Twilight aimed through her G43's rifle sights, aiming clear for her target's head she slowly inhaled, exhaled, pulled the trigger... and missed. Twilight swore as she stood up, her rifle instructor shrugging behind her. "Sorry Twilight, but I can't get you into the Royal Guard divisions if you can't hit that target." He gestured to the target Twilight missed, that was about 100 meters away, he turned back. "If you can't hit that the Royal Guard doesn't want you."

Twilight nodded and handed the rifle to her instructor. "Thank you sir, I understand, gotta head off now, don't want to miss roll call and my posting." Her instructor patted her on the back, smiling. "Don't you worry Twilight. I've put in a good word for you so you can get into the more decorated divisions, maybe you'll be shipped right up to the front."

Twilight thanked her instructor again and headed off to the mess hall. Five weeks have passed since she and Rainbow Dash joined up, already Twilight was feeling more fit and strong, remembering her first few days being hell and quickly adapting to her situation, helped put everything in perspective. She'll be sent to the front tomorrow to help fight this rebellion, and she couldn't be more nervous and excited.

As Twilight entered the mess hall, she spotted Rainbow Dash talking with two new soldiers sat at their usual spot. They always meet in the same spot at around the same time to discuss whatever was relevant, like recent news from the front, back home, or other squad-members that do particularly stupid things in front of superiors. Twi and Dash were in different courses, Twilight being in the infantry while Dash became a tank crew member. She passed her command courses and showed to be quite an effective tank commander in practice battles. So Rainbow would be given her own tank and crew ot join one of the Armoured Divisions. Twilight walked up and asked. "Hey Dash, who are these two?"

Dash looked up and smiled at Twilight. "Hey Twilight, these two are members of my tank crew Gearshift, my driver." She motioned to the gray Pegasus mare with brown hair and blue eyes to her left. "And this is Gunpowder, my loader, but we just call him Twitchy due to him having a nervous tick." She gestured to the black stallion with gray hair and brown eyes sitting in front of her, He quickly gave Rainbow a glare as Gearshift just laughed, "I told you to not blab about that to every one we meet! I mean having it is bad enough but the nickname? That's just mean."

Gearshift kept laughing as Dash replied with. "It's all in good humor Gunpowder, it's just Twitchy will be easier to say in combat." Gunpowder still looked angry about that but dropped the point. Dash turned back towards Twilight. "So, introductions out of the way, Twi take a seat, have you heard from Ponyville recently?"

"The usual. Pinkie, Rarity and Fluttershy miss us greatly and Applejack still isn't back from visiting Family up to Stalliongrad." Twi replied

"You think something happened to her?" Dash asked. "No idea." Replied Twilight. "But she's probably just stuck in the city as the rebels won't let anyone in or out."

"Yeah, seems like that would be the case." Dash looked up at the clock and a wave of shock passed over her face and turned back. "We gotta go, we're being shipped out in 3 hours!" Twilight, Gearshift and Gunpowder all got the message and rushed back to their bunks to pack up their stuff before they were called for roll call and sent to the front or other postings.

As Twilight joined up with her squad of recruits she focused intently on her Drill Sergeant as he called out names and units. "Privates Sunshine, Twilight, and Wafer, you'll be in 7th Rifles division. Report to Commander Blueblood on the double!" As Twilight moved along with twenty other recruits into a train car headed for the forward base of 5th, 6th and 7th Divisions, one thought entered her mind, Isn't Blueblood that pompous ass Rarity met 2 years ago. Well shit...

Author's Note

And that's chapter two. Thanks for reading and I hope you enjoyed the chapter. CanadianPony, OUT!