Equestria's last hope

8 platoon woke up that morning. It was a beautiful day, the sun was shining with no clouds to be seen. They were taken down to breakfast as normal, but afterwards, were taken to a large room with what looked to be about 200 seats and a large stage at the front with a huge screen behind it. They sat in one of the middle columns of seats. Pepper turned to Argyle, he looked back at pepper, both with the look of curiosity on their faces.

"I wonder what they brought us in here for." Pepper asked himself, not realising that he had said it out loud.

"I'm not sure, your guess would be as good as mine." Argyle whispered unsure wether they were supposed to be talking or not.

"Maybe they're sending us to buck some zebra flank." He whispered back, trying to hide his excitement.

"Calm down war is not fun nor is it a game." He thought to himself.

His thoughts were interrupted by Argyle. "I doubt it, we've just finished training."

There was a deep voice that echoed through the whole room. "I am Major Flash." He had a calm tone but you could see in his face that this was serious. "I'm sure you are aware of our current situation that we have with the zebras at the moment. Our intelligence suggests that there is a zebra living in the Everfree Forest. She is believed to be friendly but she may have changed her mind. Your mission is to go and get her before the zebras do."

A picture of Zecora appeared on the screen behind him. "This is Zecora, known in Ponyville for being mysterious and creating a lot of spells and magic, so stay alert. You will all be taken to separate drop of locations via dropship. Three groups of twelve, or sections one, two and three will secure the area of the forest surrounding her hut. Four section, you will be going to the hut to grab her, okay?"

"That's us, we get to go in." Pepper whispered to Argyle still struggling to hide his excitement.

Argyle sighed. "Shhhh, your gunna get us in trouble."

Flash continued. "Then when she is secure, you will take her to the castle where she will be handed over to princess Celestia. Any questions?" He asked his audience. "No... good, you deploy tomorrow. That's all, your dismissed."

The next morning came and pepper had the biggest smile and was so excited. He was wearing his Mk VI light combat armour with a assault rifle on the right side of his battle saddle. The were all given four full magazines of thirty rounds and the team medics carried the medical supplies in saddle bags. The boarded the dropships, the were big, not huge but relatively big. They were light blue with white blotches to try to make it blend in with the sky. They got in through a sliding door on the sides which had a mounted machine gun on each side.

" you ready for this? Argyle asked Pepper.

"Are you kidding, I can't wait!" He replied, eyes wide and a bigger smile than earlier. He looked like he had spent the whole night drinking Apple Cola.

Argyle was a bit scared of his response, but he knew Pepper was harmless. Or so he thought.

The flight to their drop off point took a while, Pepper didn't say a word the whole trip, he just sat in his harness wide eyed. They eventually landed. They got off.

"Hay Pepper!" Came a voice from inside the dropship.

Pepper turned. "Yea?"

He noticed one of the pilots was looking at him. " when you get her radio in and we will pick you up from the hut, okay?" The pilot shouted to make sure he was heard over the roar of the load engines that had been built by the department of science.

Pepper nodded. " okay." He replied, seeming to have calmed down now.

They moved through the forest until the were not even ten meters from Zecora's hut. "Is everypony in position?" Pepper asked on his radio.

"Team one in position."

"Team three in position."

... There was no reply from team two. They all waited for team two to get in position. Then, after a minute which seemed like ages they replied.

"Team two in position, sorry for the wait gentlecolts."

"Okay, team four moving towards the target." Pepper moved his team towards the hut. "Sparkle, Twist, you're both coming in with me, the rest of you, cover the surroundings." The three ponies bucked down the door and Burst in, rifles ready to fire.

"Don't move Zecora!" Pepper demanded.

"I will obey, what ever you say." She rhymed.

"Sparkle, Twist, check the rooms. Argyle get in here and secure her." Pepper ordered.

Sparkle and Twist shortly returned. "There's nothing suspicious here." Twist added.

Pepper nodded. "Okay, good."

He walked out the hut and threw a smoke grenade on the ground which bellowed out purple smoke. Two minutes later the dropship had landed in front of them and the loaded Zecora on then got on themselves.

"Buckle up, next stop, Canterlot Castle." Said the pilot.

They lifted of the ground and the engines rotated from vertical to horizontal to power it through the air. They were soon joined by the other three dropships. The flight was quiet, the sun was shining, not a cloud in the sky. BANG! The was a loud explosion as the last dropship dropped out of the sky in a giant fireball like a tonne of bricks.

"We have two zebra dropships on our rear!" Explained the pilot, looking very panicked.

"Well let's have them then!" Pepper was more than angry at this point, he just lost twelve of his platoon. BANG! Another ship was destroyed.

"Kill them now!" Pepper shouted getting even angrier. The second, or now rear dropship banked right, swinging round behind one of the zebra ships and fire a long burst of 20mm high explosive rounds into its hull, ripping it to pieces sending it straight into the ground below.

"Yea, that's what I'm talking about!" Pepper cheered, but as he did the second zebra ship dived from above firing at the rear ship, shredding its wings. It exploded and tumbled to the ground. But the pilot was still alive as it fell.

"Mayday, mayday. DR3 is hit. I repeat we are hit. We're goi-...". Silence. Peppers ship was the only one left.

Pepper watched it fall to the ground, then looked up to see that the zebra ship was right behind them. He could see the zebra pilots face. They looked each other in the eye.

"Warning, missile lock detected!" Came a voice from the ships A.I system.

The ship jolted but managed to stay up, smoke bellowing from his ship, the instruments stopped working and fluid was spraying out off pipes.

"Warning, missile lock detected!" The A.I repeated. " deploying countermeasures. Countermeasures not functioning." Warning incoming mis-..." The ship jolted again. All power was lost. They dropped from the sky. Zecora began to mumble chants to herself and nopony seemed to notice. Pepper looked through the cockpit window as the ground crept closer and closer. At the last second a pink sphere surrounded her, Pepper, Argyle, Sparkle and Twist. The ship hit the ground and came to a halt just out side Ponyville where a small number of six platoon were patrolling.  They had seen it fall from the sky and rushed to the crash site, unaware of why it had crashed. They pulled Pepper our first and as they did so, he awoke.

"Where is it?" He mumbled, still dazed and vision blurred. His head was spinning.

"Where's wh-..." He didn't get to finish his sentence as he was ripped to shreds by the zebra ship. Peppers face was sprayed with his blood. He wiped his eyes and dragged himself to his hooves. The othe soldier ponies had began to fire back, but were obliterated by a hail of small rockets. He scrambled to find his rifle, picked it up in his mouth and opened fire. Bullets bounced off its hull. The ships canon turned to face Pepper and opened fire.

"Argh!" He jumped to the side and burst through the door of a near by house. He looked through the window to see a rocket coming towards the house. It hit and exploded. Rubble went everywhere. He got up to find that the zebra drop ship had landed and four zebras had got out and moved to the wreckage. One zebra poked his head in through the side. BANG! A shot echoed as the zebra dropped th the floor. The othe three got in and dragged out Twist, who had fired the shot. Pepper watched in horror as they put Twists own weapon to his head and pulled the trigger. The bullet went through one side and out of the other.

"Nooooooo!" Pepper shouted as loud as he could, but instantly realised the mistake he had made.

"He's still alive. Kill the pony scum." Commanded one of the zebras, and as he said it a hail of bullets hit what was left of the house that Pepper had taken refuge in. Pepper scrambled to his hooves and scurried to the back of the house. The back door was locked. He bucked it down with all the strength he could gather. He galloped round the back of the house and stopped at the end of the wall. He could see the wreckage and it wasn't to far.

"If I'm quiet then they won't notice me." He thought to himself as he began to sneak towards it. He looked inside, there was blood everywhere. The was a cough. Argyle woke up.

"Where are we, is everypony okay?" He asked, still dazed.

"Don't worry about that yet, come on." Pepper dragged him out and put his rifle in his battle saddle. The zebras were moving towards the house. One turned and saw them both.

"Their behind us." One of the zebras shouted. The turn and began to shoot at Pepper and Argyle. Argyle fired back, but Pepper noticed the Zecora was still breathing. He dragged her out and pulled her behind the wreckage where they had taken cover. The zebra ship began to take off. Pepper and Argyle simultaneously ran out of bullets.

"So this is the end?" Argyle commented.

The zebras crept closer and the ship came round ready to fire. Then came a hissing sound.

"What's that?" Pepper questioned.

BANG! And rocket had hit the zebra ship. Then BANG! A second hit. It jolted to the right then fell to the ground exploding in a huge fireball. The out of nowhere another dropship appeared and its canon opened up on the three zebras. The ship landed.

"Get over here!" Came a familiar voice.

The three of the trotted over. It was Major Flash.

"You look like you've been to the moon and back comet." He commented.

It took him a moment to realise he was taking to him as everypony was known by their last name. "Tell me about it." Pepper replied getting on board. "You lot took your time."

"Yea sorry about that." Flash responded. "Well at least we got Zecora."

They began to take off when there was a loud sound. Argyle looked.

"What's that?" He asked as a dropship came into view. But it wasn't a normal one. This one was a lot longer and wider. It had four engines instead of two.

"That's a cargo-ship. It can carry a large amount of cargo or troops wherever they're needed." Flash replied. "Now it will be bringing a small team to recover our fallen brothers and the ship so they can be transported back to a work shop."

"Ah, makes sense. I'm gunna get some sleep, let me know when we get to the castle." Pepper shouted trying to be heard over the engines. Argyle nodded at him and Pepper closed his eyes.