Discord Space: Frozen Equestria

"Is anypony out there!? Oh Celestia, please help me!" Applejack rushed the corner. An earth pony with his chest open lay stretched out on the table. It looked like they were about to remove one of his lungs that bore several black spots. "Are you a doctor? Why is everypony else gone?" Applejack grabbed a roll of bandages and motioned to his mouth with it. He took a moment to stop crying. With that sorted, she moved around to the control table above. From there it would be a simple matter of getting the computer to enter maintenance mode. Exactly how she had gained stasis during the first hours of Station Luna.

A necromorph ran by the corridor outside. The patient below began to mumble in panic. "Shut up, okay? There's a necromorph outbreak, and if you keep screaming then they'll find us. Understand? I'll get the machine to sow you up, just find a RIG, and get out without being seen." Another necromorph appeared, this one moving slower than the first. It was searching. "Buck. Don't move, and for goodness sake don't cry." Applejack held her breath as the robotic arm began moving towards her, bringing the cutter closer with each moment.

There was no way she could tell if the movement would draw the necromorph in. Her breathing was level; every part of her body was devoted to not gaining its attention. The same couldn't be said for the patient below; across the room, his heart rate monitor was beeping very fast. Nerves got the better of her. Her left hoof started lifting upward, towards the cutter head. By then, the necromorph had walked through the doorway to join them in the room. The heart rate monitor had caught its attention. Her hoof came within centimetres of the cutter. Please go away, please go away.

"I can't take it!" The patient only had a few seconds at most to struggle free of his bindings before the necromorph started tearing off his legs. Applejack yanked the cutter free while his screams and blood sprayed the walls. It was a hard fact that she had learned the last time. Those who kept their head survived. And those who screamed simply didn't. "Help me!" His head hit the glass of the observation room with a rather sick splat. Either there was something inside his guts that the necromorph wanted, or it simply enjoyed slicing up intestines and spraying them around like a colt in the mud.

Four shots left two blades in what remained of her short-lived patient, the necromorph body falling away. "Still just as good. Time to see if it does the same to those guards." The cutter was difficult to sit right on her hoof without a proper strap. It worked at least, in a pinch she could take necromorph heads off. That wouldn't kill them, but for now, she didn't mind the idea of buying herself more time to escape. "Sorry partn'r. You probably would have gotten eaten on the way, or shot down by one of the guards." Her bare hooves shivered when they stepped into pooling blood. "At least I'm not totally gone then."

Her memory of the map wasn't pristine, but it would lead her in the right direction of a way out. The main doors made most sense, as surely they would be the largest, and therefore easiest to get through. Guards would be occupied with rescuing survivors to take much notice. And she did have a particularly lethal weapon at her disposal. The only main problem that she saw would be that other survivors would think the same thing. In particular, survivors who didn't know how to avoid getting necromorphs on their tail.

Without extra plasma, she couldn't do anything for them. And she wasn't exactly in the ideal position to acquire more. No access to storage rooms, and no way of simply making more herself. As if to prove that, she nearly rounded a corner right into the middle of a kill zone. Several guards had set up all manner of surgical tools designed for cutting in a firing range that covered the main hallway. Several varied bits of pony were scattered on the floor in front of them. "I swear I saw something peer around the corner. Just briefly."

That caused her to freeze. A grenade thrown in her direction would force her to kick it away, exposing her presence. "There! I saw it again!" She hadn't moved that time. If it wasn't me they saw... Her eyes slid to the right. This necromorph was unlike anything she had seen before. Notably a former Crystal pony, a hard shell of crystals had grown out of the head. The rest of the body looked rather thin in comparison, balanced against the extra weight on the head. Well, I never expected to see a new type of necromorph here. This should be interesting.

Cutting blades and lasers went wild when the necromorph charged right at the barricade. Applejack was intimidated enough by the loud wail it made in the process. "The bullets are bouncing off! Aagh!" A charger then, one variation in particular that she was very glad to have avoided on Station Luna. The Crystal ponies had declined participating in the project, how fortunate for her that had turned out. It would probably take a large calibre bullet to punch through the thick shell they grew when mutating. Such a weapon she couldn't have acquired.

It was several minutes before the final blare of a dead health readout faded away. A few of the guards hadn't been fatally wounded, bleeding to death instead. Applejack wasn't sorry about that. Several of them took it upon themselves to beat her during the first month. It was a horrible, yet deserved revenge that she didn't have to deliver herself. "Alright, down the hall is the suit room, right?" Pegasi layouts hadn't been her strong point at the academy. They certainly had a unique way of placing the facilities.

Somewhere ahead, she heard the screech of a lurker. "Buck, was it one of the patients? I wouldn't put it past this lot." Yet another cold reminder of just how lucky she had been to avoid assault of that nature. The screeches soon faded away, she could move on again. Down the hall was her destination, a door aptly named 'RIG Storage'. A firm buck broke the surprisingly weak lock. They probably hadn't counted on patients getting that far out of their cells. "I told them that they were slack with how they run this place. But does anypony listen to the one with an accent?"

An audio log lay on a table near the door. The room itself was rather spacious; three suit kiosks lined the left and right walls. In between, a menu for customising the RIG's sat idle. Nowhere near as cool as the liquid formation chamber for her advanced suit, but it would do alright. "Okay then, guess I have a few moments to get picky about colours and such." She paused to look at the audio log again. Usually she ignored such things, but it had caught her eye for a reason. On closer inspection, it turned out to be about her after all. 'Subject A: Designation, Marker Imbued. Experiment 6D'.

A female's voice did the reading out. "Report on Subject A, Experiment 6D. Our previous attempts to remove the subject from the advanced RIG have been unsuccessful. Conventional cutting methods that will not harm the subject have proven to be inferior to the repair function of the suit. After concluding that it would simply not be possible to remove the RIG from its body under those circumstances, we applied an electrical pulse to disable the power supply. Following that, it was a simple matter of cutting the material away. However, given the fact that such a RIG is useless to anypony but the one it was formed to, we have followed procedure and destroyed it. End report."

"Oh for crying out loud. Of course, if you can't use it, just burn the stinker. That logic always works out just great. Damn pegasi." She made her way over to the nearest kiosk. Gender was automatically determined, how that happened she really didn't want to think about. Eventually, she settled on a dark green base, with blue highlights for a nice blend. The visor colour she chose to keep as cyan. It felt more comfortable that way. "Alright, time to get probed by a weird machine that'll stick a snow suit all over me." Most importantly, the outer surface would be strong metal. She cared little for the canvas or plastic options.

This method of building RIGs was a new experience. The stores on Station Luna were admittedly cramped; these on the other hand required a pony to stretch their limbs out. Worse, she was plunged into darkness for a few moments when the doors closed, only to be blinded by intense light. Her straitjacket disintegrated, replaced by a proper RIG. "I'm surprised I didn't trip any alarms doing that. Then again, can't hurt to get a move on." She did the routine test, flexing her legs and moving her head. It felt very warm, without becoming uncomfortable. And more importantly, she liked the way the helmet closed up.

"This is how you rodeo in the snow." A locator and map were the key features to come with her RIG. Kinesis and stasis modules required a security code to unlock access to, those she could scavenge later. For now, she had her shoulder-mounted cutter back. "Spitfire, I don't know if you can hear me, but I'm heading out now. I got my hooves on a snow survival suit; I'll do my best to head for the Crystal Empire. See you whenever, I guess." There was a lot of static feeding back to her. A few words did make it through, though just barely comprehensible.

"-don't... Crystal Empire- ...overrun. Not... -north..." Buck. That was her idea for reaching safety out the window. Now she would have to rely on more of the Wonderbolts finding her alone. Which of course implied fending off necromorphs and guards while she waited. A blade tore through the wooden door, followed by a rapid assault that practically turned it into a pile of chips.

A twitcher, and she didn't have any way to use stasis on it. "I bucking told them that this is why we don't use wooden doors anymore!" Her cutter aimed right at where she guessed the twitcher blades would come through next. What remained of the door was weak enough to simply burst through. "Come on Pinkie Pie. Do momma proud, and hold still for a moment." As expected, a twitcher with a face full of splinters crashed through into the RIG room. Its left blade went flying off from two direct hits. In the stumble forward, Applejack rolled away to take out the other blade. The twitcher simply slumped to the ground with a gurgle. "You lot never were that tough anyway."

The new RIG turned out to be surprisingly light, yet it still had enough weight that she felt confident it would protect against attacks. She stepped through the hole left by the twitcher into the open corridor. Some of the file rooms and offices lay between her and the main door on the fastest route. The perfect chance to get a look at some of the other experiments performed on her, and hopefully work out why there was still a Marker signal on Equestria. That or inadvertently stumble on things she didn't want to see. The sort of things that had to be going on in a facility with completely vulnerable patients.

Every door in that part of the facility was wooden. For that matter, everything about it had a pre-war feel about it. Over thirty years ago now, and it didn't look older than a few years at most. "Well, it's not like anypony has really aged since Twilight became a princess. Maybe that affected anything built in that time too." It was a phenomenon that she had read about in the year following the war, mostly to keep her mind occupied. Ponies usually lived to about two hundred years old, until after the Elements of Harmony had been fully powered. Since then, anypony who entered adulthood simply stopped.

A pack of slashers entered the hallway while she fiddled with the lock. They didn't take much notice of her, even when she pushed it open and slipped inside. Much to her horror, both of her suspicions about what lay on each desk turned out to be true. Plenty of audio and text logs about experiments on many of the patients, most of a downright disgusting nature. Oddly enough, not a single one related to her in any way. As she progressed past each desk, taking each log as she went, it seemed more and more like her records had simply been hidden.

"-Subject R died shortly after. Evidence of the matter has been submitted to the appropriate authority for disciplinary measures. End log." Applejack had reached the end of the room at that moment. The body of a head researcher lay slumped against some cabinets. She could tell enough by the markings under his name that he oversaw a lot of the experiments. A single bullet round had gone through his chin into the head presumably. Almost appropriate, given just how many atrocities had gone on under his watch.

"In here! We need to destroy the records before she gets them!" More guards. She shoved the body aside to find one of the drawers unlocked. Subject A. Access Restricted. A firm tug yanked it open against the sticky coating of melting dead flesh. Inside, a single large device rested, one that immediately began downloading to her RIG. Great, so I'm gonna have to carry it around until it's done downloading. It slipped nicely into the main pocket on her chest, below the diagnostic screen of her suit. Moving it didn't seem to interrupt the download at least.

"There she is! Open fire!" A whole squad of guards were after her, ignorant to the pack of slashers that seemed ready to begin pulverizing them. Applejack barely managed to get out of the bullet haze that would soon become a bloodbath. Sorry fellas, I've got places to be, and necromorphs to kill. Enjoy the- A Crystal charger smashed into the wall right in front of her. The door out was effectively blocked off. Are you bucking kidding me? Actually, that's an idea. She swiftly turned around and kicked the necromorph right at the neck. Her hoof smashed through the glass-like flesh to leave a spray of glittering blood all over the door she intended to exit. An effective weak spot that could only be reached from the side.

From the door, it was a clear shot to the open world. Behind, the guards were having their own encounter with the slashers. "Have fun girls!" Lurker barbs flew by. An acid ball hit the wall above. Everypony was swarming towards the main doors, just like she was. "You can do this Applejack. Just a hard sprint, then you're out in the snow." The infamous garble of a twitcher came up behind her. How appropriate that just about every necromorph she had encountered before was there to watch her escape.

"Yeehaw!" Light that obscured her vision poured in through the open doors. The complex had been very dark with only emergency lights. Now, she galloped with every ounce of strength she had in her body. Blades punched into the floor behind each hoof beat. Barbs had difficulty catching up to her, despite their great speed. Even the twitchers weren't able to get close with their habit of dodging all the time. I'm out, I'm free! Her hooves touched metal outside the doors. At that point, she jumped.

There was one thing that she hadn't bothered to consider throughout the whole ordeal. The fact that every guard and scientist in the complex was a pegasi. Her hooves didn't meet ground, only air. It was not an earthquake that knocked out the power throughout the facility, more likely a hard gust of wind that broke the cloud's anchor cable. A floating facility, and she definitely wasn't near any big mountains. All of that passed through her mind while she fell through the whipping blizzard. How ironic that after such a dramatic exit, she would end up as a splatter on the snow. Nopony could survive such a fall.