To Save Equestria: The Mysterious Virus

by KalaAWild

Chapter 9: Afriki, the End of a Line

Chapter 9: Afriki, the End of a Line

The ship rocked Silvershot awake when it reached the port of Zezabra. His head collided with the side of the wall and it left a mild bruise on his temple. As Silvershot got up from his bunk bed, Rainbow Dash woke up with undisturbed sleep. She yawned and stretched her hooves high into the air. She never had sleep like that in a long while.

"I think we docked," Silvershot suggested.

"I think so too," Rainbow Dash answered back. "Let's go wake up Applebloom."

"Good idea."

The two of them wiped the drool from their mouths before the leaving to go get Applebloom. The haul of the ship was silent like a graveyard. Silvershot's best guess was that all the ship members were up on the deck when the ship docked. They didn't know what really happened up top. The two crept through the quiet hallways, being aware that anything could pop up from the turning corners. They reached the room Applebloom slept in and opened the door. She was still asleep on the bed with the covers over her small body. Rainbow Dash walked over to Applebloom and sat next to the bedside. She raised a hoof and laid it on her shoulder just before shaking her awake softly.

As Silvershot watched her wake Applebloom up, he smelt something funny in the room. He took a couple quick sniffs and made sure that his nose wasn't suffering from allergies or something. He was definitely smelling something in the room.

He followed the scent of the smell to the cabin desk and saw scorch marks on the tabletop. He carefully looked at the marks and deduced that something fiery burned on the table and then got extinguished really quick since the marks didn't spread far. Before he could continue inspecting the mystery, Cookie Dough unexpectedly touch downed on the door. The door cracked under her skull colliding with it and she fell onto the ground with her head spinning. Silvershot rushed to her side and helped her stand.

Cookie Dough thanked Silvershot and shook her head vigorously to regain her bearings. She had something important to tell to Silvershot and the others and this time she would say it in person.

"Silvershot, Rainbow Dash," Cookie Dough gasped, still out of breath from running through the entire ship to find the cabin. "Applebloom, you have to see outside."

"Why, what's wrong?" Silvershot asked her.

"We have no time to explain. You have to see it now!"

Silvershot was shocked when he heard Cookie Dough's serious voice. Through the entire time he's known her, he's never heard her raise her delicate and funny voice at him. Silvershot nodded at Cookie Dough and looked at Rainbow Dash and Applebloom before heading out. They were ready to leave too.

The three followed the Cookie Dough to navigate themselves back to the deck of the ship. The port bow windows that they whizzed past showed sneak previews of what was prowling outside. Silvershot tried to look through the windows without lagging behind the others but they were running too fast. Rainbow Dash couldn't take any more galloping and flew into the air. She flew up the flight of stairs ahead of them and kicked open the door.

They reached the deck just in time for the unveiling of what used to be Zezabra. As Silvershot laid his eyes on the town, his pupils shrank to loosen the light entering his eyeballs. It was horrible what he and the other ponies around him saw. The entire seaport was decimated by the mysterious virus. Bodies littered ships nearby and the houses on land. Blood dripped into the oceans as the remains rotted in the hot sun.

"No way," Silvershot muttered. "This can't be real."

"But it is Silvershot," Finn replied back with a grave tone to his voice. "You, Applebloom, and Rainbow Dash need to find that cure fast. You need to find that tablet."

"I thought you said that the tablet was an insane idea."

"It's our only hope at the moment. Find the tablet, find the cure, or else Equestria meets the same fate as the seaport town."

"What will everypony else do?"

"We will stay with the ship and will warn ships not to dock. As far as we know, as long as we are in the ship we won't be affected by the virus."

"Let's hope your right."

The crewponies laid down the gangplank to the dock and Silvershot and his friends got off. Cookie Dough waved good-bye from the deck as she hurried inside. Silvershot, Rainbow Dash, and Applebloom waved good-bye as well before turning their attention to the empty town.

"I am creating a force field so we won't get sick," Silvershot said. "I don't know if the virus can penetrate magic but we won't get sick from the rotting bodies when we get into town."

"Got it," Rainbow Dash said.

"What do we have to look for when we're in town?" Applebloom asked Silvershot.

"We need a map so we know where to get around," Silvershot explained. "Then we need to get to the City of Healing where the Zebra Kingdom's top doctors are. Maybe they have the cure and they just ain't sharing."

Silvershot took the spell caster's stance and summoned magic into his horn. A glowing aura grew around Silvershot, Rainbow Dash, and Applebloom. His eyes glowed with a silver light and a bubble of magic expanded around everypony.

The three, with the hopes of Equestria on their shoulders and the lives in their hooves, they walked through the town streets. The bodies of zebras and ponies alike were found on these streets. Their bodies exploded from the inside out which was a disgusting sight to behold.

Each body they passed idly by was worth investigating for Silvershot but they were short on time. They only had six days left before Princess Celestia and everypony else in Equestria dies. Silvershot tried to ignore the investigations of the bodies and continued with the others to a map shop.

The zebras, along with their expertise in potion-making, were expert navigators and map-makers. A map shop should suit their needs. Before entering the shop, they had to step over a body that unfortunately died at the doorway. The more and more Silvershot stayed in the shop, the more and more he wondered why all the zebras and ponies combusted all at the same time. In other places where the virus had stricken, the deaths were random and never once were in synch. Could the virus be an experiment and the town ponies of Zezabra be the controlled group?

The map shop was completely derived of all its contents. Maps that could lead you to the ends of the planet were gone and even local maps were gone too. There was only one map left but it was in the hoof of a dead zebra.

"We need a map," Silvershot muttered. "I'll take it from him."

Silvershot swiftly got close to the body and reached his hoof out to the map. The body was already starting to decompose with flies eating away at the exposed innards of the unnamed zebra. He filched it as quick as he could and galloped out of the shop with Rainbow Dash and Applebloom.

He was scared inside the shop. He thought that the zebra would come back to life or something might pop out of nowhere and frighten him. As he soon lowered his racing heart to a steady beat, he unfolded the square-shaped map and searched for the City of Healing.

Before he could even look at the map, he heard the cocking of guns in his ears. Silvershot looked up and saw ten masked zebras holding guns to their faces. Their faces were covered in a gas mask to protect themselves from the contagion of the city. The guns were different than pony guns as these guns were augmented to fit around the shoulders of the zebras instead of the hooves allowing for more mobility while carrying it.

Silvershot stood on his hind legs and raised his hooves into the air. Rainbow Dash got down from the air and did the same with Applebloom behind her.

"Don't move or we'll shoot," the zebra in front of Silvershot commanded.

"What do we do Silvershot?" Rainbow Dash whispered in his ear.

"Quiet you!"

Silvershot looked down at the map without moving his head and searched for the City of Healing. There was a path through a grain field to the forest that Armonia took to get to the city. The grain field could help the ponies escape from getting shot.

"Make a run for the grain field!" Silvershot exclaimed.

Silvershot expelled a flash spell in front of everypony which temporarily blinded everypony including himself. Silvershot knew the direction of the grain field which was 225 degrees behind him. Rainbow Dash and Applebloom knew the same thing. All three of them blindly galloped to the field.

The zebras regain their vision first and noticed that their captives were escaping. They all took a phalanx position and fired their guns at the ponies. They each were able fire a bullet round a second and a spread of bullets trailed behind the three runaway ponies.

"Why they shooting at us?!" Applebloom yelped as she ran.

"I don't know but keep running for the field," Rainbow Dash said to her.

"I'll block the bullets from reaching us. These guns are more advanced than mine," Silvershot said to them as he slowed down.

He got his throwing star out using his magic and magnetically stuck it to his hoof. As he ran, he used his sharp senses and blocked the bullets. They sped faster than the bullets he was used to blocking with but he was still able to do his job. The mares reached the field first and kept running without Silvershot behind them. As Silvershot was about to feel the touch of the grain stocks against his face, he could see with his good eye a fear he wished he didn't see.

As he turned to look at the phalanx of zebras just outside the field, he saw a new zebra behind the group. Her tattoos were familiar and the fact that the zebra was Danja scared him half to death.

"Keep running!" Silvershot yelped when he laid eyes on the terror Danja.

"You!" Danja screeched when she saw him. "Men, don't let them escape! Bring me the silver-maned pony!"

Silvershot sped up his galloping pace to catch up to Rainbow Dash and Applebloom who was a quarter of the way through the grain field.

"Keep heading straight," he said to them. "We'll hide in the forest,"

"Good idea," Rainbow Dash adamantly accepted.

"Even better, take Applebloom and fly away. I'll meet you there after I distract the zebras behind us."

"Got it!"

"Wait Silvershot!" Applebloom cried out before getting lifted into the air by Rainbow Dash. "Ey'm afraid of heights!"

"Just hang on to Rainbow Dash," Silvershot paused. "Rainbow Dash, you better not drop her!"

"I won't!" Rainbow Dash assured him.

As Rainbow Dash dodged bullets while flying in the air carrying Applebloom in her hooves, Silvershot turned around to face the zebras head on. He used a special spell that enabled him to clear crop fields nearly instantaneously. With a single breath in his lung, he huffed out a cloud steam. An explosion of magic erupted from Silvershot's horn and with it the entire grain field disappeared which only left the zebra pursuers and Danja.

Silvershot glared at the zebras as they lock and loaded their weapons. His throwing star clung to the bottom of his hoof as he scrapped it on the ground to taunt his opponents. The zebras were unmoved by the show of scintillating sparks coming off the blade and continued to reload. Danja stood behind the armed zebras with an evil smile drawn on her face.

"Kill the little pony," Danja commanded. "With him gone, everything can proceed without failure."

"I am not just anypony," Silvershot said to her before her men fired their guns. "I am Silvershot Crimson and if you are the one endangering Equestria, no, the world, then I will stop you."

Silvershot, without a single moment of fear, threw his throwing star at the group of zebras. The throwing star bounced off the masks of three zebras and knocked them cold. With three down and five to go, he only had a split second to react before he was given a body full of bullet holes. Materializing his magic into a physical material, Silvershot made a new throwing star out of magic and threw it to knock out three more.

The golden boots under his hooves clang as he flung the throwing star from his horn and he realized he had another weapon up his sleeves. The boots, with a click of Silvershot's hooves, turned into a revolver gun. Silvershot stood on his hind legs and aimed the new golden sights at the remaining two zebras. He fired two out of six bullets from the chamber and it killed two zebras.

All in three seconds, Silvershot manages to incapacitate eight zebras just before they could fire a single bullet. All that there was left was Danja.

Danja was the only one left and as epic as it was only a second ago, she didn't fight back when Silvershot apprehended her. He wrapped magic shackles around the hooves of Danja and held her tight in his grasps.

"I just want to know one thing, Danja," Silvershot whispered to her from behind her ear. "Why? Why would you cause the deaths of millions? Even your own kind is dead!"

"Your ancestor, Armonia, wronged me of ultimate power," Danja responded. Her eyes never looked behind at her captor.

"He wanted to save Equestria and so do I. Where's the cure?!"

Silvershot's magical shackles fell to the ground as Danja disappeared from view. He was momentarily shell-shocked as he found out Danja escaped like a puff of smoke. He looked vigorously around to see where Danja vanished too but she was nowhere to be seen.

"Do you want to find the cure? Let's play a wager game shall we?" Danja's voice echoed in the air.

"What game Danja?" Silvershot said with no other choice.

"Bring me the element of sacrifice and I'll lead you to the cure. The cure, with the element of sacrifice, can be found where the beginning ends."

"What in Tartarus is that supposed to mean?!" No response came back. "Danja!"

"You know, the pony virus kills randomly but there is a kill point I can control where all infected can die in one bloody massacre. You have until tomorrow before the virus completely affects and annihilates all the ponies on the planet. Good luck, my little pony."

The element of sacrifice gleans in the darkness of the room. It's golden property mesmerized Armonia with avarice but this awful curse that the element casted upon its user had to be destroyed. His search for the tablet of harmony couldn't get any worse.

With Danja on his tail and the element of sacrifice weakening him everyday, there wasn't much Armonia could do. After successfully getting healed over night by the care of the Shaman, he fled to the ruins of Le Rovine Perdute or the Forgotten Ruins.

The ruins were soon going to be Armonia's new grave. The walls were his coffin and the insects around him the decomposers to rot his body into the ground. His body was too weak to even take a breath of air and his blood from escaping Danja's strange magic was causing him to lose his consciousness. No light reached his eyes and he stood in the darkness with his shoulder on the wall.

His legs gave in just as his strength to live did. The element of sacrifice clattered onto the ground as it magically detached itself. Armonia no longer had enough energy to allow the element of sacrifice to stay around his neck. With no other choice and his dream coming to an end, he had to accept the fact he would have to use plan B and never return home to his family.

He used his magic to levitate the element of sacrifice into the air and spoke one last spell into it. He placed his own curse onto the element of sacrifice to guarantee that the element wouldn't fall into Danja's hooves.

"Split this element into eight pieces of harmony. Each piece representing a piece of light," Armonia recited as both his horn and the element of sacrifice glowed. "Let those who seek this jewel will need to give the ultimate sacrifice."

The element of sacrifice glowed even brighter with light as Armonia's magic dissipated into the darkness. The crevices of the element split the necklace into seven equal pieces with the jewel in the center as the eighth.

The pieces of the element of sacrifice shot into the air, burrowing through stone, to escape the ruins before separating themselves across the world.

"Let's hope that Silvershot saw this memory," Armonia gasped as his heart slowly gave out. "You're going to go far kid."

Armonia, before dying, took out a cigar from his saddle on his side and lit the tip of it with a fire spell. He blew in the smoke of the suicide herb and blew the smoke out of his lungs. His grandfather gave him the cigar to smoke right before dying to signify the ending of a soldier of the Cavallo family.

The weak pony gave one last smoke of the cigar before finally dropping it onto the ground. Before the memory ended for Silvershot, he saw the wall behind the body of Armonia glow. The entire wall glowed which stretched several yards far with an ominous green glow. Words began to form on the wall above Armonia's body and it read Il Tablet di Harmony which Silvershot made the connection. Armonia died in front of the tablet which was more like a wall to him. He also realized something else.

"The Element of Sacrifice still exists," Silvershot gasped as he realized this fact.

Author's Note:

It was sad to think about what the next chapter was going to be about because not only did thousands die in this one chapter alone but the main character Armonia died as well. I hope you guys like this story because it is nearing the end.