Equestria in Conflict - Discovering Home

John looked out at the midday sun. He was sitting there with Twilight and Wesley, simply enjoying the day. Twilight said she had invited a friend of hers, but John didn’t know who she meant until she saw an orange pony begin to climb the hill.

The cool breeze contrasted nicely with the warm day. Because of weather control, not a cloud was in sight. Rainbow Dash had said something about a large rainstorm tomorrow, and how they should enjoy the nice day while it lasted, so he intended to do that.

Applejack finally finished climbing the hill and joined the group. They all sat down on the quilt, looking down at Ponyville. The town’s citizens wandered about, going through their day without a worry in the world. It was a paradise to John, a place where he could rest himself and forget his past.

“So,” Wesley said, turning to Applejack. “How are you adjusting to being back?”

“Some days, ah don’t know.” The orange pony replied after a moment. “The things ah saw, the things ah did, and what ah went through near the end. To be honest to ya’ll, it scares me. Some days mah brother, Big Mac, asks me what ah saw… Ah can’t bring myself to tell him.”

“We are all going through that.” Twilight said. “I’ve caught myself throwing myself to the ground whenever Spike closes a door too loud, for Celestia’s sake. He just looks at me. I don’t even think he understands.” She finished, her voice breaking slightly at the end.

John nodded. “We’ve all been through too much. You were in the war for almost six months, and we were in it for two months longer than you. Twilight, you had to go through the nuke outside Cascade Falls. At the same time, Applejack, you got taken by the Russians. God knows how much we worried about that.

“The point is, we will all settle in eventually. It’s only a matter of time.”

“Speaking of time,” Twilight said, looking up at the sun. “It’s about two, so it’s time to get down to the town.” With that, she quickly began packing up the quilt as the others stood up and moved off it. Within the minute, they were moving down towards Ponyville.

-=-=-

Four hours later, Twilight was walking through the market, enjoying her day. She even got to visit Pinkie Pie, although her friend seemed a bit more subdued compared to normal, complaining of a ‘secret’ that she had to find out. Rolling her eyes, she had shrugged off what the pink mare said.

Out of the corner of her eyes, she saw that the library seemed fine, even from two blocks away. Nopony seemed to be inside of it, the tree wasn’t burning, and Spike was waving from the window, while-

She cut her thoughts off and turned towards the library. Sure enough, Spike was waving at her from the window, a slightly panicked looked on his face. Seeing it, Twilight quickly trotted through the crowd, headed for her house.

Bursting through the door, she was greeted by Spike, who had a solemn look on his face.

“Twilight!” He quickly said. “This just came from the Princess! You gotta read it!”

She grabbed the rolled-up letter in her magic, opening it.

To: Twilight Sparkle

From: Princess Celestia

My faithful student, I have urgent news. A Changeling attack is about to occur. Not just in Canterlot, and not just in the major cities, but everywhere. We have information from a group of rouge Changelings that an attack will be made tomorrow.

In all your efforts, you have to keep this a secret from all but your friends. The guards are being alerted, and we don’t want to cause a panic. There is a good chance they have replaced major figures, so watch closely.

Signed, Princess Celestia.

Twilight read it again. She reread it once more, and then again, in disbelief.

“Spike, did you read this?” She asked slowly.

“Yes, I did.”

Twilight looked up at the clock. It was a little after six now. Without a moment’s hesitation, she began to walk up to her room.

“Spike, stay in the house tonight at all costs.” She said. “You do not want to be outside when this happens. Warn Rainbow Dash, and tell her to grab the other Elements, and meet us here. Tell her to grab her equipment. She will know what I mean.”

Seeing the purple dragon’s hesitation, she sighed. “Now? Please?” With that, he scampered off.

Twilight moved to her bedroom and opened a chest, scrounging around inside of it for something. With a grin, she pulled out the camouflage parka that she had worn on Earth. She would need it now. Sliding it on, she went down to the room just as Rainbow Dash raced in.

“I told all the others!” The blue pegasus said, clutching a bag in her hoof. “What’s this about?”

“I’ll tell you when the others arrive. Let’s just say it’s very bad.” Twilight responded.

The other Elements started to arrive one by one. Rarity was the last one, arriving eight minutes after Rainbow Dash.

“Darling,” She said to Twilight. “What is so important it had to interrupt my early sleep? You know I need it.” Rarity finished, glaring at her.

Twilight shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. I just got a letter from the princess, and we have a major problem: The Changelings are about to start another invasion.” Several gasps went around the room. “She got the information from a rouge group of Changelings that is allied against Chrysalis. Apparently, it starts tomorrow. This is not a joke.”

Rainbow simply stared at her, before hefting her bag. “Twilight, I don’t know about you, but that is NOT cool. But I know you have a plan. What is it?”

Twilight gave a smile. “Applejack, Rainbow Dash, and I will go and alert John and the others. Hopefully, we can beat off any attack here. Rainbow Dash, you grab Anton. Applejack, you alert Wesley. And I will tell John. We meet in John’s house fifteen minutes from now. Is that fine with you all?” She finished.

“Sounds fine, Twi.” Applejack replied.

“Same here.” Rainbow Dash said.

Twilight gave a small nod, before turning to the others. “The rest of you, hunker down in here. You aren’t used to fighting like we are, and I don’t want any of you getting hurt. Fluttershy, can  you do something for me?”

“Yes.” She said in a low voice.

“Good. I need you to get Mayor Mare. We have a crisis on our hands, and she needs to be ready. It’s almost eight now, so the attack will begin tomorrow morning, most likely. The sun’s beginning to set, so we’d better get going.” With that, the four ponies left the library, headed for the areas they needed to go.

-=-=-

Unseen Shadow was enjoying his time imitating Mayor Mare. Although he didn’t get to do much, the love he received for ‘being sick’ was enough to easily sustain him and several others, and the drone impersonating the weather mare had already come over to receive some and give it to the small group.

The attack would begin tonight, so he had to disappear before then. The real Mayor Mare had already been moved to Amethyst Star’s house, and so they wouldn’t be finding her any time soon. His time to leave would come in ten minutes, so he simply was waiting around until then.

One thing that he enjoyed about this place, and impersonating ponies, was that he finally got the chance to sleep on a good bed. Most Changelings had to make do without; resources in the main Hive were scarce enough, and it was only the outlying miniature Hives that seemed to have enough supplies to make them.

A sudden knock on the door distracted him. He slowly walked to the door, so as to maintain the illusion of being sick, and opened it. To his surprise, one of the Elements of Harmony stood in front of him.

“Mayor Mare, can I please talk to you? If that’ ok with you, I mean.” The yellow pegasus said.

“Please do.” He said, his voice perfectly matching that of Mayor Mare. He gestured inside, and the Element walked in. He quickly searched the Hive Mind for information on this one. Fluttershy, yellow pegasus, pink mane, very timid and shy, Element of Harmony. The information came quickly, causing him to reevaluate his priorities.

They reached the living room, and the pegasus sat down, prompting him to do the same.

“Twilight found something, and she wanted you to know.” She said.

“Oh, what is it? Certainly the new tax proposals are not a crisis.” He said, maintaining his cover.

The pegasus shook her head. “No. Twilight got a letter from Princess Celestia saying that there will be a Changeling attack sometime tomorrow. She went me to warn you.”

Unseen Shadow didn’t have to mimic the shock on his face. He quickly relayed the information that they knew through the Hive Mind, as well as sending a real-time mental recording of this conversation.

“That’s… Shocking.” He simply said.

Suddenly, he got a message through the Hive Mind from Amethyst.

[Unseen Shadow, I need you to take her down. Capture or kill her, it is your choice. Once you are done, get out of there and fly her over to the safehouse.]

“Well, I need to get going.” The yellow pegasus said, standing up and turning around to leave.

She didn’t see ‘Mayor Mare’ transform, or the bolt that knocked her out. She fell to the floor, out cold. Unseen Shadow looked outside, judging that it was dark enough to do this. Thankfully, he knew some higher-level spellcasting, just as most expert infiltrators did. He cast an energy-consuming spell that would bend light around him and anything he carried. It would drain him of what he had absorbed within twenty minutes, but he could fly over with the knocked-out pegasus within four. He quickly cast it and picked up the pegasus, flying out the door after opening it, invisible to anyone who happened to be watching.

-=-=-

Amethyst Star cursed to herself. Although they may have gotten one of the Elements out early, and thereby disrupted the entire group, it was supposed to be more organized. She ignored Unseen Shadow as he arrived and placed the Pegasus into a deeper sleep with the green gel.

No matter. She quickly sent out the activation signals to all the drones.

Phase One would begin in twenty minutes.

-=-=-

Twilight quickly burst into John’s house. He was on his bed, reading a book. Needless to say, he looked slightly shocked when she ran into the room.

“Twilight! What the hell?” He said, putting the book down.

“No time! I’ll tell you when the others get here! It’s a serious emergency. In the meantime, you should gear up. Sir.” She added at the end.

John quickly closed the door to his bedroom and started to change into his camouflage clothes, out of Twilight’s sight. He walked over to his bag, grabbing his helmet and his AEK-971, attached its ACOG scope onto the top rail, and put the M203 on the bottom rail. He grabbed the ammo and 40mm grenades and started putting them inside of his vest pouches. At the end, he grabbed his MP-448 pistol and the clips for it, finishing up his preparations. He could only hope that this would be over soon.

He walked into the other room, fully armed. Twenty seconds later, Wesley and Anton walked in, similarly armed. Anton had a Russian ‘urban’-style ‘digital’ camouflage uniform on, while Wesley had his normal woodland style. Both of them held their weapons, with Anton having a particularly tight grip on his Sa-61. Rainbow Dash and Applejack followed right after them, the entire group sitting down.

“we have a problem.” Twilight stated, before reading off the letter to them.

John gave a low whistle, before pulling back the bolt on his rifle, loading a round.

“They won’t come tomorrow.” John explained. “If the history of the Changelings is right, like you explained to me several months ago, their first attack will be tonight. Twilight, what’s the most important piece of infrastructure in the city?”

“The waterworks.” She instantly said. “It generates the electricity, supplies water, and helps hold back the river to safe levels.”

John grimly shook his head, before walking over to the tap and twisting the knob. For the first four seconds, a stream of water came out, before slowing down into a trickle, and finally stopping. Twilight and the other ponies stared at it in horror, realizing what it meant.

“Guys,” He said. “The invasion won’t fully start tomorrow. But make no mistake,” He walked up to them, staring each in the eye.

“The invasion begins tonight.”