Epilogue
EPILOGUE
Captain Vance would eventually retire from the Marine Corps with full honors, all just a few weeks short of a well-publicized promotion which would have seen him earn his first star as a General. When asked why, he would simply reply that it was to focus on his new full-time job as a grandfather.
Uris and Samantha would go on to marry after a few years, settling down in a little house in the New York suburbs, despite his insistence to remain on active duty and his ongoing rehabilitation. He never did lose his limp, though he claimed it was his own “physical medal of honor.” They would have two beautiful children in that house, named Michael Ramirez Uris and Lucy Bannon Uris on their father’s urging. Despite some arguments that crop up every now and again (mostly from Samantha calling him a bloodthirsty barbarian for enjoying a cheeseburger and his reply to call her a filthy treehugger), the family remains quite happy together. The kids are growing up now: Michael will be joining the Marines once he graduates high school, whereas Lucy is on the path to becoming a diagnostician. It’s also worth noting that he and Fluttershy still write one another at least once a month, though when anypony asks the little pegasus why she’d maintain such a distant relationship for so long, she’ll only get a strange look in her eye and remark that it just “feels right.”
Webb, along with every other man who fought in Equestria, would be highly decorated for his actions in the Battle for Coltton, though they would all be sworn to secrecy about it. He would go on to serve with distinction across several other worlds in several more battles with the International Multiverse Expedition Brigade formed under the UN, dedicated to aiding Swarm in containing Mars’s influence across reality. He would retire with distinction in his fifties. He owns a small woodshop in the Michigan wilderness now, living a well-earned, peaceful life.
Lieutenant Miller would be honorably discharged from the Marines after his rehabilitation, and would go on to start a highly successful Italian bistro in Queens. Their slogan: “Why settle for fast, when you can really be treated like family?” Later on, Miller would claim this was really just a watered-down version of his original slogan: “The Olive Garden sucks dick.” He and the remaining veterans of the American Equestrian Expeditionary Corps still gather every year to swap stories, get up-to-date news on one another’s lives, and remember the time when they fought an impossible adversary in a land of magical cartoon ponies. To this day, he still hasn’t take Vance up on his offer to stitch his mouth shut, although he admits to being tempted on more than one occasion.
Back in Equestria, Shining Armor’s scars would reemerge after several months, much to the mystification of doctors everywhere. Though speculation flew that Princess Cadence would eventually leave for “someone better-looking than ol’ scarface” (as some ponies so eloquently put it), her love for him only seemed to grow stronger with the spread of the scarring. In fact, it would be noted that she would barely be able to keep her hooves off him in public from that point forward, thus triggering a short-lived trend of stallions purposefully hurting themselves in hopes of earning the attentions of a scar-loving princess. Most of these efforts would prove unsuccessful, with the notable exception of Prince Blueblood, who would meet his future wife, Nurse Redheart, after nearly burning his hoof off with acid.
After some clarifications (and a few broken teeth), Discord and Celestia would engage in a torrid, highly secretive affair before convincing the world of his “sudden” conversion to good with the help of the Element Bearers. Even then, it was a while before the Princess convinced him to let her go public with their relationship, but after a few years of doing good, the spirit of disharmony found himself surprised by the ponies’ forgiving nature, although a part of this may have had something to do with Princess Luna announcing her relationship with Queen Chrysalis a few days earlier (a tale for another time, for sure). After that, the only odd thing anypony would notice about the pair would be the way they would share a knowing look and a strangely passionate kiss whenever someone noticed something odd about his statue, left in Canterlot gardens to commemorate the spot where he spent a thousand years falling for the Princess; that being the little inscription behind its base, placed there a few days after the forgotten battle and reading: “In Loving Memory.”
The citizens of Equestria would go on to live their lives completely in ignorance of the destruction they had all been saved from, though echoes of the great forgotten battle and the men and women who stood between them and annihilation would continue through their collective psyche for years. The most notable of these would culminate in a line from Miss Rarity’s boutique (by then a well-established name in the world of fashion) styled after U.S military uniforms and resulting in a hit trend of pony nobility journeying far and wide to dress like Marine Corps grunts. However, by far the most heartfelt of these echoes would bombard the mind of a small-time sculptor in Canterlot by the name of Marbel Chisel, who would carve a modern art sculpture of a strange, bipedal, furless creature with an odd black helmet, baggy camouflage clothing, and a little blocky-looking thing in its hand. Celestia herself would request the statue be put on permanent display in the gardens, despite harsh critiques from most lauding the piece as nothing more than a “hodge-podge pile of junk from a jumbled mind”. Its name, carved into the base and hermetically sealed to ensure that neither weather nor time nor act of pony could ever erase it:
“Hero.”
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that was such a good ending, still sad but definatly a good ending.
that was such a good ending, still sad but definatly a good ending.
3804093 Ah thank you! I know it's sad, but I wanted to keep things realistic. Bittersweet. Now you know how I feel realizing this is the last I'll ever post of this story sort of.
3804096
i can only imagine how difficult it is to realize that "its done" after writing something for so long.
3804105 Bittersweet is the only word that comes close. It's that same dichotomy, that same oxymoron set of emotions, multiplied a few thousand times over. I could be exaggerating but what do you want from me? I'm a writer.
3868819 First of all, thanks for all the comments, they do a writer's heart good
Second, I never really thought of it that way. I figured it was just HOW she took them out. Before it was just a bunch of magical attacks that occasionally killed, whereas here the sheer brutality of the attacks sort of surprised him. I don't think he even suspected the Princess was capable of that level of violence before.
3869879 I thought that was one of my more brilliant strokes of silliness, yes
3870011 Well, look at it from his point of view: he's a SEAL brony, constantly surrounded by people, enemies and friends alike, who practically demand a macho-man image from him, hence his keeping his broniness a secret. Of course he would shy away and dismiss anything that could threaten that image as "too gay".
3870086 Thanks for pointing that out.
That was an incredible story! This story was quite the read, and it opened up an old 'ode in my imagination; I started daydreaming again about fictional worlds for goodness sake!
Nevertheless, I am glad that I got a chance to read this story, thoroughly, to the end. It was long; but hell, I know that it was even longer actually writing and coming up with all of this, not to mention getting different languages (with some accuracy, though I hardly know anything outside of English so I'm not much of a judge on that) and inserting quirks and references here and there. It was not a doom and gloom kind of work, like a war story would almost be expected to be. It was a bit cliché at points, but at the same time, that allowed for a cheesy amount of enjoyment; the familiar, in good doses, has a good way of further engaging in the story.
You hooked the reader in rather well; we start out with hardly any information on what was going on, and even then , the references to the super dimensional conflict were spoken of almost as if there was a canon behind them! (In other words, there probably is, I'm just not familiar with it). The whole time, your detail constantly kept a picture painted of what was going on and where, and though there were many names to pick up, their actions and words always spoke louder than their nametags.
Blending in a conflicted world with a world that has hardly seen war of this scale, quite the transition. For a long time, I thought much of this was taking place over the course of just a single day, but over time, I finally started to catch on to some of the transitions of days (okay, the flat-out mentioning of days passing), but that was hardly even at the forefront of my attention as the characters came to life. Their canon selves could be seen clearly through the story, and even in the most trying of times, never was it lost to the sight who each of these characters were; the Mane Six, Celestia, the entire lot.
And then your custom characters. Their names reminded me almost of Battlefield and Call of Duty, but meh. They had their own personalities; their own nuance that allowed their moments of glory (and shame) to shine and enhance their characterization, up to the moment of sacrifice and medal awarding.
But I have to criticize the decision to only have the ponies lose their memories of the battle; I'm not familiar with the mechanics behind the world mixing, but if the humans remember the ponies, then there would still be a flux of influence right? The humans, at the end of the day, would be plagued by the memories of the fought and the lost. Most of the main characters on Equestria's side did not die (None of them stayed dead, but that's besides the point) while many of the human characters lost some characters that featured in one way or another in the fic. At the end of the day, it is almost as if the ponies, for the most part, get off much easier than their human counterparts. And maybe, considering Equestria's "beacon of harmony" concept, that's for the best, even if it is a little grimacing.
And then that epilogue seemed to be missing what happened with Swarm; from your tale, it is clear that they continue the struggle, but is that all the closure to be had on them?
All in all, a great story; the mentioned dislestia fic suddenly makes a bit more sense now, with the entire backstory behind it. It was a long read, but I enjoyed most of it (However important it was to the story, I just kind of glazed over the dimensional explanation stuff, for the most part, unless I had to go back and read it to understand the whole mind fight with the clones) and would like to applaud you for finishing such a large work.
In all regards, keep on writing! And a final "well done" on the completion of your story! Cheers.
3869535
Now, replying to your replies, which I guess I could have done in my really long 'review' of sorts.
Yes, Celestia and brutality normally do not seem to go in the same sentence. Luna... Well, she has her rap sheet.
I see your point on that matter. Of course, that also means that he easily thought of the means by looking at the aftermath, being there or not being pretty irrevelent.
3870381 Yes, indeed, in the context it makes perfect sense. Don't ask don't tell might have had some influence...? Nah, just poking fun.
3870910 Thanks, fixed!
3871079 My God, thank you. Seriously.
And I did have a quick blurb in the epilogue for a while explaining what happens with Swarm (they just keep on fighting, is all) but I shirked it in favor of this ending. I thought this had greater impact, and that the main interest was in the human and pony characters anyway, not the OP demigods.
Thank you so much for reading, seriously.
3871128 When you see a bunch of dudes burnt with solar magic and splattered all over the place, it's pretty easy to figure out what's happened.
All I can say is that this is an EXCELLENT story. I enjoyed reading it all and it had one of the better endings of anything I've read. We'll anyways I look forward to reading your other stories!
I finally got time to read the last 6 chapters.
I must say. This story is one of my absolute favourites.
I've read countless stories since i joined the fandom autumn 2012. But this one is on my top 3. Right after My little Dashie and Fallout Equestria.
Have some moustache my friend.
remember me?
i finally found the time to read it xD
Very well done Bro
i cried so hard for Discords "death"
even when i new that hes not really dead (because of "Balence: a Dislestia TaiL" xD