Call of Cutie: Blank Ops
Chapter: Prologue
By Ryden and Xephfyre
“A lie is a lie. Just because they write it down and call it history doesn’t make it the truth. We live in a world where seeing is not believing, where only a few know what really happened. We live in a world where everything you know is wrong.”
~ Captain Twilight Sparkle, addressing newly-recruited Blank Ops pony agents in the Equestrian military
It is a time of great political strife. Equestria, in the midst of recovering from a great world war, has been thrown into yet another conflict; a Cold War sprung between the two greatest nations of the world: The United States of Equestria, and the United Equestrian Socialist Republic.
In the five years following her prophesized release and subsequent redemption at the hands of the new wielders of the Elements of Harmony, Princess Luna had returned to her rightful place as Equestria’s co-ruler alongside her estranged sister, Princess Celestia.
In the short span of those five years, the twin monarchs issued a decree: to unify the lands of Equestria under a constitutionalist monarchy. They would become a coalition of regions and states rallied together under a single banner – the flag of the U.S.E., the United States of Equestria.
For a time, it was good; the unification campaign was embraced in every corner of Equestria where the Princesses lay hoof. Many ponies found themselves enjoying monumental advances in areas like economics, housing, science, medicine and even government policy.
Truly, it was a time where Pony society seemed to have reached a plateau. Many scholars at the Canterlot University for Magical Arts would even assert that Equestria was on the brink of entering a Golden Age of peace and prosperity ponykind had not experienced in untold millennia… but it was not meant to last.
The Diamond Dogs, envious and jealous of the ponies’ progress and prosperity, began to launch organized raids on newly-claimed pony territories. At first, they started out small, stealing gems and other precious materials crucial to the pony economies, before eventually moving on to driving out pony settlers and annexing the newly vacant territories as their own. Yet such raids, daring as they were, were still scattered and disorganized. Princess Celestia, looking over the situation once, decided that a simple reinforcement of the Equestrian Guard and a doubling of patrols and postings was the most effective solution.
Princess Luna, on the other hand, advocated a more ruthless approach. She requested that her sister allow her to supervise the training of a new division of Equestrian soldierponies – hunter-killers specially trained to both hunt and put down the Diamond Dogs for good, soldiers whose sole purpose were to make examples of those who would defy Equestrian rule. They would enjoy complete and absolute liberty to do whatever it took to secure the freedom and prosperity of all ponykind.
While Celestia recognized that her sister’s heart was in the right place, she deemed Luna’s methods too brutal, and advocated the non-violent approach of defending her kingdom by reinforcing the guard, choosing to adopting a passive stance against the Diamond Dog threat.
Regretfully, it would be one of the rare times where the celebrated monarch’s legendary vision would fall short.
Contrary to Celestia’s predictions, the Diamond Dog raids and annexures began to grow in size, aggression, and coordination, overwhelming even the reinforced guard posts and patrols that she had commissioned. Within a month, at least a quarter of the newly claimed pony states had been annexed and taken over by the Diamond Dogs. Celestia’s cabinet of elected officials predicted that within the next half a year, the entirety of the U.S.E. would be under Diamond Dog control if things were to continue unchecked.
Forced to acknowledge the severity of the situation, Princess Celestia finally approved of her sister’s request to train her new hunter-killer division of the Equestrian Guard. Officially tasking her before the High Court of Canterlot with the responsibility of reclaiming the lost pony territories from the clutches of the Diamond Dog regime, every elected candidate expressed their complete and unwavering support for the Lunar Princess and her new military division.
The Moon Princess’s joy at having her request approved was only overshadowed by the fervor with which she set upon her task. Quickly handpicking several ponies from the Royal Guard, Luna formed an elite team of guardsmen, fliers and specialists she christened as the “frontrunners.” In times of strife, these elite ponies would answer directly to Princess Luna herself, with no other binding authority or covenant save the orders of their Princess, effectively enjoying complete wartime immunity to court-marshal, trial by law, military procedure, and doctrine.
With the linchpins in place, Luna turned to the far more daunting task of recruiting numbers at large. Calls for action were sent out to every corner of the Equestrian Guard; many heeding the summons for action against the incursions on pony lands.
From pegasi to unicorns, from soldiers to scholars, each and every candidate deemed capable of joining the newest division of the Equestrian Guard was accepted in order to construct what Luna hoped would be the most efficient fighting force in all of Equestrian history- the Equestrian 1st Regiment.
The 1st Regiment, as befitting their name, were the very first to strike back upon the annexed Diamond Dog territories. The Diamond Dogs, not expecting such a vicious counterattack, were rapidly forced out of Equestrian lands. Under Luna’s visionary leadership, the 1st Regiment had soon reclaimed all of the lost pony territories back underneath the U.S.E.’s banner.
Luna, having personally led the 1st Regiment in its reclamatory crusade against the Diamond Dogs, was personally congratulated by Celestia in the Canterlot High Court, and presented with the Medal of Honor for great valor and skill in her battle against the invaders. While the Equestrian public was presented with a very polished and flawless image, the business being dealt underneath the table was far dirtier than anypony could have ever known.
Celestia had known of Luna’s desire to do more than just take back their lost territories from the Diamond Dogs – the Moon Princess had wanted to advance into Diamond Dog territory itself in retaliation for their encroachment upon pony lands.
Her younger sister’s constant requests and demands for authorization to attack known Diamond Dog lands in recompense for their earlier aggression were met with a staunch refusal – Celestia knew that to attack Diamond Dog territories would be to incite their full wrath, something Luna did not have the foresight to recognize. Instead, Celestia once more adopted a non-violent approach, implementing an isolationist policy to cordon off their lands from hostile encroachment.
Luna, while incensed at what she perceived was her sister’s complete and utter pacifism, knew that the far better course was to bide her time and wait.
She knew that Celestia still controlled the majority of the armed forces even over a millennium, and that wasn’t going to change anytime soon. Even if she had the political influence of her right to rule, Celestia had cordoned off control of the Equestrian Guard to all but herself in what even Luna had to admit, was a “masterful” display of political maneuverability with numerous acts, amendments and constitutional rights dogging the Lunar Princess at every single turn.
Yet despite the situation, Luna could see there was a “silver lining” of sorts that might just prove the answer to all her political odds and ends. By Celestia’s own decree, her division was given the authority to supersede military procedure if a wartime crisis so held.
It was easy enough to convince the Canterlot High Court that the Diamond Dogs still presented an outlying threat, and far easier to convince her sister in front of said court that a passive show of military might by bolstering her division would act as enough of a deterrent to any future expeditionary incursions by the Diamond Dogs.
Luna’s next logical step was to see to a massive recruitment campaign. Adopting a radical slogan of “No Dogs, Only Ponies,” Luna decided it was time to take to the streets of Equestria. Flyers went up in Manehatten. Recruitment drives were sent to every corner of the U.S.E as far as Cloudsdale. Radio campaigning was so aggressive one scholar would later comment that “you could stay in Appleloosa and still hear Princess Luna’s slogan everywhere.” Literally every town was abuzz with heated talk of the Lunar Princess’s visions of an Equestria free of fear.
Within a mere two years, Luna’s division had swelled to the size of roughly fifty percent of the Equestrian Guard, and now officially referred to itself as the “United Equestrian State Armed Forces.” While composed of numerous divisions and battalions, the first regiment remained as its largest division and Princess Luna’s personal military arm, employing the latest in military science and administrative magic.
With her bargaining chips on the table, Luna decided that it was about time to take the fight to Celestia herself, with the Canterlot High Court as the battlefield. Celestia’s pacifism had gone on far enough in the Lunar Princess’s eyes, and if peace was to ever become anything close to reality in the U.S.E., then Celestia needed to realize that it was either the Diamond Dogs go, or the Ponies go, one way or the other.
Yet despite the fact that Luna, true to her name in legends as the “Princess of the Night,” had been orchestrating her political maneuvers with her true intentions shrouded in a veil as impenetrably dark as her namesake, she knew Celestia would not be blind to her machinations, and would be expecting a fight in court.
After all, not only was Celestia her sister, but her experience in governing Equestria back when Luna remained in fairytales and dusty tomes as Nightmare Moon gave her much experience in the affairs of the nation. Even worse would be contending with her massive influence and sway over the standing Canterlot High Court, comprised in no small part of officials who held her in the highest regard.
Though these odds would seem utterly depressing to some, the Lunar Princess steeled her resolve; she had come too far to fail now. All her cards were in place; all the players stood ready in their squares. The Princess of the Moon stood ready to pit ideology against ideology in the symbol of the highest authority throughout Equestria, with the stakes set at the future of all Ponykind.
Of course, it came as no surprise to Princess Celestia when her sister convened the Canterlot High Court for an emergency session. She had, after all, been watching her sister’s actions with a gut-wrenching sense of dread and anticipation.
The military expansion, her royal right to rule, the sizable respect she wielded as the heroine who drove the Diamond Dogs out of her their homes... The Sun Princess knew her sister would be pulling out all the stops at the political roundtable, and she would expect no less.
That much, Celestia could deal with; she had played the game of politics longer than most ponies had ever lived. The question that haunted the immortal monarch, however, was nowhere near as easily resolved... and far more foreboding.
Celestia knew Luna. Her sister would stop at nothing to get what she wanted. Nightmare Moon, the demise of the sun and eternal night were just a few of the mistakes Luna left in her wake. Even after untold millennia, Celestia was, beyond any shadow of a doubt, completely certain. She knew that after today, Equestria would add yet another chapter to its history books… a chapter that she would probably wish never added at all.
To call the Canterlot High Court “a raving rabble of politicians” that day would be quite the understatement. The court stood divided over isolationism and retaliation, neither side making headway with any sort of convincing argument whatsoever. Amidst the roar of representatives from all over the U.S.E, Luna’s cries for vengeance upon those who declared invasion against an innocent nation rang the loudest, echoing across the halls for all to hear.
Despite Celestia’s repeated calls to adjourn and reconvene the court when decisions could be made with reason and ration, Luna bade her sister step forth and answer for her lapse in judgement and malignant pacifism, calling before the court her failings that had claimed the lives of thousands of innocent ponies.
Faced with her sister’s heart-wrenching accusations and the deafening roar of her supporters, the Sun Princess simply asserted that Luna needed to “cool her head” before she addressed the High Court.
To Celestia’s great regret, cool heads and rational arguments did not prevail that day. Frustrated with her elder sister’s perceived reluctance to take direct action, Luna immediately took direct control of the states she had liberated from the Diamond Dogs – states who were only too eager to follow their savior.
The United States of Equestria suddenly found itself deprived of half its territories, half the guard, and saddled with a new status as neighbors to a new nation – the United Equestrian Socialist Republic, with Luna as its sole monarch. Celestia, taken aback by her sister’s sudden action, could only watch in shock as her sister’s words reached her via a magical letter: “If you are not willing to take direct action, then I will, under my own jurisdiction.”
The U.E.S.R immediately launched a major offensive into Diamond Dog territories, pushing deep into the heart of their lands within a week before they could even muster a response. Yet somehow, in what could only be called a complete tactical turnover, Diamond Dog forces everywhere responded with overwhelming force, surging up from underground in numbers and strength nopony could have ever foreseen.
Luna’s forces suddenly found themselves stranded in enemy territory, surrounded and cut off from all sides, while Diamond Dog attacks began striking at U.E.S.R. and U.S.E. lands alike. All of Equestria was engulfed in a worldwide war as Diamond Dog and Pony alike clashed in an attempt to seize permanent control of Equestria. Beset on all sides by enemies, and stranded deep within hostile territory, Luna had no choice by to grudgingly send back word to the U.S.E. leadership in a request for help.
Celestia, unable to leave her younger sister to die in the middle of Diamond Dog territory, and realizing that there was no extinguishing the powder keg that Luna had set off, immediately activated the entire Equestrian Guard. Now christened by royal decree as the “United Equestrian Armed Forces,” Celestia’s army began a massive push towards Luna’s own besieged forces. Allying themselves with reinforcements from the U.E.S.R., the Equestrian Armed Forces pushed through the siege ring that encircled Luna’s forces, and joined them to resume their advance towards the heart of the Diamond Dog leadership.
As the Equestrian World War dragged on, and the joint army between the U.E.S.R. and the U.S.E. began to push deeper and deeper into Diamond Dog territory, rumors of concentration camps, indoctrination, and unholy genetic experiments conducted on prisoner ponies taken by the Diamond Dogs began to circulate, and eventually reached pony lands, as tales of horrific atrocities committed by the Diamond Dogs began to spread like wildfire.
Within a year, the joint army had succeeded at last in penetrating the very heart of Diamond Dog lands. It was there that Luna herself found the mastermind behind Diamond Dog war machine- a particularly ruthless dog by the name of Adog Woofler. It was said amongst the U.E.S.R. that Luna herself led the raid upon the canine dictator’s underground abode, and had executed him herself with a mighty spell from her alicorn horn.
With their leadership dead, the Diamond Dogs had little choice but to raise the white flag in surrender to the pony aggressors. Those who still dared to raise arms against the clear winners of the war were quickly put down, while the survivors were rounded up and placed on trial for war crimes against ponykind as prisoners of war.
With the Diamond Dog threat vanquished for good, save for a few minute pockets of resistance every few hundred miles, Equestria looked set to finally enter a well-earned period of peace... But it was still not yet meant to be.
The war had only sown ever greater seeds of distrust between the sisters of the Sun and the Moon. Celestia, having grown distrustful of her younger sibling and her nation’s great propensity towards violence, declared a policy of zero-tolerance toward violence from “any and all potential aggressors or likewise,” in order to “secure and salvage” what remained of her land’s peace from the war.
While not named explicitly, Luna knew full well that this was a cleverly veiled threat, masked by political jargon and shrouded in smoke and mirrors. She knew full well that this was no mere safeguard; no mere “safety measure” as her sister so insisted that it was. Princess Celestia had drawn the line in the sand and etched her terms, daring Luna to check her move.
Fueled by outrage at her sister’s audacity, the Princess of the Moon christened what she called the “Lunar Program,” a 10-year program designed to expand her country’s political ties to neighboring nations and further expand an already massive military.
At the risk of showing lack of resolve, Princess Celestia answered her sister by commissioning the MARECON initiative, designed from the ground-up as a tiered danger-level warning system in order to properly analyze and determine readiness levels against corresponding U.E.S.R. threats.
Further mirroring the Lunar Program, the U.S.E. foreign policy was redacted and heavily amended to allow extensive foreign diplomatic ties with other regions, such as the formerly isolationist Zebra and Gryphon nations. Royal mandates ordering the formulation of an aggressive recruitment campaign to properly assemble a passive deterrent to U.E.S.R. military strength followed soon after.
Very soon, entire years had flown by. Little had been made with regards to diplomatic relations between the two superpowers; tension and mistrust between the two only served to create an atmosphere of veiled hate and seething mistrust.
With scientific advancements that only hurtled forward at a breakneck speed, it was merely a matter of time before a catalyst emerged that would take this conflict to the next level.
Political scientists predicted this would probably take the form of a weapon of unprecedented destructive capability that would only escalate the tension between the nations to a fever pitch. Dubbed “superweapons” by the average pony joe, what some prayed would remain as horrifying speculation soon became very bone-chillingly real.
That very same catalyst emerged in the form of a phenomenon discovered by both U.S.E. and U.E.S.R. scientists shortly after the Equestrian World War.
Dubbed the “Zero-Point Magic Effect,” it was a phenomenon that occurred when rare gems infused with opposing reactive magic created a powerful, weaponizable rejection reaction between the crystalline structure of said gems. Scientists determined the weaponized potency of this effect would not merely level entire settlements; it could doom entire towns and entire cities without leaving so much as a trace behind. Some radical physicist pegasi even theorized that given enough time, it could annihilate entire civilizations forever.
Tensions had never been higher in the wake of such an Equestria-shaking discovery. Luna and Celestia both now knew that there was no turning back the gears which they had already spun forward, driving the inner workings of the clock of time and the wheels of fate. The delicate balance of tenuous diplomatic relations and cleverly veiled threats which they had maintained for years had now become the fulcrum upon which ponykind’s future as a species so delicately hinged, complete destruction not more than a mere royal decree away.
In the midst of what scholars, generals and everyday civilians dubbed a literal “Cold War,” Twilight Sparkle, Captain of the U.S.E Armed Forces, and protege of the Sun Princess herself, stood upon the precipice of an operation that would define the face of Equestria for ages beyond.
Shrouded in secrecy; hidden by lies. These battles are the ones that were never fought, the fights that never happened. All the bullets and spells that were never fired.
These are Equestria’s Blank Ops.
---
She awoke in a daze, her head swimming with nausea and dizziness. Her breath heaved in her chest, gasping and unsteady. Her temple throbbed fiercely, signifying where she had been hit with a heavy blow to the head. Cursing silently under her breath, she attempted to move, only to discover that she was seated in some kind of chair, and her front hooves were shackled to the chair’s hoofrests by leather straps, and her hind legs were similarly restrained.
“Wake up.” A voice that she did not recognize, slightly distorted and disguised by the signature buzz of an intercom, suddenly issued from somewhere above and in front of her. Gasping for breath as another wave of nausea hit her like a brick wall, she ignored the given command, weakly turning her head around as she tried to take in her surroundings.
Her vision, extremely blurred as it was, was still enough for her to make out vague shapes - she could see the blurry outlines of a television set in front of her, displaying her frayed and dirtied countenance on the screen. To her right was yet an ever bigger set, composed of multiple screens - every single one of which bore the image of nothing but white static.
“Wake. Up!” The unknown voice commanded again, this time more forcefully, and she finally dragged her head upwards, mustering what strength she could through the drowsy haze that had settled over her world for a response.
“Where am I...?” She asked shakily, unsteady and unsure, still attempting to shake off the uncharacteristic drowsiness that continued to afflict her despite her best attempts to push past it. A glance to her left showed her the cause of her muddle-headedness: a clear, plastic bag with an IV drip line running out of it - a line that ran straight into her left foreleg. “Where’s Trixie?”
“You will answer our questions, do you understand?” Rang the disguised voice, reverberating through her skull with barely a trace of emotion in its words. Still struggling to catch her breath, she turned her head to face where the voice was originating from - what she saw was a clear glass window slightly above her, with two unidentifiable silhouetted figures standing above her, clearly defined by the bright light of the room behind them. They were ponies, that much she could tell, but other than that, she could discern nothing else about them.
“Who the hay are you?” She asked, attempting to summon at least some measure of defiance in the face of her captors - she was being held in an interrogation room, but from what she could see, there was no way of telling where she was, nor when it was.
“That’s not important,” The voice answered, almost totally disregarding her question. “What’s important is who you are. What’s your name?”
“Buck. YOU.” The two words left her mouth succinctly - if she could’ve given them the one-hoof salute, she would’ve done so if not for her restraints. A defiant rage began to flow through her body as her strength and coordination finally returned, and she redoubled her efforts at struggling against her restraints.
“Where were you born?” The voice asked again, but she had no intention of giving away any form of information at all.
“Kiss my flank!” She spat again defiantly - she wasn’t going to give them anything. She began pulling again at her restraints in an attempt to break free... and then all of a sudden there was an abrupt bzzzzzzzzzzzzzt in the background - but that sound was nothing compared to the stabbing red-hot agony that speared through her entire body, sending her muscles into violent contractions and convulsions.
“Gaaaaaaaaa-aaaaaahhh!!!!” Her screams could barely even be heard, her throat muscles strangled by her own convulsions. Her vision went red as her brain felt like it had been set on fire, and she bucked violently in the chair she had been strapped to - and then before she knew it, the pain stopped as abruptly as it had begun. Gasping for air as she struggled to regain her composure, she could barely hear the voice before her as it spoke again.
“Your name is Twilight Sparkle. You were born and raised in Canterlot. Taken in by Princess Celestia as her personal protege when you were a filly. The Cold War, 1961, you served in a E.I.A. assassination team known as Operation 40. Is that correct?”
It took her several moments to digest what she had just heard, and when she did, she was staring up at the two pony silhouettes in the window in front of her, her mind whirling.
The words “Operation 40” were reason enough for her to hold her tongue - Op 40 had been a highly classified, top secret mission that she had been tasked with by Celestia herself. Nopony knew about it save for the highest echelons of both the E.I.A. and the U.S.E. government. If these ponies here knew about what she had been involved in... The implications were-
Her train of thought was abruptly derailed by yet another electric shock, sending her body into yet another set of pain-wracked spasms, and eliciting another scream of agony from her.
“IS. THAT. CORRECT?” The voice demanded, all semblance of patience having left its tone. Huffing in short, shallow gasps as she struggled to even breathe, Twilight Sparkle could only mutter a weak affirmative.
“Yes...”
Twenty four... Ten... Sixteen...
“Where is the broadcast station?” The voice asked, again in its usual monotone. Tilting her head upwards in puzzlement, Twilight Sparkle could only weakly begin to wonder just what they were talking about.
Fifty one... Fourteen... Twenty five...
“I don’t know what you’re talking about!” The purple unicorn weakly protested, genuinely confused, and ignoring the numbers that were beginning to randomly play in her head. It was all so distracting - casting her gaze about the room, she saw that before the large set of screens to her right, there was a table full of surgery and interrogation tools: scalpel blades, tweezers, needles and syringes, clear plastic bottles filled with Celestia-knows-what.
“The numbers, Sparkle! What do they mean!?” The voice asked again, its demanding tone having returned with a vengeance. The voice’s words shocked Twilight out of her reverie - the numbers were only playing in her head, how could they possibly know- ?
Fifteen... Eighteen... Forty six... Twenty four... Nineteen...
“Where are they broadcast from?” The voice demanded again, and Twilight felt her frustration grow.
“I don’t know anything about any numbers!” Twilight cried out desperately, racking her head for answers while simultaneously trying to hide the fact that she was hearing numbers in her head. No, she wasn’t going crazy, she wasn’t insane, all those years in Ponyville couldn’t possibly have...
“What about Drago Vich? Do you remember him?” The voice asked, and Twilight’s eyes immediately shot to the television screen in front of her, where they narrowed in hate - hatred of the face that had been displayed on the screen before her, a white-coated stallion with a short cropped mane of steel gray with a sadistic, Machiavellian smile plastered across his face. His features betrayed naught save that he was a murderer of the highest order, a killer beyond any hope of redemption or cure.
Six... Fifty four... Ninety one... Eight... Seventy two...
“I...” The purple unicorn hesitated, and there was almost immediately yet another electric shock - yet this one was much shorter in duration, almost as if it were a very painful jolt to remind her of her circumstances.
“Let’s start at the beginning. Colta. 1961. The Bay of Pigs. We know you were there.” The voice said curtly, impatience plain in its tone.
Breathing heavily as the memories began to flow back, Twilight nodded numbly, unable to do anything to stop the flow...
