//------------------------------// // The Call to Arms // Story: The Winds of Change // by AgentSnail //------------------------------// Quick note: I wrote this chapter at least five times before it sounded remotely usable, so here goes nothing. The Call to Arms The crowd was silent for a time, either looking around in scared manners or just staring back at the changeling and half changeling on the ledge. Whispers started to break out, yet no one actually tried to do anything. Jason cleared his throat again. "So here's the deal, Canterlot was captured by the Griffins as I'm sure you know. Most ponies, it seems, want to give up and surrender." He realized that he needed a podium to whack when it was appropriate. He stomped his hoof into the ground instead, recoiling a little when he aggravated a crack in that leg. "We aren't doing that. What we should do, should you accept, is go back and take over the city, create an actual counter-attack. We can still win this and send those idiot griffins packing!!!" The crowd once again lapsed into silence until a more bold pony spoke up. "How can we even trust him? He's that changeling on those flyers!" he yelled. The crowd got rowdier and louder as the other ponies seemed to agree to the notion. Dash pulled out another flash-bang and threw it across the room. BANG!!! The crowd once again became silent. "Listen here, those flyers are wrong. I didn't commit any of those crimes." He felt like a broken record. This was what, the eighth time he had to say this? Ninth? "Oh yeah?" it was the same pony. "You and what army? Huh?" Jason didn't have an answer to that. He jumped a little as some of the crowd seemed to advance to where he was standing, while still staying eerily silent. Ponies started filtering out of the front of the crowd and walking up to the ledge. He gestured to Dash, who moved over to him. The ponies were almost to him, and he was about to teleport and escape, when a mare jumped in front of him. His mind tried to grasp this new development as the mare spoke. "This changeling saved me from the Everfree, and he didn't commit any of those crimes." She yelled out to the crowd, silencing the whispers that were circulating around. "Wait a second, Star?" another pony climbed up. "Sky?" The two ponies nodded and smiled at Jason as he realized that the other ponies making their way forward were ones that he and Dash had saved today. He had definitely not expected outside help. Suddenly a sinking feeling hit him. "What happened with the foals?" He was almost afraid to ask. Star smiled wider. "We sent them off for a few days to visit my mother-in-law in Manehattan, because of your warning. Without that..." She shuddered. Jason and Dash greeted the other ponies and royal guards that had all made their way onto the ledge. Dash turned back to the crowd. "This army!" She yelled, laughing. There were a few whispers in the crowd from ponies that were trying to figure out why anypony would help a changeling, the same creature that had just attacked en masse not too long ago. A pony voiced their concerns, probably the same one that had said something before. "Why would you lot help him? He's a danger to Equestria! We should be taking this time to dispose of the threat." The crowd flared up again. Sky walked to the edge of the stage and cleared his throat. "These 'threats' saved my wife, and probably my foals. He and his friend saved or helped all of these other ponies behind me." A royal guard walked up to the edge of the stage. "Celestia herself put her trust in this changeling. Don't ask me why, but that's what she said." The pony in the crowd seemed satisfied, surprisingly. Or maybe he was just at a loss for words. Jason finally got his resolve back, and turned to the crowd. "Now, in terms of troops, I doubt that I can actually legally draft ponies, and I don't exactly want to force people into a war, so here's what I'm going to do. Any recruits will be selected on a volunteer basis. That said, will all ponies under eighteen and all nursing or pregnant mares move to the side of the room?" There was a large shift, leaving a fairly large remaining group. "Good, remember what group you're in, and-- There was a flash of soundless light, yielding an annoyed looking Princess Luna and Shining Armor. They both noticed the changeling and harbored mixed responses before Dash broke the silence. "Princess, are you two the last of the ponies that were in the castle, at least, besides Celestia?" Luna nodded sadly, holding Shining behind her and keeping him from attempting to attack Jason. "Why don't you go find your wife, Shining. I made sure she got here safely after the attack started." He looked up to the princess, confused, and looked back and forth between her and Jason for a few seconds before he turned and left with an frustrated huff. "Do you have somewhere private where we can discuss strategy and stuff like that?" Jason asked. Luna nodded and gestured for them to follow her. Sky and Star and the royal guards followed, while the others retreated back into the crowd. She pushed open a door that was flush with the wall and otherwise invisible, leading them into a well lit room. Jason looked around, noticing a large table, which on closer inspection had a topographical map of Canterlot and the surrounding area on it. "Who built all of this?" He asked the princess, still slightly in awe of the detail on the map and the room in general. "There was a pony that twas the captain of the guard a few hundred years back, so my sister tells me, and he had a fear of invasion that most ponies thought twas ridiculous at the time. I suppose it was a good thing that his accomplishments were kept in working order. There is also a small armory and barracks, although nopony has been stationed here for generations." "Princess, how much food and water do we have here?" Dash asked. "Ah, I'm glad you asked. There art approximately a month's supply of food for this many ponies, along with an unlimited amount of water, fed by one of the waterfalls around Canterlot." "So nothing pressing then," Jason sighed, rubbing his chin in thought. "That makes things a lot easier, but we still can't attempt to outlast them or anything." "So what art we dealing with? How did it look up there?" She searched his eyes for information, but only saw horror at the memories of events that day. He stammered a little, unable to find a concise answer, before Dash laid a hoof on his shoulder and spoke for him. "We saw hundreds of griffins on the surface, although we did cover a fair amount of the city. Hopefully that's a large amount of them. We managed to take out several, but our efforts didn't really make any dent." "I see." She moved to the map, moving several small red chess like pieces around on the board. "This is where the most recent intelligence places griffin troop positions, although many are still dispersed randomly about the city." Most of the little play pieces were placed around the castle. "Where are we?" Jason asked. The princess levitated over a few blue pieces, placing them on the opposite side of the city. "Well great! We're not near their main troop clusters, so let's just knock out the small forces in the rest of the city." He sighed. "But what about the griffins? What kinds of advantages do they have over ponies?" "Griffins are half lion, half eagle. Luckily for us, this means that their eyes are that of a daylight bird of prey, so they shouldn't be particularly advantageous at night. Their ears are fairly sharp, and they can sneak around very quietly if they so choose." Shining Armor walked in, Cadence at his side. "Nothing earth shattering." "Princess," He said, "I still don't understand why we're being friendly to this, beast. Not two weeks ago thousands of his kind attacked Canterlot. We can't trust him." "Well, Captain, there art two reasons. He hath obviously gone out of his way to save ponies, as the group on stage attested to. Besides that, we don't have much of a choose, do we?" "Plus," Jason spoke up. "If I were evil, I don't think I would want to go through this much trouble to gain your trust. I'm too lazy for that." Shining glared at him, then turned to Luna. "Well, princess, I did a headcount and we're down to eighty-three royal guards, five of them officers." He sighed. "Out of three hundred and fifty." "Looks like you have your work cut out for you, Jason." Dash said. "Yeah, I guess you're right." He turned to Luna. "What are the routes of the tunnels under the city?" Her horn glowed, and the surface of the map became partially transparent, revealing a web of tunnels that extended like spokes from the evacuation area. "Well that's useful." He looked up. "Shining, can you divide up the royal guards into small effective teams? And Luna, I need you to give some sort of great, empowering speech, and then get volunteers." They both nodded and left. Soon after the white noise from the crowd diminished as Luna started using her royal Canterlot voice. Dash moved to the door and pulled it partially shut, cutting down on Luna's noise. "Dash, help me with this." She walked over to the table and stared. "How the hell am I supposed to know what to do with this?" "I dunno, but it's better if someone finds fault with what I come up with than no one. Like an editor." "So you're trying to take out the occupation forces without engaging the main bulk of their forces, which is apparently located here?" "And you acted like you didn't understand." Jason smirked. "Yes, that's what I'm trying to do. I figure if we manage to get a large enough amount of volunteers, we can just attack a bunch of the city at once. Things never actually seem to go to plan, though." "So what part are we playing in all of this?" "I dunno, I just figured that we'd take the place of one of the squads. I guess I didn't think about it that much. What do you want to do?" "I kinda thought the same thing. I don't know how eager I am to get back into this though. We already made it through all this, I don't want one of us to die." Jason turned and put his hooves around Dash, attempting as best he could to comfort her. They were silent for a time, just standing there with their fore hooves wrapped around each other, before Dash spoke. "I don't really want to ruin the moment here, but we should probably get back to planning." Jason sighed, but obliged, releasing her from the hug. While Jason moved the pieces around on the board and created a grid on a piece of paper, Dash took a peek outside, seeing that Luna was still giving her speech. She turned back and saw Jason's piece of paper. "What are you drawing?" He looked up. "I'm gridding out the city adn labeling the entrances. There aren't that many zones, so we should't need all that many troops. Anyway, like I said I'm skipping the castle zone entirely and focusing on the other parts of town, primarily by the edges. I'm going to assign the zones to squads, whose responsibility it will be to clear them. Do you want to do the honors and pick a zone?" Dash shrugged. "How about this one?" She said, pointing with a hoof towards a two block strip about half a mile from the castle. "How's that?" "Okay, sure. Remember, A6, tunnel eleven, sixth exit. That's our stop." He paused. "Got any other plans you want to add?" "Not really, just that you should probably station the royal guards in the areas closest to the castle." Shining walked in, followed by two other guards. "Fair enough," Jason responded before noticing their visitors. "So, changeling, do we have a plan?" "Yeah, look." The captain walked over to the map, leaving the two guards by the door. "I gridded out the city based on the exits to the sewer. If it's alright, I'd like you to brief your guard squads and tell them that they will be taking these areas, A1 to B4, excluding A6. Those are the zones closest to the castle, and should therefore have the highest potential to have large numbers of hostiles. I hope your guards are up to it." He didn't look happy, although Jason was unsure whether it was because of the fact that he was running off a plan from a changeling, or because he was stuck putting his troops into danger. Probably both. "Last thing. Give them some sort of training on stealth if they don't already have it, because surprise is the only advantage we have." He paused, seemingly out of things to say. "Oh! See if you can see if anyone knows a spell to aid eyesight." Dash added. "You know, this plan is incredibly risky." The captain formed a wry smile. "But you know what, it may actually work."