III – The Cure...?
With no other options available to her, Chrysalis darted deeper into the castle, weaving through the hallways in search of an escape, an army of cuddle-crazed ponies hot on her trail.
As it turned out, the horde didn’t take turns particularly well. That’s why, at every available opportunity, Crysalis dug her hooves in and flung herself around a bend at the last possible second. After a few such turns, she’d managed to shake them, even if only for the briefest of moments.
Panic-stricken and scared for her life, Chrysalis ran and ran as fast as her swiss-cheese-legs could carry her.
She could hear the unsettling chattering of the infected echoing not far behind her.
In that instant, Chrysalis faced a choice: she could keep running, or she could stop and hide. At the moment, it was clear that the former was getting her nowhere. Sure, she might be able to stay ahead of them, but that was only temporary. She couldn’t run away from them forever.
That in mind, she decided on the latter—she was going to hide. She trotted forward, searching for somewhere, anywhere to hole away until this whole thing inevitably blew over. After rounding a turn her eyes settled on the enormous throne room doors down at the end of the hallway.
Chrysalis paused and nodded; she knew what she had to do.
She stopped in her tracks and took a deep breath. After steeling herself, she crouched, getting ready to sprint. Then, just as the clammering of the ponies’ hoof-falls became audible behind her once again, she jumped to life, galloping as fast as she possibly could. She tore through the hallway, running so fast that she could feel tears forming in her eyes.
As she closed in on the door, she sped up even faster. Then, just before she hit it straight on, she pushed down on her hind legs with all of her might, launching herself into the air. Then, with all the grace of an ursa, she threw her weight into the door, bursting through it and tumbling through the make-shift barricade on the other side.
After gathering her bearings and letting out her umpteenth groan of the day, she clambered to her hooves and looked around.
Much to Chrysalis’ surprise, she wasn’t alone.
There, perched atop her throne in the fetal position, was Princess Celestia.
They stared at each other wide-eyed, unsure how to react.
Eventually, it was Chrysalis that broke the silence. “Quick!” she spat. “Help me re-barricade the door! They’re coming!”
At that, Celestia leapt up, finally realizing the gravity of their current predicament. Together, the two former enemies worked together to block the entryway with anything available to them. Tapestries, carpets, chairs, podiums… it was all thrown haphazardly at the room’s entryway in a desperate—and likely fruitless—attempt to block the infected ponies from getting inside.
Once they’d used everything they could, Chrysalis turned to Celestia, out of breath from what felt like a lifetime’s worth of cardio. “Can you please explain to me what the hay is going on?”
Celestia’s gaze fell to her hooves. “Honestly, you know just as much as I do. It’s an epidemic; the disease broke out two days ago. Before long, everypony will be infected.”
“But how? And why?”
Celestia shrugged. “I truly do not know.” She paused. “Now, what are you doing here?”
Chrysalis let out a brief and pathetic cackle. “Hah! The plan was to launch another invasion while you and your precious little Elements of Harmony were incapacitated.”
“And…?”
“And… clearly you can see just how well that worked out, can’t you?”
Celestia grimaced. “Is it really that bad out there?”
Chrysalis let out a long, heavy sigh, flopping back onto her haunches. “Yes. Almost everypony and everything has been infected. There aren’t any sane ponies left out there—just lots and lots of cuddling…” Chrysalis mumbled, her words trailing off into silence. “Actually, what’s with that? Why cuddling?”
“I really don’t know,” Celestia said, mimicking Chrysalis’ sigh flopping onto the ground in a starfish position. “I’ve never seen anything like it before.”
“Hmm. I see.”
Just then, a semi-audible thud came from their make-shift barricade. This was it—the horde had already found them. Chrysalis swallowed the lump in her throat, trying her best not think about the inevitable as the thud repeated itself again and again. The pile visible trembled with each thud.
“Y’know, I was thinking?” Celestia asked, pretending not to have noticed the noise.
“What?” Chrysalis asked. She fell onto her back, laying down beside Celestia.
Celestia opened her eyes, staring up at the ceiling listlessly. “What’s so terrible about this disease anyway? I mean, a little snuggling never hurt anypony, right?”
Chrysalis paused, taking a deep breath. “…You know, I… I’m not entirely sure either. My changelings are all fed because of your ponies’ love, and all the ponies are content as well. Are we sure it’s a disease?”
Celestia let out a laugh at the thought. “Hah! I suppose it depends how you define the word ‘disease’. Sure, everypony is happy for the time being, but productivity is down. Nopony is doing anything besides laying about. If this keeps up for months and months, they’ll probably all starve to death.”
“Well what happens once everypony is infected?”
“I… I do not know,” Celestia replied. “It is a pathological disease, right? It should probably run its course in a few weeks or so. Maybe a month, tops. After that, everypony will be healthy again.”
“And what then? Everypony is suddenly better again, just like that?”
After a moment of thought, Celestia nodded.
“So this whole thing is essentially just a month long cuddle fest?”
Another nod from Celestia.
The loud thud sounds from the barricade grew louder; soon they would break through and reach the two royal beings stuck inside the throne room.
“…And our best plan is to wait it out?” Chrysalis asked.
Celestia turned to Chrysalis and smiled. “Yup, pretty much.”
“Well…” Chrysalis rolled onto her stomach and pushed herself back into a sitting position, looking down at Celestia. “All of my changelings should be pretty well-fed after this, so we haven’t got much of a reason to ‘invade’ Equestria anymore. Do… do you want to just go back to normal and pretend none of this happened once this nightmare is over?”
The banging was getting progressively more and more vehement; the barrier would hold for another minute, max.
Celestia nodded in agreement, pulling herself up to a sitting position as well. “Yes, that’s probably for the best.”
“…“
“…“
“…“
“I just had a crazy thought.” Celestia blushed ever so slightly. “Do you… do you kind of want to go out there? I mean, if our plan is to play the waiting game, we might as well get in on the cuddle fest while we still can.”
Chrysalis let out an awkward laugh. “That… that sounds like a better plan, honestly.”
The barricade finally gave way, and the first purple, frothing-mouthed equine pushed her way through the tiny opening. The whole barrier crumbled, and the horde of ponies pushed through, charging the two of them.
Knowing that this would be the end, Chrysalis and Celestia linked hooves. Together, the two of them smiled peacefully as the masses overtook them, succumbing to the deadly snuggles.
Perhaps… perhaps everything wasn’t as bad as they had originally thought.
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This was a fun little story. Silly and goofy, nothing serious. I liked it.
And then the virus mutated, causing everyone to become sex addicts, thus the works of bendy were born...
Liked this story. I also have imagined the final moments of these two with the mass effect 3 theme xD
Loved it!
7037289 Awesome.
Not the snuggles!
Everypony run! Nobody will survive the pandemic! We can still try, though! 
At least the changelings won't go hungry for a long time after the whole thing ends. Or will it end? Technically, if it never ended and Nopony ever decided to eat normal food while infected, changelings would live for a signifigant amount of time as the last intelligent species on the planet. 
Wait, the disease comes with rabies? Well excuuuuse me, Princess, but you made the worst decision of your life. And the final decision of your life. I need more canon before I go any further. I think the fan fiction is beginning to corrupt me.
i like this fic
Alright, this was pretty neat but a few technical issues stood out to me.
1. Twilight can erect shield bubbles.
2. Twilight can teleport.
3. Luna and Celestia can teleport and probably erect shields too.
These issues are relatively minor as the use of these abilities would likely only have slowed the inevitable.
This part from I – Chain of Infection doesn't make sense:
Because of this part in Prologue – Patient Zero:
If Roseluck was suppose to be in Manehatten, how was she there to attack Lyra only a few hours, at most, later?
I like it, though the ending doesn't really feel like an ending.
It's like an adorable version of the zombie apocalypse. Well, adorable minus the foaming mouths.
I will say that at the end there, I thought Celestia was asking Chrysalis on a date for a moment.
I liked it, but it hardly feels complete. It seems to be missing an epilogue of sorts.
I really did expect some sort of "Aftermath" chapter...
7038742 7038535 7038335 I definitely get that. I'll start an epilogue if/when I get a chance.
Wait, deadly? Well, crap. That escalated quickly.
7039207 Eh, I think this feels complete. If you're confident that you can write an ending with just-as-good-closure as this one, ABSOLUTELY go for it!
What the heck did I just read?
7037151 Same.
7039810 We're talking about a place where there used to be ponies on every street corner with spears, magical blasts are commonplace, and there are a lot of very tall towers to throw infected off of or knock down on top of them. I wouldn't exactly say there's no way to fight the infected. Also, the whole point of a zombie-esque type of story is that there is some sort of fighting.
So what's more dangerous after all - hug zombies or biting ones?
7038235
Cuz ponies are kinda dumb.
7037289 And there were no complaints
So they're betting everything on this disease not being lethal and having no long term side-effects? That seems insanely risky.
On the other hand, maybe they're just rationalizing giving in to despair.
7038235
And Chrysalis can phase through objects (or at least floors).
7041526 They are ponies, the only reason they've lasted this long is because magic.
7041552 I'm suprised the changlings weren't immune to the disease.
Thanks that was a funny little piece.
Thanks for writing the story.
7041846
They could actually be, but they are trapped in the embrace of whoever has them, and the free feeding causes them to have no reason to resist.
I enjoyed the book a lot but the ending was a little bit dumb because its a cliff hanger.
7043718
It's not really a cliff-hanger. The two people who had the most knowledge and experience to understand how it would play out (Discord and Celestia) decided to just roll with it. Discord could have stopped it two chapters ago, but he was certain that it wouldn't cause lasting harm and he'd be able to hold it over everyone's head for a laugh once the disease ran its course.
An epilogue with Discord laughing at Celestia post snuggle-bug would have been pretty funny though.
That was beautiful.
it was not bad but it need a epilogue after all return to normal, unless they don't return to normal...
What if those that recover from the Snuggle bug are infected again as they recover? Or they get inmunity?
Lel, knew it. Chryssie will get the ultimate snuggle boost.
7041846
who says they weren't? maybe they are all just trapped in awkward situations waiting for their queen to come back
This just went into wut
There should be an epilogue where a new pony/changeling alliance is formed in the fires of cuddles, with ponies losing their revulsion of changelings because they had to spend days cuddling them and changelings being better fed than they've ever been.
Well, that was...certainly a thing that happened. I liked it. It was a very subversive story that played with conventions and expectations well.
SNUGGLES???! OH THE HORROR!!! THE HORROR!!! *devious grin* Who can I attack first?
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
Absolutely loved this!!! Just the right amount of adorableness and cuteness and....dawwwww!!! Too sweet! Not to mention funny!
You can has review!