The Trotting Dead : Assemble Towards Fillydelphia

Chapters

Part 2: Hit the Road
Part 3: A Loner Not Alone
Part 4: Twin Discoveries
Part 1: Waking Up Into a Nightmare

Part 2: Hit the Road

Vinyl groaned as she woke up, not at all getting used to unnaturally long sleeping due to head blows from ponies she didn’t really know. Attempting to sit up, Vinyl felt restraints tied around her hooves. Opening her eyes, she realized she was in a house she wasn’t familiar with, being watched over by 3 ponies.

“You’re up now. That’s good. Wasn’t sure how long you’d be out after that blow from Dinky.” Flitter spoke up and over her shoulders from a nearby desk.

“I’m really sorry miss… I thought you were dead.” Dinky told Vinyl, looking down at her hooves as she did.

“You though I was what?! And why am I tied up?” Vinyl demanded aloud, eliciting a scared glance up from Dinky.

“One question at a time. And I’ll start with the second one. You’re tied up because we didn’t know if you were bit.” Derpy spoke up from a sofa that sat right across from Vinyl, a baseball bat within hoof’s reach.

“Bit?” Vinyl questioned Derpy, her eyes flashing down to the baseball bat far too often.

“The bandages around your head. The blood we could see through them. We thought a Trotter might’ve got you there and you wrapped it up in old gauze to hide it.” Flitter told Vinyl, turning around and revealing a bandolier that currently held 2 knives and a hatchet.

Flitter trotted over to stand above Vinyl, then drew one of her knives out with her mouth. Derpy stood up and trotted over once Flitter had done this, picking up her baseball bat with one hoof and swinging it between her shoulders as she did.

“Like the look of that knife? Because it’s what’ll kill you if you are Bit or if you come at any of us. So, be nice and tell us. Why do you have your head bandaged?” Derpy narrowed her eyes as she awaited Vinyl’s response.

“I got my head split open by a bottle a while ago. I’m not sure how long ago. I’ve been in a coma in the hospital.” Vinyl told Derpy, terrified of what these ponies might do if her answers were in any way ‘wrong’.

Flitter looked at Derpy with fear in her eyes. Derpy nodded at her, leaned over, and took the knife in her own mouth so Flitter could talk instead now.

“You’ve been in a coma? Through… all this? The past 3 months?” Flitter terrifyingly asked, worry clear in her features.

“Yeah. I guess you mean for those things out there when you say ‘all this’. I saw some in the Hospital. What are those things out there anyway? They look like ponies, but they couldn’t be. Didn’t you call them… Trotters or something?” Vinyl asked Derpy and Flitter, only eliciting a terrified glance between the mares.

Derpy edged forward and cut the restraints around all 4 of Vinyl’s hooves. Vinyl massaged each of them in turn once all of them were free. Sitting up afterwards, she saw that Flitter had sheathed her knife and Derpy was leaning her bat up against the frame of the door while leading Dinky out of the room.

“It’s not an easy thing to tell. Come get something to eat. We’ll tell you what we know while you do.” Flitter smiled at Vinyl as she trotted around her bed and paused to lead the way.

Vinyl shakily got up, and followed Flitter’s lead. Vinyl looked around the house as she best she could. All of the windows were either covered by heavy fabric or boarded over. Nearly all the furniture was overturned or rifled through. Vinyl became truly terrified as she began to think of just what she could have missed.

Eventually, Flitter and Vinyl reached the kitchen, where Derpy had set up 3 plates that were partially filled with creamed corn and a couple pieces of wheat each.

“Dinky’s already eaten and I just put her to bed. It’ll make it easier to talk. Sorry it’s not much to eat either. We only have so much nowadays.” Derpy told Vinyl as she took a place at the table.

Vinyl settled down and took a few bites of the wheat, then dug into the corn. Flitter and Derpy did the same, though they kept stealing glances towards first the doors, then the windows, then upstairs, then to Vinyl herself. Once Vinyl had finished, she placed her plate aside, and folded her front hooves in wait.

Flitter and Derpy looked at each other, and then Flitter nodded to Derpy, who sighed and visibly relaxed her muscles.

“A couple months ago, stories started to pop up about missing ponies from all corners of Equestria, but who then showed up later on, only they looked far different. Visibly injured and unresponsive. Dangerous. Some thought Changelings. Others though brutal Foalnappers. None of them were right. It’s some kind of… disease, or plague maybe that brings back dead ponies.” Flitter paused, hoping Vinyl would understand.

Vinyl felt sweat begin to bead on her forehead as she heard this.

“Raise the dead? How? And how do you know they’re dead?” Vinyl asked Flitter, to which Derpy responded.

“We don’t know how it brings them back. Nopony left alive does. And they’re certainly dead. They keep coming at you even if you do something to them that would kill a living pony. You can gut them, cut their limbs off, or bleed them dry, but they’ll keep coming until you take out the brain. That’s the only thing that makes them stop.” Derpy explained, her eyes darkening as she did.

Vinyl looked down at her hooves, fearful for what Octavia, Neon, and Silver Spoon would’ve thought of this once they saw it themselves.

“If you get Bit, you die. Then you come back. That’s why we were worried about if you were Bit. We’ve already seen it take ponies away…then bring back a shell of them…” Derpy shuddered as she remembered, at which point Flitter flew over and held her.

When Vinyl opened her mouth to ask who, Flitter took the initiative.

“She lost her oldest daughter and her best friend. Amethyst Star and Carrot Top. I lost my sister. Cloudchaser… Out of them all the ponies most important to us, Dinky was the only one we could save…” Flitter closed her eyes and felt a few tears fall as she remembered her sister, and held Derpy as she cried too.

“I’m sorry to hear that…” Vinyl spoke up, horrified that this was all she could say.

Everypony sat in silence for a time while Derpy and Flitter cried. Once the crying stopped, Vinyl spoke up on her own.

“You’ve both lost very important ponies in your lives. I’m sorry to hear that. I can see now that you treasure each other and Dinky even more than you did before. I myself have to find my wife and my adopted daughter. They weren’t in town when this happened, and I know my friend went with them, and he’d have made sure they were safe no matter. If I find them, it means safety AND numbers. Alone, we’re all vulnerable. Together, we’re strong. Come with me to find them. I understand you lost ponies here, but this town belongs to the Trotters now. We can find the living elsewhere. I don’t want to leave you, but you must know that I also have to find them. Please, just think about it…” Vinyl begged Flitter and Derpy, who could only look at each other and cry a few more tears in response.

***

“Graaaagh…” The Trotter growled up at Vinyl while it started to raise its head as she sped towards it, igniting her horn in magic along the way.

Vinyl narrowed her eyes in anger and her horn flared even brighter as she got closer to the Trotter, who had now managed to raise his front hooves up too. Another few seconds and Vinyl loomed directly in front of the Trotter who had no back hooves.

Vinyl still felt pity for the creature, even if it was trying to kill her. This had once been a living pony, same as her, or Flitter, or Derpy. As the Trotter began to snap its jaws more frequently, Vinyl closed her eyes and loosed a concentrated bolt of magic right through the Trotter’s head. A loud boom resounded around, and then the Trotter fell silent, drooping back into posture appropriate for a corpse.

Vinyl quickly reopened her eyes and scanned the area afterwards, hoping there weren’t any sizeable numbers of other Trotters within earshot. A few moments passed with nothing seen stirring, and so Vinyl pivoted and trotted back the way she’d come, only a small amount of blood on her white coat as any indication of what she’d just done.

Flitter sat at the helm of an abandoned carriage a couple streets away, her hatchet clenched tightly in her muzzle as she swung her head from side to side, almost daring any Trotters to come out at her. Derpy trotted back and forth in front of Dinky on the roof of a nearby house, her baseball bat strapped across her shoulders with a piece of leather, and a knife clenched in her muzzle, bloodlust for any who would threaten her child clear in her eyes.

Vinyl trotted around the corner of the street ahead and down towards them, and both mares quickly directed themselves towards the movement, only to relax a moment later as they registered it was Vinyl and that she was alone.

“Only one Trotter. Had no back legs. I took care of him. Other than that, we’re clear straight through to the stalls and the Guard Post. No telling how long that’ll last though. We gotta go now, then try and get out of Dodge City before dark tonight.” Vinyl told Flitter and Derpy, carefully measuring the volume of her voice just so she wouldn’t attract any unnoticed guests closer.

Derpy took off from the roof, looped around and grabbed Dinky, then landed quickly and quietly next to Vinyl. Flitter launched herself off of the carriage and landed a little ahead of Vinyl and Derpy. Flitter sheathed her hatchet in her bandolier, then drew her other knife in her left front hoof.

“Let’s do this.” Flitter nodded as she said this, and set off trotting towards where they all knew the best stocked food stalls would be, and from there, to the Guard Post for Dodge City.

Derpy set off after Flitter, Dinky on her back for protection and vantage. Vinyl brought up the back of the formation, keeping her eyes trained to in front of her, but never leaving the streets behind them forgotten for long.

The 4 ponies made good time, only taking around twenty minutes to move as a unit to the last 3 standing food stalls in Dodge City 2 streets away from where they’d started. Some of the stock had rotted, and more of it had been sloppily looted, but there was enough for at least a few days food for everypony present left. Derpy went over all the stock, checking for bugs, bruises, and diseases like Carrot Top had taught her for their gardens long ago.

“It’s not enough to not worry about finding more before Fillydelphia, but this is enough to ration out well for a couple weeks on the road if we’re smart about it from the start. If we’re lucky, this will last us at least til Horseshoe Bay, and maybe even til Baltimare. There’s some seeds under the counters too, so once we settle down somewhere, we can get produce growing.” Derpy informed the others once she had shovelled what was left of the good and useable stock evenly into all their saddlebags.

“Great job Derpy. Now all that’s left is the Guard Post. If we’re lucky, they haven’t been looted at all. If not, then maybe there’s at least a spear or two and maybe a chest plate left. That would still be worth this.” Vinyl called out from her position further down the street, where she could clearly see the old Guard Post.

Flitter touched down next to Vinyl a moment later, and Derpy not but 10 seconds after Flitter, Dinky still safely on her back.

“I’ve seen Guards open up the locks to it before. It’s a really white flare of magic from their horns once they insert them into the seal. Not much use to us since Dinky can’t use magic yet and Derpy and I are both Pegasi, but you can probably open it Vinyl.” Flitter told Vinyl what she remembered from her Weather Patrols around Dodge City.

“I’m sorry I can’t help too….” Dinky lightly called out from Derpy’s back, hanging her head a bit afterwards.

“You help plenty Sweetie. You give us another reason to push, another reason to survive. And nowadays, that’s more valuable than any number of bits.” Derpy wiped away tears as she tried to help Dinky realize her role in the new world.

Vinyl weakly smiled at Derpy, truly hoping their journey to Fillydelphia could help her as much as it would help Vinyl herself. Flitter let her tears fall freely, not bothering to hide them from the others.

Everypony spread out and stopped their trot as they finally arrived in front of the Guard Post. It was protected by a barred door, with an odd seal worked into where there would usually be a key hole instead.

Flitter stood to the left side of the building, while Derpy and Dinky took the right. Vinyl trotted forward and inserted her horn where Flitter had told her to. Focusing immensely, Vinyl flooded a huge burst of white light out of her horn and into the seal. A moment later, the seal unlocked and the door swung inward.

Vinyl genuinely smiled for the first time in days, and her smile was mirrored on all the others. The quickly galloped forward into the Guard Post, with Derpy and Flitter quickly and quietly closing the gate behind them. Turning around, they saw Vinyl had frozen, and they could also see why.

There were 4 Trotters ahead of them, all wearing Guard Armor. One had a broken horn, and another had only one wing. One was missing a back leg, and one had blooded smeared on him from his muzzle to his flank. Once the gate was closed, all 4 took notice of the group and took one shaky step towards them.

Vinyl immediately flared her horn up and blew a hole clear through the face of the closest Trotter, splattering grey brain matter all across the far back wall. As the first Trotter fell, Flitter charged forward with her knife and rammed it into the temple of the farthest left Trotter, causing him to seize up and collapse immediately. Derpy quickly slid Dinky off her back and bucked her baseball bat off of her, taking the liberty of stopping the far right Trotter by bashing his muzzle out of existence, then rearranging his head to look more like an hourglass.

As the final Trotter shifted towards Derpy when she got up from stopping her Trotter, Flitter quickly grabbed her hatchet out of her bandolier and took off the top half of his head with a single swing. The corpse took one last step before falling over itself and loosing what was left of its black blood.

All the mares were heaving heavily, and all were covered in blood, guts, and brains. Each shook themselves and rearranged their manes to compose themselves. Dinky stood in the back corner, but she no longer shook with fear any more.

“We should’ve expected there’d be Trotters in here. Whether old Guards or careless Looters. Maybe even other Survivors that got Bit. Buck.” Vinyl clenched her teeth and hung her head as she realized how careless she’d been about entering a locked up building.

Flitter trotted over to Vinyl and put a hoof on her shoulder in comfort. Looking up at the contact, Vinyl saw Flitter smiling at her.

“We’ll learn. This isn’t exactly easy to get used to. Let’s take stock and get out of here. If there are other Trotters nearby, they’ll be coming to this building soon enough, and we’d best hit the road by then.” Flitter told Vinyl, giving her one last pat on the shoulder before heading off to the back room.

Derpy followed Flitter, and Dinky galloped after her mom. Vinyl shook her head a bit, and followed suite not a moment after.

***

The mare’s perseverance was rewarded. At the post, they found two chest plates and two helmets sized well for Derpy and Flitter. In the back closet on a mannequin, they found a smaller version of the Royal Guards Armor, strangely seeming to be sized for a colt of filly only a couple years older than Dinky. It was far from a tight fit on Dinky, but Derpy refused to leave her daughter unprotected while she wore armor, and none of them could rationalize leaving the armor behind.

They found a few leather sleeves as well, clearly designed to wear so any pony could carry a small weapon with them on their front hooves. Derpy, Vinyl, and Flitter each took one. Flitter placed her hatchet in hers, and Derpy and Vinyl kept theirs open in the hopes they could each find a knife or two to put in them.

They also found 5 spears. Derpy carried two, Vinyl and Flitter each carried one, and Dinky was allowed to hold one for personal protection when they were on the road or fighting Trotters. Vinyl came across a Captain’s Helmet her size, which Flitter and Derpy both insisted she take, as well as a bandolier of her own, which came loaded with 3 knives, 2 hatchets, and a pair of short swords that seemed to be from Saddle Arabia. Two of Vinyl’s new knives went into her own leather sleeve, while she gave the other to Derpy so that all three of the mares carried at least one knife at all times.

“Those swords are a good find, especially for a unicorn. You can slice and dice a Trotter easy now.” Derpy smiled at Vinyl as she strapped her new spears and her old bat over her chestplate while Vinyl spun them around in her magic.

“I’ll reserve them until I really need them. At least until I can practice with them. My magic and these knives will be good enough until Fillydelphia, especially if I have you and Flitter with me. Speaking of our new weapons, can you and Dinky take these hatchets? I’m bad with them, so they’re just extra weight on my bandolier otherwise.” Vinyl lifted the two hatchets out and offered them to Derpy, who narrowed her eyes at them.

“Derpy. We already let Dinky carry a spear when she needs to. A hatchet is a lot better if they ever managed to get too close, not that we’d ever let them get that close to her. And you could stand to carry a more close range weapon too. Vinyl gave you a knife from her bandolier too, but a hatchet’s blade is a lot wider and you can swing with it. Please. If not for yourself, carry it to help protect Dinky better. And to help give me a better piece of mind about us going on the road with only the 4 of us.” Flitter pleaded with Derpy, showing genuine concern and sadness in her eyes as she did.

Derpy sighed, and took the hatchets in her muzzle. She slid her hatchet in her leather sleeve next to her knife, then turned and called Dinky over to give her the other one, which she strapped to Dinky’s back herself with a spare piece of leather she’d grabbed from under the counter of one of the food stalls.

Vinyl surveyed Flitter, Dinky, and Derpy now that they had managed to equip all their new weapons and armor. Now they looked like a real survivor force, even to other survivors if they managed to meet anymore before Fillydelphia.

Vinyl took a deep breath in, and steeled herself.

“Let’s go. We’ve still got about 2 hours of daylight. Let’s get out of the borders of Dodge City at least. Come tomorrow, we’ll official be on the road to Fillydelphia.” Vinyl told Flitter, Derpy, and Dinky, all who steeled themselves, the same as she had at her words.

Everypony trotted after her as Vinyl headed back to the gate of the Guard Post, and from there, out to the new Equestria.

Part 3: A Loner Not Alone

“Huwaghhhh…” A Trotter leaned up from its meal of a beaver, fat and blood dripping from its muzzle, only to grumble again as its head rolled off its shoulders a moment later.

A dark figure stood above the now decapitated Trotter. The mare wore a red cloak now died an even darker red from blood splatters. If the cloak were seen close up, three emblems of the same design could be made out spaced along massive stitching lines. The emblem was that of a blue shield with a filly in the center.

As the rattling of chains permeated her ears, the mare looked behind her to once again see her two Trotters reacting to the death of one of their own. Held in place by long chains that the mare pulled along behind her with her magic, each Trotter also clearly had their jaws severed and their hooves restrained by leather straps. One was an orange earth pony mare with a blonde mane and a faint trace of freckles near where its jaw once was. The other was a cyan blue Pegasus mare with a matted rainbow mane.

Looking down for a moment in disgust, the figure then pulled back the hood of its cloak to display an indigo mane that had long ago lost the degree of finesse it once possessed. As Rarity returned to facing forward, she swung her katana back behind her with her magic and removed the Trotter’s blood from it with a rag she had fashioned from her now valueless dresses. She then proceeded to sheath her blade across her back until next she needed it.

Continuing forward through the forest toward the edge of Baltimare, Rarity suddenly paused in her endless march as she heard an immensely loud noise resound forth from the train tracks a distance ahead for only a split second. Enveloping the hilt of her katana in her magic, Rarity minutely unsheathed her blade so that she could wield it either for or against the threat ahead.

Rarity continued forward all the same, but much more cautiously and slowly, now enveloping her Trotters chains entirely in her magic to muffle the sound of the rattling, knowing that hearing something different nowadays was just as dangerous as hearing a Trotters breath. Rarity heard the odd noise again and narrowed her eyes as she prepared herself to do whatever it took to survive, and to honour her promise to Sweetie Belle.

***

Vinyl unsheathed her spear at blinding speed with her magic and impaled a Trotter right through the left eye and out the back of its head as her horn’s glow died down slightly from having blown a hold through two other Trotters a few seconds earlier. Vinyl retracted the spear out of the Trotters skull, then spun it in a circle a distance ahead of her, slicing through the top portion of 3 Trotters before watching them drop.

Derpy dove down from the sky wielding both her spears, and aimed them to go clean through 2 nearby Trotter’s mouths as she began to climb into the sky again, shaking the corpses loose onto a crowd of 5 Trotters ahead. Swooping back down, Derpy spiraled and sliced down 3 more Trotter’s before backpedaling towards a clear area of space back towards the far edge of Foal Mountain. Dropping her spears, Derpy took up her bat and hatchet as 4 more Trotters approached.

Flitter stabbed a Trotter a ways ahead with her own spear, only to have it fall back before she could get her spear back out. Cursing, she drew her hatchet and cut through 2 more Trotters as she worked her way towards the corpse with her spear still lodged in its right eye. Swinging at another Trotter, she lost her hatchet as well. Cursing even louder, Flitter drew her knives and stabbed both of them through the eyes of a Trotter that Derpy had missed and that was getting too close to Dinky, bucking it back from her to dislodge the knives. A moment later, she stabbed them both through the temples of another Trotter, though she was heavily panting and could barely lift her hooves now.

Dinky sat crying towards the back of the group, though her spear was drawn and bloody. 3 Trotters lay dead a ways ahead of her, and Dinky was determined to be ready for a fourth and fifth at any moment. Looking about her, Dinky thought she saw a Trotter move just inside the forests edge near her, but it was gone not but a second later.

“How many more?!” Vinyl screamed out, blowing a third Trotter away with another blast from her horn, heaving as she did so.

Derpy bashed the temples of 2 more Trotters in, then dropped her bat and threw up. Wiping her mouth a moment later, Derpy shifted her hatchet and drew her knife too.

“I don’t know! It could be 12, it could be 40!” Flitter yelled out as she pulled her two knives out of the eyes of two separate Trotters, splattering herself with an immense amount of blood as she did.

“BUCK!” Vinyl screamed out, at last unsheathing her short blades and carving through 3 more Trotters before she swung the blades wrong and they became lodged in the abdomen of a still moving Trotter. Screaming, Vinyl backed away and tripped over the Trotter that had taken her spear. Grasping the spear hard with her mouth, she heaved it out of the corpse and into the advancing Trotters gaping mouth.

Just as Derpy prepared to launch herself at an approaching Trotter, she heard the slash of a blade and the Trotter’s head slid clean off its shoulders. Expecting Vinyl behind the Trotter, Derpy felt her eyes widen with fear as a hooded figure with two chained Trotters behind her appeared where the Trotter fell instead.

Flitter and Vinyl froze too at the appearance of the figure, and Dinky stared terrified at the Pegasus walker that was assuredly the same one she had seen in the woods minutes ago. The figure looked at each pony for a second each, then pivoted around and impaled two Trotters through their abdomens. Seconds later, the figure removed her blade from the Trotter’s abdomen and beheaded them both with a single swing before they could edge more than half an inch closer.

Flitter and Derpy continued to simply stare after the new pony in fear, but Vinyl snapped awake once she saw that this figure was helping them with the Trotters. Trotting forward, Vinyl fired off 3 more blasts from her horn, taking down the same amount of Trotter’s. Across from her, the figure put down 6 more Trotter’s, spiraling about through each slash, somehow weaving between the Trotters as though they couldn’t see her.

Once those Trotter’s had fallen to the ground, there were only two Trotters left standing. The figure looked to Vinyl, who nodded in turn. The figure galloped forward, slashing from each side, only stopping when each Trotter’s head rolled past her hooves, still trying to bite at her. The figure raised her front hooves, and smashed the skulls of these two in, splattering ever more blood on her cloak.

Once the Trotters corpses had lain still on the ground for a few minutes, everypony began to relax. Derpy flew over and hugged Dinky, crying over the shoulder of her daughter as she did. Dinky was crying too, though her tears were beginning to run dry. Flitter trotted about the corpses of the Trotters, retrieving their lost weapons and stomping on the decapitated head of any Trotter than snapped at her. Vinyl trotted over to speak to their mysterious savior.

“I should thank you. We were running out of energy and weapons. If you hadn’t come by just now, we’d probably be part of that group now. So, Thank You.” Vinyl smiled weakly at the figure, who was currently polishing the blood off her blade and pulling a pair of chains behind her.

As Vinyl looked behind the figure for the first time, she finally saw the chained Trotters and felt even amounts of fear and anger flood through her. As Vinyl flared her horn up, the figure whipped her sword over her head and pointed the tip right under Vinyl’s chin. Flitter froze as she saw this, and Dinky tapped her mom’s shoulder to get her attention to shift towards it.

Vinyl and the Figure never moved for a time, but neither did they lower their weapons. Finally, it was Vinyl who broke the silence.

“Why are TROTTERS with you?! And what did you DO to them?” Vinyl angrily asked the figure, ever aware of the blade at her throat.

In lieu of verbally answering, the figure instead slowly raised her right front hoof up over her head in clear view by Vinyl and Flitter, and then moved it towards the flap of her hood. Jerking her hoof back once she’d grasped the hood, the figure shook her mane free for a few seconds, and slowly opened her eyes to look at Vinyl head on.

Vinyl felt her magic flicker and fade away entirely as she looked into the eyes and at the face of somepony she’d very well believed to be long dead. Vinyl also felt tears begin to well up at the edges of her eyes.

“…Rarity?...” Vinyl almost whispered, somehow still unsure that it was really her cousin that stood before her now, carrying a bloody blade and chaperoning two mutilated Trotters, until she could ask it aloud.

Rarity smiled earnestly for the first time in a very long time as she saw her cousin well up with immense emotion over their odd reunion.

“Hello Vinyl dear. I’m glad to see you woke up from your coma alive.” Rarity felt tears bead in her eyes too as Vinyl began to openly cry upon hearing Rarity’s voice.

Vinyl galloped over to Rarity and instantly pulled her into a fierce hug, crying loudly into her mane as she did. Rarity stroked Vinyl’s mane as she did this, letting a few tears of her own flow off her face and onto the cracked ground below.

Rarity and Vinyl stayed like this for a few moments before Vinyl suddenly gasped and broke the hug, taking only a step or two back from where she had just been.

“…Where’s Sweetie Belle?” Vinyl sincerely asked Rarity, intent to receive an answer of some kind in regards to the location of a filly that was her little sister as much as she was Rarity’s.

Rarity closed her eyes and bit her lower lip, which continued to quiver without cease. Rarity bowed her head for a moment, bit even harder into her lip until a bead of blood appeared, then looked back up at Vinyl, pain that could never be conveyed with words apparent on the once avid dressmaker.

Vinyl felt tears in her eyes again as she saw this, and she immediately pulled Rarity back into a hug, intent to hold her as long as she needed. For a few moments, Rarity was silent. Then, she redoubled her hold of Vinyl and wailed as tears poured down her face, finally showing the depth of the mares strength to have hidden this hurt so well for so long.

Flitter and Derpy trotted around the two mares a large distance away, watching all the nearby horizons for any sign of more Trotters as Vinyl and Rarity helped each other through their respective pain.

It was well over a half an hour later that Rarity finally fell silent again and released Vinyl from her grip. Stepping back, Rarity looked drained of energy, but there was now a brightness in her eyes again that Vinyl hadn’t spied upon first looking into the eyes of her cousin.

Looking behind Rarity at the two Trotters again, now with proper information on their keeper, Vinyl finally understood why Rarity had chosen those two particular Trotter’s to follow her through this hell.

“Applejack and Rainbow Dash. I’m so sorry Rarity. How did they…” Vinyl began, only to have Rarity interrupt by whipping her chains and mush the Trotter’s a distance closer to her.

“Die? I’m not entirely certain myself. I found them like this when I broke into Golden Oaks to see if there were any survivors holed up there, maybe even Twilight herself still. Instead, I found them and the devoured corpses of Minuette and Roseluck. There were a couple odd, small skeletons off to the side too. I’d guess they were Owlowiscious, Winona, and Tank…” Rarity trailed off as her eyes suddenly grew dark again as she watched Applejack and Rainbow move loosely about at the noise.

“Why Rarity? Why do this to them? They’re not… even ‘There’anymore.” Vinyl calmly told Rarity, hoping to coax proper understanding out of the devastated mare.

“I was… angry Vinyl. Angrier than I’d ever been before. I was angry that they’d abandoned me. Left me to my own devices. Left me to protect myself and Sweetie Belle alone. As far as I know, they never even looked for us at the Boutique. The building was destroyed, but by Trotters, not by living ponies. You can tell. So… I decided they owed me protection. So I bound their legs and severed their jaws, then put chains around them so I could bring them with me.” Rarity paused as she seemed to survey the Trotters with clear eyes for the first time.

“Does…it work? Do Trotters ignore you? I saw you weave through them just now, but I thought you might just be going really fast.” Vinyl prodded Rarity to continue as she looked over the Trotters herself.

“It works as well as you’d expect. If you keep pace with them, you don’t look like you’re moving out of the ordinary to them up close. They reek too, so I don’t think a Trotter could smell me until I was already close enough to kill. They can still smell you on the wind, and they’ll still attack you once you ARE close. It’s far from perfect, but it has helped. If only…” Rarity closed her eyes and breathed deeply for a moment, steadying herself.

Vinyl looked at Rarity, pondering the smell comment especially, and saw a possible reflection of herself if she had found Octavia and Silver Spoon like Rarity had found AJ and Rainbow. Vinyl knew what she had to do.

“The living can help you fight through this a lot better than the already dead. Come with us Rarity. We could use the company and the power that you have. But… you should let them rest first.” Vinyl nodded at the Trotters, and Rarity followed her gaze, a sad expression on her face.

Rarity turned around slowly until she was directly facing both her Trotters. Rainbow’s glazed eyes drooped down to the ground, while Applejack’s eyes still seemed glued on Rarity. Their chains continued to rattle, and if one listened closely, you could even hear the slight strain against the leather around their legs.

Rarity stared at each of them in turn for a few moments, then closed her eyes and drew her sword, slashing off both Applejack and Rainbow’s heads with a single slash. Each head spun through the air and landed a distance away, still alive, though only the eyes could show it now.

Flitter nodded and flew ahead down the road to scout, while Derpy took Dinky aside so she wouldn’t have to see the next slash. Vinyl trotted up next to Rarity and put her left front hoof around her neck.

“I could end it from here. One shot from my horn to each of their heads and they can truly Rest In Peace.” Vinyl offered, feeling Rarity move forward slightly at her words.

“No. I need to end this properly myself.” Rarity trotted ahead to the closest head, Rainbow Dash’s.

“Rainbow. I’m sorry I was mad at you. I’m sure losing Scootaloo hurt you as much I hurt after lost Sweetie Belle. Please….tell them I’m sorry. I hope to not see you again for a while my cyan friend. Goodbye.” Rarity slashed down vertically on Rainbow’s head, severing it cleanly in half.

As each of Rainbow’s eyes spun about and then fluttered shut, Rarity trotted over to Applejack’s head, not bothering to clean her blade until all was done.

“Applejack. I loved you like a sister. I’m sorry I never said that while I could have. I’m sorry I couldn’t help Apple Bloom. I promised to help the Last Crusader though. I’ll save at least one Apple from all this before I come back to Sweet Apple Acres for a nice mug of cider. Until then…” Rarity left the rest of her words to be conveyed through her final slash as she severed Applejack’s skull horizontally through the eyes, at last letting them drift off of her and onto happier sights.

Rarity let silent tears fall as she wiped her blade clean and sheathed it again. Catching a slight sign of movement at the edge of her vision, Rarity turned her head towards it, and saw Vinyl Scratch a little ways ahead, a sad smile on her face and her hoof extended back towards Rarity, ready to help her take her first steps into surviving amongst the living again.

Rarity smiled again as she trotted forward, her cloak flapping about her as the wind picked up. Looking above her form, Vinyl saw that all three Cutie Mark Crusader Emblems seeming to fly alongside Rarity’s form for a moment. Vinyl smiled, knowing that the memories of those loving fillies and the friends she’d already lost could only help make Rarity stronger from here on, so long as Vinyl was there to help her see it that way.

Part 4: Twin Discoveries

Vinyl dug through the ground with both her front hooves, glad that it had rained just the other day so it could be soft on her scarred hooves, still hopeful there might be salvageable potatoes this far down from even the rotten others. Upon seeing that there wasn’t even rotten mush in the ground anymore, Vinyl sighed and trotted away, hoping that corn would be good for supper again.

Vinyl walked for about five minutes before she started to hear the others again. Once she was over the summit of the moderate hill that separated their recent vegetable farm discovery from their current camp a fair few minutes later, she was surprised to see Rarity being swarmed by both Flitter and Dinky.

“What’s up? You find a new weapon or something Rare?” Vinyl called out to the group, causing Derpy to turn her head back towards the group as well, ever the volunteering guard though she was.

“Better. Rarity found some Grapes. And quite a fair share of corn seeds too. We’ll have more than enough for an old world size crop once we settle.” Flitter smiled up at Vinyl, causing Vinyl to smile in turn.

“Good that we’ve got variety, cause the potato hunt only yielded 2 more edible ones.” Vinyl explained as she shrugged her saddlebags off and rolled her shoulders.

Derpy flew over the group a moment later, landing a short ways away and trotting back, picking Dinky up on her back as she did.

“We’d better head out. This farm is tapped. With the corn I got a few days ago, the potato’s Vinyl collected yesterday and today, and the Grapes Rarity was able to sniff out, we have enough for 5 days if we really stretch our tolerance for certain vegetables. Seeds are no good to us if we can’t settle, and while this place could be farmed, it can’t be protected by just us.” Derpy explained, shifting the weight of her spears about as Dinky leapt off and cartwheeled around.

“Where do we head though? Right into Fillydelphia? It’s been 7 months since the Trotters showed up. By this point, the place could be crawling with more Trotters than we have seeds…. No offense Vinyl.” Rarity added, worried she might’ve upset Vinyl talking about the possibility of a dead Fillydelphia again.

Vinyl shook her head and steeled her gaze on the others.

“We have to consider that possibility, no matter how bleak it makes any of us feel, not just me. I don’t see where else we could find decent food though. Back where we came from is the Foal Mountains, and there’s no guarantee Hollow Shades would have anything even if we doubled around to it. Even if Fillydelphia got looted, I’m sure there are some spots that got missed or some spots others could never reach.” Vinyl nodded at the others, hoping they’d understand what she meant by the last part.

“Sounds like you want to try your idea out at last Vinyl. Let’s do it.” Flitter smiled, hoping this really could prove to be a permanent adaption to their scavenging like they all hoped.

***

Three crudely stitched cloaks, made from different sized bed sheets, were spread apart a ways on the ground in front of Vinyl, Flitter, and Derpy on one side, with Rarity on the other. The smallest cloak was Vinyl’s, with Flitter taking the next largest, and Derpy with the largest cloak overall. Sweat poured off of Rarity and Vinyl as they held down three a single Trotter on each cloak.

“These ones should have at least a half decent amount of blood left in em. They only had tiny bites on the ankles, and no other injury where they’d have bled.” Derpy spoke out, hoping to give what they were doing a greater sense of reality.

Flitter merely nodded and danced back and forth on her hooves, in both fear and anticipation of what would happen next. Vinyl looked up and over at Rarity, who nodded in turn.

Vinyl loudly exhaled, extinguishing her magic completely as Rarity proceeded to hold all 3 Trotters down on the ground alone. The strain on her face instantly increased and the struggling of the Trotters became much more noticeable. Taking only two short breaths, Vinyl trotted forward and flared her horn bright again.

Vinyl blew an immense hole through the entirety of each Trotters skull, instantly allowing their bodies to go limp on the ground. Rarity heaved as released her magic at last, trotting forward slowly afterwards, unsheathing her blade as she did.

Vinyl efforts had not been in vain as Derpy’s assumption had been right. A large amount of blood and grey brain matter was splattered across the top portion of each cloak underneath the corpses of the Trotters.

Vinyl now backed away from the cloaks to give Rarity the space she needed to work. Rarity twirled her blade about each of the Trotters, looking for the indications she needed. A few minutes later, Rarity held her blade in place above her and looked over at the others.

“Most of the arteries are still intact on all these Trotters, with only a few portions in the legs ruptured and the obvious destruction of most of the parts that run through the head. I’ll gut them too so we can spill their guts for an additional mask of stench. It’ll be bad at the start, but if we spend long enough around it, the stench eventually won’t bother any of us.” Rarity explained, as she leveled her above the stomach of the first Trotter, the tip of the blade turned mildly to allow everything underneath the cut line to spill out with ease.

Vinyl lifted her sunglasses up off her eyes, concentration heavy in her features. Flitter stood stock still beside her, blinking as she looked at each Trotter in turn. On Vinyl’s other side stood Derpy, her wings flared out and Dinky on her back. Vinyl had argued to leave Dinky out of this the first time and Rarity had looked worried about it, but Derpy and Flitter insisted Dinky was already having an abnormal childhood and that she needed to fully understand what would be eventually necessary from her too.

Rarity cleanly sliced the first two Trotters open across their abdomens, allowing a large amount of blood to flow out from the gash and down onto the cloak. Slowly, the bowels then rolled out of each Trotters gash and down across the midsection of the cloak underneath. Flitter narrowed her eyes as she saw this and Derpy gagged a bit, but each held their place.

As Rarity cut open the third Trotter though, a minor expulsion of irregularly coloured gastric juices surprised her and she jumped back as she steadied her blade before her, expecting another reaction from the Trotter. As it merely laid there, bleeding and losing it organs as the others, Rarity regained her former composure and trotted forward to see what had caused the expulsion.

Vinyl trotted forward to join Rarity in her investigation, a burning desire to understand more about the Trotters and what could stop them or kill them, or even just slow them down. As Rarity peered down at the still bleeding Trotter, she sighed. Vinyl looked questioningly down at her cousin as she turned her head back to talk to her.

“Burst appendix. Would’ve at least hospitalized the colt before. I guess when he died, the appendix stopped pulsing as a warning of the burst because his brain wouldn’t register it anymore. It must’ve just stayed ready to burst until it got hit hard or slashed, like I just did. Jot that down as another medical abnormality these things have.” Rarity explained, looking over her blade as she did, clearly looking for an irregularity from the recent surprise in her last slash.

Vinyl nodded and stared down at the corpse, more questions about them on her mind then ever. Shifting her sunglasses back down, Vinyl trotted over to the first of the three Trotters on the cloaks, who appeared to have run out of organs to lose and blood to bleed from his abdomen.

“We need any more blood on these cloaks Rare? They smell and look rank already. Plus, I can’t imagine how much more we can really hope to get out of these after blowing their heads off and emptying their chests.” Vinyl prodded the husk of a Trotter with her right front hoof, jiggling what muscles and limbs had yet to be severed or blown off.

“I’ll take the legs off quickly, then we can be sure. Go grab all your gear. We’re gonna have to head out soon. It’ll be light soon, and we’ll still have to move slow to fool Trotters once we get near.” Rarity told Vinyl as she surveyed the horizon, which was beginning to show a faint hue of sunrise.

Vinyl nodded and trotted quickly back over to Flitter and Derpy, jerking her head back towards where they had stashed their gear a half hour previously.

***

Vinyl sighed with relief as she hefted the last torso of a Trotter into the crudely dug hole nearby, completing the very odd effigy others might see it as. Rolling her shoulders to shift her bandolier about, Vinyl galloped back to the others a short distance away.

As Vinyl galloped over, Flitter let out a short bird call as a sign of warning to Rarity, the only pony who could lift Vinyl’s cloak up without the risk of touching it. Rarity whistled back and raised Vinyl’s cloak up slowly off the ground in her magic, careful to allow only a few drops of blood to drip off onto the ground below.

Vinyl slowed as she reached the others, lowering her head so Rarity could slide the cloak over her easily. A quick flash of darkness over Vinyl’s head and the feeling of a damp cloth being draped across her shoulders and neck told Vinyl that Rarity was done. Using her own magic now, Vinyl shifted her hood off to look at the others properly.

Flitter’s cloak dragged on the ground around all her hooves, so she would have to watch her steps carefully or risk tripping herself or others up. This design difference allowed her to be a little more liberal with her steps, as well as more easily hide a large weapon underneath her cloak. The spears were intended as the absolute last option, but they had to still be able to use them if need be.

Derpy’s cloak was sized to allow Dinky to ride on her shoulders, with and additional sheet stitched along its back to allow Dinky to see and move if the situation required it. Because of this, Derpy’s spears were bound at her sides instead of across her back, though the straps could be pulled loose by Dinky easily if she needed them in her hooves quickly. Dinky carried only her hatchet now, as Derpy couldn’t risk the off balance of another spears weight in her steps when stealth would be required.

Rarity carried Dinky’s spear across her back instead, as well as one of Vinyl’s knives carefully tucked away into a refashioned leather glove Rarity had saved from the Boutique. Her cloak was not recently created, but nopony there could deny its effectiveness after seeing Rarity’s solo forays for food into groups of Trotters, or smelling it up close.

Vinyl’s cloak was somewhat short on her, but she had dipped her tail and hooves in the excess blood from the Trotters early to make up for it. Vinyl’s hood also had a moderate sized section missing to allow her instant, unhindered access to a blast from her horn without needing to first remove the hood if an emergency arose.

Vinyl finished surveying everypony, shifted her hood back down, and pivoted herself around until she was looking down the road that lead straight into the heart of Fillydelphia. Flitter trotted up next to Vinyl, with Derpy and Dinky staying behind the two of them and ahead of Rarity at the back of the formation.

Vinyl breathed deeply in once, and glanced behind her at the decimated landscape they were now leaving, possibly forever.

“Let’s go.” Flitter spoke up, taking the first step down the road, Vinyl and the others following her example not long after, just as the sun finally peeked over the horizon behind them.

***

“Uarghh…” A Trotter moaned as Vinyl sloppily slid past him, intentionally adding odd weight to her steps to make them look strained.

The Trotter stood still for a moment after Vinyl passed it, but it quickly returned to its former path and paid them no more attention than it would a building.

Rarity sloshed her steps from side to side ahead, having traded formation positions with Vinyl once they had started passing Trotters within 2 minute intervals. Her magic lightly enveloped the hilt of her sword, ever ready to draw and slash at a seconds notice. Derpy kept her knife clenched in her teeth, occasionally mimicking chewing on it to further her Trotter illusion. Flitter had her hatchet drawn and held close to her under her cloak, shifting her steps to appear as though she had a missing leg to Trotters.

As Rarity had discovered alone and Flitter had hoped, the cloaks and the walking patterns, in addition to the silence, was enough to fool the Trotters so they could pass by the small numbers of them instead of having to engage every last one.

By now, the sun was just shy of hitting high noon and Vinyl’s team had managed to make it about 9 city blocks into the clearly abandoned downtown of Fillydelphia. Vinyl’s eyes scanned every building for any sign of the living or any indication of halted decay, still believing that Octavia and Silver could be holed up with Neon directly in the city itself.

As Vinyl swung her head from side to side to examine every apartment building and skyscraper and trusted her measured pace and pattern of steps to guide her for a few minutes without having to check where they were, she suddenly bashed headfirst into Derpy’s back, causing her to trip slightly and tear her cloak minutely near her left front hoof.

“Buck! My cloak ripped. What the Hades are you…..” Vinyl harshly whispered ahead to Derpy and the others, only to stop as she too saw the reason they’d stopped.

A crowd of at least 300 Trotters was a block ahead of them, clearly having bundled together from the surrounding building and streets. The appeared to be merely standing with the occasional wanderer amongst them, until a few of them glanced up at the sudden appearance of Vinyl’s team. As soon as a few of them took a step forward, it seemed the entire group mimicked them and began to move as a unit towards them, even though they’d have no clue that the group weren’t real Trotters until they were already deep into their midst.

“Buck! What do we do?! We can’t take that many down, and there’s no streets to duck down!” Derpy hissed back at Vinyl, fear heavy in her eyes as she shifted Dinky’s weight on her shoulders nervously.

Vinyl quickly shuffled forward to stand next to Rarity, igniting her horn as she did so. Rarity grasped her blade heavily in her magic now and prepared to draw it, intent to draw it as soon as one Trotter got a proper sniff of her. Behind them, Flitter gripped her hatchet tighter underneath her cloak, ready to cut through it at any moment. Derpy nodded to Dinky, who loosened her spears from her sides, glancing nervously ahead every few seconds.

A few seconds after each pony had prepared themselves to fight, a silver arrow whirled through the air and passed through the closest Trotters skull, coming clear out the other side and embedding itself in the street. Two more followed the first, each one taking down a Trotter with one blow.

Glancing quickly up, Vinyl saw a figure at the edge of the roof of a nearby abandoned sweets shop. The figure loaded two more arrows by hood and loosed them before glancing down at Vinyl.

“Hurry! Into the alley just ahead on the right! It’s clear, and I’ll cover you from the beginning of Them!” The stranger yelled down at Vinyl, directing her where to go with a quick point of a hoof towards the alley.

Looking back, Vinyl mimicked the point, and Derpy and Flitter each took off towards it, Dinky holding tight onto her mom’s back as she did. Once all three of them were safely in the air, Vinyl galloped forward and blasted away two Trotters the figure hadn’t gotten yet.

As another Trotter appeared seemingly out of nowhere beside Vinyl, it was suddenly decapitated as Rarity galloped up beside her, fierce determination to survive in her eyes as her sword once again drew blood.

Galloping forward, Vinyl and Rarity entered the alley not 30 seconds after Flitter and Derpy turned down it, hearing another arrow loosed behind them as they did. Pushing themselves to the limit of the endurance, Vinyl and Rarity managed to catch up to and gallop directly underneath Flitter and Derpy. A few seconds later, after hearing another three arrows loosed, a shadow passed over Vinyl and Rarity as the stranger flew above and ahead of them down the alley.

“This way! Follow me! I have a camp just outside Hollow Shades!” The figure gestured ahead with a hoof again, speeding ahead a moment later to show the way herself.

Derpy struggled to push herself faster through the air, Dinky’s weight combined with her spears clearly exhausting her. Flitter looped back and took Dinky from Derpy’s shoulders, allowing Derpy to rest for a minute and get her momentum back. On the street below, Vinyl and Rarity each had sweat pouring off them as their cloaks billowed about them like dragons wings.

Nopony let up in their pace, even when the paved streets turned back to grass, and the grass into swamp. Only after a solid half hour of pushing themselves at their speed limits once they had exited Fillydelphia’s borders did they dare break, and only because it was necessary. Derpy vomited behind a nearby tree as Flitter constantly attempted to straighten Dinky’s mane to keep herself occupied.

Rarity sat away from everypony else, in a meditative posing, hoping it would help her recuperate faster. Vinyl sat heaving through breaths in the midst of everypony, and the stranger sat a distance ahead of her, her breaths still strained, but far quieter than the others.

The figure flew about the group a moment later and gave a small flask of water to each member of Vinyl’s group, for which everypony was grateful. As Vinyl finished her water, she finally decided it was time to formally greet the stranger.

“Thanks for the save back there. You’re really good with arrows.” Vinyl smiled up at the stranger, hoping to come off as a good hearted pony right away.

The figure shook back her pink mane and smiled at Vinyl, shifting the quiver and bow she had strapped across her back as she did so.

“Glad to help a fellow survivor. We could use more hooves at our camp anyway, and you’re all clearly capable. I have no idea how just the 4 of you made it that far into the city, but it’s very impressive. Woo-hoo.” Fluttershy told Vinyl, smiling wide as she did so.

Realizing how their mysterious savior was now, Rarity immediately galloped over and hugged Fluttershy, silent tears streaming down her face as she did. Fluttershy let a few tears fall as well at the return of her friend, but moments later, they broke the embrace in order to get back on the road.

“My camp’s only about a 10 minute walk from here, and we’re certain to have lost that crowd by now. Let’s walk there. The rest of my group will trust you faster that way.” Fluttershy explained as she set off on an odd weaving path through the overgrown plants ahead.

***

Breathing heavy with anticipation, Vinyl entered the camp a minute after Fluttershy had exited her sightline, just as the yellow Pegasus had instructed her and the others.

The camp was in a large oval shape around a very well sized pit of clean water, with carts and carriages stationed evenly around and pointing in every direction, ready to flee or attack from any direction. They were thin wire lines between several of the carts and carriages, some of which had vegetables on them, while others had weapons strung up.

As Vinyl felt a smile spread across her face, she saw Flitter and Derpy come up on either side of her, Dinky already galloping off ahead of her mom, with Rarity off to one side with Fluttershy and a tall stallion who currently wore a black face mask.

Just as Vinyl felt she couldn’t be happier about what she’d found for her and her friends, she saw two familiar shapes ahead. One was that of a fully grown grey earth pony mare with a dark black mane and a treble mark Cutie Mark. The other was that of a young mare with a silver mane, glasses, and a silver spoon for a Cutie Mark.

As Vinyl felt tears of joy well up in her eyes, she saw Octavia and Silver Spoon look up at see her, and then proceed to mirror the shock she knew must be plastered across her own face right now. As the two of them suddenly began to gallop towards her, Vinyl whispered something that only she could hear;

“I’m home now Octy. I’m home.”

Part 1: Waking Up Into a Nightmare

Vinyl Scratch trotted through the abandoned streets of Horseshoe Bay, her sunglasses resting on top of the bandages that wrapped around her head. Vinyl’s eyes scanned every building around, always alert for a tiny sign of movement. Vinyl’s saddlebags hung limply at her sides, their insides almost empty of all the supplies she had managed to get from Dodge City.

As Vinyl tripped slightly and agitated the cuts on the bottom of her hooves, she stifled a moan of a pain as her eyes finally glimpsed a moving thing ahead of her. The form was that of a clearly malnourished filly, trotting shakily forward, her head wobbling almost unnaturally from side to side, barely able to lift more than 2 hooves at a time. Vinyl knew that other Things might hear her if she called out to the filly, but she couldn’t stomach leaving anypony, especially a filly, like this.

“Hey there. Sweetie? Are you alone?” Vinyl called out as she got slowly closer to the filly, who had paused in her steps upon hearing Vinyl’s voice.

As Vinyl prepared to put one of her hooves forward in a welcoming gesture, the filly shakily pivoted around. Vinyl froze as she saw the filly’s face. Her eyes were green and glossed over, and her head had several gashes and chunks of flesh missing. Looking lower, there was an immense gash across the filly’s entire throat that reached at least halfway through it, clearly being the real reason the filly’s head had wobbled while she walked.

As Vinyl continued to stare at the creature that had once been a filly, it lurched forward a single step. As the Trotter finally finished shifted the position of its walking, it began to take steps toward Vinyl faster. Vinyl began to take her own steps back, tears welling up in her eyes as she knew what she would now be forced to do. As the filly began to snap it’s jaws and growl at Vinyl, Vinyl slammed her eyes shut, welled up her magic, and sent an immense bolt of it through her horn, aiming right for the Trotter’s head.

As Vinyl heard the corpse hit the ground, her tears welled up even faster, and she began to gallop forward, pushing herself as fast and far as she could through Horseshoe Bay, holding onto the belief that if she could just reach Fillydelphia, she’d find Octavia and Silver Spoon.

***

“I have to say Vinyl, I’m jealous. I’m a DJ too, and I never get gigs like you get. You’ve been better than me since you got that gig at the Royal Wedding.” Neon Lights told Vinyl, just before he took a shot of Spectra, grimacing as he swallowed it all at once. Thumping his hoof on the bar counter, he chokingly ordered another, even though there were already 3 other empty shot glasses in front of him.

“What?! You get way more songs recorded than me Neon! You just put out your 12th like what? Last month?” Vinyl toothily grinned at Neon, hoping to coax him into cheering up about his work.

As Neon finished his next Spectra shot and let it settle, Vinyl took another gulp of her Double Luna, a new drink invented at the Nightmare Night in Canterlot 2 months ago that nopony could seem to get enough of.

“And how well do they sell? Look at me Vinyl. Here I am ordering the cheapest, strongest drinks I can on a shared tab hoping for a cancellation, while you have 2 more gigs this week alone. I’m pathetic. I don’t even have a place to go back to tonight. At least you have Octavia and Silver Spoon.” Neon jokingly grinned at Vinyl, showing off his immensely bloodshot eyes with large black bags underneath.

“You know you’re always welcome at our place. Silver doesn’t mind giving up her room for a few nights anymore. She’s really grown.” Vinyl smiled as she remembered her adoptive daughter of 2 years, and how she and Octavia had held her as she cried the night her parents had died in a fire in Ghastly Gorge.

Neon smiled shakily for a moment, before ordering yet another shot. As Vinyl looked with sympathy upon her friend, she got tapped on the shoulder. Turning around, she saw that it was the owner of the establishment, Black Jack.

“Sorry to cut your break a little short, but do you think you could help shut up some of your fans with another song Vinyl?” Black jack asked her, years of stress and bar fights in his eyes.

Vinyl nodded, drained her Double Luna, and leaped onto her hooves again. As she passed Neon on the way to the stage, she made sure to give him a friendly thump on the back and a smile. Getting up on stage, Vinyl saw that the crown appeared far drunker than they were an hour ago. The booing was sloppier, and the whistling and ogling of her was far more prevalent than usual.

Vinyl shut it all out and started her set, confident she could calm down the crowd within 3 songs. As Vinyl paused between her first and second song though, she suddenly heard a drunken stallion boo extremely loud and annoyingly. Chancing a glance, Vinyl wasn’t very surprised to see Slish Slosh, the former skier turned drunk when he had broken his back hooves.

Vinyl was still able to shut out the crowd, but it was far harder with the added annoyance of Slish Slosh. As Vinyl took a few seconds breather between Song 2 and 3, she suddenly heard an angry roar from Slish Slosh. Looking up in shock, she was suddenly brained by an immense empty bottle of Sweet Apple Acres Hard Cider, which immediately split open a large and nasty gash on her temple. Wobbling not long thereafter, she only heard a quick and worried “Vinyl!” from Neon as she passed out right there on stage.

***

Neon trotted into the Hospital Room, a vase of flowers floating along beside him in his magic. Neon stopped and turned forward to force himself to look right at Vinyl, even though seeing her like this was painful.

Vinyl was hooked up to half a dozen different medical machines, all which were helping keep her alive. A mask encased Vinyl’s muzzle, which only moved gently as the machine pumped oxygen into her body and helped her breath. Another machine kept her heartbeat monitored from her left front hoof. A third was an IV that kept Vinyl as nurtured as she could be like this. A thick layer of white bandages wrapped around the top of Vinyl’s head. Vinyl’s eyes remained closed, just as they had for the past 2 weeks Neon had come to visit.

Neon swallowed as he felt tears well up again over seeing Vinyl like this. He pushed his sunglasses up and off his head, and levitated the vase of flowers forward so that they were nearly right in front of Vinyl’s face.

“Octavia got more flowers for you Vinyl. Roseluck, Minuette and Applejack all chipped in too. Heh. I don’t know why I didn’t too. Maybe it’s because they wouldn’t let me? Maybe it’s because I’m poor. Maybe… it’s because I’m the one who sees you like this the most often…” Neon drifted off as he spoke aloud to Vinyl, hoping his voice could help her wake up.

“There’s been some odd stories going around Vinyl. Some are saying the Changelings are back. Some are saying there’s a Serial Foalnapper out there. Me… I don’t know what to believe. All I know is that this list of Missing Ponies grows bigger every day and that the smaller towns out there have completely stopped contact with the larger cities.” Neon explained, hoping maybe he could have an epiphany about the scenario while he did.

Neon closed his eyes and breathed in heavy before he continued on.

“Octavia doesn’t trust it. She wants to go check on her sister in Fillydelphia. I’m not letting her go alone, and I’m not leaving Silver Spoon behind either. We’ll be gone a week. The doctors know where we’re going, and they’ll send word ahead if anything changes, and we’ll come right back…. Celestia help me. Why can’t I shake this feeling that this is something else? Something beyond Changelings or Foalnappers…” Neon paused, his eyes growing darker as he did.

“I’ll keep em safe for you Vinyl. I know what they mean to you. If we can’t get back… If you….Go… I’ll help them. That’s what I owe you. I hope to Luna this isn’t the last time we see each other, but if it is…” Neon choked on his words, shutting his eyes hard quickly afterwards and galloping out, only taking time to make sure the vase was safe on Vinyl’s bedside table.

***

Vinyl’s ears twitched, and her eyelids clenched tight, before slowly flittering open. Vinyl smiled as she heard the echo of Neon’s words to her.

“Thank you Neon. You’re a real pal. I guess I can come after you all myself now though eh?” Vinyl chuckled, before she started coughing heavily, the dryness in her throat suddenly making itself immensely present.

Vinyl heaved through her coughing, half expecting to taste blood any second. Vinyl pushed herself up, only to jerk back slightly at a strange pulling sensation. Looking down at her hooves, Vinyl saw the needles and pads that still connected her to her now silent life support machines. Leaning down and removing them quickly with her mouth, Vinyl again attempted to sit up, only to immediately feel woozy and fall right off the side of the bed.

Vinyl didn’t feel the impact of the hit very much. Instead of keeling over in pain, she simply groaned and got on her hooves more slowly this time. As Vinyl finally shakily stood on all four hooves, she looked around her and felt her eyes narrow in confusion.

The ceiling and walls were severely cracked and filthy, while all the glass from the windows was blown out all across the floor. The Hospital looked as though it had been attacked and nopony had bothered to clean up after it in at least two months. As Vinyl looked more closely at all the damage, her eyes drifted down to her bedside table and she felt her throat catch.

The vase on it was immensely cracked, with a few sections missing. The flowers were wilted to the extent that they had all turned stark white. Trotting forward, Vinyl reached a hoof out to touch the flowers. They immediately fell apart, almost turning to dust at her touch. Vinyl staggered backwards, afraid of what this could mean.

Vinyl padded around the room and into the adjourning bathroom, managing to slice up the bottoms of her hooves while at it, looking for anything that was hers and that wasn’t destroyed or missing. For a moment, relief spread through Vinyl as she found her sunglasses in the bedside table’s drawer, but as she attempted to put them on, she felt the bandages around her head and felt despair again. Vinyl rested her sunglasses on top of her bandages, not certain she should risk seeing in decreased lighting yet.

Vinyl then slowly moved over to the door to her room, never taking her eyes off the vase once she glimpsed it again, and then proceeded to push against it, only to discover the door was blocked by something. Shoving herself harder against it, Vinyl’s finally pushed through the door, which had been blocked off by a hospital gurney, and out into the hallway. Vinyl huffed for a moment before looking down the hall, and realizing she had been safer inside the room.

Rotted forms that appeared similar to ponies in shape, size, and height were lumbering around the hallway, scraping against walls and doors, until Vinyl entered the hall. As Vinyl looked up, the creatures as all appeared to stop their normal motions and redirect their movements towards her instead.

Vinyl quickly turned around and started galloping away, instinctively knowing these things were dangerous. As Vinyl galloped around a corner, she saw quite a few more of the creatures. Backpedaling in her gallop quickly, Vinyl took another hallway nearby, which fortunately lead to the fire escape. Vinyl burst through the door, making sure to slam it shut behind her before any of the creatures could catch up. Realizing only seconds later that she was in complete darkness in the stairwell and vulnerable to further attack as long as she stayed there, she lit her horn with magic and proceeded down the stairs.

Opening the exit door, Vinyl’s eyes started to water as she glimpsed proper natural light again. Vinyl was about to reach up and put her sunglasses on, but then she realized she could better see these strange creatures in this lighting, and her glasses wouldn’t help that advantage at all.

Vinyl trotted slowly forward looking around to try and see how all the other buildings looked. The plants everywhere were overgrown, and all the building looked abandoned and in major disrepair. As Vinyl continued forward looking around, she tripped over something in front of her, greatly aggravating her cut hooves. Looking down, Vinyl felt tears well up as she saw that it was a body bag she had tripped over.

Looking up with caution, Vinyl saw hundreds more body bags scattered around her and nearby abandoned carriages and carts. Vinyl closed her eyes and counted her blessings that Octavia, Neon, and Silver Spoon had already been far gone from Dodge City by the time this many ponies had died.

Continuing to look around for some form of proper life, Vinyl suddenly felt an immense blow to her neck. Gasping and collapsing, Vinyl only weakly heard somepony yell out.

“Mommy! I think I found somepony alive! I hurt them because I thought they were a Trotter though! MOMMY!!!” A filly’s voice strangely echoed through Vinyl’s ears.

Vinyl saw a shadow obscure her now limited vision, right before she passed out.

“Celestia Dammit.” Flitter spoke up, as another Pegasus mare descended down next to her.