1820 Hours
Seven (7) days after recorded first contact

The Everfree Forest, as the humans had quickly learned, was not a place to go often. The only real reason to patrol it was to keep the perimeter of the firebase up, so as to not be surprised by an attack. While their numbers and weapons could easily drive off anything they found inside, regular patrols were suspended for that very reason: After a platoon-sized group of Russians had required an extreme amount of ammunition to drive off a roving group of fifty wooden wolves, Captain Volkov had declared that patrols inside of the forest were to be decreased. It was a waste of ammunition, and they had quickly discovered that it was many times as dangerous to the ponies, whom only stayed on the outskirts of the 250-kilometer-wide forest.

So it had come to the surprise of Sergeant Williams to find out he had been picked for a six o'clock patrol along a road into the forest. His career in the British Army had seen all manner of service, from the Falklands to Desert Storm, but this was undoubtedly the strangest place he had ever had to fight in. Within the twenty minute drive it had taken them to go from the firebase to four kilometers in the forest, he had quickly picked up on the soldier' creative nicknames for the forest, ranging from the benign to the obscene.

"I wonder, sometimes, I really do." One of them said as his squad sat on the top of FV107 Scimitar that was their transport for the patrol. "Why the hell are we truly here?"

"Do I look like Lieutenant bloody Brownfield?" Williams rhetorically asked. "I don't have a clue, and neither do the brass, and that's the truth of it."

"Aren't we supposed to be looking for a way home, Sergeant?" Corporal White asked. In William's view, the young lad was a tad young to be playing soldier, but he had done good work in helping to secure the Russian towns they had come across, and so Williams gave him the benefit of the doubt.

"We don't even know how we arrived: Almost any effort to find a way back will be doomed until then." Williams replied a moment later.

"Well, we'll bloody well try." One of the men on the other side of the large turret said. "Better than staying in magic land forever, with the damn ponies kicking at our heels at every turn."

"Better than being dead, I say." Corporal White commented. "Before we arrived, as we drive into that Russian refinery, we had no idea it was trapped. The wall of fire I saw before awakening would have certainly killed us, not to mention wiping our entire company out. Think of it as cheating death."

"I saw a movie about that once." One of the younger privates stated. "By all rights, if that movie was reality, I would expect us all to be dropping like flies."

"We're still dropping." White replied. "Private Edwards dropped like a stone, so did fifteen others. The Russians and Americans lost twenty in attacking that city. No matter how long it takes, the bloody ponies can keep replacing their losses. We can't."

"And I say it's bloody useless to talk about it." Williams said, silencing all discussion. "If you all devoted as much attention to your drills and weapons cleaning as you did to woolgathering, I wouldn't have to tire myself yelling at you lads quite as much."

"Twenty Quid that the Sergeant drops the next time he starts shouting." One of the privates whispered, while Williams pretended not to hear.

"No bet." Another replied to the soldier in a similar whisper.

Some shouting came from ahead as the column, composed of five FV107s and two Challenger II tanks, ground to a halt. Seconds later, a burst of gunfire erupted. Within two seconds, Williams and the rest of his squad had jumped down from the side of the stopped armored vehicle and had their weapons pointed outward.

"What the hell is it?" Corporal White asked.

"I don't know, damn it!" Williams replied.

The bushes at the edge of the forest, twenty feet away from the road, slowly started to move. Williams watched as the entire treeline seemed to move. Suddenly, a yell rang out, and almost two dozen ponies, along with several creatures that the Sergeant did not recognize, burst out of the trees towards the column.

"Fi-" Williams yelled, but was drowned out by the sound of the entire squad firing from both sides of the vehicle, indicating that a similar sight would greet him on the other side. His L128A1 thundered as he sent a 12-gauge Flechette round towards a rushing pegasus, causing it to instantly tumble to the ground. Within ten seconds, the engagement was over.

"Sound off!" Williams shouted as he quickly took time to pump a new shell into his shotgun.

With the 'Net' system, he quickly found that every single member of his squad checked in. Indeed, every member of the entire company checked in as fine.

"What the bloody hell was that?" One of the privates said as Williams walked up to one of the ponies. It was dark brown, one of the many without horns nor wings. It was wearing no armor, other than a slightly dented and dull iron chestpeice, and only seemed to be wielding a sword it had carried in its mouth.

"These aren't bloody guards." Williams said. "Their equipment isn't professional, and their tactics leave something to be desired."

"And this dead bloke is a griffon, Sergeant." One of the privates said, poking one of the strange creatures with his foot. "I recognize it from my College mythology."

"That's one of the species identified. Grab several and put them on the vehicle, Firebase will want one to study." Williams ordered. "Anybody spot any survivors?"

"Negative." Corporal White replied.

The men quickly went to work, lifting two corpses onto the front of the armored vehicle as the rest of the men, including Williams, looked around the short-lived battlefield, taking video with their 'Net' units. At last, with everybody satisfied, the men jumped on top of the vehicles as before, and the column did a quick turn towards the base.

"Patrol 2-2, how copy?" The voice of Lieutenant Brownfield said over his radio as the FV107 accelerated.

"This is Patrol 2-2, solid copy." Williams replied.

"Reports are coming in of an attack. What's the situation?"

"All of the bloody things are dead, sir. A few of the poor sods are griffons: We're securing a couple for you. No survivors, I'm afraid."

"Good enough that you're still alive. Return to base with all of your men, and we might have to hold a celebration."

"For what, sir?"

"The survival of the entire bloody human race. Firebase out."

1944 Hours

Corporal Emma Nguyen paused as she stood at the door of the conference room aboard the Gerald R. Ford. While she normally was not nervous about large assignments, this one had the potential to change the entire policy inside of the city they now controlled. To that end, she had gone over it dozens of times, making sure to reach a general consensus with her group on what ideas should be proposed.

The group's purpose was to find out ways to make the human presence not only tolerable, but to have them liked. After the battle that had happened only this morning, the ponies were not going to be inclined to cooperate with the military. Several high-level officers, including some civilians, had been thrown together in the city hall and come up with ideas.

With a final, deep breath, the Corporal pushed the door open and walked inside.

Captain Henderson, along with Captain Volkov and several other officers, were sitting down at one end of the room, while the other was set up with a small table. Nguyen set down the small folder of documents she had, and quickly went into business mode.

"Good evening, Gentlemen." She said. "Let's skip the formalities and get right to the issue

"The problems we will face in the coming days are large, especially with the attack on the city. With this being day seven after arrival, and only ten hours after we secured the city, some things still need to be sorted. Earning the trust of the ponies will need to start in several steps.

"First off, we assist in reconstruction efforts, as we have been doing. Sending out condolences to those who have had family members killed is optional, but sending out an apology for the mess, so to speak, will form the basis of our plans. The ponies need to see us not as conquerors, or occupiers, but as something akin to settlers of some sort."

"And just how to we accomplish that?" Volkov asked.

"Simple: By toning down several hundred laws already in place. You wouldn't believe what we found: Did you know that speaking out against a public official, even in running against said official, is liable to land you a year in a cell here? We're considering revamping all of that.

"In addition, we also propose to keep the current staff in place. Due to early action by a team of ours, we have the mayor of the city working with us. He was eager after we presented him his options: Lose his title, or cooperate. We're going to lower taxes, seeing as they're ridiculous across the board. Another team is trying to work out how we'll pay our men now, but that's for another time.

"On another note, we have the temporary prisoner camp set up, and we have a plan for it."

"What's the plan?" Henderson asked, straight to the point.

"Simple." Nguyen said, opening the small folder to lay out several documents. "After a few weeks, we release the calmer of the guards whom have families here. It's near propaganda, sure, but the headlines about us releasing them, combined with official statements, will help with the goodwill efforts."

"Where'd you draw this all off from?" One of the officers asked.

"Part of it was from what happened in Europe after World War II." She answered. "Reconstruction, as well as sending back those Germans in POW camps, was a high priority. It resulted in what we have today: NATO, a stable alliance across half of the north-western hemisphere."

"You've done your homework." Henderson noted. "Dismissed, Corporal Nguyen."

She saluted, leaving the documents on the table as she walked out of the conference room. For all the speed that it had been conducted in, she was ready to go back to her group. She quickly walked out onto the deck, stepping aboard the helicopter that waited for her and hanging on as it took off, banking towards the city.

"What do you think, Captain Volkov?"

"I think that we are all in over our heads, and the first person to notice the rising water will drown."

"About her plan, Captain."

"Captain Henderson, I believe in this plan. She delivered it promptly and efficiently, without resorting to using terms I have no real way of figuring out. The written work states the very things she said, only in longer form. We should go ahead with it."

"... I trust you, Volkov. I just hope that we don't fuck things up for the rest of humanity, the ten thousand men that we are responsible for."

"I hope the very same thing, Henderson. I just wish, in the end, that there was another way to go through with all of this."

"I wish we had the time to find that way. However, it doesn't look like it. Tritons have spotted large gatherings of guards at multiple points. They're preparing for war. Whatever we do, we have to do it quickly."

"... For my sake and for yours, and for the sake of our army, I hope that you are right."

"So do I."

Written by Merchent343
Edited by The Rainbow Brony

Author's Note

Well, there goes my second attempt at portraying a British unit. Forgive any ignorance at my part: I'm trying to play a combination of American, Russian, other Russian, British, and Pony viewpoints. To those on the other side of the Atlantic, anything wrong is not meant to offend. I try to do the best with what I've read and learned over the years.

In other news, this is the start of Act V. This Act is meant for a very specific goal: Origins and Going Forward. Why are they there, and what are they going to do next? With an entire city, not to mention the island it is on, under their control, where will they go from there?

Many things that were mentioned in previous chapters will come together, often in an obscure manner. Also, I'll be working on continuing my rewrite of the first few chapters, editing them to make the beginning more bearable.

As a side note, this is my second story to break the 50,000 words mark. I have had two that were close, at 48,649 and 46,191 words each, but my biggest story up until this point had been at 53,510 words. This story will likely pass everything I have combined. By a wide margin.