“You want our son to fight in this war!” shrieked a silver earth pony with a white coat, and an image of an open book on her flank.
Her husband, Break Through, now seemed a far more imposing figure than she ever thought possible. He had been a calm fellow academic like herself, though he was far more prone to his namesake breakthroughs. Yet now he stood before her with a sword on his back, and was demanding her son. Ever since they rounded up the mares and academics in a desperate attempt to fend of Discord, he hadn’t been the same. It made sense that being the only one who survived it would weigh heavily on him, but this madness had to stop.
“Who is left to sacrifice to the war?! You and the remaining mares are needed to take care of the babies, and what good is one soldier?” shouted Break Through, a tan stallion with three scars on top of his head that tapered off into his black mane and a cutie mark depicting a glowing light bulb.
“Unless you have the stomach to train these fillies and colts yourself, in which case I’ll take care of the babies,” he added after a moment’s pause.
“Decency is code for cruelty disguised as mercy! This conflict will involve them eventually; the sooner the better. I will not let our son be defenseless on the day of destruction!”
The silver mare was holding a white colt with a gold mane. The eight year old colt’s wings were being uncomfortably squashed into his mother’s neck. The white colt was unnerved by being held by his mother since he had outgrown being held a. His parents rare shouting match did nothing to put him at ease. He shook nervously. Yet the silver mare was too distracted by the recent “breakthrough” of her husband to notice this.
Staring into her husband’s eye’s she saw something she didn’t recognize. He wasn’t the same stallion. He wasn’t going to give this up.
She burst through the front door, and ran away on three legs. Normally holding her son with one hoof would have been difficult but the recent fury with which her blood pumped through her veins held more energy than she knew what to do with.
Despite it being almost noon, the sky was dark. Discord eventually found that swapping the sun and moon out every few seconds became too predictable, so for the last month the heavens behaved normally. Today clouds shielded the sun, making it seem far later.
She ran past the statue base that once held the likeness of six legendary mares, who saved Equestria several times and had all lived in this very town no less. Was it possible that ponies who could stop Discord, that evil entity who could control ponies, ever existed? If only she could blame him for her husband’s behavior. But Break Through didn’t have the characteristic gray tinge that Discord’s mark left.
She couldn’t focus on her husband right now. Right now all that mattered was getting her son to safety. But where was saftey? Her husband knew Ponyville just as well as she did. Because of this she considered venturing into the lifeless dusty wasteland that lay just beyond the town’s borders. Allegedly there had once been a forest not far from ponyville. Now there was nothing but powdery dirt which would often blow around fiercely enough it was nearly impossible to see. Her son would be better off with her husband then out there.
Her only hope were the three other adults. None of them were particularly strong but they loved all foals as their own.
Ahead of her laid the remains of numerous houses and several businesses including one that went back through countless generations, Sugarcube Corner. She had never been there as it had closed down due to the war, but she had often imagined what it would have been like to share sweets with friends in such a cozy looking place. It was completely unrecognizable through the mass of rubble. Yet the veritable obstacle course that lay before her was no trouble as she had navigated it daily for the last year. Unfortunately, she had never needed to wade through it quickly before.
Glancing back she saw her husband mere feet away. His bloody hooves made it clear he had caught up by not avoiding or going around anything. If only she had done likewise from the start, but her hooves were so ingrained in the route they had betrayed her. Wasting no time she squeezed her son tightly against her chest and ran.
She ran over broken wood. She ran over pieces of brick that had lodged themselves in the ground. She even ran over the occasional nail.
She had nearly arrived at the three neighboring houses/day cares when she tripped. Instinctively, she used both front hooves to place her son on the back of her neck as she fell causing her to land on her face.
He caught up as she got to her hooves. She turned to take off again but her legs wouldn’t move.
“Enough!” he declared with a blue aura around his horn and her legs.
When she pivoted to face him, her hooves were let go. She wrapped both front legs around her son and proclaimed, “I won’t let you take him from me!”
Their prior shouting match hadn’t exactly been discreet, but now that they stood right outside where the three other remaining adults took care of the orphans, her words could not only be heard but were readily decipherable.
Two earth ponies emerged from nearby buildings.
“Break Through and Fixed Pace? Is that you? What is going on here?” asked a green mare with a white mane.
“The forces of chaos always return! It has now been a year since we were attacked but we are more defenseless than ever! In case you haven’t noticed adults are scarce! I need all foals six and older!” said Break Through.
“You want our foals? Are you mad?” asked an orange mare with a yellow mane.
“The five of us would survive out there for a few months tops! But after a couple of months with the tykes, they will be soldiers. A hundred soldiers can survive,” he replied.
“You can train them?! They are just foals, and you were only in the army for a couple of months! It’s only by sheer luck you didn’t die like everypony else.” said Fixed Pace.
“One does not become a stallion or mare by the ticking of a clock, or by a trainer! One becomes a mare or stallion by bleeding, sweating, and crying until they have run dry!”
At this Break Through pulled a sword out of the sheath on his back, and pointed at his wife.
“Now give me our son, and stand aside as I take the fillies and colts of this village!”
“You wouldn’t attack your own wife!” she pleaded.
“This is a time of war and you are in my way. Neither wife nor mare stands before me, but a beast with a mare’s blood!”
At this the silver mare dropped her son, and shoved him behind her legs. The colt was in too much shock to object to his mother’s prodding.
“Then I shall die to ensure he is spared, as any real parent should!” said Fixed Pace.
“You think you can protect him from the other side of the grave! If you stand in front of our child, do you not think these mare will do likewise? With all of you dead who will take care of the one’s too little to be of use to me? Every second you spend in my way is a second you spend dangling babies and toddlers off a building by a fishing line! ”
Break Through after saying this pushed his sword forward with just enough force to break her skin.
“They are just foals! Is it worth fighting if we sacrifice them!” shouted a yellow mare with a red mane who had just exited another house/day care.
“Would you rather they be damned forever later, or for a few months right now! Is it okay to kill our foals just because you’d do it slowly with a ball and a rubber duck?”
“You’ve lost your mind!” piped up the green mare.
“No, insanity is not giving them a chance to fight back! Are we really going to force them to die because they are too young to decide they want to survive! Their blood will be paid in full, whether it is a little at a time, or all at once!”
“What of the elements of harmony? A few weeks ago the royal council said they were deploying the third set of candidates.” said Fixed Pace.
“They have they failed not once but twice! Discord is ruthless and can’t be stopped by harmony anymore if he ever could! We have to take our survival into our own hooves! With our numbers so low, now more than ever, we need every ounce of help! Can we really turn down that help just because it comes from a foal! No, these are the delusions of peaceful times. We no longer have that luxury.”
At this the mares stared in silence and disbelief unsure what to do against this crazy stallion.
“Wait, at least leave the fillies! They won’t be of any use to you!” pleaded the orange mare trying to save as many as possible. She would figure out how to save the others later. As much as she hated to admit it, the military had always had sexist tendencies, but for once that was to her advantage.
“I have seen ponies with eight more orifices than natural still take out three or four enemies before dying. How much of a disadvantage can a single extra orifice be?” spat Break Through
Again there was silence as dazed mares tried to think of where they could hide foals.
“Now are you really going to slaughter every foal here under six years old?” said Break Through.
Fixed Pace felt as though she were moving her body with a remote. One that barely seemed to work at that. She couldn’t stop thinking about what fate she was resigning her foals and others too, but at least they would all survive. Even if they went with her now crazed husband they had to survive, they just had to.
For a brief moment she wondered if her husband had really survived that battle, and if some lunatic had taken his place. She had been telling herself that he was just traumatized and would get better if she kept taking care of him. Yet the more she tended to his constant headaches, fever, and cuts that took weeks to seal, the worse his screams in the middle of the night became.
He would often wake with a cold sweat, and wouldn’t stop muttering. It was usually impossible to tell what he was saying but one thing she had repeatedly heard during these episodes was, “they’re coming.” Often he would have outbursts of anger, as if his lungs were preparing him for all the shouting he would do this night.
Finally earlier today everything seemed normal. When she awoke he had that familiar pensive look on his face. Then when he grinned his usual breakthrough grin she thought for sure he was finally recovering. He started rambling endlessly about a plan to save ponyville. It was bizarre but generally an improvement until he started contemplating what percentage of ponyville’s foals would die in the struggle.
Would he really let foals die? She wailed, yet covered her eyes with her unsteady hooves in hopes that would somehow keep the sound in. What if crying somehow made the unstable stallion even crazier? Thankfully he did not seem to notice.
The moment she stepped out of the way, he placed their son on his back with his magic.
Break Through marched to the first of the three neighboring day cares -- that happened to be the only buildings left standing beside their house -- and placed his sword to the throat of the green mare who blocked the doorway.
“I don’t plan on hurting the foals, as long as you get out of the way!”
The green mare fell to the ground trembling and crawled out of the way.
Break walked in and started lifting foals who were old enough with his magic. In a rare surge of magic, Break held roughly thirty in the air and extracted them from the daycare without any trouble. Holding the crowd of foals not far behind him, Break Through approached the next day care. Though the orange mare stood in the doorway at first, she jumped out of the way, before he made a threat.
After examining the contents of another day care, He added roughly another thirty foals to his magical grasp and approached the final one. However the yellow mare did not budge.
“Damnit I don’t want to kill you! But if that’s what it takes. If you insist on aiding Discord I will slice open your jugular!”
“You're going to hurt them if I move, I just know it!” she objected.
At this the tan stallion slowly pulled away his sword and sheathed it. He then grabbed the mare with his magic, and tossed her aside violently. Where her head hit the ground she started to bleed but she was still conscious. She did not get back up.
He pulled out the remaining foals and dragged them back to outside his house, where he finally set them down. Most of them didn’t move an inch, as he opened up the cellar, and came back up with dozens of large bags of food and other supplies.
He distributed these among the foals to carry. If he wasn’t mistaken a few foals had wandered off, but he had enough, and he could only waste so much time rounding up foals.
“Move out” he called and he began marching.
Noticing none of the foals followed, he tugged them forward several times with his magic hoping they would catch the hint. They followed.
Meanwhile Fixed Pace bandaged the yellow mare’s bleeding head.
“How do we save our foals?” asked Fixed Pace.
“If stopping him didn’t work, then one of us needs to go with him to keep an eye on the foals,” said The Yellow mare.
“Is it really wise to only send one?” asked the green mare.
“Without the help of some of the older foals, it’ll take three of us to take care of the foals,” said the yellow mare.
“In which case, you should go Fixed Pace. You know Break Through better than any of us. Perhaps you can get him acting normal again,” said the orange mare.
This made sense to Fixed Pace, but she still felt like they were putting too much faith in her. She had tried for months to get him to return to normal, yet nothing worked. Even still it didn’t make sense for one of the three of them to have to clean up the mess her husband was making. Besides her son was with him. She had to go.
Fixed Pace contemplated whether she should try sneaking around or confront her husband. There weren’t any trees to provide her cover, and her husband was the only of age unicorn around so she couldn’t disguise herself with magic. Thus there was only one option.
After her previous confrontation with her husband, the mark from which still bleed, the thought of facing him again caused bile to rise in her throat. She swallowed it back and her stomach felt bottomless. If she got caught sneaking around, he would make sure he wasn’t followed again. There was only one opportunity to go with his consent, and without fear of being seen, and that was right now.
The silver mare quivering as she did so, approached her husband and asked, “The other mares will be able to take care of the remaining foals. Can I come with you?”
“And have you try to stop me from helping these kids to grow up?!” exclaimed Break Through.
“No. I won’t stop you. I just want to make sure they survive. Please, I am your wife. Somewhere you must still love me. Just let me see that they are okay,” she pleaded.
“Alright. But if I see you helping any of them sneak out or getting them out of difficult tasks or fighting the enemy, you will leave and come back here without question.”
“Yes of course,” she muttered before taking her spot behind all of the foals to ensure none of them would be abandoned.
But since they hadn’t yet made it out of Ponyville maybe being left behind was exactly what they needed. They all were clearly frightened, and followed him because they didn’t know what else to do. Anytime one tried to run back to their mommies he dragged them harshly for several feet. Yet if she told one to run (s)he probably would. She could wait until her husband wasn’t looking. Would he notice if she helped one of them sneak off? Did it matter if he did?
It mattered. Her son whom she just spotted, was toward the front. She couldn’t risk being caught until her son was free, and there was no way she could free him yet.
“These bags are heavy!”
“I’m tired!”
“How much further!”
“Can we go home now!”
“I’m hungry!”
“I have to pee!”
Came the pleas of the foals after they had barely made it out of ponyville.
“We can’t stop yet. We have to make it to Canterlot before we run out of food.”
“But I really have to go!”
“Then you’re either going to learn how to hold it, or this is going to be a very long day for you.”
