Dead Space: Lifeline

“Move!” Applejack cried as she limped through the pools of rot and blood painting the corridor floor. “Move, Fluttershy!”

Up ahead it was hard to see her in the dim, flickering lights of the corridor, but Applejack knew her friend was moving exactly as they had planned. After all, every time they took to these lethal corridors it had been with a plan to get to the safety of a ventilation shaft, or a maintenance tunnel or some cramped, dingy cupboard somewhere. Applejack had lost count of how many runs they had made in the past day. A hundred? A thousand?

How much ground had they even covered in all those mad dashes between safe zones. Ten metres? A hundred?

It seemed they weren’t making any progress. And she felt even more helpless as she counted the amount of ponies they had lost every couple of runs. Everypony was gone, and it was now just the two of them.

Ahead Fluttershy had opened one of the maintenance ducts that sat in the smooth walls of the corridors. It was easy enough to spot the ducts, they were always pronounced by black and red hazard strips, or illuminated by dim amber lights.

The pegasus struggled into the narrow passage, twisting and scrambling in the unfamiliar bulk of the Royal Guard armour bulwarking her otherwise frail body. The golden impact plates were scuffed, chipped and dulled, painting a grim picture of everything that had happened to the pony in the past twenty-four hours. Between the dents from falling down ventilation shafts and claw marks of the unrelenting damned.

Applejack looked no better off. Her customary Stetson was missing and she tasted blood. She wondered how hard Rarity would faint if she could see either of them, clad in tacky tarnished armour, their manes all frizzed and messy and blood caking their fur.

Heck, Applejack might not even recognise herself in the mirror should she care to look. She hoped she and her friend would live long enough to.

Catching up she watched Fluttershy looked back as she scrambled over the threshold of the maintenance tunnel. Applejack thanked Celestia – and a few other deities for good measure – that Fluttershy hadn’t broken into uncontrollable tears yet. They were both afraid of death’s shadow breathing down their necks, but they had to keep going. Applejack counted her blessings that she didn’t have to carry poor Fluttershy.

But something in Fluttershy’s expression changed as she looked past the earth-pony. There wasn’t just fear in her eyes anymore. They widened to the size of saucers with absolute terror. A mask of terror she only wore then “they” entered line of sight.

Applejack turned to see what Fluttershy had spotted, but feared she didn’t actually have to look. She knew it by the monstrous roars that carried down the corridor after them, and the scuttling of talons.

Applejack flicked out her right forehoof. The armour she’d scavenged from a Royal Guard pony who hadn’t needed it anymore glowed the same crimson colour as the blood caking the outside and inside. As the magical glow intensified, spare plates slid out of a hidden compartment in Applejack’s ballistic collar and slithered down her leg. Prongs and plates built up bit by bit around her hoof to form a handle. More bits clicked into place to form a shaft ending in a trio of barrels on the business end. The part pointed at her face extended into a clamp that secured around her fetlock before the magazine slotted itself into place and the weapon hummed hungrily for blood.

The moment the crystal rifle’s safety clicked off, Applejack cocked both back legs and bucked Fluttershy in her flanks. The pegasus was sent sprawling helplessly into the maintenance corridor as Applejack landed hard on her back, rifle shifted into a firing position.

“Run, sugarcube!” Applejack yelled as she aimed her rifle. “Get out and warn everypony! That’s all that matters! You have to get ou-…”

The shadows fell upon her, tearing and spitting and roaring. Applejack screamed as loud as the rifle while the maintenance hatch fell shut to block Fluttershy’s view.

An unsettling silence filled the dead space in her ears, and realising she was now alone, Fluttershy finally found her tears.

DEAD SPACE:

Lifeline

By PseudoFiction