Death City

Verall not a WORDS, WORDS! THEY’RE EVRYWHERE! Want to know what people should do with words when they find them on a document or a file? THEY SHOULD READ THEM! So, why don’t you do me and the rest of the world a favor and read all these MARVELOUS words that I spend my free-time writing.

Chapter 34 – Gore Galore

“Well, looks like this place can’t get any worse than it already is.” Shadow spoke up as the lift beneath them lowered down farther and farther.

“Heh,” Dusk chuckled a bit as he reloaded his weapon. A clink sound was produced as he did so. “Straight into the deeps of hell.” His voice had been very dark and depressing. What they had been expecting next had been nothing new to either of them, even after what they had previously encountered in the ship themselves.

Before:

“So, what exactly did you encounter before catching up with me?” Dusk asked.

“Oh, nothing new.” Shadow responded, turning towards the dark stallion. “Just a few specks of what seemed to be a mixture for some sort of zombie-pony here and there. Just the same old stuff, really.”

Right now, Shadow and dusk had been riding an elevator all the way down to the bilge. It had been the same elevator that Shadow had ridden upwards to the control panel where she had met Dusk by chance.

“Any tips you want to share with me if we even encounter any more of the creatures, which I guarantee you we will.” Dusk mentioned.

“Go for the arms or legs.” Shadow replied. “Consider yourself informed.”

“Speaking or arms and legs, how’s your leg holding up?” Dusk asked as he turned to look at Shadow’s hind leg. The cloth had stayed in the same position that it had been in before, yet the blood had been absorbed into the cloth like a sponge.

Suddenly, there was a ding sound as Shadow and Dusk turned their heads forward to see that the elevator had reached its destination. The metal doors separated to show a steel hallway that had been badly rusted as it made a sharp turn left.

“Here, take this.” Dusk said aloud as he extended his hoof down to Shadow. “Consider it a gift.”

Looking down, Shadow saw what seemed to be a regular weapon: a gun. It had been noting special like a shotgun or ak47 or even a flamethrower, just an original handgun.

Taking it into her own hoof, she asked Dusk. “But how about you?” She asked as she looked up to him.

“Don’t worry. I’ve got one for myself too.” Dusk replied as he pulled out an average gun from his side belt. “Turns out when I awoke, I found myself in a weapons bed room. Sadly, all the good weapons had been taken, so I grabbed as much of what had been left and made a run for it.”

Hearing this, Shadow grasped the handle portion around her teeth and yanked off the thin curved piece of metal around the trigger. She still didn’t understand why they kept making weapons with the exact same dumb design for years.

“So, you ready?” Dusk asked as he looked back at Shadow.

“Ready.” She replied as she got up onto her back legs. It took her a while to regain her balance as Dusk had done the same. Like before, they both had been told that standing on only two legs promoted aim and accuracy when firing a weapon. Turns out, this had been true as Shadow almost never missed her target when firing a weapon on only two legs.

“Let’s go,” Dusk echoed as the two stormed out of the elevator. Just immediately, the hallway in front of them took a steep turn to the left. Moving forward, the hallway led to two places. In the front was what seemed to be a mini control panel for the bilge itself while to the right of the hallway was a steel door. The door had the same design as the wooden one Shadow encountered when she first awoke in this haunted cruise.

“What is this?” Dusk asked as he entered the miniature control panel room. Computers and keyboards had been laid out across the tables and shelves while the wall held countless TVs monitoring the entire lower half of the ship. The chairs near the computers had been thrown everywhere and dried blood stained the walls and the floors. The strong smell of death and decaying glided through the room as it came in contact with the two’s nostrils.

“And what a smell that is too,” Dusk added as he put a hoof up to his nose to block out the strong smell.

“Stay focused,” Shadow spoke up, “I think I know how to get out of here.” She began backing up slowly out of the room until she had been in the hallway one more. Turning to her left, she noticed not only the rusted steel door, but also the identification scanner to the right of it. It had been the same device to the wooden door before as it acted like a lock to the door.

“I may be able to hack this.” Shadow said as she lowered herself till she had been on her knees. With that, she reached into her belt pocket with her right hoof and took out the screwdriver she found in the filthy water of the tub she drained. Shadow began unscrewing the bolts of the scanner that had been located on all four corners of the outer rim. All Dusk did was watch as Shadow override the device. He knew that Shadow was smart and intelligent, but he never knew she could hack computers and electronics too.

The sound of metal crashing onto a metal floor rang into both Shadow’s and Dusk’s ear. The metal covering of the scanner fell to the floor as Shadow put the screwdriver back into her belt pocket. Looking back up, she began tugging on certain color wires and plugging them in into different slots. Shadow knew what she had been doing. She wasn’t just pulling random wires, hoping that the door would automatically lock.

After a moment of patiently waiting, the door finally unlocked as Shadow pulled out one more switch and plugged it in into another port. Standing back up on two legs, Shadow approached the door and carefully pushed onto it. The doors down in the bilge and up in the control panel had been different. They didn’t have nobs, rather it was a sliding door that could be pushed either way, making a quick getaway easier and simpler.

The door made a loud creaking sound that echoed through the hallways as Shadow pushed it open. The section up ahead was more than dark, and pretty much impossible to see. There was no way to move on unless they had some sort of light source.

“What happened?” Dusk yelled as he saw Shadow walk through the door.

“It’s too dark. I can’t see anything.” Shadow yelled back as she came back into the hallways once again.

“Oh, I have the perfect solution.”  Dusk answered as he reached into his own belt pocket. Taking out his hoof, he grasped what seemed to be a flashlight and gave it to Shadow. “Here, this’ll help you. Whenever you’re in some sort of dark situation, just turn this on, and your pathway will become clear”

Shadow observed the flashlight as Dusk talked about what it did and when to use it. Turning it around, her eyes caught what seemed to be the trigger of the flashlight. It had been a simple switch that had to be pulled upwards to be tuned on and pulled back downwards to be shut off. Simple enough.

“Wait, aren’t you coming along?” Shadow asked, looking back at Dusk.

“Me? Sorry, I have to stand guard in this room,” Dusk answered back. “Over here, I can see everything that happens aboard the ship. It’s really cool how you can see so much with just so little.”

“But what’s the purpose in that?” Shadow shot out once more. “What will happen if you do find something?”

“Here, hold on a sec.” Dusk reached back into his belt pocket. Out then came two devices that had been rectangular and covered in a thin coat of black plastic. A strong wire had been sticking out at the top of the device. He then handed one to Shadow as he kept the other to himself. “With this, we can radio each other from wherever we are! SO, if I were to pick up traces of another one of those enemies near you, I can easily warn you through this.” Dusk then pointed at his own device.

“Is that it, or is there anything else you’d like to give me?” Shadow asked in a sarcastic tone.

“Nah. There wasn’t anything that good in the weapons bed anyway.” Dusk replied. “Now off you go!” He said as he turned Shadow around and gently pushed on her back, moving her forward. “Just remember, be careful. You’ve already got that injury on your leg.” From that, Shadow instantly looked back down to her left leg. It had been in the exact same state as it had been for the last ten minutes.

“Well, wish me luck.” Shadow said a little nervously before entering through the steel door. Once she had been on the other side, the first thing she did was reach for her flashlight as she instantly pulled the switch up. Just like that, a beam of light had come flying out of it, lighting the area and only the area in front of her. It had been a nifty tool, yet Shadow knew that it was going to run out of power sooner or later. She was going to have to make the most of the light’s energy as she quickly ran down the twist and turns of the ship, not knowing what mysterious fate she would run into next.

“What’s with all this horror just aboard one ship?” Shadow thought to herself as she resumed trotting down the hallways of the ship. “Was it intended to contain so much scare in it?”

Earlier, Shadow had run into a few more enemies, as before only some of them had been new to her. While there had been the same old original ones, as well as the explosive ones and the ones with the giant spikey claws, she also found herself encountering an enemy that seemed to have what had been a small anchor shape arm that fired what seemed to be a type of ammunition out of it. Shadow had gotten hit a few times before by it, and it really didn’t hurt, but if it hadn’t been for Dusk and his navigating skills back in the control panel room in the lower half of the ship.

Opening one of the many sliding doors of the ship, Shadow found herself in what seemed to be an infected cafeteria. The place as a whole had been no brighter than the rest of the rooms aboard the ship as the floor contained moss, mold, and also what seemed to be the same substance that the artificial enemies had been made out of. This had warned Shadow that more enemies had been near as she raised her handgun from her side, ready to fire at any given moment.

As a shocking result, nothing had appeared. Shadow just stood in the deeps of the darkness with her flashlight and gun at hoof, pointing into the emptiness of the distance.

Putting the gun lower back to her side once more, Shadow began resuming trotting forward to where the nearest sliding door had been. This had been a different door, rather than the one she had just come in from.

Just as she was about to push the door open, a loud shriek sound emanated through the entire ship. As on cue, a rough sound came from the radio device attached to the belt around Shadow.

“Shadow? What was that?!” Dusk asked through the device as Shadow put the device up to her mouth and began to speak into it too while holding down the trigger attached onto the right side with her hoof.

“I don’t know,” Shadow responded, “I’m going to go investigate.”

“OK, then,” Dusk confirmed, “Radio me when you find what it had been. And just remember, be careful.”

“Got it,” Shadow said once more as she placed the device back onto her belt. Pushing onto the door, she found herself in what seemed to be a stairwell. It had gone downwards in circles, reaching around a total of ten floors from top to bottom.

Remembering where the vibrations of the noise came from, Shadow remembered that the scream had come from one of the lower floors as Shadow made her way down the first floor of stairs. She had been a total of seven out of the ten floors high as she traveled lower down to the sixth floor.

Approaching the sixth floor, the first thing Shadow tried was the door preventing her from accessing the floor as a whole. The only problem, the door wouldn’t open. Something had been jamming it over on the other side of the door, allowing her to be locked out. The result of this had been Shadow traveling down to the fifth floor, one floor lower than the last.

Expecting the same result as to what had happened on the previous floor, Shadow pushed into the door awaiting her on the fifth floor to find that it had opened with ease. Looking around her surrounding, she found another set of more hallways.

Suddenly, the same screaming echoed through the hallways, although this time it had been louder, informing Shadow that she had been getting close. Galloping down the direction left down the hallway, Shadow made her way closer and closer to where the loud screaming had come from.

Going down more stairs and making even more turns down the rusted metal hallways that would have been completely dark without her flashlight, Shadow finally approached the scene that had nearly taken her breath away.

She stood in front of another hallway that went both left and right. To the right had been a few lockers while to the left led into yet another room of the ship. But what had stunned her was what had been occurring in the room in front of her.

The only thing that separated her from the other room across from her was a sheet of glass. On the other side there were another three of the same, everyday enemies that lurked around the hallways and corridors of the ship. But what added on to the horror was that there also had been another pony across from where Shadow stood.

The three enemies cornered up on her as the pony began backing away slowly. With a sudden, swift movement, the enemy to the right extended his arm outward and grasped the pony around the neck with his hook-like hoof as he raised the pony into the air. From there, Shadow could tell it had been a mare because the body of the creature had been a thinner shape than one of a stallion.

Moving in, the mare struggled her best as she tried to gasp her way for any last bits of air she could take in. All of a sudden, the enemy that had grasped her opened what had seemed to be a mouth, and out came a worm-like creature that seemed to be attached to him mouth. Looking closely, Shadow could see there had been millions of sharp yet tiny spikes in there that had been represented as teeth.

With a sudden movement, the enemy moved his face towards the mare as the worm-like tong gripped the mares face and nearly yanked it off as he moved back. One last scream escaped the mare’s lips, or what had been left of it as the zombie-pony ripped her face off. Blood leaked everywhere as it did so.

Approaching her once again, the enemy swung his tong at the mare as he released his grip on her, throwing her against the glass, staining it completely in blood.

Shadow just stood back in shock at what she had just seen. She never knew what dying really mean to her after she had realized her immortality. She never knew how much it really hurt to be wounded or even worse, killed brutally at the hooves of mercy.

The blood spread out across the glass in front of Shadow prevented her from seeing anything else from the room in front of her as all she could hear was the sound of the cracking of boned and the spewing of blood. From there, Shadow knew what she had to do. It had been a stupid idea, but on the contrary, it had been her only idea.

She went in.

As Shadow pushed against the sliding door to her right, the first thing she noticed was the three enemies that she’d seen before as they cornered the innocent mare. The only difference: this time they’d been crouched over, literally on top of her! It had been as if they had still been trying suck out her blood or whatever they did to their victims when they had been dead.

She also noticed that the room had supplied light, unlike any other of the rooms aboard the ship. Knowing this, she quickly turned her flashlight off and put it aside for now. There was no use for light when there was enough already.

Pointing up her gun towards the artificial enemies, the first thing Shadow did was aim and fire. A simple procedure that pretty much anypony could follow, but the only difference was that Shadow had precise aim. She nearly never missed any target she aimed for.

A loud flash was produced as she fired the bullet among one of the enemies. It hit the back of the enemy as it punched a wide hole into it.

Feeling this, the enemy had stood up to its fullest height, which was almost a foot higher than Shadow, and began walking over to Shadow. The other two enemies near it who had been eating away at the carcass had also gotten up and began doing the same as the first.

Reacting quick, Shadow fired multiple bullets at the enemies, switching off from one target to another so they’d have trouble approaching her. Just like that, the three of the enemies dissolved into a pool of mush as always when defeated.

“What was that?!” Dusk’s voice rang through the radio device.

“I think I know what’s really going on,” Shadow replied as she approached the corpse of the mare that lay both at a crooked angle against the floor and the walls. “But there’s nothing I can’t be too sure about.”

“What do you mean?” Dusk asked in a somewhat fearful voice. “Did you find anything to lead us to the conclusion on what’s going on here and more importantly how to get out of here?”

“On the bright side, I think I might have.” Shadow said as she crouched down until she was eye level with the mare. Her eyes had been open and she swore she could still see her breathing. Her left arm had been completely obliterated and separated from its socket, none of the mare’s face remained anymore. The skin had been literally ripped off as blood gashed out of the massive wound in her face. Shadow could smell the intense stench of decaying as she felt as if she was going to vomit. Holding that back, she searched the mare for any signs of identification that could hint at what she had been.

Luckily she found something. It had been a key card used to open up locked doors throughout the ship. It was attached to her belt as Shadow grasped the small plastic card with her hoof and carefully read what it had said on it. Just as the last card, this one also had blood spread right out across the front of it. Shocker!

Wiping the blood off with the side of her own hoof like before, Shadow could see the format of it had been the company who made the card as well as a number code containing approximately twelve digits.

“I found something,” Shadow announced as she stood back up onto her hind legs again.

“Well, what is it?” A curious Dusked asked.

“I don’t seem to know exactly, but by the looks of it, it seems as if it’s a card that triggers each and every lock aboard the ship.” Shadow replied.

“Well that’s even better than what I expected for you to find!” Dusk jumped. “Now come back over here so we can see what else this haunted cruise ship has in store for that.”

“On my way.” Shadow ended the conversation as she clipped the device back onto her belt. Putting the card in a small pouch to her side, she quickly turned the flashlight on once again and began traveling the same direction in which she came from.

As Dusk waited patiently in the miniature control panel room for Shadow to arrive with her findings, he began daydreaming. He thought to himself what would become of the two after all this disaster and mayhem had been over. It’s been years since they last met each other as Dusk knew that Shadow or Fluttershy or whatever wouldn’t even think of going her own separate way. Still there was no way to prove that as second by second passed by, soon turning into minutes.

“I’m here.” A voice echoed through the hallways followed by the creaking of a door opening and closing simultaneously. Dusk turned right towards the direction in which the voice came from in order to find Shadow standing right beside the door.

“About time you showed up.” Dusk mentioned, trying o act civilized. “I was beginning to worry about you.”

“You know I have no problem taking care of myself in one of these situations.” Shadow replied.

“Speaking of that, how’s your leg holding up?” Dusk asked as he looked down at Shadow’s left leg, with the cloth still wrapped tightly around it.

“Oh, that?” Shadow asked, looking down at her leg as well. “I didn’t even realize I still had this on the entire time! Just goes to show you how strong I am on the inside.”

“Don’t get too full of yourself just yet,” Dusk said aloud, “We’ve got bigger priorities that just sitting around and arguing all day.”

“Right,” Shadow agreed as she went into her belt attached round her and pulled out the card with the twelve digits. “Here,” she announced as she handed it over to Dusk.

“What is it?” he asked, examining the card closely as he turned it over from time to time to read what it had said.

“I don’t know exactly, but it looks like a key for those electronic doors I found earlier. You know, the ones I wasn’t able to hack or break through.”

“Well, then. This could come in handy,” Dusk added, giving the card back to Shadow who gladly accepted it and put it back into her belt to where it first had been. “So, now where are we off to?”

“If anything, the bilge should be on the lowest floor possible,” Shadow said, “And it just so happened that in my travels before, I encountered a set of stairs that went up to the tenth floor and all the way down the first floor.”

“Well, what floor are we on?” Dusk asked the mare.

“The seventh,” Shadow responded. “If anything, we should be heading downwards to the first floor.”

“Well, then there is where we’ll go. Together.” With that, Dusk approached the door that Shadow had gone through before as he lifted his gun out of his pocket and put it out to his side. “Ready?’ He asked as he faced Shadow himself.

“Always,” was her only response as she turned on her flashlight once more and headed through the door with Dusk, weapon at hoof. She didn’t know where this mission would lead them. ‘What’s a little adventure without suspense?’ she thought to herself.

The metal door swiveled open as both Shadow and Dusk made their way to the long stairway below them. It had been an average stairway like all others, only this one had a large gap in the middle followed by rusted railings to prevent anypony from falling off.

“Woah,” Dusk said as he approached edge of the railing and slightly leaned off the cold metal, looking at the long drop below him. “Never knew this ship went so low.” They were already on the seventh floor and Dusk could see a clear image of the flooring all the way at the first floor.

“Stay focused.” Shadow pointed her flashlight towards the stairs. With that, she carefully stepped down the stairs step by step, Dusk close behind.

They arrived at floor six, the same floor that had been jammed before when Shadow tried to open it but failed. They kept moving to floor five. As they approached Shadow spoke up again.

“This is where the accident with the screaming occurred.” Shadow announced pointing a hoof towards the door in order for Dusk to see.

“What happened?” Dusk asked, slowly approaching the door.

“I don’t feel like sharing,” Shadow responded. “Even the memory still haunts me.” Shadow turned her head downwards and looked down at the rusted floor.

“It’s ok,” Dusk said, placing a hoof onto the yellow mare. “That was then, and this is now. Just remember that we have each other.”

“Don’t get too sappy.” Shadow gently pushed Dusk away in a playful way. “C’mon, we’ve got more exploring to do,” Shadow announced before she resumed trotting gently down the stairs. Dusk followed as the light produced by the flashlight assisted him as well as Shadow herself down the stairs.

Reaching the first floor at last, both Shadow and Dusk looked around themselves at their environment. It had been the same as every other floor. There had been a sliding door in front of them separating them from the rest of the ship. The only difference had been just to the right of the door was  a small scanner. It seemed as if it needed some sort of card to slide into it for the door to be unlocked.

“The key!” Dusk yelled. “Quick, give me that key card thing you found earlier!” Dusk shouted as he faced Shadow. As commanded, shadow reached into the pocket in her side belt and took out the key card and placed it in Dusk’s hooves.

Taking they key in his own hooves, Dusk approached the scanner near the door and slid the card right through the scanner quickly and in a fierce motion. The result of this had been a small little “ding” as well as the scanner light turning green, signaling that the door had been unlocked.

“Turns out this card is more useful that I first thought.” Dusk said as he held up the key right in front of his eyes once more and looked into it. “Here” He said, handing it back again to Shadow. “Keep this in a safe place. Celestia knows if we’ll need it in the future or not.”

Taking the key card back, Shadow placed it back into her belt as she aimed the flashlight towards the peak of the door. Approaching it, she gently pushed on it as the door scratched against the floor below it.

Once Dusk and Shadow passed through one of the many doors through the ship, they looked around at their surroundings to see what they’d run into. It was a series of gates and railings through one big room. Below them had been an enormous pit that seemed to lead to the incinerator room.

Taking great precautions, Shadow carefully made her way through the series of gates and railings. Dusk didn’t want to be one to just stand around, so he decided to follow Shadow as well. He knew he could easily fly over all this mess with his wings, but he knew that for somepony like Shadow whose wings had been sharp and hadn’t been made for the usage of flight, he just stayed low on solid ground as he followed the mysterious mare.

Once reaching the end of the room, there had been yet another one of the same doors with the scanner. Knowing what to do, Shadow reached for the card in her belt, slid it across the scanner, and put the card back by her side all in one quick move. Dusk just watched as it all went down.

Opening the next door, Shadow found herself in the room that had contained some sort of lift in the center.

“Hey, Dusk.” Shadow called out. “Looks like we found our way down.”

As Dusk approached the lift, he observed the controls of the lift to see that it just had an up, down, and an emergency stop button implanted onto the massive device.

“And it happens to have the key still in it.” Dusk added, pointing his hoof to where the keyhole had been. What had surprised Shadow was that Dusk had been right. The key had still been in the hole!

Jumping onto the lift, Shadow signaled for Dusk to lower it once she was ready. As signaled, the stallion had turned the key and pushed the button with the arrow pointing down. It had been as if somepony was trying to lead them down there. The stench of death and decay filled the air as the lift lowered, the area around them became darker and darker with every movement.

“Well, looks like this place can’t get any worse than it already is.” Shadow spoke up as the lift beneath them descended farther and farther.

“Heh,” Dusk chuckled a bit as he reloaded his weapon. A clink sound was produced as he did so. “Straight into the deeps of hell.” His voice had been very dark and depressing. What they had been expecting next had been nothing new to either of them, even after what they had previously encountered in the ship.

OMG! WORDS! Did you enjoy reading all those words? I hope you did, ‘cause I like words. Words make me feel WORthy (ha, bad pun!) Still a better joke than Twilight jokes. Now, go to the review box, type in some random shit (make it positive) and I will read that random shit and add more random shit onto it.

SO, yeah. I’m trying a new approach to be more funny in my authors notes. If it’s working, please tlee. Me. Still looking for new songs but no new OCs for now. Now I got to g. I have a life to get back to. (Yes, I have a life, AND FRIENDS!)  *waves* BYE!