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by The Boss

Beware The Fury of a Patient Mare...

Shield sighed contently as he sat behind his desk, watching the fillies and colts scribble away on their test. It was the final week of school, and things had been going swimmingly since his discussion with Twilight Sparkle. It had taken less than five minutes for her to pull out a bag of bits with more than enough funds to buy new curriculum and teaching materials. While it was late in the school year, Shield was looking forwards to using the new books the next year.

For now though, he was overseeing the final exam. Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon were next to each other, as usual. Though Shield noticed that they were spending less time trying to hide the little peeks they took at each other's papers, and more time actually answering the questions honestly. The marine had to admit he was truly proud of them, of all of his students in fact. It had been difficult making an impression on them, considering the closeness to the end of the school year, but he’d done it.

The stallion couldn’t help but smile, he leaned back in his chair and continued his observation of the class. One more day, a day he intended to be ‘sick’, and the school year would be over. With no way of finding a suitable substitute, he guessed the fillies and colts would have to miss the last day. As the clock on the wall ticked away, it was clear that more and more students were finishing the exam. Shield idly turned the globe on his desk, spotting a pin in the easternmost part of the Frozen North. Upon seeing it, he felt a chill run down his spine, and he quickly turned the globe and looked away.

”These tunnels run for miles…”

”I can’t see a faust damn thing, sarge…”

Shield shook his head, there would be no sorrow on this day, his eye fell on Scootaloo. She’d finished her exam and was staring off into space.

”Scootaloo… Good filly.” He thought to himself. ”Smarter than she lets on, foolhardy to boot. I can see why Dash took her under her wing.” His vision shifted back to the globe, and a small frown tugged at the corners of his mouth. ”How many fillies and colts like her did we bury?”

The stallion looked back at his desk for a moment, he cleared his thoughts before looking back out over the class. ”Doesn’t matter anymore… We did what we had to, that’s all we could do…” The stallion let out a sigh, it went unnoticed by his students. ”I’ll be called to account for it further up the road, but for now…. I gotta drive on through it.” The next few minutes were spent in silence, with only the sound of pencils scratching to break the monotonous silence. Gradually, and much to his relief, Shield found his mind drifting from the darkness of the past and into the light of the future. A small smile crept across his lips.

He looked out onto his students, they were smart young colts and fillies. They were what he’d fought for, it wasn’t just for the stallion or mare beside him in battle, it was for the brighter future of the foals that sat before him. Tomorrow he’d be spending the day with his sister, and the day after that. The Summer Sun Celebration was perhaps one of the most hated things he could know, but so long as Rainbow Dash was there he could be jumping back into the breach for all he cared.

His eye wandered back to the clock on the wall, he would have sworn if it weren’t for fear of imprinting bad influence onto his students. The stallion quickly cleared his throat, gathering the attention of the fillies and colts.

“I let the test longer than I should have…” He stated as he stood up from his chair. “So, I’ll take what you’ve got done now.” The stallion trotted around the room, gathering the numerous tests with a small smile. “I want you all to take the last few minutes of class to relax, tests are rough on the nerves after all.” The students let out relieved sighs and started talking amongst themselves, Shield went back to his desk with their tests and began the arduous task of grading them.

“Mister Dasher?” A young voice caught his attention, he looked up from the tests. Diamond Tiara was standing in front of his desk.

“Miss Tiara, what can I help you with?” The stallion leaned back in his chair, his eye watched the filly shift from hoof to hoof.

“Well, the summer is coming up. Does that mean I’m not going to get to come in early anymore?” Shield blinked his single eye. “I like the exercise, and I don’t feel as… angry.”

“I’ll tell ya what, you talk to your dad about it and have him talk to me.” Diamond Tiara smiled and nodded. There was a brief knock on the door, followed by Cheerilee poking her head in.

“Alright, students! Class is over!” She said happily, the students let out loud shouts of joy before bolting to the door. Shield watched them leave, then began to pack up his belongings. Cheerilee surprisingly stayed in the room, not that the stallion minded. She had turned out to be quite a good friend, that was something that Shield held close to his heart. “Hey, how’d it go today?”

“Went alright, all things considered.” Shield replied, picking up his cover and placing it on his head. “You?”

“Can’t complain, all the young foals seem to get along nice enough.” Cheerilee responded, the mare trotted over to Shield’s desk and looked it over. It was extremely well organized, and she found the globe strewn with pins to be the most interesting part of it. “What are the pins for?” Shield didn’t look up from his packing, he was busy stuffing the tests into one of his saddle bags.

“Places I served.” Was his only response, Cheerilee noted some were placed in countries like Neigh Korea, Saddle Arabia, The Zebra lands, a small island called ‘Greneighda’, and one or two other places. The only one that stuck out to her was the one up in the frozen north east. “Go ahead and ask about one of ‘em, everyone does. I might give you a straight answer.”

“What’s this one? Stalliongrad?” Cheerilee was excellent with geography, she was not great with history and culture.

“It is the most faust forsaken, freezing, barren wasteland of a shit hole you could ever visit.” Shield said bluntly, he picked his saddlebags and tossed them over his back. “The city on the surface was easy to navigate, but I ended up getting assigned to the tunnels with two other guys. Leading Edge, a rookie straight outta boot, and Light Wing, who’d been with me since I was a greenhorn.”

“What’d you do there?” Cheerilee asked, looking closer at the globe.

“Conquer.” Shield said, just as bluntly. “Well, Captain Equestria conquered. Me and mine were slugging through the shit under the city looking for some KGP agent.” Shield and Cheerilee started trotting towards the door. “Agent Nine, if I recall. Some sort of Stealth Psychological Recon Ops Spook, never caught her though.”

“What happened, to your buddies I mean. Did they…” Cheerilee trailed off to which Shield nodded, he was quiet for a moment. The two stepped out into the hallway, allowing him to close his door and lock it.

“Leading Edge bought it in Saddle Arabia from Griffon and Equestrian Mercs.” Shield sounded somewhat upset, but he pushed on. “Light Wing, I don’t like to talk much about him…”

“Sorry…”

“Don’t be, it’s all in the past now.” Shield sighed as the two exited the school house, Cheerilee locked the front door and the two started trotting towards their favorite watering hole. “I hope you realize that this doesn’t leave the two of us.”

“My lips are sealed.” Cheerilee said with a smile.

“Alright then, guess I can break out the real war stories then.” Shield chuckled a bit, he through his head back and used it as an opportunity to check the sky above. Sure enough, the cloud was there and following him as usual. “Now, let me tell you about how our squad ended up pinned behind enemy lines with nothing but butter knives to defend ourselves…”

[♠]

The wind blow softly through the rustling leaves, causing parts of her stealth suit to rustle with them. As the sun was setting in the distance and the cold of the evening began to descend upon the world, the mare let out an annoyed sigh. Agent Nine, or Trixie if she was going by her cover, watched the marine with a scowl. The mare had seen his face before. Never up close and personal, but during the war.

“Oh the feared hunter, it’s been too long…” She said to herself, not caring about the accent that slipped into her speech. Through the binoculars, she saw he and the school teacher heading towards a bar. As her husband had said, there was a cloud following him. That didn’t concern her though, again she had more important things to worry about. The mare looked down a small pad of paper next to her and began writing a few notes, these notes were placed next to a crudely drawn map of Ponyville. This would be the final piece of the plan, whilst Crimson was enroute to the train depot she would take a final reconnaissance of the area.

”This should be easy, even with that pesky marine…” The ex KGP agent thought to herself, the scowl on her muzzle growing in intensity. ”No, nothing is easy. All these years of playing an air head with no grasp of strategy, none of it was easy…” To the casual observer, as well as many residents of the town, Trixie Lulamoon was a bit of a pariah. She was considered brash, arrogant, boastful, and most of all, stupid. This suited Agent Nine just fine, in fact it was exactly as she wanted it. To be viewed as a nuisance. The ponies would ignore her, and when they didn’t the act would be enough to turn them away. All the while she’d collected intelligence, documents, building plans and even the weather plans for the harvests for years to come. All by acting like a complete and utter fool. It was brilliant.

The mare looked down at the map, there were six names placed in various places along the paper. ”We know their modus operandi, now all that needs to be done is tear them apart…” The wind grew in intensity, causing the mare to tense slightly. She feared for a moment that the sudden gust would cause her stealth suit to flutter, considering it was made up of burlap sacks and branches, it was entirely possible that her position could be given away if the wind grew too strong.

She decided that she had enough information, years and years worth of knowledge and a recent intelligence report would be more than enough for the first stage of the operation. Oddly enough, the destruction of Ponyville was only a bonus to the true prize. For her and her husband, it was a young filly in Canterlot. Their daughter, who’d been stolen from them by Celestia’s cronies. As Nine made her way back to the tree line, she ground her teeth. All she and Crimson had wanted was a life of peace with their child. They didn’t care that their city had been conquered, so long as their daughter was safe with them. Considering their ties to the former ruling party, however, Shining Armor had taken the one thing they loved most.

The Summer Sun celebration would be their retribution. The beloved town of Equestria’s greatest heroes, reduced to a smoldering crater and the graves of hundreds of ponies. Nine could practically smell the brimstone. The mare wanted to say something, but truly she could only think of one word.

“Soon…”

Author's Note:

Here it is, the next one! Woohoo! Now I can feel accomplished about something!

Anyway for all those in the know, Halloween is coming up. Can anyone guess what I'm doing (aside from going to a con)?

That's right! JACK SHIT because I am a LONELY FUCKER! (And also hyped up on Caffeine, mainly so I can shoot this mouse that is living in my kitchen. I'm just sitting here with a pellet gun, waiting for him to pop his little head out so I can brain him.)

Anywho, here ya are.

Like, Fave if you want, and please, PLEASE leave a comment. I need all the feedback I can get.

Comments

[meh]

Really liked it, longer chapters would be nice though

[The Boss]

5164071

I do what I can, I don't want to stretch things out to extreme levels because where's the fun in that? But I'll see what I can scrounge together.

[Blue Spark]

I hope Dasher can foil their plans before it's too late.
Or at least somepony does...

[-Brutus]

Who's Trixie daughter I wonder? Good chapter.!

[The Boss]

5166325

Admitedly, yeah it's a weak plot. In all honesty it just sort of morphed itself as I wrote it. At the time I started this, I was still getting used to creating a cast of OCs, hence RD and Ponyville. Thinking back now, I could have put this in 'Madeuptown' Equestria and cut the whole conspiracy, and RD thing, it'd still be pretty much the same character. I can see how it could seem like a self insert, but it's not intended to be. Guess it just morphed into this, too late to turn back now. Not that I really want it to anyway, maybe I'm more cut out for thrillers and action than I am for emotion and depth.

Maybe after this first arc I can tweak it a bit.

I really do appreciate the feed back, I do try to take it all into account as I write. I'm even more so glad that you pointed these things out, I don't normally get constructive criticism as much as I'd like.

Thanks for the advice,
Boss.

[Jarimor]

the story is building nicely.

now for the million dollar question-
will sun butt or lulu be there for the celebration?
THAT wont end well.

[BronyCrystal]

Great chapter Twi is please he he anywho can't what to see more ;3

[BloodyDitzy]

Wait a minute? Shining Armor somehow took her filly away. What if not physically take her take her, but through marriage? And she said that Celestia took her daughter away...what if she raised her. Maybe like a niece? Then that would mean...HOLY FUCKING SHIT!

[Risingsun896]

Very good story u can do it