Timber Spruce yawned, walking to his sister’s office. It was a warm evening and he’d rather spend it at home—his or Twilight’s because she’d just texted him saying that her parents were out of town—but Gloriosa just called him, summoning him to his office as soon as possible. Timber groaned and opened the door to see Gloriosa sitting at her desk in a dimly-lit room, with a briefcase in front of her.
“Hello,” Timber said. “I hope this was important because I had plans, you know.”
“I know your plans,” Gloriosa replied. “I assure you that this is gonna be more interesting.”
“What can be more interesting than–” Timber looked at the briefcase. “What do you have here? Filthy Rich’s soul?”
“Close, but not quite.” Gloriosa smirked and opened the briefcase. Timber looked inside and his eyes widened when he saw its contents – he’d never seen so many former presidents at once.
“It’s beautiful,” he said, his voice trembling. “Where did you get it?”
“Let’s say that’s an investment.” Gloriosa closed the briefcase. “I was thinking of building some new attractions at the camp. What do you think about it?”
Timber nodded. “Well, we could get something new, yeah. Archery sometimes gets too interesting.”
“Indeed,” Gloriosa replied. “Just don’t spend everything on it. I mean, don’t do it totally for cheap, but the more money we have left, the, uhh… less investments I’ll have to make.”
Timber smirked. “Who did you murder?”
“I’ll murder you if you ask too many questions.” Gloriosa rolled her eyes. “Also, come up with some plan before I trust you with money. It can be made of macaroni.”
“The attraction?” Timber asked.
“No, the plan.” Gloriosa sighed. “Hope you come up with something great.”
Timber nodded. “Of course. I’d never disappoint you!”
Apple Bloom hammered the final nail on the top of the wooden tower situated near the peak of the hill. From her position, she had a nice view of a patch of bare land where Sweetie Belle drove a bulldozer, evening out the last bits of a path. At the foothill stood a wooden tower not unlike the one Apple Bloom had just finished building. Scootaloo was there with Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon, attaching the rope to the horizontal beam above the platform on the top of the tower.
Timber panted; he’d just climbed up the hill and rested his hand against one of the beams supporting the tower. Apple Bloom’s cousin, Babs Seed, took a sip of beer and looked at him.
“We’re almost done,” she said. “Did ya bring the guap?”
“The what now?” Timber asked.
Babs rolled her eyes. “Money, na’mean? We just built ya the best zipline on this side of the pond.”
“We?” Apple Bloom asked. “What were y’all doin’ aside from drinkin’ beer, peein’ all over the place, and then drinkin’ more beer?”
“It’s a wicked circle.” Babs chuckled. “I was doing logistics, remember? Dragging the wood all the way up here is quite a schlep. Took me all morning. And then half of the afternoon.”
Apple Bloom groaned. “Yes, because yer mornin’ wood was too wet.”
Babs choked on her beer. After a while of coughing, she spat on the ground and took a deep breath. “Cuz, please, never use the phrase ‘morning wood’ in this context again. Or in any context for that matter.”
“Why?” Apple Bloom asked, causing Timber to facepalm. “Does it mean somethin’ else in New–”
“It means a schl– Oh, fuggedaboutit.” Babs turned to Timber. “We once watched cows fuck and she still ain’t getting it. Anyway, it’s done. Nineteen degrees of incline, a hundred and forty-three feet of vertical drop, total length–”
Timber looked at the receiving tower far away in the distance. He didn’t quite get how long the rope was, but he had a nagging feeling that its exact length was “way too much”.
“So, as the dude whose idea this was, are ya gonna try it first?” Babs asked.
Timber looked at the zipline once again. The ride was definitely way too long and too steep for his taste; he started to mentally calculate the amount of vodka he’d need to actually slide down the rope and realised that alcohol poisoning was way more likely.
“Shouldn’t we test it first?” he asked. “On something that doesn’t die easily, like sandbags or–”
Babs stood up and crushed the beer can in her hand. “Sandbags are for pussies,” she said, grabbing onto the pulley. “Hold my beer dude and watch. Apple Bloom! Witness me!”
"Wait! We don't have a safety harness—" Timber shouted.
She jumped off the tower, yelling “Geronimo!” and soon disappeared in the distance, sliding down the line some forty feet above the ground. Timber soon noticed that she was going quite fast; Babs didn’t seem to mind, holding onto the pulley with one hand and making the horns gesture with the other.
“She’s going a bit fast, eh?” Apple Bloom looked down at the wooden tower at the bottom of the bulldozed valley. “How do you think she’s gonna slow down?”
“I don’t think she planned this far.” Timber shrugged. “What’s down there? Just wooden beams and poles?”
“Well, Scootaloo, Silver, and Diamond are there,” Apple Bloom replied. “They may catch her.”
A few seconds later, Timber noticed that they did try, though without much success; due to the considerable distance, he first saw Babs hitting the platform with her calves and then heard a sickening crunch. He really hoped it was the wooden boards snapping.
Babs immediately lost control of the slide, as she was dragged across the platform, overshot the tower and slammed into the ground behind it with a distinct thud of a sack full of raw chicken marinated in cough syrup.
“Well, she slowed down,” Timber muttered.
Apple Bloom scowled. "I guess that makes her the slowest cousin."
“Well,” Sweetie Belle said. “She really shouldn’t have carried those scissors in her pocket.”
“I don’t think the scissors were what killed her.” Silver Spoon poked Babs, who lay face-down in the dirt, a bent pair of scissors sticking out of her thigh.
“Rarity told me not to run with scissors,” Sweetie Belle said. “If running is so dangerous, what about ziplining at sixty miles per hour?”
As soon as Timber arrived at the scene of Babs’s unfortunate landing, he knew that they had a problem. Babs’s bloodied shoes marked the initial impact with the platform, followed by a trail of blood smeared all over it and still dripping from the other side of the tower. The body was not much better; her calves were a complete mess with bits of bone sticking from them and she was also missing sizeable chunks of skin from her hands and face. Her clothes were torn and although Timber was no expert in medicine, he was pretty sure the spine wasn’t supposed to bend like that.
“Basal skull fracture, spine in at least three pieces, cracked ribs, organs aren’t even good for transplantation, and you’re saying it was the scissors that killed her.” Silver Spoon rolled her eyes. “This is ridiculous.”
“Shouldn’t we call an ambulance?” Diamond Tiara asked.
“More like a coroner,” Timber replied. “Apple Bloom, I’m afraid your cousin arrived at the gates of Valhalla, chrome and shiny.”
Apple Bloom sighed. “This is what she’d want.”
“Why would we bother with the coroner?” Scootaloo asked. “I know a guy who makes dog food.”
“We’re not selling her for dog food,” Apple Bloom said. “She was mah cousin!”
“Well, if the camp gets closed because of her death, Gloriosa will make sure I’m the next person to zipline here.” Timber shuddered. “Upside-down. By the neck.”
“No problem.” Sweetie Belle looked at her bulldozer; Timber wasn’t sure how she got it or was she even legally allowed to drive it, but he decided to ask no questions. “We can just bury her here.”
Apple Bloom frowned. “You ain’t gonna bury my cousin in this unhallowed ground!”
“There you go,” Diamond Tiara said, looking at the freshly-bulldozed patch of land. “Here lies Barbara Eleanor Seed III. She died like she lived.”
“Quickly?” Sweetie asked.
“Violently?” Silver Spoon looked at Scootaloo, who was just scrubbing blood off of the platform. Babs’s shoes, their shoelaces tied together, were hanging from the tower.
“With a whip in one hand and a strap-on in the other?” Scootaloo shrugged. “Best weekend of my life.”
“We really don’t need to know the details,” Diamond Tiara said.
“If you ever change your mind, I have a video.” Scootaloo smirked. “Though now that I think about it, it’s gonna be weird watching it, knowing that she’s dead.”
"How old were you when you made the video?" Silver Spoon asked. "I hope it's not uploaded to your iCloud."
"It's stored under 256-bit encryption," Scootaloo said, "and with Babs gone, only I know the password."
"Is the password 'Rainbow Dash'?" asked Sweetie Belle.
Timber cleared his throat. “Well, now we have to find a way to make this thing stop killing people.” He looked at the zipline. “Any ideas?”
Apple Bloom raised her hand. “Put something soft at the end?”
A sandbag hit a bunch of old mattresses, breaking on impact and sending its contents flying. Timber shook his head and crossed out another thing from the list. Tractor tyres, hay bales, balloons, old fabric – none of these things were soft enough to stop the bags from hitting them at full speed and breaking.
There was, however, one good side – the sand nicely masked the residues of Babs’s blood.
“What about feathers?” Scootaloo asked.
“Maybe tomorrow,” Timber replied. It was getting dark; the zipline, lit by torches, looked kind of eerie – like some ancient torture device in the middle of nowhere. It was a long day of finishing the construction and hiding a body. Timber was most definitely done with it all and would rather join Diamond Tiara, who was punching the remaining sandbags like a very diminutive boxer or, even better, go and visit Twilight.
“This won’t work,” Sweetie Belle said. “I need to come up with some braking system.”
“Well, I’m open to ideas.” Timber shrugged. “Does anyone need a ride home?”
“Nah, I’m staying here,” Diamond Tiara replied, hitting the sandbag with a pretty good right hook.
“Her parents are getting divorced,” Silver Spoon said.
Diamond Tiara frowned and for a moment Timber expected her to punch Silver instead of the sandbag. “Would you kindly not tell that to everyone we meet?”
“I thought you were still gathering evidence,” Silver Spoon replied.
Timber looked at Diamond Tiara. “If this helps, I have some suspicions about your father and my sister.”
“Oh great.” Diamond sighed, lowering her head. “Just what I needed.”
“That’s good, right?” Silver smiled.
“No, it’s not.” Diamond shook her head. “Would you, dunno, go and rearrange your plushies for the tenth time, count how many nails we used to build the child-killing machine, or work on your eye contact?”
“On what now?” Timber asked.
“Nothing.” Diamond Tiara rolled her eyes. “Can you drive Silver home before I punch her? She gets cranky when tired.”
“I’m not tired!” Silver exclaimed.
“Yes, you are.” Diamond Tiara sighed.
Five minutes later, when Timber drove his truck down the forest road with Scootaloo, Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle, and Silver Spoon, Silver decided to speak up.
“By the way, I already counted all the nails,” she said.
Timber groaned, clenching his hands on the steering wheel. The realisation that he and a bunch of girls claiming to be the town’s cheapest construction company just buried a dead body and that if someone found out, everyone would assume it was his fault was just dawning upon him. He felt he really needed a drink or ten. “And how many nails are there?” he asked.
Silver didn’t reply. He turned to her and saw her sleeping with her mouth open, her head resting against the truck’s window. Scootaloo smirked when she saw that. “Hey, do we draw a–”
“No,” Apple Bloom replied.
“You’re no fun,” Scootaloo said.
“Silver Spoon is not for drawing anything on her face,” Sweetie Belle said. “We need to protect her from evil influences.”
“Like Diamond Tiara?” Scootaloo asked.
“Yes.”
Timber sighed. He didn’t speak a word until he drove everyone home. Then, he decided to check out the nearest still-open liquor store and spend the night in his truck, trying to forget about everything that happened while building the zipline.
It took way more whisky than he expected.
“Timber, where have you been?” Gloriosa asked as soon as Timber parked his truck at the camp and rolled out of it. He was mostly sober, or so he hoped; when he woke up, the sun was already high above the horizon, his throat was dry, and an empty bottle was poking his back.
Timber stood straight, trying in vain to look like he didn’t spend the night binge drinking with his reflection in the truck’s mirror. He didn’t remember all the details, but he’d definitely called his ex or two. Or maybe even Twilight. “I had to do some business in town. About the new zipline.”
“I haven’t seen it yet,” Gloriosa replied. “Someone tried to shoot me last night!”
“What? Who?” Timber exclaimed.
Gloriosa pointed at the broken window of her house and a bunch of bullet holes in the walls. “They weren't a very good shot. The only thing they hit was the uncle Larch’s portrait.”
“Wasn’t uncle Larch shot while smuggling moonshine?” Timber asked.
“Yes,” Gloriosa replied. “Anyway, I grabbed grandpa’s rifle and shot back. The police didn’t find the body, so I guess I missed as well.”
“The police?” Timber suddenly felt more sober. It wasn’t a pleasant feeling. “What did they say?”
“Apparently some juvenile delinquent and runaway called, uhh… Barbara Eleanor Seed III was seen somewhere around here.” Gloriosa shrugged. “But I never pissed off any Barbara Eleanor Seed III, not to mention number one and two.”
Rusty gears in Timber’s head started to turn with terrible creaking. He winced, but at the same moment he remembered some torn and ragged bit of a memory from yesterday. “Could it have been a jealous wife?”
Gloriosa raised her eyebrows. “You mean Spo– I mean, don’t be funny, Timber.” She chuckled. “Whose wife? Also, don’t you have something to do at the camp?”
“Yeah, definitely.” Timber turned away. He could’ve taken the truck to the zipline, but he decided to go by foot, if only to sober up and clear his mind in the fresh morning air.
When he reached the receiving tower, he realised that someone had been there before him. One of the wooden beams was broken and there was a new pair of shoes hanging from it – blue-ish Converse sneakers, their laces tied together in a way similar to Babs’s shoes. Timber looked around, searching for a fresh grave, but he found none. However, when he looked at the top of the hill, he spotted a familiar silhouette sitting on the tower.
It took him a while to get there and by the time he did, he almost passed out from dehydration. Diamond Tiara looked at him, awkwardly trying to hide an old M1 Garand behind her back.
“Water?” she asked, producing a bottle from her bag.
“Is it poisoned?” Timber asked.
“Nah, I only have beef with your sister,” Diamond Tiara replied.
Timber rubbed his temples and reached for the bottle. “I’d take it even if it was poisoned. My sister told me you were hunting the most dangerous game, eh?”
“No, I was only trying to scare her.” Diamond Tiara lifted her bag to reveal a bullet hole in its side. “Also, I didn’t know Gloriosa could shoot. A few inches to the left and she’d give me a new anus.”
“You’d better stop this Gunfight at the O.K. Corral reenactment.” Timber took a sip of his water. “It’s bad for business.”
“Okay.” Diamond Tiara rolled her eyes. “This is why I came here. I’m thinking about trying out the zipline.”
“The zipline will break every bone in your body,” Timber replied.
“That's why I wonder if I should do my Call of Duty LARPing on my mother first.” Diamond Tiara looked at her M1 Garand. “Also, I met that cross-eyed girl from school here. We talked about cycling, poetry, and Mongolian throat singing and then she took the zipline. She broke the beam with her ass, left her shoes there, and walked away.”
Timber furrowed his eyebrows. “Did you eat the mushrooms that grow here?”
“Hey, you’ve seen the damage she’d done,” Diamond said. “Either we’re both on shrooms or she really was there.”
“I’m really not in the mood for philosophy,” Timber replied. “Give me the rifle before someone gets hurt.”
“Too late.” Diamond Tiara pointed at the bottom of the hill. “Sweetie Belle and Silver Spoon just arrived and each of them is a walking disaster area. Can I take the zipline before Scootaloo and Apple Bloom arrive?”
Timber rolled his eyes and yanked the rifle out of Diamond Tiara’s hands. “You’re not taking the zipline today.”
“Right.” Diamond Tiara got up. “Knowing Silver, she came up with some ridiculous contraption to fix the zipline. Let’s make her try it.”
Timber couldn’t help but notice that, unlike Scootaloo and Apple Bloom, Silver Spoon and Sweetie Belle took the whole ‘come up with ways of fixing the zipline’ seriously. Sweetie put on a pair of thick-rimmed glasses—Silver was quick to point out they didn't even have lenses—while Silver Spoon herself put on a neat white shirt, a navy blue skirt, and a pair of thigh-high socks she called her "thinking socks". Scootaloo, looked at them and smirked.
"Button asked me to buy him a few pairs of those," she said as she pulled on the socks. "He needed them to focus on his Python or something."
"Why would he put socks on his python?" Apple Bloom asked. "Besides, it's not that big."
“I’ll tell you later.” Scootaloo sighed. “I thought we were gonna play video games, but then he started to explain the code he was writing to a–”
“Rubber duck?” Silver Spoon asked.
“Worse,” Scootaloo replied. “A plush shark.”
Silver Spoon nodded. “Ah, so he’s that kind of a programmer.”
“But his socks are so stylish,” Sweetie Belle said.
“Those are literally the same kind of socks that I’m wearing.” Silver Spoon looked at Sweetie and winced. “Also, you wear fake glasses to appear intelligent, your opinions don’t count.”
Timber cleared his throat. “Can we go back to fixing the zipline? I’m listening to your ideas. Scootaloo?”
“Survival of the fittest.” Scootaloo grinned. “Those who survive the zipline are worthy of living.”
Diamond Tiara shot Scootaloo a mean look. “Start with yourself.”
“Remember that this is gonna be used by kids from the camp,” Timber said. “Killing your customers is a bad business model or some other shit my sister says.”
“As we all know, your sister is a shining example of a successful businesswoman,” Diamond Tiara muttered. “She totally doesn’t have to fu–”
“That’s not related to the zipline,” Timber said. “Apple Bloom?”
“Why are you asking Scootaloo and Apple Bloom first?” Silver Spoon asked.
“It’s simple,” Sweetie Belle said. “He wants to be done with the hopeless ideas as quickly as possible.”
“Hey!” Scootaloo exclaimed. “My idea is great.”
“Let’s listen to Apple Bloom, though.” Timber looked at Apple Bloom, who chuckled nervously.
“What about a counterweight?” Apple Bloom asked. “We may hang somethin’ from the rope and attach it to a pulley to slow ‘em down.”
“You’d need a lot of rope,” Sweetie Belle said. “Also, what if it breaks? Then you’ll have another kid going splat and a falling counterweight on the other side.”
“May I get eight feet and six inches of rope?” Diamond Tiara asked.
Silver Spoon looked at her. “If you want it for what I think you want it, then seven feet and eleven inches will be enough.”
Diamond Tiara groaned. “Get fucked, Silver.”
“You know what would take even less rope?” Silver asked. “Using it on your mother.”
Diamond looked thoughtful, then happy.
“You two aren’t getting any rope,” Timber said.
“If we can’t get any rope, can you seduce my mother and take photos?” Diamond Tiara asked, bouncing on the balls of her feet and clapping her hands. “Or a video. It’d look better in court.”
“Later,” Timber muttered. “Apple Bloom, this idea needs work. What about you, Sweetie?”
Sweetie smirked in a way that somehow made her look even more unhinged than Diamond Tiara. “What about a huge fan?”
“I don’t have any fans,” TImber replied.
“I know a guy who could get us a huge fan he used for cooling his GPUs,” Sweetie Belle said with a smile. “We can put it at the end of the line and turn it on so the air would slow people down.”
Timber nodded. “This… has some merit. But we should try it with sandbags first.”
The sandbag, rushing down at a speed no sandbag should ever achieve, hit the platform, getting dragged along the planks. Then it collided with the spinning blades of the fan which ripped it to shreds, sending sand all over the place.
Scootaloo put on a pair of sunglasses. “Looks like shit hit the fan.”
“If anything, this is gonna make it harder to hide the bodies,” Silver Spoon said. “It’s way easier when they’re in one piece.”
Sweetie furrowed her eyebrows. “Well, I’m listening for better ideas, then.”
“Put somethin’ soft at the end?” Apple Bloom asked.
“We tried that yesterday, moron,” Silver Spoon muttered. “But I was thinking of something like on an aircraft carrier. Bungee cords at the end of the course, intended to gently slow down the passenger before they are caught into a net in the end. What do you think?”
“If this works without cutting anyone in half, I’m in,” Timber said. “But I’m afraid the innocent sandbags are gonna suffer.”
“Why would they suffer?” Silver Spoon tilted her head. “They’re not alive.”
Timber sighed.
Contrary to Timber’s fears, the first sandbags made it to the receiving tower unharmed. No matter what their weight was, they did slow down on the bungee cords and hit the net at the speed Silver Spoon claimed to be manageable. Finally, there was a time for a brave volunteer to test the zipline.
“Well,” Timber said. “Since it was my idea, I guess I will have to–”
“I volunteer,” Diamond Tiara said.
“No,” Timber replied.
“My father paid for this zipline.” Diamond Tiara glared at Timber, her fists clenched. “Also, you have a sister who maybe loves you more than she loves my father.”
“I doubt it,” Silver Spoon said.
“Shut up,” Diamond Tiara muttered. “I really need that adrenaline kick. Besides, it’s safe.”
“Sandbags are different,” Timber said. “You can go after me and– Aaargh!” He screamed, dropping to his knees when, without a warning, Diamond Tiara’s boot collided violently with his family jewels. “That was low,” he gasped.
“I’m afraid you’re unable to go up this hill,” Diamond Tiara said. “Or stop me from doing so.”
“What’s wrong with y’all?” Apple Bloom asked.
“PMS, I’m sure,” Silver Spoon said. “We’re synchronised in this matter.”
Diamond Tiara rolled her eyes. “Silver Spoon, for once–”
“Hey, that’s like me and Sweetie!” Apple Bloom chuckled. “I keep forgetting tampons, so I borrow hers.”
“Rarity keeps wondering why I use so many of them,” Sweetie Belle said. “She thinks I set them on fire.” She smiled, her eyelid twitching. “I need to do that sometime.”
“What about Scootaloo?” Silver Spoon asked.
“I had a pituitary adenoma removed when I was twelve,” Scootaloo replied. “My hormones are a bit fucky-wucky.”
“This explains many things,” Silver Spoon deadpanned. “Also, Diamond, when did you have your last lithium refill? Diamond?” She looked around to see Diamond was already halfway up a hill. “Oh great…”
Diamond Tiara stood on the top of the hill and looked down. The zipline was there, huge and still dangerous, despite Silver Spoon’s devices that looked like a couple of gigantic slingshots at the end of the rope. The pulley was in front of Diamond, swinging in the wind a bit. Just like a noose, Diamond Tiara thought.
She didn’t think of it as a suicide attempt. More like a coin toss; sure, she sabotaged Silver’s device by unscrewing the hooks holding the bungee cords in place a bit. Still, there was a chance they’d still hold on. After all, the sandbags made it down the hill safely.
She grabbed the pulley and jumped off the platform. For a moment, she felt very light, as if she was flying in the air. When building the zipline, Apple Bloom and Timber didn’t want to risk anyone hitting the ground, so the ride was very high, some forty feet above the ground. All Diamond heard was the screeching of the pulley against the steel rope and wind in her ears. Her stomach twisted when she reached a huge drop, speeding up instantly.
Diamond closed her eyes, holding on to the pulley. Braking or not, this was still some sixty miles per hour and she was pretty sure that if she hit the bungee cords wrong, she’d end up decapitated faster than she could say “Qu'ils mangent de la brioche!”
Diamond screamed. Suddenly, she didn’t want to die anymore, but now she was rapidly approaching a device that so far saved only a few sandbags from a certain death.
The first bungee cord hit her like a sack of bricks. It didn’t snap off, but stretched, slowing her down a bit until she slipped over it and slid towards the next one, swinging and spinning uncontrollably. Her skin was burning and she was pretty sure she’d end up with cord-shaped bruises. She hit the second bungee cord with her back and also slipped over it. The third one barely scratched her; she was much slower now and managed to pull her legs up, dodging it before ramming into a safety net, letting go off the pulley and dropping on the platform.
For a moment she didn’t move. Her bruises were burning and the world around her was spinning in wild circles. She moved her arms and legs to check if nothing was broken and stood up, staggering on the platform. Silver helped her down the ladder, yelling something about her device working, but Diamond barely heard her. The world kept spinning; apparently her inner ear decided to take a week off.
She saw Timber in front of her. “Are you well?” he asked. “Do you have brain damage?”
“I need a hug and a fresh pair of undies,” Diamond replied. Her stomach twisted and suddenly she threw up right on Timber’s shoes. “I’m sorry.”
“Still better than getting kicked in the nuts."
“Okay, I’m going next!” Scootaloo exclaimed. “This is gonna be the greatest stunt of all time!”
“I don’t think it’s safe,” Diamond Tiara muttered. Silver Spoon hugged her, but quickly broke the hug and pulled out a bottle of hand sanitizer to disinfect her hands.
“I can’t hear you over the sound of how awesome I am!” Scootaloo ran up the hill.
“Seriously, the bungee cords can fuck you up,” Diamond said. “Why is no one listening to me?”
“Scootaloo lacks self-preservation instinct,” Sweetie Belle replied. “Also, she wants to prove she’s better than you. Always.”
Diamond rolled her eyes. “She’s not, though.”
Sweetie glared at Diamond, although she had to admit that there was something to it just a few minutes later. For a while, Scootaloo's descent down the zipline looked normal; unlike Diamond, who’d spent the whole ride watching her life flashing in front of her eyes, Scootaloo kept yelling something about flying and striking poses that’d look good in the Camp Everfree ads.
Then, however, things started to go south. Scootaloo pierced through the first bungee cord, its hook snapping out of its mount.
This hardly bothered her. “I’m scootawesome!” she yelled as she hit the second cord at full speed and broke through it as well. The third cord also snapped, its end hitting Silver’s leg and leaving a bloody gash in one of her thinking socks. Silver screamed while Scootaloo rammed into the safety net at an almost full speed. The net didn’t budge and Scootaloo bounced off of it, hit the platform with her back, somersaulted and landed on the ground in front of the receiving tower with her hands and legs sprawled at weird angles.
“Well, she’s scootadead,” Silver Spoon muttered, hardly fazed by blood staining her socks.
“I scootakilled her,” Diamond said, watching Scootaloo’s lifeless body in horror.
Sweetie Belle grabbed a stick, walked to Scootaloo and poked her a few times with it. “I’ll get the excavator,” she said.
“No need,” Scootaloo whispered. “I wanna do it again.”
“First you’ll have to go to the hospital,” Timber said.
“No, I’m totally fine, look.” Scootaloo tried to stand up, but her legs refused to cooperate and she collapsed face-first into the dirt. “Okay, I’m not fine.”
“Don’t worry.” Sweetie patted Scootaloo’s head with the stick. "We'll take the excavator to the hospital."
Timber furrowed his eyebrows. The shoes hanging from the tower were quite a macabre display; while the sneakers of the mysterious girl and Diamond Tiara’s old shoes—she refused to leave the shoes she was wearing during her zipline ride—were clean, there was still blood on Babs and Scootaloo’s shoes. To make it worse, Timber left his old shoes there as well; these, for a change, were covered in vomit.
“Not fair!” Scootaloo’s disembodied voice exclaimed. “You didn’t even try the zipline yet.”
“After what happened to you, I’m not willing to try,” Timber replied.
“Hey, I’m fine,” Scootaloo said. “I can move two of my toes and doctor von Krankenwagen says that one day I may learn to walk again.”
Timber looked at the screen of the tablet Sweetie Belle was holding. Scootaloo was barely visible from behind the tubes, bandages, and mysterious machines making all kinds of noises.
Diamond Tiara poked Timber. “I talked to that one foundation. They’ll try to get BTS to visit her,” she whispered.
Timber’s eyes widened. “Is she dying?”
“Nah.” Diamond Tiara shrugged. “But it’s gonna be fun to make her think she is.”
“Besides, I always wanted to see BTS,” Silver Spoon said. “Unfortunately, I’m not eligible for a wish, despite my numerous life-threatening illnesses.”
“Being allergic to soybeans isn’t life-threatening.” Diamond Tiara rolled her eyes. “Didn’t you say that it actually makes your feet smaller or something?”
Silver Spoon groaned. “It reduces my carbon footprint, you dunce.”
“I’d like to see BTS as well,” Sweetie Belle said. “They’re my favourite band.”
“They’re Rumble’s favourite band,” Apple Bloom muttered. “And we all know that y’all’s panties burst in flames whenever he shows up.”
Sweetie Belle blushed. “This only happened once.”
“Good thing I had a fire extinguisher,” Silver Spoon said.
“Ah still think it was all the kimchee she's been praticin’ cookin’. Also, Ah think Rumble’s a bit too big for his britches,” Apple Bloom said.
Timber cleared his throat. “I think y’all should quit being ugly, hold yer horses, and hush your mouths. I reckon y’all could argue about who likes BTS more ‘til them cows come home, but we ain’t have no time for that–”
“So you have time for that,” Silver Spoon said.
“Y’all may have horse sense, but you ain’t not got no common sense,” Timber said, patting Silver Spoon’s head. “Anyway, yer method of brakin’... Well, that dog won’t hunt.”
“Wow,” Apple Bloom muttered. “That’s more cultural appropriation than Carter’s got little pills.”
“Also, the bungee cords worked until they broke,” Silver Spoon said. “So it’s all fine, right?”
“And when they broke, Scootaloo ended up quadriplegic,” Timber replied. “Our lawyers may not like that.”
Silver Spoon frowned. “Technically, she’s paraplegic.”
Diamond Tiara put her hand on Silver Spoon’s arm and turned her around so they’d face each other. “Even when those bungee cords worked, they were dangerous. Do you want to know where I have bruises?” she asked, unzipping her pants in a rather aggressive fashion.
Timber cleared his throat again. “We can do it without exhibitionism. I have a great idea to slow the zipline down.”
“And what is it, smartass?” Silver Spoon asked. “Speaking of, Diamond, I’ve already seen your ass multiple times, no need to show me.”
“We’ll put more slack on the line,” Timber replied, tripping Diamond Tiara before she was able to tackle Silver Spoon. “It’s already pretty high above the ground, so it won’t be dangerous if we lower it a bit.”
Silver Spoon tilted her head. “And you came up with that yourself?”
“Yes,” Timber replied. He’d in fact asked Twilight for advice and, although she was busy, she found a moment to share the first thing that came to her mind.
“Sure…” Diamond Tiara muttered. “Let’s try this before Silver comes up with something even more ridiculous.”
Setting the contraption up took most of the day, not helped by Scootaloo chiming in every once in a while, urging them to stop as the zipline would let the worthy survive while weeding up the weaklings and the scum of the Earth. Timber eventually told Sweetie to switch off the tablet or else he’d smash it against the rock or Silver Spoon’s head, whatever would be harder. This caused them to pick up the pace and start testing.
The first batch of sandbags reached the bottom tower unharmed; so did the second, slightly heavier than the first ones. Timber nodded, looking at the police radar gun Diamond Tiara used to measure their speed and hoping she got it legally.
“Scootaloo just texted me, saying that the zipline requires human sacrifices,” Sweetie Belle said, watching the last sandbag gently land in the safety net.
“Good idea,” Diamond Tiara said. “How about we donate Silver to the eldritch gods of the zipline?”
“What?” Silver asked. “No way! I have an allergy.”
Timber raised his eyebrows. “To what, ziplines?”
Silver Spoon gulped. “I have fear of heights, I’m allergic to nuts, and my aunt’s cousin is a lesbian.”
“What does it have to do with anything?” Diamond Tiara asked.
“Nothing,” Silver Spoon said. “But can we get some regular human being to test it? I’m special.”
“Oh, nobody doubts that. If you don’t do it, Scootaloo will laugh at you and call you a weakling,” Diamond Tiara replied.
Silver frowned and took off her glasses. “Fine, I’ll do it. I just don’t wanna see the ground.” She gave the glasses to Sweetie Belle, missing her by a few feet. Sweetie barely caught them and put them on.
“Wow,” she said. “Silver, you really can’t see shit without them.”
Silver rolled her eyes. “No shit, Sherlock. Where’s that zipline? My body’s ready. I’ll kick its ass so hard that it won’t know which way is down.” She started to walk up the hill, almost immediately walking into the tree. “Okay, give me my glasses back,” she said to Sweetie.
“Okay.” Sweetie walked to Silver, tripping over a branch and almost falling before Apple Bloom caught her. “Sorry, I can’t see you!”
“Take them off, geez.” Timber facepalmed. “How did you all even start a construction company?”
“Creative bookkeeping,” Diamond Tiara replied. “Come on, let’s push Silver down the zipline before she tells you the details!”
A few minutes later, Silver Spoon—again without her glasses—stood at the top of the tower with her harness fastened and pulley in her hand. Sweetie Belle—carrying Silver’s glasses but explicitly banned from wearing them—smirked at her.
“You’re lighter than those sandbags,” she said. “You should be fine.”
“Should?” Silver asked. “I’d like to point out that I have IBS and I’m a hypochondriac.”
“We know.” Diamond Tiara rolled her eyes and kicked Silver’s butt, pushing her off the platform. Silver screamed, slowly gaining speed; however she couldn’t match the speed of Diamond, Scootaloo, or even the sandbags they had used earlier and after a few seconds of a scream-filled ride, she eventually ended up hanging from the zipline halfway between the towers.
“What’s up?” Silver asked, blinking and looking around. “Did I reach the end?”
“No!” Timber exclaimed. “You’re too light. Don’t unfasten the harness, you’re twenty feet above the ground.”
“How many?” Silver asked, looking down. “It’s all blurry.”
“Twenty!” Timber replied. “Apple Bloom, go get the excavator. We need to get her out of there.”
“Ah, this is fine…” Silver shuddered and threw up—which, given that she was twenty feet above the ground, looked quite impressive. “Okay, now I’m fine.”
It took another thirty minutes—most of which was spent fighting over whose turn it was to drive the excavator—before Apple Bloom managed to position it below Silver Spoon and lift the bucket enough to pick her up. Once Silver was back on the ground and with her glasses on, they gathered at the launch tower to discuss the experiment results.
“So, if someone’s too light, they go too slow now,” Timber said. “Well, either that, or Silver managed to brake just by screaming alone.”
“Ah may try next,” Apple Bloom replied. “Ah’m heavier than Silver.”
Sweetie nodded. “Yeah, more data is always nice.”
A few moments later, Apple Bloom started her ride letting out quite an impressive rebel yell.
“Like in my ancestor’s war memoirs,” Silver Spoon said, watching Apple Bloom slide down the rope. "Well, apparently my ancestor killed Apple Bloom’s ancestor and freed his slaves, so now they’re poor and we’re rich, but that’s not something I mention when she’s around.”
“That was almost two centuries ago,” Timber replied.
“Apple family never forgets and never forgives,” Silver said. “Speaking of, Apple Bloom got stuck.”
Indeed, despite being heavier, Apple Bloom got stuck only a few feet further down the line from the spot Silver had got stuck earlier. Picking her up took longer as well; mainly because Sweetie, while good at driving an excavator, couldn’t operate the bucket to save her life and Apple Bloom yelling at her didn’t help her concentrate.
“What in tarnation!?” Apple Bloom exclaimed when the excavator’s bucket narrowly missed her. “Sweetie, Ah don’t need a second anus, Ah need ya to get me outta here!”
“Maybe I’ll do it?” Timber asked.
“Have y’all ever operated this kinda machinery?” Apple Bloom asked.
“Definitely more often than Sweetie.” Timber jumped into the cockpit and lifted the excavator bucket so that Apple Bloom could get in it. “There you go.”
“Okay,” Apple Bloom said when she safely landed on the ground. “This dog ain’t gonna hunt, unless we try with someone heavier.” She looked at Timber. “Y’all are going next.”
Timber nodded. “Sure. Unlike y’all I’m heavier than those sandbags, so I should actually reach the end.”
“I thought only Apple Bloom could say ‘y’all’,” Sweetie said.
“Yes, but he at least uses it correctly,” Diamond Tiara replied.
Apple Bloom’s face reddened like a ripe apple. “Are y’all gonna teach me how to speak mah language correctly now?”
“The sooner I ride the zipline, the better,” Timber muttered when Diamond and Apple Bloom started arguing, both of them somehow devolving into countryisms unknown to nature. Trying to ignore them, he walked to the launch tower and put on the harness.
Sweetie Belle climbed on the top of the excavator. “Scootaloo says you need to yell something when you start, as a tribute to the great zipline!”
“I need to call doctor von Krankenwagen and tell him to change her painkillers to cyanide.” Timber shrugged. “Okay… Go, go Power Rangers!” he exclaimed, jumping off the launch tower. He immediately picked up speed – not as much as before they put more slack on the rope, but it was still enough to make his stomach twist. He rushed down, sliding past the point where the girls watched him from the parked excavator. As he was much heavier than Silver or Apple Bloom, he didn’t stop. He just kept accelerating, the wind blinding him and the receiving tower getting bigger and bigger.
Timber gasped. Sandbags were one thing, but he had a feeling that he was still going too fast. As it soon turned out, he was right – he barely had time to lift his legs to avoid breaking them against the platform, but then he hit the safety net way harder than expected, bounced off, and slammed crotch-first into one of the poles right before his vision exploded and he found himself in complete darkness.
“The Great Zipline chose us both,” Scootaloo said. “It left its mark on us, but it let us live to praise its glory.”
“I’d rather die.” Timber looked at his phone as if he wasn’t sure if what he was hearing was real. “Listen, Scootaloo, I’m gonna be a bit busy right now.”
“Didn’t the doctors tell you not to move too much for the next two weeks?” Scootaloo asked. “By the way, I can move my left foot and I even rode a wheelchair to the toilet and back.” She lowered her voice to a whisper. “Other guys here have an underground wheelchair racing league. Can I borrow fifty dollars to get in?”
“No.” Timber hung up the phone and shook his head.
Twilight walked in with a fresh ice pack. She must’ve spent a night in her lab forgetting about everything as her outfit could only be described as somewhat incomplete. She wore a lab coat barely covering a rather frilly bra, a matching garter belt and stockings, and not much else beyond that. Timber groaned; in his current state, watching girls in lingerie was rather painful.
“So, I did the maths behind this zipline of yours,” Twilight said, grabbing a sharpie and walking to her whiteboard. “The combined height of the hill and the launch tower is one hundred and eighty-three feet or fifty-five metres and some eighty centimetres. Then you have the receiving tower, forty feet tall.” She sketched out the hill and the zipline. “The vertical drop is a hundred and forty-three feet or over forty-three metres. You’re saying no one died yet?”
“No, of course not.” Timber smiled sheepishly.
“Well, from the photos I saw, it already looks a bit like a mass grave, so burying the bodies won’t be an issue.” Twilight shrugged. “Lots of environmental damage to the forest, like some idiot drove around in a bulldozer.”
“That may have been Sweetie Belle,” Timber replied. “She suggested torching the forest at first, but we took the matches away from her.”
"Be careful she doesn't light any more tampons." Twilight nodded. “Anyway, I calculated that if your zipline is not supposed to kill or injure people, the optimal height of the receiving tower should be some fifty-four metres.”
Timber frowned. “How much is that in normal units?”
“Fifty-four metres,” Twilight replied. “Those are perfectly normal units.”
Timber rolled his eyes, clutching the ice pack to his crotch. “How much is that in feet?”
“One hundred seventy-five and a half,” Twilight said. “Which, by the way, is taller than the Home Insurance Building, one of the world’s first skyscrapers, erected in 1885. Later they added more floors so–”
“I get it.” Timber winced at the word ‘erected’; the ice pack definitely wasn’t helping once Twilight dropped the lab coat. “So, what do you propose?”
“Well, unless you can build a wooden tower of this height, which would be pretty unstable, I suggest spraying the whole thing with fake blood, putting up some ‘stay out’ signs everywhere around, and hiring someone to pose as a ghost. You can make up some legend about the zipline. I’ve heard Applejack’s cousin went missing recently, so you can say that she died there and got buried under it or something. After all, a forsaken zipline sounds like an even better attraction.”
“You read too many horror books. I just don’t see it working.” Timber shrugged. “Gloriosa won’t get it either.”
“It’s gonna work, trust me.” Twilight smiled. “Wallflower Blush ended up in an abandoned amusement park once and met bank robbers dressed as clowns.”
Timber raised an eyebrow. “Who the hell is Wallflower Blush?”
“She says you once saved her from drowning but then she–” Twilight fixed her glasses. “Nevermind, you probably don’t remember her.”
“Definitely not right now.” Timber groaned; he never knew if Twilight was oblivious or shamelessly teasing him. He thought that this wasn’t the time and place for either. “Gloriosa is gonna kill me.”
“Oh, it won’t be that bad.” Twilight turned around, the light glinting off a jewel Timber completely didn’t expect to be there. Any other day, he’d be more than glad to investigate, but this was just too much for his injured body. Before he could say something, he passed out with a pained groan.
A few weeks later, Timber felt better physically, but unfortunately, his mental condition didn’t improve. Just as he expected, Gloriosa thought that there were enough scary legends surrounding Camp Everfree and told him to open the zipline. This required a rather complicated procedure; every passenger had to be weighted and sign a waiver, provided by Sweetie Belle. Those who were too light to reach the receiving tower had their pulleys fitted with additional weights. This worked pretty well for a week or so, until some tourist called Meal Ticket, a man of rather pathetic facial hair but a pretty impressive physique, got banned from ziplining due to overshooting the weight limit at least twice.
Despite Timber’s best efforts to stop the situation from escalating, Meal Ticket still wasn’t amused – partially because of Scootaloo who got discharged from the hospital apparently just to make Timber’s life even more miserable and tell an angry Meal Ticket that the Great Zipline found him unworthy. As a revenge, Timber pushed her wheelchair down the hill, but it was too late – Meal Ticket decided to sue them and crashing into the tree miraculously fixed Scootaloo's spine, making her more mobile and even more insane than before.
TImber just walked out of yet another tense meeting with Gloriosa, when Diamond Tiara approached him. Since their last meeting, she’d apparently gained a few pounds and the bags under her eyes had disappeared. She wore her volleyball outfit, consisting a white, sleeveless t-shirt and aquamarine yoga pants complete with a matching headband. She took a sip of an isotonic drink and smirked at Timber.
“Don’t worry,” she said. “Silver has a plan. She’s gonna let this guy zipline at night and if we’re lucky, he’s gonna pull a Babs Seed.”
Timber winced, looking around nervously to see if someone was listening to them. Fortunately, no one paid attention to them. Most campers were watching the volleyball game; Silver Spoon, despite all the ailments she claimed to possess, was one of the best players on the field. “Can we come up with something that doesn’t kill him? The guy has a large family who will definitely sue us if something happens to him.”
Diamond Tiara nodded, pulling out a calling card from under her t-shirt. “Titanikov, Whitestarski, and Iceberg,” she said. “The best lawyers the money can buy.”
Timber looked at the calling card. “Are they good?”
“My mother literally walked out of court wearing only a barrel,” Diamond Tiara said. “Thanks for the photos, by the way.”
“No problem,” Timber muttered with a shudder. Diamond had given him quite a nice sum for the photos, but after a meeting with Spoiled Milk—formerly Rich—he had to spend most of it for a trio of therapists called Jim Beam, Jack Daniels, and Johnny Walker. “I think I’m gonna take a walk.”
He walked to the pier and looked at the lake. There were a lot of campers swimming there; the zipline didn’t prove anywhere nearly as popular as the lake, partially owing to the fact that it was far from the camp. Also, Timber already heard some rumours, perhaps spread by Twilight or Scootaloo, about the zipline being cursed.
“Howdy,” Apple Bloom said, walking to him. “Nice day, huh? Ah have a great idea for our next build.”
Timber rolled his eyes. “What is it?” he asked.
Apple Bloom opened her notebook. “See, there’s a bit of a free place near the shore, right? What about we build a giant waterslide there? Like, really huge.”
“Okay, but we’ll ask someone to do the maths first,” Timber replied. “What about your brother?”
“Eh, he’s a bit busy.” Apple Bloom flipped the page. “Besides, I already made all the calculations. We can make a loop here! How cool is that? Have y’all ever seen a waterslide with a loop?”
Timber sighed and in one swift motion, as if by accident, he pushed Apple Bloom off the pier. With a huge splash, she fell into the lake, losing her notebook. Timber turned around; Diamond Tiara gave him a thumbs up, but not many more people noticed, too busy watching Silver Spoon serving the ball right between the two of her opponents who crashed into each other trying to defend.
“What was that?” Apple Bloom exclaimed, resurfacing. “Ah can’t swim!”
“The water is four feet deep,” Timber replied.
“Oh.” Apple Bloom stood in the water and smiled sheepishly. “So, what about my idea?”
“Ask my sister.” Timber shrugged. “Hey, Silver! I’m gonna show you who’s the real volleyball boss!” he exclaimed, some half a second before a stray volleyball hit him in the crotch.
