XII

We were in front of the castle gates. I thanked Twilight for her help and she promised she'd wait hidden in the bushes. All 4 of us were wearing the most naturally-dark clothes possible so we could blend in with shadows. Me and the girls approached the locked gate and tried to look for a way in… nothing. But then Sweetie Bell spotted a piece of the wall was missing and it was covered on each side by bushes. It happened to be just big enough for me to squeeze through. I managed to get through, and so did the CMC, so we were in.

There was a slight lack of patrols and such. Two soldiers were standing near the drawbridge which was closed and there weren't too many more that weren't stationed in specific areas that allow quite a clear view of most of the courtyard of the castle. We traveled, carefully using the shadows as our cover until we had reached the side of the castle. I spotted a suitable area to climb up to a high window that would look directly into the throne room. "Alright, girls" I said turning my head to them. "I'm gonna climb up there and see if I can't spot the target. I need you gals to cover me the best you can. If any soldiers come close enough to see me, knock them out unless they see you. In that case, just shoot them and drag the body into the bushes." They nodded and I quickly ran over to the side of the castle with the climbable area. Lucky for me, Luna had done a kindness of making tonight a little darker than usual, so I blended in with the side of the castle much more.

I made sure my footing was stable, and then started climbing as fast as I could. It was a really long way up to the window I was trying to get to. After a while, I looked down and saw the three fillies sitting there watching out for any soldiers while watching me intently at the same time. It was about 10 minutes of hopping around like I was in Assassin's Creed before I had reached the window I was trying to get to, but it was worth it. Inside the window, two officers were conversing about the war.

One of them mentioned that the other one was the Lieutenant Colonel we were after: Ltc. McMarland. I knew his face now, but before I went, I realized that the other officer had found out about McMuffin's betrayal. A soldier (supposedly working with McMuffin on this) came up behind him and used a silenced pistol to put a bullet into the back of his head, spewing blood onto McMuffin's face. I shook off my shock and began my descent. As soon as I made it down, the girls were looking at me with hyper expect faces… I sighed "he's there."

We began making our way back towards the hole in the wall that we had come through. Once we reached it, the girls started to pile through. Before I went through, one of the soldiers out and about managed to spot me. He got a little skeptical, so he walked over to check if anything was there. In the time it took for him to walk, I slipped through the hole in the wall and moved out of the line of sight he would have if he looked through the hole. After about 5 minutes, I assumed he was gone and I got up to go rendezvous with the girls and Twilight. Once we were all there, we teleported back to the front of my house. "Great work girls. We got what we needed and didn't have to kill anyone!" I stated happily. "Mission accomplished!" They let out a loud "YAY!"

The next morning, I walked out into our main room to see Connor sitting next to Afanasai on the sofa. They weren't talking… in fact, Connor was sleeping. I greeted Afanasai and sat down on the opposite side of the room. "We need a plan" he said almost monotonously.

"Tell me about it" I replied. "We know he's there, though. We found him there. Now we just need a plan and an army." Afanasai and I started plotting on how to get to McMuffin. It was the most Afanasai had ever talked since I met him. Our plan was complex, but it was very doable and it was absolutely foolproof. "I think we're ready" I chimed in after a while. "Now we just need to gather enough ponies and weapons, split them into teams and give them a rundown on how we're gonna do this."

It took several hours to get all the weapons rounded up (especially because Connor was a complete slowpoke with the limp he had from the gunshot in his leg), but we were able to tell ponies to wait at the front of my house while we worked. "Alright everypony!" I shouted to address the crowd. We had also gotten Princess Celestia to contact any of the ponies from Cloudsdale that wanted to help, and obviously the Wonderbolts responded immediately. "As you should know (if you haven't been living under a rock), we are at war with the United States of America. What you probably don't know is that this war was a set up!" Quiet chatter began to resonate from the crowd of now surprised ponies. "I know it's hard to believe, but we have proof. We received notice that an Improvised Explosive Device was set off inside of the United States, and it was traced back to Equestria, leading them to believe it was us. Then, after those buildings burned down and collapsed, we found a letter from a military officer named McMarland. He got somepony to set up one live IED and one fake one. He believes that a second sentient species should not exist on Earth, so regardless of what may happen to him, he decided to take matters into his own hands. We have confirmation that he is at Canterlot, and that's why you're all here."

The crowd began to erupt with chatter once again. Afanasai fired a few shots from his AK103 up into the air, shutting the crowd up almost instantly. "Look, we've come up with a plan, but we need all the help we can get. First, we've gotta divide everypony into teams. Team leaders will be me, Afanasai, Spitfire, Connor (if his leg doesn't get in the way), Shining Armor, Rainbow Dash and Big McIntosh. As soon as we break everypony into individual teams, I'll give you all your instructions separately. For now, stay with your assigned teams and just talk, sing, do whatever you want to do. Just stay in your groups."

The groups got assigned. I went around to every group and gave specific instructions on how the operation would work. I also asked Princess Celestia to do something else to help out. Eventually Connor limped over to me and asked "why are you doin' this all today?"

"Because we leave tonight" I answered. I armed all the groups according to their assigned tasks, and Afanasai managed to get his hands on some… special grenades that we gave to The Wonderbolts for their task. Me and Connor each got one as well. My team was "Equipe Um." Connor's team was "Equipe Dois." Afanasai's team was "Equipe três." Spitfire's team was "Equipe Céu." Shining Armor's team was "Equipe Magia." Rainbow Dash's team was "Equipe Asas." Big Mac's team was "Equipe Escavadeira." All team names were in Portuguese just to be safe. We were all ready… we just had to wait for the right time now.

Me, Connor, Afanasai and Discord all sat talking. "So what is this operation entitled?" Discord questioned curiously.

"Operation Ground and Pound!" I stated proudly. "It's foolproof, trust me!"

"How doth thou know?" a voice interrupted. It was Princess Luna. She walked from the hallway over to me. "Thou art risking thy life for a single man."

"Truth resonates of thy words like light from a mirror" I replied, trying to speak as Shakespearian as possible. "Care has been taken in analyzing every detail of this plan and I assure any and all that it will not fail. That said, what is thy question's purpose? Doth worry for me gather to you?"

"Thou art a brave young soul" she said nervously, looking down. "I have appreciation of that. There is also many other things. One of many is thy comprehension of the forgotten speech of the ancients."

"From my home and birthplace, we call the speech thou speak of "Shakespearian"."

"So it is a commonality from thy place of birth?"

"Not quite" I replied. I noticed that everyone around me was gawking in awe at how well I was communicating with Luna. "Mr. William Shakespeare was a playwright. Perhaps the world's most famous at that. His speech was always constructed in this way. My spare time was often spent reading the works of Shakespeare. His mind was irreplaceable as well as incomparable to others." Something slipped out after that. "His knowledge almost matches thy beauty."

Luna's face went from dark blue to bright red. "Wha…?"

I heard Connor mutter "What the fuck have you done, brother." Afanasai was simply shaking his head in disapproval.

I noticed that my eyes had just widened, so at least I was shocked, too. "Did I just that out loud?" Everyone in the room nodded awkwardly in unison. "Well… this is… awkward."

I expected Luna to erupt in anger but she just stood there. She said nothing; her face remained as red as a rose covered in blood and Connor and Afanasai continued to disapprove while Discord just sat there uncomfortably. After what seemed like forever, Luna finally spoke up. "Doth thou speak those words truthfully?" I nodded. "Thy bravery has been proven once again, John, and has also shown thy kindness. I admire you on the same level."

It was my turn to turn red now. "Yo-… thy words are truthful?" I stumbled to keep speaking in Shakespearian. She nodded. "I'm… I'm honored."

"I believe ending this war should be what we worry about first" Afanasai interrupted with his tainted-glass-dark voice.

"This one…" Luna started. "He speaks the truth."

"As thy wishes command me" I said, smiling. "But I may not come back with breath in my lungs nor blood in my veins."

"When doth the end begin?" she asked.

I looked over at Connor. "We need to get going in less than an hour. Not any magic can teleport groups of ponies this big, especially all the way to Canterlot" Connor told Luna. "We also can't use the train system, so it looks like we have to walk, and that's a damn long distance."

"Then I shall give a farewell now and hope you remain alive later" she replied almost sounding sad regardless of her smiling. Before I could get anywhere close to saying anything she rushed over and kissed me… It went on for what seemed like forever, but it eventually ended. Afterwards, she looked at me with her face once again a deep yet bright red. She then simply ran out of the room.

"Well, that certainly was interesting" Discord spouted randomly.

"Yeah… Interesting… Let's go with that" Afanasai added sarcastically.

"Alright, let's get ready to take this shit head on!" I chimed in. "Get your groups ready and let's all start moving to our designated locations around the castle. Let's bag ourselves Lieutenant Colonel McMuffin, boys!"

"I'll go gather the groups. You wa-" I cut off Connor remembering something that would help… possibly.

"I think I should listen to… that song" I hinted.

"Nonononononono. You can't do that" Connor pleaded. "You'll go crazy."

"I don't care" I said. "I'm gonna do it" I walked into my room and got out of one of the boxes that had my stuff… an IPod and speakers. I turned up the volume to maximum and put on the song "Mr. Jack." As it started, my head began to hurt and my eyes started to water… It was coming back

Hey Mr. Jack,

Is that the mouthwash in your eyes

Hey Mr. Jack,

Is that the cause of your surprise

Hey where you at

On the side of the freeway in the car

Hey where you at

On the side of the freeway in the car

I began to uncontrollably throw up as I remembered what had happened. Outside, I could hear Connor telling Afanasai and Discord what happened. "He went into the back room of the shop to grab something, and this song was playing. He came back to see both of his parents dead. There was a guy standing over his mother's corpse and the guy was… let's just describe it with the word "necrophilia." He picked up an old revolver that his grandfather made him and blew the bastard's brains all over the wall… then he emptied 11 more bullets into his corpse. He was proven innocent and the killing that guy was considered justified, but now whenever John hears that song, he has a relapse of everything that happened."

Hey Mr. Jack,

Is that the trick of your disguise

Hey Mr. Jack,

Is that the cause of your demise

Hey where you at

On the side of the freeway in the car

Hey where you at

On the side of the freeway in the car

I started to regain my conscious thoughts, regardless that all of them consisted of unbelievable amounts of anger

. Your prospect of living is gone

You ran the light at dawn

Protectors on your back

Lights are on their track

You must now face authority

You're nothing like me

You must now face authority

You're nothing like me

Put your hands up, get out of the car

Put your hands up, get out of the car

Put your hands up, get out of the car

Fuck you pig

Fuck you pig

Fuck you pig

Fuck you pig

Put your hands up, get out of the car

The song finally came to an end after four minutes. I burst out of the room, almost breaking the door down. Connor was about to ask if I was okay, but I reacted before him. "Before you say something fucking absolutely pointless, let me remind you dipshits that we need to gather our weapons and leave, because the sooner we make it to Canterlot, the better chance we have of ending up alive after this, so don't say a fucking thing, grab whatever shit you need and move." All three of them were staring at me with wide eyes. I ignored them and stormed out the door with my equipment.

I only had one thing on my mind:

KILL LIUTENANT COLONAL MCMARLAND

Chapter title based off of the song "Mr. Jack" by System Of A Down