The Trotting Dead Episode 1

On the highway to Canterlot Prison. I sat in the back seat of a police vehicle with cuffs tying my hooves together. The guard driving the vehicle looked at me.

He said, "How you doin' back there?"

"How do you think? I'm the back of a police vehicle on my way to prison!" I said with sarcasm.

The guard grinned.

"Ya know, most of the criminals sitting in the spot you're in usually aren't as calm as you."

"Are you surprised?"

"Yes actually. There was this time a stallion started to cry and shouting out 'It's all a mistake! I didn't do it!'"

"But did he do it?" I asked curiously.

"They caught the guy standing in his living room with a knife in his hoof, his wife dead on the floor, and blood all over his body! Then he starting yelling 'Oh Celestia! It wasn't me! Please!' then he started trying to kick my chair and break the windows to get out."

"Damn." I said.

Something caught my attention trotting across the freeway. A pony?

The guard turned back to me.

"There was another time-"

The vehicle came closer to the figure; about to hit it.

"WATCH OUT!" I yelled.

The guard made the vehicle turn right.  He hit the thing, the vehicle fell off the highway and we tumbled down the hill in into the forest.

I woke up in the toppled car, my hooves still cuffed, and me leg cut open and bleeding. I was on my back, my leg close to the window. I could see out the driver's window. His body near a tree and his shotgun closer to the window. I used all my strength to buck the passenger window my legs were near. The glass shattered with a loud CRASH. I climbed out the car. I clipped my wing in the crash. And I couldn't straighten it. I walked over to the gun, standing on two legs. I spotted a shotgun shell at the front of the tipped car. Then I looked at the dead guard with a trail of blood from the car to his corpse. I walked to the body, found the keys to the hoof cuffs and uncuffed myself. I lost my balance and fell on my back. I got up in a sitting position. The body off the guard trembled. My eyes widened. The head of the undead guard turned to me. His face rotten and an eye missing. It hissed and started to crawl towards me. I backed away as fast as I could until I bumped into the car. Quickly looking to my left, the shotgun. I grabbed it, no ammo. I turned to the right and grabbed the shell that I saw earlier. Quickly loaded the gun and pointed it at the guard's head.

"DON'T MAKE ME DO THIS!" I yelled.

The dead drew closer. I shut my eyes and fired. I opened one eye, half of his head cracked open from the gunfire. His brain spilled out of his shattered skull. Blood everywhere. My leg started to sting and swell. I got up and looked around. More of the undead came out of the forest, groaning and staggering towards me. I got up on my hooves an galloped as fast as I could. I spotted a fence in my direction and sprinted towards it. I tripped on a rock and landed on my chest. The zombies drew closer. One got on top of me, I bucked it was hard at I could, I got up, and continued to run to the fence. I jumped and climbed over the fence. I smacked into the ground of what seemed to be a backyard of a house.

"Hello!" I called, "I need some help!"

My eye caught a glass sliding door not too far away. A tree house on my right. I stumbled to the entrance, banged on the glass. Looking through the see-through material.

"Hello? Anypony home?"

The door happened to be open. I unlatched the door to see a ransacked living room, furniture tipped on its side, some broken. I heard a muffled noise coming from below a sofa at the end of the room. I crept closer to it and pushed it out of the way. There was a walkie-talkie. I pressed the red button in the right side of the device and spoke, "Hello? Is anypony there?"

"You need to be quiet" said a voice on the other line. It sounded like a little filly's voice.

I walked over to a window in the kitchen. I could see the tree house outside. "Where are your parents?" I asked.

"They went to Ponyville and left me with a foal sitter."

"Where are YOU then?"

"I'm in my tree house! I can see you! Can you see me?"

I looked out the window. An orange filly with a magenta colored mane popped out of the door to the tree house. She waved to me, I waved back. She looked at me for a while, then gasped. I quickly turned around and a corpse jumped on me. I bucked it off and backed into the sliding door. The undead crawled towards me as I kicked it away. The filly came to the door with a hammer. I kicked the zombie once more and reached for the weapon when the living dead grabbed ahold of my leg. I smashed its head as hard as I could and shook it off. I hammered it a few more times to make sure it didn't come back. Dark blood spread across the wooden floor.

"Did… did you kill it?" the filly asked.

"I think so," I replied.

"That thing… it was a monster!" she said, "but you killed it."

"Are you okay?" I asked.

"Yes."

"What's your name?" I questioned.

"It's… it's Scootaloo." she said

"I'm Rainbow," I started "How long have you been alone?"

She paused for a moment, "Several weeks."

I thought for a bit, I didn't want to leave her so I asked, "I'm headed for Manehatten, would you like to join me?"

"Okay!" she smiled, "I don't want to be alone anymore."

We walked out of the sliding door and onto the porch.

"We should find some help before Celestia lowers the sun," I said.

"Okay, it's not safe at night," said Scootaloo.

We proceeded to the backyard and to the front gate. I put my hoof on the gate to open it.

"Rainbow?" called Scootaloo.

I turned and walked towards her.

"What's up?"

"Should I leave?" she asked, "what if my parents come home and I'm not there?"

I looked into her eyes and smiled, "I won't leave you alone."

She smiled back, "Let's go somewhere safe."

I opened the gate and spotted two mares trying to push a car. Scootaloo and I trotted over to them.

"Oh crap!" exclaimed the tan earth pony with a blue and pink mane.

I held up my hoof, "Don't worry! We aren't one of them!" I said.

"Oh thank Celestia!" said the lime colored unicorn with a green and white mane, "I was afraid you and the foal were BOTH gonna munch on us!"

"We're just looking for help," I said.

"Us as well," said the unicorn, "I'm Lyra."

"I'm Rainbow, this is Scootaloo."

The earth pony bent down to Scootaloo's height, "I'm Bon-Bon."

"I'm from a farm not too far from here, it's protected pretty well," said Lyra, "we were trying to get back when we came

across a…. road block." She pointed at the 2 cars blocking the street. "If you could help us, we'd be grateful. We can also give you a ride to my home until this all blows over.

"That'd be great!" Scootaloo said.

Lyra looked back to me, "Let's get you and your sister out of here."

"Oh," I said, "I'm not her sister. I'm just somepony who found her alone."

"Just somepony, huh?" Lyra said.

Groaning noises started to get louder from around the corner. The undead started to crowd the block.

"We gotta go!" yelled Bon-Bon.

"Scootaloo! Get in the truck!" I shouted as I helped Lyra and

Bon-Bon push the other cars out of the way. We opened a path as I hopped into the passenger seat with Scootaloo. Bon-Bon jumped into the truck bed as Lyra got into the driver's seat in hit the pedal. We got away before the dead got to us.

"For just somepony, looks like you've save a bunch of lives today." Lyra said with a smile.