"Who knew that such a normal day could have turned out so badly? Nothing was out of the ordinary that day. I had risen the sun the same way I always do. But I suppose the beginning of it all actually occurred a few days before. I didn't know it at the time- nopony did- but that would set in motion events that would cause the hell we're in today.
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It was a sunny day in Ponyville. I went into town to see something Twilight had written to me about. She had gone into the Everfree forest to research the wildlife, and stumbled upon a, as she described it in her letter, 'strange piece of what appears to be some sort of machine.' So I went to Ponyville the day after I got her letter. I magically altered myself to look more... normal so I wouldn't stand out so much. I didn't want anyone asking questions about why I had suddenly dropped into Ponyville. They always wanted to know why the Princess was in a little town like Ponyville. So I made my appearance a little more inconspicuous. I kept my white mane but changed my mane to a bright yellow, got rid of my wings, and changed my cutie mark to a less intricate sun. So I walked into Ponyville undetected, thank goodness. I made my way to Ponyville's only library and Twilight's home at the time. I knocked on the door, and of course Spike answered. I asked him if Twilight was home. He told me that she was, but that she was expecting someone. I temporarily lifted my disguise for Spike to see who I really was. His mouth, quite literally, hit the floor. I put my disguise back on and let out a small chuckle. Spike took a minute to recover from the initial shock, then let me into the library. He told me Twilight was downstairs waiting for me, and he went about his business. I headed down the stairs off to the side of the library.
Now I knew my pupil had made this her home. The entire basement floor was filled with scientific devices of varying uses. Books on everything scientific in nature lined the walls. And in the middle of the room was Twilight pacing back and forth. I removed my disguise before reaching the bottom of the stairs to avoid confusion on Twilight's part. She didn't notice me, she was so worried about something. I cleared my throat and she looked up. Her face lit up a bit upon seeing me. "Princess Celestia, thank you for coming on such short notice." She bowed, then rose again.
"Well, your letter seemed urgent" I responded.
"Yes, well, I don't want to keep you too long. But this device I found is bothering me. I've never seen anything like it. I checked all my books and couldn't find anything even close to this. I tried testing on it, but it began acting... weird so I stopped. I figured you might know something about it. I'll get it." She walked over to a cabinet along the wall. She opened it, revealing a brown box. She levitated it down with her magic and placed it on a table against the wall. She popped the lid open, revealing a slightly rusted machine. It had a box shape, with a small pole jutting from the top of it. A few buttons lined one side, their labels faded with age. I levitated it out and spun it around slowly, examining every angle of it. I knew I had seen something like this before, but where I just could not place. I rotated it. Maybe, if I had been paying more attention, I would have noticed that the tip of the pole was glowing more than the rest of the machine. But I didn't. And that was my fatal mistake.
I examined it for a while. Eventually I realized it would be better to examine it with some scientific equipment. I glanced around at Twilight's assortment of machines. What I was looking for was, unfortunately, not there. There's another thing caused this. Anyways, I levitated it for another quick look, then put it on my back.
"Twilight, do you mind if I take this back to Canterlot for closer examination?" I asked, turning towards her.
"Well, of course Princess" was the immediate response.
"Thank you. Well, I believe I must be going before anyone wonders where I've gone. Plus, I'll have to lower the sun soon. Good day to you Twilight."
She bowed, then went about cleaning up the room. A golden glow encompassed my horn, then me and the machine. In a flash I was gone from Twilight's library. In a matter of seconds, I felt ground beneath my hooves again. I opened my eyes and saw I was in my bedroom. From the looks of it, nopony had even noticed I was gone. I breathed a sigh of relief. Then I turned around to get the machine and take it to the castle lab for examination. But when I turned my and looked at my back, it was gone. I was only mildly surprised. I had known of this kind of thing happening before:
You see, when unicorn's use their magic to teleport it does more than what most people know. The matter that is being teleported bounces out of this reality, bounces off of a sort of relay reality, then to the desired location all in a matter of milliseconds. This was discovered by a unicorn that lost his leg in the middle of the process. This led to research into the concept. And that's how we learned of this. My scientists had found a way to counteract this, assure this wouldn't ever happen again. At the time, I thought there was something wrong with the fail-safe they had placed. I know now that it was because of the machine itself. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
After I realize it must have been a small hole in the fail-safe, I calmed down. When something doesn't come all the way through usually appears in the intended location a few hours or days later. I wasn't particularly worried. It would appear in my room. So I poured the next few days into finding out where I had seen that machine before. I went through every scientific paper ever written. Nothing. Then I moved to the royal library and dug up every book on machinery. It had been four days since I had gotten back when I found it. A record of the machine, not the machine itself. It was in some bizarre scientific log that had no label or name in it. It only had a picture of the machine paper clipped to a page that read:
'The machine is complete in its entirety. It is perfected and ready for use. But we are hesitant to use it. Will it do what we plan? Will it be worth it? We aren't sure. But we do know it will work."
The next page read:
"The boss has decided to have it put in isolation. He told us it would make it affect a wider scale. More would become infected. The world would fall faster. He plans on going out for it in a year or so. We have placed it in the forest outside of that small village. The wild creatures that call the place home would ward anyone off. So now, we wait."
Only one more page remained after that:
"The boss is dead. So are most of the staff. I am one of the few left. Someone went into the forest to retrieve the machine, but the last footage from him wasn't very... pleasant. He's dead. No one knows where the machine is. We can only hope that it will be used in the future for the purpose we chose. The rest of the staff that are alive have entrusted various ponies with similar devices. They are to activate them when the first goes off. Magic is what activates some of them, including the main one. Any exposure to magic will begin their activation. I myself cannot activate those. But someone eventually will. The others are activated by enough force or a simple button press. Each, fortunately, has a countdown.
~So-"
The rest of the name was unreadable. I have no idea who it could be, who would head this. Whoever they are, they're dead. Hopefully we can find someone who had worked on this and find if there's a cure. But again, I'm getting ahead of myself.
Apparently, life has a sense of irony. Just as I finished reading that last sentence, it happened. It detonated at the top of Canterlot Castle. Luckily me, my sister, and most of the people in the castle were near the lower levels. Most people had no idea what it was. Frankly, I hardly had a clue myself. I told everyone to evacuate the castle, Luna included. I made my way up slowly. Nothing was on fire, so it obviously wasn't a normal bomb. As I made my way up, I heard screaming. But not normal screaming. It was hollow, and high-pitched. I worked my way slowly around a corner, and stopped in shock and fear. In front of me were three of the royal guards, one unicorn and two pegasi. But something had happened to them. Their skin was twisted, bloodied, and had holes in some parts of it. There was no light in their eyes. One of the pegasi's jaws was ripped. When they saw me, they immediately started walking towards me. The wings of the pegasi were twitching and one had a tear through it. As they moved, I saw they had attacked another guard. He was laying in a pool of blood. Multiple gashes could be seen on his body, as well as bite marks. His head turned towards me, and I saw the light fade from his eyes as he mouthed the word 'run'. Then a group of tentacles burst from his stomach and lifted him up, upside down. It began to run towards me as well.
I ran. My mind failed to remember that I had wings. But I escaped. Somehow. As soon as I stepped outside, I ordered the royal guards to get everyone in Canterlot underground. I had these underground tunnels made centuries ago, during Discord's reign. They flew off, getting as many ponies safely underground as possible. I was directing ponies into the passageway when I heard the second one go off. It was here in Canterlot, near the outskirts. Everypony still outside looked around, worried and confused. I told them to hurry. They began down again. Almost everypony was in when I saw them coming. More of those monsters. Except these were different. All these ones had their snouts split into four with a long tongue-turned-tentacle coming out of the hole. The royal guards immediately ran in front of the few ponies that were left, ready to defend if necessary. One of the monsters that were further out's tongue lashed out and grabbed on of the royal guards. He screamed in fear, and was pulled back towards the creature. Luckily, the last pony had walked into the passageway. When the guard was pulled close to the monster, it began sinking his teeth into him. The others closed in and began ripping him up. The last thing I heard was his screams of pain.
Everything was set up, everypony underground was safe. Through hacking radio signals being used, we learned that at least one of those machines had been detonated in every city in Equestria. Manehattan, Cloudsdale, Fillydelphia, Appleoosa, Baltimare, Stalliongrad, Seaddle. Even Ponyville. Each bomb contained a virus that took over the host body. It had a need to spread. There were many different variations of the virus that had different affects on the resulting monsters. They had been detonated by members of a gang simply known as The End.
Twilight and her friends were thankfully unharmed during the detonation. Ponyville had not been hit as hard as other places. I lost contact with Twilight two days ago. When I did, she had been separated from all of her friends. Rainbow Dash had been sent by the others off towards the underground tunnels with all their pets: Twilight's owl, Rarity's cat, Applejack's dog, Pinkie's alligator, Fluttershy's bunny, and her own turtle. Pinkie Pie got separated when she went to save the Cakes. A teleportation accident had gotten Applejack and Fluttershy separated from the group. Rarity and Spike got separated the next day due to the same circumstances. Apparently The End also had some sort of teleportation disruptor up and running. Twilight was by herself when I lost communications, looking for her friends and the disruptor tower. I've been waiting for her to contact me again ever since."
"And so that's why we're here." The speaker was sitting in a chair against the wall opposite Celestia. He had a short dark brown mane that fell to his eyes and a beige coat. He had just finished loading a handful of bullets into a handgun. His eyes were a blood-red. A comm mic was strapped on his head.
"Yes. The reason I hired you was originally to protect me. I have someone protecting Luna as well. But your job is now more than that. I need someone to go out there and see how things are. If there are any survivors left, if you can find any weapons. Destroy the disruptor if you find it. And-" my eyes filled with hate, I could tell, "- find some of the members of The End. Bring them back alive if you can- for questioning- but if not, plant a bullet through their skulls."
He sat there for a moment. "Consider it done." He cocked the handgun. "When do I start?"
"Gather some supplies, then head out as soon as you're ready. Take as many bullets as you can find. We don't really need them down here. I've already notified the guards protecting the entrance that you'll be leaving. Good luck."
He got up out of his chair and placed his handgun in a holster on his side. As he was about to leave the room, I quickly said "I don't believe I caught your name."
He turned around and simply said "Leon." Then he walked out.