Gill's small truck hummed along the surprisingly empty streets of the plains, giving the man time to ponder about the things that had just transgressed. In actually, his truck wasn't exactly "small". It just wasn't pulling anything, so it appeared small for the most part. Tapping his head whilst leaving his elbows on the wheel, the human began to think out loud:
"Okay, okay! Recap. Um...I went into the stasis tube yesterday, or, at least it feels like yesterday. What did the AI say? Oh right! I've been frozen for thirty years...How much have things changed? I'm attacked by apparently sentient...err...MORE sentient pony creatures who can apparently modify the dna and physical structure of a human being and turn it into one of theirs *shudder* Is there an error in the matrix? Ummm..what else is there to note?"
A blue pegasus had managed to hang onto the door on the driver's side of the car and was doing its best to lift up the gun attached to its foreleg. Gill, just concentrated on the road, opened his door slightly, and once the pegasus put its hoof forward, slammed the door, causing it to have a broken hoof and fall off. The human mimicked a very deep voice when he said:
"R-r-r-roadkill! Now then...ummm...full tank of gas...trucks usually have a tiny compartment in the back for sleeping, and this one seems to be a Machback 2014 with integrated security, which will allow me to sleep in my tiny compartment in peace. If this is a post-apocalyptic era, then maybe these 'bit' things are pointless. I wonder what they look like."
Gill, looked back to the road and then to the bag at quick intervals before finally unzipping the damn thing on the passenger seat and opening the brown bag inside of it. It was filled to the brim with gold coins.
"Woah! Wait...gold coins? When are we? The classical antiquity? How the hell am I supposed to use this shit? What am I going to do? What if I'm the last human being left? What if there are evil bears everywhere too? So much crap. Hm? That looks like an abandoned gas-station. I'll pull over and see if I can't find something to eat there."
The behemoth of a vehicle pulled up to the station. And, indeed, something strange had occurred there that bothered Gill. Not only was the price for gas at an incredible low, the door of the shop was wide open and the place seemed covered in cobwebs and dust. The tanks of the station were apparently still full, so Gill put one of the pumps into the gas tank of the truck, and the the sucker rip. He went inside of the station shop carefully, just peeking his head around the corner.
"Hello? Anyone here?"
The interior of this place was a mess, but there seemed to be a good amount of food and water left on the shelves.
"Hmm. Ooo! Meat, chips. I'll have to save the chips for later. Not too health. FUCKTONS of water and sodas, some salad...is this stuff even still good? Oh. Wait. They did say they were bio-engineering consumables to last longer...Let's see if that's true. I'll pick up this bag of dried ham and see the date. Pumpumpum...WHERE ARE THE DA-oh. IT says that it's still good 'til twenty forty-seven." There was a silent pause as Gill tried to understand. "I'm going to assume that this place has been recently abandoned. Welp. I'm going to put everything in the truck."
Thus, the truck was stock-piled with much needed food resources for this apocalypse. The only thing missing was a shotgun and some ammo. However, just before leaving, Gill saw some newspapers lying about, and picked one up. It dated from two thousand thirty-seven.
"Let's see here...Ponyfication has been going smoothly...The HLR-dah! The HLF have been spotted near Sunny Rocks and ten ponies have been reported to have gone missing..." the man lowered the newspaper and adorned a strange expression. "What the hell kind of name is 'Sunny Rocks'? Might as well call a city 'Lizard Lick'. Ahahahahoh wait... WHat else is here? Um. What? Humans are now no more than a measely ten million."
The paper flopped heavily on the floor as Tammerheight began to shake.
"Oh god...And everyone is getting 'ponified'? What's going on?! Maybe there's something else?"
Gill began to rummage through the large amount of paper left on the floor, only to stand ack up in disappointment.
"Hm. Well, nothing I can do now. I wonder if there are any CDs left here. AHA!"
The human had begun fumbling behind the counter that had seen better days, and found an old cd that was heavily scratched, but still had some manner of functioning.
"Welp. Let's hope that this thing can still play at least one song. Oh crap! Gotta go!"
The man hurried to the bathroom in a most amusing dance, and finally came out with a look of great satisfaction on his face. Why should one not enjoy the smaller pleasures of life now that the apocalypse hath fallen? Gill kicked the pump off and put it back in place, then seated himself and, with a roar of the engine, the truck took off. It took some time, but Tammerheight finally remembered that he had a cd on the "car counter".
"Oh yeah! I forgot. In you go."
The first few songs were all busted up, and their followers weren't any better. Only one songmanaged to work, somewhat fortunately.
"Hm? Hey! I know this song! I didn't think it would still exist after all this time. Nahnah! I'm on a highway to hell! Dahdahdah...GUITAR SOLO! ...ONCE AGAIN!"
All along his trip, Gill continued to play that same song again and again and again. He did seem to start worrying after noticing the lack of vehicles on the streets.
"What's going on? I know this is a lost hole in the middle of nowhere, but, last time I checked...oh...right. Dammit, what the hell is going on? And why am I cursing so much? So. Many. Mysteries. Left. Unsolved!" he whined as he slammed his fist against the car counter. "*deep gasp* I really hope I'm getting closer to a city no-aha! In the distance, there be land! Forward!"
The truck burst off with increased speed as the night began to set in.
The closer the truck got, the darker the world became Gill stopped in front of what looked like another store...but it seemed very different somehow. Either way, he decided to camp in that spot to sleep. The city seemed so huge with its tall sky-scrapers and other absurdities, but, all that was gone when he woke up. Pushing on a button underneath the steering wheel activated the security system of the Machback, causing small frames of metal to lower themselves over the doors and windows.
"*sigh* Peace and quiet." Gill said as he tried to force himself a passage to the bed in the back of his truck. He sunk right into it and quickly dozed off, reassured by the fact that this was an actual bed and not the stasis tube.
The man didn't remember his dream, but he did wake up with a comfortable stretch and the sounds of talking outside.
"Humans? Good. Then that newspaper was lying about us going extinct. I'll just...HNNNNGH! Get out of this, and push the button." Gill painfully stretched really far and finally reached the red button under the steering wheel- "YES! Got it. Uh-oh. Ah!" -only to fall shortly after his success. "Oh man. Hngh! Ah. There we go. Back on the seeaaaa..."
He was met with tons of colorful ponies gathered around his truck. An elderly red pony on knocked on his door, to which he opened said door and stared at the pony with a gaping wide jaw.
"Sir, I must ask you to move this...polluting vehicle at once. It is obstructing access to the store."
"..."
"S-sir? Are you alright?"
"...bwAAAAH! MORE OF THOSE DEMON PONIES! GET THE HELL AWY FROM ME! YOU AREN'T FORCING ME TO DRINK THAT POTION!"
"What? We aren't demons. Calm do- Don't try and kick me!"
Gill slammed the door shut and revved on the truck, just to slowly bolt away afterwards and disappear around the corner.
"I thought I was at San José. This looks more like San Poné. Oh dear god! They're everywhere! I need to get back home...If I still own it, that is."
It took awhile, but Tammerheight finally arrived in the "neighborhood, yo!", and quickly found his average house. It seemed inhabited, so he parked in front of it.
"What in the world?" he said as he jumped out of his truck and walked towards the house, only to knock violently on it.
"Hold on. I'm coming."
The door opened up, and Gill's face of anger turned to one of confusion as he scratched. " 'Coulda sworn I heard a voice."
"Down here."spoke a mare. She was orange with a vanilla mane and tail, and a cutie mark that looked like a honey drop.
"AH!"
"What? Oh! You're a human, no doubt. We don't see your species much now. What do you need?"
"Why are you in my house?"
"Excuse me?"
"You heard me!" the human waltzed right in." I bought this house on the third of April in two thousand and twelve. Why are you here?"
"I'm sorry bought, this house has been vacant for over thirty years. Plus, you look too young to have bought it in two thousand twelve."
"Uhhh. I can explain that....But you wouldn't believe me."
"Honey, what's going o...Who are you?" a rather bulky green stallion with a green mane walked into the living room.
"Gill Tammerheight. The owner of this house."
"And what proof do you have?"
"I...Shit. I left the deeds to the house in a large black safe in my room." Gill facepalmed. "And now they're gone."
"Well, I have the deeds right there. We bought it some time ago."
"May I?"
"Certainly. Just to further disprove you."
The stallion was a unicorn, so levitating the deeds to Gill was no real problem. The man started to mumble what was written on the paper, before lowering the paper while shaking, and revealing how pale he had become.
"So...I lost my house?"
"I guess so."
"Eheh." Gill fell to the floor, literally shaking up the entire house."
"WOAH!" the mare yelped.
The two were about to ask Gill to leave, but he had such a strange expression on his face. It was like a sudden realization, mixed with desperation and absence.
"Are you...going to be alright?" the unicorn asked.
"Maybe. No. I don't know! I was frozen in a stasis tube for THIRTY YEARS! Time has definitely not helped me."
"Wait...a stasis tube? I recall reading in a magazine saying that the project was canceled after a test failed horribly. It was reported that the subject had perished." the mare said.
"Dead? I guess so. All I have left is that truck I took from the facility and a bag of bits. That sounds so corny." Gill slumped even further on the ground. "I heard you noticed that I was a human. Am I a mythological creature now?"
"Not at all. There are still a few humans around. In fact, we were once human, too."
"WHAT?!" Gill shouted while clutching his head.
"Well.Yeah. We wanted a better and easier life, so we opted for this."
"Good god. You abandoned your humanity for some paltry gifts? *sigh* Is there any place with humans around here?"
The mare put a hoof to her chin and started o tap it gently as she tied to remember something.
"I know a place. It's the Cemis gymnasium. Until a place is found for them, the humans stay there."
"Will you be willing to take me there?"
"Of course. I think you said something about a truck?"
"Yes."
"Then I'll wait for you there."
The stallion cautiously moved away from the human and proceeded towards the truck with utmost haste. Gill was in utter shock and was barely hanging on to his sanity.
"Are you going to be alright? There are other humans there. They'll tell you all about what transgressed while you were in that tube."
"It's alright." Gill tapped the mare on her shoulder. "I'll manage eventually. Have a nice, ponified life."
That was the last thing Gill said for the remainder of his time with the ponies. Even the trip with the stallion proved itself as nothing but silence flew through the air as the truck passed by several houses with its inhabitants peeping out to see what the source of the commotion was. Once inside the tall city, a few rounding of corners and avoiding the passing ponies was all that the man paid attention to until he saw the massive gymnasium with many people going in and a few coming out.
"Here we are." the stallion announced as he gestured towards the line being blocked and controlled by some security teams...made of ponies of course.
"Thanks for the tour. You need me to drive you back?" Gill offered tiredly. He had enough.
"No. I'm fine. I'll walk back. I need the exercise."
"Oh. Okay. Thanks again."
The stallion hopped difficultly out of the truck and started to walk away while Gill parked his truck, sighed, and slammed his head on the steering wheel. He took his bag out and locked the door to the truck, while being sure to enable the security. With one last sigh, Gill presented himself to the security passage. When he finally arrived, he crocked an eyebrow to the sight of three white ponies wearing blue uniforms.
"Agh...I'll never get used to this."
"What was that?"
"I said I'll never get used to this."
"Used to waiting? Yeah. I understand."
"What? No. I meant-"
"ID and registration."
"I don't have them anymore. Being stuck in a stasis tube for thirty years does that to you."
"Riiiiight. Just get in. We'll find something to do with you later."
" 'Kay. Thank you."
Gill slowly walked into the gigantic sports center with a very depressed look. The sight he saw was very shocking, but he barely reacted. There were tons of people everywhere, with tents and the like pitched up here and there. Gill just walked up the seats until he reached the top, where he placed his bag on the floor and sat down, contemplating the carnage.
"Welp. Now I know what the Native Americans felt during te conquest and what the Jews felt during World War 2. Heh. A lesson learned. Welp, I better get used to this. I'm just hoping those jackasses from before aren't going to bother me again."
Meanwhile, outside the gymnasium, the security was verifying another false identity card.
"No, sir. You can't get in with a false ID."
"But you let that other guy in. Why won't you-"
The man was cut-off by a massive explosion within the building. It was followed by coughing and cries of agony as a pinkish-purple wave of gas flew out of the streets and onto the humans and ponies, making the humans fall to the ground or begin to have epileptic seizures. What had exactly happened?