Mustang and Blazer got their stuff later that day and set up their quarters neatly and efficiently, something the other guys must have mastered to the point that they had a system no one else understood. Compared to the rest of the barracks, Mustang’s and Blazer’s sections looked like they were made by the stallion’s mothers.

The sun was getting ready to go down, and the land was getting that bright orange glow that comes from the sundown. Mustang could see it outside his south-facing window, the sunset over the mountains of the Southern Gryphon Colonies. The major fighting was in the heart of the country, but that wasn’t the most dangerous part; outside that, there were insurgents and asymmetric fighters who would ambush soldiers and civilians on the streets. The ponies didn’t care much about the civilians being attacked right now, but they would later, so if someone helped them out now, it would make life easier later.

Mustang and Blazer donned most of their gear to make sure it fitted properly and they could make whatever adjustments were necessary. They both had light armored vests, but they were like sand compared to what their teammates used. Their ceramic plates, to their teammates titanium plates, their standard issue gear from their previous careers to the advanced weapons and equipment of the new team. Hopefully they would get some new stuff for themselves soon.

Satisfied with their gear, Mustang and Blazer removed it all and set it aside where they knew they could get to it quickly and left for dinner. The others had already left for the mess hall, but Mustang and Blazer wanted to make sure they were set to go first. They needed to be able to prepare as fast as their teammates if they wanted to even go on missions.

Together, they set off for the mess hall to get their food. One of the major differences, Mustang had heard, between the gryphon militaries and the pony military was the food situation. It was much easier to feed pony soldiers because the food was more easily preserved. Most ponies couldn’t complain about the food, even if it did taste stale a lot and tended to be cheaply grown. Not exactly Sweet Apple Acres apples, but they could survive off it.

When they arrived at the mess hall and walked in, they quickly spotted their team and noted their location. Before heading there, they went to the line to get their food. The hall was serving freeze-dried hay, tater tots, oatmeal, and as always, lots of leafy greens. It was the strangest thing, how they never seemed to get grass, the most abundant food in the country.

Food on hoof and stomachs growling, they joined their teammates at the table and chowed down.

When they sat, Strat was the first to greet them. “Howdy fellas, how are your bunks looking?” he asked. “I imagine they must look spick and spotless.”

“Just about,” Mustang replied.

Strat chuckled. “Trust me; that ain’t gonna last long. Once you get some of your own, better stuff, and more of it, you’ll need a system.”

“Like you guys?” Blazer asked.

“Nope,” Strat said. “We don’t have a system. We just remember where we put everything when we set it down.”

Mustang wasn’t sure how to respond. “Well… whatever works?” he said.

Strat nodded. “And it works very well.”

Aardvark overheard Mustang and Blazer and scooted down to talk. “Hey guys,” he said.

“Sir,” Mustang said.

Aardvark shook his head. “No need for that,” he said, dismissing the formality.

“Sure thing, siii- uhh, dude.” Mustang gave him a sheepish smile.

“Yeah,” Aardvark said with a chuckle. “Anyway, since we’re all here, let me give you a brief schedule of what we do.”

“Schedule?” Blazer said. “I thought this unit was always on call.”

“We are,” Aardvark said. “But there are shifts. We aren’t the only squad from the 35th here. There are four. We take turns throughout the day being on primary call and getting planned missions. If there is ever a situation where one squad is out, the one on rotational duty, another will pick up the mission and go out. Really, the only thing the schedule means is that one squad is fully ready and geared up to go at all times.”

“Oh,” Mustang and Blazer said together.

Aardvark shrugged. “Yeah, that’s all there is to it. Half the time, only one squad ends up still on base during the day because we all get called out.”

“So, what are the shifts?” Blazer asked. “Back in Detrot, we had two, morning and afternoon.”

Aardark smiled and nodded. “Yes, and you had two groups,” he said. “For Meteor to get the four squads he wanted, he had to make it look like all four would be in use all the time. That’s why we have four rotations, not two; first half morning, second half morning, first half afternoon, second half afternoon.”

“And which one is ours?” Mustang asked.

“First, afternoon,” Strat cut in. “When the most patrols are going out. From noon ‘til six, we’re on standby with all our gear, ready to hop on a small, four-pegasi carriage or fly out ourselves. With a speedy boy like Eagle, we usually fly out ourselves so he can go first, get information on the situation, and act if necessary or wait for us to arrive if he’ll need support.”

“I also bring small bombs with me in case I need to scare ‘em a bit,” Eagle said with a grin.

“So we’ve sort of got until tomorrow at our shift to just keep our stuff up to standard and-“

An alarm started to blare. Mustang and Blazer frantically looked around, wondering what it meant, but their teammates all knew and were already standing up. By the time Mustang turned back to them, they were leaving, and only Falcon remained.

“Move your asses, newbies, we got to get going!” he shouted before floating up and shooting out.

Mustang and Blazer got up and shot out right behind, sparing no time for questions or looks. This was their first mission here. They had to keep up and set a good first impression, or they would be left behind and probably not invited to go with them again. It wasn’t hard to get kicked out of a unit for being inadequate.

They rushed to their barracks, where they found the others already about prepared. Mustang and Blazer flew to their bunks and started throwing their gear on. They took swords, knives, small, single-shot crossbows with limited range, their armor, and helmets and goggles. It was practically nothing, compared to what the others had, but if the mission went how Mustang expected it to, they would end up doing most of the fighting while he and Blazer sat back and learned the ropes.

With their lesser amount of gear, the two new stallions were ready at about the same time as the others and ran out with them. They followed wordlessly behind Falcon at the rear of the group, wondering what they would do. Would they get a ride? Would they fly in on their own? What would the site be like?

They approached the runway and ran on, where Mustang saw no other stallions. It was clear; they were flying on their own. Since they were already running, it was easy enough to get the speed to take off, and everypony flared his wings halfway down. Strat took a bit longer to get airborne, being so much larger, but when he took off, he still soared like the others.

Aardvark took the center of a V formation. To his left was Falcon, and to his right, Strat. Behind Strat flew Mustang, and behind Falcon, Blazer. Eagle shot ahead at an unimaginable speed, something even a Wonderbolt probably couldn’t do. Mustang was looking around at the group, admiring the intensity of their battle mindsets and focus. He looked to Blazer, who was looking up at Aardvark.

Blazer saw Aardvark tap his ear, where a radio sat, and Blazer turned to Mustang to do the same. Mustang got it and turned on his radio, coming in just in time to hear the mission.

“Alright boys, we got ourselves a standard ambush today,” Aardvark said. “A patrol of Royal Unicorns was moving along a path on the side of a mountain just along the border. There were twelve of them; now there’s ten.”

Mustang blinked. They were going into some serious combat. Royal Unicorns were fabled for their toughness.

“From the Intel we got, it sounds like they’re outnumbered at least five to one, maybe seven to one. Eagle is heading out with some small bombs to weaken the assault on our guys before we arrive. He’ll do a flyby to fluster them. When we get there, we get up to the gryphons’ positions and engage them in some CQC. Be careful with any bolts you send; you never know who they might hit if they miss.”

“Sir, is there any info on their geographical advantages?” Blazer asked unexpectedly. “Altitude, rocks for cover, caves?”

“They’re up above the unicorns, or else they would be gone already,” Aardvark replied. “Blazer, you fight with Strat, and keep each others’ backs covered.”

“Yes sir,” Blazer replied.

“Mustang, you and Falcon will fight together until Eagle comes back from a fly around. When he does, you fight with me.”

“Will do sir,” Mustang replied. He felt honored to be ordered to fight alongside his commander.

“Get ready; we’re ten seconds out,” Aardvark said.

“I can see the magic blasts,” Strat commented.

As they approached, Mustang took in the sight with some humility. He had always thought himself and the 51st to be tough fighters, but they were never trapped in situations like the Royal Unicorps could be. These guys didn’t flinch when the bolts and arrows shot past them and always took careful aim before shooting. Mustang had respect for them before, but now, it was only increased.

There was a pretty good-sized crater up by where the gryphons were taking shots from, courtesy of Eagle. When Aardvark said Eagle would drop a small bomb, Mustang thought of a basic packing of a few kilograms of explosives. It looked like the stallion dropped a forty-pound bomb on the gryphons. The crater took out most of the available hiding places for the gryphons, forcing them to bunch together and take turns taking shots.

The gryphons were in a tough spot now, a perfect time to attack. Aardvark wordlessly swooped down toward the enemy, followed close by Strat and Falcon. Mustang and Blazer followed behind their respective partners, keeping up their formation on the approach.

The gryphons didn’t see the JSF soldiers coming; they thought Eagle was close air support. When the team landed on top of them, the gryphons faltered in their attacks on the unicorns and lost a lot of their footing as they tried to redirect some of their fire onto the pegasi among them. A couple of them loosed bolts, but ended up hitting their comrades instead. The lack of training in most of the insurgent fighters made them easy to falter when surprised.

“GO GO GO!” Aardvark commanded.

The team went on the offensive and closed in on whatever gryphons they could. Mustang and Falcon flew over to distract some of the ones in the front so that Aardvark, Strat, and Blazer could take them even further off-guard. By the time they landed, they could already hear the fighting behind them.

The tactic did put them in a tough position though; they were in the center of the group. Mustang prepared himself by pulling out his short sword and crouching low. Behind him, at his back, Falcon stood unfazed by the gryphons with a grin on his face.

“Ready kid?” he asked. “This is how you do CQC.”

The gryphons attacked, and Mustang jumped up into the air to fight them in the most maneuverable way possible. He cut down two off the bat, sending them to the dirt with almost no noise. He still had several in front of him, though, and he wasn’t sure he could take them.

The unicorns, however, were still firing up at the gryphons. With the introduction of the Air Guardsponies, the gryphons were mostly forced out of cover, and exposed to Unicorn fire. Magic blasts came up and struck down three gryphon almost immediately, distracting the remaining two for long enough that Mustang could attack.

He started with the one on his left, who was just returning his attention to Mustang. He saw Mustang coming and drew a small sword, which he used to block Mustang’s incoming strike. Mustang responded to the block with a jump and a flip, landing behind the gryphon. The gryphon was fast, though, and turned around just in time to parry Mustang’s stab.

The other gryphon had no sword, and lunged at Mustang with his talons out when he came back to the fight. Mustang feigned a sidestep, but went quickly backwards, fooling the gryphon into sending his claw in front of him. Mustang ended his fighting spirit with a quick thrust of his sword into the gryphon’s torso. He had to carry the word in his teeth for now because it made for his most powerful strikes, and he could feel his face growing wet with his foe’s blood.

Mustang was in a compromising position now, though. He was in no place to respond to an attack, and the other gryphon decided to take advantage of it. With no regard for the body of his fallen friend, the gryphon swung his sword around at Mustang’s neck, intent on beheading him and ultimately landing the blade in his dead comrade’s chest.

No sword is worth a stallion’s life, so Mustang let go of the dead gryphon, sword still in him, and hopped back. The body fell backwards and rolled just far enough to land on the ledge, then roll down the hill. The Royal Unicorns below must have thought he was trying to escape, because they were basting away at the dead gryphon like he was the ringleader of the entire group.

Weaponless now, and with no chance to pull his secondary, Mustang thought. He had his wrist-mounted mini crossbow, but he didn’t want to use it. With the gryphon advancing on him, though, he might have to. It wasn’t big enough to kill without a neck or eye shot, but it would do to distract him.

Mustang raised his foreleg and tensed, activating the firing mechanism and loosing a bolt at the gryphon in front of him. The bolt hit home and buried itself in  the gryphon’s chest, knocking away feathers and drawing blood. The four inch long bolt was about halfway in when it stopped.

The gryphon looked at it, then Mustang, then at it again. He began to laugh. Mustang was confused; these little bolts were supposed to be strong and have at least some stopping power! What gave?

“You think something as puny as that can stop me?” he asked.

Mustang looked at him, then noticed something in the sky far past him. He focused on it for just a moment, just long enough to see what it was. It was Eagle, coming back from his fly around, wearing an expression of pure, frozen combat rage. Mustang couldn’t help but smile.

“No,” he said, then leaned on a rock. The gryphon looked at him, confused. “But I think that can.” Mustang pointed at Eagle coming up fast.

The gryphon turned just fast enough to see something blurry shoot toward him, then a sword ripped through his neck and sent him spiraling into the air and back to the ground.

Eagle used the strike to slow himself down and flew back over to Mustang and Falcon. He ignored Mustang and went straight to Falcon, whom he high hoofed and shared chuckles and praises with. Mustang was a bit peeved at being ignored, but it was to be expected. He tore the sword out of the dead gryphon from the fight and put it back into its sheath.

And even if he would have stayed peeved, it wouldn’t have lasted. When he saw Falcon’s foes around him, his jaw went slack. There were at least six gryphons around him, all dead, with no cuts or bleeding wounds. Not a drop of blood anywhere, not a scratch on the stallion.

“How did you do that?” Mustang asked him.

Falcon knew what he was asking. “By being just that good,” he said with a grin. Mustang felt the grin become contagious and shook his head in mild disbelief.

“Yo, Speed Racer, Sunglasses, Newbie! Over here!” Aardvark ordered. The stallions share done look of agreement on a job well done and walked over to him.

“Sir?” Falcon asked.

“Some of the gryphons appear to have gotten away after Eagle dropped his payload,” Aardvark explained. “They’re long gone by now, but the Unicorns have regrouped and are gonna go on the hunt. We’re going to take the bodies of their boys and escort them back to base, where they will be prepared for transport back to Equestria. Are we all good?”

“I think we can go for it,” Strat said. “We’re all fine. Who carries the bodies?”

“I say we make the new guys do it,” Eagle said. “I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to carry any more this week.”

“Same here,” Falcon said.

Aardvark frowned, then looked to Mustang and Blazer. “Are you good for that?” he asked. “I understand if you feel weird.”

“Sir, I carried the bodies of little ones out of burnt out buildings,” Blazer replied solemnly. “I can do this.”

“If I need to get used to it, I’ll take it,” Mustang said. “Better to do it when it’s safe for the first time than when it might not be.”

“We’re never totally safe out here,” Aardvark said. “But sure. You guys can take them.”

The team flew down to the unicorns, who had draped black plastic bags over their lost stallions. Some were teary in the eyes, others tense at the jaw. They all looked upset by the loss, but whatever reaction they had, they all had the same emotion in their eyes. They were ready to go out for blood.

When the team landed, the dead ones were brought up to them and laid down gently so as to respect the dead. The lead unicorn walked up to Aardvark to explain the nature of their injuries and deaths so that he obituaries would be written properly and detail the heroism they had displayed.

Mustang and Blazer loaded the bodies onto their backs. Before they could return to their own guys though, one of the unicorns came up to them.

“Hey,” he said.

“Hey,” Blazer replied. He wasn’t affected by the body on his back at all.

“So… yeah. We owe you our lives. If you hadn’t come along, we all would’ve been killed.”

“When you send out the call, we’ll answer,” Mustang said.

The unicorn smiled a bit. “Good to hear,” he said. “When you get back, you’re going to have to bring the bodies to the mortician, everyone’ll want to go in and see who died. You can’t let them in.”

“We won’t,” Mustang assured the unicorn.

“The one on your back,” the unicorn said to Blazer. “He had a lot of friends. Especially at San Palomino. Our unit went though there a lot to get to our base down in the colonies. He had this list of contacts for everyone…”

The unicorn handed a sheet of paper to Mustang that had names and addresses of a lot of ponies, mares and stallions. Some of the contacts were even gryphons back home, and one was actually labeled as Shining Armor, a rising Canterlot guardspony.

“Some of them are labeled as being at San Palomino,” the unicorn said. “You need to tell them one on one that he’s gone. They deserve to hear it that way.”

“Will do,” Mustang and Blazer said together.

Behind them, Aardvark was waiting. “Chop chop, boys, let’s get these guys home before they can’t be properly cared for!” he said.

Mustang and Blazer waved goodbye to the unicorn and flew off with their team, eager to bring the dead home to rest in peace and be done with the first mission of their new careers. As great as it was to be in the elite it had certain aspects that neither stallion really expected.

Aspects that, if they wanted to survive this war with their psyches intact, they would have to get used to as soon as possible.

Next Chapter: More Than Just the Operators Estimated time remaining: 1 Hour, 12 Minutes