Equestrian Nightmare

Prologue

That day, the horrid day where everything we knew about our life. Going to the bakery for rolls, or going to the the market stalls to get some snacks with friends. All of that was just pulled right out from under us. Everything was fine that day, up until ponies started to hear about other ponies being attacked on the street by more or less alive ponies, who were then labeled crazed or delusional in their attacks. Only two hours later did they announce that a few of the people attacked were admitted into hospitals for high fevers and an unusual illness; in other words, something that the doctors had never seen before. They believed it to be a new strain of influenza. They couldn’t have been further from the truth.

It was crazy, honestly. You read and watch horror movies and television shows about shit like this, but you always go back to your beds and comfort zones and say to yourself, “It’ll never happen. There’s no way something like that could happen. It’s not possible.”

We were all so terribly wrong in thinking like that. Not once had the thought crossed any of our minds until it was a second too late.

One hour after the announcement of the patients being brought into the emergency room, these ponies, should I dare refer to them as so, attacked the nurses or doctors in a bloodthirsty rage, killing them and then, by the reports, they ate them. They consumed their flesh. Former friends and acquaintances ate each other without so much as a second thought.

They classified the patients’ bodies as deceased, considering the fact that the fevers had taken the toll on them and caused them to pass away. Once they came shambling down the hallway though, few could barely move. The smell alone from the deceased stank up many of the halls, and when they saw something appetizing, they ran and sank their teeth into their prey. Other patients, doctors, nurses, even ponies that were visiting friends and family that were in the hospital got bitten.

That’s where the problem was though; they got bit. They didn’t get it looked at, they didn’t even question what or why somepony would randomly just run up to them. So, without dwelling on the thought, they just left, wanting to go home and calm down after a traumatic experience.

A few hours later, we had more people dying, the bodies multiplying as they came back to life to join the original few patients in their trek along the streets. Arms outstretched, jaws gaping, and low growls being emitted from their throats. It was like in a movie, except -- it was real.

I still remember the first time I saw one of those ugly fuckers. It was so very vivid that it was burned into my memory, and I couldn’t forget about it, even if I tried my damned hardest to do so.

I was with a few of my friends at the time, and we were just leaving a restaurant when I saw a man, his face all mangled and cut up, chasing after a woman who was screaming bloody murder as she ran away. No more than a few seconds later I watched, along with my friends, the man grab her and immediately sink his teeth into her neck and tear away a chunk of her muscle. People were frozen in fear or shock, maybe even both at the same time. That is until he looked up and started sprinting down the street.

Right towards me.

I have no idea, and to this day, still don’t know how I managed to put him down.

He just ran up to me, and right before he grabbed me, I took his arm and spun around, bringing him with me and I flipped him over and slammed him on the ground. That wasn’t enough to kill him though, because after I slammed him on the ground, he got up immediately and tried to sink his teeth into me still. I didn’t let him of course, and I shoved my foot into his face as hard as I could and I felt the jaw bone shatter from the impact, but the son of a bitch kept on going. He pulled me down and swung his arm at me, hitting me in the face with just enough force to knock me down to the ground with him. My friends were still standing there in shock, that what was happening, was actually happening.

Eventually I managed to beat him off of me and I picked up one of the chairs for the outside tables and swing it down on him, multiple times just to make sure that he wasn’t getting up again.

This all happened in the span of about a minute or so; it sure as hell felt like a lot longer than that. “Son of a bitch!”

The others turned around and looked behind then when I cursed out. I’m sure the wished they hadn’t. Coming down the road were a whole crowd of living dead. All of them bloodthirsty and ready to feast.

“We gotta go. Now!” Was all I yelled before they followed me back to my house in Ponyville in a haste.

┐(ﾟдﾟ┐)

Once we got inside, our friend Dusk Fire made a beeline to the bathroom. Seems like everything finally caught up to her, because when I walked in to make sure she was doing alright, she was vomiting into the toilet. It didn’t help that we had eaten a lot, especially her. She had missed breakfast and decided to stuff her face during lunch. After a good five minutes of waiting around to make sure that no more would come out, we left the bathroom and came back downstairs, where Dusk laid down on the couch, still visibly shaken by what had transpired a few moments ago.

I took it upon myself to close all the windows and make sure that nothing could see inside before I turned on some lights in the living room, but I took care to make it very dimly lit. “So, now what?” I started, my voice relatively shaky as I stood before my friends. “ You all saw what happened out there. I mean, for fucks sake, I was fucking jumped by a walking corpse! I fucking shattered his jaw, smashed his head into the ground, and only when I smashed a chair over his head multiples times, did he finally drop dead. I don’t know about you, but I think the one thing that everyone always says will never happen just. Fucking! Happened!”

I walked over to the wall opposite of the sofa and leaned up against it, crossing my arms, with my head down. My other friends -- Rin, Krypt, Silver Bit, Dusk Fire, Vynx and Sweet Scent -- all found their own spots to settle down in...or at least try to, since everyone was still jumpy.

“We need to get ourselves ready.”

I looked up to see Rin looking right at me from behind the couch, before looking around at everyone else with a defiant look on her face as her brows pushed together.

“We need to get ourselves ready to leave here. We need supplies, weapons, anything we’re gonna’ need if we’re going to be evacuating when the military rolls in. ‘Cause everyone knows, twenty-four hours after a zombie out break, the military comes rolling in, trying to ‘secure the area’ and ‘keep us safe’.” Rin air-quoted most of the parts in her sentence as if she’s been through this a thousand times. “You all know what’s going to happen to all those poor fuckers. They’re gonna’ come riding in, noses so high up in the air they can’t even see you, and, by not knowing what the fuck is going on, they’re gonna get killed faster than most of the people without a gun.” She looked down at the ground, shaking her head firmly as her whiptail swayed angrily behind her. “Every. Last. One of them.” She punctuated every word by looking at a different person in the room.

“Rin’s got a point. We need to get our shit together and pack up supplies for when it’s time to get the hell out of here,” Vynx declared as he leaned forward slightly, running his light beige hand through his faux-hawked raven mane as his deep blue eyes flickered to Rin.

“Why is this happening?” Dusk asked very weakly, looking up at me with a quivering lip and sad eyes.

“I don’t know Dusky, I don’t know.” I sat down and started running my fingers through her mane while she clutched a pillow close to her chest. The mare shook violently as she leaned against me for support, the poor pillow having slight tears in the fabric from her nails.

I was about to say something else, until someone -- or something -- started to bang on the door, and I don’t mean light banging, I mean banging to the point that the door was shaking on its hinges.

Everyone jumped and tensed up, our gazes all fixated on the door. I heard a slight shuffle as Krypt rose from her seat, and immediately moved to Rin’s side in a protective manner. Vynx shifted slightly, squinting his eyes while he watched the door intently.

The banging lasted for about fifteen seconds or so, until we heard gunshots and the sound of a body hitting the door and slumping onto the ground. Dusk clutched onto the pillow harder and cried into my chest, her whimpers tearing my heart in two.

“Let’s get going, guys. We don’t have much time to get our stuff ready. We might have to leave before the military even gets here. It might get way worse before they actually show up and try to help.” I stated in the calmest tone I could muster before looking at Silver Bit, the earth pony stallion giving a brief nod before quickly running up the stairs.

Rin looked around at the group. I could see in her eyes there was something she wasn’t telling me, but I knew she’d do the right thing. Hopefully. “What we really need to do is make sure no one gets split up, regardless of whatever reason you have. Secondly, we stick together, and we change shifts around the dawn and dusk hours when we get someplace we can rest. How’s that sound, Cobolt?” The demon mare looked up at me, a firm and worried look resting on her once smiling face.

I nodded. “Sounds like a good idea. Should we stop at each others houses to grab some personal belongings?” I suggested, only to see a small frown appear on Rin’s lips.

“I don’t think we’ll have enough time to go to everypony’s house, Bolt. I mean, I live right around the corner from here with Krypt, but,” she glanced at Dusk for a moment. “I don’t think any of us have time to venture out towards the outskirts of Ponyville, and then turn back around.”

Dusk looked at Rin as she wiped her eyes. “I can go al--”

“I said no one is splitting up, didn’t I?” The demon stated harshly before inhaling sharply and covering her face with her hand. “We can all go to our houses, but as a group. I refuse to lose friends, and I think we can all agree on that. We’ll make our way towards my house, and grab the weapons I have stashed there--”

“I didn’t know you owned a gun, Rin,” I murmured, looking at the mare with a cocked eyebrow as I hugged Dusk closer to me once I felt a tremor course through her.

“I never thought I’d need them,” she responded coolly before returning to what she was saying. “After that, we’ll make our way to Dusk’s house. Then, start going towards Canterlot or Manehatten. I don’t know where, but someplace that isn’t infested with zombies.” She paused for a moment, moving towards the front-most window before peeking out to see a few zombies shuffle pass.

“Electricity will be shut down soon, maybe. So, charge everything you own, and save your battery. Same goes for water. Get a lot of it and distribute it evenly, and food. Try chips and energy bars, even granola bars. Anything helps. We need to keep a good food and water supply to make it the first few months,” she finished, moving away from the window and back to Krypt’s side.

“If we even live that long,” the demon’s servant seethed, only to earn an unamused glare from the demon herself, the piercing heterochromatic eyes staring deep into Krypt’s. Crossing her arms over her chest, the servant spoke with a matter-of-fact tone. “Look, all I’m saying is, there’s a very slim chance we’re gonna live. We all have luxuries -- food, air conditioning, clean water, electricity, clean clothes, phones, laptops -- and I personally don’t think we’ll last even a few weeks without the things we have now.”

Sweet Scent looked over at Krypt before nodding her head in agreement, pulling out her cell phone to make Krypt’s statement even more true. “See! She can’t even go thirty seconds without checking her messages!”

“Krypt, please, you’re really blowing this out of proportion--”

“Am I really?” Krypt cut Vynx off, glaring daggers at him. “I’m not blowing anything ‘out of proportion’, Vynx. I’m stating obvious facts, and if none of you can see it, I don’t wanna be the one to see you all die because of it.”

“Shut the fuck up.” Dusk muttered. I could feel her tense against me, and I looked at her with concern.

“Excuse me? Do you know who the fuck I am?” Krypt growled lowly as she moved closer to Dusk and I, only to have Rin grab her arm firmly.

Dusk looked up at her, anger seeping into her words. “I said shut up. I don’t need any more reasons to sit here and cry, and think about how all our other friends are holding up. I want to live, and I’m gonna fucking live with or without your help, Krypt. So, shut up with your negativity, and try and keep your pessimistic and hopeless opinions to yourself.”

I looked from Krypt to Dusk several times before nodding. “I agree. If we’re going to make it out of Ponyville alive, we gotta stay positive. Rin, how much time do we got before military troops roll in?”

“Probably about another twenty or so hours, why?” She replied, still holding Krypt’s arm firmly.

I stood up, looking at Vynx. “You, Silver, and myself are gonna do some heavy lifting.”

Vynx nodded, standing up with me, the six foot three inch stallion looming over the rest of the group. “Alright. What are we gonna do first? Rin’s plan, or are we gonna fight tooth and nail??

“Why not both?” Bit’s voice broke in as he held a few backpacks in his hands, tossing them down the stairs along with a bunch of zip ties and sleeping bags. “Cobolt and I have necessities here, but not enough for everyone. We can get the guns from Rin’s place, and buy more if we have to, and get some of the other things Rin suggested. We should all take a shower tonight, and get some rest.” Bit walked down the stairs, looking around at each of us with a smile. “We can do shifts and assign them to each other soon, but we need rest. We can all stay upstairs, and barricade them, and when we leave in the morning, we go by dawn so we can get a lot of ground covered.”

“I agree,” Rin murmured, nodding her head. “He has a good plan, and I don’t think anyone is ready to leave yet. Let’s get ready for bed and take showers, and then we can sleep. Vynx and I can barricade the stairs once everyone’s ready, and from there, we’ll discuss our plans, as a group, for the morning. Good idea?”

“Great idea. Let’s get ready to deal with some shit,” I stated with a grin before the rest of them shuffled upstairs. That’s when I knew that I could lose some friends, also gain some, but I wouldn’t be the same after this.