But You Were There

The whistle blows and confusion raves the frontline: “Retreat to the fallback trench! Regroup for counterattack!” an officer calls.

His voice is quickly drowned out by the sounds and force of artillery shells being dropped on the trench; during the rain of fire and steel the New Lunar Republic’s flag flapped violently in the wind. As artillery began to fall en masse and the Imperials charged their trenchline, Thestrals, Pegasi and other creatures began to scramble out of the trench in haste. Machine gun fire rang out as the retreat was held as long as the machine gun companies could hold the line, those brave bastards. Infantry scattered the land; pegasi dropped shells where artillery couldn’t reach, then came the awful rumbling of two Solar tanks crossing into No Pony’s Land. The Republic had been pushed back well over a mile. Two ponies of the 381st Luna Nova Stormtrooper Korps jump over shell holes, wounded ponies and the mud. The larger of the two, a blue pegasus, used his wing to cover the smaller gray Thestral by his side from debris as they approached their line.

“Tanks” she began shouting as fear and adrenaline pumped through her veins,They brought TANKS!”

“I KNOW they brought tanks! I see them!” he shouted back as the same feeling filled his body, trying not to think of the metallic monsters behind them.

The sound of machine gun fire in rapid succession ripped behind them followed by a flash of light behind them. They had a suspicion on what that flash was, the primal screaming behind them answering their theories.

“C’mon Stardust, we’re almost there! Just a hundred more yards” he shouted to her in the hope she’d hear him over the sounds of battle.

“Ja, and once we get there then we can radio for reinforcements” she called back at him, she knew the reality of the war though; no one would come for them.

Behind them, the sound of battle approached faster than they could run. The stallion looked behind him and saw Lunar soldiers began falling in mass with Solar soldiers following directly behind them; soldiers caught in barbed wire and crying out were easy targets after all. He saw one in particular finish off a changeling before turning their head towards them. He shouted to the Thestral mare:

“Stardust keep going! I’ve got this one! Just don’t look back!” At that he turned around and removed his pistol from the holster and dropped into a nearby shell hole. She turned her eye towards him and began to slow down: “Spectrum we have to g-”

“Stardust GO!” At that she got tightlipped and ran as fast as she could towards the safety of the trench line as the Solar soldier raised his rifle at her at first until Spectrum shouted “Hey Firestarter! Over here!” The shot was drowned out by the pounding of artillery.

Stardust dove into the trench line and looked at the situation at hand, disorganization amongst the young faces, panic and chaos ran rampant; these soldiers were lucky that an officer landed in their presence. Whatever fear she had in her mind of what happened to Spectrum was pushed out for the moment and she began barking orders at those around, her high pitched Bamareian accent rang through them like a stray bullet. She turned to a few ponies frozen in fear standing by the trench’s machine gun.

“You three,” she began with an upright stature, “machinegewehr! Hold the Imperials off and send them back to their holes!” She ran down the trenchline to Thestrals operating the field gun encampment and barked:

“I want you all to punch a hole in their tanks! Aim for the treads and the fuel tanks in the front!” She ran down the trench as fast as she could, pushing soldiers out of the way if needed, shouting for the company officer. Who she found was a young Thestral mare around age 19, two years older than herself, crying her eyes out.

“W-We are all going to die! They are going to overrun us and slaughter all of us!” the young Thestral babbled at her. She rolled her eye and ran towards a field phone and called back to the artillery officer:

“What are our orders?” a young squeaky Germane accent answered.

“Covering fire! I want to see them pushed all the way back to Canterlot!” she exclaimed, a moment later the cannonade went off in a sweep away from their trenchline. Those from the 381st came to find her barking orders, an ensign approached her and asked timidly “Hauptmare Shine? What are our orders?”
She thought for a brief moment and replied: “defend the trenchline. If anything unfriendly comes into view, shoot.” As her troops lined the trench and staved off the attacker's momentum, she scoured the battlefield with a pair of trench binoculars looking for a familiar blue form. She didn’t see anything where he was, nor did she see hide or hair of him anywhere. She remained silent as the attack was repelled by their artillery and her strategy. The question remained though, where was he? All she saw were Solar soldiers rounding up those they captured while the Solar flag raised over their previous home. A yellow eye scoured No Pony’s Land in a frantic search as tears rolled down her cheeks, at least the eyepatch covered one of her eyes.