Shining Judgment

by Bad_Company

A Fancy Duel

The wind blew through Major Snow's hair. He could hear crows off in the distance as he slogged his way through the marsh. He never felt so low in his life. A laugh escaped him as he slipped into a sinkhole. The situation was so ridiculous at this point it just seemed funny.

“Major, would you slow down a bit so I can help Fleur across this?” Fancypants asked politely. He was still at the bank while his wife simply looked at disgust towards the murky water. Fancypants had Fleur climb on top of him while he trudged through the marsh. Snow had to give him credit, he was a lot stronger than he looked.

Meanwhile the two Wonderbolts waited on the other side of the bank. “Sorry about making you do this,” Spitfire called out to them. “We'd help carry you over but I don't think I could do it by myself.”

Not as sorry as I am. Major Snow thought. Spitfire's partner, Soarin' had damaged his wing when he had crashed after he had tried taking a griffon on by himself. Thankfully he had landed across the marsh which was the direction they needed to go.

All of them had finally crossed over to the other bank and Snow took out the map. “Let's see, we can avoid the enemy lines if we head northwest, but it's a long detour and the colonel doesn't want us to waste time.” To be honest, Snow thought this whole trek was a waste of time.

The colonel had come back from the negotiations with a grim look on his face. He had ordered Major Snow to send a message to his friend, Princess Cadence, whose country was very close by to the battlefield. He wanted it to be kept secret and he wanted it done swiftly. “She's our only hope at this point,” Shining had said. “You need to get to her within the next twenty-four hours. We can hold out for a day or two if needs be, but it is imperative we have reinforcements from her. Do you understand?” The Major followed orders eagerly although he wondered what the colonel had been told at the negotiations and why the fighting hadn't started.

Snow didn't know why he couldn't just send a damn pegasi squad to just fly over to her at the time. However, he found out the hard way when he had sent Soarin' to scout out the land ahead and a griffin attacked him. Now it seemed Snow had instead taken four bricks with him instead of just two. He wished he could have taken a squad of real soldiers, but he knew the colonel needed every soldier he could get at the moment.

So it all depended on this Princess Cadence. A Princess from the neighboring country who had almost little to no ties to Equestria beyond Shining Armor coming to visit her once. Did she even have an army? Let alone one big enough that could put them on even grounds against More Dread's forces?

Fancypants had insisted he helped escort Snow over to the border while the colonel had requested the two Wonderbolts come with him as well. The pegasi could have been useful to him or so he thought. The two unicorns would have been utterly useless if they encountered any of the enemy soldiers though despite both being given weapons of some sort. He doubted any of them even knew a sword from a stick.

Suddenly, he heard hooves approaching him from the trees. “Allo? Who goes there?” An accented voice asked. It sounded as though he was from Fancy. That probably meant he was a mercenary.

Snow turned and responded with the best lie he could think up. “We are just out for a... um a stroll.”

“What? In the middle of a war zone?” Asked the voice from the woods. “State your real business here. You with Prince Dread or are you Equestrian scum?” Now Snow knew which side the mercenary was on and that he could not let whoever that was get away from him. He ripped his sword of its sheath with his mouth.

“Come out where I can see you Fancy frog-eating coward! You're on our side of the DMZ, you should be the one answering my questions,” Snow yelled back in the most threatening voice he could make.

“Um, be careful there my good man. There could be more than one of him in that forest,” Fancypants said to the major. “Last thing we need is to be captured.”

“NO ONE CALLS A FANCYMAN A COWARD!” A blue unicorn with a brown mane stepped out from the woods and drew a rapier with his magic. Five other soldiers stepped out with him. “Let's see if these pigs squeal.” The other men drew their swords as well.

“I'll skewer the lot of ya!” Snow was really angry, he had been having an awful day and he was not about to let some mercenary scum take him down.

“Gentlemen please. We can settle this a proper way,” said Fancypants calmly as he came between Snow and the mercs. “I propose we have a duel.” This was actually incredibly smart thinking, Snow realized. Stallions from Fancy prided themselves in fencing and would never turn down a proper duel. Maybe it wasn't such a bad idea having the unicorn after all.

The Fancyman stroked his spaded beard with his hoof. “A duel you say? Well of course I accept. Which one of you Equestrian bastards will be getting a bite from my hungry blade today?”

“I will be fighting you of course,” Fancypants replied. “After all I proposed the duel.”

“What are you doing?” Snow asked in disbelief. “Let me handle this, I don't want you to get killed!”

“Nonsense, major, I was the fencing champion back in my day,” Fancy replied in his usual calm tone. “They knew my name in all the fencing circles back in Fancy and Canterlot.”

“Ah says who?” Asked the mercenary leader. “Wait, are you THE legendary Fancypants? The one who defeated Laura Flessel-Clopvic?”

“I am the very same,” Fancypants replied pridefully. He drew his own rapier that the colonel had given him.

“Well then I accept your challenge with gusto, my friend. I am Gaston de Neigh and I am one of the field captains for Prince Dread's mercenaries. However, after this duel, I expect I will be the general.”

“Be careful, dear,” Fleur urged Fancypants and then hugged and kissed him. “I know you will do well!”

“Let's waste no time then,” said Fancypants. “Show me when you are ready, Captain de Neigh.”

Gaston lunged with his rapier at Fancypants. Pants parried the first cut and ducked under the second and rolled out of the way. He came up into a crouch readying his sword. Snow's jaw simply dropped.

“Captain, I'm afraid your promotion will most likely have to wait. You seem like quite the amateur.” Fancypants chuckled as he paced into the center of the bank.

“I was only warming up you idiot.” Gaston wiped the sweat from his brow. “You look like you're getting slower with age though.”

Fancypants then got a devilish grin on his face. “Why don't you come find out?”

Gaston sprang forward and their blades met together. The metal rang as they scraped together. Fancypants flicked away a jab, but another one came very quickly behind it he only just got out of the way as the blade punched a hole in his muddy vest.

Fancypants looked down at it and frowned. “I don't appreciate people ruining my nice clothes. Mud I can take. But holes are a different matter.”

“If I were you, I'd be a little less worried about my suit and more about my head falling off.” The captain circled him.

Fancypants feinted left then went the other way and left the captain lunging at nothing. Gaston was quick, but not enough so to avoid the point of Fancypants' sword leaving a scratch across his shoulder.

Gaston looked down at the wound, then summoned up his rage and lunged some more. Fancypants twirled his sword and parried once again. Their swords rang together as each one jabbed, cut, and parried the other. The captain managed to trick him with a feint, switched angle and forced Fancypants to hop away rather ungracefully.

“I take back what I said about you being an amateur.” Fancypants grinned as he panted. The stallion had forgotten how much work this swordplay business required. His lungs were burning and his legs were aching.

“And I take back about you having age get to you.” Gaston then cut at him as hard as he could, jarring the sword in Fancypants' control. “ But you being in peak form will make my victory all the sweeter.”

Fancypants riposted the captain's next effort. Gaston barely dodged Fancy's sword and stumbled a bit. In a desperate attempt, the captain then lunged as hard as he could at Fancypants who then dropped beneath the blade and jabbed his own sword right before the captain's neck.

“I suggest you yield now,” said Fancypants in his usual polite tone. Gaston stared down at the sword looming threateningly at his neck. He dropped his sword.

The ponies watching the exhibition were all staring wide-eyed at the two duelists completely in disbelief. Snow still wasn't sure if he was dreaming or not. Gaston then approached the major.

“Well, as the duelist code dictates, the victor who spares the loser's life gets to decide the terms for the defeated and he has deferred me to you. So what would you have me do?” He had a sour look on his face. Clearly none too happy about his defeat. Fancypants then followed up after him still smiling.

“I suggest that you make them escort us to our destination, major.” Then he went back over to his wife who once again hugged and kissed him.

Major Snow stared for a moment, regained his composure and then replied. “I think I will go with the victor's suggestion, Captain.” Gaston then turned around, yelled to his soldiers in the Fancy language and picked up his sword and sheathed it angrily. The rest of Snow's group followed after them.

Snow stared there for a minute. He had been completely wrong about the unicorn from Canterlot. Hell, he would probably be able to pick up a few pointers from the man. Maybe this mission would succeed after all. The major also realized how dumb and brash he had been. If he had been on his own and charged the mercenaries himself, he would have been killed. He then trotted after the group and went up to Fancypants.

“Hey listen, I'm sorry,” the major said sheepishly.

Fancypants looked at him in surprise. “Whatever for my good lad?”

“Well I mean, if I had charged and tried to fight them all and all that... well that could have you know, put us in a lot of danger...” Snow replied staring down at the ground.

Fancy gave him a warm smile back. “It's all right. I was the same way when I was as young as you. One day, you'll grow up to be as good of a leader as Shining Armor.”

Snow smiled at that and felt a little better. He looked up at the sky and realized the sun was beginning to set. He hoped that they would make it in time to Princess Cadence.

Comments

[BronyUnite]

that's a nice image of a stallion

[BronyUnite]

where did you get that picture by the way?

[Bad_Company]

324221 See the link at the top of the first chapter. I got it from DeviantArt.

[Zervziel]

Interesting work. However I find it very odd that ponies have cavalry.

[Bad_Company]

I might pick this back up, actually. I have a lot more time than I thought I would.

Dammit, I wish I could have finished this before the finale though because now it's like an AU grimdark fanfiction. I might just rewrite this whole thing so that it fits in with the actual show, but still has a similar premise to what I wrote. Now that I think about it, I really really really don't want to introduce any sort of real warfare as I don't think that fits in with the tone of the show and hell, no one comes here to read about military conflict. That's just no fun and not the point of ponies although I did enjoy writing that dueling scene. I need to figure out a way to keep that in there without making it a part of a military conflict.