A Soldier's Tale

by Eclipse

Rating: teen
Tags: Slice of Life, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Alternate Universe, Sad, Original Character, Princess Cadance, Tragedy, Random, Adventure, Shining Armor, Twilight Sparkle
Length: 6176

A young Twilight Sparkle tries to learn about an old guard as part of a school project

After a lecture in class, the teacher finds all of the students had fallen asleep: all except the yound studious Twilight Sparkle that is. So she assigns a project to the class on anypony that they would consider a 'real-life hero' and Twilight is ecstatic about the project, whilst others are all but happy with it. After overhearring two fillies talk about a retired guard, Twilight decides to go and use him for her project. What tales does this old soldier have to offer the young Twilight for her report?

Published 2013-07-29 05:20:02 UTC
Last updated 2013-07-29 05:20:02 UTC

A Soldier's Tale

Twilight was sitting in the front of the class paying close attention to the teacher as she always did, though none of the other foals in her class paid that close of attention; she sat there with the greatest and most interested look plastered onto her face every time the teacher started talking. Twilight loved it whenever the teacher started a lecture, book, or even the most dreaded of all amongst the rest of the students: speeches. All around there were scattered yawns from the other foals, but Twilight tried to ignore them and follow everything the teacher kept saying: Twilight even started to take notes whilst the others in the class fell asleep drooling on their desks. The teacher finished her lesson and saw the entire class asleep on their desks except for the attentive little Twilight Sparkle and shook her head in disappointment.

“Okay class, any questions on what I just taught you?” the teacher said loudly enough to wake up every foal in the room; most coming up with drool running down the sides of their faces and looked back at the teacher with a look of confusion and sleepiness. The teacher shook her head again and saw Twilight in the front of the class, still fully awake and attentive, raising her hoof and waving it around desperate for the teachers attention.

“Yes Twilight?” the teacher asked.

Twilight read through all of the notes that she had and then looked back up to the teacher with a smile. “I have a couple of questions for you about the use and treatment of magic.” Twilight said with a smile on her face as she always did.

The teacher rolled her eyes playfully at the small violet-coated foal. “Okay, I’ll try my very best to explain it best I can: I only know as much as I was taught.”

Twilight shuffled around her notes once again trying to find the part in the notes about small foals and the magical ‘outbursts.’ “Well, why do unicorn foals have these magical outbursts?” Twilight asked with big eyes the teacher always loved to see.

“Well Twilight, think of it all this way: their magic is still developing and since they’re young they haven’t learned to control it and since they are also too young to be able to use their magic whenever, they get a build-up of magic that comes out in sudden bursts that are usually very random. It’s hard to train a young unicorn to use magic to rid them of these attacks, but parents are advised to teach their foals how to use their magic as soon as they possibly can.” Just as the teacher answered the school bell rang and all of the foals started to get up before the teacher started to say something about it. “Ah-ah-ah class!” she yelled, “sit down!” As she said that all of the foals in the class grumbled lowly to themselves and sat back down in their class trying to withhold their eagerness to leave the room and head home.

“Since most of you decided you would take a nap during today’s lecture, I’m afraid that I’m going to have to punish you all with an assignment for homework tonight.” The teacher stated as the entire class groaned: all except Twilight Sparkle. Twilight sat there with a look of glee on her face, and she was the only one in the class that actually looked forward to these kinds of assignments. “And I expect all of you to have them finished and turned in to me by the end of the week.” After this, the entire class groaned even louder than before, but Twilight’s smile just widened. “The topic is somepony that you see as a real life hero. This paper must be at least one piece of parchment long to be turned in and you can use ponies that help around the town like, fireponies, local lawbringers, etc. Now, hurry on out of here and don’t forget about this assignment because I’ve just decided this will count for 75 percent of this semester’s grade!” As the teacher finished every foal in the class got up and rushed out, pieces of parchment flying about the classroom making the teacher roll her eyes and heave a heavy sigh.

Twilight took her time gathering her things and got up slowly and said good-bye to her teacher. “I’ll see you tomorrow Ms. Fluerance!” Twilight said as she waved good-bye and made her way out of the classroom with a smile on her face and made her way out of the door.
Once Twilight made it out of the classroom only to overhear two of the fillies talking to each other outside the class, and though Twilight didn’t feel it was right to eavesdrop on them, she wanted to figure out what they were talking about.

“This writing assignment is bogus!” one of the fillies remarked as she made a sour face at the thought of actually having to do this assignment, “that teacher doesn’t know what she’s talking about if she thinks we’re doing and finishing this in two days!”

The other filly rolled her eyes and turned out then sighed lowly in disbelief. “Where are we even going to find such ‘heroes’ that’ll be cool enough to even put into our reports?”

“Well there is that retired royal guard guy, but he’s a loser and probably has nothing cool that we can put in our reports. What was that stallion’s name again?”

“I think it was Copper Shield?”

“Oh yeah, that stallion is just the most boring pony in all of Canterlot! Not to mention that he’s so old!”

“I guess we should go look elsewhere then right?”

“I guess so; let’s go see if the younger guards have something to say to us.” They finished as they walked away slowly leaving the small Twilight Sparkle with an interesting lead on who to interview for her project. So with the newly collected information, Twilight happily trotted back to her house with great ideas in mind.

When Twilight arrived home she was immediately greeted by her favorite foal-sitter in all of Canterlot: Cadence. Every day that Twilight saw Cadence, it just made her heart absolutely soar like a pegasus pony slicing freely through the skies without a single care in all of Equestria. Twilight and Cadence just has a certain kind of unbreakable bond that nopony could seem to separate, and even though Cadence was a princess and an alicorn: her and Twilight were just as much sisters than as if they were borne from the same parent.

Cadence smiled at Twilight as she walked in the door. “Well Twilight, how was your day at school today?” she asked Twilight in the sweetest voice Twilight had ever heard, sweet like honey, and safe and securing as a comfy blanket.

Twilight smiled and giggled with giddy as she took out her five and a half pages of notes that she’d taken from the teacher’s lecture. “We talked about the correct way to use magic, what can happen sometimes when using magic, and what we can and can’t do with magic! And about why foals have magical outbursts!” Twilight nearly screamed out she was so ecstatic over it.

Cadence looked about the notes slightly confused at the writing and finally smiled back at the little gleaming filly standing before her. “Well, I’m really glad that you had a great day at school today. Do you want to go out to the park today, play some board games, or sit around and tell stories today?” she asked as Twilight’s head jolted up faster than a spring that’s been under high pressure and was finally released.

“Oh!” Twilight said as she rummaged about her stuff and pulled out a small piece of parchment with the writing assignment that she was supposed to do. “We have a small writing assignment to do that’s due at the end of the week, and I think I have somepony that I can interview for it already in mind!” Twilight said as Cadence picked the parchment from Twilight and read the topic that she had written down.

Cadence smiled at the studious small unicorn filly. “A hero huh? There’s a lot of those all over Equestria, and I believe you’ll write a great essay about them! So, who did you have in mind?” Cadence asked.

“Copper Shield.” Twilight replied.

Cadence went silent for some time trying to process the name that Twilight had just said to her: eventually the young princess once again found her voice. “Well, he’d sure be a… errr… interesting stallion to interview seeing he’s the oldest guard that had served in the past while. But I don’t exactly think you should bother him though,” Cadence suggested, “he’s never really been a stallion that everypony on the guard really, as you say, ‘liked’.”

“Well, why not?” the innocent filly asked, “I’m sure that he’s got something to tell me and how many adventures that he’s been on!” Twilight finished with a look of anticipation on her face.

“Well…” Cadence started and sighed at Twilight’s face that she just couldn’t say no to. “Okay Twilight, I’ll take you over to where he lives, but trust me, he’s a bit rude at times, extremely bitter to everypony. Especially since his incident…” Cadence didn’t seem to want to continue onwards with her thought, but the little curious Twilight just couldn’t seem to withhold her curiosity.

“Well, what exactly happened to him?” Twilight asked.

“Nopony likes to talk about it Twilight, it’s a very rough subject for anypony to touch upon…” Cadence answered with a low, saddened voice.

“Why?”

“Well, if you’re curious about what happened to him, I think that it would be best to hear the story from himself.”

Twilight nodded and withheld any further attempts to get the story out of Cadence because she knew that her foal-sitter would never tell her the story: not willingly that was.

“Now, we should head over there now before we change our minds now okay Twilight?” Cadence said as Twilight nodded excitedly and smiled with the most joyous smile that she had ever made. “Hey, Shining Armor! I’m taking Twilight out to do a project, your parents advise you to not burn your house down!” They waited a while for a response from Twilight’s older brother, until they finally heard in the distance:

“No promises!”

Cadence rolled her eyes and directed Twilight out of the front door and they made their way over to Copper Shield’s house.

Twilight and Cadence had been happily skipping along their way until they approached a generic looking old-style house at the end of the street. “That’s where Copper Shield lives: nopony’s ever been inside or even really near it for a while, I mean, even the mailmare dreads to go near the place. And most other cityfolk give the place a wide berth for the simple reason that it’s not appealing to the eye and is pretty ominous looking when it comes down to it…” Cadence said as the little Twilight Sparkle was already skipping her way up to the house.

Twilight knocked on the door and was met with a loud and irritated groan from inside: a bellow almost, like the sounds an animal would make when met with a sudden pain. Moments later the latch to the door unlocked and the door swung open revealing the head of the stallion: he had bags under his eyes, he was growing a beard that was rough, almost a survivalist type of beard, and he eyes were red from exhaustion as if he’d been doing something that tired him out. The young Twilight looked up at the large figure standing above her, his face slightly intimidated the little filly as she gulped down attempting to rid herself of the fright that she was feeling then.

The stallion looked un-amused at the little filly, his eyes almost striking fear into anypony that looked directly into them. Eventually, Copper started to speak: “Okay kid, I don’t know who the hay you are, but just tell me what you want so I can get you out of my mane already…”

Twilight nodded hesitantly and held out a piece of parchment and started explaining to him why she was there: “Well sir, you see,” she hesitated in the sight of this large, hardened stallion towering above her casting a shadow over her head, but she gulped silently and continued on. “I’m here writing a paper on a real-life hero, and I overheard your name in a conversation amongst two fillies from my class and I thought I’d conduct my report on you because you know, being an ex-royal guard and all.” Twilight finished as Copper Shield looked at her and sighed.

“Kid,” he started, “there’s a reason that ponies around here give me a wide berth: I’m not, as you would say, the nicest stallion in Canterlot and it seems that everypony knows me for my flaws than my strengths. So I’ve been set up in everypony’s mind as a cruel stallion that doesn’t care for anything but my own personal gain: now that is.” His voice was rough as he kept talking; the gruff sound of his voice only intrigued the curious little Twilight more than ever before.

“I’m sure that you’ve had a ton of fun adventures in your time with the guards, you must’ve done a lot with them!” Twilight yelled excitedly levitating a quill behind her ear.

“Yes, I have done quite a bit in my time with them, but I’m not sure it’d be anything that you’d want to really hear about though. It’s a pretty boring story.” Copper Shield replied as Twilight still kept the same eccentric smile that she’d worn the entire time.

“I’d love to hear it anyways, it sounds really interesting and I’d like to learn about what you’ve done working under the princess’ orders!” Twilight said almost unable to hold her excitement any longer, eager to hear this stallion’s story and obviously not sensing the hint of sarcasm that the stallion had shown to her.

Copper Shield sighed heavily looking at the innocent little filly, not knowing that there wasn’t any way he was getting her from bothering him. “Fine, fine: come on in then, and just,” he started, “mind where you walk, I haven’t cleaned up too much in a while.” Twilight entered behind him and saw a regal design just inside the doorway: his house was a light brown tone with small marble pillars and pictures of him and a mare with two teenage fillies and a colt with a funny square hat on.

“Who are they?” Twilight asked, unable to stop herself from asking the question.

Copper Shield looked back to the wall where Twilight was pointing to and then looked back with a sort of smirk that seemed to be his attempt at a smile. “That’s my family.” He stated, the smile getting slightly bigger before finally retorting back into a frown.

“Well…” Twilight began, “why don’t they live here with you?” Twilight asked innocently.

Copper Shield walked away from the picture and sighed. “They grew up, that’s why…” he said in the same low, gruff voice he had when Twilight had first approached him at the door. “I suppose I should’ve seen it all coming though, I raised them right and they have the right to go out and explore their possibilities in their lives. My wife though…” he said struggling upon the thought of his wife, “my wife is just no longer with me: rest her soul.”

Twilight didn’t quite understand what he meant by that, but she sensed that it was something that he didn’t really want to talk to her about, so she moved on with conducting for her paper. “So, how did you get into the guard anyways?” Twilight asked as Copper looked up at her, snapped from his memories by the violet little filly’s voice.

“Well it’s a boring story really. I was a troubled colt and my parents thought that it would help my troubled life if I went into something that was worth all of my time and efforts. So they sent me into the Guard Reserves when I finally turned seventeen and graduated from school, and I resented them at first for it… but after a while I started to build myself a reputation for the most hard-working and loyal guard that was ever put into the reserves. Celestia herself came to congratulate me on several occasions and that honestly made all of the other guards jealous like you wouldn’t even believe.” Copper Shield chuckled at the memories as Twilight kept writing down every word he said, utterly enthralled with his story. “After a while Celestia recruited me into the real guard barracks inside of Canterlot limits and it was the happiest moment of my life when I received that letter to go to the guards. So the next day, I set out giddy as a schoolfilly to my new position as a Private First Class in formal rank.”

Twilight kept writing down bits and pieces of the stallion’s story and she couldn’t help but be interested in what he was saying: she truly found the stallion to have had quite the interesting life. “So all of this happened by the time you were twenty?” Twilight asked.

Copper Shield just nodded and started to continue his story now gaining a small smile on his face. “Yeah and I built up and up until finally one day I received the honor of becoming a Lieutenant working under the Captain. I can’t say he was the nicest pony around really, but he did a great job protecting Canterlot and the princesses so I honestly have not a single complaint against the guy. Then came the day where there was a small conflict outside of a small place in the north called Stalliongrad. Now, Equestria had absolutely no grudge against the place, but all of that changed when we started hearing of some rogues causing trouble in the area and worstly, amongst guards visiting while on their leave. So naturally we were deployed out there to assess the situation, and I was asked to lead the entire operation: I accepted without a moment’s hesitation. I was so excited to deploy that I couldn’t even sleep the night before, I just sat awake trying everything to put me to sleep, to no prevail but still. And on the train ride to Stalliongrad I was so restless I just kept pacing around the cabins: all the other guards thought I’d lost my mind or nerve and was having some second thoughts, but on the contrary, I was more excited to get some action other than those training exercises that I couldn’t take my mind off it for a moment’s time.

“I finally did fall asleep on the train in one of the back sleeper cabins and was awoken the moment that we had reached our destination. So I got up feeling worse than I’d ever felt approaching the day with a sudden gloom that eventually faded back into my excitement. Everypony could tell there was tension with how many ponies avoided a certain area of the town square, so we went to that area to investigate why they were so scared of the area: bad decision. There was a group of tangos that ambushed us as soon as we came around the bend of the street, and they were really tough stallions, they certainly had some heart and muscle to back behind their fighting.”

Twilight looked at him trying to understand what he meant by ‘tango’ and after struggling to find the meaning from the context in which he said it, but could find no way to distinguish the meaning of that word, even remotely. “Excuse me, Mr. Shield?” she asked in a small innocent tone.

Copper Shield looked back down to her with her quill being levitated by her magic, a faint violet over the quill holding it in place in the air. “Yeah: what?” he said in the gruff voice, now that he forced upon to keep up the act that he’d set up for himself.

“What does ‘tango’ mean?” Twilight asked lowering the quill a little bit and dipping it in a spot of ink.

Copper Shield smiled and chuckled heartily at the small filly’s question. “Well, that’s the term that we in the guards used instead of ‘enemy’.” He replied.

“What’s an enemy?”

“An enemy is a pony that doesn’t really like you too much, so they try to hurt you sometimes and give you away to other ponies that don’t have the best intentions for you either.”

“Oh…” Twilight replied writing down the meaning of ‘tangos’ on another sheet of parchment she’d been using to take notes from the story that she’d been listening to for the past two hours now. “Continue with your story then: sorry to interrupt.”

Copper Shield nodded. “Not a problem, you remind me of my little filly way back when, but that’s not what you want to hear now is it?” Copper Shield cleared his throat loudly and shook his head a little bit before finally continuing on with his story. “Well, they were waiting in that alleyway knowing that we’d notice the locals steering clear of that area and decided they’d set up an ambush on us. They came at us with weapons that were outlawed here in Equestria, and they started to slice at us like madstallions. After some time, we were able to fight two of them off before the rest turned flank and ran the other direction yelling some threats at us in Ponsian: not that any of us could understand it really, but whatever he said sounded serious, so we stayed on alert for anything suspicious.

“Now there were a lot of suspicious things that went on in this town, place the locals wouldn’t go, ponies whom loitered around any place that a guard was stationed and whatnot. So we decided that we’d watch closely the ponies that were loitering around our stations: so we then discovered these ponies all had one thing in common, they all had two mysterious playing cards on them at all times. A King and Queen of Hearts were the two cards that they were carrying with them, and they absolutely baffled all of the ponies that we had on us. So we went around and asked the ponies in the area if they knew anything about the significance of those two playing cards: nopony seemed to want to answer our questions, so we had to figure out a lot more than we would’ve hoped. All that this was doing was digging our graves deeper and deeper the more we asked around for answers that obviously nopony wanted to have us hear.

“‘A wise pony once said, ‘Ignorance shows even in the darkest and most desperate of times, exploit a pony’s natural defense for themselves and you can get any information that you could ever require from them.’ Nopony really understands what this quote meant, but it was inscribed to every piece of Stalliongrad documents. And another quote is, ‘To understand truly, you must have been in the certain circumstance that is on hoof to familiarize yourself with the inner workings of the clockwork inside.’ This quote was the one written on all documents pertaining to a group of Stallies that were referred to as all things but good ponies. They were called the Broken Hearts and were a notorious group, or more-so gang that would cause issues in the area, take money from small business ponies, and worst of all would kill anypony that would step in their path. Now, since you’re young, I don’t think I’ll say all the parts about all the things that they would do to the other ponies: what I will say though, is that whenever these acts were committed, they would leave a single ripped playing card for each pony, Queen for mares, Kings for colts, thus why they were dubbed the ‘Broken Hearts’.

“After finding out a little more about the gang itself, we went in some of the penitentiaries to find some old members of the gang that were affiliated with some of the ‘activities’ that they were so notorious for. Soon we found ourselves in the middle of not only a problem for us, but a problem for all of Equestria, and we knew this after hearing what the jailed Heart had to say about all the plans that the boss had started making. Most of what this stallion told us was that the boss was planning a huge revolt against the Stalliongrad governing bodies and then they were hellbent on taking over Equestria as well, and that served to be a pretty big issue given the seriousness and severity of such a threat and move towards Equestria. Back then, we had a lot less laws that kept us from getting information from ponies anyway that we possibly could, so we got information out of one of the more active members by kidnapping and interrogating him. After he wouldn’t talk, we started to get harder on him, and all of our patience for the stallion was wearing about as thin as old rags, so we turned to the only other way of getting the information out of him that we knew: torture.

“I’m not proud of all of that, those horrible things that we did to that poor stallion. But we didn’t have any other choice at that point in time, so we couldn’t just turn back and release him back to his band of misfits. The only other thing we could thing to do with him is lock him somewhere where nopony would ever think to look for him, and that’s just what we did: locked him down in an old abandoned underground shelter left over from when the whole entire place was paranoid of the nuclear leaks that’d started happening long before. After a while though, the group caught on to us and what we knew, and then knew why their ‘colleague’ had gone missing and they started to hunt us down one by one and dragged us all away. I was the last to be caught by them, but still, they did eventually catch me and lock me in the most horrible place I could’ve ever imagined: the walls were peeling and ridden with mold, the water pooled on the ground was also riddled with pieces of concrete and pieces of the cracking beams that were overhead.

“It was a horrible fate, but the worst part of all of that is: we did the exact same thing to one of their ponies, and this was their way of telling us that this is what we deserved for messing with them. Eventually I started getting crafty with the resources that were strewn around carelessly to where the entire room looked like a crazy pony had rampaged through it: I think I even saw a mark where a pony had, in one point of time, tried to take a bite out of the wall. Definitely striking fear into my heart not knowing when I’d ever get out, if I ever would get out. It took me three years to make the tools needed, and after that, all I needed to do: was wait for my chance.

“Finally, that chance came in the form of a Heart opening my cell for my weekly supply of water and food: I was nowhere to have been found by the naked eye, no, I stashed myself underneath the bed with the long but thin blanket that they gave me. Big mistake on their part, guess they didn’t quite understand not to have any type of concealing substances in the cells for a crafty pony can easily hide and fool their captors. The stallion came near to me and I grabbed his forehoof and yanked it with all my might and he came crashing hard down to the ground and I even heard the sound of when he hit, and it was the most sickening sound that I’d ever had the misfortune to have witnessed, but I was determined to get out of that cell no matter what. So I made my way silently out into the hall only to see more of the Hearts standing at the top of the stairs that lead up into what I believed at the time was the main atrium of the passageways of the prison in which we were being held in. I noticed that the pony that came into my room looked like me in some ways and that he was wearing clothing that covered his entire body and a mask that concealed the features of his face: I jumped on the opportunity to get out of there with the least amount of suspicion possible, but when I removed the stallion’s mask, I cringed at the sight. It was one of my very best guards, and he had the signature call of the Broken Hearts: the two playing cards.

“I didn’t want to believe it, not in the slightest, but I unfortunately had to strip him of his clothing and objects: all he had was some Stalliongrad money and the jailer’s set of keys. I put the unconscious body in the bed and covered him up, hoping that nopony would come in and discover that the pony lying there wasn’t me. I exited the room and locked the door behind me, and continued on trying not to arouse their suspicions, until they called me over to them.

“‘You took an awfully long time down there: anything happen with that pony?’ one of them asked, didn’t help he was one of the biggest and ugliest stallions I’d ever laid my eyes on: cannot unsee… I replied, but the reply was muffled on account of the mask that I was wearing, but they nodded and told me to check on all the other captures that were down in the cell right next to the on that I was being held in: I said that I would and they walked away content that I could take care of all of this myself. The fact that they were none-the-wiser about all of it was a perk of getting the chance to swipe the clothes off the stallion that went into my cell. When I went down into that chamber all of them looked at me with a blank and cold stare, and when I tried to talk to them their faces turned more towards confusion than anger.

“That’s when I decided to take the mask off and they all sighed with relief when they knew that I was alive, and they all asked me where I’d been, but I didn’t want to answer them at that moment: there was more important things to worry about just them; escaping. So I put the mask back on and gathered all of the stallions together and we rushed out of that cell and straight through four Hearts until the boss finally made his appearance out to us: big stallion that wore a large coat that didn’t exactly fit him and puffed out with every chilling breath that he made. He didn’t say anything, all he did was smirk and get all of his guards on us while he sat back and watch his mindless followers do all the work for him: after the guards came after us we went into combat instinct mode and we used the guerilla warfare tactics that we’d learned for getting out of situations in large open areas by hiding and then attacking when they were least expecting us. It was not exactly the tactic that was required for such a situation, but they didn’t seem to be able to follow all of our coordinated motions and tactics and they all fell down before us, one-by-one.

“The boss was nowhere to be found anymore, he skipped out of the place whilst all of the fighting distracted anypony else from tailing him: we never found him as long as the two more weeks that we stayed before we finally got picked back up to head back to the barracks in Canterlot. But over the three years I was in Stalliongrad, my demeanor changed and I wasn’t quite the stallion that I went in as. I was bitter and distant from everypony else now: even close friends that I’d come to know in the guard. Nothing in the world seemed to appeal to me any longer so the guys at the barracks suggested that I probably go to the clinic: there, my worst fears were made a reality. They diagnosed me with a stress condition called ‘PTSD’ or better known as ‘Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder’, and after that diagnosis my life was pretty much classified as over: every little stressful thing that came my way would piss me off so much that I could just never let it go. Then, one-by-one, all of the other guards grew tired of me and they reported me up to the highest in command: Princess Celestia herself. And after hearing the things that I’d gone through she promoted me up to the guards in charge of protecting Celestia herself up in the castle.

“I was honored to be granted with such, but my demeanor stayed the same until one day I met a wonderful mare: one that I learned was a personal maid to Celestia, though she always told me that Celestia helped her clean the quarters with a smile on her face doing so. I eventually learned that her name was Soft Wash, and every day after our shifts we would go out and do something together: those were some of the happiest years of my life until we finally got married and had our first foal, a little colt we named Iron Shield: he’s the one in the graduation cap beside his mother in the picture behind me.” Copper Shield looked back at the picture and smiled with content and instead of letting out a heavy sigh, he let out a happy sigh that lifted all of his pain from his life in the telling of his life’s story to a pony interested in it.

“Well eventually,” Copper continued, “soon enough I was one of the princess’ most trusted of guards: and everypony in the castle loved me. Hay, Princess Celestia even funded for my wedding, thought Soft Wash didn’t want her to, she insisted that we have her fund the wedding: so we let her. And eventually my wife had twin foals, our two sweet little fillies, and those were truly the happiest moments of my life. When my colt graduated from a university I couldn’t have been happier for him, neither could my wife whom had, unfortunately, been diagnosed with cancer the month before and started chemotherapy the week after the picture was taken. After a long and grueling battle of two years with the disease, she finally passed away and those, I have to admit, were some of the saddest of times that I’d ever had to push through. The only thing that kept me from losing my mind were my two little beautiful fillies.

“But now they’ve all already flown the nest, and I just recently retired from my position as Lieutenant of the guard and resumed living in the house of my late wife, the place where we raised all of our foals until they finally left the house. They said they’d come to visit me, but then again, they never really meant a lot of the things they said anyways.

“Anyways, I believe that concludes my story until the further years to come.” Copper Shield finished with a smile as the young Twilight Sparkle concluded her notes. Twilight then looked at the clock and saw that she’d been listening to this stallion’s story for nearly seven and three-quarters of an hour.

Twilight gasped as she looked at the clock and gave a face that indicated that she took longer than she had expected to. “I’m sorry I’ve got to leave now, but your story was actually pretty interesting, and I thank you for the chance that you gave me to hear it!” Twilight said as Copper nodded and smiled as the little violet unicorn dashed out of the door and ran into her foal-sitter Cadence standing outside tapping her hoof.

“So, how much did you learn for your report, and I truly don’t think your parents are going to be too thrilled about this: neither will my aunt.” Cadence said looking back down to Twilight.

Twilight giggled, “You’ll just have to read my report!” Twilight said as she giggled and started to trot off giddily into the horizon with Cadence at her side.