Long Forgotten Memories

2011/09/12

I remember we were in Appleoosa one autumn. Cool winds blew across the plains and my parents made me wear an overcoat to stay warm. I was so young at the time. Still a “blank flank.” The fall harvest was in and our caravan was there to gather supplies and preserved foods to sell in larger cities over the winter.

I loved Appleoosa. Aside from the apple trees, the earth ponies had planted fields of wheat, barley, and corn that seemed to spread for miles. When the wind blew, it looked like spun gold rippling. It seemed so soft that you could reach out and stroke it. Since it was harvest time, we were asked if we’d be kind enough to help lighten the load. I wasn’t allowed to reap at all, but I got to pull my little wagon! That first night I was so tired and sore, but it was a good kind of sore. I wasn’t as sore the next day. Or the next. About a week after we arrived in Appleoosa, though, I remember not wanting to get out of bed anymore. Like the bed was so comfortable, I should just sleep there forever. I was so tired. And hot. Every bone in my body ached.

Sometimes I had bad dreams. It was always in the same place: our wagon. I was on a bed of straw with blankets over me. Sometimes I saw my mom, her head nestled on my stomach. I think she had been crying, trails of tears matted her face. In other dreams, she lay next to me. She looked asleep. Peaceful, except for the black splotches on her hide. Like she’d been bit by a snake, a lot. In my dream, I tried to touch her hoof with mine, but I was so tired. I could barely move a muscle.

I dreamed of my father, too. He forced me to eat and drink, but every time he was in my dreams, he looked more and more sad. I wanted to comfort him, tell him everything was going to be alright. That as long as we were together, there wasn’t a reason to be sad. And I looked down,  but my mom wasn’t there. I looked up and my dad wasn’t either. I tried to cry. To shout for my momma and pappa.

The only thing that came out of my mouth was a sad little whinny.

-W

2011/09/27

It wasn’t until many years later that I understood the full implications of the plague that ravaged Appleoosa and other villages. That my family, along with the rest of our merchant group, unknowingly carried the disease from port to towns and villages some hundred miles before we, too, succumbed. That, just as ponies were narrowing in on where the disease seemed to be spreading from, we had already packed up shop and move to the next town. The merchants that purchased goods from us, likewise, traveled to other towns.

The plague rippled through Equestria faster than any royal pegasus or incantation sent to warn the unsuspecting.

When I finally got up enough courage to read through the royal report on the disease (years later), I read that, at age of two, I was the lone survivor of the Appleoosa outbreak. I was rescued by a team of ponies tasked with containing the disease. The containment team found a mass grave where ponies were buried. Those not accounted for there could be found scattered beds across the village. As if all of Appleoosa breathed its last hacking breath and left for greener pastures as one.

All except for me. I still do not understand why a young colt survived one of the most horrific diseases ever encountered since the sealing of Discord. A disease resistant to the most potent herbs, the best efforts scientists, doctors, and unicorns Equestria over. A disease resistant to magic. That consumed magic.

Pegasi are recorded to have fallen from their lofty homes, too weak to take flight. As if the clouds themselves refused to carry their diseased hoofs. In one instance, an entire floating metropolis, unable to ignore the pull of gravity any longer, collapsed earthward. Block by terrifying block. It has been postulated that those parts of the city hit first were also the first to fall. Additionally, it’s been decided that the city did not fall in a day. According to an analysis of the debris field and the “flight path” of the city, almost a week had past from the first buildings fell to the last.

Unicorns, the wards of magic, found themselves woefully unprepared for the effects the disease inflicted on its victims. Once infected, a unicorn’s horn disintegrated at the moment of magical conjuration. The use of magic on a victim seemed to only make the plague grow ever more virulent. Though apparently immune, it is hinted that even Princess Celestia feared working her magic, lest she bring about more suffering.

Appleoosa and many other cities were razed. Cleansed by fire. Removed from all maps by royal decree. The survivors, once cleared, found themselves moved to new cities. New homes. New lives. There were so many orphans, too, myself included. So many of us had seen their entire families vanish, consumed by blistering, burning fevers. And pain. Though we still looked like young colts and fillies, all of us had lost our childhood.

It was in one of the many impromptu orphanages that I first met Candlelight Flicker. The pony that gave me a shoulder to cry on. That would become my teacher and mentor. That, along with her daughter, would eventually knit anew a family for me. A concept I was certain I’d permanently lost.

-W

2011/10/01

I realize I’m writing this history out of order, but I got my scanner working finally and I wanted to try it out.

The simple cylinder of a bacteria, shown below, is Yersinia Ponis.  When Candlelight was tasked to track down the cause of the plague, no one imagined the answer would be such a tiny creature. It certainly doesn’t look like much at all of 2 micrometers (um) in length, does it?

It is not alone, however. It can duplicate itself quickly. Within days of infection, a pony’s body is teaming with the bacteria. With study, we found Y. Ponis displaying an amazing assortment of tools to attack its host. It consumes the very essence of magic we all possess. The use of magic appears to spur its growth and replication a thousand fold and the bacteria appears to prefer the magic conducting organs of a pony’s body over others.

Y. Ponis cleaves through a pony’s disease defenses like a hot knife through butter. It injects simple structures into defense cells, destroying them from the inside out. It spews other structures designed to confuse and interrupt the communication between defensive cells. Once infected, a pony is almost helpless against the onslaught.

Good nutrition, bed rest, and somepony to care for the infected will help the most while their bodies wage a very real war against a relentless invader. However, as more and more ponies become infected, these simple necessities become increasingly difficult to supply.

There are many mysteries about Y. Ponis that we still don’t understand. This disease seems so tailored to ponykind. Where did it come from? How does it know how to evade or neutralize every defense a pony has to offer? Who made it?

That last question is my own. There is a a school of thought that Y. Ponis, regardless of how perfectly tuned it seems to be to attack us, is simply that way because it evolved over time with ponies. It adapted to our defenses as we adapted to its attacks. I tend to disagree.

I doubt, however, too many of you are interested in the rantings of an old pony, so I will leave that particular bit for now. I hope some of you found this topic mildly interesting, or at least tolerable.

-W