Do you recall reading about those old Equestrian fables as a filly or colt? The ones about StrongHoof and his courageous adventures fighting all kinds of monsters for the sake of just doing it! It taught young colts to be brave and never back down from a challenge. I often thought back to those stories while crossing the Eastern Sea.
I remember the day we took sail. All of the generals gathered at Canterlot Castle for a magnificent ceremony. The navy had done her job, now it was time for the army to finish off the Griffons! That's what the plan was, or at least what the populace thought. The ceremony was spectacular as all of Canterlot's nobility had been there. Most of them didn't sign up... In fact barely anypony that was more than a common horse signed up. This factoid infuriated me because while I had to go experience the bowls of hell all of my friends could live out their lives peacefully in Canterlot, like nothing had happened.
Shining Armor spoke from the Castle balcony as he addressed the crowd, mostly made up of civilians that had come to see the army. Those who were too old or too young to fight stayed home; so did most mares, and parents. Mares that did sign up were respected among everypony back home and they were decorated accordingly. Chancellor Frontline also spoke to the crowd. Going on and on about honor and country pride. Neither of the princesses spoke, this was a common and reoccurring theme. Celestia, too grief struck to speak, often had somepony else speak for her ever since the Declaration of War. No common pony had seen glimpse of the Princesses since then and it was getting to them I'm sure.
The armies were lined up and marched through Canterlot, mine was third behind WindSoar's. The Generals sat in a balcony adjacent to the Castle. We watched as the endless mass of faceless ponies marched forward out of our line of sight. It finally struck me how big the mass of ponies that signed up actually was as this took about an hour to get through all the armies. The marching ponies were met with crowds of cheerful Equestrian citizens. Some were given gifts as they passed by. Those ponies marched all the way to the sea, through the rural towns in between. Finally meeting up at Manehattan to board the ships. I thought it was cruel to make them march all that way in a single day. It was the Chancellor's idea actually. He wanted the soldiers to see all that they were fighting for or something stupid like that. Sure a march was a cakewalk compared to the hell we were about to experience.
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I have always really liked the ocean and sailing in general. The sea mist hitting your coat, the smell of the ocean, the sounds of the waves crashing against your ship. All of it was bliss for me, and I often enjoyed when some friends decided to take a sea ride to some distant island resort. This particular time however I enjoyed none of my ride. We, the generals, didn't have to ride on the transport ships with the rest of the soldiers. Instead we got a rather luxurious ship that was bigger and more brash than the rest. Shining Armor thought it was poor design because as he put it "They only have to fire at one boat to take out the engine of the army!".
We were accompanied by Sea Shanty, the Main Admiral of the Equestrian Fleet. He was an older stallion but much stronger and wiser than he looked. He almost always had some sort of pipe gripped between his teeth. His coat was brown in color, but graying, and he had an eye-patch. I assume it was either decoration or maybe a life-long injury but I didn't want to bring up an awkward conversation (I would learn later that he lost his eye due to a Griffin ship raid during one of the many battles of the Eastern Sea).
I tried not to grow attached to any of the other generals. I had two plans in mind: A, they replace me withing the shortest amount of time possible; or B, I die. Either way I had no plans to stick around for too long, so no sense in making friends. WindSoar was one of the few I did converse with however. He mostly kept to himself and wasn't keen on talking to a royal immature party animal like myself but I felt as though he had pity on me and my situation.
One conversation in particular comes to mind, a small little encounter between myself, WindSoar, Sea Shanty, and Shining Armor as we watched the sun rise from the front of the ship.
"Seems wasteful" Sea Shanty muttered to himself looking off at one of the Soldier Transport ships.
"What was that?" Shining Armor spoke turning to face him, intrigued.
"What? Oh... I just said it seems wasteful, is all..." Sea Shanty replied lighting him pipe for the first time of the day.
"Something you find wrong Admiral?" Shining spoke again.
"Just... I don't see the use in wasting good space on Pegasi when they can bleedin' fly! You could fit many more good stallions in the ships if you made the Pegasi use their wings and fly!" Shanty spoke out, waving his hooves about in frustration.
WindSoar chuckled to himself.
"Is there something funny commander?" Shanty spoke, turning to face WindSoar.
"If we could fly across an ocean my kind would of done it a long time ago!" WindSoar spoke bluntly. "And another thing. By the time your wooden rafts you call boats would catch up to us the war would already be over." He spoke again, with a chuckle in his voice. I also laughed at this remark but quickly shut my mouth when both Shining and Shanty glared at me from behind them.
"You can count on a Pegasus to have an exaggerated outlook on their own abilities. You seem to forget who's been doing all the fighting for the past months!" Sea Shanty spat out and everypony held their tongues for a moment.
"You're sacrifice has been noted" I said aloud as the three briefly looked back at me. The area grew quiet with only the sound of the waves crashing against the old wood filling the air.
"Glad somebody appreciates it..." Sea Shanty mumbled to himself.
Nopony spoke a word, as we all peered off into the distance. Endless ocean is all we saw, that's all we had seen for weeks. I had never crossed the whole ocean before and had only seen it on maps in grade school. You never fully realize just how vast the ocean blue is until you've truly crossed it.
I sighed to myself as I peered into the space where the sky and the sea met, way off in the distance.
You know, if you squint just right you can almost sea a-
"LAND HO!" quickly filled the silence. Without skipping a beat I could hear the sound sound of hooves rumbling beneath me as the call woke up the few ponies that were sleeping. My heart sank, and stayed sunk deep inside me as I realized that the D-Day was upon us.