Most Members of the Apple Family Killed Off in a Six-Hour Span
"You're adopted," said Ma Apple.
In the end, that was the only thing that everypony was going to understand about the Night of Knives. The 'who' and the 'where' barely count, since 'most of the Apple clan' and 'pretty much all of Equestria' are pretty broad terms. Physics broke down a few hours in, so the 'when' is pretty nebulous too. Applejack was still a filly, we know that much. The 'what' boils down to a few blanket terms, on account of everypony's fuzzy memory and all the cameras spontaneously combusting, and of course the 'how' is so utterly absent that Discord himself is suspected of involvement. But we all remember the 'why'. At least, this part of it.
But enough stalling!
As soon as Ma Apple uttered those infamous, immortal words, Filly Applejack began to sniffle. Her bottom lip began to wibble, in a way that would have been adorable if it weren't so foreboding. Then Ma and Pa made the mistake of turning to run. Applejack pointed her muzzle up at the setting sun and started to cry.
Over on the other side of the barn, Big Macintosh was standing awkwardly on the sidelines of the square dance, trying to avoid the siren call of the fiddle. It wasn't that he was a terrible dancer; he moved with surprising agility and grace for a colt of his age. It was that the moment he stepped in, he would be swamped by prospective dance partners.
That was why a very small part of Big Mac rejoiced when he heard somepony crying. Then the rest of his soul was engulfed in righteous flames as he recognized who was crying. He had been training himself since her birth to recognize that sound, and to come running whenever it was made. By the time his brain fully understood what was going on, he was already halfway around the barn, head full of age-inappropriate blood-spattered thoughts and hooves pounding the earth like he had a personal vendetta against it. His little sister was crying, and whoever had done it was going to pay dearly.
Big Mac rounded the next corner, and accelerated as he finally caught sight of the little orange bundle of heart-wrenching sorrow. He scanned the area around his little sister, and at first took a little bit of comfort in seeing Ma and Pa already close by. Then he saw that they were moving away from Applejack, and really fast too. The cauldron of Big Mac's anger boiled over.
"WHAT DID YOU DO TO MY SISTER?" he roared, in a voice that thundered like the footfalls of the gods. That only made Ma and Pa run faster, which made Applejack cry harder, which made Mac even angrier.
Luckily, this vicious cycle only lasted another two seconds before something even worse happened. You see, from the moment she started crying, Applejack's wails had been slowly rising in pitch and volume. And now, as her parents retreated into the house and Big Mac stormed after them, the poor little filly reached an octave that only dogs could hear. Which wouldn't have been so bad, if her range hadn't also reached past the borders of Ponyville and into the caves of the Diamond Dogs.
It's very hard to describe the sound of ultimate suffering, and even harder to devise an adequate onomatopoeia for. 'The sound you make when your brain is melting and leaking out your ears and oh my god I can feel it trickling' is close, but doesn't translate well to people who have yet to experience it for themselves. So instead, what I want you to do is take a baby, a puppy, and some sort of dog-safe candy that humans can also eat. Introduce them to each other, then give them both candy. Then take away the candy. Then take the baby and puppy away from each other, into separate rooms, and force them feet-first into a meat grinder.
That's the sound the Diamond Dogs were making.
Ignoramus, chief of the Diamond Dogs because he had the smartest-sounding name, was in agony for two reasons. One was the sound that filled his ears, his eyes and most of his liver, and the other was seeing what it was doing to his fellow dogs. Most of them were rolling around on the cave floor screaming, not that Ignoramus could hear them over the hell-sound. Some were pounding their heads against rocks in a vain attempt to drown out the sound, while some had taken to ripping out each other's throats for some semblance of a peaceful death.
Had he not been slowly and painfully dying, Ignoramus would have been overwhelmed with pity at the sight. Instead, though, he was filled with the need for his mother. Had he known about 200% proof vodka, he would also have been filled with the need for that.
Some small part of the dying dog felt it should try and save some of the dogs. Another, embarrassingly larger part of Ignoramus's thought process decided to prioritize the females. And by prioritize, I mean he didn't plan on any other males living through this.
He stumbled over to the nearest female and, bracing for possible death, dragged her paws away from her ears. Her eyes opened, and she stared at the chief.
"Dig!" The word was drowned out by the noise, but that was why Ignoramus was pointing at the cave floor and making scratching motions with his other paw. The message seemed to be understood, and he managed to stumble over to three other females before the need for silence became too much. Other dogs were already disappearing beneath the earth, and Ignoramus did not hesitate to follow.
It takes a few seconds for a Diamond Dog to tunnel thirty feet through granite. According to legend, their claws are fake, carved from earth pony bones. These legends were never spread around the unicorn or pegasus campfires, but never mind that now. The point is that Diamond Dogs are fast diggers, and that this particular tribe was desperate to be out of earshot of their own personal apocalypse.
Which is why, about a minute after Applejack's screams stopped being audible to ponies, the earthquakes started.
The good news is that the strange rumblings made Applejack stop crying. The bad news is that one second later, the huge stretch of road in front of her stopped lying flat on the ground. A hitherto-unremarkable point somewhere on the horizon of the filly's vision rose up high into the sky, and the line of moving-company carts that had been approaching slowly picked up quite a bit of speed. Applejack looked up, and had no idea what to think as it began to rain hats and stallions.
Big Mac had slightly more of an idea what to think, which was why he charged forward to grab Applejack and pull her out of the shadow of certain doom. Once they were out of immediate danger, though, the colt ran out of things to think. He turned to look for somepony to help them, just in time to watch as his five uncles and three great-uncles suddenly disappeared into the earth. He took the opportunity to bury Applejack's face in his shoulder, under the pretense of letting her cry things out for herself.
The earthquakes did have other consequences. These were slightly more subtle, but no less deadly. In fact, they might have been more deadly. One of the tremors only shook a few screws loose in the new grain silo, while another upset the live demonstration of unstable and proto-magical chemicals. Thankfully, nopony had brought any oranges, thus unwittingly preventing a giant lake of acid from forming. But for at least a decade, historians and chemists would debate whether that would have been better than what actually happened.
Imagine an apple tree in heat. Now ignore the various wood puns that mental image just gave you, and move on to the smell. Thick and musky, but also lofty and fragrant. Enticing, but not necessarily alluring. In almost any part of the world, one of the more harmless results you might get from a chemical reaction.
That is, unless there's a pack of mostly male timberwolves living in the Everfree Forest just downwind of Sweet Apple Acres. In which case, one of the leading causes of pony death until they evolved the 'don't go into the Everfree' instinct is about to knock on your door and demand things you cannot give them. And then, when it gets angry, it will take things that you most certainly can give them, but would never willingly give up. Like your heart. Or your spine. Or your mother's spice rack.
In any case, Sweet Apple Acres echoed with the out-of-season howls of the timberwolves, and everypony panicked. Most Apples had the good sense to run away from the farm, but that also meant that most Apples plunged head-first into the yawning abyss of the recently-concluded earthquake. A few dunderheads ran for the apple trees, where their screams rose by a few octaves before falling to a pitch that was drowned out by the rest of the screaming. Then, as the timberwolves broke the tree line and charged across open fields, someone had the brilliant idea to retaliate.
"Release the tigers!"
Wait, did I say brilliant? I meant to say, monumentally stupid in the worst possible way. It seems like fairly basic math: Rampaging timberwolves + tigers =/= improvement. But apparently you can be part of one of the most successful farming empires in all of Equestrian history without learning some simple math. Thank goodness he never had the chance to breed.
Anyway, the tigers didn't so much fight at the command of the ponies as they did occasionally try to take a bite out of the timberwolves, before deciding that they liked having teeth and focused on the squishy enemy. The timberwolves barely even registered the new variety in food, plowing angrily through anything that didn't stand up to them, which was basically everything. Aside from the minefields, of course.
Amidst the confusion, somepony found a way to make the situation worse. Hopefully, it was deliberate, because the alternative just says too many depressing things about the Apple family's average intelligence.
Now, the plan had been for the fireworks to go off at sunset. Instead, they went off in sunset. Well, her full name was Succulent Sunset, and it was just one firework, but hush your mouth, it's a play on words.
Fireworks whizzed all over the place, their stands having been knocked over by the earthquake and their fuses lit by what forensic time travellers were able to identify as a cigarette, after they hauled all the forensic time travellers' corpses off the thing. I swear that tiger was spawn-camping. At least, until his stomach exploded. Yes, chase the flying stick, you stupid cat. At least leave that cliche for the timberwolves.
Speaking of which, the only thing worse than a giant wolf made out of constantly-reassembling bits of wood is a giant wolf made out of constantly-reassembling bits of wood on fire. And at least seven of them were on fire, so you can only imagine the slaughter that ensued there.
One of the timberwolves survived, and he managed to last a few hours by hiding in the kitchen. Thank goodness for that fire extinguisher.
About an hour later, the massive peaks and valleys formed by the violent earthquake slid back into their original positions.
"And that is why we pay the fat ponies so much, L'il Sapling." Pa Apple patted Applejack's head, and smiled at her in a way that almost made her forget that she had been hearing ponies die in gruesome and horrible ways not that long ago.
"But Daddy, what about all the other places this earthquake hit?"
"Obesity is a popular problem in this country."
But happy endings are boring, so let's catch up on some other things that the fireworks did. Specifically, what the fireworks did to the old apple tree that had never been uprooted because the Apples always assumed it was a zap apple tree.
Long story short, the impact of a Red Roarin' Rocket had awakened Beppdopabook, the Breezie God of Thunder. Short story long, Equestria is treated as the Underworld by Breezies, their migration is a pilgrimage across the very borders of life and death, and Ponyville is where they hide all their thunder gods.
Upon awakening from his timber crypt, the first thing Beppdopabook did was kill a squirrel. He did this with a lightning bolt that reduced a corner of the north orchard to steaming glass. And then he noticed the hang-gliding competition.
The first few ponies, although they were all stupid to still be here, were the lucky ones. Beppdopabook evaporated them with the sheer force of his awesome lightning. Then there were the ones whose wings he turned to ash for daring to claim the skies as their own. They fell to their horrible crushing deaths, or in some cases their horrible crippling injuries. But the worst was Caramel Sr., who was set on fire and went careening into the grain silo. His impact, though nothing earth-shattering, was enough to knock the loose screws completely out of place, and his momentum gave the silo just the right push it needed to fall over and crush even more ponies.
Beppdopabook summoned a bolt of lightning a million times larger than he was, and prepared to heft it at the next pony that made a move.
Three guesses who that shmuck was. Your first two don't count.
And then everything on the planet was pink, there was a sound like a hundred million camera flashes all in a single second, and then the pink was gone, along with all of the cameras.
And that, Princess Celestia, is why you had to reinvent the camera when we were all fillies. Sorry about that.
On the plus side, I'm the only Apple family member with a complete scrapbook of the family history! Nopony else has pictures of the Night of Knives!
Why was it called the Night of Knives? There weren't any knives. There was lightning, and earthquakes, some timberwolves, fire, even tigers, but I didn't see a single knife at that party! Not even an apple peeler! Did you just decide it should be called the Night of Knives so that nopony would remember what really happened?
Well, it doesn't matter, because I've got the pictures! And ALL of the cameras! Time travel is awesome! I don't know why you keep this stuff locked away!
Oh, which reminds me, you totally need to change the locks in the Star Swirl the Bearded wing.
Yours faithfully (but not exclusively winkwinknudgenudgesaynomore),
Pinkie Pie
Celestia stared at the letter. She placed her hoof over various parts of the text, as though there was only one thing that needed to be blocked out. For about half an hour, she considered setting it on fire, or perhaps setting Pinkie Pie on fire.
"No," she decided against the latter. "Pinkie Pie on fire is just as dangerous as normal Pinkie, just with 'fire hazard' added to the list of basic precautions." At this point, the list of Basic Precautions When Detaining Pinkie Pie was filling as much space as the Encyclopedia Equestria, and probably covered more information at this point too. They didn't need another Mother-forsaken footnote scribbled in the margins.
Eventually, the clearest course of action presented itself. Celestia put the letter back in its envelope, dripped hot wax onto the edges, and took an instrument I'd rather not describe out of a drawer in her desk. After dabbing this instrument against the wax for about five minutes, it now looked as though somepony had sealed the letter by trying to lick it cool about five hundred times.
A quick little spell to clean off the instrument, and it was slid into its drawer. Celestia put the letter in her IN tray, took a deep breath, and walked out of her office and down the hall to the room where Luna was enjoying herself. She cracked the door open with only the slightest vestige of modesty and called out, "Luna! I need you to erase my mind!"
It took about five unnecessarily graphic-sounding minutes for the Princess of the Night to finally show up at the door. When she did, she was covered in what boiled down to an apron and a cooking saddle, and drenched in a creamy white substance that was already starting to harden.
"Truly, dear sister? Thou hast read the forbidden scrolls again?" Celestia gave only the smallest of nods, but Luna still threw her head back as far as it would go for her dramatic sigh of exasperation. "This makes the number three score and ten times that you have disturbed my baking class with the same plea! Dost thou never learn from thine own mistakes?"
Celestia sighed. Luna always slipped into Old Equine when she was at her wit's end. She probably wasn't exaggerating about this being the seventieth time, either.
"I'm going to try. Have you got any paint thinner?"
About four hours later, Celestia stumbled back into her office, delightfully drunk, in desperate need of a liver transplant until her magic caught up with her body, and feeling much better about the fact that the memory of Pinkie's letter was still in her head. She stared at the IN tray, and briefly considered eating the document before she thought better of it.
The scroll was enveloped in the white glow of Celestia's magic, and she moved it to her OUT tray.
