It has been nine thousand years since the wielders of the Elements of Harmony defeated Nightmare Moon, and much has passed. Ever since the end of the stories of the Mane six, Equestria was in absolute peace and prosperity, the rule of Princess Celestia and Princess Luna bringing calm, joy, and justice to everypony. They called it the Golden Age.
Over time, as the new era rushed through advances in science, medicine, and economy, the military was seen more and more as an inconvenience than a precaution. It's numbers shrinking, funding dropping, dwindling as it had no purpose in this time, becoming a former shadow of itself. The way of war was forgotten.
Then, fifty years ago, that all changed. An insect race called Nitkans emerged from the ground, hell-bent on destroying anything in their path. Their horde contained winger swarms that could shred anything to pieces, drones about the size of an average pony, but much stronger and with an exoskeleton harder than armor, and giant berserkers that are seemingly indestructible and can individually smash through buildings as if they were bundles of balloons.
The country was completely caught by surprise. Within the first year, the Nitkans had invaded every major city except the fortress of Canterlot, slaughtering millions. The forces of Equestria fought back, but at a terrible cost, conventional warfare simply wasn't effective, the bugs had a seemingly endless supply of soldiers, so the ponies resorted to other methods.
After massive collaboration and planning, nothing they threw at the enemy worked. Not chemical attacks, pathogens, or even nuclear strikes. All it did was slow the Nitkan advance. Five years later even the great castle was breached, which brought the disappearance of the two princesses, who are now assumed to be dead.
With the last of the survivors fighting for their survival, they can only hold on to the last shred of hope.
"Um....sir, are we going to move out soon?" Kada asked her superior, her hesitation getting the better of her. The yellow colored pegasus just got out of boot camp a month ago, expecting to march to the front lines, but instead she was assigned to an escort unit of about twenty ponies, along with Pip, her only friend, for some mysterious stallion in a cloak.
They were ordered to bring the VIP to Fort Lumos, which existed not far from the ruins of Trottingham. Rumors were that those orders came from High Command, but Kada knew it wasn't a good idea to believe in gossip. She knew somepony was hiding something though.
It was more than a long journey away to get to Fort Lumos. A few days into their trek they entered the Everfree forest and set up camp. It was morning and after already spending the night here, the soldiers were getting antsy, not that she blamed them, this forest was creepy enough to get on anyponies nerves.
"Well, that depends rookie......." the officer replied.
"Sir?" she grew a quizzical look on her face.
"We've been given orders for a reason, and if you keep your trap shut and follow them, you might live longer, so no." he said.
Knowing that he probably didn't know anyways and it was best not to continue, she gave a quick salute and headed back to the main tent.
"And I thought it was just us grunts being kept left in the dark" she thought.
On her way, she noticed a group of Earth ponies sharpening their longswords. She recognized one of them, Soren, a quiet stallion, he never was one for words, but more for action. You could always trust Soren to get the job done.
"Who knows, maybe if he started acting with some more leadership, he'll start getting promotions."
Anyway, she had other business to attend to, so she resumed her walk. Once she got to her spot in the main tent she went through her daily routine of checking her gear.
"Lets see, wingblades.....check, bow.......check, arrows...ch--"
"So what did that jackass of an officer say then?" a familiar voice chimed. Kada turned around to find a familiar face to go with it.
"Not much Pip. What, you don't like him?" she replied to the light blue unicorn that she called her friend.
"I think he just hates me, and you know I don't trust anypony that makes more money than I do."
"We hardly even get paid in the first place Pip." she said with a light chuckle.
"Pff, still counts Kada."
"Come on, we both know its just that you hate authority. The only reason your here is because you were drafted with me."
Pip put on the best innocent face that she could pull, which wasn't saying much. "Is not." she said.
"Is so."
"Fine, I give up, you win, but know you can't live in your fantasies forever Pip" she said with a smile.
"Alright, wanna get some food, I'm starving."
Her stomach rumbled a bit. "Yeah, I haven't had breakfast either, might as well grab somethi--"
"Nitkan rai--!" A voice yelled in the distance. Kada knew that voice, it was Tam, he was sent on patrol not that long ago. His voice was interrupted by screaming, then cut off abruptly with the unmistakable sound of a neck snapping violently.
Kada could already hear the officer giving orders. "Everypony, arm up and get to defensive postions!"-- he looked at the unicorns--"And no teleporting, the flashes will attract more. Whatever happens, defend the objective with your lives."
Everypony was scrambling grabbing their weapons and armor. She herself was attaching her wingblades to the front of her wings, fitting perfectly. Pip was already prepared and sprinting to her defense post. Once Kada was finished strapping her armor on, she too followed suit. She needed to defend the northern side of the camp with two Earth ponies and another pegasus. Once she got there, she felt like she was ready for anything out there. Except nothing came to meet their swords and arrows. The seconds ticked by, each feeling like an eternity but nothing happened.
"Where the hay are they?" she thought.
A minute passed by and still nothing, just the ominous silence of the Everfree forest. She was about to say something when a twig fell next to her, and instinctively, she looked up. It took here a split second to realize what she was looking at. They were in the trees. Nitkan drones, outnumbering them three to one.
Then they jumped on them, attacking them before they had time to react. A drone landed on an Earth pony, killing the soldier instantly as he was impaled by a Nitkan claw. It threw the corpse aside, its talons dripping in blood, and starting charging her. The other ponies had their hooves full, parrying blows from all directions with their swords and wingblades.
Kada knew that she couldn't beat it through sheer strength, she was nowhere near strong enough. If she was going to win, she needed to surprise it somehow. She saw a clearance not far from her and she got an idea, it was crazy, but it just might work. She ran as fast as she could, knowing full well that it would be right behind her.
She sprinted across the foliage, dodging the pieces of wood and growth in her way, while she heard the drone behind her simply smashing through them. As soon as she was in the middle of the open ground, she stopped dead and turned around. She looked up at the sky and titled her wings and saw at the edge of her vision that the Nitkan was getting closer and closer. Then her plan unfolded, the light from the sun reflected brilliantly from her wingblades, temporarily blinding the oversized bug for a second.
That was all she needed, she leaped towards the giant insect, and managed to cut off 2 of its arms, spewing blue ichor everywhere. The drone gave a blood curling scream and with that, Kada beheaded it in a single swipe of her blade. The body, headless, shuddered violently and fell.
"That's the first thing I killed." she couldn't help but thinking. Not that she felt remorse, she knew that every single Nitkan deserved to die. With that thought she started running back to camp, eager to rejoin the fight.
Running back, Kada's courage faltered. She could see that already, more than half of the escort unit was dead, among them was their commanding officer, his body covered in fatal slashes that caused him to simply bleed out. Not a nice way to go. Her comrades never stood a chance against the insect ambush, there were simply too many. Quickly scanning the battlefield, her heart lifted when she saw that Pip was among the living along with 3 other ponies, but noticed that she was beginning to get overrun. Knowing she wasn't going to last much longer without help, Kada sprinted to her friend's side.
"Agh, glad you could join the party Kada!" Pip yelled while parrying a blow from a drone. She always did find focus in humor somehow.
With the drone completely focused on taking out Pip, Kada sprinted past, using her wingblade to cut off a couple of the Nitkan's legs, causing it to fall on the ground screaming in pain. Quickly and efficiently, Pip dealt the fatal blow, stabbing it straight in the chest cavity where its two hearts resided. With spouts of its blue blood spraying everywhere, the bug finally gave way to silence and died.
"Did you really think that it would be fun without me?" Kada replied.
Pip simply responded with a shrug. "Come on, there are still more of them out there!"
And so they fought and they kept on fighting, time going through in a blur. Swipe after swipe, stab after stab, all that mattered to them now was their lives and the ending of the bunch of bloated slugs attacking them. After five more of the damn things fell to their swords, which were now more than soaked in the now familiar thick blue liquid, they lost two more of their fellow comrades, a pegasus to a poisoned wound, and an Earth pony to an ugly beheading.
"They will be remembered, they fought bravely." Kada thought.
Still, the two friends kept on fighting, but deep down, they knew that they could not win. Slowly, but surely, they were being pushed back by the flow of Nitkans. Eventually, it was only Pip and Kada defending their side of the camp, unknowing of how the rest of the unit was faring at this point.
As more blood was spilled and more ground was lost, they were beginning to lose hope, their strength slowly fading, giving way to exhaustion. Each swing of their swords was weaker than the last. They were approaching the center of the camp with their backs to it. There wasn't much actually there. The only thing in it was the VIP tent, where Kada could only assume the objective was. It was then that she could she a flash of light originating from that very same tent. In a second it took her to realize what happened.
"Mother fracker! He's a unicorn. The damn coward teleported and left us here to die!" Kada yelled at the top of her lungs.
She felt a hate that she never felt before, born out of the fear and shock of being left behind. She turned her attention back to the drone in front of her, slicing with her newborn fury. "He is going to die a painful death for leaving us behind, the coward". She fought with a strength she didn't know she had, inside she felt betrayed, and she focused that into whatever was in front of her. She didn't know when she killed it, but after a bit she realized that she was stabbing the thing when it was already in more than five pieces and Pip was yelling at her.
"--ome on! Snap out of it Kada! We've got to get out of here alive first. We have to regroup with whoever's left and get the hay out of here!" Pip screamed, her fear was more than noticeable in her voice. The fear of dying.
Realizing that her best friend was afraid, something clicked inside Kada. Her anger began to die down, her senses coming back to her.
"Alright Pip, lets go"
Her friend replied with a quick nod. "Okay, then we shou---agh!" Pip screamed at the top of her lungs as Kada realized just what happened. A Nitkan had crept up behind her, crawling low on the ground, and just dismembered one of her friends hind legs. Pip fell, still screaming in an intense pain and Kada caught her before she hit the ground, in total shock.
The insect raised itself to its normal height, towering over the two as it was just about to give the killing blow.
"I'm really going to die here." she thought. Time inched by as she waited for a silence and cold to meet her. She could see the insect move its claw in a seemingly slow fashion. A certain calm washed over her, knowing that soon there would be no more pain, no more suffering from these bug bastards. She was ready to go. Then out of the corner of her vision she saw something silver move. It was a giant longsword. It swept across her entire field of vision as it cut the insect in front of them in half, the color blue blinding her as all of the bug's blood sprayed everywhere.
"What just happened?"
Wiping the blood off her face so she could see, she turned around to see a stallion absolutely drenched in pony and bug blood alike, making it almost impossible for her to recognize him at first. She realized it was Soren, the quiet Earth pony. He may have been covered in blood, but overall he didn't look injured.
"Everypony else is already dead. We have to find a way out of here, if we don't we are all going to die." he said simply in the deep voice he almost never uses.
"I....I can tele..port us ou..t." Pip said weakly, still bleeding.
"Can she do that?" Soren asked Kada.
"I don't...know. She's wounded and exhausted. It might kill her."
"I ca...n tr..y, if we don't, we a..ll die, need you clo...ser" Pip said.
As they grouped together, Pip's horn starting glowing weakly, slowly gaining power, then brightened intensely, almost blindingly. This might be the last time that she was going to be with her friend. The friend she knew since she was a little filly. It couldn't end for her like this. Kada hugged her friend, crying
"Everything is going to be all right, I promise." She whispered, tears streaming down her face.
"You know I ne..ver belie...ved in happy endi..ngs." Pip said quietly.
And with that, Kada's world turned white.
