When a group of researchers stationed at an outpost many miles north of the Crystal Empire discover a strange organism frozen in the ice, they believe they have found the find of the century. But when the organism thaws, something hostile is released upon the base. Now the crew must try to survive against the cold, the organism, and their distrust of each other.
The frozen wasteland in front of him was truly breathtaking. The way the light from the sun reflected off the snow, and the mountains in the distance stood out like sleeping giants on the horizon, blanketed in snow.
Time Turner, more commonly known as Dr. Whooves to his friends, surveyed the area around him, shivering from the cold in his parka.
Him and his associates were out to place special sensors around to study both weather patterns, and seismic activity under the ice.
Dr. Whooves was part of the Crystal Research Outpost 15, an Equestrian research station located many, many miles north of The Crystal Empire. Dr. Whooves was the assistant Biologist at the station.
With him placing down sensors was Rainbow Dash, the stations tough and egotistical Meteorologist. Maud Pie, the rock loving Geologist. And Twilight Sparkle, the head Biologist.
Waiting on Standby for a pickup was the station's Helicopter Pilot Applejack.
The rest of the crew were still at the station, keeping in contact with radios.
Dr. Whooves took another sensor out of the pack he carried and switched it on before planting it into the snow.
"Are you picking this one up?" Whooves asked into his radio. The radio crackled in response, before a voice came through.
"We're receiving the data already." the voice of Outpost Commander Shining Armor came through.
Whooves looked into his pack and found it empty, meaning he had placed all the necessary sensors. He glanced up to Rainbow Dash who was in the process of placing another sensor.
"Are you on your last one Dash?" Whooves asked. Rainbow Dash turned around and nodded.
"All done, now lets get back and get some hot soup, the winds are supposed to pick up within the hour." Rainbow Dash said.
Suddenly, a scream was heard and Whooves and Dash immediately rushed over to the source. It was Twilight, who was standing over some ice, looking terrified.
"What happened Twilight?" Whooves asked as he approached her. Twilight simply pointed a hoof down at the ice. Dr. Whooves looked down and gasped.
Under the ice was the shape of some huge thing. It was at least six feet across and had 3 glowing red eyes.
"I don't think I've ever seen a rock like that before." Maud said in her usual deadpan tone, but with a glint of shock in her eyes. The other 3 glanced back and forth between each other before Twilight spoke.
"We should head back and report this to Shining." Twilight said as she placed a sensor directly over the shape.
Rainbow Dash quickly radioed back to the station, requesting a pickup from Applejack.
"You said this thing has red eyes?" Shining asked, looking up at the four scientists that brought back their findings. They all nodded.
"It could be a new life form!" Twilight piped up in an excited tone. The others gave skeptical looks as Shining thought it over, looking at the readings from the sensor that Twilight put down.
"These readings are a bit abnormal, are you positive we should take a risk like this?" Shining asked Twilight. She nodded
"Shining, this could possibly be a new lifeform never before discovered by ponies, it could even be the missing link between modern ponies and our ancestors! This could be the find of the century!" Twilight said excitedly with Dr. Whooves, Rainbow Dash and Maud nodding in agreement.
"It could be worth the risk Shining." Whooves said.
Shining thought it over for a few moments before responding.
"Okay, we'll monitor it tonight, and if anything changes, then we'll send a team out tomorrow to collect the specimen." Shining explained, the rest nodded. "You're all dismissed, thank you." Shining said waving his hoof.
Rainbow Dash turned to Twilight in the hallway, "Are you 100% certain about this Twilight, that could be a dangerous creature or something." Dash explained.
"Don't worry, we can handle it. It's been frozen for Celestia knows how long, it's probably long dead. What could go wrong?" Twilight said.
The base was alive with speculation that night, from the discussions among the scientists, to the very excited cook Pinkie Pie raving about something new.
Besides the commander, Scientists, and Pinkie, the station had several other residents.
The Helicopter Pilot and snowcat operator was Applejack, a southern Equestria raised mare with a cool cowboy hat and a thirst for hard cider.
The station had 2 Technicians, Chief Technician Rarity, a Unicorn mare with an eye for fashion, and assistant Technician Soarin, a Pegasus stallion.
The station had a team of 12 sled dogs reserved for specific tasks all under the care of their handler Fluttershy, a timid and shy Pegasus.
The Station's Physician responsible for patching up any injuries was Dr. Stables, a caramel colored earth pony with a brown colored mane.
Last but not least was the Station's Radio Operator Vinyl Scratch, responsible for making contact with other station as well as the main base back in the Crystal Empire.
The night passed and everpony woke up in the early hours to get ready for the extraction of the specimen. Vinyl entered the radio room and sat down at the desk that held the large device. She flipped it on, put on her headphones and started to tune it.
She tuned to the appropriate channel and pressed the voice projection button.
"This is Crystal Outpost 15, attempting to contact Main Base, please respond, over." Vinyl said into the microphone, she then waited for a response, only to get nothing, as usual. Then Twilight entered the room.
"Good morning Vinyl, have you contacted the Crystal Empire yet?" Twilight asked walking up next to Vinyl.
Vinyl sighed and turned around in her chair, "Still nothing, I haven't been able to reach shit in 2 Weeks!" Vinyl said frustrated.
Twilight sighed, "Well get a hold of somepony, get a hold of anypony! We need to report the specimen!" Twilight said angrily before storming out.
"I'll try, but no promises Twilight!" Vinyl called out before turning back to her radio.
The crew gathered for breakfast in the mess room later in the morning. As they all ate, several conversations began among the crew, spanning from joking with each other, to conversations about the future of the mission.
"I don't think I can last an entire winter out here Darling, I get frostbite easily." Rarity said to her table mates Rainbow Dash and Soarin.
"I wouldn't worry too much Rarity, the base is heated, and if there is ever a problem with the generator I know you and Soarin can fix it up in a jiff." Rainbow said, nudging Soarin slightly.
"Yeah, and who knows, maybe that specimen that Twilight found can get us out of here a few months early." Soarin said, pointing across the room to Twilight.
Rarity sighed, "Maybe you're right. It is healthy to have wishful thinking." She said before eating another spoonful of oats.
Then, Shining Armor entered and called the crew to attention.
"After monitoring the specimen that Twilight found yesterday, I've decided to have it collected and brought back here for deeper analysis." Shining announced.
Twilight let out an excited yelp in response.
"Applejack, Twilight, Dr. Whooves, Rarity, and Myself will head out to collect it with the helicopter, we leave in one hour, so get ready." Shining explained before leaving the mess room.
"Well, looks like something interesting is happening this winter after all." Vinyl said sarcastically.
The small team of five left on Applejack's helicopter to the site where the specimen was discovered. When they got there they had a good look at the specimen.
It was entirely black, and it was very difficult to make out any features, apart from the red eyes.
"It looks, eerie, do you think it's alive Twily?" Shining asked as he observed the strange shape beneath the ice, feeling slightly unnerved at the site of the unknown organism.
"It's hard to tell. We won't be able to know definitively until we get it back to the station and get some samples." Twilight explained.
"Alright, let's get this thing cut out of the ice." Shining ordered. Then, Twilight, Shining, and Rarity all used their magic to cut the block out from the ice and levitated it out. Now that they could see the organism from more than one angle, they could now see that the specimen was very thin, like it was cardboard cutout, only slightly thicker, since it looked much larger from the previous angle.
The helicopter, piloted by Applejack, hovered over the block and released 4 cables that the rest of the crew hooked into the ice block. After being secured, the crew all climbed back into the helicopter, and Applejack flew them and the specimen back to the station.
After the specimen was delivered, it was moved into the spare shed and the scientists along with Shining Armor began to examine it.
"Well, can you tell if it's alive yet?" Shining asked as Dr. Whooves and Twilight inspected it. Twilight turned to him with a disappointed expression.
"I'm afraid we don't know, we're gonna have to wait for it to thaw before we can make further observations." Twilight explained.
Shining Armor scoffed, "Alright, we'll let it thaw, now let's go and get drunk, because if this thing is a new life form, then we are gonna get paid extra for this mission." Shining said as he left the shed.
"Now you're speaking my language Shining!" Dr. Whooves said as he followed him.
Twilight lingered behind and continued to observe the specimen, she became almost entranced by the strange being under the ice. She stared directly into the three red dots glowing under the ice, and she felt her eye start to twitch.
"Twilight! You Coming?" Dr. Whooves called to her, snapping her out of the trance.
"Oh, yeah, I'm coming!" Twilight said as she followed Whooves back to the main building, Looking back at the shed for a second as she walked into the building.
Later that night, one of Fluttershy's dogs entered the shed with the frozen specimen. The dog wandered up to it and began to sniff it, when suddenly, the ice began to crack...
Vinyl looked up at the clock on the far side of the comms room. 11:30 it read, and Vinyl groaned. She had just spent the last 3 hours attempting to fix the radio so she could contact the main base and tell them about the mysterious specimen they had recovered, but she got pretty much nowhere.
It was early winter, so the days were getting super short, and they had experienced comms failures before, but not one that has lasted for as long as it was lasting now. Vinyl got up and stretched before moving to her chair and slipping on the headset. She flipped the radio on and moved her head forward to the mic. She then pressed the button.
"Hello, this is the Outpost again, attempting to contact the Crystal Empire, for like the billionth time, do you copy? over." Vinyl said sarcastically into the mic before sitting back and waiting for a response, but just got white noise instead.
Vinyl sighed and laid back in her chair and stared at the ceiling.
"This radio is a piece of shit" Vinyl said out loud, while slamming her hoof on the table.
"Maybe you should try being nice to it." Pinkie pie said as she skated past the comms room in the hallway.
"Don't start with me Pinkie!" Vinyl shouted.
Twilight sat at her desk in her office, jotting down as many notes as she possibly could on the specimen that she could remember. She was still thinking back to when she looked into the specimen's red eyes. Just remembering them sent a shiver down her spine.
Eventually she found herself staring out the window towards the shed. Her mind went blank, and she could see images of something horrible, a large dark mass with several tendrils, the sounds of screaming, and dogs suffering, she finally heard a voice.
"join us..." she heard faintly inside her head. She then felt like a dark mass was surrounding her, closing in to kill her.
Twilight was suddenly yanked out of her stare when Dr. Whooves entered the room.
"Twilight, are you okay?" he asked. Twilight slowly turned to face him, he could see the bags under her eyes.
"I'm fine, just finishing up my notes." Twilight said in a chipper voice, trying to hide her actual feelings of impending doom.
"It's almost midnight, you should head to bed." Whooves said, placing a hoof on Twilight's shoulder. He had been under the command of Twilight for pretty much the entire time he had been there, since he was only the other member of the crew with a biology degree, and he had volunteered to come up here for a special certificate.
"Yeah, you're probably right, I'll turn in soon." Twilight said as she began to organize her desk.
Dr. Whooves turned to leave, pausing at the door and glancing over at Twilight's notebook.
Shining Armor walked down the station's long hallway and stopped quickly at the kitchen and peered inside. He saw Pinkie Pie, Maud Pie and Dr. Stables sharing a drink. He then walked in and the the 3 drinking ponies froze in place, slightly embarrassed.
Shining frowned at the three ponies and finally spoke up.
"You three have 5 minutes to clean up and head to your bunks for lights out before I get peeved." Shining said in a deadpan yet threatening tone, making the three immediately get up and start cleaning before heading off to their rooms.
"Hey Pinkie, have you seen Fluttershy and Applejack?" Shining asked Pinkie as she finished cleaning the kitchen.
"Fluttershy is doing her nightly checkup on the dogs,and Applejack retired to her tower about a hour ago." Pinkie explained. Shining then went back to his office.
Applejack sat at her desk and stared at the screen in front of her. She was stumped, trying to figure out how to win this game. She had tried for the past hour to beat this computer at chess. She tried everything she could but kept loosing. She strained to think of her next move as she took another sip of her drink. She decided to try to move again, but like the last few times, the computer moved and immediately checkmated her. Applejack finally lost her patience and opened the computer drive and poured her drink into the computer, short circuiting it.
"Cheating bitch." Applejack said to herself as she placed her glass down and laid down on her bed for one last night of sleep. All of the stations inhabitants settled down for a good night sleep, but none of them knew what lay ahead of them.
Nopony noticed the commotion coming from the shed either....
Twilight found herself in a large, desolate void. Her limbs unable to move, like being held in place by invisible binds. In the darkness around her she could hear screams and other noises far beyond the horrors of Tartarus.
Out from the darkness stepped a familiar shape, it was the specimen, with it's three red eyes glaring seemingly into her soul. Twilight tried to scream, but her mouth emitted no noise. The creature then sprouted tendrils and reached out towards Twilight. She closed her eyes and prepared for the end, until she heard a loud blaring noise.
Twilight jolted up in her bed, yanking her out of her nightmares. She looked for the noise, and saw her alarm clock, it read 7:00am. This was the usual wake up time, and she heard the rest of the crew beginning to wake up and scramble into the halls.
Twilight slowly got out of the bed and started to get ready. Brushing her hair, her teeth, getting dressed. Then Shining entered Twilight's room.
"Good morning Twily, did you sleep well?" Shining asked. Twilight faked a smile and tried to act normal.
"I slept like a newborn foal. Looking forward to the further research today." Twilight said in a happy tone that didn't match the exhausted look on her face.
"Okay, well, we're having a meeting at breakfast, so I'll see you there." Shining said as he left the room.
Twilight and the others got dressed and went to the mess room for breakfast, they all chatted and enjoyed the meal before Shining spoke up.
"Okay, here's the plan for this morning, Twilight and Dr. Whooves, I need you guys to head back out to the shed and make some more observations on the specimen, and if it's thawed yet, then you can perform an autopsy, and bring Dr. Stables with you." Shining explained. The Biologists and the doctor all got up and headed out.
"Vinyl, Rarity, Soarin, I need you three to focus on fixing the damn radio." Shining said to the engineers and the radio technician, making them groan as they went to try once again to fix it.
"The rest of you, go back to your posts and await further orders." Shining said before heading back to his own office.
As the biologists and the physician headed toward the shed, Whooves noticed that Twilight was slightly "out of it", like she was sleep deprived.
"Are you sure you're okay to work today Twilight? You don't look so well." Dr. Whooves said concerned.
"It's fine Whooves, I just didn't get a lot of sleep last night, that's all." Twilight said as she walked ahead of the other two to get to the shed first.
Twilight opened the door and entered the shed, the other two heard her gasp and rushed inside.
When they left the specimen last night, the block was leaned up against the back wall, but now it was laying on the floor in the center of the room, and there was a large hole in the block. They stepped closer and saw something inside of the now tub shaped block.
Inside was some sort of corpse. It looked like the bodies of two ponies, but their bodies were joined from the head all the way down to their flanks. Dr. Whooves gagged upon seeing it, and Twilight covered her snout and inspected it further. The body was charred, like it had been burned.
"I think we should report this." Dr. Stables said before heading back to tell Shining about the specimen.
Dr. Whooves held his own snout and walked up beside Twilight. "So, what now?" Turner asked.
Twilight looked over, "We take it into the lab, and perform an autopsy, because this is impossible, this isn't what I saw frozen in the block." Twilight explained as some of the other crew were heard heading toward the shed.
The crew managed to wrap the charred specimen in a tarp and carried it back into the base and into the biology lab, where Twilight and Dr. Whooves prepared for the autopsy. The rest of the crew was there observing. Twilight then began cutting into the body and began to pull out organs.
"I think I'm gonna be sick." Vinyl said as she watched the autopsy.
"You and me both." Rainbow Dash said as she rushed out of the room to vomit.
After gathering several organs, Twilight turned to the others and explained her findings.
"Well, what we've got here seems to be a normal set of internal organs, Heart, lungs, liver, kidneys, intestines, it's normal." Twilight explained.
Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes after re-entering the room, "Yeah Twilight, that thing is normal." She said sarcastically.
Shining then spoke up. "Okay, put the carcass into the cooler and collect data from the organs." Shining ordered, "Document your findings and report to me if you find anything abnormal, because finding a charred, fused body of 2 ponies is far from the ordinary." Shining said.
Then one of Fluttershy's dogs walked into the room and rubbed against Soarin's leg, making him jump.
"uh, Fluttershy! get your dog back in the kennel!" Soarin said, now annoyed.
"Okay, sorry about that Soarin, I must've not closed the kennel tight enough." Fluttershy said before turning to the dog,
"Come on Clark, lets get you back to the kennel." Fluttershy said, leading the dog out of the room and down the hall.
Everypony except Whooves and Twilight left the room, then Whooves spoke, "What exactly do you think this is?" he asked as he looked back at the body. Twilight thought for a moment.
"I don't have a fucking clue, but this couldn't have been the specimen that was frozen." Twilight pointed out, remembering the shape that was frozen in the block. Dr. Whooves' eyes widened, "Maybe the specimen escaped and left this behind?" Dr. Whooves asked, visibly scared now.
Fluttershy led the dog down the hall to the end of the base, where the kennel was located. She led the dog into the room, on the other side was a cage with 5 other dogs laying down sleeping. Fluttershy unlocked the door and opened it.
"Okay Clark, in you go, I'll check on you all in the morning." Fluttershy said as the dog entered the kennel.
Fluttershy turned and headed for the door, stopping for only a second to turn off the lights, leaving the dogs in the dark.
The dog stood in the center of the kennel, not moving a single inch. The other dogs around it started to stir and stand up from their slumber, the dogs began to growl and snarl at the center dog, eventually starting to bark angrily.
The dog then started shaking violently, then bits of it's face slid back to reveal a bloody skull of a dog that fell to the kennel floor, from the stump emerged a mouth with some sort of tongue sticking out of it. It also began to make unworldly sounds.
All of the dogs were barking loudly now, bringing Fluttershy back into the room to check what was happening. She attempted to flick the light back on, but it wouldn't light. She slowly inched her way toward the now darkened kennel.
When she got to the door, she was startled when 2 dogs jumped out of the kennel and scampered down the hall, Fluttershy recovered and looked inside the kennel and screamed.
The dog in the center had sprouted 6 spider-like appendages and was squirting some strange green liquid at the other dogs, who were cowering in the corner. Fluttershy slammed the kennel gate shut and backed into the wall where she began hyperventilating, she just watched in horror as the once normal looking dog, began to mutate even more.
Applejack was in the rec room by herself, enjoying a drink, when she heard the sounds of barking from the kennel. She quickly went to go check it out.
When she stepped in to the room with the kennel, the first thing she noticed was Fluttershy cowering against the wall.
"Fluttershy! What's wrong?" Applejack asked as she ran to her side. Fluttershy simply pointed her hoof into the Kennel.
"By the love of Luna." Applejack muttered.
She saw the monstrosity in the kennel and thought fast. She smashed the glass on a nearby fire alarm and pulled it to bring the rest of the crew to the kennels.
When Shining and the scientists got there, they were confused and annoyed.
"What the hay is going on?" Shining asked.
"There's something big and pissed off in the Kennel, it's killing the dogs." Applejack explained.
Shining drew his sidearm and Soarin came in with a shotgun that he gave to Applejack. The crew shined their flashlights into the kennel and gasped at the creature, which was now in the form of a very large mutated dog.
"Tell Rarity to get the Flamethrower!" Applejack shouted at Rainbow Dash, who listened and disappeared back down the hall.
Applejack and Shining Armor began to open fire on the creature, but the bullets seemed to have no effect on it, in fact, it made it angrier. It made a terrible screeching sound and tried to climb out through the ceiling.
Rarity was still in her room trying to get to the situation in the kennel when Rainbow Dash entered.
"Rarity, get the flamethrower and get to the kennels, QUICK!" Rainbow Dash shouted.
"The flamethrower? What for?" Rarity asked confused.
"Just get it, AJ said so." Rainbow finished before running back into the hall.
Rarity slightly groaned as she finally slipped on her utility belt and went to go retrieve the flamethrower.
Applejack and Shining had unloaded a fair amount of rounds into the creature before Rarity finally showed up with the flamethrower and some of the other crew got the extinguishers.
Rarity opened up the kennel gate and stepped in, aiming the flamethrower at the now very unrecognizable creature. She found herself frozen with terror as she gazed upon it, with the other shouting at her to just torch it already.
Eventually, the creature sprouting another mouth with a large claw coming out of it to try to hit Rarity, but that did it, she torched the abomination, making it howl in pain, and thankfully killing it.
Once some of the others put out the fire with the extinguishers, everypony took a breather for a few seconds.
Until Shining finally shouted, "Fluttershy, what the fucking hell was that?!", making Fluttershy recoil in fear.
"I...I don't know, I thought it was the dog." Fluttershy stammered out.
"What do you mean it was the dog?" Dr. Whooves asked. Fluttershy stood up and responded.
"I thought it was Clark, one of the dogs, the one that walked into the biology lab earlier, I put him in, and when I came back, he was that monster." Fluttershy explained, making the others give frightened expressions on their faces.
"I need to perform another autopsy, on that creature's corpse, I think it might have something to do with the missing specimen." Twilight spoke up. Shining was about to deny her, but then thought about it, It is a possibility that this creature was the one that had escaped from the block. Shining simply nodded and signaled for the crew to assist in getting the corpse back to the Biology lab.
Twilight, Dr. Whooves, Dr. Scopes, and Shining Armor gathered closely around the operating table, where the body of the dog creature lay. The rest of the crew were present, observing from the corner of the lab. Twilight closely inspected several of the appendages that the creature had grown and removed several organs from the body and came to a conclusion.
"This is odd, the organs from this creature do not match those of a dog, and the few parts of the body that look like a dog, aren't really a dog." Twilight explained, getting a confused look from shining.
"What do you mean exactly?" Shining asked.
"She means that this isn't a dog, this is a creature that was imitating a dog, whatever this creature was, it can replicate any life form and pose as its prey before it strikes." Dr. Whooves spoke up, looking at the notes that Twilight had written down.
"So, we discovered a new species?" Shining asked.
"Well, it's only an educated guess for now, but after me and Turner run a few more tests, things should become clearer." Twilight explained.
Suddenly Maud entered the room a bit more in a rush than she usually was. "Shining, me and Dash are picking up abnormal readings from the sensors. Shining immediately followed Maud out of the room and down the hall.
Maud and Shining entered Rainbow Dash's office and joined her by her desk.
"According to these readings, the ice is shifting over by where we found the specimen, which might mean something big!" Dash explained. Shining looked at the data before explaining the plan.
"Go and get Applejack and tell her to fly you 2 back out to the site, and document what's out there, then report back here, got it?" Shining said. Both Maud and Dash nodded before grabbing their coats and heading off to get Applejack.
Applejack, Dash, and Maud got in the chopper and flew off to the site where they placed the sensors. After landing a few hundred feet from the site, they got out and trudged over to where the sensors were, and were met by something they didn't expect. About 30 meters from where they found the specimen, was a large hole that wasn't there before, it was about 600 meters in diameter and went down about 30 feet, and it held a large metallic structure that was reminiscent of old science fiction movies.
"What the hay is that?" Applejack said as she glanced over to the scientists. Maud took out one of the sensors and looked at the readings.
"This looks like an unidentified flying object, and judging by these readings, and how deep in the ice it is, its been buried in this ice for about 10,000 years, at least." Maud explained.
Rainbow Dash stared in awe at whatever this craft was, "So, we're dealing with an alien?" Dash asked, looking to her fellow crew members who both simply nodded in agreement. "Oh boy." Dash groaned as she continued to observe the alien ship in front of them.
They took several photographs of the ship and got back in the chopper to head back to the station. While on the way back, Rainbow Dash spoke up.
"I have a very bad feeling about this." She said with a bit of worry in her voice. Applejack heard her through her headset and responded, "I do too."
Once Applejack, Rainbow Dash, and Maud returned from the site where the specimen was found and showed the rest of the crew the photographs of the spaceship, they all began to speculate in the rec room.
"Could we really be dealing with an alien?" Rarity asked Applejack as she stared down at one of the photos.
"You saw what happened in the kennel, it seems like an alien to me." Applejack responded.
"This kinda stuff happens all the time, they're dropping out of the skies like flies." Soarin spoke up.
"Yeah, the Princesses probably know all about it, right Applejack?" Rainbow Dash added, tapping Applejack on the shoulder. Applejack simply shrugged in her seat and took another sip of cider.
"You don't actually believe any of this boulder dash right Twilight?" Rarity asked Twilight, who was also busy looking over the photographs and the autopsy notes.
"I'll run some more tests and see if I can deduce what this thing is." Twilight said as she stood up from the couch and walked out, passing Pinkie Pie in the process.
"Okay, somepony better tell me who threw their dirty clothes in the kitchen trash bin!" Pinkie shouted as she appeared in the doorway to the rec room. Everypony looked at each other, giving confused looks before looking back at Pinkie.
"Really, nopony's gonna tell me?" Pinkie asked.
"It was probably Vinyl." Rainbow Dash spoke up sarcastically.
"Kiss my flank Dash!" Vinyl shouted from the other side of the rec room.
Twilight sat in her office at her computer so she could possibly figure out what exactly they were dealing with. She booted up a simulation with the help of the cells from the dog-thing corpse and booted it up. The simulation showed the red cell marked as the intruder among blue cells. When the red cell touches one of the blue cells, the blue cell is absorbed by the red one, and then the red one turns blue.
Twilight now deduced that this creature eats other creatures, and imitates them to keep from being detected long enough to feed again. Twilight then began to think, this organism could already be in the base, one of her colleagues could be this creature, in disguise, like the dog. Twilight then had the computer make an estimate on how long it would take to assimilate every living creature in Equestria and beyond. It read 27,000 hours, about 3 years.
This made Twilight realize what she had to do, if one of the crew was this creature, they must be kept here, and destroyed, so that the world would not end. Twilight opened the drawer to her desk and pulled out a revolver.
Back in the rec room, the rest of the crew were still speculating on things, when Shining walked in, "Dash, Vinyl, Go and put that dog-thing carcass into storage." Shining ordered. The 2 groaned as they got up and and went to collect the corpse.
They put it onto a stretcher and rolled it down to the large storage room. "You don't think this thing is still alive, do you?" Vinyl asked, visibly uncomfortable being close to it.
"No way, Rarity got it pretty good with the flamer, it is definitely dead." Dash responded confidently. The two rolled the stretcher into the storage room and nearly ran into Applejack.
"Hey AJ, whatcha doin?" Rainbow asked, seeing Applejack carrying a bunch of her stuff.
"Shining told me to move some of my stuff out to make room for the corpse." Applejack explained.
"Well don't go to bed just yet, I'm gonna grab some more drinks for the party tonight." Rainbow said as she walked over to the area where they kept the liquor.
"What Party?" Applejack asked.
"The Party for getting the specimens, we'll probably get bonus money for this discovery." Rainbow said as she rummaged around.
"Okay, I'll think about it." Applejack said as she turned around and left the room.
"I'll go grab the keys from Shining so we can lock this room for the night once we're done." Vinyl said before she left Dash alone to find the liquor, but Dash didn't notice the dog-thing corpse rustling under the tarp...
Applejack walked down the hall when she bumped into Dr. Whooves, who had a worried expression on his face.
"Applejack, I need to talk to you, it's an emergency." Whooves explained. Applejack raised an eyebrow.
"Okay, what is it?" She asked. Dr. Whooves glanced around.
"Not here, let's go somewhere private." Dr. Whooves said. Applejack reluctantly agreed and followed him.
They ended up going outside and sitting in Applejack's snowcat.
"Okay Whooves, what is it that was so important, you had to drag me out here for?" Applejack asked. Dr. Whooves then took some paper out of his pocket and looked it over.
"Twilight's locked herself in her office, and I just figured something out from her notes.." Whooves went on to explain how the thing mimics other life forms and stays disguised until it needs to feed again. Applejack listened with wide eyes, they encountered not only an alien, but a hostile alien that acted like a changeling, only about 100 times worse, just great.
"Also, there is still some activity on these dog-thing remains, it's not completely dead yet." Whooves said, Applejack jolted up and looked at Turner.
"What?" Applejack said, a terrified expression now on her face.
Vinyl walked back down the hall towards the storage room with Shining's key ring.
"Alright Dash, let's finish this up so we can part-" Vinyl started, but stopped when she entered the room. On the floor was Rainbow Dash's clothes, including her parka, all bloodied. Vinyl turned toward the direction of the tarp.
"Shit." she muttered at the sight.
Rainbow Dash was next to the table now, and from under the tarp several red and bloody looking tendrils wrapped around her body, and dug into her skin, she even looked all bloody.
Vinyl dropped the keys and quickly ran out of the room.
She grabbed her jacket and ran outside to get Applejack. But before she could go for the tower, she saw Applejack and Dr. Whooves in the Snowcat, and ran towards them.
"Rainbow Dash is alone with that corpse." Applejack shouted to Dr. Whooves, making his expression turn terrified. The 2 got out of the snowcat and were met with a frantic Vinyl. "AJ, Whooves, Help." Vinyl shouted.
"What's wrong?" Applejack asked. Vinyl stopped in front of them panting.
"Something's happening to Rainbow Dash." Vinyl said in between gasps. Applejack and Dr. Whooves gave each other worried glances before running towards the station, followed closely by Vinyl.
The 3 made it back inside and eventually made it back to the storage room, but upon entering, the room was empty, and the corpse on the stretcher was completely still under the tarp.
"She was right there AJ, I swear to Celestia!" Vinyl said frantically, worried that the others wouldn't believe her.
Dr. Whooves looked towards one of the windows and saw that it was broken and ran towards it. He saw the figure of a pony running outside.
"There she is." Whooves shouted and pointed before running out after her, followed by the other 2.
They managed to get the attention of the rest of the base, and so every crew member ran out with their coats to see what was happening. They looked around and saw Rainbow Dash running, before falling to the ground. The crew rushed over to her, Soarin heading for her to check on her, but was tackled by Applejack.
"Soarin don't, that isn't Rainbow Dash." Applejack said as she dragged herself and Soarin away from the form of Rainbow Dash.
The rest of the crew gathered around and watched, as the Rainbow Dash lifted her head, and extended her front legs. But, instead of hooves, there was two bloody looking claws. The crew all gasped and stood shocked at the sight.
Dash-thing then let out an ear piercing shrieking noise that made Applejack stumble back and knock over a barrel, spilling gasoline on to the ground near Dash-thing. Applejack then got an idea, and pulled a flare out of her jacket, lit it, then tossed it at Dash-thing, and it lit into a blaze.
The Dash-thing let out several howls and shrieks that were unlike anything the crew had heard before. When the thing finally seemed to be dead, Applejack went back into the base to retrieve a flamethrower for her plan, followed by Shining Armor.
"What the hell was that?" Shining shouted as he a followed AJ into the weapons locker. "What happened to Rainbow Dash?"
"It only looked like Rainbow Dash, and in a few minutes it would have sounded and acted like Rainbow Dash too, so it's a good thing we stopped it." Applejack explained.
"So what's the plan now?" Shining asked as AJ slipped on the flamethrower.
"Dr. Whooves said that that body in the storage still had some life to it, which is how it got to Dash, so we need to burn that body, and just to be safe we should burn the other body that's in the cooler." Applejack explained. Shining nodded in agreement.
Some of the other crew went and got the dog-thing corpse, and the 2 headed pony corpse and brought them outside where Applejack burned them with the flamethrower.
The crew was all gathered outside while the bodies burned, but Dr. Whooves then realized that they were down one scientist.
"Everypony, fan out and find Twilight!" Shining ordered after noticing that Twilight was the only pony absent from the group as they burned the bodies. So each pony split up to search the base.
Soarin and Dr. Whooves went inside to search the bunk rooms. Whooves noticed that Soarin was a bit "gone". Like he was just staring off into space constantly.
"You feeling okay Soarin?" Dr. Whooves asked. Soarin finally snapped out of his trance,
"Oh, sorry, but no. I just, can't get that noise out of my head. That screech that thing made before we burned it." Soarin explained, shuddering at the thought as he and Whooves entered seperate rooms in search of Twilight.
Fluttershy and Maud checked the kennels, and thoroughly searched the room. Maud saw the burn marks in the ceiling from the flamethrower. She then realized something, Fluttershy handled the dogs almost constantly, so could she have been alone with that dog-thing long enough for it to have assimilated her. She glanced over, giving her a suspicious look as Fluttershy petted one of the 2 surviving dogs.
"Why are you looking at me like that?" Fluttershy asked, noticing that Maud was staring at her. Maud immediately turned away.
"Sorry, i'm just...sorry about the dogs." Maud said.
"Oh, thank you." Fluttershy responded, "well, nothing's here, we should report back to Shining." Fluttershy said as she walked out the door, with Maud giving some distance between her and Fluttershy.
Applejack was having another check around outside the main building, when she saw something. She looked over towards her parked helicopter and saw Twilight exit it and run towards the main building.
Worried, she immediately ran to check the helicopter. When she got there she opened the cockpit door and gasped in shock. The control panel had been destroyed, it looked like it had been smashed with a hammer, or an ax. Applejack then realized that Twilight must've sabotaged the helicopter. Suddenly, she heard gunshots from the main building, and immediately rushed inside.
Vinyl Scratch walked inside the radio room and glanced around, seeing nothing unusual, she decided to check the radio again to see if she could get it working, but before she could even sit down, she was struck to the side of her head by something hard.
She fell to the floor and began to scoot herself towards the corner. She looked up and saw Twilight standing at the radio with a fire ax. Twilight then swung it directly into the radio on the desk, destroying it.
Rarity walked into the door to see what was happening and saw Vinyl on the floor and Twilight smashing the radio equipment.
"What in Equestria are you doing Twilight?!" Rarity shouted.
Twilight turned to face her and took out her revolver and aimed it at Rarity. Luckily, Rarity was able to jump back out the door before Twilight fired a couple of shots.
"If anypony interferes, I'll kill them!" Twilight shouted. She then put her gun away and grabbed the ax again and began smashing the radio equipment.
Twilight began rambling on as she kept swinging the ax and smashing all the equipment.
"It's gonna get out! It's gonna kill us all! It's gonna destroy Equestria! I Have to Stop it!" Twilight shouted with each swing. Vinyl curled herself up in the corner, terrified.
Applejack joined the rest of the crew in the hallway outside the radio room. They could all hear Twilight's crazy rambling as well as the smashing of electronic equipment. Applejack approached the door and attempted to calm Twilight down.
"Twilight, calm down, stop swinging, and take a breath!" Applejack shouted from the hallway.
"No! I need to stop this thing from getting out!" Twilight shouted, still swinging.
"Okay, Soarin, grab a table from the mess hall, Rarity, go check the snowcat, see if she damaged it as well." Applejack explained. Both Soarin and Rarity nodded before leaving down the hallway. The rest of the crew kept listening to Twilight's rambling.
"That thing didn't want to be a dog! It wanted to be one of us!" Twilight shouted as she swung the ax again.
Rarity came back down the hall and knelt down next to Applejack.
"She smashed up the snowcat pretty good. And she killed the rest of the dogs." Rarity explained, giving Fluttershy a sad look when talking about the dogs.
Fluttershy gasped and immediately rushed down the hall towards the kennel.
Soarin then came back down the hallway with a table from the mess hall. The crew formulated a plan to wait for an opening to charge into the room and subdue Twilight, with Rarity attempting to create a distraction by going through the map room. Dr. Stables even quickly ran to the infirmary to grab some sedatives.
Rarity inched closer to the map room door and tried again to calm Twilight.
"Twilight Darling, you don't have to do anything you'll regret." Rarity said calmly. Twilight turned around and once agin pulled out the gun. She fired the rest of her bullets at the doorway.
"I'll kill you!" Twilight shouted.
When Twilight realized that the gun was empty, she chucked it at the door.
Once Soarin heard the click, he charged into the room, immediately followed by Applejack, Rarity and Stables. Twilight swung the ax into the table, getting it stuck and barely missing Soarin's head. Applejack then punched Twilight square in the head and held her down, so Stables could inject the sedative into her arm.
Vinyl then tried to stand up from the corner she was in, but ended up fainting.
Applejack, Shining, Dr. Whooves and Dr. Stables took Twilight up to the spare storage shed where they could lock her up and get her to calm down, with the windows boarded up.
When they got there they sat the barely conscious Twilight at the table and waited for her to fully come to.
"Twilight, do you want to explain what the hell you were doing!" Shining shouted, Twilight sat up in her chair and answered in a quiet and calm voice.
"I...I don't know who to trust." Shining rolled his eyes and started for the door.
"We're gonna lock you in here for a while, until we figure out a way we can fully trust you not to go ape-shit again." Shining explained. Dr. Whooves dropped a pack on the table.
"Here's some food, and we'll check on you in a few hours." Whooves explained as he also turned to leave. Applejack lingered a bit before heading for the door.
"Watch Fluttershy" Twilight muttered, making Applejack turn back from just outside the door.
"What?" Applejack asked.
"Watch Fluttershy, and watch her close, do you hear me? She spent quite a bit of time with that dog." Twilight said, leaning forward in her chair. Applejack just gave a slight nod before closing and locking the door.
Applejack walked from the shed down to where Shining, Dr. Whooves, and Dr. Stables were waiting.
"Now what?" Whooves asked.
"Twilight says to watch Fluttershy, says she could be one of those things." Applejack explained.
"We need a way to figure out who is a thing and who is a pony." Shining said, looking over to Stables.
"You got any ideas Doc?" Applejack asked. Stables thought for a few seconds before an idea came to mind.
"We could mix samples of the crew's blood with uncontaminated blood, that thing's blood is bound to be different, so it should be obvious." Stables explained. Shining nodded.
"Alright, here's the keys to the blood storage cooler..." Shining said as he gave the keys to Scopes, "..You two, gather the others in the rec room for the test, and keep an eye of Fluttershy." Shining said to Whooves and Applejack.
The entire crew except Shining and Dr. Stables gathered back in the rec room to prepare for the blood test. Each pony in the room gave each other suspicious glances, especially towards Fluttershy. Suddenly, Shining barged into the room.
"We have a problem, come on." He said, motioning for everyone to follow him. They all ran down the corridor to the infirmary, once inside they all looked to see what was wrong.
Dr. Stables was standing beside the cooler where the blood was stored, and saw that the blood bags had been cut, draining it all over the floor.
"The blood bank's been sabotaged?" Whooves said astounded.
"Looks like it, but who did it?" Rarity asked, looking at Shining and Dr. Stables.
"Who had access to it?" Applejack asked. Everyone looked at Stables who sighed.
"I guess I'm the only one." Stables said.
"But doesn't Shining keep the key ring on his belt?" Soarin asked.
"Yeah, but I just give them to Stables whenever he needs them." Shining tried to explain to keep the suspicion off of him.
"Could somepony have stolen the keys off you doc?" Applejack asked Stables.
"I don't see how, when I'm done I always return them right away." Stables responded.
The rest of the crew started getting angry, and the paranoia reached a breaking point.
"I'll bet he sabotaged it!" Fluttershy said, stepping forward and pointing at Shining.
"You should talk! You were alone with that dog, you could have stolen the keys and did this!" Rarity yelled back at Fluttershy. Eventually the argument started to get out of control, only stopping when Soarin saw Vinyl run out of the room and down the hallway.
"Hey, where's Vinyl going?" Soarin shouted. Then the crew immediately turned to follow her.
Vinyl ran down to the end of the corridor and turned to where the weapons locker was, she used a doorstop to smash the glass, and grabbed a shotgun. But then Shining rounded the corner with his gun drawn and aimed it at her. Vinyl backed up into the wall, with an expression of pure fear on her face. The rest of the crew finally caught up and gasped when they saw Shining aiming his gun.
"You guys really gonna let Shining do this? He could be one of those things!" Vinyl shouted as she slumped into the corner.
"Look Vinyl, just relax and put the shotgun down." Applejack said calmly, trying to diffuse the situation.
Vinyl took a few seconds to calm down before slowly sliding down to the floor and placing the shotgun carefully down.
"You too Shining." Applejack said, Shining still aiming at Vinyl.
Shinging turned quickly, the rest of the crew jumping back a bit, as Shining was now aiming his gun at them.
"Now I don't know about Stables, but I give you my word that I didn't go near that blood." Shining said before lowering the gun and setting it down on a stack of boxes.
"Maybe, you'd all be more comfortable if somepony else was in charge." Shining said, giving up his role as commander.
"Maud, you're the leader now, I don't see anypony objecting to you." Shining said, pointing to the geologist. Maud shook her head.
"Sorry sir, but I don't think I'm cut out to lead." Maud said.
Shining then looked around at each crew member, and decided that the one that seemed the most sane and trustworthy was Applejack.
"Applejack?" Shining said nodding to her. Applejack simply nodded and picked up the gun. She then cleared her throat.
"Okay, here's the plan, we are gonna go and burn the blood that's remaining in the cooler, then, we think of a new way forward from there, got it." Applejack said seriously, earning a nod from the rest of the crew.
The crew gathered outside around Applejack who had her flamethrower again, the crew placed the nearly empty blood bags in a pile in a hole they dug in the snow, and Applejack burned them with the flamer. Applejack looked back up to the 9 other ponies gathered around.
"I'm gonna lay down some logic now, I know I'm a pony, and if you were all these things, then you'd just attack me right now, so some of you are still ponies. This thing doesn't want to be seen, it wants to hide inside an imitation, if it takes us all over, it has no more enemies, and it's won." Applejack explained, getting slight nods from them all.
"So here's the plan, we're gonna put Shining, Stables, and Fluttershy in the rec room and sedate them until Whooves can come up with a new way we can test them to see if they're ponies or not." Applejack explained.
"But I need doc's help." Whooves argued.
"Yeah, you don't wanna drug me." Stables said, trying and failing not to sound suspicious.
"I'm sorry Whooves, but we can't take any chances." Applejack explained to Dr. Whooves, who simply nodded in response.
"The rest of you, Soarin, Rarity, Pinkie, Maud, and myself will take turns watching over the ones sedated in the rec room, like I said, until we can find another way to test who's a thing." Applejack said, focusing on the expressions on all the Ponies before her, they seemed normal, but they could just be hiding really well...
Applejack entered Shining's office to grab some extra ammo as well as Shining's tape recorder, just in case anything goes wrong.
She then walked back down to the rec room to check on things. Shining, Stables, and Flutteshy were all tied to chairs, sleeping, while Rarity and Maud sat on watch.
"You're doin a good job you two." Applejack complimented, getting nods from the two.
Applejack then walked down to Dr. Whooves' office and walked in. He was sitting at the desk, closely studying his and Twilight's notes, trying to deduce a way to test who was a pony, and who was a thing.
"You come up with anything yet?" Applejack asked from the doorway. Whooves turned, slightly startled.
"No, not yet, though I do have some precautions we should probably take." Whooves said, getting Applejack's full attention.
"What?" she asked.
"According to the notes, even a small particle of this organism could take over a pony, so if that's possible, I think we should all prepare our own meals, and only eat out of cans." Whooves explained, Applejack nodded.
"I'll go tell Pinkie." she said before walking back down the hallway.
Whooves turned back around to keep studying his notes, when suddenly the lights went out. Whooves jolted up and fumbled with the drawer of the desk until he pulled out his lighter. Lighting it,he got up from his desk to check on the others, but when he got to the door he saw a figure pass by in the hallway.
"Who's there?" Whooves asked. There was no response. He walked out into the hall and heard the sound of an exterior door closing at the end of the hall to his left. So he slipped on his coat to investigate.
Whooves left the safety of the main building and lit up a flare. He glanced around the dark and snowy compound before seeing another shape over by the helicopter pad. He started to move towards it.
"Hello, who's there? Why are you out here?" Whooves called out, once again not getting any response. He finally made it over to the helicopter, and found nopony, but when he looked down, he saw something half buried in the snow. He pulled it out and inspected it. It was a torn piece of fabric, probably clothing. He flipped it over and saw Applejack's initials. Whooves gasped, and glanced around again.
"What the hell?" He said to himself.
After about an hour, the power to the compound was finally restored and the remaining crew gathered in the rec room. But they were short one Pony.
"Where's Dr. Whooves?" Applejack asked the crew, who were all standing around the rec room, all giving each other suspicious glances. None of them spoke up.
"The power was gone for nearly an hour, any one of us could've gotten to him." Applejack explained.
"So, what's the plan?" Pinkie asked.
"We're gonna split up and search the compound in pairs, me and Pinkie are gonna go ask Twilight if she saw anything, Vinyl and Soarin, you two check the inside, and Rarity and Maud, you two stay here and look after Shining, Doc, and Flutters. Got It?" Applejack said.
"I'm not going with Vinyl!" Soarin said, getting an angry glare from Vinyl. "I'm not going with her, I'd rather go with Rarity." Soarin said.
"Fuck You Soarin." Vinyl shouted in rage at his distrust.
"And what makes you think I want to go with you?" Rarity asked as the three started to fight.
"Cut the BULLSHIT!" Applejack shouted, getting the crew to settle down.
"Vinyl, you'll come with me and Pinkie, and the rest of you still have the same jobs, and we meet back here in half an hour regardless!" Applejack said sternly toward the paranoid crew.
The crew complied and finished preparing before heading out to search for Dr. Whooves.
Applejack, Pinkie, and Vinyl all exited the main building and immediately headed for the shed where Twilight was being kept. They figured asking her, in case she saw anything. Applejack approached the door, and opened the tiny metal hatch in the door and peered inside, seeing Twilight sitting at the table still.
"Twilight, have you seen Dr. Whooves?" Applejack asked. Twilight looked up, she sat at the table with a sad look on her face, hanging from the ceiling next to her was a noose.
"I don't want to stay out here anymore Applejack, I wanna come back inside." Twilight said in an almost monotone voice. Applejack felt worried suddenly, she didn't want Twilight to kill herself over the distrust.
"Twilight, I'm sorry, but we can't take any chances, but please don't make any choices you'll regret." Applejack pleaded.
"I'm not gonna harm anypony, there's nothing wrong with me, and if there was, I'm all better. I'd like to come back inside." Twilight said in a more serious tone. Applejack felt terrible, but she couldn't take a risk.
"I'm sorry Twi, but have you seen Whooves, he went missing around 20 minutes ago and nopony's seen him." Applejack explained. Twilight leaned back and let out an annoyed sigh.
"No, I haven't seen anything, also, don't worry about Whooves, I'm sure he isn't a thing." Twilight said, making Applejack almost feel reassured.
"Thanks Twi." Applejack said before closing the hatch and locking it.
The 3 continued to search around the compound for Whooves, until eventually they found something. Applejack was searching around the Helicopter when she heard Pinkie call out.
"Guys! I found something!" Pinkie shouted. Applejack rushed over, and was soon joined by Vinyl, and all three of them gasped at what they found. Partially buried in the snow, was the charred corpse of Dr. Whooves.
"What the hell happened to him?" Vinyl asked in a worried tone. Pinkie looked over the corpse and saw a burnt out flare and picked it up. "A flare, maybe he tried to burn it?" Pinkie speculated. Applejack then thought of something else.
"Maybe he burned himself before it could get to him." Applejack said.
The 3 looked at each other, Applejack now felt guilty, she told herself that she wouldn't let anypony else die, but now she felt the deaths of 2 ponies on her shoulders.
"So now what?" Vinyl asked. Applejack was about to respond, but then noticed something odd, the lights in her tower were on, even though she turned them off the last time she left it, and Applejack told the rest of the crew to stay in the main building.
"Now, Vinyl, go back to the rec room and tell everypony the news, Pinkie, you and I are gonna go check my tower." Applejack explained.
"What for?" Pinkie asked.
"Because when I left yesterday, I turned the lights off." Applejack explained as she pointed toward the tower.
Applejack and Pinkie began to head toward the tower while Vinyl returned to the main building.
Vinyl entered the rec room, slightly startling the other occupants. Rarity stood up from the stool at the bar.
"Vinyl, what happened, where are the others?" Rarity asked, concerned. Vinyl then gave the room a sad look.
"Whooves is dead, we found his body burned to a crisp, we have no idea what happened, but the others are checking AJ's tower, the lights are on." Vinyl explained, making the others confused.
"Well, nopony has left to turn on those lights, so who could've done it?" Maud asked. Everyone else responded with simple shrugs and confused looks.
"Let's just wait for them to get back." Soarin said as he stared out the window.
About 20 minutes passed before the crew became too anxious, a storm moved in over the compound and snow began to fall and cut down visibility out the windows. The winds also began to pick up even more, making it unlikely that Applejack and Pinkie were still alive out there.
"They've been gone too long, we should barricade the exterior doors." Rarity suggested, the others reluctantly agreed and went about barricading the exterior doors. When Maud was busy barricading one of the doors, she looked out of the small window next to the door and saw a figure moving towards the base with a flare lit. Eventually she recognized the figure as Pinkie.
"Guys, Over here!" Maud shouted as loud as she could, bringing the rest of the crew to the door. Banging sounds began to emit from the door.
"Guys, open up, it's me Pinkie!" Pinkie's voice came from the other side of the door. Rarity showed up with a flamethrower.
"Open the door, if she's a thing, I'll torch her." Rarity said before nodding to Maud to let her in. Maud then unlatched the lock and let Pinkie in who stumbled to the ground covered in snow.
"Where were you Pinkie?" Soarin asked. Pinkie panted as she took a piece of fabric from her jacket pocket.
"We were checking out her tower, and I found this sticking out from under her bed." Pinkie said out of breath. Soarin took the fabric, it had Applejack's initials on it.
"So, she's a one of them?" Soarin asked.
"I got out of the tower as fast as I could, I made sure to get far enough ahead of her." Pinkie said.
"When do you think it got to her?" Vinyl asked.
Before anyone could answer, there was a banging on the door. The crew looked at each other, unsure of what they should do.
"I think we should let her in." Soarin suggested.
"Why?" Rarity asked.
"If she is one of those things, this is the perfect opportunity to torch it." Soarin said.
"No, lets just let it freeze out there, it'll be dead soon enough." Rarity said. Suddenly, there was a crash of glass heard from down the hallway.
"The storage room!" Rarity exclaimed.
Applejack quickly climbed through the broken window and lit a flare, finding herself in a storage room. She could hear the sounds of the other's hoofsteps coming down the hallway. Thinking fast, she grabbed a bundle of dynamite and held the fuse dangerously close to the flare.
Rarity attempted to open the door, but it was locked from the inside and Applejack had the keys.
"Soarin, hand me that ax." Rarity said, pointing to the fire ax hung on the wall. Soarin grabbed the ax and gave it to Rarity, who began to hack the door down.
"You're a dead mare Applejack, or whatever you are!" Rarity shouted as she chopped down the door.
They finally broke open the door and silence filled the air as they stood in a peculiar standoff.
"Now, everypony is going to calm down, take a deep breath, and head back to the rec room." Applejack said calmly and carefully as she held the dynamite and the lit flare. Soarin stepped forward,
"I'm afraid we can't take that chance." Soarin said. Applejack just held the flare closer to the fuse, getting Soarin to step back.
"If anypony tries, we all go." Applejack said threateningly. "Now take off the flamethrowers, put them down, and step back." Applejack ordered.
Rarity and Soarin reluctantly complied and slipped off their flamethrowers and stepped back into the hallway. Applejack slowly followed them out, eventually standing in the doorway, looking at Rarity, Soarin and Vinyl.
"Where are the others?" Applejack asked, she was then suddenly grabbed by the Pie sisters, who tried to restrain her, but she fought back, shoving Pinkie off and kicking Maud into a shelf unit.
"Woah, Applejack, just chill okay." Pinkie said, raising her hooves trying to diffuse the situation.
Applejack looked over at Maud, who was laying down by the shelf, not responding. Pinkie moved over to Maud and put a hoof on her chest, before putting her ear to her chest. Pinkie gasped and gave the others a frightened look.
"She's not breathing!" Pinkie screamed, Applejack then immediately spoke up.
"Untie the doc and the others, and get Maud to the infirmary, do it NOW!" Applejack yelled, before the others reluctantly complied and rushed Maud to the infirmary.
Pinkie and Vinyl carried Maud into the infirmary and laid her down on the table. Then the others, now consisting of Dr. Stables, Shining and Fluttershy, also came into the infirmary. Finally, Applejack came in, now with a flamethrower and still holding the dynamite. Stables immediately stepped forward and with the assistance of Pinkie and Vinyl, removed Maud's jacket and shirt so he could perform CPR.
Applejack was in the corner, using the flamethrower to warm herself up after being out in the snow.
"You pricks, don't you think anypony could've stolen some of my clothes and stuck them under my mattress?" Applejack asked in an angry tone.
"We aren't buying that." Rarity argued.
"Stop bickering over there, I'm trying to save Maud here." Stables shouted as he performed the chest pump.
When the chest pump technique didn't work, Pinkie grabbed the defibrillator and handed it to Stables, who immediately started charging it up.
"Clear." Stables said before placing down the defibrillator on Maud's chest and delivering the shock. After, Stables checked her pulse again, still no response.
"Again." Stables said as he began to charge up the defibrillator again.
"Clear." Stables said again, but before he could place the chest paddles down, Maud's chest opened up into a large mouth, allowing Stables arms to plunge inside, before snapping shut on Stables' arms. He let out a scream as the chest tore off his arms from the elbow down. Stables screamed more before falling over dead. Applejack then quickly swung open the door and motioned for the crew to get out.
Then, Maud's body began to shake before a fountain of viscera erupted from the large chest mouth to reveal a weird spider like creature sticking out of her. Applejack immediately aimed and fired the flamethrower and burned the abomination. But then, Maud's head began to detach from the rest of the body and fall off the table. The head's tongue then latched on to a nearby chair and began to scoot itself away from the fire.
The crew looked on in shock as the fire raged, but then Soarin noticed the head, and watched as it sprouted 6 little legs and tried to run away. "You've gotta be fucking kidding." Soarin said, staring at the head, Applejack turned and saw the head running away. She raised the flamethrower, and fired it again, roasting the last bit of the Maud thing.
After Vinyl and Shining ran in and extinguished the fires, Applejack spoke up, "Okay, back to the rec room, I have an idea on how we can test who's a thing..."
The crew gathered back in the rec room, Rarity carrying Stables' body and Vinyl helping an emotionally distraught Pinkie Pie into the room.
"So, what's the plan AJ?" Fluttershy asked, standing in the corner of the room. Applejack placed down a box she grabbed from the storage room onto the table, she reached in and took out a few coils of rope and tossed them to Soarin and Vinyl.
"Vinyl, Soarin, you two tie the others down." Applejack ordered.
"What? Why?" Shining shouted.
"This thing is defensive down to the particle, according to Whooves' notes before he died. When I saw Maud-thing's head detach back in the infirmary, that made me realize that each part of this thing is a whole, willing to try to escape if threatened. So I'm going to cut open each of your hooves to get a drop of blood, and I'll test it with a hot copper wire, if the blood reacts, then that pony is a thing." Applejack explained.
"I'm not taking part in this. You may think you're still in charge, but for all we know, you're a thing!" Rarity spoke up. Applejack took out her gun.
"Then I'll have to kill you Rarity, and I really don't want to." Applejack said sternly.
"We should all just calm down." Fluttershy said quietly, inching her way towards the confrontation.
The two ignored Fluttershy and stayed focused on themselves.
Rarity stepped forward, defiantly, "Then I guess you'll have to kill me." Rarity said with a serious look.
"Girls, Please..." Fluttershy tried to speak up, taking another step forward.
Applejack slowly rose the gun barrel up to Rarity's muzzle.
"I'm serious." Applejack said in a quiet yet serious tone before cocking the hammer back.
"I guess you are." Rarity said, taking a tiny step back.
"GIRLS! PLEA-"
*BANG*
It all happened so fast, Applejack had her gun aimed squarely at Rarity's head, when suddenly, Fluttershy stepped forward and attempted to grab the gun out of Applejack's hooves. When Fluttershy grabbed the barrel of the gun, Applejack fired it and Fluttershy then fell to the ground.
The crew were all frozen, silent, and horrified. Fluttershy was laying on the floor of the rec room, not moving, with a bullet hole in her head.
Maintaining her focus, Applejack turned to the crew with a frown.
"Soarin, Vinyl, tie the others down."
The crew lamented and all agreed to be tied down. Vinyl and Soarin both tied down the others. Pinkie was tied to a chair, while Rarity and Shining were tied to the couch. Soarin tied down both Dr. Stables' and Fluttershy's bodies to a table.
"Tighter Soarin." Applejack ordered.
"Come on AJ, they're dead!" Soarin argued.
"Just do it!" Applejack shouted. Soarin complied and tied down the bodies tighter.
"Okay, now Vinyl, tie Soarin there." Applejack said, pointing at the end of the couch next to Shining, and Soarin was tied down.
"We're ready to go." Vinyl said. Applejack then took a scalpel and the already labeled dishes for the blood and slowly maneuvered around the room, making small cuts in everpony's hooves and squeezed a few drops of blood into each dish, finally ending with Vinyl.
Applejack used a small spool of copper wire and heated it against the muzzle of her flamethrower to heat it up. Then she grabbed Vinyl's dish to test the blood. Vinyl was standing next to the couch, her face a mixture of curiosity and fear. The wire finally touched the blood and fizzled. Vinyl sighed in relief.
"Okay, I guess that means you're good, go put that on and watch them." Applejack ordered, pointing over to the others. Vinyl listened and slipped on the flamethrower and stood next to the couch.
"Now, I'm gonna show you all what I already know." Applejack said as she heated up the wire again, she then placed the wire in the dish labeled with her name, and the blood fizzled like Vinyl's.
"This is all bullshit." Rarity muttered. Applejack ignored her as she heated the wire again. The air was thick with tension in the room.
"Now the Doc and Fluttershy." Applejack said. She then dipped the hot wire into Dr. Stables' blood, it fizzled like before. Applejack then heated the wire again before putting it into Fluttershy's dish. The blood fizzled, and Applejack felt a pang of guilt.
"So, Fluttershy was a Pony, so that makes you a murderer doesn't it?" Rarity said. Applejack ignored her again, and heated the wire.
"Now Soarin." She said. Soarin just sat there with a blank expression.
"This is all ridiculous, it doesn't prove a thing." Shining spoke up.
"I thought you might say that Shining, you were the only one who could've gotten to that blood, we'll do you last." Applejack said before sticking the wire in Soarin's dish. The blood shot out of the dish and made a high shrieking noise, startling Applejack and making her drop the dish, wire, and flamethrower.
The room was silent for a moment, before Rarity and Shining began to thrash and scream. Soarin began to shake violently, with the blank expression still on his face as his head began to deform, bubble and burst with blood.
Applejack tried to fire her flamethrower, but it wouldn't light. The ponies on the couch kept screaming and thrashing. Vinyl found herself frozen with fear. Soarin-thing finally burst out of it's binds and flew into the ceiling.
"Vinyl! Blast it!" Applejack shouted.
Vinyl finally snapped out of her fear induced trance and stepped forward and aimed her flamethrower at the thing on the ceiling. But suddenly Soarin-thing dropped in front of Vinyl, and she once again froze with fear, looking at the now unrecognizable abomination in front of her. She was unable to react as Soarin's head split open and a tongue shot out and wrapped around Vinyl's neck and pulled her head into it's jaws. The Soarin-thing chomped down on her head and lifted her up and swung her around the room as she flailed.
As the thing attacked Vinyl, Applejack kept trying to light her flamethrower, but to no avail.
Vinyl's flailing ended up smashing the hanging light in the room, and eventually, the Soarin-thing threw her body into a side table, blood pouring from her head wounds, turning her normally snow white coat crimson.
Applejack finally fired the flamethrower and lit Soarin-thing ablaze. It let out an otherworldly scream and ran, bursting through the wall of the building to the outside, running just a few meters before collapsing in the snow. Applejack followed it, and used a stick from the bundle of dynamite she had to blow the Soarin-thing to smithereens.
Back in the rec room, Vinyl's corpse began to assimilate and move again. The last 3 in the room that were still bound began screaming again, so Applejack walked back in and burned the Vinyl-thing before it could finish assimilating. Once the room was quiet again, Applejack looked back over at the remaining crew, panting
"Okay...let's...continue." Applejack said between breaths...
Applejack readjusted her flamethrower, making sure it was properly lit before continuing with the blood test. She heated the wire and carefully stuck it into Pinkie's dish, and the blood fizzled, proving Pinkie is still a pony. So Applejack untied her and she slipped on a flamethrower.
Applejack heated up the wire again, and stuck the wire into Rarity's blood, which also fizzled. Rarity sighed.
"Thank Celestia, now get me out." Rarity said, when Applejack and Pinkie hesitated a bit, Rarity got angry. "Come on, get me out of here, get me out of here! Cut me loose!" Rarity shouted as she struggled.
Pinkie and Applejack untied Rarity and gave her a flamethrower, leaving Shining as the last one in the room to still be tested. Shining held his breath as Applejack placed the wire into the dish, and it fizzled, confirming that the 4 of them were still ponies. Shining broke the silence.
"I know you ponies have been through a lot tonight, but when you find the time, I'd rather not spend the rest of this winter TIED TO THIS FUCKING COUCH!" Shining shouted. The others flinched slightly before untying him.
"So what's the plan now AJ?" Pinkie asked as they bundled up in their jackets and hats.
"Now, we gotta go test Twilight's blood, since she's the only other pony who hasn't been tested, Rarity, you stay here to guard the base while the rest of us go to the shed to test her." Applejack explained. Rarity nodded and they began to head out into the blizzard.
"Oh and Rarity.." Applejack said, stopping in the doorway, "If any of us comes back alone, torch em, don't even hesitate." Applejack said in a serious tone. Rarity nodded again and Applejack closed the door.
Applejack, Shining Armor, and Pinkie Pie all trudged through the snow and wind towards the Shed. Applejack finally reached the door and unlocked it before swinging it open as quickly as possible. But when the 3 peered inside, the tower was empty and Twilight was nowhere to be found.
"Where the hell is she?" Shining asked as he stepped in behind Applejack. Applejack glanced around the room before noticing some ripped up floorboards over by the table.
"What's this?" She asked, bending down to get a better look.
They all gathered around and lifted up the boards to reveal a tunnel going down about 10 feet. The 3 ponies made their way slowly down the hole and found a little workshop area. There were 3 tables all cluttered with what looked like scrap and pieces of electrical equipment. And in the center of the room was a large black, spherical object that looked like a miniature version of the frozen spaceship that the crew found in the ice.
"I don't think Twilight needs her blood tested, I think this proves that she's no longer a pony." Applejack said as she glanced around this little workshop in disbelief.
"So now what?" Shining asked.
"Now, we use the dynamite to destroy this thing, this is probably what that thing was going to use to get out of here." Applejack speculated.
"Go where?" Pinkie asked.
"Anywhere but here." Applejack responded as she began to ascend the rope out of the workshop.
The 3 climbed back up and Applejack and Shining started planting the dynamite around the shed while Pinkie stood guard, when suddenly the lights in the base went out, leaving the 3 of them in darkness in the storage shed, the only lights being the guiding lights out in the snow, leading back to the base. Applejack immediately lit a flare.
"That thing must've taken out the power." Applejack said.
"But without power it'll be negative 60 here soon, that's suicide." Shining said in disbelief.
"Not for that thing, it wants to freeze again, its got nowhere else to go, it wants to just go to sleep in the cold until the rescue team finds it." Applejack explained. Suddenly Rarity ran in to the shed, panting heavily.
"I just saw Twilight, I saw her run into the base, and now the powers out." Rarity explained, almost out of breath.
Applejack then got a last ditch effort idea.
"We need to blow up the base, we need to find that thing at burn it. If it likes the cold, then we need to warm this place up." Applejack explained.
"What exactly are you saying AJ?" Rarity asked, a bit concerned. Applejack gave a somber look to the others for a second before regaining her composure.
"We're not getting out of here alive, but neither is that thing." Applejack explained, she nodded to the others, who nodded back.
"For Maud." Pinkie said.
"I'm in." Rarity said.
"Let's go fry that son of a bitch." Shining said confidently.
Using the dynamite found in the storage room, the leftover bottles of liquor from the bar, and what they could salvage in terms of gasoline, the 4 remaining survivors began to destroy the base.
They first planted charges in the shed and around the workshop below it and blew it all up.
After that they used some of the extra dynamite, as well as extra liquor bottles, and some rags, to make Molotov cocktails. The 4 entered the main base and went room to room, throwing either a stick of dynamite, or a Molotov into each room, being thorough enough to ensure that wherever the thing was hiding, they would blow it up or burn it.
After taking care of the main building, Applejack realized that there was one last place for the thing to be hiding.
"The tunnels! The thing is probably hiding down there!" Applejack said. The others looked worried.
"What should we do?" Rarity asked.
"We'll go and plant the rest of the charges along the tunnels, and this place will blow sky high." Applejack explained.
"Sounds like a plan, let's do it." Shining said enthusiastically.
The 4 made their way down the narrow staircase down to the series of dark, dilapidated tunnels. Water was dropping from the ceiling due to the melting ice. Shining walked over to where the generator for the base was, it was completely destroyed and salvageable.
Applejack found a spot in the middle of the tunnel for the detonator and placed it down.
"Okay, Rarity, Pinkie, I need your help arming the detonator, and placing some charges under this area of floor." Applejack explained, she then gave some charges to Shining.
"Shining, take these and plant them further down that tunnel." Applejack said, pointing further down. Shining nodded and turned to perform the task. Rarity then moved a floorboard and moved to plant the charges under it.
Shining walked down the tunnel, placing a charge every 10 feet or so, eventually he came to a corner, and decided that is where the last charge should go. Shining placed and started to arm it, but then heard movement behind him. He turned around and from around the corner stepped Twilight, but before Shining could react, Twilight extended a claw and wrapped it around his head, covering his mouth and lifting him off the ground.
Shining let out muffled screams as he felt the claws digging into his flesh. Twilight stared blankly as she started to assimilate him.
"Join us Shining, it'll help you." Twilight-thing quietly said. Shining kept trying to struggle, but eventually felt himself loosing consciousness. The claw then dug in deeper to Shining's face, fully assimilating him, making his body go limp and fall to the ground, Twilight-thing then dragged the body away behind her.
Applejack and Pinkie were back in the main chamber, Applejack was almost finished with the detonator. Pinkie then found herself drawn to a few noises he could hear from the tunnel that Shining went down, and ended up almost unconsciously getting up and wandering down the tunnel. Pinkie made it only halfway down before suddenly, a claw extended from the ceiling, impaling Pinkie through her head, killing her, then pulling her body up into the ceiling.
Applejack finally finished the detonator's wiring when she looked up and saw that Pinkie was gone. She stood up, she was now alone down in the tunnels.
"Pinkie! Shining!" Applejack called out, there was no response. Suddenly, Rarity frantically crawled her way out of the floor from where she was planting the charges.
"Something's coming!" Rarity screamed, her voice filled with terror. Applejack looked down the tunnel and saw something moving under the floorboards towards them.
"Get out of the way!" Applejack shouted as she and Rarity dove off to the side as a large tendril burst from the floor, wrapped around the detonator and pulled it under the floor.
Applejack quickly ran to Rarity and helped her up and the two quickly moved towards the staircase to the surface. Suddenly, a huge creature burst from the floor behind them, and the 2 turned and came face to face with the thing, the specimen that they found.
It had the same structure as when it was frozen in the ice, it's 3 red eyes piercing into the 2 remaining ponies' souls. Out of it's body waved several tendrils, and the screaming faces of the crew.
Rarity then fumbled a stick of dynamite out of her coat and tossed it to Applejack.
"Quick, blow up the fucker!" Rarity shouted. Applejack lit a flare and lit the dynamite. The creature let out a roar as several dog looking creatures began to crawl from holes in the thing. Applejack then raised the dynamite to throw it.
"Yeah, FUCK YOU TOO!" Applejack shouted before throwing it and joining Rarity as they quickly ascended the narrow staircase and dove for cover in the snow.
The station was then obliterated in a massive fireball, with one last loud howl from the thing ringing through the air.
Applejack lifted her head up after the blast and glanced over, Rarity did the same. The two stared at each other for a few moments before Applejack let out a chuckle for the first time in a long time.
"I think we killed it." Applejack said with a relieved smile on her face....
Applejack and Rarity stumbled away from the burning station and over to the still destroyed helicopter and slumped down against it. The two were panting heavily and slightly shivering from the cold.
"Well, we killed it, but, I don't think we're making it out of here." Applejack said as she reached into her jacket and pulled out a photograph and Shining's hand held tape recorder.
"Yeah, that kind of stinks." Rarity said as she also reached into her jacket pocket and pulled out a bottle of alcohol and a photo.
"Who's that?" Applejack asked, referring to the photo that Rarity held.
"Oh, this is my sister Sweetie Bell." Rarity explained, showing Applejack the picture, Sweetie was a little unicorn filly, with purple hair, and with the same white coat as Rarity.
"She's cute, this is my Brother Big Mac, and my little sister Applebloom." Applejack said as she showed Rarity the photograph she took out. Rarity smiled at the picture before taking a sip of the liquor.
"Want a sip?" Rarity asked. Applejack nodded and took the bottle and had a sip.
Applejack gave the bottle back to Rarity.
"So, what now? If there is a plan." Rarity asked. Applejack looked down at the recorder.
"Now, let's...just...wait here for a while, see what happens." Applejack said slowly. Applejack was certain that Rarity was a Pony, but anything could have happened while she was under the floorboards in the tunnel.
"I'm gonna record something, maybe our final words, for the rescue team." Applejack explained, holding up the recorder. Rarity simply nodded and took another sip. Applejack hit the record button...
"Final report for Outpost 15, Helicopter Pilot Applejack and Chief Technician Rarity reporting. The rest of the crew, Rainbow Dash, Dr. Whooves, Maud Pie, Dr. Stables, Fluttershy, Soarin, Vinyl Scratch, Twilight Sparkle, Pinkie Pie, and commander Shining Armor are dead. The base has been destroyed. The specimen we discovered turned out to not only still be alive, but also extremely hostile. I do not have time to go into details, but it killed the rest of the crew. To whomever finds this tape, please tell our families that we love them, and please take care." Applejack monologued into the recorder before turning to Rarity.
"You wanna say somethin' sugarcube?" Applejack asked. Rarity nodded and took the recorder.
"To whoever finds this, please take care of my family, and tell them I love them all, thank you." Rarity said before giving the recorder back to Applejack. She then laid her head back against the helicopter and finished the report.
"This is Applejack and Rarity, soul survivors of the event of Equestrian Outpost 15, signing off." Applejack said before clicking the stop recording button. Applejack let out a sigh before turning to Rarity.
Both of them just gave each other glances, both unsure of their fates as the station continued to burn down around them...
