Evil Empire

A loud, squishing, and - in all honesty - not exactly appetizing sound made its way through half the school's cafeteria, as a homogenous, gray mass of something smashed down onto Vinyl's food tray. Same as every day. There had been a time when only the best of meals would be served at Canterlot High, Sunset Shimmer's letter bombs to the delivery service had made sure of that. Yet, ever since she had stopped threatening people she didn't quite agree with, the food's quality had strangely deteriorated.

Combined with the event of six girls without any light equipment totally overshadowing hers, these circumstances had lead Vinyl to the assumption that everything at this school would constantly go downhill from here. In order to shield herself from any dump crap, which she was certain would go down in the near future, she constantly kept her headphones on. That way, at least she wouldn't have to be too big a part of it.

It could only be the best way out...even if her grades said otherwise.

Having some food - if one could call it that - put onto her tray, the school's DJ quickly went over to the main mess hall. Little less than 48 hours after finishing up at the store, it was just another Monday at noon. By now, most of the student body already sat themselves down for lunch, and there was only so much time to find a table worth sitting at.

After Sunset Shimmer's defeat, most of the school's social groups had broken apart, as everyone suddenly felt way better working together with literally everyone, no matter the others' interests. While Vinyl thought of that as highly bewildering, it really wasn't much of a surprise, when a light blue hand rose up, waving her over to one of the smaller tables on the room's left side.

Said hand's owner - Trixie, to be precise - had obviously left some room for her. When Vinyl spotted her, she was sitting more or less by herself, leaving a couple of seats empty to both sides. Apart from her, only a bunch of freshmen kids were at the table at all.

Stating that Vinyl didn't know much about those three menaces would have been a flat-out lie. The Crusaders, as they called themselves, had made themselves feared and famous throughout Canterlot High, ever since first attending the school.

Naturally, setting the principal's car on fire by accident as part of an "algebra homework assignment" would gain a group of 15 year-old girls quite a reputation. And ever since their first chemistry class caused an evacuation of the entire building because of an impending nuclear meltdown, said image had been rounded off rather elegantly. In the school's corridors, students usually decided to get out of the Crusaders' way quickly.

They didn't seem to mind, though. As long as they had each other, everything would turn out alright. Or not...given the perspective.

At this point, Vinyl didn't actually care, either. Trixie had never been quite the sort of person to hold a set-back conversation with, but she could really do worse. Besides, she couldn't deny herself being more than eager to find out more about that freaky encounter the two of them had had two days back. A few rogue freshmen wouldn't stop her in that. Truth be told, the three of them hardly even noticed Vinyl, as she placed herself on a chair next to the school's hobby-magician.

Trixie turned towards her, eyes wide open, and, to Vinyl's surprise, even some signs of a welcoming smile on her face. "Did you think about our talk?" she asked.

Well...someone's eager to get straight to the point, Vinyl thought to herself.

"I've been...thinking," she answered. "That was pretty weird, wasn't it? But I can't quite figure out how...or why."

Trixie smirked, as she placed both her hands onto the table in front of her, taking a deep breath. "You miss the point, Vinyl Scratch. This is nothing personal, this is about the evil empire we call our educational system. Especially concerning the upcoming showcase."

"O...kay."

"You said you were openly opposing Principal Celestia's plans?"

"Well, duh."

"And you would want to actively work against them, as well?"

"I guess."

"Should the two of us, me and you, start on that right here, right now?"

"Sounds good...probably..."

"Then it's settled," Trixie concluded, just before returning to a rather serious expression. "So, what are we gonna do?"

Vinyl raised an eyebrow in disbelief. "Dunno...I've just been boycotting it so far. You sounded like you'd have a plan, though."

"Me? Nah," Trixie answered with a shrug, as she hastily shoved some additional peanut butter crackers in her mouth. "You were the first to come up with the idea, so I kinda relied on you here."

"Is that...so?" Vinyl nervously produced a fake chuckle, while staring at the table in front of her. Her food was long gone; the gray pulp had excused itself to go, buy some cigarettes. Research later concluded it wouldn't be back for another 40 years or so.

For now however, an awkward silence ensued between the two of them.

"Well," Trixie started, clearing her throat. "I guess, first of all, we have to make ourselves be heard. You know, spread the idea of our cause to our peers. Only with enough people following it, we can actually get stuff done."

Vinyl nodded. "Again, sounds good. No idea what I'm getting myself into here, but good enough for now. How exactly do you plan on doing that, though?"

Trixie thoughtfully rubbed her forehead on that notion. "We should probably try to talk to the Principal about our plans first, just in case. After that, we need to advertise ourselves the usual way. Like, flyers, posters, bumper stickers...you get the idea."

"Uh-huh...and if we don't get permission for any of that...?"

"In that case," Trixie's evil grin crept back on her face. "We'll just have to go underground, and do the whole thing guerrilla-style. Would create more of a lasting image, anyways."

"Guerrilla...what now?"

The two girls looked up from their conversation, as someone else had obviously just tried to join in. It didn't take them very long to locate the source of the voice: One of the crusaders had turned her head towards them, obviously largely interested by that word Trixie had used. It didn't take Vinyl longer than a few seconds to recall the orange girl's name: Scootaloo, it most likely was.

"Oh yes, indeed," Trixie answered her, while nervously unwrapping another cracker. "The gr - We intend to spread our beliefs by the powers of printed media to alter the course of our school's destiny, and eventually to save the world!"

Scootaloo looked at her, skeptically arching an eyebrow. "So, wait...you're telling me, you can get your opinions across by just placing posters at places 'n stuff?"

After quickly gulping down her short snack, Trixie nodded. "That's pretty much the idea, yeah."

Lost in thought, the freshman kid placed an index finger on her chin, before turning back to her two friends. For some reason, Vinyl could immediately tell she didn't like where this was going.

The following morning, she liked it even less. For some reason, Vice-principal Luna had called Trixie and her into her office. Vinyl couldn't help the impression of all this being somehow connected to their conversation at lunch.

"Surely, you can imagine what you've been called for?" the blue-skinned woman asked them after a brief, intimidating pause. Vinyl shook her head. Even though she had a suspicion, having to attend a private lecture with Luna like that had still been quite a surprise this morning. To make matters worse, Trixie seemed just as annoying and overconfident as always. So far, she had luckily decided to remain silent.

"Tell me," Luna asked, arms crossed, looking extremely stern. "What would you think of it, if I told you about an act of vandalism that was committed here at this school, only yesterday?"

"Why, there's only one answer," Trixie answered, raising up her clenched fists. "This clearly is a travesty! Great and powerful perhaps, but a travesty nonetheless!"

"There, there." Luna raised an eyebrow, clearly somewhat taken aback by that statement. "And what would you think of it, if the two of you had been the reason for it?"

Trixie tried raising her voice once more, but this time, Vinyl was quick enough to cut her off in time. "Well...I don't know, what happened," she told the principal. "But I'm pretty sure neither of us have anything to do with that...ma'am."

"Is that so? But surely, you are aware what exactly you are being accused of? It appears you speak otherwise."

The two girls shook their heads, causing Luna to let out a low sigh.

"Very well. Yesterday, two hours after the day's final lesson, our groundskeeper went up to the second floor to close down and lock the detention rooms. Anything than the usual site presented itself to him, however. Instead, he found the room's walls, windows, and doors covered in several dozens of these." With that last word, she passed a small note of paper over to the bewildered Vinyl Scratch.

Vinyl slightly lowered her shades in order to have a better look upon it in this darkened room. It was a bumper sticker, no doubt. Wherever several dozens of these had come from all of a sudden remained an enigma to her, however.

Lowering her shades even further, she noticed the image printed upon them, and had to try hard not to facepalm: Backened by a waving, patriotic stars and stripes background, blue capitals embraced the short, but meaningful message:

Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!

Vinyl slowly raised her eyes back up to Luna, who returned the look with an even stricter, and more furious expression.

"Three freshmen students, who prefer to remain anonymous at this time, have earlier been identified as the concerning troublemakers. Upon questioning, they quickly accused the two of you for being their main motivation. Of course, vile behavior of deceiving or manipulating others would never be tolerated at this school. Do you know what that means?"

Silence followed.

"It means," Luna concluded. "You should put some effort into changing your ways for the better. For time being, maybe you would like to undo the damage that's already been done. These freshmen students will be happy to assist you with that task."

No further words followed, since in all honesty, none were necessary. Resigning, Vinyl pushed the neon shades back up where they belonged. This certainly wasn't the way she imagined a pleasant start to a day at school.