The Siege Of Canterlot

Two weeks- that was how long the city had been under lock and key, the gates sealed tight, ponies confined to their homes if not engaged in some useful activity or traveling to or from the market, a chapel or temple, or some other important duty. Regular patrols continued at all hours, circling the wall and criss-crossing the streets. Anti-Changeling precautions were in full effect, with random scans of civilians and soldiers alike by unicorn officers and Royal Guard. Infiltration was always a possibility, and it was also conceivable that the Changelings had planted sleeper agents in the city before the invasion had even begun, back when merchants, tourists and labourers could come and go all but unnoticed among the hustle and bustle of the biggest city in Equestria. There were also disquieting rumours- though rumours they remained- of covens of Moon Cultists, the deluded and dangerous followers of the banished Princess Luna, operating inside the city and potentially co-operating with the besieging forces.

The last few days had, once again, been nerve-wrackingly quiet. A single attack had been launched, and repulsed with minimal casualties on either side. The mortars had been subdued as well; General Hawkeye's spotters had reported increased activity around the earthen berms that protected them, suggesting there might have been a problem with the weapons that the enemy had been forced to resolve before they could open fire at a good rate again. They had busied themselves instead with digging more trenches and more earthen embankments to protect their own lines from return fire from the city walls, providing more protection for their troops in the advance and during the initial phase of an attack.

The full weight of the enemy cannons had also now been brought forward and were relentlessly bombarding the walls and bastions each morning, like clockwork. The more they fired, the more accurate the enemy gunners became, as they zeroed in on specific targets and features; a particular crenelation, a firing port, a roundhouse or flagpole. On some mornings, the Equestrian guns preempted their efforts, and opened fire first in an attempt to keep the gunners' heads down and stop them from unleashing their bombardment. But the Shadow Army was determined, and its gunners were resolute, standing to their guns every morning regardless. The defenders on the walls had suffered casualties, though only a few- knowing when the enemy liked to start firing allowed all those ponies who were not involved with the operation of the defensive cannons to descend to safety behind the wall, or move to the protected centre of each bastion and ravelin. Enemy casualties from the return fire were unknown, though Pegasi spotters had reported at least half a dozen enemy cannons being knocked out of action by accurate shots.

The continuous bombardment was becoming a problem, however, because, although it was only inflicting a few casualties per day, it was also causing considerable damage to the defences themselves. Each shot that struck the wall or palisade would shatter wood and splinter stone, and a continual pounding for a fortnight was having an impact even on the thick, sturdy curtain wall of the city. Battering the walls with cannon fire was extremely unlikely to collapse them entirely, but it could seriously degrade the ability of the Equestrian garrison to actually defend them. Chipping away at cover, destroying cannons, and collapsing localised sections of the wall would all make it harder for the soldiers to fight effectively.

The decision was taken to try and deal with the problem. General Hawkeye issued the commands herself.

The night was dark; the moon was concealed behind a thick layer of cloud that scudded in along the valley from the north, with a light drizzle falling, enough to make everything uncomfortably damp and letting the landscape shimmer with wetness. The gates of the fortress-city remained barred, but one of the smaller sally ports had been opened discreetly, concealed from the view of the enemy behind the multiple layers of defensive structures ahead of it. The sally port did exactly what its name would suggest- it allowed defenders to emerge from inside the walls and sally forth without the need to swing open the great main gates.

A small force, several dozen ponies, crept into the shadows, their blades and faces darkened with earth, everything else metallic removed from their kit in case it clanked and jangled. Grim looks of determination, strong fists and sealed lips were the order of the day, or rather, of the night.

Corporal Snapshot did not much relish the prospect of being covered in mud again, but at least it was not shit this time- no crawling through sewers tonight. Rather, they were on a raiding party, led by Captain Oats and another officer, Captain Breaker, a unicorn stallion from the Canterlot Regulars. Their mission was simple and clear to everypony involved. They were to raid the enemy positions, inflict as much damage to their cannons and ammunition supply as possible, and then withdraw, using the confusion they had created as cover. It was dangerous work- any time spent operating beyond the palisade wall was- but high command had deemed it necessary. The enemy outgunned them in terms of artillery, and levelling the playing field was one way of helping to ensure Canterlot could hold out until relieved.

Priority targets were the two mortars- the behemoths, and their smaller, less capable cousins, of which the Changelings had brought along a half dozen or so, were sapping morale in the city. The Shadow Army heavy siege mortars were the big prize, as the twin weapons could demolish a building in one shot, and the roar of their incoming rounds terrified the inhabitants as they cowered in cellars. Any casualties they could inflict upon the enemy would be a small bonus, but neither Hawkeye nor any of the soldiers under her command harboured any illusions that such raids could meaningfully shrink the enemy numbers. They could, however, conceivably sap their morale in the same way the mortars were draining that of the city.

Captain Oats led her detachment, made up of ponies from under her command who had escaped from Trottingham with her. Captain Breaker led members of his own unit, who had experience with raids such as this, albeit in a rather different form, when they had crept into a Moon Cultist camp and silently cut the throats of every single one of the heretical scum without being detected.

They moved forward slowly, passing through their own lines like wraiths, the soldiers around them watching them pass with salutes or nods of the head. No doubt many were wondering how many of the raiding party they would see return later on. Snapshot followed Sergeant Billhook and Captain Oats. He was laden down with two pistols holstered across his chest, a short sword at his side, and a dagger in his hand. Most of the rest of the raiding party was similarly equipped, with some carrying grenades and others powder horns and fuses. Each pony also had a trio metal spikes, with every other pony having a hammer- these spikes were the simplest method of putting an enemy gun out of action, at least temporarily, by hammering them into the touch-hole of the cannon or mortar, where the gun captain would touch his lit fuse against the gunpowder charge to set it off. Block the hole, render the gun incapable of being fired, until the enemy's armourers had gone through a long and difficult process of trying to remove it and restore the gun to working order.

Out through the palisade they went, slipping through silently and crouching as they descended the earthen slope, creeping across the open ground under cover of darkness, worming their way through the mud. Ponies had already died here; heretics, yes, members of the Shadow Army, but still ponies. Just ponies who had fallen under the sway of evil and turned their faces away from the radiant light of the Sun. Perhaps, when this war was won and Sombra was defeated, some of them might see the error of their ways and return to the Princess whom they had forsaken and committed apostasy against.

The light rain had eased, though since the ground was already damp it hardly mattered. Mud stuck to their uniforms, their manes, and their bodies as they crawled through it. Snapshot kept a firm hold on his dagger as they neared the enemy saps, trenches that jutted out from their main line of earthworks. The saps would be used either for observation during daylight, or to form up companies of soldiers in preparation for an attack. There was no sign of a guard posted at the sap entrances, and the raiding party slipped into them, one by one, moving down two parallel saps toward the main trench line.

The Captains led their detachments, each moving slowly, cautiously, with their daggers and horns at the ready in case they should encounter any resistance. Nopony opposed them as they moved down the saps, reaching the main trench line, where deeper and more well reinforced cuts had been made into the earth, shored up with timber and with duckboards lining the floors. Here, they encountered the enemy. A dozing Pegasus who was meant to be guarding the junction with the sap was dispatched with a single thrust of a dagger, and the party moved on.

The trench curved gently before starting to zig-zag back toward the enemy camp and the village of Newgrange, where construction had been started. The plain in front of the village was where the enemy had emplaced most of their cannons, protected by earthen berms and wooden breastworks. That was where they were heading. Unfortunately, not all of the trench system was as sparsely populated as the outer lines.

A cry came up from the other side of the trench wall, where Captain Breaker was leading his party down a parallel track. That was followed by a single gunshot and then shouts of alarm, which echoed in a relay along the trench, spreading to those adjacent to it, as well as those behind. There were several more gunshots and then a scream that died as suddenly as it had began. Oats readied herself, signalled to her ponies to prepare for combat, and kept pressing on. The element of surprise had been lost, but hopefully the enemy would now be alerted to the other raiding party's presence and divert attention away from Oats and her team.

That hope was short lived, however. Two more corners were traversed before hurried footsteps could be heard, and a trio of ponies in Shadow Army uniform appeared. Taken by surprise, they raised their muskets, and Oats cut them down with a noisy blast of magic. Its strength was amplified by the narrow confines of the trench in much the same way as the explosion of a grenade would be, and it tore open the lead pony as it struck him, tossing the others into the trench walls and breaking their backs.

"To me, ponies!" Oats called, whatever momentum they had now well and truly gone and in danger of turning against them the longer they dallied. "Let's go!" She set off at a run, sword and pistol in hand. Snapshot followed, swapping his own dagger out for his sword and pulling one of the pistols from his chest and cocking it ready for use. Twenty more ponies followed them, ready for a fight, with hearts pounding and sinews tensing.

Another layer of trenches was bypassed before they came to an earthen ramp that led up to one of the enemy gun positions. Here, half a dozen Shadow Army soldiers were rallying. To the sounds of gunfire and cries of anguish from the other side as Breaker and his boys went in, Oats led her team forward with a rousing shout.

"For Canterlot, and for the Princess!" she cried, leading the charge, loosing off her pistol at the nearest enemy, who went down. Musket fire crackled in retaliation, but she protected herself and those behind her with a magic shield for a few moments, long enough for the majority of the enemy troops to fire their weapons. She then dropped the shield, and unleashed her unit upon them.

Snapshot lunged forward, using his wings to carry him over the stack of crates that one enemy was crouching behind, fumbling with his ramrod as he tried to reload his musket. He swiped out with his sword and slit the throat of his opponent as he landed behind him, giving him a firm kick in the back for good measure, sending him crunching against the crates. On the other side of the ramp, Billhook and Ramble were setting about two other heretics who tried to fight them off with bayonets, but to no avail. The enemy had not quite been caught by surprise, but they certainly were not ready to defend against a raiding party like this. Within a minute the ramp was clear and the enemy were dead. Oats charged forward.

The earthen berm, protected by sturdy timber walls on all sides, concealed firing positions for a row of five cannons. Most of their gun crews were absent, presumably sleeping in advance of the following morning's bombardment, but there was a token force guarding the cannons who were now standing to as gunfire and hand to hand combat erupted around them. Oats pushed forward, and Snapshot found himself running alongside her, taking aim with his pistol as a dark blue earth pony popped up from behind one of the cannons with his musket. Snapshot, true to his name, gunned the pony down and replaced the spent pistol into his chest harness before drawing the other and cocking it.

Billhook swung a mighty blow with his sword, all but slicing one of the enemy soldiers in half and splattering blood all over the ornately decorated bronze barrel of the nearest cannon. Several of the enemy began a panicked retreat to the far end of the berm, but accurate pistol fire from the rest of the raiding party cut them down, leaving just one more unicorn standing in the way. He succumbed to a combination of gunfire and magic, slumping across the cannon he had been sheltering behind, which now had one of its wheels blown off by a blast of magic.

"Alright, get to work!" Oats shouted. "Spike these guns, all of them!" Ponies scrambled to obey. Their party had not yet taken any casualties, and Oats hoped to keep it that way, but war was not a clean business, and the enemy was already mobilising. There were over a hundred thousand of them, pony and Changeling, and there were only a few dozen Equestrians beyond the defensive line. They were dangerously exposed once the enemy roused themselves into an attempt to counter their attack, meaning every second counted. The faster they could complete their objectives, and the more of them they could accomplish, the faster they could get back to the relative safety of the palisade wall.

The ponies moved to each cannon and used their hammers to drive the metal spikes into the touch-holes, rendering all five of them useless. There were several powder barrels lying around as well, for use when the weapons were in action. At the direction of Oats, Snapshot and Ramble tipped one of the barrels over and wrenched the lid off, laying a trail of powder through the gun position from one end to the other, leaving the barrel among several of its fellows in a small stack in the corner. Once the guns were spiked, which took less than three minutes, a fuse was lit and the berm rapidly abandoned.

Back in the trenches, the raiding party began to meet stiffer resistance, as the enemy, now aware of their presence, began to organise a counter-attack. Oats's party met up with Captain Breaker and his team, linking up in the trench just as the powder trail reached the barrels and exploded with a roar that shook the night and woke practically everypony in Canterlot. A plume of orange flame leaped skyward, illuminating the trench network in stark relief, as though someone had fired a flare-magic starshot into the air.

From the first cry of alarm to this point had taken less than five minutes, and the enemy was rousing. They did indeed began to fire illuminating shots of magic into the sky, tinted white rather than the orange of the fireball, in case Equestrians were pushing across the open ground. It revealed nothing to them, however, for the raiding party was firmly down in the trenches. Their own Pegasi observers had mapped out the approximate route they would need to take to reach the mortars, and that was where they were heading. Spiking the cannons was good, but taking out the mortars would be even better. To get there, however, they would need to push through two more parallel lines of trenches.

The first one was easy enough, battering through several sections of enemy soldiers. Snapshot killed two himself, his blood up and eager for more. These were not just soldiers, not just enemies like the Changelings had been down in Trottingham. They were heretics, apostates who had turned against their rightful Princess to follow a demagogue who wished to rule not with a divine will, but an iron fist. They had to die for their crimes, for a pony who took up arms against the Princess was no true pony at all.

The second trench line had been reinforced by at least a company of enemy soldiers, and here resistance stiffened. A hail of musketry met the raiding party as they rounded the corner into the trench, but luckily Oats was alert and raised a shield. She then ordered a rapid charge down the narrow trench in order to break up the enemy line and stop them rom reloading. The Shadow soldiers were two deep and three abreast in the trench; more than that, they could not manage, as the trench was not wide enough. They lowered their bayonets in anticipation, but Oats shot one of them down with her pistol, opening a gap in their line. The rest of her raiders tore through, hacking and stabbing. The tight confines of the trench now meant that the firing line the Shadow soldiers had formed rapidly became a liability, and they were butchered quickly before the raiders moved on. Captain Breaker's team followed as they entered a wider cut in the earth, a focal point where several trenches joined. Enemy soldiers were moving in from the far side; one of the other exits led to the first of the mortar positions, their primary objective.

Oats and Breaker marshalled their teams and split them, sending them across the pit, where there was plenty of cover thanks to stacks of crates and bags of earth, straw or grain. Desultory musket fire was exchanged, the Equestrians responding with their pistols as they kept up the pressure of their advance. Speed was still the key, even if they had lost the element of surprise. Work fast, work clean, surgical precision. Move only toward the objective. No lollygagging.

Together, Oats's unit and Breaker's boys pushed through the enemy, using magic, ball and blade, shooting and slashing, driving hard for the first mortar. They had, maybe, another five minutes before the enemy overwhelmed their position with an entire regiment or more, but for now the impetus was still on their side. The enemy had to form a resistance, whereas they were already in action, and closing in on their target. The correct trench was picked, the Pegasi spotters' hand drawn maps proving to be accurate. It led them to the mortar's firing pit, as expected.

"Spike that thing!" Breaker shouted, leading the charge this time. The gun pit was protected only by two ponies, who panicked and turned to flee, leaving the mortar unprotected. The great, monstrous barrel sat horizontally, turned turn from its usual raised firing position and covered over with a sheet to prevent water from simply flowing into it like a giant cauldron. The mortar's carriage was simple wood, and could easily be smashed with hammers and booted feet. Oats's team set about doing so while Breaker's ponies covered both entrances to the firing pit. The mortar was spiked, the carriage trashed, the wheels torn from their mountings, the axle burned through by a concentrated cone of magic. Then, to make absolutely sure, as the rest of the raiding party held off the increasingly desperate enemy attacks, Oats and Snapshot tore the canvas cover from the mortar, lifted an open powder cask into its barrel, for such was the calibre of the weapon, and lit a fuse trail.

A rapid retreat was then called, right back the way they had come. More enemies were closing on them now, however, but their mission had reached its zenith. To push on any further would risk the entire force being surrounded and wiped out. The rearguard started to come under heavy fire as they moved through the open pit toward the forward trenches. As they did so, the powder fuse reached the mortar and exploded with a loud but somewhat muffled crump, bursting the barrel like a peeled banana and utterly wrecking it. No more high-explosive shots of terror would be fired from that particular device, though its twin remained- a task for another night, perhaps.

A route back to safety was rapidly plotted mentally by Oats and Breaker. The same way they had come in would be used to get them out, despite dogged harrying from the rear as enemies pushed up in increasing numbers. Several of the raiders went down injured or dead, their first casualties, remarkably, of the entire raid. With Shadow Soldiers in pursuit, the raiders charged back up the trench toward the city. Safety only lay behind the walls; until they reached their own lines, they would be vulnerable. Having had an unopposed run in, they were now being pressed hard on the way back out. At several junctions, enemies seemed to spring from nowhere, bursting from side trenches and saps and inflicting further casualties. A pony came out ahead of Snapshot, and he instinctively ducked to one knee and thrusted his sword forward, right into her guts. She screamed and collapsed, but two more ponies came out of the same side turning and set upon them. Snapshot found himself in a sword fight, desperately parrying blows where he could as a wide-shouldered, blood red earth pony mare swung for him. Her Pegasus counterpart went after Billhook, who managed to beat him back. However, as they were turning to engage the threat from their left, the raiders were set upon by a fresh enemy force from the right.

Half a dozen ponies charged out from a cross-trench, hacking away at the rear of Breaker's group and threatening to separate Oats and her team from the others. Oats rallied them, blasting a hole in the chest of one unfortunate foe with her magic and spearing another with her sword as he tried to swing a hefty club in her direction. Breaker turned back to assist. Snapshot ducked an incoming blow from his opponent and countered, slashing a nasty wound on her thigh. The mare charged him bodily and shoved him against the trench wall, hoping to finish him off, but Snapshot was able to roll to the side. Her plunging sword stabbed in between the bones of his right wing, ripping several feathers free but leaving him otherwise uninjured. He scrambled to his feet and hesitated. The raiding party was getting strung out along the trench, with enemies coming from two sides at once and other bringing up the rear. They had to close up with Captain Breaker's team or else they were in danger of being left behind, separated.

Billhook got the upper hand over his opponent, knocking him to the ground and slamming his steel-heeled boot down on the face of the Pegasus with a crack of bone. Snapshot's opponent turned to face him with a snarl, her sword raised and ready again. He met her halfway, their swords clashing, but she was stronger than him. Again he found himself shoved bodily backward, and this time he made the sensible choice. He ducked and ran, moving toward Captain Oats and the main bulk of Breaker's unit. At a distance, he turned and readied himself, but his foe was not pursuing, instead sneering at him before turning to batter another of the raiding party to her knees, stabbing her sword right through the unicorn's throat. More enemies were coming up from the rear trenches now. Several of the raiders were isolated, including, Snapshot noted, Ramble, who was trying his best to fight off two ponies at once.

"Fall back!" Oats shouted. "Time to move! If we stay here, we're dead."

"But Captain!" Snapshot cried. "We can't just leave them..."

"We have no choice, son," Billhook informed him, standing beside him, coated in dirt and mud and blood, mostly somepony else's. "The Captain's right. We've done our job, now it's time to get the hell out of here."

"But..." Snapshot swallowed a lump in his throat. Ramble was surrounded, along with two others from their unit, backed into a corner as more of the enemy pushed on to try and get at the rest of the raiders.

"No time for buts. Think about them later, cry about them if you like, but get fucking moving!" Billhook snarled. The rest of the unit continued down the path, mentally thanking the rearguard, or more accurately, the unfortunate stragglers, for buying them time to escape. Snapshot reluctantly followed them. The last he saw of Ramble was the earth pony struggling for survival, surrounded by a baying mob of heretics.

The survivors of the raiding party made their way back up the saps and out across the open ground, where they were challenged by the sentries. After identifying themselves with the correct password and challenge phrase, and passing an anti-Changeling magic scan, they were ushered back inside the walls for a debriefing. The raid had been a success- a row of cannon and one of the mortars destroyed, and a number of casualties inflicted upon the enemy- but that was little consolation to any member of the party who had lost a friend, for the raid had not been bloodless.

Snapshot did what Billhook had suggested- he cried about it later, on his bedroll in a corner of the New Town library, wordless, silent sobs of emotion. He had seen action before, yes. He had seen ponies die before, yes. But Ramble had been a good friend, and now he was dead, or worse. The sadness was mixed inextricably with guilt, also, for Snapshot couldn't help but link his retreat from his one-on-one fight directly with the failure of Ramble and the others to escape. Maybe, just maybe. He might have made a difference, if he'd just stuck at his task, even if it cost him his own life in the process.

Maybe, just maybe...