The First Battle of Equestria

Chapters

Chapter 2. Mobilizing for war
Chapter 3. The Siege of Tramplevania
Chapter 4. Preparations
Chapter 5. Bombs, Shells and Prayers
Chapter 6. Battle for Detrot: day 1 of X
Chapter 7. Battle for Detrot: day 2 of X
Chapter 8. Battle for Detrot day 3 of X
Chapter 9. Battle for Detrot: day 7 of X
Chapter 10. Battle for Detrot: day 18 of X
Chapter 1. Bad Logistics and the Cleansing of Mareville

Chapter 2. Mobilizing for war

Without further ado, I present chapter two.

Celestia just listened to the horrific reports coming in. Several months ago something had been noticed falling from the sky. It had been shrugged off as comets or asteroids. Not an uncommon thing to see. But after the tragedy of Mareville it was obvious there was something at work. There hadn’t been a senseless slaughter of pony life in over two hundred years since the war with Nightmare Moon.

There had been no warning, no mercy, just death. Celestia didn’t want to rush into something without proper reports. Her country hadn’t been in a true war for over two-hundred years. Of course they still had weapons of war, but did she really want to mobilize her entire land for war? She had thought the Nightmare wars would be the last time Equestria would see war, obviously she was wrong. Her advisers stood at the base of her throne.

“Your majesty what can we do to counter this threat?”

“What even is this threat? Is it the griffins?”

“No the griffins have kept a non-aggression pact with us for over fifty years. That and that whole ordeal was too precise and destructive for griffins. Not to mention the fire.”

“Dragons?” one of them suggested.

Several shuddered at the thought of one or more of the giant beasts terrifying the land.

“No whatever it was is a foul creature, when a group of Pegasi investigated Mareville, no survivors. Something kept ponies from fleeing. If it was a dragon it would have wanted all the treasure of the town. All of the town’s bits and treasures were found among the wreckage by a team of Pegasi. That and a dragon wouldn’t have tried to keep everyone in town while it destroyed it. It wouldn’t even have a way to do so.”

“Well it wasn’t ghosts,” one of them said angrily “something had to have done this.”

There was definite agreement between the four advisers.

Celestia could just shake her head. This was a disgusting show of force. Not even the foul Nightmare Moon had attacked a town for the sole purpose of killing everypony. It was hard to get reliable reports on whatever was responsible for this tragedy.

Most Pegasi that got to close didn’t come back. The few that survived talked about the red lights and the sting as they fell, they were barely able to fly back to report dark cloaked creatures that stood on two legs. There were some creatures native to Equestria that stood on two legs. None of them had the numbers or equipment described. The enemy was described as a sea of life and metal. They had metal behemoths that coughed up smoke to the heavens. This sounded like nothing Celestia had ever heard of. With a wave of her hoof she sent away her advisers.

Stepping out onto a balcony and looking out countless miles away she knew they were out there. She could feel they were coming, when they would arrive she wasn’t sure. Looking out at the massive city of Canterlot, hundreds of massive structures and thousands of smaller structures rose up from the ground to form the massive city. It was the largest city in Equestria, dwarfing even Stalliongrad.

Suddenly a pit formed in her stomach. Stalliongrad stood between the incoming enemy and Canterlot. She hated the thought of what needed to be done. Walking through the throne room and traveling through the winding corridors of her palace. She came upon the familiar site of a massive hallway of columns and beautiful stained glass windows.

She came upon a massive doorway, the image of a sun with a single hole for one royal horn. Carefully sticking her horn in hole at the center of the image of the sun and pouring in a little bit of magic. Pulling away as the blue light spread out and the doors opened, revealing a massive stairway underground. Carefully stepping down deep into the darkness, using magic to light that barely lit a small portion of the massive room, what was revealed were weapons of war, countless numbers of projectile based weapons that are mounted on the back of a pony. The weapons she thought would never see the light of her sky again. She gathered her advisers back into her throne room.

“My little ponies, war is upon us,” was all Celestia needed to say.

“War? There hasn’t been a true war in centuries your majesty.”

“We are not here to discuss when the last war was, I have called you four back here because messages need to be sent out. Scribe!” Celestia called out.

A unicorn with parchment, quills and ink rushed into the throne room.

“Yes your majesty? He asked eagerly.

“Take note,” she began, “every town in Equestria needs to give a tithe of ponies to the upcoming conflicts. Each town shall give forth seventy-five percent of their stallions and five percent of their mares towards the upcoming fight for Equestria. The ponies are to head to Canterlot immediately,” Celestia said, “New note. All doctors and medical ponynel, along with half the royal guard are to head to the palace courtyard.

“New note. All foals from every city from Stalliongrad and its surrounding area are to be evacuated to Manehattan. New note. Every shovel and piece of digging equipment from Stalliongrad is to be gathered outside of Stalliongrad by noon the day after next, I want every able bodied stallion out there with the equipment, I will instruct them in pony. That is all for now scribe, send those messages through proper channels and await further instructions.”

“Yes your majesty,” he said as he scurried off.

Her advisers looked at her in shock. They had never heard of conscription. Celestia had been forced to do the same thing over two centuries previous. She knew she would probably regret such a decision by the time this conflict was over.

“Your majesty?” one of them asked.

“Yes?”

“Did you need to do that? Can’t we just send a diplomat?” he asked exasperated.

“I apologize my little pony. Whatever we are facing is not something we can talk with. Look what happened to Mareville. We weren’t given warning or even a reason. These creatures will need to be removed, with force as is necessary.”

“But what will force get us?”

“It will give us peace my little pony, it will not be pretty, but it is the only way,” she said with a sigh.

The war was no longer one sided. Both sides were preparing for the conflicts ahead. Already the royal guards were moving towards the palace courtyard. Celestia sent her advisers to oversee some of the tasks.

Celestia met with the royal guards to inform them of their new duties. Each unicorn, earth pony and Pegasus was only wearing a suit of golden armor. That would not do.

“You ponies have been assembled because you know how to fight to protect your princess. I am here to inform you that you are to be training the masses of stallions that are coming from all across Equestria.”

A few of the guards snickered at what they assumed was a bad joke.

“You are the best we have to offer, you are to follow me to get yourselves suited up. You need to learn how to use the tools you will be using in the upcoming battle for Equestria.”

The knowledge that it wasn’t a joke sobered the ponies up. Standing at attention they followed Celestia through the corridors until they came to the hallway of columns. They had all seen the hallway but had no idea what was down the staircase. Their eyes widened as the room lit up. The only weapon that had ever seen was the decorative spears they had when either on parade or standing guard at the door to the throne room.

“What are these contraptions princess?” one asked obviously shocked.

The devices appeared reminiscent of a saddle bag. But instead of small saddle bags on the sides, it had large metal boxes with odd pieces sticking out.

“These are a design that is several centuries old. The piece on the left is called an ‘autogun’ the piece on the right is a ‘rocket projector’ both are deadly weapons from an age of strife.”

“How do they work?” an earth pony asked.

“It’s worn on your back exactly like a saddlebag. You earth ponies will feel a bit of a pin prick. It’s perfectly normal; it’s just linking to you. For you earth ponies you aim and fire it by thinking about the weapon moving and firing. For unicorns your weapons are controlled through a trigger activated through magic. For the Pegasi we have a different weapon for you,” Celestia continued walking them through how to use the weapons.

The Pegasi were given a different device that looked like a saddlebag but with a piece on the underbelly that resembled a leg iron wrapped around a cylinder. It was known as a bomb holder. They were told to understand how each weapon worked as they were going to be explaining it to a countless amount of ponies over the coming weeks. Along with how to fight, the days ahead would be horrific for Celestia, having to relive an age she thought long gone.

She then headed off to meet up with the medical ponynel to tell them about their duties to Equestria. Little did they know that their enemy was already mobilized and heading towards another area for cleansing; Tramplevania. Celestia had no idea why these creatures were doing this to her subjects. But she was determined to stop it.

And that is another chapter taken care of. Now we get back to the action. The next chapter will be rather graphic people. So if you don’t like the thought of having death described in detail (worse than the first chapter that is a guarantee to you) then you should probably leave. To those of you with strong hearts and mind, I will have more for you soon enough.

Chapter 3. The Siege of Tramplevania

I have for you here chapter 3. I have put a considerable amount of work into this and I hope it has paid off.

Edited on July 25th to fix a sentence that was typed wrong
Edited on August 14th to fix the previous sentence which was also typed wrong

The line of men and war machines went on for miles, a massive column of grey coated men walking alongside grey armor and towed artillery pieces.

Commissar Darren Aviel from the planet Boreas, was overseeing the massive column from his Centaur. All the Commissar could think was these were the perfect soldiers to fight for the Emperor. They did would not complain and they would never retreat. They knew nothing but forward, whether it took months, years even decades, they would keep fighting until they had ground the Emperors enemies to dust.

The leaders of the operation had decided on some detours. He might have interjected and told them it was not important, but every Xeno they left alive was one more that could fight them on the field of battle at a later date. The equine beasts seemed a frail bunch, not a single true weapon was brought to bear in Mareville, even the feudal worlds of the Imperium had spears and swords in their villages for protection. These creatures hardly seemed fit for combat. That didn’t mean they didn’t have some sort of higher combat form, the cowards, relying on size to throw their weight around. These beasts probably fed on grass like their Tau cousins. It mattered not; they were filthy xenos to be cleansed in holy flame.

They had been in this column for close to a week. Night was beginning to fall just as the city of Tramplevania came into view. The men of the 501st moved like clockwork. They spread out along a massive front spanning kilometers. At first light they were to get ready to begin their advance. Artillery was placed carefully, as they were rather short on guns, if they were at the full strength they would have thousands of siege guns, instead they had 192. The artillery stayed ten kilometers away from Tramplevania, as the artillery got a bead on Tramplevania half the strength of the 501st, a quarter of a million men were advancing at a steady pace starting at dawn, each man at least five yards apart from each other.

As half the 501st advanced, the other half was digging trenches around the siege guns.

The siege of Tramplevania went off exactly on schedule, at 11:29 Terra standard time; every gun of the 391st aimed its sights towards Tramplevania. The men of the 501st had been marching since first light.

Across the line at the dozens of batteries the same scene played out. A soldier with a vox caster listened to a series of beeps. The battery CO had his arm in the air and was looking at his vox operator.

“Sir, code confirmed, open fire,” the guardsman told the batteries CO.

“Open fire!” the guardsman bellowed swinging his arm down.

At 11:30 sharp every gun fired simultaneously. The siege of Tramplevania began; it was to be a three week affair. The 391st would continue shelling the city with heavy mortars and quad launchers until exactly 12:00 three weeks after the beginning of the siege, whereupon men of the 501st supported by elements 103rd armored would assault the city to clean up the stragglers.

As artillery shell flew towards the defenseless equines, men of the 501st advanced watching as the shells of their artillery flew overhead. The ponies had no idea what was happening, one minute it was a beautiful day the next it was complete chaos, a family of three ponies disappeared in a fiery explosion kicking dirt, bone and chunks of flesh several meters in every direction. The massive structures of Tramplevania stood defiantly as countless shells exploded against it. The ponies that were inside the structures weren’t nearly as lucky; several families sitting down for a quiet lunch disappeared as shells burst through windows. Those not killed outright found themselves in horrible pain as they lay in the streets and buildings watching other ponies running around in sheer terror. One foal was shaking her mother who was lying on her side coughing up blood due to a massive chunk of shrapnel sticking out of her neck.

Those that could get away did, Pegasi left by the thousands heading in every direction, those heading straight towards Canterlot to warn their princess fell into the open arms of the advancing 501st, some managed to escape to safety by heading eastward. Some unicorns and earth ponies followed the path towards Canterlot, they were met with a wall of lasguns, those watching from Tramplevania were terrified as they looked from windows, ponies lay dead and dying all across the streets, as a purple unicorn ran out to help a blue earth pony writhing in the street a shell hit next to them, they disappeared in fire and smoke leaving nothing but chunks of burnt flesh and bone.

The men of the 501st stopped approximately a half kilometer away, whereupon they began digging foxholes. By nightfall they had over a hundred thousand foxholes dug with two men to a hole. By morning they began to link the foxholes beginning their trench line. By the end of third day they were working on platoon trenches and linking those together, by the end of the week they had formed company trenches and were linking those together. It had become a game between the different companies to see who could dig the fastest, making the men reminiscent of their training exercises done on the surface of Krieg.

As the men of 391st were shelling the frak out of Tramplevania, the men of the of 103rd were prepping their vehicles for battle burning incense and saying prayers to the machine spirits and the men of the 501st were busy setting up razor-wire and mine fields, while they were busy, so too were the ponies who were doing preparations of their own.

“Come on you mares, give me another twenty!” Blue Blade, a unicorn, called out to the thousands of ponies under his command.

He was in a massive training field; he had to use magic to make his voice heard to every stallion. As the masses of stallions were training for battle, hundreds of medical ponynnel were giving lessons to mare unicorns on treating wounds. It was possible for anypony to treat a wound properly, but unicorn magic made the job easier as they had the ability to multitask easily and weren’t forced to learn the dexterity required to use their hooves properly. While that was going on Pegasi were practicing dropping bombs using dummy rounds and targets. This whole experience was new for everypony.

Princess Celestia herself was at Stalliongrad instructing the ponies on proper digging of pits and trenches. The war with Nightmare Moon had been a bloody affair. It had boiled down to full on charges to move the enemy off of small patches of barren ground.

Of course nopony knew about that. Shortly after the end of the war with Nightmare Moon most of the annals were cleaned up and made less violent. Today anypony you asked told you it was a simple attempted coup that ended with a simple eternal banishment. In truth it took years and was a very brutal affair. It lasted for five years and the loss of life was astounding. It had taken well close to fifty years for the population to reach even close to its old levels. She hated lying to her little ponies but to tell them of such a bloody time might threaten the serenity and peace she desired her ponies to know. There was never supposed to be another true war again. But these horrible creatures seemed to have other thoughts.

She already had to drudge up schematics she had been meaning to burn for well over a century. Now she was glad she hadn’t. She had sent the schematics to Cloudsdale, production of weather related objects was halted and instead the factory lines were dedicated to producing weapons and ammunition.

As she was overseeing to a pony building a protective complex to protect ponies from bombs, a winded blue and white Pegasus crashed in front of her.

“P… P... PRINCESS!” he shouted.

She told the workers to continue before she pulled the stallion off to the side.

“What is it my little pony?” the alicorn asked.

“Tramplevania is being destroyed,” he said terrified.

“What?” she said stunned and unable to move.

“Your majesty, I was sitting in the park with my marefriend when it happened,” he said still taking deep breaths.

“Stop and breath my little pony,” was all Celestia could say to avoid a panic attack.

After a moment he continued, “we heard a sound, like whistling, at first we thought it might be fireworks, but it was way too early, and there was a reason. Then I heard it. Big bangs and I saw big flashes of light as something was hitting the ground.
There was screaming and fire; I got my marefriend into a basement with some other ponies, mostly foals, so I said I would get help. Was going to take off when I saw the flocks of hundreds probably thousands of Pegasi already further out. I was just starting to catch up when I saw them. These grey… things on two legs. They were like a wall surrounding Tramplevania. The Pegasi kept flying, then these lines of red light came out of nowhere, they fell like flies,” he began to cry, “I saw a friend of mine I’ve known since we were colts, just drop. I turned back and went back to my marefriend. I had to tell her to be careful. I then took off eastward and flew around them. I’ve been flying for five days straight. What’s going on your majesty?” At this point he was hyperventilating and crying deeply, he was having a breakdown. He was tired and scared. Celestia cast a bit of magic to help him get drowsy. She had a couple mares that had been delivering hay and water to the workers help the stallion to some shelter.

Things were getting bad fast, these creatures must have spawned from Tartarus itself. The only hope Tramplevania had was soldiers. But her ponies had barely learned to use their weapons, let alone how to use them in a fight. The only ones ready were the Pegasi. She knew that this wasn’t going to end well. Her only option was to send in Pegasi to bomb the hay out of the foul beasts that dared hurt her little ponies.

After she finished giving orders to the people working she teleported to her palace. In a flash of light she appeared in the throne room turn war room.

“Captain,” Celestia called out.

A coal black Pegasus trotted up to her and saluted.

“Yes your majesty?”

“Captain Dark Cloud, I want five thousand Pegasi suited up and ready to fly by nightfall,”

“Five thousand?” Dark Cloud said surprised.

“Tramplevania is under siege,”

“Siege?” he asked.

“When a group of ponies surrounds and attacks a city. You know what, that isn’t important right now. Tramplevania is being destroyed by the foul creatures that started all of this,” Celestia said gravely.

Instantly the Pegasus took off to assemble the Pegasi. She had other designated ponies help her plan a course of action. The only thing she could think of was have the Pegasi move storm clouds to cover their flight and try to slow down the monsters. They would pour forth a huge amount of rain onto them. It was a tactic used during the Nightmare wars. Nopony liked being rained on, especially stuck out in the rain for days at a time.

Celestia was going to move the sun down shortly, but first she had to give her ponies a rundown on what would happen.

“You ponies are going to deliver the first strike from Equestria to the monsters that have been hurting your fellow ponies. Over a week ago they burnt Mareville to the ground, a few days ago they started doing the same to Tramplevania,” she paused to watch as her ponies began to talk and mutter angrily.

“I know I ask a lot of you to fly for days, some of you may not make it back. But you are fighting for me, but more importantly for your fellow ponies and Equestria. You will fly over the clouds and strike at the heart of the evil monster that would hurt your friends and family. You fly to protect your friends, your family and Equestria!” she bellowed.

The Pegasi cheered loudly. She hated having to manipulate her children, but if she told them everything bluntly it would be horrific. Sometimes the best thing you could do for a pony is lie.

Bombs strapped up they took off. It would be a long flight; they were to take a break at once a day. They couldn’t afford to take longer than that.

As they flew Tramplevania was still getting shelled. The Imperials had already poured forth tens of thousands of shells. They had over a million shells ready to destroy The Emperors enemies. Imperial doctrine required that the enemy not only be demoralized, they are to be crushed.

Shells were being brought forth by a train, the tracks of which were laid down by thousands of servitors that had been working on it since the decision to besiege Tramplevania. The servitors were still laying tracks down going south then southeast.

They were already into the second week when they saw the clouds. Giant black and grey clouds floating rather fast considering there was almost no wind speed. The clouds were shrugged off as a strange weather pattern; they were told that there wasn’t a huge amount of rain on the planet. But then they had been told it was a factory world controlled by the Imperium and under siege by Orks.

The massive storm clouds floated above them, one second it was sunny and dry, the next it was dark and pouring rain. That didn’t stop the Death Korp, they kept loading and firing shells. It was after the rain had been falling for about an hour that the bombs began to drop.

“This is your flight leader, come on you mares drop your payloads,” Shooting Star called to the stallions in his flight group.

Taking a deep breath they took the proper pose and squeezed their shoulders in. The latches clicked and swung open dropping their payload. Hundreds of bombs began to fall. Due to the storm clouds they had no idea exactly where they were dropping. Shooting stars group was too far ahead, his payload falling harmlessly into the no-ponies land below. However groups like Silver Sight’s flight group were at the perfect location. There bombs falling in the area of the 501sts trench line. Bombs began exploding outside the trenches.

A sentry; guardsman 4196-1594-1952-6010 was standing watch when he was hit with a chunk of shrapnel that dug into his shoulder. He didn’t cry out he just looked at the shrapnel. He hopped down into the dugout and informed his fellow guardsmen of the bombs.

Guardsman 5012-1508-1693-1593 wasn’t as lucky a massive chunk of shrapnel caught him directly in the spine. He fell backwards into the trench. His fellow guardsmen dug out the shrapnel and flipped him on his back. As if the Emperor himself knew what had happened a quartermaster was doing his rounds.

“What happened guardsman?” he asked in a raspy voice through his mask.

“I was hit in the back sir, I can’t move anything below my neck,” he said nonchalantly.

The quartermaster unlatched the holster of his laspistol, “may the Emperor embrace you with open arms,” His comrades pulled off his mask. The quartermaster allowed the guardsman a look at his skull mask with his own eyes before delivering a single headshot. He then stripped the body down to his undergarments. The body was then hefted up by his squad mates who tossed his corpse into no-man’s land. The ground was already becoming slick with mud. The men then began to shuffle into their dugout.

The quartermaster then handed the blood stained uniform to one servitor, he handed the guardsman’s lasgun, power packs and grenades to another. The quartermaster added the equipment to the current supply numbers on his data slate. Just then an explosion was seen in a trench a hundred or so meters away. The quartermaster knew he still had work to do.

The second the bombs had started dropping weapons were fired into the sky. The tanks that were ready for action around the artillery were doing the most damage. Sixty-six heavy stubbers were firing massive rounds filling the sky with tracer rounds. The clouds were lighting up from both lightning and unreleased bombs strapped to Pegasi.

One very brash flight leader; Fiery Comet, had an idea for fame and glory. He remembered when he had to help break up a little crime syndicate back in Canterlot. He received immense praise from his superiors for his valor in taking down several of the ponies and bringing them in. Maybe if he could capture one of these creatures he would be praised, maybe even rewarded.

“Follow me yellow team!” he said diving into the cloud.
Looking back he had several hundred Pegasi following him. He kept his noise pointed down feeling the air he was cutting through. As he some massive thing belching fire and smoke. It seemed as good a place as any.
“Release yellow team!” he was barely able to call out, he was flying so fast his eyes had begun to tear.

He squeezed his shoulders and released his payload. He then pulled up hard. Looking back he watched his bomb explode. It didn’t look like it did too much, then a massive explosion followed. He watched something thrown clear.
“Yellow team pull back to the clouds!” he shouted ignoring his own order.
He flew top speed to the tree that blur had crashed into. He found a red smeared grey thing, using all four his legs he wrapped the creature up and took off top speed.

Looking back down, he saw the masses of Pegasus corpses. It looked like most of his wing wasn’t as lucky as him. He shrugged it off the best he could as he tore through the cloud. It looked like most Pegasi had dropped their payloads and were turning back east.

The toll for the Death Korp was a total of twelve Quad launchers, three batteries worth, along with three heavy mortars, one short of a battery. A single Leman Russ vanquisher was destroyed by a lucky direct hit. The loss of guardsmen was two thousands dead and twice that in wounded.

Commissar Aviel just shrugged. This was a simple scratch to the forces he was overseeing. The Death Korp didn’t care about the loss of life; they were just numbers on a data slate. They did however frown at the loss of artillery.
Aviel had already executed the Major who hadn’t had Hydra platforms covering the artillery.
He couldn’t believe the cowardly beasts, using the clouds to cover their true intent. The Emperor would have his way eventually; the equine creatures were just delaying their fate.

As the Imperial Guard’s siege was heading towards the end of the second week, the survivors of the bombing were reaching Canterlot.

Celestia watched as several hundred ponies landed down. Her eyes widened as she realized that was all that had survived.
What kind of weapons did those monsters possess?
“Your majesty!” somepony called from behind her.
She turned to see a winded Captain Dark Cloud.
“Captain?” Celestia said.
“Your majesty, you need to follow me, there is something you need to see now.”
Celestia followed him, she quickened her pace to stay at pace with Dark Cloud. He looked like he wanted to break into a gallop.
Looking through a sheet of glass she found herself staring at a very strange creature. She recognized it as the creatures described by her Pegasi.
“Captain have you begun questioning yet?”
“We were waiting for you to be get here, we thought it was important you were present,” her captain told her.
“I’m assuming you already have questions?”
“Yes your majesty,” he said leaving the room.
The creature’s hands were tied in front of it.
Dark Cloud stepped into the room, closing the door carefully with his back hoof. He sat down at the table opposite the creature.
The creature had two guard ponies on its flanks.
It was a horrific looking creature. Well, from what Dark Cloud could tell. It appeared to be wearing clothes of some kind.
“What is you name monster?” Dark Cloud asked.
“I am trooper 5010-1974-4012-6029.”
“I asked for you name, not a number.”
“My name is 5010-1974-4012-6029,” he said calmly.
“For bucks sake give me a name, I am Captain Dark Cloud.”
“My name is 5010-1974-40…”
“Oh for bucks sake,” Dark Cloud muttered, “don’t you have a normal name?”
“What purpose does that serve?” the creature asked.
“It allows other ponies to know who you are.”
“What purpose does that serve?”
“Are you bucking broken?” Dark cloud growled then sighed, “it allows a pony to talk with you and know who you are, to find you in a crowd.”
Whatever this creature was, it seemed sort of slow in the thinking department.
“That seems pointless. Why would anyone bother with such a pointless process?”
He was shocked by the stupidity of this creature. Did its race not mate?
“What are you?” Dark Cloud muttered.
“I am a man, guardsman 5010-19…”
“Stop! What is a ‘man’?”
“How has your disgusting race not heard of the Imperium of Man? You dare to occupy a planet owned by the one true God Emperor, Shepherd of every human in existence. You stain his vision with every breath you take xeno scum.”
Dark Cloud was shocked at this sudden outburst.
Did his race have horns? Were they worshippers of Tartarus and its dark beings? Were they spawned from a pit?
‘Guard. Remove that thing on its head,” or at least what he assumed was its head.
The guardsman struggled, although with hands bound he couldn’t put up a proper fight. The thing came off with a hiss. For some reason the creature looked pale, almost as white as an egg and it appeared young.
“How old are you ‘man’?”
“Sixteen standard years.”
Everyone in the room gasped.
Celestia was appalled. How could any God send children to fight in wars?

As Celestia thought about that she looked at the table beside her. There was a bunch of items spread across it. Using her magic she lifted up some of the items. One of the items was in a pouch of some kind. Its end slightly resembled the barrel of an autogun. Was it a weapon? Using her magic she played around with it. Then using a bit of applied magic she pulled a little metal piece back. A bright light fired from the weapon that hit the window, the beam went through clean and hit the ceiling. Dark Cloud quickly got up and banged on the door. It was opened and closed and a moment later Dark Shadow burst through the door.
“Princess are you alright?”
She nodded dumbfounded at the odd device.
Looking through the glass the guards were both staring at the scorch mark on the ceiling. The odd ‘human’ was slouched over. She was sure nothing had hit him.

Suddenly he bucked his chair backwards and used something to stab one of the guards in the neck where he tore the small object down and out. He then turned quickly and leapt at the other guard who was just starting to react. Catching him in the eye, he began to quickly stab with a small blade. Princess Celestia began shouting, Dark Cloud took off.

“You xeno filth shall get nothing more from me. The Emperor protects!”
Dark Cloud entered the room just in time to watch the teenager plunge the blade into own neck. Twisting it as he ripped it deeply across his throat, blood poured out like a waterfall. He fell to his knees and then dropped forward.

Celestia was sick to her stomach. Nopony should ever take their own life. What kind of training did these creatures, these ‘humans’ receive? Why did they have so much zeal towards this ‘Emperor’?

She had other things that still required her attention; Tramplevania. She wanted to send out more Pegasi to keep striking these creatures, but that too risky. They had lost thousands of lives. Walking slowly to the war room she looked the piles of maps. She had no idea how long they were planning on attacking Tramplevania. She had no way to get the ponies out. According to reports it was completely surrounded by the enemy. She had never felt this feeling of helplessness, unable to do anything to help her loyal subjects. Just watch from thousands of miles away as they are slaughtered.

The main force of the old armies was earth ponies and unicorns. Their autoguns and rocket projectors were the greatest weapons they had. She had two options. She could send out tens of thousands of earth ponies and unicorns out without proper training, pray that their officers could organize them. Her other option was to sit and watch her subjects brutally killed at the hands of these so called ‘humans’. She weighed each option. One might add more lives lost, or it could slow the numbers pouring in.

The choice was clear, after the rest of this week of training, they were moving out.

Not before she herself teleported to Detrot. Upon arrival she oversaw the evacuation of every mare and foal. Every able bodied stallion started working on a series of trench lines around Detrot. They also reinforced buildings with piles of dirt. Massive pits were placed around entrances to the city.

As the week went on, the ponies trained their flanks off.

They had twenty-five thousand stallions ready to move out. More were being trained, but they would need time. If they couldn’t stop the enemy yet, the best they could we slow them down. She hated to leave ponies in peril, but Tramplevania was a lost cause. If they were dug in like the Pegasi informed her, it would be a tough nut to crack even two hundred years previous when military might was at an all-time high for ponies. It would be impossible for such a small number of ponies to help Tramplevania. They would be dead ponies walking. Of course she wouldn’t tell her subjects about it.

The call went out, every stallion who knew how to aim his autogun and first his rocket projector was to head off towards Detrot. They were also given a thousand mares that had medical experience. Level of training varied. Some were nurses and doctors, a few were actually veterinarians, most were just mares that had been forced into the past couple weeks training.

It was estimated to take close to two weeks to arrive if they spent most of that time galloping. The royal alicorn prayed to her eternal sun that they would arrive fast enough. She was sure the royal guards knew what they were doing. They had to train endlessly to join her garrison. But would they be able to keep her pony’s heads on tight under fire? Only time would tell.

The ponies that were heading off to defend Detrot were seen off with a parade. The army of ponies walked through Canterlot, their weapons mounted and loaded. The medical mares fell in behind the armed stallions and then came the Stallions pulling massive carts of ammunition and medical supplies. Mares threw flowers. Mothers of children cried as their sons marched valiantly. It was another scene that hit Celestia in her core. She had seen this scene before. It had played out during the war with Nightmare Moon. She had to put on her best smile as she watched thousands head off to die.

As the now dubbed 11th pony infantry marched off to defend Detrot, the final stages of siege were being reached at Tramplevania.

The end of the week ticked by slowly for the ponies stuck in the siege of Tramplevania. While some ponies went without food, others took chances going out into the hail of fire and destruction to get food. Unicorns with some skill took to the streets with shields raised. They found that their shields were strong enough to block against the flying chunks of metal. A direct hit from the explosives took out their shields; usually the rain of steel from the shell killed the pony. A few very lucky buckers managed to escape without a scratch, most ended up with mortal wounds, dying in the streets in a pool of their own blood as their fellow ponies watched helplessly.

The rain that had been pouring for close to two weeks had done nothing to slow the siege. The men of Krieg practiced for combat in a nuclear wasteland. What was a bit of rain, yes it had turned their trenches into soup. But the Emperor protects his children.

As noon approached the ponies didn’t know what was coming. It had been exactly three weeks since the shells began to fall. As the clocks across Equestria struck noon, every gun ceased fire as one. Over a hundred thousand shells had been fired. Barrels had been changed dozens of times. Slowly some ponies began to poke their heads out. It was over as soon as it had started. They heard silence.

As some shell shocked ponies were staggering through the streets, the 501st was rising. Everywhere the same scene played out like clockwork. Soldier after soldier climbed up the ladder to exit the six foot deep trench. They then advanced on Tramplevania. Commissar Aviel was heading the charge in his Centaur.

The ponies of Tramplevania thanked Celestia. She must be the one that stopped the fire and death. Packs of ponies were flowing into the streets. They hadn’t the slightest what was coming. As a pack of fifty ponies was heading out of the city a crew of two men was readying a heavy bolter. The one on the left cocked it; the man to his right pulled the trigger. The pony at the head of the cheering crowd ceased as his head exploded into red mist. Rounds were shredding into the crowd. Limbs were torn off and chunks of ponies exploded from the fist sized rounds. They screamed in terror and dispersed like cockroaches from light. The soldier on the left tapped his squad mate.
“Displace,” he stated simply.
The heavy bolter was quickly being relocated as hundreds of guardsmen began shuffling in through the streets, several stopping to finish off the ponies only wounded by heavy bolter fire.

Suffer not the xeno to live.

A guardsman pointed to a window where a mare had just had her head. Another with a tube like grenade launcher fired a round through the opening. A burst of dust that burst through the window signaled the round hitting a wall or ceiling. The mare inside was writhing in pain at the pieces of metal that had hit along her side. The men of Krieg had everything planned. They quickly moved from building to building clearing every pony, there was no remorse.

“Remember men, faith is your shield, fury your sword,” Commissar Aviel called out as he fired a bolt round into a fleeing pony.
The back of its head turning into pink mist as it crashed into the ground.
A unicorn charged the Commissar with a holler; it lowered its head and fired a small beam that slammed into the commissar’s chest. A yellow energy crackled around him.
“Did you not hear me beast!” he shouted as he sidestepped the charging beast and lobbed its head off with a flick of his power sword, “faith is my shield!” He was referring to the Rosarius that was pinned to his carapace armor.

A Leman Russ demolisher trudging through the street, the metal behemoth aimed its turret down the street at the first floor of an apartment complex a dozen ponies had fled into. It slowed down and fired, the first floor exploded outwards, rubble and dust flew into the street along with a red-pink mist. The tank then moved on, its commander firing the heavy stubber at windows.

As guardsman 1052-6404-9240-3958 entered into the basement of a large apartment structure he clicked on his flashlight, in the center of the room was a unicorn mare with a half dozen foals huddled around her. The guardsman flicked the lighter on his flamer, the distinct blue flame lighting up at the barrels end. The last thing the group saw was a bright light.

It took three days for Commissar Aviel to deem the city of Tramplevania xeno free. Demolition charges were planted in every building taller than three stories. Most buildings smaller had already been reduced to rubble.

The cleansing of Tramplevania was a short and brutal affair. It was an unnecessary and unintended show of violence. To the men of Krieg it was a show of faith to their God Emperor. To the children of Celestia it was a display of violence, hatred and disgust. It would be a rallying cry for both sides in the days to come.

And that my ponies was chapter three, I hope you keep following me.

Let’s hear what you guys and gals think. I love watching the view counter climbing slowly but surely. I’ve put forth a large amount of effort into this work. I hope you guys keep following my dumb ass as I write chapter four. I hope you guys have a great day.

Chapter 4. Preparations

This is a shorter chapter than the last. The reason for that is I’m going to be quite busy this weekend. As in I will be unable to access a computer for the next 48 hours. Work is quite fun. Pfft. On another I can't say sorry enough for the amount of text in this chapter. Not a whole lot of talking. It’s building up for the next chapter.

It’s not always easy thinking for the men of the Imperium to talk, at least when it comes to the Death Korps of Krieg. If I had chosen a different army like my planet Ozacom (the 106th Red and Blue Hellions is my army) other forces like the Catachan jungle fighters or the Elysian drop troopers would have been good. But neither would allow for the sieges that are going to bring Equestria to its knees. Okay maybe the Elysians might have worked if I wrote it right. They could attack the Griffin kingdom. Ooh or the Tallarns could attack Zebrica or the Mild West. I’m getting off track right now. Read and enjoy what little I’ve given you, again sorry about that.

Aviel cursed aloud repeatedly. The nerve that the Emperors servants could take this long, the Imperial Navy had taken over a week and a half to drop more transports containing supplies. Of course men had slowly but surely been moved by train. But it was taking too damned long to resupply. The Grenadier squad he had attached himself to, didn’t even bother to look to see why he was cursing. These might be some of the finest troops the Imperium had to offer, but they were a very quiet bunch. Even when he sat in with the officers planning future offenses, it was kept very short and to the point.

The final transports were lifting off, Emperor be praised. The supplies would take less than a day to get everywhere they were needed. Their original positions near the ruins of Mareville were already abandoned; anything that couldn’t be moved was destroyed. A week was what it would take to move everything necessary for the battle for Detrot. It had already been dubbed such due to reports from forward observation posts. The equines had begun preparing defenses around the city. Couple that with the women and children being evacuated along with the number of troops seen moving towards the city. So the beasts were finally revealing some ground forces. They would only barely make it, it would make little difference; The Emperor would have the city eventually.

As Aviel had studied many books on strategy, he was well aware that it could take a lot of effort to break a well-fortified and well-armed group. Plans had been made almost instantly by the leaders of the operation. They had already completed the necessary changes to equipment and battle plans. He was no general, it always interested him how fast those types could formulate plans and calculate for loss of life. The tallies were usually pretty accurate. Only time would tell.

Aviel looked up to the sky watching as the transports entered the upper atmosphere and embarked on the Screams of Retribution. The ship was massive, as he recalled it was around four and half kilometers long, two kilometers wide and a kilometer in height. He couldn’t even begin to fathom how it was constructed.

But now that everything was taken care of it was time to move out. Stepping onto his Centaur and ordering the driver to take them to their destination, Detrot.

It had taken nearly two weeks of galloping to arrive. They of course slowed down as they passed the mares and foals. It made it look as if they could take their time, direct order from Celestia herself. It made no difference to Blue Blade. He was just glad the princess had allowed him the honor of leading his stallions into battle. They would be given air cover by Pegasi as soon as possible. The princess would communicate via magic. He was glad that she had such power at her disposal, without her initiating the spell Blue Blade didn’t think he would ever be able to cast it.

As the city came into view Blue Blade could feel a lump in the pit of his stomach. The kind of thing you feel when you look off of a cliff. The uncertainty that comes from danger, he knew what he was up against. He knew he had trained his stallions as well as he could, but they had still never been in combat. Hay, the biggest ‘war’ he’d fought in till that point was breaking up drunken brawls. But he knew his duty to Celestia, Equestria and his family. He couldn’t afford to just give up.

By nightfall they had arrived. The stallions still working on digging and reinforcing structures stopped to watch in awe. Twenty-six thousand ponies forming a large column were walking into their city. Celestia had informed them of their coming, but hearing about something and seeing it were two different things.

Say for the mares with saddle bags with red crosses on them, the devices on the stallions were foreign. Metal constructs with strange pieces sticking out. The ponies dispersed across the city. As the stallions finished working they were shuffled deeper into the city. As the enemy wasn’t seen stallions were allowed to return to their homes. As Blue Blade watched out over the massive stretches of land he saw nothing. He had no way to see the dozens of pairs of eyes watching him.

Miles away on several hilltops lay dozens of guardsmen under camo cloaks, giving constant reports to high command about enemy movements. A guardsman had just hopped out of the Salamander after sending a message regarding the arrival of enemy troops; he went back to his position on over watch.

The ponies spent days watching out across the emptiness. Way off in the distance they saw smoke. But they had seen it come and go for days. Blue Blade felt like he should be fearful of whatever it was. But at this point it was too late to turn tail and flee. He was a royal bucking guard for Celestia’s sake. He hadn’t been taught to fear, he had been taught to protect his princess and country. That was what he was here for. Checking his weapons for the hundredth time he went back to over watch. Several ponies had already gotten bored with waiting. Several unicorns were playing cards using rations in place of poker chips.

“Hey Blue, wanna join in next hand?” His second in command, Tall Spark asked.

“No I’m going to keep watch,” Blue replied, “I get this feeling like I’m being watched right back. Yet I see nothing.”

“Sir, has anypony told you, you sound a bit loopy,” Spark said with a chuckle.

Blue Blade just chuckled and shook his head. It was almost like he could feel the hatred burning his fur.

They had been waiting for half a week with no sign of the bipedal creatures. Little did Blue Blade or any of the ponies know what was readying itself in the darkness.

The Commissar stood beside his centaur. Look through his magnoculars he could practically count the hairs on an equines xeno face. It was a disgusting blue visage, the image might get a bit fuzzy at times but this was a piece of Imperial equipment. Perfection was a requirement, The Emperor wouldn’t let them down, He only gave them the best.

Getting into contact with the leaders of the operation was easy when you were a hand of the Emperor. At exactly eight o’clock standard time all of the one-hundred and eighty-one remaining guns would open fire. The beginning bombardment would last two weeks. While the shells gave them cover the men of the 501st would again begin digging trenches. They knew not how strong a foe they faced, or how well they were dug in. The men of Krieg were excited, if such a word existed among them. To finally face someone trained in the art of war was what they lived for. To die for their Emperor is the ultimate sacrifice to them.

It is better to die for The Emperor then to live for yourself.

They would then attempt to breech the defenses with a quarter of a million men. If this was a larger operation the entire regiment would move in to prod the line and find weaknesses. Another regiment would then attack those weak points in key. The Commissar had all confidence in his men. They were fighting for the Emperor, they wouldn’t let him down.

Guns were being wheeled into position. The master of the ordinance stood on a hilltop miles from Detrot. His bionic eye was a bright red and it swiveled as he used its built in range finder. His range finder was telling him it was approximately seven and a half miles to Detrot. There were multiple complex algorithms that were at work, saying exactly what angle the guns will need to be set to. He thanked both The Emperor and the Machine God for this piece of equipment.

“Send the message along the line, all guns are to aim upwards at 73.4 degrees,” he said to the man behind him.

“Sir,” his vox operator said before sending out the message.

The master of ordinance also made sure to fix the problem the man responsible for the last operation fouled up. Dozens of hydra flak batteries were placed along the line. The large quad cannons constantly manned to prevent another incident.

The night went by in peace at the pony line. The Krieg line was a mass of bodies moving to finish preparations. Heavy weapons were still being distributed; Atlas’ were still being brought up. Now that an enemy had shown itself trenches were going to need to be made faster. The line was ready, on the morrow they would trap their enemies between the hammer and the anvil of war. The men of Krieg would be tested, but it would be the equine scum that would be smashed. They were His servants, they had to prevail.

Again apologizes for the shortness of this chapter. Plans are for another longer chapter to be out sometime next week. The battle of Detrot will begin.

Hunter C. Creed

Chapter 5. Bombs, Shells and Prayers

Apologies for being a bit late with this chapter. The past three days, the heat has been brutal in my home. I would need both my hands and both feet to count how many times my graphics card has overheated. But now it has cooled down I could finish the chapter. I would give you guys another date for the next chapter, but with how the weathers has been and another full three days work coming up I can’t say. I don’t want to say ‘next Wednesday’ and not be able to meet it because another several days of heat pop up. I’m rambling at this point, read on my ponies!

Blue Blade was talking with what appeared as the dismembered head of Celestia. A closer look reveals it to be a smoky form of Celestia’s head and shoulders.

“We’ve been here a while princess. We’ve seen neither hide nor hair of these so called ‘humans’,” Blue Blade said as he quickly stifled a yawn.

“I’ve received reports of the ‘humans’ massing around Detrot. I can’t figure out why they are doing this. But we need to stop it.”

“Yes your majesty,” he said with a nod.

“Have you noticed anything out of the ordinary? Anything at all?” she asked curiously.

“Well now that you mention it…”

The operation went off like clockwork. At 7:59 a familiar scene played out. A series of beeps were being listened to at dozens of batteries.

“Code confirmed. We are to begin firing,” the vox operator called out.

“Open fire!” he bellowed.

One hundred and eighty-one pieces of artillery fired in unison.

Unknown to what was happening a mile away, stallions were still trying to wake themselves. A red unicorn just emerged from a dugout. He had a towel over his neck, a tooth brush in his mouth and a small cup hovering next to him. He stifled a yawn as he stepped up onto a platform. He spat the blob of toothpaste onto the grass and gargled from the cup he held aloft with magic. He was just about to spit the water when he heard a whistling noise and saw some strange objects. He didn’t have time to process what it was before he disappeared in an explosion. Most of the shells flew right over the trenches as they were aimed at the city.

“Ponies stay down!” Blue Blade bellowed throughout the dugout.

“What is happening Blue blade!?” Celestia asked worriedly.

“I think we’re under attack,” he stammered.

Celestia was going to begin before Blue Blade cut the connection.

“Tall Spark!” Blue Blade bellowed.

“Yes sir!” Spark called back.

“Run down the line and grab more stallions. We need to get the workers to the basements. You heard about what happened to ponies inside structures above ground!”

Tall Spark needed no more motivation than that.

Blue blade galloped up the ramp into the morning light. Looking up he could see the shell flying overhead and smashing into structures. Fire and debris rained into the streets. Blue Blade gathered a dozen stallions from the next shelter and they hurried into the city. They had a way to go as they had to gallop to the furthest reaches of the city. Using magic infused into his throat Blue Blade began shouting.

“All civilians are to move with due haste to your nearest designated shelter!” The unicorns shouted.

They were dodging falling debris and moving under anything they could so they weren’t directly in the open. They were lucky they thought to move the civilians deeper. The outermost sections were taking a beating

Most of the stallions in Detrot had been pulled out to serve Equestria in its rapidly growing militia. But tens of thousands of stallions had stayed and had begun shuffling towards the nearest shelter. When a buildings top exploded in fire and large chunks of debris began to rain down did they truly begin to move. A dozen stallions were crushed under a giant chunk of concrete. Panic set in and it turned quickly from an organized march to a swirling melee of who could get to safety the fastest. Stallions were knocked to the ground and trampled by their neighbors. It took time to get everypony to safety. But after several hours they were fairly certain they had everyone sheltered. The basements were chalk full of supplies. Stallions had been assigned to every shelter to ensure stability.

Even the royal guards that had trained their entire lives were frightened like little foals. Blue Blade had managed to make it to the shelter of the trench line. The stallions and mares were shaking in terror as the shells exploded outside. Clumps of dirt fell from the ceiling. They might be fairly deep underground but they could hear the explosions quite clearly.

“Sir what’s going on?” one of his stallions asked.

“We’re under a ‘siege’ I think Celestia called it,” Blue recalled.

“What the buck is a siege?” one pony swore.

“Doesn’t sound too pleasant,” somepony piped up.

“It’s when a bunch of ponies attack a place, usually surrounding it. They throw bombs at it and then they take it over,”

“That really doesn’t sound good sir,” Spark said shuddering.

“It’s not. We’re here to stop them from getting to Canterlot.”

Several ponies nodded.

“But how many of those… those… ‘Humans’ or whatever in Celestia’s name they’re called, are there?”

“I don’t rightfully know. But you heard the princess. We’re fighting for her, Equestria and more importantly our families. I ask you, do you want really to let these things reach our foals?”

Everypony in the shelter shook their heads.

“That’s why we’re here,” Blue said sagely.

As the first week of the siege was to move slowly for the ponies, it went like a breeze for the men of Krieg. The hundreds of thousands of men had begun a trench line of their own a simple quarter of a kilometer from the equine line. The large Atlas’ made making trenches simple. The hydraulic lifters had begun digging into the soft earth, quickly creating deep trenches. It was left to the guardsmen to flesh them out.

As the foot sloggers dug, the men in the artillery companies were working just as hard. As the barrels of their guns turned red from heat they needed to be switched. They had been trained so it was like a science. Pieces of the guns had to be replaced as they were worn down from the constant use. Lucky that The Emperor protects, He ensured they were supplied with all the necessary materials needed to wage war.

Blue Blade was talking with Celestia again.

“Your majesty, the ‘humans’ are bombing us!” Blue Blade had to shout to be heard over the constant explosions.

“I’m aware of that; soon Pegasi shall be lifting off to try to cripple our foe. They will be leaving on the morrow,” Celestia said firmly.

“I understand your majesty. I just fear for what is to come. We can rarely leave our shelters. These creatures keep dropping those bombs every few seconds. I’m not sure how they’re doing it. They don’t have anything flying over us,” Blue said confused.

“I’m not exactly sure how they are doing it either my little pony. They have some kind of pipe that lobs them,” she said as happily as she could given the circumstances, “I apologize Blue Blade, I must go and make sure the Pegasi are prepped for takeoff.”

“Yes your majesty,” Blue said as the image of Celestia winked out of existence.

“Sir!” Tall Spark hollered above the explosions.

“Yes Spark?” The Blue unicorn called back.

“Care to join us now?” Spark said referring to the card game that was going on again.

“I already… You know what? Sure, I’ll join in next hoof,” Blue said sitting on a crate.

“Come on, put your backs into it. We need to get our trench dug faster than third platoon!” Guardsman 1647-3026-0125-9258 called to his squad. They had a bet with third platoon; three days worth of ration bars to whichever platoon could dig their trenches the fastest.

It was hard to tell, fresh earth was being thrown constantly. Boards were being laid down along the 6 foot deep trenches. Dugouts were already underway. Whoever could dig their platoon trench along with the eight dugouts would win.

Every so often a guardsman would stop for a moment to look out over the short stretch of no-man’s land. They each felt a burning hatred for the xeno filth. They were stain in His vision. To think that even the filthy Tau would attempt such a thing disgusted them.

Already pamphlets were being handed out. It was a list of proven fact from dedicated Imperial scientists. The equines had horrible eyesight, barely able to see past fifteen feet. They were cowards frightened by loud noises and bright lights. It was advised to shine lights on them and shout while putting them out of their misery. As they are not predators fighting is not in their nature, when the battle begins they should flee, if they are intelligent enough to know how. They had a number of unstable psykers in their midst, they were horned equines that are prone to spontaneous combustion if the buildup of warp energy is too great. The winged equines have short stubby wings barely able to lift them off the ground; they could barely reach speeds of fifteen kilometers an hour and if they go much faster their wings are known to seize up causing them to plummet to their death.

A chunk of the guardsmen chuckled at it, of course they held on to it, to just throw away something like that might be grounds for execution. Some took it to heart memorizing all the weaknesses of their enemies. Studying the diagrams provided showing weak spots.

As over ten thousand Pegasi took off the siege was well underway. Blue Blade made sure to send word down the line. Nopony was to leave the dugouts. It would be suicide to leave the protection of the underground shelters.

The time ticked by slowly, games only kept their spirits up for so long. They might have enough supplies to last a month, maybe two. But they were quickly getting cabin fever.

“Read em and weep,” a unicorn said with a smile, “royal flush.”

“Celestia’s teats,” Spark muttered.

“I’m done for now, I’m going to get some sleep,” Blue said standing and stretching.

Before he could get to his cot he felt a magical tingle. Celestia was contacting him.

“Hello Blue Blade, how are your stallions holding out?” She asked curiously.

“Well your majesty, it has only been a few days. There are always loud bangs from the bombs. But we’ll make do with what we have been given.”

“That is good to hear Blue. I am contacting to let you know that the Pegasi just lifted off. They should be reaching the humans in around four and a half days,” Celestia said with a hint of sorrow.

“Your majesty, we will crush those who would attempt to hurt our families. We will stop them here,” he said beaming.

Celestia’s heart strings ached. It tore her heart out that they truly believed anything possible. Most things are possible, this wasn’t one of them. She knew she had doomed them the moment the order formed in her head. The royal alicorn put on her best smile.

“Yes Blue Blade, we shall stop them in their tracks, they shall regret what they have done to our ponies,” she said her smile almost wavered.

“Your majesty, I need to get some rest, will you excuse me?” Blue Blade asked.

“Yes, you may soldier,” Celestia said severing the spell.

She took a deep breath. I can’t believe I lied to him like that, she said as a tear streaked down her face and landed with a tiny plink to the floor. No matter how many times she had to send ponies to die it never got easier. A wise Draconequus once told her that she was no longer fit to be ruler if it ever stopped hurting to send ponies into danger.

She took another deep breath before she got back to business. She had already ordered all the factory equipment be moved from Stalliongrad to Manehattan. It was taking forever to move everything by cart. She wished they had a better mode of transportation. But with no rivers they couldn’t use boats. Something would need to be figured out. The royal alicorn was still a bit perturbed by the news that had recently reached her royal ears. The griffins had refused to lend air, the large birds were probably hoping both Equestria and these humans would wear each other down then they would try to grab as much territory as possible. She had to find a way to draw them into the fight, the griffins had always had a firm military. With them they might just turn the tide yet. But onto more pressing matters.

She had also recently teleported to both Haliflanks and Derbyshire. Everypony was evacuated. She knew that with empty cities that the creatures wouldn’t stop to, she shuddered at the thought of the human teenager, who has said it was ‘cleansing’. They would get to Canterlot quicker, but she refused to use more ponies as bait to slow her opponents. Slowing them at Detrot had already stooped her to Nightmare Moons level. She had willingly sacrificed a hundred thousand ponies to attempt to outflank Celestia’s forces during the final months of the Nightmare wars.

Celestia thought back to the human, he had seemed very fanatical, almost like the slaves of Nightmare Moon. They would need to get more humans to find more about this ‘Emperor’ she was curious as to why he was glorified.

The week ticked by, for the artillery crews it had been a countless number of shells lobbed at Detrot. For the grim quartermasters it had been exactly fifty-eight thousand one-hundred and fifty-one. Two. Three. Servitors stood at attention counting every shell loaded and fired. Those numbers were turned into data sent to the quartermaster’s data slates. As servitors watched the shells be loaded and fired, other servitors constantly moved shells from the stockpiles to the piles of shells to be fired. Other servitors moved the used casing out of the way. It was a constant cycle they were destined to repeat until they were ordered to stop by the Enginseer in charge of them.

As the end of the first week came to a close familiar giant storm clouds were spotted. Low rez images from the ship Screams of Retribution could barely spot the Pegasi hiding in the gray carpet. The Scream of Retribution had entered the atmosphere for a purpose.

The Pegasi moved the storm clouds as quickly as possible. As they neared the fighting they gave the clouds a last big push before slowing down. They let the clouds drift for a while before it was time. But their trick wouldn’t work a second time. For as soon as the clouds were spotted servitors began moving large amounts of autocannon ammo to the hydra platforms. As soon as the clouds were within range the gunners opened fire. The massive fist sized rounds began tearing through the clouds. The front ponies were torn to pieces.

Heads exploded and limbs were torn off. Panic quickly set in, the wing leaders quickly reigned in their teams. The survivors from the first attack had given them what information they could. The ponies dove in droves towards the batteries. The infantry had quickly entered their dugouts the second the clouds were spotted. The artillery was ordered to keep firing. The hydras were told to focus fire on the ones diving. That was easier said than done. Hundreds of casings were being thrown to the sides. Servitors quickly reloaded the autocannons when they ran dry.

Guardsman 5024-5193-0859-4991 watched through his vision slit as a heavy mortar exploded in fire. His effort doubled. Spotting a small cluster of a dozen equines gathering to strike at a thudd gun, he turned his turret and pulled the trigger. Hundreds of rounds filled the air. The equines were torn to ribbons. Wings disappeared, legs were removed and giant chunks of flesh disappeared in red mist. Quickly swiveling to fire at another group of equines making a dive at another heavy mortar, more shell casings flew off to the side. The heavy mortar protected the guardsman moved onto other targets. He would purge the filthy beasts from His sight.

At battery sixteen Guardsman 6201-4929-6931-0163 was reciting a prayer as he was loading the thudd gun.

Machine Spirit, accept my gift,

Swallow the light, and spit out death.

He looked up and saw a bomb whistling down, running would be futile.

Mighty Emperor, spread Your divine light to protect me from the darkness

He heard a small thud, slowly he opened his eyes. He wasn’t dead, he was very much alive. The piece of ordnance had landed next to the stock pile of shells. It was a dud.

“You there, grab that bomb and get it out of here,” guardsman 0119-1483-1952-1825 said as he pointed to another guardsman.

“Fire!” Another guardsman shouted.

The gun went off, once, twice, thrice and four times.

Spirits in the Machine,

Reward my faith,

And smash the target.

As guardsman 6130-1863-1934-1952 unloaded the gun a prayer was recited.

Machine spirit, forgive my actions

Soon you shall be whole again.

After twelve hours of constant bombs dropping it was over. A dozen guns had been destroyed, five thudd guns and seven heavy mortars. The camo nets had been set up. But the sheer number of bombs dropped had scored some lucky hits. The Imperial trench line was in ruin. Some flight leaders had led their teams bravely. Others were content to stay above the clouds and drop their payloads.

The rain had once again begun falling on the men of Krieg. Leaving their dugouts they began working. The ground had become a brown soup, that didn’t stop them from working. The men of the 501st infantry regiment, 400th company, sixth platoon, had won the bet. Their trench had been nearing completion before the bombs dropped. Third platoons trench was now a series of craters. The men begrudgingly gave over the ration bars. They would have to spread their rations a bit thinner now.

The men of third platoon now looked across the line with even more hatred. In just over a week they would walk across the small stretch of land and begin slaughtering the colorful equines. As men on the ground watched with hatred across no-man’s land, a large amount of Marauder bombers and Vultures were being prepped for launch. No enemy of the Imperium was safe from His gaze. Man, women, child even the old would find out eventually.

I hope you guys enjoyed it. I really like the Imperial prayers (which are all courtesy of the Imperial Infantrymen’s Uplifting Primer) I’ll probably go back and throw in more prayers in previous chapters. One thing I really like is the religious aspect of the Imperium. It really helps the fanaticism to have prayers for every single bucking thing. I’m starting to ramble on guys and gals, hope you all have a great night, day?

Where ever you are, have a good one.

Hunter C. Creed

Chapter 6. Battle for Detrot: day 1 of X

This my ponies is chapter 6. I am not entirely sure how many chapters this will take. You know what, I won't even bore you. Read on!

Edited on August 14 to fix an instance of using the word 'people' instead of 'ponies'

The one-hundred and seventy-nine remaining guns were forced to work harder to make up the slack. Enginseers burned incense as pieces of the guns were removed to be swapped out.

Forgive me Machine spirit,

For soon you shall be whole again

The second week was coming to an end, just two more days until it was time for the charge. More Enginseers and the crew of the tanks were burning incense and praying to the machine spirits. One can’t go into battle unless the machine spirits are happy and ready for blood.

Celestia breathed in a deep sigh. There seemed to be nopony who was willing to lend aid. The ponies of Zebrica couldn’t help. With how slow ships traveled it might be a year or so before they would see anypony. The ponies of Prance were a bunch of cowards; known for refusing to fight even when victory is guaranteed. The ponies of Germaneigh were a warlike group, but they lacked more modern weapons; prefering to fight dawned in armor, armed with spear, sword and shield. They would be torn apart if they entered into the fray. The Diamond Dogs of Canida would be perfect. Instead of joining to save what might end up to be the entire planet, they offered a few thousand dogs in exchange for a massive stockpile of gems and immigration rights. A mere thousand Diamond Dogs could have trench lines dug like lightning. Reluctantly she accepted their proposal. It would take them a while, but they would arrive.

“Your majesty,” one of her guards said entering the war room.

“Yes?”

“The ponies of Derbyshire have been spotted; the ponies of Haliflanks should arrive tomorrow,” the guard said informing Celestia it had been close to two week since she ordered the two cities to be evacuated.

“Thank you, you are excused,” she said waving him off.

“Thank you your majesty,” he said bowing as he left.

Celestia, alone once again began thinking. The griffins were the ones who could turn the tide. There had to be a way to drag them into the war, but the question was how.

The ponies along the Detrot line were getting restless. The bombing over the past two weeks had been constant. The next day would mark exactly two weeks since the chaos started.

“Come on Blue,” Tall Spark beckoned.

“What is it Spark?” Blue replied.

“Don’t give me that, you know we’re all talking about our mares back home. How many foals you have?” Tall Spark asked curiously.

“Three and a forth on the way,” Blue said happily.

“You Diamond dog,” a purple earth pony said with a grin.

“Ya, ya, what about you Spark?”

“First ones due in a couple months,” he said with a big grin.

“We rid our lands of these monsters, these… humans. Then we go home to our mares,” another earth pony said proudly.

“That’s the plan,” Blue said happily, “that’s the plan,” he said a second time, slower.

Blue couldn’t get this feeling of dread do leave him.

“Princess, I’m sorry to disturb you but the ponies from Haliflanks are here. I think you should follow me,” the guard said quickly.

Celestia could hear the worried tone of his voice and hurried along.

He led her out onto one of the many balconies. Looking out she saw a couple thousand ponies moving slowly into Canterlot.

“Where are the rest? Did they already enter the city? Why wasn’t I informed quicker?” Celestia asked rapid fire.

“Those are all of them your majesty. Pegasi say they are the only group for miles,” he said awkwardly.

Celestia felt like she might be sick. Opening up her massive wings she lifted off and glided down to the group of ponies.

“My little pony, what happened to you?” the royal alicorn asked worriedly.

The blue earth pony just kept walking his eyes almost glazed.

“You there, my little pony, what happened?”

The pink unicorn was shaking and muttering something under her breath. Another unicorn stumbled by and knocked into the princess. She was about to say something to him before she realized why he had knocked into her. He was missing his right foreleg. Her eyes darted across the crowd; her eyes bulged when she noticed all the injuries. Ponies were missing legs, wings and horns. A couple even had makeshift bandages wrapped around their head covering an eye. One little foal was on her mother’s back, she had a blood soaked rag covering both her eyes.

It took every ounce of her soul not to vomit.

“What happened out there?” The princess said shocked.

“You have to get out of her your majesty,” one pony looking up at her in a daze.

Before she could ask why he continued.

“The metal birds are coming. Giant metal birds that spit fire. Giant metal birds that drop metal chunks that burst into death,” at this point he was sobbing uncontrollably, “my mare, my foals. Why not me!?” he shouted.

“Shh my little pony, everything will be fine,” she said unsure if even she could believe her words.

He was still sobbing deeply as he began hyperventilating.

Five days previously

“Come on everypony,” Giggling Gumbo, the mayor of Haliflanks called out.

Of course there is was no way to make everypony hear him. There had been over four-hundred thousand ponies in Haliflanks; there was more before the draft.

As ponies were shouting for everypony to keep moving the mayor noticed something. It was getting dark, but there wasn’t supposed to be any clouds. Looking up he saw something massive. His jaw dropped and his throat ran dry. He had never seen anything like it. Was it Celestias? No she would have said something. Staring up he saw something leaving the colossal construct, a lot of somethings. Were they meteors? Some of the large shapes had a pillar of smoke tailing them.

Before anypony could blink they were upon them. Large winged metal constructs were spewing fire. They began strafing the line of ponies. Thing resembling fireworks exploded sending ponies in every direction like ragdolls. Things that fired quickly and loudly tore ponies apart. Chunks of flesh and bone burst from the massive rounds. Red beams of energy cut through ponies by the dozen. Ponies that tried to flee off to the side of the colossal column were singled out, quickly being cut down.

It was a horrifying sight. As quickly as they had appeared the metal birds soared back into the skies and back to the giant metal construct. The cries of the dying were disturbing to say the least. There was no single tone, mares, stallions and foals alike were crying, moaning and struggling to process what had happened.

Present

This was told to Celestia who couldn’t believe it. These creatures were monsters. How could they do something like that to civilians, mostly mares and foals no less. If it cost her, her country she would pay them back in full. There was no excusing these horrors. Soon it would be time for her to lower her sun and raise the moon. The survivors were taken care of. The best medical staff on hoof rushed to help them.

The royal alicorn felt a fire in her belly. This threat would be destroyed as soon as possible. They would repay them for every drop of pony blood in kind. With that she flew up to the sun room to lower her sun.

It was now Sunday and Imperial priests were performing rites for the coming struggle.

Look to your battle gear and it will protect you
We guard it with our lives

Your armor is your soul, and your soul’s dedication its armor
The soul of a warrior is the protector of humanity

Honor the craft of death
Only the Emperor is higher in our devotion

Honor the battle gear of the dead

We ask only to serve

With the rites recited the men were ready for the morrow. Guardsmen sat around and sharpened bayonets and cleaned their weapons. As they cleaned they recited prayers they had memorized.

Let my hand wipe the grime from your perfect form,

May you purify with your bolts of light

Looking over the stretch of land they were prepared. The enemy had been under constant barrage for almost two weeks. Now it was the guardsmen turn to work in His name. They would be up at the crack of dawn to receive necessary supplies.

As midnight rolled around it became Monday.

Still shells dropped. Bleary eyed both sides awoke. At the pony line they ate hay and drank water while talking and laughing.

At the Imperial line it was a simple ration bar and a few sips from a canteen followed by morning prayers.

Before light had even begun to show itself, engineers had run out to cut holes in the razor wire.

The priests wandered the lines now dressed up for battle. Along with their books of hymns to The Emperor they carried an Eviscerator: a massive two handed chainsword capable of tearing through even ceramite plates with ease. Commissar Aviel was leading the morning prayer.

O Immortal Emperor, have mercy upon us,

Miserable unworthies that we are.

O Master of the Galaxy:

Protect Your flock from the alien.

O Keeper of the Light:

Guide our darkened path with Your radiance.

We are Your warriors and we are servants to Thee,

We stand free from blindness of heart,

Free from hypocrisy, vainglory and deceits,

But captive to hatred, malice and anger,

To the filth, the alien and the heretic.

By Thy agony and bloody sweat;

By Thy Golden Throne and Thy Death,

By Thy destruction and re-emergence as the god of Men,

Keep and strengthen us, we who fight for Thee.

The line was silent. Each man finished the prayer and bowed their heads. The Emperor who had allowed them life to atone for the sins of their forefathers, this day He allowed them to pay for past sins with the blood of the alien.

The quartermasters wandered the line taking away meltaguns and plasmaguns. Those troopers were given flamers and grenade launchers. Every soldier was given one extra grenade and two extra power packs for their lasgun. Missile launchers and lascannons were exchanged for heavy bolters and heavy stubbers.

The commissar stepped onto his centaur, his grenadiers following him. Aviel looked at his pocket watch, a small golden piece with the Imperial Aquila engraved on the front. It was time, clicking his watch closed just as the guns silenced.

As he watched as the men of Krieg climbed out of the trenches. They began forming a wall of bodies.

Blue Blade was alerted by sound. It wasn’t that it was too loud, it was dead quiet. It had been for a while.

“Oh buck! Everypony get your flanks in gear!” Blue bellowed.

“What is it Blue,” Tall spark said stifling a yawn.

“Everypony gear up now!”

Everypony was up quickly, slipping into their autoguns and rocket projectors.

“Tall Spark, I need you to hurry down the line! NOW!”

Spark didn’t even reply he just galloped up the ramp and turned left.

Blue Blade was next up the ramp. Their trench line was mainly a series of craters. There was still a platform. Hopping up onto it and looking out. It was like a wall of grey bodies. He swallowed deeply and let out a deep breath. Was it two, three bodies deep? He couldn’t tell.

“Sir?” A small feminine voice called out.

Turning it was a unicorn, a golden helmet floated next to her. Using his own aura he took it and rested it upon his head. The golden helm reflected the light of the suns first rays of light.

Quickly the stallion line formed. Weapons were ready, medical mares were moved into the first lines of buildings. Most buildings had been reduced to ruin, still standing but only as frames of their former glory.

“Stallions! Remember your training; we are going to stop these monsters here! We are going to push them all the back to the pits of Tartarus which spawned them! We are defending our homes, our princess, our country and our families!”

A cheer erupted down the line from those within hearing range of his magically infused voice. They were stepping in range soon.

“Open fire!” Blue Blade bellowed.

The weapons took a second to heat up before firing. They watched in horror as the enemy didn’t slow in the slightest. One human took four rounds to the chest, he dropped to one knee before a lucky round hit him in the eye. He slumped forward and his fellow soldiers stopped on him.

“First volley of rockets! FIRE!” Somepony shouted.

Everypony fired a rocket. Some rockets fell short and exploded in the dirt, making small holes in the soft earth. Ones that hit a soldier were more effective. Bodies burst open as the explosion ripped into them.

Bringer of death, speak your name,

For you are my life, and the foes death.

Then the guardsmen returned fire. They all fired as a single entity. Many shots flew wild, but the sheer amount caused damage. Ponies fell screaming as the red lights hit them.

Tall Spark took a round to his shoulder and he fell into the mud.

“Spark!” Blue Blade shouted as he galloped to his friend.

“I’m fine,” Spark said staggering to his feet.

Already things were looking bleak. The enemy was advancing and was showing no sign of slowing down. Then Blue Blade saw them, massive things at least three ponies tall and at least six wide. He now understood why Celestia had ordered the workers to dig the pits at every entrance to Detrot. These… things belching fiery black smoke rumbling along shaking the ground. What was their purpose? Blue Blade’s question was answered soon after. One of the massive metal beasts slowed for a moment and then halted. Ha! It broke down.

Then it belched fire. Blue Blade could barely follow what flew out. Only catching a glimpse as a half-dozen ponies disappeared in fire and smoke.

“Everypony into the city, send word down the line!” Blue Blade ordered, “Unicorns, throw up shields to cover us!”

Helping his friend Blue walked out of the trench throwing up a shield wall at the front of the trench; a good thing too because the humans were almost there. He watched down the line as some were too slow, he watched the humans throw some little things. Rocks, he mused. Then the ‘rocks’ exploded. What kind of monsters were these. Ponies with ammo carts were protected at all costs. Most had three unicorn’s shields covering them.

“Take cover in the buildings. We need to keep them out of the city,” Blue called out.

Blue Blade, Tall Spark and a dozen other stallions took refuge in the remnants of an apartment structure. Tall Spark was sitting in the back room with a lavender colored medical mare wrapping bandages around his shoulder with magic.

“Focus on those three on the left,” Blue Blade said as he fired a sprayed a short burst.

“Oh buck, the metal thing!”

“SHIELDS UP!” Blue bellowed throwing up a shield across the window.

The metal behemoth fired a round. Five of the six shields burst. But there was only five unicorns at the front, including Blue. Looking back Tall Sparks horn was glowing.

“You just saved our flanks Spark,” somepony said taking a deep breath.

“Before it belches more flame, we need to go deeper!” A dark red earth pony shouted as he fired a rocket out the now unshielded window.

“Ya before those things…” another earth pony started shouting as one of the grey coated monsters jumped through the window.

“DIE XENO FILTH!” It bellowed through its mask as it stabbed the earth pony in the neck with what looked like a short sword.

Quickly, his autogun already heated up, he fired a burst sending the creature staggering backwards a final burst saw it out the window.

“Medic!” Blue shouted running to bleeding earth pony.

He used his hoof to apply pressure. The knife had been torn down and blood was quickly pouring from the wound.

Quickly the mare ran over to him, she audibly gasped before she vomited. Chunks of hay and carrots landed amidst the rubble.

“Help me,” Blue said using his second hoof for more pressure.

She used her magic to pull the knife out and a spurt of blood followed in its wake. She looked ready to vomit again but she quickly got her act together.

She poured some salt on the wound and started bandaging him.

“Sir we have to get out of here!”

“Blue Blade, we have to be careful, we might kill him if we aren’t careful.”

“Everypony, we’re going to pick him up and move him a few buildings down the… INCOMING!” He shouted firing a burst to keep the attackers at bay.

“Move out, we have to go now,” Spark said helping in the creation of the magical stretcher they used to pick the earth pony up.

“Covering fire,” Blue said raking the windows with autogun fire to keep everypony at bay.

They quickly moved out into the alleyway, one of the other earth ponies bucked the door in. They quickly moved through the next apartment complex, only to find a large pile of rubble blocking the side exit.

“Quickly out the front and into the next building,” Blue Blade said leading them through the building.

A unicorn peered out the front door. The set of double doors lay on the ground inside the lobby, blown inside by an explosion.

Grant me the sight of the eagle,

The calm of the breeze,

The patience of the saint and the skill to make the kill from afar.

“I think we’re clear to…” He stopped as his eye exploded and he collapsed.

“By Celestia’s teats!” Spark swore loudly.

“Buck me,” an earth pony muttered.

“Ok, the flash came from across the street. We throw up a few shields and we move as quickly as possible to the next building,” Blue said quickly.

“Gotcha,” Spark said as everypony else nodded.

“On three. One. Two. THREE!” Blue said throwing up a five by five foot blue shield outside the door.

He then quickly hopped over the dead unicorn. As soon as he left the building dozens of small red bolts hit his shield.

“I’ll keep up the shield. Go, go, go.”

“Be careful everypony, we can’t shake him too much,” the mare said wincing as she stepped over the body.

As they left the safety of the shield Tall Spark threw up a second one.

Blue Blade fell in behind them using his shield to create an L with Tall Sparks shield. The earth ponies hurried through the door, the unicorns magically carried the wounded through the large open window of what was once a small grocery store. Blue Blade laid down keeping most of his form hidden. He aimed his autogun high and raked the windows of the apartment building across the street. His eyes flickered down the street where he saw ponies the same as he. They were hunkering down wherever they could to combat the humans.

“Spark, take Brittle and Curls and get upstairs. Fire across the street and tell us if you spot anypony hostile,” Blue said quickly before turning to the medical mare, “let’s get this pony into the back room for further treatment. Butterscotch, Scramble, you two help Seraphine. Skylight get up to the roof and tell me what they are doing down the street. I need to know what those metal things are doing. The rest of you go barricade the side door, I’ll cover the front.”

“Charge!” lieutenant 105 shouted as he sprinted across the street.

Light of the Emperor,

Shine from my eyes,

Ensure the alien surely dies.

The ponies were digging in everywhere. But they hadn’t been ready; they assumed their trenches would keep them safe. Several buildings had walls of sandbags surrounding most of it. The lieutenant was leading an assault on a building that a few dozen equine beasts had garrisoned.

His saber held high as he charged across the street. Hopping over a dead guardsman whose back was riddled with holes. The equines spotted him and his platoon, quickly the air filled with tracers whining by 105’s head. His men were dropping like flies, but sector G 14-34 had to be captured. He was tasked with capturing this structure. His heavy stubber teams were returning fire from the upper floors of the building he had just left. A horned equine stepped into the door way to block 105. Its horn was glowing signaling its weapon was heating up.

Not stopping as he fired a short burst of lasfire. A lucky round caught it in the shoulder, breaking its concentration. Closing the gap and slashing at it with his heavy saber. The weighted blade cut through its head at a diagonal angle. Blood sprayed from the wound as the beast collapsed. He then threw himself to the left of the doorway just as a burst of rounds flew out. One of his men was caught in the hail of rounds. Turning the guardsman into a puppet with its strings cut. Several men reached the wall taking place next to him or the other side of the door.

Looking back the street was a carpet of bodies. Some lay perfectly still, others writhed from injuries. He counted twenty-three out of the sixty four that made the charge with him. He could hear men muttering prayers over his vox bead, mostly from those out on the street.

Although my body is broken,

Although my blood pours away,

Although my time may end,

The Immortal Emperor will greet me,

And embrace me with His holy aura,

If only I remain constant to Him,

Through this time of torment.

“Vox caster,” 105 said roughly through his vox bead, “vox caster?” he repeated.

Looking out across the street he could see his vox caster lay dead. The mechanical piece of equipment was destroyed, every few seconds a small shower of sparks would shoot out of the battery compartment.

“Flamer?” 105 asked.

One man down the line nodded unslinging the Lucius pattern flamer from his shoulder.

“You two, grenades, you, burn em out,” 105 said quickly.

He motioned for them to start. One man on either side of the door pulled out grenade pins and threw the small cylinders into the lobby. There were some shouts of surprise, followed by two crumps and a cloud of dust spilling out of the door. The soldier with the flamer flipped from his position to the doorway. A large burst of burning promethium started more screaming. He then started walking slowly into the lobby. Four men followed, two left, two right.

After an all clear was sounded the rest poured through the door. Contacting his heavy stubber teams he discovered two of the three teams had been killed, the important thing was the guns were still operational. But 105 couldn’t afford to risk crossing the street again to retrieve the guns. He would have to clear the building first. His single surviving heavy stubber had reported that at least a half dozen enemies were killed. Five equines were killed in the lobby.

“Fix bayonets, grenades first then we move up,” 105 said to his men.

They nodded and drew their 45cm bayonets, fixing them onto their lasguns. A few men switched out their power packs.

Machine Spirit, forgive my actions,

Soon you shall be whole again.

The lieutenant was at the top of the stairs with a dozen men pressed along the wall. He could hear the sound of gunfire from down the hall. Pointing to a soldier with a Lucius pattern grenade launcher and motioning around the corner.

The guardsman nodded and moved slowly up the steps. Reaching the top he spun around and fired his grenade launcher. A small puff of smoke and a small thump signaled the weapon firing. Where a moment earlier a white equine firing out a window, now it was just chunks of meat and splashes of gore. 105 then charged saber at the ready. Kicking in a door and firing several las bolts at a stunned pony. A second one charged him only to find itself impaled on his sword. 105 left the room in time to watch a guardsman kick in a door and then explode. Gore showered the men next to him who followed in his wake. They rushed the equine who was trying to heat up his xeno weapon. Stabbing him with bayonet until he finally stopped squirming. He had lost three men on this floor. Two had been killed in hails of bullets the third being just chunks of flesh on the floor. Grabbing ammunition and grenades from the dead they continued upwards.

It had turned into a game of cat and mouse. The equines were setting up ambushes catching guardsmen as they turned corners or opened doors. By the time they had reached the top floor 105 had lost most of his men. They had just cleared the final floor. Three equines held the last room. Kicking in the door only to receive a series of bullets to the chest and head the first guardsman was killed almost instantly. A second threw a grenade into the room, following as soon as it exploded. One equine lay dead, shrapnel wounds covering its body, a second lay wounded. The third charged him from the side, its sharpened horn going through his neck and out the other side. A third guardsman followed and stabbed the equine in the eye with his bayonet. The creatures horn snapped off in the man’s throat. He collapsed to his knees choking on his own blood and bile.

Saying a prayer to the Emperor, 105 fired a lasbolt through the back of his troopers head. Blood splattered across the floor which the guardsman landed in as he slumped forward. He then walked over and put a foot on the equines throat. The equine looked up with terror in its eyes, it found itself staring at to glass orbs reflecting its face back at it. 105 lifted his lasgun and fired three bolts into its eye.

He started his assault on the structure with sixty-four men behind him, and six men left to operate heavy stubbers. Out of those seventy-one men only eight were left. He sent four men back across the street to gather the two heavy stubbers. They linked up with the other two survivors and returned to the apartment building. As they crossed the street they stopped to pilfer the ammunition from 105’s command squad’s heavy stubber. The gun itself was destroyed from a rocket. They grabbed the ammunition from the soldiers who manned the gun.

A quartermaster was now walking through the street. He had over a dozen servitors with him. They quickly stripped men of their weapons, ammunition, grenades, mask filters, rations, canteens and armor that were in usable condition. Those that still lived were given peace in the form of a lasbolt. 105 was granted, after much coaxing, a working vox unit.

A few hours after the quartermaster had finished picking the field of corpses clean, a centaur rolled along. A major stepped out; his grenadiers followed closely, hellguns at the ready.

“Major,” 105 said snapping a salute.

“Lieutenant 105, 6th company, 54th company,” the major said returning it, “I am here to inform you of a field promotion.”

“Sir?”

“Due to casualties you are now captain 105. How many men do have remaining?”

“Eight sir.”

“The remaining men from 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 6th, 9th and 10th platoons are being folded in with the survivors of the 53rd company. You are the captain of the now dubbed 107th company as you are the highest surviving officer.”

With that the major stepped back onto his centaur his grenadiers followed his lead. The vehicle then headed off down the street, bodies crushed and popped under its tracks. With that 105 entered the back into the apartment structure. He had to contact his new company and get everyone together; already he was being given a new sector to assault.

Blue couldn’t believe it had only been a day. They had been forced back a bit further, but not by much. Where once had been a clear line, was now just a blur. Every building was a warzone. They had lost Ripples, the earth pony; he bled out despite their best efforts to keep him alive. They also lost Curls and Skylight to the red lights. They headed further into the city and linked up with another half dozen stallions and another medical mare. They were now holding out in a small apartment complex. Celestia had contacted him, she was shocked to find that the enemy was already a block into Detrot. Shortly after some silence on her end she cut the spell. Blue Blade then got back to watching the streets.

Celestia had to keep her cool, she couldn’t let anypony knew how surprised she was. They weren’t supposed to just push them right into the city like that. From what Blue had told her these were truly monsters. He told her about them just walking through the hail of bullets and rockets. How they had metal behemoths that spouted fire magic that exploded on the ground.
He told her about their small weapons that shot red lights that burned flesh, of their large weapons on wheels that fired rounds that were easily able to destroy chunks of builds, turning parts of ponies to mist. Of the cylinders that exploded sending pieces of jagged metal. She had never seen weapons like these.

The best she could do was set the most brilliant minds of Canterlot to making something similar. Maybe an upgraded autogun, she wasn’t sure. All she could do was lower the sun bringing night to Equestria; bringing darkness to her brave, dying ponies.

This was a blast to write. So I hope you guys had as much fun reading, as I did writing. Again I'm sorry for not being able to give you guys a date for the next chapter. But if I set a date I usually feel rushed. I also have this lovely habit of procrastinating things that have a set deadline. But your comments and thumbs up keep me going. That sounds goofy, but when I got those three comments from: Princess Lulu, Davidpony and Stalins Organ, I got a burst of vitality. I quickly got to work and wrote over half of this within a couple hours. So leave me a comment if you liked it or disliked it. I'm always open for feedback and criticism. Have a good night my ponies, don't let the corpse flies bite.

Hunter C. Creed

Chapter 7. Battle for Detrot: day 2 of X

Apolgies my ponies for not having this chapter out yesterday. I am what is known as a lazy sod, I woke up really late due to a late night of working on sunday. When I finally got my ugly ass up, all I really felt like doing was having a bite to eat and playing some Skyrim. I also apologize this isn’t as long as the previous chapter. Again I'm going off and rambling, without further garbage being spewed, continue on reading!

Celestia’s sun was just rising over Detrot. The battle had raged on through the night. Unicorns had fired off blasts of light throughout the night; it helped them considerably to see in the dark. Blue Blade had stayed awake all night watching the streets. They had been attacked several times, losing a half dozen ponies, including Seraphine, the medical mare; she was working to try and save one of the other ponies who had survived a round to the eye. She had him stabilized and was just starting to shout of her success when a small explosion sounded throughout the building.

Running into the room to find there was no longer a pony named Seraphine, just splatters of blood and chunks of flesh and bone. After that they left the apartment structure. They risked traveling at night, but it paid off, they managed to find a friendly position after traveling through back alleys for nearly a block. Taking up residence a couple buildings near them, they dug in. Earth ponies dragged sandbags in with their teeth, unicorns magically moved them.

The lines were still blurry. Blue had sent Spark to scout around. There were some places where the enemy was holding structures. Others were held by ponies. One block there was three buildings; one was held by the humans next to them was an empty structure, the last building was held by ponies. They didn’t appear to be aware of each other. Blue Blade was informed of this and he just shook his head.

If they didn’t stop these monsters they would lose the city. Buildings would need to be reinforced and they would need to open communication with other groups of ponies. Blue Blade was sending out runners. He had just sent out Butterscotch to go to a group of ponies three blocks away. As Butterscotch got half way across the street a burst of shots rang out. One of Butterscotch’s forelegs exploded, then the side of head and chunks of his flank. He was riddled with hoof sized holes before he hit the pavement.

“Oh buck!” Blue shouted.

“What in Celestia’s teats was that?” An earth pony said shocked.

“Everypony follow me!” Blue Blade called galloping up the stairs.

He got to the fourth floor and leaned out the window. One of the metal behemoths was rumbling along heading towards the T junction. A couple hundred feet ahead of the smoking metal construct was an apartment complex with a convenience store as the ground floor. There were around four dozen ponies inside. At least a dozen of them had been moved to the top floor because they were heavily wounded. Behind the metal beast was a large amount of humans.

The ponies in the apartment building had seen the behemoth. Already they were getting ready for it. This behemoth looked a bit different than the one that attacked their trench line. It didn’t have a big round gun like the other one; it had two longer thinner guns. The thing was bristling with other weapons. When it was a hundred feet away the ponies opened fire. Hundreds of autogun rounds filled the air. They pattered harmlessly across the metal goliath. Then it fired back.

Unlike the pony’s small caliber rounds, the tank fired massive ones. Ponies unlucky enough to get hit didn’t usually survive. Blue Blade couldn’t believe it, what had just moments ago had been four dozen was now down to probably two dozen. Its main guns fired quickly, not as fast as an autogun, but with whatever it was firing, it didn’t need the speed, it made up for it with accuracy and firepower. It was up to Blue to stop this beast.

“Ponies, half of you get to the first floor and stay hidden, as soon as you see the humans, open fire. The other half of you stay with me,” Blue said quickly making sure his weapons were loaded.

Looking down the street he could see the ponies still trying to keep the metal beast at bay. He could see the wounded being shuffled down the stairs. They were sacrificing themselves so the wounded could be moved to safety. Not if Blue Blade had any say in the matter. The rumbling beast was slowing down again. It fired another long burst. A ponies head burst and its slumped to the ground. The pony next to it shouted and fired everything it had; the bullets simple pattered harmlessly across the front. Its rocket hit the front causing small dents from the explosions. Blue Blade just hoped it wasn’t as strong up top.

As it started up again it reached below Blue Blade. He leaned out his ponies following his lead. They then rained down bullets and rockets. The bullets again just ricocheted across the metal. The rockets seemed to do a bit more, but still nothing. Then one lucky earth pony hit a small metal grate towards the rear. His rocket pierced the mesh and exploded inside. What looked harmless at first changed quickly as fire begun to billow out. A small explosion sent the grate flying five feet into the air. A hatch opened at the top and several humans drenched in flames climbed out were screaming. That same earth pony had just begun to fire his autogun when a small red light blew through his head splattering red and grey matter on the ceiling.

The earth pony slumped and fell out the window. Blue Blade barely got himself back in, in time. Two others weren’t as lucky, one wasn’t quick enough and the other got stuck, his empty rocket projector preventing him from getting to safety.

Blue Blade heard autogun fire from downstairs. He gathered the three survivors and headed back down. He arrived at the top of the stairs just to watch a pony backing up get shot to death. It slumped down as several red beams of light struck it.

Blue turned to Tall Spark.

“We’re in trouble,” Blue Blade said as he moved to the side.

He could hear several feet thumping up the stairs. He took a deep breath and heated up his autogun. Quickly leaning left he fired a long burst down the stairs. The first human filled with rounds fell backwards. The second and third were also caught in the hail of small projectiles. The last couple of humans would have been killed if they hadn’t have been protected by the bodies of their comrades. The bodies of their comrades fell onto them; the bodies became tangled mess quickly beginning decent the stairs.

“Quickly out the back, we’ll hop down and escape down the alley.”

The other four nodded. Poking his head out and quickly looking left and right before hopping down onto ground. It hurt his legs but nothing twisted. The other two were find too, Spark wasn’t as lucky. His foreleg twisted on landing and he shouted. Blue Blade worriedly took a closer look. His friend just twisted his leg a bit; probably a simple sprain.

“You are one unlucky unicorn Spark,” Blue Blade said shaking his head.

“I’m still alive aren’t I?” Spark replied grinning.

“Enough small talk you two, we need to leave!” One very distraught earth pony said.

Blue just nodded before helping Spark along.

“What about our runners?” The other earth pony said

“We can’t help them now,” the first earth pony replied sorrowfully, “all we can do is find more ponies and keep fighting.”

“We should go link up with the survivors from the convenience store. I saw the survivors shuffle out the back with the wounded. We can help them and link up with some more ponies elsewhere,” Blue Blade said confidently.

The other ponies nodded.

“We’ll have to move quickly to meet them. And we’ll have to cross the street,” Blue said taking a right in the alleyway heading towards the street.

“Ok sir, what’s the plan?”

“We throw up a long shield and move as one. Spark you throw up one on the left, I’ll take the right.”

Spark just nodded and threw up a shield. Blue tossed up another one and the moved quickly. The four began weaving through the alleys looking for the wounded ponies.

Captain 26 cocked his bolt pistol. He and his platoons were being tasked with clearing out several hundred ponies that had taking residence in an apartment block. He was given a Leman Russ Exterminator, one of four; an hour ago it had been five, Exterminator tanks from the 103rd. Its commander leaned against its left sponson.

They would be the second company to be tasked with cleaning out the complex. The other company had attempted an assault in the early morning. Needless to say they failed.

His objective was to take the buildings and hold them. His surviving men would then be mixed into another company. He had seen the expected casualties, but he would succeed. For the Emperor was watching!

“Ok platoons one to eight, you are to disperse around the objective. Heavy weapons teams are to provide covering fire from surrounding structures. Platoons nine and ten are in reserve,” 26 said as he turned to the tank commander,

“Commander 51, you will receive the signal to move. Kill any xeno in your sights.”

The commander nodded.

“First platoon, on me. All platoons vox in when you are in position,” 26 said heading towards sector 59-19.

The platoons weaved through the back streets. The apartment complex at one point had probably been prime real-estate. It was four large buildings surrounded by a large park. The park was dotted with trees and shrubs along with four fountains, one in each corner. Of course most of this was torn apart. Where once stood tall oak trees were now just splintered stumps. What was once green grass and healthy shrubs now just shell holes with tufts of brown.

Three of the four fountains were just small bits of rubble. The last one was missing most of its statue and the walls that held the water were just jagged chunks of stone now.

With platoons in position, weapons teams set up, prayers on their lips, they charged. The vox signal went out. Seven hundred men charged across the street and into the park. 26 had his saber held high, light from the sun reflected off it. His grenadiers; a flag bearer was to his right, his vox caster to his rear and both his heavy flamer team was to his left. Following behind them were sixty guardsmen. Even farther back were three autocannon teams.

“Open fire,” 26 said into his vox beads.

A hail of lasbolts began pelting the buildings; followed by grenades fired from the Lucius pattern launchers. Then came the heavy bolter, autocannon and heavy stubber fire. Even from this distance he could see bits of the building exploding. Then the equines returned fire.

He and his grenadiers were fine. The grenadier squad attached to 21’s company was fine too; with the protection of their plates of plasteel and ceramite draped over their torsos, shoulders and thighs along with their reinforced masks. With their armor they could walk safely through weapons that would rip through the flak armor the regular guardsmen wore.

He watched as several men fell, but they would keep going forward, until they, or their enemy, lay dead. Several men had hunkered down behind a centaur that had its left track blown out. His autocannons had slowed and stopped firing. Those troopers better reload quickly.

21 began firing short bursts from his bolt pistol. He was pretty sure he saw an equines skull explode from one of the small missiles. Then things went to hell. He watched as his standard bearers chest exploded outwards. A massive round had punched clean through him, even the ceramite layer of his armor did nothing to stop the fist sized round tearing through his chest. 21 kept sprinting, a prayer on his lips.

Mighty Emperor,

Spread Your divine light to protect me from the darkness.

Blue Blade was leading the group of two dozen ponies throughout the back alleys. They had been wandering around for close to an hour. They could’ve tried the streets. But he was afraid they would run into another metal monster. He ordered everypony to stop. He heard something, something big was firing. Gathering most of the able bodied ponies he followed the source of the noise. Entering through the first floor he couldn’t tell what the floor had once been. Everything was covered in dust and rubble. Looking out the front he saw a mass of humans charging towards a large apartment complex. He could see ponies in the windows firing back.

If they didn’t get some help they might not make it. He could hear something firing upstairs. Carefully stepping up the stairs, he saw three large weapons being used by six humans. His ponies following him through the door, they heated their autoguns and raked the line of men. Blood splattered across the guns and floor, the humans turned to rag dolls. Using magic Blue pulled the humans off their guns; dragged the corpses along the ground leaving a trail of blood and finally dropping the carcass in the corner. Positioning himself Blue oversaw the battlefield. He would do as much damage as he could to help his fellow ponies.

One of the earth ponies did his best to use the gun. The gun shook, but he could use it. Blue and Spark used their magic to control the weapons. Tilting them down towards the charging humans they opened fire. The earth ponies shot went wild; while Blue’s and Spark’s shots were quick and calculated. Then they saw it, another metal behemoth was rumbling into the park.

“Everypony, focus fire on that tin can!” Blue Blade shouted over the din over the large weapons fire.

Most of the rounds bounced off the outer shell. Tall Spark noticed a bit on the left that was spewing fire and that tearing up the bottom floor of one of the apartment buildings. Taking careful aim Spark began firing a constant stream of shells at the side of the metal construct. A single round managed to punch through the slightly weaker sides of the metal giant. The side stopped firing, then the massive metal beast turned to face them.

“OH BUCK, GET DOWN!” Spark shouted tackling the two other ponies to the ground.

Just then a hail of massive rounds assaulted the windows. The walls inside exploded in a shower of dry wall and wood. The outside wall exploded inward raining brickwork and bits of wood onto the ponies.

The rounds stopped and Blue Blade popped his head up, the metal construct was still facing them.

“I’ll keep firing,” the earth pony said hopping back onto his hoofs.

“No stay down!” Blue shouted.

The earth pony ignored him and kept firing at the metallic monstrosity. The rounds just pelted harmlessly across the front.

“What’s that,” the earth pony said looking to the sky, just as a round tore through his throat.

Peering over there was a brown blur coming down from the sky. A bird? A griffin? No it was pony, a Pegasus, and it had a bomb!

Blue Blade watched in awe as the brown blur released its payload fifteen feet above the metal leviathan, before it quickly veered up and shot back into the clouds. The bomb smashed into the top of the beast and exploded. The top of the beast disappeared in a fiery blast. Black smoke began pouring from the flames, they saw one human escape the fires, only to get cut down by ponies in the apartments.

An earth pony who had watched his friend perish stepped up to the gun. He bellowed a massive war cry before firing more rounds at the still advancing humans. One round hit the back of a human, a massive explosion followed, fire pillared into the sky and poured down on over a dozen humans. Tall Spark and Blue Blade stood back up and followed suit, both bellowing their own war cries as they fired the captured weapons.

21’s vox caster had snatched the flag before it could hit the ground. They were under attack from behind. But turning back would be suicide, they would keep pushing forward. Right on time their tank showed itself. The massive Exterminator began pouring out fist sized rounds at the equine xenos.

The autocannons began firing at the tank. At first harmlessly pelting against the sides, they got a lucky shot. He saw a hole punched in the side of one of the sponsons. The tank’s left sponson stopped firing; the gunner was obviously dead or dying. The tank turned and began returning fire, the ponies were probably killed, he couldn’t see to be sure, but the tank stopped firing. As he continued charging he could hear an autocannon fire again. The rounds hit harmlessly across the tanks outer hull. He saw something flying down from the clouds. Was it a large bird? A fighter? No, It was a bomb wielding equine! 21 began firing up at it, but it was moving too fast to hit.

It dropped its ordnance and flew back into the clouds. The large explosive slightly pierced the top hatch and exploded. The concussion killed the commander and loader instantly. Flames quickly engulfed the inside. The only crew member to escape was the right sponson gunner. His escape short lived as he was peppered with rounds as he ran from his wrecked vehicle.

21 kept running, he heard the autocannon fire start up behind him again. He ran another fifteen feet before a massive explosion threw him to the ground. Struggling to get back up, looking he found his left sleeve on fire. Looking to his left, his heavy flamer team was dead; a dozen or so guardsmen were rolling on the ground screaming. Someone was calling for him, looking up his vox caster was offering him a hand, as he took it and started to get helped up a chunk of the vox caster’s head disappeared. The man fell to his knees; blood spurted from the gaping wound, he then fell forwards into the dirt.

Bolt pistol holstered 21 took the flag and kept going. He found himself alone, nobody following behind. A small burst of rounds hit his unprotected thigh, using the flag as a crutch he kept going. A massive round punched through his back and out his stomach. Falling to his knees, his life leaving him, all he could do was pray for forgiveness.

Sweet God-Emperor, forgive Your servant his sins,

And remember I am just a man.

With that captain 21 passed into the Emperors embrace. The attack fell apart shortly after his death; confusion reigned quickly and the survivors fled. The hundreds of survivors would end up being formed into a penal legion. Their great coats and gas masks stripped from them. Their heads would be shaved and their unit insignia tattooed onto their heads. Explosive ‘disciplinary’ collars would be clamped on their necks, they would then be sent into areas where the fighting is thickest and the chances of survival are the slimmest.

Blue Blade breathed deeply. He couldn’t believe it, but why were Pegasus still there? Hadn’t they all fled when after they dropped their payloads in the previous week? Questions swirled around his head. They would have to get to the apartment complex. Blue Blade fired a blast of magic into the air outside the building. Just in case they threw up shields and began the trek across the park. Bodies littered the ground and already flies were everywhere, they seemed quite aware of the fresh meal.

Without error they arrived at the apartment structures. What had once been pristine white structure were now covered in holes. Chunks of the structures were just, absent.

“Quickly inside,” a voice said hurriedly.

“What’s the rush?” Spark asked still trotting.

“You never know when more humans could show up,” a new voice said roughly.

Dropping their shields they filed into the building, wounded first.

It took Blue Blade a minute to tell who the pony was without his armor. It was one of sergeants Blue Blade had trained; Heavy Shield.

It had taken Blue Blade years to move up to the rank of captain; he had trained Shield as a recruit, he was a hulking earth pony, Blue was aware of some of the sergeants scars, like the jagged one that ran along his flank from fighting a hydra. But the one that ran across his forehead was new, along with numerous burn marks along his front.

He looked like he had been to Tartarus and back. It seemed like where Blue Blade was always able to barely slide out of the path of danger, Heavy Shield was always diving straight in its way.

“Sergeant,” Blue Blade said nodding to him.

The survivors Blue had with him followed suit.

“You look familiar,” the dark red earth pony said eyeing Blue Blade.

“I trained you when you joined the guard,” Blue Blade reminded him.

“Captain Blue Blade, sir,” he said with a sharp salute.

“Yes. A question sergeant, where did that Pegasus come from?” Blue Blade asked.

“Sir, you as much as anypony should know that the cloud city of Windsoar is located to the west.”

Blue Blade nodded.

“Shortly after we were pushed into the city, I sent a runner to Windsoar, he spent most of yesterday galloping, he barely managed to swim across the river. I had him gather a bunch of stallions. A few of them had been too frightened to drop their bombs over the enemy, about five or six Pegasi fled to Windsoar. We have been using the Pegasi civilians as runners, or fliers I guess. They have the ability to soar into the clouds for safety, diving out above their objectives. We have only lost one or two Pegasi, and those were only due to faulty information. We are quickly building a communication web.”

Blue Blade was glad to hear this. To know that they were getting into contact with everypony was a blessing. It meant they had a chance, a chance to not just flicker out like a candle in the dark.

“You did good sergeant, you did good,” Blue Blade said approvingly.

The younger sergeant beamed at this.

“Sir, do you have a plan?” Spark asked.

“We are going to hold onto the city as long as possible. We have too much riding on us to flee. We are going to coordinate with other groups of ponies. We dig in and make the pay for every inch of Detrot,” Blue Blade said with his usual confidence.

“Sir, we have easily a thousand of ponies with us in constant communication,” Heavy Shield said informatively, “and our Pegasi are getting into contact with more groups every hour.”

“Shield, I need a few of your Pegasi, I have some things I was sent to the Princess in Canterlot,” Blue Blade said switching topics, “on that note, I found some really interesting weapons that those filthy humans left behind. They can be of use to us in fortifying positions.”

This had Shield’s attention; of course he was quickly interested in what had to be said.

Loaded up the Pegasi took off, only the strongest were able to oversee the task. They were heavily laden and had a long way to go, but they were up to the job.

Another day was coming to a close. A priest of the Emperor’s Ecclesiarchy held his Eviscerator with a single hand; which to some would seem quite odd, he was a man of sixty-four and he appeared gaunt, with a long graying beard and his face twisted in a fanatical grin.

“Men of Krieg, I am here to fight alongside you. Men, never forget you are the walls of flesh and bone, between Mankind and a thousand horrors too unspeakable to name. You are the walls of Hell.”

The men of Krieg listened to this, although they are usually blank faced men. The priest’s words stirred fires in their bellies, his words whipping them into a fanatical frenzy. He continued his sermon as the group gathered steam.

What would have been an organized column of men was turning into a religious riot. Bayonets drawn, some mounted on lasguns; others had their lasguns slung, only bayonet in hand. What had started as a mere hundred men, was now reaching three hundred. The priest’s sermon was quickly gathering more support as they marched down the streets of Detrot.

Love the Emperor,

for He is the salvation of mankind.

Obey His words,

for He will lead you into the light of the future.

Heed his wisdom,

for He will protect you from evil.

Whisper his prayers with devotion,

for they will save your soul.

Honour His servants,

for they speak in His voice.

Tremble before His majesty,

for we all walk in His immortal shadow.

Their goal was to take a library, and they were coming up on it quickly. Shouting hymns to the Emperor they charged the structure; it was a large white building with a line of columns surrounding it, in between the pillars were sandbags with ponies taking cover. The building was covered in shell holes, and large chunks of the stairs leading up were nothing but rubble.

As they heard the shouting they raised to see the coming tide. Over five-hundred shouting crazed fanatics were charging towards them. Opening fire upon the guardsmen didn’t slow them in the slightest. Even those taking hits seemed to shrug them off. As they climbed the stairs men began to fall, the priest was still shouting hymns and passages from the many tomes and scrolls at his side. Bullets crackled across the holy field from his Rosarius.

Not a single lasbolt or bolter round had been fired. The ponies struggled to contain them. The horned equines threw up shields where they could. The guardsmen poured in between the unprotected pillars. Stabbing and slashing wildly. The priest climbed over a sandbag wall and began his holy work.

He shouted hymns and scriptures as he hacked away. He severed a pony in half, his massive Eviscerator tore through the weapons at its side along with flesh, muscle and bone with ease. The weapons teeth flung blood everywhere. The priest was practically cackling as he watched the men do His bidding. Stabbing into eyes and neck, the ground was slick with blood.

The battled lasted less than an hour. It would have taken longer and less lives if some lieutenant was heading it. But he like the other guardsmen had been thrown into a fanatical frenzy. He had fallen along with half his command squad during the charge up the stairs.

The priest then led in a cleansing of heresy. The libraries contents were found to show a false God. Some long living xeno who has been ruling for several hundred years, using magic that almost ended her death she banished her treacherous sister; she now spends most of her time on a golden throne overseeing her people. The book burning was massive; tens of thousands of books were burned in a massive bonfire. The fire was massive; creating a pillar of smoke that would be seen throughout the night and the next day.

With the task complete the priest gave a long and lengthy sermon during the book burning. It was a speech that lasted deep into the night. With their spirits aloft, the guardsmen were ready to go back into the fray. Thumbing the glyph on his Eviscerator to start it up, the priest headed off with his fanatical followers to do the Emperors bidding, in the form of spilling more xeno blood.

Another fun chapter to write. As I was writing I was thinking of possibilities of two alternate endings, one of which might allow for a spinoff story. But only time will tell, so don't try to quote me later. I will try to start on the next chapter ASAP.

On a side note, please thumbs up or down this story and leave a comment. If it is a thumbs down, I want to hear what you didn't like. Same with a thumbs up, what have you enjoyed so far?

I hope you all have a good day.

Hunter C. Creed

Chapter 8. Battle for Detrot day 3 of X

You guys have waited and I apologize for this being so short. For those who didn’t see the comment, I have been quite busy; it has left me without the time to write much. I shall start the next chapter at the earliest possible convenience. With that in mind, get to reading.

Blue Blade awoke early. He was glad to finally have a decent night’s sleep.

“Blue Blade, good, you’re awake,” Heavy Shield said looking crestfallen.

“What’s wrong Shield?”

“We lost contact with the Detrot library, I hoped it was just the Pegasi getting lost. But when one returned, I was informed that the ponies garrisoned were slaughtered, the entire libraries contents were burned.”

“Why?” Blue Blade said surprised.

“The Pegasi said he was contacted by a single survivor who escaped during the initial assault, he got scared and left his post and took refuge in nearby ruins. He said that a human different from the others gave some loud speech while they burned the library’s books. Saying we worshipped a false god, that they would need to rid us so this planet could be ‘reclaimed’ for their ‘emperor’. They said our entire history is a lie falsified to mimic their beliefs.”

“False god? Reclaimed? Their beliefs? Emperor? This planet has never had a race of monsters like this. We don’t even know their heritage, how could we possibly steal something we don’t know?”

“I’m not sure, all I know is after they finished their massive bonfire they left and attacked an apartment complex. The one leading them seemed to be able to whip them into a murderous frenzy. The only survivor of that attack was a Pegasi who took to the clouds. He said their leader seemed almost like he was preaching in a Church of the Sun. He was singing hymns and almost laughing as he slaughtered our fellow ponies.”

Blue Blade didn’t know what to say. These humans were insane monsters. It was almost like this was a religious war from fiction novels. Blue Blade had a quick bite to eat before he found himself helping his sergeant in coordinating different groups of ponies. He had a detailed map laid on a table. Arrows of different colors streaked down streets and through buildings. There were many red arrows, informing grimly of groups that were wiped out to the last pony; the humans spared nopony.

There were arrows showing the last known path a metal monster had been seen traveling. Lines also showed enemy troop movements, where they were the most heavily dug in, most lightly defended, where they were attacking and where they were breaking through.

Until it was put in prospective Blue Blade had no idea things were like this. The lines that divided pony and human were almost invisible. The battle line was a jagged thing, in some places they were only a couple blocks or so into the city; in other areas they were eight or nine blocks in. It was impossible to tell exactly how many lives had been lost on both sides.

A group of a dozen ponies had been sent out under the watchful eye of a member of the royal guard. They had been informed of several ponies getting killed in the area. They were to find rid the threat.

They were walking down the street; they were covered in dust and grime. Like most of the ponies they had been fighting almost nonstop since the humans charged their trench line. The one who had been leading them was a large muscled red earth pony.

I have become death,

Destroyer of foes.

A loud crack and the top of the guard pony’s head exploded. Gore showered those behind him. There was screaming as ponies dove for cover.

“Holy buck!” a pony shouted from behind a pile of brickwork.

Another crack and a pony that didn’t get in cover in time dropped. The round had torn through his chest; he collapsed to the ground with blood pouring from the wound. The other ponies had gotten to cover and were trying to find the killer. The unicorn who had gotten hit was crying in agony.

“I’ll get him,” A brave earth pony said as he crawled out from cover.

He had just made it to the downed pony only to receive a round through his throat. He collapsed next to the unicorn clutching his throat with his hoofs.

“Celestia’s teats!” Somepony shouted looking at the blood splattered across the ground.

The pony clutching his throat couldn’t halt the blood flow. Blood sprayed into the air and ran down his neck. After a minute he was still, blood still dripping down his neck to the ground. The unicorn was still moving, barely.

“We have to find the human doing this!” A pony shouted to be heard over a crack that shattered some rubble above his head.

Another crack rang out and the pony ceased moving, a large wound in its head with blood pouring to the ground.

“Buck! I think I saw where the shots are coming from. But I need to be sure, Comet, I need you to run across the street and dive back to cover, when he takes the shot I’ll know where he is,” a unicorn named Silver Stone said taking charge.

Comet looked skeptical, but it was either try and by chance, survive, or just sit and wait to die.

Comet nodded and without a word took off into the street. He made it halfway when a crack sounded and a chunk of brickwork exploded behind him. A second shot rang out and shattered his left back hoof sending him falling forward screaming. He barely fell into cover; it took another earth pony to quickly drag him fully into cover.

“You okay there Comet?” Silver Stone called to the pony.

“Took my bucking hoof off,” He said with a sob.

“I saw where the flashes came from. I need a few of you to keep this demons attention. Snap some shots at the building at the end of this street you don’t need to aim anywhere specific, make the bucker think hes still hidden,” he said taking a deep breath, “I need three of you to follow me.”

Silver Stone pointed to three ponies and slipped carefully into a building. The ponies following his lead; they began quickly weaving through buildings eventually coming out onto the road.

A crack rang out followed by screams; Silver cringed at the thought of what was going on. At least he could see autogun fire still peppering the buildings front.

They galloped across the street and traveling into the building next to the enemy occupied structure. They then climbed into the alley and cautiously opened the door to the enemy occupied structure. The lobby had seen battle before. Bodies of ponies and… stripped humans lay across the floor. Dried blood was everywhere, splattered across the floor and walls. The flashes had been coming from the twenty-sixth floor; in short, they had some walking to do.

Along the way they heard several more cracks, still autoguns returned fire. The loud cracks were getting closer and closer; a large number on the wall of the stairwell informed the ponies they were on the twenty-fourth floor.

Another loud crack and the autogun fire slowed and finally ground to a halt. They quickened their pace, reaching the twenty-sixth floor moments later. Silver got to the top of the stairs and slowed his pace to a crawl, no sense in warning the bucker. The second pony in the line wasn’t as lucky as Silver, his hoof caught on a thin metal wire. An explosion followed sending the third and fourth ponies flying down the steps and Silver catapulting forward. When the smoked clear the remains of the earth pony was revealed; most of the body was blown apart, the right side of its torso missing with the ponies intestines coiled on the floor.

Silver, shaking, got to his feet. He couldn’t afford to go back to the stairs. Taking off in a gallop to where the human was, bursting into the room to find it empty. Walking into the center of destroyed roomed and looking out the window and into the streets below, this was the place. Shell casings littered the floor. The window frame had several lines scratched in to it; four with a line through it, then three more; eight being the total, but eight what? Silver heard some heavy hoof falls and galloped towards them. Silver reached the source of the noise, just in time to witness a human with a great coat jumping out a window; this in turn caused Silver’s eyes to bulge. He galloped to the window and looked across, the human had made a leap of faith. He was nearly fifteen feet away and nearly three stories down. How he had pulled it off, he didn’t care. Heating up his autogun he began firing. The rounds peppered around him, a single catching his leg as he climbed through the window.

“Buck, buck, buck!” Silver shouted.

“Sir,” A pony said staggering towards him. The unicorn was peppered with shrapnel, a small piece stuck out of his head, just above his eye.

“He escaped,” Silver growled.

“Should we go after him?”

“We can’t catch him, I don’t know about you, but do you think you can jump across this gap?”

The unicorn shook his head slowly.

“Let’s go meet up with the others,” Silver muttered.

They had to help the other pony; he had broken his rear left leg. They grabbed the box magazines from the dead earth ponies sling and left.

Exiting the front of the building and heading towards their comrades.

“Hey everypony!”

No response.

“Anypony?”

Nothing, Silver took off in a gallop. Everypony was dead; most with large gaping wounds to the head or neck. They had kept fighting trying to buy him time, and he let the human slip through his fingers.

Then a noise, coughing. Somepony was alive, quickly following the source to find Comet. He had a gaping wound in his chest that visibly exited his stomach.

“Comet!” Silver shouted taking off at a gallop, “oh Celestia. You’re going to be fine Comet.”

“It hurts Silver,” Comet wheezed.

Comet was trying to stop the bleeding to no affect.

“Hey Silver?” Comet said slowly.

“Yes?”

“You get the bucker?”

“Ya, we got him.”

“That’s good,” he said with a small nod.

As if the simple lie had given him peace he shut his eyes.

“I will go to Tartarus and back to get this bucker,” Silver said lowering his friend.

Silver made it his goal to hunt the killer down.

Celestia had just finished talking with Blue Blade. He had informed her about the humans and their odd behavior at the library. Almost none of the countries past was a lie. Yes she did what had to be done in regards to wiping certain records. All that had served to do was have her lands unprepared for war. She had been far too hopeful that another wouldn’t Nightmare war would break out. But she never in a millennia could have foreseen this. A race foreign to the planet besieging its inhabitants claiming they owned it. Claiming that their god owned this planet, and to her terror, a million others.

But that wasn’t possible; she herself was a being that had traveled through the great void. Her sister and she had traveled for centuries through the void and they found no other signs of life. Were these creatures spawned from Tartarus and therefore lying to put fear into her ponies? Were they insane? Had they always existed and they come from so far not even she herself had seen their planet. She would allow herself time to think later; now the ponies researching new weapon ideas had something to show her.

Walking into one the rooms Equestria’s smartest unicorns were working around the clock in, Celestia was greeted by a dozen unicorns. In the center of the room a massive white sheet covered a large box shaped object.

“What do you have for me my little ponies?” Celestia asked curiously.

“Well your majesty, upon hearing the reports from Pegasi who took part on the most recent bombing run, we were told about a human weapon. We’re not sure how they control theirs, but we came up with a similar design for a different purpose. While their weapons were used to shoot our Pegasi down in droves, we designed this to take them out on the ground.”

“Mmph?” one unicorn with a corner of the sheet in his mouth asked.

“Yes, now.”

They ripped the sheet off revealing a large angular metal contraption. Along each side were three autoguns, a large vision slit was placed along the front where it was slanted upwards. From the side view it appeared like a

“We give you the Hornet,” one of the unicorns said proudly.

“You see your majesty; this pours out all the firepower of six ponies. It also protects the ponies within it,” a different unicorn said proudly.

“How does it work?” Celestia asked as she circled around it.

“It opens up here your majesty,” the unicorn said using his aura to open the door, he swung it down and let it gently hit the floor.

Inside it was of comfortable size, it contained some containers for food and three obvious areas where ponies would be seated.

“It needs three unicorns to work in top condition. Two unicorns are needed to turn the entire Hornet. The third is in control of aiming and firing the autoguns, he is also the one who uses the vision slit.”

“It is easy enough to make as the humans gave us the general idea and shape. It is simply put, several plates of inch thick iron magically welded together. The same material royal guard armor is made of, which as we have heard holds up well against their weapons that fire the red lights. We fired several rounds from the captured human weapon that was confiscated from the prisoner a while back. Although after several shots the metal gets red hot, it still holds up of course.”

“Why is that?” Celestia asked still gazing at the Hornet.

“The weapon isn’t firing a solid projectile, it fires a beam of some kind and it doesn’t seem to be able to pierce armor, it instead relies on hitting flesh where the weapon can have devastating effects,” one unicorn said before another pony took over.

“It pierces skin with ease and the heat can do damage to internal organs quite quickly. In short if the hit isn’t absorbed it can easily kill a pony in a single shot, if it is placed right of course,” the pony had a red cross on his white coat.

“Thank you doctor,” Celestia said with a curt nod.

“Although the materials to make the Hornet aren’t in huge supply, we can begin production immediately and begin shipping them out.”

“How easy are they to move?” Celestia asked.

“A cart pulled by two earth ponies can move it easily enough.”

So shipping those to Detrot would be impossible. From reports the entire city was completely surrounded. She was also being informed of weird looking humans that were working on a massive wooden and metal line that went from around where the first village was attacked going past Detrot and Haliflanks, she was unsure what its purpose was, but it couldn’t be good.

“I thank you for your time gentlecolts, I commend you on your work, I accept your design and I will make sure production is started immediately,” Celestia said with a bright smile.

“It was our pleasure your majesty,” they said bowing.

With that she left. She would have to send the plans to Manehattan where all of Stalliongrad’s factory equipment had been moved to. These Hornets were far too bulky to be produced in Cloudsdale.

Commissar Aviel was leading an attack. He was leading three grenadier squads to take a store of some kind that had proved to be too tough for an entire company. But tank support was out of the question. They were needed for more important matters, such as the breakthroughs planned.

The six centaurs rumbled along down the street. The store was coming into view, Aviel was eager to spill blood in his name. He would give his grenadiers a speech but it would be lost on them. Whereas the average men of Krieg could be stirred into a religious frenzy, those who stayed in the grenadiers seemed to be devoid of life. As if their skull masks sucked away what little humanity they had. They seemed to gain a bit back when they go back into the regular guard to become sergeants of regular squads.

The battle began quickly. The heavy stubbers opened up on the windows of the storefront. An equine that had the stupidity to raises head had it taken off. The heavy stubbers continued to lay the fire on them, the grenadiers dismounted and charged. Commissar Aviel and his squad started running straight, the other squads taking the flanks. The heavy stubbers changed their firing sectors to avoid the advancing squad.

Aviel flicked the glyph on his power sword; crackles of blue lightning ran along the blade. One grenadier kicked in the door, well the metal frame for the door, the glass long since pulverized to dust from artillery. Equines charged forth to try and stop the squad. Firing their xeno weapons on full auto; of course the fire just pattered harmlessly across their ceramite plates. The commissar cleaved through a ponies head with ease, the energy field that crackled across the blade allowed it to cut through flesh, bone and armor like it was butter.

The battle lasted a mere twenty minutes. In that time the floors of the store had become a river of blood. Ponies had been torn apart with bayonets, sabers and other weapons. The commissars bolt pistol was the weapon they feared the most; at least before they suffered the same fate. The commissar fired a bolt into an equines head; the bolts explosive core detonated causing the head to become a shower of gore. The xeno next to it had a look of terror on its face, the remains of its xeno cohorts face splattered across its own. Of course the look of terror on its face disappeared, along with the rest of it.

Why the pieces of xeno filth even attempted to halt the Imperium was beyond Aviel. With the store cleansed without a single loss, it was time to move into the next combat zone.

Hope you enjoyed it, have a good day. Again, sorry for making you loyal readers out there wait so long. You have my sincerest apologies.

Hunter C. Creed

Chapter 9. Battle for Detrot: day 7 of X

I apologize for the shortness of this chapter my ponies. But my parents were in a motorcycle accident and are currently in ICU down in Ohio. I probably won’t be doing a lot of writing over the next couple of weeks. Before you freak out (none of you know me so you shouldn’t) they are both living and breathing with no brain damage. But when you have work and three siblings to now take care of for at least a week or two... not exactly a lot of time for writing. Hope you enjoy this short chapter, more whenever possible.

It had already been six days, and the sun was rising on the seventh. Battles were even more sporadic, firefights breaking out everywhere and what were at least partially clear lines, were now all but gone. Every building was a warzone; every room was a bunker. Somepony said it was like there was no humans or ponies fighting, only rats. Rats that crawled through whatever they could to survive, because it seemed like traveling openly in the streets was suicide.

“Look we can’t get reinforcements, so we need to make do with every pony we have at our disposal. Look, our Pegasi are keeping us well informed, we need to make sure we are in constant communication,” Blue Blade said to Heavy Shield as they stood over several maps of Detrot.

“Blue Blade, the most recent reports are showing some new weak points in the enemy line,” Heavy Shield said pointing his hoof on the map.

“They pulled out most of their soldiers from these building here and here; they then used them to attack us down the street from them. The attack failed and we still hold the building. I think we should move a few groups of ponies and take the building they are holding. We can use that to strike at further weak points in their line,” Blue Blade said with several motions with his hoof.

“I’ll dispatch some ponies now sir,” one of the ponies said before taking off.

“You hear how it’s all falling apart?” Shield whispered.

“Yes, at this rate we’re goners, but I’ve said it before, we hold this city to the last pony. You as well as I know what is at stake. The princess informed me about new weapons in production and new ones being developed. Every week, day and hour is giving them time to be better prepared,” Blue Blade said grimly.

“I know sir, it feels like we’re fighting a losing battle,” Heavy Shield said sorrowfully.

“Because we are, I’m not going to buck with you. We are taking more losses than we can deal back. It seems like every building we take back, we lose two. And take a look at the map here,” he said pointing his hoof to two locations on the map, “they are obviously planning something here; they are putting a lot of effort along the edges of the city. I think I know what they are doing and we need to put a stop to it.”

“What does it look like sir?”

“Like they are trying to completely surround us,” Blue said flatly.

“Do you have a plan?”

“Hold out as long as possible and take out as many of the demons as we can. I have found a good place; it will be our fallback position when it all falls apart. I’ve had the fountain of Celestia reinforced; it’s surrounded with sandbags and brickwork. If we were at full strength it would be tiny, but I’ve been had a bunch of ponies digging a trench around it. The fountain is now more of a fortress. That and if we keep up our effort we can keep them on their hoofs at least another full week,” Blue Blade said traces of pride evident in his voice.

“Why do you almost happy sir?” Shield asked.

“Look at what we are facing, a force probably a dozen times stronger than ours. And have held on for a week, with a possibility of a second week. This will be one for history books,” Blue Blade said with a devilish grin.

“Yes, now if only we will be around to read them,” Tall Spark muttered from the corner.

Captain 105 was leading a defense with what little remained of his company. His once large group of men reduced once again to a handful. Starting with close to seven-hundred now down to fifty-two. 105 threw a grenade out the window the explosion was followed by the wails of injured xenos.

He motioned to one of men with a plasma gun. He stepped to the window a fired a burst of white hot plasma; courtesy of a dead quarter master. The screaming stopped.

“Captain, incoming vox,” 105’s vox caster said tapping him on the shoulder.

“New objective?” 105 asked wearily.

“Yes sir, we are to consolidate four buildings down and remove a threat to a convoy that needs to move through the streets,” his vox caster said as he closed the link.

“I want fifteen of you to give us cover, the rest of you on me,” 105 said before taking off down the stairs.

Checking outside to see if it was clear, check; with that done he sprinted out the door and into the next building. Half his men sprinted across the street. Looking out the front of building he was in, he could see his men moving across the street. He sent a vox to his men at the rear and ordered them to begin moving.

Everyone was in position, readying his plasma pistol, another weapon ‘acquired’ from the downed quarter master; 105 gave the order. Lasfire from across the street filled the air, followed by the sound of their last heavy stubber. Their other cannon had either been destroyed or they were out of ammunition.

Quickly the equines began firing back. This gave 105 the opportunity he needed. Most of the fire was coming from the upper floors, the first floor only had a couple of windows. His men were lined along the front wall, his men across the street were firing at the upper floors.

Emperor, bestow upon me,
Your righteous fury and Your furious strength,
Let me become the storm that blasts the enemy from your sight.

105 gave a nod to a soldier who tossed in a grenade. There was a cry of surprise followed by the explosion. The soldier who threw the grenade charged in, he was blasted out a split second later; white flames billowed from his torso.

He was screaming before receiving the Emperors mercy. 105 charged in, a horned equine had fired a super-heated flare, similar to what they used for lighting up the night. Its head was down and it was preparing a second one. Saber drawn 105 rushed forward and removed its muzzle with a powerful swing. The warp magic stopped and the beast did its best to scream, all that came was a high pitched whine as blood sprayed from what was left of its muzzle.

Suffer not the xeno to live.

105 thrust his saber in an upwards motion spearing clear through its skull. Its eyes rolled into its head and its legs buckled. 105 used his foot to remove the xeno filth from his saber.

His seventeen remaining men followed him in. A pony running down the stairs was met with a burst from a plasma gun. The white hot plasma hitting its head killing it instantly; its limp body fell down the stairs, the plasma melting its heads contents which now dripped on to the floor.

“For the Emperor 105!” 105 shouted as he charged up the stairs.

A pony trying to block him received an execution styled headshot. The melee was a maelstrom of death and chaos.

A guardsman opened up a door only to get bull rushed from inside. A horned equine used its horn like a lance, stabbing into his chest and carrying him across the hallway and into an open door and slammed him hard into the wall. The kid vomited blood inside his mask. He pulled out a frag grenade, pulled the pin and slammed the grenade into the xenos face. 105 rounded the corner just in time to witness the explosion of red; chunks of xeno and human flesh splattered across the walls of the room.

Two guardsmen were killed by friendly fire. They burst into a room with six equines. They spun around and stood tall to meet the guardsmen. The heavy bolter across the street had a bead on the six xenos, the loss of two guardsmen was deemed acceptable. The heavy bolter opened fire and the room was torn apart. The floor was cover in a pool of blood; amidst the carnage were large chunks of flesh and bone.

105 had to lead the way, the soldier that was killed by the flare had taken his place in the door way. He had to redeem himself in His eyes. Thundering up more stairs weapons in hand, he found himself staring into the eyes of an unarmed xeno, it had a satchel of medical supplies and was in the midst of battlefield surgery. The equine looked at him with terror filled eyes and a pair of forceps floating next to it. A single blast of plasma, blowing a clean hole through its head, the xeno fell lifeless on to its comrade, the forceps falling to the floor. Another shot to the already injured xeno; 105 then took off down the hall. He kicked in a door and found himself staring into six and a half pairs of eyes. Quickly he began firing rapid fire; his weapon stopped firing and began to glow. His eyes bulged and he threw the weapon at a xeno before diving down the hallway. He heard the weapon explode and drawing his backup laspistol he checked back in the room. There was a six foot hole in the floor with half xeno next to it; the plasma had melted the entire right side of its body in an instant. At least two other equines had been completely engulfed and melted do to the plasma, the last four had either been hit by his shots or had plasma splash on them when his weapons cooling system failed.

I apologize for my actions machine spirits.

105 witnessed a few xenos trying to flee out the rear, he let them go. They made it twenty meters down the alley before getting side blinded by lasfire. His fifteen men had cut them off completely from escape.

His assault team had taken all the losses. Out of eighteen men he charged in with his had only five left. These might only be xeno scum, but they still refused to give up even an inch of ground without a fight. 105 slammed a fresh power pack home before holstering his laspistol, luckily his vox caster had survived the fight.

“Sir, command says we are to hold this structure until the convoy arrives. We are then to join them to help them as required,” his vox caster said to 105.

“Ok men, form up,” 105 said through his soldier’s vox beads.

Just another day in the guard.

Celestia had just been informed the diamond dogs were here. It was a trip that should have taken close to a month, probably more. It turns out the diamond dogs had been living in her country for some time. They had only asked for immigration rights so they wouldn’t be kicked out if found, and so they could bring more diamond dogs in. Using her hooves to massage her temples she let out a sigh.

The news from Detrot wasn’t good news. Things were looking bleak, but her subjects refused to give up. She was proud of her ponies, where most would have given up and surrendered they stood to face the danger.

Just like so many battles fought over two centuries previous, she just hoped it wouldn’t end in the same way.

Guardsman 1637-3026-0128-1963 had been moving through the ruins of Detrot for close to a week. His rifles kill count was reaching triple digits. He had been hunted himself for around half of the week. It had started as a dozen. He had shrunk it to three. A couple days later it was down to two, the next day to one. But this last one refused to go down. It was a challenge he would gladly undergo for Him.

Four xenos were walking down the street. They froze and suddenly took off. Taking a deep breath he slowly pulled the trigger. One dropped blood spraying from its neck. He cocked his rifle and fired again; missed. The remaining equines scurried like rats into the alleys.

A xeno weapon opened up and hit around his window.

Time to displace, 1637 thought as he hefted his rifle and left. He took off down the hallway and entered the stair well; he went up two flights of stairs and entered into another hallway. He would go further left. He had his laspistol drawn when he opened the door. Peering inside, it was clear. He holstered his laspistol and moved for the window. Linking down the scope for whatever had fired at him. There was a flash from a window, followed by a flash from a window across the street. Then more small weapons fire hit around his window.

“Feth,” he cursed as he ducked below the window. His position was compromised, 1637 slung his rifle and turned to leave, with a large flash he found himself staring into the eyes of a xeno. He reached for his laspistol only for a burst of warp magic to slam in to his chest and send him flying out the window. He fell fifteen stories and slammed into a cart. Another flash and the same xeno were standing over him. He knew he was dead the second he looked into its eyes. They were the eyes of a killer, they were the eyes of someone who was already dead.

He still tried to reach for his laspistol, but he was losing conciseness due to blood loss, the large chunk of wood that was through his back and out his stomach would be responsible. He found himself staring at his bayonet which was floating in front of his face surrounded by an oddly colored glow. The sharp blade was pressed deeply against his throat and dragged across. He lay there praying to Him as darkness began to envelop his vision, the last thing he heard was-

“That was for Comet, you demon.”

With that 1637 went into the Emperors embrace.

Silver Stone stood above the dead human. He was no longer a rational thinking pony, his mind had finally snapped after losing his last two comrades. He had been tracking the human since the beginning, he found several buildings the human liked to use for his ambushes and he had switched regularly. It was a matter of time before he came back to this one. He unhooked his autogun and rocket project, they fell to ground with a clatter, he then stripped the human’s body of everything of value.

He took the weird looking straps that held its ammunition and slid them over his neck. He slid the short sword into its proper sheath along with the pistol he pried from the human’s hand. Finally he took the rifle that was luckily unbroken even with the long fall. With that he teleported into a building, he would become the bane of these filthy creatures, he would kill whenever possible and spirit himself away.

Hope you all enjoyed it. Have a great day my little ponies. The next chapter will be longer, I promise.

Hunter C. Creed

Chapter 10. Battle for Detrot: day 18 of X

Sweet Celestia, hard to believe it has been an entire month since my last update. I'm quite sorry, but if you read the single blog I put out you will probably have a better explanation as to why. I finished this chapter up quickly as my father returned home from rehab today. (That and it's my birthday) I hope this is a good chapter, I don't feel like it's my best work. Enough rambling, read on!

It had been over a week and the ponies were still holding back the humans; just barely. In a few sectors they were actually pushing them back. It was a miracle, but one that couldn’t last forever. It was due to all the metal behemoths which simply vanished. One day they were spread out all across the city killing ponies and destroying makeshift fortifications, the next they were nowhere to be found. But it was impossible to find out where in the city they were; Pegasi couldn’t fly to close to the ground in human territory without getting shot from the skies and sadly human territory was beginning to really intrude on the ponies.

“Ok, we are going to put some more weight on the points, here,” Blue Blade said pointing his hoof on the map of Detrot, “here and here.”

“Do we have enough ponies for that sir?” Heavy Shield asked.

“We can afford a few more pushes. But if the numbers are any indication pretty soon we won’t do anything but pulling further into the city. These humans are monsters, I swear they don’t need to eat or sleep,” Blood Blade said rubbing his temples.

“I still think they are demons from the deepest pits of Tartarus,” Tall Spark piped up. He had become Blue Blades wing pony, not leaving his side unless instructed otherwise.

“It wouldn’t surprise me,” Heavy shield spat.

“Nothing would surprise me any…” Blue Blade started.

He was interrupted by a loud crash as a pony bull rushed the door.

“Sir, we have a problem!” The pony shouted, clearly out of breath.

“What is it?” Heavy Shield asked, clearly alarmed.

“The humans have broken through,” the pony said quickly.

There was nothing but a stunned silence.

The Imperial Guard hadn’t drawn their tanks out for no reason. Until they could ensure the safety of their technological children, the Tech Priests accompanying the regiments urged that the tanks be pulled back. High command disagreed with this, until commissar Aviel came up with a plan. The plan was simple; soften the xeno filth with infantry attacks on key positions while simeltaniously baiting the xenos by leaving obvious weak spots in their line. The attack would be swift; a multi-pronged attack was launched with all the regiment’s tanks focused in two locations.

The first rays of light were beginning to fall on Detrot when fifty-nine tanks revved to life.

The xenos never stood a chance. Most were sleeping; others were just getting ready to switch watch duty with others. They thought it might be an earthquake as the ground began to rumble and the rooms shook.

A bunch of equines had been taken off guard by a Leman Russ Eradicator. It had cleared the entire ground floor with a single sub atomic shell before rumbling on.

Watchmaster 1053-5024-9562-6520 Rahn was crouched behind a tipped carriage along with the remnants of his squad. His captain had his head taken off by an enemy sniper as he led the charge. The attack fell as the sniper knocked out the heavy weapons teams to their rear and several flamers at the front. After that the sniper had simply vanished.

“Get some men to the rear to man the stubbers, without those we can’t advance,” one of the lieutenants called through his vox bead.

“5205, 2452, 8132 and 5425, get to the rear and man those stubbers,” Rahn said through his vox bead.

After several long minutes of enemy fire churning the street up the heavy stubbers began to fire again. Several equines had grown bold enough to stick themselves out the window to fire; they were torn to ribbons by the hail of rounds. Several lieutenants took advantage of the enemies brief cease fire; they rallied their surviving troops and charged forward.

Rahn followed his commanding officer; they leapt over the corpses of the dead as they ran. He could smell the charred flesh through his gas mask. An explosion sounded in the rear and the heavy stubber fire ground to a halt.

Suddenly gunfire opened up from the upper windows again and hundreds of rounds churned up the road. Several guardsmen went down to the gunfire and soon the road was slick with blood. The last thing Rahn saw was the light glinting off his saber as several rounds bore into his skull. The assault had failed, but it had only been two platoons sent to assault the three story structure.

Dozens of assaults were underway all across Detrot going exactly as planned.

Celestia was informed of her pony’s work on the weapons that had been dropped off. They had taken longer than expected to arrive as a rogue storm had knocked the Pegasi off course. They had arrived with their precious cargo in tow. The brilliant minds had been ecstatic to receive the weapons and had gotten to work immediately.

“What have you for me today my little ponies,” Princess Celestia said with a smile as she entered the room.

“Well your majesty. We aren’t exactly sure what the humans call this device, but due to its similarities with the autogun and other reasons to be mentioned, we call it an ‘autocannon’,” a unicorn said barely containing his excitement.

“The weapon fires slower than an autogun, but what it lacks in speed, it makes up for in sheer power. We would like to demonstrate,” a tan earth pony said before grabbing a white sheet with his teeth and yanking it.

A large barreled weapon was revealed.

“This is the human ‘autocannon’, down the line Princess, you can see plates of metal, there are three, each an inch of iron,” the tan pony said giddily, “Star, you know what to do.”

The weapons trigger was colored with a blue aura. The weapon kicked despite being magically welded in place. The sound was loud and the princess found herself almost deafened. The plates all but exploded.

“As you can see, the rounds went through like the iron was paper!” the earth pony next to the gun shouted.

The flowing maned princess was unnerved at the spectacle. Reports from her guardponies said the humans had a lot of these weapons. She felt sick to her stomach to imagine what this thing would do to a living creature.

“We reverse engineered the weapon as best we could. We weren’t able to perfectly replicate it, but we did make a weapon that is almost as capable. If you will follow us,” another unicorn said before walking a bit further down the line.

“Down this range there are only two iron plates, both still an inch in thickness. Bring in the prototype,” the same earth pony said off to the side.

A large earth pony entered the room with a unicorn in tow, the unicorn had a cloth covered cart.

“Put our autocannon on him.”

The cloth was pulled to reveal the weapon. The pieces that held the weapon in place resembled that of the autogun and rocket projectors carried by all ground soldiers. The weapon’s barrel was several times larger than an autogun. The barrel was long and smooth, but several feet shorter than the human version.

The entire weapon was surrounded with a red aura as it lifted onto the table and onto the stallions back. He winced in pain as the needles pierced his spine.

The princess winced too, no matter how many times she saw it; the thought of all those needles piercing her own spine was enough to make a shiver run through her.

“Why not use a unicorn for this test?” Celestia questioned, “Surely it would be easier, not to mention less painful.”

“The weapon is too heavy for the average unicorn. Earth ponies are quite strong by their nature, even then only a small number can theoretically wield this properly. The weapon is heavy and it kicks back hard. It would be enough to send just about every unicorn onto their hind quarters. I’m sure most royal guards could wield it, but I digress,” the earth pony stated before turning to the weapon strapped stallion, “you know what to do.”

He walked over to the firing range and fired a burst. It wasn’t as loud as the human autocannon, but it still left Celestia’s ears ringing.

“As you can see, the weapon tore through with ease, you will also notice that it didn’t do as much damage, but after a test with the human armor that was confiscated a while back, it tears through it like a warm knife through butter. We are still working out the kinks, currently it jams a little too often and the ammo isn’t nearly as easy to replicate. But within the next several weeks we can put it into production.”

“Very good my little ponies, I must attend to other matters, inform me of any new breakthroughs,” Celestia said as she left.

Commissar Aviel was leading an assault a position that had held out for too long. He could see the burnt out hulk of a Leman Russ Exterminator. He could clearly see the four large apartment structures standing defiantly. He was leading six full companies of infantry backed with two Leman Russ Demolishers.

Site the foe.

Smash the enemy.

For the Emperor, we bring death.

Aviel bellowed orders from his Centaur. Men charged to get as close to the target as possible. Mortars were being wheeled down the street by two man crews who ran as fast as they could; pairs of guardsmen followed behind them with cases of mortar rounds. Mortars were set up in the dozens of craters that pocked the area. Immediately they dialed in the distance and began firing. Krieg mortars fired heavier ordnance than most mortars. Aviel could easily track the rounds as they sailed like birds through the sky.

Explosions erupted from upper floors of the structures. Aviel gave a twisted grin as he order the charge. As one body the force charged. Heavy weapons teams charged forward to get to cover faster. Thousands of boots thundered as they charged towards the objective.

Celestia sat on her throne rooms floor with a shocked look on her face. Floating in front of her was a visage of Blue Blade.

“We are pulling back further back into the city,” Blue Blade stopped to fire a long burst from his autogun, “I need some ponies to escort the wounded, Tall Spark you’re in charge get them out the back.”

“Yes sir,” an unseen pony said sharply.

“They caught us off guard, they hit us hard and fast this morning,” he emptied his rocket projector, “they threw everything at us. I don’t know how long we can hold out, but we will,” Blue Blade said as he cut the link.

Blue Blade slid a fresh belt of ammunition into the autogun’s feed.

“We’re pulling back to the fountain of Celestia, but make them pay for every inch we retreat!” Blue Blade bellowed magically.

“Sir we are being surrounded!” there was shout from behind a closed door. A loud bang sounded and the door exploded outwardly, its hinges barely holding. A cloud of dust blew deeper into the building.

“Hurry everypony, make for the ground floors!” Blue Blade called, “we need to hurry or we’ll be cut off!”

“What is that 1647?” A guardsman asked one of his comrades.

He had a strange looking canister attached to his belt.

“Something I received on Krieg, I’m told it’s called Trimethyline-Phthaloxyic-Tertius, TP-III. Some form of chem weapon, thousands of years old. It was found in a vault in tunnel X-16-E. One was taken from a crate, the rest were handed in to be used against those fools from Hive Z-106.”

“They always were foolhardy, as if they could care more about the Emperor more than Hive I-52,” 1350 said spitefully.

“I’m sure that TP-III has turned the tide and showed those pieces of gak.”

“I hope so.”

“We’re moving out,” their Watchmaster shouted.

The squad formed up and joined the column of thousands of men marching down the street.

Dozens of brass cases bounced along the ground as Tough Oak fired his autogun. His ponies had offered to cover the retreat of the other ponies.

The enemy was pouring forth like rats. They charged forth from alleys and doorways and took cover wherever possible; whether it was craters from explosions, overturned carriages, even the bodies of their dead piled into small walls.

“Metal monster on the left!” A pony cried.

One of the open topped metal beasts was rumbling on their left flank. One of the small rockets flew from a window at the beast. It burst harmlessly against its front. A second rocket followed and hit the straps that kept it moving. The left strap snapped the metal leviathan kept going forward but turned right. One of his ponies higher up started laying down a hail of bullets at the humans from above. The ones that tried to flee were gunned down.

A several large tubed projectiles sailed through the air, smoke trailed behind them. The building shuddered as the ordnance detonated, bits of rubble showered down. There was shouting and more shooting. The humans were laying down heavy fire; the air was filled with red lights and solid projectiles.

“Medic!” a yellow earth pony shouted as he fired several short bursts from his autogun.

One of the medical mares heard the shouts. She could also clearly hear a high pitched scream, the kind of scream only a wounded pony could make. She galloped towards the source and burst into one of the apartment doors, she had to skid to a halt to avoid plunging thirty-one stories. Most of the floor and wall was missing.

She sighted the wounded pony, a brown unicorn. She rushed over and quickly got to work. He had several small pieces of shrapnel dug into his flesh along with a deep five inch gash which was spurting blood. She quickly dug through her medical satchel and gathered up the supplies needed.

“Oh Celestia, I’m going to die!” he shouted, he was able to see the blood spraying into the air.

“You’re going to be fine, just lay still,” the mare said quickly as she got to work. A large piece of shrapnel had torn open the gash; it was deep enough to have severed an artery which was going to kill the stallion quickly. She quickly moved her tweezers through the air and dug them into wounded. The unicorn screamed in agony.

“You’re going to live,” she said to comfort him as she dug around under his flesh.

“Oh Celestia, don’t let me die here” he sobbed.

Found it! She quickly yet carefully pulled the artery into view, she quickly clamped. Things were getting tricky very fast. She hovered the needle and thread in midair. She slowly and carefully slid the thread through the needle’s eye and got to work. Within moments she was closing the artery. At this point the stallion had passed out from pain. She ripped open a small packet of cauterizing agent and poured the powder into the wound. She quickly bandaged the wound up and moved the pony into cover in the hallway. She then heard another scream; a medical mare’s job was never done.

“By Celestia’s teats; big gunned metal monsters coming right at us!” An earth pony shouted over the din of autogun fire.

“Do we have any Pegasi who can help out?”

“Not anywhere nearby, we’re on our own.”

The two metal behemoths slowed to a halt at the parks edge. They both belched flames; the careful observer could see a blur as the ordnance flew towards the structures.

The building shook as the ordnance exploded.

“We don’t have many ponies down there, why aren’t them aiming higher?” A pony shouted the question.

“Maybe they can’t aim this high,” one said hopefully.

“Maybe they are just dumb brutes,” another piped up quickly.

The metal leviathans fired another salvo. As the ordnance detonated the building visibly swayed.

“Why does it feel like we’re moving?” Someone questioned.

“Because we are!” a mare screamed.

Tough Oak watched in horror as one of the apartment buildings began to sway. The supports holding up the structure were destroyed and the building was shuddering and swaying like wheat in the wind. Slowly the building began to lean too far to one side. It gathered speed quickly as it slammed into one of the other apartment buildings which in turn fell. The whole park shuddered as the two massive structures slammed into the ground.

The humans had a new found initiative and the attacked with renewed vigor.

“Oak, the enemy is in the building, they were just sighted breaking down the door.”

Tough Oak had hoped to hold them off longer; only a few hours had gone by, the sun still in the sky, but promising to only stay there for a couple more hours. The light brown equine had hoped to live to see the moon one last time, he had hoped for a lot of things.

“We shall meet them; make them pay for every room, every hallway and every step.”

The pony shot a salute before galloping away, Oak in close pursuit. He could hear the sound of fighting as they reached the tenth floor; not a good sign.

“Stay back monsters!” Somepony bellowed.

There was a sound that Oak heard, a sound that he had learned to dread these past weeks; a firethrower. There was a long scream that chilled Oak to the very core; the sound of somepony being burned alive.

“We ambush them here, gather some more ponies, we’ll stop them here and push them back,” Oak said quickly.

The pony didn’t even bother with a salute before breaking away at a gallop. Before long they had several ponies covering the stairs. It felt like hours as they waited, Oak could hear his heart thundering in his chest. He heard the smallest of sounds; a metallic clink. A small gray blur bounced off the wall and rolled at the bottom of the flight of stairs. An explosion followed and the air was instantly filled with thick clouds of dust. He was slightly deafened but he could still make out the sound of boots thundering up the stairs. He could just barely make out shapes moving through the cloud.

Quickly the air filled with autogun fire. The enemy’s retaliation was swift; dozens of red lights filled the air. The ponies may have had the tactical advantage, but the humans had training, numbers and better technology. And they made use of every advantage, the ponies were taking casualties, but they were holding on.

Loud explosions sounded from above them. The building shook too and fro, but it held. The building continued to sway and the sound of cracking brickwork and cement became louder than the gunfire. Oak watched in horror as the ceiling towards the end of the hallways collapsed. The floor gave way seconds later and a massive chunk of the hallway and its walls collapsed. For a moment Oak could see outside as clear as day. Then a massive chunk of brickwork, cement and drywall all collapsed. The view was blocked for a moment as the large shape covered the opening before continuing towards the ground. What followed was a massive crash and a pillar of dust shot into the sky

“We are losing ground!” A unicorn bellowed magically, its voice barely rising above the sounds of chaos.

The humans were walking on a ramp of their own dead.

“Charge!” somepony shouted.

They charged down the carpet of corpses to meet the humans. What was moments previously a chaotic firefight was now a bloody melee. Oak smashed a humans head open with a powerful kick. Blasts of magic made the fight even more brutal. The more powerful unicorns threw humans about like ragdolls; smashing them into walls, ceilings and even other humans. It was a struggle but they kept pushing them back. As they neared the hallway for the next floor the humans unleashed Tartarus. The melee was interrupted as the air filled with flame. There was screaming and Oak could see the flames moving like lightning towards him. He closed his eyes and waited for the pain; it didn’t come. He opened his eyes to see a red shield blocking off flames.

“Everypony, reload, when the flames die down we charge again,” Oak told his ponies.

The wait felt like an eternity as they watched ponies be burnt alive.

“Charge!” The call went out.

The shield flickered and dissipated. The scent of burning fur and flesh was like running into a brick wall. Oak had to struggle to keep himself from vomiting; yet they pressed onward; running through the small fires that covered small patches of the wall and corpses. They took out the human with the firethrower and then they pushed hard and fast. They fought floor by floor before getting bogged down at the fifth floor. They took up positions to fire at the humans coming towards them.

Tough Oak looked across the way and spotted the only other standing apartment structure in the park. The other ponies were in a similar situation. They were sparing ponies to fire out the humans that were in the lower levels of Oak’s apartment structure. And the humans from his structure were in turn firing backing. Oak ordered some of his ponies to fire at the humans in the adjacent apartment structure.

They had been fighting for another six hours before the humans broke through.

Commissar Aviel walked up the stairs; he was going to finish this once and for all. As he reached the top he could see men firing their lasguns at targets hidden behind cover. Aviel pressed the glyph and his powerfist came to life, lightning crackled across the surface of the gauntlet. He drew his bolt pistol and motioned his grenadiers forward.

As they passed the guardsmen firing up the stairs, they stopped firing. As the first xeno made itself seen it lost its head disappeared in a shower of gore at the hands of Aviel’s bolt pistol.

An equine began firing blindly around the corner. Bullets pattered harmlessly across the commissar’s shield. The bullets that passed him were stopped by the ceramite plates of the grenadiers. The commissar fired a salvo blowing chunks out of the wall. Even though the equine was in cover it stopped firing. The commissar took the opportunity to rush forward. He fired a burst of rounds at point blank; the equine couldn’t even vocalize a response before it was nothing more than chunks of flesh splattered along the walls.

It then turned into a massacre; huddles of ponies attempted to hold back the commissar and his grenadiers, but to no avail.

“Rally to me,” a shaky voiced xeno shouted.

The commissar spotted a light brown equine with one their xeno markings covering its flank in the form of a large tree. This was the ring leader of this pathetic resistance. The commissar motioned for his men to follow him in the charge down the hallway. The xenos had made small barricades to hide behind, but nothing would stand between the commissar and his foe. Hopping clean over the first barricade and gaining momentum. Two xenos reared their terrified faces to attempt to stop him. Blasts of red lasers bore into them sending them slamming into the ground.

The brown equine was looking quite terrified as the commissar continued bull rushing towards him. The xeno received a bout of courage and decided to attempt to meet the commissar in battle by charging forward, leaving a bunch of stunned equines behind him. The commissar just continued forward with purpose in his eyes and the Emperors light shining upon him.

The equine tried to combat the commissar by trying to bring down its front hooves down upon him. With a swift motion the commissar caught its leg and without any effort removed it. The beast screamed a loud screech; before it could smash into the ground Aviel removed the equine’s head with a single stroke. The large mass of flesh and bone hit the ground with a wet thump. The equines body fell to the ground where it lay twitching.

The equines comrades looked in stunned horror as the commissar fired a salvo of rounds down the corridor. Limbs exploded and heads burst. With that finished they continued their mission.

Tough Oak’s forces held on for another hour. Night had fallen and the xenos were in a full scale retreat. Aviel stood on the eleventh floor of the apartment building; the highest the structure went after everything above it collapsed and broke off from the structure. Aviel just watched as small explosions went off in the distance and tracer rounds flew into the sky

That is it for now, I already have a firm plan in my mind for the next chapter and will work on it the second I have time, I Pinkie promise. For those of you also reading 'Heindrich Wolfgang' I will try to post the next chapter tomorrow. No promises, look what happened last time.

I wish you all a very good night.

Hunter C. Creed

Chapter 1. Bad Logistics and the Cleansing of Mareville

This is my first attempt at an MLP story, let alone a crossover with a very different universe. Go into this knowing a few things. I love the show and I do plan to see this through. I want your feedback, no trolls, if you have a problem don’t even bother. If you have some constructive criticism it is welcome and will be listened to. In the name of our one true ruler (which is up to you to decide who that is.)

I guess I should let you guys know that everything to do with MLP:FIM is owned by Hasbro, anything to do with Warhammer 40000 and the Death Korps of Krieg is owned by Gamesworkshop and Forgeworld. I own zip and make no money off of this. This is the only time I'm going to put a disclaimer as I'm sure you won't need me to nag.

As long as there has been one true god there has been killing in their name.

Edited on July 7th to fix spelling and grammar errors
Edited on July the 20th to add in Imperial prayers
Edited on July 25th to fix a lore error

It is the forty-first millennium, and there is only war. For over ten-thousand years humanity has been in constant war with aliens, heretics, rebels, mutants and Dark Gods.

The planet is Krieg, a planet that seceded from the Imperium of Man. The planets leaders denounced the Emperor and most of the planet sided with the rebels.

A single hive stayed loyal to the Emperor. They sent out a message on what had happened. They received a single reply.

‘You are to hold out, push the enemies of the Imperium back. Your objective is to retake Krieg. May the Emperor be with you.’

Shortly after the beginning of the civil war the leader of the Imperial Loyalists was shown by the Mechanicus a secret cache of weapons, he detonated the forbidden weapons that plunged the planet into a permanent nuclear winter. Countless billions died in an instant as the bombs detonated in the planet’s atmosphere.

What followed was a massive war, with the Imperial Loyalists coming out victorious after five-hundred years of underground, tunnel and trench warfare. They now give huge tithes of men to help the Imperial war machine. The men of Krieg are grim, they are soldiers not known by names, but as numbers on a data slate. They fear nothing, giving their lives willingly to the God Emperor as forfeit for their ancestor’s treachery. They are experts of siege warfare, whittling away at their enemies over years. When need-be they will rush waves of men to take ground. They know that death is coming; they are the Death Korps of Krieg.

In the year 912912.M41, dozens of ships left Krieg and entered the warp headed for the planet Ozacom Prime.

O Eternal Emperor
Who alone watches us,
And rules the tides and storms,
Be compassionate to your servants,
Preserve us from the perils of the Warp,
That we may be a safeguard to the Domain of Men.

Their prayer went unheard for a single ship hit a seam of sorts entering through a wormhole that took them on a very different path. They belched forth from the warp months later right on time. Following the coordinates they located a planet. It was a different size and description than what they were given.

Assuming that logistics had dropped the ball, they loaded up infantry to land on the planet. Assuming that the other regiments would follow they began preparations for landing. An LZ was chosen to begin landing men and equipment. As night fell so too did the transports of the 501st siege regiment along with elements of the 391st artillery company and the 103rd tank regiment.

A beach head was established and an HQ set up. They brought down everything they would need, weapons, ammunition, artillery, shells and rations. They began to wait for their support to arrive, days turned to weeks, weeks turned into months. They made the assumptions that their fellow men had perished in the warp.

Astropaths aboard the ‘Screams of Retribution’ sent out messages requesting reinforcements and improved logistics. They never received a reply.

In a different universe the 501st, 391st and 103rd were considered to be lost to the warp and would be stricken from Imperial records as MIA. Their fellow men had reached Ozacom Prime and were assisting against the Waugh that plagued the planet.

The colonel of the operation decided the only possibility was to begin to find their enemy. Looking at the maps of the area that become useless due to the foul-up from logistics, they were forced to use a series of low resolution images from the vessel ‘Screams of Retribution’. They located the nearest signs of civilization and sent out a scouting party of four platoons. A one day march was all it took to arrive at what was termed sector E 52-12.

What they found was a village devoid of any visible human life. Instead they found horses, or judging from their size; ponies. They appeared to be oddly domesticated; the town was colorful and rural. This made no sense; they were told that Ozacom Prime was a factory world. There shouldn’t be any forests or towns. Had logistics dropped the ball on the world type too?

They reported via Vox to their superiors. They were told to search the town for any human life and find anything to give them a better view of the area. The enemy would know the land; they would need to follow that example. The guardsmen had encircled the town. At noon they moved in. The animals might be domesticated, but they seemed to freeze as the trench coat wearing gas masked men advanced. Was it their smell? Did they feel different then their missing masters? Two platoons kept advancing; the other two were on over-watch.

Lieutenant 1647-3026-0129-1534 Tyloc kept flicking his eyes to the windows in case of an ambush. The small equines were still staring wide eyed at him.

“Who are you?” a male voice asked.

Tyloc aimed his Lucius pattern no. 94 laspistol towards the source of the voice. All he saw was an equine. His eyes flickered around trying to find where the voice had come from.

“Who said that?” Tyloc called out in a muffled voice.

“Um, that was me,” the voice called back.

“Where are you? Civilian? PDF?” Tyloc replied still searching.

“I’m here, the pony,” the voice replied.

Tyloc turned his view to a bluish coated horse with an odd brand of a… top hat on the beasts flank? Tyloc just stared for a moment.

“Who are you?” the creature asked again.

Tyloc turned away from the equine.

“Men our God Emperor has given us a chance of redemption. We cleanse this town in his name,” Tyloc said through his vox bead, “take this one alive for later interrogation. Flamers, try to avoid unnecessary destruction of property, we need to locate any logistics. You are free to fire at will. In our Emperors name.”

Smite the foe!
Smash the enemy!
For the Emperor we bring death!

With that order the small town in sector E 52-12 became a blood bath. Tyloc turned aimed his laspistol at the nearest pony and fire a red beam of light that punched clean through its head. The light brown equine collapsed. He then walked to the stunned blue pony and whipped it in the head knocking it to the ground. It took the equines a moment to realize what was happening. Reinforcements were called and the situation reported. The cleansing of the small town of Mareville had begun.

Tyloc watched as Guardsman1505-6392-4023-0623 shot three equines with his Lucius pattern no. 98 lasgun and through a no.38 frag grenade down an alley after a half dozen smaller ponies had rushed down it.

Then Guardsman 5195-1637-7913-5194 followed it up with a short flamer burst.

By nightfall the cleansing was complete. The death toll reached thousands of the equines. A dozen guardsmen were injured by kicks when cornering the filthy beasts. No deaths. After they tore the town apart they discovered maps and various texts. Before they left they razed the town to the ground, leaving only the husk of buildings and the stench of death in the air.

It surprised their superiors that the maps and books were in low Gothic. They began noting the strangeness of the information given to them. The maps had clearly marked territory, divided up into various clans or tribes. The pony tribe was clear, then things such as griffins and dragons; obviously they were the names of other equine clans. This was probably a planet used by the sick and deranged Tau. Probably some sort of experiment to create some sort of ally to fall in with their bovine herd.

They couldn’t get much information out of the blue equine know as Ocean Breeze, after a twenty-four hour torture session he was executed. Whatever the reason these creatures existed at all was moot, they were a stain in the Emperors vision; therefore their lives would be forfeit. Suffer not the Xeno to live.

Colonel 7457-6305-1497-2496-1356 Atlas looked at the information laid out before him in his temporary command bunker. He was the highest ranking officer to have made it to the warzone.

“This campaign shall be the first battle for Equestria,” he said his hand on the map, “our long term goal is to take and hold the city of Canterlot,” murmurs of approval from his subordinates.

Atlas turned to his coms assistant, “send a message to the Screams of Retribution, they need to have the astropaths continue sending messages to the Departmento Munitorum requesting reinforcements. They should also inform them of the possible Tau experiments underway.”

More orders were sent out. Men were still being ferried down along with more ammunition and vehicles.

The first battle for Equestria was underway.

So what do you guys think thus far? Should I continue this bastard child? Or should I shoot it before it can feed? It will get grimmer and darker, because it is the 41st millennium and there is only…. Ponies? I also apologize for it being a bit of a text wall. When writing about the Krieg it will be a lot of description as they are rather quiet numbers. They are not exactly known for prolonged conversation. There will be more dialogue when it comes to the ponies. Hope you enjoyed it and hope you guys have a great day.

Hunter C. Creed