BATTLEFIELD 3-EQUESTRIA: The Griffonia Connection

"I don't know what to tell you Princess... they're coming from everywhere. Reports of Griffonian ships landing in the North Eastern regions..." Dash frowned as she looked up to Princess Celestia.
"We can longer stand by. This has escalated into open war. We are under serious threat from the communists. If they are allowed to take Northern Equestria then they will be able to use that region as a staging area for an invasion for the rest of the coutnry."
Princess Celestia closed her eyes and thought deeply.
"I don't know what we can do... I just hope the Crusaders aren't too late..."



HYENA PUBLISHING PRESENTS...




AN ELAINE SPITZER NOVEL...




BATTLEFIELD 3 | EQUESTRIA
The Griffonia Connection...

By Elaine Spitzer




3 DAYS EARLIER...

CHAPTER ONE | OPERATION ICEBREAKER
Mary-Louise "Scootaloo" Scooterson
Somewhere on the Equestrian/Foal Chi Minh Border
July 22nd, 2015
2229 HRS


Scootaloo opened her eyes. There was a second of blackness before she realised where she was and why. Crawling out from under the dusty tent she gazed around outside. Trees... a burnt out campfire... she remembered she was on an important mission. Reluctantly she picked herself up and got to walking, although it was more like staggering. She rubbed the sleep out of her eyes and let the warmth of the Northern sun embrace her. She wasn't quite used to the heat. Ponyville was comfortably warm and even then, it was mostly a pleasant coolness most of the time. Here the heat made the air quite thick; even the ocassional gusts of wind seemed to be dry.
She remebered what Dash had told her... why she was there.
"Just get in, find evidence of Griffon activity and get out. And don't fuck up."
"I don't fuck up. That's why they chose me to do this job." she had rembered saying. And now it was time to prove the truth in those statements. They say actions speak louder than words, and clearly now was a time to prove it.
Scootaloo gazed at her hoof-watch; eleven-thirty. The scorching rays of the sun penetrated shot through the spaces between the tall trees, making an intricate pattern of light rays amongst the shadows. She reached into her saddlebag and produced a cap and some shades. No body armour: she couldn't see the point. It weighed you down and if they were going to kill you
they'd aim for the head. No firearms either, just a small combat knife in case things got out of hoof. If things DID get out of hoof she'd probably get executed by the communist insurgents who were practically crawling over every inch of Foal Chi Minh.
Seeing the river ahead, she picked up the pace. The dead foliage crunched underneath her hooves as she found herself at the river's edge. Across the expanse of rapidly flowing water was Foal Chi Minh: a relatively small country which was 95% dense tropical rainforest, and snow capped peaks far in the North.
Scootaloo flapped her wings and hovered over the river, plopping down on the other side. It was time to find out the truth about what was really going on in that quaint country in the North of Equestria. Hopefully Applebloom and Sweetie Belle were already well on their way to the rendezvous point... if they hadn't gotten themselves horribly mangled on the way. She found a little patch of grass and laid down, looking out for the two ponies who were supposed to meet her there. She lazily gazed around, content that the tall grass would conceal her, yet provide enough visibility to look out for her comrades. She sighed as she allowed the warm sun to fall over her back.


Rainbow Dash
Canterlot Grand Hotel
July 22nd, 2015
2250 HRS


Rainbow Dash approached the mare at the desk half-heartedly, wiping the sleep out of her eyes.
"Going already miss?"
"Yep. Business as usual."
"Come back soon." she said, with a blank expression.
The noon sun bathed the cobbled streets of Canterlot in a warm, bright light. The weather was just how she liked: scorching hot. After all, it was Summer and the time would come for all the beautiful mares to start lining the beaches and tan their rumps but for now, Dash had to wait before she could indulge her fetishes. Business was business and it was time to get down to it.
The tall white and gold trimmed building towerd on either side of her like a line of fortifications, the sun glistening off flawlessly clean windows, glaring Dash slightly. She took a turn into a narrow alleyway and waited. Before long, a grizzled unicorn entered the alleyway with her. He wore a tattered tweed jacket with patches of cloth obviously taken from different jackets of the same color but not quite the same material. A Frankenstein's monster of a jacket.
The unicorn grinned up at her.
"Ahh Dash, you're here."
"Blueblood... it's been a while. And what the hell's up with that thing you're wearing." Dash laughed.
"This old thing? Bah... It reminds me of my youth." Blueblood mused, brushing his long grey hair to one side.
"Which part?" Dash asked, raising an eyebrow.
Blueblood didn't need to answer, the expression on his face changed as he remembered back when he had been a billionaire playboy royal. Most idle moments working at the CFSA involved sitting in an office... idle time where he could really muse on his past, but not really in the good way. Wearing the old tattered jacket instilled in him a sense of humility.
"Blueblood?" Dash's words snapped him out of his daze.
"Ah, yes. The documents." Blueblood ushered Dash along the narrow street. It was quite a long walk until they approached what appeared to be a small apartment building. They approached the door and Blueblood slid in a key, turning it with his hoof. The two entered into the little room.
The interior smelled of oil, hayfries, alcohol and to an extent, cigarette smoke. Blueblood noticed the expression on Dash's face as he turned on the light.
"You living in this dump?"
Blueblood shrugged. "Wife threw me out."
"Again? I thought you'd got the message by now."  
Blueblood let out a laugh and picked up a stray cigarette from the coffee table in the middle of the room and stuck it in his mouth.
"My ancestors used to live in wooden huts. Oh how far us unicorns have come... from wooden huts to shitty apartment blocks. You see! We're moving up in the world." he lit the cigarette with his unicorn magic and inhaled deeply, the feeling of the carcinogens flooding his lungs relaxing him.
Rainbow Dash simply nodded; mostly out of sympathy.
"Eh, she'll get over it eventually. She always does. But still, Rarity has standards you know. One look in here and she might decide to divorce me altogether. It's better than living in the streets anyway." Blueblood puffed a thick plume of cigarette smoke.
"Anyway, as you know Princess Celestia has authorized us to send in Crusader Team into Foal Chi Minh. And well, it's mostly under wraps but here's what I found out." Blueblood produced a yellow dossier from underneath the coffee table. He opened it up, revealing a few pictures and documents. The pictures showed Griffons in Foal Chi Minh, a pony holding up a Griffon Communist Party flag, a storehouse full of ammunition.
"This is...  a lot." Rainbow Dash's eyes gazed on the documents now.
"Griffon activity in Foal Chi Minh? But why?"
"That's just the thing... we don't know why. Contact with the government in Griffonia has been lost for the past 42 hours... ever since that communist revolution abolished the kingdom." Blueblood frowned.
"I have a bad feeling about this...." Rainbow Dash said as she continued reading the documents... "Something big is about to happen in that country..."