Spectrum

by Sledge115

Act I ~ Chapter Four ~ Nightfall Over Boston

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot
I AM SUPREME! I AM THE TYRANT SUPREME! BOW BEFORE ME! BOW!

JedR
We interrupt your broadcast for this important message

DoctorFluffy
WOW SUCH MEMES VERY REGRET
(official Boston Advisor for this chapter!)

VoxAdam
Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum

Sledge115
Winter is Here

The Void

RoyalPsycho
I am your Redeemer

TB3

Kizuna Tallis
I can convince small children I’m a witch.

ProudToBe

Chapter Four
Nightfall Over Boston

* * * * *

“For centuries, Alderaan stood as a beacon of hope in the Republic. But the Empire came, and with one savage strike, brought Alderaan to her knees.”
— Jace Malcom, Star Wars: The Old Republic

In the Christian Year 2016, Earth made First Contact.

They did not arrive from the depths of space, however. In the mountainous country of Switzerland, near the city of Geneva, on a field above the great underground ring designed to pierce the mysteries of the universe, known as the Large Hadron Collider, a rift appeared. A gateway to another world.

Nor were the visitors squids, or lizards, as some had predicted. Instead, they were ponies.

They came promising harmony and friendship. They offered to aid mankind solve the problems which gnawed at it. Eventually, they granted the children of men refuge in their homeland of Equestria, at a price; to shed what made them human and be reborn as ponies.

It was to prove too steep a price, and the Tyrant Celestia would take more than she gave.

Out of the rift emerged a new entity. The Barrier. All-encompassing, all-consuming. Destined to choke an entire planet. Nothing borne of Man, be it wood, stone or flesh, crosses its path without being disintegrated.

Humans were now offered a choice that was no choice. Either die, or sell their souls to Conversion, and become less than sentient.

But what Celestia did not plan for, was that not all her people would follow in her madness.

May the Golden Lyre outshine the Tyrant Sun.

— From an early pamphlet by the Ponies for Human Life, author anonymous

~ New York City, USA ~ November 12th 2024 CE ~

Freedom Tower, the official nickname for the World Trade Center.

To a nation never known for its humility, this building was the pride of a people who, merely two decades before, had suffered a gut-wrenching attack at the hands of fanatics. Instead of breaking them, it had spurred on the people, inspired the leadership to build up its military and set out to encounter the forces of darkness…

… Which led into years of getting bogged down in pointless desert skirmishes, against an unseen foe, and widespread shaming from the international community.

But now, at least, events had validated that this buildup hadn’t been a total waste of time.

The new enemy was out in the open, and the same to all. All the warning the planet Earth had received was a portal in the centre of Europe, a few short years of peace with the Queen of Equestria, and the ever-growing concern about the Newfoals. Given the circumstances, humanity had risen to the challenge quite well.

Alas, one thing even the military of the United States of America could not overwhelm with superior firepower was the Barrier.

Cheerilee sighed as she waited for the elevators to reach the Level 5 basement floor. The First Gate to the PHL headquarters.

The doors opened and she found herself staring at three .50 caliber machine-gun nests and a twenty-yard ‘no man’s land’ between them. Two of these heavy guns stood on either side of the steel doors at the far end of the First Gate. The third hung over the entrance, nested in a heavily-fortified perch of stone and concrete. In the spartan space before her, there stood several gas-masked Army enlists, rifles firmly in hand and at the ready. Their presence served merely to let any visitors know they were not alone.

Keeping her eyes trained on them, she trotted forward resolutely.

“Password?” one guard, a woman, asked.

Cheerilee drew a sharp breath. This was always the hardest part. “Celestia is a... big stupid doodoohead,” she said, stifling a giggle.

A snort was heard from one of the guards, yet no one else said anything. Because Newfoals could neither swear nor insult the Tyrant, passphrases always contained either a swear or an insult. Originally, passphrases had contained a profane slight against the Tyrant, but these had increasingly gravitated toward the sexual, the misogynistic, or the misogynistically sexual, and Cheerilee had been forced to put her hoof down. Now the insults were rather more restrained, and they were amusingly childish in an entirely different – far more wholesome – way.

The enlist nodded dutifully. “Miss Cherry, a pleasure as always. God, I love our passwords.”

“Hello, Ramona,” she replied, trying to sound light-hearted. “They…” she tried to force a hint of joy into her voice. “They do add a bit of fun to the job.”
j
Evidently, something in Cheerilee’s voice didn’t convince the enlisted woman. “Ah, Mamí, I’ve seen that look before. Which puto is carrying the news this time?”

“Same puto that tried to turn himself into a shishkebab, yesterday afternoon.”

Cheerilee sighed to herself. She walked to the massive steel doors and placed her face before the scanner. The scanner let out a positive ‘ping’ and the heavy doors slowly began to slide open.

“El Doctor, eh?” Ramona smiled before stepping aside. "Best of luck then, chica.”

“Thank you.”

When the United Nations Allied Command had first proposed their aid to Ambassador Heartstrings in assisting her, an unshakeable pacifist, to set up the military arm of her organisation, they had chosen New York City’s new-fangled underground bunkers as their base location. A decision shrouded in secrecy, to keep the people above unaware of the growing resistance group. The real reason New York had been chosen, a central metropolis to the end, was due to the brimming information brought in by refugees from around the world.

Cheerilee kept trotting forward across the sterile concrete hallway, coming to a drab train car. The Second Gate.

“Identification, please,” droned a synthetic voice.

Her answer was almost equally mechanic, by now. “Cheerilee Cherry, PHL ID N°001, Code: Unity.”

She watched the walls warily – and for good reason. At the Second Gate, like in that classroom game her pupils had loved playing when they thought she wasn’t around, the floor might as well have been lava. The structure’s original design had been provided by an over-excitable human with a desire to ensure anyone sneaking in without permission would die painfully.

Even now, Cheerilee had not forgotten the manner in which the Ambassador had talked said engineer into constructing a system that started off ‘light’ and gradually built up towards the Big Guns. This was under the proviso of ‘putting a pin in it’ for the more radical approach in case the buildup failed. Of course, in typical Lyra fashion, the unspoken idea was that, hopefully, the biggest of the Big Guns need never be used.

At the same time that Cheerilee stood here envying such idealism, she had to marvel at the ingenuity of a brilliant mind guided by a tender heart.

Out of the fifteen different hindrances to hostile progress, each positioned on a gradually rising scale, from the non-lethal to the cruel and unusual, the one she still found the most pleasing were the nozzles programmed to appear in the walls and flood the carriage with the non-lethal and porous, but motion-inhibiting substance which the grunts had nicknamed ‘Repulsion Gel’. Apparently, the name had come about after someone learnt it was a carry-over from a failed dietetic pudding substitute made in Equestria.

Like so much else, this was but one of the many, many references to human popular culture which Cheerilee had learnt, going on, that she’d have to expect throughout her time here. What self-respecting teacher would she be, after all, if she weren’t in charge of controlling a rowdy lot who spoke in all kinds of codes she’d spend half her life deciphering...

“Access granted. Welcome, Miss Cherry.”

With a deep sigh of relief, she boarded the train car. “Hotel Quebec,” she ordered, letting out a groan as she sat down. She had been on her hooves for far too long and without nearly enough sleep.

“Acknowledged. ETA, ten minutes.”

Yawning, Cheerilee slowly began to doze off as the train rumbled on to its destination, her mind a-wandering…

“What was it like, Grandfather?”

The warmth of a fireplace, a mug of hot chocolate in your grasp…

“It was cold, yes, unforgiving to the touch. Those were difficult days, when men made beasts of themselves. But home is home, little duchess, and I always carried a part of it with me wherever I went, for as the saying goes, there’s no place like it.”

… the pleasant winds, the cooling touch of snow upon your cheek …

“I want to go home.”

… the Midnight Sun, the icy bay…

“Oh, don’t you worry about that, Anastasia. You will, you will, soon… but not yet.”

… the bristling pine leaves, and the light touch of grass on your toes.

Yes… wouldn’t you want to see your home, once more?

~ Boston, USA ~

Ana woke up, gasping softly and disoriented.

Strange dreams again, and yet they felt so comforting, tempting and inviting all the same...

The ring of the bell, loud and shrill, called throughout the hallways and the barracks of the underground compound, its echo bouncing off the edges of her bunk-bed. Every morning, every evening, ever the same refrain, for almost a year. And in the years before that, not even this reminder, harsh though it felt, that she was still alive.

The young woman rubbed her eyes, brushing away strands of her tangled strawberry-blonde hair from her eyes. She’d been granted a full day’s sleep. It still never felt like nearly enough, not when she woke to this harsh, unnatural light. The same light, at all hours, except for those hours assigned by the Powers-That-Be to give their grunts some reprieve.

Was it morning, or evening? Evening. Yes, that’s what it was.

‘Helvete, I’ve… really got to cut these bangs,’ Ana thought, yawning. ‘Standard military requirement…’ And her tucked-away ponytail definitely wasn’t up to standards, but Heaven help anyone willing to check everyone’s haircut, or carry a scissor at hand.

Time was of the essence, and any second lost was time given to the relentless enemy, that’s what Tanner always said, every morning, every evening.

Even waking up early was no guarantee of saving time, for she still fell behind compared to her roommates. Whereas they were standing at the ready, she struggled with putting on her woollen socks, shrunken and dulled from hours and hours of reglementary washing. Still, she was fortunate enough to even be among them.

After all, not every soldier got to be a full-blown agent of Lyra Heartstrings’ crowning achievement.

‘Well… guess we’ll have to make do with what we have, heh,’ she thought giddily, as she went on and lined up with the others for inspection.

And if the past few nights had taught her anything, tonight was going to be a long one.

~ New York City, USA ~

It was only after the Barrier had consumed most of Europe that the Ponies for Human Life had openly announced their presence to New York. Thus had began a massive excavation under the City That Never Sleeps, linking the bunkers to the tunnel systems beneath. Subways closed for a time, but eventually reopened with new guidelines about the changes. They were now used to rapidly deploy troops in high-speed train cars, such as the one Cheerilee now rode, across the city.

With the Barrier itself now just off the coast, the last refugees had arrived months ago, people signing up to fight no matter the country they came from. Training was fast but tough, with UNAC drilling into recruits on what was expected of them, with PHL ponies actually volunteering to stand in as Imperial Guards or Newfoals to let the recruits know what to expect in the fight.

Cheerilee jerked awake as the train car screeched to a halt at the station.

“Welcome to the Third Gate. Have a nice day,” the synthetic voice echoed over the speaker.

Shaking her head, she jumped off her seat, moving onward to a pair of very old and rusty bunker doors. But instead of entering that way, she turned left and walked up to the wall, to push a seemingly random sequence of bricks.

The wall parted and allowed her entry.

A rather devious trap, since the bunker doors were sealed shut, and the room beyond filled to the brim with poison gas. Any Newfoal who managed to breach this far without proper knowledge of the hidden door was in for a death sentence. A slow, agonising one, as many people had come to wish upon them. Not the noblest of sentiments, true, yet these were volatile times. More than ever, you needed someone to hold on to, keep you grounded…

“Where are you, Alex?” Cheerilee whispered. “Dammit, we need you.”

She tried to calm herself. It would not do to lose her composure. Not now, not until she had some measure of privacy in this cramped, stuffy place, and certainly not in front of the young, slightly pasty-faced man in uniform who stood at attention, rifle in hand, to escort her down this last lap.

‘Maybe about sixteen... no... fifteen. Too young to fight... but we are getting low on willing fighters.’

“Ma’am,” the teen nodded, eyes looking straight ahead. “The meeting you called for is about to begin.”

“Thank you, soldier,” Cheerilee nodded. “For the record, would you kindly provide a briefing on the full list of those in attendance?”

“Uh… let me see,” the teen said nervously, whipping out his iPad. “From what I’ve got here, that’d be, in order of precedence, Captain Spitfire of the Rogue Bolts 1st Air Battalion, Lieutenant Scratch of the Blue Fire 1st Strike Battalion, Doctor Time Turner of Research and Development, Lady Cadenza of the Department of Psychological and Spiritual Well-Being, Dame Moondancer of the Department of Cultural Preservation, Mister Gladmane of the Department of Equestrian Liaisons, and Miss Nectar, filling in for Public Relations, all present and at order. Captain Thunderwing of the Stampede Fleet is linked up via satellite, together with Admiral Kleiner.”

For a while, the two walked in silence, the only sound that of his heavy boots treading upon the concrete. Soon enough, though, the teen broke the silence with an all-too-patently obvious fake cough.

“Ah, sorry about that, ma’am,” he said hastily. “Is… is there any sign of Captain Reiner?”

Cheerilee only lowered her head, ears flattening against her temples. “No.”

“Oh.”

“I wish I had more to say,” Cheerilee clarified, rubbing her head with her right hoof, in mid-stride. “At the moment, we can only be thankful and pray that Captain Reiner isn’t in the Tyrant’s disgusting hooves.”

“Just MIA,” the young man snorted, shaking his head. “With all due respect, ma’am, the latest reports–”

“I know what the reports said,” Cheerilee cut him off tersely, sounding more like a disapproving teacher than a commanding officer. It still had the same results, as the teen froze up involuntarily. “I know he went missing while on a private mission, and that none of his escort team reported back either. Rest assured, we’ve got our top agents looking for him up and down Equus.”

Of course, none of them had any information on it. Queen Celestia hadn’t made a public declaration of having killed Alex, and none of their allies, be they griffon, zebra or Equestrian Resistance, had any information.

So had Celestia or some agent just vapourised him? No, that wouldn’t make sense. Every possibility Cheerilee considered had too many little logical holes for her to believe. Which left her coming up with more and more options, each more horrible than the last.

They reached a set of iron double doors. Cheerilee reached up to push one of the doors open, but a new, hesitant question gave her pause.

“Is there any chance he could still be alive... after all this time?” The teen lowered his head at his question. “It’s just… we know a human can’t so much as step foot in Equestria without every Guard unit in the area knowing about it and teleporting to their location. At best.”

Cheerilee said nothing. She was afraid that the teen was right, afraid of the implications. Afraid that all they would find of Alex would be the Newfoal that they’d made of him, or his mutilated corpse. She turned back and looked at the teen before her, and all she saw was a young man struggling to breathe, ash consuming his form as he reached out to her, his eyes begging her to save him.

“Ma’am?”

Without even shaking her head, the former schoolteacher willed herself to banish the image from her mind.

“He’s alive,” said Cheerilee. “I know it. I don’t know how, but I do know that he wouldn’t want us worrying and acting like a bunch of chickens with our heads cut off. Right now, we all need to focus on stopping the Tyrant’s armies from advancing.”

She gave him a big warm smile. The teen gave one tinged with nervousness in return.

“Yeah, of course you’re right. Besides,” he exclaimed happily, “those zombies can’t get reinforcements now! Every Newfoal killed is one that won’t get replaced so easily, not by a portal or by potion! We can stop this, I know we can.”

Cheerilee nodded, before finally pushing the door open and proceeded inside. Then she stopped, and turned back to smile at him again. “That’s the spirit. Thank you for escorting me to the conference room, Private… uh…”

The teen snickered good-naturedly as Cheerilee struggled with the name on his coat. Given where her head was located relative to his waist, it nearly was impossible for her to read the label unless she stood several steps away. “Shepard. Private Adrian Shepard, ma’am.”

“Thank you, Private Shepard. My, wasn’t that embarrassing...” Yet despite her words and the reddening of her cheeks, Miss Cheerilee was glad to cause some level of merriment in this bleak period of history.

“You’re welcome, ma’am.” The teen saluted her. She returned the salute, and he walked off.

After watching him march back down the corridor for a little, Cheerilee entered the conference room.

* * * * *

For so vital a place, the PHL room of conference was average in appearance.

Ten chairs, seven of them occupied, were neatly cleaned and organised, the round table was filled with paperwork and reports from various foreign national forces. Yet it was a room of great importance, since all information vital to the PHL passed through here before it was known to anyone else. She had lost count of the many, many sleepless nights spent in here, either sorting paperwork or consulting the large plasma TVs aligning the length of the walls, two of them dedicated to the Blue Force Tracker streaming the current movement of military personnel, along with various surviving news networks or information from the Internet.

“No child should ever become a soldier…”

The unexpectedness of his voice nearly scared the coat off Cheerilee. Standing next to the half-open door, a certain tan-brown stallion had apparently witnessed the entire exchange between her and the teen, keeping silent all the while.

“But desperate times call for desperate measures,” he followed, every syllable laced with bitter sarcasm.

“Hello, Time Turner.”

He dipped his head in polite acknowledgement. “Miss Cheerilee Cherry. Come, sit sit sit, please. Me and the ladies have plenty to tell.”

“Who’re you calling a ‘lady’?” scoffed Vinyl Scratch from her seat. “Maybe that’s the right term for Dancer over here, but I’m sure none o’ the rest of us deserve to be treated with such fancy-schmancy terms, not after all the shit that’s gone down.”

“Vinyl,” Moondancer chided her gently. “That’s no way to speak in front of a teacher.”

“I’d have you give me thirty for that back at the Academy,” said Spitfire, but the former Wonderbolt’s jocular tone made it clear she wasn’t serious.

Lady Cadance, the resident Princess-in-Exile, kept quiet, as she was wont to do these days. Yet there was a twinkle in her eye as she observed them, a small group tied by small bonds.

Pineapple Nectar – or ‘Pina,’ for short – said nothing at all. She just sat there waiting, immobile, the sharp olive-green of her mane, as always, falling over one eye like a willow curtain.

Nodding to them all in quiet greeting, Cheerilee took her seat at the round table. That now made eight occupied chairs. A Texai telepresence device had been placed on the ninth. Thunderwing’s face, dominated by his striking blue eyes against his dark blue fur, filled the viewscreen, making it technically nine.

The tenth, facing the entrance, which Cheerilee sat to the right of, was always kept empty. Some time ago, a seal had been carved into its back, a golden lyre with three strings.

It helped all of them to remember, to feel a little more as if its occupant had never left them...

She tore her gaze away from that chair, returning to the fog of the here and now.

“Hello, is this thing on?” Thunderwing asked, his screen crackling a little. He brushed away a bang of his yellow-and-white mane, somewhat messier than usual. He looked like he was kept only marginally awake through the power of caffeine fumes. “Sorry, I’m filling in for Rebecca here. It’s, uh, very late on this end, and she’s still handling the other officers.”

“Hearing ya loud and clear, buddy,” Vinyl chirped. “Busy day?”

“Oh,” he sighed, “you’ve no idea.”

“Is there anyone missing?” Cheerilee asked, per formality.

“Well, my eldest daughter mentioned she might stop by,” Turner said, “but she’s… busy.”

“That’s one word for it,” Vinyl muttered.

“And there are other officials waiting for a more formal debrief,” Spitfire added, “but they’re waiting until the meetings with the big-wigs later on. With the Barrier at its present location, command’s all about planning our next move.”

“Whatever move we can make,” Turner said. “Options are still more limited than I’d like.”

“Who’re the ‘big-wigs’ coming to the meeting later?” Cheerilee asked.

Vinyl snorted. “Who isn’t coming to that fucker. Oooh, that’s not counting the entire UNSC. Kaine, Putin, Mélenchon and then some. Vanderbilt and Guterres are going all out for this one. And of course, all the shit we’ve had to swallow since the presidential elections... ” She took a big gulp from her hip-flask, then belched. “Yeah, it’s gonna be another goddamn Game of Thrones name-check. Tedious as hell, if you ask me.”

“That’s just the ones present at New York, right?” Thunderwing interjected. “We got Admiral Chirkov, Admiral Jinlong and of course, our very own Rebecca on this side of the world. Premier Jinping should be joining us shortly after, same with Prime Minister Javid. What about Admiral Hill?”

“He’ll be attending with Brigadier Merrick,” Turner affirmed. “They’re the... ah, lemme see, second or third group to arrive, from the Falklands.”

“Noted,” said Thunderwing, “and we still have no word on Minister Odonera attending or not.”

“Is he considering it?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Then count him in, Cap’n, you never know,” Vinyl finished. “Haven’t heard from Brigadier-General Gardner for a few days, and he said he’d be attending!”

Cheerilee gave a wan smile. “Then that’s everyone,” she said. “Except for Captain Reiner.”

This cast a pall on the whole of the gathering.

“Mister Gladmane, no word yet?”

“I’m afraid not, ma’am,” Gladmane said reluctantly. “If my sources are anything to go by, wherever he is, it certainly isn’t Equestria.”

“Which we should feel glad about, I suppose,” Vinyl muttered.

“I agree, ma’am,” Spitfire added, sounding practical. “These whole shenanigans with Alex Reiner remain a headscratcher, but until further notice, our best course of action would be to do as Reiner himself instructed us. Proceed with protocol, maximum efficiency.”

“Well, we had best begin,” Cheerilee willed herself to say. “We don’t want to disappoint the human officials when they show up.”

There were mutters of agreement from all around. On her cue, each of them opened the heavy black dossier to their right, each at the same page, a by now well-ritualised process. Even Thunderwing, who had no dossier at this table, kept one on his person specially for it.

“Now then,” Cheerilee coughed, “to our first order of business. Dancer, how are we faring in keeping what’s left of this world’s history from falling into oblivion?”

“You know how it is,” Moondancer said, tapping her dossier, not without a solemn weariness. “Same as it’s been since the day we initiated Operation Exodus at the Temple Mount. No news I’d tell you today would sound any different from yesterday’s. Whenever we know the Barrier is but a hundred miles from impacting an area, after we’ve done what we can to evacuate the remaining populace and grab all the local resources, sometimes, we’ve got time left to save the artefacts. Even if we have to chip straight into bedrock to do it–”

“You said you wished to talk about something,” Cheerilee reminded her.

“Why, yes, Cheerilee...” Moondancer mumbled, wavering in her flow. A mare of nervous tics, she pushed up her glasses. “I… I had a number of things to talk about, actually. Another relics shipment gone missing in the port of Auckland before it could reach Last Resort, for example. Given that it contained a number of articles from Uttar Pradesh, we’re suspecting either long-range work by the Indian Mujahideen, or the Hindutva wing of the HLF…”

“That’s bad, but nothing out of the ordinary,” Cheerilee interrupted her. “Sorry,” she added, at the pained expression on the history-lover’s face. “I know how much this means to you. Except when you met me in my office last night, you mentioned Time Turner had uncovered… how did you put it?”

Turner was fumbling with a piece of electronic equipment laid out on the conference table.

“Ah. That.” Moondancer sighed, realising there was no stalling. “Well, everyone, I advise you brace yourselves. During one of his routine radio scans last night, the Doctor came across a transmission which got him... hooked, is the easiest way to describe it. I happened to be by his side at that hour, and so I got to hear. It’s…” She shuffled her papers neatly, looking no-one in the eye. “I wouldn’t balk at calling it a most haunting epitaph for mankind.”

A ripple of unease ran through the room.

“You may want to listen to these, Cheerilee,” Turner said. He pulled up a set of data logs from next to his seat, and placed them before him.

“Turner. You were up all night? I told you to get some rest…” Cheerilee warned him, eyes narrowing.

“Wait, before you go on, I found this transmission being sent out into deep space. Very high-tech broadcast, frankly, almost a full twenty years ahead of its time. Originated from Crowe Labs Central, in Rio de Janeiro, I believe.”

He pulled out a very old boombox and inserted a tape cassette inside.

“Wow,” gasped Cheerilee. “That still works?”

As far as she knew, this thing was ancient compared to the tech she had grown accustomed to seeing on Earth.

“Heh, I may have modified it a bit. Plus, who said this old girl needed to retire?” Turner chuckled as he gently patted the old radio.

Cheerilee answered bluntly. “The 80s.”

But the eccentric stallion just scoffed. “Bah! Time makes no difference to me! I could live through the 80s forever, if I so wished. Except that would cause issues, given that I am a pony. Plus running into myself might be a problem too…” He shrugged and hit the play button. “Thoughts for another time, now listen.”

Around the table, the nine of them listened to a man’s words from halfway across the world.

“Is this thing working? Testing, testing. This is Isaac Acevedo…”

~ Boston, USA ~

Ana’s trip to the mess hall, as usual, passed by rows upon rows of propaganda posters plastered on the walls of the hallways, each of a varying quality that were either a hit or a miss with the troops – depending on the reigning mood, of course.

UNITE, read one brightly-coloured, strategically-placed poster.

Conveniently situated between doors where the hallway passed by the pony detachment posted on the base, it featured a nondescript pony and human officer rendered in a highly geometric style, raising their hoof and fist, against a backdrop of Luna’s Moon.

Next to it was a poster made from Johnny C. Heald’s famous photo from the First Battle of Montreal, featuring the HLF defector Viktor Kraber, heavily wounded and standing next to the infamous PHL soldiers Yael Ze’ev and Heliotrope.

Now is not the time to fight over the scraps. Our future lies together.

‘At least those are encouraging,’ Ana thought wistfully, though she shuddered at the thought of Viktor Kraber as she entered the mess hall. The man was said to have all the ferocity of a wolf, and the appetite.

And one needed an appetite, she reflected as she took her tray and her place in a long, long line of recruits waiting for their portion, to force down most of what was on offer these days. Except that wartime tended to work one up, many times over.

As it finally came her turn, and the sullen-looking grey mare behind the counter ladled a portion onto her tray, Ana knew she’d eat what she was given, yet on most days, it would only take the edge off her hunger.

Of course, rations here were less wholesome than in her dreams. Still, caught between the Barrier and the Second American Civil War, she would have to make do with MREs and bitter coffee. It was mercy enough that it wasn’t sawdust. Or worse.

On the plus side, the mess hall wasn’t as dirty nor crowded as her previous station’s, but nonetheless, Ana had to carefully look around the bustling, low-ceilinged room for any empty or half-occupied tables.

‘Not there, not there, too dirty, not there...’

“Excuse me, Miss, I do believe you were searching for a place?” interrupted a familiar voice, speaking in a pseudo-regal tone. “Look no further. Your seat of honour awaits, Little Duchess.”

Ana’s gaze flickered towards a table not two metres to her left.

Even as she approached, Ana saw her turquoise-blue eyes reflected against the man’s tinted goggles, most of his brown hair covered beneath his medical officer’s cap. But it was a welcome sight, for her friend had returned from his seemingly endless shifts in the nearby field hospital. A medic’s work was never done, after all.

“Well, aren’t you a sight for sore eyes,” Harwood said, gingerly removing his goggles to reveal a pair of green eyes. His sharp features were dented by eyebags and careworn lines that belied his age, but nevertheless, he returned Ana’s smile. “Good evening, Ana.”

“Heh, your evening, not mine. Long shift, I presume? You, uh, kind of messed up the time, again,” she said, setting down her tray opposite Harwood’s. “You look like, I don’t know, like you’ve been through Hell. In the hospital. I hope it wasn’t. Was it?”

Harwood, even when seated, was nearly a full head taller than she was. He leaned slightly forward to meet her eye-to-eye.

“See if you can keep track of the time when you haven’t seen the Sun in hours, my dear. Nothing too bad, today,” he said, clearing his throat. “A few flesh wounds, cuts and bruises, but anything heavier and it’s up Doc Kessler’s alley, thank God. Christ, I’m parched.”

“Ah, well,” Ana replied with affected calm, stretching her arms as Harwood drank his coffee. “It is what it is. But a day well spent?”

“Define ‘well spent’,” Harwood said dryly. “I’ve already had another Sarge get all pedantic today about how I used those very words. So how would you put it?”

“Uh, not-dying?”

“That’s a stretch.”

“Hey, at least Tanner isn’t complaining again,” said Ana, folding her arms. “These days, that has to be a plus, right? Guy never shuts up, ever since we left. I still like him, though.”

“Point taken, Little Duchess,” he said teasingly, earning him a scowl from Ana.

“Uh-uh, not here, Har,” Ana said, taking a bite out of her ration of bread. Bland, as expected, and not a sprinkle of salt at hand. But maybe that was just American white bread. Still, not her lucky day. “Anyways, Har, haven’t seen you here in a while, what have you been up to? Anything good? Anything bad? A little bit of both?”

“Ah, nothing new or exciting. Just fallout from the elections.”

Harwood gestured his thumb towards the overhanging flatscreen a few feet away. The sound was muted as usual, but the news-ticker and the regularly-appearing checklists of info told Ana the essentials. She let out a sigh.

Apparently, news of who was to be President-Elect had been received with acceptance in most States… with a few exceptions. Reports were coming in of riots in Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas, of whole districts burnt down in certain towns, and local martial law doubled down in an attempt to stem the furor.

‘Two hundred million guns are loaded,’ she thought, recalling an old song. She wondered what it had applied to, back in the day. Now, with a world gone mad, it remained relevant as ever. ‘Satan cries, take aim…’

He shook his head. “Would you believe it, we’re on the brink, and there are still idiots calling for a recount, based solely on her being one of ‘those people’,” he sighed. “Here we are, equally worthless in the eyes of the Tyrant, and even that isn’t enough for them to get some bloody perspective. Mind you, it’s her opponent I feel sorry for. It must feel pretty rough, knowing you came so close to being the last ever President of the United States. A milestone for the history books… Anyway, she ought to be quite the departure from Mister Kaine. If she ever gets to set foot in office, that is.”

“She was a lawyer, wasn’t she?” Ana remarked curiously. “And her husband... ah, I really ought to catch up on events sooner or later, been years since I saw her. People come and go in politics.”

“The voters don’t, but aye, bit of an unexpected victory, this one is. I suppose with these lower turnouts, people will be talking about her for a while, owing to reasons I’d rather not comment on,” Harwood said, with a poorly-disguised cough. “Still, a minority woman at the White House, of course, is not something you’d have expected even five years ago.” He grinned wryly. “Must be the end of the world.”

“You can say that again, heh.” Ana agreed brightly, sipping her coffee. She gagged. It was a lot more bitter than she was used to. “Helvete! This one’s expired!”

“Tastes better with a cube or two, love. You’d be surprised at how long it can last past expiration these days,” Harwood said, offering his cup. She accepted it gracefully, and pondered if she should ask him who exactly provided the coffee on his side of the barracks. “Doesn’t it make you feel surprised Kaine signed off on retiring soon, Ana? I always thought he’d pull a Roosevelt.”

“Nei, thought he’d continue too. Bit of a load he’ll be shoving in. I suppose he’ll be guiding her in the transition? War’s not coming to a close anytime soon. I wonder if he did plan for it in the end, peacetime and all. However long it’ll take...”

It was a grim reminder. Even as she looked at the image of the famous President-Elect, smiling brightly alongside her no-less-famous husband, Ana wondered what could have passed through her mind, once the results came in.

‘She’ll be inheriting a graveya– no, no, not, not now, Ana, not something you should be thinking of now, stop it. We’ll pull through. She’ll see to it. We’ll pull through.’

“Say, how was your shift, last night?” Harwood spoke up, snapping Ana out of her troubled train of thought. “Frieda’s not too much of a handful, I hope?”

“Wh– oh, well,” Ana said, clearing her throat. “It went well enough, I guess. Nothing to report, unless you’d like to count Frieda asking for more coffee as an incident. You know how she is, Har.”

“I can scarcely imagine how you can last for so long, without rest, without reward,” Harwood deadpanned, with a sip of his coffee. “How do you do it? I’d love to know your secret, Ana. How do you do it without coffee?”

“Not unless you show me your secret first,” Ana replied, smirking. She’d always known when he was hiding something, based on the smallest movement, the smallest adjustment of his fingers. And it was clear as day, he was hiding something quite special indeed. “Come on, Har, speak up. Might as well tell me before bedtime.”

Harwood smiled. It wasn’t quite that smug grin he usually wore, and she suspected he was rather giddy about something. She was right.

“Aha,” she exclaimed, cheerfully. “It’s that knights-thing you’ve been all excited about!”

“Your accent is showing again. Yes, the ‘knights-thing’ indeed, fair lady. And no, it’s not that exciting, Ana,” he replied, though his smile still betrayed his emotions.

“Feh, whatever, come on, show it!” Ana insisted, clasping her hands in anticipation.

“Patience is a virtue for marksmen, you know,” he commented, rummaging through his coat pockets. He produced a wrinkled sheet of paper that, if Ana’s eyes weren’t deceiving her, bore the signature of Major Stephan Bauer.

“It’s genuine,” Ana said, firmly, cutting off Harwood’s explanations. “Yeah, I’ve seen his signature before, back in Jakarta. Don’t ask, long story, as you would say. It was when we met the Dragons of the East, heh, remember that? I miss them, really should get Yon-Soo’s autograph. Maybe someday I’ll tell you more.”

“Ah, don’t worry, we’ll meet ‘em again soon, call it a hunch. Anyways, glad to have a third party confirm it,” Harwood replied, quite sincerely. “I got it in the mail this morning. A pen-and-paper letter, delivered by hand. Probably meant to come in sooner, but they got held up over at New Hampshire since, last week? You know how elections are. Anyway, here we are, and a right proper letter it is.”

Major Bauer, as befitted his reputation as the so-called ‘Knight of Germania’, stood as the chief proponent for a close-quarters-combat unit, a loose order of what could only be called twenty-first-century knights integrated into the UNAC forces. It could have been considered an anachronistic sight, until you realised that the enemy had a massive close-quarters advantage. Too often, soldiers had been cut down by Guardsponies simply because combat knives and rifles couldn’t match trained sword-play and armour.

And Harwood, as it were, would join their ranks.

“Well?” Harwood said, clearing his throat. He seemed a tad nervous.

“I…” Ana said, slowly tracing her finger down each line, mind abuzz with of course, excitement… and worry. The unit, colloquially known as the Teutonic Knights due to its leader’s origins, had a reputation for high-risk, high-reward combat most of humanity would never dare to even attempt. Nevertheless, when she looked up to him, she beamed.

“I’m happy. For you, I mean,” she said. “It’s what you always dreamed of, right, Sir Harwood? All those knightly concepts... I mean, it’s not every day your childhood dream will come true, least of all during an apocalyptic war or something.”

“Hah, of course,” he said bashfully. “‘I’m still assigned to your fireteam, you know. So I suppose you haven’t seen the last of me. You’re not the only one getting a fancy ol’ part-time job, you know.”

“Yeah…” Ana replied. A thought dawned on her. “But, I… we’ll be missing our medic.”

“Ah, don’t worry,” Harwood said reassuringly, with an airy wave of his hand. “I’d still be your medic, the swords only come out in desperate times, extra feature as they say. ‘Sides, I can teach you a few things with this pair of hands, aye?”

“‘Do no harm’,” Ana recited by rote. She laughed. It was the only way she could stave off her blush. “And I don’t think I can. Not after, well, Frieda told me not to. Don’t ask.”

“Eesh. ‘Do no harm’, yep,” Harwood agreed, with another sip of his coffee. “I’d still be in need of an assistant at times, however. You up for it? When well, you’re not working down at the lab, ‘course.”

“Would I?” Ana asked sarcastically, smirking. “Yes, yes I would be.”

“Fantastic. Though, I’m not sure Tanner would be quite–”

Harwood’s reply got interrupted by the mess hall doors opening, and the sound of heavy boots pounding onto the ceramic floor. A hushed silence fell over the room, and without turning Ana knew who had just entered the room.

“Speak of the devil,” Harwood muttered.

Captain Arthur Tanner, or ‘Art’ as some might call him, was one of Harwood’s old compatriots in the SAS. Ana had fought alongside him throughout their time in Indonesia, and though he may not have had her aim nor Harwood’s dexterity, he was an effective soldier, something even Sergeant Jaka had admitted.

‘I wonder how Jaka’s doing, down in New York… guarding the conference must be quite the exhilarating task. Especially if Hanne’s there reporting on it. I should ask him.’

Ana watched Tanner move to position himself in the centre of the room. His steely blue gaze, imposing height and stern face demanded attention by their very nature, and before long, all eyes were upon him.

“Alright, people,” Tanner began. “Situation’s this. For the moment, the majority of the enemy force has withdrawn to their rally positions behind the Barrier, like they always do. Token units, mostly composed of light infantry and Newfoal militia, have been left to harry our groups. For the time being, we shall remain on alert status, but we are not preparing for any immediate offensives.”

There was a murmur throughout the room. That had to be good news, right?

“Don’t mistake this,” Tanner said. “This doesn’t mean we can rest on our laurels. Tactical projections indicate that this might be the prelude to something big.”

“What kind of big, sir?” someone piped up.

Tanner scowled. “We don’t know. Anything from a major infantry offensive to another Fillydelphia-class incursion has been brought up. We just don’t have an adequate read on the situation yet.”

“Does this have anything to do with Captain Reiner’s disappearance?” said someone else.

There was a sudden hush. That rumour had been going round for a few hours now, but there’d been no official word.

This did not go down well with Tanner, who looked sternly at the speaker. “The disposition of Captain Reiner is not up for discussion.”

“But if they’ve got him...” the impudent soul dared.

“If they had him, we’d be screwed already, and the Solar Bitch would be crowing about it,” Tanner said scornfully. “Think it through, trooper. Has she ever been subtle?”

No one had an answer to that.

“Unfortunately,” Tanner said, clearing his throat. “There will be no rest, for now. All of you, back to your stations. Orders from High Command, we are to keep watch for any, and I mean any movements. This is not a ceasefire, this is a lull, and lulls end. Dismissed.”

The room was soon filled with the sounds of marching boots on the floor, plates stacked, and the doors swinging open, as the assorted personnel inside began filing out, not a single mutter to be heard.

“And, Agent Bjorgman? May I speak with you for a second?” Tanner called out, amongst the crowd.

“Aaand there’s my cue. No lab work for today, heh.” Ana sighed, rolling up her sleeves, and tidying up her vest. “I guess, this is goodbye for now.”

‘Well… so much for that break,’ she thought, sharing a knowing look with Harwood. And a fond, bittersweet smile.

“I suppose, I’ll see you around then, now, don’t you go run into the Tyrant or something alright, Agent?” Harwood said teasingly, earning him a playful punch from Ana.

“I’m not!” replied Ana, laughing softly. “So, cheers, as they say?”

“Cheers, indeed.”

The work continued.

~ New York City, USA ~

“I’ll bathe in their blood, and scream for them to stop dying on me.

I doubt it’ll ever happen. But it’s a beautiful dream.

Whoever you are, give the human race an excellent funeral pyre. To the point orbital bombardment qualifies as one.”

The radio went dead, the Crowe Labs wavelength went silent, and the message from Brazil finished at last, leaving the council to muse over what they’d heard. For a few minutes, everyone was silent. Some shivered in their seats.

Moondancer stared at the gathering silently, her face reading as that of one who felt deep regret at introducing them to such woe.

“I think,” Lady Cadance said softly, “That’s about the most disturbing thing I’ve ever heard.”

Those were the first words from her this meeting.

Even Spitfire couldn’t help but shudder. The fire seemed to have gone out of the one-time champion athlete’s mane, hanging limp.

“They’re eating ponies?” she whispered. “Newfoals, even?”

“Damn... I’d thought it was bad over in China already, but this…” Thunderwing said quietly.

Sitting across from Spitfire, Turner shook his head. “Not all that surprising, really. With much of North African agriculture and food ports being erased by the Barrier, and the loss of Central Asia, hard times will follow. If the Barrier gets to Pennsylvania, then it’ll get even worse. He’s right, though. In a few more months it’ll be far worse. I was fortunate enough to pick up the signal while scanning the Barrier.”

“Think anyone else heard it?”

“Not likely, Thunderwing,” Turner replied. “We’re the first ponies to hear of this, and I honestly wish we hadn’t.”

“That bitch…” Vinyl mumbled, resting her face against her hoof. “Oh, that fucking bitch. The things she’s done, the lows she’s forced us to sink to…”

Looking pale and wan, Moondancer ran a hoof up the red-and-purple strands of her mane.

“War brings out certain truths in people,” the erudite little mare said glumly. “Whom among us here hasn’t done things we’d never thought we could do?”

“Me,” Gladmane said. “I never thought I’d be here.”

For that matter, neither did anyone else in the room. Unlike anyone else there, Gladmane had a criminal record. As his business as a hotelier had earned him a large number of connections with Equestria’s criminal underbelly, he’d tried to start a business importing human-made goods to Equestria through his hotel. Until the Solar Empire had violently broken up his operation and confiscated his property during the Hand-In-Hoof Riots. He’d been forced to flee to Earth in the midst of the Imperials’ crackdown on crime and “subversive elements,” soon finding himself working with the PHL.

Lyra herself had personally brought him onboard, taking pity on him. To everypony’s surprise and chagrin, no less his own, he’d proven to be a worthwhile investment on Lyra’s part. He’d put his connections with the remains of Equestria’s criminal underworld to good use during the war, smuggling wartime materials, information, and other useful goods out of Solar Empire territory.

So much darkness, so little light. Strange times make for strange bedfellows...

“Freedom,” rasped a toneless voice. “It is the cure.”

They all stared. Pina had spoken for the first time.

“Humans. Ponies,” she said softly, slumped lazily in her chair. “There is no cure for what has been done to you. Except freedom.” She folded her left hoof across her right polyester limb. “Freedom is what you do with what is done to you. But is it not so that everyone is everyone? Are you not all born guilty and innocent alike? Open your eyes. Will you accept what you have done to yourselves? Or would you rather be a slave to your shadow? Freedom… is to dare look at your shadow. And to see yourself.”

She gazed at each of them in turn, her face unreadable. They waited in vain for some flicker of emotion. They had all noticed, at one time or another, that the cryptic three-legged mare rarely seemed to blink.

“Was I set up for this?” Thunderwing spoke, suddenly. “This wasn’t in the agenda, guys. Is this… am I getting punk’d? Are you going to rickroll me next?”

“Whatever meds she gets,” Gladmane sighed, “It is not enough.”

“Maybe. But this mare can tell you many things.” Pina actually sounded amused. “Such as whom you can thank for sending this spoken epitaph into space. Space? Space.”

A frowning Moondancer was staring at Pina, rubbing her chin. At least she, typically, looked less like she was freaked out than like a person who’d been handed a riddle and wanted to solve it.

“Okay…” Cheerilee said hesitantly, wondering, once again, why they had to let this nutcase in on their councils. Oh, curse how they had to cosy up to the private sector, when hope and goodwill were unable to carry them through this war alone. “So, what’s this is about Crowe Labs, Miss Nectar?” she asked, hoping to change the subject, her snout scrunched up in thought as she tried to place the odd name. “I know Alex mentioned them in conjunction with Blackwater…”

“Was once Blackwater,” Pina answered calmly. “Became Academi. Merged with Triple Canopy. Now subsidiary of Constellis Group. Always PMC.” She chuckled, sounding almost genuine. “Anyway. This Crowe Labs, yes. Advanced R&D contractors for US military. Offshoot of Raytheon-Sarcos. Good with their work. Clean record… assuming intel is up to date.”

And a frazzled Vinyl still saw fit to add her two cents. “Yeah. They’re the ones who made Allie’s HUD visor, and my minigun saddle.”

“Good company,” Pina finished. “Humane…” Again, a twitch of her lips suggested she thought she’d just said something funny.

“Right,” nodded Cheerilee. “Say, Vinyl, weren’t you making something to do with... uh, wubs, recently? I remember you showed me this schematic for some kind of weapon.”

Vinyl grinned, some of her outward cheer returning. “Yuperoonee, Cheery-cherry.”

Turner’s ears perked up at that. “Should’ve sent it to me. I’d probably figure it out in less than an hour. After all, I do have a screwdriver,” he muttered, but then he just shrugged, wincing slightly as something inside him stretched taut.

“You ought to be resting, you know that, right?” Cheerilee spoke, holding a hoof at her chest to make sure her heart hadn’t jumped out. “It’s ridiculous, the way you insist on placing yourself in the line of fire like this. Once in a while, can’t you just take a time out?”

“Take a time out? Of course I can! Who do you take me for? But the faster this is done, the more rest I’ll get when it’s all over,” replied the obnoxious pony as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

Cheerilee sighed, about to say something else, but a glance from Cadance told her to hold. The Princess-in-Exile coughed, drawing Turner and the others’ focus to her.

“And does your wife approve of this way of thinking?” the Princess of Love asked, giving him a sidelong look.

“Course she does! Derpy and me, we’re adventurers. It’s how we’ve always done things,” Turner happily answered, eyes showing nothing but mirth.

“So,” Cadance said slowly. “She approves of you being outside a medical facility, when you recently took a big shard of glass to the shoulder?”

She couldn’t help it, there was some small amount of vindication to feel as Turner’s ears folded against his head at that. He rubbed the back of his head, chuckling nervously while he looked at everything but Cadance.

“Ah...” he began. “Well, it’s a bit of a matter of perspective–”

“Whatever, Doc,” said Vinyl, leaning back on her seat with a mischievous look, her shades propped on her horn. “You’re in trouble and you know it.”

Moondancer got up and trotted over to him. “I must concur, Doctor.” She gave his wounded shoulder a slight poke, making him wince again. “Miss Derpy loves you with all her heart, but she’ll bring Luna’s wrath on your head once she finds you missing.”

Time Turner lowered his head, a feeble grin on his face, causing Cadance to roll her eyes. In tandem with Cheerilee’s.

“I guess tigerlily muffins,” he said, “would be the best ‘Sorry I’m an idiot’ apology gift to get me right in the clear?"

All of the mares looked at one another before answering. “Yes.”

“With chocolates,” said Moondancer. “I know a lady down in Boston who’d agree.”

“And her favourite movie,” said Vinyl.

“And a hoof massage,” said Spitfire.

Pina clapped her forehooves. “That mare sees in ways others cannot.”

“Maybe also a spa day?” Gladmane suggested. “I know a few mares and gentlestallions that could help you out there.”

“A spa day and a hoof massage,” Thunderwing finished. “Sorry buddy, there’s no easy way outta this. Trust me, I know.”

Turner only hung his head as Gladmane, Thunderwing and the mares other than Cadance and, of course, Pina, collectively emitted a scatter of giggles, but he was smiling at the small jabs made at him.

“Please, ladies, ladies! You do wound me so.”

The silly little joke was all the indication they needed that he’d be fine. Cadance leaned back in her seat, seemingly content to have helped raise the mood back up. Now, she would likely return to her discreet self for a while.

“Oh, quiet you,” Cheerilee laughed with Turner, enjoying a brief respite before reality descended back onto her mind. “I miss this,” she whispered as the laughter died down, the positive atmosphere slowly dwindling away.

They all heard her statement. None had to ask her what she meant.

Vinyl jumped on her seat, spinning around several times before stopping with a slam of the forehooves to the table. “Alright guys, let’s get this over with. I left a lot of my stuff in Boston and I don’t want anypony touching it.”

Cheerilee was more demure in sitting back down, scoffing at Vinyl’s urge to make haste.

“Vinyl, you are the only pony who can use said gear. Part of me’s glad you blowing out your subwoofers forced you back into using proper weapons.”

“Hey! All my speakers are awesome, you should’ve seen some of those humans fighting when they were cranked up to 15!” Vinyl jabbed a hoof at Cheerilee, while Moondancer and Spitfire only shook their heads.

“Can we get back on track, please?” Spitfire’s calm voice shattered the argument.

Both ponies looked abashed at their conduct. But they knew Spitfire, the only one amongst them to have military experience before the conflagrations on Equus and Earth, was right. Whether in melancholy or in jest, all this had been mere distraction.

They had a war to fight.

“Of course,” said Cheerilee. “Thunderwing, Vinyl, how are our ground and naval forces? What should I be worried about?”

“The Fleet’s holding up, we just cleaned up a couple of PER stragglers in the Solomons,” Thunderwing exclaimed, but his frown told Cheerilee otherwise. “Ground forces… I got the dispatch from the mainland. It’s nothing good. Vinyl’s got the report from the Americas and, well…”

“Best take it up with UNAC,” Vinyl said, ominously. “They’re not going to be happy about this…”

Cheerilee adopted a calm and calculating look, trying not think about what Vinyl Scratch’s mercurial moods might imply. Her eyes only briefly skirted to the empty chair with the engraving of the lyre. Whenever Cheerilee gazed upon this, a strange feeling would pervade her, that like a character in the tale where a fellowship of nine set out to banish great evil from the world, she was but a Steward, a custodian in wait for a King.

She had to wonder, as she saw the discarded radio, if such a wait was a fool’s hope.

~ Boston, USA ~

Ana, for around the fifth time this week, felt amazed at her piss-poor luck.

Was it something she had done years earlier, or was it the war itself? Whatever the cause, being stuck inside a ruined store bombarded by hoof mortars and rapid-fire crossbow bolts that had probably been dipped in potion was definitely not how she had planned on spending the evening. Not that she’d got to plan her own evening, but this was worse.

She wasn’t even sure if it had been an hour past her departure.

‘Frieda’s not gonna be happy…’ she thought, sighing, as she chambered another round into her rifle. ‘Well, at least it wasn’t as bad as the subway? Ach, who am I kidding.’

“Come to us!” the creature called again. “Give yourself up to the Light! You’ll be so much happier when you do!”

Ana wasn’t so sure if it was male or female. She knew that, whatever it might look like, it was most definitely not a pony, and part of the patrol that had oh-so-conveniently spotted her walking amongst the desolate streets.

“Mercy will be granted! Salvation will be yours! Please, don’t be afraid, we only seek solace for you!”

Its words were hardly laced with the malice and condescending compassion characteristic of truly indoctrinated Newfoal soldiers, or veteran Imperial Guardsponies hardened and embittered by years of war with humanity. Perhaps it, and its group, were recently converted civilians, ambushed by an Imperial patrol.

She’d wondered what it had been in life, its hopes and dreams, its family… if it had any. Did it ever say goodbye to them, hold them in its embrace one last time?

‘Not likely,’ Ana thought sadly, peeking out the broken window frame.

No sign of it, or the Imperial Guard actually commanding the unit. By ‘Mercy’ or ‘Salvation,’ they meant that at best, you’d be turned into a barely-thinking drone unable to make your own decisions, and probably die in a pointless banzai charge. Which, despite the Solar Empire’s claim of “saving” humans, was not an uncommon fate for a Newfoal. At worst…

Well, nobody wanted to think about that, not now, or ever.

“Eagle’s Nest come in, Eagle’s Nest,” Ana whispered out to her radio. “Hostile patrol, encamped down the street, South of Checkpoint Chryssie, over.”

“Loud and clear, Nordlys,” replied a voice Ana knew to be Tanner’s. “Closest patrol should be approaching your position, hold your ground, over.”

‘But would they be in time…?’ was Ana’s unsaid reply, as she pondered her options. Her rifle, a pre-war AWM model, was nearly as long as she was tall, and quite cumbersome to sprint with – and she still had no clear sight of the opposing force.

“Understood, Eagle’s Nest. Awaiting further orders, over.”

“Hold your position,” Tanner replied, sternly, but not unkindly. “Eagle’s Nest out.”

And with that final message the radio fell silent, leaving Ana alone with her troubled thoughts, the still air… and the unseen enemy.

Ponies were, in the end, rather different from Earth’s equines in every way. Even their neighs sounded just ‘off’ enough for them not to be easily mistaken from a distance. And so Ana held her breath, listening closely to each little mutter, complaint, and blind praise this Newfoal spewed out.

There had been a time when Ana wanted Conversion, to feel the wind flowing through her wings in flight, flying free high up in the sky. She probably would have, had she not received the all-too-fateful assignment to Indonesia, all those years ago.

Now, she realised, it would have been the death of everything that made Ana Bjorgman an individual as she knew it.

The Newfoals were a curious bunch. They looked, talked, and tried to behave like ponies, but there the similarities ended. So completely disconnected from their past lives and selves that the original person might as well have been dead, and utterly loyal to the concept of Harmony as the Tyrant dictated it. Loyal to a fault, inexperienced with their abilities, and tremendously reliant on potion use in combat, but they weren't stupid either. If they had been, her unseen pursuer would have rushed her position a while ago.

No, they were waiting for her – their lack of activity betrayed their lack of potion – and the Imperial Guard knew better than to immediately terminate a lone human soldier, for any PHL agent had the reputation of a one-man army. Supposedly. Most of the time.

‘If only that was true for me, darnit,’ Ana thought darkly. ‘Oh, if you could see me now, Harwood.’

For all her capabilities behind the rifle, she was more confident on her talents down at the lab, and she doubted that anyone would be intimidated by a shorter-than-average Norwegian woman, nor by her soft, bubbly voice.

Nevertheless, the reputation of a one-man-army might just have been exactly what was keeping those Newfoals at bay, amusingly enough.

Shaking out of her train of thought, she looked out onto the street, still as empty as it had been. Her options were limited, with no smoke or flashbang at the ready. Running out of of cover wasn’t an option.

‘One, five, fifteen, lemme set you down and, drats, it’s not enough,’ Ana thought, with a grimace. There simply weren’t enough sniper rounds to engage the patrol, should she miss. And without guarantee of them staying put, without any attempts at rushing towards her.

She glanced at her handgun. Three reserve mags remaining. Could be enough to cover her escape. She’d have to ditch her rifle, though, unless she had something other than pieces of debris for a distraction...

As it were, fate had its own sense of humour.

“Attention, assholes!” a gruff voice yelled out, unquestionably male and human. “Let the fucking girl on her merry way, or we will blow you all the way to Equestria and then some! Remove yourself from the vicinity right away!”

“Or what?!” snarled a voice Ana took to be the unit’s leading Imperial Guard. He had mostly kept quiet, letting his soldiers handle the latest bit of propaganda. “We have your soldier surrounded, and we’re ready to turn her! Shut your filthy mouth and turn away, now.”

“There is no need for such violence!” the lead Newfoal cried out again before the Guard could continue, to murmurs of agreement amongst its compatriots. “Please, let us do our work and we shall allow her to go on her way!”

“You do not want to reach that point, jou zombified fokkin’ kontgesig,” a second, heavily accented voice replied. The speaker’s nationality was hard to place, but Ana’s first guess was that they were Dutch. “Basically, I see how many assholes I can rip in you with the machine-gun here!”

“You’re bluffing!”

“Aweh, fine, you got me, I’m bluffing,” the heavily-accented voice said.

There was a pause, as if the universe itself couldn’t quite believe that he’d just said that. Ana held her breath, clutching her crucifix in an ever tighter grip.

“Nah, I’m just fokkin’ with jou. Eat my dick!” the thickly-accented voice yelled, and suddenly a machine-gun of heavy caliber, by the sound of it, roared in the afternoon air. There was a scream, a thud, and a crack and Ana realised it must have been the Imperial Guard.

“Target down, open fire!”

Ana wasn’t sure if she wanted to see it. But a distraction was a distraction, and soon enough there were shouts and cries from the Newfoals, spellfire and a hail of machine gun rounds. A stray round whizzed by and struck the wall opposite her, and Ana thanked her lucky stars she was not too exposed, after all.

The yells, the cries and dying screams were soon, again overtaken with silence, once the last, dull thud and whimper was heard.

“Targets are down!” the thickly-accented man yelled. “And… sort of all over the street!”

“Nordlys, come in, Nordlys,” her radio crackled again, her hand fumbling to gain a firm grasp on it. “Hostiles are down. Patrol’s reporting, several wounded, none fatal, over.”

‘Thank God,’ Ana said, with a relieved sigh. Leaning against the wall, she took off her gloves, wiping away the sweat on her brow. ‘Ah, Frieda, sorry to keep you waiting.’

“Understood, Eagle’s Nest,” she replied, gingerly taking a step forward. “It looks secure, over.”

“Copy that, Nordlys. Continue towards the checkpoint, Eagle’s Nest out.”

“Hey, Miss, you alright?”

No sooner had she pocketed the radio than the patrol’s leader, a fellow with distinctly Eastern features – Korean, perhaps? – approached her from one end of the street, eyes hidden behind protection goggles, body clad in the standard body armour worn by UN soldiers. His markings identified him as a Sergeant. “Don’t worry, they’ve been driven off. Sorry for the delay, uh, Miss. If we had known you were PHL...”

“No-no-no, it’s no problem, Sergeant. Really, don’t sweat yourself, if anything I should be apologising for, well, forcing a detour for your team. Really.” She said quickly, smiling in spite of her tired state. And she might’ve blushed out of slight embarrassment, too. “But what on Earth was an Imperial patrol doing here, this deep into the city? How could they have gotten past the checkpoints without being noticed?”

The Korean Sergeant frowned. By all appearances, the same thought had crossed his mind.

“That’s the third we’ve seen today,” he admitted. “And it’s strange. They’re not usually this consistently wasteful. Going against their ethos, about saving people for something better…” He grimaced in distaste. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say they were planning a big one. Meaning all this is just to wear us down, or throw us off the scent. Or both.”

Ana shivered at what a disregard this showed the Tyrant had for any true life.

“Maybe...” she began hesitatingly, “maybe they’re looking for clues as to what happened to Captain Reiner? I mean that’d, that’d explain why there are so many of them about. They must be sweeping the whole area.” She shuddered. “And, and of course there’s the people who couldn’t pull out of the area in time...”

“That’s just what I’m thinking, there’s been rumours of the High Command bringing in units like the Dragons of the East soon, that’s how bad it’s getting, going loud and all,” the Sergeant remarked in agreement, tightening the grip on his rifle. “And if they’re still looking for him, that’s good news for us. It means they haven’t found him yet.” He let her have a moment to catch her breath. “No offense, Miss. I ah, didn’t intend to downplay your troubles.”

“None taken, it’s alright.” Ana said, rubbing the back of her head nervously. “If, uh, you don’t mind, are you heading for the Back Bay, too?”

“We had joined the Germans earlier,” he replied, pointing towards a group behind him. Ana guessed they were the ones with the machine gun support. “They just happened to be passing by, got redirected through the North End, we did. They’re PHL too, miss. Would you care to join us?”

“Don’t have to tell me twice, heh. Hey, what was that about the Dragons?”

‘Not with Imperials about, no sir,’ Ana thought, stepping over the fresh corpse of the Guard that had so given her so much trouble. His pale blue coat stained with blood, his armour cracked and singed from the heavy caliber rounds that had impacted it.

Certainly not the last one, either, especially in Boston.

~ New York City, USA ~

Left alone at the big table, Cheerilee sighed as she stared at maps and briefing documents.

‘Not quite like grading homework,’ she thought ruefully, falling back on irony. ‘I’d take a class field trip with Diamond Tiara over this any day.’

Except she wouldn’t. Partly because, even if somepony gave her the opportunity to teach again and forget the war, she wouldn’t. It just wouldn’t be right. And partly because Diamond Tiara had been murdered during a meeting in her home by Imperial Guards about three months ago, during yet another crackdown on civilian protesters and so-called dissent in Equestria.

Presumably taking a leaf out of some human nations’ book, and rather cynically at that, the papers had spun it as “actions against dangerous terrorist sympathisers”, of “treasonous conduct against the Crown”, because of course they had, but none of that changed how it had happened in Diamond Tiara’s living room in her own damn house.

It was strange, what could set a little twinge of pain through Cheerilee’s heart now.

“Bitty for your thoughts?” came a soft, familiar voice. Cheerilee looked up, to see Lady Cadance looking at her with a soft smile.

“Hi, Cadance,” Cheerilee said quietly. She sat back in her chair. “How goes it?”

“As well as can be expected, which is to say, not very,” Cadance said with a wry smile. “No-one works harder to keep their spirits up than those saddled with people’s morale. But there are worse ways to spend your day.”

“I can only imagine,” Cheerilee said without elaborating. After all, Cadance knew all about worse days.

Of the two of them, the former Princess of Equestria had definitely had it worst. Cheerilee’s losses had been livelihood, lifestyle, home… a sister, even. But Cadance had lost even more. Lyra had been a dear, dear filly to her. Worse yet, she’d lost her husband as well. And she had to live with the knowledge that he’d been forced to perform acts that were utterly terrifying. Acts that even if by some mercy he was brought back to sanity, he would live with forever.

“So,” Cadance said, gazing over the round table. “Ready for the summit?”

Cheerilee sighed. “I’ve a horrible feeling I’m going to spend half of it explaining that we don’t know what happened to Alex, and the other half of it explaining why Alex is still on front-line duty. And, much as I respect her, I don’t look forward to telling the future President what she’s got herself into.”

“At least we’ve got our halves,” Cadance said with a snort. She shook her head. “Doesn’t help that we don’t have an answer.”

“To which question?” Cheerilee harrumphed. “Every time someone brings up the pictures of Defiance and the casualties there…”

* * * * *

… Cries of “Justice for Angelo!” in your ear as you look at the picture thrust in your face…

A woman with a pregnant belly lying next to a child of no more than nine… A random person among the reporters punching you in the face and disappearing into the crowd as the words “CHILD-KILLER!” flash in front of you…

The disapproving glares of your colleagues and fellow officers as you refuse to even consider a court martial for Alex, protests quietly moved away or ‘discouraged’...

The looks of disgust from both sides when they see that you have actually let Kraber into the PHL… A suicide squad, but still… And then swallowing the guilt knowing what you’ve allowed, and all the while Alex is impassive, doesn’t react, if only he’d react…

* * * * *

Cheerilee tried to shake her head clear of the images.

“... Or we have the likes of Verity Carter bringing up what happened to Defiance, or those ‘friendly fire’ incidents, every time, I have to answer the same questions about his competence, his mental state or, Luna help me, morals. And it’s not as if I always have the right answers.”

Cadance sighed. “I know.” She paused. “And what do you tell yourself?”

“Same thing I tell them,” Cheerilee said quietly. “That Alex was a believer in Lyra, that he’s a competent soldier, and he’s helped make the PHL a force in this war. None of us are clean.” She closed her eyes. “And I do mean none.”

Cadance nodded slowly. “I can understand that. I have to admit, though, sometimes…”

“You have reservations,” Cheerilee finished. At Cadance’s nod, the former schoolteacher smiled sadly. “Me too. But for all those things, the Captain’s been with the PHL from the beginning. He helped earn us our funding and our R&D wing. He spoke out against Lindsey Graham on the matter of the letting ICE create internment camps for ponies.”

Cadance remembered that. What Equestrian did not?

* * * * *

“They may be the same race as the enemy, but that’s a shitty way to look at them. I challenge anyone to look at the families, the academics, the pacifists, unionists, and others, and tell me why they deserve to be in a concentration camp.”

“Captain,” said Senator Graham, “this is a facility overwhelmed, not a concen–”

“Bullshit. Look at them. These are people, left to escape into a world that fears and hates them. What are you gonna tell them? ‘Your father may have disowned you, but you still deserve to suffer’? How many of these people have traded out their cushy job as a professor, just so they can do farm labour in a world where they have nothing. How many of you could do that?”

He paused and looked at Senator Graham.

“Yeah. Didn’t think so. As Ambassador Lyra has said, rebel Equestrians are the best allies we have against the Solar Empire. Treating each one that comes to us begging for help like an enemy… Well, I suspect that’s going to create a lot more actual enemies. I suspect it’ll be impossible for that kind of dehumanisation, excuse me, de-sentient-isation… not to have some kind of profound, negative effect. Better we trust ponies and let the PHL advance, rather than rely on a population of captives while giving them no good reason... actually, absolutely no reason to trust us.”

Another pause. He stroked his stubbly chin.

“Queen Celestia would have her citizens believe we’re a bunch of monsters with no compassion. I refuse to live in a world where we prove her right.”

* * * * *

As it turned out, Alex had gone drastically off-script and ad-libbed most of it.

“I’m pretty sure that without men like him,” Cheerilee said, allowing herself a fond little smile, “we’d have been folded into the US military and would’ve become practically a non-entity, and I’d be a second-class citizen at best.”

But even to Cheerilee herself, her voice sounded hollow.

“You don’t sound like you believe that,” Cadance said, picking up on subtleties in that damnable way of hers.

Cheerilee’s smile faded. “Why wouldn’t I believe it. Even with everything we’ve all done, we have to keep going. Alex too, if he’s still alive,” she added with a too-chirpy tone. “After all, Churchill was a drunk, strike-crushing old codger and Roosevelt was practically a dictator, but they were the leaders wartime needed, and let’s not start with Stalin. Yet if these guys all had one thing in common, it’s that they pushed on and kept their people afloat. We have to push on, too.”

The expression on Cadance’s face as she heard that was difficult to describe. She hadn’t exactly been suffused with hope there, but then her expression hadn’t exactly soured, either.

‘She’s got to know I’m bullshitting us both there, but… it’s not like there’s a better answer.’

“Well said,” the ex-Princess finally sighed, resignedly. “Well, I’d best be off. We all have to pay the piper sometime.”

Cheerilee nodded as Cadance left. “Don’t we just, Cadance. Don’t we fucking just.”

~ Boston, USA ~

The trip to the Back Bay was, in contrast to the previous encounter, a rather dull affair. Even climbing up the tower at Checkpoint Chryssie was a daily routine for Ana, and yet it never ceased to be quite so tiring. Thirty storeys of fortified office spaces and other such hastily constructed fortifications, leading up to her own station, a makeshift sniper’s den, overlooking the city. A corporate castle turned into a modern-day watchtower. They’d littered the way up with various traps, a few PHL-made ‘decoy’ enchantments, and claymore mines.

On her way up, Ana cursed herself for forgetting to ask about the Korean Sergeant’s name, or if he knew the Dragons’ own Park Yon-Soo, though his unit’s proximity to the Back Bay might give her the chance to stay in touch.

“Evening, Ana,” said the dull grey griffon on lookout, addressing her in English, though she knew Ana could speak the Common Tongue of Equus perfectly well. “Our little doe-face is running a bit late, I see. Holdup back at the lab?”

Frieda gave Ana that trademark, cheeky smile of hers, which was one of those odd things Ana had never quite sussed out about griffons, how they could curve those beaks of theirs unlike ordinary birds from Earth. Some of the PHL who fancied themselves as biologists had come up with their own explanations, but Ana always sort of assumed it was magic. It wasn’t much, but it was enough for her, knowing that Frieda wasn’t much of the smiling type. Then again, griffons weren’t smilers at the best of times. Or so she’d heard from ponies, and they were perhaps not the best judges.

“Yeah, right, a holdup,” Ana said, chuckling as she prepared the rifle. “Though it wasn’t at the lab per-say... I mean, per se? Nah, wasn’t at the lab. Anyways, had a few delays and, well... you know how these things go, eh?”

“Sure do,” Frieda said, with her usual, welcome gruffness. She slung her own rifle back over her shoulder, if that was the right term. The subtle differences in species’ anatomy could be so confusing. “Isn’t like watching mice scamper in a field, from up here. At least, whenever something dares to show themselves out in the open...”

When Frieda smiled again, it was a rather unpleasant grin, coupled with her magenta eyes, a predator’s leer as she patted her rifle affectionately. Odd, of course. Ana knew that smile very well, and very often it was for her. Now it was a touch uncanny.

“Eyes sharp,” Frieda said, bopping Ana’s nose with a talon, brushing so close past her as to momentarily rub shoulders. “Remember, mayhap they’ve got the winds, but we have the skies. They may shake the earth and burn skin with their magic, no matter, we can do it ten times better. And even if they’ve got the best shields, so what, always that gap between every plating, eh?”

“God, you got a way with words, heh. You know me, Frieda. I always get that mark. Weapons check?” Ana suggested, her lips curving into a smirk. Though it was strained, and not at all genuine, for her work on this perch involved less-than-moral intentions.

“Weapons check,” Frieda replied, equally deviously, and so they did.

The pre-war model AWM sniper rifle Ana wielded, and her USP .45 pistol had served her well since her service in Indonesia, and even before then. Neither had been runically enhanced or enchanted, as the best PHL equipment seemed to be these days. But Ana had full confidence that the .338 round chambered in the rifle could handle anything short of the Tyrant. Besides, someone like Harwood could make better use of runic enhancements to their weapons.

Frieda, on the other hand – or in this case, talons – had gone for lighter weaponry. In this case, a short, stubby M4 with a bayonet, the kind that were a dime a dozen in America, as they were bound to be, even with the economy in the state it was in. As her talons sometimes slipped off the handguards, she’d added a PHL-made foregrip about the same shape as a staple gun. She’d also sprung for a magnum revolver – Smith & Wesson, if Ana remembered correctly – with a thick rubbery grip, along with a bandolier of speedloaders.

With everything all set and secured, they waited.

And somewhere inside those ruined skyscrapers, untouched by the countless security checkpoints below that monitored civilians on the way back from work – or to the graveyard shift, like her – lay their enemies. Stooges for the Equestrian Solar Empire, the human adherents of Ponification for Earth’s Rebirth, and other such characters from both sides.

Ana wished she’d gone to Boston before the war. No, that wasn’t right. Admittedly, the urge had never struck her and she would have been happy either way. It was more that she wished the reason she stood in Boston had nothing to do with the war.

‘They called this the Cradle of Liberty… now it’s just, dust and echoes and ruins.’

Even before the battle was to resume, the city had crumbled from the metropolis it was before, into a dying, decaying urban hell for both military personnel and civilians alike. Yes, this was the face of America the new President-Elect would inherit.

Peering down her night-sight, on a person-by-person basis, at the people of all shapes and sizes clustering at the checkpoint she was guarding, the feeling overcame Ana, as it did every time for the first hour on duty, that she did not relish this task. She was here because she wanted to protect these people. At the same time, her job required her to see every one of the black dots down there, moving between the ruins, behind the fog of war, as a potential threat.

Five years of guerilla warfare and attrition, and ever did the enemy walk among them...

Though she was fortunate, in that she had never personally failed to stop a bombing, too often had Ana witnessed the consequences of the PER run amok.

Old visions behind her eyes. The dead who looked almost genuinely happy and peaceful for once in their lives despite the holes drilled through their bodies. One time there had been the ponified monstrosity they called a Newcalf, its insides shredded. A huge, rhino-like monster, worlds apart from the cute, doll-like, smiling Newfoals touted on PER propaganda, wearing a howdah-like, weapons-toting construction that covered most of its twisted back.

And those were the ones she’d seen… or had been allowed to see.

‘Tanner was right,’ Ana thought wistfully. ‘This is a special kind of hell, for all of us.’

Ana and her unit had been shipped from far-away Indonesia, answering the call for reinforcements sounded by UN officials present in Boston. With the Barrier closing in, preliminary reports had suggested a major offensive would be conducted by the Empire throughout the Eastern Seaboard. With rumours abound of the Element Bearers, or even the Tyrant coming in personally, the campaign took a turn for the worst.

By the time her unit arrived in San Francisco, the rate of Conversion bombings had spiked all along the opposite coastline, two weeks earlier than anticipated. Maybe, optimistically, something had spooked the Empire into hastening. She’d heard something truly horrible had happened up near Halifax as the Barrier advanced. A heist? Super-Newfoals of some kind? The stories that made it through were vague, but apparently it’d thrown a wrench into every faction’s plans – the PHL, the PER, both factions of the HLF, the Solar Empire’s colonists on the other side of the Barrier, and even, it was whispered, the far-off Equestrian Resistance.

Or maybe that had nothing to do with it and the Empire had simply been overconfident. They’d struck midway through evacuation procedures that’d been barely halfway done. Refugee convoys had been headed off and sprayed with potion, towns had been wiped off the map, and the renewal of conflict between the so-called ‘True’ HLF and their former comrades, dragging the PHL into it, had arisen at the worst possible time.

Whatever the reason, it all came down to one driving question, something that the UNAC High Command was trying and failing to keep a secret;

“Where is Captain Alex?”

Could he be dead? Scuttlebutt around PHL personnel had called him ‘disappeared’. Could he have been converted? No, the Solar Empire was too arrogant not to crow about a successful hit like that within seconds. ‘But if they aren’t taking advantage of the opportunity, then why?’ many had asked.

It was a question the High Command would have to answer soon, Ana reflected.

The Sun finally set over the city, casting a blanket of darkness upon it and its inhabitants, resistance fighters and Imperial alike. Each and every soldier within the city knew the stalemate would be broken sooner or later, for the Barrier would not stop. Equestria usually didn’t fight in the dark, not unless they were planning to, and Ana hoped this wouldn’t be one time they did.

Ana felt her grip tighten, and from a glance, Frieda did the same.

‘Well… here we go, Ana. Keep calm and… do what you need to do.’

Author's Note:

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

• This chapter features no noteworthy modifications, other than the references to real-world political figures and institutions replacing the fictional stand-ins previously used.

Spectrum 2.0 - October 27th 2017

Sledge115: Hello there - Sledge here, and surprise! Chapter’s done!

Apologies for the delay but, we’ve all agreed to post this one after the previous chapter in quick succession to make up for the brief hiatus. But hey - setting this up in advance works, and that’s what matters!

Suffice to say, welcome to SPECTRUM’s Earth. Buckle up.

~Sledge

DoctorFluffy: Yes, that was Kraber yelling “EAT MY DICK!” earlier. For those of you who remember classic Spectrum and most of my writing, I’m sure you’ll approve. 

~Fluffy

VoxAdam: If Chapter Three was the make-or-break chapter to bring the initial mystery of the human to a climax in the revamped Spectrum, Chapter Four is the same for us to introduce the teeming, breathing world of Earth under siege. We hope to have delivered. 

~Vox

Comments

[EchoWolf31]

Nice to see a new chapter so soon. Though I will ask if you guys could maybe tone down the references. I mean, in this chapter alone we had Portal, Half-Life, possibly Halo, and 2 instances from FEAR. The fact we didn't see any references in the previous chapters makes these ones even more of a shock.

This might just me, but when I see such blatant references it just makes me think that the author is trying too hard and it takes me out of the story as a result. I had this problem with Classic!Spectrum too.

[VoxAdam]

8514298

There is some level of discussion left amongst the Team as to how far we can push the fun little pop-cultural references in this version.

If there is something to be said for the examples you cited, it's that they have a greater sense of consistency. Each of them pertain to science-fiction, much of it military-themed, all of it about the unforeseen consequences of tampering with the foundations of the universe.

[EchoWolf31]

8514314
I suppose, though that just made me realize another problem I had with these is that they're all video games references, so it seems like there's less of a pop-culture focus and more of a game-culture focus. If you guys are going to continue with them, I'd recommend diversifying otherwise they're just going to get stale all the quicker.

[grixie]

Where there some Warhammer 40K references in that chapter? Certain some of the names were references Chiron (Chenkov), and Merrick the guardsman from dawn of war retribution. Or have I gone mad.

[Doctor Fluffy]

8514342
If it helps, there was also a reference to the obscure movie Death Machine:

A random person among the reporters punching you in the face and disappearing into the crowd as the words “CHILD-KILLER!” flash in front of you…

This is like a word-for-word description of a scene from early in the movie.

But diversifying the references, you say? That's doable. That is VERY doable. Oh, yes.

[Jed R]

8514298
You know, I entirely forgot about the Half Life reference. Huh.

Don’t worry though - diversifying, we can do.

[EchoWolf31]

8514394
Never seen Death Machine, so I honestly thought that was a reference to the "Punch a nazi" thing.

[Doctor Fluffy]

8514453 Here you go then! The whole movie. Completely available on youtube.

It's so fuckin' goofy. XD

[Sledge115]

8514369
Nope - as someone who doesn't do 40k, definitely not Warhammer references. One of them is from Classic Spectrum as a throwaway character

[AppleTank]

them, leaving the to escape in a world

-- them

I wouldn't really call this a breathing, teeming earth. More like bloodied and dying, with very questionable prospects for victory. But when has that ever stopped us from fighting back. Do not go gentle in to the burning sun.

[angel3591]

Chapter 3: Gosh I really like this reboot and how smooth and polished it feels. Well I guess I have to wait until next month for the next chapter. *Sees new chapter update* "Already?!"

[Sledge115]

8515008

That's what happens when you've set it up in advance!

[VoxAdam]

8514818

Life finds a way. Alternatively, and less derivatively, Sledge and I agreed to help make this a vision of Earth where people are struggling and still capable of being pretty rotten, but for the most, they gladly endure.

[Sledge115]

8514298

...wait, Halo?

[EchoWolf31]

8515044
Yeah. I'm not completely sure, that's why I said possibly, but the name of the Allied military is extremely close to the name of the Earth government in Halo.
Here: United Nations Allied Command, UNAC.
Halo: United Nations Space Command, UNSC.
This of course could just be a coincidence, but considering just how close they are, I decided to add it in just in case.

[Sledge115]

8515169

Complete coincidence right there, heh. If any I thought the security council acronym would be pointed out.

[Locky122]

...just realised that the private escorting Cheerilee has te same name as my character I'm playing through Mass Effect with...
...please make him as badass as that...

[AppleTank]

Say, what does the barrier do to plants and animals? Ignore them completely? What about farmland? Domesticated animals?

[grixie]

8514681
Ah never read the original so I wouldnt know, thanks for the info though.

[More Dakka]

 ‘Fuck Celestia’ or some variation was, after all, practically a universal code suffix at this point. Of course, it wasn’t just for juvenile humour. With the Newfoals literally unable to swear or say anything insulting towards their queen, it was only the natural choice.

this security measure seems a little redundant given how newfoals don't have cutimarks, but I can't fault them for capitalizing on an excuse to say 'Fuck Celestia' at every opportunity.

[Jed R]

8515527
You can fake a cutie mark (the = cutie mark that Starlight Glimmer has when we first meet her for example).

[Mr cold ghost]

Well spectrum earth appears to be just as screwed as classic spectrum earth. Oh and it appears to be a different president Davis. It’s going to be interesting to see what other changes there are from classic spectrum. Anyway as always thanks for the update!

[VoxAdam]

8515527

For clarification, they might have a reason to say that, but we're not. The original Spectrum's inability to split the difference between the real Celestia and her possessed TCB self is a factor which held it back.

[Sledge115]

8515810

If you're talking about the President-Elect well - she's definitely not the same as Davis, while 'classic' Davis is the outgoing President in this version

[Commandhat]

8515354
Lost in Dispatches 2 from one of the Classic Spectrum side stories has a bit where the Barrier is shattered and it's revealed that plants and animals are converted to Equestrian version, if existing. Specifically, there is 'a line in the grass' described where the Barrier has stopped when it shattered.

[AppleTank]

8516181
gotcha. everything is "Equstrialized"

[angel3591]

Really interesting to see the Imperial forces have a "personality". I like how they don't ruthlessly try to kill/convert humans the moment they spot some; we actually "see" they act more like trained professionals on patrol as they try to turn away enemy forces first with intimidation rather then openly attacking.

I'm curious what are the weapons the Solar Imperials use; We know they use primitive weaponry i.e. crossbows, spears, swords (dipped in the lethal fluid of course), the portion vials, but do they have any complex weapons/machines they use against human forces? I am particularly curious in the concept of "hoof mortars" .

[Doctor Fluffy]

8517669
We're working on that as we speak! To answer your questions.
1: The hoof mortar is, essentially, a catchall term for a grenade launcher. There's some versions made from captured human weaponry, but the basic hoof mortar looks kinda like this:
i.pinimg.com/originals/8a/f7/00/8af700ff34491012179249e7e2d4e484.jpg
The grenades can be charmed to work as standard explosives or ponification grenades. Some unicorns fire them like conventional weaponry, but, well, most of the time they're just placed on the ground like actual mortars.
2. Me and RoyalPsycho wrote up a lot of weaponry ideas. One of them that I added in (that was cut from this chapter) was "Celestia's Spear," which is essentially a laser - though it can also work as a focus lens for a unicorn's horn. There's also paintball guns that shoot potion, and a potion gun that's essentially a high-powered industrial water cutter. That last one is really short-ranged. Not sure when these will show up, but give us some time.

There's also a bunch of vehicles, weaponized newfoal concepts kinda like the newcalf, and Galactic Empire-ish superweapon concepts we've thought up. So look out for that!

[angel3591]

8517874
Thanks for the reply! I always thought that the Solar Empire lagged behind humanity in terms of weapon ingenuity and technology yet were "magically" getting the best of humanity no matter how powerful our weapons were; that concept annoyed me. To see that the Imperials can be a technological match for humanity makes the story more terrifying/exciting!

[Doctor Fluffy]

8518004
You think that's bad, try being one of the guys (including Jed) that was trying to write them competently, outright ignoring canon where possible to make them a genuine threat while the main story insisted "No, really guys, they're winning despite just zerg rushing everyone!"

It was like that one moment from Shadow Ops where apparently goblins with javelins are totally a match for trained soldiers with M4s. And thank you so much! I am so, so, so glad you approve! Jed is going to love this comment and that someone appreciates his tireless work, so I replied to him immediately below just so he pays attention to this.
8515590

[Sledge115]

8517669
That's why we never actually do see them here, making them more like an all powerful threat.

I'm glad you enjoyed Ana's little segment

[angel3591]

8518118
Haha! I'm flattered and happy how much my comment made your day! I just discovered the Conversion Bureau universe(the one where humanity is getting screwed by invasion) back in 2015. Damn what an interesting concept! I love the idea of human technology vs. magic; but in other stories I'm like Humanity has powerful weapons and there being slaughterd by tactics from the dark ages?! But this story caught my eye by its more logical realism. I always wanted to tell the author(s) how much I love the story and here I am being appreciated by the guys who keep this story going! :D

BTW when I read the story for the first time back in 2015 I listen to a song that gave me chills because of how well the lyrics seem to fit the story. I feel this can be the nonofficial official Spectrumverse theme song... Black Sabbath's Into The Void!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v6CVVa3qwyU

[angel3591]

8518554
Lyrics: Rocket engines burning fuel so fast Up into the night sky they blast Through the universe the engines whine Could it be the end of man and time? Back on earth the flame of life burns low Everywhere is misery and woe Pollution kills the air, the land and sea Man prepares to meet his destiny, yeah
Rocket engines burning fuel so fast Up into the black sky so vast Burning metal through the atmosphere Earth remains in worry, hate and fear With the hateful battles raging on Rockets flying to the glowing sun Through the empires of eternal void
Freedom from the final suicide
Freedom fighters sent out to the sun Escape from brainwashed minds and pollution. Leave the earth to all its sin and hate Find another world where freedom waits. Past the stars in fields of ancient void Through the shields of darkness where they find Love upon a land a world unknown Where the sons of freedom make their home Leave the earth to Satan and his slaves Leave them to their future in their graves Make a home where love is there to stay Peace and happiness in every day...

[Jed R]

8518554
Honestly, the main problem I always had with Classic Spectrum was that, by and large, the villains weren’t that interesting/intelligent/diverse, and it was really just a series of duck shoots. Sure, we could work to remedy a lot of that in theory and in side stories, but it was... I dunno, like papering over a gaping wound with a plaster. This time, though, we’ve obviously got all the ideas we had from the start - plus, my friend RoyalPsycho is amazing at diversifying armies (he and I previously worked together on my own Alt-TCB work, The Avatar of Albion, where he helped develop the forces of the Solaminan Empire). You’ll have noticed his work in the reference to the Newcalf - a genetically reworked Newfoal. That’s just the beginning of what we call the “bioweapon” ethos of the Solar Empire, where genetics and flesh are simply clay to be moulded...

Needless to say, this is going to be an incredibly fun but incredibly dark story as we proceed.

ETA: You ever seen GATE? How that had a supposedly “magical” Empire do nothing but act as medieval target practice for the modern army, and never actually using bloody magic? For a lot of the time, Classic Spectrum was that. I hate that. This story will remedy and is remedying that.

[angel3591]

8519129
I have seen GATE. Most of the "battles" were massacres. Back to Spectrum; To me, bioweapons are the most terrifying form of warfare. I feel that not even the atom bomb comes close to the ferocity of fighting an enemy that can silently kill a city without so much as an explosion and can start with a single person. It is one thing to see a city's bombed out ruins, but to see an intact city with a non-existent population can give you the chills...

[Jed R]

8520158
Well, I like to think we’re giving the Solar Empire a nice mix of things that go “boom” and things that are squicky, squicky genetically modified monstrosities that make you want to puke... I mean, Doctor Fluffy mentioned that Dead Space was going to influence us. He was so right.

[angel3591]

8520162
Awesome. I look forward to the battles coming ahead. Being a fan of aviation, I hope we can see some battles fought in the air; F-22/F-15s in some dogfights with Imperial pegasi or B-52s and other heavies showing the might of human resistance! Nevertheless good luck with the writing!

[VoxAdam]

8518004
8520162

While I enjoy the generally over-the-top nature of Spectrum, I'm more of an enthusiast for an insidious form of warfare than things that go "boom". This may or may not be a spoiler, but if this more tech-savvy Empire figured out how to reconfigure their potion's formula as an airborne pathogen, humanity would be in deep trouble...

And of course, thank you for all the enthusiastic comments. Hope you like what is to come.

[Solo Wing of The Abyss]

Bit of a tangent but I realized that the Rust Belt must really be something by this point. As in, America could probably supply every man, woman, child, pony, dog, cat, and houseplant in the world (hyperboles sure are fun) with an assault rifle and plenty of bullets with the extreme expansion that would go on.

[Sledge115]

8557392

As Ana remarked;

‘Two hundred million guns are loaded,’ she thought, recalling an old song. She wondered what it had applied to, back in the day. Now, with a world gone mad, it remained relevant as ever. ‘Satan cries, take aim…’

[Solo Wing of The Abyss]

8560294
I won't consider it enough guns until there's so many they replace the US Dollar as a means of currency.

[DarthSonic66]

8515817
I think you're overstating that. That was only really a problem in the middle chunk, the correction of which led to that interesting dynamic Marcus and Celestia had that I talked about in my big post from earlier (that I'm kinda sad to see go...).

[Solarfollow]

The American South rioted, because the President is a “minority woman". Honestly, this lowers my opinion of the story. I'm not normally one for political correctness. But this is stepping too far into stereotypeville for my tastes. And the “Southerners are hateful violent thugs” stereotype, it's been done to death.

But I suppose my real problem is: You're not supposed to bash or stereotype people, yet somehow, it's considered okay to do that to Southerners. And it shouldn't be! Stereotyping Southern Americans as violent thugs, that's not better then stereotyping Black Americans (or any other group of people) as violent thugs.

[gakposter]

9388568
Im a southerner. Deep South Alabama. Outside of nice urban areas, people are intolerant, crude, and hateful.

[Admiral Q Ponyform]

9388568
Yeah, that kind of person is a minority at best. This feels like keft propaganda and that should not be in this fic.

[ALittleUnwell]

9388568
Not to mention the fact that the US has already had a black president who won two turns and inspired far less rioting than his white successor.

[daOtterGuy]

Howdy, hi!

Noice, we get to see the Earth being attacked by bad Celestia. Really enjoy Har and Ana here, they are fun characters and surprisingly enjoyable in a story I read primarily for the pony. I like all the threads being built up here, I can see all the small things forming to bring pay off later and looking forward to when they get cashed out. The alternate fates of the various canon characters are quite fun. In particular Time Turner, Cherilee, and Cadance are really great and love that they feel close to implied canon while having the additions to their personalities brought about by the war.

I don't really have much else to say. This is very intriguing and I'm really getting drawn into the interesting world that's being created here. Excellent work and I look forward to contiuing.

[Sledge115]

11146023

Decided to reply to all of your points at once, heh. Let's see;

Oooh, liking the setup thus far. Lyra is a delight and I quite like her characterization of her, #ArcheologyLyraBestLyra.

Yes! It's a joy writing for her in this story, allowing us to explore various facets other than I love humans, hehe.

Well, then. This is definitely picking up. I'll be interested to see if this is a time-traveling scenario or not, there are several possibilities still that could be happening. I do feel bad for poor Celestia, though. She approaches with compassion and is immediately hit by the "die tyrant!" on landing for the actions of her future/alternate/etc self.

She just wanted to be helpful As for your theory... heh, stay tuned.

Ooh, loving the direction this is going. That was intense. Interesting to see the main players starting to show up and it's difficult to see Shining so... not himself. I do hope Alex can learn to trust these versions of the mane 6 and Celestia, maybe not fully but enough to cooperate since I fully believe that as they are right now they probably aren't that down with the events thus far. Anyways, looking forward to more. This is rad.

Trust takes time and effort, aye. And ponykind is there to help.

Yeah. Not a good time for Twilight there, seeing her brother...

Noice, we get to see the Earth being attacked by bad Celestia. Really enjoy Har and Ana here, they are fun characters and surprisingly enjoyable in a story I read primarily for the pony. I like all the threads being built up here, I can see all the small things forming to bring pay off later and looking forward to when they get cashed out. The alternate fates of the various canon characters are quite fun. In particular Time Turner, Cherilee, and Cadance are really great and love that they feel close to implied canon while having the additions to their personalities brought about by the war.

I appreciate that you mentioned Har first, I've grown fond of who was initially just a throwaway, all the way back then in the days of old Spectrum. Anyways, glad he and she made an impression! And yeah, we do love our threads.

This chapter was a point of pride for me, as its the first chapter I wrote for the story at the time, pre-rewrites. So, glad to see you enjoyed it

Stick around, there's plenty yet to come!