One Track Minds
Vanish walked over to the train compartment window, looking outside at the passing scenery as he sat on a seat of the train. “Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, Derpy Hooves. I only remembered Derpy’s name out of guilt. For some reason, I can’t forget it, so I went to the hospital with the belief that an act of generosity would alleviate the burden that had been placed on my conscience. As for the others, my client needed to teach me to remember them through extensive training. Relating a name to a face is not a task that is simple for me. I apologize if I seemed to be more complex than reality has made me, but my various tasks have been commited to memory, only as how I should perform them, and not my actual performance of the aforementioned tasks.” Vanish simply remained looking out the window, chuckling slightly as he remained avoiding the ponies’ eyes. “If you think my client simply did all of this out of some sort of sudden plan, you’d be wrong. This has been planned for weeks. Maybe even a couple of months, though the days are mostly just blurs in my mind.”
Rarity considered the stallion's words. “Are you sure it isn’t something else? Perhaps some sort of illness, or…” Vanish waved his hoof at Rarity, still looking at the scenery. “Would it make a difference, really?” The other ponies looked at each other with concern as the dark blue unicorn elaborated. “You don’t seem to understand, so allow me the courtesy of saying the truth, with simplicity.” Vanish turned around, staring daggers into the hearts of the ponies in the room with a cold look of disdain in his eyes. “We’re not friends. In fact, we’re enemies. We have different goals and different perceptions of what we are doing. I can tell you’re trying to befriend me, likely so I do not stand against you.”
Vanish walked over to the rear door as he used his magic to place the fedora into his saddlebag, sliding the door open with his hoof, revealing the next compartment’s door before turning his head. “Do yourselves a favor: Don’t try to.” Vanish turned back around to look at the second door, allowing access to the next train compartment. “Ignorance is bliss, my dear! Not knowing about the negative actions you might have committed is a lot easier than forgetting them.” His hoof opened the second compartment door, while his rear hoof closed the previous one, leaving the ponies with those words hanging in the air.
Rainbow Dash was certainly not keen of the dramatics that Vanish was portraying. “Aw, horseapples! If somepony can handle it, we sure can!” Rainbow opened the door, seeing that the second one had been closed. Lunging forward and opening it, she was surprised to see nopony inside. “Huh?” Remembering that Vanish could cloak himself, she walked in as the others followed, with Twilight speaking her mind as she did so. “Rainbow, maybe we shouldn’t just confront him li-!” The light blue mare covered her friend’s mouth, hearing tapping just above them. It seemed to resonate from the outside, which made sense, since nopony who was awake was capable of flying up to the top of the cart aside from Fluttershy, who was right behind Rarity in the line that the ponies were forced to form in order to make sure nopony would fall off the train as they walked on the coupling hooks between the train cars.
As the ponies gathered into the cart, they followed the tapping to where it ended, which was just outside of the compartment, between itself and the next cart of the train. Terrified screams were heard just outside the door, but they sounded familiar, as the ponies quickly learned why. The door glowed with a dark blue aura and slid open, revealing Scootaloo, Sweetie Belle, and Apple Bloom standing on one another, as if they were trying to help Scootaloo look through the compartment door window. Vanish was right behind them, having caught them off guard by landing from above with his flank and tail on the coupling hooks, having his back up against the adjacent train compartment’s door, and his legs and hooves to the fillies’ sides, blocking their escape from the back and sides.
The stallion shouted from behind the fillies. “Did you really think that I failed to notice you three board the train!?” Having opened the door, he used his magic to lift them into the train car that the other ponies were in, before entering the train car for himself, closing the door behind him. “You’ve got three chances to explain why I shouldn’t throw you off this train, right now.” Scootaloo shivered at those words, as the older ponies placed themselves between Vanish and the Cutie Mark Crusaders. Rarity in particular was highly displeased about Vanish's demeanor towards the fillies. “That’s enough, Vanish. You made your point. We’ll keep them on until we reach Canterlot, then they can ta-”
Vanish interrupted Rarity, raising his hoof. “One.” Rarity paused for a moment, before the realization hit her. “Pardon? Y-You can’t mean…” Vanish smirked playfully. “I said ‘three chances’, and I meant that collectively, my dear. You have two more guesses left, and don’t count on me to stand down early, either!” Vanish activated the magic of his horn, but the ponies couldn’t see the magical aura surrounding anything in the cart. “Two chances. Go.”
“You can’t do thi-!” Rainbow Dash got pulled back by Twilight, who had grabbed her tail with her magic. “Rainbow, hold it. I’ve got a feeling Vanish is still mad at us, so don't push him.” Twilight motioned for the other ponies to come closer in a huddle, but kept the fillies just within earshot range. “Maybe we should think this over. We’ve got two ‘chances’, right? Besides…” The purple mare turned back around, looking at Vanish. “I get the feeling he’s trying to tell us something.”
Sweetie Belle couldn’t understand Twilight’s logic, and from what she heard, it sounded more like they were just using them as pieces of some game. Scootaloo had the same thought, and got enraged at the idea. “Hold on a second!” The ponies tried to keep her quiet, but she just hovered over them to get a clear view of Vanish. Vanish used his magic to bring the filly closer to him, smiling mischievously as he let her land in front of him. “Do you have an answer, little one?” Scootaloo hovered in the air, to shout in his face. “You bet I do! You can’t just do whatever you want, it’s not fair to us!”
Vanish’s smile turned to a frown, no longer having the magic of his unicorn horn active. “Not fair? You three being on this very train is unfair!” Scootaloo raised her eyebrow, confused by the statement that the stallion had made. “Huh?” Vanish lowered his stance to meet the filly’s eyes. “I had intended to keep you off the train so that my client couldn’t use you like pawns. My apologies if I couldn’t help that point get through your rather…” rubbing his hoof quickly on her hair, he drilled his message further into her brain. “…thick skull...” Scootaloo was dizzy for a moment, but fixed her hair after the stallion stopped, still listening to him. “But now that you’re here, it’s only right for me to correct errors as they arise.”
Vanish activated the magic of his unicorn horn once again, this time opening the windows of the train and causing air to blow in swiftly, as it distracted the ponies’ attention. Rarity and Twilight couldn’t use their magic with their manes sharply whipping at their respective horns, knowing that they might hurt somepony. The menacing stallion grabbed the first filly he planned to toss out, which happened to be Apple Bloom. It made sense, as she was the only one he could be sure wouldn’t be able to get back: He saw Scootaloo’s wings, and although Sweetie Belle couldn’t use magic, Vanish could not know that as a mere visitor to Ponyville. Apple Bloom was brought close to him with his magical aura, hovering right over Applejack’s head. “NO! APPLE BLOOM! Leave her alone, Vanish!!!”
Vanish’s frown remained, as he brought Apple Bloom eye-to-eye to him. His short mane was blowing behind his horn, allowing him to easily use his magic, as well as giving him a perfect view of the terrified ponies’ faces on board the train. “Any last words, filly?”