//------------------------------// // Chapter 6: Aftermath Pt. 1 (Sweetie Belle) // Story: Through the Eyes of Anon-a-Miss // by sonicfan05 //------------------------------// It has been some time since the CMC successfully got the Rainbooms to ditch Sunset Shimmer, all thanks to their efforts as Anon-a-Miss. However, despite everything went according to plan, things were pretty grim. They noticed that their respective sisters/mentor were down on the dumps and miserable after they stopped hanging out with Sunset. At first, the CMC figured that they will get over Sunset after a couple days and that they will be themselves again in no time. But as many days go by, the Rainbooms attitudes never changed. In fact, they felt more depressed by the day, much to the CMC's concern. What really didn't help was that the Rainbooms continued to receive consent teasing and bullying from other students due to the posts from Anon-a-Miss. Speaking of other students, Canterlot High itself wasn't doing so good either. With Anon-a-Miss targeting a bunch of new students every day, the school spirit was plummeting. Gone were the cheerfulness and friendly atmosphere of the school. Instead, the school was filled with nothing but hostile and despair. Whenever students passed by each other, they would either laughed at the victim or openly accused each other for exposing their secrets to Anon-a-Miss. Sometimes on a "good" day, the students would just glared at each other, not saying a word as they pass by. The only time that many students would unite together is give hate and hostile to Sunset Shimmer whenever she showed up. After witnessing the Rainbooms openly accused her as as Anon-a-Miss, almost everyone in school considered her guilty of the crime no matter how many times Sunset pleaded her innocence. It was lunch time in the school's cafeteria. Instead of eating their meals, everyone yelled and argued with each other as always. Even with the school staff trying to gain control, the atmosphere was as hostile as ever. In the middle of all this chaos, the CMC were sitting at the tables just quietly, not touching their food. Neither of them had any appetite as they silently watched the events around them. Sweetie Belle didn't even want to come in to school today, especially near her "friends". Unfortunately for her, her family forced her to go back after she skipped several days of school due to her "sickness", so she didn't have a choice. Meeting her friends again was... awkward for all of them. After finding out what happened with Sunset due to the photos of the sleepover that Sweetie posted online, she doesn't even know what to feel about that. Does it feel right to get what you wanted at the expense of someone else, even though she used to be a bully? She and Scootaloo still haven't talked to each other since their fight on the day of Rarity's sleepover and Sweetie couldn't even look at Apple Bloom in the eye, still disappointed in her for the way she behaved. Even when she took a glance at Apple Bloom, Apple Bloom had a blank expression on her face, not revealing her true feelings on the situation. While her expression remained unreadable, Sweetie could've sworn that there was some kind of struggle going on from the look of her eyes but she wasn't really sure. What really baffled Sweetie Belle was that both Apple Bloom and Scootaloo continued to keep up with this whole Anon-a-Miss act even after they succeed in their goal. "This is getting out of control," Sweetie Belle spoke up, alerting her two "friends". "Everyday in this school, things are getting worse and worse by the day– scratch that, a minute! Why do you two keep doing this? You both got what you wanted!" Scootaloo gave Sweetie her angry glare. "You mean we? You're involved in this too!" Sweetie glared back. "One: I'm talking to Apple Bloom, not you! And second, I was involved because you two made me do it! I never wanted to follow through your terrible plan to begin with!" "Apple Bloom gave you an option, did she not?" Scootaloo argued. "You didn't even have to do it, you can simply choose to walk away as you claimed you would! But instead, you chose to steal pictures off of Sunset's phone and then chose to upload her pictures from their sleepover!" "Choose my foot!" Sweetie Belle shouted before pointing accusingly at Apple Bloom. "Apple Bloom made me do it over the phone!" "And yet you still chose to steal their pics before you called Apple Bloom!" Scootaloo countered as she pointed at Sweetie Belle. "Face it Sweetie Belle, you're just as guilty as us!" "At least I didn't post my idol's test scores and then posted random hurtful things to other students online like a heartless coward like you!" "COWARD!? WHY YOU–" "GIRLS THAT'S ENOUGH!" Both Sweetie and Scootaloo immediately stopped arguing and turned to Apple Bloom, who spoke for the first time today. "Stop this right now! This whole thing is tearin' us apart! We can't tear each other's throat out, not while we still have a job to do!" Sweetie stared at Apple Bloom in disbelief. "What the heck do you mean, 'we still have a job to do'!? You said we're doing this until we get or sisters to ditch Sunset! But you both keep doing this days after that happened. Why you keep going?" Apple Bloom looked down and sighed. "Because... it's too soon to stop." "What do ya mean!?" Sweetie demanded. "If we were to stop now, people would think it's not Shimmer and then realize she's been framed," Apple Bloom explained. "So we have to keep everyone believing it was her by continuing to posting stuff online." "But it's been more than a week since our sisters broke ties with Sunset!" Sweetie Belle argued. "Isn't that more than enough!?" Apple Bloom sighed but still didn't look up. "We have to... keep up with the act in order for our plan to work." "Bull hockey!" Sweetie Belle cried, banging their table with her fist. "Was 'keeping up with the act' really part of the plan... or did ya do this just to keep making Sunset suffer?" Apple Bloom didn't answer, angering Sweetie Belle further. She than turn to her other "friend" with a hard look. "What about you Scootaloo!? Didn't you think Sunset suffered enough as it is?" Like Apple Bloom, she too didn't answer while not meeting Sweetie's eyes. Whether it was because she was still angry at Sweetie or too ashamed to admit it, Sweetie wasn't certain. What she was certain however, Sweetie felt very disappointed in them. "...I can't believe you two!" Sweetie shouted as she stood up and grabbed her things. "HEY! Where you going!?" Scootaloo demanded. Sweetie Belle gave Scootaloo her angry glare. "Anywhere than here... away from you two!" With that, Sweetie turned and walked away from her table and out of the cafeteria without looking back. Sweetie Belle seethed as she was walking down the hallway, angry from her "friends'" behaviors and how they were handling this situation. I can't believe this! Even after we get our sisters to ditch Sunset and it still wasn't enough!? I felt terrible enough as it is, but them!? How can they be so heartless! Don't they realized what they're doing is making things worse then they are already!? I just... I just can't even– Her thought's were suddenly interrupted when she felt someone bumped into her and rushed pass her without an apology. Sweetie turned to give someone a piece of her mind for being so rude, but stopped herself when she realized who it was. "R-Rarity?" Sweetie uttered. While she can only see her back, it was indeed Rarity who walked passed her. She was dressed in a pink trench coat with a deep pink belt around her waist and a large pink hat on her head. Ever since the pictures of Rarity and her friends wearing her badly designed clothes from her closet of shame online, Rarity has been a laughing stock of the entire school. Everyday, Rarity tried to wear different outfits to disguised herself in hopes that she won't be noticed. Unfortunately, that never worked as it only brings more attention upon herself for more teasing from other students. Today was no different as a group of students walked passed Sweetie Belle, while their main focus was on Rarity, heckling her the whole way behind her back. "Hey Rarity? Where did you get that outfit? Was that from your famous closet of shame?" "If you were that desperate to sell those outfits, try selling those to the circus!" "In fact, the way you and your friends dressed and acted at your slumber party... you all belonged at the circus!" As the students continued to laugh mockingly at Rarity, Sweetie saw Rarity tried to raised her collar up, hiding herself further. Once they disappeared around the corner, Sweetie Belle gritted her teeth and clenched her fist tightly in anger. She hated those jerks for taunting her sister everyday ever since those pictures were up on the web. She hated to see her sister put on a different disguise everyday to hide herself from her tormentors, even though they never really work. Worse of all, she hated herself for causing all of this in the first place. No way they can laugh at my sister and get away with it! Sweetie thought angrily with a growl. She quickly took out her phone and started to log in as Anon-a-Miss. She knew the names of these students and was about to give them the humiliation of their lifetime. Once she logged in, she began to type a message on the site so she can post them for all to see. But just before she hit the 'Submit' button, she stopped, slowly realizing what she was about to do. ...what am I doing She thought as she gripped her phone tighter. What does this accomplish of posting something embarrassing about them? Sure, I get back at those creeps for bullying Rarity, but then what? Then someone else will taunt Rarity in their place or they'll blame Sunset. I mean... I don't want her to get in trouble with other students. I just want everyone who is a bully to leave my sister alone... even though she never paid any attention to me. Sweetie frowned when she realized that she contradict herself. I mean... she was but... aside from spending time with my sister too much, Sunset didn't do anything bad to her...now I mean. And... she didn't humiliate her like she used to back then than how those jerks are humiliating her now after I... posted those pictures of... her. Her eyes widened and her pupils shrunk when something disturbing came to her that she never thought of until now. Usually someone going out of their way to humiliating someone in public makes them a bully. Does... this make me a bully too... even though I'm hiding... behind the screen? "Sweetie Belle?" "GAH!" Sweetie Belle jumped from a sudden voice from behind her. She quickly turned around and realized that the voice belonged to none other than Silver Spoon, another former bully, turned friend and Diamond Tiara's best friend. She had gray hair with a white stripe. She wore purple shirt with white collars, magenta skirt, and purple boots. She was also wearing her light blue pearls around her neck and wrists, her blue glasses over her face and her signature "silver spoon" necklace around her neck. "Oh, I'm sorry!" said Silver Spoon. "I didn't mean to scare you." "Oh no it was okay!" Sweetie Belle assured quickly, while trying to calm herself. "I was just reading a, uh... a scary fanfiction." She then cleared her throat. "A-anyway, what's up Silver Spoon?" Silver Spoon looked away with a frown on her face. "Oh well... I just taking a walk around the school... just to think." Sweetie Belle titled her head. "To think? About what?" At first, Silver Spoon didn't respond as all. She was only standing there with a faraway look on her face. Just as Sweetie was about to call her again, Silver Spoon let out a long sigh before facing Sweetie. "Sweetie... I know we just become friends, but may I ask you a... personal question?" "Um... yeah, sure," Sweetie slowly responded, not sure where this would lead. "What is it?" Silver Spoon sighed again before giving Sweetie her serious expression. "Do you and your best friends ever fight each other a lot? Sweetie Belle raised her eyebrow, not expecting this question. "Well... yeah, we fought sometimes. We don't always agree with each other and get on each other's nerves, but because we have a strong bond, we made up just as quickly and still on each others side." Silver Spoon sighed. "Let me rephrase that. Do you ever have a bad fight with your friends so badly, that you're mad at them for days?" Sweetie was stumped. This was not the kind of question she was expecting. She was going to respond that it never happen to her or her friends until she realize this had happened to them for the past week and a half. Ever since Anon-a-Miss was created, she felt her whole group was slowly tearing each other apart. The only exception so far was her fight with Scootaloo and the way Apple Bloom was using her many days back. Her relationship with them have been strained since then, but there was no reason of telling Silver Spoon any of that, even if she wasn't her bully anymore. Before she could respond Silver spoke again with a sudden darken mood. "And have you ever felt so mad at them... that you did something so horrible that you not only hurt them, but you may also be losing them in the process?" Sweetie was taken back from Silver's kind of question. Before she could come up with an answer, Silver spoke up hastily. "Nevermind... sorry to bother you." Silver was about to walk away but Sweetie stopped her. "Silver... did you and Diamond... had a bad argument?" Silver paused for a moment before she turned her back on Sweetie. "...that's nothing for you to be concerned about," she uttered emotionlessly before leaving a very concerned Sweetie behind. Sometime later, Sweetie Belle was walking down the hallway with books in her arms as she made her way to next class. She still couldn't help but think about her earlier encounter with Silver Spoon. Obliviously, something's going on between her and Diamond Tiara. The way Silver asked her a question, suggests that the two of them were having a potential fall out. Was it because of Anon-a-Miss? Was it because of her? "Did anyone hear anything from Soarin?" Sweetie froze in place at someone mentioning their first victim outside of the Rainbooms. Sweetie slowly looked over and spotted two teenaged boys, hanging out by the lockers with solemn expressions. One was an athlete named Curly Winds. He had a curly blue hair, a t-shirt with a white and red jacket over it with a tornado emblem on its side and jeans. The other was Flash Sentry, a popular cool guy of the school and leader of his own band, the Flash Drives. He also had blue hair and was wearing his trademark t-shirt with a blue shield and a lightning bolt emblem on it, a black jacket with red and white stripe and jeans. "Naw man, I heard nothing from him," said Flash as he shook his head. "What about you? Didn't you talk to him all the time?" "Usually I did," said Curly with a look of concern. "But ever since Anon-a-Miss posted something about him, he haven't shown up in school since. I tried texting him but he never responded. This just made me worried about him." Flash sighed. "Yeah, I wouldn't show my face here again either if someone posted about me." Sweetie Belle winced as she was eavesdropping them. She silently cursed at both Scootaloo and herself for letting this happened. She felt awful for humiliated Soarin and chased him away and she hoped that he's okay. Suddenly, she along with the two boys heard someone crying from down the halls. Sweetie turned towards the source and her heart dropped at the sight of who it was. No! The one who was crying was a blonde teen girl with two misaligned yellow eyes. Sweetie knew this girl too well. Next to Fluttershy, she's one of the kindest person in school with a bubbly personality and a love for muffins. She is also very clumsy and caused some unintentional mishaps like accidentally blew up the science lab by mixing the wrong chemistry or let the sports balls overrun the gym after accidentally broke the storage shelves. But despite those mishaps, she would always apologized with a sheepish grin and then continued her day without a care in the world. However, only two things would bother that girl deeply; making people upset because of her and most importantly, her eyes. It is a common knowledge in school about this person's eyes, yet no one knew the origin about them except for her closest friends. Some say she was in an accident, resulting her eyes to become permanently misaligned. Others say that she was simply born with them. Whatever the reason, her eyes is a sensitive topic to her and no one dared to bring that up. But that wouldn't stop some bullies for teasing about them or her personality. Judging from the state this girl was in now, Sweetie had a sinking suspicion that whatever happened to her now, may be ten times worse. The blonde girl ran past Sweetie and ran into Flash's chest, sobbing into his chest. Flash held the girl's shoulders while looking at her with great concern. "Hey, are you okay?" "...no." She croaked as she looked up at him while tears were running down her cheeks. "Ever since that post about me... everywhere I go... everyone was making fun of me. They've mocked eyes... telling me I'm worthless... and calling me names like "stupid", "idiot" and... and..." Unable to speak further, the blonde girl buried her face into Flash's shirt and sobbed loudly. Feeling great pity for his friend, he gently hugged around the girl while trying to comfort her. Oh no... Scoots.... what did you do? Sweetie continued to watch the sad scene, feeling awful for the poor girl. While she felt terrible enough that they had hurt other people just to pin Sunset, but to see someone else in person, aside from her own sister, was too much. The guilt was really eating her, as if there was something was holding on to her heart in a very tight grip, threatening to break it at any moment. Just when Sweetie was about to shed a tear herself, she was startled when Curly banged hard on his locker in anger. "Sunset Shimmer!" He growled with contempt. "That girl had crossed the line this time! She better prayed that I don't run into her! Otherwise... she will deal with me for hurting my friends!" Sweetie watched on horror as the gravity of the situation hits her like a locomotive. She and her friends never took in account that the other students will come to harm Sunset for revenge due to their actions. While she admitted that she wanted Sunset to be away from her sister, but she never wanted Sunset to get hurt at all, especially because of them. She wanted to tell the guy not to hurt Sunset and that she was not to blame, but she was scared that if she does so, he will come after her instead. She really didn't know what to do. Luckily, Flash spoke up before Sweetie could come up with something. "Hold on man! I don't want you to go around and hurt someone!" Flash said hastily. "Besides... Sunset could be innocent!" Sweetie widened her eyes, surprised from Flash's words, while Curly starred at him in disbelief. "Are you serious? This Anon-a-Miss has Sunset's name all over it! Her profile picture and colors are on the site for pete's sake!" "Exactly!" Curly blinked in confusion. "Huh?" "Don't you think it's odd that a silhouette image of her and her color scheme was used on Anon-a-Miss' profile?" Flash pointed out. "She may be a bad girl back then, but she certainly wasn't stupid. While she almost used similar tactics like this, but the difference between then and now was despite that we all knew it was her, Sunset was able to hid anything that leads to her. But this website... it has everything Sunset all over it. If you ask me, I think she was being framed... while someone else was pulling the strings." Curly stared at Flash with a skeptic look. "But how can you be sure she's not the one behind it? What if she was just putting on an act just like how she was using you just to get popular?" Flash sighed as he patted the crying girl's head. "Look... I know that we... had a history and that she had done some terrible things before. But I know Sunset Shimmer! She would never do something as extreme as this! Besides, I've seen her so happy after she befriended the Rainbooms! Unlike how she was pretending to be happy with me when we dated, her happiness with them were genuine! So what was her gain to suddenly throw the very thing that made her so happy away and have the whole school hate her? If you ask me... I think someone who had a grudge against Sunset was the one who did it!" "I...sniff...agree," the misaligned girl spoke up, surprising the two teenaged boys. She slowly looked up and faced Curly with red tear-filled eyes. "I seen how she tried to make up for everything she did... a-and that she really wanted to change. She...sniff... really was sorry and even acted more kinder than she used to be. Even to me." She paused for a brief moment with a few sniffs. "But the things that Anon-a-Miss posted... those are too cruel to be her even back when she was a bully." While Curly felt sympathetic for his friend, he was still a little skeptical about Sunset even after the blonde girl vouched for her. He let out a long sigh before looking at Flash. "Okay... let's say that I buy that Sunset Shimmer was actually framed. But do you have any proof that it could be someone else? And do you know who is out to get Shimmer, considering that almost the entire school have a grudge against her?" Flash did not answer right away as he was in a deep thought. Even the misaligned girl had a troubled expression on her face from Curly's question. After a long minute of silence, Flash sighed with a defeated look. "No... I don't have any proof that it was a different person, nor do I have any idea who it was..." said Flash before giving Curly a hard look. "But if someone really was framing Sunset, then whoever this person was should be ashamed of themselves! The person who was doing these things right now is more of a bully than Sunset Shimmer ever was during her reign." THUMP The teens were surprised from the sudden loud sound as if someone dropped something. They all turned to see Sweetie Belle, who had just dropped her books, with a thousand yard stare. Before either of them spoke up to her, Sweetie snapped out of it. "I... I'm so sorry!" she said guilty as she quickly gathered her things and ran away from them. "I'M SORRY!" She heard them trying to call out for her, but she ignored them as she continue to ran down the hall. Some people were shouting at her after she bumped into them, but Sweetie doesn't care, she just wanted to get away. She eventually ran to the far side of the school with no students around the area. When she was sure that no one followed her, Sweetie leaned against one of the lockers before she slowly slid down to the floor, burying into her knees. What she had just seen and heard made her feel lower than dirt. It was bad enough that she saw her sister and Sunset suffering from her own actions, but seeing an innocent bystander in person who also got hurt from her actions, made her feel ten times lower than before. But the worse of all, were hearing those words from Flash in regards to Anon-a-Miss as he defended Sunset Shimmer. "Whoever this person was should be ashamed of themselves. The person who was doing these things right now is more of a bully than Sunset Shimmer ever was during her reign." As hurtful as they sound, but Sweetie knew... that it was the truth, no matter how she tried to justified her actions. Her vision began to blur from her tears before started sobbing, while she repeated the same words over and over again. "I'm a bully... I'm a bully... I'm a bully!"