Chapter 9: The Outpost
I need to take lessons in 'Awesome' from Pacific Penguin. That's a real thing, right? Right? Oh well...nevermind then.
Realizing that plans A-F were no longer options, Twi immediately began to implement ‘Plan G’. The short amount of time it took for the chariot to reach Sweet Apple Acres from Ponyville gave her a chance to consider how to break the news to AJ. As the chariot touched down in the clearing, Twilight decided that the brutal truth would be the best approach when dealing with the Element of Honesty. The thought of the Elements brought a pang of sadness at the loss of Generosity, threatening to break her composure. Twi blinked back the tears that were welling up in her eyes; she had too much to do to lose her composure just yet. Steeling herself for what she might find inside, she waved off the chariot and approached the Apple family home.
Twilight rapped thrice upon the thick wooden door and waited for a response. From within, there was a muffled thump followed by a moan as the sound of hooves on wood approached the door. Upon hearing the moan, her heart beat furiously against her ribs like an angry bird trying to escape from her ribcage. She had never stopped to think what she would do if the infection had spread this far; the farm was so far from Ponyville that it never occurred to her that the infection could even make it this far before she arrived. She didn't have time to contemplate it further as a hoof pawed at the door handle, opening it on the third try.
As the door swung outward, the sight of the orange mare on the other side began to register as somehow different than normal. First, there was the moaning and slow shuffling steps from earlier. Second, the mare on the other side of the threshold had eyes that were bloodshot and ringed by dark circles. Finally, the most incongruous thing about her appearance was the lack of a Stetson on the mare’s head. Applejack almost never took her hat off, at least not that Twi had ever seen. As all of these little observations ran through her mind, Twi's brain concluded that the one scenario she failed to plan for was staring her in the face. As the creature squinted across the doorway and opened its jaws wide, Twilight struck out reflexively with her magic and hurled the pony into the wall on the other side of the hallway, where it landed with a mighty thump.
Twilight knew that the blow would not have done more than stun the creature, and began sifting through her knowledge for a spell that would do the trick even as the creature was still in the air. A sharp cry of surprise and pain sounded from the earth pony as she impacted the wall, and it was this sound that stayed the telekinetic blade that had begun to form near her neck. The silence that followed the impact was absolute; oppressive even. The suffocating stillness was shattered by an ungodly loud holler.
“WHAT THE HAY!?”
In a flash, the orange mare had gotten to her hooves and closed the distance between herself and the lavender unicorn. So swift was AJ’s movement that Twilight didn’t have time to comprehend and react before she landed on the floor, hooves up, with stars dancing above her. She lay there in shock, attempting to piece together what just transpired. Retracing the events in her mind, Twi analyzed what had happened. First, she had knocked on the door. Alright, doing well so far. Then, she heard a thump and a moan, followed by shuffling hooves. Yep, that was accurate as well. The door opened, and she was met by…? At this point doubt filled Twilight’s thoughts. AJ had all the classic symptoms of the infected, but zombies don’t speak…nor do they move that swiftly. She suppressed a shudder as she contemplated what it would be like if they did. The final bit of evidence suggesting AJ was not a zombie, was that she was standing over Twilight, staring daggers into her very soul, but not gnawing at her flesh like Pinkie Pie with a cupcake.
As the world stopped spinning around her and the stars dimmed to nothing, Twilight’s eyes focused on the emerald ones that held her in their icy gaze. At this, AJ addressed the pinned unicorn.
“Twi, I love you to death, but if’n you don’t have a damned good reason for delaying my morning cup of joe by throwing me across my own home, ah’m likely to kill you so hard you die to death.”
Twilight sat for a moment, internally debating as to how technically correct ‘kill you so hard you die to death’ was before realizing it was a joke. She then began struggling to decide whether for facehoof or laugh. She settled on both as she began her explanation. AJ looked like she was about to thump her upside the head for laughing, but the maniacal tint to her laugh must have caused her to reconsider. Twi explained that she was under a lot of stress and that it was a huge misunderstanding that led her to toss her friend like that, and bargained to explain it fully over a hot cup o’ joe. AJ agreed, mostly because she was cranky and could really use some coffee.
Once settled at the table and half a pot deep into caffeinated bliss, the pair of mares sighed in unison. AJ was still sore at being tossed, sporting a slight bruise from where she hit the wall. Twilight was not much better off, having apparently been decked upside the head by AJ none too gently. Through idle chitchat, Twi expressed her slight confusion as to how AJ had acquired a taste for coffee. Apparently when she was back in Manehattan, her uncle had given her some when she pestered him about what he was drinking. Since then, her caffeine addiction had grown to the point that she was nigh non-functional before her first cup. That explains the thump, the moan, and the red eyes thought Twilight, she rolled out of bed and shuffled to the door to see who was there, without the aid of her morning brew. Rubbing her sore noggin, Twi began to recount the circumstances of her visit. She had gotten through her visit to Canterlot and partly through the letter from the Mayor before AJ stopped her with a hoof in the space between them.
“Now, don’t you go telling me you believe all these ghost stories too, Twilight. I figured you were too smart for old mare's tales like those.”
“Applejack, this is no mare's tale. Beyond the fact that a mare is telling the story, that is. Also, what do you mean ‘you too’?”
“I came across Scootaloo, passed out in the dirt beside the road into town. I carried her back here and when she woke up, she was tellin’ tall tales about zombies in Ponyville. Way ah figure, she done told so many ghost stories that some of them got stuck in her head.”
“Applejack, would you follow me outside?”
With a nod and a look of befuddlement, AJ complied. As they stepped outside, the duo stepped into the first rays of sunlight to break through the trees. They took a moment to bask in the warmth before continuing. Twilight gestured in the direction of Ponyville. Normally, she would have had to calculate the angle of the sun in the sky, the time of the day, and the time of year to determine a direction with any sort of accuracy, but the rising pillars of smoke from Ponyville rendered this approach unnecessary. As AJ looked on with a dazed and confused look, she briefly summed up what she had seen in Ponyville, and what she needed from AJ. Despite the mounting evidence, AJ's mind still denied that such a thing could be really happening. When Twilight reached the part of her plan where she explained why she needed the Apple family's entire harvest, AJ’s mind snapped back into high gear.
“Whoa, Nelly. There is no way in tarnation, no reason on Equestria, no circumstance under the Fiery Sun of Celestia that would make me part with my entire harvest. Twi, do you know what yer askin'? If we gave up our entire harvest we would starve, never mind that we would have no bits to make repairs or buy supplies for next year’s crop. If we do what ya ask, this entire farm will wither and die. Ah can’t let that happen, not after all we have put into it. Ah’m sorry Twi, I just can’t.”
Seeing no other alternative, Twilight quickly apologized to AJ before touching her horn to the Stetson perched on her head. Nothing happened. Rolling her eyes, Twi pushed the hat out of the way and touched her horn to the tangled blonde mane in front of her. Using a variation of a memory orb spell, she pushed her memories across the connection and into AJ’s consciousness. She could feel AJ’s mind squirm and recoil, not used to having its personal space violated in this manner, but Twi pressed on and slipped her memories of last night and her knowledge about past outbreaks into AJ’s mind.
Exercising all the control she could muster, she did not force the images and memories into the other's mind, as it seemed like it would be a great violation of AJ’s psyche; rather, she passively moved them into AJ’s mind.
The easiest way to visualize this would be to imagine the two mares sitting at the coffee table from earlier. The table represents the connection they now share as their minds are linked by the spell. Now, imagine Twi with a manila envelope in her hooves. This envelope represents all of the pertinent knowledge and memories about the happenings in Ponyville. Instead of Twilight forcing the other mare to take the envelope or trying to cram it down her throat (so to speak), Twi places it on the table, gently urging AJ to pick it up, but not forcing her to do so. Realizing Twilight’s intent and trusting the unicorn explicitly, AJ’s mind tentatively reaches out to pick up the envelope. As soon as contact is made, Applejack’s mind is bombarded by images, words, scenes from a fiery hellscape of nightmare, and the undeniable truth of what must be done.
Overwhelmed in several ways at once and feeling mildly violated, AJ sits down hard and weeps silently. She weeps for the loss of Rarity, for the death of so many ponies she barely knew, but mostly for the death of Equestria. This conclusion was inescapable once presented with all the facts. Equestria would soon be overrun, and there was nothing anypony could do to stop it. All ponykind could do was save what they could, who they could, and try to survive. Twilight looked back to the house, her gaze met by five sets of eyes. The three crusaders watched warily from an upstairs window, Big Mac stood in the doorway, seeming to debate whether or not to intervene, and Granny Smith was wearing a thousand yard stare, focused intently on something nopony else could see.
Presently, AJ calmed down enough to curb the flow of tears. When she spoke, her voice quivered slightly, the only outward sign of the emotions undoubtedly roiling within her.
“Ah’ll help you Twi, we all will. We’ll do all we can for you.”
At this, Twilight let out a breath she didn’t know she had been holding. As AJ stood up to convince the rest of the family of what must be done, she made a single parting remark.
“And Twi? Don’t ever do that again.”
With this, she walked back to the house, shoulders hunched under her new burden.
Unsurprisingly, winning over AJ was far and away the most difficult part of the whole ordeal, and with her support any opposition the others may have held towards the plan quickly vanished. For the most part the rest of the household stared on, numb with shock as Twi summed up the reason for the paradigm shift that was about to occur. The only pony that reacted was Scootaloo, a look of grim satisfaction settling on her visage as she was vindicated of letting old mares' tales go to her head, acknowledging AJ's apology with little more than a nod. In less than 15 minutes all of the questions had been answered more or less satisfactorily, and Twi headed outside to let the others mull over the implications of what she had told them as she surveyed their position and a began to formulate a plan. She was soon joined outside by AJ who, despite her best efforts to hide it, was still quite disturbed by what had transpired earlier.
The two of them sat in a silence that quickly grew awkward, as each tried to work out how to bring up the topic that was weighing heavily upon their minds. The tension was broken quite abruptly as a hexa-chromatic blur swooped out of the sky, snatching them both into a bone crushing hug. As the duo tried to gather their wits from a perfectly executed dive-bomb-hug, they grew aware that this was not an ordinary hug, as evidenced by the gentle sobbing coming from the hunched pegasus. Something quite traumatic had obviously occurred, though exactly what this might have been was a mystery to the both of them. They didn't have to wait long for it to be made clear. Over and over, the pegasus kept muttering the same phrase again and again.
“I couldn't save them. I couldn't save them. I couldn't save them.”
The words blended together into a litany of guilt, escaping from between wretched sobs. Twi and AJ shared a knowing look as they returned the tormented pegasus' hug, stroking her mane and whispering reassurances to her. Soon, she had calmed down enough to relate the events of the previous evening to the pair of ponies comforting her. As her anecdote drew to its conclusion, she couldn't contain herself any longer and began to sob again. Somehow, between shuddering breaths, she revealed what had truly been weighing on her heart; the thought of Scootaloo's corpse being picked at by scavengers because Rainbow had failed to protect her.
They had a date of sorts lined up for the previous day, and the excitable orange filly had clearly been looking forward to it, if her ear to ear grin was any indication. However, Dash had stayed up a bit later than she should have pulling jokes on couples near make out lane the night before, and overslept their meeting by a good half hour. Even though she rushed to the restaurant and searched the town high and low, no sign of her friend was to be found. Rainbow reasoned that by missing her date with the filly she had shattered scooter's self esteem, causing her to go into a deep depression and run away from Ponyville and get caught, and subsequently eaten, by zombies.
As Dash took a deep breath to presumably heap more undeserved blame onto herself, AJ and Twi shared another knowing look. Rainbow launched into a continuation of her predictable diatribe of self pity and undeserved blame only to be silenced by a pair of hooves being pressed to her muzzle. Looking confused and hurt that they had silenced her in the middle of her rant, Dash's gaze shifted questioningly between the two ponies muzzling her. Twilight was the first to speak.
“Rainbow? Not to cut short your exposition on how you think you are the worst pony ever, but we thought you might want to know...Scootaloo is alive.”
At this, Dash's eyes widened and lit up with unabashed hope that was quickly replaced by a crushing sadness that threatened to send the Pegasus into a weeping fit. At this, AJ chimed in.
“It's true, sugar cube. She's upstairs with the other two right now."
In a blue flash and a gust of wind, the Pegasus rocketed into the house at a rate that didn't seem possible, let alone safe. A couple muffled thumps later a trio of voices screamed in unison, one being cut short quite suddenly. The two ponies on the lawn looked at each other, a gesture that had been repeated more in the last day than in the six months prior combined. The awkward conversation that they had been attempting to broach earlier no longer seemed important in the light of what they had just experienced. Suddenly, Twi sat up straight.
“Does Sweetie Belle know about her sister?”
AJ opened her mouth to say something but paused, and after a moment of contemplation closed it again and shook her head dejectedly. Seeing this, Twilight hung her head, dreading breaking the news to Sweetie. The poor filly would be devastated when she found out. Twi shook her head again, muttering to herself.
“Dammit. “
Vaguely, she wondered how things were going upstairs.
*-*-*-*
Upstairs, the guest bedroom was in a state of total bedlam. An extremely frightened little pegasus was having the life squeezed out of her by a larger, sobbing pegasus. The big one was muttering something unintelligible while smiling in a most disconcerting manner and stroking the smaller one's mane. The miniature white unicorn was sucking in deep heaving breaths as she held a hoof over her heart, pantomiming a heart attack. The small butter colored earth pony was the quickest to snap back to her senses, and was presently trying to disengage the pegasi before the little one turned any other shades of blue. And finally, the little pegasus was busy turning several shades of blue and contemplating the afterlife, having given struggling for air up as futile.
As the situation quickly became desperate, the earth filly pulled a last ditch maneuver to free the mini pegasus. Rearing onto her back hooves, Apple Bloom pushed down on her friend's face with all her might. Had she not been unconscious, Scootaloo would have been in a world of pain from the impact. Nevertheless, Scootaloo's head popped free with a sound like a bottle of champagne being uncorked. For a moment, the larger Pegasus stared at the space between her hooves that had suddenly become quite emptier than it had been previously. With a mighty gasp followed by a tremendous fit of coughing, Scooter began to return to a normal shade. In a moment, Dash had realized that her petite pegasus prize had presently escaped her embrace, and quickly scooped her back into an embrace, though not one so tight as to impair survival. Sweetie Belle had caught her breath enough to berate the cyan streak for scaring the daylight out of them, shaking her hoof menacingly to further communicate her displeasure.
Scootaloo had recovered from her brush with death well enough to grasp the situation and return the embrace. This went on for several moments essentially unchanged. Eventually, the collective heart rate dropped somewhere into the range of somepony running uphill, and calmer heads prevailed. Both Scootaloo and Rainbow tried to apologize to the other for missing their appointment at the same time, realizing simultaneously that the other pony had stood them up. They went from apologizing to bickering in ten seconds flat. The pair soon realized what they were doing and collapsed in a fit of giggling at their sheer joy in knowing the other was alive. Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle shared a look of confusion, not unlike what Twilight and AJ had been doing all morning.
In the yard, Twilight had decided on how she was going to set up the initial outpost for Ponyville. The humble Apple family farm would first and foremost need to be fortified against a potential onslaught of undead. Despite being a bit flimsy at the moment, the wooden fence that encircled the homestead from the apple orchard could be beefed up to a respectable state with a bit of elbow grease. By logging the apple trees that had already been harvested of their fruit and cutting them down to size, the fence could be bolstered without any outside materials. More than anything, this operation would require horsepower, and a good bit of it at that. This was quite the conundrum, as the only settlement that could be tapped for resources just happened to be under siege by hordes of the undead.
In spite of the risks involved, Twilight would have to begin to bring the survivors out of Ponyville if her endeavor was to be successful. That is not to say that she didn’t already have the framework of a plan in place for this, but the details would have to be fleshed out ‘on the run’ as it were. Twilight summoned Dash, and soon the cyan pegasus emerged from the house with Scootaloo on her back. Once she was within speaking distance, Twilight addressed the pegasus.
“Dash, I need you to do a mission for me. It won’t take long and shouldn’t be difficult, but you’ll have to leave Scootaloo behind.”
At this, Dash seemed to draw back in shock, not sure if she was ready to let the filly out of her sight so soon after being reunited. Before she could question why Scoots couldn’t come with her, Twilight continued her instruction.
“I’ll need you to fly to the edge of the Everfree and collect Fluttershy. In addition to Fluttershy, I need you to help her gather up about a dozen small animals. Don’t bother asking why just yet, I’ll explain it when you return. I need you to head straight there, grab Fluttershy and her animals, and then come straight back. Do not stop for ANYTHING. We need you, Dash. If something happened to you down there, this entire plan would fall apart and our mission would certainly fail. I know this for a fact. Do you understand how important you are, Dash? Not just to the mission, but to your friends as well?”
Rainbow couldn’t help but crack a smile as the words sunk in. Of course she was mission critical. After all, who could deny the value of having the fastest flyer in Equestria as a part of their team? And even beyond that, she knew how important her friends were to her; it was only right that they should feel the same about her. She would not let them down, not when they needed her so badly. Turning to look at Scootaloo, she favored the little pegasus with an affectionate nuzzle before she spoke.
“Scooter, I need you to stay here. I don’t like the thought of leaving you here after everything that happened, but you couldn’t be in safer hooves. I’ll come right back for you. I promise. “
With that, Scootaloo gave a tiny nod, and slid off Rainbow’s back. As the larger pegasus hovered momentarily, she gave a quick nod to Twilight before shooting off into the distance, a prismatic contrail marking her passage. As the winds died down in the wake of the pegasus’ departure, Twilight motioned for Scootaloo to follow her. Catching Applejack’s eye from across the yard, the unicorn repeated the gesture, beckoning her to follow. At about 0600, the entire crew was gathered in the living room awaiting further information. As Twilight returned to the gathering with a pile of parchment and maps that had come from Celestia-knows-where, she addressed the group simply.
“Everypony, I have a plan…”