Crackshot lie upon his back in the wet mud, staring up at the un-natural gray sky. His ears rang like a cathedral, pain shot across his body. Pain was good, it meant he was alive. Regaining his senses Crackshot looked frantically about him. As uniformed stallions charged full steam towards impossible victory, and certain death. Trembling he rose to his hooves, pulled his rifle from the mud, and levitated it steady in front of him. Without another moment's delay he joined the charge, bayonet in the lead. With every hoof-step one of his comrades fell at all sides, spraying Crackshot with fine-misted blood. Mortars rang out, machineguns chatted, and rifles reported. Crackshot heard no whistles, no agony, and no rifles. All but running to the next trench was trivial and pointless. His goal roughly 25 yards ahead of him, the unicorn increased pace and gave a blood curdling battlecry before jumping, plunging his blade into the Germane soldier, and continuing his assault on the trench. Before the next opponent could react a .308 bullet ripped through his throat, splashing red across the earthen trench walls. A bullet snapped just off the rim of Crackshots helmet from behind. Without so much as turning to face his foe, Crackshot fired six shots blindly with his side-arm behind him, striking the gray coat wearing soldier three times in the chest.
Preparing for the inevitable counter offensive by the enemy to retake the trench, he turned to face charging germane soldiers on the field between trenches. After forcefully cycling another round into his rifle, Crackshot took aim. BANG and a stallion dropped, the cycling of a bolt and BANG the next bullet shattered the lense of a gas mask, entered the cranial cavity of a stallion, and removed the better half of his head. Gray matter left in its wake, the bullet continued on in fragments ripping the hide off of another soldiers forehoof. They were close now, too close to cycle another cartridge, this meant hoof to hoof combat. The first stallion to enter the trench was greeted by ten inches of sharp steel, the next with the steel butt-plate of Crackshots rifle, and was re-introduced to it three or four times after. A Germane soldier sprung forward to impale Crackshot on his bayonet, only to be bucked hard in the ribs by Big Macintosh. Rear hooves struck, bones broke. Big Mac's shotgun spoke fire into the kneecaps of another foe, who he finished with a kick to the skull.
Braeburn's machine gun crew arrived and took up defensive positions. Fire was exchanged across the field for two minutes more before the day went silent. It was a deathly and oppressive silence that this field, which had once been fertile farmland, was all too accustomed to. After a while small fires were struck up, for warmth and to cook what food was available in small tin potts. Little conversation was held around the dinner fire. The only topic for discussion was death, a weary subject to weary souls. Besides, there was no need to talk about death. It would only be hours before it was surrounding them again. Crackshot stared intensely at the fire, wondering if anyone back home knew what was happening here. Further he wondered if any of his old colleagues, friends, or even his family could accept him if they knew all he had done. At the war's start he had written them all frequently, but now even if he wanted to tell them what was happening he couldn't. The toxic cloud layer that hung above them did not permit messenger pegasi to travel high enough to not get cut down by machine guns.
His meal was eaten in sullen peace, flavorless as it was, his dinner brought him a sense of comfort. A rare luxury on the battlefield. He looked to Mac and said the only word anyone on the battlefield had the strenght to speak "Eeyup". Big Mac responded with the same, and the gesture spread across the trench in a flurry of "Eeyup"s. After eating, rifles were cleaned, and sometimes jerry-rigged to work. Ammunition was gathered from the corpses of the fallen, cleaned of blood, and distributed. Medic Redheart came to give care to any injuries. She never seemed phased by the death around her, which simultaneously comforted and scared Crackshot. She spoke kindly
"How about you CS? Any boo boos this time?"
"Eeyup" he pointed to a long cut up his foreleg that he'd acquired in the blast that had knocked him down.
"Wow, looks like there' s still some shrapnel in there. I'm going to have to dig that out and sew a few suititures in alright?" He didn't complain, having metal jutting out of your bits and pieces was never good. With surgical precision Redheart went to work. She was one of the few mares willing to brave war, theres a reason they called it no mares land. Within thirty minutes she was finished, the wound sealed and sterilized.
"sorry, but theres not enough morphine. A painkiller spell will have to do" a soft pink glow engulfed the stallion's foreleg and immediately the brunt of the pain was soothed. Redheart moved to give care to Mac's splintered hoof, Braeburn's burns from carrying the overheated machine gun, and a multitude of other wounds. Barbed wire was strung in the cover of night to protect from another charge, the bodies of the fallen were moved from the trenches to save from disease (that lesson had been learned the hard way), and supplies were further scavenged. A few times brief skirmishes broke out, but no one wanted to fight until morning on either side. Crackshot filled his canteen with water boiled to purify, and restocked with five new stripper clips of .308 and twenty or so loose pistol cartridges. Knowing the sun would come to filter gray light across the muddy battlefield soon, crackshot lifted his shelter half over his body and face to fall asleep leaned against the wet trench wall. He dreamt of home, of hot meals, of warm beds, of loving faces. He dreamt of his family library, which he'd spent so much time in. All of this would come to a crashing end when he awoke.
There was always a time of fear. A fear that gave the the slightest jolt to one's body, and thrust the hardest war horse from the warm ignorance of sleep into the harsh reality that gave no mercy to the awakening senses. Crackshot, with weary eyes looked upon his comrades still enjoying what little rest they could get. Frost coated and stiffened their filthy shelter halves draped over their sleeping forms. As the initial shock faded a list of concerns began to form in his mind: the machine gun crews would need to thaw their water cans, fires were going to reveal troop positions, frostbite would need tended, food was going to be frozen solid, and hooves would be cold. As if coaxed by Crackshot's concerns, the OD green pile that was Braeburn and Big Macintosh came the first spoken words of the day. "Buck my hooves are cold"
"Then how 'bout ya use 'em ta go buck yourself."
"Mac, that don't make no sense at all."
"Doesn't have ta make sense. Its cold and ya woke me up."
"Well it aint mah fault no one else'll bunk with me. Speaking of that, why's no one else willing to bunk with me?"
"Because you're a little light in the loafers, if I may interject." Crackshot's words brought a smile to his own face.
"What the hell 'er ya callin me?"
"He's sayin' yer a fruit bowl"
" A what?"
" A coltcuddler Braeburn, I'm calling you a coltcuddler." Braeburn came tearing out of his fortress of green canvas clearly embarrassed, the small amount of warmth he had in him rushing straight for his face. He rushed and fumbled to find words to retort:
"W-well if ah, was, was ah coltcuddler-which I ain't- why would it even matter, ya know, if were all at war together an' all?"
"Cause no one wants ya huddled up to 'em." Mac said joining in on the fun.
"Besides, don't you farm boys like to keep it in the family?" Big Mac shifted slightly so that half of his face could be seen clearly agitated by Crackshot's comment.
"If it weren't so cold ah'd come over there ahn' beat you--"
"Just like daddy back on the farm right?"
"Buck you Crackshot," Mac said with a light chuckle "maybe ya should try yer social skills with the dogger's 'cross the way huh?" Crackshot laughed in kind,
"Yeah, Maybe. Happy Hearth's Warming by the way." After some effort dealing with wet materials, cook fires again crackled along the trenches. Work was under way to get frozen machineguns to function. Several water cones had either buckled or cracked due to the freeze, no water cone meant no sustained fire. Crackshot took a small trot down the trench to gauge the state of affairs, of course it was poor. Judging by what could be presumed as swearing in a foreign language in the enemy trench just fifty yards away. Trotting along side him (or as close to alongside as possible in a narrow trench) was Paramount, a young dark blue pegasus. He spoke with a small amount of cheer with a constant line of questions for CS.
"So what do you think about the freeze?"
"It's got its ups and downs."
"Like what?"
"Well, gear malfunctions in sub-freezing temperatures, and its far from comfortable, but Jerry Horse across the way isn't going to attack."
"Wait, how do you know they won't attack?"
"If we don't want to fight in the cold the day after that shit storm yesterday, neither do they."
"Oh, I guess that makes sense. So, what do you think about yesterday?"
"What do you think I think about it? We lost colts, we killed, and we rolled the bodies over the top of the trench like sand bags. Like I said, it was a shit storm."
"Okay, well then how about the sky?"
"What about the sky? Its gray, and its cold, just like everything else out here."
"Well yeah, but don't you wish it was blue?"
"No."
"Why not?"
"Because I don't." aggression was now becoming more noticeable in Crackshot's voice.
"Why not?"
"You want to know why?"
"Well ye--"
"Because the sky is blue at home."
"So?"
"SO, we aren't home, were at war. If the sky was blue here, It would be more like home. When I see blue skies again I don't want to think about what I did here. Can we stop with the questions for a bit now?"
"Oh... I guess that makes sense. I was just thinking about my sister." CS paused for a moment to think over what Paramount was saying.
How was any of that in any way about that was in any way about his sister? As Paramount began to explain Crackshot began to walk again.
"Derpy always loves it when its all sunny and the sky is blue. When I was still a colt, sometimes on weekends my parents would give us a few bits to go to Sugarcube Corner to get muffins for the whole family. Those were Derpy's favorite days."
What kind of parent names their filly Derpy? What kind of pony is named Derpy?
"Those were good times. I used to write her and my family almost every day. Now even if I could get a letter to them I wouldn't know what to say about stuff like yesterday. To be honest I don't want to tell anyone, I'm afraid of what they might think of me. I'm not like you."
"What do you mean by 'not like me'?"
"Well, you know. Everyone kinda looks to you. You're always the first one over the ledge in a charge, you give good advice, you take care of us, I guess you're kinda like a father."
What the hell does that even mean?
"Paramount, you know we're almost the same age, right?"
After their rounds the two returned to their cook fire, tended by Big Macintosh, for breakfast. Forks, spoons, and knives scraped and clanked against tin mess kits. As he ate Crackshot looked over to Braeburn, who was staring at the sky over the Germane trench.
"Something caught you eye up there? Maybe a cute pegasus stallion?"
"Shut up Crackshot, ah was lookin' for smoke. But there ain't any."
Then maybe you should stop looking. "So?"
"Well ah was thinkin'--"
"That's a stetch." His red cousin cut in with a smirk.
"Hey, you shut up too Mac. Ah was thinkin' that means they ain't got no food to cook. And, I was thinkin' since you speak a little Germane you could ask em' CS. Ah mean, we got tons of apples."
"Do you seriously want me to just call out loudly in Germane, in the middle of meal time, and expect no one to try to shoot me or open fire on them and start a fight? Besides my Germane sucks."
"Everyone pass the word Crackshots gonna try ahn' talk with em'." Whispers spread up and down the trench and then a complete silence weighed down on the battlefield. "That's yer cue." As every stallion in the trench looked expectantly at Crackshot he heard enemy rifles being prepared across the way. Silence like this usually only came before a charge. There was no turning back now.
"Guten Morgen , wie geht es Ihnen heute?" (Good morning, how are you today?) There was confused murmuring in the Germane trench before a lone speaker responded.
"Kälte, und verwirrt." (Cold, and confused)
"Mein Freund will wissen, ob Sie hungrig sind." (My friend wants to know if you are hungry)
"Warum Sie wissen wollen?" (why do you want to know?)
"wir haben viele Äpfel, zu viele wirklich . Die Äpfel werden verderben , wenn wir nicht etwas mit ihnen zu tun . Wenn Sie hungrig sind, möchten wir ihnen zu teilen." (We have many apples too many really . The apples are spoiling , if we do not have anything to do with them. If you are hungry, we want to share them .)
"Ist dies nicht ein Trick , stehen über Ihre Graben . Wenn Sie das tun wir alle stehen, um Sie zu begrüßen wie eine Faustencorn geschickt Bruder." (If this is not a trick , stand over your trench . If you do that , we all stand to greet you like a Fausticorn sent brother.)
"Spread word along the line that I'm going up" Crackshot took hoofhold of the trench's ledge pulling himself over, unarmed. Silence bore down on him like the weight of the world. He thought for a moment this 'sign of faith' was a trick. Crackshot braced for a volley of death and lead to strike him down, but it never came. He looked across the field, as the gray slightly loosened its tight grip on no mares land, the opposing line rose from their entrenchment like corpses from a dim grave returning to the world of the living. A muddy Germane soldier stood before Crackshot and spoke in a familiar voice and a strong accent,
"Happy Hearth Warming Eve."
"glücklich Feuer Erwärmung Vorabend"
