//------------------------------// // Chapter One: The Bear // Story: Ten Rounds: Tales from the last of man // by Da Bunnana King //------------------------------// Ten Rounds: Tales from the last of man By Da Bunnana King Chapter One - The Bear === He sat in his darkened room with a old rusted AK next to him. It was leaned against the table while he packed the 7.62mm into the metal magazine. He knew within the core of him that it was going to happen, this was the day when Equestria will finally snap and attack humanity and the HLF. But he was ready for the coming fire, he just had to make sure everything was in place. He heard the very distinct sound of hooves hitting the linoleum floor that ran throughout the apartment, were they here to finally ponifiy him? He slowly began to move his hand towards the rifle with a full mag in the other. “Dimitri, come out we need to speak with you,” a voice that rang all too familiar with him; could it be that his only friend in this hell hole that he called home had become a pony? “What do you want?” Dimitri asked as he cycled the bolt on the rifle several times to make sure that it was functional. “I just want to speak with you, now please open up,” he replied as the man with the rifle slipped in the mag. “No, I think I’ll just stay inside,” he said as he finally pulled the bolt back and was pointing it at the door waiting for it to be kicked down and potion flung at him. “Jesus Christ, we have civvies to evac from the town; it’s finally happened. The ponies have invaded in force,” the sacred voice replied as Dimitri moved towards the door still not fully calling the bluff. “You better be shitting me,” Dimitri finally said as he saw his friend covered in blood and grime with his left arm freshly cut off. His face wasn't the happy, blond-haired, blue eye face he'd known, but a defeated face, hopelessness it's only expression. “Shit what happened to you?” “Ponies got me so I had to cut off my arm to stop the infection from getting to the rest of me,” he grunted as blood still dripped from the fresh wound. “I think we need to have the-” Dimitri began to say as he was cut off by gunfire within the base. “We got to get out of here and evac the town before those... those devil things get to us,” he said as he nearly choked on the words that he said. “Right, lets get moving,” Dimitri finally said leaving his small dark room filled to the brim with weapons. === They both ran down the maze of corridors that made up the base, being careful not to run into the Equestrian attackers who had flooded through the well armoured base as if the walls were made of wet paper. “How did this happen?” Dimitri asked as they stopped to regain their breath, “I don’t know but they had all the codes to get into the base and knew all our safe houses and plans. Heck they know all about the HLF in and out,” he said as he began catch his breath, “I think this was their plan all along.” “You don’t say?” Dimitri sarcastically answered as faint hoof steps were heard from the corner. They both raised their guns at the noise, in fear that this was the end of their lives as humans. “TAKE THAT!” yelled a angry soldier as he unloaded a round from an M16 into a group of ponies who threw what seemed like ponification bombs from devices on their backs or a crude cannon fitted to their sides. “Jesus Christ, get over here man before the-” Dimitri yelled as the poor man got hit in the back. It was almost instantaneous, wings began to sprout from his back as he yelled for someone to kill him before the change could happen. His fingers began to shrink into his hand as a pale color of green began to emerge from his pasty white skin. “Please kill me... Actually why didn’t I go pony earlier?” he said as a tail began to sprout from his already distorted body, “NO WAIT, GET OUT OF MY HEAD!” he yelled for one last time before he was a fully formed pegasus pony. “Dear God...” Dimitri uttered as the green and silver pony began to walk towards him. “You guys should try this it’s awesome,” It spoke, not ever giving thought that it was a human not even three seconds ago. “Burn in hell,” Dimitri said before putting two rounds between the pony’s eyes, but it wasn’t a good idea as the ponies who had converted him rushed around the corner. “We come offering the-” a brown unicorn said before his head exploded from the bullets that spat from Dimitri’s rifle. “Please join us in the herd! We will save you from your life as a hu-” another one said with a white coat which turned a dark red when his comrade shot the pony with his TT-33 pistol. “COME ON! COME AND GET ME!” yelled his friend in a blind rage as he began to advance towards the oncoming horde of ponies that began to flood in from the halls. “Sasha, we need to get out of here!” Dimitri yelled as he placed in his last magazine into the rifle. “You go, get the rest out of the city and somewhere safe while I take care of these animals. Be safe Dimitri, most of Russia rests on your shoulders now.” Sasha said pushing Dimitri to a fire exit that led to the harsh Russian winter and the old dead city of Prypiat. “See you on the other side if we don’t make it.” Dimitri said before something hit Sasha’s back. “Ahhh, go before... before you join the herd with me Dimitri.” Sasha said as his hand turned into a hoof. Dimitri fell into the radioactive snow as he saw his only friend turn into a snowy colored unicorn before his eyes. “SASHA! NOOOO!” Dimitri said right before he hit the radioactive snow that absorbed him into it making it become his tomb while he was unconscious. === -Several hours later- He awoke in a panic, and struggled to claw his way out of the snow to the natural light that shone through the snow. He could feel the cold air freeze his hands as the air mixed with snow battered him as he emerged from his frozen tomb. ‘Dammit Sasha, why didn’t you come with me,’ he thought to himself as he searched for his rifle in the snow, ‘All you had to do was fight a bit more then we could've gotten out and fought them like real soldiers.’ He found the snow encrusted rifle but paid no attention to the ice that had accumulated on the bolt. He slung it over his back and began a long walk to the inner parts of the ghost city, making sure to not give away his position. The town was still irradiated from when the reactor at Chernobyl’s reactor exploded back when the USSR was a forced that the West feared. So it was a prime spot for the HLF to set up shop, ponies wouldn’t dare venture into a ghost town irradiated from the Uranium dust particles from the reactor. Dimitri climbed to the top of the ridge expecting to see the ghost town fighting tooth and claw to make sure that civilians were safe, but intead he saw ponies creating a staging area and arming out anyone that was willing to fight. Some ponies were being put into chariots to be shipped off to the god forsaken land of Equestria, while the rest were near large vats filling up containers with the potion. “Dear God, this isn’t a war. This is going to be genocide,” Dimitri uttered as he collapsed on the ridgeline on his knees. “Help!” a faint voice from the city call, He looked up to see a small group of humans inside iron cages near a vat of the potion. There were several hose leading into the cage, and several ponies were near the vat doing something with the various valves and hoses that came off of it. “Don’t worry, you’ll be in the herd soon and you’ll be off in Equestria enjoying your new life,” one pony said, but it was hard to make out from where Dimitri was situated. “I hope you rot in hell,” one of the HLF uniformed guards said right before a cascade of purple drenched the sixteen humans that were trapped in the cage. Dimitri could hear the screams of them right before it turned into giggling. The humans no longer were in the cage but there were a mixture of pony races in place of them. “I can’t believe I would want to pass this up,” one giggled as the cage door was let open, “I can’t begin to thank you for that, I haven’t felt so good in years.” “You’re welcome, but there is still more work to do if you want everypony to feel the same,” one large pegasus said wearing a helmet that was made of a light snow white ore and a bright yellow crest on top. “What do you mean?” the pony asked back as Dimitri began to aim at the obvious commander of this company. “There are still humans out there that haven’t accepted our friendship, so we need to help them see the errors of their ways and turn them into happy ponies for the princess,” he said as a loud shot rang out from Dimitri’s rifle only to be stopped by the commanders helmet. “SNIPER!” yelled the ponies surrounding the commander as they began to scatter, Dimitri knew that he would be ponified if he was there any longer, so he vanished into the Russian winter only leaving one spent piece of brass where the shot was taken. “I’ll get you next time demon spawn,” he cursed as he finally vanished into the oncoming night fall. === Authors notes: I don’t know anymore. Oh and Aegis hit me over the back of the head with the grammar stick so now it looks better.