The Conversion Bureau: New Tactics Part III

by no sh*t sherlock

Chapter 13: The City

Chapter 13: The City

“Were almost out of here. I can feel it.” Matt reassured. Jacob found a foothold in the rock and climbed a bit higher.

“This is like, the second day you’ve told me that.” He said grumpily. “I need out of this place.”

After killing Diamond Tiara, Matt and Jacob never left the tunnels. Matt told of a way to get to Canterlot by traveling through tunnels. On a whim they had both decided to go for it, but now Jacob was seriously thinking twice about it.

The previous day, the tunnels, which had once been all smooth and uniform, had turned into an undeveloped cave system. The floor became uneven and slippery with water droplets dripping from above and forming stalagmites. The ceiling had lowered dramatically and in more than a few areas they had to crouch. In a few most extreme cases, crawling was necessary, with Jacob's bag full of charges scraping against the ceiling. Moving through the cave was difficult and would've been equally hard for a pony, but still they hadn't turned back. Periodically they would find very old carvings of arrows pointing ahead reading "Canterlot" on the walls. They could only hope they were getting closer.

In the past six hours, the path had gradually turned diagonally upwards. It wasn't very steep, but occasionally there would be a struggle to find a way up.

"It's gotten alot colder. I'll bet we're in the mountains now, which would explain the climbing." Matt said.

"You think they made it to Canterlot yet?" Jacob asked.

"I'll bet that too. They're probably-" The cave walls suddenly shook slightly. Water and dust splashed lightly on their heads. "Shit. Earthquake?" He asked.

Jacob placed his ear on the cave wall. He heard frequent rumbles, like thunder, before the cave shook again. "Maybe we should pick up the pace." He said with a worry voice.

They moved hurriedly now and with greater purpose. They were determined not to be stuck in such a dark dank place.

Matt led the way with the flashlight and minutes later he illuminated a small hatch. The caves exit. "Canterlot" was carved across the middle with a arrow pointing straight ahead.

"Thank god." Jacob said relieved. He started ramming the door with his shoulder as it had no knob, handle or latch. Evenually he cracked it open a bit.

The light was the first thing that hit them. By it, they guessed it was near or around midday. The cold was the second thing. The cave temperature danced around 40 Fahrenheit, but now it was well below freezing. Snow and wind hit them in their faces while they pushed the door as far open as it would go.

Jacob stepped out first and shivered as he tried to cover his arms. "You were right, we were in the mountains." He said as he looked below.

"We won't survive long in this weather." Matt said as he looked around.

"You're right, but look." Jacob pointed to a city in the green valley below. It was Canterlot and it was very close. "We made it."

"See that?" Matt pointed to a bridge that crossed a river. There were dozens of people crossing it and a few hundred more waiting in a field before it. They both caught a quick glimpse of a tank before it disappeared under the wall. "From the the ships on the beach no doubt."

Jacob was able to make out a small skinny path that was mostly covered with snow. "They're moving into the city, we need to do the same.

****************

Hudd thought chaos perfectly described the scene before him as he entered Canterlot. The tank partially blocked his view, but he could still see dozens of pony's behind it in the opening square. They looked surprised and horribly unprepared for the vehicle that had rolled into their city. Hudd could tell by the facial expressions that most were deciding whether to run or not.

The tank wasted no time in their moment of indecision. The gunner fired continuously and the rapidness in which the ponies fell added to the rising panic.

A few unicorns did try to attack, but most were killed by the russian troops who spilled out on either side of their tank. Hudd emerged from the right side into the massive plaza with a single tower rising from the middle. Hudd ran with a few others and slid into cover behind a fountain. They leaned over the concrete barrier along with a few others and fired. The targets were the ponies who were trying to load a few catapults on either side of the tower. It took a team of six ponies to load and operate, and when two were down, the others would abandon it.

"Fall Back! Go go go!" A pony kept shouting. As more people came through the wall ponies more and more ponies began to follow his orders. They retreated down the two main roads that split in a 'V' shape at the end of the plaza.

Apparently ponies in the tower hadn't heard. The unicorns fired bursts of energy down from small balconies on certain levels. They knocked out bricks from the fountain and spilled water over the people taking cover behind it. Earth ponies threw spears harmlessly at the tank which had not fired its main gun since it had entered the city.

One of the Russian soldiers was shouting something into a radio. After second later the tank's turret adjusted its aim so that it would hit about halfway up the tower.

Hudd swore he saw one unicorn's terrified expression before the tank fired. The round went through the balcony opening and exploded within the tower. The top half of it started to crumble with little to no support from below. Eventually the weight became too great and the top half, instead of falling over, imploded on itself. Rubble covered ponies came storming out of the tower ready to fight and were followed by a ton of smoke. The machine gunner made quick work of them as soon as they came into view. When the dust cleared, there were no more living ponies in the plaza.

A Russian held his gun in the air and cheered to his teammates in brief celebration at the area they had seized.

"Hudd there you are!" He looked to the gate and saw Rebbecca coming towards him. "Glad you made." She said.

"You had doubts?" He Said smiling as he gazed towards what looked like medieval castle that over looked. "We need to take the city and get it under our control before we move in for the castle."

"The tank should make that much easier."

Hudd nodded as one of the Russians came up to him. "Are you coming?" He asked. Their tank had moved in on the right side of the V and they were waiting.

"I'm coming. Just a sec." He said as he turned to Rebbeca again. "I'm heading down there with them. You take our people and lead them down the opposite street."

"Got it. The city will be ours street by street."

"Nice. Stay in touch on your radio if you need us." He began walking away. "Oh and if you see Aaron, send him to me. He could come in handy. "

***************************

"Враги в открытом! Пятьдесят метров!" A soldier shouted.

"Ponies at 50 meters!" One near Hudd translated.

"I see them." He said. In front of them a few groups of ponies quickly crossed the street and ran into two or three different buildings on the left side. As soon as they were spotted, a barrage unicorn magic and spears started coming buildings on both sides of the street.

Hudd kicked open a door and he and four others quickly took cover inside a house. A Russian knelt a few feet behind a window and fired back providing just enough suppression to allow soldiers who were still in the street to find cover. The rest of his team and Hudd cleared the building floors quickly.

When they were sure it was abandoned, one of them brought out a radio and kept asking, "Какое здание они были в?" to his comrades. After everyone else shook their heads, he turned to Hudd, who'd been examining certain aspects of the house, to ask the same question. "Did you see the buildings they shot from?"

"I didn't, but look." He pointed to window that did not lead to the main street. " We can find out."

The second and last Russian solider dropped from the window and into an alleyway between two buildings. Hudd moved towards the street as bullets and magic whizzed back and forth.

Hudd laid flat on his stomach with his head at ground level and peeked around the corner. He saw ponies shooting from second story windows in buildings about one 250 ft long block away. However there was one building much closer that had lots of movement in it. He could see it was ponies in windows lying in wait for the humans to pass.

He finally moved away from the street and back over to the soldier with the radio. "The grey and white one with the tower, second floor and the red one adjacent to it on the left side." As he said them, they were repeated in Russian through the radio.

Moments later the ground shook as the tank rolled up the street, its gun aimed at the targets. Smoke and debris exploded from the buildings as they were each taken out. Hudd stood up and and shot around the corner from the alley at any ponies who tried to fall back.

That's how things went for a while, soldiers calling out targets and the tank eliminating them. They'd move through and clear buildings, homes and stores on each street side. Progress was made slowly this way, but removed the chance of being hit in the back by hiding ponies.

Every couple of block the ponies would start shooting at them again, but it made little impact. In the heart of the city there was nothing they possessed to stop the tank. The only worry Hudd had was that it might run out of shells, but even with all the targets they had called, the firing of its main gun was very reserved. They relied mostly on the tank's machine gunner who was able to kill some ponies in building without wasting the main gun's ammunition.

The marksman Aaron had also joined them. He would climb to rooftops and warn them of ponies become they'd come into view on the street. He could also pick off certain ponies who waited to ambush them of roofs and pegasi who tried to assault them from the air.

Canterlot Castle was not 300 yards away when the first challenge was presented to them. The straight road took a sharp left and the ponies had dug in deep in the buildings around the turn. To the right there was no where to move, the mountain side had marked the edge of the city. In front were three and four story buildings with much smaller ballistae on their roofs. Ponies threw spears from windows and around the corner. If the tank had been there it wouldn't have caused an issue, but wasn't. It and a few Russian soldiers had gone left a few blocks back to help some of their comrades who had been separated. So for now Hudd and the others were left without it.

"Hudd, we've hit a snag." Aaron said as he reloaded. "The ponies have this corner locked down and they really don't want to lose it."

"Whats the problem?"

"Every building on that corner is filled with them and I'm pretty sure the street around there is too. I take out a few of them in the windows and doesn't even make a difference, more take their place,"

"Damn." Hudd spat. There was no word on when or if the tank would be making its way back to them so, they'd have to find something. There was nothing but a mountain face on his right, but on his left, Hudd found something that might work. "You see that bell tower on the top of that building? Get some of the Russians and see if you can't get to the top."

"Got it." Aaron ran to the side to grab a few soldiers to go with him. Hudd fired from around a large piece of a wall with a few others for a moment until a guy next to him loaded a grenade launcher. Once there was a pause in the pony's fire, he leaned over and fired. When the small, 40mm grenade hit under the window the entire corner exploded.

There was a bright blue, soundless flash followed by a delayed 'Pop'. The shockwave shook the ground and nearly knocked Hudd over. The buildings on the corner crumbled into rubble, with only a handful of ponies making it out alive and falling back to the castle. Piece of the wreckage were thrown into the street before a thick cloud of dust and smoke spread all over the block and cut visibility.

"Hudd! What the hell just happened!" Aaron suddenly yelled over the radio.

"Something big just exploded in those houses." He replied as he shook debris from his shoulders. "I think I'm alright though."

"Shit, was it something of ours? I'm still in the tower and can't see a damn thing on the ground."

"I'm not sure. I think it was-" Hudd saw two figures approaching in front of him. "Who's there?" he shouted aiming his gun. As they got closer, he could hear lots of coughing and choking.

Two humans eventually came through the dust cloud. They were covered in it and waved hands over their faces.

"Jacob?" Hudd asked in awe as he recognized the person who had leapt from a cliff.

"Yeah...its me." He coughed as Matt followed up behind him. "Phew! That was one nice explosion right, Hudd? "

*****************

For the next two hours Matt, Jacob, Aaron and Hudd sat at the base of the long flight of concrete stairs that would lead to the Castle courtyard. They were waiting as the Russians cleared the few buildings that were left. They were there to ensure that no one ponies fell back to the castle. But it also provided enough time to down time to talk.

Jacob told the story of what occurred after he and Matt jumped from the cliff as well as the creature that had chased them across a river. When Hudd explained how they'd acquired the tank and a few dozen Russian soldiers, Jacob in turn told him about their ships that floated in the bay.

After killing two fully armored unicorns who were trying to retreat, the topic turned to what would happen when they reached the castle.

"Luna has to die. We can't let her slip away again. This we all know." Hudd announced as he looked to each person who nodded in agreement.

"She'll be a tough one though. She always has been." Jacob said with disappointment in his voice. His previous two run ins with the pony's night goddess hadn't gone quite how he'd liked.

"Not this time, I shot her." Aaron said proudly." She'll be injured and easy. Another shot with the special bullets and she'll go down. And I'm pretty confident we can take care of that. What about that pony you told me about who developed the conversion fluid?"

"Twilight Sparkle." Jacob answered quickly. "That ones mine. We have a history."

"You can have her, as far as I'm concerned." Hudd shrugged before he thought of a personal target of his own. "There's a unicorn... I'm not entirely sure who he is, but I'm certain he's important to their army. He the one who shot those signals in the air. If we see him, he has to go too."

"Wait, wait." Matt said holding a hand up. "I think you guys are think just a little far ahead. You guys do know that the last of them will be waiting behind that door when we reach the castle, right?" Matt asked.

"You're right."Hudd admitted. "I don't think the tank can make it up these stairs sooooo, Jacob! You have any of those charges left? I was thinking about starting things off with a bang."

"Nah, I used the last of them back on those buildings."

Hudd thought and then hit his head lightly as something obvious came to mind. "Some of us flew to Equestria in armed VTOLs.... Lets fire some up."

Comments

[Deathpony]

Luna is gonna die

[The Good Boy]

yay

[Uberdeathninja]

The death of so many ponies...

Such violence...

Such hatred...

Such mindless cruelty...

I am pleased.

[DirectHit]

no not luna take spike instead nobody likes him anyways!!! jk KILL THEM ALL... STARTING WITH SPIKE

[Zervziel]

Luna deserves more than a simple bullet to the head. I mean shit Xellie had a line of people beat on her and only after all that they went and set her on fire. Luna needs something more than simply being shot.

[Buckshot2825]

Ponies, meet B-2
B-2, make it rain.

Also, I was wondering when they would use the 'armed' VTOLs

[Banchoking]

Great chapter!

[The OverWatch]

War does not determine who is right, only who is left.
And in the end there is room for only one race on Earth.
By heart, mind and soul we know that it wont be the Ponies.
Glory to Humanity and honor to those that died defending it.

[Rocky Runner]

I was nearly jumping up and down as I visualized the tank rolling down the streets and taking out all the ponies. Damn, I love tanks!

As a marine in Halo 3 said: "Tank beats EVERYTHING!!!"

[bcbc2425]

lol who went on a downvote crusaid? cause it makes these comments so much funnyer :P

[THEDALEKPRINCE]

5867852 ESPCELLY LITTLE PONYS WHO ONLY HAVE SPEARS......................... AND MAGIC.................... BUT THATS BESIDES THE POINT

[Schwaboo]

Earth ponies threw spears harmlessly at the tank which had not fired its main gun since it had entered the city.

Stalinium Russian Bias > magic, gold armor, spears