When she was a filly, Twilight believed that being a princess made all problems go away. When she found out Rainbow Dash had killed Pinkie Pie, Twilight thought it couldn't be possible. It surely must have been a dream.
At first, she felt an odd bit of resentment for Rainbow Dash. Twilight was a princess, everything was perfect, and then Rainbow Dash killed Pinkie Pie. Just as soon as the thoughts of resentment came, they were replaced by a horrified sorrow. All the death, how could she have been so selfish?
Twilight closed the book she had been reading. It was the latest "Daring Do" adventure, and with every page turn she wondered if Dash would have liked it.
When the cover of the book closed, she wasn't aware of it. Instead, Twilight was somewhere else, so long ago yet so recent.
Twilight was reading again, but the words on the page didn't matter. The sound of hooves behind her made her glance up, only to find a stallion she wasn't familiar with in her library/house.
"Excuse me," Twilight said, "But who are you and why are you in my house?"
The stallion gasped, sounding as though he had ran here from Canterlot. He took a final breath, and gave a small, meek smile.
"There… there was trouble, your majesty," he gasped in a tired breath, "At Sugar… Sugarcube Corner."
Twilight had thrown the book aside and darted out of the library, leaving the unknown stallion behind with Spike and Owlicious.
Twilight was still learning how to fly with lessons from Rainbow Dash, but now she spread her wings and kicked off from the ground to soar over the houses of Ponyville in the direction of Sugarcube Corner.
She was flying, really flying. It was an incredible feeling, but it didn't last. Twilight suddenly dipped downwards. Frantically, she tried to flap her wings but to no avail. She fell into the street, kicking up dust and landing on her face.
"Graceful…" she muttered to herself. It was getting quite obnoxious that some small fillies flew better than she could.
Finally arriving at Sugarcube Corner, Twilight threw open the door. A sickening smell, like rotting meat, lingered in the air. Twilight gasped, which was a mistake as the smell went on her tongue.
Pinkie Pie lie on the ground, surrounded by various ponies who were all talking at once. Twilight pushed through the crowd to reach her friend, ask her what was going on, but when she finally reached Pinkie, she screamed. Her friend's chest was ripped open from a vicious knife wound. She was dead.
Without realizing it, Twilight put the book aside and began to walk out of the library.
"Twilight?" She heard Spike's hesitant voice behind her.
"Just going for a walk, Spike. I'll be back soon…" Twilight responded, but her voice cracked so much that the last two words were nearly inaudible.
Twilight opened the door with magic, and stepped outside into the dimly-lit streets of Ponyville at night. She was thinking, focused on nothing but her thoughts and herself. It was as though the world had melted away, leaving her to ponder in peace, but unfortunately her only thoughts were of that terrible day…
"What happened? What happened?" Twilight sobbed over and over again. Despite the many ponies pressing in on her from every direction, all talking at once, she couldn't seem to get an answer.
All she knew was that Pinkie was dead. Her mouth hung slightly open, and it would seem as though she threw her head back in laughter if not for the glazed, vacant eyes. Blood was everywhere, and on the ground next to her was a knife, still wet with its victim, little drops of Pinkie Pie dripping off the very end onto the floor.
"Who… who did this?" Twilight sobbed.
"We don't know," Somepony next to her said.
"Maybe it was a suicide?" Another pony suggested.
Twilight realized she knew a spell that could replay all the events that happened here, but it would be complex. Very complex.
She choked down her sobs and cleared her throat. "Alright everypony, stand back."
Her horn glowed with a magnificent purple color. Any pony who cared to look would have seen her eyes glowing with a peculiar white light. As Twilight stared, she could see it all, not just the murder itself, but the ponies gathering around. However, everything was happening in reverse, as though she was rewinding a tape.
The ponies walked out backwards, and the puddle of blood slowly went back into Pinkie Pie. This was a disturbing sight to Twilight, but not nearly as disturbing as what happened next.
Rainbow Dash walked over to the corner, and huddled over there, staring at Pinkie's corpse for a while.
Rainbow Dash? Rainbow DASH?
Twilight watched in disbelief as Dash got up and trotted over to Pinkie. Pinkie got up, and Dash pulled a knife out of her chest, put it back in, and pulled it back out a few times.
Twilight stopped the spell when she saw Pinkie, alive and well, holding out a tray of cupcakes to Rainbow Dash.
Back in reality, Twilight fell onto her side. A few ponies gasped, and she was dimly aware of curious and worried faces obscuring her vision.
"Rainbow Dash…" She choked out before the faces disappeared, only to be replaced with a dark abyss that held no monsters. Twilight wasn't aware if her eyes were even open anymore.
The dark streets of Ponyville. No matter how lively, how cheerful it was during the day, at night it all changed. The streets became dark and forbidding, and the buildings loomed, blocking out the moonlight. Other than Twilight herself, there was no pony in sight.
She trotted slowly through the streets. Usually, she would be fearful of a monster jumping out of an alleyway, no matter how irrational the fear. She stared sullenly at her hooves. Clenching her teeth tightly together, she felt another memory springing to life.
Voices, excited voices, surrounded her. Twilight groaned and raised a hoof to rub her eye. The voices became silent.
"Quiet, she's awake…" One familiar voice said.
Twilight gave a small groan and opened her eyes. When she did, she found Applejack, Fluttershy, and Rarity standing over her.
"Mornin' Sugarcube. You okay?" Applejack asked.
"Rainbow…" Twilight choked out.
"We found you in Sugarcube Corner next to… Pinkie…" Rarity said.
Twilight shook her head and looked around. Her friends had taken her back to the library, and she was lying on a few pillows.
"Is… is it true?" Twilight asked, a piece of hope that it had all been a dream slowly growing inside her.
"Ya fainted after seeing Pinkie's… corpse…"
Fluttershy gave a small squeak upon the word "Corpse".
Twilight couldn't believe it. So had Rainbow Dash really killed Pinkie Pie?
"I didn't faint because of Pinkie…" Twilight slowly said, "I… I used a spell to find out what happened and saw…"
"...What did you see, Twi?" Applejack asked, eagerly.
"...Rainbow Dash." Twilight said, not believing what she said.
Applejack stepped back in shock, Rarity gasped, and Fluttershy gave a cry of anguish and left the library sobbing.
Twilight kept walking.
The moonlight barely lit her path. Luna was watching out for her tonight. Twilight stopped and froze. Why had she stopped?
Looking around for a reason, there it was. Sugarcube Corner. The place it all began and where it all ended.
Twilight went inside the building.
"Sheesh…" she mumbled to herself, "This place may be abandoned, but it's full of ghosts."
The "ghosts" hovered around her. There was the spot Pinkie was found. There was the place Rainbow Dash stood… there…
She stopped walking and only looked around the building. The Cakes had relocated somewhere in Manehatten. They had said they wanted to move for a while.
No pony interrupted Twilight as she sat, looking around at the walls and remembering that night.
"We have to find Rainbow Dash," Twilight told Applejack and Rarity.
"Y'all look 'round the lake and the cloudy areas," Applejack said, "Ah'll check her house."
"Okay, we'll meet back here afterwards." Twilight agreed.
Rarity looked around the lake, Twilight the clouds, and Applejack went to her cloud home.
Rarity walked around the lake a few times, but found nopony there. Applejack shouted outside her house for a while, but received no response.
Twilight, with wings, went to the field near Ponyville where the clouds were highest in quantity. She tried to fly around the sky, but her wings couldn't carry her high enough. After falling on her face a few times, Twilight just decided to move them by magic.
Her horn glowed, and the clouds instantly parted to reveal a blue sky. A pegasus, who seemed to have been working above the clouds, shouted angrily at Twilight.
"Hey! Put 'em back right now! We've got a storm scheduled today!"
"Sorry," Twilight apologized, "But I'm looking for Rainbow Dash. Have you seen her?"
The pegasus thought for a moment. "Well… yeah. I think she said something about a pink pie or something, and saving it. Maybe the pie was a leftover from a party or something, I don't know."
Pink pie and saving it? Twilight was confused, but suddenly everything made sense.
Rainbow Dash was at Sugarcube Corner, and she was going to try to save Pinkie Pie.
Throwing a quick "Thanks!" over to the confused pegasus pony and throwing the clouds back to normal as easily as she'd close a curtain, Twilight raced back to Ponyville.
Back to Sugarcube Corner.
Rarity and Applejack were waiting in front of the library. Twilight, nearly out of breath, hurried up to them.
"Did you find Rainbow Dash?" Rarity asked Twilight.
"N-no…" Twilight managed, breathing heavily, "But I… I think she might… might be… Sugarcube Corner…"
Applejack and Rarity tried to help Twilight along as quickly as possible to the bakery. The cupcake-shaped building seemed impossibly far away, but somehow they made it.
All the ponies were gone. Pinkie Pie's corpse was gone, only a trail of blood could be seen from the outside window. Pushing the door open, Twilight led the way inside.
It was eerily quiet. A terrible smell, like a mixture of vomit and decayed meat, greeted them. Twilight gagged, Applejack gave a heaving sound, and Rarity looked for a moment that she would vomit. Thankfully, she choked it down.
The trail of blood looked like Pinkie's body had been dragged. It led behind the counter, and went on until it was no longer visible.
"Giggle at the ghostly" A chilling, soft voice rang out in the quiet.
"It sounds like it's coming from behind the counter," Twilight whispered.
"Guffaw at the grossly" sang the voice.
Twilight, Applejack, and Rarity stalked closer to the counter. Twilight saw a rainbow mane, and then a blue pegasus, until she was finally close enough to look over the counter and see Rainbow Dash sitting over Pinkie Pie's dead body, gently stroking her mane.
"Rainbow Dash…" Rarity said in disbelief. Her voice trailed off, but it was enough for Rainbow Dash to hear.
Dash looked up at her friends, a wide grin on her face. She leapt up off the ground and her wings flew out to the sides. Twilight thought for sure they were about to meet the same fate as Pinkie, but Dash simply landed on the counter and stood over them.
"Guys! Good to see you!" She said.
From being close up, Twilight could see the blood staining Dash's fur.
"Why did you do it, Rainbow… why…" Twilight couldn't find her voice.
Dash's grin fell off and shattered on the floor. She lowered her head, and now looked very menacing to Twilight.
"It was the cupcakes."
"The… the cupcakes?" Applejack repeated.
"Every night, the cupcakes. They would come into my dreams, turn them into nightmares and spread like poison. I couldn't sleep, it would only repeat itself over and over. First Pinkie would offer me a cupcake, then I would fall down and wake up in the basement of this very building. Pinkie would cut me open, chop off my wings and slice off my cutie mark, use my entrails to make cupcakes. Do you ever wonder what's inside us? I'm sure you know, Twilight. I had to see it every night. Every night!"
Twilight took it in. Took it all in. The nightmares had turned Rainbow Dash into the monster that stood before her. Insanity had dragged Dash into the depths of the abyss of terror. Twilight's mind was racing, slowly putting the pieces together. Pinkie must have offered Dash a cupcake, or it had been the sight of her to make Rainbow attack.
"But I can save her," Dash whispered. "I can end it all and help Pinkie Pie."
"You can't, Rainbow… listen to me, you need help…"
"No I don't. Not anymore." Dash argued. "I know you think I'm mad, but I used the knife I attacked Pinkie with… and took the madness out of me! Look! I'm better now! Look!"
Rainbow Dash reared back on her back legs and held out her front ones as though ready to hug them all. Twilight and Applejack gasped and Rarity fainted.
Thick red cuts were all over Rainbow Dash's chest and stomach, and blood oozed out of long slices in her legs.
"It's all gone," Rainbow Dash whispered. "It's all gone now… and I'm going to find Pinkie."
Dash raised the knife, holding it in both hooves, and held it to her throat.
"No!" Twilight shouted, although she wasn't certain she actually said it out loud. The knife went in, and left on the other side of her neck. Dash's body went rigid, her wings folded against her, and the life faded from her wide eyes. The knife fell, bounced off the counter, and ended up at Twilight's hooves.
And then Rainbow Dash fell down, next to Pinkie Pie.
It was over. Twilight had finally finished re-living that night again, but this time had been the most intense. She had never came back to Sugarcube Corner since they buried Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie.
Twilight lived that night various times, and often wondered that if it continued she would go as insane as Rainbow Dash had been.
But thinking about what happened next helped it. No matter how wrong it was, thinking about the tears they had all shed, how Fluttershy had broken down sobbing at the funerals, was easier than remembering dead, unknowing Pinkie and poor, tortured, insane Rainbow.
In a way, she supposed it made her stronger as a princess. Twilight turned to leave. Spike would be missing her.
She had taken three steps before tripping.
"Ow! What…?"
Twilight turned to see what she had tripped over, and saw a small iron circle connected to a few wooden planks. The carpet had moved to reveal...
A secret trapdoor?
Twilight opened the trapdoor and a terrible smell, worse than when Pinkie had died, flew out as though it had been waiting.
Going down into the secret basement beneath Sugarcube Corner, Twilight had no idea about what she would find in the cellar.