Princess Celestia

Princess Celestia grants me an informal audience in the Canterlot Palace Gardens. The mood is cordial enough, despite the presence of two guards, an aide, and the press secretary.

Were mistakes made?

Of course mistakes were made. Especially in the early days. I really am only one pony after all. I’m hardly infallible. But the important thing is to learn from the mistakes. They shouldn't be repeated. If you didn’t make mistakes, no one would ever learn. That’s a lesson I think all ponies should learn.

Golden Hooves

The disgraced former pre-war diplomat with the dragons meets me in the office of his home in Trottingham. Co-signer of the infamous Fang-Hooves Agreement, Hooves is the imminent figurehead in a pre-war movement widely believed to have been responsible for initial loses in the early years of the war. Some scholars dispute that position.

What’s it like to negotiate with dragons?

Awful. They’re fickle. Arbitrary. You’ll schedule a meeting months in advance with an ambassador, only to be told at the last minute that he’s gone to sleep for a hundred years. They’re crude, their lazy, and then you’ll be told they need to speak to you in an emergency session at 3 A.M, and it will be over something completely trivial. Or they’ll ask you to lunch, and they’ll tell you something that could threaten the lives a thousand ponies. Oh, they know what they’re doing. And they’ll do it just to fuck with you.

I loved every minute of it. Dragons are where the real action is. Forget Griffons, forget ogres. When you’re sitting in a bunker hunched over a table with three dragons negotiating for peace... that’s why I got into this business.

There are those that say you’re responsible for the conditions leading to the war.

You’re implying I ever really wanted any of the conditions in that damn agreement. I had orders from the Crown to settle that. Those fools and their history books only blame me because it’s my name on that piece of paper. They’d never blame their precious Princess, oh no.

I knew before the ink was dry that there would be war. The dragons aren’t stupid. They were forced into the war. They had to do it, in order protect themselves. They’re not cowards. They’re not monsters, but their not cowards. Anybody who knows anything about the character of dragons knows they won’t leave their flank exposed. They wouldn’t leave their southern border open to invasion while they fought a war in the north. From their perspective, it was either to attack us, or let Equestria invade.

You’re saying you knew a preemptive attack was eminent?

Down to the hour. I told the seneschal. He informed the princess herself (this has not been confirmed); he was required to. I was literally screaming on the phone to him, but he wouldn’t listen. I was in my hotel suite, crying, actually, I’ll admit to it. I didn’t even have the radio on when the attack came.

Sweet Leaves

The retired earth pony accountant, now of Canterlot, has a fine condominium in one of the nicer parts of town. Numerous photos of grandfoals hang above the mantle. He seems to be more proud of them than he is in his status as a war hero.

You were among the first of the civilian refugees to make it back from the lines?

That’s right. I was born and raised Mareburg. You haven’t heard of it, I’m sure. Unless you’ve been doing your research very carefully. (author’s note: he’s correct, I’ve only read of it while preparing for this interview) Nobody’s heard of it. It was a small town then. It’s completely gone now. I’ve been to where it used to be. There’s nothing there but empty pasture.

We were attacked three days after the beginning of the war. We had all heard on the radio, of course. We were all prepared to do our patriotic duty, but none of us knew what to do. The mayor was in charge of everything; I don’t even know if he was coordinating with the (central) government. We were setting up walls, filling sandbags, forming bucket brigades, having blackouts. That kind of thing. We had no idea.

I was asleep when the attack came. Fell out of bed when the sirens blared. I didn’t see the first of the combat. I could hear it, but had no idea of what was really going on. The first time I saw actual combat it was dragon fire. Hell of a way to get initiated, eh? The dragons had a tactic in the early days. Funny thing about dragon fire on a civilian population. It’s so random. Everything in the plasma channel itself, completely vaporized- ponies, houses, roads, it doesn’t matter. Things just outside of it burst into flame. And just beyond that, you’re safe. So what the dragons would do was make a line on their first pass, and then more lines on the next pass, trying to make essentially a polygon of fire the size of a neighborhood. Most ponies would escape instant death, but those caught within the polygon were almost certain to die of the spreading fire. What kind of polygon it was would depend how many dragons there were, and how soon we could coordinate a pegasus response to disrupt them. We didn’t know anything about coordinating responses in the beginning.

You were outside one of these polygons?

I wouldn’t be talking to you if I was. I’m not ashamed; I ran. So did everybody else who had any sense and wasn’t already hurt or dead. We set up barricades around the town, you know? Gates on the main entrances, to let ponies in and out. Guards were dead, of course. There were hundreds of us trying to get out by the gate. There was a dragon there, right outside the gate. He was eating us as we left.

There aren’t that many reports of dragons actually eating ponies in combat.

No, this was still early in the war for them too. This one was grabbing ponies in his teeth, right around the neck, throwing them up in the air, and then catching them in his throat on the way back down. Some of them were still alive, you could them wriggling down his throat. Others had already been bit in half.

Later they were better trained. Chew and spit. They could fly more easily when they didn’t have gullets full of ponies. Some of them learned the hard way. We taught them a lesson.

You managed to get away.

I was lucky. The pony in front of me got ate, I ran past while the dragon was busy. Ran almost all the way to Canterlot, it felt like. Our columns, I call them columns, just lines of refugees really, were attacked a few times, but I managed to get away. Enlisted as soon as I could.

As for Mareburg, it was completely leveled. Thousands were killed. I think something like only ten percent of the town survived that night, or the escape that followed. I met up with a few of them after the war, but that was a long time ago now. I can’t remember what happened to them.

How many dragons attacked that night?

Two. There were two of them.

Thunder Charge

The veteran unicorn and I share a friendly beer at the roadside bar he owns with his wife. He’s an intriguing mix of friendliness and intimidation. He’s a massive stallion, still heavily muscled and fit despite his age. He insists on nicknaming me “Doc,” after I told him I hold a doctorate in journalism. He’ll burst into loud laughter one second, and become stone-cold solemn the next. He is a character.

Where were you when the war broke out?

Foalsom Prison, Block D. I could remember my number if you give me a minute.

What were you in for?

Attempted murder. 25 to life. But that was bullshit, right? I told the judge, if I wanted to kill that son of a bitch, I’d have gored him in the innards instead of just the shoulder. But the judge didn’t believe me. Right, Doc? (laughs)

When were you approached about serving?

Ah, well... shit, Doc. I guess that was maybe a couple months into the war. I didn’t give a damn about serving my country or killing snakes or any of that shit. I just wanted out of the joint. Drives a stallion insane, right? Anyway , they tell me I’ve got a chance at a pardon if I sign up for this thing. I figure it’s a suicide mission. But being that young and stupid, that’s almost appealing. (laughs).

And then I saw the Colonel. Knew right away I had to sign up.

This would be Lt. Colonel Storm?

Yeah, that’s right, Doc. Guess he wasn’t full colonel then. He comes to prison. They line us all up in the yard. Goes on this big speech about serving the country. Says he needs a dozen unicorn volunteers for some screwball mission to kill snakes. None of us knew what it was at the time, how could we? So about a dozen of us step forward, and the Colonel gets this big slimey looking grin on his face. You know what I’m talking about, right?

I found out later that he had researched every single one of us prisoners, looking for the right combination of skills and devil-may-care. He had us already picked out. Tricked us into volunteering that smart son-of-a-bitch. (laughs)

You wouldn’t find out about the details of your mission for awhile, would you?

Hell no. We had no fucking clue. Storm reported directly to the seneschal and Princess fucking Celestia herself. We didn’t even know that much.

We just signed up, they march us back into prison. That night, they give us “volunteers” a big fat lobster dinner, right in front of the other stallions. Almost caused a riot. Then they bussed us off to training camp that very night. Gave us uniforms, clean barns. We all figured it was a pretty sweet deal.

You had a lot of training?

Are you kidding, Doc? Years. Never told us what we’d be doing. We figured it would have something to do with teleporting. That’s damn near all we did. Teleport. Wake up, teleport, have breakfast, teleport, exercise, teleport, teleport, practice teleporting, teleport, lunch...

A couple of our team dropped out. That was in the first few months. Apparently we impressed them, because they were expecting more to wash out than actually did. Those who did got replaced by others. Mares this time. We always had a team of twelve, and a full backup team.

Mares?

Yeah, Doc. Weird isn’t it? I mean, there’s mares that serve in the forces these days. Even talk of regular combat duty. At least in theory, given we ain’t at war. Back then? Mares fighting was unheard of. That’s when I knew there was something particularly odd about this mission. It just didn’t add up.

That’s when I knew that this wouldn’t be a suicide mission.

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