Strange Voice on the Phone

Chapters

Chapter 1: Pinkie Pie
Chapter 2: Fluttershy
Chapter 3: Intermission
Chapter 4: The Mayor
Chapter 5: Cheerilee
Chapter 6: Suspect #1
Chapter 7: Applejack
Chapter 8: Chaos
Chapter 9: Searching
Chapter 10: Twilight

Chapter 1: Pinkie Pie

Pinkie Pie stood at the counter in Sugar Cube Corner decorating cupcakes for tomorrow's sales. Pinkie Pie had to be the one to bake the cupcakes because the cake family was out of town for the next couple of days on a relaxing vacation, something that Pinkie was glad to see, as Mr. and Mrs. Cake very frequently worked themselves to exhaustion every day while running their shop. It saddened Pinkie to see the Cakes slowly drag themselves up the stairs to their room every day. If they were tired then they couldn't smile! However, when they told Pinkie that they were going on vacation, she bounced around the room in excitement. They had left a few hours ago and Pinkie had decided to use the time to catch up on making cupcakes for tomorrow.

Pinkie put the finishing swirls of frosting on a batch of a dozen cupcakes. She gave them a look over to check for any mistakes. The cupcakes were a small vanilla cake inside a cupcake wrapper with a tower of light blue frosting on top of them. Her friend Rainbow Dash often joked that Pinkie would often make the icing on her cupcakes taller than Pinkie herself. She snorted when she remembered the joke and began gathering the cupcakes up to store until tomorrow. She placed each cupcake lovingly inside a large Tupperware container before gingerly closing the lid so as to not smear any icing and then sliding the container under the counter. Just as she raised her head back up, she heard a quiet *ding* that signaled that a fresh batch of cupcakes was finished. She reached over and grabbed a large oven mitt and carefully removed the new batch from the hot oven. She placed them on the counter to cool for a few minutes while she prepared a new flavor of icing.

Suddenly Pinkie Pie heard the telephone, a recent invention in Equestria, ring. She perked her head up at the piercing noise and gave a giant grin. "Ooh goodie! I wonder who that could be?" said Pinkie Pie excitedly. She bounced happily over to the ringing phone and grabbed a large headset in her mouth and slipped it over her ears. A headset was required for ponies like herself to answer a telephone because the original design had been made with Griffins in mind (as the original inventor was a Griffin) and since Ponies didn't have opposable thumbs, it had to be modified to accommodate this. The phone rang once more and Pinkie pressed the large 'answer' button. "Hello there!" said the pink pony excitedly.

"Hello," said the voice on the other end. The voice had a smooth, deep male voice that Pinkie recognized immediately. She perked up and her eyes widened in excitement.

"Ooh, ooh, ooh, you have the voice of the badpony from Scream! Ha ha, you're good," The voice on the other end faltered with confusion for a bit but The Caller quickly regained his composure and went back to his more confident tone.

"I...umm...yes well who is this?" said The Caller. Pinkie noted that the voice had a slightly metallic quality to it, almost as if the pony on the other end was using a voice changer.

"Ooh, I love guessing games! Is this twenty questions? You have 19 left!" said Pinkie excitedly. She simply adored this game and played it whenever she got the chance.

"What? No this isn't 20 questions, whatever gave you that idea?"

"Only 18 more!"

"No, this isn't 20 questions!" said The Caller with clear tones of irritation. Pinkie was taken aback.

"You don't want to play 20 questions, why in Equestria not? I mean come on, everypony likes 20 questions!" Pinkie raised her eyebrow in confusion. "Who is this anyway?" she said. The voice on the other end went back to its confident tones, now more on track with where it wanted this conversation to go.

"You tell me your name and I'll tell you mine," said The Caller in a suave manner.

"I'm Pinkie Pie! Who are you?" said Pinkie immediately.

"Uh..." The Caller clearly wasn't prepared for this and he stuttered for a few second before he finally managed to say "I can't tell you." Pinkie gasped in shock before taking a stern tone with The Caller.

"But you said that you would tell me your name if i told you mine! You broke a promise and breaking a promise is the fastest way to lose a friend forever!"

"I..."

"FOREVER!!" said Pinkie in a malicious tone that clearly startled The Caller.

"I..." said The Caller, clearly at a loss for words. Pinkie slightly adjusted her headset and thought about the conversation thus far for a brief moment.

"Hand on a second, how do you not know me anyway?" she said confusedly before perking up again. "Oh, are you not from around here? If you don't know me you aren't from around here because I know everypony, and I mean everypony in Ponyville!"

"Uh, no I'm not from around here. I'm from..." The Caller paused for a second. "Canterlot, yeah that's it, Canterlot!"

"Ooh goody! You must know my friend Twilight then!"

"I can't say that I do," said The Caller, who was growing more exasperated by the minute.

"Of course you do, she helped save the world twice now! Everypony knows Twilight," Pinkie thought for a moment. "But if you're new here then you haven't met anyone and if you haven't met anyone you must not have any friends and if you don't have any friends you must be lonely!" she said sadly. The Caller could only stutter while trying to follow her train of thought and get back to what he was trying to accomplish in the first place.

"Don't worry about me," said The Caller gruffly. "Okay, what's your favorite scary movie?"

"Scary movie? Ooh, my friend Rarity loves scary movies! You should totally meet her!"

"I...no, what's YOUR favorite scary movie?"

"Ha ha, are we back to 20 questions?"

"No! We were never playing 20 questions!" said The Caller in pure disbelief that anypony could think like this.

"Well then why do you keep asking me these questions?" asked Pinkie. The caller gave a frustrated sigh.

"I'm hanging up now, forget it. I'm just coming in," said The Caller in a defeated tone.

"Ooh! You're here! We can have a great big party!" said Pinkie excitedly, but she only heard the dial tone. As she removed the headset and placed it back on its hook where it belonged, she heard a window crash and someone muttering in frustration. She bounced over to the source of the noise. When she came to it, she saw a large pile of broken glass on the floor in front of the window. The window itself was almost completely shattered and the lack of glass left a hole large enough for anypony to get though. She heard a small groan on the floor next to the destroyed window and saw the pony that had called her. He was wearing a traditional Ghostface costume, long black robe, scary white mask, etc. He got up a little wobbly, but he made it to his feet and tried standing in front of her as menacingly as possible. To Pinkie it all looked quite comical and she simply rolled her eyes. "You know on a human it looks kinda creepy but on a pony it just looks silly!" she laughed.

"Enough! I do not look silly!" said The Caller who still was using a voice changer. However, Pinkie heard that the voice underneath still came through a little. It sounded vaguely familiar to Pinkie. She pushed it aside and smiled at the intruder.

"Ooh you're here!" Pinkie said excitedly before frowning. "The front door was unlocked though, you could have just come in or knocked silly!"

"I have had enough of this!" said The Caller who was still trying his best to be menacing despite clear tones of frustration and exasperation coming through. Pinkie saw a large knife raise up in the air, surrounded by a soft, white glow indicating that The Caller was clearly was a unicorn. He raised the knife higher and with a mad cackle he advanced slowly towards Pinkie menacingly while Pinkie just stared at him smiling. However, as he came closer, Pinkie was starting to get a little nervous. What if he was really here to hurt her? She took a small, nervous step back and her smile faded ever so slightly which seemed to encourage The Caller. Suddenly without warning, The Caller seemed to lose all sense of balance and he flailed his arms around trying to steady himself. Pinkie saw that he had slipped on a deflated, red balloon that she had failed to clean up after her party that morning. The Caller continued to stumble around a bit and since his concentration was broken, the knife fell to the floor with a loud clatter. He tried to steady himself on the counter but his hoof slipped on a stray clump of frosting that Pinkie had neglected to wipe off of the counter, which was the final blow in his battle with gravity and he fell completely to the floor.

"Oh my gosh, are you okay?" asked Pinkie worriedly.

"I'm fine, just fine! I'm gonna get you Pinkie Pie!" said the dazed intruder. He raised himself up off of the ground with a pained groan and stumbled around and bit, clearly a little dizzy from the fall. Unfortunately, he accidentally backed into the shelf of pots and pans that took up a large portion of the kitchen. Despite the fact that the collision wasn't a very violent one, the shelf collapsed and a dozen pots and pans rained down on The Caller, nearly knocking him out. He gave a weak groan before using every ounce of his strength to stand up and keep himself steady. He magicked the knife back to him and turned his attention back to Pinkie with a snarl. "This time there won't be any problems!" said The Caller thickly. Pinkie merely laughed at this clumsy display.

"That was funny!"

"No it wasn't, it actually kind of hurt," said The Caller angrily. The caller began advancing towards Pinkie when he lost another battle with gravity, and fell face first on the ground. Pinkie looked near the intruder's hooves and a green toothless alligator waddled away. Pinkie laughed at this.

"Oh Gummy, you really should watch where you're going, you could hurt somepony," she looked at The Caller. "Are you alright?" she asked.

"I...I...oh forget this. This is not worth it," said the worn down intruder. He slowly crawled near the door, with small groans of pain with every move he made. He tried to stand up to reach for the door handle, but he was too dazed and weak to attempt something like that. He sighed and simply opened the door using his magic before crawling out into the night.

"Oh, okay then, see you soon!" said Pinkie happily. "It was nice to have met you!" The Caller only mumbled a half reply before the door slammed shut. Pinkie turned back towards the kitchen and muttered to herself. "I don't care what he said, that costume did look pretty silly." Pinkie hummed to herself and went back to decorating cupcakes.

Chapter 2: Fluttershy

In a small cottage on the outskirts of Ponyville, Fluttershy was just putting the finishing touches on a splint for a small bird that had injured its wing in a race against another bird. "There you go Mr. Sparrow, all fixed up. Now stay off of that wing for two weeks and it will be as good as new!" she said happily. The bird chirped in gratitude. "Aww thanks Mr. Sparrow, now get home safely, it's dark out tonight." The bird hopped over to the door and out into the night. Fluttershy walked over to where she had fixed up the bird. She looked at the small mess of bandages and gauze and began to clean it up when suddenly, she heard the piercing sound of her new telephone. Fluttershy jumped into the air and gave a startled squeal. She still had not gotten used to the phone ringing despite having had one in her house for a few weeks now. She had only gotten one because everypony had one now and it did make contacting other ponies around town much easier. She put on the headset and pressed the large 'answer' button. "Hello?" said the yellow Pegasus nervously.

"Hi Fluttershy! This is Twilight calling to ask you if you are still on for meeting Rarity, Pinkie and I at the spa tomorrow," said the chipper unicorn pony on the other end. Fluttershy sighed in relief.

"Oh, of course, I wouldn't miss it! I have no appointments tomorrow and I have been looking forward to it all week," said a relieved Fluttershy. She didn't know why her phone bothered her so much, it was always calls like this. She guessed that it was probably just the loud ringing noise that startled her.

"Great! I'll let you know if plans change or anything like that. Well, I should be heading off to bed, goodnight Fluttershy!" said Twilight.

"Oh, goodnight Twilight," Fluttershy heard the click on the other end signifying that Twilight had hung up. She pressed the 'end call' button and took the headset off. Fluttershy walked back over to the small mess of supplies. At that moment, she felt her eyes begin to get very heavy and she began to register just how late (for her anyways) it was. She decided that she was simply too exhausted from the days work to clean up even this small mess that fixing up her bird friends had made. She turned to walk upstairs to her bed when once again, she heard the piercing shriek of her phone. She sighed and walked over to it, put the headset on and pressed 'answer'. "Twilight?"

"Who is this?" said the deep voice on the other end. Fluttershy became more alert when she heard the voice on the other end, she didn't recognize this voice. It was a male pony to be sure but she had never met anypony that talked like this.

"Umm, who is this?" She asked nervously.

"I asked first," replied The Caller.

"I think you may have the wrong number," she said.

"Do I?"

"Well, who are you trying to call?" said Fluttershy, who was just wishing she could go to her nice, soft bed.

"I don't know, what number is this?"

"I...I think you have the wrong number. Goodbye," said Fluttershy reaching for the 'end call' button.

"Wait, I just want to talk for a bit," The tone of the voice on the other end signaled to Fluttershy that this mysterious caller was enjoying this game of his. Fluttershy on the other hand, was beginning to get a headache from it all.

"No I don't think that's a good idea. It's really late and I should be getting to bed," said Fluttershy reaching again for the 'end call' button.

"Don't hang up on me." said The Caller sharply. Fluttershy squealed a bit and winced. The Caller heard this and chuckled.

"What do you want?" said Fluttershy in a tiny voice, now fully alert.

"I'm here in Ponyville looking to have a little fun. Have you seen the Scream movies?" said The Caller evilly.

"Well, yeah," said Fluttershy. Rarity had insisted that Fluttershy watch them with her a few months back, so they did a marathon of all four movies. It took Fluttershy weeks to mentally recover from that.

"Well I was in town hoping to reenact some scenes with, shall we say, deadly accuracy," said The Caller laughing maliciously.

"You're going to try to kill me?" said Fluttershy weakly, her stomach clenching up tightly in fear.

"Oh, I don't know, maybe I want you or maybe I can have some playtime with your little animal buddies. Although, I don't see why I couldn't do both now that I think about it," The Caller laughed again. However, what he didn't count on was that Fluttershy was very protective of her animal friends. Her voice suddenly turned much louder and more threatening.

"Oh you will will you!? You listen to me whoever you are! You do NOT. HURT. MY. FRIENDS. Pony or otherwise!? Got it!?" Said Fluttershy, rage dripping form every syllable.The Caller faltered.

"Well I..." said The Caller in a small voice.

"I have half a mind to come find you right now and give you a what for!" she said, practically shouting into the headset.

"Ah..." said the clearly nervous caller.

"You know what!?" Said Fluttershy ripping off the headset and slamming her hoof on the 'end call' button. "Yeah!" She burst out of the cottage, wings open and a look of pure fury on her face. She jerked her head left and right, trying to discover where the pony who had the nerve to threaten her friends was hiding. Unfortunately for The Caller, he hadn't chosen a very good hiding spot and Fluttershy spotted him almost immediately in the bushes. She leaped up and shot herself straight towards him with a snarl of pure fury. The Caller could only sit there, frozen in shock and had no time to do anything but quietly mutter to himself

"Oh dear," Fluttershy tackled the costume figure, pinning him to the ground with her front hooves. She snarled in rage.

"Hurt my animal friends will you!?" The Caller struggled to get away, clearly over-matched by the protective anger of the yellow Pegasus pony. "What do you think gives you the right to hurt small, innocent creatures?" said Fluttershy, who was using every ounce of her self control to stop her from just stomping her hooves down on The Caller's neck. She felt her body being surrounded with a white glow as The Caller used his magic to throw her off of him. He threw Fluttershy as far away from himself as possible and she skidded a bit as she landed about 20 feet from The Caller. Once he was free, he bolted as fast as he could straight towards the Everfree Forest. Fluttershy quickly got up, unhurt from being thrown aside, and followed him to the edge of the forest, but once she saw that The Caller had vanished into the pitch-black darkness of the forest, she wisely came to her senses and did not follow him. It took a few minutes of staring straight into the forest but eventually her rage subsided enough that she was able to think straight. she took a few deep breaths and thought to herself, 'Okay Fluttershy, somepony needs to know about this.' She flew back into her house as fast as she could and quickly dialed Twilight's number. She heard the phone ring on the other end and hoped dearly that her friends was not asleep yet.

A few hours later, her small cottage was bustling with activity. Fluttershy was in a corner of her home comforting some of the smaller animals who had been disturbed by all of the noise. A detachment of royal guards was looking around her cottage, Princess Celestia had sent them immediately after Twilight had written her and told her about what happened. The door to her cottage burst open to reveal her five worried friends. They quickly scanned the room and when they saw Fluttershy, they dashed to her side immediately. "Fluttershy are you okay!?" said a very panic-stricken Twilight.

"Oh, I'm fine nopony got hurt and no animals either. I chased him off," said Fluttershy. Her blood lust had completely gone away and she was back to her old, nervous self.

"We're all so glad you are safe darling," said Rarity, a look of relief washing over her face when she saw that her friends was unhurt.

"Can you tell us anything about the pony who attacked you?" said Rainbow Dash.

"We would like to know the same thing actually," The six looked up and saw Twilight's brother, Shining Armor, standing over them. Twilight grinned, happy to see her brother but he just shook his head. "Later Twi, I'm here on official business, we can catch up later. So, Fluttershy, what can you tell us about what happened here tonight?"

"Well," said Fluttershy, nervously glancing up at Shining Armor. "I was just getting ready for bed when the phone rang. The caller had a male voice but seemed to speak through some kind of voice changing device. I know that because I did hear a voice on the other end of the phone that wasn't the primary voice but I didn't recognize it. He threatened my woodland friends and I just kind of, well, snapped and ran him off. He went into the Everfree Forest and I didn't really want to follow him in," Shining Armour nodded at a group of six guards who flew off to the forest.

"What did he look like?" asked Shining Armor.

"Oh um, well he had on a black cloak and a scary white mask."

"Did it look anything like this?" asked Rarity who pulled a movie out of her saddlebag. It was the Wes Craven film Scream. On the back cover was a picture of the costume of the killer. Fluttershy's eyes widened.

"Yes, that's it, that's what he looked like!" she said, pointing at the picture excitedly.

"Ooh! I got a call from him too!" said Pinkie, bouncing int he air happily. She stopped bounding and frowned. "He was very rude. He didn't want to play 20 questions and he broke window in Sugar Cube Corner! The nerve!" she said. The other six ponies stared at Pinkie Pie as they took a minute to register what she had just said.

"So this is not the first time this has happened," said Shining Armor. He turned to another guard. "I want you to interview everyone in Ponyville, see if anyone else has gotten these strange calls." He turned back to Pinkie "Anything you can tell us that Fluttershy didn't bring up?" Pinkie thought for a moment.

"Well, it was a few days ago but like Fluttershy said, I do know for sure that this pony was using a voice changer. I remember kind of recognizing the underlying voice but it was so faint that I remember where I'd heard it before. But the pony was about our size and definitely a unicorn," said Pinkie. Armor nodded.

"That's good, that narrows our search a lot," said Shining Armor.

"He did say he was from Canterlot but now that I think about it, he seemed to make that up on the spot," mused Pinkie. Armor nodded again. A guard came in carrying a large knife with him as well as a shred of the attacker's costume.

"We found these on the ground near the bush where Fluttershy said that she had found the attacker, nothing else though, said the guard. Armor took the items and looked them over for any clues. Finding none he placed them in a bag which he gave back to the guard who had found them.

"Good, we can start investigating that," He looked towards the six friends. "Okay, I think that's all for now. If you think of anything else, let us know. We'll be in touch." Twilight nodded.

"Is there anything we can do for you right now Fluttershy?" asked Rainbow Dash sympathetically.

"Oh um...if you could keep me company tonight I would appreciate that," said Fluttershy "I'm kinda nervous being here alone." The other five voiced their agreement at this idea. Once the guards had all left, and the house was as quiet as could be, the six friends gathered around in Fluttershy's room for the night.

Chapter 3: Intermission

It had been three days since the attack on Fluttershy and the entire town of Ponyville was in a state of quiet chaos. Royal Canterlot guards were now investigating every lead they could on the mysterious caller in pure desperation that they would get a break on the case. They even went door to door investigating every pony in Ponyville, putting everypony through a rigorous investigation that often left the citizens of Ponyville even more paranoid about The caller. It was far from uncommon that the investigation would reduce some of the weaker ponies in the town to hysterical tears. But interview after interview after interview led to no new leads at all. In an act of desperation, the griffin inventor of the phone was called in to see if he could adjust his invention to track call locations, but since the technology was so new, nopony had too much hope that that endeavor would bring about much success. with the constant stress of the guard's investigations and the growing fear that anypony could be the next to receive a call at any moment, the town was in a constant state of terror. Doors were locked, ponies stayed in tight groups at all times, and the young ponies in the town were never seen outside when the night came. In an unfortunate turn of events, the male unicorns of the town were being shunned from the society for fear that they were the mysterious attacker. Few ponies wanted to talk to them, even those that had been their friends for years.

Twilight Sparkle stood next to her brother, a worried expression on her face as she watched two guards knock on the door of a Ponyville resident. "Have you had any leads on a potential attacker?" she asked. Shining Armor grimaced.

"I'm technically not allowed to tell you anything but in all honesty, you know just about as much as we do as pretty much all of our info has come from your friends. I gotta say that I don't think the choice of potential victims was random. You six are quite well known throughout Equestria and it is possible that somepony might have a grudge. Is there anyone you can think of off the top of your head?" he asked hopefully. Twilight thought for a brief moment.

"Well, there was a pony who came through a while back who called herself the 'Great and Powerful Trixie'. She was a real showoff and left Ponyville because she was embarrassed that I was more powerful than she was. I guess she could be back for revenge," Shining Armor nodded.

"Good, we'll look into that. Anyone else?"

"We ran a salesman duo named the Flim Flam Brothers out of town. Maybe them?" said Twilight. This time Shining Armor shook his head.

"No one has seen them since they left your town. Investigations into that have yielded little results although we do find a few pieces of their destroyed machine every now and again. We actually suspect foul play," he said grimly. Twilight's jaw dropped in surprise at this news. Sure the duo was annoying but did somepony actually think they were annoying enough to kill?

"Wow. I'm not quite sure how to think about that," Twilight decided to put it in the back of her mind for now and went back to the matter at hand. "Unfortunately, that's all I can think of right now."

"Well, it is helpful to have another potential suspect, but I kind of doubt she is really the one. We're pretty sure the attacker was from Ponyville."

"How do you know?" asked Twilight curiously.

"I can't give you that info, sorry," said Armor. They sat in silence for a few seconds when Twilight began to notice a nervous look creep slowly onto her brother's face.

"What's wrong?" asked Twilight picking up on his mood. Shining Armor sighed and rubbed his brow with his hoof.

"Well sis, we're so dry on leads right now that we haven't really ruled out any unicorns in Ponyville."

"What are you saying?" asked Twilight, who was kind of afraid of the answer.

"Well, don't tell anyone about this but you are a suspect."

"WHAT!?!?!?!" said Twilight in pure shock.

"Your friend Rarity as well."

"But this is...I...wha....HUH!?!?" said Twilight, reeling from the news that she was a suspect in the attempted murder of two of her best friends.

"Look, only a base suspect. You are only a suspect in the sense that we can't rule any Ponyvillian unicorns right now," said Armor in an attempt to calm her down.

"But you don't think I did it right?" said Twilight in a small voice. Shining Armor's eyes widened.

"No of course not!" he said putting a comforting hoof on her shoulder. "None of the other men really believe you did it either, or Rarity for that matter. I know you two, we all do, and we know that you would never hurt your friends. Having said that, we just can't afford to rule out any suspects right now."

"I can promise you I didn't do it," said Twilight in a strained voice.

"I'm pretty sure you're right," said Armor, taking his hoof off of Twilight.

"Pretty sure as in there is a small chance?"

"Like I said, we can't afford..."

"To rule out any suspects," said Twilight glumly.

"Don't worry, it'll turn out okay," said Armor comfortingly.

"I hope so. Pinkie and Fluttershy were lucky. I don't know if the next pony who is attacked will be so lucky," said Twilight turning towards the nearly empty streets of Ponyville and surveying them for anything interesting.

"I gotta be honest Twi, I have my doubts that we'll be able to stop the attacker before...you know. Whoever attacked your friends seemed very intent on causing them serious harm and they only got out without being hurt because they were very lucky. I don't know if we can catch him soon enough but we're all doing what we can."

"I hope it's enough," said Twilight worriedly.

"So do I," said Armor with a worried look on his face. "So do I. Our best bet is to predict who the attacker will call next. If I'm right that it is you six in particular that this pony is after, we'll probably have better luck watching you. I'll have guards posted around your houses, especially Pinkie and Fluttershy. I don't want to risk the attacker coming back to finish the job he or she failed to complete the first time." Twilight nodded and looked uneasily at another pair of guards knocking on another door.

Chapter 4: The Mayor

The Mayor put down her quill and re-read the speech she had been working on. In light of the recent events in Ponyville, she had decided that it was her civic duty as the mayor to give the citizens a rousing speech to assure them that all was well enough in Ponyville and that with the royal guards searching every nook and cranny, the mysterious caller was sure to be found within a few days at the most. She had used her position as mayor to call a town meeting where she would give her speech in the hopes that the citizens would in fact calm down and get back to living their lives without too much fear. she knew that she couldn't make all of the fear go away, but she hoped that she could at least help. She adjusted her glassed and cleared her throat. "My dear citizens of Ponyville," she said, reading the speech quietly to herself, "I cannot deny that these are indeed dark times that we are in, but have no fear! There is no reason to panic right now! Nopony has actually been hurt yet and our beloved princess herself has sent the best of the best to help catch this evildoer," She scanned the paper again. "Hmmm, I should cut the part about nopony being hurt yet. I..." At that moment, the phone rang loudly. The Mayor jumped up, having been snapped out of her concentration and turned towards the phone. As the phone kept ringing, The Mayor took a deep breath and assured herself that the odds of it being The Caller himself were slim at best. She was always getting calls late at night, especially recently. She put the headset on and answered the phone. "Hello, this is The Mayor speaking," she said in her most businesslike tone.

"Good I called the right number," said the voice on the other end. The Mayor's heart sank. This was undeniably the voice of The Caller himself. "Now Miss Mayor, I want you to listen to me very carefully. If you don't want to get hurt you will do EXACTLY as I say. Do not deviate from my instructions at all or things will get very messy. Acknowledge me if you understand," said The Caller in an incredibly threatening tone.

"I...I understand," said The Mayor shakily. She had never been as scared in her entire life as she was right now.

"Excellent. Now, I know that you are sitting in your office alone. You decided to foolishly send the two royal guards who were protecting you home. Nopony can help your right now," The Caller paused for a brief moment. "Now that I think about that, why did you send your bodyguards home hmmm?"

"I didn't think I needed them tonight. I decided to give them a night off," said The Mayor, hoping she hadn't made a mistake that would cost her her life.

"You don't say, a night off? I gotta admit, I heard you weren't the brightest mayor this town has had, but I never thought you were that dumb," said The Caller with a cackle. The Mayor looked around her desk to see if she could find anything to use as a weapon in case she actually came face-to-face with The Caller. All she really had was her quill and that would be useless if she was attacked. She realized that she had to play his game right now.

"What do you want from me?" she said, fearing the worst.

"Now Madam Mayor, I'm glad you asked that. You see, I know that throughout this entire investigation, you have been working closely with the royal guards hunting me. I admire that you are doing your very best to protect the citizens of this town," Said The Caller mockingly.

"So what do you want?"

"I want to know what they know. I know you know what they know about me," said The Caller. "I find myself in a position where I need to know what is going on around me and you can give me that information. It's not like I can just go up and ask some random guard to give me information. So, I decided to come to you," The Mayor stuttered for a few seconds, unsure of how to respond. "So, let's hear it. Tell me what you know...NOW!" yelled The Caller. The yell startled The Mayor and she gave a small squeal of fear. She took a deep breath to calm herself.

"Well...we know that you are average sized, we know that you are a unicorn, we are pretty sure you are male, we know you use a voice-changer to hide your voice, we know you are from Ponyville and are obviously still in Ponyville," The Mayor felt her resolve to keep answering weakening. Would this information be used to harm other ponies? If The Caller knew all of this, then he could probably avoid capture longer which meant that this nightmare would continue.

"Please continue Miss Mayor, I don't have all night," said The Caller sternly.

"Well, we know what kind of costume you wear, we have your knife and a shred of your costume and our top forensic ponies are analyzing them as we speak."

"What have they found?" said The Caller interestedly.

"Well, nothing so far. We can't track the knife or the costume to see who sold it too you. The knife is too common and the costume seems to be custom made."

"Your deductive skills are very good," said The Caller sarcastically. "do continue."

"We know you have a cell phone because you called Pinkie and Fluttershy close to their homes. That's all I can think of right now," she said, feeling awful about how much information she had just given The Caller.

"Well done Miss Mayor, you did a very good job and I thank you very much for the information you provided," said The Caller.

"Well, uh, yes I see," she took a deep breath, hoping this would soon be over. "Okay then, whoever you are, are we done here?"

"Mmm, not quite. Do you see that eloquently written speech on your desk?" He said.

"Yes," said The Mayor.

"Destroy it, and see to it that you don't write another one. In fact, I think it would be in the best interests of everypony in Ponyville if you just cancelled that town meeting that you had planned for tomorrow. You wouldn't want anypony to be hurt because of some silly town meeting would you?" he said in the most threatening tone he could muster.

"Oh, yes, of course I will cancel it," said The Mayor, tearing up her speech into tiny scraps. "In fact, I won't try to call another town meeting about you at all."

"I do appreciate that very much. now, Miss Mayor, you have done very well tonight and this is almost over. I only have one more task for you to complete. I want you to go to the town square, next to the fountain. There you will find a note with further instructions. Once you have completed the tasks set for you on the note, you personally will never hear from me again," said The Caller in a tone that almost sounded like an attempt to be soothing. The voice hardened. "However, if you disobey me, even slightly, I will make you feel terror that you never imagined possible. Do you understand me?"

"Yes," said The Mayor, feeling very scared again.

"Good. Now hang up and go," said The Caller. The Mayor heard a dial tone on the other end as The caller hung up. The Mayor hung up her phone as well. She galloped over to a coat rack and grabbed her jacket. She put it on and opened the door to her office. To her horror, she saw a figure in a black cloak with a white mask on. The Mayor stood frozen to the spot, every inch of her body screamed at her to run away. The Caller gave a terrifying giggle and used his magic to raise a large, jagged knife over his head.

A piercing scream split the calmness of the night.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Applejack's eyes flew open and she sat up in bed quickly. She thought she had heard a loud scream. She scanned the room for anything out of the ordinary. She listened for a few seconds and discovered that nopony in the house was awake. Her family slept soundly in their beds. A cursory glance around her room wasn't enough to assuage her fears that something was amiss though, and she gut up out of bed and lit a candle.. Applejack tip-hooved around her house, checking to see if anything was out of the ordinary. After a few minutes of searching, she discovered that everything was as it should be and Applejack calmed down. She realized it must have simply been nerves that had woken her up. The thought of a maniac running loose in Ponyville had made everypony nervous. She blew out her candle and proceeded to go back to her bed when she heard a commotion outside. She nervously trotted to her door and opened it slightly. She saw a group of royal guards rushing towards an unknown destination. Applejack's heart sank as she realized that somepony had been attacked again. If Twilight's brother had been right, then it was one of her friends! Who was it this time? Rarity? Rainbow Dash? She chastised herself for thinking that way. "Hold your horses girl, your friends are just fine. They aren't hurt. If one of them was attacked they got away, just like Pinkie and Fluttershy." she said quietly to herself. When the group of guards had passed, Applejack's curiosity got the better of her and despite her mental warnings, she slipped out into the night.

She followed behind the group of guards, making sure never to be seen or else she would be forced to return to her home and she wouldn't know what was going on. As she followed them, she realized what direction they were headed: Carousel Boutique. Apple Jack started to panic. If they were indeed headed where she thought they were headed, then it had been Rarity who had been attacked! She trotted along behind the guards, always making sure to keep a good distance between her and them. They were whispering to each other but Apple Jack was too far behind them to hear what they were saying. As they moved farther along, Applejack's worst fears were confirmed. She saw Rarity's dress shop grow larger and larger as they approached it. She saw a detachment of guards already standing in front of Rarity's door. "Oh no, not Rarity." said Apple Jack to herself.

The group of guards stopped in front of the guards in front of Rarity's door and Applejack saw that they were having a conversation. Applejack started shaking in fear. Was Rarity alright? Did she get hurt? However, to her surprise, the entire group of guards walked away towards a different destination. Applejack stood there trying to figure out what was going on when she realized that the guards were headed someplace else. She breathed a huge sigh of relief, Rarity was safe in her bed and no harm had come to her in the middle of the night.

She noticed the group of guards trotting farther away and she sped up to keep them in her line of sight. To her surprise, she saw that they all stopped in front of Town Hall. There was a huge commotion in front of the Town Hall and Applejack snuck around and dove into a bush that was close to the action. She could hear the guards taking just fine from here. They were talking about how somepony had been attacked. Applejack grimaced and wondered with fear about who had been attacked. She hoped whoever had been attacked was okay. Suddenly, she heard a familiar voice behind her.

"Okay, can somepony please tell me what is going on here? I only heard the basics that The Mayor was attacked," Applejack looked to see that it was Twilight's brother speaking. One of the guards went over to talk to Shining Armor.

"You heard right, The Mayor was attacked in her office. She wasn't as lucky as the other two," he said grimly.

"Is she alive? Have the medics checked her out yet?" Armor asked urgently. The guard he had been talking to pointed towards a group of three ponies. They were huddled on the front steps of the Town Hall with looks of pure shock and horror plastered all over their faces. "So, she is dead," said Armor in a deflated tone.

"The head medic has been in the bathroom throwing up ever since she went into The Mayor's office," said the guard grimly. "I went in myself to take a look," The guard looked down at the ground and spoke next in a shaken tone. "I'll be having nightmares for weeks." Shining Armor looked at the Town Hall sadly.

"That bad huh?" he said.

"Worse. I never imagined that somepony could do this to somepony else. I learned the hard way that that wasn't the case tonight," said the guard.

"Okay, I think I had better go take a look. Come with me and give me details about the crime scene on the way," said Armor in a commanding tone. The guard nodded and the two of them walked into Town Hall. Applejack heard the beginning of the report.

"We know for certain that no sexual abuse was involved. We didn't recover anything of The Killer's this time around but we're going to keep..." at that point, the pair was too far away from Apple Jack for her to hear anything else. She sat in the bush in shock for a few seconds. The Mayor of Ponyville was dead. The Mayor of Ponyville was dead and it had been brutal. The words sounded foreign in her head, like her own mind was rejecting what she had just heard. A single tear rolled down her face and she snapped out of her shock. Once the coast was clear, she got out of the bush and bolted back towards her home. Once inside, she slammed the door behind her and locked it. She ran over to all of the windows and locked them all as well.

Big Macintosh awoke to slamming windows and the sound of crying. He sat up and when he went to investigate the noise, he saw that Apple Jack was running around the room shutting the windows. The sobs were hers. He walked downstairs to see what was wrong. "Uh, AJ," he said. Applejack yelped in shock and spun around to see her big brother behind her with a worried look on his face. "What's wrong?" he said worriedly. Applejack ran over to her brother and buried her head in his shoulder. Between sobs she managed to say what was wrong.

"Oh Big Mac, The Caller attacked The Mayor tonight," she said, sobbing harder than ever. Big Macintosh's eyes widened and he placed a hoof on his sister's shoulder.

"Is she okay?" he said, already knowing the answer but hoping for a different one anyway.

"No. No she isn't, The Caller got her. She's dead Big Macintosh, The Mayor is dead!"

Chapter 5: Cheerilee

By the next morning, everypony knew about the gruesome death of the town Mayor. The guards had done their best to keep the most gruesome details out of public knowledge, but they were largely unsuccessful. Rumors spread like wildfire about the details that the public didn't know about and by the end of the day, the town gossip had rendered the real details of the murder unrecognizable. The entire town was thrown into a state of panic. Now it was confirmed that the town had a mad killer on the loose instead of somepony just making threatening phone calls. The danger of the situation became abundantly clear to everypony. If The Mayor, the leader of Ponyville, the one who had promised to lead them through this dark time, was dead, then no one was safe. everypony wondered about who would become the new mayor of Ponyville now that the old one was gone. The scheduled Town Meeting was held, but instead of the subject being plans from The Mayor about how to get Ponyville through the dark times, it was about who would take the place of the slaughtered mare. The debates raged on all day about what to do and it wasn't long before everypony felt absolutely helpless at the situation. There wasn't a chain of command in Ponyville, the head was always The Mayor until the next election rolled around. Never in the entire history of Ponyville had something like this happened, where a second-in-command was required to step in. After hours upon hours of grueling debates, it was decided by all that Shining Armor should take command of the office of The Mayor until her killer had been caught at which time a proper election for a new mayor would be held. It was the only thing to do.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Cheerilee was lying in her bed with her eyes wide open. She had been trying to fall asleep for the past six hours but the thought that there was a deranged killer on the loose in Ponyville made her extremely nervous. She glanced at her clock: 2:45. Cheerilee groaned and rolled over, hoping that the joy of sleep would come soon but her memory the events of the past week prevented any of that. She was concerned about the attacks on Pinkie and Fluttershy as well as the murder of The Mayor. with the murder of The Mayor, The Killer had shown that he wasn't messing around and was eager to violently kill anyone he could get his hooves on. Cheerilee's main concern at the moment was not that she herself would be attacked, although that worried her as well, but she was worried that the attacker would find attacking older ponies too difficult, that he would feel that he had gotten lucky with his successful kill of The Mayor, and start going after the Ponyville fillies next. If The Killer, who ever he or she was, couldn't even scratch Fluttershy, the most timid pony she knew, then it wasn't unlikely he or she would move on to weaker prey. She decided to have a class tomorrow where she would teach her students about safety. She couldn't be too careful after all and she wanted to do her small part in protecting her students. She simply couldn't bear the though of waking up one morning to hear that one of the children in her class had been killed by The Killer. She decided that she shouldn't be too nervous or she would start to become paranoid and if she became paranoid, it would come out in her teaching and the last thing she wanted was for the children to feel scared that somepony could hurt them at any minute. But as she thought about that more, she knew that her students had every right to be scared, somepony could hurt them at any minute. Cheerilee rolled over to the other side of her bed with her eyes shut tight, trying to fall asleep. Every tick of the clock seemed to go by slower with each passing second.

Suddenly the phone rang. Cheerilee froze in her bed. The phone rang again. She was too scared to go answer it. What if it was The Killer? Could she survive an attack like Pinkie and Fluttershy had, or would she share the fate of The Mayor? The phone rang again. For a brief moment, Cheerilee considered answering the phone. What were the odds that it was actually the mysterious caller? She inched out of bed hoping that she was in no danger. The phone rang again and then went to the answering machine. "Hello?" said the voice on the other end. Cheerilee breathed a sigh of relief. She recognized the voice on the other end as that of Twilight Sparkle. "Ms. Cheerilee are you there?" Relieved that she wasn't in any danger, she put on the headset and pushed the answer button."

"Hello there Twilight!" She said happily. The voice changed from Twilight's to a far more menacing one.

"Wrong guess Ms C," She froze. She recognized the voice on the other end as that of The Killer. Most ponies in Ponyville watched Scream after Pinkie and Fluttershy had described the voice of her attacker as the voice of the killer from Scream. She was horrified to hear that voice now. Without even thinking about it, Cheerilee reached for the 'end call' button but the voice at the other end got angry.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you!" Her hoof snapped back.

"What do you want?" She said shakily.

"To talk. I don't want to hurt you," said The Killer in an unsettlingly soothing way. It turned darker. "Unless you do something stupid like try to contact the royal guards who are passing by your house right now," Cheerilee looked out the window and sure enough, two royal guards walked past her window.

"What do you want to talk about?" said Cheerilee, her mind racing as she tried to figure out what to do. Could she escape her house? No, she didn't even know where The Killer was. She would have to play along for now.

"Well, as you doubtlessly know, there is a thorough investigation of me going on. I can't say I blame them, I hear that the death of your poor mayor shook this town to the core. Your reactions to the whole thing are really quite amusing," said The Killer with a cackling laugh.

"Please leave me alone," said Cheerilee in a tiny voice. The Killer just laughed again.

"Oh, I will soon enough but I have a few questions for you first. I was wondering what you told the guards when the came knocking on your door at exactly 4:47 this evening. See, I am looking for information on just what they know about me as well as what you know about The Mayor's death."

"I can't say, they don't really tell us about it."

"Okay, well then what did you tell them?"

"The truth, I don't know anything other than what the town has been gossiping about."

"Which is?" Said The Killer, a hint of exasperation in his voice.

"Well I don't really follow that stuff."

"Oh come on you must have heard something!" said The Killer, exasperation clearly coming through in his voice. "I violently killed your precious mayor and you don't know any details at all!?"

"I heard only basic details about it. I heard that it was gruesome and that it happened last night but that is all I know, I swear," said Cheerilee, who was hoping that this would all be over soon.

"So nothing about what the guards know?" said The Killer. "Nothing about any evidence recovered from the scene of her death."

"Nope," Cheerilee said. "In fact, I'm not really sure why you decided to call me. Why do you think I would know anything about this!?"

"Let's just say, luck of the draw. But you truly don't know anything other than what you told me?" said The Killer.

"Nope," said Cheerilee. "Nothing important to speak of." The Killer growled a bit in frustration and then sighed.

"Okay, there is one last thing though Ms. C."

"And that is?" she asked.

"Well, I kind of liked the reaction that the town had to the death of their beloved mayor and I was hoping to repeat that. I lied when I said that you were just the luck of the draw. The truth is, I would like you to be my next victim. I want to see how the children of this town react to the news of their beloved teacher's death!" Cheerilee squealed in horror.

"But you said you weren't going to hurt me!" she said wildly, while she seriously considered just jumping through the window she was next to. The Killer laughed again

"Like I said, I lied," he said in a happily malicious tone.

"Where are you?" She said in a shaky voice. The Killer chuckled.

"Why, upstairs of course!" Cheerilee immediately slammed her hoof on the 'end call' button and shook off the headset. She looked at the door to her house. The stairs to the upper level of her home were between her and the door. To her horror, she heard the sound of hooves walking down her stairs. She stood there frozen, her mind racing. However, to her complete surprise, she heard the sound of The Killer falling down the stairs. He reached the bottom in a heap with a groan of pain. He tried his best to collect himself off of the floor. "Ow! I gotta get this stupid hem adjusted, this is the third time I've fallen down the stupid stairs." Cheerilee noticed two things: one, The Killer's voice changer had fallen out of the mask and was on the floor next to The Killer. Two, she recognized the voice of The Killer now that the voice changer had fallen out. She used this free moment to bolt towards the door. She leaped over her attacker and landed on the other side of The Killer. She paused for a moment and looked behind her to see that he was getting up. She used every ounce of strength she had and kicked him directly in the side with her hind legs, causing him to go down again. She bolted to the door and burst out of her home, running as fast as her legs would carry her and didn't stop until she saw some royal guards. She ran over to them, tears of fright running down her face.

"I just got attacked by The Killer," she said, totally out of breath. Three of the guards bolted to her house while the other two stayed to ask Cheerilee questions.

"What happened?" asked one of them urgently.

"I got a call. She wanted to know what you knew about her. I didn't know much and she decided to make me her next kill for the purpose of disturbing the children directly," She was starting to calm down now that she realized that she was safe, but she was still very shaken up. "She fell down the stairs when she tripped on her costume and I kicked her and got away."

"How do you know the attacker was a she?" asked one of the guards.

"Well, when she fell down the stairs, her voice changer came out and I heard her normal voice."

"Did you recognize it!?" said the guard almost excitedly. A few ponies look had come out of their homes to see what the source of the commotion was about and were held back by a few more guards who arrived.

"I'd know that voice anywhere, but I just can't believe it!" said Cheerilee.

"Who was it!?" asked the guard urgently.

"The voice I heard was the voice of Twilight Sparkle."

Chapter 6: Suspect #1

"I'd know that voice anywhere, but I just can't believe it!" said Cheerilee.

"Who was it!?" asked the guard urgently.

"The voice I heard was the voice of Twilight Sparkle."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Twilight Sparkle was hanging out with her brother next to the library. Ever since the murder of The Mayor, she had hung around her brother as often as possible. She felt safe around him. She turned to him. "Do you have any leads on the mayor?" she asked.

"Twi, you know I can't talk to even you about that stuff. We'll let the public know about details when we find it necessary. Besides, I have a lot more on my plate now that I have to be the interim mayor for this town." said Armor. "The good news though, is that I think Ponyville had an uneventful night," Almost on cue, the two saw a group of ponies run by excitedly. One turned to Shining Armor and said

"There you are! Did you hear? Cheerilee got attacked last night and she named her attacker!" said the pony.

"WHO!?" asked Twilight and Armor excitedly.

"Well it was..." she realized who she was talking to. She looked at Twilight dead in the eyes and whimpered a bit. To the surprise of both of them, she backed away slowly. Twilight raised an eyebrow.

"Um, is something wrong?" asked Twilight. As the pony continued to back away, she pointed her hoof at Twilight and yelled

"HER! IT WAS HER!" The pony bolted away from the duo as fast as she could. Twilight and Shining Armor looked at each other uneasily.

"Did she just say you were The Killer?" asked Armor confusedly.

"I think so," said Twilight, in a tone as confused as her brother. Armor looked around.

"I'm going to get to the bottom of this. You get into the library and stay there until I can sort this out," Twilight nodded and ran inside her library home and shut the door. Spike was inside organizing books and when she came in, he turned towards her to give a greeting but he noticed her worried expression.

"What's wrong Twilight?" he asked.

"Oh Spike, Cheerilee was attacked last night by The Killer and she pegged me as the attacker!" said Twilight, trying to keep herself from panicking.

"What!?" said Spike, dropping the stack of books in his hands and running towards her. "You didn't do it right?" Twilight glared at him.

"Spike! How can you even ask that!? Of course I didn't!" said Twilight angrily.

"Okay okay," said Spike throwing his hands up. "Sorry."

"It's okay Spike, I just got to calm down. I'm sure it's just a big misunderstanding," said Twilight with a nervous laugh, trying to reassure herself. At that exact moment, Twilight heard a knock on the door. She froze to the spot but slowly gained the courage to inch over to the door and look out the peephole and to her horror, she saw a group of royal guards outside. She hesitated but one of them knocked on the door again this time more angrily. She gingerly opened the door and saw at least a dozen guards and her brother arguing with one of them, his second-in-command, named Battle Charge.

"There is no way that she did it!" said her brother angrily.

"Shining Armor, what's going on?" said Twilight in a tiny voice.

"They're saying that when Cheerilee was attacked, her attacker's voice changer fell out when she slipped down the stairs. She said the unchanged voice was clearly yours, but I'm telling you there is no way that it could be her!" said Armor.

"Look, we have our orders from the Princess herself to take any suspects into custody and right now the schoolteacher's testimony is the best lead that we have!" said Battle Charge defensively.

"But she couldn't have done it! What time was she attacked?" said Armor.

"She came to us at around 3 in the morning telling us she had been attacked. If you or the dragon can vouch for her whereabouts at that time, then of course she will cease to be a suspect and we will have a new angle to take this investigation but if not we have to take her in for questioning, I'm sorry," said Battle Charge. Twilight slowly backed into the library, hardly able to believe what she was hearing.

"I dropped her off here at around 1 in the morning. Spike, did you see Twilight here at three?" said Shining Armor desperately. Spike bit his lip.

"I'm a baby dragon, I fell asleep around 8," said Spike. Shining Armor looked frantic.

"Is there a phone registry, some way we can check calls!?"

"Sorry, the technology hasn't gotten to that point," said Battle Charge. "Miss Twilight, do you have a cellular phone?"

"Yeah, I just got it a week or so ago," she said.

"That would be around the time Pinkie got her call right?" said Charge

"Yeah, the same day," said Twilight, who was growing more and more nervous.

"Do you have it on hand?" Twilight nodded and began looking around for the phone. Spike joined in on the search.

"Look, Battle Charge, we have been friends since we first joined the royal guards, but this is too much. I cannot let you arrest my sister so suspicion of three counts of attempted and one successful murder!" yelled Armor. Battle Charge looked at Shining Armor almost a little helplessly.

"What do you want me to do? I have my orders and I can't let her go even if there is even a one percent chance that she is The Killer!" Shining Armor glared at him. Battle Charge sighed. "Look, we're not gonna hurt her at all, we really just want to ask her some questions." Twilight ran around the library frantically.

"Spike? Where is my phone?" she asked, tearing up her room in a desperate search for her cell phone.

"I don't know Twilight!" said Spike frantically ripping items off of shelves.

"Is this it?" asked one of the other guards. He held up a cellphone. "It was taken from the schoolteacher's house." Twilight looked at it.

"Yes that's it!" she shrank back. "I don't know how it got to her house." The guards nodded to each other.

"There's more," said Battle Charge.

'What now!?" said Shining Armor angrily.

"On the night that The Mayor was killed, one of our men said he saw a pony run away from the crime scene at some point after we arrived. He said that that pony looked suspiciously like Twilight Sparkle," he turned towards Twilight. "Well, was it you?"

"NO! The first I heard of The Mayor's death was when I woke up the morning after it happened. I still don't have the nerve to go near the Town Hall after what happened."

"Very well, the guard could have been mistaken but he saw somepony running away. However, that doesn't change the fact that your cellphone was at the scene of the attack on the schoolteacher so we are going to have to take you into custody, I'm sorry. Don't worry, if you didn't do it I'm sure you'll be cleared of any involvement." Twilight nodded. She couldn't understand how she was now the number one suspect in this case. Shining Armor looked at Battle Charge bitterly. Twilight was escorted away by the guards. "Don't worry, we won't talk to the Princess about this until we really know what is going on," said Battle Charge.

"Battle Charge, why wasn't I told about any of this right away? Why did you wait until now to confront her about this?" asked Shining Armor, who was slowly growing more and more angry with his old friend.

"Well we had to make some necessary precautions. This is a delicate situation, what with her being your sister and all, not to mention the personal protege of Princess Celestia. We waited until now because a few of us felt that she would be less nervous if we took her into custody in the day instead of in the middle of the night. I hope you understand," he said, trying his best to placate his friend. Shining Armor could only glare at him.

Chapter 7: Applejack

Twilight's five best friends, Applejack, Rarity, Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, and Pinkie Pie, all sat silently in Applejack's room in Sweet Apple Acres, the only thoughts on their minds were of Twilight. They didn't know if she was okay, they didn't know if she saw safe, and they especially didn't know why she was the number one suspect in the murder of The Mayor. Once they had heard that she had been taken in for questioning under suspicion of three separate counts of attempted murder and one successful one, they immediately rushed over to the library to try and talk to her, to see if they could do anything or if she needed anything but they were met only by a half-dozen guards who turned them back immediately and told them to stay out of it. After that failed attempt to see Twilight, they had gone to apple Jack's farm to discuss their next course of action. "I can't believe it, I just can't!" said an agitated Applejack.

"None of us can!" said Rainbow Dash. "I refuse to believe that Twilight is even remotely capable of attacking anyone, much less not just one, but TWO of us, Cheerilee aside.

"Oh, yeah. Twilight would never even think about hurting Cheerilee. They're good friends!" said Fluttershy.

"Not to mention the fact that they think that she actually brutally murdered The Mayor. I think anypony who even remotely knows Twilight could tell right off the bat that she would never be capable of that!" said Rarity.

"Yeah, WE all know for sure that she didn't do it, how could she have? I just hope the guards see it the same way," said Rainbow Dash.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Twilight Sparkle was sitting in her room in her library home, staring sadly out the window. After a lot of arguing, and pulling rank, Shining Armor had convinced Battle Charge to simply keep Twilight under house arrest until the investigation of her was over, something which Battle Charge only grudgingly agreed to. Spike was not allowed to be in with her and had been moved to Zecora's house for the time being. Twilight had endured hour after hour of grueling interrogation by the royal guards, after which she was analyzed by three psychologists. She was asked how her cellphone could have gotten to Cheerilee's house, she was asked what she was doing last night as well as on the nights of the attacks of Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie, and she was asked a lot of questions about her mental state, but most of all, they asked her questions about The Mayor. They asked her what their relationship was like, why anypony would want to hurt her, and so on and so forth. She simply told them the truth and tried to keep the small feeling of hope alive inside of her.

As the hours and hours of interrogation combined with the stress of both the events of the past weeks themselves, and her being the number one suspect compounded on each other, Twilight discovered that it was very difficult to keep her mind straight through all of this and she became more and more disoriented as time had gone by. A good nights sleep was now a foreign concept for her and she found that she had also lost her appetite and as a result she was eating less.

Unfortunately the Princess had found out about her status as the prime suspect in the case but her attitude about the whole thing was one of cautious optimism. She believed Twilight was innocent but couldn't do anything about it until hard evidence arose of her innocence. Twilight hoped that they would finish their investigation soon as she was anxious to know just what they had on her. So far all it seemed to be was her cellphone and the word of Cheerilee. Twilight herself had actually had suspicions of what was going on. She had told her interrogators that she was framed, that someone had stolen her phone and used it when attacking Cheerilee and that she would never do anything to hurt any of her friends. She would never hurt anyone. They all seemed to do nothing with the information except quietly note it down. Twilight looked glumly out the window to watch the next group of guards stoically patrolling her house. She hoped this would all turn out okay.

Every time her brother came to see her, he saw that she looked worse than the previous time. She looked constantly tired and lack of food was beginning to take its toll as she was beginning to look almost skeletal. As a result of all of this, she had become even more disoriented. She was always happy to see him and he told her what he could, and he always swore that he would get her out of this. as time went by, she was starting to believe that less and less. After his latest visit, in which Twilight looked worse than ever and barely spoke, he met up with Battle Charge to talk about it. "Okay look," said Armor angrily "I think this has really gone on long enough. It's been almost two weeks since the death of The Mayor and we haven't gotten any useful information from Twilight about it! Nothing is indicating that she is The Killer!" Battle Charge sighed and nodded.

"I must say that I agree with you about this. All of the evidence against her is circumstantial. it is completely possible that The Killer stole her phone and used it to call the schoolteacher. We have no real hard evidence against her so once the psychologist's reports come back we'll let her go. I still suggest keeping an eye on her, but I agree that the house arrest should end," Armor breathed a sigh of relief at this. Because of his new duties as the interim mayor and basic protocol, he had very little control over what was happening to his sister and as such, Battle Charge had to take the lead on the investigation.

"I'm glad that you agree. When do their reports come back?" said Armor.

"I expect them in the next two or three hours."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

The five pony friends of Twilight were still discussing what to do now that Twilight was, in the eyes of the law, the most likely attacker. "We've got to do somethin'!" said Applejack determinedly.

"But what? The guards know we are her friends and warned us not to get involved in the investigation! They're watching us right now!" said Pinkie Pie.

"How do you know that?" asked Fluttershy.

"Pinkie Sense. Got a left hoof cramp, right eye flutter, back scratch, and my tail straightened. It means I'm being watched."

"How often does that come up?" asked Rainbow Dash quizzically.

"More often than you think and a lot more since this started happening," said Pinkie.

"That's not important right now," said Applejack. "We've got to..." suddenly the phone rang. All five gasped and looked at it. "Do you think it could be...him?" said Applejack.

"Answer it!" whispered Rarity. Apple Jack walked slowly over to the phone and answered it.

"Hello?" whispered Applejack.

"Hello AJ," said the voice on the other end. Applejack's eyes widened, the voice was unmistakably that of The Killer. She looked at the other four, pointed to the phone and nodded vigorously. The Killer chuckled. "Oh AJ, there was no need to tell the other four I was on the other end."

"What do you want?" she asked, looking out her window to see if she could see where The Killer was hiding, but all she could see was row after row of large apple trees. The Killer could be hiding behind any one of them.

"To talk. I hear the royal guards finally have a suspect," said The Killer. Applejack brightened at this.

"Yeah, our friend Twilight, but since you are callin' me here and Twilight is still at her house under guard, that means she couldn't be the one!" she said triumphantly.

"Oh really? Are you so sure she's at the house?" asked The Killer. "Maybe she escaped and nopony knows about it.

"If she wasn't she certainly wouldn't be dumb enough to call here. We're bein' watched by Royal Guards too ya know!" said Applejack, hope rising inside of her.

"Oh my goodness," the other voice on the end erupted in laughter "did Pinkie think her Pinkie Sense meant that royal guards were the ones watching her?" As the voice on the other end continued to laugh at this, Applejack made eye contact with Rarity and then moved her eyes to Rarity's bag. Rarity gave a confused look, trying to figure out what Applejack was telling her.

"Oh uh, so it was you watchin' us then?" She moved her eyes to Rarity's bag again. Rarity's confusion suddenly changed to one of understanding and she pulled her bag slowly towards her and got out her cellphone.

"I think we can reasonably think that," said The Killer. Rarity slowly started dialing.

"So why don't you think that Twilight is in her house?" said Applejack who was merely trying to stall The Killer at this point while Rarity called the guards.

"Well that would spoil the surprise would it not? AND RARITY PUT THAT PHONE DOWN!" The voice was loud enough that Rarity heard it and dropped it on the ground with a small yelp of shock. Applejack looked at her friends and all of them had looks of pure terror etched across their faces. "Well, I think I have enough information out of all of you. But I can tell you this, what is about to happen, could redefine your whole lives." Applejack heard the dial tone as The Killer hung up. The other four looked at Apple Jack expectantly.

"I can't believe it, I just can't," said Applejack, shock dripping from every word.

"What is it? asked Fluttershy nervously.

"When The Killer yelled, I heard her real voice behind the voice changer. Cheerilee was right, it was Twilight's voice!" The other four just stared at her in shock. Suddenly there was a loud knock on the door. The five of them rushed to answer it. When they opened the door, they saw six royal guards led by Battle Charge in front of them. The five friends were uneasy as all seven guards had looks of pure fury on their faces. "Okay, where is she?" said Battle Charge, who was clearly trying to keep his anger in check. "Where is Twilight Sparkle?"

Chapter 8: Chaos

"Well, where is Twilight Sparkle?" asked Battle Charge angrily.

"Wouldn't you know that better than we would?" asked Rainbow Dash.

"She escaped from her house and two of the guards that were patrolling her house are missing. Are you hiding her and did you help her escape?" said Battle Charge.

"No, we didn't!" said Applejack. "We wouldn't want to get Twilight into any trouble and that's the honest truth!" Battle Charge glared at her but seemed slightly mollified by this.

"But we did just get a call from The Killer," said Pinkie. Upon hearing this, the seven guards led the five ponies into Apple Jack's room where they told them the whole story. when they were finished, Battle Charge nodded and turned towards a smaller guard.

"You, uh...you..." stuttered Battle Charge, clearly not knowing who he was addressing.

"Stuart is my name sir but everybody calls me 'Sticks,'" said the guard.

"Sticks? I don't remember you!" said Battle Charge quizzically.

"I've been on the force for 2 years now sir!"

"I...uh...I don't remember you," said Battle Charge. Sticks looked glum as the other guards suppressed a laugh.

"This is the 12th time we've had this conversation sir."

"Oh never mind that! Has Shining Armor been told about his sister going missing?"

"Uh, no I don't believe so," said Sticks.

"Well tell him then and be quick about it!" said Battle Charge sternly.

"Yes sir," said Sticks saluting as he ran off to tell Twilight's brother.

"So," said Battle Charge turning back towards the five "You have told us everything then?"

"Everything we know about sir. The Killer talked about where this was all going for a bit and we know she was watching us because she said stuff about what we were doing that she could only have known if she was watching," said Rarity. Battle Charge nodded and took a very serious tone with them.

"Okay. Now listen to me very carefully because this is important," said Battle Charge sternly. "Did you hear a voice, even faintly, behind the voice changer?" The five stuttered, trying to think of something to tell him which told him all he needed to know. "And that voice was Twilight Sparkle's wasn't it?" Once more their hesitation to answer told him everything. "I think you five had better stay here." he said. Silently the six guards left the room. The door shut behind them and they heard Charge order a search of Sweet Apple Acres as well as a few men to guard the house. The five ponies just stared at the door silently, not knowing what to do.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"THERE IS NO WAY!" said Shining Armor who was using every ounce of self control he had to stop him from destroying the entire building. "There is no way my little sister is The Killer!"

"What do you want me to say Armor? She's not in her house and since she has been missing, her friends got a call," said Battle Charge, who was doing his best to calm his friend down. Shining Armor gave a frustrated grunt. Battle Charge looked at Shining Armor uncomfortably. "Plus, there's something else we need to talk about."

"What now?" said Shining Armor, unsure of whether or not he could take more bad news.

"The psychologists who talked to Twilight turned in their reports a few hours ago. All three came back with the same diagnosis. They say she is likely a paranoid schizophrenic with violent tendencies. They said she kept ranting on to them about being set up and that she was really angry at them the entire time. All three said they were worried because they got the feeling that she was going to attack them at any moment. I was about to come talk to you about it when I got the reports that she had escaped." Shining Armor's anger gave way to shock and he sat behind his desk in Town Hall.

"And we have two men missing?" he said quietly. Battle Charge looked uncomfortable.

"No, no we found them both," said Battle Charge.

"How are they? Did they have any information on Twilight?" said Shining Armor perking up at the news.

"No."

"Let me talk to them!"

"You can't."

"Excuse me! I am the captain of the guard here I am in charge of this investigation!" said Shining Armor angrily.

"That's not the issue here."

"Then what is!?" Battle Charge looked dead in Shining Armor's eyes, a grim expression on his face. Armor looked back at him, confused for a moment but suddenly he realized what Charge was saying. "Oh," he said quietly. "Where did you find them?"

"Not far from the outskirts of the Everfree Forest. We had sent out a search party to see if we could find Twilight near the zebra's hut. The men who found them are pretty shaken up about it," Armor and thunked his head on his desk. "Do you know what this means Armor?" said Battle Charge trying to regain Shining Armor's attention.

"Yes. It means that we have a cop killer on our hands."

"Armor, we have to treat this delicately. The men think your sister is a cop killer. Do you know what that could mean if they found her before we got a chance to issue orders?"

"Yes I do. I still can't believe this," said Shining Armor who stood up and began nervously pacing around the room.

"If your sister is innocent, then we had better find her soon. I don't know if we can keep the situation contained much longer, which means that I will have to tell the Princess about this."

"I know, I know. Just go for now. I have to think about what I'm going to do here," said Shining Armor, waving his friend out of the room. Battle Charge nodded and left.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Any attempts the royal guards made to keep the news of Twilight's escape and the deaths of two members of the royal guards a secret failed miserably. Soon everypony knew that the killer had struck again and that Twilight Sparkle was on the loose. The school shut down, shops were seldom open, and there was very little interaction between the members of the community. The whole town probably would have left if travel in and out of Ponyville wasn't restricted. Only members of the royal guard were allowed in or out of the town. An Equestria-wide search for Twilight Sparkle was underway. All forces were under direct orders to contact Shining Armor and Princess Celestia immediately if she was found. The two of them were so worried about her that Celestia herself publicly swore that anypony who hurt her would be banished permanently to the moon (although rumors circulated that Princess Luna was trying to talk her out of this one). In short, a grim mood hung over Equestria with Ponyville at the center of it all.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Twilight's five friends were still confined to Apple Jack's house. They were constantly followed at this point whenever they needed to leave for whatever reason, as the guards suspected that if Twilight was still in Ponyville, she would try to contact them. Applejack had expressly forbidden Apple Bloom from leaving the house unsupervised by either herself or Big Macintosh. Rarity had imposed a similar rule on Sweetie Belle and even Rainbow Dash was taking more of an interest in how Scootaloo was doing. The three were annoyed at this as it limited their crusading time but they were still aware of the danger in Ponyville so they didn't complain about it.

The five of them sat in a circle in silence, racking their brains for any way that they could help Twilight. Rainbow Dash stood up with a grunt of anger, breaking the silence. "We have to do something!" said Rainbow Dash, slamming a hoof on the ground.

"But what can we do? We can't just go out looking for her, we're constantly being watched. I heard they're even considering protective custody for us! Everyone but Rainbow and Rarity have gotten the phone calls!" said Fluttershy.

"And with those two guards...you know..." said Rarity "The situation is even worse than before! The Killer just proved that he can take down two members of Celestia's personal guards! I'd say Pinkie and Fluttershy were very lucky!

"I've done some talkin' to the guards 'round here. Shining Armor has agreed that if they do find Twilight, then we can come along as mediators of sorts to make sure things go smoothly," said Applejack.

"But we can't help with the investigation?" asked Pinkie.

"They're worried we'd try to help her escape. I don't know, the whole situation seems hopeless. I sure hope they find her soon. Once we find her we can finally start to sort out this whole big mess," said Applejack.

Chapter 9: Searching

"They're worried we'd try to help her escape. I don't know The whole situation seems hopeless. I sure hope they find her soon. Once we find her we can finally start to sort out this whole big mess," said Applejack.

"No!" said Rainbow Dash angrily slamming her hoof on the floor again.

"No?" said Fluttershy "What do you mean 'no'?"

"No! Forget the soldiers, we have to go find Twilight! She could be in big trouble and I am not going to just sit around and wait for news! We have to act now!" she said once again slamming a hoof on the ground.

"I agree with Rainbow," said Rarity. "Twilight is our friend and we can't just wait for someone else to find her!"

"Yeah!" said Pinkie standing up "Twilight could be in a whole lot of danger! We need to go find her."

"Any chance your Pinkie Sense can help us with this?" asked Fluttershy.

"We'll have to see," said Pinkie thoughtfully. "But It doesn't really work that way so I doubt it."

"I am all for this idea y'all but how are we going to get past the guards? They're watching our every move to stop us from doin' exactly this!" said Applejack. "If we get caught, we could get in serious trouble and then there is no way that we could help Twilight." The excitement that they were feeling about going to find their friend subsided a bit as they thought about what to do about the guards.

"Well, I can have some of my animal friends make a distraction," said Fluttershy. She flew over to the window where there was a small bird standing on a branch next to the window. Fluttershy beckoned the bird and whispered to it and after a few seconds the bird flew off.

"What did you tell it to do?" asked Pinkie. Fluttershy blushed and pawed at the ground a bit.

"Oh, well, I might have gone overboard with it but a Pegasus has got to do what a Pegasus has to do. Twilight might be in trouble!"

"Okay, well what did you do?" asked Rarity with a raised eyebrow.

"Well, I asked the bird to umm..." she shrank back a bit. "talk to my bear friends for me," The jaws of the other four dropped.

"You just asked a bunch of bears to attack the royal guards watchin' us?" said Applejack, her eyes wide with shock.

"Oh no, I would never! I just asked them to scare them...a lot," said Fluttershy meekly.

"Whoa, way to go Fluttershy!" said Rainbow with an impressed chuckle.

"Well now that we got that settled, where do we search first?" asked Pinkie.

"I suggest we start in the Everfree Forest. It was where..." said Rarity they all shifted uncomfortably.

"Sounds good to me," said Applejack. "All we have to do is wait." They did not have to wait long. In a little less than 10 minutes, they heard the angry growls of no less than four bears and the startled yelps of the royal guards watching them. They all went over to the window and saw six royal guards running away as fast as their legs would carry them, screeching in fear as four gigantic brown bears chased after them. Once they were out of sight, Fluttershy and Rainbow lowered the other three down from the window and they all bolted in the direction of the Everfree Forest as fast as the possibly could

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Shining Armor paced around in the Mayor's office. As he continued to think about what to do now that Twilight was missing, his pacing became more and more frantic. He had ordered three different regiments out to different roads out of Ponyville in an undoubtedly vain effort to find his sister. He was highly considering simply hoofpicking a group of his best men to search for his sister with him. He nodded to himself. He liked that idea. He opened the door to pick his men and to his surprise, an unkempt Battle Charge was standing directly in front of the door, a hoof raised. He had just been about to knock when Armor opened the door. "What the heck happened to you?" he said with a raised eyebrow. Battle Charge took a few seconds to catch his breath and then answered.

"We were staking out the apple farm where the other five were when outta nowhere were attacked by bears. No injuries to the men but unfortunately, the five escaped from the house. We're putting together a few men to look for them," said Battle Charge. Shining Armor waved away this idea.

"No, we're stretched too thin as it is. I kind of regret not including them in the investigation in the first place. They could have helped."

"Oh come on, you know that they could have also hindered the investigation. They're biased and they're not going to follow protocol," said Battle Charge chidingly.

"FORGET PROTOCOL MY SISTER IS IN DANGER!" yelled Armor. Charge flinched from being yelled at. Armor regained his composure and sighed. "Now, I'm going to pick some of my finest men to go out and search for her myself. We'll start in the Everfree Forest. We can transport to the middle and work our way out."

"Oh come on you know that the forest is dangerous. If she is in there she might not..." a glare from Armor silenced him.

"If she is in there we have to get in there as soon as possible," said Shining Armor. Charge nodded in agreement.

"Well then let's get going."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

The five friends of Twilight ran as fast as they could to the Everfree forest. When they reached the outskirts they immediately ran in. The first place they looked was around Zecora's house. They asked Spike and Zecora if they had heard anything suspicious but the pair were no real help. As they ran around the forest, they made sure to stick together for fear that the dangers of the forest would separate them and they would be lost. They searched for hours with absolutely no luck. They found themselves too tired to continue without a break and they decided to rest for a bit to discuss their plans. "We have nothing to go on!" said Applejack helplessly. "What do we do now? We can't look through every inch of the forest, it's simply too big for that!"

"Well, there has to be a landmark or a cave that is significant for Twilight or someone who knows about Twilight," said Pinkie Pie. Rarity brightened.

"The castle where we found the elements!" The five of them nodded excitedly at this idea. They all ran towards the castle, each with a new sense of determination, they somehow all felt that Twilight was there.

Chapter 10: Twilight

Twilight woke up. She groaned and tried to stand up but her legs were too weak. She wobbled for a few seconds before she collapsed on the ground again, breathing heavily from the effort of standing up. She looked around and saw that she wasn't in her room anymore. To her surprise she was in the castle where her and her friends had found the Elements of Harmony. Once she felt that enough strength had returned, she groggily got up and looked around. To her surprise, she saw that the castle was surrounded by a large purple bubble, a spell that Twilight recognized as a shield spell, a powerful spell that was frequently used to transport prisoners to Equestrian prisons. She was completely trapped in the castle. She desperately tried using her magic to teleport out of the bubble in the hopes that the caster wasn't strong enough to create a stronger shield but predictably, it didn't work. She just had to wait around for someone to find her, or for The Killer to get back. She looked around for a chance of a way to get out by getting through the ground.

Using her magic, she began testing the stones that made up the floor of the castle in hopes that she could dig herself out if she could move one. In a few seconds she found a weak floor stone. She lifted it up and threw it to the side and looked at the spot where the stone used to be. she felt a jolt of excitement go through her as she saw that there was dirt under the stone. She looked around to see if there was anything she could use to begin digging her way out and to her delight, she saw that there was a tree branch on the floor next to her that was perfect for her needs. She used her magic to bring it close to her and frantically began trying to dig her way out. "I don't think that is quite going to work Miss Sparkle," said a voice behind her. She yelped and turned around. Standing just outside the bubble was The Killer who was wearing a similar outfit to what Twilight wore when she tried to break into the castle to get the time spell as well as a blank white mask. "Sorry about the accommodations but I'm afraid that I needed you out of the way for now. I have to say, I could not have planned this better if I tried. All of Equestria is in total chaos and everyone thinks you are a cop killer! It's such fun," said The Killer giddily.

"Cop killer?" said a horrified Twilight.

"Oh yes, it seems some of the royal guards met an unfortunate end when you broke out of the library. I hear that the others are really mad. You see, the members of the royal guards don't tend to like it when you kill their comrades," said The Killer in a mocking tone.

"Why are you doing this?" said Twilight, anger and fear bubbling up inside of her. The Killer just shook his head and chuckled.

"Oh we haven't quite gotten to that point yet. Far be it from me to reveal the end of the game before the right time. Rest assured, all will be made clear one way or the other."

"My brother will get you. He's the best of the best and he will find you," said Twilight angrily. The Killer just laughed again.

"Oh I've managed to fool him thus far, I mean, I've been under all of your noses this entire time and no one has ever suspected me. I don't think he will figure this all out until I'm ready," said The Killer smugly.

"So, what now? Are you just going to keep me in here and cause more chaos?"

"We're at the endgame here Twilight," he said excitedly. "You'll know everything before the end, don't worry," said The Killer. "Well, I must be going now. I still have a lot more to do before this all comes to fruition," The Killer laughed and teleported away. Twilight immediately rushed back over to the hole and started digging again.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Shining Armor looked around for good men who weren't searching around for his sister and after a few minutes, he had a group of about half a dozen good soldiers. "Are we ready to go?" said Armor to Battle Charge.

"I think so," said Battle Charge. "We have everyone who isn't doing anything right now."

"What about Private Sticks sir, do you remember where you put him?" said one of the guards jokingly to Battle Charge. Shining Armor looked confusedly at the guard.

"Uh...who are you talking about?" said Shining Armor.

"Oh, it's a funny story actually," said the guard with a chuckle. "When we went to the farm after your sister went missing, Battle Charge here had Sticks go tell you that she had gone missing but at first he had no idea who Sticks was despite the fact that he has been on the force for two years!" Shining Armor just stared at him blankly and the guard stopped chuckling and cleared his throat nervously. "You know, the guy who told you Twilight got out, he's the one we are talking about."

"Private Joker told me that Twilight got out, I have no idea who this 'Sticks' guy is. It is my job to know everypony under my command and I..." the realization hit Shining Armor like a brick wall "Oh my gosh, I think he's who we are looking for! I think we have had an imposter in our ranks this entire time! We have to go to the Everfree Forest. I'm sure they're in there somewhere!" said Armor with excited urgency. The men geared up and immediately ran towards the forest.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

The five pony friends of Twilight Sparkle bolted towards the ruins where they had found the Elements of Harmony. They didn't stop for anything. They only cared about finding Twilight. They knew the ruins were close.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Twilight had made a lot of progress in digging herself out. There was a large mound of dirt beside her and she had managed to uproot a few more stones. In the past few hours of digging, she had a good tunnel going and she had hope that she could escape before the killer came back. Suddenly, to her horror, the dirt and stones were surrounded with a magic aura. To Twilight could only watch helplessly as they all went back to their original spot. Her head snapped to the entrance of the ruins where The Killer stood. "I told you not to do that," said The Killer in an irate tone." We aren't done here yet." Twilight ran towards the edge of the shield.

"You won't get away with this," she said in a frustrated tone.

"Oh stop acting like a broken record Miss Sparkle. I have planned this out perfectly. Nothing is going to happen without my say so!" said The Killer. Twilight started to talk to him again when she glanced behind his left shoulder and saw a sight that made all of her fears melt away.

"I think my friends are going to find you very very soon," said Twilight. The Killer snorted.

"Yeah, that's not very likely. They're still under guard at Sweet Apple Acres. They'll be there for a while," said The Killer smugly. Twilight managed a smile.

"Oh, are you so sure about that?"

"Yes I'm sure!" snapped The Killer.

"I wouldn't be too sure if I was you. In fact, I think my brother and his men will find you very soon too," her grin widened. "Very soon."

"No Miss Sparkle, I assure you that that is quite impossible!" he said angrily. He inhaled to tell her off some more when he suddenly noticed her giant grin. He gave a small grunt of shock. "They're all right behind me aren't they?" he asked nervously.Twilight's grin widened even more. The Killer slowly turned around and jumped back with a yelp when he saw Applejack, Rarity, Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, Rainbow Dash, Shining Armor, Battle Charge, and a dozen royal guards, all of whom looked extremely angry. The Killer whimpered a bit. He backed up slowly, trying his best to figure out if he could escape. "Oh, hello there everypony...I...I..."

"How about you let my sister go?" said Shining Armor, rage dripping from very syllable.

"Oh yes, right! Of course," said The Killer laughing nervously. The shield evaporated and Twilight ran past The Killer to her brother and friends, who hugged Twilight happily.

"How about you take that mask off as well? Now," said Battle Charge.

"Oh right, right! Yes of course," The Killer reached up and pulled his mask off. His black jumpsuit came off too." The group looked at The Killer and gasped. They saw a pony with a completely while body with blood red eyes. His cutie mark was his own head with an open mouth.

"You're an albino," said Twilight quietly.

"NO! NO! I am NOT an albino!" yelled The Killer angrily. he calmed down a bit and cleared his throat. "Well, yes I'm technically an albino, but seriously ponies, I am tired of that being my defining feature. I'm not even joking, everyone just calls me 'The Albino' even my parents did. In fact, my parents were so ashamed of producing an albino pony that they abandoned me not long after I was born. I don't even have a real name. My being an albino pony led me to be shunned from society! The other children never wanted to play with me when I was a small colt at the orphanage. Even when I was on my own after I grew up no one really wanted anything to do with me. It was just me for most of my life. I had to learn how to survive by myself. I have yet to run into a pony who has treated me with kindness and I still don't know why! I mean come on, I just have a different hair and eye color!" he grimaced before a small smile crept on his face. "I just wanted to live my life in peace, but no matter where I went, the reaction to me was the same. in my rage and frustration of the way you 'civilized ponies' treated me, I turned to killing as a release. You have no idea what it was like to finally have power over my tormentors Twilight Sparkle. Since I did turn out to be a killer, it does beg the question of nature vs nurture. Was I born a vindictive little jerk or did society make me one? I go back and forth on that," Rarity squealed in delight.

"Ooh! Nice job with the Hard Candy reference!" she said happily. Before The Albino could respond everyone turned to her with a glare.

"RARITY!" yelled everyone.

"Oh, yes, right, sorry," she said with a weak chuckle. The Albino grinned.

"You Ponyvilleians are such fascinating ponies. I think in any other circumstances it would be a joy to get to know all of you."

"Well then why didn't you just come to live here if you though you would like us so much?" said Twilight.

"Haven't you been listening to me?" snapped The Albino. "Sure the adults of the town would come to tolerate me eventually, but how would you feel if every time you left the house you got judgmental looks from everypony you met? The adults gossip, the children whimper and you never truly fit in. I would be tolerated after a long time, but never accepted. I have gotten this from every town Twilight Sparkle, yours would be no different," said The Albino bitterly. He suddenly smiled. "But enough of my tragic sob story!" he said in the most over-the-top manner possible.

"Why would you do this!?" asked Twilight. "You killed two members of the royal guards, you murdered our town mayor, you made me the main suspect, and caused chaos throughout Equestria!" The Albino cocked his head.

"Why?" he shrugged. "Who cares?" The rest of the ponies looked around at each other in shock.

"You had to have had a motive!" said Applejack.

"Oh I suppose I do. In fact, if you remember back, I already told you my motive Twilight Sparkle," Twilight closed her eyes and thought for a minute.

"You mentioned how fun this all was for you," she looked up at him, a horrified look on her face. "You did this just for fun!?"

"Ding ding ding ding ding!" said The Albino happily. "For fun! See, I have heard about you six quite often. You are probably the most famous ponies in all Equestria after all. I decided that I wanted to pit my wits against you, to really challenge my deadly abilities. I have certain skills and I wanted to see how I could do against you all. The fact that the royal guards showed up was just an added bonus. I wanted to see if you would still be strong if I weakened you. Hence, I went after the pink pony and the Pegasus." The Albino grimaced. "As you can guess, that failed miserably. But I didn't lose heart! It just strengthened my resolve. So to strike true fear into the hearts of the people, I cut off the head of your government and tried to cause real fear among the children by killing their teacher."

"How did you mimic my voice?" asked Twilight. The Albino chuckled.

"I told you that I have special talents. My cutie mark represents my talent for flawless mimicry of anypony that I hear. I also have a talent for costumes and makeup that I developed as a result of hiding my true look. He smiled. "I think I've gotten pretty good at it don't you?" he said in Applejack's voice. Applejack glared at him.

"So you took the role of Private Sticks," said Shining Armor coldly.

"Yes, I'm surprised you didn't catch that sooner. I mean seriously, every guard I ran into bought the exact same story of 'oh you just don't remember me'. But he wasn't the only one. I took on the form of a few others."

"Others?" said Rainbow Dash.

"The roles of a lifetime," said The Albino happily in Rainbow's voice. "Remember the pony who told you that the schoolteacher had pegged you as the killer?" he asked Twilight. "That was me. The three psychiatrists who analyzed you? All three of them were me as well, and of course, Private Sticks."

"Enough of this," said Shining Armor angrily. "You will go to trial in Canterlot. Princess Celestia has asked to personally be the presiding judge for your trial. I've sent a letter to Canterlot already. once you arrive, your trial will begin immediately. I don't see you ever getting out of prison."

"Oh one never does really know now do they?" said The Albino happily. "At any rate, it will be a great challenge to escape," he said in Fluttershy's voice. The Albino was then surrounded by guards, one of whom put the shield spell on him that he had used on Twilight. The Albino was led away to await his trial in Canterlot. Once he was gone, Twilight's friends hugged her again.

"Are you okay Twilight?" asked Fluttershy. "Did he hurt you at all?"

"No, he didn't hurt me, I'm okay. I'm just glad this is all over. Thank you all for finding me," she said. She felt relief for the first time in a long time.

"We all were trying to find you. I'm glad we found you when we did. Who knows what he would have done if we hadn't found him now?" said Applejack.

"I don't want to know, but he talked as if he had grander plans for the end than what he was previously doing."

After a few more minutes of talking, they went back to Ponyville. Once it was revealed to the population that Twilight wasn't the killer, and that she had been set up by the real killer, they all apologized profusely for doubting her, Cheerilee especially. As the weeks went by, the atmosphere of the town went back to what it used to be. The shops opened again, the children went back to school and the ponies began interacting with each other as they had done before The Albino had come to their town.

A memorial was set up for The Mayor in Town Hall. It was a humble little plaque with a portrait of The Mayor on the wall. The memorial service was quiet but everypony was there. No one said much but everypony got the feeling that if The Mayor was watching them, she appreciated what they were doing for her.

A few weeks later, an election was held to find a new Mayor. A Pegasus pony named Sonic Flier was elected and with her help, the town began to rebuild their lives.

Since there was no Equestrian death penalty, The Albino was sentenced to life in prison in the highest security wing in the Canterlot prison. Princess Celestia herself used as much power as she could to ensure that he would never escape as long as he was alive. Still, everypony was worried about how secure the prison was in regard to him. Whenever he was questioned, he always seemed to act like he was the one holding all of the cards...

Epilogue

Battle Charge walked down the hallway towards the cell that held one of Equestria's most notorious killers, The Albino. He passed dozens of empty cells in the deepest, darkest part of the prison on his way to see the prisoner. He had always felt nervous coming down here, even though there were no prisoners in it (this part of the prison was reserved for the ponies who had been sentenced to life in prison) he had always gotten the feeling that there was some evil force in this area. He shook his head and cleared his mind as he reached the cell that held The Albino. The cell was a small little room, it had a bed, toilet, tiny shower and a sink with a mirror. Thick iron bars in front of the room prevented any chance of escape. Battle Charge looked on the bed and saw The Albino staring unblinkingly at him. "Hello Battle Charge." he said in Battle Charge's own voice.

"I told you I don't like it when you do that," said Battle Charge irritatedly.

"Oh very well then, but I must say that it is one of the only fun things to do down here. I really enjoy it when ponies come to pay me a visit," he said in Shining Armor's voice.

"Enough of this!" said Battle Charge sternly. "do you know why you are in here?"

"Yes, yes," said The Albino rolling his eyes. "You keep telling me so I don't know why you are asking me again." he switched back to Battle Charge's voice. "You are in here because you got careless! You are in here because you took Twilight Sparkle to the most obvious place! You shouldn't have interacted with so many guards, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah!" said The Albino, finishing his sentence in his normal voice.

"I told you not to do that!" said Battle Charge who was one step away from losing his temper.

"Oh what are you really going to do to me in here? I think it'll be suspicious if I'm hurt when you come to see me don't you?" said The Albino mockingly.

"I won't hurt you, but I won't let you out. You failed to do what you were supposed to do! When I contacted you about killing Twilight Sparkle and her friends and causing panic in Ponyville, I didn't think you would fail so easily! I gave you every chance!" said Battle Charge. The Albino rolled his eyes.

"Well, you never know when second chances may arise do you?"