Fluttershy fluttered her wings quickly and smoothly, taking care not to make any noise. In order for this to work, she had to have complete silence, or Violet would kill her without a second thought. A chill seeped through her body as her wings beat the cool afternoon air. Her hooves gently touched down on the soft earth, and she folded her wings ever so slowly, trying not to rustle even the tiniest feather.
Violet was right where she'd left her; on the ground. She lay, fast asleep, on her stomach, partially covered by leaves and dirt. Fluttershy suppressed a laugh as a throaty snore escaped the earth pony's mouth.
And now came the tricky part: Fluttershy had to remove the magic amulet from Violet's neck. She crept towards her, wary of every leaf, every stick that could make the slightest noise. It only took a few seconds, but it seemed like an eternity before she reached the sleeping tribute.
As Fluttershy stood over her unconscious enemy, it occurred to her what she was going to do. It was murder. Pure and simple. How would she ever be able to live with something like this on her conscience? How would she be able to sleep at night, with the image of this mare's face engrained in her mind?
It had to be done, she knew. There was no other way.
Taking a deep breath to calm her nerves, Fluttershy gripped one of the larger feathers at the end of her wing. Squeezing her eyes shut, she yanked, ignoring the sharp pain that resulted. The amulet around Violet's neck worked with a simple clasp; too small for her clumsy hooves, but with a bit of work, it could be removed with a pegasus feather.
She carefully pushed the quill end of the feather under the clasp, trying not to press into the mare's fur. With one swift upwards movement of her head, the clasp became unhooked, and the ends of the amulet dropped to the ground.
But one problem still remained: the amulet lay trapped, underneath Violet's neck.
Fluttershy knelt on the ground and reached her hoof towards the end of the necklace. If she could just slide the necklace out from under Violet without waking her...
The moment her hoof neared the smooth metal of the amulet, Fluttershy could feel a strange repulsion. Almost as if the amulet was pushing her away. She frowned and moved her hoof closer-
Fluttershy was blinded by an extremely bright light, right before her eyes. A high-pitched scream sounded in her ear, but she wasn't sure if it was her own or not. It was only when she hit the ground that she realized that she'd been thrown into the air the moment she touched the amulet.
Her head hurt, and she couldn't seem to focus on anything. The world tilted and spun before her eyes, and she was suddenly aware of an ache in her shoulder and a stinging pain in her ear. Along with that, both her right front hoof and back left hoof hurt something terrible.
"Where is it?"
The three words seemed to echo through her mind, and they sounded as if the speaker was far away.
"Where is it?" The strange voice said again. They sounded frantic. Perhaps Fluttershy should help them in their search. She tried to stand, but her legs wouldn't support her. She fell back onto the ground helplessly.
"You stole it!" The voice exclaimed. As the surrounding forest came into focus, Fluttershy became aware of a purple earth pony coming towards her. Violet walked with a heavy limp, but from the look in her eyes, she wasn't going to let that stop her.
Fluttershy got to her hooves, her knees shaking as she stood. She was glad to see that the amulet was gone from around Violet's neck; perhaps it had been thrown into the foliage when Fluttershy touched it.
"Give it back!" Violet screamed, stopping a few feet in front of Fluttershy. "I need my magic!"
Fluttershy blinked away the bright spots in her eyes. She glared back at Violet. This mare wasn't going to scare her anymore. Now that her precious amulet was gone, her only weapon was intimidation, and even that was weakening by the second.
Seeing that the amulet wasn't around Fluttershy's neck, Violet narrowed her eyes. "Where did you hide it? Where?" She demanded.
"Shut up." Fluttershy growled. "Shut up or I'll kill you on the spot."
Violet did as requested, dumbfounded. A bit taken aback by this newfound courage, she began to stutter. "You- you don't have any-"
"Weapons?" Fluttershy smirked, trying to keep up the act. Really, she wanted to dart into the trees and have the conversation from there, but this was one battle that required a direct confrontation. "Sounds like my sponsors are a bit more generous than yours."
Violet took a step back. "You're bluffing."
"Am I?" Fluttershy asked. "And what if I'm not?"
Violet didn't answer.
Fluttershy looked straight in the earth pony's eyes. "I'm giving you a chance to save yourself. If you leave this part of the forest, and promise to never attack me or Babs again, I'll let you live. But if you don't..." She let the sentence hang in the air, hoping it would produce the desired effect.
"You're giving me a choice?" Violet scoffed, having regained some of her usual bravado. "Did Quartz have a choice when you killed him? Did Jade or Night have a choice when I killed them both? Did any of us have a choice when we were put here in this living hell?" She shook her head.
Fluttershy swallowed. "Then... I'm sorry." She steeled herself for the moment that she knew would come, the moment when she would have to kill another living pony.
"I'm sorry, too." Violet said. "Sorry that you won't be able to see me become victor!" She dived straight at Fluttershy, knocking her legs out from under her.
"Hey!" Fluttershy shouted. She quickly got back on her hooves.
"Come on!" Violet yelled, standing and stepping closer. "Fight me!"
Fluttershy could only step back. "I- I won't-"
"You're weak!" Violet exclaimed. A bit of her forelock had fallen into her eyes, but she didn't bother to brush it away. "You've always been too weak! I could tell the moment I saw you; you'll never have the will to fight. You don't deserve to wear the image of the Princess!"
Fluttershy didn't have time to process the statement. With a yell powered by rage, Violet leapt towards her again. But this time, she aimed for her throat.
Fluttershy fell backwards and thrust out her hooves to stop the attacker. She felt a hoof knock her head hard, bending her neck backwards at an awkward angle. Something thick and warm dripped down onto her chest, and for a moment, she feared that it was her own blood. She opened her eyes, just as a cannon boomed, and was met with a gruesome sight.
It was Violet. She lay, limp, on top of Fluttershy like some sort of giant rag doll. Her face frozen in a look of shock and anger, with the hilt of a knife protruding from her neck.
She was dead.
***
Rarity smiled and stomped her hooves along with the rest of the crowd. Another tribute out of the Games! With almost half of them gone, Fluttershy had an even greater chance of winning. And the farther along she got in the Games, the more parties Rarity got invited to!
"I say, that pegasus of yours is certainly faring well." One of the unicorn stallions said to her. "I wouldn't be surprised if she made it to the top five."
Rarity smiled gleefully. She couldn't remember the stallion's name, but at the moment, it didn't really matter.
"What in Paneighm is she doing now?" One of the mares interrupted the flurry of conversation spreading throughout the room. All eyes turned back to the colossal television screen that covered the entire wall in front of them.
Fluttershy had moved the body of the purple mare off of her and was now standing next to it, eyes closed. Everypony watched as a single tear rolled down her cheek. Immediately the room erupted with whispers, questioning if the tribute was very smart, standing out in the open like that.
Rarity noticed a silver earring, still dangling from Fluttershy's ear. At least she'd managed to hang onto one of them. And something that the other tribute, Violet had said... something about wearing the image of the princess? Rarity sometimes heard Celestia referred to as a Princess, but the alicorn on the earring didn't look much like Celestia. But... what other princess was there?
As Rarity and the rest of the onlookers watched the screen, Fluttershy rolled the corpse onto her back. The whispers became excited. What would she do? Stab her again? Cut off her mane?
No. Fluttershy carefully crossed her former enemy's front hooves and laid the legs out straight. Then, with a certain solemnity about her, she closed Violet's eyes. Fluttershy stepped back and mourned as more tears dripped down her face to mingle with the blood on her neck and chest.
Rarity was dumbfounded. The tribute had tried to kill her, and yet Fluttershy treated her death as an occasion for sadness. Surely this went against everything the Games stood for. Killing another tribute was supposed to bring honor, glory, gladness. But there was nothing glad about Fluttershy now.
Evidently the Gameponies decided that a mourning pegasus wasn't very exciting, so they switched the scene to show a conversation between the two unicorn ponies that had taken the Cornucopia. Rarity tuned out, her mind focused on her tribute's peculiar behavior.
One thing was for sure: If Fluttershy didn't change her view of the Games, and soon, she would be killed. There was no room for a compassionate tribute in the Pony Games.
***
After the hovercraft ascended with Violet's body in tow, Fluttershy walked back to the stream and washed the blood out of her fur. Other than her back left hoof, which needed a change of bandage, nothing was seriously injured, only bruised and cut.
The light in the sky was just beginning to fade, and it occurred to her that Babs was still in the forest somewhere. What if she thought the cannon was for Fluttershy? What if she thought that Violet was still alive, still angry and looking for more tributes to kill?
Or what if- what if she'd been found by another tribute? What if Babs wasn't even alive anymore?
No, that's what the cannons are for, and there had only been one cannon since they had separated: Violet's. Still, the thought made Fluttershy even more anxious to find her ally.
Deciding that she could get a better view from the sky, Fluttershy unfolded her wings and took flight. Right before she cleared the treetops, however, she hesitated. Was it possible that Spitfire and Soarin were up there? They were certainly very comfortable in the sky; and what better place to watch for other tributes than a cloud?
She decided not to risk it. Better safe than sorry, after all. Finding Babs would have to wait until tomorrow, under the shade of the trees. Fluttershy chose to rest for the night in one of the taller trees, on a thick, strong branch with plenty of leaves. She smiled when she realized that this was the fourth tree she'd taken refuge in since the Games began. It was becoming a habit for her. The sky was completely dark now, and the forest was suddenly filled with the booming anthem of Paneigm. Fluttershy moved a few leaves and peered at the sky, where the giant screen showed the image of Canterlot Castle. The image faded as the anthem ended, and the first tribute showed up on screen.
The mare was obviously a crystal pony, which meant that she must be from the first district. The next tribute was a stallion, also a crystal pony. The next face shown sent pangs of regret at Fluttershy's heart; it was Violet. Then her tribute partner appeared on screen, his deep brown eyes and solemn face making her feel even worse. Then the stallion, the one that had woken her up that morning. The screen went black, and Fluttershy breathed a sigh of relief, glad that Babs' face hadn't been shown.
She laid down on the branch, gathering together a clump of leaves for a pillow. Her eyes closed, and she fell asleep instantly.
That night, she had the strangest dream.
She was running through the forest, fleeing from some unseen terror. The bright moonlight illuminated her path, and she leapt over obstacles with ease. Next to her ran the unicorn stallion, the one that had cut her at the beginning of the games. He turned to her and opened his mouth to speak, but instead of his voice, it was the voice of Rainbow Dash.
"It was only a matter of picking them off one by one," He said. The stallion turned and ran away from her, leaving her all alone.
Braeburn materialized out of the foliage, wearing a brown vest. He galloped beside her and turned to speak. "It'll be satisfying to watch them die." He said, in Soarin's voice. He stopped suddenly, and was quickly left behind as Fluttershy barreled on ahead.
Fluttershy ran straight into a tree, but it didn't hurt her in the least. She looked up to find her way barred by a tight wall of foliage. There was no way through! She turned around, and was met with the sight of a blue unicorn mare leaping out of the trees.
"You'll never have the will to fight." The unicorn said, in Violet's voice. She turned and leapt back into the vegetation.
Finally, Spitfire landed on the ground in front of her. A vain smirk on her face, she spoke with Babs' voice, "If you had any sense, you woulda killed me by now." Then she reared backwards and kicked Fluttershy in the chest, knocking the breath out of her.
She woke up with a start, breathing heavily. It was just a dream, she told herself. Just a dream.
She lay awake for a few minutes before falling into a deep, dreamless slumber.