//------------------------------// // Pestilentia (Part 2, Chapter 4) // Story: The Harbingers of the Apocalypse (In Preambulis De Apocalipsi) // by Matthebrony //------------------------------// The mares headed out, still chatting, until they got to their hotel rooms, which were already set up with their things. Save for Twilight’s, which remained unpacked due to of her involvement in the investigation, and Pinkie’s, due to her illness. Twilight took a quick shower, which was punctuated by repeated attempts to keep herself awake, it had been a very long day, and she realized that she had spent the entire night looking at constellations and the entire day looking for clues. All she did was groan when she saw the notice that had been left on her counter by her friends to remind her of her meeting with the detective and overzealous doctor. One taxi carriage and short walk later, Twilight found herself at a tavern. “Really?” She asked rhetorically as she eyed the name doubtfully “The Tipsy Filly”. She walked in and scanned the room for any sign of the ponies she was meeting with. She finally saw them at the bar, immediately wondering why she hadn’t seen them before, as Dr. Oxyde’s drink was glowing so brightly that Twilight was pretty sure it was radioactive. They waved her over and she took a seat beside them, seeing that Noire only had a small glass of amber liquid, a strange contrast to the fluorescent pink of Oxyde’s. “I didn’t know you meant literally getting drunk.” Twilight said as she approached the two. Noire smiled as she approached, but Oxyde still sat with her hoof to her forehead. “I’m pretty sure the doc means everything she says, especially when it comes to alcohol.” Noire jovially slapped the doctor on the back, which just elicited a grunt and making her move slightly to the side. “She in one of her moods, it’s about her little watch. She’s never run into something it couldn’t read before.” “That’s what she’s upset about? I’m sure we’ll figure it out.” She said to the beige pony, who just continued to slouch unhappily. “Look, once Pinkie gets better we’ll see what we can do about the strain, for now let’s just celebrate our new lead!” “She’s not going to get better.” Came a muffled voice, Oxyde had put her face on the table and spoke from there. Twilight gave her a curious look; this was different from her sugar-fueled tantrums or her regular cheery demeanor. “What are you talking about doctor?” Twilight poked at the pink mane as she waved down the bartender. “Nothing.” She straightened up and took another sip of her drink, making Twilight wince. “By the way, what IS that?” The bartender brought over Twilight’s drink, a simple glass of hard cider. “That, my junior detective, is an Atomic Bubblegum Cocktail.” Noire patted the glowing glass container before continuing. “It’s been the stuff of nightmares and no one ever stomachs it except her. I tried a glass of it once and spent the next day lying sick in bed, vomiting pink liquid sugar and bubblegum.” Twilight looked down at it dubiously before grinning mischievously. “I’d try it.” She said. Noire narrowed her eyes at the purple unicorn half-jokingly. “I once poured this stuff on quartz. It took thirty seconds to turn into rock candy.” “I don’t think that’s possible.” She said, pulling the container over hesitantly. Doctor Oxyde perked up slightly at the prospect of someone potentially dying at her hand. She simply looked on as Twilight levitated the drink towards herself and eyed it dubiously. “Seriously, my cousin put a pet hamster into a vat of it. When the doctors got all the crystallized sugar and gum out of it, the thing still hiccuped bubbles for a week.” Noire’s efforts to stop the unicorn went unnoticed, she only swirled it around for a moment before tipping her head back and pouring a small amount of the slightly thick liquid in her mouth. Oxyde grinned, Noire covered her eyes. The first thing Twilight became aware of was the tear-inducing, throat-clotting, thought-blocking sweetness. After that, the viscosity caught up with her and she realized that she could actually chew it; a very small amount of gum was mixed into the formula, which gave it an eerie liquid-solid sort of texture. She felt the alcohol mixed in burn her mouth and throat slightly, but couldn’t draw her attention away from the sickening sensation of the drink being way too sweet. “That is seriously disgusting, how do you actually drink that?” She asked Oxyde, pushing the drink back to her. “I don’t, not normally. I only have these on special occasions, as long as it has sugar and maybe alcohol, I’m happy.” “Don’t worry Twilight, you probably won’t die. You only had a sip of it.” Noire confirmed, taking another drink. “That stuff is…ridiculous. I’m not even sure if Pinkie Pie could stomach it.” She put a hoof to her chin, then rolled her eyes. “Scratch that, I’m pretty sure she’d love it.” At the mention of Pinkie, Dr. Oxyde shifted guiltily in her chair and fell silent once more. “Come on doc, your silly little stopwatch couldn’t read a chemical, big deal.” Noire said dismissively. Doctor Oxyde frowned and sighed. “It didn’t read wrong, if this thing can detect a ten-thousand year old poison then it can decode a little virus.” She pulled out the device and looked at it as she spoke. “But you said it couldn’t-“ “I know what I said; it wasn’t the place or time.” The doctor pulled over her drink and dipped the bottom of the device into it. “See? My watch is always right.” She handed it over to Twilight, who read the results aloud. “Search indication results, compound composed of twenty-five percentile levels of both alcohol and bubblegum, sugar level is…one-hundred fifty percent? Doctor, I think your machine is faulty.” “No. It’s right.” She took it back and placed it on the table, spinning it around while propping her head up on one hoof. “I said earlier that it could read a simple virus, well this isn’t a simple virus, it’s a very complex virus. That’s probably what took the machine so long. The transfusion mixture of the subject’s blood and the viral strain was a bit confusing, but it managed to separate the data into two categories. The virus was interesting, its composition looks a lot like cellular structure, to the point where it might even be a specific organism bonded to the virus but…that’s all inference of course.” Dr. Oxyde looked like she was about to go on an hour-long rant, but paused and hesitated before plowing on. “I didn’t think it would be worthwhile to check the blood sample. After all, once the separation was complete there shouldn’t be anything too interesting in the separate batches but I decided to check anyways.” She looked at the pocketwatch sitting on the counter and sighed once. “The hemoglobin was pretty conclusive, but there was one thing I noticed during my check, her leukocytes were pretty much completely depleted. Her immune system is almost nonexistent right now. I took a closer look at the red blood cells and saw the decreased activity, the low diffusion rate, the low nutrient level and well…” She flipped open the watch and pushed it over to Twilight. “All signs indicate that Pinkie Pie is dying.” ----- Twilight stared from the results, to the doctor, then back again. After a long moment, she simply smiled and shook her head. “That’s just not possible; she looked fine when we went in.” She bartered, sliding the watch back to Oxyde. “The agent is by no means dramatic; it’s very quiet, and very calm. While we were in there, she only looked tired sure, but I’m afraid that that’s all we’ll see.” She replaced the device and turned back to her drink. “You watch is malfunctioning then, I don’t think…it doesn’t make sense.” Twilight was only half trying to pay attention to the doctor’s claims; the other half of her mind was devoted to not analyzing the evidence in front of her, denial was much easier than any other alternative. “Don’t be a child,” Oxyde responded chidingly, not noticing the irony in her statement. “I know it’s not easy, but you have to accept it. You don’t get anything out of denying it.” Twilight stared at the counter, swabbing her hoof across a stain absent-mindedly. “I don’t want to talk about this.” Twilight Sparkle wasn’t normally quick to cut someone off, the images and emotions were just too much to handle, she felt a lump forming in her throat. To acknowledge the ideas would be to admit there was some truth to them. “Twilight, you should be at the hospital, I’m not sure how much time-“ “Quiet doctor. Your watch is wrong, Pinkie needs rest, and I don’t want to disturb her.” Twilight’s voice was firm, but still kind, as if insisting that what she was saying was nonsense. It was a tone she used oftentimes with Spike when he was being uncooperative. “No one wants to die alone!” The doctor insisted, tightening her jaw, but refusing to make eye contact with Twilight. “I don’t need you to listen to me, I don’t need you to know I’m right, I definitely don’t want to be right, but…just keep an ear out. For me, all right?” When Twilight only responded with silence, Oxyde turned to Noire. “Calm down, both of you, we should enjoy ourselves, this case is almost solved,” She put a hoof on each of their shoulders and pulled them closer. “We can worry about tomorrow when tomorrow comes, that’s why alcohol exists!” She waved over the bartender and ordered a refill for both herself and Twilight’s drinks. “I guess you’re right Noire.” Oxyde said, grinning at Twilight lopsidedly. “Let’s put this behind us for now, agreed?” “Agreed!” Twilight responded, grabbing her drink from the counter and taking a sip, sweeping all worries about Pinkie from her mind. “All right, should we do a bit of review?” Noire asked, pulling out her clipboard. The doctor, as if just noticing it, gave the detective a curious look. “Hey, where’s your notepad?” An annoyed look came across Noire’s face as she eyed the clipboard with contempt. “It got temporarily confiscated, my partner drew clop in it…again.” “Notepad? I’m guessing the one on your cutie mark?” Twilight gestured to Noire’s flank, on which sat a small, vertical, spiral-back, black-covered notebook, which Noire looked back and smiled at. “Yep! Got it when I was a kid, used it to solve my first case and every case since!” The detective responded proudly before turning her attention to Doctor Oxyde, who was staring interestedly at a wall, lost in thought. “What’s up kid?” “Is this the same partner as before?” “Yup, still stuck with Ellie.” She responded, rolling her eyes at the unknown antics of her companion “I like her, she’s funny.” Oxyde said, taking the swivel straw she had brought to the bar out of her drink and licking some of the pink, sticky fluid off. “And she gives me candy.” “That’s because she doesn’t believe you’re not my daughter…or y’know, not a child.” Noire said skeptically. “Regardless, there are perks to this whole being a kid thing; the candy is only one of them.” She replaced the straw in the glowing drink and took a long sip. “Maybe one of those perks is flirting with a baby dragon.” Noire mumbled in an undertone next to Oxyde’s ear. The filly immediately choked; gooey pink fluid spraying out of her nose, as her mouth as still wrapped around the straw. She withdrew her head and coughed as Noire giggled. Once she had recovered, she glared at the detective. “Shut up! Stop laughing!” This only made her laugh harder, much to the doctor’s annoyance. “What’s going on?” Twilight asked, she hadn’t heard Noire’s stealthy remark, and was confused as to why Oxyde had sprayed her glowing drink all over the opposite wall, which the bartender was now mopping up. “Nothing, I’m just teasing the good doctor about her little crush, isn’t that right Oxyde?” She leaned in and cocked an eyebrow at the short mare, who immediately glowed red and turned away, humiliated. “Crush? On who?” Twilight asked before taking another sip of her cider. “Bartend! Another drink!” Oxyde shouted before Noire could answer. “What do you want?” The pony tending to the clientele asked. “If this thing reads one hundred and fifty percent alcohol, you’re doing it right.” She responded, flashing her watch at him. She then turned to the grey unicorn next to her. “Hey Noire, heard you were looking for a roommate.” A dubious glance was cast back at the filly. “That’s right, you interested?” “Not in the slightest, it would impede me to have someone living in a room adjacent to mine. I haven’t found a way to muffle the screams yet.” She said, smirking at the concerned expression on Twilight’s face. Just then, the stallion tending to the bar came back with a drink, which he slid to the doctor. “This is called ‘The Hammer’.” He said as she picked it up. “I’d recommend you find someone to take you home before you drink that.” She picked up the small shot glass containing a dark brown fluid and raised it in the air. “I hereby leave all my earthly possessions to Noire. I just want you to know that I’ll haunt all of you once I’m gone.” “What’s with the speech?” Twilight whispered to an amused-looking Noire. “She’s had this drink before, she does it every time.” “-and I leave full control of Mann and Sons Munition Concern to Barnabus Hale. Cheers!” She threw her head back and drank the entire glass, then fell forward onto the counter, fast asleep. Twilight looked worried, but Noire simply cast a bored look in her direction and took another sip of her drink. “Are you sure she should be drinking?” The bartender asked, ruffling his feathers in concern that he was giving drinks to a minor all night. “You must be new.” Was all Noir responded with before turning to her lilac companion. “I think the doc’s got it for your little buddy in the hospital.” “What? Spike? Really?” “I think so, I’ve never seen her blush before, but then again I don’t tease her all that often.” She looked over at the smaller pony’s sleeping form. “Wow, I don’t really know what to say.” She put a hoof to her chin in thought then started wondering aloud. “Oxyde’s about twenty-five, Spike is...I don’t know how old in pony years, then there’s the difference in species…it’s pretty weird.” “No it’s not…you think?” “A little.” “Nah, it’s cute.” Noire finished her drink and stood up. “At least, I think it is, anyways, I’d better take her home, it’s been a long day and she’s already bestowed everything she owns on me if she dies.” “I’d better head back, too; my friends are probably all sleeping. It’s been a long time since I’ve been to a bar, we don’t have very many in Ponyville.” Noire propped Oxyde on her back, the pony’s tiny figure draped over her shoulders. “Wow, she’s pretty heavy. All that candy probably isn’t doing her weight any favors.” The detective groaned. They walked outside the bar into the cold Manehattan night air; Twilight hailed a carriage for her friends and the two unicorns faced each other one last time before they parted ways. “I’ll try to keep you updated on the case all right? I hope you and your friends enjoy the city, it’s awesome here.” “Hrblstufr.” Oxyde gurgled unintelligibly from Noire’s back. “Good-bye doctor.” Twilight said, smiling at the semi-unconscious pony. “Seyalatr…” She trailed off, her half-formed good-bye cut off by snoring. “Bye Twilight.” Noire nodded at the unicorn, then stepped into the carriage, stating their destination to the ponies pulling it. As the taxi disappeared in the night, Twilight got an untouchable sadness in her heart, she felt like, for a moment, the goodbye felt permanent. She shook her head to clear her thoughts, and started on the trip back to her hotel. ----- Twilight Sparkle woke up to the sound of knocking; hardly a welcome noise while it was still dark which, she observed it was. She sat up, bleary-eyed, mane a wreck, and trotted over to the room’s entrance. A glow surrounded the handle and twisted it, pulling the door open, revealing a frantic Rarity. “Twilight, I just got a letter…its Pinkie Pie.” “What? What’s wrong? “She asked, shaking herself awake. “I’m not sure, they didn’t say. It sounded urgent though.” A stab of panic ran through Twilight as she remembered the doctor’s warning. “Get ready, we need to get to the hospital.” --Three hours earlier-- Moonlight filtered through the large windows as Pestilence walked into the emergency ward, his soft footsteps pattering on the linoleum floors. He hummed softly to himself, the tune bouncing eerily around the room and falling upon the deaf ears of all the sleeping patients lined up along the corridor. He scanned the beds casually, looking for a specific patient. The darkness was only disturbed by a single dim glow shining from behind a curtain. A single doctor was leaning over a desk, busying himself with a few patient filing reports. The quill scribbled across the parchment, the eerie tune that was echoing around the room had dissipated. The first hint the doctor received that indicated he wasn’t alone in the hall was when a sticky, slick hand reached out and cupped around his mouth, effectively silencing his muffled shout of surprise. A simple incapacitation charm later, Pestilence straightened up and glanced over at the contents of the desk. “This could be useful.” He mumbled to himself as he picked up a list of the patients and scanned it, flipping a page whenever he needed to. “P…p, p, p…ah, Pinkie Pie.” He tossed the clipboard over his shoulder and gave a mumbled thanks, to the pony lying unconscious on the floor, whose muzzle was now stained green from the angel’s grip. Just as Pestilence turned to continue, he did a double-take back towards the desk, spotting a letter opener lying near the head of the wood surface. He grinned and scooped it up, giving it an experimental flip before catching the head of a wider, thicker blade on the tip of his finger, the new knife coated in a thin, glimmering sheen of poison. The back-and-green weapon floated off of his finger and hovered next to him silently; weaving and bobbing alongside it’s wielder with every step he took. As he followed the clipboard’s projected path, he subconsciously reached out and ran his hand along the wall as he walked, spreading a thick trail of sickness across the clean white surface. After a bit more walking, he finally reached her bed. She was asleep, like every other resident of the hospital was after midnight. A smile creased across Pestilence’s features as he walked slowly over to the side of the bed and sat down. He looked down at the sleeping pony and felt the smile slip from his face. She didn’t really deserve this. When he had first met her, did she cower away like everypony else that laid their eyes on him? No, she had greeted him, extended a hoof in welcome, and how had he repaid her? Guilt was weighing heavily in his gut, and he could do nothing but sit there and absentmindedly twirl his knife in the air, watching the light reflect off the blade in different ways as he spun it. After a small internal conflict of interests, purpose finally won out. The knife, which was floating several inches below the ceiling, had the magical grip around it relinquished, and dropped swiftly down, the handle landing perfectly in the angel’s outstretched palm. “How is our little patient doing tonight?” Pestilence asked, his rhetorical question coming out as barely a whisper as he sat, still staring at the opposite wall, lost in thought. His thoughts were suddenly interrupted by a purring gurgle and a wet sliding sensation on his arm. He looked down in bewilderment to see the sad-faced maggot nudging him. “Ramona? What are you doing here?” He picked up the grub and started petting it, listening to it’s happy gurgles and staring at Pinkie’s sleeping form. Before long, the maggot slithered out of his hands and snaked over to a trash bin, perching on it’s edge and turning around to fix it’s unhappy gaze on Pestilence, who leaned over and swiped a crumpled up ball of paper. “Huh, it seems I have a fan.” He said spreading out the sheet and looking it over. “I’m assuming the triangle in the air is Contagion, and that strapping gentleman with the sharp teeth must be me.” He gave Pinkie a doubtful look. “Did you draw this? I didn’t know they let foals into the emergency ward.” He glanced back at the picture, focusing on the overall implied monstrosity of his crudely drawn image before placing it on her bed stand. He then leaned back once more and stared fixedly at the opposite wall, his mind on the mare lying next to him. “It shouldn’t be long now.” He turned and looked back at her, how she still looked very much the same, if a pit peaked, still sleeping as peacefully as she always had. “You don’t deserve this. No one does.” He stared at the knife in his hand, listening to the steady dripping and sizzling of the poison sliding off the blade. “Well…maybe I do.” It was then that Pestilence thought back on all of his mistakes, on all of the cruelties he had spent so long trying to forget. "You know, you remind me a whole a lot of someone from a long time ago...a little mare I knew way back when." Pestilence said to the sleeping pony. She didn't stir or show any sign of consciousness so he continued. "Sweetest little thing ever, she was about sixteen. I don’t think I’ve ever met a brighter pony. She absolutely loved chemistry and insisted on becoming my assistant of sorts; of course I was never a very skilled chemist so as you can guess she helped immensely." He looked upwards fondly, leaning against the bedpost as his smile came back. “I still remember her panicking every time a subject or patient would go critical. I would joke about how she should trust me a bit more, and they always came through in the end. All of the more…graphic operations she had to sit out on though. She taught me everything I know about the chemical sciences. Sure I blew up a bit of the castle on several occasions but that was mostly on purpose, so it worked out.” His face then took on a shadowed look as the memories came flooding back. "But then she left, it’s all my fault really, it is. I was trying out a prototype strain on an…unwilling participant. I told her not to come in but she did anyways, it’s never nice to walk in one someone while they’re elbows deep in the bowels of a random citizen. Naturally I had never told her about how I did that sort of thing." He paused for a moment, considering whether to continue, he started to clear his throat and plowed forward. "I still remember the look on her face, she asked what I was doing, she sounded so scared. Sure there was some slight gore in the operations we had together, but to her it looked like I was butchering a citizen. I suppose I was doing exactly that in a manner of speaking. I told her to leave, I told her it wasn't important...things might have worked out if the patient hadn't gone into shock. It was violent, and it must have been traumatizing for her, in the end I had to kill him. Lethal injection, completely painless, but she still knew what I did." He plowed on, feeling more confident about disclosing his past to this unconscious listener. "She ran out, convinced I was a monster, I keep trying to tell myself that she didn't understand; but if I hadn't done that experiment in the first place she might have stayed with me." His voice wavered in cracked for a moment and he feigned a cough. "I still remembered her in that damned pit, while I was asleep for all those long years, she haunted my dreams, constantly. I suppose she's gone now, but I never got the chance to make it up to her…" As he trailed off, his face hardened, and a mask of darkness overcame it as he looked down at his knife, which tilted up towards him, as if staring right back. “Right now, however, the only thing that matters is living up to my name and title.” An evil grin came across his features and, without a twitch of his hand, several machines around the emergency ward began to disassemble and fly some components over to him. Vials of chemicals were emptied and summoned to the arsonist. An empty IV next to Pinkie’s bed plugged itself in and snaked its needled tube over to his arm, channeling a fair amount of dark emerald blood into the bag, which unscrewed itself and flew over to join the rest of the parts in the center of the room. “Pestilence, plague-bringer and first horseman of the apocalypse.” He announced as the parts flew together to form a small square device that attached itself to the wall. Ramona sat and watched the whole process gurgling and squealing before slithering down from her perch and climbing up and latching onto the shoulder of her owner. “Manehattan’s day has come. And, if I’m not mistaken, yours will too.” He clicked a small button that had been installed on the device and it started churning and clicking softly. Grinning at a job well done, Pestilence turned to leave, but was halted by one more unfinished act. He walked back over to Pinkie’s bed, knelt down right next to Pinkie's ear and whispered two words, "I'm sorry." With that, he stood up and walked out the door and into the streets of Manehattan.