Animal Cottage

The next morning Spike got up when he listened voices coming from the outside. He went to the main door expecting just a little discussion, on the contrary the entire town was in front of the castle and all the citizens looked scared and worried. At the front were Rainbow Dash, still holding Tank, Pinkie Pie and Rarity, who was the most concerned.

“What’s going on?”

“Spike, where’s Twilight?” asked Rainbow Dash.

“She’s in bed. What’s happening?”

“That’s happening!” replied Pinkie Pie, pointing at the castle.

It resulted that the entire Friendship Castle was covered by the lines ‘We warned you’, written in blood. On the star at the top was written the sentence ‘The end will come at sunset.’ With Owlowiscious’ assistance, once he came back from its duties, Angel did all the work at night and, for a bunny, it was surprisingly well written. The question everypony was doing now was ‘From who the blood was?’

“Who did this?” asked Spike.

“We don’t know” replied Dash. “When I woke up I noticed it and immediately I called everypony in town to come here.”

“I don’t care about this blood festival, I just want to know where Sweetie Belle is. I can’t find her anywhere!” Rarity whispered Spike, face to face, he could noticed tears coming out of her eyes. “Where’s Sweetie Belle? Where’s my little sister?”

Suddenly a scream was heard from inside the castle.

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!”

“That’s Twilight!”

Spike turned around and went into, directly to Twilight’s bedroom, in the way he found a concerned Starlight.

“Spike did you heard that?!”

“Yes. Twilight is in trouble, we should help her!”

When they opened the door they found Twilight crying and screaming at the top of her lungs. Her room was also covered by the lines ‘We warned you’, only with an exclamation mark at the end. What happened was that in front of her bed were three corpses placed on three mannequins, probably stolen from Carousel Boutique. All of them were stitched by the legs, both front and hind, their tummies showed signs of having been mutilated, the eyes were missing from their sockets and one of them was still spilling blood out of the body. What terrified Twilight the most was that those corpses were from foals.

“This doesn’t look good” Starlight said. “What do we do?”

Twilight wiped her tears and took a deep breath. “Wait outside the castle and try to appease the crowd.”

“But what about you?” asked Spike.

“I’ll be there. Just give me a moment with them.”

They followed her orders and left her alone. Some of the citizens asked what was occurring but Spike refused to answer to anypony, including her friends, while Starlight was trying to handle the situation. After a couple of minutes Twilight opened the door. All the crowd remained quiet except her friends, they couldn’t help but notice her depressing face covered in tears.

“Who is Twilight carrying in her wings?” asked Rarity preoccupied.

The alicorn put the foals on the ground slowly and they weren’t any foals: they were fillies, more specifically the Cutie Mark Crusaders, she previously had closed their eyelids so their sisters didn’t notice their missing eyes. Everypony gasped in horror, Rarity began to cry and Rainbow Dash couldn’t hide her feelings, they were placed in front of their respective sisters. Applejack was scarcely arriving with her family to the issue.

“Let me through!” Applejack shouted as she was passing through the crowd along with her brother and grandma. “Let me through!”

Applejack discovered the ugly truth at the end of the road: her little sister was dead. She touched her face with her hoof. “She had just got her cutie mark.”

Although she was known for crying on the inside this time there were no tears to hide, of all the sisters Applejack was the most devastated and she broke down over her little sister’s corpse.

“They were in my bedroom on three mannequins” said Twilight with tears on her eyes. “I didn’t want to pass any of this. I’m sorry Applejack, I swear I’m so–”

Before she got the chance of finishing her sentence Applejack punched Twilight in the face and began to whack her, she even left her a black eye. The rest of the friends held Applejack’s hooves so she stop beating Twilight and although it was surprising that somepony hit the Princess of Friendship nopony else interfered in the fight.

“Ya will pay for this Twilight Sparkle! YA WILL PAY FOR THIS!”

“Twilight, are you ok?” asked Starlight as she and Spike helped her to stand up.

“Applejack, you need to calm down!” exclaimed Rainbow Dash.

“Ya’re not affected by this?!”

“I am as much as you but beating the crap out of Twilight will not bring them back!”

While they were discussing Rarity noticed that inside of Sweetie Belle’s corpse was another hologram, she took it out with her magic and pointed it out to her friends.

“Girls, the rest of Ponyville needs to see this.”

Pinkie activated the hologram like before and the image was more disturbing than the last one: Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo were tied to metal chairs, like Zecora, but they looked more frightened. In front of each one were three banners held by unseen rodents who changed them when they finished reading their lines in the previous mentioned order. The voice of the pony from the last hologram was heard each time the fillies finished a sentence in a menacing, naughty mood.

“We’re Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo, the Cutie Mark Crusaders.”

“Crusaders.”

“What does it take to make you ponies want to join in?”

“In.”

“You failed to obey our orders.”

“Orders.”

“And make Twilight Sparkle abandoned Ponyville.”

“Ponyville.”

“I’ve got to get you off the bench and into the game.”

“Game.”

“Come nightfall Equestria is ours.”

“Ours.”

“And anypony left here plays by our rules.”

“Rules.”

“If you don’t want to be in the game... *the pony and Sweetie Belle at the same time* get out now.”

The rest of Ponyville went nuts by hearing this and tried to escape Ponyville from any possible way, dividing the crowd into small groups. During the getaway Derpy disappeared with no reminiscence. Only the Mane 5, along with Applejack’s family, remained near the castle. Unfortunately for the town they didn’t listen to the last part of the hologram.

“But the bridges and paths crowd are sure in for a surprise. Ha ha ha ha.”

The pony laughed evilly, ordered Harry and Tim off-screen to kill them, the bear and timberwolf were showed murdering them briefly and the hologram switched off. Applejack and Rarity covered their eyes and ears to not pay attention to their sisters’ deaths.

“What did he meant by ‘surprise’?” asked Twilight scared.

When the first pony of the correspondent crowd crossed their correspondent trail an explosion occurred and the smoke was seen by the Mane 5. It happened to be that the special weapons the animals took from Bon Bon’s house were motion-sensor bombs. Fuzzy Legs and all the other invertebrates put them during the night. Explosions were heard across all Ponyville and their smoke painted the sky black. Angel and his troops saw everything from the Everfree Forest’s highest hill, from Twilight putting the corpses to the boom. They retired for their next movement.