Children of Harmony

by Pinkie Pie Sweets

Chapter 18: The Missing Racer Part 5

At the Forest:

Aerial and the others are looking for Sakura in the forest, but so far no luck. Out of the friends who are searching for her, nopony is more determine than Ace is because Sakura is in this mess because she want to help him prove his innocents. He also think that his friends are more important that a race any day.

Just then, the others hear a strange noise coming from behind the bushes. When they slowly move the bushes they can see Fast Swift. They are surprised that he is found but Ace can tell there is something off about this, Why is he in the forest, with a evil grin on his face. He is also wonder why is Fast Swift holding some keys and some extra ropes.

"It's fast Swift what's he doing here? "Ace whispers to the others.

"I'm not sure and I'm also wondering why he has these key and rops for?" Ruby asks whispering to Ace.

"I don't know, but something telling me that we should find out," Ace whispers to Ruby.

The others agree with Ace's decision.

"Judging by his direction I say he was heading from that direction," Baked Apple suggest, pointing the direction Fast Swift was coming from.

"I think you right," Ace agrees then he notice that somepony in their group is missing, "Hey, where did Raspberry Pie go?"

"Over here," Raspberry screams. The others heard him coming for the same direction Fast Swift was coming from.

"Hey Raspberry what you find?" Ace asks.

"I found a cave," Raspberry answers.

"There is a cave here," Baked Apple says a little surprised.

"Look, there's hoof prints here," Eden says louder than normal. With that the others can see on the dirt there are hoof prints in front of cave.

"I'm guessing Fast Swift was here," Ace suggests.

"But why to this disgusting cave?" Ruby asks, disgusted by the dark and spooky cave.

"Maybe there's something inside that is tied and locked in a cage in here," Eden suggests worried for the creature that might be trapped in there.

"That would explain the rope and the keys he has when we saw him," Baked Apple says.

"But, what's in there?" Raspberry asks.

"I don't know, but I think we should split up," Ace suggests with a serious look in his eyes.

"Yes sir, so what are your order?" Raspberry says saluting with agreement.

"One Raspberry stop fooling around,"Ace says.

"Okay," Raspberry agrees sadly.

"Second Eden, you and Baked Apple follow Fast Swift to see where he's going, the rest of us will look inside this cave," Ace instruct the others.

"Okay," the others says in agreement.

With that Apple Eden and Baked make their way to find Fast Swift while the others go inside this cave to see what's going on in there.

It didn't take long for Eden and Baked Apple to find Fast Swift. They can see that he is making himself dirty for some reason or another, and he is breaking some of the rope and leaves the keys behind.

The apple cousins think something fishy is going on it almost like Fast Swift is trying to make it look like he just got out of a jam or something. After that, Fast Swift left to head back to Canterlot, and Apple Eden decide to give the keys to Ace, while Baked Apple follow him back over there to see what he's doing.

Back at the Cave:

Aerial Ace, Dragon Ruby, and Raspberry Pie are in the cave and Ruby doesn't like being in there one bit. Even though she is using her horn to light up the cave a little.

"This place is disgusting, there are creepy webs, rocks, not to mention old and yucky," Ruby replies disgusted by the cave and complaining about it.

"Don't worry Ruby we'll just look inside the cave a little long then we'll get out of here," Ace says trying to calm her down while walking further in the cave

"Yeah this is fun, spooky, scary, adventurous, mysterious, and exciting and… Ow," Raspberry says, giving many reasons to like being in a cave, until he hit something pretty hard.

Ace and Ruby run up to Raspberry and asks, "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I think I hit something," Raspberry replies rubbing his head with his hoof.

"I think we found the cage, Ruby can you use your horn to light up a little more," Ace says and ask Ruby to shed a little more light.

"Well do," Ruby replies agreeing with Ace's request.

When she light up the cage a little more they can see the cage and they can see something else that really gave them a shock.

"Sakura!" The others screams in a shock.

They can see Sakura is tied up all over her body and her clothes are dirty and a little torn. She also has a ring around her horn a well and her ankle was shackled to a metal ball.

"What do you think happen to her?" Ruby asks horrified to see Sakura in this condition.

Ace figures out what happen to her and furiously says, "I know Fast Swift did this to her."

"How do you... figure that? Ruby ask completely lost for words.

"It the only explanation why he has those things with him," Ace continues filling angry now.

"Ace, Ace," Ace and the other hear Eden calling them in.

"Eden" Ruby says surprised she heading back here and not with Baked Apple, late at night, in the dark.

"Whats going on" ? Eden asks, until she see Sakura, completely tied up and looks like she's a sleep. She gasp in horror seeing Sakura in that condition.

"What…. what happen?" Eden asks, completely terrified, seeing Sakura in that state.

"Fast Swift did this, I bet he send her that letter so he can do…(gulp) this to her," Ace explain to Eden a little lost for words.

"Oh my, either way I brought the keys that Fast Swift left behind and…." Eden try to explain what happened until she hears a loud screams.

"Perfect," Ruby says excited and yet relieved as well.

With that Ruby uses her magic to take the keys from Een's hooves and use one of them to unlock the cage. After unlocking and opening the door Ace runs fist in there like a gust of wind to see if she's okay. The others go in after him to see Sakura is okay especially in the kind of condition she is in right now.

After that Ace manages to hold Sakura by his fore legs and manages to get the cloth of of her mouth so it will be easer to her to speak and breath. Raspberry and Eden use their teeths to cut the ropes off her arms, legs and wings, and Ruby use her magic and use the keys to unlock the ring and the shackle.

Ace frantically screams, "Sakura, Sakura, wake up!"

"Are you okay?" Raspberry asks upsetly.

"Darling, please wake up," Ruby begs worriedly.

"Please Sakura, open your eyes," Eden begs feeling like she's going to cry.

And just like that Sakura starts to open her eyes, but she only open them half way and can't seem to move her body much. She looks up to see who it is. After a blurry moment, she is able to tell that it's Aerial Ace and her other friends.

"Ace…. is that… you," Sakura replies feeling really weak and tired, but able to smile.

"Yes me and the others are here, can you tell us what happen," Ace says feeling relieved that Sakura is awake.

"Fast Swift, he did all this to get you disqualified," Sakura says still feeling weak.

"What!?" The others scream with an absolute shock.

"So that's his game," Ruby says furiously.

"Yes and to make it worse, he blackmailed the other races, including Storm and Gia," Sakura says feeling numb.

"So the rumors about Fast Swift are true, he's nothing but a blackmailing cheater and will hurt anyone in order to win," Ace says really angry now.

"Don't worry Ace, Fast Swift is going to get his just deserts when we tell Celestia what he did," Ruby says trying to reassure Ace. The only problem is that he is having a problem calming down seeing that Sakura has irritation and scratches after being tied up for so long.

Just then they others hear a deep male voice on the other side of the cave, "Hello anypony in here?"

"Yes we're in here," Ace answers.

After getting a closer look they can see two pegasus guards, two unicorn guards, and two earth pony guards.

"What happen?" The brown unicorn guard asks worried.

"Is Sakura okay?" The tannish pegasus guard asks in concern.

"Yeah, but it seems she has some irritation from the ropes, cloth and shackle," Ruby explains putting her hoof on Sakura's forehead to comfort her.

"Not to mention she seems tired and weak," Ace replies worried.

"But the worst part is that Sakura told us that Fast Swift was holding her prisoner and had her tied up and everything," Raspberry panicky says waving his hooves around like crazy.

After that the guard want to have a better look at gasp to see that she has scratches and bruises all parts of her body where the ropes were on. This make the guards very angry and upset know that somepony would do something very illegal and wrong.

"For Celestia's sake how can anypony do that to a child," The pegasus guard replies in anger.

"So what do we do?" Eden asks the guard, worried about her friend.

"Me and the other guards will bring her to a doctor to have these irritations, and scratches look at, and maybe you can tell the Princess about Sakura's testimony," The unicorn guard replies.

"Can at least one of us go with her," Ace asks in concern.

"Will alright, but just one or two of you," The unicorn informs the group of friends.

"I think Eden should go, she and her mom are good with medical care with many creature so maybe she can help," Ruby suggests.

"I think I should go as well, besides after everything she done for me at least i can try what I can to help," Ace suggests while looking down at Sakura still being held in his hooves.

"Very well," The earth pony guard says.

With that the unicorn guards use their magic to carry Sakura to the doctor with Ace, Eden and the other guards behind them.

"Okay, see you guys later," Ace says.

"Bye," The others say.

After they left, Ruby and Raspberry decide to find Baked Apple and then go to the castle to explain to Celestia what they found.

In the streets of Canterlot:

Raspberry and Ruby are running to the castle in inform Celestia about the truth to the mystery, until they see Baked Apple looking for something.

"Baked Apple," Raspberry screams.

"Ruby, Raspberry what are you doing here?" Baked Apple asks confused.

"To find you," Ruby answers.

"And then to go to the castle," Raspberry adds.

"Why? What happened?" Baked Apple asks starting to feel scared.

"While me and the others were in the cave, we discovered that Fast Swift was helping Sakura in that cage, oh the poor dear was bound, gagged, and imprisoned," Ruby explains still having that awful image in her head.

"What? so that's why he has that rope and dished the keys," Baked Apple realizes what is going on in a state on anger.

"I know, we need to get to Celestia now," Ruby screams worried.

"Right," Baked Apple says.

With that, Ruby, Baked Apple and Raspberry Pie make their way to the castle and hope that nothing else goes wrong.

Sometime later:

Aerial Ace and Apple Eden are in the waiting room at the doctor's office. They are waiting to see the result and hoping that Sakura is okay.

After a whole hour, the doctor goes opens the door to tell Ace and Eden the result.

With that Ace and Eden fastly go to the doctor at a frantic state.

"How is she?" Ace asks worried.

"Is she okay," Eden asks in concern.

"She's going to be fine, but needs lots of rest," Doctor Heart Sting says.

"How in the world did she get in such condition?" Doctor Heart Sting asks completely upset.

"It's not our fault, Fast Swift was the one who kept her prisoner in a cave outside of Canterlot," Ace explains.

"What!?" Doctor Heats Sting replies with a shock.

"Well, Sakura was trying to prove my innocence when Fast Swift went missing. He probably realize that the only way to make sure he wins is to get rid of Sakura until the race is over," Ace explains sadly.

"Poor girl, and all the rumors about him were true after all," The doctor replies sadly.

"I'm afraid so," Eden sadly agrees.

"Gosh I guess Fast Swift doesn't care who get hurts in his wake of success,"

"So is there anything we can do for her," Ace asks worriedly.

"All you can do is make sure she's get plenty of rest and have take the moisture cream to have the irritations taken care of for a while," Doctor Heart Sting says.

"Thank you," Ace replies feeling relieved.

After that the doctor leaves the room to make sure Sakura gets some rest. All Ace and Eden can do is nothing and hope that Sakura will feel better and soon.

Author's Note:

Sakura is found, but still need to put a stop to the mess.

Comments

[Vampire king Jonathan]

I think I'm going to get my Springfield carbine out and shoot fast swift in the head then he'd fall down dead