Ponyfront

Chapter 2: Why We Fight

The deep blue sky was without a cloud and the sun shone high and bright, spreading its warmth and light all over the town. It was a beautiful day that Ponyville was experiencing, weather wise. However, its residents were still locked in a life of violence, as they had been for over two years.

Sky Skimmer awoke from his slumber to the sound of his radio. It was broadcasting a weather and news report to its listeners. Sky never listened to it properly, not since Canterlot had fallen. The public radio channels had been taken over and had been riddled with human lies and propaganda. The pegasus got up from his bed and walked over to his mirror on the door of the wardrobe.

Looking into it, he saw his own miserable reflection. A light green pegasus stared back at him, his wings tattered and bruised. Sky could still fly, but not as well as he once could. It pained him to flap his wings, and it exhausted him to even glide or hover. His mane, tail and coat were stained with grease, dirt and sweat He couldn't wash and neither could anypony living in Ponyville as the humans had cut the fresh water supplies to the residential areas. The closest place to wash was at the re-education camp but it wasn't worth it. He knew that once he went in, he would never come back out.

Returning his gaze to his reflection, his attention drifted to his scar. It had been there for a few years now, acting as a constant reminder of his old job; how he got it. His job was to test new aircraft for the human army. Sky was fascinated with the ambition that humans had for aviation and wanted to help them become better at soaring through the air. He knew what a wonderful feeling it was to have the wind rushing through his mane, and he wanted to share that feeling to everypony or human he could.  He had acquired his scar in an accident during a test flight. A plane was attempting a crash landing and the plane's underside scraped along the runway. As it did, pieces of metal flew off in all directions and Sky was unfortunate enough to be standing in the wrong place at the wrong time. Some shrapnel flew past his face, cutting in for only a millisecond, however the pain was immense. If it had struck a little further to the right, Sky would have died on the spot.

He looked outside through a hole in his boarded up windows and saw what the real Ponyville was like. It was exactly opposite to the radio’s lies and propaganda. It sure as hell wasn’t the best place to live in Equestria. Through the cracks he saw ponies being rounded up on the street and forced to line up. They were beaten and abused beyond belief but they had no choice. It was either live with a beating, or resist and be shot. This is unbelievable, he thought to himself. Sighing, he turned back into his room.

Suddenly, there was a series of violent knocks on his bedroom door. As much as he didn't want to open it, he had to. He moved over to unlock the door. No sooner had he unlocked it than it was kicked open violently, forcing Sky back as two armed human policemen walked in. One pinned him to the wall while the other hit him once in the stomach with the butt of his weapon. After them, a high ranking officer walked in. He could tell by how his uniform was decorated.

The officer turned to Sky and spoke to him in a cold and hard voice, "Greetings, Sky Skimmer. I am General Arnold Scott, the leader of the army here in Ponyville. We have been watching you since we arrived and we were shocked that you didn't sign up for our pony regiment. We were even more surprised that you didn't even join the pathetic Ponyville Resistance considering how patriotic you are towards Equestria and her... Princesses."

General Scott looked around the grey, dull room. Its bleak walls were in complete contrast to the bright and sunny day outside. The tiny room was close to empty, holding only the empty wardrobe with a mirror attached to it, a small bed with no quilt and a chair and table with Sky's radio atop it.

The general spoke again with his arms extended, "If you would fight for either one of these armies, then this poverty in which your kind lives in would all be gone... but we will make sure you have no choice in the matter. Take him away!"

As soon as Scott had spoken those last three words, Sky found himself being dragged out of his bedroom and thrown down the set of stairs in front of his door. The light green pegasus tumbled in a ball. He hit his head with some force against the wall at the bottom of the stairs and passed out.

Two human policemen slapped him awake, one kicking him in the ribs. They told him to walk toward a parked transport bus a few metres away. His wings were cuffed together so he couldn't fly even if he wanted to. He was in bad shape, and he walked slowly. The humans were unforgiving, repeatedly abusing him to “Encourage” movement.

Once inside the bus, he could see a few other ponies sitting on the seats with cuffs on their forelegs. Sky was shoved towards the back of the bus and toward another policeman. The second policeman grabbed him, made him sit down and hoof-cuffed him. Sky noticed that the prisoners where all spaced out so they couldn't talk to each other without the guards hearing. Sky guessed this was to prevent escape plans from being formed.

A pony in front of Sky didn't turn around but started to talk to him, "Hey, you're a pilot too, aren't you?"

Sky was looking at his hooves but stopped and turned his attention to the pony. "Yeah, I am. Is everypony on this bus one?"

"I think so. I wonder why they're rounding us all up. Do you think the resistance is planning something that involves us and the humans are making sure we don't become a part of it?"

"I don't know," Sky replied, "I just hope the resistance gets Ponyville free and that the REA gets its act together."

The green pegasus moved his head to the window of the bus once again and instantaneously wished he hadn't. The brutality and crimes committed against the ponies were unforgettable. Couples were split apart and would probably never see each other again. Foals were separated from their parents and sent onto buses going in opposite directions. Worst still is that if a pony did not comply within three seconds of being given an order, they were shot or executed in some other manner, no matter if it was a simple order or a complicated one. Nopony was spared.

The bus rounded a corner, but something was different about this street. It was abandoned. The other pilot spoke again but much softer and quietly then before, "How do you think they get rid of the bodies so quickly? Mass graves, that's what I've heard..."

Sky winced at this thought. His face screwed up a bit and his limbs retracted slightly. In his opinion, no matter whose body it was, a body should always be respected by having a marked grave to its own.

The bus stopped at a checkpoint. The security guard questioned the driver of the vehicle.

Sky replied to the other pony by asking, "Where are they taking us? Is it that re-education camp?"

"I don't know mate, but wherever we're going; once we get there we need to stay together."

Sky said "Okay" in response. His mind drifted outside the bus again. Another street was barren and deserted. There wasn't even a single human patrol in sight, which struck Sky as strange.

Sky might have continued pondering this thought if he didn't see something that sent a chill down his spine and caused his mane to stand on end. There was a bright red lorry cabin travelling at full speed right toward the bus. He had one thought on his mind, to brace for a side-on-impact. He tried to warn the other ponies but he was too late.

The cabin collided with the bus at such speed that it stopped dead in its tracks, but the momentum continued and passed into the bus and caused it to roll continuously to the right. It rolled seven and a half times, stopping on its roof.

Sky was barely conscious. He could still see, but he was so disoriented that he might as well have passed out. He saw that the bus had been deformed horribly on its left side and every single object made of glass had shattered. He looked over to the pony who had talked to him moments before, but the body wasn't moving. He saw drops of crimson running down his head. Sky hoped he was still alive, although he knew deep down that he, and all the other ponies, were dead. He looked towards the front of the bus and could see that the windscreen had shattered, the driver stuck in his seat thanks to his seat belt.

Sky's vision got slightly better but it wasn't good enough for him to tell if the new life form that had just entered the bus through the broken windscreen was a human or a pony. Something inside its mouth shimmered for a second as it caught the light. Sky immediately recognized the object as a knife. Sky saw the creature drive the knife into the struggling driver and withdraw it. The creature then saw another human propped up against the underside of a window, just regaining consciousness, and killed him as well. Sky began to panic as the creature came towards him but calmed as his vision came back fully just as the creature inspected him from head to hoof. It was a pony, one that had the entire rainbow light spectrum all the way through her mane and tail. He recognized her from the Best Young Flier competition in Cloudsdale a few years ago; Rainbow Dash.

Rainbow noticed that Sky was alive and spoke softly to him, "You can thank me later." She turned around to exit the bus the way she came. She gave Sky some sort of gloves and told him to put them on. She also noticed a pistol lying on the ground and picked it up. She broke off the trigger guard, which prevented non-unicorn ponies from firing due to their lack of fingers. The cyan pony then gave it to Sky.

The gloves were strange, unlike any gloves that Sky had seen or worn. They fitted his hooves perfectly but they had a Velcro like material on the outside. He soon figured out what it was for, as he saw Rainbow stick a strap of Velcro onto the butt of the pistol.

"You know how to shoot?" asked Rainbow. "Stand on two legs and use your wings for balance so you can shoot and aim with your forelegs." Sky could only nod in acknowledgement, as he was still recovering from the impact. "Good" was the reply he got.

Rainbow made her way out through the windscreen with Sky trailing closely behind her. The green pony had no idea what was happening, but at least he wasn't dead, or worse- going to the re-education camp. Sky stepped out onto the street and looked back at the bus. It was almost completely trashed, as was the lorry cabin. The entire front of the lorry was crushed. Sky started to wonder how he survived the crash considering that everypony else had died. He looked back to Rainbow Dash and saw a pink Earth pony standing on her hind legs beside the multi-coloured pegasus. Her mane and tail looked like candyfloss and her light blue eyes were wide with disbelief at something.

"Glad to see that Rainbow's 'plan' didn't get you killed," said the pink pony, "I protested against it saying, 'But Rainbow! It’ll get him killed or wounded beyond fighting fitness' and she was like, 'No Pinkie it won't' and I was like-"

"Pinkie, shut it," said Rainbow. "We need to move before the entire human army is on our flanks."

No sooner did Rainbow finish that sentence than a helicopter appeared from behind a building. Pinkie spotted it, pointed and said, "Too late, here comes the cavalry." She saw an open fast-food restaurant and ordered everypony to get inside and get out of the parking lot.

They had just got inside before the helicopter opened fire and humans started to rope down, armed with various sorts of heavy weaponry. The three ponies took cover behind the counter and looked for a way out. Rainbow noticed a door, which she guessed, led to a way out. They had no choice; they had to take it.

"Everypony through this door, now!" she ordered. Pinkie went first followed by Sky and then herself. She closed the door behind her to find a short corridor with another door at the end. "

"We need you in this fight, Sky, so start shooting," continued Rainbow.

"And if I don't?" replied Sky.

"Then we probably won't make it out alive."

The trio formed up at the other door as Pinkie kicked it open, revealing a narrow back alley with chain link fences on each side. At the end was another shop, which the three ponies ran towards.

Two humans suddenly appeared and jumped over the chain fence. Pinkie made sure the other two knew. Rainbow told Sky to aim for the head and make every bullet count. Sky had waited for this moment for years. He didn't hold back as he double tapped his pistol, dispatching both hostiles with clean headshots.

Rainbow saw Sky's two swift kills and immediately recruited him on the spot. "There’s no going back now, Sky. You've got Human blood on your hooves. You're in the resistance now," she told Sky.

"It's about time I was," replied the green pony.

Rainbow kicked open the door and they ran in. More humans came in through the front door directly opposite them while a few more roped down through the skylight on the ceiling. No time was wasted dispatching the policemen. Pinkie told Sky and Rainbow to take as many spare magazines as they could and leave none for the enemy. Sky noticed a UMP.45 sub machine gun lying on the ground and decided that that was better than his M9 pistol. Rainbow gave him some Velcro strips and told him to stick them onto any gun he was going to use.

"There's a gas station up ahead which the humans use as a fuel depot. It's part of a shortcut to a place I know where we can get outta sight and wait for all this to blow over," stated Rainbow.

"I thought this was supposed to be a quick and stealthy snatch n' grab, not some sabotage attempt," Pinkie complained.

"It is," replied Rainbow, "But why not kill two birds with one stone?"

Sure enough, the gas station was up ahead. The three resistance fighters ran into the small building. They looked out through the broken glass, but that was a mistake. There were many human policemen outside by the pumps. A few officers saw the resistance fighters and opened fire. The three fighters cursed quietly under their breaths, as a hail of lead flew above their heads.

"What the hell are we going to do now!?" yelled Sky.

"The only thing we can do; Return Fire!" Rainbow shouted back and with that, she tossed a grenade, pointed her gun out of window and started firing, closely followed by Pinkie and then Sky.

Both sides were fired endlessly upon each other, neither stopping until the other was dead, our out of ammo. After about two minutes, the three ponies were starting to run low on ammo. Pinkie was down to her last magazine with Sky and Rainbow not far behind. The fight was looking bleak until a transport truck came out of nowhere and started unloading more human soldiers. Rainbow lost it slightly.

"Alright, that's it!" she shouted, "Aim for the pumps and start shooting them!"

Sky knew why Rainbow told them to shoot the pumps. If they were shoot enough times, they would explode and cause an inferno, killing anything that was beside them when they went up but Pinkie didn't catch on. She thought it was a waste of very precious ammo and her last mag.

"But if we shoot them, they'll go up."

Rainbow replied with only one word, "Exactly."

Pinkie's face lit up five seconds later as she understood why. She loaded her last magazine in and kept firing along with Rainbow. Sky reloaded and fired a couple of bullets into the burning pumps. It only took a couple more bullets before the whole station exploded into orange and yellow flames. Screams erupted from where the humans stood seconds before. The explosion was so powerful that even the ponies, behind a solid brick wall a few metres away, had to curl into small balls to protect themselves. Rainbow swore loudly and Sky didn't blame her. The blaze burned madly and way less controllably than anypony could’ve predicted.

Once the blaze had subsided somewhat, the ponies walked out into the lot. There were still a few small fires here and there, but they could get through with no problems. They proceeded to move toward a suburban area. Rainbow grabbed her radio and spoke into it.

"AJ, it's Rainbow, we've got the pilot."

The radio came to life as a voice came out of it, "Why didn't ya use the codeword an' what was that explosion? What’d ya'll do?"

"Don't panic, it was just a gas station. We decided to take out two birds with one stone."

"Gosh darnit Rainbow, you could’ve been hurt. Be more careful! Where are y’all headed?"

"Sugarcube Corner. Meet us there."

"No! There's ponies living there! Ya'll put 'em in danger!"

Rainbow was defiant in her tone, "I don't have time to argue! Rainbow out." She put down her radio back onto her belt.

Pinkie was puzzled by the conversation. "What was that about?" she asked.

Rainbow replied to Pinkie as they entered some ruins of old houses. "Applejack thinks it's a bad idea to blend in with the locals. She'd rather risk Ponyville's freedom for a bunch of cowards."

"Calm down. I'm sure she-" Pinkie began put couldn't finish her sentence. There, right in front of them, was a tank and around twenty humans behind it. Sky stuck his hoof over Pinkie's mouth to stop her talking quickly enough. His heart rate increased and his mane stood on end once again. He looked over at Rainbow. He may not of known her personally for very long, but he knew that she wasn't one for showing fear. He knew it was bad when her back legs were starting to shake and her voice broke more than usual upon seeing the mechanical menace.

"Shit," she whispered, "Get down and hide."

Pinkie and Sky couldn't be happier to obey her. They ducked down behind an old sofa that had burned to a crisp along with the house it once stayed in. They had entered through a hole in the wall behind them and the wall in front of them was non-existent. If any of the humans turned their head even slightly over to inspect the house, the ponies would be filled with hot lead.

They decided to wait until the patrol was out of sight but changed their plans quickly, as they saw the tank turn toward the house they were in. As soon as they could, they crossed the road into another house. Being a pegasus, Sky flew over as fast as possible and covered Rainbow who carried Pinkie over.

***

The three ponies continued moving through the ruins and rubble of houses until a familiar shop came into view. There was a crowd of ponies outside it. Pinkie’s face lit up when she saw Sugarcube Corner.

"I have so many happy memories of this place. I wish I could to have more," she said sadly.

"Well if this Operation goes according to plan then maybe you will. Maybe we all will." Rainbow said softly.

"Some shortcut, Rainbow," commented Sky. "It was probably shorter and safer the other way."

Rainbow turned to Sky with a frown on her face. "I didn't expect all those patrols, okay? Besides, you should be grateful that you're not in that damn camp."

Sky looked back at her with a cheeky grin on his face. "Thank you. Thanks for saving me."

Rainbow looked into her green friend's red eyes for a second before breaking away. "You're welcome," she said, "but the only reason we did it was because we need you in this OP."

Before Sky could ask why they needed him an orange pony galloped up to them. If her orange coat wasn't enough to make her stand out, the Stetson hat she was wearing certainly was. Sky had never seen a pony wear a hat like that before. She didn't look pleased to see them too.

"Wah did ya choose here for the meeting point, Rainbow? You've attracted lots of attention to yourselves and now ya'll gonna endanger the lives of all these civilians? Ah don't think so. We gotta go, now!"

"We had nowhere else to go! The area is covered with human patrols!”

Rarity trotted up to Rainbow, "We're meant to be fighting for these ponies, not hiding behind them."

"Who the buck's hiding?" replied an angry Rainbow Dash.

It was then Twilight's turn to interrupt. "That's enough, both of you!"

Applejack thanked Twilight and spoke to Sky, "You must be Sky Skimmer, the pilot. My name's Applejack and I'm the leader of the Ponyville resistance."

"Thanks for freeing me from the humans," said Sky thankfully, "But I still don't know why you need me."

Before Applejack could answer three human armored cars can out of nowhere and started shooting at the ponies, not caring if the ponies they fired on were hostile or peaceful.

"Get inside everypony!" screamed Applejack. The seven resistance fighters charged into the nearest house. Applejack devised a plan within seconds. "Twilight, go and get Mercy and target the humans. Rainbow and Fluttershy, escort her."

Rainbow saluted Applejack, grabbed Fluttershy and followed Twilight out the back door of the house.

"Who the hay is Mercy?" asked Sky pausing between words as he popped up from his cover to shoot.

"You'll see soon enough," replied Applejack, "Rarity, I need more ammo."

Rarity's horn began to glow and three magazines appeared in the air in front of the orange pony.

Sky was baffled. He tried to ask Rarity how she did that, but before he could ask, the white unicorn replied, "I'm a unicorn. Twilight taught me how to teleport small objects from our hideout to the battlefield. It does come in handy doesn't it?" she said with a smile.

Suddenly, the sound of an engine echoed throughout the house. It was louder than the sound of the gunfire outside. Sky swivelled his head to see what was making the sound, expecting to see a tank plough through the wall. Something did break through the house but it wasn't a tank. Instead, a massive, rectangular, metal body resting on six wheels, about the size of Pinkie, charged through the house followed by Twilight, Rainbow and Fluttershy. Twilight was using her magic to tightly grip a sort of remote control, which Sky guessed was for the machine.

"That's Mercy!" said Applejack. "Twilight, set its guns and rockets on the humans!"

Twilight turned to Applejack, her face failing to mask the maniacal thoughts going through her mind. Rarity couldn't help but wince at the sight of her for a second. Twilight simply nodded.

Suddenly, a loud bang filled the air. The window that Twilight was standing beside shattered and the purple unicorn fell to the ground screaming and clutching her left foreleg. Applejack and Rainbow swore loudly while Pinkie and Rarity stood with mouths open wide trying to figure out what just happened. Applejack looked for Fluttershy.

"Fluttershy, you're the medic, help her!" she yelled.

The yellow pegasus looked absolutely terrified, "But...But the bullet is very deep and she's losing a lot of b-b-blood. I d-don't think I can-"

"NOW! Do you best to save her! Rarity, use your fancy magic to help her."

Rarity knelt down beside the heavily injured Twilight and used her magic to make the wound big enough to get the bullet out. Another bang filled the air but it missed Rarity by a hair. Applejack grabbed the control for Mercy that Twilight dropped and gave it to Sky yelling, "Use it!"

The target locator was an odd looking object. It looked like a pair of binoculars that could see in infrared with a button and two antennae on the top. Sky noticed that whenever he pointed the locator in a direction, Mercy's gatling gun would look in the same direction. He looked through the locator and focused on the enemy sniper. A red box appeared around the human and bold yellow writing popped up above the target, "TARGET LOCATED." Sky pressed the button on the top and took the locator away from his face. He looked up at Mercy's gun, which had retracted into its metal chassis and replaced it with a rocket launcher. It fired a volley at the unfortunate test target and the human disappeared into a cloud of smoke and flames.

Sky felt a hoof on his shoulder. He tilted his head to see Twilight staring at where the human was a few seconds a go. "Nice shot," she said, "Now let's get the rest of them."

At that moment, Mercy rammed down the wall in front of it and started cutting down every human in sight. The resistance behind it came out the houses they were hiding in and fired on the retreating enemy.

"Ha-ha! We sure kicked their flanks didn't we?" said Pinkie.

"You bet we did," Applejack replied.

"Thanks to Mercy," added Twilight.

"Right, cut the celebrations, we'll do that later. Sky, I'm sure you're wondering as to why we need you more than ever now. Well, we need to-"

A massive explosion happened no more then fifteen metres away. Rainbow stopped talking and immediately looked up. What she saw froze her to the spot with fear and dread. "Predator Drone right above us! Scatter and run everypony!"

All the ponies looked up and saw that she was right. Everypony ran in all directions as the drone fired a second missile. Rainbow and Fluttershy grabbed the recovering Twilight and flew as fast as they could. They all ran together. Sky looked behind him and saw the missile come closer to the ground, closer to him. It impacted and the force of the explosion pushed the group at a ferocious speed. They all fell to the ground. Sky struggled to remain conscious. His eyes closed, but not before he saw Mercy launch a barrage of missiles at the drone. Then, he fell into darkness.