All Quiet on the Equestrian Front

by Tempest Wind

The Bridge

O living pictures of the dead,
O songs without a sound,
O fellowship whose phantom tread
Hallows a phantom ground --
How in a gleam have these revealed
The faith we had not found.
---
Four

The Bridge

Dusty wheezed awake with a throaty coughing fit, as her lungs spat up the mostly gone flakes of roofing that had congealed in her throat, over the couple hours she'd been asleep.

The Changeling artillery was doubling down, apparently, what with the Stuka bombers unwilling to fly in the poor weather above them.

Gale quietly passed Dusty a tin cup, full of a dark liquid, before quietly sipping at her own. Bags pooled under the younger’s eyes, something Dusty no doubt reflected in her own. The Earth Pony took a sip from the tin cup, mouth twitching into a scowl as the familiar taste of black coffee wafted past her teeth and into the back of her throat.

Biting down the strong, bitter taste, Dusty shook her head in disgust. “Blegh, fuck, that's rank-ass coffee. Too strong.”

Gale shrugged, chugging away at her own cup. “Can't light a fire. Beats nothing.”

Trails gave a non-committal grunt in reply, as artillery echoed frustratingly in the distance, before taking another swig of the horridly strong- and rather cold- liquid. “Dunno how you stomach this stuff, Gale. I mean, damn.”

“Eh, my sister brews stronger. It's usually hot, though, yanno?”

“I fear for your sister’s bladder in a few years.”

That, finally, got a snort of amusement out of the bat pony, who shook her head, and downed the rest of the nearly syrupy liquid. “Alright, alright. That's enough fun for today.. They're supposed to blow the bridge today I think.”

“No shit?” Dusty shot back in question, downing the rest of the cup, and tossing it aside as she slid behind her Vickers gun for a third time in as many days.

“Shit.” Gale nodded, towards a group of ponies at the river’s edge. Most seemed exhausted, their rifles slung over their backs- or missing, in a few cases- helmets dented from combat; uniforms tattered or mud caked from constant battle. “That's the last group from Acornage. Just got here a few minutes ago. Had to shoot their way through the Changelings.”

“Damn. And they got through?”

“Most didn't.”
--

The group of Acornage survivors were fairly quickly shuttled towards the rear lines by another group of ponies- others from Dusty’s group, the ‘Bell Garrison. They were in no condition to fight, having been marching non-stop for three days, and nopony expected them to.

That fell to Dusty’s group of ponies. The Earth Pony private followed their trail to the rear for a few minutes, before turning back to her and Gale’s gun position.

The two mares sat tensely in the dugout. The Changelings had stopped firing their artillery a few minutes earlier. Yet, nothing had materialized.

Three boxes. Three boxes of four hundred rounds chambered .303 Canterlot Standard Calibre. Four belts per box, twelve belts in all.

If she was gentle with the gun, the ammunition would, perhaps, last a couple more hours.

Three boxes. Twelve belts. One gun.

The three pounder and its crew off to their right was busy reinforcing their position in the basement of the ruined bakery, probably just as exhausted, and probably just as low on ammunition.

The single three pounder gun- shipped to the Shire by accident when it'd been meant for Vanhoover’s Garrison- had been the sole deterrent of Changeling armor crossing the bridge over the Shire river. It's position shelled repeatedly; it'd been blasted away with Cannon, and was still somehow operational.

Dusty twitched her head back towards the front, shoving the Vickers barrel forward, hooves near the trigger grip.

Still nothing.

The mare exhaled shakily, and let the MG rest against the sandbag wall, leaning against it herself.

A smoke or two would have been great right about now.
---

The Field Marshall gazed out at the riverline, as artillery crews to his right and left were busy cleaning and maintaining their light field howitzers- the journey overland had been rough on the large caliber guns, and the constant shelling of Equestrian lines had been costly, if important.

The shattered gun caisson behind him spoke volumes, as the weary crews gave their cannons some time to cool off, and engineers time to check their structural integrity.

“More delays.” Trimmel muttered, shaking the morning condensation off his field cap, before replacing it atop his head. “More delays, damnable roads, absolutely pathetic weather.” The Changeling gazed about the artillery battery, and decided to take a stroll, as they’d be unavailable for several hours.

The Architect paused, however, as he felt something patter across his cap’s brim. Followed by a steady pitter patter.

The officer gazed upwards, toward the air above.

Rain.

It was raining.

The damnable pegasi had brought in storm clouds overnight.

Bloody, assault-stopping rain.

Trimmel spun about on his hooves. “I need a runner! Now, verdämmnt!”
---

The rain began to flow downwards, and shortly after, came the panzers.

Muck flew, splattering Dusty’s face, as she fell back from the Vickers gun in shock. Gale helped her back to her hooves, as she wiped her own face clear of mud, the two having very nearly been taken out by another tank. The three pounder roared, adding another Changeling tank to its tally.

Somewhere to the defense’s front, past the hastily dug foxholes that other infantry ponies had dug along the riverbank, the Royal Sapper Brigade had finally arrived, and were, if Gale was correct, wiring the bridge with explosives.

Thunder crackled as lightning flickered across the sky. Gale tucked into a corner for a moment, thinking the thunder enemy artillery again, as Dusty emptied out another ammunition belt into the steadily building storm. Her face flushed with exertion regardless of the frigid rain, Trails cracked open the next ammunition box, yanked a fresh belt free of the case, and began the somewhat slow process of reloading the Vickers gun.

At least the rain helped keep the last fresh barrel she had in operable condition.

Thunder echoed again, as Gale slid back over, next to Dusty, and went back to helping feed ammo belts into the greedy heavy machine gun.

Dusty twisted the gun about to face some sort of movement- barely visible in the rapidly building thunderstorm, when a flash of tank fire brightened the downpour, before an explosion threw Dusty back, towards the rear of the house.

Wheezing and wide eyed, the Earth Pony mare began patting herself over. A wince near her hip made her jerk away, before gazing back at her bloody fetlock, throat rather dry.

“Sh-ah… Shit I uh.. I think I got h-hit, Gale.”

The bat pony mare whimpered, as she pulled herself to a standing position, and slunk over, looking towards Dusty’s wound. She, at least, seemed unharmed, if somewhat badly shaken by the close call.”

“Oh- oh jeez that doesn't look good. Th-there's uh.. that's blood.”

“Hey, hey re-relax, Gale, it dunnit feel that bad, honest. Just a bit of a love tap, you know?”

“I-I ah, oh jeez, uhh…”

“Hey, uh, ow, shit. Careful, Gale. That still smarts.”

“Shit sorry! Sorry sorry sorry!”

Dusty grunted, as Gale backed off her a few feet.

“S’fine. Gun’s wrecked.”

“O-oh, uh. Yeah.” Gale blinked, then blinked again, finally realizing that their gun nest had been knocked out. “Holy fuck we just got shot by a tank.”

“Yeah… let's… not do that again.” Dusty wheezed, as she walked over to where the Changeling rifle carbine she'd stolen the night before had wound up- flung across the nest by the force of the tank shell.

Snagging up the Changeling rifle and checking the ammunition, she jammed the bolt forward, loading a fresh rifle cartridge into the breech. Two left, by the looks of things.

“So what now?” Gale questioned, as she unslung her chatterbox once more, checking her magazine seating.

“Guess we find a foxhole. I ain’t staying in a gun nest that's already been blown to shit once.” And then she was out the back door.
--

Dusty practically flopped face-forward into the muddy foxhole, and turned to its other occupant to say thanks for letting her hide inside it, but stopped, taking a good look at the pony against the other wall of the trench.

Quietly, she set aside her acquired Changeling rifle, and grasped the Type-K in the pony’s grip, checking its ammunition, before sliding a fresh stripper clip into the rifle’s magazine, after a short root around in the other pony’s pocket.

He wouldn't be needing it anymore.

Daring to peek her head over the lip of the foxhole, she strained through the rainstorm to make out the bridge again, as rifle fire snapped and hissed around her, and tanks incessantly belched forth shells from across the bank.

Sure enough, there were Pony-like shapes down below the riverbank and around the old stone bridge’s supports. Looked like they were blowing the bridge after all.

Focusing on the work in front of her, Dusty followed the opposite bank with her rifle sight, watching the occasional flashes of light, intermingled with thunderous lightning, illuminating the bank. She waited over one particular spot where she'd seen a flash repeatedly over a few seconds- about the time it took to rack a bolt- and, upon seeing it flash again, squeezed the trigger on her own rifle, before ducking back into her foxhole, as quickly as possible.

The mare racked the bolt on her rifle, and rose up again, making sure to shift to the opposite end of the foxhole, as she took stock of the engineers again- the rain was, for the moment, slackening off, though the storm clouds showed no sign of disappearing.

The Young mare watched as the engineers, doing their best not to draw fire from the Changeling side of the river, calmly crawled their way along the support stonework, the last Pony in line bringing a box attached to a wire of some sort alongside him- the detonator probably.

They'd made it nearly back to the foxholes, when Dusty was forced to duck down into her hole- a Changeling Spandau machine gun had begun raking up the riverbank, along their position. Inside her hole, she quivered, as the rippling cloth-like sound of the machine gun tore into what could only be the engineers group, before passing on down the river.

Peering up, Dusty’s eyes widened at the sight of the corpses, and the mare struggled to keep her lunch down. She was aided somewhat by the shock of watching a Changeling tank roll up to the bridge itself and position on said bridge. A three pounder shell ricocheted off the front of the tank’s armor, as it rolled it’s turret over to the bakery. There was a slight pause, then a roar, as the bakery exploded in all directions, brickwork and construction mortar flying in several directions, with a red haze momentarily filling the air immediately surrounding the basement.

The mare looked around herself. No planes in the sky. No other tanks or tank guns to help out. Just terrified ponies, struggling not to be shot to death, or blown sky high, alongside a muddy riverbank, with grinning death atop steel Panzers to their front.

Dusty’s gaze fell upon the corpses of the engineer team again- and the still connected detonator. She gazed over at the tank, then the bridge it sat on.

Dusty Trails sat her rifle down in its previous owners’ hooves, shed her kitbag, uniform overcoat, and helmet, and set her jaw, leaping from the foxhole.

A rifle cracked alongside her, as she felt the bullet brush her cheek, though she didn't take the time to stop and regard it, as it was followed by several others. Moving as quickly as she could gallop, the mare from Dodge Junction planted herself in front of the detonator, grasped the plunger with both forehooves, and gazed for a second at the tank barrel aimed in her direction.

“Fuck off and die!”
--

Dusty found herself on the ground, wheezing and whimpering, Spandau gun bullets stitched up and across her barrel. She lay there, shivering in pain, but smiling.

The bridge was gone.

Even if she hadn't been in the capacity of mind to enjoy it going off. She'd heard it go, and that was enough for her.
---

“Here she is, guys.” Gale’s soft voice carried over the evening breeze, as Dusty felt ponies shifting next to her in the darkness. “D-do you think she'll make it?”

A flash of light, that stuck around blindingly, for a few seconds before disappearing. When had she fallen asleep?

“Fuck, that's bad looking. Morphine.”

“Morphine check.” A tap-tap, against glass.

“You said she got stitched by a Spandau oh-two?”

“Yessir, right up the chest.”

“Ok, miss, take it easy. This is gonna sting.”

A short prick brought a low whine from Dusty, as she immediately felt tension begin to fall off her muscles.

“Surprised she's still alive myself. Ok, let's get her on the stretcher. One, two…”

Dusty felt herself being lifted, and heard Gale trying to say… something.

She couldn't tell.

She couldn't tell much of anything, as she let herself fade back away to darkness, the voices blurring into a low mumble.
---

We have sought God in a cloudy Heaven,
We have passed by God on earth:
His seven sins and his sorrows seven,
His wayworn mood and mirth,
Like a ragged cloak have hid from us
The secret of his birth.

Brother of men, when now I see
The lads go forth in line,
Thou knowest my heart is hungry in me
As for thy bread and wine;
Thou knowest my heart is bowed in me
To take their death for mine.

Author's Note:

Minor edits to grammar, thanks to my good friend and editor Stemis! Dude's awesome.

Comments

[Stellar_]

F

[Sassy_Changeling]

Pressing F to pay respects

[Mykin]

F for respects.