A van drove briskly through the cold night, carrying many passengers; one of which was Rainbow Dash. The van was headed for the prison of Ponyville and was just a simple black carrier van, with seats for up to 10 ponies and thick, steel wires to keep the prisoners away from the driver. Two guards stood on the opposite side of the wire to the prisoners, armed with loaded rifles, ready to shoot anypony who made a scene.
Rainbow Dash sat between two other mares, her feeling of depression matched evenly by her feeling of anger. Furious was an understatement to describe how she felt about Applejack at this moment; her betrayal marked one of the worst moments in Ponyville. Unfortunately, only two ponies knew, and nopony would believe one of them and the other would never tell.
The van turned sharply into the prison entrance, making Rainbow Dash almost fall off her seat. She accidentally fell onto a unicorn sitting in the seat next to her and got a sharp jab in the ribs from her horn as she fell over her.
“Hey, get off me!” the unicorn shouted irritably.
She shoved Rainbow Dash off of her and she fell to the dirt covered, linoleum floor. A few ponies scoffed and laughed as she meekly picked herself up.
“Sorry about that” Rainbow Dash apologized to the pony she fell on.
The pony didn’t say a word, but instead got up and struck Rainbow Dash in the throat with her hoof. She had a fast hit and Rainbow Dash never saw it coming.
A few ponies sitting nearby erupted into laughter as Rainbow Dash fell to the floor, coughing and spluttering. The pony who hit her felt proud of her actions as she sat back down in her seat. It’s a sad day when an innocent pony is made to be subject to this kind of cruelty.
Just moments later, after Rainbow Dash settled back into her seat and got control of her coughing, the doors of the van opened.
“Alright, come on out you worthless scum!” a guard shouted.
The ponies on board loosely organized themselves into single file; Rainbow Dash being near the back. It was an arduous van ride and they’d only just arrived at 6am. The light emanating from the sun rising over the horizon hit Rainbow Dashs eyes as she stepped off of the van into the prison courtyard. The inmates who were already here were still in bed, but were about to be made to get up.
A group of guards stood near the exit of the van and before Rainbow Dash could take more than a couple of steps, a guard locked a pair of wingcuffs onto her wings.
“What the?” Rainbow Dash said in confusion.
“It’s so you don’t fly away” the guard told her. “You can’t be trusted, killer”.
Rainbow Dash felt disgusted.
“I’m not the one who murdered Rarity!” she screamed.
The guard pulled out a baton from his uniform.
“See this? I’m gonna smack the shit out of you with it if you don’t do what we say. You speak out, you get this to the head. You got that?” he snarled.
Rainbow Dash grunted, but reluctantly nodded.
“Good. Now follow me, I may as well show you your cell” he said, sheathing his baton.
Rainbow Dash followed the guard over the courtyard as other guards led other new inmates to their cells. There appeared to be four different cellblocks, each with about 20 individual cells inside. Rainbow Dash followed the guard through an entrance and up a dilapidated, concrete hallway. The walls were grey and bare and gave the building an eerie, lonely feeling. Rainbow Dash couldn’t help but feel confined by the nature of the hallways and how their stone floors made her hoofsteps echo across the hallway, showing just how empty her new home was. The way the walls made this building seem so lifeless, like it absorbed all positive feelings from everypony who fell under the unfortunate circumstance of being made to walk down it, gave Rainbow Dash a chilling feeling. After what seemed like hours of walking down the lonesome, cold hallways, the pair walked around a corner, leading to a line of cells.
“Welcome to Ponyville Mares Prison” the guard said half heartedly. “If you need anything, don’t ask”.
He opened a jail cell with a set of keys and gave Rainbow Dash a shove as she stepped inside. The sound of the door being locked shut behind her filled her soul with a feeling of unjust confinement and when she turned to see the metal bars preventing her escape from her new six foot by eight foot home, her expectation was turned into a grim reality.
An hour passed by until Rainbow Dash was told to get up by a guard. She felt groggy from her mere 15 minutes of rest, only being experienced after 45 minutes of weeping tears of anger and hurt.
The shouting made by Rainbows Dashs fellow inmates echoed from the concrete walls as she wandered down the line of cells through the crowd of inmates, not even sure where she was going.
She meekly tapped somepony on the shoulder next to her. The pony turned around and almost made Rainbow Dash jump back in shock when she saw she only had one eye. The other eye, it appeared, had been gouged out.
“What do you want?” the mare asked in an aggressive tone.
“I…I just wanna know where we’re going” Rainbow Dash said weakly.
“Breakfast” the mare said, before snorting and spitting on the concrete directly beneath Rainbow Dash. The sight of phlegm and blood being spat underneath her sickened her to her very core, causing her to gag.
She gradually but rapidly moved with the rest of the mares to the dining hall where she sat alone at the back, feeling miserable and angry. However her lifeless attitude and actions were silenced by the obnoxious yelling and the odd fight of everypony around her.
She looked around the dilapidated cafeteria at all the ponies she now had to live with. She felt overwhelmed with grief seeing all her fellow inmates doing everything from yelling to fighting; and these fights were a lot more brutal than just your average fight where the two ponies just shove each other around and throw the odd hoof.
Rainbow Dash, for the first time in her life, now understood the difference between loneliness and aloneness. In here, she had no friends; nopony to help her if somepony decided to beat her up. She was surrounded by many, but allied by none.
---
Meanwhile, Applejack sat with Fluttershy in her cottage. They’d just been to see the squirrels and now sat at Fluttershys table, enjoying a warm cup of tea.
“Thank you for visiting” Fluttershy smiled, setting the teapot down on the bench.
“It’s fine” Applejack smiled back.
Applejack seemed ok at a glance. She looked happy, always wearing a cheery smile with eyes full of blithe to match. But inside her heart, a storm of guilt brewed, striking her conscience with it’s lightning of regret, matched by it’s thunderous cries of remorse. However her mind had an opposite feeling of the dilemma at hoof.
Better her than you the voices would shout, echoing off the base of her skull with relentless fortitude, reminding her always of that day in the courtroom. A day she wanted to forget. But she couldn’t stop herself from playing that scene over and over in her mind, again and again like a movie reel being shown in a theatre where the audience was her conscience, her sense of honesty, her sense of remorse, and so on; forever judging her with every showing of the reel and torturing her with their bitter opinions.
A war waged between the conscience of her heart and the ruthless voices in her head, Applejack being caught in the middle of the conflict.
How could you betray your friend? her sense of regret would cry out.
And even worse, how could you lie? her sense of honesty would add.
If she hadn’t done what we said, we’d be rotting in prison right now! One of the many voices in her head would scream.
That farm would be driven to the ground in an instant without Applejack! another voice would argue.
Rainbow Dash was an innocent pony. Who knows what she’s going through in prison? Does she deserve to be beaten up by the other inmates? Because she probably is! her sense of remorse shouted acidly.
She’s just a casualty in a predicament that happened because of self defense another voice in her head shouted back.
This kind of arguing happened every day since that day in the court room, usually persisting for hours. Applejack couldn’t sleep because she was always being scolded for lying by her sense of honesty. She couldn’t rest, talk, work or have fun without being reminded of her actions that day by the constant conflict in her mind, waged by her altruistic heart and the pernicious voices in her head.
“So, I can’t believe Rainbow Dash did that to Rarity” Fluttershy said sadly.
Her words felt like a dagger in Applejacks heart, but she did her best not to show it.
“I know” Applejack replied, not physically able to bring herself to utter anymore words.
“Would you like some scones?” Fluttershy asked sweetly, eager to change the subject.
At the sound of her friends voice, Applejack snapped out of the trance-like state she’d suddenly entered when Fluttershy reminded her of how everypony thought it was Rainbow Dash who’d murdered Rarity.
“Yeah, sure” she said, almost about to cry.
The pegasus turned to fetch the scones from her oven, but Angel stood in her way. He looked annoyed, with his arms folded and a scowl on his face.
“Oh, did I forget to feed you?” Fluttershy said pusillanimously.
Angel nodded.
“Oh, Applejack, I hate to bother you, but um…could you please get the scones while I prepare Angels lunch?” Fluttershy asked.
“Sure” Applejack smiled, grasping the opportunity to do something active in the hope that it would help her ignore the conflict in her head.
She methodically stood from her chair and wandered over to Fluttershys oven. She grabbed an ovenhoofmitt and opened the oven doorway. The smell of freshly baked scones filled the air, pleasing Applejacks nose with its delicious aroma. She was eager to taste them, knowing that the smell of Fluttershys cooking was what made you want to eat them, and the taste was what made you not want to stop.
“These look delicious” Applejack grinned.
She set down the tray on the bench as small trails of steam rose from each scone. She glanced over at Fluttershy, who was cutting up a head of lettuce on the bench a few metres from her. She grabbed a few of the scones to put on a plate, but dropped them immediately. Her hooves filled with a painful burning sensation.
“Argh, these are hot!” Applejack gasped.
“Sorry, I should have told you about that” Fluttershy said sheepishly.
Applejack went to grab the ovenhoofmitt, but Fluttershy meekly stopped her.
“Oh, I’m sorry, but you can’t use those” Fluttershy said weakly.
“Why not?” Applejack asked incredulously.
“They’re too big and you’ll crush the scones. I’ll go grab a smaller pair”.
She raced out of the room and upstairs.
“Another pair? I can do it with these” Applejack scoffed.
She put the ovenhoofmitt on and grabbed a scone, but as she went to place it on a plate, Fluttershys prediction turned into a reality. Crumbs were littered all over the floor as Applejack grunted angrily. Of course, the voices in her head were quick to judge her for her folly.
“Dang it!” Applejack groaned.
She opened a cupboard to grab a dustpan to clean the mess she’d just made. But in the first cupboard, all she found were spices. She looked in the next one over, but again just found more cooking ingredients.
“Where could that dustpan be? I know I’ve seen a dustpan in one of these cupboards before…” Applejack said.
She went across the kitchen and opened a cupboard completely at random. But she gasped at the sight she saw when the cupboard doors opened.
“How could Fluttershy do that?” she said, completely shocked.
---
Rainbow Dash wandered weakly across the courtyard, her eyes darting in every direction. All around her, everypony was either relaxing, fighting or anything in between. She looked over at some ponies lifting weights. They looked tough and gruesome with the way they pushed themselves to the limit lifting dumbbells and doing benchpresses.
Rainbow Dash moved on, eager to get away from a group of ponies who were a lot bigger and stronger than her. She saw a gang of ponies standing around a tree, just talking. She decided that if she was going to survive in here, she couldn’t do it alone. She needed allies.
She gulped, fearing for her safety, but pushed through her anxiety and forced herself to approach the gang of ponies amalgamated around the old oak.
“Then I shoved her up against the wall and told her, “if you look at me like that again I’ll rip off your clit and shove it down your throat”. She ran away crying” one of the tougher looking ponies in the group laughed.
The remark made Rainbow Dash shudder and almost gag.
“Ahh, hello there” Rainbow Dash muttered timidly.
The gang of ponies turned to face her. One of them stepped towards her and shoved her to the ground.
“What do you want, bitch?”
“I…I was j-just wondering if you could let me hang out with you” Rainbow Dash said timorously.
The pony who shoved her looked confused, but irritated.
“Who put you up to this?” she asked snidely.
“Nopony” Rainbow Dash answered as she picked herself up from the dirt. “I just wanted to make some friends”.
“Get the buck out of here” the pony said maliciously.
Rainbow Dash felt like crying as she turned and walked away. She stepped a few feet away and stared up at the sky. A soft meadow of clouds danced through the azure sea of air above her, taunting her with their pure, celestial charm and how it reminded her that that was the opposite of the dirty, confining prison that was now her home. The clouds looked gentle and welcoming, and the long ocean of air stretching over the crimson horizon beckoned for her to soar across it.
She went to stretch her wings, but all that happened was she let out a painful cry as the wingcuffs almost dislocated her wings. This pegasus could not fly, and thus could not fill her hearts desire to soar the sky.
But the surrounding ponies laughed at her weak attempt to fly away; including the ponies she’d just walked away from. She turned around and saw them standing around the tree. Pointing at her. Laughing at her. Insulting her.
“What a bucking idiot!” one of them laughed.
Rainbow Dash became enraged. Finally, to her slight happiness, all the anger she’d built up since that day in the courtroom could now be focused on somepony. In fact, multiple ponies.
She charged at them as they continued to laugh. She tackled one of them into the tree as hard as she could, actually breaking some of the ponies ribs. The pony she tackled gasped out in agony as Rainbow Dash threw her to the dirt. She put her hooves up, ready to fight, as the others formed a circle around her.
She felt deeply anxious, not sure what to do or say. She threw a wild hoof, smacking one of the tougher ones in the nose, but after that the group erupted into a mass of brutal fighting.
One of the ponies slammed Rainbow Dash against the tree and bashed her nose with their hoof. Rainbow Dash fought back by hitting the ponies throat with her forehooves, but the others immediately jumped in and slammed her to the ground. She curled up in a ball as a fury of kicks hit her head and belly. She actually feared for her life as the kicking evolved into stomping.
“Help!” she screamed out.
But no help came. For a brief moment she opened her eyes and stared between the legs of one of her attackers and out across the courtyard. Nopony bothered to look. In fact, they looked frightened.
Nopony helped Rainbow Dash that day and her beating left her with severe bruises and cuts, as well as a concussion. The part that hurt Rainbow Dash the most though, was how one of the attackers, during her beating, screamed “take this, you bucking murderer!”
So it was clear now; everypony thought it was her who’d killed Rarity. Nopony would ever believe her.
She knew that every day, we do work, which prepares us to work again tomorrow for the day after tomorrow, meaning that yesterdays work was so that we were able to work today. But it was different in prison. That savage beating almost killed her, and every day was a gift for now on.
---
Applejack was speechless. She couldn’t bring forth words to describe her emotions at the sight before her.
An open bottle containing a viscuous liquid stood alone in the cupboard. The bottle was about half empty, and the label read ‘Truth Serum’. She felt appalled, but immediately closed the cupboard when she heard Fluttershy flying back down the stairs.
She raced back to the scones in time to see Fluttershy walk around the corner into the kitchen area.
“Ahh, I tried it with the big ovenhoofmitt…” Applejack grinned sheepishly as the pair stared down at the crumbs on the floor.
Fluttershy chuckled.
“It’s ok, I’ll clean that up. Here, take this and put those scones on some plates. The ones on the left side are yours and the ones on the right are mine”.
Applejack nodded. She took the much smaller ovenhoofmitt and wore it as she put the scones onto plates. She made sure Fluttershy had her head down when she tore open one of the scones on the left side and looked at the inside of it. Sure enough, she saw the truth serum smeared across the inside of the scone.
The conflict that constantly filled her head now switched to the subject of the truth serum.
She’s trying to get a confession out of you! one of the voices in her head screeched.
She suspects it’s you! Kill her now, while you still have the chance! Another voice pleaded.
This will lead to justice. Don’t do a thing her conscience demanded.
Each part of her argued what to do. These thoughts spun around in her head making her feel confused. She didn’t know what to do.
She mixed the scones up, putting some scones containing truth serum on Fluttershys plate. If Fluttershy was going to do something like this, then maybe she could get some truth out her; like why she was doing this, or if she had accomplices.
Fluttershy put the crumbs in the bin and strolled to the dining area as Applejack put the plates on each end of the table.
“These look delicious” Applejack smiled.
“I hope you like them” Fluttershy said.
“I’m sure I will” Applejack responded.
The pair started eating the scones on their plates while sipping their cups of tea. Applejack felt that the scones were delicious, but it was time to put her plan into effect. However, she could taste the truth serum in some of her scones. It didn’t have much of a taste, but she was able to detect it. And knowing that within moments the truth serum would take its grasp on her and she’d be forced to speak the truth for at least a few hours, it would make her susceptible to giving a confession.
“So, you put truth serum in this, didn’t you?” Applejack said bluntly.
Fluttershy looked shocked.
“Yes, I did” she said reluctantly. “How did you know?”
Applejacks tongue and lips began to move and her voice box began to produce sound, but it was completely against her will. She physically couldn’t stop herself from giving an entirely truthful response.
“When you went upstairs I went to find a dustpan to clean up the mess I made. I opened a cupboard and saw a bottle of truth serum, then later I opened up one of the scones you wanted me to have and saw that it had truth serum inside”.
Fluttershy gulped.
“I suspected it was you who killed Rarity” Fluttershy said in a bashful tone.
Fluttershy was also unable to speak anything other than the entire truth, which she now realised. Applejack erupted out of her seat.
“I knew you suspected something. The voices in my head told me” Applejack shouted.
Fluttershy looked horrified.
“Voices?! What voices?” she gasped.
Applejack immediately responded, again completely against her will.
“The voices that have been talking to me ever since I killed Rarity” Applejack said, doing everything she could to stop herself from saying that.
Fluttershy got out of her seat.
“I knew I could make you confess!” Fluttershy said.
Applejack trembled with anxiety. Everything was out in the open now; Fluttershy knew that Applejack was the murderer now.
Do something! a voice in her head cried out.
Applejack shook with fear, unsure of how to handle the situation. But then she remembered her plan.
“Fluttershy, do you really want to get me, your friend, put in prison?” she asked softly.
“If it’s for justice, then yes” Fluttershy responded.
Applejack stepped closer to Fluttershy, making the pegasus step back a few feet.
“Is that just the truth serum talking? Do you really want me to go to jail?”
She stepped towards Fluttershy and carefully stroked her mane. Fluttershys level of anxiety rose. Applejack had already stated proof that she was going insane, having said she could hear voices in her head.
“If it’s for justice, then yes I do”.
“For justice? So if it wasn’t for justice, would you still want me to go to prison?”
“No, I wouldn’t” Fluttershy said.
“I’m sure Rainbow Dash can handle it in prison” Applejack said soothingly.
This was Applejacks honest opinion; or at least the opinion that had been impressed upon her by the voices in her head.
“Justice needs to be served, don’t you think?” Fluttershy said pusillanimously.
“Justice does need to be served” Applejack said, unable to stop herself from giving that remark.
She stopped for a moment and tried to control her speech. But it seemed like a futile effort.
Ask more questions. Then what you’re saying can’t be the truth, nor a lie one of the voices in her head recommended.
“How do you think Rainbow Dash is doing in prison?” Applejack asked.
“I bet she’s having a terrible time” Fluttershy replied. “I bet anypony would hate to be in prison”.
Applejack began to walk in a circle around Fluttershy, making the pegasus feel constricted.
“Are you sure? How can you say she’s having a bad time if you haven’t seen her?” Applejack asked.
“I bet she is having a terrible time. How can you have a good time in prison?”
Applejack couldn’t stop herself from answering Fluttershys question.
“You can’t” she said hastily, then stopped and took a deep breath.
Don’t let her ask questions, or else that truth serum will make you answer truthfully! a voice in her head yelled.
“Fluttershy, do you remember when you and Rainbow Dash were fillies in Cloudsdale and Rainbow Dash knocked you out of the clouds and you fell to the ground?”
“Yes” Fluttershy spoke.
“How did it make you feel to have her just arrogantly push you out of the clouds?”
“At first I felt…mad…but if that hadn’t happened I never would have gotten my cutie mark”.
“So you felt mad? What made you feel mad?” Applejack asked, feeling intrigued.
“I felt mad because nopony tried to rescue me and Rainbow Dash never made sure I wouldn’t fall” Fluttershy said in the most demure of tones.
“Doesn’t that hurt your feelings? Doesn’t it hurt that nopony gave a buck about you?”
Fluttershy did everything she could to resist, but she’d already eaten enough truth serum to last at least an hour.
“Yes, it does hurt” she said, finally giving in to the force of the truth serum.
“Why don’t we go back to why you want me to go to jail?” Applejack said dastardly. “So if justice wasn’t going to be served, you wouldn’t want me to go to jail, would you?”
“No, I wouldn’t”.
“Then why are you doing this? Do you seriously want your friend to wind up in prison?”
“No of course not” Fluttershy muttered weakly.
Applejack picked up a vase off of the table. She spilled the water and roses inside out onto the floor, leaving a large puddle.
“I want to smack you in the head with this so that you won’t remember any of this” Applejack uttered without hesitation.
Fluttershy shook with fear. She slowly stepped back, too scared to utter even a single word as Applejack approached with a menacing gleam in her eyes.
“I don’t want to go to jail” Applejack grunted, tears beginning to drain from her eyes.
Fluttershy stumbled backwards into the kitchen and crashed to the floor. Her wings locked up and she was unable to get up and run as Applejack stepped towards her, beginning to swing the vase around more and more violently.
“You’re going insane!” Fluttershy finally screamed.
“Am I? What if we live in a world where everypony is insane and I’m just turning sane?” Applejack said.
“Get away from me” Fluttershy shouted.
She skidded back across the floor, in an attempt to get as far away from Applejack as possible.
“You really wanted me to go to jail, didn’t you?” Applejack said, now breathing a lot heavier.
“Yes, but only so justice could be served. Why do you keep asking so many questions?”
Applejack grunted and groaned. She dropped the vase and it smashed to pieces on the floor, sending hundreds of shards of opaque glass across Fluttershys kitchen.
Applejack clamped her hooves over her mouth, but the truth serum could not be stopped.
“A question can’t be the truth, nor a lie, so that means I can use propaganda against you to persuade you not to turn me in, while still being affected by the truth serum” Applejack blurted out.
Fluttershy looked shocked, but yet she felt intrigued.
“So if I ask questions, the truth serum can’t affect me?” Fluttershy asked, deciding to adopt this strategy.
“Yes” Applejack replied, finding herself unable to do much as she answered questions.
“Why did you murder Rarity?” Fluttershy asked, beginning to stand up.
She decided it was time to begin the interrogation she was planning to do. It hadn’t gone as planned, but at least now maybe she could get more evidence out of Applejack than just a confession, which she knew Applejack would never repeat to anypony.
“I was arguing with her. The argument escalated quickly and we broke out into a fight, which resulted in her smashing a computer monitor on my back. I shot up and stabbed her throat with a pair of scissors” Applejack said.
She’s onto you! a voice in Applejacks head screamed in rage.
How could you let this happen? Now she’ll tell everypony! another shouted.
“Did you frame Rainbow Dash?” Fluttershy asked, grinning as she realised she had some power over Applejack.
She had to be careful though, as Applejack had the same power over her.
“Yes, I did” Applejack answered.
“How did you frame Rainbow Dash?”
“I gave her the scissors in the bathroom of the courtroom before we went in, and you know the rest because you were there to see it”.
Fluttershy smiled.
“We need to go to the police station so we can get you to confess this to them” Fluttershy said.
“No, I don’t want to do that!” Applejack whined.
“It’s for the best” Fluttershy responded.
She’s not asking questions! Ask some while you still can, you idiot! a voice told Applejack.
“What if what’s for the best was that Rainbow Dash stayed in prison? Do you really want me, your friend, to go to a prison and get hurt?” Applejack asked.
Fluttershy gasped and grunted, but couldn’t stop herself.
“Justice needs to be served though” Fluttershy said, now returning to her normal, unassertive tone.
“Does it? What if we just stayed this way? Does anypony really need to know? Don’t you think Rainbow Dash would like to be away from all of us anyway?”
“No, she’d rather be with her friends” Fluttershy said.
“Would she? Don’t you think she’d find everypony here annoying? Don’t you think she’d find you annoying, Fluttershy”.
“No. I’m not annoying…”
“Aren’t you? What if I told you Rainbow Dash said you’re annoying?” Applejack said.
Fluttershy shook her head.
“I know you’re trying to use propaganda, but I’m not gonna accept it”.
“Are you sure? I mean, are you sure Rainbow Dash doesn’t deserve this?” Applejack said, trying to get Fluttershy to believe that Rainbow Dash wasn’t as innocent as she seemed, despite that she was.
“I’m not going to believe you” Fluttershy said.
“I know what I’ll have to resort to then” Applejack grunted.
She grabbed the teapot and before Fluttershy could speak a single word, she struck Fluttershys head with it. There was a loud smacking sound as metal met flesh, and Fluttershys body collapsed to the floor. Her lifeless legs fell to the ground next to her, just inches from the glass of the broken vase, as she fell unconscious.
Applejack stood over her, breathing heavily.
“Oh Fluttershy, what to do with you…” Applejack sighed, with her insane side beginning to surface again.
---
Rainbow Dash sat alone in her cell, nursing her wounds. A gargantuan sea of misery swept across her mind, laying waste to her happiness and leaving her devoid of cheerfulness as it filled her body with sorrow. Likewise, a storm of hatred and bitterness swarmed over this sea, leaving Rainbow Dash unable to see or hear anything but its thunderous cries of anger and its lightning strikes of fury as her conscience sailed a ship over this tormenting sea of depression, the waves of which were exhilarated by the storm of hate relentlessly and fiercely rumbling overhead.
Rainbow Dash held up the shank she’d just been sharpening for over two hours with a rock. It was made from another rock and she was very careful not to let anypony see her with it.
She stepped towards the front of her cell, where the bars were, and looked up and down the hall. There was only one guard on duty, and he looked bored and tired.
“Hey, can you come down here?” she called out.
The guard turned around from examining a window and frowned at her.
“Shut up and leave me alone” he called back.
“I need help” Rainbow Dash shouted to him. “There are tarantulas in my bed”.
“That’s your problem, not mine” the guard shrugged.
Rainbow Dash grunted angrily. This guard was testing her patience.
“Please, I need help!” she whined.
The guard sighed irritably. He marched up the line of cells and stood in front of Rainbow Dash.
“Your bed looks fine from here” he said sternly.
“No, you’ll have to come in here and check it” Rainbow Dash told him weakly, pretending to be distressed.
The guard groaned angrily.
“Turn around and I’ll hoofcuff your hooves to the jail bars” he told her.
She nodded, but before turning around she took the shank, which she’d been holding behind her back throughout the conversation, and concealed it in her fur. She buried it deep so he couldn’t see it.
She then turned around and put her hooves between the cells bars. The guard locked a pair of hoofcuffs tightly onto her hooves so that she couldn’t move away from the bars. He then unlocked the door and walked inside.
“I don’t see any tarantulas running around” he said.
Rainbow Dash grabbed the shank out of her coat and started using it to break the chains of the hoofcuffs.
“They’re over by my bed” she said, again pretending to be distressed.
The guard sighed and walked over to the bed. Rainbow Dash furiously filed away at the chain, and eventually it snapped.
The guard pulled her bed apart but couldn’t find anything.
“There’s no spiders here at all. Is this some kind of joke?”
Rainbow Dash clutched the shank tightly in her hooves as she continued to keep her hooves behind her, to give the illusion that she was still confined to the cells bars.
“Ok, you got me” she said playfully.
The guard grunted.
“You little bitch” he said.
He stomped towards her and put his hoof in her face.
“If you pull that kind of shit again I’ll beat the shit out of you. You hear me? I’ll hurt you”.
“Think again” she muttered under her breath.
In one fluid movement, in less than a second, she brought the shank out from behind her back. Using the momentum of the shank being pulled out from behind her, she sliced it along his belly, cutting shallowly into his flesh.
He stood back and gasped in a mixture of pain and shock.
“What the?!” he shouted out.
Before he could say more, Rainbow Dash plunged her shank into his stomach, then ruthlessly ripped it out. The guard moaned quietly, then collapsed to the floor. His uniform was soiled with blood as he let out gurgling noises, the likes of which were painful to listen to.
He began coughing blood, and even though Rainbow Dash didn’t want to murder, she did want vengeance. She ripped his uniform off of him and held it firmly against his stab wound, then kicked the back of his head.
This knocked him out, but she lay him on his back and put his hoof over the uniform which was held against his wound. To keep his hoof in place, she took a pair of hoofcuffs out of the pocket of the uniform, then locked one end of them on the hoof that held the uniform to his wound, then with the other end she stretched out and put under his body. This way his hoof wouldn’t fall off. She then grabbed a set of keys out of his uniform and held them tightly.
She stood up and felt stricken with guilt. But this was outweighed by her longing for vengeance. She looked at her wings and realised that it would be difficult to find a way to get those wingcuffs off. But she’d find a way, somehow.
Meanwhile, escape was imminent.
She stepped out of her cell and down the hall. She reached the end and used the keys to unlock the doorway to the staff room. When she opened it she peeked inside, but was delighted to see that nopony was in there.
“I may not be able to fly yet” she muttered under her breath as she climbed through a window and jumped out of it.
She landed in some bushes and grinned when she saw that she was outside the gates of the prison.
“But I’m coming for you, Applejack”.