The Cutie Mark Crusaders form a not-so-secret swat team devoted to battling an unknown attack.
I'm rewriting this story, essentially. As such, you see a lot less than there actually is. If you're curious about the story, PM me and I'll show you the rest. And even more, if you'd like to help me out, I would so greatly appreciate it.
The Cutie Mark Crusaders have regrouped after a personal hiatus; after about a year. Two out of the three live their lives according to new—and really not the best—kinds of 'philosophies', but the other member, Apple Bloom, remains totally faithful to her friends and her family.
However, her family isn't in the best shape right now: all of the metaphorical glue that held it together is gone now, and the Apple name doesn't have nearly as great of a reputation as it did years ago, before Apple Bloom was even born. But even more so—Apple Jack is missing, and the Crusaders come to find out that she's in deep trouble.
A powerful, psychic force doesn't make Apple Bloom's life easier during this time of confusion, as it begins to stalk her after she witnesses an event that, while she already questions so much about her life as of late, makes her question reality itself. As the Crusaders' group efforts to find the truth about Apple Jack reach higher and higher grounds, so does the threat that the force poses.
It wants something from Apple Bloom, it seems...and it wants whatever justice it so desires. It won't stop.
“Okay, Crusaders! We need to come up with a new plan!” A heavy slam was heard against the table, the sound reverberating throughout the treehouse: the orange Pegasus filly stated the obvious . . . Again. Complete silence reigned afterwards, but for only a few seconds, as her two friends thought for that moment, however brief it was.
“Cutie Mark, uhm. . ." A curly-haired filly hesitated. "Uhm, pole dancers?” No matter how excruciatingly awful the idea was, she was certain that her idea would have her friends grinning with confidence. "Pole dancing! Yeah, yeah! Why don't we try that one out?!" While the peppy, squeak toy of a filly seemed insanely confident in her idea, the other two fillies were both confused, and a little disgusted, finding her proposal.
“Why would bring that up? I thought we wouldn't ever mention that again. . .”
"Heh, yeah. Besides, we tried that out already. And you even tried it out even more than us!"
There was only a minor, collective fit of laughter, but it was short-lived, as two out of the three of them were being purely fallacious:
—
Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle, and Scootaloo, the leader of their locally-renowned group; ‘The Cutie Mark Crusaders’ had spent endless days—full weeks, even—formulating ideas and clever hypotheses, and hard. They literally spent their days either in their clubhouse up in the trees, or out in the open, putting their forged-in-fire theories to the test.
Their clubhouse—earning the simple nickname 'the place' by the aging fillies—was no longer bound to the ground as it once was before. The 'young mares', as they preferred to be called, had learned how to seclude their weighty 'hideout' in the greenery of the trees, or whatever pigment the leaves took, if any; the weather was taking on early signs of winter, and there were much fewer leaves than normal. And even if everypony knew that their 'hideout' was in fact the opposite of a 'hideout', it was still 'kickass' to 'hide' up in the 'shelter'.
Their goal was simple . . . Except it wasn't. They vowed that, within the month they re-formed their group, they would find out what each of their special talents were, or at the very least, one of theirs. Scootaloo herself was the most adamant and pushy of the three of them, shoving aside any signs of what she personally thought would be negativity and despair, and replacing them with tough, choice words of encouragement, strewn together in a surprisingly cohesive sentence or two. She knew that there was always something out there to try; she knew that they had to do always be doing something. Their reputation was on the line at all times.
See, whenever anypony needed any kind of help, they would be called to the scene They held themselves to that personal standard every day, and they really did mean 'any' kind of help. They highly preferred helping those few bare-flanked members of their graduating class discover their own special talent, but most of them left before the group was re-formed. And over time, being a socially favorable 'friend' to their community lightened their toughened hearts, and became just another service they were proud to employ.
But, over three whole weeks of near nonstop energy-burning activities, their inspiration began to weaken and fade. Their often stumbled-upon ideas and more frequent calls for help had finally gotten to wearing them down, and that's really saying something—coming from a group whose original motto was going to be 'We'll blow you away. . .better than anypony else!!' Though, in their defense, it was Sweetie Belle who originally came up with that one.
However, even the dirty-minded mare grew tired as she kept pursuing her not-so-hidden hidden interest of dancing around a pole. . .of all possible things, and even those many, many ideas filthier than that. But hey, she was convinced that it was in her best interest to keep at it; that she just might need a little bit more practice and 'flair' each time. Well, that time had turned into bit of a nuisance, and her fellow Crusaders had agreed, that from that moment on, to just accept her way of thinking, and simply move on.
—
“You know," Sweetie thought, out loud. "Maybe I just have to make somepony fall head over hooves for me, maybe then I’ll get my Cutie Mark!” She squealed excitedly. "You know, actual love stuff!"
“But ‘Se2’. . .You know you're makin’ us look bad when ya do that. And everyone knows you’re a part of our group.”
Apple Bloom used Sweetie’s nickname, and that meant she was being serious in her complaint, despite not seeming forceful at all. Both the unicorn and the pegasus had a nickname that correlated with two of the same letters in their name repeating in two separate instances. The names were originally devised when they all imagined a time where they would need to use them during undercover missions and the like—anything that would have been considered 'totally awesome', and required them to be super sneaky.
“Well, there probably are a lot more possibilities in the same field. . .” Sweetie continued, pondering her thoughts vocally.
Scootaloo spoke up this time, as she came leaning forward in a swivelling chair. "So hey, you're implying that you're gonna whore yourself out, huh?"
"Well hey, whatever it takes. Scoots! I'm willing to make the sacrifices for us."
"So. . .you're willing to take all the blows, per se?"
"Either that, or I'll sure as heck give all the blows!"
Scootaloo suddenly leaned her back into her chair, muffling a fit of laughter underneath her hoof as she swivelled the back of the chair to the group.
Apple Bloom, however, had a blank mind upon listening to them conclude their little chat. She rarely ever joined a conversation that openly warranted sexual jokes and innuendos; all she really ever listened for was her name. And even then, she wasn't too keen on responding, because she knew that she'd be dragged into a question she couldn't—or didn't want to—answer, or a statement she couldn't—or didn't want to—understand. She just wasn't a very big fan of the subject; she always found ways to keep herself busy otherwise.
"You guys are driving me nuts," Scootaloo joked. "Jeezums."
“Hehe. . ."
Apple Bloom knew the sound of that giggle, for sure; "Welp, she's up and running now."
"Going, going, gone. Only she never really needs to gothere."
"Oh my. . . !" Sweetie continued giggling, seemingly without the need to take any air in.
"Yep, she's that fast, hun."
Over the years, Sweetie Belle and her entire demeanor had changed drastically. She was no longer the sweet, innocent Unicorn she was before; the one that dreamed of being a fabulous fashion designer like her older sister. Once Fluttershy gave the group a minor biology lesson about baby fillies and baby colts, and where they came from, and how they were made, she was the only one out of the three who was completely fascinated with the disgusting truth.
Sweetie Belle had grown to accept that truth, but now, not an hour goes by when she isn't. . .sexually stable, with correlating thoughts never to be tame again. To say the very, very least.
“I’m gonna drive these nuts in your face, Scootaloo,” the lewd Unicorn taunted
“Guys! Stop it! Everypony can hear us. . .” Apple Bloom really wasn't a fan of the topic. Not a bit. Though, it would have been easier to tolerate if Sweetie wasn't shouting out for the whole town to hear.
Scootaloo responded, but she sided with Sweetie's call, and not with Apple Bloom's “Well, maybe. . .maybe after we get those marks on our asses, then maybe I'll give you some more marks on yours.”
“Guy, come on. . . !" Apple Bloom cried out to them. She would never get in between those two when they had entered a conflict, because, again she would be dragged into it. Even though Apple Bloom's trains of thought changed after hearing the same story that Sweetie had, she didn't focus on the topic at all—unlike Sweetie.
After the incident—the one that her and Sweetie Belle called the 'terrible truth', though their opinions varied—Apple Bloom dove into topic in secrecy. She adopted Twilight Sparkle, their Unicorn neighbor with unmatched magical talent, as her 'part-time' big sister and mentor, after her own blood sister Applejack suddenly disappeared one day. Apple Bloom was certain, though, that she would be back, and that her reasoning was urgent. She had taken abrupt leaves before, especially with her being a sixth of the world's global defense.
On occasion, she asked Twilight if she could spend a few nights at her place, though it soon became a constant routine. The mare would almost always oblige, as she was quite honored to have someone like Apple Bloom to be another one of her 'big helpers'. Spike, the little dragon who lived with her, insisted on the use of the term 'big helper', as being a 'little' one was both demeaning and embarrassing, and he was one of the only two reasons Apple Bloom really wanted to spend time with him and the Unicorn; both correlating to the fact that she had a crush on him.
Her primary, ulterior motive for her time spent their place was to sneak down to the library portion of their home at night, sit her butt down, and read her fair share—and more—about the forbidden laws of sex and reproduction. She never exerted her secret interest in the subject until night fell, and they were both asleep. Twilight told her that the library was open to her at all times, but she obviously felt the need to be sneaky because of what knowledge she was after.
Eventually, she would put all that knowledge to very good use. Eventually, she would have Spike.
“What?!” Sweetie squealed, in a manner that made her sound offended. “You mean it??” She wasn't.
“Yeah, I’d tap that ass again after all this time we've been together.”
Apple Bloom piped up, instead of doing so in her head. "Wait, again?"
“Hey!! Maybe we can get 'AB' in it, too!”
Apple Bloom whimpered—she spoke up during the conversation, and now Sweetie Belle was after her like a shark.
“Uhmm. Se2. I don’t do three ways.”
"Have you ever triiiiiied a three-way sex party?" She was a total savage.
"Well, I'd definitely be part of it if there were penises involved, but I don't think it'd be very fun with two other pussies, not that I'm calling you guys pussies, but-"
"But we have them is what you mean," Sweetie interrupted. "Well, you know Ihave one."
"Yes, sweetie, I know you have one."
"But what about heeeeerrrrrr?" She nodded toward Apple Bloom, who looked Scootaloo dead in the eyes, across their distance.
"Sweetie, she doesn't really care for this kind of stuff, and hey AB," she called to her. "we appreciate that you put up with our crap, don't we, Sweetums?"
“Then I’m stumped. Stumped, I say!”
"But yeah, AB, if you were off your guard now, you'd better sleep under all the covers you have. I can't keep her away forever."
Apple Bloom blushed just a tiny bit. "Heh . . . I appreciate it, So."
Regardless of the comfort she was given, Apple Bloom didn't want the rest of the town to hear any more of Sweetie's perverted rants than they already have, hearing them go on long enough. She proceeded to gently shove the windows down into their slots within the sils, but she hesitated to do so: there was a stallion standing outside; she recognized him as mister Carrot Cake from the nearby bakery, as both the colors of his hair and his fur resembled that of the seasonal treat. He looked up at her, and from the distance between them, she assumed that he gave her a quizzical sort of look, mixed in with a hint of concern plastered all over his face.
She now decided to thoroughly scan the area outside, and immediately upon doing so, she saw another adult, approaching mister Cake. It was none other than his wife, misses Cup Cake. With her pastel-blue coat, and a mane that whipped itself upon her head, it was rather difficult not to notice her. Apple Bloom began to wonder why they were here, with plenty of concern of her own. She tried to call her friends to her side, but to no avail could she manage: the two were still at war with their differing opinions on a multitude of lewd topics, and Scootaloo was the one 'on top'.
Scootaloo seemed to disregard the apparent traumatization that her friends had gone through—that is to say, she was also passive about it, like Apple Bloom was, but also much more tame than Sweetie Belle. She thought it was interesting, and that she would passively pursue an interest that wouldn't cause a figurative kink—or a literal one—in her relationship with her friends. Her exact opinion, on sex and the like, was made out to be. . .the use of her body and lust to get what she wanted. From manipulating colts with her words to coming close to having to actually use her body, she found the thrill of it to be very pleasurable.
But even more pleasurable than all that was when she discovered how to. . .manipulate her own body, all on her own. There was one day, just before the name 'Cutie Mark Crusaders' was coined and used once more, where she went missing for an entire day. She had kept Sweetie Belle as a fairly close friend during that time, but her and Apple Bloom eventually grew apart for reasons not her own.
Nevertheless, Scootaloo kept using the country filly's clubhouse as her home, every now and then. She had nowhere else to go, honestly, but she felt safe there—safe and hidden enough for her to try something she'd kept in her mind for a while: masturbation. She went into expecting ease, but that just wasn't the case for her. But after a while, Sweetie Belle, being as spontaneous as the flirty comments she'd share with her friend, showed up and left Scootaloo breathless.
She wasn't sure why, but fear consumed her, but Sweetie just . . . Well, she did what she, in her controversial mindset, thought was appropriate. All in all, that night was a 'magical' experience for those two young fillies. . .
However, unlike the Unicorn, Scootaloo didn't obsess over the experience. Sure, she thought it was the most awesome evening in her life, but she chose not to talk about it at all after that. It was their little secret, but if other ponies were to find out, she wouldn't care all that much, as it'd make her more 'mature and experienced'.
Utterly frustrated, Apple Bloom resisted the urge to swear. Considering her nature, she almost never did, but sometimes, one would slip out. She continued to try and snap her friends out of their blind conversation, and she actually did so when she decided to scream at the top of her lungs, syllable by syllable. But first, she gently closed the window, as she had intended to do earlier—
“Can. You! Please!! Listen!!" Whenever she screamed like that, she drew their attention in an instant, freezing them in place. Scootaloo was pinned to the wall, and Sweetie Belle had her hooves on her shoulders. They both knew Apple Bloom was being dead serious, and they honestly freaked; they let go of each other and started walking toward her, apologizing in their own unique way. And in herown unique way, she was technically the leader of the Cutie Mark Crusaders, but she was too quiet and passive to take the kind of 'charge' that Scootaloo recommended she did.
“Apple Bloom?” She heard the raspy, masculine voice of mister Cake call to her, at which point she had turned her attention to him, opening the window back up and making her own apology:
"Heh. . .sorry ya had to bear witness to that."
"Uhm," A slur of uncertainty was all that escaped his mouth. As his wife met his side, he began to come closer to the tree's base, making Apple Bloom. "AppleBloom?"
“Yeah?” She leaned her neck to look down at the adult from her height. “What’s up?” As the stallion hesitated to respond, Scootaloo interjected:
“You are, doofus.” She violently rubbed her hoof over Apple Bloom’s head, roughing up her mane's appearance. "Who're you talking to over here?" They looked down the window as a pair this time, but they did not see mister Cake anywhere.
"Wait, but he was just here. Wasn't he?"
AppleBloom. . .
The filly heard her name, and it sounded like it was totally muffled through the building's walls. At that moment, she was certain that her head felt heavy, in some way. She quickly deduced that it was recovery from her screaming and dismissed it. "They're probably out the other window," she said as she headed toward the other end of the clubhouse.
Just as she thought, she saw the couple walking away as she opened the other window, looking down at them. “Come down here, please. . ." Misses Cake beckoned to her once more.
Scootaloo's impatience peaked before AppleBloom's did, leading her to head toward the clubhouse door, with the dead intent to greet the Cakes'—nicely, of course. Sweetie Belle agreed to come along, too, as those those two were almost inseparable, but the only way she was going to follow her was with her hooves wrapped around Scootaloo's legs. It slowed them down considerably, but the Cakes' weren't going anywhere.
Apple Bloom felt a strange need to take her time and survey the situation further. Even now, she wasn't going to disobey orders from adults, but still, their demeanor left her rather phased. She saw her friends heading down the ramp that led to the ground, where she saw Scootaloo apologizing to them for Sweetie's behavior. It was then she decided to head outside herself, where quiet conversations became audible.
When her hooves touched the grass, it immediately grew quiet again, but mister cake broke the silence when his gaze met hers, with tears in his eyes. “Apple Bloom,” he repeated her name once more, before his wife interjected. Mister Cake started to cry again. Apple Bloom's friends each looked at the mare.
All three of the fillies asked the couple, in unison; "What's up?"
“Apple Bloom must be coming along with us now,” she told them, with all but cheerful hints in her voice. She then looked at her once again “We’ll tell you on the way. We’re going to the park, but not to play. . ."
"Not to play," Mr. Cake repeated. "No . . . Not to play." From the look in his eyes, he looked like he hadn't slept in days. His face looked rather ragged making him seem generally worn out.
Scootaloo finally broke free from Sweetie Belle's tight, constricting grasp. She took her to the side. “AppleBloom," she asked. "What’s going on? Did you do something. . .or something?”
“Ah, . . . I don't know.” She refused to waste any more time and just decided to join the Cakes' side. "I guess I'll see you later, guys." She developed a somber tone of her own. She was soon guided away by the adult mare, who stayed silent as she comforted her husband as he continued to linger in sadness. Her friends just watched as she walked away with the adults, and she looked back at them, too. They didn't know whether they should be concerned or scared, or anything of the sort. Even Sweetie Belle put on a serious face upon seeing the dire question in AppleBloom’s face, as she gave them one final glance before she disappeared from sight.
But clearly, something serious was happening if Scootaloo, the group's 'fearless' leader, received a bone paralyzing chill in her wings, during the whole ordeal. It just seemed so. . .odd and unnatural.
{----- [[[[[-Interval=00_INTRODUCTION (prologue pt. II)-]]]]] -----}
As Apple Bloom followed mister and misses Cake, along the narrow dirt path, she kept the idea of this sudden, seemingly urgent trip fresh in her mind. She kept on pondering their insistence on such a simple trip to the park. She certainly remembered it very fondly, as it was very close to her old school, where she met her two childhood friends, Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo. However, with the demeanor that the two adults at her side had shown, she was only left to keep theorizing a valid purpose for the trip. The couple was silent, though they offered an explanation before they left—but they hadn't spoken since then.
She didn't know what to think, or how to, frankly; her strange summoning had left her feeling a little light-headed and weak all of a sudden. She kept walking with the two adults, but she ended up falling behind, as she found herself suddenly lost in nostalgia:
On the right side of the trail they walked along was the school that she graduated from, just years ago. She had the memories engraved in her mind from those six years; from when she met Sweetie and Scootaloo. They were her best friends in the world, and they helped make those six years much more tolerable. With their newfound friendship, they felt on top of the world, and, while they weren't troublemakers by any means, there was one filly that tried to bully them, but the three would always send her home scrambling to come up with a new plan to foil their popularity among all their peers.
By themselves, though, they were harmless—mostly.
Sadly, though, her memories were only to remain memories: the school was burned down, completely reduced to nothing more than a huge pile of rubble that built upon itself. The charred-looking remains made its fate entirely evident to the filly.
She walked on by as she also examining the remains, not knowing how long it could have been like this. She got to thinking, when suddenly, she felt something moving against her scalp, as if Scootaloo was giving her another one of her 'noogies'. AppleBloom looked ahead at the Cakes, who only continued to walk ahead. She slowed her pace and knelt forward, lowering her head to the ground, and out slid a small electronic device. It was a mobile phone that, while bulkier than her friends', could still be hidden inside her mane very well. It was still vibrating, rumbling inches along the ground, and a blue light started to blink along the edges. The Cakes' only continued to walk forward.
Apple Bloom's childish instincts kicked in: she picked her phone up with the cleft of her hoof, and, while anticipating the Cakes' to look back at her, she pretended to cough into her hoof as if she were ill, hiding the phone behind her head. But still, the adults weren't paying her any more mind than they had before; it's like they were being held against their will or something. Though her imagination knew little bounds, Apple Bloom put the childish idea aside. And she kept her suspicions about them, but she continued to follow them, only from the distance they now shared.
Within seconds of catching up, Apple Bloom stopped once again and paid mind to her mobile device. She brought its five-inch reflective surface to her muzzle, to which she applied light pressure to. Suddenly, an image of Sweetie Belle appeared, signifying that the filly was calling her from the white Unicorn; it was rather instantaneous, in fact, that the image itself made her cringe a little bit:
The picture featured Sweetie Belle as a bit of a sexual tease, and, with it fresh in Apple Bloom's mind, it actually made her cringe every time she saw it. The filly was lying down on her back; her forelegs were bent to hold her head up, and her corresponding rear legs were wide open. The only good thing Apple Bloom deduced from the picture was the fact that she was wearing clothing—albeit skimpy—between her legs. Apple Bloom never looked at the picture directly, as she never had gotten up to changing her picture. Sweetie Belle messed with her device weeks ago, and she hadn't figured out how to undo her prank. Regardless, she looked forward to seeing what Sweetie had to say; her calls weren't always of great importance, but she hoped that it was this time around.
She brought her phone to her nose and tapped its 'accept' icon, to which a microphone suddenly protruded from her ear, extending all the way to side of her cheek, close to her mouth. She moved her mane away from her ear so that there was no weight on the wireless receiver clipped onto her, and she adjusted the microphone as well, bringing it a little closer to her lips. Finally, she pulled an elastic bit that stuck out on the side of her phone's solid, black case. She pulled on it until she could not pull anymore, and with it being a Velco-type contraption, she carefully looped it around the top of her neck, having to briefly stand on her hind legs to do so. It was a loose fit, but it would hold: the study of technology had only recently started to take off, and thus, nothing was perfect.
She continued on her way, the Cakes' barely in sight over the hill she was approaching.
“Zzzzt . . . AppleBloom.”
Scootaloo's voice spoke to her instead, and this led to great relief, as she never felt protected while talking to Sweetie by herself. However, the distortion in her voice was both present as well as it was amplified as she walked along the trail.
“What’s going on?? I've b--- try---g to zzzzzt-rea---you. ZZZZZZZ . . . ZZZZ P-----me?” The call was instantly dropped.
“Ophh, gosh darn it!”
All the gusts that blew past her ear were presumably interrupting the wireless reception. She thought of returning the call, but just as she reached for her phone again, she heard Scootaloo's voice through the speaker once more. It wasn't every day that the wireless communication failed like it just did, especially considering the short distance that was between the two fillies, but it was always quick to pick itself up again.
"Are you okay?" Scootaloo's voice was much clearer this time around, but static still remained in their connection. Apple Bloom hurried her pace and was about to speak, but she was cut off from her friend once more.
"For the most part," she responded, to herself alone.
She finally passed the school’s miserable scene, conquering an awkward feeling of nostalgia as well, and she proceeded to walk up a short hill. As she reached the top, she gazed over the downward slope and admired the colorful park that laid upon the flat valley. It was the town's biggest attraction for all the younger fillies, although she would occasionally pay a visit to the big tire swings. She was older, but that didn't mean she had to give up anything she knew she enjoyed in her foalhood.
However, the colors of all the attractions and the excitement of all the children seemed to be absent. She peered through a large stretch of rope that was part of the playground, and she saw a number of ponies gathered close together. She approached, her curiosity and confusion both taking a passive hold over her.
What the heck was going on?
She walked down the hill, almost slipping; she had kept her eyes on the the ponies she knew were there. She clumsily made it down onto the park's grounds, surrounded by other hills all around, and now she was seeing a few more ponies congregate into a crowd that was growing, on the other side of the playground. She continued her approach, but a stallion with a somber expression took her from behind and left her no way to walk but forward, along with him. Apple Bloom read his face with absolute certainty: this stallion was devastated. She didn't utter but a word.
They circled around the plastic stubs that separated the playground from the rest of the land, and past the double-helix slide, she saw the backs of many more ponies than she'd originally surmised to be present. They were all wearing black, highly contrasting against the color of their own fur. Apple Bloom put her phone away: she knew what this was, or what it resembled:
This was a funeral . . . A funeral at the park. . .
Of all places to hold a funeral. . .why the park?
"Come." Mrs. Cake's voice was the only one that passed through the air. Apple Bloom made her way through the quiet crowd, toward her voice. It was made easy, as all the adults moved out of her way. This was definitely strange; she felt incredibly light and frail, as if she were dreaming. “Everyone would appreciate it if you’d pay your due respects.”
“Uhm. . .” She slurred through her sense of dizziness. "Alright. If you. . .say so."
So this was a funeral, but who was it for? She felt no remorse, as she had none of the answers she craved.
She got closer, and through the shrinking amount of ligaments, she started to see a brown, almost auburn-colored object in the middle of the crowd. Mrs. Cake's voice grew ever clearer, and so did the object she kept her eyes on. The more steps she took, the more pieces she put together: she saw that she had laid her sight on the casket, but she clearly wasn't the only one. Everyone on the opposite side of it had their somber gaze upon it.
Flowers were thoroughly scattered along the ground, surrounding the casket on all of its sides. The direction that Apple Bloom approached from, however, was littered with rose petals instead; the grass underneath could not be seen, and it looked as if she would just fall into the earth when she stepped on them. Mrs. Cake beckoned her still, and the filly walked over the petals, as if the thought of falling was no longer there. She dismissed it as another crazy thought, and she dismissed everything, really. She had a terrible need to know what she had stumbled upon: the what, the who, and the why.
Finally, with a heavy weight in her chest, her hooves came to the end of the scarlet trail. She looked around her one more time, and she saw that everyone was still, and everything was totally silent. Everypony's eyes were on her; she could both see and feel them on her. This creeped her out without a doubt, but she forced herself through the fright of all those eyes on her, watching her hesitate. The casket laid open for her, for whenever she decided she was ready, but her heavy heart was thumping within her chest, making her feel like she was in some kind of danger. She started to feel sick, weak. She looked inside.
She flinched. "No." She slammed her eyes shut. "No. . . !
A concoction of sadness, fear, and a remaining sense of uncertainty proved to be potent, leaving Apple Bloom with tears welled up in her eyes. "No!" she cried, but it was to no one's avail—especially not to the mare who laid inside.
"No!!"
The once endlessly jovial mare, an element to the entire world that was Pinkie Pie. . .was finally laid to rest. For good. The bright, pastel pink colors that defined her by name were no longer present in her coat, her hair; everything about her was without color, much like the surroundings. Her body looked to be decomposing at Apple Bloom's sight onto her. The distortion of her remains drove Apple Bloom's sight away from her, and with everypony else still staring at her, she slowly looked back at the deceased mare.
Her mane, half deflated already, collapsed underneath her head as it finished flattening itself out, as it normally would when she would grow discouraged in her life. Apple Bloom was deeply disturbed to witness all this and more, but then Pinkie's closed eyes began sinking inside her skull, and the filly's stomach sank. Her heart raced, her teeth chattered, and her mind fluttered around in a conglomeration of emotions. The colorless foliage in the trees swayed, as an ever-approaching wind personified the effect that Pinkie's death had on her. The temperature dropped drastically and the air became incredibly thin, and Apple Bloom could feel that as well. And among all these effects, she finally overcame the initial shock and could actually compose her thoughts and her words. She didn't speak much, but she felt alleviated when she cried. This was too reminiscent of her grandmother's funeral, a few months back.
The sun was setting at her back, and she stayed longer than she had originally intended. fear and uncertainty no longer plagued her mind and her heart. She remembered asking, with the clearest memory;
"Who could have done this? Why would they??"
But. . .that was also hours ago.
-----
It was now a perfect dark; no moon nor stars were present in the sky, if there even was a sky to look up to. Apple Bloom found herself leaning her head over the casket, still looking upon the inside, but she pulled away, utter shock coursing through her. She saw the darkness all around her, and nothing more than that. Further confusion saturated her thoughts: she knew that she hadn't been there long enough for the sky to go completely dark. And she didn't merely shrug this off, either—she full-on panicked. She literally couldn't even see her own hoof in front of her face when she tried. Feeling cold and vulnerable, she aimlessly wandered in the darkness with no more of a light source than the dim screen of her phone, which she had to keep tapping so it didn't fade and disappear. It proved to be only a bit reliable, as bright as she always had it.
After what she assumed was a single minute, she finally saw something on the ground, in the distance: rose petals had littered the ground in a slim, narrow path. Apple Bloom instinctively headed toward it, shining the shallow light on the ground. She saw the grass she was about to step over, and she felt it under her hooves, too. She assumed she was still in 'the real world', as she compared her knowledge of the whole evening to some kind of twisted dream, where Pinkie Pie was dead. Her breathing was the only thing she could hear, as there was nothing but the suffocating darkness around her.
When she began to walk along the path of crimson petals, she saw something else ahead of her; something that didn't fit in with the darkness at all. She made out a few features, and deduced that she was walking back to the park's playground, and upon a few more steps, a dark-grey haze started to gradually brighten the air. Standing upon the petals that still covered the ground, she saw the eleven-foot-tall spiraling slide and all the steps that led up to it. adjacent to it, she saw the set of three tire swings, all aligned with each other, unmoving. In fact, the still air grew thick and suffocating as well, but Apple Bloom kept herself moving, hoping to find salvation in some way or another.
She investigated, roaming free around all the park's attractions, desperately looking for anyone who might have been around. The loneliness was getting to her; she felt isolated for all the wrong reasons, as if she'd been left behind for some reason or another. Everyone had left the scene of Pinkie's funeral, and, again, all she could do was ask herself why. However, when she hopped onto one of the still tire swings, she spotted somepony across the way, standing just outside the plastic stubs in the ground.
"Hey!" she called out loud. "Where'd everyone go?!" Her hasty cries warranted a response, but she didn't receive one at all. She quickly hopped off and trotted forward, and she called out once more, as she figured out who it was she saw. "Mister Cake! What happened??" Again, no response was given, and the more she approached, the more the stallion seemed to disappear into the haze, looking as if he was walking backwards. "Where are you going??" She stopped: he realized how far away he was. She grew tired from searching all around, only to find someone who would not provide her with any answer she desired. But when she reached the end of the park's grounds, she felt a force holding her within those very grounds.
The rose petals on the ground apparently marked the end of the playground area, where she was supposedly trapped in. She tried and tried to push through the invisible barrier, but it threw her back like rubber. She fell onto her stomach, her face buried in pieces of the red flowers. It was two seconds after she fell that she heard a voice this time; a short, playful giggle. It was the way there was a rough snort in-between that made Apple Bloom lift her head with haste.
"What the heck was that?!" She knew that very same laugh, but, with her priority being finding answers, she hadn't recognized it instantaneously. But she knew she would have otherwise. She looked all around, as the sound resonated throughout.
"Pinkie. . . ? She uttered the name, and she was greeted with a grim visual, as she turned her head a few more times:
Pinkie Pie's body stood at the very edge of the rose petals, looking at her with empty, wide eyes that were filled with a black nothingness, and similar, wide and open smile that was also totally dark. She was uncomfortably close to Apple Bloom, but the filly didn't move an inch; she only rose to her hooves. The two stared at each other for a while before Pinkie decided to walk just outside the invisible barrier that stood between them. She kept her gaze on the filly, tilting her head in an unnatural manner. She started laughing at her again, and it prompted Apple Bloom to stretch the distance between them as best she could. However, when she stretched her own legs and started running away from her, she felt liquid at her hooves; thick, heavy liquid. It was the same color as the rose petals were.
It was blood, and It was everywhere she could possibly turn.
She cried out in fear as all this was happening around her. She begged for this terrible nightmare to stop; she put all her faith into the belief that this was, in fact, a nightmare. Eventually, however, she stumbled across another wooden casket, only smaller this time. It literally came out of nowhere, it seemed, and she literally stumbled onto it. Shocked, she traced her sight to the contents inside, and her dead grandmother laid inside, shocking her to the core. This was all so close to the pain and the remorse she held for her, and it only stacked onto the stress she bore on her shoulders.
She screamed out loud, "This has to be fake!!", and filled with anger, she struck the casket with her right hoof, then backed away, turning herself around, and suddenly, every pony was back in their place, like before, but only much closer. They looked at her with blank faces, their eyes all laid on her, never one of them blinking nor moving. Apple Bloom wasn't trapped forever, though, as the crowd of ponies suddenly burst into flames, their bodies just vanishing. She flinched as there was a slight quake in the ground as it happened, tough ripples splashing against her legs, and she panicked, thinking of what she should do. It instantly grew to be sweltering—comfortably hot—but it also took no time at all to attempt to burn her. There was very little opening in the wall of fire, but she launched herself through it regardless: it was the only thing that came to her frantic mind. She fell back onto the ground, but on her hooves this time. She knew her mane had gotten burned just a bit, but when she took in her surroundings, she feared for both her hair, and her life.
Everything around her was on fire. From the limits of the playground, to the attractions themselves, everything was ablaze. A giant wall of fire stretched in a shallow arc along those very limits, surrounding the area and threatening to keep her there, to burn her alive. The fire spread even faster, as the rose petals returned to litter the ground once more, but in greater numbers than before. So many of them were catching fire so quickly, making it harder for Apple Bloom to navigate the maze of fire. She turned and decided to run alongside the tallest, most saturated wall of fire to her left, looking for an opening in the flames, however small it would be. She stumbled a bit, with how exhausted she had come to be. The fire seemed to chase her as she only kept her eyes on the ground ahead, keeping the peripherals of her vision open for a way out.
She could see Pinkie Pie running alongside her, divided by the fire, with all her terrifying facial features to continue haunting Apple Bloom. She was directly adjacent, looking to be running toward her, following her movements along the fire, but she stayed ahead of her the whole time, threatening her with a wicked smile that was so surreal. In her exhausted, half-mind of a state, she made out the bodies of the Cake couple laying on the ground, and then more and more ponies alongside them. She paid them little mind as she was already physically stressed enough as it was, but she did keep the Cakes' bodies in mind—the flesh on their bodies being eaten by the flames. Their own horrific faces that raced by her stuck with her, and she would have ran faster if she physically could, but her legs felt closer to collapsing than jumping over more hurdles.
Apple Bloom had to stop running. Her lungs seemed to be turned to stone, with how heavy her chest felt. And her heart was all the same, seemingly beating out of belief. She slowed down and looked to her right, at the burning playground. With a bit of remorse came a substantial amount of concern when she saw children running for their lives, also carrying flames on their backs. They all seemed to run toward her, and her concern turned to guilt when she heard many voices scream many variants of; "There she is! Get her!!"
And there were so many children, screaming her name and swearing that they would kill her. She had no idea why, or what she had done, or, in this twisted nightmare, what this could have represented—but they were coming for her. She could hardly run anymore, and when she brought herself to try, she stumbled on somepony's burning corpse. She managed to get up on her hooves again, but it took her quite some time, and now the army of foals were much closer. She could make out their faces, and most of them were ones she recognized: Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon, her school bullies, Featherweight, and even little Pip, the very colt she sat in front of at school.
But she also saw the angry faces of Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo. It was as if they had never known her, shouting the same death threats as the others. She wanted so desperately to deny her exertion, but it wasn't possible to ignore sprained tendons in her leg. She limped away, but the children were almost caught up to her. She looked back, hearing their terrible threats get closer and closer. She had the strongest feeling that this was the end of her life, and all the strain on her body was so incredibly realistic, assuming this was a nightmare as she prayed for it to be.
They were now mere feet away from her, but now it was Pinkie Pie who suddenly appeared in front of them. She was charging at her with her eyes open wide, her mane flat and flopping against one side of her face. The whites of her eyes and her toothy, dirty smile were all she saw during the split-second flash. She felt Pinkie's body crash into hers, also made incredibly lifelike with a strike to her face.
Everything faded to black, at that moment.
Apple Bloom awoke on her back, surrounded by a suffocating darkness again. It was hard for her to move, but she saw a few pinpricks of light above her. She reached out toward it, and she felt her lift something with ease, like a plastic slab. Sunlight rushed inside the walls to shine on her face, and as she flinched, she sat up and peeked her head into the light. The first thing she saw was a row of trees ahead to her front, an upward hill to her sides, and the park to her back. She looked upon where she laid, with it's physical barriers and all, and she was quick to hop out: it was the coffin that Pinkie laid inside before the nightmare started. She knew it was just a bad dream!
But. . .how did it start? If the park was just as she remembered, why did she wake up inside that coffin?
"I hear voices. . .”
Apple Bloom froze in place as her spine was chilled down to its core. Somepony was speaking out loud, with a clear shrill in his or her voice. She strolled around for a bit, eager to get out of the park, and preferrably in the daylight. The voice, however, piqued her interest, and she found the source much sooner than she anticipated.
"They say they know you. . .”
She saw someone huddled up against the back of the coffin. "Who. . .are you? Hello?" The lid obscured the majority of her body, and only her mane was draped over it. However, just based off of it, she knew who was talking; she suddenly froze in place, then slowly backed away.
Pinkie Pie.
"They say you killed me. . . ," she said, almost whispering. The filly didn't understand how her voice was carried like it was—like a reverberating whisper—but she kept backing up slowly, keeping her eyes on her. She didn't want to imagine what kind of face she must have had this time around, dream or no dream. Had she even died at all?
Pinkie Pie turned her head, looking past the lid to the coffin. She looked terribly cold, and, even from a distance, Apple Bloom's spine once again chilled to its core. Her mane still covered half of her face, and she wore the same smile as she did in her nightmare—perhaps it was bigger and much more disturbing, the latter effect amplified by her wide-open eyes staring at her.
"Apple Bloom."
Their contact never broke once until the filly turned tail and ran away, to which Pinkie did not move from her seat on the grass. She only continued to watch her run away from the direction whence she came.
She was afraid, and she had every natural—and supernatural—reason to be.
Apple Bloom was running; sprinting away from something. She had no idea what she had encountered back at the park, but whatever it was, it scared her to death. In her mind, she put herself farther away than she really was, however, passing the wrecked school grounds to her right, which only marked a hypothetical 'halfway point'. She hadn't missed the feeling of her lungs working themselves way past their limit, but she felt the need to keep herself running, exhausted as she was.
She really was scared to death.
She soon began to reach the clubhouse again, but she still ran: she wouldn't stop until she saw either of her friends, in their non-violent, realistic selves. Like the whole trip, she kept her head down out of instinct, but she came to an instant halt when she bashed her head into something—
Something rather plush, fortunately for her.
"Heeey, App!!” Sweetie Belle called, happy to see her again. Apple Bloom rammed headfirst into the Unicorn’s rear end, as the filly's tail swung to the side at the worst possible time. "Where have you been??"
“Oh . . . Hey!" she responded, trying her best to keep her exhaustion to herself. She clearly couldn't, but the shock that one of her friends was still alive and as she remembered—even though it was Sweetie Belle, in all her perverted nature—relieved her more than it brought her closer to a heart attack. She had all the reason in the world to think that it had gone straight to hell. It hadn't, apparently, and Apple Bloom was left in slightly less confusion than before, but still enough to have her fallen onto her butt and stuttering within her words. Sweetie Belle only stared at her.
“Do that again,” she said with a sly grin, associatede with her silly request. Sweetie acted as if she were completely oblivious to the fact that something was clearly wrong with her friend, but she wasn't: the Unicorn knew the times to take matters seriously, and this was one of them. "Hey Apple Bloom," she started up again. "You really don't look so good." She prompted herself to assume that there was a reason she was out of breath. She turned to walk toward the path she came from. "There's a reason why you didn't get Scootaloo's calls?" It's been a while."
“Se2!" Apple Bloom threw herself at Sweetie to stop her. "Don’t. . .go that way.” She pointed her foreleg toward the path she came from. “The old school . . . Ah' think it's haunted or somethin'." However, she just laughed and made fun at her ridiculous assumption.
“Really??" she gasped in surprise. "Like, our school?"
"Yeah, but I dunno. . .but there's somethin' out there that's out to get me and I have to hide!" Apple Bloom shouted. She circled around Sweetie, and then around the side of the tree, toward the catwalk leading up to the clubhouse. Sweetie followed her like a puppy with how concerned she had become; she almost became an obstacle to her as she insisted that she explain the situation:
"I bet'cha I know why it’s haunted. . .” she started. Apple Bloom knew she wasn't being serious and ignored her completely. She eventually ran toward Scootaloo, who was standing on her hind legs and leaning against the tree. All the while, though, Sweetie continued her theory: “Big Mac and Cheerilee were doing it all the time in the school. Like, after classes and stuff, and his dripped babies were unborn. And nooowww they want—"
Scootaloo extended one of her legs out as Apple Bloom passed her, tripping the running filly and sending her flying a short distance. Sweetie made herself useful and dove down underneath her, catching her with her back before she would hit the ground. Apple Bloom muffled a watered-down swear she muttered and looked at Scootaloo with furrowed brows and gritted teeth, seeing a mobile phone in her own hoof, brought to her ear with a quiet voice emitting through its speakers. All the while, Sweetie came to the conclusion of her story, to which she applied heavy emphasis to. She gave her best impression of what a ghost would sound like, even through her boisterous voice.
“Reeeevvveeeeeeeeenge!!!”
"Hey, slow down," Scootaloo said before she covered her microphone. She pushed off the tree and started walking away from them. "You too, AB."
Just then, Apple Bloom was sure she heard something out of the ordinary; something that didn't fit in with the Unicorn's loud vocal antics. She freaked out and stuffed Sweetie's mouth shut with her hoof. “Do you hear that?” she said. She looked all around, hoping that her friends' company would have driven the nightmare away by now. The frightening whispers from before still echoed in her head, though; it felt like blood was pumping to all areas of her body but her head, leaving only her fear to think for her. She only listened to the fading voice coming from Scootaloo's phone as she walked away, but that wasn't anything like she was listening for. "Do you--"
“Yeah, I do!” Sweetie managed to blurt out, licking Apple Bloom's hoof. “Kinky!” She then proceeded to suck on it, and that really made the filly fairly uncomfortable. She tried pulling it out of her mouth but it was much more difficult than she'd thought. She pulled until her hoof popped out of her mouth, but she also fell to the ground as a result. She decided to lay on the ground for a while; to try and catch her breath, more than anything.
"Actually," she sighed. "it might not be the school that's haunted. . ." There was barely a real threat present here, and she knew her friends would have her back if anything weird happened again. She gave herself two minutes to rest before she got on her hooves again, heading after Scootaloo. "Hey," she called. "So2!" She still stumbled a bit, as the injured muscles in her leg hadn't healed; she only dealt with them. She made her way along the path Scootaloo took around their clubhouse. She could hear her own boisterous voice from around the corner. "What the heck are you doing?"
"You sure you don't need a lift?" Sweetie asked of her.
"Yeah, I'm fine," she said, wishing Scootaloo would have stopped what she was doing for one second. She wished Sweetie would take things more seriously as well. And speaking of the dirty-minded Sweetie Belle, her demeanor suddenly changed once again.
"Oh, okay!"
"But hey, I guess-"
Interrupting her once again, Sweetie caught up to Apple Bloom and pressed her head against her rear, pushing her forward as her hooves dug into the ground, leaving a trail behind them. The filly wasn't amused one bit.
"Yeah, I guess you're going to anyway. Thanks." Whether or not the Unicorn was aware of the sarcasm, she accepted her thanks.
"You're welcome!" she said. They started moving faster, as did her story: "But Big Mac didn't stop. He just kept going! He was freakin' pounding Cheerilee’s ass!"
“Se2, please. I'm beggin' ya, here. Just. Bucking. Stop.”
Scootaloo sat on the ramp that led up to their clubhouse, still having a conversation with her phone. She saw her friends following her, then she pressed a button on her phone that dramatically amplified the volume of the voice she was talking to. She sighed.
Scootaloo's phone was different than her friends', primarily in the sense that it was just one device. While Apple Bloom's had physical buttons and shared a dongle inside her ear, hers was solely the flat surface in which she could operate with her hoof. Sweetie Belle owned one like Scootaloo's as well, but she rarely used it in public for some reason. The back of her phone was plastered in a single, shiny, mulit-colored decal of the Cutie Mark belonging to her personal hero: Rainbow Dash was that hero, and she was the one she had resolved to model herself after.
"Sup, champ?" said Scootaloo, as Rainbow Dash would have. "Been a while."
Scootaloo looked at them, observing the shenanigans, "Alright, hold on," she said. Her lips then spoke into her phone once more. "Okay, okay. Wait. Lemme get this straight: I’ll meet you behind Sugarcube Corner tonight and you’ll have my money, right?”
“What the?? Scootaloo, come on; what are you tryin' to do? This is serious!”
“Hang on," she said into her phone. "Yeah, hang on a second. . .baby.” Scootaloo covered the microphone’s slot so that her voice would not enter through. “What the hell's going on? I’m trying to make us some money here.” Apple Bloom suddenly had the shivers again as she heard those voices from before; she feared they knew where she was.
“Pinkie Pie! Dead! Ghost. . .following me! This. is. Bad!!"
Scootaloo's expression was almost a little sarcastic. “Yeah-huh. Hold on, I'm swear I'm almost done." She turned her back.
Apple Bloom was both angry and confused now, leaving her feeling of fear and dread to idle; she wondered why her friends both mentioned how long she'd been gone. She recalled not getting the one, but the two calls from Scootaloo, but they both happened just before she left. . . She tried to recall even more from before the scene at the park, still rushing herself all the while: she needed to get inside and think instead of stand out in the open. And she was close, too.
"Hey, App!" Sweetie seemed to just burst in front of her, causing her to fall down onto her butt. "We're worried about you! Don't you wanna tell us what happened??" She was concerned for others' well-being when she wanted to be, but she was a real 'sweetie' at heart, underneath all the perversion.
"Se2, what the hay?!" she stammered. "I wasn't even gone for that long, now let me in!" Apple Bloom got right back up and staggered her way up past Sweetie, not even looking at her. She got inside the clubhouse and looked at Sweetie from out the window. It was then that she saw Scootaloo coming around the corner, phone strapped to left foreleg.
"Dude, AB, you need to chill," she called up to her. She used the filly's other nickname more favorably when there was a crisis present. "Sorry that took so long, but seriously, what took you so long? It's been a few days, you know." Apple Bloom knew she meant well—that they both did—but she refused to respond with more than a single as she scanned the area with the higher vantage point she had. Her friends decided to head up to the clubhouse themselves, Sweetie mentioning what Apple Bloom had told her. However, when they walked through the doorway that she left open, they both saw that Apple Bloom really wasn't okay: the filly was knelt below the windowsill had a dead stare out the window, her eyes darting around all she saw. She didn't even respond to either of them when they spoke to her—not immediately, anyway.
She finally said something. "You guys didn't hear any of that? At all?" She stayed where she was, but her friends approached her, albeit carefully; she was one of those fillies who would eventually give herself a heart attack due to her panicking. She managed to keep it together even as she distinctly recalled her friends coming after her, wishing her dead.
Even if it was just some weird blackout she had all so suddenly, she had every right to question reality, even still. But when Sweetie sat next to her, slumped against the wall, and Scootaloo doing the same on her opposite side, Apple Bloom felt comfortable. She felt Scootaloo's hoof on her left shoulder, and Sweetie's body nestling close before rest her head on her other shoulder. Scootaloo got more comfortable herself, leaning on her just a little bit. The Pegasus may have always come off as brash, but she wasn't afraid to get soft with her friends—definitely not.
"You suddenly afraid of us now or something?" asked Sweetie. Ironically, and unbeknownst to her, that was indeed. . .partly true. But that was also unrelated
"Would you guys believe me if I told you?" Apple Bloom replied to the both of them, her head slumped and looking to the ground. They could still hear her quietly catching her breath.
"Listen," Scootaloo started. We might not have the best track record as friend anymore, but we could definitely get that back, and I'm not gonna decide to hate you again. And neither is Se2."
"And neither am I!" Sweetie piped up.
Apple Bloom carefully got up and walked over to one out of the many desks further inside the clubhouse. She placed her hooves on it and leaned, looking out a different window this time. In the direction she was looking, she could only see the thick lining of trees that blocked off view of the path to the park. "It might not know I'm here," she said. "I'm gonna close the windows, though." And so she did, but her friends helped her; they all shut the windows and closed their curtains. They were thin, but Apple Bloom felt significantly safer regardless.
“Now, what’s this crazy talk about a ghost following you, again? Tell us."
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"Wow, what the hay. . . She's really gone." said Scootaloo. "Damn. . ."
"And I guess her ghost is after me for some reason. But yeah, I never heard anything about it before the four days you said I was gone."
"You keep on going; I'll to see if I can find any news about this."
As Apple Bloom nestled more details into her story, their effects weren't as effective as they very well could have been: the talk of her supernatural experience already had them going. Sweetie Belle was given a very self-conscious thought as she got up and headed toward a nearby desk, giving one more comment before taking a seat in a chair. And Scootaloo wasn't much different thinking about something that could hurt her, but that she also couldn't physically combat made her skin crawl.
"I don't really blame you for freaking out like you were," Scootaloo said as she and Apple Bloom also rose to their hooves. "I don't know what else I would've done."
"Yeah. . ."
They came to Sweetie's side and watched her laptop screen turn on as the system booted up. Scootaloo thought of asking Sweetie how many apps would need to load up before she would actually be able to use it, but she instead looked around the clubhouse in wonder, her mind half-blank. Silence reigned, with the exception of the whirring machine.
—
On the outside, anypony would likely assume that their clubhouse was of simple design, one whose other half wouldn't be nestled inside the greenery of the tree it was built upon; one whose interior wouldn't be filled with high-tech electronics spread around to all of its corners. But that clearly wasn't the case—it was all here. From the setup spread around the clubhouse—amatuer as it may have been—it resembled a small intelligence base within. The group had a slight fixation on electronics; even Apple Bloom had a few of her favorite devices. They were all inspired to make such a setup because of the time they spent writing for their school newspaper, back in their school days.
The long desks ran alongside the walls, and they each had a couple of lower-end devices, and, because they were pretty outdated, there were only a few hard feelings for Scootaloo when she stole them. The three fillies all shared the interest of splicing these electronics together, and from a few of the devices they deemed to be less valuable, they made a huge circuit board that they placed inside the desk in the middle of the clubhouse, kind of like what Sweetie recalled her sister, Rarity, being in the development of, for practical use in her boutique. Obviously, electronics weren't magic, and it was nothing close to as wondrous as holograms were, but they still created something cool that they were proud of, and used every now and then just for fun.
—
"If you say this thing's real. . ." said Scootaloo, still looking idly at the central desk.
"It is real!" Apple Bloom replied. "Her ghost is really really real!
"I believe you, I'm just saying . . . That's goddamn terrifying."
Sweetie Belle was finally able to enter the password for her computer, and after she did, the screen displayed the website she last visited. But, because this was her computer, she had been browsing for some naughty things. . .
"Shit," she said, likely as just an innate reaction and nothing more. "My bad." She went ahead and initiated a download of the paused video and promptly closed the webpage, without a concern in the world for what she made her two friends see.
"What in the hell did I just see!??" Apple Bloom asked of her? Scootaloo was the one who answered her, though.
"I don't even know, but I do know that Sweetie's into the weirdest stuff out there. Best not to ask."
"You like?" asked Sweetie, with a hint of smugness in her voice.
"Uhm, no!" she said.
Scootaloo grew impatient. "Screw it, it's gonna be faster if we use this thing." She headed toward—and gestured to, beckoning Sweetie to follow—the large table in the middle, the one with the technological congregation. "We still need your password, Se2."
Oooooh, you need the master's help, huh?" Sweetie said as she hopped down from her seat to join them. As soon as she could touch the electronics, she tapped the on-screen keyboard in a rhythm that unlocked her own personal profile. The three fillies shared this amalgam of a computer, but Sweetie was the one who mainly kept it up-to-date and had the know-how to take care of it properly, so whenever they needed her for literally anything—it wasn't as often as one might assume—she was pleased to help them, but not without a hint of cockiness in her demeanor.
“Pinkie. . . Pie.” She spoke the name she spelled out on one of the bigger screens with her hooves. Though, when her eyes moved toward an icon that would confirm her search, she saw the voice-recognition software at work—and already finished in mere milliseconds. hundreds of results appeared on screen, with the most recent result sitting at the top of a long column of other results. Sweetie skimmed through the previews of the first three links, looking closely and squinting her eyes.
"See," said Scootaloo. "Fast."
“Hey, guys. . . ?” she said. Her tone of voice sunk drastically, alerting her friends. They asked her if anything was wrong, but they could see it in her face when she looked up at them; she had a very good answer for them “Get over here."
“What do you see?" Scootaloo asked, concerned.
"Nothing good. . ."
She and Apple Bloom made their way around the corners of the table to lean in closer, upon Sweetie's instruction. Apple Bloom was the first to to shout out, in an unprecedented sense of denial. And Scootaloo followed her lead, the only difference being her dreadful habit of swearing:
"That's fuckin' horseshit right there."
“'APPLE JACK TAKEN INTO MAXIMUM SECURITY PRISON'!??”
"No, no! This is wrong! It's all wrong!!" Being Apple Jack's closest relative as of now, Apple Bloom knew that the news just couldn't be true. She doubted the news all the way to hell, and wondered why anyone would lie like this. Looking over all the headlines on screen, the caught sight of the name of the one she was reading. "This is all about Pinkie's death, but it's dated more than a week ago! Bull crap!"
“That's really weird. . .” Sweetie said. "According to this, Pinkie died before you even found out, and me and So2 didn't hear anyone talking about it. Surely no one would be taking it lightly."
Apple Bloom's anxiety hit her all over again, and Sweetie's words obviously didn't help her; though she, too, honestly doubted what she read. Scootaloo leaned in and picked up another part of the headline: “What the heck??" she shouted in her own words. She jumped to a section of the article that mentioned her own personal hero, made easier by the bold text: 'Rainbow Dash testifies in Apple Jack’s favor. . .as she denies that the accused killer'. . . ? She paused for a few more seconds, exchanging defiant looks with her friends before she got back to reading, louder in tone. 'That the accused killer had to have been her sister'. . . !? Apple Bloom??!” She couldn't believe what she was reading, and neither could Sweetie; Apple Bloom was nowhere near believing a single word Scootaloo said, despite them not being the fillys' own. "Rainbow Dash?? What the hell. . . ?"
The three fillies were erratic in their reading; they all picked up different sections of the article. With a vengeful intrigue, Sweetie nudged her head in and continued reading Scootaloo's paragraph. "Listen to the rest of this," she said. 'However, since the filly was much too young to be tried as an adult, her older relative, Apple Jack, was taken into custody of the prison in her stead, as she was the one who brought the filly up. And therefore, she was responsible for the death of the mare who brought so many smiles to our faces."
Apple Bloom read and re-read the words to herself, taking it all in; taking her time and taking deep breaths. She decided to read a section she picked out herself:
"’There’s a reason Apple Bloom was gone for a week,’ proves reporter Featherweight, an experienced alumni from the elementary school not too far from where the murder occurred. He has been able to report, more or less, seven days of the convicted country filly playing a continuous a game with the mare of legend before it happened. She leaned over an open casket where the mare laid inside and," Apple Bloom stammered sarcastically. "she disintegrated her with. . ." She chuckled fearfully at the rather comedic line of text. "Dang, this is. . .just dumb." She was still very worried, though, about how everypony else would likely believe all these false words.
Sweetie butted in again, finishing the filly's sentence. "Laser vision?? What the heck, really?? Apple Bloom doesn't have laser vision!" She jumped to her now. "You don't actually have laser vision, do you?"
"Sweetie, I'm not no robot or anything like that," she said. "Now stop joking around! My big sister's in trouble!"
"Exactly!" Sweetie exclaimed. "You know these these guys have nothing on you, App!” If anything, the purest mutual feeling the three friends shared was outrage. Scootaloo had the hardest time containing herself, and Apple Bloom was having an oddly easy time doing it—on the outside, anyway. "I still talk to Featherweight, too. I'm definitely not sexting him anymore till he gives me answers." And so the Unicorn pulled her phone from the table and rapidly started typing away.
“Who in the hell can actually believe this?" Scootaloo asked out loud. "Like, to the point where they would actually believe this?!” And why haven't there been riots or anything like that?" This is super late. I'm sure it's just a big hoax or something, cuz hell, Rainbow Dash wouldn't pit any blame on anyone." Apple Bloom agreed with the main point she shared: she couldn't do much else to defend her name—not on her own, anyway.
"We've got your back," Sweetie appended, awaiting a response from her phone. "Whoever wrote this is a big butt!"
So, does this mean I have to be on my own?" said Apple Bloom, the thought binging out a crestfallen tone to her voice. That, and her mind wasn't about to rest anytime soon. "Like, leave town, maybe? Everyone probably hates me now, anyway."
"You're not going anywhere. We're fighting this!" said Scootaloo. "Like Se2 said, Featherweight needs to tell us everything, knowing he was involved in this. We're gonna get the truth out there and get Apple Jack back!"
"Actually. . ." Sweetie said aloud. "He says that he's just as surprised as we are, and he doesn't know anything about it either. He only just found out now, too."
"Well how can we believe him? He's the one who's accusing App, here."
“Hey Scoots,” Apple Bloom's voice chimed in. "Who was that guy you were talking to earlier? You called him 'baby' or somethin'"
“Huh? Oh, boy, I’m never one to remember most ponies' names. But why do you wanna know? You're not freaked out about this in the slightest? I can see it all over you. This is freaking retarded."
"Wait," said Sweetie. "The guy's voice. I think I recognize it. But hey, what was his voice like? If it's him, I think that'll help us."
"Yeah!" Apple Bloom agreed "I think I heard you guys talking about how he wasn't from around here. Maybe he'll know something about it. Just maybe. I think we're takin' a crazy chance, here, but you know."
Scootaloo awkwardly stuttered. "Um. . . He had a deeper voice than most of the guys around here, that's for sure. He said his name was . . . Shit, I think it was like, David or something."
"Oh! Hang on! We went to school with a guy named David, remember?"
"Yeah, but there's a ton of Davids around here, including this one who's visiting. You want me to get my yearbook, though?" Apple Bloom already made her way to get it from her corner of the clubhouse. She was quick about it; she lightly bit onto it and brought it over to the corner of the table, away from the electronics. The yearbook she owned was precious to her, as it was all about her last year at the school.
Sweetie opened it up and flipped to a certain set of pages; she knew where she was going. Sweetie Belle's memory was one of her strongest abilities, luckily. She had no idea to know if she was right or not, but nonetheless, she felt like helping out any way she could. And so she skimmed the photos of her classmates until she shouted out.
"Here! You know, the guy who had his Cutie Mark before anyone else in our class? The pencil?” she hinted. Apple Bloom and Scootaloo looked into the book and, with Sweetie's additional information, they did indeed remember their fellow classmate. They were impressed with how much help Sweetie was actually being right now.
“Hey, shit, it's Danger Dave!” Scootaloo said, having flashes back to her school days. “He knew, like, literally everything!”
“Yeah!” Sweetie Belle bounced up in the air in her sense of accomplishment.
"And yeah, I guess he was pretty hot." Scootaloo gave Sweetie a look of approval.
"Yeah!!"
“Dang it, we did! Wow, Se2, nice!” Apple Bloom thanked her.
"No problem, guys! I'm sure it was the lust helping a bit, too. His pencil was always pretty hot.” That was the last sexual joke they needed to endure before they could follow this new lead; before they could take some kind of fighting measure against the apparent attempt to flame Apple Bloom's name.
"Are you a hundred-percent sure this is who was on the phone?" Apple Bloom asked her; the last real confirmation the group needed as a whole. She didn't really doubt her, as she knew how good her memory served them in prior situations. But she still had to ask, at least, for time's sake.
"I mean, I remember him and Featherweight writing for our teeny school paper, and he might still have Dave's number, and then I could-"
"Don't you go talking to him, too. I still want to make some money off this guy." said Scootaloo, more than half-serious. "Don't you ruin it."
According to the plans that Scootaloo and the old classmate David made earlier, they were going to meet up in the back alley behind Sugarcube Corner—the town's largest local bakery—and conduct whatever business they had discussed. As they prepped some rookie equipment, such as an extra-small laptop that belonged to the group as a whole, Apple Bloom thought about how she had never gotten an answer out of her when she asked.
"So hey, Scoots," she started. "If you were on the phone with this guy. . .callin' him sexy and stuff. . .were you doing what I think you were doing?"
"Sexting? Nah, that takes too long. I was. . .planning on making us some money. You know?"
Apple Bloom partly understood; she knew it wasn't a sacred activity. "You mean, like. . ." she just couldn't say the words.
Sweetie took the words out of her mouth and spoke them herself: "Were you bite on his pencil without me?"
"Heh, that's what we agreed on, but if he's willing to pay more, I'll let you join in. App, too," Scootaloo looked at Apple Bloom, nodding defiantly, as she already knew the answer she would get. "If she wants to."
"Ehem, no, thanks," she said, blushing at the very idea.
"Plus, if I get tired, I'll really sic Se2 on him,” she added. Upon a second thought, however, she was certain that Sweetie would kill him if she let him as jump on him. "Actually, I'll ask him about that article first. If he knows even the littlest thing that'll help us out, I'll fucking bend his dick in half."
Apple Bloom giggled at Scootaloo's threat. "But won't that just make him mad?" She smiled, but the others didn't notice; they were ready to leave by the time she had come to be.
"Huh, true," Scootaloo replied, throwing a full saddlebag over a jacket Sweetie Belle helped her put on. They were both a deep grey, with buttons on the bag's strap, and on the jacket's sleeves and neck. "Maybe I’ll just bruise it or something. Bruise it really bad. . . Yeah, something like that."
Apple Bloom didn't have anything she wanted to bring along except for her phone. It was pretty much a necessity for her, especially now; with any way to record evidence being a viable reason to bring it along. She knew the importance of having it with her, but she hadn't yet developed the habit of always carrying it with her, somewhere on her body. She sat down and carefully velcro-ed it to her upper thigh, then got back up, walking toward her friends.
"So I guess you're all ready?
"She sure is," Scootaloo answered, gesturing to Sweetie. The Unicorn seemed to be anxious and ancy, and heading toward the door herself, ahead of Apple Bloom as she made her way to it, too. Scootaloo, however, tossed a bag over her shoulders hefore she joined them.
“So hey, let's go get this taken care of and find out where Apple Jack is!” The dedicated filly climbed up from the wooden floor and joined her friends as they both headed out the door She was nervous about all the eyes that would be on her, but if she was going to get answers, then she would endure the worst she could imagine. She loved her sister to death, and she wasn't going to make sure that herself and Apple Jack weren't just going to be victims.
It was to Sugarcube Corner they set forth for.
"Iiiiin-credible. . . Our old classmate wants a blowjob after years of not talking."
By the time the three young mares made it over to Sugarcube Corner, the sky was beginning to take on a deep, dark, pearlescent tone. The color was strong and saturating, but, being stretched across the sky, it was rather thin and left only the exact imitation of daybreak. Apple Bloom swore that the ever-growing darkness warranted the return of Pinkie's ghost, and the reprisal of that feeling of dread that consumed her; that the fear would consume her once more. She tried to use her friends' company to forget that sight—in the deepest corners of her mind—that she had seen.
She confronted that harrowing, grinning face up close. There was no way she was going to shake off the feeling of being stalked, now. . .
“Well, we’re here. Just gotta go to the back. Follow me,” ordered Scootaloo in an urgent manner. Sweetie Belle promptly got behind Apple Bloom, who then kept file in front of her. Scootaloo got to the front of the line and kept her side against the wall, taking a quick glance at the back alley.
“Darn, where's a dude when you need one?" Sweetie's voice piped up from the back, and it took much of Apple Bloom's gumption to ignore her. She managed much easier than any other situation she could recall. Apple Bloom ignored her, though.
“Wait, what do you mean 'follow you'? I think me and Se2 know how to-“
Scootaloo gently pushed her hoof against Apple Bloom’s lips, to which a small, slim knife slid into her hoof's grip, as she saw for herself. She clenched it with the cleft of her hoof, pressing the cold, flat side of a single knife against Apple Bloom's neck: she understood now, and nodded in agreement.
“I don’t trust anyone.” Scootaloo concealed the knives once more. “Even if we knew this guy back then, ponies can change, and we know he could very well be up to something putting you away. Good lessons to learn, you know.” She taunted Apple Bloom for her gullibility of tongue, for how she gave most ponies the benefit of the doubt, but she kept it friendly: she pressed her lips to her forehead before looking at her. "But you're my friend, and I can say I love my friends with all of what little heart I actually show." She turned back, but not before reassuring the filly with a smile.
Apple Bloom had. . .trust issues. Before Scootaloo came along, she was always getting herself into small snippets of trouble, as her family hadn't taught her much of the world outside of their own. Even though she lived with her 'family', the ones she considered to be related to only by blood, there were never any other times where she felt more alone, surrounded by those who merely tolerated her. After living in such a hostile environment for more than half of her life, she couldn’t have any better reason to consider as such.
------
Macintosh, AppleBloom’s big brother, had become little more than a bully after his three years of nonstop service to Sweet Apple Acres. Back then, he had only considered the family as a paycheck to him, after an entirely different set of circumstances caused him to distance himself from the family. They realized he never wanted a thing to do with them, but they desperately needed his help, and he needed a job just as badly. He knew that there was very little purpose in continue miserably working on that farm, aside from the money, and Apple Bloom herself, who was only just about to start her six-year career at elementary school. The sweet child: she was the one out of the whole family that he really cared for—or yet, the only one who hadn't given him an a reason to despise her, yet.
But again, after three years, his bitterness grew exponentially bigger, for even his biological family.
And so, with his final incoming pay from the Apple family, Macintosh was gone. He had ripped himself from their guilt-tripping grasp for the last time, happily leaving town for the lonely, free life of the road. He had taken everything the family ever lived for, and they were left with nothing. He was nearly nothing but a fraud who destroyed the family's loyal reputation, with all the more shock coming when he told them to "just fuck off."
Mac's sister, AppleJack, saw his outrage as a unique opportunity, as disgusting as the thought was, but honesty was important to her, and she also needed to stay true and honest to herself as well. Like the family, she had also grown angry with Macintosh—she threatened to leave, and leave she did, much to the everyone's ineffective pleas. Most of the other members had left as soon as Macintosh did, as he was the reason why they had dealt with the family's ugly transformation for years.
She made a heavy point to them before she left by taking Apple Bloom with her. The filly was still too young to properly understand all the conflicts that plagued her family, but the one thing that Apple Jack implanted in her mind was the only thing she came to know for the next few years: that the Apple Family was completely. . .dead. She had been born after the prime of the family's life, and now it had all fallen apart thanks to her bigger siblings.
Apple Jack stole her away, and the remainder of the family couldn't afford a legal battle, so they also couldn't stop her and her incredible resolve. She promised her sister that she would do her damndest to support her, and raise her right. But the very first night that she promised to always be by her side, through thick and thin, for better or worse—
She abandoned her. Even after such a promise, she left her vulnerable side.
Apple Jack, the Element of Honesty, a national savior. . .
How could she do such a thing. . . ?
-----
Those particular memory came back to her, however brief the moment allowed. Okay, I’m on it this time," she whispered. Scootaloo was creeping alongside the building once more. She was almost like a second role model to her; Apple Bloom was that dependent.
Sweetie whispered, too, but directly into Apple Bloom's ear. "I bet Scootaloo's gonna rape this guy!" They both continued follow her, keeping themselves close to the side of the building. The lamplight could guide them only so far, however, and it was getting harder and harder to see as they kept pushing forward.
"Wonder why she brought that little ClopTop with her," Apple Bloom asked. Sweetie answered her, enthusiastically.
"Recording all the action?"
Loitering was dangerous anywhere at any time in the town of Ponyville. The town was becoming so violent so fast, becoming less of popular pick for tourists to spend their days—and their nights—in, and also cared about less and less by everypony who lived there, with more residents relocating than ever. If Pinkie Pie had been 'murdered' only a little more than a week ago, wouldn't more time need to pass before everyone's spirit would fall into disrepair?
“Kay, guys.” Scootaloo whispered, keeping her head forward and still, though her eyes looked in all directions. “Keep your guard up. He's here somewhere, but he's gotta be different by now. Still sounded like a puss to me, though.” The three kept their right sides to the nearest wall, trying to prevent any ambush by actively looking for the stallion, David, through the growing darkness. With how far they'd gone into the alleyway, there was hardly any more light to help them in that endeavor. They knew that crime had been lurking in their peaceful town, especially in the many alleyways around, and their cautious actions would help defend them against any criminals as well. Though, the idea of Sweetie fearing an encounter with any sexual predator was entirely controversial.
And now, with the artificial light so far away, the three friends had couldn't see a thing, and there was absolute silence, exemplified as they reached the end of the building, right about to turn a dangerous corner. Scootaloo, being the one ahead of them, stopped them.
"What the hell is this? she whispered. She slowly reached up to her face and flicked off a cold, sticky and slimy substance from her face. She proceeded to touch the very end of the wall, where it contorted to an angle and led them a new path to follow, however blind. But, when she placed her hoof on the cool surface, she felt more of that same substance from before, reacting accordingly. "Seriously, what the hell is this. . . ?"
Apple Bloom, right behind her, brought up the observation—or, rather, the smell—of whatever the substance may have been. "To me, it's like it just rained or somethin'," she said. "It feels like it, too, doesn't it? Or is that part just me? Dew-ey?"
Sweetie agreed. "I feel like it's gotten way colder, yeah. "It feels really wet, too, but that might definitely be me." She made her friends chuckle for all but a moment, but they also kept their faces straight, serious, for an encounter that was bound to be shady in some way or another—and Scootaloo was the most cautious of all, as she always had a tendency to be.
"No, it does feel like it just rained or something," said Scootaloo, to neither friend on particular. "But it's not, and it didn't. If he's here, I'm sure he's up to something. Grab the comp out of my bag, would you? And be careful." Peeking around the corner, she immediately caught sight of something: It was a dim light in a rectangular shape, slightly slanted, with the silhouette of someone's hoof entering it, moving and casting a shadow. The light then became nothing more than a wall, all in but an abrupt second. She felt around behind her for a friend to assist her, and it was Sweetie Belle who ended up at Scootaloo's side; she expected Apple Bloom to be the one to get the ClopTop out of her bag, and not the obnoxious-at-times Unicorn. Though, Sweetie just went ahead and grabbed the whole bag off of Scootaloo's body, sliding the cloth strap up her neck and down her own.
“Hey, that’s him! That's Davy over there!” Sweetie said, louder than necessary.
After cringing a bit, Scootaloo gave her a warning to keep her voice low. Sweetie suddenly launched herself at herself at Scootaloo, throwing her behind the cover of the wall, and the Pegasus then fell on top of Apple Bloom. The biggest sound they caused was the thud of their three bodies, and Scootaloo was sure that their cover was blown. But then again, the sound of rats and other night prowling critters knocking objects over could have excused their presence to him. She gritted her teeth and swore. . .silently.
"God dammit, Se2!" The angry words slurred through her teeth as she threw her friends off of her—gently, of course, as she was worried enough that David would ran off. She thought that, with a few thuds in the dark alley, his preconceived 'pansy ass' would have scared him away; either that, or he feared for his life just like they did. They all rose to their hooves once again, and of course, Scootaloo was eager to check around the corner again, taking time to do so carefully. "Fuck, where'd you say you saw him again?" Eagerly, the Unicorn jumped to her side again, looking out into the darkness.
"I don't see him anymore," she said, bringing a look of distress to Scootaloo. "He was on his phone earlier, or I guess it was a phone."
"You mean that light we saw?"
"Yeah, it was shining off the back wall and stuff."
"Well, where else could he have gone? This back alley is just a dead end. I would know. Sneaking around, maybe."
Her and Sweetie were about to turn the corner when they instructed Apple Bloom to follow. But when there was no response, they didn't move on; they wouldn't do so without being assembled as a group. They both looked back where she was and saw her back turned to them, and, upon ignoring their instincts and staying silent, they heard her talking to herself. Sweetie was just about to say her name when she head another voice in the filly's direction.
"Hey, it's alright," it said. "I swear I'm not here to hurt you." But even with the words that the soft and rather gentle voice spoke, Apple Bloom started to groan in pain. "Hey, calm down!" The sounds of her suffering only grew louder, as her painful grunts turned into moans that exemplified her pain even more. "Uhm. . .please? Are you okay?!"
Sweetie and Scootaloo took no effort to keep quiet anymore as they jumped in Apple Bloom's direction; the filly's cries resonated off the dark walls, and that warranted a little bit of recklessness. On their way, the voice spoke to them this time, and they were able to make out its masculine nature, despite the medium pitch.
"Hey, you guys!" he called, once again, seeing only slivers of their bodies. "Is this girl with you? Can you help out here!?" He quickly turned around and ran away from them, their slowly highlighted selves looking like they were going to attack him.
Sweetie took the lead ahead of Scootaloo as they split paths; she ran toward the stallion's voice while Scootaloo took care of Apple Bloom. The male voice asked them for help one last time before Sweetie jumped at him, only able to see his silhouette from the distant light. She hit him hard and brought him down to the cold asphalt, and even she was staggered by the fall.
"Alright, let's take off this mask!" she called out as she proceeded to pull on the David's mane, with the the two of them under the wide cone of light, in its furthest reaches. His face was hardly visible, but she was able to see the whites of his eyes before he slammed his eyes shut. He fought back, trying to pry Sweetie from his torso, and yelling at her while he did. But the sounds of Apple Bloom's suffering seemed to subside, and when the last echo came to pass, so did Sweetie's attack on the stallion. In the brief silence between them all, including a muffled David, she broke it. "Scootaloo!" she called, keeping heavy pressure on his body. "Everything okay?"
"Everything's fine." Apple Bloom was the one who answered her, pushing her words through her heavy heaving. "Sounds like you got him, so. . .everything's fine, right?" She was suddenly so weak, and Scootaloo had to help her stand. "Let me at him . . . I mean, let me talk to him." Sweetie looked back at them, assisted by the light from the cloptop she pulled out of Scootaloo's bag, draped over her own shoulders. She saw that Scootaloo was helping her approach, and she turned back around, shoving the bright screen right in front of David's face, taking care not to impale the device on his horn. The computer was 'asleep', and, even with all the rough shaking it endured, all she needed to do was open the top lid to attain a bright screen again.
"What the heck is this, mister?!" she said forcefully. David placed his hooves on the computer and gently pushed it back toward her. His face, lit up by the uncomfortably bright screen, was properly revealed. His confused face hadn't ever changed; she couldn't see his expression before, but it still spoke volumes.
"I don't understand," he said. "You guys are looking for me, of all ponies? What the heck is this all this about?!"
Not much about his appearance changed, either; over the years that passed since they last saw him. His auburn-colored mane and tail leaned toward a darker shade of brown, but the hint of redness definitely complemented his eyes, with multiple hues of green that mixed to give off a lush, beautiful hazel. One of his eyes was halfway obscured by a part of his mane that was also a mixture of colors: many small strands of his hair hung down over the left of his forehead, completely separate from the rest of the hair on his scalp thanks to his horn, piercing in between the his two-toned colored mane. The fur on the majority of his head, his strong facial structure, was a pure white that saturated the rest of his body, no traces of any dirt anywhere, despite them being in an area where filth and scum would thrive.
The last thing that they all noticed about him, as Scootaloo and Apple Bloom stood at his sides—the most appropriate vantage points—was his Cutie Mark: His flanks only featured the pencil that Sweetie spoke of, upon his white-coated skin
"Sweetie, get that out of his face." Apple Bloom was angry at this stallion, and she made it perfectly clear within her words: when Sweetie hesitated to take the ClopTop away from his face, she shouted. "Now." Sweetie obliged, backing up and keeping the device's light on him, then Apple Bloom approached him, standing at his side and trying to get a good look at his face. To her benefit, he looked at her, dead into her eyes, asking them all, once again;
"What's this all about?? Why are you guys after me?!" His own demeanor took a more serious tone than before. "Leave me alone!" he told her. "I haven't done anything to you guys!"
Scootaloo backed her up. "So, you didn't see what you put out? That bullshit?"
"What're you even talking about? Are you . . . Wait, you mean on the screen?"
"You know it," said Apple Bloom. "I wanna know why in the hay you wrote that!"
"I couldn't see a thing," he argued, pointing at Sweetie Belle. "She had it all up in my face, and I can barely see anything now because of how bright that screen is!" Apple Bloom and Scootaloo looked at each other, and then they both gave Sweetie one order each.
"Don't go anywhere, Sweetie," said Apple Bloom.
"Show him again," said Scootaloo. "And turn down that screen!"
David looked at each word carefully, as Sweetie had fixed the text to be fairly large and easily readable. He skimmed through, but made cohesive sense of what they wanted him to see, what they wanted him to understand.
"No . . . No no, I didn't write this at all! I don't know why the hell my name is in this thing at all! You have to believe me!" he said. Scootaloo promptly got up in his face as soon as his echoing voice cleared the area.
"Didn't ring any bells, huh?" She looked at Sweetie, but her voice still directed at him. "If you don't tell us the real story behind this, I'll have to sic my pal Sweetie on you." Sweetie put on a devilish look.
"What?" She gave her a quick look before looking back at Scootaloo; he noticed her 'evil' frown and chuckled. "But she's too. . .I have to say. . .cute." He took a moment to catch a bit more breath. "Look, you have to believe me."
"It's because she's so cute that all the stallions want her, and why she's seen quite a bit of penis. She can give, oh, let's just say. . .pretty bad blowjobs sometimes. We're talking teeth, here, boyo."
"?Wait, huh? I really hope you're not threatening me," he said, his head turned away with one eye squinting at them, eyebrow scowled. "But this isn't the worst one ever. I guess." He blushed ever so slightly; they couldn't see the fluster in his face.
"She told me she ate a guy's dick before." David jerked his head back to them. "Yeah, like, with a fork and knife." David looked back at Sweetie, who had somehow gotten a fork and a knife in her hooves, and was staring him down. All of a sudden, David's face took a sour turn, pulling his jaw back and still forming a frown. "I'm pretty sure she had 'em tied down, too."
"Oohh. . ." he stammered. Then he got up and started yelling, all so suddenly. "Oh god, no! I swear I don't know anything, like I've been saying!" Scootaloo got in his way and shoved him to the ground, Sweetie coming down to his side, holding the utensils in front of her face, looking at him. "I'm serious, I promise you I don't know anything!! Leave me alone!" He tried getting up again, but Scootaloo put her heavy leg on his tightened abdomen.
"You're not going anywhere, man." She leaned on the same leg on slapped his face. "Not till you tell us what we know you know. We'll let you talk when you look ready." Then she moved her leg down his body, and that was when Apple Bloom started to look away: even though David was their immediate enemy, she felt bad even for him.
"Aaaaaahhhhg!!!"
The girls tortured him in various ways, but it wasn't his loud, half-muffled screaming and their echoes that brought weight to Apple Bloom's head: She backed into the a thin cover of darkness, but nothing too dark where her fear would only amplify the pain in her head. She massaged her head and looked at them from afar, holding her hoof to her head. She sighed and mumbled to herself.
"They can be. . .really violent when they want to be. Dang." With another heavy sigh, she took slight comfort in the distance she added to the scene, but the silence was immediately broken when she heard the steps of hooves behind her. She swung herself around, but saw nothing; only blackness. David and her friends’ voices faded drastically as she focused her eyes and ears on whatever had caught her attention; she rather stayed still while the source can to her. Soon, though, another bipedal figure came into view; its physical presence made clear, with its menacing approach, but identity unknown. This character, whoever it was, had come from nowhere, and that's exactly how Apple Bloom remembered him before she felt weak in her bones all over again. He quickly slammed his hoof over her mouth, muffling her before she even took the breath she would need to scream.
"Relax."
The atmosphere in which Apple Bloom saw the distant structure was within a dark, suffocating haze. The building was merely a silhouette, in front of a likewise hazy horizon, saturated in a sickly twilight that seemed to take the mountains it touched. AppleBloom knew she was trying to move her body, but she remained stationary; and with every step she took, the barn began to disintegrate. Flashes of her life with her family raced across whatever part of her was conscious during the whole episode, and she started muttering to herself.
“Why, Big Mac. . .?”
Each flash that passed, she caught a glimpse of the barn once more, only with more and more bits missing from it; and with less and less structure, a figure began to form from where it stood. It, too, came to stand on two legs, and it closed its distance from Apple Bloom as more flashes passed her by. First it stood on one leg, upright, and then another leg grew from it's body, making greater strides now. Then its other legs appeared on the sides of its torso, one after the other. And then finally, when the creature was only feet away from being able to touch her, its head appeared from her grounded view—it was just the shape of a head upon the creature’s shoulders. She looked up, seeking better understanding of this creature, however she could. Her head was thumping, perhaps along with her quickened heartbeat, but she saw nothing at her front, as it had disappeared.
Her body was so difficult to move, it was as if gravity focused solely on her. She gave in, her sight falling back down to the ground, but her ears still told her where the creature had gone: It was breathing directly into her right ear. She didn't dare to look, even if it were easy, but she suddenly felt five sets of hooves wrap around her head, turning it in the same direction. She could hardly see anything during that split second, aside from the silhouettes of numerous other creatures through the legs that held her. More of them must have come from behind, as even more legs and hooves laid across her body and head.
A good half of her fear was exerted through her screams and whines, however muffled they were: though, she was not the first to speak words that were nearly unintelligible. She couldn't make them out, with what little she could see, and she wasn't given a real chance to after they started closing in on her, their bodies pressing up against her vulnerable frame. She could do very little, struggling feebly and heaving her limbs at them before she one of them struck her cheekbone with enough force to lift her from the ground, even an inch. She slid into a gathering of the creatures, in which they surrounded her further, all of them.
The pain was so real, as if it were real. It could have very well been real. . .
------------
"Did you see where she went?"
"Nope, sorry. Maybe she's humming one of her happy tunes? Like, quietly?"
"Fuck it, you stay here and watch Davy."
Scootaloo gave Sweetie Belle one last direction as she parted ways into the far reaches of the cone of light. She soon started to hear Apple Bloom, fortunately for her, but the moaning that she heard in the filly's voice heightened Scootaloo's senses again. They felt more comfortable that they found and technically captured David. . .but now, not so much.
Sweetie Belle still heard nothing from the path that Apple Bloom took, the path she herself followed. She was full of fear, wary of the darkness around her. Behind her, Scootaloo watched as she slowly faded out of sight, into the dark; Sweetie wasn’t one to screw things up entirely, as was mostly all bark and little-to-no bite. The Unicorn lit up her surroundings with the flick of her horn — she actually made the motions as well — and worriedly called out her friend’s name.
“App?” she asked. “Apple Bloom..?” The deeper she progressed into the abyss, the more her voice quivered, soon growing desperate for Apple Bloom’s voice to comfort her. She looked back as she thought she heard a soft voice, like the one she searched for, but she saw nothing. The sounds lingered, however, evolving into a soft hum, something that Apple Bloom was known to do when she was frightened. Sweetie laid her guard down; the two fillies finally stumbled across each other in the dark. “App, why’d you leave us? Did you see someone?” She saw her sweet and adorable face, coming close.
Sweetie felt a tap on her horn without a warning, and she ‘flipped’ off her light ‘switch’. She felt hooves reach her back and caress her body as she was weighed to the ground. She felt Apple Bloom’s body on top of hers. She also felt the slight cushion of liquid that didn’t fail to seep deep within her white coat, essentially staining her appearance.
“Apple Bloom!” She already started giggling, just like when she knew what was going to follow these kinds of delicate actions. “This feels like blood! Are you ready to do aaaallll the sexy things now?” She did indeed feel a muzzle on her face, heaving breathing on her as hooves still ran all across her back and shoulders, as if assessing their broadness. She felt warm for a time, but she immediately grew colder as her left arm was squeezed and clamped around by...something.
This was not Apple Bloom.
“Sweetie!” Scootaloo was entirely tempted to leave David to his own when she heard Sweetie's scream. Thinking harshly, she grabbed him and half-galloped in her direction. The colt didn’t struggle very much anymore and followed Scootaloo, in the exact same and slumped fashion. Had he accepted whatever fate would befall him, at the mercy of these three silly fillies?
David managed to break free from Scootaloo’s grasp, but she felt no other choice than to just shove his presence off, not looking back. He’d stay close if he knew what was good for him, she thought; she intimidated him enough, she believed. She just continued to blindly run ahead, away, though now unencumbered. But suddenly she was no longer lost as another streetlamp turned on with a bright flicker. She looked to the right to see a terrifying sight:
She saw Apple Bloom’s head worn on the neck of some horrible monster: Her eyes sockets were huge and empty, her mouth opened on command of the monster, and upon closer inspection, her lithe little body was slung around its neck. It planted its heavy hooves around Sweetie’s body with its torso leaned over hers, and Apple Bloom’s empty mouth expanded to an impossible length, sinking down onto Sweetie’s head. Her cries became muffled and were even quicker to become non-existent. But Scootaloo quickly came to her rescue with a full-on tackle to the creature’s body, taking care to avoid Apple Bloom’s own.
Catching an ample breath, she put forth all her strength into another tackle, shoving the creature off of two legs, to which she immediately became its new target. It was angry, and so it pursued her as fast as it regained its balance. Sweetie scrambled onto her hooves and started after them, but she was confronted by two more of the same creatures, similar in size and stature, but these wore no faces. None yet, anyway; they craved Sweetie’s body; they relished in the beauty of her face. She could see the desire in their naked headpieces...
Scootaloo continued to race from her pursuer. She occasionally glanced behind her to see Apple Bloom’s horrifying face. It looked like it was shrieking at her, and it chilled her to the bone well after she had lost visible sight of it. She started stretching her legs further out with each leap she took, hoping to circumvent the monster and rescue Sweetie once more after she heard another one of her screams. The ground seemed to disagree, however, as it quickly became damp and...sticky,
“No, noo!” she exclaimed, out of breath. She made every little stride count even though the monster was catching up effortlessly. “What the heck...is this??” She felt spit at her back with every huff took, right behind her — or was it Apple Bloom’s saliva? With a collaborative effort, it opened Apple Bloom’s empty abyssal mouth and snatched her right up inside, where Scootaloo could hardly struggle free; her hooves were just short enough to allow her to have a chance... All started to run black for her.
She was suddenly ripped from the abyss’s hold by her tail, violently. Flying away from the creature at extreme speed, she lost sight of it in less than a split-second. The very next breath she planned on heaving was instead forced out of her when her back crumpled against the alley’s wall, where she shrieked a violent and painful whine from her already sunken heart. She felt above her head wildly and felt that it was a short metal rod pinning her to the wall, and when she started pulling, she heard the clear and wet sound flesh being penetrated. It was infrequent but it was all so clear.
Even more straightforward, though, were the mad cries of frustration and deep growls from all around; the Pegasus feared for her friends’ lives. But those battle cries weren’t coming from her friends — Sweetie Belle assured her of that, rushing up to her and helping pull the rod out of the wall. The two of them succeeded, releasing Scootaloo’s mane.
“Apple Bloom..! She’s..!” Sweetie was yelling over the ever-increasing background noises. They were both deep in thought, but more debilitated by the confusion and fueled by adrenaline. “She’s a monster! Did you even see her?!” Once she was released, she gripped Sweetie so abruptly that she dropped the metal rod. It clanged to the ground, but nothing could scare them any more than their frightful trade of words, however brief.
Scootaloo reached in her ear and turned her phone’s flashlight on, relaying the command to her in-ear device. “She..!” She shook her head, picking up the bludgeon from the ground. “That monster almost ate me! Whatever it is, that’s not Apple Bloom! It was... It was just her face, but she had no eyes at all!” She soon found the object heavy, giving a steady grip on it with both hooves. She was ready to fight. “There’s so many more; they’re not nice and they probably all got Apple Bloom!” Sweetie nodded in firm agreement, and with that, they raced off to the sound of the scene.
Neither one of them were too late to leap up at one of the beasts, where they tackled it down with their combined might. Scootaloo proceeded to bash it in the head with the metal rod while Sweetie ran toward David, who was rearing back to swing the blunt weapon he wielded. She caught the time just right to grab onto it as he started swinging, quickly letting go and flying off ahead of him.
The area to David’s front was highlighted by another overhead lamp, and she saw her disappeared; he had some faith that she knew what she was doing. He could hardly help if he wanted, his legs standing so heavy and firm, slamming the monster down to the ground. He didn’t stop until it ceased to struggle. until he beat through flesh and struck gore. When he was finished, he shoved off two more of them and hurried toward Sweetie's direction, feeling the need to come to her aid.
Scootaloo’s presence immediately followed, attempting to enter the scene before she was confronted by a beast that lunged at her with its jaw. She hopped to the side, where she was challenged by a frightful swat; she wearily dodged the attack, with only ample aid of her fluttering wings. If the monster had eyes, it would have surely seen the fire in her own as she carefully spun around and kicked it in its featureless head. It toppled backward and she fluttered her wings again to soften her fall, then she spun right back around to Sweetie’s aid.
David started after her, seeing another beast dangerously close. He raced toward it while rearing into an attack once more, where he met Scootaloo’s exhausted glance as he crossed her path. He struck the beast and suspected its peril based on the whine it gave. He snarled in its pain-stricken face, but it was then that another beast joined his partner from the guise of darkness, returning much more than growls. It was the newcomer he had stuck, proven by its movements as he twisted his weapon around, trying to dislodge it from its body and from his arm, also twisting painfully. It barked at him while the other monster opened its mouth wide and devoured David’s arm in that absolute darkness. David screamed and struggled until the other did the same, taking hold of his other arm by the hoof.
Sweetie was blindly circumventing the entire back alley, with many entities at her back, chasing her. She came to hoping that she kept most of their attention because she detected many more presences closing in from her left. Like Scootaloo, she was using her own ear-mounted device to light up her path. Also like Scootaloo, however, she was unfortunate enough to have exposed a hostile with it — it was right ahead, possibly fifteen feet. It was just like the rest, and she felt like she could use some of the loose features on the wall to aid in her leap above it.
She got closer and saw that the creature’s head was blank just as all the others were. Save for the one that wore Apple Bloom’s face, she leaned on the fact that this one was just as mindless as the rest, and so she lunged to grapple onto the nearest chest-high protrusion. It was risky, but she leaped onto and off of the rim of a trash bin; she continued her amateur parkour along the wall. She cautiously glanced at the monster again and was compelled to take note of its head: it was a contorted mess of features that tried so hard to be facial ones. But those elements soon constructed Apple Bloom’s face.
Sweetie tried to hurry away but immediately found herself glancing back again, where Apple Bloom’s innocent shrieks quivered from the beast and suddenly snatched her with a strange appendage. It tightly bound her body while it carried her across the alley, throwing her onto her belly soon after. It let out another screech and before she knew it, Sweetie was struggling to escape the amount of hungry, gaping, abyssal mouths that grouped around her. Her bones were weak from the rough slam to the ground, though. Among other things, it was a good thing her light was broken — she wasn’t terrified further by the faces of death, and just rather meet it.
All the way across the alley, Scootaloo was conjuring the same idea as Sweetie. Though she did not know the details of her dire straits, she didn’t really even have to wonder; the fear for their lives permeated her mere vapid thoughts. She started climbing up the wall with David’s assistance, allowing her time by bravely fighting them back. She looked down at him, and she started to fear for his life, too — there was so much more stallion underneath his colt-like demeanor. “Hey, be safe down there!” she called before she started reaching greater heights.
Each protrusion seemed more loose and fragile than the last. She soon broke the main outdoor aqueduct of the building after she pushed off of it, dipping her hoof into the water before it plummeted to the ground. The broken pipe fragmented into five pointy shards, where two of the five sunk into the heads of two respective victims, who ran off into the distance. David took care to avoid the rest while the monsters started swarming him. He started after Scootaloo, climbing cautiously. The beasts groaned, some carefully watching them, others clawing at the wall. And all while, water recklessly poured down onto both David and their enemies.
“God, I hope they don’t..!” David shrieked to the side, planting himself to the wall as best as his wet hooves could. He held onto the sturdiest pipes Scootaloo climbed on just seconds ago, then he leaned back bravely. He looked up, meeting her desperate gaze with his own, then he pushed himself off the wall, leaping into the darkness. Scootaloo didn’t stop to stare as she just resumed climbing, keeping a curious ear out for him. “Surely you’re not trying to run now...”
Further steps came to tread unsuccessfully, however, as her rear hoof broke her very next step. She clutched onto the object she was hoping to bring her legs upon, but it didn’t feel like anything she could immediately recall. It was fairly thick and featured two embossed circumcisions that unfortunately didn’t compensate for fate. “Come on!” she shouted. Come on, come ooon!” Her entire lower body felt around the wall, searching for something she could propel herself off of.
She was down to one hoof rapidly sliding down the peg in the wall, She quickly looked down and saw no concrete, but only more monsters that awaited her all so eagerly. Her hoof finally slipped and her vision started to plummet toward them. She snapped her head back and feebly screamed out to no one — not a soul could help her. Scootaloo shut her eyes...but then her skeleton rocketed to all sides all at once, forcing a copious amount of air to exit her lungs. She was alive, but there was a massive pain, and a minor little pleasure, in her rump as water ran down her body. “Wh-aat..?”
The source of the two led her to believe that she was somehow hanging from her tail, as she...explicitly knew these feelings, for the sake of explanation. She tried reaching up with her hooves but could hardly complete the motions, so she closed her legs and felt the same kind of object as before, between her hooves. It was thick and felt a little slimy — oh, the innuendos she could make right now, with all this... She focused through her haze and did her best to look around the area, but her head quickly filled with blood and she started feeling more disoriented with every second that passed by. He ears picked up silence slowly closing in, but she still couldn’t see a thing, and this scared her all over again.
“Apple Bloom?” She started passing out before she could hear any voice beside the silence. “Don’t...go away..!” She shook herself awake time and time again, waiting to lay her eyes on anything, as the darkness felt so suffocating. But though her eyes saw nothing, her ears heard deep growls approaching, quickly growing louder.
“Hey...” she whimpered, the creature closing in. “Hey..! Hey!!” She riled herself up once again to offset her heavy head and was ready to fight merely with her arms. She soon felt each of its hungry breaths from her one and only for now... She soon saw Apple Bloom’s face, but she knew it was the nightmare, the ruse she was forced to combat... She was ready to seriously maim...
“Apple Bloom...” She choked.
“You...ass!”
The sound of a weak scream suddenly came to her aid, giving hope for a distraction. The monster’s head snapped back to look for the source, and Scootaloo searched for it all the same. They were both successful in seeing a small source of light race toward them, rapidly swinging to the left and right. The monster barked at the approaching sight which then steadied itself — it was terribly bright and aimed at the two of them. Scootaloo caught the briefest sight of the belly of the literal beast before slamming her eyes shut.
The stomach-churning sounds of evisceration were heard, in so much more detail as it was happening right in front of her. The low, painful moans the monster made lured her to take sight once more, however. She thought she was going to die next, but she was instead greeted by blood-glazed hooves dropping into her view. She was forced to squint her eyes and looked to the monster’s body through the bright light that was still present.
She lifted her head left and saw David, the brave stallion who had impaled it with some kind of weapon. Its body was bulky, but it slimmed down near the tip into something with a sharp point. He struggled to toss the slow, likewise struggling body into the darkness. She continued to look him over, whereas he felt a little embarrassed and looked right back at her.
“Heh, you done?”
“David?” She slurred. She offset her feelings of nausea with all she had seen, but with the only stress left being to catch her breath, it all came rushing back to her. She happened one more glance at his face, where he looked back at her just for a few seconds before he shook his head. She soon found herself doing the same, though she couldn’t fight nearly as well as him.
“Yeah...” she slurred. “I’m done.” Then before she knew it, she was out like a light. That’s when David looked her over, chuckling to himself.
“What am I going to do with you?” he whispered to himself. He turned off his own weapon-mounted light and got to work, pulling the pin in her tail.
