Several Nights at Pepperoni's

Chapters

Prologue: 15 Years Ago
The Delivery
Night 1
Day After Delivery
Night 2
Family Get-Together
Night 3
The Final Night

Prologue: 15 Years Ago

A barricade had been set up around the crime scene. Too many ponies were starting to become interested in what had happened and were blocking the intersection where the restaurant was located. It was around eight in the morning and raining heavily. Not a good start to the day.

The Captain had arrived to the scene as quickly as possible when he got the call. Days like this were when he wished he was anything other than an Earth Pony. If he was a pegasus he could fly there fast or teleport around if he was a unicorn. He just had strong legs to run with. He'd need another coffee.

"Where the new guys at?" the Captain growled out.

"They should be here soon sir. They got the call when you did," a cadet reported.

"Well they better be here before their first day is their last." The Captain got a coffee from another wary cadet while waiting. He drank it all in one gulp and tossed the cup into the nearest trash can (ten feet behind him). Two young guards suddenly squeezed through the crowds and saluted to the Captain.

"Captain Headlock! Cadets Shining Armor and Retributive Justice reporting for duty!" The two were nervous as the Captain looked them over. One unicorn and one pegasus and he managed to get there before any of them.

"Y'all need to get around faster ta make it as a guard," he told them. "Be ready to get out fast when ya hear someplace in Canterlot is barricaded. Lotsa folk like ta gawk. Follow." The two followed closely to the Captain, passing by the ambulance. The doors to the pizzeria opened up before the three as four medical personnel came out, wiping their brow.

"Left all the stuff as is, sir," one of them told the Captain. "Just be ready for what you see."

"They'll be ready," Headlock said, looking to the two cadets. It sounded more like an order than a confident statement. "Let's go."

Inside the entrance of the place everything looked normal except for the other investigators around there. Cameras were flashing at average locations as if they were interesting. The three walked through to the back and that's when things started to get weird.

"Captain, you mind letting us know where the culprit most likely broke in?" Shining Armor asked.

"That's for you to find out, cadet. Keep yer eyes open," he replied. The blood smears could finally be seen coming out of a room. Looking closely they could see that the door was titled "Costume Room". Inside the room they saw what looked like a pool of blood that something had sat in before moving. Shining Armor and RJ were somewhat anxious and nervous about seeing their first real body. Their emotions turned sour when they saw the blood trail continue around the corner.

"This is getting, um, interesting," RJ said trying to contain his growing fear. The trail started getting thicker until they turned the corner and saw the body.

The two cadets were visibly shocked when they saw what had happened. Captain Headlock, even though he wouldn't show it, was just as shocked if not more at the sight. He'd spent twenty years as a guard and had never seen anything like this.

The body was inside of a duck costume. At least that's what they guessed. Whoever the unlucky guy was was currently wearing a duck head, so they couldn't get a good look at his face. With the condition he was in, the three guess that doing so would've been difficult.

"Medical guys came through here with CSI. Said they'll ID the guy using his teeth. It'd probably the night guy who's supposed to watch this place though." Headlock took out a cigarette and put it in his mouth. "Picked the worst time to quit."

"Sir," Shining Armor interrupted, "guidelines strictly prevent anypony from bringing anything such as cigarettes or anything near a crime scene and lighting them." The Captain and RJ looked at Shining Armor as he said this, both with different kinds of incredulous expressions on their faces.

"Glad you caught me, cadet." The Captain then took out his pack and shoved to RJ. "Take care of this for me. Trying to get clean."

"Um, okay sir." RJ put the cigarettes away, but then he realized that he had managed to figure out what was bothering him before. "Say, who opens this place up?"

"What're you talkin' bout?" Captain asked.

"Is there a day manager that comes in early? I mean, somepony had to place the call for us to come. Not like we just came here and magically found this guy."

"We got the call from the morning janitor. He came in to find this mess. Don't envy that guy's cleanup." Captain Headlock was a stallion of many vices, as he took out a flask and started opening it.

"So was he the one who opened up?" Shining Armor asked.

"Couldn't. Says that he comes in about half past six after the manage-" Headlock, who was just about to take a swig, suddenly stopped his drink and somehow realized that nopony, not even the janitor had wondered about the pony who came in earlier. "Tell the other guys to check out the manager's house! Make sure that exits are secure again! The day manager for this place just became our number one suspect." Shining and Retributive were about to follow their Captain to wherever he'd be going when they heard a thud come from around the corner.

"Sir," Shining Armor whispered, motioning over to the two quietly. Without a word they got in formation to surprise whatever was around there. In a moment's notice they activate the plan and went around to confront the target.

On the ground was a large bear costume that looked as if it had been crawling. Behind it they saw was a fresh path of blood paved by whoever was in there. The head looked up at the three, the eyes not looking as if they belonged to any animatronic. He crawled some more, the legs not moving at all. The head raised once again and let out a pained scream that made the Captain truly remember what fear of the unknown was. The head dropped one final time, blood seeping out through the fur.

Two hours after that and the two cadets were still sitting out there, blankets wrapped around them. Shining Armor regretted the fact that his mother had prepared him a hearty meal that morning as he had the displeasure of seeing it all over again. RJ just muttered some things under his breath. He kept telling everypony he was fine and then continued talking to himself. Captain Headlock came forward to the two ad tried to talk with them.

"I'm sorry boys. I thought that the suit was the only thing in there." The Captain seemed to lose his hearty sounding accent. Apparently he used it to sound tough whenever he was with anypony under him. It wasn't time to sound tough. "I was thinking, 'Headlock, you show the rookies something this weird, nothing else will ever freak them out from this point on'. I was so wrong."

"Not so, sir," Shining Armor spoke up. "I doubt the two of us can say that there's anything more horrifying than what we just saw today." It was an odd thing to say, but slowly the three of them there just started chuckling of how absurd their day had gone.

"I never told you fellas this," the Captain started, "but I have a history with this place. About ten years ago I had just gotten to Lieutenant when I got called in here about four foals that disappeared. They say some creep dressed up as the mascot of this place and lured them back to where the employees go. Never found the culprit or the kids." Headlock took a deep breath after he told them that. "About a year later I get a call saying to check out the place because of some defective animatronic biting at some poor birthday colt's head. Pretty bad scene when I got there. Wanted me to keep control of the situation and make sure that it wasn't some kind of sabotage or something. Like I'd know that."

"That was you?" RJ suddenly said. "I totally remember that! I was there and saw the entire thing go down. Mare, ever since then I just cannot look at those robots and feel calm at all."

"If that's the case then why did you come to investigate a murder in a place where you were traumatized as a kid?" the Captain asked.

"Cause that's where my duty took me. Also, I decided after seeing how big and strong you were that I could give my fears something to worry about themselves: me." Captain heard that and couldn't keep his laughter down.

"You two are going places. That's for sure. Ret, you can take some solace in knowing that this place is closing down anyway. Health code violations and such."

"You know what they'll do with those robots?" Shining Armor asked.

"Hear that they're probably gonna store them and try selling them sometimes in the future. Nostalgia and whatnot. Wonder who'd buy something like that."

"Maybe some other pizza place," Shining Armor suggested. The three sat there silently, thinking about the day. "You think we'll find the guy who did this?"

"Hope so. This was just brutal. Guys from the lab came back recently and told me the first guy was the night security and the other was the day manager. The teeth were almost pushed out of their mouths." Shining Armor started gagging again when he heard that. "Sorry. Anyway, stranger thing was that they weren't attacked first or anything. It looked as if the suit itself is what killed them, what with all the sharp metal and electrical stuff in there. What's weirder is that nopony's found any forced entry into the place. It was all locked up until the day manager came in. This is gonna be a tough one."

"Pretty messed up way to die, sir. Don't know who'd want to kill someone by stuffing them into a suit like that," RJ chimed in.

"Indeed." The Captain finally got up and told them, "well, I think you two should head on home. Not the kind of first case I wanted you two to get. Do something to get your mind off of this stuff."

"Will do, Captain." Shining Armor saluted and walked toward the direction of Celestia's School of Magic.

Twilight was reading a new book she'd gotten and was really enjoying it when she received a note the Spike burped up.

"What's this?" She read the note and was so excited that she rushed off right then to the school's entrance. There she saw in full armor was her brother. "Shiny!" she yelled out.

"Twily!" he responded, hugging her. "How's school going for you?"

"Great! I learned how to make lead into gold and why you should never, ever do that to make money." Twilight noticed that her brother was still hugging her. "Shiny, is something wrong?"

"Not right now there isn't." The two spent the rest of the day together, the horror of the morning being forgotten.

Some horrors should not be so easily forgotten.

The Delivery

"Sound! You know if the mail's been delivered yet?" Pepperoni yelled upstairs to his daughter.

"I've been working up here all day! If you don't know then neither do I!" she yelled back from her room.

"Alright. Just hope I don't end up missing my delivery." Pepperoni then took out some of the pizzas he'd been baking and called two for delivery. The third he delivered to a booth where they'd been eagerly waiting to eat. "Enjoy!" he said with a smile.

"Oh, thank goodness," the mother said as she kept her children separated. "I don't think they would have lasted any longer."

"Don't worry, mam. I've got something coming this way that will help keep the kids busy while waiting for pizza," Pepperoni told her. He went back to the kitchen, wondering if he'd finally be getting his delivery today. He thought that it should be here soon. After all, he'd ordered it just over a week ago now. When he lived in Cloudsdale the deliveries were always prompt, most likely since everyone there could fly. At least he knew that next time he shouldn't go immediately for free shipping.

"Sound? Would you mind coming down here and watch out for any deliveries? I don't want to miss it," he asked.

Sound came downstairs, asking, "What's so important that you need somepony to watch out for it? I'm busy with work right now."

"It's gonna be a big surprise!" Pepperoni said, giggling at the prospect of his new purchase. "After the incident with the guards and my subsequent jail-time, they gave us a cash settlement seeing as they kept me from doing my job and leading to this place being nearly blown up."

"Also the thing from the oven makers," Sound reminded him. "Something popping in an oven usually shouldn't break the gas lines like that."

"Well at least we got a whole new oven from them. But anyway, the thing I purchased will hopefully help out business even more. I've seen it happen to other places like this in the past, so here's hoping luck strikes here."

"Guess you're not gonna tell me then," she said, carrying her art supplies near a window looking outside. She made certain to clean it up before putting anything down, worried that sound blot of marinara or cheese grease would ruin hours of work. Feel like I should put some barriers around my table in case some kid comes running with soda or something," she said as she saw the family of goats at another table.

The lunch shift went by without any problems, at least for Pepperoni. Sound had to worry about kids checking out all of her drawings though. She felt self conscious as children kept on goggling her images while she worked on them.

"That looks weird," one colt said as she worked on a basic sketch.

"Well it's just a rough outline. Not finished with it yet." Sound's brow furrowed as she tried to concentrate more. The kids wouldn't leave her alone though.

"Why didn't you color it?" a filly asked.

"That's not my job. I just draw the characters."

"Why?"

"Because I'm a penciler."

"Why?"

"Because I wanted to draw characters."

"Why?"

"Because I enjoy drawing the characters for comics."

"Why?" Sound was never going to satisfy this filly's curiosity.

Pepperoni was in the kitchen, taking a break in his few moments of freedom. There weren't any new customers right then, so he was able to start cleaning up in the back. It was a fairly busy day, but he was hoping that it could soon get easier for him with his new purchase.

"I wonder where I could put it," he wondered aloud. It would need to be visible, but not ruin the view of the place. He thought maybe in a corner on the left that no one sits near for some unknown reason. "I should check that area out for any outlets."

The rest of the day consisted of Pepperoni doing his usual job while Sound kept trying to keep her drawings from getting ruined. She was particularly angry since at no point did any kind of package was delivered. Her entire day felt spent and she was going to let her dad know.

"Dad! Why am I here?" she asked.

"Why are any of us here?" The two were quiet, Sound giving him a glare. "Oh, you meant why you had to be down here today. Thought we were gonna get philosophical for a moment. Anyway, I was told that my package would be arriving so I had you down here."

"I know that! What I want to know is what's so important that you ordered?"

"You'll know when you see," he teased. "So what has you working constantly?"

"I'm supposed to be drawing a poster for the Hoof of the South Star movie that's being developed. Interestingly enough is the fact that the studios didn't want me to work on it."

"Why wouldn't they want the original penciller to work on it?" Pepperoni asked.

Sound explained, "Because then they'd need to pay me more than the other people drawing it. They just want me to do the poster and that's it."

"Sorry to hear that. Hopefully the movie stays close to the source material."

"Same here." Sound, seeing that she didn't need to be around anymore, got up from her seat and grabbed her supplies. Just as she was going upstairs, she saw something out the window. "Say, did you know that our neighbors ordered something huge?"

"What?" Pepperoni looked out the window and saw a tall box sitting right outside their competitor's place. "Wait a second." He went across the street, encountering Bob as he left his own shop. "Bob, did you order something?"

"No. Don't know why I got this." The two analyzed the box before finding the order form on it. "Apparently this is yours. Don't know why they-" Before Bob could finish, Pepperoni was already carrying the large box back to his place, struggling while attempting it.

"I thought this would be easier that it looked," he said, crumpling down on the ground. "Bob, you mind helping me? I think I may be literally dying here." Bob then grabbed a side and the two worked together to get it into the restaurant, having to tilt it to fit. The decided to set it down near the counter, gasping for air when they finally got it down.

"So I'm guessing it was heavier than it looked," Sound commented on seeing the two.

"Yeah.....you mind....opening it?" Peppeoni asked between his breaths. Seeing as those two weren't in any condition, she grabbed the store's easily accessible crowbar and started peeling at the crate. It was pretty tightly sealed, but she managed to pry it open with a loud thud as the side collapsed. Sound looked inside the crate to find a tall pile of hay standing upright. Out of the pile was a single furry leg.

"Dad, did you finally end up buying that leg lamp mom told you never to buy?"

"Of course not! You know we don't have anyplace for a lamp. What I bought us is a robot!" Sound thought her father was joking for a second. Suddenly he pulled away the rest of the straw to reveal a large robotic wolf standing on two legs with a ripped ear. It had brown fur and an odd yellow color for eyes. Sound couldn't tell whether that was accurate for wolves or just how robots looked.

"Why'd you buy...that?" Bob had no other way he felt like asking.

"You know how those kids that came to this place always rambunctious?" Sound nodded in agreement. Bob just stood there while grunting. "Well, thanks to this 'animatronic' as they are called, those kids will be busy having while playing with the wolf. She'll do things like sing or play music or whatever else animatronics do."

Bob perked up at that. "Wait, so do you actually know what this thing does?"

"Well, not exactly. What I saw was that this thing used to be at another pizza parlor and only cost me a hundred bits!"

"A hundred bits for a robot? Why so cheap?" Pepperoni thought over Bob's question but couldn't come up with an answer.

"Not really certain. Now, let's look for any instructions." He looked through the crate, rummaging through the hay to find a pamphlet with basic info on it. "Got it. Now I'll- huh?" A messaging machine was in the hay. Looking at it he saw that there weren't any tapes in it right then. He reasoned that he would search to find tapes only if he didn't find what he needed in the pamphlet.

"So we plug this thing in somewhere?" Sound asked, finding an extension cord on the wolf.

"I guess. Let me check." Pepperoni skimmed through the pamphlet to find what he needed to start with. "Okay. First we plug it into an outlet. Then we can change the times it can operate through some kind of panel on it." The two decided to start feeling over the animatronic to find the panel and found that there didn't seem to be anything like that.

"What's going on? Thought this wouldn't be that hard."

"Sound, just calm down and let me check out-oh great." Pepperoni did not look happy.

"What is it?"

"This manual's for a different model. It looks like it's for a skeleton model of animatronic. See, this one is actually built specifically for this fur. It's not a skeleton animatronic."

"Well maybe that's why the messaging machine was left in there. Instructions for us since they didn't have a manual." Sound began searching through the hay, managing to find one of the tapes. "Here's one labeled '5'. Let's see what on it." Sound put the tape into the machine after making sure it was rewound and hit 'play'. What happened next she could not properly describe.

A horrible growling noise was heard with some weird vibrating bass noise. There sounded like words being said, but the voice was to indistinguishable to be understood. Suddenly, and without any prior indication, the tape ended.

"Huh." Pepperoni said as he looked at the message machine. "That was freaking scary."

"I think the tape must be worn out or something," Sound reasoned. Her mane was still sticking up however, frozen in place from the terror.

"Yeah. I think we'll continue working on this tomorrow." Pepperoni and Sound went upstairs to get ready for bed.

None of them remembered to unplug the wolf.

Night 1

Bloomheart had had a late shift at Ponyville Hospital today and was finally glad to be getting home. Several times on the flight over she thought she'd conk out or something and crash. All she wanted to do was get to bed and sleep till whenever she wanted.

The store was dark as she got out her keys to unlock the door. That was normal, seeing as it was just past midnight. Unlike other places, they kept a reasonable schedule and knew that nothing good comes in after midnight. What did surprise her however was the noise she heard on the other side of the door. She stopped jingling the keys for a second and listened, hearing what sounded like fast footsteps.

"Who could that be?" she asked, trying to figure out if it was her husband our daughter moving about in the dark. She got the key and opened up the door to find...absolutely no one. "Definitely heard someone," she said as she locked up. She attempted to turn on the lights only to find that they wouldn't work.

"I'm too tired for this shhhhh-" She stopped talking right then as she was certain that something had just started to move in the kitchen. Whatever it was sounded like it was in a hurry. Bloomheart, certain that it was a family member, called out.

"Sound?" she said, immediately feeling regret. She suddenly realized that if it was a family member then they would have turned on the lights. The fact that the lights wouldn't turn on either made her certain that somepony had turned off the breaker switch for them, leading to her coming to one conclusion.

Robbers! she thought, suddenly looking for someplace to hide. She heard more rustling and momentarily had her heart stop when she heard the door to the kitchen swoosh right open. She was suddenly in the room with the robbers.

Trashcan! she thought, quickly moving into the trashcan near the door as quickly as possible. It smelled, but it was better than the alternative. I'll need to remind Sound to take out the trash before we close up she thought in between moments of terror when she felt the pizza cheese sticking to her coat.

Bloomheart kept hearing the sound of running most of the night, her eyes peeled open by fear and adrenaline in the hopes of not being found. At one point she felt it had somehow become routine. The robbers just seemed to run around and not even search for anything. Either the robbers couldn't find anything of worth or their robber was a jogging pony that had gotten seriously lost. Eventually the running seemed to soften to her ears, her eyes feeling like they needed her to blink for just...

"Bah!" Bloomheart yelled. She quickly got up and tipped over the trash can she had been hiding in. She worried for a moment, sure that she had alerted the robbers when she looked around and saw nothing going on. She checked the time which was half past six and decided to look around to see what was stolen. Getting out of the filth, she looked around to see almost nothing disturbed in the eating area. She decided to check the kitchen when she noticed a large box just sitting in front of the counter.

"Whats this for?" she asked, checking the sight out. She saw hay on the floor and reasoned it must have been in the box when she finally noticed what had been inside it.

"SUPER FUDGE!" she yelled out, surprised by the large furry creature just standing there. She instinctively flew up to the ceiling, banging her head in the process and falling back down. Hearing the racket, Pepperoni and Sound came rushing down.

"What's going on?" Pepperoni asked, seeing his wife scurry backwards with her hind hooves.

"That thing! What is that?" She pointed over to the bipedal wolf standing right outside the box, scared of what it might be.

"Oh. That's an animatronic dad bought," Sound explained. "He said it's to keep kids entertained and stuff."

"Does it run around?" The two were confused by that question.

"What do you mean 'run around'? It's one of those singing robots." Pepperoni had on idea what she was talking about.

"Last night! I got home just past midnight and heard running through the restaurant! I even heard the door to the kitchen open!" Taking heed of what she said, the two checked back in the kitchen to see what had happened. Bloomheart followed behind. finding that the kitchen was left completely in tact.

"You sure that somepony was back here?" Sound finished checking the walk-in, finding nothing out of place.

"I mean, I heard something like running. It would start and stop. I'm sure of it." Bloomheart sat down and collected her thoughts. "I'm so sure."

"The only thing I'm finding suspicious right now is a weird smell. You know what I'm saying, Sound?" Sound nodded in agreement.

"Oh. That's probably me. I was hiding in the trashcan last night." The two went 'ew' upon hearing that.

"That's my bad. Forgot to change the bags last night," Sound apologized.

"Honey, I think you need to rest upstairs. You probably had a long night and just worried when you heard something odd."

"You're probably right. I'll just clean up and rest. Probably nothing to worry about." Bloomheart went upstairs, giving one last glance at the strange wolf animatronic. She noticed that one of its ears was ragged looking, as if something had ripped at it. Before looking away, she could swear that it looked right back at her.

Day After Delivery

Sound got to work early that morning. All the extra work she'd been doing with the movie poster sketches had started to annoy her. She thought that Cloverbud was probably the strictest Quality Control pony in the business, but at least she could tell the difference between knowing something is good and liking it personally. This director however was not like that. If he didn't like it, it was objectively bad. Apparently the movie had to be micromanaged by the guy since he'd flip out otherwise. Too bad her partner, Buronson, needed to consult on the movie and apparently had to accommodate for the director's decisions.

"Hey, Buronson. Your story butchered yet?" He greeted her with a deep moan, waking up from what she could tell was a long night's rest in the office.

"I'd rather not talk about it." He struggled to get out of his seat, attempting to head to the coffee machine only to run into a desk.

"Hey. I made this thing with you and I have even less say than anypony else," she reminded him. "I wanna know what's going on there myself."

"Well," he said, trying to grab a seat, "They got the art style down to a dot. That was a surprise from what I expected. They're also doing the entire first arc of the story as well. It's weird how short it seems when you see it in movie form. I mean, I thought it'd be longer, but no. They managed to get all the good details down and didn't try to cut anything out."

"That actually sounds pretty good," Sound remarked. "Why're feeling down then?"

"It's just that, I dunno, I guess I feel like everything we've made has actually been pretty...stupid." Sound was shocked when she heard Buronson say that. She went over and slapped him across the face.

"That's nonsense! You and I both know that Jenshiro's story of a post-apocalypse is an epic tail about fighting through the evils of the world through the power of explosive punching. That isn't stupid. That's revolutionary! How many other stories take place during a post-apocalypse and fight warriors with odd clothing?"

"I'm guessing that the movie called 'The Path Warrior' that takes place in a post-apocalypse where the protagonist fights against raiders that where weathered clothing," he explained.

"Yes, but did he defeat them purely with the power of punches and was a girl?" she replied.

"No?"

"Then that settles it. Our thing required thought to put that together." Sound strode off confidently, feeling more confident than she had earlier that same morning. "Creators never feel fully satisfied with their work. That's the only thing you're feeling. You have to learn to say that you've done enough and move on."

"So why have you redone the poster at least five times?" he asked.

"Because the STUPID FREAKIN' DIRECTOR keeps saying that it isn't good enough or doesn't capture the style. I made the style! I drew the artwork!" She started scribbling furiously on a piece of sketch paper, not really sure if she was actually trying to draw something. "What can't this guy get through his head?"

"Guessing he has his own unique vision of how to present the story," Buronson suggested.

"His vision is wrong."

"Whatever." Buronson was too depressed to deal with this. "I don't have anything I need to do today. Should've just stayed in bed."

"If you stayed in bed then you wouldn't be able to hear me complain," Sound teased.

"Go ahead and complain. Your pain may make mine more bearable."

"Alright," she started. "Well, yesterday I had to work on the poster downstairs in the restaurant while a bunch of kids and foals joked around and kept asking me questions about my profession. Then I had to try and help my dad figure out this animatronic he apparently got for just a hundred bits. This morning I go down and find that my mom apparently hid in the garbage all night thinking that a robber was running around downstairs."

"Sounds like your mom is the one having a difficult time," Buronson said as he raised his head up.

"Late shift and then spending your night in garbage? Obviously. She must have thought that the new animatronic was in invader. Can't say I'd blame her. Thing kinda looks creepy even when there's light."

"What kind of animatronic is it?"

"Well," Sound dragged out as she tried to remember details, "It had brown fur, some weird yellow eyes, and I even think one of its ears was torn."

"You think it was from shipping?"

"Nah. I think you just expect something like that when you order something that complex used," she reasoned. "Anyway, I better come up with something to do for a poster soon or I'll lose my mind."

"Can I help? Buronson asked.

"Wouldn't have it any other way, partner." Together, the two worked on designing a suitable poster that the annoying director could not possibly hate.

Pepperoni had just opened up the shop when the first customers started coming in. It was around that time when he finally saw the wolf animatronic start to do its thing.

"Hey there! Welcome to-" It stopped talking for a moment. From the sound of it the character was supposed to be a girl. Pepperoni was confused for a second before realizing that whoever had owned it last must have reset some of its voice commands. Or something. He wasn't really sure how it worked yet.

"Pepperoni's Pizzeria," he told it, hoping that it would understand.

"Hey there! Welcome to Pepperoni's Pizzeria! Hope you enjoy your meal!" she said. Pepperoni was pleased with himself as he hoped that figuring out the rest would be that easy.

"Now, entertain children," he ordered, hoping that it actually was that easy.

"Dance, song, story, jokes, or shuffle?" it asked.

"Um, shuffle I guess." Pepperoni watched as the wolf started moving its arms around and bending its knees. Music seemed to be playing out of some speakers it must have had on its body somewhere, though Pepperoni could not guess where. This kept on going while he made the pizzas. It looked like he made a good investment after all.

Bloomheart bumbled around the break office before finding her seat. With a great humph she sat down, plopping her head down. Tina Triage and Chatty Cathy, the head nurse and junior nurse, were both sitting there without saying a word to their friend.

"None of you gonna ask why I'm tired?" Bloomheart said halfheartedly.

"You're a nurse. No need to ask why you're tired," Tina remarked.

"I never feel tired. Wonder why," Tina added, drinking her fourth coffee that hour.

"It's not my job. It's something that happened when I got home last night. I thought there was a robber in the restaurant and he was in the same room as me so I ended up hiding in the garbage all night." The two snickered hearing that.

"I've made mistakes in the past when tired, but nothing like that," Tina replied. "One time I thought that a bag of garbage was a cat."

Cathy added, "I once put cream cheese on my toast when I thought it was butter. It did not taste good."

"Well I think I'll be heading home early today. Haven't been doing so well today. Almost let Dr. Zebra Chaser forget his watch inside a patient today. I'm supposed to remind him before it happens again."

"It's not hard to tell when you have a watch in you. You start feeling strong pangs of pain in the area along with hearing subtle ticking throughout the day." The two were about to ask Cathy about how she knew that before reconsidering.

"Anyway, I can't do well today, so you guys have anyone to look over my shift?"

"You don't have to go home. I know a place you can sleep in secret." Tina leaned forward and started whispering. "There's a sleeping quarter for the students that's usually locked, but I managed to jimmy one of the locks so anypony can get in there when they need it. It's on the third floor right across the from the janitor's closet. Go there, rest an hour, and come back feeling better."

"Okay." Without any real emotion, Bloomheart dragged herself off to the third floor to get some rest. Her two friends felt insulted by this though.

"She could've said thanks," Cathy said.

"True, but then that would mean less time for sleep." Tina took out a piece of gum and started chewing. "Everypony needs their thing to get through the day."

"I hear that!" Cathy said as she took a drink of her coffee.

Night 2

Shining Armor found himself running. He couldn't tell from what, but knew that it wasn't anything he wanted to deal with. He hoped to find someplace to hide in this long hallway, maybe a door or something, but that didn't seem to be happening. As his hoofs clopped against the floor he heard another sound behind him. It sounded like a clanking noise rapidly hitting the floor, getting closer and closer.

"Come on. Come on!" he yelled to himself, panting as he made his way through. He thought he spotted a corner coming up and knew that this was his best chance of getting some distance. He rounded the corner and found that the thing that had been chasing him was not in front of him.

It was a bloody bear costume wearing a top hat. Shining Armor tried to move but found his legs frozen in terror. The bear lunged at him and made a terrifying scream.

Shining Armor work up, rustling the sheets as he gathered his thoughts.

"Alright. It was just a dream," he told himself, still dazed from his rest. He got out of bed slowly and made his way to the bathroom. He was careful not to wake up his wife as he went down the hallway. He just needed some water and that would help this situation.

The light hurt his eyes when he turned it on, momentarily blinding him. He got a dixie cup out and started filling it with water, drinking it, refilling, and doing the same thing over and over until he drank the equivalence of half a cup of water.

"Wish these things held more," he said, wondering if he was really thirsty or these were just so tiny. After his sixteenth refill he remembered the details of his dream once more. The bloody bear and that scream felt so familiar that he couldn't get it out of his head. It felt like something he'd actually seen before. "Maybe I should give my old partner a call. Haven't talked with him in a while."

He went downstairs and made and picked up his phone. Looking through the directory, he found his partner's number and decided to ring him up. Hopefully he wouldn't be upset by this late night call.

The number had just been punched in when a voice answered, "Captain Ret here."

"Ret!" Sound said, surprised to find his partner so quick to answer. "Glad that you picked up. It's me, Shining Armor, your old partner!"

"Shiny! How're things going for you?"

"Great. Um, sorry if I cut the pleasantries short, but I need to ask you something. Have we ever worked on a case involving a bear suit?" The line was silent and Shining thought the call had been dropped for a moment before he heard a reply.

"What the hay you talking about?"

"I had this strange dream involving a bear that was bloody and letting out a scream. Sounded like it was in pain. I know it's weird but it feel like this has happened before. I can't remember exactly where it was, but I remember that it had something to do with...,"Shining Armor stopped talking as the thoughts raced into his head. He knew that there was something off related to the topic. "Pizza?"

"Pizza?"

"Yeah. The bloody bear suit and pizza place." Shining Armor only realized it after, but he said 'suit'.

"Oh." Ret's tone seemed to suddenly shift. "I think I remember it now."

"What was it?" Shining Armor's heart was now racing. He couldn't tell if the feeling was excitement or if it was fear.

"Our first real case. It was at this pizza place and the guys were found in the suits the robotic skeletons would be placed in. One guy was in a bear costume. Was still alive when we got there apparently. Didn't last long though."

"I honestly can't believe I forgot about that," Shining Armor said, surprised. "Did anypony ever figure out who did it?"

"I remember it being labeled a cold case a couple years back. They could never find any evidence of anypony else entering the place." Shining Armor suddenly came up with a thought that he knew he'd regret.

"Say, Ret, you wanna-"

"Work together on this case? I'm already clearing my schedule. Get your pampered hide down to the headquarters ASAP and we'll give it a shot." Shining Armor was glad to have Ret as a partner.

"I'll leave first thing in the morning." Shining Armor hung up the phone. He felt like he was in a dream again. Working with his partner after all these years to solve their first ever case? He didn't know what had gotten into him. Whatever it was, it wasn't gonna leave on its own.

Sound had been working in her room late tonight. She was sketching an alternate version of the movie poster that the director asked for just so he could have a good comparison. When she saw how late it was even she was shocked.

"Three already? I don't even feel dead yet," she said as she chuckled at her own joke. "Can't believe I'm spending more time on this poster than my actual comics. At least I'm still getting paid for this." It was only then that Sound noticed that she was starting to get hazy with her colors, almost drawing a grey weapon as pink. Taking this as a sign, Sound went over to her bed and plopped down.

It was only several moments later that Sound heard a noise. She determined that it was somepony running around downstairs. It was probably her dad making himself a midnight pizza. She decided to tune it out and focus on getting some rest.

A couple moments later the noise sounded closer. It reminded Sound of the steps leading upstairs. All that was missing was the creak at the very top.

She suddenly heard a creak. Then more running.

"What could dad be doing?" Sound asked herself. She reasoned that it could be mom. The problem with that was mom had been home earlier that night. She was ready to come to a conclusion when she heard a knock on the door.

"Who is it?" she asked. Sound didn't know why she had to ask that when it could only be her own parents. She started feeling uncomfortable when there was no reply. "Hello?" The sound of running now took over again, getting further and quieter.

Sound was starting to feel scared. She didn't know why, but things didn't feel right. The running continued once again and was getting closer now. Each step she heard made Sound's spine tingle even worse.

And then there was the knocking again.

She didn't know why, but Sound was certain that she needed to open the door. It may have been curiosity. It may even have been stupidity. Whatever it was made her want to find out who was knocking. She opened the door and found that nopony was there.

"The hay? Did I just hear something like knocking?" while pondering she heard a noise. It sounded just like running. The noise was getting closer and closer and sounded almost nothing like the noise of somepony running. It was something else.

Fear took hold of Sound and she shut the door, running to her bed and hiding under her sheets. She didn't know how that would protect her but still hid there. She felt like a child hiding from the monsters in the closet.

There was another knock at her door.

Scared, she wrapped her sheets around herself, cocooning herself in fabric. Her heart pounding, she passed out from fright.

Family Get-Together

The group was working on the "Hoof of the South Star" movie had convened in the conference room that morning to meet with Sound and Buronson. Today they'd be showing the two a sample of the music that would be in the film and getting their feedback. Sound was still sleepy when she walked into the room, plopping her head down without caring how it looked.

"You okay?" Buronson asked.

"Yeah. Just worked late last night and had this really weird dream. You know what you have one and it feels so real?"

"Never. I never dream. Only wait until the day comes and I can continue on." Buronson saw the surprised looks on everypony's place as they just stared at the writer. "I should totally write that down."

"Okay. Listen up!" the director announced, waiting for everypony to pay attention. "We have a special guest coming in today."

"Who is it, Mr. Adisha?" Sound asked.

"Today we will have the wonderful singer who helped us to make these songs visit us. When we told her where we were going she was thrilled to come along. I guess she's a big fan of your work."Sound wondered who Mr. Ashida was talking about and asked him.

"Who exactly is singing for this soundtrack?"

"Who else do you think would wanna be a part of her sis' first big movie," a voice in the doorway said. Sound turned to find that her sister was standing right there.

"Cleversong!" The two got up and hugged each other right there on the spot. "I can't believe you're doing the music for this movie."

"Well I just had to when I saw it," she responded. "I mean, this is your project," Cleversong told her.

"Uh, technically I wrote it, so," Buronson felt like he was the third wheel in his own creation.

"So what kind of music is there for the movie?" Sound asked, wondering what her sister had come up with.

"Well, I'm not the one that actually composed it. Some other guy I'm not sure wrote it. I just sang the lyrics. Apparently it's a different language. Diamond Dog, actually." Cleversong took out a CD and asked, "You wanna hear the one I really like?"

"Totally." The room became silent as Cleversong got the track ready. She popped the disk into the player and waited for it to load up. There was some whirring, and then the music started blaring. At first it was some guitar with what sounded like synthesizer. And then came her sister.

"YOU WA SHOCK!" the voice screamed out, filling the room with a strange energy.

"You guys liking it?" the director asked.

"Yeah! I don't know what the lyrics mean, but it's certainly energetic. What about you, Sound." Buronson waited for his partner to reply. "Sound?"

The room started staring at Sound as she stood up and stared blankly. It soon became apparent that she was shivering while listening to the song. She then got up on her hind legs and apparently leaped across the room over to a stand that had been set up of the film's big baddie Bow Roah.

"ATATATATATATATATATATATATATATATA!" Sound screamed as she pounded the stand that had been set up The room looked on in terror as she completely eviscerated the poster with each punch. Soon it became nothing more than scattered bits of cardboard on the ground. "You're already-" She was cut off when her sister stopped playing the song. Sound blinked and looked around, dumbfounded by everypony's expressions.

"Did something happen?" Nopony knew what to tell her.

Pepperoni and Bloomheart were serving the dinner rush together that day. Bloomheart's shift ended early and she was able to get home to help out Pepperoni before he got overwhelmed. The animatronic seemed to be working pretty well, keeping not only the children busy, but also entertaining adults as well.

"What did the pizza say to the cook when he was scheming?" the robotic wolf asked. "I hope this isn't a half-baked plan!" The kids started laughing with their parents chuckling at the terrible puns that they would not admit they loved.

"Can't believe that thing is working like you intended," Bloomheart said, surprised that things were going well with that purchase.

"Same here. Somehow thought that it would end up betraying me and doing something terrible." Pepperoni was glad that customers weren't hassling him now about when their orders would be ready. He felt like he actually made a good decision with this purchase.

The door to the restaurant opened up, Sound coming through, followed by her sister. "Hey guys! You won't believe who I ran into at work."

"Grain Miller?" Pepperoni asked, unaware that he had been eaten by a shark.

"Nope." Sound moved out of the way to reveal Cleversong standing right behind her.

"Cleversong!" the two greeted, going over to hug her.

"What brings you down here?" Bloomheart asked.

"I'm actually doing the singing for Sound's movie." she explained.

"It's not really my movie since I haven't been involved in almost any way." Sound corrected. "Still, awesome to have my sis working on it. Now I know that they can't possibly butcher it with you on board."

"Hoping the exact same thing," she replied. "Oh, someone came with me as well."

"Justice?" the three guessed, thinking that it was her boyfriend. Just as the three said that the door opened up revealing who it was.

"Ha! You thought that it was Justice! But it was I, Ret!" he yelled as he strode over to them.

"Ret? Why're you here?" Bloomheart asked.

"Sorry that you thought my little bro'd be here, but I'm having my former partner over to my place to investigate and I told him I'd get the best pizza I know when we meet up. Pepperoni, you have a thing that'll keep these pizzas hot on the way back?"

"I have something better!" Pepperoni went into the kitchen and came out with two boxes. "These pizzas haven't been cooked yet, but you can actually bake them at your place. I write the instructions in the boxes for you to follow."

"Awesome! Can't wait to say that I made it," he joked. "So anything new going on with you guys?"

"Dad bought this new thing recently. Wanna see it?" Sound asked, hoping to surprise Ret.

"Sure!"

"Alright. Close your eyes and I'll guide you. It's a big surprise." Sound could only imagine his reaction to seeing the creepy animatronic staring at him. He did as she instructed and the two went over to where it was stationed. "Alright. Open up!"

Ret did as she commanded and Sound was surprised when he just stood there, his expression not changing. It started to become weird after a full minute of this. Then she didn't know how to react when he fell to the floor and started crying.

Night 3

It took all of them to get Ret to the guest room while he was wearing all his armor. It was a guess to how the floor was able to carry his weight without cracking. After what seemed like forever they were able to get him to the bed and closed the door, letting him sleep off whatever had just happened in peace.

"So," Sound said, breaking the silence, "anypony know what just happened?"

"I have no idea," Cleversong confessed. "I'd never seen him act like that before. He's stared down cannon fire and held his own but this...THING...just made him crack."

"Maybe it's just a phobia he has," Bloomheart suggested. "After all, it is kinda creepy when you stare at it." Bloomheart was still nervous about whatever this thing was. She still felt like it was out of place in the restaurant.

"Okay. Anyway, let's get this place cleaned up. Cleversong, you know what to do?" Pepperoni said, referring to her doing the dishes when she lived there.

"On it, pops," she replied, knowing that he hated the word since it made him feel old. The family laughed as they got the restaurant cleaned up for tomorrow.

Ret rose up from his sleep, groggy and wearing his thick armor still. He didn't know how he'd ended up in this room. He remembered that he visited Pepperoni's Pizza Place to pick something up for Shining Armor and himself and that's when things go black. Something scared him, but whatever it was he couldn't remember.

"Gotta check out where I am," he said, reminding himself of his training for when you find yourself in unknown places. He turned on the light and found himself in a room he remembered seeing last Hearth's Warming Eve. "Oh! This is the guest bedroom!" he said, recalling all the workout equipment he helped to move.

"Guess they finally threw that stuff away or something." Ret tasted the inside of his mouth and was disgusted. He needed something to drink and left his room for the kitchen. He tried turning on the lights for the room but found that none worked.

"Wonder what's going on there. Better let Pepperoni know that he needs to change the bulbs," he said to himself as he tried to feel his way around. He couldn't help but knock over pots and pans while moving around the tables. He felt a long handle and figured that he must be at the walk-in. "Okay. I think if I head this way I should-" he said before sticking a hoof into a pot. He tried to pull it off but found that it didn't work. He then started shaking it and gnawing at it and resigned that it'd be a two-pony job.

"This'll be awkward." Ret moved around, trying to be quiet with the pot on his hoof. He finally found a metallic basin and realized it was the sink. Only then did he realize that he needed something to drink with. "Where'd he keep the cups?"

Before Ret could say anything else he heard swift footsteps and the door to the kitchen swing open. There was sudden clanging as some pots and pans fell without heed. Instinct kicking in, Ret managed to find a cupboard to hide in. He thought that he was overreacting for a moment, but wanted to be sure. Nighttime makes ponies more paranoid. Things were suddenly quiet and Ret was sure that he had overreacted to whatever he'd heard. He was about to leave his safety hole when the running started again. At this point he knew somepony was in there and stayed where he was, leaving a small slit to peak through. It paid off when he saw what appeared to be furry feet just standing there in front of him.

Ret's heart was beating heavily now. He didn't know why, but something felt off about whatever this was. He couldn't pump himself up like he usually did but instead felt like he was a rookie again. The feet started to turn around and he heard the kitchen door moments later.

"What am I doing?" he thought. "I'm RET! I bring the pain to anypony who breaks the law, and Breaking and Entering is against the law!" Ret got out of cover and felt his energy returning to normal. He then went charging into the dining area, ready to bring down any intruders. "Whoever's in here is under-".

Fear. That's what Ret would later realize he was feeling. Pure fear distilled from past traumas returning to light. Ret looked at what he was sure was the intruder and saw the animatronic just standing there with its mouth hanging open as if trying to say something. He remembered what had made him faint right then and found himself taking steps back. His instincts kicked in and he ran as fast as he could to wherever he could. He felt himself trip and tumbled over, hitting his head hard in the process. Ret was about to get up again when he instinctively saw a smiling face right behind him, causing his heart to stop.

The Final Night

Ret woke up to find himself in a hospital bed, tubes sticking in his body. He tried to move up to get a better view and found himself too weak to move up more than a few inches. Feeling desperate to contact anypony, he took a deep breath and let out a yell.

"Anypony there!" he called out.

"I'm right here," a doctor said to the right of him.

"Oh. Sorry. Just didn't see you," Ret explained.

"That's alright. From what you've been through I'm glad you're able to yell like that," the doctor replied. "The ponies you were staying with heard the noise you made after tripping and came downstairs to find you all curled up."

"What time was that?" Ret asked, wondering what time he had encountered whatever he saw.

"It was five after six in the morning," the doctor told him. "They found you right after having a heart attack and called it in. If they hadn't done it right then you most likely would have been lost. Actually, you were dead for about five minutes."

"WHAT?" Ret was completely surprised by this news.

"Yeah. You had a second one right after you were brought in. Most ponies wouldn't survive having two heart attacks that soon after the other, but you somehow managed it."

"Look, Doc, thanks for saving my life, but I need to make a call to my partner stat. You mind getting a phone for me?"

"Of course. I should get home soon though. It's almost midnight." The doctor went and brought the phone over to Ret who proceeded to put in Shining Armor's number. The line only rang once before he picked up.

"Ret!" exclaimed Shining Armor, sounding out of breath. "Heard what happened but couldn't visit. Think I found out what happened. You remember how that pizza place had those robot mascots?"

"How could I forget," he replied dryly.

"Listen. Apparently the place got turned into a video store. It got shut down. Then it became a beanie buddy store. That got shut down. Then it became a neon jacket place and became successful before shutting down once again. Now it's something a little more permanent - a comic store. The guy I met there apparently worked there ever since the pizza place and says that before he worked there it was a robot fighting arena. The animatronics there were made from the spare parts of those machines and may have been programmed to kill when set on free-roam."

"What?" Ret wasn't even sure if he was surprised at anything his partner was saying.

"Yeah. The managers had them roam at night to keep their servos from being stuck or something. Eventually they started to cause damage to the place and there was another one of them made that never got to be put out. It's job was to maintain the other bots and keep them from injuring themselves and to set them back up before the place opened up."

"Shining, how exactly did you learn this stuff from your source?" Ret asked, suspicious about how anypony could know this much.

"Simple. The guy was a janitor there. Everypony knows that janitors are the best at finding information. Our Intelligence Department is literally a guy in a janitor's closet with a CB radio. You'd be surprised to learn how much he knows about everypony."

"Whatever. What about these killer robots you're talking about?"

"Apparently the company that owned the place managed to hide the fact that their animatronics did this and scrapped them while hiding the other one they created to maintain them. Turns out that one was much more intelligent than anypony thought. Creator was a bit of a mad scientist, putting in a super-powered battery, high-processing brain, and an unstoppable thirst to perform its task. Managed to be considered too important to be destroyed and was left untouched." This news suddenly brought a spark to Ret's eye.

"Wait, what happened to that one?"

"That one was owned by the creator's wife. I met and talked to her. Apparently she didn't like having it around and sold it online for cheap along with a creepy message machine simply to get it out of the house. Pointing that out since those creepy messages turned out to be left by the victim recalling the events of those nights he worked there."

"Meet me at Pepperoni's Place! I think the last bot might be there!" Ret yelled at Shining Armor, forgetting to let him know where that was. "Doc, you have any way to get me to town fast?"

"Do I!" The doctor ran out into the hallway and quickly returned with a wheelchair with flames and spoilers on the sides. "This baby can go sixty miles per hour and has nitro. Only reason not everypony's in one of these is because it's called 'horrifically dangerous' and 'unwieldy'. We'll show them! Now hop on out!"

"YEAH!" Ret slowly got out of his bed, slowly removing the tubes and moving over to the chair with difficulty. He sat himself down and put his hoof to the control stick, immediately going at 30 mph out into the hallway. Without thinking much, Ret decided to launch out the window. Luckily for him the doctor had hung on and deployed the retractable wings that came with it just in time.

"Let the world know that I, Dr. Spacepony, have created the most awesome wheelchair ever!" The two cheered as they flew into town.

"So that's why Jenshiro now has blue hair," Buronson complained to the group. He and several other coworkers decided to go to Sound's late that night to discuss the movie in progress. The group performed a collective groan at the knowledge that the director was making some odd choices.

"It's like the guy never read the books," Golden Bell, Public Relations Manager, complained.

"To be honest, neither have we," Heyfield, one of the writers, admitted in front of them.

"Look, let's be honest and say nopony here reads anypony else's work," Bates, Chief Editor, told the group. "I know the reason why me and Cloverbud know your stuff better than you is because we had to read all your stuff at least five times." The groups discussion was suddenly cut off when there was a knock at the door.

"Wonder who that is," Sound asked as she got up to check it out. She opened the door to find their neighbor standing there with four large packages behind him.

"They delivered to my place. Again." Bob said, agitation in his voice. "What did you guys get this time?"

"Don't exactly know. I'll get my dad." Sound went upstairs as Bob dragged the packages in. Sound returned with her dad, hoping he would know what was in the box.

"I really don't remember buying anything new." Pepperoni looked at the labels and saw that it was linked to his account. "Let's open it up to see what's going on." The box was pulled open and inside was what looked like a giant mascot costume for a rabbit. "What?"

"Let's check the other three," Bates suggested. Heyfield, Sound and himself went and opened the others to find a bear costume, a chicken costume, and a fox costume.

"What they hey are these for?" Heyfield asked as he looked inside one of the helmets. It was surprisingly cramped and filled with lots of metal pieces. Obviously not meant to be worn by somepony.

"Buck if I know," Buronson said. At that point both Cleversong and Bloomheart came down from their rooms to check on the racket going on.

"Is that a robot head?" Cleversong asked as she looked at the fox's head.

"Your guess is as good as mine." Before Pepperoni could guess anything else, the lights for the room went dark, surprising them all except for the family.

"You still do the timed lights?" Cleversong asked.

"Sometimes I forget to turn them off. Too bad I can't turn them on again. Freakin' electricians," Pepperoni was about to go on a rant just before Bloomheart calmed him down.

"Sorry everypony, but you should go home now. It's just about midnight," she reminded them, hoping they would let her sleep that night and stop complaining about their 'craft' and 'integrity of artistic value'.

"Well, I'll be heading off now," Bates said, gathering his stuff. "Cleversong, you mind holding onto the tape that demoed today? I know you won't forget to hand it back to them. It's still in that tape recorder on the counter."

"Will do," she replied before he left. The door closed and suddenly bolted shut to everypony's surprise.

"What was that?" Pepperoni asked. Bloomheart was surprisingly the one to answer this time.

"Oh, I just installed a security system that would look the door automatically at closing time since you keep on forgetting," she said in a tone that made it obvious that this happened frequently. Happens automatically at midnight."

"Okay. Wanna continue this discussion tomorrow?" Buronson asked, getting up along with the rest from their seats.

"Sure. I wanna get to-" Golden Bell became silent as she suddenly heard some quick shuffling. "Heyfield, is that you?"

"I'm right over here," he said, holding her right hoof. "Come on and let's-" Heyfield suddenly became stiff when he heard that same shuffling from moments ago draw closer to him. "Uh, who's shuffling? Sound like you're gonna run into me."

"Hold on." Pepperoni went behind the counter and grabbed a flashlight, giving them something to see with. "Now who's doing-" Now even Pepperoni was cut off as he saw something blur through the light, everypony else seeing the same thing.

"Can somepony stop cutting everypony off with their-" The shuffling that cut Cleversong off became full on sprinting now. Pepperoni heard where it was coming from and shined his light at the spot just in time for everypony to be horrified.

"BUCK!" cried out Pepperoni.

"Fudge!" cried out Bloomheart.

"DUCK!" Cleversong yelled as she was suddenly grabbed by the animatronic with its mouth open, howling in what sounded like pain. Everypony was in shock at seeing this happen right in front of them.

"Stop it!" Heyfield yelled out. He and Buronson rushed it only for the robot's claws to pierce Buronson before slashing across Heyfield's face!"

"Heyfield!" Golden Bell screamed, approaching her boyfriend. "Are you alright?"

"Guys?" Buronson said weakly as he was bleeding out his wounds.

"GET OFF OF ME!" Cleversong continued to yell, squirming in the thing's arm. It approached one of the boxes and pulled out what looked like the fox's head.

"Foxy mascot," it said in a grinding voice, the voice box not in use for so many years. It started its attempt to place the painful looking head on Cleversong while she tried to uselessly push it back. Everypony who could tried to rush the machine from behind and damage it or somehow stop it. Bloomheart and Pepperoni attacked from the side.

"Let go of my girl you piece of spinach!" Pepperoni yelled, knowing very little of intimidation. The wolf animatronic responded by biting down on his head.

"DAD!" Cleversong and Sound cried out when they saw this. Cleversong's fore-right leg got crushed when the wolf turned to bite, destroying her resistance to the helmet. She started to yell in pain as it started being forced down on her head.

"No!" Sound yelled without thinking. She got backhanded right into the counter, knocking over the tape player in the process. As it landed on the floor, the tape started to play.

First was the guitar.

Then there was the keyboard.

And then there was the vocals.

"You wa shock!" the song belted out. Sound was suddenly filled with a new kind a flowing energy that fought for righteousness and peace in this chaotic world. She saw the sight of her sister's torment and felt pure fury rage inside her hoofs. Without a second thought, she launched herself toward the wolf animatronic.

"Atatatatatatatatatatatatatatatatatatatatatatata!" she yelled as her hooves mashed against the metal head, breaking its hold on Cleversong. The thing staggered back for a moment before letting out a howl and rushing Sound.

"Sound, move!" her sister warned. Sound did not comply and thrust her hoof forward. The wolf seemed to anticipate this and bit straight down on her hoof. The group was horrified to see this.

All except for Sound.

"Life is a privilege," she said, pulling her arm out of its mouth, ripping the jaws out of the head in the process, "and you don't deserve it!" She took the jaw pieces that were stuck in her arm and thrust them straight into its torso. The wolf started moving again but found it much more difficult.

"I've punctured the battery located in your chest as well as the fluid pump right under it. Soon the acid located in the battery will flow into the tube and reach every single joint in your body, burning it up in the process. In other words," she grabbed the head and pulled back her other hoof, finishing with, "you're already dead!" The other hoof punched straight through the other side of the animatronic head. The wolf's movement was much less coordinated now and was struggling to move. Sound pulled her hoof out of the head and it crumpled down to the floor with a final twitch.

The music finally reached it's conclusion and the tape stopped. With its final click, Sound shook her head and asked, "What just happened?"

To make things even more complicated for everypony, a giant red wheelchair suddenly burst through their wall with Ret and another pony screaming, "Oh yeah!". The two looked pumped up before seeing the mechanical heap on the floor.

"Guess we were late," Ret said. "So, anypony here need a doctor? This guy's one." At that point everypony raised their hoofs and collapsed on the ground.

The next few days of recovery were difficult for everypony. Sound's drawing arm had been shredded by the bite, so she could not draw for a while. Pepperoni's bite to the head, while being substantial, did not affect the way he could bake pizzas. The only real change for him now was that he would sometimes shriek out loud for a solid minute at exactly 8:53 PM every night now. Heyfield got an awesome scar out of the whole ordeal while Buronson learned the wonders of a liquid diet. Cleversong's head was not severely injured, but she did notice that she was now terrified of putting anything on her head. Ret and Shining Armor were now happy that the case was solved and that they could now sleep in peace and feel justified in their hatred of animatronics.

THE END

OR IS IT?

Yeah. Sorta. They've still got a movie, remember?