//------------------------------// // Surprise! // Story: Live and Let Die // by Dihinner //------------------------------// The steady clock on the wall of the large waiting area was the sole thing from keeping eight ponies from going completely insane. All eight pairs of eyes were staring intently at it while they waited for the ninth member of their group to leave the hospital room. Tick tock. The deep breathing of a rather large stallion with a faded pair of dark blue pants was keeping a small white Pegasus with red tipped wings from panicking on his back. Tick tock. The cloud of smoke that was constantly being omitted from a tall charcoal grey stallion with equally grey jeans caused the stallion to cough slightly as he waited. Tick tock. The chirps of a yellow green mare and the frantic look in her eyes made a fat mahogany stallion sigh and nod. The mare quickly bolted out of the room and into the washroom with a trail of burning stomach acid trailing out of her mouth. Tick tock. The low cackling of an electric blue colt made the watchful eyes of an olive green mare with an oversized right foreleg fall upon the colt, making him stop cackling for a moment. Tick… tock… tick… The quiet flapping of wings from a tan Pegasus with a white towel crudely wrapped around his forelegs like a straightjacket thumped in the ears of the charcoal grey stallion like a steady drum beat. Tick, tick… The seven present pairs of eyes beamed at the clock. It froze at exactly five thirty p.m. There was a brief period of utter silence in the room as the yellow green mare re-entered the room. She looked around and asked, “Why is it so quiet in here?” As if a switch was thrown, Smoker slammed his head into the wall, Screamer landed on the ground with an audible thud and stood there, Witch began crying and Tank started to wander slowly, Jockey started cackling loudly causing Charger to mutter something under her breath and Boomer sighed heavily and started to lean against the wall. “The clock broke,” Boomer sighed, “The one thing keeping us from going crazy broke.” “Ah,” said Spitter as she wandered over to Smoker, whose head was still against the wall, “How are you doing?” Smoker grunted slightly, “I’ve been worse.” Spitter nodded, “Yeah, we’ve been through a lot of shit, haven’t we?” “Damn right we have,” muttered Screamer as he stretched himself like cat on the floor, the towel restricting his forelegs falling, “Remember the time when Witch went missing for an hour?” Smoker smiled slightly at the memory. It was about two and a half weeks after the infection broke out and about a week after they all met each other. They were slowly making their way across the country side and avoiding six immune people with guns. They stopped to rest for a while in a large forest not too far from where the six immune people were. Naturally, both sides were cautious of each other. About an hour after the six left and the sun was up in the early morning sky, Witch had literally vanished from thin air. Tank was franticly searching around (if you could call shifting multiple bushes and muttering death threats at the six immune people frantic) when Hunter picked up her tell-tale smell of dried blood and the peculiar smell of dried tears. The eight searched for her for most of the day until Spitter had found her sitting in a kitchen with a large bag of opened sugar torn to shreds on the floor and Witch sitting in the middle of the room. Hunter was the one to notice a small trail of blood leading into a cupboard a few feet away. Inside of it were the brutally massacred remains of the six survivors they were avoiding the day before. As Smoker finished remembering the event, the door to the room Hunter was in opened. All eight pairs of eye darted over to see the doctor from that morning and Hunter, who seemed to be wobbling slightly as he and the doctor walked over to Smoker and Spitter. “Well, I got him to calm down,” said the doctor, grinning weakly, “Unfortunately, I noticed something when I was looking over the records I made today that might explain why Hunter here lost it.” Smoker stared down at him, narrowing his eyes slightly, “And that would be?” “Due to the strange properties your sickness, you may completely forget where you are and act on instinct of the virus. To put it simply, Hunter thought he was back from where ever you nine came from.” Smoker nodded slowly as he noticed Spitter tense slightly beside him, “Is there a way to prevent or at least know when it will happen?” The doctor shrugged, “I’m not sure about that. Was Hunter acting differently earlier?” “He was a bit jumpy, even for him, yesterday,” muttered Smoker. The doctor smiled, “Then that’s probably it. You will probably be startled easier when the effect kicks in.” Smoker nodded again and saw Hunter fall to the floor face first. Spitter, who also saw, stared at the doctor in surprise. The doctor chuckled slightly. “Oh, don’t worry about that. I gave him a slight sedative to calm him down. He should be fine in the morning.” Hunter lifted his head off the floor and gave a lopsided grin. “What are you talkin about,” he slurred, “I feel fine.” Spitter watched Hunter shakily get to his hooves and try to steady himself on a nearby wall, only to miss and fall again. “How much of that stuff did you give him?” asked Spitter. The doctor shrugged, “Enough to knock out an adult tiger.” Spitter stared at the doctor, who reassuringly told her that Hunter could totally handle the tranquilizer and not to worry. Witch, who had lost interest in the conversation, was now poking Tank’s back with her wing tips. Tank turned his head to face her. “What is it?” he asked. “Is there anything sweet?” she rasped quietly. Tank shook his head, “Not here. The sugar is at the big sugar building across little pony town.” Witch sighed slightly, “Can we go there?” she asked quietly. Tank smiled slightly as he watched Smoker wrap up the conversation with the doctor and Hunter shakily walk over to them. Screamer hovered over to Hunter and smacked his hoof across the back of his head. “Hunter, what the hell was that?” Screamer growled. Hunter lazily raised his head to Screamer and gave him a toothy grin. It was then Screamer realised that nearly all of Hunter’s teeth were unnaturally sharpened and rotted to the core. Deciding it was best to ask someone else later, Screamer grabbed his white towel from the floor and wrapped it around his forelegs like a straightjacket and resumed hovering. Tank sighed and announced that he was taking Witch to obtain some food at the bakery from earlier. At the mention of food, Screamer flew over to him alarmingly fast and stared him straight in the face. “You know where we can get food?” Tank nodded, “Yes, Witch and I were there earlier when Witch tried to eat little pink pony.” Screamer smiled, “If there’s food I don’t care who ate who as long as it’s edible, I’m going with you guys.” ************************************************************************************* Nine figures made their way across the eerily deserted town. Smoker’s eyes flicked around for any signs of life in vain. It was like the entire town had simply gotten up and moved away. He was not the only one to compare the deserted town to the infected cities that each of the nine originated from on Earth. Smoker heard the sound of groaning and quickly spun around only to face Hunter, who had an expression that implied that he was unwell on his face. “Ugh,” he groaned slightly. “You alright there, Hunter?” asked Smoker. Hunter shakily took another few steps before collapsing to the ground, still groaning. “Hunter, what’s wrong?” Smoker asked sternly with a hint of concern in his voice. By this time the others noticed and Smoker gestured to them that he could handle this and told them that they’ll catch up soon. Shrugging, Tank resumed leading the other seven infected to the bakery. Smoker kneeled down to be face to face with Hunter, who appeared to have some fever like symptoms. “Hunter, what’s wrong?” Smoker asked again, his tone like the one a father would give to a child. “It hurts,” said Hunter as he tried to stand again only to collapse once more. “What hurts?” “Everything hurts.” Smoker nodded, “Are you hungry?” Hunter faced him, if he had eyes he would have been giving him an odd stare, “Yes I’m hungry.” “Well,” said Smoker, rising to his full height of seven feet, “Then you’d better get up and hurry.” Hunter sighed and slowly began to get up. He started to lose balance again but was supported by Smoker’s left foreleg. “If you’re going to collapse again, tell me,” said Smoker as he slowly began to walk in the direction the others went in with Hunter leaning against his leg for support. “My head feels like crap,” Hunter muttered. Smoker chuckled softly, “Don’t worry. Eventually all of us will be in the same position as you.” Hunter nodded slowly and continued his slow walk. After a few moments he turned to Smoker. “Hey, Smoker, what exactly happened earlier? Everything after leaving the doctor’s office is blurry.” Smoker smiled slightly, “You’ll remember soon enough, Hunter.” Hunter nodded again as the two walked through the abandoned streets of Ponyville with the glow of the sunsets on their backs and the shine of the moon ahead, illuminating the path where the others awaited them. ************************************************************************************* “Alright, a tree is one thing but this?!” said Screamer as he stared at Sugarcube corner in disbelief, “Who in the right mind would come up with this?! Hell, even I would never think of this back home.” The seven stood idly around the entrance to the building, none of them wanting to take the first step inside. One of the reasons were that this building, unlike all the other one’s they passed, had it ‘open’ sign still up. Spitter sighed again as her stomach grumbled. The last time she had food was two days ago when she was scouting around some towns with Hunter trying to figure out where exactly they were. From what she gathered, this was Ponyville and to the hills was the country capital, Canterlot. Spitter sighed, ‘why is everything a stupid pony pun here?’ she thought to herself as she saw Smoker and Hunter slowly make their way towards them. Hunter had a tired look on his face as he used Smoker for support. When the two finally caught up with them and Smoker raised an eyebrow. “Going inside anytime soon?” he asked. Spitter shrugged, “Nobody is willing to take the first step inside.” Smoker rolled his eyes and walked up to the door muttering, “And I thought I was paranoid.” He pushed the door open and walked into the darkened bakery. Glancing at each other, the other seven followed Smoker inside the building and the door closed with a click. “Hey, Hunter, see anything?” asked Screamer as he squinted in the darkness. “We’re not alone in here,” Hunter said quietly. There was a huge explosion of light in the room, blinding the infected that was quickly followed by a loud “Surprise!” yelled out by everyone in the room that had been hiding in the darkness. Pinkie pie bounced over to the nine infected as they tried to get their bearings. What happened next was not expected by anyone. All of the infected’s most basic instincts took action causing a most likely traumatic experience to most present. Spitter’s pupils were reduced pinpricks and as large amount of burning stomach acid forced itself up her elongated throat, causing her to spit it across the room where it exploded into a puddle of the stuff. Smoker launched out his tongue in an attempt to grab something as Hunter tried to pounce only to fall onto Smoker, causing him to stagger and make him miss his target, who was on top of a table trying to get out of Spitter’s acidic goo. Tank roared that caused everything in the room to panic as he tried to pull a chunk of the floor out of the ground. Witch let out a bloodcurdling scream and leapt off of Tank and ran at blinding speeds to the first thing she saw, which was Pinkie pie. Boomer groaned slightly but the medication the doctor gave him prevented him from producing bile in his liver. Charger let out a yell and charged into the crowd; luckily she missed hitting anyone and collided with the wall. Jockey cackled and leapt off somewhere, presumably to ‘ride’ them in a humiliating fashion. Screamer blinked and shook his head during the pandemonium from the safety of the air. After he got his bearings back he took a deep breath and let out what was possibly the loudest shriek possible by a living creature. Everything that was glass in the room exploded violently as all the ponies, including the eight infected on the ground, fell to the floor trying to cover their ears from the harsh sound that was getting higher in pitch. After Screamer decided that they had enough, he stopped and dropped to the floor, panting. “What the hell,” he rasped; his voice was heard throughout the room, “was that?” Screamer looked through the heavily damaged building that once was Sugarcube corner and found the other infected in the crowd of panicked ponies. “Guys, get the fuck over here.” Slowly the eight infected, each looking ashamed in their own way, came over to Screamer. “Guys, I know it was everything we hate, it was loud and bright but come on,” Screamer said, looking at all of them, “We’ve gone to hell and back, surviving everything the world threw at us. But here you are, panicking about ponies. Not a group of crazed maniacs with guns.” Witch blinked a few times before sniffing slightly. Tank moved slightly and looked down at her, muttering something softly. Screamer got back into the air and looked at the crowd of ponies behind the infected, too shocked to flee. “And what did you think that would accomplish?” asked Screamer in an accusing tone, “Abandoning the town and scaring the living shit out of us when all we wanted was something to eat.” Screamer shook his head, “I have one question, just one, whose idea was this?” There was a silence in the room before one voice responded. “It was my idea.” Smoker turned to see Pinkie pie, who was looking guiltily at the floor. Screamer hovered over to her and sighed. “Why did you do it?” asked Screamer. “Well, I whenever somepony new comes to town I throw them a huge party to celebrate,” Pinkie pie said sadly. Screamer nodded, “Look, we appreciate the gesture but,” Screamer turned to the eight other infected, “We’ve had a rough few weeks and they caused us to react badly when startled like that.” Hunter groaned slightly as he leaned on Smoker to keep balance. Smoker looked at him concernedly and Witch was crying softly with Tank trying to comfort her. Pinkie pie looked at them with concern, all of them had large scars or deformities on their bodies that made her shudder slightly. But the main thing she noticed was how tired they all looked, like they haven’t gotten a proper rest in months. “Sorry,” she said quietly. “Don’t worry too much about it,” said Screamer, hovering over to the door, “You don’t have to babysit these idiots.” With that, Screamer opened the door and left with the other eight infected saying apologies of their own and following him. The last one was Witch, who sniffled slightly as she left. Pinkie pie sat down in the damaged bakery and thought about the nine infected. What happened to them? What made the not like bright things and loud sounds? And most importantly Where did all those scars come from?