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"Mommy? Mommy.. It's so dark. I'm scared. Everything shook, mommy?" The little colt was crying in what remained of his home, saved only by the fact a couple beams landed crossed over each other and held up the rest of the rubble.
"Mom..please..somepony? Anyone?" He lay there shivering in the dark, sobbing. After a while he was becoming numb and tried to move, finally finding he could just barely squeeze out of a little open piece heading towards some dull light. The place was a total wreck. Nothing looked right. Absolutely nothing. It was almost as dark outside and the sky looked weird.
"Daddy?...Shuffle Deck? Hello?.." He was becoming increasingly frightened by this emptiness as he called for his brother.
It took a moment for his young mind to reach the realization. It wasn't just his families house that was destroyed. It was everything for as far as he could see. There was not much to see but flames.
"No..no.. MOM!? DAD!?" He yelled at the top of his lungs which echoed through the eerily quiet neighborhood. Everything around was also collapsed, shattered or on fire. Where was everypony else?
"Help me..please..." He slowly turned to look around to see it looked much like the entire town he'd lived in all of his short life was enveloped in this nearly absolute destruction. His school teachers, his friends. Were they all gone too?
All alone. So very alone. He swallowed hard, tears rolling in grief and shock. He turned around to view his ruined house and could not get himself to take a closer look. His parents and brother were in the house. It was easier to believe maybe they'd gone out while he was occupied with some silly game. Someone. Anyone. He coughed raggedly, really needing to find something to drink. His throat hurt, as did some of the cuts and scrapes he had all over. No mommy to make it better.
"Mom. I have to..to get help. That's what I'll do. Find help." He said to himself and quivering as he wandered the lonely empty streets all cracked and covered in wreckage and horror as if a great beast smashed through it all unhindered.
In some of the fallen houses he could see unmoving hooves or tails hanging out in places. He took deep breaths, finding it hard to believe or breathe properly. Where should he go? He didn't have any idea what to do. Fearfully treading cautiously along the street it was becoming increasingly obvious just how bad this really was. With everything looking this much different it was hard to tell where he was.
"I..I'm lost. Help! Help me!" He sat down and shuddered for a few moments, huffing and coughing from all the smoke and dust in the air.
"This is.." He mumbled as he spotted a charred sign. The candy store he loved to visit was gone as was most of everything else.
"Mr. Softcoat? Hello? I'd really like some candy!..." He screamed. There was no reply to any of his pleading and yelling, eventually forcing him to move on. He was feeling sick to his stomach and knew something was not normal with any of this, but was slightly too young to understand what had happened. Wandering these empty streets was torture for him. He was getting the most awful sense of isolation and desperation.
"Huh?" Thinking he heard something he hopefully went around a smashed street corner only to find small pieces of brick falling off a crumpled building and shattering on the ground.
"Ohh..There's nopony! I'm all alone!" He began galloping wildly down the remains of town roads looking for someone, something, anything that resembled a living person of any sort. A yak, an errant dragon, a griffon. It didn't matter what or who now, just someone. There were none. Not even any of those funny floating loudspeaker things he thought were neat floating around town sometimes. Just nothing. Nothing whatsoever. He ran on yelling and yelling until his throat went ragged.
Sputtering and heaving for breath he finally thought he spotted somepony alive at a distance only to be disheartened further by finding it was just a cardboard cutout lying against a wall as he ran towards it.
"Aaah!" He yelped and tripped, crying so hard he couldn't see.
"Help me.." Someone said, somewhere.
"What? Hello? Hello!?" He knew he heard that somewhere, or was he just going insane? No, he heard it again. So quiet. He listened intently now and followed it to the source.
"This is..I was here once. The theater where we saw that funny play." He remembered. The shaking colt still could not find whoever was whispering. There it was again. He definitely heard it somewhere around here. The theater was a big mess as with everything.
"I'm here. I'm here!" He called. A croaking voice that was just audible enough to be heard finally caught his attention again. He was shocked to find somepony buried up to their neck in debris and rubble. They were bleeding everywhere. Oh no. No. No.
"Help.." A stallion was under all that? He would never be able to get him out of there. His muzzle was barely visible as it was.
"Mister..mister can you hear me?" The shivering colt had to yell so he could be heard.
"Get me..out." He whispered, hardly breathing. He was obviously crushed under all that. The colt tried to move some of the stuff around but could not make any of it budge at all.
"I can't..I can't move it!" He called so the unfortunate stallion could hear him.
"I can't breathe..I'm dying." The unseeable stallion said. Dying.
"Mister..mister please don't go. I'm all alone!" The colt was absolutely coughing in desperation trying to move the stuff off of this only living thing he'd seen or heard.
"I'm sorry..kid. This is it for me..good luck... I'm....sorry..." He wheezed and said nothing more, leaving the colt all alone once again. He sat down and cried tears of misery and pain.
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Where does one go from there?