Conflict in Bloom

by aDerangedBrony

Shallow Water: Chapter 3

Chapter 3

The possibility of a revolution shocked the council. A heavy silence sunk in for a while, eventually broken by the youngest pony in attendance.

“You’re basically saying that the aristocracy will give the common pony an enemy to rally against,” Colonel Spitfire said, “Well, what if we abolished the aristocracy?”

The naivety of the young colonel prompted a chuckle from many of the council members.

“Do the math, colonel,” Celestia said, “There are twenty-five noble families in Equestria. Each of them has their own loyal, highly trained military, on average about three thousand ponies strong, as is their right under the Limitata Monarchia,” she shot a spiteful glance at her sister before continuing, “We figure they could each recruit at least one thousand more once they start mass recruitment and drafting. Another ten or so thousand hardline conservatives from all across Equestria would join them, and another five thousand would betray our own military. You want to quell a rebellion of a few thousand ponies by abolishing the lords? Great, then we’d just have to deal with the one hundred and fifteen thousand ponies rising up in response. Believe me, I’d send the lords to the moon if I could. They oppress their constituents, make my job hard and undermine my power. Why do you think we’ve been beefing up the military over the past decade?”

“You planned to start a war with the lords?”

“A war between the lords and the monarchy is inevitable. There hasn’t been a century since I had to sign the Limitata Monarchia," she shot another glance at Luna, “without at least one such conflict. Every century it gets more violent, but every century it results in a return to the status quo. Given a few decades, we might be able to finally take them. We’ve excelled past them in terms of technology and firepower, and we’re catching up to their numbers. My sister’s reforms might finally undo the damage dealt by her rebellion a thousand years ago.”

“Again, I’m sorry,” Luna said, having finally mastered the modern dialect, “I lost control and acted foolishly, forcing you to sacrifice the rightful royal power to guarantee the aristocrats' loyalty. I've been working tirelessly to return Equestria to the rightful order of things. If it weren't for this present thorn in our side, we could act within a few years.”

“Well, this has been eye opening," Spitfire said, "All these big speeches about “securing Equestria’s future with a standing army” and “superior forces as a means to prevent conflict rather than escalating it” have been a cover for building an army to overthrow the lords?”

“That’s exactly right.”

Spitfire was stunned, but a smile was slowly creeping across her face. Like most modern ponies, she despised the nobility. They were immensely wealthy and treated their constituents like the scum of the earth. None of them had earned their title; it was passed down the family, along with their psychopathic lack of empathy. The ponies living in the region around Cloudsdale, Ponyville and Canterlot had it lucky; the benevolent princesses acted as the lords of the Central Heartland, also called the royal province. Spitfire had always been loyal to the Alicorns, and this new development sturdied her resolve to serve the monarchy. There was really only one way it could possibly be better.

“So,” Spitfire inquired, “when the lords are gone, who gets their power?”

“We’re going to completely rewrite the political system,” Celestia declared, “Luna and I will act as the nation’s heads of government, heads of state and commanders in chief. Of course, we can hardly run the whole nation ourselves. After this nightmare with the aristocrats, we’ve reached the conclusion that those who hold seats of power must be replaced regularly, and we must be able to overrule their decisions where necessary. The senate springs to mind.”

“The plan then,” mused Spitfire, “is to quell this uprising, overthrow the aristocrats, then establish a semi democratic government run by you benevolent alicorns?”

“That’s the plan,” confirmed Celestia, smiling at the young colonel’s enthusiasm.

***

If possible, the wickedness of the Everfree Forest seemed to increase as the PBR slowly progressed downstream. It rapidly changed from the temperate woodland near Ponyville to a boggy mangrove swamp. The trees were fairly sparse closer to the bank, but the seamless canopy cast a dark shadow over all, creating the illusion that the forest was in fact growing denser. In the vast wetland, it was becoming difficult to see the borders between the river itself and the wet quagmire. Further upstream the environment had at least been somewhat familiar to the duo of young mares, but now the foliage was unlike anything they’d ever seen.

The added responsibility of keeping the craft safe began to weigh heavily on Apple Bloom. Rebel activity had been virtually nonexistent for half a decade, but the various creatures lurking in the darkness were an ever present danger. Every tree, every shadow, every bush and every boggy hole could be hiding some foul creature. What if she let the marines down? She might end up being responsible for their deaths. Even if she screwed up and every pony survived, the humiliation would be unbearable.

Apple Bloom began having visions of failure. Rebels crawled out from behind the trees and started firing, but no matter how hard she tried she couldn’t hit them. Crying in desperation, the mare on the machine gun just couldn’t land the lead downrange. She saw the skipper and chief screaming at her in furious disbelief. The chief was yelling about how incompetent the Expeditionary soldiers are, and the skipper was berating her for putting his boat in danger. Juvenis was desperately trying to protect the vessel by himself. Sweetie Belle had taken a bullet to the chest and was bleeding out, screaming in agony as she tried to put pressure on her wound. The unicorn looked up at her as if to say “I joined for you, and you couldn’t even protect me”.

The paranoid mare was snapped back to reality by a sudden movement on the bank. There’s no way she’d let that happen! Resolving not to hesitate lest she let the crew down, the inexperienced young soldier began firing upon the bank, being sure to operate the machine exactly as she’d been trained to.

The gun roared deafeningly, spraying innumerable rounds at deadly speed into that evil forest. Less than a second after Apple Bloom held down the trigger a loud curse came from the stern of the boat, immediately followed by the roar of Juvenis’s turret. Both these ponies gritted their teeth, spraying bullets in wide arcs across the bank, desperately trying to keep the unseen enemy at bay.

As the boat surged forward with renewed speed the skipper crouched down for protection, keeping his eyes ahead, blocking everything from his mind save the path of his PBR. He hoped against hope that his gunners could handle whatever pony or creature was attacking them by themselves as he guided the vessel through the bog.

Sweetie Belle scrambled around on the deck before attaching her SLR to her hoof and leaning over the side of the boat to add her own firepower. Her semiautomatic fire was barely noticeable compared to the rain of the stern and bow turrets. The enemies must have been some distance up the bank hiding in the darkness, because no pony could place a bead on them. All three of the firing ponies desperately searched the bank, their paranoia causing them to fire blind, convincing themselves that they had their targets pinned down.

“CEASEFIRE, CEASFIRE!” the chief roared furiously, “What the hay are you three shooting at?”

Every pony immediately obeyed the order and jumped in their skin, looking up at the chief sergeant. She was standing tall on three legs, her right front hoof holding a rifle aloft. Her entire body swelled to an immense size. Light itself seemed to be shying away from her terrifying form. She was quivering with anger, teeth bared and eyes narrowed. Her face showed a barely restrained violent rage. The mare, highly experienced in the art of killing, seemed to radiate power and demand respect.

“I said,” she repeated in little more than a whisper, “What were you shooting at?”

The ensuing silence seemed to answer her question. There was no returned fire, no cries of pain from the bank, no roaring monster, nothing. The only noise cutting though the quiet was the hiss of the boiling hot turrets. It matched the mood perfectly.

As Apple Bloom swallowed in fear and guilt, she looked around for an excuse. With a great effort, she broke eye contact with the chief and looked over at the skipper, who was shaking his head in disbelief as he returned to his regular posture and resumed a safe cruising speed. Sweetie Belle was biting her lip nervously, and slowly going about the business of slinging the rifle on her back. Juvenis was staring at the ground, his cheeks bright red.

Beneath the iron gaze of the senior NCO, the guilty mare summoned the courage to reply “I saw-”

“You didn’t see anything, private!” the chief interrupted furiously, “You freaked out and started spraying bullets everywhere. I’ve seen it before, but for some reason I keep thinking you damn Expeditionary kids can be trusted behind a mounted gun without shooting at shadows. Why did I think you could handle this? You land troops have always been trigger happy.”

The victim of the verbal assault shrank from the chief, slowly backing away from the weapon. She muttered an apology.

The chief turned to Juvenis to continue her lecture, “You’ve been in the military, what, two years? You’re supposed to be a hardened soldier by now, not a little filly who starts spraying at the drop of a hat! Sweet Celestia, the two of you must’ve wasted over a thousand rounds of ammo. Yea, it’s ok for you; you’re not the one who has to fill out the paperwork explaining what happened to all that ammo when we didn’t hit any combat. You call yourself a marine? I’ve seen ponies in the coastguard with more military professionalism than you. You’re an immature, incompetent foal.”

Finally, she turned to the unicorn before continuing, “And why the hay did you join in? You’re using a weapon built for precision, not spray. Were you lining up the shots on those shadows? The expeditionary force should be proud to have such a marksman in its ranks.”

“Every pony else was doing it,” Sweetie Belle replied in an innocent tone as if she was a school filly addressing a teacher, “it was peer pressure, miss. Please don’t tell mom!” she finished the statement with a cheeky smile.

“Wise one, huh? Yea, you boneheads are so smart. Wonder if you’ll be such a smartass when your quartermaster wants to know what happened to your ammo. The expeditionary is real fickle when it comes to supplies. They’re not fans of unicorns at the best of times. You’re in for a hell of a deployment if you keep that attitude up.”

Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle and Juvenis sat in guilty silence as the chief resumed her position on the front turret. She inspected it, as if she expected to find that the silly filly had somehow broken it, before finishing her speech.

“You’ve wasted our ammo and caused some wear-and-tear for our equipment, but I’m really more worried about you. All three of you have shown a true incompetence today. If you don’t take this as a lesson, it will bite you in the flank if you ever get into a real fire fight. You probably hate me right now. Good. That means my message will sink in.”

The two land soldiers sat next to each other, taking comfort in each other’s proximity. Both the skipper and the chief were staring straight ahead with stone hard unemotional faces. At the back of the boat, Juvenis sat by himself. The coldness radiated by the forest and his comrade seemed to be sinking into his soul, putting him in a truly depressed mood.

Comments

[fallen starr]

This is really good and should have more attention than it does. I'm really interested to see where it goes from here. You're doing an amazing job and I can't wait until the next update.

[aDerangedBrony]

1106000 I know, right?

[Hunter96]

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