In the year 2020, an island appeared in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Upon this island was a portal: this portal, impassible by human beings or their technology, led to the magical land of Equestria, home of a species of sentient ponies: it was a magical land, once a beacon of friendship and hope - but a place that would soon become something much darker.

In 2022, a barrier of energy toxic to human life and utterly destructive to man-made technologies, began slowly expanding across the planet Earth. It's source was the portal to Equestria. What no one could have known was that, in Equestria, the once benevolent Celestia had turned into something far, far worse.

One by one, nations fell. People died running from the barrier, people died fighting it, people chose to die at their own hands. Many, however, chose not to die but to live instead: the Conversion Bureaus, buildings built with the purpose of converting humans into soul-damaged, brainwashed ponies, were more than happy to accommodate them.

The entire world fell before this power in only two years, two years of terror, panic and desperation. The entire planet fell: of seven and half billion people on Earth, over five billion chose to surrender to ponification, and the remaining two and a half billion died.

The only place to be spared the destruction of the human race and the world they had once ruled was one damp little island. Though they had never realised it, never suspected it, the people of the islands of a Great Britain and Ireland had lived on land with it's own magical protection, a protection Equestria's energy field could not penetrate. On this damp little set of islands, one hundred and forty million human beings, the only remaining humans left in the whole world, survived, protected by a power only a handful understood. This insult to her power the tyrant Celestia could not stand. She declared herself the Empress Astra Solamina, leader of the new Equestrian Empire, and decreed that it was the divine right of the ponies to conquer and slaughter or convert the humans.

And so, with the combined forces of billions of converted humans and other ponies, the nation of Equestria attacked Britain, seeking to lay low the last of humanity, huddled on that small isle.

It was never a fair war. It was a war of retreats, holding measures, last stands, heroic sacrifice - and in many cases, cowardice and betrayal. It was a war that might one day become the stuff of legend, a war that would one day - many years from that day - become known as an age, not merely of darkness, but of heroes as well. But if they were heroes, they were heroes of desperation. If a man stayed behind to fight a desperate last stand, he did so because he had no hope. If a woman stood her ground and faced death to save her children for a day, she did so fully expecting them to die the next day, but content that they would live one more day. No one fought with any hope.

One day - tomorrow, the next day, the day after that, none could say - they knew they would fall. It was an age of darkness. The last days of mankind.

And then, out of that darkness, there stepped a hero. A shining beacon of hope. The Avatar of Albion, the vengeance of humanity incarnate.

And yet... though without him, there would have been no victory, it was not his victory alone. There were many long years between the first strike of that war and the final stand, and many fought to hold the islands of Britain against the hordes of Solamina's Empire. It was the age of heroes.

And these are their stories...

***

Timeline of The Equestrian Crisis.

2020: The year of the so-called "Equestrian Crisis" beginning.

A small island materialises in the Pacific Ocean. Geologists sent to investigate discover an impassable portal upon that island: no probes can mass through, and even living human matter is repelled or destroyed. Shortly after this, the ponies of Equestria make first contact, initially seeming amenable to friendly relations.

2021: The ponification potion is developed by Princesses Luna and Celestia, and the first Conversion Bureaus are set up, ostensibly with the purpose of allowing diplomats to enter Equestria and report on their findings. Fringe groups - such as Ponification for Earth's Rebirth and the Human Liberation Front - are formed in this time, and several dozen riots occur across the planet when the two clash.

2022: In Equestria, Princess Luna dies. This is attributed to illness, but this raises some suspicions among the populace. The Night Guard is quietly retired - unbeknownst to most ponies, they are all but exterminated. The Eclipse Guard is incorporated.

The Equestrian Barrier begins expanding across the planet. Military measures are attempted to halt it, but none are even partially successful. Members of the PER attempt to assassinate Queen Elizabeth II and many other political and military leaders, though their attempts are less than successful in most cases. Queen Elizabeth dies fighting, shooting herself rather than submitting to capture. King Charles III rises to the throne of Britain. David Elliot joins the UK military.

2023: Humanity begins a slow retreat from the Barrier. Millions die. Millions more take the ponification potion. Across the world, the best and worst of humanity may be witnessed. The formation of the Sanctified Republic of Gilead occurs in the ashes of the United States of America, leading millions to sacrifice their children in the vain hope of stopping the barrier. Doomsday cults, religious fanatics and renegade HLF units all strive to destroy the Barrier or fight it somehow, but nothing succeeds. Meanwhile, the human race converges first on Europe, which is slated to be the last landmass to fall completely, and then when Europe begins to fall and more extremists spring up, the British Isles, the last landmass on Earth to exist free of the Barrier.

2024: The Barrier is stopped by the magical field surrounding the British Isles. This is hailed as a miracle by many. Shortly afterward, the Pony Exodus reaches Britain's shores: several thousand ponies escaping Equestria explain to the human defenders exactly what has happened in Equestria, and warn of the incoming invasion. Thanks to their help, the human defenders are ready. In Equestria, Celestia declares herself Empress, taking the name Astra Solamina Maxima. She decrees that Britain and the humans it harbours have become an affront to Equestria's sovereignty and dignity and must be destroyed. Shortly afterward, the Equestrian Resistance Army is incorporated. The War, known by no other name, begins.

2025: During this year, the war intensifies. Millions of people are killed, and several towns and cities, including Lancaster and Goole, are lost, with mothers such as Leeds being devastated by the fighting. King Charles III is killed aboard the HMS Defender by Wonderbolts and the Defender herself is sunk. The naval vessels HMS Prince of Wales, USS Constitution, HMCS Vancouver and the HMAS Stuart are all sunk by Equestrian forces, though over one hundred capital ships, including recommissioned vessels such as the HMS Illustrious, remain intact, continuing to act as the first line of defence for the British Isles.

February 19th, 2025. Battle of Hull.

April 12th, 2025. Battle of Whitby.

2026:

March 10th, 2026. Battle of Manchester, destruction of the ERAS Harmonious Order. Grey Squadron all but annihilated, remaining members disband.

2028:

November 10th, 2028. Battle of Dover. John Constantine approaches David Elliot, offering to give the human defenders a powerful weapon. Elliot agrees to help him. Death of Rarity, who is killed by the newly awakened "Avatar of Albion", incarnated in Elliot.

November 12th, 2028. The Avatar of Albion is transferred to "special operations", giving him and a selection of ponies and humans he chooses special dispensation to do whatever they feel is necessary. Elliot begins fighting on the hardest fronts, lending his new powers to the defence of the most beleaguered cities.

2029:

January 11th, 2029. Fluttershy submits to execution by Albion in Sherwood Forest.

6th March, 2029. Defection of Prince Blueblood. He later becomes the Pony representative on the Council, and the leader of the Equestrian Government-In-Exile.

March 10th, 2029. Applejack killed while leading raiding forces on an attack on British farmland.

December 25th, 2029. Death of Rainbow Dash at Buckingham Palace.

2030:

January 19th, 2030: Battle of London begins.

January 23rd, 2030. Death of Pinkie Pie at the hands of David Elliot.

January 24th, 2030. Death of Shining Armour, death of True Grit.

January 25th, 2030. Events of The Avatar of Albion begin.

Author's Notes:

And so begins the First Anthology, a collection of short stories and other pieces expanding the universe of The Avatar of Albion.

Initially, expanded universe stories happened in the main story itself by way of "Interludes", however these - while good for the purpose of expanding the story - are limited in what they can achieve, and there are many more stories in the world of TAOA than can be fit into a small number of Interludes. Instead of relying on them to continue the expansion of the universe, therefore, I decided that a separate "Anthology" should be set up for stories that wouldn't necessarily "fit" the main story as Interludes but still deserved to be told.

Anyone who wants to may submit a story to the Anthology by PM-ing me. :-)