On Behalf of Soviet Equestria

“Augh... For the love of... How your baggage are so heavy? What you put in there?” the troika driver asked in his broken Equestrian as he struggled to lift the large, overstuffed suitcases that sat on the curb. His words were directed to a stallion dressed in an elegant-looking suit that stood by the bags.

“Only the necessities, I assure you,” the stallion replied. “I had to make sure that I didn’t forget anything essential. It’s not as if I can just walk back to my office in Canterlot to go fetch something that I left behind.”

The disgruntled pegasus called for the other two drivers of the troika to slip out of their harnesses and help him with the luggage. The three-ponies tag-teamed the gargantuan suitcases and flung them, one by one, into the back of the troika.

“I hope you pack wheelchair in there, comrade,” the driver moaned as he rubbed his back. “I thinking I need one.”

Alexander Palominov watched from across the street as the scene unfolded. He knew who the stallion in the suit was. He had met him during one of his visits to Canterlot in the prior months. The stranger was a professor at the Canterlot Academy of Political Science, and Palominov didn’t care for him one bit.

A violet mare with a matching platok wrapped around her head approached the stallion as he watched the final suitcase get tossed into the troika.

“Well, Mr. Wordsworth,” the violet earth pony said, “I enjoyed our talk on the train last night. But I suppose this is goodbye.” She had addressed the professor in Equusian, and Palominov was shocked to hear him answer in flawless Equusian of his own,

“Of course, my dear! I wish you the best of luck. Alas, I must make haste - my colleagues at the State Institute await!”

“Good luck, comrade!” the mare answered with a wave as professor Wordsworth climbed into the back of the troika and squeezed in among his suitcases. The three drivers, already back in their harnesses, dragged the loaded vehicle along as they carted the stallion off to his destination.

The violet mare waited until the troika turned the corner and disappeared from view. She picked up the rucksack at her hooves, slung it over her back, and studied the busy street before the train station, deep in thought. Palominov could tell by the platok on her head that she most certainly wasn’t a local. He stood there, eyes fixed on the mare, as the neverending procession of pedestrians hurried past him on the sidewalk. She surveyed the building facades, looked back down the road where the troika had exited, and then her eyes came to rest on a brown stallion in a dark jacket standing across the street. He was watching her all the same. She looked to ensure that there were no troikas coming and trotted across the road to Palominov.

“Excuse me,” she asked Palominov, “do you have a moment?”

“I do,” he replied.

“This is my first time in Stalliongrad in a very long while,” the mare explained. “I just got off the train and I’m not too sure where I am. Do you know how to get to Victors’ Square from here?”

“Of course,” Palominov said with a nod. “You can follow me - I’m on the way there myself.”

“Looks like l asked the right pony,” she replied as the stallion and mare started off down the sidewalk. The violet mare looked all about her with an amused smile as they went along, at one point posing the question,

“So if you were headed to Victor’s Square, why were you standing there watching me?”

“You?” Palominov responded, flashing the stranger a quick glance. “No, I was watching that idiot that was talking to you.”

“Excuse me, comrade, but he was no idiot,” the mare said, almost defensively, to Palominov. “He’s a perfect gentlecolt, here on a sabbatical to visit the State Institute. He’s a professor from Canterlot.”

“Don’t worry, devushka, I know all about Everett Wordsworth, what he is, and what he does.” The violet mare was shocked when Palominov just rattled off his name.

“You know him, then?” she inquired.

“I unfortunately got to meet him at Canterlot Castle. Twice. A long time ago,” was Palominov’s answer.

“You’ve been to Canterlot? You’ve seen the princesses too, just like the professor?” the mare asked. Palominov chuckled at the envy in her voice.

“Take it from me, comrade. It’s not as wonderful or special as it sounds. How do you know Wordsworth, anyway?”

“We shared a room on the train to Stalliongrad,” the mare answered.

“You’ve got my sympathy,” was Palominov’s frank reply.

The couple continued to talk as they wove their way through the stream of pedestrians that crowded the streets of Stalliongrad. The mare was particularly inquisitive, asking why Palominov had been in Canterlot, what he did there, and why he didn’t seem to like professor Wordsworth. She seemed simply fascinated when she learned that Palominov had been a diplomat, going back and forth to Canterlot on official Party business for talks with the princesses. She didn’t expect him to speak so negatively of the experience, however. Palominov freely criticized Celestia and Luna and bad-mouthed Wordsworth, explaining a conceited side of the stallion that Wordsworth “probably hid when outside of the imperialist cities.” Eventually, Palominov started throwing around some questions of his own. He asked the stranger where she came from, what she did, and why she was in the city. The violet mare’s name was Nastenka. She lived and worked on a collective farm near Saddel’naya, a rural region right in the middle of the lengthy distance between Stalliongrad and Saddlestopol. She left for the city when the news of the Crystal Empire’s surrender had reached her farm, hoping to meet her husband as he returned from the northern front. It had been a year since she had last seen him.

Indeed, the long fight had come to a close. The Great War had ended merely a week and a half after the Empire was chased out of Foalgograd. The Reds had secured their northern border and were pushing deeper into the Crystal Empire every day as their new weaponry cut down all that stood before it. And as the imperials withdrew soldiers from the east to defend against the advance, Trotterstan, Mustangistan, and Grazerbaijan were able to band together and reclaim their own borders. Eventually, the terrified princes in the capital waved the white flag. It would not officially be peacetime until a number of treaties were signed in Canterlot. But the surrender marked the undeniable victory of Soviet Equestria over their imperial aggressors.

“So nopony on your farm even knew the war was over until six days after the surrender, when your commissar showed up with the news?” Palominov asked.

“That’s right.”

“And then… you hopped a troika, went to Saddel’niy Vokzal, bought a train ticket that put you in Wordsworth’s car, and showed up here this morning?”

“That’s right.”

“You didn’t waste any time,” Palominov laughed.

“I tried not to. You know, this is the first day I’ve been off my farm in years,” Nastenka admitted, watching the the crowds as she followed Palominov down Stallions’ Prospekt. “This city is beautiful. But it’s not the same city I remember from the first time I was here, back when I was a filly.” She paused. “Well, I mean, it is. But… it’s not. Well, you understand what I mean, don’t you? The first time I was here was before the revolution.”

“Of course,” Palominov answered. “It’s changed. No more Breiyar princes, no imperial guards on the corners, nopony listening in on you to make sure you speak Equestrian… The city has been reborn. And now, it’s going to stay this way.”

Eventually, Palominov and his new acquaintance Nastenka found themselves in the massive plaza at the center of Stallions’ Prospekt. This, of course, was Victors’ Square, the iconic area at the heart of the city. From the moment she had entered this legendary spot, Nastenka had barely been breathing. It was the same square she had seen years ago, but at the same time it was not. Imperial flags had become red flags. The Sapphire Palace had transformed into Council of Ministers. The Mares’ Death Battalion stood where crystal sentries once kept watch. Most importantly, the sculpture of a wise-looking king in a grand throne - made entirely of precious gems - had been taken down. In its place stood three massive statues - one of a soldier, one of a metalworker, and one of a farmer.

“And here we are, comrade,” Palominov said with a sweep of his hoof. “I don’t want to just disappear, but I was called to a meeting with a few members of the Council and, as you can imagine, I can’t miss it.” Palominov paused and briefly surveyed the square. “You’re meeting your husband here?”

Nastenka didn’t hear him. She stared off at the Hall of the Council of Ministers as if she were in some sort of trance. She only snapped out of it when Palominov gave her a gentle nudge.

“Sorry, what?”

“Are you meeting your husband here?”

“Oh, no,” Nastenka said, “He’ll be at Foalgogradskaya Station. But I wanted to see the square again, first.”

“Do you… know how to get there?” Palominov asked.

“Of course not,” the violet earth pony laughed, brushing a few stray strands of her mane out of her eyes. “But I’m sure I’ll find somepony else who does. I’ll be just fine.”

“If you’re sure.”

“I am. Thank you for showing me the way.”

Palominov bade her farewell and crossed the square toward the staircase to the Hall of the Council. Before entering the building, he turned around and looked back into the plaza to find the violet mare waiting on the same spot where he had parted with her. All around Nastenka, the urbanites hurried this way and that, but she remained still. She was reliving a memory of years gone by.

*   *   *

“But it got thrown in the wrong box. Or somepony dropped it. Hell, I don’t even remember the story! But they found all this stuff when they took the telegraph exchange in Foalgograd, and somehow it got misplaced and sat somewhere for two whole weeks before somepony found it and had it rushed over to me!” Orlov spat as he paced around his office. The premier was addressing Nikolai Broncov, Gennady Mareinskiy, and Alexander Palominov, all seated around the his desk.

Orlov had called these three members of his inner circle to an emergency meeting, where he presented them with material that had been recovered during the fighting in Foalgograd nearly two weeks prior, but not delivered to him until a day ago.

They were letters direct from Canterlot castle. Two of them had been addressed to the princes in the imperial capital. The annotations in the margins suggested that they had been seen by the capital and then got rushed off to Foalgograd for the commanding officers of the Crystal Army. Another letter was penned for some higher-up in Canterlot. Two more didn’t even seem to have a recipient. But altogether, they conveyed a massive secret that wasn’t supposed to have reached the eyes of anypony in Soviet Equestria.

“She lied to us the whole damned time!” Vladimir Orlov fumed. The white stallion continued to stomp around the room. He kicked over an end-table in his frustration. “For months, we sniffed out the anarchists left and right and beat them into submission until they scattered. So Celestia sent agents out to reunite them. Funded them. Gave them a coherent arsenal. And then they staged the rally and marched on the Hall of the Council.”

Broncov grew steadily more aggravated as Orlov’s story continued. Palominov didn’t seem that surprised. But Mareinskiy, the pony who had defended Celestia from the more radical element of the Party in the wake of the revolution, was shaking in his seat.

“But that was the distraction!” Orlov raged, kicking at the end table until one of the legs snapped. “The mob of anarchists in the square was the damned distraction to keep everypony busy so her assassins could slip in here and take me out!” He grumbled under his breath as he searched the room for something else to destroy. “Those goons in the grey robes - you must remember - the ones that flew in here on the day the anarchists attacked… They were hired by the crown to come and eliminate nine members of the congress. Eight others and myself. Five of the assassinations succeeded. The only reason they didn’t get me was because I called a meeting at the last minute. Those two imperialist dogs flew in here expecting to find me alone… but they had three to contend with. And we took them down.”

Mareinskiy couldn’t discredit anything that Orlov was saying. The letters clearly outlined the machination that had been orchestrated by Canterlot. The cream-colored pony had lost track of how many times had he defended his beliefs about the princesses in his quarrels with other members of the Party. But it seemed now that he had been wrong in his conviction.

“And if that wasn’t bad enough, she lies to our diplomats’ faces, telling them that she won’t get involved on either side of the fight, when all along, she directly engages the Red Army and tries to keep it a secret!” Orlov raged, taking more of his anger out on the destroyed end-table.

“But where?” Mareinskiy asked. “There was never one report, from anypony or anywhere, that said soldiers from Canterlot were seen on the battlefield!”

“Then you didn’t read all of the notes,” Orlov laughed. “Fish around in that pile, they’re in there. There’s a giant, sugary love-letter, signed jointly by Celestia and Luna, that explains it all. The brigades that attacked Trotterstan didn’t come from the Crystal Empire. They were soldiers from Canterlot, sent to the imperial capital, where the mages worked their magic and made them appear to be crystal ponies. Then they suited up like the rest of the imperials and marched on Trotterstan. Don’t you see? The Crystal Empire didn’t have enough soldiers to take on the Trotter SSR. So when Mustangistan and Grazerbaijan joined the coalition, they went crying to Canterlot to save their miserable hides.”

“Well that’s not news,” Broncov huffed. “They’ve been crying to Canterlot for who knows how long.”

“But at one point, Canterlot started listening,” Orlov continued. “They picked a side, and they tried to make us believe that they didn’t pick a side. And I always knew that Celestia was doing something behind our back. I knew it. But I never had any definitive proof.”

Orlov looked out the window at the street below, watching as a line of militsiya officers walked along. A smile slowly crept across his face as he turned around to face the members of his inner circle.

“I never had any proof… until Foalgograd…” the premier rambled on. “Nopony ever expected the tachanka to make an appearance. We cleared that city out so damned quickly that nopony had time to ensure that all the sensitive documents at the telegraph exchange were accounted for. And another stroke of luck was that the telegraph exchange was located south of the river. Had it been up north, these letters would have burned. Hell, I wonder what else we could have recovered from the north if it didn’t burn to the ground… Who knows what other crazy schemes were unfolding behind our backs!”

“With all due respect, comrade Orlov,” Palominov smirked, “Treachery worked both ways. I’m sure the Crystal Empire wanted Emerald-Ingot’s head on a plate.”

“Ah, but who’d have thought!” Nikolai Broncov said amusedly as he looked up to the ceiling. “Emeraldavia breaks away from the Crystal Empire and takes our side. And if the rumors are true, Prince Emerald-Ingot was out there on the battlefield, bashing skulls with that giant green hammer of his.”

“But remember, comrades,” Orlov added, “that it was Emerald-Ingot’s own imperialist greed that gave rise to his treason. We had nothing to do with the offer he made us. He just jumped at the chance to crown himself a prince. He is still a royal, and has no intention of incorporating Emeraldavia into our union of Equestrian Soviet Republics. He’s made that perfectly clear.”

Broncov and Palominov nodded in agreement. Mareinskiy, slowly shaking his head, was re-reading the text of one of Celestia’s notes, praying that somehow it had been misinterpreted, and that all of this was some massive mistake. But misinterpretation was not the case. It was all spelled out neatly in the letters from Canterlot.

Somewhere, hidden away in the depths of Mareinskiy’s mind, a set of floodgates opened, releasing an avalanche of memories from the previous two years. Suddenly, Mareinskiy found himself on Sapphire Square on the day the nobility was ousted. Then, an ensuing blur took him to the founding of the Party in the earliest days of the first Soviet republic. He saw the crisp drafts of the first manifestos to Canterlot, the same ones that called for the crown to order the Crystal Empire to stand down. Mareinskiy once again was resting in his bunk on the stuffy sleeper train, riding through the night toward Canterlot Castle. He relived the conversation where he assured Palominov that talking directly to Canterlot had the potential to solve everything - how Princess Celestia would be infinitely more understanding than the imperials. Another strange blur clouded his vision. He blinked and was suddenly in the throne room, watching himself speak before the princess, but couldn’t hear a single word that was being said. Darkhan Dressazhanov from Trotterstan and Ivan Furlongev from Belequus appeared as if out of thin air, and the princess addressed them, though she was inaudible. Her voice was being drowned out by a news broadcaster that suddenly started speaking behind Mareinskiy. When he turned around, he found himself alone in his flat. The voice’s origin was his old radio. Loud and crackly, the broadcast announced the Crystal Empire’s declaration of war. Mareinskiy tried desperately to turn the radio off, but the announcer could not be silenced. The stallion threw himself into an armchair and placed his hooves over his ears, jamming his eyes shut as he tried to mute out the disastrous news. But the cushion of the chair soon became hard and unyielding. It had transformed into a barstool - Mareinskiy was back at the Druzhinnik Bar, and an inordinate amount of empty glasses rested on the counter before him. The bartender stepped forward and brought him a new bottle, but a flaming rag was sticking out of the top. The mare behind the bar grinned as a roar of enraged voices erupted from behind. When the cream-colored pony hopped off the stool and turned toward the noise, he saw himself before the anarchist mob. The bar was melting away now, slowly transforming into Victors’ Square. The anarchist fanatics charged around Marinskiy, toward the Hall of the Council as flames bellowed from its windows. When the stallion blinked, he was inside the auditorium, where the grey-robed assassins tossed lifeless carcasses over the balconies of the upper stories…

“Gennady Sergeyevich… Can you hear us?” Palominov asked.

The three stallions were crouched down around Mareinskiy, who had simply gone limp and fallen out of his chair. They spoke to him, shook him, and propped him up against the desk, but the unresponsive stallion just stared blankly ahead through half-closed eyes.

“I told you it was a bad idea to call him to the meeting,” Broncov scolded. “Look at him.”

“So what, then? Tell you two and leave him in the dark?” Orlov asked, still trying to shake Mareinskiy awake. “How could I let him go on like he was, wading nose-deep in a false conviction? He had to learn the truth.”

“Look, it’s just the way he is,” Palominov huffed, taking a seat on the floor. “Gives everypony the benefit of the doubt, except for himself. You know what happened when the war broke out. Said it was all his fault and locked himself up in his flat.”

“I don’t know what he saw in Celestia and Luna,” Broncov muttered with a shake of his head. “To me, imperialist swine is imperialist swine. They don’t come in shades and categories.”

“Alright. Let’s just worry about getting him back on his feet,” Orlov said as he rose to all fours. “Somepony downstairs probably has smelling salts left over from the attack on the Council. And if not, just get some water. I’ll wait in here with him.”

Palominov and Broncov got up and made for the staircase while Orlov leaned against his desk and put a hoof to his head, watching Mareinskiy with concern.

“What can I say, Gennady Sergeyevich?” the premier said. “You’re one of the best deputies we’ve got. But sometimes you’re just too soft.” Orlov waited around for a minute before calling through the open door to the office, “Hey, Irina!”

There was no response.

“Irina!” Orlov called again, still receiving no answer. “Must have her door shut.”

Premier Orlov stepped out of his office and took a short walk down the hall, stopping in front of a closed door and knocking.

“Irina, you in there?” Orlov asked.

“Of course, Vladimir, come in,” was the muffled reply from behind the door. The white stallion pushed open to reveal a red unicorn seated at a cluttered desk, sifting through a mound of papers.

“I know you’re buried under work, but we need some help,” Orlov began, stepping into the room. “You still remember anything from your days in the clinic?”

“Oh chyort, what happened?” the deputy asked, removing her glasses.

“Mareinskiy fainted on us. Long story. It’s probably better if we get somepony like you to help wake him back up.”

“Oh, yes, of course.”

Irina followed the premier out of her room and through the door to Orlov’s office. The stallion froze upon entering, and the red unicorn looked about the place in confusion.

Gennady Mareinskiy was nowhere to be found.