Interview with an Immortal

     March the nineteenth, 1917.

     Gryphon Squad was sent on a  mission to the Crystal Empire to assassinate King Sombra.

     Those included on the mission were Sgt. Sky Quake, Lt. Spitfire ( the First, there's more than one Spitfire), Cpl. Fifty Caliber, and myself, Captain Rainbow Storm Dash. The mission was stationed in the middle of a battleground.

     Artillery shells were exploding all around us as we made our way to the castle. One of Sombra's loyalists pulled a knife and jumped me. I struggled to keep him off as the blade inched closer and closer to my belly. Finally, one my troops came and pulled him off, then stabbed him. I got back up and picked up my .44 Magnum double-action revolver. I was going to need it and its magic-infused bullets eventually. Fifty Cal picked up a second Thompson SMG off a dead soldier, saluted the stallion's body, then used it and his own Thompson to provide cover fire as we made a mad dash for the castle doors. I bucked down one of the side entrances and marched in with a Colt 1911, then shot two guards.

     We took the stairwell up to the fifth floor, where Sombra was located. Sky Quake covered our six as Spitty placed her hoof on the door gently, while I set mine on her shoulder. I pointed my revolver over her shoulder and said, "You fillies ready?"

    Spitfire kicked down the door, and I used my position and wing power to leap over her and fired four rounds, one striking a mare blocking the way, the others hitting the king dead on in the forehead. We went to see if the magical rounds had worked. Sure enough, that bastard was dead as a door nail. Thank heavens.

     I then saw a small grey figure slip past my peripheral vision. I whipped around to see her just as she rounded the corner of the room. "Captain?"

     I ignored Spitfire's concern and galloped out of the room. I chased this grey mare down the stairwell.

     "Hey, you!" I called. She ignored me and kept going. "Stop!" But of course, she kept galloping. Eventually, I chased her out a door into an open field.

     There, I had her. No one in the EDF could beat me in a race, not even the Wonderbolts.

     I bolted out the exit and took the skies, my humongous, powerful wings propelling me to seventy miles an hour, easy. It was only ten seconds before I overbore her. I grabbed her by the ankle and brought her to the grass, where I held her in a lock, with her demanding I let her go.

     Not gonna happen.

      "Why were you running?!" I screamed.

     "Let go of me!"

     Of course. First thing they do after you ask 'em something is demand to be released.

     "Answer my question! Why were you running?!"

     She kept squirming in my grasp. "Please," she cried. "I don't wanna die!"

     Wait, what? Am I really that scary when I'm angry?

     "I'm not going to hurt you! Just please, answer my question!"

     "You were going to shoot me!"

     I should have asked her what she was on and where I could get it...

     "What?! I wasn't-- No! "

     "You shot my mother!"

     I paused for a moment and sighed. "Your mother jumped in the way. She was aiding and abiding a criminal of war and a public menace. " It was then that I realised who this filly was.

     The youngest daughter of the late King Sombra. You see, five years ago, Sombra's eldest son and daughter were captured and executed for high treason, mass murder, and affiliation with a traitor.

     And this filly? She looked like her father beat her every day for fun. I wouldn't have put it past him. It appeared as though her mother was the only one she cared two licks about.

     "Why did you shoot my father?" She asked weakly.

     I turned to face her and get a better look at her.

    My Celestia, she was beautiful. In a sexy, naughty sort of way...

     She had grey fur and a jet black mane with dark green highlights that was spiky and came forward in front of her face, a style many future DJs would adopt. Her eyes were a deep purple, but I could have sworn they were a bright red not too long ago. I noticed she had a stump of what appeared to be made of bone on her forehead. A horn, maybe? No... Impossible...

     She also looked like she was no older than fifteen. Shit, and I'm thirty-two.

     Well, there goes that relationship.

     "Your father... Was a bad stallion. My squad was sent to kill him."

     I swear, the moment I released my grip, she squeezed me tight. I was shocked.

      "Thank you, she murmered.

     "What?"

     "I hated him. He would beat me for the simplest mistakes, he would sometimes lock me up in the dungeons, and he made me fight in the arena once... I barely made it out of there with my life. My sanity was another thing." She pressed her face against my fur. "You're so warm.."

     I chuckled. "It's a pegasus thing."

     She looked at my tags, then at me. "Thank you Captain Dash... for getting me out of there. I don't know what's going to happen to me now, but I'm glad I'm out of there."

     I stood up off of my haunches. "Well, we'd best get moving. It's not safe here, not 'til the shellings have stopped. "

     I had just set her down when I felt a sharp tug in my gut. I looked down to see two green crystal hooves holding a blade in my right kidney. I watched as my crimson-red blood spilled over the steel blade, onto my cyan fur and his sinister hooves. I lifted my chin up to look at the filly. I tried to say something, but blood spewed from my mouth instead of words.

     The last thing I remembered was her screaming and jumping at the bastard who stabbed me, and then my vision got fuzzy. Everything went white, black and every other colour, and nothing all at the same time.

     I was bleeding out in the middle of a war zone.

     And the fight was already won.