Wildcard and his wife walked hoof in hoof, and it was a rather dreary evening in Ponyville. Fitting that it should be so- it was the first of October. Winter had come stealthily in the night, and a thin coating of snow could be found over everything.This winter had come early, but it wasn’t so bad, not for Wildcard anyway. The hive at this time of year was a wet mess of cold mud. School was cancelled for the day, although this was simple coincidence- Cheerilee was the only real teacher in the small town, and she was busy trying to explain how important that was to a draft board in Canterlot. She had done well for Wildcard though, and First Class had already made sure she would come back, with a significant raise. The school, however, would be re-purposed to a battle academy. Such was war.
The others in the city however, had problems of their own. While the fillies and colts playing in the streets didn’t notice, Wildcard and First Class did. Flyers on nearly every blank wall sounded the rallying cry for another protest later today, which was sure to draw all sorts of unruly ponies from other cities. Ponyville was a stronghold of loyalty to the princesses, and that’s exactly why Trotsky chose to protest there more than anywhere- nearly weekly now. He was goading them, desperately trying to force the townspeople to engage him, to prove right his own theories on the nature of ponies.
Thus far the townspeople had met him with kindness and civility, but everyone had their limits.
A breeze of wind blew some snow into his face, and Wildcard drew his coat in tighter. He hadn’t been feeling quite right lately, but perhaps it was just the whether. It would take more than a cold to stop him, anyway.
First Class strode beside him, deep in thought.
“I conducted a poll last week; Silver had your people in Equestria Daily help out. I’m ahead, Wildcard, but it’s the places I’m not that concern me,” She said.
“Why’s that?”
“They’re too dense. Ponyville is nearly unanimous, most of the country hovers around two-thirds, but Manehatten and Baltimare- what's left of it- are almost totally against me. I fear that they’ll break off. I'm going to head that way tomorrow, try and convince them who the real enemy is.”
Wildcard frowned, his wife was right. If an election was held she would surely win, but two two cities that had seen the worst in this war had totally lost faith in the monarchy. First Class was seen to represent it. If she won a theoretical election, right now, they could pick a fight. Or else they could separate, and try going on their own. Perhaps even seek membership in the Crystal Empire.
Whatever they chose, it wouldn't end well.
“So that’s why Luna has been delaying saying anything? If they sense an election is coming, and they’re going to lose…” Wildcard thought aloud.
“… Exactly, they’ll secede pre-emptively. Equestria is already bleeding, I don’t think it would survive getting it’s legs broken too,” She said, and stopped to look at one of the posters.
Freedom of speech, freedom of assembly! Come and have your voice heard, and rally against the powers of oppression! Towards a brighter future, together! Tear down the Lunar wall, and extinguish the Solar fire! Friday October 1st, Ponyville. 8PM.
First Class tore it off, and tossed it aside.
“Ponyville. Not a mention of where in Ponyville, just Ponyville. He’s bringing in help from the other towns, if I only I knew who so I could have them locked up for the night,” she said.
"This town hasn't known a quiet night for months, they don't deserve this nonsense," she added, growling at the crumbled up paper.
Wildcard put a hoof on her shoulder.
“That’s what he wants. If you do anything even in the slightest against him, he’ll react as if you personally stomped his throat with a jackboot. No, what we need to do is get rid of the problem at the source,” Wildcard said.
First Class squinted at him.
“That’s rather ominous, especially coming from you,” She said.
Wildcard laughed, and they continued their walk. Their walk took them back to their home, and Silver saluted outside. He had become like Wildcard’s right hand, and his loyalty was absolute. He and his hundred changeling soldiers had become the intelligence wing of the Home Guard, and Wildcard’s public relations agency. For weeks now Equestria Daily had been publishing stories of Thestral heroism, Changeling generosity, and tales of friendship. Simultaneously, they had been running slander campaigns against Chrysalis (The great liar) and Trotsky, who EQD was styling as "A businessman who puts his pocketbook first," true enough.
Wildcard wasn’t sure, at this point, if Luna or himself was pulling that newspaper harder. Luna’s decree’s had turned the open media into a propaganda machine, and he was definitely taking advantage of it.
“Welcome back you two, have a nice walk?” Silver greeted.
“We did, thank you,” First Class said, and stepped inside.
Wildcard stayed out with Silver, and leaned in close.
“Do we have an entry?” he whispered.
Silver nodded, and handed Wildcard a naked manilla envelope. Wildcard stuffed it in his jacket, and then ducked inside. First Class had flopped near the fireplace, and stared into it while she thought whatever thoughts she had. Wildcard silently worked around her, and went up to their room.
He sat on the bed, and opened the envelope. He grinned widely to see what was inside, and reclined to read it.
A changeling dossier, describing- quite intimately- the life story of one Velvet Glove. She was a highly respected member of Trotsky’s “Pony Independence” party, and quite possibly his lover. Silver had truly outdone himself to get all this, it provided Wildcard exactly what he needed.
Infiltrate the PI party, and find whatever critical weakness Trotsky has. Perhaps he has been evading taxes, perhaps there was some proof he was preparing for insurrection- maybe he could even be connected to Mezza Luna. The only thing Wildcard couldn’t do was outright kill him- that would make a martyr. He was able to do anything else though, anything to discredit the pony and make him look like a criminal, or a fool; both, if possible. If he was removed from the equation, Baltimare and Manehatten wouldn't have anything to fight for, and would have to accept First Class's rule.
Wildcard was eager to begin, but found himself unable to rise out of bed. He was suddenly tired, and decided to leave the matter for tomorrow. He folded the document back into the folder, and slipped it under the mattress.
No sense acting tonight anyway, too many eyes would be on him. So he closed his eyes, and allowed sleep to overtake him.
First Class, down in the living room, continued her pondering by fire. So many things were on her plate at the moment, so very many. Ensuring factory production met expected levels, tallying up the captured Night Guard equipment, and keeping tabs on expenditures all around the state. It was mentally exhausting, and took nearly sixteen hours every day to keep up.
At least Mezza Luna was dead, and Archer was imprisoned, so that chapter was finally closed. Luna's trial had lasted ten minutes, and he would spend the rest of his life in the Canterlot Dungeons. They had however, in a strange roundabout way, given them a gift. Their research would greatly benefit the war effort, and First Class had managed to assemble her own secret weapon. She kept it secret from everyone, even the Princesses and her own husband, simply because she wasn’t quite sure it would work.
The Night Guard had aspirations of building a second Magnificent, dubbed the Paraselene. With the start of the war though, they were forced to abandon this idea as the material required to build such a magnificent machine would have blown their treason wide open if they stole it. A large amount of the equipment that would make the core of this new ship had been created at several locations however, and it was all in her hooves now.
They still didn't have the material to build a second Magnificent- and certainly had no crew for such a ship, so she had instead thought outside the box. What was she going to do with an incredibly powerful alicornium based reactor, computing devices capable of massive amounts of number crunching, and a few gigantic engines?
The answer was perhaps the greatest siege weapon ever made. A single great gun, mounted on what had been a simple supply barge. The weapon itself she had taken from one of Twilight’s many ideas, something she called a “railgun”. This weapon, when used, could create an explosion equal to one-thousand tonnes of conventional explosive, at a range of several hundred kilometres. Magnets, and a lot of electricity, made a potent combination.
Thus far though, the guns had a simple problem: they melted, exploded, or fell apart. No material yet available could take the force required. The theory was there, the practice wasn’t. When she had finalized the plans for this, First Class had rolled a 26 sided die, and named it Project 11.
Nobody would bat an eye over something so boring sounding, so it was perfect. It gave her something to think about that wasn’t accounting or trivial government work, and could perhaps be her great contribution to the war. Only a dozen people, other than herself, knew about it. They were all thestrals, formerly in Mezza Luna's employ, and they knew that if they broke the secret they would find themselves in prison rather quickly. A few of them had committed some serious crimes, but she was willing to put justice on hold for the greater good. Living with the constant threat of imprisonment over their heads must be a prison in itself, after all.
First Class sighed, and flipped the burning log before her over with the poker. When had she started keeping secrets? It wasn’t like her, but she couldn’t stop at this point. This product had to either pan out, or fail, entirely by her own leadership.
She nodded to herself. That reasoning was enough for her. If she couldn’t handle a simple top-secret military project, what business would she have running the entire Equestrian state?
At that, she grinned, and got up as she had an idea. She strode over to her desk, got out some official parchment, and wrote up a rather simple order. She ordered that every factory involved in war-time production- which it could be argued was every factory , would have a political director assigned.
Which would report to her.
Trotsky would know damn well who was in charge. He might own the factories, but she was Minister of State. They were at war, and she could nationalize the damn things if she really wanted to. That would probably lead to violence however, so it remained the Alicornium option. There was also a rather interesting mare named Valient Veil that was turning heads after buying Southrop-Grumman, but she was too unknown to trust such important work to.
As she folded the order into an envelope, there was a knock at the door. The mayor of Ponyville announced herself, and First Class bade her enter. A light tan pony, with grey hair and spectacles that went out of style thirty years ago trotted in.
Mayor Mare always looked nervous. and the war was not doing much for it. She stepped in, quickly closed the door, and glanced around the room worriedly.
“Is there something I can do for you, Mayor?” First Class asked.
Mayor Mare walked towards her uneasily, continuing to glance around as if expecting someone to leap out at her.
“I noticed you don't have any guards, so I was going to suggest the police stand guard for tonight,” She said, standing before First Class’s desk.
First Class laughed, and the mayor looked at her as if she was insane.
“Ms. Mayor; As soon as you approached that door, three changelings have been watching you from the building over. Do you notice that my window is open?” First Class asked.
Mayor Mare swallowed, and glanced out the window. She quickly made out the tell-tale shining of three scopes watching her from a window across the street.
“If anyone so much as looks at me funny, there’s a pair of thestrals watching over as well. They are here to deal with anyone sketchy, while the changelings will deal with anyone… violent,” First Class said, and tented her hooves on the desk.
“I assure you mayor, I am well protected.”
The mayor backed off, and slowly moved for the door.
“I… see. Uh, good evening then!” She coughed out, and quickly darted back out.
First Class smiled and leaned back in the chair, it had been a while since she had so much fun. Convincing people that you were some sort of dark, mysterious, evil, manipulator brought her great fun these days. Going out with a pair of armed thestrals at her side had the effect of keeping away riff-raff, and had the dual effect of showing the people that the thestrals could be trusted. She was trusting them with her life after all.
Luna had jokingly referred to her as Dusk Shine in a meeting once, First Class certainly had learned from her. A leader should be strong, and that strength should be visible. Her husband always traveled armed, but she never did. Respect, and authority, those were her greatest weapons. Others would fight for her, and die for her if need be.
Soon, she would have magic as well. First Class had gotten behind in her studies, but she did her best. She could move grains of salt easily enough now, and perhaps soon enough she could try conjuration.
Relying on that staff was annoying though. She had it covered covered in velvet, so that anybody else would simply assume it was a decorative staff. She knew better though, it was the key to her eventual ascension. What a day that would be. She would be the first pegasus in their history to do as such, and would have done it through strength of will and wits. An outsider that forced her way inside, whatever it might take. In the annals of history, she would stand side by side with Celestia.
First Class reached into the desk, removed a textbook, and spent the rest of the night reading. Eventually Trotsky’s “protest” went by, and she looked on it from her bedroom window on the second floor. To her chagrin, he went by without doing anything she could have him arrested for. Only shouting absurdities about how “evil” the Princess’s were. There was no law against being an idiot.
First Class sighed, and slid into bed beside her husband. He was colder than than usual, so she encircled his body with her own, and covered him with her wings. He had so many faults, enough to write a good sized treatise on, but she loved him beyond anything else in this world. He was the only person that never judged her, her decisions, or tried to leverage her position for his own gain unfairly. When they discussed “work”, it was always on even terms. He supported her, through everything, and she did the same.
She carried his child, as well. Soon she would be a mother, something she had never even considered before being confronted with it. Their child would be born into a new world, and their parents would be leading it.
It made her happy. Happier than she had ever been.
___
Wildcard awoke in the early morning, and pulled himself out of bed to the washroom with a splitting headache. A splash of water to the face drove the sleep away, and he stared into his bloodshot eyes.
He didn’t even know Changeling eyes could be bloodshot until now. It was like looking at a drop of water somebody had dripped red food colouring into.
Wildcard sighed, washed his face the best he could, and took a better look at himself. He did not look good. No, he looked terrible. Wildcard looked at the face of someone ten years older than he had a few weeks ago, with a furrowed brow and deep wrinkles in his face. He was only thirty years old, and there was something not right about it. He ran a hoof through his mane, and found a clump of it decided to join it. He was not in good shape, for some reason, but that would have to wait. He took a quick shower, and made himself look reasonable with a bit of his wife’s makeup. It covered up the worst of his suddenly sagging face, and that would do well enough.
The throbbing of his head was solved by a handful of painkillers; thank Celestia for modern medicine. With that accomplished, Wildcard took a quick breakfast of oats, and left First Class a note. He was out on business, and that’s exactly what the note read. He walked out of his home, clad in the uniform of an Equestrian officer, with that dossier in the inside pocket. His first destination was Canterlot, First Class had her business, and he had his.
He had come up with a plan in the night, and looked back at Ponyville on the the train. He could see his current home from there, and thought of First Class.
“For you.”