> My Little Underlevels
>  by zero_hour
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Twilight Sparkle Part 1
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Twilight woke up to the ringing of her alarm clock. She used her magic to silence the device, and rolled herself out of her simple bed that was little more than a cot. As she made her way across her tiny apartment into the kitchen, the unicorn nudged Spike out of his basket, eliciting a groan from the baby dragon.
“Five more minutes…”
“It’s already six, Spike. You sleep in too often as it is”
“Lighten up, Twilight. Besides, when was the last time I slept in?”
Twilight levitated two packages of preserved hay towards herself from their place in a cupboard.
“Well I don’t keep track of that, but I’m sure that the office records all of your late arrivals in a nice big file.”
Spike rose from his bed, muttering darkly to himself as he did so. Twilight allowed herself a small smile of triumph before turning back to the breakfast she was preparing, grimacing at the unappetizing blobs of gray paste that had allegedly once been hay. Still, she supposed, it was fortunate that she had anything to eat at all. As far as the underlevels went, she and Spike were quite well off. After hurrying through their meal, the pony and her dragon friend walked out into the hall outside their apartment. They made their way down several flights of stairs and out the main door of the building, and had just started off down the street when they were approached by a white unicorn who, despite her somewhat dirty appearance, had an aura of respectability around her.
“Why hello, Twilight,” she crooned. “How are you today?”
Twilight smiled falsely, experience telling her what was coming next. 
“I’m fine, Rarity. And how have you been?”
“Fabulous, darling, just fabulous. Say, you wouldn’t happen to be able to loan me a few credbits, would you?”
Twilight sighed. “Between jobs again?”
Rarity sniffed, raising her head a little. “Not everypony is fortunate enough to have as steady job as you, Twilight.”
Twilight sighed again. That was true, but as much as she hated to leave a friend in need, she couldn’t spare anything without missing that month’s rent. Suddenly the lavender unicorn brightened up as she formulated an idea.
“Well I’m sorry Rarity, but I need to save my credbits for the rent.”
Rarity started to turn away, looking a little disappointed and reassuring Twilight that there were no hard feelings, when her friend interrupted her.
“However,” she continued, levitating her spare key towards the white unicorn, “Feel free to get some breakfast out of our apartment, so long as you don’t eat everything.”
Rarity gave Twilight a hurt look. “Twilight, I don’t know where you got the idea that I’m the type of mare who would take advantage of her friends, but-”
Twilight laughed. “I was just kidding, Rarity. Take the key.”
The flustered mare did so, watching as Twilight and Spike continued down the street.
“Really,” she muttered to herself, entering the gray metal building that stood before her, “The things that some ponies consider funny.”

*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*	

As Twilight walked down the dirty, metal-plated street, she looked at her surroundings . She had been born, and had grown up in, the underlevels of Coruscant. Coruscant was a city planet. This meant that not only was the entire planet covered in one massive city, but that there were new buildings constantly being constructed on top of those that already existed. This created levels of city, those that were further down being called underlevels. The level that Twilight lived on was old, hundreds of levels down from the surface. It was lit exclusively by artificial light, as it was much too far down for any sunlight to reach. To make matters worse, Empress Celestia ignored the masses of ponies living in poverty, apart from a light police presence to enforce the local District Leaders’ authority. Partly because of this lack of control that the government showed, and partly because of the atrociously high unemployment and poverty rates, crime in the underlevels was a huge problem. Twilight was one of the few government workers in the underlevels. She had a steady job, which was rare, but the work took more intelligence than most ponies there had, on top of being long and tedious. Evidence of the tediousness of Twilight’s job was presented as she rounded a corner and was greeted by the sight of some two hundred ponies trailing from her office down the sidewalk. She groaned. Today was going to be a long day.

The line of ponies had been in front of the Imperial Department of Paperwork for hours. The earliest had arrived at three in the morning, and they came to do everything from pay taxes to turn in draft notices to renew identification cards. As they moved aside to allow Twilight to unlock the door of the building, they felt relief that the wait was nearly over as well as apprehension for the harrowing process that was to come. Twilight also dreaded the approaching maelstrom of paperwork, although she was more used to it than anypony in line. She and Spike walked through the main door, locking it after them. The exasperated colts an mares outside would have to wait for a few more minutes. Twilight said goodbye to Spike as he turned down a side hall towards the office where he worked as the District Leader’s personal assistant. She then approached her desk, cleared it off, and opened the front door with a small control panel on her desk. In seconds the room, the hall beyond, and a good portion of the street outside were filled with ponies. Ponies bearing papers. Twilight sighed before moving to help the first mare in line. This was going to be a long day.

*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*	

“Hello, and welcome to the Imperial Department of Paperwork. How can I help you?”
The words were unnecessary, really, but Twilight felt that they helped create an atmosphere of professionalism, so she repeated them to each and every pony as they approached her desk. It was almost seven in the evening now, and the exhausted unicorn had droned through countless papers since she started an seven that morning. It didn’t help in the least that the vast majority of the ponies in the underlevels couldn’t fill out a form if their life depended on it. In theory, Twilight was only supposed to be filing the papers that the other ponies turned in, but due to the inabilities of others, she spent most of her time filling out paperwork that was brought to her and making futile attempts at teaching hopelessly uneducated ponies how to deal with hopelessly complicated bureaucracy. On the bright side, there were less than ten ponies left in the lines that had started out with well over three hundred. She was just about to start helping Berry Punch, the owner of the local bar, with an Alcohol Distribution Permit Renewal Form, when a commotion near the door caught her attention.
“Hey! I was here first!”
“Do I look like I care? Get out of my way.”
Twilight peered over at the source of the disturbance and saw a pony in white armour and a helmet shoving it’s way past what was left of the line. She let her face fall down into her hooves. It was hard to recognize the voice, thanks to the voice distortion in the helmet, but there was only one local stormpony with that kind of swagger. Sure enough, the mare shouldered past Berry and removed her helmet, revealing a sky-blue face and a rainbow-coloured mane.
“Hey Twilight! How’s it going?”
Twilight gave Rainbow Dash a disapproving frown.
“I’m fine, but you just cut in front of several ponies who have been waiting all day to talk to me.”
The pegasus grinned. “Oh come on, Twilight, I can do that sort of thing. Why do you think I joined the army?”
The purple unicorn gave her friend a skeptical glance.
“I thought you join the army to get offworld?”
Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes. “Well yeah, but that didn’t really work out now did it?” she tossed her helmet on the ground carelessly. “They just had to stick me with police duty. And not just police duty, but police duty in the exact same district that I’ve been my entire life!” there was a thud as the mare brought her head down on Twilight’s desk. “I just need to get out of here, get a change of scenery, you know?”
Twilight placed a comforting hoof on Rainbow’s shoulder for a moment before turning back to the Berry Punch and continuing her work.
After the last pony left, she turned back to the armour-clad mare, whose head was still resting on the desk.
“So…” she ventured, “Did you come to visit me or do you have some papers?”
Rainbow Dash straightened up. “Oh right. The papers. Here you go.”
She produced a small packet from her military-issue saddlebag and handed it to Twilight, who quickly scanned the first page. “Another police brutality form?” the unicorn exclaimed.
“Yeah, well, he uh… He was asking for it. Trust me.” Rainbow Dash made her way towards the door. “You should take care of it tomorrow. You look tired.”
She reached the door and turned to face her friend.
“Oh, and Twilight?”
Twilight look up. The pegasus looked embarrassed, avoiding her friend’s eyes.
“Forget about what I said earlier, about being stuck here. I’ve just been real -well- stressed lately. Besides,” she said, breaking into a grin, “if we give up hope, what have we got left?”
With that, the cyan mare donned her helmet, turned around, and walked out of the building.

> Twilight Sparkle Part 2
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Twilight Sparkle woke up to the sound of running water. She looked up from her cot and saw Spike filling a tall glass with water and a packet of juice mix. After glancing at the clock, she buried her face back in the pillow. She had been having a nice dream about a grassy hill, too. Still, the clock read 11:30, and just because she had work off today didn’t mean that it was okay to sleep all day. The mare lifted herself up from the bed and stumbled half-asleep over to the bathroom, where she did her best to smooth her frazzled mane. The water stopped running in the next room, and Twilight called across the apartment.
“You’re up early today, Spike. Don’t tell me that you got up on our day off just to make me juice.”
The dragon responded in a tired, irritable voice. “We’ve got conduit worms.”
Twilight poked her head out into the main section of the apartment, a worried expression on her face.
“They didn’t bother you at all, did they?”
Spike snorted. “If being woken up by a worm trying to crawl in my ear counts as being bothered, then yes.”
Twilight rushed over to her friend, lifting him up in a massive hug.
“Oh, Spike, I’m sorry. Are you all right?”
Spike grunted in protest as the wind was squeezed out of him.
“I’m fine, really,” he wheezed. “Put me down.”
Obeying the request, Twilight began to pace around the room.
“Let’s see. Things to do today: get rid of conduit worms, do Rainbow Dash’s paperwork, and stock up on food over at the grocer’s.
She picked up the glass of juice that was still sitting on the counter, beginning to drink it in large gulps.
Spike protested, only to be interrupted by his pony companion. “But Twilight-”
“Now Spike, I know what you’re going to say. You think that I should take some time to relax.”
“But I-”
“Well if I don’t get these things done now, they aren’t going to get done at all.”
“I just-”
“And I’d better get going now if I want to finish everything on my list.”
The mare set the now empty glass in the sink and galloped out the door.
“I’ll see you tonight Spike!” she called, disappearing down the hallway.
The dragon gave a resigned sigh as he watched her leave.
“That was my juice…”

*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*

Twilight trotted briskly down the street, the plan for the day organizing itself in her head.
Turning towards a small, beaten building with “Repair” written proudly, if a bit faded, above the door, she sighed to herself. “Might as well start here.”
A bell chimed as she walked in, and a gray pegasus with a blonde mane and goggles emerged from a back room to greet her.
“Hi Twilight,” she bubbled enthusiastically. “Anything I can help you with?”
“Hello Derpy. I’ve got conduit worms in my apartment again.”
The unicorn tried not to stare as Derpy slid her goggles up to her forehead, revealing her crossed eyes.
“So is your landlord too cheap to get rid of them or what?”
Twilight sighed. “Yeah, I have to pay for maintenance. When do you think you can come over?”
The repairpony smiled. “Anytime. I haven’t been too busy lately. Ponies don‘t break things quite as often as I’d like them to.”
“Okay then, tonight around seven?”
“Works for me. I think I have your address written down somewhere. See you then.”
The mares waved goodbye as Twilight left the shop. That was one thing taken care of. Next stop would be-
Twilight’s train of thought was broken as three young fillies raced past her. She recognized them as Applebloom, Sweetie Belle, and Scootaloo, the local troublemakers. In hot pursuit of the trio were a small group of stormponies, the local police force. As the troopers passed Twilight, one of them slowed and stopped. The two ponies stood awkwardly until the armoured one broke the silence.
“It’s me. Rainbow Dash.”
Twilight rolled her eyes. You know I can’t recognize you with that helmet. Take it off.”
The mare complied, taking the opportunity to wipe the sweat out of her eyes.
“Those dang fillies are getting faster.” she grunted.
“Why are you chasing them?”
“Scootaloo got her hooves on another switchblade. We’re trying to take it from her.”
“You know she’d never hurt anypony.”
“Well yeah, but still…”
“Still…”
The two friends stood there for a few seconds until young voices sounded from a side street.
“Hay, Ah didn’t do nuthin’! It’s Scootaloo ya’ll want!”
“Hay gimme that back! It’s for self-defense!”
“Dumb cops!”
Rainbow Dash put her helmet back on with a sigh.
“I’d better go help my squad out. See ya.”
“See you later.”
Twilight watched her friend run off before going about her business.
“Now where was I? Ah yes. Groceries.”

*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*

Twilight arrived at the Apple Family Market five minutes later, and was greeted by her good friend Applejack.
“Well hiya Twi’! What brings you here?”
“Hello Applejack. I’m just here to do some routine shopping.”
A slow, deep voice emanated from behind a crate of canned hay. “Seems ‘bout time we got ourselves a paying customer.”
Applejack glared at the pony behind the crate. “Now Big Macintosh, you know that Fluttershy has the best a’ intentions with that there place she set up, an’ the least we can do is provide her with somethin’ ta feed them folks. Now ain’t that right?”
The red stallion looked away from his sister’s eyes, clearly unconvinced, but unwilling to start an argument.
“Eeyup.”
He continued to push the heavy crate, a testament to his strength, as it would have taken at least four lesser ponies to accomplish the same task. Twilight watched him admiringly as Applejack addressed her.
“We always give Fluttershy somethin’ for that shelter she’s got. Big Mac seems ta think it’ll bankrupt us.” The orange mare sighed before continuing. “So were ya’ll lookin’ for somethin’ special or just canned goods?”
Casting a furtive glance towards the door, Twilight leaned towards Applejack and whispered, “Actually, I was looking for some apples.”
The earth pony began to sort through a group of cans that were scattered across a shelf.
“Well let’s see here, we got pears, daffodils, daisies- aw horsefeathers, Ah can’t seem ta find the apples. Applebloom was supposed ta sort these-”
Applejack was interrupted by a small cough from her friend. Seeing that she had the orange mare’s attention, Twilight spoke.
“I’m not looking for canned apples.”
After a quick nod and a check to make sure nopony was in the shop, Applejack ushered the unicorn into a side room, hurrying in after her. Twilight was led up a flight of stairs to a door with a small keypad lock on the wall. After Twilight, on her friend’s insistence, had looked away, Applejack punched in the combination and the door slid open. The two mares entered together, gazing upon the object that dominated the tiny room. It was a dwarf apple tree, hardly three feet high, and the pride of the Apple Family,. It was also the only source of fresh fruit in the district, and very possibly the entire underlevels. As such it was kept secret for fear of theft or simple vandalism. Few ponies could purchase the apples that grew here and Twilight, being Applejack’s close friend, was one of those ponies. She walked a slow circle around the tree before spotting two perfect-looking miniature apples. The unicorn stared hungrily at the fruit for awhile until, sighing regretfully, Applejack spoke.
“Twilight?”
Receiving a faint “Yeah?” in response, the orange mare continued. Ah know we gave y’all a few free apples before, but what with givin’ Fluttershy all that free food an’ payin’ all these danged fines that Applebloom keeps bringin’ in, Ah think y’all’re gonna hafta pay this time.” Twilight tore her gaze from the tree and faced her friend.
“Well that shouldn’t be a problem. How much are they?”
The earth pony kicked at the floor sheepishly. “’Bout ten credbits a piece.”
“What? Ten credbits each? That’s almost a month’s rent!”
Applejack’s face began to grow red as she scratched the back of her head with a hoof. “Well,” she stammered, “Ah don’t think that- that is, it takes a lot of work to-”
Seeing Applejack’s distress following the outburst, Twilight calmed herself.
“Hay, so I can’t afford it. It’s not like it’s the end of the galaxy, right? We’re still friends.”
“Yeah, Ah guess.” The orange mare perked up. “Tell ya what, Twilight. Ah’ll make it up to ya. Ah’ve got some knives that Braeburn got a hold of down at the docks. D’ya want one?”
“I appreciate the offer, Applejack, but-” Twilight stopped mid-sentence as a thought hit her. “You, uh, haven’t been giving those to Scootaloo, have you?”
“What, Applebloom’s little friend? Yeah, I figure she could use it, what with her being on her own an’ all. Why?”
Twilight shook her head. “Never mind, it’s not important.”
Applejack grinned. “Alrighty then. Anything else Ah can help ya‘ll with?”
“No, I just came here for the apples.” The mare cast one final longing glance at the fruit before turning to the door. “Anyways, I’ve still got things to do to today.”
“See ya later then. Good luck with whatever it is ya’ll’re doin’.”
Twilight left the shop, feeling Big Mac shooting her a disapproving glare, undoubtedly due to her lack of purchase. She hurried away, making her way back home. It was only one-thirty, so there was still plenty of time to finish that form for Rainbow Dash if she was fast. She entered the apartment, picked up the papers, and began to review them.
“Let’s see what we have here…” The mare read through the medical report, muttering to herself as she did so.
“Broken nose… Excessive bleeding… Missing clumps of mane and tail… Will be unable to walk for a number of weeks…” She moved on to the next section, this one filled out by Rainbow Dash herself. The careless, poorly spelled scrawl contrasted sharply with the neat print of the squad’s medic. It read:
“So this colt comes up and hes all like hay and im all go away but he wood not so I beet him.”
Twilight put her head in her hooves. Rainbow Dash really needed to let up on the local ponies. Even with the utter lack of governmental presence in the underlevels, somepony up there was bound to notice the brash young stormpony, and not in a good way. Pushing those thoughts aside, she turned to the next page of the packet of papers, this one almost completely blank. She sighed, preparing to fill in the extensive form. Hopefully this wouldn’t take long.

*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*	*

Twilight was just finishing the final page when a buzzer sounded in the apartment. She set the papers down and walked over to the door, pressing the intercom button and speaking into the barely-functional speaker adjacent to it.
“Yes, who is it?”
A cheerful voice answered her. “It’s me, Derpy! I’m here to get rid of the conduit worms!”
As Twilight opened the door to admit the pegasus, she silently wondered how the mare kept her cheerful attitude. Twilight had trouble staving off depression at times, and she had a steady, well-paying, comfortable job, even if it was dull beyond belief. The pony who was now unpacking a toolbox in the corner of the room, on the other hoof, was lucky to make a few credbits killing pests, and considering the kinds of pests that lived in the underlevels, it was a wonder that the poor pony wasn’t completely insane. Twilight glanced back to Derpy, who was now holding an old stethoscope up to the wall, her eyes crossed wildly and her tongue stuck out one side of her mouth in concentration. Looking at her now, Twilight decided, it was easy to imagine that she was already insane.
“Hay Derpy?”
“Yes?”
“Do you have any friends?”
“‘Course I do!” The gray mare looked up from what she was doing. “You’re my friend, aren’t you Twilight?”
“Of course I am, but I mean friends that you hang out with, aside from your job.”
Derpy frowned thoughtfully before turning back to her work. “I guess not. Other than Dinky, that is.”
“Dinky?”
“Yeah, Dinky. My daughter.”
Twilight raised an eyebrow. So she was supporting a filly on top of everything else? She must be straining to make ends meet. 
Without warning, the repairpony threw down her stethoscope, snatched up a crowbar, and began to pry a section of the wall open. The wall gave way with a screech, revealing a thin, enormously long white worm wrapped around a length of electrical wire. It began to slither further into the wall before Derpy grabbed it with her bare hooves and proceeded to pull it length by length out of the wall. When she had finished, she threw the writhing bundle onto the floor and began to stomp on it. After a few minutes, it became still. Derpy turned with a triumphant grin towards Twilight, who by now had turned away nauseously.
“I got it!”
Twilight groaned, putting a hoof on her stomach. She had seen conduit worms plenty of times, but somehow she never quite got used to them.
“Thanks Derpy. Could you, you know, get rid of it?”
“Sure thing, Twilight!” The gray mare stuffed the worm’s corpse into her saddlebag and started collecting her tools. An unpleasant thought entered Twilight’s head.
“Hay Derpy?”
“Yeah?”
“What are you planning on doing with that thing?” She gestured to the worm’s remains. Derpy grinned.
“Well, conduit worms feed off of electricity. I charge a battery with what‘s left of this thing. It’ll power a cordless drill for at least an hour.”
“Right… Well… Have fun with that.”
“Will do Twilight! See ya!”
“Wait!” 
Derpy halted halfway through the door. “Yeah?”
Twilight smiled. “We should hang out sometime.” 
The pegasus returned the smile. “Sure! You know where to find me!” She continued out the door and down the hall, passing Spike on his way in.
“So did she get rid of the conduit worms?”
“Yes she did,” Answered Twilight, walking to her bed. “You can sleep easy tonight.” The unicorn yawned. “I’m going to bed. I’ll see you in the morning.”
“’Night Twilight.”
Twilight closed her eyes, thinking back on the day. Applejack’s store was losing money, Rainbow Dash was getting in trouble with her police work, and Derpy was clearly struggling financially. Twilight was glad now that she had offered her friendship to the mare. Down here in the underlevels, even more than elsewhere, the biggest thing that got ponies from one day to the next, was their friends.

> Rainbow Dash Part 1
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	A bell echoed throughout the barracks, prompting Rainbow Dash to cover her head with a pillow. She lay in a small but comfortable bed in a room that was, for the underlevels at least, spacious and well-kept. The mare tried to drown the noise out for a few minutes before crawling out of bed and leaving her quarters. She yawned, stumbling down the hallway until she reached the barracks’ recreation room. In the center of the room, three stallions and a mare were gathered around a folding table playing cards. Judging by her grin, the mare was winning. The stallions’ angry scowls were replaced with mocking smiles when they noticed Rainbow Dash.
“Hey look guys, it’s Rainbow Crash.”
“You’re late again, Crash.”
“Nice bedhead, Rainbow Crash.”
Rainbow Dash ignored the stallions. She had known them since she was a filly, and they had never grown out of insulting her. Smiling, the blue pegasus pointed to the white mare who was sitting with them.
“I see you’re losing to Redheart again.”
Redheart, the squad medic, glanced up from the game. “We’re not actually playing for credbits. I don’t think they have any left from our last game.”
Rainbow snickered as the frowns returned to the stallions’ faces and they turned back to their game of pazaak. She looked around for the rest of the squad and saw Sergeant Silverstar sitting on an old sofa reading a holobook, as well as a dark brown pegasus walking towards her from the mess hall, balancing a styrofoam cup of coffee on each wing.
“You sure do like your sleep, Rainbow. Silverstar thought he was gonna have to get you out of bed himself.” The stallion nodded towards the coffee. Take one before I burn myself. They’re hot.”
Rainbow Dash took a cup. “Thanks Leeroy. I haven’t been sleeping well lately.”
The stallion chuckled. “You need to forget about all this ‘leaving the underlevels’ stuff. Be content with what you have.”
The cyan mare looked over towards the card game, which was breaking up as Redheart was accused of cheating. 
“Yeah, right. Be content with this?”
He nodded, walking back towards the mess hall. “Well, I guess there’s nothing wrong with striving for more. Don’t set goals you can’t reach though.”
Rainbow Dash walked over to the couch, sat next to Silverstar and began to sip her coffee. The card game had erupted into a shouting match, and she guessed that it would’ve become an all-out brawl if Redheart hadn’t outranked the other three. Sergeant Silverstar, clearly annoyed at this disturbance of his reading, tried to yell over the other ponies. He remained unsuccessful until he resorted to throwing his book at them. They grew silent and turned to the stallion, who was glaring at them.
“Corporal Redheart, y’all should know better than ta fight over somethin’ dumb as a card game. An’ as for you other three, Ah know y’all are too stupid ta know better, but shut up anyhow. We’re goin’ on patrol in ten. Go get ready.”
The four ponies gave each other a final glare before heading towards the locker room. Rainbow Dash and Silverstar followed them, joined by Leeroy as they passed the door to the mess hall. Once in the locker room, the squad split up, each going to their respective lockers. Rainbow Dash pulled her armour off of the shelf where it sat, moderately free of carbon scoring from the last time she cleaned it. She slipped into the black body glove, which covered her from her neck to her hooves to her flank, even encasing her wings. She then fastened greaves onto all four of her legs, strapped on her breastplate and corresponding back armour, put on her flank plates and stepped into her boots. She grabbed a small black bottle, squeezing some of the contents onto her tail, which protruded from the back of her suit. Part of the standard stormpony uniform was a black dyed tail, and while some more drab-coloured ponies didn’t have to dye their tails, thanks to the leniency in the rule’s enforcement, Rainbow Dash was definitely not drab-coloured. Once she had finished rubbing the dye into her tail, she donned her helmet, slung her blaster over her shoulder, and walked out the door into the street with the rest of the squad.
To the average observer, the seven soldiers were identical. Even the pegasi didn’t stand out, their wings being concealed under their armour. But the squad was able to identify each other. Years of working together had taught them to recognize each other’s height, size, and even walking styles. Failing at that, they could always check the identification number that each pony had printed on the back of their helmet. Rainbow stood in line next to Leeroy as Sergeant Silverstar addressed the squad.
“Alright now y’all know the drill. We’re gonna split up and look for trouble. If any of y’all sees something, report it on the comm. Now, Ah want Private Hoops an’ Private Score with me.”
The two stormponies stood to attention and saluted.
“Corporal Redheart, you get ta keep an eye on Private Dumbbell.” The sergeant received two more salutes.
“An’ that leaves Private Wingkins an’ Private Dash. The two of you better not be slacking off without a superior ta watch y’all.”
The two pegasi saluted before the squad split into their assigned groups. Rainbow turned to her partner, who was giving his rifle a final check-over.
“So Leeroy, where are we gonna patrol? I heard that there’s been gun running going on near the corner of streets Whiskey and Seventeen.”
The stallion shook his head. “Silverstar’s group is checking that out already.”
“How about the theatre then?”
Leeroy shrugged. “Might as well.”
The two soldiers set off down the street, receiving half-scared, half-angry glances from the ponies they passed. Rainbow sighed. She hated police work. She joined the army to fight, not to walk around writing tickets and drinking coffee. The closest any of the squad had come to a real fight was at the bar, and unruly ponies there always calmed down the second they saw a uniform. There was always the chance of a transfer, but it wasn’t very likely that the Empire would want to bring rookie stormponies all the way from the underlevels when they could just recruit locally. Still, if she ever got the chance to prove herself…
“Hay, we’re here. You okay?”
Rainbow jumped slightly as her thoughts where interrupted by Leeroy tapping the side of her helmet. “Huh? Oh yeah, I’m fine. Let’s go see how Pinkie‘s doing.”
Leeroy nodded, turning to the building that the two had just arrived at. “This early in the morning? I doubt that there’s going to be anypony here.”
As Rainbow stepped inside, she found that Leeroy had been correct. The building, which was little more than an old warehouse with a projector showing a movie on one wall, was empty. Well, nearly empty anyways.
“Hi guys! What’s up? Here to see a movie?”
Rainbow shook her head as a pink earth pony bounced into view from a back room. “Just a routine patrol. Everything quiet around here?”
“Quiet as a drunken stallion taking candy from a foal!”
The two stormponies exchanged a glance before looking back to Pinkie.
“So… it isn’t quiet?”
Pinkie laughed. “Of course not, silly! It’s a theatre!”
Rainbow groaned, rolling her eyes. Pinkie could be so obtuse sometimes.
Leeroy sighed. “We’re glad to see that everything’s fine, Pinkie, but we should probably get going. We’ve still got places to-”
He stopped abruptly as a voice sounded on his and Rainbow’s in-helmet comlinks.
“This is Corporal Redheart to squad. Private Dumbbell and me are seeing some flashes coming from a building over here on Mike Street that we think might be from blasters. Could we get some backup?”
“This is Sergeant Silverstar ta Dash an’ Wingkins. What’s your location?”
Leeroy was the first to answer. “We’re on Hotel Street, sir.”
“Well Ah want y’all ta get over to the corporal an’ back her up. We’ll be on our way too, but it might take us a while.”
“Got it sir. We’re on our way.”
Redheart’s voice came back on the comm, accompanied by the sound of blaster fire. “Make it fast, we’re taking fire!”
Rainbow couldn’t suppress a grin as she galloped down the street with Leeroy, ponies scrambling to get out of their way. This was more like it. Her first real fight since she joined the army.
Rainbow turned the corner onto Mike Street, stopping in her tracks as she saw the situation. Redheart and Dumbbell were pinned behind a derelict landspeeder by a hail of gunfire coming from a building across the street from them. Reaching over to Leeroy’s utility belt, Rainbow grabbed a pair of binoculars and took a closer look at the building.
“Looks like they’ve got a heavy repeater of some sort… backed up by some small arms. Piece of cake.”
Redheart looked over at the two from her place on the ground. Her voice crackled inside Rainbow’s helmet. “You know I can hear you, right? We’ve been stuck here for five minutes, this is serious. Don’t try anything stupid.”
“Yeah, whatever. I’ll bet we could clear that building in ten seconds flat. Right Leeroy?”
“Yeah, LET‘S DO THIS!”
The two stormponies started running towards the building, firing wildly at the open windows.
Redheart and Dumbbell stared for a second before emerging from behind the landspeeder and opening fire in an attempt to cover Rainbow and Leeroy, who were now stopping in front of the building. Rainbow fired a few shots at the door, her reckless confidence dissolving as they bounced off.
“It’s magnetically sealed!”
Redheart’s voice sounded on the comm again. “I could’ve told you that if you’d waited for thirty seconds!”
“Y’all stop squabbling! We’re here!”
Sergeant Silverstar galloped around the corner of the street, followed closely by Hoops and Score.
“We called for backup, an’ it should be here soon. Y’all sit tight an’-”
The stallion cut off as he caught sight of Rainbow and Leeroy huddled against the side of the building. “What in the hay are you two doing? Get out of there!”
Rainbow took a deep breath before getting up and sprinting towards Silverstar, followed closely by Leeroy.
“Cover those two idiots!”
The fleeing stormponies reached their sergeant, diving to the ground next to him. The gunfire stopped abruptly as the rest of the squad dropped back into cover.
After a few moments of silence, Silverstar stepped out into the open.
“Alright you lot in there, y’all need ta drop your weapons and come on out. If y’all don’t, we’re gonna have ta-”
The stallion was cut off as a burst of plasma erupted from the building, hitting him squarely in the chest and knocking him on his side.
“Sarge!”
Rainbow sprinted the few meters to Silverstar and grabbed him, pulling him to safety under the cover of Hoops, Score, and Leeroy. She scrambled to pull his breastplate off, sighing with relief at the sight of his chest, unscathed apart from some bruising. The stallion grunted. 
“It’s going ta take a bit more’n some smuggler’s toy ta punch through Imperial armour. And speaking of armour…”
The squad looked up as a rhythmic clanking noise started up in the distance, becoming louder and louder until the stormponies were forced to yell over the comm in order to hear each other.
“What the hay is that?”
“I don’t know, but I wish it’d shut up!”
“This day is just going from bad to worse, isn’t it?”
An earsplitting screech of feedback sounded in Rainbow’s helmet, followed by a new voice.
“This is Captain Octavia checking in with squad 406-Bravo. Did somepony here order a raptor?”
Rainbow stared as the clanking became louder than she thought possible, and an AT-ST walker stomped around the corner of the street, the impact of each step shaking the groud.
Silverstar stood, putting his chestplate back on. “Yeah, there’s a building here that’s givin’ us all sorts of trouble. We’d all be mighty grateful if y’all could take care of it.”
The walker continued down the street, stopping near the squad. Almost immediately it started taking fire from the building.
“Hay, this is Octavia again. Which building is it?”
Rainbow laughed. “The one that’s shooting you.”
“I can’t see anything from in here. Hang on, I’ll take a look.”
The hatch on top of the vehicle opened, and a grey helmeted mare peeped out, ducking back in as a blaster round narrowly missed her.
“Okay, got it. Hold tight, this should only take a minute.”
Turning towards the building, the walker made a humming sound before firing its chin gun into the building. The gunfire from the building quickly stopped, but the tank continued.
“406-Bravo, this is Octavia. tell us when to let up, I can’t see anything.”
Silverstar watched the building start to break apart under the continuous pounding if the heavy gun.
“Keep ‘em coming, Captain.”
Finally the building gave in, crumbling and crashing into a heap of twisted, burnt metal.
“Alright, that should do it. Y’all can stop.”
“I didn’t copy that, louder please.”
“Ah said stop!”
“You got it.”
The guns made a humming noise again as they stopped firing.
“Do you need anymore help, or have we saved your flanks enough yet?”
“Ah think y’all have done plenty. Thanks.”
The walker turned, tromping back off down the street. As the noise of its steps receded, Octavia’s voice came onto the comm.
“This is Captain Octavia to 406-Bravo again. We’re checking out of your block. You ever need divine intervention again, don‘t hesitate to give a call.”
Rainbow waited another minute before speaking. “What a snob. Armour always thinks they’re all that.”
Redheart trotted over to Silverstar, checking his wound despite his protests. “You should be more appreciative, Private Dash. They did save us after all.”
“We would’ve been fine on our own. The door was sealed, but we could’ve gone in the windows or something.”
Silverstar chuckled. “That kind of attitude is gonna get you in trouble. Well, more than you already got in. Next time y‘all listen ta Redheart.”
Rainbow laughed nervously. “Yeah… Sorry about that, Red.”
The corporal nodded to Rainbow before turning back to the sergeant. “You seem fine. You’re lucky that it hit your armour just right.”
“Thank you Corporal. Now Ah think that we should be gettin’ back ta the barracks. We’ve had plenty of action for one day.”
The squad followed their sergeant as he trotted away from what was left of the building. Rainbow hesitated, looking back at the wreckage. This was what she signed up for. Action. Not walking around telling civilians what to do. She sighed, trotting after the other stormponies. One of these days, she told herself. Somehow, she was going to get transferred. She was going to see action like that every day, and she was going to make something of herself.

> Twilight Sparkle Part 3
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	"Thank you for stopping by, I'll do my best to get that taken care of ."
As the last pony left her office, Twilight breathed a sigh of relief. Not a bad day as far as her job went, but it was still nice to be done. She straightened up wearily as she heard the door, relaxing again as it opened to reveal Spike.
"Oh, hi Spike. I just finished for the day."
The dragon gestured over his shoulder. "I think you should see this, Twilight. he mayor just dragged in a bucket of bolts she says is gonna replace you."
His words were quickly followed up by the sight of Mayor Mare guiding an old, rusted protocol droid into the building. Twilight frowned. She had never actually worked with droids, but she was confident that there was no way one could outperform her, especially one as run-down and decrepit as this was. The mayor however, judging by her proud smile, thought otherwise.
"Miss Sparkle. Spike. This is CZ-71. He's going to be the newest addition to our team."
Twilight leaned forward, feigning interest. "What's his job going to be?
"Well, actually... he's going to replace you. He's a secretary droid."
Unable to hide a sarcastic smile, Twilight nonetheless managed to keep calm enough to answer without raising her voice. "I am not a secretary. I am a highly skilled administrative assistant, and without all the hard work I do on my own time, which I might add goes unpaid, this entire department would get shut down within a week."
The mayor gave her hapless employee an unconvinced look. "But... the droid will work for free."
Twilight sighed. This was going to be a pain...
"No, and with all due respect, we've gone over this before." Twilight stood in Mayor Mare's office the next morning, frowning uncomfortably. "Even if a droid could do my job, there's nowhere that we could get one that was functional. Our budget is stretched thin as it is."
The mayor tapped her desk thoughtfully. "Are you sure you aren't just trying to keep yourself from being replaced? I'd like to remind you that you could be criminally charged for interfering with this department."
"Yes, I'm quite certain." The unicorn rolled her eyes. Any droid put in her position would probably short-circuit on the first day.
"Well then... you wouldn't mind if I looked into the matter further?"
"Not at all. I wouldn't recommend wasting your time on it though."
Mare stood and gestured to the door. "I think I can make that desicion for myself. That will be all."
Twilight turned and walked out of the office, sighing heavily at the sight that greeted her. The line in front of her desk had at least doubled in size since she'd been called into her boss's office. Taking a seat, she looked up at the pony in front of her.
"Hello Miss Redheart. How can I help you?"
The corporal set a small stack of papers on the desk. "I've got a injury report I need you to file."
"Uh oh... who was it?" Twilight flipped through the forms for a name. "Oh, Silverstar. Is he okay?"
"He'll be alright, but he's not as well as he says. He's just afraid that the squad will fall apart if he takes a few days off to rest." The medic glanced behind herself at the line. "I should probably let you get back to work. You've got quite a crowd here."
The two mares waved as Redheart trotted off, leaving Twilight to face the ever-growing line.