Of a German and American soldier in Equestria

by redspark

Supplies and advance

Chapter 30
"Supplies and advance"

The sound of working ponies filled the air as the last parts of the fort's walls were finished. The wooden palisade now surrounded the entire camp, along with a few watch towers that gave a nice view of the surrounding areas and the forest. The entrance was a simple wooden gate that opened and closed going up or down respectively. Even though the fort wasn't a magnificent work of architecture or the best for military purpose, it would do for the time that Davis planned on going ahead with the operation. He estimated that, if all went well, the war would be over within a year of their first move against the changelings in the Griffon Kingdom.

Apart from the walls, there was nothing else, except the small improvised stone smithy, that was built. The rest were simply tents for the army and the large command tent for war gatherings. All things considered, it was far more than what Davis had envisioned in the beginning having originally planned a simple short palisade wall with no gates (only one open hole) and no towers. The smithy had been a last minute idea and request from Tempered Steel, who was still working on the new weapons for Davis and needed to have one. For it they had to dig a hole in the ground to make the forge and the rest was also a little cave where the pony smithy would work in private.

Davis now stood in one of the tallest towers, which was approximately the size of a normal Ponyville house, roughly two stories high. He looked around the camp with a small smile on his face as the ponies finished securing the gate's simple mechanism that consisted of a rope, a few levers and two large stallions.

His eyes darted back and forth around the camp, inspecting how everything was going with his troops. Many were simply resting in the tents or talking to others around unlit fireplaces. Some were still working on a few things, such as building tents or sharpening their weapons. Some, very few, were sparring in an open area of the camp that was placed for practice; others were also practicing with their bows.

Now Davis only had to wait for one thing: Louis and the supplies. They were not going to last long in the camp without the supplies the German was going to bring, and he would certainly not attack without them since he would risk a lot of odds with that. He was worried, especially since he hadn't heard from Louis since he departed the port and not a single messenger or letter had arrived regarding that matter from Canterlot.

He slowly leaned against the side of the tower, watching now towards the forest to the south. In the distance he could see a faint outline of some mountains. He knew that somewhere around there was the griffon's capital city, the Golden Throne. That seemed an odd name to him, but yet again, ponies had weird names as well so he didn't judge anything anymore regarding that.

There were, according to the map given to him by Celestia, two forts between them and the capital; those two forts were controlled by the changelings, or so the princesses had been told. He hoped there were mistakes in that and the forts were under griffon control; if that was the case, it would make their trip much easier. If it wasn't it would mean he'd need to take them first before advancing any further, and that was something he felt worried about.

If he took the forts, he'd need to leave troops behind to make sure that the changelings wouldn't take it back easily or at all. If he did that, then he would lose troops he could instead use in upcoming battles.

There was also the theory that they could have been abandoned after the changelings took them. Then maybe he could simply pass by without stopping to secure them except to make sure there weren't changelings inside. That would be nice, but Davis felt for some reason that wouldn't be the case.

As he stared off into the distance, he managed to see a small dot in the sky above the forest. He tried to see what it was, but it was still too far away for his eyes to see well enough to distinguish it. He remembered he had his binoculars and proceeded to use them, looking for the dot he had previously seen. When he managed to locate it, he felt a wave of emotions within him, most notably curiosity and worry.

What he could see was a pegasus pony in an Equestrian Army courier’s outfit flying with a saddlebag. Davis slowly pulled the binoculars away from his eyes as the pony got close enough for him to see well. The American quickly went down the tower and ran to the main tent. He didn't normally ran inside the camp, and he earned a few glances from ponies as well as some salutes he ignored.

He finally reached the tent where Ace and the courier were talking inside. When he entered, both looked at him and the courier pegasus saluted.

"General, sir!" he said, raising his hoof to his head. Davis looked at Ace and then back to the pegasus.

"At ease," he said, getting an immediate response from the pony lowering his hoof and taking off his saddle bag.

The pony rummaged in it for a second before retrieving a letter and extending it to Davis. "From General Louis, sir. He sends you this and the news that the griffons are retaking their coastal cities and ports with the support from the Equestrian Navy. He's advancing towards us as we speak with the supplies as well."

Davis nodded, too surprised to answer instantly. He looked at the letter the pony was passing to him, which he took with his hand rapidly and proceeded to open it. He looked at the pony and nodded. "Thank you for the information. Please go and eat something and drink. Rest, you are probably tired after flying so much." The pegasus smiled tiredly and saluted.

"Sir," he said right before turning around and walking out of the tent. Davis looked at Ace and then went to the table in the tent and sat down. He slowly pulled the paper out and unfurled it.

Ace was right next to him, also reading what it said.

Davis,

If the courier hasn't told you yet, the supplies are on the way. When I write this letter, the supplies are probably three days from reaching you. From what I've seen from the letters I've sent this'll get to you within a day from here so wait for the supplies; they'll arrive in less than two days.

As for my position, I'm currently turning from my route towards the griffon capital and will get there in approximately six days if all goes well.

Please let me know of any progress or change of the original plan.

Louis

Davis sighed as he finished. Everything had gone as planned. He’d be able to go out once the supplies arrived, but until then he'd have to wait a little. As he turned he saw Ace holding the map and staring at it. He walked towards the pony.

"What is it?" he asked.

Ace looked at Davis and then back at the map. "I worry about the forts. If the changelings know what they're doing they'll make us siege them. If it comes to that, we'll lose too much time." He rolled the map. "How are we going to get to the Golden Throne in time for the changelings’ attack?"

The American slowly pulled his rifle from his back and stared at the barrel. "If all goes as planned, we'll manage to take those forts fast."

Ace simply rolled his eyes. "You keep on saying that taking the forts will be easy; I can't picture in my mind a way that we can do that fast and without the loss of many," he said almost angrily.

Davis noticed the tone and sat down again. "I have a plan in mind that, if everything is done by then, we'll have the power to tear down those forts is we need to." The made Ace look at him confused.

"What do you mean by that?" He pointed outside. "We have only a few siege weapons, and they are all worn out by the trip. And even then, they are not enough to do enough damage to the griffon's quality in forts and stone building. We'll be lucky if we manage to tear down the gates."

With a quick move, Davis placed the rifle on his arm and fired one shot to the sky. The thundering sound made Ace flinch, especially since he wasn't expecting it.

"You forget who I am, Ace." He stood up and placed the rifle on his back. "I have my ways with this sort of thing."

Ace gave him an annoyed look. "Can you at least let go the secret and tell me what you've got planned?" Davis walked to the tent's entrance and started leaving.

"I'm afraid that I don't want anypony to know of this unless I'm certain it can be done. Before that, I don't want to speak about it, I'm sorry," he said. And with that, he walked outside leaving an annoyed Ace within the tent.

The pony officer grumbled to himself as he unrolled the map and looked once more at the territory around them...

*** *** ***

"Sir!"

The shout woke Davis from a deep slumber. He rapidly stood up with a gun in his hand, alert. He scanned around his tent and noticed a pony's head with a helm looking inside.

"Sorry for waking you up." Davis mumbled something under his breath that went along the lines of 'are you...' "I was told to report to you that the supplies have arrived along with a hundred ponies, sir."

The news immediately brought Davis completely awake.

"Thank you, go out now." Even though that was important news, he disliked getting woken like that. It wasn't the first time, and he suspected it wasn't going to be the last.

The pony nodded and got out.

Davis quickly got on his boots and placed on the general's uniform on top of his plain white shirt; he had fallen asleep with the uniform's pants, so he didn't bother for that one. He took the cap and placed it on his head before strapping the gun's holster to his belt. He took the gun, placed it on the holster and then went outside.

The sun was already up, making Davis worry a little that he had woken up late. He noticed ponies gathering near the entrance of the camp, so he approached.

Once he was close enough, he spotted more than a dozen carts with ponies all round, looking at them. Davis knew they had figured out what the carried, especially since he had started to reduce rations so that they didn't ran out of food. They probably saw all that food as pretty tasty now.

"Alright, newcomers!" Davis shouted, getting attention from the ponies. "The newcomers, go to the training ground; there you will be assigned to new units. General Ace, please see to it yourself." The pony general, who seemed to have woken up late as well nodded.

"Follow me!" the pony general shouted right before walking away. Soon after him, a dozens of ponies began to move behind him.

Davis looked next to the supply carts. "The head cook will see that these food supplies are stored safely. As of now, we return to normal rations." That earned a few whistles and shouts of approval. "Now, everypony that isn't doing anything vital now, get ready for departure! We leave tomorrow before the sun comes out!" That made every soldier around to go to their tents and their units. Davis had spoken to his officers as to how the mobilization was going to be handled by them and how they were going to organize everything.

As he went to the main tent to prepare his things, he was intercepted by the pony smithy.

"General!" he saluted. Davis looked at him.

"Yes Steel?"

The pony smiled happily. "They're done! The pegasi guns are finished."

Davis looked around to make sure nopony had heard.

"Let's discuss this in the forge." The two walked away.

Soon, the two were inside Tempered Steel's forge, surrounded by the guns he had worked on.

"I modified it a little from the original version, since the magic that I needed had a few problems when used with the original model..." The smithy passed him a long and thin rifle. It looked like his own, only that when he picked it up, he got unbalanced since he was expecting the normal weight of a gun that size. He stared surprised at the almost weightless artifact he now had on his hands.

Tempered Steel smiled at his expression of surprise.

"It uses a similar kind of magic to that of the pegasi wing blades. It makes the metal used on it weigh like a feather, though this design made it weigh a little more." He took another one he had beside him. "You can see here the trigger," he said, pointing at the usual part of the rifle where Davis was used to seeing it. "It has a special variation from yours that allows a pegasus pony to hold it up front and be able to fire. The trigger is moved in a specific angle so that the wielder's hooves can press it both at the same time. Then behind it is a type of sucking strap that lets the wielder put it on without much of a waste of time and allowing it to be firm on the hoof the pony prefers. Then when he wants to take it off, he or she can simply pull it off and it will come off without problem.”

Davis smiled. "Magic."

The smithy nodded. "Yes, it is magic." He placed the three models, each designed for each different pony. "I have ten for earth ponies, six for unicorns and five for pegasi. I've made two thousand bullets, so approximately a hundred shots per gun. Hopefully that'll be enough for the first attack?" he questioned.

Davis thought on at for a moment. Yes, he wasn't going to use his trained ponies on something more than snipers and air support. If all went well, he was going to end up using only the pegasi and the unicorns, since the unicorns had turned out to have better aim at long distances. Earth ponies were much better at a closer combat, or so he had ended up concluding after finishing basic gun training with the ponies he had rounded up for the team. The pegasi gave a large advantage because they could fly.

"I don't think we'll need more than that, thank you Steel," he said. He had a light smile the whole time. "With this we will get the upper hand on the next battles."

Tempered chuckled. "Don't you mean hoof, sir?"

Davis sighed in annoyance. Most of his officers and friends had been bothering him with that; it was more of a joke and teasing than anything serious, though.

"I said hand, and hand it will be," he clarified laughing. The pony chuckled. "Alright. I'll go now. The gun unit will arrive in some hours so that you can instruct them in what they are to do with those guns, and remember," he said, leaning on his ear. “Keep this a secret. We don't want any changeling spies knowing about this, or any other creature that's not us."

Tempered nodded. "I'll make sure this doesn't come out, don't worry, General."

Davis nodded and turned to leave the forge.

*** *** ***

The sound of marching hooves filled the soft and cold night air of the changelings’ attack camp. It was more of a bug hive, built upwards like a monolith with many holes in it. It was too dark to see much of it, but nothing seemed to bother two changelings as they talked alone inside one of the smallest holes, careful not to be spotted.

Their whispers were barely strong enough for them to hear, and their worried faces would have given them away should another changeling pass by.

"Are you sure? That is not wrong information?" the one on the left said. The one to his right nodded.

"Yeah, heard it from the queen herself. There was an anomaly like that one the ponies detected when the two humans arrived to Equestria. Only that this time in the south of the Griffon Kingdom." She said, since it was a she. The sound of hooves nearby made them hide deeper into the shadows of the hole. In the outside, a changeling guard passed by, not even looking at the hole. Once he was gone, the two relaxed.

The first one spoke again. "I need to notify the griffon lieutenant... This means there's another human nearby."

"Yes, but the queen is sending her own personal guard to fetch him. They'll be lucky if their small resistance can rescue the human from them," the second added.

"There's no other choice..." the first one said. "If she gets one of them on her side, the war will be won and we will never be free..."

The second one nodded, her face softening. "Be careful, please. I know that is no more dangerous than being here, hiding our individuality from the queen but..." she turned. "I don't trust those griffons. They might well kill you after you give them information."

The first one got closed and hugged her. "He won't. He owes me his life, and a griffon doesn't betray that. They're all about honor and that nonsense." She turned to face him. "We'll be safe soon, sister. I promise you that."

And with that, the changelings took to the air, his wings buzzing off into the darkness of the moonless night. The changeling, his sister, slowly sat and contemplated where he had gone, a tear rolling out of her eye...

Author's Note:

Thanks to my editors, Dasher and Final Fan.

hope you guys like this chapter

Comments

[Tx Avenger 218]

Individuality among the changelings, and in a war no less! Man this story is getting better and better. Plus I can't wait to see the new guns in action. It's gonna be so good. Keep up the good work.

[redspark]

6272897

[p61blkwidow]

this story is epic! i just read all the chap[ters. all i can say is amazing! patton would have been proud of davis. congrats on a fine story!

[redspark]

6275234 My thanks

[treegrowth]

Reads the last part of the chapter.
don don DON!!!

well, didn't see that coming.

[redspark]

6277405 hehehe