//------------------------------// // Chapter 4 // Story: Twelve Days of ChristMinty // by Twilyx360 //------------------------------// The next day Minty headed back to the town center. And saw that it had been closed off. And saw the ladder they set up. “How are they going to move it?” Minty asked herself. “Hmm well they have to touch it right?” Minty once again was bunching her socks up in her hooves. She was getting frustrated again. She tried walking away. But then she sighed and said. “Ok…” She jumped over the barricades and ran over to the ladder and started to climb. She got to the fire of friendship and figured she could fix it. She was worried though. She put her hoof on it and immediately pulled away. “Ouch!” It burned. She tried again and powered through it. She did end up pushing it a little bit upward. But her hooves were hot. And then she tried it one more time and gave it a push upward. And then there was trouble. She knocked it off of the tree and it fell down into the presents below. And in no time at all, every single present at the base of the tree was on fire. And then the entire tree went ablaze. Minty quickly got off the ladder and jumped into the snow. But when she got up and looked back. She was horrified. “Oh no…” === Firefighters rushed in and put it out. But all of ponyville witnessed what had become of their hard shopping work. And everypony was deeply saddened and angry. “Who did this?” Asked a pony. “I don’t know but that pony will never see this place again if I ever see em!” Said another. “Whoever did this ruined everything!” Screamed another pony. “Hearth's Warming eve is ruined!” Shouted another. And then Minty was in the background. On the ground crying. It was all her fault. And she walked off with her head hanging low. What was she going to say? She needed to tell the truth at some point. When she opened her eyes though. She saw something unexpected. A flashing tree bulb right in front of her. Then, she saw a message on it. It read “Follow Me.” And it rolled away by itself. “W-what is that?” Minty followed the bulb out of the crowd until she bumped into Derpy. “Oh, hey Minty. I guess you saw what happened, did you?” Asked Derpy sadly. “Y-yeah.” Said Minty. “It’s gone, even the presents we got yesterday…b-but. I s-saved a piece of the tree...” Said Derpy as she pulled out another flashing tree bulb. Just then it flew out of her hoof and onto the ground right next to the other bulb. “Wait what?” Derpy was shocked. The other bulb also had a message. “She can help you.” And the two bulbs rolled off again. “After them!” Said Minty, and Derpy followed suit. They followed the bulbs all the way until they reached Twilight’s Castle. “What the..?” Minty and Derpy were surprised. And they saw a third bulb hanging on the doorknob. It too had a message on it. “Honesty will save you.” Minty briefly felt a pit of sadness in her when she saw that. But then it flew off the knob, hit her face and landed next to the other two bulbs. And the three of them rolled off with Minty and Derpy giving chase again. When they caught up with the three bulbs it had brought both of them to the closed off town center. “Alright, there’s another bulb then, but we can’t go past here!” Said Minty. Crowds of ponies were still surrounding the area. All of them were either sad or angry. She could hear them screaming and shouting. Minty sat down again. She felt awful. “Minty? Are you ok?” Asked Derpy. No response. Minty had a million thoughts a second. She felt like she was on fire, she felt angry, sad and confused.  “Minty?” Asked Derpy. No response. She saw a flashing light by the ashes of the tree. She imagined it all, what would happen if she- She looked at Derpy. And broke down into tears. She screamed in pain. And then she spoke. “I…I’m so-ooo. Sorre-ey Derpy. Please d-“ she could barely speak. But then she tore down the barricades and ran into the center of the ash pile. She picked up the last bulb and it read. “Your voice has power. You can still bring it back.” She put it down and shouted. “EVERYPONY!” And the crowds all looked at her. And then she confessed. “Yesterday, the tree topper was leaning to it’s side. And they were going to fix it, but they didn’t do it all day. And well, it bothered me and made me worried so I figured if ‘I’ could fix it. Nopony else would. So, I climbed up to fix it but. It burnt my hooves and then I dropped it into the presents and… I burnt all the presents in Ponyville.” She sat down and cried again. “I-I-I’m so, so sorry…” Derpy gasped with horror and ran off to find some help.