Sunset Shimmer lay on the floor of her apartment, curled into a fetal position and practically inanimate, save for the light breathing she was doing. The last of her tears ran down her eyes, but the emptiness in her body didn't go away. It did change that her time in Canterlot High was over.
It was over.
All her hard work to get everyone to trust her again. All the sacrifices she made. All the acts of atonement. All of it was gone in one day.
Just flushed down the drain. And it was because of something Sunset didn't do. She knew she was guilty of a lot of sins, but getting punished for something she didn't do hurt, like a rusty knife in her back.
Not to mention how suddenly it all ended: One minute, her friends were gushing over her getting to celebrate their first Christmas with her, and the next minute, they left her abandoned and crying in the hallway.
Her comatose state was interrupted by some thumping. After a few seconds, she realized someone was knocking on the door. Wiping the tears from her puffy red eyes, Sunset pulled herself up to answer the door. Not out of politeness, but because she wanted to enjoy her pity party in peace. Sunset opened the door, only to find a certain white-haired girl answering.
"Hey Shimmer," Gilda said, her yellow eyes honed in on Sunset, "we need to talk-," in a panic, Sunset quickly slammed the door. She was met with an angry yell.
"SHIMMER! I'M GONNA KILL YOU!" Sunset pushed her weight against the door, but it was no match for the statuesque girl's strength. Gilda forced the door open and burst into the former unicorn's apartment, her face in a red-hot rage. "YOU'RE DEAD!" The white-haired girl fumed before letting out another wail. "I'm gonna kill you!"
2 Days Later
"Y'all haven't seen her in class?" Apple Bloom asked Scootaloo. The two girls and Sweetie Belle stood in the halls, practically gushing over having gotten one over on Shimmer.
A proud smirk formed on Scootaloo's face. "Nope. I've talked to all her teachers, and they haven't seen her either."
"Rarity still isn't talking to her," Sweetie Belle added with a nasty grin of her own.
"Are you sure?" Apple Bloom asked with a serious tone. Sunset and their older sisters needed to stay out of contact for their plan to work. If they reunited, they would put 1 and 1 together and find out they were the ones leaking secrets.
"I went up to Rarity," Sweetie Belle gloated. "And asked in my sad voice, 'Why are you being mean to Sunset?' " Apple Bloom smiled, remembering that they could shift suspicion away by pretending to like Sunset, and was impressed with Sweetie's puppy-eyes.
Scootaloo was happily curious. "And?"
"Well, Darling," Sweetie Belle said, imitating Rarity's fancy speech. "They are not words a proper lady uses in public." All three friends laughed out loud.
"Good," Apple Bloom chirped with a dark smile. A part of her regretted her actions. Some say she was going too far. But after all that Sunset did, it was what she deserved. Not getting invited to the party was just the final straw that broke the camel, or in this case, pony's, back. "And maybe if we're lucky, we'll never see her again."
The three girls paused as they noticed the hallways had become unusually quiet. "What's going on?" Sweetie Belle asked worryingly. They turned around and saw a shocking sight.
Two people escorted, or perhaps paraded was the better word, down the halls by two cops while covered in handcuffs. One of them was Officer Garda, the school's resident police officer, while the other was some fat lady with brown hair and blue skin that Apple Bloom did not recognize.
To Apple Bloom's growing horror, Gilda's face and clothing were all covered in blood, her face covered in slash marks. What horrified the youngest Apple was Gilda's expression. It was completely blank and emotionless. Whatever horrible thing Gilda had done, she didn't seem to show any remorse or shame for it.
Officer Garda and the female cop stopped in the middle of the hallway. "Go on," Officer Garda told Gilda. "Tell'em what you..." he trembled as if he wanted to punch Gilda herself. "Tell them what you did, monster."
Gilda's expression was colder than ice. "That...that bitch spread my secrets," she said in a tone that was calm but with such force that everyone could hear Gilda's confession across the hall. "And saw her and I saw red and..." a nasty grin formed on her face, but then faded, "I...I just woke up... like this..."
The hallway descended into a cacophony of shrieks, terror, fear, and sadness. With that, Apple Bloom and her friends felt tears run down their eyes in guilt. Apple Bloom's guilt only grew when she saw her older sister shrieking.
"WHY?!" The cowgirl shrieked, her tears running down. Behind her, Applejack's friends were also crying their eyes out. "WHY DID YOU DO IT?!"
Gilda lost any pretenses of calm, a psychotic smile forming on her face. "That bitch got what she deserved! I thought you and your bodies would be thanking me, Apple Girl!"
"I didn't want her to die!" Rainbow bellowed in hysterical rage, moist tears running down her eyes. Scootaloo's heart utterly shattered at that.
"YOU MONSTER!" Rarity shrieked in a voice that felt like a knife in Sweetie Belle's heart.
"Don't worry," Officer Garda muttered. "She's going right to jail."
"No, she's not going to the jail."
Suddenly a red-skinned upperclassman stepped out of the crowd. Apple Bloom remembered this was Sunset's boyfriend, Twinkle Toes. He strode toward Gilda, bone-chillingly calm. As soon as Gilda saw him, her deranged joy became more pronounced. "What's wrong, Twinkle? Sad I killed your pet slut? Don't worry." Gilda's eyes became utterly dead as she let out an evil cackle. "Don't worry. There's enough of her left you to enjoy." She paused. "Barely." Everyone let out a horrified gasp, followed by more shrieks.
Twinkle's expression got colder. "You're going to the morgue." The track runner suddenly pulled out a handgun and shot Gilda point-blank. She fell to the ground, dead, with a spot of crimson forming around her white shirt. The hallway descended into an even louder chorus of shrieks, crying, and whimpers as the two cops tackled Twinkle to the ground.
"OK! I admit it!" Apple Bloom yelled over everyone. "I am Anon-A-Miss!" The upset crowd looked in shock at the red-haired girl. But what broke Apple Bloom more was the betrayed look on Applejack and her friends' faces.
"Me too!" Sweetie Belle yelled, tears running down her eyes.
"Me three!" Scoootaloo shrieked. "We're sorry. We didn't mean for anyone to get..."Scootaloo lost all composure and broke down crying along with her friends. The taciturn female officer stepped away from manhandling Twinkle and stormed to the CMC. The three girls craned their heads, ready for whatever punishment the blue-skinned woman was going to give them. They deserved it.
The CMC broke from their grief as they stared at the cop in confusion. She didn't look angry, admonishing, or even remotely upset. She was smirking at them. Their confusion gave way to shock as the woman pulled off what turned out to be a face mask and wig, revealing familiar red and yellow locks.
"Gotcha!" Sunset said with a smirk. Suddenly a not-dead Gilda sprung up from the ground, laughing her ass off as well. Twinkle was also cackling like a madman, as was Officer Garda. The entire student body stood in shock at what occurred while the CMC was still cold and motionless.
"I think I'm a pretty good actor!" Gilda boasted. "You dweebs are too easy."
"You all should've seen your faces!" Twinkle gushed.
While the police officer and three students continued to laugh over their successful prank, a flurry of complicated emotions flowed through everybody; Relief that Sunset wasn't violently murdered. Guilt at being deceived and not believing Sunset, exhaustion at being, and anger at the CMC for leaking their secrets online.
The emotion that won out in Apple Bloom and her friends was fear as Officer Garda approached them with an angry expression on her face.
The emotion that won out in Applejack and her friends was guilt as Sunset's fit of laughter died down, and she looked at them with no small amount of disappointment. It was a look that was even worse than when Sunset bullied them in the past.
Apple Bloom once thought the scariest thing she'd ever seen was her Granny blowing a gasket at her.
But that paled in comparison to seeing the police officer's gaze honed onto her like a vulture waiting for an animal to die and become its lunch. The fact that he was looking down at him made his expression all the more powerful. And the look Vice Principal Luna was giving them wasn't much better. The lack of noise coming from her two friends showed how scared stiff they were.
"A slumber party," Officer Garda parroted to the Crusaders in a deceptively calm voice. Officer Garda, Luna, and the Crusaders were in the Vice Principal's office. The three sat on a couch. Vice Principal Luna sat silently behind her desk while Garda stood beside the woman. "That's what this is about?" The green-skinned man asked, taking a sip from a mug he was carrying. A very long and audible gulp. He then placed the mug on the desk with more force than necessary, causing a noise that made Apple Bloom and her friends flinch. "You three violated your sisters' privacy and violated the privacy of others because you got upset over not getting invited to a slumber party?" Luna's gaze was even sharper, driving the three girls to bow their heads in shame.
After a few moments of silence with disgust in her voice, Vice Principal Luna finally said after a few moments of silence. "Are you sure that's the reason?"
"Well," Apple Bloom muttered reluctantly.
"OK, we thought it wasn't that everyone started liking Sunset, OK!?" Sweetie Belle shrieked at last to the surprise of the adults.
"And why is that?" Principal Vice Principal said in a less harsh voice.
"Sunset ruined some poor girl's life," Apple Bloom muttered bitterly, " and she also ruined my life, sending my family and me into the poorhouse for a year. And after the...Battle of the Bands, everyone started liking her and patting her on the back."
"So when we didn't get an invitation and she did," Scootaloo said with pursed lips, "it felt unfair...she was getting everything she didn't deserve while we were getting screwed over."
"You know what's unfair?" Officer Garda asked the three girls with a sarcastic smile. "When someone steals your secrets and spreads them online." The girls flinched at that.
"And it never once crossed your mind to talk about how you felt with me, your friends, and your sisters?" Principal Luna asked with some sadness in her voice.
"I didn't think they'd listen," Apple Bloom muttered angrily. "They were all patting Sunset on the back."
"So your...strategy was to humiliate your sisters, humiliate everyone else, and get someone in trouble for something she didn't do." Luna's face was one of incredible disappointment. "That's how you chose to deal with your anger. By becoming as bad as Sunset used to be?" The three Crusaders felt tears go down their eyes.
"I'm sorry." Apple Bloom said bitterly. Luna looked a bit sympathetic, if still angry, but Officer Garda was not.
"I can see that." Officer Garda crossed her arms. "But what had I made perfectly clear after the whole thing with Quick Pace?"
"Not to take revenge against Sunset?" Sweetie Belle said.
"And what did you do?"
"Took revenge." Sweetie looked down at her knees.
"Because revenge doesn't solve anything and makes you stupid." Garda's face turned red again. "And because you violated that, you three are in severe trouble!"
"Hey." Scootaloo looked at the man with pleading eyes. "Doesn't it count that we told the truth?"
Officer Garda's face was one of disbelief. "Oh, so you want a medal for telling the truth?" Officer Garda said sarcastically. "I suppose you want a prize for chewing with your mouth closed, right?"
"Uh, no?" Sweetie Belle uttered.
"Nope, is right." A nasty smile appeared on Garda's face. "What you three we'll be getting is some nice, long community service. Since Sunset had to do 100 hours of community service, you'll be doing 200 hours."
"What?" Scootaloo said in a panicked tone.
Luna felt a mean smile form on her face as well. "That sounds pretty fair."
"But...but..." Apple Bloom stammered. "Sunset did worse-"
"If you think I'm being unfair," Officer Garda interrupted with a look that stopped Apple Bloom cold, "I'm gonna tell you now that I could care less about Sunset Shimmer." A dignified expression appeared on his face. "My true friend is the law, which you broke. By taking revenge when I said not to!" Apple Bloom's defiance ceased and replaced by acceptance.
"I will also be notifying your parents," Luna said coldly, "and you will confess to what you did in front of the school tomorrow. And you will also go right up to Sunset and apologize to her. If she lets you." Luna finished with some bitterness, emphasizing how the three girls almost permanently drove Sunset from the school.
"Yes, ma'am," Sweetie Belle said in a tired voice. Scootaloo and Apple Bloom also silently accepted their punishment. The three were so weighed down by guilt. They couldn't care less about the fact their reputation was about to go down the drain.
"Again, I can understand you have lingering resentment toward Sunset for what she did," Luna said in a sympathetic voice, "and you have every right not to like her. But this is not how a mature person handles their anger. You've not only hurt Sunset but many of your classmates and your siblings. If you hurt someone, you have to pay the price. My hope is you girls will take that lesson to heart."
"Now get your butts to class!" Officer Garda growled. The three girls walked out of the room, dragging their feet, their heads hanging in shame.
As soon as he left, the red-haired officer snorted. "You know what's great about kids?"
"No, what?" The Vice Principal replied.
"You can't think of anything either," Officer Garda muttered as he felt a massive headache in his brain. "Those three idiots are the best argument for why we should bring back child labor."