“The Birth of a Revolution”
Conrad Schmidt
The Castle of the Royal Pony Sisters, Everfree Forest, Equestria
September 6th, 15 ALR

With a soft pop the group landed in the ruins of a large, derelict throne room, Conrad falling over at the sudden shift in position. He groaned, disoriented from his fall as he heard several giggles coming from the ponies accompanying him. “Ha ha, very funny,” He muttered as he climbed to his feet and looked around.

While the room was in a state of disrepair, it seemed as if at some point there was an attempt to restore it. The floor was clear of all debris, and the large hole in the ceiling was covered by a large pink tarp. His eyes locked onto the two large thrones at the back of the room. Made of wood, the chairs had a large amount of detail in them, so fine that Conrad couldn’t help but be amazed at the spectacular craftsmanship. Above the two thrones hung two large tattered banners, one having a sun symbol and the other a moon.

He stared for what seemed like an eternity until he heard Rarity snort. “This room still looks hideous... I wish we had put more work into it before Twilight insisted we focus on that silly reading room of hers, I mean look at those banners! Utterly ruined, disgraceful!” She exclaimed as she trotted up to the thrones and looks up at the ruined banners. While Rarity inspected the banners closely, Conrad turned to face the tall mare that they had rescued and cleared his throat.

“Luna didn’t tell me your name miss, would you mind telling me?” He finally asked. The mare chuckled softly, giving Conrad a soft grin.

“My name is Celestia, former ruler of Equestria and her territories. How about you? I’ve never seen a creature like you before,” She responded. Conrad returned a short smile before removing his helmet.

“My name is Conrad Schmidt, a human soldier from the Germany. To be fair, you haven’t seen a human before because I’m not from this world. Luna somehow summoned me here and told me that I was her only hope of liberating Equestria. Other than that, she didn’t tell me much other than to rescue you. I was hoping you’d have an idea on how to proceed.” Celestia looked at Conrad for a few moments, then slowly nodded her head and started walking towards the two thrones, stopping just in front of the two staircases.

“There is a way you can help, but we best meet up with Luna before I can tell you how exactly. We’re about to enter one of the castle’s many secret rooms, please stay close to me,” she explained neutrally as she lit up her horn. There was silence for a few moments before a deep rumbling could be heard coming up from the floor. Soon enough, the floor between the staircases started parting revealing a decrepit, but still solid stone staircase. Rarity and Applejack let out a soft ooooh as they watched the staircase revealed itself, but Conrad was silent as he observed. It reminded him of the tales of a nearby castle from his childhood, Burg Hohenzollern, which was rumored to have interesting trap doors and secret passageways. Once the passage was fully open, Celestia took no time in heading down into the darkness, using a lighting spell to guide the way. The rest of the group was quick to follow, not wanting to be left behind in the derelict throne room.

The passageway itself was rather thin as the group passed through it, with large chunks of stone making navigation rather hazardous. After a few minutes of walking and avoiding the rubble, the group finally emerged into a circular room surrounded by ancient looking maps. In the center of the room sat a table with a map on it, surrounded by many stone chairs. On the opposite side of the table, illuminated dimly by a single torch, sat none other than Princess Luna, a grin on her face as she got out of her seat. “Sister, it is good to see you again. I hope your journey here was a safe one?” She asked warmly. Celestia nodded, using her magic to ignite the rest of the torches in the room as she walked over to Luna and hugged her tightly.

“Indeed it was, Luna, thanks to Conrad here. I hoped you could get me out of that prison sooner, but I’m still glad that you still managed to get someone to rescue me. Can you give me a full report on what’s happen to Equestria since Twilight took over? News has been impossible to come by in Sunny Hills,” she finally responded as she let go of Luna. Luna nodded, then gestured for everyone to take a seat in one of the stone chairs. Once everyone had been seated, Luna took a moment to look around before responding.

“After you were captured, I managed to flee with General Night Wolf and a few members of the Lunar Guard. We waited a while for Twilight to stop looking for us, then regrouped here and planned our moves. We ended up setting up surveillance in Twilight’s government, using a system of bribes and covert operations to gain as much information on Twilight’s moves as possible. She was quick to set up her own personal guard, known as the Death Hooves which she used to silence any resistance to her rule. In fact, Ms. Rarity here was part of them. She could tell you so much more than I can, for that organization is tightly knit,” Luna reported, turning her gaze to Rarity. A bead of sweat rolled down Rarity’s face under her helmet as all eyes turned to look at her.

“Uhh... why don’t we let Princess Luna finish her report before I tell you about the Death Hooves?” She asked softly. Applejack, Luna and Celestia frowned at this, but Conrad smirked at this statement, placing a hand on his pistol holster.

“Why don’t you tell us now, Rarity? Prove that you want to see Equestria freed from Twilight’s rule and tell us what you know about the Death Hooves. After all, you were quite eager to help back at the farm,” He exclaimed. Rarity gulped, shaking a bit as she shrank back in her chair.

“We... well... alright, if you insist. The Death Hooves are a division sized unit, holding control of approximately 15,000 troops. They serve as Twilight’s military police units, deploying to domestic situations such as riots, as well as serving as her personal guard. Death Hooves are trained to fight without mercy, only taking prisoners if Twilight orders it. While most Death Hooves are very loyal to Twilight, the Royal Protection Detachment is fanatical in their devotion. This fanaticism makes them incredibly dangerous, even more so than regular Death Hoof units,” she replies, not bothering to hide the sheer amount of nervousness in her tone. Conrad smiled, taking his hand off his holster before gesturing for Luna to continue. She looked around the table, making sure that nobody else wanted to speak before coughing and continuing.

“As Rarity explained, the Death Hooves are a very dangerous threat to any upstart revolution, as they proved in the Cloudsdale Riots of 8 ALR, which brings me to another, very disturbing topic. About ten years ago Twilight passed the Forced Relocation Act, a law that forced non unicorns to specialized zones, away from the rest of the population. They’re treated very poorly in these camps, and conditions are reported to be exceedingly harsh. What most disturbs me is that recently, Twilight has ordered these camps to be liquefied, with the occupants being sent to some other camps in the Everfree. Whoever gets sent to these camps, never returns. I have good reason to believe that we’re witnessing a genocide in progress here,” she finished. There was a few moments of silence as Celestia processed the information given to her, a deep frown forming on her face as she got to her hooves.

“If what you say is true Luna, then we are facing very grim circumstances here. It’s one thing for Twilight to take over the Kingdom, it’s another thing to begin a genocide against her own subjects. Do you have a plan?”

Luna was quick to nod in response, getting up as well. “It’s quite simple really. While the unicorns rely heavily on magical constructs to fill the gaps left by the non-unicorn races, they still face a major problem in the fact that they are severely outnumbered... at least for now. What we need to do is to have Rarity here train the ponies from Sweet Apple Acres in the art of battle as quick as we can, then strike a relocation zone. If we can liberate the ponies of the relocation camp that we choose, then we will not only swell our numbers but also send a strong message to the rest of Equestria that Twilight can be beaten. From there, it’s just the challenging task of liberating the rest of the relocation camps, followed by a directed assault on Canterlot,” she explained.

Celestia listened thoughtfully, closing her eyes once she had finished. “This will be a significant challenge, but we have no other choice if we are to free our land from Twilight’s tyranny. This Dawn Rebellion will succeed, but only if we move with haste!”

The room went quiet for a few moments as Luna thought of a response, followed by her coughing. “The ponies of Sweet Apple Acres should be camped in the plains outside Appleloosa, we must regroup with them quickly. If there is anything else that needs to be said, please say it now.”

Everyone shook their heads, all getting up as they prepared to depart. As Conrad stood up, he exhaled, feeling a bit nervous as the prospect of what loomed in the future for him hit him fully. He had crossed the line of no return.

Author's Note

I'm sorry this took so long, school and other shit piled up on me. I also come bearing bad news (for you guys at least), I'm going on an eleven day trip to Germany today (so fucking hyped ), so I'm not going to be able to write at all until I get back on the 24th. I'm not looking forward to coming back and looking at my feed (holy shit that's going to be a nightmare and a half sifting through), but goddamit I really want to go to Germany, it's always been my dream. So with that being said...thank you all for reading, and I'll be seeing you all on the 24th :D

Also, this chapter was edited by my good friend Flyerton as well as Echo. Go give him some love for me will ya? :D