The sultry summer sun, ever benevolent in its presence. I swear it was like I could feel the goddess embrace me in her warmth. The sunlight enveloped the world around me, pulsating with such a rich energy it seemed everything was more alive than usual. The rabbits frolicing in the meadow, the birds singing in the greenest trees I have ever seen, and are those butterflies? I haven’t seen a butterfly in ages. They’ve always fascinated me, starting life as nothing but a peripheral little insect. But one day metamorphose into the pinnacle of ethereal. Prancing around their invisible realm with an air of majesty and peace the likes of which almost appear as though it’s orchestrated. As if a unicorn is behind the scenes pulling the hidden strings, a puppeteer, whose marionette is her tool of admiration. Only such desire for attention fueling her passion to make her butterfly dance with such grace, oddly too natural to be replicated. But of course, it’s not a puppet, it’s just a butterfly, a single mere example of the inherent peace nature strives for. I haven’t seen a day like this in a very long time, it’s simply… perfect.
I awoke to the ear piercing screech of an alarm, the instantaneous jolt of energy sent my horn into the concrete, inches overhead.
Thud.
“Ow! Son of a bitch.” I muttered as I massaged my horn and got to my hooves off of the bed. The usually colorless drab walls of the sleeping quarters were bathed in a flashing red glow. Could today be the day of days? As quickly as I smacked my head on the concrete overhead, I was making my way towards the control room. It wasn’t a long walk, maybe ten feet at the most. As soon as I walked in the control room I noticed my commander was looking incredibly unhinged, I could empathize with him, hell I was beginning to feel the same way.
“Finally! Welcome to the party, get your authorization book!” His demeanor was undeniably frantic as he clumsily hustled his checklist and other essentials together.
I wanted to say something, be sarcastic, toy with him, but that idea was suppressed as quickly as it festered. Instead I did what I trained to do, sat down and pulled out my book, “Copy, authorization book ready, standing by for authorization code.”
“Copy standby.”
To say we were waiting impatiently would be an understatement; sure the early warning alarm was going off, but we could do nothing let alone knew anything until we began to receive our authorization code. Meanwhile the alarm continued to attack my eardrums, deafening me more and more with every screech from that cursed box.
Beep.
Beep.
Beep.
The alarm stopped, and our radio crackled to life with the distorted voice of our authorization agent relaying a code. I hastily began to copy the words I didn’t want to hear.
“OSCAR, THREE, TANGO, TWO, TANGO, LIMA, X-RAY…”
I was writing everything down as quickly as the pencil could mark the paper, I was concentrating on nothing but that voice, and operating the pencil. Someone could get shot in front of me and I would probably miss it.
“DELTA, ECHO, TANGO, EIGHT.”
Not a second after the transmission concluded I was practically throwing my book at my commander to switch and verify. He hastily, grabbed my book and I took his. Reviewing what he wrote was rather difficult, Celestia knows why his hoofwriting looks like he’s more qualified to be a doctor than a missileer. Earth ponies. Regardless, his… glyphs checked out; I reached his book back out to him and received mine in return.
“Authorization code confirmed, Deputy, unlock your lock.”
“Fuck”. I thought to myself. I got up, braver than I really was and followed my commander to the war safe. He quickly entered his combination and I did the same, we removed both padlocks and opened the blood red safe. The black interior of the safe contrasted heavily with the many tiny manilla envelopes filed in a long row, nearly illuminating them. He began sifting through the tiny envelopes and nearly filed through to the end without pulling an envelope. A drill, I thought.
Pluck.
He lifted one of the tiny envelopes from towards the end of the row. Then he proceeded to lift his book next to the envelope and verify that the first two characters were shared between them… They were. We have only made it this far during one drill before, maybe if the code inside didn’t match with the rest of our authorization code, then for sure it was a drill. My hopes were quickly brought to their knees when he read the tiny slip inside the envelope, and as luck would have it, the codes were identical. He looked up at me gravely.
“Begin unlocking sequence.”
I hesitated for a moment, I heard those words in training, I know the launch sequence like the color of my mane, but this, this is the farthest we have gone since. I went to the locking rotors and began to translate the authorization code to the passkey for mag-lock release on the missile. My commander started to activate several primers for the rocket. Time slowed to a snail's pace as I turned the wheels from the random numbers they were, to the passkey we received.
There are six wheels in all that must be turned to the right numbers, each time I rotated one of the wheels, I had flashes. Flashes of time as I once knew it, 3, memories of me as a filly buying candy with my mother, 7, my brother being born, 1, my first kiss, 9, finding out my brother died, 2. I froze and looked down at the button labeled “VALIDATE PASSKEY”, after I push that button, all that’s left to do is turn the keys. Then in about half an hour, some plot of land somewhere will be vaporized, all who inhabited it, gone with the dust they have become. Delivery in thirty minutes or less, or the next ones free, I used to think our slogan was funny. It’s not. I pushed the button to validate the passkey, and sure enough.
Beep.
A robotic voice filled the control room.
“Drill concluded, total elapsed time, four minutes, twelve seconds.”
After the pit of dread was lifted out of my stomach, I slowly regained my composure and looked at my commander. He looked much worse than I did, I could see the glass in his eyes from the tears he was moments away from shedding. He tried miserably to make a joke.
“H-hey that’s a good time.”
The sad part is, he’s not wrong.
Dear Star,
You know I’m horrible with words, and hoof writing, obviously. I just want you to know that I can’t wait for your next leave! Grandma Crab gave me a new recipe that I think you’ll love. Of course it’s gonna be a surprise, I can’t lay all my cards on the table, like in the picture I gave you with this. Those are two things you can think about when you’re lonely, or homesick. I do worry about you Star, ever since we moved I’ve been feeling like I’m losing you. I can’t imagine what stuff you are doing, and I’m not mad about that. I understand your work must be a secret, but I just want you to know that I will still be here for you as soon as you get back, that you will have a nice warm home to come back to, and we can live like ponies. Even if it’s just for another two weeks, but I think that everything will come good soon. This war looks to be on its tail end, hopefully by Hearth's Warming this nightmare can finally be over. Then we can create that life we’ve been dreaming about. Anyway we will see each other again soon, I will be thinking about you every night, just like in that picture, wink wink. I’m going to stop embarrassing myself now, and I’ll see you soon my little bird.
Forever and always,
Moon Stone
Anxiety, anxiety is an uncontrollable plague that constantly festers in my mind. I've been reading that letter over and over for the past three hours. Not finding any compelling reason to get up out of my launch chair. Surrounded by the tools to our destruction. It’s like all the dials and switches stare at me, mocking my optimism. Their very presence is enough to oppress my motivation. That letter, one of the only objects I have that tethers me to the idea that life is worth living. She gave me that letter a week ago, as I walked out the door to come here. She always gives me letters when I go to duty, and there’s always two pictures folded with them. One that’s safe to display on the wall in the barracks, and one that’s a lot more private. At first I found these extremely corny, I wasn’t going to war, I would be back in two weeks. Now they’re practically essential.
I try to hide it from Moon but, she’s not a dumb mare, a bit of a klutz, but definelty educated. She can sense the unhinged disposition that I’ve garnered these days. Which has definitely contrasted my old self, the witty sarcastic lovable asshole. Her being the ever loving Mare-friend tries to be there for me, Celestia bless her. That’s caused some storms to stir, my lack of being able to buck up and tell her how I feel. Of course I legally can’t tell her, because that would probably get us both arrested. She’s a good mare I know she can keep a secret, on the other hoof it’s easier to just stick with the secrecy angle.
I can’t do that to her, drag her down to my reality, what kind of pony would I be to tell her the truth. That maybe these stables that are being built aren’t just a precaution. Or that Zebras have more than enough mega spells to blow this world over twice, at least that was the last confirmed report.
The state of the world as most ponies know it, is a well constructed lie. An illusion of possibility, when we are all damned in one way or another. Keeping this secret eats me alive every day I spend with Moon. Seeing her faith in a better future, a future where this whole conflict will evaporate away and we will all live together happily like nothing ever happened. I don’t have the guts to let her in on the reality of war. That even after victory peace isn’t always there to follow. Of course ironically there is a way to secure the ultimate peace she dreams about, unfortunately we can’t be there to see it. Doom, that’s our true fate and it’s only a matter of time. I've been working here for the better half of four months and I’m not even coming close to being numb to that idea. Part of me wishes I can be numb to this constant pit of dread and misery that’s present in every waking moment of my life. But I don’t get to be that lucky, I’m not a soldier who's watched their friends get blown apart on the battlefield. Or a nurse who plugs holes in other ponies for hours a day every day. There’s no chance for me to become desensitized. I’m the one who lives in isolation with nothing but thoughts. The curse to dwell and imagine what hell I will unleash onto the world, and the dying thought that I will be the one responsible.
I imagine what it will be like, will there be screams? Will there be anyone left to walk amongst the rubble and destruction? What will all that radiation do to the world? Will all life be snuffed out? Can you scrub away radiation burns? Those are just a few from my library of questions I’ve come up with in those four months.
I’ve found one thing humorous, however, everything in this bunker has a checklist that leaves nothing up to question. How each key shall be turned, each switch to be flipped, down to how many times we can use the toilet. That’s due to our lack of having a water talisman to purify our water. Nothing here is self sufficient, all we have is supply. A supply of food that we restock with every shift change; a shift change happens every two weeks when my commander and myself are relieved of duty by two others who take our place. After two weeks of us living as normal a life as possible we come back and relive them so on and so forth. When we come down here we bring two weeks worth of food and other provisions with us. You see nothing is planned for after, only up to. The final order in our launch procedure book is Order 37. “Await further instruction.”
Await further instruction, from who? Is Celestia gonna knock on our blast door and tell us to suck off her horn? What I’ve found funny is there is nothing set up for us to survive. That’s the one thing without a checklist. Aside from the two weeks of food that we bring down there's an emergency supply cache with thirty days worth of food. Thirty days. And it’s not like rationing that out will make any difference. This facility is blast proof, unless the Zebras dropped a mega spell right on top of us, we will survive the explosion. We are buried three stories underground. The silo door for our Shadowcolt II missile can reseal itself in thirty seconds so we are safe from any radiation down here. With all that emphasis on survivability we have no air or water purification talismen, only an oxygen recycling system. Those filters are rated to last again thirty days. Water will be gone much sooner than that.
So we got quite the selection on how we want to kill ourselves. Walk out into the wasteland we created above, and die from radiation poisoning. Stay down here and ration our food as long as possible while slowly suffocating to death. Or hell, we can have one massive feast celebrating the end of time then starve to death. They didn’t even bother to give us a gun. Funnily enough they said that rule is instated for our protection.
Whatever, only three more days until our next shift change...
