Cupcake Souls
Written by Peter Kurucz
Helped by Andrew Vereczki
Translated to English by TheAwaken
The blowing of the wind, the speed. The mad flashing of a blue pair of eyes. The step-up of a blue foal to protect her friend’s honor. The increasing pain. Playing pranks with a pink pony. The sound of ripping skin. The Sonic Rainboom. The award of the Best Young Flier competition. The birthday party. The Gala
That was how Rainbow Dash’s life flashed in front of her eyes as the cold steel sliced her throat. Then darkness. Deep darkness. Rainbow wanted to scream out of fear and she was surprised when she found out she could. Her voice cut through the darkness. Then she realized she was sitting in a room.
At first, she thought she was dreaming, but then she noticed it was the same room where she was screaming in pain only minutes ago.
She turned around and saw her own decapitated body. She screamed again and started to retreat until she fell off the table. She couldn’t feel a thing. Right now she didn’t have time to deal with that. Her first thought was that she needed to get out of here, away from Pinkie. She looked around the room looking for her. She was smiling in front of a mirror with Dash’s severed head in her hooves.
This was quite shocking, so she started to run for the door. Pinkie didn’t even look at her. Rainbow ran with all her might. She was already out of the room and running up on a stairway. She then noticed there was a trapdoor on the top of the stairs. She decided to dash through it and hope for the best. She closed her eyes before the impact, but in the next moment she fell to the ground because there were no more stairs.
She looked around to see she’s in the Sugarcube Corner. She looked back to where she came from only to see the closed trapdoor. She started to realize what’s going on. She raised her hooves in front of her eyes and she could see they were translucent. She didn’t believe in ghosts, but now she had to since she became one too. Then it hit her: she was dead. She was absolutely despondent.
She went over her life, what has she achieved and what did she want to achieve. The Wonderbolts… she will never be one of them, she will never be the best in all of Equestria, because there is nothing left. Rainbow was crying. Then she was addressed by a familiar voice.
“Rainbow, is that you?”
Rainbow was surprised.
“G-Gilda?”
She didn’t believe her eyes when she saw Gilda coming.”
“Oh Rainbow… you also ended up in the hooves of this insincere pink bastard.”
“Gilda, I-I… What’s going on?”
“Those ponies’ souls who are killed by that bitch are stuck here.”
Rainbow only now noticed that they are not alone. There were many souls around crying in despair or just staring in front of them.
“Does that mean that I’ll stay here… forever?”
Gilda was just looking at her sadly.
“Gilda, I-I’m so sorry about what happened!” Cried Rainbow.
“Come on, that doesn’t matter anymore.”
“I want to leave this place! I need to get away! I can’t stay here forever!” Cried out Rainbow. She looked up at Gilda, but she just stood silently.
“Unfortunately that’s impossible…” Gilda lowered her head.
“Dammit!”
“I noticed something: nopony has their cutie marks.” Rainbow raised her head and checked her flank, but it was bare. Then she remembered.
“I got it! That whore started with cutting out my cutie mark.” Then she mused a little.
“And what about you?”
“Well, I only came back to you when I learned that… well, yeah.”
Rainbow was touched. “You are such a good friend.” She said.
“I need to leave you, because my time is over.”
“Wh-wha-what? What time?”
“I could only come back for a limited time.” As she said this she started to fade away.
“No! Gilda! Don’t leave me here! You can’t leave me!”
“I’m so sorry, but it’s how it has to be.” She said as she disappeared for good.
“GILDA!” Yelled Rainbow “GILDA! YOU CAN’T DO THIS TO ME! DON’T DO IT!”
She swished her hoof where her friend stood just a moment ago.
“ARE YOU KIDDING ME?! AAAAAAAAARRGGHH!” She bellowed angrily. As she continued to shout she became but a voice in the many.
It was a sunny day in Ponyville. Twilight was reading a book when there was a knock on her door.
“Who could this be?”
“Oh, hello twilight”
“Hi Pinkie. Is it Gummy’s birthday?”
“Oh no silly, that’s still far away. I was wondering if you could help me making cupcakes in today’s nightshift.”
“I don’t really know. I haven’t done anything like this before.”
“Come on. We’ll do it by a book.”
“Well, then nothing can go wrong.”
“There now! I’ll be waiting for you.”
Twilight went to the Sugarcube corner that evening. She brought a book she found at home just for safety’s sake.
“Hello Pinkie! I’m here!”
Pinkie came forward from the back room.
“Wonderful!”
“I also brought a book. It may come in handy.”
“Perfect! In fact I just tried a new recipe and here is a sample. I’d like you to tell me what does it taste like.” She handed over the cupcake.
“Okay.” She said and took a bite. “It’s good, but it has a strange off-taste.”
“Oh, don’t worry about that, it’s just sedative.”
“What?” Asked Twilight, but she didn’t get an answer, because everything went black.
When she woke up she was in the same, dark room where once Rainbow was suffering.
“Where am I? What’s going on, Pinkie?” Asked Twilight.
“We’re making cupcakes.” Said Pinkie.
“But why am I strapped to the table?” Asked Twilight with a slight panic in her voice.
“You know my cupcakes are so special because I use a special ingredient.”
“And what is this “special” ingredient?” She looked nervously at Pinkie.
“Ponies!” Answered Pinkie naturally.
“Pinkie, don’t be kidding. I know you like joking, but this is not funny.”
“Weird. Rainbow assumed the same.”
“You mean Rainbow…”
“Yes, I made that special cupcake on Tuesday out of her. It was very tasty, wasn’t it?” She was smiling.
Twilight didn’t want to believe her ears.
“Don’t worry. I bet the cupcakes made of you will be just as good.”
Twilight was overcome by panic. She tried to break free, but the braces held her in place. She only now remembered she could use her magic, but no matter how hard she tried she couldn’t do it.
“That’s not going to work. While you were sleeping I cut off your horn so you can’t discommode” She picked up the mentioned bone from a small table.
Twilight couldn’t believe what she saw, but when she glanced up to check her horn, her face became a mask of terror. It wasn’t there.
“Wait, I’ll add it to the others. Don’t move, well *giggle* you couldn’t move anyway.”
Pinkie disappeared in the darkness and left Twilight alone who looked around in the room for the first time.
The spectacle left Twilight frightened. The first thing she noticed was the tables made of bone and chairs with skin cover. On the wall there was “Life is a party!” written in red letters. Not far away Twilight could see a few pony skulls painted in bright colors. Seeing this was quite shocking. Then she saw a pony-like shape. A shape that was too familiar, but not enough to recognize who it is.
“Rainbow?” She asked unconfidently. When her eyes finally focused she could see it clearly. Rainbow stood there, but she was covered in stitches. She was taxidermied. There was darkness where her eyes should have been.
Pinkie returned in her pony skin dress and unicorn horn necklace.
“Oh, I see you are watching my newest creation. Isn’t it fantastic? This way she can stay with me forever, and I promise you will too!”
Twilight was absolutely confused. She didn’t know how to handle the situation. She was always thinking logically, but in this case it didn’t help.
“I almost forgot, don’t you think this dress is wonderful? Look, here is your horn!” she pointed at one of them, but it immediately fell down.
“Oh, dammit. Screw it, we don’t have time for it now, we have so much to do!” She pulled closer a rolling table with different surgical tools on it.
“Pinkie, what do you want to do with those?” Asked Twilight looking worried.
“It’s all part of the fun, you’ll see, we are going to have a whale of time.” Pinkie said cheerfully.
She picked up a scalpel and trotted to Twilight.
“Just a heads-up: If you struggle it will hurt more.”
“Pinkie, why are you doing thiiiAAAAHHH!” Twilight wanted to ask something, but then she could feel a burning pain in her rear end. Pinkie started the removing of her cutie mark!
“You know, I always start with cutting off the cutie marks of ponies. I don’t even know why, but it feels right.
Twilight didn’t pay attention because the pain was stronger than anything else.
“PINKIE, WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS? PLEASE LET ME GO. AAAHHHHHH!”
Pinkie finished.
“See, silly, it’s not that painful.” Said pinkie in fulsome voice.
“This hurts! THIS HURTS!” yelled Twilight with tears in her eyes.
“I hope you don’t want to pass out already. I know you as a cultivated pony, and we have so much fun to do.”
Pinkie brought out a bucket with something smoldering in it and a long metal pole sticking out of it. She stepped behind Twilight, grabbed the pole and raised it. It was a brander iron shaped like a cupcake. She pushed it in the flesh where she cut off the skin from.
“AAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!” Twilight could feel a shrewd pain in her rear end as the red-hot metal made contact with the bare flesh and burned it.
“Look! You have a cutie mark again! Aren’t you happy?”
“Pi-Pinkie, w-why?” Asked Twilight quavering.
Pinkie didn’t reply. She trotted to the other side and repeated the procedure. Twilight cried out in pain. Her face was covered in tears and sweat.
“You know, a pony’s destiny is determined by their cutie mark, so I made this innovation so the ponies who end up here don’t feel so bad.”
Pinkie pulled a lever and the mechanism holding Twilight turned to the other side.
“There!” Said Pinkie “This way it will be much easier to do all fun things I came up with just for you!”
“W-What fun things?” Asked Twilight dizzy from pain.
“Oh, great things, you’ll see, you’re going to enjoy it!”
As Pinkie finished the sentence she picked up a big knife and moved it close to Twilight’s belly.
“I’m so curious about what’s inside you.”
The knife was getting closer to the skin from inch to inch, from second to second.
“Pinkie! Don’t!”
The tip of the blade made a small cut on the skin.
“Oops, I almost forgot. Silly me * giggle* so Twi, I wanted to ask talk this over before we get into things, how much do you actually know about Spike?”
“S-S-S-Spike? What about him? Wait, don’t you say he has anything to do with this.” She had problems speaking because of the pain.
“Well, not exactly this, but he has. You see, once I wasn’t cautious enough and that little dragon figured out what’s going on down here. But of course he’s carnivorous so I offered him some of the meat of every victim. I wonder what his reaction will be when I serve you to him.
If it’s possible then Twilight’s eyes opened even wider, but this time not because of pain, but surprise.
‘You’re lying! Spike would never do anything like that! I know him, since I brought him up!”
“Oh Twilight, do you think that with those sharp he would make do with only stones as his dietary?”
Twilight remembered that she read many books on dragons because of Spike and by them Pinkie was right. She also questioned why Spike didn’t have the predator instinct, but she thought it1s because of the upbringing.
“No…” Twilight was disappointed, but then she felt an overwhelming pain.
Pinkie started to cut up the skin deeply from the crotch to the neck. Twilight responded with loud screams.
“Aaaah, Pinkie, NOOOO!!!”
“You know, I’d like to start with your head because I’m interested I your brain, but then you couldn’t be with me until the end and I can’t let that happen because we’re having such a good time.”
Twilight was shouting in pain. Pinkie was happy. Twilight’s situation made her smile. When Pinkie finished, Twilight wasn’t fully conscious. Pinkie wanted her friend to be with her until the very end, so she gave her an adrenaline shot which immediately woke up the dizzy unicorn. Pinkie watched the contents of Twilight’s belly with fascination.
“When I get to this part I always see this… I don’t really know what it is. Could you tell me?” While saying this Pinkie grabbed and tore out Twilight’s jejunum.
“aaaaAAAAHHHHH!!!” Twilight was screaming and twitching.
“You are not too helpful.” She said then threw the organ in a bucket. Twilight was shivering. Her eyes turned inside their sockets. She couldn’t even apprehend things anymore. She could only feel the pain burning her body.
“Hmmm… I thought as much you were not going to bear it like Dash or Gilda, but don’t worry, I’m prepared for this too.” Pinkie picked up a syringe and sprouted its content into Twilight’s bloodstream. It was painkiller and it did its work, because not much later Twilight stopped twitching and was just staring in front of her. It was like she was dead but still breathing. Pinkie was happy when she saw that Twilight’s awake.
“It’s so good we’re together again!” Cheered Pinkie.
Twilight couldn’t say a word. She was just lying there numb.
She gave up all hope. It was the most logical thing to do.
“It’ll be better if I clean the wound. I can’t see a thing.”
Pinkie grabbed two buckets and a rug and brought them to Twilight.
“Hmm. I wonder, in which did I pour salty water?... Wohoo! Game! Well, which bucket do you chose?”
Twilight didn’t comprehend a thing, but she could hear somebody talking to her so she tilted her head to see the voice’s source.
“The right one! Splendid!” She plunged the rug in said bucket.
“It wasn’t very nice of me, but there was salty water in both buckets *giggle* Oh how evil I am.” Then she started cleaning the wound.
Twilight screamed as the pain increased. She then fainted.
“Twilight! Wake up! We’re running out of time!”
Twilight opened her eyes. Pain. It was burning her body.
“it’s astonishing how impolite you are! You are even worse than Dash were. It’s not enough that you fall asleep, but I have to spend hours waking you up! I’m not going to lecture you because Spike will be here any minute and I’ll need to leave you, but!” she said in a harsh voice. “While I’m gone think about decency!” Pinkie went up the stairs holding a bucket. Twilight couldn’t see its contents only that it was something red. She didn’t think about it for too long since the effect of the painkiller slowly wore off and the pain was started to spread in her body. She noticed that she could only feel numb pain in her left hind leg. She looked down and freaked out. It was missing. The wound was bandaged, but she knew it was only for her not to bleed to death while Pinkie’s gone. Twilight was just lying there helpless. She knew that her life will tragically end in a few minutes. All that knowledge, research and notes. She started crying. She cried and waited for death.
Pinkie opened the trapdoor. Trotted to the table and put down the bucket. She didn’t like this part, but usually she was satisfied by a successful autopsy. This was not the case now and that made her fretful.
“Where is he? I’d like to go back and play.”
Pinkie waited three minutes when there was a knocking on the door.
“At last!” Pinkie opened the door for Spike.
“Hello! I hope you have some delicacies for me.”
“Just come on in and eat. I’m in a bit of a hurry.” Came the edgy answer from Pinkie.
“Okay, okay. I’ll eat and get out of here.”
Spike went to the table, jumped on a seat and looked at the food. He immediately started eating eagerly.
“I see you like it.” Noted the pink pony in a bored manner.
“Of course! This one is even better than the previous ones. Who was the victim?”
“Twilight.”
“Wh-wh-what?”
“You heard it. Twilight.”
Spike’s pupil narrowed. He slowly turned to Pinkie.
“You whore!”
He attacked Pinkie who was startled by the sudden offense. Spike went for her throat. Pinkie deflected him with a hoof sweep so Spike was knocked hard against the wall. Pinkie didn’t hesitate. She hurried there and kicked Spike with a heavy swing.
Spike groaned, but stood up fast. He wanted to use his claws now. He ran, jumped and swung his arms towards her. Pinkie tried to evade, but one of the strikes has furrowed her cheek.
“You little…!” Spike landed behind Pinkie, so she bucked out with her hind legs. It was a direct hit. The end of Spike’s flight was the wall once again. He couldn’t move anymore, just moan in pain.
“I had enough fun with you.” She trotted to Spike, lifted her front hooves then stomped with all her weight on the head of the baby dragon. His skull cracked open. The hooves pushed the bones into the brain which splattered all over the pink legs.
Spike’s death satisfied Pinkie, but she wasn’t finished yet. She picked up the corpse and went down the stairs.
“Look who’s here!” Said Pinkie as she entered the room. “I never worked with a dragon before, but I don’t think he would be very tasty.”
“You-you-you” Twilight tried to say something.
As she saw Pinkie with Spike on her back, blood dripping down her sides, her tears started to flow. She felt like her child has been killed. She felt guilty for not spending more time with him, for not talking with him more. She knew nothing about his predator instinct.
“Oh, don’t cry Twi! You will be together soon!” Pinkie said happily.
***
The Sun was nearing the horizon behind the towers of the royal castle. Princess Celestia put this day down a successful one as she watched the sunset from her balcony.
“Sister, can we talk?” Luna appeared behind her back.
“But of course.”
“So, I was thinking. While I was banished you were able to control both the Moon and the Sun.”
“Yes, but… what’s your point?”
“What I was thinking about was if I’m even needed, but then…”
“But then?” Asked Celestia. Suddenly Luna was consumed by a black puff of smoke and when it dissolved there stood the evil Nightmare Moon.
“But then it occurred to me that I don’t need you either!”
“Luna! No!” Yelled Celestia, but in the next moment she was surrounded by darkness.
Lonely, cold, quiet darkness as she was imprisoned in the Moon.
Nightmare Moon Laughed maniacally. “It’s time to pay a visit to my little assistant.”
***
“I think it looks great here.” Pinkie said as she lied down the body of Spike on the table next to Twilight. She cried. She was sore on the outside as well as on the inside.
“Twi, if it makes you feel better, I still have much fun planned.” At this moment, accompanied by a blinding flash, Nightmare Moon appeared in the middle of the room. She looked around and let out a satisfied hum.
“Mistress!” Cheered Pinkie.
“So it was you…” Said Twilight.
“You did a very nice work. Pity you didn’t do it on your own will.”
“I don’t understand, Mistress.” She looked questioningly at the larger mare. Nightmare Moon let out another two happy hums as her horn lit up. Pinkie’s pupil narrowed. The gates in her mind broke and let way to the happenings of the past month. The faces, sufferings and deaths of all the victims.
“AAAAHHHH!!!” It was all her work. She tied up, excised and made cupcakes out of all those innocent ponies.
“WHY?!” She yelled. Her gaze met the taxidermied corpse of Rainbow Dash. She screamed and collided with a table knocking Spike down of it. He landed in her lap. His dead eyes stared in her face. She continued screaming as she tossed the body off herself. Nightmare Moon laughed out loud as she watched the scene. Pinkie stood up stumbling. That was when she saw her friend tied to the table. “TWILIGHT! Oh no… what have I done…” She then accidentally kicked something. She looked down to see it was a horn. She picked it up and used it to stab herself in the head. The horn went through the skull and penetrated the brain. Bone shards scattered as Pinkie dropped down dead. Nightmare Moon giggled.
“I admit, this was entertaining.” She went closer to Twilight and stared in her face.
“You are the student of Celestia, aren’t you?”
Twilight panted. Before her stood evil itself and she was defenseless. She closed her eyes and waited for death.
“I think you may be useful for me. You will be serving and helping me.”
Twilight opened her eyes. She saw that the alicorn was in the middle of a spell. Twilight felt something on her belly and as she looked down she saw the wound healing.
“Of course you are going to need you magic too, but I need to make sure you won’t use it against me.” Her horn lit up again and Twilight could feel something clenching her neck.” Now you can’t use your magic to do anything I don’t give you permission for. Otherwise this collar kills you.”
“It’d be better if you killed me.” Twilight only understood the situation now that her circulation was back to normal.
“Oh please. I can’t let all that knowledge get wasted. I read the letters you sent my sister and I know how smart you are. Now let’s do something with that missing leg.” She looked around and saw Pinkie’s body. “Perfect.” She lifted the body by its leg. There was a strike of light cutting through the haunch then the leg came off the body which fell to the ground with a loud squelch. “Now, it would be better if you wouldn’t move so please forgive me, but….” These were the last sounds Twilight heard as she fell asleep. She woke up minutes later staring at the ceiling. “Well, how do you feel?”
Twilight was dizzy. She turned her head to the left and saw the frightened and bloody face of Pinkie. Her blood froze on her veins. She looked around the room and her gaze fell on her left hind leg what was pink! Twilight didn’t believe her eyes.
“This was the most I could do. Yours were in shreds.” Said Nightmare Moon.
“I’d rather go through a thousand tortures and die than to serve you!” Yelled Twilight at Nightmare Moon and tried to cast a spell to attack her, but then a strong clench on her neck stopped her. She was suffocating.
“Compared to your smartness you forget pretty easily. I’d like to take the opportunity to remind you, that collar prevents you from resisting and only I can make it stop.”
Twilight was jerking on the floor. She tried to take off the collar, but it was impossible.
“So you have no other choice than to serve me.” The collar loosened and Twilight was finally able to breathe.
“This was only a warning, but if you try to set your face against me again then I won’t be this merciful.” Said Nightmare Moon.
“Now we are leaving! We have so much to do!” She turned to the all familiar purple cloud and disappeared in a blink of an eye. Twilight was surrounded by the same purple fog. She tried to resist, but in the next moment she disappeared too. Her last scream echoed in the room where the suicidal Pinkie and the shattered skulled Spike laid. They became the victims of Nightmare Moon just as all the other innocent ponies.
***
Pinkie woke up panting ad with the feeling that something is not all right. When she lifted her leg she saw her translucent hoof.
“Oh no!” She was surprised. She looked around but she could only see a beam of light so she decided to go to its source. She found a staircase with the light coming from the top of it. She went up, but she was blinded by the bright light. As her eyes accustomed to the light she could see that she was in the Sugarcube Corner. She couldn’t see anypony around so she went out. She only now became really frightened as she saw the world around her.
Crying and screaming ponies everywhere.
“Did I do all this?!” Screamed Pinkie.
In this moment everypony stopped and went silent.
It was a very embarrassing moment for Pinkie. She trotted through the crowd of souls.
Every eye was watching her. She felt like a thousand knives were stabbing her body.
All the souls were silent. As Pinkie went through them she became more and more nervous then she burst out shouting.
“I’M SORRY, IT WASN’T MY FAULT, PLEASE FORGIVE ME!” She yelled with a teary face.
“Then who did this wit all of us?!” Asked a familiar voice behind Pinkie.
“R-Rainbow?” Asked Pinkie surprised.
“You have the nerve saying it wasn’t your fault…”
“Oh, Rainbow, please forgive me. It wasn’t me who did this to you!” Pinkie was drowning in her tears.
“Really?!! So you don’t even remember all that monstrosity you did to me and all these innocent ponies?!” She said in a harsh voice to Pinkie.
“You don’t understand, Rainbow. I was under the curse of Nightmare Moon. She returned to drive Equestria into eternal darkness!” Pinkie shouted on the top of her lungs. She didn’t want to believe this was happening to her.
“Well, we don’t need you pity. We are stuck here forever in this damned place and it’s all because of you!”
Rainbow was looking at the faded pink pony with commiseration and hatred.
Pinkie was crying and yelling. She was thinking of ways to get out of this nightmare. Suicide wasn’t an option since she was already dead. That was when the terrible thought which she didn’t want to believe hit her. She’s stuck here forever with Rainbow Dash and all the other ponies who hated her for what she had done, even though it wasn’t her fault - she was just another victim of Nightmare Moon – and from this nightmare, which Pinkie felt herself in, there was no way out…
