Unexplainable Causes

Chapter 4: The Abandoned

The terror induced shriek raced throughout the maze of ventilation; the circulatory system of the mansion that brought  life giving heat and oxygen. As though stricken with a disease, the vessels carried the frightful scream throughout all parts of the house, brining it an unnatural, terrible life, making all other systems aware of the infectious, painful howl of anguish.

In the first waking seconds of the awful sound, the whole group in the room above froze all movement, from their hearts to their lungs. Speechlessly, they listened at their own peril, the unnerving sound of pain flowing through their bodies, filling them with distress and burden.

The scream brought more to action than simply the house; however, for in the deepest bowels of the mansion, a creature stirred, awakening to the horrid scream as its consciousness finally made its way back to her.

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Her awareness had left her long ago as her consciousness was agitated into life by the terrible and unidentified  crys of horrifying pain. In her grogginess, she paid no heed to the yell, her mind still in whirls in her present situation. Her forehooves were binded to a support beam of the mansion where she hung two feet from solid ground, leaving the rest of her body to dangle while her arms and wrists seized in pain. Her stomach burned in an agony not fully realized in her uneasiness and weariness. She tried to force the lids of her eyes open so she could see where she was, for all she remembered was falling asleep. Now she was here; wherever here was for her.

Fluttershy's, who had been presumed dead, consciousness came in stronger, giving her new awareness as her mind finally started to register the sounds of anguish engulfing the room, which even in her incomplete consciousness brought revulsion to her mind. Such pain, such horrible pain flooding her entire body, in sound and feeling, infecting her with the searing, horrid angst that had swept through the house. Her ears immediately identified the wails as her dear friend, Rarity.

Rarity! Her dear friend! What was happening to her? This isn't the first time the young mare had heard Rarity's  whines and yells of deep angst but these were far more defined than the irrelevant and dramatic situations of the past. These were terrible, and unbearable primal screams of the deepest pain she'd ever heard. Her muscles seized in pain as a wave of unbearable feeling tore through her stomach. A silent, stream of hot tears fell from her face as she imagined the awful things that must be happening to her beloved friend and at the pain she herself felt. She could only imagine the cruelty that her friend was enduring. She wished she could take her place; she wished the screaming would stop, for it was more terrible than the seizing and cringing pain she felt.

Tears flowed freely down her yellow-coated face, hot with a depression no one could imagine. She felt the sharpness of a hot blade being wrenched in her, making her cringe at the thought. She sought only to wake up from this terrible nightmare that had taken hold of her consciousness, she wanted it to stop; the scream that haunted her mind and forced her to imagine the bastardization of civility and peace and live the torment her friend was experiencing. She clenched the muscles in her face, the only thing she could move at this point, hoping to at least deaden the sound, but her efforts bore no results as the piercing scream still engulfed her spirit, suppressing it in a blanket of awful guilt and smothering it in an unrealized want for an end.

An accompaniment to the dreadful wavelength came in a low, steady rhythm. A sound she knew, for it sounded like rain, but this sound was less frequent, and much thicker, creating a continuous echo of a heavy splatter. The sound; the uninterrupted, continuous sound complimented the highly pitched shrieks of pain and misery with heavy, almost melodious ripples of sound waves, resembling that of a leaky tap that fauceted something thicker than water. She could stand the unknown origin of the sound no longer as she looked about her, taking note of multiple drainage pipes running accross the ceiling, but much to her dismay, none of them bore any semblance to the thickness that fell upon the floor. The sound fell lower, toward the direction of the ground. Hanging her head in disbelief, she tried to block out the sound, but was instead met by another surprise. With her body being paralyzed in all but her face and arms, Fluttershy could only look in horror with her remaining bits of strength at her stomach, nearly vomiting as the poor mare gained new sight to the long cut that had been carved across her, blood dripping out of meter. Her eyes once more became lined with tears as her mind, at the sudden realization if the origin of pain, sent more jolts throughout her body, registering the pain on an unimaginable scale. Her mind was on fire, trying to understand what was happening while she forced herself to calm down, for her increased fear and heart rate only brought an exponential amount of pain. She looked around now that her head bore slight strength to move.

Her eyes fell to a blackboard in front of her, unto which there were multiple sentences under the heading of Coniine. She relaxed, trying to put her body in a more comfortable stasis for reading. With her eyes refocused, she read, 'Coniine paralyzes muscles by blocking the nicotinic receptor on the post-synaptic membrane of the neuromuscular junction causing a flaccid paralysis.' She blinked indifferently at the sentence.

It took Fluttershy many confusing moments to decode the medical jargon into a simplified statement she could understand, and as that understandment slowly presented itself, her eyes started to widen in sudden fear at the realizations coming to her. She seized once more in reaction to a wave of pain that ripped through her. She read on, her heart starting to race and her mind in a state of disfunction, 'Symptoms of paralysis occur within a half hour, and death may take several hours.'

Death...

Her timid mind could only fall over itself as it tried to discern the meaning. She knew what death was, but to have it upon her...

Death is absolute, the only absolute in a moving and changing world. You can fix anything, change anything for the better, for the worse, for anything. Everything can be helped, everything can be stopped, and for a lovingly complacent pony to undergo such an exposure to madness, hysteria, and death was utterly inconceivable to the untainted mind. Everything had always been able to be helped, to be cared for, to be changed, until she came upon such an absolute that held no alternative. Though she understood her fate, her mind just couldn't accept it. She was sure she had the deadly neurotoxin in her system for her next reading was completely applicable to her situation, 'As the central nervous system is not affected, the person remains conscious and aware until respiratory paralysis results in cessation of breathing. The muscular paralysis is an ascending flaccid paralysis as the lower limbs are affected first. '

She read in a new understandment as her mind became accustomed to the medical terminology. She suddenly understood why she couldn't feel her legs; why her stomach, which had a large, bleeding cut across it, could no longer react to the waves of pain; the neurotoxin paralysed from bottom to top. It would work its way up to her lungs until she asphyxiated and died.

She silently sobbed, unable to accept her fate, wishing anything could happen to prevent her inescapable future. Her dried rivers across her cheeks became newly wetted at her eyes' dams broke once more, letting the hot tears revive her sorrow. Uncontrollably, she cried, sobbing as her mind slowly became aware of her imminent death. She was going to die! Alone...

There were more sentences underneath the heading, but she could no longer find the will to learn more about the cause of her soon to be realized death. She knew no other emotion than utter anguish and grievance, each being accentuated by warm tears, nearly silent cries, and pain. She wanted nothing more than the sounds to stop; the terrible screams of her dear friend and the incessant fall of her own red blood upon the concrete floor and the unendurable pain that rested in her being. These sounds and feelings  filled her to the brim with emotion until she felt she would hear and feel  no more than this for the rest of her waning life. But she was proven wrong; her ears, though she thought she could hear no more, intercepted something that came through the concert of carnage.

A third accompaniment tore through the ventilation shaft, which was immediately identified by her as Twilight Sparkle as the lavender mare suddenly yelled out, "Don't worry, Rarity! We're coming!" which brought a flood of happiness and relief the likes of which nopony had ever known! Her friends, her dearest friends' voices rang in a sort of triumph throughout the stubborn house of death, sending wave after wave of goodness to battle through the sounds of the evil. Her friends had never failed her, her friends were always there to help her. And her friends always triumphed over any obstacle thrown at them. The magic of friendship had guided them through everything. Fluttershy knew it would see them through this, too. She listened with a newfound vigor, finally able to ignore the continuous screams and dripping of her own blood and finally held control of her pain receptors, for her stomach no longer bore any semblance in pain as it had before.

She heard multiple assurances for Rarity's safety as multiple voicings were heard from Twilight and others, each in different frequencies, insinuating that each group was in a different proximity. As for why the group would split up, the only logical explanation that would suffice her curiosity was that they had split up to cover more ground. She pleaded in nearly silent whispers and tears to Celestia for their safe return. She knew deep down; however, that her friends would win this terrible battle; that they would save Rarity; that they would save herself. More words of endearment rang about her ears regarding the safety of Rarity, to which resulted in a lingering feeling that the young mare immediately dismissed; her friends would never favor the safety of one over the other...

These were her friends! After all they'd been through, she knew they didn't have the heart to favorite the safety of Rarity. She didn't know where the feeling originated from, but it was negated just as quickly as it had come. She tried to excuse her feeling with her fear and emotional pain as justification, but no matter how hard she pushed the fear induced feeling away, it seemed drawn to her mind like a parasite; her mind was the host. She silently cried once more

"Rarity, we're coming! Where are you!?"

"Rarity?! Rarity!"

She could hear the anxiousness in Twilight's voice when she screamed her assurances to a dying Rarity, who's screams were slowly withering away. But Fluttershy still held high hopes. Friendship wasn't easy but it was definitely worth fighting for and always triumphed. They would save Rarity, and Fluttershy was happy to have her saved first. She cared a great deal for her beloved friend.

Don't worry, Fluttershy. They'll come get you when they have time.

She believed what she told herself, but for a reason unknown to her, she held a slight doubt. She trusted her friends with her life and couldn't bear the thought of doubt on her friends. She forced her feelings into the deepest parts of her heart, letting it roam about in curiosity and eat away at her goodness. For the first time in her entire life, she felt completely alone...perhaps even abandoned.

Her feelings suddenly became slightly twisted as she tried to understand her friends. They sent words of endearment and comfort to Rarity...they searched for Rarity...

Was it true that perhaps her friends had abandoned her? She tried with all her might to suppress such ridiculous feelings. Her friends would never abandon her! They had always been there for her in her weakest moments, why did she doubt them now? It seemed their efforts were based solely on the discomfort of Rarity, but what about her? What about Fluttershy? Had they become sick of her?

She suddenly became aware once more of the sharp pain painted across her body. The stabbing and slicing feeling ran across her nerves like a tidal wave of pain. She started accepting it.

You were always weak and helpless. You couldn't rely on them forever! This is what you get; your lesson in complacency!"

Her thoughts kept sending mixed messages. She agreed with the terrible thought, but at the same time she couldn't accept it as truth! How could her friends even think of such a thing? How could she even think of such a bastardized realization against everything she stood for? She found no answers to these questions that tormented her consciousness as though she was interrogating herself. She cried uncontrollably, unable to produce an answer that sufficed her tormenting mind. Her mind condemned the rest of her being, throwing accusation after accusation at her own conscious, trying to get it to forsake her being and realize what was happening! Two people were dying and only one was being saved. She was alone, forsaken. Her friends cared for her safety no longer. They were too busy saving a pompous, snobby boutique store operator to help out a friend that had always cared for them and never held a shred of doubt pertaining to their actions. After all she had done not only for them, but for the community as well, her former 'friends' leave her here to die! What kind of true friends were they! They left her to die, completely helpless.

Helpless...

What kind of a friend was she? It was true, she'd admitted her weakness and helplessness before, and in her complacency, she'd become accustomed to acceptance of her weakness. She begrudgingly understood their reasoning. She could hold them back no longer as she accepted the premise that had followed her all these years. She was a burden. And in all the history that had passed between the group, she knew she'd never truly helped anypony in the group but on a few occasions. She had felt as though she'd helped them with everything, but in truth, she'd barely even been noticed.

She was worthless now. In a house full of chaos and murder and awful happenings, kindness held no place in anypony's heart, only survival. And she accepted that. She knew everything about animals and ponies were no exception, for when in danger, all animals fall back to their instinct of survival. Rarity isn't as worthless in terms of survival as she was. Rarity wasn't as afraid of anything as much as she was. In terms of her friends survival, Rarity was more suited to become useful than Fluttershy was; and even though she had accepted that, it filled her with a grief more painful than anything she'd felt before.

Emptiness...

Loneliness...

Abandonment...

She could put no one word forth in description of this horrid emptiness inside of her soul, she had to put many: empty inside; totally lonely; completely abandoned.

Though she hadn't realized it, her emptiness was caused not only by her departure from her friends as she though, but also her departure from life, for Fluttershy was beginning to bleed out. Her stomach no longer caused her body pain as her nerves no longer sent the electrical impulses as the blood for her life-giving cells ran out of the slash.

Her thoughts couldn't find themselves as the stumbled, trying to discern the thoughts into coherent messages for her conscious. Her mind spun around her thoughts, causing her to become nauseous. She vomited, relieving her mind the spinning sensation that seemed to engulf her body. She wanted nothing more than to hear her friends once more; for them to accept her weakness once more and comfort her. She wanted to see but one more living being, to hear one more sound, but her mind no longer registered these simple and impulsive actions. She vomited one last time, unbeknownst to herself, who hadn't even realized her body had expelled her stomach fluids in an attempt to calm her center. She cried, not truly knowing why. Though she hadn't experienced any feeling like this before, even in her traffic congested thoughts, she knew what was happening. She was dying, which after all the pain and misery she'd endured, she felt indifferent towards. Perhaps she was willing to accept her death and was slightly curious.

So this is what it's like to die... she thought to herself. Others may have called in courage that she wasn't afraid of her inevitable fate, but in fact, she pushed her fear away with a logic perhaps only those about to die could truly understand; she didn't fear her fate simply because she accepted the fact that it was inevitable. She no longer feared the unknown because it would serve no purpose. She couldn't escape her fate and chose not to waste time and energy worrying about it.

Her eyes dropped in a sudden exhaustion that swept over her body like a heavy blanket of a sort of relief. Though she accepted her death as inescapable, she still felt so empty inside and so abandoned. Though she understood their reasons for abandonment, she just could not grasp the concept of having the capacity to abandon her friends simply because she'd never abandoned them, even if she was useless. She clenched her eyes as renewed streams of hot tears ran down her face. She felt her body slow down gradually as her thoughts suddenly became restful and her heart beat slowed down to a pace unsafe for almost any creature. Though her body was at rest and her thoughts had calmed, her mind was still torn between acceptance and disbelief. She began a cycle of thought that began with her anguish and ended in her indifference though she could not explain why.

The screams she wanted so desperately to cease finally met an end as they died away in its last utterance of pain. It seemed either Rarity had been saved or she was on her last breath; then the screaming ceased, not that Fluttershy could tell, for her brain no longer registered sound of any form as it devoted its last remaining power to stabilizing her vital and critical organs, which served only to prolong the inevitable death the young mare would soon face.

Her mind slowed to an almost stop as it started to register less and less of her thoughts, creating a pool of incoherence. She no longer heard her heart beat as it became weaker with every beat, lessening the amount of life in her body every second. Her mind no longer possessed the amount of blood necessary for her continuation into life. Her mind's last registered thought rested upon her terrible unbecoming pain and emotional agony. Abandonment and deceit of her most trusted 'friends'. Her heart, heavy with grief, felt light in mass as the last drops of blood left her body, sending her heart in spasmodic movement to which her brain would have normally registered had there been enough blood to do so; she hadn't even noticed that she'd fallen into a cardiac arrest. As she took her last breath of the taken for granted oxygen her body needed for life, her last thoughts were those she never thought she could've felt; pure contempt, though toward what, she could no longer define as her brain shut down;. Her heart no longer pumped the absent blood. It was still, unmoving, finally welcoming the absoluteness and coldness of death as the last flicker of life in her eyes left her, leaving her with the desolation of the point of no return, sending her soul to the deepest, darkest reaches of oblivion, restless, forever to wander its hell it had created for itself in its own despair.

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