The Melding of Two Worlds Pt. 1: The Battle for Ponyville

The room was lit by a single light hanging from the ceiling, giving the room a dark, and even more depressing feeling to it than it already had. This was a viewing of Smokey's body. The enchanted necklace had long been removed, so we were staring at a horribly emaciated black earth pony. Even without the wounds, looking at him made me want to cry at how disfigured he was. If only he had been better fed, then he most likely would've survived the blood loss, and the brain damage he suffered from the bullet hitting him would instead be a concussion.

In the room with me were my fellow squad mates, staring sadly in silence between Smokey's body, and his family. Plus nurse Redheart, who was just as torn up about it as the rest of us.

Smokey's parents weren't all that old. His father, Coal Dust, was an earth pony with a grey coat and white mane, without any impressive build like his son had before the siege. His mother, Wing Glider, wasn't an earth pony like her husband and son. Just as her name implied, she was a pegasus. She was thin, but it was natural, a part of her frame. Her coat was white, and her mane was grey.

I'd been the one who had to tell them how he died, WHY he died. I had thought It was because he was too innocent and hopeful to realize the stupidity of what he was doing, but what I told them was, "He had hoped to meet them again with friendship, but he was met by hatred."

The viewing lasted forever, but when it finally ended so his body would be frozen in a brick of ice until he could be given a proper burial when the conflict shifted away from Ponyville. We filed out of the room, and went our various separate ways. My unit went back to the trenches, Redheart went to the hospital to care for the wounded and sick ponies, and Smokey's grieving parents went back to the underground shelter.

As we made our way, the mood shifted from depressed, to filled with rage with one line from a certain cyan mare, "F**K! I can't wait to ram my fists into those ugly faces of theirs!" She growled.

Oh, thank you Rainbow Dash and your quick temper! I'll take pissed off over sad any day.

But that feeling of hope that her anger would spread was nullified by Spike, "But how many of us will make it out? How many of us are going to die?" It seemed like he was asking more to himself than to us, but it still sent unnerving chills through our bodies.

"Spike." I said with a tone that let it known I was on the edge of losing my temper.

"Yes?"

"We ain't goin' tuh die, so stop it." Spike does shut up, but the damage is done. Everyone's mood has dropped back to where were at in the viewing room. Even Rainbow Dash looked glum.

Tym

When King Thorax announced that we were going to war, I was confused. We'd just dethroned Queen Chrysalis, a war lover, and revolutionized our whole society and industry towards peace, just for us to go to war again? Then, he told us what had happened, which was hard to believe, but it sure made us going to war seem more reasonable. Our world had merged with another. Half of that other world was invading Equestria (and therefore, later us), and the other was taking great lengths to defend it. So it did make sense that we'd mobilize for war. Why wait for the enemy to conquer your neighbors and fight alone, when you can join your neighbors and fight together?

Every changeling saw the sense in this, and we were all eager to join the war effort. However, we were all flummoxed as to the new weapons and equipment that we were being given. It was then, that we were given a crash course into the extremely new modern warfare. We were given guns of many kinds, and taught how to navigate trenches, towns and cities while at the same time taking as few casualties as possible. We were taught to adopt a new form, one that looked much too ridiculous to fight, much less stand on those two gangly legs. However, as hard as we tried, not even the changelings from Queen Chrysalis's command hive could imitate the form. We called them the Color changelings, because they don't have the regular black coloring of most other changelings, but they bore dozens of different, bright colors. All because they had made a magical event through breaking that foreign magic barrier chair.

No longer was combat and the survival of it determined by ones' skill and prowess, but now it was luck, accuracy of gunfire, and how much lead you could throw down range. It was infuriating, demeaning... and made sense. By removing the need for such skills opened up the available use of an unskilled populace, increasing the potential size of one's military, but not necessary the quality.

When they changed into this strange new form, their new skin was colored as they had been. But when everyling else tried that wasn't from that hive tried, we were black with many holes in our legs and "arms". Our skin was hard, and refused to move unless we moved our limbs, and even so, just enough to bend to our will.

So now, we were marching. Thousands of us. And we were headed for Ponyville, which had been besieged by the Federation of Trade. From what our scouts had surmised, they'd entrenched nearly 5,250 soldiers around the town. Ponyville was being defended by a much smaller force of under a thousand. We didn't need to be told what the goal was, we knew as soon as we heard they were surrounded. We were going to liberate them.

Wolfgang

We'd all hidden when the plane went over our heads, but the sound of papers flapping in the air drew our attention, and lured us out of the safe haven that was our dugouts. Sheets of paper were floating down to us slowly, tumbling over and over. I snatched one out of the air, and read the simple text that it bore-

This isn't your war. Surrender, and you'll be treated well.

I spat on the ground, and threw the page onto the ground. Not our war? Yeah right. You're gonna be in for a big surprise a**holes!

The screeching of the speakers coming online startled me out my anger, and started playing a song. And a smile crept across my face, for I knew it well. It was a rendition of Five Finger Death Punch's "This is My War" that was modified slightly for the military. The changes were small, only editing the parts where they sang, "This isn't my fight, this is my war!" into, "This is my fight, this is my war!". Small, but greatly appreciated.

As soon as Ivan Moody's voice started up, I sang with him with all my heart and soul.

As the song goes on, more and more voices join into an angry, roaring chorus that shook the hill, and swept and out to the enemy trenches. Even the Equestrians joined the roar with a vengeful smile plastered on their faces.

We sang (or yelled, take your pick) on for hours, eventually flowing through all the militia favourites, many of which, were Five Finger Death Punch songs that managed to fit pretty well to our situation. It was a giant middle finger f**-you combo to the enemy, and it was glorious. That night, we went to sleep with high spirits, despite eating practically nothing.

"Come on Wolfgang, wake up!" My eyes opened up slowly, and I instantly became aware of the soreness of my throat. Ok, note to self, don't yell so loud next time. Now, let's deal with... who was it, Spike? Yep, Spike.

"Ugh, what the hell is it Spike?" My voice is a weak rasp that could barely be heard, even by my own ears.

"Lieutenant Alexander wants all his sergeants to come to a meeting in the dugout three holes down."

I groaned miserably, "Ugh, right. Thanks Spike." I pushed myself up to my feet, my eyes barely cracked open to allow thin slivers of vision to my eyes. I tripped over RD, who didn't even grunt, or roll over in her sleep. The air outside of the trench reminded me of the severe contrast between the body odor stink of the dug out, to the fresh air that had faint undertones of gunpowder. The trench itself looked the same as always, lightly dusted with snow and mush on the wooden ground. I took a right, towards where the Lt. bunked in. Inside, are two other sergeants. My old one, and another guy I don't know.

"Finally made it. I thought I trained you to be faster!" Sarge says in his jovial tone.

I smile, knowing the joke, "What training?" We snicker a bit until the Lieutenant clears his throat poignantly to politely tell us to shut up.

"Boys, I've got good news, and bad news. The bad news is, we'll be launching an attack against the Feds tomorrow. The good news is, we'll be getting A LOT, of help. We're getting several thousand troops of relief forces, and they're called Changelings. This is what they look like." He dug out two polaroid photos. You know, the kind of printed out photo's on that weird, plasticy paper. On them, was a single figure that bore striking resemblance and difference at the same time. One was a black insect-pony hybrid, with holes in their legs, a fin and a mutilated horn on the head, plus wings. The other was a basically a compounded hybrid between the pony-insect and a human. Tall, lanky, no clothes to hide the arms and legs with holes in them, and a dull horn. No wings though. Actually, it kind of looked like a burned zombie. Either version actually looked kinda cool.

"So they'll be around by tomorrow?" Sarge asked. A nod.

We were going to be surrounding them then? Wonderful. I smiled menacingly. Any force that's being attacked from the front and the back is doomed to be overrun, or they'd be forced to surrender in sheer panic. Either way, we win.

"They'll be hard to spot. These things are shape-shifters, so they'll be changing their coloring to match the environment. The only thing they'll allow to be seen is their blue eyes. Once the battle is over, they'll likely revert to the bipedal form in the picture. Now, the battleplan."

He pulled out a map from one of his many pocket, unfolded it, and held it out for us to look at. Now, I might not be very smart, but it would be extremely hard to f**k up the interpritation. Our hill, which marked in blue, the no-man's-land was in white and red arrows outlined in black, and the enemy trenches in red. In the bottom right, was a direction marked. North pointing towards the top of the paper. The enemy trenches had black dots, all over the place, which the key labeled as machine gun emplacements.

Alexander tapped on the Easternmost part of friendly lines, "This is where we are, and will be launching from. Overnight, we'll be sending out several mobile machine gun squads out into the field, and into shell craters. This means all of your gunners need to be fielded by sunrise. At around 1130 hours, the Changeling army will engage the enemy from all sides. At exactly 1200 hours, they'll cease their attack just long enough for us to launch our own attack and advance our troops closer to the enemy trenches. At 1230 hours, we'll dig in long enough for the Changelings attack again. I think you get the idea."

"Yeah, it's a bait 'n switch, so we don' get any friendly fire." I guess.

"Exactly. Don't forget to remind your troops to carry extra grenades. They'll be our best friends tomorrow. Dismissed."

We give each other halfhearted salutes, and leave for our squads. We were finally going to get off of this damn death trap, and I was absolutely ecstatic. However, it made me curious as to how the Equestrians would take an offensive attack, leaving the safety of the trenches.

I entered the trench to a sea of curious eyes, awaiting the news they knew I was bringing, "Well, you obviously know somethin's up, so I'll be straightforward. Tomorrow, we're leavin' the trenches. The Higher-Ups somehow organized a coordinated attack agains' the Fed lines with the "Changelin's", whatever those are supposed to be."

Spike's eyes lit up with some odd sense of joy, a smile spreading over his face immediately, "The Changelings are coming to help us?! I wonder if I'll get to see Thorax again?"

? Who the hell is Thorax? One of their soldiers? Doesn't matter, read your men. I cast my gaze on the rest of the soldiers, and I saw an entire array of emotions. A lot of fear and nervousness, but thankfully, I saw that form of angry eagerness for revenge, especially from Applejack, but absolutely nothing from Mac. I don't think I'd ever seen this guy actually make an expression before, besides his neutral stare.

"First, we need to go o'er the battle plan. AJ, Mac, once it's dark out, you two are goin' out there an' establish a firin' position in one of the craters." And it hit me. In every war, the machine gunner was always the target of the infantry, and being so valuable, they needed to be as alive as long as possible. I really hated the idea of losing it, but THIS, this was important to the success of the mission, "Mac, since you've got the .50, you'll be specially targeted by the enemy, so as much I really, REALLY don' wanna do it, I'm giving you some armor."

I braced myself, and took off my coat, letting the freezing wind to set in on my body. I shuddered, hating the contact. I tossed it to the ground, and pulled the armor off over my head, exposing my torso ever further. For the first time in months, I saw my own body. It was thin, practically emaciated, and the cold had made all my scars turn into a prominent brown. I recognized every one of them. The one's that I got from being shot a year ago, the long scar from being sliced at with a long knife, and others that I didn't really want to think about.

I tossed the armor at Mac, who catches it with his same neutral demeanor, Does nothing faze this guy? "Go on, put it on. You're gonna need it." I say as I rush to cover myself again, shivering madly. For f**k's sake! Does it have to be so damn cold?

"Now, tomorrow, the Changelings attack at 1130 hours-"

"Hours?" Spike interrupted.

"Yeah, hours. It's so we're able to tell the time without sayin' AM 'r PM by countin' 'em out. It used to be on a 24 hour basis, but now it's lengthened to 36 hours cuz the days 'r longer. Now, at 1130 hours, the Changelings will attack from the rear, an' we'll advance slowly out to the offensive line that our machine gunners will establish. Then, the Changelings will cease their attack, an' we'll launch our own, allowing them to advance. The cycle continues until we overwhelm their forces, or they surrender. If need be, the Changelings will surround 'em, an' we starve into surrender. I think our artillery got resupplied, so if I had to guess, we'll be gettin' artillery support at some point between now an' then."

It was at that moment that I was proven correct, as the distant booms of artillery firing from our mountain rolled over the land. We rushed outside, expecting the enemy trench lines to erupt in plume of fire and smoke. We spotted the trailing white smoke from the artillery shells, soaring through the air peacefully, misrepresenting their intent in an odd sense of majesty, in the wrong direction. They were sailing towards the forest. Had those guys forgotten where the enemy was? Had they just horribly screwed up the sights?

Imagine our surprise that once the shells disappeared over the treetops, when a repeating thunder erupted from the trees, a violent tear of fire reaching for the sky. That was... their artillery. They got them. The enemy artillery had actually been hit, and we knew that they had been from the stockpile of shells detonating from either the newly generated heat, or from neighboring shells blowing up in quick succession. Now, they couldn't threaten to collapse our trenches. Now, we had an even more clean shot at the enemy trenches tomorrow.

The guns fired again. Our eyes locked onto the shell trails, soaring in a new direction, in the direction we wanted them to go in. The shells came in so close that we could see the coppery bronze color of the shells just before they landed in the enemy trenches in front of us, or just before they disappear out of sight from the other side of the hill. Words cannot express how we felt, how f**king awesome it felt to know that tomorrow wasn't going to be a hailstorm of bullets and the uncertainty of survival, but more like that we would come out on top with ensured victory.

As the shells landed, we got the call to lumber off for breakfast. That, in and of itself, was new. Usually, we wouldn't eat until after night fell, since it didn't make sense to attack when you couldn't see well, and we couldn't eat very often, via the lack of food supply.

So eating during daylight hours, AND having the insinuation that there were more meals to come left us feeling strange. That kind of "this, in no way, feels right. My anxiety over this is going to rip apart my mind" kind of strange. I mean, we weren't getting anything as luxurious as pancakes, but it was still twice as magical to us. We hurried back to our holes in the ground, and ate greedily. Except for Rarity, she still tried to act dainty about eating what basically amounted to gruel, taking spoonfuls of it at a time.

We ate our fill, and sat content as we waited for night to come again. Like every other day, we played cards, tried some chess with homemade pieces, and told stories, most of which we'd already told. Those of us who don't do anything just stare blankly outside or at the walls, probably daydreaming. Spike was sneaking looks at Rarity when she's not facing him, and Rarity talked mostly to Bouncer or Ace. After a few glances at Spike, I realized that the little guy had a crush on her, a much older girl. If I had to guess, she was probably almost 20 or something. Poor guy didn't stand a chance.

The day crawled on longer and longer, letting sleep overcome nearly everyone in the dug out, except for me, RD, and AJ. We sat staring at the small fire inside the tiny stove. None of us spoke, prefering to just soak up the atmosphere of comrades in dirt. I'd spent countless hours with this unit, and now that I finally had the silence to hear myself think, I felt how my heart seemed to latch to them protectively. It was with this that I understood that I loved them to the point that I was willing to die for them. We were a family. We ate together, slept together, fought together, and we were likely going to die together. I wouldn't have it any other way, except live instead of dying.

The twilight hours had come, where the sun cast wonderous colors from pink to a light orange, across the sky. The artillery was silent, but we weren't. I was passing out grenades to everyone. We stored them in pouches that hanged off of our clothing, and attached them loosely to our belts. Applejack and Mac both looked nervous, anxiously tapping a foot or a finger. They would stand up for a few seconds, pace, then sit down again. I'd tell them to cool it, but I wasn't much better. I was leading them out them out there, and LEAVING them in the middle of a hell hole! It felt like I was knowingly abandoning them to death, even though I knew and kept reassuring myself that I wasn't.

The sun finally dipped over the horizon, and the stars came out. It was time. Mac and AJ bound their machine guns to special rigs to carry the guns on their backs while they crawled. I stuck to the tried and true method that generations of soldiers before me had done before me. I would be cradling my rifle in the crook of my elbows, which would assume most of my forward movement.

I led my gunners to the front trench, and my heart felt like it was twisting inside its' boney cage. Move, damn it. Don't let your feet stop moving, or you'll never move again.

I turned to stare into the faces of my comrades, who, like me, had painted their faces and any other exposed skin black, to make it ever more difficult to see during the night. White would've been preferable, but black was still better than their natural orange and red coats.

In a hushed whisper, "Let's go." We hefted ourselves over the edge. I lifted the wire for them, using my rifle to grasp the sharp wire instead of my hands. Without a sound, they crawled under, and disappear into the dark. I followed after them with an equal silence. I eased myself down the slope of the ditch, and caught up to the two. We crawled through the packed snow, which hardly crunched underneath us, only loud enough for our own ears.

Every second, every movement, I thought we might be discovered, thought that we might be alone in the field. But we weren't shot, and I knew that there had to be dozens of other soldiers doing exactly as we were doing. Crawling. Going up small slopes, and going down again, trying to get to that perfect position for a machine gun to be placed. Far away enough for a decent range of spread for minimal turning, but not to far as to not mitigate the effect of our advance to a mere few yards, or few dozens of yards. No, we needed to gain a good distance before we could stop and bed down. We kept crawling, on and on. Further than I wanted, or felt comfortable with. Our fronts were wet within minutes, our elbows sore. But we eventually came to the perfect spot. Two nearly impossible to see highrises, spread about 20 feet from each other, provided perfect positions for AJ and Mac to shoot from, while also be protected from wild incoming fire that somehow had the accuracy to find their position.

"Ok, pick yer poison, an' git to it. Try to reinforce yer position in any way you can. I'll see you two at daybreak. God be with you." God be with you. In war, even atheists find themselves saying this. Because when hell has opened up around you, you can only hope that there's some being watching over you, and has some form of influence over the course of events. If there was even the slimmest of chances that God might be real and be able to help you, then you take it. You want to live, and see your loved ones again, which includes family, friends, and comrades. Therefore, you take any chance there is. Providence, luck, skill, and strength. Every soldier relies on each of these four statutes, though depending on who you talk to, Providence and luck could be separate or one entity. I'd long given up, and just went along for the ride.

I crawled my way back, lifted up the wire, and awkwardly maneuvered myself underneath the wire while holding the rifle in the same position. On the right side of the wire, I eased the rifle down, and drew it back to me. I was stuck in place. Now that I was back in the trench, I couldn't move. I'd left them. Alone. Out there. ALONE. I felt guilty, enormously guilty that I wasn't out there with them. They were shouldering a burden, and I wasn't easing it.

It took every fiber of my being to keep myself from turning around, and sprinting my way back to them. I trembled, and took a step forwards, away from the edge, and a pang of guilt sent a spike of pain through my head. I took another, and it became a dull throb, each heartbeat giving a painful spike. Another step, and I was feeling dizzy, and the throb was becoming a little more painful.

By the time I'd reached my trench, I couldn't even attempt thinking, and I was audibly growling in pain. I heard the others say something, but the pain overwhelmed my understanding, and I just flopped onto the ground, curled into the fetal position, and passed out.

Rainbow Dash

I was about to slip into today's 3rd, and final nap, when I heard a growling. It was weird, it didn't sound like an animal, but not human either. Then, in came Wolfgang, clutching his helmeted head, face contorted in pain, teeth bared, and growling in pain.

"What's up Wolfgang?" I asked hesitantly.

He didn't respond. Instead, he went over to his sleeping spot, and dropped into a ball, his back facing away from us. Then, nothing. Complete silence, and his only movement was his breathing.

We all looked at each other, "Humans are weird." we collectively stated.

Applejack

I was all alone, in the middle of a field, and I was left conflicted. On the one hand, this feeling of solitude wasn't dissimular to being out in the applefields, but then again, the absence of trees and the ugly terrain was incredibly concerning. I felt small, almost insignificant in the void of the field. This had started since the moment Wolfgang had crawled away. In fact, I had to stop myself from grabbing his leg, and begging him to stay. I think he might've even agreed, his face seemed so pained. My comfort was that I wasn't truly alone, that there were many others out in this field with me, and that by morning, my family, my unit, would be coming to me, surrounding me, protecting me, fighting with me.

Well, might as well try and get some sleep.

Wolfgang

My sleep was very upsetting. Nightmare's over my abandonment plagued me through the night, oftentimes waking me in a screaming fit, only for me to be overwhelmed by my headache and pass out again. Mostly, they concerned AJ and Mac angrily confronting me in various ways, or by me being abandoned by my unit in the middle of combat, to be slaughtered brutally by Fed soldiers.

Mercifully, morning came. Once I woke up, and saw the light shining through the opening, illuminating dust particles hanging in the air. I bolted up onto my feet, gathered up all my gear, and sprinted out of the trench. I've got to get to them! My entire being was on fire, forcing me into action. The spires supporting the sides of the trench whizzed by as I made my way to the front trench, and violently crashed into the wall to keep myself from leaping onto level ground, and bounding over the barbed wire to go to my brother and sister in the field. But nothing good would come of me breaking cover for them now. I'd be gunned down within probably 30 seconds. That would leave my own unit alone, and even if I survived, I'd still be abandoning them without leadership. But as long as I remained in this trench, they wouldn't be without me, and I wouldn't be betraying them.

After a minute, the unit joined me on either side, along with countless others. It was almost time, "Alright boys 'n girls, attach bayonets if you got 'em. Rarity, I want you to be on overwatch. Find a good spot out there to shoot from when we charge, an' hold your fire until everyone else starts shootin', then pick yer targets. Machine gunners are the more important targets, but it doesn' really matter. Just don' waste bullets."

Even as I was talking, we collectively dug out the thick bayonet blades that hang off our packs. The black blade was 8 inches long, single edged with the unsharpened side being a thick four millimeters thick, and a four inch long hilt of stacked leather washers that had been dyed black. It looked very similar to a morphed version of a Ka-BAR knife. I attached mine to the end of my M-16, and marveled at how much more deadly the knife made the rifle look.

And my mind fell to the environment, years of combat experience coalescing together to dominate my thoughts. What emotions I let myself feel died, fallen to wayside as the cold came over me. My face turned into a scowl as I stared at the lip of the trench, the edges of my vision turning red. The Changelings attack was the cue to attack, like a whistle in the first World War telling the soldiers to attack. I found myself wanting them to attack already, and stop all this waiting, to get it over with already!

Spike

We were going to be charging over the edge of the trench, and we were going to... to... to kill people.

Everypony here looked nervous or scared, with few exceptions. Rainbow Dash looked more consumed by brash anticipation, and Rarity had that beautiful calm that she always had, but Wolfgang looked... ugh. He looked absolutely terrifying, like he was ready to murder somepony at the drop of the hat. He may have been staring upwards, but his helmet cast a dark shadow over his eyes, completely hiding them from anypony else's view. He was scowling angrily, bearing those sharp teeth. He gripped his rifle so tightly, that his thin fingers' knuckles turned white. He tipped his head up a little further, and the light touched his eye sockets, revealing eyes consumed by dead emptiness.

I shuffled a few steps away from him, and closer to Rarity.

Rainbow Dash

For the first time since training, I pulled back the bolt on my rifle, chambering a round. We were finally going to strike back against those filthy Feds, who destroyed AJ's farm and my town. Come on Thorax, don't keep us waiting!

Finally, the sounds of heavy gunfire from all around erupted, the tell-tale sound of 5.56 NATO rounds firing clueing us in on the owners of the gunfire. It was the Changelings, firing the M-16's that the Chestians had given to the Changelings. All at once, we grabbed wooden poles connected to the wire supports, and hefted them up above our heads, and tossed the wire onto the other side of the trench. Once it touched the dirt, we burst out of the trench, beating the dirt in a roar of thunder as we rushed forwards.

No bullets whistled or whizzed or cracked past us, no artillery shells erupted next to, or on top of us. No grenades blew up between us. Just us running forwards. And we kept running. We ran past AJ and Big Mac's positions, and still, no shots rang out.

We're we supposed to stop at some point or something?

At that moment, the Changeling army silenced itself, like flipping a lightswitch, and the Fed soldiers turned their guns in panic at the other force attacking them.

A *zzzzip* later, and the sickening squelch of a bullet piercing flesh, and someone collapsed to the ground. Everyone hit the dirt as machine gun fire erupted from in front of us.

"S**T! We were almost at the trenches!" Wolfgang growled. I looked towards his voice, ahead of all of us. Wow, for such a beanpole, he sure runs fast. He was looking over his shoulder at us, a look of an angry emptiness in his eyes, and that same scowl I'd seen earlier. I followed his gaze, and looked back.

It was Arrow Shaft. He was lying face first in the mud, his helmet having fallen off, and his rifle resting loosely in his fingers.

He wasn't moving.

"S**t."

I looked back at Wolfgang. He was crawling forwards, up the mound of dirt, his gun cradled in his hands, ready to be put to use. He reached the peak, took quick aim, and fired a short burst of fire over the other side before ducking back under.

It came to me that I should be doing the same. I started crawling too, but I didn't have that feeling of bravery or courage like I imagined I'd feel. No, I felt scared, terrified I'd be shot. I getting worried that somepony else in our squad would die. Die. Shaft was dead, wasn't he? Damn it. I'll kill them, every last one of them!

Wolfgang

"Get yer asses in gear an' git up 'ere!" I yelled over the gunfire. I looked back at Mac and AJ's positions. Bright flashes of light were blinking in and out of existence too fast to count. That was good, we were getting at least some cover fire and support.

My unit slowly complied. Spike ran hunched over, one claw holding his rifle, the other forcing his helmet to stay on his head. Not that it would do much good to have a helmet anyways, kid was f**king bulletproof. RD was already crawling forwards, getting close to a small highrise in a crater. Shaft was... dead, Rarity was somewhere (hopefully taking potshots), and the other guys were hugging the ground.

For f**k's sake, if you don't move, you'll die anyways!

I peeked over the edge again for a quick estimate of how close we'd gotten. A quick assessment, and I'd say we were about 20 yards away from the first muddy trench. Let's get a grenade out there.

I ripped off a grenade from my belt, got to a stooped kneeling position, and tensed to jump up.

Aaaannd, NOW! I sprang up, pulling the pin out of the grenade, and chucking it as far as I could.

A force punched into my stomach, and I stumbled back a few steps. Another punch hit me in the shoulder, turning my whole body. I tried to keep my balance by taking a few more steps, and was about to right myself, when a third shot hit me in the head, throwing my head backwards suddenly, throwing any semblance of balance out the window. I hit the ground heavily, and I came to the notion that I felt oddly wet and sticky at the same time.

I looked down, and saw red splotches growing from my stomach and shoulder. I looked up a bit, and saw my helmet, a foot away from me with a big dent on the very top of it. A hand reached out to it, grabbed it, and it was on my head again. Everything went into autopilot as I got up again, found my rifle, and started running forwards. I heard my wailing scream as I charged, rifle above my head. I saw the terrified faces of Fed troops as they looked up to see the bloody soldier charging them like a madman. I felt more impacts, like strong punches, hit me time and time again. But I didn't stop. I rammed my bayonet into one man, removed it, and started firing at anyone unlucky enough to be near me. When there wasn't anyone left, I looked for more, and killed them too.

Twilight

Call it being over protective, but I wanted to make sure that Spike would be alright, so I watched his unit from the upper balconies of my castle as they charged across the battlefield. But it soon came to my attention, that it wasn't Spike I should be REALLY worried about. Arrow Shaft took a bullet straight to the chest, and went head first into the dirt. He didn't get back up. When Fluttershy finally made her way to him, all she did was lift his head up long enough to close his eyes.

Then, Wolfgang, who may have been intimidating before, now seemed demonic. After chucking a grenade into the enemy trench, he'd been shot in the stomach, a red mist spraying out behind him. Then in the shoulder, and then the head, which threw his helmet off, and knocked him to the ground. I had already come to the conclusion that he must've died, when he grabbed his helmet, put it on, and rushed back into battle, charging straight into enemy fire, being shot several more times, before landing in the enemy trench, and unleashed... what was the word he used? Oh right!- and unleashed hell.

Most of him was hidden inside the trench, but the flash of gunfire could still be seen from here. And there was a lot. It went on and on and on, slowing and speeding up. It paused, then started up again even more furious a few trenches deeper. Friendly troops charged into the trenches from both sides, then spread like wildfire through the trench in either direction, wiping out any resistance.

Federation troops could be see being forced out of the trenches with their hands held high, waving tiny white flags and completely unarmed. The battle, was won.