To Do Our Duty

Chapter 2 – The Ponies Came Marching Two By Two

By: Sturm Panzer

Twilight Sparkle stood there at the window, looking out into the night sky, gazing off into the direction that Rainbow Dash had flown when she left.  Toward Canterlot.  The Pegasus has long since vanished into the darkness, but still Twilight stood there, worry written clear on her face.  “Please come back safe, Dash,” she whispered softly into the wind.

It was still some time before she was finally able to turn away from the window, and then make her way up the stairs and crawl into bed.  But sleep was a long time coming for Twilight, as she just couldn't shake the bad premonition that had come to settle in the back of her mind.

It wasn't until late morning when she finally woke up, her sleep being fitful, with her tossing and turning much of the night.  By the time Twilight finally made it out of bed and down the stairs, she was greeted by a rather surprised looking Spike.  “Whoa, Twilight, you look you just came off a 3-day bender.  Did you run off to some amazing party after I went to bed last night?

“What?  No, Spike,” she said slightly incredulously, and sounding somewhat offended by the implication that she'd be off to some wild party in the middle of the night.  With a slight shake of her head, she walked over to her desk, “I just didn't sleep that well, was all.  Err, do I really look that bad?” she asked the dragon, magically picking up a small mirror and floating it over to look in it.  “Oh, yikes!” was her instant response to the image that greeted her.  “I guess I really do look that bad.  Have you seen my brush, Spike?”

The dragon's reply was preempted by a knock on the door, along with Rarity's voice, muffled by the door to the library “Oh Twilight, are you up yet?”

“Come on in, Rarity,” Twilight answered, opening the door for her friend, “Although you might not like what you're going to see…”

“Hell-ooo,” Rarity cheerily beamed as she walked in, then immediately got a shocked look on her face before running right over to Twilight and taking the brush from her.  “Oh my stars!  You look like you just did an all-nighter with the entire offensive line of Canterlot Chargers.  You're going to need a lot more than what this brush alone can do,” she stated flatly, magically taking the brush that Twilight had just picked up off the desk.  “Now sit down and allow me to get some semblance of style back into that mane of yours, my dear.”

Twilight sheepishly sat down on one of the cushions while Rarity started walking around her, comb and brush starting to work, along with a small bottle of spray from one of Rarity's saddlebags to help undo the knots.  “Now what in Equestria were you doing yesterday to get your mane and tail all mussed up like this?”

Twilight draw in a slow breath, then let it out in a soft sigh, taking the moment to gather her thoughts together.  “Well.  Remember how we were talking about the possibility of war yesterday?  I was reading that history book that Applejack lent me, when Rainbow Dash flew in.”

“Oh really?  And is she what kept you up all night?” the other unicorn teased, while carefully working a rather large knot out of Twilights purple mane.

Rolling her eyes, Twilight sighed and then shook her head slightly, “Very funny Rarity.  No.  She came in with what she thought was an invitation to join the Wonderbolts.”

“How wonderful!, I'll bet that she was absolutely thrilled to get that.  Hold still, dear, this knot will take a bit of work…”

“That's just it, Rarity.  It wasn't actually an invitation.  It was a Conscription order!  Rainbow Dash was drafted into the Royal Guard.  She just didn't realize that at the time, and might not until it's too late for her to do anything about it.  And also, the letter called the Wonderbolts the 'Special Operations Group', whatever that is.”

Rarity paused in her tending to Twilight's mane to mull that over for a few moments.  “'Special Operations Group'?  I've never heard of that before.  It does sound kind of..  Ominous?  Ok, dear, almost done with getting your mane into some kind of order.  Not fabulous, unfortunately, but at least it's much better than what it was like before.”

“Oh thank you, Rarity.  Frankly, I'm more than a little worried.  If they're starting to conscript ponies into the Royal Guard, then things could escalate into a real war very easily.  Ponies will get hurt, or killed.”

Once Rarity had tucked her things away once more, she gave a slight toss of her mane.  “Come, let's go get a bit of breakfast.  Closer to brunch, really, but I think you have yet to eat.”

“Ok, twist my rubber hoof.  Coming Spike?”

The small dragon hopped onto Twilight's back, “Oh you bet.  Breakfast is one of my favorite meals of the day.”

With a soft laugh, Twilight led the way out, “Every meal is your favorite, Spike.”

It would be nearly three weeks before more news made it's way to Ponyville, and it came from an unlikely source.

Twilight was up early, organizing some notes for an upcoming meeting with the mayor to plan for a late spring festival when there was a knock at the door.  “Hey, Twilight.  Mail!”

“Oh, hello Derpy.  What have you got for me today?”

The gray Pegasus paused at the door, rummaging around in her bags and finally pulling out a few things.  “Your Equestria Daily.  Also, the new Canterlot Journal of Magic came in.”  she handed them over to Twilight, who magically floated them over to a table.  “Your latest from your 'Tome Of The Month Club' subscription. And a couple of letters.  That's it.”

Twilight settled everything on her desk and then called to Derpy just as the Pegasus was about to leave,” Thanks Derpy.  Say, have you heard anything new about the war?  News about it's been kind of scarce and I was hoping you might have heard something in Cloudsdale.”

“As a matter of fact, I did.  Over the past few days, a number of Pegasus in Cloudsdale have gotten letters from the Royal Guard Induction Center.  I'm guessing they're calling up ponies into service.”

“That's kind of worrisome. If they bring so many of them into the Royal Guard, then the weather control will suffer.  There could be crop failures.”  Twilight frowned a little as she thought that over.

“That's not all, a few unicorns have gotten them, too.  And there's more.”  Derpy looked around a little before leaning in closer to Twilight.  “I talked to a Royal Guard courier the other day, and he said that there was already some fighting going on between the Royal Guard and the buffaloes.  From the sound of things, the buffalo definitely got the worst of it.”

Twilight was a little surprised that there was already fighting going on.  “That fast?  Do you know what happened to cause the fighting to start?”

“No, but the courier seemed to think the Buffalo had provoked it by having the griffins set fire to one of Appleloosa's warehouses.”

“What?!” exclaimed Twilight.  “Why would the griffins do something like that?  They had to know it would cause tensions to flare and maybe even cause a retaliation.”

“I dunno,” shrugged Derpy.  “Supposedly somepony saw some griffins flying away just after the fire started.  Guess they were stealing stuff and then set the fire to cover their tracks?  I should get going, I still have lots of mail to drop off.”

“Ok Derpy, thank you for the information.  It's a lot for me to think over.”

Once the gray Pegasus left, Twilight brought her mail over to the desk to sort through.  “Hmm, 'Tome of Fire Elementalism'.  I was wondering when the fourth one in the series would arrive!  Hey, what's this?...”  One of the letter was addressed to Twilight Sparkle, and was marked as being sent from the Canterlot Royal Guard Headquarters, but the sender's name was.. 'Twilight Sparkle'?  Opening the letter, she found it written in a rough scrawl, and it took a moment before she recognized it as Rainbow Dash's writing.

Hey Twilight!

It's Rainbow Dash.  We're not really supposed to be writing letters right now.  Secret training stuff we aren't supposed to talk to anyone about.  So I snuck off and wrote this letter.  I had to use your name to get them to actually mail it.  I guess being the Princess' pupil gets you some perks, huh?

Whew, training is a lot tougher than I thought.  I thought I was in good shape before I got here, it took Spitfire just one day to show me I still had stuff to learn.  But now, I'm the one on top of her!  They're really trying to pack in as much as they can, so it's basically non-stop training, practice and drills.  We're doing stuff all hours of day and night.  Actually, there's probably more night flying than daytime, but I'm not sure why.

Of course, I'm doing awesome.  Was there ever any doubt?  All the other trainees can't even come close to matching my awesomeness.  Soarin said that I could be a Flight Leader by the time I finish training.  It's gonna be so awesome!

I gotta get going, tell everypony I'll visit as soon as I can, and I miss them.

Rainbow Dash

“It sure sound like Rainbow Dash is doing well,” Rarity commented later that day as the five ponies and single dragon sat in Twilight's library.

Fluttershy just smiled as she nodded slowly.  “Oh, I hope she finishes training soon.  It would be nice to see how nice she looks all dressed up in the Wonderbolts uniform.”

“Ohh!  Ohh! We’ll have to throw a big party when she gets back!  We can invite everypony over, and Dash and the other Wonderbolts. With lots of yummy food!  Cakes and pies, and especially cupcakes!” Pinky Pie squealed happily, clapping her hooves together eagerly.

“Oh, I'm getting hungry just thinking about all that food, Pinky,”  Spike leaned back against Twilight's side, rubbing his belly dreamily.

Fluttershy raised her head up, “um, hey…” she said softly.

“Sure she's doing fine an' all, but it's what happening in Appleloosa that worries me.  Sure they've got a bunch of Royal Guard over there, but it sure the hay means that things could go to from bad to worse in a hurry,” muttered Applejack, who cast a look over at Twilight.  “Sure as rain, things'll get darker before they get brighter.”

“It's like I said last time, Applejack.  This is all just a show of force.  The buffalo aren't really going to try to take on the Royal Guard, they wouldn't have a chance,” Twilight took a sip from her tea before adding, “They just want the best deal they can get by making themselves look strong.”

“… Um..  did somepony… hear something?” Fluttershy asked, looking around a little.

“Oh yeah?  If the buffalo are so gosh-darn set on peace, then why did they have the griffins light fire to that warehouse?” was Applejack's retort.

“I don't think the Buffalo ordered the griffins to do that at all.  Trying to make griffins do anything is like trying to herd cats.  I think they just saw it as an opportunity and did it on their own.”  Twilight poured some more tea for Rarity and herself.  “Besides, maybe the fire was an accident?”

“Pffa!” Applejack snorted dismissively. “They griffins would never have been there if it wasn't for the buffalo goading them.  And before you ask, yes, I'm sure that they were stupid enough to set that fire.”

“Oh, does anypony hear that?” Rarity quipped, tilting her head slightly.

With a soft sigh, Fluttershy nodded her head, “I was trying to tell you…”

“Sounds like..  Many ponies marching?”  Applejack looked at Twilight uneasily.  “And I can only think of one thing it could be….”

The lot of them dashed out the main door of the library, and looked up the road, toward where the sound was coming from.

And coming down the road toward them was a column of Royal Guard marching in double-file, their armor gleaming as they marched into Ponyville.  Most of the Royal Guard soldiers were lightly armored Pegasus ponies, with a smaller group of Unicorn ponies accounting for about a quarter of the force, with the unicorns wearing much heavier armor than their Pegasus counterparts.

More striking was the handful of ponies leading the formation.  A trio of unicorns, and a single Pegasus, wearing armor that looked much more ornate, clearly indicating their status as officers in the Royal Guard.

Most striking of all was the large unicorn in the very front of them all.  His lush golden-brown mane fluttering in the breeze as he led the Royal Guard contingent into Ponyville.  All clad in golden armor, which has the marks of battle on it, including a noticeable indent on one side of the chest piece. A grim visage on his face, and the steely look of a determined warrior.

Rarity gasped, causing Twilight to look at her.  Rarity's jaw hung open as she stared at the Royal Guard's leader with a look of shock, amazement, and maybe a little desire.  It took a few moments for Rarity to find her voice,  “PRINCE BLUEBLOOD?!?”

Next Chapter: Chapter Three -- Not all Wounds Bleed Estimated time remaining: 37 Minutes