Nightmare Team: New Blade

by Ser_Galahad

First published 27th of January, 2018

Revenge begets Revenge. A phrase that Twilight will come to learn as she becomes the newest member of a special strike team built to guard the realm from things things that go bump in the night. Or in the day

Those that would threaten the peace and harmony of Equestria stay awake at night. How do you sleep when you know you are being hunted? How do you run from ghosts that haunt the night and wraiths that hide in your shadow?

It used to be so easy. The Day guard were powerful but they were designed to repel armies and fight wars. If you were smart you stayed small and you slipped under their reach, But now...

Ever since that Moon Princess returned 20 years ago they have been hunted by a team of Nightmares, but will their past actions come back to haunt them.

Twilight Sparkle is the prime student of Celestia and on a fast track to an officer's commission into the Day Guard, but another unit has their eye on her.

Prologue

A knock sounded from the other side of the door causing Princess Luna to look up from the piles of mission debriefs and intelligence reports, particularly the very troubling report that she held in her hand.

"Enter Captain." Luna replied putting down the report file and reaching for her cup of coffee on the other side of the black oak desk. Opening the door the Captain strode in stopping a few paces from the front of the desk. Tucked under his left arm was a manila folder bearing the mark of the Royal Day Guard. He snapped to attention and rendered a crisp salute.

"Good Evening ma'am. Captain Hunter reports."

Not bothering to get out of her chair Princess Luna returned a quick salute. "Take your seat. Be at ease Captain." after he complied Luna continued. "Once again, I feel the need to remind you that you do not need to stand on formality with me. You are the Secondary commander now."

"I'm well aware ma'am but I believe that I will continue until I grow in the new role better." Replied the bat pony captain.

"If you insist." replied a slightly exasperated Luna, "I see you got the file that I submitted to you. So what do you think of her? Will she be a good fit for the team."

Removing the file from under his arm Captain Hunter opened it to the primary profile page looking over it again for possibly the twelfth time. "I have my reservations about this girl. Is she really the only possibility that you have been able to find so far?"

Looking over the file, Hunter received a nod from the Princess before moving on. "Twilight Sparkle, Student of Celestia and expected to receive her Officer's Commission here in a few weeks time. She is admittedly one of the strongest unicorns I've seen if we go by pure power level," the captain flipped to the next page describing magical prowess along with a list of mastered spells, "but she is green as the day is long. No combat time to speak of. Only a few full level training missions. How do we go from having the positioned filled by one of the most experienced members in the military to a novice?"

"I know you are still coming to terms with the loss of Captain Nightshade, but you know the unit needs a new Shadow-walker. It can't function properly without one and she is so far the best candidate." Luna replied. Pausing to take a sip from her mug she continued. "I am aware that she is inexperienced but what is a better way to learn then with on the job training? Besides, you have just as much experience as Nightshade had. I'm sure that you can devise a way to bring her up to speed. "

Grunting a little in confirmation Captain Hunter assented a bit, then pointing to a mission report on the desk. "Ay, I'd be able to train her here at base but our missions don't stop for training. Along with that you know full well that the missions that we take don't exactly come with training wheels."

Looking down at the after action report on her desk Luna answered. "Yes our missions are not by any means easy, but the truly difficult ones are not as common as they were when I formed the unit or when you joined. Besides she would never be infiltrating alone and Wolf is in no way a slouch of an operator."

"Yes but she was never the lead during infiltration missions, that always fell to Nightshade." Captain Hunter countered.

"No but you are the operations commander now you will be on comms with the team at all times. Just keep Mrs. Sparkle on a short rope and you can walk her through missions until she is fully up to speed." Luna said taking another drag from her cup.

"A short rope is still long enough to hang yourself with if you aren't careful." came the curt reply

"I understand your concerns Captain, but I believe that her abilities are up to the task. Are there any other concerns besides her lack of experience?"

"Just one." Captain hunter replied turning to the psyche profile further into the personnel report. "I don't think she has the mentality to do job. You above anyone else must attest to the emotional and psychological effects that this work can have on a pony. I'm not convinced she has it in her to do what needs to be done."

A shadow flirted across the princesses eyes for a second at the mention of the emotional and mental effects of the job. All Luna could do was let out a low sigh. She placed her coffee cup back down on the desk. With her elbows on the desk she templed her fingers in front of her face then resting her head on them in contemplation. For about a minute Luna stayed silent. Finally she appeased the pony across from her who had been waiting for a response.

"I agree with your assessment on the hazards of the job, but wither or not she is able to handle the job is a question that only she can answer herself."

This time it was Captain Hunter's time to let out a sigh. "I still don't fully agree with bringing the girl this fresh on to the unit, but ultimately it's your call ma'am." Taking one last glance at the dossier in his hand he closed the folder and continued, "Do we want her or not?"

Leaning back in her chair Princess Luna raised a hand to her chin in contemplation. After a moment she gave a slow nod. "Yes, I think we will. Let's see why my sister praises this girl so highly."

"Alright. I'll put the order in to Captain Armor. Would the standard set of orders for 'tactical consultation' work or should I give him something different this time?"

"No, the usual smoke and mirrors should work. It will look a cushy enough position for her first assignment that I'm sure he shan't complain." Princess Luna signed a form and slid it over the desk for Captain Hunter to take and slip into the folder with the rest of the information on Twilight Sparkle.

After reorganizing the file in his hand Captain Hunter looked back up and asked, "Will that be all ma'am?"

"Just one last thing." Igniting her horn Princess Luna levitated the intelligence report that she had been reading prior to the meeting back in front of her face. "Have you read the latest report the analyse team has put together?"

The Captain grimaced. "Yes ma'am I have, and I must say it's a bit disturbing."

"Indeed. All the more reason to get the unit back to operational status." Luna lowered the report again. "Let us see if Twilight Sparkle has what it takes to be a Nightmare."

Author's Notes:

Thank you for reading through this introduction to my next work. If you have read any of Dusk Quill's work then you might notice a bit of my inspiration came from him. Since he is no longer writing for the foreseeable future, I thought I might try my hand at a similar concept but with the stories that are floating around in my head.

I am and engineer not a writer so writing non-technical works is not my strongest suit so if you have any comments, suggestions, or ideas about either about the narrative or my writing please share them with me. I can't improve or know how I'm doing without feed back from viewer's like you. Even something simple like "I like the concept." or "Your sentence structure is horrid" is usefull.

Thank you again for reading.
Aim High All

Chapter I: Proposition

Twilight Sparkle cracked her eye open as a beam of the morning sun shot through her window. After a several groggy groans and a few attempts to return to the bliss of sleep, Twilight gave up and decided that it was time to get out of bed. Walking into the bathroom connected to her sleeping quarters she went through her standard morning routine. Using a light force of magic she smoothed out her disheveled purple and pink highlighted mane into its traditional strait nature. Then she picked up her toothbrush and washed the taste of morning breath away. She was due to have breakfast with her teacher and mentor, Princess Celestia, here soon. It wouldn't do to have poor breath in front of her. After relieving a few other calls of nature, Twilight returned to her bedroom to dress. She pulled out a set of the Royal Day Guard cadet uniform and donned it. The uniform was a semi-formal uniform that was meant to be worn by all cadets at either the Royal Military Academy, the Wonderbolt Academy, or by the students of Celestia's School for the Gifted. Being the primary student of Princess Celestia firmly put Twilight in the latter category. The uniform consisted of an alabaster dress shirt, light gold dress jacket and pants, light blue tie, and a red garrison cap. A copy of the Day Guard's crest, a blazing sun surrounding a pair of crossed swords, adorned the right shoulder. The left shoulder was a patch of the personal crest, the unique image that identified each individual pony. A name plate was pinned above the right breast pocket and ribbons of achievement mirrored on the left. The shoes were low quarters polished to a mirror shine.

After dressing, Twilight inspected herself in the mirror ensuring that every part of her uniform was perfect. Satisfied that she found no infractions Twilight exited her room and moved down the white marble hallways of Canterlot Castle towards Princess Celestia's dining quarters located near the Princess's personal suite. Upon arriving at the door to the dining quarters Twilight rapt her knuckles on the door twice and waited for a response.

From inside Twilight a voice call "Enter." Twilight complied and opened the door, revealing Princess Celestia as well as a table laid out with food. After seeing that it was Twilight entering Princess Celestia gave her a knowing look and stated, "You are my main student Twilight. You do not need to request permission to enter for breakfast. A breakfast we planned to have no less."

"I know Princess, but I am set to commission tomorrow and as an officer I will have to stand on all the formalities due to your rank. I thought that it would be a good idea to start getting back into that habit." answered Twilight taking her seat across from the Princess at the small table. She surveyed the food in front of her. As always Celestia had ordered that a selection of Twilight's favorites to be cooked. Waffles with lots of syrup, golden hash browns, and a glass of apple juice sat waiting for her.

Celestia pulled a plate of her own towards herself and responded, "I suppose you are correct, my little student all grown up and ready to graduate. How do you feel about graduation and commissioning? Are you nervous?"

After taking a bite of her waffles, Twilight nodded. "I suppose a little, but that's normal. This is a big step, but I'm sure that I'm ready for it."

"Well that's good otherwise I would need to have some words with your teacher if she was ready to graduate you before you were ready." the Princess quipped from behind her cup of coffee. Twilight giggled lightly at her mentor's joke. "So, is there a particular job you were looking to get for your first set of orders?"

After thinking on it for a bit, Twilight shook her head. "I don't really know. I want something where I can make a difference and protect the ponies of Equestria, but I am not sure what the best fit is for me. I would assume something that would make use of my intelligence or natural gift at magic would probably suit me well."

"What about a combat role? Have you considered one of those? I know a mage is not as important of a role in combat anymore since firearms developed but a powerful strike can still change a lot on a battlefield. Not only that but you are also one of the best tactical thinkers I have ever seen for your experience level." Celestia glanced at Twilight in between bites of hash-browns waiting for a response.

Again Twilight contemplated this for a minute or so before replying. "I'm not so sure that I am cut out for combat. Sure, you and Shining have both taught me how to fight and shoot but I don't know if I have the right mentality to do those things in anger. On the other hand I don't want a role that's buried in the back not really doing anything. I joined so that I could help better lives for people, not get a soft cushy job."

From there the conversation got directed back to more casual topics. Both mares continued to eat and talk. They covered a varied amount of topics from the new archaeological finds that were unearthed at the Pone-henge dig site, the latest political unrest in the Griffon Kingdom, and a new development in the research of theoretical magic. This continued for close to an hour before Celestia reminded her student that she would need to get going if she was going to be on time for her daily training session with her brother, Captain Armor. Bidding farewell to the Princess, Twilight collected herself and returned to her room. The door was still shut and locked as it had been before but something tickled across Twilight's passive magic detection sense. She paused with her hand on the door. Twilight lit her horn and did a full magical sweep of the room prior to opening the door. Finding no active magic still at play she opened the door with her left had she started slowly preparing a small magic missile on her right index finger. Sure a magic missile needs distance to gather enough magic from the environment to do any real damage but even at short range, with her raw power level, it could do some serious damage to a target. A look around the room revealed that nothing was different from when she left except that an envelope was placed on her desk. Approaching the desk Twilight noticed that the letter had a strange symbol on it. It looked very much like the normal crest of the Night Guard, a small contingent of the Guard established by Princess Luna after her return some decades ago that focused mainly on intelligence analysis. The normal crest consisted of a winged sword under a crescent moon. The difference here was that the crest that the envelope bore had replaced the crescent moon with that of a full moon bearing the Mare in the Moon on it. Twilight picked up the envelope and determined it was strange but nothing else. It had no other markings on it that could indicate anything of value. She replaced the envelope on the desk.

Whatever is inside of the envelope, it can surely wait a few hours for me to return from my training time with Shiny.

Twilight stripped off her cadet dress uniform and returned it to its place in her closet exchanging the dress uniform for a duty version. Instead of a suit the duty uniform consisted of a pair of durable pants with various pockets, a green undershirt, a work over-blouse made of the same material as the pants, and a pair of green rugged boots. The color scheme had ditched the flashy solid gold look for muted combination of green and brown splotches. Where the dress uniforms had been designed to look sharp and present an image of professionalism, the duty uniform was purely utilitarian and designed to be worked in and worn into combat. This was the usual ware for her daily encounter with Shining Armor. Giving one last glance at the mysterious envelope that had appeared in her room Twilight left shutting the door, and this time she applied a strong ward to keep further snoopers out.

The training room that Twilight and her brother used was not a part of the castle itself but instead was part of the Royal Day Guard's command building located separately on the Castle Grounds. She passed a few cadets that she knew from classes and training exercises. They all saluted her as she passed and gave a quick "Good morning ma'am" Sure she wasn't an officer yet but the cadets had a sub-division of cadet level ranks. Being the current oldest cadet and the closest to her graduation Twilight was naturally the highest ranking cadet. Twilight returned all of the salutes and matched the greetings in reply. Being the highest ranked cadet how ever did nothing when it came to real officers. After she located Shining she approached him and snapped to attention presenting a salute and greeting, "Good morning Sir." Her brother was Captain of the Guard Shining Armor after all.

Snapping his return salute, Captain Armor developed a mischievous grin. "Good morning Cadet Twily." Knowing that she hated that version of her name only made the glare that he received in response that much more amusing. "Is my little Spellblade ready to start her training for the day?" Shining wore a similar outfit as Twilight. The only difference was that where the tops of Twilight's shoulders bore the mark of a cadet, Shining Armor's bore that of a Captain of the Guard. A single five pointed star was stitched on either side

Lightening up a bit more at the use of her much preferred pet name Twilight responded, "Only if our esteemed commander is ready to get beaten again at whatever type of training he has plan for his little Spellblade."

"Oh? That's some bold talk there cadet." Shining said with a raised eyebrow and a cocky smirk. With a sweeping gesture he ushered his sister through the door and into the training room. The room was rather large at about 45 meters square. The room was constantly being rearranged based on the needs of the training. Some days it had rows of weight lifting equipment for strength training, some days it was set up with obstacles to be run through. Once Twilight had even seen it set up with fake buildings to practice some urban combat maneuvers. Today however the room was clear of everything, it was just a big open sparring pitch with a rack of various weapons ringing the outside.

Crap this isn't what I wanted to see.

Twilight dropped the feeling of supreme confidence that she had previously possessed. It wasn't that she was a bad hand to hand fighter, far from it in fact. She had mastered a few fighting styles and practiced with a verity of weapons. She had found that simple ethereal blades suited her best. Mastering that ethereal blade spell at the age of twelve is what had earned her the pet name "Spellblade" from Shining. That is why she enjoyed that pet name over other it was a badge of pride to master that so young. No she was not afraid or incompetent at sparing; it was just that her brother actually surpassed her skill in this area of expertise. Looking back at Twilight, Shining made his way to the center of the pitch and teased "You ready my little Spellblade? Perhaps you'll win this round and bring our records closer to even, though I do think by my record I'm up five rounds on you."

Recomposing herself, Twilight walked out onto the pitch and assumed a ready stance a few meters away from her brother. "Yes Sir! And by my records you are only up four rounds. And if your records are organized in the same manner that you kept you room when we were younger I'd bet that my records are more clean accurate." That earned her a chuckle from her brother across the way.

The siblings circled each other with their guard up for close to a minute before Shining Armor made the first move. He lunged to Twilight's left and attempted a basic right cross that was easily blocked. The follow up leg sweep however did connect with the back of Twilight's heels sending her falling to the mat but she was able to roll away quickly enough to prevent Shining from capitalizing. Springing to her feet Twilight retaliated with a pair of quick jabs meant to drive Shining back then unleashed a low kick at his right leg to try and unbalance him. He however was able to block both punches and danced out of the way of the kick moving to his right and preparing a return strike.

"You're going to have to try harder than that Twi. I taught you that move." Through his gloating he didn't notice that Twilight had modified the move to include a right to left leg sweep sending him flying to the mat.

"And you need to learn to vary your counter moves to attacks you recognize." replied Twilight standing over him. She moved in for a pin but he managed to brute strength his way through the attempt and slipped further away.

The fight continued like this for about 5 minutes with neither side gaining the advantage for more than a second or two. Finally it was Shining Armor that made the first mistake of the bout. He had used a series of hard hits to try and break Twilight's defenses. He ended up driving Twilight towards the edge of the mat and backing her close to the wall. It was at this point he tried to push the fight even further and through a right cross that had more power behind it then it should have. It missed wide and took his whole upper torso with it. This left the perfect opening for Twilight to grab him by the arm and flip Shining over her shoulder and down onto the mat. He finally came to a stop near the wall. Getting ready to revel in her victory Twilight approach her brother only to notice that one of the slots on the weapon rack next to were Shining lay was empty. Reacting quickly Twilight light her horn and ethereal cloud the length of a short sword bloomed from her right forearm. The magic solidified into a purple translucent blade the length of a short sword. The spellblade materialized in front of her mere moments before Shining rolled and attempted a strike with the practice sword that he had grabbed from the wall.

"Outstanding situational awareness cadet. Now let’s see if you've been practicing like I keep nagging you."

The sword that Shining wielded got a quick boost from his magic making it’s so that he could move faster than any non magic wielder could react at that distance. This enhancement of swords through magical means gave a distinct edge to the wielder of the weapon at close range and was the key reason why even with the advent of firearms swords were still a common sight on the battle field. Shining continued his assault repeatedly driving his sister back . After a few barrages Twilight could tell that her brother was getting slower. While a real sword had the advantage of being longer and being able to hit with much more weight behind a swing the reason that Twilight had taken so much to an ethereal blade was because it had no weight to it and only needed one arm to use. Most had to use both hands to get full control of a sword moving at magically augmented speeds. She could move just as fast as Shining, even without using the augmentations that Shining had used. It also meant that she did not tire nearly as quickly. Finally Twilight was able to lock blades with Shining and get him to hold it.

Now I've got you.

"So brother, do you remember why you should never lock blades with an ethereal wielder?" Twilight smiled. Shining look at her with a hint of confusion before his eyes went wide. Twilight capitalized on this, "That's right! While both blades may be locked," Twilight flared her horn,"I've always got a free arm!" With that a second smaller magenta blade about the size of a decent fighting knife grew from her left forearm. Twilight punched with her left arm stopping just short enough to not stab her brother but still far enough that he could still feel the pressure of the blade on the other side of his duty uniform.

Stepping back from their combat embrace Shining Armor lowered his sword and released the enhancement spells. "I yield." He fixed Twilight with a brotherly smile. "I'm glad to see that my little Spellblade is starting to think outside the box and no longer trying to fight like she was reciting textbook maneuvers in her head." Twilight returned the smile until they both heard a din of amused laughter. A quick look around revealed that no one had joined them in the training room and nothing was messing with Twilight's passive magic.

What the hell is that?

Suddenly Shining whipped around on his own shadow pointing his sword at it before commanding, "Now Midnight, how about you get the hell out here before I beat you black and even more blue then you already are?"

With that the laughter grew even stronger before a pony rose up our of Shining Armor's shadow. The new arrival was a bat pony with leathery wings tucked behind his back. He had a coat of Midnight blue and a jet black mane cropped in a standard military fashion. He was dressed in a duty uniform, however instead of the Royal Day Guard duty uniform this one was in a digital tiger stripe pattern made of dark blues, blacks, and muted gray. This was the uniform of the Royal Lunar Guard. His name was stitched in silver above his right breast, "Hunter". Over his left breast was a stitching in the same silver of his rank indicator, the five-pointed star of a Guard Captain. On his left shoulder was a patch of his personal crest. A set of stars shaped into the constellation of Orion. On his right shoulder was the Lunar Guard crest. Strangely enough, the crest that he wore was the same altered version that the envelope in her room had.

Interesting I'll need to look into that sometime soon. Was the thought that ran through Twilight's mind.

Shining armor had a strange expressive mix of joy and irritation and the appearance of the new captain. Shining however stuck out his hand to shake with the bat pony in front of him. "It's good to see you Midnight, but how many times to I need to tell you not to jump out of my shadow? It's just plain creepy."

The Lunar Guard captain shook Shining's outstretched hand and shook it firmly. "Oh I don't know. Probably until it stops being entertaining. Now are you going to introduce me to the young cadet that just trounced the revered captain of Her Majesties Royal Day Guard?"

Rolling his eyes, Shining turned back to his sister. "Midnight, this is my sister, Twilight Sparkle. Twilight, this is the second in command of the Lunar Guard, Midnight Hunter."

Hunter cleared his throat. "Actually It's Captain of the Lunar Guard now. I got the promotion after Captain Nightshade passed last month."

Shining nodded. "Should have known. Even back when we served together under him during the Griffon War he always seemed to try to groom you to rise up. It was only a matter of time. Still not sure how Princess Luna convinced the two greatest combat officers the Guard had into joining an Intel analysis branch. So what brings you around Twilight's and mine training session?"

"To answer the first, the Princess gave a very convincing pitch." Captain Hunter replied with a chuckle. "Second, I'm here to check on the next officer to join my unit."

He must be talking about me. Maybe that's what’s in that letter.

Turning to face her, Captain Hunter answered "Yes, as you have probably deduced I am talking about you Ms. Sparkle." almost as if he could read her mind.

"So that's my first assignment? What exactly does that entail?" Twilight asked inquisitively.

"Well that depends on what you want to make of it. For some it's important but not always the most impactful of jobs. Most study previous battles to try and develop new strategies that may get implemented in a few years after the Intel is no good anymore. Some debrief units after they get back from a mission to see what they can learn about future hostile action. A lot of it is looking back at things in hindsight and seeing what would have been important that got looked over. Sometimes it's useful, sometimes it's not. But there are a select few ponies that do seem to have the notion that they are having a pretty important part of protecting Equestria and its ponies even if no one ever hears of it. It all comes down to choices." Captain Hunter gave a hard knowing look at Twilight putting a little extra emphasis on the word choices.

And just what choices is he implying I'll need to make.

Shining Armor grinned and crossed his arms looking between his friend and his sister. "Well I for one am a little glad you're giving her an egghead assignment." He turned to Twilight. "It's somewhere you can put that brain of yours to work. Also mom, dad, and I will all sleep better knowing you're not going to be out in the middle of a firefight any time soon."

A small snort of amusement passed from Captain Hunter. It was imperceptible enough that it seemed to pass under Shining's radar but Twilight picked it up. She cataloged that in the back of her mind along with the other information such as the altered Lunar Guard crest.

Hunter then took the time to motion for Shining to follow him as he walked a few paces away from Twilight standing out mostly out of earshot. Shining Armor looked to Twilight and shrugged before following after Captain Hunter. They had a short discussion that Twilight couldn't make out. She only caught a few words such as "Canterlot", "inconsistent Intel", and "soon". During the entire conversation Captain Hunter maintained a hard look like whatever they were talking about was particularly unpleasant. Shining Armors face blanched a little and he worried frown crossed his face.

"Are you sure?" Shining finally asked. Receiving a nod from his counterpart Shining sighed. "I'll notify the rest of the guard then." The two then made their way back to Twilight who now looked good and confused.

"So what was all that now?" she questioned.

Shining gave her a half-hearted smile. "Oh it's nothing you need to be worried about. I'll take care of it. Though Twilight, I would like it if you stayed out of downtown for a few days. Can you do that for me?"

Fixing him with another inquisitive look Twilight nodded, "Umm, I guess that I can do that." The gears started to spin in her mind trying to piece all the strange information that had come her way this morning.

"Thank you, Twily." That earned Shining an irritated look from his younger sister. "I think that's all for today, I need to get going to take care of a few things with the Guard. Midnight do you mind coming with me? I have a few more questions that I would like to ask you."

"Umm Yeah I guess I'll see you later then Shining. It was nice to meet you Captain Hunter I guess I'll be seeing you in a few days. Good Morning Gentlemen." With that Twilight made her way out of the training room and turned to head back towards the castle while the two captains turned in the direction of Shining's office.

Well that was different, and I'm not sure that I really like being kept in the dark about what is going on.

Twilight made her way back into the castle and up to her room. This time she found no magical residue around her room and no breaches of her wards so she went right in. She started to make her way to the bathroom to shower and clean off all the sweat from the earlier sparing match but the letter on her desk caught her eye again. She looked over the strange variation of the crest once again before she flipped the envelope over. With a spark of her horn she tore open the top of the envelope and levitated out the letter inside.

Good morning Miss Twilight,

Today you are going to receive information regarding what your assignment will be once you graduate. You will be told that it is boring and sometimes ineffective. You will also be told that it is a combat free job in a back office somewhere. These statements are partly true and partly false. It is entirely dependent on what choices you make. All I can say now is that there is a set of Ponies that work below the radar to protect Equestria and its inhabitants. What they do is very dangerous, but the lives they save are numerous. It is not a life that many choose and it is hard. On your body, your mind, and you're relationships. I say this so you do not make your choices lightly. If you choose to ignore this message you may. You will continue onto your previous assignment and become an analyst. However if you are interested in this proposition then you are to come to the ruins of the old Castle of the Sisters. There you will receive more information. The proposition has been given. Now the choice is yours.

-P.L.

Twilight was stunned. She read over the letter three more times ensuring that she wasn't missing anything.

What organization is this? How is there a combat unit no one knows about? Who is P.L.?

These thoughts and more raced through her head. Finally something clicked. That talk about choices and the patch. Captain Hunter must know something about this. He may have even been the one to place the letter this morning. On the other hand his initials were M.H. not P.L so who could it be. Then a second thought hit her. This was her real assignment. She was being offered a secret position. One that offered to protect all of Equestria. Should she take it? The letter had made it clear that this was her choice to accept or not. She wanted to protect Equestria. That was why she joined in the first place. The warning about danger to herself and her relationships however troubled her. What did that mean? Maybe she should stick the Intel job instead. It was safer and even if it took a while the job still had an impact on saving lives, just not as much as this different job was supposed to. Was the secret assignment worth the unknown cost?

Twilight was so caught up in contemplation of the letter and what its words meant that she didn't even notice the raging fireball blooming out from downtown Canterlot until the concussion wave of the explosion reached Canterlot Castle, rattling every window. It was followed shortly thereafter by a deafening wave of sound.

Author's Notes:

Again I want to thank you for reading this little story of mine. This chapter turned out a bit longer then I expected but I'm happy with the result and I hope your are too. As before I am open to feedback on how you think I'm doing and how the story is going.

Thank you for reading.
Aim High All

Chapter II: Hardening Resolve

A deafening roar ripped through Canterlot Castle. Twilight rushed to her bedroom window to find the source of such a disturbance. What she found filled her with dread. A dissipating rage of flame giving way to a column of tumultuous black smoke on the far side of the city. Where Twilight could normally see all the way to the little town of Ponyville from her room, now the smoke descended as curtain blocking her once gorgeous view and focusing her vision instead on the devastating scene before her. For the sound and the shock wave to have traveled this far mean that the explosion must have been particularly concussive leading it to be more boom then blast, or it must have been horrifyingly destructive. Twilight prayed to Celesta that it was the former but even then a concussion wave that large could still be incredibly deadly for quite a distance outwards. A knot of panic started to well up insider her chest.

What in the name of Celestia is that? Was it an accident?

She stood there hoping that nobody was hurt knowing full well the chances of that were about slim to none. The clamor of ponies in boots sounded outside her door. Opening it Twilight ran into a pair of guards jogging down the hallway.

Twilight called out to them. "Hey! Do either of you know what that explosion down town was?" A hint of worry crept into her voice.

The guard on the right, a red unicorn with sandy blond hair and a fiery joker mask for a personal crest responded first. "Yeah! we just got a message from some guard down there. A bomb detonated in the shopping district. Reports are coming in saying there are a group down there with small arms taking shots at civies!"

The left hand guard, a purple maned pink unicorn with the personal crest of a teal quill urged her companion on. "Let's go Brand we need to get to the Princess and let her know whats happening." With that they both took off running back down the hallway in the direction of Princess Celestia's office.

Oh Merciful Sisters! Are we being attacked?

Twilight rushed back to her window. She looked out into the distance and sure enough she could hear the soft retorts of small arms fire. Knowing how long it would take the Guard to arm up and mobilize in a surprise situation like this Twilight started to formulate a plan. She quickly ran back down to the bottom floor of the castle and across the courtyard to the Guard Head Quarters. Taking her practiced route she quickly made her way to the training room. Scanning the walls and racks of training equipment she finally found what she was looking for. Twilight ran past all the weaponry, not stopping to consider taking any of them. A weapon would only occupy a hand that she would need for spell fighting. No what she really needed was the set of armor on the far wall. While the duty uniform that she still had on was designed to go into combat, it had nothing in the way of armor or ballistic protection. That is why she needed to get the Kevlar vest, basic knee guards, and helmet off of the training racks. The sets that were kept in here were not as high quality as the ones that were issued to the Guard now, they were however the only set that she could get access too due to the fact that she still wasn't a fully commissioned officer or a Royal Guard yet. Strapping on her newly "borrowed" equipment Twilight made her way back of the the training location trying to avoid being seen. It would be more convenient if she didn't need to explain why a cadet was walking around in full battle rattle. After making her way back to the courtyard Twilight started looking around for any stairs or a ladder that could get her up to the top of the perimeter wall that guarded the castle.

Twilight wanted to teleport into town, unfortunately while teleportation was incredibly fast it had two very serious downsides if you didn't have line of sight of your target. First you could get spliced, teleporting to a location where an object already was. This was quite dangerous because the spell naturally pushed your body to the nearest clear space, but that nearest clear space was not always the same location for your entire being. This could end with most of you outside a house but your arm and a few toes on the other side other wall. Not a pleasant experience. The second downside was teleporting with out a sight line meant that the spell had to do it for you. This very often left the user drained and unable to cast spells at best and completely immobile for some time at worst.

After a minute of searching Twilight finally found a set of stairs that ran up to a high parapet and took them two at a time. Once the blasted visage was visible again Twilight ignited her horn. A small translucent purple square appeared in front of her, and magnified the landscape. It was a simple spell that she had devised a few years ago to allow her to stargaze more easily now it was being used in a potential combat scenario. She found a clear patch near the destruction and focused on it. Another spark from her horn and she felt the constricting sensation followed by sense of falling that always came with teleportation. Just as quickly as it had begun the feeling vanished. Her vision wavered but when it returned what had moments ago been a panoramic vista of the shopping center was now very much close and personal. she could smell the sent of burning wood and ash. Around her were multiple small fires still smoldering. A good portion of the vendor carts had been flipped on their side by the blast. Everything around Twilight was blurry due to the amount of smoke enveloping the market. Then she heard the screaming. There was screaming from every direction. Ponies in pain, one was trying to put out a fire that had set to his clothing. A brown earth pony was attempting to lift a beam that had fallen on a yellow pegasus. The most horrifying were all the silent, still forms that littered the streets. The most screaming however, was coming from further down the street where they mixed with the cacophony of multiple weapons firing.

From through the smoke Twilight could make out multiple forms moving about a scattering crowd of ponies fleeing for their lives. The first form that took any meaningful shape through the smoke, was a female griffon hovering above the rest of the chaos. In one talon she wielded a great curved cutlass, and in her other she gripped what Twilight first took for a normal pistol until the griffon turned and fired unleashing a half dozen rounds much faster then any normal individual could possibly pull a trigger. The next thing Twilight noticed was a massive, lumbering, behemoth. How she had not seen the minotaur before was a mystery she could not fathom. The beast was a solid wall of muscle mass and dark red fur. With a bellow the minotaur turned and, like the griffon above him, unleashed fire. The difference was that while the feather assailant had used a small machine pistol the giant was wielding a machine gun that was typically reserved for crew served operations or mounted on a vehicle of some verity. It looked to be chewing through a belt of .50 caliber rounds quite quickly and spitting them back into the crowd in a hailstorm. Surrounding the minotaur were a pair of diamond dogs and a unicorn. The unicorn was firing a Street Sweeper automatic shotgun, while one diamond dog was reloading a Kalashnikov style assault rifle. The other dog had an MP-7 hanging from a strap while he pulled the pin from a grenade and tossed it. Thankfully it sailed wide and ended up rolling down a side alley away from the majority of the fleeing ponies. A few pegasi tried to take to the air only to have a second griffon swoop in and cut them down with a burst from another assault rifle. The first griffon with the machine pistol attempted diving maneuver as if to commence a strafing run of the few ponies that were still trying to escape the market on foot.

Oh hell no you don't!

The magic missile formed from the tip of Twilight's fingers. Taking aim she let the bolt fly. It rocketed off at the griffon who looked up just in time to see the indigo projectile hurtling at her growing in power as it passed through innate magic of the land drawing in strength. A mighty flap of her powerful wings lifted the griffon out of the path of the missile but it thankfully had the desired effect of buying time for the escaping civilians. The griffon that had just avoid being hit started to hover and searched for the source of her attacker. Eventually she locked eyes with Twilight.

Looking over her shoulder the female griffon hollered over the din of the rampage, "Hey boys! Looks like we finally have company that has some sort of spine. Keep alive there may be more!"

Hearing his companion the second griffon wheeled about in the sky and came diving down taking aim at Twilight. The shower of rifle fire sent Twilight scrambling for any sort of cover.

Crap what am I supposed to do now? Opening fire like that while I was still in the open, that's just stupid Sparkle! You know better then that! Twilight berated herself.

With rounds kicking dust up around her Twilight finally spotted a nearby vendor cart that had been overturned and dove behind it. The cart took multiple impacts, and luckily it stopped the slugs from getting all the way through, before the the fire stopped suddenly. Now Twilight could hear the sharp retort of a Guard standard issue carbine rifle behind her. Turning her head to see who was supplying her with her covering fire she found a sight that both relived her to no end and scared the living hell out of her for the lecture that she would be receiving if she made it through the firefight. It was her brother Shining Armor running down the street taking shots on the move as he made his way toward the wagon that she was taking shelter behind. Shining was also still in his duty uniform and battle rattle, but unlike Twilight he had newer issue gear that covered more of his chest and arms but didn't restrict his range of motion any more. They were still clunky and made some movements difficult, but they were an improvement. Reaching Twilight, Shining slid into cover next to her under the wagon.

A piercing gaze hit Twilight. "And just what in all holy Celestia do you think you are doing here?!" he shouted furiously. "I gave one simple order! Don't go downtown! Yet here you are!" popping over the cart Shining took a few shots at the unicorn down the street trying to keep him from advancing into range with that shotgun of his.

With a bit of a sheepish grin Twilight looked away. "When I found out what was happening I knew the guard wouldn't be here fast enough and someone had to try and help those poor ponies escape. Besides it was more a request then an actual military order."

Judging by the hard look she got in response Twilight could tell Shining was not amused by her logical loophole. "We will talk about this later, after with both survive this,"

For the next few minute and a half Twilight and Shining Armor managed to slow the advance of their adversaries with a combination of precise fire from Shining's carbine and Twilight's magic missiles. Slowing however does not mean the same as stopping the attackers. The female griffon with the cutlass had started giving orders to the others. She was clearly in charge of the group and she got them organized and started to overtake the siblings. There is after all a limit to the suppressing fire that two ponies can lay down against six well armed combatants using coordination. After a bit Twilight and Shining had been forced apart due to a grenade. They were now on opposite sidewalks firing down the market. At some point Twilight had heard what sounded like another large explosion back towards the direction of the castle, but she couldn't respond to that until this fight reached a conclusion. Finally the combined rifle and magical fire were not enough and while both were distracted the male griffon let out a war shriek and dove from above. Twilight looked up just in time to know that she didn't have enough time to aim and fire off a shot before the griffon could put a bullet in her.

*Crack*

The sound of another firearm sounded out and the Griffon fell from the sky dead before he hit the ground. A clean shot through the heart. Stepping out from behind cover of a cart further down the street came her savior, Captain Hunter. He was dressed in his LDU's, however he was not sporting standard battle armor like Shining. His was flat black and seemed to flow with his every motion like silk. The word "Orion" was stitched across his back in sliver lettering. Once again it bore the altered version of the Lunar Guard insignia. Captain Hunter also came armed with a carbine but his bore a low powered magnifying scope. Taking careful aim the Lunar Captain fired a second shot drilling a hole clean through the head of the unicorn that was trying to advance on Shining and Twilight's position. A deluge of fire forced Captain hunter back behind cover. One of the diamond dogs, the one with the sub-machine gun, saw an opening and rushed down the lane. However in the dog's attempt to get to Captain Hunter he ran right past the cover that Shining was currently crouching behind. Shining reacted quickly turning and firing off two rounds that struck the diamond dog in the chest and the dog collapsed into a heap on the ground.

While the rest of the enemy combatants took the loss of their comrades in stride the second diamond dog stopped in his tracks at the sight of his fellow dog dropping to the ground and forming a small pool of blood in the street. All at once the dogs pupils dilated. "I'm going to kill you for that you miscible little pony!" the dog howled in a gruff broken voice. With a bolt of speed the dog was on Shining Armor before he could react. The dog raised his rifle to Shining's head.

No, no, no, no, no, NO!

Acting on instinct Twilight lit her horn and teleported directly in front of her brother's would be executor. For possibly the first time she wasn't thinking through her actions, she didn't have a plan. Her body was acting on its own will and she was just along for the ride. With a second glow from her horn Twilight activated her blade spell extending both the short sword length blade from her right arm and the smaller fighting knife sized one from her left. While normally the blades would be translucent magical constructs this time they were solid forms of lavender ether. With her left arm she swung up piercing the blade into the right forearm of the dog. With her right arm she swung down, slicing her spellblade through the rifle like she had taken a plasma torch to a thin sheet of aluminium. The assault rifle fell into two pieces onto the ground at the diamond dog's feet. His left hand followed suit as it was caught in the swipe. With a final flare she slammed the dog against a nearby shop wall knocking him out cold. A cold wave washed over her as she looked at the crumpled mass that she had thrown into the wall and the smoking stump of an arm. She almost fired a magic missile to finish him off but in the end turned away and made her way back to cover.

I saved my brother, and that is the important thing. I don't need to kill if I don't have to.

Shining for his part nodded his head and voiced his thankfulness for her rescue then went back to holding off the attackers.

Taking stock of the rate that her troops were dropping the remaining griffon hollered down to the remaining minotaur. "Fall back! We're dropping like flies. Just hold them off until Blackhat and Phantom give the signal." For the next five minutes neither side was able to gain any amount of advantage. It was a constant volley of fire and counter fire. Shining eventually took a small wound to the thigh but was able to staunch most of the bleeding with a strip of cloth he tore off his undershirt. Twilight had also come a little to close to flying lead a few to many times for her liking, but still the worst she had was a tear in the side of her duty uniform sleeve where a round had just grazed her. However, Twilight, her brother, and Captain Hunter were giving just as good as they got. A few times Twilight heard a curse emanate from where the murderous bastards were taking cover, likely indicating a shot had found its mark or had come much too close for comfort. Eventually the fight was interrupted by a blossoming green firework from, what appeared to be, over the castle.

"About damn time! Alright Stonewall pack up your shit and get the hell out of here I'll deal with Canine." The griffon shouted to her remaining partner. With that the minotaur, apparently named Stonewall, took off down the street surprisingly fast for a creature his size. None of the three could go after him though because they were still taking fire from the griffon. Then all in one burst the griffon took off and swooped back down over the group. Preparing for a diving attack no one was ready when the griffon changed course and dove for the unconscious diamond dog. Lifting the dog's good arm over her shoulder. Then she turned to the three who were starting to bring their weapons or magic to bear. "Not to slip too far into cliche but this isn't over. Oh! And go burn in hell!" And with that she took to the sky again escaping into the bank of smoke that still drifted above them, taking the dog with her as she went.

The captains lowered their weapons and Twilight let her magic missile fade back into the ether. Then they slowly made their way back towards each other. Together they surveyed the destruction around them. Several shops were missing their store fronts from when the blast had ripped off their front wall. Even more were riddled with bullet holes or scorch marks from the fire fight. Then the number of dead sunk in. It had to have been in close to two hundred ponies of varying race. The market had always been a crowded location so the destruction from both a blast and indiscriminate weapons fire had taken a heavy toll.

Oh sweet Celestia how could this have happened? Why did it happen?

Twilight walked over to a body that looked smaller then most of the others and held its hand. It was a little purple and green colt, no more then six years old at the most. He had a wound in and out through the chest and burn marks over his body. She didn't know who this little one was but the thought that such an innocent life had been snuffed out in such senseless violence shook Twilight to her core. It was at this point that a regiment of the Guard showed up with a medical unit in tow. Far too late to help any of the ponies that had been caught in the attack before. Just as Twilight had thought earlier, the guard was effective at large scale war, but this was not something they were suited to handle. The medical team started to try to triage the patients but there were so many to get through that most didn't know where to start. Twilight heard a ragged breath come from below her and the blood in her veins ran cold. The little colt was still alive!

"Help!" she screamed as loud as she could, "I have a wounded child over here that needs medical attention immediately!"

A medic, a white unicorn with the personal crest of a red cross, ran up to Twilight with a stretcher and a medical kit held behind him in his magic. The unicorn came to a stop and dropped to his knees to examine the colt in Twilight's arms.

"One GSW in and out, based on the sound of his breathing it looks like he has a sucking chest wound. Also various first degree burns around his body. Doesn't appear to have any spine or neck injuries, multiple lacerations and abrasions." The medic did his analysis with a cold detached tone like he was trying to keep his emotions from overwhelming him. "Honestly I can't believed he doesn't have more serious burns. This must have been real close to that first explosion." the medic commented pointing to the rest of the bodies around them. All of them were severely burned and charred. Opening up his pack the unicorn pulled out a set of gauze, a plastic card about the size of a note card and some surgical tape. He quickly pressed the gauze against the exit wound in the colt's back to stop the bleeding and used the surgical tape to secure it. He then went back to the colts front and placed the plastic card over the entrance would where the colt was sucking in air with every breath causing a sickening gurgling sound. He then taped three sides of the card do the chest of the purple child, leaving one of the long sides unsecured. This made it so that when the colt tried to breath in the card sealed to his chest maintaining the pressure inside his chest cavity that is necessary to breath properly but allowed the blood to flow out on an exhale so it did not pool inside of him. Once the unicorn had stabilized the colt as much as he could, he levitated the young male onto the stretcher and started to move him away from the devastation and towards a flock of approaching medical evacuation carts that were starting to arrive on the scene.

After shooing off a few medics that tried to look at his leg, Shining Armor gave a few orders to the troops that had escorted the medical personal, and they started to fan out and secure the perimeter of the attack site. They searched for additional attackers that may still be on site as well as started to push back the growing crowd of civilian onlookers that were coming out now that it appeared to be safe again.

Shining Armor now approached Twilight once again with Captain Hunter in tow. "Are you alright?" Shining Armor asked his little sister.

Visibly shaken Twilight stood up. "Yeah. I think I'll be alright. I'm not hurt just in shock a bit."

"Good! Now I can give you a proper lecture without being worried to death about you!" Shining said dropping his Guard Captain face and assuming an angry, concerned, older brother one.

"I wouldn't be too harsh on her there Shining." Stated Captain Hunter fixing his gaze on his fellow Captain. "She did a good job in combat. If she hadn't responded as fast as she did I feel that this market would have a lot more bodies in it then it does now. Besides I'm pretty sure your little 'Spellblade' here is the reason why I'm not going to be handing a folded flag to your mother later today." Hunter gave and approving look to Twilight like a concern he had possessed was no longer there. "Besides all that didn't I tell you not to come down here?" Hunter returned is to his hardened captain gaze back to Shining.

Shining crossed his arms across his chest as best as his Kevlar armor would allow and looked off to the side before huffing. "After I gave the orders to the Guard to mobilize I knew they wouldn't be here fast enough and someone had to try and help those civies escape. Besides it was more a request then an actual military order."

"Right." said Captain Hunter not liking that response any better then Shining himself had earlier.

"Well it looks like we are out of the woods for now but I still need to check back in with the Lunar Guard to get the full story on what has happened. We still don't fully know what the aim was. I have reports saying that there was a second explosion near the Royal Prisons that I have a sinking feeling is related to this whole disaster." With that he unfurled his leathery bat wings from behind his back and took off into the sky.

True to his word, when Shining had Twilight alone he did unleash a lecture that would have made their mother proud. It hit all the beats of staying safe, letting the trained professionals do their jobs, and what would they all do if she had gotten hurt. The only difference from what their mother's would have been was that the ending didn't end with a stern rebuke of Twilight's actions. Instead it ended with a hug, and him saying, "As angry as I am at you, I can't tell you how proud I am as well. You couldn't stand by while others were getting hurt and you did the right thing. The stupid thing, but the right thing."
With that he sent Twilight back to the castle while he went off to give more orders the Guard that were controlling the area.

Upon returning to the castle, Twilight found her way back to her room. She dropped all the gear she had been wearing and fell on her bed. She was exhausted both mentally and physically. Twilight had never seen such devastation. Sure she had seen pictures of actual war zones of years past, but that destruction was generally in open fields. Very rarely was a city with civilians. Not only that but those were all during periods of declared war. This...was just violence. A soldier signs up for the military knowing what they are possibly getting into. They are supposed to be the sword and the shield so that civilians can live peaceful lives. How can one do that when a group bent on terror can act and because there is no country backing it there is nothing to retaliate against. Twilight's mind floated, contemplating everything that she had been through in the past few hours. Then the face of that little colt flashed into her mind.

I wonder if he is awake yet. He's most likely an orphan now. There must be a way to prevent this from happening again. I can't let this happen again. If I can find a way find that group and bring them to justice then I must. If I can prevent something like this from happening again...

That was when she remembered the letter on her desk and what it had proposed. She could take the cushy job and sit at a desk and analysis situations like this after they occurred. Or she could take action and keep them from ever happening in the first place.

So it's decided then.

---

Two days later, Twilight had all her gear packed in the duffel bag sitting next to her on the train to Ponyville, the closest town to the old abandoned Castle of the Two Sisters. She checked into a hotel on the outskirts of town and stowed her gear in the room. Nightfall had already set in, still she made her way to the Everfree Forest and down the path that led deeper into the darkness. The walk through the forest took a few hours. While most ponies might have been fearful due to the series of dangerous creatures that were rumored to roam in the depths of the woods. Twilight, through her studies, knew that these creatures weren't myths but real creatures. That however did nothing to cause her fear. Twilight had a meeting to get to and she was determined to see that she got there. Besides anything that wanted to get to her had to go through her magic first. Soon she saw the crumbling spires growing in the distance. Taking in the view Twilight determined that at its zenith the castle must have been a beauty to behold, possibly even rivaling Canterlot Castle. Now it was a crumbled ruins, however.

She made her way into the main hallway of the castle. Twilight wasn't sure what to expect but the way the letter had sounded there should have been some sort of operations outpost here, but nothing could be seen. The only things that were taking up space in the great hall were a pair of raised thrones sitting in front of what must have once must have been a pair of stained glass windows, and a large organ sitting off to the left side of the thrones. Taking her first step into the room Twilight detected a field of wards encompassing the place. She also had the uneasy feeling she was being watched. She made her way further into the hall. Approaching the twin thrones she noticed that the one to the right had an engraving of the sun, a perfect copy of Princess Celestia's personal crest. The second to the right bore the crescent moon of Princess Luna. A small breeze picked up in the hall.

Perhaps I should come back again in the morning, there doesn't seem to be anyone here.

*Click*

From behind her a voice spoke up. "So how about you tell me why the hell you're snooping around here"

Twilight whipped around to stare at a light orange Unicorn with a head of fiery red and yellow. She was dressed in the Lunar Duty Uniform with a black duster jacket draped over her shoulders. A patch of the Lunar Guard was sewn on the left hand shoulder of the jacket. It too had the altered mark with the Mare In the Moon on it. Attached to the right hand shoulder was a patch of her personal crest, which was a sun colored half in red and half in yellow with an intermixing in the center. Her eyes hid behind a pair of dark aviator sunglasses that had a very faint glow about them. The mouth of the mare was pulled into a thin frown of disapproval.

All of these details Twilight would have made out, if she wasn't more focused on the barrel of the revolver that was being leveled at her forehead.

Author's Notes:

While I have a general arc planned out this was as far as I had planned in detail so it may take some time for the next chapter to come to me. Please have some patience with me. As always please leave a comment on what you like/ don't like and any suggestions on improvements. Also let me know if you find errors so I can fix them.

Thank you for reading
Aim High All

Chapter III: Meeting a Nightmare

Twilight stared at the barrel between her eyes. The she could almost see herself in the reflection of the deep blue of the gunmetal. Twilight was transfixed with looking into the abyss of the dark chamber that may well mean the end of her. Then the abyss blinked.

*Click*

Or rather the drawing of the hammer from half to fully cocked roused her from her transfixed state. Twilight looked up from the revolver to the face of the orange mare holding it as just now registering her existence as well. The wielder of the gun held the same grim frown that she had been wearing for the past several seconds waiting for a response. All Twilight could do was move her jaw up and down as if willing words to come forth, but none did. After a few more seconds of this the dam finally broke and all the questions that had been racing through her mind sprung forth into the world.

"Who are you? What are you doing here? Where is the pony I'm supposed to meet? Are you her? What is this assignment I've been tasked? Why is it so secret? " Then she added lastly as if an after thought, "Why are you holding a gun to my head?"

Also why is she wearing sunglasses at night?

The fiery haired woman made no effort to answer any of Twilight's barrage, instead she reached inside her duster and drew a second hand gun from her belt holster with her left hand and pointed it at Twilight. Unlike the dark blue revolver, this was a more modern styled 1911 Colt colored with the same mix of red, yellow, and light orange that made up the unicorn herself.

"Before we go off playing Twenty Questions, how about you answer me? Who the hell are you, and why the fuck are you snooping around our castle?"

After getting her racing mind and heart under control Twilight answered. "My name is Twilight Sparkle. I am a former cadet from Princess Celestia's School for the Gifted. I was given the assignment of Lunar Guard analyst but also received a letter telling me that if I so choose I could come here and take a separate assignment. I wasn't told what it was only that It was designed to help protect ponies. Now can you please lower your weapons and tell me what is going on?"

If Twilight had been told that the expression on this mare's face could get any colder or more hostile she would have objected, but at the mention of Princess Celestia the mare's eye's darted to the brightly colored .45 in her left hand and the scowl on her face grew deeper.

The mare shook her head in response. "I don't answer questions to ponies I don't know. They tend to have a bad habit of being untrustworthy, dangerous, or occasionally both. I wonder, which category you fall into? As for the guns, I think they'll stay where they are until I get some kind of confirmation on your story."

As if on cue a rumbling began behind Twilight. It sounded as if multiple large stones were being scrapped against each other forcefully before being dropped into place, She turned to look but was stopped by a look from the orange mare with the weaponry that made it clear she wasn't to move. A few seconds later the grating sound stopped and it was replaced by the sound of a pair of boots marching forward.

"Wolf, I see you found Cadet Sparkle for me. I do thank you for introducing yourself in the typical Nightmare manner. You can stand down now, I hereby give her access authorization." a male voice stated.

With that "Wolf", as the the orange mare was apparently called, withdrew the handguns from Twilight's face. Un-cocking the hammer of the revolver she returned both weapons to their respective holsters hidden under the black duster with practiced ease. The command to stand down however seemed to do nothing to ease the scowl on her face. Her arms now unburdened by weaponry crossed in front of her chest.

Now free to move without the risk of becoming the backstop to a shooting range, Twilight turned around to discover who the newcomer was. While she was unable to find the origin of the grinding sound she was delighted to see that it was Captain Hunter. He was still in his LDUs but now without the fancy armor and scoped carbine.

So I was right! He does have something to do with all of this!

"Hello again Cadet Sparkle. It seems that you have made your choice. To be honest I wasn't entirely sure that we would ever see you show. I assume you are probably quite interested in finding out why exactly you were asked to come to this old castle?"

"I would be lying Sir if I said I wasn't." Twilight replied with a nod. "The letter that I was given was much more vague then I would have preferred."

Captain Hunter replied with a nod of his own. "Yes our dear commander does like her vague wording. Not that I can blame her too much. This is an off the books unit operating outside the bonds of the rest of the Guard's oversight."

Twilight was taken aback by the information that she had just been supplied. "Wait, you're the Captain of the Night Guard. How are you not the commander of the unit? And what do you operate without oversight? No unit is without scrutiny by higher levels."

Twilight's words were met with an exasperated snort from "Wolf". Twilight turned her head to find the orange mare rubbing the bridge of her nose like she was having a migraine.

"In the name of Oh Merciful Luna, Where the hell did you manage to find this one Orion? When she told me she was a former cadet from Celestia's school I didn't think she literally meant she just graduated. Are we starting a damn orphanage for lost children now?"

"That's enough of that Shimmer!" barked the Captain. "The commander selected her for a reason. She has never selected an unqualified pony for any part of the team and you know that as well as I do. I'll admit her age was not on the top of my list of ideal traits but I can personally attest to her ability to perform. She was first on the scene during that mess up in Canterlot, even before I was."

"Is that so?" The mare gave another sidelong glance at Twilight. Then She stepped off away from the other two and back towards the door to the outside calling back, "I'm going to finish my patrol of the grounds then get in the back way. Don't wait up for me."

With that "Wolf" stepped into a shadow near the door and vanished silently as if she had become nothing but a shadow herself. Twilight blinked a few times like it had been a trick of the light, but no it looked like she had really dissolved into the shadows. It seemed awfully similar to what Captain Hunter had done a few days ago when he had walked out of Shining's shadow in the Day Guard training room.

"I get a distinct feeling that I'm not much liked by her," Twilight huffed.

Captain Hunter gave Twilight a sympathetic look. "Don't worry about Shimmer. Despite her crest being a sun she isn't exactly the warmest of ponies when it comes to new individuals."

With a shrug the captain continued, "Well I think it's about time I take you to meet the commander and give you a tour of the base."

Twilight glanced around the crumbling ruins of the former castle. The place truly looked derelict and condemned. "Sir if you don't mind me saying, this doesn't exactly look like the place I imagined a secret unit to reside. It looks awfully abandoned."

"Ah, yes that must be the keen sense of observation and deduction your brother is always going on about," the Captain joked.

Then beckoning for Twilight to follow he walked toward the organ that stood to the side of the raised thrones. "Watch this." With that he hit a series of four keys that seemed to have no melodic connection , but as soon as he did Twilight noticed that the stones that made up the steps to the thrones had started to shudder then slowly descended with the same grinding sound that Twilight had heard early while she still had a gun to her face.

"Fascinating! How did you get the system to work so smoothly and seal so seamlessly? Is it arcane or mechanical?" Twilight gushed over the discovery.

"Couldn't tell you. It's been here since before even I was part of the team." Captain Hunter shrugged "Anyways Please follow me." He descended down the newly created stairway under the thrones.

Twilight followed with the stairway sealing again behind her as she came to the bottom. The room that she entered was a modern style vestibule with muted white walls and midnight blue tile. The first thing that Twilight's eyes picked up was a giant version of the modified Lunar Guard crest, the one with the visage of the Mare in the Moon, displayed on the far wall. Encircling the crest was a phrase.

To Those That Threaten Dreams, We Are The Nightmare

Under the crest was a set of double doors that lead further into the facility. To the left and right of those doors were a set of stairs that descended deeper underground. The left hand wall bore a st of doors as well as a sign that labeled that room as the medical facility.

Leading Twilight further into the foyer Captain Hunter walked up to a desk stationed in the middle of the room where a bat pony stallion sat.

This new pony also wore a set of LDUs but his unit crest was the traditional crescent moon above a winged sword of a normal member of the Lunar Guard. His coat was a dark black and his personal crest was that of a Crow with outstretched wings.

The stallion at the desk looked up from his paperwork and greeted the Captain.

"Good evening Captain Hunter. Is there something I can help you with?"

"Yes there is. I would like you too meet Ms. Twilight Sparkle. If she accepts the commander's offer then she will be our new addition to my team, so if you could set up a clearance package for her that would be appreciated," The captain replied.

The seated stallion turned and smiled at Twilight

"Ah, yes Ms Sparkle. You must be the one that all the talks been about lately. Welcome to Home Castle. My name's Nights Watch. I head the security and clearance around here." He extended a hand to Twilight. "I also want to say you did some damn fine work back there in Canterlot. You saved a lot of lives getting there as early as you did."

Twilight took the offered hand and shook it. He had a rather firm grip even more so then what you get from most of the military types that join the Guard.

"Thank you Nights Watch. Though I wish I had gotten there quicker. There were still a lot of civilians killed before we could drive them off. Part of why I'm here is so that I can get back at those that caused that."

Nights Watch nodded, "I can understand that. I hope you didn't have any family get caught in that. There didn't seem to be many survivors. Just a small colt and a shop owner that got trapped under an overturned cart was what the report said."

"Luckily, no when it comes to my family. Though I actually held that little colt in my arms before he got shipped off to Canterlot General," Twilight said.

"Now this is just a suggestion, but I think you should go see that little colt. I'm sure that he would love to meet his new hero. It also does the soul some good to see the little bit of hope this profession of ours claws back from the tragedies that we fight," offered Nights Watch. He sounded almost sagely for a pony that didn't look much older then Twilight herself.

"Thank you. That actually sounds like a good idea. I think I might just do that," Twilight replied

"By the way,Is there anything I need to do to help you with this clearance package?" asked Twilight

Nights Watch shook his head. "Not really. You being a former cadet and Captain Armor's sister means most of your information is already on file down below with the intel boys." He gestured towards the stairs behind him. "Just a matter of going down and getting it.

Twilight turned to face the Captain. "You have a file on me? Why?"

The Captain shrugged at her question. "We have files on a lot of ponies. Anyone that draws attention or has access to a decent amount of power gets a file. It also helps that the commander was scoping you for a position."

"I see." Twilight stated a little irritated.

"Anyway," Captain Hunter said turning back to Nights Watch "Is the commander in?"

"Yes, Sir. She's back in her office over in the command section." Nights Watch answered pointing to the far right wall that had another set of doors. The sign over these stated that they led to the "Command Section".

The captain thanked Nights Watch and walked towards the doors. "Alright Ms. Sparkle its time to meet the commander."

Twilight followed Captain Hunter through the set of doors that led to the command section and into a hallway. They passed the first door that had a name plate on it that stated that it belonged to the Captain of the Night Guard, meaning Captain Hunter. The second door at the end of the short hallway had no label. The door was made of solid oak painted in a dark blue. The only markings that the door had were a splotch of black surrounding a crescent moon. Things started to finally click in Twilight's mind.

For the love of Celestia Twilight, who else would that Captain of the Lunar Guard refer to as his commander. There is only one pony that was above him.

Captain Hunter knocked sharply on the door twice. A recognizable voice replied "Enter." from the other side of the door. The captain opened the door and walked through it. Twilight followed close behind and sure enough, just like Twilight had started to piece together, sitting behind the black wooden desk was Princess Luna.

Simultaneously Captain Hunter snapped to attention and reported in while Twilight started to bow.

A soft sigh emanated from Princess Luna's lips "I feel the need to once again inform you, Midnight Hunter, that you do not need to stand on such formalities with me when we are not in the public eye." The captain relaxed his poster a little but still maintained an air of formality.

"As for you Ms. Sparkle you may rise. I will tell you this now and hopefully you can take the message to heart faster then My dear captain here. While my orders and commands still carry the full weight of my Princess hood I would request that you treat me no different from how you would a fellow officer. Is that understood?"

"Ye..Yes Ma'am. Though... if I may make a statement. I...umm...I'm not technically an officer yet." Twilight answered with a bit a quiver to her voice. As confident as she was now in the presence of Princess Celestia, it had taken quite some time to evolve beyond bowing and stammering every other word while facing what amounted to almost a god. Now here she was facing a new Princess, one that Twilight had yet prove herself to. Sure she had met her mentor's sister before, but only rarely at formal occasions that Princess Celestia had taken Twilight to.

No! Bad! You're regressing. She even told you to act casual around her.
"Ah yes, that new tradition about not gaining your real rank until the commander appoints you a position after arriving at your first station. Quite a strange system. Why my sister changed it from the original method of Royal commission in my absence I'll never know, " Luna replied. "Well, I am technically the station commander, but I can't give you your commission yet. That is because until you make a choice I can't place you in a position."

Confused Twilight looked to the princess. "Is this about the letter that I was given?"

Nodding Princess Luna replied "Precisely." she looked over at the captain. "Midnight, would you mind leaving us so that Ms. Sparkle and I can talk?"

"Of course Ma'am," Captain Hunter replied. Turning on his heels he walked out of the office and closed the door behind him.

After the door had shut the princess gestured for Twilight to take a seat across the desk. Twilight stepped forward and took the seat as requested. Still not fully able to let down the formality of being in front of a Princess of Equestria, Twilight sat stiffly as if an iron rod had taken the place of her spine.

"May I call you Twilight? I'm not much of one for formality." Princess Luna asked after Twilight had taken her seat.

"Of course Princess." Twilight replied quickly.

"You can be at ease Twilight. I just want to have a conversation before I ask you to choose what path you wish to pursue. How much of my past do you know? I assume as my sister's apprentice she told you what happened?" Luna asked.

Twilight nodded. Celestia had indeed told her some tales of what had happened but they had been more like a bed time story then a recollection of historical facts.

"Yes, Ma'am. She told me that a little over thousand years ago you became distant and cold. Under her watch she had allowed you to become corrupted by an evil force that ate away at you. She said that she had been too blind to notice that you were being taken until it was too late. Finally, the corruption took over and turned you into a force of evil. Unable to find a cure for what had taken you she fell back on the only option at the time, and used the Elements of Harmony on you. While they did in fact purify you, they had the side effect of locking you in the moon until you were able to be released 20 years ago."

Luna listened to the recounting. When Twilight had finished she spoke.

"While the core of what you have been told is accurate, there are issues with the finer details. The main difference is in how I was corrupted. It was no magical cures or other purely arcane corruption that took me. It was an affliction of the mind.

" As it is today my sister has her Guard that protects the country from foreign attack. With her at the head of combat they were very apt at protecting the nation. However, even then the guard was unable to react to attacks of a more secret nature. That was where I came in. I could not stand by and allow the deaths of innocents to go unpunished. For evil to remain without a judge and executioner. I took it upon myself to root out those that brought harm our little ponies that the Guard could not. I acted in the shadows of night to find the evils that hid from sight day, and rid them from our land."

"So you started the Lunar Guard way back then? Why have I been led to believe that the Lunar Guard was a recently developed unit?" Twilight questioned.

Luna shook her head.

"No. That was the folly that drove me to my downfall. I took the action all on my own. When I went on missions I developed a persona meant to frighten and haunt those that wished ill on our land. Can you guess what this persona was?"

Twilight thought for a moment but the answer seemed pretty clear based on what Twilight knew of Luna.

"You named yourself Nightmare Moon didn't you?"

With a pensive look Princess Luna nodded.

"Correct. I became a nightmare. I assume you saw the crest in the foyer?"

When Twilight nodded Luna continued.

"Those words that have become the motto of my team are a direct quote from myself when I informed my sister of what I planned to do. When I started my operations I became just that. A Nightmare. I was a legend, a fable, a horror story that villains told each other in hushed tones. It was said that once you were on my list you were as good as dead, and for the most part they were right."

"So all of those foals stories about you were really true? How are they only considered fables if all of this really happened?" asked Twilight.

She was wrapped around every word that the princess was saying. This was history that no one, out sided of the ponies in this unit she was about to potentially join knew. This was information, that by the sound of it, even Princess Celestia only vaguely knew of.

With a light chuckle Luna replied,

"For the most part the stories are real, and they stayed legend because just about no pony ever saw me and lived. The only remains of my work were the bodies of the convicted that I left behind. I did however never eat any children, unlike what the legend of Nightmare Night would have you believe." Another chuckle escaped the princesses lips before she continued. "And even an offering of sweets would not have been able to save you from my fury once you had drawn my ire. Though I believe that one crime lord did try to bargain for his life by offering me his beautiful daughter's hand in matrimony just before I ran my blade through him..."

The princess trailed off looking away, her eyes glazing as if getting lost in a hazy memory of events long ago.

"Umm Princess are you OK?" Twilight asked hesitantly after seeing that Princess Luna start to slip deeper into her mental rendition of the past.

The princess blinked multiple times, snapping herself out of her escape into times historic Luna looked back at Twilight.

"I'm very sorry Ms. Sparkle. After two decades since my return I don't often slip back into my memories as I did in the first few years, but recounting the events will occasionally still trigger an unfortunate side effect of what I tried to repress. I waded deep into the world of the dark and deceitful and came back far from unscathed."

Wide eyed Twilight tried to digest everything that she had been told.

"Princess Celestia once told me something similar when I pressed her on the subject of how you two defeated Discord. Something about everlasting damage consuming those that tried to fight his madness with madness in return." Twilight interjected.

"Ah yes. If I am not mistaken the line you are thinking of is 'If you stare into the abyss and you blink first, it wins and you die. If it blinks first, you are the victor, but the prize is insanity.'

"You are correct that it is meant to talk about Discord and his chaos, but it is an apt description of my journey down the path that I took. It is not a path I recommend. That is why I tell you of my past when I have kept so many in the dark.

"It is through my stories that they were ready for me upon my return. Three ponies, two loyal Bats and a young unicorn, along with my sister nurtured that broken mare that I was back into the real me. Through my stories the devised a new method to the old madness. For Equestria still has its evils lurking in the dark, but they no longer face a sole Nightmare, but a host of them. Where I was alone and vulnerable, they stood strong together. And thus the Nightmare Team was formed."

Luna leaned forward focusing her dark teals eyes on the light purple ones of Twilight.

"So now I have one question for you. On this answer hangs my decision to offer you a place with this team. For what reason did you respond to my letter: to avenge the dead or to protect the living?"

With her question asked Luna sat back in her chair, steepled her fingers in front of her face, and fixed Twilight with a piercing gaze.

Twilight was swept away by the speech of Princess Luna.

Why did I truly come her tonight.

The faces of all the ponies lying dead on that market street rushed through her mind. All the death and destruction. All of the families now ripped apart by loss and senseless violence.

Those fallen ponies deserve to have justice dealt out in their name.

The faces continued to pass before they stopped on that one little colt that Twilight had found still alive. It was then that her answer solidified.

Twilight returned the gaze of Princess Luna with a determined one of her own.

"I came to honor those that died, but to protect those that remain." Twilight's tone came with a sense of resolution and resolve she was not even aware she possessed.

A small satisfied smile crept onto the princesses face.

"Good. Now please stand." Luna said

With that Twilight watched Luna rise before doing the same and assuming a position of attention facing the princess. Luna walked around the desk to join her. Opening the door to the office she called out "Captain Hunter I would like you to return and stand as my witness."

From down the hall Captain Hunter opened the door to his office and returned. Once in the room he assumed a position of parade rest and asked, "Has she accepted?"

"I am to offer that right now." replied Princess Luna.

Turning back to Twilight, Princess Luna began speaking with a royal tone of strength and formality.

"Twilight Sparkle. I now formally offer you the position on Nightmare team in the role of Shadow-walker. Do you accept?"

With a sense of pride beginning to well inside of herself Twilight responded, "I do Princess."

"Then I now hereby fully recognize you as both a member of this unit as well as a Lieutenant in the Lunar Guard. Congratulations Lt. Sparkle, Welcome to the Nightmares!"

Author's Notes:

This chapter took longer then I thought it would due to a major revision to where I wanted it to go in the end, but over all I think it turned out better then it was originally going to.

Take not I named a character in the prologue as "Gunslinger" that character has been renamed here to "Wolf" for reasons that will have more of an impact later in the story I have also changed the name in the original chapter, so if you are reading this story after the change this note means nothing to you.

Once again I implore you to offer any feedback you have for me or the story at large.

Thank you again for reading.
Aim High All

Chapter IV: We Few

Oh my gosh!Oh my gosh!Oh my GOSH!

Twilight was overjoyed. In fact she was practically giddy. She wanted to jump and dance, and as little as she cared for act, hug someone. Her biggest dream and driving desire for the past 8 years had just been achieved. What else could she want to do? Ever since Shining Armor had come home all those years ago in his dress uniform she had wanted nothing more then to pin on her own set of officer ranks. To be counted among those honored heroes, to be given the responsibility to lead, to know that she was repaying her country for everything that she had been lucky enough to have. Now she had it.

Only her strength of will, the thoroughness of her training, and insurmountable desire to not make a fool of herself in front of a princess and a Captain of the Guard held her in place. It did, however, nothing to keep the manic grin from starting to grow on her face. The smile seemed to be infectious as Princess Luna reciprocated the expression.

"As the newest addition to my unit I believe that there are a few in processing actions that are necessary," Princess Luna began. "We need to have the captain here introduce you to the rest of the team. Then we need to get you to the armory so that we can get you some properly geared for missions. Then Captain Hunter can show you to your room so that you can settle in and move the rest of your belongings to the castle."

Captain Hunter nodded. "I would prefer to go to the armory first and get you changed into some Lunar Guard uniforms first, but the armory is towords the back of the facility and we are bound to run into the rest of the team between here and there."

The captain eyed Twilight and the Day Guard style cadet uniform that she was still wearing. "Admittedly, I want to get you changed because, as I have informed your brother multiple times, I think the Day Guard uniform looks ridiculous. So many flashy colors. To be honest I always felt ours looked sharper." He shrugged.

The princess looked to Twilight and gave a small roll of her eyes. "Ever since they were both promoted to Captain, both your brother and Midnight here have been in a foalish rivalry over who has the better unit."

This elicited a bit of a giggle from Twilight before she spoke up. "Fret not Captain Hunter! You have new reinforcements in this war with my brother."

Breaking into a grin of his own Captain Hunter cheered, "Outstanding! You'll fit right in." before facing his princess. "You do always have a knack for selecting the best fitting ponies for the team."

"In the name of my sister, what have I done. Apparently I have developed a team of highly trained foals," commented Luna with a bemused shake of the head. "Perhaps you should start the introductions while we search out the rest of the team," She stated looking at the captain and gesturing for the trio to start walking back down the hallway.

Stepping into stride, Captain Hunter began talking.

"Well Twilight, as you know I am Midnight Hunter, Captain of the Lunar Guard. I am also the field commander for Nightmare team. As you will learn all the members of the team use call signs in the field and often in casual conversation. Mine is 'Orion'."

Twilight's ears perked up at this. "Wait, you named yourself after the constellation? That's so cool!"

Captain Hunter turned his left shoulder to Twilight so that she could get a clear view of his constellation shaped personal crest. "Well, given the name and the crest I felt it was a fitting call sign to go by."

Making their way back into the main lobby Twilight asked, "So I know you are in command of the unit under Princess Luna, but other then that what do you do?"

"I'm the field commander for any ops we do. The position in the team is known as "Watchtower". Generally I will be flying above any zone of operation getting a god's eye view. From there I give communication relay, mission directives, and just generally control the flow of the unit. Also If need be I can provide some distance fire support with my riffle," Hunter explained.

"So you must be a pretty good shot?" Twilight asked.

"Best shot I've ever seen with a riffle," commented Princess Luna causing the captain to shake his head a little.

"I'll admit I'm above average, but most of that comes from being a sniper and aerial fire support for the team when It was still being commanded by Captain Nightshade before he was killed." Captain Hunter said. "Captain Nightshade was actually our former Shadow-walker, the position that you fill now."

Twilight had heard that position title earlier when Princess Luna had made her offer, but she still did not know what it fully meant.

"So what exactly does a Shadow-walker do?" she asked.

"I'll be able to explain it better latter after you are settled in and I can start to train you." replied Hunter.

The group made their way past the desk where Nights Watch sat. Taking notice that it looked like Twilight had accepted to join Nights watch gave her an approving nod that again made Twilight smile.

Princess Luna pointed to the stairs that led down below and spoke up, "So down there is where the contingency of Lunar Guard intel analyst work. They are our eyes and ears staying alert to try and warn us when something big looks like it's developing."

"So then what happened with Canterlot? Why did you not know that was going to happen?" Twilight asked perhaps a little harsher then she intend, but the events were still raw in her mind.

The princess did not shy away from the pointed questions. "We are still trying to figure that out, we knew something was coming and it was going to be Canterlot. Short of that we were in the dark as well, and that bothers both me and the boys downstairs quite a lot."

Twilight looked away slightly ashamed. "Sorry Princess. I didn't mean to accuse you of being derelict of duty. I just get so angry when I think of that day and how many people I failed to save."

A midnight wing reached out and wrapped itself around Twilight. "I take no insult from you Ms. Sparkle. It would be incorrect for you to not feel for those that have fallen," the princess stated in a hushed tone. "It means that there is good in your heart. Do not let it fade."

Twilight looked into the face of the taller alicorn and nodded.

Captain Hunter respectfully cleared his throat in an attempt to get the tour back onto its intended course.

"Yes Captain Hunter you are correct we should continue. By your lead." Princess Luna stepped back into stride with the field commander.

Hunter walked to the set of doors located under the large unit crest. After holding the door open for the Twilight and the princess to pass through, he followed suit.

They had entered into what Twilight could only assume was a lounge or common area. There were various scattered lounge chairs and couches. On the left hand side was a poker table, and a clearly well used pool table with a rack of ques lined up. A portable whiteboard still had the marks of what looked like a running count of wins between "Honesty" and "Rainboom" with "Rainboom" ahead by two wins. To her right was a rather large and elaborate looking chess board. It was the size of a dinner table and much to large for it to played normally. It also had no pieces upon it, only two gems on either side. One was white amethyst and the other was black obsidian. Likely it was powered by magic. Down the center was a set of bookshelves, one side full of military manuals, tactics books, combat history texts, and mechanical reports. The other side was brimming with fiction ranging from Science-Fiction to tales of Dareing Doo.

Not what I would call a proper library but at least they have books. I'll need to add a section for magical theory.

Twilight then took notice of a set of doors that lined the walls. Two to the left, two to the right, and another set of double doors on the far side across from her.

Twilight's examination of the room however was cut slightly short as the Lunar Captain growled and crossed his arms. He then started to make his way towards a cyan mass garbed in an olive drab flight suit. The mass was sprawled out on a plush couch, fast asleep, an empty cider bottle clutched in its hand.

Walking quitly to the sleeping mare that the mass turned out to be, the captain leaned down close to one of the pony's ears. He lifted a section of rainbow streaked mane so that he could be heard clearly before he started a loud whisper.

"Oh Sergeant Dash, wakey wakey."

The blue mare started to stir a little to the voice in her ear, groaning about 5 more minutes.

The captain continued his whisper, "Now Sergeant, it's time to wake and..." the captain suddenly shifted from a whispered tone to a full yell that would have made the most stone-hearted Drill Instructor smile with appreciation, "EXPLAIN TO MY WHY IN ALL SMOLDERING HELL YOU ARE DRUNKENLY PASSED PUT IN MY COMMON LOUNGE!"

"Bwah!" was all verbal response given as the mare jolted awake and took flight into the air. The cyan pegasus with the rainbow mane suddenly seem to take accord to what was going on and rushed back to the ground to land at the position of attention.

"Captain Hunter, permission to speak freely. I would like to explain," Sergeant Dash spoke hastily.

"Go on. This one had best be good, or at least better then the one you gave me last week," The captain replied with a smoldering glare and crossed arms.

"Sir, I was not drunk. I mearly was enjoying the one bottle of cider that I won from Honesty in our last game. I then fell asleep because I was tired from running close air support for the 501st out on the Dragon Lines all day," the Mare stated with some steel to her voice.

"Be that as it may, Why were you passed out in my lounge?" replied the none too pleased commander.

The chastisement went on for about a minute. Twilight looked on trying to comprehend the situation. Luna however crossed her arms and only let out a small chuckle and a bemused shake of her head.

"Umm, Princess? What exactly is going on?" Twilight asked turning with a confused look to face Luna.

Another chuckle escaped Luna's lips. "Oh this is a weekly occurrence. Sergeant Dash here is an outstanding combat flyer, but when she is away from battle she tends to fall a bit on the more lackadaisical side. This is much to the irking of our dear captain as he does tend to love his military discipline and she is supposed to be his aerial partner on missions. Even with her having a bit of a maverick side she is a pure iceman when the bullets fly. I also know that despite how much he chastises her, Midnight would want no other pony in the teams Topgun role."

"I see," replied Twilight in a manner that didn't even convince herself. She turned back to the captain and the flyer.

"...now you will polish all of the gear in the armory tonight. Is that understood?" huffed the disgruntled officer.

"Yes, Sir!" replied the duly chastised mare.

Captain Hunter returned to his normal calmer tone. "Good. Now I would like you to come here and meet our new team member."

Sgt. Dash blinked a few times before looking over and finally registering that there were other ponies in the room as well.

"Wait! You mean that I'm not the FNG anymore? Outstanding!" she exclaimed.

"Correct, but she still outranks you. Sgt Dash meet Lt. Sparkle."

"Psh. Figures,"Dash harrumphed.

Dash walked up to Twilight and stuck out a hand. Up close Twilight was able to take in the mare in front of her. She was much shorter then Twilight making her well below average, even for mares. She was also quite thin, not scrawny, but lean and streamlined. Like the mare that had pulled the revolver on her above, Dash also wore aviator sunglasses. These however had reflective lenses and were tinted to the same color blue as the coat of the mare that wore them. A velcro patch of the Nightmare team crest was affixed to her left shoulder, and on her left was a personal crest of a rainbow lightning bolt striking from a cloud

"Hows it going L.T.?" Dash asked with a lopsided grin. "The name's Sgt. Rainbow Dash, but I go by the call sign Rainboom."

Shaking the proffered hand , Twilight introduced herself as well.

"So, I've been told you're a good flyer and the team's Topgun. What does that position do?" Twilight asked.

"You were told wrong." Rainboom replied quickly.

"But how? I was told that by Princess Luna here," Twilight inquired.

"I'm not a good flyer. I'm the best flyer. I suggest you remember that." Rainbow's grin grew sideways smile grew a little more smug.

A bit cocky if you ask me.

"As for being Topgun, I'm the main air support for the team. Need enemy air taken care of, an LZ cleared, or a strafing run, it's me that does it. I also perform the quick extraction maneuvers if we need to."

"Well I guess that makes sense. If your part of the Nightmares why were you flying support for the 501st? Aren't they a regular Day Guard infantry unit?" asked Twilight.

"They got some good flyers in the Day Guard, but the Wonderbolts can only do so much. Princess Luna sometimes loans me out when we arn't running an op here. So you the new Shadow-walker? You better not try anything shady, I'll be watching you."

What the hell does that mean?

Dash either missed Twilight's perplexed look, or just chose to ignore it.

"I guess I better got the armory before Orion blows another gasket on me," Rainbow Dash said with a glance over her shoulder at the captain.

With that Twilight watched Rainboom turn around and walk through the set of double doors on the far wall. A concerned look of confusion marred Twilight's face. She looked between the two other ponies still in the room with her. A shadow had crossed over their eyes.

It was Captain Hunter that spoke up first.

"We had a previous member, that we thought could be trusted turn on us, it's probably what has led to both the outbursts from Dash and Shimmer. Unfortunately you might have an upward fight to be fully accepted by everyone."

Well that's less then desirable.

Twilight cast a dejected look. "Well I guess I should meet the rest of the team so that I can start weathering the storm now before we have to work a mission together."

"I concur," Princess Luna replied. "The rest of the team is probably further into the base. Let's proceed."

The trio set off again passing through the common room following the previous path of Sgt. Dash through the double doors.

Twilight surveyed the new room she was in. It was another large open room but unlike the previous room that was clearly meant for relaxing, This was set up for physical training. All around the edges were racks for free weights, calisthenics equipment, and muscle training machines. In the center of it all was a large sparring ring. The training room was no where near as large as the one that Twilight had used so often with her brother, but for the size of the unit stationed here, it was more then adequate. To the right was a set of doors labeled as "Engineering Lab", another set across the room from Twilight proclaimed the room beyond was used for "Live Fire Training", and a final set of doors held the label of "Staging Area".

The sound of grunting drew Twilight's attention to an earth pony working over a heavy bag. The stallion was dressed in a gray t-shirt with the unit crest on the back and a pair of running shorts, but Twilight could see he was the same dark blue shade as the captain that stood to her right. He was also well muscled and he wore his jet black mane cut short and slicked back. Twilight had never been enraptured with stallions, unlike many of her class mates had been in her younger years, but she had to admit that he was an impressive specimen.

The stallion stopped his workout when he noticed that he was no longer alone. Pulling off his gloves he made his way around the equipment to where Twilight and the other two stood.

"Good evening Princess, you look lovely as always. Good evening Captain. And a special good evening to you miss! My name is Bulwark. To whom do I owe this lovely honor?" Bulwarks works came out as smooth and as suave as fresh silk. He reached out a hand to Twilight.

"I'm Twilight Sparkle. I guess it's Lt. Twilight Sparkle now." Twilight replied a bit of a hitched to her speech.

When she went to shake Bulwark's extended hand she found that he raised her hand up to his lips and kissed it like in the fairy tale books she had read as a filly. Her ears started to burn a little and she felt a bit of a blush creep along her cheeks.

Is he really the chivalrous type or just a smooth talker?

"Alright Warrant Officer you can stand down," Captain Hunter interjected. "Despite the uniform she is currently wearing, Lt. Sparkle is not some liaison from the Day Guard for you to woo. She is our new Shadow-walker."

I guess I can add play boy to his potential monikers.

"Ah, Wonderful! Welcome to the team. I guess if you're going to be one of us you can call me Lazarus. It's my field call sign but around here we tend to use our call signs just as often as our real names. I'm the teams "Lifeline" or field medic when we go on group missions."
Twilight was about to speak again before the doors to the Engineering Lab burst open. The hinges seemed to strain to counter the force that had thrust open the doors. This burst of action was followed by the sound of a voice roared out.

"Lazarus, you no-good bootlicker! Did you go stealin' mah damn copper tubin' again?!

The voice emanated from a rather tall, blond maned, orange coated, green eyed, earth pony mare. She marched down the walkway to the muscled stallion with the fury of a country storm. Stopping directly in front of him and fixed him with a furious stare.

Even compared with the bulk of the stallion in front of her, this new mare also appeared to have well developed muscle tone. Unlike the stallion dressed in work out attire, the mare was dressed in a dark blue mechanics jumpsuit with a series of oil stains on it. A tan stetson hat sat atop her head the Nightmare crest was stitched into the the front.

Bulwark turned to face the furious mare with a charmer's smile plastered on his face.

"And if I did? What would you do about it Honesty?"

The orange earth pony jabbed a finger into his face. "Normally Ah'd say Ah'd beat the pretty out of your face, but you ain't got much to spare!"

The stallion just chuckled and rubbed a hand through his hair. "Oh just relax will you. If you must know I took it to finish my still. Besides you know I'll pay you back sooner or later. Besides Hotlips, I might even invite you to the Med Bay for a drink when it's finished."

So, smooth talking playboy it is.

At the name "Hotlips" a fire caught light deep in Honesty's eyes. Captain Hunter face-palmed as Princess Luna simultaneously started to rub the bridge of her nose between two fingers like a frustrated mother.

The orange mare thrust her thumb over her shoulder towards the sparring ring.

"Get yer ass in there now," she growled at Lazarus.

"I see I stepped over the line again," Bulwark said with a sigh as he started to walking to the ring and stretching his arms.

The mare took her hat and placed on a bench near the ring before un-zipping her jumpsuit half-way to reveal a white undershirt that was also spotted with oil. She tied the sleeves around her waist to hold the suit in place then steeped into the ring as well.

"You know, If you wanted to wrestle with me this bad you could have just invited me into that lab of yours and we could have done this in private." Lazarus said with a sly wink.

The captain, face still in his hand, started to shake his head and uttered, "Boy, you really are just playing with fire."

Twilight turned to the Princess and asked, "Umm...should we do something to break them up?"

Luna just shook her head.

"No, no. we just need to let them work it out themselves. Otherwise both my doctor and engineer just walk away worse off then If we don't interfere."

"But what if one of them gets hurt?" Twilight asked, slightly worried.

Captain Hunter finally raised his head from his hand and gave a little chuckle before he responded to Twilight's question.

"You don't need to worry about that. This is more an issue of a standing rivalry between the two. They booth grew up good friends in Appleoosa before Lazarus went off to Manehatten to go to medical school. That's where he picked up 'A no good city-slicker swagger' as Honesty puts it."

Twilight looked on as the two earth ponies traded a few blows. It looked no more intense then her training matches with Shining. In fact if she hadn't seen the argument that led to the bout Twilight would have just assumed it was a sparring match. A few minutes latter the fight was over with no real winner. Both walked out of the ring glistening with sweat and rubbing soar spots.

Donning her stetson again Honesty turned to Bulwark and started talking, "Now you best take that less'n to heart. And you best be using that still o' yours to make proper
cider this time and not that watery swill you call liquor or I'll need to bring you back here and give you another good whippin'."

Bulwark grabbed a workout towel from a near-by bench and started to wipe his face down.

"Yeah, yeah what ever you say AJ, and my still makes real gin not that moonshine you take too. Anyways I'm heading to the shower." He made his way to the doors that led back to the common lounge. "Have a nice night ladies. Captain."

With that he was gone. Honesty then walked over to the group.

"Princess I'm sorry about starting that, but he had it coming. He's been pilfering small items from my shop to work on his little 'side project'."

"It's alright Apple Jack, but don't let this rivalry of yours effect field ops do you understand me?" the princess scolded.

" 'Course ma'am. We would never risk a mission over our petty problems." Honesty replied.

"Good. Now I would like you to meet Lt. Twilight Sparkle. She is going to be our replacement Shadow-walker.Twilight this is Warrant Officer Apple Jack. She is our the team's 'Sapper'," Luna introduced the two ponies.

Twilight stuck out her hand to shake. An action that Apple Jack reciprocated with a a rather firm grip.

"Good to meet ya' L.T. To be honest I'm glad we're finally gettin' back to full strength. Hard to run missions when you're down the main role. By the way, most ponies call me AJ, or use my call sign Honesty" Apple Jack said with a genuine smile.

"So you're a combat engineer? Why the full shop then?" asked Twilight.

"Well shake mah leg most ponies got no idea what a sapper is. As fer the lab Princess Luna gives be free rein to work on various projects that look to have benefit to the Guard," answered AJ.

"Really? What kind of projects do you work on?" asked Twilight curious to have found another pony in the unit that might be into science and engineering like herself.

"Well at the moment Ah'm tryin' to develop an armored up cart that can move on its own with out needin' to be pushed. Only trouble is the current design is just too damn heavy to not just be a sittin' target in the field. It also handles like a stubborn mule." AJ said with some consternation.

Fascinating!

"You mean that big monster of a noise machine I see you pushing to and from outside the castle walls?" asked Captain Hunter with a raised eyebrow.

"Aye, Sir. The very same one." Honesty confirmed with a note of pride for her lumbering behemoth.

An idea struck Twilight. Well actually about a dozen had hit her after hearing about the problems with the design. This was the main one though that she had to follow first to carry out the other ones.

"Would you mind if I came around the shop after I get settled to help you work out the kinks? I got my major in magical theory, but I also got a few minors in engineering and physics too," Twilight asked. She was actually a little giddy about the idea of working in an actual engineering lab and not just the old broom closet she had turned into a workstation back at the school.

Another smile crossed Apple Jack's face.

"That actually sounds down right perfect. It's been mostly me with just a little bit o' help from Wolf. A second brain to bounce ideas off of would be just as useful as the second set o' hands. Speakin' o' which I should probably be making my way back there now. I left some tools on when Ah saw mah copper done skedaddled, but feel free to come around any time you can."

With that and a wave AJ made her way back to her workshop to go take care of her tools.

"I do believe that you would have made a good fit for the Sapper position if it had been open," Luna commented. "I also believe that we are about to hear twice the number of explosions and curses flying from that shop in the future." She shrugged.

"So you've met our Watchtower in myself, Rainboom our Topgun, Lazarus our Lifeline, and Honesty, our Sapper," listed off Captain Hunter. "The only one left is Wolf, our Gunslinger."

"I'm pretty sure I already met her. Or at least I got more intimate with the barrel of that Colt .45 revolver then I wanted to be," Twilight deflected.

At this Luna perked up. "You mean to tell me that Sunset pulled Eclipse on you? When?"

"Well, right when I showed up." Twilight said a little meekly.

The captain gave a little chuckle. "Wasn't just Eclipse. She whipped out Daydream too."

"And why pray-tell did my protegee feel the need to draw aim on Twilight?" Luna asked Midnight.

It however was Twilight that answered. "Well I was kind of just lurking around upstairs and I guess I just ran into her on patrol. I really can't blame her for not trusting my intentions."

Luna sighed. "Be that as it may, I still feel the need to talk to her about drawing iron first and asking questions later. At least on an individual in our sister services uniform."

At that moment a bat pony with a pair of glasses and a slightly lighter toned coat then Nights Watch's walked into the training room.

"Princess Luna, Captain Hunter, the boys and I think we may have finally pieced together some information on what went down with Canterlot. Would you like a briefing?"

"Captain Hunter would you mind taking that. I would like to finish in processing Lt. Sparkle. I'll come by and get the information afterwords unless you think there is something important that needs to be brought up to the team then come get me," Luna said looking at Midnight.

"Will do Princess," Captain Hunter replied. Then turning back to the other bat he said, "Alright Foresight let's go see what you all have managed to turn up."

With that the two bats walked back thorough the door that led to the common lounge, and likely off to the stairs that would take them to the intelligence monitoring section of the base.

Luna started to walk towards the door that would take them to the staging area and the armory.

"If you would please follow me Twilight I would like to take you to the armory. Perhaps we will catch Sunset on her way in the back method, but in any case I have one last thing that I need to show you."

Twilight fell into step beside the princess and said, "If you don't mind me asking Princess what is it?"

Pushing through the doors Luna made here way to a pony sized vault style door that had the label "ARMORY" spray painted in bold red letters.

"What I have for you is in here," Luna said.

They entered the vault door. The armory looked like just that. An armory. Against one wall there were a set of lockers for each of team members with their call signs and positions labeled on them. Another wall had a supply of LDU's, a selection of body armors, and other various clothing items for use in the field. Finally there was a wall with racked firearms of various types, along with ammo for all of them.

Twilight found that the armory was however, already occupied by two other ponies. The first was Rainboom in the process of buffing a set of LDU boots. The second was the flame haired mare from above, Shimmer.

She was sitting on a bench in front of her locker stripping and cleaning her handguns. She at some point had removed her sunglasses and stored them in an inner pocket of her duster.

"Good evening Princess. I hope your night is well." Sunset said as she finished polishing her revolver.

"Ah, good. I was hoping to find you here Sunset and it is indeed. Sgt. Dash would you mind leaving. I will inform the captain that you completed your punishment. Next time you wish to nap simply go to your room."

With a bit of a blush Rainbow got up from where she had been polishing and walked in the direction of the door.

"Thank you ma'am." Then she was gone.

Luna looked back to Sunset. "I have been told that you two have met already."

Sunset lit her horn and reassembled her stripped 1911 faster then Twilight had ever seen done. Sunset then stood and holstered both guns beneath her duster.

"You are correct Princess. I found Ms. Sparkle here walking around upstairs before I found out who she was and what she was doing here. I assume that by the fact that she is still here and that you are showing her the armory that she has been offered and accepted a position."

"She has indeed. She will be our new Shadow-walker," confirmed Luna.

Sunset let out a low breath. "I see. Princess may I speak freely?"

"You know that you of all ponies always have that freedom with me." Luna answered.

With her permission Shimmer continued. "I mean no disrespect to you-" she nodded at Twilight,"-but I don't believe that she is ready."

"I know that I'm not as experienced, but what makes you think I can't handle this job? I have skills that I have honed for years even if they have only been battle tested once in anger."

Sunset looked into Twilight's eyes before responding

"I don't know if you have the mentality for this work. You heard the story from Princess Luna. Even with the help of a team to support you, the work we do taxes the soul. That is where I'm not sure you are ready."

"That is why you are her partner." the Princess replied. "Between Captain Hunter and yourself I was hoping that you could lead her down the correct path and assist her in avoiding the mistakes that I made in the past. There are no ponies that I trust more with this then you two."

"Very well. I will do what I can, but the stress of this life can get to anyone if you are not vigilant." With that Sunset walked up to Twilight and stuck out her hand.

"I suppose I should formally introduce myself in some manner other then down the barrel of Eclipse here," she said patting her side with her other hand.

Twilight, for the fourth time tonight, took the offered hand and shook it.

Sunset continued, "My name's Sunset Shimmer. I also go by the call sign Wolf. I'm our Gunslinger and your partner on all infiltration missions. So for the sake of my life I best get you up to speed on how we operate before our next mission comes in."

Twilight responded by introducing herself, "Twilight Sparkle. Don't have a call sign yet. I do although have a few questions for you."

"Shoot away," Sunset said.

"First why Wolf? Second why the sunglasses at night?" Twilight asked.

"The first one's personal and you haven't earned that yet. Second one I'll give you because most ponies don't stay that observant with a pair of .45's in their face. I love my glasses, but as you can guess, we operated mostly at night. So I enchanted them to enhance low level moon and starlight. Now when I wear them at night I get just as good of night vision as any bat pony or diamond dog."

Damn, that's actually a really smart idea.

Princess Luna spoke up at that point, "I'm glad that this is starting to work better for you two, but I do need to get Twilight her gift."

"Gift? What gift?" Twilight asked a bit confused. It wasn't a holiday as far as she could remember.

"Twilight, on top of basic equipment I give each member of the team a special item to aid them. Captain Hunter has his enhanced scope that operates beyond the bounds of a normal scope. Rainbow Dash has a flight helmet that enhances her visual processing allowing her to make full use of her speed. Bulwark was given a medic's kit that will never be depleted of the essentials. Apple Jack was given her hat that reduces the effect of concussion waves as well as other adverse effects that comes with operating too close to live explosives. Sunset was given Eclipse. Now it is your turn."

Luna walked towards the stored clothing and withdrew a black and gray mottled cloak. On the left shoulder was Twilight's personal crest of stars and the right was the crest of the Nightmare team. The princess handed the cloak to Twilight.

"I know you are not one for physical weapons so I provide you with this. This is known as a shadow cloak. It is a combination of rare materials and a powerful enchantment. When you wear it normally it will look like any other black and gray cloak, but with a thought it can take the color and pattern of what ever surrounds you. With enough skill you can effectively hide in plain sight anywhere. However it works best in dark locations hence its name."

"OH WOW!" was Twilight's response. She could think of no better gift then this for working as part of a clandestine unit that operated at night.

"And now Twilight it is time to choose you're call sign," Luna said

"Choose wisely for this will be you're operational name for all missions," Sunset interjected before Twilight could respond.

Even with the warning Twilight knew there was only one name for her to choose. It was the name that defined how she fought, the things that she was proud of, and her relationship to her family.

"Spellblade," Twilight answered with confidence in her tone.

"Then it shall be," replied the princess, and with a wave of her midnight hand the name appeared under her name on the locker against the far wall.

It was then that Captain Hunter walked out of a shadow in the corner as if he had been there the entire time. Even for this being the third time that Twilight had seen a pony traverse shadows she could not tell how it was being done. The captain was not even a unicorn.

"You need to teach me how to do that!" Twilight exclaimed.

He wore a grim expression on his face. It was cold and hard like he was suppressing the emotion that he wanted to unleash.

"I will, but not now."

He looked to the Princess with that same cold look.

"You said to inform you if the information I learned was important."

"I did," replied Luna.

His hands were slowly clenching into and out of fists as if he wanted to hit something. His lip had a slight twitch to it. A cold sweat seem to drip from his brow. His breathing seemed somehow hollow.

"Would you classify the escape of Raven Cain as important?"

Author's Notes:

Thank you again for reading.
Aim High All

Chapter V: Informed

Will someone let me in on the secret already?

The air around the base seemed like it was dead still and tasted stale in Twilight's mouth. She wasn't entirely sure why that was. She hadn't gotten a word out of anyone as to what was going on. The captain, Sunset, and the princess had all been closed lipped about the whole situation ever since the name Raven Cain had been dropped. The only words that any of the three had exchanged were a command from Princess Luna to assemble the team in the meeting room down the hall in the command section. Captain Hunter and Sunset had then led Twilight back through the base and through the command section to a doorway across the hall from Capt. Hunter's office.

Inside the room was a large round table big enough to seat seven ponies around it with a few extra chairs off to the side. The table was a rich dark mahogany with the Nightmare crest in the center under a cover of lacquer. The chairs were black leather office chairs with wheels affixed to their base. A symbol was stitched into the back of each chair. The ceiling was rather high with a large crystal jutting from it directly above the table.

Once they were inside the room Sunset took a seat at one of the chairs, the one with the drawn revolver stitched into it. After sitting down she rested her elbows on the table, intertwined her fingers, and rested her chin on her hands. She stared off into space as if lost in thought.

The captain made his way to another smaller crystal, no bigger then a bit, embedded in the wall next to the door. Taking a deep breath to calm his voice, he pressed it like a button.

"Attention all Nightmares, Priority one meeting. Make your way to the briefing room at once," he spoke in a much smoother tone then he had been using when he had first reported to the princess.

Twilight watched the captain with curiosity.While he had spoken at a normal volume, Twilight could hear his words reverberating around the base.

This place has all sorts of tricks.

After relaying his message with the PA system, Hunter made his way to another of the leather seats and sat down. His chair had the symbol of a stone tower with two pointed spires on either sides of the towers pinnacle with a watching eye between the two spires. He sat there rubbing the side of his head as if trying to sooth a particularly irritating headache.

Not sure what to do with herself Twilight just stood off to the side with her arms crossed. She had been given time to change before they had made their way to the briefing room. She now had on a fresh, crisp set of LDUs, polished black boots, and she had also donned her new shadow cloak.

The cloak fit her perfectly. It covered the full length of her body without dragging on the ground. The hood, were she to draw it up, cast her full face into shadows to hide her identity from those that tried to look her in the face. When she drew it fully closed around her and thought the activation phrase "Nachtzeit" she all but disappeared from sight as the colors of the cloak shifted to match those of her surroundings. That was until she moved. The cloak was good but it didn't match motion blur well, as well as it did nothing to muffle the sound of her movements.

Twilight stood pondering an explanation for the sudden change in demeanor of The Captain and the two mares. Multiple reasons for the current environment floated through her mind. Each one seemed more preposterous then the last, but until she got some hard information they were all she had.

Perhaps this Cain is like the reincarnation of Discord.

The door next to Twilight opened as Rainbow Dash burst through. She was still dressed in her flight suit but now had her blue tinted aviators hooked into a breast pocket. She walked over to a chair next to the captain, the one with the stitched representation of the winged shield that made up the pilots wings.

No that can't be. Discord is still alive, he is just a statue in the gardens.

Looking between the two other seated ponies Dash asked, "So Orion, Wolf, you gonna fill me in on what this is all about? I didn't think there was a mission planned for a while."

Sunset shook her head slowly and the Captain responded.

"You'll find out when everyone gets here. I would rather this gets covered all at once."

Dash sighed and leaned back in her chair and stuck her booted feet up on the table. She gave a small, worried, sidelong glance at Captain Hunter when he didn't chastise her for it.

Maybe Cain is the name of one of the rightful leaders of the Changeling Hive that Queen Chrysalis displaced in her coup.

Again the door opened as AJ marched in, a serious look on her face. She too made a bee line for one of the leather office chairs. This one had a stitched image of a square looking castle with three short towers, two on the sides and one in the middle. She was still dressed in her oil stained jumpsuit, but now she seemed to have a little oil in her hair as well.

Shortly behind her was Bulwark. He sauntered in with his casual swagger and took the seat next to Apple Jack with the caduceus stitched to it.

No that's wrong too. Captain said Cain escaped. Chrysalis didn't imprison any of her former leaders, she just killed them.

Apple Jack looked at the others in the room and started to open her mouth to ask a question but Rainbow cut her off.

"Don't waste the breath Honesty. The Captain said he ain't gonna spill it till everyone is here."

A flash of annoyance crossed AJ's face but she didn't push the subject. She too relaxed into her chair but in a more professional manner. Bulwark similarly looked troubled but tried to hide it behind a suave grin.

Could Raven be an escaped dragon bearing down on some town along the Dragon Lines?

The last two ponies walked in. The first was Princess Luna with an unreadable facade. The second was Foresight the bat intel officer from before. His expression was ashen and nervous.

No. That's not likely either. The Day Guard has an entire two volume manual on how to deal with a dragon incursions. A sole dragon making across the lines wouldn't cause consternation like this.

The Princess sat down next to Capt. Hunter. Her chair had the image of the Mare in The Moon embroidered into the leather. Foresight however stood off to the side. In his hands he held a semi-translucent crystal slab. The chunk of crystal was roughly the same length and width as a sheet of paper but was about a centimeter and a half thick.

Possibly this Cain is...

"Excuse me Lt. Sparkle, but if you would like to come back to this plane of existence I can have Lt. Foresight start his briefing," Princess Luna interrupted Twilight's cycle of Hypotheses.

"EEP!" Twilight exclaimed at being ripped out of her own head. "I apologize Princess I was lost in thought."

"I understand but If you would please take your seat-" Luna motioned to the remaining vacant seat at the table, "-you would probably get all the questions running through your mind answered."

"Of course Princess," Twilight said, moving to indicated chair next to Sunset.

This last free chair meant for her also had a symbol on it. Her's was that of a dagger enveloped by a cloak.

After Twilight took her seat Luna turned back to Foresight and nodded.

"You may begin now Lt. Foresight," she stated.

Gulping he responded, "Yes Princess."

He tapped the slab in his hands a few times and the lights in the room dimmed. Then the large crystal started to glow projecting a three dimensional holographic of the Lunar Guard crest.

Twilight gasped softly at this new fascination. Two dimensional projection had been cutting edge tech while she had been going through classes, but the rest of the team seemed to take this in stride like this was something they dealt with every day. Dash didn't even take her boots of the table and reclined a little more.

The crest revolved a few times before Foresight tapped a few more times on the slab and the crest was replaced with a fully detailed 3-D projection of Canterlot. He performed a reverse pinching motion on the slab and the projection zoomed in on the market district of the city. The same district where the attack had happened, the only difference was that there was no damage and ponies were walking around without a care in the world.

"We finally were able to piece together the events of the Canterlot attack from residual magical foot printing," Foresight started as he began to scroll on his slate.

The scene started to play in fast forward. Ponies going about their lives, buying, selling, carrying on. It was like looking down on a doll house come to life. Then suddenly there was a flash and the entire model was consumed in a fire ball. The scene stopped here. Then it reversed slowly until it was mere moments prior to the blast.

"First we found the source of the blast," Foresight said pointing to a small gray object that was hovering slightly above the ground in the projection. "It was an aerially dropped munition. We don't have enough information to track it all the way to it's source but there is a good chance it came from one of flyers that took part in the attack."

"You mean one of the griffons?" asked Twilight trying to remember information from the middle of the firefight.

"Possibly, however we do know that they were not the only flyers. There was a second team that I will get to in a bit," Foresight responded. He scrolled through more of the projection's timeline until about a minute or so after the blast had subsided.

"Here we see the attackers arrive on the scene. They start to open fire into the crowd indiscriminately. I don't have any of the fine details because there were very few living ponies at this point to give off the magical residue that we need for high fidelity."

He continued to describe the events of the attack in an almost robotic tone until he got to the point where Twilight arrived.

"Here as two of you know was the major turning point of the attack. It also is where we first start being able to make out more detail due to the sheer amount of magic that radiates off of you Lt. Sparkle."

Twilight looked away not sure how to take the comment.

Foresight continued unaware of Twilight's reaction. He zoomed in on the first of the griffons. The one that had first taken notice of Twilight's presence.

"Here we have Carrion. Captain you may remember the name from when you and Capt. Nightshade were operating in the Griffon Kingdom during the Great War."

Captain Hunter nodded. "Ya I think I do. She was one of King Alaric's top generals. I believe she was in our deck of 52 if I'm not mistaken." He looked over at the princess.

"Correct she was the Queen of Spades. High priority but not in the top ten." Luna confirmed.

Foresight nodded at the information. "Just so. She was the second in command of their Air Knights. As you know by the fact that we still speak Equestrian and not Griffon we repelled the invasion after they got dragged into the war by their alliance with the hippogiffs and minotaurs. Eventually forced them to the peace treaty. After that It seemed that she dropped out of the military and has flown a fairly low profile. The recent hardships that the Griffon Kingdom has faced have however brought her back to the surface. She as held many rallies and political forums in her home country. It seems that she still holds a chip on her shoulder and blames the majority of the problems with the Kingdom on the way that they were treated by the peace accords. She also hasn't been seen for a few months."

"Well that's bullshit if I've ever heard it," Sunset spoke up. "It wasn't our fault that they built their kingdom on the profits of conquest. Just because we banned them from having as large a military doesn't mean that they couldn't have industrialized."

Foresight grunted at the assertion, but didn't comment himself. He zoomed out from the first griffon and zoomed in on the second griffon.

"Here we have the griffon that you killed Captain. We don't have anything on him more then he was a former flyer under Carrion and shared many of her views."

He moved on to a unicorn.

"I believe you also got this one Captain Hunter," Twilight noted.

Hunter nodded in confirmation.

"Right. This was Red Dawn. He was at one point a farmer from Ponyville, but one day his family was killed by bandits, and he blamed the Equestrian government and Equestria as a whole for his loss. Since then he has been a low level domestic terrorist. He had made a few threats of violence, but this was the first time that he had actually taken any action," explained Foresight.

The intel officer moved over to the minotaur.

"He had his entire family killed during the Great War. He has openly taken an oath to make Equestria pay for each member that he lost."

Finally he shifted the scene over to the diamond dog pair.

"Now these two are an interesting pair. Well used to be a pair." He chuckled a little before continuing. "They are the Blood brothers.This was Rabid," he pointed to one of them, "he was the one that was gunned down by the Day Captain. The other one is Canine. That's the one you tried to throw through a building after you tried to cut him in half with that ethereal blade of yours," Foresight commented looking over to Twilight who again was not sure how to take the comments. The scene played out until just after Twilight blasted Canine.

"Well there, Lt. Sparkle, that was kinda bad ass, but from what you've shown us here I would hardly call the dogs interesting," Dash said, still reclining in her chair.

Foresight continued, "It's not what they did in the fight that is the interesting part. It's their circumstances. You see there used to be five of the Blood brothers. The first brother died after their den was raided to rescue a few ponies they had tried to ponynap. They swore vengeance on the Guard member that pulled the trigger, but when the went after the guard member another of their kin was killed by a different Guard member. So they swapped targets to this new member. They almost got their vengeance but a griffon ended up killing that Guard member in the Great War. Instead of being satisfied with this they crossed the sea to go after this griffon. Only to have a third brother killed by a pony on the battlefield."

"Let me guess. this pony happened to be in the market that day?" Bulwark asked.

"Correct, but that pony had retired and was that shop owner that was one of the only two survivors. The attack also resulted in the death of fourth brother. Normally I would say that Captain Armor should be worried about being the next target for Canine's vengeance, but now I think that might fall on you Lt. Sparkle."

Twilight looked up startled. "What? Why me? Not that I want it to be my brother, but what did I do?"

Foresight rolled the projection back to the scene of Twilight cutting Canine's gun in half and forcing him back.

"Well you prevented his vengeful charge. That may have shifted his ire. Just a theory." Foresight shrugged.

"Well Ah' reckon that covers the who the attackers were, but ya mention'd their was a secon' team? And jus' what pulled all them together in the first place?" Apple Jack pondered.

" I was just about to get to that second team. Captain, Lt. Sparkle, do you remember a green firework going off during the fight? Possibly near the castle?" Foresight asked

Both nodded in response to the question.

"Well it looks like that was the sign to end the diversion," Foresight said.

"What do you mean diversion? Are you trying to say that all that killing was just a way to draw our attention?" Twilight asked flabbergasted.

"Indeed. As I explained to the Captain earlier, it seems that while the majority of the group was in the market to hide what the real group was doing," Forsight said as he zoomed out from the market and zoomed back in near the castle at what looked like a gated entrance to a cave.

"Wait! is that the dungeon entrance?" Sunset squinted at the projection. "Where are the Guards that are supposed to be watching the gate?"

"A very good question. Unfortunately the answer is that they were killed. While the rest of the group was unleashing havoc, there were two others staging a breakout." Foresight mad a motion on his slab and a pegasus appeared in the projection.

It was a female Pegasus in a vary similar looking flight suit. It looked a lot like Rainbow Dash, The cocky grin and all, but there were two key differences. First was that instead of a streak of many colors, this mare had a mane of pure jade. The second was that where Rainbow had her Nightmare crest, this mare had a Wonderbolts patch. That wasn't all, the patch seemed to have been covered over with a red X.

Rainbow Dash had her interest piqued by this new mare.

"And just who is this now?" she asked Foresight.

"Well, this would be Starfighter. She was a Wonderbolt for some time but grew discontent with the idea that while she and her brethren fought and died for the country, the nobles of Canterlot stayed home in their cushy lives. She has manly been a low level political activist but has also made more then her fair share of threats against the ponies of Canterlot."

"She doesn't look that great how did she make it to the Wonderbolt squadron?" Dash asked.

"Well believe it or not she was one of their better flyers especially against the dragons during their first attempt to invade Equestria from the south. From the reports we have she may even be a potential match for your own abilities."

"Pssh. Not a snowball's chance in hell egghead," was all Dash had for a response.

While they had been talking both Apple Jack and Bulwark had seem to take notice of a different location of the map. Standing outside the locked gate to the dungeons was a single figure. It was a stallion dressed in denim jeans. Tucked into the jeans was a plaid wool button up shirt. A bolo tie was around his neck and a pitch black stetson sat on his head. A brown duster jacket covered his back and on his feet were a pair of black cowboy boots with spurs.

Foresight noticed this and zoomed in on the figure but it was too blurry to make out more of the finer details. The only other thing that Twilight was able to make out was a pump action shotgun strapped to his back.

"This is the only figure that we couldn't get anything on. The magical footprint around him is too poorly formed to get a match on face recognition."

Bulwark got up and leaned closer to the projection squinting at the figure. Looking over to Apple Jack he shot a look that Twilight couldn't really place. Somewhere between anger and disgust possibly.

"Honesty, you don't think it's really him do you? I heard that Sheriff Silverstar got him a year ago?" Bulwark directed his question to his fellow earth pony.

"Ah heard something similar, but Ah'd recognize that there hat anywhere. Ah would also reckon the fact that he's got Bertha on his back also pretty much confirms it if ya' ask me. Ah'd also bet that if it were clearer we could make out that scar o' his," Apple Jack responded with a hard expression.

"Would you like to fill in the rest of the team as to who this seems to be?" Princess Luna asked looking between the two.

"That no-good fuckin' scoundrel is the one and only Blackhat. Pardon the language Princess, but Ah really got no love for the stallion," AJ answered with a scowl. Bulwark nodded in confirmation.

Foresight rubbed his chin for a second. "You may be right. We have a pretty large file on him if that's who it is. I could run and get it or you could inform the team about him as you two seem to have some knowledge about who he is."

"He's an outlaw, thief, and murderer all rolled into one fowl package. He was the head of the Blackwater Bandits for years," Bulwark explained. "Back when Honesty and I were younger, he would roll into Appleossa with his gang in tow. He took what he want and rolled back out. He was a terror across the entire badlands. He was known by his signature stetson and his shotgun that he named 'Bertha'. He also has an old war scar on his face that curved from above his left eye to his jaw."

"And he put a fuckin' gun in mah sister's face. Right before he shot mah Pa'," growled Apple Jack clenching and un-clenching a fist repeatedly. "When I heard he had been taken out, the only sadness I had was that I wasn't the one to put the bullet in him myself. Now it looks like even Tirek himself couldn't stand his presence and through him back from the pits o' hell."

"Pray tell, what led him to a life of banditry?" Princess Luna asked.

Bulwark responded, "Ma'am have you heard about the legend of the Mounted Rangers?"

The princess seemed to rack her brain for a bit.

"Vaguely. They were a cavalry unit that tried to protect the fledgling settlements in the early years of the Badlands expansion as far as I remember."

"Yes. However I would use the term protect rather lightly. They were a small unit. Blackhat was one of it's original members. After conflicts with the buffalo of the land died down the unit was disbanded and properly compensated for their service. Blackhat felt otherwise. He decided that he was owed more by the people."

"So if it wouldn' be freely given' he decided to take it. By what ever means necessary," Apple Jack interjected now rubbing her hand as if to contain her emotive response.

"I see," was all Luna had to say as she looked like she was trying to piece how all of this fit together.

"That's not the last of it though. Foresight, I suggest that you get to the real turn of the screw in this story," said Captain Hunter in a cold tone.

Finally. Maybe now I'll find out what this is all about.

"Indeed," Foresight said as he continued the playback of the events.

Blackhat finished planting the explosives around the gate while Starfighter kept watch. Then they both backed away to a safe distance before the blast ripped the gate off its hinges with a column of smoke. The two disgraces of former military servants disappeared into the dungeon cave. A short while later the cave belched smoke again indicating another blast from further into the cave. Once the smoke had cleared Blackhat and Starfighter could be seen making their way back out. This time they were accompanied by a third figure. Foresight zoomed in on this new unicorn.

He was a pitch black stallion dressed in ragged prisoner's garb. He had a long slicked back mane of midnight blue. But, what really struck Twilight was his eyes. They were a piercing gold.

The room fell deathly silent. The same stale feel of before came back as every pony in the room but Twilight fixated on the coal colored stallion. The only motion was Dash's eyes going wide with recognition before she stopped paying attention to her balance and her entire chair flipped backwards sending her flying to the ground. No one seemed to notice, they were still transfixed with what they saw. Dash, for her part, didn't even comment. She just stood back up and stared at the projection.

The most notable reactions where from Sunset and Capt. Hunter. Sunset had subconsciously brought her right hand to her hip, as if ready to draw Eclipse at any second. The captain, meanwhile, stared at the figure with a clenched jaw and cold fire in his eyes.

It was Captain Hunter that spoke up first, breaking the crypt like silence.

"No Mares and Gentlecolts, your eyes do not deceive you. That is in fact Raven Cain. In the flesh, and free to roam."

The furious anger in his voice was palpable.

"Sir..." Twilight spoke up, slightly raising her hand as if she were in a classroom addressing a teacher.

Midnight's eyes flirted away from the projection and to her. As if recognizing what Twilight wanted to ask he took a calming breath and started to explain for her benefit.

"Do you remember me telling you about the late Capt. Nightshade? Or about how he was killed by someone we thought we could trust?"

Twilight nodded. "Yes Sir, I do."

The captain nodded back in the direction of Raven Cain.

"That's the son of a bitch that did it. He was part of the regular day guard before he caught our eye. Nightshade knew he wouldn't be able to take on the role of Shadow-walker forever so we brought Cain on as a recruit. Nightshade trained him in everything he knew and acted as a second Shadow-walker when need be. Then when they went on a joint mission together..."

Sunset interjected, "The fucking traitor stabbed the captain in the back and vanished. It took us two whole months to track him down to some little backwater town in the middle of no where."

Captain Hunter took back over, "We seemed to take him by surprise as he walked out of a small church side graveyard. We brought him back here and tossed him down the deepest hole we had. Apparently we didn't dig deep enough. Perhapse we should have gone six feet deeper."

Luna turned to him.

"That's enough of that talk Captain. Those are words that would pass through my mind before my fall. Banish them from your thoughts. We seek peace and justice, not vengeance and hate. We kill for defense, never for satiation of rage."

"You are right Ma'am. Please pardon my outburst," Capt. Hunter said with shame hinting in his voice.

"What Ah' don' get is what pulled all these ponies together. They don' seem to have a lot in common." Apple Jack commented.

Sunset shook her head

"No they do have one thing in common. They all have a vendetta with Equastria, Canterlot, or us."

"So are there any leads?" Bulwark asked

"I'd like to know that as well. I don't like the idea of Raven being free to do as he pleases," Dash added.

"We have a few," Foresight answered.

He flipped the lights back on and ended the projection. All the ponies that had stood earlier sat back down in their chairs.

"There is nothing hard yet but it looks like there have been some possible sightings of different members of these attackers around Equastria as well as in the Griffon Kingdom. The first is Griffonstone, the seat of the King Alaric's government. To the north we have reports coming out of Stalliongrad. Some have mentioned seeing unknown ponies and other creatures around The Shades as well."

Sunset raised her eyebrows. "You mean that town we pulled Cain from the first time?"

"The vary same." Foresight replied.

He continued, "There have also been possible sightings through out the southern Badlands around the Dodge Junction area."

"Lazarus, Ah ain't a fan o' hearing reports that close to Appeloosa," Apple Jack mumbled to Bulwark.

"I haven't been back in a while but It doesn't please me either," Bulwark responded.

"It isn't a lot to go on," admitted Foresight, "but its what we have for now. I'll keep the Princess and captain appraised of the situation and let them know when we have something to build a mission off of."

"That is all we have for you at the moment," The Princess said. "You are dismissed for now."

Twilight got up with the rest of the team and watched most of them file out. She made to walk out the door before she was stopped by Captain Hunter and Sunset. Their demeanor had improved, but Twilight could tell that they were still fighting with daemons in their respective minds.

"Lt. Sparkle. It seems we most likely have less time to get you up to speed then I would like," Midnight started. "Because of this Wolf and I need to start you're training soon.

Sunset nodded. "The only problem is that we need to get a few things ready to properly train you. Because of this we wont be able to start whipping you into shape for a day or so."

The captain added, "I would suggest that you use this time to return home and gather anything that you did not bring with you as this will become your new residence along with the rest of us. If you have any business I suggest that you take care of it as well. The only request I have is that you not tell anyone, even your brother, of what your assignment is here. We can only operate correctly if we stay off the books."

"If you are pressed the usual answer that we give is that we are 'Tactical Analysts' for the 'Studies and Observations' department of the Lunar Guard." Sunset commented.

"Is that all understood?" asked the Lunar Captain.

Twilight nodded.

"Yes sir, I do."

Captain Hunter smiled a good-naturedly at Twilight. "Good. Then you may enjoy your short leave. Dismissed, Spellblade."

Author's Notes:

As always:
Thanks for reading!
Aim High All

Chapter VI: A Walk In The Woods

Twilight made her way out of the briefing room pondering what to do with her free time now that her training had been deferred. Twilight heard the sound of both Sunset and Capt. Hunter in the room behind her. She couldn't make out what they were discussing nor was she particularly invested in the content of the conversation. She had her own internal debate going on in her head.

I should take Captain's advice and go see mom and dad. The way this sounds it may be a while before I get the chance to.

Twilight made her way down the hall back to the lobby area.

But do I really want to see the mess that Canterlot is right now? I'm not sure I want to see the destruction that I was to late to stop.

The motion of Twilight entering back into the lobby caught the attention of Nights Watch, who was still at the desk. He seemed to catch the look internal debate going on in Twilight's head.

Though if I am going to be moving here I should probably get the rest of my stuff from home. I guess I should tell my family about my change of location.

The voice of Nights Watch cut through the mental block that she had unconsciously established.

"Hey Twilight!" he started. "Or should I call Lt. Sparkle, or do you go by Spellblade now?"

He chuckle slightly to himself.

"Oh!" Twilight looked up in surprise. "Sorry Nights I was kind of lost in my own head. I guess you can call me what ever you prefer."

A concerned expression crossed Nights Watch's face.

"Is everything alright?" he asked.

"No. Well, yes. There is nothing actually wrong. It's just that I have some free leave before I start my training, and I'm not sure what I should do with that time. Do I go home and see my folks? But then I would have to see all that destruction of Canterlot and I don't know if I'm ready for that, but there are some things that I need to do, and I'm just not sure what to do."

Breath Twilight! You're starting to ramble. Keep it under control.

"Hey, you don't need to panic on me. You want to take a seat and talk out the options?" Nights watch offered and gestured to a nearby chair.

Twilight sighed with a bit of relief and embarrassment. At least she wouldn't need to keep this stuck in her mind. She made her way to the offered seat and took it.

"I'm sorry for being a bother. I didn't mean to make this your problem. I'm not even sure why it's a problem for me. It shouldn't even be that big a deal," Twilight said. She wanted to just vanish inter her cloak to avoid pushing her problems on to the security head in front of her.

"It's not a bother for me at all. It sounds like a lot of your reason for not wanting to go back is about the market attack. Am I right?" Nights Watch questioned.

His pale blue eyes seemed to bore into her. Not in a threatening or malicious way, but in a softer manner. It was like he was trying to ease his way into the core of Twilight's problem, extract the truth of the issue, and sooth it. Twilight looked back into his eyes and noticed for the first time that they were slit like a cat's. She felt much more at ease under his warm gaze then she had before.

"Yes, I that sounds right," Twilight admitted. "I think I'm just hesitant to go back to a place that holds so much death."

Nights Watch nodded a little, "Sounds like a common post trauma reaction. You know it's said that revisiting a location of a prior even can give closure. Have you also given any thought to what I said about seeing that little colt?"

The face of the purple and green colt flashed through her mind. She had, but she hadn't factored it into if she should go back to Caterlot. Now that she was adding that in, the scales seemed to be tipping towards going.

"I hadn't factored that in, but that, along with the other reasons, might be what gives me the push to go. I need to move the rest of my gear from my hotel in Ponyville first, but then I think I'll get the morning train to Canterlot," Twilight said. "Thanks for talking with me. It helped I think."

Nights gave a warm smile. "Of course, some problems just take talking to another individual."

Twilight smiled back. She stood and started to walk back to the stairs that had brought her into the base only to see that the only thing on that side of the room was a solid wall. The stairs had apparently been retracted at some point now all she needed was to figure out how to lower them again. She walked up to the wall and started the search for any kind of contraption like the organ above that she could manipulate. The whole time Nights was giggling softly. About what, Twilight had a decent guess but couldn't confirm without further evidence.

She was in the middle of pressing her ear against the wall and trying to use echolocation to find what got the wall working when Sunset walked out of the command section. Sunset took in the events in front of her with quite a perplexed expression.

"Lt. Sparkle, am I correct in assuming that you are trying to get out so that you can collect the rest of your belonging from town?" Sunset asked, still looking confused at Twilight's actions.

At seeing Sunsets face, Nights Watch couldn't keep himself together and doubled over with laughter drawing Sunset Shimmer's attention.

"Sgt. Watch. I'm sure this is just a real knee-slapper for you but would you hit the release before I put you on report for behavior unbecoming?" Sunset asked, schooling her face back to the stone cold expression that she had used when she had held a gun to Twilight's head.

Nights Watch quickly sobered up and replied, "Yes Ma'am." before he hit a button labeled stair release, located on his desk.

He shot Twilight an apologetic look that, she assumed, tried to convey that it had been meant as a joke and not malicious.

Sunset maintained her cold expression and as soon as the stairs had lowered she walked up them, beckoning for Twilight to follow. Twilight complied and fell in step behind the fiery headed mare. They walked up the stairs, out of the castle, and started back down the path to Ponyville with out a word. Sunset also replaced her enchanted sunglasses once they were away from the light of the base. Twilight began to wonder what this was all about.

Finally Sunset broke the silence

"So apparently the captain wants me to accompany you to town so that we can get to know each other. I guess he is right on some level. We are going to be infiltration partners. The issue, is that I still don't fully trust you. To be fair that's not all your fault. A certain Raven is partly to blame as well, but that doesn't fully cover my distrust of you."

Twilight felt both insulted and confused.

"What have I done to make you possibly distrust me." Twilight asked incredulously

"Should I start with you being from Canterlot or you being Celesita's 'faithful student'?" Sunset asked in a rather cold manner. Her left hand twitching at the mentioning of Celestia.

"I think I would like to hear both, so whatever order you want to start with is fine by me." Twilight replied rather hotly.

"Alright," Sunset continued on in the same emotionless tone. "Canterlot first then. You come from a middle to upper class family in a town were status is everything. I could throw a stone in that town and probably hit a noble that advanced his status by getting a spot on a 'Special Assignment'. They don't care about the work they are doing or the lives they can put at risk, as long as they get to add that assignment to their repertoire. It's a bullshit mentality that pisses me off and I don't want it anywhere near my team. Every member of that team is their for to help everypony but them-self."

"This sounds a lot like a personal bias than a real reason not to trust me personally. How did you develop this stereotype anyway?" Twilight countered.

The argument didn't even phase Sunset.

"Oh, I'm fully aware of that. Does it make it less of a valid reason for me to personally not trust you? Not only that you have never wanted for anything. Everything you had was provided to you. How can do you expect me to trust someone who has never lived a hard life of any kind when our entire job is to live possibly the hardest of lives? As for how I got these ideas, I spent more time in court with Canterlot nobles then I ever desire to again."

Twilight hadn't considered that. She had never really stopped to question the difficulty of her life. She just lived it. Twilight had also never thought that Sunset would have any experience with the goings on of court. She didn't seem like the pony that would ever step foot in court little lone spend time with nobles. She seemed more the type to stick to shadows then the limelight.

Twilight huffed, "And how does me training under the Princess make me untrustworthy?"

a scowl crossed Sunset's face, though this time it didn't seem to be directed at Twilight.

"That might be a bigger reason then being from Canterlot. Under Celestia you were raised from a filly to be superior then others. Groomed for higher positions as if you were to take the crown. I need you to understand one simple thing. You are no better then any other pony. You are not destined for anything that you don't work yourself to achieve. Do you understand me?"

The entire time that Sunset had been giving her little rant, she had never looked at Twilight. Twilight also noticed that her left hand, the one next to the orange and red painted 1911 called 'Daydram', was locked in a clenched fist. The nails digging into her palm with force. Sunset's facial demeanor never changed.

Sunset went on.

Twilight wanted to counter about how she was supposed to trust if she could not be trusted herself, but she was beaten to the punch.

"I know however that this is not exactly fair on you. How can you trust me to be a partner, when you know nothing of me. I know that you are analytical and like knowledge. Am I right?"

Twilight nodded, "I've always believed that knowledge is the strongest weapon, as well as the greatest ally."

"Then I propose a deal. It will be your actions that convince me to trust you, in exchange I give you information about myself. The more you show I can trust you, the more I show you can trust me. Does that sound agreeable to you?" Sunset asked.

Twilight considered the offer. She did have a number of questions about Sunset. And from what Twilight had seen of Sunset's demeanor this might be the only way to get personal information from her.

"Ok," Twilight said. "I can work with that."

"I'm glad to hear that. If you have any questions that are eating at you now I may offer some information. You impressed me by your actions when Canterlot was attacked. Not only that you also seemed to have gained the trust of Princess Luna, Orion, and Honesty. Those are three ponies that don't give out rust easily. Don't press your luck though There are a lot of things that I keep personal. There are only two ponies alive now that know all my secrets," Sunset said.

Twilight had multiple questions. She tried to organize them in her head by importance and then sub-organize based on potential of actually getting answered. Five minutes later she finally narrowed down her list.

"Ok first, I heard Luna mentioned that you were her student. Is that true?" Twilight asked hoping that she hadn't already gone too far.

Sunset nodded. "Yes, in a mannor of speaking I am her student. Not the same relationship you an Celestia have-" her hand twitched,"-But not entirely different."

Twilight suddenly stopped walking. Now her interest was peaked and her mind ran wild with what that information meant.

A secret team with a student from both princesses. This sounds like a poorly written story not real life.

Twilight noticed that while she had stopped moving, Sunset had kept walking. Twilight doubted that Sunset hadn't noticed, her situational awareness seemed to high for that to be the case.

"And just how did you becoming her student happen?" Twilight pressed.

"That's gonna need to stay personal for now. That's a story I really don't like to share," Sunset stonewalled.

Some time passed as Twilight considered her next question.

"Why the call sign 'Wolf'? I don't see how that matches with you like the others seem to with their call signs."

To this question Sunset just shook her head and said, "Already told you back in the armory, that's personal. That hasn't changed ."

Twilight frowned but there was nothing she could do. If she tried to press to hard it would only be counter productive to her cause of getting answers. Without answers she would stay just as far in the dark as she was now. That wouldn't do at all. Twilight spent a few minutes going back over her list to decided what her next question should be.

"Princess Luna explained how all our gifts were enhanced to aid us on missions, but all she gave you was a revolver. It's a beautiful revolver, don't get me wrong. Ff I used physical weapons that would be high on my list, but it still seems like just any old revolver. What is special about it?"

Sunset sighed softly and pulled out the midnight blue revolver. She then held it out for Twilight to look at.

"I can't tell you why it is special because that is personal. But, that wasn't really the question you asked. Unlike what it may seem it is magically enhanced to aid me as the Gunslinger. It comes down to the way I fight and use magic. Let me ask you a question that I already know the answer too but humor me for the sake of making a point. Why do you use purely ethereal weapons, and why do they work so well for you when most unicorns still have to rely on conventional arms?"

Twilight thought about it for a bit. She had always just stuck to magical combat arms because hers had always been stronger then real weapons. Now that she thought about it though, she did start to realize that she rarely ever saw another unicorn use magical combat. Even when they did it was to supplement, or as a back up to, their normal weaponry.

"I guess it's just because it's so natural for me." Twilight answered not sure if that was what Sunset was getting at.

"Precisely. You are Valkyrie," Sunset stated.

A what?

"Umm, Sunset, sorry I mean, Wolf. I have no idea what a Valkyrie is." Twilight said not even trying to hide her confusion and curiosity.

This time it was Sunset's turn to stop dead in her tracks and stare at Twilight.

"You really mean to tell me that Celestia never told you?" Sunset asked with disbelief. "Hell even I knew that's what you are and she couldn't even be bothered to tell you."

"I ahh...I guess not." Twilight answered meekly accompanied with a small nervous laugh.

"Fine I guess I have to explain it to you before I get back to my original point. A Valkyrie is a rare aberration of a unicorn that only comes about every 100 years or so. They are extremely gifted in both manipulation of magical energy and shear depth of power, although they tend to favor one side or the other. I'm sure if you think back on history you can come up with at least one name that fits this bill."

Twilight considered this before exclaiming, "Starswirl the Bearded right? He's my idol!"

Sunset nodded. "That would make sense. He was a Power Valkyrie like yourself. You both have better control of magic then a normal unicorn but that is eclipsed by your shear power. I on the other hand, am a Control Valkyrie. I don't have the depth of magical reserve you do, but I can use my magic in manors that you may understand, but never replicate."

"So then I assume that Eclipse in some way compliments this?" Twilight asked starting to put the picture together.

"Exactly, now your starting to understand. Eclipse was designed for a Control style user. It allows me to fire regular ammunition, or with it's aid, I can change the very physics of the bullet. When you start training you will get to see more of the specifics." Sunset said, a smirk creeping onto her face at that last part.

Twilight wasn't sure she liked the look of that smile. It looked too much like the smile Shinning got before he pulled a prank, or the one Princess Celestia got be for she gave a particularly difficult exam.

"And the other one? Why also have another along when you have Eclipse?" Twilight asked as they resumed their walk down the forest path.

Sunset flourished the colt revolver with practiced ease before holstering it. Then with a much slower draw she withdrew the light orange, yellow, and red 1911.

"You mean Daydream here?" Sunset asked, looking at the handgun. "I have multiple reasons for holding onto her. The only one your going to get for now is that when in a SNAFU or an op goes FUBAR I like to be able to put more lead down range then Eclipse can solo. Plus, admit, were you even considering doing anything asinine when you were starring down the barrel of two .45's?"

"No I can't say that I was." Twilight admitted sheepishly.

"Good. That's the way I like my interrogations." Sunset said with a more genuine smile.

She holstered Daydream back under her black duster.

"Though I suggest not letting the enemy pull the same trick on you during an op. I would rather not have to come save you from a rookie fuck up."

Twilight nodded that she understood, "I'll do best."

For the first time since Twilight had meet the mare, Sunset actually laughed.

"Damn straight you will. In this job you don't do you're best, you die. You do your best and you possibly get to not die."

Twilight gave the flame headed mare a queer look.

"You have a bit of a morbid sense of humor, you know that right?"

"You better get used to it, It comes with the territory. And I ain't talking just about the Everfree either."

Twilight sighed and chuckled a bit herself. Even being a bit rough around the edges Twilight could see how Sunset fit so well with the Nightmares.

I may not fully understand this mare, but I could get used to her.

Sunset spoke up, "Looks like we arn't too far from Ponyville. So if you have another question I suggest that you ask it now."

Twilight looked ahead and sure enough she could see the trees thinning and a hint of civilization. Not only that but the sun was starting to peak over the eastern horizon. Twilight had already decided on her last question.

"So your role on the team is 'Gunslinger' right? What exactly does that entail?"

"Would you look at that! A practical question about the job and what we do. About time," Sunset said with a light shove, that Twilight took to mean that she was probably joking.

Probably.

Sunset continued, "A gunslinger is one part stealth one part firepower, and all parts ass kicker. I can swing from running through shadows to a fire fight in no time flat. That is why I go in with you during infiltration missions. You do most of the wet work while I cover you. If shit hits the fan, as it likes to do, I'm your covering fire till the rest of the team responds."

Twilight pondered this. "So on a spectrum it goes from me being the stealthy one, to Honesty bringing the noise, with you somewhere in the middle?"

"Spot on there Spellblade." Sunset replied. "Now we need to clam up about work as we are getting into town."

Twilight noticed that as they walked further towards the center of Ponyville, more and more ponies started to rise with the coming sun. With this in mind Twilight agreed that in the interest of OpSec it was probably best if they clammed up.

"What hotel did you leave the rest of your gear at?" Sunset asked.

Twilight directed Sunset in the direction of the tree shaped hotel that she had checked into. They both took of in its direction. They had to to keep maneuvering around all the ponies on the street in the morning hours, farmers heading to the fields, merchants going to peddle wears in the market, young fillies and colts on their way to class. All around were houses with thatched roofs, and rustic design. Small shops along the street peddled everything from sofas to quills. Stay at home wives and husbands kissed their spouses as they went to work and handed the children lunches as they left for school. It was all a rather nice mix of small town charm. Twilight felt that if given the chance this wouldn't be a bad place to live when she wasn't staying at the base quarters. It was even close to Home Castle.

"So were you planning on going back to Canterlot with your bit of leave before we continue?" Sunset asked drawing Twilight's attention back from her surroundings.

"Yep, I was going to go see my family, and there is another that I should probably visit while I'm there." Twilight answered.

They walked up the door of the hotel and Twilight ran inside and up to her room. Her duffel was still on the bed where she had left it the night before. Grabbing in she returned to the front desk and paid for the room that had ultimately been used as more of a storage locker then a hotel room.

Oh well. The room was cheap.

Twilight walked back outside to where Sunset was waiting for her.

"I checked and their is a train that leaves for Canterlot in ten minutes. If you want I can take you're duffel back to base and you can jump the train home," Sunset offered.

"I could't make you haul my stuff all the way back to Home Castle just so I can get an earlier train," Twilight replied, not wanting to act like a burden on the mare that had possibly started to trust and accept her a little.

"Really it's not a problem. I have a short cut I can take back that I normally use. I just couldn't take you down it yet," Sunset said as she started to steer Twilight to the train station.

"If you're sure then here you are." Twilight handed her bag off to Sunset.

"Have fun. Oh and remember, don't talk about the team to anyone including your brother. I would also prefer if you don't talk about me with anyone while you are there. There are a few ponies up there that I would really like to not remember me," Sunset said.

With her piece said Sunset backed into a shadow cast by the ticket booth and when Twilight blinked Sunset was gone.

Shaking her head with frustration at still not understanding how Sunset or Captain Hunter did that she walked up to the ticket counter and purchased her pass.

A few minutes later the train pulled into the station with the usual gust of steam and cacophony of a slowing train. Twilight climbed aboard. Finding an open seat in the corner of an empty car, she flopped down. Now that she was sitting and no longer caught up in the goings on, the past few hours caught up with her. The tension of her first encounter, The excitement of her commissioning, the recounting of the attack. All in all it had been a long night and she hadn't slept in close to twenty hours. With her body relaxing in the chair she started to drift off. Finally she pulled her cloak around her self. Not wanting to be bothered until she arrived at Canterlot, and not wanting to have a pickpocket to try and be wise while she was asleep Twilight made sure she was fully covered and then muttered the activation phrase 'nachtzeit' to vanish from view before finally falling asleep.

Author's Notes:

I'm sorry if this has been a bit slow but I wanted to try and build the world first before jumping into the action, but rest assured that there is action coming. I just want you to actually get to know the characters before combat.

Please let me know what ya'll think of the story to this point.

Thanks for reading
Aim High All

Chapter VII: Home Leave

Twilight slept through the vast majority of the long train ride back to Canterlot. After the long night the sleep was vary much welcome, even if it did leave her with a kink in her neck from sleeping in a sitting position. Thankfully the train car she was in seemed to stay pretty empty and her cloak had done what it was meant to do. No one had bothered her the entire trip. Thinking the activation phrase in her head Twilight reappeared just as the train was pulling into Canterlot Central Station. When the train finally pulled to a stop she disembarked and walked out of the station. Checking the clock on the outside of the station Twilight saw that it was close to 1100 hours.

The normal way that Twilight would use to get to her parents house went through the market district. Twilight didn't particularly want that direction so she took the much longer rout around the outskirts of town. It took considerably longer but it mean that she was able to avoid the devastation in the market district. In total it took about an hour to walk from the train station back to her childhood home.

When she got there, she walked up to the entrance and knocked twice on the door crisply. She heard a shuffle of movement inside before the door opened.

"Oh Twilight honey! It's so nice to see you. Come in, come in," the light gray unicorn mare said with a sparkle in her eye. Stepping back the mare opened the door.

Anypony would have been able to tell that Twilight Velvet was Twilight Sparkle's mother even without the need to hear the similar names. They shared the same manecut, the same facial features, and the same mannerisms. The only difference was the coat color, the strip in her mane was white instead of pink, and the fact that Velvet was close to twenty years older then her daughter.

Stepping through the entrance way Twilight hugged her mother.

"Hey mom. It's good to see you too. Is dad home or did he go into the lab today?"

Velvet returned the hug before answering.

"Oh yes, your father is in the kitchen getting lunch ready. You came on a good day too. Shining is coming over for lunch today too." Velvet broke into a wide grin. "Oh how wonderful! both my children over for lunch, just like when you were little."

Velvet led Twilight back through the house to the kitchen where a light blue unicorn with a darker blue mane stood at the counter cutting up cucumbers for sandwiches.

"Nightlight dear, look who I found! You'll need to make another cucumber and daisy sandwich for your daughter," Velvet announced.

Nightlight looked up from his task and set the knife down and made his way around the counter to where the two mares stood. He wrapped his daughter in a hug like Velvet had done earlier.

"How's my little Twily doing?" he asked.

After being release from the hug Twilight replied, "I'm doing great! I'm sure Shining told you that I got my first assignment."

He nodded, "He sure did, but he didn't tell us anything about it though. I'm guessing though that you are with the Lunar Guard if the outfit is anything to judge by. Want to let your mother and me in on what your going to be doing?"

"I'll let you all know when Shining gets here so I don't need to repeat anything," Twilight replied. "Do you need any help with getting lunch together?"

Velvet steeped forward and put a hand on Twilight's shoulder, "Oh no dear your father and I have it well in hand. You just get an appetite. There should be some time until your brother arrives if you want to wash up dear. You haven't been away so long that you've forgotten where the bathroom is have you dear?" A playful twinkle evident in the edge of Velvet's eye.

"Oh, yes mother. Har har. Unless you've remolded since I went of to school I think I can find a bathroom in the house I grew up in." Twilight snarked back, a mirthful grin growing on her face as she made her way to the kitchen door.

Twilight walked up the stairs that led to the second floor where she had spent her childhood growing up. Her parents still hadn't patched the dent in the wall from where Shinning had ran into it while 'trying to rescue the princess' when they were playing as foals. She made her way down the hallway toward the bathroom. Twilight only got about half-way down the hall before she stopped at the first door.

The door was painted with a tone of lavender that had was significantly lighter now then it had been when it was first painted. Stars in the shape of Twilight's personal crest were centered on the door, also starting to fade with time. Turning the brass knob Twilight gave the door a light push. The door swung open silently showing that the hinges at least had aged better then the old paint. Twilight strolled into her old room and looked around.

Unlike what Velvet had threatened, she had apparently not turned Twilight's old room into a sewing parlor. Twilight also suspected that, were she to peek into Shining's room, she would fail to find the gym equipment that her father had talked about putting into his room when he moved out. The room was just like she had left it when she had moved out five years ago to join Princess Celestia in Canterlot Castle. Twilight scanned the room stopping every now and then on an item of interest. Before she knew it she was preparing a mental list of the items that she would need to pack to take with her to Home Castle. The majority of her personal belongings were still here as she had left them behind when joining Celestia's School for the Gifted. While she was the princess's personal student, that didn't change the fact that life at a millitary school meant a life of spartan possessions.

Well my book collection of course, I cant leave that. Some pictures perhaps?

Twilight continued to ponder what of her possessions she should take back with her to Home Castle for a few minutes before she heard. The door downstairs open and the sound of her mother made it's way up to the second floor. Twilight then remembered what she had originally came up stairs for. She hurried to the bathroom and washed her hands before heading back downstairs.

The first pony she found was her father.

"You were up there for some time. Thought you said you wouldn't get lost?" he asked with a smirk and a good natured elbowing.

With a dramatic roll of her eyes Twilight replied, "Ya ya I know. I was in my room and remembered how much of my personal stuff is still taking up space."

"Oh don't worry about it sweetie. It's not that big a deal for us to hold onto some stuff till you get a place of your own. We should get out to the living room. It sounds like your brother is here." her father said as he picked up a tray full of delicious looking sandwiches.

Twilight followed her father out into the living. As Nightlight had predicted Shining Armor was there talking with Velvet. Shining was dressed in the his light golden yellow Day Guard dress uniform, and his shoes were neatly polished. Their conversation ended as Twilight and Nightlight joined them in the living room. At first Shining's eyes snapped to the sandwiches. His face lit up and he started to salivate like he had been stranded for years on an island with nothing to eat.

Twilight rolled her eyes again at the display he put on at the sight of home made food.

Brothers. Brothers never change.

It took a few seconds for Shining's staring contest with the food to end, but when it finally did he noticed that he was not the only sibling that came for lunch.

"Twily! Your home! I thought you were shipping out for assignment?" he asked moving in for a quick hug.

She returned the hug before admonishing her brother for calling her "Twily" again.

"I actually already have my assignment, but there is a little time before I can start my formal training for the unit so I was given a bit of leave." Twilight continued.

"Oh that's right now that your brother is here you can finally tell us what it is you will be doing." Velvet said turning to look at her daughter.

"Yep I got assigned to the Lunar Guard," Twilight said with a bit of pride.

"We can see that," Shining said.

Shining looked her up and down taking in her new Lunar Guard uniform. His eyes seemed to catch twice during his inspection. First on the alternate patch that was on her right shoulder. The second time was when he took in the cloak. His eyes squinted at it for a second or so, but he made no comment about it at the time.

"I think our uniforms still look better but to each their own I guess," Shining said with a sly smile and joking shrug.
gesturing to the sitting area.

"At least we don't look like a unit of walking lemons," Twilight stuck her tongue out at her brother playfully.

"No, you just like one of those new televisions with poor reception," Shining countered with his own joking grin.

"Now you two, stop teasing each other like you were foals again. Let's sit and enjoy the food your father made," their mother interjected, gesturing to the table in the middle of the room.

They all took a seat around the living room table and Nightlight placed the tray of sandwiches on the table. Shining grabbed a sandwich faster then Twilight could blink. He took a quick bite and swallowed before he turned back to Twilight

"So I assume by the crest you took the position with Midnight? Or I guess Captain Hunter as you would know him." Shining asked before he took a second large bite.

Taking her own sandwich, Twilight answered, "Yeah. I got a pretty convincing pitch on why I should join."

Nightlight looked between his children. "Wait a second. Shining, did you know what assignment Twilight got and not tell us?"

Turning to face his daughter he continued, "And are you going to finally clue your mother and me in on what it is you're going to be doing?"

"Sorry I didn't let you guys know, but I don't even really know what she is doing. I just know her CO from when we served together in the Griffon War." Shining said with an apologetic look at his parents.

They all turned to face Twilight now with expectant looks. She wasn't sure exactly what to tell them. She had promised not to tell even her brother about what the unit really does, but she also didn't want to have to maintain a lie with her family. The conflict on what to do about had been eating at her insides for a bit now. Ultimately, Twilight had decided to go with a half truth.

"I work with a team that collects information on possible threats so that they can be acted on if the threat is credible." Twilight answered.

Technically, that was correct. She did work with the unit that collected the information, she just left out the part about what part of the unit she was on.

Shining cast a glance at her, but this seemed to appease her parents as they smiled. Her mother even sighed with relief as if a weight had been lifted from her shoulders.

"I'm glad to hear that you are in a back lines job where you can use that brain of yours. We were so worried about Shining when he was in combat. You can't believe how glad your father and I are that you won't be getting shot at constantly." Velvet said patting her daughter on the hand.

Twilight tired not to let her nervousness show, but she couldn't stop her hand from moving up and scratching the back of her head.

"Yeah, I'm sure you two must be relieved to hear that." A nervous laughter escaped Twilight's mouth, but her parents didn't seem to catch it.

The conversation continued for a while between the family. A few easier questions to answer like, had she gotten to know any other ponies in the unit yet, and where she was going to live. Twilight told them that the base had its own quarters for members of the unit, and that she had also come to pick up some important personal items to take back with her.

Eventually, they all finished their meals. Nightlight and Velvet took all the dishes back to the kitchen. The told Twilight that she should go pack what she was going to take so that she could take it back with her on the train. Shining Armor also offered to help her pack as well. Twilight and Shining made their way upstairs and back to Twilight's childhood room.

For a bit they worked mostly in silence. Twilight would select an item that she wanted and would hand it to her brother to pack in a box. Finally, Shining broke the reprieve.

"So what are you really doing with Midnight?" he asked.

Twilight was caught by surprise so much that she dropped her stuffed animal, Smartypants, as she was considering packing him. He ended up falling into the box so that settled that debate. Now to deal with her brother.

"Uhmm...What do you mean 'really doing'? I told you already," she asked trying to sound calm.

"You can cut the crap with me Twilight." Shining didn't sound angry, just serious. "I'll start with the cloak."

"What about my cloak. It was just a gift that I received when I joined the unit." Twilight said defensively.

Shinning crossed his arms. "I've see those kinds of cloaks three separate times. First was when I caught a master theif when I just joined the guard. The second was a hunter/kill team that the griffons sent after my unit back during the war. Lastly was Capt. Nightshade. It's a shadow cloak. I've seen them in action, I know what they do."

"So, it was a nice gift." Twilight tried to deflect weakly.

Shinning continued, "I'll move on to the unit crest. I've had to work with a lot of the intel guys from the LG, and none of them have a special unit crest. You also share the crest with Hunter. Now that Nightshade has passed, Hunter is the most exceptional combat operators I have ever known."

"But he told you he was intel as well and you believed him. Why can't I have the same crest and still be an intelligence operator as well?" Twilight asked trying to out logic her brother.

He wasn't having any of it.

"I never for a second believed him. I just knew that pushing it would be a good way to ruin a friendship. But he isn't my little sister. So will tell me what you are doing."

Twilight sighed. She knew when she was beaten, but she shook her head anyways.

"I can't. I made a promise to Princess Luna not to tell even you what it is we do. We have to stay off the radar. Secrecy is mission critical for us."

Shining just looked at her for a while with his arms crossed. Eventually, he relented.

"Ok, if it is so important I won't push it with you either. I want you to know that if you ever need to, you can come to me for help. Let Hunter know the same goes for him, even if he is a stubborn ass when it comes to accepting help."

Twilight nodded in assurance.

"I promise that I will tell you if I need anything."

He stepped closer to Twilight and wrapped her in a hug.

"Just please be careful. I was in combat remember, I know what it can do to you."

With that done the siblings went back to the task of packing. It mostly consisted of a lot of books, a few pieces of small furniture like lamps or an alarm clock, some personal decorations like movie and book posters, a few records of her favorite music, and some pictures of family. All of it was neatly packed into three boxes labeled with her name and destination so that they wouldn't get lost in transit by the baggage team at the train station. With that done Twilight and Shining made their way back down with the boxes trailing behind them, wrapped in Twilight's levitation spell.

Their parents walked out from the kitchen. Velvet had a letter in her hand. It was Nightlight that spoke first however.

"A royal messenger came by while you two were upstairs and he brought a letter for Twilight." He said as his wife handed the parchment to Twilight.

Twilight wasn't sure how Princess Celestia could have known that she was in town, but clearly she did. The fact that she had a royal letter, delivered by a royal messenger could only have been from her.

Twilight unrolled the scroll and read what it had to say.

My faithful student,

I am aware that you are back in Canterlot already. I am glad that you are because I have some information that I would like to talk to you about. I know that my sister has offered you a position on her special team and I would like to talk to you about it.

-Princess Celestia

The fact that Princess Celestia knew about the team didn't surprise Twilight as much as she thought it would have. Perhaps it was just because the princess always seemed to know everything. That and it was also very possible that Princess Luna just simply kept her sister informed.

She finished reading the letter and rolled it back up. She saw that her family were all looking at her expectantly.

"It's nothing important. The princess found out I was in town and just wants me to come by the castle so that we can talk," Twilight informed the three looking at her.

"That's sweet of her to still care about you even after your graduation from her school." Velvet said with a smile. "You should go see her."

"I actually need to get back to the garrison as well. I can walk you to the castle on my way," Shinning added.

"What about my stuff? It might not be a good idea to just show up at Princess Celestia's wing with boxes of stuff following about behind me," Twilight wondered.

"Oh don't worry about that honey. Your father and I can get them to the train station for you while you go to the castle," Velvet said.

"Yep, I know one of the luggage stallions. I can get them to hold your stuff till you get there and get a train," Nightlight added trying to reassure his daughter.

Twilight considered this for a bit. It would be a good Idea to talk to the princess. Especially about this whole Valkyrie situation. Having her stuff dropped off at the station for her also meant that she could go to the hospital and potentially see that little colt if he was still there.

"Alright, you've convinced me. Are you sure it's no trouble?" Twilight asked her parents.

"Not at all Twilight. Despite how old he looks, your dad can still manage a levitation spell with out any troubles," Twilight's father joked.

"Well then I guess we better get going BBBF" Twilight said looking to her brother.

Shaking his head at the use of the old childhood acronym, he indicated for Twilight to lead the way.

Twilight said her goodbyes to her parents before she stepped out of the front door. Again Twilight was confronted by the problem of having the market district between her and her destination. She started off in the direction of the long way around but was stopped by her brother putting a hand on her shoulder.

"Where are you going? You know full well that the way to the castle is this way." He gestured in the direction of the market. "You aren't trying to avoid it are you?" he asked with a concerned look crossing his face.

Twilight looked a little sheepishly back at her brother.

"Possibly, I'm just not sure I want to see that spot where so many died because we didn't get their in time. Plus we both almost became casualties there as well." Twilight said back to Shinning.

Shinning cast a comforting look back at his sister.

"I know that going back to a place marred by violence can be difficult, but it might be a good idea for you to see what has become of it in such a short time.

Twilight relented and allowed her brother to directer her back in the direction of the quick route back to the castle as well as the market. The walk was not that long and there were only sparse crowds to wade through so they made pretty good time. In only a few minutes they were already at the edge of the market square.

Twilight gasped a little. Teams of ponies had come together from all across the city to pitch in and help the devastated district. The destruction was almost completely cleared away already. A few shops were even starting to open again in some areas. All of this was a sight to behold for Twilight, but what really took her breath away was a statute that had been erected in the middle of the market.

The statue was of three ponies, one of each race, standing back to back on a large three sided pedestal, watching over the market. Twilight walked up to the statue and saw that there were a series of words inscribed around the base. As she go closer she saw that it wasn't a saying, but a list of names. The names filled the base and wrapped around all three sides of it. Above the names was an inscription that was broken up between the three sides.

'Never Forgotten,'

'Together We Stand Strong'

'Watching Over You from Beyond'

Twilight just stood staring at the statue reading through the names. Her silent vigil was broken when a pegasus mare walked up to her and asked Twilight a question.

"Are you by any chance Twilight Sparkle?" the mare asked.

Unsure how the mare could have possibly known her name, Twilight just nodded. Before she knew what was happening, Twilight found her self wrapped in a tight embrace.

"Thank you! My family an I were only a half block from the market. If you hadn't shown up when you did I know the violence would have spread to where we were. You save our lives. Thank you so much!" The mare sobbed into Twilight's shoulder.

Not sure how to react Twilight just returned the embrace without saying anything.

The pegasus eventually released Twilight, but the sound of the mare crying into Twilight's embrace drew the attention of another earth pony stallion cleaning off the front patio of his store that seemed to be one of the few that was still intact. He quickly walked over to where Twilight and her brother were standing.

"Ma'am I want to personally thank you and your brother for the heroics you showed that day. The only reason I have a livelihood to come back to is thanks to you two," the stallion stuck out his hand for Twilight and Shining Armor to shake. After they did he thanked them again and made his way back to his shop.

Twilight was stunned. She had avoided this place to keep her distance from the devastation, and yet here she was. The destruction was being removed and the ponies were coming together in a way that she never expected.

"It's a little overwhelming isn't it?" Shinning asked from beside her. "I know I went through a bit of a shock myself the first time I came through here after the attack. But this is the spirit that I cherish when I see it. They have every right to be cowering and isolationist to preserve themselves after something like that, but as you can see they won't be cowed. They stand for each other and are stronger for it."

Twilight and Shining continued on their way through the market towards the castle. All the way there she kept seeing displays of ponies coming together to rebuild the destruction. In a few rare cases a random pony would come up to the siblings and thank them. A few times Twilight had to turn down offers of free patronage at stores upon reopening or other like gifts. If it wasn't for the fact that she would have drawn more attention by suddenly winking out of existence she would have loved to activate her shadow cloak and walk the rest of the way unseen.

Eventually they made it to the gates of the castle. Shining bid her farewell and good luck with her training and then he was off to the Day Guard HQ. Twilight turned in the opposite direction and crossed the courtyard to the castle. Having been a student and living in the castle for over four years Twilight knew exactly where she was going. Whenever Twilight was summoned by Princess Celestia they always met in the same location in the princess's private study. She was also such a common fixture of the castle that the sentries didn't even question her presence. They either just nodded or saluted depending on their respective ranks and their relation to Twilight's own.

Twilight reached the door to Princess Celestia's study and knock twice in quick secession before she was told to enter. Twilight opened the door and passed through. Marching to three paces from the princess's desk, Twilight stopped and snapped a salute.

"Lieutenant Sparkle reporting as ordered." Twilight said with a straight face, watching Celestia's expression.

A light hearted sigh was what she got.

"Twilight, really? Do I need to break down the reasons why you don't need to salute me when we meet in private? Chief of which is that I'm not exactly your commanding princess any more?" Celestia said as she motioned for Twilight to take a seat across from her.

Twilight took the offered seat. Princess Celestia offered her some tea but she declined it.

"I see by your change in fashion that I don't really need to ask for confirmation about you joining my sister's Nightmares." Celestia said with a ghost of a smile. "I think its probably for the best. It's where you have the most potential to help the realm."

"Thank you Princess. I'm glad to hear that you approve." Twilight said honestly.

"Of course Twilight, there are very few choices that I think you would make that I could disapprove of. So how are you liking the team? Getting to know the rest of them?" Celestia asked.

"So far I think the team is pretty well rounded. I feel like I've hit it off well with most of the unit. Apple Jack, the engineer, has already invited me to her shop to help her on projects she is working on." Twilight answered.

"Good to hear that you are getting along with the rest of the team." Celestia said taking a sip of her tea

" I did although hit a few rough patches as well. I didn't exactly set a good first impression with the first and got a pair of .45's in my face for it." Twilight said a little sheepishly.

Celestia paused at hearing that.

"Did you by chance meet a pony with a 'sunny' disposition?" Celestia asked.

Crap I told Sunset I wouldn't let even Princess Celestia know about her.

"No Wolf just thought I was trying to break in at first." Twilight answered hoping that using Sunset's call sign would hide her identity.

Luckily the princess didn't give any indication that she recognized the name. "I see was all she said."

"Princess, If you don't mind, I have a few questions that I would like to ask you." Twilight said trying to hide in her chair.

"Go ahead Twilight. Anything." Celestia replied.

"Ok here it goes." Twilight tried to keep her nervousness under control. "Am I a Valkyrie?"

Celestia stopped mid sip and placed her tea cup back on the saucer that sat on her desk.

"I see. So you found out on your own then. Yes you are." Celestia said looking into Twilight's eyes.

"Then why didn't you tell me? It doesn't seem like it's that big of a thing, they are just rare and skilled right?" Twilight pressed.

"Because being a Valkyrie is a big deal. I hid this information from you for two reasons. I wanted to avoid a terrible mistake I made in the past and to protect you. The problem with a Valkyrie, of either type, is that their body produces more magic then it can reliably contain. It can result in magical flares if the Valkyrie tries to use their enhanced abilities without maintaining control." Celestia explained.

Twilight adopted a confused look. "What do you mean by magical flares?"

"I trust that you remember your entrance exam?" was all Celestia said. She raised an eyebrow at her former student.

Twilight's cheeks turned crimson as she remembered that day. She had thrown the test proctors around the room and had turned her parents into house plants. How could she possibly forget.

"I see what you mean now." Twilight said. "What did you mean by advanced skills?"

"It varies from Valkyrie to Valkyrie. Starswirl was attuned with portal opening, artifact creation, and banishment. For you I am not fully sure what all of your's are, but I do know that one of them is fully formed ethereal blades.

It was Twilight's turn to raise an eyebrow. "I know that I'm good with them but any combat mage can learn to use ethereal blades."

Celestia shook her head. "You misunderstand. A fully formed blade is different from a normal one. While normal ethereal blades act just like ones made of physical properties, only lighter, a fully formed blade can cut through anything that is not another fully realized blade or specifically reinforced against it. They are incredibly rare even among Valkyries. Do you remember during the attack seeing your blade take on a more solid color as opposed to its traditional translucent one? "

Twilight tried to think back to that day. She wasn't exactly preoccupied by the state of her blade during the battle, she was a little busy staying alive. Although as she thought more on the details she did vaguely remember seeing her blades get a little darker in color. It had happened when that diamond dog, Canine, had rushed her brother and she had cut the dog's gun in half before throwing the dog through a wall with her magic.

"I think I recall something like that. How did you know?" Twilight asked her mentor.

"Luna shared her intelligence report with me and the reconstruction of the events. I say it during the fight." Celestia explained.

"So can using these fully formed blades be dangerous for me?" Twilight asked?

Celestia nodded. "They can be. They are hard to control or even activate even for those skilled in them.

"Is there anything I can do to control it better?" Twilight asked eager to learn about this new part of her magic.

"There is not much that you can do yourself besides practice. Though I did provide a parting gift to my last student. Perhaps if I...."

Celestia trailed off, seemingly lost in thought for a second.

"Hmm... No I won't trouble you with that at the moment. Though I will figure out a good gift to help aid you with this new assignment of yours."

"Thank you princess. Was there anything else you wanted to talk about?" Twilight asked.

"Yes there was one last thing." Celestia said as she passed a small badge across the table.

Twilight picked up the small badge that had just been pushed her way. Looking at it she saw that it was a visitor badge for Canterlot General Hospital. At first Twilight didn't understand why her former teacher would be handing her this. Then she put this information together with the other motivation that Twilight had for coming to Canterlot today.

"How did you know that I intended to visit that little colt from the attack?" staring at her mentor.

"Well I don't know if you know this but siblings have a habit of checking in on each other. Luna informed me that you intended to go to the hospital, but the wait for a visitor pass is high at the moment. Many a pony want's to check on loved ones to see if they are okay. I was there the other day and when I found out you were going to be in town I held on to that pass for you." Celestia said with a smile.

"I don't know what to say. Thank you Princess." Twilight walked around the desk and hugged her former teacher.

Returning the hug Princess Celestia told her, "It was nothing Twilight. Though I would suggest that you get a move on. Visiting hours are almost to a close for the day, as well as I believe that you need to catch a train later today."

Twilight nodded her head. "You're correct princess I should be off. Do you need me for anything else?"

"No Twilight. You are dismissed. Go and I hope that the meeting with the little colt will do for you what you hope it will. Oh, there is one last thing. When you see my sister next tell her that she should cut back on her cookie intake. Then I need you to stick out your tounge at her. Can you do that for me?"

Twilight was flabbergasted. Was she really being told to tease one princess by another princess.

Twilight mumbled through her words. "I uhh...I guess I can do that Princess."

Celestia just smiled and nodded. Twilight took that as her cue that she was free to go, and walked out of the private study.

Twilight made her way back out of the castle, still only receiving a traditional salute or greeting from the guards as a challenge to her presence. Twilight finally made her way out of the castle and tried to orientate herself so that she could find the hospital. It wasn't a location that she knew well, because she had never needed to go there. After stopping a few ponies on the street to ask directions, Twilight found her self standing in front of Canterlot General. It was possibly the largest building outside of the castle, making Twilight wonder how she had not been able to find it on her own. it was easily five stories tall.

Twilight walked inside and up to the reception desk. She asked for the room number of the small purple colt. The receptionist initially was said that she couldn't let Twilight in because they were already on their limit of guest passes. That was until Twilight showed that she had already attached her guest pass to one of her breast pockets. After that The receptionist was not wishing to divulge the location of the colt because Twilight was not a relative, but after Twilight explained the situation the nurse relented a little and gave the room number for the colt. Twilight thanked her and walked off.

Twilight made her way up to the third floor where the colts room was located. It took some time to find it with all the medical personnel running around, but she did find it.

She stood outside the door and was about to knock before the door suddenly opened on its own. It wasn't the young colt that stepped out but a nurse.

The nurse walked out of the room and almost went headlong into Twilight due to the fact that she was looking more at the clipboard in her hands then where she was going. That and she had a flowing pink mane that covered one eye.

"Oh I'm so sorry ma'am I should pay more attention to where I'm going," the nurse tried to apologize.

"It's alright. Would this happen to be the room of a small purple colt with a green mane by any chance." Twilight asked wanting to make sure she was in the right place.

"Oh yes it is. Are you a relative? He hasn't had any family come by since he was brought here after the attack." The nurse said quietly.

No visitors or family? Maybe my guess was sadly correct and he is an orphan now.

"No, I'm not family but I am here to check up on him. I was the one that found him during the attack, and I wanted to see if he was doing alright." Twilight explained.

"Oh I see. Well he seems to be recovering quickly. He's awake now if you want me to take you in to see him," the nurse said.

Twilight nodded, "I'd appreciate that."

The nurse turned back around and re-opened the door and led Twilight through it. The room they entered was small, sterile smelling, and white. Just like every other hospital recovery room. Centered on one wall was a hospital bed surrounded by monitoring equipment. Laying on the bed was the small colt with a light pinkish purple coat. Twlight noticed that all of his burn wounds were fully healed now. Much faster then they should have. This didn't extend to all of his wounds, as he still had bandages around the gunshot wound that he had received. Only the fire based wounds were healing faster.

"You're looking a lot better then the last time I saw you. Especially the burns." Twilight commented after looking over the small boy.

"Uhh...I guess," the colt replied clearly not remembering the first time that they had met. Not that that surprised Twilight. The little one had been in unconscious and going into shock at the time.

"We noticed the burns healing fast as well. We won't know until his blood work gets back from the lab but some of the nurses are speculating he has some dragon blood in him." The pink maned nurse explained.

"Well that's interesting to hear." Twilight replied.

The whole time the look on the colt's face kept getting more and more confused.

"I'm sorry ma'am but do I know you?" he asked Twilight.

Twilight turned back to the colt laying on the bed, "Well no you don't know me. I was just the one that found you after the attack and brought you to medical attention. I was just hoping to check in on you and see if you are alright. My name is Twilight Sparkle, by the way. What's your name?."

The little colt listened to what Twilight had to say until she said her name. At this a look of anger crossed his face.

"Do you mean that you are the same Twilight sparkle that was in the paper? The one that was there when the attack happened?" he asked.

"Yes," Twilight said, "I was the first one to respond."

"THEN FUCK YOU!" the colt shouted with furious anger.

"Spike! Mind your language please. That is no way for one your age to talk." the nurse tried to reprimand him.

"No! She is the reason my parents are dead. She was to slow to save them. Now I'm alone." The child started to sob.

Twilight decided that this had been a mistake to come here. She apologized to the colt for upsetting him and to the nurse for holding her up. She made her way out of the hospital, leaving her badge on the receptionist's desk. She made her way all back to the train station. She found her father's friend who had held on to her luggage and thanked him. She then went and bought her ticket.

She stood with no emotion on her face until the train called for all passengers to Ponyville. She stored her belongings in the compartment below the train then boarded. Again she found a mostly empty car and sat down. She mentaly said the word 'nachtzeit' to activate her shadow cloak once again. This time it wasn't to avoid being disturbed while sleeping, but so that no one could see her cry herself to sleep.

Author's Notes:

This was a bit of a longer chapter because there were a lot of points I wanted to hit before going back to training and I didn't want to drag it out to a second chapter of no combat or at least training for combat.

Thank you again for reading.
Aim High All

Chapter VIII: Getting Up to Speed

So I don't think I'm a fan of the rain.

Another burst of lightning came from the port side of the cargo ship. The rain had come in about twenty minutes ago as Twilight had settled into her hiding spot. She currently stood in a shadow in the back of the cargo freighters main deck with her shadow cloak activated. While the rain was a pain in the ass she was glad to have the cloud cover. The moon had been full before the clouds had moved in and made it difficult to stay hidden even under the dark of night. Now the moon was gone and she was nigh impossible to see even when she deactivate her cloak.

The pirate guard sweeping this section of the deck had already walked past her location, and even with her shadow cloak masking her visual presence, she was sure he would find her on each pass. This time wouldn't just be another observation. Twilight had already concluded that his path was patterned and that no other guards came through this area. As the unicorn pirate stepped past her, Twilight stepped out of the dark and ignited her horn causing a dagger length spell blade to silently grow from her right forearm. As she moved forward the cloaks hiding ability dissipated back into its mute black and gray pattern.

Twilight approached the unsuspecting guard as a panther hunts in the dark of the jungle. She moved closer to the back of her prey till she was a breath away before unleashing action. She wrapped her left hand over the unicorns mouth to muffle his coming death rattles as her right, armed with the spellblade, drove though his back and punctured her victims right lung and severed multiple arteries. She held the blade in place and hand over his mouth until he stopped thrashing and she lowered his body to the deck. After a quick visual to see if she had alerted anyone she let her blade fade back to nothing. It had been lucky that the pirate had not been wearing much armor or her blade might not have gone in far enough. While she had been practicing, she was still unable to reliably get her blades to go fully formed like she had during the attack on Canterlot.

Twilight made her way to the door hatch of the rear deck house. She found herself in a tight stairwell that only led up.

Damn I need to get below deck. Might as well make sure that there are no deck observers up here before I cross to the bow.

Twilight made her way up the metal plate steps trying to not give away her approach if there were any more pirates up here. Reaching the next landing she found herself standing in front of a second hatch door. She slowly opened it and moved in. Turns out it was the helmsman's room.

"Who the Fuck are you and what are you doing on my ship?!"

Well shit!

Twilight turned to find the deck officer, a sea foam green earth pony, standing behind the navy blue pegasus helmsman. The officer drew his pistol and leveled it at Twilight, while the helmsman kept shooting glances between Twilight, the officer, and a button off to the far wall labeled 'ALARM'.

Twilight raised her hands to show she had no physical weapons on her. The officer approached with less caution then he should have. Being a earth pony he probably didn't even stop to consider the risk of ethereal weapons.

When he stepped in range Twilight grabbed his hand holding the pistol with her left. With a flare of her horn she re-summoned her blade, this time the length of a short sword, and pushed through the officer's chest.

During this the helmsman had abandoned his post at the controls, and ran for the far alarm button.

Twilight dispelled her blade and grew a magic missile on her right index, middle, and ring finger before letting them fly. In her hast to deal with the mess she a stumbled into all of them missed their target.

Crap, crap, crap.

She took a very quick calming breath and leveled one more missile at running helmsman, ensuring that her aim was true. She let if fly.

Just as the helmsman reached the alarm the missile struck him in the back and he crumpled to the ground in a sprawl of limbs.

"That was real fucking close Spellblade, Let's not let the whole ship know you are there. We need you to get evidence that the griffons are smuggling a bio weapon on this pirate freighter. If they get word you found it then they get enough time to come up with plausible deniability before we reveal it to the public."

The voice came over a small earpiece she wore in her left ear.

Reaching up touch it she replied, "I'm sorry Orion, I didn't want to come up here but I need to cross to the far side and these two would have spotted me for sure."

"I understand but you need to have more situational awareness when entering a room."

"Understood."

Twilight moved the bodies of the officer and the helmsman to the back of the helm room. Checking through the bodies revealed two beneficial items. The first was the access key to the hold and the second was a cargo list that told her exactly where in the hold her target was. It wasn't detailed enough for Twilight to take it as evidence but it did make the search for the right crate easier. Now she just had to get to it without getting spotted again.

Twilight magically locked the controls of the ship so that the ship would continue to go straight so that it wouldn't alert the rest of the crew. She then set off back down the stairs to the main deck.

She made her way across the deck taking cover behind the occasional crate or cargo container so that any passing guards didn't spot her. The rain and darkness thankfully help to mask her movements and sound as she crossed to the bow of the ship. Thankfully she didn't actually see any more deck guards.

Maybe those three where the only ones above deck.

Once she made it to the front of the ship she found the hull hatch that allowed her to descend to the the next lower deck.

"Make sure to watch your corners." the voice in her ear said

She found that she was passing through the crew quarters. A series of bunks filled the sides of the hall, four on each side for a total of eight. All the bunks were sloppy as if they were slept in and never made afterwards.

As she slinked through the hall she noticed another pirate, a griffon this time, walking down the hall with his back to her.

Well, walking may not be the correct term for the movement that the griffon was performing. It was a mix of swaying and sloppy flailing. As Twilight approached she saw that gripped in the griffon's claw was a large bottle of cider that was all but gone at this point. There was no way to go around the griffon so she decided that she needed to go through him.

Approaching from behind she pulled the same move that she did on the guard up above. This time however she didn't just leave the body on the deck. She lowered the griffon into one of the bunks where she covered him with a blanket.

Twilight continued on. The next hatch door led her to the cargo hold. Spotting a ladder to her left she climbed up to the catwalk above. From her vantage point she spotted three more guards; a unicorn, an earth pony, and another griffon. Noticing that their patrols crossed each other she knew she couldn't just sneak up on each guard and take them out with her blades.

She grew a magic missile and waited for the right time when one of the guards wan't being watched. Finally the unicorn stepped behind a crate and for a brief second was out of sight of her comrades. Twilight fired the shot striking the unicorn in the head killing the mare instantly.

The griffon didn't see the shot but he did hear the sound of the body drop. He started to make his way to where the unicorn had been standing a few seconds before.

"Oy! Daisy, did you trip over your own damn feet again?" the griffon called out.

He turned the corner and walked right into Twilight's line of fire. Another magic missile took him out as well.

The remaining earth pony was alerted once again by the sound of a falling body.

"What the fuck are you two doing back there?" he said as he too went to investigate only to get a missile to the chest for his troubles.

Well that was easy. That should be all of them.

Twilight made her way back down the ladder and walked to where the cargo document said her target was located. Sure enough she found a cargo container with Griffon Kingdom markings. Twilight opened the container door and walked in. The container was filled with crates and each crate was filled with small vials of green liquid. Twilight reached up and tapped her ear piece.

"Orion, this is Spellblade. I have confirmation on the bio weapon."

"Good job Spellblade. Grab a vile and the shipping manifest in the container so that we can link it to the griffons. When you have them get the hell out. Rainboom is in a holding pattern above the ship waiting for you to call for an evac."

"Copy that Orion."

Twilight grabbed the nearest vile of the green substance and the shipping info that was attached to the inside wall of the container. Once she had them she made her way back to the stairs that led to the top deck.

Suddenly Twilight's senses were assaulted by a flashing red light and the sound of a klaxon going off. Twilight's expression melted.

That can't mean anything good.

"We have reports that the alarm's been set off. Get the hell out of there. Now!"

Twilight was all to happy to comply. She rushed up the stairs to the top deck. The storm had apparently grown while she had been below deck. It was starting to rock the ship more side to side.

"Spellblade this is Rainboom. I'm waiting off the port stern for you hurry up we need to go fast."

Twilight rushed for her life and made it all the way to the far side. She saw Rainboom hovering anywhere between a meter and five meters off the side of the ship. She couldn't maintain a good distance because of the swaying.

"You'll have to jump for it!" Rainboom cried.

Twilight took a deep breath to steel herself and took a running start. She got to the edge and leapt.

*Crack*

The revolver rang out. Twilight felt a shock of the impack in the back of her head as she fell to the waters below.

Then her world went black.

---

Twilight opened her eyes to find that she was staring at the floor of her simulation room. Laying on the ground Twilight started to rub the back of her head. It may have only been a training simulation but she still swore she could feel where she had been hit. She hadn't of course. The magic crystal embedded in the ceiling of the simulation room took and returned signals directly from the brain of the pony in the room, as well as the one next door. This allows for the user, or users, to have a scenario play out in their minds while allowing them to affect it. It didn't however, translate the damage from the simulation to the user in the real world, but it could still mess with the mind.

The door to the room opened and Twilight finally pulled her face from the floor to see Sunset and Capt. Hunter walk in.

"So do you know what you did wrong or should I tell you?" Sunset said, standing above her with her arms crossed. She had aviators and duster on over her battle armor

"I didn't run fast enough?" Twilight hazarded as a guess as she pushed her self up to a kneeling position before moving the rest of the way to a standing position.

Sunset just shook her head. This was the third time that they had run the simulation or a variant of it. The first time Twilight didn't even make it below deck before she was found and shot. The second iteration had turned out very similar to the one she had just completed, only she hadn't made it to the jump that time.

"No, it's your situational awareness that keeps getting you killed," Sunset said turning to the captain. "Do you want to explain what she keeps missing or should we run it again?"

Capt. Hunter shook his head and looked over to Sunset, "No, I'll tell her. This is clearly not the way to get her to learn the lesson. She has most of the technical skills down, the problem is her either over or under thinking about the situation. We need a new method to drive this home."

Twilight frowned at the discussion of her failure, especially when it came to the criticism of her critical thinking abilities.

He turned to Twilight, "How many pirates did you take out during your maneuvers before you thought you were in the clear?"

Twilight did a quick headcount, "The first on the deck, the two at the helm, the drunken on, and the three down in the hold. That makes seven."

"That's correct," Capt. Hunter confirmed. "Now how many used beds were there?"

Twilight thought back to the simulation and the hallway where she had killed the drunken griffon. "There were four on each side and they all seemed to be ruffled as if they had been slept in. I guess that would make eight used beds in all."

The captain just nodded as if there was some conclusion that Twilight was supposed to be drawing.

A second later there was an almost audible click went off in Twilight's head. She face palmed and groaned to herself. "I missed a pirate didn't I? That was the alarm right."

Sunset was the one to answer, "Exactly, I was hiding and running random patrols every few minutes to see if you left any substantial evidence of you being there. And my how much evidence it was. Seven kills and only one of them did you try to conceal in any meaningful way. Good rule of thumb is don't drop a body if you don't have to. If you do, hide it well or make sure that you drop all of them. You think you will be able to go up against a cunning opponent like that Luna forsaken, weasel of a back stabbing coward Cain if you don't pay attention to what is going on around you."

Capt. Hunter jumped in at this point, "Despite the saying a dead pony does tell a lot of tales to observant eyes. That is why you need to make sure you have complete situational awareness on a mission. Do you get what we're trying to show you?"

Twilight nodded in confirmation. She did see how the issues they had were valid. While she was great at collecting all the details in an academic situation it was different in a live fire situation. She couldn't always just observe everything before she acted. Twilight knew she had a bad habit of forming a plan and being loathe to deviate from it. She needed to learn how to take information on the fly and alter a plan as needed.

What was that phrase Shining always uses? 'No plan survives first contact with the enemy'?

There was however one other issue that she had.

Twilight looked over at the Gunslinger and huffed a little in frustration, "It would be a lot easier to not kill if you showed me how to do that shadow walking trick."

Sunset shook her head at Twilight, "You may be the team's Shadow-walker but you're not ready to learn that yet. It takes a special kind of battle field understanding to be able to properly use that maneuver with out screwing it up. There is more to situational awareness then just reading the ponies and how they will act it also goes for the enviroment. Could you tell me where every major shadow was on that ship?"

Twilight shook her head, "No I guess I couldn't. Why would that matter?"

"When you shadow walk you enter a plane called the Shadow Realm. You can think of it almost like a large open field full of closed doors and small windows. Each one of those doors is a shadow that you can pass through back into the real world and they are based on proximity and direction in relation to you when you entered the Shadow Realm. It is however, not a one to one scale always. Some of the more stable shadows will allow you a small glimpse though them, but most are not that strong. When you are in the shadow realm it is impossible to know for certain where a shadow will take you. That Is why you need to understand how the real world is functioning and what is going on with others before you can use it."

Sunset raised a hand to her chin and rubbed it in thought. Then a sly grin crossed her face as she turned back to Hunter.

"We could always have her play a game of 'tag' like how Nightshade had us when we were his trainees. If that doesn't teach her to read a situation then I don't know what will."

"We could do that," Capt. Hunter nodded slowly while considered this option. "I think that might be the best option."

The captain led Twilight and Sunset out of the simulation room and into the rest of the live fire training area.

When Twilight had first seen it she had marveled at it. It was a giant concrete room, rivaling the size of the training center back at the Day Guard HQ. Twilight also found that it had many possible configurations. Most of the time it was just a very large firing range with the simulation rooms off to the far left side. She had been told however that they could have the room set up to do multiple different live fire training exercises with the whole team. This was mostly done when there was an upcoming mission to prep for. The only reason they hadn't used it was that They had wanted to do practices with multiple "enemies" and that was hard to do outside of the simulator.

"Twilight, why don't you go take a break. Sunset an I need to talk about exactly how we want to do this and get the set up ready." Captain Hunter said directing his gaze to Twilight.

Twilight nodded. "I wouldn't mind a short break. I could use a shower."

She really could. Twilight could feel the layer of sweat all over her. While the simulator reduced your neural connection to the muscles, it didn't stop all of it. This meant that some actions were actually being performed by your body. It also didn't stop your mind from reacting to all the movement that it thought you were doing, or the heat that you would normally feel from it. Because of this you still tended to sweat quite a bit in the simulator.

Taking her leave Twilight walked out of the live fire range and to her room. Normally after using the range you needed to go to the armory to store your arms, but Twilight didn't have that problem.

Twilight had been given one of the personal rooms that were behind the four doors on the sides of the common lounge. Her's was on the same side as the chess board, and next to Sunset's. Twilight's room was the one closer to the lobby while Sunset's was closer to the training room. The two rooms on the other side housed Apple Jack and Rainbow Dash. When Twilight had quickly noticed that there were fewer rooms them Nightmares she had been informed that the captain had a room behind his office, and that Bulwark kept his room in the medical bay so that he was always there if an emergency happened.

Twilight pushed through her door and peeled her LDUs off and levitated them to the wash hamper. From here she made her way to the bathroom that was attached to her room. She turned on the water and waited for it to warm. One relaxing shower later she was dressed in a clean set of LDUs and laying on her bed. Her head swam with thoughts. It started with a detailed break down of the training session and what she should have done at key points. From there she went over the criticism and feedback that she had received. This only lasted so long, as when she started to think of the criticisms that she had been told one surfaced above the rest.

"THEN FUCK YOU!"

The exclamation reverberated in her mind for some time.

Does he have a point? What could I have done? I got their as fast as I could. Could I have been more ruthless in my attack? I was trying to save the innocents not kill the attackers. I get that he has no one now but...I don't know.

That was just it. She didn't know, and it was eating at her. Why was she his target. She was the one that had probably saved him, but none the less it had been her that he had directed his anger at. Why did he......

*RATTATATATATA*

The strange repeating sound pulled Twilight from her internal thought process. It seemed to come from outside Twilight's door and back towards the physical training area.

What is that? It sound almost like a machine gun firing on auto with a suppressor on.

*PING*

The noise reverberated around the base. It sounded almost like a bullet going off in a sealed cave.

"CELESTIA DAMN IT! COLT OF A BITCH!"

The swears rang out just behind the ringing and at almost the same decibel level. Those pretty much narrowed down the location of the disturbance. Those were the swears of a pissed off engineer. Twilight knew, she had used them herself every now and then when an experiment blew up in her face.

Twilight made her way out of the room, back into the work out area. A stream of smoke pouring out of the Engineering Lab confirmed her suspicions. Twilight approached with caution. She didn't know what had happened just that it had gone wrong apparently.

Opening the door she found AJ with a fire extinguisher furiously trying to douse the flames that were engulfing what looked to be a large metal object. Apple Jack finally managed to smother the fire before moving to the vent controls to try and purge the smoke from the workshop.

"What happened in here? You ok? It sounded like you tried to play the Trotkovsky overture with the real cannons." Twilight said waving a hand in front of her face in an attempt to clear the smoke.

"Nah, nothin' like that. I was workin' on the power plant for mah armored car, and the darn thing done blew on me." Apple Jack clarified in a disgruntled tone. "Got ta get the smoke ta clear before Ah can see what gone wrong."

Twilight lit her horn and allowed her magic to leach into the room in a wave. The wave moved through the work shop and collected all of the smoke while not disturbing the clean air. Once all the smoke particulates were collected and compressed they were force out through the ventilation system. Now with clear air the two mares move in on the engine, that was up on a testing rig, to see what had happened to it.

Twilight had already been by once before and Apple Jack had filled her in on the essentials of how the engine worked. In simple terms combustible fuel was expanded to a vapor state, mixed with air so that it could still burn. It was then injected into one of a group of piston chambers where a spark caused the gas to ignite and expand pushing down the cylinder. As the cylinder oscillated it turned a drive shaft that would then be used to turn the wheels of the vehicle. It was much more complex then that but that was the general gist of it.

Quickly AJ spotted the biggest problem with the engine block. What used to be a solid side of steel, now had a gaping hole in the side of one of the piston chambers. The next piece of evidence was found by Twilight. What looked like a piece of the piston that was supposed to be inside, was embedded in the wall of the shop.

"Well ain't that a hoot 'n a half. If Ah didn't know any better Ah'ld say that mah engine went 'n threw a piston rod at me. How ya reckon that happen' Spellblade?" Apple Jack scratched the back of her head looking at the engine. She stuck her finger in the hole that was just a bit larger then the digit. She pulled it back to find it covered in oil.

Twilight considered a few posibilities, but she needed more information before she could confirm any of them.

"What was going on right before it blew on you? I assume that you were running on the test stand right?" Twilight inquired.

"Yep, Ah was tryin' to test if Ah could get a higher revolution count from the pistons. Ya know, to see if Ah could solve the speed issue Ah been havin' with the car. Ah even made sure ta double check all the connections were tight, 'n as ya can see, it was all oiled up this time." Apple Jack explained showing her black coated finger before wiping it clean on the side of her work suit.

Twilight walked over to the piston piece in the wall. The end that was sticking out looked to have fractured off of the main piston arm. Twilight looked edge where the fracture had propagated.

"How many test runs have you been running on the engine?" Twilight asked.

"According to my engineerin' notebook here, this should be test 153. Why?" Apple Jack replied as she leafed through a bound notebook filled with grid paper pages covered in design ideas, sketches, and test results.

"Have you been using the same pistons for all the tests? How hard have you strained them?" Twilight continued. She took a closer look at the warping that had occurred along the fault line.

"Ah only got the one set." Apple Jack answered to the first part before she had to stop and consult her notebook. "As for the stress on them, they been put through the ringer a few times. You think that it hit it's yield point?"

"I think that it started to move into plastic deformation from cyclical loading and the high rev test just finally put it over the edge. It probably fractured in the cylinder, but the other pistons were still firing so the broken rod started to knock against the sidewall before being shot out the side." Twilight concluded with a satisfied nod. That was the scenario that all the evidence pointed to. The rattling sound, the warping, and the stress that the test had put on the rods.

"Ah think ya might be right." Apple Jack agreed before she stomped on the floor of the shop. "Shot! I really thought I was getting close to a breakthrough and now I got to machine all new parts."

"Well I guess in a way you did make a bit of a 'Break Through' with the engine." Twilight joked wearily before letting out a small laugh at her own joke.

"Would ya look at that! We got us a comedian." Apple Jack gave Twilight a good natured shove in the arm before laughing herself.

"So how's the trainin' goin' with Wolf and Orion? You look mighty worn down." AJ asked seeing the weariness in Twilight's face.

"I'm not that worn from it really." Twilight tried. It was not completely the truth, but not technically false. It wasn't the training that was weighing on her the most.

AJ gave her glance that told Twilight she was not taking the deception.

"To be honest, I don't know if the training is the biggest thing weighing on my mind." Twilight admitted waved her hands in front of herself trying to dismiss the suspicion. "It has more to do with a colt that I met when I was back in Canterlot."

AJ's expression softened and she wrapped an arm around Twilight's shoulders. "What happened shug? Ya ok?"

Twilight's eyes fell to the floor. "I think so. It's just that after the attack on Canterlot I found this small colt. He was badly injured, but I was able to get him some medical help. When I went back earlier this week I went to go check on him, you know see if he was healing well."

"Was he gettin' worse or something like that? Is that what's getting to ya?" AJ asked.

Twilight shook her head. "No he is actually healing a lot better then I thought he would have. Most of his burns are gone. No the issue is that his parents died in the killing spree, he's an orphan now. That's not the worst part. When I went to see him, he blamed me for his parents not surviving. He said that I was too slow to respond. That's whats killing me. I don't know what I could have done differently. I don't get why he hates me."

Thinking about the little colt had Twilight was on the verge of crying again.

AJ rubbed Twilight's shoulder. "Ah don't think that little colt really hates ya Twilight."

Twilight looked over at Apple Jack with confusion. "What makes you think that?"

AJ pointed to the broken engine on the stand.

"Well, because Ah've found that ponies are like machines at times. When they are stressed 'n strained ta their limit, parts brake in side."

Apple Jack shifted her finger from the engine to the piston piece in the wall.

"Some times those pieces are so broken that they need ta go 'n lash out. They don' always want ta, they have ta. They also don' always pick their target. They jus' hit the nearest thing when they let fly. They gotta hit something, 'cause if they don't they jus' fly off 'n are lost for ever. Do you understand what Ah'm trying to say? If I had ta hazard a guess Ah'd bet that he regrets what he said too after he finally calmed down"

Twilight just nodded. AJ's words made sense in her head and they had made her feel better. Perhaps she should go back again to the little colt again to find his real feelings and to talk to him in earnest.

Maybe if I get a reason to go back there I will, but it will probably take a good reason.

Twilight hugged Apple Jack and thanked her for her comforting words. They had just disengaged from the embrace when the door to the shop opened. It reveled Capt. Hunter standing in the door way looking at the mess that the broken engine had caused.

"Hot damn Honesty! Did you try to blow up your shop again?" He shook his head and turned to Twilight. A knowing smirk crossed his face.

"We're ready for you Spellblade."

Author's Notes:

If you have any feed back for me please send it my way. I don't know what you do or don't like if you don't tell me.

Thank you again for reading.
Aim High All

Chapter IX: Live Fire Training

Twilight stood just inside the entrance to the maze that had been erected in the live fire range. Captain Hunter had led her there from the engineering lab after he had come for her. He was now standing at the bottom of a set of stairs that on a raised platform. Sunset was conspicuously missing.

Twilight looked at the entrance to the maze trying to discern what it is that she was meant to do.

Captain Hunter crossed his arms with a slight smirk and a twinkle in his eye

“So we are going to play a little game. This was a training exercise that Nightshade used to have us run. Its main objective is to teach you to pay attention to your environment. It is also a good way to learn methods that work for both offensive and defensive stealth. Like how I learned that you can fly up above a situation with a good rifle and take out multiple opponents before they know what is going on, because most ponies have bad habit of never looking up for danger.”

“How does it do that?” Twilight asked. She looked around at the entrance of the maze a little more warily feeling like she was being watched. She warped herself deeper into her shadow cloak as if ward off the unseen eyes.

“This is no ordinary maze my lovely fresh faced lieutenant,” the captain explained. His smile grew even wider on his face as he continued, “This is a hunting ground my dear. While this is a maze of sorts, there is no exit. Instead, you get out when one of two things happen. Either you catch Sunset, or she shoots you. Have fun!”

With that, the door to the maze slams shut in front of Twilight. She was now locked in here like pray to be hunted.

“Umm…What did you mean by shoot me?” Twilight asked to the open air above her, not entirely sure that she wanted to know if he was serious or not.

No reply came to her inquiry. After waiting for a while Twilight took off into the maze. The walls of the maze were seemingly made of large white panels. There was very little light making its way into the maze causing long shadows to stretch down hallways. The shadows cast some of the pathways into full darkness even.

Twilight made a left turn and then a right, she made little note of where she was going as she searched out Sunset. She felt that if she moved fast enough that she would be able to take Sunset by surprise.

Where the hell is she?

*Crack*

Twilight felt pain bloom from the back of her head. A spark of electricity coursed through her body as all her limbs went stiff as if they were locked. She toppled to the ground like an unbalanced statue that had been placed on its edge. Twilight struggled to move but she was almost paralyzed, but she could make out the sound of boots on the hard concrete of the floor. While most of her vision was stuck on the ground, she could see the fringes of a black duster out of the corner of her eye.

Sunset squatted down, smoking revolver in hand, and rolled Twilight on to her side so that Sunset could look Twilight in the eyes.

“Poor situational awareness. Again,” was all Sunset said before her horn lit up.

Twilight found herself teleported back to the entrance of the maze. The stinging sensation and the sparks of electricity also seemed to dissipate. Twilight ran through a few motor function tests to ensure that she had full control again before she took off again into the maze.

This time Twilight took much better care to examine to maze before her so that she would not miss any movement that would reveal the location of her opponent. She moved slowly sticking to the sides of walls. She started was steps away from moving from one corridor to another when a light gust of wind brushed the back of Twilight’s neck.

Twilight initially dismissed it as a ploy to distract her from her surroundings. That was until she felt the cold gunmetal push against the back of her head just before another round of shocking electricity coursed through her extremities.

Once again her limbs when stiff as she toppled over onto the concreate ground. As she fell, a hand reached out and twisted her as she fell so that Twilight wound up landing on her back staring at the celling of the live fire range.

Sunset once again crouched down next to Twilight and lowered her aviators just enough so that they could look each other in the eyes.

“Failed rear security. Again.”

Another flash of light from Sunset’s horn and once again Twilight was back at the start.

This pattern repeated itself for some time. Twilight would stalk her adversary through the maze. Every time that she thought she had found some edge on Sunset, a shot would ring out. Then Twilight would fall to the ground only to have the fire haired mare walk up and tell her what she had failed at this time and then ‘Again’ followed by a teleportation to the start. All throughout this ‘game’ Capt. Hunter walked along a catwalk above the whole scene, observing and taking notes.

Twilight had started to notice a few key aspects of the Sunset’s approach to the exercise. Sunset always shadow-walked out of a nearby shade before she fired. Sunset also seemed to have an affinity for sneaking behind Twilight. Once Twilight had picked up on this she started to pay more attention to where each shadow was in relation to her. She also took greater care to constantly check what was going on behind her. Not too often, as that had gotten her shot from a shadow that had been in front of her at the time.

The most interesting times had been when Sunset had come at Twilight with a short sword. Twilight wasn't entirely sure why the Gunslinger had changed up weapons. This seemed to work in Twilight's favor as all she had to do was activate her spell blades and fight hand to hand for a few seconds before Sunset would disengage and vanish into a shadow to try again later.

Twilight tried twice to see if she could tip the fight in her favor by creating a fully realized ethereal blade. However, both times she tried all her blades seemed to do was pulse with power and then fade back to their normal state. Eventually Sunset seemed to get frustrated with the hand to hand combat and just resorted to using a stunning shot from her revolver.

The most annoying ones where the times that Sunset would tag her with her stunning rounds and then double tap her after explaining to Twilight the folly of making the same mistake twice in a row. This seemed come with a greater sting then the stunning rounds provided, due to the fact that it was not only Twilight’s body that took the hit, but also her pride.

This wasn’t to say that Twilight had not had any success. Multiple times Twilight had been able to catch a glimpse of Sunset moving about. Twice, Twilight had even been able to get a low powered magic missile off in an attempt to get a hit. They weren’t to a level that would do any damage more than a light sting similar to the shots that Sunset was taking. They were always for naught though. Each time that Twilight thought she had Sunset trapped the Gunslinger would simply vanish into nearby shadow and the Twilight would have to start her hunt again.

Twilight was even starting to react to subtle cues that she had been missing before. The light tap of a boot around a corner. The small click of a revolver hammer being drawn back in the preparation of being fired. The gust of a light wind that signaled that Sunset had just walked out of a shadow. In fact, the closest Twilight had been to securing a round was when she had felt the slight breeze similar to the second round. Reacting much quicker then she had at the beginning, Twilight had wheeled on the source of the gust only to find Sunset stepping back through to reappear on the other side of Twilight and once again take her down.

“Just because you think you know where the enemy is doesn’t mean that you can forget about the rest of your surroundings. Again.”

For what was possibly the tenth or twelfth time, Twilight was returned to the start of the maze by Sunset’s magic.

Right. Once more unto the breach.

Twilight once again moved off into the maze. She noted the location of all twelve shadows that she passed that were large enough for Sunset to use. Twilight categorized each one and placed them in a mental map that she was starting to form. Twice a stray sound or sense of movement tipped Twilight off that she was about to be found. With the aid of her shadow cloak, she was able to vanish long enough for Sunset to move on. Once she was out of the disadvantages position Twilight resumed her hunt.

At one point Twilight was scanning the area around her to find the next spot to move to that would limit her exposer, when she looked slightly upward. For the first time she noticed that not only were the tops of the maze walls thick enough to walk on, in this section they were also well within reach of a good jump.

Ponies have a bad habit of looking up do they? Let’s see about that.

Twilight took a quick peek around her to ensure that she wasn’t going to get spotted then took a running leap for the top of the wall. She managed to get a good hold on the edge of it, and with only a little strain, she was able to lift herself onto the top of the wall. Once she was perched upon her vantage point, Twilight vanished with the aid of her shadow cloak. From where she stood, Twilight was able to map out the entire maze in her head as well as locate all of the prominent shadows that Sunset could use.

A plan started to form in Twilight’s mind. Twilight scanned the maze from where she hid on the wall. After a few moments, she caught a glimpse of red and yellow moving down the corridor a few walls from her. Moving slowly enough to not draw attention, Twilight slinked over to the top of one of the walls that lined the path that Sunset was patrolling. Twilight ran some quick calculations in her head as she waited for Sunset to pass below her perch before she made her move. Twilight dropped loudly enough to alert Sunset of her presence. As Twilight had predicted Sunset didn’t panic but quickly made for the nearest shadow to disappear into.

Acting fast Twilight ignited her horn and tapping into her vast reserves summoned a giant ball of indigo light above the maze in a very specific location, just as Sunset diapered into the darkness. Twilight smiled as she saw that her mapping of the shadows and her geometry calculations seemed to have been on point. The ball of light acted as a second sun, and due to its location banished all of the shadows from around the maze. All of which, except the one that Twilight now stood just to the left of.

Preparing a single low powered spell blade on her right arm, Twilight waited under her activated shadow cloak. Thanks to her understanding of the layout, this shadow was the only exit that Sunset still had in the maze. Eventually, Twilight sensed the light breath of air. She whipped out her right arm so that the ethereal blade came to a stop just in front of a startled Sunset. Another quick flare of her horn and a second, much smaller, ball of purple light formed and dissolved the remaining shadow.

With her free hand, Twilight lowered her hood so that Sunset could see Twilight’s good-natured smirk. Twilight was sure that if Sunset hadn’t been wearing her enchanted aviator sunglasses, Sunsets eyes would have been either wide in surprise or squinted in irritation.

“What do you say Wolf? Again?” Twilight asked.

Sunset looked between the spell blade, the spot where the shadow formerly existed, and then eventually at Twilight. Then she let a light breath she had been holding and holstered Eclipse under her duster.

“Well, about time kid,” Sunset finally commented.

A voice from above called out to them. “Outstanding! End exercise, and debrief.”

Twilight watched as Sunset lit her horn and enveloped both mares in an orange aura of magic before they both teleported out the maze with a bright flash.

As soon as they were back on solid ground, Twilight turned to face Sunset and Capt. Hunter who had descended from his catwalk above. The captain looked pleased while Sunset cast a stony gaze as if trying to grade Twilight.

“Consider me at least slightly impressed,” the Captain began. “That was certainly some out of the box thinking to solve the problem.”

Sunset nodded in agreement. “That may not have been exactly how we intended for you go about winning, but it did take a pretty good understanding of the layout to properly take away all of my escape routes except the one that you wanted me to have.”

Her words may have been kind, but her look was far from it.

Twilight started to beam a little at the praise. It wasn’t often that you got compliments from a Guard captain, even if one of them was your BBBFF.

Sunset then crossed her arms over her chest as she continued his evaluation of Twilight’s performance.

“There was however two issues with what you did.” Sunset began. “The first was we wanted to see you use a full realized spell blade. I noticed that you seemed to pulse your blades but you never activated them. Why?”

Twilight adopted a bit of a sheepish look. She took pride in her magical abilities so she was loathe to admit to her short coming but she had no choice here.

“I couldn’t get them to activate. That pulse was me pushing power into them, but the magic didn’t want to focus on what I was telling it to do. It was almost like I was trying to bend fire to my will with only mind.”

“I see,” was all Sunset had for a response. She seemed to get lost in thought.

Capt. Hunter took over from there, “The second issue was that it took you eleven attempts…”

“Twelve,” Sunset interjected looking over at the captain.

The captain looked down at his notes and nodded before returning his look to Twilight, “Right. Twelve attempts to come to a decent plan. In the real world you only get one.”

And just like that Twilight’s happy pride wilted back into its traditional humble state.

“I understand. I’ll do better next time.” Twilight replied.

“Don’t get me wrong Lieutenant, you did well,” The captain said, “This is why we do training, so that you can make your mistakes here and not in the field. Besides, if you had beaten Wolf too quickly I would have been concerned that she was taking it easy on you. ”

“You know I don’t take it easy on anyone. You also know that with her background I would never give her a quick pass.” Sunset said turning her cold gaze to the Captain.

This comment struck Twilight. It was one part insulting that something about her background offended her partner, and another part curious about what that portion of her background could affect Sunset in such a way. Twilight wanted to quell this curiosity and get some answers.

Twilight turned to Sunset and fixed her with a curious look that drew Sunset’s attention back from the captain.

Twilight pointedly asked, “And just what about my background makes you want to push me so much?”

Sunsets eyes slitted a little at the semi-accusatory question. Twilight watched as Sunset’s arms uncrossed and moved to her hips. While Sunset’s right hand went to rest on her hip, Sunset’s left rested on the grip of Daydream in its holster.

“It you really must know it’s about your relationship with Princess Celestia,” Sunset started. She fixed Twilight and even fiercer stare then was normal.

“I want you to ask yourself one question. I’m not going to leave it as closed off as Princess Luna did with only two options. No it’s very open ended so it’s really on you to answer it for yourself. Why are you here? What motivates you?” Sunset asked with more than a hint of ice in her voice.

*My relationship with the Princess? Why would that bother her? She is Princess Luna’s student not Celestia’s.*

Twilight was about to voice her confusion at Sunset’s answer, but she never got the chance. Any words that she was going to say were cut off by a sudden interruption of a wailing base alarm.

Author's Notes:

This chapter took much longer to come out and is much shorter than I was planning. This was mostly due to a very busy past few days. However I have already got close to 2000 words down for the next chapter so that should be up pretty soon. Possibly tomorrow or the day after that depending on if I want to write after going to a hockey game.

Thank you for reading.
Aim High All

Chapter X: Ride of the Wælcyrge

All three ponies in the training area froze in place and turned to face the PA horn that was connected near the ceiling above the main entrance door. Because she was still fairly new, Twilight only had mild understanding of the alarm system and what each call meant, but she could tell by the lack of action from the two veteran Nightmares that this probably didn’t mean they were under attack. The alarm wailed twice before it stopped and the voice of Princess Luna took over.

“Now here this: All Nightmares, you have ten minutes to gear up and report to the staging area.”

Captain Hunter and Sunset both looked at each other before they took off at a quick jog that prompted Twilight to follow. Sunset looked back over her shoulder at Twilight.

“Hope we’ve put you through enough training, because you’re about to get a dose of combat.”

I hope so too

Twilight gulped a little as she continued to follow the two others to the armory. She felt that she had been trained enough, but that did not stop her from feeling nervous about going into combat.

“I sure hope you’re right. I don’t much fancy the idea that my first op will be my last,” Twilight replied. “That would also make it hard for me to help bring down that team that attacked Canterlot.”

The group made it into the armory to find that Rainbow Dash had beaten them to the armory and was already gearing up. Dash was in the process of changing out her normal flight suit for a similar looking one that came with some additional armor around the chest and back. The armor appeared to be fairly light as to no effect Dash’s flying. Sitting next to dash was a flight helmet painted light blue with a pair of rainbow lightning bolts streaking from front to back on either side. Across the front of the helmet, it had Dash’s call sign “Rainboom” painted on it. A P-90 rested next to Rainbow’s locker. She had stuffed a few extra 50 round magazines in the leg pouches of her flight suit. A bag of impact grenades were also near at hand.

“Always trying to be first aren’t ya Rainboom,” Sunset teased as she opened her own locker and gave Dash a light punch in the arm.

Sunset stripped off her Duster and gun belt and put on a fresh set of LDUs. She exchanged her usual gun belt for one that held bullet loops for her revolver and an ammo pouch that held a slot for magazines for her 1911. Sunset then loaded out her ammo as well as clipping a pair of grenades to her belt. She add on her ballistic armor before donning her duster again. It was the same advanced armor that Twilight had seen the captain wear during the attack.

Aegis Combat Armor as Twilight had been told it was called. It was a creation that Apple Jack had developed in her engineering workshop. While it was much harder to create, it was also lighter are more durable than most guard armor. It also had the added benefit of not being loud and cumbersome. This made it ideal for a small special operations unit like the Nightmares.

Dash laughed and replied, “I know you’re just jealous that you can’t match my speed.”

Dash gave Sunset her own light punch in the arm and turned to face the captain. “You know what’s going on Orion?”

Captain Hunter shook his head in reply as he started to pull out his own gear. “Not a clue. I’m sure either Nightmare-Actual or Foresight will fill us in after we get geared up.”

The captain simply slipped on his Aegis armor and grabbed his scoped rifle from the weapons rack. He pulled a worn looking 9mm handgun from his locker and looked it over as if considering taking it. Ultimately, he decided to replace it back in his locker. He added a few additional magazines to an ammo pouch but didn’t bring any other gear.

Twilight looked around at the others as both Apple Jack and Bulwark made their way into the armory as well. Once inside they also moved to their respective lockers.

Bulwark, similar to the captain, only took minimal gear. He wore his Aegis armor, though his had a red cross painted on both shoulders. He then shouldered his backpack size medical kit. This was probably the same kit that Twilight had been told was enchanted to never run out of the essentials. Finally, he selected a rather standard M4 riffle and took two spare mags.

Apple Jack took the polar opposite approach. She squeezed into a much bulkier, more explosive resistant version of the Aegis armor called the Aegis Mk II. It also came with an attached back pack much more cargo space to bring equipment in. Twilight watched the engineer add 3 packages of C4 plastic explosive, 2 thermite charges, a claymore anti personal device, and two fragmentation grenades. AJ also selected an M249 SAW from the rack with an attachable 200-count disintegrable belt feed ammo box

Twilight couldn’t believe the amount of gear that the mare was packing. Not only that, but AJ only seemed slightly encumbered by her burden.

“Damn, Honesty!” Twilight exclaimed, “How can you possibly carry all of that? Your call sign should have been ‘Machine’ not ‘Honesty’”

Apple Jack let out a small laugh in reply.

“Ah’ve had ‘Machine’ suggested to me before, but I had a bad run in with some sleazy snek’ oil peddlers an’ their apple machine that turned me off from wanting to be a ‘Machine’. To answer the second question, lots an’ lots o’ hard work down on tha family farm.”

Growing up in Canterlot, Twilight had no frame of reference for what farm work could be like so she too Apple Jack’s word for it.

Twilight herself had started to don her gear, but because of the training and her method of fighting, there wasn’t much gear to gather. She changed from her current sweaty LDU’s to a fresh pair. She also slipped into her Aegis armor, followed by reattaching her shadow cloak. The only additional gear that Twilight decided to add to her kit was a pair of smoke grenades.

The whole team got dressed pretty quickly with a few jovial remarks made between team members. Most of the jokes seemed to show the camaraderie that the team had from working together. The only one that seemed in poor taste was when Bulwark tried a lighthearted catcalling whistle as Sunset and Twilight swapped LDU’s. This only drew a roll of the eyes from Sunset and a firm cuffing to the back of the head from Apple Jack. Bulwark at least had the decency to look a tad sheepish afterwards.

Once all the members of the team were fully kitted out they made their way to the staging area across the hall from the armory. The solid clack of combat boots echoed off the tiled floors and the walls around them.

This was the first time that Twilight had a reason to go to the staging area. It was only used for assembling the team prior to boarding the transport that would drop the team of at the mission location. The staging area was little more than an a concrete hanger bay with a ramp that lead upwards to a large blast door that Twilight assumed opened to the outside above the headquarters. It also struck Twilight that this must have been what Sunset had meant when she had talked about using the back entrance the first time they had meet.

Sitting in the middle of the hanger bay was what looked like a metal tube with two tick pillars, one on the front, and one at the back. It, in some ways, resembled a large closed off version of a flying chariots that the princesses used. There were small windows along the side and larger ones up front. In the back was a drop-ramp for loading and unloading. The tube was painted a dark matte black. The name of the transport, “Strongheart” was painted in gray lettering along the front right quarter. On each tower was also a name in the same gray lettering, Lt. ‘Viper’ Metcaif on the front one and Sgt. ‘Charlie’ Blackwood on the rear.

Standing next to the transport where four ponies standing together and talking. The first and most recognizable was Princess Luna. She was holding a file that she seemed to be poring over. The expression on her face was stiff and betrayed some concern.

Next to her was Foresight, the head of the Intel team. He was looking at his own file and conversing with the final two ponies of the group.

The pair consisted of one bat pony male and one pegasus mare. They both wore flight suits similar to the ones that Rainbow Dash typically wore. In addition to the suits, they also carried flight helmets under their arm. As Twilight drew closer she was able to catch the last part of the conversation.

“So because of that, we need you to get skids up as soon as they get off.” Foresight was telling them, looking at his file.

“So we’re doing a quick drop then?” The pegasus of the pair asked.

“Looks like it.” The stallion next to her said.

Twilight continued to follow the rest of Nightmare team as the approached the group. As they drew closer, the princess looked up from her file.

“Good, you’re all ready. This mission is very time sensitive so we need to forgo the typical mission briefing in the Situation room.”Luna explained. She looked over at the captain. “Orion, I need you to get your team loaded. You will get a briefing once Strongheart is in the air. Is that understood?”

The captain snapped a quick salute, “Yes ma’am.”

Turning to the rest of the team he made a gesture of raising one hand above his head with his pointer finger extended and circled it around his head. “You heard her folks sit down and strap in.”

Twilight watched as the two pilots that had been talking to Foresight flew up to the top of the transport. The bat pony went to the front pillar of the transport and started to strap himself into a harness that was connected to the craft. The pegasus did the same thing at the back.

Starting to feel a little nervous, Twilight just followed Sunset onto the transport where she took a seat in one of the jump seats that lined the sides. The rest of the team followed behind her and took their own seats. The last onboard was Capt. Hunter. Once he had walked up the ramp he slammed his hand on the metal side of the transport.

First the ramp rose up from the ground and closed behind the captain. Then Twilight heard the sound of wings beating from outside. Moments later the entire craft lifted from the ground with a lurch. Through the forward looking windshield Twilight could see that the blast doors had opened and that they were now flying through them out into the night sky. They hovered above the trees for a second as the pilots orientated the craft and then they were off.

Twilight looked around the craft and out the windows at the quickly passing landscape with amazement. She had flown before but that had just been in a slow moving balloon, nothing like this. Twilight had heard rumors that something like this was in development but had never gotten any real information.

Because she was sitting next to Twilight, Sunset noticed this amazed look. She shot a bemused look at the excited Shadow-walker.

“Is this one of the new helicopters that they’ve been trying to develop?” Twilight asked. “I thought they were only in the prototype phase.”

“Technically they still are,” Sunset replied. “You would need to talk to Honesty about them. This is a Buffalo class transport, and we’ve had them for years.”

Apple Jack picked up on the conversation and chimed in

“The R&D team for tha Day Guard have been usin’ the Buffalo as a model for what they want ta develop. Where we have them pegasi pilots flyin’ us, they wan’ the propulsion ta be magic o’ mechanical based. Ya know so you don’ got live bodies on the outside to get shot at.”

“The raw power they would need to get that kind of lift would be enormous. And without something like your engine, I don’t know how they would be able to do it mechanically.” Twilight commented trying to picture how to convert the Buffalo into a non-pegasi variant.

“That’s why they are still in just a prototype phase still,” Sunset said.

“Alright cut the chatter we need to get our mission brief going. Lazarus, can you get the lights?”Capt. Hunter said as he walked down the center aisle between the jump seats. He made his way to the front and pulled a retractable canvas screen down from where it was stored in the ceiling.

The team stopped talking and turned to face the captain and this new screen. Bulwark, who was sitting across the aisle from Twilight, leaned over and flipped a switch that was along the wall of the transport. The normal lights of the cabin went dark and they were replaced by the glow of a crystal. The crystal projected the face of Princess Luna onto the screen.

“I have you Orion. Are you receiving me?” Luna’s voice seemed to come though a set of speakers in the transport.

The captain looked at the screen and nodded. “We have you five by five, Nightmare-Actual.”

“OK good. Standby for Intel briefing from Foresight.” With that the Princess’s face disappeared from the screen to be replaced by the Bat pony Intel officer who cleared his throat before starting his briefing.

“So I assume that you all would like to know where it is exactly that you are going.”

There were some murmurs of agreement from the team as he continued.

“You may remember from the initial break down of the attack on Canterlot that one of the potential spots was Stalliongrad. Well as it turns out we got hard connections to it now.”

Well that’s unfortunate, I hate going to northern Equestria. It’s always so cold and covered in snow.

“How did you get the info?” Sunset leaned forward to ask.

“I have a contact inside of the Stalliongrad Mafia.” Foresight said. “He fed me some info that clearly links the griffon Carrion to being in Stalliongrad right now. We don’t know how long that info will be good so that is why we had to launch you so fast.”

“So what’s our game plan?” the Capt. Hunter asked. He was still standing at the front of the transport. He was clearly used to the turbulence that came with the flight. He didn’t seem to ever lose his balance even on jostles that would have tossed Twilight from her seat if it wasn’t for the straps of the jump seat.

“You’re going to meet up with my contact, his name is Borscht. Once you have contact with him, he will take you to their current Pakhan. His name is Trotsky, and hopefully you can work with him to find out what Carrion is doing. Because of the population in the city we don’t want to leave Strongheart just sitting around any longer then we need to minimize risk of getting spotted. That means this is going to be a hot drop.” Foresight explained.

“Wait we work with the Mafia? Aren’t they criminals?” Twilight asked looking around with wide eyes.

It was the captain that answered her question. “In any other city in the kingdom we don’t, but Stalliongrad plays by different rules. After the Griffon War, it was the mafia that rebuilt the city and now they run the town. If we want to operate there we have to use them.”

Sunset also patted her on the shoulder. “It’s not as if we like having a major mafia presence there, but with the weak government that was left in the town after it got cut off in the war a criminal organization was going to grow. We guided this one in behind the scenes because they were the least violent, and they had the strength to generally shut down the more violent ones. We still keep an eye on them and work to remove the control that he crime lords have on the city, but until that day they fill the power gap for us.”

Twilight harrumphed but leaned back into her seat.

I don’t have to like it, just work with it.

“Did your contact give you any information about what the terrorist is up to?” Bulwark asked from his jump seat trying to get the briefing back on track.

Foresight looked down at the file in his hands. “Only that Carrion is supposedly using one of the Mafia’s smaller rivals, the Bratva, to smuggle and store some not so legal equipment. They said that they would fill you in better once they meet you face to face.”

“Alright, sounds good. Is there anything else you have for us?” Capt. Hunter asked.

Foresight shook his head and closed his file, “No that should be it for me. Stand by for the Princess.”

With that he stepped back and his face vanished from the screen to be replaced once again by Princess Luna.

“Ok Nightmares, I know this was short notice but I have faith in you. You know how we operate; I want this as clean as can be. I don’t want a firefight in a heavily populated city. Is that understood?”

The entire transport echoed with a cry of “Yes, Ma’am!”

“Good. Remember: We are the nightmare! Nightmare-Actual out.” And with that the screen went dark as the crystal faded.

Leaning over again Bulwark flipped the switch and the lights came back to life. Twilight had to squint for a bit to get her eyes adjusted after being in the dark but she recovered quickly.

A crackle came over the radio system. “Orion, this is Viper. Be prepped for wheels down in ten.”

“Copy that Viper. Wheels down in ten.” The captain responded on his own radio.

At this point Rainbow Dash stood up,”Alright! It’s time for some battle music! I say the Baby L.T. picks our song for us.”

Rainbow Dash tossed a small music player at Twilight who fumbled the catch a little out of surpise but still managed to hold on to it.

“There you go Spellblade. Just type in the name of a song and it will find it. Just make it some real battle music.” Rainbow Dash said from behind her blue tinted aviators.

“Umm ok. Let me see.” Twilight said as she wracked her mind for what to play but then she thought of the perfect song and punched in the name.

A few seconds later the classical music started to sound from the speakers. It started with the string section and then moved quickly into the main theme being played by the brass.

DaDaDadaaadaDaDaDadaaadaDaDaDadaaaaaaaaaaaa

Both Sunset and Bulwark looked at Twilight with knowing smiles clearly understanding the meaning of the piece. Their understanding of the piece however did not translate to everpony.

“I thought I said real battle music! Your tastes in music are even older then Orion’s. What is this?” Rainbow Dash said giving Twilight a sour look.

“It’s called Ride of the Wælcyrge.” Twilight answered. Dash’s lack of culture really did rub Twilight the wrong way at times.

“And just what are the Wælcyrge?”

Twilight sighed before explaining. “The Wælcyrge were a group of winged warriors from northern mythology that flew around a battle and chose who would die and who would live. The song describes their flight through a large ongoing battle.”

“Really?” Rainbow Dash asked looking between Twilight, Sunset, and Bulwark who were all nodding.

“She’s telling you right Rainboom.” Bulwark finally said.

“Damn, that’s kind of badass! You know what I’m kinda feeling it now.” Rainbow Dash admitted as she sat back down.

Everyone on the transport simply sat and listened to the music as the contemplated the mission before them, but Twilight had other things on her mind.

And it all revolved around a question that Sunset had asked her before the alarm had gone off.

Why am I here? What motivates me?

Author's Notes:

Just to clarify Wælcyrge is the old English form of Valkyrie.
the song is Ride of the Valkyrie by Wagner: https://youtu.be/GGU1P6lBW6Q

I want to see if anyone understands why the helicopter transport model is called the Buffalo

There is also a semi-subtle Easter egg for one of my favorite movies in this chapter. Leave a comment if you think you know what it is.

Thank you for reading
Aim High All

Chapter XI: Kapkan Park

There was a light downfall of snow and a chilling frost in the night air that betrayed the fact that they were now in the northern reaches of Equestria. Twilight could feel it reach all the way to her bones as the back hatch of the Buffalo transport lowered. It wasn’t nearly as bad as the time that Shining had taken her up to the Crystal Empire to see her former foal sitter Cadence, but it was damn near close.

Twilight pulled her cloak tighter around herself to guard against the cold. Twilight could see that Wolf was performing a similar action with her duster to ward off her own chill. Twilight considered area and she wanted her wits about her. The draw it would take on her concentration to maintain the spell was not worth the small amount of comfort it would afford.

Orion stood up from his jump seat and tapped the side of his helmet above the right ear to signal for the team to activate their communication ear pieces. These would allow for him to both recive information from the rest of the team, as well as enable him to communicate orders to specific parts of the team. Twilight quickly did as she was signaled and turned her ear piece on.

Once everyone had activated their ear piece he started to give orders, “We are dropping into Kapkan Park. Intel says we shouldn’t be expecting anyone but our contacts, but I still want us in a Perimeter Defense Formation.”

“Probably not a bad idea Orion,” Wolf commented. “Bad Intel can only screw you if you take it as gospel.”

Orion simply nodded in agreement.

Viper and Charlie hovered the transport for a second or so above the open ground that they were going to use as their landing zone. After observing the LZ and determining that it was clear of any dangers, they slowly lowered until they were wheels down.

As soon as they were back on solid ground the team performed a quick exit down the ramp taking up a pre-established circular formation as the transport lifted back into the air.

Each member of the team already knew their position to take up upon exiting the craft. A team member took up one of the six positions in the circle; 12 o’clock, 2 o’clock, 4 o’clock, 6 o’clock, 8 o’clock, and 10 o’clock. A 5 meter spread was maintained between each member and their two closest neighbors. All of Nightmare Team had weapons at the ready position, except Twilight what had a pair of magic missiles charged, and pointed outwards from the circle. They all swept their overlapping zones of coverage to ensure that there was no incoming danger. Captain Hunter took up the initial 12 o’clock position. To his right, at the 2 o’clock was Wolf. Continuing around the circle was Rainboom, then Honesty, followed by Lazarus, and finally Twilight in the 10 o’clock position to Orion’s left.

The landing zone seemed to be clear of any hostilities. Taking in her surroundings now, Twilight could take in the run down park and the surrounding buildings. The park was a fairly open rectangular shaped clearing. The buildings were so close together that the only way out of the park were very narrow alleyways. One alleyway at the midpoint of each side to the park.

The only good sources of light were one flickering lamppost and the almost full moon breaking through some of the cloud cover. The result of this was a series of long shadows across the park. The ground was covered in a modest layer of snow. Everything seemed to be in a state of disrepair. The grounds were overgrown. The shrubs had clearly not been taken care off. The concrete walking cracked and crumbling. The park was surrounded by old abandoned brick apartments that looked like they had been ground zero for a war. There were multiple scorch marks and signs of explosive damage especially around entranceways and choke points. Come to think of it, with the history of Stalliongrad being surrounded during the Griffon War, that idea that it had been a war zone was probably accurate.

The only part of park that seemed to be in any decent state was a statue near the center of the park, not more than 20 meters to the left from where Nightmare was formed up. The statue depicted a hooded figure kneeling down holding out a boxed item and a screw-gun as if to affix the box to the inside of a door frame or something. Surrounding the statue was a low wall probably no taller than three-fourths of a meter tall. The wall had three small sections, equispaced around the wall, cut out to allow access to the statue.

Leaning against the low wall was a white pegasus stallion dressed in a thick winter jacket. His slicked back mane was beat red. A bowl of some kind of red colored soup was stenciled on the arm of his jacket. Standing on either side of the stallion were a pair of earth ponies, one male and one female. They were both brandishing a pair of Ak-47s.

“Contact 10 o’clock!” Twilight called out to alert the rest of the team to the presence of the other ponies in the court yard.

Orion twisted slightly to face the same direction as Twilight.

“Contact confirmed 10 o’clock. Weapons tight! That’s our informant.” Orion barked out. “Break formation. Wolf I want you to go run a perimeter sweep. Make sure we’re operating in the green.”

“Wilco, Orion,” Wolf replied before disappearing into a nearby shadow.

I really need to learn that soon if I’m going to be the team’s Shadow-walker.

Orion turned to Twilight, “Spellblade you’re with me. The rest of you, keep your eyes out for anything unsavory.”

Twilight nodded her acknowledgement and took of walking with Orion in the direction of the three strangers.

“Why are you having me go up with you and not Wolf? She’s second in command right?” Twilight asked in a hushed tone.

Orion in an equally quite tone replied, “Yes, Normally your roles would have been reversed. However due to the fact that we haven’t had the time to teach you to shadow-walk properly I had to send Wolf. This is on us we thought we would have more time. We will correct this mistake when we return to Home Castle.”

That was where the conversation ended as the stepped closer to the waiting mobsters.

Noticing their approach, the pegasus stopped resting against the low wall and also took a few steps closer.

This must be Foresight’s contact; Borscht.

Borscht turned to face Orion and was the first to speak, “Welcome, komandir.”

He spoke with a fairly heavy northern Equestrian accent. He also extended a hand out to Orion to shake.

“You must be our Stallion. You must be Borscht right?” Orion accepted the proffered hand.

“Da, I am.” Borscht replied. He leaned to his right to look behind the captain, “I saw fire haired mare’s magic trick. Where she go? We going to have problem, you and I?”

Well, street smarts: one. Proper grammar: zero.

“No, she is simply ensuring that we are not being watched. I thought a man of your chosen career would appreciate that,” Orion replied, somehow maintaining a professional tone despite the snark that was inherent in his word choice.

“Precisely,” Twilight also added. “And how can we know that we won’t have any trouble with you? You are criminals after all.”

Borscht locked eyes with Twilight. They were cold dark eyes that showed clear evidence that they had seen hardship; death, destruction, and the chaos of battle. These eyes had watched the light drain out of others before. Twilight could tell.

“I suggest you adopt more respectful tone when you speak to Bratva. He is not as…tolerant…of disrespectful outbursts such as that,” Borscht said before turning back to Orion.

“So what can you tell us about the ponies that we have been looking for?” the Watchtower asked.

Borscht shook his head in reply. “Nyet. Not here. This area may be abandoned, but still has eyes and ears. You know what I mean?”

That put Twilight on edge. She already had a bad feeling about the abandoned area, and those words defiantly didn’t help.

“I guess we don’t have much choice,” Orion replied. “What do you propose we do, Mr. Borscht?”

“We go to Bratva. He tell you more. Come, follow me.” Borscht gestured for Nightmare team to follow him as he turned. His earth pony guards flanked him on either side as he started to walk towards one of the nearby alleys.

Twilight, following behind their escort, had just stepped foot into the alleyway when three shots pierced the stillness of the snowy night. The burst of noise was also accompanied by a plum of stone shards and dusk as a bullet struck the wall of the alley just ahead of Borsht.

Seconds later, a body flew out from a nearby shadow. Twilight would have put an ethereal blade through the body if she hadn’t recognized that it already had a bullet hole in the temple. A stream of crimson blood was streaming down the side of the clearly dead unicorn’s face. As the blood reached the torso of the unicorn, it blended with her shirt, as they were the same color.

Following quickly behind the corps was Wolf, a smoking Eclipse in one hand, and a wrecked form that may have at one point been a long riffle.

“What is meaning of this?” Borscht asked looking between Wolf and the captain. Twilight also noticed that he had produced a handgun from somewhere.

Beneath the folds of her shadow cloak, Twilight prepared to summon her shadow blades and was already calculating the quickest path to take to disarm the contact and his guards if this turned ugly.

Wolf holstered Eclipse, and readjusted her enchanted Aviator sunglasses.

“We could be asking you a similar question.” Wolf replied. “I caught this young lady here trying to take a pot shot at us. Is she one of yours?” She asked tossing the wrecked riffle at Borscht’s feet.

Twilight could now see that there was .45 caliber round lodged in the side of the riffle. Sunset had probably fired that shot first to throw off the aim of the would-be sniper. The second shot that they had heard was probably the same one that had embedded itself into the brick wall of the alley. The final round must have been the one that Wolf had put through the skull of the assailant.

Good shooting Sunset.

Borscht shook his head in frustration, “Nyet. She is not ours. Though…”

Borscht knelt down and examined the shirt that the shooter was wearing. Looking over the right sleeve he reviled a symbol stitched in yellow. A crossed hammer and horseshoe.

“Der’mo!” Borscht swore. “Is Red Army soldier. They know we are here.”

As if on cue three ponies, all dressed in red shirts, turned down the alleyway. They were all armed with AKs.

“Nightmares! Back out of the alley now! We can hold them from cover.” Orion started to command.

“Don’t know if that’s going to work Orion. We have contact rear now too.” Honesty called out over her shoulder. She readied her M249 in case they started to take fire from the advancing red shirts

“More boogies above us as well. I think I see a flyer too.” Rainboom reported.

Lazarus also informed them that there were more red shirts on either side as well.

“They were waiting for us so they could ambush us.” Twilight deduced out loud.

“Fuck, you’re right. We need cover yesterday.” Orion said firing a warning shot at one of the ponies advancing down the alley way.

“Everypony! Retreat back to that statue! Take cover behind the wall! Wolf, Spellblade, go hunting!” the Watchtower called out.

The majority of Nightmare team, along with Borscht and his guards, retreated back over the open ground of the park to the statue and the cover that its low surrounding wall could provide. As they sprinted the last few meters all hell seemed to break loose. The team started to take fire from all directions.

Everyone in the group made it to the relative safety of the wall. One of Borscht’s guards, the mare, did take a grazing blow to her left arm but seemed to be still in fighting condition.

Twilight however, did not make the run for the statue with the others. Wolf had grabbed onto her arm and pulled her off to the side off the alley.

“Why did you pull me back?” Twilight asked the flame haired mare. Twilight didn’t understand nor did she try to hide her confusion.

Wolf just looked her in the eyes. “We’ve been cleared to go hunting. That means that we detach from the rest of the team and go take out targets of opportunity.”

Twilight’s eyes went wide in realization of what this meant. “How do we do that?” she asked.

“Normally we shadow walk to targets and take them out, but we are going to have to improvise this time since we haven’t been able to teach you yet,” Wolf said. “I’m going to take you to the rooftop of one building, then I’ll go to the other side and we work to take down the snipers that are taking shots at our team. Do you have any questions?”

“Ok Wolf that sounds like a plan, Should we make sure that we both move clockwise around the park so that we can cover more ground, or both move to the same side so that we catch one side in a pincer.” Twilight asked.

“I’m going clockwise,” Wolf said, “I’ll leave your direction up to your discretion. Just get the job done. Are you ready for this Spellblade?”

Twilight nodded in confirmation. With that, Wolf grabbed Twilight in a tight embrace and stepped back into the void of light that the alleyway stretched out.

Twilight quickly found out that there is a place colder than Northern Equestria, the Shadow Realm. Initially, Twilight couldn’t make anything out in the inky darkness that made up the Shadow Realm, but slowly she could see little pockets of light, some large enough to see back into the real world. Most were no bigger than a pinprick.

Before she knew it, Wolf dropped her through one of the larger holes in the darkness. Twilight found herself back on solid ground, only now she was on a rooftop looking down at the park below.

She could see that at some point during either her talk with Wolf or their transit time that the shooting had started. There were close to a score or red shirted individuals trying to advance on the statue and its low wall that protected her team. The outside of that wall had become cratered in multiple places from bullet impacts of various weaponry. Various shotguns, pistols, rifles, and submachine guns all pointed at a group of ponies that, from the look of it, were giving just a good as they got.

Orion would sporadically pop up from behind cover and fire a round from his scoped riffle at the Red Army soldiers advancing from the north. He hadn’t been able to land a lethal round yet because, with the amount of lead flying through the air, he couldn’t risk taking the time needed to look down his scope and align a decent sight picture.

Lazarus and the mare Mafia guard were holding off the east side advancement. Twilight couldn’t be sure but by the looks of it, Lazarus was joking and tossing pickup lines at his newfound partner.

Of course he paired off with the female. Even in a firefight he’s got to try and be smooth.

Borscht and the other guard, the one that had taken the grazing round, were on taking shots at red shirts on the west. The guard still had his rifle, but all Borscht had was his pistol. That didn’t seem to hinder him too much as he was able to double tap one of rival gang members, causing the first casualty on either side.

Possibly the most effective one at keeping the attackers at bay was Honesty. She was the only one facing the southern derelict apartment building, the same one that Twilight happened to standing on top of at the moment, but the suppressing fire that the M249 could put out had all of the gangsters diving for any cover that they could find.

The only pony that Twilight could not account for was Rainboom. She wasn’t down at the statue putting out fire like the others. It wasn’t until Twilight stopped looking down that she understood.

A forest green pegasus stallion in a red shirt was trying to dive bomb the group from the air. I was a good idea after all Twilight had to admit. There statue wall provided good cover from the ground troops but none for attacks from above. A rainbow blur dashed down, from even farther above, after the attacking pegasus and forced him to abort is aerial attack. He fled to the side trying to avoid his new predator. With a 90-degree turn, Rainboom was able to stay on his six and was now gaining on him.

Turning at the speed that Rainboom had been going should not have been possible. That close to the ground, she should have crash-landed back into the dirt.

The red shirt pulled multiple maneuvers that to Twilight’s eyes, even as Permanently On Ground as they were, seemed like they should have been effective at shacking his pursuer. Rainboom, however, wasn’t even phased and maintained her position on the flyer’s 6 o’clock. Her superior speed even allowed her to continue to allow her to gain on the stallion until he was in range of her SMG. The event was too fast for Twilight to see, but the staccato of fire followed by the dropping body confirmed Rainboom’s kill.

Damn Nice flying

Rainboom was about to turn the previous Stuka dive tactic back on the gangsters, but she was quickly intercepted by a new jade colored flyer. Strangely enough this new flyer was not wearing a red shirt like all the others.

Now Rainboom was on the opposite side of the dogfight. Luckily, her superior speed was still her advantage and she simply stayed out of range of her new pursuer. One Rainbow streak was being chased after a similar jade colored blur.

A sudden shot rang out from the rooftop that Twilight was standing on, drawing her attention back to the rooftop she was on currently. Twilight turn her head slightly to the left and found that perched on the edge of the building was a unicorn stallion in a dark red shirt with a scoped rifle aiming down into the courtyard. Twilight immediately dropped to a crouch and activated her shadow cloak. With the darkness, she could have been a ghost in the night for all that could be seen of her.

Twilight waited for a few beats to make sure that the sniper had not taken notice of her presence. He never looked up from his rifle. Deciding that it was safe to move in, Twilight slinked through the snow that had accumulated on the rooftop. With a slight glow to her horn, that couldn’t be seen with her cloak activated, Twilight summoned one of her magical blades on her right arm. She only made it about 15 centimeters long. Just enough to be deadly, but not to be a hindrance to a stealthy approach.

Twilight moved to within a quarter of a meter and prepared to strike. The red shirt never even looked up from his scope.

Like a coiled snake, Twilight lunged forward, dissipating her shadow cloak as she did so. Her left arm wrapped around the unicorn’s head and pulled back. Simultaneously, Twilight drove her spell blade into the back of the stallion’s neck, ensuring that it severed the spinal column. She felt the body turn into a rag doll in her arms as the riffle dropped out of the stallions grasp and fell to the ground.

Now I understand why Wolf and Orion want me to have situational awareness. Being clueless like this one gets you killed.

Twilight laid the body down on the ground. She didn’t want to kill him, but he was trying to kill her team and she couldn’t allow that.

Twilight looked up from where she was and observed the situation again. Rainboom was still in the role of the pursued. Twilight watched as Rainboom stopped trying to pull maneuvers to shake her aggressor and just used her speed to go in a straight line. The jade pegasus was only to happy to comply. This however, turned out to be a mistake. Rainboom flared her wings and came to an abrupt stop that also raised her slightly higher into the sky. The jade blur clearly didn’t expect that and zoomed right under Rainboom. With her adversary now in front of her, Rainboom resumed her previous speed.

The rest of the team seemed to be doing well. Honesty was, however, no longer the biggest gun on the field. From down the alley way a large gray mass had appeared while Twilight had taken out the first marksman. A familiar looking minotaur was now deftly wielding his large Browning .50 cal. Honesty’s M249 was a powerful tool, but in terms of stopping power, her LMG just didn’t compare to the heavy machine gun.

Shit, that’s the minotaur from Canterlot. That probably means that the other flyer is Starfighter.

Twilight looked across the courtyard to the other rooftop where she could barely make out the form of Wolf dispatching one of the snipers. Wolf then started to move down the rooftops going in a clockwise direction as she had said she would.

Twilight now had to make the command decision on what direction she was to take. Doing the mental statistics in her head. She figured that there was a 96% chance of taking out the other two sharpshooters on the roof if they worked together, but a 45% chance that one of Nightmare team would be wounded before then. It was only a 73% chance that she could take out the other shooter alone and about a 59% chance she would get spotted and injured herself.

In the end, it was an easy choice. She couldn’t run the risk of letting one of her teammates getting shot for her own protection. Twilight also took off in a clockwise direction around the buildings. This meant that both Wolf and herself would have to take out a shooter solo. Twilight wasn’t worried about Wolf’s ability to handle it. It was her own skill that she was worried about.

Twilight took off running to the next building. She saw that there was going to be a large gap in between the building that she was currently on and the next one. Reaching the edge of the building, Twilight flared her horn. With a burst of pure arcane energy, Twilight launched herself into the air. Her forward momentum carried her forward and she landed softly in the layer of puffy snow that was covering this building.

Twilight was now on one of the two buildings that made up the west side of the park. The same side that Borscht and his stallion Mafia guard were firing on. They were doing well, especially Borscht.

He would probably have passed as a championship winning pistol shooter if he weren’t a damn criminal.

Now that she was on the new building, Twilight stopped her sprint and adopted a more crouched stance. With caution, she moved forward searching the roof for any sign of her target. She moved slowly as to not giver herself away to the shooter. Twilight much preferred to be the one throwing the surprise party for her quarry, not the other way around.

A series of hoof prints in the snow drew her attention. Twilight followed them to the edge of the roof where there was an easy to spot disturbance in the snow. It was pretty clear that whoever the sniper was had changed buildings for some reason. Perhaps they had seen that two of their fellow shooters were no longer active.

Twilight mentally noted that actually three of the shooters were dead now. She did this as she looked over to the east side buildings to see Wolf no longer prowling around the roof top, but taking up the position of high ground.

No longer burdened by the need to maintain her stealth, She was using the full capabilities of her Control Valkyrie nature and the aid of Eclipse. While each shot started out as a normal .45 round, they quickly changed form. Some turned to shards of ice that would freeze a target to the ground or make a small portion of the ground so slick that it could not be traversed. One shot formed into a bolt of lightning that chained between several red shirts, killing them all. A few even impacted the ground and were soon followed with the sudden eruption of a yellow and red fireball.

This was helping but not enough. The minotaur was using his .50 cal. To suppress the majority of Nightmare Team’s fire. This had allowed for the dozen or so remaining red shirts to advance. They were quickly closing in on the team and would soon over take them.

The fight in the air was also not going as well as the previous one. The Jade blur, that was probably the terrorist Starfighter, which Rainboom was fighting, was good. The Starfighter wasn’t quite as fast at Rainboom, but she seemed to have the maneuvering superiority.

This is bad. This is really bad. I have to find that shooter before he manages to…

A shot rang out from the far roof followed by a red plume exiting the back of the Borscht’s stallion guard. The guard flopped onto the ground like a rag doll.

…get a fatal shot off. Damn it! Why can’t I just keep everyone alive and safe! I need to kill that shooter NOW!

Like last time, Twilight launched herself across the gap that separated her current building and the one that the shooter was on. Unlike last time, she did not land gracefully. This time, Twilight hit a patch of hardened ice, slipped, and found herself face down in the layer of snow that covered the roof.

There was a scrambling of feet as Twilight got up. The sniper had clearly heard Twilights poor landing and was now aware of her presence.

Well there goes the easy option. Time to put that combat training to the test.

Twilight hurried to a nearby chimney that was sticking out of the roof. She managed to get into cover just as the ground behind her exploded from the impact of a riffle round. Twilight peaked over just long enough to spot the shooter, a hot pink mare unicorn, and the shooter’s location. It may not have been long enough for Twilight to fire a magic missile it was however, enough time for the sniper to send a round into the brick of the chimney, causing Twilight to promptly duck back down.

“I suggest that you surrender now before I have to kill you!” Twilight cried over the clamor of the battel.

“Silly southern pony, you not kill red shirt so easily and Red Army never surrenders!” came the reply.

Fine, you want to draw blood and not surrender? I’ll show you the error of your ways.

Twilight’s horn flared and she focused on the location of the shooter. In a low stress environment, teleporting was dangerous. In the chaos of battle it was almost suicidal, but Twilight was well trained enough to reduce the risk, at least she hoped so.

With a blink, Twilight found herself in a different part of the roof. She was in the right spot she saw, but facing the wrong direction. Twilight simultaneously rotated on her heel while activating her right spellblade to full short sword length. Unfortunately, the time needed to turn had given the other unicorn enough time to react. Igniting her own horn in a hot pink glow, the red shirt managed to pull a section of the nearby brick roofing in front of herself as an impromptu shield.

Twilight saw the new cover that the mare had acquired. Twilight focused on the mental concept of a fully formed spell blade and thrust her right arm at the cowering gangster.

Her arm came to an abrupt and jolting stop as the tip of her blade collided with the section of brick embedding itself five centimeters deep into the mortar and stone slab. Confusion filled Twilight’s mind as her full ethereal blade failed to cut through the piece of chimney. It should have been as smooth as a hot knife through butter. She looked down to see what could possibly have gone wrong. She was met not with the visage of the opaque blade of pure magic able to cut anything, but with the disheartening sight of the much more typical translucent variety.

How?

The sound of cackling emanated from behind the slab.

“See what I say. Ponies of the north not so easy to kill.”

Fine you want to make this hard we can make this hard.

Twilight dispelled her useless blade and instead enveloped the pink mare in a field of pure magical energy while also forming a rather large magic missile in her right palm. She then lifted the unicorn, slab of chimney and all, off the ground. Once airborne, Twilight used a large portion of her ability to hurl the magically grasped gang member down, at great speed, into the courtyard among a large group of her fellow red shirts. The large palm sized magic missile followed close behind, gaining in size as it went.

The pink unicorn landed in a plume of dirt and masonry. A split second later the ball of arcane power hit in the same spot. It did not strike with the kinetic force that a magic missile normally uses to do damage. Instead this one struck its mark and stopped. The ball, which had grown from palm sized to the diameter of a small boulder, instantly collapsed on itself. It started a strong gust as it sucked in all of the air around it as well. Once it reached the size of a pinprick in space it rapidly expanded back in a massive explosion of force and fiery.

The shooting on all sides seemed to come to a mutual pause to witness the large column of smoke and dust drift skyward. Even The minotaur stopped firing, and both Rainboom and Starfighter hung in the air, as if frozen mid-dogfight. When the air cleared, what had once been four red shirts of the Red Army gang, was now a smoldering crater a meter and a half deep and three meters wide.

Huh. I guess Shining’s old Sci-Fi shows were right. You wear a red shirt into combat, you end up dead. Need to remember that.

With that thought Twilight doubled over to vomit before falling down in the snow and passing out.

Author's Notes:

This should have been out a week ago but life had other plans and has been keeping me quite busy.

once again I encourage you to provide me with feedback, both positive and negative on the story. I have gotten a little bit smarter and started typing the chapters in Word first and then pasting them here to try and catch easy mistakes that I seemed to keep missing.

As always:
Thank you for reading
Aim High All

Chapter XII: Magic Lesson

Ow, ow, ow. Why does my head hurt so bad? And what is that terrible ammonia smell?

Twilight shot up into a sitting positionas Bulwark removed the offending package of smelling salts from her olfactory area. Twilight looked around trying to re-establish her grasp of her surroundings. She quickly realized that she was still in the park that the firefight had taken place in, but there was no combat to be seen. Next, it occurred to Twilight that while she was still lying in the snow, she was no longer on the roof top that she had passed out on. Instead she was down on the ground in the center of the park.

She looked around her and saw Captain Hunter standing above looking down at her while Bulwark was kneeling to her right. Continuing to look around her, Twilight saw Rainbow Dash hovering in the air keeping a lookout. Sunset Shimmer was walking a slow patrolling pattern around the perimeter of the park. Apple Jack was behind the spot that Twilight was sitting on. AJ had her M249 trained on the alleyway, as if to guard their location from another attack. Borscht and his remaining body guard were off some distance having a hushed conversation that Twilight was unable to make out.

“There. She seems to be back in the world of the living, Sir,” Bulwark stated turning to his commander.

“You feeling ok there Lieutenant?” the Captain asked, looking Twilight in the eyes.

Twilight did a quick once over of herself to self-diagnose any issues. Besides the lingering headache, the only other problem that she could find was an uneasy roiling in her stomach.

“Yes, Sir. A little queasy but nothing serious,” Twilight replied, shaking her arms to try and get the blood flowing to her hands again after going numb laying in the snow cover.

“Good, we need to get going before those terrorists and the rest of the red shirts can regroup,” The commander said. With a nod of approval Capt. Hunter reached a hand down to Twilight to aid her as she stood up.

Grasping it Twilight was hauled back onto her feet by the strength of Capt. Hunter. Once she was on his feet the captain turned around on his heel. With a whistle and a wave of his hand the commander of the team signaled for the team to move out. After giving the signal he set off walking back to the alleyway that had led to the initial part of the ambush.

While still walking, the captain also fished a small black and midnight blue device out of the side of his bag that he hadn’t had the time to get during the shooting. The device was a small palm sized piece of plastic and metal. The Captain raised it up and affixed the device to the special connection that was located on the left side of his combat helmet. From where it was attached it rested over his left ear. With a flick of his finger, he lowered the microphone extension that had been hidden, tucked inside the edge of the headset. With a tap to the side, the system came alive.

The much smaller earpieces, similar to the ones that Twilight had worn in the simulations, whined quietly in each team member’s ear.

“Nightmare team, comms check. Over,” came the voice, belonging to the commander, in Twilight’s ear.

A chorus of confirmations rang out from each of the operators.

Twilight felt a hearty pat on the back as Bulwark passes by her. Twilight turned to face the source of the impact.

As he continued moving on Bulwark turned around and started walking backwards slowly.

“Glad to see back on your feet darling. I would hate to see a pretty face like yours dead so soon after joining,” Bulwark said with a crooked grin and a coy wink. With that he turned back around and took off on half jog to catch back up with the captain.

Twilight looked up again to see that Rainbow Dash had ended her air patrol landing next to the captain and following after him down the alleyway. Sunset for her part had also stopped her patrol but started making her way to Twilight.

“Let’s go Sugar Cube. Time ta get a move on,” Apple Jack said to Twilight. AJ lifted her M249 off of its resting spot and turned to walk after the rest of the team.

Twilight, her mind finally coming fully back to the present, took off as well catching up to AJ. When Twilight came abreast to Apple Jack, Twilight also found Sunset matching her pace. Together the three brought up the rear of the team.

Borscht, and his remaining guard, finally took notice that Nightmare team was ready to go and ended their hushed conversation. With a huff of exertion the female bodyguard lifted her deceased counterpart over her shoulder and they both moved out of the park coming alongside Captain Hunter and the other two members of Nightmare Team that were leading from the front.

Twilight wracked her brain to try and recall what they had done to get out of the fire fight, but all she drew was a blank. Strain as she might the mental wall of fog would not clear. The most she could recollect was the detonation of a particularly large magic missile and a sudden draw on her magical reserves.After that it was just a blur as she remembered the snowy rooftop raising up to meet her face and unconscious.

What did I do? A magic missile, even a large one, should not have put me out cold like that.

A voice with a drawl cut through Twilight’s mental review of the past few hours.

“Ya doin’ alright there Spellblade? What happen’ to ya?” Apple Jack asked Twilight. AJ’s expression betrayed her concern for her fellow teammate.

Twilight nodded her head on response.

“I could be asking you the same question. Wolf and I took out the snipers, but you guys were still surrounded and there were the two terrorists down there. My little magic missile took out some of the red shirts, but didn’t do that much damage to their numbers. How did you drive them off?” Twilight inquired of her new friend.

“Ah don’ reckon Ah know wha’ ya mean by lil’. That blast you let off fried a few of them varmints, but the secon’ explosion knocked us all on our collective asses,” AJ replied looking a little confused.

“It’s true,” Sunset interjected, “Luckily Orion, Borscht, and myself seemed to recover faster than everyone else. We started to tout them from that point as the rest of the team came back on line and drove off the rest of the ambush. We got most of the gangsters, but some of them got away with the two terrorists.”

“After tha’ Wolf here found ya out like and extinguished lantern up on tha’ there roof,” Apple Jack finished.

It was Twilight’s turn to display her state of confusion.

“What do you mean second blast? All I remember was the simple magic missile taking out a few of those gangsters, and a sudden draw on my reserves. I’ve never felt anything like that,” Twilight replied.

“The second blast was a chain reaction of two spells drawing from the same source in a harmonic fashion and overcharging in a dramatic fashion. Also, are you seriously going to tell me you have never hit magic exhaustion before?” Sunset said as she gave Twilight a disbelieving look over the tops of her enchanted Aviators.

“Are you saying I hit spell resonance?” Twilight asked the other unicorn. “And to answer your question yes, I don’t think I have ever hit total magical exhaustion. Even when I had a flare as a young filly I never drained my reserves that bad.”

“Well, If you hit resonance without you knowing it that could put you in a mana loop and drop you quickly,” Sunset reasoned.

“Uhh, I’m sorry girls, bu’ ya wanna explain to a down home, country, earth pony what in the hell a spell resonance is?” Apple Jack finally spoke up, her confusion apparent on her face. “Ah feel a lil’ out of the loop here.”

Twilight looked over at the engineer a little sheepishly. Sunset also glanced at her fellow teammate, but she maintained her usual air of stoicism behind her reflective glasses.

“Sorry Honesty, sometimes I forget no everyone has an encyclopedic knowledge of magic like Wolf and myself,” Twilight apologized to her engineer friend before explaining more.

“Spells don’t draw mana, or power, from a unicorn at a constant rate. It comes more like a wave,” Twilight said trying to simplify a very complex ethereal concept.

“Somethn’ like a radio transmission or a microwave? Somethin’ sinusoidal like that?” Apple Jack asked in an attempt to convert a high science into the plane of engineering that she understood.

Twilight was somewhat surprised at this correlation. The connection between mana draws and the sinusoidal form of a radio wave was quite interesting. Being a magical concept, it had never occurred to twilight to compare it to a mechanical or electrical form. A raised eyebrow also showed that Sunset was equally interested in this concept.

That actually makes a lot of sense. Maybe I can set up a test to see if these waves can affect each other. That might explain the poor reception that unicorn cites deal with. Possibly if I…

Bad Twilight! Combat now, science later.

“That’s actually pretty close. Spell interference occurs when two spells draw mana or power from a unicorn at the same frequency and wavelength. This interference has two different forms. The first is spell cancelation. This is when the spells draw at half a cycle out of phase,” Twilight said condensing an entire year of Celestia’s leading edge magical class into a handful of basic sentences.

“So if’n it works out in a similar way ta the mechanical forms, then that would make ‘em cancel out. Is that right?” Apple Jack asked still trying to clarify this odd idea of magical interactions.

The team was now firmly divided between the group in the lead and the group in the rear. While the rear echelon was discussing a theory that drove high level magical manipulation; the front group was patrolling through a series of alleyways. The way seemed to be clear, but the captain didn’t trust his current surroundings. There were still too many shadows to hide unwanted eyes or undesired company.

“Spot on there Honesty,” Sunset Shimmer said with a nod to the earth pony engineer.

Twilight also nodded in confirmation of AJ’s statement.

“The second variation of spell interference is spell resonance. This is when the natural frequency of one spell’s draw is in phase with another spell’s mana draw. When this happens it can lead to a magical overcharge,” Twilight continued to explain.

Sunset jumped in to help with the impromptu magical lesson.

“When a unicorn slips into a spell resonance the spell can hijack the mana flow and draw at a faster rate than expected. That over draw of mana can cause a spell to grow unstable and eventually break down. Usually rather spectacularly, I might add.”

The three ponies bringing up the rear had closed some of the distance that the leading officer, medical expert, and ace pilot had established. Borscht and his female lackey were now side by side with the commander. Borscht and Capt. Hunter were locked into conversation. Borscht had started to lead the group out of the alleyways and down a main street. The rest of the team was still keeping a look out for possible dangers, but now they seemed to be heading in a desired direction.

“So I’ma guess that’s what happened back there than wasn’ it?” Apple jack said with a slight nod of her head back at the way that they had come. Back to the park that now contained a new, freshly smoldering crater and a pile of dead gang members strewn about it.

“That sure seems to be the case,” Lt. Sparkle admitted with some begrudging acceptance.

Apple Jacks brow furrowed for a bit as she contemplated this information. She seemed to reach some understanding, but there was still clearly some confusion in her face. After a few more seconds of a pondering look Apple Jack finally voiced her question that she clearly hadn’t been able to answer for herself.

“Now Ah can see how that could go n’ blow to bits in yer face, but I’ve seen unicorns use multiple spells at once with no problems at ta speak of. Why was this so different?” Apple Jack finally asked.

The team had started to leave the broken down ghetto that made up the majority of the outskirts of Staliongrad. Up ahead of the team a large skyscraper could be seen blazing in a glory of lights. A name was emblazoned upon the top of the structure; Workman’s Respite. This structure towered above all the surrounding buildings, dwarfing even the tallest of other buildings by comparison.

Borscht tapped Captain Hunter on the shoulder to draw his attention. Once he had Midnight’s attention the pegasus gangster pointed out the tower. After a muttered conversation between the two, Capt Hunter started to change his heading to take a more direct path to the tower. The Lunar Guard Captain reached up to the headset that he wore that acted as the team’s communication relay. Tapping it the system came out of the standby mode that it had been in with a small burst of static in each of the Nightmare’s ears. The irritation quickly subsided as the voice of their commander cut through.

“Nightmares, be advised rally point is that tower to our one o’clock. Also I need the three of you in the back to close the gap. I don’t want you to get cut off if we get hit again. Two of you can deal with that, but I don’t want my heavy weapons separated from me if it comes to a firefight.”

It was sunset that responded first to the message, “Wilco, Orion. We’ll close the distance.”

Sunset then looked at the other two that were trailing behind with her. With a quick nod of her flaming maned head at the rest of the team up ahead she took off on a slight jog.

Twilight took the cue and started to trot along side. Surprisingly, Apple Jack was also able to keep pace, even with her extreme load that she was carrying.

As the closed the last remaining distance, Sunset revived their previous conversation.

“So to answer your question Honesty, most unicorns can avoid the majority of spell interference with practice. You learn to manually separate spell draws and manipulate their natural wavelengths so that they don’t affect each other. However, if a unicorn is careless or letting their emotions get the better of them,” Sunset cast a glance at Twilight as she said this, “they can sometimes slip.”

Twilight sheepishly looked away from the glare of her partner.

Shoot! She read me like an open book. Ok, pull yourself together. A pony died because you weren’t quick enough. Perhaps a little overreaction is not so unexpected.

“She’s right. I let some anger take over my better rational and didn’t properly separate the draw that my magic missile took and it must have hit resonance with the spell that I used to throw the sniper into the courtyard. Subsequently, it over taxed my abilities and caused my exhaustion,” Twilight explained, finally coming to terms with how she had screwed up.

The mention of anger taking over seemed to grab Sunset’s attention, but she made no mention of it.

“So I can understand that,” Sunset said, “What I don’t get is why you did what you did in the first place. You seem to excel with hand to hand combat. Against an opponent that is only equipped for long range engagements, it makes no sense to me why you would increase the separation distance.”

“She was a unicorn,” Twilight tried to explain. “When I went at her with my blade she pulled a piece of rubble to her aid in warding off my blows. So I just decided that it would be simpler to use my Valkyrie strength to just out power her.”

A puzzled expression crossed both of the other mare’s faces. Apparently, as Twilight quickly found out, for different reasons.

“What the hell is a Valkyrie?”

“What happened to your fully formed blade?”

Apple Jack and Sunset asked their questions, overlapping each other. It just mashed into a collection of word soup to Twilight’s ears. She was able to untangle the jumble in her head in short order.

Twilight responded to the two different questions, “Now is not the time to discuss what a Valkyrie is…”

“You’re damn right it’s not.” Sunset interrupted with a cold fury to her voice. “You weren’t supposed to just letting that detail slip loosely.”

Crap. She’s probably right.

“Right,” Twilight said sheepish once again. “As for the second question; for whatever reason, I could only summon the normal spellblade. The full form seemed to evade me. It didn’t seem to matter how much power I supplied, it just didn’t want to work.”

“Interesting. That’s something we should look into, but that will have to wait for later. There is nothing that we can do it about it here in the field.”

It didn’t take long for the three mares to reach the rest of the team. As they did, the entire group, including the two mafia members, stepped out on to the main thoroughfare through the heart of Stalliongrad.

By Twilight’s estimation, they were still at least 3 kilometers away from the high-rise that she ascertained to be their destination. This assumption came from the fact that with the sight of the building both Borscht and his female subordinate, still burdened with her deceased counterpart, were visibly relieved with the realization that they were in such close proximity to the building.

Captain Hunter, however, did not share their breach of operational security. With a series of hand gestures, he signaled to the team to form a perimeter watch as the closed in on the sky scrapper. It was clear to Twilight that he didn’t want any surprises this close to relative safety. Sure the town was technically still under Equestrian claim, but it was still ruled by the lawless.

Moving in line with a five meter spread they all took a different zone of coverage. The Captain covered the road ahead of them, Rainbow covered the front right, Bulwark did the same with the front left. Next in the line was AJ covering the rear left with Sunset behind her covering the rear right. This left Twilight as the rear security covering the team’s six o’clock region.

Slowly the team made it to the beacon of light with no incident. The extra caution may have proven unnecessary, but to Twilight it still seemed like the right play.

Approaching the front door, Borsht rapped the frame crisply. A second later a slat in the door opened up and a pair of eyes peered out.

“Ehhh…What’s the passphrase?” the voice asked from inside the door. It had some sort of drawl to it but it wasn’t the same northern accent that others of this region had.

“Let me in Turnip Truck, I have our ‘friends’ and we need to get off the streets.” Borscht said with a bit of disdain for this pony on the other side of the door.

“Well that aint the passphrase Borscht,” came the reply.

With a deft motion Borscht drew his handgun. Without even attempting to disguse his frustration and anger, he jammed it through the open slat, directly at the brow of the pony behind the door.

“I ain’t in the mood to play games Hayseed. One of our family is already dead tonight. Don’t be the reason that number goes up to two.” Borscht said in a cold tone that convinced Twilight that the mafia stallion was deadly serious.

“Ya know, on the other hand it was close enough.” Turnip Truck said with a slight quiver to his voice.

The slat slammed shut and the sound of deadbolts turning made its way through the heavy steel of the door. Soon enough the door swung open. Borscht holstered his sidearm again and ushered the team in.

“Hurry up,” he growled at the team. “The boss is upstairs and he is waiting on you.”

Author's Notes:

So this and the next chapter were supposed to be combined, but while writing this I decided that the two sections were distinct enough in content that they should be separated. I know it took a while to get this chapter out, but with a combination of busy schedule and not a small portion of laziness this kept getting put on the back burner. I will try to not do that again, but this is a personal passion project, so it will only get work when I have the proper passion for it.

However I have tried to do better at cleaning up this chapter more than normal, but I'm sure that I have missed something if not a lot of things so please let me know if you catch something.

Thank you for reading
Aim High All

Chapter XIII: Inside the Mafia

To Twilight Sparkle the exterior of the highrise had been quite normal when compared to the buildings of other cities she had seen. Perhaps not so much to Canterlot, with their rolling curves and traditional architecture, but it would have fit right in with the metropolises of Manehatten and Baltimare. The only true stand out feature of the building was its dominance of the present skyline. It was illuminated with enough exterior lights as to be a beacon for all of Stalliongrad to see. The building did tower over the rest of Stalliongrad, but when the majority of the buildings were either ruins or only 3 stories tall, this fact was much less impressive. For all intents and purposes, the building looked to Twilight to be nothing more than a standard office building.

Because of this it came as quite the shock that upon entering this overly generic looking highrise, Twilight’s senses were assaulted from all directions by noise and sound. The drab exterior of the building gave way to a boisterous speakeasy.

The lights were dimmed and pulsing red and black. Rolling jazz flooded the air all through out the speakeasy. Numerous patrons to the bar were clearly already well imbibed in their drinks. Some were even passed out in a corner, multiple empty cider cups piled around them. Neither Apple Jack nor Rainbow Dash made any attempt to hide their interest in the bar and the liquid refreshments that it contained but a look from Captain Hunter seemed to suppress any notion they had of tasting the local drink.

Off to one side of the noisy establishment was a stage surrounded by the majority of the patrons. On the stage was the source of the brass heavy music, a jazz band made of an earth pony on drums, a pegasus playing the saxophone, a unicorn on the piano, and finally a second earth pony on a stand up bass.

However, it was not the band that caught Twilight’s attention. It was the scantily clad unicorn mare that was up on the stage, standing off to the side of the band that drew all of the attention. A burst of applause rang out from the still conscious drinkers as the mare started to sing. The song started slowly as the singer slowly stepped out from the shade of the curtain. The ivory coat of the mare was starkly contrasted by the gossamer red of her dress. Her intermixed white and pink mane flowed behind her as she continued to sachey her way to the edge of the stage. She seemed to hypnotize the majority of her audience. The use of her body, the movements that she made. The teasing and playful touches she left on the stallions and occasional mare that were transfixed on her. The couldn’t look away.

This included Twilight and Bulwark, the latter of the two even lowered seemed to almost salivate before he remembered he needed to maintain his suave demeanor. It wasn’t that Twilight had never heard of clubs or speakeasies and what sorts of entertainment they tended to provide. It was that she had never actually encountered a scene of such sexuality. She was thankful, when Borscht pushed his way through the club to a door near the back and Captain Hunter motioned for the team to follow to follow. Twilight followed close behind the commander.

Bulwark, seeing that it was time to move onto more serious business gave a final catcalling whistle. With that done, he returned to the team as they proceed through the speakeasy.

Twilight was initially surprised by the lack of reaction to their presence, but the patrons seemed to be accustomed to armed groups being escorted through the club.

Must be some mafia related desensitization. They are all brutes so they don’t mind other brutes in their midst.

Borscht led the them through the door, which was flanked on both sides by large earth pony stallions, at the back. The stallions were both dressed like many of the club goers, they even had drinks in their hand, but it wasn’t hard to notice that there was a distinct difference in the air about them from the others that were reveling in the debauchery of the watering hole. Not only were their drinks still full and untouched, their suits did little to hide the bulge of a shoulder holster. The eyes of both bouncers tracked over all of the members in Nightmare team, surveying and sizing them up. Many members of the the team returned the same surveying glance.

After a short reaffirming nod from Borscht, the bouncer acquiesced to the team and opened the door to them.

In stark contrast to the velvet colors and the boisterous sound of the club, the other side of the door was a rather utilitarian and mundane staircase. Much more like what Twilight had expected to find based on the drab exterior. Their mafia envoy started his way up the staircase with the Nightmares in tow. The stairs ened on a floor that was fairly open with a series of doors that seemed to ring the outside of the main open room.

Reaching the next floor, Twilight found that her previous thought on the acceptance of violent individuals in the presence of the mafia seemed to be confirmed. All around on this second floor were individuals, sitting on crates, leaning against walls, or sitting at tables, that were fully loaded with weapons. The armed strongmen were a conglomerate of all three pony races. Some were talking with others, some were cleaning or maintaining their weapons, and others were drinking and playing cards at a table near the center.

Unlike below, the arrival of Nightmare Team did seem to draw some eyes. A few hands even moved closer to weapons.

Twilight for her own part felt a little uncomfortable it what amounted to the lions den of a known criminal organization. Out of the side of her eye Twilight could notice that Sunset’s hand had also moved back closer to the houlster of her revolver. AJ, Bulwark, and Rainbow Dash also tightened their grip on their respective weapons. Even the guard that had been part of the original meeting turned firefight looked a little uneasy with the current situation. In the whole room the only two people that showed not sign of feeling the palpable tension were Captain Hunter and Borscht.

The invisible stare down between the two groups continued to grow until Borscht stepped out in front of the rest of the members of the mafia strongmen.

“Stand down. They aren't here for us, at least not this time. It’s more of a cooperation between our two organizations. More than that, they have Bratva’s protection on them for now,” Borscht announced.

With those words the tension seemed to ease for both sides but it most certainly didn’t go away.

With this potential conflict out of the way, Borscht continued to lead the team through the open meeting area to what looked to Twilight to be an elevator door on the far side of the room.

At this point Borscht turned around to face back to the team.

“From here I can only take the officers of your group,” Borscht stated.

Captain Hunter sighed and gave the red maned pegasus a stern stare, “What do you mean only the officers go on? You want me to split my team in the middle of your headquarters?”

Borscht gave an affirming nod in response, “Yes, the way that our organization works is that only officers in the mafia meet with our higher leaders especially with Bratva. It is not just in our organization, but between all of that gangs in the city. This is a requirement that we will be extending to you and your team.”

After a brief moment of thought the team lead finally relented, “Alright, Lazarus, Honesty, Rainboom, you three stay here. Try to indear yourselves to the mafia members if you can. Wolf and Spellblade you’re with me.”

The three sergeants; AJ, Rainbow Dash, and Bulwark, all shared a nervous glance at each other. After a few seconds of silent resignation they moved off as a group. They proceed to the side of the open room and took up a set of crates together, each still scanning their surroundings like they were caught behind enemy lines.

Sunset also moved up to the Captain and, just loud enough for Twilight to also hear, muttered, “Sir are you sure you’re alright with this? I don’t know if it is really such a great idea.”

Twilight also inched closer to her commander and joined the muttered conversation, “Sir, I concur with Wolf’s assessment of the situation. We are currently in a semi-hostile environment. Every tactics book that I have read says that splitting our strength and sending them in separate directions could easily turn to disaster.”

Captain Midnight Hunter turned to his two young Leutinents with a stoic gaze.

“I have full faith in those three to keep themselves and each other safe and relatively out of trouble. The same faith that I have in the three of us to do the same. We also need the cooperation of the mafia to run this operation. If that means playing Bratva’s game then that is what we do. Besides, sometimes you just need to trust in others.”

Both Twilight and Sunset muttered their acceptance to Capt. Hunter’s decision and fell in behind him, flanking on either side. They proceed forward to join Borscht at the entrance to the elevator.

It did not take long for the elevator to arrive after Borscht pushed the button to summon it. Upon arrival the doors of the elevator opened to reveal a new set of guards. Neither one of them looked particularly aggressive, and one of them stood at the input panel pressing the hold door button.

“If you have finished gossip session we can get going, Bratva is waiting,” the thick northern accent of Borscht called as he entered the elevator followed by the female earth pony that had been part of the original receiving party.

“We best not keep the man waiting I guess,” Captain Hunter sighed, and he too entered the elevator.

Twilight shot a quick look to her partner as if she was looking for some assurance from Sunset.

“It will be fine Spellblade. Apparently we need to play nice with the mafia to catch a terrorist. Who knows, maybe a talk with the Captain will be enough for them to see the error of their ways and reform into well adjusted members of society,” Sunset said with a small snort. With that she entered the elevator leaving Twilight little choice but to join the others.

The ride up to the top floor was a short one and was completed in relative silence with only the noise of the elevator on the cables to break the stillness. The elevator came to a jarring stop at the final destination. The door creaked open and Borscht stepped out onto the landing. Twilight watched as Captain Hunter, Sunset, and the female escort exited the elevator. Twilight moved out behind them into a small hallway.

The walls of the hallway were fairly barren. One side of the hall had an Equestrian flag. The flag was slightly tattered and had smudges of what could be either dirt or possibly blood. The other side there was a pair of maps. One of Stalliongrad and one of Equestria at large. The hallway extended for a few meters before it ended at a metal door.

Once again Borscht lead the way with the three officers of Nightmare Team in tow. He rapped on the door twice. A resounding metallic echo eliminated from the door. A few seconds passed before any response came from the other room.

“Borscht? Is that you?” a mystery voice boomed through the door.

“Da is me.” Borscht yelled back through the door.

“Well get on in here. I want to meet my new guests,” the mystery voice commanded.

Borscht opened the thick metal door and walked in. Captain Hunter followed behind with Sunset Shimmer at his side. Twilight hesitated a second until she realized that the female mafia guard was waiting around and watching for her to enter as well. With a small apprehensive inhale of air, as if preparing to dive into a deep pool of water, Twilight followed the rest of the group and entered the den of the gangster leader.

The room, like the hallway that preceded it, was spartan. There was little on the walls besides a second Equestrian flag was displayed prominently behind a large wooden desk.

Behind the desk were a pair of ponies, one seated and one standing just off to the side and leaning over the desk. Bother were going over a black ledger book that was open upon the desk. As Twilight and the rest of the party entered the room the seated pony, with a waive of his hand, dismissed the apparent secretary. She moved to close the ledger book, but not before Twilight was able to take interest and attempt to snoop on the contents of the book from a distance. Even though the contents were upside down, Twilight was still able to make out a few lines. This was purely due to the shear number of odd ways that she had lain about reading her her younger days.

The leger seemed to mostly contain information on payments to and from various groups or individuals. Only one name really stood out to Twilight, Sonnenreich. It was the only name that she could remember before the ledger was closed and taken away by the secretary.

As the group entered the room, the seated pony, a gray maned earth pony with a dark green coat, looked up and seemed to examine each member of the Lunar Guard as they entered. Based on the description this was most likely Bratva, the head of the mafia.

Bratva cleared his throat before speaking, “I’m glad that you could finally make it back Borsch. What took so long?”

The eyes of Bratva finished his scan of the group. It was clear from his pause that there was something was wrong.

Bratva continued, “Where is Dacia?”

Twilight immediately felt a pang of nervousness. There was only one pony that was at the initial rendezvous that wasn’t at this meeting. The dead guard is the only pony that the gangster boss could be talking about.

Borscht’s expression turned somber, “We were ambushed by Red Army upon first contact with guests. Dacia didn’t make it.”

An expression of anger flashed across the face of Bratva. He did a second, much slower, scan of Nightmare team. In Twilight’s mind it was as if looking for a culprit or a villain

Oh no! Is this alliance going to fall apart? Did I ruin everything because I wasn’t good enough.

The anger in Bratva’s face eased and it turned a bit sorrowful. He reached down under his desk and withdrew a bottle of some clear liquid. He placed the bottle down on the desk and reached back into the drawer to retrieve a number of small metal shot glasses, 6 glasses in total, before placing each of the glasses in a row, Twilight watched as Bratva unscrewed the cap of the bottle and filled each of the shot glasses.

Bratva picked up one glass and with a gesture offered the remainders to the others in the room. Borscht was the first to move forward and take one. The female guard was not far behind the second in command of the mafia in retrieving her glass. Twilight was more hesitant to take the proffered drink. The Captain and Sunset also seemed to share an apprehensive glance before the head of the Nightmare team nodded. Captain Hunter was still looking slightly apprehensive about drinking on the job, but still stepped forward and took the last three of glasses off of the desk. He handed one to Sunset and the final one to Twilight.

Sunset took a sniff of the drink and seemed to be satisfied with the contents. Twilight however was still nervous and hesitated to take the drink from her commander.

Bratva noticed this hesitation. He tried to break through it with a smile.

“Come my new friend please join us in this toast.”

Alright. How bad can it be?

Twilight took her glass but still stood of to the side, unsure of how to proceed.

With all of the glasses passed out to the ponies in the room, Bratva raised his own glass and began to speak, “We drink to those that stand strong for what they believe in, their brothers in arm, and give their lives for the beliefs they hold so dear. We vow to hold your memory and avenge your death.”

With his small speech completed, Bratva took his glass and tapped it against the top of his desk with a small clink. After the motion, Bratva threw back the drink in one go showing no reaction. Borscht and the remaining guard followed suit. Captain Hunter and Sunset also took their drinks and downed them as well.

Overcoming her hesitation, Twilight also took her drink and, in one fell swoop, downed her drink. At first she felt nothing, but in seconds she could feel a burning sensation run down her throat. The burning sensation seemed to cause her throat to inflame and close. In seconds Twilight was doubled over with her hand on her knees, caught in an uncontrollable coughing fit.

Author's Notes:

So I know that it's been a while but over this summer I've been kind of busy. I did mention early on that I didn't want this story to die out, but I also mentioned that It is a passion project. I didn't really have a lot of desire to work on it for a while, but that is starting to change. However I still will probably write less often then I did when I started this. If you like the story please have some patiance. I do intend to finish it and there is still a ways to go.

I also intended this chapter to be about twice as long but I wanted to get something out because its been so long. This part seemed like a good split so i split it here. The second half will come out as its own chapter when I can finish it.

As always thank you for reading
Aim High All