A War

by Comma Typer

Routines

"Out, out, out!"

Long Shot kept running through the tunnel, Eff Stop flying by her side, the both of them strafing and avoiding the arrows flashing by them.

Crystal ponies lunged at them, though they deftly eluded their grasp.

Out of the tunnel, before them, a huge glass building in shattered tatters—its whole framework tainted by holes and dangling steel bars, most of it exposed by the space which used to have glass panes.

"Long Shot," Eff Stop said, grabbing her by the shoulder—redder eyes, "if we're going down, let's at least go down together. Do you have a note?"

She shook her head, whimpering and moaning while fumbling in her bag for something—a scrap of paper, perhaps.

"Nothing's going to solve itself!" Eff Stop yelled, patting her hard on the back of her neck and urging her on. "Let's go, let's go before he—"

They turned around, facing one.

Clothed with a flowing cape and metal armor, a silver crown around his head.

Fanged, red eyed.

"Sombra!"

They ran away.

Only for Sombra to reappear in front of them.

"Other way, other way!"

Their other way blocked by a black wall of crystal.

Left and right—walls of crystal.

Stepping forward, laughing maniacally—Sombra.

Out of the ground, he levitated two swords of black crystal.

Eff Stop hugged her tight.

Both clattering their teeth.

Sombra whacked him on the head with the first sword, scarring him on the cheek and knocking Eff Stop out.

"No!" Long Shot shrieked.

The tyrant before her merely laughed again at that, dropping the weapon.

Aimed the second sword at her.

Then, vaporized into shadow, screaming.

He vanished

In his place:

Luna.

Long Shot gasped. "A-Are you...d-did you just kill my—"

"No," was the Princess's short answer. "This is only a dream...or, to be more specific, a nightmare."

Long Shot exhaled easy. "So...I-I'm not dead?"

Luna nodded. "You are not."

Her horn glowed and the crystal walls disappeared.

---

"But, I don't understand," Long Shot said as the newspony and the diarch walked along a dirty but flowery path under a moonlit sky. Butterflies chirped the sounds of crickets and flamingos dined with toast on the open fields. "What y-you're saying is...I'm OK?"

"Mostly so," Luna said. "So is your friend, Eff Stop. It just so happened that, when the shell landed on the bridge, several squads were converging upon that spot and managed to detect you under the mound of dirt."

"Then, where am I?" Long Shot asked, then twitching her eyes as she noticed the change of smell from pleasant grass to aromatic butter. "Am I in a hospital?"

"About to be discharged," Luna replied.

"Which hospital?" she asked further.

"The one in Pony Island, in Bronclyn."

Long Shot gasped. "I'll wake up in Manehattan! But, Print Run's gonna get mad about us—"

Luna held up a hoof, signalling her to keep quiet. "Rest assured, if he insists that you go out once more to such a dangerous situation while you are not in the best of conditions...I could send a royal decree."

The Princess giggled at that.

"Is there anything else that you want to ask about before I go to other dreams?"

"There's nothing—wait..." Placed a hoof to her chin, wondering. Thinking hard. "Actually...do you know what happened to those three ponies we were with? Like...do the names of Silver Spanner, Sandbar, and Macnam ring a bell to you?"

Luna blinked.

Lowered her head.

"You've seen Spanner's corpse," Luna began. "Macnam was overwhelmed and died shortly after you left that restaurant. As for Sandbar, he is the only one left alive—as alright as you are, in fact."

Long Shot glanced away, closing her eyes.

Feeling the tears well up.

Luna wrapped a hoof around her neck.

The two of them on that dirty but flowery path under the moonlit sky. Gone were the toast-eating flamingos and the cricket-sounding butterflies.

Only grass around them.

---

While Long Shot trotted past gridlocked carriages, teeming crowds, and streaming supplies—all in the morning backdrop of skyscrapers, high-rises, and intermingled words and accents which, joined up, made no sense to her—the journalist did not pick up on a conversation between two pegasi wearing military uniforms; they were herding sheep into a huge warehouse by the harbor where the waters did not crash against it in waves but, rather, stayed calm.

"What did you have for breakfast?" Sassaflash, the blue one, casually asked the other.

"Salted beans and peanuts," replied Rainbowshine, that other, purple one.

She placed a hoof on her own cheek. "You're too harsh on yourself!"

"It's not that bad," Rainbowshine replied, staring at the perfect line of sheep being led into the warehouse. "If you tired some for yourself, it's...passable."

---

Applejack opened the large cage at the archway to Sweet Apple Acres.

Amidst the clangs and jangles of machinery working inside the brick barn, the sheep outside grouped themselves into a straight line, haltingly moving their way to the shearers busy with the sheep who came before them.

Among those shearers was Fluttershy whose pink tail had already been cut shorter than last time as well as her mane. Her hooves and her face were blemished with mud, and her drab beige clothes did not help her image. The sheep before her was almost done, with only little wool left to shave off.

She nervously looked at the new batch of sheep approaching.

And sighed.

Closed her eyes.

"Fluttershy!" Applejack yelled from beside the cage. "Focus on the job!"

---

Cherry Berry, a pink Earth pony, had found herself inside a dark and damp train carriage, surrounded by many bales of white and black wool.

The bumpy ride made her trip and fall, hitting herself on one of the bales and feeling its soft and fluffy surface while slightly injuring herself on the chin.

"Ow!"

"Hey," another voice yelled out, this one female, too. "Watch where you're going."

"Sorry." She stood up while dusting her now dirty legs. "It's taking me some time for my eyes to adjust to so much...darkness...on a daily basis."

"Remember the layout," the other mare quickly replied in a helpful tone: "The walls are lined with wool."

---

It was nighttime back in Bronclyn, Manehattan.

Which district? The Fashion District.

However, one must disregard the art deco skyscrapers, the plentiful parks, and the overall poorer look of this side of Manehattan, styled with more bricks and mortar than steel and glass despite fashion being its famed subject.

Three or four turns would land a tourist on a narrow two-laned street jam-packed with industrial structures. Smokestacks, chimneys, conveyor belts, assembly lines; do not forget the open cemented spaces where carriages and wagons are parked to obtain their cargo and haul to wherever—drivers stood at the ready.

Inside one of the factories here was a uniform mill. Carts of wool were wheeled to the main processing area where, in many dimly lit rooms and cubicles, ponies worked hard on producing bleak, colorless, and efficient uniforms. Stacks of raw wool laid beside stacks of completed uniforms, these before the neatly organized workers at their sewing stations each of which had a sewing machine, a pincushion, and a set of instructions on how to operate the sewing machine.

Rarity, one of those workers, was clothed in one of those mass-produced uniforms. Blue gray with buttons, sleeves, pockets—this was the uniform for the body. Blue gray, tied, wide—this was the uniform, the cap, for the head.

She wiped the sweat off of her forehead.

It was hot and humid here, garnering the collective sweat and heat of those ponies crammed into one room.

Her mane? Gone were those fine curls. That mane, corrupted with splitting ends and frizzes—her tail, too.

With yet another uniform done, fresh from the machine, she levitated off to one of those uniform stacks, ready to go to some citizen ready to fulfill his or her duty to Equestria and fight for the cause—surely, a noble cause.

Whether willing or unwilling.

---

In the afternoon, at the train station in Ponyville, a line of ponies ended on its wooden boarding platform. They did not mind the breakdown of the station—graying paint, invasive graffiti, decaying propaganda posters.

Sea Swirl, the next unicorn to enter the train, received her uniform from the guard in front of her, floating it with her purple aura instead of the guard's yellow. She turned around and trotted to the train, carrying a full and heavy sack on her back.

Before those wooden carriage doors closed, before she was fully inside, the train whistled and blew out lots of smoke, spreading everywhere.

But, the ponies did not cough at this, nor did they cover their noses to protect themselves from whatever harmful chemicals might be in the smoke.

The line moved.

---

"'Do not cry, my dear,
At the tip of a spear.
Better to die in dignity,
Than to live in scorned conceit.'

"For that is a poem written by one of General Firefly's contemporaries, Battery Fire, who, by the way, bears no relation to the general," a yellow stallion conveyed to the newbie soldiers at their seats.

The train rolled on, the grassy hills continuing in the landscapes past the windows.

"What I'm trying to say here is, whether you signed up for battle or were forced to do so, remind yourselves that this is for the greater good, for the good of Equestria."

Most of them looked elsewhere. Some gazed upon the beautiful outside, that one last glimpse of an outside of green and blue and yellow—the green of the bountiful grass and the lush plants, the blue of a sunny sky, and the yellow of that very sun. Others occupied themselves with looking at another pony as they conversed with them, revealing their secret pains, their hidden worries, those things that would prompt any creature to tears if pushed to it. Finally, there were those who merely looked, deep in thought as they mulled over what was to come, what was to arrive for them.

Therefore, that stallion, who went on with his speech which was supposed to encourage a new platoon of ponies, instead bored them.

Or worse, burdened them.

---

It was sunset.

Chocstown, a city by the bay, teemed with what was deemed "old architecture". Indeed, many of the buildings there had that design—thin houses with diagonal roofs squished against each other, spacious balconies where an entire party could be held, and shrubbery decorating the yards of even commercial establishments.

For the train Sea Swirl rode on, the last stop was at the end of land and the beginning of sea: Chocstown Piers.

Vast warehouses capable of storing thousands of multi-story tall racks and shelves which could themselves contain everything from the tiniest of laboratory samples to the biggest of catapults and cannons and "Sunburst's Famous Artillery Cannons!" one of which was put on display right before those warehouses, a sign depicting those words and a painting of a happy Sunburst complete with glasses.

At the ports proper, cargo ships were the majority here, although passenger ships for the soldiers were not lacking. Long lines of uniformed soldiers, mostly wearing gloomy expressions, simply waited to move up the ramp and to the ship. Those who were on the ship simply waited for the vessel to be full. For those with full ships, they simply waited for the ship to move.

But, something unusual was happening on the side. Two huge families were bickering with a blue dragon almost twice as tall as them, those arguing parties standing right at the edge of the port and near a large steamship.

"I was told there was something urgent!" Ember, that dragon, roared at them. "But, what do I get?! A bunch of obnoxious ponies too little to save themselves!"

"But, we made an agreement!" Big Daddy McColt shouted, raising his hooves to the air to make a point, although his height and his hat was not enough for it to be very convincing. "We promised to temporar'ly set aside our diff'rences to get to safety in yer' place!"

Ma Hooffield, an elderly brown mare with aging hair, stomped her hoof on the concrete. "What he said or you stay away from us!"

Ember snickered and crossed her arms. "Oh, so you think you're too tough for a dragon, huh? I live in the Dragon Lands and you think you're tough enough to just sleep in our territory?!"

Meanwhile, a robed unicorn with a goatee watched the whole affair unravel from afar, seeing the blue McColts, the brown Hooffields, and that single dragon duke it out in words.

---

The large clock on the wall struck ten in the evening.

That robed unicorn sat on a swivel chair, sipping a cup of coffee while tapping his hoof on the table.

His room was tremendous in size, and the imposing stone columns would immediately catch the attention of any visitor unaware of what this place had. Portraits of various ponies, including himself, graced the walls alongside statues and flower vases. Thick tomes took up the space of many bookshelves arranged in precise order. Secured collections of valuable antiques such as ancient helmets and maturing perfumes dotted much of the space that was left.

Finally, a red carpet led to the table where he sat under one light.

"It was a mistake," he said in his deep accent. "A serious, grave mistake. But, the dragons deceive only themselves, and so do the rest in their so-called 'help'."

Silence, the only sound echoing throughout being his voice and his hooftaps on the table.

"How many times have I advised the Princesses about this error? They, of all ponies, know the maxims of war and, among them, is this one: That a war should never be long, lest it should drain the kingdom waging war. Don't they know that these 'leaders' also have knowledge of that, too?"

He shook his head.

"We are exposing ourselves to a fatal spiral of death. Even if we gain the upper hoof in this conflict, we are purely an opportunity in the eyes of others—a prize, for a moment, achievable. The changelings, the Abysinnians, and the hippogriffs to the South, the dragons and the griffons to the West, and the yaks who are already within our borders! Once they see us weak and weary..."

Shook his head again, rubbing his forehead.

"It is a national disaster. If only ponies like us had more sway. If spoken principles alone won't bring the Princesses to realize their wrongs, then only action can set them aright!"

The double doors opened.

He stood up from his chair, trotted to Princess Celestia who had walked halfway on the carpet, and bowed down to her. "Your Highness."

Celestia smiled at him. "How many times do I have to tell ponies they don't have to kneel all the time?"

"It is only right and respectful, Princess Celestia," the unicorn said.

She nodded, her wavy mane moving with her. "You still sincerely see the value in it. That is always good...but, you can stand up already."

He stood up.

"So, what is the object of your sudden visit?" he asked.

Celestia removed her smile.

"To speak with you about an important topic, Chancellor Neighsay."

Comments

[Sir Budginton]

Congrats on reaching 200k

Also, not neighsay!!!!