A Walking Chestnut

by Netap

Chapter 23: Martial Law.

"What the hell did you do?!"

Deep in the abandoned mines beneath the capital city, Dimondia, A Dachshund was yelling at a group of taller Dogs carrying several burlap sacks.

"Y'See boss, We got told to get the Pony politicians and bring them here, so we did" One of the Dogs told the shorter Canine.

"I Understand that you fool! I meant What Did you do to get the Pony Diplomats, Who told you to get the pony diplomats, And why the hell, if you succeeded in that Foolish mission, are the pony diplomats not here?!" He yelled back, grabbing the fur on his head and stretching it, as if trying to tear it off.

The sack carrying Dogs looked at each other before simultaneously opening their mouths.

"Alex told us to-" "-we grabbed sleep canisters and-" "-The Castle had bad security so we-" "-We grabbed this Rat thing then-" "-You're not mad at us are you?" The Dogs answered together in a jumbled mess of words.

The Dachshund, Sir Rockefeller, the right hand man of President Lycanroc and co-founder of the D3U took a deep breath.

He then promptly told the Dogs to go get Alex and throw him off a ledge.

Now with two problems taken care of, one of how to deal with the group of Idiots that apparently broke into Princess Lanternlight's Castle and Puppynapped a diplomat from Equestria. And second of dealing with the fool that told them to do that in the first place. Leaving him with problem 3.

How is he going to salvage the situation without having Equestria declare war on the D3U.

The Plan was going so well, Queen Katherina had no choice but to give the throne to Lycanroc.
The Political scandal of allowing them to kill Princess Moonbeam would ruin the public support of her.
The D3U Was in a situation where they win either way.

And now these stupid idiots had to go and ruin everything by kidnapping an Equestrian.

Caninia isn't built to go to war with the ponies, should any harm come to the Equestrian, it would cause an international incident where they, The D3U, would be the instigators.

Sir Rockefeller had to think of a plan to salvage this mess before Lycanroc will hear about what had happened and try and do something to fix it.

As much as Rockefeller supported the Dog, He knew that Lycanroc would just make things worse.
And Also, this is now a very delicate situation.

And if Lycanroc was going to be a Hammer, Sir Rockefeller had to be a Scalpel.

---

"What do you mean he's been taken?! Your job description is in the title, You Guard. How can you stand there and tell us that the main thing that you were supposed to guard, was unguarded?!" Blueblood was not having a good day.

It started when the Horse drawn carriage decided to stop outside of Dimondia. It then got slightly better with him and his cohorts leaving a positive impression on the royalty of the land.
Sadly the royalty that had the good impression is the group in opposition of the ones that invited them to Caninia in the first place.
The day then went from better back to worse by having Lycanroc, self proclaimed president and leader of the D3U, proclaim out to the city that he has Princess Moonbeam Twinkletail hostage, and will execute her in little more than 24 hours if Queen Katherina doesn't step down from her position as ruler of Caninia.

Given that all this information had to be translated by the Diamond Dog Princesses and Mr Cohen, he had to take it with a grain of salt at first. At least until they all went to the Traditionalist Royal Castle, where Queen Katherina Proudpaws and Princess Jennino Lanternlight got into a heated argument.
Samuel Cohen was taken for a talk with Princess Fiona Floppyears, that seemed to leave a sour taste in him if the face he made when he left the castle was anything to go by.

So now, Queen Proudpaws doesn't want Equestria getting into Caninian business, Princess Ambrosia Muffinsbuns has also been surprisingly quiet ever since they returned to the separatist castle, only for them to find that the castle was attacked, the guard knocked unconscious and Samuel Cohen missing.

This Entire mission was turning out to be more hassle than it was worth, and it hasn't even been a full day since the Equestrians arrived.

"Blueblood we have more important things to focus on, we need to get Chespin back" Cadance tried to tell the Unicorn.

Blueblood turned to look at the Alicorn, a retort ready on his tongue to lash at her.

All this trouble was her fault.
It could be blamed on Raven Inkwell for starting the mess and giving outdated information, It could also be blamed on Queen Katherina and Duke Snifflepaw for being awful rulers to the people, that three of the princesses decided to leave and form a newer, and dare he say it, better faction.
If Queen Katherina wasn't so stuck up in her traditional views, Lycanroc might not have had such a large following.
If The Royal Family did their job correctly, they wouldn't be having the need to get His Country to clean up the mess.

But even with all these reasons, They could have been ignored if the Delegation never formed.
Raven Inkwell wasn't planning on going, so she had Him, Cadance and Samuel be the Diplomats on this mission.

Blueblood even told her that this was a terrible Idea and that they shouldn't be helping them, Samuel seemed to agree with him if how he was acting during the meeting was anything to go by.
Usually, If more than half of the delegation refuse to cooperate, the mission is then pushed to a different group, willing group.

If Raven Inkwell didn't have Celestia's Pupil and her pet dragon in the meeting, Cadance wouldn't have fought so hard to have this whole thing happen.
And Why did Raven even count Twilight Sparkles opinion on the matter, she wasn't even invited to the conference meeting!

It was Twilight Sparkle and Mi Amore Cadenza agreeing with Duke Snifflepaw that caused this entire thing to happen in the first place, So Blueblood feels fine with putting some of the blame on her.

Who did she think she was? A Pegasus who has ties to a long dead royal line from a forgotten Empire, why did she get a Horn? He was the one making sure things were running smoothly in Equestria, He was a descendant of Princess Platinum herself, His Magic is second only to the Alicorns and Twilight Sparkle.
He was the one that brought peace with the Minotaurs!
He was the one that opened trade with the Zebras!
He was the one that funded the building of the Equestrian Railways!
He was much more deserving of being in charge of Equestria!

So why did Celestia make her an Alicorn and not him?

And as Blueblood was about to tell this to Cadenza, he stopped.

He didn't think that way. He loved Cadance like Family, she was his cousin in all but blood.
He was never before jealous of her, or of Celestia's treatment of her, nor of Twilight Sparkle.

"Someone is attacking us" He spoke and started walking into the castle, catching the other royals off guard at his sudden change in behavior.

What previously looked like an Angry Manager has now become a Trained Soldier.
The sudden change in how Blueblood was acting, followed by his statement caught the attention of everyone in the area, before they all soon followed after him.

"What do you mean we are under attack?" A Guard Dog, quickly asked as he walked after him.

"It means that someone is trying to cause chaos. You must have felt it, haven't you. Sudden inexplicable changes of your behavior, sudden doubts and thoughts that you never would have considered. And all of that with this Situation in our hooves, this has to be a targeted attack. Someone, no, Something is trying to get Lycanroc's plan to succeed."

They entered what looked to be a classroom with a blackboard on the wall.

Grabbing a chalk in his magic, Blueblood drew a detailed, top down map of Dimondia, with the mountains surrounding the city as a border, the two castles as points of interest, and the massive ravine splitting the city in two halves. He even drew the rock spire that Lycanroc seemingly created.

"We need a rescue plan, We need soldiers, and we need to be fast. Who knows what Lycanroc might be doing right now." Blueblood said before pointing at a random guard, "You, Go to Katherina's castle and tell her to bring everyone here, The guards, the princesses, even the servants and cooks!"

The Guard Dog turned to look at Princess Lanternlight.
"Do as he says" she told him, before watching him run out of the castle.
"All of you, Listen. As of this moment, I am placing us under Emergency Protocol Number 14-1, during a national emergency, the leader of the nation, be it Queen, King, Princess, Prince or other, May take control of all aspects of the nation until such a time as the emergency is over.
As Ruler of this nation, I am effectively placing us under a form of Martial Law" Jennino Lanternlight told the now awake and surprised crowd of Dogs and few ponies around the room and outside of it.

"And now that we got that out of the way, As Ruler of this nation, I am placing Prince Blueblood Platinum of Equestria in charge of all military and financial decisions needed to end this farce." Now effectively Queen Jennino turned towards the surprisingly quiet Blueblood.

"I am putting a lot of trust in you, I want Princess Moonbeam Twinkletail back here safe, I want Samuel Cohen back here safe, and I want Lycanroc's head on a plate" She told the Unicorn, now temporary General AND Treasurer of the Separatist forces of Caninia.

"You have a week, Fix this" She then turned around and left the room.

A silence followed her exit before a Pit Bull wearing a Butler uniform clapped his paws to get everyone's attention.

"You heard her Majesty!" Before turning to over to Blueblood, "What do we do now General? What's the plan?" He asked, getting nods and even more question from the other Dogs in the room.

Even the two remaining Princesses in the room stood ready to listen to his orders.

Taking another quick look at the map he drew, "Okay, So here's what we're gonna' do-"

Author's Note:

Sir Rockefeller is making his move, we didn't see him since his introduction during the Interlude.
Blueblood is now in charge of a nation, although temporary.
And a certain Emotion Controlling creature is trying to make problems for the Group.

Does that creature have anything to do with what Luna said in chapter 17? Who knows :)

Thank you for reading this far :)

Comments

[bonberjean]

That would explain some of the weird stuff with Raven...

[kaiser0kolovos]

I see where she was coming from but putting Blueblood in charge of the country may be one of the worst decision Lanternlight could have made.

It could a good decision to keep her country running, Blueblood is good at running the civil matters of a country and is a seasoned diplomat, but the issue here is that it shows to everyone in Caninia that she is incapable of holding things together on her own and needs to rely on a foreign power. This also looks bad for her in that she basically forced foreign diplomats to take a side in the conflict and put them in harm's way.

Blueblood also doesn't have any reason to have the Caninian monarchy's best interests in mind. Blueblood was pretty much given an opportunity to escalate the situation in Caninia, like how he and Sam were talking about earlier.

He could use the military to attack the D3U poorly which would escalate this into a Civil War, he could refuse and take any action taken against the diplomatic team as an act of war against Equestria, he could use the military to subvert the monarchy "to protect them" and remove them from the equation.

Here's hoping that President Lycanroc makes it out on top (and probably Blueblood as well), that the Equestrian diplomats make it back safely, and that Raven Inkwell gets hanged, drawn, and quartered.