Author's Note

Hi! Welcome to my fanfic. I have a small stash of fanfics that were not released yet, so I decided to give this one a try. If you guys like it, or have a suggestion regarding storyline like Ellis and AJs friendship, leave a like and comment.

Dead Center: Hotel

"Hey! Over Here! I'm still alive! Help!" Ellis yells to the helicopter as it flies away from the rooftop. "Shit..."

On the top of a hotel, waving pointlessly at the sky, was a survivor named Ellis. Ellis was a southerner raised in Savannah, a former mechanic at a garage, and generally loved life. However, that was the past. The present at that moment was the feeling of being stranded, loneliness, and worry. The air smelled of smoke and flesh. All he could hear was the sounds of flames slowly eating away at the hotel. Ellis was devastated. He rarely felt anger, but he was on the verge of it. He climbed all the way to a rooftop of a burning building, only to find that his escape bailed out on him. Thinking rationally, he looks at the helicopter's flight pattern.

"Look's like it's headin' for the evac center at the mall, guess I'd better head there." he said, trying to stay positive.

Ellis examines the area around him. The only items of interest were a health kit, a pistol, a crowbar, and a fire axe. Ellis decides to grab the fire axe, thinking that he wouldn't need a pistol, and the first aid kit. Securing his items, he heads down the stairs to find part of the stairwell he used was engulfed in flames. Looking around, he finds a metal door that leads into the main part of the hotel. He opens it to be greeted with an abandoned hallway. Now he was confused. It was chaos when he was outside the building, he could hear panicking noises while going up the stairs, and now not a soul. The silence actually scared Ellis. As he walked down the halls, he heard something. It sounded like a growling noise.

"Anyone?" Ellis asked, nervously.

He heard a banging noise from the other side of a door. Thinking that it was another survivor, he opened it. He was greeted by a figure wearing a hoodie with duct tape around parts of it's limbs. It then crouched, and tried to lunge at him. Using quick reflexes, he immediately jumps out of the way. The creature smashed against the window, shattering it and then falling out of the building. That one moment made Ellis feel not only scared, but also a bit powerful. He felt as if his confidence was slowly coming back. Smiling to himself, he explored the room that the creature came from. The room had a large table with papers scattered all over it, and had a pie chart with colors representing the people who are infected, those who are not, and those who are immune. The immune part was incredibly tiny. Before Ellis left that room, he heard a voice! It was not a growl or screech, it was another person's voice. Or was it?

He peeked his head out of the doorway to see a creature that looked like a pony run towards him. It's colorfulness not only startled Ellis, but confused him even more. He saw it for only a second, but he saw that It looked very unrealistic. Like it was from a cartoon show for children.

"Help me!" it yelled.

Ellis then sees another human-like creature. However, this one was different. It was only wearing overalls and one shoe, had one big bulging arm with a small arm on the other side, and the same thing going on with its feet. The creature then does the unthinkable and charges at him, making a horn-like honking noise. It goes right past Ellis and hits the wall next to the pony. Whatever it was, it was determined to kill her. The zombie swings its oversized arm wildly at the pony, and got closer and closer every time. Ellis, having a love for horses, takes his axe and chops the zombie in the back. Angered, it turns around and punches him in the chest. Making him fall onto his back. He quickly gets up and lands a hit on it's head, getting the axe stuck in the zombie's small dome. It stops, and falls lifelessly. Ellis then walks towards the pony.

"Hey, you okay?" he asks in a comforting tone.

"Are you one of those monsters?" the pony asks.

"Woah! You can talk? I mean, nah, I ain't one of them zombies."

"Okay, I'm gonna trust ya on that one."

"We should get moving, we can get to know each other later. It's too dangerous to stick around here. Just follow me."

Without another word, they both jog and trot down another hall, only to be blocked by flaming junk. Looking around, Ellis saw a door that lead to a storage room holding things like cleaning supplies, toilet paper, and other objects. The only way out is through a window that leads outside to a balcony without support beams. Hesitating at first, the slowly walk across, going into the closest window. When they enter, they hear another noise. Ellis closes his eyes and listens closely. It sounded like a cough that a really old person that used to smoke would make.

"What was that?" asked the pony.

"I don't wanna stand here to find out. Through here." Ellis said, pointing to an open door that lead to another staircase.

They headed down, only to see part of the staircase blacked off with flames. The only way through was a door that went back into the main part of the hotel. When they entered, they saw a long hallway lined up with doors leading to even more hotel rooms. As they jogged through the hall, a door broke, making a wall of flames in front of them. "Shit! We'll have to go around." Ellis said as they entered one of the hotel rooms. When they reached the end, Ellis spotted an elevator that looked to be in working condition. They both go in and Ellis presses the button that went to the bottom floor. When the door closed, he turned around and sighed.

"Now, we may have to stick together for a bit, so let me introduce myself: my name's Ellis. Some people like to call me Ell, but I personally don't like that because it kinda sounds like a girl's name but if you wanna call me Ell I suppose you could." he said.

"My name's Applejack. You can call me AJ if ya want. I have absolutely no idea what happened, or how I got here. By the way, thanks for savin me over there. I thought I was gonna be ground up into applesauce before you helped me." the pony said.

"Oh by the way, I love your hat."

"Heh, thanks."

The elevator starts to have smoke form on the inside, and Applejack starts to cough.

"Sweet Celestia! What's with the smoke?" Applejack said.

"It's the fire. This building is getting eaten away by flames as we speak. That's why we need to get out of here. Fast." Ellis responds.

When the elevator stopped, the doors stayed still. Ellis then gets the hustle in his muscle, and pries the doors open. Smoke fills the air completely with only the flames lighting the way. Ellis then notices something shiny on the ground. It was an UZI submachine gun. Grinning, he picks it up and motions Applejack to just follow him. As they navigate through the thick smoke, the coughing sound returns, except this time it was much closer. While Ellis was not thinking too much about it, Applejack was getting a bit scared. Normally, she would not be scared of anything at all. However, something about the sounds that the zombies were making really scared her. When they left that area, they found the main room with three different ways to go into the hotel, all blocked off. On the far side of the room, there was a metal door that looked pretty secure, so they both headed straight for it. Applejack entered first, but before Ellis went in, he heard a slurping noise and felt something get wrapped around him. Whatever it was, it made the same coughing sound that he heard earlier.

"Help! AJ Help! It's...choking...me!" Ellis yells.

Applejack runs out of the safe room and towards the zombie that was strangling Ellis. She gives it a good, hard kick and it explodes into a cloud of stinky, thick smoke. "Hey, thanks a lot!" Ellis said, cheerfully. Applejack blushes and they both head for the room with the metal door. After they enter, Ellis shuts and locks the door.

"That there was some crazy shit man!" Ellis yelled in celebration.