Raise the Sun

The silence around the candlelight was all but unbearable, and from what anyone could see, each of them were waiting for another to speak up, before finally Twilight broke the silence, her ears flattened against her head as she slowly made her way to her back room to retrieve something with the near-amplified click of her hooves, and came out with a small stack of books which she set at the center of the candles.

Rarity was first to react, her expression quite shocked by the books' titles. "Necromancy, Twilight? But why would you ever study such a thing, it's forbidden!"

Twilight hung her head low as she came down to her seat, feeling like quite the pathetic excuse for a magician in spite of her having mastered so many innumerable spells already. "I had a lot of questions," she confessed, "mostly pertaining to why this sort of power would ever exist, so I did a bit of study to look into it."

"A bit?" Applejack raised a skeptical eyebrow. "Twilight, you've been outta yer library twice a week at most, tha's more than 'a bit'."

"Okay okay," Twilight sighed, "it grew on me, fast. Answered so many questions I've had for years, made me see things in a whole new light. It's not like I cast any of the spells in there."

Now it was Rarity who raised an eyebrow. "No really, I didn't! I know the magic is forbidden, but mundane knowledge never hurt anyone."

"And look where we are now," Rainbow Dash interjected, "with enough secrets to hurt all of us."

"R-Rainbow?" Fluttershy's eyes widened at her fellow pegasus, almost as though questioning if the mare so much of town had idolized as a practical star could have done anything wrong.

Rainbow Dash's eyes quickly dilated down to mere specks. "Yeah, it's true." She said at last. "I'm not exactly innocent of all this either. You guys remember when we toured through the weather factory way back?

The other four - excluding Fluttershy who had helped with the tour - nodded.

"Not a word of this gets out." Rainbow said sternly, "I'm not even allowed to be telling you guys this."

"Nothing of this goes beyond these walls." Twilight nodded, "That goes for each of us."

Rainbow took it for what it was worth. "I didn't actually take you into the rainbow factory for a reason. Every foal out of Cloudsdale that doesn't pass their flight test winds up there, put through a machine and turned into the raw colors of the rainbow."

"What?" the other ponies, excepting Pinkie Pie - whose expression quickly grew more and more sad hearing the news - exclaimed.

"It's true. It's all true." Rainbow said guiltily with a twitch of her eyes. "A thousand years ago when Celestia had to control the entire running of Equestria, she couldn't set aside time to hold up the weather patterns, so she left it to the Cloudsdale pegasus ponies to make it happen. So, they made the weather facility and all its branches. I was titled in charge of the Rainbow Factory since I was the only pegasus to ever perform a sonic rainboom, and the entire operation is classified."

"Y-y-you weren't... k-kidding when you said I didn't want to know... were you?" Fluttershy whimpered in disbelief.

"Now you know, I guess." Rainbow said, for once purely disheartened at her occupation's cruelty laid bare in front of her friends.

"Pinkie Pie?" Applejack tilted her head, watching the normally ecstatic mare's expression continually wilting away. "Y'alright there, sugarcube?"

"You know," Pinkie sniffed, "how some of the ponies in town just vanish out of thin air and aren't heard from again?"

"Oh no." Twilight sounded worried, "This isn't with that alter ego of yours, is it?"

Pinkie Pie shook her head. "No, it's me. Those red velvet cupcakes I just made are the reason they've been disappearing."

Spike was the first to catch on, his heightened sense of smell leading him to suspect before the party had even begun what the case was.

"They're made with the remains of the disappearing ponies." Pinkie finally mustered to say.

Again with the sole exception of Fluttershy, who had opted not to take any of the cupcakes to leave them for her friends, each of the others fought the urge to wretch. Rarity naturally was the first to fail in the effort, and it took not long at all for the others to follow suit. Spike wasted no time in clearing the mess, having to put a clothespin to his nose to dampen the smell in the process.

"Pinkie, how long's this been goin' on?" Applejack finally dared to inquire.

"Years," Pinkie confessed, "the Cakes don't know, nopony knows."

"Let's change the subject..." Twilight offered, looking over to the other three. "What about you guys?"

One by one, the others shook their heads, nothing to offer or confess.

"Things were just settling down, so... I think we've all started going our seperate ways." Rarity finally pieced together.

"We're still friends... right?" Rainbow Dash asked.

Twilight hung her head with the realization. Half of them had fallen far short of their typical virtues, and the same half that normally everypony looked up to and admired, even idolized... If they were ever going to recover from this, it would be a long, probably painful process. And it would no doubt involve the relinquishing of her studies. Oh, how she hated that idea.

"Sure ah might be scared sick, but y'all are still my friends at least." Applejack motioned, looking about to the others.

"Once a friend, always a friend," Fluttershy added, her words muddied slightly by the shyness of voice.

"It takes more than dark rumor to turn this pony away," Rarity chimed in, struggling but putting forth a genuine smile, "Besides, who doesn't have their differences?"