Friendship is Infectious Ch.13

Chapter 13
Upgrades

OK, she had to admit it. She was a brilliant pony. It wasn't your normal filly who could make a bits gun out of a cash register, ticket machine and popcorn popper. Dash turned to see how the other two were faring. Octavia tucked her mane behind one ear and surveyed her result. A few strings from her broken cello and some goose tape, and she had an effective razor sharp whip. Soarin was having some trouble coming up with any sort of weapon, so Dash decided to lend a hoof. Trotting over to the small group of arcade games in one corner of the theater, she pulled one of the blasters off of the game Parasprite Busters: Garrison of Gobbling, and after some finagling, she produced a makeshift tazer and handed it to a gaping Soarin.

    "Wow Dash! You have a gift with gadgets!"
    "I got it from my dad. He'd show me how to build all kinds of stuff..."
    "Sounds like he was a pretty great guy."

Rainbow Dash sighed. "He was..."
    "Well what happened to him?"
    "Do you mind if we don't get into that right now?"

Dash really didn't want to talk about her dad. Besides, Soarin wouldn't understand. Having a human as a father was difficult to discuss at the best of times, and these definitely weren't the best of times. Soarin shrugged.

    "Sorry. Anyways, we have another problem."
    "And what's that?"

Soarin made sure Octavia couldn't overhear before continuing. She was busy humming a melody to herself, pausing to scribble notes onto a piece of lined paper. Soarin leaned close to Dash and spoke barely above a whisper.

    "What about Tavi?"
    "What about her?"
    "She doesn't have wings. How will she keep up with us?"
    "Don't worry Soarin. I got it covered."

She pulled the contraption she had been working on out from behind the counter. Using a little bit of everything she could scrounge up, she had made a pair of metallic wings, which could be attached to a pony via a black harness and operated with cables attaching to the hind legs, which left the front legs and mouth free to carry weapons.
Soarin gave Dash an admiring grin.

    "More of your dad's work, I take it? Oh. Sorry. Anyways, that looks rad! But how do you know if it'll work?"
    "It's OK. And I don't. We can't test it in here. Too small. We'll only know if it works when we make a break for it. Either she'll fly, or she won't."
    "Yo! I dunno 'bout you, but this gear needs some serious vampage, if ya dig what I'm sayin'!"

Soarin, Dash and Octavia grabbed their weapons, and Octavia addressed the newcomer

    "What business have you here, intruder?"

The white unicorn pushed her purple shades up onto her forehead and stared at them with crimson eyes.

    "Duuude! I ain't no intruda! The name is Vinyl Scratch! DJ of awesome!!!"

The three survivors were flabbergasted.
    "How long have you been here?"
    "I been here the whole time!"
    "So why haven't we seen you before now?"
    "Cause ya weren't lookin', dude! I holed up the the projector booth, don'tcha know? Now about this flying doohickey. I'm no mech, but I think this could use some improvement!"

Vinyl trotted over to the pair of wings, and after a few minutes of tweaking, she had changed it from wings into an entire battle suit. Dash and Soarin were awestruck.

    "Woah!" Said Soarin. "How did ya do that?"
    "Two words: Video Games dude! Video Games! I can totally hook us each up with a set!"

Rainbow was practically dripping with envy. But she had to admit having a suit of power armor sounded pretty cool. Octavia had an objection however.

    "What are these garish contraptions? You expect me to wear this angular and tacky device?"

The white unicorn gave a nod. "Yup, unless you wanna end up like those snazzy dressers outside!" She tilted her head in the direction of the zombie ponies.
Octavia gave a small huff, but she clambered into the suit all the same.

After a few hours, each pony had a custom suit of armor. Octavia had a small dark grey  curved suit, with slots for two bow-shaped swords to be stored over the shoulders. Her helmet had a silver T-shaped visor, and angular cheek plates. Soarin's suit was dark blue with yellow highlights, similar to his Wonderbolts uniform. Extra armor had been added to the front legs, and metal wings enhanced his wingspan by several feet. He sported a teardrop shaped helmet with a black bubble visor. Dash's bits gun had been enhanced into a chaingun that was mounted on Soarin's right shoulder. Dash's outfit looked similar to Soarin's, but a lighter cyan blue, without the extra armor or chaingun. Instead she had two hoof-mounted tazer blasters. She wore a streamlined helm, and her crescent visor was a striking gold. Vinyl's armor was truly a sight to behold. Pure glimmering white, with bandoliers loaded with compact disks. A mike stand had been re-tasked as an effective quarterstaff. Sprayed in electric blue along the right side of the armor was blazoned the words DJ Pon-3. Her helmet had a unicorn-esque crest which swept backwards. Her razor-thin visor was as purple as her DJ shades. The joints of the armor were decorated to look like records, and on each flank was a mounted speaker. Dash pointed a hoof at the speakers.

    "What are those for? Some kinda sonic attack?"

Vinyl shook her head. "Nah, that'd blow out the speakers out in about one blast! These are for background music dude! When I'm kickin' some serious flank!"
*****

Fleur-di-lis was still hungry. She had been eating for hours, feasting on anypony she had come across. Maybe she just needed something fresher...
She heard a small pop. It sounded as if a cork being let out of a bottle of champagne, and at the same moment something lodged itself in her ear. She lifted her loose eye from where it dangled alongside her mouth, and turned it to look in her ear. A small blue beeping charge...

The bullet detonated, vaporizing Fleur-di-lis' head and replacing her body with a mangled pile of blood and bones. Four armored creatures burst from the theater, and landed in the courtyard. More zombie began shambling towards them. Drawing her blades, Octavia turned to the other three.
    "This is the time for me to avenge my fallen orchestral companions. Stand aside foals!"
She moved with a fluid grace and delicacy, her blades twirling in a mesmerizing vortex. It looked less like battle and more like a gloriously coordinated dance. Within moments the courtyard was devoid of undead. Octavia stood in the center of the courtyard. She was barely even panting as she made her way through the shredded bodies back to the other three ponies. She spoke one word as an explanation to her amazing talent.

    "Ballet."

They continued on toward the front gate. The next challenge came in the form of an infected royal guard. He had almost doubled in size, and large spikes sprouted from its elbows. Dash looked at the others.

    "Don't worry guys. I got this."

She strode forward with confidence, then opened her wings and soared into the sky. From the high altitude she saw that the hulking monstrosity stood in a shallow puddle. It was easy to aim and fire several tazer rounds into the pool. The resulting shock caused the creature to tense. Every muscle in its body strained to the snapping point, literally tearing itself to pieces.

As they progressed, more and more infected began pouring out of abandoned buildings. Finally their path was blocked by dozens of the undead. As they began retreating back up the street, Dash yelled over the howls of the creatures.

    "Anypony got any bright ideas?!"
    "I got one." Said Soarin, spinning up his chaingun. He unleashed a devastating barrage that tore through the oncoming hordes. Bits ripped through the zombies, and blood gore and body parts spattered the pavement. As they horde began to thin, they pushed towards the main gate. They began to gallop. Vinyl took a moment to tap a button on her suit, and a few seconds later the low untz untz untz of a kick bass began pumping from her speakers. The four ponies charged through the city, blasting techno as well as any zombie they ran into.

As they galloped, Dash called from her position overhead, pointing a hoof.

    "There's the gate! We're home free...uh oh."

All four screeched to a halt and gaped at the horrific sight in front of them. A massive pony stood in front of them. But it wasn't just a large pony. Hundreds of ponies were lumped together, a twisted zombie erector set. They formed legs, torso, head and mane. Vinyl was in awe.

    "Duuude! That thing's bigger than my house!"

Rainbow Dash looked from one pony to another. "Well? I'm open to suggestions."

Octavia took charge and spoke to the other three.

    "We cannot hope to defeat that creature in single combat. We must find an alternative exit out of this city. Everypony follow me."

She turned and galloped for a nearby sewer entrance. The others hesitated a moment, than followed. Vinyl turned off her music as they entered the sewers. No sense sounding awesome when trying to avoid certain death. As they exited the sewers several miles from the city, Soarin spoke.

    "Well now that we ditched the monster, what's the plan?"

Dash removed her helmet, tucking it under one leg.

    "We gotta go back to Ponyville. My friends might still be alive."

Octavia argued the point.

    "You do not have any evidence to support this theory you have created. In any case, I have heard that Ponyville was the first place these creatures were seen. How do you know if any of your companions yet live?"

Dash sighed. "I don't. But I made a promise to come back, and even if I hadn't, those ponies are my friends. I have to go back. Loyalty, ya know? It's my element after all."

She looked from one pony to another, but all seemed to accept this response.

    "Very well Miss Dash. We shall accompany you to Ponyville. If we are fortunate your friends shall be alive and unhurt. We could also use the extra numbers."

    "You know me Dash. Us Wonderbolts gotta stick together."

    "Heak, I'm always down for a good plot-whoopin'! I'm in!"

Dash nodded, and slid her helmet back on. "OK, well we've got a bit of a walk, so we best get started."

Vinyl tapped a hoof on Dash's visor. Even with her helmet on, Dash sensed the white DJ rolling her eyes at the pegasus.

    "Duuuude? Why can't we just take the train?"

Dash looked at Vinyl, then nodded and offered a brohoof. Vinyl returned the gesture.

    "Alright, but one issue: the train station is back inside the city."

Now it was Soarin's turn to look smug. "We could just hop the tracks and follow them back to the station."

    "Excellent." Said Octavia. "But we should be proceeding quickly if we are to make it to the train station before these horrible creatures either catch up with us, or figure out what we're up to."

Dash gave Octavia a skeptical look. "You make it sound like they can think..."
*****

It had been quite a task to retake the train station, but they had finally managed. Thanks to Vinyl's armor suits, none of them had been bitten, though it wasn't for lack of attempts on the zombie's part. Now the were on the train to Ponyville, and each was in their own private thoughts.

Rainbow thought about her unusual encounter at the train station. She had been flying solo trying to find the keys to the train when she had been ambushed by a zombie pony. This one had been different. Instead of rushing her in a mindless fury, it stood back and spoke. It hadn't been a long conversation, but in the short time they talked, the creature had told Dash that they planned to attack Earth. Now Dash was worried. She had to warn her father, and anyone else on Earth she could. But how?...

Soarin had to admire Dash's skill. She was an amazingly graceful pony...
Now he had to stop thinking like that. He couldn't afford to get attached to a mare again. The last time he let that happen, he had to kill her when she turned into one of the infected. Poor Spitfire. But he felt the same way about Dash that he had about Spitfire. The best thing he could do now would be to suppress his feelings and hope that they would eventually go away...

Vinyl tried not to think about what had happened today. Too much pain and blood. Instead she focused on mixing a new song. Add some bass. No, too much. Maybe a couple synth licks? Am chord, C chord? Maybe this would work...

Octavia sat alone. She had left her helmet on so nopony could see her quietly crying. She had heard Dash talking about her family at the theater. Octavia had a family. That is, she had had one. They has all been turned, and Octavia had been forced to kill them all, sacrificing her cello to do so. Losing so much that she loved, her family and her music just minutes apart from each other. It had almost broken her will. She hadn't wanted to live anymore. Then she had seen him. That flowing mane, those strong wings...He had given her something to live for.
Oh Soarin...she thought. If only I could tell you how I feel...