Armor's Game

by OTCPony

Ultimatum

All of Princess Celestia ached. Her cuts had been dressed and her burns treated, but nothing could be done for the dull pain she felt deep within her bones and wings, nor for her exhaustion, and certainly not for the sense of utter failure and loss that threatened to engulf her.

For hours on the train race southwest from Hoofsburg, she had been in an information vacuum. On her orders it had cut out all but three of its stops until it reached Tall Tale, and then only to pick up whatever snatches of news or rumour they could before racing on. It was only when they had finally reached Tall Tale that afternoon that an extra edition of a newspaper had laid bare the awful truth: Blueblood had seized Canterlot and granted himself dictatorial powers. Radical Road may have delivered the speeches, but her nephew’s guiding hoof was behind it all.

Tall Tale had been so alive with rumour when she arrived that the policepony she had sent word ahead to had insisted that she travel to this radio station in an unmarked taxi. She’d known then more than ever that she had to give this address. She could not allow this crime to go unanswered, for regardless of what she did, she knew that ponies would bleed.

Through the glass of the radio booth, she saw the operator signal to her, and she began.

“My little ponies, many of you will have now heard Radical Road’s speech in the House of Commons this morning,” she said quietly. “He names me tyrant, deceiver and attempted murderer. He accuses me of trying to kill him and Blueblood so as to destroy the Parliamentarian movement.

“I name him liar. I summoned neither Radical Road nor Blueblood to a meeting last night. The Trottingham Grenadiers were never to be reviewed at Canterlot Castle. Last night, Blueblood and Radical Road, with a group of officers led by Major General Neigh, broke into Canterlot Castle and attempted to force my abdication at the point of a spear. Through treachery Blueblood forced the Trottingham Grenadiers to attack the Royal Guard while they were still unarmed in their barracks, and to attempt to kill me and drive me from the Castle.

“With their lies Radical Road and Blueblood have granted themselves dictatorial powers. They have overridden Parliament. They have unlawfully detained my ministers and illegitimately proclaimed themselves a government. I will not allow these crimes to stand.

“To Radical Road, Blueblood and Neigh I say this: step down now and surrender your control of Canterlot. Renounce all claims to governance. So long as you retire from public life, no vengeance will be taken against you. Unless I receive word by eleven o’clock on Friday morning of this week that you are prepared to do this immediately, I will have no choice but to mobilise the Royal Army.

“It is my first, greatest, and only wish that peace and friendship will prevail, but there is no justice or harmony in allowing a tyranny of criminals and liars to exist. Consider my offer, my would-be killers,” she finished, in the voice that a thousand years ago had cowed a hundred feuding kingdoms. “Step down now and I will show you mercy. Otherwise, I will destroy you.”

***

Golden Oaks Library had been transformed into a war room. Twilight, Spike, and Summer Set watched, the latter with barely-contained glee, as Warding Ember and the dozen officers he had hastily dragged together to form an ad hoc staff pored over maps liberated from the Ponyville Post Office. Applejack and Cherry Fizzy hovered on the edge of the crowd, trying to be useful.

“If the entire regiment has gone over to Neigh, then this town is indefensible. We’ll be flanked from the north and east.”

“He only had the one battalion at Canterlot, and we have the Life Guards and the Light Infantry with us. Tomorrow morning we’ll have the Cloudsdale Greys.”

“Neigh can be here before then, and if he has Canterlot, then he has the Arsenal,” growled Ember. “Twenty guns to our none. We do not have the strength to occupy every possible fire position he could take, and the risk to civilians...” Ember straightened up from the library’s table. “We cannot stay here. Where’s the nearest arsenal?”

“Stamplona, sir.”

“Tirek in Tartarus! Find me a chokepoint near it.”

“General!” cried Twilight. “Surely you can’t be thinking of abandoning Ponyville?!”

“We may have no choice, Your Highness,” said Ember gravely. “Look.”

He swept aside a large-scale map of Ponyville, with the Guards’ recently-dug defensive positions marked, to show the whole of Equestrian General Survey’s map of Ponydale and the White Tail Uplands. Twilight spotted Ponyville immediately, nestled on the banks of the River Saddle in the valley of Ponydale. The hills sloping up to the White Tail Woods formed one side of the valley, while to the east was the Central Plateau, covered in the thick green mass of the Everfree Forest. It was scantily mapped, with large portions marked ‘Unexplored: Hazardous to Ponies’. It was so huge it spilled off the map.

“Ponyville sits in this valley,” Warding Ember was saying. “Low hills to the east and west, and this ridge to the north that we came over this morning. If Neigh has the guns of the Canterlot Arsenal, then he won’t even need to come into spear range of us. I saw Neigh during the war: if he’s prepared to launch a coup, then he won’t care about civilian casualties. He will mass that artillery on one of these slopes and rain fire down on this town until you surrender.”

Twilight suddenly felt very unsteady on her hooves. When she’d first come to Ponyville, all she’d ever wanted was to be somewhere else. Now she couldn’t imagine abandoning it for a second, and certainly not to the stallion who had overthrown Canterlot and tried to kill Princess Celestia!

She was relieved of having to make an answer by one of Ember’s officers. “Here sir, Asshaye.”

Ember frowned at where the officer was pointing on the map. The village of Asshaye sat just west of where the River Saddle split and the Wither River snaked south into the Everfree Forest. The river fork was a swampy, complex mass of wetlands and muddy islands, and the only route through was a wide causeway along which ran a single road and railway.

The General smiled grimly. “Protected flanks. Single way of approach. Covered lines of supply to the rear.” He pointed north of Asshaye to the White Tail Woods and turned to Applejack. “You’re from around here, Sergeant. Are these woods passable?”

Applejack shook her head. “White Tail Woods are mostly hilly, sir, an’ even in the best o’ places it’s old farmland gone back ta forest. Thickest woods ah’ve seen outside the Everfree. An’ if you want ta try ta get an army through there, the paths go all the wrong way for ya. Ain’t nopony sneaking around ya that way, General.”

“Perfect.” Ember turned to Spike. “Sir Spike, I need you to send a message to Colonel Spitfire. Once her regiment is assembled she’s to rendezvous with us at Asshaye and prepare the village for defence.” He turned to Cherry Fizzy. “Colonel, prepare your battalion to march. Make sure similar orders are sent out to the rest of your regiment.” He turned to Twilight. “Your Highness, you’re coming with us.”

This hurricane of commands was met by moment of ringing silence, then a storm of protest.

“General, ya can’t be askin’ us ta leave our families...”

“Sir, my wife...”

“General, I will not abandon this town to the stallion who tried to murder...”

General Warding Ember was not a stallion used to having his orders questioned. “ENOUGH!” He fixed Cherry Fizzy and Applejack with an icy stare. “You two have forgotten what you are. I have a wife and three fillies in the Crystal Empire. I’ve seen them once since the war ended, and now I don’t know when I’ll see them again. None of us want to do this, but we have a duty to Equestria, to all of it. Other ponies forgot that last night. We will not.”

He turned to Twilight, staring at her desperately, willing her to listen. “Your Highness, we have stayed here too long already. Neigh could be here by nightfall, and if Radical Road and Blueblood are committed enough to launch a coup then Princess Celestia’s offer of clemency will not dissuade them. If we don’t leave now then I cannot protect you here. Neigh will return you to Canterlot as a hostage for Radical Road to use against Princess Celestia, and there will never be an honourable peace.

“But if we do leave now for Asshaye, then we can mass the Braytish regiments there and launch a two-pronged counterattack with Princess Celestia marching out of Whinnyapolis with the Horsetrian regiments. If Princess Luna and Princess Cadance attack from the north as well then we stand a good chance of ending this insurrection quickly, and getting everypony home quickly too.

“Your Highness,” he said pleadingly. “When I joined the Guard I did so to protect innocent ponies and our way of life. I have never wanted to see anypony die needlessly, but our hoof has been forced. If our way of life is to survive, we have to fight, and if we are to fight, then we have to leave now.”

***

“So!” thundered Blueblood. “The tyrant’s true colours are revealed at last!”

The opposition benches across from him, which the Parliamentarian movement had occupied only that morning, were deserted but for a few dozen non-aligned MPs. Those few had been quickly cowed by the sight of Neigh’s troops marching the government’s members from the Commons Chamber that morning. The government benches of the House of Commons were now thickly settled with Parliamentarian MPs.

But it wasn’t the House of Commons anymore, Blueblood corrected himself. Radical Road wouldn’t hear that. It was the “National Convention”. And they weren’t Members of Parliament anymore, he’d insisted over lunch. No, they were “Deputies”. Blueblood had struggled not to roll his eyes, but the party line had to be maintained. For now.

“Celestia pours lies into the ears of the ponies of Equestria! She smears and libels the elected representatives of the Equestrian public! She threatens war if Radical Road and I do not step aside! She tries to bribe us into betraying the revolution with false offers of clemency!”

Roars of disapproval erupted from the carefully-disciplined ranks of Deputies behind him. Some of them had more reason than others to appear enthusiastic: they had already been told that they had been selected for Radical Road’s new cabinet.

No, not a cabinet, he reminded himself, and not ministers either. They were “Commissioners” now. “Commissioners” of the “Committee of Public Safety”. The name was so nauseatingly prosaic that Blueblood had wanted to gag when he’d heard it. Where was the grandeur? The majesty of authority and power? Well, there would come a time when he would see to that.

“Well to the ponies of Equestria I say this,” continued Blueblood. “We will not submit to this despot's ultimatum! We will not submit to an honourless peace for the false promise of a few crumbs of mercy!

“Never will we allow this autocrat to trample your rights and freedoms beneath her hooves! Freedoms that had to be wrenched from her unyielding grasp! We will fight her tyranny, even if we are pushed back to the very steps of the Castle we have driven her from! We will fight anypony who seeks to undermine your rights! Already Major General Neigh’s troops are closing on Ponyville to arrest Celestia’s puppet, Twilight Sparkle!

“Citizens, remember the sacrifices of these brave soldiers! As they have won your freedoms, help them secure it! If we form a community closely bound together by vows, ready for anything, resolved never to surrender, then our willpower will master every hardship and difficulty! If Celestia would fight, then let her come!”

Comments

[The Good Boy]

shits getin real m8

[paladinwolf]

i1.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/facebook/000/076/655/shitstorm-flyer.jpg

things are happening so fast, there is going to be a lot blood shed.

This message brought to you by the makes of...
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Dont forget to start your war with a big bowl!

[Celestial Knight]

I'm trying to decide whether Blueblood deserves a firing squad or a hanging. I'm leaning towards the latter, firing squad is too quick.