Revelation

Chapter 1: Revelation

Earl groggily made his way out of the bed, it's tattered sheets sprawled out across the floor from his previous fit of unconscious rage. He looked around the room for several moments, trying to process where he was. The grey-coated unicorn bore several stains on his fur, a frazzled and out of place mane, and blood-shot, twitching eyes. Eventually, through the darkness of the room, he classified the decor as Fluttershy's cabin from his numerous visits with Twilight, and allowed himself to calm slightly. He instantly snapped back to attention worriedly, as sounds of screaming filled the room next to him.

One voice? No... Several... He thought, trying to piece-together the situation happening just outside of Fluttershy's guest room.

A dull buzz echoed throughout his mind as he began to overcome the sensation of waking up after his lengthy slumber, and a high-pitched scream caused it to clear completely as his ears perked weakly upwards in fear. At first, he thought it might be Twilight, but it was too high-pitched to be his marefriend. It quickly dawned on him that he was in Fluttershy's Cabin.

"Get her in the corner and watch her! I need to take care of these bloody windows!" a voice called.

The grey, waking unicorn hadn't heard the second voice before. He narrowed his eyes and tilted his head in thought, trying to search his memories for the voice, but found nothing. It was rather peculiar, a thickly-accented stallion, with a synth-effect to it? Earl quickly shook his head to dispel the irrational thought. But the voice just sounded so... ghostly.

It was time to investigate.

With a soft groan of exhaustion, Earl stretched his muscles, causing them to scream fiery insults in return. He wobbled momentarily and stumbled to his left, and bumped into a nightstand beside the tattered bed. A small vase of flowers toppled over and fell to the ground with the piercing sound of shattered porcelain.

The stumbling stallion paused and tried to regain his balance while his burning forelegs trembled slightly. He lifted his right hoof into view for further examination of the exhausted appendage.

"What the hell...?" he whispered to himself in confusion of the weakened limb.

Out of the corner of his blood-shot eye, Earl spotted one of the flowers that had fallen along with the vase. Directing his attention to it, he noticed how dead the small plant was. The color had faded substantially from it, and it was beginning to crumble.

"How long... Have I been out...?"

His thoughts were quickly cut short however, when more voices sounded from the other room. This one, he recognized instantly.

"They're breaking through!" Twilight shouted worriedly.

Earl's ears perked up once more, higher and more alert than before as he heard his marefriend's worried tone, but continued to see nothing through the dense darkness blanketing the room.

"I know! Just... Stay back! I'll try and hold them off!" the stallion's synthy voice called in response.

A loud crash echoed throughout the halls of the cottage, followed by another frightened scream from Fluttershy. Without any further investigation, Earl broke into a sprint towards the door of the guest room, barely visible on the other side. He had already heard enough to know that Fluttershy and Twilight were there, and were indefinitely in danger from the amount of screams and worried shouts.

His speed allowed him to savagely throw the door open on contact, adding to the burn in his muscles for a moment. The light from the living room blinded Earl momentarily, and caused him to recoil and shield his eyes. Twilight screamed from across the room at his frightening entrance, but her face brightened as soon as she noticed him.

"You're awake!" she shouted thankfully.

"He's awake?!" the stallion's voice called from the other side of the room, his own covered by a low groan from the outside of the cottage.

Earl knew he had heard the groan from somewhere, but discarded the thought and turned his attention in the direction of the voice. Standing against the boarded-up window, was a dark-blue, black-maned pegasus. The pony's eyes glowed a bright red as his hooves were held firmly against the wooden boards on the window. He quickly turned in the direction of Earl.

"Get over here!" the blue pegasus called.

The grey unicorn froze completely and looked to Twilight for a moment, as if to ask her what to do.

"We don't have time to explain!" the pegasus shouted.

The tone of the pegasi's voice, mixed with it's synth-y, and ghostly tone, caused Earl to snap out of his dumb trance. He looked to Twilight once more, who frantically pointed a hoof in the direction of the red-eyed pegasus as he struggled against the slightly-shifting boards. With a nod, the grey unicorn trotted hurriedly towards him as several more crashes sounded near the window the pegasus was propped against.

"What's going on?!" Earl shouted frantically upon reaching him.

"Do you know battlemagic?!" the pegasus asked in return.

"Tell me what's-"

"DO YOU KNOW BATTLEMAGIC?!" the pegasus asked again, his tone growing angrier, and more shrouded in ghostliness.

"Yes!" Earl shouted in return.

"Use it!"

Before Earl could protest, the pegasus pulled away from the window, allowing a plank to fall and leave a substantially large hole in the wooden barrier. Instinctively, the grey unicorn looked through the window. Several ponies were viciously trying to gnaw their way inside of the hole. He froze in terror as he briefly examined their their appearance, fresh blood falling from the lips of one pony, along with several bleeding wounds scratched across it's faded chest. All carried one trait, possibly the most frightening, two stone-white eyes, glowing brightly against the cold darkness. One word quickly wormed it's way in to Earl's skull at the ravaged appearance of the creatures.

No... Not here... Not them... he thought, his eyes spastically scanning the creatures, trying to make sense of what he was seeing.

"Mate, we aint' got time for this! Hit em!" the pegasus screamed angrily.

Earl snapped out of his trance and narrowed his eyebrows. Within seconds, his horn began to glow brightly, before discharging a massive flash of light. An ear-shattering boom sounded throughout the walls of the cottage, in synce with an array of bright magical bolts, that shot out of the window. The bolts hit most of the ponies gathering outside of the home with it's extensive spread, and sent them flying backwards in a spray of crimson-red blood. Fluttershy screamed in fear once more as the intense volume of the shot struck her like a punch in the gut, and tears began running down onto the yellow fur of her face.

"Shh... They need to do it... To keep us safe..." Twilight said, tightening her embrace as she shuttered as well.

The recently-awoken unicorn stared through the gap in the barrier wordlessly as the ponies outside squirmed, slowly being taken to their deaths as blood poured out of the holes in their skulls like a crimson river. Earl opened his mouth to speak, but was sharply cut off by a hoof pulling his neck, and slamming him into a nearby wall, cracking the wood and his neck slightly.

"Now..." the pegasus began in a grim tone. "Why the HELL were you screaming at 'Shy?! HUH?!" the red-eyed pony said, pressing his hoof against Earl's throat.

The unicorn gagged at the amount of pressure and struggled, trying to escape the grasp. Immediately noticing his attempts to escape the grip, the pegasus narrowed his eyebrows and brought his free hoof into view. With a flick of his foreleg, the hoof was instantly shrouded in brightly glowing blue sparks.

"Start talking, NOW!" he shouted, his voice growing ghostly again.

Earl shoved himself into the wall further and jerked around, trying harder to escape the grasp as as the sparks casted a shadow on the terrified unicorn's face.

"Static, Stop!" Twilight screamed, standing up and taking a step away from her sobbing friend.

The pegasus ignored her plea and moved his sparking appendage closer to Earl.

"You want a shit-ton'a volts?! Start talking motherfucker!" Static shouted, the red in his eyes intensifying.

Twilight narrowed her eyebrows and sprinted towards Static and Earl, across the room. Upon reaching the two, she shoved Static away and planted herself in front of the mortified unicorn defensively.

"Leave him alone!" the purple mare shouted.

"How... The hell... Did he do that?!" Earl asked, catching his breath.

"You saw him scream at Fluttershy!" Static shouted in return to the purple-maned unicorn.

"Seriously, his... It was like, all... Sparky..." Earl continued, scanning the floor absentmindedly.

"When a unicorn goes through too much trauma, they undergo a revelation!" Twilight replied.

"What the bloody hell does that mean?!"

"It means he didn't know who the hell he was! Now back off!" Twilight shouted, her voice growing angrier.

The vicious tone in Twilight's voice caused the sparking pegasus to retreat slightly.

"He never would've done that in his right mind!" Twilight said, her tone serious and firm.

For several minutes, a quiet tension hung in the air of Fluttershy's cottage, as only the silent sounds of breathing and the soft, rhythmic sobbing of a timid pony echoed lightly off of the walls. After a moment, Twilight turned around slowly to face Earl, keeping eye-contact with Static for as long as possible.

"How do you feel?" she asked quietly.

Earl looked to her, then to the hole in the window, scanning the floor again.

"I... Better than before... But, were those-?" he asked, cutting himself off of his choked voice.

Twilight looked away for a moment and took a deep breath before quietly eliciting her answer.

"Yes..." she said in a breathy tone.

Earl closed his eyes and inhaled deeply as he aimed his head to the ceiling. His mind searched frantically for what to say next. A massive array of questions swirled like a hurricane in his mind. Was she kidding? Was it global? He settled for a simple question, as to not snap again.

"How?" he asked, barely audibly, opening her eyes to look at her.

Twilight hesitated for a moment, scanning the room, and eventually bringing her eyes to rest on Earl's.

"We don't know... They just... Showed up... We've been stuck here for about a week now." Twilight replied, almost as softly as her coltfriend.

The grey unicorn's brown irises grew widely as the words left her lips.

"A week?!" he shouted.

Twilight nodded slowly.

"I've been out for a week...?!"

"A revelation takes time, Earl..." she replied, bringing a hoof up to rest on the unicorn's shoulder.

"R-Reva-what?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Yes... Are you still hearing voices?" she asked.

Earl paused for a moment. He hadn't thought about the voices since he'd woken up. After hearing nothing over the silence in the cottage, he slowly shook his head.

"No... How did you-?" he asked.

"I've been around a lot of guards with traumatic stress... The revelation allows you to go through recent events and process it all... The voices were just a way of your brain telling you to stay alert." Twilight replied, her voice filled with wisdom, like she always had when she explained things to him.

The grey unicorn nodded and slowly lifted a hoof to his head. No raging headaches, no voices... Nothing.

"I don't mean to interrupt... But, there are pressing matters." Static said, raising a hoof.

Twilight looked to Static for a moment, before nodding slowly and tugging lightly at her hoof on Earl's shoulder.

"Come on... We've got a lot to talk about." she said softly, pulling him over to where Fluttershy was recovering, Static following close behind.

Earl obliged, and let her hoof guide him as the questions continued cycling through his recently-cleared mind. She gently sat him down next to Fluttershy, who cowered slightly upon seeing him, but calmed as Static took a seat on her opposite side, his red eyes still glued on Earl, a scowl on his face.

"So... We've been trapped here for a week, like I said." Twilight said, sitting across form the three ponies. "Static has been picking the attackers off one-by-one, but they just kept coming..."

Earl looked up and to his marefriend, an eyebrow raised.

"So.. You think this might be... Everywhere?" he asked.

"Wait. He already knows what these things are?!" Static asked, placing a hoof towards Twilight.

"Yes. I told you that!" Twilight replied, slightly annoyed.

"Well hell, I didn't think you were serious. S'not everyday you meet a 'Zombie Expert'!"

Earl scowled at Static and looked back to Twilight.

"I already hate this guy..." he said under his breath, his eyes meeting hers once more. "You told them about it?"

Twilight nodded, her eyes closed.

"Yeah, she did. And I'm starting to think you had something to do with it, mate. You seem pretty calm about the whole situation, wouldn't you think?" Static said.

The grey unicorn sighed and looked to the dark-blue pegasus once more.

"You classified me as the 'Zombie Expert', didn't you?" he said in a slightly snarky tone.

Static raised an eyebrow and nodded slowly.

"Then shut the fuck up. Staying calm is essential."

The red in the pegasi's eyes intensified for a moment as he returned to his hooves, ready to lunge at Earl,

"Oh, I'ma' wail on you, mate." he said in a grim tone.

The pegasus was stopped dead however, as Fluttershy put a hoof in his way.

"J-Just... Let Twilight fill him in, please..." she said softly, her voice shaky from the recent fit of crying.

Static hesitated for a moment, but hesitantly sat down again, and looked to Twilight.

"Continue." he said in a reluctant, grim tone.

"Do we... Know if anypony has survived...?" Earl asked hesitantly.

Twilight shook her head reluctantly, causing Earl to look to the ground, and place a hoof under his chin in thought.

"We've got a lot of work to do..." he said quietly.