The Equestrian Honor Guard
Chapter 7
By Honored Service
“Awwwwwwwwwwwwww.” I sat up from my bedroll and cracked my back while stretching to the sky. I looked and saw the fire was beginning to die out. I hurriedly ran to the edge of the forest and collected a few more branches and laid them down on the hot bed of coals. Soon enough I had a cozy little fire to eat my breakfast next to.
“Ok what’s on the menu this morning,” I reached over and grabbed my pack back and began to open it, “Show me waffles!” No waffles were shown. I had the options of my last pack of pop tarts or a delicious MRE. Now I noticed that I was actually beginning to run low on sustenance. Two MREs left and the pop tarts.
I scooped up the pop tarts and ripped open the package and ate the two delicious brown sugar bastards in what felt like seconds.
“Well shit, now I’m all out of breakfast food.” I sat up and brushed off some crumbs and stretched again. The sun was just beginning to crest on the horizon covering the landscape in a warm glow. I walked over to the river and plunged my face into the cold water to help wake up.
Only I open my eyes to see a large black pupil staring back at me.
“HOLY SHIT SNACKS!” I yanked my head back and fell backwards onto the river bank. My heart felt it was going to explode out of chest.
“You are sooooooo lucky I’m a vegetarian serpent or I could have just eaten you up! Nom nom nom Burp.” Reginald slowly brought himself out of the water and propped himself up on his elbows as he had done the previous day.
“Haha yeah you could have. God Reginald you gave me a heart attack. What were you doing anyway?” I picked myself off the ground and brushed the dirt of my uniform. Actually that dirt wasn’t coming off. Man I needed to wash this damn thing.
“Oh well I couldn’t just let you stay out here all night without some serpent to watch over you.” He flicked a rock into the river.
“The Everfree does have some non-vegetarian creatures in it, who would just love to try some Human. I hear it’s incredibly rare, only one in all of Equestria.
“Really? You would stay and help me even though I’m some unknown creature from another planet?” Either Reginald was being entirely to nice, or the show was right, everyone here is just trusting and nice to you. (Unless you’re a Zebra of course.)
“Well yes Johnson.” He bent down closer to me, “If you were some horrible creature from another planet that was here to cause destruction and death, would you really do it alone?”
He cocked and eyebrow at me waiting to hear what I was going to say to that.
I walked up to him and placed a finger on his scaly chest. “How do you know I’m not some immortal monster from another world able to send lighting out of my hands and rain fire and brimstone from the sky?”
“Hmmm I wouldn’t,” Reginald drummed a finger on the ground, “But would an immortal monster from another world that can shoot lightning from his hands and call down fire and brimstone from the heavens; run screaming from a mosquito?”
“Oh you say that, I mean I don’t know what you’re talking about Reginald.” I backed up just a tad from the 20 foot tall river monster.
“Of course you don’t immortal god.” He reached over and with one finger pushed me over onto the ground. “Haha although I’m sure you are positively terrifying thought.”
I picked myself up again, I was falling over way to much here in Equestria, “Listen Reginald, I need some help; something that you could possibly help me with?”
“And what else do you need Johnson?” He started playing with his hair and straightening his moustache.
“Well two things really. I’m running low on food and I need some metal to melt down and make into something that will make me able to protect myself here in the Everfree. Would you be able to help me with any of that?”
The purple serpent moved back into the water, so that only his head rested on the bank. “Well I know I can get you some metal things. Ponies will sometimes drop things into this river. I can look and see if any of that useless stuff is metal. As for food, I eat river weed and grass from the bottom of the river, would that work for you?”
I sat down and removed my digital camouflaged jacket and took off the patches on the chest and arm spots. I then began to wash it in the river. “The metal you’re talking about would be amazing. But the food, no. Any way you could get me fish? Or would you be totally against bringing me other river inhabitants?”
“Hmmmm I guess I could bring you a few fish.” Reginald raised himself out of the water and began moving downstream. “I’ll see what I can bring you back. Don’t run off anywhere…or get eaten. Tata Johnson, I’ll be back.” And with that, he slipped under the water and was gone.
Well now it was just me and my thoughts here in the camp. I finished washing the jacket; getting most of the stains out of it. I laid it on the bed roll next to the fire to help it dry faster. Next were the pants. Off came the pants and I began to scrub the stains out of those. The knees were the worst. I always seemed to crouch in mud or something when firing or more recently falling.
“Exxxxit light, enteeeer night,” I sang a jolly little tune to myself as I finished the pants and put them next to the jacket to dry. “Take my hannnnnnnd, where off to never never land.”
“Ok clothes are done; now let’s clean the rifle that doesn’t work yet.” Sitting down I pulled over my rifle and began to break down the weapon. Bolt, receiver, trigger mech, feeding system; shit dropped that pin where is it, fuck, ok here it. Whew that could have been bad.
With the rifle complete stripped I cleaned every little piece and part in it. Running through the forest and my constant failing had gotten it very dirty. Dirt and grime were in the ejection port and the receiver had bits of vines on it. Wiping everything clear, I began putting it back together, like a puzzle; a puzzle that can kill.
With a satisfying click, the rifle was complete once again. Checking my watch I noticed…
“WHAT? It’s only been 10 damn minutes!?” I almost hurled the rifle across the camp, but remembered I just cleaned it, and if it broke I would be losing my primary weapon.
“I guess Humans aren’t a very patient species?”
I whipped around to see Reginald behind me in the river holding some junk in one hand and dangling 3 fish in the other. He was giving me an amused smile.
“Oh hey there Reginald, I didn’t notice you over…um… yes Humans on a whole are not a very patient species. We are more of the nothing is fast enough kind of animals.”
He dropped the pile of junk on the bank of the river near me. I walked up to it and found some pieces I could melt down. There were parts of an oven and a refrigerator along with random bits of scrap metal. I could only use small pieces that would fit in the bowl so the larger stuff I made a separate pile out of for other uses later in my stay in the forest.
“Thanks Reginald! This is perfect!” I walked over to the fire and dropped a handful of nails, screws and other small bits of metal into the bowl. Now I just had to wait for them to melt down and I would be in business.
“And I brought you some fish. This was all I could actually find. So you may need to find another source of food. May I suggest a fruit tree or something plant like?”
“Yeah I guess I’ll have to get on that won’t I, Reginald?” I scooped up the fish I carried them over to the fire. I would have to cook them soon. Could you make fish jerky?
“Please call me Reggie, Johnson. No need for the whole name thing. We’re friends.” Reginal-Reggie moved back into the water sinking down a little bit into it. “Is Johnson your name?”
“Yes, it’s my last name. Where I come from, I was known by my last name. Well actually everyone is referred to by their last name were I came from. The military.”
“Ah yes you mentioned that yesterday. The army was it?” What is it exactly?” He perked up a bit in general interest at this.
“Well that’s what I’m in, the Army. It is a militarized force of soldiers, kind of like the Guards here in Equestrian. And I was an officer in training, until I was brought here.”
“And the last name?”
“The school I went to used the last name, as does the military on the whole to identify everyone. It created a professional atmosphere where it wasn’t friends, but fellow soldiers. You can know everyone by first name, but the last name is professional and creates a bond. So I was Johnson.”
“Your whole name? Reggie was very interested at getting to know me. And I was trying to be good friend to him. After all he had given me food, metal and his scales.
“My full name is-“
A bubbling sound came from behind me near the fire.
“What was that?” Reggie stretched his head up to see near the fire. I was also pretty curious to see how this metal melting was going to turn out, if I would be successful or not.
“This is the metal I’m melting down, so I can get my weapons to work and be effective as it’s supposed to be.” I looked down into the bowl and saw a glowing yellow liquid in it. It would bubble up occasionally. Looked pretty damn hot, I didn’t want any of it to end up on my arm. Or anything attached to me.
I picked up the 5.56 mold and dipped one in slowly into the bubbling concoction. I placed the top half of the mold back onto the other. I pushed it together and held it like that, I could feel the heat from the metal inside of the scales, but it wasn’t burning me. Good, trying to do this without using my hands would just be short of impossible.
We both waited for the metal to cool. Once the metal cooled I pried the mold open using BB. Inside of it, was a copper colored bullet that had a swirl of purple running along its length. Not sure why that was there, but it was a bullet with the correct shape and form of a bullet.
“All that work for this little thing?” Reggie backed up and moved into the river. “Seems like a waste of time for that.”
“I know it seems insignificant, but this bullet will make a huge impact when fired from this.” I picked up the rifle showing it to him. Taking one of the may blank rounds I had, I began to work the bullet into the end of it. I had already prepared this blank using my knife to open the firing end of the blank round. Then using two hard rocks I pressed the metal around the bullet, locking it into place creating my first bullet.
“HA it’s done, and it only took 16 hours to make.” I grabbed the rifle and opened the receiver and slid the one bullet into the chamber.
Now was the time to put all the work to the test. This would either fire and I would be a soldier armed and I would be able to protect myself. Or it could explode. Or destroy my rifle. Or it could do both, while harming me as well.
I shouldered the rifle and aimed down the sights at a tree cross the camp. I looked at Reggie, “Cover your ears, this may be loud.”
I closed my eyes and slowly squeezed the trigger.
Click-
BOOM
The gunshot was 5 times as loud as it should have been. Fuck was all I could think. The rifle had exploded in my hands. I cracked my eyes open to see the damage. The rifle was still clasped in my hands so tight my knuckles had turned white.
Reggie was still near me, and his jaw was hanging wide open.
“What? Was it that loud…” I turned and saw the tree I had fired at.
When a bullet of that size strikes a tree, it should go in and stop. No exit opening, it was just supposed be stopped by the density of the wood. But if that what was supposed to happen, why was I staring at a 3 foot hole in the tree. I looked at the rifle, it was fine. A small trial of smoke was still leaving the barrel. I did notice the shell lying next to me; it was glowing red with heat. That’s new.
“Um Reggie, are your scales magic?”
Honored Service here, I hope yall are enjoying this story, i'm enjoying writing it for yall. I Revived a message yesterday asking if i would post a picture of Bad Bertha. Would yall like to see her? Yes she is real.