Author's Note

This is the "remastered" version of Chapter one. Hopefully, it's a bit better than my previous effort. I might add more onto it, I am open to suggestions.

UPDATE: I've been running into a lot of problems on Fanfiction.net with this, so I'll put on here to for reference. I'M NOT BASHING PINKIE PIE OR ANY OTHER CHARACTER!!! Pinkie Pie is portrayed is criminally insane in the Cupcakes story, someone who is beyond the point of no return, I didn't kill her because I didn't like her, I killed her because that was the only way I saw the story could go.

Chapter 1

“I want to go home,” Dash sobbed.

“Yeah, I can see wanting to do that,” replied the party pony in a cold, uncaring manner. “Sometimes, I just wanna give up, just say ‘I’m done with this mess’ and go to bed. But you know what? You can’t shrug off your responsibilities. You got to pull yourself up and meet the challenges head on. That’s the only way you’re gonna get ahead in life.”

Dash hung her head and cried. Minutes passed, but they felt like hours to the cyan mare. She had lost a great deal of blood, the stubs where her wings used to be were bleeding profusely still, and the electricity had more than likely done some serious damage to her heart. Not to mention the spikes that were still cooking the enamel and flesh inside of her hooves. Dash looked up to see Pinkie approaching her, scalpel in hand, with an evil grin on her face.

"Well, this is it, looks like I'm done for." Dash thought solemnly. "I just wish I could have said good-bye to my friends.

In that moment, time stopped. Everything was still. Rainbow Dash lied there, life flashing before her eyes. She saw it all. The countless amounts of pranks she and Pinkie would play on other ponies. When she first met Twilight Sparkle. Standing up for Fluttershy when they were both in school. So many happy memories presented themselves before her. It might have held some nostalgic value had it not been for the mind snapping pain that pulsed through her body.

One thing that she knew for certain, however. Rainbow Dash wasn't ready to die. There was simply too much left undone. So much she still had to do, The Wonderbolts, her friends, her place as an Element of Harmony, she wasn't ready to give it up. All these thoughts led up to one thing. One soul-crushing fact. Her entire life's work was about to be rendered useless at the hooves of her dear friend: Pinkie Pie. Rainbow Dash felt the tears stinging her face again, as she realized that Pinkie had little to no sympathy for her, or for anypony, as she had deduced by looking around her "eccentrically" decorated room.

Rainbow Dash, even in her pained and nearly dead state, she was still in awe of just how far a pony could slip into insanity. The residents of PonyVille were always peaceful, warm, and welcoming. Why would anyone in the town want to do something as macabre as this? An Element of Harmony doing it, no less! Not even an entity like Discord was capable of driving somepony this far into madness.

As all of these thoughts were going through Rainbow Dash's head, her left hoof involuntarily twitched, Rainbow Dash wouldn't have even noticed this movement, but it than dawned on her that she could maneuver her hoof a little bit better than before. She glanced up to see that one of her bindings was loose. She struggled against her restraints. The ends were frayed and the bolts holding the edges down were loose. Dash could feel it.

"Of course!" Dash thought with new found hope. "With all the ponies Pinkie must have abducted, these old things had to have gotten worn out after a while! If I can wait until Pinkie is close enough, maybe I can get loose!" Rainbow Dash felt more of her strength returning at this realization, but she did her best to hide it. Apparently it worked, because Pinkie was still advancing towards her. Ever so slowly, as if she were savoring the final moments of Rainbow Dash. As much as she didn't want to, Rainbow Dash maintained eye contact with Pinkie, trying her best to keep her poker face up.

Rainbow Dash waited until Pinkie's scalpel was, but mere centimeters away from her stomach, than, with all the strength she had in her body, ripped her left hoof free and punched Pinkie right in her jaw! The scalpel flew from her hooves and Dash instinctively caught it with her free hoof. She looked up to see that Pinkie had already regained her bearings and had picked up another scalpel.

In a blind rage, Pinkie charged the still restrained Rainbow Dash. Dash held up her free hoof, closed her eyes, and waited for, what she thought, was inevitable. But nothing came. She unshielded her eyes to see Pinkie staring wide eyed at her, than falling on her side, unmoving. Dash looked down to see the scalpel she had been holding only second prior was jammed right into Pinkie's heart. It took some time for it to sink in. But inevitably, it did. Rainbow Dash had just killed Pinkie Pie. It may have been accidental, but it still happened. Despite the hell that Pinkie had put Dash through, she still wept for her friend. She wanted so badly, to be angry, to be infuriated, but she just couldn't find it in herself to hate Pinkie Pie for what she had done. All she could do was weep and mutter to herself: "Why?"

Rainbow Dash, after regaining a partial portion of her sense, reached down to the scalpel and grabbed it. She cut the rest of her bonds loose and attempted to make her way out. All she could do was crawl. The drug that Pinkie had injected into her spine prevented her from using her hind legs. And even if she could, the heated nails that were driven into the soles of her hooves would more than likely dispel any notions of walking anyway. She slowly crawled up the stairs, pain cascading through every fiber of her being with every stride she made. Eventually, she reached the door leading to the shop, shakily, she opened the door and dragged herself into the room.

Aside from Rainbow Dash's gasps and moans of pain, no other sounds were being made in the vicinity, everything was silent, still, and neat. A sharp contrast compared to the scene just a few paces behind her. The shadows that were being cast from the windows gave the entire room an extremely eerie and foreboding feel. As if a predator was waiting to pounce upon a wounded animal. Strange, considering how bright and happy the store is during the day.

After what seemed like hours of tedious and pain-filled crawling, Rainbow Dash finally made her way out of the shop and into the street. It was in the middle of the night in Ponyville, so everyone was asleep at this time, so Rainbow Dash tried to scream to get somepony's attention, but it was no use. All the screaming she had done in the cellar while Pinkie was torturing her had strained her voice to the point where she could only offer a whisper of a scream.

As blurred as Rainbow Dash's mind was, she knew one thing for certain: She needed to get to the hospital. Now. It felt so far away though. Dragging herself in this state, it would take hours for her to reach the hospital. Rainbow Dash, knowing this, still tried. But it was no use, any help that she could possibly reach was too far away and the was almost out of time. For the first time in her life, Rainbow Dash rolled over onto her back and, after a few moments of pain from the stumps of her wings making contact with the dirt, surrendered herself to her fate. For a time, she just stared and the night sky.

Rainbow Dash's eyelids became heavy and it wasn't long before she shut them. Darkness soon engulfed her entire being. Not long now. Not long before her agony was all over. She chuckled, the trauma must have really had an impact because she thought she heard the extremely quiet, but worried and soon, fear-filled ramblings of a pony who's voice could only be described as extremely timid. Rainbow Dash felt her hallucination as well. She felt gentle, caring, hooves inspecting her wounds. This was followed shortly by, what felt like, water droplets falling down onto her face.

"There weren't any clouds in the sky when I looked up, how is it raining?" Rainbow Dash thought to herself.

The rain kept up, first a few drops at a time, than a few more, and more, and more, until the drops were cascading down on her face. Rainbow Dash would have thought of it as strange that it was raining only on her face while the rest of her body stayed dry, but she was teetering on the brink of consciousness and any and all cognitive thought was quickly being sapped from her mind.

It almost made her want to cry again, but she just couldn't. She was just too exhausted. Rainbow Dash than felt a soothing warmth throughout her entire body, as if she had just been engulfed in a soothing hug by a dear friend.

And then, at that moment, everything in Rainbow Dash's world ceased to be. For a time, anyway.