The gap in between the last chapter and this chapter was simply just preparation for the true ending, which is nearly completed. Enjoy the last non canon ending of the Lab as we discover possibly the worst off for the player out of them all.
I absorbed my surroundings, and took a deep breath, I was so close to the cure, I could weirdly almost feel it. But as I turned around, my setting had changed. The support beams that had previously fallen, were gone, and instead, was a long corridor, with several rooms labeled 'testing room', 'fusion machine'. I took of down the corridor, my two greatest priorities repeating in his mind over and over again. Gathering the others, and of course finding the cure. The first door I stopped off at, was the fusion room, I also made sure to watch out for infected, although I was immune, the infection clearly made me pass out for a while, exactly what happened in the sewers of the school. Inside the fusion room, was a lab like space, counters with different coloured potions inside vials, a huge metal machine was of course the main sight, with three titanic test tubes, the two on either side were signed as 'input' and the middle was 'output', pretty self explanatory. Just then, a sound like a large entity taking a footstep could be heard. And it was close,
"Looks like I got company." I whispered. Diving into a supply closet, and leaving the door a crack open to see what was going on. Then, a towering, disturbing nightmare fuelled beast emerged. It was huge, and bulky, with torn clothes, and gnarly limbs, then there was the head, it was the rotting image of a deceased pig, it had bloody scratches bubbling with pus, and jagged teeth, it had a signature eye of insolence.
"Wouldn't want to get on the wrong side of that thing." I though, barely daring to breath.
The pig creature stumbled forward, jerking with every step. Then, it's nose twitched in the most disgusting manner. Then it plunged it's blistered fist into the closet right next to mine, who's heart was now pounding like the footsteps of the creature. To his horror, the pig wrenched out a person, the man had dirty grey hair with a scraggly beard and faded scientist outwear.
"No, No, Penny, stop!" He begged.
"Penny!" I thought, nearly blurting it aloud. As he recalled, all of Georgie's family were infected by Mr.P, except Georgie obviously. He had previously run into both infected parents, but never Penny, or was it a coincidence. Either way, things weren't looking good for this guy. Squirming and screaming all the way, Penny slung him over her shoulder and tossed him into one of the tanks. Penny noticed icicles had formed in the other tube.
"DON'T!" The man screamed, pleading for mercy, banging his fists on the glass, Penny stumbled over and pulled a lever. Both tubes whirred, and smoke set. when it cleared, there was a frozen figure in the output tube, on it's knees. I gasped, nearly giving himself away. Penny's neck turned like someone had whipped her. After about twenty solid seconds of tension, she turned back. And in one move, she completely shattered the ice sculpture that was a scientist. But then, something just as terrifying entered the room, and it was the opposite build to Penny. This creature was tall and slim, with slimy and oily features, but the worst part was it's head. The feature's head was that of rotten stitched wool, that had...wait...was that an eye of insolence? Right next to it, stood, a slightly shorter version of the creature, expect it's head was teardrop shaped, and had two blazing orange eyes. Penny snorted, then her body changed, it shrunk down until it was a girl, my age. Long hair, long skirt, it was definitely Georgie's sister.
Only, as Penny changed, she was completely a shadow, no visible facial features. But a bright red eye. Then, Penny slunk across the ground in the blink of an eye, before strangling the mini creature and tossing it across the room, it smashed one test-tube and lay on the ground. The insolence creature glared with hatred at Penny, but like more of an irritated glare than a pure angry one. Then, Penny dashed forward, and tried to pummel The wool creature with her bare fists, but it kept dodging, this way, and that way. It ducked and swerved. Penny took a deep breath and stepped back. But now it was the wool creature's turn. It's eye glowed so brightly it looked like the furnace fires of hell. Then it blasted an orange beam of energy at Petra, rasping,
"I AM STITCHY!!" However, Penny had melted in her shadow form, and simply re-formed right behind Stitchy. She punched, but Stitchy created a hole where she punched, and then reformed, trapping her hand inside. Stitchy whistled, and the other creature rose up, it extended it's arms and grabbed Penny, it pulled her and tried to smash her on the ground, but then Penny grew, she reformed into the gnarly pig. It barred it's saliva dripping fangs, before pouncing at the creature. Stitchy charged up another beam and fired, but Penny held out a knuckle, then there was a faint sizzling noise. The beam died out, and Stitchy glared again. The only problem with this, was the fact that I was long gone.
My heart pounded even more as I sprinted out of that room, he I met two creatures that from the looks of they, could have quite simply killed him. But what was Penny all about, she was a write-off, his heart panged painfully when he realised he'd have to tell Georgie what happened to her. He strode up stairs, completely out of breath, and saw commotion unfolding in a room before him. It was Willow and Tigry. Tigry was on one knee, a nasty bruise on his cheek, and Willow standing up, staring down at him.
"Go on then." Tigry snarled. "Finish me, deep down, I know you don't have the heart to." Willow decided to promptly kicked him in the chest, causing him to collapse.
"Maybe you do." He grunted. Willow noticed me.
"Look at this pathetic man." She spat, kicking him again. "Surely you could never trust him." Just something about watching these two endlessly fight, that made my insides squirm.
"STOP IT!" I yelled at them. Both of them looked at me, surprised, before I continued.
"The cure has to be around here somewhere." I reasoned. "It's probably in this very corridor."
Willow and Tigry glanced at each other. I could tell they both agreed with me, Willow to a lesser extent. The two of them rose to their feet and followed me. And then, he checked every room of the hallway that we could find. But then, a miracle happened. At the end of the corridor briefly flickered, just showing a room where a vial sat on a table. The liquid was bright blue.
"Could it be?" I whispered, darting forward. Willow and Tigry followed close behind me as I slowly made my way up to the door.
"Well I never." Tigry growled, running forwards. However, all of a sudden, like something out of a dream, my vision faded to black, and when I opened my eyes, the whole scenery had changed. I was no longer inside the lab, instead, I was in some strange, distorted landscape. And to my horror, Willow and Tigry were about fifteen feet ahead of me. They stood in the centre of the landscape, and they were fighting, only, it was way more intense than before. Blood was flying everywhere, bones were breaking, I had to act fast. And I didn't have too much time to act either, as not too far away from me, several, ghostly entities appeared. They were the colours of the rainbow, red, blue, purple, only they were about two feet taller than me, and nearly double my armspan. I rose to my feet. If I was going to stop this, it wasn't going to be with them around. I started running around the landscape, the floor underneath my feet cracking into nothing. It was like a dream. And then, I circled back around until I was right in front of the battle taking place. Both of them were in bad shape.
"Y-you." Willow said shakily, out of breath. Her left leg was clearly broken, as she was kneeling down, and various wounds sported her face. Tigry wasn't much better, he had a black eye, and what looked like slash marks over his torso. And then, I saw something, to the left of me. A baton! Picking it up in my hands, it was heavy, heavy enough to do some serious damage. I looked towards the fight. And then, in that moment, with the entities wailing after me, I made a split decision. I reeled my arm back before throwing the baton through the air. Towards...Willow. I don't know why I made that decision, but in the moment it seemed right to me. As soon as the baton was in her hands, Willow swung the bat upwards and hit Tigry on the chin with all the force in her right hand. Tigry froze for a moment, before sailing backwards and hitting the floor, knocked out. And then, as quickly as the dream had started, it ended.
Just as the two of them disappeared, a strange figure appeared in the centre of the room. His hand reached out slowly towards the unconscious Tigry.
"Be ready to face your destiny." It said. "Tigry..."
Meanwhile, me and Willow had both been safely transported back to the lab.
"Thanks for the help." Willow said quietly. "But I probably didn't need it."
"You sure about that?" I asked, raising and eyebrow, thinking back to the part where both of them had been bruised and bloody.
"I don't know what else you want from me!" Willow snapped. "I've apologised."
"An essay perhaps?" I asked, pulling her leg.
"Now you're pushing it!"
"I'm Joking! I'm Joking!" I said playfully. "Anyhow, do you think Tigry will be okay. I mean, where did he even go?"
"I don't know..." Willow said, before I picked up on the topic.
"Let's just grab the cure and get out of here." I reasoned. Willow nodded at my statement.
"I'll grab it." Willow said. "I..just need a minute."
"You got it." I said, nodding, before turning around to leave Willow be. I paced down the corridor. I was pretty sure Pony would be outside. As I stepped into the elevator, I almost got a...strange feeling. Like a euphoric rush that everything was going to be okay. I wanted to do everything in my power to make that a reality. Pretty soon, I made my way outside, and sure enough, Pony was leaning against a tree, looking down at the ground. In my moment of happiness, I forgot about my anger towards Pony.
"Pony!" I called. "Are you okay?" Noticing the expression on his face.
"Heh..things were okay a long time ago, I'm sure about that." Pony laughed. "But.." His expression turned more solemn. "But..not anymore. Since the infection started, nothings been good since."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"I'm infected." Pony said, dropping the bombshell. "Way back at the docks, I was infected by that damn moose." Pony's words didn't feel real to me. In fact, this couldn't be real.
"No, no, NO!" I yelled, a wave of silence descended over the space. "I don't believe you! Get up, we have to save Zizzy! Isn't that the point of this mission! Aren't you going to see it through."
"I can't feel anything anymore." Pony said, his voice was barely louder than a whisper. "I failed Zizzy, you're gonna have to...go one by yourself." And then, I remembered what I had previously discovered.
"Wait a minute!" I yelled, excitement creeping into my voice. "The cure! Willow! Willow's got the cure! Where is she!"
"We both know she isn't coming back." Pony whispered. A part of me probably knew Pony was right, but the other part of me had to stay strong..I was the only one who could save my friend. Pretty soon, my legs felt weak and they simply couldn't support my weight anymore. I crashed to the floor, on my knees.
"Tell me this a joke." I murmured. "Some kind of twisted joke."
"I'll sit here any lie all you want." Pony said. "The truth'll only hurt more." Me and Pony said in silence for ages, both us not knowing what the next plan of action was.
"Can you do me one last favour." Pony whispered in a dry choke. "Take care of the kids. Stay strong for them. They need you." I shakily rose to my feet.
"I will Pony." I said steadily.
"I hate to be a bother." Pony chuckled, in a last, attempt to brighten me up. "But cheer up will you. Look how far we've both gotten." I turned around.
"I don't think I could've gotten any farther to this point with anyone else but you." Pony said with a weak smile. And then, I did something for the second time that day that I wasn't quite sure about.
"I...Forgive you Pony." I said, my voice just as quiet as his.
"You don't mean that."
"I do." I said. "I don't think I could stand the risk of seeing Doggy get infected closer to the finish line. I don't know if that's an excuse, but.."
"Do me one final favour." Pony pleaded. "Remember me...after..after..this all."
"I will Pony." I said, the words somehow manifesting in my lungs and voice. "Forever." Feeling tears glistening in my eyes, and not wanting to make a scene in his final moments. I looked behind myself one last time. Pony had closed his eyes, accepting his fate, he almost seemed..at peace with with what had happened to him. Gathering up my courage, I turned around and paced off into the distance, my outline soon one with the falling snow.
Bingo! All non cannon chapters of the lab finished. After this, you'll get the two bonus chapters before we finally move onto the big finale. I'll admit, I'm really excited to show you what I've been cooking up for nearly a few months now. I'll see you there
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Doctor of Fun