//------------------------------// // 1: Why does Something Bad always Happen when She has Free Time? // Story: Maniac's Melody // by Dementia Ravenmane //------------------------------// Written by: Drweegee1337 Edited by: Jake Roberts Ahh, morning in Ponyville. Was there anything more picturesque than a cloudless day featuring Celestia’s glorious sun as its centerpiece?  The denizens of the small, frontier town went about their business with the rest of the town proper ready to seize the perfect day. However, inside the town’s only library, there was one pony (and her dragon assistant) who was not about the town. Twilight Sparkle was getting ready for another day of studies, albeit today, reluctantly. While it was indisputable that the lavender unicorn was a passionate scholar, even the best of them sometimes get exasperated with the heavy workload of often demoralizing busywork. Twilight was, for lack of a better phrase, running on fumes this morning, and ideally needed some rest. “Maybe I should just take the day off?” she thought to herself while brushing her teeth. Looking at her reflection in the mirror, she could see the evidence that supported her idea.  She had gotten a solid eight hours of sleep that night, but the stress-induced bags under her eyes indicated that she had been working too much. “Spike, take a letter.” Twilight said to her purple dragon assistant. The student’s young ward whipped out his quill and scroll in a motion that was second nature to him at this point.   Dear Princess Celestia, Today I would like to take a break from my studies and see my friends. Your faithful student, Twilight Sparkle. Spike took the letter and breathed his signature emerald blaze unto it. The document disintegrated into a cloud of swirling smoke and flew out of the window, on its way to Celestia. About two minutes later, the baby dragon burped out Celestia’s reply in a cloud of smoke.  He unfurled the scroll and read aloud, My dearest Twilight, Of course it is okay for you to take a break from your studies to see your friends. Just make sure to send me a letter on anything you have learnt today. Twilight didn’t say anything, at least not to Spike.  Initially, she just stood there with a widening grin on her face. “OHMYIHAVETHEDAYOFFTOSEEMYFRIENDSWHATSHOULDWEDO!?” she thought out loud; VERY loud; loud enough to give herself a light migraine. Twilight bolted out her front door giddy as can be about the prospect of an unrestricted day.  Unfortunately, as soon as she took in her beautiful surroundings, the lavender unicorn experienced an unsettling rumbling in the air. “What could that be?” she asked nopony particular; curiosity and nervousness sharing each other’s company. Following the tremble was an explosive sound-wave that sent tremors throughout the town. The ground was shaking, glass was breaking, nocturnal animals were waking, all of this was interrupting the Cakes’ baking.  It was practically Armageddon, but it ended almost as quickly as it began.   “What in the world just happened?” Twilight thought as she was lying on the ground, having been rocked from her stance by the booming quake. She rose to her hooves and started trotting toward the commotion a couple of houses away.  A large crowd had gathered outside a house and judging from the sounds, they were not happy. Twilight walked closer and noticed that the owner of the house, a white unicorn with blue mane and shades appeared to be held responsible for the sound-wave. “Hold on, everypony! What is going on?” Twilight asked when she got closer to the crowd. “That Vinyl Scratch has taken her musical terrorism too far this time!” a light blue mare with a blue and white mane yelled. This was Colgate, an acquaintance of the unicorn’s that, as far as Twilight knew never liked Vinyl’s music.  Twilight sighed. She found it hard to believe that the sound-wave was Vinyl’s fault. Normally, when she played her music loud enough to create sound-waves they sounded like bass drops, you felt them move through your body, and they where never powerful enough to shatter glass. This sound-wave however, had an otherworldly power behind it. It was hard to describe but it had felt like having shattered glass pressed through your ears with a jackhammer. Twilight then proceeded to force her way through the crowd until she saw Vinyl through one of the blown out windows, she could see that Vinyl had suffered just as much as everypony else, the glass in her shades had been blown out and she looked like she had eaten a gemstone by mistake. One of her red contacts had popped out of her eye revealing its natural color of magenta. Twilight prepared herself to attempt to mediate the situation.  Needless to say, this was not the way she wanted to start her day off. Twilight cleared her throat. “Hey Vinyl, can I come in?” she asked gingerly. “Calm down, it’s just me, Twilight Sparkle, i don’t think it was your fault.” Twilight said in her calmest voice. “I am NOT opening the door while that angry mob is there!” Vinyl quickly replied, pointing to the gathered mass of disgruntled ponies (some of whom were adorning pitchforks and torches). “OKAY EVERYPONY! BACK OFF! You can’t start blaming Vinyl for what has happened.” “YES WE CAN!” the crowd replied in miraculous unison. Twilight breathed an exasperated sigh. “Okay, how about this. Let me investigate what has happened. If it turns out that Vinyl was completely responsible for this, I’ll turn her to you all.” Muttering, the crowd began to disperse seeming to begrudgingly accept Twilight’s offer.  Satisfied, the unicorn turned back to the broken window. “Can I come in now?” Twilight asked soothingly with a warm smile. “Umm...Okay, but promise you won’t be mad at me.” Vinyl weakly replied, obviously upset and somewhat guilt-ridden. Twilight heard the door unlock and was just about to enter when she heard a scream in the distance. “SOMEPONY, HEEEEEEEEEELP!” the scream was coming from Colgate. Twilight rushed over to where she had heard Colgate’s distraught screams. When she got close she saw Colgate leaning over something pink bathing in a pool of something red. Twilight leaned over the pink thing and saw what it was. “It... It’s Pinkie...” Twilight slowly said, becoming consumed by shock and fear. It looked so strange, Pinkie was laying in a growing pile of blood, with foam coming from her mouth. Twilight examined Pinkie but couldn’t find any wounds. “W-where is all the blood coming from? Wh-what? H-how, what?” Twilight stammered to Colgate. Colgate managed to reply without breaking down, “It seems to be coming from her....her...ears.”