Rainbow Dash painfully picked herself off the ground as the screaming whistles continued. In the distance thundering explosions continued, causing the ground to shake as in an earthquake. Rainbow checked herself for damage. Nothing new was broken, and she seemed to have gotten away with just a few bruises.

She looked around to find the building utterly devastated. It was more or less whole when she came in with the soldiers, but it was now lacking a wall. Rubble was strewn randomly inside the building. She saw one soldier laying over a pile of rubble. She cantered to his side. Spinning him around with her hoof, she almost wretched at what she saw. His entire face was missing. It had been brutally stripped away by the explosion, and his eye had been obliterated. His chest was punctured with pieces of metal that had scythed overhead with the detonation. His remaining eye was glassy and still, rolled back in the embrace of death. Blood smeared the ground behind him, flowing through cracks and crevices created by the explosion. Rainbow had always boasted to being the bravest among her friends. This claim was reduced to nothing before the horror of the violence.

She heard the noise of clattering stone. She spun to see Hans painfully extracting himself from a pile of rubble. He flinched as he put weight on his leg. It was not broken, but it was obviously sprained. There was a coughing noise behind one of the pieces of rubble. Hans threw his gaze to the origin of the noise. He hobbled over to find another soldier trying to move his leg from under a large piece of the building. With much straining they managed to remove the piece of rubble. Hans offered a hand to the soldier, who gratefully took it.

Pulling his comrade up, Hans false groaned, “”

Fritz grinned and patted him on the back, “”

Rainbow Dash blinked, ignorant to their conversation. She coughed on the latent dust floating in the air, causing the two friends to turn and look at her. Hans’ eyes drifted to the area behind her, where the cadaver remained on the pile of rubble. He grimaced as he stumbled to the corpse. Going down on one knee, Hans felt alongside the body’s throat. Rainbow could only assume that he was looking for a pulse. Hans sighed, and reached to a chain around the soldier’s throat. With a quick pull of his wrist, he removed an oval piece of metal that was dangling from it. He pocketed the object. He closed the soldier’s eyes with his fingers, and stood up.

“His name was Heinz,” Hans stated simply, “He was just eighteen.”

Rainbow was seized with a sense of tragedy. He was only eighteen. One so young could die so violently here? It was a horrifying thought. Young age did not make one exempt from death. Rainbow was roughly eighteen, doubling the impact. What if she died? What would her friends do without her? What would death even be like? Rainbow Dash’s stunts had always been hailed as “death-defying”, but never before in her life had she been so confronted by the concept of death. She was surrounded by the dead and dying. How could she ever consider herself courageous when these humans were facing death daily?

“Hans!” Fritz called, “Kommen sehen!”

Rainbow followed Hans to Fritz’s side. When she saw what Fritz was staring at, she once again felt her gorge rise. Another soldier was draped behind a piece of rubble. What truly horrified Rainbow, though, was the fact that he was in half. His torso was completely separated from his legs. There was a single strand of ruby red intestine ran between both halves, showing that they had, in fact, been conjoined. His face was twisted in an expression of abject agony. His death had not been instantaneous. Trails of blood still leaked from his lips, where he had been coughing up his internal fluids. Since his heart had stopped beating, blood had ceased to flow from his bisected remains. Once again, Hans removed the tag, and closed the victim’s eyes.

“Konrad…” he mumbled, eyes tired and filled with pain, “He had a wife, two children…”

He stood stiffly, before turning to the other two survivors.

“We have to find new shelter. The Soviets will be through here soon, and I don’t want to be caught in the open.” He spoke in Equish, or English as he called it, for Rainbow’s benefit.

“Soviets?” Rainbow asked.

“Bolshevik Russians,” Hans amended.

Rainbow was still confused. It was obvious that the Soviets were hostile to Hans and the rest. Why this animosity between them? They were both the same species; surely, they could live together in harmony. Hans claimed one of the boxy implements from the ground. Fritz still had his firmly in hand. A whistling shriek sounded overhead. This time, Rainbow did throw herself to the ground. At least Rarity was not here, she would have hated to be in the dirt like this. The thought of her friend brought to Rainbow Dash a feeling of loneliness. Sure, she was not alone, but she had no friends here. This was a hostile world of war. How was she to survive.

In the distance, the now familiar staccato burst of an automatic weapon resounded. It was answered by cracking explosions. She heard screaming in the distance. It caused her to flinch. It was a cry of agony. It sounded of unspeakable horror and pain. A massive explosion ended all screaming. There was a bright flashing in the distance. More distant cracking explosions. The cacophony was repeated endlessly as if on loop. It was a nightmare. On and on and on it continued. So many lives were ending suddenly.

Rainbow and Fritz followed the limping form of Hans. His weapon was held loosely by his side. They were silent. Rainbow could not tell whether it was from mourning, or from nervousness of getting caught. Perhaps it was both. The tension was killing her, and she did not know how much more she could take.

“So…” she began, “Why are you fighting the Soviets?”

“We invaded them,” Hans grunted.

“So, why are you killing them like that? They’re only trying to defend their homes!” Rainbow was shocked. Who in their right mind would willingly invade another nation like that?

“Does it look like I have a choice?” Hans hissed in response, “I’m a soldier, I follow orders. I kill them because if I do not, they will kill me and my comrades. I hate being here.”

“Then why did you join the army?” Rainbow hissed back.

“I was drafted! I had no choice but to join. I have a family, you know. I would never have joined the Werhmacht of my own accord!”

“Wait, they forced you to join the army?”

“Ja, military service is mandatory for all those aged eighteen to twenty-five. You do not have mandatory military service where you come from?”

“No! You can volunteer for the Royal Guard, but they can’t force you. Why would they? Equestria hasn’t had a war for centuries!”

“You haven’t had a war for centuries? That is miraculous indeed. We have wars every decade or so.”

“Every decade?” asked a horrified Rainbow Dash, “How can you have so many wars?”

Hans' answer was lost in a massive explosion. Rainbow Dash heard roaring as a building collapsed violently from the detonation. Ruble spilled into the streets. She heard screaming, and realized in horror that there were people trapped underneath the rubble. Hans continued past, tensing as he heard the agonized voices crying out for help.

“Aren’t we going to help them?” Rainbow Dash called out to him.

Hans sighed, “There are only three of us, and we are all injured. How can we help?”

Rainbow felt her gut twist as she realized that he was right. There was nothing they could do. The massive pieces of rubble required several people to lift. Rainbow couldn’t lift things effectively, since she only had hooves. Fritz and Hans were not going to be enough. There were voices ahead. Hans and Fritz instinctively threw themselves to the ground, in case the voices belonged to Russians. They listened closely.

“” Hans muttered to Fritz.