//------------------------------//
// Chapter 52 - Gabby Gums! The Secret Revealed! 
// Story: My Little Pony: Ren's Adventures In Equestria 
// by MaxTV1234 
//------------------------------//

Well...this is quite awkward. It was the day after we finished up the Pegasus Hurricane event and we've decided to investigate the new floors in the home-ship. We've invited the Mane 6 (which I've decided to call them), and Spike to explore the shopping mall district as well as Nikki's room. 

"Golly, this is such a huge place!" Applejack commented, looking over at the Target store district entrance. 

Rainbow flew around the place with an eccentric look on her face and let out a whistle, already have checked out every part of the place due to her speed. "Ah ha ha! This is so awesome! You guys get to own your own awesome mall! This is just awesome!"

“You can say that again!” I chuckled, walking around the place with a couple of french fries in my hand. 

"With this mall, we pretty much have enough food to last ourselves for as long as we stay here." Kaede stated.

"Quite indeed." Mason smiled.

"Say Ren..." Spike looked over to me with a raised brow. "What's up with the goggles? Didn't you use them when you and Fluttershy helped Rainbow Dash and the other Pegasi onto delivering all of the lake's water up to Cloudsdale? Why are you still wearing it?"

"Oh this?" I asked, pointing up at the goggles on my head before letting out an awkward smile. "Well, Flutters said it looked pretty cool so I decided to just keep them around a bit."

"Easy for you to say." Jake laughed. "You looked like you could pilot a plane with those things."

"But I don't even know how to fly a plane." I pointed out.

"And you would need to take up on earning your pilot's license for about a minimum of 40 hours of flight time so that you could learn the basics of flying." Jamie explained, writing down in his notebook. "It's not very easy, you know."

"Whatever." Jack scoffed. "I learned how to ride a motorcycle when I was 10 thanks to my old man."

"Wow, that's pretty amazing." Kodiak commented, which earned a smug look on Jack.

"And I say that's quite a boastful comment you made." Rainbow laughed, earning a snarl from Jack.

"Don't you do it all the time?" Jack questioned.

"Duh! For my own amusement!" Rainbow grinned.

"Oh just shaddup!" Jack growled.

"Calm down you two." Twilight said sternly. "We have no time to be fighting. We need to keep on investigating if we're gonna figure out the mysteries behind this ship."

"Quite." Mason nodded, examining a nearby Walmart district. While we looked around the place, I came across Fluttershy who was looking over at a nearby pet shop, and ironically, no animals were in it.

"Hey Flutters, what's wrong?" I asked in concern.

"Oh hi Ren..." Fluttershy sighed. "I was just looking over this pet shop, but nothing there. No animals in there and I was so excited to see the cute little critters."

"Yeah, that does seem weird." I stated, gazing at the store with a confused look. I don't get it, what's the point of a pet shop if there's no animals in there to adopt here.

“You know Ren, I never knew that the home-ship would have this…umm…so many places.” Fluttershy, looking at the empty animal shop with a soft grin. “But it’s a shame that there’s no animals in here. I would really enjoy playing and talking with them.”

I rubbed my cheek in embarrassment and replied “Yeah, so it would seem.”

“Amazing, just how many floors does this ship have?” Twilight said in awe before hearing a squeal, which we were all too familiar with.

“Hey, wasn’t that the crazy pink pony?” Jack asked, blinking in surprise.

“Oh boy…” Applejack sighed before we ran inside of the mall’s playground and saw Pinkie…sliding down a slide. 

“Woo-hoo! This is so fun! Who knew malls can be so much fun?!” Pinkie laughed while we gave out deadpanned looks upon seeing this.

“Well…I guess we should’ve seen that coming.” Kaede chuckled nervously.

“Yeah…” I nodded before noticing Pinkie behind me. “AH! Holy cow, where did you come from?”

“Oh, I was just standing right next to you just a few seconds ago.” Pinkie answered.

“B-but…” Jamie looked over at the playground with a confused look before looking back at Pinkie. “You weren’t even around us just now.”

“Just drop it already.” Mason sighed. “We’ve already discussed this by now, so we’re used to it by now.”

“I-I know…” Jamie sighed before copying some notes down with a sulk look on his face. “I just can’t help it…”

“AHHHHH!” Now what? We looked over to our left to see Rarity in a beauty shop with an extremely excited look that you’ve possibly ever see a girl can ever make. “Look at all of these perfumes! These shampoos! T-These equipment! I am in heaven right now!”

“Rarity, please calm down.” Mason begged with a concern look. “I understand that you have not seen these type of stuff considering that these belong in our world, but you need to relax and stay calm.”

“Right, right…stay calm Rarity, stay calm…” Unfortunately, as she took some deep breaths, she let out a squeal before passing out with a smile onto her face. 

"I spoke too soon." Mason sighed before walking over to the fashion shop and picked her up while she remained unconscious at the moment.

"That's very nice of you to help her up, Mason." Kaede grinned. "That's a very chivalrous thing to do for a lady."

"That's what I've been taught when I was in training to become a personal bodyguard for Elena." Mason grinned.

"It is quite true." Jamie agreed. "While it quite questionable due to your...choice of clothing, you are quite helpful just like the maids and butlers back at home."

"I'll admit, these are not quite good clothing I wear." Mason smiled nervously before looking down at Rarity with a soft grin. "But Elena suggested that I need to wear this in order to hide my identity for others not to know that I am her personal guard."

"Hmm...good point." Jamie nodded.

"So where to next?!" Pinkie asked, eager to explore more of the place. "I want to explore more of this place! Especially of that 'Walmart' place I saw earlier!"

"Well I already checked up the place and there's nothing much but a bunch of stores that sells clothes, games, and other junk." Rainbow Dash explained.

"But no clues relating to our missing memories, right?" Kaede asked, which she replied by shaking her head. Kaede slumped down sadly and muttered "Just great..."

"Don't worry, I'm sure there's gotta be some clue in this ship." Twilight assured with confidence. "We won't give up!"

"Yeah, especially about that letter Ren found." Jamie nodded. "We've been trying to decipher and it was too smudged it."

"Speaking of which, have you and Twilight decipher the letter from all those smudges?" Mason questioned. 

"No." Twilight shook her head. "I've tried applying many appliances and spells to remove the smudges, but it didn't work. I'm not sure why it didn't work..."

"Maybe...that letter must've been there for so long in that room that it didn't work?" Fluttershy suggested.

"That might be a possibility." Jamie sighed sadly. "But even so, something doesn't add up..."

"Well don't worry you guys, we just need to hope that we'll be able to fully read it." I chuckled with a grin, cheering Jamie and Twilight a bit before noticing the confused look on Kodi as he looked around the place. "What's wrong boy?"

"Has anyone seen Rantaro and Nicole?" Now that caused us to realize that we couldn't find those two. Okay, how in Equestria did we not noticed that? 

"Hmph!" Jack scoffed, walking off with his hands in his pockets. "That guys must've ditched us."

"Come on Jack! Be nice!" Fluttershy begged. "I'm sure both Rantaro and Nicole are just exploring this place together."

"Speaking of which, you fellas told us that this Nicole girl is quite hard to communicate, right?" Applejack asked with a raised brow.

"Well, she is." Twilight nodded. "Trust me, she kept catching me off-guard by guessing everything to say."

"Yeah, it's like she can read minds." Spike grinned. "That takes the 'psych' in psychology."

"That's technically not wrong there." Jamie agreed. 

"Ooh! Maybe she's really a psychic! Ooh, I can't wait for her to guess what I say!" Pinkie exclaimed, bouncing a bit in joy.

"Ugh, I'm still annoyed with her ignoring or not even replying back on what we even say." Rainbow scoffed, crossing her hooves with an annoyed look.

"Come on Dash, be nice to her." I said with a slightly stern look.

"No, I'm with Skittles on that." Jack scoffed, rubbing his back a bit. "She's a pain in the butt to communicate."

"Is she that bad to communicate?" Applejack raised a brow. Oh right, they haven't met her yet. 

"Well a little but she's a good person by heart." I assured with a soft grin. "She's just...quite unsure of herself?"

"Unsure of herself? What the hay does that even mean?" 

"We'll just show you who she is once we find those two." I sighed before we began heading over to the second floor of the mall district and kept looking around before seeing both Rantaro and Nicole walking out of an apple store with Rantaro holding onto a box of an Apple Mac Laptop in his hands and Nicole having a stern look on her face while Gizmo was busy sitting on his hat with a cheesy pretzel in his hands, taking a bite of it.

"So why are you taking that Apple Mac Laptop?" Nicole questioned.

"So what? There's no one here and we can practically do whatever we want." Rantaro answered with a small smile. "Besides, you're not my mom."

Gizmo raised his half-eaten cheesy pretzel in the air, agreeing with Rantaro's statement. Nicole looked at him for a while going back onto her iPad.

"Good point." Nicole shrugged.

"Hey!" I called, gaining their attention. "There you guys are!"

"Oh great, it's you." Rantaro scoffed. "Now what kid? Can't ya see that I'm busy minding my own business?"

"Heh heh, sorry you guys." I apologized, rubbing the back of my head while the others came over here as well. "We were just worried about you two."

"I am fine." Nicole stated before gazing at Applejack, Pinkie, and Rarity, who seemed to finally starts to waken up from Mason's arms.

"O-ohh...what just happened?" Rarity asked in confusion before looking over at Mason and after a few blinks, she blushed in embarrassment upon realizing that Mason was carrying her. "O-oh Mason! I-I never knew that you would carry me..."

"Y-yeah...I felt worried about leaving you behind, t-that's all." Mason replied before gently placing her down on the ground. "You okay?"

"Y-yes I am. Thank you for your concern, Mason darling." Mason smiled over at her, along with Rarity while the others blinked in confusion and surprise. Well those two seemed to get pretty along.

"Hmm..." Nicole looked at those two for a while before looking away with her gaze shifted towards the iPad. 

"So what's up with the weird box thing you have, Rantaro?" Kodi asked, tilting his head curiously before walking up to him and sniffing the box. 

"This here is a new little toy of mine." Rantaro grinned. "Lucky me, eh? Gotta hand it to our kidnapper for allowing us to keep things like that."

"But Rantaro...we're not even sure if we were even taken to this place." Jamie pointed out meekly. 

"Yes yes, I know. We only got theories and all that junk. So what?" Rantaro shrugged with a grin. "If it beats than making sure to stay away from the police for a while, am I right?"

"I see, so you're running off from the police, eh?" Applejack questioned suspiciously.

"Makes sense considering what Jamie, Mason, and Jack said is true about him being a criminal." Rainbow huffed, glaring at Rantaro. 

"Whatever. Say what you want." Rantaro chuckled before looking over at Mason. "By the way Mason, I couldn't help but notice that you were quite familiar to me."

"What?" He asked, not following what he meant by that.

"What I mean is that I once saw your face from one of your darling princess's party she does whenever she comes by to the U.S." Rantaro explained, causing Mason to glare at him.

"How do you know that?" 

"Well duh! I was there because I felt like it. Thought I could see something exciting for the old 'vault'." Rantaro shrugged nonchalantly.

"Old...vault?" Fluttershy asked in confusion.

"I think he means for the memories, Flutters." I answered, which she nodded in understanding.

"See, he gets it." Rantaro snickered. "Now excuse me, I rather head back to my room to test out this baby and probably gonna go back on my business on giving info to these gullible and naive ponies."

"Hey! That's just mean!" Pinkie pointed out. Rantaro gave her an annoyed glance and replied "What? I was just-"

"Pointing out the truth, that's what he was trying to say." Nicole explained before glancing over to the three. "And I have a feeling that you are also more friends of Ren and Twilight?"

"Yes, names Applejack!" Applejack tipped her hat to her.

"I'm Rarity. It is quite an honor to meet you darling." Rarity bowed a bit to her.

"Hi, I'm Pinkie Pie and it's so nice to finally meet you!" Pinkie called, bouncing right in front of her. However, she wasn't surprised by her...well, she was HARDLY surprised by her. "Ooh! You look pretty smart with those glasses on ya! I wonder...are you a psychic? Ooh! Ooh! What number am I thinking?"

"...I told you your friend before that I'm not a psychic." Nicole stated, glancing away from her.

"Heh heh, sorry about my friend here, it's just that-"

"She loves being hyperactive and is super excited to meet new ponies, am I right?" Nicole guessed, which caught Applejack off-guard. 

"...Yeeeah." Applejack nodded with widened eyes. "How in tarnation-"

"...Did I figured that you would say that?" Nicole guessed again, surprising Applejack before glancing away and walking off in silence. 

"Jeez, for a psychologist, she sure loves to just walk off in front of people." Rantaro scoffed.

"Sorry." Nicole sighed. "I'm not that too comfortable with large crowds."

"But we're not much of a large crowd." Kodi pointed out, looking at her curiously. Nicole looked at him for a while before bending down and started scratching him underneath the chin, much to his joy. "Ooh yeah! I love that! That's the spot!"

"Ahh, I never knew that you have a liking towards animals." Fluttershy cooed in joy. "Say, do you have a pet, Nicole?"

"I do." Nicole answered bluntly.

"Oh wow, really?" Kaede asked, feeling a bit excited to see her pet. "What is it?"

"Oh, you'll be in a real surprise to see that pet of hers." Rantaro answered before he began walking off.

"Hey wait! What are you talking about?!" Rainbow demanded. Rantaro didn't answer as he tried to walk off, but he was pacing himself more faster. 

I blinked in surprise before turning to Mason and asked "Hey, is it just me or is Rantaro...running away?"

"Yes, that is quite strange." Mason nodded. 

"Who cares about him?" Jack shrugged. 

"I agree with fatty." Rainbow shrugged. 

"So what's your pet name? Is it a puppy like Kodiak was before? Or a kitty like Rosy?" Fluttershy asked excitedly.

"Well I'm sure she has a pet that's common for psychologists." Jamie smiled a bit. 

"Yeah, like the ones Fluttershy suggested." Twilight nodded with a grin. "Or like a bird specimen like Owlicious."

"Or maybe a mouse?" Spike offered. Nicole glanced away from us for a while before letting out a whistle and before you know it, we heard a loud roar and heard a scream coming from the other side.

"What the heck?!" Kaede exclaimed.

"What the hell was that?!" Jack demanded.

"It sounded like it came from where Rantaro went!" Kodi pointed out before running towards the scene, which the rest of us followed after. We kept following after Kodi till we arrived to the scene and saw an unbelievable scene.

"What in Equestria is that?!" Rarity gasped in shock, jumping into Mason's arms in fear. It turned out it was none other than a polar bear. No seriously, a real live on! Normally, you would see a polar bear on the National Geography Channel, or at a zoo. But seeing one this up close is just shocking and bewildering to us all. 

"Is that a polar bear?!" Pinkie gasped, but in an exciting tone before exclaiming "Wowie zowie! I didn't know that you guys can keep polar bears as pets! Why didn't I know that from the beginning?!"

"Yeah, that's Snow." Nicole explained with a soft smile. "My friend."

"Oh dear!" Fluttershy gasped, seeing the big polar bear licking Rantaro, who held an annoyed look while Gizmo raised his paw in protest while Kodiak walked over to Snow with a smile.

"Hi there!" Kodi called, gaining Snow's attention. "I'm Kodiak! Nice to meet ya, Snow!"

Snow waved her paw with a smile before licking his face, causing half of the fur on his face to be wet but he didn't mind as he laughed.

"Well at least we know that Snow is friendly." I grinned.

"B-but...!" We looked over to see Jamie hiding behind Twilight and Spike in fear. "W-why would a psychologist like Nicole have a polar bear for a pet?!"

"Wow...and I thought Pinkie Pie owning a gator was rough." Applejack whispered to Rainbow Dash, who nodded in agreement.

"Ooh!" Pinkie said in awe. "Nice choice! Polar bears are so cute! You and I are so alike, Nikki!"

"Please don't call me that..." Nicole said, looking away from her before walking over to Snow and petted her polar bear's face. "Come along Snow, let's head over back to our room."

Snow nodded before hopping off of Rantaro, who wiped away the saliva off his face with a grunt before putting his fedora back on just as Gizmo hopping onto his shoulder and nodded in agreement with the same look as Rantaro.

"Ugh...that's not gonna wash off for a while." Rantaro scoffed with Gizmo hopped back onto his shoulder with the same look his owner had.

"Hold on!" Kaede called. "Where are you going? I thought that we were going to investigate the place together?" 

"I'm sorry, but I'm not comfortable around other people." Nicole replied, glancing towards us. 

"Come on!" Rainbow grunted, rubbing her hooves across her face.

"Are you kidding me right now?" Jack grunted.

"Rainbow Dash! Jack! Be polite!" Rarity scolded, only to earn an annoyed look from the both of them. Mason stepped forward with a serious look and said "Listen Nicole, we can understand your reasons but the more you try to separate from us, the more we grow suspicious of your actions. You need to at least try and get along with us."

"I wished...but I can't." Nicole answered. "However, I may be useful in your investigations, but not in relationships."

"B-but I thought that we were super duper awesome friends!" Pinkie remarked with a sad and worried look. Nicole looked at her for a while before glancing away to her left and replied "No...I'm just not good with relationships except with Snow."

Snow roared in agreement as Nicole scratched it underneath the chin. "Now then, we should get going and we'll try to at least find any clues involving our memories."

"You know about you losing your memories already?!" Jamie exclaimed in surprise. "Did you study us a bit with your observation skills?"

"Yes." Nicole answered before she began walking away and probably headed to her room.

"She's gone..." Fluttershy muttered.

"Ahh..." Pinkie muttered, looking down sadly. "And I thought that we could be good friends."

"Tch! Let her be!" Jack scoffed. "No matter what, we can't get close to that girl as long as she keeps reading our minds."

"For once, I agree with the biker." Rantaro sighed. "Especially if that polar bear of hers tries and attack me again with its lick attacks."

"I take it you've encountered that bear when ya first found her?" Applejack guessed.

"Yeah, so?" Rantaro scoffed. 

"B-but we didn't see any polar bear when we were exploring the new floors." Jamie pointed out.

"Yeah, so how do you explain that?" Kaede wondered.

"That bear was sleeping in her room the other day, that's why you didn't noticed her." Rantaro explained, much to me and Kodi's shock.

"But we've been there before!" I exclaimed.

"And we didn't even see a bear with white fur in there when we went investigating the place!" Kodi added, also shocked by that revelation. Rantaro gave us both a smirk before saying "Guess you weren't looking hard enough."

Yeah, I guess so...

"Are we sure that we can even trust your word?" Jack growled. 

"And if I'm possibly lying?" Rantaro raised a brow with a shrug.

"Then I'll beat the crap out of ya." Jack cracked his fists until Mason blocked his way with his left arm extended in the way.

"Please, don't. Fighting against each other won't resolve anything." Mason scolded.

"He's right, we all need to work together." I added with a serious look. 

"Ren's right!" Fluttershy nodded, walking next to me with a concern yet stern look. "Could you please, like...not fight each other, Jack?"

Jack let out a scoff before looking away with a light blush and said "W-whatever...only because you're too soft for me to even both to argue."

"Oh...okay." Fluttershy smiled softly. 

"Guys, now's not the time." Twilight stated. "Right now, we're trying our best to find more clues about helping you guys find a way to get back to your pasts, but overall, our leads have getting nowhere and you guys haven't been remembering some stuff."

"Not true." Jack retorted. "I've been remembering some stuff...just forgot..."

"Of course you did..." Rainbow grunted. "Now you guys haven't been remembering any stuff for a while and we've haven't got a clue on how to get you guys back to your planet!"

"Wait Rainbow!" I begged with a worried look. "I'm sure we've been remembering stuff like about the part where I met a group of guys in black about some deal they were making which I was refusing."

"Oh yeah? Did you ever happen to figure out what they were talking about?" Rainbow raised a brow, causing me to slump my head down with a sad look. 

"No..." 

"Exactly! This has been a waste of time!" Rainbow growled.

"Rainbow Dash! Settle down!" Rarity scolded before taking a deep breath. "Look, we're all need a break. How about we do a little shopping?"

"Yeah, I think I needed that." Kaede rubbed her head bashfully with a small smile. "Besides, I'm sure we can clear our heads from all this searching for more clues."

We all looked at them for a while before looking at ourselves before letting out smiles. 

"Yeah! I do wanted to explore and see what a mall is like!" Kodi said in excitement. "This is my first time to ever be here before!"

"You can say that again!" I laughed with a grin, only to be grabbed ahold by Jack who held a toothily grin along with Mason in a massive bear hug. 

"Yeah, I guess we kinda need it. I'm hella starve!" Jack laughed, only to received widened eyes from Fluttershy, Jamie, Kaede, Kodi, Mason, and I. Mason stepped on his foot, causing him to yelp in surprise before glaring angrily at Mason and exclaimed "What the hell?!"

"Jack!" Mason pulled him by the collar and whispered "Are you serious right now? Remember, we can't let then know about us eating meat? Do you remember what we said about that? We only have to eat what they eat in Equestria, that way that they won't be freaked out by us!"

"Oh...right..." Jack rubbed his head bashfully, remembering our last conversation about that. "Fine..."

"Promise?" I asked, which he nodded. "Pinkie Promise?"

"Ugh..." Jack sighed before setting us down on the ground and did the Pinkie Promise gestures and said "Cross my heart, hope to die, stick a needle in my eye."

"...Well alright then." Despite him doing a different kind of Pinkie Promise, but overall, at least he accepted it.

"What are you guys talking about?" Twilight questioned. Me and Jack gave her nervous smiles while Mason crossed his arms with a serious look on his face, not showing any lie about it.

"Oh, it's nothing Twi." I assured with a nervous chuckle.

"It's none of ya business. This is man to man business." Jack patted me on the head while Mason nodded and replied "Indeed. We're sorry but it's something we can't tell you."

"Are you sure?" Twilight asked, feeling eager to learn from us. "What is it that you guys want to hide from us?"

"Umm...T-Twilight?" Jamie called. "I-it's nothing. Please."

Twilight looked at him with a soft smile before sighing and said "Alright...only because you said it."

"Well...thank you." Jamie looked away with a blush. "W-why not we head at the first floor of the mall? I-I think t-there's a book shop there. Perhaps there are some good books that you never read before due to being in...umm...different worlds?"

Twilight beamed at that idea with a bright smile before exclaiming "Would I?! You should never that I always enjoy reading the nice books! Come on!"

She grabbed him by the tie, forcing him to come along and show her that bookstore he claimed to see with Spike sighing and following after them. 

"Oh well, might've as well chased after them before they go 'geek mode'." Spike sighed with a soft grin. 

"Well I'm off heading back to the farm." Applejack said as she began walking away and headed down the stairs. "You coming Mason?"

"I'll catch up by the noon. I promise." Mason replied, which earned a smile on Applejack's face.

"Good to hear!" Applejack smiled before walking down the stairs and headed over to the central elevator, which we've began calling that elevator due to showing us the other floors of this home-ship, before walking inside of it and entering it.

"Well excuse me but I'm off to shop some new human clothing and gained inspiration on making new designs." Rarity chuckled with a smile before turning to Kaede. "Kaede darling, would you like to accompany me?"

"You bet!" Kaede smiled happily. "I am so excited to see what they got!" 

"Same here!" Rarity exclaimed before she and Kaede squealed in delight, causing us all to cover our ears in pain. 

"Yeah, don't ever do that again." Rantaro said with a slightly annoyed look on his face. With that, both Rarity and Kaede ran away towards a nearby clothes store. 

"Now excuse me..." Pinkie pulled a massive grin before putting on a party hat and said "I'm gonna head over to the Party City store and go and buy more of that party stuff to spread out more parties over at Ponyville! Woo-hoo!"

With that, she began back flipping towards the Party City store while we all had sweat-drops at her randomness. 

"That pink pony will always remain in my 'Top 10 Annoyances of my life' list." Rantaro scoffed. 

"You said it." Jack couldn't help but agree with him there.

"Please boys, don't be mean to Pinkie Pie." Fluttershy softly scolded. "She may be a little weird, but her weirdness always helps brings us a smile like when Ren encourages us to keep moving forward with smiles on our faces."

I blushed and rubbed the back of my head with a sheepish grin and replied "W-well...I suppose so..."

"Quite, for a young 15 year old, he sure does know how to encourage people." Mason softly grinned over me, but I barely see that through that red scarf of his, but I know that he's smiling. 

"Thanks, I guess." I chuckled nervously, rubbing my head.

"Whatever." Rainbow stretched her forehooves with a really tired out look. "If you excuse me, I'm gonna rest over at that bench."

With that, she flew over to one of the mall's benches and took a snooze there, which caused us all to laugh nervously and sweat-dropped a little. 

"Heh heh, good old Dashy, eh?" Kodi joked, which I nodded in agreement.

Suddenly, we heard the central elevator, which we decided to call upon due to leading us to different floors of the home-ship, opened up and revealed the Cutie-Mark Crusaders and Carrie walking in. I took noticed that there were wearing ecru hats like journalists and news reporters wear when interviewing people about live news, and they held notepads in their hands and or hooves.

"Whoa!" The three younger fillies said in awe. "When ya said that it was big and amazing, I didn't know that it was THIS big and amazing." Apple Bloom said in awe.

"Yeah! It makes ya feel like your princess of the world!" Sweetie Belle commented, examining some of the stores names.

"Carrie?" Mason raised a brow. "What are you and your friends doing here? Shouldn't you be at school?"

"Oh we were!" Carrie answered with a grin. "You see, we just signed up for the Journalist club and so we're just after a big scoop!"

"Really? A big scoop you say?" Rantaro asked, feeling a bit intrigued upon hearing that. "Well that's quite something to admire. If you want, I could tell you of my latest deals I made in the Underworld Society."

"Thanks, but no thanks Mr. Rantaro." Sweetie Belle rejected his offer with an innocent smile, causing him to blink in surprise with a little sweat-drop while his fedora tipped down a bit and Gizmo snickering at his friend. 

"Well...damn." Rantaro muttered.

"You joined a club that makes newspapers?" I asked rhetorically. "That's awesome!"

"Thanks Ren!" Apple Bloom giggled. "We're only doing this for one thing only!"

The three fillies bumped their rumps together with grins and shouted "Cutie Marks!"

"Of course you would." Mason chuckled before turning to his sister and asked "And I guess being a journalist might be a little hobby of yours, eh?"

"Yep! Just wanna try it out and see how fun it is!" Carrie said with determination before frowning a bit. "So far, we haven't made any good discoveries or news anypony wants to read."

"Really?" Kodi asked incredulously. "But don't ponies normally like read stuff no matter what it is."

"I know right?" Scootaloo scoffed. "Everypony's a critic."

"Tell me about it." Rantaro shrugged before rubbing his chin in thought. "But you know, why not you write a news report about something that pizzazz's the crowd. Like something you can make up to make ponies really amazes them."

"I know. I thought coming here and interviewing you guys might be a great idea to enjoy." Carrie explained. "I mean, I'm sure the many ponies of Ponyville are so eager to learn more about you guys!"

"Really?" I asked incredulous.

"Ooh, that sounds so nice." Fluttershy giggled. "I'm sure you girls will do an amazing job at being journalists for the school news."

"Seriously, who reads the school news?" Jack rolled his eyes. "I rather go watch TV and take a nap like what Rainbow Dash is doing."

"Wait, Rainbow Dash is here?!" Scootaloo shouted in awe and excitement.

"Yeah, she's just taking a nap over there." Kodi pointed over to Dash, who was still snoozing over by the mall's bench like a little baby. 

"No way!" Scootaloo shouted in amazement before covering her mouth, not wanting to wake her up. "I-I mean...no way."

"Well it's best if you don't wake her up." Fluttershy suggested. "She's been investigating with the rest of us for a while now and you know how you like it when she takes a power nap."

"Yeah, and if I know about taking naps is that you never interrupt the one taking a nap." Jack added, scratching his butt a little. "Specifically, me."

"Okay." Carrie smiled. "Ooh! How about an interview big brother? Can we please?"

"Heh heh, okay sis." Mason nodded with a smile.

"Hey, I want in on it too!" I offered, raising my hand in the air.

"Meh, I've seen better. Don't wanna give out much about myself." Rantaro replied before walking off. 

"Well he's gone..." Kodi watched him leave with Gizmo by his side. "Say, can I join in too on this interview? I wanna see what it's like to be in one!"

"Say Flutters, you want in?" Fluttershy froze at that before looking down at the girls' excited looks on their faces, causing her to glanced away nervously. "W-well..."

"Don't worry, I'll be by your side." I assured with a wink, which made Fluttershy smile softly at that idea. 

"O-Okay...I trust you Ren." Fluttershy smiled.

"Awesome!" Scootaloo cheered.

"Our first interview!" Sweetie Belle cheered. 

"About time!" Apple Bloom grinned.

"Come on! Let's go over to the food court and discuss our interview there!" Carrie offered, which we all nodded in agreement and also because we heard the loud rumbling from Jack's stomach, prompting us to give him weird looks.

"What?" He asked bluntly. 

Well...this might be a long interview. 



My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
Later
We soon headed over to the food court to prepare ourselves for the little interview, which consist of me, Fluttershy, Kodiak, Mason, and Jack. Carrie and the Crusaders looked at us with excited grins as Scootaloo cleared her throat and said "So tell us, what're your names?"

"Oh, well it's Ren Loodan." I introduced myself with a grin.

"Names Jack Yamaki."

"I am Mason Hunter." 

"I'm Kodiak!"

"A-And...I-I'm Fluttershy..." Fluttershy mumbled nervously, only to receive confused looks from the girls.

"I'm sorry, what?" Sweetie Belle asked, not hearing what she said.

"I-I'm...Fluttershy..." She spoke up a little louder, but not enough for the others to hear.

"What?" Scootaloo asked.

"Hold on!" I stopped them with a somewhat nervous look. "She's just introducing herself as Fluttershy, that's all."

"Oh, okay." Scootaloo grinned as the girls began copying down notes before looking back and asked "So tell us, what exactly are a bunch of specimen are doing here in Equestria?"

"Well...we don't know honestly." I rubbed my cheek with an embarrassed look.

“In case you forgot, we can’t remember anything on how we even gotten in this damn place!” Jack exclaimed.

“Calm down Jack.” Mason said sternly before turning back to his sister and friends. “Anyway, what my friend is trying to say is that we don’t remember on how we got here. We’ve been wondering about that for a while and yet we don’t remember a thing. Surely you remember that, right Carrie?”

“Sure do big brother!” Carrie smiled happily before writing down some notes. 

“But surely you guys haven’t been thinking about your missing memories, right?” Sweetie Belle questioned.

“No, of course not.” I shook my head with a grin on my face. “We’ve been wondering much about our missing memories for a while. I think we had dreams of them, but haven’t been remembering much about it.”

“Boy, you sure missed being at your home planet, huh?” Scootaloo wondered aloud.

“Well yeah, we have our friends and families back home.” I pointed out. 

“And while on that…” Sweetie Belle turned to Mason with an innocent smile and asked “Tell me Mason, do you have anyone that you’re particularly close to?”

Mason glanced away with a light blush and soft smile on his face.

“W-well…there is one person that I want to see again. It’s Elena, it’s almost been a year with me and my sister being here in your world but we haven’t found a way back nor had any contact to our world.” Mason explained. “I just wished I could see her again. I don’t care what’s happening, all I care is about how she’s doing and the rest of the royal family.”

“Don’t worry big brother, I’m sure Elena’s alright.” Carrie assured with a soft grin. “She’s tough, so I know that she’s not giving up on finding us.”

“Right…” Mason nodded with a smile.

“Well…” Sweetie Belle make a sneaky smile on her face before asking “Do you, by chance, have any crush on a certain white unicorn sister of mine?”

That’s what caught Mason off-guard as his face turned red and exclaimed “I-I am sorry, I would not want to answer that question!”

“Come on, we’re all eager!” Sweetie Belle pleaded.

“Alright Sweetie Belle, that’s enough.” Fluttershy insisted with a light chuckle. “You heard Mason, he wishes not to answer that.”

“Hey, he already plead the fifth.” I agreed while trying my best not to laugh. Seriously though, isn’t that funny to hear Rarity’s own sister asking him something like that?

“Well about you big guy?” Scootaloo asked Jack. “I’ve noticed you exercising with Jamie, Mason, and Ren the other day, care to tell us why?”

“We just want to exercise, that’s all.” Jack answered, picking his ear a bit. “That’s all I can tell ya.”

“Ahh, can you tell us more?” Apple Bloom begged.

“No!” Jack yelled, much to their disappointment. Apple Bloom then turned to me and asked “So Ren, how is it that you’re so good at art?”

“Oh, I done plenty of arts and crafts when I was in middle school.” I explained. “It’s pretty much a fun subject but I was kinda shy and embarrassed to admit my talents to other people other than my family.”

“Really?” Apple Bloom asked in surprise. “But you look like you don’t mind anything about ya being revealed over the year.”

“Yeah…I figured…” I chuckled while Carrie walked over to Kodiak and asked “So Kodi, I’ve always been wondering since I first met you…How did you ever learn to talk?”

“Oh that?” Kodi chuckled, wagging his tail a bit. “It’s pretty much a long story but to cut it short, it was because I wanted to see how ponies do it.”

“Do it?” Fluttershy asked curiously. Kodi nodded to her before replying “Yeah, I always hear them talking so much from where I was born and so one day, I tried it out but it took longer to even pronounce words.”

“Wait what?” I asked in confusion. “But Twilight told me that a few animals are born with the ability to talk when we first met. This is the first time I’m hearing about this.”
“Me too.” Fluttershy nodded. “Umm…did you…learn it yourself?”

“W-well…yeah.” Kodi nodded, his smile turning into a frown. “It’s a long story…but maybe another time.”

I nodded before patting him on the back, causing him to smile back at me while I smiled back at him. But you know, this is quite weird. If Kodi never been born with the ability to talk, does that mean…he learned it on his own? That’s…awesome! I wonder what Jamie and Twilight’s reaction upon ever finding out about that from Kodiak? Probably geeking out or something Jack and Spike would say.

“Anyway…” Mason looked over at the clock, seeing the hour hand turning to twelve. “I should get going. I’m about to head off to Sweet Apple Acres to work.”

“Oh right, you work there.” Jack snorted. “Well be back. Remember, I want to have an arm wrestling match to test more of your strength.”

“Hmm…Challenge accepted.” Oh boy…these two are acting like friendly rivals, or maybe deadly rivals that want to prove to each other who’s the strongest like Goku and Vegeta from the DBZ/DBS series.

“Ahh…” The girls sighed sadly as Carrie looked at her brother and asked “Can’t you stay for five more minutes?” 

“Sorry Carrie, but I promise that you can ask me more questions after work...” Mason offered.

Carrie thought for a while before letting out a sigh and smiling softly at her brother. “Okay big brother.”

“Well…” Apple Bloom tapped her pen by the chin before turning to Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo as she asked “What do you girls think? Wanna end the interview for now? I mean, I’m sure we got plenty of info that we can share for the school news. I’m sure everypony are eager to learn more about these guys, right?”

“Yeah.” Scootaloo shrugged.

“You betcha!” Sweetie Belle smiled. “Soon enough, we’ll get those journalists cutie-marks!”

“Yeah!” The four girls cheered loudly before bidding us farewell and immediately took their leave with Mason following after them before turning back to us and said “Well I better go, see ya you guys.”

“See ya Mase!” I grinned while waving goodbye at him before he took his leave out of the mall district and the home-ship to go over to Sweet Apple Acres to work. Jack turned to me with a confused look and asked “Hey kid, when did Mason started working there?”

“Hmm…” I thought for a while, trying to remember when it happened. “I guess you can say about two months during the Zap Apple Jam.”
“Zap apple jam? The hell is that?” Jack asked.

“Oh right, you and Rantaro weren’t there for it.” I chuckled, rubbing my head bashfully.

“Well either way, I’m glad those girls joined a club.” Fluttershy smiled. “They looked pretty excited but I’m not so sure if they’re gonna get their cutie marks.”

“Don’t sweat it, Flutters.” I assured with a soft grin. “Maybe once they start getting good with their little club activity, then I’m sure they’re gonna do well in it, right?”

“Yeah.” Kodi nodded in agreement. “I mean, we all started off badly but sooner or later we started to get good with what we do best, right?”

“Yeah.” Fluttershy nodded. “It took me about a year to fully learn what the animals are saying after I earned my cutie-mark.”

“Same here.” Jack rubbed his nose a bit before saying “It took me about several weeks to catch up with my old man and the rest of the gang. I was all the way at the back of the gang, but sooner or later, I started to improve and managed to ride alongside my old man. It was a proud moment there.”

“Well I guess maybe for you.” I chuckled nervously before noticing the others walking by to the food court with happy smiles and such. Twilight and Jamie were discussing about books of astronomy while Spike held a Marvels Comic book in his hands with an interested look on his face while carrying a wagon filled with many books. Yikes, those two went full-out on that book shop, did they? 

Rarity and Kaede held many bags in their arms, probably from all the shopping from that clothes store they entered. Pinkie Pie…well, she nearly looked like a clown for a minute there due to all the party outfits she’s been wearing.

“Ahh, it was such a wonderful experience.” Rarity sighed in joy.

“I know right? I haven’t done any shopping for such a long time since getting here.” Kaede chuckled in agreement.

“I know right? Now I have more books than ever to read and bring back to the library.” Twilight said, not gazing at us while she and Jamie read each different book about astronomy. 

“Quite, and it would be quite amazing for others to learn more about our world. Think of it as…culture shock.” Jamie smiled happily.

“Yeah, you two keep dreaming on that.” Spike rolled his eyes. “I wanna hurry up and read this comic book I got from that comic shop called ‘Marvels Comics’.”

“Oh wow, didn’t know they had something like that here!” I said in excitement. “I bet they even got some mangas that I haven’t read like Inuyasha and more of My Hero Academia and Assassination Classroom!”

“Those are some…peculiar names for a bunch of books.” Rarity remarked, raising a brow at me.

"Hey! I love mangas, alright?" I asked, pouting my cheeks at her while the rest just laughed at me. 

"You know, we should do this more often." Kodi suggested.

"Agreed!" Pinkie nodded in agreement before blowing into a loud party kazoo, immediately waking up Rainbow Dash as she stood up and raised her hoof in a salute and exclaimed "I'm up! I'm up!"

"About time, Skittles." Jack grinned, causing the rest of us to laugh while Rainbow Dash blushed in embarrassment.

"S-Shut up!" She exclaimed.

"You know, maybe Kodiak has a point." Kaede insisted. "We've been working very hard lately and maybe we do need a break." 

"Yeah." I nodded. "How about we spend the rest of the day by relaxing and having fun by the other places here in the home-ship? I mean, we can go swimming by the basement's pool and such. That'll be fun and awesome, right?"

"Yeah, that could work." Twilight smiled. "I guess we really do need a break." 

"You can say that again." Rarity sighed happily. "After all the hard work we've all been through the past months, I don't think we ever had a break."

"You can say that again." I nodded in agreement with a smile. "We can invite everyone to join in on the fun!"

"Even Rantaro and that psychologist?" Jack grunted, which I nodded. "Good luck on trying to convince those two."

"Come on, I'm sure it'll work out." I assured with a soft grin.

"Yeah, have more faith Jack." Fluttershy said, only to receive a grunt from him, much to her disappointment. "Oh well...so do you guys wanna meet up tomorrow at noon? I think that's the only time that I'm free."

"I see why not." Rarity nodded with a smile. "I'll be sure to let Applejack know. Right now, I should go and try out these designs to match them on pony sizes."

"Me too!" Kaede grinned before the two began walking away. 

"In the meantime, me and Twilight are going to look over these books back to the library." Jamie said, placing the book back on the wagon while Spike carried it.

"And tonight, we're gonna have a little night study on it!" Twilight squealed in excitement before she and Jamie began taking her leave.

"Yeah, I rather get out and go practice more of my tricks!" Rainbow stretched her back before flying off. "Catch ya in the flip side!"

With that, the others began taking their leave, leaving me, Kodi, Fluttershy, and Jack alone in the mall district.

"Well, I do need a good break." Jack yawned. "But I'm still not convince that broker and psychologist chick is gonna join us in our day-off."

"Well I have high hopes that they will!" I assured with a confident smirk. "Trust me that they will come."

"Well if Ren says so, then I'll believe in him!" Kodi grinned with Fluttershy nodding in agreement before saying "Mm-hmm! I'm sure Ren can convince those two to come."

"Whatever, you guys are unbelievable." Jack scoffed. "Now excuse me, I'm gonna grab a burger."

Fluttershy irked at that idea until I gave Jack a stern look and said "Jack, we've been through this! We can't eat meat in this world! If everyone sees us eating that then imagine just how their reactions are!"

"Hey! Shut up!" Jack hissed before pushing me through and headed towards one of the food places in the food courts while I sighed, realizing that there's no way convincing someone like him.

Fluttershy walked over and comforted me by holding onto my hand with her hoof, which made me to look at her. "Don't worry Ren, it's understandable that you and the others are trying to adapt in our world, but what if the others do know about you guys eating meat?"

I rubbed the back of my neck in thought. I can imagine that they would scream and be terrified of us. I don't want that to happen, but...I know that we might be able to convince the other ponies that there's nothing to be afraid of us. I'm sure the ponies here aren't that cruel, right?

"I can imagine..." I sighed before turning to her with a soft smile. "But don't worry, I'm sure that even if it happens, we'll be able to convince everypony in Ponyville that we're not gonna eat them nor eat any meat as long as we're here. Besides, the food here in Equestria are quite delicious despite being made of hay."

"Well it's nice to hear that you enjoy our diet." Fluttershy giggled. "Well anyway, I should get going and I hope we meet again tomorrow at noon."

"You bet!" I nodded with a smile. "Let's meet at the swimming pool. You know, to catch up and take a dip in the pool, you know?"

"Okay." Fluttershy nodded before flying up and kissed me on the cheek, causing me to blush a bit before she took her leave while Kodi raised a brow, looking between me and Fluttershy before forming a smile.

"Wow, you must really love getting kiss, eh?" Kodi joked. "You know, you're starting to improve on this relationship of hers, eh?"

"Y-yeah..." I chuckled before hearing a camera flash, much to my confusion. I looked around and noticed that no one was here. Strange, could've sworn that there was a camera flash in here. I guess that was my imagination...

Besides, the only ones who's in here is just me, Kodiak, and Jack, who was busy chopping down a big meaty hamburger which made me and Kodi just looked at each other with nervous chuckles. Oh well, you know how Jack is with tasting meat but hopefully we can keep hiding this secret as long as we can.



The Next Day
And so, another day has passed since our investigation at the mall district. None of us went into Nicole's room due to...well, her room. And so, we came into the dining hall with the others already eating breakfast and enjoying their time eating their breakfast. 

"Hey you guys!" I called before noticing Nicole eating her breakfast. "Oh? Nicole!"

"Hello." She waved at me slowly before taking a bite of her pancake. 

"So I take it that you want to hang out with us for breakfast every morning?" I asked with a smile.

"No." She answered bluntly, much to my confusion. "I'm sorry, but I only came here to eat."

"B-but-"

"You were gonna ask me about taking a swim at the basement's pool? Was I correct?" Oh wow, she did it again!

"Y-yeah..." I nodded.

"Ren suggested it." Kodi added. "We thought everyone should come and enjoy themselves for to rest up."

"No thank you." Nicole replied before taking her plate and began taking her leave towards the central elevator. I slumped my head down a bit with a sigh before saying "Oh well, at least we tried to convince her."

"I know how you feel Ren, but you know that she doesn't like company." Kaede reminded me, causing me to rub my head bashfully with a nervous smile.

"Yeah, I get the idea but..."

"Don't worry Ren, I'm sure she'll try to hang out with us at least." Mason assured with a soft grin. I nodded before sitting down and eating my pancakes before noticing Jamie and Carrie weren't here. 

"Hey, where did Carrie and Jamie go?" I asked, noticing that they aren't in the dining hall table.

"Jamie went to stay overnight with Twilight for night studies." Kaede explained.

"And I brought Carrie early to school so that she can finish up with her journalist work with the Crusaders." Mason added. Oh, well I guess Rantaro is an exception considering how he always likes eating alone at whatever he goes to. 

Suddenly, I heard a loud burp which came by Jake as he let out a satisfied sigh.

"Heh, you never cease to amaze me with your cooking Mason." Jake laughed, which earned a smirk from Mason's face. 

"Well...I've been taught how to cook by the maids in the castle during my trainer." Mason chuckled. 

"You know, you're quite good at taking care of us." Kaede chuckled before turning to me and asked "Say Ren, do you know how to cook?"

"Well yeah." I rubbed my head bashfully before saying "Well...only pancakes, that's all."

"I-I see." Kaede rubbed her cheek with a smile before we heard a knock from the door, prompting me and Kodi to walk over to the door and opened it, revealing the rest of the gang. 

"Oh hey girls, Jamie." I greeted with a smile. "You came to hang out for the day-off?" 

"Hey, we did agree on that didn't we?" Twilight chuckled with a smile.

"You bet! I heard about swimming in the pool in the basement so that's why I'm excited to do this!" Spike grinned. 

"Yep!" Applejack grinned. "Fluttershy told me about taking the day-off thing, so I thought I could use my break to hang out with the rest of ya over by the pool."

"Quite!" Rarity smiled, carrying a sack that was around her back. "I've brought and prepared myself these many swimming outfits I brought over."

"And I have many books that I want to read." Jamie meekly smiled, holding onto some books that he and Twilight might've gotten from the book shop at the mall district. Jamie let out a sad frown and said "I-I'm sorry...I'm not so much of a good swimmer."

"Hey, it's okay." I assured with a soft grin. "You don't have to swim as long as the rest of us spend some time with each other at the pool."

"Yeah! What's important is spending time with each other as friends!" Kodi smiled, wagging his tail in joy. Fluttershy let out a smile before flying over and scratched him underneath the chin, much to his joy. 

"Ahh, thanks you two." Fluttershy smiled.

"Oh, it's you guys." Mason said, walking over to the door with a smile along with Kaede and Jack. "Well you sure came early. I thought for sure we meet up at noon?"

"We were but we thought that we could have more time together earlier." Twilight explained. "Besides, me and Jamie are nearly finished up with the books that we got over by the bookshop."

"Already?!" Kaede asked in bewilderment. 

"Y-yeah..." Jamie yawned before having a soft smile. "W-we worked read almost every b-book and wanted to f-finish it during our little day-off."

"Well that's awesome to hear at least!" I chuckled with a grin. "Well we're almost done with breakfast, so why not we head over to the pool after we're done?"

"Of course!" Twilight nodded.

"Say, where the hell is Skittles?" Jack questioned, noticing a certain blue Pegasus wasn't here. "You would think she wouldn't want to miss a day-off?"

"Oh right." Fluttershy tapped her chin in thought. "She said that she was trying to finish up with her work early by scheduling the other workers for more weather reports around Ponyville for the week and the week after that."

"Don't you worry, if I know Rainbow Dash then she'll get here in no time and won't miss out on the fun." Applejack assured, earning a scoff from him.

"I'm not worry about Skittles, that's all AJ." Jack scoffed. "Come on, let's just go and if she doesn't show up and misses the party, then it's her fault."

"Sure." I rolled my eyes with an amused smile while the others snickered at Jack, which he noticed.

"What?" He asked grumpily. 

"Nothing." We all answered before we began heading inside where we finished up the last of our breakfast and decided to head down to the basement through the central elevator down towards the locker room.

"Been a while since we last explored this place." I commented.

"Yeah, it was during when you were asleep after Rantaro shocked you out of the blue, right?" Kodi asked, which made me rubbed the back of my neck while the others looked at each other in concern, remembering that fateful day when we first met up with him and Jack.

"Yeah, but it's best not to be reminded of that." I chuckled nervously with a nervous grin before heading over to the two locker doors. "Alright, we all just need to go to the separate rooms, right?"

"Y-yes." Jamie nodded with a smile, gazing at the two doors. "B-blue is for the boys and the pink is for the girls."

"Well come on! Let's go then!" Kaede exclaimed in joy before she and the rest of the girls headed over to the girls locker room while me, Jack, Jamie, Mason and Kodiak headed into the boys locker room to prepared ourselves in the room. 

"Why is it that the boys and girls have different locker rooms?" Kodi wondered aloud. 

"Did you even ask that question?" Jack asked, sneering at the dog.

"It's...a long story." I answered with a soft grin, petting Kodiak on the door.

"What do ya mean?" Kodi asked, tilting his head with an innocent look.

"W-well it's because of...p-personal things." Jamie explained, furthering more confusion to Kodiak.

"Really? What do you mean?"

"Just drop it please." Mason sighed. "Now come on, let's go." 

We all nodded before taking off our clothes and put on our swim trunks with Jamie, Mason, and I wearing normal short trunks while Jack wore a swim trunk that it was almost looked like a thong.

“Alright, let’s go!” Jake walked towards the door with the rest of us towards the pool where we met up with the rest of the girls where Kaede was wearing a swim suit model while the rest of the girls had pool floats on them. 

“Hey you guys! There you are!” Kaede smiled. “Heh heh, you’re just in time to take a swim down there.”

“Yep!” Applejack nodded, sitting down on the lifeguard chair. “And I’ll be keeping an eye out for you guys just in case there’s no horsing around in that pool.”

“Of course you would.” Jack muttered in a deadpan look. 

“Well either way, this might be a good chance to have some fun at least.” I said with a soft grin.

“Quite.” Mason nodded. “It would be fun for Carrie to come but she has school work to go and finish up.”

As well as Rantaro and Nicole, but you know those two…

“Don’t worry, I’m sure they would enjoy it.” Fluttershy assured, swimming by the pool side. 

“Yeah…” I sighed.

“Actually, we can.” Huh? Is that…? The moment we turned our backs, we saw…

“Rantaro! And Nicole?!” It was them right there in front of us, and it would seem that they were wearing swim trunks like we are. Does that mean…?

“What brings you two here?” Mason asked.

“Good heavens!” Rarity widened her eyes and looked over at them from her lounge chair. “I was sure you two wouldn’t want to join us in a little swimming considering you two being…antisocial.”

“Yeah, yeah, keep that Atlanta Georgia accent to yourself.” Rantaro hushed her, much to her annoyance.

“So wait, a-are you two joining us in on the fun?” Jamie asked in confusion.

“Yeah, so?” Rantaro asked.

“He convinced me.” Nicole answered bluntly, much to our surprise.

“So wait…Rantaro convinced you to come and enjoy our swimming meet here?” Twilight asked with an incredulous brow.

“I find it hard to believe.” Spike added, swimming in the pool with Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie.

“Yeah, since when the hell did Rantaro even cared about anyone other than himself?” Applejack thought aloud.

“Maybe he didn’t feel like being left out, along with Nicole?” Kodi suggested.

“No, I just felt like it.” Rantaro answered. “I overheard your little conversation about hanging over by the swimming pool today and thought that you all can’t have any fun without this guy.”

“I still find that hard to believe.” Jack scoffed.

“Yes, quite. He is lying about it.” Nicole answered with a nod. “His real reason was to try and spend time with you all.”

That caused a little twitch from his brow and gave her a scowl before saying “And here I thought you couldn’t keep your mouth shut.”

“I was just saying.”

“Jeez, you two just argue like a couple.” Kaede said with a deadpanned look. Umm…I’m not so sure about that Kaede. 

“So are you two gonna join us for the rest of the day?” Fluttershy asked curiously.

“Jeez, that’s what we’re saying, duh!” Rantaro scoffed. “It’s not like I have any feelings for any of you sore losers.”

“Hmph! Well I never!” Rarity scoffed, irritated by Rantaro’s attitude.

Rantaro is a total mystery to us considering that he’s known for being the Shadow Broker back in our world. He never reveals anything about his past or anything like that because he always conceals it with a veil of his own lies but I wonder…is what Nicole said is the truth? That he didn’t feel like being left out on the fun? I can’t help but feel quite curious to know more about Rantaro.

“Well either way, I guess I’m glad to see you two here.” I said with a smile.

“Same here.” Kaede nodded in agreement. “I can tell you two are gonna enjoy swimming.”

“I rather not.” Nicole stated before she began walking towards the lounge chairs where Twilight and Rarity were sitting as she sat down on the middle one between them with her eyes gazing at the iPad. Of course she would do something like that.

“And if you don’t mind, I guess a little swim won’t hurt.” Rantaro shrugged before turning over to the pool and put down his fedora as Gizmo was near his shoulders. “So…what do you say? Or else you guys are too chicken?”

Jack gritted his teeth in anger towards Rantaro before exclaiming “Ooh! You’re so gonna get it!”

Jack immediately jumped into the pool, creating a big splash that neither Fluttershy, Spike, Pinkie Pie, nor Applejack could avoided, as well as the rest of us as we were all wet from Jack’s splash.

“I was being sarcastic.” Rantaro muttered while Gizmo shook himself, attempting to get all the water off his body before starting squeaking at Jack, like he was protesting.

“Ha! Whatever!” Jack toothily grinned while the rest of us either gave him amused looks or irritated frowns, which was mostly from Rarity. 

“Jack! No splashing in the pool!” Applejack scolded, causing Jack to make an amused grin and said “Hmph! You’re not my mom!”

“Grr!” Applejack narrowed her eyes at him.

“That’s gotta be the biggest splash I’ve seen anypony ever done!” Pinkie commented. “You gotta teach me how to do that!”

“Hmph, I like the sound of that!” Jack smirked, which made the rest of us chuckled in delight.

“Well come on!” Kodi exclaimed, which I nodded in agreement. We both took a step back before jumping into the pool as we both screamed “Cannonball!”

Our splash was nothing compared to Jack since it was a little small but Fluttershy clapped her hooves together to help boost my confidence.

“That was a good splash Ren!” I rubbed the back of my neck with a sheepish grin and said “Well maybe not as good as Jack’s, but hey! At least I tried.”

“Here we come!” We looked over to see Kaede and Mason jumping into the pool while Rantaro climbed down the pool’s ladder and enjoyed himself in it, along with his raccoon friend, Gizmo. Jamie, Nicole, Twilight, and Rarity were sitting on the lounge chairs with relaxed looks on their faces while Twilight and Jamie were relieved that none of the books they brought over were caught up in Jack’s splash. Rarity herself put her two hooves behind her backs with a sigh of relief escaping from her mouth. Nicole was busy looking over her iPad with a neutral look on her face, not looking interested in the activities we were doing.

Kodiak, Fluttershy, Pinkie, and I were splashing each other with water while Jack and Mason tried to see who can swim the fastest while Rantaro just sat there on the water with a relaxed and amused smirk on his face. 

You know, we were having a good time with each other. But you know, it kinda feels bad not having Carrie join in on the fun but she is a student over by the Ponyville Elementary School, well…the first human student there anyway. 

But soon our fun lasted till we heard one of the locker rooms doors slammed open, revealing to be Rainbow Dash holding a newspaper in her hooves.

“You guys! The new Gabby Gums just came out!” She held a newspaper in front of us while we looked up from either our lounge chairs or the pool area. “The Great and Powerful Trixie secrets revealed!”

“Trixie?” I asked in mild surprise. Huh, haven’t heard from her for a while.

“Wait, who the hell’s Trixie?” Jack questioned. 

“She’s a magician that proclaims herself as ‘Great and Powerful’.” I explained with a sigh. “But we learn that she wasn’t so ‘Great and Powerful’ but a boastful mare and nearly made Twilight go so worried about her powers.”

“R-Really?” Jamie asked, turning to Twilight in a worried look. Twilight rubbed the back of her head with a sigh before saying “Yeah, it’s a long story but I’ll tell you later.”

“We know Rainbow Dash, we already heard about that story a while back.” Rarity waved it off. 

“You have Rarity?” Alex asked with a raised brow. “Do you happened to read it earlier before coming here?”

“Oh quite Mason!” Rarity nodded. “See, just after we left the home-ship and as I came back to my home, I came across Sweetie Belle’s bag and I just couldn’t resist the temptation of peeking in and I just happened to find a newspaper article about some ponies getting gum all over their body. It was hilarious!”

“I see, so I take it that it was made by this Gabby Gums reporter?” Mason guessed, which she nodded. 

“BWAHAHAHAHA!” Rantaro and Jack laughed while the rest of us snickered, except Nicole but I saw the small amused smile on her face.

“So this Gabby Gums just made a funny report about two ponies getting gum stuck to each other?” Kaede laughed. “I mean, how does that even happen?!”

“That’s what I’m wondering!” I laughed.

“So wait, do you still have the newspaper?!” Kodi asked, trying to contain his laughter.

“I’m afraid not because the moment I kept reading it, Sweetie Belle came back and snatched it away from me with an irritated look on her face.” Rarity explained. “I wasn’t quite sure why she was so angry.”

“W-well…y-you did looked into her bag without h-her permission…” Jamie explained.

“I suppose that is true.” Rarity shrugged.

“Hmm…” Nicole glanced down, like she was in deep thought. I wonder what she’s thinking about.

“So what do you guys think of her?” I wondered aloud.

“Well I suppose that she is alright.” Mason smiled a bit.

“Yep, whoever the hell is this Gabby Gums is okay in my book.” Jack grinned.

“I don’t know you guys.” Twilight shook her head. “I mean, I like Gabby Gums too, but don’t you think she can be a little mean?”

“She’s not mean, Twilight, she’s a hoot!” Applejack smiled before noticing Pinkie jumping into the pool with a huge splash that nearly gotten me, Fluttershy, and Kodiak wet. “Pinkie Pie! I thought I told you no making huge splashes in the pool!”
“But Jack did it!” Pinkie pointed out, earning another scolded look from the farmer.

“I have to agree with Twilight.” Jamie said, looking over one of the newspaper articles. “I mean, look at this.” He showed us a newspaper article about Princess Celestia…having some cake frosting on her mouth while she eats some chocolate cake. “I mean ‘Celestia Just Like Us?’, Gabby Gums doesn’t seem to value anyone’s or anypony’s privacy. I-I mean…don’t you think it’s rude?”

“Jamie has a point.” Twilight nodded. “I mean, it is quite troubling if this keeps up. Who knows what Gabby Gums could do? I mean, she could even post some embarrassing secrets of our own.”

“Oh lighten up, Jamie, Twilight, there’s nothing but harmless gossip!” Rarity assured.

“Yeah, I mean they’re just some little gossips, that’s all.” I added with a grin.

“Yeah, Twilight, Jamie, I mean listen to this one.” We looked over at Pinkie as she pulled out a piece of paper out of the pool, which we will never ask how is it not wet before reading the headlines. “Mayor Not Naturally Gray!’ The Mayor in a mane dyeing scandal? Who wouldn’t wanna read that?

“I just can’t help feeling sorry for the ponies featured in her columns. It’s gotta be a little embarrassing.” Twilight retorted.

“Indeed, I mean I am praised by many of my s-supporting f-fans of my novels…” Jamie twiddled his fingers with a nervous and worried look. “But I mostly don’t make my appearances on TV a lot because I don’t like being in front of crowds.”

“I know that feeling.” Fluttershy sighed sadly.

“Are you kidding?” Rainbow laughed with an excited smile on her face. “Do you know how awesome it is to get your name in the paper?”

“You can say that again Skittles.” Jack toothily grinned. “I wouldn’t mind these ponies to get used to my awesomeness, my guts, and my muscles.” Jack started flexing his chubby muscles, which made the rest of us laughed as Rainbow commented “Yeah right! Like someone get into the newspaper, fatty!”
“Shaddup!” Jack snarled. “Like someone yourself can get into the newspaper!”
Rainbow glared at him before exclaiming “Yeah right, like you can even become as cool as me!”
“Wanna bet?” Jack growled.

“Calm down you two.” I chuckled.
“Ren’s right, we don’t need another fight between you two lovebergs.” Applejack giggled, earning two angry looks from the two stubborn pony and human we call friends.

“We are not lovebergs!” Rainbow and Jack yelled in outrage.

“Settle down you two.” Rantaro waved it off before gazing at Rainbow Dash. “So I take it you came here to enjoy our day-off?”
“Well I came here to tell you the big news, but I guess why not.” Rainbow shrugged before flying over to one of the nearby lounge chairs, much to her joy. “Ahh yeah, now this is the life…”

“You know, I sure love to have Gabby Gums do a story about me.” Kodi smiled. 

“Yeah, same here.” Kaede nodded before turning to me and asked “What do you think Ren?”
“Oh me?” I asked incredulous before rubbing my cheek in embarrassment. “I’m not sure. I guess I could show them my art portraits that I made over whenever I feel bored.”

“She did one on me.” Wait what?! We all gazed at Spike with shocked and excited looks as we yelled out “What?!”

“Aaah!” Spike fell off the lounge chair before getting back up and dusting himself off. “Well it’s true! She did an interview with me and boy, am I famous or what?”

“S-so you know who Gabby Gums is?” Jamie asked, which Spike nodded.

“Do you suppose you could tell us more about her?” Mason questioned.

“Sorry, but it’s a secret. She said she likes her appearance to be well hidden.” Spike winked, much to our disappointment.

“Spike is telling the truth.” Rantaro called out. “But you seemed pretty sure to hide Gabby Gum’s identity over something like that. I mean, why is that?”

“Well we’re just becoming good friends, that’s all.” Spike answered.

“You’re becoming quite nervous.” Nicole pointed out, much to our confusion. “I can see a sweat from your brow.”

“W-what? Where?!” Spike exclaimed in shock before touching his forehead to look for it. However, that was a little trick devised by Nicole herself.

“Nothing, it just shows that you’re hiding something about Gabby Gums.” Nicole stated bluntly, much to Spike’s shock. “I’m sorry if I had to lie to you in order to gain much info about that…” She narrowed her eyes towards him. “But I know that you know something about Gabby Gums than we do.”

“Oh really?” I asked in surprise before turning to Spike and asked “So Spike, what is it that you’re hiding from us?”
“I told you that it’s nothing!” Spike exclaimed. “I’m sorry but I can’t tell you guys!”

“Can we even be sure that he’s even met Gabby Gums?” Jack asked deadpanned. “I mean, why the hell would some pony like her want to meet up with some baby dragon.”

“Hey! I take offense to that!” Spike exclaimed angrily.

“That is a good question.” Mason couldn’t help but agree, ignoring the protests from the dragon himself. 

“Well maybe she likes interviewing anypony they meet?” Kodi suggested, but for some reason…I sorta have my doubts. Just who is this Gabby Gums pony? I bet this pony is something of a journalist, eh?



Meanwhile
"Exclusive! Local Dragon Tells all!" Carrie announced, showing a newspaper in front of the desk of a familiar pink tiara wearing pony, Diamond Tiara. Apparently, when Carrie and the Cutie-Mark Crusaders joined the Journalist club, they became shocked to learn that the school bully, Diamond Tiara, became the head of the club and has been giving them assignments to go look out for assignments, but when they came up with the Gabby Gums story, Diamond Tiara has been forcing them to do more gossip by spilling the beans all over the citizens of Ponyville.

"Spike opens up about Canterlot, naps, and his favorite jams!" Carrie smiled brightly. "Do you like it Diamond Tiara? We spoken about almost everypony in town!"

"It's our best column yet!" Scootaloo grinned.

"More like your worst column yet!" Diamond Tiara slapped the piece of paper away before slamming her desk, nearly frightening her assistant, Featherweight. "Gabby Gums didn't become the biggest thing in Ponyville with namby-pamby ponies like this!"

"But...I thought it was a good thing we've done." Carrie said, but was silenced by Diamond Tiara's glare as she said "Do you want me to get you kicked out of this club or not?"

Carrie let out a sigh before saying "I'm sorry..."

"Good! Now get out there and find a decent story to make Gabby Gums more famous than ever!" With that, the group left the newspaper room with heavy sighs. 

"Yeah, she's right. This column is a little softer than our usual gossip." Apple Bloom stated.

"Are you sure?" Carrie asked curiously. "I mean, I'm starting to feel a little bad on what we're doing."

"Carrie has a point." Sweetie Belle agreed. "Like...maybe we could be hurting other ponies' feelings?"

"Yeah, I didn't wanna say anything because everypony loves Gabby Gums so much, but...I was sorta hoping we could start writing more stories like this one." Apple Bloom nodded with a small yet worried smile.

"Me too." Scootaloo sighed.

"Me three." Carrie nodded. 

"But if we're gonna get our cutie-marks, we've got to give the ponies what they want." Sweetie Belle added, causing the young girls to sigh sadly before walking off. Back in the head of the news club office manager, Diamond Tiara was busy stacking some papers before Featherweight came into the office with an envelope.

"Alright Diamond Tiara, I got all these pictures just as you wanted." Featherweight said, handing the file to her.

"Excellent job Featherweight." Diamond Tiara smirked before looking over the envelope, seeing numerous pictures of the crusaders doing embarrassing things, and a peculiar photo of Jack...eating a hamburger over by the mall district. "Hmm...I wonder..."

She thought for a while before noticing the lights flashing over and over before noticing the entire room turned black, much to her confusion and shock.

"W-what the?! Featherweight, what's going on?!" Diamond Tiara demanded before noticing that he was nowhere in sight. "F-Featherweight?"

"Do not worry, we are in your mind." A voice spoken, much to Diamond Tiara's shock before noticing a dark figure walking towards her with a serious glint in his eyes through the mask. "I am here to make a proposition with you."

"W-what the? What the hay are you?!" Diamond Tiara exclaimed. "G-Get away from me, you freakshow!"

"Please calm down you spoiled brat." Void said, hiding his annoyance from his tone. 

"S-Spoiled brat?!" Diamond Tiara exclaimed in anger and shock.

"Now listen..." Void spoke up, showing him the picture of Jack eating the hamburger. "I must warn you about these humans...you need to warn the other ponies about these monstrosities. They're monsters...they're not the only one who eats vegetables, fruits, and whatever food you eat in this world, but they also eat meat."

"W-what?" Diamond Tiara asked in fear, her face turning pale. "W-what are you saying?"

"Trust me, they could be after you..." Void looked at her with his right eye glowing red as Diamond Tiara looked at him, looking nearly trance at his stare. "It's best to warn the others...you could end up being a hero."

"A hero..." Diamond Tiara muttered, which made Void nodded and patted her on the head. 

"Good little pony...I wish you adieu." Void bowed before disappearing in the darkness as everything turned back to normal with Diamond Tiara looking terrified.

"Umm...Miss Diamond Tiara? Are you alright?" Diamond Tiara blinked in confusion before looking over at Featherweight, who looked at her with a worried and concern look. "I've been calling you over and over again but you looked like you've seen a ghost."

"...Featherweight, please publish that photo of the big brute eating the burger to the papers under the name of 'Gabby Gums'." Diamond Tiara said, much to her assistant's surprise.

"W-what?"

"Just do it! NOW!" Diamond Tiara demanded, much to his surprise before nodding and immediately headed over to the production room with the photo in his mouth while Diamond Tiara looked down, her face a bit darkened with slightly widened eyes.

"A hero..."



Later
"Okay, just hold still Kodiak..." Just one more spot and it's finally complete. We spent all morning to noon time at the pool before drying off and began doing other activities, and this is one of them which I suggested. Painting, obviously. I was busy painting a portrait of Kodiak and I was nearly done. The others in the meantime were in the living room minding their own business. Kaede and Rarity talking about fashion while Mason stood next to them with his eyes closed in deep thought.

Jack, Applejack and Rainbow Dash were having an arm wrestling competition with either showing off their brute strength, Twilight and Jamie were taking notes with each other on facts between their two worlds, Fluttershy was near me watching me paint which I didn't mind while Rantaro and Nicole were busy minding their own business sitting down on the couches with bored looks, well I don't know about Nicole because she just has that neutral look on that face like she isn't showing any fear at all.

But I was almost done with Kodiak's portrait. Just need the final touch of it and...boo-yeah! "Done!"

"About time!" Kodi sighed in relief as he gotten out of his pose and walked over to the portrait, seeing it him with a bright smile with his tongue out as he looked at the sky upwards. "Ooh, I look good!"

The others, except Rantaro and Nicole, stopped what they were doing and came over to see my portrait, impressing them with my artwork while they felt amazed by its designs.

"You can say that again!" Kaede complimented. "You know Ren, your art skills are really improving."

"You think so?" I asked, rubbing the back of my head.

"It looks so peaceful." Fluttershy smiled before asking "So have you been selling any artwork lately?"

"Not much, but I know that one day that a bunch of ponies are gonna come in and admired by artwork." I assured with a grin.

"You sure have a lot of confidence there partner." Applejack smiled, admiring a bit of my confidence.

"Well I wouldn't say 'confidence', I would say 'optimistic'." I shrugged before hearing loud knocking on the door.

"Huh, now what?" Jack asked irritably as we walked over to the door, only to be met with an angry mob filled with almost everypony in town. 

"There they are!"

"You monsters!"

"How do you sleep at night?!"

"Oh goody...an angry mob." Rantaro muttered, forming an amused smirk. "Been wondering how long did these guys starting one?"

"Wait what?" I asked in confusion.

"What the hell?!" Jack exclaimed.

"U-uh...w-what's going on?" Jamie asked in confusion.

"Shut it freak show of a...freak!" One of the crowd shouted, terrifying Jamie a bit.

"Everypony settle down!" Twilight shouted. "What seems to be the problem?"

"How could you stay calm with those...those monsters!" A cyan colored earth pony shouted.

"What are you...talking about?" Applejack asked with a raised brow.

"Monsters?" Nicole questioned. "Why are you calling us 'monsters' exactly?"

"Indeed, what in Celestia's name are you talking about?" Rarity wondered the exact same thing.

"Are you kidding?!" A brown colored Pegasus wearing an apron threw a newspaper article right in front of my face. I managed to take it off and began reading it. "Why not you read it?"

"You mean the newspaper? But why?" Kaede wondered as I kept reading the headlines and once I was finished...my expression turned shock and pale upon reading it.

"W-what?" What in Equestria am I reading right now? Are you kidding me right now?!

"What?" Mason asked before he and the others read the headlines of the paper as it says the one thing we thought it was never going to happen ever as long as we remained here in their world.

"Humans lied! They don't eat like us but eat meat as well! Can they be trusted?"

"Oh my god..." Kaede muttered.

"N-no...!" Jamie gasped with a horror look on his face.

"Whoa...this...this looks bad." Jack commented.

"You think?" Rantaro asked irritably.

"W-what?" Applejack widened her eyes in shock as the rest of the girls, except Fluttershy and Twilight, looked at us with shocked looks. "T-this has to be some sort of joke, right?"

"Ren...everypony else?" Rarity covered her mouth in shock. "W-what did this newspaper...is this true?"

"Oh no..." Mason muttered, face-palming a bit.

"Heh heh, good one!" Pinkie laughed, earning weird looks from us and the crowd. "I mean, we can't be sure that Rennie and the others really eat meat. I mean, we're practically made out of meat and such, right? Right?"

"...Umm...well..." I rubbed the back of my neck with an awkward smile. 

"It's the truth..." Twilight sighed, earning shocked looks from her friends while the crowd began ranting on again.

"We trusted you all!"

"How could you?!"

"You monsters!"

"Muffins!" 

...Wait what? Who said that? Who even said that last part? It almost sounded like...

"I have a feeling that I'm suddenly not feeling so well..." Rarity fainted to the floor, but not before he was caught by Mason.

"Rarity!" Mason gasped, only to earn a shocked look from the crowd.

"Look! That guy was about to have that white Unicorn as a snack!" One of the crowd shouted, earning another outrage from them.

"Now now everypony! Calm down! Please calm down!" Twilight begged, but her pleas were ignored. Me and the others looked at the crowd with pale looks. I can't believe it...this newspaper suddenly convinces them all that we were bad all because of eating meat? I mean, sure back when I started adjusting to this place, Twilight warned me to never ever reveal that detail because something like this might happen. Well...so much for that...

"R-R-Ren?" I looked over to see Fluttershy scared look. 

"Fluttershy..." I muttered, looking at her with a concern look before hearing the crowd walking towards us with angry and outrage looks, causing us to back away as Twilight used her magic to slammed the door closed shut and managed to block it with the many furniture that were in the room. 

"Phew, I think that'll keep them shut." Twilight sighed in relief.

"Ohhhh..." We looked over to see Rarity slowly beginning to wake up before she looked around the room. "Where am I? Last thing I remember was that..."

"Rarity? Are you alright?" Mason asked in concern as Rarity gazed at him, seeing that he was holding onto her. 

"O-Oh! Mason!" Rarity widened her eyes in shock, but it wasn't because she was embarrassed just how closed he was to her, but because of what she and the other girls learned. "U-umm...this is quite awkward...right?"

"Y-yeah..." Mason nodded before setting her down on the couch.

"No way!" Rainbow shook her head with an upset look. "There is no way in Equestria that you guys are carnivores!"

"It's the truth, R-Rainbow Dash..." Jamie muttered sadly.

"I won't believe it! I'll prove it!" Rainbow flew over to the window and immediately opened it.

"Whoa whoa whoa, where the hell do you think you're going?!" Jack demanded.

"I'm heading over to town and find more of that newspapers that Gabby Gums made herself!" Rainbow replied, not gazing at him before she took off.

"I can't believe it..." Applejack gazed down on the ground before looking over at us and asked "Why didn't you say anything? Were you guys...hiding this from us?"

"I-it wasn't a choice! W-we just..." Oh boy...how am I gonna explain this?

"It wasn't Ren nor the other's fault!" Fluttershy stepped up with a serious look on her face. "Ren and the others are the kindest humans we've ever met...well the only humans we've met but we know that they wouldn't dare eating us! Ren and the others promised not to do that and began accepting our food! Have you not remember all the times we've been through again?!"

We all stared at her in shock, never seeing Fluttershy standing up for anypony, not even us. Normally it's me or one of us trying to defend her, but...wow!

"Fluttershy..." Rarity muttered.

Fluttershy suddenly widened her eyes with a blush before looking away, trying to brush her hair to hide herself before saying "O-oh! I-I didn't mean to make you guys so angry with me!"

"No we aren't! We're amazed!" Pinkie pointed out, bouncing in front of her before grabbing and shaking her. "I mean, we've never seen you like this before! Who are you and what have you done to the real Fluttershy? Are you an alien from another planet like Ren and his friends?"

"Wait what?" I asked incredulous.

"Whoa nelly." Applejack muttered, blinking in surprise. "Pinkie has a point. Since when did you ever start standing up for yourself...well more than usual?"

"W-well..." Fluttershy gazed at me with a soft smile and a small blush appeared on her face. "You may say that it was a little advice that Ren gave to me back then..."

"Really?" Rarity asked in surprise before turning to me with a nervous grin. "I suppose...that would make sense considering how nice he is to be considered your special somepony."

"H-hey!" I called out, feeling a bit embarrassed about that fact.

"Guys! This is no time for any talk!" Twilight scolded. "For right now, we just need to calm down and try to calm the crowd down as well."

"Yeah, but how?" Applejack asked.

"Yeah, I mean, they seemed pretty outrage." Kodi pointed out. "We're not sure if we can even calm them down now."

"Yeah..." I nodded, feeling a bit heartbroken that the town now is turning against us. After all what we've done for them for a while...

Suddenly, the window immediately blasted opened with a tons of newspaper made specifically by Gabby Gums appeared, with Rainbow Dash having to carry them out with an exhausted look on her face.

"S-so, how did it go?" Jamie asked in worried.

"I...I wasn't fast enough!" Rainbow exclaimed. "My life is officially over!"

"Wait what? What do you mean 'your life'? What about ours?!" Kaede exclaimed in shock. 

"Gabby Gums has made it to Cloudsdale!" Rainbow exclaimed, causing us all to widened our eyes in shock.

"What?!" Twilight hissed.

"It's true! Everywhere!" Rainbow yelled out. "It was all spread out all over town and now it's over! I mean, she didn't only do it to Ren, Jack, Rantaro, Mason, Jamie, Kaede, and Nicole either!"

"What do you mean?" Nicole asked, feeling a bit surprised by this. Applejack walked over and picked up one of the newspaper and read "'Rainbow Dash: Speed Demon or Super Softie?'?!"

"I grabbed as many copies as I could, but it was too late!" Rainbow cried out, banging her hoof on the ground. "I'm a laughing stock!"

"Calm down Dashy." Jack patted her on the back, cheering her a bit. Rantaro picked one of the newspaper up before letting out a chuckle, and then started laughing.

"AH HA HA HA! Get a load of this!" Rantaro laughed before showing us an image about Applejack snoozing over by a nearby apple tree. "Applejack Asleep on the Job!"

"Wait what?!" Applejack gasped before grabbing it and began reading before slowly taking her eyes off of it with widened eyes, "I can't believe this! That Gabby Gums wrote a lie about that!"

"And this one..." Kaede picked another one up before showing us an image of Big Mac holding a familiar doll that I soon recognized as Mr. Smarty Pants from many months ago. "Big Macintosh - What's He Hiding?"

"It would seem that this Gabby Gums must've wrote many bad lies about you guys while practically toying with us with our little secret." Nicole deduced. "Just how far is she gonna go?"

"Ha ha! Look at this one!" Spike showed us another newspaper article written by Gabby Gums herself, showing us Twilight reading a book that made it look like she was snobby looking. "Twilight Sparkle: I was a Canterlot Snob?!"

"Are you serious?!" Twilight gaped at that before making an irritated look on her face and swiping the newspaper from Spike's hands and began reading the article. "A well-placed scaly source close to the prissy pony says Twilight Sparkle thinks Ponyville is nothing but muddy roads and low-class rubes." 

She immediately turned towards Spike an upset look and yelled "Spike!"

"Well I didn't!" Spike shook his head with a panic look. "Gabby Gums made that up!" He picked another piece of newspaper article that showed the same one Twilight was holding. "I never said anything like that!"

"Everypony, please." Rarity announced with a calm look. "She's just a harmless schoolpony engaged in a little idle gossip. You're really making too big a deal out of this."

"B-but it's all lies!" Jamie pointed out. "She's writing any lies about us and what's worse is that she somehow discovered about our secret about eating meat!"

"Yeah! She's just humiliating us all!" Kodi agreed before grabbing another piece of article with his mouth before handing it to me as I read it over before gawking at the front cover of Fluttershy having a weird looking tail with arrows on the bacl. 

"What the heck is this?" I gaped before reading the title. "Fluttershy has tail extensions!"

We all froze before slowly gazing at the yellow pegasus, who glanced towards us before slowly hiding behind the kitchen counter.

"...What kind of drugs has this chick has been going on?" Jack asked bluntly.

"Jack!" Kaede scolded.

Jack raised his arms in the air in surrender before saying "What? I was just asking!"

"And look at this one!" Twilight picked up another article from the pile with her magic as it showed Pinkie Pie dancing around in a punch bowl. "Pinkie Pie is an out-of-control party animal!"

"What?!" Pinkie cried out before grabbing the newspaper and reading over it. Just as she finished reading it, her eyes were bawling out of tears as she cried out out "It's true! I do have a problem!"

"B-but...w-we don't mind that..." Jamie muttered, feeling scared and terrified right now. "I-I just don't get it...why? Why is this Gabby Gums doing this to us?!"

"That's what I wanna know!" Jack demanded. "I don't care who it is! I'll beat the hell out of them!"

Well I'm pretty mad at them for what they've done but...why do I have this strange feeling that something doesn't add up here? 

"Ha ha ha ha..." Huh? Why is Rarity laughing of all times? "Honestly, you ponies have no sense of humor." Rarity rolled her eyes.

"How can you be so calm about this?! Our lives are practically ruined thanks to that journalist!" Kaede exclaimed angrily.

"Calm down Kaede darling." Rarity picked up a random newspaper from the pile Rainbow Dash picked up and began reading it over. "So she tweaks a few ponies every now and then, maybe they...AH!" 

"What? What's wrong?" Kodi asked in concern before we all saw the angry look on her face. "I'll destroy her!" 

"Rarity! What happened?" Mason asked in worried before the paper was shoved into his face by Rarity as he began reading it over. "The Drama-Queen Diaries"?

"She's reprinted my secret diary! How could Gabby Gums possibly get access to my private diary?!"

"I don't know..." Mason wondered before widening his eyes in shock. "Oh no!"

"What? What is it?" Kaede asked in worried.

"Carrie! I think she's in trouble!" Mason exclaimed. 

"In trouble?" I asked in confusion.

"He means that due to the many ponies in Ponyville knowing about our diet, I have a feeling that they might go after anyone who's human." Nicole pointed out.

"Hmm...that is quite troublesome." Rantaro shrugged before turning to Mason. "Well, what are you waiting for? You gonna let her die?"

Mason gritted his teeth and darkened his face. "You be quiet!"

"Mason, allow me to tag along!" We all looked at Rarity with surprised looks. "Please! I need to find out who is Gabby Gums is..." She made a dark and angry scowl before exclaiming "So I'll make sure that she's gonna pay for revealing my secrets!"

"Whoa...that loon really went nuts." Jack whispered to Jamie nearby, which he gulped and nodded in agreement.

"But do we even know who Gabby Gums is?" Rantaro questioned, earning anothe scowl from Rarity.

"Of course she is! She's one of the schoolponies back at the school!" Rarity exclaimed.

"Then why not ask your sister and her friends about her? Maybe she knows her identity?" Rantaro smirked, which made Nicole raised a brow at him.

"Good heavens no!" Rarity scoffed. "My sister, Mason's sister, and their friends would never associate with anyone as beastly as Gabby Gums!"

"Rarity has a point." Mason nodded, crossing his arms with a stern look. "Carrie would never do anything horrible like that. She would never post these embarrassing secrets and photos about us."

"Yeah! I mean, they're just kids!" I added. "I mean, even if it was possible, which I don't believe, I don't think they would do this on purpose."

"Ren might have a point there." Twilight nodded. "I mean, I'm sure there's a rational explanation about all this."

"Y-yeah...if we just remained calm..."

"Remain calm? REMAIN CALM?!" Jack yelled out, making Jamie flinch in fear. "Our lives are ruined! Everypony in town, practically in this damn world knows more about our species! It's over! We're done!"

"We just need to calm down Jack!" Kaede begged. "I-I'm sure once we find out who Gabby Gums is, we might be able to make her apologize to everypony and have her convince to apologize to us all! That's all!"

"Grr!" Jack growled at her before taking a deep breath, softening his expression. "Alright fine..."

"Good..." Kaede sighed in relief.

"Anyway, we shall be going." Mason nodded before grabbing Rarity by the arms, much to her surprise.

"O-oh Mason!" Rarity giggled, hiding away her blush. "You know, you sure are quite amazing, aren't you? O-of course I would never think of you as a monster."

Mason softly smiled at her and nodded, happy to hear that Rarity doesn't have any fear in him anymore. "You can thank me later. For now, let's go find our siblings and the rest of their friends."

"Okay." Rarity nodded before the two climb out of the window.

"Just be careful you two. The crowd might be still out there." Nicole warned them.

"Don't worry, we will." Mason nodded before climbing out of the window with Rarity by his side. 

"I sure hope those two will be alright." Kaede sighed.

"Me too..." I nodded before noticing that Fluttershy wasn't around here. "Hey, where did Flutters go?"

"Last time I saw her, she was around and hiding behind the kitchen counter." Kodi reminded me.

"Well don't worry, I'm sure that she's still around here." Twilight assured before pointing to the blocked door. "After all, I did blocked the door with almost every furniture to make sure the crowd doesn't come after us inside."

"Yeah..." I nodded.

"So how in Equestria could you guys eat meat?" Applejack asked. 

"W-well..." Jamie twiddled with his fingers with a nervous look before he began loudly muttering again. "Y-you may say that's the only thing we eat, but that is not true. There are certain set of animals that we can't eat in order to protect and preserve their species. We eat only animals that are limited to us for years and years to come."

"Really? Well that's nice to hear Jamie!" Pinkie grinned, hugging him tight as he widened his eyes in shock. 

"W-wait! Did I say that aloud again?!" Jamie widened his eyes in shock.

"Settle down, if they want to know they have to know in order to trust us." Rantaro shrugged. 

"Well that's nice to hear that you guys don't eat every single kind of animal." Twilight sighed. "I bet that's a relief to Fluttershy."

"Yeah..." I nodded before looking over at my room door, forming a worried look. "I'm gonna go off to find Fluttershy. I'm worried about her."

"I'll help too." Kodi offered, which I nodded with a grin. Kodi began using his nose and started sniffing around the ground a lot before I began following his tracks as we arrived to our room while the others stayed behind and discussed more about the topic on hand.

"Please allow me to give out an explanation..." Nicole offered, adjusting her glasses.

"If they even believe us." Rantaro shrugged.

As soon as we entered my room, I began to hear some whimpering. Oh man....I bet that she's crying because of what happened. I walked over to the other side of my bed, finding a tearful Fluttershy around the left side of my bed, covering her face with her forelegs and kept crying.

"Fluttershy." I called with a worried look. "Are you alright?" 

Fluttershy looked up, having a tear-stained look on her face.

"Oh hi Ren...hi Kodiak...I-I didn't see you there..." Fluttershy wiped away her tears with a sad look. "S-sorry if I'm causing any trouble for you."

"It's alright. You didn't mean too." I assured with a soft grin. "But you don't have to keep crying. I don't think that's embarrassing..." Actually, come to think of it? Now that I'm realizing it...why is having extended tails that bad? "But why is it so weird that you didn't want it to be reveal?"

"I..." Fluttershy's face turned bright red in embarrassment. "It's too embarrassing for anypony to know!"

"So why do it in the first place if you knew it was gonna be embarrassing?" Kodi wondered.

"Because I was just curious to see if extended tails were quite amazing!" Fluttershy cried out. "But now that everypony in town knows about it, I'm a laughing stock!"

"Don't say that Fluttershy." I said with a soft smile before sitting down next to her with Kodiak laying on my laps. "I understand that you must feel sad but you have us and we would never laugh at you like that. I mean, many of us has embarrassing secrets and were mocked as well."

"I-I suppose so..." Fluttershy cried out, wiping away her tears before leaning against me. "But what about you and the others? Aren't you just angry yet upset about it?!"

"I am." I nodded. "But I know that these guys are just scared of us and I know that we can encouraged them to be friends with us."

Fluttershy let out a smile before snuggling against my sweater, much to my embarrassment. Kodi smiled at us before licking Fluttershy on the cheek, which made her finally smile. 

"Better?" I asked.

"Better." Fluttershy nodded.

Phew, glad that I was able to help her out of her misery. Still though, I get Rarity considering that her secrets that she wrote in her diary is one thing to be embarrassed, but this Gabby Gums is for some reason is going too far. I may not have read much about her but all I got was that she was a schoolpony and was posting everypony's secrets. Just why is she doing this? Out of pleasure? No, that wouldn't be it...

BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!

"What the heck?!" Kodi exclaimed as the three of us looked at each other before getting up from the floor and headed out of my room as we saw the front door banging over and over.

The others looked panicked upon seeing this.

"O-oh no! W-we're gonna die!" Jamie gasped, bending down with a scared look. 

"Calm down, we'll be fine." Rantaro waved it off.

"Yeah! I mean, it's not like things can get worse." Pinkie agreed with her signature smile. Suddenly, more banging came running out of the door, much to our shock. 

"Open the door!"

"Get out here now!"

"Come out so you can fight us like a man!"

"Oh golly..." Applejack muttered.

"Everypony! Secure the door!" Twilight yelled, which we nodded in agreement before running over to the blocked door and attempted to hold it back. "Make sure that they don't run in here!"

"What do you think?!" Rantaro asked angrily.

"Everyone, you all need to calm down." Nicole assured, looking at us with a calm look.

"Easy for you to say!" Rainbow growled, holding back the door.

"Do you think that we can make sure that they won't get in?!" Kaede asked in fear. "I-I don't think we can hold much longer!"

"Well just shaddup and keep pushing back!" Jack exclaimed. "Dammit! Where the hell is Mason, Rarity and the others?!"

"If we all just remained calm at the moment, we might even discover Gabby Gum's identity." Nicole assured.

"What?! You figured it out?!" I exclaimed in shock.

"But how?!" Kodi added.

"I'll explain till everypony arrives." Nicole stated, furrowing her brows with a serious look.

"Hmm...well this should be interesting." Rantaro chuckled with a grin.

Oh man, I'm not sure how did Nicole find out about the identity of Gabby Gums, but...oh god! I just hope we'll be able to make sure that the crowd won't be breaking down this door for now!



Later
“How could you Diamond Tiara?!” Apple Bloom demanded, narrowing her eyes in anger at her. The Crusaders and Carrie just came back to the editor-in-chief’s office to confront Diamond Tiara upon discovering an article that was made by Gabby Gums herself, but that wasn’t true at all considering that Gabby Gums were those four girls all along! Diamond Tiara was practically stealing their name and taking credit of her own work.

“Why? What’s the matter?” Diamond Tiara asked in a mocking tone. “Too shocked that I sold a story or two to all of Equestria about what these humans really are?”

“Why did you do that, Diamond Tiara?!” Carrie demanded. “You made me, my big brother, and the others look like we’re the bad guys!”

“Duh, that’s cause you are!” Diamond Tiara sneered at her. “You don’t think I won’t find out about you little cretin? Serves you right for what you humans did to make me humiliate myself!”

“No please!” Carrie pleaded. “It’s me you want but don’t take it on my friends! Please!”

“Yeah! I mean, a human eating meat? That’s obviously a lie!” Scootaloo exclaimed before turning to Carrie and asked “Right Carrie?”

Carrie lowered her head down a bit with a sad look, letting out a tear and said “No…it’s the truth. I’m sorry…”

The Crusaders gasped in shock upon hearing this from her while Diamond Tiara laughed mockingly at her.

“Yes, that’s right! Go on! Mock her! Laugh at her! Teach her that humans can’t be trusted!” Diamond Tiara laughed. The Crusaders looked at each other with worried and concern before narrowing their eyes and glared at Diamond Tiara.

“Yeah right! Like we’ll laugh at our friend!” Scootaloo exclaimed, much to Diamond Tiara’s confusion.

“What?” 

“You heard her!” Sweetie Belle stepped forward with a serious look. “Carrie is the best friend we ever had before! She may be like a princess, but at least she’s caring and lovable unlike you!”

“What?!” Diamond Tiara hissed angrily, nearly frightening Featherweight.

“You heard her!” Apple Bloom glared angrily at Diamond Tiara. “I want to thank Ren for helping me overcome my dilemma with being a blank-flank because if it wasn’t for them…” She turned to her friends with a soft and warm smile. “I wouldn’t have met these girls ever in my life.”

“Apple Bloom…” Carrie looked at her with amazement before smiling over her friend. “Thank you!”

“What are you saying?! Are you just gonna be friends with a freakshow like her?!” Diamond Tiara exclaimed angrily. “This is just messed-up!”

“Why is it a problem to you anyway?” Sweetie Belle questioned with a raised brow. “You never had any problems with her being a human before. Normally, you just teased her because she friends with blank-flanks like us.”

Diamond Tiara sneered at the Crusaders before scoffing “Why does it matter anyway? You girls are just too boring to bathe in my glory anyway.”

Carrie glared at Diamond Tiara and said “Well why not bathe into your own glory? We quit!”

Diamond Tiara snapped her eyes opened with a shocked look. “No! I won’t let you quit!”

“But the gossip we’ve been printing is hurting everypony’s feelings!” Sweetie Belle retorted. “And what’s worse is that you’ve posted a really hurtful comment that’s making everypony in Ponyville have a deep grudge on Ren and his friends.”

“Feelings?!” Diamond Tiara scoffed. “I don’t care about feelings! Gabby Gums is my bread and butter, and I’m not gonna let you goody-two-horseshoes and some freakish naked ape of a freak take that away from me. Besides, why should you care? You girls been posting mean comments about your own friends on the school news.”

“We know, but we learn that it’s not right.” Apple Bloom shook her head. 

“We’re sorry Diamond Tiara, but we’ve made our decision.” Carrie said with a serious look.

“I won’t be doing this anymore longer. Who cares about earning some journalists cutie-marks?” Sweetie Belle nodded. “I rather care more about our friends, their feelings, and the other ponies that we wrote about it.”

“Yeah, you can’t force us to keep gossiping.” Scootaloo smirked, but that was soon dropped upon seeing the evil smile on Diamond Tiara.

“When you see these…” She threw a folder filled with many pictures of the Crusaders, much to their shock upon seeing embarrassing photos. One was Apple Bloom of her as a little baby having applesauce all over her body. The next one had Sweetie Belle with a case of a bad hair day, and another had Scootaloo snuggling against a stuffed teddy bear. “You may not want to quit after all.”

“W-what?” Apple Bloom muttered.

“I told Featherweight to document everything…” Diamond Tiara evilly smirked. “And that’s exactly what he did!”

“But wait, there’s nothing of me.” Carrie pointed out. “Which means I can tell on you for what you did.”

“Go ahead, and I’ll post these on the school newspaper.” Diamond Tiara smirked. “Besides, it’s property of the Foal Free Press. And if Gabby Gums really does go into retirement, I’ll need something to fill that empty column space…Actually, I can post them and just take the title of Gabby Gums anyway.”

“You don’t scare me Diamond Tiara.” Carrie stated.

“Sure, go on ahead. Tell on your big brother and you’ll end up being the cause of humiliating your friends.” Diamond Tiara smirked. Carrie widened her eyes in shock before looking over at her friends, seeing the pleading looks on their faces. Carrie didn’t want to humiliate her friends so she looked down with a sad look. 

“O-okay…I’ll be quiet.” Carrie muttered.

“What was that? I don’t think I heard that.” Diamond Tiara asked mockingly, wanting to hear it louder.

“I said that I’ll be quiet.” Carrie sighed.

“Good answer.” Diamond Tiara evilly smirked as Carrie glared at her. “See what happens when you mess with me?”

Carrie blinked in surprise upon seeing a shadowy figure next to her as a dark aura surrounded Diamond Tiara. 

“W-what?” Carrie wondered.

“Now excuse me…I must go.” Diamond Tiara stepped out of her chair and began leaving her office.

“H-hey wait! Where do you think you’re going?!” Scootaloo demanded.

“None of your beeswax!” Diamond Tiara scoffed. “Now get out there and bring me more Gabby Gums!”

With that, she opened the door and slammed it shut which nearly made them flinch while Featherweight simply side-stepped away from them.

“I don’t get it…” Apple Bloom turned to Carrie and asked “Why did you agree on her offer?”

“Because…I didn’t want to get you girls humiliated because of me.” Carrie explained sadly. “I’m sorry…it was so stupid of me to do that.”

“No…that was a nice thing you done for us.” Sweetie Belle smiled. “Well…other than the other things you kinda done for us.”

“Yeah, but now what? We’re being blackmailed!” Scootaloo exclaimed, reminding them of their current situation. “First we began unintentionally hurting ponies’ feelings across town, next Diamond Tiara posts a newspaper article about humans eating meat that quickly makes the town go so crazy at them and not in the good way, and now we’re being forced to continue hurting more ponies’ feelings by our work. What are we gonna do?!”

“Well even if we did told them, I doubt that they would ever forgive us for what we’ve done.” Sweetie Belle sighed sadly.

Suddenly, they heard the door immediately opened, revealing two older siblings that Carrie and Sweetie Belle recognized!

“Carrie!”

“Sweetie Belle!”

“Big brother!”

“Rarity!”

“Mason?”

“Rarity?”

“What are you two doing here?” Carrie asked curiously.

“We’re here to rescue you all!” Rarity said before hugging Sweetie Belle tightly. “I was sure enough that the angry crowd might’ve gotten you all hurt or worse!”

“What’s important is that you’re all safe.” Mason smiled before hugging his sister tightly as well before looking over her with a soft smile. “Are you alright?”

“Y-yeah…I’m alright big brother.” Carrie nodded, much to Mason’s relief.

“Okay, now let’s get back to the others.” Mason said, taking Carrie’s hand.

“I agree. Let us go.” Rarity nodded.

“Wait what? But why?” Scootaloo asked, oblivious to know about this.

“You don’t know?” Mason asked incredulously. “Everypony in Ponyville are practically storming towards the home-ship as an angry mob! Until the crowd calms down, I don’t think we’re ever gonna show our faces in Ponyville ever again…”

“No…” Carrie muttered.

“That can’t be! This wasn’t supposed to happen!” Sweetie Belle cried out, confusing Mason and Rarity.

“What in Equestria are you talking about Sweetie Belle?” Rarity questioned her sister with a suspicious gaze. 

Sweetie Belle widened her eyes and began sweating nervously. “U-uhh…n-no! No! Of course not my dear sweet sister! Now come on! Let’s get going!”

“Sweetie Belle….what exactly are you and your friends hiding?” Rarity raised a brow.

“N-nothing! I told you my dear sweet sister that everything’s alright between us, right girls?” Sweetie Belle chuckled nervously, glancing towards her friends. “RIGHT, girls?”

“O-oh yeah!” Apple Bloom nodded as she and the others began chuckling nervously, furthering their suspicions on both Mason and Rarity as the two looked at each other with blank looks.

“Carrie, tell me what exactly is that you’re hiding, now.” Mason said sternly.

“O-of course not big brother!” Carrie stepped back a bit before grabbing her bag and attempted to try and act innocent but not before she tripped over and the contents of her bag fell out of it, including a book that Rarity was all too familiar with.

“M-my…diary?” Rarity widened her eyes before glaring over at the girls, including Mason. “So this whole time…Gabby Gums were you girls all along?!”

“I-I’m sorry Rarity!” Sweetie Belle pleaded.

“How could you girls do this to us?!” Mason demanded. “Carrie, you should know better about posting things that ponies find offended and now the whole town hates us.”

“Mason…allow me.” Rarity assured with a calm look. She turned to the girls with a scolding look that could’ve traumatized anyone who dare makes contact with it. “How could you girls do this to us?! Sweetie Bell, Carrie, Apple Bloom, Scootaloo, you girls know better about posting things that ponies find offended and now the whole town is trying to get rid of Mason and the others! Is that what you wanted?!”

“No…” Carrie and the girls shook their heads sadly. 

“We didn’t mean for this to happen…we wanted to stop this but we were forced to keep going…” Carrie explained sadly.

“What? What do you mean?” Mason asked, softening his expression. “Carrie…did something happened that made you and your friends write more of those hurtful comments on the school newspaper?”

“Y-yeah…but we can’t tell you.” Carrie shook her head, much to the older siblings’ confusion.

“…Something did happened, did it?” Rarity guessed, which the girls nodded. “Well…while I do not appreciate for what you girls done, we shall talk about this later. Right now, we need to head back and make sure the others aren’t hurt by the crowd.”

“Agreed.” Mason nodded before walking over and bending down to his sister’s height. “Carrie…I know that you wouldn’t do this and I’m not mad at you, just disappointed on you.”

“I’m sorry.” Carrie apologized, sniffing miserably. Mason gave Carrie a little hug to cheer her up while Rarity and the rest of the girls smiled over them.

Rarity soon turned to her sister and her friends and said “And I’m sorry for scolding you like that earlier. Maybe I should’ve gone a tad bit easier on you.”

“It’s okay Rarity, we deserved that.” Sweetie Belle nodded.

“And you know what? Who cares if we get embarrassed?” Apple Bloom asked herself with a smirk. “Come on! Let’s go!”

“Huh? To where?” Scootaloo asked.

“Back to the home-ship, of course…” Apple Bloom answered, which Carrie and the others caught on. “But first, I think it’s mighty time for everypony to know who Gabby Gums is.”

Carrie, Sweetie Belle, and Scootaloo smiled over at their friend and nodded, while Mason and Rarity looked over at their sisters and friends ready and taking responsibility on their actions. 

“You don’t suppose I went too far with them, right Mason darling?” Rarity questioned, which Mason shook his head.

“Well no, but seeing them here means that Carrie and the others are growing up.” Mason smiled.

“Yes…I suppose so…” Rarity nodded. 

“Okay, but how are we gonna do that?” Scootaloo asked.

“I think I know where Apple Bloom is going with this…” Carrie formed a smile. “And I like it.”

Later

“Oh goddammit!” 

Oh man, this is so not good! Apparently that the angry mob been getting stronger with all the banging onto the door. 

“Seriously, what are they using to keep ramming the door? A log?!” Kaede exclaimed. As we continue to hold back the door, the door immediately flew opened, causing all of us and the stuff that was blocking the door to blast off and into the ground where thousands of ponies walked into the room with angry and outrage expressions.

“Stop it everypony! Calm down!” Twilight begged.

“How could you join and take their side?!” One of the ponies from the crowd exclaimed angrily.

“Because we trust them!” Applejack retorted. 

“They’ve done nothing wrong! So what if they eat something that you guys don’t bother to eat!” Rainbow added, only to be furthering the crowd’s anger.

“Oh no! We’re doomed!” Pinkie yelled.

“Serves them right!” Huh? We looked over to see Diamond Tiara walking over with a satisfied smirk on her face. “It shows you that these new species that appeared out of the blue, which are called humans, cannot be trusted.”

“What? Diamond Tiara?” Jamie asked in surprise. “W-what are you doing here?”
“I’m actually to cover the story to find out whether or not that humans are to be trusted.” Diamond Tiara answered bluntly.

“Wait…” Jack gritted his teeth in anger. “Are you telling us that…?”

“Oh no, that was Gabby Gums herself.” Diamond Tiara chuckled. “But I guess it’s no point anymore.”

“What…do you mean?” Nicole asked, raising a brow of suspicion over at her.

“It doesn’t matter because we can’t simply trust you lot anymore.” Diamond Tiara scoffed. “And those siding with these humans can’t seem to be trusted anymore it would seem.”

“D-Diamond Tiara, how could you say that?” Twilight gawked at that.

“And since when did she even care about species?” Spike whispered to Rantaro, who only shrugged as he kept his gaze at Diamond Tiara.

“W-why are you doing this?” Kaede demanded. “We haven’t been eating any meat at all in this world! We swear! We don’t anymore since getting here!”

“Shut up!” One of the ponies shouted as they slowly began walking towards us with angry looks, almost having the intent of killing us. Kodi stepped forward and growled and barked at them while Fluttershy held onto me in fear as I looked at them with a worried and scared look. Oh man, this is not how I want to die right here! I haven’t solved all the mysteries of this world and how do we even get back!…Is this the end?

“Stop! Stop it!” Huh? Mason? Rarity? Girls?! We saw them making their way through the crowd carrying a bunch of newspapers in their hands and hooves. “There’s something you all need to read!” Apple Bloom pleaded.

“It’s made specifically by us!” Carrie added with a soft grin. “It’s…something that we want to say and tell you all that we’re sorry.”

“….Huh?” We all asked with blank looks.

“What they’re saying is that they’re-”

“Gabby Gums.” Nicole answered, cutting Mason off. “Gabby Gums wasn’t just one journalist. It consisted of these three girls, and your little sister, am I right Mason?”

“Y-yes…” Mason nodded.

“So wait…it was you four all along?!” Rainbow exclaimed in shock.

“The hell?!” Jack exclaimed, also shocked by this. Everypony in the crowd murmured among themselves in shock, confusion, and surprise. 

“What do you think you’re doing?!” Diamond Tiara hissed. “If you tell them anymore, then I’ll post all those embarrassing photos of you idiots to the whole public to read and see!” 

“Oh? Do you mean this file?” Rantaro held a file in his hands with an amused smirk on his face, which Diamond Tiara widened her eyes in shock.

“What?! But how?!” Gizmo climbed onto Rantaro’s shoulder as the two fist-bumped each other with smirks on their faces.

“You should really keep a close eye on your stuff. But out of my gratitude, I’ll keep a close eye on this.” Rantaro snickered, much to Diamond Tiara’s anger as she tried to swipe it away from him.

“Give it back you idiot!” She jumped over and over to reach the file, but Rantaro refused to. 

“Yeah…no.” Rantaro replied bluntly. Diamond Tiara growled angrily before kicking him in the leg, which didn’t faze him at all. “You know that I’m still alright, right?”

“Grrr!” Diamond Tiara’s left eye twitched in anger.

“Thanks Rantaro.” Carrie thanked with a smile. Rantaro bowed with a mocking smile and replied “Whatever you say, your majesty.”

“Don’t push it.” Mason said sternly.

“So what does those newspaper say anyway?” Kaede asked in confusion.

“Well…” Apple Bloom and the other girls looked at each other with worried and concern before looking back at all of us. “Before you all get angry and scold us all for what we’ve done, we just want you all to read this over and say what you all think.”

“Here, we have them right here.” Mason said, handing one for each pony and even us to have. Kodi, Fluttershy, and I looked over at the new newspaper that Mason handed us as I began reading aloud.

“To the Citizens of Ponyville, For some time now, you’ve been reading this column to get the latest dirt and the hottest buzz. But this will be my final piece. We want to apologize for the pain and embarrassment we’ve caused. You see, I’m actually three little fillies and one human girl, Sweetie Belle, Apple Bloom, Scootaloo, and Carrie Hunter. As the popularity of our column grew, we got swept up in the hype. We knew that what we were doing didn’t feel quite right, but we ignored the guilt because everypony seemed to want to read what we were writing. From now on, we promise to respect everypony else’s privacy, and we won’t engage in hurtful gossip anymore. All we can do is ask for your forgiveness, Ponyville.

Signing off for the very last time,

XOXO, Gabby Gums."


…Wow, this is so beautiful. Me, Fluttershy, and Kodiak looked at each other with awe and shock before smiling over at the three Crusaders and Carrie and everypony else seemed to be finish reading it as they stared at the little girls who wrote this.

“They meant it in every word.” Rarity smiled, hugging her sister a bit.

“And didn’t mean to write all those hurtful comments to you all.” Mason added, ruffling his sister’s hair which made her laugh. Apple Bloom looked over at her sister, who sported a stern look on her face.

“You’re…still mad at me?” Apple Bloom asked in concern.

“Well while I don’t appreciate writing lies about me nor your brother…” Applejack pulled her over for a hug, along with Big Macintosh, who smiled over at his little sister. “But I’ll forgive ya Apple Bloom.”

“Eeyup!” Big Mac nodded in agreement. 

“Rainbow Dash! I am so sorry for writing all those mean comments about you and send it up all the way to Cloudsdale!” Scootaloo apologized, seeing Rainbow Dash’s angry look. Rainbow Dash looked at her for a while before smiling and hugging Scootaloo.

“Are you kidding? After reading that whole thing, there’s no way I could stay mad at you like that!” Rainbow laughed, much to Scootaloo’s joy. Everypony seemed to nodded in agreement while the rest of us felt heart-warmed by this scene.

“You know…that went better than any of us expected.” Jamie stated, blinking in surprise.

“You can say that again.” Kaede sighed in relief, which I nodded in agreement. You can say that again, Kay. But you know, I still can’t believe that it was Apple Bloom, Scootaloo, Sweetie Belle, and Carrie that would do all that gossiping. But at least they finally learned their lessons….

“This isn’t fair!” And of course the moment had to be ruined. We all gazed at Diamond Tiara as she began panting heavily and her eyes…it looked nearly blank like they devoid any emotion at all. “This isn’t fair…what about the humans? There’s no way you all can forgive them, especially for eating our flesh and meat.”

I turned to Diamond Tiara with a serious look, but before I could say anything, someone else beat me to it.

“You’re wrong Diamond Tiara! Ren and the others don’t eat our kind!” We all gazed at Fluttershy, who surprisingly had a serious and scolded look on her face like she was angry or something. 

“Sure that they eat, but they told me that there are many other animals that they protect and don’t try to eat them in order to protect and preserve their species! That’s what I do as an animal caretaker along with other ponies and creatures out there protecting and preserving animals to save from extinction! Think about the good times and how many times they saved us from Cerberus and the other bad things that occurred in Ponyville! They showed kindness, generosity, been honest with us, and showed their loyalty, and you’re all just gonna call them ‘monsters’ even though you all don’t show any concern or even care how they feel right now?!”

Oh my frigging god…I never thought I would hear it from her of all ponies. Fluttershy panted heavily before widening her eyes with a small tainted pink blush on her cheeks before flying over and hid behind me in a flash.

“W-well…if it’s alright with you all.” Fluttershy muttered.

“Whoa, never thought that she would even say all that.” Jack muttered.

“It would seem that she’s starting to overcome her nervousness.” Nicole stated, looking over her iPad. “Besides, what she spoken is quite encouraging I would say. But that’s not the only thing that you all should be angry at, you all should be suspecting Diamond Tiara.”

“What? Me?!” Diamond Tiara exclaimed.

“I figured that you had something to do this.” Nicole said with a stern look on her face. “Apparently I can tell considering the newspaper.”

“The…newspaper?” I asked in confusion.

Nicole nodded before picking up the article of Jack eating a burger along with the paper of Fluttershy and her tail extensions, much to her embarrassment. 

"You see these two articles? They look different due to their wording." Nicole explained. "Gabby Gums consisted of these little girls and been unintentionally hurting you ponies' feelings, but the one about Jack wouldn't be something they wrote because Carrie is a human and she would know better than to reveal something so hurtful to cause all this."

"Exactly." Rantaro smirked. "I had a feeling that something was weird considering that Carrie is very trustworthy and would never dare try to ruin a secret, so she couldn't written it...right Diamond Tiara?"

"Y-you think I did this?" Diamond Tiara narrowed her eyes. "It could've been those idiots before! They could've easily taken a picture while you guys were distracted!"

"No, I saw them." Rantaro answered, much to Diamond Tiara's confusion. "I saw them go into the elevator while I was busy looking around the place to mind my own business and I just happened to see them go through the central elevator out of the mall district, so technically speaking, they do have an alibi."

"Ah!" Diamond Tiara gritted her teeth in anger.

"And other than that, you seemed to be the most obvious choice considering that you have this file, right?" Rantaro smirked. "And when I saw the girls having those relieved looks, I knew there was something that they didn't want to be revealed."

"And if I had to guess, I say that this file contains something forces them to either do all those rude comments and not wanting them to quit, correct Ms. Diamond Tiara?" Nicole asked, seeing the upset look on her face. "I could tell that from your outrage look that you're admitting this is all your fault, right? Also, you may have fooled everyone but I'm afraid that isn't possible for neither me or Rantaro due to the two different newspaper articles."

"You both could tell by all that?!" Kaede exclaimed in shock.

"Ooh! I knew that she was psychic!" Pinkie smiled brightly.

"I-I have heard that her psychology and observational skills were quite advanced, but I never i-imagined it was this advanced." Jamie muttered loudly, having a surprised look on his face.

"Y-you're wrong...I'm not the bad guy here." Diamond Tiara hissed as something began emanating out of her. I widened my eyes a bit to see a dark aura surrounding her. "I...I can't afford to do this anymore. All of you are...idiots...I...I knew the soul inside of me to let go..."

"What?" I asked in confusion.

"I...I don't deserved this. I have no life!" With that, Diamond Tiara began running away until Jack grabbed her by the tail, holding her steady. "No! Let go of me! I don't deserved to live! We're all gonna die! Let me die!"

"Calm the hell down for crying out loud!" Jack yelled.

"Wait, just still!" I said with a concern look as I tried to touch her, but she swatted my hand away in panic as her face showed extreme paranoia.

"Don't touch me! Let me go!" Diamond Tiara screamed while everypony else looked at shock and confusion at her. "I don't get why you idiots can't see that these humans are monsters even when I tried framing them and making you all hate them!"

"Ahh...did I hear a confession?" Rantaro smirked.

"So she did do it then." Twilight said with a stern look.

"Y-yeah...b-but why is she acting like this?" Jamie wondered. Nicole examined Diamond Tiara for a moment before widening her eyes in pure shock.

"Huh? Is there something wrong, Nicole darling?" Rarity asked in concern.

"....I'm not sure." Nicole replied, returning to her usually solemn look.

"Not...sure?" Mason asked with a raised brow.

"Her emotions are at the point of her wanting to..." Nicole stopped herself, not eager to finish that sentence which made everypony intense.

"Well what?!" Rainbow exclaimed impatiently.

"I am sorry...but just drop it for now." NIcole replied, much to our disappointment. "Right now, we need to calm her out of her paranoia. She's fully unstable."

"Okay." I nodded as I tried walking over to Diamond Tiara as she struggled around with Jack holding onto her.

"Please! Let me live! I don't deserve living in a world with these freaks!" 

"Calm down already brat!" Jack exclaimed.

"Y-yeah, calm down." I assured before tripping over something as I fell to the floor but not before my hand made contact to Diamond Tiara's head and a bright light emanating the entire room, blinding us all.

What's...going on? I fell face flat on the floor until ten seconds later, I soon started to get up with Kodiak running over and licking my face. "W-what?"

"You okay, dude?" Kodi asked in worried.

"Y-yeah, I think so."  I nodded in agreement before seeing everypony gazing at Diamond Tiara. Jack settled her down on the ground the moment she began to slowly wake up.

"What the? How did I get here?" Diamond Tiara asked herself.

"You don't remember?" Mason asked with a raised brow.

"Yeah, you just started panicking and such with some crazy nonsense." Sweetie Belle explained.

"Ugh..." Diamond Tiara rubbed her head with a groan. "I can't remember a thing. The only thing I remember was being in my office."

"Huh? Are you serious?" Jack asked incredulously before scoffing "That obviously sounds like a lie considering you being a spoiled brat."

"Yeah! Especially blackmailing our friends." Rainbow added.

"What? How do you know that?!" Diamond Tiara demanded before realizing that the crowd of ponies she was accompanied with were glaring at her. "I-I mean...what ever do you mean?"

"It would seem that your lies won't get you anyway anymore." Twilight said sternly. "I'll be sure to tell Ms. Cheerilee about your behavior as being the editor-in-chief."

"Hmph! Whatever, I like to see you all try." Diamond Tiara stuck her tongue out, only to backed away in fear upon seeing Kodiak growling at her. 

"Well I'm glad that shut her up." Jack scoffed.

"B-but wait...y-you don't remember anything at all?" Jamie asked in confusion. "Just where you were?"

"Yes, I said that already stupid." Diamond Tiara scoffed, earning a frown from Jamie's face.

"Well that's weird." Applejack said with a confused look.

"Meh, probably just more of her lies." Rainbow rolled her eyes.

"Diamond Tiara!" Huh? We looked over to our right to see an older brown earth pony wearing a tie that had a money sigh on it and slick and smooth black mane and tail as he glared at his daughter. "I don't know what made you think about forcing your own classmates to write all those hurtful comments to these innocent ponies, even to one of my employers."

"Hey, who's that?" Kaede asked.

"Oh, t-that's Filthy Rich. Diamond Tiara's father." Jamie explained. "We met during our first Equestrian Christmas celebration."

"Oh yes. I seem to recall that we met during Family Appreciation Day." Mason smiled. "I would see that you joined in on the angry mob, yes?"

"Oh, hello there Mason, Jamie, and the Apple Family." Filthy Rich smiled over us. "It's good to see ya.

"You're really avoiding the question." Nicole pointed out. "Were you apart of the mob or not is the question Mason is asking."

"Oh yes, I am terribly sorry about that." Filthy Rich apologized. "I didn't mean to partake in it. I was just curious and wanted to find my own answers whether it was true or not, so please forgive me for anything I could've said to you." He glared at his daughter sternly. "Especially if my daughter forced these poor innocent girls to do terrible things for the Foal Free Press."

"It's alright." Mason assured.

"So what are you gonna do with her Mr. Filthy Rich?" Carrie asked curiously.

"Easy, I'll make sure that she gives an apology to all of Ponyville." Filthy Rich stated.

"Ahh, but daddy!-"

"No buts! Now march!" Filthy Rich pointed his hoof towards the door, much to her anger and frustration as she began marching off with the rest of the crowd looking on her before they turned back at us.

"Umm...hi?" I waved my hand nervously with a nervous smile. "Anyway, we're sorry about the whole thing. It was all just a misunderstanding and sorry if we didn't tell you all but I swear that we don't eat meat anymore since we're here. It's a promise."

The crowd gave me and the rest doubtful looks, causing me to frown sadly. Man, I guess they still don't trust me yet, do they? Suddenly, we heard someone walking towards us as we saw a little foal making his way towards me with a curious look and asked me a little request.

"Pinkie promise?" Ahh, now that's just adorable. Who can't reject a face such as that?

I let out a nod before began doing the gestures for the Pinkie Promise Pinkie Pie Style. "Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye."

That made the little foal giggled and the rest of the crowd let out some 'Aww' on us before they began walking towards me and the others with apologetic looks.

"Hey humans...we're so sorry."

"Sorry if I called you a monster."

"Could you ever forgive us all?"

"Would somepony like a muffin to accept our apologies?"

I looked over at the crowd with a surprised look while some of the others had bewildered looks and smiles on their faces. I let out a smile before nodding and replied "Yeah, it's okay everypony. After all, you know the saying folks 'Everypony deserves a second chance', am I right?"

The crowd murmured in agreement with bright smiles on their faces before they began to take their leave out of our home, now sporting calm and happy looks instead of the angry looks they had a moment ago.

"Well that's a relief. Glad that's over." Rantaro sighed. "Heh, for a minute there, I thought for sure those guys might've tried to kill us or something."

"Don't say stuff like that!" Rarity exclaimed angrily. "We wouldn't dare resort to such violence!"

"Sure, say what you want beautiful." Rantaro shrugged nonchalantly, ignoring the squawking coming out of her.

"That was awesome Ren! Told ya that one day that the Pinkie Promise would always make others trust ya! Just remember not to break it." Pinkie reminded me, causing me to smile nervously as I rubbed the back of my neck and said "Yeah...I'll be sure to remember that."

After all, I don't want to go where Applejack went when she nearly broke your Pinkie Promise that one time ago back at Dodge Junction.

"But you know what? Nothing's more surprising but seeing Fluttershy defend you like that." Pinkie turned to Fluttershy with an excited grin. "You were awesome back there Fluttershy!"

"O-oh!" Fluttershy blushed and looked away nervously. "D-do you really mean that?"

"Hell yeah!" Jack nodded with a toothily grin before nudging me. "Who knew your gal had the guts to even talk back to those idiots."

"H-Hey!" I looked away with a blush on my face.

"You know, they do have a point." Kaede smiled happily. "You were pretty amazing there Fluttershy. Thanks for defending us all."

"W-well...you're welcome." Fluttershy thanked.

"And we're sorry for writing those nasty comments." Apple Bloom apologized.

"Yeah, we wanted to stop at first but we didn't because everypony seemed so interested in it and DIamond Tiara wouldn't let us quit because she blackmailed us." Carrie explained. "I wanna tell you guys but she blackmailed me too if I told anyone because I would've been the cause for humiliating my own friends and I thought you guys might hate us forever."

"Of course not, darling." Rarity shook her head with a soft smile. "What's important is that you girls learned your lessons."

"Indeed." Mason patted his sister's head with a satisfied smile. "Well I'm just glad this is all over now and hopefully the town and possibly all of Equestria will accept us again due to finding out about our diet."

"True..." Twilight nodded, who was rubbing her chin in deep thought. "But I am just curious about Diamond Tiara."

"Huh? What about her?" Rainbow asked with a raised brow.

"Yeah, I mean she's caught, isn't she?" Spike reminded her.

"True, but I can't help but wonder why she can't remember anything and that bright flash from before..." Oh yeah, I totally forgot about that for a moment there.

"Yeah, what was the big deal with that?" Kodi wondered. "It happened when Ren touched Diamond Tiara and somehow got her out of her sanity."

"Yeah, just what happened?" Jamie nodded, crossing his arms in thought before taking out his notebook and began writing some info down. "It's best if we tried to figure this out later Twilight."

"Indeed." Twilight nodded.

"Yes." Nicole smiled a bit. "But you know...this is the first time I've ever encountered something crazy like that in one day."

"Trust me, you're gonna see a lot of crazy in this world." Rantaro sighed.

"True..." Nicole nodded before furrowing her brows at him. "But if I may ask....why did you lie?"

"Eh?" Rantaro looked at her like she grew a second head or something.

"The part about seeing those little girls going into the central elevator...that was definitely a lie. You committed perjury." Nicole explained, much to our shock.

"What?! You lied?!" Applejack glared at Rantaro, who just shrugged at her and replied "So what? It cleared her out of suspicion."

"But lying is still a wrong thing to do." Applejack scolded.

"Of course you wouldn't lie, farm girl." Rantaro smirked. "You would one day find out how lying can be useful in times." 

"Yeah, for a creep like you." Jack muttered.

"You can say that again." Rarity nodded.

"So wait..." Apple Bloom looked at Rantaro, along with the rest of the Crusaders with shocked and awe looks. "You lied to protect us? You did it for us? Despite everything, you helped us?"

"You may say something like that but-" Before he could finish, he was immediately hugged by Carrie and the Crusaders, much to his bewilderment.

"Thank you Mr. Rantaro!" Carrie thanked, letting out some tears. "We can't thank you enough!"

"Yeah! You're okay in my book!" Scootaloo smiled happily.

"R-right..." Rantaro raised a brow at them as they ended their hugs and smiled happily at him.

"We won't ever forget about this, Mr. Rantaro!" Sweetie Belle thanked.

"W-whatever..." Rantaro muttered before looking over the file. "Though I am curious to know what it is."

The Crusaders widened their eyes in shock before jumping all over him, attempting to take back the file.

"No! Give it back!" Apple Bloom demanded.

"Please! Don't look at it!" Sweetie Belle begged.

"We'll do anything just don't look at it!" Scootaloo pleaded.

"Jeez, you guys are really panicking over one measly file even though it's what caused you girls to be blackmailed in the first place." Rantaro rolled his eyes as he attempted to read the file, but the Crusaders kept preventing him from doing so while the rest of us looked at each other in surprise and concern. 

"Wow, did not expect that to happen." Kodi said aloud.

"You said it, dog. You said it." Rainbow nodded.

"Speaking of which..." Nicole turned to me curiously before grabbing my hand, much to my surprise as she took me far away from the group. "Ren...can we talk?"

"Huh? Sure, what for Nikki?" I asked in confusion. Nicole glanced away before saying "I'm not sure what happened, but that bright light...it came from you the moment you touched Diamond Tiara."

"I get that...but I don't know why." I said, looking at my hand. "Why are you asking me that?"

"...I am not sure why..." She narrowed her eyes at me. "But there is definitely something strange going on...I'm not sure but do you remember when I looked at Diamond Tiara and tried to sense what was wrong with her?"

"Yeah?" Where exactly is this going?

"...She was thinking of committing suicide."

"...Huh?" At that moment, I looked at her with a shocked look as I was unable to hear what she just said to me. "S-suicide? Are you serious right now?!"

"Yes, you should know that I am a psychologist and I am able to read people's emotions and personalities very well." Nicole nodded before looking over at her iPad. "But for some strange reason, she was thinking of that but the moment after the flash, she acted like her normal self."

"B-but that's-"

"Quite strange and crazy?" Oh dang it! She beat me to it! "It is...which makes us begs the question...why was she even thinking of that before? And why can't she remember everything that she did?"

Those are good questions. I gazed at my hand and blinked in confusion, wondering what just happened? What was that bright flash all about? Why would Diamond Tiara at one point think about suicidal thoughts but later stopped that? I...I don't understand this at all...my head hurts right now...

"But...we may discuss this later." Nicole took her glasses off and began wiping them off with her own piece of cloth. "But overall, I think it's best if we kept this a little secret till we find more about it. Something's happening here in this world and we need to be prepared on what we're about to face..."

"Y-yeah...I'll try to remember." I nodded, letting out a gulp. I really don't get it...but overall, at least everything's back to normal now, right? But still...why do I have this uncertainty in my heart that this isn't all over yet?

"Hey you guys, what are you two talking about?" We looked over to see the others looking at me with concern and confused looks.

"It's nothing..." Nicole answered. "I should be off now...farewell..."

With that, Nicole headed over to the central elevator and immediately, she was gone.

"And she's gone...great." Rantaro grumbled.

"Hey Ren, what were you and Nicole talking about?" Fluttershy asked curiously.

"Ooh! Ooh! Maybe a surprise birthday party?" Pinkie guessed, which made me chuckle and shook my head. 

"Nah, it was just some secret." I replied before raising my hands in surrender. "But it's nothing, honest."

"Okay then, partner." Applejack shrugged.

"Are you sure?" Mason questioned.

"Yeah, it's nothing." I replied back. 

Yeah...it was nothing. Nothing at all...



Meanwhile
"Well...it would seem that it nearly worked." Void was seen watching Ponyville from the skies as he began manifesting some dark power in his hands over with a single dark-looking shard in his hands. "But overall, at least I got a bit of darkness from all of their hatred...and it would seem that the Elements' magic is starting to fading away judging by that little pony's reaction. Soon...this world will surely be brought back of the hope that was lost from when these specimen took control of it."

With that, Void disappeared in the dark unknown with a little shard in his hands. Just what was happening?



The Next Day
After the incident yesterday involving many apologies from all citizens of Ponyville, Ms. Cheerilee called over all members of the Foal Free Press Club to discuss the events yesterday.

"Well, staff, I guess I gave a little too much authority to a first-time editor." Ms. Cheerilee said, glaring at Diamond Tiara. "I'm sorry, Diamond Tiara, but I have no choice but to strip you of your title."

She slammed her back hooves onto the wall, folding back a screen with Diamond Tiara's image painted on it. Diamond Tiara growled angrily before walking over next to Carrie and co.

"And for the next editor of the Foal Free Press..." Diamond Tiara gave the girls a raspberry, which made Carrie give her one back. "...Here's your new editor-in-chief, Featherweight!"

The door to the office opened up, revealing the pony from before who was forced to take those horrible photos of the Crusaders to blackmail them. Apparently, like his name implied, his entire Pegasi body was lighter like a feather, literally.

But the students didn't care about that as they at least had a better and nicer editor-in-chief unlike somepony who shall not be named.

"Ugh! Him? But what about me?!" Diamond Tiara demanded. As if on cue, a dark blue pony handed her an apron and hat to her.

"Here ya go! I've been promoted to staff photographer!" The pony grinned before snapping a picture of her. The flash nearly caught her off balance as she landed near a machine, causing ink to spill all over her.

"AH HA HA HA!" Carrie and the others laughed while Diamond Tiara glared at them angrily, hoping that one day that she will get her revenge on them...not.
To Be Contined