//------------------------------// // Chapter 22 — School Day // Story: Dictators Of Ponyville // by Dragon-In-Black //------------------------------// Sweetie Belle didn’t realise how much time had passed since she and her friends fled Ponyville from its tyrannical rule. There were more houses scattered and there were a lot more ponies and creatures roaming about, enjoying their day. She wasn’t afraid of the creatures that ranged from ponies to dragons, and even yaks, but it wasn’t the same Ponyville she once knew. It felt… warm. The creatures greeted each other and had kindness in their eyes and helped each other out when one of them asked for help. Sweetie Belle was walking to school and noticed a dragon helping a pony reach the roof of her house and a yak helping deliver heavy packages to a construction site. All in all, it felt welcoming. It was as if they had learned from their mistakes and decided better themselves. But it was all a lie. It had to be. Sweetie Belle did admit that while it looked realistic, she knew that something was brewing behind the scenes. It was clear as day that something was going on. They were trying to brainwash her. How she came to this conclusion was that earlier that morning, her older sister, Rarity and her friends had asked her multiple questions about where she’s been and what she had been doing, creating small talk so she could let slip where in the Badlands her friends were. Rarity and her friends kept lying about how she loved her and how they had missed them the entire year. The lies were almost believable, the crocodile tears were phenomenal and Sweetie Belle had recommended that they should try to do a movie with their gold-tier acting. The marshmallow-coated pony couldn’t help but laugh when she saw the hurt look they had when she had said that, and they had, again, tried to convince her that they actually had missed them and even informed the Princesses of their disappearance which had made Sweetie Belle wary. “Why in Celestia’s name would you involve them for? They aren’t needed to clean up your mistakes,” Sweetie Belle had retorted. After that, she walked out the door together with her friend, Dinky Whooves and her mother Derpy Whooves who had been informed to make sure that Sweetie Belle doesn’t try to escape the country which she most certainly had planned from the second she was captured. “So, Dinky, what have I missed since I defected?” Sweetie asked with a curious tone. While she may not like being in Ponyville which she saw as nothing more than the dumpster of Equestria, she was still curious about the town and school. Dinky smiled a wide smile that made Sweetie Belle’s heart feel warm. “Well, the only thing you missed was a few creatures we learned of in school such as changelings which are evil pony-bugs that can change into anything and feed off of the love we have.” The blonde filly explained with a thoughtful look. “I’d be a horrible food source since I have no love for this place,” Sweetie Belle laughed at her joke while Derpy and Dinky felt a little uncomfortable. When Sweetie Belle saw mother and daughter share a look she felt a little bad. “Sorry, what else has been going on?” Surprised by the apology, but not against it, Dinky smiled and told her everything that had happened while the Crusaders had been gone from the Canterlot Wedding and the return of the Crystal Empire. Sweetie Belle listened intently as to learn everything she could. The more information she learned, the better. It meant that if she managed to escape, then she could inform Scootaloo and Applebloom how the tyrannical Equestria is becoming far more corrupt than it already is. Sweetie Belle frowned. Corrupt? Equestria isn’t corrupt! Sure, corruption existed in every kingdom and country around the globe but the thoughts she had were far more dark than she anticipated. Where did those thoughts come from? Equestria is not a tyrannical country, only Ponyville is a tyrannical town. When the unicorn and two pegasi reached the school, Derpy waves her hoof and hugged Dinky and did so for Sweetie Belle as well which the young unicorn didn’t return but did smile, showing that she appreciated the gesture. The other students felt their jaws drop when they saw Sweetie Belle in the flesh standing before them. Miss Cheerilee looked ecstatic to have her student back and even shed a few tears. “Oh, Sweetie Belle how we have missed you!” Cheerilee spoke with joy in her voice. She hugged the young filly. She didn’t return the hug. Cheerilee had found out what had happened when the three fillies ran away and immediately went to the source; Diamond Tiara who confessed to her crime which hadn’t surprised Cheerilee, but had made the rest of Ponyville feel guilt and sorrow for what they had accused the crusaders of. They found out it was Diamond Tiara after Cheerilee had overheard a conversation between Pipsqueak, and Snips about how he had been the ones to take the pictures on Diamond Tiara’s order and that she had embarrassing pictures of Pipsqueak. She had used it to blackmail him to get the juiciest gossip possible. The confrontation hadn’t been pretty. Cheerilee was a grown mare and had to act like it. She couldn’t curse out a young filly even if the young snobbish filly deserved it. She had demanded to know why Diamond did it to which the filly had given a small reply. “Because they all asked for it,” Cheerilee didn’t know what that meant at the time, but when she thought over the days and weeks of ponies asking for more gossip, she realised that Diamond Tiara was giving the ponies what they wanted and seemed to enjoy it herself. Cheerilee had contacted Filthy Rich and informed him of what happened and to say that he was shocked and angry at his daughter would have been an understatement. He had forced the filly to reveal that it was she who controlled the entire press and was blackmailing the others who worked there. The ponies of Ponyville had been stunned at that, not wanting to believe that a pony so young could do such schemes. They had been angry and distraught. To think that they were searching for three missing fillies while still believing that they intentionally embarrassed them. But now that Sweetie Belle was home, the other two Crusaders would follow and return to Ponyville. “I highly doubt that,” Sweetie Belle responded with a neutral voice that made Cheerilee shiver. It sounded so wrong. Having a neutral voice is one thing, but the neutrality that Sweetie Belle had sounded forced. As if she was forcing back negative emotions. She knew what those emotions were. Deciding to leave the conversation at that and not allow it to escalate into something worse, she led them inside the school where most of Sweetie Belle’s friends and former friends were. There were a few new fillies and colts who looked at Sweetie Belle with curiosity. The new students knew of the three Crusaders but they had never met them or seen photos of them. All they knew was that there was a falling out and that the three fillies ran away from Equestria. One of them must have returned. Willingly or unwillingly is the question, but due to her body language and how she spoke, they could only assume that it was unwillingly. Sweetie Belle walked inside the classroom and sat in the back where she and her friends used to sit when they still went to school. The classroom didn’t look different, the benches and chairs were the same, and the walls and windows were the same. The wall was filled with different posters or things to do around the town and events taking place in different parts of Equestria for those interested. The students started taking their seats and that is the moment Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon decided to walk through the doors. Both fillies refused to look at one another showing that something happened between them but no pony knew what. Silver Spoon took an empty seat near Pipsqueak while Diamond Tiara took an empty seat in front of the class where every pony could see and hear her. Sweetie Belle felt rage fill her veins. The filly who had ruined her and her friends' lives walked into the classroom as if she was welcome. She scoffed loudly, making the class turn to her. When Silver Spoon and Diamond Tiara turned to see who scoffed, their blood turned to ice when they saw the blank flank they had bullied for years. The one Diamond Tiara had driven out of Ponyville a year ago that forced her to admit her crime. “Why hello, loser, I didn’t realise you still went to school, I thought you would have been a garbage collector by now because that’s what you are to society; trash,” Sweetie Belle laughed while the students and teacher gasped loudly in shock. Silver Spoon had to stifle her laughter and Diamond Tiara looked hurt and had a tear in her eye. Sweetie Belle turned to Silver Spoon with a deadpanned look. “What are you laughing at you blind feather?” Sweetie Belle asked, once again drawing gasps from the students and teacher who decided to step in when she saw the hurt look both Silver Spoon and Diamond Tiara had. “Sweetie Belle!” Cheerilee scolded and trotted up to Sweetie’s desk and looked at the filly sternly. The marshmallow-coated filly adopted an innocent look and smile. “Yes miss Cheerilee?” Sweetie asked, with a sweet voice that held hidden rage that every pony, including Cheerilee, picked up on. Cheerilee sighed as she had anticipated a confrontation of sorts. “I understand you’re angry Sweetie Belle, but I cannot have you say hurtful words to them inside the classroom and hopefully not in your private time, but I know that it’s none of my business what you say or think in your private life.” Sweetie Belle decided to unveil her mask of innocence and showed pure rage in a blank look which terrified even the grown mare. They felt the rage she had and they knew that she didn’t show everything. “They ruined my life. They lied to every pony and forced my friends and I to spread rumours and secrets. They’re nothing but useless trash to society.” Sweetie Belle coldly spoke the last sentence, making every pony there flinch and the two fillies hang their heads. “Sweetie Belle!” Cheerilee scolded again. “I will not tolerate such hurtful words in my classroom, one more time and you get detention,” Sweetie Belle scoffed. “You’re just saying that because you want to cover your stupid mistake,” The students gasped and immediately looked to Cheerilee whose eyes widened and a few tears escaped from being reminded of her mistake. She hung her head low and didn’t meet the filly’s gaze that had a cold look that she felt. “Please… refrain from saying hurtful words in my classroom and I’m sorry for my mistake,” the teacher spoke and turned around and started to teach something about hippogriffs. While the class was going on, the students frequently exchanged glances with one another and glanced at Sweetie Belle regularly as if they weren’t sure what to say or think. She gave them a cold glare which made them stop and chose to pay attention to Cheerilee for the remainder of the class. When the bell rang, Sweetie yawned and stretched her hooves from the sleep she had gotten. She hadn’t paid any attention to the class at all and Cheerilee hadn’t tried to awaken the filly due to the hurtful words the filly had spoken and because she wanted to give the young filly some space. The sister of Rarity walked out of the classroom with the other students and secretly took her saddlebag and walked out to the playground with the other students and saw that all of them paid attention to their friends. Hoping that no pony saw, she walked out of the school grounds and didn’t look back to see a few friends like Dinky, Pipsqueak and Rumble who saw her gallop away from the school and “escape” from her boring day of school. When she walked into the town, she saw a few creatures look at her oddly, knowing that the school day wasn’t over yet. They didn’t try to approach the filly because they knew that the filly wanted nothing to do with the town that betrayed her and the other Crusaders. The filly looked around the town thoroughly and saw the different houses and buildings, some being as tall as thirty floors which made her question what it was used for. Shrugging, she looked to the ground and saw that it still had the distinct dirt paths that she strangely enough miss. She had gotten used to the stone ground in Badlands, but the dirt from Ponyville always made her feel at home until the betrayal. Now, she felt disgusted. Sweetie Belle wasn’t a common pony! She was a celebrity! She deserved to be treated better than a common Pony like Mayor Mare or her pathetic sister! “Ugh!” She said and wrinkled her face in disgust before making her way over to Sugarcube Corner where many ponies were talking and having fun but that stopped when they saw Sweetie Belle walk inside with her stone-cold face which made them shiver. At the counter, Pinkie Pie was taking an order from the last pony wanted to see. Rarity. She groaned in disgust and waited for her sister's order to come through. While she waited, the other ponies looked at Sweetie Belle as if waiting for her to do something. When Pinkie gave Rarity’s order, she dramatically gasped in shock and Rarity turned around and almost dropped her smoothie when she saw Sweetie Belle. “Hello,” was her nonchalant response. “Sweetie, what are you doing here, shouldn’t you be in school?” Rarity asked with concern which made the younger pony scoff. “I saw walking dumpsters there, I have never seen two fillies look so disgusting before, I thought I was going to vomit,” Sweetie Belle dramatically spoke, making a few wince at the two ponies she spoke off. It wasn’t hard to figure out whom she spoke of. “Besides, there’s no point to that school when I have experience working in the real world, the job that those corrupt guards ruined my reputation for! I enjoyed the modelling I did and those pigs took it from me,” Rarity gulped at the rage her sister showed. Sweetie Belle had been angry about many things in the past but never to the point she would call a fellow pony… trash. She decided against scolding since it would only make the young filly angry. The element of generosity got an idea from what she heard her younger sister say and decided to see if she could entice Sweetie Belle. “Sweetie Belle, I understand that you don’t want to go to school but I highly recommend going there. If you want to continue your modelling I can contact a friend who does photoshoots for my dresses and you can be in the magazines and all the bits from the photos go to you, how does that sound?” The creatures inside the cafe had to admit that it was a fair deal. If what the young filly said was true, then she had every right to continue the work she had been doing previously, which was modelling from the sounds of it. Sweetie Belle stared at her sister blankly before raising a brow. She was unimpressed. “You think I want to model for you? Why in Tartarus would I ever want to dress in your horrid dresses? The only ones who buy your dresses in people who love you for your beauty and because of the fact you’re a celebrity and element bearer, they don’t buy your dresses because they like them. I want to dress in dresses that are made for creatures who want to wear them.” Sweetie Belle heard the gasps from the creatures inside the cafe. The Cakes had come out to see what every creature was gasping about and saw Sweetie Belle and Rarity in the middle of their argument. They stepped back as they didn’t want to interfere but would if their argument escalated. Rarity felt tears run down her cheeks at what Sweetie Belle had said. It wasn’t true… was it? Did creatures around Equestria buy her garments because of her nobility and not because they wanted them? She knew her mascara was ruined, but she didn’t care. “That’s… it’s not true is it?” She tearfully asked and looked at her sister for an answer, and ignored the resounding no that came from the creatures around them. Sweetie Belle chuckled. “It is, they say no, but they haven’t seen your feats and believe I’m blind to the looks they give you. They believe I’m too young when I see a creature look at you in lust,” the creatures around them felt their hearts stop. “Oh, settle down you fools, I’ve known since I had the ‘talk’ and you don’t make it easy for yourselves when you do it clear as day so stop looking like the fools you all are!” The creatures bowed their heads in shame. Rarity didn’t react outwardly or inwardly. The last sentences didn’t surprise the mare, but the first sentences made her heart stop. So no pony liked the dresses she made and had on display in her boutique? She bowed her head in sadness. She should have known, she was a grown mare who should have known that no pony enjoyed her dresses despite the time and effort she spent on them. “Look, I’m not saying this to be rude, I’m just saying it because you’re living in a Fairy Tail. The only one who ever enjoyed your dresses was Fluttershy and Spike as far as I know. Spike was the only one who stared at you with love, see you around, sister.” Sweetie Belle said the last word as if it was poison before leaving the cafe and walking down a street. In her subconscious, there was an eerie voice that spoke four words. “Long live the dictator,”