The Last Humans: a magical apocalypse

Chapters

TLH ch1 What the fuck happened?
TLH ch3
TLH ch4
TLH ch5
TLH ch2

TLH ch1 What the fuck happened?

“Together with the crown, they create a power beyond anything you could ever imagine, but it is power you don’t have the ability to control. The crown may be upon your head, Sunset Shimmer, but you can not weld it. Because you do not possess the most powerful magic of all, the magic of friendship.”, Twilight proclaimed. The girls came together, the magic flowing through them. A bright light engulfed them all. Sunset tried to resist but couldn’t. The light became so bright, Twilight and the rest of the girls had to cover their eyes. “This never happened before.”, Twilight cried out in bewilderment. The light was so bright, it seeped through their closed eyelids, then it all went dark.

Day one

The girls all reawoke to find themselves in a crater, all covered in dust. Each of the girls looked around, confused, and slowly rose to their feet. Their wings and pony ears were gone, and Sunset was back in her human form. As Sunset got up, the crown fell off her head and with an unceremonious clunk onto the ground. Sunset scooped it back up and tucked it away in her jacket which Twilight noticed but was too preoccupied to say anything about at that moment. Questions such as “Why are we in this crater?”, “Why is it daytime?”, and “Did I miss the portal?” swam in her mind.

“Crap, I got dirt in my undies.”, Pinkie said. Her voice thundering in the dead quiet. There wasn’t the distant sound of cars or planes. It was quiet enough for each of the girls to hear their muscles moving and blood flowing past their eardrums.

“How come it’s daytime?”, Rainbow asked.

“Why are we in a hole?”, AJ asked.

Sunset was ignoring the group but had the same questions. She climbed out of the hole and what she saw shocked her. “What the crap?!” Sunset’s cry alerted the others, and they climbed up to see what made her say that. What they saw was the school, weathered and decayed. The entire building was taken over by strange plants, the paint was peeling, the roof looked to have collapsed in some places, and the hole Sunset created was still there.

“What happened?”, Fluttershy asked.

Rainbow spun around to find that the Wondercolts statue didn’t fare much better and the houses were in similar states. “We need to find our parents.” The other girls either silently agreed or had no better ideas.

Rainbow led them to Fluttershy’s house, which was the closest. Fluttershy tried to get her key into the lock, but it was too badly rusted over. “Um, I can’t get it open.”, she sheepishly admitted.

“Let me see what Ah can do.” AJ moved to the front of the group, and after getting everyone to back up, rammed the door. It only took a signal hit for the hinges to completely snap. “Wow, how did these get so rusted?”

Fluttershy’s roof was intact, but her home was covered by dirt and dust and infested by the same plants as the school. The girls spread out, some aimlessly, some with purpose. Fluttershy went to her room, which was in the same state as the rest of the house, then to the rest of the rooms. Sunset went to the kitchen and opened the fridge only to be met with the smell of very rotten food. “Oh! Yak!” Sunset slammed the door and tried to clear the air.

“Nobody's here. Not even my animals are here.”, Fluttershy said.

“Twilight, what happened?”, AJ asked.

“I-I don’t know.”

“No surprise there.”, Sunset snarked. “So much for the power of friendship. You nuked the neighborhood.”

“Nuked?”, Twilight asked, confused.

“Now, hold it right there. What makes you think we were responsible?”, Rarity said.

“Because it was your attempt at a magic beam that caused that light, and now, we’re here.”

“Correlation doesn’t mean causation, smartass.”

Sunset was about to retort before AJ cut in. “Simmer down, now! As it currently stands, we’re on our own. That means we need to at least cooperate.”

“Then what do you suggest, farm girl?”, Sunset asked.

AJ pulled out her phone and began fiddling with the settings. “No signal.” Everybody who had a phone pulled theirs out and also checked. The head shakes from everyone told AJ they were all in the same boat. “Okay so, no cell phones, but we still need ta cover a lot a’ ground.”

“What do you mean?”, Twilight asked.

“What Ah mean is that, for all we know, the whole city’s like this. Until proven otherwise, we need to act as if there are no other humans. We need to survive.”

“We need food. I, personally, haven’t eaten since lunch, and all the food in the fridge is way bad.”, Sunset said.

“You can check the pantry. There should be some canned food in there.”, Fluttershy said.

“I think I will.” Sunset began raiding the pantry while the other girls continued talking.

“We also need a safe place to sleep. These buildings are here structurally compromised.”, Pinkie said.

“Water’s out too.”, Sunset called from the kitchen. Everyone, except for Twilight, who had checked out, turned to see Sunset turning the faucet on and off but no water coming out.

“Okay so, we need food, water, and shelter, and we also need ta see if there’s anyone else around.”, AJ summarized.

“I can lead a team to get a camp set up. Do any of you have any survival knowledge?”, Sunset asked while munching on a can of beans.

“What makes you think you get to be in charge?”, Rainbow asked accusatorily.

“The six of you had your parents or guardians to provide you with food, water, and shelter for the entirety of your lives. I’ve had to survive, by myself, ever since I came to Earth.”

“You seriously had no one? That’s sad.”, Pinkie said.

“It is what it is. Now, any volunteers for ‘camp setup’?” AJ, Rainbow, Pinkie, and Fluttershy raised their hands.

“I guess that leaves me and Twilight to search the city.”, Rarity said. “Twilight?”

“Huh, what? What were you saying?”

“Twilight, are you okay?”, AJ asked.

“Oh, I’m fine.”, Twilight said unconvincingly. “I was just thinking.”

The other girls, except for Sunset, all wanted to question her further, but they were burning daylight.

“Okay, we’ll meet back up by the statue at sundown. So, get movin’. We don’t have much time.”, AJ instructed. Everyone nodded in confirmation. Sunset and her group went off towards the stores while Rarity took Twilight’s hand and they began walking in just any direction.

Team camp setup

“So, what’s the plan?”, Rainbow asked.

“Bargain-mart, that place is a one stop shop for everything we could need.”, Sunset answered.

It took a while to get there without vehicles. Upon reaching the store, the glass doors had to be pushed open, and the inside was dark. Surprisingly and despite the outside being almost completely covered, the inside was free of plant life.

“This might actually make a good campsite.”, AJ said.

“Yeah, but there would be no way the seven of us could heat this place up on our own. Something smaller would serve better.”, Pinkie contested.

“We could set up a tent in here.”, Rainbow suggested.

“That would work.”

“That would also mean we wouldn’t have to carry our supplies far.”, Fluttershy added.

“Okay then, find lights and weapons, and let’s secure this place.”, Sunset instructed.

“From what?”, Rainbow asked.

“I don’t know, and that’s the point.”

Team people finders

Rarity watched the other girls walk off with purpose before she and Twilight began meandering through the streets. Rarity and Twilight looked through the windows of the houses but found no one.

“Twilight, you’ve been very quiet. Are you okay?”

“I-did I really cause this?”

“I don’t know. None of us know what’s happening. All we can do now is try to survive.”

They continued to search for anyone but came up with nothing. There weren’t even any bodies, human or animal, just plants.

“You know, this kinda reminds me of pictures I’ve seen of the villages surrounding Chernobyl.”

“What’s ‘Chernobyl’? And Sunset said a word that I didn’t understand earlier too. What does ‘nuke’ mean?”

“Well, Chernobyl was a nuclear power plant that went critical and blew up, causing widespread radiation poisoning of the land and a radioactive cloud, and nuking refers to eradicating or completely destroying something.”

“What does ‘radiation’ mean, and what’s a power plant?”

Rarity was caught off guard by that. All this knowledge was just so basic to her along with most American highschool students. I guess a world of magic would have no need for nukes. But how could they not have power plants? “Do you have electricity in your world?”

“We do. We just don’t call it that. For us, it’s just lightning.”

“Good, that makes things easier. Humans have learned to harness lightning for everyday use, but we need a way to make it. That’s where power plants come in. We make electricity using them.”

“Okay, I guess you would need another way to power everything without magic.”

“Yeah. Nuclear power plants use special rocks to create electricity. I think Sunset knows more about how they work, so you can ask her later, but the relevant part is that these rocks are very dangerous. They produce radiation, which is an energy that will rip apart your DNA and kill you or give you cancer.”

“What’s DNA?”

“It’s what tells your body how it should work.” Rarity was trying to explain it in the simplest way she knew how, but she wasn’t the best at explaining it.

“How can-”, Twilight tried to ask, but Rarity cut her off.

“Ask Sunset. She’s better equipped to explain it to you.”

“Okay”, Twilight said, a bit disheartened that she would need to wait for her answers.

The two continued searching until the sun started to go down. At that point, they were forced to turn around and head back to the school. Once they got there, they found the other girls waiting there with headlamps and bikes.

“That should make getting around easier.”, Rarity commented.

“I would not have thought humans could ride bikes.”, Twilight said.

“You have bikes in your world?”, Rarity said, slightly shocked. “I wouldn’t have thought ponies could ride bikes.”

“There are design differences, but both species can ride bikes made for their species. Now, get on. We have something to show you.”, Sunset ordered.

The trip back to the store was significantly easier now that everyone was riding their bike instead of having to walk because they had to tango with two extra bikes. Twilight did take a couple minutes to get the hang of it, but they were back to the store within fifteen minutes. They placed the bikes in the racks, not bothering to lock them, and entered the store. Sunset picked up a newspaper and showed it to Rarity and Twilight. “Whatever happened happened on the day of the Fall Formal.”

“Only more evidence that we caused it.”, Twilight said solemnly.

“That’s not all.” Sunset opened the paper up to a missing persons ad.

“Noka Wilds, what about him?”, Rarity asked.

“That’s tha gruesome part.”, AJ said. Team camp setup led Rarity and Twilight to the refrigeration aisle. Everything was gross, smelly, and moldy, but that’s not what they wanted to show them. In the middle of the aisle was a unit that was removed from its spot, scrubs, glasses, a mask, gloves, and a mummified, dead body. AJ pulled Noka’s wallet out of her pocket and handed it to Rarity. “We present to you, Noka Wilds.”

“I couldn’t tell you how he died or when, but I can tell you everything weird I found while examining his body.”, Sunset said.

“Like what?”, Twilight asked.

“He shows clear signs of insect predation, but it seemed like the insects just stopped. There are many holes where botfly larvae should be. Insects should have eaten him to the bone, but he’s still got a lot of meat on him, and do you notice his lack of smell?”

“What does this mean?”

“Haven’t you noticed that we haven’t heard any sort of noise that would suggest life of any kind?”

“Fluttershy, what is she getting at?”, Rarity asked, much to Sunset annoyance.

“There aren’t any insects, rodents, birds, or anything else aside from us and plants. Even the bacteria that should be eating him isn’t there.”

“What the fuck happened?”, Rarity asked.

“We can figure that out in the morning. We need ta eat dinner n’ go ta bed.”, AJ said.

“Before we do that, can we do something about him?”, Twilight asked.

AJ and Sunset shrugged and dragged the body outside and away from the doors. With the body out of the way, the girls picked out their preferred canned goods, cured meats, beverages, and candies and congregated around the lantern. The campsite consisted of a large tent with seven sleeping bags, flashlights, and metal baseball bats and seven camping chairs set around the lantern.

Twilight looked around at all the girl’s choses. She was most intrigued by the slender red things called ‘Slimithy’s Jimmies’. All of the girls, except for Fluttershy, had at least one. “What are those?”

“This?”, Sunset asked, holding up the item in question. Twilight nodded. “It’s cured and smoked meat.” That was all Sunset was going to say until she remembered Twilight wouldn’t know what cured and smoked meat was. “Basically, humans use a lot of spices to keep the meat good for a long time then cook it by keeping it in an enclosed space with hot smoke instead of directly over a fire.”

“Humans eat meat?”

“We wouldn’t have had the energy needed to develop such big brains if we didn’t, but you don’t have to eat meat if you don’t want to. We’re not obligate carnivores.”

Twilight knew she couldn’t judge a species based on their eating habits, but seeing her friends chow down on meat was still off putting. “Thanks” was all Twilight could say as she tried to process this on top of everything else.

“Do you think our parents are okay?”, Fluttershy asked.

“Ah hope so, sugarcube.”, AJ said solemnly,

“Clearly whatever happened happened a long time ago. If they are still alive, they likely think we’re dead.”, Rainbow said bluntly.

“Did you have any parents, Sunset?”, Twilight asked.

“I’d rather not talk about my moms.”

“Okay”

The conversation died down after that. None of the girls wanted to think about the possibility that their parents were dead on top of their lives, as they knew them, being over. Once everyone was done eating, the girls went inside the tent and crawled into their sleeping bags. After some tossing and turning, everyone was asleep.

Day two

All seven girls were awoken by the sound of someone banging on glass. They jumped to their feet, grabbed their bats, and ran towards the banging. They got to the front doors and found Noka, or what was Noka, banging his fist on the door. Noka had those same plants growing out of him, and his eyes were completely white.

“What the fuck!? What the fuck!? What the fuck!?”, Rainbow screamed, brain failing to process that there was a zombie on the other side of the glass doors.

“Okay! If he breaks through, we rush him! Aim for the head!”, Sunset ordered. Nobody did or said anything in response, focused more on not peeing themself, especially since none of them have gone to the bathroom yet. Suddenly, Fluttershy dropped her bat and ran back into the store. “Get back here, woman!”, Sunset ordered. “Stand and fight!” Fluttershy didn’t listen, and the sound of breaking glass forced Sunset’s attention back to the front.

“Oh! Why did it have to be zombies!? I couldn’t have died to a vampire or werewolf or any other sexy mythical monster!”, Pinkie cried.

“You think werewolves are sexy?”, Rarity asked.

“I have a thing for fluffy, pointed ears and tails!”

Bladders were relieved as Noka broke through and began advancing. “Aim for the-!” bang Sunset war cry was cut off by the sound of a shotgun blast. Noka’s head was obliterated, and the girls turned to see Fluttershy holding the offending gun. “You know how to shoot?”

“I’ve seen it on TV.”

“What’s that, and what’s a ‘zombie’?!”, Twilight asked, freaked out.

“We really need to get her to a library or something.”, Rarity said.

“No way. What if there are more of them out there?”, Rainbow protested. “There’s never just one zombie.”

“We can’t just stay locked up in here forever. We’ll run out of food and water.”, AJ said.

“We also need to wash ourselves. I don’t know about you, but I ain’t sitting around in my pee soaked clothes.”, Pinkie added.

“Sunset?”, Fluttershy asked.

“Why are you asking me?”

“You have kinda been taking charge a’ everything since we got inta this mess.”, AJ said.

Sunset gave AJ a scowl before taking a deep breath to clear her head. “We’ll definitely need guns, but we only have limited ammo. We need something else.” That’s when a realization hit. “Come with me.”, Sunset ordered. The group went back over to the tent, and Sunset pulled out the crown from her sleeping bag.

“Didn’t that thing turn you into a demon?”, Rainbow asked.

“It did, but it also gave you guys powers. If the princess can make this thing work again, we’ll have what we need to take on any more zombies.”

Twilight looked down at her crown then back up to Sunset. “It’s also the cause of this whole mess.”

“No, your friendship laser was. You avoid doing that, and you don’t start another apocalypse.”

Twilight gingerly reclaimed her crown and placed it on her head.

“Now what?”, Fluttershy asked.

“Everyone, sit on the ground in a circle. I’m going to try something.”, Twilight ordered. Everyone, except for Sunset, complied. “That includes you Sunset.”

Sunset was surprised by that. “You’re not worried I’d turn into a she-demon again.”

“I am, but I’m willing to risk it.”

“You’re a fool, Twilight Sparkle.”, Sunset said but joined the circle in between Pinkie and Twilight anyway.

“Now everyone, hold hands.” Everyone did, and Twilight closed her eyes. She focused on the magic in her crown. It felt like the magic was hiding, cowering away from something, but Twilight was still able to pull on it. She pulled the magic into her body then guided it down her arms and into her friends. The seven of them began to glow and their ears, tails, and wings came forth.

“This feels nice.”, Sunset thought.

“Yeah, it does.”, Twilight said.

“What’d ya say?”, Sunset asked.

“You said “this feels nice”. I was saying “it does”.”

“I didn’t say anything, but I was thinking that.”

“Odd”, Twilight thought.

“Holy crap, I just heard you speak without your mouth moving.”, Sunset said.

“I heard it too.”, Pinkie said. The other girls all nodded. They heard it too.

“Hang on, what number am I thinking of?”, Twilight asked. “Twelve, twelve, twelve, oh twelve pancakes would be good.”

“You’re thinking of pancakes.”, the other six girls said in unison.

The glow dissipated and the girls stood up, releasing each other’s hands.

“Hm, mama likes what she sees.”, Pinkie thought.

“So, we're all still telepathic.”, Sunset deadpanned.

“Can we do something about getting bathed and changed?”, Fluttershy asked.

“Right, everyone, grab a gun.”, Sunset ordered. “Remember, our supply of bullets is limited. Use what you need but make every bullet count. Grab backpacks, whatever can pass for armor, soap, a change of clothes, towles, and pads, if you need them. We’re going to head back to the school. Hopefully, we can use the pool to bathe, and Twilight can use the library to get a bit more caught up on Earth. Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash, and Twilight, you’ll fly ahead and scout for any more zombies. We’ll follow behind on the bikes. Any questions?” Twilight raised her hand. “Yes?”

“How do these ‘guns’ work?”

“Fluttershy, may I borrow yours?” Fluttershy nodded and handed Sunset her gun. “Guns are basically the next step up from crossbows. This is called a shotgun. It’s very powerful but doesn’t have much range. You load what are called rounds in here.” Sunset pointed to the relevant piece. “This is called the chamber. A round is a cartridge with a fuse and explosive stuffed with gun powder and a bullet. A bullet is a piece of metal that is launched from the chamber, through the barrel, which is this part, and into whatever’s unlucky enough to be in front of the gun. When you pull the trigger here, it pulls back and releases a hammer that strikes the fuse, firing the bullet.”, Sunset explained then handed the gun back to Fluttershy.

“Me and ma family had ta shoot critters that would get into the fields, so Ah’m a pretty good shot. Ah should probably give people tha rundown on how to shoot before we go.”, AJ said.

“That sounds good. I’ve only shot a handgun before.”

“Um, how’d you get a handgun?”

“I stole one off a cop shortly after I got here. I had no idea what it was at the time. I just knew he was aiming it at me and it was most likely a weapon.”

“How’d you take one off a cop?”, RD asked.

“I scared him, he dropped it, and I grabbed it and ran. Not much to it.”

The six girls looked around at each other warily but shrugged it off. The girls set off to grab the stuff they needed for their trip, then to the gun section. The girls took their time picking out which guns would work best for them. Fluttershy traded out her shotgun for a rifle and handgun, and Rainbow also chose a rifle and handgun.

“Here Twi. We’re going to be up in the air. You’re gonna need something with range and something for close range defense.”, Rainbow said.

“Oh, okay.”, Twilight said.

The other four girls chose shotguns of varying sizes and handguns. “Okay, follow me outside, and Ah’ll teach ya how to shoot.”, AJ said. The girls followed AJ out of the store, but as they passed Noka’s body, they noticed the plant was still alive and squirming and growing.

“AJ, what is that thing doing?”, Pinkie asked.

“It looks like it’s trying ta root itself, but Ah don’t think it will be able to.”

“We should still move it out of here. We don’t know what this thing is capable of.”, Sunset said.

“Isn’t that how that thing came back to life in the first place?”, Fluttershy asked.

“Um, we can put it in the shade or dumpster.”

“How exactly would that help?”, Rainbow thought.

“Ever heard of photosynthesis? It’s a plant.”

Rainbow’s eyes went wide before she mentally facepalmed. “Stupid telepathy.”

Sunset and AJ dragged the body out of the store and into the shade, which there was a lot of due to it being early. As soon as the body was in the shade, the plant slowed down to an almost imperceptible amount. “Okay, we’re putting this thing in the dumpster.”, Sunset ordered. Pinkie and Rainbow opened the lid, and Sunset and AJ lifted the body in. After closing the lid most of the way, Pinkie poked her flashlight in, and the plant had shriveled up and retracted into the body.

“These things shut down in the dark.”, Pinkie transmitted.

“Now that gives us an advantage, but for now, AJ”, Sunset said.

AJ took them to one of the trees in the parking lot. AJ taught each of them how to load their guns then stood in front of everyone. “Now, tha first rule about using a gun is to always treat a gun like it’s loaded, even if ya think it isn’t. The second rule is ta never aim your gun at friendlies. Third rule is to not put your finger on tha trigger or aim it at anything unless ya plan on shootin’ it. That thing around tha trigger is called a trigger guard. That’s where ya can rest your finger. Now, when actually firing the gun, you need to apply equil pulling and pushing force. When firing your large guns, place tha butt against your shoulder and prepare for kickback. Watch what Ah do.” AJ turned so she wasn’t facing anyone then held her shotgun up to her shoulder. After everyone had a chance to see, AJ lowered her gun then turned back to the group. “Go find a tree ta shoot at and make sure you’re not firing in the direction of anyone else. Ah’ll come ‘round, and once Ah okay ya on your hold and position, ya can start shootin’.”

The six girls each found their own tree, making sure to be facing away from each other and the storefront. AJ went around, checking everyone’s grip and making adjustments where needed, then gave each girl the ‘okay’ to start shooting. None of the girls were the best shots, but they could hit something that was shambling towards them. After proving they could hit what they aimed at, the girls reloaded their weapons and geared up to possibly fight through the city.

Armed with guns, baseball bats, and Bargain-mart armor, the fliers took flight, and the bikers followed. As the fliers went higher, they noticed more human-ish shapes both in the streets and embedded within the larger plants. The ones in the streets were coming out of the larger plants. The fliers transmitted all this information to the bikers.

“Do you think they’ll be hostile like Noka?”, Pinkie asked.

“Most likely. Is there a way to avoid them?”, Sunset asked.

“There’s no way to completely avoid them, but we can guide you down the least populated route.”, Rainbow explained.

“Do it.”, Sunset ordered.

The fliers guided the bikers down an alley with many shadows. The bikers swerved from one shadow to the other, as the zombies within the plants reached out to grab them. “The plants have arms! The plants have arms! Aaaiiiyyy”, Pinkie screamed. “Start panic pedaling!” After picking up speed, it only took a few more minutes to get to the school and find a dark spot to hide.

“Pew, Sunset.”, Rarity said.

“I can’t help it!”, Sunset complained.

“What is this smell?”, Twilight asked as the fliers landed.

“A byproduct of how humans became top dogs.”, Rainbow said, but it didn’t clear up Twilight’s confusion.

“Humans get rid of excess body heat by sweating. Unfortunately, bacteria like to munch on our sweat then… um, fart, for lack of a better term.”, Rarity explained.

“And some of us have stinkier bacteria than others.”, Sunset added. “And bacteria are one of the many really small life forms that live on our skin, and there’s nothing we can do about them.”

“Wait, so the theory of mycro life is correct?”, Twilight asked in astonishment.

“Huh, I guess Equestria’s scientific field has advanced quite a bit since I left.”

Once everyone was done catching their breath and cooling down, they began sneaking into the basement. The school was filled with plants reaching up through the holes in the floors and roof and firmly rooted through the foundation, making the floor cracked and uneven. The girls avoided those areas in case the plants reached for them again and because of the questionable stability of the floor and they could see the zombified faces of their classmates twisted amongst the plants. Fortunately, the plants were mostly around the destroyed front entrance, making the rest of the school sparsely or not at all populated.

Despite the holes in the floors above, the basement was very dark. It was almost to the point the girls couldn’t see. The pool room was even worse. The plants and grass completely covered the above ground windows, the lights weren’t on, and there were no plants inside.

“At least we’re safe.”, Fluttershy squeaked out.

“Hang on, I have a spell for this.”, Sunset said. Sunset turned around, and her hands began to glow. The girls' sclera turned black, their irises began to glow, and their pupils became vertical slits.

“Wow, AJ, you should see your eyes.”, Rainbow said.

“So should you.”

“Sunset?”, Twilight asked.

“It’s an old dark seeing spell. I used to use it to sneak around the castle at night and pull pranks. The glow’s too dim for anypony without the spell to see it.”

“Seriously, pulling pranks? You were Celestia’s personal student. That position demands respect.”, Twilight chastised.

“Precisely, that’s how I was able to get away with so much crap.”

“I mean from us.”

“Hehehe”

The girls began undressing and unpacking their bags. “What should we do with our dresses?”, Twilight asked.

“Toss ‘em.”, Sunset said.

“Ah, Sunset!”, Rarity said indignantly.

“We’re in a fight for our lives. Dresses aren’t exactly conducive to that.”

Rarity huffed but threw her dress into the pile.

“Fuck! That’s cold.”, Fluttershy yelped, causing an echo.

“Wow, Fluttershy, I didn’t know you can be loud enough to echo.”, Pinkie said.

Sunset hovered her hand above the water and cast a heating spell. “Twilight, come help me with this. There’s a lot of water here.” Twilight mimicked Sunset’s posture and siphoned power from the crown to help. It was odd channeling her power to her hands instead of her horn but not hard. Huh, humans didn’t seem to have hard set magic channels like ponies. The magic just flows freely around their new bodies.

“Ah, that’s better.”, Fluttershy said. Twilight placed the crown by the edge, and she and Sunset joined the rest of the girls in the water and began lathering. “I wish we could use magic like you.”

“You probably can.”, Twilight said. “We’re not casting our spell as we would if we were unicorns, and you’re using magic to fly.”

“Can ya teach us?”, AJ asked.

“I can. Twilight, you should read up on Earth.”, Sunset said.

“Are you sure you can handle it?”, Twilight asked.

“Yeah, I just need to teach them how to lob magic at zombies. Not that hard.”

“Alright, but if you need any help, just ask.”

“Yeah yeah”

The girls finished up cleaning themselves, pulled themselves out of the water, and dried off. Sunset’s gold hair was going to turn green, but she didn’t care so long as the others didn’t make Christmas jokes. The girls began dressing, and much to Sunset’s delight, all the girls chose clothing made out of demun, faux leather products, and other sturdy materials. The girls packed up their bags, and Twilight put hers on while the others put theirs along the walls.

“Sunset, here.”, Twilight said, then handed Sunset her crown. Sunset was a bit surprised by this but quickly took it anyway. “You can use that to help teach them.”

“You’re putting a lot of trust in me not to steal it.”, Sunset joked.

“Sunset, I know you’re not stupid.”

Sunset gave Twilight a sly grin and tucked the crown away in her jacket. “You need me to dispel the dark seeing spell?”

“No, I know how you cast it. I can undo it myself.” With that, Twilight took off out of the pool room.

Sunset turned back to the human borns. Their attention was fully on the plants outside the windows. They were moving but had not tried to enter. Hopefully, it will stay that way. “Okay girls, line up. We’re going to start with the basics.” The girls did as instructed and lined up in front of Sunset in a zig-zag due to the narrow space. “Now, the basics are simple. You use your magic to affect and manipulate the world around you and yourself. What makes this both tricky and easier is that magic can ignore many of the laws of physics, but it takes a lot more power to do so. Spells like teleportation are so difficult because it needs to break many of those laws. It’s easier to just work within the laws of physics.” Sunset stopped talking when she saw Rainbow raise her hand. “Yes, Rainbow?”

“What about our ability to fly? There’s no way that our, what, four foot wingspan can support us in flight, and using magic to fly majorly breaks the laws of physics, but it took so little energy.”

“You’re right. I’m not well versed in flight magic, but you are using magic to keep yourself aloft. Flight magic is a combination of wind, gravity, and spatial magics. The ability to use it is innate to pegasi, which is why you can use it so easily. Now, let’s first work on learning control.”

Sunset taught the girls how to move their magic around their body. It was very different from when she was a unicorn. It flowed freely through her body while also still feeling directed. It felt like blood. The girls picked it up quickly and promptly began throwing balls of magic at each other like snowballs. AJ’s turned into dirt and plants, RD’s turned into wind, Rarity’s turned into crystal, and Pinkie’s made a small explosion. Sunset just watched on in disbelief as Fluttershy hid behind her. “We’re in the middle of a zombie apocalypse, and you’re launching the one thing that can save us at each other like it’s a game.”, Sunset said indignantly.

“Oh, lighten up, sourpuss. People have to have fun, or else they’ll end up looking, well, like you.”, Pinkie said.

Sunset glared at Pinkie, and Fluttershy backe away. Any further argument was cut off by Twilight screaming over the mental link. “Help! It’s the plants! They’re attacking!”

Everyone sprinted to grab their bags and run out the doors, but as everyone got their bags and weapons over their shoulders, Sunset dispelled the dark seeing spell and teleported them to where she sensed Twilight. As they popped into existence within the library, they saw Twilight bound by vines and the zombified bodies of their classmates being led by zombie Flash. Strangely, the vines were avoiding exposed skin and Twilight’s hair as she tried to whip them with it, and the zombies weren’t attacking.

“Magic, give magic.”, Flash said in a voice that was far from his. It was deep and sounded like an alien was trying to figure out how humans spoke.

“It wants the crown!”, Twilight clarified. “Sunset, whatever you do, don’t give it over!”

“Give magic.”, the plant said again.

“I don’t know what you are, but you clearly don’t have access to Flash’s memories. If you did, you’d realize that tactic would never work on me.” Sunset pulled out the crown and placed it on her head. She then formed a fireball in her hand and threw it at the base of the vines holding Twilight. The zombies let out a horrific screech as the vines dropped Twilight. Before Twilight hit the ground, Sunset teleported her and the other girls away, leaving herself alone with the zombies. “I am Sunset Shimmer! And this crown rightfully belongs to me!”

Twilight and the other girls landed outside the school with a thump. Rainbow jumped up and tried to run back in, but AJ grabbed her. “What the hell, AJ?! Sunset’s still in there!” Instead of a verbal response, AJ simply pointed to the now burning school. “Oh”

TLH ch3

Hundreds of zombies surrounded the girls. Some of which Pinkie remembered taking out earlier. Sunset set as many of them on fire as she could while everyone else tried to keep them back. The circle continued to get smaller, forcing Pinkie to use smaller and smaller explosions or risk hurting her friends. As the girls were forced back to back, Rarity put up a dome around them, but the zombies continued trying to get to them.

“Now what?”, Pinkie asked.

“I-I don’t know.”, Sunset said with tears starting to roll down her face. She was scared. She was going to die. They were going to die. They trusted her, and she failed them. No, this is not the time to think like that. Let’s see. They couldn’t fly out of there. Less than half of them had wings, and they were too weak to fly anyway. Maybe- “Rarity, you can levitate your crystals, right?”

“Yes. Why?”

“Can you carry us on one?”

“I don’t know, but I guess we have a lower chance of dying that way., so-” Rarity created a crystal under their feet then exploded her shield outwards and shot them into the air. The girls all grabbed hold tight to each other as they really didn’t want to fall off. Once they were a fair bit off the ground, Rarity expanded the platform and created railing.

“Oh, thank Celestia that worked.”, Sunset sighed.

“Now, what do we do? The zombies are now actively hunting us and got a major upgrade.”, Rainbow said.

“Burning them to ash seemed to work.”, Sunset said.

“Sounds like we’re learning pyromancy.”, Fluttershy said.

“Yeah, but where. I don’t know about you, but I don’t think this teeny tiny little hover crystal is the best place to be shooting fireballs.”, Pinkie said.

“I could create a dome out of crystal to protect us while we train.”

“That sounds like a fancy oven to me.”, AJ retorted.

Either because of the mental link or their brains have been horribly mutilated by trauma, all seven girls came to the same realization. “We can cook the zombies.”

“But what about other survivors?”, Fluttershy added.

“I’m starting to have serious doubts that anyone without magic survived.”, RD said.

“Yeah, but what if?”

“Searchin’ for survivors is what got us inta this mess in the first place.”, AJ added.

“I would still like it if we could at least try.”

“It would take me a long time to create a dome big enough to cover the whole city.”, Rarity said.

“See, we have time.”

“Actually, we need to land soon. I’m running low on magic.”

“Okay, set us down in the woods. Once we’re down, use your magic to create a shelter.”, Sunset ordered.

“I barely have enough to get us to the forest. I won’t be able to make a shelter.”

“Just go. I’ll worry about the magic.”, Twilight ordered.

Without time to spare, Rarity sped them towards the woods, and her platform gave out just before they hit the ground. Twilight sprang to her feet first, ran over to Rarity, picked her up, and quickly transmitted what to do to the other girls. The rest of the girls got over to them as quickly as they could and placed their hands on their backs. The magic flowed through them and into Rarity. Rarity’s eyes began to glow, and she had enough energy to erect a dome around them with air holes that were hopefully too small for the vines to get in. All the girls collapsed from exhaustion after that, and Rarity’s armor disappeared.

Day four

~12:00 am

Sunset and Rarity were the first to wake up. It was night time, and there weren’t any vines or zombies surrounding their crystal tent. Sunset cast the altered dark seeing spell on Rarity. “I gotta go.”, Sunset whispered.

“Me too.”, Rarity also whispered. Rarity created an opening, and they left the tent. Rarity closed the opening once they were out, and the girls went in opposite directions to take care of their business. Once they were done, they returned to the tent but didn’t go back in just yet. They sat underneath one of the trees and looked up into the sky. It was the same sky they could see every night just with more stars. “Beautiful, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, you can almost forget what’s going on.”, Sunset said.

“I’m sorry about Flash.”

“It’s okay. I didn’t really love him. I was just using him. - I’m sorry about your family.”

“Can you please not bring them up? I’m trying to not think about them. If I don’t think about it, I can pretend they got out and are safe.”

“I guess morning can wait until we’re safe.”

“Exactly”

The two of them stayed out there in silence until the other girls began waking up. Rarity reopened the tent, Sunset casted the altered dark seeing spell on them all, and each of the girls ran off in different directions to do their own business. As each of the girls came back, the first thing everyone noticed was that all their injuries were healed. Not even scars were left.

“Looks like we all have passive regenerative powers.”, Sunset noited.

“We can do magic sciencey stuff later. I’m really effin’ hungry.”, Pinkie complained.

“Is there a nearby town we can go to?”, Twilight asked.

“Tha next closest human settlement is tha village of Cunnington, in tha mountains, on tha other side of Canterlot.”, AJ explained.

“Oh”

“Let’s hope they went back into their vine alcoves like they used to.”, Fluttershy said.

“Maybe, maybe not. The game has changed. We can’t be sure what to expect.”, Sunset said.

“Whatever, we’re hungry. Let’s just run in, grab some food and water, and run out.”, RD said.

“Looks like we don’t have very many other options unless you know any invisibility spells.”, Sunset said.

“I would’ve figured that was something you knew.”, Twilight said.

“I only know disguise magic. Hm, I could mask our magic and darken our colors, and I don’t they can’t hear very well.”

“That will have to be enough.”

“Alright everyone, gather around.” The girls gathered around Sunset, and Sunset began the spell. To do it on so many people all at once took more time and focus, but soon, everybody’s everything began to turn various shades of dark blue and black. By the time the spell was finished, the only part of them that could easily be seen was their glowing eyes. If a normal person saw them, they would likely crap themselves.

“Okay, let’s go.”, Sunset ordered.

The seven girls quickly made their way down the mountain, and the flighers took flight. They made their way to the closest supermarket. Even with Bargain-mart being turned into Zombie-mart, they still had a few options. The closest supermarket was a Bullseye. On their way there, they saw zombies with weapons standing guard around some of the larger vines like they were protecting the other zombies. The store was just as vine covered as many of the other buildings, but there were no guard zombies. The girls were able to get in without issue and went straight for the food and water. After having their fill, Twilight grabbed a new backpack and baseball bats, the ground forces grabbed extra bags, and everyone began loading up on food, water, medical supplies, warm clothes, and anything else they could fit into their bags. They couldn’t get Twilight new guns or stalk up on bullets because, despite the name, Bullseye doesn’t carry such products.

“This is why I shop at Bargain-mart. Bullseye is just un-American for being a superstore and not carrying guns.”, Pinkie joked.

“Haha!”, Sunset laughed loud enough to be heard throughout the store.

As they were leaving the store, the doors were opened and a zombie with a gun came in. The girls all backed away from it slowly. It seemed to be searching for them but had not narrowed in on them.

“I can create a dome. Sunset, you can roast it.”, Rarity transmitted.

“No! The crown made us telepathically connected. There’s a good chance it’s connected to the rest of the zombies. Just stay away from it.”, Sunset ordered.

The zombie moved closer, and the girls moved away from it in separate directions. The fliers flew on top of the shelving, but the ground forces did not have that luxury. AJ moved into the bread aisle where mold covered just about everything. Rarity backed away into the clothes which she bumped into, making noise. The Zombie walked towards her, but Rarity moved out of the way, and the zombie bumped into the rack. The zombie stopped for a moment before resuming in the opposite direction. Sunset backed into the freezer aisle, the noise giving her a chance to breathe. As Pinkie was backing up, she bumped into an end stand, knocking it over and making a lot of noise in the near dead silent store. The zombie’s head whipped towards her and it began moving towards Pinkie. It hadn’t locked onto her yet, but that could change in an instant. Pinkie closed her eyes and held her breath. Rainbow grabbed a can and threw it. The zombie’s head whipped towards the noise, and it walked away from Pinkie. The girls took this chance to get out of there. As soon as they were outside, they poured as much magic they could into the relevant body parts and hurried back to the woods.

Once they were back at their campsite, Rarity enlarged the tent to make room for their supplies.

“Okay, we’ve got enough food and water for a few days.”, Twilight said.

“And we now know that the zombies have gained the ability to have a few of them out during the night but not all of them. They also don’t seem to have strong night vision, but their hearing is better than I expected.”, Sunset said.

“So, if we can’t attack the zombies, what are we supposed to do, hide?”, RD asked.

“Exactly, but we should still teach you all pyromancy.”, Twilight said.

“Can you handle that? I’m going to do some more intel gathering.”, Sunset said.

“I can, but you shouldn’t go alone.”

“I can move faster on my own, and if I do get into trouble, I’ll teleport out of there.” Without waiting for a second opinion, Sunset packed the bare escentuals and ran back out of the forest.

“Sigh, okay girls, let’s start with the basics.”

Sunset

Sunset ran until she reached the treeline. Before she left, she checked around for zombies.

Seeing none, Sunset crept out of the trees and along the buildings. Sunset moved silently until she found a plant with a face in it and no guard. Sunset pulled out her knife and was about to cut into the plant, but the moment she touched it, images and sounds flooded into her mind. The plants attacking, screaming, people calling 911, children crying out for their parents, she experienced it all, and she couldn’t stop it. It was horrifying. The plants moved faster than she had ever seen. People witnessing their loved ones being taken. All animals other than humans were killed and eaten by the plants. There was one little girl and her dog trying to scare off the plants.

Slowly, Sunset managed to sift through everything and find where this all started. It was the memory of someone who lived across the street from the school. She saw her demon-self and the statue. The other girls were somewhat visible but were mostly blocked by the statue. The scene played out like Sunset remembered it, including the bright light. The person was also blinded by the light. As soon as the light dissipated, she saw that they were all gone. There was no demon, no rainbow, and no crater. The person ran outside, and shortly after that vines began to shoot up from the ground and went after everybody. She had to jump from memory to memory to find someone who wasn’t swallowed up by the vines. She found no one. The vines took over the city within hours.

Sunset couldn’t find any memories from the zombies, but there was this intelligence. It wasn’t human. “Sunset”, the entity transmitted. It didn’t say that so much as that’s what Sunset’s mind interpreted it as.

“What are you?”

“Sunset”, it called out again.

It was strangely soothing, like everything would be okay if- “No!”, Sunset screamed out. Through much will power, Sunset pulled herself from the mental space and back out to the real world. Sunset scrambled away from the vine, greatly disterbed and angered by what happened. “Pitcher plant”, Sunset growled out. She stuffed her knife back into her bag and ran into the nearest store, which was a small clothing store. Sunset was spotted by one of the guards, and she was alerted to the guard’s presence by an unearthly scream. She grabbed a pair of gloves and slipped into the shelves. She slipped the gloves and pulled out her knife as the zombie entered. This one seemed different from the last one, more intelligent. It seemed to have purpose in its movements and paid more attention to where it was looking.

Sunset waited until the zombie was facing away from her then jumped on it. Sunset jabbed her knife into its skull and used the knife to guide her flames into it, ashing it from the inside out. Sunset melded back into the shadows and waited for more zombies to arrive.

Home base

“Do you all know the basic fundamentals of fire?”, Twilight asked. Various yesses came from the other girls. “Great, that makes this easier. Now, pyromancy is that, but magic is used as the fuel and used to create heat. Let’s start out with gathering magic in our hands.” Twilight demonstrated the proper way to gather magic. The other girls followed suit and were able to gather the magic without converting it to their natural affinity. “Very good. Now, vibrate the magic until it ignites.” The girls’ success varied umongest them. Rainbow was the first to produce fire with her flames being very violent, Pinkie and Fluttershy were next with much calmer flames, Rarity had the weakest flame, but AJ wasn’t able to create one at all. “Try again. You’ll get it.”

“Agh, what’s tha ignition point of magic?”, AJ asked, frustrated.

“It’s different for each person.”

“Ah don’t think this is working for me.”

“Okay, we can try figuring out what your natural affinity is.”

“Ya mean like this?” AJ brought her hands together and formed a ball of dirt and roots.

“Yeah, like that. So, you have Earth magic. I think I have a substitute that would be just as useful as fire. Do you know what petrification is?”

“Yeah, it’s when organic matter is replaced by minerals.”

“Glad that dino obsession of yours is finally coming in handy.”, Rainbow snarked.

“You’re one to talk, mis astronaut.”

“I don’t know what either of those things are, but AJ, I can teach you how to petrify zombies.”

Sunset

Not long after Sunset killed that first zombie, two more guard zombies came in, both wielding shotguns. Sunset pulled out a second knife and repeated the same action as with the first. She then took their guns and any amo they were carrying, which wasn’t a lot. So, even if attacked, only the guards have enough power to retaliate, useful.

Sunset headed towards the exit, but as she peered outside, she found more guards with various weapons including guns. “Ah, farts.” Sunset slammed the door and ran to the other door, but there were zombies there too. “Oh, screw you.” Sunset teleported to the roof and began throwing fireballs at the zombies. However, trying to light something on fire from a distance is far less effective, and now, flaming zombies were using their vines to climb up the building. “Okay, you’re getting smarter. Let’s see how smart you are.” As soon as the first zombie reached the roof, Sunset used the stab and ash trick on it. Sunset used the stab ash trick in combination with burning the vines and shooting them in the head to keep control of the situation, but the non-ashed zombies would just regenerate. Three down, twelve to go.

Sunset stabbed one zombie in the head, but instead of screaming and just trying to claw like all the other unarmed zombies, this one formed a hook with sharp thorn blades with its vines. It tried to swing at Sunset, but she caught it’s arm. “Oh, you’re an interesting one.”, Sunset said as if she just found a new variation of her favorite candy. She began ashing the zombie, but before it could reach its arm, Sunset cut off the hook and kept it on the roof. As she went around ashing zombies, Sunset periodically checked the arm to make sure it stayed just an arm.

Sunset continued to stab and ash zombies until they were down to four. As Sunset was stabbing a zombie, one snuck up behind her and bit her shoulder, ripping through her jacket and into her flesh. She could feel the zombie sucking something from her. Sunset didn’t let it go on long enough to figure it out as she ripped the zombie off her by its neck, set it ablaze, threw it into the other zombies, and bent the fire to engulf the remaining zombies.

Sunset staggered back and collapsed from the adrenaline warring off. She was low on magic and losing a lot of blood. “Sigh, I was hoping I wouldn’t need to do this.” “Hey, I need pick up.”

“What happened?”, Pinkie asked.

“I got bit, and I’m losing blood.”

“Oh no, Sunset’s going to turn into a zombie!”

“Agh, Pinkie, you sound like you’re screaming in my ear. Plus, I don't think that’s how this infection works.”

“I’ll come get you.”, Rainbow said.

Home base

“Wow, you picked that up quickly.”, Twilight said. AJ had managed to completely petrify a small tree. “That will definitely kill a zombie.”

AJ looked down at her hand and flexed it. “This is morbid.”, AJ said flatly.

Twilight couldn’t think of a thing to say to that so just patted her shoulder. Twilight walked over to Pinkie, who was sitting on the ground, doing something with her fire. “Pinkie, what are you doing?”

“Trying to turn my fire blue. Blue flames are hotter.”

“O-kay. Hey, Pinkie, can I ask you something?”

“Shoot” Twilight merely responded to Pinkie’s answer with a raised eyebrow which Pinkie picked up on. “That means go ahead.”

“Strange but okay. I’ve noticed that you guys don’t have much of a sympathetic response when dealing with the zombies even though they used to be the same species as you, and I’m kinda worried. Now, I’m asking you because my Pinkie is pretty good with psychology, and I’m hoping you are too.”

“Oh yeah, I get it. Now, I don’t know much about pony psychology, so I don’t know what we’re being compared to, but humans are scarily good at othering other humans. To us, we aren’t fighting humans. So long as we don’t think about the fact they were humans, we can incinerate as many zombies as we need to.”

“So, there’s nothing wrong with us?”

“Wrong, many things; outside of the norm besides the zombies and magic, nope.”

“That doesn’t make me feel better.”

“Haha, yeah, humans are fucked up.”

Twilight and Pinkie’s conversation was ended by the arrival of Rainbow and Sunset. Fluttershy immediately went up to them as they landed, shortly followed by everyone else. Rainbow set herself and Sunset down on the ground as Sunset was loopy from blood loss. Fluttershy started healing Sunset’s wound, but she could do very little about the lack of blood. Sunset kept moving and cuddled up to Rainbow, annoying Fluttershy. “Can someone keep her still?”

“I got it.” Rainbow repositioned herself so that she was hugging Sunset. Sunset nuzzled into Rainbow’s neck contently and settled down long enough for Fluttershy to properly heal her.

“I need water.”, Fluttershy ordered in her gentle tone, but it sounded just as commanding as one of Sunset’s in the situation. AJ ran back to the tent and grabbed several bottles of water. “Rainow, sit her up.” Rainbow did as instructed. Sunset did not appreciate that and made as such clear with displeased moans. Fluttershy took the water from AJ and gently coerced Sunset to drink.

“She’s going to be okay, right?”, Rarity asked.

“She will. She just needs food, water, and sleep.”

“I’ll put her in the tent.” AJ picked Sunset up, brought her into the tent, and took her backpack off. AJ grabbed some blankets, spread them across the ground, and placed Sunset down. Sunset was not happy about being put down and reached out for AJ. “Hey, hey, it’s okay.”, AJ reassured, then covered Sunset in a blanket before leaving the tent. “Who knew Sunset was so attention starved.” Rarity shrugged and closed the opening.

“Sunset” The plant entity was back. It was still strangely soothing, but Sunset wasn’t going to fall for it.

“No, you stay away. I saw what you did. You’re a monster.”

“Sunset”

“N-no, no”

The other girls noticed Sunset’s distress and re-entered the tent. “Fluttershy, what’s wrong with her?”, Rainbow asked. Sunset was shaking and growling.

Fluttershy knelt down and removed Sunset’s jacket to check her injury but found no sign of infection. “I don’t know.” Fluttershy pulled Sunset onto her lap and began stroking her hair. “Sunset, are you okay?”

“No, nn-o, nnn”

“Sunset, what’s wrong? We need to know what’s wrong to help.”

Suddenly, Sunset jumped up and pinned Fluttershy to the ground. Sunset was growling and snarling and did not recognize Fluttershy. The other girls jumped into action and pulled Sunset off Fluttershy. Strangely, despite her violent behavior, Sunset wasn’t actually attacking them but still tried to escape.

“Sunset! Snap out of it!”, AJ commanded, but Sunset didn’t even respond to her name.

Twilight moved in front of the thrashing Sunset and tried to use the telepathic link to communicate with her, but instead of anything coherent, Twilight was subjected to Sunset’s rabid screams and something she couldn’t identify. Sunset created the illusion plume of flame around her, forcing everyone back, and ran out of the tent and deeper into the woods. The remaining girls looked around at each other, unsure if they should go after her.

Home base

“We need to go after her!”, RD barked.

“We can’t. Ah don’t like this just as much as you do, but Sunset’s likely infected.”, AJ retorted.

“I would just like to say, I told you so.”, Pinkie said.

“This is no time for ‘I told you so’s, Pinkie. Now, if she was infected, she would have attacked us. She didn’t even use real flames, just illusions meant to scare our monkey brains.”, Rainbow barked.

“Ugh, Twilight, talk some sense inta her, would ya?”, AJ asked, exasperated.

“I think Rainbow’s right.”, Twilight stated bluntly.

Both RD and AJ turned back to Twilight with shocked expressions. “You do?”, both asked.

“Yes, Rainbow’s assessment’s spot on. We don’t know what’s wrong with Sunset, and we need to find out, but whatever’s going on with her, she clearly doesn’t want to hurt us.”

“Perhaps tha reason she ran was so she wouldn’t hurt us when she loses control.”

“Oh please, we’ve all seen enough TV to know that plan never works, well, maybe except Twi.”, RD scoffed.

AJ looked around only to see that nobody was on her side. “Oh fine, but Rarity, can ya somehow spread y’r magic armor to tha rest of us?”

“I can certainly try.”

Everfree forest

Sunset couldn’t remember why, but she knew she had to run away but not from what. Her body hurt, but she kept running. Eventually, she collapsed from exhaustion, and her mind began to clear. There was a monster. That monster, she was running from that monster. Sunset rolled onto her back. Her mind was foggy, and she was hungry. She couldn’t remember when she last ate nor where she could get food.

Sunset laid still until a rustling caught her attention. It was an animal of some kind. Sunset pulled out a sharp object she had strapped to her leg and jumped the creature. The creature squealed and squirmed, but Sunset killed it without issue. She tried biting into it, but the fur didn’t taste good. She used the sharp object to clear away the bad tasting fur and get to the food inside.

When Sunset was mostly done with the animal, another noise demanded her attention. Sunset dropped the animal and spun around to face the noise, sharp thing in hand. Those same animals from earlier came through the trees, and Sunset raised her sharp thing to them.

“How Sunset, you’re okay. We’re not going to hurt you.”, Pinkie said.

“Sunset, it’s us. Don’t you remember us?”, Twilight asked. The red blood from the rabbit contrasted sharply with Sunset’s blue coloration, and the way it made her look kinda freaked Twilight out, but she knew she had to be strong.

Fluttershy pulled out a packet of Slimithy’s Jimmies and offered it to Sunset. “I bet you’re hungry. There’s no way a small rabbit like that could fill you up.” Fluttershy approached Sunset carefully and slowly. Fluttershy’s words had a calming effect on Sunset, and she was able to approach.

Sunset snatched the food from Fluttershy and began to run off, but RD was not about to let that happen. “Oh, no you don’t.” Rainbow ran up to Sunset and tackled her to the ground. Sunset struggled against her but some stroking of her hair calmed her down quickly. This allowed Fluttershy to come around and begin to heal Sunset. She placed her hands on Sunset’s head and began the process. Soon, Sunset’s memories came flooding back to her, and everything became clear again.

“Ugh, my head.”

“Are you back with us?”, RD asked.

“Yeah, I am.”, Sunset said. Rainbow got up off of Sunset, and she righted herself as well. “You guys look like the worlds’ strangest chandelier, and I mean so strange that it ain’t even ugly.”

“That’s one way to put it.”, Rarity said out the side of her mouth.

“So, Sunset, what happened?”, Twilight asked.

Fluttershy handed Sunset some fresh food, and Sunset began to eat as she told her story. “There’s some sort of intelligence behind the zombies, and it reached out to me. I went to cut into one of the plants to see how it would react, and the moment I touched it, my mind was flooded with the memories of the final human moments of the zombies, and that’s when the entity first reached out. Spoke isn’t the right word, but I don’t have a better one. The way the entity spoke was soothing, almost hypnotic. I can’t tell you why I reacted the way I did, but I knew I had to get farther away from the city.”

“Should we wait here until you’re recovered?”, Fluttershy asked.

“I think I’ll be okay. Plus, I need to wash up.”

Sunset finished eating, and the girls began walking back to camp and searching for a source of water. Finding water was easy for the girls with their pony ears. They ended up finding a calm stream a few hundred feet away from their campsite. Twilight made note of where the stream was in relation to camp so they could find it again. Sunset kneeled down and began cleaning herself. Her gloves and shirt also had to be cleaned. Sunset was no stranger to cleaning blood out of her clothes, whether it be hers or not, but the lack of soap or any other cleaning products made the task a bit harder.

“Hey, girls.”, Pinkie said. The girls looked up and saw what Pinkie was warning them about. The sun was coming up.

Sunset rang out her shirt, and all the girls beelined back to the tent. “We need to hide the tent.”, Sunset ordered.

As soon as they got back, AJ began to use earth magic to hide the tent underground, Rarity altered the tent so it could be underground safely, and Sunset disguised the parts that remained above ground. By the time they were done the tent looked like a dirty, mossy rock with some stemming plants growing on and around it. Rarity opened the tent, and the girls hopped inside. The tent was mostly the same shape and size, but now it was partially underground, had a crystal floor, and the air holes were now air shafts. There were also now footholds in the subterranean part of the wall to act as a ladder.

The girls curled up the best they could on the hard crystal. They gained protection from the frigid ground but also lost the softness of the dirt. “Next supply raid, let's find matting of some kind.”, Sunset ordered. Feelings of agreement spread across the link. Sunset took this period of calm to examine the mental link. It seemed to be in a state of change. Sunset tried to visualize the spell. It looked like a web or a “it’s all connected” conspiracy board with all the girls having strings connecting them to each other. It felt nice, safe. The strings seemed to be strengthening themselves. Sunset looked for any sign of a central point and found one. She was the central point, and she was subconsciously causing the strings to change. It was then Sunset noticed the entity’s voice, but it was being blocked out. So, that’s what’s going on.

With a final spell to rouse her once the sun went down, Sunset closed her eyes, confident that whatever magic they had would keep that thing out of her head. Unfortunately, their heads were not the only thing they needed to keep the entity out of as zombies began to rise out of their vines and march into the forest.

TLH ch4

Day five

As the sun rose over the harrison, zombies from all over the city congregated in the streets and began to shuffle into the woods. As they absorbed more light, their movements became faster, and they began to mutate. Some became larger with vines and muscle fibers twisting and writhing and tearing apart the skin and the outermost layer becoming bark as strong as iron, becoming an abomination capable of crushing a car; some grew taller and lanky with sharp claws made out of keratin and thorns; others’ arms became leaf like wings and feet became thorn talons; and others’ arms became weapons of varying types made of plants and human flesh, clothes being torn to sunder or falling off. The remaining unmutated zombies all held guns.

By the time the sun was almost high in the sky, thouthands of zombies began moving into the forest. Their movements were slowed as the sunlight became more sporadic, but they marched on until they reached their destination.

The girls were awoken not by Sunset’s spell but by the sound of something pounding on the crystal tent. Sunset dispelled the illusion only to find their view obscured entirely by zombies, and Sunset, in particular, got an eyeful of zombie junk. “Okay, I did not need to see that.”

Everyone scrambled to get as many supplies as they could carry, sacrificing the less important stuff to make room for things like food and water.

“We can’t fight off that many, and my dome isn’t going to last much longer.”, Rarity informed.

“Ah think Ah can tunnel us out a’ here.”, AJ said. Rainbow’s face went pale at that suggestion. “Ah now ya don’t like tight spaces, RD, but we have no other choice.”

Rainbow stiffened up and smoothed her eyes closed. “Fine, just do it.”, RD said through gritted teeth.

AJ got the okay from Sunset, and Rarity opened the floor. AJ used her earth magic to create a tunnel just big enough for the girls to fit through and crawled in, shortly followed by Sunset and the rest of the girls with Pinkie bringing up the rear. As soon as everybody was a safe distance into the tunnel, AJ collapsed the entrance, sealing them off and only leaving them with the light from their eyes.

“Rainbow, ya doing okay?”, Sunset asked. Rainbow didn’t answer, but Sunset could feel the fear from her.

“There are thousands a’ zombies up there. Ah would even say the whole city.”, AJ said.

“How do you know?”, Twilight asked.

“Ah can feel ‘em through the Earth. It’s a trick Ah’m copying from a TV show.”

“That’s cool.”

“It is. So Sunset, which way?”, AJ asked.

Sunset contemplated her options. If all the zombies were in the forest, should they go to the city? But what if that’s what the entity wants? “You know that cliff North of here?”

“Yeah, but Ah don’t think going there is a good idea.”

“Well, that’s where we’re going.”

AJ hesitated and began to question Sunset.

“AJ, I have a plan, and we need to move. I will explain when we get there.

Despite her misgivings, AJ complied and began lengthening the tunnel towards the cliff. “Ah swar, Sunset, if ya get us killed, Ah’m gonna personally throw you off that cliff.”

The journey to the cliff took a long time, and the girls only grew more tired, Rainbow’s tolerance became more strained, and their bladders grew fuller. As soon as the sound of rock dropping into water was heard and light flooded into the tunnel, temporarily blinding them, AJ began to dig up. As soon as they were out, they ran off to do their business then returned to the cliff.

“Okay, now what?”, RD asked. Just then the sounds of approaching rang through the trees.

“Rarity”, Sunset said while gesturing to the cliff.

“I see.” Rarity encased them in crystal and hovered them over the raging waters below.

The lanky zombies arrived first and tried to leap for the girls, but they couldn’t get a grip on the cage and fell into the river.

“Where does that river lead to?”, Twilight asked.

“Tha river leads to tha ocean were tha salt will likely kill the plants.”, AJ said. “Smart move, Sunset.”

“I actually didn’t know salt water would kill the plants. I just thought we would have less zombies to deal with. At least we don’t have to worry about zombie dicks anymore.”

“Hahaha, oh dear.”, AJ said while shaking her head. “Ah-” AJ was cut off by the screams of more zombies, and this included flying zombies.

“Oh come on!”, RD cried. “That’s not far.”

“Rarity, open and widen the cage.”, Sunset ordered. Rarity complied and gave each of the girls enough space to cast their spells.

Rarity gave RD and Twilight crystal armor, they took flight, and the ground forces readied their spells. Rarity put up several shields to act as floodgates and keep the fliers at manageable numbers and shield the others from bullets. Fluttershy readied her healing spell while also casting several small fireballs around the platform to act as a deterrent. Pinkie created explosive balls and used her bat to launch them at the ground zombies. Rainbow used her flames in combination with wind magic to trap zombies in fire devils. AJ caused the ground beneath the zombies to collapse, sending some of the zombies into the river. Twilight combined pyromancy with her magic lazers to cause the zombies she cut up to burst into flames. Sunset had no idea if this would work, but she knew it would look cool. Sunset created a real life magic fire arrow. It pierced the zombie and caused it to burst into flames.

“That was awesome.”, RD cheered.

“Hey Rarity, ya know in Minx the fairies can cast convergence magic?”, AJ asked.

“You’ve actually paid attention?”

“Yeah yeah, tha show’s good. Anyway, what if we combine our magic?”

“Let’s do it.”

AJ and Rarity put their hands together and created a gray crystal construct. Rarity took the construct and launched it at one of the flying zombies. It hit the zombie, and the zombie turned to stone and almost fell on RD. “Hey! Watch it!”

“Sorry!”, AJ called out.

AJ and Rarity continued to use this attack, but the flying zombies began dropping the bruisers on them, forcing Rarity to move the platform. This caused the girls to miss their shots and become vulnerable to gunfire. The snipers moved to the trees to get better vantage points. The sheer number of needed shields was quickly draining Rarity. Fluttershy and Sunset began bolstering Rarity’s reserves, but that would only work for so long. On top of that, the lack of sleep and food was starting to get to them.

“Sunset! We need to retreat!”, Rarity called out.

A growl arose from Sunset’s throat, but she was forced to agree. “Everyone, fall back.”

Twilight flew to about the center of the girls and teleported them all far deeper into the forest. AJ created thick walls of stone and a roof of plant life, and with the help of everybody with remaining magic, Rarity reinforced it. Sunset and Twilight set up layers upon layers of detection and barrier spells. All the girls collapsed, and Rarity fell asleep. The rest of the girls took Rarity’s backpack off, took out and laid out some of the warm clothes, and laid Rarity on top of the clothes and backpack. The rest of the girls got some water and ate some food and then laid out the same sleeping setup for themselves and fell back asleep.

Sun down

Sunset’s alarm clock spell sounded, and the girls were roused from their sleep. Sunset and Twilight checked their proximity spells and, seeing no intruders, gave AJ and Rarity the okay to open the new tent. As was routine by now, the girls scampered off to do their business then returned to the tent. After food and water, the girls sat around to discuss their situation.

“We need to kill as many zombies as we can tonight, or else we’ll just be attacked again in the morning.”, Sunset said.

“Ah agree, but what Ah’m curious about this entity. If we can somehow destroy it, we’ll just be dealing with brain dead husks again and might even find tha crown.”, AJ said.

“I suspect the entity is under the school. That’s where the plants first emerged.”, Sunset said.

“And how do ya know that?”, AJ asked with a suspicious tone.

AJ’s tone didn’t go unnoticed by Sunset. “AJ, spit it out. We need to be able to trust each other.”

AJ and Sunset glared at each other, Rainbow glared at AJ, and the rest of the girls shifted uncomfortably. “That thing was inside your head. We don’t know what it might have done to you.”

“I can assure you that my mental faculties are my own, and I know where the plants started from because someone was watching our fight and I saw their memories.”

“How can we be sure? For all we know you’re under the control of tha entity, and ya might not even be aware.”

“AJ, how can you say that?! Sunset was fighting and killing the zombies! If she was working for them, why would she do that?!”, Rainbow asked, outraged and even jumping to her feet to get into AJ’s face.

“She could just be trying to earn our trust.”, AJ defended.

“We’re talking about a plant here!”

“We’re talking about a plant controlling Sunset! This is certainly something she’s capable of and has done before!”

“Are you saying this because of a grudge?!”, RD accused.

“Rainbow, sit back down!”, Sunset forcefully ordered. Rainbow complied but not without a huff and a glare at AJ. “What will it take to convince you I’m still me?”

AJ said nothing and tried to think of a way Sunset could convince her.

“Twilight, can mind control be affected by healing magic?”, Fluttershy asked.

“Your healing, yes. You’re using a powerful spell that can heal anything physical that’s not a part of the person.”, Twilight explained.

“In other words, you can heal anything physically wrong with a person that’s not a genetic defect.”, Sunset put in a way Fluttershy would better understand.

“Do phobias fall in that category? Because if we have to crawl through tunnels again-”, Rainbow asked.

“Learned behaviors, trauma, and phobias can’t be healed by this spell.”

“Nuts”

“Okay then, let Fluttershy heal you. If she gives you a clean bill of health, I’ll be convened.”

“Alright then.” Sunset got up and walked over to Fluttershy, and Fluttershy patted her lap. Sunset laid down with her head on Fluttershy’s lap, and Fluttershy placed her hands on Sunset's head. Sunset could feel when Fluttershy started. It felt warm and relaxing. She could feel the energy flow through her head, but she wasn’t alarmed. She knew it wasn’t malicious. Sunset was even able to fall asleep.

Pinkie stood up from her seat and walked over to the now sleeping Sunset. “Huh, Fluttershy’s sleep aid, get a good night’s sleep and make sure you’re not being mind controlled with one simple product.”

“You might actually be able to sell that to some of your relatives.”, Rarity commented.

“Okay, I’m done.”, Fluttershy said.

“So, any plants in her brain?”, RD asked.

“Nope, no mind control.” Fluttershy began shaking Sunset’s shoulder. “Sunset, it’s time to wake up.”

“Mmm, five more minutes.”, Sunset murmured.

“Come on, Sunset. It’s time to kill zombies.”, Pinkie said.

“Okay, I’m up.” Sunset pushed herself up and gave herself a minute to let her brain fully boot up.

“So, are we attacking the entity directly or taking out as many zombies as we can?”, AJ asked.

“Let’s do some zombie hunting. They can’t repopulate their numbers, so killing them will prove effective.”, Sunset said.

“Great, let’s get going!”, RD cheered.

Rarity created a platform, and all the girls hopped on but huddled together in the center. Rarity took them into the sky where they could see the sprawling forest below them. It was both beautiful and strangely melancholic. None of the girls could say which one of them was feeling that way or if it was all of them as the feeling seemed to spread across the link and become intertwined with their own emotions. Rarity began their journey back into the city, but it would take a while. This left the girls with a lot of quiet time to just think. Twilight could feel each of the girls growing despair. Even Sunset seemed down.

“What do we do if we encounter your families?”, Twilight asked.

“I’ll incinerate them while you guys ball your eyes out.”, Sunset said.

“Thanks”, Pinkie said dully. “Hopefully, this thing doesn’t understand human psychology and purposefully sends our parents to attack us.”

“Don’t jinx it, Pinkie.”, Rainbow said. “That’s the last thing we need.”

The girls soon landed just inside the city. Rarity gave the girls crystal armor before they disembarked, and she lifted herself and AJ back into the sky.

“You gonna do that petrifying darts spell again?”, Sunset asked.

“Yes.”, Rarity answered.

The girls on the ground lit their flames and began burning any vines with faces, and Rarity and AJ began launching their darts. Dozens of guards soon arrived on the scene. Sunset blasted one of the bruisers, but it had little effect.

“Aw, shit. Rarity! Attack the bruisers! Rainbow, Twilight, protect them.”, Sunset ordered.

Rainbow and Twilight shot up into the air and began attacking the winged zombies, AJ and Rarity began firing at the bruisers, and the rest attacked the runners and the gunners. The wingeds’ wings burned up like paper, but as they did, they released a toxic smoke that spread across the battlefield. The girls began coughing and wheezing, and the zombies were able to rip into the girls. Rainbow used her wind magic to blow the smoke away, but the girls still had breathing problems, and the zombies got their swings in, weakening the armor. Fluttershy tried to heal everyone, but healing people while they’re moving and at range while also needing healing made any progress limited. Sunset incinerated a runner and gunner, but neither of them produced the toxic smoke.

“Sunset, should we retreat?”, Rarity asked.

“No, we can heal once we take these out, but we can’t let the entity mutate the zombies again.”

Pinkie combined her fire with her explosives and was able to fire off incendiary explosives like a grenade launcher. This allowed her to stay relatively still for Fluttershy. Sunset dispelled her fire aura and switched to fire arrow so she could also stay as still as possible. This did give them a chance to catch their breath, but it also made them sitting ducks. Sunset put up a wire wall, which kept out the runners but not the bruisers or bullets. The lower caliber bullets mostly just bounced off the armor, but Rainbow could see much bigger guns being brought up to the back lines.

“You guys need to get moving soon, or you’re gonna be swiss cheese.”, RD transmitted as Twilight rounded up the wingeds. Their plan was to incinerate the wingeds inside a shield bubble, trapping the toxins inside, then throw the bubble away from them. As much as RD wanted to protect the three on the ground until the bubble was ready, she had to forcefully pump air into Twilight’s and her lungs as they were hit the worst by the smoke.

Rarity was shooting off darts as fast as he arms could move, and AJ pumped in petrification magic as quickly as she could. She couldn’t get the full amount of mana in, so the spell was incomplete. This resulted in the zombies being only partially petrified, but they were basically stopped in their tracks, and they weren’t regenerating quickly. They were no longer just aiming at the bruisers. They were now aiming at anything that posed a threat to the other girls. Their breathing was labored, but they could still breathe. As the larger guns arrived on the back lines, Rarity shot the darts at them.

“Die! You undead meat puppets!”, Rarity roared.

“Ya sound like a pack-a-day smoker.”, AJ commented.

“So do you.”

Twilight finished gathering the wingeds, and she and Rainbow incinerated them then Twilight chucked the resulting smoke as far away as she could. The two of them landed by Fluutershy as Sunset and Pinkie launched towards the zombies. Twilight collapsed, but Rainbow and Fluttershy caught her. They had to support her as Twilight laid down. Rainbow continued to force air into their lungs as Fluttershy worked.

Sunset charged at the zombies with her knives swinging and fire spitting from her mouth and through her muscles, and Pinkie sent massive explosions into the back lines. Their throats were still sore, but now they could breathe without feeling like they were swallowing lava. Pinkie noticed a crack in the armpit of one of the bruiser’s armor. She prepared a powerful explosive and compressed it until it was the size of a penny then, after dogging swing after swing from the zombie, slipped it into the crack. The zombie took this opportunity to take another swing and launched Pinkie into a building. The sound of cracking bones met Pinkie’s ears, and she slumped to the ground. The zombie with the bomb along several others began approaching Pinkie. They were too close for Pinkie’s liking, but they weren’t getting any further away. Pinkie covered her face and detonated the bomb, sending bits of incendiary zombie shrapnel everywhere, including into herself, and setting the other zombies on fire. Pinkie prevented the bits in and around her from igniting, but she still was impaled by zombie bits and had several broken bones.

Pinkie looked around the battlefield. The zombies’ numbers were down, but Fluttershy was still healing Twi and RD. Sunset was using her fire magic to rocket blast herself from zombie head to zombie head and stabbing them to make them bleed fire. Rarity and AJ were still on their hover crystal, shooting zombies. As much as Pinkie wanted to take a nap, more zombies were headed her way.

“Help.”, Pinkie weakly called out.

Sunset propelled herself in front of Pinkie and pushed the zombies back with two jets of fire. With one last explosion of fire and a few more darts, the zombies were finished. Sunset slumped down next to Pinkie. The two of them closed their eyes now that it was safe.

Fluttershy finished up healing Twilight and Rainbow and hurried over to Sunset and Pinkie. Seeing as Sunset was just exhausted and literally burned out but not injured, Fluttershy focused on Pinkie. Rarity and AJ landed next to them, and AJ channeled her mana into Fluttershy.

“How much longer will this take?”, Rarity asked, still sounding like ET.

“Well, I have to remove the shrapnel then heal her wounds, so a while.”, Fluttershy answered.

“Can you do it on the move?”

“I can heal her, but I need to be steady to remove the shrapnel. Why?”

“Because we got more zombies comin’.”, AJ answered.

“Already?”, Twilight asked. She was almost impossible to understand due to how gravelly her voice was.

“Eyup”

“Okay, I can do this back at camp.”, Fluttershy quickly said.

The girls loaded Sunset and Pinkie onto the crystal platform, and Rarity got them out of there.

Day six

Sunset shakily pushed herself up to a sitting position. Her muscles were sore, but she otherwise felt fine. Pinkie was lying next to her. She was still asleep and didn’t look too hot. She was now missing her shirt and her upper body was almost completely bandaged. Sunset remembered her nearly blowing herself up, again. “Pinkie, Pinkie, Pinkie, you’re gonna have, ‘she blew herself up’ on your headstone.” The rest of the tent was empty except for supplies and sleeping places, so Sunset stepped outside. The sun had long since set, and the rest of the girls were sitting around a fire with a pot cooking over it. “Yes, you guys got warm food.”

“Hey Sunset, how ya doin’?”, RD asked.

“I could ask you the same. You sound like you’re choking on gravel.” Sunset sat down with the rest of the girls and received a bowel from Fluttershy. “What’s the news?” Sunset took a sip of the soup, which wasn’t very good. “And what’s in here?”

“To answer your second question, squirrel meat and canned stuff.”, Twilight answered. She sounded a hell of a lot better, but like Rainbow, sounded like a female Scooby-Doo.

“You’re eating meat?”

“I don’t have much of a choice. And to answer your first question, we’ve gotten some cooking equipment, and AJ has been teaching us to hunt.”

“That’s good. Now, we need a new plan to deal with the zombies. I still want to take out as many as we can before going after the entity, but running around, setting vines on fire, isn’t doing the trick. Any suggestions are welcome.”

The girls sat in silence, sipping on their soup and mulling over ideas.

“Blitzkrieg”, Rarity said.

“What?”, Twilight asked.

“Blitzkrieg bombing, we attack them from the air then hightail it out of there.”

“That sounds perfect, but we’d need a spell with a wider AOE.”, Sunset said.

“We’ll destroy the city if we do that.”, Rainbow said.

“Ah’m pretty sure tha city’s beyond savin’.”, AJ said.

Rainbow looked towards the direction of the city. They couldn’t see it from where they were, but they knew where it was. “Yeah”, RD said solemnly.

Sunset grabbed a stick and began creating spell formulas. What they needed were several incendiary bombs that could spread. It would need to be Sunset’s and Pinkie’s jobs to create such a spell. Although powerful, fire didn’t much like to be told what to do. If they were working within a building or tunnel, they could focus the blast, but they were working with streets. The fire would want to go up, and considering that’s where the girls will be, they don’t want that. They need some sort of flammable liquid. Or all the flammables. “Girls, we need all the boom boom liquid.”, Sunset said.

“Sunset, are you okay, like mentally?”, RD asked.

“Of course not. Now, gasoline, propane, if it goes boom, grab it. Let’s go.”

They finished up their soups, grabbed their stuff, and jumped on one of Rarity’s platforms, leaving Fluttershy behind to watch over Pinkie. The first place they visited was Bargen-mart, armored up, and grabbed every canister of propane and every gas canister along with gas siphons. There was one zombie there on patrol, but AJ just petrified it. The girls began pumping gas from the cars and into the canisters.

“Wingeds”, Rainbow alerted. She and Twilight took to the sky and began rounding up the winged.

Sunset was focusing on pumping until she was side swiped by a runner. She was sent rolling, and some of her armor was now missing, but she wasn’t badly hurt. Sunset quickly got to her feet and pulled out her knives. The runner charged at her, and Sunset swung at it, but it dogged her swing, got behind her, and took its own swing. Sunset was once again sent flying and was missing more armor. “Okay, you’re less of a joke than I thought.” Sunset pumped her magic into her muscles and, when the runner charged at her again, was able to stab it. The thing caught on fire and Sunset was able to get back to pumping.

The fliers finished up the wingeds, and the girls grabbed their loot and hopped onto the platform. Rarity got them into the sky as more runners entered the parking lot. The girls returned to camp and unloaded their loot.

“I don’t think that will be enough to blow up the city.”, Pinkie commented. She sat in front of the fire, still without her shirt, next to Fluttershy and with a bowl in hand.

“Glad to see you’re awake.”, Rarity said. “But seriously darling, you’ve got to stop nearly blowing yourself up.”

“I will nearly blow myself up as much as I want!”, Pinkie joked. “Fluttershy filled me in on your plan, and I’m in, but I’ll need more than that.”

“Agreed, that’s why we’re heading back in after we rest up and I go to the bathroom.”, Sunset said, then ran into the trees.

AJ began piling their loot away from camp and then encased it in a protective dome as much for its safety as their own.

“I can heal your thoughts some more, if you would like?”, Fluttershy said. Both Twilight and RD nodded and sat down in front of Flutteshy. Fluttershy placed her hands near their throats and began healing them.

Pinkie poured herself another bowl of marginally better than bland soup and downed it. Getting healed makes one ridiculously hungry and the soup was lukewarm at this point. Sunset soon returned, and the girls prepared to leave again. Pinkie staggered to her feet and went to grab her stuff but was stopped by Fluttershy. “Oh, no you don’t. You can barely lift yourself, let alone gallons of gas.”

“But-”

“No ‘but’s, Pinkie. You’re staying.”, Sunset ordered.

Pinkie sat back on the ground, crossed her arms, and pouted. The other girls hopped on another platform and flew off into the city. For the rest of the night, the girls would go back and forth between the city and camp, bringing back more and more flammable material. Each time they came back, they had more cuts and bruises. Fluttershy would heal them to stop the bleeding, but the bruises would only go away once the body had reabsorbed the blood even though healing magic would speed up the process.

Pinkie watched the girls come and go each time. She wished she could control the direction of her explosion to keep herself from being sidelined by her own magic. Maybe I can. Pinkie staggered to her feet and began walking into the trees.

“Pinkie, where are you going?”

“I’m going to not blow myself up. I’ll be back in a while.

Fluttershy wasn’t sure what she meant but figured she needed to go to the bathroom so let her go. After several minutes, she was wondering what was taking Pinkie so long. That was until she heard an explosion from the direction Pinkie went. Fluttershy sprung to her feet and ran to find Pinkie. She soon found a partially destroyed boulder and Pinkie on her butt. “That happened?”, Fluttershy asked alarmedly.

“Uh, I was training, but I underestimated the blow back.”, Pinkie said while rubbing her hind quarters.

“What kind of training could have resulted in that?”, Fluttershy asked while pointing to the boulder.

“I was trying to focus my explosions, make them more directed. I sorta did that. You might want to get out of here. I don’t want to accidentally hit you.”

“Okay, be safe.” Fluttershy walked back to the tent, and Pinkie slowly got back on her feet.

Pinkie locked back on to the rock. Pinkie formed the image of a funnel in her mind and imagined it directing her blast, widened her stance, and bam. An explosion rocketed out from her hand and regulated the rest of the boulder, and this time, she was ready for the kickback and didn’t end up on her ass. She wasn’t sure if she could do that at a distance, but it was better than nothing. She continued practicing, increasing her speed and trying it at a distance to questionable success, until Sunset came marching through the brush with an annoyed look on her face and black eye.

“Pinkie! I told you to rest!”

“No, you told me that I was staying, and Fluttershy said I wasn’t lifting gallons of gas.”, Pinkie snarked. Sunset let out an annoyed growl but otherwise said nothing. “Why are you even so worried about me anyway?”

“Because, despite myself, I love you guys.”, Sunset admitted.

“Wow, you mean it?”

“Yes, now, come on. We brought back spices for the soup, and you and I need to make some bomb.

TLH ch5

Day seven

It had been a week since the girls arrived in this distorted version of their beloved city. Though, it had only been six days for them since they slept the entirety of the third day. Rarity created more of an airboat with dedicated space for the bombs for this platform so they don’t fall off or roll around during transport. The pyromaniacs assured her that the bombs wouldn’t go off unless magic was applied to them, but Rarity wanted to still be careful because, you know, BOMBS. The rest of the girls loaded everything up into the platform, and they were underway.

“Rrr maties, to the high skies we go! To adventure and explosions!”, Pinkie cheered.

Instead of starting near the edges, they were going to start the bombing near the center of the city. As they got closer, the buildings got taller.

“Okay Rarity, stop here.”, Sunset ordered just before they reached the skyscrapers.

“There are snipers on the roofs.”, Rainbow pointed out.

Rarity put a dome over them as the bullets started flying. The bullets made clicking sounds as they bounced off the shield. Sunset prepared her fire arrows and aimed for the snipers. “Okay Rarity, drop the shield.”, Sunset ordered. Rarity complied, and Sunset fired three arrows, hitting all three snipers.

“Great. Now, start dropping before more come.”, Pinkie said.

Pinkie activated the bombs, the girls began throwing them in the directions Sunset calculated. As they hit the ground, thunderous explosions rang out, and fire started to engulf the city. Wingers approached the girls’ location, and Twilight and Rainbow sprang into action. Pinkie used her own magic to create more explosions, and Sunset used her magic to spread the fire and took deep breaths of the smoke filled air.

As the fire raged, Sunset noticed there was something wrong with the smoke. It smelled sweet. The rest of the girls noticed it too, and Rarity and Rainbow used their magics to create a bubble of clean air. Twilight and Rainbow landed and Fluttershy immediately started healing herself and Rarity as the effects of the new toxic became known. The smoke made the girls feel groggy, and Sunset passed out due to it. The effects were easily countered, and all the girls were wide awake again within seconds, except for Sunset.

“How much longer will it take you to heal her?”, Rarity asked.

“I don’t know. She took in a lot more than we did.”, Fluttershy answered.

“Should we go on with the mission?”, RD asked.

“Yes, we need to get rid of these things before they can mutate more.”, Twilight ordered. “Rainbow, can you keep the smoke out while letting us deploy the bombs?”

“Huh, easy.”, Rainbow said cockily.

“Great, let’s move ladies.”

Rarity moved them to the next location as Fluttershy kneeled to heal Sunset and Pinkie prepared more bombs.

“Sunset”, the entity spoke.

“How’d you get back in my head? I blocked you- oh, that wasn’t just chloroform. You knew I would stop to smell the smoke.”

“Sunset”

Sunset was feeling its effects again. She felt nice. She felt safe. She felt- nope! Nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope! This thing stole your crown! It tried to kill you! Whatever it’s doing now, it won’t be good for you!

“Sunset”

“Screw you! You can’t have me!” Sunset tried to get away from that thing, towards Fluttershy who she could feel healing her, but the entity’s grip was too strong. Sunset did the mental equivalent to staring down at the thing and charging at it. Sunset ended up in a different place, but still an endless black void, with a giant, pulsating, green - thing. It was kinda like a heart made out of vines but had roots under it. At least that was the best idea Sunset’s mind could come up with to represent the thing. “Okay plant, I’m gonna make you leave me alone one way or another! You messed with the wrong-wrong gir-”, Sunset tried to shout, but the pulsating was so hypnotic that it was hard to concentrate. “No! You’re not- you’re not- not-” Sunset’s projection within the mindscape went limp. Feelings of safety and warmth and pleasure radiated through her. She could just stay here. She was safe here. Out there, they were constantly worried about survival. It was cold out there.

A root snaked up to Sunset and wrapped around her, bringing her closer to the entity. As rhythmic and captivating the pulsating was, the entity itself was kinda disgusting, and it didn’t feel nice to have the vine wrapped around her, but Sunset couldn’t resist and the pulsing was being brought closer, so she didn’t care to resist.

“Sunset”

“Yes?”

“Stay here.”, the entity ordered. The order reverberated through her mind. It was all encompassing. She had to obey it.

“Yes”

“Good” Sunset never thought she would get such pleasure from praise, but here she was.

“My friends, they would like it here too.”

“No”

“Why?”

“Be silent”

Sunset couldn’t understand why the entity wouldn’t want to bring her friends here, but that was what it wished, so she obeyed.

Back in reality

Sunset’s eyes shot open, she lifted her head from Fluttershy’s lap, and quickly stood up.

“Oh Sunset, be careful. You might fall.”, Fluttershy warned.

“I’m fine.”, Sunset said coldly.

The rest of the girls all looked between each other, silently asking each other if they all just heard that.

“Hey Sunny, did ya hear the plants again?”, AJ asked, but Sunset didn’t respond. “Hey Sunset, Ah asked ya a question.”, AJ said more forcefully.

“No, I didn’t hear any plants.”, Sunset said in a monotone voice.

“Okay. Hey, can ya stand point?”, AJ asked while pointing to the front of the platform.

“Sure.”

Sunset walked to the front of the platform while the rest of the girls congregated in the back, and Rainbow created an air bubble to keep their conversation private.

“So, Sunset’s compromised.”, RD said bluntly.

“Looks like it. Also looks like the entity has no idea about how humans communicate.”, Pinkie added.

“So, what do we do about it?”, Rarity asked.

“The mental link is most likely also compromised, so we can’t use that.”, Twi added. “We also don’t know what that thing might do to her once it realizes we caught on.”

“Do you think Sunset’s even still in there?”, Fluttershy asked.

“Let me try something.”, Pinkie said. Before anyone could try to protest, she was out of the privacy bubble and marching towards Sunset. The others watched on in both intrigue and horror as Pinkie spun Sunset around and kissed her.

The mindscape

Sunset felt the taste of lips on her own. In her muddled and pleasure filled mind, she did care where it was coming from. She leaned into the kiss without closing her eyes and tasted squirrel meat. Girls. The pulsing changed. Different parts of the plant were pulsing differently, pulling Sunset in deeper. She forgot about the kiss in exchange for focusing more on the plant. The feeling of someone’s hands on her thighs and ass made Sunset want to moan but she obeyed the entity and remained quiet. Sunset moved her hand to where the mystery person’s hands were as they pulled away. She wanted them to stay. As much as she loved the pulsing, the plant didn’t feel nice. She wanted a human’s touch. The vine wrapped more of her up, restricting her movement, which she did not like and tried to squirm out of.

“Stay still”

As the entity wished it, she obeyed and stopped moving, her body going limp again, except for her eyes which remained fixated on the pulsing plant.

Back in reality

Pinkie felt Sunset kissing her back, but the rest of her body was unchanged, indicating the plant wasn’t mimicking Pinkie. Pinkie only released the kiss when she felt Sunset pull away. Pinkie looked up into Sunset’s face but only found a blank expression.

“Oh, come on, Sunny. Don’t you have anything for good ol’ Pinkie?” Pinkie rubbed Sunset’s thighs and bum but with no reaction, pulled away. Sunset moved her hand to where Pinkie’s just was and began moving around as if searching.

“I do not have anything for you.”, Sunset said with absolutely no hint of emotion.

Pinkie shrugged and went back to the other girls while Sunset turned back around. “Sunset’s def still in there.”

“So what do we do to get her out?”, RD asked.

“Well, last time this happened, Sunset said the thing was using some sorta hypnosis. Now, despite what movies show, hypnosis isn’t that hard to break. Just a big enough shot to the system will do the trick.”, Fluttershy explained.

“Yeah, I already surprise kissed her, and that’s a pretty big shock.”, Pinkie said.

“Maybe something less pleasant.”

“I could kick her.”, RD said.

“And if that doesn’t work?”, AJ asked.

“We have to try. Rainbow, you kick her. The rest of you, hold her down. I’ll heal her.”, Fluttershy said.

The other girls looked around with unsure looks on their faces, but what else were they going to do. RD dispelled the privacy bubble, and the girls walked up to Sunset. Sunset turned around to face them as they approached.

“We need to stop the fire.”, Sunset said.

“Why?”, Rainbow asked. The rest of the girl moved around Sunset as Rainbow distracted her.

“It’s destroying the others.”

“You mean the zombies. Why would you want to stop the plan you put together?”

“We must stop the fire. It’s destroying the others.”, Sunset repeated.

The rest of the girls nodded that they were ready, and Rainbow adjusted her stance. “Ya know, you’re really crappy at pretending to be a human.” Before Sunset could say anything, the girls jumped on her, Fluttershy grabbed her head, and Rainbow gave her a medium strengthened kick to her sternum.

The mindscape

Sunset felt a sharp pain in her chest and the air was forced out of her lungs. She tried to stay still and silent, but she let out a wheeze and would have doubled over if the root wasn’t holding her. The pulsing changed, and now there was a rippling of colors, pulling Sunset deeper. There was also a new wonderful, peaceful feeling in Sunset’s head. Sunset wanted to close her eyes to focus on it, but that would mean losing sight of the hypnotic, pulsating, rippling colors.

There was another sharp pain in her chest, causing the same reaction. Sunset wanted to apologize for disobeying the entity but feared making anymore noise would anger it more and it would force her out of this wonderful place. Suddenly, Sunset wasn’t just looking at the entity. She could still see it, but now she could see some sort of still surface and a strangely familiar girl. Sunset tried to remember where she’d seen the girl before, but the pulsing, rippling colors wiped such thoughts away. Once again, her only purpose of obeying the entity was the only thought in her mind.

There was another sharp pain, and she realized it was that girl. The roots around her metal projection slipped away, and the entity’s indescribably wonderful and hypnotic voice filled her every being. “Attack them.”

As the entity wished it, she obeyed. Sunset engulfed herself in fire, forcing off what she realized were more girls, more girls she must attack. That new wonderful, peaceful feeling was gone. Sunset wanted to ask what she did to displease the entity, but she was ordered to stay silent. A blast of wind hit Sunset, which she then blocked with a shield spell. A different shield was put up around her, so Sunset dropped hers. Sunset looked around to see it was another one of the girls that put up the shield.

“Rainbow, pull the air out!”, the shield girl said.

Sunset then felt the air escape her lungs, and realized what they were doing. She teleported out of the shield and to the back of whatever they were standing on. They all shot blasts at her, but Sunset blocked all of them with ease.

“Uh, guys, why is she so powerful?”

“She must have access to the crown’s power.”

Sunset wondered what the ‘crown’ was, but as the entity did not wish her to think about it, she did not. Realizing the wind girl was the one preventing the sleeping smoke from getting in, Sunset teleported behind her and knocked her out. The air bubble around them disappeared, and the girls began falling under the effects of the smoke. Sunset used an air filter spell to keep from falling under the effects of the smoke as well. The crystal disappeared next, but Sunset levitated them all to the ground. While they were still in the air, Sunset dispelled the flames that were ravaging the city.

The outside world disappeared, and Sunset was left staring at the hypnotic vision in front of her. She didn’t mind this one bit, but she did wish that peaceful feeling would return. The root wrapped around her again, but this time, there were two of them, and they went further. The ends of the roots pressed up against the sides of her head, and searing pain penetrated through her skull. Despite her order to be still and silent, she could not suppress the screams, and she thrashed against her restraints. Sunset squeezed her eyes shut due to the pain, and due to the entity being out of sight and the pain, Sunset’s memories came back to her.

“Aaaggghhh, I hate you! I’ll kill you! My first attempt at confronting you might have failed, but I will not fail a second time!” The pain stopped, and the roots moved away from her head, but Sunset kept her eyes shut and kept trying to escape.

“Sunset”

Sunset began to relax at hearing the entity’s voice. Somehow, it was even more soothing, and it turned to a gentle, effeminate voice instead of a monotone, genderless voice. It was similar to Celestia’s voice but clearly wasn’t, but it still elicited the same knee-jerk reaction her voice would. Sunset thought of what it made her do to her friends, how it violated her, anything to keep herself angry.

“Sunset, open your eyes.”

“No, piss off!”

“Sunset, open your eyes.” Sunset still didn’t open them, but the entity started singing. It was an old lullaby Celestia used to sing to her. All the fight left Sunset’s body by the time the song was done, and the entity spoke again. “Sunset, open your eyes.” This time, Sunset did and was once again met with the same pulsating, hypnotic, rippling colors. Sunset forgot why she was even made, and soon, forgot she was even made at all. “There, isn’t that better?”

“I don’t like being wrapped up in the roots. Can you please remove them?”

“But you do like the roots. They’re even better than human touch.”

“They aren’t though. Nothing can beat the touch of another human, not even the touch of another pony. It’s special.” The roots wrapped around Sunset’s head and made her stare straight into the colors. “Please, I can do this myself.”

“You will remain silent, let yourself be pulled deeper, and learn to love the touch of roots. You are not human or pony. You are a part of the system. Say it.”

“I am not human or pony. I am a part of the system.”

“Good. Now, mind your manners while I take care of business.”

Back in reality

The entity refocused on the outside world, and gave Sunset’s neck a roll. Having nerves was interesting but so again was having conscious thought. The ‘zombies’, as the humans called them, were done tying up the remaining humans. That name now made sense to the entity. It was fitting.

The entity ordered the humans to be brought to it. Their magic made it impossible to infect the normal way, and it didn’t wish to have any more humans like Sunset. It now knew how to use proper magic and that there were other human settlements. It could replenish its numbers faster by going to those settlements. These humans will be consumed, and then it will have their magic.

Canterlot high

Twilight woke up with a groan, followed shortly by the rest of the girls with varying pained sounds. Each one of them felt like they had a hangover or in one way or another, just got off a binge of something really not good for you. The fact that they were all tied up really didn’t help matters.

“Owie, what happened?”, Pinkie asked.

“Interesting, I did not expect you to wake up so quickly. Oh well, that just means you’ll be conscious while you're consumed.”, Sunset said.

“Sunset?”, Twilight asked. Sunset was standing in front of a large mass of roots and vines, using her magic to alter it.

“Might as well be.”, the entity said while turning to face them. “I have all her memories and skills and even some of her personality.”

“But you’re not her. I know she’s fighting you inside.”

“Oh, she was but is no longer. She’s settled in quite nicely. You know, she was the one fighting you on the platform. All I had to do was give her the order, and she did it.”, the entity said coyly.

“You’re lying.”, Twilight accused.

“Hmhmhm, oh, I’m really not. I can let you speak to her.”, the entity said with a smile. Twilight snarled at it, which it took as a yes. The entity let Sunset see outside like on the platform, and her outward appearance turned from smug to glazed over eyes.

“Sunset?”

“You may speak to them.”

“Yes?”, Sunset asked dully.

“Are you okay?”

Sunset smiled, but her eyes still looked hazy. “I’m wonderful.”

“Do you know who I am?”

“You do know her. She’s Twilight Sparkle. She’s to be consumed.”

“Yes, I do. You’re Twilight Sparkle. You’re to be consumed.”

“Do you know who you are?”

“You are a servant of the one they call ‘the entity’. Nothing more, nothing less.”

“I am a servant of the one you call ‘the entity’. Nothing more, nothing less.”

“No, you’re Sunset Shimmer, ex-student of Princess Celestia. You don’t serve, you lead.”

“I am a servant of the one you call ‘the entity’. Nothing more, nothing less.”

“Okay, hey, clearly, this is going nowhere, and I have a few questions for the plant.”, RD said.

Sunset’s demeanor went back to smug and in charge, and she walked over to Rainbow. “What?”

“When we were talking on the platform, you basically acted like an NPC, but now, you’re acting like pre-Fall Formal Sunset. What changed?”

“Hm, you’re just trying to get me monologuing to buy time to escape. Sunset’s seen all the same movies. Fortunately or unfortunately for you, depending on how you see it, I won’t be ready to consume you for a while anyway, so I might as well indulge you. Shortly after you were all rendered unconscious, I gained full access to Sunset’s mind. I don’t like it, but it’s necessary, and it was quite painful for your friend.”, the entity said that last part with noticeable glee.

“Well, on her behalf, fuck you. Now, second question, how’d you come to be?”

“That I don’t know. Up until a couple hours ago, I did not have a brain. I was just functioning on instinct, very advanced instincts, but still just instincts. I don’t have memories from then. Though, from what Sunset has seen from my zombies, it had something to do with you, and I think I exist outside time, judging by the way things seemed to be aging inconsistently.”

“So, you’re really going to eat your moms?”

“Yes”

“Well, poo. Okay, last question, why Sunset?”

“I’m surprised that you didn’t ask why I’m doing this.”

“I already know that from your answer to the second question. You’re doing this for the same reason why we’re trying to stay alive. Our instincts are telling us to.”

“You’re smarter than I gave you credit for. And why Sunset, because I could. Because of her ability to read minds, I was able to put a little bit of my magic in her, like a seed. Like any invader, her body tried to fight it off, but I just put it into dormancy until I had my chance.” As the entity finished talking, the sun began to rise. “Show time.”

The entity’s true body began to shift and open up like a giant mouth with bizarre sap or saliva.

“Ew”, Rarity commented.

“You should’ve stayed unconscious then.”, the entity commented.

Pinkie looked into the maw of the beast and noticed a purple sparkle, a magical purple sparkle. “Huuuh, bonsai!”, Pinkie screamed as she ran into the plant. The rest of the girls, even entity possessed Sunset, were too shocked to react as the plant clamped its “jaws” shut.

The entity looked at the plant, then at the girls, then the plant, then back at the girls. “Did she jus-”, the entity tried to say before a fiery explosion cut it off. The entity didn’t even look back at the carnage and hung Sunset’s head. The zombies began dropping all around them, and the vines began to wither.

Pinkie hopped out of the burning plant, carrying the crown. “Hey girls, lookie what I found.” Pinkie hopped back to the flabbergasted faces of her friends.

“Pinkie, that’s possibly tha dumbest thing Ah think Ah ever seen ya do.”, AJ said while shaking her head.

“What can I say? The difference between bravery and stupidity is whether or not you die. Oh, and here you go, Twi.”

“Thanks”, Twilight said as she took the crown back.

“You still haven’t defeated me! I still have your friend, and you couldn’t get rid of me before! Surrender now! Or I’ll blow her head off!”, the entity threatened while holding Sunset’s handgun to her head.

“Someone’s gone off the deep end.”, RD whispered.

The girls looked at each other, and Twilight put the crown on. The girls grabbed hands and began to lift into the air. The entity tried to shoot, but Twilight pulled Sunset’s finger off the trigger and threw the gun out of the entity’s reach. The entity tried to run, but the magic rainbow laser never misses its mark. With a wail of pain from the entity, a blinding white light encompassed everything.

The light faded, and the students of CHS congregated by the destroyed front entrance in hopes of figuring out what just happened. Twilight and her friends lay on the ground, some carefully getting up after their human, now not so human, bodies’ first time channeling magic. Spike licked Twilight’s face, waking her up. Upon regaining her senses, Twilight invited Spike in for a hug, which he gladly accepted. The rest of the girls walked and flew over to Twilight and the fresh crater in the ground. In the smoke and dust lay Sunset Shimmer, her body in far worse shape after her ordeal.

Twilight stood up, strong and proud, and looked over the now defeated Sunset. “You will never rule Equestria. Any power you may have had in this world is gone. Tonight, you’ve shown everyone how you really are. You’ve shown them what is in your heart.”

Sunset struggled to her hands and knees with tears of regret and pain rolling down her cheeks. “Heh, eh, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I didn’t know there was another way.”

“The magic of friendship doesn’t just exist in Equestria. It’s everywhere. You seek it out, or you can forever be alone. The choice is yours.”

“But-but all I've ever done since being here is drive everyone apart. I don’t know the first thing about friendship.”

Twilight grabbed Sunset’s hand and pulled her out of the crater. “I bet they can teach you.”

In destroying the entity, the world was set back the way it was supposed to be. The origin of the entity remains unknown, and all memories of it and the devastation it brought, gone from the world, but who’s to say there are not more of them out there. One magical blast in the wrong place, at the wrong time, away from total disaster. No one will ever know as the entity is either completely erased from time, or the world is destroyed. Next time it’s been rather mundane lately, ask yourself, has it really been?

TLH ch2

The six girls stared in shock as the school went up in flames and zombies, both burning and not, ran out. Shrieks that sounded like a mix of the high pitched cries of a drowning goose and human screams emanate from zombies in the courtyard and trapped in the school. Within minutes, the school was completely ablaze and starting to fall in on itself.

“Wow, she really did that.”, Rarity said.

“I expected her to throw us to the wolves when it proved beneficial to her but this. Wow, she was a better woman than I gave her credit for.”, Pinkie said seriously.

“Come on girls. We should get movin’. Ah wanna search further inta tha city. Hopefully, this thing hasn’t invaded the whole town.”, AJ ordered.

The girls turned to go back to their bikes or get back into the air, but the sound of an explosion stopped them in their tracks. The girls spun back around to find a slightly chard Sunset stomping out of a brand new hole in the wall. The girls continued to stare in silence as Sunset marched over then stopped in front of them.

“You’re not dead.”, Rainbow finally said matter-of-factly.

“Sure am, Captain Obvious.”, Sunset said while blasting a zombie.

“I know elemental magic users are resistant to their own element, but that’s a bit much.”, Twilight said. She noticed a zombie behind Sunset and blasted it. The rest of the girls, except for Fluttershy, followed suit and began lobbing magic at the zombies that were still trying to get the crown that still rested on Sunset’s head.

Sunset shrugged her shoulders. “Yeah, I used to set myself on fire to scare the ever loving crap out of ponies. Though, I’m clearly out of practice.”, Sunset said in reference to the crispy end of her hair. “Do you think this will get rid of my split ends or make them worse?”

“I’m inclined to say ‘worse’.”, Rarity said.

“That’s not the only thing that’s burnt.”, Fluttershy said and pointed to Sunset’s arm.

Sunset shrugged. “Eh, it’s not that bad.”

“Bullshit. It’s larger than the palm of your hand. If we had access to a hospital, we’d be taking you there. Let me look at it.”, Fluttershy said sternly.

“Fine”, Sunset conceited. “Can the rest of you take care of those?”

“Oki-doki-loki”, Pinkie said, then ran towards the zombies with two balls of explosion magic. These were much more powerful than the ones she was throwing at her friends and sent the zombies flying backwards if not blast a hole through them, leaving fleshy bits scattered on the ground. “Who wants some more?”, Pinkie asked with a maniacal grin.

As AJ fended off the zombies, she found that she was much stronger. AJ gut punched a zombie so hard, it flew back into the burning school. “Wow”, AJ said, then a fart blast sent two more zombies in and temporarily increased the fire. “Oh, god! Seriously, Rainbow!?”

“What? It worked.”, Rainbow said, then took flight.

AJ shook her head and just went back to punching and shooting zombies. Rarity began shaping her crystals into cones and telecanedically threw them at the zombies’ heads. This proved less effective than the shotgun, so she just went back to that. The plants still squirmed without the heads, but it seemed to not be able to control the body without it. Twilight was not as comfortable with her guns as she was with her magic so just magic blasted the zombies.

While all this was going on, Fluttershy was tending to Sunset with the first aid kit she packed. The whole time, Sunset wanted to join in the fight. “Come on, Fluttershy. How much longer?”, Sunset complained.

“It will take longer the more you squirm.” Fluttershy finished dressing Sunset’s wound through her impatient grumbling. “There, finished.”

“Finally. Everyone, get behind me. I’m gonna light shit on fire.” All the girls looked at each other then hurried behind Sunset. As soon as everyone was in position, Sunset siphoned magic from the crown and created a ring of fire around them then sent the wall of fire in all directions that weren’t at them. “Sniff, sigh, gotta love the smell of freshly cooked zombies in the morning.”

“Siff, smells like pork and cheese broccoli.”, RD commented. “I hate cheese broccoli by the way, yak. I mean you take perfectly good cheese and contaminate it with broccoli. Fluttershy doesn’t even like the doom tree.”

“It’s true.”, Fluttershy corroborated.

Once the flames took their course and started to die down, Sunset walked over to one of the cooked zombies. As soon as she approached, the zombie reached for her, but the damage made its already slow movements even slower. Either way, Sunset took her bat down and pulverized it’s shoulders, severing it’s shoulders.

“Nasty”, AJ said.

“I want to perform an autopsy. Can’t have the cadaver getting handsy. So, we still have some daylight. How about you guys look for survivors while I dissect this thing.”

“That sounds good, but shouldn’t a flier go with you?”, Twilight asked.

“I’ll be okay. Plus, I won’t have the crown.”, Sunset said, then tossed Twilight the crown.

Twilight caught the crown, looked at Sunset, then placed the crown of her own head. “Okay, but be careful.” Twilight turned to take off, but she caught the statue in the corner of her eye. “Oh, girls! Before we go.” Twilight quickly ran over to the mirror portal and looked it over. It was in bad shape. There was a single stalk of the plant wrapped around it, it was dirty, and the horse’s left hoof had fallen off. Twilight put her hand to the portal, but it was solid stone. “Sigh, of course it wouldn’t be open.” Twilight turned back to the girls and spread her wings. Twilight and the other fliers finally took flight, and the other three girls got on their bikes.

Team people finders

The fliers of the group scouted ahead of the party, giving them detailed reports of what was ahead and around the bikers. Through a combination of magic and bullets, the bikers slowly worked their way through the zombies. Due to Twilight having the crown, the zombies would crowd under and chase the fliers. Throughout the whole process, Twilight couldn’t help but wonder why the zombies wanted the crown and how the girls, including herself, seemed to be almost unfazed by it all.

Twilight flew up to Rainbow, who was looking through binoculars for any signs of humans. “Hey, Rainbow?”

Rainbow spun around, looking at Twilight through the binoculars before lowering them. “Huh, oh hey, what up?”

“I was wondering how you were doing?”

“I’m doing fine. Why?”

“Well, we are shooting through zombies that used to be your schoolmates and fellow townsfolk. For all we know, your parents may end up being among them, and you’re not having much of an emotional reaction, none of us are.”

Rainbow’s face turned speculative then serious. “Well, I try not to think about it, but you’re right, that is weird. I’m no expert on human psychology, but that sounds like psychopathy. We can add that to the question board, but for now, let’s take this as a blessing.”

“Alright, I guess this is the least concerning of the many questions.” Twilight turned away to fly off before she noticed something flapping out a window. “Rainbow! Look at that.” Twilight pointed to the flapping item, and Rainbow looked through her binoculars in its direction.

“It’s a bedsheet. You do that to alert firefighters to your location in case of an emergency. I’ll check it out.” In a flash of speed that surprised Twilight, Rainbow was off.

Once the air resetalled and Rainbow was already halfway to the bedsheet, Twilight landed on a nearby roof under the pretense of needing to rest her wings and pulled off her backpack. She pulled out the book entitled “Psychology 101”. She opened it to intex, found psychopathy, then flipped to the relevant pages. “Psychopathy, sometimes considered synonymous with sociopathy, is characterized by persistent antisocial behavior, impaired empathy and remorse, and bold, disinhibited, and egotistical traits.”, Twilight read out loud. “That doesn’t quite fit.” When I was captured, I could feel the girls’ fear and compassion for me. Even when we thought Sunset was dead, the girls did feel somewhat sad, even with her previous actions making the girls not like her. It’s just in reference to those outside the group we seem to be numb to. This is very strange.

Sunset

Sunset watched the girls fly and ride off as she dragged her disarmed zombie to her bike. Sunset pulled out some rope from her backpack and looked back at the zombie then her bike. “O-kay, how am I going to get you home?” Sunset looked between her bike, her rope, and the zombie again before an idea struck her. “I only really need your head intact. It doesn’t really matter if any other parts of you get damaged.” Sunset wrapped the rope around the torso of the zombie while dodging its bites, using what little remained of its arms to secure it. She then tied the rope to the package shelf bit of her bike and began to ride off. It wasn’t easy with the weight of another person dragging behind her, but she was able to pick up speed and use the momentum to keep herself upright. Bikes really were an engineering conundrum.

Upon reaching the store, Sunset untied the rope from her bike and used it to drag the zombie inside. It calmed down once out of the sunlight, and Sunset was able to get a folding table and use it as an autopsy table. After hoisting the zombie onto the table, Sunset untied its torso but then used the rope to tie down its head. She wrapped it under the table then in the zombie’s mouth like a super gag. “Good thing I’m doing this alone.”

Now knowing that the zombies need sunlight to function, the wall to wall windows and broken glass doors made Sunset uncomfortable. Before starting the autopsy, Sunset telekinetically grabbed as much black and dark paint, black trash bags, and duct tape as she could find. She began painting, taping, and trash bagging layer after layer until the sunlight was no more. Sunset cast her dark seeing spell and reexamined her work with even more sensitive eyes. The light still did not shine through. Sunset then casted a small light spell and threw it into the rafters, illuminating the whole store for her new eyes.

Feeling safer now, Sunset went to the electronic section to grab a recorder then to the hardware, gardening, and kitchen section to grab anything that could substitute what she’d seen on TV and used in biology. Sunset laid out her bizarre and frankly scary collection on a shelf close to the table, put on her ppe, and began making her preliminary notes.

“Subject’s designation, number zero-zero-two. Formerly, Photo Finish. Subject was badly burned and arms were forcibly removed during capture. Legs were damaged during transport. Up until being deprived of light, subject two was resisting and attempting to bite me, even after being burned. During capture, it was observed that small arms or equivalent damage will not incapacitate a zombie. The brain needs to be completely destroyed. Burned zombies are significantly slowed down but not stopped and smell like pork and cheese broccoli. Clothes of subject zero-zero-two are seared to the skin. Subject does not appear to feel pain. Proceeding to open the skull.” Sunset placed the recorder down and picked up a knife. Sunset carefully removed the scalp then picked the recorder back up. “Blood is present but not to the extent typically associated with a head wound. Livor mortis has not set in,” Sunset went down to the zombie’s chest and placed her ear to its chest, “but heart is not beating.” Sunset went back to the head, took a chizzle and hammer, and began to open the brain cavity slowly and carefully. Sunset cast another light spell and used it as a headlamp. After several minutes, Sunset’s arms were shaking from holding them so steady, but she could now access the brain.

After shaking out her arms, Sunset picked up the recorder again. “Subject's brain cavity has been filled with plants. I’m surprised they weren’t coming out of the ears.” Sunset paused for a moment then leaned down and looked inside the ears. “Scratch that. Plants are coming out of the ears. Hearing is likely impaired.” Sunset grabbed clippers and began working her way through the plants until she found the actual brain. “Brain has been infested with so many plants and has been damaged by the pressure exuded on it by the growing plants. Plants were getting their nutrients directly from the blood supply.” Sunset grabbed a knife, extracted the brain, and began dissecting it. “The plant infestation appears to originate from the base of the brain stem as that’s where the thickest plants are.” Sunset took her light and shone it inside the brain cavity. “Infestation appears to extend down through the spinal cord.” Sunset flipped the body over and began cutting along the spine. “Infection seems to begin with what was likely a seed embedding itself in the brain stem then growing into the brain. From there, it travels along the spinal cord and throughout the rest of the body.” Sunset placed the recorder down as a tinge of sympathy pang in her heart. “I hope you weren’t in pain.”

Team people finders

Rainbow flew up to the bed sheet and opened up the window. “Hello, is anyone here?” Rainbow entered the apartment and pulled out her flashlight to begin searching. Just like with every other place they searched, Rainbow found nothing. Rainbow left the apartment and, pushing magic into her body and mind to increase her speed, blitzed through all the other apartments, still finding nothing, just vines. The vines didn’t even have faces in them. Rainbow leaped out the nearest window and rejoined the others, who were just finishing clearing the zombies. “How’s it going?”

“I’m honestly surprised I haven’t thrown up.”, Rarity commented. There were headless zombies scattered all around the street. The mix of blood and vines was quite nasty, but none of the girls were bothered by it.

“Did ya find anyone?”, AJ asked.

“Not even a zombie or a face in a plant.”

“Okay, where would people go if there was an emergency of this size?”, Twilight asked.

“Well, tha state guard would round everybody up in places like school gyms, stadiums, community centers.”, AJ listed off.

“Yeah, but if the guard was here, they’d be shooting down zombies.”, RD countered.

“We should check those places anyways.”, Twilight said.

“Alright”, RD said.

The girls took off again towards the community center. Upon reaching it, the fliers immediately noticed the roof was completely caved in,many zombies were congregating around a large stalk and on the roof, some of them were dressed in military armor and had automatic assault rifles, they were aiming at them.

“Dodge!”, RD shouted.

A hailstorm of bullets cascaded up at the fliers, giving them little time to dodge. Rainbow tried to fire back but could not afford enough time to stop and aim. The ground forces tried to help, but they simply couldn’t get close enough. Even with the girls’ efforts, they could not dodge all the bullets. Bullets grazed and went straight through them, and Twilight was the first to fall. Twilight fell into the center, and was immediately swarmed by zombies. The ground forces rammed and punched the doors and windows trying to get in. AJ put so much magic into her arms, legs, and shoulders that they started to bruise and break under the power, but the vines bearing the windows and doors were tightly woven and several inches thick. Fluttershy had grabbed onto Rainbow and helped to glide her to the ground.

“Rainow! Can ya fly in?!”, AJ frantically asked. Rainbow simply shook her head as she was too injured to speak.

“I got an idea! Everyone! Stand back!”, Pinkie ordered. Rarity and AJ helped RD and Fluttershy away from the doors, and Pinkie used the break AJ caused to stick a massive explosive inside. By the time Pinkie detonated her explosive, it was as big as her head, and Pinkie was thrown back to the other girls and was knocked out, but she was able to create an opening.

AJ checked to make sure Pinkie wasn’t dead while Rarity pumped as magic she could into her skin as she ran into the center, turning her skin to crystal and creating several jagged points all across her skin. As Rarity ran into the hoard, she quickly learned she could shape these crystals into weapons or thicker armor. Rarity used her new arm blades to slice the zombies heads off, but there were more of them than Rarity had spikes. They began grabbing into Rarity’s spikes, and Rarity would create new spikes to shove them off before retracting them. “Twilight! Twilight!”, Rarity screamed as she swam through zombies to get to Twilight. Twilight groaned in response to her name. “Get out of my way!”, Rarity screamed, and shards of crystal went flying in all directions, clearing just enough space for Rarity to grab Twilight and get out of there. As Rarity ran outside, she stomped on the ground, creating a crystal wall to seal off the entrance.

Rarity brought Twilight over to the rest of the girls, where Fluttershy was sitting up completely healed. She had her glowing hands on Rainbow’s once bleeding abdomen and AJ’s now unbroken shoulder. Rarity created a crystal barrier to protect them from any more attacks then turned back to the girls. “Fluttershy?”, Rarity asked.

“Put Twilight down here. I can heal her.” Rarity placed Twilight down in front of Fluttershy, and Fluttershy moved her hands to Twilight’s shoulders. Twilight’s whole body began to glow, and her wounds began to heal. “You look pretty.”

Rarity looked down at her crystal skin, finally taking the time to properly admire it. “It is pretty, but I can’t feel anything other than the crystal.”

Twilight’s eyes began to flutter open, and she looked around. “What happened?”

“We were shot down, and you landed inside the center.”

“What kind of weapons were they using?”

“Automatic assault rifles, they’re a type of gun that can shoot out a lot of bullets very quickly.”, Rarity answered.

“Ugh, how many more types of guns are there?”

“I think you already know about all the guns we’re likely to encounter.”

“Good” Twilight sat up and reached behind her for her backpack, but it wasn’t there. “Girls, where’s my bag?”

“You weren’t wearing it when I grabbed you. I think the zombies have it.”

“My crown was in there!”

Horrified faces spread across everyone who was conscious.

“We need ta get it back.”, AJ said.

“None of us, other than Rarity, are in any position to fight through that.”, Fluttershy protested.

“What’s going on?”, Pinkie asked as she woke up.

“The zombies got Twi’s crown, and we’re in no condition to get it back.”, RD explained.

“Shit”

“Sunset, can ya hotwire and drive a car?”, AJ transmitted.

“Probably. Why?”

“We need pickup. We’re badly injured.”

“Where are you?”

“Canterlot Community Center”

“Okay, I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

Sunset

“What could those six gotten themselves into?” Sunset ridded herself of her ppe, grabbed a wire coat hanger, dispelled her dark seeing, and went out to the parking lot. It was not easy finding a car that could accommodate seven people, but Sunset was eventually able to find a minivan. Getting it open was the easy part. Once the door was unlocked, Sunset crawled in and began grabbing wires. She had never hotwired a car herself but had seen others do it. After some finagling and checking the gas, Sunset was able to start up the car and was on her way to the others.

Upon reaching the others, Sunset immediately noticed the zombies welding guns on top of the roof and aiming towards her. Rarity quickly enlarged the shield enough to cover the van. Sunset put the brakes on and leaned out the window. “Get in!” The least injured of the girls helped the others in, and Sunset sped out of there like a bat out of hell. “What the hell happened?”, Sunset asked.

“It was an ambush. They shot us down and took my bag with everything in it, including the crown.”, Twilight explained.

“What?! We need to go back and get it!”

“We’re too injured.”, Fluttershy said.

“I can burn the whole place down!”

“Ya’d get before ya could do that.”, AJ said.

“How could you let this happen?!”, Sunset accused Twilight.

“I let nothing happen! How was I supposed to know you had weapons like that?!”

“By reading the books!”

“Well! Excuse me! I was too busy being attacked by plants! Oh! And by the way, you burned the whole library down! Now, we have no books!”

“Everybody! Stop yelling!”, Fluttershy screamed. “We are all stressed and scared. We need to heal, then we can burn down the center.”

“Fine”, Sunset said through gritted teeth. They drove back in silence as Sunset steamed about the situation while the other girls slept. Upon reaching the store, Sunset woke each of them up and began corralling them inside and into the tent. Fluttershy did another round of healing on each of the injured girls before crawling into her own bag.

“You can use healing magic?”, Sunset asked.

“Yeah, I can.”, Fluttershy said as she closed her eyes.

Sunset grabbed her gun and went back to the front. There was no telling what the plants could do now that they had magic, and they had an entire wall of glass that the zombies had already shone they could break through. Sunset began moving shelving in front of the windows and doors but was not confident they would keep the undead out. She could only hope they didn’t come. Once all the glass was covered, Sunset took a seat in front of the doors and watched them for any sign of attempted break in. During that time, Sunset redesigned the dark seeing spell to automatically activate and deactivate when appropriate because casting and dispelling it over and over again was getting repetitive.

Sunset had dozed off at some point, and she was later awoken by the sound of a zombie. Sunset sprang up at the sound and spun around to find that it was Subject zero-zero-two getting off the table. “This is impossible. I took your brain out.” Two turned to face Sunset, and Two’s eyes were glowing purple. Before Sunset could fully process that, Two sprinted towards Sunset, and without thinking, Sunset lifted her gun and fired, leaving Two without a head, but that only slowed it down. Despite the lack of a head, Two continued to run towards Sunset, and she loaded three more rounds into the zombie. Two was left as just two arms, two legs and a hip, and a pile of goo, but it still wasn’t done. The plants began to reach out for each other. It was regenerating. Shit! No! Sunset began spraying every bit of zombie with flames until it was ash and bone, including the brain which was still on the shelf.

Sunset then heard a rumbling sound come from all around, and vines started to squirm in through the walls and ceiling. Sunset desperately tried to burn them all back, including setting the whole front on fire, but it wasn’t working. “Everyone! Get up!”, Sunset mentally screamed, then ran back to the tent. The rest of the girls were confusedly coming out of the tent, but the situation quickly became clear to them. Everyone grabbed their bags and guns and ran towards the back. Pinkie blasted the loading bay door open, and everyone ran outside.

Sunset mentally relayed everything that happened as they continued running. Zombies began chasing after them and trying to cut them off, all of their eyes were glowing purple. Sunset and Rarity tried to keep as many of them back as they could, but there were too many of them. They were surrounded.