The C̸̞̙̭̽̌̀̈́̽̕̕ȗ̵̧̨̢̻̩̞̘͙̉̋̊͂͘ŕ̷͖̦̍͝s̵̫̪̋̍͂̆̆͆̄é̶̡̧̺͖d̸͎͒̒̿̈̀ Apocalypse

Muffled voices entered my ears, causing me to open my tired eyes.

Motherfuckers

That was the fucking closest I’d fucking gotten to getting my fucking ass to fucking sleep on this stupid fucking train bench.

Sorry. So…

Shortly after my spanking and talk with AJ, the others had gotten the train to kinda work. Apparently, that one fucking lever broke it to the point where stuff in the crankshaft and pistons or whatever acted up, causing major malfunctions. Ironically, the boy had helped them figure out how to get it to work, albeit less efficiently. Go figure.

This allowed Dash and Luna to turn on the train and start moving again, at a nice, rolling pace. It would take us longer to get back to Ponyville now, but whatever. We were still at a speed faster than walking, and if one of us somehow fell off, it’d only be a slight pain in the ass. I don’t know how one of us would fall off, but yeah, that’s how my mind works.

Regardless, once we were moving, most of us split up between train cars and went to bed. At least… most of us.

I angrily sat up on the bench. These benches were uncomfortable as fuck. I’d rather stop and sleep on the fucking grass at this point. I’d been trying to get to sleep on this damn bench until hearing these weird noises start from the train car right behind us. I was in the very last row of this train car, and the princesses had put the humans in the one making noise behind us.

It sounded like the girls making most of the noises, and to be honest… they sounded strange. It almost sounded like… moaning?

…

I swear. If these motherfuckers were having a damn threesome back there, I was gonna beat the living shit outta all of ‘em.

I glanced at the train car’s back door beside my bench, noticing Twi was lying on the one across from me. She was originally set up a few cars ahead of this one with the other princesses, but I guess she abandoned it to join me. How sweet.

She was also awoken by the noises, raising her head and exchanging a confused glance with me. I leaned over my seat to see that Guard Blaze, on the bench in front of me, who was supposed to be monitoring the humans, was sound asleep.

Sheesh… that’s illegal.

I’d heard that if a royal guard fell asleep during a royal watch, on their own, at least, that they were to be punished severely. That sounds bad, but it’s probably just a brutal Celestia spanking, to be honest. Normally, I’d snicker at the opportunity of ratting out a royal guard to get his ass hooved to him, but I felt kinda bad for Blaze. Instead, I scooted over on the bench and listened as the muffled noises eventually stopped.

“What the fuck are they doing??” I whispered to Twi.

She shrugged her shoulders before standing up and tip-hoofing towards the door. Don’t ask me how a pony can tip-hoof, either. It looks bizarre, but kinda amusing. I stood up as well, tip-toeing toward the other side of the door.

I opened it for her and followed her between the train cars. The ingenious walkway was just big enough to fit Twi and me standing side-by-side, so I walked up with her and grabbed the door handle of the next train car. After exchanging a glance with Twi, I opened the door so we could look insi-

…

…

…

Oh…… shit…

My frustration was sucked out of me when I saw what I saw.

The car was dimly lit by lanterns along the walls, which the princesses requested to be left on for this car. This allowed us to see the unexpected sight before us.

Jen was standing up between a row of benches to the left, kinda leaning up against the wall of the car. She had her hands out on the tops of the benches, revealing a… knife??... in one of them. Not only was it a knife, but it was a BLOODY knife. The entire blade was coated in a fresh red color.

Also coated in this fresh red color were her hands. And her arms… and her shirt… AND her neck. She even had blood splatter on her face.

Underneath her, lying in the middle of the aisle, was…

The boy.

I hadn’t even learned his name. Now it didn’t matter. I could see blood splattered all over the aisle and benches near him. I could see his bloodied-up white t-shirt. There was…

… so… much of it…

Jesus.

Abby was the only one making noise now. She was on her knees in the aisle, behind the boy, sobbing out loud. She was splattered with blood as well, but not as dramatically as Jen was. She held her hands against her mouth, clearly distraught. Twi and I gazed on in bewilderment, catching Jen’s eye. She looked distressed, too, breathing heavily, but there were no tears from her—just a look of shock.

I looked on for a moment longer before slowly pulling back on the door handle to shut i-

click

Twi stuck her hoof out to stop me from shutting the door, huffing at me before reopening it fully. When she did, Jen dropped the knife to the floor and put her hands up by her shoulders in surrender.

“Just wait!! We can explain!” she exclaimed.

“Sweet Celestia,” Twi mumbled to herself, shifting her gaze up to me. “Get your gun out and keep an eye on them. I’ll be right back.”

I nodded and pulled out my baby as she took off to grab some of the others. This left me in the doorway, swaying gently with the train as it slowly click-clacked on. Jen and I stared at each other for a few long seconds, both of us forced to listen to Abby’s weakening crying.

I took another second to take in the scene, realizing more and more by the second how severely they’d stabbed him to death. His shirt was drenched now, pooling blood all around.

“Y’all are fucking crazy,” I commented.

“Like… you have room… to talk!!” Jen exclaimed, stammering from her adrenaline.

“I mean, yeah, but damn…”

I kept eying the boy, observing his fucked up body. Upon stepping a few paces closer, I noticed that this dude’s neck was eviscerated. Even my crazy ass was appalled by just how cut open his throat was. There were also stab wounds on his chest, contributing to the murky pool of blood flowing off his body and covering the floor.

“L- look…” Jen continued, “...it was self-defense, alright?”

“Self-defense?? Looks like a damn murder.”

“N- no… no no no no no, you have to understand. He attacke-”

“HE DESERVED TO DIE!” Abby exclaimed, interrupting her.

We both turned our attention to Abby, who’d finally stopped crying. She was still on her knees behind the boy, gently rocking herself now. She gazed up at me, a mix of fury and despair in her teary brown eyes.

“O… kay?” I said.

“We didn’t want to! But for OUR protection, we HAD to kill him! He was a MONSTER!” she cried.

“ABBY!” Jen shouted, “I told you to shut the fuck up! Now we’re FUCKED!”

“What??” I inquired.

This situation was getting dicey. I didn’t even know where to stand yet. I mean, it’s not like I cared about the boy in the first place, but this was a brutal scene to stumble across. I hadn’t realized the girls were capable of anything close to this. Jen threw me a desperate glance, her hands still in the air.

“Listen, D’mitry, please. I can explain this all to you later, but can you please work with us and pretend you didn’t hear all that? Please? It was self-defense, ok? That’s what we’re going wit-”

“Whoa whoa whoa,” a male voice called from behind me.

I looked over my shoulder to see Blaze walk through the door and up by my side. His eyes widened when he realized the severity of the crime scene.

"Well good fucking morning, sleepyhead," I mocked.

Blaze shook his head frustratingly and looked up at me.

"Yeah, yeah, I know. I'll take responsibility," he stated, glancing back at Jen. "But what's this about working with you? Is this some kinda cover-up for a murder??"

“No… no-” Jen started.

“Well, duh,” I interrupted, “Of course it’s a cover-up, dumbass. What does it look like?”

“D’mitry, please!” Jen cried.

Blaze huffed, eyeing the boy one more time before glancing between the two girls. “I can’t let you two get away with this; I’m sorry. The princesses will be notifi-”

“Dementia patients say huuuuuh?!?!” I exclaimed.

“Huh-?”

BONK!

I used the butt end of my baby to pistol-whip the shit out of Blaze. The end smacked his forehead so hard that it sent him tumbling to the ground. Me and the girls looked on in silence for a second, realizing he’d fallen unconscious. The girls then looked back at me in shock. I pointed a finger at Jen.

“You owe me one,” I stated, before swinging it down toward Abby. “And you. Listen to your girlfriend for once, would you? Dumb bitch. Shut the fuck up and play along.”

Abby froze, seemingly unsure if she wanted to lash out or not. After a second, though, she slowly nodded her head. Jen was frozen as well, eying me questionably.

“Th… thank you…”

Like clockwork, as I lowered my finger, the others came rushing up behind me. I turned to see Twi come back in with Celestia and Nurse Snow. Celestia and Twi stood side-by-side in the aisle, Celestia motioning for me to scoot over. As I moseyed my way between a couple benches, they finally noticed Blaze knocked out in the middle of the aisle.

“What the fuck happened to Blaze?!” Twi asked.

I shrugged my shoulders. “I don’t know. Dude walked in and passed out. I guess it was too much for him to see or something? We didn’t really expect that.”

Celestia glanced between Blaze and me for a second before shaking her head and returning her attention to the murder scene.

“What in Equestria happened in here, girls?”

“We… we can explain!” Jen cried, “He attacked us!”

“He attacked you?”

“Yes!”

For the next minute, Jen went on a rant explaining what ‘happened’. The more I listened, the more I couldn’t wait to hear what actually happened. Her story went as follows:

Earlier, when they were escaping the royal castle with the others, they and the boy discussed their associations with Peter. Apparently, they’d even gotten into a small argument about this. The princesses broke it up, as they were more concerned with making it out alive.

Also, during my little nature bath from hell stop, they’d had some time alone while the princesses set them up in this further back car. They argued again but resolved it themselves by separating. She made it clear that they weren’t very friendly with one another. Therefore, they ended up sleeping at different ends of the car.

While they were sleeping, Jen overheard his footsteps slowly approaching them. When she shot up in the bench, she saw him coming at them with the now-bloody knife on the floor. He’d noticed her get up and lunged for her, but this awoke Abby. Jen held him back for a second before Abby got behind him and locked him up by grabbing hold of his armpits.

This caused him to drop the knife, which led to Jen picking it up, aaaaand…

Stabby Stabby Stabby.

You have such a way with words.

Thanks.

Jen delivered the story so well that even I believed it for a second, until I remembered that she literally told me otherwise just a few minutes ago. While she did, Abby quietly rocked herself in the aisle. She didn’t speak many words, as she was ‘too distraught’ to comment. This meant the story actually made it past Celestia.

She believed them, so she allowed them to come join them in the train car Luna and her were in. Snow helped her escort them out of the train car, both of them trying to comfort Abby, who balled like a baby the whole time they did. Jen shot me a glance as she followed them out, mouthing a ‘thank you’.

Twi told me she’d be back and left me to keep an eye on Blaze. It only took a minute before the idiot slowly squirmed awake. He moaned and groaned while he did, until shooting up to a wobbly stand once he saw the dead boy laying in front of him.

“Sweet Celestia!” he cried, stumbling around and nearly falling over from standing up too fast. He shook his head and regained his balance, eventually meeting eyes with me. “What happened?!”

“You killed him, bro,” I answered, pointing at the boy.

I wanted to go along with this lie but couldn’t help but bust out into laughter at the sudden shock on his face. During this laughing fit, his shock vanished, and he huffed angrily. “You can’t take anything seriously, can you?”

“Not really.”

He shook his head and asked for the ‘real’ story, which I gave him. Not the murder one, obviously, as I didn’t even know the details of what had actually happened. I told him Jen’s fake story instead. After this, I told him the princesses wanted to see him so he’d leave. Once he did, I cupped my beardless chin and ran my fingers through the invisible hairs as I intently analyzed the wicked scene. Not long into this, Twi came back with the little asshole, Spike.

“You two are going to haul him out,” Twi stated.

“Bruh.”

“That’s an order.”

Ugh.

Great. Can’t wait to work with this little asshole again. Twi monitored us while we both grabbed the boy’s legs and dragged him to the doorway. We then impatiently waited in silence while Dash slowly stopped the train.

After twiddling our thumbs for these long couple of minutes, a hydraulic hiss indicated that the train was… fully stopped? I guess. Both of us followed Twi out of the doorway, dragging the fucked up body of the boy onto the outside walkway.

Thankfully for us, he wasn’t too heavy (probably cause he was missing 75% of his damn blood at this point). He was also skinny, so despite Spike’s weak, useless ass offering me damn near no help at all, we managed to lug him off the walkway between cars. It was easier dragging him through the grass, which he was painting a wonderful shade of blotched red.

Twi walked beside us the whole time, making sure we didn’t ‘beat the shit out of each other again’. As much as I wanted to kick his ass, I didn’t really have the energy right now. My ass cheeks were also still slightly buzzing, reminding me what could happen if I did. Therefore, I reluctantly worked with him, dragging the boy away from the train and behind a bush where we dropped him.

Good riddance.

“That’s good,” Twi confirmed.

“K.”

“Hey, D’mitry,” Spike called. I ignored him, obviously, brushing my hands free of some residual blood. Despite this, he pointed at the boy and continued yapping anyway. “That’s what you’re gonna look like if you don’t leave me the fuck alone.”

“You stu-”

“AH AH AH!” Twi hollered, “Don’t fucking start. You two do NOT want another Celestia spanking.”

“He does,” I stated.

“Spike. Go back to the train,” she ordered.

He huffed before leaving.

Good riddance.

Twi took a moment to observe the dead boy. Celestia walked up behind her as she did, observing the drop zone where we’d left the boy.

“Good to you?” Twi asked her.

“Yes. Thank you. Can you head back to the train, please?”

Twi turned and walked away. I started following her until Celestia held out her foreleg to stop me.

“Not you. I need to speak with you.”

Oh shit.

Twi exchanged a glance with me before walking off. Celestia waited for her to be out of hearing range before dropping her hoof and staring back at me.

Talking with Celestia was always an interesting change, since she was one of the only ponies that came up to my height. I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it, but she was actually a bit taller than me, meaning her eyes were slightly higher than mine. She stepped forward, within a few feet of me.

“Tell me the truth.”

“The… truth? What truth?”

“Don’t play dumb, D’mitry. I need to know what actually happened in the train car.”

“Uh… respectfully, Celestia… Jen already told you? Do you not believe them?”

“Debatable. However, I know there’s far more to it. I need to know the actual truth.”

“I thought she was telling the truth.”

“Oh? Is that why you knocked Blaze out?”

“I didn-! Uh… mmmmm…”

“Just admit to it.”

“Okay… I knocked him out, but that was unrelated. He scared the shit out of me!”

“Bullshit.”

“I- I-”

Before I could attempt to plead this nosediving case, she stepped even closer to me. Her pink eyes lasered through mine. “You’re setting yourself up for another spanking, already. Tell me what you’re hiding so we can avoid that.”

“I… I’m not hiding anything!”

She was getting angry now. She raised one of her front hooves, firmly pressing it against my chest and holding it there.

"Tell me," she hissed.

I angrily raised my hand and pushed her hoof, managing to shove it off of my chest. I don't think this would have actually worked if she had expected it. A mix of surprise and anger filled her face as I backed away a few steps.

"D'mitry!" she scoffed.

"No! I'm not hiding anything, but I know someone who IS!”

She carefully analyzed me, her anger morphing into a confused look. “Who?”

“YOU!”

“Oh? And what do you accuse me of hiding?”

“You were the one that told me I was ‘transported’...” I said, using finger quotes to exaggerate, “...to this world, and that I could leave my life behind for now, if I so desired. You… LIED TO ME!”

This threw her off. “What do you mean by that?”

“Oh, don’t play dumb, Celestia! We wouldn’t want that!” I mocked, realizing I was fucked either way. “I woke up at Emory when Pete shot me! Emory! My body was there all along, in a fucking coma! I wasn’t ‘transported’ here, I’m just some fucking clone! I know you know about it, too! You have to! I mean, how couldn’t you?”

Unexpectedly, she averted her eyes. After a minute of uneasy silence, she took one last glance at the boy and sighed.

“We will talk about this situation later. But… okay, D’mitry. You got me. I know about it. The other princesses do too. We just weren’t ready to tell you. It didn’t matter much at the time, given that you haven’t been even remotely interested in going back. Even if you did want to go back, I have to remind you, that contract still has a couple of years left on it. Even if we beat this thing soon, the contract still stands.”

“Bruh.”

“Yeah. Sorry to break it to you. The contract mentioned ‘natural disasters’ at some point, and that’s what this whole apocalypse falls under. So, the contract is still binding.”

“Natural disasters? Really?”

“Yes. It’s not like you have a say anyway. You’re ours.”

“Wow.”

“Don’t act like that upsets you now.”

“I mean… not really… but-”

“Good. Now let me finish explaining away your whole ‘clone’ accusation. You are not a clone, D’mitry. Due to a plethora of science you will likely not live long enough to comprehend, we had to freeze your body to bring you here. In other words, we put you in a coma. What you have to understand is that this world is in a whole different universe. As you should know, we aren’t in your universe right now. There is a lot of complicated science and astrophysics jargon behind it all, involving time and spiritual presence as well. If I were to explain it to you, it would take me decades…”

She eyed me briefly.

“... Mmm… maybe even a century. But I hope that answers your question. As for why you woke up there when you were shot… I’m not entirely sure why.”

“What?! So I was lying to Peter?”

“No… no… what you said was accurate. If you die, given what I know, you should be ‘teleported’,” she explained, using hoof-quotes for dramatic effect as well, “back to Earth, awakening from your comatose. However, I didn’t think merely falling unconscious had the same effect. Did you get sent back to Earth when Pete slashed your eye too?”

“Uh… hmm… no. That time, I was just unconscious. It was only later on, when he shot me in the chest.”

“Hmm. Alright. Well, I’m sorry, but I don’t have a direct answer for you in that regard. I can look into it further when I’m free, but for now, we have bigger matters to tend to. In the meantime, I’d suggest you avoid falling unconscious again. Never thought I’d have to suggest that, but you are an interesting creature. Are you satisfied with that?”

I slowly nodded. “I… suppose so.”

“Good. For now, let’s head ba-”

“So wait a minute. Does that mean I could escape your whole contract by just knocking myself out hard enough?”

She rolled her eyes. “No, not really. We’d just go back and steal you again. We know how to find you there.”

“Yeah, you could. But what if I knocked myself out now?”

Celestia gazed in my eyes with a look I hadn’t seen before. It’s like she realized for the first time that she had finally lost her power over me. Well, briefly at least. Once this apocalypse ended, and magic returned, I’d probably be snatched up again. She didn’t seem to be thinking about that possibility though.

“You… you really want to go back?”

“No.”

She huffed. “Then why did you bring it up?”

“I…”

Something peculiar was happening within me. Out of nowhere, my brain struck some kinda locked-up dungeon full of thoughts I’d been hiding away for some time. An unusual feeling was flooding my brain… one I didn’t like.

Sadness.

I averted my eyes, feeling a couple stupid fucking tears starting to fill them. “I… I just…”

“You just what?”

“I miss my mama.”

This threw her off big time. It threw me off too. I hadn’t realized it myself, but it was true. She knew as well as I did, though…

My mama was dead.

I turned around fully to avoid showing any emotion. I knew I was supposed to mourn or whatever, but couldn’t I just do that later or something? I thought I had mourned enough already. I wiped my stupid eyes, hearing Celestia move up behind me.

Her long foreleg grabbed my hand, spinning me back around to face her. I tried to blink away my watery eyes as she gazed into them with a sense of compassion in hers. This was pretty rare to se-

Oof!

Before I could react, she wrapped her foreleg around me in a tight hug. This musta physically pushed out some more tears or something, because I was definitely too strong to cry on my own. I hugged her back, the warmth of her fur shifting to me. This emotion was rare, but it was… nice…

It felt nice.