Chapters Feast
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I don't know how long I was out but I know that I never felt better, but sweaty? As if something was smoking, wait smoke? I jumped out of my bed and ran all over my little house. I opened the cabinets, checked the closet the stove, even the bathroom. Instinctively, I ran to the second floor of the house, and poked my head into the first room. I was covered in sweat by now, and adrenaline was only making it worse somehow. The first room was clear, so was the second but the third looked strange, shiny. I gasped when I realized what was on the floor, glass. The bedroom window had a crude, jagged hole in it, and on the floor, surrounded by glass, was a rock. I knelt down and looked it over, but there was nothing special about it. I then moved my gaze towards the window, but a fog covered my view, a hot fog. It took me that long to realize that the smoke was not from my house, and so I bolted to my door, fiddled with the lock and stepped out into the world before me. The sun, smoke and air hit me like a bullet, followed but by the light sense of copper, blood. I then opened my eyes, and immediately wanted shut them again. The world before me was not the world I knew, it looked more like Hell than the peaceful land that I had resided in for more than a year. Houses burned, the fires burning high into the daylight, screams of panic and fear filled the air. My ears rang from the destruction that was in front of me. I ran into the middle of the street and caught a glimpse of the citizens of Pony-Ville, they running but from each other? As I watched one tackled another and to my horror, bit straight into the neck-area. I began to sprint, but soon other feral-like ponies swarmed the dying one, and began their gory feast. I wanted to scream, but I couldn't take them all on, and that's when I saw it. Noble Dreams house, half on fire, half melting. Simple appeared in my mind, and I ran. It took all my might not to help the unknown pony being consumed alive by the feral one, but when a flashed a glace towards the group, one of them stared at me, making that moment the first time I caught I glimpse of the feral-ponies. Its eyes were white, in the sense there were no noticeable pupils to call eyes, and it was caked in blood, its mane dripping with the blood of its new kill. It opened it mouth, revealing a set of jaws not seen in ponies but something a shark would have. The thing snarled at me and went back to consuming its meal. I turned back, disturbed by what I saw, and was immediately hit by an unknown force. I fell on my back, as so did the other figure. I tasted blood in my mouth, dazed; I looked up to see the figure and was shocked. Isaac, Isaac Changeling. He wasn't disguised a pony like he normally was but he was in his changeling form. He looked scared, fearful, but of me, not anything else. I then realized, with the blood in my mouth and dazed look I had, I didn't look human at all. I tried to say something, but all that came out was a "Gugh-"as Isaac lifted me up with his telekinesis and threw me into the nearest building. I crashed into it with full force and sat uncomfortably on top of large pieces of wood. The pain was unbearable, I felt horrible. I wanted vomit, but I turned my head upwards, just as the rest of the house collapsed on me and everything went black.
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I woke up feeling like I had been hit by a freight train, my head was pounding and I could already feel the blood soaking my clothes. I was surprised I was still alive, living truly is a blessing. Without even opening my eyes, I knew something was wrong, it was quiet, there were no screams, collapsing houses or anything, just dead silence. I opened my eyes only to find myself covered underneath many large pieces of wood from the collapsed house. I tried to move, to look around, but my vision was obscured by the large mound on top of me and when I tried to, I sharp pain ran up my leg. I managed to see the problem; a small spike of wood was protruding from my leg. Luckily, I could reach and pull it out, and so, as I moved closer to the spike, one the ferals slowly trotted in. I slumped back into the mound, praying it wouldn't see me. It was the same one that growled and looked at me from earlier. It began to sniff the area, searching the collapsed house for food. I refused to be on the menu, I slowly began inching my way out of the mound, it seemed impossible but I was willing to try. I began to silently put wood on the floor. After what seemed like hours, my lower right arm was free. I moved my shoulder slightly, just to get comfortable for the rest of my body, when my shoulder touched a standing piece of wood making crash on the floor with large "THUMP". The creature reared its head in my direction, snarled and began to leap on the mound. I tried to escape as quick as possible but my leg wound only allowed me to get half of my body out. The creature jumped once more, this time landing on the piece of wood above my chest. I roared and brought its teeth down. I panicked and grabbed the large piece of wood next to me and hit it square in the mouth. It wasn't a hard hit, but the creature lost its stance and slipped. That gave me time and I quickly shed the wood off of me, and started to stand up. The creature roared once again, and charged. I wanted to run, but my leg let a sharp gust of pain, also at the same time the creature slammed into me. This time, it stood on me, and wasted no time bringing its jaws down on me. However I still had the piece of wood on me, and used it to block its jaws. I was panicking, and with all my might brought the wood upwards, directly into its neck. The creature recoiled and fell to the floor, growling and snarling. I stood up slowly, the adrenaline coursing through my veins, and I looked at the thing. "It isn't alive anymore, it isn't the person it once was", I thought. The creature was already trying to stand, and in a few minutes it would devour me. With these thoughts in mind, I raised the piece of wood above my head. The creature roared up at me one last time, before I drove the sharp end into its body. Again and again and again, and again. Warm blood splattered onto my pants and my shirt. Adrenaline was the only thing keeping me going, I couldn't stop. I continued the ordeal for what felt like years, the corpse in front of me looked unrecognizable, yet I continued. Finally I stopped, surrounded by a pool of blood, panting, I dropped the plank of wood and took 2 steps back before falling to my knees. The spike was causing me enough pain already. I couldn't just leave it there; my leg would be rendered useless. I took one last look at what had been Pony-Ville, before wrenching the wooden spike out my leg, screaming into the day.
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."
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.
Shock Wave was shouting, I didn’t know what it was, nor did I care. The only thing that came to my mind was Star Dust, as she opened a kit that she had, and screaming the only words audible since we stepped inside the house ; “AUSTIN!”. Somehow, those words sprung me into action and I moved beside Shock Wave. Star Dust gave us simple instructions, or at least, simple to her. She ordered me to wrap a pair bandages around the stump of the wing to stop the excessive blood flow, and for Shock to elevate Derpy’s hind legs in case he went into shock. I wasn’t a medical expert, but I wasn’t an idiot either. On the floor of the doorway stood a machete and right next to it the amputated part of Derpy Pant’s wing and on the wing was large, red bite mark. No one had done this to him; Derpy had done this to himself to prevent his own infection. I bent over Derpy but was instantly told to move back by Star. A pair of gloves and a medical mask was then thrown to me and Shock thanks to the wonders of pony telekinesis. I looked at them curiously and then to Star.
The breeze brushed my hair lightly, the smell of fall heartwarming, yet depressing. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Shock come out of the house. He rubbed his eyes gently with his hooves, yawned and spoke.
40 minutes. That’s how long it took for us to pack, scavenge the rest of the house, put Derpy in a hay wagon we found and begin to travel towards Everfree. Before we left however, I found a pair of flowers next to the bed Derpy was in. I don’t why, maybe it was instinct, but I took them and put them in my bag. I had volunteered to pull the wagon, mainly because I couldn’t stand watching them doing it. Another 10 minutes later, we had begun to climb a slanted, yet tall hill. The purpose of this was to be at ta better position in case of any other attacks. Sweat dripped from my face. I won’t lie, this was hard work, and I wasn’t the most muscular or strong. Pony-Ville wasn’t safe at all anymore when we left. There were infected and the higher we traveled, the more of them we saw. I was right; going to Canterlot would have been suicide. I turned back to the hill. Star and Shock were in front, keeping an eye if any of the infected were close by. I looked back to the wagon and to my surprise, I found Derpy sleeping. After he had told us where Slender was, we immediately made him rest. Poor guy I thought but I had question that kept nagging me. What was Derpy doing in Pony-Ville? If I was to guess where he would be, it would be with Colgate (his girlfriend), and she was nowhere close by. I wanted to ask, but it wasn’t the right time, or place for it. I gasped as we reached the top of the hill. I lay on my back on the dirt, panting and grateful we were here. I reached for my bag and took out an apple and bit into it deliciously. I had a clearer view of the force field now so I asked Shock for his binoculars, made myself comfortable, crouched and pointed them to Canterlot. The sight was not pretty, not even close. There appeared to be a number of openings around it, yet each one had its problems. There were a number of guards allowing other ponies inside, but for every 1 pony going in there was 1 infected pony waiting to assault the guards. In fact, even inside there were infected, ponies who had been fine going in, but had turned while inside. It was a horrible sight, blood stained the ground, and a feeding frenzy was ensuing. I moved the binoculars around focused on the inside and froze. Isaac and Dusk, two of my friends, helping a guard fend off a group of three of the infected. In short, they won, but I lost sight of them after. Instead I caught a glimpse of a dark and light pink mane, not Pinkie Pies but someone else; Shimmer. I moved around and saw the most of unlikely of people there, Kyle Mosley, a friendly, quiet pony, and he was beating an infected pony to death. The situation seemed hectic but under control. I wanted run down there and help them, but that would only guarantee my death. I lowered the binoculars, I had seen enough. I handed the binoculars back to Shock, stood up and moved back to Derpy.
Chapter 4:Blood and Chocolate
“It's give or take, I know it well”
The voices of my friends woke me up. Honestly I was kind of surprised I had slept at all. The sun was blinding, forcing me to squint just too barely make out my hand. I sat up and examined the room to find that I was the only one still in bed, even Derpy Pants was gone. The voices outside continued but I can’t make out anything they’re saying. It was then when I realized how cold it really was, and how close winter was. I rubbed my eyes furiously, the lack of sight annoyed me and the kaleidoscope-like shapes in my eyes weren’t helping. I slowly moved out of my bed, like an old man reaching for something on a high shelf. The hay was so tempting to just fall back into and sleep for a few more hours, but the voices and my nightmares made me push away the decision. It wasn’t long before I had reached the door and stepped outside. The wind was cold, yet bearable, the smell of fall felt so eerie and depressing, almost like it was mocking me; the perfect setting for the perfect disaster. My hand rose to shield the sun from my face, and I could make each and every one’s outline. It seemed like a pretty heated debate, with no real sides. I walked closer until everyone was aware of my presence. The chatter stopped then, but the looks on their faces didn’t change. Alaina, Shock, Star Dust, Derpy (in his wagon) and Slender were here. The mysterious pink pony that I saw earlier was nowhere to be seen. No one seemed to want to talk, and so, I began the conversation.
“SHOCK AND AUSTIN MAY COME IF THEY WISH, HOWEVER ANY FAULTS MADE BY AUSTIN WILL BE HIS OWN AND HE ALONE WILL ACCEPT THE CONSEQUENCES. DERPY PANTS WILL STAY DUE TO THE FACT THAT HE HAS NOT EVEN EXPERIMENTED WALKING AGAIN. ALAINA AND STAR WILL STAY TO TAKE CARE OF DERPY BUT ALAINA MAY LEAVE IF SHE CHOOSES. STAR WILL STAY TO CARE FOR DERPY WITH HER MEDICAL EXPERTISE. THIS IS FINAL….”
I was ready to the least, hammer, knives, map and binoculars. It was quite pathetic from a distance, especially when compared to Shock Wave who had a pickaxe, but it was all I had now. The 4 of us were ready and surrounding Slender with the exception of Shock Wave who was kissing Star good bye. It saddened me; the fact that anyone could die, even the ones who don’t deserve to or shouldn’t, that is why I was sad; but I tried to block the emotion out of my mind. Shock moved back to us and “stood” on guard. Slender spoke first;
Alaina rushed forward and “pulled” Kim by her shoulders with her hooves. The grey one held onto to her furiously, but Alaina still managed to shake Kim. She screamed at Kim, she screamed at her to tell her to calm down, that everything was fine, that it was Alaina and not a “monster”. Kim screamed and shook and cried. She was so scared the she couldn’t think clearly. She screamed and screamed until she finally looked straight at Alaina Kim hugged Alaina hard, sobbing and crying, relieved that her nightmare was over. It was then that I noticed Kim’s right eye. It was bloody and empty; there was nothing there, just an empty socket. I was horrified and sad by this, and so I bent down and sobbed while staring at Kim. Shock held back tears while trying to calm the other pony and Slender watched quietly. I sobbed because, even though we were late and Kim was hurt, she was okay and we made it. We had risked our lives and saved one of our own. I wanted to jump for joy and burrow my head my head in a pillow and scream while sobbing. I crouched there quietly sobbing while watching them both, listening very carefully to the words Alaina said to Kim while she stroked here mane, soft and gentle words which found a new hole to live in my mind.