An Act of Betrayal

     Applebloom kicked out desperately with her hind legs, her brow furrowed and frustration coming down in beads from her forehead.

     She gasped. "Get. . .Off!" She gasped again, between words, but Applejack's weight was insistent on her belly. Rainbow dash snatched up the knife by its handle in her jaws, pointing it for her stomach.

     Applejack shot a glare at Rainbow Dash, and bitterly the Pegasus gave in, dropping the knife at her hooves.

     "Applebloom, Ah ain't got no idea whats goin' on, but ya'll gotta stop! NOW!" Applejack begged, on the verge of tears.

     "This is just the start!" Applebloom grunted with the effort of squirming like a worm in her older sisters grip. "You never understand!" Tears blurred the edges of her vision. "Ah'll be sad and you yell at me for no reason! You call yerself the element of honesty? Well, I think that fits just fine!" Tears streamed down Applebloom's cheeks and Applejack released her grip.

     "A-Ah never knew! Ah'm so sorry, sis'! Are we good now?" Applejack was trying to place her words carefully, but she was just too desperate to get her sister back and escape. A shame. . .

     "So. . .This "apology" is just. . .Just to escape?! Well, I'm not having it! Rainbow!" Applebloom snapped, and the rainbow-maned mare turned her attention to the filly, ears pricked and wings only half folded.

     "Pick up the knife!" Applebloom demanded imperiously, watching furiously as Rainbow Dash apprehensively picked the knife up in her teeth.

     "Okay. Applejack, go fetch a blindfold and put it on Rainbow." Applebloom's sunsety gaze was cold.

     Driven by fear, Applejack obeyed.

     Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle's sacks started to move. Applebloom cast a glance at Diamond Tiara.

     The small pink filly was flailing her forehooves against Rarity's flailing own. Luckily, the unicorn was batting pettily, grimacing as though, to an average pony, Diamond Tiara was a homeless colt trying to touch her. Not in a certain way necessarily, but she was still being a bit ridiculous, especially in times like this.

     But, finally, Diamond Tiara threw Rarity to the ground. She pressed her skull against Rarity's horn, which had blue sparks igniting on it. Pain was starting to stab at Diamond's head, since Rarity's sparking horn was pressing very hard against it.

     Grunting with the effort, Diamond Tiara smacked Rarity's shoulder blade with a hard hoof, gritting her teeth in frustration. The older mare scrabbled to her hooves and held Diamond down against her fluffy pink belly, blue eyes gleaming with rage and disgust. Her hooves pressed sharply into Diamond's throbbing spine.

     Applebloom lifted a hoof, afterword slamming it back down. "O-Okay. Then Ah'll do it." Reluctantly, Applebloom trotted over to the sacks, ordering Rainbow Dash to stay put across the room, in one of the dark corners in the far left of the basement.

     She pulled open the sacks carefully with her teeth, her heart racing. She scrabbled back, expecting Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo to come flying at her, but instead they charged toward each other, pressing their lips together passionately and throwing their hooves around one another's neck in a big hug. Scootaloo was the first to pull back, daunted by the power of her and Sweetie Belle's love.

     "I-I. . ." She stuttered, but Sweetie Belle put a hoof to her lips, her eyes glistening.

     Fury boiled up inside of Applebloom, hurt spiking her chest like a thousand knives. She bolted for the knife beside Applejack and raced back toward "Scootabelle" with it clamped between her teeth.

"STOPPIT!!!!" Applebloom yowled, dropping the knife at Scootaloo's hooves. It grazed the blue, youthful Pegasus' foreleg and she raised it in alarm, her fur spiking and her pupils thinning. She slowly looked up to Applebloom, staggering back a tail-length.

     Sweetie Belle's face was a deathly pale. Her eyes were practically glued to Scootaloo's hoof and the knife, flicking from one to the other. Horror was plane on her bone-white face and wide eyes. Her pupils were small dots in her green iris. Slowly she dragged her green gaze to Applebloom's.

     Applebloom's eyes were blazing as she imagined Scootaloo crying out on the cold floor, blood clotted in her orange fur-which had turned orange red with blood. Quickly she shook her head and matched up her gaze with Sweetie Belle's horrific own. The small white filly's glistening eyes gave away her exact emotion.

     "You and Scootaloo always ignore me!" Applebloom shouted. A cry sounded behind her, but she ignored it and flicked an ear, anger firing in her sunset-colored eyes. "Y'all are so lost in yer eyes ya can't even see how much it's affecting me!" Applebloom pressed her right forehoof against her fuzzy yellow chest, which had drying blood flecked on the fur.

     Scootaloo's pupils were small dots in her eyes, which had sparks of light scoring through her purple-white iris, giving her a crazed appearance. "I just want to be more like Rainbow Dash!" She gushed hastily. "She likes mares! And, and I do, too! I just really, extra like Sweetie!" She bumped her head against Sweetie Belle's and gave the white unicorn a fervent kiss on the head. Scootaloo was shaking excessively.

     "Wha do y'all get a love and not me? It's just not fair!" Applebloom bellowed, scooping up the knife in her mouth and lifting her head, her eyes blazing. "You had it coming!" She growled around the knife handle in her mouth. In a flash, she jerked her head down, towards Scootaloo's chest. "You were always the most annoying!"

     But her plan backfired, and Sweetie Belle leaped in front of her marefriend, taking the blow. The knife slid into her chest, blood bubbling at the metal that wasn't yet inside of her, causing a strained gasp to heave out of her throat. Her muscles tightened, and pain clouded her green gaze.

     "Agh!" Sweetie Belle moaned and gasped, blood spurting from her chest and spattering Applebloom's fur.

     Scootaloo was too shocked to speak, her vision blurred by tears, of which even they hesitated in a stage of shock. She shook her head, trying desperately to clear it, but Sweetie Belle still had a knife through her chest with blood pressing to pour out. She collapsed, her white fur spiking.

     Meanwhile, Diamond Tiara thrashed wildly under Rarity's grip, but the white unicorn caught a glimpse of Sweetie Belle and her heart stopped.

     "Sweetie Belle!" Rarity hollered, shock piercing her blue eyes. Forgetting about the pink "demon" filly she had been holding down, Rarity galloped to Sweetie Belle's side.

     Applejack twitched as she watched the scene. Her green eyes flitted to Rainbow Dash, who was slowly creeping up to Twilight's limp body, but the Pegasus leaped back, startled, as the Alicorn's body convulsed.

     Twilight's eyes blinked slowly open and a light moan rasped slightly from her throat, which was clotted with blood. It trickled from her mouth and, suddenly, she coughed, blood spraying the floor at her purple hooves. Her pelt spiked as she coughed and hacked, and Applebloom's attention was snapped to the princess.

     "Oh, great, she's woken up." The yellow farm filly muttered darkly. She abandoned the spluttering and bleeding Sweetie Belle and plodded up to Twilight.

     "Shut up!" She demanded imperiously, fur prickling.

     The only response was the start of a sentence, only to be broken up by yet another fit of coughing.

     Pinkie Pie's mouth quivered in an attempt to hold back her tears, but they were insistent, like the lump throbbing in her tightened throat.

     "Twilight! You egghead, get up!" Rainbow Dash hissed, kicking Twilight by her shoulder.

     Blood sprayed Rainbow's hoof. She lifted it, her jaws clenched and her eyes wild with fear and mental pain.

     "Wake up, fully!" Rainbow Dash howled, stamping her forehooves on the ground. Tears blurred the edges of her vision and a lump arched its back in her throat, causing her to struggle for breath.

      "Twilight!" Rainbow Dash's voice was strained.

      "R-Rainbow Dash?" Twilight spluttered, hacking up blood and touching a hoof weakly to Rainbow Dash's. "I-I loved being your fr-friend." She gasped between words, but luckily the blood flow coming from her mouth was slowing.

      "I-I love you! Friend love!" Rainbow Dash cried, an awkward smile quivering on her muzzle.

      "I do, too. . ." Twilight's dull eyes flicked to Rainbow's neck, but almost instantly dropped to the Pegasus' hooves. "I-I'm too weak. . .Rainbow, come closer. . ." Twilight forced out, the bags under her eyes dark and heavy.

      "Me, too?" Pinkie Pie asked, her voice very small.

      "Ye-" Twilight's body jerked and spasmed as a bought of coughing and hacking attacked her and coarsed through her body. Her horn sparked, and she fell limp, blood pouring from her mouth.

      Rainbow Dash and Pinkie and Rarity drew their attention to the knife that was shoved into Twilight's spine. Blood spurted out of it in arcing "chunks".

     "TWILIGHT!!!!" Rainbow Dash bellowed, her eyes sparking.

     "TWILIGHT!!!" Rarity shrieked, her fur spiking.

     "No, guys! She's alive, she's alive!" Pinkie Pie rasped, her ice-blue eyes bright with fear, tears stuck in her tear duct. She crouched down before Twilight, prodding her stiff shoulder with a careful pink hoof. Nothing stirred.

     Twilight's body was stiff, her legs sticking out as though she was stretching. All of her muscles were tensed, as any body would be after death. And her chest, face, and forehoof fur was matted with thick blood. It was still dripping from her mouth, but yet easing as heartbeats among rapid heartbeats went on.

     Applejack forced back tears, but also the urge to go up to Twilight. Her hooves quivered.

     "Okay!" Applebloom hollered. "Everyone, gather around Twilight!"

     Applejack stumbled numbly up to Twilight's blood-smeared body, her striking green eyes glazed with grief and tears, but Diamond Tiara stood where she was, a few paces from the other ponies.

     "This," Applebloom gestured to Twilight's body, then Sweetie Belle's, behind her, "is what happens when you disobey me. These games will go on until one of you is left, or two, if you've grown to hate each other, are left. You will face death in vain, and tests." She drew in a deep breath. "And don't think y'all can escape!"

     Applejack winced. And not even your sister may escape. . .I loved you, Applebloom. Invisible hooves gripped Applejack's throat.