A/N: I'm legitimately surprised at the amount of hits I've gotten, because (excluding my failure at the Total Drama Island fanfiction) this is the first fanfiction I have put effort into. That, and it's this or a research paper that has me on my last nerve. So, here's the next chapter. Hope you enjoy it, read and review as always.
After the appointment, I realized I'd have to go BACK to the library, back through the crowds. Wow, I'm so stupid. How did I not realize that? Jesus, I don't deserve to live. At least the painkillers worked. Sort of. I had taken the pills and was filling out some paperwork, when I made the connection.
"Are you finished yet?" Twilight said, trotting over to my side.
"Almost, just give me a little longer." I had to tell my age, and all the other things like a normal patient now that the problem was taken care of, if only for now. I had, of course, lost weight as far as I could tell, as I hadn't gone to the doctor's since I was seven years old. Granted, my health was in decent shape thanks to a little thievery-I wasn't proud of that, but I knew the importance of being alive and in good health when living alone. "And… finished. Can we go back now?" I asked hopefully, not wanting to be stared at more than necessary.
"Yes, just give me a moment." She looked somewhat thoughtful as she started to walk away.
"What's up? You alright?" I asked, more out of being polite than actually caring. I hope I'm being polite, I need to get out of here. Don't need to become friends with these pastel ponies. Well, I do for now, but I still need to get home.
"Just a little… perturbed by what the nurse said. I mean, bone and muscle mass forming JUST CAUSE? And that's okay? Something just doesn't seem right, that's all." Twilight said, as she turned to me with a suspicious look on her face.
"I'm sure I'll be fine… well, not really. On the bright side, at least the painkillers are working. Anyways, ready to go?"
"Better question would be; 'Are you?' You looked pretty shaken while we were walking." I looked up, took a deep breath, closed my eyes, and walked out the door.
"Now, or never." I said, and opened my eyes. Not a single pony in sight. Where would they have gone? Oh yeah, probably into their panic rooms because of a certain big bad monster walking through their town. Least I don't have to feel their eyes on me.
I never saw another pony on our way back to the library but Twilight. Not one. I still believed that they all had gone inside and hid, but Twilight seemed like she was hiding something. "Would you happen to know anything about the mass disappearance of EVERY single pony in this town? Or am I just that awful looking that I scared them all into hiding?" I spoke cynically, half expecting her to ignore me.
"Oh come on, it probably wasn't you. Even if it was, I'm sure they wouldn't all just go hide because you're ugly either." She replied, but before she could continue I interrupted.
"Thanks for calling me ugly, I really needed to hear that." I couldn't help but to laugh after I said this, as her face flushed and she began to apologize.
"I'm sor…"
"No need, I'm joking. Any idea as to where they would've gone? I think it's high time I stop hiding anyway. I think I should just… you know, come out with it." Under my breath, I started to mutter something I had heard on the radio. "Look alive, sunshine… one-oh nine in the sky but the pigs won't quit, you're here with me…"
"What was that?" Twilight must've heard me, but I just raised my head, and my voice so that she could hear.
"Doctor Death Defying, I'll be your surgeon, your proctor, your helicopter, pumping out the slaughter-matic sounds to keep you alive,"
"What are you..?"
"A system failure for the masses, anti-matter for the master plan! Louder than God's revolver and twice as shiny, this one's for all you crash queens and motor babies! LISTEN UP!" I could've sworn every single background noise stopped, if only for a moment when I continued. "THE FUTURE IS BULLETPROOF! THE AFTERMATH IS SECONDARY! IT'S TIME TO DO IT LOUD AND DO IT PROUD, KILLJOYS,"
Suddenly, I heard another voice. A voice that is all too familiar, one that has been with me through everything, one that I enjoyed hearing and had come to love, sounded off from somewhere behind me. "Make some noise."
I wheeled around, looking for where I had heard it. "Where are you? Come out! Or am I just hearing things?"
"No, I definitely heard that too." Twilight said, squinting her eyes as if that would help her find who had spoken. "Anypony there?" I could've sworn I heard laughing. I searched the area, to no avail. I couldn't find the person who had spoken.
"Maybe we both just need to relax a little." I wanted to keep looking, but Twilight insisted we kept walking through the currently empty town towards the tree-brary. We rounded a corner, and with the library in sight I stopped thinking of the voice and moved on to more important things, like what's for lunch. We opened the door, when suddenly…
"SURPRISE!" A pink pony was at the door (now in my face), along with the other four ponies were inside. I realized that these were the same ponies that I had sat down with the previous night. I then noticed that there were EVEN more ponies behind them. I felt uneasy, not unlike the way I feel before a big storm. "Hi, I'm Pinkie Pie! Do you like it? I like it, I think everypony else does too. Oooh have you ever played "pin the tail on the pony?" I love that game!"
I didn't know what to say, I was surprised at the number of ponies that had somehow managed to fit in the library. "Wha-what is this?" I asked in disbelief and fear.
"It's a party silly! Your party!" I must've looked really confused, because she laughed and said, "Have you ever been to a party before?" She was about to ramble on about something else before my mind finally registered what she said.
"N-no, I can't say I have." I stuttered and stumbled over my words, still shocked. Pinkie froze. I was about to poke her again when she turned around and got in my face again.
"You've… you've NEVER been to a party? Like, never ever EVER?"
"n-never. I don't have friends, and I don't have a place to hold a party. Well, I didn't have a place to hold a party. I appreciate you bringing everybody here, but could you let me get upstairs? I-I need some time to do something." Pinkie gave me a strange look, but she let me pass.
"Okie dokie lokie, but you'll be missing the party." I moved past Pinkie, and the ponies gave me almost three feet of clearance as I walked through their ranks. Walking up the stairs, up to the balcony, I began to think. Okay, Pinkie made my job a lot easier, and a lot harder. Let's see here, pros and cons.
PRO: Pinkie gathered all the ponies, or at least a majority of them, and has them here.
CON: It's a party, getting their attention should be hard.
PRO: They will most likely listen to me out of fear.
CON: They're listening to me out of fear. Not good if I want to get home with their help.
PRO:I can make them fear me, or I could be nice.
CON: I have no idea what to say.
What to do… what to do… I gazed up at the night sky, hoping for some guidance from the heavens. No such luck. Screw it. I turned back inside and looked down on all the ponies down there. The music wasn't very loud, but I'd still have to raise my voice to be heard.
"COULD I GET EVERYBODY'S ATTENTION PLEASE!" My shout was met with near silence, that is, until someone turned off the music. "Thank you! First of all, I'd like to introduce myself. My name is Brian, and I'd like to thank you for coming!" So far so good, I haven' t messed up yet. "Secondly, you might have seen me walk through town today. I know I'm not a pony like you, but I didn't like being stared at like an animal in a zoo. I'm called a 'hyoo-man.' I'm not an it, I am a he. Thirdly, I'm not from here, but you probably guessed that. I'm from Earth." '
"WHERE'S THAT?" I heard one call from the crowd below.
"Hard to explain. In my personal opinion, Earth is really messed up-not someplace you'd want to visit. We have war, famine, disease, pollution, everything that could possibly go wrong has gone wrong there. In fact, there's parents that beat their children, something I fell victim to. That is, until I ran away." I said, and was about to continue when I was interrupted again.
"IF YOU'RE NOT FROM HERE, THEN HOW DID YOU GET HERE?" The very same voice called, although this time the pony was shushed.
"I… don't know. To save you the details, I got one of my only two friends killed, I severely injured or killed three more people, and was caught in an explosion. Next thing I remember I wake up here, in this library." All the ponies gasped, and I saw a few of them leave right then and there. A lump caught in my throat, I looked to my right for a moment and noticed a blur of color in the corner of my eye. Twilight, Pinkie, Rarity, and the others were all in a line. It almost seemed like they were guarding me. Maybe they were, but I had to keep talking. "This leads to my last point. While I know it sounds like I'm going to kill each and every one of you," I smiled slightly at this. "I can assure you I won't. I have no intention of harming any of you." A collective sigh of relief was passed around the party-goers. "I'm not going to hurt you." I wanted to get my point across. "Now, I believe this is a party, correct?" I turned to Pinkie Pie, who nodded enthusiastically in response. "Well, I don't see very much partying going on." Of course, she took it over from there.
"Let's PARTY!" The music came back on as I walked down the stairs and back into the crowd.
The party lasted until the sun went down, when Twilight Sparkle finally kicked out everybody except for Spike and I. We, of course, had to clean up. There wasn't too much to do, but it was boring work. Soon after finishing, I went back up to the balcony. The night was shrouded with clouds, but the moon still shone brightly. Happy, for the first time in what felt like forever, I fell asleep. My dreams, however, had no intentions of happiness or well-being.
I was in a ravaged field, the smell of rancid flesh everywhere. I stood, to see I was wearing armor. Not just any armor, I was wearing beautifully crafted steel-like armor. Patterns of wings adorned the shoulders and chest piece. A gray sky was reflected in the metal, as was most of the world around me. A sword hung by my side, as did my knife. I looked around at my surroundings, only to see bodies. Bodies everywhere. However, they weren't human. They were ponies, with an occasional mixture of horrifying creatures. A screeching came from behind me. Of course, I did an about-face and drew my sword. One of the things was there, and it was coming straight for me. It seemed to be made of blackness and shadow itself. The maw of the hellspawn opened and-
I woke up in a cold sweat. Brain… what the hell are you thinking? The sun was still behind the horizon. Not wanting to go back to sleep, I watched the sun rise and waited for the librarian to wake up.
"Well, you're up early." Twilight remarked when she saw me.
"Didn't sleep well-bad dream." I explained what had gone on when she asked for more detail, thinking she was probably trying some psychology thing on me. However, that wasn't the case. When I finished the tale of the nightmare, she immediately gave me a solution.
"You should see Fluttershy, she's good at helping with stuff like that." The librarian said, and as soon as we had eaten breakfast (oatmeal this time), Twilight Sparkle and I set out for Fluttershy's home.
I had that same bad feeling in the pit of my stomach. Dark clouds covered the skies, the sun a light gray circle. Twilight reassured me that it'd be fine, as the pegasi control the weather. However, weather was the least of our problems. A large, nasty-looking black spike had just embedded itself in a tree, inches from my face. The nightmarish screaming came again, and I hit the ground-pulling the purple unicorn with me. I drew my knife and yelled to Twilight, "STAY DOWN!" Oh shit… It was a monster. A real one. A carcass in my dream made a reality. About 6 feet tall with a thick exoskeleton, it looked like a giant beetle with lots and lots of teeth. Why me? I didn't have time to think, because suddenly it charged. I rolled to the side, landing on my feet. The beetle turned around to face me again, and came at me. This time, I rolled under it, hoping that its underbelly would be soft enough to cut. Luckily for me, it was. The beetle let out a roar and stomped its feet, trying to hit me. I was behind it now, trying to get on top of it. Somehow I managed to get onto its abdomen and was climbing up to the head when it realized that the pesky human was on top of it. I held on to its back for dear life, but it wasn't enough. It bucked me right off. My body flipped through the air when suddenly, a razor sharp spine on the creature sliced through my upper arm. "SON OF A BITCH!" I yelled, out of pain and anger. I hit the ground hard, and looked up in time to see the beetle get its head squashed by a boulder. Huh, looks like I got saved by a rock. Thanks Tom. Hehe, Tom the Rock. Has a nice ring to it.
"Brian! Are you alright?" Twilight ran to me seeing I was injured. I owed her one, seeing as she killed the beast.
"I… I don't think… My back…" The painkillers were doing me no good. My back felt like someone had poured liquid iron on it. The skin felt so stretched like… like it was going to rip. And it did just that.
I heard a sickening tearing noise, followed with hearing blood splatter against the ground. I felt blood run down my back and sides.
"BRIAN!" was the last thing I heard before I lost consciousness.
A/N: So, how was that? I had a ton of fun with this chapter. So many things I could've done. I'm glad that this wasn't just one of those filler chapters, I've finally got a plot advancement. Plus, I worked until 12:35 AM to finish this (Probably not too late for some of you guys, but I had a busy day today) As per the usual, PONY ON!
~LazerShaman