Screams rang through the halls of the castle, and a pair of frantic ponies came galloping out. A lean pegasus, as pale as a ghost, flew around, she screamed out for help; following shortly after her was the ever-steady Applejack, she too was a ghostly pale and her breaths came in labored pants. It wasn’t very long ago that they had discovered the unmoving Princess Twilight in her room.

The pair managed to find help in the form of medic ponies; moments later and the castle was flooded with paramedics. Without much effort they were able to hoist the body onto a stretcher before carrying her off; the two mares followed after without a word, they were in shock and disbelief. As the medics arrived at the hospital a groggy group of friends followed after silently.

Pinkie was the first to speak up, “There just isn’t anything to say at times like these…” she wore a smile, but it was easy to see the sadness in her eyes. “Last night she was… she was…” and with that the pink pony broke down crying a stream (or maybe it was a mini-river?) of tears.

“How did this happen?” Fluttershy asked, her voice barely above a whisper.

“Pinkie and I were with her yesterday,” Rarity offered with a small wave of her hoof. “It is ghastly to think about… I mean, what could have happened? We were with her and now this!” she started to break out into a maniacal laugh that sounded devoid of emotion. Seeing two of her friends break down like that caused Fluttershy to become nauseous.

Rainbow and Applejack just continued to trot forward, brim lowered along with their heads. For them, it was best to not say anything, because like Pinkie had said ‘There just isn’t anything to say at times like these.’ and the pair knew it. They all knew it.

After several hours a doctor came out, she strode up to Twilight’s anxious friends. The doctor held a straight face as she addressed them, “You must be Princess Twilight Sparkle’s friends, am I correct?”

Applejack stepped forward, “We are. How’s she doin’, Doc?”

Doctor Lun clicked her tongue and said, "I'm sorry, but your friend didn't make it. She had far too many burns across her throat, but she died as a result of blood loss. Upon further study, we found that there was a substance in her blood close to the throat, and that substance chewed away and burned at her flesh.”

Applejack looked down and held her hat to her head holding the tears inside. The others, however, broke down and it took them awhile to process this; and when they eventually processed that their friend was truly gone, they all slowly left the hospital with looks of concern and worry.

While the others went home to deal with what had happened, Applejack and Rainbow Dash, however, went to Twilight's castle to study what Rarity and Pinkie had said about the strange mirror. It took some time before they found it inside Twilight's room above her bed.

They exchanged confused glances as it was strange, since this wasn't where Pinkie said it was at. The two trotted up to it and began studying it for any clues, as well as checking around the mirror to see if there was anything out of place. Not that they didn't believe the staff of the hospital, but something was out of place from what their friends had stated about it.

Something moved from the corner of the reflection in the mirror; Rainbow saw it while Applejack remained aloof, Rainbow went to investigate while her friend stayed behind. Soon Applejack felt sleepy from her hard day of work and wait to hear the news about her friend. She blinked and there was this pain of something striking her, the sounds of bones cracking rang out, she hacked, beginning to cough as blood flowed from her mouth. She looked up to see Twilight ramming a hoof into her ribs, a few were cracked, and there was a hole.

She grunted before quickly kicking her away, but before she could formulate any questions it seemed that Twilight hit her head against a desk and her neck broke almost instantly. Applejack began panting, yet the pangs continued to rush through her chest. She blinked the tears away as she saw Rainbow Dash's lifeless body spread on the floor, she wished and hoped to scream, but nothing came out; until the soft clopping of hooves came into focus, it was Dash. Applejack looked to where the body should be at but there was nothing there. She got up and found no pain in her body, she looked scared and creeped out. Stepping away from Dash before she fell over the desk and saw the mirror looming above. Rainbow flew over the desk while grabbing a heavy object and began to bash Aj’s head in with it, but using all of her strength Applejack focused on pushing the other mare away, in the lapse of time Applejack tried, yet failed to grab something to defend herself with.

Rainbow Dash continued to strike at her friend, but to her, all she saw was the decaying corpse of Twilight and she wanted to stomp it dead. Rainbow knocked the thing from her hooves and began stomping down on her with all four hooves. Gurgling sounds could be heard, or more whispered begging for Dash to stop, but she continued hoping the creature would die; she began screaming, yelling, and swearing. "Die! You fucking monster! What are you?! Is this some sick joke?!" Rainbow had seemed to snap because the skull of the creature was destroyed.

Dash stopped and looked down before falling to her rump, finding herself to be out of breath. She looked down again to see the bloody remains of what was once a close friend. Her heart sank when she blinked to find that it was Applejack lying there, the body twitched and bucked a little, and Dash turned pale, vomiting onto the floor "A-Applejack, how could I...?" Rainbow closed her eyes sobbing and shaking; she just committed murder ‘What will my friends think?’ she thought, she looked at her hooves which were covered in blood.

Rainbow shuttered and looked around before trying to leave the castle. However, a few guards bumped into her and noticed that she was blood soaked, they hastily grabbed her and put her into a skycart. Others went in to find the remains of yet another of the Elements of Harmony.

Author's Note

Sorry, this took so much time, my editor and myself were very busy but here you all chapter 2! There's one more chapter after this and that will be it :)