Of Brothers

by FirestormFIM

Chapter 3

A/N: an * symbol means there is a sidenote, it isn't required to read, it's just more detail that I recommend you do, each sidenote is at the bottom of it's respective scene

---

"And 'The Zoology of Zebrica" goes... here." Twilight Sparkle thought aloud as she slid the book into it's place. "Done! Another wonderful re-shelving day." The librarian smiled, re-shelving was one of her favorite duties as Ponyville's librarian.

"Finally" groaned a rather lazy purple dragon, revealing himself from behind another bookcase at least four times his height.

"Oh, Spike." Twilight chided, "I just can't understand how you can not love re-shelving day, I mean -" Before the lavender unicorn could finish explaining the many joys of organizing the multitude of books she was interrupted by the sound of a hoof knocking on the door. "That's weird, most know they can just come in during the day, I mean, it's a library after all." Twilight trotted over to the door and opened it, revealing a familiar stallion.

"Hey Twily!" Shining Armor exclaimed, an actual smile on his face at the site of his little sister.

"Shining Armor! What are you doing here in Ponyville? Twilight asked, expression a mix of surprise, confusion, and excitement.

"I'm here on Guard business." The Royal Guard Captain replied, face darkening for a moment at the thought of his reason for being there. "But it isn't all that urgent so I figured I'd spend the afternoon with my little sis, you know, make sure you don't get yourself into too much trouble." the older unicorn teased, smile returning as quickly as it had left.

"Hey Twilight! Who is it?" Spike called, emerging from the other room. "Shining Armor? Hey!"

"Hey Spike, Twilight hasn't been to hard on you has she?" Shining Armor replied.

"Oh you wouldn't believe it, she's practically a slave driver."

"Okay, that's enough teasing you two." Twilight said, her glare at Shining Armor rendered distinctly un-menacing by due to the smile she couldn't quite suppress.

"Oh!" Spike exclaimed, "Shining Armor come here! I gotta show you something I made, I need your opinion on it." he pointed up the stairs. "It'll only take a minute."

"Umm... sure." With that Shining Armor followed Spike up the stairs. Twilight made to do the same when she heard another knock on the door.

"What's with this?" She asked nopony in particular, "doesn't anypony know you can just walk into a library during hours? I mean, there's a sign and everything." Twilight opened the door magically to reveal Firestorm. Of course, she thought, he's new here too. "Hey Firestorm, what can I do for you?"

"Hey Twilight, I was wondering if you could help me out with something." He said.

"Sure what do you need?"

"I need you to help me 'Cutie Mark Crusader-proof' the forge for the afternoon, I kinda promised them I'd teach them a bit about smithing."

"I'll do what I can, though I'm still not sure I like the idea of them around fire and hot metal. They tend to wreak havoc no matter what we do to prevent it." They shared a laugh at that.

"You sound exactly like Applejack did." Firestorm laughed. "Thanks though, I suppose since Scoots is one of them I'd have to end up doing this eventually."

"I guess so, I'll come down to the forge in a few minutes."

"I'll go get started then, thanks again Twilight," Firestorm turned and left without noticing that Twilight was about to say more.

"What did the traitor want?" The angry voice behind her caused Twilight to jump.

"He just wanted some help getting the forge ready for three troublesome fillies. Wait, why did you call him a traitor? I thought he had just resigned from the Guard." Twilight responded when she had recovered, concern crossing her face as she processed what her had said and just how far away the smile that he had been wearing was from his face.

"Whatever the official term is, he abandoned Equestria in the wake of a major crisis; he's a traitor." Shining Armor snarled.

Twilight flinched at her brothers sudden fury towards one of his oldest friends. "But he left so he could take care of his sister."

"If he wanted to protect his sister he'd still be serving to keep all of Equestria safe. I haven't left the Guard and you've been involved in literally every crisis in the past two years!"

"But I'm a grown mare, Princess Celestia's personal student, and the embodiment of the Element of Magic; I can take care of myself." Twilight was beginning to become frustrated by Shining Armor's new-found closed mindedness. "Scootaloo's just a filly. Would you have not done anything different if everything that's happened in Ponyville happened if I was her age and lived here?"

Shining Armor opened his mouth to reply then shut it, deciding there was nothing more for him to say*. Instead, he snorted angrily and stormed out of the library. Twilight left a few minutes later, still deeply concerned about her brother but deciding not to say anything to Firestorm, not yet anyway.

*Definitely not because he had no counter to her argument, no, not at all

---

Several hours later the sound of hammers could be heard from the forge. Firestorm had begun teaching his little sister and her friends the basics of smithing about four hours earlier and, both fortuitously and surprising, there had been no serious damage to the forge or anypony inside. That is, unless you count two horribly abused pieces of bronze still being pounded on by a pair of increasingly deflated (and formerly overeager) fillies. Well I guess it's not something that necessarily runs in the family, of Rarities for that matter. Firestorm thought, at this point somewhat desensitized to the works of the Pegasus and Unicorn fillies. That Apple Bloom however, she isn't bad. I'll have to teach her some more at some point. It looks like it isn't exactly her preferred material though, wood maybe? I'll have to talk to her sister about that. The Earth Pony in question was using a chisel to try and carve out the Cutie Mark Crusader insignia, unfortunately adding scratches to an otherwise reasonably well made shinguard.

"Alright girls, time to close up shop." Firestorm said receiving disappointed groans from all three fillies for a variety of reasons, the most common of which being the failure of all three to receive their Cutie Marks.

"But I wanted to be good at this stuff like you are." Scootaloo whined.

"Try not to worry about it Scoots. All three of you are better than me at somethings, you just have to realize what those things are." Firestorm said, both trying to comfort the fillies and convince them to look at what they were already good at.

With that Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle said their goodbyes as they were picked up by their older sisters. Scootaloo was sent back into the house to get ready for bed, it was a school night after all and she had spent the last four hours pounding on hot metal. Firestorm stayed to close the forge down for the night. As he finished the sound of a hoof on the door filled the forge. The former guardpony opened the door to reveal one of the last ponies he'd expected to see.

"Captain? What are you doing here?" Firestorm asked, surprised to see his old friend in Ponyville.

"You gave up the right to call me that." Shining Armor growled, "and I think you know why I'm here. this is your last chance.

"My last chance? Shining, I told you I wasn't going to rejoin when I was still in Canterlot." Firestorm replied, "is this really the only reason you're here?" Firestorm was starting to get angry at his friend's constant refusal to accept his resignation.

"I don't tolerate deserters." The Unicorn said, "as Captain of the Equestrian Royal Guard I order you to return to your post Lieutenant."

"Order?" Firestorm's temper was quickly slipping. "I resigned Shining, you can't order me to rejoin. And I am not a deserter! I've already told you that the Guard can always buy from me at cost. But I am not leaving my sister again, not after everything that's happened here!" Firestorm was practically roaring now. "The forge is closed, get out."

"This isn't over, the Princesses personally gave me permission to do this." Shining Armor snarled over his shoulder as he left, only to be met by a slamming door.

---

Deep within the Everfree Forest, deeper even than Zecora's hut, a camp was alive with activity, the sounds of nearly a dozen forges and many more training drills echoing through the depths of the ancient forest. At the edge of the camp a group of scouts returned from their mission. They immediately went to find their commander.

"Sir" one panted, the group saluting as they reached their superior.

"You were told to come back only when you had news." The commander hissed, "well, report."

We've seen the Pegasus smith and the Unicorn captain in Ponyville" the scout reported. "They seem to still be unaware of our presence."

"Good, it seems this blow will be more devastating to our enemies than we thought." The commander thought for a minute, then he looked back to the waiting scouts. "Infiltrate the town, find out what you can about their presence and the complement of guards they brought with them."

"Yes Sir" the scouts acknowledged in unison as they turned and raced back out of the camp.

After the scouts had left, the officer turned to the dark opening of the largest structure in the camp. "Did you hear the scouts report, my Queen?"

Queen Chrysalis stepped into the moonlight, an evil smile on her face. "Yes," she replied, "it looks like Shining Armor will be mine after all."

Comments

[FirestormFIM]

For the record, I am working on the next chapter, I've been busy and I'm trying to slow this down some and I'm trying to think of good filler. So chapter 4 is coming, slowly but surely

Edit: And I just realized I've started both of my comments with "for the record"

[i_am_the_jam]

I assume that Firestorm was honorably discharged. And are there no more smiths in Canterlot?