//------------------------------//
// The Beginning of the Nightmare 
// Story: Don't leave me 
// by Timid Tune 
//------------------------------//

She ran and ran, and kept running, until she felt that her legs were burning because of the speed and the effort. But she couldn´t stop. If she slowed down, she knew she would be captured by them. But, even if she kept on running the whole night…Would she manage to escape?
The little Applebloom did not even have the time to think about that. She kept on trotting as much as her short little legs allowed her to, while more and more skeletons raised from the earth, all black, all sinister, and glowing eyes as red as the blood they were looking for. 
They were going to surround her…Or more like they were already surrounding her. The little filly thought she had seen a bright light with the corner of her eye, but she was going so fast, that when she tried to turn to look back, she could no longer do it. She skidded by the floor, even thought it was all earth, but she made the mistake to stop for a second. Then, something started rising from the place where her back legs stood. Applebloom screamed noticing this, turning back with a snap, but she felt some sort of pain in the flank, and the blank flank already had her trapped. Applebloom tried to break free, filling the forest with new screams that resonated maybe even in its corners. The place where Applebloom had slipped was starting to crowd with blank flanks. 
Seconds later, it had all ended. 
The silence came back. A cold, cursed silence took the place. 
The entire forest stank like death. 
“Again…” Muttered Mitta. “Again…And again…” 



How many days had passed?  Two? Or just one? No…it was impossible that it had been just one…so many seemed to have happened…
What had happened? No one was entirely sure; Twilight´s explanation did not seem to be enough. She had taken Applebloom with her to the Everfree forest, to take books back to Zecora. But then trees blocked the exit, and when Twilight finished taking the trees out of the way, Applebloom was not longer there. 
Twilight spent all night looking for her, searching her at any zone she knew, and some she did not know of from the Everfree forest. She did not find her, not even with magic. 
Then, she went straight to town, to communicate with great embarrassment and guilt for what had happened. 
From that moment it had been two days and a night, and no one was able to find a single mark of Applebloom. 
It remains to say how torn apart the apple family was. 
The same Twilight, responsible of a great part of the events, was defeated, feeling so guilty that she had done nothing more than looking for Applebloom for the last 48 hours. 
No one was being successful. 
But there was a pair that was barely being payed attention to because of that. A pair of young and small fillies, who did not have a cutie mark, like Applebloom. They were the best friends of hers, and they were being left out almost entirely. 
“Scootaloo…”
The mentioned was still staring through the window, looking at the clouds of a dry and depressing shade of grey.
“…Yes?” 
“Scootaloo, we have to do something.” Said Sweetie Belle, finally managing to get the attention of her friend. 
“Do what?” 
Sweetie Belle, despite her general bad mood, which reminded of the clouds in that moment, suddenly had a decided look in her face, similar to the one of her older sister when she decided that there was something more important than a new line of dresses.  
“Go to the Everfree forest…you and I…We have to search.” 


“I hate to say this, but we should hurry. I don't think your sister arrives at home too late…she is worried for you.”
“It´s true…” Said Sweetie Belle softly, but it was her only comment. 
It had been a while since they had been roaming trough the Everfree forest, alone. It was, at all reason, a bad idea, and a really dangerous one, but they were tired of seeing how everyone was trying to make their efforts to help find Applebloom, and they couldn´t do the same. 
Applebloom would ‘have done the same for them.
They took a little lamp with them, that was their entire guide, and they were careful to not take the paths they remembered taking before. That is all they knew.    
Suddenly, Sweetie Belle stopped, and Scootaloo did the same, looking at her without understanding. 
“What is it…?” 
Sweetie Belle, not hiding her fear, managed to say:
“I- I think I saw something…”
Both were scared by hearing that. Scootaloo, because the news were new to her, and Sweetie Belle, for the reaction Scootaloo had. 
They did not dare to say anything, but they kept walking, really close to one another, and alert in every way. They jumped at the most slight sound. Various minutes later, out of the nowhere, something crossed their range of vision, some kind of light that seemed like a star that came from heaven. 
“What is that?” Shouted Scootaloo, alarmed, and they both jumped in inertia.
The little light dived deep somewhere behind the tree, and disappeared. 
The two members left of the cutie mark crusaders stared at each other. 
“Seriously, what was that?” repeated Scootaloo, shaking a little while saying it. 
“I don't know.” answered Sweetie Belle, doubtful.
The stood there, thinking of what to do, until Sweetie Belle retook the word.
“What if it…is a signal…?”
“A signal?”
They shared glares again, and they both went to a conclusion at the same time.
“Of Applebloom.” They finished, smiling slightly.  
“Well…Let's go.” Said Scootaloo, and they walked to the point where the light had disappeared. Most of their fear had disappeared after the apparition of the little light. It was like the light had taken their fears away, leaving a pleasant feeling…at least, for now. 
“There is an entry!” 
None of them lost more time, hesitating to decide who would go first, and so, they entered together. 
They regretted that. 
That part of the forest made them feel like it had went out straight from a horror movie. There was something in the ambient, the air, that muttered something impossible to understand, even thought there was no wind blowing. Whatever it was, it gave the both of them goosebumps. 
“Wh-what would Applebloom be doing here?!” muttered Scootaloo, walking quietly side by side her only company. 
“Maybe she got lost…” Whispered Sweetie Belle, all in muttering.
Their walk around the forest could not be less pleasant, or scarier. Both had the feeling of being observed at every moment, but no one dared to comment that, with the particular fear that it attracted an unknown beast. They barely shared a few whispers during the pitiful moments they spent like that. But in certain point of their clandestine search, they heard a noise, and the pulse of the both of them went to the clouds, at the same time they paralyzed in fear.
They identified, in the shadows, the figure of a pony that was coming closer to them. Obviously, their impulse was to run, but something had their legs glued in place. Soon they would discover what that something was. 
What they saw left them so perplexed that they did not manage to process it until seconds later. Afterwards, they broke into tears, like if after all the fear they had, they finally had arrived to their limit.
The little figure-That in reality had their same size-that had always seemed so familiar to them would have been practically unrecognizable, if it weren't for the reddish hair, and the sweet red ribbon at top of her mane. 
Her hair, before of a bright and fluffy red, now was dried of all color and messy, fitting with her dirty ribbon spotted with earth. Her eyes, before that gold, did not even have pupils. In her face, there were only two giant and bright red orbs. The little one tried to go near them, but not even Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle were able to resist the urge of stepping back. 
“Girls…” Said the figure; her voice soft, broken. Her skin, if she even had, been dyed blacker than the same night, and neither Sweetie Belle nor Scootaloo took their eyes off her, the both of them wide, not realizing the tears they were dropping. 
“A…Applebloom…?” Strangely enough, Sweetie Belle was the first to regain her speech, or at least daring to, while Scootaloo was still coming out of the shock.
“No…” 
Applebloom-or what was left of her-hung her head.
“I've missed you” She said, and in her face appeared what seemed to be a slight attempt of a smile. 
“What…What happened to you…?” Said Scootaloo, and in her voice appeared a hint of anger threatening to rise. “Who did this to you…?”
“Oh, Applebloom!” Said Sweetie Belle, and she let out a cry. 
“I'm…Fine…” Said the mentioned, her body shrinking. It was a way too big lie, and a really obvious one. “I knew you were coming…I knew it!” She said, and she straightened up again, looking at them with a happiness that seemed really bitter for the three of them. “For a second I thought no one was coming--”
She could not go on. Something in the branches alerted them, and thus Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo glued themselves close with one another, scared. Moments later they saw the origin of the sound, and they both cried. 
Something they did not identify came out from the shadows. The only thing noticeable from the dark was their glowing red eyes. 
“You are not like them, right? True that you are not?” Said Scootaloo, turning to Applebloom.  
She quickly shook her head.   
“No! Of course not…I would ever hurt you. Here there also are…Good Ponies despite all.” A memory crossed her mind, and she lowered her gaze again. She raised it immediately after hearing another branch crack, the sound she knew so well. “They must not do the same thing to you… Maybe if I tell them you are my friends…”
“But Applebloom!” Sweetie Belle turned around to her friend, when she noticed how another pair of red eyes appeared in the bushes, and she felt her heart in the mouth. “We cannot stay!”
“Don't leave! Stay a little longer!” Applebloom pleaded sadly “I am really lonely here…”
“The-they'll make us cut-meat if we stay longer!” dropped Scootaloo, shaking. 
“But…Don't abandon me…Stay with me…” Applebloom held out a hoof to her friends in a heart breaking gesture of pain. 
The little orange pony hesitated. Taking her hoof, even to comfort her, would have a secondary effect?
“S-scootaloo…” hissed Sweetie Belle while touching her friend´s flank, with a shaking hoof. 
Scootaloo saw her with the corner of her eye, and she was her sweating, with an expression of horror. She did not need to look more times to realize that the number of red eyes surrounding them had grown, and she felt her pulse go faster. 
“A-applebloom…You're our friend” She said, barely controlling her shaking. “And-and we love you…but…”
The figures that had appeared around, that had been camouflaged by their black color like the shadows, were starting to leave the dark and reveal themselves. Sweetie Belle let out a loud and high pitched cry, and Scootaloo did the same thing moments later. 
The beings, which once had been ponies, were entirely made of skeleton. In fact, they probably were skeletons.
But none of the two had ever seen a skeleton with black bones. 
“How much I am sorry, Applebloom…! We have to go!” managed to say Sweetie Belle, absorbing her tears that were threatening to come back while she glared at Applebloom, which was staring back at Sweetie Belle with an expression full of desire and tired with pain. 
“Don't do anything with them!” She exclaimed, looking at the blank flanks getting closer without dissimulation to her friends. “Stop! I just want to talk with them!” 
Sweetie Belle used the hesitation of Scootaloo to add something, impulsively, when she thought of an idea:
“Come with us!”
Confusion flashed through the face of all the present beings, stopping the blank flanks for a second. 
The answer of Applebloom was even harder and more painful to assimilate.
“I can't!” she muttered, and her eyes glowed more than usual. She doubted, and the blank flanks continued to move. “All right, it's just that they don't let me! Right now I don't know how, but one day I will, and I will come back home…But I don't want to be alone all this time…no…”        
“What do you mean by they don't let you?” Jumped Scootaloo, barely noticing the really small distance there was left between the cursed ponies and them. 
“Scootaloo!” Shouted Sweetie Belle, and pushed her with the help of her horn, causing her to make a gesture of pain. But she had accomplished her goal, and Scootaloo reacted right away. 
In a moment, like they agreed to do so, they started running away, skidding, dedicating a last glare to their friend.
“I am really sorry!” lamented Sweetie Belle, crying.
Applebloom, destroyed, turned to them in a second, like attracted with a magnet. 
“No, Wait…!” 
“We will come back, Applebloom!” screamed Scootaloo for the last time. She perceived how something arose from the earth next to her, and felt it grasp her mane, really close to claw her neck, as the fear made her go even faster. 
Sweetie Belle went through something similar, and both of them got to escape by really little, after having the flashing vision of a pony with normal colors, and shining yellow eyes. After that, a powerful light blinded them, and when they opened their eyes, they were back were they started. 
Scared, disconcerted, lost, and alone like they had never been in their lives, they cried a little more. But soon, the balance went down the other side, and the tears were more because of their friend than because of fear itself. There, someone would find them. 
Applebloom would never be found. 


Seeing her friends run made her fill with a sensation that made her believe the world had fallen apart, oppressing her heart. Would she still have a heart, thought? 
“No…Don't leave me…” She managed to say before seeing them run and disappear in the dark path of the forest, the same one she had tried to take herself. 
Would she have wanted them to make it, or not?
“No…”
She wanted to cry, but she could not. The tears did not flow. She was not like Mitta, according to what she saw. Maybe she would never cry. She would have to take back her feelings, her pain, her sorrow, her tears, until she exploded like an inflated balloon. 
Balloons. She was going to miss balloons.
Sometimes, her family made parties, and they decorated the whole farm. They served delicious things made of apples, pies, sweets…
She would never see them again. Would granny smith miss her a lot? Applejack…and Big Mac…Thought, with time, would they eventually forget her? Or Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle…Would they ever forget they had met her?
Despite all they had been through together…
The cutie mark crusaders.
She was not going to be there for them when they got their cutie marks. 
She would never get her cutie mark. 
In her blurred mind, the words she had heard before transforming started to hammer her mind, like needles breaking her mind, again and again.
“Don't worry…
“Ugh…”
You will never be like her
“I did…I did not want…”
We will protect you…
“I did not want… this… I…”
Forever”
“I never asked for this!” The words were not coming out of her mind, like a broken disc again and again. After seconds, she thought she would go insane. “STOP!”
She shouted, crawling into a ball in the ground, in fetal position, and the blank flanks that were left around started dispersing when they saw the state she was in. 
“Stop…” Kept muttering Applebloom, and the tears she had so missed started coming out, after all. “Please, no…”
Minutes went on, but she stayed in the same position, and finally stopped crying. Her crimson glare looked up, looking for the sky. 
But she saw nothing. 
“Why…? Even If I am…”
She dedicated an empty, hollow glance to herself. She finally saw herself as she really was: Broken, twisted, a vulgar imitation of what she once had been. 
“Don't leave me…”