Some Days Are Better Than Others
1pm, 1st Birthing, 1009ALB
“Yesterday at noon, Changeling forces crossed the border and bombing raids were launched upon the town of Acornage. An ultimatum was immediately dispatched to Queen Chrysalis that all hostile action be ceased by 6am today or extreme measures would be taken... That deadline has now passed and Changeling units have not been withdrawn. Her Majesty Princess Celestia will issue a statement later tonight.”
As the Prime Minister finished his short announcement and the usual EBC presenter passed over to the weather schedule in her falsely prim tones, the floodgates of speculation were opened and a buzz of conversation filled the regimental mess hall. About half our company (such as it was at the time) and a few other off-duty stragglers had gathered when rumours started circulating about an important announcement, huddled on hastily rearranged mats around Daffodil’s radio set.
Sergeant Steward reached over and clicked the set off, though the sound and onset of silence was drowned out by the buzz of conversation.
“It’s going to be war, isn’t it?” Soapy Tail said quietly nearby.
A few heads turned to her, a couple of attentive ears drooping as the broadcast sank in and lines were read between.
“Nah, not yet.” Said a Vanhooverite Unicorn beside her, another member of my section and one of the most recent arrivals to the company. “It’s not over ‘till the fat mare sings...” He scratched at his side with an orange hoof. “Or the lanky one, I suppose.”
Next to me, Victor spoke up in his usual, cheerful way. “Don’t get your hopes up, Murkie. They vill just be crushed.”
I glanced at the brown Earther. Even for a dour old Severyan (a stereotype Victor lived and breathed with gusto), that was uncommonly pessimistic.
“An’ here’s mister rain cloud come to rain on us all.” Mercurial (far better known by his nickname) snarked back.
“Poetic as ever.” Victor sniped.
I intervened before the two could really get going. “Enough of that, both of you. The signs don’t look good, but Murkie has a point. That wasn’t a declaration of war. It’s still possible there will be a last minute save.”
Victor huffed and looked away, obviously not convinced. To be honest, I wasn’t either.
“Maybe...” Soapy said, drooped ears belying her own doubts. I felt sorry for the mare, what with recent events.
The orange Vanhooverite nudged her shoulder. “Even if there isn’t, we’ll give ‘em a right kickin’ and it’ll be over by Hearth’s Warming. Worst case, you get to send Clear Glass a card from old Chryssy’s office.”
Soapy chuckled at that and shook her head. “I’m not sure the captain would let me do that.”
“What, you? Poster mare of the Guard?” He teased. “She’d take a photo of you doin’ it!”
The Pegasus ruffled her pale pink wings a little self-consciously. “You know that wasn’t me.”
“You have to admit Soapy, you’re the spitting image of that uniform model.” I said, referring to a picture in the new regulations leaflet we had been passed a week prior.
Victor stood up “I need some air.”
Soapy watched the greying stallion’s retreating figure as he tramped toward the door leading toward the barracks proper. “What’s got into him?”
Murkie shrugged. “Dunno. Allergic to fun, I suppose.”
I shot the ginger Unicorn a warning look.
Murkie subsided, looking a bit guilty. “Sorry, Leader.”
I hummed at that. “I’ll go and check on him.”
Obviously trying to change the subject as I got up and departed, Murkie said; “Here, you’ve been in the Guard a while Soapy, do you know what they feed the Princesses? Never realised it ‘til I saw ‘em, but they’re blinkin’ massive!”
I didn’t hear Soapy’s reply as I followed after my old friend, guessing at his destination.
For once, I was glad of the horrible, tasteless affair of blue and yellow stripes that were my uniform coveralls as the shade of the palace turned already chilly early spring air biting. It took a couple of minutes, but as expected I found Victor on the north wall of the citadel in a quiet spot where the ramparts meet the back of the palace. Hardly anypony ever went there, except for the odd gardener sneaking a smoke when they were going to and from the nearby compost heaps or the occasional patrol.
Victor was sat on his haunches and leaning against the crenellations, looking north-east in blank way as his front hooves absently fiddled with his seldom-used pipe, turning it over again and again.
As I approached, I deliberately coughed to get his attention. Victor didn’t like being startled.
An ear flicked around and the pipe’s twisting motions slowed, but otherwise there wasn’t any response.
I sat down beside him, following his gaze. Victor was the one who had taught me the ropes of soldiering long before I was promoted over him or got transferred to the Guard. I’d have been the poor rookie who didn’t make it back from her first engagement if it weren’t for him, and probably several more times over for good measure as well. Even if it weren’t my job to look out for my section, I owed it to him to be there.
A few minutes passed in silence apart from his slightly wheezy breathing and the occasional click of the wooden pipe against the hard parts his hooves.
Eventually he spoke. “Up north we have a saying, Section Leader: ‘Some days are better than others.’”
His tone was a prepared one, he’d expected me to follow.
“Doesn’t sound like much of a saying, more a truism.” I commented.
Victor huffed, but in profile the corner of his mouth turned up.
“I assume today falls into the second category.” I said.
He nodded. “Yes. Yes it does, Section Leader. Or vill, soon enough.”
“Victor, you don’t have to call me that, we’re not on duty.” I replied.
The scarred old Severyan grunted, a large cloud of steam rising in the cold air.
“Is home bothering you again? That’s usually why you come here.” I asked after it became obvious he wasn’t about to speak.
“No, not quite. I have hardly thought about it since Princess Luna wisited me.” He paused, looking at the pipe for a moment before swivelling an eye around to me. “You know I am supposed to be retiring soon.”
It was a statement, not a question, but I nodded anyway. Victor was turning fifty-six in a couple of weeks.
He raised his head and looked back to the north-east, as if he could see Severokholm from there. “Three days. Three stinking days they could have vaited and then I vouldn’t have to care. But no. Now they vill vant to keep me on for one more trip through Tartarus.” His tail flicked agitatedly and I felt the black hairs bat against my flank.
I’d not known it was only three days, but given this was Victor, he had probably wanted to avoid a going away party or something. It was rotten luck and I felt sorry for him, but he wouldn’t want my pity either.
“It might not come to war.” I instead repeated the vain hope.
He shook his head and slotted the pipe back into one of the pockets of his uniform. “No Rose, it vill. The Princesses have been preparing for moons. If not, then vhy reform the army in such haste? Vhy sack most of the old Guard and bring in new blood? Why form the LDV? Caution in a dangerous time perhaps, but that doesn’t excuse the conscription.”
“Conscription?” I parroted, surprised.
“You have not heard? Just before last Hearth's Warming. Vhat did they call it? Something flowery.” He paused, staring intently at one of the bricks making up the wall as if it had offended him. “Oh yes, ‘incentivised recruitment’.”
“Isn’t that just what they called the pay rises?” I asked.
Army pay had lagged behind inflation for years, back when I signed up a private would earn almost as much working in a factory. Poor pay and danger wasn’t exactly an encouraging combination for prospective recruits.
“Yes, but I have a cousin a few times removed in Trotterfield. She owns a party supply shop, costumes and the like, but I heard down the family grapevine that a couple of new laws vere about to put her out of business; higher taxes on a lot of the things she stocks. Then, a couple of veeks later out come the incentives. Sign up for two years, and it just so happens that a lot of those taxes just” he waved a hoof in the empty air, “go avay, like so much morning mist. You must have seen the posters.”
I nodded uncertainly.
“Don’t vorry, it vill all be vaiting for you once your enlistment expires.” He dropped his hoof back to the ground and looked at me seriously. “I did a little reading after that. Decorative florists, art shops, clothes shops, all those little businesses that aren’t really all that important. Services you can get by vithout. They vere all affected.”
“Sign up, or struggle to get by, you mean.” I observed.
He nodded. “Exactly. Not spoken in so many vords, but implied all the same.”
I shook my head. “I don’t believe it, it sounds like a conspiracy theory.”
He chuckled darkly. “That is reality, Rose. Just ask my cousin, she signed up last moon.”
“I don’t mean to be rude to your cousin, but one Pony doesn’t make a pattern. Plus, it really could just be caution, especially with that near-miss in Manehatten last year. And you remember the equipment shortages as well as I do, the army needed a reform.” I countered. “Besides, the Princesses have always done right by us, they wouldn’t start a pointless war.”
“Perhaps, perhaps.” Victor went quiet for a moment and looked away again, this time toward one of the palace’s towers high above us. “You grew up just outside Canterlot Rose, so you must have seen the Princess at some point.”
“A few times.” I replied, it wasn’t hard to guess which Princess Victor was referring to. “She visited my school once.”
Another nod from the old soldier. “I have been in the Guard fourteen years, ever since the revolution. For five of those, I have been assigned to the citadel itself. I once even filled in for one of her personal guards when he vas sick. I like to think that I have seen enough of the Princess to know at least some of her character, her quirks...” He looked back down at me. “There is one thing that alvays remains constant about her. Can you guess vhat it is?”
I considered that and realised I knew an awful lot less about Celestia than I thought. Not the Princess, the Pony. After a while I guessed. “She likes cake?”
“Vell, yes.” Victor conceded. “But if you vere joking, it vasn’t very funny.”
“I’ll be the first to admit that my sense of humour is pretty poor Victor, but you know I’m not that bad.” I replied.
He huffed and flicked an ear. “I vill take that as an elaborate ‘I don’t know’ then. The answer, my cream coated friend, is that the Princess is alvays calm, collected. Nothing flusters her. Vhether she is losing a game or a battle, she vill just smile as if everything is going according to plan, and it almost alvays is. Princess Celestia is many things; competent, experienced, motherly... Some even call her a goddess. But she is not skittish and she never, ever cracks. Not anyvhere anypony other than her sister can see, anyvay. Maybe not even her.” Then he looked back down at me. “Rose, Princess Celestia is vorried.”
“I wouldn’t be surprised.” I said with a shrug. “It doesn’t take much to see that things aren’t exactly peachy right now.”
He shook his head vigorously. “No no no. I should not be able to see this! Until a moon ago, I never saw her vorried. She is still wery good at hiding it, but vell...” He tapped the spot where his Mark lay under his coveralls with a hoof. “This doesn’t just make me good at following orders – I know vhen somepony is afraid, and she never is.” His voice dropped a little. “Now, think: Vhat scares a mare like Princess Celestia?”
It was disconcerting sometimes, how canny Victor could be. I scratched at my side and pondered while he watched, silently waiting to see if I came to the same conclusion he obviously had.
What scares a mare who has lived millennia?
Celestia was around at the time of the Founding six thousand years ago, even if she didn’t take the throne until much later, anypony knows that much. She was still a Pony though (cue the flak from any Solarites reading this) and I didn’t think she would let a mundane thing like a fear of spiders show through even to Victor. Unless it was a real phobia I suppose, but I’d never heard of her having one. Yet at the same time, there are deep fears everypony has that aren’t so easily hidden.
Fear of failing the Mark didn’t fit, it wasn’t like she wouldn’t be able to raise the sun any time soon, unless Victor was misascribing the Changeling situation as the cause for her worry, and if he was then it was well above our pay grades anyway. There had to be something more.
Fear of dying was possible, but Celestia led armies in less peaceful times, had personally led charges and made stands against odds that would make Flash Magnus himself blanch. One of them was at the Battle of Ponderhill, after Harald Fairantlers rolled up her northern flank. In case you’ve not heard the story; she and sixty-four Guards bought enough time for the rest of the army to retreat, but during the fighting she took a crossbow bolt to the neck and had to be carried away.
It happens that my forty-nine times great grandmother down the direct line was the healer who treated her. My family still venerate Willow Meadow as the greatest of our Ancestors for it, the one real hero we’ve got to guard our prayers as they pass up the Whispering Tree to Lifgyf and Wealdafrea.
Anyway, it probably wasn’t a fear of dying that Victor was picking up on. What else does everypony fear, deep down? Fear of failure, fear of death, fear of... Victor had hinted at it and the more I thought about it, the more it made sense.
“Fear for a foal?” I suggested.
Victor nodded, a rare smile crossing his muzzle. “Not in the literal sense – I am not some crackpot who claims Princess Twilight is her secret daughter – but yes. Perhaps she was once a mother, in the mists of time, but today? I think Celestia sees herself as the mother of Equestria itself, of everypony within... And now Chrysalis is hurting her foals, killing them.” He sneezed, wiped his muzzle with a hoofkerchief and shoved it back into a pocket disdainfully, muttering in Severyan; “Humph. Dolzhno byt’, stanovitsya myagche.”
“She’s going to end up on the moon, isn’t she?” I said, referring to the Changeling.
The old stallion shifted, leaning his forelegs on the parapet. “Without a helmet, assuming there is enough left to fire from the cannon.”
I shot a sidelong look up at him from my distinctly unimpressive vantage with a smirk on my muzzle. “I didn’t know you read Murkie’s comics.”
The one eye I could see found something else to focus on. “I don’t. He just inflicts them on me from time to time.”
There was a moment of humoured quiet before I responded. “He’s not a bad sort, you know. I think it’s his idea of being friendly.”
Victor shrugged. “He is too bouncy, I find that annoying. And besides, I have a friend. I don’t need another.”
“I’m not asking you to be friends with him, just... Try not to argue with him so much, please?” I reared up to the parapet next to him, the view of the gentle rolling hills of Equestria’s farm-quilted heartlands spread out below was a pleasant one. “I know he’s immature, but we were all green newbies at one point. Murkie needs an example, and if you’re going to be sticking around...”
“You have a point.” He admitted begrudgingly.
That was all I’d get out of Victor without throwing rank about, so I left it at that and we fell into companionable silence as the off duty hours wore away. The sun began to sink sluggishly into the west, casting long shadows across the landscape.
You would think that with such tension hanging over us, like a thunder storm about to break, that the weather would be appropriately dramatic, but no. The sky was clear and a gentle easterly breeze rippled the pennants dotted here and there atop the castle towers as the moon appeared over the mountains to the east. It seemed a little slower than usual, but that might just have been the dull, nagging stress that was tugging at my guts playing tricks on my mind as well.
Eventually, I shifted as bells started to ring across the city. “Half six, we’d best report in.”
Victor nodded and followed as I trotted away, taking the short stairs down from the wall and beginning across the domain of the gardeners, passing their staffroom as we went and catching the pleasant scent of tea carrying from a not-quite-closed window.
“In vas thinking.” Victor said as we passed the window. “I might have underestimated the situation.”
I twisted an ear his way and slowed my pace a little for him to catch up. “Hmm?”
“Vell, if the Princess sees herself as our mother... Then she has to do something vorse than watch her foals be hurt, is already doing it.” He continued as we worked our way around the high hedge that hid the working part of the gardens from the public. “If it does come to war, then she is forced to choose vhich live, and vhich die.”
I couldn’t help but grimace at the thought as my coat prickled and a shiver ran through my body ending with a tail flick. I might not be the most motherly of mares, leaving aside a certain fillyhood fantasy of the most mundane kind that teetered upon a dangerously soppy precipice†, but I don’t think any healthy adult mind could seriously consider being put in such a position and not feel at least a bit uncomfortable.
“I don’t envy her.” I said aloud.
“Nor do I, and it explains the clinical approach.” Victor replied. “As you said, the princesses have always done right by us, by all of us.”
“The good of the many.” I replied, not holding eye contact.
“Outweighs the good of the few." He completed the saying. "Exactly. And piece by piece it must break her heart, every time she has to do it.”
And I imagined that already the cracks were forming across another part of that battered old heart, which she had given unconditionally to her country and its inhabitants day after day down the long roll of years.
I’d seen the vast amount of paperwork that got brought in and out of the Princesses’ offices, not to mention holding court three times a week and all her other duties, and to imagine one mare doing that – even allowing for vassals taking care of a lot of micromanagement and how government must be more complex today than it was in the past, it was mind-boggling. I’d never heard of her going on holiday either, or even having a real day off except for Hearth’s Warming. One day off a year for goodness knows how long, doing a job that stressful which probably wasn’t even related to her Mark...
It added a layer of awe to the veritable walking onion of the stuff that was Princess Celestia.
We turned the corner of the palace and hurried across the front, past the steps leading up to the great doors. As usual for when end of shift was approaching, the guards to either side were a bit stiffer than usual, no leaning on ceremonial spears to be seen.‡
As we passed under the main balcony overlooking the citadel courtyard, I thought I just caught a flash of bright golden light from overhead. The sun, which had been lingering in its descent like a foal seeing how long she can put off heading out for school, finally got a move on and slid downward. Though the scene was as beautiful as alwaysθ and the physical clouds remained pointedly absent, the metaphorical cloud of doubt – of fear – remained, as if the tardy sun was being devoured by the distant horizon, a horizon beyond which the source of that cloud lay.
Combined with Victor’s words, it almost seemed prophetic.
†Don’t laugh, everypony dreams of something embarrassing once in a while.
‡Anypony who’s been in the Guard (and to a degree the army as a whole) more than a couple of moons figures out that the officers like to come along about this time to check for slacking, and of course they know that we know, which depending on the officer can either lead to a quiet arrangement of mutually assured peace of mind or a vicious cycle of silent gambits and double-guessing. Neither Victor or myself had quite sussed out which of those Captain Barstow was just yet. We did know not to call her Bairstow if you valued your dignity though, as Private Halibut found out on his first day a couple of weeks back... I’m really glad I wasn’t the one to make that slip.
θHonestly, the views were one of the best perks of a Canterlot posting, even if it meant dealing with annoying tourists now and again.
Twenty minutes and a stop by the armoury for equipment later, I was following the rest of the platoon into the palace proper. We were on duty in the royal offices, which meant a much shorter walk than usual.
Under ideal conditions, Lieutenant Clover and half the platoon would be in a guardroom near the entrance to the offices with the actual weapons, but since the Guard was still understrength after the mass sackings, we were all on corridor watch.
Goodness knows what we were supposed to do with spears if things went wrong enough that we actually ended up needing to use them there, but I suspect ‘mad dash for the guardroom lockers’ would have been featured somewhere in Clover’s briefing.
We were a motley bunch in those first few moons following the reforms, especially being in the middle of an equipment overhaul. Most visible was the influx of Lavenders and heavy weapons like the Wicket gun we were getting, phasing out the old Lilias which had been in service longer than Victor. Not only that though, the first batch of new armour was starting to trickle in.
The old stuff really wasn’t up to snuff, at least according to the entire section dedicated to ragging on my new unit in particular in the partial, sanitised version of the Dotted Line Report which had been given to me as required reading when I was transferred a few moons earlier.
More or less, it had gone that as fancy as it looked, the old munition plate was more appropriate for ceremony rather than real combat these days. It had no enchantments against non-magical weapons and only basic wards against telekinesis and the like. Not only that, it clashed with modern infantry doctrine thanks to the cosmetic enchantments which somepony three hundred years or so ago must have thought was a good idea.
Back then of course, a battle meant lining up with muskets at a hundred lesthae and blasting away until somepony legged it, so making the Guard look like an impenetrable wall of gold, white and blue was intimidating and tangibly beneficial. Unfortunately, it made my job a nightmare. During exercises, beyond tribe and gender (sometimes, based on size), I’d found I couldn’t tell who was who in my section or even if they were my section unless they spoke. The problems that caused are self-evident to any with the most tangential understanding of modern combat. At least there were platoon-level identifiers and rank insignia, small blessings.
Back when I was in the Green Boars, the pre-reform Guard had been the butt of several less than flattering jokes (starting at calling them ‘tin soldiers’ and getting much nastier and less clean from there), but having known Victor I’d mostly just put it down to jealousy over a prestigious posting or being related to that armour.
I couldn’t have been much more wrong. Victor was an exception, hence why he was still around and most of the rest were looking for new jobs.
Thankfully for us all, the Ministry of Defence had taken the Report seriously, and part of that included buying some armour blueprints from an Aquiliean arms manufacturer and hiring a few enchanters to modify them for the Guard. That news had been a fair bit more confidence-inspiring than the pamphlet combined.
Strongly enchanted against spells and weapons, with the cosmetic nonsense dropped, a full suit was expensive and slow to produce (as anypony and especially anygriff working in the citadel armoury would tell you), but it would laugh at a Lavender rifle from anything but point blank and Starswirl himself would have at least broken a sweat getting through the wards.
Less verbosely, it was high-end stuff similar to what griffons like to give their officers and special forces. We’d been told we would be fully equipped by the end of autumn, but for now Steward was the only one in the platoon had a new suit as we clattered our way down the corridor, splitting off in pairs as we passed each station and relieving the previous shift.
As a section leader, I was assigned to watch the doors to the Princess’ offices themselves. Leader Rustle could have pulled the job that day, but he was on the main doors today since we had an excess of NCOs. Under nominal conditions, the platoon sergeant would lead the corridor patrols in the platoon’s sector consisting of No.2 Section while No.4† took door duty and the lieutenant would remain in the guardroom with No.1 and No.3 sections.
Being pretty much adjacent to one another (there was a broom cupboard between, probably for soundproofing) the same pair watched both doors to save corridor space, with two to four normally standing watch at any given time, depending on if one of the offices was occupied.
It’s surprising what random bits of obscure regulations float back up.
Anyway, I would normally take that spot with Victor, since I naturally trusted him most to be professional and competent in the unlikely event of a crisis. Not only was he my self-appointed mentor and had forty-two years of experience in the army, but he had sided against most of his old unit (the Forest Brothers) in the middle of Severyana during the Freezing Revolution. That sort of loyalty takes guts. Honestly, I’m quite surprised he wasn’t tailing one of the Diarchs full-time‡, though I had a couple of theories.
Enough about Victor though, because today I had packed him off with Murkie in an attempt to get the two the acclimatise in a position where they couldn’t shout at one another.
Instead, I had Soapy with me. Soapy was another of the old guard of the Guard, so to speak. She wasn’t a lifetime veteran like Victor and the only real fight she’d ever been in was the royal wedding fiasco (an event which featured prominently in the Report), but she had some medical training and had performed well enough during the crisis to save herself from a sacking.
It helped she was very capable in her regular duties as well; which translated from Officer means that Soapy was really good at staring at a blank patch of wall for hours on end, to the point that if you had to guess her Mark, you’d expect wet paint or something.
In fact, it was a basin of what she said was carbonic acid, and because I was a good little filly at school (unlike at home, as my parents would fervently attest) who didn’t fall asleep in history, I know that carbonic acid was used to sterilise medical tools up until about a century or so ago.
Good grief, I just realised I’ve let my brother infect my writing with footnotes and digressions. That’s what comes of agreeing to proof-read some of his manuscripts last week, I suppose.
Back on topic; as we relieved our predecessors at the post, my counterpart leaned in as he moved out the way.
“There’s a couple of sound engineers in there right now, getting ready for the speech.” He whispered, gesturing at the door with a wing. “Just so you’re in the know.”
I nodded understanding and he moved off with his partner. As far as anypony would be concerned if they didn’t catch the switchover, the same guards were on duty as had been there two shifts ago... Unless they looked closely at the heights.
Outdated illusion magic or no, it’s quite hard to make a rather petite mare (as they would say in Aquileia) who just barely scraped past the height requirements look the same as the average stallion.
And that was more or less it for the next three quarters of an hour. Unlike Soapy, staring nothing much for hours without getting bored doesn’t come naturally to me and I usually turned over ideas for stanzas in my mind to pass the time.
The quill on my Mark isn’t just for show; nor is the sword it is crossed with, for that matter. I’m better on patrols and even with the less pleasant parts of a soldier’s duty, just so long as it is something active.
Then, as the bells fell silent once more, up the corridor came the Diarchs. Both of them, bodyguards trailing in their wake. I distinctly recall how tired Princess Luna looked, she must have been up since last night, maybe even since yesterday afternoon. I’ve done forty-eight hour stints before and can empathise, even if I usually had stimulants to help.
There was a soft shuffling of hooves on thick carpet as we stiffened a little, then again in the opposite direction once they had passed us by and walked into Celestia’s office.
Normally Soapy or I would have opened the door out of courtesy, but the Diarchs’ office doors were enchanted to only respond to them and a few trusted servants. Since her personal guards would have had to indiscreetly rush past her to reach the door, it was a long white limb that gracefully brushed the handle down.
As the Diarchs entered, their guards peeled off and stood across the hall from Soapy and myself. All four of them had the new armour and carried rifles, the latter of which I found a little odd as before I had only seen them with the same ceremonial spears the rest of us carried in public.
Out the corner of my eye before the door closed, I scanned the surprisingly small room. It was huge compared to the office I had when I worked for the Bitterberry Gazette, but for a head of state I’d honestly expected more when I first saw it, and certainly something fancier.
Almost everything inside was as I had occasionally seen it; a battered old desk that was probably older than my parents almost encircled with bookshelves chock-a-block with folders, scrolls and (obviously) books. The only gaps in the circle were for the window (which was more a porthole in the literary wall than anything else, with shelves both above and below) and a path facing the door that was just about wide enough for the enormous Diarch to pass comfortably though.
Closer to the door was a small stove of the old magically powered variety and more shelves with tea making equipment, along with a tin of biscuitsθ. Just across was a mat that looked out of place by how new it was amid the musty surroundings and yet another shelf stocked with distinctly ordinary books, the sort you’d expect in the living room of anypony’s house.
This excepted the one major difference: A couple of Unicorns fussing over a microphone and a black box like something off a science fiction film set covered in knobs and switches that had been set up on one side of the old desk.
Then the door swung closed, more or less. A cable running under it and down the corridor caused enough drag to stop it short of where the latch would catch. On other occasions, the Princess had simply closed the door behind her after a second or two when this sort of thing happened (the door was prone to sticking, usually when it rained for some reason, the palace maintenance staff seemed baffled), but not today.
The thought crossed my mind to reach over and close it for her, but I wasn’t sure the enchantment would be too happy with me fiddling with it. The bodyguards weren’t moving to do it either, and so the door remained ajar.
Murkie would probably snigger about that.
Somewhat muffled voices wafted through the gap and I did my best to resist eavesdropping, keeping my eyes and ears resolutely forward, but the simple truth of the matter is that it doesn’t take all that much attention to guard a quiet corridor while facing a more or less blank wall, even while actively stiffening one's nerves.
The conversation with Victor earlier didn’t help matters and so the large part of my mind unoccupied by the thrilling job before me began turning over unbidden. Besides, maybe they knew something we didn’t? Perhaps the door being ajar was intentional and we would be needed? Best to be alert, just in case.
That was how I justified it to myself when I gave up pretending in the privacy of my head, anyway.
There was the sound of shuffling hooves, then a young feminine voice drifted through the door, local if I’m any judge. “Your highness, we were just about ready for you.” Beat. “Oh, highnesses? Highnessi? Oh dear...”
A voice rose, touched with the faintest hint of an accent not authentically spoken by mortal mouths in centuries, if not longer. “Rise, it is quite all right. What do you need me to do?”
“Erm...” More shuffling.
A smooth masculine voice, a northerner this time (Riverpudlian perhaps, definitely not Bales) and obviously older than his colleague, maybe in his fifties. “Good evening your majesties, I’m Direct Current and this is my assistant, Clear Receipt. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
“The pleasure is ours Mr. Current, I’m sure.” The melodious voice replied.
“Not long to go until we’re on, so we’d best get cracking.” The non-specific northerner said. “Just sit here ma’am and I’ll fine-tune the microphone position. This is your first broadcast?”
There was movement, heavy hoofsteps that I could feel through the floor. “Yes, it is.”
“Well, I don’t think I’ll have to remind you about speaking clearly...” A quiet hum of magic whispered through the door. “There, just talk into the bit in the middle that looks like a honeycombed box. I assume that’s comfortable?”
“Yes, quite all right.” The eldest of all mares said, calm and measured as ever.
“Excellent! The microphone will pick you up best from about a quarter of a lesthae.” Direct replied with that satisfaction of the Mark fulfilled.
“Two m-minutes.” The nervous young mare stammered.
I could empathise, I thought I’d wet myself on duty the first time I saw the Sisters up close. There was an undeniable aura of majesty that followed them wherever they went that demanded more respect than anypony could give. It gets a bit easier to deal with as you get older, but I couldn’t help but imagine the stallion not quite making contact with those ancient eyes.
“Do I need to introduce myself?” The Princess asked.
“Up to you, ma’am. The newscaster will be leading into the speech now though. When the yellow light turns green, we’re live.” The soundstallion replied, a touch more hurried than before. “Princess Luna, will you be speaking? I’m afraid we only brought one set of equipment, but I’m sure-”
I’d not heard Luna’s voice as much, that was inevitable on the day shift, but it was a couple of octaves deeper than her sister and a significant degree louder, though not eardrum-poppingly so as I’d heard rumours about. “No, I art-” There was a brief pause before the fatigued voice started again at a more normal tone. “No, I am here to lend unity to my sister’s words tonight, no more.”
“Of course, ma’am.” Direct said. There was a little more shuffling and a longer hum interspersed with a few clicks. “Ready on this end, Clear.”
“One minute.” The assistant reported.
The seconds ticked by in silence. I’d like to say that each irreversible slice of an imaginary pendulum seemed to echo with the weight of approaching doom, but that would be melodramatic. The moment certainly had its ears up and alert, however.
Direct’s voice briefly cut through it. “Three, two...” Then he fell silent again, the motion of an unseen hoof likely counting the last second.
Then Princess Celestia began her speech and history was made:
“Good evening. I am speaking to you from the palace in Canterlot, my voice carried for the first time by a miracle of technology into millions of homes across Equestria and beyond. That I may connect with you all ought to lift my heart with joy, but tonight I feel only regret, for the topic of which I must speak is a terrible one.
You can imagine how bitter a blow it is to me that I must inform you all that my long struggle to win peace and harmony has failed. Indeed, it has failed in the most disastrous manner imaginable. The current situation requires no introduction, for the atrocity committed upon Acornage is upon all lips today, at home and abroad. My thoughts go out to the brave soldiers who organised the evacuation and who bled today to buy the time the helpless needed, and to their families as well.
This was a catastrophe moons in the brewing and up to the very last moment, it would have been quite possible to arrange a peaceful settlement with the Changelings, but Chrysalis would not have it. She had evidently made up her mind to attack our country, no matter what, and though even now she claims that she put forward reasonable proposals which were rejected unilaterally by my sister and I, that is not the whole truth.
I may inform you all now, that those supposedly ‘reasonable’ proposals, that were in reality ultimata dressed in an armour of flowery words, would have seen over three million innocent beings – for I do not care only for the Ponies under my wing – placed at the mercies of the High Queen and her cronies. She was fully aware that what she demanded could never be accepted, and ordered her troops to cross the border the next morning before any official response from this office was compiled or delivered.
Her actions demonstrate convincingly that there is no chance of expecting this Changeling to ever give up her practice of using force to attain her ends. She showed this seven years ago in her unprovoked attack upon our fair capital, she showed this in her brutal subjugation of the other sovereign states of her race and she showed this in her wicked invasion of Olenia, which she excused under markedly similar pretences to those she now uses to justify this latest assault upon Harmony.
We have done all that we could to establish peace with words, but her ears were closed and perhaps, we may have shied away from the necessary when the truth has been shouting into our own complacent ears for well over a year. It is a difficult truth, a harsh truth, but a truth nonetheless that the brute Chrysalis can only understand force, can only be stopped by force and we, with the help of our overseas dominions and our friends to the north, must with heavy hearts be the ones to undertake that grim task…
Let this be our response to the Queen’s proposal then, spoken loud and plain: Do not mistake docility for weakness. We will defend our homes, our families, our friends. We will throw back your armies. We will free Olenia from the shackles of serfdom and then we will come to Vesalipolis and dethrone the monster who has dragged her people into this dark age of oppression. You leave us with no choice but to go to war, and may the Ancestors have mercy on you... May they have mercy on us all.”
My veins ran with ice as the Princess finished. They shouldn’t have done, I’d known deep down that this was coming since lunchtime, even if I hadn’t been ready to proclaim it hither and yon like Victor had. I thought I was ready, but to hear the confirmation jangled certain fearful nerves I’d thought were well and truly battened down. I swallowed them though, because that’s what I was trained to do.
That didn’t stop me stealing a glance at Soapy though, turning my head a little to get both eyes on her. The medical school dropout's eyes were closed a bit too hard, her breath a bit too deep. That only lasted a second before she felt my gaze and straightened up. Fine for now, but I made a mental note to check on her later.
That was when the door began to open again.
I snapped my head forward once more and stiffened to attention as the Princesses came out, close enough to feel the draft of their passage against my coat. Rather than going back the way they had come, the Sisters turned past me, heading for their chambers. Luna looked as tired as before and was mostly hidden by Celestia...
I got a very good look at the elder mare in that moment and she didn’t look so much worried as utterly miserable. The wind seemed to have left her mane and though she walked with the same ramrod posture as before, from so close it was impossible to miss the hesitancy of her heavy steps, a slight unevenness entering the rhythm of thumps as if she was forcing herself to just keep walking.
Glancing up, her eyes were locked forward, her blinking a bit too frequent in the brief glimpse I had. There were no tears, not yet, but I suspect now that was only because she wasn’t allowing herself the luxury in front of us. It made my heart sink again to see her that way.
The Diarchs walked slowly, but long legs carried them faster than their pace would imply and soon they were gone, flanked again by their guards.
About ten seconds later, as I was considering checking inside, the sound engineers came out as well. The stallion explained they’d be back tomorrow morning to dismantle their kit and had the right form for itψ. Neither made a fuss about being searched (they had been left in a restricted area unattended, if only briefly, and protocol was clear) and they headed for the exit to the wing. I gave the office a quick scan to see if anything was obviously out of place and found nothing amiss, so I pulled the door as closed as I could without risking setting off a false alarm.
†Sections were traditionally always referred to by their leader’s name in the Guard, but ‘Rose Section’ was officially ‘No.4 Section, B Platoon, A Company, A Regiment (Dayguard), Royal Guard Legion’.
‡Getting picked for bodyguard duty is the sort of honour which is a career soldier’s wet dream, or so I’m told. I’ve never experienced that one personally. Being passed over for it has definitely triggered more than one case of Mark Failure Syndrome in the past though, so there might be something in it.
θAnd I shall say no more on that topic, I want no part in the great dunking debate.
ψNot one specifically for the offices, but there is a form for leaving stuff on citadel grounds, which obviously includes mentioning where it is to be left.
The rest of the shift was quiet, but no more artistic thoughts crossed my mind. At ten we were relieved by the Nightguard and I explained to my replacement why the door wasn’t closed properly before joining the procession returning to the barracks.
Having dropped off our gear with the quartermaster, I caught up with the Pegasus I was looking for on the way to the mess hall.
“Soapy! Soapy!” I called, hurrying up behind her as best I could in the busy corridor. Shift change meant a lot of hungry soldiers.
She stopped and turned, pressing against the wall.
“Soapy? Are you ok?” I asked, catching up and slotting into the patch of open space beside her, doing my best for that not to turn into her personal space.
“I’m fine.” Came the inevitable, automatic response.
I looked her up and down. Pinned back ears and a hunched posture told a very different story. “You’re not.”
I regretted the too-blunt words as she winced. “I’m just being stupid, fretting.”
I took a breath and gave myself a second rather than just blurting out the first thing that came to mind. “Do you want to talk about it? It might help.”
Soapy shook her head. “It’s a bit... Cosy here.” She glanced around at the dozens of Ponies moving around us. Most of them were stragglers for the current shift or the second batch heading for the mess after having taken care of certain other business first.
“In private?” I suggested.
She nodded and fell into step behind me as I trod a familiar path. Proper privacy was hard to find in the barracks and it was getting quite nippy outside now (not that Soapy would mind much), but I was fairly sure the sleeping quarters would be mostly empty right then.
My hunch turned out right and we found our platoon’s dorm empty. Only officers get their own quarters, everypony else gets to revisit Hayton, or at least what I assume Hayton is like – my family wouldn’t have been able to afford private schooling in a million years. Not that my parents would ever approve of such a snotty place even if they could.
NCOs got a modicum of privacy though, in the form of curtains around their beds and a corner spot in the room. I led Soapy over to mine and pulled the curtain closed. The space was a bit tight, but there was enough for the two of us to stand without resorting to perching on furniture.
“It’s obvious it’s something to do with the speech earlier, I saw how stressed you looked.” I opened, keeping my voice down in case somepony wandered in.
Soapy fidgeted, fluffing her wings and not holding eye contact. Having known her a few moons, this really wasn’t normal. “I...”
My usual response to skittishness like this from an adult would be a brisk ‘Pull yourself together mare!’, possibly accompanied with a sharp nip on the ear for good measure. I trust my gut though, and right then it was saying that a gentler approach was needed, so I gave her time.
It didn’t take long. “Rose, I’m worried about my husband.”
Oh. Right. That would do it.
“I mean, I knew the risks, we both did, but...” The taller mare snorted and stomped a hoof in frustration before unleashing a flood that had been building for hours. “Why! Why now? Couldn’t we at least have had a quiet moon? It’s bad enough we all got hauled off to that surprise survival training weekend right after the wedding, and now this! Clear and I haven’t even had our honeymoon yet and we’re going to be shipped off to fight those, those... Bucking bugs! Murkie hasn’t the first clue what he’s on about, ‘over by Hearth’s Warming’ indeed! You heard what the Princess said, how she looked. That’s not the look of a mare who thinks it’ll be over quickly. It’ll probably be years! Years where we’ll be lucky to string a week together, let alone be anything approaching family! He’s going to be worried sick about me the whole time and, and...” Soapy’s eyes were watering now and she shivered as she slumped onto her haunches, her voice rasping a bit. “What if I don’t come back? What if he doesn’t recognise me when I do?”
I’d never seen Soapy cry, unless you count a drop or two the time she cracked a cannon during sparring. She wasn’t the hardest Pony I’d ever met, but not everypony can respond to getting stabbed with a bayonet with grumbling (no prizes for guessing who that was).
My point is, it wasn’t something I was really prepared for, especially not so suddenly, so I stood there like a lemon for a few seconds wondering what to do. It wasn’t just the job, I liked Soapy, I didn’t want to see her upset. But what could I do? I could try, badly, to comfort her, but at the end of the day I was just an infinitesimally larger cog in the gargantuan machine we’d just heard set into motion.
Doing nothing would achieve exactly that however, so I picked at the one loophole in her tirade I could spot and tugged. “The Guard is nowhere near ready for a fight, Soapy. They won’t send us off half-prepared, so you’ll have a few moons at least.”
She squeezed her eyes shut again and took a breath, forcing down the reflex to panic. “Y-yes. There’s time. And there’ll be letters, some leave...”
I nodded, then hesitantly reached out and patted her on the shoulder. “You’ll make it through.”
“You can’t guarantee that.” Soapy replied.
“I can if I order you, because I know you’re competent.” I said.
Despite herself, she chuckled. “You know it doesn’t work like that...” Then she wiped her eyes and stood up, reasserting herself. “Look at me, moping like a lovestruck filly. Sorry for snapping at you like that.”
I nodded and moved to brush the curtain open again. “You did the right thing, waiting until we were off duty. Better me, here, than back in the corridor with the Princesses watching, or bottling it up.”
“Thanks.” Soapy said, backing up to free up a little room.
There was a gurgle and she looked a bit embarrassed.
“Come on, we’d best get a move on before everything’s eaten.” I said.
The pink Pegasus nodded and we set off together through the now-quiet corridors of the barracks. Quiet both in a lack of passers by and noise. The barracks was built into a hillside, extending down under the palace, so the soil did a good job of sound-proofing.
“How are you holding up?” Soapy asked me after a moment.
“I’m fine, and by that I mean nervous.” I replied. “Mum will probably send a letter full of panic tomorrow, and I’ll probably have to go round next Amarda to show her I’ve not managed to impale myself on barbed wire or something, which means Dad will be quietly disappointed at me for a few hours because I've not spontaneously become a gardener... That’s not it though; Victor just gave me something to think about earlier.” I shook my head. “I’ll feel better on a good meal.”
The Pegasus snorted. “Well, you’re out of luck here then.”
“Says the pampered Guardsmare.” I countered lightly. “Back in the Boars, you’d be lucky to get a meal that wasn’t out of a tin. None of these fresh vegetables. What we had was beans, beans, and more beans.”
“Must have been whiffy.” She laughed.
I hummed agreement. “Mmm... Heading to Clear’s place this evening?”
They’d not sorted out a proper place to live together yet, but I knew he had a small apartment in the lower city. One of the perks of the Guard was that you got to commute in if you wanted, assuming you had somewhere to stay in the city. The barracks was rarely full, even before most of the old lot got the sack.
Soapy nodded. “I don’t think I could do anything else tonight... Probably until we get deployed too, if we get deployed.” She added hopefully. “We don’t have much time, so best make the most of it.”
Funny, how she summed up life so well without meaning to.
The mess was unusually quiet, with a lot of picking at food to be seen – unless one looked at Victor anyway. He seemed downright cheerful in spite of what he’d said earlier, more in contrast to everypony else than any outward change in his mood.
Murkie was fine too, full of the same confidence he’d been showing earlier, which he demonstrated with chatter as soon as Soapy and I came to our section’s usual table on one side of the room about equidistant between one of the windows looking out of the hillside and a large fireplace.
I mostly let the young orange and black stallion’s natter wash over me as I joined in the picking, thinking more on Victor’s observations and my own. Musings that would last throughout dinner and most of the way to bed after that.
My mind didn’t stick long on Celestia though, I don’t think anypony would have been unfazed by making that speech and one glimpse does not a psychoanalysis make, despite what my brother often seems to think. No, it was the younger of the Sisters who grabbed my attention, and my sympathy to a degree. I didn’t doubt Princess Luna would be looking in on dreams and had a busy night ahead of her, probably starting with her older sister, assuming Celestia wasn’t kept up by work. I’d not be surprised if she was.
What would it be like to be Luna, I wonder? Does she see the world as a tapestry of imagination periodically washed out with the turning of the sun around Earth, or does she limit herself to her own domain?
Would she see the dreams of kings and queens and ministers across Griffonia vanish as they were shaken awake in the middle of their night by shouting aides? Most of them would probably want to speak to Princess Celestia (and it would be the older Diarch) personally in a tide of ringing telephones and clicking telegraphs after an announcement like that, right after a cup or two of coffee.
There was a poem to be found somewhere in that imagined flurry of activity, so much in contrast to the little people in the face of a world-changing event, and I’d write it at some point, but for now my own sleep was calling. War or no war, I had to be with it for morning drill.
I don’t usually remember my dreams, and the ones I do are usually embarrassing or dull, but the one I had that night is surprisingly clear and doesn’t fall into either category. It had nothing to do with the day, or of what was to come. Instead, I dreamt of a white ship set against the starry horizon, sailing beneath a rising moon which made the sea around it sparkle like silver.
Author's Note
First things first, thank you for reading. This is my first attempt posting anything on this site and feedback on formatting is greatly appreciated.
I usually write Lord of the Rings and Silmarillion fanfiction (which might show up a little in the writing style), but I'd been toying with the idea of writing something for EaW for a while since I got into the best HoI4 mod. When I heard about the competition, that was all the excuse I needed.
A note on terms:
NCO is an acronym that stands for 'Non-Commissioned Officer', in layman's terms any rank above a private but below an ensign or lieutenant, depending on the military.
Yes, I called the planet Earth. That doesn't mean it's the Earth we know and sort of love. In a way this is an oblique reference to Truckers by Sir Terry Pratchett, where to paraphrase a certain computer: All species call their home star 'the Sun'.
'Birthing' is what we would call March, 'Amarda' is Sunday. For the reasons why I created an entire calendar system, let us just say that this will not be the last we see of Section Leader Rose Meadow...
