The Cutie Mark Crusaders were the sweetest foals but five years can change anypony.
Apple Bloom, Scootaloo, Sweetie Belle. The adorable Cutie Mark Crusaders. Younger sisters to the Elements of Honesty, the Element of Loyalty and the Element of Generosity.
They were so lovely, weren't they? Sure. But did they remain the same after five years?
Apple Bloom, Scootaloo, Sweetie Belle. The separated, used-to-be Cutie Mark Crusaders. The ponies who are living lost causes. An unsuccessful and exhausted saloon owner, a weapon smuggler (part-time assassin), a gambler who is in dire need of money to keep hide on her bones.
Don't live in Ponyville anymore. Don't even live together or talk to each other. Their sisters, out of sight and (probably) out of mind. Their friends, they don't care about. Their home, left and abandoned by themselves. Their lives, full of desolation and ruin.
An earth pony entered the dark room, a lit candle in her hoof. The luminosity of the burning candle gave bold shadows to her blonde mane that lay tossed to one side on her tangerine coat. A brown Stetson hat lay on her head, slipping back as she raised her head to observe the room with determined, emerald eyes. There was a small four-poster bed by the wall, somepony huddling and giggling under the sheet.
Eyes narrowed, she took silent, measured steps ahead – so stealthily that the candle flickered no more than the millionth quarter of a centimeter. When she was practically looming over the intruder in bed, she took her empty fore-hoof and, with a cry of annoyance, yanked the sheets off her younger sister.
Apple Bloom giggled, her candy red mane tied in with a pink ribbon. “Whoa, Applejack! That sure was quick!” she laughed.
Applejack’s narrowed eyes widened into an amused expression and she laughed back, settling the candle on the bedside table. “You said it, sis,” she winked, patting Apple Bloom hard – to which the filly gave a loud ‘oof!’ – on her back. Applejack settled on the bed as her sister dropped on the pillow, ignoring the previous pat and laughing in all her juvenile innocence.
“Can ya tell me the story of the pony that turned into a dang timbahwolf?” she pestered.
“No can do, sugarcube,” sighed Applejack, smiling nonetheless.
“Aww, c’mon, big sis!” Apple Bloom tugged the mare’s mane playfully, causing the hat to just slightly slip. Applejack secured the hat back on her head with one hoof and gently pushed Apple Bloom’s hoof away, a grin growing on her face.
“Well, ah guess I could tell y’all somethin’,” she pondered but Apple Bloom didn’t want to wait.
“Somethin’? Aw, can’t ya tell me that were-pony story!?” pleaded she.
“That one’s a tad too long to be told at this here time of the goldurn night,” told Applejack, sternness now making its way into her voice. Apple Bloom, realizing she wasn’t going to get the story now, plopped back on her pillow but Applejack was not one to watch her little sister wallow into sadness even for a night.
“Buck up, sugarcube,” she winked, nudging the filly, “I’ll tell it to y’all tomorrow, ya hear?”
Apple Bloom’s face immediately lit up in all the colours of rainbow and she started jumping up and down on her bed with a smile as big as her face. “Yippee!! Yippee!!!” she squealed but Applejack put a hoof to quieten her down.
“On one condition,” the older pony added – words that completely silenced Apple Bloom. “You gotta sleep early tomorrow. Don’t wanna come up here again this late, ‘kay?”
Apple Bloom thought for a minute but quickly nodded. “Ya got it, AJ!” she grinned brightly.
Applejack smiled with a mixture of pride – at her little sister’s growing mature decisions – and happiness – at the fact she managed to brighten the filly’s mood – and she got off the bed, making her way out of the door when Apple Bloom spoke up.
“Uh, Applejack?”
Applejack turned, her mane lightly sweeping with the movement. “Yeah, sugarcube?”
“Can you tell the Line of Light?” whispered Apple Bloom, her little voice echoing in the silence. “Please?” she added before Applejack decided to oblige.
“Oh, a’right,” exhaled Applejack, walking back to her sister’s bed. Apple Bloom excitedly jumped up once and then cozied up in her sheets as her elder sister sat down at the edge of the bed. The candlelight filled the small room with a beautiful glow, gentle and warm, silent shadows of the two sisters appearing on the wall behind.
“Wherever we go,” Applejack started, her thick Southern drawl evident even in her most memorized song, “we should never forget family. Family is what makes us whole. Lose your family, lose your world. This is the real truth; this is what you need to see. The thing that makes us all whole is family. Standin’ with your family, you can never lose your face. Your dignity will always be intact.”
Apple Bloom felt her eyes getting heavier as she listened to the soft melody of her sister’s words. Applejack put a hoof to the filly’s forehead and smiled as she sang out the last line: “If we all try to be happy, we can achieve success.”
The last words flowed out of the mare’s mouth in a lasting symphony until she finally ran her hoof down Apple Bloom’s forehead and over her eyes to close them. “Hush now, quiet now, Apple Bloom,” exhaled Applejack lovingly.
A smile lingered on Apple Bloom’s face and she whispered, “G’night, big sis.”
Applejack kissed her forehead softly and smiled back. “Night, lil’ sis,” she whispered back as she tucked her sister in and got off the bed. She leaned towards the candle as it burned and flickered and blew it out before silently trotting out of the room.
–––––––
Apple Bloom slumped back into the red-stained chair, a mug of dusty salt swinging in her hoof. With her other hoof, she jingled the small bag of bits she had. It wasn’t much money but she would manage – right after she paid all her employees and a fraction of her gigantic debts. Yes, she would manage. The musty, smoky air of the club filled her nostrils but she was used to it. She took a large gulp of the salt, swallowing it with ease – she just needed to come up with a plan.
Her candy red mane, which once used to be tied up in a delicate ribbon, was now rough as it hung over her crest, her gold-orange eyes were fiery but exhaustion was seeping its way in and there were stains – and perhaps even bruises – all over her parmesan coat. Life had been slightly rough but she could manage. She had always been able to – she thought so.
A pony coughed rudely from behind. Apple Bloom recognized the sound as one of her most obnoxious employees, Redcut Peel. Peel was a money-hungry savage and she would have fired him the day he spoke to her – but, unluckily, he was also the club’s biggest entertainer. She couldn’t fire him if she wanted people to actually come there – and be entertained – and he used it to a very unfair advantage.
Peel coughed again. Apple Bloom rolled her eyes before taking another heavy gulp of the salt and spinning around in her chair, her face exhausted and monotonous. He stood there in a studded leather jacket, heavy dark makeup around his eyes and a see-through lavender cloth around his cutie mark which was a black, rotten banana peel with crimson hues around edges. With a cigar between his lips, he smirked.
“Bloom, I have come to talk to you,” he took the cigar out and nonchalantly observed his hoof.
Apple Bloom stood, clutching the bag of bits tightly in her hoof, and slammed the mug of salt on the table in a moment of fierce irritation.
“Yeah? Well, I ain’t got no time for the likes of y’all savages,” she spat through gritted teeth. “Need nothin’ more than cursed, darned bits, do ya?”
“I just want my pay,” Peel told simply but then snorted, “Don’t want your useless club to shut down, do you, Bloom?”
“I’ll give y’all two bits for today,” forced Apple Bloom with a defeated grunt. Peel looked pleased but he was a greedy beast. He wanted more.
“Two bits isn’t enough to buy a darn carrot-dog,” he scoffed. Apple Bloom instantly snapped her head back up, her blood boiling and her eyes turned a bright shade of fire. “I will need ten bits,” continued Peel while Apple Bloom glared at him, wishing she could throttle him at the spot without making a scene.
“Ten bits?” she snarled. “Y’all lost yer bloody nuts!? I ain’t givin’ you ten bits, you jerk. Two bits is all y’all gonna get!”
“Hold the language, Bloom,” laughed Peel. If he were capable of reading Apple Bloom’s mind and if he saw what she wanted to do with his flesh at the moment, he would never dare to talk to her like that ever again. “I’m the star of the show,” he grinned sickly, “and you gotta give me what I deserve. You know?”
“Ya deserve a chainsaw ripping you apart, that’s what!” screamed Apple Bloom. Her voice was loud but the musical din of the noisy club overpowered it – which she was thankful enough for. The last thing she wanted was some police pony deciding to lock her up for the night. Her eyes getting ignited with fury, she stomped to Peel and seethed, “And that chainsaw’s gonna be in my hooves – and I sure will relish every second of slashin’ it through you.”
Peel knew this act. He smirked to himself. “Fine,” he breathed, appearing offended, “I guess I am fired then. Okay, I am leaving.” He turned around and started to leave – everything was going to be perfectly according to his plan and Peel knew it.
Apple Bloom watched him leave – watched him pretend to quit – as he had done a hundred times before when she refused to pay him. Because she would never be able to get a scrap to eat if the club closed, she would end up paying him what he wanted. She snarled, outraged at the very near future. She hated Peel to the core – he was a monster – and yet she would have to oblige to his cursed will in the end.
“Wait!” she was mad at her own voice but it had to be done.
Peel turned, waggling his brows in downright smugness.
Apple Bloom undid the string around her money pouch with her teeth and, taking out ten bits with her hoof, she threw them at his face – a discourteous gesture that he accepted in self-righteousness. He had known she would give him his money, didn’t he? Without a word of thanks or anything, he turned around to leave the shack of a club. There were only fourteen bits left in the pouch now.
Like a volcano erupting, wrath overcame Apple Bloom’s whole being – but she chose to suppress it and slumped back on the chair behind her, waiting for all the club guests to finally go home. The salty stench, the warm air, it all made her forehead damp with sweat and, muttering a harsh profanity aloud, she yelled out for more salt. She was not going insane – truth be told, she already was.
The lake was silent and warm as the sun glistened in it with radiant golden hues. The afternoon was so summery yet so quiet – it was just begging to be disturbed by the high-pitched giggles of a filly splashing about in the water, having no consideration about ruining the peaceful moment. She was just hitting the water with her hooves, appearing to be magically sitting on the wet surface all on her own, while trying to speak but her laughs drowned any other sound she tried.
“Hahaha – the water is so cold! – hahahaha! Haha!” she rolled on her back over the bed of water without drowning and tried to suppress her giggles as she stared up at the clear blue sky, squinting to get the sun out of her eyes.
“Not a cloud,” she whispered and giggled quietly again, “and it is all so blue – just like you!” She looked at the water, a pure but rippling reflection of the azure sky, and grinned as she sat up again. Immediately, two feathery blue wings flapped out of the water, wallowing water all over the already-wet filly; and, from under the water, a soaking mane in gorgeous rainbow colours plopped out. Streams of water trickled on the pegasus’ sky blue coat, her eyes squeezed shut – when she opened them, anypony could see she had dazzling magenta eyes.
The filly on her back held on to her neck tightly as she rose up in the air and, making a few circles, landed on the ground at the edge of the lake.
“Hop on down, Scootaloo,” she laughed, nudging the filly on her back with one wing. Scootaloo looked disappointed for a moment but jumped off her back anyway. The blue pegasus shook the water out of her mane and tail with great vigor till the edges of her rainbow hair were back to their usual bristly shape. Scootaloo, having stood right next to her, was very wet now.
The mare stifled a giggle. “Whoops. Sorry, Scoot.”
Scootaloo, seeming to break out of a stunned daze, immediately shook herself too, fluttering her little wings as she did so. Some droplets landed on the older pegasus but she playfully laughed, shielding her face with one wing. “Rainbow Dash, Rainbow Dash, what’re we gonna play now!?” she giggled, running around her adoptive sister in circles.
Rainbow chuckled at the filly’s enthusiasm but shrugged. “I dunno – nothing?”
The little pegasus came out a screeching halt and, as a result, stumbled on the ground with her face first. Rainbow shook her head and lifted her back on her hooves with a half-smile. “Watch where you’re going, squirt,” she sighed.
“B-b-but, but the games!” gasped Scootaloo, looking up at Dash with a face that was full of adorable, childish shock. “Come on, we have to play at least one more!”
“Time for my noon siesta, kid,” winked Dash as she turned to make her way to the two hammocks.
Scootaloo threw herself and clung to Rainbow’s back hoof, making the latter burst into a laugh. “Scoot, what’re you doing?” she asked, wiping a tear from her eye.
“I wanna play,” begged Scootaloo, “Aw, please play with me! The water ride was so awesome! I was sitting on the water – it was like super magical! – and you were so awesome – and everything was awesome – I felt like I was so magical!!!”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” dictated Dash, swinging her hoof up with a jolt so hard that Scootaloo flung up and landed on Rainbow’s back – a fall the older pony softened by spreading her wings on it. “The point is, I gotta take my nap,” continued Dash as she rose a couple of inches, the filly pegasus sitting on her back quietly, “and maybe – just maybe – I will play a bunch of games with you–”
“Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you!” squealed Scootaloo at once. Dash turned and looked at her with one raised eyebrow; apparently she had more to say before she was interrupted. “Sorry,” whispered she as Dash sighed.
“–after I take my nap,” she finished. Scootaloo opened her mouth to protest but she put a small smile on her face instead.
“Something’s better than nothing and that’s good enough for me,” she smiled.
Dash laughed, landing back on the ground, the brown land warm against her hooves. The hammocks were right in front of her. Both looked exactly identical if not for the contrast in size – one for Dash, the smaller one for Scootaloo. “You know, Scoot, I laid this hammock out for you… in case you wanna take a break,” Dash said, climbing into her hammock and picking up her shades, as Scootaloo got off her back.
“Ugh, I don’t like sleeping when I can hang out with you,” grinned Scootaloo.
“Yeah,” laughed Dash, “I am pretty awesome – but you should catch some shut-eye too… y’know, if you want to be bright-eyed and bushy-tailed for all the cool, cool games we’re gonna play later.”
Scootaloo’s face fell but she lazily climbed into the smaller hammock anyway. Dash noticed the filly’s lack of excitement and poked her gently. “Hey, it’ll be fun,” she consoled. “You’ll see.”
“Sure it will.”
Scootaloo tried to smile back but couldn’t – instead she sank her face in her hammock. Dash pondered on what could cheer her up and then, in a nonchalant voice, said out aloud, “I could tell you a story or something” – knowingly glancing at Scootaloo who had jerked up – “but, you know, if you don’t want to hear…” She flashed Scootaloo a bright smirk, deliberately trailing off in the middle of her sentence.
“A story? Is it Daring Do? Is it about you and your friends!? Is it just about you?” Scootaloo had a grin as big as half of her face.
“The Line of Light, Scoot,” exhaled Dash.
“Oh.” Scootaloo looked disappointed again. “That’s… not really a story,” she added, “It’s a mantra.”
“An awesome mantra, yeah,” chuckled Dash. “And you love it, don’t you, Scoot?”
“Hmm.” Scootaloo thought for a minute and then shrugged. “Okay, I guess. If you say so, Rainbow Dash.”
Black sunglasses on the top of her head, Rainbow bent closer to Scootaloo and sung, “Whenever you need light, you only need hope.” Her raspy voice was strangely elegant at the time and a small smile tugged at Scootaloo’s lips as she lay. “The end of the line, the end of the road; unable to move but you need to get to the top. Together with friends, all of us holding hands, we will invite hope” – closing her eyes as she exhaled out a repetition – “… we will invite hope. Be brave; with friends, be the best you can be.”
Scootaloo’s eyes were open in awe and admiration. Rainbow Dash had sung the song to her many times and every time it sounded more beautiful than the last. Dash bent closer to the little apricot-coated pegasus and whispered out the last sentence in gentle euphoria, “If we all unite, we can be free.”
A smile lit Scootaloo’s face and she blinked. “Awesome, thanks, Rainbow Dash!”
“You are welcome, squirt,” laughed Dash as she rolled back on her hammock and set the sunglasses back on her eyes. “And now that we’re done, sleep tight and, uh… keep away from dirt mites.”
“Don’t let the bed bugs bite,” corrected Scootaloo with a giggle.
“Potato-tomato,” scoffed Dash, “I like it my way – it sounds more awesome. Doesn’t it?”
Scootaloo giggled again, sinking into her hammock and closing her eyes. The warm sun glowed in summery radiance and the sunshine tingled warmly on her coat, above her closed eyelids and she smiled, taking a moment to appreciate the peace.
“Yeah,” she whispered. “It does.”
–––––––
Guns rattled. Bullets blasted across the dark valley. Smoke was rising on the horizon; shrill roars pierced through the atmosphere.
Four pegasus ponies scrambled on the rocky cliffs, the front half of their body armored in hunks of grey metal; they carried dark, heavy bags and khaki stripes ran along their faces in an attempt to camouflage from the war raging on all sides. One pegasus, an old mare with a charcoal coat and wrinkled garnet red eyes, looked the most important in them. She had a now-healed but painfully visible scar running across her flank – with such savagery that she must have had trouble getting over the agony – right above her cutie mark: a purple heart slashed open in the centre.
There was only one stallion in the group of four, his coat the lightest shade of artic blue. His solemn eyes were a deep indigo – he spoke without emotion; he always spoke with burdened yet vague pain. Three icicles hanging in a row wasn’t a bad cutie mark choice on him – just made him seem all the colder. The third member was a female pegasus with vibrant chartreuse hair in a fringe that clashed unattractively with her crocodile green skin and crow-black eyes – her cutie mark was a strange one: a yellow eye with a vertical black pupil.
The last pegasus on the team was a ragged, hard-hearted, with magenta hair shaved from the back of her crest in a way that it fell in an arc over her lavender eyes, Scootaloo. There were scratches on her back legs but they didn’t bother at the moment. The bags – with outlines of something that looked rather dangerous – were presumably heavy but she carried them with ease. She was used to it – this was her life.
“We stop here, ponies,” commanded the old mare with an authoritative grunt as she held up one hoof. The other three Pegasi stopped and, as she lowered her hoof back down, they sat on the rough rocky terrain of the Hinnyharsh Cliffs.
“The battle is fierce,” the mare commented as she trotted towards them, “and we don’t want to be seen by any pony.”
Her comrades nodded in respectful agreement. She sat down and they all remained silent till the green-skinned pegasus spoke. “So when are the delivery guys coming?” she ventured.
“Our last supply to the rebels was hearty,” told Slashcut with a hint of gruffness. From the side of her eye, she looked up at the building tower of smoke behind. “They should manage for a bit – and, if I remember the schedule well, they should be here soon. Huh. Well, forget all that. Did you still have those grenades, Greenwing?”
Greenwing nodded, somewhat alarmed at the doubt in Slashcut’s voice.
“Did you check?” spat the older mare.
“N-no,” hesitated Greenwing, “but…”
“No time for but’s!” yelled Slashcut. “We come to these lands to supply weapons, not play. Check your bags! Now!” Anger, built up with her old age, appeared to be shooting out of her eyes and she snapped her head at Scootaloo and the blue stallion. “All of you! I don’t want a single piece of machinery out of place, you hear me!?”
Scootaloo heaved her bags off her own back in presumable obedience but, from inside, she was terribly infuriated. Her madness had nothing to do with Slashcut’s arrogant manner of bossing everypony around – it was just madness that had become part of her. She was part of a team that illegally supplied lethal, modern weapons to a pony rebellion fighting in the dragon lands – she herself had fought with those weapons, killed with the bullets and the bloody memories were hard to get out of her head.
She opened the zipper of one bag and looked inside – machine guns. Machine guns were the latest weapon technology in Equestria – fresh off the black market – and the rebellion would pay plenty for them. Those guns would take down thousands of lives – innocent and deserving – but none of it was her business. She had a routine – her team’s routine – and that was to get the pay from customers who they sold illegal weapons to, use a large fraction to get newer, better ones from the black market suppliers, sell them to the customers – and the cycle kept going on and on.
Never be seen or heard by any pony who is not part of the business – that was the rule of the team. That was the only rule of the entire business – that’s all she had to stick to. The team she was part of would let her remain a part if she never broke that rule – and, for all these years, she had never broken it so what could go wrong now?
Scootaloo opened her other bag that was full of Whinnychester 99 guns – another weapon the rebel ponies loved. It was fast, effective and perfect for pumping bullets through any hide – best weapons, they had said, for a bloody massacre. Scootaloo put one hoof in the bag to feel the metallic iciness of the bullets at the pit of the bag – they are slender and cold, perfect for the guns and every victim they would cross.
“I-I… I got the grenades, Slashcut,” muttered Greenwing as she checked and re-checked her bags.
“Good,” hissed Slashcut and glared at Scootaloo. “You?”
“Everything’s there,” replied Scootaloo with a firm nod of her head as she zipped the bags back. Slashcut looked over to the stallion pegasus as he closed his bags as well.
“Artic Sea? Are you present!?” she chided his silent behaviour with a scream.
Artic looked up slowly with rheumy eyes. “I have everything,” he spoke, despondency – despondency that didn’t seem to have reason, thought Scootaloo – tinging his bland voice. He was always so insipid – Scootaloo would have wanted to know how exactly he managed to get in the team; but then again, she was recruited after him.
“Slashcut, Slashcut…”
A hefty voice broke out from behind them. Scootaloo turned.
There were six or seven stallions standing behind them, heavily built and armed, dirt marking almost every inch of their coats. One stallion, wearing an eye patch, stepped ahead as the four Pegasi stood.
“Slashcut,” he repeated as the other mare nodded without any expression, “good to see you so soon.” He took a heavy step closer to them – Scootaloo secured the bags back on her back, eyeing them with intense caution. “The weapons,” he asked with a smirk, “… you brought them?”
“Everything is here, Groove,” nodded Slashcut. “Material worth four thousand and twenty bits – as the deal went.”
Groove chuckled. Scootaloo turned her head and unexpectedly met eyes with Artic – she couldn’t understand whether he thought this was a set-up, not with his deadpan eyes, but she wasn’t going to be taking any risks.
“Give us the goods,” he demanded, grinning in a manner that Scootaloo could only consider evil, “Then we pay you.”
All the gears in Scootaloo’s mind started pumping – turning, twisting, begging for action. She smelled a set-up – she sensed death for all the Pegasi on her side. Not hardly did a fraction of second pass after Groove presented his crude demand that Scootaloo, whipping her head to Slashcut, blurted: “No, Slashcut, tell him we want the money first!” Without waiting for any reply or reaction, she snarled at Groove. “We want the money, Groove. Then you get the weapons. Don’t think we will let cheaters like you in the game, do you?”
“No,” he answered simply, his grin still lingering on his ugly black face. “Guns first. Money after.”
“We aren’t betting our bits on damned ruffians. We smuggle these things for wretches of your kind with difficulty, understand?” snapped Scootaloo and then pushing her open hoof forward, repeated: “Money. Now.”
“Scootaloo!”
Scootaloo, her face burning with intensity of anger, turned to find Slashcut addressing her.
“Give him your bags,” ordered Slashcut.
“What!? Slashcut, how can–”
The other mare cut her off. “Give him your bags now!!!”
Groove smirked. With a defeated snarl, Scootaloo tossed the bags off her back. She was angry, she wanted to kill every single thing in sight – but she didn’t. She held it back. She didn’t hear Slashcut address anypony else but, when she heard Artic and Greenwing’s bags slide and hit the rocks, she realized Slashcut must have gestured them to do the same. Even Slashcut dropped her own bags.
A unicorn on Groove’s side used his magic to take the bags. Slashcut trotted forward, her face stern as she stared at them.
“You’ve the weapons,” she stated, “Now give us the money.”
For a brief moment, Scootaloo raised her head to see Groove smirk at her – specifically at her – and then he gestured at one of his minions – a gesture meaning ‘pay them’, seeing how the stallion tossed a large pouch of money at them. Slashcut gingerly picked it up with the tip of her wing and nodded at Groove.
“Pleasure doing business,” she remarked.
“Yes,” he agreed, never wiping that grin off his face. He turned and, instinctively, his group turned to leave – but Groove stopped. He leaned towards Scootaloo and she looked at him without raising her head, through her roughly done hair.
“Watch who you deal with,” he coldly commented in a whisper, his grin flashing away for a minute. “Save your hide, eh?”
Scootaloo gritted her teeth in punishing rage but she didn’t answer. Groove straightened back and grinned sickly again before turning to leave. Threats, threats – Scootaloo was used to them. That was her life. Was she insane? Possibly. She certainly knew what insanity felt like – she knew so because she was so.
“I know, darling, I know. So bedazzling, is it not?”
“No, no! I mean it – it is too pretty!”
“Sweetie Belle! I know!”
“You’re not understanding! It is actually, truly beautiful!”
The mare’s eyes twitched. She was a unicorn with a stunning pearl-grey coat and a mane that was coiled elegantly, the shades of royal purple heaving in gentle contrast. Her eyes, a spectacular hue of cobalt blue, fixated on a piece of blue gem on the little ornate table – and the younger unicorn filly who was trying hard to suppress her giggles.
“Sweetie Belle,” she breathed, herself trying not to be angry, to the filly, “I realize it is lovely, darling! You needn’t repeat it.”
“You think it is lovely, Rarity but I know it is! It is so very pretty!”
“I didn’t say I thou–”
“So beautiful, so beautiful! You know?”
“Sweetie Belle! What in Equestria!?” cried Rarity, now aghast. Sweetie Belle tried to maintain a serious face but toppled on the floor, with her back first, bursting into a heap of giggles. Rarity took in a minute to fully comprehend the meaning of her sister’s ‘practical joke’ but she didn’t appear to have enjoyed it.
“Honestly, Sweetie, darling?” she scolded. Being rudely interrupted in the middle of her sentences was clearly not her sense of humor. “Was that rude behaviour supposed to be a joke?”
Sweetie Belle’s laughter came to a gradual halt.
“The proper lady does not play practical jokes on her elders – have you never heard of manners? What would Mother and Father say if they saw this uncouth behaviour of yours, darling?”
Sweetie Belle’s grin turned into a frown.
“Such actions deserved to be punished,” declared Rarity, using her magic to adjust the blue gem on the table slightly. “Therefore, as a punishment, I shall…” she loomed upon Sweetie Belle who looked rather repentant.
“– tickle you!” laughed Rarity as she jumped on Sweetie Belle, the filly breaking into peals of laughter as her older sister tickled her. “Oh yes,” Rarity chuckled between laughs, “I am going to tickle you so very hard, O unruly unicorn!”
“Rarity – oof! Hahaha! – Rarity, I can’t – hahahaha – Bwahaha!” Sweetie Belle rolled as she tried to get a hold on her uncontrollable laughter.
Both sisters fidgeted and laughed wildly, Rarity’s lady-like etiquettes and manners forgotten to winds. They were having the time of their lives – tickling and tickling and tickling! After five solid minutes of non-stop tickling and Sweetie Belle’s laughs-mixed-with-pleads, Rarity finally stopped and the two unicorns collapsed into a heap of quiet giggles.
Sweetie Belle was panting although her smile was big enough to light up any room. “I… I am sorry, Rarity.”
“Oh, darling, it is alright.” Rarity was panting too – tickling a squirming foal was exhausting – but she managed to get a hold on it. The lavender carpet under their backs was plushy and soft – all the carpets in Carousel Boutique were only of the finest quality – and Rarity would have hated it if she had to lie on some cold marble floor.
“So… the joke…” Sweetie Belle went on, “Ladies can play practical jokes, right?”
Rarity let out a single giggle. “Well, certainly, they can, darling.”
“And it was not uncouth?”
“Of course not. It was actually rather amusing, now that I think back to it… Lovely prank, darling.”
Sweetie Belle grinned for a moment but then it faltered. “You… you still love me, right, Rarity?”
“Darling!” gasped Rarity, “Of course, I love you, my little sister! I love you more than anything, darling!”
The grin on the filly’s face returned and she looked adorable. “Oh, thank goodness,” she breathed, closing her eyes. Then she opened one eye – so it seemed as if she were winking – and giggled, “Because that means I have your approval to prank you like this whenever I want!”
“My approval to do what!?” gasped the older unicorn and then shook her head amid chuckles. “I never said that, Sweetie Belle.”
Sweetie Belle laughed softly. She was getting… well, she was getting tired. Rarity had been working on a necklace – refined with elegant textures and studded with only the most dazzling gems, as Rarity had said – for the filly and Sweetie had stayed up all day with her to make sure it was absolutely to her liking. The day was ending; the dusk was upon them – and, instead of fixing gems in to the necklace, they had been playing around.
“Rarity,” she started, trying to keep her tired eyes open, “what about my necklace? We have to finish it!”
“Well, of course, we do, darling,” nodded Rarity but, when she cast a glancing at the exhausted little unicorn at her side, she added, “but that can wait till morning, can it not?”
“But we have to finish it!”
“Oh, pshaw, darling!” Rarity maintained a most lady-like scoff. “There is no deadline whatsoever – besides, you look terribly worn out, darling! I will finish it; you go to bed, all right?”
“You promised you’d do it with me – this was supposed to be our fun activity! Together!” protested Sweetie Belle.
Rarity ran her hoof on her sister’s mane gently and sighed. “Well, yes. Yes, darling, I guess it was…” she stopped to think and, when she did, she looked upon Sweetie Belle with a tender smile. “What say, we do it tomorrow, hmm? Together?”
A frown creased on Sweetie Belle’s forehead for a moment – she couldn’t be unreasonable and just carry on pestering; she had to make a choice. With her sister or not – that was the question. Exhaustion mounted upon her being and she let out a small exhale.
“Okay,” whispered she, letting her eyelids fall upon her eyes. Even though she wasn’t outside, she could smell the scented aroma of the evening air and it filled her with love… and sleepiness. She could hear the birds chirping as they made their way back to their nests.
“Darling, you look so very tired,” came Rarity’s whisper beside her.
“Mhmm.” Sweetie Belle’s lack of words and closed eyes defined her exhaustion well enough.
“Oh, my sleepy sister…” Rarity used a flick of her magic to delicately push away a couple of stray hair strands from her sister’s mane. “I know you worked hard with me today,” cooed Rarity softly, “and you deserve to rest.”
“Mhmm…”
There was a pause and then Rarity said, “Would you like me to sing to you?” It was just a gentle offer – she understood if Sweetie Belle was not in the mood for listening to songs in such a state of exhaustion and Rarity certainly wouldn’t mind if she refused.
“Uh…” a slight frown appeared on Sweetie Belle’s face. “Sure.”
“The Line of Light?” asked Rarity, making sure to keep her voice soft as to not disturb the filly.
“Uh-huh… sure.”
Rarity smiled. Sweetie Belle couldn’t have seen it – her eyes were shut – but she felt it.
Rarity began singing, her accented voice delicate and beautiful, “Whatever there is that life has to give, it is beauty. Looks can deceive; yes, it is true – but only outer beauty, not the real truth in you. Look at those eyes, look at the gait – outside in this world, false compliments await. Look in your heart, choose what you want to believe; loveliness of a pure soul or ugly looks that deceive. There is nothing keeping us from our true selves; nothing keeping you from me.”
The evening seemed to have grown quieter and so had Sweetie Belle’s mind. The comforting dark of her closed eyes and her sister’s care were everything she needed to lure herself to silent sleep. Noticing the quiet heaving of the filly’s chest, Rarity’s enchanting voice lowered to an ethereal eloquence, “If we all try to love each other, we can create harmony.”
Sweetie Belle had fallen into a quiet slumber and, with a loving smile, Rarity swiped a tender hoof to set another loose strand from her sister’s mane. “Oh, my darling Sweetie Belle,” she chuckled – almost whispered – softly.
Her horn fizzled with a glistening blue aura as she, her eyes still watching her little sister, used her magic to bring out a plushy pillow and a small pink blanket from a nearby closet and delicately pushed the pillow under Sweetie Belle’s head, covering her with the blanket.
With her magic, Rarity picked the blue gem on the table – the same one she and Sweetie Belle had playfully argued about – and smiled at it. She turned her head to the sleeping foal and whispered as if her sister were listening, “A very beautiful gem, you said, darling? Very well then. It shall be the pièce de résistance of your stunning necklace, darling.”
She smiled at the gem again and, with the gem hovering in the air by her side, trotted outside, her hoofsteps subtle and quiet. The door closed with a gentle clink but, almost immediately, it clinked open again, Rarity’s face whisking in with a tender smile at sleeping Sweetie Belle.
“Good night, Sweetie Belle,” she whispered, “I love you, darling. Sleep in beautiful peace.”
With that, she whisked her head back out and the room was quiet – and dark – once more.
Sweetie Belle’s eyes didn’t move but her mouth did.
“Love you too, Rarity.”
–––––––
The last chords rang in the air as the music died down. The only lasting symphony was the unicorn’s melodious voice; it was the only thing the crowd of listening ponies seemed to actually appreciate – even if their ‘appreciation’ meant whistling and hooting in the most rogue of manners. It was not an outdoor stage upon which the mare stood – on the contrary, it was inside a steamy, boisterous hall filled with hooligans for an audience.
Her almost-pure-white coat unsheathed from see-through layers of a short, translucent, violet dress; glittery, periwinkle eyeshadow lay above her light green eyes; soft curls of her pink-and-lavender mane were tied in a grossly sparkly band to form a high ponytail – the cheers of the ponies were nothing uplifting at all but Sweetie Belle had to go on. This was her life now. She had to pretend to be happy – she had to swallow her heart, her fear, her emotions – if she wanted to live.
The music had completely finished as Sweetie Belle sung her final words to the crowd, the uncomfortably sizzling yellow lights dimming. There were distorted cheers and chortles and somepony in the audience screamed her name in something of a dizzy frenzy. Faint but still disgusting odor of smoke and sweat culminated around Sweetie Belle but she smiled – they would kill her if she let her fear break her into tears instead.
Going out in the fresh air was calming but being hurled to stacks of metal was nothing short of being extremely painful. Sweetie Belle’s backbone nearly cracked with the force and she sniffed back a tear, shivering and meeting the gaze of the stallions glowering at her.
One of them, older than the others and shriveled but with a deadly glare and barking voice, stepped forward as the unicorn got back on her feet, trying not to quake with fear. “I thought,” he spat, “you said you would get me the money by today, Belle, eh?”
“I, uh, couldn’t just… the time, you know…” she couldn’t calm her breath as she spoke. Behind the black-coated stallion was a bench. On the bench were a variety of pony-mutilating tools – instruments of torture that she could only stare at weakly, praying to Celestia her life would be spared this once.
“You have lost enough money to pay the bloody rent of a Manehatten flat for a whole year, Belle! A whole bloody year!!” He waved angrily at Sweetie Belle and a bulky pegasus with a gold tooth and pale skin gave her face a violent strike, a scratch exposing raw skin on the far left of her face.
She coughed, falling to the ground. “Slayer, I j-just didn’t have the time,” she croaked out a lie as she got back on her feet, keeping her head low. She had time – that was true – but she had no money. The few bits she got by singing – for rather unpleasant audiences – were just enough to keep herself from starving – and she could not use those bits to help her in her lost gambles.
Slayer loomed towards her, his ugly face drawing dangerously near. “I’ve been letting you slack ‘bout for a wee too long, eh?” his barks resulted in specks of gross spit landing on Sweetie Belle’s face and mane. He grabbed her neck – and she was shaking to the core with thoughts of what would happen next – and made her look up at him, his grip terribly strong for a wrinkled old stallion. “I want my money, Belle; I want my money and nothing else!!”
“You… You’ll get it, Slayer,” she managed to squeak, a valiant effort judging how her throat squeezed. “Just give me a while to gather it up.”
“Three years!” he spat right in her face. Sweetie Belle knew better than to use her magic against her loaner – it could result in a penalty of gruesome torture or even death – and, with a heavy heart, she let the saliva mark her face again. “Three years,” Slayer repeated. “For three years, I have kept you out of my radar all ‘cause you said you’d pay me back – and here I am! And you! Without a single bit on you, you… you worthless wretch!!!”
Sweetie Belle tried not to cough on his face – a slight fragment of bad manners and she would be nothing more than a mess of bloodied entrails and sliced organs. “P-P-Please,” she muttered, “just a little more time, Slayer…”
With a snarl, the old pony tossed her on the ground. Wheezing for breath and lacking any energy to move, Sweetie Belle lay in a slumped heap, her chest bloating and shrinking rapidly.
“You have three days,” he barked with wrath that could only be rivaled by Kronos’ thirst for revenge.
“T-T-Three… Three days?” the words blurted themselves out weakly from the unicorn mare’s mouth.
“You’re lucky it is not three hours, Belle,” Slayer bellowed to the quivering Sweetie Belle as his assailants gathered up the death instruments from the bench, loading them in a sack. Sweetie Belle watched with a fearfully cautious eye, afraid one wrong word might result in her last breath, as she tried to push herself in a sitting posture, her tongue lolling out between her gasps for breath.
The gangster minions of Slayer started making their way out of the valley-like settlement at his gesture but he stayed behind to address his to-be victim one last time. He turned to look at a breathless Sweetie Belle, the moonlight hardening his menacing features significantly.
“Three days, Belle. If I don’t get my money then…” he stopped speaking and licked his rotten old lips, eyes slanted. “If you don’t pay your debt,” he rephrased, turning to face her completely, “I will make sure you die – in the most succulent ways of maiming known to the world of mutilation. Pray your money will save you from me, Belle. Pray.”
Croaking out the words, he turned and hobbled out with the rest of his goons. Sweetie Belle waited, still trying to regain a constant breath supply. The night air was cool and pleasant to breathe in, the moonlight was a spectacle to behold in the dark and the silence – the gradual fading sound of hooves – was too inviting for Sweetie Belle to yell her frustration out. All in the cold silence of the night – when Slayer and his henchponies were safely gone.
“DAMN YOU!” she screeched in the shrillest volume her lungs could manage. “DAMN YOU, SLAYER! I HATE YOU!”
Her voice rang out in the empty vastness of the ground, the wind carrying her words to far-off boundaries but she didn’t care. Boiling tears streamed down her reddened face in frustration and she didn’t even care to brush them off. This was her life and she was used to it – for the most part. “I HATE YOU, SLAYER!” she screamed to the wind again between squeaky but noisy sobs.
“I hate you so much…” her voice dropped, her energy gone, and she dropped down to her haunches, tears dripping on the rough ground under her. Insanity was something she felt herself associate with – insane was the only word she thought could possibly describe her.
It was dawn. A red sun was growing out from the tip of the east horizon and its dim rays beamed sketchily across the blue sky, reflecting on scattered patches of alabaster white clouds. A brown-furred jackrabbit hopped out from behind a putrefying shrub, sniffed the air instinctively and hopped away in short little bounds, scurrying away into the endless desert. From a closer view, the place was undoubtedly in terrible need of inhabitants – for a bird’s eye view, one would spot the currently quiet town of Appleloosa settled many, many miles away into the east. The desert itself was hopelessly empty – for the few exceptions of some rough buildings hanging around.
One of those buildings was a two-storied, salt-selling saloon; it had a reasonably strong but still crude exterior painted matching shades of violet and sangria, all complete with a partly cracked, sloping, cerise roof. A wooden board hung loosely outside from the structure, ‘Salt in Hooves’ coarsely carved in the dense wood.
Trudging along, tired steps marking the dry dust, eyes cast downwards – not in any shame but irritated exhaustion – Apple Bloom approached the saloon – the saloon she owned. She didn’t look anything like a proper mare should have – prim and sophisticated certainly didn’t seem to be her style; in fact, her condition made it seem like nothing was her style. Strands of candy red hung over her trio of white freckles on either cheek. Her rugged hair hung over her head and crest, partially covering the top of her eyes; her mane retained its once-adorable, U-shaped front but it was far too raggedy – and definitely not in any good way – to be anywhere near nice now.
Lack of sleep – possible insomnia, an onlooker could think – had caused deep wrinkles to crease around her eyes – eyes that still had their fiery gold hues, flaming and fighting against whatever fatigue was burdening the mare. There was dust on her tail – there was dust all over her, to be frank – and tiny pieces of splintered twigs were visibly poking out from here and there.
She was right in front of the saloon’s door, her head still down – not hanging down, but its position couldn’t be called ‘up’ either. She put one hoof to the gate as it swung loosely on its hinges and pushed herself in.
There were few ponies in the saloon – surprising enough, given the time of morning – although two were simply employees: the piano player and one of the bartenders. A bunch of stallions, who Apple Bloom didn’t even bother to try to recognize, stood near the counter, talking at abrasive volume. The mare plodded forward to the bartender and slammed a hoof on the counter, making him look up.
“A mug o’ salt,” she grumbled.
“Miss Bloom?” the bartender pony – whose name was Sipstraw – asked with a slightly wavering voice.
Most of the employees were considerably respectful to Apple Bloom – except one certain beastly miser – and a lot of them were generally accustomed to her habits. That was the reason why Sipstraw quivered; he knew when she drank salt so early, ponies were never safe from the terrors of her messed up temper.
“Mug o’ salt,” repeated Apple Bloom, looking up at him with a deathly glare.
Sipstraw nodded hurriedly. His cedar horn glowed with a dark green aura and he used his magic to pour his employer a mug of salt as she had requested – more like demanded, actually. Apple Bloom grabbed it in her hoof and gave it a single chug before banging it back on the counter, her hoof still lingering around it, as she grumpily stared around at the saloon.
Apart from the dispersed shafts of sun rays peeking in through the incompletely-curtained windows, it was rather dark inside the building. A couple of firefly lanterns hung from the ceiling, their weak glow showing a vague staircase going upstairs. Tables and chairs were neatly – and surprisingly – stacked on top of one another in a corner. A piano sat in another corner, dirt staining its edges and keys. A mare, plum and petite with a string of music notes for a cutie mark, sat playing it in low, soulful tunes.
Soulful, thought Apple Bloom with a grunt as she took another gulp from her mug, but not soulful enough.
Hardly did the thought cross her mind, the door swung open from behind. Somepony tapped their hoof, waiting for her to turn around.
“Bloom!”
She didn’t even need to turn her head to recognize that voice. Instead, she gritted her teeth and shoved the mug back in her mouth, relishing the horrible taste of salt on her tongue.
There was little left in the mug now. She shoved it towards the bartender – a gesture he was scared to both refuse or accept. As far as Sipstraw knew, ‘Miss Bloom’ had a hard time keeping herself from hitting others after she had enough salt – on the other hand, he feared for his job and his life if he did not pour her more salt. Reluctantly, he tipped a ladle of salt over the mug, the stream of grey specks rolling down to become part of the mug’s contents.
From behind Apple Bloom, the pony she despised so much tapped the saloon floor again. She clamped her eyes shut, as if trying to keep her cool, and took one gulp of the salt.
“Hey, you! Bloom, I am talking to you! You deaf?”
The voice was so disturbing, so irritating; she would give anything to just never hear it again. Slamming the unfinished mug on the counter – and startling the bartender in turn, she turned around and wiped her mouth with the back of her hoof and looked up.
Peel was standing there.
He was not alone. Nearly a dozen ponies formed a semicircle behind him as if he were leading them to some protest rally.
Normally, such a sight would terrify Apple Bloom but she just rolled her eyes.
“Huh. Finally,” she spat. “Came early fa once to get ta work?”
Peel looked at his supporters with a smirk and then sniggered at her face. “I am quitting, Bloom.”
“Quittin’?” the word forced itself out of her mouth in utter disbelief. She couldn’t believe her ears. Redcut Peel, the saloon’s most popular asset – quitting? Only if he meant it for real, that is. Peel enjoyed tormenting her already weary and outraged being with twisted jokes that she never found humor in.
“Well, you sure don’t want me around,” Peel spoke, smirking as he observed his hoof. “I thought I would spare you. Haha.” A disgusting laugh snaked out of his mouth as he went on, “Of course, this place wouldn’t even survive without me.” He laughed again.
Apple Bloom watched, her shock turning into all-too-obvious anger. “Well, what’re ya waitin’ fer?” she barked. “Go get yer bloody rump outta here!”
Without waiting, or caring, for an answer, she abruptly turned back around with plans to finish that mug she had been interrupted in the middle of.
“Yeah,” Peel let out a loud cackle, “that’s not gonna happen, Bloom.”
“Y’all think? It sure is if I gotta break yer ribs an’ kick y’all out m’self,” she grunted between gulps and chugs of salt, her face still turned away.
“I’m not just quitting this runt of a saloon. I’m opening my own.”
Well, this just got a tad interesting, thought Apple Bloom as she turned her head partly so that she was able to look at him out of the side of her eye. Mug in one hoof, the other hoof leaning back on the counter, she snorted.
“Openin’ or quittin’, y’all still gotta get outta my place,” she pointed out, her voice as dreary and coarse as her intense intake of salt could make.
Peel chuckled. Rather darkly.
“Not if there is no ‘place’ to get out of.”
The pianist mare was playing a deep tune now – something that sounded… frightening.
Apple Bloom could have choked on her salt at the words but she only raised one eyebrow – the art of perfectly raising one eyebrow with proper sass had been bequeathed to her by a certain older mare – and put her mug back on the counter. This time, it was completely empty.
“And y’all mean what by that?” she growled.
The stallion didn’t answer. He smirked slyly and there was a sick glint of deviousness in his eyes – that was enough to alert Apple Bloom.
“Y’all gonna answer me or do I gotta punch the damn daylights outta yer head!?” Her voice was rising, vibes of indignation building up.
“Oh,” Peel clicked his tongue in phony pity. “You see, Bloom,” he exhaled, taking a few steps forward and smirking all the while, “as I said, I am opening my own saloon. Gonna be real grand, real big, real nice. My uncle Trot here” – pointing to a small old stallion beside him – “is gonna be paying for it. Damn hot idea, huh? And it is going to be around this area too. Well, I wanna start big and that means my place needs to be the monopoly. That, Bloom, is where you come in.”
Apple Bloom was listening. She wasn’t bored – all signs of weariness had been wiped off her face – and she was awfully attentive – her facial features pulled back in a threatening scowl. She did not like where this conversation was heading.
“You see, Bloom, like it or not, your saloon is the one place in this area that ponies recognize. Might not be super famous but they still know it. And they come here. Kinda annoying, you know? I just can’t have any competitor around when I open my thing.”
He took another step forward and smirked at her.
“You are going to have to close your saloon. Now.”
There was silence. Heavy silence.
Only some random tune on the piano rang in the air.
The customers, who had been watching the interesting episode, waited as if they were right at the climax of a suspense thriller.
The bartender behind the counter gulped and noiselessly took Apple Bloom’s mug away from her sight – lest she be inclined to drink more salt.
The ponies around Peel straightened up as if they were readying themselves for any reaction the mare could slam in their way.
Peel flashed a sickly smirk, observing his hoof for the billionth time in his life.
Apple Bloom’s lips twisted. Was it a smirk or a scowl?
A growl escaped her lips, her eyes suddenly changing into a blazing orange color, as she lowered her head, scraping the floor with one hoof.
“That ain’t happenin’,” she finally spoke. Her voice was low, deep –-and if words could kill, Peel would’ve been lesser than a bucket of pony entrails chopped out and doused in blood.
“Yeah, it is,” snickered Peel. Two big stallions, faces scarred and weapons hanging around their bodies, stomped over to his side. The meaning was becoming clear. If she didn’t listen, they would kill her.
For a single second, she swallowed. She felt tense.
“Peel,” she forced, keeping her glare as intense as the summer sun, “this is m’ saloon and what y’all are tryna pull off is downright illegal. Y’all wanna quit? Be m’ blood-damned guest. Want me to shut down my own saloon?” She scoffed angrily. “Well, over mah dead body.”
“I am warning you,” chuckled Peel. “If you don’t agree now, I will open over your dead body. There will be no second chances – just killing. Pure, bloody killing. Bloody, you know? You like to use that word pretty damn much.” He laughed at Apple Bloom’s fuming face. “Well, you sure will know what bloody is.”
This had to be a joke. Another one of Peel’s cursed, horribly twisted jokes.
She couldn’t shut her entire business down – the bits on which she survived – all because the spoiled brat wanted to open his own saloon; and, in response, she snarled, prepared to stand her ground.
Peel chortled at her intensely furious gaze. “Opening a saloon, I hear,” he started between nauseating hoots, “is a lot of work but it really is nothing I am gonna be unable to handle.” He took a step forward, his laughter dissolving into a tacky leer as he stared at Apple Bloom dead in the eye. “Figured killing you would be a nice pastime, eh, Bloom?”
The ponies behind him were all staring at Apple Bloom. Her mind was barely functioning like a normal pony in spite of her salt consumption but, even with corroded brain gears, she realized Peel was not joking. Knowing the bloodthirsty customs of the ponies around, she knew it was a ‘life or death’ option.
Appleloosa? No, too close. Too crowded.
Her eyes narrowed even more. For a split second, she shifted her glance to the glass window on her left, the rising sun visible through the black curtains.
Peel clicked his tongue, waiting for an answer. “Well, Bloom? So what is your choice gonna be?”
Somewhere rougher.
Apple Bloom’s gaze landed on the floor. There was a very dim tune playing on the piano now – apart from that, silence ruled in the saloon. She closed her eyes, thinking in the darkness of her mind. Little exhales of breath escaped her lips as she spared sanity to think. Her head throbbed – too much salt never ended well for a pony – and her throat burned.
Someplace like… the Dodge City. Better chance of hiding.
Then she shifted her eyes up to look at Peel, her head still low and still.
“Nah.”
One word that silenced everything in the saloon – except the piano’s shaking tones. Sipstraw stood behind the counter, somewhat frightened for his employer’s life. The customers looked ready to flee at the drop of a hat.
“Nah,” repeated Apple Bloom, now turning her face up to face the stallion properly, “I ain’t shuttin’ Salt in Hooves an’ I bet y’all on mah life that ya can kill me if y’all wanna. Whatever it be, this saloon ain’t shuttin’ down all ‘cause you wanna be some bloody prat and destroy competition without a real sense of damn business. I ain’t shuttin’ nothin’.”
What happened next happened rather fast.
With a smirk and a gesture, Peel cackled. The armed, scarred unicorns with Peel pumped bullets that would have pierced and killed Apple Bloom on spot – her mind might have been drowned in salt but she knew what to do. Leaping for her life, a snarl plastered on her jaw, she smashed through the glass window she had targeted, rough pieces of glass tearing her skin and making thick blood spurt out. The bulky unicorns smashed out after her, firing loads of lead that Apple Bloom very luckily missed.
For all that she knew, she shoved herself to become the target of a corrupt cult – and she had to run. For her life. Galloping as the dry wind mercilessly lashed at her eyes, she fled out in the direction of Appleloosa, leaving a cloud of dust dispersing in the wind.
As he watched her disappear further in the east horizon till his unicorns could only fire about aimlessly, Peel trotted towards the saloon door casually.
“Stop shooting, boys,” he told, smirking as he cast a look around the saloon at the suddenly-empty saloon. The unicorn stallions lowered their guns in the air beside them as Peel put a hoof above his eyes to look at where Apple Bloom was headed.
“Ah,” he snickered, trotting out right outside the saloon, his group of assaulters following him out. “Looks like Bloom’s headed to… Appleloosa… Ha, not a bad choice but not the best hiding place.” His hoof still to his head, he smirked. “The saloon’s empty like I wanted. All we gotta do is demolish it. We don’t need that pest around to do it… but…” His voice suddenly lit up with a devilish tone, ringing with devious intentions. “But,” he repeated, lowering his hoof and turning around to address the ponies behind with a smirk, “didn’t I say killing her would be a nice pastime?”
The infectious smirk spread over the other ponies’ faces with the exception of the queer expression on his uncle Trot’s wrinkled features.
“Kill her, you say?” his voice was dim, cracked and too scratchy to be healthy as he questioned his nephew.
“Yeah, you got that right, Uncle,” Peel guffawed with sly eyes as he took a determined step back towards the saloon, the other ponies following him at a distant pace. “I want her killed,” stated the stallion as he trotted on, “and I want all of you” – moving his hoof around to include the others – “to find her. That is your job for now – track Bloom down to Appleloosa and finish her. You get any news, lemme know.”
He sniggered.
“Looks like Bloom’s got a lot of – ah, how can I put it dramatically? – blood coming her way.”
––––––––––––––––––––––-
The Badlands were not a particularly welcoming place for creatures of any kind. Dry, grimy, unruly – anypony could see they were the perfect spot for illegal advocates to gather around. Weapon smugglers were frequent visitors to the Badlands –- Scootaloo was no exception. Her last mission in the Dragon Lands had left her more rebellious and fiercer than she had been when she started out. She had blatantly lashed out at the leader of the delivery ponies –- at their customers. Neither Slashcut nor any other of her pegasus accomplices had brought that up yet but Scootaloo knew it would be addressed sooner or later.
With the single exception of Scootaloo’s crude insults at Groove, the delivery had gone without a hitch and they had been paid the full sum –- unlike the many other unfortunate times Scootaloo had affronted some customers which resulted in the team being paid lesser than they had initially bargained.
For the warm and particularly dry morning, Slashcut led her team to a spot in a wretched, little town in the Badlands. She had been commenting about how they needed to have a drink and ‘cool off’ –- a remark that was without a doubt meant for Scootaloo. Since they had set hoof in that town – and not for the first time, all four Pegasi had kept communication levels terribly low. Artic Sea was usually the quietest one but, for once, Scootaloo seized the title that day. She wasn’t afraid about her future –- she knew she was never afraid of anything –- but sulking would be a good way to describe her mood. While they all knew Slashcut was the leader of their group, Scootaloo was awfully infuriated about when Slashcut berated her in front of somepony who she knew to be in the wrong.
When they crossed a make-do stall selling cutlasses and daggers, Greenwing was the one to break the stomach-turning silence:
“We smuggle those high-tech thingies,” she commented airily, “but the old antique stuff” –pointing a hoof at a sleek, steel blade with a copper handle–“will never go out of fashion, you know.”
“Blades will not be of much use to ponies battling dragons,” Slashcut reprimanded, “and our customers can only match that might with technology. They are not pirates; they are rebels. If we were to supply cutlasses and” –clearing her throat ominously– “knives, we would be worse than tramps on the streets of Equestria.”
“But they are still pretty,” protested Greenwing feebly.
“Pretty does not mount to power,” snorted Slashcut, harshness abundant in her tone, “and weapon traffickers like us need powerful goods to bargain for bits.”
“They just have s-style… is all I am saying…” the younger mare tried to argue.
“Style!” exclaimed Slashcut in disapproval, waving a heavily dismissive hoof in the direction of the stall. It was purely an exclamation blurted out in terrible distaste, making Greenwing cower low to the ground in fear, but it caught the eye of the stall vendor –- an odd half-fish monster who immediately got the impression that Slashcut, as a potential customer, thought his items had ‘style’.
“Hey, you! You, grey pony!” he called out, his scratchy voice squeaking out in the street. “You buying?”
The old mare, already enraged by her accomplice’s unfitting interests, snapped back to glare at him but Artic Sea shook his head on her behalf. “Just passing through,” he spoke with a volume that was slightly louder than usual.
“Ah, but cutlass is good. It stylish,” pestered the weird creature, “and it be only nine bits.” The corners of his fish mouth twisted into an uncomfortably broad smile, displaying rows of jagged, yellowed teeth. “So… you interested?” he wheedled again.
“No,” Artic answered, his very manner of speech disinterested and bland as it always had been.
Defeated by, what he thought was, a lost customer, the vendor grumbled some curses, going back to ordering his items on display. Scootaloo spoke nothing; she only watched the encounter with bored eyes and a boiling mind. The rest of the journey was silent once more till they reached a two-storied building, shabby and cracked but the din of the customers inside seemed like it had a good business running.
A chaotic scene greeted the ponies as they entered inside. A large anteater and a shark-like creature stood behind the messy counter of the bar, pouring and serving drinks and collecting bits hungrily. The culmination of so many creatures made the internal environment of the bar sweaty and warm but Scootaloo had been through worse temperatures and she bore her disgust the best she could. Small tables with wooden stools were littered on the floor of the building and the new arrivals roughly made their way through the heaps of customers to the counter.
Slashcut tapped the counter loudly to get one of the bartenders’ attention. The anteater turned to look at her with a gruff scowl.
“Whaddya want, pony!?” he yelled over the building’s noise.
“Drinks! Lemonade for me,” Slashcut yelled back and went to specify her choice. “Salted, no sugar.”
“And ya three!?” he shouted at the other ponies.
“Plain lemonade,” piped Greenwing.
“Water,” said Artic Sea.
Scootaloo thought for a while and then, with a decided glare, ordered, “Salted lemonade.”
The anteater shuffled some mugs and containers before thrusting four mugs towards them. “That’ll be two bits for each of you,” he growled.
Slashcut pulled out two, greasy, gold bits from the saddle on her bag and dropped it in front of the bartender. Artic Sea paid his sum as well; his bits were strangely sparkling. Greenwing accidentally dropped five bits on the counter but immediately swept up three of them with her wing before the anteater could lay his paws on them. Scootaloo rummaged her own saddle bag for bits with one wing and, upon feeling a healthy dose of bits, shoved two on the counter.
Hungrily, the anteater grabbed the bits, dropping them in a grubby cash box nearby. There was an awfully forceful air around him or so Scootaloo thought; the way he guarded his bits with that burning ravenousness in his beady grey eyes –- it was just sick. Before she knew it, Slashcut was pushing her towards an empty table and then she found herself plopping down on the hard wooden surface of a stool. The other ponies were sitting around the table as well; Slashcut was in front of her while Artic Sea and Greenwing sat on either side.
“Dirty lemons,” muttered Slashcut as she took a gulp of her drink and slammed the mug back on the table, her hoof still holding it. With her other fore-hoof, she pointed at the popping bubbles in her mug. Scootaloo watched. “In the Badlands, they say,” told Slashcut, staring at her drink rather intently, “the fruits and veggies are always mucky. Like lemons. Dirty.” She stopped and took a small sip. “Well, the Badlands are definitely not anything like the capital of Equestria… but still…” She shook her mug a little as her words faded away – knowingly. “Hmm. It is just odd, you know. Ponies still pay for stuff made out of dirt. Shocking.”
“Well, we paid for this ‘dirt’ too,” Scootaloo snapped before she realized what had come out of her own mouth.
Slashcut took her hoof away from her drink and looked up at the younger pony. There were no traces of anger on her face –- just tolerance.
“Yeah,” she agreed unashamedly, “we did, didn’t we?” Her voice grew soft – dangerously soft – and she leaned forward to look at Scootaloo properly. “You know why?”
Of course, Scootaloo didn’t answer. But her silence was acknowledgment of her ignorance and Slashcut sighed, anger now seeping in her tone.
“To blend in,” she exhaled.
Scootaloo had a feeling this conversation was slipping down a messy lane.
“Everything in the Badlands is dirty, Scootaloo. We need to behave in accordance to their ways to be a part. Ponies like us, the most wanted criminals in Equestria, we gotta stay low to save our skin. If we don’t drink this dirty stuff, the only place you’re gonna find sparkling, fresh mulch is the fancy society of Equestria. You wanna go there? The only home we can find there is in the jail –- if we’re lucky, that is.”
“What I meant,” grunted Scootaloo, her adamant nature refusing to give in even though she had a very clear idea of where this road was leading to, “was that we are here now so… well, so there is no reason for any whining. I mean, badmouthing the stuff you are drinking yourself? Who does that?”
“Badmouthing?” Slashcut raised an eyebrow. “I ain’t the one badmouthing, girl.”
Scootaloo totally knew what was next and she shoved her mug towards her face, trying to drink whatever came near her mouth.
“Yesterday,” breathed the old pegasus. “With Groove.”
There it was. She finally spoke it. Scootaloo drove the lip of the mug further into her mouth, pretending to be busy drinking.
“You talk like that to dealers, you increase chances of exposing us.” Now Slashcut’s voice was raging like sizzling lava pouring out of a volcano. “All of us!” the words came out as a scream and creatures on nearby tables turned around slightly to see what was going on. Greenwing and Artic Sea silently sipped on their drinks, eyes cast down lest Slashcut find reason to yell at them too.
“I was just trying to prote–-”
But Scootaloo was cut off by a snappy growl as Slashcut banged her mug on the table. “Don’t you dare say that, Scootaloo,” she seethed. “Trying to protect us, were you!? More like exposing us right on the spot!!”
Then, without warning, she thrust her face towards Scootaloo; the latter, taken by complete surprise, scooted her stool back and scratched the floor in the process. Some patrons again turned to see the cause of commotion but ignored it and went about their own conversations. Slashcut was glaring right at Scootaloo, a piercing gaze with her boiling red eyes, and Scootaloo inched further back from her slavered screams.
“You know what laws those Equestrians have put up now?” she barked. “Equestria, land of harmony and friendship between ponykind… that’s what they used to say, huh? Well, when the rebellion began with the dragons and ponies took up trades like ours…” Slashcut growled, specks of grimy saliva marking Scootaloo’s face. “Since that happened,” repeated she, “do you know that Equestria permitted… hanging? Killing unlawful ponies that push this rebellion on and on? Ponies like us!?”
Her breath bore an unbearable stench of tobacco and betel leaves. Scootaloo put one hoof up –presumably to block the smell – and wiped the saliva of her face as Slashcut lowered herself back in her seat.
“Groove looked dangerous,” began Scootaloo when it looked like Slashcut had cooled down a bit, “and I was afraid it was gonna be some crazy set-up. Thought we’d get to know the truth of the meeting if they paid us first or not… Well, I guess it sure was no set-up but…”
“But what?” retorted Slashcut.
“But,” continued Scootaloo, trying to keep her cool, “I was just acting on instinct.”
“Your instinct,” snorted Slashcut dismissively. “It is all about your instinct every time, isn’t it? A dozen times you have berated our patrons and, whenever I ask, it is either about protecting the team or your bloody instinct! Such damned instincts belong in a grave, Scootaloo –- and you bring that fate upon yourself every time you mess up. The team –- we –- cannot be seen by anypony not part of our circle, remember? Buy, deliver, sell –- that’s the motto, huh? Hmm?”
“I remember,” breathed the apricot-skinned pegasus, reluctance grudging in her tone.
Slashcut regarded her with slight scorn. “I want to make myself absolutely, one-hundred-percent crystal clear here, Scootaloo. Listen well, pony. I want you to keep up with the rules of this team, get it? Protection or not, danger or not, I want you to stay in your limits, do as you are told and, unless somepony doesn’t violate our safety obviously, you are to remain obedient and silent. Do you hear me?”
“I care about the team,” Scootaloo started, her hoof slightly quavering and her mug shaking with the movement, “and sometimes I need to trust my gut for the good of all of us, Slashcut.” She wasn’t afraid of repeating her mistake or Slashcut’s rebukes –- but she was afraid. Of something. Something she didn’t know herself.
“Trust your gut?” snarled Slashcut, “The gut that will be sliced open by the Equestrian Intelligence Agency if they catch sight of you!? Law forces are right up our tails here, tryna track our every movement and eliminate us when the time is right! You make enemies, you increase chances of our coordinates being leaked!”
Scootaloo didn’t answer. She had nothing worthwhile to say. Impulsively, she darted her eyes to glance towards Artic Sea –- who was silently observing his lap –- and Greenwing –- who had taken a refill for her lemonade and was chugging it down rather busily.
“Now, Scootaloo,” Slashcut’s voice sounded calmer and more controlled, “I can’t have you yelling at any more clients, get that? Cooperate with the team and learn to know what is really best for all of us. Do you understand?”
The younger pegasus blinked, tossing an unwary glance at her still-half-full mug of salted lemonade. Then she drifted her tense eyes and grimaced.
“Yeah. Totally.”
“And I’m hoping you mean it for real this time,” rumbled Slashcut.
Scootaloo nodded slowly. “Yeah… I do. For real.”
There was a minute of silence while both sides absorbed the conclusion of the rebuke. Scootaloo unenthusiastically sipped tiny drops of her drink while Slashcut looked for something in her saddlebag.
“Slashcut?”
The old mare looked up at Artic Sea. “What?”
“We got a transaction for this noon,” the stallion answered. “Gotta get a couple of toxic sprinklers, remember?”
“Huh,” huffed Slashcut. “Guess we gotta go soon then.” She adjusted her saddle slightly and started to address all her team together. “These toxic sprinklers are one of the newest additions to the current range of weapons –- and a pricy thing to sell and buy. They’re hot off the presses and I know the rebellion’d die to get their hooves on stuff like that. One snap and a single sprinkler can finish anything in a ten-mile radius. Well, I got a fathead of a yak to give us three dozens of them – costed three thousand bits, I tell ya. But we’ll make up for it. We’ll sell one dozen for five thousand bits. And I know those weapon-hungry idiots would never let such a massacring option slip out –- they will pay any price to kill the dragons.”
“What’s the pay then? For us?” asked Greenwing.
“We’ll divide it as usual. Half for future supplies and the remaining half will be split in equal parts for each of us.”
“Works for me,” Greenwing grinned, hunger gleaming in her eyes.
“Sounds good,” nodded Artic Sea bluntly.
“Sure,” agreed Scootaloo although her voice lacked any luster.
“Look well, ponies,” spoke Slashcut as she stood up and so did the other three Pegasi. “Let’s go and get it.”
It took a solid ten minutes to find their promised informant in the chaos of the building. He was a smaller-than-usual yak with ebony fur and bright, lemon yellow eyes; one horn was chipped and jagged while the other had a red band strapped around. When they reached him, he was silently sipping water from a small beaker.
“Furcuts,” Slashcut addressed him as she slid into the stool opposite, the other three ponies standing around warily, “have you brought it?”
Furcuts looked up at her and blinked as if he was studying her for any signs of deviousness. Finally, he spoke, his voice deep and defying of his stature, “Yak bring sprinkler like yak promise. Three thousand bits. Pay yak now.”
“Show me the goods first,” demanded Slashcut with an objectively arduous tone.
Without any change of expression –- or any expression at all in the first place, Furcuts pulled out three, small, black bags from under his stool and tossed them on the table towards the pegasus. Slashcut opened one bag with the tip of her wing and ran her wrinkled hoof over the tiny but deadly spheres inside. With a sharp roll of her eyes, she gestured Scootaloo and Artic Sea to check the other bags which they did. As they found, all three bags contained the toxic sprinklers and no symptom of mischief from their supplier’s side.
“Looks like the deal is working out,” Slashcut remarked as she gathered the bags closer to herself. “Greenwing! Pay him.”
Obeying the given command, Greenwing pulled out a brown satchel from her saddlebag, her hoof twisting with the weight, and lay it on the table in front of Furcuts. The yak poked at its side, felt the satisfying outline of bits and nodded in approval. “Three thousand bits cheap,” he bellowed suddenly. “Yak go through intelligence agency ponies to bring sprinklers. Officer ponies have dangerous traps. They hunting for old pony” – pointing a grey hoof at Slashcut– “and old pony’s friends. Yak want more bits!”
“What?” blurted Slashcut. “More? You asked for three thousand and that’s what we’ve given ya!”
“Yes,” nodded Furcuts. “But going through EIA ponies not easy. Yak run for life. Yak hide. Yak try to be safe! Yak want five hundred more bits.”
Another threat. Scootaloo’s mind boiled all of a sudden. She opened her mouth to tell him to back off into whatever snowy hole he crept out of –- but she remembered her promise to her team–- and clamped it shut again.
“Fine,” Slashcut gave in with a groan. “But you’ll have to give us two days.”
“Yak want money now!”
“Well then, ‘yak’ gotta stop being a spoilt foal and give us time to gather the bits!”
Furcuts huffed and was silent for a long minute. “Old pony has two days. After two days, yak come to get bits.”
After this somewhat uncomfortable encounter, the four ponies, now carrying their new supplies in the saddlebags, walked out into the street. Grey clouds were looming overhead –- signs of a brewing rainstorm –- and it was unsurprisingly dark for the time of day. The sweltering heat of the town was mingled with a fresh breeze and everything was quiet. A few cloaked ponies trotted by, minding their business in silence.
“Well, that deal was a bummer,” bayed Greenwing.
“We couldn’t risk making a scene,” Slashcut expounded firmly, “and five hundred bits isn’t that much. We can get the bits once we sell these sprinklers…” Her adamantly self-assured voice suddenly faltered. “There is something else bothering me though…”
“Something worse than a messy transaction?” asked Artic Sea.
“That yak said the EIA were hot on our trail… they are looking for us so desperately…” Slashcut’s voice cracked in fear and faded away. For a few moments, only wafts of cool wind and indistinct whispers of creatures seemed to exist in the silence but then Slashcut regained her voice. “And, yesterday, I heard about this new thing that EIA got to track us: the Mark Disparager. Don’t know how it works exactly but the federal officers use it to capture a pony’s cutie mark and skim the database for whereabouts of that unlucky thing. And” –in an icy, frightened whisper– “it never goes wrong.”
“Huh. Pretty creepy,” admitted Scootaloo, “but we can worry about that later, huh? Right now, let’s focus on paying that damn yak his bits.”
They ambled further ahead into a narrower street. There were just a couple of stalls around, selling discarded junk, and even fewer ponies. The calming scent of rain in the air intensified into an alarm of imminent danger and Scootaloo’s eyes whizzed around on impulse to make sure everything was safe to go through. Her cautious lavender eyes glanced at some bizarre creatures walking by, some grubby and greedy stall vendors who were trying to get customers but one sight made her breath hitch to a sharp stop in her throat: two groups of cloaked ponies stood quietly on either side of the street, watching and waiting.
For them.
For them, for them, for them. Damn. They were so not safe.
Suspicion seizing every cell of her panicked brain and eyes shrinking to the size of dots, Scootaloo nudged Artic Sea who was beside her. The sudden movement immediately grabbed both her team members’ and the cloaked groups’ attention.
“EIA!” was all she had time to yell out before she instinctively unfurled her wings and threw herself up in the air.
The masked ponies she had so blatantly accused galloped forward, their loose cloaks falling off their bodies, as they pointed weapons of all sizes at the fleeing group of four. “Freeze!!!” shouted one of the officers but, before Scootaloo could slit his throat open with a knife, Slashcut was already flapping her wings and screaming: “Fly! Fly! RUN!!!”
All four Pegasi immediately took to the sky, flapping ferociously and soaring as far from the clutches of the Equestrian Intelligence Agency as their wings could take them. Greenwing was the speediest –- she whizzed through the air like a green spark, nearly forgetting her team behind. Slashcut and Artic Sea were somewhere on the same altitude; one was old and one was slow –- but their terror of being caught drove them across their usual speeds. Scootaloo took off the group and, even with all her flapping and beating of wings, she could never go beyond a few meters in the sky, lingering many yards behind her rapider accomplices. She was able to fly but only just –- she had always been a weak flyer.
“RUN! RUN!”
Slashcut’s shrill screams blasted through the air and Scootaloo’s ears throbbed as she fought to get away from the agents behind. She beat her wings harder and harder till beads of sweat wrung her face but she was still unable to escape from the impending hazard. Greenwing was flying so swiftly that, from Scootaloo’s distant gaze, she was appearing as a mere bright green dot in the greyed sky.
“Come on,” she urged herself, dangerous panic burning in her mind, “fly faster! Flap those wings harder! C’mon, just a little harder! Fly, fly, fly!! Fly, you damn weakling!”
Wheezes of sweltering, enforced breath rushed out of her mouth that was terribly desiccated; she fought her weak aerodynamics to mange to keep up with her team. Maybe it was on instinct and maybe she shouldn’t have done it but, when she did snap her head around to see where her pursuers were, her entire circulatory system froze as she saw them not more two yards behind her.
Her wings skidded to a rough halt and she tumbled down on the roof of a shack she had been flying above. Two EIA agents flew to her, holding peculiar weapons painted red and purple in their front hooves, but Scootaloo acted fast. Unfurling her wings at sight of them, she again took to the skies, trying to get away as she screamed for help from her team who had flown miles away by now, dodging past the bullets attacking them from behind. Both Slashcut and Artic Sea turned to notice her pleas but they didn’t stop to help.
“Get away!” Slashcut screamed back at her. “Get away, Scootaloo! Run! RUN!”
Scootaloo hardly got a mile up into the air when she felt a hoof roughly grab her hind leg and yank her back down. Barely able to keep herself afloat, she kicked the unwanted intruder with the strongest buck in her entire life. Flapping like her life depended on it –- and it did, Scootaloo cast a rapid glimpse behind her to see the two pegasus agents flying right behind her, those strange weapons still in their hooves, one of them concealing a fractured and bruised jaw with a hoof.
She beat her wings harder, trying to keep up with her withdrawn team. All her energy was put into flying faster. She didn’t even spare energy to breath –- just to fly fast enough. The cloudy horizon in the distance blurred in her eyes, a daze dawning over the darkness of her mind…
Her hooves quivered, trembling in the air…
Streaks of mulberry mane crudely hung over her closing eyes…
Her wings flapped unsteadily but in vain…
There was a zap. Something hit the top of her left flank, a burning sensation devouring her entire leg and she let out a piercing scream that filled the silent winds.
For a few seconds, she forgot to fly.
Tears leaked from her eyes with the throbbing pain and she grit her teeth to hold back any other scream that could discharge from her dried lungs. Her wings snapped shut at her sides and, before she knew it, she was falling.
Falling. Falling. Falling.
Cold air, carrying the scent of forthcoming rain, brushed through her mane as she dropped down towards the ground. She blinked once. Twice.
She was still falling. To her death.
Something rang in her ears.
An indistinct voice of somepony she couldn’t quite recognize.
All the same, it was blazingly motivational and perky, ringing with intense vibes of inspiration and energized vigor. Her ears perked up against her head and, without knowing it, she spread her wings open just before she hit the rocky ground.
For the first time in seconds, Scootaloo realized what had happened. She had been falling to her death, under some gaping old buildings, her pursuers seemed to have temporarily lost track of her and her team was nowhere in visibility range. The saddlebag containing the toxic sprinklers was still safely resting on her side and the weight relieved the mare.
As she lowered herself on to her hooves on the ground, her hind leg scorched with pain and Scootaloo had to control the cry she was about to release. Looking down at her left flank, at her cutie mark, she found to her sudden horror that around half of her cutie mark was roughly bleached, reddened and aching like hell.
“Scootaloo!”
Greenwing whizzed towards Scootaloo from the back, lithering to an abrupt stop next to the mare. Her bright hair hung messily over her sides but she didn’t seem to mind.
“Scootaloo,” she repeated, “come on, let’s go!”
“You came?” asked Scootaloo, a doubtful frown creasing her dusty forehead.
“Didn’t really hear you screaming,” chuckled Greenwing –and Scootaloo was surprised she found any humor in the whole situation, “but Slashcut did. Then she told me to go get ya so… here I–- hey, what the hell is going on with your flank?”
Scootaloo winced as she looked down at where Greenwing was pointing. “Those EIA guys shot my cutie mark with something,” she grumbled, “and it seriously doesn’t feel nice. Ugh, the pain is damn awful!”
“Geez, it looks bad enough,” coughed Greenwing. “You still able to fly?”
“And walk,” stressed Scootaloo. “My leg sure is hurting but I’ll be fine in a snap. I know I will.”
“Well, good. I got a deserted back alley to get out of here safely. Slashcut’s waiting for us! Come on!” Grabbing Scootaloo’s front hoof in her own, Greenwing shot back the way she came. Her hooves were bended back as she flew, holding on to Scootaloo tightly all the while. The speed she had was incredible –- not quite as fast as a certain, sisterly pegasus Scootaloo remembered but it was way better than her own slow pace.
Before she knew it, the pair were approaching Artic Sea and Slashcut, Greenwing had left her hoof and she was flapping her own wings to keep balance at the mountainous altitude.
“I got her!” Greenwing flashed a grin at Slashcut who nodded rather neutrally.
“Scootaloo, you okay?” asked Artic Sea, his voice lacking any care his words hoped to show.
“Yeah, almost,” grimaced Scootaloo and then pointed a wary hoof at her cutie mark. “They shot my flank with some burning stuff and, yeah, it hurts but I am gonna be fine.”
“No.”
Scootaloo looked up at a blanched Slashcut. “Huh?”
“No,” repeated the old pegasus, “you are going to be killed.” She shakily pointed at Scootaloo’s cutie mark. “You’ve been struck with the Mark Disparager. All this part that’s bleached… they have recorded it and- and now they are gonna find you.”
Words are supposed to hold meaning, they say. Scootaloo had never struck herself as a really deep pony. She had always been a bit rash and was used to tossing words away like garbage. The words Slashcut stuttered, however, meant the world to her –- rather, meant her world would be going away from her.
“G-G-Gonna find me?” the words tumbled out of Scootaloo’s mouth between shaky breaths. Slashcut, Artic Sea and Greenwing were already backing away.
“You can’t stay with this team now, Scootaloo,” exhaled Slashcut. “If they find you, they’re gonna find us. Uh… here, gimme those sprinklers.”
Scootaloo didn’t even have time to properly respond or react before Artic Sea grabbed the saddlebag in his own hooves. The world spun around Scootaloo in a haze and she just wanted to… go away. From life.
“Slashcut,” she whispered in a voice that shook and cracked, “let me stay. Please. I won’t ever tell anypony abo–-”
“It doesn’t work like that,” Slashcut cut her off with a shake of her head. She had the dignity to sound somewhat remorse. “The EIA will find you. If you stay with us, they will track you to us as well…. And you know the rule. To never be seen by anypony. To never be caught…” She sighed and put a hoof on Scootaloo’s shoulder, a burden that struck the groping pony like a mountain. “You are gonna have to go, Scootaloo. We can’t help you.”
“No…” whispered Scootaloo. “No… I-I- I can’t… You guys’re a-a-all I’ve known…”
“Sorry, Scootaloo,” Greenwing peeped in, swinging her vibrant hair to hide her –- as Scootaloo thought –- unashamed face.
“You really are going to have to leave,” told Artic Sea, flapping gently to just hover in the air. “Helping you is gonna be… well, toxic for us.”
“I’m going to die,” Scootaloo forced a whisper where she wanted to scream, “and none of you are going to help me? After all these years? All what I’ve done?”
“We want to help,” Slashcut spoke before either pegasus could reply, “but we can’t. We just… we just gotta cut ties, Scootaloo. If you hadn’t been hit with the Disparager, we’d help you at once but… that ain’t the case here, is it now?”
“So you are just going to send me away with the knowledge I will die?” croaked the panicking, quivering pegasus, her head hanging down as to prevent them from seeing her misty eyes.
“Seems that way,” came Slashcut’s sigh.
Scootaloo inhaled sharply and swallowed her tears back, brushing her eyes roughly to wipe away any that might have gotten away. She looked up slowly at her former team and a discouraged glower darkened her face.
“And where am I gonna run to, huh?” she hissed. “Just where can I go that my hide might be safe? Everything I have done for this team!! You’re just gonna walk away!?”
“We have to,” stressed Slashcut, “and we’re sorry about it. But that doesn’t mean we ain’t gonna help you when we can.”
Scootaloo glowered even more.
“You wanna run somewhere... safer? Well, I can tell ya one thing: stay in these parts and you’ll be EIA food in a jiffy.”
“I can’t go back to Equestria,” muttered Scootaloo, almost spitting out the last word.
“Yeah, you can,” pressured Slashcut. “You’ll find more reason to mingle there with other ponies, ya see? Word of advice: go to the Dodge City. It’s past the Macintosh Hills–- some haven in Equestria that doesn’t have enough law enforcement. You’ll be safe there… uh, for some time…” There was a beat. “Scootaloo, just leave. Every second you spent here is only gonna draw EIA closer.”
Scootaloo hadn’t realized how much anger her fear had drowned by now. Her legs were quaking at the thought of being hunted by the EIA and losing her… well, not friends but they certainly had been her acquaintances. She couldn’t argue back; she had no choice except accept what little advice she had been given. It was painful. Every muscle in her body ached and she sniffed.
“Well, have to leave now, huh?” she contorted. She didn’t look up at them; she just turned away, getting ready to fly to that Dodge City. Wind swept her bristly hair in her eyes as she stared at the darkening, stormy horizon.
“Goodbye, Scootaloo,” said Slashcut’s hoarse voice from behind.
“Yeah, bye,” mumbled Greenwing almost inaudibly.
“Good luck,” came Artic Sea’s bland words.
A storm was brewing. It was going to be really wet soon, Scootaloo decided.
“Huh… yeah. See ya,” she muttered as she gave her wings a heavy flap before heading over to the Macintosh Hills. The EIA wouldn’t leave her. Equestria had permitted hanging and killing of ponies who broke the law as badly as she had. If she could live for more than 24 hours before the EIA found her, she sure would be surprised.
She was going to die. She knew it.
––––––––––––––––––––––-
The first of the three promised days had begun.
Ten hours ago.
Actually, Sweetie Belle decided, it might have been evening by then. The sky above the roads of Baltimare were gloomy and the air carried an intense smell that promised heavy showers later that day. There was no way to tell the difference between day and night with plain vision; the bronze clock tower peaking at the Mane Road was, however, helpful in time-telling. A high-pitched bong, when the minute hand hit twelve and the hour hand hit ten, cleared Sweetie Belle’s concerns.
It was indeed ten o’clock in the morning.
Sweetie Belle’s mane hung loosely over her shoulder, a discarded sparkly band partially holding on to a few strands at the back of her head. Her recently manicured hooves lumbered along the marble-tiled pavement by the silent road. Baltimare was not the busiest city in Equestria but even so it was eerie to see it so quiet–- especially at such a time. Icy shivers slid through Sweetie Belle’s spine like a trail of ice cubes; it could have been because of the morning’s unnerving hush or because of the threat Slayer had palpably unleashed upon her.
Three days.
Seventy-two hours.
Well, ten hours had already gone to waste so only sixty-two hours were left now.
And how much of her debt had she managed to collect yet?
Ten bits.
Sweetie Belle shuddered at the thought of Slayer; thinking about the consequences of being unable to pay him nearly made her collapse where she stood. For the past five years, she had been doing one thing: gambling. One year back, she tried to control it –- but ended up still doing it anyway. Now she was inches away from the menacing hooves of ponyslaughter and there was nothing she could possibly do in three days to save her hide.
Her head thumped with anxiety and mental discomfort and there was a terrible droning sound in her ears that she just couldn’t get rid of. Pointing a hoof up, Sweetie Belle rubbed her temple and grunted.
“Just need to clear my head a bit,” she grumbled to herself.
As she drifted her stressed eyes up, like a mirage in her dreams, the young mare saw some sort of roadside bar lingering at a silent bend in the road. The day was rather quiet and there were hardly any ponies around so Sweetie Belle was somewhat astounded to see that the place was still open. Tramping forward in not her best mood, she gave the counter a series of continuous, harsh raps to demand the attention of the pale yellow stallion behind.
The earth pony, who was not particularly busy and just adjusting some barrels to keep himself occupied, spun on his hoof to see what customer could be so ill-mannered –- but when he saw the dazzling unicorn in front of his humble shop, he was so badly lost for words that he couldn’t speak.
“Oh, many apologies for the harsh noise, dear sir,” cooed Sweetie Belle, maintaining her most ladylike stature, “but I was wondering if you could be so generous as to pour me a dainty mug of… salt? I have been having a slightly busy day and would love to clear my head.”
The stallion blinked.
Then he shook his head and coughed.
“Uh… we sell cider, miss. A-Apple cider,” he stammered. For a moment, Sweetie Belle nearly dropped her charming facade out of disappointment but she decided to make do with what she could get.
“Oh, not a problem,” she fluttered her eyelashes and exhaled in a measured, soft tone. “Could I kindly have a mug of cider then? What, pray tell, is the price?” Every word she spoke danced out of her mouth and floated to the stallion like a cool breeze over a field of sweet-smelling lilies –just like she had practiced many-a-times– and he cleared his throat in an attempt to sound more virile.
“Why, miss, I would be more than happy to offer you one for free,” he grinned.
Sweetie Belle smiled from the outside; she smirked from the inside. “My, what a gentlecolt!” she exclaimed, allowing her lashes one more unrushed flutter before the pony turned to pour her the promised mug, fumbling awkwardly with some tools in the process. Charm works every time, told Sweetie Belle to herself as she turned herself slightly so she might be able to view the rows of neatly-lacquered houses in the distance.
Staring aimlessly at the houses, another daunting realization struck the bars of her breaking mind. There was a mare called Mrs Cloud Boothoof who had lent her a shack of a room to reside in while she had been in Baltimare; it had been four months since she had last paid her rent. She had been coming up with excuses, avoiding Mrs Boothoof and generally sneaking in and out for all that time; the last time they met, Mrs Boothoof had clarified that either Sweetie Belle pay the rent of all four months or leave. That had been the day before yesterday and Sweetie Belle still had to come up with something to say when she met Mrs Boothoof again.
“Miss, your cider!”
Sweetie Belle jolted forward in surprise, turned around to yell but remembered to be ladylike and politely accepted the mug the bartender had put forward. A luminous green aura enveloped the mug handle and she levitated it towards her mouth, suppressing her thirst to take a dainty sip of the drink.
The liquid was surprisingly cold but still delicious and the taste of creamy yet tangy apples swam down Sweetie Belle’s throat in caravans of luscious delight. It had been a long while since she had some apple cider; it had been even longer since she had some ‘quality’ apple cider. Managing to drink her cider in the most dignified manner she could bear to possess, Sweetie Belle levitated the empty mug back to the stallion.
“Goodness, that cider was most divine!” she twittered, loosely leaning a stunning hoof on the counter. “I don’t believe I have had the chance to drink something with such quality for a long time!”
The stallion grinned broadly. “Fresh cider, miss, fresh cider! And we refuse to use anything less than the highest quality of apples in our products.” Pride flashed in every word of his but Sweetie Belle ignored it; she only tossed her mane and melodramatically sighed.
“Dear me,” she gasped, false yearning glimmering in her eyes as she maintained her best air of drama, “I do wish there were something so delicious that I could taste again…” Her eyes flickered to the too-happy-for-his-own-good stallion and a deliberate smirk flashed on her lips. “Something to fill my being with delightful sensations… Something so exquisite in taste and so rich in flavour…”
She knowingly trailed off in her words with a breath of longing but she knew she needn’t say anymore.
“Oh, of course, I could give you another mug – for free! O-Of course, miss… heh, heh…” Yet again, the stallion turned to pour her another mug. Sweetie Belle knew she could be charming enough when she tried; when she practiced her behaviour over and over, she learnt to be good at it and get away with a number of things that weren’t all the nicest to speak of. Unlike a certain unicorn sister who naturally had the most charming allure a pony could hope to retain, Sweetie Belle had learnt to be charismatic to make do with her life.
She tapped her hoof on the marble beneath to stop the unwanted nostalgic memories that were mingling with her headache…
A home…
Three friends…
Laughter of a filly who loved her life…
Her sister…
The aroma of home-made dinner…
Giggles…
Smiles…
She didn’t even know how she was quivering till a tear slipped down her cheek and, with a tiny ‘plip!’, landed on the ground beside her. She raised her head, her bottom lip shaking gently as she held back whimpers, and, in her misted vision, like a heavenly haze, she saw a blend of white and purple approach. The clink of hooves gradually approached, the sound distant and barely audible to Sweetie Belle’s dazed mind.
Was it that one pony she was thinking of?
Was it… her?
Sweetie Belle straightened up and blinked. The white-coated mare was even closer, still blurry in her vision, and her purple mane was slowly swinging in the cold, rain-scented breeze.
Sweetie Belle’s lips shook. How could it be?
“Is… is that you? Ra–-?”
The elucidated appearance of the mare stopped her in her words and her ears perked up in alarm. A small, blue coat adorned her ivory fur down to her mid-section, her folded wings lying out neatly at her sides, and bouncy curls of her grape purple mane were partially knotted up into a bun. Perched on top of her slightly craggy nose were a pair of small, round, azure-rimmed spectacles; behind them, she had squinty, pink eyes with gentle furrows lining the skin underneath.
“Oh, damn. Mrs. Boothoof,” Sweetie Belle coughed –- mostly to herself –- and, forgetting the cider she had to have, she took the old mare’s appearance as her cue to make an exit. As she turned, the cider stallion slid the promised mug on the counter, grinning buoyantly at her. Sweetie Belle grimaced–much to the stallion’s shock, levitated the mug in a snap and was about to take off sprinting when–-
“Miss Belle!” called out Mrs Cloud Boothoof, much to the unicorn’s dismay; it looked like she might have to stick by for a lot longer than she had hoped. “Miss Belle,” said the pegasus again as she trotted ahead with a presumably synthetic beam, “I was just looking for you!”
Sweetie Belle coughed again and rubbed her eyes, the mug still levitating beside her. “Well, I sure wasn’t looking for you,” she wanted to spit out but she shook her head and smiled back weakly at her landlady. “Hello, Mrs. Boothoof. Um, good morning…”
“Yes,” nodded Mrs. Boothoof, looking up at the swelling grey clouds that enveloped the sky, “I certainly agree. It is quite a fresh morning, isn’t it?”
“C-Certainly,” swallowed Sweetie Belle. She turned her eyes down and poked at some insignificant dot on the sidewalk with her hoof. Her mouth was silent but she was mentally rummaging through her mind for some excuse for when Mrs Boothoof would bring up her delayed rent.
“Haven’t seen you for a couple of days, dear,” said Mrs Boothoof’s homely voice. “Where have you been?”
“Uh…” Sweetie Belle cleared her throat and looked up slightly. “Well, I’ve had some hard luck as it is… and, well, I’m just trying to keep up with life, I guess.”
Mrs Boothoof nodded–- in understanding, perhaps? Mockery? Sweetie Belle couldn’t be sure. The pegasus was a generally nice old mare but anypony could lose their temper if somepony refused to pay them what they deserved. Still, Mrs Boothoof knew of Sweetie Belle’s rather crude life to some extent and she had a hoof in keeping the police away; so she was the closest to a friend that Sweetie had had in a long time.
“Drinking cider, I see,” remarked Mrs Boothoof.
Sweetie Belle passed a swift glance at the hovering mug and chuckled feebly. “Yes... i-it is simply too good, I have to say.”
“Cold cider on a cold morning. Ah, just the simple bounties of life,” the old pegasus commented, her eyes staring for into the distance. She blinked, a little smile fleeting across her lips, and turned to Sweetie Belle. “How much was it?”
For a moment, the young unicorn considered lying but she just shrugged in reply. “Nothing. This delightful stallion here”–pointing a hoof at the stallion who was still overcoming the shock of her anger– “was generous enough to… gift me some. A princely gesture indeed!”
Mrs Boothoof raised a knowing eyebrow. Sweetie Belle blushed and fumbled her hooves together–- but then her landlady gave a low chuckle.
“Oh, Sweetie Belle, you’re such a card,” she giggled, patting a soft hoof on Sweetie’s back. “You make being a lady sound like one can get away with anything!”
Sweetie Belle cleared her throat and tried to giggle back but her mouth was too parched all of a sudden. Turning her head away from Mrs Boothoof’s well-humored face, she pretended to find something interesting in the endless empty streets ahead.
Three days.
A bit more than sixty hours to pay back her creditor.
Just a while before she would be murdered in the most vicious ways known to ponykind.
How could she do it?
“…and now she said I need to attend but, really, I have too much to put up with here already; what can a mare do in such a pickle, hmm, dear? Well, that’s exactly what I asked that old neighborly sir–- and do you know what he said? Well now, this is quite the tale, dear because do you know that old thing always forgets to water his sweet peas; and I…”
Mrs. Boothoof was just going on and on about one of her ‘interesting’ and terribly lengthy incidents that she had been part of recently. Sweetie Belle had zoned out somewhere while she was babbling on about some sugary vegetables and everything suddenly became quiet; the voice of the pegasus mare became distant and faraway and every sound that was once audible was now no more than a tiny tinkle.
The burden of her debts.
The restrained time.
And no money.
Sweetie Belle didn’t know what she was going to do in the few hours she had left. She knew she would be unable to get the money in such little time… unless she could plan a bank heist–- but she shook that thought out of her head. It had taken her a while to leave her larcenous life and keep clear of police and she couldn’t risk all her secrets now.
And if she couldn’t pay, then what?
Where would she run to?
More specifically, where could she run to that Slayer would never find her?
“Sweetie Belle? Miss Belle, are you listening?”
Jerking from her terrifying nightmares, the unicorn turned to Mrs Boothoof again. The older mare frowned and Sweetie Belle tried to smile.
“Huh? Oh, yes… uh, what is it, Mrs Boothoof?” she coughed, almost choking her syllables out in a fearful feat of memories.
“Dear? Is everything okay?” questioned Mrs Boothoof, patting her two-toned mane softly.
Sweetie gulped. And then she flashed a half-smile. “Um, yeah. Why wouldn’t it?”
Mrs Boothoof’s eyes narrowed at the other pony’s weak attempts to hide what she was truly feeling. “Because you are crying?” she suddenly hissed. Sweetie Belle’s eyes went wide and, on impulse, she put a hoof to her cheek to feel the streams of tears running down. Gasping, she brushed them away and cast a feeble glance at Mrs Boothoof.
“I-I-I-I…” there were no proper words for Sweetie Belle to convey her shambolic mind’s state and, for a long second, her face paled as she stuttered to find the right word.
Her landlady listened to her meaningless ramblings with a fixed eye, waiting for something audible to actually come out.
“I can’t pay the rent,” blurted Sweetie Belle.
The world stopped.
The cider bar behind them had been closed –- and they didn’t even know.
Thunder rumbled in the distance.
Mrs Boothoof sighed knowingly–- and not happily.
“Well, I figured as much,” she pronounced, shaking her head in disapproval. “I have been letting you stay for too long for no money. I suppose it would end up like this.”
“I’m sorry,” whispered Sweetie Belle, her arid voice squeaking out faintly. She wasn’t crying anymore but the turns her life was taking her on… she was unsure she would ever be able to anything anymore.
“And I’m sorry,” decided Mrs Boothoof, glancing at Sweetie with unmoved, fuchsia eyes. “You are going to have to find another lodging, dear. I am one old pony; I need money. If you can’t deliver that, I believe my resources can be put to better use.”
For a moment, Sweetie Belle resisted with great fervor the urge to slam her hoof on Mrs Boothoof’s face and knock her lights out. Of course, she was just being professional but Sweetie Belle felt like a solid punch or two on the jaw would teach her a lesson for such relentless unfeelingness.
“And if,” she seethed, opting for words instead of action, “you let me stay for a couple more days…?” Because that’s pretty much all I am going to live now, she thought of saying as well.
“Miss Belle! I have let you stay for four months without any charge; do you expect me to be so naïve as to give you more time?” barked Mrs Boothoof. Sweetie Belle just rolled her eyes so Mrs Boothoof continued, “It is best you pay me your due rent if you so wish to stay.”
“Yeah, I told you that can’t happen,” mumbled Sweetie Belle, her voice dry of any emotion–- not even anger or fear. “I am in bit of a pickle as it happens…”
Mrs Boothoof sighed quite audibly. “What happened this time? Did the clubs not pay you enough?”
“Damn the clubs,” the unicorn muttered under her breath but only shook her head at Mrs Boothoof. “Been taking a bit too much debt lately, you know, and now I’ve… well, now I gotta pay back all of it if you still want to see me with a head on my shoulders.”
“Some big crime boss?” Mrs Boothoof pressed.
“Yeah. Some real big crime boss… I owe him bits. Millions of bits.”
“Millions?” came the shocked question.
“Millions,” repeated Sweetie Belle. Her head hung low and she felt dizzy. Her stomach turned and shrunk madly like she had just gotten off a rollercoaster–- she could feel tears lining her eyes yet again but she blinked them away. Mrs Boothoof wasn’t that inhumane after all, she decided; still she thought against revealing that it was Slayer she owed money to or that she had only three days to pay.
A tiny ‘splash’ landed on her nose. It was cold and wet and suddenly made her entire body rigid; she lost her balance and her cider mug dropped from her magical hold, the frothy, golden contents spilling out on the ground. Instinctively, she shot her eyes up to the sky–- to have another raindrop whizz right in.
“Eugh!” she groaned as she shook the water out of her eyes.
Hundreds of clear water droplets poured down from the rolling, grey clouds and, before long, the marble sidewalk was ringing with the familiar pitter-patter of the rain. The water dribbled over and mingled with the sugary cider that had been sadly wasted, the excess liquid trailing away in a thin stream down the pavement. Using her magic to create a shield big enough to act as an umbrella from the wet weather, Sweetie Belle looked over at Mrs Boothoof who had taken out an actual, purple umbrella and was holding it open with one wing.
Her mane was drenched enough in rainwater but Sweetie estimated it would take less than an hour in good sunshine to dry it up. Mrs Boothoof, on the other hand, was completely dry; it looked as if she had taken action sooner.
“So it looks as if you are in a bit of a predicament,” commented the old landlady, increasing her voice over the obscuring clatter of rain.
Sweetie Belle nodded. Even if tears did slip out, they would mix in with the rainwater. “Please, Mrs Boothoof,” she appealed as professionally as she could without sounding like a wretched beggar, “if you could let me stay for a while longer… just while I collect that debt…”
“I have another customer who is interested in that room of yours,” Mrs Boothoof piped up in response, “and he has agreed to pay eighty bits each month, not to mention the advance of hundred bits. Remind me again how much you are supposed to pay for that room, Miss Belle?”
“Er, sixty bits per month,” grumbled Sweetie.
“Exactly,” hissed Mrs Boothoof–- or maybe it was not a hiss. The rain could be deceiving. “At the moment, you owe me two hundred and forty bits which I have relieved you of… I could be making a profit here with that new client while, with you, it is always one gambling story or another. You were too young to mess with such crass lifestyles–- but you did and now look where you are, Miss Belle. I helped you while I could but I do have my own life and business to take care of, don’t I?”
“Yeah, I know but–-”
“I know you need help,” Mrs Boothoof cut Sweetie Belle’s forthcoming jab as gently as she could muster, “but I can’t help for much longer.”
“I could die,” squeaked Sweetie Belle hoarsely, “and I need somewhere to live while I think about how I could sidetrack my own doom. You’re my friend, Mrs Boothoof; and… well, that’s why I am looking up to you.” She assembled all her grace into her words and, even though she knew she wasn’t in the mood for extreme wheedling right then, she hoped the response would turn to be appealing enough.
Falling raindrops cast a vague, shimmering curtain over Mrs Boothoof and Sweetie Belle was unable to see what expression the pegasus’ face retained at the moment. Irritation? Pity? Ridicule? Perhaps it was best that she didn’t see her face; the words that came next were enough.
“Miss Belle… you are my friend and I am glad to know you think the same way.” Her face was still unclear and her voice was official and smooth –too smooth to mean anything positive– and boiling hot tears dribbled on Sweetie’s white cheeks, their warm touch contrasting with the colder raindrops. “From the perspective of a business-mare, I hate to say it but you are most certainly not allowed to set hoof in your former room.” Rigid words, colder than the rain, shoved themselves out of Mrs Boothoof’s mouth and Sweetie Belle winced.
Of course. She should have known.
Why would she get help from a mean old mare like that prune of a landlady?
“However, from the perspective of your friend,” Mrs Boothoof turned slightly, a hint of a… kindly smile tugging on her face, “I suggest you go over East… there is a cheap city where you will easily find lodgings… five bits a week, by Jove! If that’s not affordable, I don’t know what is.”
Sweetie Belle had not realized her mouth was hanging open but, as she shook her head to fully get Mrs Boothoof, little hope crawled into her guarded heart. “That’s… good,” she lowly squeaked. “What city is it?”
“Dodge City. You might have heard of it… well, if you happen to be into rodeos, that is.” The little laugh Mrs Boothoof added at the end didn’t stir any change in Sweetie Belle’s mind but she still shrugged and said:
“I used to know it. Yeah, not the case anymore, though…”
Don’t do anything stupid. She might be able to help you yet.
Sweetie Belle groaned. There was this annoying voice in her head–- her own irritating conscience. “Mrs Boothoof,” she started, her voice slightly cracking as she went, “is that really the only option? Not that I don’t appreciate it–-because I certainly do–- but is there no other, uhm, advice I might find more… elaborate?”
“Oh, somewhere stylish and unique like the height of luxury in Canterlot or the never-ending twinkle of ornamental gems in Manehatten, you mean?” A scoff followed Mrs Boothoof’s words. “Dear, you are penniless. I know you are and so do you. Go to those glamorous cities if you want, if you can. I certainly won’t stop you.”
The attitude, the arrogance dripping from the old mare’s words once again made Sweetie Belle want to strike her. Her jaw and her nose would bleed non-stop for an hour at the latest; still, at least, she would learn to mind her manners next time.
Or maybe she was right.
A snappy grunt yelped out of Sweetie’s mouth to get the voice out of her head. But she stopped out to consider what it had said.
Could there be any truth in Mrs Boothoof’s words? Could there be?
“Yes, well, uh, what I meant was that it sounds okay… Of course, about cities like Canterlot…” A half-hearted chuckle. “Well, a filly can only dream, huh?”
Warmth returned to Mrs Boothoof’s face and she gave a soft giggle. “How right you are, Miss Belle.”
“So, yeah, Dodge City sounds good enough and all…” Sweetie Belle bit her lip and darted her eyes about at the heavy showers pouring all around her. “I’m just on a real strict time limit here, Mrs Boothoof, so every minute counts.”
The landlady raised an eyebrow. “Are you saying you want to reach there as soon as possible, dear?”
Sweetie Belle sighed and, slumping her shoulders in a shrug, croaked, “Uh, um… what would you do in my horseshoes?”
First she frowned but then a little smile sparked on Mrs Boothoof’s wrinkled lips. “Oh, Miss Belle, worry not; I have got a few leads!”
“You mean… you mean…” words tumbled out in a breathy pant from Sweetie Belle’s mouth. “You mean you can send me off to Dodge City now even though… I mean, all trains have probably stopped running, right?”
Mrs Boothoof waved a dismissive hoof in the air. “I know a pony. He will take you to the town anytime.” If Sweetie Belle hadn’t been staring at her in all her shock, she would never have seen just a dash of coldness envelope the old pony’s eyes. “Just one thing, Miss Belle: this is not a personal favour. I am helping you so that you forget me. Paying millions of bits is an impossible feat for anypony who is not Celestia–- and when you do get caught by your creditors, I wish you to never even know I existed. I don’t want to be hunted by money-crazy savages. Am I clear?”
“Will it be free?” rasped Sweetie Belle in her squeaky voice. Action was the essence of time and there was no time to even think about anything; only to act.
“Free and immediate,” nodded Mrs Boothoof. “I would prefer to leave this pickle at once.” She smiled briefly and gave her tail a slight swish. “If you’ll pardon me, Miss Belle, I should leave to call the stallion who will drop you off.” With a nod and no patience for an answer, she trotted down the road, leaving Sweetie Belle standing under the magically-diverted rain.
What choice did she have?
She was stuck between the Devil and the deep blue sea; she might try the sea for a while because she definitely knew was going to end up with the Devil in the end.
It was past twelve in the afternoon. The merciless sunshine beating down on every pony who trotted by visibly denied that, only hours ago, Equestria had been showered with a heavy downpour. The sun-scorched ground, however, which happened to still have drying puddles of rainwater here and there, declared otherwise. Nevertheless, painted stacks of buildings, some rough and some decent, were scattered at the sides of different roads.
Dodge City had long been the place of all things mismatched and trying to fit in. Such was the chain of thought of an earth pony, a pegasus and a unicorn who were all seeking to find refuge and safety from the slovenly hooves of their pursuers. Apple Bloom, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle all happened to enter the Dodge City at around the same time.
The former two had been on their own during their journey of hours but the fervor to flee from their chasers was too overpowering for them to even think of a break. Sweetie Belle, on the other hoof, had been driven in a carriage by a snooty pegasus stallion who spent half of the journey bragging about all his petty accomplishments (such as helping his friend open a peanut butter jar). Even though her landlady had promised a free ride, Sweetie Belle was bound to give him two bits so that he would just shut up.
Tongue lolling out, fatigued wrinkles scraping under her eyes, Apple Bloom scrambled into the city. Every muscle in her body stung with constant galloping for the past seven hours and dry mud caked strands of her red mane together in a rather disagreeable fashion. The moment she entered, and despite her body’s throbbing longing for some rest, she snapped her head around to catch unlucky sight of any possible goons that could inform Peel of her whereabouts – if she wanted to mingle, she knew she would have to expect ponies as crude as herself. Fortunately, for her, all the ponies looked contented enough to be non-criminals.
Journeying to the Dodge City with weak wings and devouring fear of being spotted had rendered Scootaloo restless and drained. The merciless rain earlier had greatly propelled up her course by the time she arrived at the Macintosh Hills but she had managed to find temporary shelter in some hollow cave nearby but she didn’t have time to rest with the EIA hunting her; she crawled through the caves where she could be safe from the thunderous showers till it was dry again. When she arrived in the city, the first thing she did was to look out for any police officers. Observing at different ponies’ cutie marks, she figured she was safe… for a while.
It might not have been an endeavor that used up most of Sweetie Belle’s physical strength but Celestia would be a changeling if it were to be claimed it didn’t take every ounce of Sweetie’s mental strength to keep herself from going insane on the journey to Dodge City. Her chauffeur had been the single most irritating fathead of a pony she loathed herself for coming across in such a long time… and the abysmal rain hadn’t been particularly nice either; the ruin that had befallen her coat and mane was awful and she decided it would take a while before she got the money to maintain her makeup again. As soon as she stepped out of the carriage– more like ‘jumped out’– and into the city, she hoped nopony would notice her; she looked simply hideous at the time; instead, she chose to find the cheapest room on rent immediately.
***
“Excuse me, miss,” bellowed a burly stallion as he sidestepped Apple Bloom, being too busy glaring at any pony suspicious, who was going to crash straight into him.
“Beg pardon,” muttered she, slightly alarmed, but without casting another glance at him.
Some ponies were dangerous, some could be helpful and some were important– this one, she observed, was none of the three and she never cared to remember unimportant ponies. Forgetting the trivial encounter, she, with her back slightly crouched in defense, trotted on ahead.
The Dodge City was not as rough as the Badlands and it was not as sophisticated as Canterlot; it didn’t have EFBI-level wanted criminals lurking about and neither did it have top-class security forces rummaging the place upside down. It was as safe as it was crude; in short, it was the perfect place for Apple Bloom to lie low for a while.
Peel wouldn’t give up his massacring search for her; he was too crass to do anything close to forgiving or decent. And Apple Bloom knew that it would only be a matter of days before he got to her with those daft gangsters that he employed – unwillingly, Apple Bloom internally scoffed to herself as she trotted down a calmer street where she wouldn’t collide with anypony else.
For all that Scootaloo knew, there used to be a sheriff in the area at a time; she even used to know his name. Where that pony was now, she failed to find out. At least, she consoled herself, that meant she had a slightly higher chance to staying undercover in the Dodge City.
Slashcut told you to mingle.
Her mind was pushing her to fall back on her former team member’s advice. First, she growled and fought against it but then she let it seep in. Slashcut might have been a traitor but sometimes even traitors can be right. Scootaloo’s eyes fell on an elderly mare, a purple earth pony, hobbling nearby and, reluctantly deciding to follow Slashcut’s advice, she unfurled her wings to fly to her.
Slashcut wasn’t the only traitor, it turned out. Her wings snapped shut with a sharp sting of pain the moment Scootaloo opened them. Flying non-stop for hours on end did have its disadvantages and, with a defeated sigh, Scootaloo took a step forward– only to have her hind leg scream in silent agony as she did. Suppressing a yelp, she trudged forward to the old mare.
“Miss?” she asked, tapping the mare’s shoulder as she turned. Her voice was rough and raspy from not having eaten for hours. “Uh… can I ask you something?”
“Bask hooves in a tin?” croaked the old pony with a raised eyebrow as she perked one craggy ear up.
“No, can I ask you something?” corrected Scootaloo, raising her voice a bit.
“Oh,” nodded the mare with a slight smile, “What do you want, dearie?”
“Uh… I heard there used to be a sheriff here… he still around?”
“What? Sheriff? Oh, you mean Sheriff Silverstar, do you? Oh, he is still in office, that old chap… He is the Sheriff of Appleloosa, mind you, not this city– but he pops in now and again. We don’t really have much law enforcement in this place, heh, heh… Oh, uh, did you want something from the sheriff, honey?”
Scootaloo blinked.
Then she shook her head.
“No… thanks, though…” The questioning look in the mare’s grey eyes thought otherwise and, stuttering something unintelligible (something like ‘sorry for wasting your time’), Scootaloo quickly trotted away into a street behind where the lack of ponies would keep her unnoticed.
The main thing Sweetie Belle had come to the Dodge City was to find somewhere affordable to spend the rest of her fifty-nine remaining hours. Just because she was going to die didn’t mean she couldn’t use a bed to think of any way to divert it – and, if what Mrs Cloud Boothoof was to be trusted, she could book a week’s stay in the…
Sweetie Belle squinted at the yellowed paper floating in her magic before her eyes. Mrs Boothoof had written the name of a certainly cheap inn but Sweetie Belle was having bit of a time deciphering her hoofwriting.
She squinted a bit more.
The… the… the Dodge and the Pony!
Glad to have comprehended out the incomprehensible, Sweetie Belle folded the paper and trotted forward, looking for a potential informant who would be able to guide her in the right direction. A young, seemingly polite and blue-coated mare caught her eye as the former sold little bouquets of flowers at her shop and Sweetie Belle cantered ahead to talk to her.
“Excuse me? I’d like some directions please,” smiled Sweetie Belle, standing in front of the counter, as she adjusted her mane enough to look presentable. The petite mare looked up, gave a little gasp of shock but then she smiled.
“Directions? To where, ma’am?” whispered the mare, arranging some pink flowers in a white bouquet.
“The Dodge and the Pony… Do you kindly happen to know where that is?”
The mare raised a hoof at a quiet street close by. “Go through there, turn right from the carpenter’s place and there is the inn!”
Sweetie Belle smiled, glancing at said street again. “Oh, I see! Thank you!”
“It’s no problem,” nodded the smiling mare as she got back to her work. Sweetie Belle, on the other hoof, walked into the greeting hush of the street.
***
Coincidence is a funny thing. It always happens when one least expects it. It is even weirder when the involved don’t realize it is actually happening. Coincidence brought Apple Bloom, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle in the same street and, if they hadn’t been so watchful with each step, they might never have seen each other again.
The moment they all met each other’s eyes, they froze. Words were another language and time stood still; it became intolerably silent and there was not a soul around. Each of them felt like they should just make a beeline out of the place and pretend it never happened; but each of them also felt like they needed to talk and catch up with… oh, the words were just too hard to choke out…
With…
With their best friends.
The first to break the stillness was Apple Bloom. She didn’t speak; she moved. Her eyes, trying to think it was some mistake, shot down to Scootaloo’s and Sweetie Belle’s flanks. To their cutie marks. To see if they were really ‘them’.
A heavy gulp sunk down her throat in realization.
They were.
In due instinct, the pegasus and the unicorn too darted their eyes to check the cutie marks of the mares before them; and, right at the same time, three of their faces blanched. Five years was a long time to spend away from one’s closest friends; seeing them after leading a rather shamefully brazen life is never the easiest of feelings.
“S-S-Scootaloo?” croaked Sweetie Belle after what appeared to be an eternity of silence. Her very voice broke and ripped itself in the wind that suddenly seemed to be howling wildly.
“A-Apple B-B-Bloom?” rasped Scootaloo in turn, her speck-sized pupils darting back and forth at the two mares.
“Uh… S-S-Sweetie B-Belle?” muttered Apple Bloom with a tone that twisted and turned in a rollercoaster of emotions at the sight of her friends.
They all stopped speaking. Silence prevailed for the next minute till Scootaloo broke it with an almost inaudible mumble:
“It… it’s you…”
Sweetie Belle blinked and some colour returned to her paled face. “Yeah… but you two…” she pointed a disbelieving hoof at the two mares ahead, “How can you be here?”
“Could ask ya the same,” breathed Apple Bloom. There was no sign of harshness when she spoke; her voice sounded lost and it didn’t look like her mind was capable of thinking at the moment.
The moment she spoke the words, however, Sweetie Belle’s white face turned a bright shade of red and she pretended to find her ruined hooficure rather fascinating. “Oh, who? Me? Oh, just looking around… you know… the Dodge City is, er, a nice place, I hear.” She tried to regain her cool composure and, immediately wishing to escape the situation, looked at Scootaloo. “And what are you doing, Scootaloo? And… oh my, why do you look so… insalubriously emaciated?”
“Huh?” quirked the pegasus, snapping both her head and eyebrow up, “Insal–what now?”
“Insalubriously emaciated,” repeated Sweetie Belle, pronouncing each syllable slower.
Apple Bloom rolled her eyes. “What the hell does that even mean?” she grunted. Instantly, remembering she swore, she rephrased it and repeated, “I mean… what the hay does that even mean?”
“Yeah,” joined Scootaloo, “I am not… insalivation emmy-sammy… ugh, whatever you said.”
“Honestly, don’t you ever look at the dictionary?” scoffed Sweetie Belle.
“Not in five years, I haven’t,” barked Apple Bloom.
Not that any of the three ponies, having become part of a nostalgically memorable argument, noticed what was going on around them but frosty mist was beginning to surrounded them from all sides. They were in an empty street and, bit by bits, snaking arms of purple smoke emerged from the wall of mist-turned-into-fog. Little glowing lines of grey outlined individual strands of the smoke, shimmering as they surrounded the trio as they bickered like foals.
“What, five years and you’re the queen of eggheads!?” Scootaloo was snorting. “Yeah, right, when pigs fly!”
“How dare you!” seethed Sweetie Belle. “Being knowledgeable is cool in its own style just like everything else… humph, well, apart from your rather emaciated figure.”
“Yeah, you’re just goin’ on about that fancy-schmancy word and I bet y’all don’t even know what it means either!” snickered Apple Bloom.
“Oh, if I must!” Sweetie Belle suddenly gave herself airs, flashing a smirk at the other two. “A conversant pony like me remains satisfied with her knowledge but if two jerks” –glaring at the sniggering mares– “are really so dumb, she is bound to stoop lower and find an easier synonym to meet their lowly wants.”
There was a pause.
Apple Bloom raised an eyebrow. “Uh… I… got no idea what y’all just said.”
Scootaloo groaned. “Argh, won’t you just tell what the darn word means?”
Sweetie Belle’s cheeks fumed and she was about to deliver a most unladylike retort– when a roaring rumble erupted out from nowhere and everywhere.
The wind shrieked and every single molecule unfortunate to be within a radius of the ice-cold fog was bathed and enveloped in rigid iciness. Howling wind slapped at the three mares’ faces, their manes flying and flapping around uncontrollably. Glacial force fenced around; the dust flew up and swirled around with a swish; dark smoke took over the sky and none of the three ponies were able to tell whether or not a solar eclipse had just happened.
Trapped in a cuboid of smoke, fog and cold with only the smoky strands’ glimmering outlines as a light source and the unearthly wind thrashing at them, Apple Bloom, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle stepped backwards and closer together till their tails were brushing each other.
From the haze, a billowing wave whisked past.
“Who’s there?” growled Apple Bloom.
There was a gentle trot and then a vague figure of a half-hooded pony appeared, standing in the middle of the fog, their wafting tail swishing gradually with the wind. The most outstanding feature, however, was embedded in the figure’s flank: scribbled lines, words that couldn’t quite be made out, that glittered and glowed with every moment.
“We have come,” bellowed a deep voice, “to mark the reconsolidation of three! And we, with elated eyes, see before us… ponies joined by fate!”
“What’re you, a wizard?” snapped Scootaloo. “Come on, show yourself! Whaddya think you can do, huh?”
“Silence!” boomed the voice. The added effect of the rushing wind had the desired reaction on Scootaloo who immediately clamped her mouth shut. “Silence,” repeated the voice, stamping one hoof against the ground, “O boisterous pegasus!”
“What in Equestria is up with damned funny words today?” grumbled Apple Bloom under her breath.
However, Sweetie Belle, finally recoiling from her fearful shock, brandished her hoof forward and raised her head high to show that she was not frightened. “Boisterous?” called she to the figure. “Who are you to call any pony boisterous when you yourself give no thought for your awfully, ear-piercing volume!?”
The pony’s eyes flashed a bright white in the darkness and, for a moment, Sweetie Belle regretted having tossed those words out of her untrustworthy mouth. It took one step forward, mane almost out of the fog, and exhaled.
“Words shall now be chosen carefully,” it declared, “for we are aware that all of you are on a rather restricted time limit.”
The three ponies snapped their heads around to the figure who had disappeared but still speaking.
“We know each of you are running from the fear of being caught.”
Their eyes minimized to the sizes of dots.
“We know each of you are going to be killed.”
Their fur bristled and their faces paled, suddenly feeling very cold.
“And,” the figure was suddenly behind them, making them all turn around and yelp in undisguisable surprise, “we also are aware that you all are in dire need of help.”
There was lasting silence between in the boundaries of the fog. Neither of the mares had the courage to look at their friends, having had their lives so blatantly exposed in mere seconds. The very stillness the ethereal figure was employing could have cast the impression it was there no longer; but it was. With silent, judging eyes, it analyzed the red-faced ponies in front of the guarding fog.
“So…” croaked Scootaloo, sensing the presence had not yet gone, “you know about m-me?”
“You speak accurate words,” responded the echoing voice. “Indeed we do!”
“But… h-h-how?” murmured Sweetie Belle, burying her face in one hoof.
“The unicorn need not be flustered,” came the deafening rumble, “for we only know what needs to be known and we only do what needs to be done.” The violet strands of smoke precipitously darted out of the icy fog and started swirling up to the sky that was beginning to clear up. “We come to offer advice for we know that you need words that will aid you,” thundered the figure’s roaring voice again.
Before anypony could protest, let alone speak, the figure was beginning to disappear as the layers of fog upon fog draped around it. Only words could be made out.
“Go to Ponyville,” reverberated the disappearing pony, “and go there together. Leave now; the clock is ticking; you must reach it as soon as possible if hope is to be had. Only there will you find the help you seek; only there will you find what you truly need.”
And, as quietly as the icy, smoky fog had arrived, it dispersed and the ponies found themselves back in the same, empty street. The afternoon sun was still shining and, by the looks of nearby ponies, it looked as if none of them saw what otherworldly absurdity had just occurred.
The three ponies looked around and then they looked at each other.
They said nothing.
–––––
When the mysterious figure had appeared, neither did Apple Bloom nor Sweetie Belle or Scootaloo knew why it had come.
How did it know?
Where did it come from?
What did it want?
Who was it?
The same questions drilled around each of their minds. Whatever that pony was, it had uncovered what they had been hiding – and this particular realization was still raw and fresh for each of them. They hadn’t spoken more than a couple of words to each other (how could they?) but, for some reason, they agreed to follow the figure’s advice. Nopony had any better suggestions, anyway.
It had been hardly fifteen minutes since their bizarre encounter. Reaching the promised destination as soon as they could would be the most logical action, they decided, and they had taken a train out of the Dodge City – each mare had to pay for her own ticket, much to Sweetie Belle’s horror – and, upon inquiry, they were told it would take around half an hour to reach Ponyville. And here they were now. Sitting on an empty train as it rattled on. They felt abashed. Silent. Violent.
“Uh, Sweetie Belle? Scootaloo?” shrilled Apple Bloom, breaking the demonic silence that lingered about like a ghost, “That mage thing back at the Junction… It said we all were, uh, being hunted, eh? I-Is that… true?”
“Yeah,” choked Sweetie Belle. “Guess I qualify for that.”
Apple Bloom turned her burning face away to the window, pretending to find the barren landscape rather interesting. Scootaloo was simply rigid; her face was emotionless– or so it seemed. “Y’all bein’ pursued?” was all Apple Bloom could ask her unicorn friend, face still turned.
“I am,” came Sweetie Belle’s defeated exhale. “I happen to be in deep debt to this big goon… And now… well now, I just got to pay up…” Her voice broke. “…if I want to keep hide on my bones.”
“So…” Apple Bloom turned slightly so she could see Sweetie Belle from the corner of her eye, “you’re sayin’ that goon’s gonna kill y’all if he don’t get his bits?”
Sweetie Belle put a hoof to her temple, her head lowering as she sighed again. “I suppose I am… Life certainly hasn’t been lovely, to say the least…” Almost as soon as she spoke the words, Scootaloo’s detached face suddenly flashed with redness.
“Huh, I can’t tell you how true that is,” rasped the pegasus. “Life’s been damn hard.”
“You don’t have to,” replied Sweetie as calmly as her remorse could allow. “Your emaciated figure says enough.”
“And ‘emaciated’ means what exactly!?”
Sweetie Belle sighed at the frustrated pegasus and clicked her tongue. “Underweight,” she explained and shot Scootaloo a sharp glare. “Understand now?”
But Scootaloo wasn’t looking at her; she was observing her skinny body with a cautious eye. Her jagged bones visibly poked at her weak layers of flesh; scrawny skin tightened around her scarred jaw; the skeletal outline was noticeable from beneath the feathers of her wings. Scootaloo’s eyes misted and she clapped her hooves together to see how strong they still were– all that came was an unnatural clack of bones. Wildly staring at her hooves that sounded as if there was no skin left on them, she tried to unfurl her wings. To her horror, her wings refused to open – because of her hours of flying hard; in addition, a painful sting hissed at her sides.
Scootaloo blinked her tears back and looked back up, her face frozen.
What had happened to her? This condition had never victimized her.
Or had it always been there?
It couldn’t have. She had fought a lot; she had killed dozens of ponies on her assassination missions. Never had she felt weak; she had always been strong.
“Scootaloo?” Sweetie Belle’s hoof gingerly patted Scootaloo’s back in consolation. Apple Bloom was still staring out of the window; even if she decided to tell them what she had been through, words would never be enough.
“I-I-I… I….” Scootaloo had nothing to say. She clapped her hooves together once more; the empty clack resounded in her throbbing ears. “How did I get so… ugly?” she finally blurted out. Apple Bloom’s ear perked up at the word but she didn’t turn.
“Ugly? Why, that’s a bit strong,” sympathized Sweetie Belle. “You just need to eat a bit more. What do you usually eat, hmm?”
“I don’t,” Scootaloo muttered.
Sweetie Belle blinked. “I beg your pardon?”
“I don’t, okay!?” repeated Scootaloo, snapping her head up. “I want to but I can’t! I don’t eat stuff! Whenever they called me, she always made us have stuff to drink! A-a-and I hate that stuff!” Tears spurted out her eyes, rolling down on her cheeks. “But I had to drink it or they’d kick me out! I f-f-f-forced it down and… and it was awful! So, yeah, I don’t eat!”
“Well, it don’t matter,” came Apple Bloom’s voice. She had turned around and stared right at her friends, the sunlight outlining the left part of her face with a golden glow. “That’s yer choice: eat or not. You don’t wanna? That’s fine by me. I’d never judge y’all on how many conkers you can gobble down; only a pony dumb as hell would.”
“But I’m still… deformed, aren’t I?” clogged Scootaloo, staring longingly at her bony hooves.
“No!” yelled Sweetie Belle. Too loudly. “Of course not,” she breathed, composing herself. Her face was pale – paler than usual – and her hooves were trembling. “You just forgot to add healthy food in your diet; it can always be adjusted.”
“I didn’t forget,” barked Scootaloo. “She always made me the goon brawler, the fighter, the butt-kicker! And when I didn’t like drinking that stuff, she told me all fighters need it!”
“Need what?” growled Apple Bloom. She was a fighter and she was curious – dangerously – to know what that ‘she’ recommended that made her pegasus friend so unhealthy.
“Salt,” told Scootaloo, scrunching up her face at the very name. The growl fell off Apple Bloom’s face as soon as it had appeared and her face reddened.
“Oh… horse apples,” she mumbled, shaking her head at herself, and then looked up at Scootaloo again. “So… lemme get this straight. You don’t like salt?”
“Well, its flavor is just… ew! And the dust and the, ugh, stench of those mugs!” Scootaloo turned green and shoved her hoof to her mouth as if she were going to vomit.
“It is rather despicable,” nodded Sweetie Belle but a blush darkened her cheeks, “but, if I am to be honest, it is easy to… get, um, addicted.”
“Wait.” Scootaloo’s eyes widened and her jaw dropped. “You… Sweetie Belle, you haven’t drunk salt and liked it, have you?” she asked though she had a feeling that the answer was going to be–
“Yes,” whispered Sweetie Belle. She looked away, unable to bring herself to meet the eyes of her friends. There was a momentary silence but she spoke again, her voice low and distant, her eyes lingering away. “I don’t know how to say this b-but, well, these past five years have been terrible. First, I tried to be a bit ladylike, find a decent job, keep myself in good company… but fate decided otherwise. I didn’t find a job, anyway, and was unable to fend myself; so I decided to gamble.” She stopped. “A lot.”
“Lemme guess,” Apple Bloom blurted, “that didn’t go too well, huh?”
“Well, not immediately,” Sweetie Belle only tossed a hint of a half-hearted smile. “My first gamble I won… the second one was a bigger one. Two thousand bits as of total winnings. I won that one as well. I was young, foolish and really stupid back then; my biddings went higher and higher. I started betting with dangerous ponies.” A deep sigh. “A-and, as for my third gamble, I bet a thousand bits… I lost. And I didn’t just quit then– I thought I’d bet again, win again and make more money.”
“But you didn’t,” spoke Scootaloo’s voice.
Sweetie Belle turned, tears misting her eyes. “No,” she shook her head. “But I kept going. Kept losing… till I had no money to bet. So I gambled without bits.” Words were just pouring out of her mouth as if she thought sharing her troubles would ease her burden. “I told them I had bits, bet a huge sum, lost, got in debt… and it went on and on. Sometimes, for the pettier creditors, they would make me sing. In their clubs. Casinos. So that… so that was the way I paid their debt. And the big beefy goons… they demanded bits… All the bits.”
“Y’all mind tellin’ me what’s the name of this goon you owe?” hissed Apple Bloom.
“Apple Bloom, my life was hard. I chose a wrong path; many ponies do,” Sweetie Belle protested. “Your envisioned virtues of being clean… I am sorry but I was simply unable to put up with them. I got into a dirty business and it was hard to get out.”
“But what’s the name of that pony?” repeated Apple Bloom firmly as if she had not even heard Sweetie Belle.
“I don’t know what good it will do you…” started the unicorn, “but his name is Slayer Throatcut. A-and I just wish you won’t bring up how wrong I–”
“No, I won’t,” interrupted the earth pony as she whisked her head away. Then she mumbled under her breath, “It ain’t you who’s wrong.”
“Well, you had a tough time,” spoke Scootaloo from beside Sweetie. Her head was hanging low in shame. In pity? Guilt?
Sweetie Belle just laughed nervously. “I’m sure my life was easier than whatever you had to endure, Scootaloo.”
“Maybe,” whispered Scootaloo, her tone a low bark.
The train rattled on the tracks. The carriage was silent. Apple Bloom turned to look out of the window and Sweetie Belle occupied herself with examining her still-ruined hooves. This time, Scootaloo broke the prickly silence – though not in the best manner.
“I smuggle weapons,” she blurted out as if she had to confess on gunpoint. The other two turned to look at her but it was her turn to be unable to look back. “I-I used to, at least…”
Nopony spoke. The building silence forced Scootaloo to go on.
“I guess this is kinda my own confession… about what I’ve been up to…” A long second of silence again. “So I’m being hunted. By the EIA,” Scootaloo forced coughs as if she hoped their volume would hide her words.
“The EIA?” gasped Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle together. Scootaloo partially turned to look at them and nodded.
“What the hell did ya do to get the EIA upon y’all!?” cried Apple Bloom.
“I smuggled weapons,” sighed Scootaloo, “like I said. You guys know about the war raging between ponies and dragons?”
“In the Dragon Lands?” frowned Sweetie Belle.
“Yeah, that one,” Scootaloo forced a nod. “The rebels there need weapons so I was one of those who smuggled weapons to them. Real high-tech. Real pricy too.” She cleared her throat. It suddenly felt too dry. “So I am– was part of a team of four pegasus ponies. There was our leader, Slashcut Hearts, and she was the one who, y’know, made the deals, talked to suppliers and stuff. Then there was Artic Sea… kinda bland and blunt but I guess he had a knack for weapon knowledge. Greenwing was recruited four months after I joined; her thing was being fast. Speed. I was just the brawler.” She grunted. “Ugh, this is so uncomfortable.”
“Yeah, I get ya,” she heard Apple Bloom reassure.
“You don’t have to tell if you don’t want to,” came Sweetie Belle’s imperceptible whisper.
“But you did,” Scootaloo answered, jerking her head to Sweetie Belle. “You told us what was going on in your life. We listened. Why shouldn’t I wanna repay the favour?”
“It wasn’t… really a ‘favour’,” sniffed Sweetie Belle. “I told you because I wanted to. None of you forced me now, did you, Scootaloo?”
For a moment, Scootaloo stopped. She didn’t have to tell. Her life had been awkward, bloody, embarrassing. Why did she have to tell? She could just let it slip away.
But what did it matter now?
Whether she told or not, nothing was going to change. Scootaloo inhaled a deep breath and just shook her head. “No,” she replied, turning her head away again. “I want to tell. My life’s kinda… well, gory. It’s hard to keep it all in, y’know, and there’s no one to listen. I will tell you two ‘cause I know you’ll listen.”
“Darn tootin’ we will,” Apple Bloom said as she gave a nod though Scootaloo couldn’t have seen it. But she heard the words.
She allowed herself a bit of a smile. “Equestria has got these recent laws,” she started, “that ponies feeding that rebellion will be hanged. That’s why my team and I stayed away... we lived in the Badlands. Moving here and there but never went to Equestria. We smuggled weapons safely for about four years; no law; no police; and, above all, no EIA… It wasn’t the best thing but I was safe… Uh, remember I said I was the brawler of the group? Well, the brawler had to have a part-time job as well– assassination on contract. And I… well, I did many of those contracts. Made a lot of money, put it into buying weapons, smuggled them, got more money… and the cycle went on… The EIA got hot on my tail and, with that, my team’s too. I stopped the killing for a couple of months but I guess that wasn’t enough.”
She stopped speaking. She had spoken enough. Too much, actually. Okay, she had given them an overview of what she had been doing but she still had to tell them why exactly the Equestrian Intelligence Agency was just after ‘her’. She had to. She just had to.
“This morning, we’re in the Badlands, my team and me,” she choked. “We got a new supply of these weapons, toxic gas stuff, and we were just getting out of town when the EIA ambushed us.” Her eyes felt hot and she wanted to cry. Just a little longer. “The entire team tried to get out but I… uh, got behind.” ‘My wings are still weak,’ she thought of saying but she didn’t. “There is this Mark Disparager thing they had and they shot at my cutie mark with it.”
Scootaloo shifted slightly, her left flank showing the bleached blotch covering up part of the cutie mark. “All this bleached stuff means they recorded it. As Slashcut told, they’ll search all their data for my cutie mark and, if they do… when they do, I’m toast.” She settled back in her seat again and rubbed her eyes with one hoof. She couldn’t cry; she wouldn’t.
“And that’s why I came to the Dodge City. To hide. Not much law enforcement there.” A brisk conclusion to a brisk narrative. Perfect, she decided.
“You did what you could,” said Sweetie Belle’s voice beside her. Scootaloo finally looked up; Sweetie Belle was looking at her but Apple Bloom was intent on staring out of the window like she hadn’t even heard anything at all. A hint of growl overtook Scootaloo’s face but she held it back. Her face fell.
Of course, Apple Bloom wouldn’t listen. Nopony wanted to listen to the life of a loser. Nopony wanted to care.
“You tried to fend yourself. I was just a gambler with bad connections,” Sweetie Belle went on, breaking Scootaloo out of her thoughts.
“You don’t have the blood of dozens of ponies on your hooves, Sweetie Belle,” sighed Scootaloo with a shake of her head.
“I can’t say I know how you feel but I have done worse than gambling as well,” admitted the unicorn.
“Burglary,” she whispered and then shivered.
Her light green eyes gazed into Scootaloo’s lavender ones and the pegasus could see a shimmery outline of tears forming. “I know burglary and murder are two separate things but they are both… hurting. I tried to pay back my debts by stealing. And… a-and that money belonged to honest ponies. To poor ponies. And I took it. I took it when it wasn’t mine, Scootaloo – and that was the worst. It did get the Baltimare Police on me but I then stopped. They stopped… and I resumed gambling.”
Sweetie Belle shivered again and sighed. “I’m sorry for what happened to you, Scootaloo. Because I know what it feels like to hurt.”
“Yeah…” was all Scootaloo could say. She wanted to pat Sweetie’s shoulder but she didn’t. They hadn’t met for five years; it would be a while before Scootaloo decided to be proper ‘friends’ with them again.
Everything was silent again. The train still rattled on, the clangor of its metal wheels the only sound audible. Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo were just looking at their laps as they sat quietly. Apple Bloom still looked out of the window, her face turned. The landscape wasn’t quite so barren anymore. It was green, many beautiful shades of light green; a distant blur of dark green was visible in the distance, getting closer each second.
Ponyville.
It was coming closer.
“I know you hate salt, Scoot,” spoke Apple Bloom’s solemn voice as she forced her eyes on the greenery ahead, “but, ta be honest, most o’ mah darned diet’s made up of it.”
The wheels still clanked on.
“I got me a salt saloon,” the earth pony finally breathed out her haunting burden, “and I made mah bits on that. Had a coupla employees too; enough customers daily… but that ain’t how it started. When ah… When ah left Ponyville, ah had many, many… er, odd jobs.” Far worse than just odd jobs, she revealed to herself mentally. “Ripping away my dignity… it was hard for me. I was just a dang filly and… and I was so scared. So cold. But ah had mingled myself in bad company. Rotten ponies. Rotten work. One of those jobs, it was kinda way more awful than the rest– or maybe it was just that I couldn’t keep doin’ that kinda thing. Well, one way or the other, I just had enough. So…”
Deep breaths, Apple Bloom. Deep breaths.
“So ah killed the pony ah did the job for.”
She didn’t turn around to see the expressions Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle would have on their faces. She didn’t dare to blink; she didn’t dare to think. Yet she kept forcing words out of her mouth.
“Ran around from police, out in the damn desert. When ah think ‘bout it, the only sensible thing I did then was save money… and ah had ‘bout hundred bits when I stopped runnin’. Somepony I knew – not a good one too – suggested that ah open mah own salt saloon. After a bit o’ thought, I put in all my bloody money in the place and opened it.”
“Uh… did it go well?” Scootaloo piped up from behind.
“Nah,” Apple Bloom just gave her head with the slightest of shakes. “Went all the way downhill… till ah met this darn Redcut Peel. Dude was an entertainer, had a family of goons and pretty well-known ‘bout the place. So ah hired him. The saloon started goin’ uphill, that’s true an’ all, but Peel was a rotten piece of poop. He was… argh, he was just an obnoxious, mentally-torturing, glib and sure-as-hell shitty menace! Damn, bloody thing!” She snarled at the very thought of him and slammed an angry hoof on the empty seat beside her.
No. Don’t, don’t, don’t. Be calm.
Apple Bloom heaved a deep breath and spoke again, her voice fallen to low levels. “But the only reason mah saloon started gettin’ known was because he was there. That cussed idiot decided that meant more than half o’ mah damn earnings’d be his bloody pay – and I had ta pay him. Not just ‘cause he was a bloody popular asset but also ‘cause he got a goony background. Ah didn’t wanna mess up… but he was a damn pain. And… well, not many hours back, he went an’ decided he wanna open his own salt saloon. The spoiled prat don’t want no competition around when he does that so he barged in my damn place with a dozen goons and demanded me ta close it. Ah said no.” She raised her head. Maybe there was still a bit of dignity in the words. “Outright and downright. Nopony ain’t gonna push me to do somethin’ ah don’t wanna do, I told him. So...”
Apple Bloom coughed. They both had told their tales. She shouldn’t hide hers.
Just spit it out.
“Well, he tried ta kill me… and I doubt he gonna stop after I fled. He’s a bloody butthead, stubborn and spoiled. So, yeah, he’s huntin’ for me and he ain’t stoppin’ till ah am dead.”
There was a bit of silence but then Apple Bloom mustered enough courage to turn around and look at Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo. Her eyes felt… misty. Was she crying? Was she going to cry?
Of course not.
She had just told a miserable tale of her horribly brazen life. Nothing to cry about. She hadn’t cried for a long time – it was stupid to break the streak on just a bit of… a story.
“So I think we’ve all had a pretty bad time,” Scootaloo cleared her throat. She made sure to look at both Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle when she spoke; there was no reason to feel guilty or ashamed. They were all in the same boat.
“You said it,” sighed Apple Bloom. For once, she didn’t speak and turn back to look out of the window. There was a time to keep secrets and a time to spill them – this looked a lot like the latter.
“Goodness,” said Sweetie Belle as she gave her head a glum shake. “What have we been up to?” she breathed out in a ghostly whisper as if she didn’t believe how badly she had been faring all the past years.
“We messed up pretty bad, huh?” Apple Bloom almost succumbed to the urge of turning her boiling cheeks back to the window but she held her composure.
“I just can’t believe,” rasped Scootaloo, “we all just happened to meet at the Dodge City. I mean, I know coincidence happens and stuff… but it was still weird.”
“Ah know wha’cha mean,” nodded Apple Bloom. “And who’d guess we’re all messed up? Ah mean, if it were up ta me, I’d think y’all”– gesturing at Scootaloo with her muzzle – “were some Ponlympics extreme sports’ athlete by now… and I’d guess ya”– turning to Sweetie Belle –“had been and become some super fancy popstar.”
“Yes, well, that’s kind of you to think so,” Sweetie Belle chuckled quietly. Half-heartedly. “But that isn’t the case.” She paused and let out a sigh of longing. “As much as I wish it were true.”
“And that creepy mage pony was right,” shrugged Scootaloo, rubbing her temple with a hoof. “We all are being chased. We’re running from death, aren’t we?”
“Quite,” agreed Sweetie Belle.
“It’s true,” confirmed Apple Bloom with a distinct grunt.
“But… w-will we make it?”
“Make it?” frowned Sweetie Belle.
“Yeah. That pony told us to go to… to Ponyville.” Scootaloo’s voice broke with a heavy gulp. Her eyes were shimmering with… fear? Horror? Whatever it was, it was not something that seemed to have a positive effect on the pegasus. “But, even if we do, will we still live?”
“I guess we’ll find out when we’ll try,” replied the unicorn, the words almost automatically coming out of her mouth.
Apple Bloom chewed her bottom lip nervously, thoughts of a previous childhood striking back to haunt her, and, for a brief moment, she turned to glance out of the window. The dark green blur was clearer and closer now – and the earth pony knew all too well what it was.
“Guys!” she cried to Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo. “Guys! The Everfree Forest!”
The two ponies immediately hopped to the window in foal-like excitement to view the forest. It was green and dark, clearly flourishing in all the bounties of wilderness and nature – similar to what the mares remembered what it was five years back. Then, one by one, apprehension clouded their excitement and they fell back in their seats, looking at one another with wide eyes.
“So it’s finally there,” whispered Scootaloo
“You darn tootin’ it is there,” mumbled Apple Bloom, rubbing her forehead.
“And Ponyville isn’t far,” stated Sweetie Belle. “Are we just going to go in?” Her eyes darted from mare to mare. “Like this?”
“And the problem is?” asked Apple Bloom, a hint of obstinate pride flashing in her tone.
“Sweetie’s right,” said Scootaloo, coming to Sweetie Belle’s defense. “We can’t just enter the town. I mean, we were pretty popular there. How can we just barge in and tell what we’ve been doing?”
“Make something up,” pestered Apple Bloom. “It’s our home, ain’t it? Or we’ll just say… uh, that we ain’t in no mood to talk ‘bout it.”
“Our sisters,” spoke Sweetie Belle, her voice halting every sound. Her tone was solemn. Grave. She was serious and both Apple Bloom and Scootaloo shifted uneasily in their seats. “Our sisters will… might still be there… and we will have to go back to them. It’s not like somepony will randomly come by and say, ‘Oh, hey, you are the CMCs! I know you and I love you! Come in my house to stay! I am your biggest, most ginormous, high-as-Mount-Everhoof fan! Do come, do come!’ So, yeah, it’s our home and that’s why we have to think what to do. We might have lived there but we sure don’t own the place.”
“Now that y’all put it like that,” mused Apple Bloom, “I guess we ain’t puttin’ the best impression by just… going in.”
“Sneak in?” suggested Scootaloo.
“It’s Ponyville, remember? Everypony practically knew every other pony.”
“But we can’t just face anypony, right? Especially not our sisters…” Apple Bloom’s grunt trailed off into an inaudible grumble.
“We will have to face some pony soon enough,” sighed Sweetie Belle and all was silent in the carriage once more… till Scootaloo spoke up:
“The forest…”
“The forest?” asked Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle in unison.
“There is a route to Ponyville through the Everfree Forest,” Scootaloo clarified. “It won’t exactly keep us invisible but it will keep ponies from swarming over us immediately. It’ll, like, buy us time… and, yup, we’ll still have to face ponies but I think we would be a bit more concealed, y’know.”
Once the words dropped out, Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom’s minds fidgeted and geared up mutually. Apple Bloom snapped her head to look at the ever-nearing forest and Sweetie Belle, with a zap of her horn, used her magic to pull the chain. Scootaloo’s own mind hardly had to time to register what was going on as the train skidded to a harsh halt, knocking all three down their seats and on the floor.
“What the hell?” growled Scootaloo, pushing herself up in a sitting position. Sweetie Belle was dusting herself but Apple Bloom had already got back on her hooves.
“We’re stoppin’ here,” told the earth pony simply, running a hoof in her mane to rid it of glass shards that were still planted there stubbornly.
“Sto–” Scootaloo started to question but Sweetie Belle chipped in first.
“The route through the Everfree Forest. We are taking it,” she clarified, also standing up.
“Yeah, I figure jumpin’ off the carriage’s gonna be the best bet,” nodded Apple Bloom towards Sweetie Belle.
“So now we’re just going to… do what exactly?” Scootaloo cocked up one eyebrow as she got on her hooves as well.
“Well,” started Apple Bloom with a discernible shrug, “I guess we just run out and in the forest. Ah ain’t riskin’ nothin’ to be dropped at the Ponyville train station and ah bet y’all don’t either, do ya?”
***
The Everfree Forest hadn’t changed much in five years and so the three mares found as they trekked through it. If anything, the most prominent change was that it certainly had expanded– and it did seem to house a variety of newer, more exotic plants. The path to Ponyville that Scootaloo had thought of was still roughly visible through the forest floor but even so, in the Everfree Forest, a journey could never be without incident.
When Sweetie Belle tried to tug at a bulgy, crimson rope in their path with her magic, it had turned out to be a manticore’s tail; the monster was definitely not pleased about a bunch of puny ponies disturbing his nap and the mares barely escaped becoming manticore supper.
Halfway through their journey, a clearing which they nearly chose to rest in turned out to be a swarm of pony-devouring plants. They soared and swirled in the air, roaring and trying to strike the to-be prey while the ‘prey’ leapt about to make a run from it. Scootaloo, at that point, tried to fly away but, even after two hours of non-flying, her damaged wings wouldn’t give in to moving.
After Apple Bloom bucked (and temporarily stunned) a few of the bigger plants, giving herself and her accomplices time to dash off, tempers suddenly flared when she commented about how Scootaloo could still not fly. The pegasus argued that she was not a crippled foal anymore at which her earth pony friend snidely asked how much her wing power was; when Scootaloo reluctantly admitted it was 6.1 at her very hardest try, Apple Bloom aired herself on being ‘kinda right anyway’.
It took all Sweetie Belle’s charm and sweet nature to calm the bickering ponies–and even she was exhausted after she finally got them to be quiet. “Some ponies do never change,” she had groaned to herself. Running from carnivorous butterflies, snare-like bushes, zombie chickens and half a dozen other frightening encounters later, the three ponies finally found themselves approaching the end of the forest that edged towards Ponyville.
Swaying blades of green grass lined the smoothened path, colorfully specked with carefully planted flowers, and, when they brushed at the drooping, leafy branches of the evergreen trees, the mares saw before them a cottage.
They walked forward over the little bridge, covered in fuzzy grass, swept over the sparkling stream that flowed underneath with a tiny, twinkling sound; tiny birdhouses in so many different colours hung from the trees that surrounded the cottage; entrances to warm burrows of earthly creatures peeked out from various grassy lumps near the path; and the cottage ahead was the prettiest spectacle of all. Made out of a tree, it had a roof bounded in beautiful flowers and dainty foliage and there were little, wooden windows at the corners of the cottage; like a brown ribbon, a small fence ran around the presumed yard but that didn’t appear to deter the dozens of creatures that were running about.
“It… it’s still the same,” whispered Apple Bloom as a squirrel scurried towards her and sniffed.
“Like five years didn’t even pass,” agreed Sweetie Belle in a voice that didn’t believe what her eyes were seeing.
A tiny hummingbird with dazzling turquoise and pink feathers buzzed around Scootaloo’s head and the pegasus fought the urge to just hit and toss it (and its annoying sound, she thought) away. Before she could do that, Sweetie Belle, catching that irked glint in her eyes, blew at the bird to direct in some other direction.
“Well, it sure is still a zoo,” Scootaloo mumbled carelessly but quickly corrected herself: “Uh, a sanctuary, I mean… you know, it is keeping all these critters happy…” She sighed and, in reaction to her friends’ raised eyebrows, slumped her shoulders in defeat. “Uh, sorry. I just can’t think positive! I guess I’m just worried that we are doomed.”
“Ah get it,” breathed Apple Bloom. “Looks like a lost cause, huh?”
“You said it,” exhaled Scootaloo but any further words she was about to speak were cut off by a nudge on the shoulder by Sweetie Belle.
“Come on, you two,” the unicorn tried to smile. “Stop being so pessimistic; for all that I know, that mage back at the Dodge City was right about… us. And let’s be honest, what other option do we have?”
Apple Bloom sighed. “Hmm. Guess y’all are kinda right,” she shrugged. “Gotta make do with what we got.”
Hardly did her words make Scootaloo nod when a small colt with a curly silver-blue-and-pink mane and a pale golden coat fluttered ahead from behind the house as he played chase with some giant monarch butterflies. Tossing himself around in the air and laughing at his own game, the colt flew about in loops till he got sight of the three unkempt, wide-eyed mares in front of him. For a minute, he stood stock-still midair– but then he fluttered his wings again.
“Uh… hi,” he started. With the silence finally broken, the three ponies felt slightly embarrassed that a foal had to start the conversation instead of themselves but bygones were bygones and they had to carry on.
“Hey, little guy,” coughed Scootaloo as she took a couple of steps forward. “You… uh, do ya live around here?”
“Do you live here?” interjected Apple Bloom a bit more forcefully (and loudly) than she had intended.
With a short, panicked cry, the colt stumbled out of the air and dropped on the grass with a gentle thud, unable to keep his balance. Before he could pick himself back up on his hooves, Sweetie Belle was already using her magic to lift him and strip away the inconvenient grass blades that had stuck themselves to his coat.
“Oh gosh, ah am sorry,” cringed Apple Bloom. However, Sweetie Belle was already taking hold of the situation.
“Goodness, I hope you’re not hurt,” she cooed as tenderly as she could without showing her irritation towards the earth pony. “There! All better now, hmm?”
The colt watched with a slight smile as Sweetie Belle plucked a last piece of grass from his curls and tossed it away. “Oh, thank you, miss,” he just managed to speak when the cottage door opened and…
And a pegasus came out.
Her light pink mane was pinned up in a half-bun and there was a delicate butterfly pendant around her yellow coat. Even though it had been five long years since they had seen, she was still as fragile and as young as she had been five years ago. There were no visible signs of any aging wrinkles or even the slightest hint of a crumpled hoof. No, she was still the same. Fervently dashing to the little colt without noticing the three mares ahead, she patted his hair with a stroke of her wing.
“Oh, Bubbly,” she cried in a soft, whispery voice, “are you alright? I heard a thud and you were talking to… to somepo–” As she spoke the word, she looked up at the mares in front of her, turquoise eyes suddenly contracting to the size of specks. Apple Bloom, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle’s reaction was much the same – jaws dropped to the ground and eyes shrunk to a terribly tiny size.
For a minute, nopony –except Bubbly the colt– twitched so much as an eye muscle, trying to make sense of the uncanny encounter. Then, finally, Sweetie Belle croaked:
