It was a beautiful day in Equestria.
Then Twist happened.
The front door to her home blew off its hinges, brimming with ruby-colored smoke. The rotund piece of ginger maredom frolicked through her garden, a bright smile plastered across her face, with eyes that glimmered beneath a pair of glasses completely devoid of their thick translucent lenses.
“Mmmmm! What a thweet, thugary day!” Twist trotted and sang, “Morning in Ponyville thhimmerrrrrrth!”
Two branches melted off a pair of oak trees as a squirrel exploded above her.
“Morning in Ponyville thiiiiiiineth!”
Ten pickets from her fence shattered from top to bottom, as if lopped off one after another by a sweeping sickle of crimson.
“I know for abtholute thertainnnn!” As Twist danced her way out of her front gate, two wide ditches were carved out of the sidewalk, taking a chunk of the road along with it. “That everything ith thertainlyyyyyyy fiiiiiiine!”
A cardinal landed down atop a parked stagecoach and tweeted pleasantly.
Twist grinned at it, her sparkling teeth reflecting the creature. “Why, good morning to you, Mithter Thongbird!”
Before the animal could chirp in response, its feathers caught fire. Writhing in agony, the thing fell under the filly's gaze and rolled until its charred body found a puddle of rainwater along the street curb.
Twist kept smiling. “That'th a neat trick!”
Humming, she bounded gaily along, her head tilted up. The clouds parted down the middle as a flock of geese dissolved in bright red mist.
“Hmmm-hmmm-hmmm!” Twist smiled to her side and waved at the many adult ponies she passed by in the crisp morning sunrise. “Good morning everypony! Thuch a thwell day for thchool, don't you think?”
“Meh,” a pair of mares muttered... just seconds before a charbroiled streetlamp fell over their twitching figures. “Guhkkkck... h-help... pl-please...!”
“Pffft!” Twist rolled her eyes with a red flicker and resumed her canter down main street. “Thomepony didn't graduaaaaaate!”
As Twist made her way to school, random mailboxes blew up one by one on either side of her. A mare stood before an apartment window, beating the dust loose from a carpet, only to have the rug burn to a crisp in her twitching grasp. Two stallions struggling to pull a wagon full of anvils suddenly flew forward as the wheels of their cart shattered completely, raining metal death down upon their screaming figures. Weathervanes flew apart, pelting the sidewalk below with cardinal arrows and metal rooster parts as panicked ponies darted for cover.
“Dum de dum...” Twist looked aside. “Oh! Good morning, Mitth Redheart!” She waved her hoof. “Fine day for a drive, huh?”
“Er, yes, quite...” The glum mare stood before an apartment building. She gave a limp wave, adjusted her nurse cap, and resumed pulling a gray shroud over a lime green horn. As she tried pushing the weighted gurney into the back of an ambulance, the vehicle's tires exploded, causing the entire thing to flip high and land with its hollow compartment encapsulating the shrieking pony.
“Wowtherth!” Twist beamed as she beamed ahead. “Everpony'th tho lively thith morning!” As she smiled skyward, a burning corpse crash-landed through a fence to her side, spilling gray feathers and muffins out of a brown satchel as its hooves twitched to a cold, cold stop. “Glad it'th not jutht me!”
Cheerilee's schoolbuilding stood in the distance like a melting red iceberg...
“So I heard you two went into the Everfree Forest yesterday!” Snips leaned forward with a humored squint. “Did you two have an adventure or what?”
“Pffft... Nah...” Silver Spoon rolled her eyes and adjusted her glasses. “We chickened out.”
“What do you mean we chickened out?!” Diamond Tiara glared across the recess yard at Silver Spoon. Fillies and colts played giggling little games across the innocent playground behind them. “You're the one who insisted on telling on my dad if we didn't back out!”
“What were you so afraid of anyways?!” Snails warbled.
“Meh...” Diamond Tiara folded her forelimbs. “She's a zebraphobe.”
“I am not!” Silver Spoon frowned. “I just don't think it's wise to talk to a lone wandering zebra who lives in giant tree hut in the middle of the woods!”
“She's right, you know,” Snips said with a nod. “They'll talk your ears off with their rhyme. Plus, each and every one of them is secretly carrying a golden switchblade!”
“Ungh!” Diamond Tiara stomped her hoof. “You guys are so equinist! Don't you even hear yourselves?” She frowned, then upturned her haughty muzzle. “Anyways, they only carry silver switchblades. Zebras can't afford gold.”
“Yeah.”
“That's true.”
“You're right...”
“Hey!” Scootaloo smiled as she and Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle rolled up to the group in their wagon. “Whatcha guys talking about?”
“Nothing that concerns worthless, flightless ostriches!” Diamond Tiara grinned devilishly like Aphex Trot. “That's what it says in the dictionary, y'know. 'Ostrich: Scootaloo, flightless, motherless, fatherless, and loveless.'”
“Yeah!” Silver Spoon chimed in. “Right next to 'Ostracize: Scootaloo, getting rid of.'”
“Oh yeah?!” Scootaloo removed her helmet and frowned at the fillies. “Well, you and your dictionary can just buck right off!”
Sweetie Belle's eyes teared up. “But I dun wanna—” She began to squeak before a pale yellow hoof was planted over her mouth. “Mmmmf!”
Apple Bloom looked over, frowning. “Scootaloo! Applejack says it ain't right to be tellin' other ponies to do the 'b'-word!”
“But they deserved it—”
“I dun care how mean they may be!” Apple Bloom removed her hoof from Sweetie's mouth and stripped her helmet with a proud tilt of the chin. “T'ain't a good thang to tell other ponies to... nnngh... 'buck off,' no matter how cruel or vicious they may act towards us. We gotta set an example.”
Scootaloo rubbed her chin, then said, “But what about mules and rocky boulders?”
“Oh, those are fine.” Apple Bloom shrugged. “Applejack says that neither of them have souls.”
“But I bet they could afford gold!” Snails interjected.
Everypony chuckled.
“Heh heh heh!” The ground shook as Twist bounded into the scene. “That'th thuper funny, guyth!” A ring of grass burned around the group as she did a pale pirouette. “Oooh! My turn!” Thud.
“Ahem...The other day, I thaw thith homeletth donkey thitting all by hith lonethome behind a bakery, and I wath all, 'Oooh! What thmellth?!' Heehee! You thee, it'th funny becauthe he'th thomething that ithn't a pony, so it'th okay to hammer that truth into each otherth' therebrumth with inthultth while he ithn't around to lithten!”
“Uhhhhhh...”
“Nnnghh...”
“Yeahhh...”
Every foal within earshot fidgeted, trying not to look the redhead in the face. All except for Scootaloo.
“Huh...” The pegasus rubbed her chin as she stared at the burnt grass curling beneath him. “That's new...”
“What'th the matter, ponieth?!” Twist bounced and bounced. “It'th a beautiful morning for political incorrectnetth! Oooh!” She squatted low like a kitten spotting a ball of yarn. “Tell me if you heard thith one before! Ahem...'How many changelingth doeth it take to fill a stagecoach?!”
“Pffft. Listen, you...” Diamond Tiara glared at the filly. “Did you—like—snort your grandmother's ash tray this morning or something?!”
“Hey! Don't thpoil the punchline!”
“What she means is since when did you get off talking to us directly?!” Silver Spoon interjected. “The only things that deserve to share conversation with you are bats and asylum inmates.”
“Batth?!” Twist's face scrunched up. She stared up at the sky. “But thith is morning time, thilly!” Just then, the entire sunrise flashed red and went back to blue. “Batth don't come out until it'th night!”
This comment was punctuated by several glaring plops as over three dozen variety of fowl littered the playground, from ducks to robins to blue jays to geese to crows, and all of them smoking from beak to tail with ashen feathers. Foals paused in mid-climb on their jungle gyms, gawking at the sudden avian graveyard that the playground had become. Two preschoolers in a sandbox gawked at a bloody albatross having crushed their sandcastle.
Scootaloo's violet eyes narrowed at the scene. “Uhm, guys? Did you see... Just now... What the f-fuzz...?”
“Ungh, what is it, Ostrich?” Diamond Tiara lifted her spoiled nose. “You are—like—so dramatic... ppft... plbbllfft!” She spat out a tuft of bloody feathers. “Stop trying to fill the obvious vacuum of your dead family with silly—pfffbltt—hallucinations.”
“I'm not having hallucinations...” Scootaloo then snarled. “And my family isn't dead!”
“They just wish they were,” Silver Spoon said, sharing a communal snicker with her equally snobbish friend.
“Heeheehee!” Twist's head rolled, and several mountains in the distance produced snowy waterfalls. “It'th funny becauthe it'th tho blatantly cruel! I had no idea how enjoyable it wath!”
“Ugh... now she's learning things...” Diamond Tiara whispered to Silver Spoon. “See, this is why we can't allow her to speak to us. Ooooh! Hey!” She tapped the black strand suddenly sticking behind the filly's gray ear. “I love the feather accessory! It's so chic!”
“Why thank you!” Silver Spoon smiled at the feather while a severed duck-tail fell onto her shiny flank. “I wish I thought of it!”
“Twist?” Apple Bloom fluffed her red mane loose and readjusted her bow. “Uhm, I don't mean to pry or nothin', but are you feelin' okay?”
“Hmmm?” Twist looked at Apple Bloom and the bow flew clear off the filly's head, landing several thousand feet away in a sizzling heap. “How do you mean?”
Apple bloom blinked up at her own mane, then shrugged. “Oh, I dunno. Reckon yer just... more cheerful, all of the sudden...”
“Yeah,” Scootaloo nodded, still squinting. “More cheerful than normal. Like... freaky cheerful.”
Twist shrugged. “Can't a girl enjoy a moment while it lathtth?!”
“What kind of a moment...?”
“Why, thith moment right here!” Twist jumped up and down. Thud thud thud. Several lines of trees collapsed behind the schoolhouse, burning in red ash. “I'm not uthed to you guyth talking to me! It'th thuper thwell!”
“Yes...” Apple Bloom fidgeted. “The cat's meow...”
Sweetie Belle leaned in from the wagon. “Hey, uhm, can I remove my helmet now too?”
Apple Bloom shook her head. “No, Sweetie Belle. Just...” She sighed, her ears drooping. “Just keep it on...”
“Yaaay!” Sweetie Belle reared her hooves with joy. “I'm fashionable!” Just then, two red beams bounced off her helmet. Her eyes crossed as she fell back with a shriek. “Ackies!” Thud.
“And thhiny!” Twist added with a giggle, her lenses smoking.
“There!” Scootaloo pointed. “That!” Scootaloo gestured. “That there and that! Somepony tell me that they saw that!”
“Nnngh...” Sweetie sat up, rubbing her cheek beneath her helmet. “No, it's okay. I-I always see stars after Rarity kicks me...”
“No, I mean... that... thing!” Scootaloo flung both forelimbs in Twist's direction. “That thing that just happened! Right in front of Twist's eyes! As if they came out of Twist's eyes!”
“Yer just seeing things, Scootaloo,” Apple Bloom droned.
“I am not—” Scootaloo went cross-eyed, shook her head, then frowned, “I mean yes! But—like—it's stuff that the rest of you can see too!” She blinked, then crossed her legs demurely as she mewled, “C-can't you?”
“Jee, I dunno what you're talking about, Thcootaloo!” Twist scanned the horizon, and several tree tops lost their leaves in successive bursts. “But I'll keep a lookout!”
“See?!” Scootaloo pointed. “That right there! If you guys can't see that, your eyes are bucked!”
“Scoots...” Apple Bloom growled. “We talked about this...”
“So sue me!”
“Hey...” Snails was suddenly squinting at Twist too. “What's wrong with your eyes, anyways?”
“Huh?”
“Yeah!” Snips bounded around, peering right up into Twist's face. “Snails is right! You're totally glowing from the middle of your head and stuff! I don't like it!”
“I don't like it either!” Snails snarled, rearing his hooves. “Bring the light closer so I can smash it!”
“Oooh!” Twist grinned. “I could uthe another bit! You can never have too much thinnamon!”
Scootaloo dashed in the center, holding Snails back in time to utter, “No, for real! This... is totally weird.” She turned and spoke nervously towards Twist. “You know that your eyes are glowing hot red like volcano craters, right?”
“Huh...” Twist's eyelids fluttered, and it felt like an oven door opening and closing repeatedly before the others. “So that might explain why the think evaporated when I tried to watth my hooveth after my father and thithter flew away.”
Scootaloo's face winced. “Your... father and sister flew away?”
“Yup! Right after making me Pancake Thinnamon Thurprithe! My favorite!”
“Uh...” Scootaloo cleared her throat and leaned forward. “Twist, a pony's family—like—doesn't spontaneously fly away, especially when they're earth ponies.”
“I dunno,” Apple Bloom murmured. “It's been known to happen.”
“Since when?”
“Applejack says that my Ma and Pa flew away years ago...” The yellow hairs on the back of Apple Bloom's neck bristled as she frowned. “And t’ain't nothin' wrong with that!”
“Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!” Sweetie Belle blurted. She instantly covered her muzzle, blushed, and cleared her throat. “I'm sorry. Rarity told me never to laugh at that.”
“Seriously...” Scootaloo trotted across the scene. “I dunno if you've told your dad and sister, but you oughta have that looked at, Twist. And also...” Her lips pursed as she placed a hoof up against the frames. “Are the lenses gone—?” A column of smoke hissed from the contact. She brought her forelimb back and blew wildly on the burnt hoof. “Ow ow ow ow ow...”
“Huh?! Don't be thilly!” Twist pulled the glasses off, examined them, and slid them back on. Even more waves of grass died during the process. “They're the thame glathheth that I wath born with! Er... figuratively thpeaking. Heheheh...”
“Ugh!” Diamond Tiara rolled her eyes. “Are you—like—stupid?! Your lenses are as thick as Snail's head!”
“Haha! Yeah! As thick as my head!”
“Everypony who's got a lick of sense in this town knows that you're legally blind without them!”
Silver Spoon chimed in. “Only a dumb ox would prance around wearing glasses without lenses!”
“A dumb ox who's blind!”
“And annoying!”
“Hah! That deserves a rump bump! With extra rump!”
“Oh, pleathe! I can thee ath good if not better than the retht of you ponieth!” Twist's head swiveled smilingly across the playground as she said, “Why, I can clearly thee that melting jungle gym, the filly threaming atop a thteaming thlide, and Rumble trying to make a patth at Dinky, only for hith mane to spontaneously catch fire!”
As she said that, the colt in question screamed from afar. He galloped in circles like a living torch, tripping over a sobbing mare with a slide-shaped burn mark across her hide. This agony went on for seconds until three brave children hoisted Rumble up and carried him over to a full horse trough. They dumped him in, covering the south edge of the schoolbuilding with steam and fog.
Twist stared proudly at the foals with an innocent smile, all the while they gawked at her and the dismally quiet scene beyond, interrupted every now and then by a sobbing voice or the flicker of flames.
“I guess if they flew away, there's no need to explain why they haven't glided back home,” Sweetie Belle thought aloud.
“Whoahhhhh...” Snips pointed at Twist's sporadically pulsating cranium. “She's no longer an annoying freak! She's an annoying and hotheaded freak!”
“Wasn't she always hot headed?” Snails added. “What, with the hair that looks like the stuff that I'm not allowed to touch after that one day I played with matches and suddenly I no longer had a baby brother?”
“Yeah! It's like she's got one big flaming eye!” Snips grinned from ear to ear. “Like—ya know—a cyclops!”
Twist recoiled. “A thyclopth?!”
“Even better!” Diamond Tiara grinned. “A Twistclops!”
“Yeah!” Silver Spoon giggled. “Now she doesn't just burn our eardrums! She burns everything in between!”
“Uhm...” Scootaloo stepped nervously backwards, her wings drooping. “Guys...?”
“She was always like a nasty rash that could never go away!” Snips said. “Now she brings the rash to you at long distance!”
“Heheh! Twistclops Express!”
The air heated up as Twist's hooves grinded ever so slightly into the charred earth below. “I... am a happy... loved... pony. A thyclopth thoundth like thomething that ith neither happy nor lucky...”
“Heehee!” The two colts formed a melodic duet. “Twistclops! Twistclops! Watch your flank, or she'll make it go pop!”
“I'm, uh...” Scootaloo smiled sweatily, wincing. “I'm not sure if you wanna be poking fun at the thing that can make adorable colts spontaneously combust from thirty yards...”
“Why not?!” Snips giggled, reached into a nearby satchel, and produced a pair of gold coins. “She loves earning her bits! How about it, Twistclops? Think you can eat cinnamon without burning it?”
He was answered by a crack of thunder. A thick trench formed in the ground, carving a three-feet deep path across the schoolyard. Foals flew left and right like a pastel parting sea, and at the far end was a fresh crater carved into the red brick wall of the school's building face. Snips and Snails had been reduced to living tacks hammered into the center of this crater, their rear limbs and tails flailing as their upper bodies let loose mortified, muffled shouts from deep within the building's foundation. The entire structure shook from top to bottom, causing the newly replaced bell above the roof to ring loudly.
This sound awoke Scootaloo and the rest from their frigid stupor, and they flinched to see Twist standing between them as a vortex of heated air settled down. A single pulsar of ruby-red light dissipated into two thin slits as she adjusted her shades, smiled, and picked up a pair of partially melted bits.
“Why, how thoughtful of you! Yeth, boyth, I think I will enjoy my thinnamon thwirlth thith afternoon!” She finished with a sing-songy gigglesnort.
Diamond Tiara's pale nostrils twitched. She stepped a few inches to the side so she could avoid the rising stench of her own urine.
Just then, Cheerilee trotted out of the schoolyard. “Oooh!” she chirped. “The bell's ringing early today! That's strange... Oh well!” She shrugged and waved to the students. “Come on in, class! Time for homeroom!” A pale figure limped in through the door with charred hair. “Nice suntan, Rumble!” Cheerilee merrily said. As more ponies lurched by, she glanced aside at the two colts stuck in the crater. “Snips, Snails...” She frowned. “What have I told you about playing shoulder-deep in walls of concrete and mortar? See me after class.” She waved towards the last group as she bounced back into the room. “Come along, everyponyyy! Early bird gets the worm! And that worm is knowledge!”
“Yayyyy!” Twist shoved the ponies inside ahead of her as her grinning face twitched. “I love wormth! Don't you?”
“Ow ow ow owwwwwwww...” Rumble teared up and sniffled, rubbing his red welts from where he sat in the corner of the one room school.
“And ever since the Equestrian Monarchy's Rise to Power,” Cheerilee explained, pointing a wooden ruler at a picture board displaying progressively anorexic alicorn silhouettes, “The surviving descendants of the Cadenza Dynasty have been required by law to have their wings clipped shortly after birth, due to their bodies being so thin and bony that they would—in the words of Princess Celestia herself—look ‘too damn stupid to fly.'”
Cheerilee flipped the front page back over the easel, spun to face the class, and grinned wide.
“Any questions, my little ponies?”
Rumble sobbed quietly. A filly leaned forward, wincing from the burn marks on her back. Snips twitched with a bleeding nose while Snails dangled off the edge of his desk, drooling mindlessly from the pain. Quiet crying noises and stifled whimpers filled the room.
“Uhm...” Scootaloo fidgeted, then pensively raised her hoof. “Mrs. Cheerilee?”
“Mmm? Yes, Scootaloo?”
“Could you... I dunno... call Nurse Redheart from Central Ponyville Medical or something?”
“Why, what for?” Cheerilee's face stretched in concern. “Is somepony ill?”
Scootaloo glanced left and right at the moaning, sobbing, bruised children. Just then, a flicker of ruby light shone in the corner of her peripheral vision. The tiny pegasus went pale, her wings shrinking by her side. “You kn-know what? Never mind. I'm fit as a fiddle!”
“You sure about that? You look rather squirmy.”
“Yeah. Just... uh... menstrual cramps! Heheh! False alarm!”
“But... Scootaloo, haven't you had the talk with your parents? The natural estrus cycle of horses doesn’t exactly allow for—”
“Mybloodlineispartmonkey!” Scootaloo squeaked. Twist's grinning teeth glinted out the corner of her eyes, and the pegasus shrank and shuddered even more.
“Hmmm. Well, then. Any questions pertaining to the lesson?”
“Oooh!” Twist leaned forward. The room heated up and cooled down with sporadic bursts of red energy as she flailed her hoof in cyclonic circles aimed at the ceiling. “Ooooh! Ooooh! Mithh Cheerilee!”
Cheerilee looked at her... then past her. Her left eyebrow twitched, and she swiveled her gaze around the schoolroom like an army prison searchlight. “Somepony? Anypony? Would you like to ask a question about today's lesson?”
“Mithh Cheerilee!” Twist sang and hummed. In rapid blinks, several chunks of gritty plaster fell from the chalkboard at the front of the class. “Mithh Mithh Mitthhy Cheerileeeeee!”
“Hmmmm?” Cheerilee looked and looked. “Anypony?” Her eyes darted to a bright lavender shape. “Sweetie Belle?”
“Nnnnngh...” Sweetie Belle froze in the middle with fussing with her helmet. Wide-eyed, she blinked, twitched, then blurted, “Crotchbewbs?”
Cheerilee sighed, sighed, and sighed some more. As her fuzzy ears drooped, the mare swiveled her head back and flew a lethargic smile towards a glowing ruby sight. “Ahem...” Her teeth showed in a meager display of felicitation. “Yes, Twist?”
Twist folded her forelimbs cutely in front of her and tilted her nose up. “Why are you boring all of the foalth today?!”
The teacher blinked. “I beg your pardon…?”
“Look at everypony!” Twist gestured towards the moaning, groaning, fidgeting lot of students. They all instantly flinched from her as if her body might explode like a horse-shaped pinata full of TNT. “They're on the edge of their theatth, but not with learning! Instead, with nauthea!”
“Uhm, well, you know what they say...” Cheerilee chuckled nervously. “Knowledge is good for the body as well as the soul! I'm certain that if we went over today's lesson and made an outline, then the pertinence of the message would enlighten—” She blinked, crosseyed. “Why are you getting out of your desk?”
“I know jutht what to do!” Twist skipped gaily towards the front of the class. “We need to play a game of thchool trivia! That way, not only will the lethhon be exthiting, but it will be fun too!”
“Twist, even if a game of trivia was on my itinerary, I certainly wouldn't need you gallivanting around without permission—”
“Nonthenthe! I'm the teacher athhithant for the day!” Twist smiled as she grabbed a chair and slid it over so that it was positioned next to Cheerilee, facing the clast. “I can help you get the thtudentth back into the thpirit of thingth!”
“You're the teacher assistant...” Cheerilee droned.
“Yeth, ma'am!” Twist plopped down in the chair, beaming.
Cheerilee folded her forelimbs, twirling the ruler loosely as she glared at the foal. “Since when? I don't remember making this 'New Assistant Day,' young lady.”
“I woke up to a tathtey dithh of Pancake Thinnamon Thurprithe thith morning! The latht time that happened wath when... when...” The ruby light died down as a pair of naked peepers blinked dully behind the rims of Twist's glasses. “'Why, when Twitht had ponieth who loved her...'” There was a lingering pause, and then the glow was back. “But thith hath been the betht morning ever! Thith mutht mean it'th my birthday!” She leaned towards Cheerilee with a cute pouty face. “You wouldn't want to let down a birthday filly'th withh, now would youuuuuu?”
“Twist, I'll have you know that I keep a record of every important event on my calendar!” Cheerilee turned and pointed towards the paper binder in question atop her desk. “And I know for a fact that today is not ‘New Assistant Day—’”
Just then, the calendar evaporated, and Cheerilee's entire desk along with it. Anything and everything of utility that had ever belonged to the teacher was suddenly miles away, burning in the distance beyond a massive horizontal figure eight that had been blasted through the school building's wall.
As sheets of paper and chunks of the ceiling fluttered down over the speechless mare's mane, the four-eyed ginger cooed, “Hey, who keepth track of time thethe dayth? Theriouthly!”
“Uhm...” Cheerilee's eyes narrowed. “My... daily planner... all... gone...”
“Well then, clathh?!” Twist clapped her hooves, swiveled on her chair, and beamed at the class. “What thould the topic of our trivia be, hmm? Thporth?! Politicth?! Attitude Era Wretthling?! Oooh! Who here wath around to watch the Manetreal Thcrewjob live?!”
“Hey!” Diamond Tiara angrily spat. “How about 'Twistclops Doesn't Deserve the Spotlight 101?!” Just then, her head flipped backwards and her body snapped back with it, toppling several times along an angry beam of ruby energy that shoved her—smashing—into a lunchbox counter in the back. “Ooof!”
Several ponies held their breaths as the red beam of light gradually fizzled out.
At the front of the class squatted a seething redhead, her glasses smoking like twin shotgun barrels. “That... had nothing to do with Bret the Hitmane Heart...”
“Mmmmm...” Sweating profusely, Silver Spoon turned around from gawking at Diamond's smoking figure and waved her forelimb. After a pale hoof pointed at her, she smiled nervously. “H-how about that John Ceneigh?! He's pretty cool, right?!” Her desk exploded with a bright red beam. It took four full seconds for her body to stop flipping before it fell back to the earth with a sickening thunk.
“No... he ithn't...”
“Twist!” Cheerilee growled. “What's the meaning of this?! Don't you see what an effect this violent topic is having on the class?”
“Unnngh!” Twist slouched as her body rolled back dramatically. “Don't you thee how hard I'm trying, Mitth Cheerilee?! Thethe kidth are jutht not into it!” She gasped with a bright smile. “Oh! I know! I have the best topic! My dad ith alwayth big on military hithtory, what with thith 'Neighzee Zombie Mode' he keepth playing everynight on hith Xbuck! Why don't we have a trivia contetht about Germaney'th invathion of Stirrup?!”
“Young lady, now you have gone too far!” Cheerilee frowned and waved her ruler threateningly at the child. “You are in the second grade, and the Equestrian Education System expressly forbids me from teaching anything about past century war crimes to schoolfoals before their fifth year—”
A red blast darted up and singed the ruler to a melting crisp.
Cheerilee's pupils shrink. One blink, two blinks, and then she swiveled to grin at the class. “Who wants to learn about the Holoclops?!”
Everypony's hooves flew towards the ceiling.
“Uhm... mmmm...” Rumble shivered, tears running down his face as he clenched tightly to his desk under a settling cloud of dust. “The... r-reason that... Germaney lost the city of Stalliongrad... was because... mmmmm... th-they were really bad at killing other soldiers faster than they themselves could die?”
Thunder rolled. The colt's eye quivered as a beam of red light flew directly into his face, knocking him viciously across the room so that his body fell—groaning—atop a pile of bruised and flinching foals. The wall behind the pummeled children was pockmarked with equine-shaped craters and fractured bits of shattered lunchboxes.
“Unnnngh...” Twist groaned, rolling her eyes and causing ceiling panels above her to evaporate. “Come on, everpony! You have to do better than thith! Put thome energy into it! Be creative!” She flipped through her notecards. “Now thith next one ith a doozy! Tho put on your thinking capth—” The card immediately in her grasp blew up in smoke. She blinked. “Huh... why doeth that keep happening?” She shrugged. “Oh well. Guethh I'll jutht have to wing it... again! Heeheehee!”
As the redhead giggled, the scant remaining ponies in the classroom trembled in their desks, beyond mortified. Chunks of the broken schoolbuilding dangled above them like ominous shadows. Snips' buck teeth bit into the edge of his desk. Scootaloo hyperventilated while Sweetie Belle gulped and Apple Bloom curled up in a golden little ball, stroking her red tail hairs and mewling, “Iwanngohommmmme. Iwannagohommmmmme...”
“Mmmmmm...” Twist pointed. “Thnipth!”
Snips gasped. “Oh sweet Celestia, no...”
“How many allied tholdierth were able to retreat from the thity of Dunkanter before the Germane fortheth caught up with them?”
“Uhm...” Snips smiled nervously, his muzzle awash with sweat. “As many as could drink tea and not get their pee turned green?”
“Not exciting enough!” Thunder crackled.
Snips whimpered, “OhmommyI'msosorryforeverything—” His desk exploded as he became one with a burnt skid mark along the tile floor.
Twist's twin red spotlights swiveled onto a unicorn in a helmet. “Thweetie Belle?! Do you know?”
“Uhm...” Sweetie Belle blinked. “Three hundred?”
“Grrrrr!” The schoolroom lit up.
Sweetie Belle blinked again. “Crotchbewbs?” She flew back, helmet over hooves, and slammed against a wall.
Apple Bloom flinched, stifling a sob. She shivered as the red beam swam over her—causing her coat hairs to curl from the heat. The crimson spotlight eventually settled on the pegasus beside her.
“Thcootaloo!”
“Ggghhh!” Scootaloo bit her lip so hard it bled.
“Thcootth, old pal!” Twist rocked happily back and forth in her seat. “You're a lucky, lucky filly! Cuz you get the latht quethtion of the day!”
“Oh... well... c-cool! Heheh...” Scootaloo wiped her brow. “Shoot!” She winced. “I mean, take your best shot!” She winced again. “I-I mean, fire away—Horseapples!”
“Oooooh... Thith had better be a thhowthtopper!” Twist turned to grin at Cheerilee. “You've got a quethtion in mind, Mitth?!”
“Guh... guh... muh muh muh murderrrrrr...” A wide-eyed, frazzled Cheerilee stammered, quivering from beneath the hollow of a fallen school bell.
“Alright, guetth it'th up to me again!” Twist rolled up a pair of sleeves that didn't exist and leaned forward, her eyes morphing into one red slit as she narrowed her vision on Scootaloo's fragile, feathered figure. “According to hithtorianth, why did the allieth take tho long before invading Prance to take back Stirrup?!”
“They...” Scootaloo gulped, glancing behind her shoulders. “They... uhm...” She looked at Apple Bloom's sobbing figure, Snips' charred coat, Rumble's bruised muscles, and the undeniable pile of foals forming a moaning mountain in the back of the room. “Hooooo boy...”
“Thcootthhhh.... Thcoot Thcoot Thcootalooooo...” A tongue licked a pair of grinning teeth beneath a conjoined red lens. “We're all waitinnnnnng...”
“Uh... yeah... yeah... so... uhm...” Scootaloo's voice wavered as she took on a crooked smile. “So, like, the allies were all 'Wow, this is some tough war, and we really love Stirrup, but darn if it isn't full of a bunch of bleeding heart fascists and communists wanting to punch each other into next century! I think we'll just wait this out and see who gets tired of throwing stones sooner, Germaney or the Sovioats.' And, like, Josef Stallion—yeah—he was all 'Yo, dudes, what's with the delay?! My guys are over here totally busting their flanks in the goddess-forsaken snow to save Stalliongrad!' And then Winstrot Churchhay, as always, sticks his hoof in his mouth and goes 'Well, that's what you get for naming such a miserable city after yourself, jerkface.' So, Stallion gets all mad, and he's like 'Y'know, when this is all over, I'm totally taking over Ponyland and Romaneia because screw you guys!' And that's when—like—Roosepelt got up, folded up his stagecoach, and smacked the thing over Stallion's sorry skull! And it got a huge pop from the crowd of Prance resistance fighters, who weren't doing much of anything anyhow. They were all, 'Whoah, did you just see Josef Stallion take that sick stagecoach-shot to the skull?! What a work, brotha!' But it was no good, cuz, like, Roosepelt died from some lame-ass disease before Trotsdam even happened. Total sell-out, y'know? So it was up to Trumane to clean shop, but he was too busy dropping a bomb full of parasprites on the Japaneighs cuz of what they did at Pearl Haybor. And, y'know, chalk up what happened at Hiroshimare alongside the internment camps for bad stuff done in the name of war, and it just goes to show that no matter how victorious you are, you can... uhm... still be a heartless bunch of jerks who show up late to the party... which is... uhm... why the Amareican forces were... so late... at... Normanedy?” Scootaloo ended her long-winded speech with a prolonged wince.
Twist's face was stuck in a frozen lurch of comprehension.
The silence broke when Sweetie Belle struggled up to her seat with an awkward clatter. “Unnngh...” She rubbed her naked head through a frazzled mane. “Heh...” She smiled tiredly at Apple Bloom. “Good thing I was wearing that helmet, huh?” A red beam slammed into her skull. “Ackies!” She fell with a thud.
“No thpeaking out of turn!” Twist growled, then swiveled to stare down Scootaloo. “That'th a very nifty anthwer...”
Scootaloo squee'd. “Yeah! Yeah!” She gulped and wrung her sweaty hooves in her lap. “Isn't it, th-though?”
Twist's eyes narrowed to a burning red slit once more. “Care to thite your thourtheth...?”
Scootaloo froze, her orange coat pale. “Cite... m-my sources?”
“That'th right, clever girl...”
“Uhm...” Scootaloo bit her lip.
Suddenly, Apple Bloom broke from her stupor to blurt, “Hayrold Bloom!”
“Yeah!” Scootaloo piped up.
“That pony researches everythang!”
Scootaloo slapped her desktop and leaned forward with a girn. “Hayrold Bloom, motherbucker!”
“Scootaloo!” Apple Bloom squeaked. “What have I told you about—?”
“Wait a thecond...” Twist glanced at Cheerilee. “Thomething'th not right. Trumane wathn't the Amareican prethident until after Normanedy, right?”
“Muh-muh-muh-monsterrrrr...”
“Meh. Whatever.” Twist faced forward, her eyes vibrating with a pent-up shot of ruby fury. “Thtill too boring in my book...”
“Oh my goddess...” Scootaloo pointed wildly over the redhead’s shoulder. “Cheerilee's got a denim purse!”
“Where?!” Twist spun, and the far end of the schoolroom exploded along with an eruption of a lone mare's horrified screams. “That'th only two degreeth away from jeanth!”
“Nnngh!” Scootaloo picked up the first blunt object she could find and tossed it towards the front of the room.
“Weeeeeeeee!” Sweetie Belle deliriously squealed before her numb body collided with the source of the crimson outburst. She and Twist went rolling while the optic blast spun like a bastard sword, cleaving blocks of red brick and mortar loose at every angle.
“Let's go! Let's bucking go!” Scootaloo rushed over and grabbed Apple Bloom.
“Scootaloo, for the last time—” Apple Bloom began. A roar lifted in the corner, like the oscillating growls of an angry phoenix, and huge beams of flesh-melting light flew their way. “Buck!” Apple Bloom ineffectually shrieked.
“Buck!” Scootaloo retorted. She dragged Apple Bloom by her mane, hoisting her over shattered desks, fallen plaster, and the countless bodies of foals. “Buck buck buck buck!”
“Buck!”
“Buckkkkk!”
Both fillies threw themselves out into the schoolyard. They lost balance and collapsed amidst crumbling playground pieces. The whole earth was shaking. Scootaloo's wings blurred, thrusting her forward. Apple Bloom could scarcely regain her balance.
“Buck buck buck it all!” Scootaloo hopped onto her wagon.
“Scootaloo!” Apple Bloom whimpered, crawling like a pathetic infant towards the vehicle and its tow. “Not so fast!”
“Buck, Apple Bloom!” Scootaloo shouted over the bedlam, fastening her helmet as squirrels and lizards melted around her. “Get the buck into the wagon!”
“But we left Sweetie Belle behind!” Apple Bloom yelped. The death rattle of cockroaches and cats sounded off beyond the crumbling educational edifice just past her twitching hoof-ends. “We can't just leave her behind!”
“She knew what she was bucking getting into!” Scootaloo roared, waving with her hoof. “Now get your bucking flank in the bucking wagon!”
“But... but...” The building collapsed as Twist rose out of the dusty heap like an angel of death, spewing her frothing sight across the melting grasslands. “Buck!”
“Fweeeeeguhhhuuthhhh!”
“Buck me!” Apple Bloom shrieked.
“What did I bucking tell you?!” Scootaloo howled, already pedaling. “Buck! We're all bucking dead! Get in the bucking wagon!”
“Oh for buck's sake!” Apple Bloom broke into a gallop and flew herself forward. She grabbed onto the rear of the wagon just as it reached its top speed. “Nnnngh!” She flailed, her rear hooves dragging through the dirt. “Scoots! Slow down, ya orange buck!”
“What did I bucking tell you just a bucking second ago?”
“It's not my buckin’ fault she was a buckin’ eyebeam laser demon child! Nopony could have guessed that for buck-all!”
“Shut your bucking face and get in the bucking wagon!”
“What do you think I'm buckin’ tryin’ to do here?!”
Waves of red madness sliced through the road, spitting up dirt and tearing trees to angry splinters.
“Gaaah!” Scootaloo shrieked, swerving left and right as the scooter's tire screeched. “Buck!”
“Buck!'
“Meennnguuuttttttth cruel evil ponietttttthhh!”
Post boxes and rain ditches and park benches exploded left and right.
“Buck buck buck!”
“Buck me in the eye!”
“Aaaaah! Buck!”
The fillies passed by a decrepit old horse who paused in shoveling manure by the side of the road to tip his moth-eaten hat at them. “Nope! It's ‘Buster,’ actually!”
“Buck!”
“Buster!”
“B-Buck! Buck!” Scootaloo screeched to a stop. She pointed towards the burning sky while Apple Bloom's body rolled across the wagon. “Buckkkkkk!”
“No, Buster!”
“Bucking look!”
“Buster Colton, pleased to meet you—” A beam of red laser energy ignited the stallion from behind. “Oh buck!”
Apple Bloom and Scootaloo shrieked. “Buckin’ Hell!”
The stallion collapsed as he vomited up his melting entrails. “Bnnnngrllrrrgg-Buckkkkkkkk my liiiiiife!” The manure caught fire behind his corpse, sending a smoldering plume of death and stench high into the air.
“Bucking A!”
“Buckin' gun it, Scoots!”
“Buck this place!” Scootaloo kicked against the ground and glided off as Apple Bloom clung to her, sobbing. “Buck buck buck it all!”
“Please, Princess Bucking Celestiaaaaaaa...” Their voices sang like sirens over the melting tree tops as the pair finally outraced the spreading waves of purgatorial ruby heat seeping after them.
“Ohhhhh buck! Oh buck buck buck!”
“Buck...” Apple Bloom sat dazedly in the corner of the Sweet Apple Acres farmhouse, her eyelids layered with the dried crust of countless tears. “Buck... b-buck... buckbuckbuck... buck... buckitall... buck... buck...”
Sighing, Applejack continued notching across a pad of paper with a pencil. “One hundred and ninety-eight... one hundred and ninety nine... two hundred.” She slapped the notepad shut. “Alright there, lil' missy.” She planted a hoof on her flank and frowned at the catatonic filly. “That settles it! Yer officially doin' morning chores for the rest of the year! Now I hate bein' this cruel to ya, but we've had this conversation tons of times!”
“Applejack!” Scootaloo grunted as she galloped across the house, stacking buckets and tables and other bits of heavy furniture against the front door of the place. “Buck your apples-backwards tradition and help me board up this place!”
“Whoah nelly!” Applejack held Scootaloo back by her tail. “Now you jus' wait a second, small fry!”
“B-buck...”
“Two hundred and one. Ahem. Who died and gave you the right to march into my house and toss all my belongin's around?” Applejack binked. “Besides yer parents, that is.”
“This is serious, AJ!” Scootaloo hopped in place, her mane and coat frazzled. “They're dead! They're all dead!” She hyperventilated and squeaked, “Miss Cheerilee, Snips, Snails, Diamond Tiara, Silver Spoon, that shoe that likes to sing all the time!”
“Pinkie Pie?”
“No, the other shoe.”
“Ohhhh. Sweetie Belle.”
“Right.” Scootaloo gulped and nodded. “Something bad is happening to this town, and it's stronger than anything I've ever lived through seeing! I mean it! This is bigger than Nightmare Moon! This is bigger than Discord! This is bigger than that stupid she-bug thing that crashed a wedding for a stupid monologue and then got totally trashed by the power of lameness!”
“What, Scootaloo?” Applejack trotted forward and rested a reassuring hoof on the filly's shoulder. “What is it? You can tell me!”
Scootaloo took a deep, deep breath then blurted, “Twistclops!”
Applejack stared blankly at her.
The filly's face contorted with disbelief and disappointment. “AJ?! AJ, come on! Are you deaf! I just said—”
“And I done heard ya, sugarcube...” Applejack nervously adjusted the brim of her hat. “It's just that... uhhhh...”
“Well...?!”
Applejack smiled nervously, her cheeks reddening. “Well, if ya ask me, every pony in this world deserves feelin' good once in awhile, and how they... uhm... go about gettin' to feel that pleasure is their business, and none of ours, ya reckon?”
“Huh...?!” Scootaloo blinked. Eventually, she went cross-eyed, then shook her head with a frown. “Oh for the love of—No! I mean Twist's shooting a big beam of angry red light out of her eyes at the flick of a hoof! I don't understand it one bit, but she's dangerous, I tell ya! She's already iced half the children in this town! It was… t-totally metal. But still! Might as well say 'goodbye' to Ponyville's future by this point!”
“B-bucking bucks...”
“Ahem... Two hundred and two...” Applejack looked from Apple Bloom back to Scootaloo. “Sugarcube, let's be honest for a moment here. Don't y'all be forgettin' that honesty is my bag, now.”
“That's why I need you to totally believe me on this—”
“But Twist is the sweetest, most darlin', most honest-to-goodness pony in these parts!” Applejack said with a smile. “Ya sure ya ain't lettin' your imagination run wild?!”
“You've got to be plot-snotting me!” Scootaloo gasped, then grinded her hooves against the floorboards with a snarl. “You mean you actually liked this pony before all this crud happened?!”
“Well...” Applejack leaned back, fanning herself with her heat. “I gotta admit, I was a touch bit beside myself with anger when I found out about all the bullyin' she did along with Silver Spoon and Diamond Tiara.”
Scootaloo went cock-eyed. “H-huh?!”
“Though, I'm just plum happy y'all made up and made her an honorary member of yer little Cutie Mark Capsizin' club thang...”
“I... it... but... Snkkkt...” Scootaloo banged her orange skull several times, hissing. “Friggin' grownups!”
“What...?” Applejack's eyes narrowed. “We ain't talkin' about the same redhead?”
“Heck, no!”
“Uhm... Well, this is mighty embarrassing...” Applejack blushed. “Which one of them lil' critters is 'Twist' again?”
Scootaloo trotted forward.
Applejack leaned down.
The tiny pegasus whispered into the mare's ear.
Applejack nodded... and nodded... and then went ghostly pale. Slowly, an iron-wrought frown crossed her face. “Grannnnnny!” her voice boomed against the house's foundation as she protectively flung Apple Bloom's limp figure over her backside. “Fetch me my rifle!”