Trixie was woken up by a slap across the face. “Ow!” When she regained her senses she saw Raindrops standing over her.
“Is this really the time to be napping?”
“I wasn’t napping. Ditzy punched me. Why do you ponies keep hitting me?!”
“Cause you kind of deserve it sometimes.”
Trixie glared at the weather pony. “What are you doing here?”
“Well I was at the school in case there had been a fire. I saw you and Ditzy leave in such a hurry, so when I couldn’t find Dinky anywhere on the school grounds I started to get worried.” Raindrops explained. “I decided to come check and on the way here I ran into Silver Script who explained to me what was going on."
“Could we focus on finding Ditzy?” Trixie turned her head to see Silver Script, still carrying the L&T bat. “You were supposed to keep her safe.”
“I tried but then...” Trixie’s punch drunk brain finally got back up to speed. “WE’VE GOT TO GET TO THE TRAIN STATION RIGHT NOW!!!”
Ditzy arrived at the train station to find Parley waiting for her.
“Punctual as always.” Parley said smugly “Good to see you haven’t let the recent event change that.”
Ditzy just glared at Parley as the two boarded the train.
“Well isn’t this nice.” Parley commented. “It looks like we’re getting a car all to ourselves. What a pleasant turn of events.”
Ditzy scanned the empty train car. “Where’s Dinky?”
“Again with that? Honestly you’re like a broken record. I told you, my associates have found an alternative means of transport for her so she’ll be waiting for us in Manehatten.” Parley sat on a nearby seat. “My advice to you is to get comfy and enjoy not having to worry about the little brat for a while.”
Something snapped in Ditzy’s brain. She picked up her suitcase and threw it through a nearby window, sending shattered glass everywhere.
Parley looked at the grey mare in dismay. “What do you think that is going to prove?”
Instead of answering, Ditzy pounced, grabbing hold of Parley, then flew straight out of the opening she had created.
Ditzy flew higher and higher, dragging a screaming Parley along with her. She finally found a lone cloud to stand on and dangled Parley over the edge by his tail.
“LET ME GO! LET ME GO!” Parley paused for a moment as he reassessed the situation. “DON’T LET ME GO! DON’T LET ME GO!”
“Where is Dinky?” Ditzy’s speech was slightly muffled because she was hanging on to the tail with her mouth but she was still surprisingly clear.
Parley’s screaming soon died down in to a panicked muttered as he tried very hard not look down. “Look, I know I’m not your favourite pony right now but if you kill me my boss’ll...”
“Your boss will keep Dinky alive so long as they think they can use her to get to me. If you die it will just be considered collateral damage so long as I’m on that train when it leaves.”
“You won’t kill me, you’re the element of Kindness.”
“Kindness has limits.” Ditzy answered. “and I’ve reached mine.”
The stallion was starting to sweat. “Look we’re both reasonable ponies. Get me down and I’ll tell you where to find Dinky.”
“No you tell me where to find Dinky and then I’ll think about letting you down.”
“You drive a hard bargain.”
“The ground is harder.”
“Alright! Alright! The thing is I don’t actually know where Dinky is.”
“My jaw is getting tired.” To prove it, Ditzy loosened her grip on Parley’s tail.
“It’s the truth I swear.” Parley was on the verge of tears. “Plata was in charge of getting Dinky to Manehatten, I never thought to ask him how he was planning on getting her there.”
“Well sucks to be you.” Parley started to plummet when Ditzy let go.
“PLOMO!! HE WOULD KNOW!!!”
Parley’s descent started to slow and came to a complete stop inches from the ground. He risked a glance upwards and saw that Ditzy had grabbed his tail again. She then dropped him onto his back but he was too scared to move. “Plomo was supposed to be following you. He and Plata scheme everything together. Find him and he can tell you where Plata went with Dinky.”
Ditzy glared down at Parley for a moment longer before being satisfied that the stallion had told her everything. She then clocked him in the jaw her right hoof knocking him out.
“Oh sure now you decide to actually start punching the bad guys.”
Ditzy turned to see Trixie, Raindrops and Silver Script approaching. “What are you doing here?”
“What are we doing here?” Trixie repeated in disbelief. “You punch me in the face and that’s all you have to say? What do you think we’re doing here?”
Raindrops silenced Trixie with a nudge. “We came to help you and Dinky.” She paused when she noticed that Parley was unconscious. “Seems we were a little late for that.”
“No time.” Ditzy said. “I’ve got to find one of the goons that were with him.”
“You mean we’ve got to find him.” Trixie interjected. “Look I know knocking me out was your way of stopping me from getting hurt but the best shot we have at saving Dinky is if we work together.” She then crouched and covered her head.
“What are you doing?” Silver Script asked
“Protecting my vitals in case she hits me again.”
“You're right.” Ditzy admitted.
“Well first thing we need to do is tie up this guy.” Raindrops idly poked the unconscious stallion. “Has anypony got some rope?”
“Here ya go.” Pinkie Pie appeared, holding a roll of rope. “I have rope hidden all across Ponyville, in case of rope emergencies.”
“Pinkie Pie?” Trixe gaped at the pink pony. “What are you doing here?”
“A running gag and a pointless cameo. See ya.”
As the other three watched Pinkie bounce off, Trixie used her magic to quickly tie up Parley.
“You know, speaking of Pinkie.” Sliver Script spoke casually. “Doesn’t she usually have these things at her parties that you dangle from a tree and beat with a stick until candy comes out?”
“Yeah, they’re called Piñatas.” Raindrops said. “Why do you ask?”
Silver Script eyed a nearby tree as he casually ran his hoof over L&T. “No reason.”
“That’s extremely tempting but not helpful.” Trixie turned back to Ditzy. “You said something about a goon?”
“Yeah, he was supposed to be following me. Parley said he would know where Dinky was.”
“The only one of those crooks that we’ve seen since so far was this one.” Silver Script gave Parley a kick. “Think something happened to him?”
“Something did.” The four turned to see Caramel make himself known them. “He’s big, red and not somepony you want to get mad.”
“Caramel?!” Raindrops said in disbelief. “What are you doing here?”
“Big Mac sent me here to make sure that Ditzy didn’t leave on the train.” Caramel glanced at the unconscious stallion. “Kind of a moot point now isn’t it?”
“Big Mac sent you?” Trixie asked. “Why?”
“Because he’s off finding Dinky, why else?”
“You know where they took Dinky?!” Ditzy closed the gap between her and Caramel. “Where?”
“Sorry, can’t tell you.” Caramel said. “Big Mac told me to keep you safe and if I tell you, then you’ll want to go off to rescue her yourself.”
“Tell me where they’re keeping my daughter this instant!!”
Silver Script put a hoof on Ditzy’s shoulder. “Listen, maybe he has a point. I’d like to have a crack at the scum bags too but Big Mac might be Dinky’s best chance and we’d only get in his way.”
“But why are you and Big Mac involved in the first place?” Trixie asked.
“Because I asked them to get involved.” Silver Script admitted. “I went to them this morning hoping they could chase those thugs off before they did something like this.” He gave Caramel a brief glare. “Nice work on that front.”
“If you have any complaints about the service you have received, please feel free to visit our complaint department at Froggy Bottom Bog.” Caramel turned back to the mares. “Look, trust me, Big Mac is on the trail so the best for us to do is to stay out of his way and wait for him to bring Dinky home. Besides, it's not like he's hunting solo, Cheerilee's with him."
"The school Teacher?" Silver Script asked disbelievably, "No offence, but is she really the best bet for a rescue mission?"
"I'm sure this is an excellent subject for discussion but could continue this somewhere safer," Caramel looked around. “Preferably not here.”
“Why not?”
“Well I may have...sorta...sabotaged the train as a stalling tactic.” Caramel explained sheepishly. “We may not want to be here when they come to investigate.”
The midday sun beat down on Plata as he waited in the clearing. Dinky was still in the bag that she had been caught in, struggling and shouting.
“Quiet you.” Plata hissed. “Kids these days.” He then saw a large shadows being cast. Looking up he saw a mail wagon (or at least what was supposed to look like a mail wagon) being pulled by four Pegasi descending. “You took your sweet time getting here.”
“It’s not like you gave us a lot of notice.” The driver hoped off the wagon and approached Plata. “Considering that we took a major detour getting here I’d appreciate a little less lip.”
“Quit your whining. You’re getting paid double for this.” Plata turned attention back to the bag. “Now my friends are going to fly you first class to Manehatten. I suggest you stop struggling otherwise they may drop you.” At that moment Dinky’s horn stabbed through the bag. “What the..?”
The clearing was suddenly filled with a bright light. As the adults were blinded, Dinky used her magic to tear the bag open. Once she was free, she ran for it as fast as she could.
Dinky didn't know where she was but she knew that anywhere was better than here. Despite running as fast as she could, Plata, having recovered, soon caught up with her.
The filly came to an abrupt stop when Plata stomped down on her tail, preventing her from running any further. "Listen you little bruja, give me one good reason why I shouldn't snap that horn off."
"Ahem."
Plata looked up from Dinky and came face to face with an extremely angry Big Macintosh.
"I got one."
Any reply Plata was going to give was stopped by a hoof straight to his face.
At that moment the Pegasi had finally gotten over their temporary blindness and had caught up to the scene. Seeing their current employer laying on the ground in a daze and their meal ticket was currently being blocked by the red new comer, they decided to leap into action.
The driver and two others tried to charge Big Mac at the same time. The red stallion used his front hooves to swat two of them away as if they were flies and head butted the third. After taking what could be compared to a wrecking ball to the face, the third Pegasus went down and stayed there.
The first of the two remaining flew in and bucked Big Mac in the side of the head. Big Mac, only slightly fazed by the attack, put up his foreleg to block the on coming onslaught. When he saw an opening, Big Mac struck out, hitting an incoming hoof with his own. The Pegasus fell to ground and held his hoof in pain, only to be silenced by an upper cut.
Cheerilee raced up to Dinky. “Are you alright?” She asked the young filly.
Before Dinky could reply a Pegasus tried to attack the school teacher. As he stood up on his hind legs, Cheerilee raced in, driving her shoulder into the attacker's chest and unleashing a devasting series of gut punches. When she finally relented the stallion took a couple steps back and doubled over in pain. Cheerilee then finished him off with two hooves to the top of the head.
As she finished that, another stallion flew in, hoping to tackle her. Instead of dodging, Cheerilee stood her ground. When he was close enough, she jumped up, caught him in a reverse headlock and, using the weight change and the stallion's own momentum, drove him head first into the ground.
When Cheerilee stood back up, dusting herself off, the pegasus remained motionless.
“Alright!” The two earth ponies turned to see the driver was back up and was holding a crossbow that he had probably recovered from his wagon. “Don't move!”
“Hey genius, you've got one shot and two angry ponies,” Cheerilee replied. “Do the math.”
When realisation struck, the driver dropped the crossbow and took flight. As the pegasus tried to fly straight up and away, the two earth ponies shared a look. After a nod from Cheerilee, Big Mac held out his hooves. The school teacher jumped into them and as she did, the red farmer threw her skywards.
As she flew through the sky, Cheerilee let out a sharp whistle to get the driver's attention. The pegasus looked down in time to get a magenta hoof straight to the face.
When gravity finally caught up with Cheerilee and the now unconscious driver, she remaining calm descended, right into the waiting hooves of Big Mac while the pegasus had a destiny with hard ground.
Cheerilee chuckled as she looked up at Big Mac. “You haven't thrown me like that since that job you had in Hoofington.”
Big Mac let out a chuckle of his own. “Good times.”
The red bounty hunter then turned his head and saw the remaining Pegasus trying sneak up on him, wielding a large piece of wood as a club. When the Pegasus saw that he had been caught out and the annoyed looks Big Mac and Cheerilee were giving him, he let out a nervous chuckle. He then promptly used the piece of wood to knock himself out.
Big Mac rolled his eyes as he put Cheerilee down but then saw that Plata was trying to crawl away. The farmer stopped Plata’s retreat by stepping on the grey stallion’s tail. When the Manehattenite looked up at Big Mac in fear, the farmer offered eight words of explanation for his actions.
“You attacked a school and foalnapped a filly.”
Next thing Plata knew, he was being held by the Big Mac. He wondered what the point of this was until he saw Cheerilee approach, fire burning in her eyes.
“I'm going to make you regret being anywhere near my students.”
With no means of escape, Plata could only look on in horror as Cheerilee readied her hooves to deliver harsh justice, repeatedly. She then stopped when both she and Big Mac remembered that Dinky was busy watching this. Though not releasing Plata, the two earth ponies turned to Dinky. For a brief moment the three just looked at each other
"Violence is bad." Cheerilee said in a weak attempt not to be a bad example for the young filly.
"Yes, I know." Dinky replied before turning her back to him and covering her ears with her hooves. “Let me know when you’re finished.”