Ace Combat: Hooves of Solace

Dear Princess Celestia:

We realize that Equestria provides unique economic opportunities found no where else in the world. However, with the large number of griffons immigrating to your kingdom, we respectively request that you deport all griffons back to our homeland of Gryphus. Our population shortage is beginning to take a toll on our economy. In my professional opinion, I believe that Gryphus may soon become unreliable trading partners if this persist; which could in turn, disrupt your kingdom’s financial well being.

Sincerely, Administrator Tolstaya

Stratocratic Republic of

Gryphus

Dear Administrator Tolstaya:

I hear your voice of concern and promise you that in the event that your economy becomes compromised, I Princess Celestia will personally see to it that a global relief effort will be provided. I cannot however, return your former citizens to the police state they have fled from. They are citizens of Equestria now, and they are here to stay.

Sincerely, Princess Celestia

Kingdom of

Equestria

Dear Princess Celestia:

We are disappointed, if not outraged, that you have not only refused our request of the return our citizens, but have insulted the structure and competency of our government as well. We do not need a global relief effort and find it offensive that you could consider the notion. To prevent any further leakage of our citizens, we have closed our borders and shut down all exportation. Your merchants are no longer welcome in Gryphus. We can no longer let your kingdom leach off of our economy.

Sincerely, Administrator Tolstaya

Stratocratic Republic of

Gryphus

Dear Administrator Tolstaya:

I respectively demand that you reopen Gryphus’s borders for open trade. You provide the world with large amounts of combustible fuels and rare earth metals. You cannot simply close your borders and expect to repair your economy without global trade. This is a very foolish decision for the well being of Gryphus.

Sincerely, Princess Celestia

Kingdom of

Equestria

Dear Princess Celestia:

We will keep our borders closed, and we will not export any goods to the rest of the world. When and only when we receive our citizens from your kingdom, our borders will remain closed to the world. We will inform all other nations on earth of our requirements to reopen our borders. I expect a fast deportation of all griffons if you wish to maintain a good diplomatic standing with the rest of the world.

Sincerely, Administrator Tolstaya

Stratocratic Republic of

Gryphus

Dear Princess Celestia:

After much thought and consideration, I have concluded that to ensure the global stability and ethical treatment of Equestrian griffons, we will build up our military as a bluff. We will threaten Gryphus with invasion if they do not resume open trade and exportation of their goods. I cannot stress enough that this is only a bluff and that there will be no invasion what so ever. So I ask of you, the approval to accomplish the following goals: Start an aggressive recruitment campaign, focusing on not recruitment, but international visibility to warn Gryphus of our military build up. Enlist the industrial private sector to manufacture military hardware, to further help Gryphus foresee our military build up. And finally focus on quantity rather then quality of air-force personal and equipment to make Equestria look more intimidating. I estimate that it will take 3 years to organize the build up of a sizable military before we state our demands to Gryphus.

Sincerely, REAF Director, Crimson Springs

Kingdom of

Equestria

Dear Administrators of Gryphus:

With the recent developments of Equestria’s military build up, I propose a counter offencive plan. An invasion of Equestria. I require that Gryphus must direct all nonessential spending and labor to a Total War policy. Military analyst predict an invasion in less then 3 years.  We must invade Equestria before they invade Gryphus.

Sincerely, Administrator Tolstaya

Stratocratic Republic of

Gryphus

Ace Combat: Hooves of Solace

- Prologue -

- 3 years later -

Scootaloo took a deep breath.

“This is my moment.” She thought. “Everything I been training for, has all come down to this moment.”

Her pupils dilated as the curtains opened and the trumpets wailed. “Graduation,” she said out loud, giving tentative glances to the astute pegasi next to her.

Confetti poured from the ceiling as the pegasi cheered for Equestria’s newest members of the REAF. Scootaloo did not want to stay here. She was thinking of her friends back in Ponyville and the party they had undoubtedly planned. Her daydream was broken when she heard her name from the announcer.

“Lets get this over with.” She mumbled to her self.

“Surprise!”, Pinkie yelled as Scootaloo returned to her home. Over a dozen ponies stared at the unsurprised mare.

Scootaloo gave back a slapstick impression, “Wow Pinkie, I’m really surprised.”

“Well duh! Do you know haw many letters I had to intercept to make sure no one told you about this?” Pinkie Pie stated with a serious tone. Squinting closer and closer at the increasingly worried mare.

Scootaloo stalled, “Umm...”

“Zero!” Pinkie Pie exclaimed with a huge smile.

A confused look over took Scootaloo’s face. “Alright fine, that surprised me.”

Pinkie gave a satisfied nod and wondered off to tend to the party.

Scootaloo looked around to find somepony to mingle with. Standing out of the crowd of ponies was a cyan mare with colorful hair. “Rainbow Dash!” Scootaloo yelped with excitement.

Equestria’s best flyer heard her name and gave Scootaloo a confident glance. “Hey Scoots. Congrats on getting out of Cloudsdale.”

“Thanks Rainbow,” Scootaloo said while entering the circle of conversation.

Sweetie Belle continued the complementing of Scootaloo. “Yeah, isn’t it the hardest military academy to get into these days?”

“Not when you know me.” Rainbow Dash said with an over-confident tone.

Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle both rolled their eyes and sighed.

“So why did you join the air-force Scootaloo?” Sweetie Belle asked in an aggressive voice.

Before Scootaloo could form a cohesive sentence, Sweetie Belle continued, “Because I think this is just another way to get those greedy military contractors more money in their deep pockets.”

When Scootaloo tried to retort her statement Sweetie Belle continued, “I think your just falling for the propaganda that the REAF is dishing out.”

“Hey!” Scootaloo yelled. “That was uncalled for.” She gave a glance at Rainbow Dash before continuing. “I joined because- I want to think- I want to know that I’m helping defend the Equestria.” Scootaloo stuttered out. It was the most textbook answer she could think of.

“I- sorry.” Said Sweetie Belle resentfully. “I just hope you never have to defend us. Its not like Gryphus could pull of a sizable invasion. Their economy is in a deep recession.”

“It’s not like I’ll be killing anypony Sweetie Belle, I’m just a reconnaissance mare.” Scootaloo informatively put.

Sweetie Belle looked down nervously, “Just- be careful alright?”

“I will, not much action for my role anyhow. Except when they invade we’ll be the first shot down.”

“What!?” Sweetie Belle squeaked.

Scootaloo took mild amusement for teasing her friend, “Relaxing I’m joking. The special flight suits they made help us fly really high up. So high that griffons can’t even see us. It take a really strong pair of wings to keep you flying that high because the air-pressure is so low, and you couldn’t even breath without the suit. Actually there was this one stallion that tried to fly without his suit, he was so-”

“Okay I get it Scoots,” Sweetie Belle groaned.

“But that’s not the best part!” Scootaloo whined.

Sweetie Belle glared, “I think I could go without hearing the conclusion to that story.” She turned and trotted to another circle of ponies. “Nice talking to you Scootaloo.” She said sincerely.

“Yeah. See-ya.” Scootaloo said. Satisfied from teasing her friend.

Scootaloo looked awkwardly at the floor and asked it, “Why did I join?” She gave a glance at Rainbow Dash and proceeded with talking to her friends. Scootaloo knew why she joined the REAF, she just couldn’t admit it to her self.

A couple weeks later, Scootaloo had been assigned to the 128th Aerial Reconnaissance Squadron “Sirin”. Regent, Her wingmare, and Sky Light, who was the AWACS (Airborn Warning and Control Systems) operator. Her and Sirin squadron were shipped to the Marigold, an Equestrian airship. The airship was specialized as a mobile command center. And to Scootaloo’s surprise, the same airship the Wonderbolts are stationed on, the kingdoms Ace fighter squadron. She was given a terse introduction to her squadron and was briefed for her first sortie. A simple reconnaissance mission over the Equestrian border shared with Gryphus.

- 2100 Hours -

She stepped into the hanger to suit up and was over taken by awe with the complexity of the room. Dozens of ponies, mostly unicorns, darting around like mice. Tending to the equipment and maintaining the hanger itself.

Several uniformed maintenance ponies surround Scootaloo and guided her to the launch platform. For all intensive purposes it was just a metal panel sloped at 25 degrees that would be pushed on a rail. The pegasus in question would stand on the panel and be propelled off once the panel reach the end of the rail. This was done just to get the pegasus to a comfortable flying speed without him or her wasting energy to take off.

Scootaloo stepped onto the launch pad and was suited up by 3 unicorns. One assembled a helmet and levitated it onto Scootaloo’s head. The other 2 strapped on her flight-suit and fastened the final buckles with a satisfying click. The first one then connected the helmets muzzle to a thickly insulated tube, and then the other end to an oxygen tank mounted on Scootaloo’s back.

This was all starting to become very heavy. Scootaloo felt like she was about to lose her grip on the slopped panel. But when she checked her hooves were not moving.

The all important radar equipment and aerial cameras were fastened to Scootaloo’s belly. Several more buckles were clicked into place and Scootaloo’s helmet came to life. Her heads up display made it easy for her to keep track of her heading, speed, and altitude. “Speed: 0, Altitude: 3,159ft, heading...” She turned her head left and right to watch the compass move. “hmm-hmm, 134⁰”

The 3 unicorns suiting her up gave nods at each other and backed away. “Huh, record time.” One of them said unimpressed.

Regent, her wingmare, was prepared as well. All the unicorns fled the hanger. The deep buzzing of a klaxon alarm vibrated Scootaloo’s helmet. Steam gently climbed from the rail in front of her. The bulky hanger doors began to open. As soon as the night sky became visible, the thin tower of steam was sucked away from Scootaloo. She felt her hair reach for the main door of the hanger in front of her. Scootaloo felt she lost her grip on the panel again. She lowered her self readying for her launch. The radio in her helmet began to countdown.

“5”

“...4”

“...3”

“...2”

“...1...”

“Launch!”

Soon Scootaloo’s hair was racing in the other direction. She could hear a loud whistle of steam from the rail below her. But it was soon replaced by the roaring wind as she left the hanger. Her wings instinctively flung open to catch as much air as possible as she felt her self quickly losing speed.

Her mind finally caught up to her after she experienced her first real launch. She looked behind her and found the strobe lights of the Marigold already a long distance away. “Change your heading to 1-3. Maintain current speed and ascend  to 20,000.” Scootaloo told her wingmare. Scootaloo turned to her new heading followed by Regent and began their climb.

- 0200 Hours -

Regent tells his story to the Scootaloo and Sky Light. “So then I’m standing in line right? The Royal Guard pulls me aside to “confiscate” my saddle bags. When I asked for ID they exchanged worried looks and persisted that they’re legit guards. One of jumped me from behind, but I bucked right in the jaw and broke it. Then the real Royal Guards showed up and the other 2 fakes one flew away and left their broken jawed friend behind. Heh, freaking pansies.”

“Hey you two, get your heads out of the clouds.” Sky Light said with urgency. “Think I’m picking up some bogeies on radar here. Fly over to these coordinates and check.”

Scootaloo’s helmet beeped and the indicators on heading shifted.

“Oh boy... I’m picking up at least a 3 dozen fighters. IFF comes back negative.” Sky Light said.

Scootaloo asked worriedly, “Griffons?”

“Celestia I hope not. If the griffons invade they won’t know what hit ‘em.” Regent humorously said.

Bitterly, Sky Light said, “This is serious Regent, it could mean war.”

“What...” Regent said, “Just stating the obvious.”

Scootaloo pulled out the looking glass for her belly mounted camera. She could barely  see the long winged creatures flying through the mountain pass far below her. She stared though the looking glass in disbelief for a few seconds before she yelled, “I’ve got a visual! It’s griffons, Sky Light, we got griffons!”