A QUIET PLACE ~ EQUESTRIA GIRLS

C.S.P.B. PAX.

C.S.S.M.L.—N.D.S.M.D.

V.R.S.N.S.M.V.—S.M.Q.L.I.V.B.

Day 9

I’m told this journal used to be Sunset Shimmer’s, whoever that may be. Lots of people are missing now. Found this on the floor of a torn-up school hallway, under piles of trash and ripped-off lockers. Miss Pie recognized the symbol on the cover. I scavenged all notebooks I could find, but Miss Pie tells me this one has something special about it, as her missing sister once told her. Even though the statue has been demolished by a wild semi that blew up, she thinks her sister Pinkie, her friends, and Sunset cannot get back to us from the other side, whatever that means, and would want to know why through the journal.

Almost sounds like she’s in denial, but Miss Pie’s even tone somehow shows conviction.

Anyway, I’m going to roll with it and try to offer a testimony of some kind for whomever finds this. Something to remember us by.

So far, I’m joined by Miss Maud Pie, and her sister Marble, who used to own a rock quarry they called a farm, losing two another sister and parents. Maud also has her boyfriend, Mud Briar. I crossed paths with them while scavenging at Canterlot High, alongside a Miss Wallflower Blush, an only child without her own parents. From the local orchard, one Big Macintosh and his youngest sister, Applebloom. They’re also missing a sister from the ensuing chaos and bloodshed, with their grandmother who raised them now bedridden. Then coming to the Parish Hall from Crystal Prep are Mr. Shining Armor, his wife Mi Amore Cadenza (Cadence), and their infant Flurry Heart. Armor’s sister is also lost someplace.

Again, so many of us are missing loved ones.

As for me, my name is Solace Sheen. I’m a scavenger and survivor at Holy Cenacle Parish, where the Church, school, and Divine Providence Hall serve as a refuge for stragglers. I happened to find a pair of toddlers; sound asleep after all hell broke loose. Miss Pie told me their names are Pumpkin and Pound Cake, whose parents used to own a bakery and ice cream parlor in town. She said Pinkie told her all about them in letters before she, herself, moved here. It’s a miracle they’re alive to begin with, praise God! I decided to bring them to my home Parish, where we’re starting a place for survivors seeking shelter and necessities. Other, both from inside and out of the Parish, also joined in with all they have to offer.

But there’s always the danger of growing sounds that come with growing numbers.

Which brings me to how this all started. The radio and TV interrupted everyone’s baseball games and favorite shows on July 25, 2020, the Feast of St. Stumble Neath. I’m just going to refer to each day onward by counting up after that date. A special news report stated how a meteor shower was sweeping across the Northern Hemisphere and entering Earth. Satellites were wiped out, but thankfully the ISS didn’t suffer too much damage. Big cities were hit the hardest first. Not by the meteorites themselves, but what was on them.

All of us at this small urban area, several miles from the closest major city, were not sure what to make of anything. Until they showed up.

They went after anything and everyone that was making noise. All the screams, horns and sirens were silenced in no time at all. Those who avoided the first onslaught hunkered down under tables, busted cars, fallen debris, staying absolutely quiet as we watched one of them passing slowly from up close. So tall and limber, but also lean and deceptively lanky. It walked on all fours, though the front legs were folded as if crawling on elbows and wrists. It has long, razor-sharp appendages that can tear through steel and solid brick. It pulled down the giant water tower, by itself.

But that’s not all. Not even close. Its head had no eyes, no visible ears, or even nostrils or gills. What it did have was the shell of the hardest exoskeleton I’ve ever seen. With a mouth full of long teeth, like dozens of scimitars and daggers. It made clicking sounds like a dolphin, before it shrieked worse than a wild animal. It would move its head around, as if to pick up a scent, before it did something else next.

I don’t know how else to describe it, but it opened up its head. The exoskeleton flexed different parts of its skull to reveal flesh and giant ear canals. I didn’t realize I held my breath for so long, until I felt the pain in my chest and saw red flashes. Suffice to say, I only survived because it picked up another noise further out, and it made a mad dash towards it screaming like a banshee.

9 days later, we’ve been told through HAM Radio and earphones how the military’s response has made little impact on them. They’re spreading their numbers across whole continents, and into the Southern Hemisphere. It seems the only places that aren’t hit are those islands far from the meteors’ path, like Hawaii and Australia. Turns out these things don’t know how to swim and smart enough to avoid deep water.

I started scrounging through wreckage as quietly as possible, finding notebooks and pads of paper to write on. Technology here’s been reduced to whatever electricity and generators are still working. That’s when I came across this journal, Miss Blush, Miss Pie, her boyfriend and sister, and other stragglers near the damaged high school looking and waiting for their missing siblings, friends, and Sunset Shimmer. So, I carefully brought them with me back to Holy Cenacle, where Fr. Redmane Farmer's starting a silent help and prayer center. We even started removing the noisy pews, one each day, for more floor space. They’re also tall enough to tip over and use for cover, as well as makeshift insulation for the winter months.

Thing is though, we have to do everything so painfully slow, because the second someone makes a noise we have to stay absolutely still ‘til the danger passes. Thankfully, so far, we’ve been spared by a deer, squirrel, raccoon, or crows drawing attention away from us. But we can’t just push our luck and test Providence for much longer. We’re also setting up our own sound decoy systems, for when they get close to us again.

Then there’s the issue with small children, who just don’t know better because they can’t. Whatever the Cakes gave their toddlers to stay asleep during the slaughter must’ve been something given regularly. None of us had the foresight to know what was coming. I went looking around at the Cakes’ address, seeing what I could find. Seems to be a feeding solution that you mix in water that the little ones are affected by. Cadence and other new mothers can also save and share some of the milk for orphaned babies to help soothe them. Another reason to be thankful is the fridges and ice boxes at the Parish Hall that still work.

So far, we’ve kept the little ones in an enclosed space with old theatre curtains hanging for sound absorption. That’s been working fine so far. But again, we can’t just rely on that. And we can’t expect them to learn quickly and imitate their parents to stay quiet.

As for health issues and medical needs, my cousins and neighbors have made trips to all the pharmacies and stores in town. They even collected oxygen tanks and sound-proof boxes on their last trip this morning. Thanks be to God!

That’s the one thing I’ve picked up from surviving so far. Something that might last years or generations while these things are still alive on Earth. There’s always a reason to be thankful, especially the gifts found in having each other, and the hope for a future. Both during, and after this terrible danger.

I’m not saying I have all the answers, like how to survive or why this is happening. Nor is this a new flood, since God’s promise to Restfulness obviously still stands. Otherwise, we’d all drown with them.

All I can say is this: There’s an even greater evil we can’t sense, compared to what can kill the body. Long before these things showed up. An evil that does attack our souls and hearts, and even seduce us to despair, apathy, reckless abandon and depravity. But we’re also given a free will to resist, and to trust in the power of someone no evil can outlast or dare to touch.

But that’s the thing, too. We do have a choice, whether to give in or fight back. And from what I heard about this Sunset Shimmer and those with her, their friendship is a strong reflection of that divine power. I see no reason why we can’t strive for that same holy resistance amongst ourselves. Something that’s given to us over-abundantly by silent, gentle Grace.

Amen.