought back to rest against their owners’ arms. The armies stood and watched each other, neither seeming to make the first move. She watched as they continued to sit, still and unmoving in a kind of faux peace. Then the Prussian lines shifted and churned. Thousands of bodies moved at once as they shifted positions and formed ranks anew, slightly narrower than before, but much longer.
A slow, steady drumbeat floated hauntingly over the city. It continued for maybe thirty seconds before being followed by five rapid beats, then returning to the same beat as before. Only this time the snakes moved with it. Each beat brought the hordes of Prussians one step closer to the Crystallian lines. The men moved in almost perfect synchronization, seemingly emotionless and machine like. Twilight quickly brought a pair of binoculars towards her with magic and spied closely on the Prussians in the line. There she found a single young Prussian whose face seemed just a little softer than those around him and had a hint of fear showing through.
Theodore stepped forwards. The ponies were now just three hundred yards. Bumdum. Another step forwards, two hundred ninety-nine. Bumdum. Another step. Bumdum. An officer called out to them, seeking to aid their nerves, “Steady now boys. Keep it steady! On the beat now!”, Bumdum, “Just like that now, boys. Keep it up! For the Crown!” Bumdum. The cycle continued.
At one hundred yards the ponies let out a cry and loosed dozens of bolts into the ranks, bringing down two of Theodore’s fellows beside him. His eyes widened a little, shaken by the sudden loss. The holes were instantly filled by two others. Theodore recognized one as the older brother of a friend of his, who attended the same church before they enlisted. Another wave of bolts was loosed, and the friend clutched at his eye, screaming as he dropped to the ground and was trampled.
The order to halt was called, and the fire and retire. Theodore readied his musket, primed it and fired, watching a golden armored pony in front of him drop to the ground with a grim sense of revenge. He then made a quick right face and ran to the back of his platoon’s formations and began reloading his musket. Every second a volley’s crack broke across the city and the sound of bolts whistled through the air. He stepped forward with this rank, stepping over the bodies of fallen Prussians. He reached the front, fired, and retired again. Following the cycle as his platoon slowly diminished in numbers.
After his third volley, the regiment was cycled back to the company's rear, the entire platoon broke off and darted single file down the side of the company. The line was just fifty long, thirty of Theodore’s comrades left bleeding, suffocating, or cooling on the pavement as another platoon took their turn. As they ran to the back of their formation thunder sounded far behind the regiment and he watched howitzer shells trailing a thin, white vapor trail race overhead, rocking and whistling as they flew.
Theodore turned his head towards the crystal castle and watched them arc over his units, falling into the enemy lines, eyes moving over a small window with a purple unicorn.
Twilight watched the Prussian retreat, hearing a thunderous clap erupt from behind the Prussian lines. She kept her eyes trained on the soldier, up until he turned and looked right at her, momentarily causing her to lean back from her binoculars and look at the battle. She watched Prussian artillery balls, trailing the horrid white snow she saw once before, arcing down towards the hordes of veteran pony fighters by the dozen.
She cried aloud and her horn blasted out a shield, quickly covering her brother, sister-in-law and any soldiers nearby with a shield as the artillery fell. Her friends were shaken from their battle-induced fear as they quickly darted over to the window to see what had elicited a reaction from Twilight. They reached the window just in time to watch the horrors of the ambush be reenacted many times over, the deadly white snow exploding out over hundreds of ponies and drifting onto the ranks, breaking them instantly. The screams and clattering of armor against stone and metal could be heard from their window, splitting the room. Other guards ponies rushed to the window, watching with horror as the few surviving veterans melted and burned.
And then a roar of courage was launched from the Prussian lines. Thousands of soldiers rushed forwards into the off balance and stumbling ponies, bayonets lowered and hungry for blood. The horde pushed easily into the mess of ponies, before breaking through and surrounding the veterans. The rear troops quickly set to butchering them while the front lost no momentum and pushed into the trembling reserves.
Very soon the battle devolved into a mess of flailing hooves and slashing blades, ponies and Prussians falling alike. Twilight watched her sister-in-law slay a dozen Prussians with a single flash of her horn before beginning to pull the reserves into the castle. Twilight quickly abandoned her place at the window and rushed to the staircase nearest Cadence and greeted her as she came in with, “How can I help?”
Cadence looked her in the eyes with a shaken look and said, “By taking your friends to the safest place you can find while I get my husband out of that massacre.”
“No, I want to-” but Cadence was already gone, disappearing back into the crowd of guard ponies pushing up into the castle, eyes filled with terror as they sprinted higher and higher, pushing past everypony to get away from the Prussian menace. Twilight sat beside the stairwell, staring down it as the reserves continued to rush through, splitting almost evenly in rushing up and down. The guardsponies tasked with holding the door were shunted to the side, and in one case dragged up the stairs in the hurry to retreat. After a moment Cadence returned, her husband being carried by four stretcher bearers behind her.
Twilight watched as Shining Armor was carried past her, Cadence ignoring Twilight in her rush, and up into the reaches of the castle. He was bleeding from two separate wounds, one was a slit across his chest, having punctured his armor, and the other a slice across his horn, shattering the ivory and leaving a bloody gash along the base. Twilight sat down and covered her head, her vision darkening as her breaths came quick and fast. Fear, terror, anxiety and panic all swirled through her chest as she broke down right beside the stairwell, rocking back and forth a little as the last of the reserves fell back into the castle.
From below the sound of a melee echoed up the stairwell as the guards tried to close the barricades.
Theodore found himself at the front again, pushing into the rippling wave of retreating ponies, stabbing and slashing at them as he pressed towards the door in the castle leg just in front of him. Taking a moment of pause in his fight, if only a moment in his head and not his arms, he pondered the purpose of a castle held up by four small, easily destroyed legs before pressing through the door and into the chaos.
The nearest pony was caught unaware and was quickly greeted with steel through the neck, dropping it spraying blood all over Theodore’s uniform. He turned to another pony and tried the same action, only to be dodged. He quickly brought the butt of his gun to its chin, knocking it off balance. He quickly dove onto it and began repeatedly bashing it with musket’s butt, breaking its nose. Once it no longer moved, he got up and looked around, seeing a steady stream of Prussians pushing in and filling the space. The contingent quickly dispatched what paltry guard there was and set to divining tasks.
Theodore glanced up, looking up at the wide, open stairwell, again terrible design for a castle, and saw the cauldron of oil sitting just on the edge. With a shout he raised his gun, shooting one pony sitting beside it, a light-yellow crystal one, which fell over the edge and plopped into the crowd of Prussians. But it was too late. The pony’s body pulled the cauldron over the edge, flinging boiling oil down the well and sending the iron bouncing down the stairs.
Theodore narrowly dodged the oil, watching the others stagger about clawing at their skin and eyes, writing in agony. The cauldron crushed the legs of two soldiers, trapping them in a puddle of oil. The wounded men pressed against each other as they pulled themselves out of the door, trying to get away from the mess. Theodore looked around hesitantly and accessed who was left. Just a handful of soldiers, either unsplashed or unaffected. More troops rushed into the breach, pushing their way up and down the stairs bayonets held at the ready as they pushed into the crowd of panicking ponies.
Taking a moment to reload, Theodore steadied himself before joining the charge. An officer called out into the crowd, ordering them to leave those surrendering and unarmed, but to kill the rest. Similar orders echoed throughout the hundreds of men pressing into this leg of the castle, each officer ensuring the orders issued found their way to every ear.
The top of the stairs was devolving into an all-out brawl, with the landing being too cramped for ponies or Prussians to effectively wield their weapons. Theodore picked his way to the edge, ducking under and around flying hooves and fists, tripping over limp legs. A purple unicorn had caught his eye, laying on the ground with its forehooves wrapped around its head. The unicorn wore an ornate set of armor, unique from the rest Theodore saw. It carried no visible weapons. In short, an officer or noble of some kind. Casting his gaze about, Theodore looked for somebody to help him drag this valuable hostage away.
He quickly called out to a few Bavarians as he shifted his musket to one hand and pointed at the unicorn. The four Bavarian infantry understood immediately and jogged over, just outside of the melee that was rapidly pushing deepening into the castle and up a nearby flight of stairs. The Bavarians quickly took positions besides a limb each, before grasping it with one hand and hoisting the pony into the air. The pony was snapped from its panic attack and cried out in its native tongue before its horn began to glow. Theodore quickly punched the pony in the muzzle, knocking its head back. The glow faded and the pony went limp. The Bavarians began to drag the dead weight towards the stairs, a flow of line infantry still pushing up it and unslowing in their single-minded goal to press into the castle. Theodore and his small contingent began to push down into the flow, slowly making process down the stairs.
Just as Theodore made to follow them, he heard shouting as a blue, armor clad blur shot over the heads of the other soldiers and beelined for the purple unicorn. Theodore shifted to intercept, only for his musket to be knocked aside by the blur as it whisked past. It overshot the stairs and careened back up at a sharp angle, preparing for another pass.
Theodore shifted his stance, arms spreading out to try and catch the blur, He stepped forward onto the landing, and it slowed to a hover just in front of him. It snarled something to Theodore before leaning forwards to speed off again. Theodore yelled a wordless cry as he lunged forwards, each hand reaching for the pony as it shot forward.
The blur shifted to the left as it buzzed forth, nearly making it clear of Theodore. Nearly. As it buzzed past Theodore barely managed to grab at the base of a wing, getting whipped around to face the same direction. Its strength surprised Theodore as he was dragged forward by it, pressing towards the purple pony, now almost halfway down the staircase.
It turned its’ armored head towards Theodore, snarling something with such ferocity that its muzzle shrunk back from its breathing slit. It kicked wildly at Theodore, smashing his stomach and knocking the wind out of him. Without thinking, Theodore loosened his grip, his empty hand flying to his stomach. The blue pony flailed harder, kicking everywhere as it tried to break free totally.
Blinding, warm pain suddenly shot through his face when a blue hoof smashed into his nose. Theodore felt red hot rage boil through his body as his eyes bulged and his neck tightened. Without thinking, Theodore’s snapped to his knapsack and pulled out a small hatched, normally used for firewood and clearing brush, snapping it from the sheath and swinging it around his body.
In a single fluid motion, he brought his arm down just behind his grip on the wings. He heard a cry of agony from somewhere in front of him as he fell hard onto his butt, plopping down slightly disorientated. Shaking his head, he got up clutching his nose to stop the now steady flow of blood. The blue pony had flown right to and over the edge of the landing and sat hanging into the stairwell. Fear and pain filled its eyes as it said something, maybe to itself or Theodore, perhaps begging for help.
Theodore grasped his hatched and coolly stepped forward, the other hand still holding the broken nose. He reared back and punted the pony over the edge, sending it tumbling head over hooves down the well, where it cracked to a stop on its spine, just beside the Bavarians and the purple officer. Coughing for a moment Theodore sat on a crystal bench cut into the wall, slinging his bag onto the floor and grabbing his canteen.
He gulped down the hot, leathery water inside before leaning back against the cool crystal wall. After a minutes rest he rose to his feet, hatchet in hand and followed the squads of his fellows clearing out the castle.