Screwy Chaos

"Listen to me! It's really serious!" Diamond Tiara shouted straight into the mic and created an unpleasant high pitch. "I was there and barely the only one, who escaped alive!"

At least she was trying to shout, but still panted of exhaustment and shock. A few ponies stared at her with utter lack of understanding.

Twilight Sparkle and her friends have never looked that confused. Even Discord has never seen such a thing. He just stood there, staring at Diamond Tiara with oversized binoculars, and said nothing.

"What happened?" Twilight asked quietly, after she found her voice again. "Tell us everything you saw."

"I...I was in the train with my friend S...Silver Spoon and everything as n...normal, but suddenly...suddenly..." Diamond Tiara didn't continue.

She trembled incredibly with widened eyes and pale skin.

"To be honest, I have never seen her that anxious in my life," Applejack whispered to Rarity and Rainbow Dash.

Both ponies nodded.

"What happened then?" Fluttershy whispered, trying to sound collected.

"Something...someone attacked the whole train and drained magic out of all the passengers!" Diamond Tiara screamed, almost hyperventilating.

"WHAT?"

Everyone was in deep shock.

"Cozy Glow?" Silverstream whispered anxiously.

"Cozy Glow?" Discord drawled loudly in unbelief and snapped his fingers to make a huge hearing horn appear.

"Cozy Glow?" Twilight gasped.

"We thought Cozy Glow won't return in any time soon," Ocellus whispered horrified.

The ponies in the crowd soon got nervous and hastily looked around for any danger. Some even tried to hold their breath or hide behind their taller classmates.

In the meanwhile, Discord snapped again and relaxed on a red and white striped lounger, wearing cinema glasses and with popcorn and cola in his claws/paws. "This is so exciting!"

"Not Cozy!" Diamond Tiara interrupted the nervous pack of ponies. "I'm not sure it's magic, I...I just..., Silver Spoon was so mean to me and...and it also attacked two Griffons...I don't know!" Diamond Tiara continued with written terror in her eyes.

Gallus did a mute gasp and folded his claws together as unobstrusive as possible, trying to pray, but he definitely was worried.

Applejack and Rarity glanced at each other.

"So who was it?" Rainbow Dash eventually asked.

Diamond Tiara didn't answer. She only shrugged shortly.

"Was there a kirin among the passengers?" Twilight asked.

"Y...yes," Diamond Tiara answered and slightly nodded. "The pony who drained the something out of t...them looked like a kirin. She was very...very evil."

"Do you remember the colors of the pony?" Applejack asked.

Diamond Tiara shook her head. "She is definitely evil."

"Wait a minute," Twilight interrupted the filly.

She quickly gathered her friends around her and bowed down to make sure, nobody else is listening to her.

"Autumn Blaze and Diamond Tiara might have been in the same train. What if Autumn Blaze was the pony, Diamond Tiara was talking about?" Twilight whispered in fear.

"But you know, that's ridiculous," Spike disagreed.

"Autumn Blaze will never do such an awful thing, that little filly described," Fluttershy exclaimed slightly angry. "You can't expect her to do something awful like that!"

"Fluttershy, don't be ridiculous," Rainbow Dash hissed. "In danger, everyone could be our enemy!"

"What does that mean?"

Fluttershy was confused.

"It means, that everyone could do certain things, you don't expect them to do," Rainbow Dash explained. "I think, we learned enough from Cozy Glow."

"By the way, Autumn Blaze has a Nirik form," Applejack added. "She might be able to control her anger most of the time, but there's still a probability, that she can't and we both know, what Niriks are able to do."

"No way! I still don't believe it!"

Fluttershy crossed her forehooves and arrogantly raised her head.

In this moment, the Mane 6 saw two ponies hastily arriving. They were as confused as the pony crowd and looked around several times. Twilight noticed, that it was Precious-la having fetched Autumn Blaze from the train station.

"We saw that pony running in such a high panick..." Autumn Blaze began to explain.

But she was rudely interrupted by Rainbow Dash.

"Did you drain magic out of some passengers like Diamond Tiara told us?" Rainbow Dash asked severely.

She stared deeply at Autumn Blaze with her magenta eyes. Autumn Blaze looked confused and scared at the same time.

She shook her head and gasped nervously, "What? No of course not! I don't even know, how to do such a thing!"

"Well," Rarity said and shrugged, "Diamond Tiara said it was a kirin."

"So, did you see that situation in your train?" Applejack asked.

"What situation are you talking about? Everything in my train was peaceful," Autumn Blaze responded, still very nervous.

Now, Smolder instantly flew to Autumn Blaze, joined by Gallus. She built herself up in front of the kirin and put her claws on her hips.

"You say everything was peaceful," Smolder hissed and stared at Autumn Blaze. "So are you sure?"

Autumn Blaze nodded frantically and whispered, "Could you please leave me alone?"

"Not before we analysed this situation!" Gallus said.

He stood next to Smolder and was doing the same pose. "Where are my sisters?"

"Teachers and students, you can't expect her draining magic out of strangers. After all, she is not Cozy Glow and if she said, she didn't do anything, so she didn't!

"Besides, she was in another train than Diamond Tiara, so no wonder that everything was peaceful!" Precious-la suddenly interfered into this discussion.

Autumn Blaze shortly looked at her and felt delighted. She smiled.

"We're really sorry," Twilight explained. "We don't want anything like Cozy Glow happen again, so we have to regard every creature equally."

"Well, I like the word equally," a completely new voice said.

The Mane 6 was confused and turned their heads. They noticed Starlight Glimmer standing on the speech spot, but there was something clearly different about her: She changed her manestyle and carried a huge stick with her.

"I know everything you're talking about and I know, it's not equal of that monster absorbing the magic from every other creature they meet, so it can negatively affect your behavior. Ponyville is not an equal town, especially this school and it's about all your cutie marks. It's not only the problem, that they're different, some of you don't even have cutie marks!"

Starlight Glimmer simulated an exaggerated horrified facial expression.

The Mane 6 didn't say anything. They were too shocked to say anything, so they only stared at Starlight all the time as Celestia's mother just came to Ponyville to buy some toilet paper.

The Young Six remained quiet, as well the crowd. Discord didn't say anything either, but went on snapping his popcorn into his mouth.

"I agree that equality is good," Precious-la said, as she found her voice again.

She teleported next to Starlight, flipping with her notebook.

"But I'm not sure, whether it has anything to do with cutie marks!" she went on.

Gallus tried to wave Precious-la back, as he didn't want her to be involved into all that trouble, but Starlight ignored her anyways and just rudely pushed her away.

She took the mic and shouted loudly, so that everyone could hear her.

"You know? Ponyville is not equal and it's all about your cutie marks! Ponyville isn't harmony, friendship or fun all the time, Equestria isn't either. There's deceit, betrayal, greed, envy, theft, there's so much more in this world and it's all about we want to be better than others, but we're no bit better. The cutie marks are the main problem, they define you and make you better than other ponies and that's the problem!"

"That's not true!" Precious-la shouted as well, being upset.

Starlight didn't notice her this time either.

"Starlight, what happened to you?" Twilight exclaimed.

Now, she can see, that Starlight didn't only change her hairstyle, but also her cutie mark. Instead of her spark shaped cutie mark, there was a boring, grey equal sign on her flanks.

"I came to sanity," Starlight replied proudly and shook her mane.

"Which sanity to be honest?" Sandbar asked.

"You're excactly saying it!" Starlight shouted angrily, pointing accusingly at Sandbar. "You make yourself better than your own friends, because you've got a damn cutie mark, they don't have!"

"That's not true!" Precious-la yelled.

"That's not true!" Sandbar yelled and his friends agreed by frantically nodding.

Starlight ignored them as well as she ignored Precious-la and stepped to Autumn Blaze. She stopped and for a second, everyone holded his breath and no one said anything.

Even Precious-la didn't comment on Starlight's antics and Discord stopped eating his popcorn and only stared at the pink unicorn.

Suddenly, she swiftly flipped her stick and tatooed an equal mark on Autumn Blaze's flank. Everyone gasped in shock.

"Look, a little demonstration," Starlight said in a sugar sweet voice and pointed on Autumn Blaze's flank.

"What...what happened to it?" Autumn Blaze said, pale in her face.

Starlight said nothing but only gave her a little sweet smile, which however made her face turn even paler. Autumn Blaze kept staring at her flank without knowing, what just happened.

Rainbow Dash pulled Diamond Tiara harshly aside.

"Distract her, before she gets even more ponies equalized," Fluttershy quickly whispered to Sandbar and the rest of the Young Six.

Precious-la instantly caught the information and teleported to Starlight again, followed by a group gasp of the Young Six.

"Diamond Tiara! We have to know every single detail about that pony-kirin, you were speaking of!" Applejack said seriously.

"It could be Starlight, or Autumn Blaze, this situation is really confusing," Spike added.

"I...I really can't remember her," Diamond Tiara trembled, "but I don't think, S...silver Spoon had an equal...equal mark after the attack. She was just...mean."

"Oh you mean the awkward greyish pink pony with purple mane and a beanie?" Pinkie Pie has spoken for the first time.

Since now, the others realized, that she's been missing all the time, they talked about Diamond Tiara's experience and the new Starlight Glimmer.

"Pinkie! Where have you been?" Twilight asked horrified.

"I had to go to toilet, but suddenly, I saw that pony, that was talking about going into Starlight's office!" Pinkie responded cheerfully as she was only talking about Cupcakes.

Right after she has spoken her last words, Discord shot up from his lounger, dropping his popcorn and cola, his glasses falling down from his eyes.

He instantly snapped his fingers and teleported them away from Ponyville into his home.