Part 1: Who ya gonna call? Seriously, who?

Tirek had been re-imprisoned in Tartarus and peace seemed to be back in the land of Equestria. The citizens of Equestria were now rebuilding and recovering from the damage inflicted by Tirek and his deceived pawn Discord. Twilight Sparkle now had a new palace to call her own as the Princess of Friendship.

Something else escaped from Tartarus. A couple of unsavory things escaped. And Ponyville was in the pair’s direct sights.

These strange entities eventually approached a helpless pony in an alley.

“Excuse us sir. Do you have a moment to hear about the lost Testament of Tirek the Great?” One said as his devilish horn emitted an eerie glow and levitated something previously unseen.

“What is this?” the terrified pony demanded.

“Welcome to the machine of salvation!” one of the sinister two chuckled.

“NOOOOOO!”

The roaring scream could be heard for a mile’s radius.

A few hours later at the break of day Vinyl Scratch woke up on the floor of her apartment. She and several other friends had a grand party in celebration of Tirek’s defeat. Well it was a grander party than her typical weekend ones anyway.

Her roommate Octavia walked in and kicked aside a cider can as she entered.

“It was quite a smashing celebration, wasn’t it Vinyl?” Octavia said cynically while nudging Vinyl awake.

“Oh wha, huh? Yeah. Mornin’ Tavi.” Vinyl replied in a mumble.

“Coffee is on by the way my dear.” Octavia said.

“That’ll help. And thanks, that sounds good Tavi.” Vinyl replied.

Vinyl attempted to leap up but stumbled slightly. She had become comfortably numb, but made it back on balance.

“Yeah, it sure sounds great. Hey look, one of Pinkie’s Equestria Games pom poms. Where’d that come from?” Vinyl inquired.

Over coffee Vinyl and Octavia attempted to chat a little bit. Vinyl was nodding and agreeing with everything Octavia was saying obliviously because she had her mini earphones in her ears playing jams.

“Oh yeah that was a good part huh?” Vinyl said.

“No it most certainly was not good that Tirek drained nearly all of the magic in Equestria! Vinyl are you even…” Octavia began saying but realized Vinyl was probably drowning her words out with music as was fairly typical. She raised her hoof and pulled out the earphones.

“Heh, well it’s always the good part when YOU tell the story Tavi.” Vinyl cooed.

“Thank you for the flattery. Anyway, onto another similar topic. I was wondering about the safety of this town with Tirek having escaped from Tautarus. Do you think other things could have escaped? Or perhaps Tirek himself again?” Octavia continued.

“Good question. I think Princess Twilight and her amazing rainbow friendship patty cakes powers can deal with whatever baddies come along though.” Vinyl said with a grin.

“Oh you’re probably right Vinyl” Octavia said. “Patty cakes? Ok, let’s head out shortly for some groceries.”

The two set out to get some vegetables for that night’s dinner. Along the way they discussed their favorite topic of music. They made it to the marketplace and strolled along the vegetable aisle for a little while.

“Tomatoes! Tomatoes!” Vinyl said enthusiastically.

“Ok Vinyl. Chill if you would. I get that you like tomatoes.” Octavia replied.

Just then Octavia noticed a pony being knocked into a basket of tomatoes, which rolled onto the ground. It soon became apparent that his attackers were two robed individuals who appeared to be ponies.

“We just wanted to give you free literature about our faith dirty non-believer.” One of the robed figures said.

Octavia and Vinyl looked at each other.

“Should we do something?” Octavia asked.

The always bold and shameless Vinyl stepped forward without answering Octavia.

“What are you buckers doing?” she demanded.

“Have you heard of the glory of lord Tirek?” the other robed figure enquired.

“Oh my. Oh no you didn't. You ponies are out of your minds.” Octavia said.

“Who said anything about ponies?” the robed figure countered while partially revealing faintly luminous eyes.

“Where did you guys come from anyway?” Vinyl demanded.

“We escaped from Tartarus of course. Triek’s conquest is not complete. Even in his absence we shall claim Equestria for our master. The citizens of Ponyville will be quickly educated on just who their lord is.”

“We don’t need no ecucation!” Vinyl snapped.

“We don’t need no thought control!” Octavia added.

The hooded menace then levitated a small pouch that released a trace of dust upon the pony who crashed into the tomato basket. As he rose his eyes started glowing.

“Serrrve Tirek.” The now entranced victim said.

“Yes indeed, serve our lord by dealing with these two interlopers. Gotta go, more souls to conquer!” the hooded fiend said as he and his other hooded companion vanished.

The zombie began moving toward Vinyl and Octavia.

“Crush the non-believers.” The zombie droned.

“You’re serious. You’re bucking serious?” Vinyl quipped. She then did a flying kick and knocked the zombie down.

“Vinyl that was amazing. I didn’t know you knew Pony-jitsu!” Octavia said with astonishment.

They looked around and saw more entranced ponies approaching them. Luckily these strangers moved somewhat slower than normal ponies.

“I don’t! Let’s run!” Vinyl replied.

The two ran back to their apartment.

They tried to rationalize what was going on. Octavia peered out the window and saw a pair of ponies just finish painting the word OBEY on a wall. Further away she saw what looked like a sacrifice of a pony about to take place. She quickly drew the curtain closed.

“What shall we do?” Octavia asked.

“I don’t know. I don’t have any master plan.” Vinyl answered.

“It looks like our Tirek troubles aren’t over. These vagabonds are probably going to try and free him again from Tartarus.” Octavia said.

“You think?” Vinyl countered sarcastically.

“You are cute when you act like that Vinyl.” Octavia said to lighten the mood.

“Those two freaky cult dudes. They must be the x factor here.” Vinyl hypothesized.

“That’s perhaps just fairly obvious. But we don’t know where they are let alone what we could do about them.” Octavia said.

“It should be easy to deal with them. Did they really think their little zombies would stop us? I just hope Celestia doesn’t even consider giving their religion a tax exemption!” Vinyl said with a smirk.

“There must be a way to get Princess Twilight aware of what’s going on here. Oh my Princess Twilight, wish you were here.” Octavia said.

“She's probably still at her new castle. We have to fight our way through the zombies!” Vinyl suggested.

“We’re outnumbered by far. I think any attempt at a fight will just lead us to the great gig in the sky. No, we should be more cautious and stealth.” Octavia replied.

Octavia and Vinyl still had no idea of just how many ponies were "converted" to this sinister cult.

“Too bad my glasses can’t tell us who’s still a real pony and who’s a zombie. Ok, any idea how to go about this in a cautious and stealth way then?” Vinyl queried.

Octavia couldn’t quite figure it out. Then it dawned on her.

“Perhaps we can pretend to be members of Tirek’s cult?” she suggested.

“Well that may be our best bet.” Octavia concurred.

The two put sheets over their heads and walked out into the dangerously occupied public square.

“We’ve just got to work our way to Twilight’s castle. No jump kicking zombies Vinyl.” Octavia stipulated in a whisper.

“Oh my Celestia Tirek is such an emo.” Vinyl foolishly said aloud.

A cultist in the crowd heard the snide remark.

“What was thaaaat?” he droned.

“Uh, uh hail Tirek! Emo-Tirek. Emo-Tirek.” Vinyl quipped thinking quickly.

She and Octavia began moving quicker than they had planned. It may have been counterproductive to not blowing their cover.

“You and your big mouth Vinyl!” Octvia said lightly but sharply.

“Ain’t I cute though?” Vinyl asked.

“Yes, but things could get ugly quickly here!” Octavia replied.

The pair darted quickly behind a nearby barn.

“Ok miss cute, can you get us out of this mess with your cute cuteness like a cutie?” Octavia asked snidely.

“I could get us out of this with my kick flank-ness. Ha, Rainbow Dash herself could even be MY sidekick now that I thought of it.” Vinyl said with a hint of overconfidence and a smile.

“I do actually find your behavior cute Vinyl. Even when it’s exhibited during an extremely dangerous and inopportune time. Just know that in case we don’t survive this.” Octavia said.

One of the cultists crept around the corner. Vinyl raced towards him and knocked him down with a flying kick.

“You got knocked the BUCK out!” Vinyl proudly related to the unconscious cretin.

“VINYL SCRATCH! Didn’t I say not to go wildly jump kicking cult zombies? I must admit that was cool though.” Octavia uttered.

The two musician ponies looked around and were unsure of where to go. A wooded area behind the barn seemed to be clear of cult zombies but Vinyl and Octavia had no idea if it was the right way to Twilight’s castle. It seemed to be the only way to go least they get swarmed by zombies and “converted” to the cult.

“That way. Right way, wrong way, we’ll last a little longer before being turned into zombies right?” Vinyl hypothesized.

Octavia nodded and the two darted off.