The Beginnings of a Plague

Fifteen

The grass beneath my feet rapidly dissipates, replaced by cold stone slabs, a path stretching forward towards a collection of obsidian pillars. They shine and reflect the moonlight above the clearing, dark trees flanking the site with imposing and unnatural height.

In the center, I see three small creatures, with ponies flanking them on all sides. Their features are blurred, hidden, save for one. This one pony has a gray coat, and a mane of black, fashioned into different beads and knots. A plume of black fur shoots downward from his muzzle, coming to a point below his chin. He grimaces and turns to face the smaller creatures in the center.

What is this? What am I seeing?

"We art without time. Be'est not afraid, little ones. Thine power shalt be'est ev'r greater, heroes, champions of our kind!" His voice carries in these woods, stretching out over the plains and clearings, into the forest beyond. His voice lilts and his eyes don't share his enthusiasm. When he turns back over to me, I see in his face that he doesn't believe a word.

I try to approach, but my feet are locked to the floor. I can't move. My neck refuses to move. All I can move are my eyes. I don't think I'm supposed to see this. This must be a memory of Luna's.

"Shall't hurt, Papa?"

That voice... small, frail. The voice of a child. What's happening?

"Nay, nought a dram, little one."

A wave of nausea crashes over me. My skin goes cold, my head pounding. There's a pressure at the base of my skull, like a thumbtack pushing into the back of my neck. I struggle, trying to whip around, but nothing happens. My breath is held down in my throat, every heartbeat felt across my veins. Pump. Pump. Pump.

In the center, surrounded by these faceless figures, I see... Luna?

The world sinks down below me, gurgling and bubbling to a point unseen. Where is Nightmare? Who is that? God my fucking head!

"Thank you, Liam."

The voice is coming from behind me, a cacophony of overlapping voices with one taking the stage. The voice sends shivers down my spine. It sounds familiar.

"Guh... sss... stop... w-who..."

"Without you, none of this would be possible," he coos, gravel and grime roiling underneath the silk. It's my voice.

I hear his footsteps. Like walking down the halls, click-clack of dress shoes against the facility floors. They echo and bounce, leaping inside my chest and shaking my heart.

I feel the skin of my fingers peeling back, the fingernails sinking into the flesh. The stinging pain becomes white hot agony as the bones splinter and crack in my hands, but no sound can escape my mouth.

Veins tear, tendons pulled from the bone, blood running down the length of the arm.

Crushing pain. My teeth chip and my tongue pulls back, painfully twisting and slipping into my throat. My heart seizes and bursts in my chest, my lungs collapse and my ribcage explodes outwards.

"Grrghh..."

Then it's over. I fall to my knees, coughing and hacking. I bring my shaking hands to my face and find they're the same. No wounds, no cuts. My skin's still there.

"To think, another species... just waiting for us."

Click-clack, click-clack. Coming closer. Towards me. In front of me.

"For Father."

I raise my head and see myself, standing there. My pale visage and trimmed brown hair, neat eyebrows and clean-shaven. I'm wearing my lab-coat, my nametag hanging from the pocket on the left side, where I always kept it. My thin lips curled up into a small smile, hazel eyes staring down at me.

"Wh-what..."

I see myself laugh, a short bark. His left eye rolls back into his head, then focuses back on me.

"Come now, Liam, don't make this any harder on yourself."

My brain is burning. Something is trying to get inside.

"Who are you?!" I scream and fall back.

He frowns, and I see my face distort, sagging and lip curling up to reveal decayed teeth in a horrible maw. He clicks. It's as if it was never there. He crouches down into a squat, arms resting on his knees, perched before me. He reaches into his pocket and pulls a glob of misshapen flesh and bloody meat out.

He gazes at it with a smile. My stomach churns and I retch. My vision blurs.

"You know," he says, fixated on the... thing... in his hand, "you've known, ever since .̶̪͇̰͒͠.̴̰̟̽̾.̴̡̘̅̽͝.̷͖̂͊͌;̶̢̼̽̅͐.̷̲̩͋̓ͅ;̶̡̗̮̓.̷̞̪͖͋̏;̵̨͖̜͂̀,̴̗̥́͘.̷̨̡̄̍̉;̴̻͎͔̇̍̊.̸̡̅̏.̶̢̞͔͗̈́.̵̨̝̓̏.̵͙͊͘.̵̟̩͕̈́̈́͂.̷̢̖͇̍.̷͙͍̓̍ͅ.̵̩̾.̶̖̫́;̴̡̙̝̾͂͝.̶̧͑."

My eyes roll back into my head and my teeth come down hard, grinding and clenching. My head threatens to explode, my muscles burning and electricity rocketing down all of my nerves. Flashes of images, memories, going over my mind.

"They've tried to hide it from you, tried to make you forget," he laughs.

I splay out on the floor, limbs twitching and body fighting to regain control. Finally, a breath.

"But we will fix that, together."

"W-what..."

He grabs me by my coat and throws me into a rolling chair. It slides back, going faster and faster, accelerating. It crashes into a reality with a harsh stop, throwing my head forward with a sharp crack.

I jolt alive, sitting in... an office. This office... this is...

I've been here, I think. This is... is...

"Mister Webb, you told me you'd be back here Sunday. Do you know what day it is?"

"T-Torrez?"

I can't see her face. She's spun around in her chair. Tick-tock, tick-tock.

I look at the clock, but the hands aren't moving.

Tick-tock.

The walls of the office fall outwards and explode into a firestorm, consuming the world. My flesh boils and burns away. The fire melts my eyes, my vision sinking and dissolving into flames. I scream and try to stand, but the bones of my legs crumble under my weight, and I plunge into the burning hellfire.

"Administer amnestics and start over."

The world comes back to me in flashes of light, strapped down underneath bright lamps.

"Your pet project isn't working, Director."

Who's there?! I can't... I can't fucking talk!

"It will."

Black again.

"So they much they hid from you, but I remember. Father, remembers," it sounds like it's spoken underwater.

Wait!

I'm sinking, drowning. Something in my lungs.

No!

I can't control it.

I'm alive again, I think. As alive as I can perceive, anyway. It's hard to keep track of things. I know I died... but I don't know how...

Or why.

I'm lying on my side in a cave of some kind, a flashlight beside me. I roll off my back and towards the flashlight, my face tapping the floor. A sticky residue is on my cheek, and a cursory look at the floor tells me that I was better off not knowing what I was laying on.

Meat.

Flesh.

It's so hot in here.

I've been here, I swear. It feels like...

Home.

Home? What kind of sick...

Ugh... my head is falling apart. I feel my brain firing off all circuits. There's blood in my mouth.

A concussion?

Why can't I remember anything?

What the hell was I doing?

Where am I?

The walls, they're... alive. They're breathing. Each exhale, a foul wind passes over me. I retch. Can't stop it.

"Father will forgive you, Liam. Even though you worked against us, Father will embrace you once more."

Vomit passes my lips and splashes on the vertebrae beneath me. The visceral surface seems to absorb it. The sight almost has me back for seconds.

"I don't... know what you're... talking about," I spit.

It's true. I can't... remember...

His shoes... my shoes, standing in front of me. He.. I bend down and pick myself up. But it's not me. He frowns at the predicament. He brushes part of my shirt.

"I will free you, Liam. This mind is more powerful than yours. I will use it to free yours."

Gnawing, clawing...

"Who's mind?" I ask numbly.

Scraping.

"The Princess," he responds matter-of-factly.

Wait. The Princess...

He puts his palm against my head and I feel a thousand worms pouring through my brain. Looking for something, they squirm and writhe under the skin, behind my eyes. I weakly groan. It's so hot.

Princess...

Who...

"We will be whole again, Liam. You will rejoin Father's embrace."

Father.

My eyes roll back into my head.

Luna.

I remember!

The worms go deeper.

NO!

I struggle, try to get myself free, but his grip holds strong.

No...

I can feel my will slipping away.

The worms go deeper.

Then...

Then they touch they're not supposed to, maybe the thing they were looking for, maybe they were trying to avoid it. But I feel it. Deep inside, there's something there. Something waiting. Waiting for a moment like this.

They move away from it, but the words are on my lips. My tongue moves slowly, the worms scour my mind, looking for an exit. It knows something I don't. Something deep.

"Sárka, Metaxý, Ektélesi!"

The voice isn't my own, but the words blast forward. My body falls back, my eyes are burning hot embers. My mouth tastes like ash, and my skin crawls. I lie on my back, looking up. The ceiling bleeds away. It's cold now. Everything's cold and hot and broken. The smell... sulfur... brimstone...

I painfully push myself upwards off of my back. Looking forward, the figure is on the floor. The other me. He's shaking, his mask has come off. Pustules and sacs of fluid bubble and simmer beneath the skin on his neck, his nose angled away and his nostril bonded with the side of his face. Disgusting, ugly monster.

But you? You're the worst of them all.

An indescribable determination overcomes me, down to the core. I know what I have to do. I don't know why, I don't know how...

I'm going to kill you. I'm going to all of you.

Every last one of you.

I throw myself over towards him and crawl. I cough, but all that comes out is a painful growl. I press on. There's blood in my mouth, and all that will wash it away is more.

His sunken yellow eye darts over towards me. A horrible ripping noise slithers out across the void as a spider-like leg bursts from his chest, a sharp spike on the end of it. It slams into the floor of the void beside me, the blade disappearing beneath the black. The ground seems to vibrate.

I growl again and grab at his leg, pulling myself closer. The pant leg dissolves into ugly, pallid flesh.

The thing pulls the spike free of the floor, then lurches towards me. A horrible pain explodes across my back and my stomach as the blade rips through my intestines. I grunt and my mind goes blank, my vision blurring.

No. Not here. Not until...

I grit my teeth and pull myself forward, feeling the blade shift inside my guts. I crawl up the leg and the leg rips itself from my back. I hear a wet splashing noise behind me, but the pain is gone now. Just anger. I crawl up the creature, his sunken eye wide in panic.

"No... gleb... could've... ghhhssss... been so... more..."

The spider-like leg is in the way. I grab it to pull myself forward, on top of his chest. It tries to stab at me. I grab it and break the joint with newfound strength.

It hisses in pain, yellow ichor staining the both of us. It can bleed.

Another leg bursts from the shoulder. I grab it as it lunges forward to stab me. Another bursts from behind me, through my chest. Through my heart. My shoulder. I pull down on the spike in my hands, inching closer to his face.

I can feel my blood pouring out onto him. The pain, the fear, all gone now. Only rage. You won't break me. You broke me once. Never again!

I pull down, closer. Closer! It gasps, a other tearing sound. I've got you. Down! Down!

"You would have... been... so..."

I yank it down with the remaining strength I have left. I pierces that damned yellow eye, the gray bone sinking through down into the skull. He squirms and writes. Another spike into my waist. I can hardly feel it. Down!

"Fuck... you..." I hiss, red misting from my mouth. I pull it out and plunge it in again. And again. And again. DOWN!

He stops moving. After a while, so do I. The spears of keep me suspended above him... above it. My blood pours down freely onto the thing. I've stopped breathing. Everything is slow. No heartbeat. The pain never comes.

He sinks below me, into the darkness, disappearing beneath the tides of black.

I fall over.

"You know, that's gonna kill you one day," I say, leaning against the railing.

Claire either ignores me or can't be bothered to engage. Another one of those shifts, I guess. The hum of the fluorescent bulbs above threatens to incite riots and destabilize the nation. Damn things make so much noise, and for what? To drain all the life out of a room. Claire still looks pretty as ever, though.

Her blue eyes fixate on me, taking a long drag from her cigarette. She blows it at me.

"Hey," I give her a stern look, "I'm more than happy to take these field-trips to the stairwell with you, least you could do is keep that to yourself. I quit, remember?"

She makes a muppet-puppet out of her hand and mocks me.

"Sorry, Mister Webb. Can't all be perfect, normal people like you," she says. I scoff. She sticks her tongue out.

"Nice," I say sarcastically. I pull my phone from my pocket and open up the calendar. I'm scrolling through it when she coughs. I quirk my brows.

"See? You're the smartest person I know and you do the dumbest shit sometimes."

She groans and sinks her face in her free hand.

"Oh, live a little, Liam."

"I plan on living a long time. You on the other hand... if Ino catches you-"

"I'm not that smart."

I grunt in reply. She has to fight me on everything.

"Liam," she starts, looking rather serious now. The look in her eyes... something's different. There's something there I can't nail down, an emotion I haven't seen before. I don't know if I should be scared. I opt for caution.

"Yeah?"

She pulls on her cigarette again and purses her lips away from me. She blows the smoke over the railing, then bites the inside of her lip. She brushes her blonde hair from her face.

"How do you want to die?"

I recoil slightly.

"That got dark fast."

"We were talking about death so, y'know," she waves her hands about.

I rub my brow with a finger and lean back up against the railing. Nothing comes to mind, not immediately anyway.

"Hm... you first."

She looks at her cigarette, burning down to the base. She flicks it over the railing, watching it plummet down the stairwell.

"Falling. It's probably nice to see the whole world below you, then you go splat. Make a big mess," she grins.

"Like all the cigarettes poor Richards has to clean up?"

She laughs quietly and looks down the stairs.

"Yeah, I guess so."

The smile slowly disappears from her face. She looks back to me.

"So?"

"So...?

"How would you die, if you got to pick?"

"Happy."

All that's left is me.

Again.

It's so quiet.

The wounds don't close. A strange sensation to feel your heart ripped apart in your chest, stranger still, feeling it try to beat. I don't have the energy to contemplate his words, to reflect on what I've seen. I feel it giving up, my heart. The twitches are getting slower.

I don't know how long I've been lying here. The pain is gone, but so is all sensation. Time and thought and memory, all blurring together, like a dream. A nightmare you can't wake up from. I can't move. The black void above slowly begins populating with lights, faint twinkles of stars far away. Is it over?

"L-..." I try to speak, but my throat doesn't comply. A terrible pain in my esophagus. I'm in the dark again. The only thing I can see in the void is myself and the stars above. Slower still. A blanket of fog rolls in over my body, over the darkness. The sky above fills with light, the arm of a galaxy splashing over the dark, blending like ink in water. My eyes stop working.

I try again, but no words come forth. I swallow. I have to say something. I must.

"...please," I whisper. I can't tell if I actually say it, or if it's my thoughts.

There's no answer. Nothing, just silence. I can't hear anymore. My heart's quiet.

"Please..." I whisper again. "I don't want to be alone again..."

Nothing. Not even the sound of my voice echoes back into my ears. I lie there, unmoving, trapped in my own body. I can only hope that...

Her name is on my tongue, but it all just ebbs away. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.

Good luck, Luna.

"He's awake!"

It's so god damn bright. Everything hurts. My eyes can't adjust, and every breath is labored. I hear an EKG. It's somewhere to my left. It feels like I've been thrown off a building. I shut my eyes and try to speak, but it comes out as a wheeze. I'm in a bed. This feels awfully familiar.

"Son, don't move, okay?" That voice, I've heard it before. I know that voice. It's warm and it's fatherly, nurturing.

"The lights... turn them off..." I rasp.

After a moment, the sound of hooves on tile, everything gets a little darker. I'm afraid to open my eyes. I'm so tired...

"Liam?"

I recognize that voice. It feels like I haven't heard it in years. It cracks.

"Luna?" I can't stop my lip from trembling. I try to open my eyes, but everything is blurred. I see a vague shape, dark blue. I'm awake, right? Please, tell me I'm-

Before I know it, I feel her embrace me, hooves wrapped around my neck. Her head pushes against mine and I feel a wetness on my ear. She's crying. Don't cry, don't... God damn it. I'm crying too. I slowly move my arms up and feel around her back, avoiding her wings and wrapping her in a hug.

"You're okay," I whisper, "thank God you're okay."

"Is it over?"

"Yes," Neat Stitch says, "you're okay, son. Just take it slow. Can you see?"

I blink, then screw my eyes shut. Breathe. I open my eyes again, then everything comes into focus. The curtains are drawn shut. Luna is still here, still holding me. Neat Stitch is staring at me with concern, red eyes staring at me intensely. I shudder and sniffle, pulling Luna tighter.

"Yeah. Why are you looking at me like that?"

He brushes his chin against his shoulder, looking down at his beige coat for a moment. He then looks back to me.

"There's no easy way to put this, Liam... you were dead for three hours, then revived in the morgue. Is that normal for your species?"

I take a raggedy breath and Luna pulls away to look at me, cheeks matted with tears and muzzle pointed downwards. I look over my body, naked save for the gown. Nothing's new.

"Liam?"

I look at Luna and notice she's much taller. As tall as Celestia now. Her coat is darker, that ethereal mane a deeper shade of blue. Her legs have become more slender, her body more agile and powerful, her movements more graceful. I snap myself away when I notice she's looking at me right back. I feel my ears flush.

"Uh... no."

"You died, Liam," Neat Stitch says again.

"I know. I don't know why I'm alive. I can't even hazard a guess. Everything's... muddy."

Neat Stitch levitates a pen and a clipboard over and begins jotting down notes.

"How long have I been unconscious?"

Neat Stitch doesn't look away from his clipboard.

"Three days. You had no brain activity. Princess Luna spent every night here with you since you were found."

I look over to Princess Luna and she doesn't shy away. She nods towards me and places a hoof on my bed. I take it. I don't want to ask this question, but I have to. I squeeze her hoof gently.

"How..." I swallow, "how many died?"

She gives me a grave look. She looks to Neat Stitch and he stops writing on his clipboard. He grimaces. That's not good. That's not good at all.

"Fifteen. Forty-seven injured."

"Fifteen?"

"Yeah, we..." he coughs, trying to hide the wavering of his voice. Luna bows her head.

"Only fifteen... thank God..." I lay my head back and stare at the ceiling.

"Only-?!" Neat Stitch restrains himself from marching forward, and out of the corner of my eye, I see an incredible anger in his features. Princess Luna positions herself between us, shooting me a look. She opens her mouth, but I cut her off.

"If this was the real deal, we'd be looking at a death toll in the upper hundreds, if not the thousands," I say calmly.

"What?" Neat Stitch whispers.

"I don't mean to take away from the tragedy, from the pain of this, but trust me when I say... this could've been a helluva lot worse. It would have been the greatest loss of life in Equestrian history."

He shakes his head, a silent snarl on his features. He turns his head away and continues writing on his clipboard. Luna gives me a horrified look.

"I'm sorry, Stitch. I know that's a terrible thing to say, to find light in any number of dead. It's just..."

He looks back to me, anger simmering beneath the surface. The fur on the back of his neck is raised.

"That was my life, that was my world. When you're dealing with big numbers, anything one or two digits off is good news. I'm sorry. I should've said nothing," I murmur.

He keeps his gaze focused, but I see some of that anger and some of that pain flow away. He shakes his head and turns back to the clipboard. He probes the side of his cheek with his tongue and turns back to me.

"How are you feeling?"

I keep my grip gentle on her hoof.

"Like shit. Everything hurts."

He nods and keeps writing.

"Are you capable of seeing Princess Celestia in your state?"

Oooh... that's the big one. I...

I feel a twist in my heart and a tightening in my chest. I know how that conversation is going to pan-out. I look at Luna and she gives me a reassuring nod.

"We... I think you will be fine, Liam. It was circumstances outside your control. I have spoken with Celestia."

I nod silently, and turn to nod at Neat Stitch. He levitates the clipboard into his labcoat.

"I'll send her a letter right away."

"Okay."

He turns and walks towards the door. Before he heads out, he turns his head over his shoulder and starts to say something, but closes his mouth and walks out. The door shuts behind him.

"I like the new look," I say awkwardly and turn to Luna. She smiles softly, her wings fluttering lightly.

"Thank you, Liam. You look..."

"Like Hell on wheels?"

"I do not know what that means, but I assume it is negative."

"You'd be right, yeah," I chuckle weakly. She smiles.

"No, you look fine, if not a little... unkempt."

I grunt and look at her hoof. Her coat is soft. I rub my thumb over it and I notice her shiver at the touch.

"Sorry, uh... that probably felt weird."

"No, it felt great," she says quickly, then shuts her mouth and brings a wing over it. A deeper blue blush explodes across her cheeks. I laugh.

"You've dropped the Old English speak?"

She bristles and tucks her wing back, teetering on her hooves.

"Old Equish, but yes, is it not better to speak with a modern tongue?"

My smile softens a little.

"I thought speaking to pony Shakespeare was cool, personally."

"Shakespeare?"

"Ah... nevermind. Someone from Earth."

We sit there in silence for a few moments, but it's comfortable. I notice there's something in her eyes, that smile slowly fading. I think I know what it is, and decide to move first.

"Luna?"

Her gaze focuses and she looks at me.

"I... when I died... you..."

I swallow and she leans in slightly, those magnificent eyes trained on me.

"I was afraid I wasn't going to see you again. I'm just... I'm happy that-" my voice breaks and my eyes water. She doesn't give me any room to breathe and is on me again, holding onto me tightly. I bury my face in her neck and hold on for life. The sobs don't stop, not for a long time. I don't know how long I've been holding her like this, but it feels good.

"Liam," I hear someone call.

Luna pulls away gingerly and I see Celestia standing there, an impassive expression on her face, and in her eyes...

"We need to talk."