The Final Stand of Ponyville
Honor Above All Else
Chapter 32
By Honored Service
Pre-read Tbone5363
“Shitshitshitshitshitshitshitshitshitshitshitshitshitshitshit.” I yelled to myself while running along the end of Ghastly Gorge. I spun around and fired the rifle from my hip, spraying the area with magical blue bullets. Shadows jerked left and right before collapsing to the ground. There were a lot more shadows than I had expected. The first explosion had wiped out a lot of the shadows, and the following fight in the gorge had also cut their numbers down, but then the next wave came.
(Honored Service fighting a Shadow Warrior. Yes thay are pretty big.)
Covert and myself had just began to walk back to Ponyville when the next wave broke over the top of the ruble from the first explosion. Another fight had broken out, but this time, even I couldn’t handle the amount of shadows that were rushing forward. It was a rush.
And here I was running for my life to clear the blast radius of my follow up bombs I had planted. At the exit of the gorge I had planted two bombs on either side of the entrance to the ravine. I'm glad I loved explosions or else this would have ended a long time ago.
The rifle in my hands went silent as I fingered the magazine release switch. The empty clip dropped to the rocky ground with a clatter and the new one was pushed firmly into the magazine well. I continued running as Covert appeared from the shadows next to me.
“So what’s the plan now?”
“Run. Hit button. Boom.” I panted out before releasing another wave of fire into the oncoming shadows. Thank the lord above the Shadow Warriors couldn’t run fast or this would be a bitch. And those Shadow Champions, don’t even get me started. Those fuckers could run, jump, hit, do everything better than me, and yet every one of them was beaten thanks to one thing.
Luck.
“Speak of the devil.” Something flashed by me and stopped directly in front of my run. The horns on its head gave it away immediately. Another Shadow Champion had decided to take me down.
I quickly jerked the rifle up and fired the remaining rounds into the gorge wall above the creature. Large rocks shattered and exploded off the wall and came hurtling down towards the creature. It side stepped to avoid the crushing rocks, but I slid across the ground on my knees and sliced my knife across the thing’s stomach. It dropped to its knees while I stood up and swung around flipping the knife around in my hand and driving the fourteen inch blade through its neck and jerking it to the side. Its head flopped to one side and it fell over to the ground among the rocks, dead.
“There!” I pointed ahead of me with the black blood soaked knife at the end of the gorge. I put all of my reaming strength into running and sprinted towards the exit. I could hear the screaming and wild calls of the shadows catching up. They were gaining on me, and fast.
I turned my head and saw that the shadows were almost on my heels. “Shit!” I screamed, hoping that some force would answer my silent prayers.
BOOM
I was thrown onto my face as something exploded behind me, rocketing me forward. I flipped over onto my back and shoved the barrel of my rifle into the face of a shadow that had survived the random explosion. Its head snapped back as the bullet punched a small hole in its forehead, and blew the back of its head open.
“Looks like you could use some help!” I looked up to see Fast Skies gliding in from behind, its four forward cannons smoking. “Load another volley lads! Let’s assist the human!” I could hear Sergeant Stand Bold’s loud voice commanding his crew. I got to my feet and watched as the destruction power of the airship’s cannons ripped the oncoming shadows to bits.
The airship lazily turned, bringing the twenty cannon side to bare, the shadows still rushing forward.
“FIRE DAMNIT!” I screamed at the top of my lungs.
I slammed my eyes shut as the cannons roared from above and the world flashed before me. I waited a few seconds before staring at the carnage before me. The entrance to the gorge was obliterated. Bits of shadows covered the area, gore smearing every surface.
“Damn.” I lifted my second detonator to my side just as Covert reappeared beside me. “Jesus Covert, could you give me some warning or something?” I shook my head and sighed, “I need to get you a bell or something to wear around your neck.” I looked at the small magical detonator. “You know what, here you do it.”
I flicked the remote over to the shadow, who caught it in his hand. “You want me to press it?”
“Why not. You did kinda kick ass today.” I smiled and nodded. “Blue one.”
Covert looked at the button before morphing his bladed hand back into a normal hand. He slowly pressed the blue button. A second later, both sides of the entrance to the gorge were consumed in a massive multicolored explosion. “WOW!” Covert yelled bouncing up and down, before regaining his composure and passing the detonator back to me. “Thank you Honored.”
“Sure.” I but the detonator back into my pocket just as a tan pegasus in gray mismatched homemade armor landed next to me.
“So I’ll take that thanks now.” Stand Bold rubbed a hoof across his chest. I reached over and scoped him up into a hug and squeezed him. “AH not like that you big monkey!”
“Thanks Sergeant. Okay now let’s get the hell out of here. The gorge is closed up, so now they have to go back. It will by us some precious time.” I said. A rope dropped down from the airship bay door, and I grabbed a hold of it and looped it around my waist. Sergeant Stand Bold flew back up to the cockpit and the airship began drifting towards Ponyville.
I looked behind be and pulled the detonator out. I looked out at the field before me before sighing.
I pressed the red button. The field disappeared, engulfed in rippling explosions that caused the field to become one large trench filled with rocks and piles of dirt. Combined with the blocked of gorge and the new terrifying terrain, this would by the defenders of Ponyville some much needed time, which is just what we needed.
(Johnson in his old ACU's with the added pony golden armor. M16A2 and the black magical gauntlet)
“Twilight can you do it?”
“With your help Princess I think I can. But why are we doing this?” Twilight cocked her head to the side as she finished creating the diagram on the ground of the command tent.
“Johnson needs all the help he can get; we need all the help we can get, and I believe that this could help. If it works.” Luna bowed her head and flipped through another page in the large tome in front of her. She was looking at a spell that could teleport a creature over long distances, distances spanning oceans. With enough power and concentration maybe the spell could reach out to other planets.
“But Princess, what if this spell doesn’t work. He might not only be from another planet, but from another universe, like how Princess Celestia suggested.” Twilight said while glancing at the tome next to her.
“I know young Twilight. But this is a losing fight. We need all the help we can get. And if, and that’s a big if, this works we can at least claim a victory here, and then push to Canterlot and secure Day Terror and blast her with the Elements.” Luna had thought this plan through and through. Any attempt at a sneak attack would fail with that many shadows around Canterlot.
By forcing Day Terror to launch an all-out assault on Ponyville, her numbers at Canterlot would be significantly smaller.
“Alright Princess. Let’s just give it a try.”
Luna nodded and took a stance opposite of Twilight. Twilight mimicked the stance. They both nodded at each other before charging a spell and shooting it at each other, the magic meeting in the middle of the large intricate design drawn on the ground.
“KEEP THE POWER FLOWING!” Luna called out above the roar of raw magic being dumped into the spell. Luna reached out with her mind and began scouring the realms of the universe. She looked through all the planets her magical sense touched, trying to uncover this mysterious Earth populated by violent sentient creatures.
“PRINCESS MY MAGIC CHANNEL IS FAILING!” Twilight roared above the intense noise the spell was creating. Twilight’s purple glowing aurora was beginning to falter. With one last push, Luna grunted and reached out to the closest planet and pulled what she hoped was what they were looking for through the small portal in a flash of light so intense, it blotted out the sun for a second.
Both unicorn and alicorn lay panting on the ground, exhausted and spent from the monumental task they had just preformed.
In the center of the diagram, half buried in the ground from the sheer force of the impact was a large metal dark green container. It lacked any markings except a black star and two words stenciled on the side, smudged and dirty.
US ARMY
Covert stood on my left and Stand Bold stood to my right. We were gathered on the bridge of Fast Skies looking towards Ponyville when the world disappeared in a flash of white. I slammed my knee into a control panel next to me as I stumbled around, blinded from the flash.
“The fuck was that!” I screamed aloud while hoping around with my hands clasped around my knee.
“I need darkness now!” Covert hissed while diving under a control panel and disappeared into the darkness of the shadows under it.
“That was a bright light!” Sergeant Stand Bold said turning to me. His eyes were completely blood shot and his pupils were pinpricks.
“You okay?” I blinked a couple times at him.
“Oh yeah.”
“Did you even look away?” I asked snapping my fingers in front of him, his eyes unmoving.
“Nah, where’s the fun in that?” He smiled and walked head first into the steering wheel of the airship, falling back onto his flank. “Ah! It’s just like that one time with the entire bottle of Appleloosa Whisky.” The pegasus laughed as he took command of the airship and slowly began the decent towards the town of Ponyville.
“Is it gone? The bright light?” Covert asked as he poked his head out from under the console. He looked around and blinked his red eyes until he decided the coast was clear and crawled out from under the equipment.
“Wow.” I turned from the blinded pegasus and looked at the shadow. “Does light really hurt you?”
“Yes. Intense magical light does. A light from the source of magic is incredibly painful and even downright lethal to us shadows.”
“Really?” I tapped a finger to my chin as the airship lightly kissed the ground. “I’ve got to go see the Princess and the Elements immediately. I think I have an idea!” I rocketed out of the bridge and towards the dropped ramp at the side of the airship. I ran towards the command tent but slowed down as I neared the tent.
Smoke was slowly curling out from under the tent flap. I cautiously tiptoed towards the tent. I reached my hand out carefully to the cloth, about to pull it back. “AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!”
I was knocked backwards by a purple and a dark purple blur. I landed on the ground and bounced away as Twilight and Princess Luna panted for breathe a short distance away.
“You didn’t say it would create so much smoke!” Twilight said, coughing heavily as she fanned herself with a hoof.
“Well I haven’t exactly done that spell before, and I never was considering that the tome would be destroyed in the process.” Luna shot back. She also was breathing heavily. I looked at them from the ground, dumbstruck by the fact I had gotten knocked onto my ass that hard.
“What spell?” I piped up and asked, slowly rising to my feet and walking towards the two ponies.
“Oh Honored you're back so soon.” Luna coughed one last time before smiling, “I’ll take it the plan went flawlessly and that the army was crushed.”
I frowned and merely hung my head. “No. There is a lot more shadows than we had believed.”
“How many?” Luna asked calmly.
I took the second detonator from my breast pocket on the armored chest rig and threw it on the ground in front of the princess. “Enough that all of those explosives are only going to slow them down for a day or two.” I pulled out the first detonator, the one still connected to the dam. “This will be the only way.”
“No!” Luna stamped a hoof to the ground. “We can still make a stand here in Ponyville!” Luna turned around and jerked her head at Twilight, who ran back into the still smoking tent. “Besides we have something that will help you, we hope.”
“And I have so information from Covert that can help too.” I said, placing the detonator back into my pocket. “Magical light is lethal to shadows.”
“Really? Something so simple?” Luna brought a hoof to her chin and rested her head there. “We could construct some lights using magically charged gems… and use simple light focusing spells. Yes that could work.”
“Whatever you have to do, do it. Make sure all the guards know this. Fight the darkness with magical light. Stop hacking at the shadows with swords at close range, blast them with bolts of magical light from afar, it will change the way we fight here in Ponyville.” I explained to the princess. “Wait. What do you have to help?”
On cue, Twilight’s flank poked out from the tent. She was dragging a large dark green case with her mouth. She pulled it all the way out of the tent until it rested in front of me on the ground.
“Why didn’t you just float it?” I asked pointing to the large crate.
“Why don’t you just float it?” Twilight mumbled to herself. “Because it is resistance to magic. And that Princess,” Twilight turned to Luna, “is why it was so bucking hard to transport here.” The unicorn flopped over onto the ground and sighed.
“Whatever is in there weighs a ton.”
“What is it…?” The questioned faltered on my tongue as my eyes ran over the dark green surface of the crate. I made out the two words on the side of the container and then looked up to the ponies.
“Yes Honored, we got that for you. We don’t know what is in it, but we hope it will help.” Princess Luna smiled and nodded towards the shipping crate. “Open it.”
I slowly walked up to the shipping crate. I placed a hand on the hard surface. Something from home. Something from my Earth. I stopped just as my hand reached the lock on the side.
“I thought Princess Celestia had said there wasn't any way to get me back home.” I turned from the crate to face the other Princes of Equestria. “That I was stuck here.”
I was happy to stay here in Equestria and live among the ponies, but I was always going to miss my home. My earth. My people. My culture.
“Well I mean we didn’t know if it would work. This spell nearly drained all of my magic.” Luna stared at me. Her eyes kept shifting from the crate back to me.
“But you could have tried!” I slammed a fist on the container. “You had the option to send me back, or at least to try and you didn’t!?” My voice was slowly rising as the anger I was feeling began to seep out.
I was about to yell again but something stopped me. I looked over my shoulder back at Twilight. She was staring at me with tears brimming on her eyes. “Please stop.”
I raised my hand to yell but couldn’t bring myself to do it. “But I could have gone home. I could have never been here, and then Day Terror wouldn’t even be here.”
“You're right,” Twilight said rising to her hooves and walking towards me, “But then again, the second changeling attack would have gone perfectly and we would all be slaves to them. If you had gone back who knows what would happen.”
“TERRIBILE THINGS!” A tan earth pony with a brown mane and a bowtie screamed from around the corner of the command tent. He was grabbed and pulled back by a pair of light gray hooves.
“SHHHHH Doctor, they are having a breakthrough. Back to the TARDIS with you.”
I sighed. “You're right Twilight.” I nodded to the purple unicorn and turned back to Luna. “Princess I'm sorry for snapping
like that. I shouldn’t question you're judgment like that. You are much, much, older and wiser than me. Much older.” I looked up with a slight smirk on my face as Luna smiled and playfully punched a hoof against my chest.
“Oh shut it human. And don’t call me Princess. Or old. Just call me Luna.”
“Sure thing Luna.” I gave her a smile and relaxed. I walked over to the crate calmly before raising my rifle quickly off my side and firing a round through the lock on the side.
BANG
“AH!” Twilight and Luna both jumped in surprise at the sudden noise as the lock exploded into bits and pieces, metal raining down everywhere.
“Open sesame.”
“Okay and the last one should be Hotel Sierra Papa 3456-61.” A bored looking soldier read off of a clipboard to a another soldier inspecting crates in the armory/supply depot in the back of an Army base stationed on the far end of the world.
“It ain't here.” The one solider looked up at the other. “Sergeant it ain't here.”
“I heard ya’ the first time idiot.”
“What should we do?”
“Meh let the next shift worry about it.” The sergeant made a check on the clipboard and placed it on a rack by the door. “It ain't nothing to big. Just one crate.”
I griped the sides of the lid and slowly pushed it up. The crate opened to show its contents. I stepped to the side so Luna and Twilight could also stare inside. I smiled and reached down to pick up the brown plastic package.
“What is it?” Twilight said, trying to levitate one of the things out of the container.
“It’s an MRE. You guys brought me a crate of food!” I smiled and read the label, “vegetable soup with hardy beef!” I glanced down at Twilight, whose face turned partly green. “Oops sorry.”
“You mean to tell me, that after all that work, we brought you a damned container of food!” Luna screamed and threw a hoof across the packages of food, sending them scattering across the ground. She panted and flopped down on the ground screaming into the dirt. “This was supposed to save the day and help you beat Day Terror’s army! Not feed you!”
I was too busy starring at the container to pay attention to the frustrated alicorn. I dropped the MRE and reached both
hands into the now completely MRE free crate. There were some things packed under the MRE layer. And this was a deep container.
“Calm down Luna, and say hello to my new friends, M240 Bravo and her sister M249 Squad Automatic Weapon.” I lifted both weapons out of the crate and gently placed them on the ground. I did a double take and my smile got even wider. I reached back into the crate and pulled out four more weapons. Once they were removed, I felt sad because the only other things in the crate were boxes of ammunition for the weapons and one unmarked black box.
I beamed at the six new toys sitting in front of me.
“Are you all-“ Luna began to say, but I raised a hand.
“Shhhh. No words. Only silence.” I laid down next to the weapons and slowly covered myself in the hard metal. “Hello girls. Daddy loves you. You're going to have some fun here. I promise. Now who wants to get named first?” I cooed out to the weapons cradled in my arms.
“I think we had better give him some space.” Twilight whispered to Luna. The two backed away from me and left me alone with my new friends.
Mentally I went over my new instruments of death, and I was about to conduct and orchestra of sweet, sweet melodies.
M240 Bravo medium machine gun firing 7.62x51mm rounds at either 750,850 or 950 rounds a minute. Oh baby, I’ll call it Thunder.
M249 SAW light machine gun firing 5.56 rounds at 1,000 rounds a minute. And I shall dub thee, Lead Spitter. And the fact it uses 5.56 meant I could put the magic bullets into it as well. I wonder what that would like. A hundred rounds of magical bullets flying downrange in a span of seconds.
Two sexy Glock 21 semi-automatic pistols. Chambered in .45 ACP rounds, it could fire as fast as I could pull the trigger. Which would be fast. They also came with extended barrels to allow the attachment of silencers that I found molded into the packing foam in the crate. Silent but deadly. I shall call them Love and Tolerate.
XM2010 Enhanced Sniper Rifle firing the powerful .300 Winchester Magnum round. A bolt action sniper rifle good out to 1,300 yards; that being the point blank. Only two boxes of ammo came with this rifle, so it would unquestionably be one shot, one kill with this baby. XM2010 ESR was a mouth full, how about Longbow.
M1014 Combat Shotgun with forward grip, extended under barrel ammunition tube, and a holographic sight attachment. This sweet gun fired a wide range of 12 gauge shells, but only came with slugs and 00 steel buckshot. This gun will appropriately be called, Room Sweeper.
I looked at my new arsenal around me. There was no way I could carry all these at once. Unless I could…no that would be way too heavy and cumbersome to try. I scrapped the idea of strapping them all to my back but decided against it. I could maybe do three…and that would severely reduce the amount of running and jumping I did on the battlefield. Hell, even two of the rifles or machine guns would make doing all the agility shit impossible. I absently minded kicked the unmarked little black box with the tow of my boot.
I heard something metallic clink inside of it. I bent down and opened the lid of the small box.
“Well that could have been bad.”
I was staring at six M67 hand grenades. They had a blast radius of fuck you, that shit will explode in your face! I slowly closed the lid on the container and picked it up. I tucked it under my arm and held the little hot potatoes close. These could cause some chaos.
“Twilight! Luna! I'm all done, you can come back! And bring Covert and Stand Bold. I thing we can hold Ponyville!”
“Alright we use Fast Skies to bombard the shadows advancing on the town from long range, softening up their numbers.” Sergeant Bold pointed at the map with his wing, “The cannons have enough remaining ammo for a good half day of fighting.”
(Sergeant Stand Bold flying without his armor in front of the airship Fast Skies)
“Excellent!” I said, placing a chess piece in the shape of a knight on the map behind Ponyville to represent Fast Skies
“Twilight, see if there is anything you can do to the cannon balls like you did to those special bullets you gave me. Some extra punch would be nice. The army that’s coming is still way to large of a fighting force.
“On it.” Twilight nodded and left the command tent with Sergeant Stand Bold. I turned back to the large map of the town and the surrounding area. Luna, Covert, and Master Sergeant Dawn Guard of the Royal Guard stood around the table. The shadow was busy trying to figure out the M249 trigger mechanism. Ever since he had walked into the tent, he had been fascinated with the light machine gun. I figured what the hell, and gave it to him.
I could use a good companion next to me. And having him armed to the teeth with Lead Spitter would do just fine.
“There!” Covert exclaimed happily and presented the LMG to Luna and myself. “I think that was the quickest time yet.” He had been disassembling it, and rebuilding it for the last two hours till he could do it my memory. And he was good at it.
“Alright Covert, it’s yours.” I reached into the large shipping container and pulled out the six box magazines that came with the weapon. I slid them across the table to him. He stared at the boxes and slowly picked one up. He smiled so his red mouth was open and threw one box into the air. With one arm holding the LMG he flipped the cover open and caught the falling ammo canister on the side of the weapon while dragging his other hand over the ammo belt and into the feed system. He slammed the top closed and racked the bolt back.
“Impressive.” I gave a whistle as Covert admired his work. “Seems like something I would do.”
“So it’s mine now?” Covert asked, hugging the weapon close.
“Yes.”
“Perfect.” I watched as black smoke slowly rose around the weapon that Covert was holding. The weapon vanished into thin air.
“What did you do?” I yelled out at the shadow. “That was one of the weapons we needed to hold Ponyville!”
“Please just give me a moment!” Covert raised both his hands trying to stop me. I had my gauntleted hand resting on my M9 and the other hand resting on the grip of one of the Glock 21s now strapped to my waist.
I watched as the wisps of black smoke slowly fell back into the shadow’s hands, reforming a purely pitch black M249. It was now made out of shadows, just like the creature wielding it. “I had to transform it into a shadow weapon, so that it could travel with me when I go in and out of shadows.” Covert explained, while performing the same magic on the other boxes of ammo. “If I didn’t do it, then whenever I molded into the darkness, the machine gun would simply fall to the ground. Now I can absorb it into myself when I move.” To emphasize his point, Covert simply absorbed the LMG into his arms.
“Well that does make carrying it a lot easier.” I pointed out. I was slightly jealous he could do that. It would make carrying all of these other toys a lot easier. I could load up with all my guns with that ability.
“Most impressive.” Luna smiled at the shadow as he left the tent, still enthralled by his new ability to use the shadow Lead Spitter. “Now Lieutenant, Sergeant, we need to discuss our plan in the fight.”
“We have thirty-five Royal Guards and eighteen Night Guards able to fight.” The guard pony said solemnly. “And out of that number, we only have twenty-seven unicorns that have been taught a magical lightning spell.”
Luna spoke up, “But thanks to help from Twilight and a few other unicorns we were able to enchant gems given to use by Rarity to explode into brilliant light when thrown.”
“Just like grenades… very clever Twilight.” I mumbled to myself. “Okay so then arm the pegasi and earth pony guards with the enchanted gems to be the close range combatants, and set the unicorns along the roof tops and barricades along the front line of defense here, here, and here.” I pointed to the buildings and stands set up closes to the field the attacking shadow arm was bound to advance from.
“Right away sir!” The guard saluted and galloped away to begin arranging the guards to their defensive positions. The battle was looming over everyone’s head. And I could tell it was weighing heavily on the Princess’s mind.
“Luna everything will be fine.” I laid a comforting hand on Luna’s shoulder. She looked from the map and to me.
“If everything will be alright then why don’t you give me the detonator to the dam?”
“I… I can’t Luna.” I placed my hand on my breast pocket that held the trigger mechanism. “The responsibility to blow the charges rests on my shoulders. You're the Princess, you can’t be held responsible for the destruction of an entire town.”
“And you can?” She asked, looking back at the map and the solid blue line drawn around the town and into the surrounding area. The line showed the area that would be totally eradicated from the flood the dam would cause should I have to blow it.
Roughly two thousand acres would be lost. Gone. Nothing but mud. Ponyville included.
“Because I'm the one in charge of the fight against Day Terror. I’ll be the judge if we’ll lose Ponyville. And I’ll give my own life dying to protect this town before I press the button.”
“Let’s hope it doesn’t come down to that.” Luna glanced across the room to the container and the table containing the new weapons that she had helped brings to the planet.
I followed her gaze and found it locked on Thunder, the M240 medium machine gun. “Oh no.”
“Please?”
“No! That’s mine!” I crossed my arms in front of my chest. “You don’t even know what it is.”
“A gas operated open bolt air cooled medium machine gun. It fires 7.62mm rounds at 2,800 feet per second. Effective out to 4,075 yards. Cycle rate of 750-950 rounds a minute with 6,000 rounds before stoppage and weighs 27.6 pounds with load.” Luna rattled the information off just as fast as that gun could shoot.
I grabbed the manual for it out of the container and flicked through pages checking Luna’s statement. I through the book down and stared back at her. “You still can’t use it.”
“Covert got one.”
“But he… he can… ugh!” I through my hands up in defeat and stormed over the weapon. I picked it up, and heaved it across the tent to the princess. She caught it in midair and levitated in front of her. “Fine! Take it. But don’t come crying to me when you can’t figure out how to use it!”
My jaw dropped when she broke it down into every single piece and floated them around her. Each little metallic and plastic piece suspended in the air with her dark purple aurora surrounding them. Then they quickly whisked by me and reassembled themselves back together in front of Luna.
“Fuck it!” I screamed aloud. I reached back into the container and dug out the eight boxes of linked bullets that came with it. “Here take ‘em. You can fight with me and Covert on the very front line!”
“And where is the very front line?” Luna asked while drawing the metallic link of shiny bullets across the feed system of the machine gun before closing the lid and locking the first round in place.
“There.” I pointed my finger on the map at the field where we had fought before. “Only now that field looks like the deepest pits of Tatarus.”
I stood atop the barricade overlooking the field, except now it was No-ponies-land. The deep craters and long trenches provided us defenders with plenty of hiding spots to ambush the shadows from. Well more exclusively, to hide traps in. As I stood alone the makeshift structure, guard ponies were planting enchanted gems to explode everywhere in the land. The shadow army wouldn't know what hit them.
I shrugged my shoulders, the weapons on my back shifting as I did so. I was loaded down with all the weapons I could carry. I opted for firepower rather than mobility in this battle to come. Resting in my hands was the new sniper rifle. Strapped to my back across the swords were the shotgun and my faithful M16A2. Along my belt was Bad Bertha, both Glock 21s, my Berretta, Spike, and all six of the hand grenades. And of course all the ammo I could freaking carry. I was ready for war.
“Are you ready human?” Covert materialized before me in the shadows below the barricade. His shadow M249 appeared in his hands and he racked the charging handle.
“Yeah I'm ready. Let’s have some fun with old Day Terror. Show her what a few good creatures can do.” I smiled and pulled the bolt back on the rifle and chambered the powerful .300 Winchester magnum round.
“Agreed, let us perform actions worthy of any song!” Luna said as she flew in from above. She landed softly on the ground next to Covert.
“Slipping into the Canterlot thing.” I said to Luna.
“Oops,” Luna coughed into her hoof, “lets kick some flank!”
“Much better.” I nodded in approval. The soft thumping of Fast Skies’ engines droned on from behind us. Stand Bold was making his appearance into the battle.
“AND IN THIS CORNER WE HAVE THE MOST BADFLANK TEAM OF FIGHTERS EQUESTRIA HAS EVER SEEN!” The amplified voice of Sergeant Stand Bold rang out from the speakers mounted on the underside of the airship.
I waved up at the airship as it slowly moved off towards the side of the town where it could rain death and destruction down upon the attacking army.
“Alright team, this is it. Luna you fly around and provide close air support to us and the guards at the first stage of defense.” Luna nodded and took the sky, the M240 medium machine gun floating next to her in a deep purple glow.
“Covert, you stick with me and we’ll rush forward and just cause hell.”
“Sound like a blast!” He said, smiling wide.
“And here,” I handed him an extra box of linked bullets, except these were glowing light blue; my magically enhanced rounds, “it’s dangerous to go alone, take these.”
“Um. Thanks?”
“Sure.” I peered off into the distance. “It’s time buddy.” I moved down into a prone position and extended the XM2010’s bipod. I aimed down the scope of the sniper rifle and adjusted the crosshairs and focused the scope.
“Show time.”
“Shadow General, the town is in sight, permission to give the command to release the shadows?” The lower Shadow Champion addressed the higher Shadow Champion. Both were about to relish in the fight they had planned.
Unknown to the two leaders of the invading force, the enemies they were up against had new weapons, one that could literally reach out and touch them from a mile away.
“No my second in command shadow, send the Shadow Warriors first. They will rip apart the pitiful defenses and then the regulars and Champions will move in to clean up.” The Shadow General waved a bladed hand forward. Amongst the shadows hundreds of tall massive moving shadows broke ranks and began their slow attack on the Ponyville.
The Shadow Warriors were impossibly strong, but they were slow, but even at their slowest they made a beeline towards the town at an impressive speed. The thought of destroying ponies and the human were present in their one track mind.
The first Shadow Warrior to reach no-ponies-land stepped right into a deep hole. And at the bottom of the hole was cluster of magically enchanted sapphires.
A blue bolt of light shot forth from the bottom of the hole and shot straight into the sky, but not before passing over the Shadow Warrior’s face. The light died down and the Shadow Warrior was left standing in mid stride, frozen in instant death.
The body slowly toppled sideways, hitting the ground with a loud thud. The other advancing Shadow Warriors stopped briefly to watch the horror that awaited them in possibly every inch of the barren landscape.
But the attack had to continue, it had to go on. One by one the Shadow Warriors pushed forward towards the town, and one by one they ran into more and more traps placed by the ponies.
“Wait!” The Shadow General called out to the last Shadow Warrior as he ran towards the battle. “You stay with me, I need some extra protection.”
The Shadow Warrior looked as if it was about to say something, but suddenly its head popped open spilling black blood and chunks of black shadow flesh everywhere. The body fell forward directly on top of the second in command Shadow Champion, crushing him under the weight of the lifeless body. The Shadow General stared at the dead body. Nothing had killed it. It simply had just died.
And because of the constant noise of the exploding magical gem traps, the Shadow General never heard the retort of the .300 Winchester magnum round as it passed through its chest, sending the leader to the ground, watching lights shot up into the sky, showing it that more Shadow Warriors were dying instantly to the intellects of the pony guard.
“Boom headshot.” I pulled my head away from the scope and racked the bolt back, the smoking shell flying from the breech and toppling down from the barricade to the ground below. i pushed the bolt forward, the new round entering the chamber. I squeezed off the second shot without even blinking, watching the other Shadow Champion collapse to the dirt about 1,200 yards away. “How are the traps doing Covert?” I was focused on finding the commander of this attack that I wasn’t even paying attention to the efforts of ponies and their magical traps.
“See for yourself.” Covert said with a happy tone.
I watched as light shot into the sky every few seconds, signaling to all that another shadow had bitten the bullet…so to speak.
I trained the rifle on an approaching Shadow Warrior. I breathed out and held my breath. I lined up the shot, and slowly began to depress the trigger.
BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM
The thundering roar of cannons shook me from my concentration. I was able to watch as at least thirty Shadow Warriors were engulfed in a wave of bright yellow fire. It was a pure yellow like the sun, magically enchanted cannon balls.
"Nice one Twi."
I smiled and refocused through the scope at another Shadow Warrior that had stopped to try and help its comrade off the ground. The one was missing all of its legs and was flailing around desperately trying to be pulled away.
“No mercy.”
CRACK
At the farthest side of the barren landscape, all the remaining shadows watched as the terror unfolded before them. The Shadow Warriors were being slaughtered. The shadows just stared, until one Shadow Champion stepped forwards and ran towards the battle.
Soon the screaming of five thousand shadows filled the air as the rest of the shadow army began its attack on Ponville.
“Oh no.” I pulled myself back from the sniper and dropped the five round magazine from the rifle. I pulled out another one and loaded it in, and pushed the bolt forward. I watched through the scope as from across no-ponies-land the rest of the army broke rank and charged forward. Only a handful of Shadow Warriors remained thanks to the airship that was still raining death down on the field, and the magical traps scattered across the field, but they were nearing the first line of defense. Hopefully the magical gem grenades and the spells would do their jobs.
I fired another shot into the skull of one of the last Shadow Warriors. The rifle kicked against my shoulder as the warrior tumbled forward and rolled into a trench where a bright blast of light shot out.
“Haha, you see that Covert?”
“Sure did. Hey can we go down there?” Covert sighed, he was obviously bored of watching me drop shadows and the traps take all the glory.
I watched as five unicorn guards fired different colored bolts of magical light into the chest of a Shadow Warrior and its chest cavity imploded on itself before falling backwards.
“Yeah I think the guards can handle the reaming big guys.”
“Finally!” Covert shimmered into a nearby shadow and vanished. I knew he had merged nearby and would stick with me. He was good like that.
I began a light jog towards the incoming attacking army. The shadows were still a good couple hundred yards off, so I dropped to a kneeling position and aimed the XM2010. I squeezed the trigger and felt the rifle jump in my hands. The bullet passed through three Shadow Humans with ease before nailing a Shadow Champion in the leg, sending all of them to the ground.
I racked the bolt and fired the rifle four more times, each time another couple shadows hit the dirt because of how tightly packed they were running together.
“Oh it’s good to have range!” I smiled as the rifle ran dry and I loaded another magazine into the gun. “And I still got a hundred yards to go.” The rifle barked five more times.
And more shadows hit the earth bleeding black blood onto the barren landscape.
“Guns ready!” A muscular earth pony guard called out as he slammed the port closed on the cannon.
“Fire!”
Another volley of magically enchanted cannon balls left the side of Fast Skies at the new threat.
“Come on stallions! You call yourselves a gun crew? We got thousands of those abominations pouring right at Ponyville. We got to fire faster if we want to make any sort of dent in them!” Sergeant Stand Bold shouted from the alleyway that ran between both sides of the gun room. Ponies ran about quickly carrying cannon balls and canisters of magical propellant from every direction, loading the cannons and firing them.
“Sergeant!” A pegasus acting as the spotter called out from his position at the bow of the airship below the bridge, “We got the human entering the battlefield, permission to change the position of fire?”
“What?! Of course, don’t you dare hit my friend!” Sergeant Bold yelled out.
“Now fire that volley as close as you can without hitting that idiot!”
I yanked the shotgun of my back, and strapped the sniper rifle in its place. I pulled the charging handle back and loaded the first shotgun shell into place. The Shadow Humans rushed in from across the trench, leaping over it to reach me.
Some tumbled into the long ditch, but others made it across. I leveled the shotgun at the first one to make it across and pulled the trigger.
BOOM
The 00 buckshot ripped through the shadow with ease and actually sent the thing flying backwards. I pushed forward, flipping the shotgun around and delivering a block to an attacking shadow while kicking him backwards across the ground. The barrel spun around and emptied its deadly shot onto the helpless shadow.
“Get some!” I swung around and fired the gun again, directly into the face of another shadow. I drove the butt of the shotgun into the gut of a shadow attempting to grab me from behind and placed the barrel under its chin before squeezing the trigger. I slid under a blade that whizzed through the air, aimed directly at my head.
I spun around on my knees and pointed the shotgun at the stomach of the guilty shadow. It flew backwards into another shadow, knocking both to the ground.
I reached into a pocket on my armored chest rig and pulled out a handful of red shells. Each one was loaded into the under barrel of the shotgun before pulling the charging handle back again. I was about to bring the shotgun up to block a sword slash, when a burst of rapid fire brought the shadow to its knee.
Covert appeared beside me and nodded. I returned the nod as he held his shadow machine gun and fired the weapon at the assaulting Shadow Humans. They all began to fall, black blood blossoming forth from wounds appearing all over their chests and abdomens.
“This is most enjoyable!” Covert said above the roar of gunfire.
I fired another shell into a Shadow Champion that was attempting to ram me with his horns. “Yeah these new guns sure work their magic!”
I emptied the shotgun again and began loading the plastic shells into the breach. I finished quickly and slung the gun along my back and drew both Glocks from their holsters.
I ran forward, both arms outstretched before me, and fired the weapons at any shadow that happened to cross my line of sight. The handguns barked and the casings left a trail of death behind me. I whipped around, ejecting the empty clips and loading fresh ones into the pistols. I smiled as the shadow’s numbers slowly began to thin around me and Covert.
The constant rattling of his shadow M249 and the quick retorts of my handguns signaled our corner of the battlefield.
Along the other side of the barren landscape that was filling with the bodies of dead shadows, cannon balls impacted the earth and blew small groups of shadows to smithereens. Sergeant Stand Bold and his crew of guards aboard Fast Skies rained lethal and accurate fire down on the remaining army.
And in between the battlefield and the first line of defense a dark coated alicorn would swoop down and cover an area in
medium machine gun fire. Shadow Humans crumpled beneath Luna’s fire and Shadow Champions jerked and toppled as the rounds ripped them apart.
We slowly began making our way towards each other. Before long I spun around, both Glocks aimed at the barrel of a M240. I laughed and spun around as Luna did the same. Back to back Luna and I gunned down shadow left and right.
Covert joined in and soon we had a triangle of death that was impervious to the enemy shadows. I dropped two more empty clips and loaded two new ones into the 21s. I holstered the new pistols and drew my old M9 and Zappy. The ancient magically enchanted blade sparked as it was drawn from its sheath. I wielded the pistol in my gauntlet and charged up a magical bolt into the pistol. I held the sword above my head and prepared for the attack.
But it never came.
I looked around and watched as Covert leapt into the air and jammed the barrel of his gun into the face of a Shadow Champion and let a stream of bullets tear its head apart. Luna also removed the last remaining shadows from her side of the area with a long burst from her MMG. Smoke snaked from the barrel and she panted while throwing the empty box off the gun and loading a new on onto the mount spot and magically drawing the belt into the gun.
I slowly relaxed and watched as the last Shadow Warrior assaulted the defense line. I quickly dropped the sword and jerked Longbow off my back. I lined up the shot and fired the .300 round at the warrior.
The creature’s head exploded all over the unicorn Royal Guards that were about to deliver the final kill shot.
“Hey kill steal!” they screamed from across the no longer barren landscape. Thousands of bodies covered the area. All shadows had been completely destroyed. There were a few moans of pain and agony coming from around the field, but I paid them no mind. As I got closer to the guard’s defensive position I saw that the shadows had gotten lucky.
There were a lot of dead ponies. Out of the fifty-three Royal Guards and Night Guards assembled to fight, only twenty-five remained standing. Over half of the pony defenders had been killed. A part of me was glad that I hadn’t been here to witness their deaths.
“Honored what’s that?” Luna pointed a hoof towards Canterlot. A black silhouette was looming towards Ponyville.
“Sergeant!?” I screamed up at the airship now floating above Ponyville.
Something hit me on the top of my helmet. I looked up to see a soup can attached to a string that went all the way up to the airship. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”
“I heard that.” A very scratchy voice responded through the can. “And this is the best I can do so I can actually hear you. But then again I can use the speaker system.”
“NO!” I screamed into the can. “Sergeant, can you see what that is coming in from Canterlot?”
“Yeah give me a second.” There was the sound of hooves trotting away followed by a brief silence and then the hooves getting closer. “Yeah it’s another airship.”
“Well you want to engage it?” I asked, slightly annoyed.
“I would love to, but.”
“But what.” I rubbed my nose and looked up to the airship, hoping Stand Bold could see my glare.
“We’re all out of cannon balls up here. Used ‘em all up on that last volley.”
“Okay. Thanks.” I tugged on the can once and it was pulled up towards the airship. “Jesus. Fuck me.”
I crossed my arms and thought about how to deal with the airship problem. No way to fight it, I could just teleport onto it like before and try and take it over. I tapped a hand against my chest and felt something. I reached into a pouch and pulled out the purple bullet Twilight had given me.
“Hmmmm, well why not? Can’t hurt.” I unslung my M16A2 from my back and removed the magazine currently in the weapon.
I opened the breach and slid the round into the chamber. I pushed the charging handle release switch and the weapon closed with a click.
I brought the weapon to bare and aimed down the sight towards the growing airship.
“Honored you really think that will do something?” Luna asked conceding.
“Not really, but Twilight hasn’t failed me yet.” I said calmly. I leaned into the rifle and squeezed the trigger.
Blackness swallowed the end of the gun and then punched forward. Silence was the only thing I heard. Nothing. No sound.
Everything was still as the weapon fired the most wicked evil thing I’ve ever seen.
A pitch black ball formed on the end of the rifle when the human pulled the trigger. The magic locked in the round punched forward and raced forward from the rifle faster than anything imaginable. In scientific terms, it reached the nose of the airship in about .000001 of a second. On impact, it merely tore through the metal hull and out the back in another .0000001 of a second. But that was just the bullet, the real magic was trailing the bullet. The miniature sonic rainboom Twilight had infused into each one of those special rounds.
The three different shades of color then leapt from the barrel of M16A2 chasing after the path the bullet had made .000001 of second before. Bright pink, light purple, and dark purple streaks sped out of the rifle and followed the same path. The top half of the airship that was inbound to level Ponyville just simply vanished. The other half fell to the earth in a heap of metal, cloth, and explosives.
But the bullet didn’t stop there, so neither did the sonic rainboom. The both travelled all the way to the top of the tallest spire on the Canterlot Castle. The roof collapsed down onto the city bellow leaving one very startled Day Terror in her bed.
I sat up and looked at the fifty foot long trench I was lying in. I was holding my rifle in one hand and the smoking gauntlet in the other. I was blasted back fifty feet by that shot and sent through two walls and still carved a trench into the earth. I stood up shakily before sling the rifle on my back.
“Well at least that’s over.” I coughed and slumped forward and breathed a heavy sigh of relief. “Okay lets starting planning our infiltration on Canterlot.”
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I think I just caught a stiffy.
gotta agree with The Sniper, that is the sexiest box he has ever gotten, loaded with guns n'shiz.
and on the topic of ponyville, the shit storm has now just flown into a even bigger fan,
Wow, that was an awesome chapter. I am really digging this Epic. Well done!
ah i got my weekly dose of carnage, thank you
okay just a few things I want to comment on; on the first shadow champion in the beginning of the chapter was that Seppuku that honored did to it slicing the stomach and beheading it, also that crate wasnt from a normal army compound, it seemed more like a supply crate that would be dropped to troops/ mercenaries behind enemy lines like you see in some video games. also I am surprised that he didn't name his grenades "the elements of harmony" or something like that. and lastly those bullets that twilight made holy buck, I can only imagine what twilights face looks like after seeing the destruction that a single bullet that she made caused
2220302 I man-gasmed when he started talking about the different guns. Imagine the damage the Longbow could do with magic shells.
2220699
i407.photobucket.com/albums/pp160/Daxdiv/GIF%20Party/bloodyhell.gif
My reaction to the super bullet
t3.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRIyrpXa0N6SAOBT8gqiTbiU_aaSSTRlYnTzWboA2W1bamqCMQXGA
I would have named "Lead Spitter" "Paper Shredder" instead but...
that's just my opinion.
This was a very fun chapter to read!
Is That A Bird?A Chuck Norris Bird?No,It's Chuck Bullet
im sorry but all i could think was how fun it would have been to fight that army with a flamethrower.
Luna is best support class...hey, where is her ammo crate!? She needs to listen to her team-mates and dish out those ammo crates.
2217972 indeed
hel never be lonely with a voice in his head and a wall that lets an outside force watch on
i wish i had a voice in my head to keep me company. all I got is a stinking conscience, but hes no fun 
He could have said something better than “Well at least that’s over.”!
Or before he fired it, 'Yippy-ki-Yay-Mother-F###ER!'
Or something after the Zeppelin had been taken out! I just feel let down here.
Oh, so that's how it is? U is 2 over powered. I HAVE THE POWERRRR.[youtube=heman says i have the power]
I see what you did there.
YAY! M249 for awesomeness!
There was plenty of room for, "the other half of the zeppelin fell as though it were made of lead."
Anyways, a glorious chapter once again! You never fail to please your readers, Honored Service.
2221604 fire, fire everywhere
2221943 your nick....
he afire'd his lazorz
Here goes the list:
Holy shit you're fast writer!
I think he's going little coo-coo...
Twilights bullets fuck up with style.
When looking at how the story is proceeding currently, I wouldn't wonder if a fucking Jesus would come down from sky just to rape Honored giving him the powers of a Superman, shit's that crazy man...
I should really finish off that drawing I'm making. But I'm also working on MLP zombie-comic soooo... yeaaah that's gonna take a while. Luckily it's weekend really soon •3•
Covert is one of the most adorable motherfuckers this story has!
You... You are... Fucking... Amazing... Seriously #HONOREDISAGODDAMNFANCYASSMOTHERFUCKER!!!
Edit: Next time when firing that god damn uber-bullet, make sure he yells "SHOOP-DA-WHOOP!!!"
The "L" is still large.
I have to say, your writing has significantly improved since your first chapter that's for sure.
2225461
i feel sorry for anyone with OCD that saw that.
2224704
no rush needed, i have a slave artist that will do my biding, take your time, you are still free.
And maybe....
2222561
pun cannon was being reloaded at the time.
There was originally something their, but i felt it didnt do it justice.
2220607
yes, twilight is unaware of what they did, but she saw, and there will be a reaction to them.
2220302
dude, im going to get one once they open up to the public. gotta score one of those bad boys.
2226160
And when you do get one, I expect a video of the beast of a rifle.
2226153 yea probably had the same stopping power behind it has a 105mm sabot round but compacted into 5.56
when he goth the other weapons i looked up the ones i didnt know at google and damn he is going to give them hell with those babys. i what those guns when i can get them fuck those babys are sexy
2226137 When can you upgrade the pun cannon to fully automatic?
2225959 do you mean CDO? XD
2226813
the glocks you can get at any gun store (no silencers though)
the m1014 surprisingly is allowed to be purchased with a class 2 gun license at least in my state)
the XM2010 ESR should be on the market... eventually since it is a bolt action with a five round clip
the M240 + M249 cannot be bought my civilians, because you know...fully automatic harbingers of death.
grenades... self explanatory.
2227440
next chapter.
the puns will be everywhere
2228065
everything in alphabetical order damn it!
2231134 well i know about the lmg's but still they are sexy ps if you cant tell i love guns
2231136 I look forward to it! Next chapter, double the guns and double the pun! Huzzah!
Oh sweet mother of super wepons!!
2206697
To a point, yes. I would like to point out at the start that the discussion was a closed-system dichotomy analyzing gold and bronze specifically, and not any third option, but your point is valid. Furthermore, I so love to play devil's advocate--iron surely has been used more often, but gold has the badass factor--so keep that in mind.
I'll eschew any Minecraft "science" for now (although it's surprisingly [in a good way] realistic, given the premise)
Your point was that iron is "better" than gold. I'll define "better" temporarily as "being more protective" or "protecting more effectively." I hope that's a reasonable clarification.
Protection encompasses multiple aspects. Certainly hardness (the capability to resist impact damage, if I'm not mistaken) plays a part, but there's also some amount of malleability (or "giving" with the blow to soften it) and just plain durability involved. Iron is far harder than gold, that's for sure. Furthermore, iron is very workable at medium-high temperatures, making it a staple of industry. Gold, however, wins in the malleability department--it's much softer.
This softness allows it to "give" and weaken the amount of energy transmitted from a blow into an (to quote Star Trek) "ugly bag of mostly water." I hope this diagram isn't too confusing:
Before
Impact>>>>> |||Body
^energy ^gold
Impact>>>>> |||Body
^iron
After
Impact>))>Body
>: energy ):deformed gold. Result: *OW*
Impact <<}||>>Body
<: rebound }: fractured metal. Result: *AGH MY ARM*
Of course, this diagram only works if the weapon does not puncture the armor, and only if the armor is thick enough to actually deform and release the energy. And then the armor would be temporarily (or permanently without re-forging) weakened in that spot.
So yes, you are right. Iron is usually better than gold. To a point. And that point is the transfer of energy. Granted, the amount of gold armor you'd need to obtain iron's blow-stopping power is obscene (picture HUGE a torus for a golden circlet, and you'd get the idea. Or picture Smithers' fat suit.). But it does dissipate energy better as a pure metal.
The question is irrelevant if we're considering alloys, as obviously an alloy could combine the softness of gold and the strength of iron. Or padding. Whatever. Hope that wasn't too disjointed; I'm now thinking in circles.
IX
I would've let Luna keep one of the glocks. Love and tolerate, good god I laughed my ass off
Twilight`s reaction to the shot
denver.mylittlefacewhen.com/media/f/img/mlfw6184-poker_face_by_cloudshadezer0-d5856tv.png Whoop-de-bucking-doo!
At first when I saw the Sniper I thought about this.
But then when I saw the Magic Bullet.... ohohohohoo! The shear power makes me laugh! So I thought of this!
well shit i want some of those rounds, and just think of them in his sniper rifle.
dam lol loving it
I was squealing like a 5 year old girl that gets a pony (no pun intended) on her birthday while reading what the bullet Twilight made did!
2255110
static2.fjcdn.com/comments/ARE+YOU+A+WIZARD+_324436c69cd6c0b9ba6bda42bdd0ab01.jpg
static.fjcdn.com/pictures/Are_3061e5_423868.jpg
lol
what
I wish to start a conversation about armor. PM me please.
en.wikipedia.org/XM2010_Enhanced_Sniper_Rifle
c2.staticflickr.com/8/7117/6997939246_e55abf2f0e_z.jpg
T-the power...of that shell... It's like a handheld MAC round