Battle Scars

August 3rd, 1943

Tronia

Pvt. Applejack

"Time to move, private, get your hooves up and runnin', we're gonna push for an attack." said a pony. Applejack woke up, rubbing her face with her hooves as the light shined through the tent. Applejack got up from her hammock and trotted outside to find ponies scattered all around the area, grabbing supplies, and gathering around.

"Let's get moving, everypony, we're gonna move up this hill!" shouted another pony. Applejack, confused, trotted around to find her company. Several ponies ran up the mountain whilst others ran down it. She looked around at all the devastation that laid on the base of the hill. Several ponies laid shot and mangled from bullets and explosives.

"Pvt. Applejack!" shouted a voice in the distance. AJ turned her head all around, but couldn't find anypony looking for her, or anypony sticking out of the norm.

"Pvt. Applejack!" shouted the voice again, this time a bit closer. Applejack turned around once more to find a lavender pony with her hoof up looking around. Applejack trotted to the pony, she had a war torn look, toughened by battle, and had some blood stains on her uniform.

"Pvt. Applejack!" she shouted once more. Applejack ran towards the pony calling her name. She was standing on a box, looking around at the sea of green.

"Pvt. Applejack here sir!" she said. AJ looked up at the lavender pony. It looked like she was a god, with the sun in the background, only being blocked by her head. The lavender pony looked down, showing no emotion whatsoever. She jumped down from the crate and started trotting away, Applejack followed.

"You're with me private. I'm Lt. Sparkle, your CO is Captain Braeburn. You'll be moving with us up the mountain on the left flank." said the Lieutenant.

"Yes sir." she replied.

"Riflepony?"

"Yes sir."

"Not anymore. Grab a BAR, from the armory, you're our new gunner." Applejack was shocked a little. She'd never handled a BAR before, she felt somewhat terrified. But, she remained her composure.

"Yes sir." she replied, hastily.

"Alright then. Get movin'. We're moving up the mountain in 0500 minutes, move your flank." said the Lt. with an annoyed tone in her voice. Her eyes looked like'd she had seen everything. Applejack took once glance and saw horror inside of it. She ran immediately to the armory after the Lt. gave her a deep, hard look. It wasn't like a facial look, it was literally like she was ripping her soul right out of Applejack's body. Applejack sprinted down the road and went into the armory.

"Whadda need private?" asked the armorer.

"Uhh.... a bar." she simply said.

"You mean a B.A.R., right?"

"Uh, yeah. One of those things."

"Alrighty here yah go." The armorer placed a machine gun on the table. The Browning Automatic Rifle, an awesome weapon that fired 550 RPM, with a .30-06 bullet. The firepower of a submachine gun, with the range of an M1 Garand. It had a 20 box magazine and weighed around 18 ibs loaded. She picked up the weapon and read the top of it.

COLT FIREARMS LLC. CANTERLOT, EQ. 1942. M1918A2 BROWNING AUTOMATIC RIFLE. .30-06 SPRINGFIELD.

Applejack never felt power in her hooves like she did before. The gun was heavy, but, nothing like she hadn't experienced on the farm. Applejack grabbed 6 magazines and trotted out with the weapon. She slung it on her back and ran to find the Lt. again. Before she knew it, all the ponies seemed to be more organized. At the corner of her eye, she saw a pony wave at her. It was Pfc. Colgate, a fellow member she met a basic, and a squad mate.

"Nice to see y'all Colgate." she said, shaking her hoof.

"Nice to see you too, AJ. C'mon, the Captain's looking for you." she replied, taking a drink from her canteen.

"What's in there? Water?"

"Nah, whiskey. Calms my nerves. Want some?"

"No, I'm good."

"Whatever you say."

"How the hell am I gonna navigate through this mess?"

"Beats me."

The two ponies trotted off to find the company. They found a bunch of ponies gathered around the line, prepared to attack the position. The hill looked more like a mountain with a fortress on it. Applejack gulped down her fear and said a quick prayer to Celestia.

"Let's go everypony! Let's get moving!" shouted Captain Braeburn as they charged up the hill. Applejack leaped up the ledge of the hill and began to run next to Colgate. Machine gun fire in the distance gunned down several ponies in the front. Applejack ran like she never had before, her eyes hyper focused on the mortar enclave that was created in the ground. She jumped inside and took cover. Bullets smacked the dirt near AJ and flew up and on to her helmet. She covered her head with one hoof and just kept her head down. She felt as if she was in a state of awe. Everything began to slow down. She watched as explosions from mortars hit several ponies, there bodies flying high up in the air. She turned around to find a hoof on her shoulder, it was Lt. Sparkle.

"Keep moving AJ! We gotta get up this hill, get to the line!" she shouted, as she pulled Applejack up. The two ran and took cover behind a series of rocks, she looked around to see several ponies in the same situation as her. Scared. Applejack just didn't know what to do. Should she fire at the enemy? Or should she stay and listen for orders? Applejack looked down at her BAR. A round was chambered and the gun was ready to fire.

"AJ! Cheerilee! Offer some suppressive fire on that crew! Colgate, Cloudchaser, Roseluck, and Bon Bon, get ready to move to the left with the Lt. Wait on my go!" shouted Braeburn. Applejack ran down and deployed her bipod on the gun. She ground felt slippery, but stable enough.

"Open fire!" shouted Braeburn. Applejack didn't even hesitate, her hoof let down on the trigger. The big BAR spat out a burst of 5-6 rounds on to the bunker. The impacts were clear, AJ was missing, but still keeping the changeling's heads down. She fired another burst, the BAR spat out more rounds on the German position. Applejack never felt power like this in her hooves, and she had a slight grin on her look, as if it was like shooting tin cans with her sister, Applebloom, on the orchard. Before she knew it, Applejack was out of ammo. The BAR didn't fire anymore, all it just made was a small click noise.

"Reload, cover!" shouted Applejack, her training kicking in. She pulled out a new mag and dropped the old one in the dirt. She pulled the bolt back and began to fire once more. The gun's ferocious sound was audible throughout the battlefield.  Her impacts were closer and closer to the changeling's machine gun position. Applejack let loose on her BAR, dumping out an entire magazine. When she was out, her smile turned into a frown as the machine gun began to target her. A burst of bullets wizzed over her head. She ducked down, back into her little ditch as she covered her head with her hoof once more. Before she could look over, a echoing boom sound filled the air. A high pitch whurring noise came crashing down on the machine gun position. Applejack looked up to find the machine gun position completely evaporated.

"Let's get moving everypony! Get up the hill!" shouted Braeburn. Applejack soon followed them up the hill as the attack was now at a full scale. Applejack ran up to the entrance of a bunker, the first of many that needed to be cleared out. Her squad stacked up by the door.

"Get Thunderlane up here. Have him burn 'em out." said Braeburn to the Lt.

"Cpl. Thunderlane, get that flamethrower ready!" shouted the Lt. Thunderlane came up with the new M2-2 Flamethrower in testing. He stacked up next to Applejack. She hadn't seen such an amazing weapon before. The two tanks of fuel and nitrogen, the nozzle, and the small flame coming out of the gun.

"Lt., grenade." said Braeburn. The Lt. nodded and threw in a frag. Within seconds it exploded and the door fell down from the force of it.

"Thunderlane! Burn 'em!" shouted Braeburn. The black colt pulled the trigger, and a burst of fire shot out of the gun. The orange flame lit up his black coat as the fire moved down the hallway and to the machine gun position. The screams of changelings inside haunted Applejack further as they slowly, and painfully, burned to death. Their last minutes on this earth, suffering a slow, awful death. Thunderlane let out another stream of fire to incinerate more changelings inside.

"AJ, Colgate!" said Braeburn, "Check the bunker, check for survivors and kill 'em."

Applejack just nodded. She looked at Colgate, who was feeling the rush of war. She stacked up and bashed in the doorway. Applejack noticed she now had a shotgun of some sorts. It was pump action, it reminded her of her times on the farm, the old double barrel Granny Smith kept in case of emergency. Colgate entered in first, with Applejack following. The bunker smelled of fire and burned wood. The once stone bunker was now covered with ashes from the fire of Thunderlane's flamethrower. Applejack slowly trotted as they entered the main complex, where the machine gun was. She looked inside to find it clear. Colgate, still staring at the surroundings looked around the structure.

"Welp, looks like we're clear, AJ," she said with pride, "let's regroup with the captain."

Applejack nodded as the two walked out. Applejack trotted out first, down the hallway. She felt relieved she didn't kill somepony up close and personal. She began to trot out the exit of the hallway. She looked down at her hooves as she trotted away, but she was stopped in her tracks by an echo throughout the hallway. It sounded like some sort of pistol, Applejack turned around and looked towards the doorway of the machine gun bunker. She saw a figure, it looked like a pony, it was clearly hurt.

"AJ?" said the voice weakly. Applejack immediately ran over, dropping her helmet to find the injured pony.

"No...no no no!" she said to herself as she got closer and closer, but, she knew who it was.

Colgate laid down on the ground, a pistol wound to the upper chest. The blood began to pour out of her mouth, as she gagged for breathe. Applejack frantically tried to hold the wound down. But, it was no use, Colgate spat up more blood as she coughed more, until her eyes closed. Applejack looked at the lifeless face of Colgate, it was like a knife to the heart. The warm tears began to run down her cheek, she closed her eyes and began to cry on the now dead Colgate. Her hooves still on the wound as her head dove down deeper into her body. Applejack's soft cry turned into a sob as the tears ran quicker down her cheek.

As the tears flew out of AJ's face, another pony began to cough a little. AJ, still a crying wreck, looked up to find a changeling, struggling for life. Applejack sniffled up her runny nose, and trotted up to the changeling. It looked like it was going for some sort of pistol, but, AJ kicked out of his hoof quickly, and pulled up the wounded changeling.

"You...buckin'...sonuvabitch." she said as she threw a punch to the face of the changeling. Some blood spat out the changeling's mouth, but, Applejack wasn't finished. She threw several more punches, eventually, the changeling was too weak to continue.

"Please..." the changeling coughed up, "spare me...please..."

Applejack laughed a little at the request of the changeling. She smiled a little and pulled up her BAR. The gun was eager to be fired as the muzzle was pointed directly at the head of the changeling. Applejack looked longer, until the barrel began to shake a little. Her hooves trembled, as she sweated, determined to pull the trigger. Her hoof wrapped around the long, metal trigger, as she slowly pulled back, then she hesitated. Applejack brought the gun down. She leaned closer to the changeling. He crawled himself against the wall as he looked in fear into AJ's eyes. Applejack saw nothing but pure terror and violence. She delivered a swift kick to the stomach of the changeling, as the changeling's ribs cracked as the kick was with tremendous force. The changeling fell down, clenching his ribs after being kicked. Applejack then leaned down to the face of the suffering changeling.

"You don't deserve a quick death." she simply said. She lifted her upper body up. She went to Colgate's body, to find her lighter and canteen. The canteen was empty, but, she noticed some wine bottles on a crate in the part of the bunker Thunderlane's flame missed. She grabbed the lighter and walked up to the changeling again. She picked him up and threw him against the wine bottles. Glass shards tore the flesh of the changeling, it pierced and cut him skin as he screamed in agony. Applejack took the lighter and put it to the puddle of wine. She was gonna burn the changeling to death, as punishment for killing Colgate.

"Please, no. Anything but that." he said in panic, realizing what was going to happen. She didn't listen as she had an evil smirk on her face. The changeling looked into her eyes, only to see blood red eyes. It was like staring into the eyes of a devil. She smiled as she lowered the lighter. Then, the lighter dropped out of her hands, she fell forwards and face planted into the wall. It was Lt. Sparkle, standing high and mighty at the dazed private. Applejack looked up and stared into the eyes of the Lt.

"What the buck is going on her with this changeling, private?" she asked.

"This motherbucker killed Colgate. So, I was gonna kill him." she replied.

"By lighting him on fire?"

"Why'ds it matter? It a changeling, he doesn't deserve a quick death."

"Private, doing this will get your flank court marshaled."

"But, sir..."

"Applejack, do not kill this changeling this way, either we take him prisoner, or you can get your revenge, your choice."

Applejack stared at the Lt, and back at the changeling. Her anger began to boil higher as she grabbed Colgate's shotgun. She pumped the shotgun as she walked up closer to the changeling. She pointed the barrel of the shotgun to his chest.

"No! Wait..." he shouted, but it was too late. Applejack pulled the trigger of the shotgun. The hail of buckshot lead balls flew into the changeling's body. It jolted backwards from the tremendous force, then fell down, lifeless. The chest cavity completely exposed as the blood poured out like a waterfall. Chunks of body parts slowly fell out as the changeling laid there, now gone. She trotted over to the Lt.'s way to grab her BAR, lying on the ground. As she was about to lean down, she felt a hoof on her shoulder.

"Just do your job, private. Kill 'em quickly, kill 'em fast. We have more important objectives than revenge. Now get movin'. We need you, sane and ready to fight." she said with no emotion. Finally, Applejack began to regain her thoughts. She collected her thoughts as she picked up her BAR once more. Applejack nodded at the Lt., and with that, she ran out of the bunker. Applejack quickly glanced at the mangled changeling, and then back at Colgate one more time. She took a deep breathe and ran out of the bunker.