That Others May Live

by CptBrony

On the Fly

On the Fly

Duke had them running laps again, only this time, they were all carrying sandbags. Two forty-five pound sandbags.

“MOVE, MOVE! I WANT SPEED!”

He was yelling at them to go faster, and he and Frost ran alongside them to “encourage” them to keep up. Initially, Amel had translated for them on this one, but Duke decided that it would be more interesting to see how they handled not understanding what they were being told. They had to figure out what they were being told to do, as they would soon do in the field, and weren’t allowed to crack under pressure. If one failed to follow orders, he would have to go to the pullup bar.

At this point, Duke and Frost pretty much just did whatever they could to make it difficult for the stallions. Duke watched as Frost ran off for a moment, then came back a new ten pound sandbag for each stallion. He went all out in order to put one on the back of each candidate.

“DON’T DROP THE SANDBAGS!” They weren’t secured like saddlebags, unlike the other ones they carried.

One of the stallions almost immediately dropped his sandbag, but didn’t make any move like he noticed. “YOU!” Duke shouted. All of the stallions slowed down and turned around; they had figured out that “you” meant that they should all look back. Duke grabbed the sandbag off the ground. “CARRY IT!” He threw it at the stallion who dropped it, who caught it in his mouth and started carrying it that way.

Frost seemed to like that idea. “All of you, move the bag to your mouth now!” He pointed at the one who was carrying it that way to explain, and after a moment, the stallions all switched over. Their heads hung noticeably lower as they ran.

“Keep your heads up!” Frost shouted. Off the track, Amel shouted out Frost’s orders to the stallions.

The stallions struggled to keep their heads up and their eyes forward as they ran with the sandbags in their mouths. Some had a tendency to look back to see who was behind them or if the humans were looking at them. Every time, Duke would run up to the stallion and shout in his face. Since they didn’t understand, they would just go back to looking forward, nearly pissing in their armor.

They finished their eighth lap around the perimeter. “STOP!” Duke shouted. They had already learned that command very well, and all of the stallions froze in place. Duke pointed at the climbing wall. “Climb to the top and wait there!” The stallions ran to the wall, some groaning as they heard the command repeated in their own language.

Duke and Frost ran over behind them to catch stragglers, though none were had. At the wall, the stallions all waited in place, some looking up the wall, others dutifully staring straight ahead. When the humans and mare ran over, the stallions all stood in place.

“Did I stutter?” Duke asked. After the translation, the stallions all got a look of terror on their faces. “Climb!”

The candidates all clambered amongst themselves, each one trying to be the first one up the wall. Except for a couple. They waited for the others to go first. “GO!” Frost shouted as he ran at them. The two stallions joined their brethren on the wall, making their way up. On the way up, there was little or no teamwork to be had, some even pushing others out of the way in order to get up first. There were just three doing that, though.

Once they were all up, Duke and Frost started up. “You’ll need to yell from down here.” Frost told Amel as he went up. “Otherwise, they might not hear you. And that’ll be THEIR fault.”

Amel chuckled. “Yes, Frost.” She watched in awe as the humans scaled the wall with incredible speed. “وأتساءل عما إذا كان كل البشر يمكن أن نفعل ذلك؟” she wondered.

The men were on top of the group before any of the stallions knew it, weaving their way around the hooved climbers who could barely hold on. Some shook like there was an earthquake going on. Duke scanned the group, trying to gauge how tired they were. Some were certainly struggling, though they seemed to be the ones who were being pushed out of the way. That kind of lack of teamwork could get you killed in the field.

Duke pointed at the three who had been pushing others out of the way. “You three.” he shouted so that Amel could hear him. “Back to the ground, now.” Amel shouted up Duke’s command, and the three stallions shamefully made their way slowly back down to the ground.

He turned his attention to the rest. “The rest of you,” he began, letting Amel shout up to them. “See this cord?” There was a cord hanging just above them; Duke had seen it earlier. “You are going to hang from this cord and shimmy your way to the other side, then find a way down. Work together!” He and Frost started making their way across to demonstrate what they wanted as Amel shouted the orders.

The men were able to get across quickly and find a way down easily, even though there wasn’t a built-in way to climb down. They used the grooves in the wall to lower themselves down to the ground to watch. If any of the stallions fell, they would be able to rush over and help, then send them away.

The stallions were only halfway across when the men hit the ground, moving like caterpillars on a leaf, if that leaf was less than one fiftieth of the caterpillars width. The men maneuvered over to be under the group just in case something happened and watched as they went across. Eventually, when they were across, most of them just continued to hang there without any clue of what to do.

“Work together to find a way down, come one!” Frost shouted, faking anger.

The stallions actually managed to surprise the men with what they did next. First, they just talked, but after a few minutes, they started to make a chain down to the ground. Or rather halfway; they would just jump from there and roll. They hooked their hooves at what would be called the wrist and worked like those barrel monkey toys that were just so awesome. Once enough were down, they formed a platform that had several levels to it, stallions standing on stallions, and let the remaining stallions fall onto them.

As the last one fell, Duke and Frost stepped toward the group. The whole platform disintegrated as they got close, everyone falling over and losing their footing. The men had to try desperately not to laugh at the spectacle, Frost biting his lip and Duke simply looking in another direction.

The nine stallions stood back up and stared straight ahead, faces red from either embarrassment or a head rush. Some let their eyes glance at Amel, who was barely able to hide her own laughter at them. Maybe that was why some were red faced; they had just hit on her, and now, this happened.

Duke crossed his arms as he approached. “Amel, call over those three stallions.” he ordered.

“Yes sir.” she replied. She turned around and barked out, “الحصول على أكثر من هنا!” The three ashamed stallions sprinted over, not exactly eager to hear their punishment for whatever they did wrong.

Duke watched them run over. When they arrived and stood at attention in front of the group, Duke told Amel, “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” she said, sounding a bit more confident. She was probably enjoying putting these guys through Hell. Wouldn’t you?

“Do you see these three?” Duke said, pointing at them. He waited for a moment while they were given the translation. “These three did not use teamwork. That can get you killed in combat, especially in our kind of combat.” He paused for a moment. “If you can’t naturally work as a team, you should leave now.” The stallions all looked nervous, but still determined, when they heard what he said.

Frost walked forward. “As for you three.” he said, pointing at them each individually. “You will have to go.” When Amel translated, the stallions looked like they had been kicked right in the nads. “Maybe later when they’re training operatives you can join, but until you learn teamwork, you have no place here. You must leave now.”

Amel gave them their orders and the stallions exited the room, heads hung low, eyes shut. The remaining six watched as their previous comrades left, all wondering who would be the next to go.

Duke let them watch just until the stallions were out of the room, then barked, “Get to the free zone!” He had come to calling the area where they had done their pushups earlier by that name. “Go!”

The group of six sprinted over, bodies aching, eyelids trying desperately not to fall. While they moved, they could hardly even feel their hooves crushing the ground beneath them. Their minds were too preoccupied with the next objective to think about the searing pain in their muscles right now. It was like a dream, but turned into a nightmare, run by bizarre aliens who seemed to gain some terrifying satisfaction from causing them pain.

Duke shouted, and they all dropped to the ground to do more push ups. It was odd, seeing horses doing push ups, but they seemed to have joints similar to those of humans. The men watched as the stallions bobbed up and down, trying not to fall to the floor, sweat pouring from their heads like Niagara Falls. Their manes were soaked with sweat and lashed like whips when they moved.

The men started going around them, shouting, sometimes without even saying words. The stallions had no idea what they were being yelled at for, and when one was focused on individually, he had to stare right at the ground to drown out the nonsensical blather coming from their trainers’ mouths. Frost got close enough to look one straight in the eye.

“GET LOWER!”

The stallion couldn’t ignore him any more, and had to look around to see what the others were doing that prevented them from being yelled at coherently. When he saw how much higher up he was than the rest, he whimpered and started trying to go lower.

“LOWER!”

The stallion tried to get as low as possible, but failed and collapsed. Frost grabbed him by the mane and dragged him away, the other stallions looking up in horror. Duke shouted at them, and they put their heads down, too scared to look on. They weren’t scared for their friend, though. They were more scared for themselves and terrified of the wrath of the Duke.

Frost picked up the stallion and tossed him toward the pull up bar. “Give me fifteen. Now.” he ordered coldly. The stallion looked at the bar, then back to Frost. “Why, you little-” He started to walk towards the stallion, but stopped when he ran up to the bar and leapt up for it. He missed on the first try.

“Do it again.” Frost ordered, arms crossed, looking expectant.

The stallion leapt up once more and made it, but only barely. Because he had no fingers to latch onto the bar, he had to hook his hooves around it like they were wrists. Once he got his grip, he started doing his work.

One.

Two.

Three.

Four...

Five...

Six...

He tried to get his seventh, but his forelegs and hooves were coated with sweat. The stallion slipped off the bar and landed flat on his back with a loud Smack. Frost was ready to move in case he was hurt, but when he got up, he looked fine. Mostly.

The stallion looked at the bar forlornly, then back to Frost. Still Frost just stood there, waiting. Under his scrutiny, the stallion began to try to shrink away, like that would save him from the brutality of the winter Frost.

Frost took one look at him and actually felt sorry, a little bit. He remembered how much he struggled with his PAST, especially with the pull ups. The stallion was looking straight at the ground, ashamed of his failure. Behind the human, he could hear the grunts of his teammates fighting against gravity.

He looked back up at Frost, but instead of being met with anger at his failure, he found himself face to face with something else. He looked up at the human, who was bent forward and looking the stallion directly in the eyes at his level. Frost poked him in the chest.

“I want you to do it. Can you do it for me?” he asked in a normal voice. He wasn’t trying to sound intimidating or cruel. He was just casual; it rocked the stallion to the core.

The stallion furrowed his brow. “أنا لا أعرف ما قلته للتو،” he began. “ولكن أعتقد أنني يجب أن تحاول مرة أخرى.”

He got back up and looked at his comrades, then back to the bar, the shame gone. Like a lion after its prey, he leapt back onto the bar and went for his pull ups again. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen...

Frost stopped him at twenty, proud that he was able to get him to keep going. While he and Duke may have been abusing them, physically and psychologically, they didn’t actively want to see them fail. No trainer ever does. The trainers just want the people who are the best to prove themselves.

Frost led the stallion back to the rest group, who were just finishing up their round of push ups. The stallion joined back with them as they took a two minute rest before beginning the next round.

Duke walked over to Frost, eyes on the time. “How was he?” he asked quickly.

They had to be fast, so Frost had a speedy response. “He was having trouble, but he pushed through. I think he might be good.”

Duke nodded. “That’s good, I guess. I just want to knock off at least two more of them. If not, I suppose we’ll have a pretty big team.” Frost nodded in response.

The two minute break was up before any of the stallions wanted it to be, and the men stood in front of them, waiting. As soon as one of the stallions realized what was happening, they all scrambled to get back into formation. It took them much longer to get to it this time than any other time.

“What’s going on here?! Get in formation!” Frost yelled.

They all got into their line and stood at the ready. Duke snarled at them, causing a bit of cowering, then turned to look at the clock. He had no idea what it said.

“Amel, what time is it?” he asked.

Amel looked at the clock. “It is soon going to be six hours after noon.”

Damn, that didn’t take long. Duke looked back at the group in front of him; they looked haggard and exhausted, about ready to die if they were given permission to do so. He could tell that they all wanted to just fall down and sleep on the ground; he had wanted to in his training plenty. But he couldn’t let them be finished just yet.

Looking around, he tried to find something he hadn’t used just yet. At first, he thought that he would send them back up the wall, but that would take more time than he felt like and they had done it earlier. They had used most of the weights as something to weigh the stallions down while they worked, and they still had the sandbags on them, so that was pretty much out.

He noticed something that he had totally forgotten about; horse jumps. They were in increments, the first being just a foot tall, the next two, then three, and so forth.They went up to about five feet, and there were little holes in the ground under some of them. Most were wide enough to have three of them jump over t once, some even had enough room for four. It was perfect.

“Amel!” Duke shouted. She ran over, eager to help out. “I have one last thing for you to make them do.” She nodded, and he turned back to the stallions.

“Alright, mares, you have one last challenge to do.” he announced smugly. It was really a stroke of genius. “You’ll be running again, but there’s a catch.” He waited for a moment after the translation was finished, smiling devilishly, racking the nerves of the stallions before him. “You’ll be doing those jumps. But this time, you’ll be racing.”

The stallions’ jaws fell to the floor at hearing that. “The top finisher, which will be determined by place and grace in jumps, will get to be done. The others will go again. But the catch...” He waited; they were anxious to hear what he was going to do to screw with them this time. “Whoever finishes last is kicked out immediately, no ifs, ands, ors, or buts.”

When Amel told them what Duke said, they all gasped and looked around at each other, horrified at the prospect of putting their own friends in such a position. “You’ll run ten laps of all the jumps as soon as Frost puts them on the track.”

“Dammit.” Frost said as he walked off to place the jumps. Duke chuckled at him.

He turned his attention back to the stallions. “I want to see just how capable you are. So get ready; you’ll be up against what’s hopefully a decent match.” He walked off to talk with Frost while the stallions all murmured amongst themselves.

Frost saw him coming as he placed the first of the jumps. “You know how much you suck at times?” he said, grunting while he placed the jump.

“Ha. I do now.”

He and Frost walked over to the second jump, which Duke helped with this time. “So boss. You really gonna kick out whoever finishes last? I mean, that’s not really the point of this part...”

They reached the second jump and got under it, lifting it up with ease. “Wow. This is light.” Duke commented. “But anyway, no. I don’t plan to. This is all a mental test.”

“Oh?” Frost asked. “Pray tell, what is it you are doing?”

They carried the second jump over to the track and set it down. “By now, I know who’s got endurance and who doesn’t, who’s strong and who’s not really. By the looks they give each other, they know too.”

“I see.”

“Well, the test is simple; Those guys who are stronger and such are pretty good, they’ll finish easily enough. The weaker ones will have trouble. But I want to see each stallion’s attitude. Those who are weak; I want to see if they pretty much give up. Those who are strong; I want to see if they give a reduced effort. Place means nothing in this race; the only ones who are gonna get kicked are the ones who don’t still give it everything they’ve got.”

“Hah!” Frost shouted, clapping his gloved hands together. “Good thinking, boss.”

“Thanks.”

They finished up with the jumps, putting a total of seven around the track for the stallions to jump. They didn’t put them in any kind of order, though; they set them randomly. The order went three, six, two, seven, five, one, four. Once that was done, the men walked back to the stallions, who were all looking either confident or nervous about the race.

Duke tapped Amel on the shoulder, and she cleared her throat to translate. “Alright. Everyone line up and get ready to go.” he ordered. The stallions nodded in sync and all trotted on over to the track. “There is no time limit; I want to see the best from you.”

They were all itching to go, twitching in their eyes and hinds. Looking at them, Frost could see the tension, ready to release and rocket them forward like a bullet from a gun. Their hooves pressed into the ground, digging in like a drill to get a good start. Next to Frost, Duke raised his hand up high.

He threw it back down. “GO!”

They all ran forward, some much faster, others much slower. The two who were in front sped on, leaping over the first jump like it was nothing. Frost was the one who kept an eye on them. They were both pretty impressive, shooting forward at crazy speeds. It was clear that both of them were putting everything they had into it.

Duke was watching the rest of the group behind, as they were mostly close together. One started to fall behind, but he kept on going, running like a madman. Or madstallion. The others left him in their dust, all of them seeming to want to race each other.

The time passed quickly for the men, and the first two stallions were only two laps away from finishing. But Frost frowned at them. Something was wrong.

The first stallion had left the other behind some time ago, about sixty feet away. He looked back at the other stallion, whose chest contracted and expanded like a vacuum bag, and smiled. He actually began to slow his pace down, taking to a leisurely stroll as he went along.

“Son of a bitch.” Frost thought. The stallion finished his last two laps in comfort, and his tail followed soon after, breathing hard and ready to collapse.

Duke watched as the others were about three laps away from finishing. The one was still way behind, he had actually been lapped by the others, but he still went on. The others were still racing amongst themselves, looking haggard and in pain. Their lungs were probably on fire right about then.

That was when one of them decided that he couldn’t go on. He began to slow down and took to a leisurely pace as he ran, hope lost and ready to simply stop. Behind him, the other stallion saw him slow down and upped his own pace, ready to try to pass him if he could manage to make up his lost lap. The other two just kept on going.

The first two of the group finished not long after, followed not very closely by the one who gave up because it was too hard. He was followed close after by the last stallion, who Frost recognized as the one who failed his pull ups before but then recovered. The last one looked around at those who he believed defeated him, then puffed out his chest and walked over to the men, looking at least proud that he had the mental toughness to never stop.The men raised their eyebrows at him as he began to speak.

“I can help.” Amel said from close by, listening. “He says, ‘I have failed, but I am not ashamed. I put forth what I had. If you are happy about that Frost, I am glad to leave, for I have pleased my superior.’ He thinks he failed.”

Duke and Frost looked down at him, feigning disappointment. “Get over there,” Duke said, pointing at the rest of the group. “And we’ll address this.” The stallion looked over, nodded, then ran there, ready to receive his punishment.

The men strutted over and stood before the group. Looking them over, Duke and Frost pointed right at the two who had failed the actual test. “Step forward.” Duke said, pointing down. They stepped forward, curious as to why they were being chosen.

Duke looked to Amel, then back to the group. “I lied about the test. It wasn’t about physical ability.” When they understood, the stallions’ eyes shot wide and they looked at each other, confused. “The test was to see who could keep going, non stop, even though it was hard.” Duke turned to the two before him. “You both ceased to give the effort we wanted, even though you were both fine in where you were.”

Frost waited for Amel to translate, then went on with his own monologue. “You see him?” Frost said, pointing at the one who came last. “He never stopped. That’s one of the most important traits that you can have. If you’re taken by the enemy, you need to be able to take whatever they can dish out at you and toss it back. You need to be able to run longer than them, outlast them. That is what makes a special operator special.”

“You two failed us on a personal level.” Duke said sternly. “You are to leave us now. You may return to Nedal and try again some other time.”

The two stallions before them looked positively shocked; they had believed that they completed exactly what they were told. But then again, lying and false information would be a regular occurrence with the honorless griffons. With tears in their eyes and heaviness in their hearts, they turned around and sulked away, silently accepting that they had failed. But they could always try again someday; they had learned a powerful lesson.

The men looked to the group of four still before them. “Congratulations.” Duke said cheerily. He wasn’t that cheery, but this was something that could be celebrated. “Meet us here again tomorrow at 0700 for the real training.” When Amel translated it, the four stallions let out a loud series of cheers and embraces, absolute glee exploding out of them like dynamite.

With that, the men, mare, and stallions all left for their own quarters for a night of well deserved rest.

Comments

[Ponytime]

Nice, very nice

[Rain_Bow_Dashie]

Need more ponies.... O.o i need to go to bed....

[Ogatasensei123]

pretty good, definitely worth the read.

[jedi501]

#teamworkismagic

[Moonreaper666]

First part is good!

[SirLlamaIII]

2890748
I know that feeling. When it's 3am and you need to get up at 6:30