//------------------------------// // Barely Controlled Chaos // Story: The Retaking of Canterlot // by Charles Rocketboy //------------------------------// The alert hadn’t gone out but the Territorial Army reservists in Ponyville knew to gather and suit up because they could see the explosions in Canterlot. Everypony was outside and everypony was scared and when the explosions stopped, even before the flares went up and the church bells rang, they were still scared. That was Canterlot. The princesses lived there. These things did not, could not, happen. In old war stories, the town turned out to cheer and wave flags when their sons and daughters went off. Everypony just looked sick. Since Amethyst Star felt sick too, that didn’t bother her much but she could see Thunderlane and Cloudchaser were rattled; those two had always bought into the rah-rah. She’d joined the TA for the extra cash. She hadn’t expected to ever have to do anything. Who were they even fighting? Her helmet chafed around her horn and the boots felt like chains. “EYES RIGHT!” snapped Filthy Rich – 2nd Lieutenant or Platoon Leader Rich, she’d have to remember to call him. He was more serious and his voice harsher than he’d ever been in trained, and he looked older and weaker. She felt a nudge on her side – Hayseed Turnip Truck, of all ponies. “Got butterflies there, Am?” “Could say that.” “Private Am now, Ah guess. Hey, heard the joke about the private? ‘What’s yer name, soldier?’ ‘Parts, sah! Private Parts!’” She burst out laughing and felt very ashamed, especially when the rest of the platoon turned to stare at her. “Something you want to share with the rest of Ponyville Platoon, privates?” snapped Rich. “Uh, yessir, Platoon Leader,” said Hayseed. “Basically, it was ‘What’s yer name, soldier?’” “Parts, sah, private parts!” barked out Sergeant Breezy. “That’s a good one.” Rich started to chuckle, and tension drained out like it had been punctured. “Yeah, alright, that is a good one,” and his voice was back to normal. “Hey, anyone heard this one – there were those three stallions, one from Canterlot, one from Brayfast, and one from Shetland…” ******** Outside, the streets were deserted but the skies were black with her swarm. Every building in sight had a broken door and there were impact craters on the ground: every pony around the castle had been collected. Inside the castle, her castle, her throne room, were feeding sacks with the princesses and Twilight & her annoying friends and the highest of politicians and one of the serving staff who’d just pissed her off, and in the corner stood poor, dazed, delicious Shining Armour. All of them got to watch her win. On top of that, Celestia’s old throne was really comfy. Chrysalis had it made. One of her scouts came buzzing in: “Your highness, as you expected Cloudsdale is moving towards us. We’ll be in range soon. We’ve also spotted a small army gathering on the ground some miles away.” “They really do want to go play war. Adorable.” She looked up at Celestia, smiling. “Hear that, Celly? I get to kill some more of your little ponies!” Whatever Celestia said couldn’t be heard through the goop but she was sure she got the gist. “I want word sent out, we’ll stop the collections for now – the whole swarm must be in the air to meet their attack. Overwhelming force should, well, you know. Take prisoners if possible, we can do with the extra food.” “Your highness. Oh, Commander Strect asked if we should concentrate on the holdouts before—“ “No, keep them under siege, capture any that fall, but otherwise, let the holdouts see their rescuers come and get routed. They’ll go down easier when they know there’s no point.” ***** The rendezvous was at Midway Greens, a train station between Ponyville and Canterlot that thought it was a village, and Amethyst’s first thought was this looks like Dinky’s room. It was a mess of barely controlled chaos and loud noises, with a few regimental and national flags limping on poles, and the green-and-gold of the Self-Defence Forces glittering everywhere. Hundreds of ponies jostled for space and tried not to poke each other with spears. Tents and carts kept being moved around. Armoured pegasi, and what she was pretty sure were the Wonderbolts, were lying on clouds and shoving them together for an easier chat. “Fixer upper,” muttered Filthy Rich, but Amethyst probably wasn’t meant to hear that. “Alright ponies, we’re with D Company. They’re around somewhere, we just find someone in charge—“ “ATTEN-SHUN!” That voice was definitely in charge – over to their right, a few dozen ponies were snapping into rank as Iron Will, the famous (and bloody loud) assertiveness trainer, marched in front of them. She hadn’t known he’d been a reservist and she definitely hadn’t know they made armour that fit minotaurs. Iron Will had a truly massive war hammer in his left hand, a captain’s bars on his shoulders and (slightly too big) helmet, and a face that said he was having the time of his life. “Remember – the changelings think they’ve won…” “WE MAKE THEM DONE, SIR!” The minotaur caught sight of her platoon and snapped a salute. “2nd Lieutenant Iron Will, Soydon Platoon, D Company! Retaking Canterlot’s the game--” “And the changelings are lame, I’m guessing.” Rich cut him off with a smile that, for a brief second, didn’t quite meet his eyes. “2nd Lieutenant Rich, Ponyville Platoon, and we’re in the same company. We’re, ah, not sure where to stand?” “Captain will be back soon enough, Richy – in the meantime, got any chants of your own? Good way to build up the platoon spirit!” ”I do not, sorry.” Amethyst Star was starting to feel better now – you looked at this sort of chaos, it was hard to think of anything truly bad happening. ***** Blueblood’s bravado had drained away hours ago and now he felt like throwing up. His cabinet kept talking and talking and he wasn’t sure of everything they said now, but he nodded and things seemed to happen after that, and at least they talked to him like they remembered he was a damn prince. He was important. That meant, of course, he had to give the final say to sending ponies to their deaths. He had to tell Greyjoy and Geldmore to slow down and repeat themselves and then repeat themselves with smaller words (that mare kept biting her lip for some reason) because he needed to understand all this. When Geldmore said they were “air-heavy”, for example, and said that meant too many pegasi. The Brigadier was a pegasi, what did that mean? Was he self-hating? “I mean that all-pegasi groups are trained differently to earth ponies and unicorns,” the stallion said. “They were trained for air-drops and to replace ground forces when necessary, but street-fighting would be done by non-pegasi and groups where pegasi train alongside others. Our problem is that the Dragoons will have to do the street fighting if we want to retake the train station.” “Which we need to do so we can shuttle everyone else in,” said Blueblood, because he wanted to make sure he had this straight. “Exactly, your highness.” “I thought there were unicorns and earthies in the city.” ”Numbers are unknown and they’ll be fatigued after being under siege,” said Greyjoy, still stuck in her papers. “This is all doable but we expect severe casualties.” Geldmore nodded and said nothing. It struck the prince then that the brigadier was worried about sending ponies to their deaths too; after all, they were his ponies. He was like Blueblood. The prince had a sudden urge to tell him not to worry. “We can’t go up the mountain?” “Canterlot is defended against mountain attacks. We plan to send North’s Watch up the north cliff as a feint, but they’ll be a small number trained for this.” “By your command, we’ll send a recon flight to gauge the changeling’s positions and attack plans,” said Geldmore. “Do it, yes.” Maybe it would work out fine. “When is everyone else coming back, anyway?” “Not until the attack starts,” said the mare. He wanted to complain about that but when he’d said something before, they’d talked and talked about civil service and infrastructure and communication lines and all this stuff that, frankly, he’d started to tune out but Blueblood got the impression that it was all important. It saved him having to do it, anyway; that was what the cabinet was for. Yes, they dealt with all the unimportant stuff and he rubber-stamped the coffins. ***** They’d scrapped up enough MPs and a few city technocrats – the head of Manewaring Bank had found himself the new Finance Minister and looked like he wanted to cry – to form the rest of the cabinet, even if it gave them a mix of all six political parties. There’d been some argument breaking out between old rivals until Salad Daze started to bang her hoof on the table yelling “ONE!” every two seconds. “That’s how often a pony is dying in Canterlot.” (With no new food and drugs coming into the hospitals, that would soon be true) “Nopony has time for anything but our best. Got it? This will be your finest hour because it freaking well has to be. Now, you, Friendly Smiles, I want the Foreign Office and by that I mean whatever office your desk is in to start sending messages to every friendly state and protectorate ‘asking’ what help they can give. Even if no help can arrive in time, I want us to be able to say that the Zebrican Navy is going to sail warships up the River Celeste. And, what was it, Count-Up, yeah you better cry cos half our cash reserves is in Canterlot and so is the damn mint and the Royal Bank, but I want you to use every sneaky bit of wordplay possible to make everypony think the bit is stable. “And you, I’m commandeering your glass.” Salad Daze grabbed and drank the Minister of Transport’s wine (he was Solarian Democratic Party, sod him). “Right. Okay. Any questions?” Across Cloudsdale, Billie – because, apparently, Minister Without Portfolio meant Odd-Job Goat – was organising a new ad-hoc civil service when the bulk of civil servants and all departmental records were back in Canterlot. Cloudsdale’s city council and every town in the immediate vicinity was sparing every pony it could and some it couldn’t (and the magic it was taking to get & keep all the non-pegasi up there was surely going to be a resource issue soon enough) but numbers couldn’t compensate for lack of records. “Look, can we just… How much of this can we just delegate to regional and town offices?” She held up a hoof to silence to inevitable yelling. “They do the work on the ground, even if they don’t have all the records on them they can still make do for a week or something, right?” “Welfare offices can still offer cheques to ponies they know, yes ma’am,” said a bureaucrat whose name she’d frankly forgotten. “Anything more complicated, like adding new ponies to the list or carrying out investigations or—“ “Then we put a moratorium on everything but the basics until we have this sorted out. I realise, no, quiet, I realise that this will cause harm to some but we can’t overstretch now.” And at yet another end, Stoutheart was learning that Watch Intelligence had a list of over 400 known changelings in Equestria. “That’s just the ones investigated, found innocent, and living here under registered identities,” said the spy, a dusty brown unicorn crammed in an uncomfortable City Watch dress uniform. “There’s also the few hundred in jail for abduction and emotional crimes. We have a penal colony for them up in Port Mareion – the princess thought it best to keep them a secret, after the ‘trials’ in Sabreen. Before you ask, turned out there were no changelings in Sabreen.” “They’re living here?” Stoutheart repeated, feeling like the cloud-walk spell was about to give. “They feed on our emotions, how--?” “Registered changelings invent a pony form or, with consent, assume the identity who already died, and they can feed by gaining friends and family. Abducting and replacing a pony is just easier.” The spy shrugged. “Some of those we arrest claim that it’s ‘cultural’ to do that, but they can shove it, sir.” “Has Blueblood seen this?” “We’re preparing copies for the whole War Cabinet, sir.” The Commissioner of Cloudsdale Watch grimaced. “I can begin internment in—“ and then stopped because Stoutheart was on his feet. “We are not jailing four hundred Equestrians without proof of wrongdoing. In the heat of war, we get scared and say stupid things, don’t we, commissioner?” He sat back down and turned to the spy. “Careful Reading, I’m assuming your men are going through the list and checking each changeling is still legit. Carry on and, ah, make it clear what will happen anyone who ‘let’s slip’ who is a changeling, eh?” And in a local radio station, Hottrot was running through his speech notes: someone had to address the nation, and Salad Daze was busy and Blueblood… Yeah. Well. Hottrot had the best patter anyway, and was probably the most famous MP in the War Cabinet; “the Red Dread”, the right-wing parties and papers called him, the scourge of companies and banks, four-time MP for Cloudsdale North. He could have been party leader if they weren’t worried that his affairs would come out. Anyone could do a speech, it was him. Outside all looked calm but inside he was shaking. The speech was half-baked, he knew that, but tone and delivery would sell it. What if it didn’t? What if it worked but they lost, and he was remembered for fine words that got ponies killed? And what if someone found him out? They had him on a list somewhere, and this was a time when people would be seeing traitors under every rock. But outside, all was calm as he spoke into the microphone: “And while I can confirm Canterlot has fallen, I can also confirm Operation Celestia Endures has begun…” Blueblood had come up with that name. It was inspired. Hottrot wished he could claim it. ***** There were other pockets of resistance in Canterlot, Flash Sentry was sure of that, but for the moment they were on their own. At the start of the battle, the Royal Guard and a ragtag civilian militia had held half the street and Flash had just been second-in-command of the air cover. Then, he’d landed for ten minute’s rest to find their resting post (it had been the roof of his favourite Buckstar’s before) had been infiltrated: one of the pegasi had been replaced mid-battle and Sergeant Stalwart… Well, Flash was in command after that. Then the east barricade was penetrated (one of the civilian refugees had been a changeling) and Flash’s colts were too busy preventing another air bombardment to help. Half the street was overrun and the civilians evacuated into Harrier’s department store (joining others already sheltering there). When the changelings pulled back, it turned out Flash Sentry was now in total command and that meant it was him who had to say that the west barricade was never going to hold. Now, they held Harrier’s, the buildings either side, and the street around them. Only a third of the Guards remained alive, uncaptured, and uninjured/walking wounded, and the civilian militia had gone from support to front-line. There was enough food in the store to keep everyone going for another day or two, but the toilets were going to back up and the medical supplies… well, there weren’t any. And the changelings were overheard, always overhead, watching for weakness and Flash Sentry was the son and grandson and great-grandson and great-great-grandson and so on for three hundred years of professional soldiers and gendarmeries, so damned if he was showing weakness. He had a pony watching every roof and every window – and half of them were window dummies but the changelings couldn’t tell that – and everyone held a weapon and only those he knew weren’t going to blink were up front. And every twenty minutes, he’d make a circuit between every building they held checking up on his men and he said no word, nor threatened, nor even looked at the changeling patrols. Because he wasn’t scared of them. And if he wasn’t, others would know not to be. And he wanted the bastards to see that. He wasn’t scared. Someone (Stavia? Octave?) was playing the violin back in Harriers, someone else was playing dubhoof. All upbeat, lively songs. Good. Take that, you slavering freaks. That’s what we think of you. Because we know help is on the way. ***** The press was there to watch the recon team fly off – two squadrons, one for the recce and one to cover them. So fine in their blue-grey barding, with the regimental band playing March of Thunder. Prince Blueblood saluted them and they saluted back, an image for that same press. Operation Celestia Endures was a go. ---- -- BG: Official protocol is that we randomly name operations -- BB: Oh blow protocol. Picture this: the Times or I suppose the Sun-and-Moon for the common folk, a huge headline saying ‘Celestia Endures’ and a photo of the Dragoons in full flight. Now try that with “Operation White Manticore” – hardly gets the blood stirring, does it? Chrysalis isn’t going to hear “White Manticore” and freeze in dread. No, Celestia Endures. That’s a statement of intent. - Official War Cabinet transcripts The one thing that I can’t get: these ponies are just so weak. Why has nobody tried this before? - Queen Chrysalis’ private notes.