Author's Notes:

I wish you all a Happy New Year 🎆! Sorry that I couldn't say it yesterday but I arrived home at 11 PM and instead of doing a blog post wishing you all a happy new year I decided to watch the fireworks, and then go to sleep.
Alright, I won't bother you anymore, go ahead and read Chapter 5.

Canterlot used to be a thriving city. Ponies would be enjoying their times in the capital knowing that they were safe. But that wasn't the case. Canterlot was now a ghost town. The city that used to stand as a monumental place with its iconic castle, schools and main street was no longer.

A First Order Command Shuttle was approaching its destination, the main square in the city. Onboard this shuttle was General Drant. Accompanying him was a droid. An intelligent, self-sufficient model coming from the YT-90 series. There was also about four Stormtroopers.
The shuttle landed and the door slowly opened. The General left the shuttle followed by the droid which was hovering. Two of the Stormtroopers would stay with the shuttle while the other two followed Drant.

Walking in a ghost town was new for them. It was rare that the First Order had done such a massive operation of killing an entire city with such a massive population. Instead of ponies walking about with smiles there was nothing. All the building's doors were closed and some of them had even begun collapsing due to nopony renovating or repairing them. Others were gone from the fires created by the Flametroopers, about 20 buildings were now ash and rubble from the fire.

Nonetheless, it did not matter whether this city would survive to see new residents or not. Not for him at least. His mission was to capture the princesses who can cause an uprising. Chasing them like a cat chasing a mouse didn't work and neither did imprison them. His last idea was simple. There are four princesses, two on the run and two behind bars. Imprisoned and tortured daily, right underneath Canterlot. Except for Celestia who instead was on the Tector. Admiral Tarron's flagship.

A Stormtrooper guarding the Dungeons opened the door for General Drant and his droid. The two Stormtroopers entered and stopped right when they entered. The dungeons had seen better days. Namely being much bigger and being able to hold much, much more prisoners. But due to a thermal imploder that went off by accident, there were only 5 cells left. All of the other ones were now buried.

The first cell had a white coated Unicorn in royal guard armor. He also had a blue mane. His helmet laid in pieces on the ground.

"Identify," Drant asked.

The YT-90 model droid hovered towards the General. "Subject is known as Defensive Heart. He possesses the rank of Sergeant in the Royal Guard."

"Would he be able to get us to the fugitives?"

"The possibility of him knowing the location of the fugitives is very slim."

Drant made eye contact with the guard.
"Execute him," Drant said.

The guard's eyes widened. He looked at the Stormtrooper approaching the cell with his F-11D blaster cocked. The trooper slowly positioned his blaster so that he would hit the guard bulls-eye. Once he did that, he emptied his entire magazine. Slight smoke came from the blaster marks left on the body of the now dead guard.

The second cell had an orange-yellow pegasus guard with his entire armour broken. He had a blue mane and his neck had clearly been hurt hard as it was missing some fur. It was hard to see it still but looking closely it was visible.

"Identify him as well," Drant asked the droid.

"Subject is known as Flash Sentry, he possesses the rank of First Lieutenant. He is also the announcer for royalty and sometimes an escort for Princess Cadance or Prince Shining Armor. It is also rumoured that he is the love interest of Princess Twilight Sparkle."

"He seems like someone who could get us to the Princesses and their friends."

"It is possible. But the answer wouldn't be the precise location and just an estimate."

Drant looked at the same Stormtrooper who killed the guard. He ordered the trooper to open the door for the cell.
The rusty door slowly glided to the side.
The General and the droid entered the cell. Drant looked at the injured guard.

"I've told your minions multiple times already, I have no idea where they are." The guard said weakly without looking at the General.

General Drant looked at the guard on the ground. He was weak from all the pain he was suffering. Drant knew what to do. The most effective way to retrieve information was sometimes tortured. And while torture was outlawed by the Galactic Concordance it didn't stop the First Order from using it. The General swung his foot back and then forward towards the Pegasus. He hit him in the back and in doing so almost broke the bones situated there. The guard groaned in pain right after.

"This one is a fighter I can tell," Drant said.

"Droid. You mentioned he was the love interest of Princess Twilight Sparkle, correct?" Drant asked.

"Affirmative."

"We'll use him as bait in that case."

General Drant and the droid left the cell. The same two Stormtroopers that escorted them to the Dungeons would go inside the cell where he was grabbed by the two. They then dragged him along the stone floor to the exit and towards the shuttle.

"Now for the royalty," Drant said.

The General approached the cell where the Princess of the night was. Luna. The cell door opened and both stepped in.
Princess Luna was attached to two cuffs on the walls where her chest and stomach were exposed. On her horn was a metallic ring preventing her from using her magic. The wings were also held together using a rope.

"According to the history books, Princess Luna previously went by the title of Nightmare Moon and brought eternal darkness to the land until Twilight Sparkle managed to use the elements of harmony to defeat her."

General Drant looked at the vulnerable spots on the body. But right when he was about to deal pain to her just as he did the guard known as Flash Sentry he stopped. The mentioning of her past opened a window of opportunity.

"How is it being reformed, Nightmare Moon?" Drant asked.

"I no longer go by that name. I am Princess Luna, not Nightmare Moon." Luna responded.

"Are you sure of that?"

"Yes. Yes, I am."

"General, if I may. The possibility for her to turn into Nightmare Moon is 573,891,450 to one." The droid said.

"Hmph. I suppose that's true. Let's move to plan B shall we?" Drant said.

"Plan B?" Luna asked.

The door to the dungeons swung open violently. A unicorn pony was standing at the entrance but its appearance was blocked by the sun. The shadow of the unicorn pony began to move. Slowly the unicorn became visible. She was a mare. Pitch-Black coated and a mane made out one colour. Black. The most unusual thing about her appearance wasn't the scar she had in her left eye or the iron boot on her left hoof, but the cutie mark. There was none.

She approached General Drant.
"Everything is going as planned, I assume." She asked.

"Indeed it is," said Drant.

"Princess Luna. Meet Queen Iron Hoof." Drant introduced the name of Iron Hoof to Luna.

Luna stood silent. She examined the mare that held the title of Queen and was thinking how in Equestria did she get it. The Princess of the night knew something was wrong. The eyes gave it away. The pupil had an evil looking green color. As if she was corrupted. If she could use her magic she'd have the answer to whom she was. But she couldn't. And by what she was about to say next, she may never truly know the one suffering behind a mask.

"Take away this filthy princess away." Queen Iron Hoof demanded.

The two Stormtroopers, that had just finished putting Flash Sentry inside the shuttle took the princess away. Not to the Tector. But to Camp Vanoi. The newest facility built to hold the First Order's prisoners. With a capacity of 500 inmates. Its location was just south of Dodge Junction. A city that surprisingly had a few First Order sympathizers.

"Now we just have to find the other two," Drant said.

"Leave that to me..." Iron Hoof responded.

The Queen began to march out again. Back to the castle that was now hers. The First Order's presence on Equestria may not have been as big as the Empire's. But it was working, the newly appointed Queen was to trick the ponies that the First Order's presence was a peacekeeping one. When in reality, it was much bigger and worse.

Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, and Fluttershy were no more. They were still alive but no longer with the group. Having been captured to let their friends escape. Except for Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy who got caught. This meant that the fugitive group that previously was made out of eight were now 5. While from a normal perspective it would seem alright, for them it wasn't. The only good thing was that they hadn't stumbled into any First Order soldiers since the capture of Fluttershy. They knew about Queen Iron Hoof. Her propaganda had replaced all First Order ones and her 'Royal Guard' as she called it patrolled the streets now. The First Order was mainly only guarding locations of high interest. Such as Camp Vanoi, Canterlot or the old Imperial bases. Quite a brilliant plan to let the population think that the First Order was now Peacekeepers.

The new temporary home for the group of ponies was the crashed Imperial II-class Menacer. It may not be the most comfortable home at first but on closer inspection, the surviving officer quarters or Stormtrooper barracks that were still intact made it quite better. Not to mention that every Imperial II-class Star Destroyer has enough rations to feed its crew for six years without restocking and with there only being 5 consumers the food could theoretically last for more than a decade.

Princess Cadance and Twilight Sparkle were currently looking around the crashed ship measuring a thousand meters for items that could help them. Eventually, they would stumble upon the private quarters of Captain Maponoa. On the ground was the body of the Captain, by the looks of it it had already begun its decomposition phase. On the desk, there was a hologram projector. Twilight approached it, interested in what she could learn about the galaxy. She used the magic that her horn possessed to activate it.

A mini-map of the entire galaxy appeared. Complete with the names of the planets, names of the different parts such as the Inner Rim, the Colonies, and the famous Outer Rim. While it was interesting she was more interested in the history of the galaxy. She got her wish when the projector suddenly switched from the map to a HoloNet recording of a combat cam from the Clone Wars. On the sides, it read vital signs and information about the clone. All of it was written in Aurabesh, also known as Galactic Basic. Luckily for Twilight, she was capable of reading it. She looked carefully and read:

"CC-8484, Marshall Commander, 'Hike', 98th High Altitude Assualt Battalion."

She then looked at the recording. Infront of the Trooper were three other ones and a woman. She was wearing a peculiar outfit and was holding an item. Twilight guessed that it was a weapon. By now Cadance had also begun to watch.
On the ground, there was lots of snow, and it was also snowing. Guessing by the amount of snow they both guessed that this was taking place on a mountain. It would explain why it said 'High Altitude Assualt Battalion'.
Suddenly two beeps were heard. The trooper took out his hologram projector and a live image of a man with black robes appeared.

"The time has come. Execute Order 66." The man said.

Immediately the four Clone Troopers began to fire. Either firing their DC15A's or DC15S's. Immediately she fell down on the cold snow. She was dead.

Then the HoloNet recording switched off.
The events were more than the Alicorn had asked for. Instead of a maybe an audio recording talking about recent events she got a horrible recording. A dark one. But she had learned new things. One of them being the Clone Army and Order 66.

She left the room that belonged to Captain Maponoa. She saw Cadance, standing right outside with the same expression. They had gone through worse. But to be feeling shaken after a recording wasn't something that happened every day. There's always a first time for everything.

Without saying a word, both began to make their way to the Stormtrooper Barracks where the five slept, it may not be the most comfortable place to sleep onboard but the majority of the luxurious chambers for the officers were sealed shut. With only Captain Maponoa's being accessible.

A loud thumping sound was heard. Shortly after another one. The loud thumps weren't stopping anytime soon. The town of Ponyville was the only populated area in all of Equestria in which the First Order had a presence. All other cities and towns were guarded by Queen Iron Hoof's Royal Guard.

An AT-AT would stop right on the outskirt of the town. Following it was an AT-MA. Two squads of Stormtroopers would deploy via rope from the All Terrain Armoured Transportation. The 20 Stormtroopers would form a perimeter and clear the area of curious ponies.
The All Terrain Mobile Artillery would position itself into firing mode. The two laser cannons would begin charging in preparation to fire.

Meanwhile, 4 Kilometers from Ponyville, in the Everfree forest laid an abandoned mansion. This mansion wasn't abandoned, however, It was the home for the Ponyville resistance fighters. They resisted the First Order's occupation and moved to the forest to set up camp. Little did they know that the First Order was about to crush their uprising before it'd he thought to begin.

The two canons fired. A continuous barrage of laser fire would fly over the sky and land at the mansion. The mansion, along with its resistance members were gone. After firing for a full minute the AT-MA stopped. It returned to walking position and along with the two squads of Stormtroopers and the AT-AT returned to Fort Kilo.

The Tector was slowly turning portside. All its TIE Fighters and ground assets were returning onboard. Admiral Tarron had been ordered by the Supreme Leader to assist in the fight against the Resistance and therefore, the Arrestor would be alone in the blockade of Equestria but because the Resistance didn't know of this world it wouldn't matter much. As for ground troops, the Imperial bases still had a few abandons vehicles and heavy weaponry so the First Order did need to worry as much.

Though for the ponies of Equestria, this meant that they were one step closer to liberation. One step closer to living in peace, harmony and in a beautiful land.