This story is considered canon for A 14th Century Friar in Celestia's Court, but may be read as a standalone.
Spearhead was a guard. Had been for years. He'd gone through the Academy with Shining Armor, seen action against bandits in the border territories, even served a stint in the Royal Expeditionary Force. It was good work; a noble calling. He loved being a Guard.
Spearhead was an artist. Sure, it might not have been his special talent, but he'd been creating avant garde art for as long as he'd been training with spears. He was planning on going back to school to pursue a career in art. He didn't want to stop being a Guard to make art, at least not yet, but he did wonder about the future, when he wasn't so fit or wanted a change of pace. But it wasn't an immediate issue. He still had years of service ahead of him, after all, and there was no reason not pursue art on the side. Plenty of soldiers had hobbies, and Spearhead was content to let the future look after itself.
Then, the day his buddy was supposed to be getting married, an invading swarm of Changelings broke through the city's shield, which did not sit will with Spearhead, to say the least.
This is a tale of the Battle for Canterlot, and of one guardpony whose life would be forever changed by it.
The character of Spearhead intrigued me. From the brief bit that we see of him in Season 7, he seems like a standup guy, even if he's not quite all there. I felt he merited fleshing out. This story is rated 'Teen' for violence, though I don't plan on making it gory.
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good stuff
8751757
Thank you.
this is feature worthy
8753080
I appreciate it. That means a lot to me.
Damn, that ending struck a chord of feeling. Good story, certainly worthy the read.
8765849
Thank you
Ya know, I just can't stop thinking about how Chrysalis' strategy was so abysmally dumb.
Here she has a race of shapeshifting, mind-controlling bug monsters... and she uses them to invade openly and undisguised. I mean, even ignoring the Anti-Magic Throne thing she somehow acquired at what point we have no idea because the show hasn't explained a damn thing about changeling backstory, her species had the ULTIMATE powers for infiltration and UTTERLY blew it.
The ponies are lucky she's such a dreadful tactician.
Although... as we saw in Season 6, the ponies end up being even worse since they knew the changelings were still out there and had ZERO preparations in place.
Eh... everything in the show is Idiot Balled at this point.
As far as Chrysalis, I think that the Marine reviewer Firebrand has an interesting theory that she's not as inept as she looks (link). As far as the rest goes, I'll admit that I'd like to see some more security precautions that are explicitly in place, but for the sake of my own peace of mind I try to just assume that there's a lot happening off screen that we just don't know about. It's similar to how post-911 the airport security was visibly increased, but does little to actually deter terrorism, while the intelligence community has (behind the scenes) stopped dozens of large-scale attacks. Even so, the FBI has missed what, in retrospect, should have been some obvious threats. I imagine Equestria isn't that different. Maybe Chrysalis tried several different ploys before the season 6 finale that were successfully stopped, but then blindsided everyone. That's how I prefer to think of it, anyway.
If nothing else, I hope you enjoyed this story.
Looking good so far.
I think in that final argument, the proper spelling would be "Is too!" rather than "Is to!"
Whelp. Looks like Spearhead's dead.
Plot twist! The Spearhead from the show was a ghost all along!
8884814
Thanks for the edits
I really enjoyed this. I'm not quite sure what to say in particular, but your writing is really solid and you convey emotion well (although someday I'd like to get through a story of yours with dry eyes 🙃). I've only read your shorter stories so far, but you're definitely one of my favourite authors on here. And I did quite like Argent so I guess I'll have to read that HiE behemoth you've got now 'cause I skimmed the prologue and saw she was there.
A few minor corrections though:
Maybe Shining is just preemptively thinking of her as his wife, but elsewhere it uses fiancé so this should maybe be switched.
Missing apostrophe and maybe some missing words, unless I'm just misunderstanding what she's getting at.
9128874
I appreciate the edits and the praise. I am deeply flattered that you think so highly of my work, and, perhaps oddly, I actually take it as a compliment when I find out that my work has brought someone to tears - it means I did my job. I hope 14th Century lives up to your expectations. And, yes, I had a lot of fun with Argent. Far more than I expected to, hence her coming back in the next story. Happy reading!
Another brilliant work. It says something how I honestly can't tell how much lasting brain damage Spearhead suffered.
In any case, thank you for this.
9210241
Always a pleasure. Glad to know a story that was completely off-the-cuff worked out.
An awesome story. It seemed a bit strange to me at the time the show didn't show Spearhead physically or mentally affected by his service, so I went into this reading expecting it to fill a gap. But now I can appreciate it both ways. He can be the stallion he wanted to be or the one he used to be.
Horseapples indeed
This is great,
LET'S GO!!!! THX FOR CHARACTERIZATION FOR SPEARHOOF!
9480946
Thank you! Glad you enjoyed it.
This was pretty good
9522561
Thank you.
Back-pedaling.
I love your story about the good Friar, so I marked this one to read a while back. And today is the day I follow through. Thank you for writing.
Head down.
I love this.
10317021
Thank you.
This is a delightful little read, just what I've been looking for.
Their
8813706
I concur with Firebrand's theory. Great chapter!
I don't understand why gold nuggets like this aren't featured when so much other garbage is.
). This story was enjoyable and scratched that itch for me. Well done.
I always enjoyed Spearhead's appearance in the show. That one brief showing of a small, entertaining side-character gave much needed depth into the lives of characters like Shining Armor and Cadence (who should have had more development!!!
10498481
Danke
10498522
Your words please me.
Came here from A 14th Century Friar in Celestia's Court. Someday I hope to have the energy to continue my detailed 'read and commentate' on that, but this at least tided me over in hopes of that day (depression means lots of time and a limited amount of energy). Fav and upvote for this as well, which should come as little surprise.
Might comment on an earlier bit of this later.
11283341
I'm glad you enjoyed it. Take care of you. Comments are great, but I wouldn't want anyone feeling bad they didn't comment on my story. Hope you're doing well.
Love the interactions between spear and ardent. Had a grin the entire time 😁
Spear was really trying to raise a flag at the end there.
This was a great read. Really emotional and you got the tension for each scene perfect. Thanks for sharing it!
11507605
Huh? What precisely do you mean?
11861610
Flags are points in a story that change the flow/direction of the story. Death flags for example. Say a cop character was idly chatting with someone when a fight breaks out nearby. Part of that chatter could involve him mentioning he's only 2 weeks from retirement. That would be raising a death flag.
It's kinda like Murphy's law. Anything that can happen, will happen, at the most inconvenient time possible.
The flag I commented on was about a it could be worse flag from his statement:
Which was followed by them realizing that the massive flock outside the shield wasn't birds.
11861796
Ah! Thank you!
11507707
Thank you!
11507562
I'm glad you commented on this story, as I kind of forgot how much fun I had writing it.
12084237
Happy to help, I thoroughly enjoyed it.