MiE: Divided Path

"GodDAMMIT!" I shouted as we raced to whatever cover we could find. Not even ten steps and I was forced to pick up Fluttershy, since she stopped, looking on in horror as a changeling melted from a lucky blast.

"Take cover where you can!" Huka shouted to the others as we piled behind buildings. A few frightened civilians ran past us.

"Bubba, come here!" I shouted, looking around for my radio.

[?'s POV]

Racing out past the odd looking ponies and bipedal monkeys, I stumbled a little and hit the ground hard.

"I got you!" One of the monkeys said, helping me to my feet as the metallic stick spewed fire out of one end with deafening cracks. As I turned to thank him, to my horror his foreleg started turning to ash as he screamed in pain.

"Just go!" He yelled, gently shoving me with his remaining foreleg.

"Covering fire for that filly! If you can hear me, get to the line of Day Guards!" A voice shouted, but it wasn't coming from him. Rather, it was coming from his left shoulder, out of a black box.

"Thank you..." I whispered, before running at the line of white stallions in golden armor. They must've thought I was running to hurt them, because a few lowered spears at my body.

"Let her through! Can you not see the look on her face?!" A guard shouted, running out to help me through. We were quickly enveloped, and a second later my mother burst through and embraced me, much to my embarrassment.

"I was so worried!" She bawled, while I weakly grinned at the guard who helped me through, who was chuckling lightly.

"The evacuations are taking place about a hundred meters behind the line." He told me, pointing a hoof down the street to a crowd of other ponies.

"Let's go, sweetie." Mother said, causing my ears to flatten against my head in embarrassment.

"Moooom!" I moaned in fake agony, before trotting alongside her.

[With Mark]

"They're through!" I called out, gaining a sigh of relief from several men. That included Allan, who was groaning in pain and had a death guard pressing a washed hoof against his nub of an arm. Luckily, the wound was instantly cauterized.

"Sir, may I make a request?" He asked, looking up at me.

"Go ahead." I answered, crouching next to him, while looking for day guard scouts to put rounds into.

"When we get back to base, could I quit?" He chuckled a little, causing me to laugh.

"Yes, you can. With a Purple Heart and Medal of Honor, to boot." I answered, smiling. "You did more than the Marines required of you, just by being here."

"How many people do you have?" Huka's voice came over the radio, although he could've just shouted, being in an alley across the street.

"Seven, but Allan's down." I answered. I could hear the frown in his voice.

"And the locals?" He asked.

"They made it to safety." I said, sighing in relief.

"That's good. When are we going to pull off the assault?" He asked while I tasked myself to fire off a bullet, causing a 5.56mm round to burst through the skull of a now dead pegasus.

"When we get some goddamn reinforcements!" I couldn't help but shout, pulling the pin to a smoke grenade and tossing it down the street. On the other side, Huka did the same, and we had some smoke cover to regroup.

"Three at a time, get into the trinket shop!" I shouted, ready to put bullets into anything that broke through the cover. "Cover your group and you'll make it out alive!"

"Alpha, go!" Huka shouted, causing two changelings and Applejack to race across the street.

They got halfway before a laser went flashing out of the veil of smoke, heading towards Applejack.

"No!" I shouted, but a changeling raced through and intercepted the deadly projectile, barely, and went down hard.

'Fuck it.' I thought, helping the changeling into the building, helped by AJ.

"Thanks." I said, sticking the muzzle of my M16 out of the door frame and letting a few rounds go flying in retaliation. To my satisfaction, I heard a scream of pain.

[?'s POV]

"Let's get going." I whispered, walking away from the lifeless corpse of a day guard, flicking some blood off of my hoof.

"Right behind you." The changeling that was named Bubba whispered back, slightly adjusting the tanks strapped to his chest. As we sneaked away, a stray 'bullet' went zipping past, catching a few strands of my tail.

"They're getting bold, aren't they?" I muttered as we hurried into an alley.

"The NLR, or the SE?" Bubba asked as we looked around to see if we were followed.

"The NLR. The humans need to tone down the firing just a bit; nearly lost my flank." I answered, finding what we were looking for.

Knocking on a nondescript part of the wall, a piece of it slid away to reveal a set of eyes.

"Password?" A stallion quietly asked.

"It's me, goddammit. Open the fuck up." I answered without missing a beat.

"Password accepted." He answered, and a door opened up, revealing a tired looking batpony.

I'm not talking about Luna's night guard, I'm talking about an honest to God batpony.

"It's good to see you, General Mark." He said with a small grin, allowing the two of us inside.

"So, what forces do you have?" I asked, looking around the room. A few tired batponies looked back at me.

"About a dozen." He answered, waving a mare over. "This is Echo, Lt. Colonel and second in charge."

"How long do you think you'll last down here?" I asked, nodding to Echo.

"Two more days, at the most." She yawned out, revealing a nice set of fangs. I frowned, but nodded anyway.

"Hate to ask you this, but what do you all eat?" I asked, switching back to human form and cracking my back. Both of them flinched from the sudden light, but didn't comment otherwise.

"Blood and fruit, sir." The sentry answered, eyeing me a little.

"We have a lot of IVs back at base, your majesty." Bubba answered. "Fruit too, but the blood packs are more plentiful."

"Would your lot be willing to join the NLR?" I asked Echo, since I didn't know where the batpony in charge was.

"Absolutely. And I'm speaking for everyone when I say that." She instantly answered. In response, I held out a hand to shake.

After the shaking of hand/hoof was complete, I cracked my neck and poked my head out of the entrance.

"What do you see?" Bubba asked.

"Nothing, and I hope to keep it that way." I answered, before looking at Echo. "Get yourselves ready to help us when night falls, and we'll provide support for you."

"Aye aye!" She said with a grin and a salute, before lifting off and heading back towards where she came from. I looked at the sentry and nodded, before exiting with Bubba.

Behind us, the wall returned to normal, and we were alone once again.

"Where are they?!" A voice shouted, and I knew that we were found out.

"Goddammit..." I muttered, crouching behind a dumpster as Bubba turned into a fucking mouse.

It didn't help that I had forgotten to turn my radio off.

"GET US OFF OF THIS FUCKING STREET!" Huka's voice rang out into the alley. "How long until the fucking reinforcements get here?! WE'RE FUCKING PINNED DOWN, GODDAMMIT!"

"Of all the times..." I hissed, cocking my weapon and became ready to kill some sumbitches.

[With Huka]

"We're five minutes out!" A voice, Ryan Andrews, replied, causing me to swear.

"We don't have five minutes!" I shouted into the radio, letting off a few bullets from my Famas and taking care to not let it overheat.

"We're doing the best we can, dammit!" Ryan yelled back.

"We've got too many fucking wounded, most of which are critical, to fight back effectively!" I snapped, tossing a grenade and hugging the back of the wooden display case that I was taking cover behind. An explosion was followed by several screams of pain, indicating that I at least wounded four day guards.

"...Repeat, we have two A-10 Warthogs scrambled and en route to your location. ETA, thirty minutes... copy?" Another voice called out over the radio.

"I copy, dammit!" I said. "Just tell them to avoid hitting civilians and us!" I requested, gunning down several cocky guards.

"Roger, over and out." The guy said, clicking off.

"We got two A-10's inbound! ETA thirty minutes!" I called out across the shop for everyone to hear me.

"Oh, that's wonderful!" Allan shouted from his position behind the shop's counter. A moment later, a grenade sailed from his position and went through the shattered display window.

All in all, we were running out of ammunition (save for my weapon) and grenades, and we haven't even hit the two minute mark yet.

"Conserve your ammo, fire at only what you can hit." Gallan said as his BAR fired the last bullet in the current magazine. "Same goes for magic! We can't have you guys pass out on us now!"

"Yes sir!" A small round of voices called back, making me frown.

"We're probably not gonna make it, aren't we?" Allan quietly asked. In response, I tossed an M9 at him and brought down a unicorn who was charging a spell.

"You see any assholes come in from the door behind us, bring 'em down." I said, before turning my attention back to the front door.

"...Aye aye." He sighed, and flicked the safety off.