//------------------------------// // Chapter 12: Wedding Day Part 1 // Story: Life,Death,and Rebirth // by Shadow-Dancer //------------------------------// Chapter 12: Wedding Day Part 1 It was a sunny Saturday morning and a week had passed since I had left basic and now I found myself standing in front of the castle doors watching ponies pass through. To make it more interesting that day would mark the wedding of Captain Shining Armor and some princess whose full name escaped me but sounded French or Italian. As if that was not enough, the scouts passed along some intel saying that there was a high probability of an invasion the same day, and in response the guard was doubled and the captain put up a shield . This got summed up in my head to shit was going to quickly hit the fan and to assume that every pony that took a step past me was carrying a dagger, just to be safe. Well it turned out to still not be enough, anyway enough foreshadowing. The guard across from me, a private by the name of Gleaming Shield looked over and said, “What do you think about this whole evasion thing?” I scanned another group of ponies that passed by with a subtle glorified magical metal detector while the guard across from me scanned for any known poisons, “Best case the scouts are wrong, worst case your going to have to repel an invasion. Just hope for the best and prepare for the worst.” I replied nonchalantly. Gleaming Shield looked at me with an eyebrow raised and his mouth twisted slightly before he snapped back into a position and we continued our task.   Gleaming Shield and I entered the castle, I looked at a clock and it was around noon, about five hours before the wedding began. I wanted to have lunch and made my way through the maze of hallways that take days to learn, and arrived at the mess hall, where I grabbed a salad, sat down at a empty table and ate. During those moments eating I tried not to think about the conversations I had with my friends during my time in the Marines. I was successful, but now as I write this I find it hard to not think about it. How we would joke and jab just trying to forget if only for a moment, that we could die at any second of any day. Those were some of the best days of my life, those moments that reminded me that I was with friends no, brothers that I would take a bullet for knowing they would do the same for me.  We constantly reminded each other about the reason we fought in that hellhole of a desert. Well anyways, Once I finished my food I went with my partner who just finished his conversation with a few of his friends and then walked next to me and nodded. With that we began our patrol around the castle frequenting the throne room, and reception areas. I noticed that Twilight was here with her friends helping prepare the finishing touches to the event, I was not the only one that noticed her as my partner was barely containing a apparent fangasm that popped up the second he saw her, once we were alone he let it out. “Did you see that? It was the Twilight Sparkle the famous Element of Magic, one of the six Elements of Harmony!” I sighed and nodded, noticing the worried frown and scrunched eyes rather than just her presence, I knew that she believed something was wrong but she did not know how to deal with it. I upped my guard, looking around a little more and studied the expressions of ponies closely. I never knew a person that got worried over nothing and I didn’t take her to be that way either. I would find that I was very correct later that day. We were still on patrol when we walked past the Captain's quarters, as I looked around I heard talking and a green glow coming from the room. I let my partner know what I saw and told him that I was going to see what was going on. He followed me as I knocked on the door. Chrysalis’s POV I was absorbing more of Shining Armors love for Cadence and just had finished when I heard knocking on the door. I retook the guise of Cadence and opened the door while putting on my best smile, to see one of Celestia’s Royal Guards with a neutral expression along with another Guard Stallion behind him. I took a quick scan of their emotions and noticed that while the second stallion had the usual happiness along with a hint of boredom. As for the stallion in front of me, I was having an unusually hard time getting through his mental defenses, while I could not find any hint of magical protection. I was still hitting an unusually sturdy mental wall that would take awhile for me to find a way in. Not wanting to make it unusual I said, “Hello Guards, what brings you two here?” The first stallion simply said, “I saw a green glow coming from the room, I was just making sure that everything was okay ma’am.” I chuckled nervously hoping that it was taken as just stress and nerves, “Yes everything is okay here, sir.”  I finally was able to find a small leak of emotion from him and found it to contain hints of so many emotions at once but mostly sorrow, along with the image of some bipedal in odd clothing walking through a desert. Before I was thrown out of his mind before I could dig further and the odd thing was I felt no magic ejecting me, I just was forced out. The guard pony before me nodded and left along with his partner, resuming what I believed was their patrol. I thought to what I read from the stallions head and could still remember the only image I got from him, the slew of emotions that escaped a small crack in his otherwise impenetrable defenses. I shook my head and thought to what he saw and realized how close I was to being discovered, two times already. “I’ll have to get rid of Twilight Sparkle and have a infiltrator keep tabs on the odd guard, with an equally odd and well defended mind. I had a suspicion that he was not a pony at all but right now that did not matter right now. Only this invasion did and I could find out more about the guard after the fact. Shadow Dancer’s (Marcus’s) POV I walked away from the door that the pink princess answered and shook my head remembering an odd feeling in my head that was there and left as soon as it came. I decided to worry about the feeling after the wedding was over. I found a clock and checked the time, it was three hours before the wedding began. Gleaming Shield looked my way as we walked to our next post,“So far so good, just the wedding in a few hours and the reception, then we can relax back at the barracks for the night.” “Ya only a bit over three more hours then we can relax.” I said with an unconvinced huff. “Why are you so bucking paranoid? Even if there is an invasion the Captain's shield will hold it off long enough for us to repel it.” I stopped and looked into the stallion's eyes and let out a dry laugh, “Why am I paranoid? Lets just say that plans tend to go out the damn window if your enemy is smarter than you give them credit for. Not to mention, the guard seems not to truly take this threat with the seriousness that it warrants and I have seen the best of plans go to fucking hell myself, that is why I am paranoid.” The rest of the walk to our station was quiet, and I became disappointed in myself for giving in to my anger and killing any illusion that I was just your average rookie knowing that this conversation would find the captain eventually, although as I write this I realize I started killing that illusion many hours before then. My reason for the paranoia ringed true almost an entire three hours later, when I heard a loud shatter and looked up to see the barrier destroyed and a large wave of what looked like black insectoid ponies rush forward through the sky to the castle. The sound of alarm bells rung throughout the city, the invasion had begun.