Between Life and Death

When the Osprey landed on a pad about a quarter mile away from the base camp, the door opened up, allowing everyone to step out of it.

“Hey, Dance boy, I thought you said we were in Iron Air?”Clockwork asked

“We are in Iron Air-“

“No, we aint, this is Iron Works, I should know, I used to live here-“

“Well it’s been renamed, it’s now called Iron forte-“

“I thought it was called Iron Air!?”

“The hanger and take off area is, the town isn’t.” Dance Party smugly replied as he walked off, Clockwork growled before he started following him. As the approached the gate leading into the town Dance Party stopped them all, and as Clockwork started complaining, Dance Party pointed to the ground and right at his hoof was a small metallic dish, he leaned down and picked it up, when he stood back up he threw forward, when it landed another one shot out of the ground, into the air and exploded.

“What was that?” Twilight asked.

“Bouncing Betty, we get to close to one that happens.” Dance Party replied. He looked into the distance and saw a guard string at him, he started waving his arms and the guard walked behind a tower and out of sight, a second later, several red lights appeared from under the snow. “We have 2 minutes, let’s go.” He and the others started running towards the gate past all the lights. When they arrived at the gate the lights turned from red to green then disappeared.

“So, you made it back.” a man chuckled from behind the rusted iron wall.

“Yes, we did, now open the gat-“Dance Party replied, but was rudely interrupted.

“What’s the password?”

“Bitch please open the gate.”

“Nope, that’s not it.”

“Since when was there a password?”

“Since I said there was.” The man chuckled again as Dance Party sighed with irritation.

“Let me try.” Red requested a he walked up to the iron wall. “My name is Red, Captain of the army, I demand entrance.”

“Like I’m dumb enough to fall for that.” The man started laughing at him, Red pulled out his sword and stabbed it through the wall. “Oh shit, alright fine! Just take your sword!” Red smiled as he drew his sword from the wall. A moment later the gate slid to the side and the man who was talking to them appeared as he stood with in the opening. As Red walked by him he turned and allowed him to pass without bumping into him.

“So, Orange Hoof, did you finish the mission for once?”

“Yes, no thanks to you, you spineless son of a bitch-“

“Whoa, watch the language, we got kid’s here-“

“I bet half of them are yours.” Dance Party interrupted him; Clockwork started laughing historically as the others looked at him with confusion. As they walked into the town Clockwork rushed ahead of them and started looking around joy and happiness.

“Wunderbar! I missed this place!”

“You’ve been here before?” Dance Party asked as he approached him.

“Like hell I have, I used to live here, they used to call me ‘Master of the Steel Flames’ because I was the best weapons forger here!”

“Congratulations, I don’t care.” Clockwork stared at him angrily. As they walked further into the town they arrived at an old shed house that was falling apart.

“Wow, home never looked so good-“

“You used to live here?” Dane Party asked.

“Yup, although, it looked a lot smaller in the past.”

“We…remodeled.” Dance Party told him, he opened the door to the building, and when Clockwork rushed in his expression of joy quickly faded into shock and sorrow. The inside was completely different then he imagined, there were large glass cases with lights in them lining the wall, shelves with weapons and ammunition on them, and a table in the center of the room with a map on it and a light above it.

“What the hell did you do!?” Clockwork yelled with anger.

“Like I said we remodeled-“

“What? Oh no not that, I was talking about Dagger Fang!” Clockwork rushed to the back of the room that had a tank with a large snake in it, he opened it up and it slithered out. “You ok boy? Did those mean people hurt you?” Clockwork asked it sympathetically, as it slithered out it started wrapping it’s self around him.

“You shouldn’t do that, that thing is dangerous-“

“No…he’s just…lonely.” Clockwork replied as it strangled him. He fell over and his face started turning blue.

“Should we help him?” Dance Party asked as he turned to Monochrome.

“…Nahh, let his snake love him.” Dance Party walked to the back of the room and got a pair of keys off the hooks about the tank.

“We’ll take the Humvee and a Jeep, I’ll take you all to the safe haven in Central City, you’re on your own from there.”

“Wait, so, you’re just going to abandon us?” Twilight asked.

“I have to, if I don’t I’ll be considered A.W.O.L and they’ll hunt me down.” He walked past her and the others joined him. When Twilight turned around she saw Monochrome trying to unwrap Clockwork from dagger fangs hold, a few minutes later he managed to free him and dragged his unconscious body out of the building and the three of them rejoined the others. When they met back up with them Dance Party just handed his keys to two other soldiers who saluted him and ran off. “Our rides will be here in a few seconds, so don’t get comfortable.” He turned around and saw Monochrome dragging Clockwork behind him. “Did he get enugh ‘love’ from that snake of his.

“I hope so, if that thing loves him anymore his head is going to pop off like some toy action figure.”

“I’m happy I rescued him.” Clockwork added as he started waking back up.

“Clockwork, that thing hates you-“

“It loves me, your just jealous-“ and just then, an alarm started going off, everyone started looking around wandering what was happening. Monochrome looked into the distance, he saw someone smiling and heard him say “Time for us to shine” to some other guy before he started running.

“What the hell is that guy doing?” Monochrome asked himself, and right as Clockwork said something a giant machine rose from the ground on a lift. “Holy shit, look at that.” Monochrome smiled and dropped Clockwork he sat up. The man started climbing a latter on the side of the machine and sat in the seat, he then closed the two glass panels on the sides of him and it roared to life.

“Admiring the mech?”

“No bucking way you guys have Mech suits!?” Clockwork shouted with excitement as he stood up.

“It took years to get them corrected and fully operational.” They looked back towards it, it had a large glass windshield for the cockpit, two large cylinders on its back, a claw for its left hand and a flame thrower for the other hand. The cylinders on its back lit up, it ran forward and jumped into the air and landed on the wall, when it jumped again it landed outside the wall.

“I have to see this!” Clockwork yelled as he got up, Monochrome followed him. Clockwork flew up to the walkway and Monochrome climbed up the latter, and when he reached the top another two mechs landed near him on the wall then jumped down.

“This is going to be awesome.” Monochrome told himself as he looked over the railing. Three mechs stood in a single file line right outside Iron Works.

“Looks like the both of you find them interesting.” Dance Party said, Monochrome turned to his left and saw him standing between him and Clockwork. “Eachone has a code name, the first one you saw is Dawn Brake, the one with the drill is Miner, and that last one on the right is Moon Shot-“

“Why do you call them that?” Clockwork asked.

“Miner has a drill, Dawn Brake has a flamethrower, and Moon Shot has a .50 caliber mini-gun.’

“No way.” Clockwork said to himself as he looked back towards them.

“Hew, Dawn!” Dance Party yelled, the pilot in the center mech turned around. “Show them your weapon.” He lifted up his arm and shot a ball of fire into the air.

“Cool, hey, do that again!” Clockwrok called out, he pulled a cigarette out of his vest pocket and held it out and the mech pilot lit it for him. “Thank you!” he yelled before he started smoking his cigarette.

“So, what are the names for the operators?” Monochrome asked.

“Huh? Oh, Dawn Brake is controlled by Icarus, and Miner and Moon Shot are controlled by our two drunken morons-“

“Hey, I think they said yer name!” the Moon Shot pilot said with a heavy Irish accent.

“Yeah what do ya…-O’h buck off ye wee drunk prick!” the Miner pilot yelled at him with a heavier Scottish accent as he laughed at him. “Fine, if I’m the drunk moron then yer the drunk Leprechaun!”

“Are you call’n me short?!”

“I ain’t call’n ya fer dinner!” Dance Party sighed as the two of them fought each other.

“Ladies and gentlemen, Shamrock the Irish, and Kilt the Scottish.”

“Do these two always fight like this?” Twilight asked.

“Only while they’re drunk.”

“And another thing, yer mother hat the face of a hamster!” Shamrock yelled.

“What did ya say about me mum!? If ya say anything like that again I’ll break that bottle of whisky over that head of yers!”

“Bring it on ya dress wear’n, bag sacking-!”

“Would the both of you knock it off!?” Icarus yelled at the two of them. “We got multiple hostiles inbound, get ready.”

“Get, that skrew of yers ready lady man-!”

“That dress is a native fashion, and it ain’t a screw it’s a drill-!”

“Whatever floats yer boat!” Shamrock laughed at him then looked into the distance.

“Monochrome, I think we should get going.” Twilight told him.

“No way, I have to see this.” Monochrome replied then went back to watching the mech pilots excitedly. Icarus started pressing a few buttons on a screen and it turned on.

“This isn’t good.”

“What is it?” Shamrock asked.

“Ye didn’t break yer viewer again did ya?”

“No, they’re all earth walkers, be careful we got heavy hitters!” Icarus lit the flame for his gun and got ready to attack. When the infected got close enough a started firing and lit all the ones in front on fire. “Attack now!” he yelled to the other two. Shamrock lowered his gun and started firing at them, and Kilt shot the claw off his mech, he caught one of the many infected and started reeling it back towards him. Once the claw was reattached he raised his drill and it started rotating, when it was spinning at its full speed, he put the tip of it in the infected’s  head and it completely demolished it.

“Ah come on now Kilt, ya need to think of a more efficient way-“ he paused as he crushed a zombies head with the tip of his claw. “To kill these sorry bastards.”

“Alright lad, you want to see an efficient way to kill, I’ll show you one!” his drill split into four separate pieces and revealed a gun barrel, he pointed it upward and it fire a mortar shot which landed in the middle of the horde and killed most of them.

“Cool.” Monochrome and Clockwork both said at the same time.

“No one told me that Miner could do that.” Dance Party mumbled to himself.

“Theirs your efficient way to kill ya green hared drunk!”

“Who are you calling a drunk, ya drunk!?”

“You’re both drunk!” Icarus yelled at them both as he continued lighting everything on fire.

“Sir!” two men said at once. Dance Party turned around and saw two people standing in front of two different vehicles and saluting him.

“Hey, our ride’s here, we should get going-“

“But I want to see those three kill everything!” Clockwork whined.

“To bad, we need to get going before this gets out of hand.” he jumped down and landed in front of the two. Monochrome and Clockwork hesitated before they jumped down. “Ok Clockwrok-“

“I call Humvee!” he shouted and interrupted Dance Party, he ran to the armored truck.

“Great…Monochrome, you’re with Clockwork.” Dance Party  continued, Monochrome saluted to him then walked over to the Humvee.  “Uh…You and you.” He pointed to Agony and Twilight. “Humvee, rest of you with me.” He walked over to the Jeep and the others followed him and took their seats in it. Clockwork got into the  Humvee threw the passenger door while Monochrome got into the driver’s seat.

“You rush over to this thing and you don’t even want to drive it?”

“I wanted to use the turret…plus I never really cared about driving, even though it’s been my lifelong dream to ride in one of these things, same with the Osprey.” Monochrome rolled his eyes. He inserted the key into the ignition and turned it.

“You guys ready to move?” Dance Party asked over the radio built into the vehicle.

“Ready.” Monochrome replied, and as he put his hoof on the peddle their was loud noise that sounded like an explosion. He looked up and saw there was a dent in the gate. “D.P…what the hell was that?”

“I’d rather not find out.” The noise sounded again and another dent appeared on the gate. “Mechs aren’t responding!”

“Think the infected got them?”

“Impossible, those things are indestructible.” The noise sounded a third time.

“How strong are those things!?” Clockwork started panicking.

“We measured them at several thousand pounds.” It went silent for a moment, nothing happened for a few seconds then eventually one of the mechs flew over the wall and landed right behind the Humvee. “That’s Dawn Brake.”

“What happened to it?” Clockwork asked.

“I’d still, rather not find out.” Dance Party revved up the engine to the Jeep and drove to the back of the town and left threw the back gate. “I’ll go out this way; you guys take that way and drive over everything that gets in your path.”

“Roger that.” Monochrome started up the engine, and as soon as the gate opened he started driving as fast as he could running over all the infected in his path. “Dace, where you at?”

“Look to lour left stupid.” Monochrome looked out the window and saw him and the other waving to him.

“…Oh…Clockwork, get on the turret-“

“Aye sir!” Clockwork opened the top of the truck and climbed onto the bed in the back of it. He took the chain of bullets out of the box behind him, put them in on the side of the gun mounted on the stand in the back and started shooting everything that got close to them. Dance Party did that same, he took a pair of guns from under his seat, he gave one to Applejack and he kept the other, and as something got closer to them they shot it.

“Dance, how far away is Central City?” Monochrome asked over the radio.

“About 5 klicks, why?”

“Just wondering.” About half way through the frozen waste land they encountered a bigger problem, another horde, bigger than the one they just faced, and it was blocking their path. “Shit.” Monochrome whispered to himself, Clockwork climbed back into his seat from the roof.

“You do know that there’s an army in front of us right?”

“Yes Clockwork, I can see that.” Monochrome began speeding up.

“Monochrome, what are you thinking?” Clockwork asked. He started speeding up more which caused the others with him to panic.

“Monochrome, I think you should stop.” Agony told him, but he ignored her, and when they reached the horde, he drover right threw them all, running over all of them like they were speed bumps.

“Monochrome, your insane.” Clockwork told him and the two of them smiled, but Twilight and Agony didn’t find this amusing, while they were driving and running over everything they kept their eyes closed. Eventually, somewhere in the middle of the army one of the tires blew out and they started spinning until they completely stopped.

“Well…were bucked.” Monochrome laughed. When he was about to get out of the Humvee, Dance Party and the others drove up to them.

“Stay in the Humvee, I’ll take care of this-“

“You going to change the tire?”

“No.” Red Drove forward and got in front of them, then Dance Party leaned to the side and planted something into the ground then drove off. When they were gone it started blinking, then after a second a mech landed in front of them, but this one was special, instead of a claw and a weapon, it had two massive circular saws. He turned around and Monochrome waved to him with a nerves expression on his face, the mech pilot saluted to him then turned back around. He held his arms out and the saws started spinning. He slashed a zombie in front of him and it cut it right in half. Monochrome got out of the vehicle and approached him.

“Stay in the Humvee.” He told him with a British accent. “It’s too dangerous for you to be out here.”

“I can take care of myself.” Monochrome replied.

“You sure about that? What about your friends, they look like they can’t.” Monochrome turned around and saw the Humvee was being attacked.

“Oh shit!” Monochrome pulled out his scythe, he ran over to the infected and started slashing at them. The pilot didn’t bother with helping him since he knew Monochrome was strong enough to handle everything. As he was slashing at the infected, one of them jumped onto the cockpit window, and to get it off, he held up one of the saws and placed it right on the infecteds back, when it started spinning it cut it in half but it sprayed it’s blood all over the glass window preventing him from seeing. He opened it ad right as he did, another infected jumped on to him and bit him, he was incapable of doing anything since it had him pinned, he fell backwards causing the mech suit to fall with him. Clockwork saw the zombie, he pulled out his gun and shot it, it’s head exploded and the rest of its body flew away and landed at the suits feet. “Shit, did we lose our support?” Monochrome yelled as he helped the others out of the vehicle. Clockwork jumped out through the passenger side window and ran over to it. He looked into the cockpit, the pilot was bleeding from his neck and mouth and he had a faint orange light coming from his eyes.

“Monochrome, we have a problem!” Clockwork yelled, and as he did the saws started spinning and the mech got up. It turned around and faced Clockwork, his skin was starting to rot away already, and his eyes were glowing a bright orange. “Monochrome, we got an even bigger problem!” the beast roared at him then started swinging the saw attempting to hit him. He ducked out of the way each time it attacked him then eventually pulled out his gun and shot him, but before the bullet could reach him, the cockpit door closed and the bullet bounced off of it. The door slid opened again and the beast roared at him once more. Clockwork roared back and rushed towards it, it swung one of the saws at him, he was to slow, he moved out of the way but it cut off his right ear and blood started tripling down the side of his head. He didn’t care, he held up his mechanical arm and attempted t punch it, but his fist hit one of the saws while it was still spinning . “Monochrome, get your ass over here!”

“I’m a little busy!” Monochrome yelled back as he slashed his scythe at several zombies as they got close to him and the others. Clockwork took his fist back, he jumped into the air and attempted to punch the pilot again. He closed the cockpit door, but Clockwork’s fist went right through it, he grabbed his head and pulled it off of him and the mech fell back down. He released the pilots head and withdrew his fist, he attempted to open the cockpit door, he struggled for a moment then an alarm sounded and it slid open and he almost fell in face first. “Hey, think I could use this thing?!” Clockwork shouted to the others who were still defending themselves.

“If you can then do it, we could use all the help we could get!” Monochrome yelled back as he cut a zombies head off. Clockwork dragged the body out of the pilot seat then got in, he strapped himself in a pushed a few buttons and instantly the mech came back to life. When he stood up so did the mech.

“I kind of like this-“

“Good for you now get your fat ass over here and start killing!” Clockwork started up the saws then ran towards them, he swung once and managed to clear away enough of the infected, once they were gone he picked up the others. “What are you doing?”

“Hang on.” He took Agony and Twilight under both his arms and Monochrome climbed onto his back. Clockwork flipped a few switches, he started running then jumped into the air and somehow jumped higher then he would originally be able to. When he landed Monochrome looked back and saw all the zombies were running after them, and without warning Clockwork started running again nearly knocking Monochrome off. He jumped into the air again and landed even farther away, and this time when they landed they saw the others in the distance. Clockwork jumped one lasttime and landed right next to them, knocking th jeep onto it’s side when they landed.

“Where have you four been?” Dance Party asked as he climbed over the over turned vehicle.

“Fighting for our lives no thanks to you-“ Monochrome replied angrily.

“Hey, you four were in a armored truck, we were in an open roof Jeep, you have no right to complain.” Clockwork put Agony and Twilight down then opened the cockpit door. “Who- Clockwork? Where’s Lumber?”

“You mean the other guy? He’s dead-“

“You killed him!?”

“Buck no! Would have, but those other things beat me to him. So hey, I think we should get going since those things back there are going to be here in a few minutes and since they managed to get this guy, it’s going to be easier to get me since I’m nearly blind in this thing an theirs a big hole in the window.” He closed the cockpit and Monochrome pated the top of the suit signaling him to go, he ran forward and jumped into the air and landed what seemed a mile away. Hours later the others arrived at Central city and saw them waiting there for them.

“You guys do know you could have just ran alongside us instead of ditching us there.” Dance Party told them with annoyance.

“We’re just doing the same thing you did to us.” Clockwork replied. Dance Party rolled his eyes then looked up at Monochrome who was standing straight up on top of the mech.

“Monochrome, what are you doing?” Dance Party asked, he turned around and looked down at them, he was holding a pair of binoculars.

“There’s someone in the tower.”

“How can you tell?” Twilight asked.

“I saw them kick one of those things out the window.” He jumped down off the mech and landed roughly on the blood soaked stone walk way. He threw the binoculars into the Jeep then turned and walked past Clockwork who was smoking a cigarette. “Oh, and f-y-I dance boy, everyone here is dead.”

“What?”

“Yeah, these guys didn’t stand a chance. Everyone here was trained in un-armed combat, which made them easier to get bit. Also, they were never trained to kill anything, so all they did was constantly punch them since they’d never go down.”

“So everyone here is either infected or lunch for one of those things?”

“Pretty much, yeah.”

“Buck. Well, we might as well do something about that last person.”

“Yeah, we should.” Monochrome replied.

“So how do we get to the top of the tower?”

“Easy, theirs a stair case that leads to the top of that big dome, then theirs a ladder that leads to the tower top.” Monochrome walked off the central area, the others hesitated, but the followed him.