Outbreak

Chapter XV

Over a Bottle

The steel door of the hospital isolation and quarantine ward creaked open slowly, revealing a lone stallion sitting upon a paper-covered examination table inside. The stallion was none other than Dr. Seymour, who had broken quarantine protocol just a few hours earlier after experiencing a mental breakdown at the most horrid thing he had ever seen. The stallion was clearly disturbed, looking somberly downward, not even noticing the subtle opening of the door where Twilight Sparkle stood on the opposite side.

"...Um, Seymour?" called Twilight in a soft, reasonable tone while giving a couple of taps on the inside wall.

Seymour looked to greet the mare in the doorway, still distraught over the events which had transpired earlier.

"Twilight?" he spoke. "You... didn't go back to the hotel already?"

Twilight shook her head and entered the room, taking a seat near the table on the cold, marble floor.

"Of course I didn't. I've been waiting here since you were hauled away earlier." she spoke. "Listen... about what happened this afternoon, are you okay?"

Seymour turned his head town towards the table, a couple of tears forming in his eyes.

"...They were just babies, Twilight." he sniveled, clutching his temples in his white hooves. "Poor, defenseless, innocent babies! They're all just going to... die, you know!"

"Babies...?" Twilight questioned, bringing a hoof to her chin. "You saw infected babies... my goodness."

"I-I'm a college professr, Twilight." continued Seymour. "A fucking college professor, not a trauma surgeon! I-I can't just look at something like that without having to throw up! It's just... indescribable how horrible that was, I'll probably have nightmares for years!"

"Seymour, easy now." calmed Twilight, getting up to drape a hoof over her partner's shoulder. "It's just you and me now, you should calm down a little. I know you must have had a horrible experience, but we need to get back to focusing on what we came here to do. Doctor Thrax needs our help, Queen Chrysalis needs our help, the whole city of Chitin needs our help..."

"...I'm sorry."

"Sorry?" Twilight questioned. "For what? You didn't do anything wrong, it's just... you've never seen anything like this before."

"Twilight, Dr. Thrax tried to talk to me earlier." Seymour explained. "She told me that anypony who breaks quarantine procedure puts the entire team in danger, and she's right. I just couldn't contain myself, now what am I going to do? How am I going to live with myself if any of the staff who helped us get sick?"

"Seymour, it's okay." reasoned the young princess. "I know you didn't mean-"

"No, no it's not okay." sighed the professor. "What if something happens to Dr. Thrax, or her helpers, or... what if something were to happen to you just because I got scared?"

Twilight pressed a hoof onto Seymour's mouth, effectively silencing him.

"Listen, Seymour... you just got spooked is all that happened." she reassured him with a warm smile. "To tell you the truth, I'm scared too. I've never been involved in anything like this, but I can't be beating myself up every time something goes wrong. These changelings are depending on me, they're depending on us."

"Bfut tviwit I-"

"Shhhh..." Twilight whispered, inching closer to the white stallion's face. "...I wouldn't want anypony who wasn't just a little bit afraid to be my partner, you know."

"You mean that?" questioned Seymour. "Even if I almost got us kicked out of the kingdom?"

"Seymour, I wouldn't say it if I didn't mean it." giggled Twilight. "I think you'd be out of your mind if you weren't scared. I understand how you must have felt. Don't worry about anything that happened. You just got a little bit overwhelmed is all, I probably would have done the same thing."

"Twilight..."

Twilight smiled back to her partner.

"Seymour, you're my partner." she concluded. "Like it or not, you and I have a job to do, and we're going to do that job together. I trust you Seymour, and I'll do anything needed to help you adjust to such a sudden, volatile mission."

"...Wow, t-thanks Twilight!" Seymour beamed. "That means a lot to me, you know."

"Hey, don't mention it..." replied Twilight. "...Partner."

The two remained silent for a moment before they heard a voice calling out to them.

"...Excuse me, Dr. Seymour and Princess Twilight Sparkle?"

The two turned their head to face the door leading out into the hallway, their eyes meeting a changeling disease specialist from several floors above.

"O-Oh, yes ma'am?" Seymour asked. "Is there a problem?"

The changeling shook her head.

"No, I'm here to relay that you have passed your quarantine screenings- we have determined that your risk of exposure to the virus is minimal."

"So..." spoke Seymour, rubbing his left front leg with a hoof in nervous anticipation. "...does that mean that I can leave this glass bubble now?"

"Yes." the changeling answered. "You may both leave when ready. Just speak to Dr. Thrax when you want to head out."

"Thank you." Twilight thanked. "We will."

The changeling nodded and left the doorway, leaving the two inside to their thoughts.

"Hey, Seymour?" Twilight asked, standing upon her four legs again.

"Hmm?" replied the white stallion as he dismounted the examination table. "What's up?"

"I know this might seem a bit sudden of an idea." Twilight explained. "But you look like you could use a drink tonight. Heck, I think we both could. Just a little something to take it easy for a few hours, you know?"

"Ummm..." Seymour mumbled. "...Sure, I suppose that would be nice."

"Alright then, we can go after we finish up our business here if you want." smiled Twilight.

"Okay, that sounds good to me."

Dr. Thrax sat upon a bench near the quarantine room where Dr. Seymour had been kept. She fiddled with a lock of her short, blue hair in the jagged edge of her hoof while looking over a piece of text held on a clipboard. Soon enough, the changeling medical director began to overhear a friendly banter between the princess and professor as they left the isolation pod.

"Ah, there you two are." she called. "I was beginning to think you'd be in there for the whole evening."

"Sorry about that." Twilight apologized. "Nursing a broken spirit takes more than a couple of seconds, you know."

"Oh, be quiet." grumbled Seymour.

"Hey, I call it as I see it." Twilight chuckled, rolling her eyes.

Dr. Thrax was taken by a bit of surprise as she witnessed a rookie college professor address a fully-fledged member of alicorn royalty with not even so much as a single formality. The whole idea seemed alien to her- she had never known her own queen to be so formal with anyone, even to the drones which kept her company in the most intimate of ways. To see an equestrian princess addressed with such friendly and colloquial vocabulary was more than a little shocking to her.

"Remarkable." she spoke. "Your confidence has returned tenfold if you can address a princess in such a way, Dr. Seymour."

"Well, to tell the truth..." began Seymour. "...We've kinda been skipping the formalities for most of our partnership. We thought it might get in the way of the mission, you see."

"I see." Thrax replied. "Well, I take it you two are ready to get out of this hell hole?"

"Yeah." Twilight answered. "Although, I wouldn't be so quick to call the changeling kingdom a 'hell hole', it seems a bit harsh in those terms."

"Yeah, I'm sure you have certain facets here that are worth a visit, don't you?" asked Seymour. "I mean, it can't always be sunshine and rainbows here, but that doesn't mean it has to always be miserable, right?"

"Well..." Dr. Thrax confessed. "Outside of the thriving city of Chitin, much of the kingdom still remains the same as it was before the invasion of Canterlot. Much of the nation is still impoverished. The queen tries her best to aid her children, but even she can't bear the weight of two billion of us alone."

"Well, yes." reasoned Twilight, looking toward Thrax with a concerned expression. "But that's why we're doing our best to help her and your kingdom. I mean, look at Chitin- it's really become a great, exotic city with an amazing night-life scene. How hard could it be to help the rest of the kingdom?"

"I understand what you're trying to say, and I sincerely appreciate it." Dr. Thrax continued. "It just doesn't change the fact that the queen has never been so stressed until just recently, and it's really taking a toll on her both physically and emotionally. It must be tough being a single ruler in such harsh, uncertain times."

Twilight had seen such a stressful existence herself. She recalled how Princess Celestia had to rule over the largest, most successful empire on the planet for the thousand years since her sister's rebellion. And she had to do so alone, as the only alicorn left in the kingdom of Equestria for the entire time.

"I know what you mean..." comforted Twilight. "Princess Celestia had to rule alone for one-thousand years. I've seen the sort  of dilemmas she went through on a regular basis before Princess Luna returned to rule by her side. Being an alicorn myself now, I need to face the reality that that might be my job some day."

"Hehe, I guess you're right about that." laughed Dr. Thrax. "But what of you, Dr. Seymour? Surely as an average citizen of Equestria, wouldn't you rather be back home than in a place like this?"

"Well, not necessarily." spoke the professor in question. "Some might say that Equestria has its own flaws. It's not a utopia."

"Really?" Dr. Thrax inquired. "That doesn't sound like the Equestria I know of."

"It's a capitalist society. Not everypony is cut out for that kind of constant pressure." continued Seymour. "Sure, it gets the job done most of the time, but it's far from perfect."

"He's right." Twilight added. "Sure there are great opportunities to be had, but at what cost? Your gain is somepony else's loss."

"Interesting." Thrax stated. "You two don't sound like any of the ponies I've ever met. Most of them just drone on about how the changelings should adapt to live more like Equestria- all the fun parties, spontaneous musical numbers, a free-enterprise market, all of the 'perfect' things, you know."

"Well, a lot of those ponies have become rather... insensitive to other cultures." Seymour reasoned. "Most of them grew up privileged- a modest living, loving family, the kind of neat stuff you're talking about. They don't really know the other side of the coin until they travel outside of Equestria. It's funny, and a little sad."

Soon enough, the trio of Doctors Seymour and Thrax and Princess Twilight Sparkle had reached the quarantine access passage to the city outside. The sky above had shifted in color to that of a gentle seaside sunset, complete with vermilion, crimson, and cinnabar. The sound of gentle waves cold just barely be heard through the dense walls which now crippled the city's infrastructure and trade economy. Once at the final doorway, the three were ushered through by a pair of armed soldiers as they finished their conversation.

"I guess I understand why you two seem so different now." spoke Thrax. "I suppose it only took an outbreak of deadly hemorrhagic fever to get any sort of real communication between the commoners of pony and changeling society to really be able to converse for once."

"Yep." nodded Seymour. "Sometimes it seems that the collective 'head' of Equestria is as hard as a rock. I bet it's because of how widely different your way of life is from ours... or something like that."

"It takes a bit of shell-shock to break free from the improper judgment of others sometimes." Twilight agreed, looking up to the noticeably taller stallion.

"Feh, amen to that." Dr. Thrax chuckled. "Well, I hope you two can forgive my earlier criticism... I sincerely apologize for the way I acted, especially to you Dr. Seymour."

"It's okay, I understand why you were so apprehensive." Seymour dismissed. "I put the team in danger, I should be the one who is apologizing right now. But I guess that's all water under the bridge."

"You're right." admitted Thrax with a genuine smile she had not shown the two all day. "Besides, we have more important things to worry about now. Listen, we already know where this virus came from. But now we need to figure out how it got into the city, and how it was spread so rapidly."

"Yeah, knowing what the virus is isn't much help if we can't see how it was spread to 14,000 changelings in a single day. I suggest we split up for the night." offered Seymour. "Twilight and I will try to come up with some sort of theory as to how this all could have happened, where the virus was released, and if we can find any patterns between the three clusters."

"I'll try to come up with some information on my end as well." Dr. Thrax replied. "Until then, stay safe you two."

With the last of her instruction stated clearly, Dr. Thrax returned to the hospital, leaving Twilight and Seymour behind her. In their time alone, Seymour turned to his partner with an expectant look on his face.

"...So, about those drinks?"

After a long, stressful day, night had finally fallen upon the newly-walled city of Chitin. The city's night life had once again taken effect with changelings and other visiting species heading out to party with friends and companions. Beer, wine, and spirits of all different kinds became the life blood of Chitin's nighttime debauchery. Casinos churned token after golden token where only the house really won. Street markets dispensed exotic foods and goods to the comfort-thirsting populace. Taxi cabs and motorized bicycles littered the streets, and unadulterated adult fun was the law of the neon-lit darkness.

In one little hole-in-the-wall bar sat two of the most important Equestrian guests to grace the Changeling Kingdom for quite a long time- Princess Twilight Sparkle and Dr. Seymour. Several empty shot glasses lay overturned on the table as a testament to their night on the town while the two laughed the night away after witnessing the horrors of the earlier afternoon.

"So you ended up passed out on somepony else's lawn, fully out and exposed for all the world to see?!" giggled Twilight Sparkle, holding a hoof to her blushing face to stifle her laughter.

"...It was a crazy night." Seymour confessed, chuckling himself. "Hey it wasn't my fault, They started it.

"Who started it?" questioned the alicorn, emptying another shot glass of the bourbon which had previously existed inside.

"The new limited-edition mini-shots of Cherry Ice Vodka, that's who!" answered Seymour, bursting into a fit of laughter which threatened to throw his chair backwards. "I must have lost count after... I don't even remember! GAHAHAHAHAAA"

"You're an animal, Seymour..." laughed Twilight. "How was the next day?"

"I really don't remember much about the morning... I must have still woken up a little wasted, and in a hospital bed." the stallion chuckled. "They said my BU... BI... BMI..."

"Blood Alcohol Level?" Twilight corrected.

"Yeah, that." Seymour affirmed with a wave of his hoof. "I was at double the legal limit. I'd been in an alcohol coma for more than a few hours, and even then I still had some kick in me!"

"Did you ever get in trouble for it?" asked Twilight.

"Somehow and miraculously not!" spoke Seymour. "I got away with nothing more than the worst migraine of my life!"

The two shared a healthy dose of uninhibited laughter before Twilight would speak up again, asking Seymour something she had meant to ask him since the two had first met. Something about Seymour just seemed odd- he wasn't like Flash, or Shining Armor, or any of the stallions she usually saw around. Most of the time they were either involved in the military or had a hand in politics, government, or special operations that were typically out of the public eye.

Most of them, at least, except for the white stallion in black she had met only a day before.

"So... you really aren't like all of those other stallions, are you?" she asked, crossing her front legs on the table.

"What do you mean by that?" chuckled Seymour.

"I mean you were hand-picked by the princesses to help me on such a highly sensitive task, but really don't seem like any of those guys from the royal guard or DNS, or any of those other three-letter government acronyms that they always seem to pair me up with." she explained. "You're... really not one of them, are you?"

Seymour rolled his eyes and leaned back in his chair. Once comfortable, he answered the princess's prodding personal questions as best he could in his semi-inebriated stupor.

"Naah. Just a regular, boring college professor." he confessed. "Wrong place, wrong time I suppose."

"Well, I suppose that if there ever were a right place and a right time for that phrase..."

Seymour had shifted his attention away from the alicorn seated across from him and down to a shadow cast over the table behind him.

Noticing that someone was likely standing over him, he leaned his head back to catch an upside-down glimpse of the two earth pony agents who had taken him out of his classroom the previous afternoon.

"Dr. Seymour? Your Highness?" the lighter-colored suited stallion addressed the two. "Your presence is requested at the Queen's palace."

"Oh heeeey, it's my best buddies!" the professor drawled in his inverted position, earning a giggle from an amused Twilight Sparkle. "Hey, what brings you to this magical land of sentient insectoids?"

"Hehehe, hey Seymour..." laughed Twilight. "Aren't those guys the ones who came to pick you up from your class yesterday?"

"Hah, kidnapped me is more like it." answered Seymour, returning to a properly-seated position. "So, of what do I owe the honor today? Why don't you two join us for a drink and let me know, eh?"

"We'd be much more appreciative if you would join us for a ride to the palace." the same earth pony answered, losing his patience ever so slowly.

Seymour turned to Twilight with a devious smile.

"And what if I were to decline... just curious as to what might happen." he asked aloud.

The earth pony shook his head as Twilight Snickered loudly.

"Well, sir, we have no sense of humor... as you may be aware." he explained. "And we have a warrant to take you there by force if need be."