The Crimson Smile.

by Cookietheif

Schism

Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
To the last syllable of recorded time;
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.

-Macbeth, scene V.

It was a silent night in the Everfree Forest... The coat of our killer glared out in contrast to a darkened land, wholly without mercy to her every need as she desperately searched for a place to hide once more. "Somewhere not far from the entrance... It'd be bothersome to walk for long, only to snatch a pony and come straight back~", Brightsmile grinned, the sing-song tone of her words clashing with the peace of the trees...

But her chipper attitude swiftly faded as she leaned against a tree, sharp pain still radiating from her fractured foreleg. "Speaking of, I shouldn't even be walking in the first place," she growled, the sound temporarily quieting the nightlife around as she strode carelessly onward, cursing Celestia with her every thought.

"Hey Rarity, hey Pinkie Pie!" Blitz said, poking his head from behind a nearby tree, the two deceased mares keeping pace beside Brightsmile, all of them bearing the features at the time of their death. "She looks rather tired... Think she could use a nap?" He grinned at their killer, no longer walking but shaking with fear and trying her best not to scream. "Oh, oh, oh! I've got just the thing!" Pinkie said, with a cleaver in hoof that still seemed intent on gleaming in the abject darkness.

"Well... Red is her color." Rarity claimed again, twisting the remnants of her mane with a sick expression and managing to appear as sharp as ever.

Brightsmile closed her eyes tightly with a deep sigh, "You're just illusions, just illusions! My mind is messing with me..." She chanted to herself, opening her eyes once more to see if her tormentors were gone... But once she did, she received a shallow cut on her cheek, the ghostly images around were very much real.

She ran, her mind accepting no other action even as her right leg, the fractured bone grinding and tearing her flesh with every step refused to be strained further, sent breaking waves of pain across her entire body... Only the importance of her own life fueled her onward stride, not daring to look backwards, not even to sate her soul-grasping panic.

Her deceased victims let her get a head start, reasoning among themselves that it only added more fun to their hunt, to their torment of her that they never wished to end.

But they weren't the only ones hunting that night, the wind began to pick up, and in the distance the howl of Timberwolves and other creatures of the Everfree echoed through the air... Even the trees twisted themselves unnaturally to reach for Brightsmile, the horror she inflicted awakening a desire to rid their land of her existence... But she was just of out their reach, running as if the very souls of the dead were behind her, "Go back to Tartarus where you belong!" She screamed, the tread of hooffalls sounding from only a few feet behind her outstretched tail.

"You will never have a place to hide!" Blitz called out, his voice in eerie unison with another, this dreaded voice in her mind that spoke of her downfall... The maddened mare pushed futilely at her exhaustion to run still faster, but achieved nothing more than a stumble as, without any warning, a diminutive figure stepped in her path...

With a silver flash and the patter of blood against the dirt, Brightsmile let out a startled, pain filled scream as she plowed into the ground and toppled on her side. "Oops!" Sweetie Belle said, the precocious tone completely lost on the petrified mare at her side, her neck still bore a wide gash, and she was missing a massive amount of flesh from her side... Flesh that Crimson has bit before the foal bled to death on the floor. "Did I do that?" She asked innocently, with a smile that hammered innocence and sunshine into Brightsmile's tattered mind.

"Y-You shouldn't be able to do this!" She choked out through gritted teeth, as Sweetie raised her knife in both hooves, the same one that had ended the filly's life, when all this began... But her pain, her exhaustion, and the voices of her victims spoke otherwise; Rarity approached with the other pursuers beside her, "Oh but we can, darling." She said with a crooked smile, Zecora, Brightsmile noticed vaguely, stood behind her with an expression more serious than the others.

"And now you must pay for the actions that scarred the most." They intoned, the synchronization speaking far more to Brightsmile's terror than even their presence had.

Even though she was injured still, Brightsmile managed to lift herself back to her hooves... But the spirits formed a ring around her; only a single gap presented a hope, one that was quickly banished as the murdered officer stood in its place. "It is time to end this," he announced grimly, and they all began to close in on her.

Brightsmile felt the overpowering need to think quickly, time was running out and she attempted a teleport in frantic uncertainty... Only to feel her disconnected body be rebounded by an unknown source and leave her trapped in the enclosing ring.

Time for plan B, Brightsmile thought, glancing at Sweetie Belle as assumptions pieced themselves together in her mind... The filly was rather short, jumping over her shouldn't be much of a problem, but Rarity had seen the issue before even she did, taking place beside her sister and placing the handle of Sweetie Belle's knife in her own mouth. "Nice try," she muttered through her clenched teeth.

Any moment they'd pounce her, bearing her down to the solid ground of the forest, beating her to death or slitting her throat as she had done to too many of them... Brightsmile closed her eyes tightly and waited, resigned, for the worst to happen.

Goodbye Scootaloo, she thought as the cool touch of a blade rested along the side of her neck...

...A blinding light washed over the clearing and the took the attention of every one of the spirits gathered there, after what seemed to stretch on for an eternity but had elapsed in a few short seconds, the light rapidly dimmed out until it was gone... But none of those gathered were in a simple clearing any longer, instead each pony stood at the edge of a deep fissure, behind the forest, and beyond the gaping earth stood the ruins of Equestria's old capital.

Everypony, including Brightsmile herself, had confusion written all across their faces... But it wasn't long before the dark-hearted mare grinned and swatted the knife away from her throat.

Pushing through the corporeal dead while they were still too stunned to give notice, she started to cross an old bridge that connected the sides of the chasm together, certain that the fortress before her would guarantee safety.

A quarter of the way was all the grace period she received, Rarity and the others snapped out of their stupor and began to give chase... For all their supposed injures, only Brightsmile's broken leg turned to the disadvantage of physical effort... Even as she was halfway across the bridge they were nearly upon, she hissed to herself; "Dammit Brightsmile! Hurry up!" Nearly tripping over a small gap in the planks that would have been there years ago, the bridge swayed side-to-side with the increasing struggles of the ponies upon it, it's ropes groaning in contest and threatening to snap.

Nearly to the other side, Brightsmile was running with all of her might, the sweat pouring down her body an ever constant risk to her tripping again as her leg didn't so much protest, but delivered her agony that wished for nothing but death... The great doors of the castle were opened wide, as if to invite her in, and something was calling her name... Though the voice was familiar, she doubted her ability to place the pony it belonged to, even should she have the concentration to afford it...

And it didn't matter; Brightsmile could feel the presence of strong magic flowing from inside the building, promising protection to all who entered there... If only she could get inside.

"Hold it!!!"

Pinkie Pie came out of nowhere, as she always had in life, and collided with the fleeing Brightsmile, sending them both tumbling inside the structure... Pinkie may have Brightsmile pinned to floor, but she's inside the castle now! Brightsmile almost laughed in an assurance, she expected the spirits of her victims to just go away... But after a pause she realized they were all around her, and Pinkie pulled the same cleaver out from her cotton candy mane... Had she just imagined the magical presence, the promise of protection? She seethed to imagine that after her effort, her life would end now.

Here Pinkie Pie paused, looking down thoughtfully at the mare beneath her, "We don't work for Tartarus, silly!" She said with a grin that quickly turned menacing, swinging the cleaver downwards like a gavel-wielding judge to condemn Brightsmile to death... And there was no more sound, Brightsmile's world seemed to fade out as she accepted her fate and closed her eyes against the sharp edge about to be buried between them... And with a gust of wind across whatever the blade had left of her face, she knew it was done.

Yet all she felt was the absence of blood, vengeance, even pain itself, Brightsmile opened her eyes to see the blade, though in her skull, had made no contact with it... Though otherwise lethal, neither it nor Rarity's bite left any physical damage at all! And it was now that each and every one of the dead ponies began to slowly fade away.

"No... No!" Pinkie Pie yelled, pulling her weapon back and striking at Brightsmile again, who began laughing in her mad triumph, making absolutely no progress in her murderous gestures... "Y-You... You have to die!" She cried, "You have to die before you take any more of my friends! I don't want any more of my friends dead..." Tears ran down her translucent cheeks, "Please, Bright... Stop this..."

They were gone.

Brightsmile sat up with a start, and found herself back in Fluttershy's cottage with a pulsing mass of a headache, "It... It was all a dream?" She thought aloud, her only response the smell of rotting flesh and the stinging from her leg... There was a gash in it, in the exact same place that Sweetie Belle had cut her in the dream, and even though she had slept all night, Brightsmile felt like she had ran to Canterlot and back...

...And if it wasn't a dream, then could that castle really exist? There was only way to find out, she supposed.

"Back to the Everfree it is!" Brightsmile cheered, a new fire burning in her eyes.

Scootaloo was high above the clouds, the wind flowing through her mane as she zipped past any birds that happened to be flying this high, and she didn't have a care in the world... In fact, riding on Rainbow Dash's back was the greatest thing in it! She held on tight as her larger-than-life idol dove down into Ponyville with the air screaming through her feathers, pulling up a mere foot above the ground and startling everypony as she swerved out of their path at the last possible second.

After many moments of flying like this, minutes or hours lost in an adrenaline induced blur, they decided to rest at Fluttershy's cottage, alighting next to the coop that had built for the chickens she cared for. "That was great!" Scootaloo said happily as she sat up on Dash's back, taking extra care not to put pressure on her wings, but she didn't respond immediately, her attention fixated on the coop, "Hey..." She said shortly, "I dare you to try and call one of 'Shy's chickens to us."

It was one of the strangest dares she'd heard, true... But there was no way Scootaloo was going back down from anything Rainbow Dash asked of her! So sliding off her back, Scootaloo began clucking wildly to see if any of the chickens would leave their nests, "Here chicken, chicken, chicken!" She called when her previous attempt failed, stomping her hoof and pouting a little as she swung the gate open, "Come on! Get out of there!"

"That's not how you call a chicken..." An eerily familiar voice informed her, "This is how you call a chicken."

Applebloom practically sauntered out of the wooden building, placing one hoof slowly in front of the other... Her tongue was missing and she had several gaping holes bored into her skull. "Scòòtàlòò~!" She called out to her mortified friend, placing an unnaturally high emphasis on each vowel, speaking as articulately as Rarity despite her bodily damage.

Scootaloo was shaking now, barely managing to back up from the awful specter of her dead friend, her eyes wide and her pupils’ mere pinpricks... Now her memories were flooding back, Applebloom and Rainbow Dash were dead, and she'd been the one to kill them.

"Rainbow... Wouldn't she be?" Scootaloo realized, turning around to a sight that ripped a scream from her throat and chilled her from ear to hoof, Rainbow Dash was in the same state as Applebloom herself, but with an extra wound caving in her chest. "Why, Scoots?" She asked coldly, her hoof whisking through the air to collide with Scootaloo's head, knocking her to the ground. "WHY WOULD YOU AGREE TO BE BRIGHTSMILE'S DAUGHTER?!" She screamed, shaking the remains of her head and clenching her eyes closed.

Scootaloo curled up into a tight ball, shaking uncontrollably as she closed her eyes, trying to hide from their presence much like certain creatures buried their heads in the sand. "Y-you're not real! You can't be real! I'm just having another nightmare, that's all!" She claimed hysterically, "Wake up, wake up, wake up-wake-up!" She babbled to herself as she was suddenly pulled into a tight embrace, Rainbow Dash was hugging her, tears streaming down her cheeks, "I'm so sorry," she sobbed, and Scootaloo gasped... Could she be, just maybe, coming out of this horrible world she seemed forced to wander?

Shaking her head slowly, Scootaloo poured out tears of her own, dripping from her face to the ground below, "No..." She sniffled, "I'm sorry... It's my fault that you and Appleboom died!" She confessed, feeling another presence press against her as Applebloom joined in the group hug, crying herself as they all held on tightly... Bringing a warmth that burned away all of her fears, her growing guilt and shame.

It was such a happy reunion, and to her shock it was nothing but short-lived, as two knives pierced her sides, digging beneath her ribcage, tearing her flesh and causing blood to spill out over them all...

"Then come join us," The specters said in a horrifying unified monotone, "We'll forgive you..." They promised, the blades driving deeper towards her lungs, and Scootaloo began coughing up blood as she tried to speak, her eyes wider than ever before as she choked... And any remaining hope was shattered as Rainbow Dash spit venomously in her face, her words burning with rage in shocking contrast to her earlier tears, "Goodbye, you traitorous little-!"

...The world washed out in a blinding white, and the spirits of the ponies that Scootaloo had once held dear to her heart vanished, but her wounds remained... It was the most agonizing torment she had ever felt, incomparably worse even than her brush with death at Applebloom's own hooves. Once again she curled into a small, pitiful, weeping ball of guilt and pain, her shame erasing any trace of self-esteem she once had... She should have died that night, beaten to death by her fellow Crusader, she shouldn't have adopted Brightsmile as her mother, just maybe...

"Scootaloo?" A familiar voiced asked, piercing her thoughts as she felt a warm pelt pressing against hers, and a purple wing resting itself over her shaking body.

Princess Luna!

"Princess... Luna, why does this hurt...?" Scootaloo wheezed, a pool of blood rapidly spilling across the invisible floor, "Why isn't this just like any other dream?" On hearing this, Luna's eyes widened, what she had thought was merely a nightmare was, in fact, frighteningly more real than she had expected... Her horn began radiate with her aura, encompassing the wounds of the broken filly at her hooves; gradually healing the ravaged flesh to nothing more than two fresh scars with the help of her powerful magic.

"There have always been rare, extremely rare, cases... When what happens to inside a dream is real," Luna explained hesitantly as the healing process was nearing its end, "But only the spirits of ponies that dare wander in another's dream may inflict such... Suffering." Luna didn't want to believe it, but she knew that this meant nothing less than that both Rainbow Dash and Applebloom were dead, and were haunting the dreams of their surviving sister... Friend. Confidant. Ally. Bosom-Buddy. Gal-Pal. Comforter. Chum-of-Chums. Home-Girl. Amigo...

"...I killed them."

Those words struck the Princess, carrying with them the same shock as her banishment had, all those years ago, and she flinched from them as she would any physical blow... "I had to fight Applebloom," Scootaloo spoke into the heavy silence, every word tearing itself from her throat with the subtlety of twisted metal, "If-if we hadn't fought, th-then Applejack would have been run to ground by Brightsmile... And Rainbow Dash was already caught... Just waiting to be killed too, I killed her Luna! I killed my best friend!" She buried her muzzle into the softness of Luna's fur, trying desperately to hide her face in her weaving mane, as she continued to choke out word after chilling word.

"A-an-d... And then Rainbow Dash broke, she went crazy and tackled me... And the same kn-kn-The same knife I used on Applebloom went right in her chest... And she died on top of me..."

Princess Luna was stunned speechless for what felt like countless moments, all of her own horrors rising up as her mind processed the equally horrific experience that this young foal had endured. "It'll be okay, little one..." She said, in an attempt to soothe the heart-wrackingly sobbing pegasus, "I'll stop Brightsmile, this I do promise you... And when I return I will aid you in coping with all that she has made you do, but I must know where she is hiding now."

Scootaloo looked up, her eyes burning with the faintest spark of hope, a fragile reality that she could hardly bring herself to believe, this could be only chance to make things right! Maybe... Maybe if she told Luna everything, Rainbow Dash and Applebloom would forgive her as well.

These was a downside to this idea, as there was to everything though, after it was all said and done; Nothing, and certainly not this, could ever bring any of them back... And she would be all alone once more and thrown back into an orphanage, a lonely parentless filly, a 'worthless parasite' that nopony ever cared about.

"I-if I tell you... Would you help me find a family...? Somepony to love? I never want to be in that orphanage again... And everypony I cared about is... is..." She choked to a halt, her eyes sparkling with barely-suppressed hope and tears as she reached out a shaking hoof out towards Luna, staring into the Princess' eyes as well as her own blurry vision would allow.

Luna stared back in no small measure of shock and uncertainty, she hadn't thought she would have to make such clear deals with the filly, and she... She barely knew her subjects yet again, but as she took a fortifying breath, she made the only decision she could, "I'll raise you myself if it means that you'll tell, Scootaloo."

Scootaloo leaped up from her prone position, her overflowing joy washing the dreamscape in shifting vibrant colors, washing away her lingering guilt as she threw her legs around Luna and hugged her tightly, "Thank you!" She gushed, even repeated happily, "We're at..." She started to say, the guilt crashing back around her as quickly as it was forgotten, causing her to cling to Luna all the more... "We're at Fluttershy's house."

And though neither of them had noticed, there was a third pony in this void, a shadow of one to be precise, "Not for long..." It growled, vibrating the nothingness like glass windows on a train.

Luna, growing quite tired of being startled, turned quickly to look in the direction of the voice... But there was nothing there. "Down here," the voice growled, and she looked at Scootaloo, but it wasn't her... A shadow now stood in her approximate shape, shifting in a manner similar to her mane, as if on of the whims of an invisible wind. "I sent it away to brood on its crimes, the oh so delicious failure, so that we may speak in private." She, or at least seemed feminine, said... Moving away from Luna, she took on another shape, that of an Earthpony mare.

"Who are you?" Luna asked, standing up and turning again towards the invader, "And how do you know that Brightsmile is leaving?" She asked, the shadow grinning in response, exposing row after row of unnaturally sharpened teeth. The void became a room, and the room soon filled with images of Brightsmile, sowing strips of pony pelts together. "This was only a short time ago..." The shadow paused, her smile turning malicious, "And Lu-Na," she said, as if making a mockery of the name the Princess had reclaimed, "You may call me Crimson..." She continued, her dark visage growing frightful to behold. "She won't be there much longer after she's finished, but luckily for your precious little ponies, I know her new destination~".

"Where is she going?" Luna snapped, the bloody portrayal before just heightening her anxiety, the humming dentist vanishing from view as the world became white once more... She knew that this shadow was too well-informed, to not be involved... "As well," she hedged, "Before I banished Scootaloo's nightmare, I observed the spirits within acting differently than they had when still yet alive, have you been behind that as well?"

Crimson became a shapeless entity, her flowing shadow thrusting the entire dream they were in into darkness, "I may have had some influence in their behavior... Though not as much on Rainbow Dash, you may thank Brightsmile for that... Pity you had to go and get in my way," she sighed, echoing through the abyss, "Oh well. Before I reveal her destination, you must abide by a few rules..."

Luna frowned suspiciously, her own experience with the standards of evil beings leaving her to assume she wouldn't like these rules at all... "And what would they be?" She asked, cautiously accepting the only solution she could see, Crimson may be planning something dark and foul, but if this was the only recourse in finding the killer herself, so be it.

"Rule one~" Crimson chimed, mocking a songbird with her tone, taking the form of Celestia... The ordinarily white coat extremely dull, on the point of grey to blend into the unspeakable darkness they stood in, their observance of the other not impaired in the slightest.

"Your sister must not have any part in any of this, just imagine what she would do if she had Brightsmile right where she wanted her... At the mercy, or lack of, of her hooves."

The sound of fire roaring rose from the very depths beneath their feet, and the illusionary screams of Brightsmile herself chased hard on its hooves, but neither fire nor mare could be seen. "I would much rather see the ungrateful whelp die in front of everypony in the whole of Equestria!" She finished with a smirk, but Luna was calm and collected... Showing no sign of anger, or indeed any emotion that Crimson so desperately wanted to see.

"Rule two," the demon growled, "Only two ponies may accompany you... It would hardly be fair if there were so many fresh bodies going against one mare~" She said, shifting into the form of a Royal Guard, the monochromatic color making it impossible to tell which sister the guard would have answered to, mocking a salute towards Luna... Who was shaking in rage that this villain dare act so high and mighty before a Princess, she was royalty that should be groveled before! And she despaired that anything should keep her from banishing this bodiless being, vital information to stay these horrible murders caused her to still her rage, however barely.

"Is that all?" Luna asked, keeping most of her composure even as irritation escaped with her voice, and Crimson took again the form of an ordinary mare and stepped within inches of the taller Luna. "Nopony else may ever know of our talk... Not even the two you'll be taking with you. Do we have a deal, your highness?" Crimson offered, silence passing as Luna thought it over, nothing about this felt right, but little often did, and she couldn't let this chance get away! "We have a deal." She said quietly.

"Gather the two ponies, then!" Crimson exclaimed, leaning in to whisper more softly in Luna's ear, "And once you, mmm, possess them," she said in a tone that could almost be called seductive. "Then shoo them along to Fluttershy's, that poor thing, and return to the library... I wish to meet you there, alone once more~" Crimson finished, vanishing without a trace, for Luna to open eyes in the waking world... She was, remarkably, laying in Twilight's bed, with the librarian passed out downstairs, a mess of books lying open around her.

"TWILIGHT!" She shouted, coming on the verge of using her full Royal Canterlot voice; A loud surprised squeal alerted Luna that Twilight was indeed awake now. "I KNOW WHERE SHE'S BEEN HIDING!"

6:34 A.M. Fluttershy's Cottage, Ponyville Outskirts, Equestria.

Scootaloo bolted upright on the couch, a cold sweat breaking out as her eyes, widened in alarm, darted around the room... After a moment of equal parts calming down and waking up, she realized that she was back on the couch, instead of the featureless void where Luna had been... "Shcoodaloo?" Came a garbled noise from the stairs that might have once resembled her name, causing her to glance around again and sight Brightsmile on the lower steps, a toothbrush in her mouth that she was just removing.

"Are you alright?" Brightsmile asked, a worry glowing in her eyes that unsettled the newly-apologetic Scootaloo, and seemed entirely at odds with the patchwork of bandages that covered her 'mother', from the splint on her right foreleg to the side of her face.

"Y-Yeah... I just had a really bad dream," she replied, the half-truth coming more easily than she could have hoped. "Why do you have those bandages...? And the splint?" She asked, remembering that Brightsmile had been consistently limping since the night she'd offered to take the Pegasus under her proverbial wing... And feeling brave - or perhaps reckless - enough, to feign concern, almost feeling as if Rainbow Dash would have approved.

"W-well my leg got fractured," Brightsmile said with a pained wince, not really wanting to discuss the circumstances, "It was just a small accident a few nights ago," she trailed off into silence as her mind sought a distraction - whether for herself or from Scootaloo's questions, she wasn't sure...

"Here," she said suddenly, levitating a toothbrush, still in its package, over to Scootaloo. "Fortunately, Fluttershy bought a few of these recently, I bet they were for her filthy animals," Brightsmile said, changing the subject with a snicker of maddened laughter. "Speaking of which, turns out she wasn't quite dead..." A dark smile spread rapidly across her face with that revelation, a bound and unconscious Fluttershy dragged roughly down the stairs, the white aura carrying her at odds with a large gash in her head that seeped fresh blood from this newest round of abuse.

Scootaloo's eyes had resumed their previously wide expression, utterly speechless as she watched the steady rise and fall of Fluttershy's chest, proof that she truly was still alive. "But for how long..." She thought despairingly, sadness not so much flashing in her eyes as stabbing into them, "I'm so sorry, Fluttershy..." She lamented in her mind, her thoughts cut short as Brightsmile began climbing back up the stairs, calling over her shoulder, "Brush up and pack anything you want... We're leaving soon," she finished, vanishing out of sight.

"Leaving?!" Scootaloo thought desperately, Luna was supposed to be here at any moment! "C-Can't we stay a while longer?" She asked, dashing upstairs to her temporary mother. "No, remember that yesterday more guards should have been here... And today I'm absolutely certain that more will come, luckily your mother knows exactly where to go~" She sung affectionally, as if she'd nuzzle Scootaloo if she weren't so busy preparing something that was wrapped in several fresh bed sheets. "It's a surprise," she added abruptly, before Scootaloo could even think to ask.

Scootaloo slowly walked into the upstairs bathroom, deep in thought as she let her own hooves choose how to guide her inside. "What if they got away before anypony else came?" She mused with a scowl, supposing - or at least hoping that she could meet up with Luna when next she slept... Scootaloo took out the stolen toothbrush and lathered the bristles with toothpaste after wetting them under the faucet, tasting nothing but guilt as she scrubbed her mouth clean. "But... What if I'm attacked by Rainbow and Applebloom again," she thought with a groan, "And if Fluttershy dies today, will she try and kill me too?"

Glancing towards the bathtub, her current activity briefly forgotten, she noticed a dried puddle of blood where Fluttershy had hit head... The guilt not just content to sit in her mouth but boiling at her insides, eating away at her heart and leaving with a pounding headache that threatened her with physical collapse... It was becoming harder and harder for her to believe that she ever would, ever could have done such a thing... Even to the point of enjoying it. "It'll be fine, Scoots." She insisted to herself, returning her focus to brushing, "You're making up for it now," if only she could dare to listen to herself ever again.

After some time, or perhaps only a little while... Brightsmile was finding it difficult to discern how long had actually passed without the sun - or more preferably a clock, to guide her... But she finally had a makeshift sled harnessed to her, whatever she'd gathered in the sheet secured to it, directly beside an equally well-secured Fluttershy, her muzzle and her wings both viciously tied shut. The former just to prevent even the smallest of moans, the latter not to keep her from escaping, as she was also fastened to the sled, but more to aggravate the wound she'd suffered there.

"All ready, sweetie?" Brightsmile asked Scootaloo with a confident smile, one that only grew more certain as she gave her a small nod, she didn't really want to leave... But it would only raise Brightsmile's suspicion is she tried and insist that they stay.

The moon slowly dipped beneath the horizon, to be quickly replaced by the sun peeking over the mountains across from the vanished night as Scootaloo and the chillingly clever killer that she hated herself for ever associating with began their trek... Only a few steps passing until Brightsmile paused to look at the fenced off Chicken coop, one of them standing outside staring at them in the morning light. "Hmm... I wonder," she said, a corner of her mouth upturned in a sharp-toothed grin as she levitated the animal towards her, making sure Fluttershy was watching as she suddenly snapped it's neck. "What does chicken taste like?"

Tossing the Chicken onto the sled next to a sobbing Fluttershy, the only noise she could make her breath hitching in her throat, Brightsmile resumed walking without even a backwards glance... leaving Scootaloo to give her an apologetic glance, one Fluttershy couldn't see through all her tears... "Where are we going now?" She asked Brightsmile, who grinned even wider than before. "I... Remembered," she said after a brief hesitation, her earlier pretense of surprise forgotten, "...There used to be a castle deep in the Everfree Forest, large enough to hide us, and nopony will think to look for us there..."

"Even if they do think to look there..." Brightsmile thought deviantly, "I will have quite the surprise for them..."

6:45 A.M. Golden Oaks Library, Ponyville, Equestria.

"She made Scootaloo do what?!" Twilight shrieked, her tail nearly standing on end as she performed a close approximation of the Royal Canterlot Voice, not fazing Luna in the slightly as she glanced down and continued to explain.

"She was... Unable of informing us - me," she went on, barely catching herself as her own distress caused her own speech to slip even further, "...Unable to inform me of what occurred immediately after the two of them died... What knowledge I do possess indicates that Brightsmile and Scootaloo are temporarily residing in Fluttershy's cottage... I want you to make all haste there now, I believe the pair may have already left - Events have undoubtedly left her with a tendency to move, much as she fled from Ponyville just days ago. You will be accompanied by some of our sister's guards, an elite unit trained by your brother himself we were told. And Spike?" The Princess looked towards the baby dragon, his hands clenched in a desperate and questionably effective attempt to the sides of his head in the hopes of missing the dire story she had been telling.

"A-Are you done yet?" He called out, managing to look pale despite his scales - a state that revealed his question was entirely unnecessary, doubly so as they were all sitting downstairs facing each other... Both mares simply nodded in response and he ventured to remove his hands, for whatever good they had done... And then Luna pressed on, making haste in her instructions. "I require you to go with Twilight Sparkle and document everything that ye," she started, clearing her throat, "That you both discover... But if you should find... Anything that may be too much for you to handle, please leave the... The particulars of such an occurrence to Twilight, then." She finished as diplomatically as she could, genuinely wishing to spare the dragon any further horrors... And feeling no pleasure as Spike gave her a weak nod in response, and completely sympathizing at his grimace towards whatever they may find inside.

"I'll send Applejack over... I think you should be the one to tell her about Applebloom," Luna said softly, both ponies' expressions saddening, and Spike's quickly following when he realized exactly what the Princess had meant... Following both Twilight and Luna dutifully out of the library, they watched outside as the Night Guard began to leave Ponyville - only a few temporarily delayed as they gave brief reports directly to Luna, and the Royal Guard reported in to start their patrols.

"General Eaglewing!" Luna bellowed through the still air as she caught sight of a large Pegasus in golden armor flying overhead, causing him to stop midflight and drop like a stone to land beside her. "Yes, your Highness?" He asked, after giving her a salute.

"Take yourself and two of your best officers and escort Twilight Sparkle and Spike to Fluttershy's cottage, we have reason to believe that Brightsmile may still be located inside... Or that her trail may still be fresh if she has fled."

The General's eyes widened slightly, but he nevertheless gave a quick bow of his head. "As you wish, your Highness," he said, quickly motioning over two of the guards that were checking residences at random... Luna barely acknowledged his acquiescence as she strode off at a brisk pace, the longer she took, the longer still she would have to wait to speak with Crimson back at the library... Her select retinue of the Night Guard falling respectfully behind her as she set hoof on the path to Sweet Apple Acres.

"Nothing out of the ordinary.”

"We're sorry, but we couldn't find her..."

"We'll be sure to look harder tonight!"

Luna couldn't help but sigh to herself as the Bat-pony to her right read off a scroll containing the individual reports that her Night Guard had left with him... They were all variations on the same, and not able to stand another word she dismissed them both with a wave of a hoof, sending them home to rest and try once more when the moon once again rested in the sky. "At least there's time for that..." She thought with another sigh, she herself struggling to sleep after she raised the moon, and wake before setting it... It wasn't the only thing that felt unnatural to her, and with her sister back at Canterlot she was cutting even her own restless nights short in a bid to stay up as long as possible.

She could see the entrance to the Acres now, berating herself as she realized that a few minutes more lost in thought, and she'd have been over the next rise and out of sight completely... Somepony was leaving, Applejack pulling a cart laden with apples towards town, her head was low and her bloodshot eyes and frazzled eyes told the Princess that she'd been doing more crying than sleeping lately... Less sleep than she herself, Applejack did not even notice Luna standing in front of her until she very nearly collided into her.

"Oh... Howdy there Princess," Applejack drawled, not even tipping her hat as was her custom, and only lifting her gaze slowly to lock eyes with Luna. "What brings you here?" She asked, causing Luna to purse her lips for a second, thanking her stars that Twilight had agreed to deliver the horrid news in her stead... Luna most certainly did not wish to be around when the deed was done... "Greetings, Applejack. I require you to make all haste to Fluttershy's cottage and meet Twilight there."

Applejack's exhaustion burned away like a match in an open flame at the thought of yet another friend's demise. "H-Has something happened to 'Shy?" She hesitantly asked, feeling her heart seem to shatter past the hope she thought she'd already lost, but Luna could only heave her lungs in a heavy sigh and give a very un-Princess-like shrug. "Twilight has something to tell you when you arrive... After both of you are finished there I need both of you to return to the library so we can discuss this investigation further."

With nothing more left to be said, Luna and Applejack parted ways, the cart left abandoned in front of their homestead as Applejack herself set a quick pace in her need to see if Fluttershy was safe and sound... Leaving the Princess to drag her hooves back towards the library, dreading the being she was sure awaited her. "Nopony deserves this..." She said quietly to herself as she approached the tree-turned-home. "Brightsmile is tearing... Is tearing my little ponies apart," She thought ferociously, the terminology feeling completely natural to her in that moment. "Dealing more damage to them than any blade could hope to achieve... T-To myself as well, if it wasn't for them I-"

Once she stepped hoof inside the Library, her musings were cut short by a deep and familiar growl, "Twilight and Applejack... I should have seen that coming." Sitting in a chair was Crimson, clothed in the dark outfit that she had made before claiming her first victim. "You like it?" She asked, positioning herself with a deep-throated purr as if she was a show mare attempting seduction, "I figured Rarity wouldn't mind if I borrowed some fabric..." She said, her grin distorting her face and exposing a mouthful of gleaming ever-sharp teeth.

Luna stood in a mixture of shock and anger, especially at being foalishly surprised once again, but only for the barest moment as she quickly gained her composure and shut the door with finality behind her. "An outfit that reflects your blackened bloodthirsty heart... It cannot be said that such a choice serves no purpose for a monstrosity such as you, Six-Two-Six." Luna said, taking a seat opposite the demonic being. "Now... Where may I find Brightsmile?" She asked, doing her best not to flatten her eyes as Crimson cackled harshly at Luna's response, seeming to take no offense whatsoever...

Suddenly, her laughter transformed into a blood-curdling scream of rage - sounding more like a bat out of Tartarus, too harsh for anything but experimental magic, than her mockingly cultured attitude had suggested... Seeming to ripple instantly from her reclined position as she snapped her teeth closed an inch away from Luna's neck, causing the Princess to tilt her chair deliberately backward and come free of it, her wings flaring to catch herself as she settled to the ground. "Go back to the place you once called a capital, where you lived a thousand winters ago.." Crimson called out, her body gone but her voice a slowly fading echo throughout the room. "She will be inside there."

"But I must warn you, I highly doubt that all of you will make it out alive~" Crimson delivered with a final maddening cackle, the last thing Luna heard before her mocking falsetto voice faded completely.

"HURGH!" Came a horrible, gut-wrenching sound as Spike stood outside, violently expelling the gems he had snacked on while riding on Twilight's back here, she was upstairs levitating the rotting corpse of Applebloom down to a panicking guard on the ground... Trying valiantly not to lose the contents of her own breakfast as her control flickered, and sent the body dropping with a nauseatingly moist sound on the guard just as he opened the door and stepped inside...

...Shuddering as it slid off and fell to the ground, he jumped backwards, inadvertently clearing the way for the General, who drew a sword from its sheath using mouth and rushed inside - the upstairs having been unorthodoxically cleared first and sealed off by Twilight herself, "Brightsmile! You are-!" He shouted through gritted teeth, dropping his sword in the empty room with a gag. "... For the love of Celestia... Somepony please tell me I'm imagining this..."

Everypony else entered the room, Twilight dismissing her magic barrier to walk tentatively down the stairs as they gathered to see what had disturbed Eaglewing so, not one of them running out to join Spike as they stared in abject horror - Rainbow Dash's corpse, missing it's pelt but for a few tufts of fur, was quite literally everywhere... Organs covered the couch, cabinets, and floor... Intestines were pierced through with nails to drip fluids onto the floor from the ceiling, and her limbs were shredded and thrown like confetti seemingly across the floor, most of her bones and both her wings missing and her head impaled like a trophy on a bedpost.

"BETTER LUCK NEXT TIME!" Was carved onto the wall, red staining the interior of each letter, a femur resting in a kitchen sink filled to the brim with blood making it quite clear where it came from - the only sound the buzzing of flies around it for a moment.

Twilight started backing towards the door, her hooves tracking blood as she didn't watch quite where she stepped before turning around and running as if Brightsmile herself was hot on her hooves... Guiding herself subconsciously towards the exit, her mind in utter panic, denial, a dictionary of synonyms trying to protect her conscious mind from the horror as all she could think about was home...

...Going there, being there - not to be brave in her closet but to hide with a teddy bear all the same, not one for prayer but perhaps to pray to somepony - anypony that might hear her... That... That this twisted dentist would never find her inside, but just before she could leave, her last best friend got in her way. "Whoa!!!"

She was going too fast, the familiar voice hammering a name associated with it past her flight response, as she herself hammered into Applejack and sent them both tumbling head over hooves outside. "Oof!" Applejack grunted as she hit the ground, looking up at the unicorn clinging atop her, shaking uncontrollably - even crying. "Twi... What's happened?" She asked her friend as she slowly untangled herself and stood up, Twilight shaking her head as she wiped her tears away. "Let's head back to the library... Y-You do not want to stay here..." She choked out, shivering from fear and wiping away another round of tears.

Their walk back was silent, not even Spike ventured anything to break the disturbing tension that left them all feeling like the world was about to shatter... All the madness in existence seemed turned against them for a change, and no blue boxes suddenly appeared to 'make things' alright... Applejack's mind was buzzing with far too many questions, "What was inside that made Twi lose it? What did Luna want her to tell me? Does she know what happened to my sister?" All ran through her thoughts, and she shivered the worst at that last one... She had no idea what she'd do if her little sister was gone, and once in the library they found Luna sitting with three cups of tea waiting for them. "Have you told Applejack yet?" She asked, glancing nervously at the pony in question.

Twilight rubbed the back of her leg while steadfastly looking down... "I couldn't. I couldn't tell her there... Wh-What Brightsmile did was just... Was just. Not even the guards could handle what was - what was... What was up there!" She exclaimed, swaying slightly as the sick feeling came back full force, along with the same fear, sorrow, and hatred that had been growing since this whole nightmare had begun...

"Just what is this thing that you're supposed to tell me, Twi?" Applejack asked with an audible and growing concern.

"I-It's about Applebloom... Luna found Scootaloo in a dream, and... She told her that Applebloom is... Is gone... I-I'm sorry..."

Whatever remained of Applejack's hope, that small flickering flame that maybe her sister was alive that had kept her going died, flashed out of existence as surely as if it'd been frozen in carbonite... Her legs gave out and she collapsed against the floor as tears instantly obscured her vision... Her attempts to avoid breaking down completely failing as rapidly as her limbs, as she openly sobbed into the fur of her two friends as they rapidly grasped her in a warm embrace, comforting the crying mess she'd become.

"We'll find her..." Luna murmured past Applejack's mane, "I want you and Twilight to follow me... I think I know where she is now, she won't escape!" She said, fire lightning in her eyes as surely as it burned in her tone... Before the Sun set in the West, she would see Brightsmile hang!

Luna stood up suddenly and gestured for the others to do the same. "I know this may be hard to accept, but crying will solve nary a task, if you don't want your sibling's death to be in vain then you must come with me."

Applejack and Twilight looked up at the Princess, her imposing figure stirring their own determination as they wiped away their tears and nodded together. "I'll have my revenge soon..." Applejack promised herself as Luna looked towards Spike, who was bravely pretending that he wasn't crying at the moment either.

"Spike, I require you to remain here for your own safety... If we do not returned by the break of dawn tomorrow, inform my sister of the events that have transpired..." She told him seriously, as she ushered Applejack and Twilight, the requisite two other ponies out the door and started running towards the Everfree, her determination causing her mane to temporarily abandon its ethereal ripple and instead sway in the natural wind.

8:10 A.M. Abandoned Castle of the Royal Pony Sisters, Everfree Forest.

"...Finally! We're here!" Brightsmile said, making huffing noises between each noise as she fought to catch her breath and looked up at the crumbling castle in triumph... It had taken quite the walk, especially burdened as she was, to reach this place... But it was worth it! "What do you think of new home, sweetie?" She asked Scootaloo, turning her around to spot her daughter not far behind, Scootaloo looking back at her with a nervous grin. "Nopony can hope to find us here..." She replied simply.

"Exactly! Let's go settle in... I've got another surprise for you when we do," she said, levitating the sled up the stairs as they entered the old structure... Fluttershy had finally stopped crying half-way through the trip here, now she was just silent, defeated, and above all scared... All she did was stare at Brightsmile with pleading eyes, which she ignored but Scootaloo found herself unable to, glancing into them again and again.

"What are you going to do with Fluttershy?" Scootaloo asked, forcing her voice into nonchalance and failing again to look away from Fluttershy's miserable stare... Her supposed mother grinning as she limped ahead through one of the many halls, somehow knowing her destination despite never having set hoof here in the waking world. "I may keep her around for a while... But I can't say for how long, "Brightsmile mused idly, before stopping abruptly and holding a hoof out to stop Scootaloo from taking another step forward. “Wait," she intoned.

Brightsmile, for reasons known only to her deranged mind, pushed herself and Scootaloo against the wall and made them walk, sides brushing against it, until they reached a spiral staircase that led to one of the Princesses' old rooms... Inside was a large comfortable and utterly white bed with elegantly carved bedposts, rotting bookshelves lining the wall and sagging under their weight as they spilled over onto a dusty floor, and equally dusty furniture.

Brightsmile set the sled down with a sigh of relief, her magic breezing the bed clean of the self-same dust that had been collecting for centuries and out a sagging window frame across the room before placing Fluttershy on the bed, still bound just as securely. "I hope you're cozy~ Because it won't last long," she teased with a menacing grin.

Scootaloo laid her ears back, thoughts of what horrible the black-hearted Brightsmile would do flooded into her mind... And every attempt to banish them merely made them come back stronger. "Do you have to hurt her...?" She asked softly, causing Brightsmile to pause, Scootaloo's growing concern was starting to unnerve her... Hadn't she made progress in changing her behavior? "Of course not dear... I don't intend to, but I so very much want to," she replied, her manic grin growing wider.

Lowering her head to meet Scootaloo's gaze, she spoke in a soft sibilant hiss. "Didn't you enjoy silencing Rainbow Dash and Applebloom, even when they were already dead? Didn't you enjoy holding that knife to that rodent's throat? You didn't have to do any of that stuff... But you still wanted to, why must it matter what I do now?" She queried... And she had a point, Scootaloo had enjoyed doing that... But... But not anymore, and this was Fluttershy... Still alive, hurt and scared...

"She was always so nice..." Scootaloo tried, attempting to reason even if it was the death of them both, "...I-I don't want to see her hurting more than she already is."

With a heavy sigh, Brightsmile broke eye contact and looked at Fluttershy before speaking again. "Alright... You won't have to worry about seeing her suffer, but I think it's best if she isn't in this part of the castle with us for long... Now if you'll excuse me, I have something to finish!" She said, her ever-present grin returning full-force as she vanished with her mysterious bundle of sheets in a flash of light, leaving the heartbroken Scootaloo and the injured Fluttershy alone... "At least she promised not to hurt you," she offered quietly.

Sitting silently at the foot of Celestia's old bed, she kicked up a small cloud of dust off the floor. "Fluttershy...?" Scootaloo said, looking at the bound mare, and feeling something other than pain when Fluttershy returned her gaze. "I'm sorry for everything I did... A-And I can't help but feel so horribly eternally guilty... S-She... Brightsmile made me do something horrible, and then she... Let? Let me think she could help me now... But I realized that staying with her will only make everything worse... For everypony."

Scootaloo untied Fluttershy's muzzle, and released the ropes binding her injured wing and shoulder to relieve the pain, and give her a chance at speaking before Brightsmile returned. "Could you forgive me?" She asked desperately.

Fluttershy was silent for a moment, their eyes, filled with so much mutual sorrow, boring into each other's for the longest of moments, and she finally spoke... "I do... But right now I need to be set free, if that's alright..."

Scootaloo shook her head suddenly, "Brightsmile will try and hunt you down if you leave! Pl-Plus she promised that she wouldn't hurt you anymore..." She explained, sadness breaching into her tone, but slowly gaining a positive edge as cheer overcame her. "But we'll get some help soon! Luna knows that I'm with Brightsmile... And tonight I can tell her exactly where we are."

Fluttershy felt her rekindled hope flare to life inside, she was going to be saved! And Brightsmile would be caught... And this whole horrible thing would all end, she pulled Scootaloo to her side with her only free wing, ignoring the stabbing pain it sent through her as she gave an affectionate nuzzle. "Oh thank you, Scootaloo," she whispered, neither of them noticing the door opening as Brightsmile stepped back inside, her mouth open as if about to speak... But slowly shutting it as Fluttershy continued.

"I should have known that you weren't all that bad..." She said, smiling softly as she buried her still-present heartache beneath the kindness that had earned her an Element, causing Brightsmile's eyes to flicker with flames of deranged anger, "So that's why Scootaloo is suddenly acting so strangely!" She seethed mentally, storming closer in a range and grabbing Fluttershy by the neck, staring Scootaloo into silence as she opened her mouth to speak. "Fluttershy and I need to have a talk," she said icily, vanishing with a pop and leaving her alone.

"AAAAHHHH!!!" Fluttershy screamed, as the rusty remnant of broken cell bars tore through her wings and embedded into the stone wall behind... Brightsmile had brought them to the dungeon, crumbling mortar, collapses walls, and the same metal lodged in her wings betraying it's state of poor repair. "What makes you think you can try and take my daughter away from me?!" Brightsmile screaming, her magic holding Fluttershy immobile as she drove a sharper pair of iron bars through each leg, leaving her dangling a foot above the ground.

Brightsmile's nostrils flared in danger, Fluttershy's presence had been changing Scootaloo... And in a way that might cause her to turn against Brightsmile herself... Before she had left to retrieve the pelts of her victim, the foal had been becoming so much like her mother... But now she was changing back into the filly she had been before... And it had to be Fluttershy's doing!

"I-I wasn't! I promise! P-Please just let me go... I-I won't tell anypony where you are!" Fluttershy pleaded.

"You seemed so Tartarus-bent on escaping and telling Celestia back at the cottage... Why should I believe you now?" Brightsmile hissed, levitating another bar and pressing it lightly against Fluttershy's chest as she continued begging for mercy... Pleas that fell on deaf ears, leaving her nothing to do but close her eyes tightly as it began digging into her skin... Fluttershy just prayed to Celestia that this would kill her quickly, she didn't want to die slowly like her other friends must have...

"INTRUDERS!!!" Somepony screeched, causing Brightsmile to nearly jump out of her fur and twist around to see who shouted, the bar clattering forgotten against the floor... But there was nopony there. "Luna, Twilight... And some other mare," another voice said, and Brightsmile calmed down for a moment... It was all just in her head, surely they... She stopped in midsentence, the import of their words striking home and inducing utter panic, galloping out of the dungeon and coming to a hallway not from the entrance, the pain from her fractured leg momentarily absent...

Her breaths were coming in large gasps by the time she finally came to a halt, she could hear other voices - real ones, coming from the direction of the stairs that led into the main hall... Luna, Twilight... And a Southern accent, the third had to be Applejack to guess, causing her to smirk darkly to herself. "I did say I'd kill her," she muttered, "And with Twilight and Luna gone as well, nopony will be able to stop me... Let's see what you've got, Twilight Sparkle..."

8:25 A.M. Abandoned Castle of the Royal Pony Sisters, Everfree Forest.

"Alright," Twilight said, levitating a large book titled 'The Art of Adventuring: Avoiding a Total-Party-Kill, and ten thousand other helpful tips for DM's and players alike,' in front of her as they walked, "Let's stick together so Brightsmile can't pick us off, it says so right here," she motioned vaguely before the book snapped out of existence as she turned her mind back to the physical world as much as she possibly could. "Luna, you know this place best, so you should be the Meatshi- I mean, group leader, and take the front... Applejack, will be center and I will cover the rear." She dictated, smiling to herself as they all agreed to yet another of her admittedly brilliant plans and they walked inside together... Little knowing that the mare they came to capture was lying in wait, and planning best on how to seal all of their fates.

Moving along the same hallway that Brightsmile had taken when she first entered, Luna's every sense was on high alert... She was aware of all the traps that might still remain active after all these years, but what came next was never planned... A cackle echoed throughout the castle and dislodged dust from the walls, the same walls that rapidly shifted around them... Separating each of the three ponies by walls springing up in their way, and they all called out in surprise.

"Is everypony alright?!" Twilight shouted, pressing an ear against the wall that was now in front of her, Applejack being the first to respond. "I'm just dandy, Sugarcube... There's a new hallway to me right... I'll just have to go and see where it leads."

"I am unharmed as well," Luna called out next, "But I do not that separating is-" She said, falling silent suddenly... "Luna?!" Twilight called out, paling as she assumed the worst in the sudden silence.

"...I believe I can hear her, I shall proceed with caution, and instruct you both to do the same," Luna finally responded, and left Twilight sitting in silence again.

Pressing her ear back to the wall as Applejack's voice erupted through it, mixed with shock, horror, and most frighteningly anger, "Brightsmile!!!" Twilight struggled to discern the exact direction as Applejack's galloping hooves echoed across the enclosed space, about to teleport out towards her friend until a growl sounded behind her. "No cheating..." It warned, causing her to bolt around in time to catch a vanishing glimpse of a shadow whisping around the nearest corner as she gave chase.

Turning the corner suddenly, Twilight skidded to a stop and illuminated the entire room with her horn, "Show yourself!" She challenged, eyes darting to each shadowed corner, dark crevice, every pile of rubble that anypony - even Pinkie Pie - might hope to conceal herself with, but finding nothing... Nothing except voices that started to rise from the depths of the castle, most inaudible, but a few clearer ones that had no desire to hear whispering in her ears, painting in absolute detail with their words how they wanted to her die, every single excruciating moment exhaustingly described... And even should she survive they promised her a horrible fate.

"The eyes are not the windows to the soul, they are the doors," one whispered, and the voices began to cascade in on her sanity like a waterfall.

"For if you stare into an abyss, the abyss also stares into you... How doth one hunt a monster without becoming a monster oneself, Twilight Sparkle? Look at you... All grown up, and still incapable of protecting herself or the ones she loved most..."

"And tell us, how is Celestia doing these days? Nearly burned you and your own town to ash didn't she? That's rather inspiring if you ask me, I like a mare who thinks big."

All these things and more she heard, flattening herself against a wall in horror as her mind flashed through spell after spell, snapping her defenses into place and chasing out every notion pouring into her mind...

"You heard them, didn't you?" Brightsmile called, her voice ringing out eerily in the closest to horrifying demented glee that could provide emphasis for. "Try hearing them forever... Every single night since I first checked-up on Pinkie, first it was about your blood... Oh Celestia was it amazing, it was like a dozen rollercoasters, so frightening but so amazing... Taking you to highs you've never felt before... And after that it was meat, you have never tasted anything that could compare to the taste of flesh!" She called, the voices renewing their assault on Twilight's mind with things more horrible than she could imagine.

Grabbing her ears with her hooves, a vain attempt to block out the voices that now echoed inside her own head, she snapped her eyes left and right again, then left and through a complicated series of moves that left her with an insatiable desire for something named 'Konami'.

"Stop this Brightsmile! These voices aren't real... J-Just surrender and maybe we can solve this!" She pleaded, trying to get a grip on herself, even going so far as to cast the memory spell... And in a moment where she felt like she'd actually succeeded against those awful voices - a moment too brief to tell for sure, a crack sounded against her skull and she fell to the floor... Her fading vision catching sight of Brightsmile as she was knocked out cold.

"It's far too late for you to help me," Brightsmile mocked, standing over Twilight with a mad grin as she dropped a large piece of stone. "Don't worry... I won't kill you yet... I want to save you for last, I want to savor you... It's your blood that got me started... Maybe you won't even die, imagine that Twilight," she said, dragging her latest victim to the old throne room, hiding her out of sight behind it for later, "That's right," she said, picking up another rock and smashing it brutally against her horn, shattering half of it to pieces.

"Imagine if I just... Bled you regularly for the rest of your life," she said with another bout of maddened laughter, leaving Twilight unsecured in utter confidence, for a Unicorn is nothing without their horn... And without it Brightsmile no longer considered her a threat.

"Time to fulfill my promise," Brightsmile chuckled softly to herself as she stepped determinedly through the halls, "It's time for Applejack to see her sister..."

"Where..." Applejack said, panting heavily, "Did she go?" She was absolutely lost in this maze of hallways... Every so often she would catch of glimpse of something moving in her shadow, but would turn around and see nothing... "Where in tarnation are you?!" She screamed out in frustration, giving a sigh and lowering her head almost completely to the ground when all that returned to her were echoes. "Great... I'm lost, tired... And I lost her," she moaned.

As if on cue, she caught a glimpse of white down the hallway to her left, "Hold it right there!" She hollered as she gave yet another blind chase... Right, left, right again... Left again... Over a strange series of markings in the floor that spelled out 'B, A, B, A'... Only to nearly collide face-first with a dead-end... And no Brightsmile! "Dang it!" She exclaimed, stomping a hoof down in frustration as she turned around, only to see a bright flash of magic come at her, knocking her into the wall and leaving her to fall onto the floor, unmoving.

Brightsmile cackled derisively as she practically pranced up to the mare on the floor, doing a series of hops along faded chalk markings, "Five Six, pick up sticks," she chanted as she landed on the last number, right next to Applejack's head, "You're number six, Applejack, I wonder if outsmarting Luna will be this easy... Twilight was hardly a challenge either, for an egghe-" She started to taunt, before being cut short by a blow to the jaw, Applejack suddenly back on her hooves. "If you did anything to Twilight, so help me I'll end all of this right now!"

Brightsmile stumbled a few feet back, resting a hoof lightly on her jaw. "She hits harder than Rainbow Dash!" She thought angrily, her horn glowing as magic wrapped it's way around Applejack and slammed her back into the wall. "I haven't done anything to her yet," Brightsmile lied, barely concealing a wince from the pain that talking sent spiking to her head. "But the same couldn't be said for Fluttershy," she chuckled, teleporting them to the dungeon in a flash.

"Oof!" Applejack let out, as she dropped onto the cold stone of another place that her clearing vision marked as a prison of some sort. "Applejack...?" A soft and weakened voice called her name.

"Fluttershy?" She questioned back, hardly daring to believe her ears, or her eyes as she looked upon her tortured friend in horror... The blood from her wounds staining her fur and gathering in a massive puddle beneath her, the few patches not soaked in red revealing how pale she was... Aside from a still-present redness around her eyes from crying to the point of dehydration, Applejack would have been hard-pressed to say Fluttershy was alive at all, if not for her speaking in the first place.

"Such a pleasant little reunion," Brightsmile said, rolling her eyes as she grabbed Applejack by her mane and slammed her face into the ground, causing several teeth to skitter across the floor. "But it's time you join your other friends..." She snarled, lunging with her teeth directly for Applejack's neck, only to take another hit under the jaw as Applejack thrust her head backwards and her hat - along with Brightsmile herself, were knocked several paces away. "Not today, partner," she said, resolution set in her eyes and a confident smirk on her face. "You planned this all along, huh? Knew we were coming, and had a trap set up for us... Looks like the follow-through had a few holes in it."

"Actually, I didn't have the slightest idea... I assumed you fools simply sprung that on your own, but if you want to put up a fight..." Brightsmile said, growling, "Then I might as well enjoy this," materializing her still blood-stained knife and taking hold of it in a hoof... Preparing herself for a head-on attack before realizing that Applejack knew better, already pitching stones into the air and bucking them at rocketing speeds with her hind legs... One hitting the knife and disarming her, the other striking her horn and stunning her long enough for Applejack to barrel into her.

Hitting the wall in a daze, Brightsmile slumped against the ground and looked up blearily at her victorious opponent, Applejack holding a rather large chunk of stone in her hooves, eyes burning with a desire for vengeance as she lifted it over her head, ready to bring it down and end this horror forever... And she found she couldn't, literally couldn't... Her legs were as unwilling to move as the stone in her grasp as her conscience took war to necessity.

But then the chance was lost, Applejack found herself caught up in Brightsmile's magical grasp once again, and thrown into Fluttershy... The two bars pinning her left in leg into place piercing through Applejack's chest, immediately causing her to choke up a large amount of blood as she slowly looked down at the bars... "I'm coming... Applebloom," she muttered, the world fading out, though not quickly enough to stop Brightsmile from picking the knife back up, intent on releasing the anger from being beaten down once again.

Applejack survived fourteen repeated stab wounds before she died in front of a sobbing and screaming Fluttershy, Brightsmile not even pausing in her vicious thrusts as she savored every drop of spilled blood her tongue could reach... Grinning as the sweet moisture poured down her throat. "Applejack! No!" Fluttershy screamed, unable to tie her eyes away from the brutality being inflicted before her eyes, wishing to cover her eyes as Brightsmile began laughing madly in triumph as she pulled Applejack's body away from Fluttershy, letting it drop to the floor with a thud.

"Don't worry..." She said, her grin made all the more disturbing by the blood coating her teeth and face as she looked up at Fluttershy, sobbing anew at the sight before her as Brightsmile exposed all her frighteningly sharp teeth. "It's your turn now..." She soothed, the incongruity causing Fluttershy to struggle all the more as Brightsmile attacked her lower legs, tearing massive chunks of fur and flesh away, while avoiding the wildly kicking hooves caused by her struggling. "Hold still!" she growled, ignoring the renewed agonized screams as she went in for another bite.

"T-Twilight!!! Help!!!" Fluttershy screamed out in pain, only to receive a horrifyingly deep bite into her side, what of her intestines that Brightsmile hadn't ripped free falling out of her body and onto the floor with a disturbing slurping noise... Her entire esophagus elongating as her stomach threatened to rip free and every gag reflex she had triggered at the same time. "AHHHH!!!" She screamed, loud and with a piercing frequency enough to reach Scootaloo's ears, who had curled herself into a ball trying in vain to block them out, tears streaming from her eyes... Fluttershy would lead Luna to Brightsmile if she kept this up, and so she did what any good cannibal would do... She spat a piece of Fluttershy into her own mouth and watched her expression change to further horror as the taste slicked across her tongue...

And then she tore deeply into Fluttershy's throat with her teeth, severing her windpipe entirely and even nicking her spine.

Fluttershy's cries were immediately reduced to fading gurgling and choking sounds, and Brightsmile relished the taste of her blood as it gushed down Fluttershy's throat and into hers... Her muzzle, once white as snow, was splashed with a dark shade of crimson atop that which had already dried to black from the liquid that she had been constantly indulging herself in... And the world around Fluttershy consisted of nothing but a fading red void.

The pain of her body was dying with her, all Fluttershy felt was a sense of surreal shock as her body seized up, chemicals rushing through her as her body both prepared to death and tried futilely to save her... Her brain dumping everything into her conscious mind as it was literally burned out cell by cell, flashing through her life from her earliest members of foalhood, to the last time all her friends were there together, happy and smiling... And she wasn't afraid of dying anymore, she could admit it was happening... And it was fine with her, she had friends waiting on the other side to stay with forever... And this was a rather happy thought to go out on, or at least that's what she thought, clinging to it desperately as her eyes glazed over, her body started to lose most of warmth... And she was gone.

Brightsmile, painted completely now in blood without a trace of her original color showing any longer, pulled away from Fluttershy's corpse when the blood stopped flowing and looked at her hooves with a strange smile... "I can't believe I was scared of it," she remarked, remembering her early days in Ponyville... Before this wonderful thing had ever happened to her, and wondered how she'd ever wanted it otherwise. "Soon, I'll coat the very halls with all of their blood, and as it dries all the doors will be painted black..." She laughed, limping along the corridors as she hummed to herself, Luna shouldn't be hard to find... Especially since they were looking for each other, and a recurring question to came mind... One that made her super nervous-cited and curious at the same time. "I wonder... Does Alicorn taste better than normal ponies?"

Brightsmile cackled darkly, her voice reverberating in a manner that only Crimson's had previously at the thought of ripping Luna apart... But she wondered where the fun was in just that, she was planning on killing royalty... She should make things so much more interesting, so she spun a teleportation spell and popped into existence in a room not far from the one Scootaloo was in... A room that held the solution to her problem, she took it and made a dash towards her daughter...

8:45 A.M. Abandoned Castle of the Royal Pony Sisters, Everfree Forest.

Luna found herself in the old library, she'd been constantly chasing varied sources of maddening laughter, most so loud that she couldn't hear the unbearable screaming of Fluttershy, but never once catching a glimpse of what was giving off the wretched sound. "Where are you...?" She muttered, her eyes scanning across the countless shelves... Her recent experiences of unpleasant surprises had kept her turning around regularly, but doing so now she spotted not Brightsmile, to her surprise... But a grinning shadow. "What are you doing here?" Luna asked harshly, her eyes narrowing as her adrenaline-fueled senses snapped to high-alert, looking for any tricks, any traps...

Crimson stalked closer, the short distance between them vanishing in an instance as she peeled her lips back to bare her teeth. "You were right to suspect me... Brightsmile's demise was never my main goal... You were, Princess," she grinned with a wink, dispersing into a formless being and wrapping herself around Luna as she tried to flee. "You will be mine!" Crimson laughed in mad victory.

Luna began struggling as soon as the icy coldness touched her heart and the darkness came into contact with her fur, "Get off of me!" She demanded, her voice causing entire shelves to collapse and priceless books to fall around them... Her willpower was strong, but this psychotic influence proved to be the stronger... She had been tempted into darkness before, but she realized that such a thing was nothing like insanity, Luna collapsed to the floor as her midnight pelt began to darken and her horn began to painfully extend... The transformation was intent on turning into a far more sinister version of what was her Nightmare Moon counterpart...

A new voice entered the room, eerie and laden with darkness, much like Crimson's... But it held millennia more years of anger and wisdom... "She," it said with a simple and chilling simplicity, the weight of power behind it's words, "Is ours," it said as the voice coalesced with a new shadowed form, seeping from the cracks in the very structure of the room and latching hold of the Princess as well... Two painful screams, and one may have been her own, radiated throughout the library... And in a battle that felt like an eternity but in reality could only have been mere seconds, Crimson was expelled forcibly from Luna... For the second time she had lost the struggle of controlling a body, and she disappeared into thin air. "I won't forget this!!!" She vowed, revenge implicit in every syllable as her disembodied voice vanished completely.

Luna climbed shakily to her feet, the second shadow has left as well, leaving her there fighting for balance and painfully gasping for each breath in turn... She glanced around hoping that both of the foul presences were truly gone. "Could... Could that have been?" She thought, but it was impossible... It had to be. "No, that part of me can... Can no longer exist, but if so... What was it? Is it stuck in my mind... Or where did it go?" She mused aloud... If it was what she believed it to be, why was she no longer changing into a monster as when Crimson had begun to take control?

Luna shook her head savagely, banishing the questions from her mind... Their importance was paramount, but not immediate... She was here for herself, to kill Brightsmile, for Twilight and Applejack and Fluttershy and Scootaloo... And any other matters would simply have to be dealt with afterward.

Luna managed to return to the entrance with little trouble... Twilight and Applejack were nowhere to be seen. "Twilight? Applejack?" She called out, to no response... She was starting to worry, and then she noticed drops of blood dotting the floor, a trail that hadn't been there earlier but was cause for concern more than relief... She followed it cautiously towards the throne room, careful not to activate another booby trap like that triggered on their arrival... "If Brightsmile thinks tricks of my own design can stop a Princess raised inside these walls, then she underestimates me..." Luna said softly, as she stepped into the old throne room, to be confronted by a seemingly innocent giggle.

"Well of course not, Luna..." Brightsmile said, a truly horrific sight as she sat in Celestia's chair, Scootaloo looking dwarfed as she fidgeted in Luna's... "But I know your end is near," she grinned... Luna had seen Brightsmile's work before, but this was...

This was her most horrifying.

Brightsmile was wearing stockings, striped black and white and made from Zecora's pelt... Pinkie Pie's pelt was tied in an "X" across her chest, holding the still-whole sternum of another pony against her fur, covering her entire front section... Rarity's pelt sewn together as a cape that covered her back and sides, around her neck hung an array of manes and teeth worn like a pashmina... Even to the extent that she'd hastily added Applejack's and Fluttershy's to the vulgar collection.

Scootaloo stood up, her eyes filled with despairing sadness once more, "Luna..." She called out softly, her voice breaking... She was in a dress as well, Applebloom's pelt had been sewn against Rainbow Dash's... The former crossing across her chest like a tabard - complete with bloodstained tools in sewn pockets - and the latter draped across her back, designed to look as if Scootaloo actually possessed wings and a cutie mark not her own... To add insult to injury, Applebloom's bow had been undone and now served as a sash.

"Do you like it?" Brightsmile asked, the crazed smile returned full force, her entire face still stained by the blood of her recent victims. "If Rarity were still alive, I think she would have loved it! I mean, couldn't have finished it without her!" She began to cackle, her throat growing increasingly raspy from all the abuse it had been suffering, turning towards Luna to throw more barbs her way. "How does it feel to know what you failed so many subjects? That they died such horrible deaths and neither you, nor your wretched sister could stop me?"

Luna stood her ground - if anything stepping closer... The words stung, but the fact that the ponies she'd failed were being worn as trophies was hardest to bear... But it wasn't a complete failure yet... She could still bring an end to this! "Brightsmile, I hereby place you under arrest... If you resist, I will be forced to end your life immediately..." She uttered calmly, far calmer than she actually was, and yet still far calmer than she thought was possible in such a situation...

Brightsmile stepped down from the throne and stopped about five feet away from Luna, "If I surrender, my fate will still remain the same... So why not risk death in the most delightful way possible?" She sneered, taking out a knife from a sheath sewn into the stocking on her broken leg... The knife itself was made out of a rib, and the handle tied with a familiar rainbow mane, a purple sword knot attached along the back of the handle.

"So be it..." The Princess said grimly, her horn radiating with magic as she charged, firing a large radius of seething energy at another pony for the first time in a millennia, but Brightsmile vanished just before it hit.

"Did you honestly believe that I would fight you head on?" She laughed at Luna, her voice slightly muffled from where she stood behind the throne, stepping out suddenly with Twilight Sparkle levitated a few inches in front of her, conscious now both with her four legs tied solidly together.

Pressing the tip of her bone knife against Twilight's chest as well, pressing just hard enough to break the skin and let a small amount of blood trickle down across the blade, she laughed again. "It is you who will surrender," Brightsmile said, her laugh turning into a growl. "Or else this shattered pony, the last... Will die in front of your eyes," She sneered, leaving Luna caught in checkmate as she wracked her brain for a solution... The knife pressing ever deeper into Twilight as the seconds passed without one, leaving Twilight with nothing to do but grit her teeth and struggle backwards...

Luna lowered her head slightly, "Alright..." She said softly, "You win, just... Please release her."

Brightsmile's heart was pounding in excitement, pure unadulterated glee stretching her features... While Scootaloo's nearly stopped, actually skipping a beat, Luna was just going to give up...? Just like that? After all she'd do- She was suddenly interrupted as a voice other than her sounded in her thoughts... "Scootaloo," it said, leaving her to blink in confusion. "It's Luna," it - Luna, clarified... "I need you to get that knife away from Brightsmile if we're to have any hope in saving Twilight and stopping her," to which Scootaloo nodded certainly as Brightsmile caught her attention again.

"Sweetie, I need to take care of Luna's horn... We don't want any tricks from her," she said confidentially.

Scootaloo shakily took out her knife and gazed in trepidation at it... So much harm brought by such a simple thing, and she was responsible. "M-Mom," she stuttered, "I don't think I can do it," she said, dropping the knife and taking a brief moment to inwardly rejoice as Brightsmile's jaw dropped... "I mean... That knife is still dull, I don't think I could even make a little cut with it," she added, causing Brightsmile's blackened heart to start beating again.

"O-Of course! Here you are," she said with a small amount of nervous laughter, levitating the dull knife into her own hoof and giving Scootaloo the sharp one... A blade she instantly returned by stabbing it deep into Brightsmile's left foreleg. "That's for making me kill my friend and sister!' Scootaloo screamed, the shocked Brightsmile letting out an agonized scream of her own as Scootaloo struck again, sawing through a tendon with her second blow as she dropped both the knife and Twilight.

"Scootaloo?! What are you doing?!" She cried out, before yanking the knife painfully out of her leg, causing another deep scream to tear itself from her throat. "You... Would betray your mother?"

Brightsmile staggered back to her hooves, putting extra pressure on the fractured leg in an attempt to compensate for her ravaged left, only bringing more than pain than she had in the other to begin with... "Buck!" She cursed, staggering backwards from the other ponies, which were advancing on her - Twilight included as she was freed from her bounds by Luna's own magic. "It's over, Brightsmile," they all said at once

"Ha... Haha, hahaha!" Brightsmile began to laugh hysterically, "Or so you think," she said, strange whispers guiding her actions as she reached a fumbling hoof behind Celestia's throne, making contact with a lever that had been previously hidden by magic but revealed over the centuries since... She herself was utterly unaware of what such a device would do, but the voices provided reassurance, and as she eagerly pulled it, the castle itself seemed to groan and hiss...

Spores began to fill the castle around them, spewing forth in the form of a fog that proceeded to coat the floor and hang thick in the air. "Wh-What is this?" Twilight asked, panic in her voice as she watched them spread across the floor around her hooves. "I don't know myself..." Luna answered cautiously, never taking her eyes off the grinning Brightsmile as she responded, "'Tia must have kept this trap installed here... In case of emergencies."

Luna quickly began charging her horn to unleash a devastating bolt of magic... If these spores were intended to have a negative or dangerous effect on them, then she had to this quickly she reasoned, destructive energies leaping from her horn towards Brightsmile... Only to collide with the spores which shimmered strangely as the spell collided with them, a thunderclap of sound echoing across the enclosed space as a massive wave of overloaded magic that sent Luna, Twilight, and Scootaloo flying across the throne room... Twilight slammed against the ground hard enough to knock the wind from her lungs, Scootaloo sent rolling a few feet behind her until she fetched up against a mound of rubble, knocked out cold.

Luna herself took the worst of the damage, hitting the wall with enough force to cause large gaping cracks in the aged stone that almost made it fall apart atop her... She was unconscious as well, her horn completely blackened with char. And even though all of the spores in the room were gone, they were quickly being replaced as more travelled through the hallways and even arouse from the floor below.

"Hahahaha!!!" Brightsmile laughed again, the mad howling sound strangely muffled in the smog. "And now nopony can stop me!" She said, her grin widening as she took up her knife once more and limped slowly towards Twilight just as she was struggling to rise. "I hope you made peace with yourself, Twili-..." She started to say, coming short as somepony coalesced into being in front of her... Somepony she'd been certain couldn't possibly follow her here... "Applejack!" Brightsmile gasped in disbelief, her eyes glued to the holes in her chest, belatedly realizing that the spirit must be trapped within the castle, spores clinging to her ethereal body as she moved closer...

"I'm not the only one," Applejack said, her accent none the weaker for being recently deceased, "Remember them?" She asked, nodding towards something directly behind Brightsmile... Leaving her hesitant to turn around even as she slowly did so, her heart skipping a beat before picking up in pace faster than ever before... Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy... All her past victims, "No... No, no-no-no! Y-You can't possibly be here!" She shouted in complete horror, limping away from those in front and as well as the one in behind.

"Well we are..." Rarity said, approaching Brightsmile in sync with all the others. Twilight herself was finally standing, staring at her friends and all the others who hadn't yet passed on. "Wait..." She managed to get out, her voice stopping them - all of them, as they turned to face her... "We d-don't need to kill her, even if you're not..." swallowing audibly as she spoke, "...Not alive, what made us the bearers of harmony was not what we were on the outside..." She finished, her sentence hanging in the air as a stiff breeze blew in through a gaping hole in the wall, magical essence itself pouring into the room and sizzling as it made contact with the spores...

"If our Elements could transform Luna from Nightmare Moon, and thaw Sunset Shimmer's frozen heart, we can do the same for Brightsmile!"

A series of loud cracking sounds heralded the arrival of the Elements, clinging to each one of their deceased owners, the spores dulling their radiance as they were clung to in turn, the rest moving up from the ground and depositing themselves around Twilight and what little was left of her horn... A new series of hissing and cracking sounding as they were pushed back when both she and her friends began to levitate upwards, reforming elsewhere on her body...

"W-Wait!" Brightsmile called out, panicked as she was pinned against the wall, her breaths coming fast and shallow as she continued. "If use that much power the spores will kill us all! Look at what damage it dealt to Luna alone!" But none of them listened, only Twilight giving any indication she had heard as she glanced briefly where Luna and Scootaloo lay as they disappeared in a strong flash of magic.

Brightsmile turned towards the hallway to flee, only to be sent skidding backwards as the dead officer blocked her path, knowing that if she attempted to teleport it would backfire... "Buck!" She raged in her mind.

The room began glowing, filling with loud cracks and sparks of energy as the light came into random contact with the spores... "Stop..." Brightsmile pleaded, as a rainbow began to form between the separate Elements, pouring into the focus set in Twilight's crown. "S-Stop!" She called again, desperation cracking her voice as the room brightened tenfold, causing the very foundations of the castle to shake. "STOP!!!"

The spectrum of rainbow-hued explosion would have been visible even as far away as Canterlot, the castle itself was nothing but rubble as the stone and mortar were blown into their constituent parts and almost completely vaporized before reaching ground again... Nothing remained save for Twilight, an unconscious Brightsmile completely stripped of her grotesque dress... And a confused tangle of physically manifested ponies, staring at themselves and each other as the sound of their newly renewed hearts beat in their ears... A broken sort of silence save for Sweetie Belle and Applebloom clinging to their respective sisters, all four crying tears of joy as everypony else gathered for a large hug.

A pained groan cut short their happy moments, they all had momentarily forgotten about Brightsmile herself... "What should we do with her?" Fluttershy asked, cringing backwards behind Applejack at even such an oblique reference to their respective murderer. "She must have been changed now... The Elements of Harmony dispel the darkness that resides in our hearts..."

"I think," Twilight said softly, gazing upwards at her own rejuvenated horn thoughtfully, walking towards the limp form of Brightsmile... "That Celestia should be the one who passes judgment on her," she finished, looking down at her with a practiced neutral expression.

"But with some precautions first... Just in case."

Author's Note:

Mother buck this is a massive chapter! the largest I've ever made.

So much pain, sorrow, yummy ponies, and now...

What will become of our favorite creative killer...?

Credit goes to Crimson Dash with the dress and final trap design.
Same goes towards Ecstatic with the help of creating the chapter and of course editing.
Final credit goes to you guys, readers.You guys helped with what motivation I had to make these chapters!
Thanks for the major help guys!

Comments

[Ecstatic]

I'd just like to point out to everypony that Chapter Six used to contain italics and bolding: Those obviously didn't make it through to the copy-paste (As Cookie sent all these to me for editing, and I sent them back to him)... And obviously reentering those manually would require much double-checking and annoyance... This is also the reason that the paragraphs may have different spacing than you're used to, please don't complain about either of these things.

As such: If you want to imagine certain words/lines in bold (for yelling/shouting/heightened emotion), or certain words/lines italic (for emphasis)... Well, you get where I'm going with this. #Imagination.

And let's see, what's a safe thing to comment on about the story itself? There is a lot of in-character laughter, if you want anything explained (or anything theorized) about events that happen in this chapter: Please use a spoiler tag.

[Cookietheif]

3789143

I'll go through it at some point and add all of those italics and bolds... Just when School has a damn real advisory period so i can have 40 minutes for 2 days to go through it all.

[Cookietheif]

3844468

Thanks! And I know! It would have been fun to see corrupted Flutters

[Ecstatic]

3844468

Don't forget to tell us what you think of chapter six~

So exciting.

I wanted Flutters to escape Chapter 5, honestly, I am an avid Fluttershy fan.

The fact that I proofread what happened to Fluttershy without blowing into a million pieces makes me 20% cooler... Slicing Brightsmile into a similar million pieces sounds satisfying.

[HonorableInsanity]

This is a great story, I really look forward to seeing more when you get it done.

I really like Brightsmile, as crazy as she is. However, I have a feeling she may be joining the list of characters I like who end up with tragic fates, especially after this chapter...

Anyway, keep up the good work!

[exitdoesnotexist]

This was a really cool chapter. Descriptive Pony Cannibalism combined with the fact that all of my favourite ponies came back to life? Hell yeah!

[exitdoesnotexist]

Hoo boy... 3 years. 3 very long years since the last update. 2 similarly long years since the author of this story was even last online. I guess this is just one more of many great stories that will never be finished - forever left on one last cliffhanger.

[exitdoesnotexist]

For real though this comment section is like Pompeii or something. Come back cookietheif pls.

[exitdoesnotexist]

Give it up for year 5! Year 5, everybody! I wonder what happened to cookietheif.