One week after he left, Crimson and his Guardians arrived at the ruins of Big Mountain. It seemed that that they arrived before Red Eye and started to set up command around the area. Quickly setting up a temporary barracks before the facilities could be properly renovated, he was surprised how undamaged the facility was. The last thing he remembered was the entire area in flames, yet, it seemed that a group was already trying to renovate the facility before he arrived. Once the facility was declared a command post, this would give the Federation a fantastic head start for the war. Crimson was about to walk into the long hallways until he heard the unmistakeable sound of gun shots as a 308. round pierced directly through the chest of one of the Guardians. While he cried out in pain, he looked at the large group of ponies dressed in Red. "Red Eye" Crimson muttered. He then went over to the injured Guardian as the others quickly took positions for cover-fire. Fire from the Guardians energy rifles hit many of Red Eye's forces as they quickly fell. The Eternal knew that something was not right, something was happening. He then activated his pipbuck to do an entire survey of the area and found something horrifying. This was not an expedition force, this was a full scale attack. Thousands of soldiers then ran over the craters walls as the Guardians struggled to hold them back. Knowing that gunfire would not take them all down, Crimson pulled out his infamous katana, Blackstar, and ran towards the soldiers at an ferocious speed that scared some of the Tyrant's troops. Covering dozens of meters in seconds, Crimson radioed to command. "Big Mountain is under a full-scaled attack. Requesting reinforcements via Vertibuck. Roughly about 10,000 soldiers attacking my entire squad. Big Mountain must not fall." Crimson radioed as he then jumped several meters into the air, and came down screaming a war cry.
Jarii and his squad loaded up into a Vertibird the moment Crimson's request for reinforcements, but he didn't plan on getting directly in the fray, after all, Magniitiums aren't for offensives when they are in small groups. He knew any large army was going to have artillery, even in the hellish Wasteland, and he was going to have his squad S&D for them, then it'll be their job to take a peice of artillery and fire it upon the enemy, leading them to misdirection, and once they were figured out, move to another artillery piece. Making Red Eye's forces try to hunt down those using their artillery would be that fewer that the Federation had to fight, and sow discord in Red Eye's forces as their artillery begin to fall and fire upon them. once their Vertibuck pilot got close, he told the pilot of his plans and had him divert off, and they dropped him and his squad near one of the ten separate artillery peices. In a quick attack, the 6 operators were killed, and Jarii had his squad sniper spot targets via his scope, and they tried to aim for officers, beginning their misdirection...
With the vertibuck and Jarii's support, the battle turned quickly to the federations side. The Guardians tried to keep up suppressive fire while trying to keep one of their own alive. With a quarter of Red Eye's forces and leadership already taken down, chaos began to spread across their ranks. The Guardians soon aided the Magniitiums by unleashing energy rifle fire alongside a heavy machine gun that was set up shortly before the battle began. With most of them facing against the Magniitiums, the remainder of the army that knew no retreat focused on one individual. Crimson. Shortly after he jumped into the center of the army, Crimson was surrounded by roughly 2,000 soldiers. The Eternal and Red Eye's forces looked at each-other in silence as they all drew out machetes and axes. Crimson, unimpressed at the lack of training raised Blackstar towards the enemy before getting into a defensive position. This swift and sudden move was enough to already send a dozen men running away from the battle. The remainder of the force looked at Crimson tensely until one of them decided to begin by attacking from behind. All that got him was a quick death via getting sliced in half. Slowly but surely, the enemy decided to rush towards Crimson. Within almost half an hour, Crimson had wiped out almost 1,700 men. 200 still remained alive due to mercy deaths via getting a limb getting cut off while the other 100 tried their hardest to defeat the Eternal. The Guardians then lowered their rifles to watch the bloodbath unfold, they could not compare to Crimson's sheer skill and abilities. Plus, he was basically wiping the enemy out for them. Five minutes later, an eerie silence fell before Big Mountain as almost the entire army that did not retreat were slaughtered. Mountains upon mountains of corpses were piled on each-other, almost enough to obstruct almost all view of Crimson. He climbed to the top of a small hill where he began to speak towards those still alive "Those of you lucky enough to have your lives, take them with you. However, leave the limbs you've lost. I want all of you to tell Red Eye exactly what has happened here today, the slaughter of his men in every detail. I want you to tell him the fear in your comrades eyes when they knew they were about to die in detail. And tell him, that he has not only angered the entire wasteland, but me as well. I'll see him soon." And with that, Crimson sheathed his sword and went over to check on the injured Guardian before heading towards Jarii. He turned around when he seen the surviving Red Eye soldiers beginning to walk away from the battlefield and looked in disgust.
Jarii and his squad strode confidently up to meet Crimson, "10 captured peices of artillery, and 23 captured Red Eye soldiers that are now on their way to the Encampment to be interrogated, long with 120 Red Eye soldiers that we confirmed as kills." Jarii told Crimson, "Nothing compared to what you did, but I would say it's fairly impressive to my speed-trained Magnitiums!" He said brimming with pride, "That is what Magnitiums are for Crimson, hitting the enemy from behind while the main force hits them from the front. It's why Glory's so successful, especially when you through Elatians in the mix! I'll tell you, you would have a fun time with an Elatian to see who could kill more!" - - Auto Merge - - (Also: Dat Kill Bill reference)
Crimson smiled at the compliment that was given it to him. "You and your Magnitiums are very impressive, you reminded me why they were so feared during the war. And the Elatian's were even worse. It seems that me and a Elatian would both have a fun time." The Guardians then gathered around the squad of Magnitiums and shook hooves with them. "Thank Celestia that you arrived when you did, my squad would have been destroyed if it wasn't for your intervention. Remind me to allow your squad for better supplies and weapons, once i drop word about you, the quartermaster will give them to you on the house." He then looked at the facility and smiled with pride. "Home sweet home for about seven years until it's destruction. It was Equestria's finest facility before and during the war and the birthplace of my kind. Restoring this will not only give us an advantage in this war, but the technology and prototype weaponry inside was light-years ahead of it's time, possibly century's ahead. That technological gap to the rest of the world was the reason all of my kind survived their augmentations." Crimson then wiped the blood from Blackstar and sleethed it again. "You can head back to Adelneigh if you wish, I'll stay behind and help with tiding up the old home and set up base to ensure another.....massacre like that" Crimson said pointing to the artificial mountain of corpses which were now being burnt as funeral pyres. "Never happens again."
Jarii nodded then realized something that his father told him about the Equestrian Wars, and Big Mountain, "You know. You're lucky to be alive,..This facility was targeted by a MAC round..." He muttered to Crimson, "Well, anyways, if there's any other way you want to use my squad, or even if you want more Magniitiums, let me know. In the meantime, we'll like to get back to camp to rest."
"I'll see you back there soon. Oh, and consider yourself promoted as well. You'll are allowed for a bigger squad if you wish, hell, i can give you an entire battalion if you wish. We'll discuss more when i arrive back later, see you there." Once Jarii had left, Crimson quickly radioed to his generals to start reinforcing the entire facility with the the Federations with the military and scientific officers. Within the next hour, five thousand troopers and dozens of scientists began to remove the debris from around the facility, most notably the Dome itself which took the force of a MAC round which almost levelled the entire facility. Luckily, because of the previous 'renovations' throughout the course of 200 years, 75% of the facility was rebuilt. At the end of the day, the flag of the Federation flew proudly above Big Mountain. Crimson went down stairs, elevators and hallways that were familiar to him despite the now deteriorating condition of the interior. He walked past the Eternal’s training facility and the large jumbotron sized leader board that sat on its walls. He walked into the scientific labs and the technology within, which still remained in flawless condition. He came to a pause when he seen his old bedroom however. Aside from being a small room with only a bed, a wardrobe, a television and a small desk with a terminal, the room contained more character then most of the facility. The room itself was almost untouched, with the exception of some rubble on the floor and moss growing on the wall. His bed was neat and tidy, since the last time he touched it. His desk contained a bobble head created by Stable-Tec of himself and the Eternals and an entire photo album that remained in pristine condition of old photos. He looked at the pictures and began to tear up at the memories. There was a picture of himself and his friend Sandstorm playing a prank on one of the scientists, another of him and Vulcan holding their weapons for a portrait for a magazine dressed in full armour and many more. One of these photos gave him pause, it was a picture of his wife Ocean before she was presumed dead through Vulcan’s betrayal which then led to the end of Big Mountain. She was standing next to a much younger Crimson happily with a warm smile that would be imprinted in his mind for the rest of his life. Crimson arrived back on the surface holding the photo album and a small suitcase of his belongings as he climbed onto a private Vertibuck to travel back to Adelneigh. He sat in silence as he looked at the photos again, and kept his eyes focused on his wife’s photo as a tear fell upon the album. It was extremely rare for Crimson to cry, and he only cried about the things he really cared about. As the Veribuck rose above the ground, he looked at the facility one more time and muttered something under his breath as the facility soon disappeared out of view.
Barely after 3 hours of rest and Crimson still on his way back to Adelneigh, Jarii had gotten his squad back to training, as he tried to condense 10 years of training into as little time as possible without loosing quality. If he knew that as well as he had trained this squad to adapt to Magniitium tactics, they still would be easily defeated by a true Magniitium squad, but he kept silent about that. As he yelled and pushed them more, he thought about how he could use these 7 to train a whole battalion. He would have to remind Crim that Magniitiums made up a fourth of the Glorian military, and that it was entirely possible that somewhere, old Glorian POWs who weren't rescued in the war 200 years ago could still be on this planet, just like with Equestrians on Terra... Meanwhile... "Sir, Faliia sir! We've just received a distress signal from...Sector 50..." King Faliia Hadriionus of Ciilonii secretary yelled out suddenly. "Sector 50? Are you sure?" He asked "Yes sir, and it looks like it sadly...is a Glorian signal...from THEIR planet." Faliia's eyes narrowed, "Prepare two Light Frigates, we're going in to save who ever sent that distress signal and kill whatever civilization that's survived."
Crimson arrived back into Adelneigh and seen the arrival of a very familiar group of ponies, The Brotherhood of Life. Rumors about their hyper advanced technology were true as they waltzed into Adelneigh in a slim black power-armor that appeared like the Los Pegasus Guardians, but much more menacing and carried weaponry that dwarfed anything currently seen in Red Eye's troopers. Leading the Brotherhood of Life were the remainder of Crimson's kind, The Eternals who fought alongside Crimson during the war dressed in their iconic Riot Gear. Hopefully, their name was still as fearsome as it once was to Glory all those years ago. Crimson was surprised to see the five survivors standing in a line as they saluted Crimson, in which in turn Crimson responded back with another salute as they soon hugged each-other. It was their first meeting face to face in 200 years. They wasted no time reinforcing their positions, even making Adelneigh almost untouchable by Red Eye, training all the current troops and supping them with weapons that put the Federation on par, even more powerful, then all of Equestria's former colonies combined. The Brotherhood even tapped into wartime sate-lights to record Red Eye's every move. However, they then noticed that there was movement from out of planet and advancing quickly. This could have only meant one thing....
Jarii suddenly got message over his helmet in the middle of training in a language he hasn't heard in 2 weeks, his native language, Glorian. "To whom is recieving this message, this is Admiral Tibar of Ciilonii, your distress beacon has been received and there are now two Light Frigates in orbit around the planet. Fear not, for the moment you recieve this message, your location shall be tracked and a rescue be properly made. If you are still alive, please respond." Jarii gulped then looked to his squad, making a "relax for a bit" gesture then activated his end of the radio and began speaking back in Glorian, "This is squiidariius Jarii, Legotium Magniitium, there is no need for a rescue, though I do request a small team for negotiating a final peace between Equestria and Ciilonii, for there is no more Equestria, and there is need of assistance 'les another power comes into power here and finds out how to travel space once more, thus causing another war. Please do not attack." Jarii waited for a response, to which none came, he would simply have to wait to see what they did...
The moment Crimson knew that the unidentified movements were, infact, Glorian Light Frigates, him and the Eternals ran as fast as they could towards Jarii and his squad where they seen the Glorian radioing back his command. While not speaking the language for over 200 years, the Eternals understood Jarii perfectly, leaving some of the other onlooking soldiers confused. Standing in line, the Eternals went from Crimson, Jackpot, Sandstorm, Dust, Sunny and Lace. They stood a fair distance away from Jarii to allow him to speak, and managed to pick up key words, such as a ‘small team’ for a ‘negotiation’. Crimson hoped that Glory would not attack the Federation, an attack from them would permanently wipe out any chance of winning the war against Red Eye. He had hopes that his enemies during the war would take the time to listen to Jarii’s plea. Incase no attack came, Crimson was the only pony able to properly discuss negotiations with Glory. Not only was Crimson the first and only pony in recorded history outside of the royal family that was on the succession line, but was told by Princess Luna herself on her death bed to rule Equestria when the Celestian dynasty died. This was even mentioned on her will list. Crimson began to walk towards Jarii and stood besides him, soon followed by the remainder of the Eternals. Once Jarii had stopped talking, an eerily silence fell upon the area. “This can’t be good.” Crimson spoke in Glorian.
Jarii sighed and looked to Crim, taking off his helmet for the first time around him, "No, no it's not." Jarii said in Glorian back before looking up to the sky to see two black dots through the cloud cover of the wasteland that rapidly approached. Within minutes, two Glorian light frigates punched through the clouds just around the camp. They were beasts nearly 800 meters long with a MA Cannon, numerous energy cannon and anti-air/spacecraft batteries, and on top of that, they could send out 40 Gloriian Sabriir spacefighter craft. They were fast and deadly, the main weapon of the Glorian Royal Space Navy. The two craft hovered above the camp for several tense moments, with no sign of movement aside from the automated scanning of the energy cannons. Then...A small shape fly out of one of the two, then quickly followed by several others. They dived quickly before pulling up and flying with incredible speed just a mere 200 meters above the camp, then slowed and turned back, seemingly having used the pass to locate Jarii. And Jarii knew those weren't Sabriis, they were Sriitus fighter-transports. Either way, not even Crimson and his fellow Eternals would have reconized them aside from the basic shape and layout, for they changed dramatically in the last 200 years as spacefaring technology improved. The Sriitus slowly pulled to a stop just above Jarii in a line, which then floated down vertically to land in front of Jarii and Crimson, and after they landed, an eerie silence fell upon the camp. Then, the back door of the Sriituses slid open to form a ramp. This was followed by 6 squads of Gloriian soldiers, one from each Sriitus, poured out, and it didn't look good, considering there was an Elatian squad in full power armor and heavy loadout, backed up by four Legotium Magniitium squads. Jarii gulped as another eerie silence fell upon the camp, but Jarii and potentially the Eternals knew this single group of soldiers numbering 48 was more than enough to take out this whole encampment, well, aside from the Eternals...
Crimson broke the silence as the Glorian squad stood directly in his way. He understood that they were on the planet for two possible reasons, firstly being was Jarii whom he had originally been trying to return home with no success. Then there was the Glorians themselves, and considering that there was an entire Elatain squad, provided that Equestria was going to never going to return to power again. "So you came back to finish the job?" Crimson began. "Your king wanted to order your kind to return to the planet and finish us off completely, to ensure nothing ever poses a threat? There is nothing else to kill. You have already turned this planet into a wasteland, slaughtered billions upon billions in almost cold blood and have reduced Equestria to a feudal state of society. You have killed our dreams of joining the stars, killed a co-existing harmony that we longed for. You have called us monsters, when sometimes all one needs is to look into a mirror to see ones true self." Crimson then turned around to face Jarii, clearly upset. His expression and feelings were strange, he felt like Jarii had betrayed him with the Glorians returning to the planet but knew that he has done nothing wrong, and was trying very hard not to directly insult his race for the relationships during the war. He looked back at the squad, speaking once more. "You should have finished the job, but you allowed us to live. And seeing how you have not raised your weapons, then you're priority's are clearly not for a quick extinction process unless your going to take your time. But if you are here to kill.... then kill me first. If the true end of Equestria has arrived, I'll die honorably for my country and for my princess." (Had an awesome idea for this scene, or a possible alternate ending for this RP, where Crim is shot and killed in the next post in an amazing fashion similar to Rorschach's death in Watchman. Once he died, Glory proceeds to wipe all sentient life from the planet.)
The soldiers remained silent and still, clearly not effected by Crimson's speech. They suddenly all turned to face an imaginary walkway, quickly lining along said imaginary walkway leading away from the center Sriitus' platform. Then a man in a Glorian admiral's outfit(think something along the lines of a dark blue version of General Lee Oliver's uniform) walked down the ramps and the soldiers all saluted in unison, "Ah, thank you for making yourself evident as the one in charge around here Crimson, oh, that's right, I know your name, anyways, you made it a lot easier on me. You know, you shouldn't be so quick to jump to conclusions about things, and must I remind you the EQUESTRIANS started the Ciilonii war, not the Glorians? You never sought peace. We did. But that can be discussed at a later time, squiidarriius Jarii over there made a compelling arguement for making final peace, which wouldn't really say a whole lot considering that this place is in such shambles, but well, Ciilonii Glory is always looking for new allies, and if we support you, we gain another potential ally, and you'ld gain a very, very powerful ally out there in the big black." Admiral Tibar said to Crimson, "So, I'm Admiral Tibar, and I would like to discuss helping you secure this wasteland for future prosperity that does NOT threaten Glory and her interests."
Crimson stood in silence for a moment, it seemed that the Equestrian government had lied to him, again, and the rest of the Eternals about Glory starting the war. Sandstorm stood besides him and whispered something in his ear, knowing that Crimson would be reluctant to help due to his ideals and his opinion of Glorians, which were changing since Jarii met him. Sandstorm then stopped speaking until Crimson faced him and nodded his head before facing Admiral Tibar. "As the last pony on the succession line of the Royal Family of Equestria, i speak for their dead souls, Princess Luna and for the future of the wasteland. We should probably speak in a more private location, such as the cathedral's interrogation rooms which will be renovated for such a talk. You'll be allowed inside of the camps, but please try not to cause trouble between our ranks. And to ensure your safety, you're allowed to have a maximum of four bodyguards, alongside my own bodyguards as well. Shall we discuss what you have in mind?"
Tibar nodded and motioned to four Elatians, "Everyone else, guard the Sriituses until I get back." then he turned to Crimson, "Lead the way. Glad to know I'm negotiating with one who was supposed to succeed the Equestrian monarchy, oh and Jarii, you may do as you wish until I get back, you are being temporarily incorporated into the Ciilonii military until we can get you back home to Terra." with that, Admiral Tibar and the four Elatians stepped forward and waited for Crimson to lead the way
Crimson whistled as four Brotherhood guards suddenly formed around him dressed in black power armor. Once they made the short trip to the Cathderal, Crimson led Tibar and his Elatian bodyguards into the interrogation room. It was empty with the exception of a plain wooden desk and two chairs with a bland cream colored wall. Once inside of the room, Crimson took his seat as his bodyguards stood behind him in formation, their rifles lowered. "Excellent. I might take this time to say that it's a pleasure to meet you and make your acquaintance. We'll discuss Jarii later. Now, you mentioned something about 'securing' the wasteland to protect your interests and another ally. Let's simply say that Cillioni was a disaster for both of us, good thing that the scientists in The Brotherhood have discovered several Equestrian like planets uninhabited by Glory nor another alien race. You can see where I'm heading from there. We headed north towards Cillioni all those years ago, so we're going south next time." "Now. What did you have in mind Admiral?"
"I had the removal of all opposition to the legitimate government here wiped away. Glory knows better than anyone that insurrection should be crushed as soon as possible." Tibar told Crimson, "And as you are the heir to the throne, you are the legitimate government. Consider yourself lucky we at Ciilonii are separate from the UC so we can act instanteously without bureaucracy. Now, how can we help you so you can help us? Oh, and on your interstellar expansion, please be careful for you could run into Earth Aliiance or Brotherhood territory, they are much more...thorough when it comes extermination."
"To keep things short, there is a power here that threatens my nation. Slavery based monstrosities that should be put down like rabid dogs. If this power were to rediscover space travel, they'll start another war with Glory as soon as they could. This tyrant goes by the name of Red Eye, an Earth Pony Stallion with cybernetic implants who is surprisingly charismatic. Red Eye is a monster. I have been planning to send Jarii back to Terra, but the war destroyed any forms of possible and safe return without the need for Glorian Intervention." "What i would be very grateful over is to end this war against Red Eye without the need to blow up entire cities with MAC cannons because i need to liberate the slaves if you will. Once the war is over, I'll unite Equestria for the first time in 200 years. Within 25 years, Equestria will return to it's original technological state. Within 50 years, Equestria will not only be terraformed but will be stable. And within 100 years, Equestria will have her colonies restored. The reason the outer colonies fell so quickly was that they were under-equipped, so i have no aggressive tendency to advance like a ruthless warlord in terms of territory. So to ensure the survival of Equestria, good if not fantastic relations to your kind and a long lasting peace, you should trust me." "And unlike Princess Luna, i don't pick fights."
"I had no designs upon firing more MAC(this stands for Mass Acceleration Cannon, so you kinda said Cannon Cannon in your post xD) rounds upon your planet, besides, analysis shows that any more MAC rounds could potentially push this planet out of the zone for easy inhabitable, after all, the bombardment that ended Equestria as it was pushed this planet enough towards your star to result in a 1.3764 degree centigrade increase in temperature to be exact." Tibar told Crimson, "But we have better ways of taking an area. In the two light frigates currently 2000 meters above our heads, we have a total of 4,000 Riigulas, 2,000 Magniitiums, and 1,000 Elatians along with 800 Sabrii, 200 Striitues, and enough firepower attached to both ships to give even a Citadel a headache. And not to mention all my men are well experienced from Ciilonii's expansionist wars. After all, we destroyed the Thyraxians, the first space faring nation in this Arm of the Galaxy and even managed to swipe a system out from under the Brotherhood and the Earth Alliance, as a show of Ciilonii's might of course. All you need to do is point, and this war of yours will be over within a week, not even long enough for a hyper speed message to get to Ciilonii."
