The DJ, the butler and the colt
Vinyl Scratch groaned. Her whole body was stiff from sleeping on a cold ground. She stretched her hooves and rubbed her forehead – pounding headache was telling her that she definitely had partied a bit too hard the night before.
She turned and clenched her eyes shut – she felt as if they were going to burn the moment she opened them. Her coat was sticky from sweat, her mane was unkempt and greasy. She could feel the taste of bile in her mouth.
She thought that it wasn’t exactly her fault. Since she’d found Zippoorwhill, she just couldn’t focus when she was sober. When the guards had arrived, she’d followed them to the forest and saw what had scared the little filly so much. Such view would reduce anypony to a whimpering mess.
Since that day, she was always taking her duties in the neighbourhood watch during the nights. After they were over, she was usually trotting to the nearby bar to drink a beer. Or, more often, a couple of beers. Then she walked home, or rather tried to – if she wasn’t lucky to find someone to help her get to the house where she lived with Octavia and Neon, she’d usually sleep on a park bench. On particularly rough nights, she couldn’t even make it out of the bar. Then she’d just nod off on the chair, trying, if it was unavoidable, to vomit all over herself rather than on the floor – pissing off the bartender was the last thing she wanted to do.
Vinyl hoped that she wouldn’t have to look for a new home soon – while Octavia at first understood that her marefriend was going through a hard time, soon she grew increasingly annoyed at her. Neon couldn’t stand that and before he’d left on tour, all three had a rather nasty argument. Vinyl didn’t know how it ended – she went drinking, leaving Octavia and Neon alone. She hadn’t even come back to say goodbye to Neon before he’d left Ponyville.
Later, Vinyl had spent the night shivering on the porch, begging Octavia to let her in.
Wonder where did I land today… she thought. The air smelled of decay. Vinyl’s stomach grumbled in protest when she rolled over and tried to get on her hooves.
Slowly, she opened one eye. The first thing she saw was some dirty brick wall. A couple of overfilled trash cans stood next to it, which explained the smell. Still, Vinyl couldn’t recognise in which part of the town she was.
“There you are!” She heard a voice behind her.
“Octy?” she asked unsurely.
Suddenly, someone kicked her in the stomach, sending her tumbling at the trash cans. She hit one of them with her head. A loud cling almost deafened her. She looked around groggily, when another kick knocked the air out of her lungs.
“What the–” Another blow to the head interrupted her. She groaned and spat some blood and pieces of broken teeth.
“You tell that kid to look for her dog in the forest and she finds your dumping ground… Yeah, I can totally believe that it was a coincidence…” The voice said. “Who knows what’d happen if I didn’t stop you…”
“It… it wasn’t…” Vinyl slurred. Her vision was blurry; she could barely see the assailant, who was now rummaging through the scattered rubbish.
“Shut up!” The next kick was aimed at Vinyl’s crotch. She cowered, yelping in pain and praying to Celestia for someone to hear her.
The assailant stood above her. Vinyl, gritting her teeth, looked up and froze upon seeing the face of the pony holding a metal pipe in her mouth.
“B-berry… No…”
She felt her ribs cracking when the pipe landed on her side. She lifted her hoof to cover herself, only to hear a sickening crunch when her foreleg became numb. The third swing reached her temple; her body went limp and she rolled on her back, her white coat stained red.
Berry Punch threw the pipe away and looked at Vinyl with a frown on her face.
“This’ll teach you…” she muttered and spat on her before walking away.
Randolph was serving the Rich family for years. He remembered the day when Filthy Rich was born; he remembered him growing and meeting his wife; he could easily recall the day when Mr. Rich’s daughter had been born and the day when Ms. Amber had died.
Randolph didn’t want to admit it, but he was getting old. The days when he could barely get out of bed were more and more often. His bones were aching even during hot days like that one. That was why he’d finally decided to ask Mr. Rich for a day off and went to the doctor.
Before that, he was worrying for the whole day what Mr. Rich’s reaction would be. To his surprise, his boss only waved his hoof, dismissing him. Randolph knew him well and found such behaviour rather unusual for him. However, even though he was old, he wasn’t blind: he could clearly see his boss worrying about the affliction of Miss Tiara.
Now, Randolph was sitting in a waiting room, watching the ponies as they passed past him. Some of them seemed worried; some of them were too lost in their thoughts to notice him. Almost all of them were younger than him.
Randolph was rarely leaving the Rich family estate. He didn’t know a lot of ponies, but he knew almost everything about them, thanks to the other servants, who were always first to gossip. Randolph didn’t like them – they were treating him as if he was some relic from the past; they had no respect to the family. Recently, he heard some of them calling young Miss Tiara a “psycho” or a “little bitch”.
He saw two ponies who sat on the bench next to him – a big, grey pegasus with black beard and thick-rimmed glasses and a small pegasus filly. Randolph thought that she was probably his daughter. She was trotting slowly behind her father and when she sat next to him, she just stared at the wall with a blank expression.
“Good morning,” the stallion said.
“Good morning,” Randolph replied. To his clamour, he noticed that he was the only one to reply, even though the waiting room was full of ponies.
Suddenly, the door on the other side of the corridor bursted open. A couple of doctors and nurses ran past them with somepony lying on a trolley. Randolph took a look at the patient and saw a piece of electric blue mane, protruding from behind the i.v.’s, oxygen bottles and bandages. Behind the doctors, a minty green mare was running. Randolph knew her – a week or so ago she’d come to the Rich family estate, asking if someone wanted to join the neighbourhood watch. From the conversations of the other servants, he’d learned that her name was Lyra Heartstrings and that she was a fillyfooler. Not that he cared about that much.
Randolph saw the the pegasus next to him was also staring at the trolley, his eyes wide in shock. His daughter hid behind his wing, embracing it as if it was the only safe harbour in the cruel world.
The doctors disappeared behind the door on the other side of the corridor, leaving Lyra Heartstrings behind. For a while, she stood there, her head lowered, but then she turned back.
“Lyra!” the pegasus called. “What happened? Was that…?”
“Yes, it was Vinyl…” Lyra replied, her voice quivering. “I… I was going shopping and I f-found her in the nook… Someone beat her...”
“Sweet Celestia!” the stallion exclaimed. “You need to call the guards… Who could do this?”
“I already did. I bet it was Berry Punch… You know, she thinks that Vinyl…” Lyra looked at the filly, who seemed completely lost in her thoughts.
“Well, she’s upset because of her daughter,” the pegasus said, wrapping his wing around the filly. “But that’s just crazy… Though, if I got the guy who did this, I’d probably do the same… for Zippoorwhill…”
Zippoorwhill raised her head when she heard her name, but apart from that she remained motionless, as if she didn’t realise where she was.
“Just like Bonnie…” Lyra said, wiping her eyes. “She had to identify the… the body. Since then she doesn’t leave her room…”
Randolph tried to tune the voices of those ponies out. He wasn’t much interested in other ponies’ tragedies. Of course, he felt compassion; but he always considered things such as mourning as something intimate.
For a while, Lyra and the stallion stared at each other in silence.
“I think I’ll go to Octavia… She doesn’t know yet…” Lyra said, looking at the door. “And we’ll have to call Neon…”
“I don’t like him,” the pegasus said. “Vinyl is sometimes eccentric, but he’s a creep… I wouldn’t be surprised if it was him… And since he’d left on tour, nopony disappeared…”
“I’ll talk to Octavia if she noticed anything strange,” Lyra replied. “We’ll be back soon…”
She left the room, followed by the gazes of the other patients. Randolph sighed and straightened in his seat. There were still three ponies before him in the queue and he was getting tired. He’d always thought of himself as very patient – after all he had to deal with Miss Tiara (though he’d never admit it, it could be rather absorbing) – but the company of all those ponies was throwing him off balance.
The door on the one side of the corridor opened and Randolph saw a familiar silhouette of a blue mare with grey mane and smile that looked slightly off. She was assisted by a nurse. Randolph knew her – she used to work as a gardener’s assistant in the Rich family estate, but then she went crazy and had to be taken to the asylum.
“Good morning, Ms. Redheart,” said Randolph to the nurse. “Good morning, Screw Loose.”
Screw Loose looked at him and barked. It wasn’t unusual; she was doing that since the day when the doctors arrived to take her away. More unusual was the reaction of the pegasus filly – if Randolph recalled correctly, her name was Zippoorwhill. She screamed and took off in the air; only a quick reaction of her father, who caught her, prevented her from ramming into the ceiling. Even then, she was trying to free herself, thrashing and screaming.
“I’m sorry for her,” the pegasus said to Randolph. “She’s not herself since…”
“There’s no need to apologise,” Randolph replied. The view of the crying filly tugged some string in the heart of the old butler. “You know, I’ve recently heard about a hospital in Trottingham… They do wonders with, umm… difficult cases…”
Diamond Tiara glared at Sunshine Rainbows angrily. Her roommate had just turned in her bed and began muttering some random words. She was doing that from time to time; sometimes they weren’t even words, just some nonsensical blends of syllables. On other occasions, Sunshine was having long conversations with Diamond Tiara in her sleep. They were usually absurd – for example, two nights before she’d spent fifteen minutes talking about some colt Diamond Tiara didn’t know and how good he’d look in the coffin.
Diamond Tiara groaned. She started to wonder why didn’t she suffocate Sunshine with a pillow yet. She didn’t even feel like it. Maybe it was another sign of progress? Over the last two weeks she’d made some – she was now able to fall into a shallow slumber for an hour or so, usually during the day. Despite the warnings of the strange colt (Sunshine had told her that his name was Pepper; due to his paranoia, he was rather reluctant to introduce himself), she was dutifully taking all the pills the doctors were giving her. She was spending at least two hours a day talking to a doctor about her problems. Everything seemed good.
Except it wasn’t. Despite the slumbers, she felt more tired than ever before. Every sound was annoying her – Sunshine’s babbling, rustling of water in the pipes, even buzzing of electricity in the wires. She preferred to stay awake during the nights – bright light was hurting her eyes.
She banged her hoof against her pillow. Sunshine was still muttering something incomprehensible. Diamond Tiara looked at her again, recalling the events of the past weeks. Sunshine had phases – usually she seemed normal, though maybe a bit cynical for her age. She also had a bit morbid sense of humour, though it wasn’t too creepy for Diamond Tiara. But there were days when her condition was getting worse. She was usually spending them in her bed, barely speaking. Every attempt Diamond Tiara was making to cheer her up resulted in tears. Once during such phase, Sunshine started to talk about suicide and Diamond Tiara spent the night watching her carefully. Now she could easily imagine how her roommate acquired the rows of cuts on her forelegs.
On the next day, however, Sunshine was back to her usual, sarcastic self. She even helped Diamond Tiara convince Pepper that the doctors implanted a chip in his skull so they could hear his thoughts.
“Breezies… moths… clarity of calamity…” Suddenly, Sunshine’s murmurs became more coherent.
“Would you, please, shut up?” Diamond Tiara asked.
Sunshine Rainbows sat on her bed and looked around – even though her eyes were still closed. “Where’s my wallet?” she asked.
“They don’t let you keep money here because they’re afraid you’d cut yourself with a sharpened coin,” Diamond Tiara explained. “Now, shut up and let me sleep.”
“Right… Breezies…” Sunshine replied and pulled the blanket over her head.
Diamond Tiara sighed. She turned her head to face the wall and closed her eyes.
Alula, bleeding profusely from the wound under her wing, watched in horror as Twist fell to the ground with a betrayed look on her face. Seeing that Diamond Tiara was now going back to her, she closed her eyes and wept.
“Why are you laughing?” she heard Diamond Tiara’s voice above her.
“I’m not laughing…” she hissed. Even though she’d put her hoof on the wound, she felt that she was getting weaker; her whole body went numb and she could barely see anything.
“Shut up! Or…”
This surprised Alula. “Or what? You’ll kill me?”
She screamed when the knife plunged into her body. She lifted her hooves, trying to defend herself, but then another stab reached her eye, piercing through it and reaching her brain. Her thrashing became incoherent before she finally lay limply on the ground.
Diamond Tiara’s eyes shot open. She was lying in her bed, motionless, panting heavily. She could hear the rain banging against the window and Sunshine’s hoofsteps.
“Hello, sleepyhead,” Sunshine said, putting a newspaper on Diamond Tiara’s nightstand. She had a habit of stealing them from the doctors’ room and tearing the articles she’d found interesting (she was forbidden to have scissors). They were usually news about murders and disasters. She also liked to collect obituaries. While reading one she often wondered if her parents organised the funeral.
“What’s going on?” Diamond Tiara asked.
“I found some cool news from Ponyville. DJ Pon3 is in a coma,” Sunshine levitated a newspaper and opened it. “Someone straightened her out with a lead pipe.”
“Who’d do that?” Diamond Tiara asked.
“Dunno, Sapphire Shores?” Sunshine shrugged. “Or maybe her lover… Those celebrities…” She chuckled. “Hey, I have an autographed photo of her somewhere! If she kicks the bucket, its price’s gonna get higher than Cloudsdale…”
Diamond Tiara said nothing. She still had an image of Alula before her eyes, lying in the mud, her body almost unrecognisable after what she’d done to her. Then she imagined Vinyl being in her place.
“By the way, they found those kids who went missing there…” Sunshine said, flipping through the pages.
Diamond Tiara froze. “What happened to them?” she asked, trying her best to keep her voice steady.
“Oh, someone massacred ‘em and dumped ‘em in the woods. They wrote that some kid was looking for her dog and found it eating a wing…”
“Eww… Do they know who killed them?” Diamond Tiara asked.
“Not yet,” Sunshine replied, giving Diamond the newspaper. “There’s an interview with a guard here… He says that they have some trace… And that the killer has a pattern…”
“What pattern?” Diamond Tiara asked, looking at her curiously. Do I really have one? she thought.
“Four victims, two blank flanks and two with cutie marks,” Sunshine explained. “Blank flanks were mauled… smashed skull, multiple stabs… But those with cutie marks… one had slit throat, the other was drowned. They even thought it was a suicide. This guy ain’t picky, but seems to hate blank flanks…”
Diamond Tiara looked at the floor. “Can we stop talking about it?” she asked. “Some of them were my classmates…”
“Yeah, sure,” Sunshine replied. “But if this guy ever comes to Trottingham, I’m dead…” She looked at her flank. “Knowing my luck, I’d be ripped open and fed my guts…” She shuddered. “I’d rather not meet that tosser…”
Diamond Tiara looked at her blankly.
“I don’t think they’ll ever find who it was…” Sunshine continued. “Twilight Sparkle will never let ‘em know about her little hobby…”
“What?” Diamond Tiara exclaimed. “You think it’s her?”
“Who else but her? I’ve read about those nobles… There was a unicorn tribe leader who had a harem of blank flanks… Once a kid got a cutie mark, they were given for the guards to play… And since he had lots of guards…”
“I think I’ll go for a walk…” Diamond Tiara said.
She didn’t trot far when she saw a couple of nurses running somewhere. She followed them – two weeks of living there taught her that running nurses usually meant that something interesting was happening.
They stopped in another wing of the building, the one inhabited by colts. Diamond Tiara hid behind the corner and saw one of the doctors, a slightly overweight earth pony called Barrel Cortex.
“I got it,” he said to the nurses. “One of the colts suddenly began hitting his head against the wall, saying something about implants…” He chuckled. “Did you plant any implants recently?”
No one laughed. Diamond Tiara leant from behind the corner and saw that the doctor’s face was also serious.
“You’d better check if he’s alright,” he said to the nurses. “Charming Heart, may I talk to you?”
The rest of the nurses left them alone in the corridor. Diamond Tiara’s ears perked.
“Charming Heart, when you give those kids pills…” Barrel Cortex said, looking at the nurse with serious expression. “...do you check if they swallow them?”
“What? Yes… Of course,” Charming Heart replied.
“Well, he didn’t look like a pony who takes pills…” Barrel Cortex muttered. “Unless, of course, they don’t work for him… But I guess we’d find that out earlier…”
“Are you accusing me?” Charming Heart exclaimed.
“Of course not, Charming…” Barrel Cortex shook his head, smiling mischievously. “Accidents like that happen… By the way, when he’s better, we’ll transfer him to the secure unit. You’ll fill the paperwork.”
Charming Heart nodded her head and they trotted away.
Diamond Tiara felt stronger. When she imagined Pepper banging his head against the wall because of something she’d told him, her body suddenly awoke. Her heart started to work faster. Sparks of electricity ran through her nerves. Finally she was able to tune out the background noise. The inside of her head was so silent…
So, you want to sleep again? You know what you have to do… No more trying just to be rewarded with that ersatz of sleeping…
She took a step forward. From what Sunshine had told her, Pepper lived alone. And now, he wasn’t in his room… And it didn’t seem that he’d be back soon…
You know where he keeps them, don’t you?
Pepper’s room looked almost exactly the same as hers; the only difference was the Wonderbolts poster on the wall and a bloody smear next to it, in the place where the poor colt had tried to get rid of an implant in his head. His bed was messy, but Diamond Tiara didn’t care; she took a look under it and found a loose tile.
She gasped when she saw how many pills were there. Pepper probably was gathering them for quite a long time. Some of them were white, some green, some orange… Diamond Tiara smirked. Among the rubbish scattered on the floor she found a plastic bag and put all the pills into it.
Now we only need someone to eat them… she thought, hiding the bag in her tail.
When she was back in her room, she lay on her bed and, to Sunshine’s surprise, soon fell asleep with a smile on her face.
Chapter 10 still needs one scene, but I just wanted to post that one... 
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Nice.
Though Berry Punch needs a good beating.
I suppose Curtain Call will take the blame for Pepper's murder. Pepper is the next kill, right ?
4674065 Berry's an alcoolic, what do you expect from her ?
Hey Sunshine, wrong fanfic. You're looking for Pages of Harmony.
Me: (Laughs psychotically.)
The amount of new developments in this chapter is outstanding. Now, Ponyville needs to figure out who beat Vinyl senseless.
And now, just like I said in "Hush Little Diamond", our tiara-wearing killer is succumbing to dark pleasures...
Keep the chapters coming, man!
4674522
Dodging the rat's nest of 'what kind of addiction'...
Berry Punch is making choices. Alcoholism is treatable in a number of ways. Fuck, she could just ask Twilight or Zecora for an appropriate spell or potion(If Twilight can turn fruit bats off of fruit, alcohol should be doable.) Or make a Pinkie Promise and let the Pink Demon handle it. By deciding to just go with the flow, she's responsible for her actions.
As such, I hope she's arrested, given a fair trial and sentence, and undergoes court mandated treatment.
And that Vinyl finds her in an alley someday and balances the scales.
more?
4676998
Soon...
img2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20120703015850/mlp/images/1/1d/Diamond_Tiara_wanted_to_hear_S2E23.png
4674585
Though PoH was for science... 
Oh yeah...
Figuring out Vinyl's case shouldn't be hard – half of the town knows where Berry went after Ruby got missing...
4674644
4674522
Hmm, knowing Twilight's experience with such spells, something would go very wrong... I already have an idea what...
Brilliant!
And I find Sunshine's sleep-talk hilarious.
4677520
Oh my. I do hope you include it then. DTs+Magical Mishap = Fun on a bun!
She was doing that from time to time; sometimes they weren’t even words, . . .
Randolph was serving the Rich family for years
SO.
What the fuck is up with this format?
It hurts my head.
Oh, things are getting spicy...
Seems that DT is willing to kill in all manner of ways. Good. It is important to stay adaptable.