• Member Since 14th Jul, 2012
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Georg


Nothing special here, move along, nothing to see, just ignore the lump under the sheet and the red stuff...

Sequels1

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This story is a sequel to Equestria : 1940


In September of 1939, Germany and Russia invaded Poland, and the European war became inevitable.  Unlike the Great War where Equestria remained mostly neutral, this time there will be no safe harbor for the small nation of ponies.  While they quietly attempt to withdraw their citizens from the bonfire that is engulfing Europe, they are operating blind.  There is a fair chance their peacetime ally of Germany has already decided Equestria would make a good base for an attack on America, and just as likely the Americans will move to prevent it, resulting in the war arriving on Equestria’s shore regardless of any futile attempt at neutrality between the Great Powers.

Celestia has to do something to stop this disaster, or at least mitigate the destruction to save her little ponies from the ravages of war.  If only there were some way to read Germany’s mail so Equestria could remain one step ahead of them.  With Cadence on a last-ditch diplomatic mission to France and Celestia distracted by other affairs of state, the crushing responsibility falls on the thin shoulders of a young unicorn researcher and a reluctant spy.  Together, they will carry out a daring raid right into the underwater clutches of a German submarine and try to escape without getting caught or killed.

While on the moon, dark forces have begun to stir…

Art by Airy Words and a certain amount of AI and tweaking, but mostly Airy Words
Editing by Tek, Airy Words, and whoever finds the inevitable typo and politely reports it.
Credit to DC Comics and the 1970s series Weird War Tales, of which I have several in my basement collection.

Chapters (11)
Comments ( 91 )

Welcome to the prequel to Equestria:1940, where the small island nation of Equestria, about the size of Ohio, sits a little north-east of Bermuda and remains mostly to itself, except for tourism. Although they remained neutral during the Great War, that neutrality is about to be shattered as the Great Powers go to war, and the tiny nation has few assets to protect itself from the modern weapons of war.

Unless one stubborn young unicorn researcher and a disfunctional spy can somehow sweep back the curtain of secrecy over the German war machine and allow Equestria to stay one step ahead of the oncoming destruction. Ten chapters from now, or eleven depending on quantum uncertainty, we all will find out.

Stalin tried to create the alliance against the nazi Germany since 1934-35. But the Western world needed the war machine against the communists, so Stalin failed. How it all will turn here?..

11990934
Of course, it's important to remember that a big part of why Stalin failed, and western states felt they could use Hitler as a counterweight, was because Stalin was a paranoid tyrant running an oppressive dictatorship that was rapidly industrializing and arming itself up.

11990967
The Soviet Union seen the Western intervention during the Civil War in Russia which threatened to turn it into the pile of Colonial states with puppet governments. And later the USSR was not surrounded by friendlies.

11990970
Sure. And large reason why the USSR was not surrounded by friendlies was that it was fucking awful. The Russian civil war was an absolute bloodbath of atrocities, brutality and deliberate murder, even without any outside interference.

I want to be clear that I'm not in any way trying to defend the Nazis; they managed to be even worse than Stalin and Soviet Union, on basically every level, which took some doing. But let's not err in the other way, either. In fact, let's not have this discussion at all, if you don't mind; I think it will be better for everyone if we just wait and see what Georg is going to write.

11990971
No problem. You see, the Soviet Union for me is the great period in history of my country. It had its own problems and bad sides but I don't like when it colored black and bloody-red more than it deserves.

11990994
It was a "great period" insofar as you got your acts together well enough to actually fight external threats for once. The rest of the world reacted about as you'd expect given the region's indigenous people are the etymological origin of the word "slave" IIRC, but the fact that its eventual collapse was too delayed yet sudden to be part of any kind of actual plan is telling.

Well back to this universe. I do wonder how this will all go, and who will finally force Celestia to make a choice she doesn’t want to make?

Strong "Narbonic" vibes to the beginning. Also, we don't read our friends mail? Really?? You're listening to every communication in the facility!

That, actually, is a bit of small-town hypocrisy with which I'm familiar. Eavesdrop and gossip about a person like mad, but don't violate their privacy. That's just rude.

11991037 The decision has already been made. The ponies are being withdrawn from foreign countries, her intelligence services have boosted the process of obtaining intelligence from the inside of the German state, something that you don't do to allies, and her own niece has been sent on a futile mission to obstruct the German war machine from continuing their acquisition of nearby countries by force. War is inevitable. All she can do is try to save as many of her little ponies as possible.

No, let's not ask about Root Stock.

On a side note, most people when asked about German encryption around World War II (the amazingly popular sequel to the smash hit The Great War), will mention Enigma and stop. In truth, there was a practical blizzard of codes and codebreakers on all sides, of which Enigma was the king of the hill, and it is rather difficult even most of a century later to identify who could read what. History is complicated by the fact that the breaking of codes was frequently partial, and classified right up to the sky to the point where it can be difficult to determine who was even involved due to the immense amount of sheer lies that were published in order to disguise any progress on each side.

Quite a bit of furor over a little metal machine in a wooden box.
iwm.org.uk/sites/default/files/styles/text_with_media_large_desktop_1x/public/2018-01/large_0.jpg?itok=Liw8W0Qm

It's funny to me that her mother issues her a directive to issue her a directive.

Abduction of Romanovs? Intresting. What is next? Trotsky is ruling the Soviet Union and Stalin killed in Mexico by Ramon Mercader with the ice axe?

Ah, there's nothing like meeting an old instructor out of the blue, years after a project was due.

For reference, Guttman is slightly over 40, and prematurely grey and balding. Attending University in Equestria probably contributed to that.

1940 BRITAIN FRANCE AFRICA OTHER EUROPEAN NATIONS TAKE EQUESTRIAN HOSTAGES AS WAR EXPANDS TO COVER ALL EUROPE

Africa is not a country, unless there should be a South in there.

Europe will be in flames, from Britain to Africa

This seems a very odd way of wording things, one is clearly within Europe the other by definition is not.

Desperate people. Cruel people. And stupid people.

I think you could just say Humans, humans, humans.

11992526
Be fair. We've seen desperate, cruel, and stupid ponies.

> The cheerful and smiling alicorn turned serious in the blink of an eye. “They’re going to fail, of course. In a year or two, all of Europe will be in flames, from Britain to Africa.”
“And Russia, and Japan, and the colonists,” said Sherbert.

at the moment Russia and Japan are fighting on the border of China and Mongolia.

I have only one major complaint about this chapter, the character Prime has me thinking of certain Transformers and it kept throwing off. Still sad to see how stubborn our MC is being about just how bad it is going. Still it is the norm of the era and sadly sooner or later she will make the correct choice.

I'd think there is a good medical center attached to or at least fairly close to Celestia's School for Gifted Unicorns as well. What a way to deal with 'prisoners' from most of what we've seen or been shown of Equestria there aren't many prisons from anyone maybe the Gryphons or Minotaurs have something. Wonder what the Geneva conventions say about "prisoners of war" potentially blowing themselves and others up
11992530 agreed
11992526 Well keep in mind a good number of African countries especially those on the med were European colonies or they had a very strong influence there

I was wondering if it would remain an Acronym forever.

There will be a brief moment of silence for the poor lizard, whose sacrifice in the name of science will not go unnoted.

One of the tasks of Q branch is to provide agents of Equestria with resources,

I was immediately put it mind of the Office of Diplomatic Support Services.

It's good to see her open up and get that off of her chest. That much self-hate can only carry one so far as a driving force.

11993197 Yes, but in James Bond, Q stands for Quartermaster research branch. In Equestria, it stands for Questionable.

Science isn't always clean and nice its messy and nasty at times. Mistakes happen and those mistakes have lead to many interesting things

_NOW IS THE TIME FOR ALL GOOD PONIES TO COME TO THE AID OF THEIR COUNTRY

Now it's just a matter of how far they're willing to go

https://m.

11993209
While ‘eureka’ does precede some scientific breakthroughs, ‘huh, that’s weird’ can be just as indicative.:twilightsmile:

11993209 11993254 Equestrian science producing 'interesting things' Generally those come not with an 'eureka' moment, but a "Run for your lives! Run!" Equestria provides its share of mad scientists. The ones you really need to look out for are the angry ones who don't like to lose.

“I’m angry,” snapped Sherbert.  “I’m an angry scientist, and this is an experiment.”  She lowered her horn.  “Try me.  Or would you like a different kind of experiment. One involving random transformation of your liped membranes into something unpleasant.”

11993254
At least it isn’t “Oh, oh.” That is usually a very bad thing.

And she learns something interesting about her mother.

11993193
So, we are to assume destructive copying as opposed to the other sort? Or should we consider it somewhat akin to attempting human transmutation in the Full Metal Alchemist universe?

11993193

Science requires sacrifices, although Nosey the lizard would have preferred she wasn't one of them.

Mothers will be mothers, in whatever form they be.

Ponies have often wondered about the name of the Chrystlar building, to say nothing of why the foundation is that odd shade of green. They are quietly but firmly encouraged to wonder about something else.

In any case, deeply engrossing stuff thus far. Looking forward to further science and intrigue. Especially if that Turing fellow ends up cracking the code before Sherbet. Imagine, all that work only to get undercut…

Nah, you’d never be that cruel. :rainbowwild:

11994048
Thing is, even if they do manage to crack the code before Turing and his team, the fact remains that they wouldn’t give that information out to anyone. This is strictly to protect Equestria and its citizens, not to aid other foreign nations.

11994061
Too, there's the operational security aspect. Even if they were willing to aid the Allies, they probably wouldn't reveal that they'd cracked the code.

"I'm not a mad scientist! I'm an angry scientist!"
-- Dr. Gangreen, Attack of the Killer Tomatoes (John Astin)

News Announcer: [voice-over] And today the president closed the nation's last remaining submarine base at Groton, Connecticut. When asked why he had made the startling decision the president responded, "Those funny little black ships just keep sinking anyway."
--Same Movie

On a postscript, I find it ironic that the modeling community has better information on the layout of various models of submarine than other resources I could locate.

Ah, and here I thought you were riffing on Sheep in the Big City with the angry scientist. :derpytongue2:

In any case, it’s a viable proof of concept, but the actual execution may prove… impractical. Though given the urgency of the task, “impractical” may be the best option available. Let’s just hope it ends with a minimum of gunfire.

:rainbowlaugh: I can hear the echoes of the cries from the comments of 1940. "Impossible!" they said. "What? Did they just walk up and get a guided tour?!" :pinkiehappy:

And put me down for Sheep in the Big City as well.

Mane upended the percolator over his cup and waited. After a few seconds, an inky lump dropped into it.

A proponent of the "If you can chew it, it'll wake you up" genus

Interesting incentive package.

For the first time in her life, Sherbert is caught caring about another individual who is not a direct relative. She picked a darned poor time.

The chapter ends on an interesting cliff hanger, though using Prince Blueblood's nature as a distraction is interesting and who anywhere would think anything of it unless they know Blueblood was somewhere else

“The first ninety percent of a problem takes ninety percent of the effort. The last ten percent takes the remaining ninety percent of work, at best.”

That math ain't mathin'. :rainbowhuh:

11995793 Yeah, but it's the First Rule of Project Management.
11995690 I must admit I'm a little hesitant to use a cliffhanger ending for the chapter, since I haven't done that before. Or lie to the reader.

11995932
You meant for there to be 180% of effort?

Ah, educational opportunities.

Oh dear, that can't be good.

11996118

First rule of Project Management Club is that you must make the numbers lie.

11995932

That's true! Georg has never used a cliffhanger ending for a chapter, or lie to any of his readers.
Also, strangely enough, I have to part with my bridge in brooklyn. Slightly used, going for cheap, must sell it before friday. Interested?

“Ah,” said Sherbert. “Fiction.”
“Most historical texts contain only bits and pieces of the truth,” countered Mane. “True history seldom rhymes. Well, human history. I shall have to introduce you to my oldest friends. Liars one and all, but tiny shards of the truth can be found if one looks carefully between the pages.

This feel somewhat profound. Is the only difference, between fiction and non-, that the fiction writers don't pretend to be writing the facts?

Edit: Also, that was a great ending. :pinkiehappy: The fact that it's Incomplete only makes it better.

leave them free reign

That should be free rein. A horse metaphor in a pony story - what will they think of next? :rainbowlaugh:

11996135
Most aromantic romance I ever read.

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