//------------------------------// // Chapter 10 // Story: Shroud of darkness // by LeTriggs //------------------------------// Voice of freedom The seven ponies walked through the open field on their journey with the sun hanging in the sky over them. It was the second day since they had left the cave where Stargazer had conditioned the mares for battle and after the first day of journeying through forests the once farmlands were a pleasant change of scenery, even if they weren’t sheltered from the sun. As they pressed on their morale was slowly waning with each step they took. Stargazer looked up at a tree on a small hill within the field they occupied and made a decision not wanting to deal with another tantrum from Rainbow Dash. “Okay my hooves ache let’s take five on that hill.” The others were shocked by his sudden change from his cold tone but Twilight saw through his ruse but decided to keep up with it for the benefit of her friends. “Wow I didn’t think you were one to get tired.” He shrugged his shoulders as he moved into the shade of the tree and sat down making a bottle of water appear and began to share it around. Her friends moved past her and took their own spots. Applejack sat down next to Stargazer leaning against the tree like she would do back at home, Rainbow dash flew up onto a branch of the tree keeping an eye on Stargazer at all times whom she still didn’t trust. Fluttershy had sat down next to Pinkie Pie giving her a hug to try and lift her spirits slightly and Rarity had begun preening herself in a last ditch attempt to have some form of normality in their current situation. Twilight get out of the sun it’ll bleach your lovely coat.” Rarity’s voice broke Twilight from her trance to which she went and sat next to her unicorn friend who began drinking from the bottle then offered the final bit to Twilight who finished off the refreshing liquid then gave the bottle back to Stargazer who made it vanish again. After their break the group carried on through the fields refreshed from the rest they had and in a much better mood which Stargazer was thankful for. They walked through yet more fields moving through a thin tree line until they found themselves on a small ridge overlooking a town. --------------------------------------- “Ah Trottingham.” The town stretched out before them looking similar to Ponyville but larger with a bell tower near the centre of the town. Stargazer suddenly dropped to the ground seeing something that made him uneasy. Up one of the streets were a group of ponies on their knee’s with their fore hooves behind their heads each of them had behind them a Diamond dog. The leader of the dogs walked in front of them speaking all the while. “We told you ponies to leave yesterday and that you wouldn’t be harmed we gave you a gracious offer and you spat in our faces!” The pony on the far left of the group spoke up as the leader walked in front of him with rage in his voice. “We’ll never submit to your will we are free ponies and that will never change!” The dog pulled a pistol out from his belt and shot the pony in the head prompting the others to start screaming. The shot echoed throughout the hills and into the hilltop group’s ears. “Shut up!” The dog spat at the prisoners then moved over to another group of dogs within the town square and began talking amongst them. “Come on lets go round this isn’t our fight.” Stargazer had no wanting to get into a fight and would prefer giving the town a wide birth but Applejack interrupted him. “No we gotta help ‘em” She had moved next to Stargazer looking over the ridge at the dogs and she obviously wasn’t going to take no for an answer. “They’re armed you do know that?” “Then we need ‘a stay quiet like then.” Stargazer nodded then collected his thoughts. “Okay Twilight, Rarity and Rainbow you stay up here and give us cover while we move in to the town. Applejack Pinkie your with me.” Before the trio moved out a timid voice piqued up. “Urmm what about me?” Fluttershy looked around scared by what was going to happen to them. “You wait up here until we call you down there may be a chance that we may get hurt. Now let’s go.” Stargazer, Applejack and pinkie each slid down the ridge and moved across to one of the houses as quickly and quietly as they could. They stuck close to the building and moved along it till they reach the corner to which Stargazer held up a hoof signalling the others to stop. “There’s one on the second floor, Pinkie I need you to take care of him.” She nodded then climbed in through the window on the side of the house before Stargazer and Applejack ducked below the wall surrounding the house’s garden and moved to the edge where Stargazer looked around seeing a dog on the other side of the street looking away from the towards his allies in the town square. Stargazer moved across the road as quickly and low to the ground as he could making sure he wasn’t noticed and hid behind the wall behind the dog. Pinkie climbed off the counter which she had ended up on from climbing through the window into the wrecked kitchen. She looked around taking in the sights. The table in the centre of the room had been tipped over with the food that had been on it covering the adjacent wall, her eyes looked over the work surfaces and saw a knife still in its holder which she picked up in her mouth and moved into the hallway. Within the hallway she saw the stairs leading up to the second floor and began to ascend them slowly not wanting to alert the dog to her presence, she rounded the corner on the stairs and looked at the hallway ahead of her. She moved forwards and turned to the first door on her right that was open and saw the dog looking out the window at the other end of the room. She stood up on her hind legs holding the knife in her hoof and walked slowly towards the dog. Stargazer saw the pink hoof drag the dog away from the window and made his move. He hopped over the wall and snuck up behind the dog in front of him, he wrapped his hoof round the dogs neck and pulled his machine gun up and fired at the dogs guarding the prisoners causing them to panic from the sudden gunfire. Their flesh tore open as the bullets ripped through them killing them. The other group within the town square started shooting at him regardless of their ally being used as a shield. The bullets hit the dog causing him to howl in pain before Stargazer snapped his neck and let him drop to the floor as he took cover against the wall in front of him. “A.J! Catch!” He threw the machine gun over to her which she caught and began firing at the dogs whilst he shot magic at them managing to kill one before they got into cover and returned fire. Twilight and the others looked on at the battle before them stunned at what was happening. Rarity was the first to focus herself lowering to the ground and spotting a dog in the bell tower taking aim at Stargazer. She focused her eyes on him taking her time as she was told lining up her eyes with where her bolt would go and breathed in before letting the magic bolt fly from her horn. The dog fell from tower and out of sight behind a line of buildings. Rainbow took off seeing another dog on the roof of the house behind Stargazer. The dog crawled slowly over the roof keeping quiet as he could, he reached the edge looking down at the Alicorn and held up his assault rifle taking aim wanting to take out the pony in one shot. The dog dropped to the ground behind Stargazer with a sickening snap of bones breaking. Stargazer looked up to see Rainbow Dash who had obviously bucked the dog off the building to which he gave a nod before she took off to cover him from the air. He picked up the assault rifle and began firing at the dogs killing two more before the final three threw their weapons to the ground and began running away from the ponies attack. Stargazer moved into the middle of the street and fired a few shots in their general direction shouting at them. “Yeah you better run fuckers!” He turned to Applejack and began speaking noticing that Pinkie hadn’t appeared from the house. “You get the others down here and make sure the place is safe I’ll go check on Pinkie. She nodded at him and waved the others towards her whilst Stargazer moved into the building which he had sent pinkie into. He walked cautiously through the building checking each room on the ground floor noticing the hoof prints of the pink mare on the dust covered floor moving from the kitchen to the stairs. He held up the rifle as he moved up the stairs wary of any dogs that could be within the house. He turned with the stairs prepared to shoot down the hallway but saw nothing. He heard sobbing coming from the room to his right and saw a small trickle of blood coming out from under the door which he began moving towards more cautiously than before. He nudged the door open with the barrel of his weapon and was greeted with a sight that made him recoil in shock. The room was covered in blood spatters and the bed was the still twitching body of the dog that occupied the room on a bed with a knife sticking out of its throat. Sat huddled under the open window was pinkie sobbing to herself. She looked up at the pony before her and threw herself round him crying onto his shoulder taking him by surprise. He pulled her down from him and tried his best at a reassuring look. “Hey calm down it’s okay now, let’s get you cleaned up yeah?” She sniffled trying to control her tears and followed him towards the bathroom in which he cleaned the blood off her. “Thank you Stargazer.” He was taken aback slightly it was the first time he had heard her say a coherent sentence since he met her but put on his usual expression and shrugged it off. They headed outside to see Applejack keeping an eye out around the town, Twilight assisting Fluttershy in helping the injured prisoners and Rainbow and Rarity gathering weapons from the dead dogs and placing them into a pile. Stargazer didn’t tell them what had happened with pinkie in the room, they needed to band together as friends now instead of question her sanity They had to rely on one-another and not split apart. He thought about the lesson he was taught by Celestia amazed at how even in modern time’s it still made sense. He moved over to the prisoner that had been next to the one that had been shot, a blue earth mare with white hair that was kept tied back. “Are you all okay?” “Yeah we’re fine. If only you got here sooner.” She looked at the corpse of the pony and let a single tear roll down her muzzle. “A friend of yours?” “Father.” “I’m sorry. Is there anywhere you.” He was interrupted by the sound of a voice amongst static. He looked for where the noise was coming from but Twilight beat him to it. She pulled a small radio out from a piece of rubble and began fiddling with the dial until the voice came out clearly. “Repeat. Everyone should stay away from towns and the main highways, we have had numerous reports of raiders taking up positions in these areas. If you happen to run into these groups run or fight, just don’t surrender they’ll butcher you. This is the voice of freedom.” Twilight looked at the radio with an odd expression on her face. “That voice has been magically altered.” She looked at it with more confusion, even with the magic enhancements she recognised it from somewhere. Stargazer moved back to his conversation with the mare. “Is there anywhere you can go?” She snapped her look back to him from Twilight. “Yeah the rest of the town said they were gonna set up camp to the west yesterday.” “Go there that’ll be your best bet now.” She nodded and gathered up the rest of the prisoners and began moving to the west. Stargazer then moved over to the weapon pile and gave them out accordingly. Applejack had requested to keep a hold of her machine to which she loaded another belt of bullets into it, Twilight and Rainbow were both given assault rifles the same as his own. Rarity was given the sniper rifle still with a blood splatter on it from the dog that had fallen from the tower and Fluttershy took after a great deal of convincing the dog leader’s pistol. Finally pinkie had taken a shot gun which she had done with her typical silence that the others were starting to worry about. Stargazer began moving to the northern edge of the town whilst Twilight picked up the radio and with a small piece of rope tied it to her body so that they could listen to this “Voice of freedom” more. ------------------------------- They walked through yet more fields with nothing but the sound of Stargazer’s armour clinking with each step. Rainbow Dash flew next to him on her back mimicking a back stroke. “Sooo…Stargazer I got a question for you. Why is it you where that armour? It can’t really do anything I mean look at it.” “I agree that dull orange doesn’t complement your colours at all you need to wear something more vibrant to contrast against your dark coat.” Rarity had interrupted Rainbow Dash but her words slightly confused Stargazer. Why is she going on about fashion? This is armour it isn’t meant for show. “Well Rainbow this was an Element of harmony so it is still pretty tough even in this state. And Rarity I haven’t cared about looks for a long time.” His quick answer seemed to silence them which he was glad for till Twilight piped up with yet more questions. “What do you mean WAS an Element of harmony? How can it stop being an Element?” “The Elements of harmony exist in two forms. There is the physical form such as my armour which is linked to the one that bears the Element that it is linked to. But if the spirit that exists within that pony is broken the connection between the physical part is broken but it stays and due to its magical formation it remains stronger than most things hence why after all this time this armour is still usable.” “But you said that you bore two of the Elements. So what happened to the other one?” Stargazer stopped in his tracks as she asked the question. Tears began falling from his eyes as he remembered when everything changed for him.