Plague
June 2015
Twilight POV
I woke up this morning really tired- probably because it was 3 am, and a thundercrack woke me up. I got out of bed, as quietly as possible so Spike wouldn't awake as well. I walked over to my little podium where I write my stories- I hope you don't tell anyone- and got to work on my longest and most detailed work yet- a story about a colt and his sexual adventures with his marefriend. Anyway,in the midst of the trance of writing I entered, I suddenly heard my phone go off. I flew over to where I heard the ringing, so that I would save Spike some extra hours of sleep. What I read on the phone was shocking- other than the fact that I have been writing for two and a half hours... What? Anyway, what I read- It went a little something like this,
Breaking News!
Scientists are baffled by the casualties caused in one day by a mysterious virus- Thi..
I tapped on it in order to see more, and the rest was horrible- at least 450 deaths in the span of four hours. And the worst part- the mysterious disease, so fittingly dubbed 'Brinitis' , dries up the insides of your veins, and it's like bleeding out without being cut or shot. Basically running out of blood, all of it drying up faster than it can be replaced. I screamed, waking up Spike (and possibly all of Ponyville.)
"Twilight? What's wrong?" He asked groggily.
"Oh, it's nothing, Spike. Just go back to sleep." I answered slightly quieter than I would normally.
"I know that look- something's wrong. What is it?" He pointed out, resisting the urge to go back to sleep.
I sighed heavily, as I fought my urge to just shout at him to go back to sleep. Instead, I told him everything. The death count, the symptoms, everything. When I finished, he simply stood there, in awe. He was about to scream when I covered his mouth.
"Go back to sleep, Spike." I whispered.
Time Skip five hours
10 AM
I trotted downtown, and almost NOPONY was there. Just the very few that were either really brave, or really stupid. I turned around at started heading home, when all of a sudden, I heard a scream coming from the Carousel Boutique. I ran as fast as I could on my way there, to see if the sisters were OK. I busted through the door, and I saw Rarity and Sweetie bell screaming over a withered-up colt on the floor. I gasped. When the completely unnecessary screaming ended, Rarity noticed me and immediately jumped over the corpse and onto me. My legs almost couldn't handle the weight, so she and I fell backwards. When we got up, she spoke. Well, when I say spoke, I actually meant screamed.
"TWILIGHT WHAT IS THIS FINE GENTLECOLT DOING ALL SHRIVELED UP ON MY BOUTIQUE FLOOR!?!?!?" She screamed into my ear.
"RARITY STOP SHOUTING!" I replied quickly and loudly.
"Alright. What is this... THING doing here!?" She repeated.
"I- I don't know, I didn't know it would spread that quickly, I-" She cut my stuttering off with a calm sentence.
"Twilight, dear, I really don't know what you're saying?"
"Oh, you didn't see? There was a notification sent out last night that there was a deadly virus that dries you up- Ah!" I tried explaining, until I was cut off by a particularly quick pegasus pony. I was sent flying into the room, and only caught myself in the air with my wings.
"Oh, sorry, Twil- AGH! WHAT'S THAT!?!?" Our blue newcomer shouted, finally taking notice of the shriveled body on the floor.
"EXACTLY!" Rarity shouted from underneath Rainbow Dash. The two of them blabbered about how the colt got there, then I noticed Sweetie Belle just standing, staring.
"Oh, uh, Sweetie Belle?" I asked, calmly approaching her. She turned at looked at me with a cold, lifeless stare, as if all of the innocence she had as a young filly had evaporated as soon as she saw that corpse. After a while, she stopped staring and ran to her room.
When I looked up, Rarity and Rainbow Dash were silent.
"What happened there?" Rarity inquired with a worried voice. I stood there, gazing into nothing, as that single moment replayed in my head, over and over. Her stare, it was just...
"Hey! Twilight! Hellooooo!?" Rainbow Dash said, waving her hoof in my face.
"O-Oh, sorry, I just... I don't know, you guys. This disease, it-"
"Wait, what disease?" Rainbow Dash practically shouted, cutting me off.
"You don't know either!?" I shouted. I honestly am sick and tired of explaining everything to everypony around here. "Well, it's called Brinitis- it dries up every fluid in your body, killing you in a span of 3 hours." I explained in the least amount of detail possible, as not to confuse our, let's say, more simple friend.
"Wow... that's AWESO-"
"Rainbow Dash! I am appalled at you! This is no joking matter, you know! This is a serious pandemic, that's killed HUNDREDS of ponies, and it will probably KEEP killing ponies until all of us are dead! So if you'll PLEASE pay some respect to those who have lost their beloved to this... this... Plague!" Rarity shouted. Wow. She will NOT take ANYPONY'S shit when there's a dead pony in her house.
Then we heard another scream. And another. And there was screaming all around Ponyville with ponies just dropping like flies, then getting all wrinkly, and dry, much like a raisin. We simply stood outside the boutique as ponies flooded out of their homes, screaming. Then we saw the single, most terrifying thing in the history of ever.
One of the bodies in the middle of the town, a shriveled up pink colt.
His hoof moved.