Piercing the Heavens

by Calm Wind

Chapter 90: Fate

MLP: FiM
Piercing the Heavens
By: Calm Wind

Chapter 90: Fate

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“There! I see him!” Matteo called out while pointing towards the ground. Dash followed his talon, scanning the ground below until her eyes landed on something moving, or rather twitching a few yards from the courtyard wall amidst the many torn up patches of grass and small craters.

“Squall!” Dash called out as she and the rest of her squad dipped down towards him.

Silver and a few of the Wonderbolts were still caught in the moment of meeting their old comrades again, but as soon as Princess Luna mentioned finding and treating the wounded, Dash pushed aside her awe in the presence of legendary Wonderbolts. She had to make sure her squad was still alive. She spotted Matteo quickly. He was already up and flying around despite the endless beating he took from the pin sized magic bolts. Little Star and Twister both joined them shortly after. Star was bruised up from being pounded around by exploding spheres, but Twister’s injuries were minimal, despite having experienced the rush of the burning energy wave.

Dash had also suffered a bit of a beating from the magic bolts, having been with Matteo as he received similar punishment, but all four of them were up and moving, sucking it up and still able to fly.

What worried them though was when Squall didn’t show. It took them less than a minute of waiting to start fretting, and they immediately began frantically searching the battlefield for him as other Wonderbolts and Renegades flew among them, helping and carrying others who were hurt.

It wasn’t until they moved a good ways away from most of the fallen, that Matteo’s eagle eyes picked up Squall’s colors further away.

And from the looks of things, Squall had had it worse than all of them combined.

“Oh my gosh!” Star gasped as they all landed and ran towards Squall.

He was curled up on the grass with his back turned to them, his body twitching as faint groans and quiet wails uttered forth, muffled with his nose stuffed between his hooves. His suit was also ripped and torn, but damaged differently than theirs. It was sliced with thin cuts that revealed painful looking scratches, a few bleeding lightly.

“Squall!” Matteo called out his name as he and Dash reached down to move him.

“AH!” Squall yelped the moment Dash and Matteo touched him. Dash reclined quickly, but Matteo remained firm.

“What happened to you?” Matteo asked as he examined the cut wounds on Squall’s body. “Where else were you…” Matteo stopped cold and his eyes widened as Squall turned over slightly. There was blood all over the arms of Squall’s flight suit. It was fresh blood, and it was clear where it was streaming from.

Little Star threw her hooves over her mouth and Dash’s jaw dropped as they too saw the blood.

“TWISTER!” Dash turned to him frantically. “GO GET—”

“WAY AHEAD OF YA!” Twister yelled out as he was already a good twenty meters back towards the compound as the medical teams began pouring out.

Dash quickly turned and cantered back up to Squall with Star slowly hovering closer as she cringed at the sight.

“Show me,” Matteo ordered as Squall continued to hold his arms up over his face.

“NGH!!” Squall grunted as Matteo tried to move him again. Matteo glared down at Squall and grabbed his arm despite it being covered in Squall’s own blood.

“Squall, SHOW ME the wound!” Matteo said more sternly, causing Squall to flinch.

“Hey!” Dash reached up and grabbed Matteo’s arm. “He’s hurt! Don’t force anything!” she said, but Matteo didn’t even look at her.

“We need to stop or slow down the bleeding until the medical team gets here and I can’t do that if I can’t see the wound!” Matteo yelled more towards Squall then towards Dash.

“Squall, please…” Star hovered up between Dash and Matteo. “Let us help you!” she said as she tried her best to look at him. She could barely stand the sight.

Squall suddenly stopped resisting. Dash let go of Matteo as she saw him move Squall’s arm gently without any trouble.

“Oh… god!” Star turned and pressed her face against Dash’s shoulder. Dash herself was at a loss for words. It wasn’t an easy sight to look at.

Squall looked up at them with only one eye barely open, the other slammed shut as a stream of blood from the center of his face flowed over it and down his cheek. The whole right side of his face was covered in blood from the wound between his eyes. The wound itself was deep, at least as deep as it could possibly get on one’s face. And being a very sensitive part of the body, it was no wonder to any of them just how much pain Squall had to be in.

“Damn, it looks worse than I expected…” Matteo cursed, completely unaffected by the gruesome sight. He brought his arm up and hooked his beak into his flight suit before tearing a large portion of the sleeve off. “The suit material isn’t the most absorbent… but it’s better than nothing…” he folded up the torn piece of his suit and looked back down at Squall. “This is going to hurt a lot,” he said without hesitation.

Squall didn’t respond. He just stared up at Matteo while continuing to groan and wheeze painfully. Dash and Star quickly moved over to Squall’s other side, and both grabbed his hoof as Matteo reached the cloth towards Squall’s face.

“Nnnngggggrrrraaaaahhhhggg…” Squall’s whole body tensed and he nearly pulled both Dash and Star flat to the ground as Matteo gently pressed the fabric over the wound. “Ahhh… gaaahhh….rrrghhhh…” he continued to grunt.

“We’re here, Squall!” Dash called to him as he nearly crushed her and Star’s hooves with his.

“Good, we’re at least slowing it down,” Matteo commented as he applied pressure as gently as he could without causing more pain. He looked up to check if Twister was on his way back yet, but there was no sign.

“Hang in there Squall!” Star squeezed Squall’s hoof back just as hard as he was squeezing theirs. She was biting her bottom lip as she looked directly at Squall, forcing herself to look as she and Dash held on.

Squall’s open eye moved and looked at the two of them. Dash smiled as he looked at them and nodded, glad that he could see them all there for him. Squall’s eye moved again, staring at Dash and Star’s hooves locked with his. He moved his eye to look up at Matteo as he continued to try and control the bleeding on Squall’s face.

“Twister!” Dash yelled out while waving up into the air.

Squall’s eye moved again and looked up as Twister flew in while holding onto Bliss’ apprentice. The yellow unicorn mare with the straight, dark red mane: Mahogany. She was frantically clutching a bag of medical supplies and visibly a little freaked out about being carried through the air so fast.

Squall released a sigh mixed with discomfort as he closed his eye.

“One M.D. incoming!” Twister yelled out as he dove in for a landing. Mahogany squeaked, and shut her eyes, but Twister came to an abrupt halt just before touching the ground and gently set her down on the grass. Mahogany opened her eyes and blinked as Matteo, Dash, and Star all looked towards her eagerly. She shook her head out, hoisted her medical bag up in her magic and quickly approached Squall while taking note of the situation, specifically Matteo holding a now very bloody piece of his flight suit over Squall’s forehead.

“Let me see it,” Mahogany ordered as Matteo slowly removed the rag. She didn’t even flinch as she saw the nasty cut down Squall’s face. She immediately opened the bag and began pulling out the items she needed. “That’s going to need stitches for sure, I’ll do what I can here, but we have to get him to the training room, Bliss is already sending for doctors from Canterlot Hospital,” she said professionally, proving that she was well trained under Bliss.

“What can we do to help?” Matteo asked as Mahogany stepped around Squall with several sterile rags, a bottle of disinfectant and rolls of bandages floating in her magic.

“Please hold him still,” she asked as she took one of the rags and began wiping the blood off of his face around the cut. “I’ll have to clean off the cut itself too, and it’s not going to be pleasant for him,” she asked as she finished cleaning the excess blood before rubbing some of the disinfectant on the rag and moving it towards the cut. “Now please, hold his head steady especially.”

With Squall still mostly on his side, Matteo shifted over and pressed his talons over Squall’s front and back hooves, holding two hooves in each. Twister and Star moved around and held his body down as Dash held his head steady. Squall’s eye slowly opened as he felt the pressure all around, followed by his eye widening and the other almost opening as well despite all the irritation from the blood getting into it.

“GRRRRAAAAHH!!!” Squall yelled out in pain as Mahogany worked around the cut and along the edges.

“Hold him! Hold him!” she repeated as she finished cleaning it and quickly grabbed a large gauze pad with her magic, placing it over the wound before it could start bleeding again. She followed it up by hovering the bandages over and with Dash’s help, wrapped it around Squall’s head diagonally until it was snuggly pressing the pad down onto the wound.

“Guuuhhh… aaaaah…” Squall quieted down as the worst was over. He couldn’t see at all now with his good eye covered by the gauze pad over his face, but the sharp stinging had stopped.

“Okay, that should keep it under control until the doctors gets here,” Mahogany sighed in relief as she looked towards the rest of them. “Now we need to move him, but slowly. I recommend against flying, I don’t want any fast movements to irritate the wound.”

“I’ll carry him,” Matteo offered. “Get him on my back.”

“Twister,” Dash made a head motion towards Squall. The two moved over and figured out how to gently lift up Squall without moving him too much from his current position. Star helped keep him that way as they moved Squall from the ground and onto Matteo’s back. “Still with us?” Dash asked Squall as they gently placed him down, positioning him so his side was on Matteo’s back and his head was still upright.

“Ngh…” Squall replied, hearing and acknowledging Dash’s voice.

“Good,” Dash gave him a light pat on the back before something caught her eye.

She blinked as she saw Soarin, Fleetfoot, Air Mach, Silver, and Rivet flying overhead with a few Renegades following close behind including Bomber, Valkyrie, and the twins Pixie and Fairy. Bliss was riding on Bomber’s back as they passed overhead.

“Over there!” Bliss suddenly yelled out in a frantic voice.

“Oh! That’s where we were fighting!” Pixie pointed out as she and Fairy shifted up.

“Hang on, we’ve got ya,” Fairy continued as the two of them shifted above and grabbed Bliss off of Bomber’s back before turning towards where Bliss pointed.

“I was right over there…” Fleetfoot pointed. “Swift should be over there somewhere.”

“I’ll take a look,” Soarin offered. “Calm and I landed beyond the wall over there by the coffee shop, hopefully he got out from those rocks,” Soarin directed them in the right direction. “Air Mach, come with me,” he and Air Mach veered off to find Swift Justice. Valkyrie turned and made a head motion after them, a few of the Renegades nodded and followed Soarin and Air Mach to assist.

Dash blinked as she watched Fleetfoot, Rivet, Silver, Bomber, and Valkyrie continue onward.

That was right, squad zero… they took quite a beating. Dash suddenly felt worried for them, and having fought beside them, wanted to help if she could. She looked back at Squall for a moment before addressing her squad.

“Guys, I’m gonna go help the elites, stay with Squall until we get him to the compound okay?” she asked them.

“Will do,” Matteo answered quickly, being Squall’s transport after all.

“You’ve got it, go help ‘em out,” Star smiled as she and Twister hovered to Matteo’s sides, holding Squall steady as they began to move back towards the compound with Mahogany. Dash blinked and held in a snort as Twister hung a sign from the base of Matteo’s tail that read ‘we brake for oranges.’ She shook her head, but was happy they found and were taking care of Squall. Without wasting another moment, Dash spread her wings and lifted off to follow behind the group of Wonderbolts and Renegades.

---

“Silver!” Dash called out as she approached the group. Silver glanced back at her as she slowly passed beside Valkyrie and Bomber, looking them both over with awe. They were both famous retired Wonderbolts, but they were also just very impressive ponies, Bomber being larger than Matteo and Valkyrie having twice the muscle mass of her, maybe even more. She continued onward until she was side by side with her mentor. “Can I do anything to help?” she asked. Silver looked over all the pegasi that were already flying with him, but nodded.

“Not gonna say no,” Silver replied as he faced back forward. “Might need some help scraping these slapdicks off the courtyard…” he said with a quiet growl in the back of his throat.

“Silver! Enough of that!” Fleetfoot suddenly looked back and glared at him. “You don’t like them, we get it!” she snapped. “But they just fought for us, and we’d probably be a lot more banged up than we are now without them, not to mention some of us consider them friends, so SHUT IT!”

Dash shifted away slightly in surprise as Fleetfoot berated Silver, Valkyrie and Bomber both looking over at the two of them as well. Silver snorted as he looked towards Fleetfoot with disapproval, but did as he was told, keeping his mouth shut as he kept following. Something that Dash rarely thought about was the fact that Silver was the captain of squad TWO. Meaning that Spitfire, Soarin, Fleetfoot, and at this point and time even Air Mach had authority over him. She was so used to seeing Silver only as her mentor, and somepony she answered to through her own choice. She would never get used to seeing him take orders.

It was also strange to see Fleetfoot exercising her authority. With Spitfire it was a natural occurrence. Soarin didn’t do it very often, and usually preferred not using it, but if he had to give orders he would. Dash had never seen Fleetfoot give orders. She just wasn’t the type. She went along with whatever decisions Spitfire or Soarin made and let them do the talking while she remained carefree and silly more often than not.

However in this case, Dash could see why Fleetfoot was being serious. First off, Fleetfoot liked squad zero a lot. Dash had seen her mess with them and express how much she enjoyed them, particularly how she always purposely flirted with Calm to cause a sensory overload. She had expressed her fondness for the rest of them as well. Playbitz made her laugh with his goober antics, she found Swift’s shameless flirtation techniques to be more amusing and less disgusting than Lightning Streak’s, and she thought Shine was adorable, despite how much Shine got grumpy every time Fleetfoot mentioned it.

The second indication that Fleetfoot was being serious was that she was flying side by side with Rivet and not squeezing the life out of him with affectionate hugs.

Dash was surprised to see Rivet out helping with the injured. Then again, he was wearing an interesting pair of goggles, so there must have been a reason Fleetfoot recruited him into her little search party.

“If you’re wondering,” Silver spoke up beside Dash. “We’re searching along the outer edges of the compound. We can’t neglect the possibility that some Wonderbolts may have gone down further out,” he made a head motion towards Rivet. “He’s got some heat… detector… goggles doo-dad to help us find any.”

Dash looked over and watched as Rivet kept reaching up and turning a small dial on the side of the left goggle frame. Whatever it was, if Rivet made it, it was bound to do whatever he said it does.

“We already know Calm went through a building somewhere outside the compound,” Silver continued. “At least that’s what Soarin said.”

Dash took a moment to look towards where Soarin flew off with Air Mach and a few Renegades. She thought about going to help them, but the thought was spawned merely from the desire to be beside Soarin, so she struck the thought from her head. She was more likely to come across Wonderbolts in need with the larger group. And like Silver said they already knew Calm was out here somewhere. Dash blinked and glanced at Bomber and Valkyrie.

“Oh, I take it Calm is the reason you brought those two along?” Dash chuckled as she made a head motion towards the two powerful Renegades. Silver looked back and smirked.

“I’m not gonna try lifting that tub up off the ground, not to mention we might have to pull him out of some rocks. So I hired some muscle,” Silver said with a light chuckle while staring at his two old comrades for a moment.

Dash was at least glad to see Silver happy about his old wingmates. Obviously they were in a bit of a situation right now, but once they got a chance to rest, she really wanted to personally meet all the former Wonderbolt Renegades. Maybe Silver could introduce them all to her. The thought made her giddy.

“There!” Rivet suddenly yelled out. “There he is!” he said as he pointed just beyond the wall at a coffee shop beyond the walls of the compound perimeter. Half the outer wall of the shop had collapsed, and after another second of flying, they spotted a Wonderbolt uniform over a large light blue body and a brown mane.

“CALM!” Fleetfoot cried out as she flew down. Rivet ripped his goggles down from his face and quickly followed right behind.

“Oh damn…” Dash cringed as she saw Calm half buried beneath a pile of large, jagged stones freshly ripped from the coffee shop wall. The rest of them followed behind, landing as Fleetfoot and Rivet rushed up to Calm and began looking him over.

“It’s about… time…” a voice called out from behind the rocks. It wasn’t Calm. Dash’s ears perked up as Fleetfoot and Rivet looked at the pile. That was Shine Struck’s voice! Shine stepped out from behind the pile, sitting down and leaning her back against pile of rocks as she winced in pain. “Can’t… move the rocks… by myself…” she panted, as she slumped down. Her hooves were dirty, covered in flakes of the red stones. Dash and Silver quickly stepped over and helped her up.

“You tried freeing him all by yourself?” Dash asked in disbelief. “You should’ve flown for help!”

“Hey…” Shine pouted before trying to lift her left wing and cringing as it moved. “I didn’t get as lucky as you,” she exhaled and let her wing fall back down. “Crash landed right on it…” she sighed as she cringed again. Silver shook his head.

“Come on. Let’s get you out of the way,” he said as he and Dash helped her up and walked her over towards the outer wall of the compound. Dash sat down with Shine as Silver walked back towards Calm. Rivet was trying to get a response out of him and Fleetfoot was already on top of the pile of rocks, throwing aside any she could lift.

“Calm!” Rivet called his name as he lightly pushed his hoof against Calm’s cheek. “Give me a sign bro!” Rivet continued as he pushed a little harder.

“Rgh…” Calm gritted his teeth and groaned.

“Was that him?!” Fleetfoot hopped off the rocks and quickly trotted around. Rivet nodded as a he breathed a sigh of relief. Fleetfoot looked towards Calm as he grunted in discomfort again. “Oh thank goodness…” she fell back on her plot and exhaled. “AH! What am I sitting around for?!” Fleetfoot sprang back up. "We gotta get him out!” Fleetfoot jumped up on the pile of rocks again and latched onto a large rock near the top of the pile. She tried to pull it off. It was heavy… she planted her hooves firmly and began tugging at it. The rock slowly began to rise up, but before she could move it any further—

“OW!” she yelped, her body twitching as she dropped the rock and nearly fell backwards off the pile. She wrapped her arms around her body, remembering now the current state it was in. The burning energy wave from the cream colored Shadowbolt mare had left her body in a painful sensitive state. She had adjusted to her tattered suit rubbing against it, but as soon as she tensed her muscles to lift the heavy rock, a fresh wave of pain shot over her body. “Eek!” she slipped and fell backwards as tried to back off from the rock, but Rivet reached out and caught her by the arm just before she could fall backwards. He was almost yanked forward with her, but Silver reached up and stopped them both from falling, helping them both gently land on the ground.

“Commander…” Silver began sternly, but Fleetfoot glared harshly at him before she could go further.

“BUZZ OFF!” she hissed at him. “I’m helping him! I don’t give a damn what you think about—”

“Commander, shut up, and go sit down,” Silver said as he leaned in close so the look in his eyes would be completely clear to her. “You’re still hurt,” he grabbed her by the arm and started pulling her over to the wall. She had latched onto Rivet’s arm when she snapped at Silver, so he got pulled along too. “We’ll get him out, stop overstraining yourself,” Silver said as he forced her over to the wall near Shine and Dash and pointed at the ground. Fleetfoot scrunched her face at him before sitting down and pouting. “Rivet, make sure she doesn’t get up,” Silver added as he turned. Rivet blinked at him.

“How am I supposed to—ERK!” Rivet was cut off as Fleetfoot grabbed him and clutched him grumpily like a child holding a stuffed animal. Rivet stared forward blankly for a moment as his arms dangled over the top of Fleetfoot’s before releasing an exasperated sigh.

So much for the authority. One moment Dash saw Fleetfoot completely handle Silver as their ranks dictate, but the moment Fleetfoot started acting irrational, Silver turned it right around and put her in a time out so she wouldn’t hurt herself. Fleetfoot clearly wanted to help Calm, but straining herself in her current state wasn’t going to help anypony.

“Val, Big Green,” Silver called to Valkyrie and Bomber. “Help me get these rocks off this lug,” he pointed towards Calm. Valkyrie stepped forward and the first thing she did was lift up and toss aside the rock that Fleetfoot struggled to budge.

“Definitely need to find out her gym routine…” Fleetfoot muttered to herself as she puffed her cheeks out and continued to pout beside Dash.

Silver took a step towards the pile, but stopped and turned to look at Bomber, who hadn’t moved.

“You hear me big fella?” Silver waved his hoof up at him. Bomber was frowning at the collapsed wall of the coffee shop.

“Bomber liked this coffee shop…” he said with a sad tone mixed into his raspy voice. Silver blinked and glanced between the shop and Bomber.

“Aw damn, that’s right. I forgot you used to go there every morning…” Silver sighed as he hovered up and placed a hoof on Bomber’s shoulder. “I’ll make sure it gets fixed up afterward big guy, now come lift some rocks, our wingmate needs your help.”

“Okay, Bomber help…” the massive pony lumbered forward, joining Valkyrie as the two heaved heavy rocks off the pile while Silver tried to clear any rocks he could down around Calm.

Dash glanced over at Fleetfoot, noticing no visible change with Rivet not even trying to break free. She chuckled at the site, wondering if Rivet finally got used to it and just let it happen now. With a slight smirk on her face, she turned and looked at Shine sitting next to her. Her smirk faded quickly.

Shine was looking straight down at the ground with a rather depressed expression. Dash immediately began wondering what was wrong as she contemplated what had Shine in such a state. But with the two being so similar Dash had a feeling it had something to do with squad zero’s lack of success in the battle. It’s not like it was their fault, none of them knew how to fight the new Shadowbolts. But with how much faith Spitfire had put in them, it was easy to see how much pressure was on them to succeed, not to mention with the criticism from Silver as well.

“That should do it,” Silver spoke up, drawing Dash’s attention back to the pile of rocks… or lack thereof now. Valkyrie and Bomber had cleared off most of the larger rocks quickly. “Let’s get him out of there,” Silver pointed as he tried to push any more excess rocks he could off of Calm. Valkyrie and Bomber grabbed Calm’s arms and began gently tugging until it was clear he would move.

“RRGHH!!!!” Calm grunted in pain as they began sliding him out from under the rocks. Both of them stopped and looked up, but Silver shook his head.

“He can take it, just get him free,” Silver ordered sternly. The two continued without hesitation. Dash cringed as Calm continued to yelp and groan painfully until they finally freed him from the rocks. “Ouch… that doesn’t look pleasant…” Silver commented. Dash gritted her teeth and winced as she saw Calm’s back. There was a shallow cut that ran diagonally down his back that was surrounded by nasty bruising, exposed due to most of his suit being split open in the back.

“Blade did this,” Valkyrie stated as she shook her head.

“We need to get him back,” Silver nodded as he stepped up to Bomber. “Let’s get him up on Bomber, can you pick him up, Val?” Silver asked Valkyrie very casually. Dash and Fleetfoot both stared wide eyed as Valkyrie simply nodded and stepped up to Calm. Valkyrie was about Descent’s size, almost as muscular too, but Calm was still larger. Bomber made them all look small, but being the transport, it fell on Valkyrie to the loading. She bent down and shimmied her hooved under Calm’s bulk, setting her back hooves firmly on the ground and locking her back while spreading her wings.

“HHRRMMPH!” Valkyrie grunted as she slowly lifted Calm up off the ground.

“No way…” Fleetfoot’s jaw dropped and bopped Rivet on the head. Valkyrie flapped her wings to lift off as she straightened upright and hovered, carrying Calm in her arms over to Bomber while making sure to keep his wound facing away from her. As she drew near Bomber, Silver got on the other side of the juggernaut and helped balance Calm on his back as Valkyrie set him down and exhaled.

“Ugghhh…” Calm groaned and cringed as his eyes slowly opened. “S-Silver?” he said through the pain.

“Rest, we’re taking you to the medical staff,” Silver gave him a pat on the shoulder.

“Did… somepony just… lift me up?” Calm asked in his half-conscious state. Silver smirked.

“You’re a heavy son of a bitch, but Val did. She got you up here no problem.”

“SHE?!” Calm’s eyes widened and he suddenly shot upright. “AH! AARRGHH!!!!” he winced before flopping back down on Bomber’s back.

“Nice one,” Silver sighed and shook his head. “Val, Big Green, get him back to the compound.”

“Big… Green?” Calm managed to say as he opened his eyes again to see Bomber’s head turned to look at him.

“Hello, little pony…” Bomber said with a chuckle as he began to move, Valkyrie following behind to make sure Calm didn’t fall off.

Bomber even made Calm look small. Dash wondered how Silver could have possibly not recognized such an enormous fellow flyer back when they encountered them in Cloudsdale.

“That’s just not fair…” Fleetfoot spoke up while shaking her head and looking towards Valkyrie. “I wish I was that strong.”

Dash chuckled and shook her head.

“I don’t think you’d be as fast as you are if you had all that muscle,” she joked. Fleetfoot shrugged.

“Maybe, the extra wing power might make up for it, but it would definitely help in combat… oh, sorry,” Fleetfoot grinned sheepishly as she let go of Rivet.

“Next time, hug Shine…” Rivet pointed at Shine Struck with a miffed pout as he re-fixed his special goggles on his face. “She’s just as small and actually likes it,” he said with a clearly sarcastic tone.

“Mmph…” Shine made a noise that didn’t really sound like anything. Rivet turned to Shine and blinked, only now noticing how sad she looked.

“Shine?” Rivet tipped his head to the side, unaware that Silver approached right behind him.

“Rivet.”

“WAUGH!” Rivet leapt three yards into the air, spreading his wings and floating back down with his face scrunched and eyes wide, facing Silver. Silver didn’t react at all. He just waited patiently for Rivet to touch back down.

“I want you to make a full pass around the courtyard perimeter with your goggles. Commander,” he looked towards Fleetfoot. “Can you accompany him?”

Fleetfoot released a sigh as she got up, clearly with her mind elsewhere.

“Alright,” she said as she stood up. “Come on Rivvey, let’s go,” she said as she spread her wings and hovered up, visibly in discomfort from her own injuries.

“Commander, are you—” Silver tried to ask out of courtesy but he didn’t get very far.

“Silver, I’m fine,” she quickly cut him off before she started flying away. Rivet spread his wings and followed.

“Rivvey?” he said to himself as he caught up behind her.

That left Silver, Dash, and Shine behind. Silver approached Shine, looking down at her carefully.

“A bad wing right?” he asked her. She didn’t reply, she just nodded. Without hesitation, Silver turned to Dash. “Help me put her on my back, we’re taking her to—”

“Don’t bother, I’ll just walk,” Shine said sharply as she stood and started walking, but Silver held out his arm and stopped her.

“Shine, get on my back,” he said sternly. Shine kept staring forward, focusing her eyes where the two couldn’t see them.

“Fine…” she gave up and turned to Silver. Silver bent down, but even then, Shine was quite small and had a hard time climbing up without the use of her wings. Dash reached forward and supported her as she slid up onto Silver’s back. “I’m sorry Silver,” Shine suddenly said right before Silver and Dash could take off. Dash nearly tripped over her front hooves as she stopped the forward motion. She stumbled slightly before looking back at Silver, who hadn’t budged, but also hadn’t so much as turned his head an inch towards Shine.

“About?” Silver asked, again without looking at her.

“You were right about us,” Shine sighed while letting the side of her head plop down on his shoulders in defeat. “We didn’t do anything.”

Silver glanced down, then at Dash. He didn’t approve of squad zero, but his bias towards the traditions of the Wonderbolts didn’t change the fact that squad zero had an impact on the battle.

“I was right and wrong,” Silver spoke up. Shine picked her head up and blinked as Dash listened intently. “I was right that you would be wild and unorganized. I commend you for trying to keep them in line, but Calm, Playbitz, and Swift were too eager to scrap. However,” he exhaled through his nose. “I was wrong too. I assumed you would all cower in the face of real danger and in the end not make much of a difference. You all held you ground, fought like Wonderbolts worthy of high tier elite status. Not to mention you got us all out of a bind early on in the battle,” Silver finally turned and looked at her. “Blazetail and Flashwind did a fine job training you guys, but you weren’t prepared for the enemy we faced, just like we weren’t. Your wingmates need to work on discipline, but… you all did well otherwise. Be proud of that, you sure as hell blew my expectations out of the water.”

“I…” Shine tried speaking, but nothing came to her.

“Relax, let’s fly you to the trainers and get you patched up,” Silver concluded as he spread his wings and took off.

Dash smiled wide as she took flight and followed right behind, quickly catching up and shifting beside them as Silver glided.

So was that how it looked from outside? Was that how amazing it was to see Silver be himself and influence others? He wasn’t a mentor to Shine like he was a mentor to her, but it didn’t stop him from giving wise words of encouragement. He even admitted that squad zero performed better than he expected. How much humility did it take to admit something like that after how much he had apparently opposed the whole thing? Silver was a crowning example of a complete pony. He may have been physically weakened in his age along with the wear and tear on his body for sticking with the Wonderbolt regiment for so long, but when it came to maturity and influence, Silver was without equal.

And Dash was beyond glad that she had several ponies she felt she could look to for guidance, because in the current situation, she didn’t know what she would do without them. There were a few, but specifically it was Silver and Soarin that primarily helped her feel at ease no matter what the scenario. If not for them here, she’d probably be having trouble.

Just… helping the injured. Seeing so many Wonderbolts beat up or grounded by their own pain was a tough site to take. Thankfully there had been no word of fatalities yet. The Wonderbolts were very tough ponies, and she was sure the Renegades made it in time before any could be killed. Dash shivered at the mere thought, forcefully pushing it from her head and let her mind go elsewhere as she surveyed the courtyard below them, examining the commotion below as several medical ponies, Wonderbolts and renegades flew about assisting the injured.

They passed by Bomber and Valkyrie soon after taking off as they carefully moved Calm back towards the compound.

Dash glanced to her left as they continued on and saw Bliss and the Renegade twins helping Playbitz get off the ground. He was in rough shape, movement clearly painful, and his suit was nearly torn to shreds having taken multiple magical explosions almost at point blank. Dash frowned as she saw Bliss lunge at him and hug him tightly after he got up. It looked painful, but after the hit Playbitz took, his wife had every reason to be incredibly relieved that he was okay.

Dash turned her head and looked past Silver to see Soarin and Air Mach gliding through the air while carrying Swift. It was hard to tell if he was hurt due to his super dark blue fur and his darkened Wonderbolt stealth suit more or less hiding them all, but Dash was sure he had multiple bruises. He had taken several eyebeams to the body as the blue Shadowbolt held him and a few others in his powerful telekinesis.

Dash also spotted Rivet and Fleetfoot as they continued their scan of the outer edges of the courtyard, stopping once or twice as they came across those in need of medical attention. Rivet would stay behind as Fleetfoot glided to find help.

In all, it just wasn’t a pretty sight. It didn’t help seeing her own squad hurt too, especially Squall. She had to check up on him later.

Dash had to get her mind elsewhere, again. She was already trying to not think about bad things and all she did was think about more bad things. Her instincts made her look towards Silver. And… despite the situation, Silver was smiling.

She didn’t blame him to be honest, his old, long lost friends showing up to save him and everything he cares about. That had to be quite a rush. Hell, it made him cry! She wanted to hear from him, just exactly how it felt and what he was currently thinking.

“So…” Dash spoke up, the out of place, jovial look upon her mentor’s face forcing a smirk onto hers.

“I don’t like it when you start like that…” Silver shook his head.

“Deal with it, I’m curious,” Dash chuckled.

“If I must…” Silver gave in.

“Tell me, what was it like seeing your old friends again after so long?” Dash went right for the kill. Silver remained quiet for a moment, his smile steadily and noticeably growing wider as Dash waited.

“It was quite possibly one of the most joyful moments of my life, right up there with the day I got married,” Silver described it.

“I have a hard time picturing you as joyful,” Dash snickered.

“Good, let’s keep it that way,” Silver added as he chuckled along with her. He looked back forward and released a long, content sigh. “Wonderbolts tend to up and disappear after they retire, becoming a shadow of their former glory, fading away as the newer and younger rise up to take their place. Having stuck it out as long as I have, I didn’t know where any of them went, much less how I could find them after my time’s finally up. I was more than certain that I would never see most of them ever again and I had come to terms with that. Suddenly being with them all again… all of their faces, all of their smiles, the way they instantly greeted me as if they never left, the memories of the best times of my life rushing back to me…” Silver looked down and nodded as his smile remained strong. “Let’s just say… I can’t remember the last time I cried like that. I was too happy to give a damn about you and the rest of the Wonderbolts watching me bawl my eyes out.”

Silver’s words made Dash’s skin tingle beneath her fur. If anypony deserved feeling on top of the world it was Silver. After all he’d experienced and all he had been through, seeing him in such a happy state made Dash feel so good.

“I guess you have a heart after all, you big softie,” she teased.

“Hey, what’s that?” Silver pointed behind her.

“Huh?” Dash turned her head, but saw nothing. “What are—,”

“It’s a distraction,” Silver interrupted her as he shoved his wing over her head and pushed her down.

“AH! Hey!” Dash quickly regained control of her flight and glared up towards Silver, but he was gone.

“Awareness.”

“WAHH!” Dash yelped and flinched as Silver’s voice came from the other side of her.

“You’re an ass,” Dash pouted at Silver while lifting an eyebrow at him. Silver only smirked as the two looked towards Shine on Silver’s back as she suddenly giggled.

“You two crack me up…” she said weakly, still dealing with the pain in her wing.

“Alright, enough shenanigans before I drop her by accident,” Silver chuckled as the two drew near the compound, spotting Spitfire right outside the doors to the lobby, helping direct the medical teams in and out of the compound as the wounded arrived.

There were a good number of Wonderbolts gathering nearby as well, organized in their squads. A few were missing members due to injuries. Most notably, squads three and seven were standing closest to Spitfire. Surprise was missing from squad three. The Streak twins and Misty were all a little battle damaged, but they were capable of flight. From what Dash heard, Surprise had taken a hit similar to Calm from the magic sword. It was just a little terrifying to know that Surprise wasn’t able to elude injury with her antics. Then again, Twister hadn’t escaped completely unscathed either, despite looking less hurt than most. It seemed that not even a silly pony could evade the unknown nature of the new Shadowbolts’ abilities.

Squad seven was missing Point Dex. Storm, Macho Savage, and Lead Runner were standing right behind squad three. Dash didn’t quite know the specifics of the other squads present, but it looked like very few of them had all of their members present.

As Dash and Silver landed and passed Shine Struck off to the medical staff, Spitfire turned towards the gathered Wonderbolts.

“Listen up!” she called them to attention, all of them turning and facing her quickly, squads three and seven standing front and center as Fire prepared to translate for Misty. “We’re all just scattered out there right now,” she pointed out into the courtyard where any Wonderbolts not present before her were flying about and helping the medical staff with the Renegades. “We need a more efficient search. I can’t shake the possibility that we might miss somepony. I don’t want any MIA Wonderbolts after a fight that took place right in our own courtyard. How many squads do we have here?” she paused as she hovered up and looked over the top of Fire as he made his wing and hoof signals to Misty, who was nodding in response. “One, two, three, four, five, six…” Spitfire counted off the squads present. “Nine squads? We don’t have every member, but it should still work,” she mumbled to herself before floating back down and continuing. “I want a spread out, aerial sweep of the entire courtyard. Organize yourselves by squad number and comb your sections up and down at least five times. The whole front lawn is pretty torn up and damaged so if you see anything and I mean ANYTHING that looks out of place or may have somepony hurt out of sight, CHECK IT!” she emphasized it sternly. “When you finish your patrol run, report to me, Soarin, or Fleetfoot, even if you found nothing. We have to know we’ve thoroughly searched everywhere. Understood?!”

“YES MA’AM!” the squads all saluted and began taking off. Storm glanced towards Dash and Silver briefly before taking flight with Lead Runner and Savage. Squad three followed close behind the rest once Fire finished relaying everything to Misty.

“No stone unturned, eh?” Soarin’s voice came from above Dash as he and Air Mach slowly hovered in with Swift Justice in tow. Spitfire nodded, watching the squads reach a high point above the courtyard to begin their sweeps.

“I can’t take any chances,” Spitfire replied as Soarin and Air Mach passed off Swift to Bliss’ staff. “I’m responsible for all of them, even if…” she trailed off.

“Let’s not think about that unless it happens,” Soarin quickly cut her off as he and Air Mach approached her.

“The Wonderbolts aren’t so fragile!” Air Mach pounded his chest as Fleetfoot and Rivet landed nearby. Fleetfoot turned towards the rest of the lead squad as Rivet followed after Swift and Shine as the medical staff moved them into the compound. “You can bet on that!” Air Mach continued. “A couple of magic pumped freak shows ain’t enough to take us down!”

“One of them almost killed SOARIN in the past,” Fleetfoot said as she approached and huffed at Air Mach, not too amused by his usual nature still active in a rather serious scenario. “I don’t doubt we’re tough, but it’s stupid to take them lightly,” she said sternly to Air Mach, who tipped his glasses down and looked at her with an eyebrow raised.

“Anything to report?” Spitfire asked Fleetfoot, nearly pushing Soarin aside to get to her. Soarin didn’t fight back, he understood the situation they were in and Spitfire had every right to be a little frantic and concerned. It was the safety and wellbeing of the Wonderbolts they were talking about. Spitfire was responsible for all of them, and it was something she approached with the same passion as a mother looking after her children.

“Nope,” Fleetfoot shook her head. “Rivet and I scanned the whole outer wall. If anypony else was thrown past it they’re definitely not close by.”

“Rgh…” Spitfire turned around and began slowly pacing back and forth. “We’re going to need a full roll call after we get everypony in here and finish our sweeps. If there are any missing, we’ll have to get the royal guard to search the surrounding area, we can’t afford to have anypony off-site right now.”

“That would be wise,” Descent’s low voice suddenly came from above. The lead squad all looked up to see Descent floating down towards them with Starry Skies, Lightning Dust, Blazetail, Flashwind, and Princess Luna all in tow. “We must prepare for what’s to come and believe me, you can’t afford to focus on anything else,” he said as Luna stepped forward.

“Indeed,” she nodded. “With what’s sure to happen now, we must be ready.”

Off to the side, Silver and Dash glanced at each other.

“Looks like we’re about to get the full rundown,” Dash said as the two started walking towards them to join.

“It’s about DAMN time…” Silver scoffed as they approached.

Dash walked up beside Soarin, gently leaning into him as Luna prepared to explain. He stole a brief glance at her, smiled, and gently returned the lean to acknowledge her before they all turned their attention to Luna and the Renegades.

“So how about you start from the top?” Spitfire suggested while narrowing her eyes at Luna. “And don’t leave a single detail out because you’re gonna need everything you can get to convince me I should trust you after this.”

Luna stared down at Spitfire, but did not glare, nor scowl. She understood Spitfire’s frustration well.

“This all began much further back than you may realize…” Luna began as the Wonderbolts all listened with anticipation. “About a year ago to be precise. On a day that most of you here are very familiar with… the tornado crisis in Ponyville.”

“I had a feeling that’s what you meant,” Soarin nodded as he and Descent glanced at each other. Dash watched as the two exchanged looks, remembering it like it was yesterday. She could clearly recall the sight of Descent and Soarin grappling as the strong winds from the tornado surrounding them battered against them. Descent snarling and roaring in Soarin’s face as Soarin growled and pushed back against him before Dash flew in… intercepted Descent… pushed him into the dense thundercloud and…

Soarin blinked and glanced over as Dash suddenly shivered sharply. Without even asking, he draped a wing over her, knowing full well that the tornado incident was a very unpleasant memory for all of them.

“Specifically, it was right after,” Luna confirmed. “When we arrived with our sister in the hospital to save Soarin. Dost thou remember what our sister said before we began?” Luna looked at Fleetfoot, Spitfire, and Dash. The three of them glanced between each other before Fleetfoot shook her head.

“I remember you yelling in Celestia’s face about using the dark magic on Soarin, followed by a freaky light show, but…” Fleetfoot looked between Spitfire and Dash, they both shook their heads as well. “What exactly did she say again?”

Luna nodded and looked down, taking a long deep breath and exhaling. She completely understood why they had forgotten. The whole situation a year ago in the hospital was focused around saving Soarin’s life. All the explaining Celestia did beforehoof was easily pushed aside by everypony’s desire to know one thing: if she could restore him.

“The very reason that our sister decided to use the magic, and put Soarin’s life back into motion…” she looked back up at them. “Her premonition.”

Spitfire and Dash blinked for a moment before Dash’s ears perked up.

“Oh! Wait… I think I remember her talking about it… about making sure Soarin was alive because… she saw the future and he was in it? I remember it being something strange like that.” Dash relayed to the rest of them.

“Strange indeed,” Luna agreed. “Because Soarin would have died that day… yet he was seen in a vision of things to come. Hence why my sister felt inclined to break many of our rules… but this is all beside the point,” Luna pushed aside her discontent for her sister’s decisions. “What truly frightened us… was the conflict she described in her vision.” Luna turned away from them and began pacing back and forth. The Wonderbolts watched her as she moved, gathering her words to make sure she left absolutely nothing out.

“We were able to pry more from her before she began her long rest. What we were told was quite troubling,” she stopped pacing and faced them again. “The Wonderbolts locked in a large scale conflict with shadowy counterparts… fighting erupting across the land, plunging Equestria into the heart of a war waged by an enemy none can even see or identify. The citizens of Equestria are driven into mass panic, their peaceful lives broken as a war rages in the skies above. Celestia saw more than just the Wonderbolts, other military factions getting involved: the Royal Guard, the Crystal Army, mercenaries, other species… all fighting against something that even we the divine alicorn sisters could not hope to stop due to the unknown nature of the true villain. It was something we couldn’t stand to hear and couldn’t bear to imagine…” Luna bit her lip and squinted. “And then before we could ask further, our sister began her rest… her power manifesting in the castle as her physical form disappeared. She left us alone to dread the future conflict without her to comfort us.”

Luna paused for a long time to let it all sink in. Silver, Dash, Spitfire, Soarin, Fleetfoot, and Air Mach were all at a loss for words, their mouths agape as they took in all the information. This was another case where it was hard to comprehend the inner workings of the divine alicorns and how they could see what they saw and do what they do, but once those thoughts were aside, Soarin found himself curious.

“Hold on, I heard everything about the premonition loud and clear, but what was that you said at the end? About Celestia’ physical form disappearing? Is that why we haven’t seen her? Where is she?” he asked all at once. Luna nodded.

“She shed her physical form in order for her power to fully re-manifest itself,” Luna explained. “She used enough of her divine life force to kill a normal pony twelve times over when she cast the spell to restore you. To be quite honest, even with the help from Captain Spitfire and Rainbow Dash, we’re surprised she didn’t destroy herself. Her power is within the castle itself, waiting for her return,” Luna paused and sighed. “However, something was wrong. Before casting the spell, my sister assured us all that she’d only be out of commission for two months at most, and we rested easy knowing that she’d be back and we could focus on what was to come. But then two months passed… and now a whole year… and she has yet to return,” Luna shook her head.

“We began to panic after three months went by. Something felt wrong, as if there was something very important that we failed to ask or our sister failed to… or maybe purposely didn’t tell us. Another risk to her? Something that would cause her to be longer than expected? We did not know, and with the premonition fresh in our head, we began frantically searching for answers,” she turned her head towards Descent. “Then the encounter in Canterlot happened half a year ago. Chaos in the streets as a lone Shadowbolt ran rampant through the city, enhanced by the power of magic unknown to us. When Silver Lining came to warn us, we feared that the conflict had begun and rushed out to meet them, only to lose Commander Soarin and Rainbow Dash. We rescued you later with the help of Discord and things continued without fighting… but the sudden nature of the attack made us worry even further…” she turned back to Spitfire. “And that is where our plans were set into motion…”

“Yes, please go on…” Spitfire said sharply while tapping her hoof impatiently. The reasoning was all fine and dandy, but Spitfire had yet to hear why Luna kept them out of it and she was growing impatient. Luna could tell it’s what Spitfire wanted, and she wasted no time in continuing.

“The attack on the Wonderbolt compound… and the attempt to capture Soarin while he was imbued with the powerful dark magic. It put us in a state of panic. Something was happening, and something was going to happen. Celestia’s premonition would come to pass and we didn’t know how to handle it… so we made a decision… a decision I now fear was ultimately unsuccessful…” she paused. “To prevent the conflict from ever happening.”

“Hmph…” Silver grunted, catching Dash’s attention. “Playing with fate… I never liked the gods…” he mumbled.

“But how to do it?” Luna continued. “This was our dilemma. Naturally, in order to stop an enemy we needed a strong force… but there was a problem with the Wonderbolts that we could not ignore.”

“I’m listening,” Spitfire continued to tap her hoof.

“The public eye,” Luna stated followed by a short pause. “The Wonderbolts are an icon, quite possibly the most symbolic and famous group of ponies. They are both inspirations and role models, rarely ever out of the eyes of the media… and this is where we saw a potential disaster.” Luna stepped away from them and stared out at Canterlot. “As our sister said… Equestria is a safe haven. The only kingdom ruled by divine entities. The ponies live without worry, in a dream land that’s safe from all the political clashes and wars that go on outside the borders. We have had a crisis or two, our own attack while possessed, Discord’s second coming, the changelings… all were handled and taken down, but not without mass panic and paranoia from the public both during and for a while afterward. Many were hurt when it could have been avoided simply because of the mass chaos these events caused in the general public of the area attacked. If the Wonderbolts were suddenly drawn into a conflict, surely it wouldn’t just be Canterlot… all of Equestria would be tipped off within days. I couldn’t stand to think of how many innocents could be sucked into the confusion purely by accident.”

Luna paused to look them all over. They were all listening, but Spitfire looked like she already disapproved. Luna wasn’t expecting Spitfire to be happy with her, but she continued regardless.

“So what were our options? We examined the report of the Shadowbolt encounters carefully and something caught our eye… the second and third in command of the Shadowbolts deserting. After digging for some information we found that several Shadowbolts had deserted Nightshade, not just after their flying compound was destroyed either. It had been occurring for months, most likely due to Nightshade being controlled by who we believe may be the unknown enemy that was in Celestia’s premonition.

“Kayn Ost,” Soarin repeated the name he hadn’t heard in a while. Luna nodded.

“Correct. The one pulling Nightshade’s strings. We regret to say that we still know nothing of him. Anyway, we saw an opportunity with Descent. We kept a close eye on him and watched how he pulled together the Shadowbolts who had left their old, corrupt captain behind. The Shadowbolts had worked under the noses of the media, the Wonderbolts, and the Canterlot royals for almost a century. They expressed qualities of those who lived outside of Equestria, outside of the perfect world, we felt that with their help, we could quell the threat before it ever began… nopony would ever know about it… no Equestrian citizens would come to harm… and the Wonderbolts could go on with their daily routines, allowing Soarin to focus on controlling the power that caused Celestia’s absence.”

“I was quick to accept,” Descent stepped forward, taking over. “My goal was to restore the Shadowbolts to their former glory, to take back my family and all those who are still under the grip of that faceless Kayn Ost coward who hides in the shadows that we used to be the masters of. My brothers and sisters share my desire to restore our greatness… but even with our superior numbers, those we tracked down and those we were able to convince away from the crystals… Kayn Ost has made the Shadowbolts under his control stronger, and has given them access to great magical prowess as you witnessed. We needed help… and I knew exactly where to look,” Descent turned to Blazetail and Flashwind for a moment before turning back.

“It is important to know your enemies well… and back before we left the Shadowbolts, I had done a great deal of research on the Wonderbolts. The one thing that stood out to me more than anything else was the Wonderbolts’… incredibly idiotic practice of ejecting the old from their ranks in favor of the new,” he put heavy emphasis on ‘idiotic’ making all the Wonderbolts wince uncomfortably, save for Silver, who couldn’t have agreed with him more. “The perfect mix of strength, speed, and youth seems to be what the Wonderbolts believe is required to be the best… but that’s far from wise. I couldn’t believe some of the names I saw on the list of recently retired Wonderbolts. The very same Wonderbolts I read about in records of being peerless fighters or incredibly talented. They were all thrown out far before their time was up… so I took a chance and met with these two,” he made a head motion towards Blazetail and Flashwind.

“Took a chance is right,” Blazetail chuckled. “I’d call it damn ballsy, walking up to us in the middle of Canterlot during the day, wearing the uniform and everything with that scarred up face of yours for good measure. I liked you the moment you looked me in the eye.”

“I admit,” Flashwind took over. “If any of the retired Wonderbolts should be retired, it’s the two of us… but when we mentioned flying and fighting again… well…” she giggled.

“I was asking for a uniform before he even finished!” Blazetail chuckled.

“With their help,” Descent continued. “I was able to contact and recruit several old Wonderbolts, all who were beyond eager to suit up and fly like they used to…” Descent glared at Spitfire. “I implore you to rethink your moronic code… do you want to know where I found half of your retired wingmates? Drinking themselves under the table or isolating themselves from all contact, ashamed and bitter about what was taken from them long before their time.”

“We’ll talk about who’s right and wrong later,” Spitfire said sternly as she glared back at Descent. "I’m still waiting to be convinced that this was all for the best,” she hissed.

“We’ll get to that,” Descent fearlessly snapped back at her before continuing. “Luna’s plan was a stretch, and one that I didn’t fully agree with, but she was helping us as much as we were helping her. We had the old Wonderbolts joined into our ranks, but having Blazetail and Flashwind was by far the largest boon. Unlike the others, they were still frequent visitors of the compound. With them always walking about, we had easy access to all of your whereabouts and inner workings. More specifically, we would know if you were doing anything that may conflict with our plans. With the Wonderbolts thoroughly left in the dark… we were able to engage the enemy. However, the more we fought the Shadowbolts, the more it seemed they were less interested in dealing with us, and more interested in another goal. So we left them alone for a short period and watched them carefully… and they eventually led us directly to Canterlot, right to the Wonderbolt compound…”

Descent paused and looked towards Soarin, specifically at the horn. Soarin growled and shook his head.

“It’s me again isn’t it?” Soarin spoke up. “Just like before, they want me and the magic in me…”

“That is the best assumption we have,” Descent nodded. “Those are orders I carried out myself before I decided I had had enough. However, this was another boon for us. We now knew their target… so that made it easier to both find them and fight them off. With the flying compound destroyed, they rely on the crystals to teleport. The teleport magic is loud, bright, and takes a moment to charge, making it impossible for them to simply appear in the compound without risking capture. They were forced to teleport to areas outside of Canterlot and make their way in. It made our job easy, surrounding the compound every night and easily picking them off as they tried to approach,” he sighed and looked towards Soarin. Blazetail suddenly grunted as he too looked towards Soarin and Dash.

“You almost gave us a heart attack the night you and your mare decided to sit on a cloud for an hour. Son, you’re lucky they didn’t try to attack that night.”

“Not to mention the party after the recruitment ceremony,” Flashwind spoke up. “That was a stressful night for us.”

Soarin and Dash blinked, staring at each other in disbelief.

“Wait…” Dash pointed at Descent. “Are you saying that every single night I’ve been here… the Renegades have been outside keeping watch and none of us ever knew?!”

“That is correct,” Descent nodded. “Specifically, the old Wonderbolts have been in charge of watching over the compound. Starry Skies, Lightning Dust, and I have been patrolling outside of Canterlot with our fellow deserters, taking the fight to them whenever we could. We felt the older Wonderbolts were better suited for the guard duty around the compound. After all, should something happen, they are much more familiar with the inner workings of the compound than we and the former Shadowbolts are.”

“So is it safe for me to assume…” Soarin spoke up. “That every single time I’ve been away from the compound, you guys have been stalking me?” he paused as Descent simply nodded. “That’s great… that explains the encounters with the Renegades at shows and outside of the compound.”

“That doesn’t explain why other squads encountered them though,” Fleetfoot added. “We had multiple squads report you guys sneaking around near them. What gives?” she asked.

“You should be glad we did,” Starry suddenly scoffed. “Faulty information is the only reason some of you are still alive,” she said sharply before going back to more or less ignoring everything that was being said. Flashwind nodded and laughed sheepishly.

“We misread the schedule one day… and I ended up leading a group out with the intention of watching over Soarin, but it ended up being squad four and five going to a charity event, not the lead squad heading for a show. But… the Shadowbolts began appearing anyway, and if we weren’t there to stop them, they would have attacked. In short, we were lucky to be there… it was the first time they had made moves to attack other Wonderbolts, and after I reported this to Descent, we decided to watch the other squads as they left.”

“The Shadowbolts’ second goal became clear,” Descent took over. “They want Soarin, but they also want to take out the Wonderbolts. We are not yet sure of the reasons, and we’re still contemplating if it was meant to lessen our numbers against them by distracting us… but either way, it was more than just Soarin in danger.”

“And THAT…” Luna sighed. “Was when they began to step outside of my orders,” she said with a grunt of disapproval.

“We risked being exposed with our extra actions, yes,” Descent said while looking towards Luna. “But I felt it was necessary, and part of our contract with Luna was that we would not hesitate to take extra measures if needed,” he turned and looked at Blazetail and Flashwind. “We were faced with an interesting case. We believed the Shadowbolts were keeping up their covert attempts because the Wonderbolts were completely unaware of them. So if we could keep it that way, it would be easy to keep repelling them, however…” he emphasized while glancing back at the Wonderbolts briefly before returning his eyes to the old captains. “The Wonderbolts are perceptive. We knew it was only a matter of time before one of them discovered what was going on… so…” Descent made a hoof motion to Blazetail. He nodded as he smirked.

“Heh… well, from the beginning the two of us had extra plans,” Blazetail chuckled while glancing at his wife. “We coordinated a few planned encounters where we would purposely reveal ourselves to the Wonderbolts. We wanted them to focus on us and believe we were Shadowbolts while we worked to keep the real Shadowbolts at bay. Luna didn’t like it, and even Descent thought it was a bit risky, but hey…” Blazetail shrugged. “It worked. You were so worried about us that the Shadowbolts continued to attempt their covert operations.”

“I’ve had a hell of a time keeping track of these two,” Descent huffed as he looked between Blazetail and Flashwind. “I didn’t even know about this… ‘squad zero’ they were putting together for you until a few days ago,” Descent rolled his eyes.

“That’s why you funded it…” Silver shook his head as he looked between Blazetail and Flashwind. “I thought for sure you would oppose it.”

“We thought it would be a good emergency valve,” Flashwind took over. “A small force that could repel magic as we eventually learned to. We masked it as an experimental combat squad to gain support from other current Wonderbolts. Unfortunately, we were only able to train with them twice a week… so their progress in learning the magic deflecting techniques was slow… and…”

She paused as they all looked off to the side. Bomber and Valkyrie had finally made it back from across the courtyard with Calm and Pixie, Fairy, and Bliss were close behind with Playbitz. Flashwind sighed.

“Ultimately, they were not ready,” she finished with a frown. Blazetail put a hoof on her shoulder before taking over.

“Anyway… everything seemed fine. We were keeping them out, keeping you unaware, and slowly working towards a solution of how to find them and defeat them… but…” Blazetail suddenly growled, he removed his hoof from his wife’s shoulder and sharply turned around. Flashwind frowned and turned towards him, rubbing his back softly as if trying to calm him down. Lightning Dust stepped forward, glancing at Descent as he nodded to her, giving her the go ahead to explain.

“About a week or two ago…” she began. “A certain Shadowbolt developed his magic, creating a technique that made him nearly impossible to detect.”

She didn’t even have to say it. All of them knew exactly who she was talking about.

“Rapidfire…” Dash said his name, flinching when another loud grunt came from Blazetail.

“Yep,” Dust nodded. “He figured out a way to manipulate the magic of the crystals in a way that completely alters his physical appearance down to the finest details, which allowed him to take the form of any pony he wished. It’s not just a simple image. It’s solid and sturdy, holding up until given a few good whacks. It’s a perfect image. He could disguise himself as Bomber and would appear just as large. Thankfully he only copies the appearance, not the abilities. He infiltrated a group of our ranks not too long ago and threw them into a panic, leaving them open to attack and allowing one of the Shadowbolt captains to surprise them… and kill them.”

She paused as it sunk in.

“That… despicable…” Blazetail ground his teeth together.

“Honey…” Flashwind clutched his shoulder. Soarin shook his head.

“Completely undetected and a perfect image to sneak around in…” Soarin growled. “’The Artist’ indeed…” Soarin sighted Rapidfire’s old nickname as a member of the lead squad. “Figures he’d find out the most complicated ways to manipulate the magic.”

“DON’T call him that!” Blazetail suddenly turned, glared at Soarin, and stomped, forcing Flashwind to let go of him. “Any names or honors he earned as a Wonderbolt no longer exist!” he snarled. “That ungrateful son of mine had incredible talent and a clear road to an opportunity most can only dream of… AND WHAT DID HE DO?!” Blazetail was enraged. Flashwind tried to hold him back.

“Blazetail, calm down! He’s been led astray, but he’s still our son…” she tried to ease him. Blazetail shot her a nasty glare before scoffing sharply, his tail whipping once before he turned around and started walking away.

“I don’t have a son…” he said in a tone that was filled with anger, but it failed to hide a faint choked up tone that was barely audible in the back of his voice. Before Flashwind could stop him, he took off and flew out towards the courtyard. She sighed and shook her head before turning back to the rest of them.

Soarin and Dash glanced at each other after witnessing the little scene that erupted alongside the long explanation. Blazetail and Flashwind were Rapidfire’s parents. They knew this, but they had yet to ever see how they felt about the situation with their son. Blazetail’s harsh reaction to the mere mention of his son was understandable, but the way Flashwind tried to defend Rapidfire and the very slight evidence of regret in Blazetail’s voice made them look at it a little differently. Perhaps there was more than one motivation for them joining up with the Renegades. Descent was trying to get the Shadowbolts back… perhaps Blazetail and Flashwind were trying to get their son back?

“Rapidfire added a whole new danger to the formula,” Descent took over, bringing the focus back to him. “With this new development in his magic, there was nothing to stop him from walking right into the compound. So… against Luna’s concerns, we decided to let the old Wonderbolts have a little fun with their old friends,” Descent chuckled. “We had them all expose themselves in a large group, and play a game of tag. I had faith in them not being caught because they knew all of your moves, tactics, and maneuvers. Cannon Ball almost got himself caught, not to mention he almost hurt one of you two which was strictly against my orders, but they still performed admirably… and proved that they can still handle themselves,” Descent looked directly at Spitfire as if trying to drive home his point about changing the Wonderbolt code. “It had the exact effect that we wanted. You became paranoid… but not paranoid enough, which is why we had Comet walk right in through the front door.”

“And then Rapidfire appeared the next day,” Fleetfoot added on the end. “Wow, we’ve been played HARD.”

“We knew the Shadowbolts were planning an attack, but we didn’t want to break the advantage we had. They were still under the impression that the Wonderbolts and the Renegades were not in contact, so they sent a small force…”

“SMALL?!” Dash blurted out. All eyes went to her. She blinked and quickly stepped back. “Sorry, right… the magic clones… but… how many of them are there in full?”

“I’ll get to that after,” Descent nodded. “They didn’t feel the need to send their full force out, probably because they didn’t know where we were or if we knew their whereabouts. They aren’t mindless, that’s for sure. Unfortunately, they were right. The small force was all they needed because the Wonderbolts did not know how to fight against them, which forced us to act. And that I fear, has called off all the bets and tricks. The next time they strike, with us in the picture beside you, will be without any holding back. We have yet to see their full force, so we can’t tell you what to expect. But they will be sending everything they have at us for sure.”

“So here we are! Woo!” Starry Skies added sarcastically.

The Wonderbolts remained silent as they stared between Descent and Luna. Dash fell onto her plot and groaned as she rubbed her forehead.

“You alright?” Soarin asked her as she shook her head.

“That was A LOT to absorb all at once, and we haven’t even gotten to who we’re fighting or the ‘what comes next’ part,” Dash complained as she sighed.

“Leave it to me!” Air Mach suddenly pounded his chest, drawing Dash’s attention. “Animak’s short version! Luna wanted to avoid drawing Equestria into a mass conflict! She hired the Renegades to solve it before it happened! They’ve worked behind the scenes and kept us from being hurt! Rapidfire ruined it! Everything happened like Celestia said anyway! How was that?” he hovered up and crossed his arms while bopping his head up and down.

A quiet growl from Spitfire drew their attention to her. She began walking towards Luna, pushing right past Descent as she did.

“Air Mach… all I needed to hear from you was… ‘IT DIDN’T WORK.’” she said very sternly as she stopped in front of Luna. “Princess, keeping all of this from us was the dumbest thing you could have done. You can’t solve problems by dancing around them. You should have joined the Renegades with us and together we would take on the Shadowbolts. All you’ve done here is cause mass confusion, panic. Several of my Wonderbolts are now heavily injured and everything ended up coming to pass anyway!” Spitfire was yelling as she rose up and got directly into Luna’s face.

Luna glared back at her, not giving an inch despite Spitfire’s fury.

“We did what we felt was right. Celestia’s premonitions have always come to pass, but she has never told us about them until this one. We felt that with the knowledge, we’d be able to effectively stop it from occurring. Changing the future we saw for the better…”

“Fat load of good it did!” Spitfire threw her arms out.

“We are AWARE, Captain Spitfire,” Luna hissed, pushing her face forward towards Spitfire’s. “You don’t need to remind us of our failures as we acknowledge them!”

“Sorry if I’m not sympathetic towards you LUNA…” Spitfire growled, dropping the title from Luna’s name. “I’m angry at your poor choice of how to handle this! Nearly half of our elites are down because we didn’t know what we were up against… Something you could have prevented and…”

“YOU WILL BE SILENT!” Luna suddenly floored everypony with the Royal Canterlot Voice. Spitfire was blown a few yards back by the voice as Soarin, Air Mach, Dash, and Fleetfoot all fell backwards, Silver holding his ground as usual. “I did what I felt was right! I made a judgment call!” Luna belted while dropping her usual royal speech and speaking about herself in the first person. “I decided to do things this way, thinking that it was for the best, and that we could avert a WAR. And you know what? It was the WRONG choice! I was wrong to try and change Celestia’s vision of the future!”

Luna pulled back and took a deep breath, exhaling for a long time before looking Spitfire directly in the eyes. The rest of the ponies as well as several of those moving about were all staring in at Luna.

“I was wrong to keep you all in the dark… I went ahead and took things into my own hooves… and in the end, nothing changed and ponies got hurt because of it…” she narrowed her eyes into a stern glare. “And… I’m not the only leader here… who’s guilty of doing that.”

Spitfire’s eyes widened and her wings stopped flapping. Everything went completely silent as Spitfire gently plopped back down on the ground and stared up at Luna with her ears folded back and her expression completely flipping from anger to dread as Luna dropped a painful reminder on her.

“Ouch…” Soarin said quietly as he watched Spitfire become completely subdued. Luna was right. She made a choice to keep them in the dark as she took things into her own hooves… and it failed. It was no different than what Spitfire had done in Cloudsdale. Spitfire could have easily argued that it would have never happened had Luna not done it first, but at that point she would just be pointing hooves.

She was just as guilty of it as Luna… only Luna openly admitted it was wrong without hesitation or contemplation right after. So Spitfire found her urge to fight the subject slowly fading.

Perhaps Luna’s decision was the wrong decision, but her reasons for doing so were in the interest of everypony involved. It wasn’t the time to argue, and it wasn’t the time to blame. If everything that was said was true… then they had more important things to attend to.

“Princess Luna…” Spitfire looked up at her. Her resolve and hardened expression had returned. “I appreciate your attempt to prevent what’s to come. It gave me a few dozen grey hairs, but I can see what you were trying to do,” she turned to Descent. “But now that we’re all here together it’s time to take action…”

Dash and Soarin watched as Spitfire approached Descent and the two leaders looked themselves in the eyes. Wonderbolt and Shadowbolt. Former Shadowbolt to be precise, but it was a symbolic moment nonetheless. Spitfire reached her hoof forward.

“We’re going to need everypony we can get,” she nodded. “Never thought I’d be doing this… but, I officially ask for your cooperation as an ally. What say you?”

Descent looked at her hoof for a moment… and then chuckled.

“What a strange world we live in. We try to kill you and a year later we become allies,” he reached up and clasped his hoof with Spitfire’s the two shaking hooves. “The Renegades will fight beside you.”

Rainbow Dash gulped. It was beyond incredible to watch Spitfire and Descent agree to help each other… but at the same time, what manner of enemy were they facing if it meant two forces of incredibly skilled warriors had to band together to stand a chance? Dash had a feeling she’d know very soon, because no sooner did the two finish their hoof shake did they begin discussing the new enemy…

The new Shadowbolts.

---To Be Continued---

Author's Note:

Oooh ouch... Luna bringing the boom on that one. So looks like she was trying to prevent the future that Celestia saw way back in Head in the Clouds... and tried to do so behind the scenes, in the end it didn't work and caused problems... but hey... like she said, she's not the only leading figure guilty of that... eh spitfire?

We finally get to see how Blazetail and Flashwind feel about their son... it seems that Blazetail is in denial and Flashwind just wants her little colt back. it seems the renegades have many reasons for fighting, some joint, some personal.

Sorry if this was a bit of an apbrupt cut off, there was no way i was going to fit the rest of my originally planned chapter in here, so chapter 91 (which im already working on) will kick off immediately from where this one left off after the hoof shake.

Also ouch... Squall... that's gonna leave a scar...

And good lord, Valkyrie is strong

Thanks for reading! i hope you enjoyed!

(Also Kestrel is back to editing! )

Comments

[Aelflonra]

(This Chapter was edited by Lucky424)

Eh didn't you say Kestrel was looking at it?..

[Calm Wind]

6040028

oops i forgot to remove that *fixed*

[Kestrel]

Very nice. It's about time we learned some stuff in this story

[BlabideeblahMLP]

Brb gotta hold a funeral for Squall's facial features.

[Laveria Dreams]

Oh God...I'll admit I saw some of this coming...plus, I personally think Luna made more mistakes...

Sheesh, I need to go absorb this for, IDK, the next hour!!!

[NyOs29]

Sounds like Celestia's vision was a fixed event; in otherwords nothing Luna did would've prevented what came to pass.

[Jim Hoxworth]

...Excuse me while I go pick my jaw off the floor. ...I mean, I knew what was on the way, but I didn't know just how deep the rabbit hole went.

[WildStallion]

Crazy. Though honestly, if I was in Spifires position it will take a long time for me to trust Luna ever again.

And Rivet not being affected by Fleet, that's new. And Calm, met a mare that's even stronger then him.

[Godleon]

its ok Squall! scars are sexy!

another amazing chapter! been so eager for it!

[Calm Wind]

6040036

haha so much mystery

[Calm Wind]

6040077

If the character he's based on is any indication, the mares will still think he's sexy

[Calm Wind]

6040095

oh believe me, Luna made far more mistakes than Spitfire, but the nature in which she tried to handle things was very similar to a blunder Spitfire herself had made. Now i wonder what Luna intends to do to make up for it?

[The Forgotten Comrade]

He was already up and flying around despite the endless beating her took from the pin sized magic bolts.

he

“Where else where you…” Matteo stopped

were

I'm more interested in what Squall's gonna be like now. Will the scars affect his self image, his confidence and his love for Star. Forget Shadowbolts give me Squall!

[Calm Wind]

6040108

Celestia's premonitions always came true... Luna just didn't want to believe it

[Calm Wind]

6040114

oh it totally started some 900K words ago

[Jim Hoxworth]

6040180
You really drove us nuts with this one. My hat is off to you, man, and I can't wait for the next one.

6040036
Also, welcome back, Kestrel. Hopefully, Fleetfoot wasn't too rough with Rivet this chapter.

[Calm Wind]

6040160

there will definitely be some trust issues, but at least everypony is on the same page now

Rivet has accepted that Fleet's gonna get him no matter what he tries And indeed... Valkyrie is quite strong. (Not to mention Calm also got called 'little' by bomber )

[Jim Hoxworth]

6040191 Wait a minute. 900k?!?!? You had this planned since Head in the Clouds?!?!

[Laveria Dreams]

6040186

Hmmm...so do I...

[Calm Wind]

6040187

Hehe Squallis alive and well and while it's definitely going to leave a scar, it may not mess up his face (in face it might do just the opposite )

[Azure_Shadow]

Things are starting to get good! Plot is finally happening! Woo hoo!! I'm excited to see what happens.

[NyOs29]

It seems to me that the reason Kayn Ost want the Wonderbolts dead is that one of those Wonderbolts is the only one keeping Soarin's dark magic restrained but as he/she/it doesn't know which one.

[Calm Wind]

6040192

glad you enjoyed it!

[Calm Wind]

6040199

haha well no not exactly. Thats an interesting story in itself.

The premonition in head in the clouds was supposed to be something else entirely, but my whole plan for the timeline changed after i decided to write Flying Sky High for a contest, pushing everything in a much different direction. When i outlined Piercing the heavens, the original plan i had was long gone, but the whole premonition and seeing soarin alive and fighting in the future worked perfectly into the new timeline

[Calm Wind]

6040212

WE READ FOR THE PLOT

[Calm Wind]

6040214

oh there's more to it than that

[Sadyeehaw]

Poor Squall, I was shivering when I read what happened, I hate my habit of imagining a scene to every single little detail, because once I imagine something it takes ages to get that image out of my head
Geez Luna thanks for that tid bit of information that would have been much more useful EARLIER!! But then that would have meant this story would have had less chapters, so honestly thanks
And Spitfire, that name is so fitting at times, but unfortunately you are gonna have to live with the fact that some ponies will deflect the fire back at you, in other words:
Feel the burn!!
Wonderbolts and Shadowbolts together, hmm...Shonderbolts or Wadowbolts?

[Jim Hoxworth]

6040222
It worked out pretty well, it seems.
Did your original plan have something to do with the group of six stallions you were setting up?

[Easyglider]

“Val, Big Green,” Silver called to Valkyrie and Bomber.

https://youtu.be/CCt58nrgvD8?t=18s

Hold up.

“Wonderbolts tend to up and disappear after they retire, becoming a shadow of their former glory, fading away as the newer and younger rise up to take their place.

“Wonderbolts tend to up and disappear after they retire, becoming a shadow of their former glory,

Wonderbolts tend to up and disappear after they retire, becoming a shadow

they retire, becoming a shadow

Wonderbolts

becoming a shadow

bolts

shadow

i.imgur.com/QS9Pre2.gif

Not really much else to say since Luna came in and shot her knowledge all over our faces(Quagmire.jpeg), other than my friendly reminder to Calm that I'm still working on something(s) for you....

[Calm Wind]

6040245

haha indeed Spitfire got that one handed right back to her

and i hear ya, it was hard to write Squall under such pain like that

[Calm Wind]

6040253

It was going to be a final fantasy crossover called warriors of harmoney, where the elements of harmony acted like the crystals, granting each of them skills (And Soarin was going to be a dark knight due to the dark power) But like i said, that got chucked out the window xD now i hav no idea how i will, if i ever decide to "end" the timeline. I almost feel like never ending it and leaving it open to constant expansion since... well... ive created a whole universe now might end up playing with concepts and things from the newer episodes as i go forward

[Calm Wind]

6040263

camo.githubusercontent.com/d0cccd8d3b074fd523d8de7d126994b6f87b718a/687474703a2f2f692e696d6775722e636f6d2f37766a4f326d462e676966

[Calm Wind]

6040289

Well hehe that whole line about old Wonderbolts... fading into shadows...

keep in mind that the subtitle for part three is:

Shadows of Fading Wonder

[Easyglider]

6040338 Hey....Hey.....Hey..........Hey....You stop....You stop it.

Next stop, 1 million words?

[Calm Wind]

6040352

well im definitely on that path! i wouldn't be surprised if i hit it way before i finish part 3 too

[Lucky424]

endless beating her took

endless beating he took

Little Star and Twister were both joined them shortly after

Little Star and Twister were both joined them shortly after

turned them. His body

turned them, his body

with his back turned them.

with his back turned to them.

Twister hung a sign from the base of Matteo’s tail that read ‘we brake for oranges.’

...goddamit Twister!

impressive ponies. Bomber being

Change the period to a comma.

mention some us consider

mention some of us consider

Fleetfoot berated Silver. Valkyrie

Period to a comma gain.

back up. We gotta

back up. "We gotta

“Okay, Bomber help…” the massive pony lumbered forward,

Anypony else getting a Hodor feeling from Bomber?

She bend down

She bent down

Calm’s bulk setting

Add a comma after 'bulk'.

we’re taking he to—

we’re taking her to—

below them. Examining

below them, examining

tell he was hurt

Whilst not exactly wrong, flow would be better with
tell if he was hurt

watching be bawl

watching me bawl

Point Dex. Storm,

Replace the period after 'Dex' with a comma.

at Descent. I’m still

at Descent. "I’m still

You know what? Spitfire, don't back the fuck down! And, as much as it sucks to say this, I hope one or more Wonderbolts die. Because then she will have that on her conscience for he rest of her many years! And when Celestia returns, I hope she really berates Luna for unnecessarily risking lives, both the Wonderbolts and Equestria's citizens.

6040028 6040032 Reporting for post editing duties!

[Hooper_Canson]

Get everyone...

media.giphy.com/media/c0NwRD0Vi5Cta/giphy.gif

...and suit up

cdn1.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/MeBi7fYkutwp44nQhIKrZvwm51s=/cdn0.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/2387962/Hulkbuster_suit_up_660_12fps_256c.0.gif

'Cause it's about to go down

[Eveyann]

6040077 Ahhhhhhhh my ears i was wear headphones at full volume ouch

[Calm Wind]

6040403

oh yes

[Calm Wind]

6040381

Hey at least Luna isn't preaching that she was right, she knows damn well she goofed hard, but she thought it was the right thing to do, even she has to live and learn

And thanks dude! As always!

[Hestia]

ANSWERS!!! GLORIOUS ANSWERS!!!!

It actually is worrying me a little that the Shadowbolts are so powerful Wonderbolts and Renegades have to fight together. Which I guess is the point, but that doesn't mean I'm still not chewing my nails over here.

Poor Squall

[Calm Wind]

6040451

indeed, they have to pool their strengths and it will be awesome

[Paladin Redflare]

I didn't read any yet, it's too huge. >~> (Still your biggest fan)

[Easyglider]

6040451 Fear not, that scar is going to look sexy as hell. I can already tell.

Edit: Rhyming accidentally.

[Darth Redbeard]

ten more till 100

[Hestia]

6040460 maybe then Squall and Star can finally get together

[Easyglider]

6040474 Would be about time eh?

*loudly clears throat while glaring at Calm*

[Hestia]

6040478 I second that motion.

*joins you*

[Lucky424]

6040450 I don't care. I want something to happen that shows her how much of a stupid bitch she has been! Admitting she was wrong doesn't deny the fact that a lot of this could have been solved in one simple way...

HIDE SOARIN!!

If he really is the key to Kayn Ost's plans, then stick him somewhere safe, like ban smack in the middle of Canterlot Castle.

Also, from what's be mentioned, your Royal Guards are the usual incompetent assholes. Why weren't they fighting as well? Another mistake Luna made. It takes me a lot to say this... but I don't like this Luna.

[AdmiralWilson]

Is it bad that I see this all in a positive light... I just really want to see that battle