"To the citizens of Ponyville,
"For some time now, you've been reading this column to get the latest dirt and the hottest buzz, but this will be my final piece. We want to apologize for the pain and embarrassment we've caused. You see, I'm actually three little fillies:
"Sweetie Belle, Apple Bloom, and Scootaloo.
"As the popularity of our column grew, we got swept up in the hype. We knew that what we were doing didn't feel quite right, but we ignored the guilt because everypony seemed to want to read what we were writing. From now on, we promise to respect everypony else's privacy, and we won't engage in hurtful gossip anymore. "All we can do is ask for your forgiveness, Ponyville. Although, by the time you read this, we'll probably be long gone, seeing as how we've hurt so many of you. Once again, we're sorry.
"Signing off for the very last time,
"Gabby Gums"
As she set down the morning edition of the Foal Free Press, Cheerilee's hooves seemed to be going numb from shock.
"Th-they couldn't have...!"
Slipping easily from her chair behind her desk where she'd sat down, Cheerilee picked up the paper in her mouth and ran out the schoolhouse front door, heading straight for the first place she could think to go, to be sure if she was right or not. Those little fillies couldn't have actually left... could they?
It wouldn't be the first time those three have done something like this, she thought. But they can't have any idea what they're doing if they actually went through with it! Oh, sweet Celestia, please let it be a joke!
Normally, Cheerilee wouldn't have been caught dead running so recklessly as she was, her head bowed low as she sidestepped past other ponies trotting along their way. Thus, she wasn't surprised at how many were turning their heads to watch her in shock, although she didn't dare stop. This was far too important.
Sliding to a stop at the door to the Carousel Boutique, Cheerilee immediately brought her right hoof to the door, dropping the paper into her left so she could freely call out, "Miss Rarity? Are you at home?"
"One second, please," was the reply, accompanied by the whirring of a sewing machine. "I'm just a tad busy at the moment!"
"Rarity," Cheerilee called, "please, this is important! It's about Sweetie Belle!"
There was a loud huff from inside, followed by the sewing machine winding down, before the door slowly opened to reveal the as usual very proper yet at the moment slightly annoyed face of the Element of Generosity and owner of Carousel Boutique, Rarity.
"Miss Cheerilee?" Rarity blinked, startled, as she looked the teacher over for a moment. "What on earth are you doing here, darling? You look rather a bit winded, too, and–is that dust all over your coat? Goodness, you didn't run here, did you?"
Sparing her coat a passing glance, Cheerilee rolled her eyes–another thing she wouldn't normally do–and sighed. "Now is not the time, Rarity. Please, you must tell me: is Sweetie Belle at home?"
Now Rarity's eyebrows quirked upward as she stared at the teacher's face. "What do you mean? She should be at the school by now; she's been making it a point to get there early as of late, especially since she got involved with that–" The white unicorn mare scoffed and tossed her mane, right fore hoof resting against her chest. "–despicable example of a newspaper column! I mean, really, that she would print so many horrible things about myself and my friends is simply–"
"Rarity, I don't have time for this!" The cerise teacher's eyes were wide now, though they still didn't compare to the saucers Rarity's had become. "Do you mean you don't know where she is? Or her friends?"
Rarity blinked and stepped back, her expression shifting to one of concern. "Miss Cheerilee, what's wrong? Has something happened?"
Slumping back so her rump landed in the dust before the doorstep of the Boutique, Cheerilee bowed her head and felt a shudder roll through her body. "No, please... Celestia, please don't let it be true..." Swallowing, she tapped the paper she'd dropped with her hoof and said simply, "This will explain, Rarity..."
Confused, Rarity lit her horn and the paper rose up in her bright blue magical aura, only for her face to grow progressively more overcome with a look of mixed horror and despair. "N-no," she finally stuttered out, "this h-has to be a trick Or something of the sort! Sweetie Belle would never do this to me! We're sisters!"
Cheerilee looked up with a sigh. "And I don't doubt that. But that's this morning's edition, Rarity. There's no way around it; if they're not at home, those three fillies have truly run away." She looked away, hoping to find something she could look at besides the fashionista seamstress... and blinked.
There, walking on the path through town, was Diamond Tiara, accompanied by her friend Silver Spoon. And Diamond looked rather smug.
"Oh my gosh," the teacher gasped.
"Girls, are you sure about this?"
Apple Bloom and Scootaloo both glanced at Sweetie Belle as they stood before Cheerilee, Diamond Tiara and Truffle. Sweetie's ears were drooping, her expression full of nervousness as she met her friends' eyes.
Apple Bloom sighed as the three grouped together in a huddle, unaware that, as Diamond Tiara snickered slightly beside Truffle and the printing press, Cheerilee was watching with concern, barely catching small bits of their conversation.
"If'n we don't," Apple Bloom was saying, "then Diamond prints..."
"...on't care what she...us anymore," Sweetie replied, head bowed. "It's what we're... Do we really have too?"
Scootaloo's head lowered as well, her already shaggy mane seeming a bit more unruly and dimmer in color than usual. "What else can we...? No one...talk to them."
Sighing, all three fillies nodded and turned to Diamond Tiara as Apple Bloom marched forward, handing over the papers that she'd been keeping held against her barrel with one foreleg to the tiara-wearing filly.
"Here ya are, Diamond. Another Gabby Gums article, an' prob'ly gonna be the best one yet."
Diamond grinned snidely as she took the papers in her hooves and passed them to Truffle without even looking at the contents. "Pleasure doing business with you, girls."
Cheerilee blinked as she watched Diamond Tiara, sparing a quick glance towards the three fillies as they moved back into their huddle. None of them–not Diamond as she returned to the Foal Free Press editor's desk, Truffle as he got to work running the press to print the latest edition, or even Cheerilee herself as she stood waiting with a slowly growing smile for the next issue–noticed as the Crusaders left the room.
"She was blackmailing them," Cheerilee gasped, staring after Diamond Tiara as the filly and her friend paused in their walk, laughed, then parted as the pink pony began heading back towards the schoolhouse.
Rarity stared at her with a raised brow, confused, as she stepped slowly forward. "What? Miss Cheerilee, darling, whatever are you talking about?"
Cheerilee stood up and shook her head, scooping up the paper with one hoof as she said, "Sorry, Rarity, but I have something I simply have to do, and quickly. I need to go to Mayor Mare at once. Maybe she's already seen by now–Truffle does print quickly with how familiar he's gotten with the press, all complaints aside."
As the fashion-mare blinked, the cerise mare shook her head again. "Never mind. Listen to me, Rarity–you need to go to Sweet Apple Acres. See if Apple Bloom is home and, if she's not, see if Applejack can help you find her, Sweetie and Scootaloo. We have to find those little fillies before they get themselves into trouble!"
Rarity blinked and leaned forward, slowly getting caught up in the schoolteacher's urgency. "But do you really think they ran away?"
"Considering the antics I've seen and heard them getting into to earn their Cutie Marks, I wouldn't put it past them." Cheerilee sighed as she turned and set off, going at a more reasonable pace–but still galloping–towards Town Hall. "I just hope we find them in time."
Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo all three looked back with sad eyes as they stood at the edge of the woods. Each one carried a set of saddlebags on their backs, stuffed with things they assumed might be of use in the midst of the trees. Once, such an expedition might have made them grin in spite of shivers of fear. But now, not even fear stirred them into any emotion beyond sorrow.
"Ya'll ready t'go?"
Sweetie Belle sighed and sniffed, wiping away a tear with her foreleg. "Y-yeah, I'm ready."
Scootaloo gazed at the distant shape of Rainbow Dash's cloud house, blinking back the dewy drops in her own eyes. "As I'll ever be."
Silently, somberly, the three turned as one and fell into line together, marching slowly but steadily into the Everfree Forest.
The trio traveled in silence. It wasn't that they didn't want to talk, more that none of them had anything to say which hadn't already been said. Thus, the silence remained, and grew steadily more tense for each of the three fillies as they marched in single file.
Apple Bloom led the way, but she would never presume to know where she was going. The only thing she knew about their road–if blindly picking a direction and trying to stick to it could be called having a "road"–was that she was set against going back, in a circle, or towards Zecora's house. She wasn't sure if the zebra shaman even read the newspapers, but she didn't want to take the chance. After how Applejack, her own sister, had acted, she wasn't eager to learn how bad her reception would be with her "mentor". That was the truth, as sure as her sister bore the Element of Honesty.
Behind her trotted Sweetie Belle, her head bowed so she could only see her friend's tail and hooves. She sighed softly, and pictured in her head the scene of Rarity as she'd discovered her little sister's betrayal of trust. She had known what she was doing, she had known it was wrong, and yet she had ignored everything her heart had tried to tell her in favor of listening to her head and the fear of being humiliated by Diamond Tiara. It was selfish, completely unbefitting of both a lady and the little sister of the Element of Generosity, and, more to the point, it was no one's fault but her own. She could have refused, taken her lumps from being ridiculed by her friends and neighbors in Rarity's stead, but she had made her choice. As wise ponies would say it, she had "made her bed".
Scootaloo, however, was perhaps the most despondant, trailing behind her friends so slowly that she had to jog every other minute to keep them in sight, and spent every minute between with her head and wings nearly dragging the ground. While usually the second-toughest, least dramatic of the group, she was struggling the hardest to hold back tears. Rainbow Dash, her idol, her mentor and–most painful of all–her surrogate sister in all but official papers–had frowned upon her, cast her aside and even drenched her with rain. While the latter, any other time and with a chuckle or a grin, would have been an easily accepted prank, the sheer disgust in Rainbow's eyes had broken the filly's heart.
She wanted to blame Diamond Tiara. She wanted to claim loyalty to her friends. She wanted to admit and confess over and over that she had simply been too scared of humiliation to go against a bully. They all did, really, and Scootaloo knew her friends well enough to know it. But she, just like them, knew that it was their fault. Real Loyalty would have been to stand up to Diamond. True Honesty would have been to state that they didn't want to accept her deal. Genuine Generosity would have been to endure the humiliation instead of humiliating others, and doing so in silence with dignity.
But now they walked, each knowing it was far too late. They had messed up, and the only way to fix it was to leave. After all, if they weren't there to make things worse, it'd be easy to clean things up, right? And none of them wanted to stay and endure the pain anymore than they had.
Finally, Scootaloo fell behind and simply stopped walking, planting her plot in the dirt and sighing heavily, a hoof reaching up to wipe the petulant salty water from her eyes. "This stinks," she said. "Why'd we do it? Why?"
Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle both stopped and turned to their friend, but it was the latter who asked, "'Why'd we play Diamond's game,' or 'Why did we leave town?'"
Sniffing, Scootaloo shrugged. "Either, or both. I don't really care anymore."
"Ya know the answers already, Scoots," Apple Bloom said, and for the first time her voice was lacking of its usual energy as she sat in front of her friend. "We all did it 'cause we didn't have no nerve to stand up fer ourselves or our friends. We left 'cause ya'll know same as ah do we don't wanna deal with Diamond or face the town no more. It's-" She swallowed hard as tears began to bead her own eyes, refusing to let them fall. "It's better this way. Ya'll know that. An' so do ah."
Sweetie Belle hiccuped a little as she joined them, forming a triangle between them, and whimpered, "Doesn't make it hurt less..."
"Nah, ah... Ah guess not."
Once again silence fell over the trio, and was disturbed only by the occasional sniff or sigh as they simply stared at the ground, lost in thought. Birds chirped overhead and squirrels chattered back and forth, but nothing was able to lift their spirits for even a moment. Not even when a rabbit, it's curiosity outweighing the usual fearful nature, walked up to and almost brushed itself against Sweetie's leg did they move, only turning their heads or eyes enough to watch as it, in turn, watched them. For a moment, they imagined it replaced by a butter-yellow Pegasus, and all three choked back heavy sobs, the noise startling and sending the rabbit running.
"Sh-she was so upset," Sweetie said, and neither of the other two fillies needed her to clarify who she meant.
"An' Twilight... A-ah ain't ever seen her p-put up a shield on the library a'fore..." A long sniff, and Apple Bloom swiped angrily at her eyes. "Spike looked ready to spit fire if'n we'd managed to get through the shield..."
"He's a dragon," Sweetie murmured, trying to smile but failing miserably. "He's always ready to s-spit fire..."
Understandably, no one laughed. If anything, it made them all feel worse.
"I-I'll bet P-Pinkie was g-going gray," Scootaloo said. "L-like when she had th-that p-party craze g-going on, rememb-ber? She was s-so upset when she th-thought everyone was t-trying to avoid her..."
Each paused a moment, glancing from the filly to the left to the one at the right. Then all three threw themselves forward and wrapped forelegs around one another as they burst into tears, each one finally succumbing to the pain and sorrow and regret. They stayed that way, even after their throats started to hurt from the vocal part of crying, and simply let the tears fall until they were all but blinded.
Finally, Apple Bloom sniffed and broke the hug, and all three sat back again as they struggled to wipe away and contain their anguish. "W-well, n-nothin' else we can do but c-carry on, ah guess... One way or another..."
She didn't finish her sentence, but they all three knew what was left unsaid. Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo nodded to their club's unofficial leader and stood with her as she took one final swipe at her tears. Then, once more falling into line, they set off, keeping closer together but with no less of an ache in their hearts, each one weighed down by what had been left unspoken, whether it meant the road ahead or the cause of their hurt.
We can never go back.
Author's Note
Well... That was... something else... eh?
Yeah, as you can tell, this was bit of an emotion dump. It won't be the last. This is, ultimately, intended to be a story focused on what would have been different per Waspinator331's suggested plot. Thus, it's going to focus heavily on how the different events would have weighed down on the characters. They will, in the end, make this story.
I hope I portrayed the CMC in a manner that satisfies, and I apologize for the chapter being so short. This needed an update, and this builds up more I can work with. Think of it as a "Development" chapter.
There will be one more before the nitty-gritty is more than emotional.
Until that chapter is released, however, please make sure to tap the Upvote/Like button if you enjoyed the story so far, leave a comment if you feel like it (no flames, please) and make sure to drop the story into a "Tracking" Bookshelf so you don't miss the next update. If you'd like to see more of my work, it's all on my User Page for your enjoyment and you can slap a Follow on me to be alerted whenever I post something new, update or drop a Blog. Until next time, folks, this is Flutter-Spark sayin' thanks for droppin' by, and see ya next time.
