Dear surviving stranger,
It all started without me knowing it, as silly as that sounds. The end of the Equestria came and yet I was in my own world seeking beauty and perfection as always. That was how I made my living, at least until the thin line of “living” became somewhat of a cruel joke. While I toiled away at sewing gorgeous ensembles in my shop, ponies just stopped “living” without actually dying at all.
Whenever I got to work on a piece, my mind would be completely into it. Every stitch I took in the way the fabric folded and came together. This usually meant I stopped paying attention to everything around me. So when my busiest fashion season came along my parents packed up Sweetie Bell and Opalescence to go on vacation for the week to give me my space. During this time a customer commissioned me to make her a dress inspired by a special wildflower for her to wear to a gardening convention. She dropped the pot of rare wildflowers off and offered to come by everyday to tend to the flower’s strict needs so that I wouldn’t be distracted from my work. The thoughtful dear knew how I lived and breathed fashion, so I would have no time to water a plant as fragile as hers.
She was supposed to visit my shop once a day until her dress was complete. Some days she did nothing more than water the plant while on other days I had to work on other dresses while the pot sat under a cozy sunlamp. Overall I never paid much attention to the visits until I realized that they had stopped completely.
It took me a moment to bring myself out of my fashion induced trance and into my surroundings. What had made me realize the absence was in a telltale sign of the subject meant to be my muse. It was beginning to wilt! But more than that, my customer’s carefully kept checklist for the plant sat nearby without a single note for the last three days.
This simply wouldn’t do, I couldn’t continue until the flowers were in good health again. Dying flowers were not beautiful and therefore not suitable inspiration.
I set down my needle and thread and crossed my shop to the phone. Using my magic I picked up the phone to my ear. To my shock no dial tone answered. I set my mind the clouds a lot, but the clouds usually weren’t quite thick enough for me to forget to pay the phone bill! Even if I had, surely my parents would have remembered.
While I set the phone back down on the receiver I began to realize that something more was not right. Not just the absence of my flower loving customer or the dead phone line. It was the town itself. This may be a small pony town, but I lived near Pinkie Pie who was by far the noisiest neighbor of all. Every day I had to tune out the sounds of party horns, balloons popping, and loud music. Even the sounds on the street weren’t exactly quiet. But that day for the first time I was tuning into the noises instead of out. No party horns, no balloons popping, no loud music, and no carriages going by. More importantly, I couldn’t hear a single voice.
The windows in my shop were covered in sheer curtains, so I could easily see outside. I just never really ever paid enough attention to them to care what was outside. Maybe occasional glances here or there, but I usually just didn’t have the time to just stare out windows. It merely only served as a way to let natural light into my shop and nothing more. Until that day.
What I laid my eyes on confused me and froze the very soul within me. Fires smoldered in the distance, some of the buildings already gutted by flames that were just dying out. In the street I could see countless carriages and wagons; many overturned or smashed into storefronts. I could not tell from my shop window, but I swear by Celestia that the streets swam in blood! Even in all of the madness there were ponies in the street. All of them shambled as if dazed, each covered in dirt and blood. The foolish thought of running out to help the injured ran through my mind momentarily until I saw a group gathered tightly around an overturned wagon. The wagon was still mostly intact, save for being overturned and having a gaping hole in the back of it. It didn’t take long for a frightened pony hidden under the wreck to try and make a desperate escape out of the hole. A mare climbed on top of the wagon in a shaken state, screaming and piecing the silence. Even this close, though, the sound was muffled by my shop’s thick walls.
The group began shaking and pounding the sides of the wagon, reaching their hooves toward her in frustration only to be bucked away. The more she struggled the more it seemed that it was fruitless. She was surrounded after all, and the ruckus she was creating in her shrieks only seemed to bring more slovenly ponies to join the crowd. In the end she lost her balance on the rocky wreckage when bucking at another attacker. She disappeared within seconds amongst the mass of bodies and could only howl in agony until her voice gurgled too low to hear.
I stood there in shock, wondering what I was seeing. Was it a riot? Were we invaded maybe? When the last of the group’s stragglers dispersed I could see nothing of the mare, just a large bloody spot and oddly shaped lumps I now know was flesh and bone.
I felt nothing but shame and guilt for not having done something, but I tried to reason with myself despite it. There was too many of them, I’m not much of a fighter, there was nothing I could do.
I was in a different kind of dazed state now. Instead of being lost in fashion and thoroughly content, I was lost for words or action, and panic was beginning to set. How had I not heard anything going on? Was I that able to separate myself from the world around me? Apparently so, but it wasn’t a time to beat myself over it. I needed answers! I needed to know what happened and what to do!
My steps were unsteady as I carried myself up the stairs to my room. My bed sat only a foot or two from my TV, so I eased onto the edge as though I may fall through it, the floor and into the earth’s very center. When I finally gathered my wits enough to turn on the TV a face of a very scared and unkempt reporter greeted me. His tie lay loose around his neck, his once pressed white shirt stained with various unknown substances. The more likely to come to mind first was sweat due to his face dripping with it. Behind him was nothing more than a blank blue screen while some kind of ticker ran across the bottom of the TV reading various news stories in a few words.
“Do not go outside! Stay in your homes and barricade all windows and doors! It’s been confirmed that the dead are returning to life! They may be slow and lack intelligent thought patterns, but are still quite dangerous!”
He paused, his eyes looking far away as if he debated continuing or as if he pondered his own belief in these words. “One bite from these creatures ensures infection. We are as of yet unsure of how long infection takes to kill a victim, but… but they all come back. Do not attempt to harbor or save those who have been bitten…”
Again he paused with a pained look on his face. “Your loved ones will no longer be themselves once they have reanimated… Memory and emotions are lost on the undead. Once they turn you are just mere meals to them. You’re no longer a mother, a father, spouse, or friend to them. Remember! Survival means that you may need to stop any pony before it’s too late! No matter what it takes.”
The reporter swallowed as if he had a large lump in his throat. His eyes closed tightly as he went on, sounding tearful. “Massive trauma to the head is the only effective way to kill the undead for good. A shot to the head, baseball bats, even severing the head are examples of defending yourself.”
His eyes opened. “Be safe, stay off the streets, and… don’t be a hero.”
The reporter sat silent for what seemed like hours before standing up. The camera was still live and showed just how much of a mess he was. The colt’s shirt was covered in blood splatter. His desk had been blocking most of the ghoulish site the entire time, the screen behind him showed hints of blood splatter now that he was no longer sitting in the way. It probably explained the way with which the colt spoke with such emotion. He probably did what he had to do to survive. Just because it makes sense does not make it any easier to do nor live with.
I sat in awe even as the channel changed to a blue emergency screen listing everything to do, not to do, and information that was known thus far about the incident. Not much actually was known, it was only three or four days so those kind of questions of “what”, “who”, and “why” wouldn’t be official yet. They listed theories like a super bug, radiation, pollution, and terrorism. Even a wild theory that Discord had escaped once more. None of that seemed to matter though, survival was first and foremost and the questions would just have to wait until there was a better handle on the situation.
I was lucky as a survivor goes; considering that I hadn’t been found while in my daydreaming state. If I could block the windows and doors while still remaining silent I would have a better chance at keeping myself safe. But quiet would be essential even if I blocked every entrance off.
The emergency channel scrolled more advice, this time on how to remain calm in this crisis. This reporter sounded overly chipper compared to the last one, especially under these circumstances. It was as if he didn’t notice the blood splatter behind him at all.
“Keep yourself busy! Though the zombies are dangerous, you own sanity could be what kills you in the end. Not only is this epidemic traumatic, but also those that lock themselves up for safety are likely to suffer cabin fever and even severe paranoia. Lack of sleep is also an issue if the undead are keeping you awake. It is important to remain calm and tend to your mental well being as well as your physical safety. If you have a hobby, do it to get your mind off of the tragedy outside. Dwelling on the undead could lead to an unhealthy state of mind. If you are safe, read a book! Play a game, clean, whatever it is that makes you happy!”
Happiness… Just one more beautiful thing in this world that has wilted. I had a hobby but now there was a flaw in it making it hard to be happy. The world no longer needed fashion and had just blackened into something ugly and unfashionable. The world was ugly now, not even worth painting. Fires in the distance blotted out the once blue sky, blood covered the streets, and every living subject I would have once created a dress for was gone or out there chewing on some pony’s brains! All that was left was death and a downward spiral into the monotony of survival.
From the moment I heard the news, all I could do fortify the shop. Every once in a while I would look out a crack of the barricades in front of the windows, but the site of those rotting husks lumbering about made my spirits lower each time. Even the wildflowers were beginning to die despite my efforts to rejuvenate them. For me, it was the last beautiful thing in the world. Would it too return after dying?
As the flowers withered further, so did I. I wept in a corner and mourned for all of the beauty in the dying world. Beautiful mares and colts, newborn foals, love, and of course friendship. This biological disaster had chiseled pony kind down to its uglier traits. I watched colts shove each other in the street into the paths of the wandering cannibals. Foals once in a while were wandering abandoned in the streets. Although this made me feel sorry for them, I was beaten to my own basic ugly instincts as well. I just stayed there and never helped. Out of fear I only wanted to survive. My better qualities were extinct. So I allowed whoever needed help out there to die.
I began to do nothing but sleep after a while. I at least had the advantage of blocking out the world on my side. The screams and moaning never kept me from sleeping, but they sure helped in giving me horrendous nightmares now that I was painfully aware of it all. Even my own sense of separation couldn’t save my sanity now.
I don’t know how long I just slept for, but I could no longer close my eyes. Frustration had gripped me in a tight hold that brought tears to my eyes. So I took it out on my own dresses. All of my completed works once inspired by things that were memories now and could never exist again. Screaming like a wounded animal I tore through fabric and kicked down mannequins. Some dresses tore easily, others it took more than one yank to rip it apart. My tantrum continued only until I had nothing else to destroy. I don’t know when it happened, but I also realized I was bleeding. One or two needles stuck out from the side of my lower leg, though it only pained me slightly. Like an annoying reminder of the world as it was now and never would be again.
I did not remove it immediately, just watched it ooze. If I bled to death would I become one of those hungry for the flesh of my fellow pony? Or did I have to be bitten to succumb to the curse.
My freak out had attracted a few morbidly curious zombies outside of my shop but the barricades seemed to hold well. I had gathered many heavy pieces of furniture to ward off intruders and since these creatures were essentially weak there weren’t enough of them to knock down my defenses. Yet, anyways.
My eyes became drawn to the window from my upstairs bedroom just as I saw yet another poor soul. This one was a young colt fleeing across a rooftop from a group of these monsters. Inevitably he became cornered with nowhere to go but down. Surely, I thought I was going to witness the undead feast on him right then and there. But he surprised me in a way that baffled my mindset. Instead of trying to fight, he turned his gun on himself. The slightest hint of a smile on his lips, he pulled the trigger without hesitation.
He dropped dead where he had stood, collapsing into fragments of his skull and brain matter. The dead were not picky though and began to pick him apart while he was still warm. He never got back up and that is when I knew that he was free.
“Of course…” I said quietly.
There was still beauty in this world, just not the typical kind that I had been so used to all these years. Those that died always got back up and killed. Then that pony would get back up as well and continue the cycle. But by shooting yourself in the head when it was hopeless, you saved countless ponies from ending up in your stomach! Thus preventing them from becoming a zombie as well!
“There is beauty in death…” I whispered. “…When you don’t come back.”
I began to laugh out loud as if it were the funniest thing I’d ever heard. I collapsed onto my hooves and knees. I was shaking from the giggles I let loose, my face hurting from smiling for the first time in so long. But then I began to weep, and I wept for at least ten minutes. When my tears dried, I pulled myself to a standing position.
Like a crazed mare with purpose, I set about the task of sewing my best creation thus far. All the while I used that scene as my muse. I didn’t have much time left anyways, food was running scarce in my shop and though I thought of eating Opal’s cat food, even that would run out eventually. This would be my best work even if it were my last.
If you are reading this then you already know. I will not be returning. Please be sure to bury me in my final work of true fashion.
Sincerely,
Rarity