It was not the world they had known.
Before the world had moved on, it was once was filled with colour and life. Birds flew, flowers grew, and ponies (as well as other species) lived day to day. Well, most would, anyway. To some, Armageddon (or The Passing, as some had chosen to call it) was soon. To most, though, the concept had merely been a high fantasy.
Unfortunately for them, however, Armageddon had been nearing for almost one thousand years. You see, it had been hundreds, maybe thousands, of years since the last large-scale war, much less the last battle. The countries of Equus, though slightly strained, had relied too much upon each others resources to fight over them. They especially relied on Equestria. The Equestrian diarchy (which eventually turned into a monarchy, then back, then to a triarchy, and even a quadrarchy.) had the ability and the responsibility to raise and lower the sun and the moon. It was their express purpose to prevent the planet from simultaneously burning and freezing. Due to this, the planet's inhabitants thought it neigh-impossible that anyone could even imagine killing the diarchs.
And they were right. None could stand the thought of killing those responsible for their survival.
But viruses don't think, do they?
Viruses infect.
They don't care for whatever unfortunate creature they're infecting is. They just infect, reproduce, and spread. And when they spread, they infect. And they reproduce.
And they spread.
With this endless cycle of infection and spread, a virus could kill towns, cities, and countries. The only limits to their power are a doctor's medical treatment, and the host's own immune system. If a doctor could identify and treat the virus, and the host had a strong enough immune system, a virus can be wiped out in a matter of weeks, if not days. Some viruses adapt and disguise their presence, but again, a strong immune system can kill them when they're found.
This information is elementary on Equus. Children are taught and tested on this information. And some children take a special interest in it and become doctors, or become a specialist and work for their government's biological engineering institution. In either scenario, the risk of infection is higher than an average person's. For the specialists, though, it may not be a normal virus.
The specialists could be working on new diseases, be it engineering one or defending against them. And to do either, you need to get close. Dangerously close. If they were to get that close, they needed to be encased in a bulky hazmat suit, but all it took to ruin that defense was a small, almost invisible hole.
And if a virus got through that hole, it would infect the being behind it.
And it would reproduce.
And, once the suit were removed, it would spread.
All it would take was a tap. Or a cough. Or, perhaps, a shared drink. And it would spread to whomever touched what was infected.
It was this way that Armageddon had happened. It was this way that nearly all life on Eqqus was ended.
Including the diarchs.
It was this way that the Old World ended, and the End World was born.
But this is not that story.
This is the story of picking up the pieces of the Old World. The story of the forces that will fight to keep the End World standing. And the story of a gang of ten who will determine which will win.
Author's Note
See, I've gotten to be a fan of Stephen King recently. I'm in the middle of reading both The Stand (aka the longest damn thing I've ever tried to read) and The Dark Tower series (currently in The Dark Tower III: The Waste Lands), and it's given me ideas. Specifically, a mashup like this.
Now, I'll never be as good a writer as I wish I could be. But with you lot who enjoyed (and/ or criticized (I get it, guys. Show, Don't Tell.)) the first story I made, I think I'll get better. All thanks to y'all.
Now, I'm gonna say this right now: UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES will characters from The Stand or The Dark Tower appear in this story. This is BASED off of, and INSPIRED by, the stories mentioned above, not a crossover with them. I'll allude to characters, but I won't place them in the story whatsoever.
Thanks for listening. Or reading. Whatever.
Nobody had predicted them, the diseases. Nobody had the ability to. Some had known of them, of course. They had known of them well before they spread. But they had thought that the facilities could contain them. The governments that ran the facilities thought they had the power to stop the diseases from spreading if there were a breakout.
They had all thought wrong.
The diseases they were all making were specifically viruses, as viruses are harder to kill than a bacterial illness. They had tried bacteria first, but they all realized very quickly it was too weak to work. With a bacterial illness, it usually took some heat, some pills, and some rest, before it was killed by the host. Viruses, however, hide. A virus will hide in a cell, changing what the cell produces to be nearly invisible while it reproduces. This meant that it takes time to do damage before it reveals itself.
And when the Old World hosts went home after a night of experimentation, they had no clue that they had been spreading Death to any and every being they had encountered. Nor did they know it the day after. And those they infected didn't know the day after their encounter. And the ones they encountered didn't know.
And the chain continues.
It made it's way to the Emperors, and the Princesses, and the Sultans. To the Queens and Dictators and Presidents.
And once the Rulers knew of the infection, they did the only thing one can do when you've been given a death sentence.
The lashed out.
The first battle in thousands of years had started, from what the citizens knew, over a stomach bug. Or a sniffle. Or maybe a cough. Something nearly all of them had at one time or another. Something they all were starting to get.
And if they had been told they were going to die from it, they would have lashed out too. The Rulers had decided that it would be better to wait to tell them. Or, in the case of the Queen, to die before telling them.
The diseases, known by the names of Fiji, Dean, and Drow, among others, proceeded to kill. They killed the Specialists first. Then the people of the world.
But not all of the world's people were infected. Some were immune. Others had prepared for Armageddon or The Passing. The unicorn survivors were put in charge of the sun and moon, the pegasai in charge of weather, earth ponies in charge of crops. Griffins were armies, Saddle Arabian horses distributed products of the earth ponies among the survivors. Minotaur were too proud to help, and left to survive on their own. As did some of the other survivors.
They all lived in the Old World no longer. The Old World was gone. The world had moved on. The End World is what was left in it's place.
And hundreds of years later, nothing changed.
Until the Black Pony fled across the desert.
And the Spellslinger followed.
Author's Note
If I used any tropes that you deem idiotic or amateur, please direct me to the appropriate TV Tropes page.
I'm looking for more pre-readers, if any of you are interested. And I am fully aware that these past two chapters were just over 1000 words combined. That was intentional. I'm gonna set a goal to make the actual first chapter a minimum of 1500 words, or a maximum of 2500 words. I'm gonna try to stick to King's chapter setup between The Stand and The Dark Tower.
Again, thanks for reading.
The Stand is 1500 pages, and The Dark Tower is 7 books or more. I'm gonna take a hell of a long time to finish them.