Home Is Where The Sanity Isn't

by Soufriere

Chapter 4 - Blue Flu

Mayor Meyer Mare face-hoofed and let out the most drawn out and weary sigh she could possibly muster as Raven slowly read the flyer that had landed in front of them. She had been temporarily shaken into sobriety and was not at all happy about it due in part to the sudden hangover. She frantically searched her own and Raven’s saddlebags for another bottle of hooch, eventually finding a flask marked ‘Emergency’ inside a secret pocket.

“Hm,” Raven hm’d. “Well, every single thing Twilight Sparkle wrote on this is, as far as I am aware, factually and technically correct. Of course I’d expect no less from her.”

“But did she really have to tell everyone Blue-Flu’s mortality rate?” Mayor Mare asked. “Or its assumed rate of contagiousness compared to other diseases? Or every last detail of each stage of infection? OR the fact that our local clinic is criminally unprepared for an outbreak?”

Raven shrugged. “The Ponyville EHS Clinic is criminally unprepared.”

“Obviously I know that,” snipped the mayor as she gulped the contents of her flask like it was mere water. “What do you think was the subject of one of those dozen or so funding requests I wrote up to send to the Imperial Senate? Literally every facet of our social and physical infer- …irnbru- …infrastructure is underfunded. The thing that allows ponies here to keep living their blissful little lives is that they do not know about it!”

“Wait, that letter was supposed to be about EHS funding? You kind of veered off a paragraph in to rant about a pink elephant just out of your reach and ghost riders in the sky,” said Raven.

“I’ll get that elephant one of these days,” Mayor Mare declared. “I’d chase a purple dragon but I already know one. Speaking of, where’s Spike?”

“Not a clue,” replied Raven, shaking her head.

“Of course he’s never around when we need him,” the mayor groused before letting out an involuntary hiccup.

Raven cocked her head. “What would him being here accomplish?”

Mayor Mare’s mouth hung agape for about a minute as she tried to figure out the answer to that question. “Well, it wouldn’t be so darned quiet here. I’d have a second friend to talk to.”

This caused Raven to give a small smile which she tried to hide behind her ever-professional bearing. “Well, Meyer, if he shows up, I’ll be the first to let you know. But you do have a point. It’s so quiet here. Reminds me of back when Zecora first arrived in town.”

“I’ll never understand why Ponyville was so racist against one Zebra when we all know the problem is those darned Yaks and Gryphons and Alicorns.”

Raven facehoofed. “Meyer, replacing one form of racism with another doesn’t actually improve anything. You’re kind of sounding like Orangeglow, if I’m being honest.”

At that, Mayor Mare uttered a profanity too nasty to put in print, just as Apple Bloom approached them from the road leading south to the still-haunted Everfree Forest.

“Uh, is that a word I should be hearin’?” asked Apple Bloom, curious, as Raven shoved her hoof into the mayor’s mouth.

“Absolutely not!” Raven insisted. “I’m pretty sure if your big sister heard you repeating half of what Meyer says, she’d literally wash your mouth with soap. In fact, she already thinks we’re a bad influence on you …and I can’t exactly say she’s wrong.”

“But I like makin’ that Happy-Juice,” said Apple Bloom. “It lets me put all my potions trainin’ with Zecora into practice.”

Raven nodded. “That’s fair. Speaking of, do you happen to know where Zecora is?”

“She was right behind me last I checked.”

Sure enough, a Zebra wearing a brown cloak and multiple non-magical golden rings around her leg and neck soon approached them. She bowed slightly in greeting.

“As expected, ponies have shut themselves in. It reminds me of my first sojourn into town again. Though I do not expect to be feted, it is unfortunate how I continue to be treated,” Zecora opined in her characteristic rhyming couplets.

“Naw, Zeb,” the mayor counted with a bit of a slur. “This is, uh… something.”

Zecora levelled a look at Mayor Mare. “I can only assume some sort of funk as a reason for your being drunk.”

“Nope,” Raven replied on behalf of her boss. “It’s just a day that ends in ‘y’. As for the empty streets, it doesn’t have anything to do with you this time. Here. Read this.” She handed Zecora the flyer Twilight had had printed and distributed.

After careful reading, Zecora arrived at her conclusion. “This is all correct, but I wonder why… Did Twilight intend to terrify? While an epidemic is certainly no joke, there must be a better way to communicate with pony-folk. All this information about death can take away one’s breath.”

“Well, it is a respiratory virus,” replied Raven, “but I get what you’re saying. By the way, what brings you into town? How come you’re not quarantined in the Forest”

Zecora nodded slowly before speaking. “I came in search of herbs for Apple Bloom’s new brew. And, as it happens, Zebras are immune to Blue-Flu.”

“Also, they ain’t vectors or nothin’ like that, she told me,” Apple Bloom chimed in.

“So,” said Raven, “Zebras can neither catch nor carry Blue-Flu?”

“That is true,” Zecora answered. “It is perfectly safe for me to be near you. Or you near me, as the case may be.”

Suddenly, Mayor Mare collapsed, crumpling to the ground with an unceremonious thud. The other three rushed to her aid.

“Meyer!” Raven exclaimed, obviously worried.

“Don’t tell me you’ve got the virus too!” said Apple Bloom.

Zecora stood over the mayor, closely observing her. “Her pupils are misaligned, dilated, and glazed. No blue tongue, though she is dazed. I shall dispense with being formal. Raven, is this normal?”

Raven rolled her eyes. “For Meyer? Yes. Honestly, after the double-all-nighter we put in writing funding proposals as Meyer drank her entire supply of Apple Bloom’s ‘Happy-Juice’, I’m surprised she was able to walk down two flights of stairs and one block of road before losing it. I guess Twilight’s flyer knocked her lucid for just long enough.”

“Twilight’s real good at makin’ ponies think about stuff. Sometimes she makes us think too much,” said Apple Bloom, tilting her head over to the flyer.

Raven shrugged. “She does have a point, though. Better safe than sorry, especially with a disease as dangerous and contagious as Blue-Flu. I’m sure if Meyer was conscious, she’d agree that businesses shutting down for now and citizens self-quarantining is the best course of action.”

Mayor Mare let forth a loud burp.

“I’m taking that as Meyer okaying a formal shelter-in-place decree,” said Raven, her expression stern. “Twilight got everyone’s attention, but it’s our job as public servants to make it official. I’ll let the ponies at City Hall know. Apple Bloom, you should go back to Sweet Apple Acres and check in on your family.”

Apple Bloom gave a quick nod and trotted home as fast as her stubby legs could carry her, which was not very fast but it would do. Zecora meanwhile continued her futile effort to find an open business stall. Raven at first tried to drag Mayor Mare back to their office; failing that, she returned alone, leaving Ponyville’s mayor passed out drunk on the side of the road.

---

Mayor Mare floated on a raft made of overturned bottled down a swift-flowing river of noxious clear liquid through a crystalline cave, its innumerable facets depicting scenes from her memories. The mayor, for her part, was not terribly interested in her surroundings and decided to try drinking whatever the river was. To her, it was good, gave a nice buzz.

“Even in your delirium, you can’t help but go for the sauce,” said Discord, floating along the ceiling in tandem with her raft.

“Discord?” the mayor asked, obviously knowing who was talking to her.

He immediately teleported so that the two were face-to-face, mere millimetres separating their snouts. Uncomfortably close would be a massive understatement, but it did force Meyer to focus as best she could.

Discord’s breath smelled of burnt chocolate as he spoke. “You realize your inebriation, amusing though it is, makes my job a lot more difficult? Things are coming to a head, and if I stick my neck out too far in doing what I was asked to do, which is to protect this pointless town you pretend to lead, I have to deal with Twilight and her lectures. You know how annoying those are. I need you to step up or else I’ll get it from more sides than I can count.”

Mayor Mare cocked her head. “What do you mean? Am I that out of it, or did I really just hear you say you’re protecting Ponyville? Who in this world would be insane enough to ask that and also order you around?”

“Like I told you before, these lips are sealed,” said Discord, “But I’ll dispense with the joking for now because something wicked this way comes, and it’s not me for once. Way worse.”

He poofed out of existence. Mayor Mare felt the lightness return to her head and lay back down. Not long after, she heard a familiar voice that immediately raised her hackles enough to knock her almost sober.

“Well, this is a sight,” the high-pitched gravelly male voice said. “What did I tell you before? You’re fake. Third-rate. Useless. You’ll never make it.”

The mayor’s left eye twitched involuntarily upon hearing him. “Orangeglow…” she said.

“I came to this shithole town again to make sure my orders were being carried out. I give the biggest and best orders, you know,” he said with more than a hint of pomp.

“I’ve heard,” Mayor Mare snarked.

Orangeglow did not get it. “See, I’m the Chancellor of the Country. That means I have a lot of power. Great power. Big tremendous power. And all the mayors and governors know that. The ones who don’t respect it, well, they don’t get my help in stopping Blue-Flu. And Ponyville is at the very top of my list to not help. Nothing good ever comes outta here and all the ponies are crazy. Plus, you allow an ash-kicker and a dirty Zigger to live here and spread whatever diseases they have.”

This diatribe left Meyer confused. “Huh? You mean Spike and Zecora? They’ve helped me out of several jams. They’re my friends, which is more than I can say for you.”

“You think you’re in any position to tell me off, ya loser?” Orangeglow asked with a sneer.

“I could always set you on fire or throw up on you again,” responded the mayor.

“Yeah, see? That’s what I’m talking about,” Orangeglow said with a hint of triumph in his voice. “Ponyville, which I’m sure has many good ponies who aren’t traitors and criminals like you, doesn’t support me. I don’t know why that giant horse who thinks she’s in charge, Celestia, I don’t know why she gives you all special treatment. Y’know, for everywhere else I have to at least pretend I care about poor ponies dropping dead from Blue-Flu. But here? No. I’m not gonna rest until I’ve brought this town, and you, to your knees. Well, you’re already on your knees so half the work is already done for me.”

“I muss be out of it,” Mayor Mare slurred. “The real Orangeglow duzzin’t …can’t string that many words together at once and still make sense. Me at my drunkest is more cohabit …concomi… uh, coherent than that idiot, so you,” she pointed an accusatory hoof at Orangeglow, “aren’t real.”

“What?!” Orangeglow nearly roared.

“That’s right. I’m on a trip through the cosmos in my mind, thanks to Apple Bloom, gotta love that kid. I was having a good time until you showed up,” said the mayor as Orangeglow’s jaw hung open and his cold beady eyes tried to make sense of anything, causing a tiny bit of drool to fall to the ground.

Orangeglow failed to regain his composure, but he quickly found words with which to respond. “Nasty mare. You think you can treat me like this and get away with it?”

“Of course I can!” The mayor retorted with a chuckle. “Because you’re just a fig-newton of my drunk brain. I can say whatever I want. Like, you’re a fat stupid lazy excuse for a powerless Unicorn and you’re probably a gelding, since I’m pretty sure you have no balls and try to compensate by being a bully and pugnan-… piggi-… pugilist.”

By this point, Orangeglow’s entire face had turned red with rage. “You really want to cross me like this? I will squash you like a bug.”

“Whatever,” Mayor Mare replied as she finished getting upright. “I know I’m halfway in La-La Land right now, but I should probably get back to doing my job. Me with one cylinder going is still ten times better than your real self at full power. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m taking this bottle-raft though the crystal cavern back to my office. Bye.”

Mayor Mare pushed Orangeglow aside as her floating transport began to move again. She closed her eyes and smiled as she felt the wind blow through her mane. Orangeglow said something, but she could not hear him.

“You really shouldn’t have done that,” Discord said as he poofed into existence next to her.

Mayor Mare laughed, followed by an involuntary hiccup and burp. “I just don’t care anymore, Discord. If Apple Bloom’s Happy-Juice is going to send me on a magical mystery tour, I may as well make the most of it, right? Oh! Do you think you can make this river here flow up? I wanna get to my office to, I dunno, do stuff. And stuff.”

“Well, from your perspective, it kind of already is,” he replied.

Sure enough, the channel began moving upward in a sort of corkscrew for awhile before levelling out, the reflections off the crystal walls gorgeously iridescent. Eventually the raft came to a stop in a small chamber containing Meyer’s desk, chair, and empty drink bottle. With difficulty, she climbed into her chair.

“Thanks for your help, Discord,” she said. “I’m gonna sleep off the rest of my drunk now. I know it’ll be hell in the morning or whenever, but oh well. This is the life I chose.”

Discord gave her a look of uncharacteristic concern. “Oh, I think the hell will happen long before the hangover. I just hope I won’t have to get involved again. With my bad luck, I will. Ugh, doing good gets tiring, you know that?”

Mayor Mare nodded knowingly. “I do. Over a thousand ponies depend on me and so many times I can’t fix every problem. Why do you think I drink? If I was a Unicorn I might have snapped and burned it all down already, like Twilight almost did that one time. I don’t like her, but at least she tries to do the right thing. More than I can say for…” she trailed off.

Discord craned his long neck over to see his lady-friend passed out in the giant leather chair, her wavy grey mane in shambles and her glasses askew. She snored softly, with the occasional hiccup or burp. He watched over her for another minute or so before shrugging and poofing back to wherever it was he felt like being.

---

Mayor Mare’s dreamless sleep was rudely interrupted by a loud blast and shock wave that sent her hurtling out of her chair into the wall. As her brain and eyes adjusted to unwanted wakefulness, she could make out the blurry upside-down figure of Raven shaking her.

“Meyer! Thank Celestia you’re finally awake!” Raven said.

Only marginally with-it, Meyer responded, “Why do I need to thank her? Is she here? Did she throw me into this wall?”

“Now is not the time to be literal-minded. We have an emergency!” Said Raven with a sense of urgency unusual for her as she helped the mayor to her feet and guided her to the window.

Outside the windows of the mayor’s corner office, where normally one would have seen Ponyville’s main drag and its businesses, albeit empty due to the quarantine order, they saw only fire. Nearly every building between City Hall and the old Town Hall by the river was aflame. The wood frames and thatched roofs only exacerbating the problem as residents and workers scrambled to evacuate their burning domiciles and the fire brigade worked in vain to contain the conflagration.

“What in the hay…?” Mayor Mare quietly asked no one in particular as the magnitude of what she was witnessing hit her like a ton of bricks.

“It just came out of nowhere,” said Raven, her voice quivering. “From the sky, and then …it was all on fire.”

“Wild Dragons?” The mayor asked, but Raven shook her head no.

“Dragon fire doesn’t work that way or go that far. No one as far as I know was able to see who did it. Twilight shot off some spells before I told her to start coordinating the fire brigade.”

Mayor Mare nodded in surprised satisfaction. “Good to know she’s willing to help when it comes down to it.”

A loud crack signifying a temporary breach in the space between spaces plus a brief flash of light heralded Twilight Sparkle’s arrival in the mayor’s office. Meyer and Raven both turned to face her in all her purple non-majesty. Indeed, Twilight looked distinctly frazzled.

“Mayor, I know we don’t always get along,” said Twilight curtly, “but Ponyville has been my home for years now. I’ve made friends here. Of course I would do anything to help in the event of a disaster, especially one neither I nor the other five played any part in.”

“Fair enough,” Mayer said, a tad guiltily. “Since it seems the fire-ponies are as on top of this as they can be for now, can you tell us what you know?”

Twilight nodded. “I didn’t see them coming. No one did. It couldn’t have been a dragon because a dragon’s fire-breath is indiscriminate in what it burns, as you’ve discovered from Spike. Speaking of, I still have no idea where he went and I can’t get in touch with Princess Celestia. Anyway, what I could see were shots deliberately aimed at Ponyville’s thatched roofs from a tremendous altitude. Ultra-precise. I don’t want to believe what I’m about to say, but…” she trailed off.

Mayor Mare rolled her eyes at the dramatic pause. “Twilight, we don’t have time for this. Please, spit it out.”

“Sorry. It’s just that… only the Canterlot Imperial Guards have the skills to pull off an attack like this without being caught,” she finished. “I let loose a few attack spells, but that type of magic really isn’t my forte. I wanted to send Rainbow Dash after the attackers but she flat refused, staying here to help ponies evacuate and lend a wing to the firefighters.”

They looked out the window and, sure enough, a rainbow-coloured streak whizzed by just above street level before pouring a bucket of water on a nearby roof to try and quell its flames, then busting through a wall to herd out whatever inhabitants remained inside.

Twilight spoke as if she was about to cry, likely because she was. “The Palace Guards, trained by my big brother. No matter which way I try to take the logic based on what I’ve seen, that’s the only answer that makes any sense. Princess Celestia’s personal army attacked Ponyville. Why?? She loves this town! Did I do something to displease her?” Twilight began to hyperventilate.

“I honestly doubt it,” replied Mayor Mare truthfully, placing her hoof on Twilight’s trembling shoulder.

Suddenly, Raven’s eyes lit up. “Twilight,” she said gently, “I was inside when the attack began, so I’m wondering if you happen to know the first building that was hit.”

Twilight looked quizzically at the mayor’s faithful assistant, but took the question seriously. “Actually, several ponies, trying to still keep their distance while fleeing due to the pandemic, told me that it was the hospital.”

At that, Raven frowned and furrowed her brow. “I thought so,” she said.

Mayor Mare stared blankly at the other two, but the metaphorical rusted gears that made up what was left of her brain slowly began to creak to life. “Hospital. Blue-Flu. Funding…”

“Exactly,” Raven replied. “You’ll get to the answer I did soon enough, Meyer.”

“What are you two talking about?” Asked Twilight as a nearby Pegasus firefighting squad began to unload the contents of a massive basin onto the still-burning buildings.

“Twilight, Celestia would never in a million years order an attack on Ponyville. You know that better than anyone,” said Raven matter-of-factly. “In fact, we all know she goes out of her way to protect our little town. Members of her guard have gone rogue. Meyer and I saw it firsthand at the border with the Crystal Empire some weeks back. Ponyville’s hospital being specifically targeted just confirms it.”

“Rogue?!” Twilight blurted out in disbelief. “That’s crazy! Just like Shining Armor, they swore an oath to Princess Celestia. It’s an incredibly difficult, thorough vetting process.”

“Maybe you should get in touch with your brother and ask him what he dealt with when trying to escort us back here,’ Mayor Mare intoned gravely. “It wasn’t pretty. Being turned on by his former comrades never is. Neither is murder, even if it was undeniably self-defence. He may or may not spare you the details.”

Twilight shook her head in disbelief. “I just can’t believe any of this is happening…”

Mayor Mare bowed her head. “And… friggin’ sobriety… if what I’m thinking happened in my dream was not, in fact, a dream, then this is probably my fault. I might have accidentally brought the wrath here myself.”

“What?!” Twilight asked, staring at the mayor as if she’d grown a second head.

Before the conversation could continue any further, the door burst open and Apple Bloom ran into the office, tears streaming down her face, eyes already bloodshot.

“Apple Bloom! What’s wrong??” All three mares asked in unison.

After some time sniffling and trying to compose her breathing, Apple Bloom finally spoke.

“It’s Granny Smith. She got the Blue-Flu. I didn’t get too close but… what I saw was just like you said on those flyers, Twilight. Zecora hightailed it back to the Forest once everything started catching’ on fire. Big sis and Big Mac are here in town helping’ the firefighters so they ain’t seen how bad she’s gotten. I…” she sniffed, “I don’t think she’s gonna make it.”

Comments

[Iron Comet]

Time to fake her death. So convenient.

[Munro]

urghh not another one...good work on the story tho
orange glow lost it, celestia will be pissed as fuck

[Spellflame]

10199125
It really is

[Vaguely Demented]

Hell of a time to choose to fake your death.