//------------------------------// // Epilogue: Death Is In Your Bed (Admiral Biscuit) // Story: Fimfic Authors Are In Your Bed // by Admiral Biscuit //------------------------------// Death Is In Your Bed Admiral Biscuit It's Monday again.  It happens every week. You trudge home like a man on the way to the gallows. Dinner is a simple affair; a fully-loaded deep dish pizza, washed down with Jim Beam straight from the bottle. Maybe that'll help numb the pain you know you're going to suffer. You don't know what kind of pain, of course. That's one of they ways they get you. It might be physical, or emotional, or psychological. It could be financial; you've lost count of how many beds you've gone through, but you're on a first-name basis with the guy at the bed store. You put the three-quarters empty fifth of bourbon to your mouth and drink deeply. Hell, it could be a combo. Those Mondays are the worst. You listlessly shove your way into your bedroom, holding your free hand against the door to steady it, stagger across the room, and drop into bed. It's pony free. For now. "Get it over with," you shout at the ceiling. The ceiling doesn't answer, so you take another drink. ☠        ☠        ☠ You're not sure what time it is. The power seems to have gone out, which is undoubtedly a pony's doing. You paw at the covers, but you're still all alone in bed. That means that the pony is somewhere else. Eating your food, maybe, or burning down your kitchen. Maybe it got lost, and it's raiding your neighbor's fridge. That would serve him right. You check the living room. No pony. You check the kitchen. No pony. But you do find another bottle of bourbon, and since you're down here anyway, you might as well take a drink. Or maybe two. You stagger back to your bedroom, caroming off the walls like a billiard ball, until you finally reach your bedroom. Through your blurry vision, you spot a lump in the bed—tonight's pony is hiding under the covers. Were your coordination more certain, you would have strode boldly over to the bed and yanked the covers off; the tiny part of your brain that's still sober reminds you that your drunken gait isn't impressive at all. But it doesn't matter: you get the duvet on your second attempt and yank it free. Time stops completely. Up until now, you'd believed that it took a while for alcohol to wear off despite what the whisky-devil in your head might insist—but at the sight of your visitor you reach a state of 100% stone-cold sobriety in a tenth of a second. That's followed by a shriek which would do a six-year-old girl proud. In your bed, staring at you with empty eyesockets, is Death. Pony death. He's wearing a black robe, and holding—somehow—a pony-sized scythe. All you can see of him is his skull and if he weren't in your bed and staring at you with his not-eyes, you might think he's cute. He opens his mouth and lifts a hoof—no surprise that his hoof is also just bones—and at that moment you remember that you have urgent business anywhere but here and sprint out of the bedroom door like Usain Bolt mainlining epinephrine. It's possible you just set fire to your carpet with your feet, but you're not going to look back and see. You fly down the stairs . . . especially after you hit the skateboard which is there for no apparent reason. At that point, your figurative flight becomes more literal. However, unlike those pesky pegasus ponies, you have no control in the air, and your windmilling arms do nothing to alter your tragic headfirst arc into the floor. Out of the corner of your eye, you can see your visitor coming down the stairs, and he leans over you and then everything goes black. ☠        ☠        ☠ Time passes in a weird staccato montage. An ambulance crew is putting you on a gurney, and then you're in a hospital bed, dimly aware of a doctor shaking his head. Then the blanket is pulled up over your head, and you realize that you're dead. You've never been dead before, so you don't know quite what to expect. It's peaceful, but kind of boring. Having a front-row seat at your own funeral—literally—wasn't something you'd ever anticipated, but the lid's open for the service, and everyone says nice things, even your boss. You're surprised he showed up. Maybe he thought it was a good excuse to skip work. It does make you wonder who's going to get your last paycheck. The saddest man at the whole funeral is the salesman from Mattress World. If only they'd branched out into coffins, he could have made one more sale. As you hear the first shovelful of dirt rattle against the lid of your casket, your face breaks into a broad grin. At least there won't be any more ponies. ☠        ☠        ☠ You feel a heavy weight on your chest. It was crowded in here before; now it's intolerable. A horsey, hay-ey smell assaults your nostrils, and you feel the weight shifting around. "Where am I?" a girlish voice says. You can hear a faint tone of alarm in her voice. You should have seen this coming. Even death won't keep the ponies away. Oh how you wish you'd been cremated. “What are you doing here?” you ask. Your voice is harsh and dry. Makes sense, you haven't had anything to drink in a week. “It's a Monday,” she says. “But this isn't a bed.” Her tone is accusatory, and you almost recognize it—you know her. She's visited before. Then a hoof jabs into your groin, and you discover that you can still feel pain. You sit bolt upright and open your eyes only to find yourself back in your bedroom, sprawled out over your bed. You're still in your clothes, and there's a mostly-empty bottle of bourbon clutched in your left hand like an adult's teddy bear. You're covered in cold sweat, and you just look at the ceiling for a minute, to get your bearings back. Then you feel that stabbing pain again, and it's not a hoof in your groin, it's what Wacko would call a potty emergency. The pizza and bourbon isn't sitting right at all. You launch yourself out of bed, and carom against the hallway wall as you skid towards the bathroom. You're already shucking your pants as you hobble into the bathroom and the salvation of the porcelain god. You make it, but only just. Your head's spinning, your gut's clenching, and you're sure it's going to take the whole can of Febreeze to make the bathroom habitable again, but at least it can't get any worse. Which, of course is when the shower curtain's pushed back by a hoof, and a familiar wall-eyed pegasus sticks her head out. You jerk back in surprise, cracking your head against the cabinet above the toilet. You lean forward, fight down a wave of nausea, and sidearm a roll of toilet paper at her, striking her right in the muzzle. Her hooves skitter on the bathtub, and you hear a heavy thud as she loses her footing and crashes. She catches the shower curtain, and it falls down on top of her, shrouding her completely. "Serves you right," you mumble. "Catching me by surprise like that." And then two thoughts occur simultaneously. She might be hurt, and you'd actually feel pretty bad if she was. But more importantly, that was the only roll of toilet paper. From under the shower curtain, you hear her mutter, “I just don't know what went wrong.” You hold your head in your hands. “Neither do I, sister. Neither do I.” The End