Epidemic

by UnknownSubject

Rating: teen
Tags: Crossover, Tragedy, Twilight Sparkle, Princess Celestia, Dark, Doctor Whooves, Sad, Original Character, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic
Length: 5898

A seemingly harmless virus arrives to Ponyville from the unknown.

Twilight finds a book. In this book, there is a certain virus that spreads quickly, and has the potential to wipe out millions.

At the same time, a mysterious virus appears from unknown origin, spreading quickly from pony to pony.

Is this virus the same from the book? If so, can Twilight stop it before it causes harm?

Inspired by Ndemic Creations, Plague Inc.

Published 2015-07-03 20:10:01 UTC
Last updated 2015-07-13 04:40:33 UTC

The Virus

-Ponyville; Twilight’s Residence-

Twilight was doing what she did best, and that was reading. Only this particular book she was reading, was a book on disease. She found the book on one of her many book shelves, and since she hadn't seen this one before, she decided to give it a try. Until she was interrupted by a certain baby dragon coming down the stairs.

"Hey, Twilight! Whatcha doin?" Asked the curious Spike. Twilight maintained her sights on the book as she gave him her response.

"I found this book, and decided to give it a good read. It's really odd though, I'm pretty sure I haven't seen this one before, and I've read every book in the library. More than once, I can assure you that." Twilight explains to Spike.

Twilight flipped the page to find an interesting section of the book. On the left side of the book, there were gruesome pictures of incredibly pale ponies with decaying ones not too far away. On the right, pictures of a DNA strands and arrows marking their genetic makeup. Twilight was very concerned by what she was reading and investigated further. The page containing the DNA was titled 'Celius', and on the bottom right corner there was a microscopic view of what appeared to be the cells of a virus.

Twilight flipped the page, remembering carefully the contents of the previous page. She saw more gruesome images on the left side. The right side, however, contained pictures of a blue shining liquid within a beaker. The right side page was titled 'Cure', and had what appeared to be a list of instructions for the liquid. The instructions demanded ingredients that were very hard, but not impossible, to retrieve.

Out of the blue, Twilight heard Spike give a small but noticeable cough. Twilight turned to him, now concerned for his condition granted by what she had just read.

"Spike? Are you okay?" Twilight asked the Spike.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine." Spike assured Twilight, "Just a little tickle in my throat."

Twilight worried for the small dragons health, but decided to shrugged off the doubt. It probably was just a tickle in his throat, and nothing more, and so she continued reading the book.

Twilight flipped to the next page, this time the left side of the book was titled 'Symptoms'. As the title would lead you to believe, it had a list of symptoms. On the top of the list, ‘coughing’ was written. Twilight grew nervous, and looked behind her, hoping to find Spike. But alas; Spike wasn't there anymore. He must've went into town.

Twilight returned to the book, and scanned through the list. The symptoms grew in severity and lethality as she went down the list. From 'coughing' to 'pneumonia' to 'coma' and finally 'total organ failure.'

Twilight finally closed the book, and she figured why she hasn't seen this book before. It scared the living daylights out of her, she probably just never wanted to read the book in the first place.

Twilight took a deep breath, and Spike conveniently walked through the door, returning from the four minute, not-a-waste-of-time trip he just had.

"Spike, there you are. I need you to write a letter." Spike somehow pulled out a piece of paper and a quill from the invisible pockets he has, and waited for Twilight to tell him what to write.

"Dear Princess Celestia, I had recently read a book on a virus named 'Celius.' I just wanted to know if the virus is gone, or if it is still roaming around the area. Your faithful student, Twilight Sparkle."

"Faithful... Sparkle" Spike repeated as he finished the letter. He rolled up the paper like a scroll and blows fire on it, causing it to disappear into smoke that exits through the window.

"Celius, huh?" Spike asks, hoping to get more information out of this.

"Oh, it's really nothing you should be worrying yourself about Spike." Twilight replied, sparing him the bloodcurdling details within the haunting book.

"Hmm… Ok, if you say so." Spike says rather disappointed. Then he let out another set of coughs. Only this time, it was a bit more violent.
"Spike, are you sure you're okay?" Twilight said, getting closer to examine him clearly.

"Yeah, Twilight, I'm fine. Just a little tickle." Spike reassured her with the same excuse. Twilight didn’t buy it this time, and cautiously places her hoof on his forehead.

"You... don't have a fever." Twilight removed her hoof, carefully examining Spike. After some thought, Twilight reached a conclusion. "Spike, I'm taking you to see the doctor.”

"But I'm fine Twilight. I just-"

"No buts.” Twilight interjected sternly. “This could be the first stages of hay flu." Twilight hoped as she walked toward the door. Spike reluctantly slugs his way out of the library.

-Ponyville; Hospital-

A while after walking, Twilight finds herself at the hospital. She leads Spike into the waiting room, and walks up to a white pony with a pink mane reading a book.

"Good morning Nurse RedHeart." Twilight greeted happily. The white pony looks up at her from her magazine and smiles.

"Hello Twilight! How can I help you?" RedHeart asked with a happy grin spread across her face.

"Spike needs a check up. I think he might be coming down with something." Twilight explained as her smile subtly faded away into worry. Nurse RedHeart looked over to Spike, and curiously raised an eyebrow. The little dragon looked fine, but it could be something undetectable from the outside.

"Of course. I'll appoint Spike in for a checkup. There are a few patients ahead, so you might have to wait a while." The nurse explained to Twilight. Twilight nodded in agreement as she goes to sit next to Spike.

A few moments later, after some patients came out, the nurse came into the waiting room, with a clipboard at hoof.

"Spike!" She called out.

Twilight nudges Spike, and cocked her head over to the nurse. Spike lazily slumped off his seat, and walked over to her. Twilight followed after.

They walked into a room, and the nurse walked in with them. The nurse took a quick look at the patient, and her clipboard.

"Spike. You came to see if you were sick, right?" The nurse questioned.

"Yeah..." Spike replied, as he swung his feet below a big chair.

"Well then, lets get started." The nurse said with glee.

A couple tests, an uncomfortable urine sample, and a quick blood sample later, the nurse returned with a puzzled look plastered on her face as she stared at her clipboard.

"What is it, Ms. RedHeart?" Twilight asked, growing in anticipation.

"Spikes illness, it-" she paused and took a quick look at the clipboard to reassure herself of no mistakes.

"It doesn't exist." She ended her sentence.

"What do you mean?" Twilight asked, getting a bit paranoid.

"Spikes results are unknown. We don't know what kind of illness he has." The nurse explained, "We found a virus for sure, but we don't know which virus it is. It isn’t Hay Flu. but that’s as much as we can get." Twilight thinks for a second. An unknown pathogen, virus class for certain, and coughing symptom.

At that moment, she had remembered Celius.

Author's Note

Reboot!

Evolution

-Ponyville; Hospital-

“Nurse RedHeart,” Twilight said calmly, “Has there been any other ponies with this ‘unknown virus’?” The nurse held her chin with her hoof as she began to think.

“Well. We have been getting a decent amount of ponies coming in with this virus, but the virus is mostly harmless. Nothing that can actually hurt anypony.” RedHeart explained. Twilight thought about the book, and of the contents. There’s no way there’s a connection.

Suddenly, Spike began to groan. Nurse RedHeart and Twilight backed away, and he held his stomach in pain.

“What’s going on?” Twilight asked the nurse. The nurse looked at her clipboard, and back at the dragon.

“I-I don’t know. His results showed nothing of stomach infections.” Nurse RedHeart said. Then, an unbelievably believable scene occurred.
Spike belched out a letter. Twilight and RedHeart let out a sigh of relief. Twilight levitated the letter up to her and read it silently.

[Dear Twilight Sparkle, Celius is nothing to worry about. The virus plague had been eradicated thousands of years ago.] Twilight sighed in relief once more, happy to hear the good news, and kept reading. [Although it almost wiped out most of our species, we were able to find a cure, and stop the devastating plague from spreading further.] Twilight smiled at the good news, though the next thing she read almost threw her into a fit of panic. [However, it is possible that the virus may not be 100% gone, and the cure can take extensive amounts of time and effort to put together. Let us hope that the plague never returns to our peaceful country. Your humble teacher, Princess Celestia]

Twilight started hyperventilating slowly. Could Spikes illness be Celius? Nurse RedHeart looked at Twilight with growing concern.

“Is something wrong, Twilight?” RedHeart asked with a worried expression.

“Yes! Yes.” Twilight snapped back into reality. “A-Are we finished?”

“Yes. Like I said before, we don’t know exactly what Spike has.” RedHeart re explained as she walked them towards the door.

“Well thank you for your help anyway.” Twilight departed and she heads home. “Come on Spike let’s go.” Twilight waved goodbye one last time at nurse RedHeart.

-Ponyville; Twilight’s Residence-

After a good amount of walking, (and a bunch of annoying coughing) Twilight and Spike found themselves at the library. Twilight immediately sat down in front of the new book, and flipped over to the symptoms page.

The second symptom on the list was ‘nausea’. Twilight decided to keep a close eye on Spike to see if he showed any sign of nausea. Then she heard a knock on the door. Departing from the book, she went to go see who it was. Surprisingly, it was an orange earth pony wearing a cowboy hat.

“Oh Hello, AppleJack. What a surprise, how can I-” Twilight was interrupted when the cowpony started coughing.

“Hey there Twi. Ah was wondering if you were carrying some cough medicine. I went to Fluttershy’s house, but she ain’t got any.” AppleJack said. Twilight backed up from the door, afraid she might catch the potential Celius. AppleJack noticed Twilight’s sudden movements.

“Don’t worry Twi. It’s only a cold *cough cough*, Ah think.” AppleJack assured the nervous-looking Twilight.

“I’m sure it is. Wait here while I go get your medicine.” Twilight closed the door and zips to the medicine drawer upstairs in her bathroom. Grabbing some cough syrup, she quickly returned back down and opened the door to reveal a waiting AppleJack.

“Here you go AppleJack,” Twilight gave her the bottle with a smile. “A couple spoonfuls of this and you should be feeling much better.” AppleJack looked at the bottle labeled ‘Doctor Hooves Cough Syrup’ and smiled gratefully.

“Thank you kindly, Twilight,” AppleJack said before coughing once more. Twilight backed away again, fearing the potential plague. AppleJack turned and left. Twilight closed the door, and went back to her book. Ignoring the repetitive coughs upstairs, she sat down and continued reading.

Twilight flipped back a page, to the cure. The ingredients for the blue liquid were mostly plants, some of which can be found in the Everfree, while others were on the far side of mountains on the other side of the country. Twilight considered sending a letter to Celestia about the mysterious illness going around Ponyville, and it’s connection with the book, but she didn’t want to disturb Spikes rest, given his condition.
Twilight decided to study the virus herself. She slowly, and smoothly walked up to her room, and peeked inside. Spike was laying down in his small bed, coughing. There was no change to what she had seen before.

Twilight went downstairs, grabbed a saddlebag, and headed towards the hospitals. If she was going to study the virus, she would need every piece of information she could, starting with the one place lots of diseases are found.

-Ponyville; Hospital-

Upon arrival, she met up with Nurse RedHeart.

“Nurse RedHeart.” Twilight begins. “I need a bit of Spikes blood samples."

Nurse RedHeart looked up at Twilight a bit taken back.

"Why?," the nurse asks Twilight, concerned.

"The virus you found in Spike needs to be studied. I’m going to need some samples to take a look at the cells.” Twilight explained. RedHeart simply nodded and went into a cabinet behind her. She levitated a container filled with the red liquid, and gave it to Twilight. Twilight took the container and put it in her bag.

“Thank you, and have a nice day.” Twilight said before heading out the door, and back to the library. On her way back she saw more ponies coughing, but they didn’t seem to care or notice at all. She made sure to keep a five meter radius between her and any coughing ponies.

-Ponyville; Twilight’s Residence-

Twilight arrived at the library, and placed the container next to the book. She silently crept up to her room. Spike was still there, snoozing silently. She snuck in and quietly took a microscope from a box under her desk.

Twilight went back downstairs and put the microscope next to the small container. She slid the drawer open, and pulled out a small syringe along with two small plastic sheets. She opened the container and dipped the needle of the syringe into it and sucked up some of the blood. Then, she carefully dripped a tiny amount of the blood onto one plastic sheet, and put the other sheet on top. She slid the two plastic sheets with the blood under the scope of said microscope. She took a peek into the microscope.

The cells were tiny, and far apart. Some of the cells were not even noticeable, and the ones that were noticeable blended in with the blood cells. The virus cells were blackish, and moved very slowly.

Suddenly, there was a groan upstairs. Twilight’s ear perked up, and she got off the microscope. She hurried upstairs to her room, and saw Spike holding his stomach.
“Spike? Is everything alright?” Twilight asked, hoping for something small.

“I just feel like throwing up. You were right Twilight, I do feel sick.” Spike said, still holding his stomach even tighter.

“Well get some sleep. It’ll be over soon.” Twilight assured Spike. Spike rolled over and threw a blanket over him, still groaning in disgust.

Twilight went back downstairs, and looked back into the microscope. Only this time, something was different. The cells grew. Not in a large way, but in a very small noticeable way. Twilight looked over to the book, it was still on the ‘symptoms’ page. The second one on the list was ‘nausea’ and that has already occurred in Spike.

Twilight began to panic and hyperventilate as she put the puzzle pieces together. What she assumed was true, and no other pony has noticed it.

Celius has returned, and is evolving...
Fast.

The Doctor

-Ponyville; Twilight’s Residence-
Twilight shut the book closed. She then slid opened the drawer, and pulled out a quill and a sheet of plain line paper. Without hesitation, she immediately began to write.

[Dear Princess Celestia,
Celius is not gone, it’s still here. We must start working on the cure as soon as possible. The virus mutates very fast, and can become completely immune if we don’t work on the cure now. All I ask is that we get scientists working, before this virus spreads to further areas. Please please PLEASE, get started immediately.
-Twilight Sparkle.]

Twilight rolled up the paper, and took it upstairs quickly. She opened the door, and woke Spike up.

“Spike!” She exclaimed, “We need to get this letter to Celestia, NOW!” Twilight fidgeted as she frantically waved the scroll in front of Spike.

“Why?” Spike asked, apparently not giving much concern as Twilight. Twilight thought to herself. She didn’t want Spike knowing about Celius, his poor young heart couldn’t handle the pressure of knowing that he could possibly die from his condition. She also didn’t want rumor of this virus going out, and knowing Spike, he’d be the first to tell someone. So she thought of an excuse, to keep the news hidden.

“Because, uhh... Because... It is very important!” Twilight exclaimed, still frantically waving the scroll around.

“Oh, alright, fine.” Spike sat up, and grabbed the scroll slowly, and took a deep breath. Twilight anxiously watched for Spike to blow the letter away sending it off to Celestia’s care. However, it didn’t happen. Spike’s violent cough got the better of him, and he dropped the scroll to the ground. Spike picked the scroll off the ground, and took another attempt. The same happened, Spike was simply too sick to send off letters.
“You’re going to *cough* wait until I get better, Twilight. I can’t do it like this.” Twilight anxiously rub the back of her head, biting her lower lip. She didn’t know what to do, this conflict was an entirely new one from what she regularly had to deal with.

She took the the scroll back from Spike, and he went back to sleep. As much as it didn’t look like it, Twilight was terrified. A plague that has risen and been defeated ages ago, was now circling around the small peaceful town of Ponyville. She couldn’t fix it herself, a single pony can’t cure a plague, not without the proper equipment. She couldn’t tell anyone, for she feared that the citizens of Equestria would be thrown into panic, and chaos would emit. In a situation like this, what was Twilight to do?

Twilight returned back downstairs, and thought carefully of her next plan. She could only think of one solution to this. If she would have to cure the virus herself, she couldn’t do it alone. She would have to try and find any other pony willing to help with the cure. Somepony who wouldn’t panic and would take the job seriously. She grabbed her saddlebag, put all her tools (Microscope, blood vial, the book, and a notebook with quill) in said bag, and headed out the door.

The first person Twilight would look for would be Dr. Whooves. His experience in these sort of things would be needed if she wanted to even know more about the virus. She needed to get to the hospital.

-Ponyville; Hospital-
Once she arrived, it took her by surprise, and filled her head with extreme concern to see that the hospital was full. The line to the reception was even forming outside the hospital, and they were all violently coughing ponies. Twilight skipped to the counter, making sure not to make any sort of contact with anypony. She had to see nurse RedHeart.

“Please sir. You need to wait, there are seven ponies ahead of you.” The nurse tried calming the impatient crowd down. “You’ll get your turn.”
Twilight walked up to the nurse, keeping a meter long distance away from everyone. RedHeart spotted her, and looked at her with pleading eyes.

“Oh please tell me you found something!” The nurse desperately asked. Twilight nodded, and the nurse let out a sigh of relief.

“Everypony calm down!” The nurse yelled out to the arguing audience. “Twilight here knows wha-” The nurse was quickly interrupted by Twilight’s hoof being shoved into her mouth. Luckily, none of the ponies in the waiting room heard RedHeart’s announcement over the arguments and impatient bickering.

“Shh!” Twilight leaned in to RedHeart, and retreated her hoof. “We need to keep this virus in a low profile. If anypony catches on about this, Ponyville could go into complete anarchy.” Twilight whispered. RedHeart nodded at Twilight in understanding agreement.

"Is Dr. Whooves in today?" Twilight anxiously asked. RedHeart looked down at a clipboard, and back up at Twilight.

"Down the hall, third door." RedHeart replied with worried eyes.

"Thank you." Twilight ended, and walked past the door into the hallway.

"Why did she get to go first!?"

"Yeah! We were here first!"

Twilight passed two doors before reaching the third one. She slowly opened the door, to reveal a brown pony wearing a medical mask. The brown pony was looking at a green pony sitting on a bed.

"Hello?" Twilight asked the pony. The brown pony turned to look at Twilight. The green one coughed.
"Hello, Twilight. What brings you here?" The brown pony says.

"Hello, Dr. Whooves. I'm here because of..." Twilight leaned in, as well as the doctor. "The unidentified virus." She whispered.

"Oh. Good. But first, let me deal with this patient." Dr. Whooves said, and handed over a medical mask to Twilight. "Put this on, you don’t want to catch a cold." Twilight put the mask on a watched.

"So. Lyra, it says here you are constantly coughing and you feel nauseated at times. Correct?" Doctor Whooves asked the patient.
"Yes doctor *cough*," The presumed Lyra answers. Dr. Whooves looks at his clipboard.

"Ok then we'll need to do an analysis on you. You know, physical checkup, urine samples, blood samples, all that regular stuff you do at a normal checkup." Dr. Whooves smiled at the patient. "So let's take a look at you."

Twilight attentively watched as the doctor placed the end of his stethoscope on Lyra's chest. Dr. Whooves listened carefully.

"Her heart rate is normal. Nothing wrong there." Twilight shuffled through her bag, and pulled out her notebook and her quill. She began writing what Dr. Whooves was saying. He then grabs a tongue depressor, and uses it to look into Lyra's mouth.

"Red throat. Obviously from repetitive cough." Dr. Whooves grabbed an ophthalmoscope and looked into Lyra's eyes.

"Hmm... This is new." Dr. Whooves announced. Twilight looked up from her notebook, and looked at the doctor.

"What's the matter?" Twilight asked, once again concerned.

"Her eyes are bright red. Nopony else had this." Dr. Whooves explained, turning the ophthalmoscope off. Twilight pulled out her book, setting her notebook and quill on a nearby table.

Twilight cracked open the book to the 'symptoms' page. As she had assumed, the third symptom was 'Eye Fatigue'. She scanned through to the next symptom. 'Insomnia'. It wasn't lethal or that severe, but it had to be studied further.

"Ok. We are done here Lyra. If you were to please get through to the next room, the nurse will be with you to get your blood sample." Dr. Whooves explained to the patient. Lyra got up and walked out of the room, coughing and rubbing her eyes.

"Now then. Twilight. What do you know about the mystery virus?" Dr. Whooves asked Twilight, keeping a serious tone in his voice. They both take off their medical masks before speaking again.

"I think I may know the origins of the virus." Twilight responded. "It may be a virus named 'Celius'. It might seem like nothing now, but-"

"Celius?" The doctor grew visibly concerned, as if he had just heard terrible news.

"Yes. It was found and supposedly eradicated from ponyville a while back, but I think-"

"Celius must not return Twilight." Dr. Whooves turned to look at Twilight.

"Dr. Whooves?" Twilight said with worried concern. It was obvious that the knowledge the doctor had over Celius was a surprise to her. "You know about Celius?"

"I do. It is my job to know. After all I am a doctor." Dr. Whooves explained.

"Oh... Right. I have this book about it with me." Twilight levitates the from the table, and showed it to Dr. Whooves. "It could give us needed information to stop the virus."

"Not here though." Dr. Whooves said. "I wouldn't want to scare the patients with this. Or the employees."

"I understand, I didn’t want the news to scare ponies either." Twilight returned the book to its original spot in her bag, as well as the notebook and quill. "Where should we study it?"

"At your library. I'll be there when my shift is done." Dr. Whooves said. Twilight nodded and walked out of the room. On her way to the exit, she noticed the red in ponies eyes. They were not too obvious, but they were noticeable.

Twilight walked out of the hospital, and headed home. She avoided everyone who had the slightest signs of Celius.

-Ponyville; Twilight’s Residence-
Once she arrived, she went upstairs to check on Spike. He was laying in his little bed, snoozing soundly.

Twilight walked back downstairs and set her microscope out of her bag, and onto the desk it previously was on. She emptied everything from her bag, and organized them neatly next to each other.

Twilight grabbed the syringe she used for Spikes blood, and sucked up more blood from the vial. She then put a little bit of that blood on the two glass sheets. Then she placed the sheets under the microscope, and looked through.

The cells of the virus were growing for sure. They were now twice the size than when she looked through last time. Twilight wrote her observations in her notebook, and kept watching.

Twilight studied the virus for a couple hours, until she heard a knock. She walked towards the door, and opened it. There stood Dr. Whooves with a serious expression.

"Hello doctor, please come in." Twilight beckons the doctor to come inside, and as soon as he walked in, she closed the door behind him.
"Now then. Let's begin the study shall we?"

Tragedy

Dr. Whooves walked over to the microscope already set up and took a good look. Twilight intensively focused on the doctor, and he peeked into her microscope.

"This is absolutely astonishing! The virus cells are growing with an accelerated rate. The virus seems capable of mutating up to three times in one day!" Dr. Whooves explains as he departs from the microscope. Twilight looks in as she saw the same the doctor has seen. After her own observation, she backs up off the microscope, and shifted her attention to Dr. Whooves.

"Does that mean that the virus is severe?" Twilight asked, afraid of what answers might prevail.

"Not only severe." Dr Whooves begins. "But very lethal and possibly immune. If the cure isn’t started immediately, we may not have a chance whatsoever!”

Twilight took a deep breath to relieve herself from any panic, and decided to open her book. She flipped over to the page titled 'Cure', and scanned through the ingredients. Dr. Whooves joined her, to knowledge himself of the ingredients as well.

"The cure has incredibly rare ingredients." Twilight says, turning to Dr. Whooves. "How long do you think it will take before we discover it?"

"With only us two, it could take up to ten years to find it." Dr. Whooves says, keeping his eyes on the book. Twilight begins to worry.

"At that rate, Ponyville will go extinct before we find the cure." Twilight said, now worried, not only for her own life, but for the life of the millions of ponies put at risk.

"Then we need to raise attention on Celius. We have to get more people on our side." Dr. Whooves put a hoof to his chin, while thinking up a solution for this predicament.

"How will we do that?" Twilight asked, her attention focused on the doctor fully. Twilight was prepared to do whatever it took to raise attention on the virus, and ultimately eradicate it.

"How about a 'Celius awareness day?'" Dr. Whooves suggests raising a hoof.

"But not many ponies know about it." Twilight begins. "How will get ponies to start a Celius awareness day without proper knowledge of it?”
"We’ll have to think of another way to spread the word." Dr. Whooves says as he looks out the window. The sun sets over the horizon. "But for now, you need to rest. We will continue tomorrow." The light outside Twilight's library was quickly beginning to be overpowered with the darkness of the night.

Twilight nodded at the doctor, as to agree with him.

"Very well. I will see you tomorrow." Dr. Whooves says, and heads out of the library, leaving Twilight alone with her thoughts.

If Celius spread amongst the thousands, it could cause catastrophic damage to society. Twilight almost regretted not telling the townsfolk of the plague soon to rise in Ponyville, but she convinced herself it was the right thing to do not to tell anypony. If she had, the ponies would surely panic, for this isn’t the first time the ponies cause anarchy at the sign of trouble. They usually only panicked when something that was destructive came to town, who knows how bad society would’ve been left at if they realized that the next sign of trouble could kill them.
Twilight slowly walked upstairs to her bedroom, yawning and bowing her head in exhaustion, she carefully opened the door, to reveal Spike snoozing soundly on his little bed. She silently walked over to her own bed. She laid down, and yawned once more before drifting off to her peaceful slumber.

Who knows? This may be the last peaceful slumber she has.

☣☣☣☣☣☣☣☣☣☣

Twilight awoke, and yawned. She realized there was something ominous outside; a mysterious red glow was emitting through her window. She got up and looked over to where Spike should be, but wasn't. Just then, she heard a knock, and went downstairs to see who it was. When she opened the door, she saw Dr. Whooves standing there, but the condition he was in frightened Twilight.

Dr. Whooves stood there with bloodshot red eyes, and his skin infested with opens wounds. He was sweating around small bubbles that formed around the wounds. Twilight let out a shriek of terror when the doctor coughed blood, and almost sprayed some onto her.

"Twilight." The doctor began to speak. His voice was broken, and hardly recognizable behind the gurgled words. He fell to the ground, coughing and spewing out blood. His eyes rolled to the back of his head, and he lay unconscious.

Twilight slam shut the door, and ran towards the book. She immediately opened the book, but was shocked to find that no words or pictures were in it. Just empty blank sheets of paper. Twilight frantically flipped through the pages, trying to find anything in there. Until she found one page. One paged in the middle of the book. The page had no title, only one word in bold letters centered on the page.
'Celius'

The word was written in big red letters. There were no other words, or pictures. Just the one word written on the book.
Suddenly, Twilight heard angry screaming coming from the outside of her library. She slowly opened her door, and saw tons of ponies outside throwing molotovs at buildings, flipping over chariots, and throwing bricks at hospitals and clinics.
Twilight teared up when she saw fillies and colts lying lifeless on the ground as their assumed parents furiously cried while hugging them tightly.

The ponies were all in the condition the doctor was in. Twilight started hyperventilating when she saw a couple ponies collapse to the ground, most likely dead. Flames engulfed ponyville as the angry ponies screamed out in pain.

Twilight could not understand what was going on around her. The virus could not have possibly mutated and spread so fast overnight.
Twilight closed the door, and ran upstairs to barricade herself in. There she remembered something. Spike! She hurried back downstairs. She still had the medical mask given to her at the hospital. She put it on, and fearfully walked out. Twilight was befuddled when she noticed that no one was looking at her, a healthy, clean, sterilized pony.

"Spike! Spike where are you!" The frantic Twilight called out. It took a couple minutes of yelling for Spike for her to realized the crowd forming a circle around something, and sobbing their eyes out. Curious, Twilight maneuvered through the crowd in an attempt to see what was going on. What she saw made her join the crowd's sorrow as she cried in emotional pain.

It was Fluttershy. Her limp body was oozing blood from the wounds, and her bloodshot eyes were rolled back into her head, her twitching arms confirmed that she was barely alive, and suffering a great deal of pain. Twilight scooped her lifeless body, not caring for catching the infection anymore, and hugged Flutershy tightly with remorse. Her tears dripping from her cheeks, and falling onto the dead Pegasus.
"This is my fault." Twilight blamed herself for the chaos around her. She hugged the butter yellow pegasus tightly, and shut her eyes tightly.
"This is my fault. This is my fault. THIS IS MY FAULT!"

"Twilight!" Yelled out a familiar voice.

"THIS IS MY FAULT!"

☣☣☣☣☣☣☣☣☣☣

Twilight awoke to the brutal shakes of Spike.

"Twilight! Wake up!" The little dragon yelled.

"What?" Twilight rubbed her eyes and looked out the window. It was morning, and birds chirped their morning melodies.

"You were screaming in your sleep." Spike explained. Twilight yawned and got out of bed. “It must’ve been a crazy dream. What was it?”

"It was nothing, Spike. You need go get back to sleep. You're sick remember?" Twilight reminded Spike before yawning her again. Spike was disappointed, and reluctantly walked over to his little bed. Then he fell back asleep.

Twilight walked downstairs thinking about the nightmare she had. The virus has been stressing her out lately, and she has been on it too much. But it had to be studied, no matter what. Even if that meant putting her own mental state at jeopardy.

Twilight heard a knock on her door. She opened it, and was relieved to see the doctor in the healthy condition he was in yesterday.

"Good morning doctor. Please come in." Twilight said as she stepped aside, giving Dr. Whooves a chance to pass by. He accepts the invitation and walks in.

"Good morning Twilight." He says as he walks in. "I think you'll be glad to know that I got us access into a laboratory. So we can continue our research there." Twilight responded with a nod.

"So pack your tools and supplies. We'll head over in an hour." The doctor says. Twilight nods, and heads over to get her things.

“This would also be a good time to say goodbye to any friends you have.” Dr. Whooves pointed out. The statement caused Twilight to stop, and look at the doctor.

“The Lab isn’t in Ponyville?” Twilight asked.

“While there are laboratories here in Ponyville, I think we’d be more suited with a laboratory outside of the town where the virus is taking place.” The doctor explained. Twilight was saddened by the news that she wouldn’t be able to see her friends for the time being.

“Can’t I bring them along?” Twilight asked, hoping she’d get the answer she hoped for.

“I’m afraid not, Twilight. Remember that our mission has to stay silent. The ideas we had earlier were for spreading the word were for officials and authority figures. We can’t tell your friends about our mission.”

Twilight was deeply sorrowed about the news, but decided that he knew best, so she started packing her bags, and was prepared to leave her friends behind.