Equestria First and Only

by Verlax

Chapter V : Our Enemy and First Blood

Chapter V : Our Enemy and First Blood

Thought of the Day : While the enemies of the Emperor still draw breath, there can be no peace.

---

Location : Equestria, Equestrian Regiments Training Facility.
Time : 16:30 PM, 08/11/1003 in the Equestrian Calendar.

Entire class stood up to salute the incoming instructor. Cloud Kicker was busy with reading his own Uplifter and almost didn't spot that Soarin, their new drill sergeant entered the room. Drill was a bad word however, Soarin was quite nice, comparing to others. Cloud Kicker really pitied the poor ponies under the Spitfire wings, they had no rest during her command. What was unique this time however, was the human marching just beside Soarin. He was higher than anypony in the class and was wearing a black uniform, which looked rather like ceremorial, rather than battle suit. His entrance to the class was accompanied by the sounds of creak, his metal, artificial legs were realising dozens of the squeaky sounds. He looked old, however future guardsponies couldn't think of how many years he exactly had. Deep wrinkles and white hairs suggested that he was pretty old, but also he looked quite excited and energetic.

"Hi guys, did you miss me?" Soarin asked, chuckling a bit.

"Sir, yes sir!" entire class bursted out.

"Oh, thanks. But you don't need to be that serious. We have a special guest today and by mean "special" I really mean it. Allow me to introduce retired Mayor Hingard from the Mordian 11th Regiment. This time he will lead the lesson."

"I'm not retired." Hingard said. "Only in death does duty end after all, I'm just serving other way."

The human saluted and without asking for permission took Soarin favourite chair. Vice-captain of Wonderbolts approached doors and just stood in the entrance, while Hingard was comforting himself, trying to find a perfect position in his seat.

"So..." Hingard began. "You were told earlier, that topic of this lesson will be the vehicles variety of the Imperial Guard. However, as much as I would love to teach you about Leman Russ tanks, artillery and other vehicles, we have much more important topic."

Hingard rose his head, almost looking into the celling.

"You have learned about weaponry already, but do you know to what targets you will be shooting at all?"

Class felt silent for a moment. After a few seconds, Golden Harvest gathered courage to answer.

"Chaos?" she said quietly.

"Elementary, my dear pony. What is Chaos?" Hingard asked with a smile.

This time, no pony had idea. Some guardsponies recalled something with Discord, but they were sure that it wasn't the thing Hingard was asking for.

Mordian Seargant sighed and continued.

"You see, you are the first living, intelligent beings that don't know what Chaos is. As you already know, Imperium of Mankind reaches almost all the edges of this galaxy and there are no humans, that don't know what it is. In all honesty, it's unbelievable to me. But well, you were isolated for quite long time and my order is to teach you it. I'm not questioning orders. Let's start then."

"Before I will get to the point what Chaos is, you need to know some history. I guess, that Soarin taught you something about it, but honestly..." he turned to face the vice-captain and smirked. "I don't trust him. Take the notes guys, because it will long as the Mordian infantry column. In your calendar it's one thousand three year, while in humans calendar it's forty thousands, seven hundreds sixty five. In shortcut : "765.M41". We need to go back in time. Close your eyes guys, you need to imagine all the glory of our past. Long time ago, I can't freaking remember date, so let's stay that really long ago, humans built the civilization on our home planet, Terra. Basically, we were in the same state like you are now. However, we discovered the way to travel to the distant planets and stars. We were using the "Warp" jumps. I guess, you already started making questions what in the hay is the Warp jump. For now, you need to know that's the way to travel in space really fast, but with quite great danger.”

“So, our civilization reached other planets, and we built our cities on the other worlds. Everything went quite well until the Age of Strife began. If my memory is still working it was 23M... or 24M? My memory is messing, no idea. But you are following, right? So basically, Age of Strife destroyed our possibility to make the Warp jumps. All planets were isolated from Terra and because of it, the great civil war began. We were fighting everything, other races, some crazy mad robots, orks and of course, ourselves. It was the dark age of the Imperium, but then... miracle happened. On the Earth, the God-Emperor appeared. He re-united entire Terra, and using his power he created Adeptus Astartes, the Space Marines. They become our ultimate weapon of war, their invincibility allows Imperium to re-unite again. Also, Emperor power allowed us to travel though the Warp again, thanks to the light of Astronomica. God-Emperor created also eighteen genetic sons called Primarchs. All of them took one of the Space Marines Legion, like for example Jaghatai Khan was in charge of the White Scars..." Hingard stopped for the moment.

"I'm not mumbling, am I?"

"Certainly not, please continue." Soarin said. Rest of the class wasn't that sure.

"Okay then. Wait, where did I end? Ah, Space Marines, okay. So, in total we had eighteen Legions of Adeptus Astartes and eighteen Primarchs to lead them. And this is a time when Chaos appeared."

Hingard stood up and came closer to the future guardsponies.

"Okay guys, what I told earlier I could tell quite in frankly jokingly atmosphere... but Chaos is something much darker to do it. Chaos is a manifestation of the Four Gods of Chaos. Their ruinous powers is beyond measure and only the light of the Golden Throne and wise eyes of the God-Emperor allowed us to survive. The four are : the god of blood and slaughter, the god of rot and disease, the god of change and fate and the god of pain and pleasure... Yes?"

"What are the names of these Gods?" Cloud Kicker asked. "We never heard about them."

Mordian seargant fell silent for a moment.

"Their "names" are such foal and powerful that I will never dare to say them." Hingard answered. "And you will also. However... if you heard one of these names, you will certainly know what they mean. Hate them, nothing more."

"But backing to the topic." the old man continued "Chaos is tempting. Chaos can offer a power beyond measure. Chaos can do things, which our minds can barely understand. It was M31, the times of the Great Crusade. God-Emperor of Mankind came back to Terra, while he promoted one of his Primarchs, Horus to the rank of Warmaster. His task was to re-unite rest of the colonies, lost in the depths of space. However, Chaos already started breaking though existence and soon Chaos reached the Horus weak mind."

"Finally, Horus declared a rebellion against the God-Emperor. He gathered half of the Legions to his side. That was, how the Horus Heresy began. History of this war is really long and I really don't have time to teach you about it. The most important is the last part, the Battle on Terra. Horus sided with the Deamons of Chaos and received a blessing from the all Four Gods. His army became foal, rotten berserkers, they were burning entire cities, worlds... once he destroyed entire planet by simply bombing it to death by cyclone's torpedoes. You need to remember another thing. God-Emperor wanted to create a heaven, an utopia for their kind, same as yours rulers. I don't want to argue about which method was better, to fight to the death for the better world or to isolate yourself from the rest of universe... but point is that Horus destroyed permanently the God-Emperor plan. In the last battle, in the fearsome duel God-Emperor defeated his son, but he was strucked deadly too. Rogan Dorn, the Primarch of the Imperial Fists Space Marine Chapters put the body of the Emperor on top of the Golden Throne. Thanks to the lost power of the past technology God-Emperor is still alive.

“However, the Imperium is now under siege from all sides. Forces of Chaos, greentide waves of Orks, Eldars and their dark cousins, Tyranids, Necrons and Tau Empire, all at once are attacking the Imperium of Mankind. Now, there is only war, nothing more. Horus Heresy ended in M31, but the war still remains. It’s M41, and nothing changed at all. The mighty Imperium is still holding, thanks to Adeptus Astartes, Inquisition, mighty hammer of the Imperial Guard... and soon you will help the Imperium too. There is no peace in these times and as you see, the war finally came back to your Equestria too. Any questions?"

“Who now leads the forces of Chaos? Had Horus have a succesor?” somepony asked.

“In theory, yes. Horus was the Primarch of the Sons of Horus Legion and after his death, the first captain of the Legion took control over the army. So for now, Abbadon the Despoiler is “Warmaster” of the Chaos forces. Thankfully, other Legions really don’t care much about Abbadon, so they forces are pretty scattered across the galaxy.”

"Okay, let's keep going.” Hingard continued. “So, what fighting Chaos is like? The are several options. The most common Chaos treat are heretics and bandits that gathered in warbands are pillaging sectors. Really often in their ranks you can find traitors guardsmens... do not feel any regret to shoot them down. Another major difference between Equestria and the rest of the universe is that there is no forgiveness. Damnation is eternal, you will not feel any mercy for people that worship Chaos."

"The next come Chaos Space Marines. They are nine Legions of them, and I guess that Soarin will make one lesson with the huge describing of these traitors, so I will not do it myself. If you will really meet them, be really careful, because most of these guys are ten thousands years veterans and by saying “Ten” “Thousand” “Years” “Veterans” I'm dead serious. One of them is more powerful than one hundred of the crazy heretics."

“There is also the Dark Mechanicum. You know already, that Adeptus Mechanicum is responsible for caring and keeping the technology of the Imperium of Mankind. Dark Mechanicum was a part of the original Mechanicum, but they decided to side with Horus. After his death, they helping Chaos forces in maintaining tanks, weaponry, ammunition and the last and more fearsome, Chaos Titans. What can I say, may seem crazy for you, but Titans are the war machines that are from fifteen to eighty meters tall and have weaponry enough to destroy entire continent in one barrage.”

"And the last one, Deamons. And to all honestly, I have absolutely no idea what they really are. I can tell you only that they are really dangerous, but also really rare. In my entire military carrier I never met one. Once, when my squad was helping the acolytes of Inquisition, one of them told me that even one, weak deamon is really bad news. Maybe you will tell me about them, after you will met them on the battlefield? I wished I could still have a chance to fight for the Emperor" Hingard sighed. "I'm really jealous in that matter... Yes?"

"Ehm, sir." Cloud Kicker spoke. "With all respect, but from what you described I don't see how our Regiments will make any difference in fighting the Chaos threat. I mean... we have our lasguns, we have flak vests but I still don't see it, sir. Nine thousands of us will not stop the wave of mad, skilled in combat zealots, especially while being outnumbered one to ten or even more, not talking about Chaos marines, Titans and such.”

"You are doubting yourself and calling it foolish is a big understatement." Hingard smile vanished immediately. “I tell you a story and it's the true one, I can ensure you. I guess you still remember the Horus Heresy? During the Battle on Terra the God-Emperor himself teleported on the Horus flagship. He found his traitor son and the fearsome duel began. However, our Emperor loved his son so much that he couldn't finished him. Horus, blind by the forces of Chaos was attacking his father madly, dealing many deadly wounds which later brought the Emperor on the top of the Golden Throne. The days would be over for us when this happened."

"Imperial Guardsman. Same as you, equipped with the flashli.. I mean lasgun" Hingard smirked. "and flak vest. Probably, he had even shorter training than you. Horus palm was bigger than his entire body. Horus have just dealt the mortal wound to his beloved God-Emperor. He could run. He could shot himself. And you know what? This guardsmen didn't do that. He started shooting with his lasgun at the Horus, which couldn't even scrap the piece of metal from his armor. Horus, in exchange tore him into pieces just by using his foolish mind. When the God-Emperor saw this, he truly realised how evil his son became and with one, swift strike he killed him, ultimately stopping the forces of Chaos from overcoming Terra. This was one guardsman. His name was Ollanius Pius and he is the hero and saint of the Imperium."

"Now, realise this. If one guardsman can change the fate of galaxy, how much can do nine thousands of them?"

Cloud Kicker didn't have answer for this.

---

Location : Equestria, Equestrian Regiments Training Facility.
Time : 17:13 PM 08/11/1003 in the Equestrian Calendar.

Almost entire hospital was abandon. Most of the beds vanished, same with the medicines and the hospital equipment. The building was strangely silent, even for the hospital standart. Doctors leaved this place for the special lecture at the Wonderbolt Academy. However, “almost” was a key word. Two ponies giggling were delicately throwing the perfect peace of this place out of balance.

"So, I finally didn't go for the camouflage training, because I really, really, really wanted to see this new human instructor!" Pinkie Pie said with her usual enthusiasm. "Ponies says he have shiny, robot-metal legs, but I couldn't find him so I left this idea and I headed to the kitchen, when suddenly sergeant Loken found me. He immediately grabbed me and said "Well, I didn't see you on the camouflage training.”

"Oh. And what did you say?" Fluttershy asked curiously.

Pinkie Pie made innocent face and said.

"Thank you sir, I really strive."

It took only a dozens of milliseconds for two ponies to explode in laughter, that filled empty hospital. After the moment, Fluttershy managed to calm down. Pair was sitting on the bench in the regiment hospital. There were no other ponies around, war didn't started so no patients were in sight. She tried not to think about the future.

"Pinkie, but why you was supposed to be on the camouflage training?" she asked. "I mean you are... cook."

"Silly filly, it's better to be sneaky cook than not-sneaky cook!" Pinke Pie answered, chuming muffins she received from Derpy. "I think it's purely logical."

"Well... logic..."

Pinkie Pie was about to make another bite into the muffin when suddenly entire Pinkie body began to shake horribly.

"Wawawawawawawawawa! MMMMy Pinkie Sense!"

“Pinkie! Are you okay!?” cried Fluttershy and dashed to her. However, in the same moment she approached the pinkie mare, she immediately stop shaking.

“Nah, I’m fine! But I think something really, really, really bad will happen soon!” Pinkie Pie cried, jumping in the place. “Something not related with falling and doors sneaky, sneaky attack!”

Fluttershy gasped and now it was her, who was shaking. Not from sense, but rather from fear. Now, her eyes were locked on the entrance to the building, looking for “something bad to happen”. Pinkie Pie was alerted too, glaring at these two metal doors with piercing sight.

However, they didn’t spot the problem. They heard it.

Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy heard the sound of the explosion, quite far away, due to the low volume of it. Pinkie Pie was about to dashed out of the building to check what happened, but then she realised that Fluttershy was too scared to even leave the bench. The shy pegasus covered her head between hooves, not daring even to look again at these two metal doors, shaking horribly. The party pony hooped on the bench again and hugged Fluttershy tightly.

“It’s alright, probably they are launching fireworks.” Pinkie Pie hushed, her smile not cracking for any moment. “And I guess that they probably didn’t bring enough of them for a New Year and it’s really really scary! And...”

“P-Pinkie, can you hear t-that?” she stammered out.

The party pony felt silent as her ears twitched in the quest for these odd sounds. After a few seconds, there was the loud cry. The cry filled with pain, fear and horror. The cry, which reached all the nerves in the two ponies minds.

“MEDIC!!!”

With that shout, the doors into the hospital were suddenly opened. Three figures entered the hall of the hospital, not bothering with closing the doors behind them. A yellow earth pony and bald, massive human were carring the dark blue unicorn with short, messy mane. Pinkie Pie gasped when she realised that carring pony was leaving a blood trail behind her. The human glanced on them with disbelief.

“What is going here!? Where are the doctors!?” he cried with desperation. Now, Pinkie recalled who was the human. She couldn’t mistake this voice with anybody else.

“Th-They are all at the lecture at the Wonderbolt Academy, they are not here.” Pinkie Pie answered with a weak voice.

Seargant Loken blinked several times. “You seriously mean that there are no doctors at the hospital!? You’ve got to be kidding me!”

The party pony looked on the wounded pony. There was a small stream of blood, which came from the rear hoof of the injured unicorn. She also spotted, that in the same place something was delicately protruding from his hoof. Something metalic... oh, no...

“We were training with grenades and we made, ehm... mistake.” the earth pony with a big sunflower as the cutie mark explained, widely gesturing with her limbs. “This thing exploded really close and Star Gazer got shrapnel deep in his hoof!”

“Guys, I’m fine, it’s just a...” Star Gazer tried to say and fainted, his head dropping low.

The earth pony and Loken were now piercing Pinkie Pie with their eyes. The party pony knew that they were demanding her help.

“I’m sorry, but I just don’t know anything about the medicine...” she whispered.

“I can do it.”

All the heads turned immediately to the shy pegaus who now stood near them with determination written in the capital letters on her face.

“Seriously?” the Star Gazer partner muttered.

“Of course she is!” Pinkie cried and hugged the shy pegasus hard. “Fluttershy gonna fix everything! She is always the most caring of all of us!”

“Ehm, thanks Pinkie but...” the yellow pony tried to release herself from Pinkie help.

“Guys, you know, it’s cute and all, but we have a bleeding pony here dammit!” sergeant Loken shouted with annoyance, holding the unconscious unicorn along side with the yellow earth pony.

“Ehm, sorry.” Pinkie Pie realesed Fluttershy and let her catch the breath.

“Okay, listen up. Pinkie Pie, I need you to find all the medicines available. Loken, take the Star Gazer and find a bed to put him into. Mrs...”

“Sunflower. Pretty obvious.”

“It would be nice, if you could find somebody with higher rank and inform him of everything.” Fluttershy ordered.

“Roger that.” earth pony saluted and bolted out of the building, while both Pinkie Pie and Loken with Star Gazer entered the long corridors of the hospital.

Fluttershy feared it. This was exactly the thing she was afraid for. Even the idea of war seemed incredibly cruel to the shy pegasus mind. She could almost see all the faces of the ponies... and humans in pain. It was unbelievable. But it was also the reason why she joined too. She just couldn’t stand the thought of these poor beings suffering and left alone, she wanted to comfort them. Fluttershy just couldn’t make this happen.

---

Location : Equestria, Canterlot Castle
Time : 23:24 PM, 8/11/1003 in the Equestrian Calendar

On the balcony of the famous Canterlot Castle two figures were sitting against each other. While the moon was sending the small but marvelous light, these two figures were playing chess. First one was Princess Luna in all her grace, the second one was the bald, much bigger human with the power armor. The symbol with the skull and the “I” symbol was clearly stating that human was the inquisitor of the Ordo Malleus, the Deamonhunters. One more figure was guarding the entrance, standing still. Its black armor matched the darkness of the night, making it almost invisible.

“I never asked for this.” Inquisitor said. “When I received this order I was clearly shocked, I was thinking that my superiors were heretics in disguise. Even now, when I think about it, this idea was ridiculous.” He moved his pawn forward. “I came here with a suspicion that you will be threat. Before that, I heard how similiar you are to humans. I wasn’t believing it. When I arrived on Equestria, I still wasn’t impressed. You were xenos, nothing more. But then I saw this.”

Inquisitor rose the bishop from the tableboard and was observing it for a while.

“Priest. You call that bishop, but it’s the same. How it’s possible? The same game, the same rules, the same figures... I never saw something like this.”

“In fact, I was suprised that you are playing chess too, inquisitor Goran.” Princess Luna stated and moved her tower. “But I guess, you invited me to the game not just for the fun?”

“Of course.” Goran answered. “My task is to seek the foul deamons and you are first person to ask.”

“First?” Luna rose brew with astonishment. “I thought that you will start your interrogations from my sister.”

“Celestia will be second. And I don’t like to call it “interrogation”. I prefer “friendly conversation.” he smirked.

“You know what, even your presence is quite scary. Not talking about the words.”

“My chief weapons are suprise and fear at all.” his smile grew even bigger.

“Okay then,” Princess Luna sighed “Start.”

“Is this true, that once you rebelled against your sister, becoming something which was called “Nightmare Moon?” he asked.

“Who told you that?”

“Random filly from the streets of Canterlot.” Goran smirked. Luna wasn’t sure if he was joking or not.

Princess Luna sighed again. “It’s not something I’m proud of. When I was responsible for the Moon, my sister was basking in the glory, being the keeper of the Sun. Of course, it was all lie, but this was the game of pretend. Princess Celestia was beloved in the eyes of ponykind, while I was barely remembered. I was hunger for the love and after a few thousands years I couldn’t stand it anymore. That was why I rebelled and I’m still regreting it.”

“This “Nightmare Moon” thing... I’m still not understanding it in full. I think it’s something like “transformation”. While being Nightmare Moon I was still able to think, but I was blind in a fury. I could still feel emotions, but they variety ended on the hatred to my sister. After I finally back to my normal own, I started research to discover what exactly happen. I didn’t find clear answer, but I think it’s closely related to the magic from the deep core of Equestria itself. The barrier existed long before I turned into Nightmare, so it was for sure not related with “other” influences.” she said with the small suggestion.

There was a few seconds of silence. Night Stalker, who guarded the entrance didn’t say a single word from the begin on the conversation, but was looking with suspicion at the inquisitor.

“You was so busy with answer that you didn’t focus on game.” Goran said and moved bishop, killing her tower. “Check.”

Luna winced when she realised that inquistor was playing with her.

“Are you so sure?” she asked and elimanated bishop with her own.

“Yes, I am.” Goran asnwered and elimanated her bishop with the queen. “Check.”

Luna moved the king forward. Inquisitor moved his queen deep inside her side of board, killing her pawn. In that moment Princess realised that his queen wasn’t protecting inquisitor king anymore. Luna moved her own queen across entire board.

“Checkmate.”

Goran was watching the board for a few moments, clearly suprised by the Princess maneuver. Night Stalker couldn’t hold his poker expression any longer and a small smile appeared on his face. Luna smile grew even bigger in the triumph.

“Good game, princess.” Inquisitor said. “I wish that you will manage to create this Regiments as easily as you beat me in chess. I also really hope, that no Chaos taint settled in this land...”

Comments

[Verlax]

I spotted that there are a lot of guys who enjoyed the story, but have a bit problems what Warhammer 40.000 is. This Chapter is for you guys, enjoy. I need to warn you, that next Chapters will come much slower than this one, because my two weeks of free time are ending.

About grammatic stuff : No, I don't have editor, so you had to survive my terrible gramma in this story. Sorry for that, but kinda can't help the fact, that I was born in "this" country and not in "that" country.

Stay Awesome

Verlax

[FastShadow78]

Alright.
I am a bit more oriented. A bit.
Was there any more significant event before or after Equestria is discovered?
You said it's M41. If I have ANY grasp on Warhammer 40k then I know a lot of things happened in M41 period.

Jesus, these nerd dates are killing me.

[Verlax]

2173202

There were a lot of things that happen before and after Balhaut Campain ( and Celestia speech in this fiction ). However, there is one problem :

Dates in the universe of the Warhammer 40.000 are really messed up. I give you example. Dan Abnett in the original Tanith First and Only made Ibram Gaunt to reffered to Commissar Yarrick. Problem is... that Yarrick was born one hundred years later. The buck...

Actually, there is a reason for it. Warp jumps are making quite big anomalies, so chronology in the WH40k is really derped. However, I can give you a timeline of the Sabbat Worlds Crusade, the most important of the historical event for this fiction and for original Tanith First and Only.

Warning! Spoilers for original Tanith First and Only! Sabbat World Crusade

[FastShadow78]

2177957
Oh Jesus. So basically warp is the Deus Ex machina of Warhammer?
Ugh. Why couldn't it just be a goddamn video game and not have stupid comic spin offs and novels. I mean sure, it's based off of one but really. Go away.
Now, time to complain about some more First World problems!