Strange Voice on the Phone

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.

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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."