Arefu, late-2279
“No, no, no...” Dom muttered.
She looked around hopelessly, refusing to believe what she was seeing. “God damn it,” Sentinel Sarah Lyons muttered.
“Those bastards,” Gallows said quietly.
The settlement of Arefu, built on an old overpass bridge and the fields around it, had been destroyed. The ones who had set up on land had gotten lucky, their homes reduced to piles of scrap. Those on the bridge had suffered a much crueler fate. Not only had the bridge been attacked, it had been blown up. What was left was lying in the dried-up Potomac River.
“How the fuck did they do this?” Dom asked, walking slowly towards the rubble, the servo-motors in her T-45d helping her climb over the rubble. She strained her eyes and managed to see the remains of shacks made from scrap. From this distance it was impossible to see any bodies. She was thankful for that.
“You think any got out?”
“I hope so, Gallows,” the Sentinel muttered.
To the south, a pair of Enclave troopers sat on a rock. “There they are, power-armoured boy scouts.”
“Do you have to call them that?”
“It’s what they are,” the first one replied. “The rifle any good?”
The second one looked at the old sniper rifle they had stolen from a mercenary. “Should be. Looks like it’ll just fall apart, though.”
“Give me gauss weaponry any day,” the first one grumbled. “Think you can make the shot?”
“Should be easy enough.” The second one shouldered the weapon and looked down the scope. “I’ll have to compensate for drop... wind... Which one should I go for?”
“Take your pick.”
“What the...?” The one with the Sniper Rifle leaned forwards slightly. “Holy crap, it’s her.”
“Her? You don’t mean...?”
“You seen anyone else with one of those wrist computers?” the sniper asked excitedly. “If I kill her - ”
“Take the shot,” the first one interrupted. “Take the fucking shot, we won’t get this lucky again!”
The Enclave sniper pulled the trigger. Four hundred yards away, Dom fell to the ground with a scream.
“Holy shit!” Sarah looked around, and saw the glint of a scope and two armoured figures running. “Gallows, help!”
“This is Gallows, we need Vertibird extraction, now! Paladin Esposito is hit, and we have two Enclave personnel running south. They may be part of a larger force, so send reinforcements too.”
Dominica forced herself up with a grunt and unholstered her plasma pistol. She fired wildly in the general direction of the Enclave sniper, using all the power in the energy cell before collapsing. “Oh shit,” Lyons muttered.
“How bad is it?” Gallows asked, pulling his R91 Assault Rifle off his back.
“They got really lucky,” Sarah said, jabbing Dom with a Med-X syringe. “Hit the servo, sent shrapnel everywhere.” Gallows didn’t say anything, instead opting to stand guard. “I don’t think we can save it.”
Veronica was the first out of the chariot, jumping from it before it landed. For her eagerness, she landed face-first after losing her balance.
“Real smooth,” Dom said as she walked over to the Scribe.
“Shut up.”
Thomas walked up, flanked by the two ponies on either side. “So, what’s the plan?” he asked as Veronica pushed herself back up onto her feet.
“Shadow Dancer and I will go to the town hall to assess the situation there and provide assistance if necessary,” Shining Armour said commandingly. “I can trust you three to help?”
“Sure, why not?” Veronica dusted her armour off and looked around. “Wow. Colourful.”
“Thank you, Captain Obvious,” Dom said snidely. “With observational skills like that, you’ll make Elder in no time.”
Veronica shot a glare at the Paladin that, due to her helmet, went completely unnoticed. “This is nothing, wait until you see the rest of the ponies,” Thomas said with a snicker.
“You mean what we saw in the castle wasn’t nuts?” the ghoul asked.
“I feel insulted,” Shadow Dancer muttered unhappily.
“Look, you can poke fun at us later, we have a job to do!” Shining said irritatedly.
Thomas opened his mouth to respond, but instead spun around and pulled the trigger of his shotgun.
A Diamond Dog had unfortunately chosen that moment to burst out of the ground in an attempt to take the counter-attackers by surprise. What he got for his trouble was a face full of fire as the shotgun spat a fifty-foot long tongue of flame out of its barrel.
“How’d you like a face full of Dragon’s Breath, you furry son of a bitch?” Thomas taunted as the Dog writhed on the ground in agony.
Shining and Shadow stared in shock for a moment before the latter slit the Dog’s throat with a shadow to stop its pained howling.
“Did you really just do that, Thomas?” Veronica asked flatly. “Really?”
“What do you mean?” he asked as he pumped his shotgun, ejecting the spent shell.
“You just called a dog-thing a ‘son of a bitch’,” Dom said, clarifying the situation.
The four waited for the shotgun-wielding black man to get it. “Fucking...” he muttered as he placed his left hand on his face.
“That wasn’t real dragon’s breath,” Shadow said with a roll of her eyes. “Real dragon’s breath wouldn’t have left a body.”
“I do the best with what I have,” Thomas retorted.
“You two can argue later, my sister is likely running herself ragged keeping that barrier up!” Shining yelled.
Twilight Sparkle took a deep breath as she poured more power into her spell. All around her the residents of Ponyville milled about nervously, some clinging to each other. Ponyville was well-known to suffer the occasional disaster, and the unspoken plan was to congregate in the town hall. In the past this had saved countless lives, but those events had been monsters wandering out of the Everfree, or more recently Discord’s insane warping of reality. By holing up in one place, they had inadvertently saved the Diamond Dog attackers from having to search the town.
“Twi, you can’t keep this up.” Rainbow Dash detached herself from the throng of ponies and walked slowly towards her friend. She could see the sheen of sweat coating the unicorn’s body, and the blood vessel that threatened to burst in her forehead.
“I have to,” the mare said through gritted teeth. “I need to protect everypony.”
“Twi, you need to rest. You can’t keep this up.” Rainbow landed next to her and looked into her eyes pleadingly. The rest of what she was going to say was cut off by a loud, familiar voice from outside.
“This is the Royal Guard! We are here to help!”
Twilight’s eyes widened. “S-Shiny?” she asked quietly. Her horn fizzled out and the bubble around the town hall disappeared.
The heavily-armoured stallion slammed open the door, damaging the hinges and wall it was attached to in his haste. The gathered ponies stared in a mix of awe and trepidation at this intruder.
The metal pony ignored the stares and rushed towards the purple unicorn, who chose that moment to collapse. “Twily!” Shining Armor caught his sister in his telekinesis and set her down softly.
“Sir!” A stallion called out from the civilians and made his way to the Knight-Commander. “Thank Celestia you came.” The gold-armoured pegasus looked as though he had just flown the Pegathlon, and had more than a few gouges in his armour.
“Give me a sitrep.” Shining Armor said commandingly, entering full-military mode to block out his sister’s condition.
“The Deltas attacked about an hour ago. We weren’t able to repel them with just two pegasi and a unicorn, so we rounded up the civilians and got them to meet up here.” He winced as he moved a wing. “Got more than a few scratches keeping the Deltas away. Beacon got hit pretty bad, but one of the doctors from the clinic is taking care of him.”
“Okay, it’s not that bad,” Shining muttered. “Still a bucking disaster, but we can recover.” The stallion pulled off his helmet and looked at the pegasus. “What about the other pegasus...?” He trailed off, realising he didn’t know who he was talking to.
“Oh, Private Overcast, sir,” the pegasus said after a few moments. “Corporal Hailstorm left about five minutes after the attack. She didn’t say why, though,” he said uneasily.
Before Shining could question the private any further, he was barrelled over by a pair of mares. Ignoring the pain and slight embarrassment, he righted himself and realised that he knew who they were.
“The school! She went to the school!” The orange-coated, blonde earth pony mare looked at him desperately, her face etched with worry.
“The school?” Shiny was confused. Why would Hailstorm go to the school?
“It’s just terrible!” The white, purple-maned unicorn faced him, her make-up ruined by tears. “I can’t imagine what it’s like for poor Sweetie Bell...”
That name was familiar to him. His jaw dropped when he remembered why.
Thomas looked down the sight of his shotgun uneasily. “Where the fuck are they?”
“Hiding,” Dom growled, keeping a finger on the switch that would send the blade of her Auto-Axe spinning.
Shining Armor had instructed them, along with Shadow Dancer and Veronica, to wait outside the town hall, both to keep watch and because the ponies would panic even more.
Without any warning whatsoever, the shield reappeared. The four turned to see Shining Armor, still without his helmet, poke his head out from the door.
“I’ll stay here and keep the townsfolk safe! You four need to get to the school! Now!” Before any of them could question him, the door slammed shut.
“What did he just say?” Veronica asked, pointing at the space the Commander had just occupied.
“Why would we need to go to the school?” Shadow asked loudly in Zebrican, hoping for some input.
Thomas’ expression turned grim. “We need to get moving.”
Dom’s expression had hardened. “Blood and Steel,” she muttered.
“A school?” Veronica sounded shocked. “That’s just...”
Author’s Notes:
If anyone says that the Enclave sniper destroying Dom’s left arm with a lucky shot isn’t possible, remember that the T-45d is quite primitive compared to the T-51b, and even more so compared to the Advanced Mk II. The T-45d is all riveted steel plates, with subsystems and electronics exposed or not as protected as they should be.
And yeah, a Dragon’s Breath round does in fact shoot fire about fifty feet . That’d be a on a good day, though. You’re more likely to get somewhere between thirty and forty.
The Royal Guard uses a phonetic alphabet. I haven’t got all the particulars worked out, but it’s definitely not the same as the NATO or Western Union phonetic alphabets.
Sweetie Bell was a flower girl (filly?) at his wedding.
Next chapter, I Pinkie Promise. (What does she actually do if you break one of those, anyway?)