What Happened at Sugarcube Corner Chapter 1, a my little pony fanfic

In the end it's the smell that I'll always remember. That horrible, awful smell. Not of blood, although there was plenty, and not of viscera or assorted… bits… though there was plenty of those things too. It smelled clean. Not a refreshing clean, like that of house after a thorough cleaning. No, it was the smell of formaldehyde, alcohol, vinegar, and other cleaning agents. It was the smell of a hospital.

Or in this case, the smell of insanity.

The Cakes left, the same week it was found they packed up their belongings and left. Even though no pony blamed them, I wasn't terribly surprised by their decision, I don't think anypony was. Not after what happened in the basement of Sugarcube Corner.

I was the one who found them. It had been almost three days since I had seen Rainbow Dash or Pinkie Pie, and although Rainbow Dash disappearing for a few days wasn't really all that strange since her weather control was needed in more places than Ponyville, not seeing Pinkie Pie was kind of like the sun not showing up, she was more of a fixture of Ponyville than any of the actual fixtures. So I cast a spell to find her, innocent enough. Or so I thought.

I grimaced as I focused the mystical energies through my horn, shaking a few dark night-colored strands of hair from my eyes as I concentrated. There was a flash of light and a feeling of 'knowing' that entered my mind telling me I had cast the spell correctly. Which was good since miscasting an locator spell can take you really weird places. I had to make sure I used Pinkie Pie's full name otherwise I might've ended up looking for oddly colored baked goods. Although in retrospect that probably would've landed me at Sugarcube Corner anyway. The spell took me there, it was in the middle of the night but I figured Pinkie must've come home from wherever it was she had gone. The door was locked and the light in Pinkie's room was out, I levitated a few pebbles against the window but if she was in there she didn't respond. I felt a little uneasy at this point… but I decided to go inside anyway, I concentrated on the door and a quick glimmer of light of my horn and the tell-tale sound of clicking told me the lock had come undone. A useful little spell I made up when I was Celestia's apprentice in the Castle. Mostly for nicking sweets after dark than for anything else. There are times I wish I had never made that spell.

The room inside was dark and smelled a little musty, which was strange since it was the main foyer where the Cakes did all their business. The I started up towards Pinkie's room when I felt the spell tug me down. She was in the basement? I shrugged, I hadn't even realized Sugarcube Corner HAD a basement. Maybe the Cakes used it for storage or inventory. Was Pinkie Pie doing inventory? At this time of night? I shrugged again, maybe she had eaten too many sweets and couldn't get to sleep. I focused on the locater spell. It pointed me towards the back corner, it wasn't used for anything but extra space occasionally when the Cakes needed another table put out. I looked around but didn't see a door or entrance to the basement, I was about to go home and recast the spell, figuring I was in fact in search of oddly colored baked goods, when I realized that there was an almost invisible rung built into the floor, it was so old and dull it hadn't even shown up in the night time dimness. Smiling I trotted over and levitated the trap door open.

I instantly knew something was wrong.

That smell, the smell of terrible sins and the kind of insanity that drives other ponies mad wafted out. Panic struck, my heart started racing as old primal fears welled up, fear of the abnormal, the dangerous, the truly and terrifyingly insane things that haunt the edges of our worst nightmares. My legs shook even though I didn't know why at the time.

"P-p-pinkie?" I whispered softly, my voice weak as a filly's, "Are y-you in here?" I continued down the stairs, they were short, only a single level down, maybe ten steps. It felt like a hundred though. "P-pinkie, come out, y-you kn-know I don't like scary p-pranks…" I said, my voice a trifle louder this time.

I caught glimpse of pink and started to take a breath of relief. It turned into a full throated scream.

Pinkamena Diane Pie hung lifelessly from a rafter, swinging to and fro with a steady pendulum-like balance. I barely registered anything for a few minutes, my mind trying to convince itself that it was some kind of horrible cauchemar come to laugh at me until I woke safe in my own bed. Then I started to notice things. The analytical part of my brain that Celestia so praised kick-started and began feeding me information. Her mane was thin and drooping, her normally vivaciously pink coat was dull and patched; she had been gone for days.

Then I got more. I started to register the room.

There were some kind of rubbery streamers hanging from the ceiling, vile looking cupcakes that stank to Canterlot and gone, something else on a slanted slab in the corner. Something with cyan fur and multicolored…

"Oh. Oh no. Oh no no no no no no no no…" I whispered over and over as I was drawn inch by inch to what little remained of one of my precious friends. I emptied the contents of my stomach right there on the floor, hot steaming tears spilling out into the sick that now stained the already irrevocably stained stones. "Oh Dash… What in Equestria happened to you… what…" Then I saw the rest, I saw the tools. The scalpels and dull knives, the hacksaw, the nails. I saw them all. I turned back to stare dumbly at Pinkie Pie, just as her interminable swing brought her around into view. Her face was stretched into a horrible rictus, and the 'party dress' she was even then still wearing, I finally realized what it was made of. It was then, I think, that I put it all together. Pinkie Pie hanging herself… Poor Dash…. The… *Gulp* streamers…

It had been Pinkie Pie all along.

The disappearances, it was Pinkie Pie, it had been her. Somewhere along the line her friend had utterly lost her mind and whatever it was that was left, it hadn't been Pinkie Pie anymore; it hadn't even been a pony. I fell down.

And while I'm being honest, I think for a minute, down there in that nightmare place, I lost my mind too.

I don't know how long I laid there, my knees had given out completely, my body couldn't even keep me upright when I realized what Pinkie Pie had done, what she had DONE to Rainbow Dash. It couldn't have been long, someone came when they heard my scream, and it must've only been a few minutes, it felt like so much longer. I was taken to Ponyville General Care; despite being a small town Ponyville had good medical facilities, I mean just ask Applejack, farm accidents were nothing to shake your hoof at. I don't even remember the trip to be honest, faces, sounds, screams. They all blurred together as they took me to in, I remember seeing two black bags being wheeled past me at one point. I think I saw a strand of pink sticking out of one of them.

I was there when my friends came, what was left of them. Applejack, Rarity, Fluttershy, and Spike were all clamoring around me, asking me what had happened, I remember telling them, I know Applejack fainted when I got to the part about Rainbow Dash, Rarity kept making this odd squeaking sound like she was trying to scream and couldn't, Fluttershy just stood there, staring, her eyes wide and her complexion going whiter and whiter in shock. Someone made Spike leave the room near the beginning, but he heard the part about Pinkie Pie. After I finished we all just sat there, me in my bed, the other on the floor or on the few chairs the room had. What else could we do?

I laid there in the hospital bed, it was late, Doctor Trotson said he wanted me to stay overnight. My friends all stayed with me. I'm glad, I don't think I could've made it through the night without them. Applejack was asleep next to me, after she came to she begged me to tell her she had dreamed it but…

She cried herself to sleep. Fluttershy and Rarity were asleep on small cots that had been brought in by the nurses, and Spike was curled up at the foot of the bed. I couldn't sleep, even though my mind was so worn and exhausted, I couldn't sleep. My eyes burned a little from the exhaustion and I couldn't focus very well, the silence wasn't helping, I tried focusing on my friends, the sound of Applejack breathing, I smiled a little wryly as I realized she wasn't snoring.

The smile vanished as a thought entered my mind, 'She must've cried so hard she lost the energy to even do that…' I turned, lifting myself weakly to rest on my front hooves staring forward at the sterile metal head board and the white washed walls. The movement helped a little, my mind wasn't so foggy, it's probably the reason I noticed the creaking sound in the first place. A slow, almost measured, creaking sound, like metal being bent ever so slightly this way and that.

Creak…

Something in the back of my head screamed at me to ignore it, just ignore it, just let it be, just ignore the sound and go to sleep.

Creak…

It was no use, I turned my head slowly and caught a slight glimpse of something hanging from the ceiling, something pink and drab, clad in a 'homemade' party dress. I snapped my head back around to stare at the metal of the bed frame and the bland white walls.

Creak…

…

I felt something move next to me, in my blind spot just behind my ear, I felt it rustle my mane softly as it moved closer to whisper…

"Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye… teeheehehee…"

I quaked beneath the covers before laying my head down on my hooves, my eyes wide, tears spilling silently out of them as I waited for morning to come.