Seven years... seven long, difficult, grueling years of war... hard to believe that it's finally all over, it all ended just a few hours ago, with the final assault on Manehatten, and with the Rebel leaders finally calling it quits, funny how fast it ended, the disputes that started seven years of war, were resolved in just a few hours, though i guess your more open to compromise when there's millions of guns pointed at ya'. Thinking back its hard to believe that some hay brained pony's could have started all of this... some stupid politics caused the destruction of cities, and the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Earth Ponies, Pegasi, Unicorns, Griffins, and Celestia knows how many critters died in those fires!
That night, the camp was as lively as ever, friendly chatter, fireworks, and more then a few drunk ponies. Though no matter how happy you were, how much you partied, or how drunk off your hooves you were, you couldn't help but notice the eerie orange glow of Manehatten in the distance, a once proud city with skyscrapers towering above, slowly burning... You couldn't help but think, of all of Equestia's once great cities, that have met a similar death by fire. Wonders of pony engineering, gutted by fire, and blanketed by ash. But Manehatten was far from the worse, even though it's been the site of both a seige, and a massacre...
Manehatten was spared the worst of the destruction, Canterlot suffered heavily during the seige, but most of the smaller buildings made it through, the royal palace held up surprisingly well, though it was built during some of Equestria's darker times... darker times... i say that like it's been hundreds of years ago.. but no, the 'Dark Times" just ended. Ponyville... I've only been their twice since I left for the army, once running for my life on the retreat, second time, we were on the attack... I'm just glad that Apple Jack, got everypony out in time, if i didn't send that letter, im pretty sure that A.J. would have been there trying to fight off the entire Rebel Army, with Apple Bloom, and Granny Smith cheering her on... I still remember that letter, of course it wasn't that long, I was in a rush... we all were...
To A.J,
I know your not one for running from a fight, but you need to get out of Ponyville. Grab what you can and get Apple Bloom, and Granny to Canterlot, things have gone south here, and it looks as if we'll be falling back again... See if you can get Flutteryshy to go with you... for reasons we both know... just what ever you do, GET OUT OF PONYVILLE!!!
Your Brother,
Bic mac
I remember when we were marching through the first time, there were still a few buildings standing, the library, Sugarcube Corner, and a cottage here and there, the farm was gone though along with the trees... years of work, plowing, planting, sweat, and memories... gone in a flash, some of those trees stood for hundreds of years... the zap apple trees were here long before any pony stepped hoof in Ponyville, or what came to be Ponyville... It was a horrible feeling... seeing your memories... your childhood... your entire life, reduced to a smoldering crater...
And then there was Pillydelphia, the sight of the bloodiest, battle ever fought by ponies... or griffins... heard thats the reason the griffins quit... I'm glad I wasn't there... I've seen some of those pony's, shaking, stuttering, always looking up, like somethings out to get them... Experts say it will take years just to clear up the rubble, who these "so called experts" were, I don't know... If you asked somepony eight years ago, how long it would take to repair a city that was bombed into non-existence, they would've bucked you in the head, and called you a loony...
That night, we all slept peacefully, free of worries, no longer did we have to sleep next to our guns, or wake up suddenly, in the middle of the night, to an ambush or the sound of air raid sirens and Anti-Air cannons firing into the sky. Those were the worst, once you heard those Pegasi over head, you forgot your training, you forgot everything they drilled into your skull about "keeping a cool head" the only thing you were thinking of was finding a hole, and sticking your head in as far as you could, if you weren't in a hole when the raid started, you certainly weren't there when it ended... It was horrible, you look up to see the "night flak" something the Princess's chemists came up with, it let out an eerie black flash, clearly visible even at night. You would see objects fall from the sky, followed by that unmistakable "thud" which signalled that another Pegasus wasn't coming home...
But that wasn't the worst fate, sometimes they survived the crash, but they payed the ultimate price for their lives, their wings... Night flak was known for blowing off wings, even worse, the flak did something to the veins or nerves or something... those wings never grew back. Those Pegasi were grounded for life, never to fly again, they lost what made them a Pegasus, most chose not to live that life, to take the easy way out, can't say I blame 'em, loosing what you were born to do...
The Pegasi wern't the only ones to lose what made them... different from any other pony, often you would see, an Earth Pony missing a leg, a Unicorn missing a chunk of their horn, or just having it blown clean off... One pony I would never forget, a Unicorn named "Bristles" that nick name suited him perfectly... the brown hair on his tail, was all stringy, looking, like a broom, but what really earned him that name, was his painting's, some of the most beautiful things I've ever seen. I never figured out how he could still paint such beauty, in such a horrible place...
Then came that fateful day... we were moving in to retake Ponyville, we made in to the first trench, and we were getting ready to continue on. Bristles was half out of the trench when a "Pheonix round" landed right on top of us. The trench protected most of us from the fires, and scorching smoke. Bristles wasn't so lucky, at first we thought he was fine, just a singed mane... then we saw it, the look in his eyes... he was blind... He never painted again, we all lost something that day, the one bit of beauty that still remained in those trenches... those, cold bloody trenches...
So many ponies dead... the worst part, you knew you caused some of 'em! You knew what those five rounds in your "Ursa Junior" meant, it didn't mean you had five shots, it meant that you were going to kill five ponies, that you were going to take away a little filly's father, or a mare's husband... That's the kind of thing that would have kept you up at night, but the constant air raids and nightly fire fights never gave them the chance.
So much death... so much destruction... but, that's gone, that's the past...
"Yo Mac!" "Were getting ready to move!"
Pvt. Streaks, a young care free, fire colored Pegasus, he always had a way of just dropping in, seemingly out of no where. He was one of the stupidest, hay brained, ponies I have ever met! He had no sense of self preservation! But that's what made him a hero, he saved my hide more then once, and probably ma' family's to.
"Mac!" "C'mon lets not keep the princesses waiting, Luna did go an round up all the booze in Canterlot for us!" "Ready for our heroes welcome?"
"Eeyup"
