2*10+2: The Sleepover

Dear Diary,

I'm so excited for the sleepover! Sweetheart still wasn't at school today. She said she's 100% sure she'll make it though! Teddy was super weird all day. He seems really stressed. I mean, he's always stressed when Sweetheart's sick, but today more so. Melody says she saw him yelling into the phone. Something about boys not being hairdressers. I'm so excited!

-Bonbon

Dear Diary,

Okay, now Teddy's being super weird. Halfway through lunch he started talking about having too much homework and then ended up in a massive rant about how ponies shouldn't be forced to take up responsibilities they know they're not ready for. Weird. Oh yeah, and I have a flank-tonne of math homework. On the bright side, we have biology tomorrow and we'll learn about genetics! Patch thinks she'll be able to use genetics to find out who her parents are. I doubt it, but a girl's gotta dream!

-Bonbon

Dear Diary,

Sleepover tomorrow! I'm so excited! Sweethear finally showed up at school, thank god! So excited! Oh, better stop writing now. Mum might get upset I'm not doing my homework. My homework's not due till next term, but dad always said do it as soon as I get it. Pretty good advice- there have been times when me and Bright Eyes were the only ones that got our work done because the teachers set the due date too late and everypony forgot.

-Bonbon.

"Sweet music! Ooh, sweet music-"

"Chumba wumba gobbelty goo, life isn't fair, it's sad but it's true-"

"Sweet music! OOH, sweet music-"

"What do you do when you're stuck in a chair-"

"SWEET MUSIC! OOH, SWEET MUSIC!"

"WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THE ONE YOU CALL GOD? ISN'T HIS ABSENCE SLIGHT- LY- ODD?"

Mr. Brushstroke sighed. He was starting to regret letting the teenagers listen to music in his class.

"SWEET MUSIC-"

"CHUMBA WUMBA GOBBELTY GORSE-"

"SWEET MUSIC! OOH, SWEET MUSIC!"

"THEY WOULD TURN YOU INTO DOG FOOD-"

"Melody! Ace! If you two keep switching songs on my computer then I'll make everypony listen to Dora the Explorer!"

Melody nodded, switching back to her song. After all, she had written it. What was more important- a song written by a student in the class, or an ableist gag from Family Guy?

Ace wasn't too happy about that, closing Melody's window and playing the last part of his song. It was only a few more seconds, after all, she could wait.

"Or to chumba- wumba- gobbelty- glue!"

"That's it!" snapped Mr. Brushstroke, pushing them both away and typing on his own keyboard. Melody trotted back to her desk, snickering. "He won't actually put Dora the Explorer on, he's a grown man-"

She was cut off by the Dora the Explorer theme song, which I can't put here because of copywright, but I can put a Youtube link to a good song, so https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tx1XIm6q4r4. Stupid Fimfiction rules.

Starlight laughed. "Clover's gonna laugh her head off when we tell her tonight!"

After around a minute the computer grew silent, and a minute after that the bell rang. Everypony grabbed their books and shoved them into their bags before galloping out, ignoring the teacher's commands to help him clean up. After all, once the bell rang school was over, and he should have told them to pack up earlier anyway.

"See you at three!" Starlight called to the other girls as she galloped off.

That wouldn't be the first time she would gallop that day.

"Sweetheart!" yelled Teddy, grabbing his girlfriend's hoof. She sighed.

"I really truly promise I'll tell them tonight, and the next day I'll tell my parents and we can decide what to do."

"Okay," he mumbled nervously. "Just don't drink too much, okay?"

She gave him a disgusted look. "I'm not going to drink!"

She noticed the teachers walking out of their rooms and added, "We're underage!"

She trotted away, nervously glancing back. She would tell them tonight. It wouldn't be a problem. I mean, she had a whole day, and an afternoon, and the next morning. Nopony could put it off for that long. Worst case scenario, Starlight's house somehow exploded and they all died. And if they all died, it wouldn't be a problem anyway- God, that was the weirdest thing she had ever thought. These hormones were weird.

She caught up with Patch. "Hey, Patch......have you stayed in touch with Rosy?"

She stared. "Erm, yeah, why?"

"Just out of interest." If she asked enough questions, Patch wouldn't be able to guess which ones were important. "What was the orphanage like?"

"Err......I dunno, I can hardly remember it."

"Right........hey, how do you get your mane like that?"

"I've worn it like this every day for the last six years."

"Yeah, but I really truly just noticed. Also, what's your favourite colour?"

"Errm.....I'm not sure."

Patch sighed and galloped off to meet her foster parents at the gate. A short drive, a bit of packing she had forgotten to do, a slightly longer drive, and a quick hug from her mother later she was excitedly knocking on the door. "Starlight! Let me in!"

The door swung in to reveal a grinning pink pony. "You're early."

"Yeah, well, I live the closest."

She galloped inside with a grin, running into Starlight's room and throwing her bag on the floor, hurriedly getting her stuff out. A few minutes later Clover galloped in and Patch awkwardly realised she hadn't noticed the doorbell. After a while Starlight, Sweetheart, Melody, Bright Eyes, Patch, Clover and Bonbon could be found sitting in their sleeping bags in Starlight's room.

"So," asked Melody. "Who wants to try on my saddles?"

Bonbon stared at the massive bag she was holding. "How many saddles does one pony need?"

"Don't make me answer that, babe."

She rolled her eyes. Melody's constant flirting with everypony was starting to annoy them alll. "Why are we still friends with her?" whispered Patch.

"I like her mother!" answered Sweetheart unhelpfully.

A few hours of (to everypony but Bonbon and Melody, reluctantly) trying on saddles, and a few minutes of reading surprisingly entertaining terrible fanfictions (including one Harry Trotter fic invlolving somepony called Ebony where everypony was either an evil 'prep' or a cool 'goff', and a fair few that really needed a 'dead dove, do not eat' warning), they galloped downstairs and threw themselves onto the couch.

"Alright," asked Starlight. "Family Guy, Futurama or Simpsons?"

"Family Guy," decided Patch. "Ace got that dumb song stuck in my head."

"Can we watch something a little less....I dunno......dark?" asked Sweetheart.

"I like Futurama," muttered Bright Eyes.

"How about we just watch Total Drama?" asked Melody.

They heard what sounded like static interference and a loud voice through a megaphone.

"PLEASE EXIT YOUR HOMES WITH YOUR HOOVES UP. THIS IS NOT A JOKE."

Clover laughed. "Good one, Patch, you're getting better at voice acting. When did you record that and where's the player?"

Patch stared around. She really was very good at pretending to be nervous. "That's....That's not me, guys."

"PLEASE EXIT THE BUILDING WITH YOUR HOOVES UP OR WE WILL BE FORCED TO BLOW UP THE BUILDING."

Sweetheart bit her lip. "I think we should go outside. Starlight, go wake your parents up."

"Yeah, right!" yelled Melody. "Sweetheart, are you in on this or just gullible?"

"I'm telling you, guys," yelled Patch, positively panicking now. "this isn't me! You know I suck at imitating voices! Starlight- you saw me unpacking my stuff! I didn't have anything that could record sound!"

"She does have a good point...." mumbled Starlight.

"THIS IS YOUR LAST WARNING: PLEASE EXIT THE BUILDING WITH YOUR HOOVES UP OR WE WILL BE FORCED TO MAKE USE OF OUR GRENADES. THIS IS NOT A JOKE, REPEAT: THIS IS NOT A JOKE."

Sweetheart stood up. "Look, if it turns out that this is just a joke, then you can do what you like. But I'm going out the back door and I really truly believe you should follow me."

She stared at them for a second and trotted off. Bonbon sighed. "I'm going with her. This could be real."

She nervously walked off. Starlight stood up. "I'm going to go and wake up my parents. They'll know what to do."

Sweetheart looked behind her as she walked out and forced herself not to say anything to Bonbon. She felt a twinge of guilt for keeping it this long- it looked like she wouldn't get a good chance tonight, and any longer and they would start noticing....

She backed away, staring at the house and wondering if Patch was about to come out laughing her head off. She swore she could see strange-looking beige horses standing on their hind legs with no tails. She backed away a little to get a better look.

In approximately half a second, she would be oh, so glad she did.

Before she knew it, she heard the loudest noise she's ever heard and saw what looked like a massive ball of fire was erupting from the middle of the house. Parts of the wall flew at her. She saw Bonbon galloping inside, and felt a twinge of guilt for not having done the same already. Her friends......but the smoke, she could get herself killed......but her friends.....

She bit her lip, sighed, and galloped in.

Smoke. Fire. Half-destroyed table. She noticed Bonbon pathetically trying to lift a massive wooden beam off of Bright Eyes. She galloped forward and helped her lift it, throwing it across to the ground. Bright Eyes jumped to her four hooves, coughing. "Starlight!" she muttered urgently. "Her parents' room- it's at the end of the hallway, if it catches fire she'll-"

"I'm on it!" yelled Patch. Sweetheart stepped forward to follow her, then stopped herself. If she died, Teddy would kill her, she thought in an attempt to justify it as Patch galloped past her.

The peach mare galloped past them and through to the hallway, staring in front of her. A section of the carpet was completely engulfed in flames. She bit her lip. Would Starlight have the wits and courage to jump out the window? Probably, but it wasn't a risk she felt right taking. She took a deep breath and galloped.

For a second she felt the heat of the fire. But before she knew it she was pushing the door open to see Starlight standing over her parents, who were scrambling out of bed.

"Starlight!" yelled Patch. "We have to get out!"

She turned around as she heard hoofsteps. It sounded like whoever was coming was on their hind legs. She prayed it was the others.

If only.

She gasped aloud as a beige......thing walked in. It was wearing strange clothes in all shades of green, standing on its hind legs. Its front legs ended in big flat things, which divided up into five different sausage-things. Its face was so flat it was just crazy, and it was holding what looked like a glorified, black stick. It adjusted its hold with one of the hoof-sausages and there was a resounding bang.

Starlight screamed. Patch stared at the thing, then turned around and kicked out. She felt her back hooves meet the glass, then looked back at her work. "Everypony out!"

At that moment a lot of things happened at once.

The stick-thingy made the bang noise again. Starlight swore she saw blood splattering onto the floor. Before she could do anything to see if her parents were okay, though, she felt Patch's hoof pulling her backwards. The broken glass scratched her skin, and then she was falling.

She groaned slightly as she hit the ground hard and stumbled to her hooves. "My parents-" she stammered.

"There's no time!" snapped Bonbon, galloping. That was when Starlight noticed the others- Sweetheart, Melody, Bright Eyes and Clover galloped past her, and she and Patch followed. By the time they caught up, there were more of the things, all holding the sticks. The air was filled with their bangs.

It was about half a minute before they heard Clover screaming.

Everypony galloped over to her. Blood was spewing out of her right flank, her Cutie Mark completely obscured by the red liquid. Patch lifted her up onto her back and kept going, and they galloped.