Chapter 1: Awakening (Written by LemonCurse)
Chapter 1: Awakening
Silence.
It lurked the halls, echoing the song of those long since forgotten. For years this grave was room to only one. Today, that changes.
*** *** ***
I saw an iron grating as I slowly opened my eyes. I was staring at the bottom of a top bunk bed. I quickly pushed myself to sitting position. My mind shrieked on response, I brought my hoof to my head with a groan and glance around through the haze.
I found myself in a dark and dusty room, the only light coming from somewhere far out side. As my eyes slowly adjusted to the darkness, details became more apparent. The walls were made of pure iron, rusted by many years of age, making the room colder than it already was. A tattered poster was displayed on the wall opposite to me.
Join us in our happy home in Stable 16! It displayed proudly under the image of a smiling white earth pony that wore a blue and yellow jumpsuit with '16' stitched into the collar.
Dust laden the room. A pile of…. Who knows what, layed in the corner. Room service obviously hasn't been doing it's job any time recently.
"What….?" I asked in a tired whisper. "Where am I….?" No one responded, obviously, and talking just made my head hurt more.
Was I hung over? Oh no…. I hope I'm not in a jail cell. I groaned aloud. It would be something just like that to ruin my day….
I brought my hooves up to rub my eyes, when they bumped into something. Turning my head, I saw a small table next to my bed. On it was a 9mm with a bunch of bullets scattered around it and a waist clip leaning against it. Whoever put it there clearly was in a rush.
Ok, perhaps this isn't a jail cell.
I was reluctant to get out of bed, but I had to find out where I was. I slowly slipped out from the covers and got to my hooves shakily. I grabbed the gun's clip and strapped it to my side before putting the gun in its holder. Never knew when you would need a Glock.
I made the mistake of looking at the bed I just got out of. On the top bed was what looked like the remains of a pony. Its forehooves hung limply over the side of the bed. Looking down I saw the stain on the floor where the ponies blood had dripped from its hooves. The corpse looked very old, most of it's skin had already turned to flakes.
Holy shit. Definitely not a jail cell.
I moved away from the scene, trying not to think that I had just slept under that. I stumbled out into the hallway.
The hallway was even worse than the room. Cracks spread out across the walls like a spider web, leaving many areas where on could easily cut themselves. SMILE! was crudely written across one of the walls in stale blood.
Feeling a bit more coordinated, I slowly walked down the hall. More message were written randomly along the walls. "Remember the others." "What happened? What caused this?" Then one last simple one. "Help" the 'p' trailed off and ended at the hoof of a pony corpse, leaning like a sack of rocks against the wall.
What the hell happened here?
Then I saw a far off light. A bit desperate to get away from these messages, I continued towards it, using the wall to stabilize myself. Unfortunately, it wasn't the exit, It was a small room.
I cautiously stepped into the room. A limp light bulb hung from a few wires, looking ready to snap at any moment, cast a dim glow on the table beneath it. The table appeared to be a writer's desk, papers were layed out across it. In the corner, a rotten inkwell sat in its holder. The chair was knocked over.
I shuffled closer and grabbed one of the papers. It was a printed report:
Entry #652
We have been experiencing some trouble with one of our younger residents. From what we have been told, the resident found a way out of the Stable. One that was not registered on our map. When he returned, his pipbuck's radiation intake indicator was at a dangerous level. We brought him into our hospital junction, but so far he's been unresponsive to any of our treatments. I will do an update once we have more information.
I moved over to the second paper:
Entry #655
He's becoming more aggressive every day. We can hardly restrain him anymore. Just the other day, he attacked one of our staff. We had to use tranquilizers to get him to stop. We've made arrangements for him to be transferred to a different location. So far, this info isn't known to the public. But if you want personal opinion, he should just be thrown out to the Wasteland.
I continued to move along, entranced by this bizarre story. The next one wasn't printed, it was handwritten in a rushed style.
He's done it, he's gone full ghoul. I'm the only one left, the rest are dead or gone. I've been looking around for a possible cure, but I haven't been able to find anything in the library or in the Stable's data bank. "It's too late. He can't be redeemed." That's what they keep saying, but I know it's not true! I hate that I have to do this, but I'm going out there, I'm going out the Wastelands. I WILL find a cure. In the meantime, I'll keep him locked in here in hopes that no one will find him. I will find a cure. I will return. Aqua, if you're able to read this, I WILL return.
Signed neatly at the bottom was a name:
Berry Curse
I reread it twice. Someone had gone full ghoul? What does that mean? Looking back at the hall, I thought that whatever this was talking about had caused that mess and that I would not like to meet it.
New plan, get out of here as soon as possible.
I was moving for the door when I heard a sound. At first, I thought I was hearing things, with the condition this place was in, there was no way someone else was here. then I heard it again. It was coming from above. I slowly looked up as the clanging sound got closer. A vent ran along the ceiling and ended right above the table. The vent was shaking violently. Then something fell from the vent duct, breaking the table as it landed.
It was another dead pony, this one was a blue coated pegasus with lighter blue hair. Unlike the others, this one's skin was all there, just badly defaced. Cuts littered its body, each wound bleeding profusely. There was a deep gash lining it's cutie mark, a white rose, causing the skin to hang by a few veins. It was as if someone had tried to cut it off, but never finished. It wore a jumpsuit just like the one on the poster. The part of the collar that should of showed the numbers '16' was torn off.
I walked closer, not entirely sure what I meant to do when I thought I saw it move. But that was obviously impossible. It was clearly dead.
I sighed and looked up. Why had it come from the vent? I gulped. Perhaps the 'ghoul' was up there. If that was the case, then it would be best if I wasn't here when it appeared. I backed away from the corpse and made my way for the door.
The iron floor creaked eerily behind me.
I slowly turned around. The corpse was standing and had its eyes trained right on me. I froze. No. It's impossible. Perhaps the haze from earlier was just making me see things and I just got a bit spooked by the letters.
Without breaking eye contact, it took a staggering step towards me. Nope. Definitely wasn't my imagination.
I wasn't given any more time to think as the ghoul jumped at me, pinning me to the cold iron floor. Its foul smell washed over me as I tried to fight back against it chomping teeth. It got dangerously close to my throat when suddenly-
BANG
The sound rang out behind me as the weight suddenly disappeared from above me. I was in a state of shock. I looked at my foreleg to see sharp teeth embedded in my skin. With a quiet whimper, I pulled them out and slowly got up, blood beamed from the wound.
I looked over at the 'pony'…. What was left of it. It layed splayed at the opposite side of the room, its head was gone, having littered the wall behind it with gore.
"I believe a thank you is in order." Said a sarcastic voice behind me. I looked behind me to see a dirt and blood covered pink pegasus behind me. She had a large gun held by a mechanism on her wing trained on the ghoul corpse.
"I… uh…. Thank you, you saved my life!" I said, genuinely grateful.
"Yeah, yeah. That's great." She quickly moved the gun's aim from the corpse to me. "Now would you mind telling who the hell you are?" She said in a threatening manner.
I was significantly less grateful. "I'm…." I trailed off. That's when I noticed that couldn't recall who I am, not even my own name. "....don't know." I finished lamely.
"Excuse me?" She asked, bringing the gun closer to me, the barrel inches from my forehead.
"I- I said I don't know! I just woke up, how am I supposed to know what's going on?" I exclaimed, knowing I was just a feather twitch away from ending up like the ghoul.
"What kind of bullshit-" she was cut off as I heard a sound behind me. I tried to turn and look but the pegasus fixed me with a glare. She moved her gun to where the corpse layed and let a bullet lose. The bullet found a fleshy home and I heard a splatter.
"Let's move this conversation somewhere else." She said quickly, moving so I could go out the door with the gun still trained on me. Then she stopped me.
"Hold on." She turned me around. "Give me that." She said, pointing a wing at my gun. I sighed and handed it over. She took it and deposited it in her saddle-bag.
As we left, I caught a glimpse of the ghoul corpse. It now layed in a completely different position. Then the pegasus closed and locked the door.
I was lead down the graffitied hallway. I could hear her curse under breath as we came across another corpse. The hallway ended at a huge doorway leading to a large cafeteria-like room. The room had foldable tables laying around random, some were even knocked over. I was leded at point blank range to the nearest one.
"Sit down. I'm not letting you out of my sight till I know if your friend or foe." She said, sitting down across from me, gun still pointed at me.
"I don't know! I don't remember anything! That's what I've been trying to tell you!" I practically whined.
"You're just trying to be ignorant." She replied flatly.
"Oh my-" I sighed deeply, I was quickly getting tired of this conversation. "And how exactly am I supposed to prove that? What threat am I to you anyway?"
"You were an armed pony, that could pose many threats."
"I was being attacked! And you saved me! Why would hurt you after you saved me? If anything, I should be scared of you!"
"You're right about that." She replied, nodding to her gun. I could feel that headache from earlier coming back.
Then a different expression shadowed the pegasus face. "Say…. I were to believe you…. What would you do after I released you?" She asked suddenly.
Finally! "I would get out of here as quickly as possible." I replied bluntly.
She looked at me for a moment, then lowered the gun. "Alright, better than just sitting here pointing a gun at you forever. The names Coral Note" She said simply.
I sighed with relief.
"But I'm keeping your gun." She said quickly. I groaned inwardly, of course there was a twist.
I finally had some time to think. So, I can't remember anything. So I should probably learn as much as I could about myself. Then, realized I didn't even know what I look like.
I got up, but as soon as I did. "Where do you think you're going?" Coral said critically. I sighed "I'm going to go find a mirror. Is that ok with you?" I replied, dripping the last sentence in sarcasm.
"I'm coming with you, to keep an eye on you."
'Great.' I thought sarcastically. I looked to hallway, with the ghoul locked in there, there was no way I was going that way. I looked around and noticed a long window with a sill allowing a view into another room with a door near it.
So it was a cafeteria. I walked over to the door to the kitchen, Coral following closely behind me.
A strong stench hit me as I neared the door. I noticed that many blood streaks lead to the door. I slowly opened the door and found the source of the smell. A pile of corpses was collected in a corner in the back of the kitchen. It took all I had in me to not throw up upon seeing it. Then I noticed something about them, different bits and pieces were missing from some of them, as if someone had cut them away.
Coral entered the room and grimaced. "When someone's stuck somewhere they will go to great lengths to survive. They may even resort to cannibalism." She explained unnecessarily.
Thanks for the mental image. I sighed and turned away from the pile. I saw a stained mirror on the south wall, thankfully far away from the corpses. I walked over to it.
The mirror was cracked and caked with grime and there was a sticker at the bottom that read "Smile for the customers!" With a cheesing smile next to it. I focus on my appearance. I was a blue pegasus with a blonde and purple mane. I turned to my side to look at my cutie mark. It was two crossed golden swords in front of a pair of wings.
"Maybe your good at fighting." Coral said sarcastically. I glared at her.
"I am. You just haven't seen it yet." I retorted.
"Right, cause getting mauled by a ghoul count as 'being good at fighting'" Coral said, rolling her eyes.
The normal conversation felt out of place with our location. I sighed, the sooner I get out of here, the better.
THUMP
I stopped. The sound had come from outside the door. I slowly turned and looked out the window. The ghoul was standing there staring at me with a deadpan expression. I felt ready to faint. Coral on the other hand, flew into action. She grabbed me and brought be down below the window.
"Ok, so it's still in the cafeteria, as long as it doesn't enter this room we should be fine, Alright?" She said rapidly. The creature still loomed outside, waiting for one of us to appear. Coral cocked her gun and prepped it on the window sill. The monster was just standing there, staring.
I looked around. If this beast could survive a headshot, then it would take a lot more fire power to take it down. Then I got an idea.
I quickly ran over to one of the cabinets and started searching. The first held nothing helpful, the second one however, did. A bottle of alcohol. The plan was becoming more solid in my mind.
I moved over to what looked like the storage area, a small room off to the side lined with metal shelves. A quick search, in which many things fell and broke, I found what I was looking for. A cloth. I open the beer bottle on one of metal corners and shoved the cloth in. One last thing needed.
I went back into the main part of the kitchen. Coral was still at the window, shooting at the ghoul. But the bullets barely seemed to phase it as it slowly crawled towards us. For a moment I wondered why she still protected me rather than save herself, but right now really wasn't the time for contemplating.
I shook the thought away and approached the set of steel ovens. I bent down to look at the most broken one of them and found that it's gasoline input was disconnected, perfect. I put the cloth and bottle under the pipe and reached up to turn the dial. Miraculously, there was a low churning sound as a bit of gasoline dripped from the pipe and onto the cloth. Then a loud screeching sound as it shuttered to a stop. The scratching sound from the ghoul increased.
"What the hell are you doing?" Coral exclaimed, looking over at me. Then she saw what I was holding. "You're kidding, right?"
I didn't respond. Instead, I grabbed two pieces of nearby metal debris and struck them together next to the cloth, igniting a small flame that quickly grew. I threw the makeshift cocktail bomb into the cafeteria. I grabbed Coral and hid below the window as there was a large explosion from the other room.
We slowly stood up and looked at the results of my craft. The cafeteria was nothing less than a giant fireball, fire roamed around freely, hiding the ghoul within. The Stable's water system went off almost immediately, slowly soaking the raging flames.
"Wow…." Coral said, amazement blanketing her voice. "Just… Wow…" She then made the mistake of turning away from the window.
The ghoul, skin dripping away from it bones, leaped through the window and tackled Coral. They fell to the ground in a messy heap. For a moment I just stood there shocked. How could it had taken a blast to the face and still be standing!?
I snapped out of the shock too late as the ghoul picked up Coral and threw her across the room, hitting the wall and slumping down into the pile of corpses unconscious, staining her coat a darker red than before. Then it turned to me.
I don't think I've ever been so scared before. I felt my knees buckle as the ghoul approached, it's slowly deforming face seeming to wear a twisted smile.
I looked around frantically, there had to be something, something, to help me. The gasoline? It was already broken. Debris? I couldn't think of how to use that on the spot. Then I saw something.
Coral's saddle-bag.
It had been knocked loose in all the conflict and now layed next to me with it's contents spilled out. I looked over the items, one caught my eyes. A 'Grenade'. The name of item popped into my mind uninvited, but I didn't have time to focus on that now.
I hastily grabbed it and brought it closer. The ghoul now stood right in front of me. It seemed to be wearing a questioning expression, but my mind registered it as a sneer. The expression faded as a different, deadpan, expression shadowed it. It leapt at me, teeth barred. Without hesitation, I pulled the cord and threw the grenade into the mouth that was searching for blood. When the creature swallowed the grenade, it stumbled back, the earlier expression appearing again.
Then the kitchen became a slaughter house as guts mixed with debris and painted the room in red.
Regaining feelings in my legs, I stood up shakily. The room was an absolute mess, I tried not to throw up as I took it all in. Then I heard a sound behind me.
Turning around, I saw Coral slowly stumble out of the corpse pile. "Whoa…." She said hazily. "What happened….?" She looked around the room, her eyes widening. "Whoa!" She said again, more alert this time.
Then she looked at me, an odd expression of fear and excitement written across her face. "Did you do this?" She said, had she been on a chair she would be leaning out of it.
"Um…. Yes, I did…." I replied, even I couldn't believe that I had just done that. But now I was confused, shouldn't Coral remember what happened. And she seemed more…. Frizzley now, somehow. Had she come down with memory lost?
"Coral, are you o-" I was quickly cut off as Coral practically launched into the air, landing square in front of me.
"AMAZING!" She exclaimed, inches from my face. "Are you some super secret agent!? Or maybe a war warrior!!" Our noses were almost touching as she pelted me with questions.
Ok, this was just too weird.
I pushed her away. "No I'm not! I'm not any of those!" I yelled, irradiated with her badgering. "But what's with you? Why are you suddenly acting like this!?" I retaliated, my question coming out before I could properly process them.
Coral blinked at me, then realization dawned on her. "Oh….! You only know Meanie-Pants! My other personality. Well I'm Hyper! Er- that's what they call me. Not that I'm not hyper…. I'm-" Her rant was drowned out by my own racing mind.
Her other personality!? And she said it so nonchalantly too! Of course, why not!? With all the stuff that's happened, I shouldn't be surprised!
"And the dream ended and everything was fine!" She finished, looking at me expectantly.
"Uh… I wasn't listening, sorry." I said lamely.
She frowned a bit. "Oh! Well, what I said was…. " She trailed off, looking at a spot behind me. "Perhaps we should save the story for later." She pointed a wing at where she was looking.
I turned, what I saw made my stomach drop like a stone. The splattered pieces of gore that once been the ghoul were slowly moving together into a pile. Even the blood looked like it was being seeped back in.
Oh, you have got to be kidding me.
"Let go before we have more trouble." 'Hyper' said acutely. She picked up her saddle-bag, then proceeded to move a body away from the door and open it, trotting gleefully out as if there wasn't blood everywhere.
The water system had fully put out the fire by now. The room somehow looked worse than it was before. What was left behind was charred beyond recognition. Of course, Coral walked through it like there wasn't a single thing out of place in the world.
Coral lead me down the creaky hall. More messages were written here or there on the walls. It would of taken a lot of ponies to make that many messages. So what if…. Then it hit me. Aqua wrote these! Suddenly, the messages made much more sense. "Remember the fallen." Did the ghoul feel…. Sorry for his actions? For all the life's it had taken?
I shook my head. It didn't matter. All that mattered was getting away from it before it reformed again. I picked the pace up, I wanted to get out of here as quickly as possible.
Then a menacing clang rang down the hall. I looked at Coral and her scared expression cleared any suspicions I had, that was not a part of my imagination, it was very, very real.
Our fast trot changed to a full out run as the clanging got closer. I wanted to look behind me, but I didn't dare. We raced for the entrance, trying not to imagine getting caught.
Finally the entrance to the Stable entrance came to view. Sadly, so did the ghoul.
As we ran in, Coral few up and slammed the wall above the door, causing debris to fall in the doorway. Not enough to keep it out forever, but enough to stall it.
Still panicked, I looked around the room I was now in. It was a small room, focusing on the giant metal door that led to the outside world. Looking back at the door we entered through, I saw the ghoul trying claw its way in.
I looked back to Coral, she was at the control panel. She quickly punched in a code and pulled a red lever. My panic heightened as a loud siren filled the room accompanied by multiple flashing red lights.
A loud grinding sound filled the room as the Stable door started to open. I heard a much smaller sound, smaller, but much more frightening. Turning to the hallway door I saw that ghoul had finally broke down the rubble and was now heading straight for me. I froze and covered my eyes. I was tired and I just wanted this to stop!
Suddenly, I felt the ground leave below me. Uncovering my eyes, I saw that I was being carried away from the ghoul. Looking down I saw a pink coat. Coral was carrying me on her back.
She quickly ran through the open crack the Stable door had opened up and brought us out to the night air. She came to an abrupt stop, causing me to fall off.
Looking back I saw the ghoul, but it was still inside. It seemed…. Unwilling to leave. The Stable door screeched closed, putting solid metal between me and that beast.
Sighing with relief, I collapsed to the ground. I was exasperated! That's when I got my first real view of the outside. It was barren, save for a few charred trees that stood out like fingers. Looking up, I saw a solid layer of grey cloud, making the place seem even more murky than normal.
I stood up quickly, this was not a good place to let my guard down.
"Welp, guess this is where we part ways. It was nice meeting ya." Coral said a bit bluntly.
What? But she just saved me!
"Wait. What about me? What am I gonna do?" I questioned, trying not to sound like I was begging.
She looked at me with a weird expression. "Don't you have somewhere to get back to?" She asked.
"No." I replied flatly. Was she just going to abandon me?
"You don't have anywhere to go?" She paused for a moment, then her face brightened. "Wait, I have a great idea! You could come to my town and work with me!" She said cheerfully.
It was abrupt, yes, but did I really have any other option?
"Me and my friend Ruby live in a town about a day's travel south." She said, pointing in south with a hoof. "We're a group of Traders who…. Well, trade!"
I did a fake smile. Well, at least it wasn't that bad, and a bit of work never hurt anyone. "Sounds great." was all I could muster, I was so relieved. I wasn't going to just be left in the middle of nowhere.
Coral started walking the way she pointed, jarring me out of my thoughts. "Come on, if we start now we can get there by noon tomorrow." She said. However it sounded more like a cheer.
And so began my adventure, walking towards Coral's town and towards my destiny.
