The Great War

Name: Edward Blankflank
Rank: Private
Date: 6th June 980 AD
Location: Vanhoover Frontline, about 15 kilometers away from the city centre

I've known that this war is hell for quite some time now, but the worst thing is...that it simply doesn't stop. The War, with all it's attrocities, horror, blood, death and destruction, simply won't find an end. If anything...it simply keeps getting worse...

The War carries on, the gunfire never ceases, the destruction never stops, the bodycount ever rising...but an end? An end to all this? An end to 'The War to end all Wars'?

No. There is no end. The end is burried under all the brave and innocent ponies that were tricked into giving their precious life for a war that was meant to achieve so much...yet achieves nothing.

It began early in the morning. Most of us were asleep when it all started. The only ones awake were the night patrols, tasked with watching out for enemy movement and possible attacks.

It turns out they were needed sooner than expected.

A sudden wave of screams and shouts could be heard, waking up my friend, the stranger in our 'bedroom' and me. The screams were a mixture of screams of horror and fear and orders. I managed to hear out things like "Take cover everypony! Take cover!" and "Incoming! Run!"

Me and my roommates were quick to get up on our hooves, forgetting to put on our helmets that laid in our little bedroom. As we ran outside, we saw the trench was filled with stallions hectically running about. Some seeked cover in small dugouts, others covered in corners, some went completely mad as they looked at the sky with fire in their eyes, yelling "You want me? Then come and get me!"

We knew what he was talking about as we were temporarily blinded by a ray of light. We looked up, seeing the dark, almost gray, thick cloud cover. Multiple rays of sunlight managed to break through as big projectiles penetrated the clouds and shot straight down towards the ground. For a moment, a tiny little moment, a truly breathtaking sight could be seen, as the light managed to defeat the dark. Any kind of thoughts like that were quickly pulverized though, as high pitched whistles, followed by explosions interrupted.

An enemy Artillery barrage.

As the first shells impacted with the ground, me and my roommates immediatly crawled back into our little dugout. Me and my friend grabbed our helmets as we crawled back in. Our other roommate though, didn't. I still don't know if he had forgotten about it or if he simply decided it wasn't of any protection against gigantic artillery shells anyway.

After about a minute, a small time of peace returned. I poked my head out of the entrance to our dugout and saw that almost everypony was unharmed. Some even celebrated that they survived. But I knew that wouldn't be the end. There'd be more. Much more. Barrages like that would always be used to further adjust the firing angle. They were sheer practice shots.

And now...they had their firing angle.

Once again, There were rays of light shining down towards us from the sky. The enemy Artillery shells punched through the once again closed up cloud cover once again, but this time...their shots weren't for practice, they were serious, aimed to kill.

As the first whistles from the incoming shells could be heard, one of our comrades shouted "Coveeeer!" My friend reacted immediatly as he ran back into our dugout. Me and my other roommate simply stood outside though. I don't know why we did it, at least I don't know why I myself did it. I know any sane pony would immediatly seek cover like my friend but...something kept me from doing so. Something made me look up as the air was full of whistles from the rapidly descending artillery shells. I saw how they headed straight towards us, no intention on moving or seeking cover.

Then the world froze for a brief moment.

I looked around, I could see the artillery coming in, see the explosions, for Celestia's sake, I even saw stallions getting hit, horrifying sights of poor stallions dying or ,even worse, surviving the impact with horrible, painful injuries. But even then...It was all silent. It was...peaceful. It was all so strange, like I never had anything to do with all of this. It was like...I was not actually there. Like I was merely spectating. Like it was some kind of movie and I sat in the first row.

Then I came back to my senses.

My eyes opened as I heard explosions, screaming and destruction all around me. My vision was blurry and my head hurt. I slowly turned my head to my left, only to see the fiery blurs of a fire. Then I turned my head to the right and saw...something. Something right in front of my eyes. It was a dark-greenish blur right in front of me. My instinct told me to see what it was, so I tried stretching a hoof out towards it. However, my attempt to do so was denied, as I found myself unable to move my right hoof. I simply didn't have the strength to do so. I kept trying and trying, but then I was interrupted by a loud noise.

Boom.

That's all it needs to end the life of a pony. It doesn't need some kind of spell, some kind of plan or anything complicated like that. All you need...is that. If a boom goes of next to you, the chances of survival are as slim as they can get.

And I survived.

As the explosions stopped, I Once again opened my eyes, my vision was now clearer than before. As soon as I opened my eyes though...I wanted to immediatly close them again. What the world showed to me that day...I will never forget....

I saw...ponies. A lot of them. Most of them were known to me, I had seen them before and they were...gone. Dead. Forever.
My breakfast threatened to show itself again as I inspected their corpses. The trench was filled with them. Some of them were missing limbs, others had several cuts all over their body, the shrapnels of the artillery had simply shot through their bodies as if they were butter. The 'fortunate' ones were seemingly unharmed, although I knew their true wounds were on the inside, not the outside. They must have died of inner bleedings, slowly extinguishing their spark of life, leaving them to struggle on the ground as they reach out for help.
Some of the corpses were also burried under all the dirt that had been catapulted into the trenches by the explosions. I was unsure whether they had died by the actual explosions or if they were simply buried alive under the dirt.

As I turned to the left, as I did previously, I now saw the remainders of our forward command post. It had been a simple wooden structure, used to contact HQ or to plan out attacks, although we always joked about how this entire war felt like it was planed by donkeys.

Now, it was nothing but ashes. Small parts of it were still standing, most of it though was destroyed. Either immediatly destroyed by artillery or burnt down from such afterwards. In the ruins, I saw a dead stallion. His head and left hoof was poking out of the rubble, it almost looked as if he were screaming for help. But I knew...it was too late for that now.

Then I turned to my right, and as if It couldn't have gotten worse, the war once again proved me wrong. It was at that moment that I realized I was actually on the ground, lying in the rubble like all the other soldiers I've seen so far but...I was alive. I had survived.

Why I realized I was lying down?

Because my roommate, the very stallion that stood next to me on the outside before all of this went off, laid next to me, on my right...dead.
His dead, cold, empty eyes stared at me as his head was turned towards me. They actually stared past me, but for me, they looked right towards me, into my very soul. Tears flushed over my face as I refused to believe what I saw. I mumbled 'No, no, no' to myself repeatedly as I scrambled over towards him. I now kneeled next to him, on his left, and looked over him. I inspected his body, looking for any wounds. I couldn't find any, so, in my state of denial, I decided to rip off his uniform to properly look at him.

I regret doing so. A gigantic wound on his belly revealed itself beneath his clothes. Although he was lying on his back, blood was pouring out of the wound so much and quick, that soon a big, red puddle formed next to him.

"Why..." I thought to myself as I threw away his now useless clothes, "Why him?" I then, still on my knees, turned back around to all the dead corpses in the trenches. "Why!? Why them!? Why them and not me!? Why would you let ME survive!? Why? WHY!?" I yelled into the air. I don't know who I was really yelling at, maybe Celestia, maybe the enemy, or maybe myself. I simply felt like yelling because...

"This...doesn't make sense..." I then, for the first time during all of this, decided to stand up. As I stood, I once again looked over all of the horrifying sights that offered themselves to me in the trenches. "Why would everyone die...but not me? Why do I have to endure this hell and not them? Why do they get to die in unison and I..." I stottered mid-sentence, looking for the fitting words, "...I live on in loneliness."

Suddenly, interrupting my thoughts, I heard a known voice to my right. It called for help and came from beneath the rubble, the same rubble I and my roommate found ourselves on.

As I walked up closer to it, I managed to identify who it was that was screaming for help: My friend. He was alive!
Filled with hope and determination, I replied: "I'm here! Don't worry! I'll get you free!" and started clearing out the rubble, picking up pieces of both wood and stone, and also shoveling hills of dirt away with my bare hooves.

Then, I saw a face. I had broken through the thick layer of rubble and had finally found the only survivor of this mess besides me: My friend Slingshot. "Edward! Thank goodness you're here! I thought I was gonna die in here!" He gave out as I removed the last remainders of rubble. As I did, I noticed he wasn't simply burried under rubble, he was trapped inside our previous dugout, our bedroom so to say. The explosions must have blocked the entrance with all this rubble and dirt, trapping him on the inside. Surely, he would have died a painful death if I hadn't heard him. He would slowly breath in the air in the room until...there would be none left to breath.

"It's alright, Sling, you're fine. Come on." I reached out my hoof towards him, helping him out of the still partially blocked entrance to the room. Then, he too was frozen in place as he saw the full extent of the war. He saw what I had seen before, and now he went through exactly the same.
I saw him running towards our dead roommate. It's funny. We never counted him as one of our 'friends' but we still seemed to care so much about him to cry. War may be fought because of disagreement and hostility, but it also forges together to some degree. In the face of death, anyone can be your best friend, as long as his goal isn't to crack your skull open.

I slowly walked up to him. When I stood next to him, he collapsed to the ground, kneeling next to our dead comrade. I heard him sobbing quietly. He went over the beaks of the stallion once and then looked at his wound.

"Why...Why did this all have to happen?" He asked aloud. I was unsure whether he was talking to himself or not, but I decided to reply either way.

"I dunno...I don't think we'll ever find that out for sure." I replied, laying my left hoof on his right shoulder.

He turned his head towards me, still kneeling next to the stallion, answering with: "This is horrific...h-how...why? Why didn't they tell us that this is what the war really looks like? They told us it was all glorious and heroic but...this...this is nothing like that, it-" I decided to interrupt as I had already thought of the same things myself.

"I know. They've lied to us. We're simple cannon fodder, nothing more, nothing less."

My friend now wiped away his tears. "B-but why? Why would they lie to us? We are on their side after all!"

If it wasn't so serious, I maybe would have considered laughing at the innocence of my friend. "We're no use as long as we are at home. They deliberatly want us to sign up for this by believing in their lies, because that way we'll be 'useful' for them."

"S-so..." My friend started, standing up before continuing, "What now?"

I took in the question and once again looked around, the corpses in the trenches and all the fires around us almost seemed normal by now. I took a deep breath and sighed as I gave him my honest answer:

"I don't know."