Swift Blade sat on top of the big red barn, over looking the surrounding area of Sweet Apple Acres. In the distance, he could make out Ponyville.

The earth pony was munching on some persevered peaches from a can that he had swiped from the house where he had first met Vinyl. He sighed lightly, lowering the spoon in his hoof.

The beautiful DJ was stuck in his mind, he couldn't stop thinking about her. Her beautiful eyes, that carefree attitude. It was all just so...alluring. Swift could tell, he was starting to fall in love with her, something he never thought would happen to him again, not after Flutter Shy, but it had.

He saw Vinyl as attractive yes, but to fall for her, this was something he didn't see coming.

It had been several hours since they had reached the farm house.

Apple Jack was still inside the house, crying along with Pinkie Pie. Big Mac had gone to patrol, and he had no idea where Vinyl had gone. He really hoped she was okay.

The stallion went back to looking at Ponyville, he could see the large castle that had once been Twilight Sparkle's library and home, the castle looked more like a shiny tree really. It was harder to tell what the other buildings were from this distance however.

Suddenly, a tap on his shoulder jolted Swift out of his sight seeing. He quickly turned, trying not to spill his peaches, to find Vinyl standing behind him, her shades still on, and she was grinning. ''Hey Swift, you feeling any better'' she asked, referring to what happened with Rainbow Dash earlier.

Swift nodded solemnly, mostly he had stopped feeling upset about it, he had accepted it, but it still was sore subject. ''Fine I guess, its more Pinkie and AJ that I'm concerned about, Dash was one of their best friends after all.''

Vinyl nodded, ''Yeah, they were taking it pretty bad.'' The unicorn sat down on her rump next to Swift Blade, and stared out over the apple trees. Swift turned his head to look at her, his cheeks reddening a bit. he looked away quickly when she turned her head, puzzled at why he was staring. ''Um, why the staring?''

''no reason, I just...''Swift quickly thought of something to cover up why he was staring. ''What happened to you when this all started? You know, what was your life like before the outbreak, and what happened to you after it started?''

Vinyl's response was at first to stare sadly at Ponyville, before finally saying ''As I said before, I was a DJ. I played awesome beats at party's and other gigs where I was needed. I lived a great life, with my best friend and room mate Octavia. she was a beautiful earth pony cellist, and a great friend'' a tear fell from Vinyl's left eye, she didn't bother to wipe it away.

''then, the last night that Equestria ever saw was when it happened.'' she took another second to compose herself before continuing.

''Me and Tavi were hanging out at home, just jamming together, doing what we enjoyed you know? Then we heard a scream. Tavi wanted to check it out, but I just wanted to stay inside and let whatever was going on take care of itself, but Tavi could be really stubborn, so she finally got me to come with her, but right after we opened the door, the screams got even louder.''

''Another few seconds passed and the screaming got louder and multiplied. Tavi started galloping towards the cries of distress, calling for me to hurry up. So I followed, she rounded a corner, and I lost sight of her for a few seconds, and when I rounded the corner, I found that my friend had discovered the source of the screaming. Tavi and me just stood there, watching as a bunch of those things were chowing down on a couple of our friends. Bon Bon and Lyra, and one other pony we couldn't identify. They were just...tearing into them, Lyra was crying and screaming at the same time, as she had her stomach torn to bloody shreds, and Bon... she just screamed as they took a bite out of one of her neck. Tavi started crying and screaming at the sight, and I just threw up.''

The unicorn let a few more tears fall from her eyes as she went on, ''The zombies stopped for a few seconds when they heard Tavi scream, which gave Bon enough time to try to escape, but it was sickening to watch her stagger away, blood dripping from her neck. Two of the monsters went back to eating Lyra and the other pony, but the third one decided to come after us. Tavi started trying to reason with it, get it to stop and leave us alone, but I pushed her away from the bastard and we ran for home.''

Swift suddenly remembered the small chunk that was missing from Bon Bon's neck when he had seen her, now he knew what had happened.

''Octavia and I got inside, but a minute later, after we finished catching our breath, the one that had tried to catch us started slamming against the door, trying to get at us. Tavi started crying again, and I ended up barricading the door with my big ass record player. We went to sleep together, as it was the best comfort we could think of. The next day when we woke up, the sun was starting to rise, but the moon was still up, just like how it is now, at first we thought we woke up early, and that the zombie had left, it had, but hours passed and nothing outside changed.''

''What happened then?'' Swift asked, he wanted to know her story, and what happened to her friend.

''We finally decided to figure out what happened, so after a quick breakfast we went outside to investigate, and you know what it looked like... a nightmare. We tried to find help, and we ran into a horde of those things, so we ran. We ended up deciding to head to Canterlot to find the princesses or somepony who could help us, so we headed back home and spent the rest of the day, if you could call it that, packing for our trip. It was pretty hard to leave behind my DJ equipment and Tavi her cello, but we had to travel light.''

The DJ removed her shades, revealing her beautiful red eyes, tears falling from them. Swift put a hoof on her shoulder reassuringly, ''you don't have to continue'' he gave her a comforting smile.

Vinyl shook her head, and continued: ''We traveled for a long time before we decided to stop and set up camp near the everfree forest, which as you know stretch's for miles, b-but...that's w-when....it happened...'' A long silence followed before Vinyl spoke again.

''A...A timber wolf...it just jumped out of the forest...snarling and dripping black stuff all over the ground, I didn't realize it at first, but it had been infected...''

Swift Blade's eyes widened ''It doesn't just effect pony's then...'' he muttered ''Shit.''

''It...leapt at Tavi, with more savagery than normal, and before she could even scream, it bit down on her back, taking a big bloody piece out of my best friend...so...so I incinerated it...I just went pull force and annihilated that bucking thing from existence. When it was over, I packed up my stuff, and supported Tavi, and we kept going, but a horde must have heard the screams and cries of agony she was making when she was attacked, so we got cut off. Tavi...s-she wanted...she wanted me to go, she would distract them, but I knew she wouldn't make it if she didn't, so I refused, but she kept telling me she would slow me down, then she shoved me away from her, her back to the horde, and gave me these last final words:

''Live your life Vinyl, for the both of us, thank you for being my friend.''

''The horde tore into her, but she stood strong as she went down, not letting out any screams as they piled onto her and began to feed on her. So I... I ran...and I kept running until I was far away from the horde. I hid myself in a bush, and I started to cry. I must have cried so hard that I fell unconscious...and when I woke up, at first I thought about just waiting there, for somepony to come and eat me, but that's when I saw you, well...I have a confession to make. You keep saying you have hope, and when I saw you, it gave me hope, hope for the future.''

Swift was about to ask what that meant, but instead found one of his hooves moving to wipe the DJ's tears away from her face. Vinyl smiled at Swift, her red eyes showing hope in them.

''Hope never truly dies, all it takes is a spark, to reignite it.'' Swift stated, his voice calm and comforting.

Vinyl and Swift sat up on the barn for a while, just staring off into the distance, as Swift talked about what had happened to him after the outbreak started, Vinyl giving him some reassuring pats very once and a while.

A scream rang out, interrupting Swift's account, and the two pony's quickly scrambled to their hooves. They galloped to the ladder they had used to get up and hurried down it.

Apple Jack and Pinkie Pie rushed outside of the farm house, the orange farm pony carrying Swift's sword in her mouth and Pinkie had a large cleaver in hers.

''What in tarnation is happening out here!'' Apple Jack tossed Swift his weapon before speaking.

Swift shook his head. ''No idea, but we better find out, wait, where's Big Mac?''

The big farmer appeared from the tree line and galloped up to the group. ''What in the hays going on!?'' He asked.

Pinkie shook her head, ''No idea big guy, but were gonna find out, you can pinkie promise on that!'' Her mane and tail still hung deflated, but her cheery attitude was starting to return.

Swift pointed a hoof towards the direction of the scream, which echoed out again, ''We better find out, before it draws every zombie in hearing radius!'' he snatched up his longsword in his mouth and galloped off, the others following him as fast as possible.

They all headed for a spot deep in Sweet Apple Acres, which had once been a headquarters of sorts.

A tree house, that belonged to a group of three filly's.

The Cutie Mark Crusaders.

Author's Note

now the filly who survived will be chosen, cast your votes for which Crusader it will be.

also, hit that like button some more, and I might consider making some sort of sequel to this book when its finished.

enjoy!