Feast

I was limping, and every step felt like having a large needle stabbed into my leg. I didn't know where I was going; I just felt the need to move away from the corpse that was unrecognizable thanks to me. I was in shock, tears burning my face, I was hyperventilating, my heart wanted to explode, I wanted to dig a hole in the middle of the ground and hide in there forever, but instead I stopped, bent over and breathed. What have I done? You killed someone; you took that piece of wood and ended his life. But it wasn't itself anymore, it was, a monster. I needed to get myself together; I took in deep breaths, slow and big. Pony-Ville was deserted, there was no-one anywhere, alive or not. A certain emotion swept, over me, a strange sort of depression, the cause being that I couldn't do anything or go anywhere, I was lost. A few seconds after my last thought, the memory of my friends flashed into my mind, they could be dead or worse, I wanted to make sure they were alright, but that only made my sadness worse. I then focused my attention more on Slender, if anyone knew more about this he would, but the problem was, I didn't know where he lived. Crap he must have told me a bunch of times. Then my thoughts shifted back to my friends in general, I had to find out if they alive, but I was in no condition to do so, and so, I headed back towards my house, a plan forming in my mind.

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In about half an hour, I had strapped a large bandage over my leg (plus alcohol), several knifes in a pouch, and a hammer in my right hand. I pulled out the mini-map that I had and looked over to the closest house that belonged to someone I knew. It was close, and it belonged to Shock Wave. Unlikely he was even still there but he was the only pony that lived near here other than Noble, Kim, Rainbow Blitz and Callie. . My mind ran over the total amount of people that I had to find. Wow, I have my work cut out for me, and with that, I started walking. On my way to his house, I searched the other ones, only to find food, money and a corpse, all of which I took, except the corpse. Despite what had happened, I still searched Noble's house, only to find more bodies and bullet shells. Where Noble had gotten a gun, I had no idea. Finally, I reached the front door of Shock's house. Surprisingly, it was one of the few houses not looking completely damaged. I pushed the door open, only to be greeted by several bodies, none of which, were Star Dust or Shock Wave. I began to climb the stairs, slowly, quietly. If a zombified Shock Wave was waiting for me I didn't want to be caught surprised, so a gripped my hammer in one hand and my knife in the other. I found his room, and pushed the door open. I stepped inside, only to find nothing, in fact, the room looked very untouched. I turned around, as almost screamed as Shock Wave charged at me with a voice full of rage. He tackled me onto the ground on the floor of the room, and began to continue beating me anywhere he could. At least he's alive, I thought. I violently shoved the pony of me and readied my hammer. I was right; he was alive, alive and trying to kill me. The push managed to get him to notice me, his expression changed from angry to surprise. "Austin?" I nodded my head but before I could speak, we both froze at the sound of the all too familiar snarl of an infected pony, coming from downstairs, slowly moving towards the stairwell. We stood there for a few seconds before slowly inching away from the room and to the top of the stairway, careful not to make a sound. We peered down, and saw the feral pony, sniffing the air, looking for food. I then realized my failure. My leg had stopped bleeding but a medium sized spot of blood was still noticeable, even through the bandages. I had no idea whether or no these monsters cared much for smell but it certainly looked like it. Shock Wave saw this too and a look of fear spread over his face. I ignored it and looked back to the feral. It was directly below us, walking around. I was at a loss of what to do, but Shock began moving to the opposite hall. He entered the last room and came back out with a table. I was confused even more so as tried to put it over the railing. I got the idea then, and so I helped him get it over the railing and we waited for the perfect moment. The feral moved closer, closer, perfect! We pushed the table off, watching the table fall, trapping the monster under it. I moved closer, but Shock Wave moved faster, and beat the creatures head into a pulp. I was shocked, but I kept that to myself. "Nice to see you too Shock." I said. "In case you haven't noticed, it's okay to be too careful" he responded. He had a point; it wasn't Trust-Everyone-You-See Day. I then asked "Where is Star Dust?" "Upstairs, she's fine; we managed to hold up here when these things appeared."
"What happened?"
"I don't know, we didn't notice until a small crowed was running and soon after them another and another and another."
I nodded, and we made our way upstairs and we recovered Star. She seemed fine despite the horror that they both just witnessed. "Hey." She looked up, in shock and both happiness. "Hey! How did you get here?" she asked. "Long story" I responded stupidly.
Shock spoke up then "So where are you headed?"
"Originally to find you guys, seeing as how you were the second closest to my home"
"What about Dreams?"
"Gone, no trace of her anywhere but I wouldn't count her out."
"Did you find anyone else?"
"No, you both were the first."
"What do you suppose we do?"
"Leave, the more you both move the better chance of you finding a safe location. Celestia has to be taking some form of action towards this."
"And you?"
"I don't know, I might look around, see if I can locate anyone else"
"This place is infested with those things!"
"I know but the chance that someone might still be alive here keeps me here."
Shock wave paused and looked at his hooves, deep in thought. At the moment, Star spoke up.
"Maybe we should go with you?"
"What?"
"I mean, we would be better off as group right?"
I stared at her blankly, she was right but we would be more vulnerable mobile and I didn't want to be the cause of their deaths.
"No, it's too much of a risk; I can't be the reason why you both end up dead."
"You won't, this is our decision. Not much of a choice anyways. We're going." Shock said.

I looked at them both considering the possible outcomes of this. There was a second choice for them both, they could go to Canterlot and make it but it was obvious they weren't moving if not with me. "Fine I said let's go".

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Next on the list were Rainbow Blitz and Callie along with Kim. We slowly walked our way to RB's place, mainly because my leg was not helping. I noticed during this time I caught Shock peeking several times at my leg. He looked away each time I noticed him. We discussed our (very) limited knowledge about the ferals when Shock said "Why do you call them ferals?" It was a good questions Shock kept calling them the Z word but I stuck with ferals. "I don't know, maybe because I don't like the other name." Shock nodded then stared at the ground and stopped moving, then so did Star Dust. I stopped as well and followed their gaze. It lead to a pool of blood but not a dried one like all the other here, it was fresh. We followed the blood trail carefully to its destination, a house, not of anypony we know. I pushed open the door; hammer in hand, just in case the pony inside wasn't himself or herself anymore. I opened the door, to have the strong smell of fresh blood viciously attack my nose, and to my horror, I saw freshly severed wing on the floor along with a machete. My mouth was wide open as I looked towards the bed that stood in front of the door to the right side, and recognized the gray, unconscious, yellow haired pony lying on it. Shock and Star were already moving towards Derpy Pants, trying to stop the bleeding, Star was screaming at me to help, but I was frozen, their pleads fell upon numb ears. I felt like I was hit by a grenade, my ears ringing from the blast, when at that moment, a leaf flew into the room and landed in one of the puddles of blood. It wasn't a green leaf but a read one blending in perfectly with the blood. I forced myself to move then, when an unrelated yet very horrible realization came to me. It wasn't summer anymore, fall had begun.