The Last of Equestria: New Beginnings

"Are you sure you're okay to work?"

I sigh softly as I close my locker and shove my collection of pens into my scrub pockets. My concerned coworker and fellow nurse, Minnow Brookewing, looks at me with deep, genuine concern. I understand it entirely and had yesterday's events happened to anypony but myself, I would've been in her shoes. I look at Minnow and give her a reassuring smile.

"I'm fine, I promise," I say as reassuringly as I can "I'll be able to do my job just fine. If it starts to feel like I can't, I'll let you know."

"Okay, if you say so... but I'm keeping an eye on you, okay?," Minnow says before trotting away.

'I'm sure you will', I think to myself as I follow her out the door and to the break room for our morning report. Once there, I file into line alongside my coworkers and only half listen to our attending as he gives us the report. Despite fighting to do the complete opposite and pay attention, my mind keeps wandering, thinking back to yesterday, almost like it's on autopilot or something. An eternity passes by and finally, report is over and I'm free to tend to my patients. I pass by the nurses station, wave at my colleagues, turn the corner and continue onwards until I reach room 31-03 here on the second floor. I grab the patient's chart from the holder screwed on the wall just outside the door and read through it. Comatose patient, medically induced, severe head injuries from a recent skiing accident and more fractures all over than I've ever seen on one patient at any given time.

Both out of habit and standard procedure, I knock on the door before entering the room. The poor mare is laying on the bed with an assortment of machinery keeping her alive and breathing while her brain heals. Were it not for them, one would think that she was probably dead. She’s by herself today. I suppose the family had other things to take care of. I trot up to the small counter in the left corner of the room closest to the door and grab up the bathing kit left in here ahead of time just for little ol' me. I take it to the bathroom and place the contents- soap, a rag, towel and small baggie with combs- next to the sink. I turn the knobs so that the water comes out warm and wait for it to reach the proper temperature. As I wait, I look at myself in the mirror, my reflection staring back at me with the same emotionless expression...

***

"I got the restraints! Minnow is coming with the B-52 for backup as you requested, Maple!"

Citrus Citrine, a certified nursing assistant- CNA- working on our floor that day, galloped into the room carrying the bed restraints requested by our colleague, an advanced practice registered nurse- APRN- named Maple Grove.

"Holy shit, are you okay, Silver?!" Citrus exclaimed as he tossed Maple a set of the bed restraints.

I glanced down at my foreleg and the small streams of blood that had been oozing down my leg and dripping onto the bed. Our patient, a scientist with the Equestrian Centers of Disease Control and Prevention, had been brought in two days prior for injuries brought on by a workplace altercation. She was perfectly fine on day one, alert, coherent, aware of herself and colleagues, laughing at the circumstances, even. Ms. Aria seemed to be on the road to a full recovery until suddenly she became fevered, delusional and agitated around midday yesterday. She was then admitted and quickly brought up to the ICU, where we then began treating her for sepsis, put her on broad spectrum antibiotics, and then when it clearly wasn't working and she was only getting worse, we started other treatments.

We've gone through every logical explanation, and courses of treatments, including ones for known fungal infections, yet nothing is working and she's gotten severely worse. Now, this poor, sick mare is to the point where she's lost all sense of reasoning and is trying to attack everypony she can for reasons I- we- didn’t know, hence the need for bed restraints. She tried to rip out her IVs and take off the various monitor cords attached to her, all while trying to get out of bed as quickly as she physically could. Luckily, Maple had already been with me at the time and together we held her down after I called for some backup.

While Citrus had been on his way here, Ms. Aria had thrown her head back and sunk her mouth into my leg. She broke the skin enough for it to bleed at a pretty decent pace. I was bitten hard enough that you could almost perfectly make out nearly every detail of her teeth. I continued to hold down her forelegs as best as I could while Citrus fastened the restraints he had to the bed before moving onto her left back leg. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Maple hurriedly working to untangle the other set of restraints.

CRACK!

Intense pain engulfs my face as I’m sent reeling backwards, causing me to completely lose my grip on Ms. Aria. A warm, wet sensation pours down from my muzzle and down my neck. I hear Citrus gasp loudly, which is quickly followed up by a pained yelp. Distracted by Ms. Aria headbutting me in the face, I helplessly watched as she bucked him in the jaw. Based on the sound alone, I had no doubt his jaw was broken. It all happened so quickly, in a matter of seconds. Between how surprisingly quick she was and being stunned by our respective injuries, Citrus and I were unable to react fast enough to stop her as Ms. Aria threw herself out of her bed, completely ripping the restraint from the bed rail in the process.

The two of us are stunned further as Ms. Aria tackled Maple to the ground and bit off a huge chunk of flesh from the side of Maple’s face, who screamed in pain and tried to push Ms. Aria off. Citrus rushed to Maple’s side as I spun around and smashed the call button. I call for immediate backup and security to come to the room. I heard Citrus yelp again as I turned back and saw him get pushed over by Ms. Aria, who quickly galloped out of the room.

“Tend to Maple’s wounds, I’ll worry about Ms. Aria!” I shouted at Citrus as I galloped after our runaway patient.

“Yes ma’am!” Citrus called out as I quickly exited the room.

As soon as I entered the hallway, I momentarily paused in my tracks in pure shock and utter terror at the sight that had been waiting for me. Two ponies wearing visitor stickers had been attacked by Ms. Aria. One of them, a young unicorn mare, was on the floor gasping for air as blood gurgled out the wound on her neck and onto the floor. Ms. Aria had taken out a chunk of this poor mare’s throat before moving onto the other visitor, an older earth pony stallion. The older stallion was on the floor attempting to fend off Ms. Aria and had a chunk missing from his shoulder, leaving a bloody, oozing cavity behind. It was absolutely mind boggling how fast Ms. Aria had been in accomplishing those attacks.

Reality suddenly snapped back to me as I galloped forward and tackled Ms. Aria off the stallion and to the ground. I wrapped my forelegs around her neck and my back legs around her waist and held her down with every ounce of strength I had in me. Ms. Aria struggled in my grasp and tried her best to bite me again. I yelled out as loudly as I could manage for help. I could worry less about my own injuries. It wasn’t my first broken nose and it certainly wouldn't be my last. I look behind me to see the older stallion holding the young mare he had been accompanying close to his chest and sobbing. Her body was limp and her eyes appeared to be lifeless, though blood continued to pour out of her wound. Given the severity of the injury and the amount of blood on the floor alone, I knew the poor mare had bled to death before she could receive proper medical care.

“My god! Aria, what have you done?!” An unfamiliar voice exclaimed in a mixture of shock and terror.

“Hey! You need to leave! It isn’t safe right now!” I ordered as I quickly looked forward.

Standing before me was a unicorn mare wearing a light pink turtleneck sweater with dark brown sleeves and stripes throughout. Pinned to her sweater was a badge identifying her as a member of the ECDC. Underneath it was the same visitor sticker given to family and friends here to see their loved ones at North Star Medical Center. She had a short, mulberry mane styled into a straight bob with a single curl at the top. Her coat was pale olive in color and her eyes were a bright turquoise. The mare looked down at Ms. Aria, her expression changing to one of sadness and regret.

“Aria… I’m so sorry. I should have done this sooner,” The mare apologized softly, her voice trembling.

Before I could even question a single word she said, the mare pulled out a small pistol- a 10mm if I had to guess- with some kind of attachment to the barrel, which she then pressed against Ms. Aria’s skull using her turquoise colored magic. There was a brief moment of hesitation before the mare pulled the trigger and put two rounds into her brain. I flinched at the sound as my ears flattened against my mane. Ms. Aria went limp in my grasp as her head drooped down and to the side. Despite everything awful Ms. Aria had done, I couldn’t help but stare at the mare in sheer horror. Ms. Aria... her illness had removed her sense of reason and ability to rationalize her actions. I didn’t harbor any ill feelings towards her. Instead, I felt incredibly sad for Ms. Aria, seeing her suffering so greatly that it completely changed who she was fundamentally. It didn’t change or undo what she did, but still…

“I’m sorry for the pain and suffering Aria has inflicted upon you and those poor souls behind you. I’m her colleague, Dr. Phantasia. I knew this was going to happen, but Dr. Brown…” The mare trailed off as she shook her head and put away her weapon.

“He refused to listen. She ended up just like Snow and Dawn. I told him she would,” Dr. Phantasia quickly added.

“I… Wh-wha… You…” I trailed off as I struggled to formulate a coherent thought.

“She bit you. Did she bite anypony else besides you three?” Dr. Phantasia questioned.

“Y-yes. Maple. Sh-she… bit a-a chunk of out her f-face,” I stammered.

“It all started with our colleagues Dr. Snow and Dr. Dawn. They ended up like this after inhaling a… a specimen we had discovered. They attacked Aria, bit her on the neck and ear,” Dr. Phantasia explained “and then, two days later, Aria ended up just like them? It's not a coincidence. It's cause and effect. Now you’ve been bitten...”

“What?? Are you suggesting that-” I barely get the sentence out before I'm interrupted.

“The same thing is going to happen to you. I’m sure it differs between individuals, but you’ve got a maximum of two days before you… end up like her,” Dr. Phantasia said, her eyes and words filled with sadness.

“This isn’t a sci-fi movie, this is reality! S-Stop making it sound like this is the start of a-a-a zombie apocalypse!” I snapped angrily.

“Look, I get it. I know this is hard to accept and maybe even harder to believe, but the evidence is lying lifeless underneath you. If I was allowed to, I’d show you the evidence back at our laboratory,” Dr. Phantasia snapped back with a heavy sigh.

“Wait. Before you say anything else, just let me say this; If you and whomever else Aria has infected end up just like her, we’ll have a serious epidemic on our hooves… and it’s one I’m not sure we could ever hope to cure,” Dr. Phantasia added as she stepped closer.

I released my hold of Ms. Aria and stood up, my wounds still oozing blood. I inhaled and let out a long, shaky sigh. I was utterly dumbfounded at the very idea this so-called ‘scientist’ had suggested. Dr. Phantasia reached out and placed a hoof on my shoulder as she looked deep into my eyes.

“I… I’m not… I’m not a murderer… a-and I would never, ever wish that anypony would commit suicide, but…” Tears spilled down her cheeks as she trailed off “please, listen to what I’m telling you and believe it. You don’t want the same to happen to you. I can't imagine what it was like for them, all the suffering and being unable to stop the changes. Please, go home, write a letter to your friends and folks and… and end it however you’d like.”

“You’re a fucking quack, you know that?! You need to have yourself committed to the psych ward! You’re suggesting an impossible, purely fictional scenario!” I exclaimed angrily, swatting her hoof from my shoulder “just because this so-called ‘evidence’ of yours happens to be similar to the start of every single zombie movie currently in existence, doesn’t mean that the same is happening in our reality!! It's coincidental, not factual!!”

“I understand your point of view entirely and I’m very sorry for what I’ve suggested. I also understand you don’t agree, however, to put it bluntly, you have a degree in understanding our anatomy and how to fix the pony body when something is wrong with it,” Dr. Phantasia said sympathetically but with a hint of frustration “I have a degree in biology with a specific specialty of mycology. I understand- I know- what’s caused this. I know that I’m right about this.”

“Oh, yeah? That so? You must be sooo knowledgeable, then! Is there anything you don’t know?!” I snapped angrily before taking a step closer to her.

I could feel my blood begin to boil in my veins as my anger continued to climb. I knew what I said was childish, but everything was so stressful, confusing, and anger-inducing... I just couldn't formulate a more mature response.

“I am very knowledgeable about the things I’ve learned and discovered, but yeah, there are things that I don’t know,” Dr. Phantasia sneered as she stepped away from me “I know that Fairy Wings is the cause of this. I know it turned my friends into monsters and that it will do the same to you and your friends.”

“I don’t know why and that’s about it,” She quickly added.

“F-Fairy... wings?” I couldn’t help but to question something that sounded so bizarre.

“Mediocris Alas, a long lost cousin of poison joke, twice removed. Fungi aren’t in the same kingdom as plants, but they have a few strands that are genetically similar to strands of DNA found in poison joke,” Dr. Phantasia explained with a deep sigh “I’m not supposed to say anything to anypony without the proper clearance, much less outside the ECDC, but.. I guess it doesn’t matter now, does it?”

“You’re going to die soon, whether by your own hoof or the infection,” She added so matter-of-factly.

I took in a deep breath and slowly exhaled it in an attempt to calm down. I regained my composure the best I could and pointed a hoof behind me.

“I’m not going to die nor am I... ‘infected’. You better get the hell out of here before security comes and I have them arrest you for having a prohibited firearm in the hospital... or that you murdered your colleague,” I said in a more calm manner.

Dr. Phantasia stared at me for a moment before sighing and nodding her head. She looked down at Aria, then back up at me and the presumed father mourning his dead presumed daughter behind me. She sighed heavily once more before moving uncomfortably close to me.

“I am so terribly sorry. I could’ve stopped this sooner. What’s your name?” Dr. Phantasia said as she locked eyes with me.

“Silver Swallows. As in the birds, not the bodily function,” I said simply.

“May I take your picture? Only to remember you by, of course,” Dr. Phantasia asked as she pulled out a pocket-sized polaroid camera.

“I'm not exactly camera ready, but... sure?” I replied, though it was truly more of a question.

Dr. Phantasia took a few steps backwards and quickly snapped my photo. I didn’t really care how I looked and or that I was covered- drenched, even- in my own blood. As long as she didn’t rub one out to it, I really didn’t care what she did with my photo. Once it had developed, Dr. Phantasia pulled out a small notebook and stuck the photo between some random pages. She then put back both the camera and the notebook before locking eyes with me again.

“Thank you. Again, Silver, I am so, so very sorry. Please, no matter what happens… know it wasn’t your fault,” Dr. Phantasia said somberly.

Before another word could be said, the sound of shouting came from the direction Dr. Phantasia had come from. The two of us locked eyes once again before Phantasia fled down the hallway behind me. I turned and watched her canter away until she was out of sight. I took in a deep breath and sighed sharply, then looked down at the older stallion and young mare. At some point during my interaction with Dr. Phantasia, the older stallion had tragically taken his own life using a pen to puncture a major artery in his neck. The pain of losing his loved one so violently and not being able to save her must have been too much to bear. I feel so horrible that I hadn’t even noticed until now.

“Sweet Celestia! What happened here, Silver?!” A familiar voice exclaimed.

I turned to see a slew of fellow nurses and security officers approaching me. I give them a rundown of what transpired, except I leave out my interaction with Dr. Phantasia. Instead, I tell them it all happened too quickly, I didn’t get a good look at who shot my patient other than it had been a mare and that that was all I knew. I wasn’t sure why I was protecting Phantasia or what I even gained from it, but my gut told me it was the right thing to do... even if I didn’t agree with anything she had said.

***

… Huh? My hooves are… wet?

Reality suddenly comes crashing into me like a tsunami. I shake my head and look around to get my bearings. I come to realize I’m still at work and in a patient's bathroom. I look down to see the sink is overflowing onto the floor, creating a giant puddle. My head throbs and I feel as if I just woke up from a dream. ‘Shit, shit, shit!’, I mentally curse as I turn off the sink and look for something to clean up the spill with. I use the two large towels kept in every patient’s bathroom as well as some of the soiled linen left in the hamper to clean up the spilled water. I don’t remember putting the plastic bath basin in the sink, which is what obstructed the drain and allowed the water to build up and overflow.

I mentally kick myself for even thinking this, but I am glad my patient is comatose. It’s still embarrassing that I spaced out like that, but it’s a little less so knowing my patient isn’t awake to know just how long I’ve been standing here with water puddling at my hooves. I woke up feeling off this morning, but I still forced myself to go to work today because I felt it would keep my mind too busy to think about yesterday. I guess I was wrong about that. Shit. Maybe Dr. Phantasia was right all along. Am I really infected? Am I really going to turn into a mindless, flesh eating zombie? My heart begins to race in my chest as panic sets in. No, no, no, no! I… I can’t turn into a zombie!

I slap myself in the face and shove that irrational train of thought to the side. I was right yesterday and I’m still right today. Dr. Phantasia was just... just paranoid and overly cautious. There is no way a zombie outbreak will happen. I don’t remember if I cleaned that bite properly, if at all. These delusional thoughts I’m having must be from an infection creeping in, but not the kind Dr. Phantasia was suggesting. I’ll have to clean it later when I finish up my initial rounds this morning. Celestia knows how long I’ve been standing here daydreaming, I’d better hurry and get a move on before Minnow comes along with a big, fat ‘I told you so’.

I get my shit together mentally and gather everything I need to bathe my patient, then exit the bathroom and do my job properly. As a way of apologizing to my comatose patient, I take extra special care of combing out her hair carefully and thoroughly before washing it well. Most nurses and the like would skip over the hair and just bathe the patient’s body, but damn, this poor mare has such long, gorgeous locks. I’d hate for it to get to the point where it’s so matted and tangled that they’d have to shave it. I wash her body more quickly than I normally would while still ensuring that she’s actually nice and clean. Once I finish, I properly put up the bathing supplies and leave the room to go care for my other patients.

I hurry out into the hallway and canter down to the next patient’s room. As I do so, I pass by a set of elevators and find myself suddenly coming to a stop. Once again, my body feels like it’s on autopilot. I stare at my blurred reflection in the elevator doors as this weird, tugging desire to go to the morgue suddenly overcomes me. It takes every ounce of mental strength to break free of it and now I’m starting to doubt my own beliefs once more. Maybe I should’ve taken that paid leave and stayed home. I’m clearly just traumatized from yesterday and it's manifesting in some weird ways. I’m fine. I’m fine. Totally and perfectly fine.

I continue on with my work day, focusing harder than normal on doing my job and even harder on ignoring the weird desire to go to the morgue that keeps recurring. Despite my wishes and how hard I try to do otherwise, I keep having moments of memory lapses and suddenly snapping back to reality. As the day drags along, I start to feel like I’ve caught a fever and I feel even more off than what I was when I woke up. I borrow a thermometer and check my temp. Sure enough, I’ve got a low grade fever. I know I need to go talk to my attending and let him know that I need to go home because.... *sigh* but I can’t leave just yet. I need to check on Maple first.

She was admitted to the ICU a couple of hours after the incident yesterday. Citrus told me they had to sedate her because the pain had her badly agitated. Although… was it really the pain that made her that way or… or was Dr. Phantasia right after all? At this point, I’m not really sure if I want to find out or not. The feeling of knowing you’re sick and are going to turn into a monster completely out of your control is sickening, but somehow I find the uncertainty of not knowing if it will or won’t happen to be worse. I don’t want to believe it, but I keep finding myself wondering if it’s true. Good lord, I hope it isn’t. What if it is and deep down, I’m still there but my body is doing such unspeakable horrors, hurting the ones I love and care for?

Lunch time rolls around before I know it. The world around me continues on as if everything was right as rain, but yet my own world seems to trudge on at crawl. As I ride the elevator up to the third floor, that desire to go to the morgue forms in the pit of my stomach again. Why the morgue of all places? Maybe... Yeah. Ms. Aria, her body is still in the morgue. No family has come to claim it, so I’ve heard. I know she’s the one who bit me, but… but why do I subconsciously desire to go to her corpse? It's like- if it's true I'm infected- that we're... connected somehow? I wish I had answers to all these questions. I guess only time will tell. I wish I had a good thought to take comfort in, but my mind- unsurprisingly- draws blanks.

I exit the elevator once the doors open and quickly make my way to Maple’s room. It’s incredibly ironic, but they wound up putting her in the same room Ms. Aria previously occupied. I don’t think they meant to, unless for some reason Maple specifically requested it. By the way Citrus was talking, I don’t think that was the case. I softly knock on the door and quietly enter the room. Maple is sound asleep on the bed… or maybe she’s just unconscious from the medication they gave her. Either way, she’s not awake to hear my hello as I approach her bed. I pull up a stool from nearby and sit right next to her. As I watch her sleep, Maple’s body twitches a couple of times. They weren’t exactly subtle, but also not on the violent side. Suspicious, I guess is the right word to use.

I sigh sharply before leaning forward and placing a hoof gingerly on the bandage covering her facial wound. As soon as I do, I find myself put in some kind of trance. Instantly, I’m frozen to the spot and it’s like I’ve entered a shared dream world with Maple. The two of us are in the morgue now and that weird desire has returned stronger than ever. It’s almost like it’s calling for us, urging us to come down. The world spins and I feel a strong sense of vertigo wash over me before it suddenly stops. Still in that weird dream world, we’re in front of a cold locker in the morgue. There’s a paper tag in the small square tag holder on the door. On it, the name 'Sweet Aria' and yesterday’s date is written on it.

I’m violently snapped back into reality as I find myself falling off my stool. Luckily, I caught myself just in time before I could get hurt, however, I do so in such a way that it forces me to come face to face- so to speak- with my bandaged bite wound. Somehow I’ve gone all this time without noticing, but the wound has gotten… worse. These weird vein-like marks have appeared, like it’s… growing? Yeah, it’s like something is growing from the wound and making its way up my leg. It’s all red and tender and… well, infected looking. I get up, scramble to the nearby cabinet and grab a roll of bandage wrap. I quickly cover what’s ‘grown’ up leg from the bite wound. She did say it was a fungus, right? Could the fungus be... growing under my skin? It didn't seem to respond to treatment, but maybe it could be surgically removed?

I hate to admit it, but I think I’m starting to come to terms with the fact that Phantasia was right. Thinking back to when Ms. Aria was admitted, I realize that her wounds had progressed in a similar manner. Then yesterday happened. Oh god… She was right. She was right and I… I still came to work. I know now more than ever I should leave and go home, but what about Maple? What if she-she turns while I… More ponies might get hurt if I just leave her here unattended. There’s no way I could leave early, get some kind of… oh my god … some kind of weapon to… to spare her from that fate and sneak back in without somepony noticing or it causing suspicion. No, the best course of action is… I don’t know. I guess I’ll finish out my work day and figure it out when I'm off? Then again...

I look up at the clock and realize my lunch break is basically over with. I whisper a promise to Maple that I’ll return later before turning and hurrying out the door. I continue on with my shift as best I can manage. As time drags on, I grow more certain and can even feel that I’m losing myself to this infection. It’s absolutely terrifying, but I need to hold on just a little bit longer. My shift is almost over. As soon as it ends, I’m going to do what Phantasia suggested. I… I really, really don’t want to die, but Maple and I will hurt others and spread this damned infection to others if we remain alive just for us to turn later. However, a couple of hours later and things have only gotten so, so much worse for me. I can hardly concentrate as I work on some of my charting. I’ve gained a new, horrible and unfortunate symptom.

A new desire to hurt others and 'further the spread'. It’s so difficult to fight it. I’ve had to put on my jacket because the spread of the wound has worsened and traveled up to my chin. My body is trembling and twitching and I’m not sure anymore if it’s from being scared and nervous or from the infection. I abandon my charting and steal some paper from a nearby printer. Using a pen from my extensive pocket collection, I write a note for my loved ones and a second for my coworkers explaining the situation and what really happened yesterday. I also make it explicitly clear that I’m going to the morgue and taking Maple with me as well for them to keep out or come armed… just in case.

My writing is sloppy and hard to read from the trembling and twitching. I keep accidentally leaving random stroke marks and messing up letters and words. Worst of all, I can see not all of my words are coherent and I end up writing a good deal of total gibberish. I can’t control it, either. I guess that’s truly the worst part. My time is quickly running out and I can feel the horrible sensation of losing control of my body and my actions. I double check the bandage scissors I acquired earlier is still in my pocket, then tape the notes to the outside of the door of the room I was in and make my way to Maple’s room as fast as I can.

I don't know if it was luck or some kind of blessing, but somehow I managed to slip away and get there totally unnoticed. At least, I didn't see anypony and if anypony saw me, they didn't say a word. I disarm every alarm and IV hooked up to Maple as well as her bed. Once she and the bed are totally freed and all alarms have been disarmed temporarily, I push her out of the room and to the nearest staff elevator. It’s quite the struggle in my current state, but I thank my lucky stars the elevators aren’t very far. I thank my extra lucky stars that I continue to somehow avoid my coworkers… or visitors, for that matter. I smash the button for the elevator and wait as patiently as I can. My head stays on a swivel as I wait. The elevator dings and the doors open with whoosh, which causes me to flinch.

I push Maple into the elevator- thankful no coworkers are inside- and smash the button to take us to the floor where the morgue is. As the elevator makes its descent, the sensation of losing control of myself grows even stronger. I sob as my body involuntarily twitches, jerks and trembles uncontrollably. By the time the elevator finally arrives at my destination, I’m no longer in control of myself or my actions. My body is stuck on autopilot. Old and new desires, urges and sensations overwhelm and flood my body and brain. I feel like an outsider to my own self, some kind of specter watching from the outside as the infection takes over me entirely. Is this how Ms. Aria felt until Phantasia snuffed her out? There... There are no amount of letters or words in any language that I could possibly string together to properly describe just how... how awful, terrible, frightening this is.

I feel connected to Maple in a more literal sense now as I push her out of the elevator and down the hall to the morgue. It’s a struggle and a nearly impossible task, but somehow I… somehow my body manages to do so. I practically send the bed sailing through the opened door to the morgue and it crashes into a metal table in the center of the room. A cloud of cold spills out from the morgue and although the chill covers my body in goosebumps, it's otherwise totally unfazed. My body throws itself into the morgue and stumbles about looking for the locker with Ms. Aria’s name on it. A diener working in the morgue sees this and shouts something at me. He looks angry, but I don’t understand a single word of anything he says. Then… it happens.

All thoughts leave what’s left of my sane self as I turn and lock eyes with the poor, unfortunate stallion. His eyes go wide with fear and somehow I can make out that ‘holy shit’ leaves his lips as he notices what’s causing my erratic behavior. I try to speak, but no words come. Only guttural gurgles and groans. I stumble and stagger towards him slowly. He makes a sudden movement- an attempt to flee- and then I come to understand how Ms. Aria had been so fast. In the blink of an eye, I tackle him to the ground and attack him like some kind of feral beast. My teeth sink into his flesh as he screams, his warm, metallic blood filling my mouth.

He tries to fend me off, but his efforts are futile. I was never a weak individual before, but now I am absurdly strong. Only a small shred of myself is left as I watch the life leave the stallion's body as I continue to maul him and rip him apart. There’s nothing I can do anymore. This part of me left is growing smaller by the second as the infection gains total control of my brain and body. The stallion stops moving but I continue to rip and tear into his flesh, consuming part of it and slinging the rest across the room. I’m stained in blood not of my own. Movement out the corner of my eyes catches my attention. I look over and see Maple twitching and jerking in her bed. My body throws itself off the stallion and gallops across the room until it comes to a stop in front of a cold locker.

My reflection shows how far gone I am, just how worse this infection is. It’s spread from my chin and up my head. It's consumed the majority of the right side of my face, wrapping around the side of my head and up my ear. My right eye is bloodshot and my pupil looks cloudy. The veiny growths of the infection have spread into my eye and nearly reach my pupil.

“I am so, so very sorry. Please, no matter what happens… it wasn’t your fault.”

No… I should’ve listened to her. I shouldn’t have waited. I’m sorry everypony… I... It’s not my fault… She... She said it wasn’t… It’s not my fault…

It’s not my fault…

It’s not my fault…

It’s not….

My fault…

It’s not…