Once upon a time, in the magical land of Equestria...
...there came a day when equinity could no longer support itself. When lines were drawn, redrawn, crossed, and eventually erased, all in the name of sustainability. Once-peaceful neighbors turned on each other in the name of progress and necessity, to claim what was theirs and what they wished was theirs, despite all opposition. Two great powers emerged: the young Roaman Empire, and the newly militarized Royal Equestrian Army. Two nations whose sole reason for existence was to wipe the other off the face of the world and lay claim to what remained, at any cost. In the end, it was their downfall. In dedicating all of their resources towards destruction rather than survival, they were unprepared for their own failures.
But three friends had made a plan: they founded a company, Stable-Tec, to preserve equinity in case the worst should happen. One hundred and twenty two underground survival shelters, or Stables, were built to house a small percentage of the population. It wasn't nearly enough to save everyone, but it was enough to set the public's mind at relative ease. And when the worst came, when the Mutually Assured Destruction of war had finally reared its head on Equestria, equinity was not, as many had feared, wiped out. Instead, that horrible day was merely a prologue to the next bloody chapter of pony history.
Nearly two hundred years later, the inhabitants of this blasted world survive, unchanged amid the radiation. Civilization is on its way steadily back, although a far cry from the levels that it was back before the apocalypse. New monsters roam the lands, the forests run rampant and untended, and new evils lurk in the shadows.
This is a new world, but the wars are still fought - for peace, for life, for survival.
And war... war, never changes.
Author's Note
Intro to my story, I'll probably rewrite this later as I get better at this.
I've been meaning to write this book for two years, can you believe it? Ever since I first played Shadow of Mordor, I knew what my story would be. And now that the sequel,Shadow of War has come out, I know how my story will end.
It was a pleasant dream, one I'd had many times before. It was a long time ago...
---oooOOOooo---
Rust was humming quietly to herself as she worked, her hooves kneading the dough to a fine mush while her hips swished back and forth in that way that drove all the young bucks of 101, and more than a few of the older ones, wild.
I snuck up behind her, keeping my hoofsteps as quiet as I could. I knew she could hear me. She pretended not to, but I saw her ear swivel to the side and she paused for a beat before continuing her work.
Wrapping my right foreleg around her middle, I leaned close and whispered tenderly in her ear "Happy anniversary, love" as I passed the bright red and blue bouquet to her.
She inhaled the sweet fragrance deeply, closing her eyes and breathing the aroma deep into her lungs. She opened them and nuzzled back into my embrace. "Mm, Broken, they're beautiful! Where did you get these?"
"I still have a few friends among the Scouts," I said with a grin, although I could see her mood darken at the mention of the foragers of our home, the 'Hundred-and-One Scouts' who kept us fed and protected from the outside world.
"Have you spoken to my father?" she asked me, even though we both knew the answer.
"Yes, I have. And he's still very stubborn." My grin faded, growing as dark as the mood, suddenly soured by the shadow of the future.
"I say we go anyway," she said, one hoof caressing her noticeably swollen belly. "This is home, yes. But there must be a better life than this. Think of our child, Broken. Do you want him growing to be like you and me? Like the Overstallion and everypony else in this Stable? Or do you want him out in the open world, among the fresh air, the people--"
"The danger?" I finished for her.
Her eyes darkened. "Don't do that. The world isn't all danger and you know it. You've seen it. I've never even left the Stable and I know it, just as you do. There is a better life out there. One where ponies don't just survive - they get a chance to live."
"I know," I said, trying to calm her. "That isn't what I meant, and we will go. I promise you that. Not now--"
"But soon." she finished with me, repeating the often-repeated litany of our marriage.
---oooOOOooo---
The dream was over now, and as I opened my eyes, the nightmare of the last days' events came back to strike me with fresh horror.
---oooOOOooo---
The rain was heavy on the thin steel roof over our heads. The metal was rusted and pitted with time, yet it still held back the elements of Everfree, as it had done since time immemorial. I was waiting for Red to return from his patrol before closing up the Stable, and it was getting late. My son, Squeak had come out to keep me company while I waited.
"Dad, can we train with the swords while we wait?" he asked me, those big pleading amber eyes a direct reminder of who his mother was.
I chuckled quietly, unable to stop myself. "Of course, son. Uncle Red should be back soon, so we can't practice for too long, but it won't hurt to kill the time."
With a happy squeak, he raced back into the Stable entrance to grab the ancient swords from the small armory just inside the great steel door that closed 101 off from the rest of the world. He returned a moment later with his training blade in his teeth, a small hoof-and-a-half sword with a fine rubber mouthgrip, then went back inside for my larger longsword.
The blades were old, old even when the first blocks of concrete that would become the Stable were set. They had been passed down, if legend was to be believed, since the days of the dawn of the Princesses and the age of the mighty Starswirl the Bearded, himself. They were well-cared for, kept clean and polished, stored with care and respect, and used regularly. Squeak laid mine at my hooves and then did likewise, bowing to touch his snout to the cold blade in the traditional gesture of respect, warrior to warrior. I returned the gesture, then picked up the long, heavy blade in my teeth, squaring my shoulders and pointing the blade to the sky: En garde!
---oooOOOooo---
I coughed onto the cold stone as my eyes opened. My throat felt... raw. No, my throat felt torn! Reaching up a hoof, I felt the ragged bits of flesh that had been my throat - my torn, bloody throat.
I looked down, and started to scream as I took in the blood, the limp bodies, the blood, the... no. No! NO!
The bodies.
---oooOOOooo---
"Dad! Where are you?!" The hushed but desperate whisper told of the tension Squeak was feeling - and I couldn't blame him, not one bit.
Running up to him in a half-crouch to keep out of sight of the things around us, I clapped a hoof to his muzzle to tell him to be quiet. One of the creatures, if they even were creatures, glomped past where we were hiding, behind a desk in one of the lower workshops in 101's repair wing. It paused for a second as it passed us, but kept moving after a moment, leaving a thick trail of mud - or was it moss? - behind it.
"Don't look, Squeak. Close your eyes." I breathed silently into his ear, before crouching up behind the thing and, with barely trembling hooves, wrapped one foreleg around its neck, the other on the forehead. With a jerk that was easier that I thought it would be, I twisted the head one way and the body the other, a muffled crak! and a sudden limpness in my victim the telltale that it was dead. I gasped in horror as it melted against me, dissolving into more of the muddy moss that it had left behind.
My gasp didn't go unnoticed, as suddenly there were two more of the plant-like monsters, one in front of me and one behind. Remembering my hoof-to-hoof combat course, I shifted into a defensive posture, my left front hoof's blade sliding out with an audible snik!
"HALT!" shouted a voice behind me, so loud that I nearly jumped. Turning, there was... Luna! Goddess of the Blessed Night! But no, it wasn't the Goddess, just a trick. Whatever this was, it was new, and angry, and had one jagged shoe pressed to Squeak's throat! "DROP YOUR WEAPON OR THIS ONE DIES! Gently
