• Published 10th Oct 2015
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BLITZ - The Commandant



Two opposing soldiers on two different fronts must fight for their survival in a war they did not wish to be in.

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Chapter 14 - The Beasts of Sydneigh

Three days later

"-and that's how I survived Stone Ridge."

"So, you got to the .50 and took out six squads of Zebras? Yeah, right."

"Colby'll tell you the same thing! He saw me do it with his own eyes!"

"It's true. I swear, those Zebras went straight for the hills after that."

"I... want a third opinion on that."

"Hmph! Third opinion my ass..."

I rolled my eyes as the gunner walked away to talk to someone else about his experiences. I doubt he was lying, but one can never be too sure. I should probably try to not piss off the gunner though, otherwise he'll kick me off the .50 Cal on top of the "Little Ann", which is the T-4 I'll be riding on during the attack on Sydneigh. It should be fun.

"Hey Mathew, come over here for a sec." Someone said to me.

I looked around the motor pool and saw Johnny standing patiently by the tank, waiting on me.

"Oh, sorry sir." I said quickly, sliding off of the tank's sloped armor and landing on the dirt floor.

"It's fine. I just need to talk to you about something in private." He responded, walking slowly over to me.

"What is it?" I asked quizzically.

Johnny did not respond, he just walked towards the exit of the massive garage. I just followed him out, not really sure of what he was going to discuss with me. We walked past most of the armored forces gathered to attack Sydneigh, which was obviously outside of the garage.

Later, I noticed we were walking towards the command tent for our platoon, which usually meant I wasn't going to like what I'm about to hear.

"I... Am I in trouble?" I asked cautiously.

"Well... Not yet." Johnny replied, continuing to walk towards the tent.

This can't be good. At all.

"-looks like a howitzer. Could be a rocket launcher." One officer said as we walked inside of the tent.

"No, it can't be a rocket. The Equestrians only have Zebrican weapons donated from various countries. I'm not sure if they even know how to make any of the tech they use." Another officer replied.

"No, they're mass producing those weapons, but I'm pretty sure resources are going to become a problem for them real soon." The officer from before said.

"I guess the question is how soon." The other officer said. "Oh, Johnny. You just love to sneak up on people, don't you?"

"Well, I just come in at the worst times, I guess." Johnny replied, walking towards the table where the other officers were at. "What are you two going on about?"

"Well Johnny, I wouldn't tell anyone yet, because we aren't sure if it's true, but we think the ERA has deployed some kind of new tank. It looks like the Mk 1s they have, but the turret is more smooth-looking, and the cannon... well... we don't know if it really is a cannon. This is all based on this one photograph that was recently given to us." The officer replied, his name was still unknown to me. "We were going to send it up to High Command for evaluation, but we wanted to look over it first, just to see if it's valid."

"So how long have you been 'looking over it', Pat?" Johnny asked.

"Uh... about an hour or so." Pat replied.

"Really? It took the both of you an hour to do something I could do in ten minutes?" Johnny asked, unimpressed.

"Well, why don't you go on ahead and do it in ten minutes, instead of running your big mouth?" Pat asked.

He paused for a little while before responding. "I would love to, but I just remembered I needed to be somewhere." Johnny said. "Come on, Mathew."

I left with Johnny, who didn't seem to wait on me at all. After a minute of walking, he finally slowed down to my pace.

"Mathew, I need to talk to you about what happened a few days ago..." He said, walking next to me. "Listen, I know you meant well, but if anyone above me doesn't know you, and sees that after-action report... Mat... you could be put on death row for treason."

I sighed. "They would give me a trial before they began pressing charges, right?" I asked, not too sure if it would go down like that. "Man... hopefully it never comes to that."

"Don't worry about it Mathew, I've already got you covered. Just as long as... they... keep their snouts shut, you should be okay." Johnny said semi-confidently. "Besides, I know how excited you are to finally man the .50 cal on a T-4, so I don't wanna ruin it for you."

I was nearly speechless.

"You... I... Thank you... Thank you, sir!" I said happily, my face beaming while I bounced up and down like an excited child. "I... This means so much to me! Thank you, sir!"

"Now, all I want from you is that German Shepard you got in San Fransiscolt." Johnny said.

I froze for a few seconds, my face becoming void of any emotion... Until Johnny began to break into a small laugh.

"Oh, you're sick." I said, punching him lightly in the arm with my fist.

"Ah... You're dismissed, Mathew." Johnny said, chuckling a bit. "You tell that German friend of yours I said hello, alright?"

"Yes sir." I said, walking back to my squad's tent, with a small smile on my face.


Two days later


ZOIP!

I pulled the trigger on the .50 caliber machine gun, aiming at a small trench, suppressing the ponies that were hiding inside. It was awesome just listening to the RATATATATA of the high caliber machine gun, which made me smile, even if there was obviously a high risk of severe injury or death. The .50 caliber rounds tore through Equine flesh like a knife cutting butter, with the added ability of tearing limbs off if you hit them right.

Our tank column was massive, and if the Equestrians didn't pull some serious shit out of their asses, we would roll right over their defenses in little time. I don't remember the exact numbers, but it was damn close to 700. Though, compared to how many rolled in to storm the beaches of Neigh Orleans, it was minuscule.

PING!

I instinctively ducked behind the massive turret, hopefully evading enemy bullets that would've had my name on them. I looked up from behind the cover of the turret, and saw massive amounts of aircraft and Pegasi fighting one another in the skies above me. Tracers were flying across the skies, making the air battle above look like a dogfight from Star Wars.

When the bullets stopped landing near my head, I stood back up and began to fire at a pony who was foolishly running towards one of our tanks. The recoil from the gun made it hard to hit the pony, but I eventually made my mark. I don't know why that pony was so stupid... it's common sense not to run towards the enemy, right?

"Sergeant Mathew! We've got more tanks coming out of the city!" The tank commander said to me through the intercom onboard the T-4. "Take cover behind the turret, I don't wanna lose our machine gun support!"

And sure enough, three more tanks approached our column, but they didn't look like the usual Mk 1s that we had constantly encountered before. The shape of the gun was nothing like I had ever seen before, and the body of the vehicle looked like a Tiger I's chassis, which was a German heavy tank from WWII. The gun looked like a tesla coil had been strapped onto the turret and had a hole drilled through the middle of it.

"What are those things?!" I asked the commander.

"They must be those new tanks the brass told us about... they're really braving it with only three of them, aren't they?" The commander asked rhetorically.

Then, a bright blue light shone from the lead tank's gun, followed by a low pitch noise that got louder and louder.

"Gah, Jesus!" I yelled, clutching my ears due to the painfully loud noise.

Then a large flash erupted from the lead tank, sending a beam of light towards one of our tanks, instantly destroying it. I... couldn't believe it.

"Holy shit..." I said, stunned by everything that just transpired.

Almost all at once, all of our tanks began to fire at the enemy tanks, but each round bounced off an invisible wall surrounding the entirety of the tank, like a force field. Then, another light show happened, this time coming from the other force field tanks. More beams of blue light ran towards more of our tanks, burning through their frontal armor and igniting the ammunition.

It had to be some kind of magic! That was the only explanation for all of this!

"What the hell?!" The commander exclaimed. "Those... things just tore through three tanks like they were nothing! It... It's not possible!"

The tanks all around us began to fire at the magic tanks, but round after round was being deflected by their magic force fields.

Equestrian magic was never this powerful before! How did they do it?!

"Everyone! They're aiming right at us! Bail out!" The commander ordered, trying to open his hatch and escape the T-4.

I looked towards the lead magic tank, and saw its "gun" staring straight at us. A small blue light emitted from the barrel, then it got brighter and more intense as each second passed by. In a desperate attempt, I aimed my .50 cal at the tank, which was extremely hard thanks to the blinding light coming from it. I pushed the firing button and let loose, hoping that by some miracle this would save me.

As the light got brighter, and the noise becoming more unbearable by the second, my machine gun kept firing at the tank... until it all stopped.

It was so sudden I couldn't process it all at once, it had just... stopped.

Then I realized I wasn't dead, and I was still on top of the T-4, still clutching the grips of the .50 cal. I looked around, and saw that the commander's hatch was wide open. Then I saw the magic tank in front of us, which had a decently sized hole in the left side of the turret. There wasn't any smoke coming out from anywhere, it just lay there, dormant. Had one of our other tanks hit it? How?! The shield was still up, wasn't it?

"Mat! What the hell is happening!?"

I look behind me and see Anthony and the other guys standing behind our tank, all looking at me.

"Uh..." I said, still shaken by the sudden turn of events.

"Mat! What's going on?!" Anthony asked, struggling to climb on top of the engine block behind me.

"I... I don't know..." I stammered, trying to sit down behind the turret. "I think I almost died..."

"What?" Anthony said, confused.

"Just look for yourself!" I said, pointing behind me.

"What...? You mean... THAT tank almost killed us?!" Anthony asked, slightly stunned after taking a peep.

"Yeah." I said, which brought up a question in my mind. "Hey... where did the tank commander go?"

"Uh... I think he ran away. I... think they all ran away..." Anthony replied. "Why do you ask?"

I climbed onto the turret and peered through the open hatch of the tank, and I saw no one inside. Not even the other crew members were inside, but as far as I knew the tank was still operational, which brought a stupid idea to my attention. It excited me.

Heh, I've always wondered how a T-4 works from the inside...

"Anthony, choose three responsible guys and bring them up here, ASAP." I ordered.

"Uh, okay. What for?" Anthony asked with a curious expression on his face.

"Heh, you'll see soon." I said, laughing to myself. This was crazy and awesome.

"Okay..." Anthony said uneasily, climbing off the tank and walking towards the squad.

After a few moments of observing the battlefield, the line of T-4's still advancing, Anthony tapped me on the shoulder, which told me he was ready. I turned to Anthony and saw that he had chosen Bill, Zachary, and Ethan to come with us.

"Alright Anthony, I want you to climb inside the tank and get into the drivers seat." I said, bringing a look of disbelief to Anthony's face. "Bill, get in the gunners seat, and everyone else will decide the rest."

I got strange looks from everyone, but eventually everyone I needed was stuffed inside the tank, and I took the place of the commander.

"Okay, the rest of you guys will follow us in." I said, closing the commanders hatch. It got me even more excited. "Anthony, get her rolling."

"Gotcha." He replied via intercom.

With that, the tank began to move forward towards Sydneigh, the tracks rolling over the grassy plain and making the infamously creaky noise of greased treads.

"How's everybody doing?" I asked via intercom.

"Uh... I have almost no clue as to what I'm doing." Anthony replied. "Luckily, there's a manual next to me, but I obviously don't have the time to read it right now."

"That's pretty convenient." I said, looking around the commanders cupola.

"Uh, sir? The other T-4's have spotted us, and are trying to talk to us." Ethan said. "I don't know how to use a radio, sir."

"Don't worry about it for now, we still got a ways to go before we worry about communication." I replied, checking on the the guys who were following us outside of the tank. Thankfully, they were still behind us. "How's everyone else?"

"Fine." Bill replied.

"How do I load the shell? I forgot." Zachary said.

"Jesus, you're helpless!" Bill exclaimed.

"That doesn't help me get better, you dick!" Zachary retorted.

"Oh, just can it. I'll be down there to show you how to load a round, not a shell, in a few seconds." Bill said.

"Anthony, get us moving faster, we're falling behind!" I said, looking out one of the commanders optics.

"This is as fast as we're going without leaving the rest of the squad behind!" Anthony replied.

"Ugh..." I sighed, opening the commanders hatch and standing on the chair I was sitting in.

Then I saw that all of the magic tanks had been destroyed, much to my disbelief, but at the cost of several more T-4's that had ridden in with us. God, all those men...

We were driving by the tank that almost killed us, and saw some of the dead crew who had tried to escape. I don't know why they tried to leave if their tank wasn't burning, but I guess that secret died with them.

PING!

I ducked down instinctively into the turret, adrenaline filling my veins.

"The hell just hit us?!" Anthony asked via intercom.

"I... I don't know! I'm looking!" I said frantically. "There! To our right!"

A Mk 1 had opened fire on us, but one of the rounds had bounced off our armor, while the others missed us. It must've slipped past the initial wave of T-4s, and probably saw us as easy prey.

"It's an Mk 1! Bill, get the gun pointed straight at it!" I ordered.

"It's to our right?" Bill asked.

"Yes!" I replied.

"Alright!" He said. "Holy shit! This takes a lot of muscle!"

The huge turret of the T-4 began to turn slowly towards the Mk 1, aligning the gun with the enemy tank.

"Zachary, load the round or we're all dead!" I said frantically.

"Uh... Okay, okay!" Zachary replied.

The Mk 1 had its gun pointed straight at us, ready to blow us to pieces at any given moment. That is, if it could penetrate our armor with one lucky shot.

"Bill, is the gun ready to fire?!" I asked, still sticking out of the commanders hatch.

"Yep! I'm aiming right now!" Bill replied, shifting the turret slightly. "Okay... He's in my sights! I'm aiming for the turret!"

"Fire when ready!" I said.

"Firing... Now!"

As soon as he said that, we drove over a good sized rock, which threw the tank into the air for a split second.

BOOM!

The round had missed the Mk 1 by a mile, landing somewhere beyond the horizon.

"Shit!" I exclaimed, hitting the armor plating with my fist.

"Would it be a good time to worry about communication now?!" Ethan asked.

ZOIP!

The Mk lobbed a round towards us, but it misjudged our range and fired the round just over the top of my head. I ducked like I had before, and decided to stay inside the turret this time.

"They... they just missed us! Zachary, get another round loaded!" I ordered, still a bit phased by the close call.

"Roger!" He replied.

"Noob, never say that again." Bill said.

"SHUT UP!!" Zachary screamed, causing me to clutch the headphones on my ears.

"Jesus, now you're a twelve year old?!" Bill exclaimed.

"I swear, if you both get us all killed, I'm going to burn you alive in hell!" Anthony yelled. "Get the god damn ordinance ready! That's a flippin' order!"

"Sir..." Zachary replied, calming down a bit.

ZOIP!

"Jesus, please hurry up!" Ethan exclaimed, firing the .30 cal at the relentless Mk 1 from the radioman's seat, which was next to the driver.

"It's ready! I'm firing!" Bill said.

BOOM!

The Mk 1's turret exploded in a shower of sparks and fire, sending shrapnel flying in all directions, some pieces bouncing off our armor. The tank began to burn almost instantaneously, giving no time for the crew inside to react before they were being cooked alive.

"That hit em' good!" I exclaimed happily.

"Oh, thank God..." Anthony sighed.

"I knew we'd make it." Bill said.

"SHUT UP BILL!!" Anthony yelled. "I've had enough of your shit!"

"What the crap did I do?!" Bill asked, confused and angry.

"Firstly, you almost got ALL of us killed with your little shit show, and now you're telling us that YOU saved our asses?! No, I'm not having it!" Anthony replied angrily. "Friggin hypocrite!"

"Yeah? What did you do?!" Bill asked angrily.

"Oh, we aren't going there, Corporal. I'll kick your ass back to Antonia!" Anthony said angrily.

"SHUT THE HELL UP! BOTH OF YOU!" I screamed, losing my tolerance completely. "Anthony, you know better than this! But Bill, if you ever disrespect your authorities again, I'll have your ass court martialed! Do both of you understand?!"

"Yeah... Sorry, Mathew..." Anthony said quietly.

"It's fine." I said. "Bill?"

Bill did not say anything, instead he began to pout like a child in third grade. It was disgraceful to watch.

"Alright then, be that way." I said, giving up on him. "We've gotta focus on what's important right now, alright?"

"Yeah..." Ethan said. "How far away are we from Sydneigh?"

"Uh..." I replied, opening the commanders hatch and climbed through it. "Not that much further, we've got about half a mile left..."

Then I saw another Mk 1 to our left charge us, it's commander staring straight at me. Is there a gap in our... lines?

Oh yeah, the magic tanks.

"Shit! Another Mk 1 coming right towards us! To the left!" I said, closing the commander's hatch.

Our turret began to turn left towards the brave little Equine tank.

"Why hasn't anyone helped us fight off the Mk 1s at all yet?" Zachary asked.

"Because those... damn magic tanks killed a lot of the tanks around us! We're practically on our own!" I replied.

"The gun's loaded!" Bill said hesitantly.

"Fire when ready!" I said.

"Firing!"

BOOM!

The round shaved the side of the Mk 1's turret, but I could tell the commander was scared shitless.

"That one bounced! Load another round now!" I ordered, reminding me of an annoying voice.

"Come on noob! Hurry it up!" Bill said.

"Jesus, I'm trying!" Zachary retorted.

"Stay focused!" I said. "Our enemy is that Mk 1 out there, not ourselves!"

"..."

"AP's loaded! I'm firing!" Bill said.

BOOM!

That round went straight through the center of the turret, and right through the commanders mid-section. I could see the commander's face change from "I'm going to kill you bastards" to "oh shit, I just lost my lower half", then proceeded to go limp and fall back into the tank. While interesting to see, it wasn't funny. None of this was funny.

"That hit them hard! We've knocked out their commander!" I exclaimed. "Load another round and finish them off!"

"Alright!" Bill said with a little more enthusiasm this time.

After a few moments, the Mk 1 stopped moving altogether, so ironically they were now easy prey.

"HE loaded! Firing!"

BOOOM!

The moment we fired at their right side, the Mk 1 went up in flames as sparks erupted from the hull.

"Good hit! Good hit!" I said. "We're all clear for now!"

"Ugh... Thank god it's over... I thought my arms were going to fall off." Bill sighed.

We continued the drive forward, slowly making our way towards the city, which looked like Godzilla went to town on every single building. It was actually kind of sad to see all this work that could've taken years to build be destroyed in under a few hours.

I can't admire this destruction forever, we have more important things to worry about now, like catching up with the rest of the T-4 wave.


One day later

"NO! NOO-"

BAM!

...

Shit, I got her blood all over me.

"Jesus, Mat! Take it easy with the shotgun!"

"I can't help it. The shotgun decides how much damage is dealt."

I looked that the bloody corpse of a mare in a ERA Battle uniform. Damn, the shotgun blew her head to bits!

"That's not really an excuse for killing her like that." Anthony said, crossing his arms.

"Well, I think it is, since... you know, she was trying to kill us." I said, pointing the shotgun towards the dead mare.

"Yeah... Whatever." Anthony sighed, walking past me into the next room.

I looked back at the corpse, then walked in the opposite direction, heading into a larger room, which is where my squad was located for now.

"Anthony! I'm going back!" I called out, walking into the other room.

"Alright, I'll continue scouting around!" He called back. "I'll tell you if I find anymore ponies around!"

I walked into the large room, with one of its walls containing a large hole, while furniture was littered all over the floor. Our squad was scattered all over the room, Taylor was in one corner, while Bill was in the other, and so on. We had set up some barricades in front of the hole and placed our MG there, which had a great view of the crossroads three stories below us. Enemy resistance was scattered, so we had to be extra careful not to stumble upon a rouge enemy squad.

We decided it was best to have an elevated position so we could fire down at any ERA troops passing by. Unfortunately, the building we chose was occupied, so we had to clear it out for our use.

"Man... I sure wish Dylan was here." George sighed, sitting down by the doorway. "He'd probably do something stupid just to cheer us up right now."

"Yeah." Ethan sighed sitting next to George. "Hey George, how's he doing?"

"Who? Zachary?" George asked.

"Yeah. He and Bill were at each others throats yesterday, and I thought they were going to get us killed." Ethan laughed. "Man, the poor kid's got a lot of people hating on him."

"Yeah, I don't know him well." George replied. "But what I don't understand is why he's got such a bad reputation. I mean, he just got here, and he's already been hated on by Dylan, and now it's Bill!"

"Right?" Ethan said, sitting up straight.

"Holy shit! Guys, come over here and look at this!" Jones exclaimed, standing up behind the MG.

"What is it?" I asked, walking over to Jones.

"You just gotta see it." Jones replied.

I peered through the hole, looking for anything out of the ordinary, but could find nothing.

"Uh... what is it?" I asked, not sure if Jones was joking or not.

"Look up." Jones replied.

I looked a little higher, and then I saw it; hundreds of Mk 1 Biplanes were zooming towards Sydneigh!

"Holy shit!" I exclaimed. "Where are our planes?!"

"They're... Uh... They're only about three squads in the air right now." Fredrick said, who had also seen the spectacular numbers of the Mk 1 biplanes. "That's only sixty planes."

Usually I never worry about what goes on in the skies above me, but now I'm starting to freak out.

"But, we do have a lot of AAA trucks scattered around Sydneigh, so I guess that's a plus." Fredrick said, reassuring me.

"You should warn everyone about this." I said, calming down some.

"Right, right." Fredrick said, turning on the radio and contacting other squads. "Skull six to Skull eight, be advised, we have several enemy aircraft in the air, over."

"Mathew! We got a few more ponies hiding in the other rooms!" Anthony said, walking through the doorway. "Care to join me?"

"Yeah, I'll be right there." I replied, grabbing the shotgun and walking towards Anthony. "Where are they?"

"Three of them are in a room two floors above us. I'd go get them, but I can't do it without help." Anthony said, walking into the hallway. "And this time, I'd rather come back without using any ammo."

"Fine." I said, knowing the job would just be harder. "But we should bring more guys... just in case."

"Sounds good." Anthony responded, walking back to our SCP, or Squadron Command Post, to grab a few more troops.

I turn to walk into one of the empty rooms, when I accidentally stepped on the dead body of the mare I killed.

"Aww... Shit."

Author's Note:

Sorry for the HUGE wait, but life is making it harder to make progress on the story. Anyway, I hope you've enjoyed this chapter! Be sure to tell me what you thought of it, and thanks for reading!

See you next chapter!

(Was Edited to make things a little more clear.)

Fun fact: BLITZ was originally going to be centered mostly around armored and aerial combat, but I decided to change it to infantry combat, as well as some armored combat.