Dead Space: Lifeline

The three of us grunted, sliding the tram doors open inch by inch. Spike had managed to get his claws between the seams allowing Rarity and I to pry in our hooves and push off each other. Add a tweak of unicorn magic and soon we had ripped the door open and stumbled into the carriage.

Watching our backs, Shining Armor swept the muzzle of his rifle up and down the abandoned platform before backing on after us.

“We should be good,” the captain muttered as he eyed the inside of the tram carriage. “How’s everypony doing?”

“Well enough, considering,” Rarity mumbled.

“Considering?”

The mare hesitated a moment, then sighed with a shrug. “We’ve been running and hiding so long… what day is it even?”

“It’s today,” Shining offered with a cocked smirk.

“Remind me to stop asking you questions.”

Shining Armor moved up a little, peering through the askew doorway leading into the next tram carriage. About four carriages ahead the cockpit sat with the controls to get us moving.

“I’ll take point,” Shining said. “Give me to a count of ten, then follow. If there’s an ambush ahead there’s no point all of us getting jumped. Who wants to come with?”

Spike put up his claw and ran up to the unicorn’s side. “I’ll go!”

He was stopped by a magical glow matching the aura on Rarity’s horn catching him by the scruff of his neck.

Pulling him back, Rarity shot the baby dragon a concerned look. “I don’t know Spike. It could be dangerous.”

All three of us stared at her for a long time before she finally got it.

“Oh, right. Everywhere is dangerous. Well then I suppose it wouldn’t be any harm. Just be careful.”

As Spike and Shining Armor set off towards the front of the train, Rarity and I followed at a slower pace. I made sure to seal the door we’d pried open shut, or at least as shut as I could get it so we wouldn’t be followed and ambushed by any crystal ponies.

As we moved Rarity spoke up.

“Do you think he’s okay?”

“Spike’s tough as nails and twice as sharp,” I assured the mare, but paused when she shook her head. “You mean Shining Armor? What’s wrong with Shiny?”

Rarity shrugged, thinking for a moment. “I’m not sure. He just seems… off.”

I thought back to the few times I caught him speaking about somepony unknown, wondering if he was speaking about himself or somepony else. Then there was the fact he was being very calm about this whole situation. Not that that was a bad thing, mind you. It was putting me at ease enough that I might just die without remorse.

The thought still put a chill down my spine. I didn’t want to die. Didn’t even want to think about it. Still, I wasn’t delusional enough to not realise it might happen any time now. But with everything that happened on top of Shiny’s calm I was growing used to the idea enough to not worry about it too much.

“I dunno, Miss Rarity,” I offered. “When all this is over I might not be the same way I used to be either.”

“That’d be a pity.” She suddenly managed a small smile. “On the plus side, this is the most I’ve heard you speak in all the years we’ve known each other.

I gasped dramatically. “Oh, no! I’m starting to crack already!”

We shared a chuckle as we reached the front of the train where Shining Armor and Spike were rooting about.

Shining was on his back digging into the underside of the control console while Spike plodded about the dashboard testing buttons and switches while glancing over a driver’s checklist.

“How’s it looking?” I asked.

Shining Armor was shaking his head as he slid out from under the console and found his hooves again. “Not good. There’s no power going to any of the systems. Far as I can tell everything’s plugged in.”

“Must be a tripped fuse,” I mused turning the way we came. “The fuse box for these things is usually in the mid-section somewhere. I’ll have a look, see if I can get her running again.”

“I’ll come with,” Shining started to say, but I waved him off.

“Nah. You guys stay here and get the tram moving as soon as I restore power,” I told them. “The sooner we get moving the better. And don’t worry. I killed quite a few crystal ponies before you showed up.”

“Yeah, but you didn’t do it looking as good as I do!” Shining called after me before sealing the driver’s cabin door.

It didn’t take me long to reach the mid-section. All the doors hung open and it was easy enough to see two carriages ahead. If there was danger I’d be aware of it before it hit me.

At least I thought so.

A moment of vertigo hit me. There was a stab of pain deep within my skull, as if something had worked a knife carefully between my eye and its socket and then suddenly plunged it deeper in. I swayed and for a moment the dark and grey world was dyed red.

Little letters left a bloody imprint in my retinas for a brief moment, then faded into the air. It took some blinking, but eventually my vision returned to normal and I was left to wonder what the hell had just happened.

There was something else new there, just ahead of me and facing away. Or rather, somepony. A mare, somehow familiar, her body glowing softly. I knew it couldn’t be a pony though. If there was one thing the Crystal Empire taught me it was that none could wander around here alone and last very long.

And yet there she stood.

I moved closer, making sure to strike the deck under my hooves loudly to announce myself. She didn’t turn as if she were deaf. It was just a few feet away when I reached out. But before I touched her side she seemed to come to life and turned around.

“Applejack!?” I cried.

It was my sister… but then it wasn’t her. It couldn’t have been. Because if it were she wouldn’t be able to stand.

She’d be dead.

I could hardly tell what had happened to her. Half her face had been mauled off, one eye hanging grossly out of its socket. Her customary Stetson was missing and most of one leg was chewed down to the bone. Chunks of meat were missing from her side to reveal the ribcage and a beating heart beneath. Blood flowed from every crevasse in her body forming a thick pool beneath her.

“You left me!” she screamed through ravaged vocal chords. “Why didn’t you save me!?”

I was left for words, stumbling back and unsure what to do. I wanted to run to her and hold her. I wanted to scream for help, for Celestia and Luna to come from the heavens and save my sister. I was rooted to the spot though, unable to say or do anything.

“Why aren’t you ever there!? Why do you never save me!? Why do I always have to be the hero!?”

“I-… I-…” some doubt bubbled up within me. This couldn’t be applejack. Something told me this wasn’t my sister. I wasn’t sure what it was. Intuition. Gut instinct?

Or maybe it was the fact that I knew my sister, the stubborn mare who never backed down from a challenge. The pony who was ready to save the day and ask for nothing in return. She’d never question me like this. She’d never expect me to throw myself into danger for her.

“You’re not Applejack,” I blurted out. It seemed right, and hearing the words reassured me. “You’re not Applejack!”

“You have to help me, Big Mac!” the bloody mare screamed, her voice warping into something sinister and unrecognisable now. “Make us whole!”

“You’re not Applejack!” I just kept screaming. I was pointing my rainbow cutter at her. “Stop pretending!”

I was beginning to pull back the trigger but found myself hesitating. Closing my eyes I centred myself to end this, but when I opened them again the imposter was gone and the weapon I thought I’d been pointing at her was pointed at my own head.

I batted my own leg away with some shock and looked around. Everything was back to normal, just as I’d left it. The red dye on the horizon faded away and my headache faded in an instant. Swallowing some bile I clenched my jaw and went to move on.

That was when I was pounced by a roar. Turning my head in shock the area I thought was clear just moments ago was filled with crystal ponies. Face to face with a slasher I screamed and jumped back, but already all three of them were on me, clawing and scrabbling at my armour. One of them hit me hard in the side numbing one of my back legs. Another locked its jaws around my rear hoof tight enough for me to feel the pressure through the armoured boot.

I swung hard, catching one in the scythes with the metal guards of my rainbow cutter. Limbs were lobbed off in a single swing, sending the creature sprawling. I kicked off the slasher on my back leg with a powerful buck then started laying rainbow shots into the last crystal pony at point blank range. The legs came off first and it toppled. I fell on top and started to work stomping and cursing like a mad pony.

The scrap was over faster than a knife fight in a phone booth, and the result was twice as messy.

Breathing heavily I picked through the slick gobbets of gore and sectioned the slashers that looked a little too whole for my comfort before turning to find the fuse box I had been looking for. It became quite a chore to get it open, my hooves now slippery with blood, but after some pawing I got it done and inspected the contents of the box.

As I suspected, a fuse had been tripped. It was just a case of flipping a switch that sparked dangerously, but with a loud crack the lights on the interior came to life. The motors in the trams undercarriage hummed reassuringly before a small blue spark flashed to life in front of me.

Projected from one of the intercom gems glowing in the wall, a small panel of light lit up in front of my face. It formed a solid screen that fuzzed over with static before the little pixels took on various colours and formed the familiar shape of Rarity’s face.

“Big Macintosh?” she called, her voice projected over the intercom’s magical airwaves. When I looked up she must have spotted me through the two-way intercom and smiled. “There you are. The board lit up green. Captain Shining Armor has control now.” she must have notised my shaken expression because she added; “Are you alright, darling?”

“I’m fine. You just tell that plot-hole on the reigns to keep it under the speed limit.” I added jokingly. It earned a giggle from the mare at least.

“Will do.”

The tram chugged, the clamps linking the carriages rattled and a second later we were away; slowly chugging down the elevated rails stretching through the Crystal Empire skyline.

By my initial estimate I figured it would take us thirty minutes to reach the library at this speed. Not too long then. If only we could avoid…

I couldn’t even finish the thought before I had jinxed it.

Further toward the rear of the tram windows shattered inward allowing the frigid wind to snake its way in. it was followed by crystal ponies. More than I cared to count at the time, at least a few pukers mixed in with a sizeable compliment of slashers.

They clambered in and hissed when they spotted me. I staggered backwards, aiming and firing my rainbow cutter as I did. It was only on the third dead click that I looked down and realised the rainbow cartridge in my weapon wasn’t glowing anymore.

I was empty.

With some deep breaths I managed to pull the empty cartridge from the rainbow cutter and produced a full pack from my saddle bags with a shaking hoof. It took some effort just to line up the magazine with the receiver, never mind plug it in and prime the pump.

All the while, over the skittering of crystal pony movements approaching on my front, I could hear the thunderous hoofbeats of something charging up my rear.

I turned in horror, expecting to see more crystal ponies box me in before I could even click the rainbow packet home. To my relief it turned out to be Shining, Rarity and Spike running towards me. But at the same time it begged the question ‘why?’

“What are you guys doing here!?” I shouted before the reason became obvious.

Shining Armor forced out a bitter chuckle, turning and laying suppressing fire into the pursuing crystal ponies. “Funny story!”

The rainbow packet clicked home and the rainbow cutter gave a preparatory soprano whine. “Cockpit got overrun!?” I asked, turning to engage my own pursuers.

“Cockpit got overrun!” Shining confirmed.

We fought like hell for what felt like hours in the cramped confines of the transit car.

On one side Shining Armor let fly the full merciless force of his crystal rifle. Firing in full automatic the stinging whine of the weapon perforated our ear-drums as the sting of its razor tipped projectiles perforated the incoming monsters. He didn’t break his fire into bursts like he always did. There was little point for controlled fire at this range. He just let ‘er rip and swung his aim from side to side, lobbing limbs off by the dozens until the deck was slippery with bits and pieces.

On my side things were a little more controlled. I would take more care aiming and with each expended shot would sever a limb from a crystal pony. I didn’t have the luxury of a high rate of fire, but that didn’t prevent me from spamming the area ahead of me with bolts of burning liquid rainbow.

Unfortunately the slower rate of fire came with the risk of getting overwhelmed. Every once in a while a slasher would get too close, or a leaper would leap in before I could de-limb it enough to prevent it from pouncing. At that point I’d duck aside and Rarity would step aside.

Anything that got by either of us, Rarity cleaved into it with powerful telekinetic swings of her sword. She tried to erect a shield and hold the crystal ponies back, but the creatures just ploughed through the barrier like it wasn’t there. Even Spike’s fire had no effect.

He breathed over one slasher as it crawled in and nipped at my fetlocks, but the beast merely glowed hot and did not melt. On the upside, Rarity’s blade cleaved through it with greater ease.

Within a minute I lost count of how many crystal corpses littered the floor. And crystal ponies just kept streaming in.

A break in Shining’s fire caused me to pause and look back. He hadn’t stopped to reload, those breaks only took a second and were announced by a tell-tale click of him opening the rifle’s chamber. The crystal rifle let up for exactly two seconds prompting me to look.

A slasher had its bony scimitars pinned across Shining Armor’s weapon. He had it held in front of him horizontally, keeping the creature from sinking its teeth into his neck.

“Mother-bucker!” the stallion seethed as the slasher was joined by another running into his side.

I leapt into action, slipping by Rarity and calling for her to switch with me. She did so immediately, spinning her blade into a deadly flourish that dropped two slashers in quick succession.

I hobbled as I fired, nailing the slasher in Shining’s side. It hadn’t breached the captain’s armour, thankfully. I quickly adjusted my aim over Shining Armor’s shoulder and dropped a leaper before it could jump us.

Shining immediately took the initiative and levered his rifle sideways, throwing the slasher pinning him into a chair. He then proceeded to smash the weapon into the creature repeatedly, snapping the scythes one after the other and finally decapitating and disabling the beast.

Ignoring a squirt of blood tagging the side of his face, Shining Armor turned and took over on Rarity’s side before she was overwhelmed, pushing back the gathering wall of undead.

“These zombies really love ‘ya, Shining!” I commented.

“They just want me for my brains!”

The lull in the crystal pony tide allowing for a bit of banter was brief and once again we had to get stuck in. The cycle of death and dismemberment continued.

And for a dread second I thought fate was throwing us another curve ball like the tormentor.

A previously untouched pane of glass shattered inward and a blurry streak smacked into the side of an approaching slasher. At first I thought a leaper had just smashed its way in beside us. Luckily I turned my eyes before my rainbow cutter sights and caught a flash of blue.

“Awwww, yeah! This fight just got twenty-percent cooler!”

Rainbow Dash may have been cradling a broken wing by her side, but her spirit was still whole. She bashed the slasher she pinned to the deck in the chest and sent it sliding into a group of others, toppling the mindless killing machines. She then whipped around and brained another with a scissor kick, sending it sprawling. Another fell with a double kick to the chest.

But as was expected, after the crystal ponies took their medicine and fell down, they just as quickly came back for seconds.

The cyan pegasus with six colours in her hair turned with her mouth open, probably about to shout something about getting out of there; when she came nose to nose with my rainbow cutter.

She froze a second, as if trying to figure out what the weapon was until I barked; “Get down!”

She hit the deck and I blasted the slashers looming up behind her. While I was a segmenting them I pulled a spare rainbow packet from my saddle bags, so as soon as I ran dry, I ejected the spent cartridge and slotted the next one in place. The reload was significantly shorter than my previous fumble and I was back to chopping crystal ponies a split second later.

When the line was pushed back a bit again I helped the newfound pegasus to her hooves again and pushed her into our group’s middle.

“You figured out how to stop these things!?” Rainbow Dash cried as she fell over a dead slasher. “How!?”

Despite the wind, debris, scuttling corpses and flying bullets making up the chaos whirling all around, Shining and I still managed to share a glance and roll our eyes. Rainbow Dash was loyal, tough and difficult to scare; but boy, that girl wasn’t exactly the brightest crayon in the box. How she had survived this long and not figured to stop kicking the crystal ponies in the torso like a stubborn mule and go for the limbs instead was anypony’s guess.

“The limbs!” Rarity cried, cleaving her sword through a slasher, taking off both scythes and the head in a single swing. “Go for the limbs, Rainbow Dash! Cut them to pieces!”

It was like a small spark went off inside the pegasus’ head when the penny dropped.

She stepped around Rarity and laid into one of the slashers almost experimentally. I didn’t see properly, but I heard her grunt, knocking the thing over before her hooves came down on the monster’s limbs again and again. She huffed and when I turned she was up to her belly in blood and slime, breathing heavily.

But the crystal pony under her wasn’t moving anymore.

“R-right. This is d-definitely going t-to get difficult a-after a while,” she panted before turning to the next slasher in her path.

I was back on track listening to another mare join the fray somewhere behind me, and for a while it was going good.

Then it all went bad, as things in the Crystal Empire inevitably do.

Rarity screamed as Rainbow Dash did. At first I didn’t look, thinking perhaps one of them had been pinned to be freed by the other. Only this time Spike was crying and Shining Armor called my name.

Looking over my shoulder I saw Rainbow Dash was on her side with Rarity huddled over her. There was a long scimitar of bone sticking out of the pegasus’ side and her eyes were shut; Dash was out cold and bleeding. Rarity worked the scythe from her friend’s body and was plugging the wound with both hooves and glow of magic, but whatever way the crystal ponies worked the stab-wound would not yield to her healing magic. So she focused on stopping the bleeding.

“Bucking hell, this isn’t going well!” Shining yelled, backed up by the wall of undead until he was practically standing on top of Rainbow Dash’s prone form.

I was being pushed too, crowding near them. Every time my rapid taps with the rainbow cutter made a hole more windows would break and more crystal ponies would stream in.

This is it, I thought to myself, clenching my jaw. This is how I end.

Then came a blessing in a hideous disguise. It belted out a screech that could strip paint and I felt my ears automatically ping against the side of my head. Shining recognised the predator’s wail as well and cried out.

“TORMENTOR!”

I didn’t see where it launched itself, but the way it slammed into the side of the forward carriage it must have thrown itself from a rooftop. The tormentor tangled with the carriage, turning it into a twisted knot of metal and shards of glass, sending the compartment off the tracks. The whole train piled up, folding around the joints between carriages like an accordion.

The sudden impact threw us into the ceiling and tossed us about the compartment. The crystal ponies were the same, flung out of windows and smashed into the deck right beside us. I managed to aim and belt off a few shots as I tumbled, nailing one or two slashers mid-air before I was wrapped around a luggage rack.

I saw Dash’s limp body fly past me and smack into Rarity who was holding on for dear life to the back of a chair. Shining Armor was still shooting, wrapping his hooves around a support handle in the standing area, his telekinesis still glowing to manipulate his rifle.

The train hit something and we were jostled again. I fell first, tumbling helplessly down into the next carriage as the train remained vertical. The newly formed well spiralled around as I flailed for something to catch on to. And then I fell out of the train completely.

I slammed into the ground, a cold, wet and hard ground. The impact threw the wind out of me, then my ribs buckled and even more breath was driven out of my chest when Spike landed on top of me. We both cried out in turn when Shining followed, then Rarity landed on us and finally Rainbow Dash formed the unconscious cherry on top.

We lay there in a pile for a moment before I caught my breath enough to let out a pained groan. “What a day.”

It took some wriggling, but we managed to untangle from each other and look around. I was the first on my hooves, flicking on my flashlight and scanning the dark cavern we had fallen into.

The train stood perfectly upright behind us, hanging a few metres above the ground and forming a perfectly vertical tunnel through the bricked up ceiling. We were clearly in the Crystal Empire’s sewer system. The ceiling was slightly curved into vaults and bows at each junction ahead. To either side of a sloshing river of muck and slime was a path slick with filth and moss.

The train had punched clean through the ground and into one of the tunnels before ejecting us. Which made me wonder what happened to all the crystal ponies we’d been fighting. We’d nailed quite a few and flung even more from the train during the crash.

I trotted back to where we’d fallen and looked up through the interior of the train. The carriages were suspended through some sort of building sprawling above our heads, and the compartment directly above us was packed with crystal ponies. Many were pinned by debris, impaled on twisted poles and girders. Some half hung out smashed windows, pinned in place by shattered glass turned to long knives. All of them were moving however, and it was only a matter of time before one worked its way free and fell down after us.

“We need to plug this hole,” I mused looking at them.

“I got something for that,” Shining Armor assured, levitating something at his side.

With a metal ‘clink’ he pulled the pin from a grenade he pulled from a pocket and flung it upward into the train’s cabin. We all ducked down and plugged our ears so we could barely hear him shout “Fire in the hole!”

We did hear the explosion rip at our ear drums and rattle our teeth much more clearly. But when we looked again, waving away acrid smoke and soot, the hole was plugged. The train had slipped down so the nose ground into the sewer floor, the cabin backed up with enough twisted debris to block any crystal ponies from digging after us.

We were alone in the sewers. I didn’t dare think of the word safe, as so far nowhere in the Crystal Empire had proven to be safe.

“That’s handy,” Rarity said looking at the plugged hole, and Shining huffed.

“Well don’t get used to it. That was my last grenade. I was saving it for a special occasion.”

“I’m honoured I was a part of it,” the mare quipped back before looking to where Spike was sitting next to Rainbow Dash. The unconscious pony was still breathing, her chest gently rising and falling steadily. Her wound still wept a little, but it had coagulated and wasn’t bleeding as profusely as before. They had lucked out.

“We need to get her to safety,” she added more gravely.

“Agreed,” Shining nodded. “We’ll keep moving to the library using the underground. These sewers can’t be more dangerous than up there.”

I groaned.

“Sorry,” Shining apologised, realising he’d jinxed it.

“I’ll dress Dash’s wound and get her ready to move,” Rarity said and I nodded, digging in my saddle-bags and tossing her the med-kit I had found earlier.

As the mare set to work getting Rainbow Dash patched up, I took a moment to reload my rainbow cutter. I paused halfway through though, staring at the full cartridge in my hoof for a long time. I wasn’t thinking about almost dying back there, or the crash, or Dash being hurt.

I was thinking about that vision of Applejack. What had that been? What brought it on? Was I beginning to crack under the stress?

This ‘hero of Equestria’ thing was starting to wear me down. However did Applejack stick it? Had the Changeling invasion of Canterlot been anything like this? What about the battle with Discord? All I knew is she and I were going to have some words as soon as I found her.

“Something wrong?”

I jolted and looked up to see Shining Armor had trotted over. Swallowing, I shrugged and slotted the rainbow pack into my cutter.

“I don’t know how much more of this I can take,” I whispered honestly. “How in Tartarus am I supposed to keep going?”

Shining seemed to understand, and thought for a moment. “I found it helps to keep in mind what you’re going to go home to. You got a special somepony waiting for you?”

I thought of Cherilee for a moment and wondered what she was doing. Maybe preparing for class in the morning? Cooking a meal for one? “I might do.”

“Yeah? What’s his name?”

Blinking for a moment, I shot Shining a sarcastic glare. “Oh, a gay-joke.”

Shining Armor chuckled. “Just working with what you give me, buddy.”

We were quiet for a moment before Shining Armor gave me a reassuring pat on the back then set out. I gave the way we came one last look, then sighed and moved to follow. Only I wasn’t moving on as grimly as I expected. I was grinning optimistically.

“Hey, Shiny? Thanks.”

“Anytime.”