On Behalf of Soviet Equestria

The weeks that followed brought further uncertainty to the future of Soviet Equestria as Foalgograd fell to the Crystal Empire.

The brigades from Trotterstan never arrived to support the defense. They were forced to turn and march back home as the Crystal Empire moved on Palominograd, the large city at the heart of the Trotter SSR. The Empire had launched the eastern campaign shortly after the pro-Soviet rebels of Grazerbaijan had ousted imperial authority in the capital, Bucku. They were fearful of a potential Grazer SSR, and sought to separate the infant republic and Trotterstan from the federative capital in Stalliongrad.

Again, Canterlot was quiet, and the Empire continued its reconquest without any hinderance but the will of the defenders of Soviet Equestria.

The agricultural regions of Soviet Equestria, collectivized by the state in the previous months, saw the beginning of requisitions as food and other essentials were taken to the north to support Soviet Equestria’s most important objective - the liberation of Foalgograd.

The spirit of the Soviet ponies was tested more harshly than ever before. The end of the union of red republics seemed to be looming ever nearer, and everypony knew that if Soviet Equestria was reabsorbed into the Crystal Empire, the days ahead would be even more abysmal than the days before the revolution.

Far from the front, it seemed that Stalliongrad and Saddlestopol’ were the only cities that had thus far been spared the misery of battle. Unfortunately for Alexander Palominov, Gennady Marinskiy, the Party, and the ponies of Stalliongrad, distance did not necessarily confer safety. On a quiet morning in Victors’ Square, the epicenter of the revolution in Stalliongrad, they learned the hard way that in strange times, anything goes.

*   *   *

Gennady Mareinskiy and Alexander Palominov were no longer simply diplomats that worked in conjunction with the Council of Ministers of Soviet Equestria. In recognition of their work abroad in Canterlot and at home in Stalliongrad, they had been honored with an invitation to join the Inner Party as members of the Party Congress. Mareinskiy, of course, was reluctant to accept, still somewhat unable to come to terms with the situation, but after a few days of deliberation agreed to the offer.

They gave their input on the new constitution of the Soviet Equestrian Republics. It was to be published, ratified, and go into effect as soon as possible and would serve as the basis for the legal system of Soviet Equestria, establishing the Workers’, Soldiers’, and Farmers’ soviets. The system would only endure, of course, if the union persisted and wasn’t forced to again be a subject of of the Crystal Empire.

It was slated to be a day like any other. The Party Congress was but an hour away from reconvening. Nearly all the deputies and constituents had arrived at the Sapphire Palace and were settling the usual preliminary business, as well as inquiring as to the latest developments on the warfront and information from the provisional committees of the other Soviet Equestrian Republics. Naturally, Grazerbaijan was a primary concern.

Mareinskiy and Palominov had been waiting in one of the corridors of the palace’s third and highest story, talking to pass the time as they waited for Orlov and several other deputies to conclude their morning meeting.

Palominov was still as in awe of the palace’s interior as he was on his first day within its walls. Indeed, it certainly was a marvel to behold. Even the nondistinct hallway in which they had been waiting that morning was decorated and furnished to be as grand as the entrance hall and bedchambers (which, now, had been converted into offices, archives, and conference rooms). The base and head of every column was decorated with gold leaf and hunks of refulgent sapphire, the favourite precious stone of Duke Saphirov III from which his surname was derived. The delicately-painted ceilings bore images of the cosmos, of the countryside, and of mountains made of crystal. The floors were massive mosaics, some segments consisting of repeating patterns of precious stone, others depicting scenes of the empire’s most stunning buildings and locales. The Party considered the removal of these imperial scenes, but it was ultimately decided that alteration of the palace’s interior was an insult to the artists and architects that constructed it.

“Just imagine,” Palominov stated dreamily, “living here, and knowing that the whole place belonged to you and you alone. I can’t wrap my head around it. I simply can’t.” Palominov slowly paced across the floor mosaics, staring up at the paintings overhead. “And meanwhile, everypony else was struggling to get by as the tyrant shut himself away from the outside world and lived like this.” He turned to look at Mareinskiy, who was staring intently through one of the windows. “Imagine how Saphirov felt on the day when the protests met in the square. We saw that day from the street below. But imagine if we had seen it from the other side,” the brown stallion continued. “Imagine if we could have seen the final moments before Saphirov made his escape. Heh. You know, it makes you wonder… what did he think when he saw half of Stalliongrad take down the guards and start breaking down the doors? What I’d give to know what was going through his mind...”

“Careful what you wish for,” Mareinskiy stuttered. Palominov stopped and turned to face his comrade.

“What?”

“I don’t… Just… come over here and look.”

Palominov’s hooves clacked across the floor as he trotted to the window through which Mareinskiy had been watching the square.

Citizens were making way for Stallions’ Prospekt and clearing Victors’ Square as a sizeable crowd of ponies with black banners and flags approached the palace. The Mares’ Death Battalion was no longer standing at attention, but was cautiously stepping forward, forming a line that spanned the square, separating the Sapphire Palace from the advancing mass.

“Anarchists?” Palominov questioned as he put a hoof on the glass. “On top of everything else…”

Black flags hadn’t been seen in Stalliongrad for over a month. The anarchist groups had been suppressed in the wake of the revolution. It seemed now that the movement had been in a temporary state of dormancy, and was ready to strike once again.

As the two members of the Party watched from their window, one of the battalion's brown-uniformed soldiers stepped forward. She was shouting at the crowd with short, impatient gestures. One of the flag-bearers moved toward her and waved wildly, pointing to the palace, and then, with an elaborate sweep of his hoof, appeared to reference the group standing behind him. The angry crowd began to cheer and shout. The roar was audible even from the palace’s interior.

“Well, it’s not like the Death Battalion hasn’t put up with these idiots before,” Alexander Palominov grunted.

“But look at them… They’re armed, moreso than they’ve ever been before,” Mareinskiy countered.

The group continued to grow more riotous by the second. Palominov hadn’t noticed it before, but nearly everypony without a flag had some sort of weapon. Now, they were being brandished and waved around threateningly.

The mare from the battalion continued her shouting match with the flag-bearing dissident. Everypony else had cleared the square now as the confrontation continued to unfold. The angry stallion made another sweeping gesture and stomped as he grabbed the hilt of his own shashka in his mouth and drew it from the sheath at his side. The officer turned toward the battalion and barked an order, presumably for the soldiers to ready their own weapons. But before she could finish, the apparent leader of the anarchists lunged forward and stabbed the officer in the flank. He pulled the shashka from the wound and kicked her to the ground.

Mareinskiy and Palominov watched in disbelief as the fanatical mob shouted and cheered. The Death Battalion had their weapons at the ready now as the officer got to her feet and hobbled away from the anarchists, unable to put any weight on her left hind.

The leader motioned toward the palace and slowly proceeded forward as the group marched toward the Death Battalion and closed the gap.

“They’re mad. Stark-raving mad,” Palominov whispered as the anarchists met the soldiers and turned the square into a battlefield. The two sides tore each other apart as the anarchists struggled to enter the Hall of the Council of Ministers.

“After all this time… they’ve come back to try again,” Mareinskiy said in disbelief as he turned to Palominov. “It’s like we’ve gone back in time. To three months ago.”

“Yeah, but this time… it looks like they’ll actually storm the place,” Palominov spat. He tore his eyes from the scene in the square. “We’ve got to get out of here. Everypony has to get out of here. Now.” Palominov took off down the hallway as Mareinskiy followed behind. “We need to warn Orlov and his comrades!” he shouted. “They can’t see the square from his office!”

The two stallions raced down the hall toward the set of rooms that once comprised Duke Saphirov III’s bedchamber and private quarters, passing countless paintings and sapphire-studded columns. They heard some commotion in the hallway behind them but didn’t stop or turn around to see what it was. They thundered down the corridor and threw open the doors to the vestibule of the upper-story’s meeting rooms, much to the surprise of the Party members and secretaries that were conducting business.

“Quickly, comrades!” Mareinskiy shouted as he ran through the room, “Get downstairs and head for the rear exits! Anarchists are storming the place!”

Palominov threw open another set of double-doors as the frightened secretaries and deputies grabbed what they deemed necessary and tried to flee. With Mareinskiy right behind him, he ran to the far end of the hallway he had entered and made way to Vladimir Orlov’s office.

His gallop came to a stop at the door when he heard the smashing of glass from within the office.

“What the hell is this?” was the cry that followed immediately thereafter.

Palominov pushed the door, but it wouldn’t budge. He remembered that Orlov always locked it during meetings.

“Vladimir Ilyich!” Palominov called, pounding on the door. “Are you alright? Let us in!”

From within, something crashed to the floor as what sounded like an apparent struggle ensued.

“Alright. We’ll break it down, on three,” Palominov decided as he turned and got ready to kick. Mareinskiy took a stance by his comrade and did the same.

They counted in unison: “One, two… three!”

The two stallions jumped and kicked at the doors, but failed to break the lock.

“Again,” Palominov shouted. The struggle continued in the office as something else crashed to the floor. “One, two… three!”

The doors didn’t open, but gave a little more than the first time. Two more shouts sounded from Orlov’s office as something was thrown against one of the walls.

"One, two… three!” Mareinskiy and Palominov kicked again, the wood by the lock splintered, and the doors flew open.

A struggle had destroyed the office. Two bookshelves had fallen to the floor, a chair was overturned, papers and envelopes littered the carpet, and the porcelain desk lamp had been shattered. The massive window behind the desk had been smashed inward, as evidenced by the glass shards that littered the desk and floor.

At the left, a strange-looking pegasus in what appeared to be a tight-fitting grey robe was lying motionless on the floor beneath one of the shelves. At the right, one of the congressponies was curled up by the wall, seething as he clutched at bloody tears in his suit.

And there, behind the desk, was a white earth pony, Vladimir Ilyich Orlov, up on his hind legs, restraining another grey-robed, winged assailant while a second deputy of the congress was bucking and kicking him without mercy. When the intruder stopped struggling, Orlov let him collapse to the floor.

“It’s alright, comrades, we took care of them,” Orlov gasped to Mareinskiy and Palominov as he leaned against his desk, trying to catch his breath. He was winded, but at the same times seemed to be eager for more. His expression was as determined as it always was, and as he looked to the pegasus on the floor, he looked ready and willing to jump on him and give him another sound beating. Meanwhile, the second deputy quickly but carefully walked across the sea of broken glass and paper to tend to his wounded friend. “Nikolai Mikhailovich was the unlucky one,” Orlov added as he looked to the wounded pony on the floor moaning in pain.

"Vladimir Ilyich,” Mareinskiy called to Orlov, “we all need to leave the palace. There’s a mob of anarchists in the square and they’re trying to storm the congress!”

Orlov, chest still heaving, looked at the bloodied masses of grey robes on the floor.

“So, our kind guests were anarchists. As if we didn’t have enough problems, these degenerates have formed up again… But why would…” Orlov stopped mid-sentence and shook his head. “Why, all of a sudden, would they have…”

“Comrade Orlov, we have no time!” Palominov shouted. “We need to get out of here. Now.”

“And we need to get him to a doctor as soon as possible,” the deputy added as he tried to help his comrade stand. “Comrade Broncov is in rough shape.”

“Augh! Blyad’!” Broncov hissed. “Not from that side, that’s where it stings!”

“Sorry, sorry…” the deputy sighed. “Let’s switch sides… there. Now put a hoof over my shoulder, and let’s go.”

Orlov, meanwhile, had picked up one of the daggers that the grey-robed strangers had brought with them.

“Take the other one,” he said to Palominov with the dagger handle in his teeth. He pointed behind his desk. “The other one’s back there. Chances are you’ll need it.”

Palominov grabbed the second dagger, and the group made for the hallway, moving slowly to allow Nikolai Broncov and his helper to keep up as they left a trail of bloody hoofprints in their wake.

The group had made their way to one of the two rear staircases that flanked the ends of the hall. Behind them, another office door had been thrown open. They stopped and turned to find a deputy bolt into the hallway with another pegasus in tight-fitting robes flying after him. The pegasus took a dive and tackled the stallion as he fought to throw him off.

“Get Broncov downstairs and out of the building!” Orlov ordered as he charged the attacker.

“Alright,” Palominov shrugged as he began to descend the stairs. “It’s your funeral, comrade." He stopped on the first landing and turned to the rest of his group, still at the very top of the staircase. “You heard Vladimir Ilyich, let’s go, before we get trapped in here. This is the Hall of the Council, not my coffin.” Mareinskiy and the two deputies exchanged indecisive glances, but after a few seconds began down the stairs, afraid to look back at Orlov and the struggle in the hallway.

Palominov was already scouting ahead. He dashed down the hallway toward the main vestibule, dodging the other secretaries and members of congress attempting to flee. If the entrance hall was still clear, the group would be able to cut through to the main auditorium and slip out one of the rear exits.

The brown stallion galloped into the vestibule to find that the battle before the palace had devolved into shoving contest at the front door. Nopony was fighting anymore. The Mares’ Death Battalion had been pushed back and was attempting to close the doors of the Sapphire Palace, but the anarchists were shoving just as hard from the other side, beating back the battalion even further and preventing the doors from closing.

“Quickly, comrades, shut those doors! You’ve seen worse than these filthy, anarchist dogs!” one of the senior officers hollered over the chaos. The Death Battalion continued to push, but they were slowly losing ground.

Broncov better pick up the pace, or we’re all done for, Palominov thought as he turned and retraced his steps to his comrades in the corridor.

He charged onward as fast as he could, dodging secretaries and ministers that were making their way to the auditorium, but stopped short and almost tripped as a flaming bottle of oil, liquor, and turpentine smashed through one of the windows and started a blaze in the hallway.

“Blyad’, now it’s cocktail hour!” Palominov raged as he backed away. Further down the hall, his comrades had just rounded the corner. “Hurry up!” Palominov called to them. “Before the fire spreads!”

Broncov hobbled along as fast as he could as Mareinskiy and the second deputy tried to help him along. Fortunately for the three of them, the hallway was wide enough such that the blaze from the flaming cocktail hadn’t been able to entirely cut them off from the vestibule, but it continued to grow as they drew nearer and nearer. The flames crept up the wall opposite the window, slowly blackening a delicate painting of crystal ponies walking about a humble looking street studded with gemstones. One by one, the subjects of the painting disappeared as the wall was irreparably charred. Broncov watched the scene burn as his two comrades helped him past the blaze.

Palominov was in the vestibule again, watching with frustration as the Mares’ Death Battalion was losing more ground. The mob of anarchists was chanting “Down with the Party!” as it inched forward. From the front doorway of the palace, two more flaming cocktails were hurled through the air. They crashed to the floor on the east end of the vestibule, right behind the battalion’s right flank. The whole line shifted as the soldiers moved to avoid the fire, and their formation began to falter.

“V auditoriyu, davai!” Palominov yelled his group over the chaos. The four ponies retreated into the massive congress auditorium. There, the deputies were scrambling frantically to take with them from the desks and tables what they could before they fled the scene. Palominov and company made their way across the speaker’s platform where they could quickly pass to the far side of the auditorium without having to fight their way past the other congressponies in the maze of desks. They passed beneath the massive crimson flag that hung at the front of the room, embroidered with the golden emblem of the hammer crossed with the sickle.

Coming down the steps on the other side of the speakers’ platform, Mareinskiy and Broncov tripped and fell to the floor. Palominov, already at the doors on the far side of the room, sighed and ran back to help get them back on their hooves.

At the same time, one of the secretaries, eyes on the second-story balconies, screamed and pointed as a minister of the council was thrown over one of the balustrades, landing with a sickening smack on one of the desks below. Out from the same balcony flew two pegasi that wore the same tight-fitting robes as those seen on Orlov’s assailants. One of the pegasi dove for a deputy on the first floor while the second made a beeline for the large flag. She unsheathed a shashka and dove downward, slicing the crimson banner in two before coming out of her dive and tackling another member of the Party Congress.

Meanwhile, a deafening roar rang out from the vestibule, where the anarchists had presumably shoved their way through, finally gaining entry to the Sapphire Palace.

Broncov and his two supporters had made it to the far doors of the auditorium now.

“You three go first, and I’ll cover your back,” Palominov shouted. Nopony argued with that plan, as he was the only one with a ready weapon - the dagger he took from the pegasus in Orlov’s office.

The group of three proceeded down the corridor as quickly as Broncov could possibly move. Palominov followed, never turning his back on the doorway to the auditorium. He could see smoke from the doors on the other side of the room. The vestibule was engulfed in flames now, and some of the fanatic anarchists had pushed their way past the Death Battalion and into the auditorium.

They moved farther and farther down the corridor, and it seemed that they were going to make it to the rear exits of the Sapphire Palace. But each and every member of the group could think only of those ponies that were still inside that had little chance of escaping with their lives. They wondered how many other offices on the upper stories were visited by the strange, grey-robed pegasi, and how many managed to escape them. They feared for Orlov, asking themselves if leaving him on the third floor was the right choice.

They got the answer to that last question as soon as they escaped into the alley behind the Sapphire Palace.

Reinforcements from the kreml’ - the massive fort at the center of the city - had arrived to support the Mares’ Death Battalion and had the Sapphire Palace surrounded on all sides, as well as in the air. They were a mix of soldiers from the Yakut Military District and volunteer Red Guards. Behind their line of encirclement were the secretaries and deputies of the Party Congress that had managed to escape, and among them was Vladimir Orlov. Although his white hooves and mane had been bloodied and pieces of his suit had been torn, he seemed to be in relatively good shape.

“Relax, comrades,” Orlov laughed to the group after they made their way behind the Yakut line. “Most of it isn’t my blood.”

The center of Stalliongrad had been turned upside-down as plumes of smoke rose from the windows of the Hall of the Council of Ministers and the Yakut Military district, together with the Stalliongrad militsiya, had the square and Stallions’ Prospekt on lockdown. The green-uniformed Yakuts and motley Red Guards stormed the Sapphire Palace to round up the anarchists and eliminate those that refused to surrender.

Civilian brigades were doing their best to bring water to squelch the fires that raged at the front of the palace, through work on both the ground, with bucket handoffs, and in the sky, with rainclouds brought in from the periphery. Doctors were brought to the scene for the injured, and those with the most severe and threatening wounds were given first aid and escorted off to clinics and hospitals by troika. Broncov was one of the first to be taken from the scene.

Mareinskiy and Palominov were just thankful that they managed to get out alive. After all, not everypony in the Party Congress that morning was quite as lucky.