The Rainbow Plague

by Prixy05

Chapter 2

Four days post infection...

---

After everybody had rested for the night, they woke up to see that the rain had finally let up and the sun had risen. Whether due to Celestia or something else was unknown. The three ponies stood by the front door of the Castle of Friendship.

"Right girls," Twilight stated, gathering the others in a huddle, "First things first, we go out and see if there's any other survivors in Ponyville." She pointed to Applejack and repeated the plan they made the previous night, "Applejack, because you have experience surviving already, you go out by yourself. First you go to Sweet Apple Acres to show that you're okay to your family, then you go to the Carousel Boutique to see if Rarity's there." She turned Rainbow, "Rainbow, you and I will go to Fluttershy's cottage to see if she's there, then we'll go to the Ponyville Town Hall to scout out the rest of the town." Finally, she turned to Spike, who was decked out in a makeshift armor of pots and pillows, "Spike, you remain here and secure the castle, be sure to keep an eye out for anypony else. And the remember everypony, if you spot anypony who is infected, do not engage them."

The others nodded and grabbed their gear, or at least what Twilight could gather in short notice with what she had in the castle. A bit of food, including some of Spike's surplus rainbow cookies, which Rainbow Dash refused to take, some water, some ragged bandages, and some enchanted items, though their capabilities were severely diminished.

The ponies hugged each other and made their goodbyes as they departed, splitting off on their separate paths.

---

Applejack had experience with survival, so her trek to Sweet Apple Acres was relatively simple in nature. Keeping to the more isolated segments of the town, Applejack dashed between houses, avoiding the main road. The streets were still wet and muddy from the rain, which made quick movement difficult, but luckily, they seemed to be as empty as the previous day.

Applejack only spotted one infected pony; a light olive earth pony named Junebug who was aimlessly wandering in front of some storefronts on an opposite street. She was easy to avoid, giving Applejack easy access to the road out of town.

As Applejack approached Sweet Apple Acres, she took note of the damage done earlier. Several of the apple trees leaned at askew angles, the soil beneath their roots having been swept away by the torrents of rain. Sweet Apple Acres in general was dirtier than usual, with puddles and mud everywhere. Thankfully, the wooden barricades she and her family had set up had held, providing protection for the farm.

Applejack ran up to the farmhouse and knocked on the door. A large red stallion answered, warily opening the door, and gasped when he saw Applejack.

Applejack patted him on the back, "Yep, I'm here Big Mac, you can stop worryin' about me."

"Applejack! You're okay!" Apple Bloom yelled excitedly, the yellow filly running up to the door and embracing Applejack, "I was so worried! What happened?"

"Sorry I didn't come back last night y'all," Applejack apologized, "Things got a bit, complicated."

"What in the hayseed happened out there youngin'?" Responded a third voice. Granny Smith, the wrinkled, pale green, mare, waddled up and began to inspect Applejack, "You get attacked? Ya get bit?"

"Hoofness no Granny!" Applejack chuckled, "Nothin' like that! I found some friends, some fellow survivors."

Apple Bloom looked up curiously, "Who'dya find?"

"Rainbow, Twilight, and Spike. They're all at the Castle of Friendship," Applejack paused, before remembering, "Oh! 'fore I forget, here's some extra food I found."

She took out the pears she gotten the previous day, and some extra food Twilight had given her. The Apples had to scavenge their food for the meantime, for their food supplies were low when the infection started, and the apples trees had yet to ripen.

"So Big Mac," Applejack asked as she finished unpacking her food supplies, "Did the farm hold while I was gone?"

Big McIntosh nodded, "Eeyup."

"Any attacks?"

"Eeyup."

"Any damage?"

He shook his head, "Nope."

"Same pony?"

"Eeyup." Most attacking ponies were a one-and-done thing, but one infected pegasus had attempted to attack the farm repeatedly, attacking at least once per day. Though persistent, she was rather inept, and easily repelled by Big Mac.

Applejack lightly laughed, then sadly sighed as she hoisted her saddlebag once again. "Sorry ya'll, but I'm afraid I have to make my leave."

"Your leaving?" Apple Bloom cried, "But you just got here!"

Applejack pat Apple Bloom on the head, "I know sugarcube, and I'm sorry, but now that we know there's other survivors, it's my, our priority to go out and find anypony else who could still be out there."

"Maybe I could go with ya?"

Applejack softly smiled, but shook her head, "Sorry Apple Bloom, but I need you to stay here so you can be safe. It's dangerous out there, and I don't think I could stand losin' any of y'all."

"Oh," Apple Bloom sniffed, "I understand. You'll come back soon, won't you?"

"I'll come back as soon as I can, I promise."

Applejack straightened up and adjusted her hat. With another hug from Apple Bloom, and a nod to Granny and Big Mac, she turned tail and left the farmhouse.

---

Twilight's and Rainbow's travel to Fluttershy's cottage was steady, but slow. Rainbow Dash was peeved off at her inability to scout ahead, being unable to maintain anything above a hover off the ground. Meanwhile, Twilight took constant note of her surroundings, leading to her getting her hooves stuck in the mud more than once.

However, once at the edges of town, the going was much easier, with mud having lessened and path being clearer. Rainbow looked over to Twilight, who was staring down at her parchment, and spoke up, breaking the silence.

"So, Twilight, what exactly do we do if Flutter's not there?"

Twilight didn't look up, "I guess we look somewhere else."

Rainbow shook her head, "Not that, I mean if she's not there, you know, gone."

Twilight stopped walking and looked up. She let out a sad sigh, "Then we leave her."

"Can't we take her back? You know, like what you did with, Pinkie?"

Twilight shrugged, "I suppose we could, but if Fluttershy's still in there, I don't think it's unreasonable to expect her to remain there." Rainbow Dash hmphed and turned away, leaving Twilight to resume walking.

As the duo approached the cottage, Twilight noticed that it looked remarkably normal. The place seemed to have been unimpacted by the rain nor sick ponies. That might be a good sign.

Walking up the steps, Twilight was the first to step forward and knock on the front door. After a moment, somebody suddenly answered. A gray-furred head poked out, blinking at the ponies with his mismatched beady, red pupils.

Twilight blinked, Discord. She had completely forgotten to factor the Lord of Chaos in this.

"Oh! Princess Twilight Sparkle!" Discord chirped, clapping a paw and talon together, "What a pleasure it is to see you! Oh, and is that Rainbow Dash with you as well?"

Twilight gave the draconequus a paltry smile, "Uh, hello Discord! By chance is Fluttershy home?"

"Is Fluttershy home?" Discord stroked his beard, "Certainly Princess! She is right inside!"

"Right, would you say Fluttershy is sick perchance?"

Discord laughed, "Sick? A bit under the weather perhaps, but not sick, certainly not! Why, me and her were just having our weekly tea before you knocked."

"But it's Thursday," Rainbow Dash interjected, but she was ignored.

"Come in! Come in!" Discord said as he snaked inside with his serpentine body, waving the ponies inside.

Twilight and Rainbow exchanged glances, and reluctantly followed Discord inside.

---

For the first hour, Spike had patrolled the front hall of the castle, occasionally checking the traps and twanging the tripwires, but the young dragon had gotten bored quickly and leaned against a crystalline wall for a break. Spike blew a raspberry and twiddled his thumbs, who knew that the zombie apocalypse would be so boring?

Though the first day was certainly exciting, and traumatizing, he had done basically nothing since; merely patrolling the halls and assisting Twilight with her "research". The research had done little to nothing, mostly due to Twilight's unconscious resistance to testing on who was one of her best friends. He wasn't even sure if the traps were needed; nopony had attempted to break in or shown any interest in the castle so far.

Spike sighed and straightened up, sure it was boring, but he had a duty to attend to. And there was the possibility that any of the others could get sick as well.

He grabbed the fireplace poker he had been using as a weapon and walked down the hall while he thought to himself. Maybe he could do something else, like checking on Pinkie Pie. It would certainly be more interesting.

A minute later, the door to the meeting room creaked open and Spike poked his head in. The room was darkened, the cage still covered. Spike adjusted the pot on his head and tiptoed up to the central table. He turned his head to the cage and heard something.

Light breathing. Was Pinkie asleep?

Spike wasn't sure if the zomponies slept, he certainly hadn't seen any of them sleep. Just to be cautious, he climbed up onto the table and slowly and silently lifted the cover a smidge to look inside.

Immediately in response Pinkie leapt at the bars, causing Spike to yelp and jump back in fear. He tumbled backwards off the table and landed on his tail. Behind the cloth cover, Pinkie finished reaching through the bars and giggled quietly, retreating to her corner of the cage.

Dumfounded, Spike stood up and wiped the rainbow goo that had been spat onto his chest, did Pinkie just trick him?

However, he had little time to reflect on this when the tell-tale sound of a snap echoed in from the front hall. It was one of the traps! Somepony, or some thing had gotten inside.

---

Apple Bloom gazed longingly out of her bedroom window. Her room was where she spent most of her time, as the others refused to let her go outside. Applejack had left earlier, leaving Big Mac to continue protecting the farm, Granny to store the goods, and Apple Bloom to just stay inside and stay safe.

Apple Bloom wasn't exactly sure what was happening outside, Applejack didn't elaborate on stuff beyond vague phrases about a "sickness" and "zomponies" while Big Mac said little to nothing, per usual with him. Granny Smith hadn't gone outside either, but the old mare was content with holding out, relegating plenty of stories to Apple Bloom of similar events in the past.

Apple Bloom sighed and flopped back onto her bed. Her gaze flicked over to her cutie mark. She and the rest of the Cutie Mark Crusaders had got their matching marks not too long ago. She wondered where they were. Was Sweetie Belle at the Carousel Boutique? Was Scootaloo at the treehouse? Were they sick as well?

This lack of answers frustrated the filly. Apple Bloom wanted to help, but nopony else let her do anything! She had gotten her cutie mark, performed at the Equestria Games, and had gotten out of plenty of crazy situations, many of which were admittedly her fault, but besides that, she was perfectly capable of going outside!

Apple Bloom's train of thought was interrupted by a thumping sound outside. She ran up and peered through the window to see that the sick pegasi attacker had returned yet again.

The gray coated pegasus was maintaining a low hover over the ground, repeatedly ramming herself into the side of the barn, leaving rainbow-colored splatters of goo on the side. Apple Bloom twisted her head to see Big Mac sternly march over to the barn. The pegasus stopped her ramming and turned to give the red stallion approaching her a hungry stare. With a silent snarl, the pegasus swooped at Big Mac, who caught the pony's open maw with a broom handle. Ignoring the flying rainbow spit, Big Mac turned the pegasus and gave her a hearty kick to the stomach. The infected pony somersaulted into the air, landing in the mud with a splat. With one more look back, the cross-eyed zompony retreated up the hill into the apple orchards.

Apple Bloom smirked, that specific pegasus had attacked four times already, each time playing out largely the same as before. Her smile quickly faded as her feeling of sadness onset again. She could be out there doing what Big Mac was doing, it didn't seem too hard. After all, if that ditzy pegasus was representative of the average zompony out there, they would be a hitch to handle.

Yes! That was exactly what she could do! She was old enough; she had gotten into worse situations. Apple Bloom resolved to herself, that she would go outside to save everypony or die trying!

---

"Dearest Fluttershy! We have some more guests!"

Discord jaunted into the main cottage, where a large table covered with an mismatched assortment of teacups and teapots lay assembled over the pink tablecloth. The scene was remarkably normal for a tea party with Discord, who was chaos incarnate. However, as Twilight and Rainbow immediately noticed, something was very wrong with the tea party.

Various cloth puppets resembling different ponies and creatures sat at each of the table's chairs, but at the head of the table was the pegasus herself, Fluttershy. Unfortunately, Fluttershy was very much not herself. The yellow pegasus was bound to her chair by various ropes. She looked around angrily with her glazed, white eyes, and snapped at the air, rainbow drool flying out of her mouth and sticking to the tablecloth.

"Discord!" Twilight yelled out, "What happened here?"

"Why I already told you Princess," Discord replied bemusedly, "Fluttershy and I are having our weekly tea meet, but I suppose I should explain the other 'guests'. Shouldn't I Fluttershy?"

Fluttershy snapped her jaw in the direction of the ponies in response.

"You see, I would have summoned some extra guests myself," Discord pompously stated, "But my chaos magic is very off-kilter today." As an example, he snapped his fingers. A small yellow spark fizzled out from his claw as a crude smiley face appeared on the wall behind him. "So instead I had to get a little creative," he wiggled his fingers before swerving to the purple puppet next to him, "See Twilight? This one's supposed to be you!"

His red tail crept up behind the puppet, taking control of it. "Hi! I'm Twilight Sparkle!" The puppet said in a perfect recreation of Twilight's voice, "I love books and friendship! Yay!"

Fluttershy reacted violently, thrashing about in her bindings as she bit the air in the puppet's direction.

"See?" Discord motioned to her, "Fluttershy oh so dearly loves the puppets!"

Rainbow Dash bolted up, "Enough!" She pointed a hoof at Fluttershy, "That's not Fluttershy! Well, she is, but she's sick! I don't know or care what you're playing at Discord, but things aren't fine!" Rainbow finished her outburst, and turned to the door, "Come on Twilight, there's nothing of worth here, let's leave Discord and his creepy 'tea party' alone."

Twilight held up a hoof, "Wait Rainbow! We can't just leave him."

"Why not?" Rainbow snapped, "I don't even think he can get sick! Why not just leave him to play pretend?"

"Because Rainbow," Twilight sighed, "because he's Fluttershy's friend, he's our friend. Discord seems to be in some kind of denial about this, and Fluttershy would have wanted us to help him." Rainbow grumbled and turned around but didn't say anything else.

Twilight turned around to Discord, who had been watching silently with his ears drooped, "Discord? I need you to be completely honest, are you aware about Fluttershy's condition?"

With a sad sigh, Discord collapsed his noodle-shaped body onto the nearby couch, "Perhaps I am Princess, what about it?"

"No more of your misdirections Discord!" Rainbow demanded accusingly, "Did you cause this?"

Discord scoffed, "What? That whole 'zompony' thing? Please! The Lord of Chaos would never stoop to an apocalypse so cliché!"

"So, you don't know anything about this or Fluttershy?" Twilight asked reassuringly.

"Look at her!" Discord cried, pointing at the growling pegasus, "You think I would ever do something like that? Frankly I would be offended if it wasn't so upsetting!" He blew his nose into his tail.

Rainbow rolled her eyes, "Look Discord, you wanna come with us or not?"

Discord shrugged, "I suppose I should." He waved off the ponies, "Go on without me! I need to- make my peace," he said with sudden sincerity.

Twilight nodded and left, followed by Rainbow. Once outside, Rainbow turned to Twilight, "I don't trust him, he's probably doing one of his 'Discordy' things."

"I know Discord can be frustrating," Twilight responded, "But he's reformed, and I know, deep down, he really cares, not just about Fluttershy, but about us as well."

"Yeah, right," Rainbow commented half-heartedly as she fluttered her wings and flew away without looking back.

---

Spike grabbed his weapon and scampered to the front hall. The front door was ajar, and the tripwire had been tripped, but to his horror the net was empty and hanging limply in the air.

He slammed the door shut and nervously looked about. If the trap was empty, that meant whoever entered inside was still in the castle! His eyes snapped to the right as banging noise echoed from down the hall.

Claws shaking, Spike lifted the fire poker and proceeded down the hall. The halls of the castle were unnaturally dark for it being the middle of the day, the windows casting long shadows on its crystal walls.

Another noise. This time from around the corner. Spike gulped and clutched his weapon to his chest as he walked around the corner and- nothing. The hall simply ended at a small outcropping. The only other way forward was doorway. Spike froze when he saw what it was. The entrance to the tunnels.

When the castle first magically appeared, Twilight had found a network of tunnels underneath the castle. Unfortunately, Twilight was the only pony who knew the exact layout down there, precisely the reason why the entrance was normally sealed. But now, whoever was in the castle had somehow gotten down there.

Spike looked down the dimly lit stairs; maybe he should wait back and wait for the others. No! He had a job, and he needed to keep everypony else safe. After all, he was pretty sure as a non-pony, he was immune to the illness.

Spike tore off the pillows he was wearing and bundled a bunch of the cloth. With a little breath of fire, Spike had made himself a makeshift torch. And with nothing but the torch, a fire poker, and a pot, Spike entered the doorway into the darkness.

Comments

[darklight731]

Spike, you idiot. You are just like applebloom. Just do what you were told, and stay safe!

[Puritanical_Frenzy]

11449134
There could be a a zombiepony down there. It makes sense to neutralize or capture it as soon as possible to prevent any further infection.

[darklight731]

11449266
True, but, well, having the only caretaker of the castle go in, alone, reaaaly doesn`t seem like a good idea.

[Puritanical_Frenzy]

11449394
True, but what if the other ponies came back only to be surprised attacked by the zompony? You raise good points though, leaving the castle unattended is also not a good idea. There's not much Spike could've done.

Sorry for responding so late, I don't get notifications and I was rather busy attending to personal matters.

[AgentKorpsman]

"Right girls," Twilight stated, gathering the others in a huddle, "First things first, we go out and see if there's any other survivors in Ponyville." She pointed to Applejack and repeated the plan they made the previous night, "Applejack, because you have experience surviving already, you go out by yourself. First you go to Sweet Apple Acres to show that you're okay to your family, then you go to the Carousel Boutique to see if Rarity's there." She turned Rainbow, "Rainbow, you and I will go to Fluttershy's cottage to see if she's there, then we'll go to the Ponyville Town Hall to scout out the rest of the town." Finally, she turned to Spike, who was decked out in a makeshift armor of pots and pillows, "Spike, you remain here and secure the castle, be sure to keep an eye out for anypony else. And the remember everypony, if you spot anypony who is infected, do not engage them."

By do not engage so you mean if they are not coming to the castle or just don’t engage period even if they threaten the safety of the castle?

Because spike engage if they get too close Or they get into the castle