Chapters How the Scheisse we got there.
It was 1944, the Red Army had managed to stop our Blitzkrieg into their lands, and had begun counter-attacking. Our Fuhrer, fearing that the Hungarians would surrender to the Communist scum, sent us into Budapest to make sure that they would continue the fight. It was a routine mission, and one I thought was going to be very easy, and with very little risk of damage for us. I was in the newest result of quality German engineering, a Tiger II. This beauty wouldn't be penetrated by the strongest of anti-tank guns, and I was certain that the Hungarians didn't have much in the way of opposing us.
I was the tank commander of this tank, and my fellow patriots were Albrecht, the tank gunner, Bernhard, the loader, Dietrich, the Radio Operator, and finally Gerhard, our driver. Driving through the city wasn't exactly the best of the plans High Command made, but orders were orders. Having my head inside the turret to prevent it from being shot off by someone in the buildings or a lucky shot. Don't get me wrong, serving the fatherland was one of the greatest honors, I would like to go home alive after this though. This meant that I didn't notice as the scenery was completely changed. The only thing I noticed was the radio suddenly being silent, and Dietrich suddenly adjusting the radio, letting off a string of curse words. After fiddling with it for a while, he called for me.
"Schmidt, I think you need to see this, "he said.
"Ja, what seems to be the problem? "I replied.
"Either the radio died, or we're cut off! "
"Schiess, anything wrong with the radio? "
"Nein!"
I opened the hatch and looked out, what greeted me was extremely surprising.
Instead of the ruined city I was expecting, I saw an open plain with a clear blue sky. The tank was in the middle of the pathway, where the pathway led to, I had no idea. As I looked behind me, I saw a weird forest. It was eerie to say the least, and it looked dark. The trees trunks weren't brown, instead being a weird black color. The leaves were no better, instead of looking green, they looked quite dark, as if someone decided it would be a good idea to paint them black. Oh god, am I finally cracking under the stress? I ducked my head back into the turret to ask if Gerhard and Albrecht saw the same thing. A few ideas flashed through my mind about what happened. I'm not being affected by some strange gas the Hungarians got their hands on, right? The madness part was dispelled by Gerhard and Albrecht affirming that they also saw the same thing. Dietrich and Bernhard left their posts to look through the gunner scope and driver window.
Shouts of confusion ensued.
"How did we get here? Where the fuck is Budapest? "
"Oh Scheiss, how in the name of the Fuhrer did we get here? "
"In fact, where the bloody hell are we? "
"Enough! " — I held my hand to my head, knowing that the headache was going to come at any second — "Our first priority is to find the nearest civilization, and then identify if they are hostile. Panicking is not going to help get us back to Germany! "
They immediately stopped panicking and I was able to order Gerhard to start driving the tank down the dirt road. One of the disadvantages of this tank, was that it was horribly slow. An earlier Panzer would have been much faster, but I was not giving up the protection that this tank provided. I guess it was paranoia, but hey, it's not paranoia when you have a legitimate reason to do so!
Everyone was tensed up, prepared to spring into action if necessary, and I have to admit, I was so too. I had no idea how we got here, but I sure as hell am going to find out!
A while down the dirt path, I spotted was appears to be a village, but the style of the design was more... older. It reminded me of some older German villages back in the Fatherland. Which reminds me, we should get back so we could contribute to the war effort. A bit close on the path, was... apparently a giant apple farm. A red barn and a lot of apple trees, with buckets under each of them. A white picket fence surrounded the entire farm, and ended with an archway with a giant apple sign hanging from the arch.
The path narrowed considerably when reaching the arch, and I felt that crashing through the arch would not be a good idea to introduce ourselves, and I was unwilling to leave the relative safety of the tank in order to walk in. Not knowing what the farmers defended themselves with, ranging from pitchforks to shotguns, I wasn't in the mood to be shot.
"Keep us moving, I don't think the farmer folk would be too happy to see us. Especially if we destroy part of their property getting in." And I'd rather not die in a strange land.
As the the outskirts of the town came into view, I was able to see the town much more clearly. The roofs seemed to be made of thatching, and the walls were built out of something white. If I had to hazard a guess, it would probably be quite strong and hard. There were some anomalies from the standard design though, one being that weird little house that looked like it was made out of frosting and cake. I had no idea how it was standing if this was true,it was probably painted over materials then. Crossing over a ledge, I saw... Is that a house? Built in a tree? That's a giant fire hazard if I ever saw one, and the height of it means that it'll attract lightning. Surprised that this hasn't burst into flames yet.
As the tank rolled into the middle of the town, this is surprisingly quiet. I had a feeling that something was off. Too quiet...
"Cut the engine, no use wasting fuel here, " I said.
"Jawohl!" Gerhard said, turning off the engine in the process.
"Dietrich, Gerhard, get your STG 44s and let's scout the area out, the radio's kaput and we're not going anywhere until I have some answers. "
They agreed an were grabbing their STG 44s as I stepped out from the cupola, STG 44 in my hand and a Luger in my pocket just in case. The candy house seemed like it would be a good first place to search.
"On either side of me, and stay alert, we have no idea what the local inhabitants will do. "
They stepped up to the side of me and were looking all around, trying to find if any threats were here. My biggest fear was that someone would appear from a window somewhere and put a bullet through my head. But the fear was unfounded as we managed to get to candy house. As I passed by I saw a sign that proclaimed, "Welcome to Sugarcube Corner!" Sugarcube Corner? Wait this is in English! The local inhabitants speak English? I could be in America for all I know! As Dietrich and Gerhard followed my gaze to the sign, they immediately tensed up, fearing that we were somewhere that spoke English. Only the Allies spoke English, none of the Axis countries had it as a primary language. I slowly pushed open the pink door and it was surprisingly dark in here.
It appears that Sugarcube Corner was a pastry shop, and a pretty big one at that. There were all sorts of desserts in glass display cabinets and there was a big three-layer cake in a corner. There was a table on the right where I assumed people could sit and eat at. All the blinds were pulled down for some reason and there was no light inside. I was going to the nearest window to open the blinds when I saw a pair of eyes look at me.Oh scheiss, scheiss, scheiss, this looks like a horror movie! Gerard and Dietrich were scanning the area, and when Gerard saw the eyes he was going to shoot them before I held a hand to his gun.
"Verdammt, don't shoot them unless we're sure they're hostile! "
He nodded and left to search the rest of the building. I opened the blinds to shed some light on the situation here. When I opened the blinds, instead of a person, I saw 6 horses all huddled in a corner. They were all the colors of the rainbow, one was white with a purple mane with a horn sticking out of its forehead. Wait, is this a unicorn? And do does horses have wings?
"Gerhard, Dietrich, did you find anyone?" I said.
"Nein, No one in the back. " Gerhard replied
"No one upstairs. " Dietrich yelled from the stairs.
I waved them over to where I was. I asked them, "Any idea why there are a bunch of horses huddled in corner? "
"Wait, how are they on the floor? Only sick horses lie on the floor! Those aren't horses, they're too small. They're more like ponies. " Gerhard used to work on a ranch before he was conscripted to fight for the fatherland.
"How is that possible? Are they all sick? "
"I have no idea! "
"Should we put them — " Dietrich tapped my shoulder, "what? "
He pointed at the ponies and said, "I think the purple one is looking at us. "
I turned my head and discovered that she was watching us intently, as if she was studying something. Then when she noticed me looking at her, she quickly turned her head away, Wait did they just understand what I said? If the sign is in English, they maybe I should try speaking English then. If they were intelligent, they should respond to this then!
"Should we use them for food? I think —"
Upon hearing this, Gerhard and Dietrich gave me confused faces as to why I suddenly switched to German, but the ponies were giving me a look of horror. Ah, so you are intelligent then.
"—that's a horrible idea." The ponies let go of a giant breath, and it was loud enough for both Gerhard and Dietrich to hear. Gerhard and Dietrich were alarmed by the noise, and looked to me for an reason.
"I believe we've found the local inhabitants. They're intelligent ponies. " I explained, before turning to them and said, "We come in peace, we don't mean any harm."
One of them, a cyan pony with wings, jumped up and said, "Then why were you trying to use us for—" She broke off as she realized that she had spoken in response to me, getting daggers from the rest of the ponies. Dietrich and Gerhard looked like they were beyond confused.
"Well since the cat's out of the bag, why don't you all stand up and let's get to know each other, shall we?" I said, before giving them the biggest grin I had. Hopefully this alleviates their fears. Apparently not, as the ponies were even more scared when they saw me smile. I facepalmed and pointed at the purple one. "You, stand up, name and occupation. Now."
She stood up and said,"My name is Twilight Sparkle, I am a student of Princess Celestia, the ruler of this land."
"Do you have a method of contacting this... "Princess" then?"
"Yes, I do"
"Call her to wherever this place is, for I would love to meet her. I shall be waiting in the tank for her."
And with that, I left the building with Gerhard and Dietrich, and walked through the cupola and into the tank. Dietrich and Gerhard gave me a look that meant 'you'd better explain'.
I sighed and said, "My grandmother was English, and she moved down to the Fatherland to meet my grandfather. Even though she had willing gave up her English roots, she still thought it a good idea to teach me the language, just in case I ever needed it. Guess it was handy, isn't it? "
The crew looked at me for a while, before Albrecht finally got up.
He said, "Since you are the only one who knows English here, I guess you'll have to translate for us. I guess we'll all have to learn some English too. "
"Since I basically demanded them to call for their leader, we'll be sitting pretty while whoever is their leader, I imagine another pony, comes down here to see us. Until then, you lot better go over what we have left in here, it could be a while. "
Everyone got up and began to take inventory, in a few minutes I was reading off a checklist of what everyone had.
STG 44 x5
7.92x33 magazines x100
Luger x5
9x19 magazines x25
Stielhandgranate x5
Flammenwerfer x2
Assorted rations x50 cans
Water bottles x5
Assortment of spare parts
A toolkit w/ an assortment of tools x1
Panzerschreck x2
Panzerschreck rockets x10
Pack of cards x1
At the last item on the list, I looked up and asked, "Who got had those cards, I'm not going to yell at you, just fess up. "
Bernhard slowly raised his hand and sheepishly said, "It was me sir. "
"Well then, anyone up for a game of cards? Seeing as you're the one who brought it, you get guard duty. Get up to the cupola and be on the lookout. "
The rest of the crew huddled together as we started to play Poker to pass the time.
Albrecht, seeing the new card that I drew from the stack, flipped his cards over with a grunt. While Dietrich and I threw in a few more Reichsmarks into the pile. Gerhard seemd to be mulling over if he wanted to follow or not. We were waiting for him for his decision. Hope this pressure means he makes a wrong move. He followed and threw two Reichsmarks into the pile. He flipped over his hand to reveal two pairs of 7 and 9. I threw over mine to reveal a three-of-a-kind, made up of three 5 cards. Dietrich, seeing my hand, whooped and threw down his slightly larger three sixes. He then grabbed the small pile of Reichsmarks and stuffed them in his pocket. I'm going to be broke if I go on at this rate. As fate would have it, Bernhard decided to inform us that their leader had arrived.
"I think their leader is here!
"Great, join the crew if you want to lose all your money to Dietrich. "
Dietrich just gave me a really happy smile.
I exchanged my spot with Bernhard and looked out. I saw what appeared to be a giant pony, nearly twice as big and tall as the normal ponies. She had both wings and horns, and her skin was so white that even if you threw yourself into a vat of bleach you wouldn't be this white. The weirdest thing was her mane and tail, it seemed to be like rainbow coloured water, but somehow defying gravity and flowing sideways. She had a golden crown on her head and she had a sun on her butt. Knowing that taking the initiative would meant that I would control the conversation, I spoke first.
"So, you are the leader of these ponies, correct?"
"Yes, I am. I am Princess Celestia, ruler of Equestria."
"Did you just rhyme that on purpose?" It looked kinda surprised at that comment.
"What? Oh, that was... unintentional."
"Whatever, first thing's first, where are we."
"You are in the land of Equestria" No thanks, Captain Obvious.
"Never mind, is there a place called Germany here?"
"I don't think so, would that happen to be Germania?"What? Is she talking about the Roman country?
"No I think that would be a different country, now how about you send us back to Germany, and we'll forget about all of this."
"I regret to inform you that I am unable to transport you back to this... 'Germany' you speak of." Great. Just great. Now we're stuck in this country with talking technicoloured horses.I wonder how my sister will do now? Well she was expecting me to die when I left for the front lines, I guess she'll have to live with it.
"Now if you don't mind me asking," she said, "How did you get here?"
I threw my hands up and said, " I thought you knew! How in the bloody name of the Fuhrer should I know how we got here from Budapest! We'd just like to go back to Earth!"
She seemed to recognize the word 'Earth'.There's something you're not telling me here.
"You should have said you were from Earth. I am able to teleport you back to earth." Wait, did she say teleport!?
"Hold it, you're able to teleport me back to Earth, but not Germany?"
"Yes."
"That means you have no idea where we're getting teleported to, just on the same planet?!"
"Yes?"
"That means that me and my crew could find themselves in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean in a seventy ton tank!?"
"I suppose so, but you may be able to be teleported to this... Germany you speak of."
"You have a 0.124% chance of sending us to the right country." I deadpanned.
She seemed taken aback by news, that the chance of us getting to the right country was that low.
"If I may ask, how big is this Germany?"
"About 633,000 square kilometers."
"How long is one kilometer?"
"A thousand meters"
"How long is one meter?"
"A tenth of the length of this tank."
"Then how big is your planet?"
"510,072,000 square kilometers."
She seemed very surprised at this, with her eyebrows shooting up into her forehead.
"How many people are on this planet, in your time?"
"2.3 billion people. Why?"
She seemed to stare into space for a second there, muttering something that I couldn't make out. Her expression then hardened and she asked me a really strange question.
"Do you mean harm to my little ponies?"
I nearly fell over laughing at this question.Are you serious?
"Look Celestia, if I wanted to harm 'your little ponies' I would've easily done so. Earlier when you weren't here, and even now I could've easily killed most of you."
She seemed to accept this reasoning, and was contemplating something. I took this as an opportunity to tell my crew that we weren't going home anytime soon. The news was met with... mixed results.
"How will I see my wife? Or my Daughter? "
"My parents need me to help them! "
"I knew my brother was annoying, but he was all I had. "
"We're stuck here, unless you want to risk the 0.124% chance that you'll end up in Germany. "
For all their complaints, there really didn't want to risk that small chance.
"I guess my family were prepared in the event I didn't come back... "
"Yep, so were mine. "
"Oh but I can't stand their faces. "
"Get over it. Moping won't help. "
I left them to mope to each other. Looking out again, I found that Twilight had been in an animated conversation with Celestia. I left them to their own devices until they remembered our presence. Closing the hatch, I looked back inside, hoping a nice poker match would take their minds of their families.
Apparently they got carried away, as it was quite a while before they knocked on the hatch. Or they were too scared to approach the tank. Either way, I opened the hatch, and found another large pony staring in my face. This one was slightly smaller than Celestia, and had a black crown on her head. Hence I presumed the pony in question was another Princess. She also had the same gravity defying hair, but this time it was blue and dark blue instead of a rainbow color. She was dark blue, instead of bleached white, and she had a moon on her butt. She also seemed to lack volume control, and liked to speak in Ye Olde English.
"Does thou not see that we want to speak with thee? "
I covered my ears from the noisy barrage, and the crew grabbed the nearest gun when they heard the sound. I waved them off, and then looked back to the Princess.
"What was that for?!"
"It is tradition to speak with our subjects using the Royal Canterlot Voice! "
"Yeah well cut it Princess before I become deaf!"
She sheepishly looked away before speaking in a much more manageable volume.
"Thou think that I am too loud?"
"Yes, and cut the Olde English!"
"But it is tradition to refer to me as us, and you as thou! "
"Ack, again with the volume, just speak normally!"
"We do not know how to speak... normally as you might say."
"What? Why?"
"When we were banished to the moon for a thousand years, we —"
I held my hands up to stop her, saying, "Wait, you were banished to the moon? And for a thousand years!? How did you even get up there?! Not to mention how you breathed up there?!"
"My sister banished me to the moon with the Elements of Harmony."What are these 'Elements of Harmony' and to be so powerful as to send someone to the moon!
"What are these Elements of Harmony?"
"They were taken from the Tree of Harmony"Raises more questions instead.
"Okay, what is this Tree of Harmony?"
"It is the tree that governs the harmony in the land."
"And how does it do so?"
"Magic!"
"Magic doesn't exist, it's usually an illusion."
She seemed horribly confused and slightly angry.
"What does thou mean by magic not existing? Magic clearly exists!"
To prove her point, her horn glowed and a boulder was surrounded a blue-ish glow. It then proceeded to lift it up for a few inches.What? There must be some sort of crane here. I looked up and found only the sky. Does magic really exist here? Or that they made the crane hard to see? Probably the latter.
"Very nice crane, you almost had me there for a second."
She looked frustrated, and then she... teleported?!
"Hazzah! Now does thou believe in the presence of magic?"
Okay, now I believe it. Wait, do those wings work?
"Wait, then can you fly too?"
"Of course we can!"
She flew up in the air, flapping her wings to keep her hovering in the air above the tank.
I ducked in to call the rest of the crew, and told them to get on top of the turret. They were extremely surprised by this new pony hovering in mid-air with her wings. I asked her to demonstrate magic again, and she obligingly teleported onto the turret, which caused us to grab our guns as an instinctive reaction.
"Apparently, ponies can fly and they have magic. "
They were too shocked to respond, I ordered them back in, thinking that they would get around to it later. I asked what her job was.
"Our job is to raise the moon at night, and lower it in the morning."
That was one of the most ridiculous things I ever heard, and thus I reacted accordingly. I began to laugh so hard that I was crying tears of joy and my stomach hurt. She did not seem amused.
"'Tis the truth!"
"Yeah, uh,I don't think you can move a large rock in the sky, next thing you'll be telling me Celestia moves the sun."
She actually nodded her head at that.
"You've got to be kidding me, you moving the moon is believable, but no way is she moving a enormous ball in the sky!"
"Magic."
"It all comes down to magic doesn't it. Oh, wake me up in the morning, not that your moon isn't pretty, but we're used to a very rigid sleeping schedule. Good night!"
I slammed down the hatch and locked it. Settling myself next to the engine for warmth, the rest of the crew already curled up next to it, I slowly joined them in dreamland.
You think that'll keep us in?
I woke up with a giant pain in my back, my spine seemed it was in 5 different places in my body, and my neck felt like it had already snapped. In hindsight, sleeping on the floor of a metal tank wasn't the best of ideas. My back decided that it wanted to give up at that second, and I fell back onto the floor of the tank. Scratch that, worst idea ever. After doing a little stretching, I woke up the rest of the crew. Their sleeping schedules meant that they would've woken up a few minutes later anyway. I opened the tank hatch and stepped onto the turret. How did I get here, I was a good soldier, fighting valiantly against the Communist and Allied scum. I was stopped from walking into the town by a magenta barrier. What the? Oh you idiots have the balls to surround me and my soldiers?!
I walked up to the nearest pony I could find. This was one of the males, a stallion I believe, from the shape of its muzzle. He was wearing golden armor, which also seemed to only protect half of his body. Whoever designed these is an idiot, and he should be fired for using something so valuable as gold for armor.
"You! Stop!"
He seemed to jump up six feet in the air with that, and it would have been very funny if the circumstances were different.
"What is the meaning of this!?" Gesturing towards the giant dome around my tank.
"Royal Guard Captain Shining Armor made it."
"Well, bring this Shining Armor to me then!"
He ran off as if the Communists were after him in a mass charge.
I inspected the shield as I waited. Besides being a dome shape, it seemed to be translucent, allowing us to see through and others on the other side to see us too. Then they're not trying to conceal us then. The dome thing was magenta, which made me want to punch Shining Armor for making it in such a girly colour. If he erected this dome over us in a night, then could he have at least made it something less girly? No wait I'm in a world with talking ponies, never mind. It seemed to be pretty thin, at best half a centimeter thick. When I touched it, it felt cold and hard, as if I was touching metal.
That guard I talked to brought Shining Armor as fast as possible. Shining Armor quickly dismissed the guard, who ran away at the speed that looked like another charge was on its way. Shining Armor narrowed his eyes at me from the reaction of the guard. I was not taking any of it.
"What in the name of the Fuhrer compelled you to make a shield around us?"
"You are a threat to Equestria."Not this trash again. I'm getting tired of having to answer the same question over and over again.
"For the last time, we are not a threat to Equestria!"
"We are not lowering the shield for you, unless ordered by Princess Celestia."
"Well where is she?"
"She is currently in Canterlot, dealing with important business." Why do I have a feeling that you made it so?
"Fine!"
I stomped back to the tank and went back in. But I was not giving up without a fight, oh no. I'm gonna break this shield of yours, see what happens then.
"Albrecht, Bernhard, stop whatever it is you're doing. Those assholes out there decided that a shield would stop us. Let's prove them wrong. "
Both quickly got to their feet and went back to their positions. They worked like a well oiled machine.
"Target fifty meters, at seventy degree slope. " Albrecht was aiming the gun.
"Alright, this calls for a PzGr 40/43 " After checking the shells, Bernhard grabbed one of them and shoved it into the turret, slamming the door shut.
"Loaded! "
"Aimed! "
They both looked at me for a second, and I opened the hatch to see before I gave them the order.
"Fire! "
The tank rattled as it fired off the Armor-Piercing shot. It produced an immensely loud bang, but we were used to it. As for the ponies... In the split second I saw them, their ears were all flat on their heads, they were all flat on the floor, with their front hooves over their heads. Then the shell hit the shield. Even with the angle, the shell easily penetrated the dome, and it shattered like glass. I closed the hatch before some of the pieces could get into the tank. When I couldn't hear the sound of the dome's pieces clattering around. Which sounds surprisingly similar to glass. I opened the hatch to find all the ponies in that weird crouching position, except for the guards and Shining Armor, who were looking at us while their jaw muscles malfunctioned. I gave them a victorious smile before patting Albrecht and Bernhard on the back.
"Nice job, now, I'm going to see about getting us some meat. Hand me that Flammenwerfer. "
Stepping out of the tank and onto the street, it appears that they were in shock, as they had been in that position for the last minute or so. I couldn't care less as I walked off to the forest to find us some nice meat. And roast it in the process. Shining Armor and his guards hadn't moved and were just looking at me, their jaws still malfunctioning. I walked over to the nearest stand that sold food. I snapped my fingers in front of him, and he jumped seven feet in the air. We could have a high jump competition at this rate. He looked at me and quickly threw his hooves in front of his face.
"I'm sorry, please don't hurt me with that giant loud thing!"
"All I want is just some food buddy."
He lowered his hooves and then looked at me.
"What do you want then?"
"Do you have some meat?"
A look of pure horror came over his face while running as fast as possible. why are they all athletes? Now why was he scared when I mentioned meat? He didn't think that I would have... oh. You idiots thought I would eat you, didn't you. Facepalming, I went over to the next stall which sold food. This one was run by a female pony, and she had the same reaction as that earlier stall owner. The conversation went about the same way, but this time I asked her one more question.
"What do I pay with?"
"Oh, you pay with bits."
"What are bits?"
She gave me an incredulous looked before grabbing a bit from somewhere in the stall and showing it to me.
"Is this gold?!"
"Yes, why?"
You've got to be fucking kidding me, a race that uses the most precious metal for a currency?!
"Would these work?" I asked as I grabbed a few silver Reichsmark and showed them to her. Her face lit up at the sight of silver. A race that uses the most valuable metal for currency, and silver is the most precious metal. What have I gotten myself into.
"Oh yes, silver would do just fine, what would you want?"
"I would like some meat please."
She had the exact same reaction as the stall owner before.
Guess I'll have to hunt for them myself.
I walked towards that creepy forest before, hoping that I get lucky and get some meat to roast.
As I walked on into the forest, I passed by that farm again. Not much had changed besides buckets being placed all around every single tree. What? Scared the apples will fall without you noticing? As I walked along the white fence, I heard a loud 'thunk' sound every once in a while, accompanied by a lot of individual 'thunks'. After passing the pathway in, I saw the orange pony from earlier, using her hind legs to hit the tree. Well, that tree pissed her off. Then the apples proceeded to fall from the tree and into the buckets below. That's a really efficient system, if used correctly. How does she even know how hard to kick the trees? Add to that, every apple is grown differently on the branches. They need different amounts of force to make them drop. Too hard and the whole tree falls down, too light and nothing falls out. It's a ridiculous method! I shook my head and continued walking down to the forest.
I saw a sign that named this the 'Everfree Forest' and someone had drawn a skull and crossbones on it. That's either the chemical warning for 'Toxic' or there's a pirate in there. Why not write 'Abandon hope all ye who enter here' as well? As I continued to walk in, the density of the leaves slowly increased, until the sun couldn't get in anymore. A fog had suddenly appeared out of nowhere, and the trees suddenly had scary faces on them. Well this looks familiar to all the horror movies I've watched. My natural Paranoia started to kick in, and I quickly turned my head all around the forest, extremely alert of anything. This paranoia's saved my life, so I'm not giving it up yet. While the fog grew thicker and the trees closer, I got more and more paranoid. There's something in that bush? No wait, just a branch. I noticed a bunch of blue flowers somewhere ahead. Biology lessons have told me that, the more colorful it looks, the more poisonous it is. Not touching that stuff. Something roared where I wasn't looking. I immediately went into a combat stance and looked where the roaring had come from.
Oh god what the bloody hell is that thing!? It had the body of a wolf, and it seemed to be made out of wood. It had glowing eyes and had a leaf where their eyebrows should have been. I grabbed my Luger and immediately fired seven shots into it. They all penetrated, and flew out the other side into the forest. For once penetration doesn't help me here. The wooden wolf looked down at itself and saw the seven bullet holes in it. It growled its teeth at the sight of it. Okay now it's just more pissed. Wait, it's made out of wood! I shoved the Luger into a pocket and grabbed the Flammenwerfer. It was confused, then it looked like it gave up processing and leaped at me. I barely got the nozzle up in time to shoot the fire into his face. The wooden wolf, being made out of wood, along with it being dry as wolves don't like being wet, The wood immediately caught fire and the wolf gave a giant loud howl of pain. Before his friends arrived, I immediately made a beeline towards the entrance. It appeared the howling had attracted something else as well, this time it looked like a lion, had what looked like bat wings, and had a stinger as its tail like a scorpion. I didn't even try to register it anymore, just immediately used the flamethrower on it, and when it stopped moving, dragged his corpse out of the forest. Took me a good ten minutes to do so. As I dragged the corpse down the street into Ponyville, every single pony gave me looks that were a mixture of fear and awe. The guards especially, whose jaws malfunctioned again as they saw me dragging the darned thing near the tank. I hammered on the hatch, and when Bernhard opened the hatch, something came to my mind.
If those darned ponies find the shell they could replicate it...
"Bernhard! Find the shell that was fired and bring it back now! "
He jumped up and ran off to try and find the spent shell. The rest jumped out to see what I was doing, their eyes looked extremely confused when they saw the lion-scorpion-bat hybrid, then they threw up their arms. Yeah, I know, what else can this crazy world throw at us?
"Anyone up for some roasted meat? "
They jumped off an began using combat knives to carve out pieces from the corpse.
The Cutey Mark Crusaders?
After having a nice meal of meat from... Whatever that was, cooking it with some spare wood we found around the town and telling them to take a break. They sort of wandered around in a circular radius around the tank, I would've done the same. Bernhard appeared, carrying the shell on his shoulder.
"Okay, here's the shell, now where's the food? " I decided to have a joke with him
"We ate it all. " His eyes popped out and he nearly tripped.
"You what?! " His eyes narrowed. He did not look happy.
"Oh you should see your face right now! Priceless! " He growled at me.
"Where's the food then? "
"On the turret, near the engine. "
"Oh. Well then. " He proceeded to use his strength to lob the shell as far away from me as possible. It went over the crest of a small bump in the road so I couldn't see it. My jaw dropped. You seriously didn't do that?
"Oh you're right, your face is priceless! " He clutched his sides laughing, tears coming out of his eyes. I guess I deserved that.
I walked down to the other side of the town to see where the shell I fired earlier went. When you want to do something, you do it yourself. No use letting them get the shell and carry it off to study. Being a APCR shell, that thing would've been made out of some expensive material Bernhard would be able to tell me about. The shell went pretty far off before I managed to find it, noticing the fear in the ponies' eyes as they saw me coming. I can see the black suit being intimidating, but come on you idiots, we're not going to kill you. The shell looked pretty fine, only the tip was bent somewhat as it hit that shield from earlier. Eh, might be reusable, I don't know how, but it'll be used for something. I grabbed the shell and lifted it into my shoulder. This is quite heavy, I have no idea how Bernhard does this every day. I slowly lugged the shell back to the tank.
When I was walking back, I heard a familiar rumbling sound. Are you idiots trying to go for a joyride? Adjusting the shell on my shoulder, I ran towards the tank as fast as I could with the shell. I skidded to a stop and nearly dropped the shell from the sudden stop as I saw what was going on. All of my crew were on top of the tank, banging the turret as hard as possible, while a large crowd of ponies gathered around to see.Have they gone mad? I threw the shell at a nearby spot to the tank, and quickly ran up to them. They were screaming things in German.
"Get out of there! "
"Dumb ponies better get out before I shoot you! "
"Get out of our tank! "
"What's going on here?! " I said, while running full sprint at the tank.
"Sir, a bunch of smaller ponies ran up to the tank and screamed something like 'Cutey Mark Crusader Metal Monster Drivers!' "
"And you let them!? "
"No, they ran into the tank, and got into the hatch before we could stop them! Then they somehow managed to lock the hatch! "
"Then where were you? "
"In a circle around the tank. " I can't leave you idiots alone for a single second,can't I?
Just then, I heard a really high pitched voice say,
"What does this do?" and the tank slowly began to move forward.
"Get out of the way! " Before jumping off to a side. The ponies immediately started backing away, probably afraid of what the tank will do.
The tank slowly began to pick up speed and started rolling down the road.
"Cutie Mark Crusader Metal Monster Drivers! Yay!"
Now I was extremely pissed. What kind of fucking idiotic pony jumps into a fucking tank, without knowing what the fuck every single of those fucking things do. They might accidentally fire a shell or something! Or worse, accidentally use one of the fucking machine guns, fucking kill someone, and probably these fucking paranoid ponies will blame us instead of them for some reason.
"Whoever is in my tank, get out now! " Ponies near me really started to back away, this time not from the slowly moving tank, but this time from my voice. Whoever was inside heard my voice, because I heard one of them say,
"Uh oh." And the tank stopped.
"You will get out of that tank, this instant! "
"I think it's one of those weird monsters that drives this thing! Oh no, they've found us!"
"You will get out before I fucking shoot you on the spot! " Ponies recoiled in horror at my words. And I couldn't give a damned fuck about them right now.
"Gah! We're going to die! Whatdowedo!?"
Then one of em screamed, "Help me Rainbow Dash!"
Which proceeded to set the rest of them off, screaming help from a certain pony
"Help me Rarity!"
"Help me Applejack!"
"Enough! You will get out of that tank, this instant! "
A whimper emerged from somewhere inside the tank.
"This is your final warning, get out or we will shoot you! " I barked out an order to the crew, "Weapons out and safeties off. " The ponies now were seriously worried, but some looked at us in anger. Boo hoo, you're pissed because I'm threatening your young? Fuck off.
"I am giving you five seconds to get out and surrender! " I simultaneously ordered my crew. "Weapons aimed at the tank! "
Just then, those six ponies that we originally found ran out and stood in front of us.
"What do you think you're doing?!"said the purple one.
Upon hearing the pony's words, the ponies inside of the tank screamed, " Save us Twilight!"
"Getting some thick-headed children of yours out of our tank!"
"Wait, are those the Cutie Mark Crusaders?" This one came from the blue pony with a rainbow-colored mane.
"That means that my Sweetie Belle's in there!"
"And mah Applebloom!"
Five of them, except the Pink one who seemed content bouncing around the place, walked up towards us, all the while ponies were saying, "No! Don't go! It's dangerous!"
"I have to do it for my sister!"
Why in the fucking world does everyone think that we put them in there. What the fuck.
"Then give it to 'em!", said someone in the crowd, which prompted clapping and some "Yeah!"s from the crowd. That's it you, you fucking broke the line.
"ENOUGH! " This time, even my crew started to slowly back away from me. This was a new level of angry for me. The angriest they had seen was when someone had damaged the tank and I went ballistic on them.
"Those ponies inside the tank will come out right fucking now! Not later, right fucking now! "
"Hey, they're trapped in there you bozo!" The cyan pony immediately took to the air.
"They fucking locked the hatch themselves dumbfuck! " She looked surprised at my cursing, which again I couldn't give a flying fuck about, and looked towards the tank.
"Scootaloo, did you really lock the hatch?"
"It was to keep away the monsters!"
"I don't fucking care, unlock it right now! "
"We don't know how!"
"You knew how to lock it! Figure it out! "
After a lot of scrabbling within the tank, the ponies came out. There was a white one with a light purple mane and a horn, one who was orange and had wings, and the final one was yellow with red hair and a ribbon.
The ponies all looked relieved, and were until I raised my gun at them and pulled the bolt.
"You shitheads have fucking crossed the line! " My crew also pulled their bolts on their guns.
Seeing that, the three young ponies immediately ran behind whoever they had called out for while they were in the tank.
"Hey! What are you aiming that at them for!"
"They have, without our permission, entered the tank and started to move it! "
They all looked at the three young horses with a glare.
"They had permission from us to inspect the tank, but not to go in it." All of them glared at them again, while the young ponies began to huddle together in a circle.
"I don't fucking care if they have permission from fucking Celestia or otherwise, they have still entered my fucking tank without me or my crew's permission! "
"Why don't we settle this inside?" said the purple one, gesturing with one of her hooves towards the weird house made out of a tree, apparently called "Great Oaks Library"
Not wanting to piss off more of the locals, I agreed.
"Bernhard! Dietrich! With me! The rest of you, fucking get inside the tank and fucking guard it this time! "
After seeing Bernhard and Dietrich falling in next to me, I promptly walked straight into the library.
I was livid when I entered the library, and knowing that yelling at them in anger wouldn't get us anywhere, I punched the wall with all my strength and anger in it. OKAY, HOLY SHIT THAT HURTS . I tried to get some feeling back into my hands by massaging it, I looked up to see where I had punched the wall. A nice fist-shaped indent was able to be seen in the middle of the wood, and it was about a two centimeters deep. Bernhard and Dietrich sort of made a compromise between standing next to me and staying as far away from me as possible. Both because they thought I was really angry. Which I was, but mostly in pain from that point onwards. After taking out my anger on a wooden wall, Dietrich and Bernhard slowly scooted further away from me, trying to evade my notice of them doing so. You are idiots if you think I can't see you in this small room, and the fact that you guys are horrible at stealth. Then those six ponies came in, with the three young ones from earlier in tow. Those three tried their best to hide behind the six ponies.
"Let's begin by introducing ourselves then. I'll start." Said the purple one, probably their leader.
"I am Twilight Sparkle, personal student of Princess Celestia. These are my friends, Applejack —" She pointed at the orange pony. "— Rarity —" Pointing at the White one. "—Rainbow Dash —" She pointed at the cyan pony who was aimlessly hovering. Waste of energy. "— Pinkie Pie —" She gestured at the pink pony who was bouncing around. "— and finally, Fluttershy." She pointed at the yellow pony with wings, who unlike Rainbow Dash was cowering on the floor.
"I am Hauptmann Schmidt of the 503rd Heavy Panzer Battalion of the Wehrmacht of the Third Reich. Bernhard is our Loader, he has a rank of Unterfeldwebel, Dietrich is our Radio Operator, he has a rank of Unteroffizier."
"Ah, I see, should I get you something to drink?"
"You may dispense with the pleasantries."
"Okay then, Scootaloo, Sweetie Belle, Applebloom. Is there any reason why you would go inside a place belonging to someone else?"
"We wanted our Cutie Marks!"
"What's a Cutie Mark?"
"Oh, it's the mark that shows what our special talent is. It's on our flanks." She pointed towards the star on her flank.What? So it shows you your special talent?
"Do all of you tattoo yourselves to show your special talent?"
"What's a tattoo? And no, these appear when we discover our special talents."
"A tattoo is a picture that is made on your skin by using a needle with ink to pierce your skin. It is horribly painful, and was used back home to identify people."
"Why would they do that?"
"It's much more efficient finding people with the marks on them, instead of having to find each person individually."
"What people had these marks?"
"Jews, people that our leader believed were inferior to us. I personally thought that was ridiculous, but those were the orders."
"What did your government do to these 'Jews'?"
"They sent them to concentration camps."
"Then?"
"I don't know. I'm a soldier, not a government officer. Now can we please get back on topic. Those three..."
"Fillies, it's the word used to describe children."
"Those fillies should be punished. Since you seem to be the guardians of these three, you shall deal with their punishments. Any damages to our tank shall be paid for by you. Do you accept?"
"Yes. And I'm sure that these three will get a lesson they won't forget. We'll start by your apology to him."
"Do we have to?"
"Yes! You're also grounded for five years."
"Aww come on!"
"Unless, he agrees to reduce your punishment." They ran up to me and started hugging my leg.
"I'm sorry Mister Schmidt! Could you please forgive us!"
"Hmm... Yes."
"Yay! Does that mean we're not grounded for five years?" Twilight looked to me.
"No."
"Aww! Please!" They used their puppy dog faces and were giving their best shot.
"No." Somehow, they managed to get even cuter.
"Please!"
"No. No matter how many times you ask, No." Why do I have the feeling, that many a man that got into this world, has fallen to this cuteness.
"Aww..." Before they went back to their respective sisters, or guardians.
"Now, is there anything that you wish to know. I do not want more misunderstandings."
"Oh! How about everything!" Twilight levitated a piece of parchment, some ink and a quill.
"That is an impossible question."
"Oh. Then start with your history!"I have never seen anyone so excited for history.
"Bear in mind I'm not a historian,you'd probably be better off with someone who knows history better."
"That's no matter! Please!"
I sneaked a glance at Bernhard and Dietrich, who were standing at attention, looking irritated that they were going to have to stand there for the length of the history rundown.That's what you guys get for letting children get into the tank.
And I started to tell Twilight about a brief history of the Earth.
Twilight bombarded me with questions, some that I couldn't possibly answer. Like, "Why would the Romans invade Britain?" I didn't really focus on the why part. I just liked the fighting wars part of it.
"No idea." I shrugged.
The brief history lesson lasted about five hours, in which everyone except me and Twilight had fallen into a coma. Rainbow Dash and Applejack were sleeping with their heads on a table, Pinkie Pie was talking in her sleep, saying something about parties, Fluttershy was in the most inconspicuous corner possible, probably trying to hide herself. Rarity was sleeping on her couch that she somehow conjured when I talked about the first war, saying that it was the worst possible thing while fainting onto it. Drama Queen. I let Dietrich and Bernhard sit down after an hour of standing, where they proceeded to find the furthest seat from me possible, occasionally eyeing the fist-shaped hole in the wall. They fell asleep in two different armchairs.
"And that's all I know before I somehow got here."
"From this... Hun... Gary right?"
"It's one word, and yes." She scribbled something on her mile long list that stretched all around the library, I was surprised that she had that much parchment. She finally noticed the time.
"I'm sorry for keeping you here so long!" Everyone in the room promptly woke up, in quite hilarious fashions. Dietrich and Bernhard tried to reach for their rifles, but forgot they put them down so they were jumping up holding their hands like they would hold a gun, but with no gun in it. Rainbow Dash and Applejack woke up and accidentally hit their heads against one another's. Rarity woke up and started screaming about her mane, which was very untidy and some cotton had got into it. Fluttershy woke up and banged her head into a wall, Pinkie jumped up and hit the ceiling. It took a few seconds for everyone to register what they were doing, me laughing very hard their expense, rolling along the floor laughing with tears coming out of my eyes due to sheer joy. Oh god, this was totally worth the five hours of talking!
I eventually stopped myself, wiping away the tears in my eyes. I thanked Twilight for being a nice host, while Dietrich and Bernhard walked as fast as they could without passing ahead of me, and out the door. Once outside, I felt a nice breeze pass by, the moon had come up and the stars were twinkling in the night. Mentally replaying their reactions in my head when they woke up, I started laughing again.
"Oh you two looked so goofy with your two hands in the air, grabbing a gun you didn't have! " This earned me a nice punch in the shoulder. Still worth it. We got back into the tank, Gerhard already asleep next to the engine, and Albrecht apparently fell asleep in my cupola. I woke him and told him to move, while Bernhard and Dietrich got in and almost immediately fell asleep. I locked the hatch and waited for tomorrow to come.
Another day, another bunch of ponies looking at me with fear and distrust as far as the eye can see. I had my flammenwerfer with me again, this time going to explore the creepy forest. It was the only place that seemed like the ponies would stay away as if it were the plague. Understandable when you have golden armor against whatever those wooden things were.
I slowly walked in, making sure that there was not going to be any surprise attacks. When I arrived at the spot where I had been attacked by the wooden wolves last time, I saw the head of a dead wolf. Someone must have either lobbed it like an idiot, or those horses used their legs to kick it. Wonder what kind of horses would venture into here? Apparently, some ponies did come in here, as more and more wood parts of a wolf littered the road. I started to see something else as I walked on, blood. I don't know anything about those wolves, as far as I know, they're hollow but can really give you massive splinters, but they definitely did not have blood in them. What poor pony ventured in here and got hurt? The corpse count had now increased to seven dead wooden wolves, all the while more and more blood had been left on the road.
I stopped when I saw three wolves surrounding something, though they did not seem like they were in an attacking stance. I flamed them with my flammenwerfer. They yelped and ran off into the forest. With them out of the way, I could fully see the carnage that had happened. There were five more dead wooden wolves, and there were two dead ponies. They were the winged variation of the ponies. Pegasuses? No that sounds dumb, Pegasi? They had claw marks all over, splinters all along their hooves, and their wings had holes in them, like the wolves had clawed a hole in them or something. Feathers littered the area, and there were pools of blood where they had died fighting. Respect to you two. Without any weapons, you've managed to take twelve of them down with you. I gave them the military salute, instead of the Hitler salute. I began walking around when I found a second blood trail leading into a bush. I found another peagsus, this one slightly smaller, but by no means a child. This one had less injuries than the ones before, it had a really light gray color, though there were red scratches nearly everywhere, her tail was red and black so it sort of look okay? Her wings seemed to have also been clawed and had large holes in it. Guess wing membranes are really thin. I clipped the nozzle back onto the tank and carefully wrapped my hands under her. You should join your families, I'll fire a gun salute for you three later. She was surprisingly warm for a corpse, and so I listened more carefully, a heartbeat or a small inhale would be nigh near impossible to hear if you're not looking for it. I felt her very softly breathing, and so I immediately took off my jacket and wrapped it around her, using the sleeves to tie them together so my jacket wouldn't fall off, covering the wings in the process. Wait, if she's alive then... Fuck I need to get her to a hospital!
I began running at full tilt, not really caring anymore about the wolves, just trying to get her to a hospital as fast as possible. With the noise I made, some wolves appeared, then, spotting me, they began to chase me. Not right fucking now! Being four legged cheaters, they caught up and tried to claw me. I started dodging by stepping to the sides more, all the while sprinting as fast as I could go. shitshitshitshit not the time you wooden bastards! The three wolves chasing me made much more noise, and thus attracted even more wolves, pretty soon, I was running away from ten wolves in the forest, my legs and lungs screaming while my heart felt like a machine gun. The endurance training in the army was useful after all! The entrance of the forest came into view, and provided some hope for me. I felt like I had been running from these wolves for hours. All the while evading their claws. When I burst through the entrance, the wolves stopped and growled at me. Seems like they can't or won't follow me out, that's helpful. Now, I said I was running, but in reality I was more stumbling at a very fast speed as I went slightly delirious from lack of oxygen. Every single pony was giving me a weird look that I didn't bother to dwell on as I ran through the marketplace. My tank crew were surprised to see me running that fast, half expecting that something will show up behind me. To conserve energy, the only thing my brain could process at the moment was 'Get her to hospital', not even bothering with grammar at this point.
Feeling like I had internal bleeding in my lungs, I got to the hospital doors. I had my hands full by carrying her, so I used my foot to kick open the door. The ponies all were afraid, and attempted to stay as far away from me as possible, while not leaving the hospital entirely. I ran up to the reception desk, cutting in front of the ponies in front of me, who were really too scared to do anything but back off. After carefully laying her down, which got me some weird looks, I have no idea what those mean, can't read horse face yet. A pony with a nurse cap was at the desk, she was sorting through some paperwork. She somehow felt my presence and said, "How may I help you?"
Too winded to reply to that, I picked up the injured pegasus and carefully placed her on the table. She looked up and her pupils dilated when she saw me and a very injured pegasus next to me.
"Oh! What have you done to her?!" She gave me an accusing look and looked like she wanted to fight. Motherfucking hell I wish these ponies would stop assuming that I'm the bad guy here. Me being paranoid, I sort of understand, but this is beyond paranoia.
Finally catching my breath, I said, "Found her. Creepy Forest. Help her. Now." I coughed after I said this, probably my lungs trying to work again.
"Not so fast there, I have some questions for you."
"What?"
"Did you do this to her?" Fucking hell, use your brain woman!
"If I wanted to hurt her, I wouldn't have brought her to hospital now, would I?"
"Maybe you injured her too much and now you're trying to cover for it!" Fuck it.
I grabbed my Luger and pointed it at her face.
"You will find me a fucking doctor in ten seconds before I blow your face off and find one myself!"
She immediately pressed the nearest intercom, saying "Would any doctor that's free please come to the reception area."
Seven really scary seconds for her later, a doctor showed up. He stopped in shock when he looked at me, but when he looked at the injured pegasus, he immediately went into action, hollering orders for nurses. "I need a stretcher here! Get her to intensive care now!"
Seeing that my job was done, I walked out of the hospital, hoping that whoever she was, she would get better.
Oh sometimes I hate myself for even thinking of saying those words. We were now somewhere near Canterlot, it's giant bubble shield making the hard-to-miss city even harder to miss, when the tank, after three days of being perfectly fine, decided that it had had enough and promptly broke down. Because apparently the universe hates me, we had to break down somewhere in the mountains and freezing cold! It's like Russia all over again. I yelled over the snow and winds that universe conjured up just to rub salt in my wounds.
"Gerhard! What's the status on the replacing of the drive housings! I can't stand much of this cold anymore! "
He yelled his reply from somewhere near the engine,
"It's nearly fixed, and we all can't stand this cold! Never knew how the Russians dealt with so much snow! "
"I assume with vodka and lots of coats! "
"Neither of which we have now! "
"Just get the damn tank moving! "
"What do you think I've been doing! " With a few more metallic clanging sounds, the familiar rumble of the engine started up again.
"Alright, let's go! "
The weird convoy slowly began moving along again, snow on the tracks no match for seventy tons of pure German steel and engineering. The ponies, so far haven't ventured out yet, probably due to the sheer coldness outside. As we neared Canterlot, there seemed to be lots of activity, pegasi guards flying around the city, presumably patrolling, while earth ponies and unicorn alike marched down the streets of the city. I wonder if this has anything to do with us? Nah, she wouldn't invite me here, just to insult me by the fact that she doesn't trust me. Alright, my track record isn't exactly the best, having threatened two ponies with a Luger, and a bunch of fillies too. But I'm not going to go on a random rampage through the city.
We had gotten up to the giant bubble shield, and since it included parts of the track I assumed we should just drive right in. We did, and got us a lot of dropped jaws when we pulled up to the station, with the station manager sputtering in confusion at how her locomotive had been replaced by a giant rumbling metal box. I just unhooked the chain, and then proceeded to tell Gerhard to make a beeline for the castle. Not really caring about the literal amounts of confusion that were created by the populace.Besides, we'll leave a long lasting impression on the locals here. Before we could drive our way down to the city, we were stopped by... something that looked like a bat and a pony that combined. Or, a pony and a bat loved each other very much. Okay, now I need bleach to wash that mental image away. Shuddering at the thought of the weird things my imagination comes up with, there were three of these weird hybrids. Probably mares judging from their muzzles, wearing black armor that made them look much more dark. Along with one mare and a stallion normal ponies... With that stupid golden armor again.Although gold is a much more commonplace item here, Gold is definitely not going to protect them from any physical attacks. One of the normal pony guards cleared his throat nervously, the other four sharing his nervousness at the tall sight of us in a tank. We probably towered over them, ponies usually only coming up to my waist when standing, us in a tank meant that we were even higher than them. They kinda look cute when they're nervous. We're not that intimidating right?
"Excuse me sir, by the orders of Princess Celestia, the Solar guard are to accompany you to the palace. Whereas our friends here are from the Lunar guard, assigned by Princess Luna." I decided to have a nice joke with them. They slowly got scared as I didn't respond, and probably fearing that they had insulted me or something, prompting my retaliation. Alright, I'll let you off the hook. They were in near panic states now, probably thinking over some of the worst-case scenarios that could happen.
"Lead the way guards." They all visibly sighed when I finally responded, then suddenly appeared afraid again as they realized that they had done it in front of my face, before quickly surrounding the tank, the leading stallion in front of the tank, occasionally looking back to see that, yes the tank was still rumbling towards him.
We arrived at the palace soon, the leading stallion, who nervously told me his name was Sharp Spear, told us to leave our 'metal beast' in a open area, telling me that it used to be the parking area for guests, but since most ponies arrive by flying chariot or by train, it was rarely used. He and the other Solar guard stood guard next to the tank, while the Lunar guards followed us into the reception. We were greeted by Princess Luna and Princess Celestia, who gave all five of us guest rooms, all across or next to each other. Two Lunar guards stood guard outside two rooms, while one stood guard outside my room. I assumed it was because I was the highest ranked person of the five. Oh the wedding is going to be fun. I went into the bathroom to deal with personal hygiene, the tank itself obviously not having any where to deal with it.
After a very nice bath, albeit in a wooden tub that was too small for us, but better than nothing I guess. I used the mirror inside the room to fully inspect the look of the uniform. I look quite intimidating. Not going to complain. After smoothing out a few creases, I walked out to the main room, finding a comfortable armchair and getting comfortable on it before striking up a conversation with the really nervous hybrid in the corner, judging from her fidgeting when she saw I was watching her.
"So, what's your name, I'd like to stop to referring you to as 'hybrid' mentally." She did a double-take when she heard that I was talking to her. Then looked scared when she realized her reaction, fearing that she had insulted me in some way.
"Uh, my name is Pale Midnight,sir." Why are all their names related to their Cutie Mark, their species or their color?
"Alright, would you prefer Pale, Midnight or both?"
"Midnight,sir."
"You may stop referring to me as sir."
"Yes. Sir...?"
"Oh, I'm Hauptmann Schmidt of the 503rd Heavy Armor Battalion, part of the Wehrmacht of Nazi Germany. You may refer to me as Schmidt."
"Yes si— Schmidt."
"So, what are you exactly Midnight?"
"We're Nocturns, or commonly referred to others as bat-ponies."
"I can see why. If you don't mind me asking, why do you look like a hybrid of both?"
"I really don't know, Schmidt. It's the way we were born."
"Do you mind if I ask some things about your country?"
"Oh, not at all. However, I do have to keep some things confidential due to the fact that it's sorta important for national security."
"I understand completely. We used to do the same, and usually are even more tight-lipped about it."
"Thank you."
"It's no matter."
Pale Midnight could hear her heart racing, and it sounded so loud it seemed like a miracle that Schmidt hadn't heard it yet. He scared her a lot. She had heard stories about them from Ponyville and had even been briefed by the Princess about him and his crew. She thought of the briefing that she had been attending. Captain Darkwind had hoof-picked ten ponies from the Lunar Guards, and requested that they go to the meeting room at midnight, not giving a single hint what it was about. She had arrived at the meeting room only to see Princess Luna herself. When she had learned that she was to be escorting what was essentially an alien, she had been extremely curious but also terribly afraid of what would happen. Luna then picked three out of the ten guards, and after making sure that not one of the ponies would let a word out, she began the briefing.
"We know what we will ask of you will be difficult, and you may be wondering why we have picked you three instead of your more experienced brothers and sisters. The answer is that you are much less professional that them. Professionalism is a good thing, but the cold demeanor will not be able to get the humans to open up to us. They possess secrets that could radically change the entire course of the world, and if it were to fall into the wrong hands..."—Princess Luna shuddered at the thought of some of their enemies getting on the secrets that the humans had.—"This is why we must get to them first, in order to prevent those who are not worthy from getting an advantage over us. You will be provided with as much information as we can provide, and your mission is to get the humans to open up to you. Especially their leader, Schmidt I believe. He is the only human in the group that speaks Equestrian, and his opinion greatly affects the rest's views on us. As of now, his opinion on us is not too good, in fact I would go so far as to say it is cold. You need to turn this around. We have picked you three simply because you are young, and we hope your demeanor will allow them to open up to you. This is highly important to the future of Equestria, do you accept?"
All three mulled over the choice, but the end result wasn't in doubt. In Nocturnia, the honor of being chosen as a Lunar guard was high, but being chosen for a secret mission? This made getting into the Lunar guard look like foal's play. "We are willing to serve you Princess Luna."
Princess Luna's eyes lit up, and she had a big grin on her face. "Please, you three may refer to us as Luna."
The Nocturns' jaws dropped at what she had said. This meant that she valued them as equals, rather than those below her. One question was created in their minds. What kind of being was this, to make this mission so important that we were equals to the Princess?
"Of course Prin—Luna."
"We shall begin your briefing, we believe that you should be well prepared, to increase our chances of success." She used her magic to levitate a small stack of papers and photos. They were passed between the three Nocturns, each studying each piece of information with extreme detail.
Queen Chrysalis received a very interesting report from one of her infiltrators in Canterlot. Using the hive's mental links, the infiltrator, Mirror, had told her and the entire hive of a strange contraption, painted with brown,green and yellow hues, emerging from the station, only to be intercepted by a small group of guards. According to her, a hatch on the contraption opened to reveal a strange being with brown eyes and a black cap. It had conversed with the ponies in fluent Equestrian, and the guards had formed up into an escort for the contraption. What interested Chrysalis the most was the fact that the ponies had seemed utterly terrified of the contraption, this meant that these beings were very powerful. If they could be persuaded to assist the hive... With that in mind she sent an infiltrator-wide telepathic message.
*"All infiltrators in Canterlot that are not currently engaged are to investigate the new contraption and the beings it carries."*
She smiled when she thought of the terror that she would strike into the pony's hearts. She was however, interrupted by a knocking at the door.
"Princess Cadence, it's Shining Armor."
Irritated at being interrupted, she quickly morphed her features into a smile for the stallion on the other side of the door.
"This was one written by Twilight Sparkle, it used to be a two hundred page long report, but it has been suitably condensed into a much shorter version."
The Nocturns all looked curiously at the new information that was being given to them. It was a much more simplified version of the history of the humans.
They flipped over to the first page.
The Greeks
Where humans had started was unknown to the humans themselves, Schmidt recalling the earliest civilization that he knew as the 'Greek city-states'. These were all in the small area of 'Greece' which he said was much more smaller than this 'Germany' he himself came from. The Princess had said that the area of 'Germany' was around 634,000 kilometers big. He said that there were many small cities, but they were very powerful. He mentioned 'Athens', 'Sparta', 'Corinth, 'Argos' and 'Megara'. He claimed that the humans there had the same language, same gods and goddesses, but they were not united as one. The Greeks believed that there were many gods on 'Mount Olympus'. The highest mountain in the country of Greece. They would go to temples to worship them, and hope for better lives. He revealed that there was actually no proof of such gods, and that there were none found on 'Mount Olympus'. They Greeks had faced many...
I am disappoint bat-pony.
Midnight found herself getting tired from reading the insanely long text that had described human history in an extremely high detail. The only reason why she was still awake was because of some Zebradican beverage called Coffee. She took another sip of brown liquid and resumed her reading. Her only comfort was that the darned thing was nearly over.
World War II
This was the last major event that Schmidt knows of. He was in fact teleported here during this war. He had said that there was a major crisis in 1929, refusing to talk about it further. He said that the event allowed for a man named 'Adolf Hitler' to rise to power in Germany. This man had transformed the previous 'Republic' into a one-party dictatorship, and he declared that Germans were the superior race above all. He aimed for the annexation of previous German lands at first. He had massively increased the army, way beyond the limit imposed by the previous 'Treaty of Versailles', after there was not much resistance, he proceeded to occupy the 'Rhineland', another breach in the 'Treaty of Versailles'. He then used the uniting of Germans as an excuse for the annexation of German-speaking areas. He annexed 'Austria', the 'Sudetenland' and half of 'Czechoslovakia'. When he invaded 'Poland' a response was finally found from 'Britain' and 'France', but Germans used advanced tactics (that Schmidt also refused to tell me about) to crush the Polish, within a few years they had conquered 'Norway','France','Yugoslavia'. But then 'Adolf Hitler' decided that they didn't want to defeat 'Britain' and instead focused on the 'USSR' whom he tells me the full name is 'Union of Soviet Socialist Republics' Which ended in an absolute disaster. The inclusion of another major power the 'USA' or 'United States of America' did not help, and by the time Schmidt was teleported there were going on the defensive.
Midnight breathed a sigh of relief as she finally finished the extremely long report, deciding to get some sleep before the aliens arrived to Canterlot.
Mirror watched as the metal contraption with it's rumbling rolled past. She could hear what she assumed to be the alien with his his supposed head, judging from what she thought was its eyes. But then again, these were aliens, who know if they had fifty eyes or something. With her transformed form, she walked up to one of the guards escorting the metal contraption. This was a bat-pony, which were a rare sight around Equestria.
"What is this thing?" The bat-pony seemed to notice her uneasiness.
"Oh, this is apparently a tank. Theh thing standing at the top is called a human and his name is Schmidt.'
"Where did they come from?"
"Nopony knows. Would you mind, I need to get them to their rooms."
"There are more than one?"
"Yes. There is a total of five humans. Only one speaks Equestrian though." Interesting.
"Why are they here?"
"They're here for the wedding." This will be very useful.
"I'd better not intrude you further."
"It's no matter. Most ponies are reluctant to even talk with us Nocturns. It's nice to have someone to chat to."
"Oh, thank you."
Mirror trotted off to a side street while the bat pony continued alongside the 'tank'.
I need to report this to the Queen right now! With that in mind, she began sending her telepathic message to the Queen.
Midnight seemed terribly scared, but she seemed like she was very interested in what I had to say. I'll have to admit, she's been one of the most accepting ponies i've met so far.
"So, why are you not immediately suspicious of me like the ponies?"
"Oh, it's the fact that we Nocturns are somewhat isolationist, so we aren't that surprised towards new things we've never seen, and we aren't quick to judge." Or ponies are xenophobic, racist idiots with a highly illogical distrust towards anything that is not a pony. Ironically, they run around peaching shit like Harmony and Friendship. We do the same but we don't rub Harmony and Friendship into everyone's faces. They're also fanatic towards their rulers. Wait we do the same, never mind.
"You're outperforming the Equestrians already." She looked a bit more comfortable and she had what looked like pride on her face.
Pale Midnight could barely suppress her emotions. An alien, from another world, with secrets that deemed them so important as to be equals to Princess Luna herself, had essentially deemed Nocturns as superior to Equestrians! This bolstered her confidence and she had a weird thought about writing this on a sign, and parading this around the entirety of Equestria.
"Why thank you, it's a high compliment coming from you."
"I'm just stating the facts."
Deciding that he had opened up enough to her, she started her mission.
"So, what is that thing you carry all around?"
Already trying to pry into my secrets eh? I don't believe there will be much harm in telling you the name of it at least.
"This is a Luger, it's a weapon we created that would be compact enough to be used in a moment's notice, compared to some of the bulkier stuff we have."
She was elated at the ease in which the human had responded to her question, even giving her the reason for why the item was designed! She would not let her fellow Nocturns' faith in her be misplaced. As she was assigned to arguably the most important of the aliens, she felt a responsibility to her country to do her best.
"Huh, what sort of bulkier stuff?"
Oh I see where you're going with this, information extraction? She has been friendly so far, and nothing bad will come out of this if she just knows the names of things.
"Well, there's the STG-44." I went over and picked up the STG-44 lying on a desk. "This is meant as an all-purpose weapon. A jack of all trades. It's good at everything, but not extremely good at anything. You should see some of the more specialized stuff we have."
Pale Midnight had nearly jumped for joy at the ease at which she was prying information off of Schmidt. She felt like that it was an opportune moment to get him to explain more about his weapons, judging from his ending remark.
"Really? What do they look like?"
Well that confirms it, idle curiosity doesn't go this far. You're definitely trying to extract information. The only thing that I somewhat trust right now. And right after I just gave you a goddamn compliment.
"It would take me hours to explain all the weapons we have currently, so I'd rather not."
Midnight's thoughts of an easy mission were shattered with those words. And she noticed a somewhat disapproving look on his face when he said the words. She was afraid of that look and unconsciously stepped back. She prayed to Luna that he had not discovered her true intentions for asking this was more than just idle curiosity. Little did she know that Schmidt already knew.
From outside the bedroom window, infiltrator Mirror watched as the bat-pony continued to converse with the humans. She felt slightly angry that her enemies had already begun their attempts at extracting information from him, but when the human sported a slightly displeased look while the bat-pony slightly backed up, meaning that the human had discovered their attempts at subterfuge. It would be no matter for changelings, for they are masters at the art, especially infiltrators, who were born to infiltrate the enemy and acquire information.
"Well this is boring, and the wedding is in a few hours." Then again, what could these ponies have as entertainment anyway?
"You could go for a walk around Canterlot?"Eh why the hell not.
"Sure." I grabbed my guns and checked if everything was there. I walked out into the hallway, Midnight following behind me.
"Crew, let's go for a walk. It's too damn boring in here. "
They shrugged and grabbed their weapons from their rooms, then they formed themselves behind me in an arrowhead formation. Why an arrowhead? Wait, why not an arrowhead?
"Alright, let's go. You do have everything right? " They nodded.
I opened the door and went for a nice stroll in Canterlot.
Mirror had moved away from the palace in order to avoid suspicion by the guards. They were giving her funny looks after they had seen her staring through a window. She needed to keep her existence a secret, if word got out, the entire invasion would fail. And she couldn't possibly live on, knowing that she had destroyed their species's only chance of getting more love. They had been running out and desperate times call for desperate measures, and so the plan to invade Equestria had been born. It had been going well, but the aliens were a wild card. They could just as easily help Equestria or the Changelings. What if they decided to help Equestria? Her thoughts were interrupted by the sound of the palace doors opening, and she got a good look at the aliens. They were walking on two legs, each wearing some variation of black clothing, while the one she had seen on top of the metal contraption was who she assumed as the leader. This was further reinforced by what looked like medals on his chest. Along with his position at the front of what appeared to be an arrowhead formation, the guards assigned to them trailing behind them. The aliens all had a cross between gazes of suspicion and curiosity, while the leader seemed to take it all in stride, you would have thought that he dealt with being teleported to an alien planet every day. They started to move down the street she was in, and she made sure to pay attention to them.
Well this was horribly boring too. I couldn't possibly think of anything more boring down a damn street than fashion stores, clothes shops, fabric stores, fashion stores, jewelry stores, fashion stores. Did I mention fashion stores? The entire street was packed with them. The amount of them seemed to suggest either the people here were stupidly wasteful and wore one outfit per day, or fashion trends were a high-speed roller coaster that switched every single day. Both were unappealing to me, and probably my crew as well. We really never understood how women like going shopping so much, the depressions and war didn't help much. Even worse was the fact that half the ponies on the street were stark naked, so it meant that even less ponies were buying these. This is a broken economic system. Someone's gonna run out of money someday, and when that happens, it all comes crashing down.
There was one that didn't have fashion-related objects on display, and when we walked closer we found it was a bloody casino. Add gamblers to the list of pony types. Must have too much money or something. Oh Dietrich is going to have a field day with this. We found two guards standing outside, with the usual stupid gold armor that was forever impractical.
"Look, a Casino. Why not we set Dietrich loose on them, and we have some drinks in the bar that they're bound to have somewhere. " They agreed, especially Dietrich, the man took pride in breaking casinos within a day. The guards tried to look more intimidating by making themselves look taller, but it didn't matter in the slightest when we were at least twice as tall as them.
"Hello guards, me and my friends here would like to have some fun." They looked at each other for some reason, then they looked at me again.
"Uh, we've never had aliens before, no foals allowed."
"Do we look like children to you!?"
"Uh no sir. It's just that—"
"Good, then let me in." I cut him off before he could go on about regulations and the lot. I had enough of that back in the army. They reluctantly stepped aside, and we walked into the casino. Boy it was packed. Slot machines, Blackjack, Poker, the lot of them, all arrayed neatly in sections. I gave Dietrich all of our money, I trusted him since he's never ever lost money before at gambling. He walked over to the nearest table, while the rest of us walked to the bar nearby, finding a booth to sit at to watch the eventual loss of all the money in the casino. We decided to get some drinks, not like we had anything much to do. I noticed a newcomer come in through the door, she seemed to be looking for someone. Eh, none of my business anyway.
Mirror felt a barrage of lights and sounds when she walked into the casino. It was so goddamn noisy in here, with bets being called out all over the room and the ringing of slot machines. She scanned the area and found that one of the aliens had detached himself from the group to walk to a Poker table. She walked over the same table, but then she found out that particular alien couldn't speak Equestrian, since he seemed to be using hand gestures to communicate. She looked around for the one she knew for sure could speak it, their leader, and found him in a booth in the bar. Mirror went over to the barkeep and asked him for a glass of beer. Technically Changelings were not allowed to drink alcoholic beverages, but it would be used to not draw suspicion to herself, after all, how many people do you see in a bar without a drink? Grabbing the drink with her hooves, she walked over to the booth with the aliens, and used an old trick to get him to talk to her. She pretended to trip, and bumped into him, spilling parts of her drink.
"Oh I'm so so sorry!"
"Nah, it's fine, you didn't get it anywhere important anyway." She felt relieved that she had found the right one, imagine the awkwardness if they couldn't understand each other.
"But still—"
"It's no problem, alright?"
"Okay, I guess."
"What's your name? You're the first local pony that's dared actually approach me. Most look like they wouldn't touch me with a ten feet pole."
She guessed that their feet meant hoof in pony language.
"My name is Radiant Flare."
"So, if my experience is correct, you have something to do with fire?"
"Uh, yes. I'm the local pyrotechnician."
"Ah. I'm Hauptmann Schmidt of the 503rd Heavy Tank Battalion, part of the Wehrmacht of Nazi Germany. You probably won't understand anything past Schmidt."
"Uh... Yeah. So, Schmidt, what is the meaning of the rest of those?" He put down his drink and leaned slightly forward, strangely enough, he had barely touched it.
"Well, Hauptmann means Captain, 503rd Heavy Tank Battalion is the name of the battalion I was in, Wehrmacht means our Military, and Nazi Germany is the name of our country."
She made mental notes in her head regarding the definitions of the words.
Midnight was astonished by how easily Radiant Flare had just simply waltzed up to him, spilled her drink over him, then engage in a conversation that allowed her to know what those weird designations mean. She was slightly jealous of the fact that she dealt with it with such ease, but then she thought that she could get some good out of this, since Schmidt hadn't bothered to keep his voice down, she could report on this information too. Neither of them maybe thought that Schmidt didn't care about said information.
Wow. These ponies are really really bad intelligence agents. I mean seriously, Radiant Flare's doing it slightly better than just straight up asking me, but I guess the peaceful lifestyle really doesn't develop spies.
I looked over to the crew, they were all engaged in some weird drinking contest, they all seemed seriously drunk, and the answer was found when I noticed the large amount of empty glasses. Thankfully, no one should know about German so they could speak with impunity, which was weird since Bernhard was on yelling about how his father had been breeding horses. That would've been a weird conversation.
Dietrich came over, I had originally given him about 100 bits. He returned with a humongous sack filled to the brim with coins. He grabbed a handful of coins, walked up to the bar, and made gestures towards some of the bottles on the shelves. It was like a game of Charades, but this time it was hilarious since the barkeep was much shorter than Dietrich, and the fact that the table had been designed for ponies, which meant that it only came up to Dietrich's hip at best was quite an amusing image. With much gesturing and throwing up his hands, he got what he wanted and came back over. Only to join the rest of them in their insane drinking game and promptly got drunk. They now had all put their hands on each other's shoulders, and were singing the German national anthem. It was quite beautiful, if you could get past the fact that the words were slurred and some parts were left out. Though in their drunken state I'm surprised they pulled it off. I joined them in the second verse.
Mirror was surprised when the aliens started singing some weird song in an alien language. But what was weird was that there was a small trace of love from it. She guessed that it would probably be the national anthem. Schmidt joined in after a while, and he also started to leak love. The five of them combined was essentially a small snack for her, and she drunk it eagerly, the shortage of love meant that she barely got enough to get by. This was also a hugely important fact to the Changelings, the fact that the aliens did have love, and thus could become food sources. After a while they stopped, and they looked quite sad. They got of the booth and left, but not before Schmidt left a generous tip. They all started to return to the palace and when Mirror excused herself, they seemed like they didn't hear her.
Well, since we're drunk, I decided it would be best if we didn't hang out in the streets where we could, in our drunken stupor do some stupid things. Like flirt with the tank, and get into a fight over who would get to marry it. That was one of the weirdest days in my life. My solution was to get back to our rooms and sleep until we were sober again. Damn Gerhard, the lucky bastard, has this weird innate ability to not have hangovers, even when intoxicated into unconsciousness. The rest of us weren't so lucky. Now, here are some weird things about the wedding that I've noticed. It's an open wedding, meaning anyone could just literally walk into the palace, which is stupid since you have the Captain of the Royal Guard, lots of local nobles, two Princesses, Twilight and her friends. Their security awareness was about non-existent. Other than that, is how snobby the locals are. I mean, one even said "Monsters like you should be locked up in the dungeon!" It took my crew and my guards to restrain me from just unholstering my Luger and blowing a hole in her face. To prevent myself from causing more diplomatic incidents, I went back to my room and waited until it was time for the wedding.
"Midnight?" She slightly cocked her head to the side.
"Uh, yes?"
"My tank is still in the parking field right?"
"Yes?"
"Great." I stood up and grabbed all of my gear. She unfolded her legs, which were tucked into her, making her look like some sort of tortoise, and stood up.
"Where are you going?"
"To get my tank." I had slung the STG-44 over my back.
"Why?"
"Because, it's the only thing I'm comfortable with? My only part of my homeland left?" She gave up and walked next to me.
"Time's up sleepyheads! " The response were a lot of thumps coming from the rooms. I had a nice mental image of Gerhard falling off his bed. They came out a while later with their weapons.
"Alright, let's get this over with. " We got back into the tank, and weirdly enough, I started to hear someone start singing, "This day is going to be—" I closed the hatch. I am not listening to some sappy song. Though, I barely was able to hear it over the giant rumbling of the tank anyway. Eh not complaining.
So, someone who would want to appear modest, would've have left his or her tank, then walked on foot into the wedding hall. I am not someone who likes appearing modest. Besides, our projection of power has only helped us so far, it's apparently enticing literally everyone to try and find out our secrets. And, it's helping me learn more about them. So far,what I know of them, is that the nobles are absolute pompous pricks, their spies are horrible at stealth, their army, based off their armour, is impractical. Generally enough, the ponies are also racist and extremely suspicious of strangers. This is world isn't too happy to be living in as an alien is it?
Now, imagine their faces, when we drove the tank into the wedding hall, and parked up in a side of the hall. Oh it was Gerhard's greatest day I imagine. The giant grin he was sporting after gluing his face to the driver slit would also be another indicator. Alright, who's here. The Elements of Harmony, minus Twilight, Princess Celestia, Shining Armor and Princess Mi Amore Cadenza, that dragon. Huh, usually Twilight's always right next to a combination of the above ponies. They were going through some rehearsals that I wasn't paying attention to, because... No offense, but it's kinda boring to anyone not involved. I did start to pay attention when that dragon... Spike, I think, accidentally flung a toy onto the tank, making a giant clang sound which made me snap back to full alertness.
Shining Armor was saying, "Hey, has anybody seen Twilight?"
And speak of the devil here she is... Using magic to slam open the door.
"I'm here! And I'm not going to stand next to her! And neither should you!" Wait, what? Okay, this has been the most entertaining thing so far.
Shining Armor made an embarrassed face and told Princess Mi Amore — You know what, I'm going to call her Cadenza. "Im sorry — I don't know why she's acting like this."
Princess Cadenza looked about ready to rip Twilight's head off at that point. "Maybe we should just ignore her."
Twilight, probably hearing that, said "You have to listen to me!"
That pale yellow one... Uh... Fluttershy? went over to her. "Goodness, are you okay?"
"I'm fine."
Then... Okay, this one has apples, Applejack, also joined Fluttershy, "You're sure about that?"
Twilight used magic to lift her hat and cover her face with it.
"I've got something to say." She strode purposefully down the carpet, while doing so, I sneaked a glance at the two guards wielding spears. I think I don't need to repeat why this is dumb okay? My crew, although not really understanding whatever was being said, knew something was going to happen.
"She's evil." I facepalmed at that. Wow. I know your security was bad but, this is on a whole new level. Either Twilight was insane, which I'm quite inclined to believe right now, or someone had managed to infiltrate the fucking capital of a giant nation, through the guards that guarded the palace, take the appearance of a fucking Princess, and manage to fool everyone close. Yeah, I'm going to lean towards Twilight being insane, or at least wrong about this somehow. I normally would intervene, but the personal affairs of others, of the royals of a country no less, is not my jurisdiction. Seeing as I won't be much of a help, we got back into the tank, the guards assigned to me watching the drama unfold. This was gonna be a very long rehearsal.
Obligatory Special Occasion Chapter
"'Cause tomorrow Spring is here!" Well fuck me, I was pretty annoyed at it being winter. Mainly because it reminded of the frozen hellhole someone decided to call "Russia". My usual solution, since Russians don't exist here, in fact, besides us, there are no humans on the planet, was to wake up late, when the sun was shining so it was somewhere above freezing, and go on a hot drink binge. Well imagine yourself being woken up, at much too early in the morning, by ponies yelling "Winter wrap up! Winter wrap up!" I mean seriously, have you ever heard an entire town sing in synchronization? It's... really freaking loud, like rivaling firing an Acht-Acht pretty close to you kinda loud. And we were inside a fucking tank. So, I opened the hatch during a brief lull in the song.
"My god in heaven what the fuck is going on here!?"
They were all wearing vests... somehow. I still don't know how they got those on them without fingers. Twilight Sparkle seemed to be the only one that didn't have one, and seeing us, quickly walked over to us, while assuring everyone else that it was totally fine.
"What do you mean?"
"Well, I get woken up too early in the morning for winter, by the sound of the entire town singing. Please fucking explain."
"They're wrapping up winter."
"What? Like a present?!" She looked at me with extreme surprise before replying.
"No! They're cleaning up the town, in preparation for Spring!"
"Doesn't spring like, come by itself? I mean yes you do control the weather partially but the seasons?"
"Normally in Canterlot, we would've done this with magic, but Ponyville likes to do this the old fashioned way." I gave her a very unamused look.
"By making everyone's ears bleed?"
"You should really stop saying everyone, the correct words is 'Everypony'. Besides, it's kinda our way of doing things."
"Firstly, no I am not going to stop saying everyone, and you cannot stop me from doing so. Second, that's a highly stupid way of doing things." A sudden thought struck me. "Wait, how long does it normally take for you to do this in Canterlot?"
"Within an hour, a quarter more at worst."
"And how long will it take here?"
"A few hours."
"Well. Traditionalists. My father used to be one, but frankly it was quite inefficient. Everyone seems to have a job, except for you."
"Well, since I just moved here, I wasn't assigned to any team."
"Teams? You have teams?"
"Yes, we're divided into three separate teams, dealing with the air, animals and ground respectively." Apparently someone far off was singing a solo verse, since suddenly the song was back in full force again. Not sure how long I could take this. Wait, maybe if I helped this would be done faster, and I would have less torture! Great plan!
"Can I help?"
"Uh, sure? You should really speak to Mayor Mare then."
"Nah, we'll stick with you." After telling my crew to get ready to move the tank, we followed Twilight Sparkle around the town.
"Do my best toooday~~" I immediately regret my decision. It was like the entire town had decided that Twilight suddenly became the center of all their efforts. AND BY GOD WAS IT LOUD.
I blanked out just so I didn't have to listen to more, right until she started NOT SINGING. THANK YOU!
"How about if I help clear out the clouds?" I facetanked for that one. I was going to point out the obvious, but Rainbow Dash beat me to it by showing Twilight her wings.
"Oh. No wings." She looked pretty sad, and Rainbow Dash apologized before flying off.
"Sorry, Twilight."
"Great, now what do we do?"
"I don't know, I'm following your lead."
Spike said something about taking a nap. And fell asleep. Instantaneously. Somehow.
"This is serious business Spike! Winter needs to be wrapped up and I'm determined to do my part!" Last I heard, they were doing it perfectly fine without you.
Her head lowered slightly before saying something that I didn't hear. She walked off to search for somewhere else to help.
She was walking towards Rarity. Well, time to initiate half-asleep mode. She had a really annoying British accent which reminded me of British, which wasn't a good reminder. Even more ridiculously, they were making fucking nests. With their mouths. Huh? Don't birds build their own nests? Or, from the ponies' interference for over a thousand years has made the animals DEPENDENT on the ponies? Well, they've completely screwed up nature.
"Rarity, please, tell me there's something, anything that I could do to help." Nope, I'm not going to make nests with cute little red bowties on them. It'd get my man card revoked.
Twilight tried her hand at it. And made something resembling putty. Huh. Spike was brutally honest, while Rarity tried to defuse the situation by cheering up Twilight. Rarity tried to salvage the nest by starting to strip out... just about everything. Twilight was demoralized and walked off, leaving Rarity to her devices.
We're going to a lake. Why? Because a pony who defies all the laws of the universe is there, who happens to be one of Twilight's closest friends. Pinkie Pie did a twirl and was making weird shapes onto of a frozen lake with ice skates. Wait. Does snow not melt here? Have you seriously gone to the point where ice refuses to melt? Pinkie Pie was a natural at it apparently, and were doing all sorts of ridiculous poses. Somehow. Then she went on a technical explanation about how cutting the ice into pieces would help. Twilight attempted to join her, and utterly failed at skating. Though, I'm not sure how cutting the ice in a completely random pattern was going to help at all. They all ended up on a bank of the lake before I decided to do their job for them. I fired a tank shell into the middle of the lake, which cracked a gigantic chunk of the frozen lake.
"See, it was that easy." Twilight, Spike's jaws had dropped, while Pinkie was already off, somehow still walking on snow with ice skates on.
Twilight eventually shut her jaw before going to find another friend.
I couldn't hear a single word of what Fluttershy said. But somehow, Twilight had woken some snakes, crashed into a hornet's nest, and got herself stung all over. Gerhard would, and probably did, judging from the snickers from inside the tank, have loved it. Twilight had to be scrubbed with sting lotions and all that for a while.
Twilight had come out a while later, looking perfectly fine, she set off to find something to help. She found Applejack, who was using... What the hell is that. You. What. I. Whatever, I'll roll with it. Twilight had jumped into one of the snow plow-things and had started moving forward. And getting absolutely nowhere. I got off and found a few spare plows and pulled them all over to the front of the tank. Twilight suddenly had picked up speed and was going quite fast. Why is she still accelerating? Uh...
"You're going a little fast there Twilight!"
She couldn't control her path and a giant snowball somehow gathered. And was being pushed towards Applejack and Spike. Who were caught up in the ball... Then the entire thing crashed on. Something? And a giant avalanche of snow rendered the work of all the other ponies null and void. I facepalmed while sighing, and told Gerhard to start driving the tank up and down the area. We were able to fit about seven on the things on the front of the tank, and within a few passes, I had fixed Twilight's mistake, while all the earth ponies' jaw muscles malfunctioned. Twilight and Applejack had a giant fight in that time. Twilight did go off to hide in a bush. I unattached the snow plows and ordered the tank back to the center of town.
The three teams had some sort of argument. Then Twilight had come out of her bush to present her services. To organize the entire thing. I didn't pay attention. Which meant that I was surprised when me and my crew were assigned to multiple different tasks. Here's the list of tasks she made me.
Make nests (Fingers make it go much faster)
Plow Snow (Using the tank to push it)
Break up the ice (With the tank's weapon)
Melt Snow (With your Flammenwerfer)
Plant seeds (Using the tank to push it)
So basically she just assigned us to do everything, save move clouds and wake up animals. Well fuck me today's going to be a long day.
After finishing the tasks, thankfully the ponies also helped. Yeah. You see that giant pile of nests next to that one pony who was making nests? Those were ours. The grid was for a small lake, while we cracked the rest. We did push most of the snow out using the tank, then we also had to use... something with blades at the end of it to do something to the soil which was attached to the end of the tank. They also had a water convoy. The tank pulled the volume of the Ponyville water tower in that one. Then there was also the clean-up phase, where the tank had to pull, about half of the tools they used in this fucking Wrap Up.
THEN THEY FUCKING PRAISED TWILIGHT FOR HER ORGANISATIONAL SKILLS. AND HAD A GIANT PARTY IN HER HONOR, unsurprisingly held by Pinkie Pie.
I'm fucking done. Nope. Not coming outta this damn tank for a week at BEST. SEE HOW YOU DO WITHOUT ME PONYVILLE!
Drama and Twilight is sad.
The rest of the ponies were murmuring among themselves, before Twilight tried to drive her point home.
"She's been horrible to my friends." That's not a valid reason. As much as it stands, being an asshole doesn't mean you're a dick. She teleported next to Cadenza. What's with the theatrics?
"She's obviously done something to her bridesmades." How is a reshuffling of personnel a crime? Even then, as long as she didn't mean any harm to them, there is absolutely nothing wrong. She slowly started to advance on Cadenza
"And if that wasn't enough, I saw her put a spell on my brother that made his eyes go—" Her eyes... Wait, did they just independently spin? As far as I knew, from personal experience or otherwise, the best we could do was get ourselves cross-eyed, never de-synchronize them to the point of independance! That's... highly disturbing, to say the least. She also stuck her tongue out when doing so. Everyone, even my crew were highly confused. Princess Cadenza looked highly uncomfortable, and... Princess Celestia was standing slanted from the floor? Oookay... Apparently the pressure was too much, as Princess Cadenza started crying.
"Why are you doing this to me?" She started to run out of the hall. Twilight pointed towards her like she won or something.
"Because you're evil!" She teleported to the door.
"Evil!" She made a gesture remarkably similar to someone clenching their fists and shaking them towards the sky.
"If I don't stop you now you're going to ruin my brother's life!" Wow. Control freak much. If your brother wants to marry someone that... technically hasn't done anything wrong all, he's totally free to do so. Everyone's reactions were a mix of confusion and shock. Twilight turned around and began to triumphantly stride down the hall, her head held high, only to bump into Shining Armor. And he did not look happy.
"You want to know why my eyes went all—" He did that weird eye thing again. Okay, it seemed to be something that all ponies could do. And I swear, a fucking star flew out his horn.
"—Because ever since I started my protection spell, I've been getting terrible migraines. Cadence hasn't been using spells on me, she's been using her magic to heal me." Her name is Cadence, okay. Twilight looked like she was about to retort, when he continued his debunking of her theories.
"And she decided to replace her bridesmaids, because she found out that the only reason that they were in the wedding, was so they could meet Canterlot royalty."
"And she hasn't been on her best behavior with your friends—" He slammed his hoof on the floor for emphasis, "Is because of me being so busy, she's had to make all the decisions about the wedding!" Personally, I don't get it. But some of my friends who have gotten married also told me of this.
"I was just trying to—"
"She's completely stressed out because it's really important that our big day be perfect!" He slammed both his hooves down on the floor this time. He also seemed to now be in full rant and panic mode.
"Something, that obviously wasn't important to you." Twilight looked kinda angry by then. Also, Shining Armor had another one of his... supposed migraines that cause stars to pop out of his forehead then. Hey, maybe Gerhard could... Wait, does Aspirin even work on ponies?
"Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go and comfort my bride." Twilight looked she was panicking and stretched her hoof out to Shining Armor
"And you can forget being my best mare. In fact, if I were you, I wouldn't show up to the wedding at all." That's... kinda harsh. But not really my business anyway.
"Come on y'all, let's go check on the Princess." Twilight's friends walked right past Twilight without even giving her a second glance. Except Spike. And why is he still holding that red cushion?!
"I was just—" She was cut off by Celestia
"You have a lot to think about." Strangely enough, her wings were all spread out. Does this means that she's angry? Alright, note to self, spread out wings means that they're very angry.
Twilight looked ready to break down, and she was already crying. The guards closed the door with a resounding slam. Did they forget about us or something?
"Maybe I was being a little overprotective." That's the understatement of the month. Also, she still didn't pay attention to us. I mean seriously, the tank was painting in camouflage, but, it was painted for forest conditions, and I don't see a single fucking speck of yellow here anyway, which was the base color of the tank.
"I would have gained a sister." She walked up the stairs, and laid herself ontop of it. I don't know why, Stair's sharp angles not being the best place to rest... well anything really.
"Instead, I just lost a brother." Her horn lit up, and I swear on my honor as a German, she made what looked like one of those toy versions that Spike smacked me in the head with earlier, and started moving them around, all the while crying. The magic... I don't know what to call them. Starting dancing around one another.
"He was my very very best friend, forever..." The one that was supposedly representing Shining Armor disappeared.
"And now we'll never do anything, together..." The one that represented Twilight looked terribly sad. It was later squished by Princess Cadence.
Cadence put a comforting hoof on — Wait, Where in the holy name of God in heaven did she come from? Didn't she leave about a minute ago!? Also, how did she get through the — I checked to be sure — still closed doors?
Cadence had put a hoof on Twilight's head. I refuse to think anything beyond that.
"I'm sorry!" Twilight looked up, her eyes filled with tears, into Cadence's eyes.
Suddenly, Cadence's face scrunched up into a scowl. Her horn suddenly glowed... Green? I expected something like pink, seeing how Twilight's was purple, Princess Celestia's was yellow, Princess Luna's was dark blue, but hey, I know fuck all about this shit.
Then shit started getting weird. Twilight immediately jerked up, and was surrounded by fucking green flames. Oh god in heaven save us. The freaky green flames formed a circle around Twilight, then formed a dome over her head, and slowly... Is she being absorbed by the ground!? Is she being sent to Hell or something!? I prayed to the god that I technically didn't believe in. Oh god please, save us from whatever the hell that is! Twilight's entire body was soon absorbed into the damn floor. Cadence walked onto the higher section of the hall... For some reason. I decided it would be the best fucking time to leave. Like right fucking now. The crew were saying prayers, grabbing their guns very tightly to their chests. Even normally calm Gerhard, who could find a joke to crack in any situation, looked horrified.
"Get us the fuck out of here now! "
No objects were met as Gerhard drove the tank as fast as it could go, out the main hall doors. I am not going to deal with this shit. Fucking hell nope. I need a drink right about now.
Twilight and her friends were all inside her brand new sparkly castle. Which is still way too sparkly for my tastes. Rainbow Dash was going on about their exploits, something about Keys, Tirek and a sweet castle. Twilight was being all philosophical again when she sat on her seat. The cutie mark on their respective seats started to glow. Due to past experience, my first instinct was to locate my tank and hide inside it. When you've been here as long as I have, glowing things mean giant weaponized doom, for example, a few days ago with Tirek, Giant Glowing Ball. The wedding, giant glowing shockwave, the Crystal Empire giant glowing heart, Discord, giant glowing Elements of Harmony. Oh, even worse if it's spinning. So, when I jumped back into the tank and waited for the impending shockwave, explosion, something to come, there was nothing. So, I decided it would be a good idea to drive the tank into the castle room itself, the doorway was clearly big enough for us.
We drove in to find a giant crystal table that wasn't there a second ago, Spike walking on said table and stepping on something and Pinkie Pie looking sad. Then glowing symbols of their cutie marks, which made me duck my head in again, since the last few times I saw them meant that the Elements of Harmony were being used, flew from the place where Ponyville was marked on the map, to some random area in a mountain. Twilight made some speech about how the Elements of Harmony were connected to the Tree of Harmony, which was connected to the castle, which created this map. Therefore, it must be telling them to go there. I won't go on about how that may not be the case, since it all did was show their Cutie Mark symbols over a mountain. Twilight and her friends made some plans discussing about how they would go there, while Spike turned down the offer of going, in favour of Hoofball. I decided to tag along, since they're going into the middle of about nowhere and not to brag, but we're the only crew that's equipped heavily enough to take down dragons. Dragons! 88mm cannons with AP shells do help a lot.
I didn't know their trains had absolutely stunning brakes. I should ask them them about it. I mean really, have you ever seen a train, going at full speed, stop in three seconds. I think I'm going to call Magic being the cause of it. It's always Magic around here. Anything interesting? Magic. Anything powerful? Magic. I have yet to find something that's seriously powerful and is not related to Magic somehow.
Well that was a fucking long road trip. At least the tank offered shelter, to us, Twilight and her friends. There are so many ways a tank could be used, you just don't know that some of them are quite unorthodox. So, we arrive on the edge of a cliff, looking at a small quaint town, built in two columns, with one random house in the front. Pinkie rolled down the cliff and was now attempting to hide under rocks. The rest of them followed her down, but not doing the same weird thing she was doing. I learned not to question Pinkie Pie, it makes my head hurt less. It was a pretty steep slope, but we managed to do it without anything falling out or the tank tipping over. After checking that nothing had fallen out, I looked up to see Pinkie Pie lifting a boulder, which was somehow flat, and motion to Twilight and the rest of them to come over.
Later, we managed to find out that they didn't have normal Cutie Marks, instead they were all equal signs for some reason. Twilight remarked that it's impossible and I'm no expert on Cutie Marks so I'll go with neutrality on this one. We all started going into the town, and got greeted by seriously weird smiles. It was seriously unnerving and Pinkie Pie went so far as to say "I know smiles, and those smiles? They're just not right!"
"Well you've certainly come to the right place for friendship."
Oh brother, more of this friendship stuff. I think I'm slowly starting to hate the word friendship, since it usually brings with it a horribly long lecture or speech about how friendship is good and so on and so forth which I never paid attention to anyway. So I my brain slowly began detaching itself from reality. All I got afterwards was mostly their motivation for coming... What's the name of this town anyway!? They did the basic introductions, Twilight asked if there was any trouble, they made some weird looks at their Cutie Marks, before taking us to their leader, some pony named Starlight Glimmer.
More introductions, rapid fire talking, talking about where they found out about the village, a long story, Pinkie Pie as usual popping in with a very detailed explanation later... "We're happy to have anypony that wants to experience true friendship for the first time." Starlight Glimmer stressed the true in that sentence, and her eyes dilated. No, not just her pupils, that's normal, but even her irises shrunk. Her fucking irises! Maybe it's some weird pony ability, like de-synchronized independent rotating eyes?
"Say what?" Applejack, as blunt as ever.
Then she went on explaining why the village was special and what those equal signs meant. Then Twilight asked her about all of them having the same Cutie Mark.
"Perhaps it would be easier to understand if I gave you a tour of the village!" Oh no. There was high chance that the ponies would spontaneously break into song. It was quite loud if enough of them sang all at once. And then a drum started playing. Well that was a surefire sign that they were about to sing a song, at least we had some forewarning about this one. I grabbed the radio and placed the earmuffs securely over my ear, I also noticed my crew doing the same. From the sound of the rhythm, it was a marching song. Starlight Glimmer herself wasn't loud enough to be heard with the earmuffs, but when they sang the chorus I could hear it just fine.
"In our town! In our town! We don't have to wait!" Wait? "To find out our destiny is just to emulate!" That's a paradox in of itself. If you emulate somepony that is emulating another pony who is emulating another pony, are you emulating yourself?
They stopped singing, and Starlight Glimmer picked up the song, but again, one pony's voice couldn't be heard over the earmuffs.
"In our town! In our town! We not dare compete! Winning only brings the worst ego-filled conceit." That is fundamentally wrong on so many levels. I took off the headphones and hung it around my neck, trying to listen to Starlight Glimmer's reasoning for this.
"Life is a joy in our town! We're all equal here! No one is superior, and no one shakes in fear!" The rising of the orchestra meant that it was time to put on the headphones again. Hmm, that equal part seems eerily similar too... Wait, it is quite similar to... Are these ponies... Do I dare say it, Communist!? Let me go through the checklist. Oppressed people? Check. Absolutely no freedom? Check, since they had to drop everything for the song. Absolute order? Check.
"In our town! In our town! We work as a team! You can't have a nightmare! If you can never dream!" Emphasising Teamwork? Check. Cult levels of devotion? Check. What's left is one of the ponies going "For the people!" or "For the motherland!" and I could be seriously doubting if this isn't the Soviet Union. She went on about how it would be better for Equality and so on and so forth. I couldn't care less for it. They went on for a bit longer, all about how equality was superior and we should join them. Tough luck!
"We were all once confused once, blinded by the promise of our Cutie Marks." Seeing parallels to Communism very strongly here...
"When we were sent to this village, we assumed it was to help in some way." Well, as I said, you're assuming that, the map did nothing but tell you to get here— Oh no, I know where this is going. "But, well... It doesn't seem like you need any help." I'll give them the benefit of the doubt... One more sign of Communism, I'm officially labeling them Bolsheviks and blasting them to pieces.
"Have you considered perhaps that you've been sent here so we could help you?" Called it! She went on about how we were free, pushing more propaganda into our faces.
"But there's no reason to be rude!" Yes there is when they're nearly Communists! The only thing left is the fact that the free market still exists! Wait, that's a pretty big part of Communism.
Then they started arguing about the map, Cutie Marks and so on. A random pony walked up behind them and they still won't shut up. Again, leaving themselves open to being exploited for information and future plans.
"My name is Sugar Belle, what can I bring you? We have Muffins." Wait, is that it? Huh. Why do I feel like there should be more? It's this town's Equality, I swear!
Pinkie Pie order a dozen muffins, and they go on discussing about the village, in plain sight this time. Sugar Belle popped in and started to ask about how they were disagreeing a second ago and were now agreeing. It happens a lot, that happens to me and my crew too. She also carried out a tray of burnt looking muffins. Yeah no, not touching that. Twilight then later agreed that they were being watched. Well excuse me oh smart one, but why weren't you just announcing your plans fucking seconds ago!?
Sugar Belle did leave us with one final message. "Come inside before you go, meet me downstairs!"
Of course Twilight decides to immediately trust the random pony in this random village in the middle of random nowhere! A loud clang was emitted from inside the tank somewhere when Twilight decides to now discuss how to go down into some random pony's house. I rubbed my now very sore forehead, for a tank is made out of metal and it is not a soft material. Twilight and her friends walk into the house after faking eating all of the muffins, and she tells me that we should be outside the door, just so it doesn't look suspicious with a tank inside. What? "Did she think I was glued to the tank or something?"
"You are Schmidt!"
"Shut up Gerhard!"
So, Sugar Belle must have told them something, because we were now in the middle of Nowhere, going up to the Nowhere Cave in the of Nowhere Mountain. No it's not actually called that, but I decided it would be better if I had something besides "Village", "Mountain" and "Cave" to name these. What all I heard of Starlight's Glimmer speech as we went up the mountain was basically this, "Blah Blah Blah Vault, Blah Blah Blah Pilgrimage, Blah Blah Blah Cutie Mark Removed." Now we were going into the creepy cave in the middle of Nowhere.
"Behold!" Holy shit. That is a giant fucking vault! "Our Cutie Mark vault!"
"I've never seen anything like it!" Me neither!
"And here, is the staff of Sameness." What. That's the stupidest name I've ever heard! "It was one of the great mage Metalwork's nine enchanted items!" Whee I know fuck all about this.
More propaganda later...
"I'm curious, how did the subject of the vault come up?"
"Uh... some ponies told us they miss their Cutie Marks and—" I... I don't even. Please. Never. Ever. Hire these six espionage-retarded ponies as spies. Please. Multiple clangs were heard as all five of us began smashing our foreheads into the tank itself. "Oops."
"Well, it seems that you inspire all sorts of free thinking don't you?" Oh god. Communist levels of oppression.
"Well, we didn't mean to cause any disruptions to your charming village." Rarity, please, Communists.
"Good. Let's make sure of that, shall we?" Haha! Here comes the betrayal! Why am I happy about this!? Oh yeah!
"I WAS RIGHT! BOLSHEVIKS CONFIRMED!" I stood straight, pronouncing this highly important information to the world! Then my brain kicked in and now I was suddenly worried. Magic is a serious unknown. Also, Nowhereville ponies seemed to come out of the walls to surround us.
"It's a trap!" Thank you for your very insightful comments Twilight. I'm sure that we shall benefit greatly from this analysis.
Twilight teleported into the air and started charging her magic, before being blasted by the Staff of Sameness. She suddenly looked like she was in pain. Wow. Wait what the fuck!?
"Hey! Hello? Deutschland to Twilight's Friends? Help her?" They gave no reaction at all, besides staring at Twilight. Twilight's Cutie Mark was pulled out and was stored in the vault. Twilight had a very strict no shooting ponies rule. She did a whole weird magical pact thing that I had to sign on, which I am too scared of breaking right now, so we couldn't do anything at all. Twilight's friends' Cutie Marks were also pulled out soon enough and were put in the vault. Starlight Glimmer turned the staff on us and did nothing. No seriously, I know, she tried fourteen times. Each attempted bounced off the hull of the tank like a normal shell would, never penetrating the armor. Starlight resolved to just grab Twilight and her friends to bring them back to the village, and we couldn't shoot them, so we couldn't stop them.
"Can't we just shoot the walls down? " Gerhard was thinking of ideas to save them.
"We might hit them with the shell, even then it might compromise the structural integrity. "
"How about ramming it? "
"Same reasoning as above, but this time with crushing them. "
I hoped that they would make some plan. We couldn't do anything.
I was just as shocked as they were at Fluttershy's converting to Equalism. I'm going to call it Equalism. Sue me. But really, Fluttershy, I'm kinda disappointed in you. Unless... Nah, she's too meek to be a spy. Not to say absolutely horrible at espionage and subtlety. Well, I can't leave without Twilight calling for a train, since we don't have the fuel to go back.
Wait a second, is that Fluttershy from Starlight Glimmer's chimney? Well she's gonna need some help for this. I'm surprised that she's managed to make it out so far, guess she isn't that bad of a spy after all! She's still pretty horrible though, mark my words. The tank gave her a ledge to stand on as she looked into Starlight Glimmer's room, and we both saw something that was a serious twist. She was actually masking her Cutie Mark all along! Dictatorship levels? Stalin.
Tomorrow morning, Starlight Glimmer was exposed by Fluttershy and thus there was an ensuing scramble for the villagers to get their Cutie Marks back. Ignoring Twilight and her friends. If there was one thing to say about that confrontation, Starlight Glimmer is fucking insane. Twilight and her friends' Cutie Marks were in Starlight Glimmer's room, as seen by me and Fluttershy yesterday. The tried to knock down the door, their desperation ignoring our attempts to get them to move out of the way so we could use the tank's long barrel to ram open the door.
"Stand back everypony!" Oh. Now they listen!?
The door was rammed open and we drove the tank in. I was way to angry to seriously care about structural integrity at this point. Oh look she was smart enough to have an escape plan! Wow. The opening was barely big enough, but the tank's weight was able to make the opening slightly bigger. The cave that it was at was big enough, if we scratched a few spots here and there.
Then one of the Nowhereville ponies made a pair of balloon binoculars? What fucking. I can't grammar. I slapped myself, and I'll deal with this later.
"She's headed for the pass! If she gets there, we'll never find her!" Technically impossible, if we surround all possible exits.
"There's a whole network of caves up there! Your Cutie Marks will be gone forever!" Why not just blow up the cave system then? The range would be too far for now, but if we... Yeah, that could work. Rainbow Dash was flapping her wings as hard as possible to try and go faster.
"Oh god. This is hilarious! Hahahaha! Wow, even we're faster than you!" Yes! Sweet revenge! The slow Tiger was faster than them! Yes! We left them in the dust.
They were chasing Starlight Glimmer up to a pass. I told the crew to aim the bridge, hopefully blowing it up to stop her from escaping.
"Fire! " The shell missed the bridge slightly and fell into the abyss below. Bernhard loaded another shell and Albrecht adjusted the angle slightly.
"Fire! " Sadly enough, Starlight Glimmer had just passed the bridge, and when the shell hit, she blasted the bridge with her magic at the same time, causing the bridge to collapse. Well FUCK.
Wait, did he just fucking— I give up, this guy's on Pinkie Pie levels of Logic. And by that I mean absolutely none! Maybe if we aimed for... Yes that could work
"Aim for the mountain! If we can shake some snow, we can block her path! " The turret began to rotate to aim towards one of the snow-filled peaks.
"Fire! " At the same time, the white Nowhereville pony skied down from another mountain, the shell's impact helping to shake loose the snow to stop Starlight Glimmer. She was buried in snow, and the glass jars holding the Cutie Marks of Twilight and her friends were all returned to them. For some inconceivable reason, they were all standing at the snow pile rather than oh I don't know... MAYBE TAKING STARLIGHT GLIMMER IN FOR CUSTODY? Starlight Glimmer got out of the snow pile, and boy did she look pissed. Twilight did get their in time to block the laser that she used, creating a shield to protect the four Nowhereville ponies. And then decided to go on arguing when she could have oh I don't know... ARRESTED HER WITH HER MAGIC? Then she makes a giant bubble that distracts everyone for a while and she gets away.
Then they decide to hold a party. I'll admit that their regaining of their Cutie Marks is a cause for celebration, but... Isn't Starlight Glimmer only going to go off and find some other random village or town to Equalize? And then she'll be back, with a vengeance? I don't get these ponies sometimes. But hey, it's the world I live in now.
View Online
You have been cordially invited to the royal wedding between Shining Armor and Princess-whose-name-is-a-mouthful
My recollection of what happened after that was fuzzy, since my brain had all but shut down during the oxygen-starved run, and I sincerely hoped that my brain did not lose brain cells in the process of suffocating it. Mostly it felt like I had gone drinking a lot, with the same sort of hangover that greeted me as I woke up. I found myself in the tank, in a sitting position while my head was looking at my legs. My neck decided that a world of hurt was necessary and sent it to my brain, along with my everything screaming the same message. I groaned and straightened up, hoping that the pinpricks of pain and the numbness would wear off. I placed a hand of my forehead, hoping that I could out-pain the headache.
"What happened, did we have a giant party or something? " Gerhard heard my voice and turned around to speak to me from his usual driver seat.
"Well, after you decided to go dashingly save the princess from danger, you walked back here like a zombie, got in and fell asleep like a sack of bricks for a day. "
"Ha ha very funny. So wait, I've essentially missed a day? "
"Yep, nice going there hero in shining armor. "
"Oh enough with the darned knight jokes, what did I miss? "
He shrugged, "Ever since you've threatened them, they've been very reluctant to approach us, and even if they do they run off when we spot them. So essentially, what happened was that we lost all of our money to Dietrich. Again. No idea how he's that good at poker. "
"I sometimes think he cheats. You guys never learn do you? " Shaking my head in disapproval of their lack of sense not to continue playing with someone who clearly is able to take all of their money.
"Nothing interesting enough happens without you running around, saving damsels in distress, and literally not a single pony wanted anything to with us. So, we didn't have many options. "
"Firstly, enough with the knight jokes, they're getting old at this point. Secondly, do you have some painkillers? " He nodded and tossed me a small box. It read 'Asprin' on the cover, proclaiming in German that it would "Cure all your fevers, migraines and inflammatory diseases! "
"Any water? "
He pointed towards a water canteen placed nearby on the engine. "That one's yours anyway. "
I unscrewed the cap and put the pill in my mouth. I used a generous amount of water to wash it down, and to get rid of the bitter aftertaste.
"What now? " I asked
"We wait for our mighty Hauptmann to go off on an insane adventure again. "
I climbed out of the tank, hoping a nice walk would relax my mind. Only to be stopped by Twilight.
"Excuse me, Mister Schmidt? Could I stop for just for a second?"
I stopped my walk and sighed.
"If it's another question session, No I am not giving up my technological secrets even if they would benefit you greatly."
"Oh, sorry, it's not that, though I do have a few—" She stopped herself from going of on a random tangent.
"—Never mind, On Behalf of Princess Celestia, we invite you to the wedding of Shining Armor and Princess Mi Amore Cadenza."
"I have never heard of whoever Cadenza is." She scrunched up her face and looked like she was trying to figure out who she was too, after a while she gave up.
"I honestly have no clue either. She better be nice, I wonder why my BBBFF didn't tell me earlier?"BBBFF? Big Ballistic Balls For Friends? Whatever.
She appeared to have gone into her own world again, and I would have left it at that, except for one thing.
"How will we get there?"
She snapped out of her reverie and looked at me. Her ears pressing themselves on her head and blushed.
"Oh, I'm so sorry for doing that, as for your question, your transportation has been arranged by Princess Celestia, a chariot will be here to pick you up."
"Can the chariot carry seventy tons?"
"Uh no, you'll have to leave your tank behind."
"Nope."
"But it'll be—"
"Nope."
"But—"
"Nope! Without my tank we are going nowhere!"
"I guess you could use the train.However, you'll have to start travelling today, the wedding is set for tomorrow. I'll tell Princess Celestia of your decision."
"As long as I don't have to part from my tank, I am fine with it."
"Oh! I almost forgot!" She passed me a small purse of their local currency. "The Princess told me to give this to you, for any miscellaneous spending."
"Thank you, now if you'll excuse me, I have to buy me some tickets."
I walked back to the tank, and finding that only Gerhard was still inside, hollered,
"Bernhard! Dietrich! Albrecht! Assemble in front of me. Now! "
Bernhard and Albrecht came running from the marketplace and Dietrich came from a random side street.
"We have been invited by the ruler of Equestria to attend a wedding. It will be horribly boring but we must do so as to represent our species and the Fatherland. Any questions? "
Dietrich raised up his hand. "Do we need anything to wear? "
"Nein, I believe our military outfits will be enough. Clip as many medals on them as possible though. "
They mostly seemed satisfied, before Gerhard asked the important question from inside the tank.
"What time are we moving out then? "
I'm going to love their reactions.
"Right now! "
Their jaws all dropped, and I suspected that Gerhard's did too if I could see him right now.
"With all due respect sir, isn't this— "
"It's either you leave the tank behind, or we go now. "
They slowly agreed that leaving the tank was a horribly bad idea.
"Excellent. Gerhard, start the tank up, everyone else get in. We're going to the train station. " Hopefully all turns out well.
"Why can't you carry my damn tank up there? You have trains for god's sake!"
The conductor shook his head. "We cannot possibly carry a seventy ton machine all the way to Canterlot. Our trains do not have the horsepower."
"Alright, how much does the rest of the train weigh, full of passengers?"
"About 10 tons for the 3 mail carriages, 20 for the 2 passenger coaches. Why?"
"Unhook your locomotive."
"Wait what?! No no no no! What are you trying to do?!"
"I'll drag this sorry load all the way to Canterlot with my tank. I'm not paying for this."
"What? No no no!" I pulled out my Luger again, and pointed at his face.This seems to be a common thing now.
"Wasn't a suggestion."
He unhooked the locomotive, and slowly switched it to another track, while Gerhard drove the tank onto the tracks. I chose a few more train cars, those filled with assorted things like Iron Ore, Coal
"You sure this is a good idea? "
"Nope! But I'm not leaving the tank behind! "
I attached the first carriage to the tank with a chain, and jumped into the tank.
"Let's get this show on the road! "
The Tiger's Maybach engine groaned and started to move. All 12 pistons beginning their wonderful symphony. The Tiger stopped for a while when the chain pulled taut, and it proceeded to move on just fine, the train carriages barely providing resistance to the powerful engine, designed to power a 70 ton tank. The weird convoy slowly pulled out of the station, slowly picking up speed. I stood in the cupola, going to admire the scenery, to explore a new area. I was in high spirits, and everything seemed it was going to go well. Nothing could possibly go wrong. Right?
