An Aerial Assault team soared through the skies like shooting stars, and nosedived toward an incoming airship. Each pegasi had a gun mounted on its back, along with booster rockets attacked to their jet packs. An earth pony sat in the ship, manning a magic cannon, and began to rapidly fire at the pegasi that sought to take him down. One by one, the pegasi were blasted off, their bodies dismembered into nothing but limbs and bloodied chunks of flesh that fell to the crumbling and panicking town of Ponyville.

“Move, soldiers, MOVE!” ordered an earth pony commander of a Ground Trooper team. Each earth pony, just like the Aerial Assault pegasi, had a gun mounted on their back. Each pony was clad in a green vest and helmet, with coats the color of beige. “Soldier 061!” yelled the commander. “Make sure that all residents are evacuated from the premises at once!”

The residents were running, screaming, hiding, panicking. Footsteps littered the white blanket of snow. Fear was all they felt. Their cries were the only thing louder than the combined noises of guns, missiles, and death. Ground Troopers charged and rapidly fired at griffons that had landed to begin the battle.

“CITIZENS OF PONYVILLE!” bellowed Soldier 061 through a megaphone. His amplified voice was similar to the royal voice of Canterlot that Princess Luna would often speak in. “Remain calm! Form three straight, single-file lines, and STAY QUIET! Military forces are dealing with the situation--there is nothing to worry about. Repeat: form three straight, single-file lines. The evacuation carriages should be arriving soon.”

Up in the air, a griffon had grabbed an Aerial Assault pegasi by his wings. The griffon ripped the wings off of the pegasi soldier’s body, and the Aerial Assault soldier plummeted to the ground, desperately screaming “I’m going down! Repeat: I am GOING DOWN! Griffon attack--the bloody thing took my--” The pegasi’s body slammed with the ground, breaking its bones and ending its pitiful life in one quick second.

Meanwhile, a beige earth pony in a dark brown winter jacket jumped over a pile of rubble and landed his front hooves, concealed by black leather boots, in the snow. He looked behind him, wondering if his wife had caught up yet.

“Silkskin!” he cried. “Sweetheart, quickly!”

A light yellow unicorn pony lifted aside a huge rock in her path and scampered forward. “Jet!” She collapsed on her back, her stomach bloated. “Unnhh...”

Jet scootered over to his wife, who lay in the snow. “Silkskin!”

“Jet--I’m sorry. It’s just...the foal...”

“It’s coming?”

Tears welled up in Silkskin’s bright sparkling orange eyes. She simply nodded.

“We have to get to the evacuation carriages,” Jet explained. “I’ll carry you.”

“No, it’s fine. We won’t live to see our baby, anyway.”

Jet rolled Silkskin on her side with his snout and heaved her on his back. “Come on!” Jet turned towards the lines that began to form in front of the descending evacuation carriages. He took one huge leap forward and sprinted toward the end of the line.

The line began to move forward hurriedly as more and more ponies climbed into the carriages. When the line finally got to him, he laid his wife down in front of Soldier 061. “Please, sir, is there a doctor aboard the carriage? My wife is about to have her foal, and--”

“Sir, please calm down. We will get your wife to safety. There is no reason to panic.”

Up in the air, above Canterlot, an earth pony in an airship spoke into a headset: “Permission to drop bomb?”

Inside his headphones, a voice crackled: “Permission granted.”

A hatch door at the bottom of the ship opened, and a rocket-shaped bomb came plummeting towards the innocent city below. Ponyville was just a normal but happy town. It was a shame it would have to be at the mercy of a dirty nuclear device.
Back in Canterlot, Princess Celestia continued to flap her wings. A bright sphere of light formed at the tip of her horn, and she closed her purple eyes. The pink shield of magic in front of her continued to flicker before maintaining itself to stay the way it was supposed to be. Celestia needed more concentration than ever. But she didn’t have enough. The panicked cries of Canterlot’s inhabitants pained her more than ever. She had to save them. She had to save Equestria. But since the war’s inception, there wasn’t much that she could do now.

The magic forcefield that Princess Celestia was conjuring used a mass amount of energy, and it could not stay there forever. As long as Celestia’s concentration was strong, Canterlot was safe. But her concentration broke, and her magic suddenly washed away from her mind. Could she have used all of the magical energy she had in herself. No--impossible. Celestia’s wings stopped flapping, and she realized that Canterlot’s destruction was inevitable.

The shield faded away, and the nuclear doomsday device fell in. The royal skyscapers toppled as they were consumed by an orange blast of fire. The screams of Canterlot’s inhabitants resonated and traveled through the space between Canterlot and Ponyville like radiation. The ledge the city rested upon crumbled and broke away from the cliff, and it collided with Equestria’s landscape. Clouds of black smoke rose from the burned rubble that was the regal city of lights.

“Canterlot has been destroyed,” he said. “Next target: Ponyville.”

Another bomb fell from the airship--this time, it was heading straight for Ponyville.

“Sir, quickly! Board the carriage!” Soldier 061 yelled after he heaved Silkskin into the carriage. “Hurry!”

The bomb came down before anyone expected it. Jet didn’t even hear a blast--it was too loud and defeaning to even imagine. Below him, the snowy ground collapsed into an abyss, bringing down the evacuation carriages, everypony else (the Ground Trooper team), and himself.

Jet only had time to breathe out “Silkskin” before being buried and smothered by a blanket of snow.

The Next Day
A charred slab of white marble glowed a white aura and levitated in the air. It moved to one side, being followed by many more identical pieces, being pushed aside to make way for the one rearranging them: Princess Celestia.

The glow in her horn quickly died out. She had used up all the magic she could have had. It would take hundreds, maybe thousands, of years for her magic to recharge. She was lucky to be alive, but she felt dead inside.

I am alive, but I am dead, she thought to herself quietly. I am alive, but I am dead.

My little ponies are dead. All dead.

But I am alive.

Yet I am dead.

The corner of Celestia’s eye formed a small droplet of water. The drop escaped from Celestia’s tear duct, and it streamed down her snout like a river.

If only we could maintain the peace. Just like before.

Before this dreadful war.

Celestia looked up. The sun was suspended in mid-air. She hadn’t moved it all this time. She wouldn’t be able to move it anymore. She was dead.

Equestria was dead.

Her little ponies were dead.

But most of all, Celestia herself was dead.

If only we could maintain the peace.

Just like before.

Before this dreadful war.

Celestia began to travel along the ruins of her city. It pained her to see the bloodied, torn apart, dismembered bodies of her little ponies. She could not bring them back. There was no such magic. She wished there was.

I wish to relive the past. The happy moments. With Twilight Sparkle. With all of her friends. With everyone in Equestria.

Where have those times gone?

Celestia felt even more hurt inside.

If only...