The Zombie Chronicles: Road to Sanctuary

After dividing his day between Professor Utonium, Brick’s planning room meeting, and reporting on only part of that day to Princess, Kyle finally made his way back home as the sun was just starting to set.

As he walked down the street, he noticed yet another protest forming just outside of City Hall… He wanted to do something but knew that nothing he could say would convince them to go back home. Not after what Princess did. So, he continued on, paying them no mind.

Entering his apartment building, Kyle approached the elevator and pressed the button leading to his floor. As the doors closed, a hand reached inside and stopped them, making them open back up.

Kyle glanced up to see Sunset stepping inside, holding two backpacks… He immediately recognized the one as his from their run to Sanctuary, which immediately made his stomach drop.

“Hey.” Kyle said to her.

She didn’t respond, letting the doors close without pressing a button to another floor, just to Kyle’s apartment floor.

The two stood in silence, with Sunset simply glancing at the closed doors in front of her, barely looking over toward Kyle. He wasn’t entirely sure what to make of the sudden change in personality, but he had a good guess…

“Sunset, I’m pretty sure I know what this is about--”

“Your apartment. We can talk there.”

Kyle froze and nodded, now fully aware of what Sunset’s intentions were.

The elevator doors opened, and they walked down the hall, with Kyle unlocking his apartment door and allowing Sunset inside. He closed the door behind them and locked it as Sunset set their bags on the single bed and immediately unzipped Kyle’s.

As soon as Kyle turned around, Sunset set the picture of Kyle and the Dazzlings on the mattress for him to see.

He looked down at the picture, and silence filled the room. It lingered until Kyle couldn’t bear it anymore.

“I always hated my hair in that picture…” He nervously chuckled.

“When were you going to tell me?”

Kyle fell silent, shrugging and taking a seat on the mattress, turning away from Sunset.

“I wanted to for a while… but I was scared that you’d all get the wrong idea.”

Sunset let out a scoff.

“Seriously? What, did you think we’d just up and turn on you after finding out they were, what, your friends?”

Kyle paused and chuckled.

“Sisters.”

Sunset’s head snapped back toward Kyle, her body turning around to face him.

“Uh… can you run that by me again?”

Kyle turned and faced her.

“After the Battle of the Bands, whatever really happened there, my dad found them. He took them in, and after a few months, he adopted them. They became my sisters, and that was that.”

Sunset slowly nodded, following along with Kyle’s story but clueless as to what to make of it.

“Okay… your dad adopted them, but… why weren’t they with you? When we met?”

Kyle sighed, shaking his head.

“After the fire, Adagio and Aria took off. Left a note saying that they ‘needed to be free spirits’. Sonata stayed, and we all lived in that house together. That… guest room? That was her room.”

Sunset nodded, her suspicions of Kyle hiding something that day finally being realized.

Kyle took a sharp breath before continuing.

“Also… I wasn’t alone when everything started.”

Sunset’s eyes widened at that revelation.

“Sonata was there, too. I made it back home with a sprained ankle from the wreck, and she helped me get back on my feet. It was a few weeks in, and she always did scavenging runs because I could barely walk then. I was on my feet that day, but she said that she’ll go, that she’d take a day or two.”

Kyle took a moment as he felt his eyes water, and his voice began to crack.

“After the second week, I figured she wasn’t coming back.”

Sunset let out a long sigh.

“There, that’s just about everything…” He sighed, taking a moment to wipe a running tear.

Sunset paused before asking her next question.

“What did you know about them? About the Battle of the Bands?”

Kyle turned to her and shrugged.

“Nothing, really. I knew they lost, and you won-- I heard the rumors-- about them being magical sirens? I always joked about it, ‘my sisters nearly conquered the world’, you know?” He chuckled.

Sunset cracked a smile, imagining Kyle ecstatic about having magical sisters.

“But I never actually believed them. Not until I made it to Canterlot. All the things you can do… the things I’ve seen others do here. There’s no denying it, now… and I know now that my dad knew about that, too.”

Sunset nodded-- he had to know about what the Dazzlings did. But why on Earth would he adopt them…?

“So, what happens now? Where do we go from here?”

Sunset shrugged.

“Nothing changes. We keep going the way we are… but why did you think this would’ve changed things?”

Kyle paused and sighed.

“I don’t know… I thought that if you knew about them being my family, you’d…” Kyle started.

Sunset glanced up at Kyle and scooched closer to him.

“I’d what?”

Kyle stayed silent, trying to find the right words.

“I thought that you’d leave.” He sighed, settling for those words.

Sunset registered what she heard, feeling a sting in her heart, and responded first with a heavy sigh.

“I thought you’d all leave and… I couldn’t-- I can’t-- be alone like that again.”

Kyle briefly stopped for a chuckle.

“It’s funny… before the world went to shit, I was a bit of a loner. Sure, I had friends… a handful, but I always preferred being by myself. Especially after my dad died, and especially during--” Kyle stopped himself, not ready to tell Sunset about her.

Sunset, however, subtly nodded, letting Kyle continue.

“After the outbreak, I got what I always wanted… I was alone. I was alone for a long time… I hope this doesn’t come out wrong, but it was… fun for a while. It was like I had the whole world to myself, you know? But… a few weeks in, it all hit me. For all I knew, I was all that was left. My family is dead…”

Sunset didn’t dare face him as tears began to flow.

“Everyone I’d ever known from before is dead or worse. And I… I don’t have another three months in me like that,” He shook his head, “Staying in some two-story house, looting neighborhoods by myself, hoping that one of those freaks doesn’t tear me to shreds… No. No. I’ll die before I’m out there on my own again.”

The two sat there, their backs facing each other, for what felt like ages. Sunset was the first to finally break the silence.

“The Dazzlings, they were, um… they were what we called Sirens. Their singing is magical. It can control people’s emotions and, well… people after they’re charged up with Equestrian magic.”

Kyle took a moment to wipe a few tears from his eyes.

“Well, that explains why they never did karaoke nights.” He chuckled.

Sunset smiled, laughing along for a moment.

“Yeah… yeah, that makes sense. So during the Battle of the Bands, with all that access to Equestrian magic…”

“Yeah. They had an all-you-can-eat buffet of magic, so they became insanely powerful by the end of the week. If we didn’t stop them when we did… Zombies wouldn’t be what we’re worrying about.”

Kyle nodded, taking in that information.

“Yeah, Aria always seemed super bitter about losing that competition… guess now I know why.”

Sunset slowly nodded, her mind hard at work for a brief moment before relenting and turning towards Kyle.

“Which one was Aria?”

Kyle involuntarily let out a laugh.

“She had the purple hair? Massive pigtails?”

Sunset thought for a second and quickly snapped her fingers in realization.

“Oh, yeah! That’s right! Man, she was weird…” Sunset smiled, shaking her head.

“Yeah, tell me about it. Don’t get me started on her and Sonata going back and forth just about every day…”

The two shared a laugh together, one that Sunset was the first to stop.

“Kyle… there’s something I need to tell you. Something I’ve also been keeping from you.” She sighed.

Kyle curiously turned to her, scooching a tad closer to her.

“Yeah? What is it?” He asked her.

She turned to him and glanced into his eyes for a brief moment, trying to recall the glimpses she saw when she read his mind back when they first met…

“Kyle, I know--”

Before she could finish, a gunshot rang out from outside.

Kyle and Sunset both bolted to the window, peeking out to see that the protest had only grown since Kyle saw it last. By now, hundreds of protestors were raising signs or even trying to storm the building…

“Oh, shit… we gotta get down there!” Kyle said, getting up to race out the door.

Sunset, however, didn’t budge as she saw soldiers aiming their guns in the air, and toward approaching protesters. As they advanced, soldiers finally opened fire, taking down protestors as that only incited a full-on charge…

“Kyle! Kyle!” Sunset screamed, running after him.

Outside the streets, soldiers desperately held back the approaching riot but were quickly running out of bullets as the swarm soon became too much to bear.

“Fall back! Hold the line!” Some soldiers barked, tossing tear gas and opening fire.

As rioters dropped dead, more only took their place, armed with pipes, bricks, shattered bottles, torches, and anything else they could find… they were all thin, clearly having not eaten for weeks… it was fight or die for them, now, and they weren’t against the latter, anymore.

Kyle and Sunset were halfway to City Hall when they both stopped and saw a familiar blur rush through the sky and land right in front of City Hall.

“Fuck.” Sunset cursed, slowly backing away, knowing there was nothing she could do to stop the now-inevitable slaughter.

Sure enough, the remaining protestors outside the building were immediately cut down to nothing by two red laser beams. Princess slowly walked down the path, incinerating anyone she saw who wasn’t wearing gold.

She mentally kept count of how many she was killing… 1, 3, 6, 11, 14, 25, 48… the numbers were quickly adding up, which she faintly smiled at… How many more could she pick off?

She slowly stopped just outside the building, letting her laser vision build for one final time before letting out a devastating blast…

However, she felt a hand grab her hair and yank her head back, causing her blast to shoot straight up into the sky.

Princess gave whoever grabbed her an elbow that did little to send them back, which told her that this was someone with Chemical X…

“Jennifer! That’s enough!” Buttercup shouted into her ear, pulling her back and tripping her on the ground.

Princess let out a vicious yell after hearing that name, immediately speeding off into the air, taking Buttercup by the neck in her flight.

Kyle and Sunset had no time to follow them as they saw the gunfight inside City Hall…

“What do we do…?” Sunset asked.

Kyle struggled to think for a moment, but then, a realization hit him. He remembered what had occurred at the police station with the Caribou… one minute, they were still controlled, and the next, after he and Shining talked and mockingly sang together…

Sunset’s words echoed in his head about the Siren’s Song, and he gasped in realization…

He tightly held Pinkie’s Geode in his pocket and sprinted towards the building. Sunset shouted for him, but he paid her no mind, finally pulling it out of his pocket, its power already flowing through him as he started sprinting faster.

Once he grew close enough, he held the Geode out and started to sing random melodies…

Sunset ran as fast as she could but started to slow as she realized what was in his hand and what he was doing. Her eyes widened as a familiar green aura emitted from Kyle, and Pinkie’s Geode began to glow red…

Slowly, Kyle heard the gunfire inside cease and the screaming stop. Slowly, those still alive inside marched outside, standing at full attention with a bright green tint over their eyes…

Kyle’s relief was immediately replaced with horror as he immediately stopped singing and pocketed the Geode, seemingly doing the trick as the glint in their eyes faded. They all looked at each other in confusion before Kyle addressed them.

“You need to stop! Killing each other is exactly what Princess wants! Princess is the one turning us against each other, not them. Fighting ourselves won’t help our situation-- we only do that by pulling together!”

Clearly, there was some reluctance, and the remaining protestors slowly started dropping to their knees.

“If she won’t let us leave… then she’ll have to let us die.” One of the protestors said.

Kyle paused, unsure of how to respond to their pleas for death…

Back with Buttercup, she was being dragged outside the walls and into the rest of the city, desperately clawing at Princess to drop her. After one good scratch across the cheek, Princess instinctually dropped her, plummeting down towards the skyscrapers below…

Buttercup began to panic, searching for the instinct to fly, failing to find it… she desperately tried everything she could, flailing around, even unintentionally doing a few poses in attempts to slow her descent…

Her fears began to overwhelm her as she fell, but in a moment, they left her, replaced with a feeling of acceptance… this was it. This was where Buttercup Utonium died, and she was okay with that for a fleeting moment…

As she closed her eyes, content with her fate, her thoughts drifted back to her father, desperately trying to keep Princess happy after wronging her… then to her sister Blossom, who sacrificed her gifts and was being punished every day for it.

Then her thoughts focused on the people in Townsville. The people she helped keep safe ever since she was born. The people that she refused to lose faith in when her sisters did… the people who need her, now more than ever…

The feelings of fear and acceptance were replaced by determination, a feeling she hadn’t had for many years… Focusing her breathing, she kept her eyes closed, not daring to see how close she was to the ground. Then, she felt it… she felt the muscle, the nerve, the feeling of flight. Slowly harnessing it, she took a breath, and suddenly, she wasn’t falling. She had stopped right in the middle of the air.

Slowly opening her eyes, she saw that she was just feet from the ground. Looking up toward the silhouette of Princess, she cracked her neck and took off into the air like a speeding bullet, clenching her fist as she reared her arm back and, in seconds, delivered a powerful uppercut straight at Princess.

“It’s gonna take a lot more than that, Jenny…” She said, taking a mid-air fighting stance.

Princess felt a throbbing pain as blood spilled from her mouth. Forming a bloody smile, Princess cracked her knuckles.

“It’s about time I had a good fight…”

Lunging back to Buttercup, the two began to exchange brutal blows, Buttercup showing years of martial arts as well as show-biz maneuvers she pulled many times for a few stunt shows. Princess, however, was swift and savage with her attacks, aiming for sensitive spots-- eye jabs, side-shots, even a few groin kicks.

Their fight tore through abandoned buildings, knocking a few down as they beat each other down. Princess finally took control, pulling Buttercup down into the rubble and dust, obscuring her vision.

Buttercup let out several coughs as she slowly rose out of the rubble, desperately searching around for Princess.

However, she was first caught off-guard by a Rager lunging towards her. Quickly grabbing it by its torn shirt and tossing it across the destroyed lot, she was easily taken off-guard as Princess sped and tackled her from behind.

As Buttercup struggled to break free, Princess delivered a series of punches, pinning her down to the rubble-ridden ground. As blood sprayed from each punch, Princess refused to relent, continuing to beat Buttercup until she could barely move…

The beating continued, each punch echoing across the city until Buttercup’s face was swollen, several teeth were knocked out, and she was wheezing for breath.

Princess let out several huffs before standing up and glaring down at Buttercup.

“This is my city now… fucking remember that.” She scolded, taking off into the skies and leaving Buttercup behind.

Barely able to breathe, let alone move, Buttercup laid on the debris beaten and battered…

She had lost. Despite everything, she lost…

She had no time to reflect on her failure as she could barely see what she first perceived as a dust storm in the distance before quickly realizing that she was watching a horde of Ragers charging towards the new noises… towards Townsville.

Buttercup fought her pain and struggled to rise on her feet, but only to stumble and fall back down. She knew it was useless to move, so she watched as the horde grew closer to her… her vision began to go black, her eyes too tired to stay open any longer, and right before the first few Ragers could pounce on her, she fully blacked out.