"Yo Spike!" A slap across his back caused the boy to nearly jump out of his skin. The bruises across his back and chest created a minefield that one wrong touch would explode in shockwaves of pain.

"You okay there guy?" Scootaloo asked rolling up to Applebloom and a wincing Spike.

"Oh yeah, totally never better." He lied through gritted teeth. His knees were quivering like jello and it was all that he could do not to fall over into a ball on the floor. Scootaloo gave him a long hard look before nodding.

"So crazy about those goons huh?" Applebloom started the conversation rolling. It had been a few days but they all still talked about the random firework attack.

"Oh yeah...crazy." Spike said absentmindedly before yawning.

"You know for a guy who claims to sleep a lot you sure are tired a lot of the time." Applebloom noticed and pointed it out.

"Really? I guess I am." Spike said shifting his eyes uncomfortably.
"Do you think that they'll attack us again?" Applebloom said excitedly. Scootaloo had the water bottle out ahead of time and she squirted her friend in the back of her head, narrowly missing her bow.

"They won't attack us specifically genius, it was just some weird fluke. I bet they egg the school or something though." Scootaloo said self-assured. Spike had stiffened the entire time that they were talking, not saying a word. His back straight as a ruler and his eyes wide with fear.

"What's the matter you afraid of a couple of jerks or something?" Applebloom asked the boy giving him a crack across the back. Spike snapped out of it and for a moment his reprise broke and the mask that he had been wearing was gone. His face contorted into pain and his fists clenched, the nails biting into the meat of his palms. They left several white half-moon imprints.

"Yeah. Yeah I really am." He snapped at the country girl. For an instant he could see it, all of the ways that he could completely and utterly break her. Point out all of the country bumpkins flaws and leave her a crying mess on the floor of the school hallway. He bit his tongue, he could imagine it, her red embarrassed face, as bright as her bow, her eyes wide with tears and her fists clenching her ears in denial and rage.

And they would hate him. They would all hate him and he would be alone.

"Man it sounds like you should get a nap in or something." Scootaloo said breaking the uncomfortable pressure that had been building around the trio for a few seconds.
"I probably should." Spike admitted, he had gotten very little sleep last night, with the nightmares and the memories flooding back to him and on top of that waking up early to apply more makeup before anyone else. Twilight might be getting wise, she had been giving him strange looks over the breakfast table that morning.

The three had gotten to the choir room, where Sweetie Belle was, as usual practicing her vocal warm ups. She stopped when the three of them entered and skipped over with a little hum. She smiled and embraced Spike, she felt him stiffen in her arms before giving a curt pat to her back. They all went to sit down, Applebloom turning a chair around to lean on the back rest, Scootaloo looking out the window and Spike laying against the wall. Sweetie smoothed out her skirt and sat with her back on Spikes chest his legs on either side of her.

He shifted before she finally relaxed again on his chest.

"You feel softer than normal, squishy." Sweetie said up to him, Spike just shrugged, he wondered if maybe they had broken a rib the other day. He wouldn't have put it past them to do so.

"So hows the plant doing?" Applebloom asked Spike, he shrugged.

"So so." In all honesty he had lost the plant, it hadn't even come to his mind until the girl just mentioned it to him that very second. A shame, it had looked really cool, not to mention it also needed very little care as if twas basically in a fluid. Applebloom smiled, her grin wide and dazzling.

"Well if you ever need any help with it just ask, I'm a natural gardener if you didn't know."

"Working on a farm to mass produce apples and keeping a small flower alive is entirely different." Scootaloo said snarking at her friend. Applebloom frowned before sticking her tongue out at her wheelchair bound friend.

"Hey where are you two going on your first date?" Applebloom said suddenly her eyes popping over to the two cuddling teens. Spike looked down at Sweetie Belle who's eyes suddenly widened in realization.
"Whoa, we haven't even had a first date!"
"There was sugar cube corner."
"That doesn't count, we became a couple there, we didn't have like a 'date' date." Spike honestly had no idea what the difference between the two could possibly even be. He looked into her eyes and tried for a smile. He needed to try and convince them that everything was totally normal, and anyways if he did end up killed then he wanted to go on at least one date before that.

"Well lets go out sometime. To an actual restaurant or something." Sweetie Belle squealed and grabbed his head and kissed him on the lips, hard.

"Oh gross now they're kissing." Grunt said as he pulled his eyes from the binoculars. Clunk snickered as he tended to the small flower in the jar, he had been holding onto the thing for a few days now and it was starting to get on Garbles nerves.

"Are the three chicks still with him?" He said aggressively, the boy looked back through the field glasses and nodded.
"Yeah the redneck, the cripple and the other one are with him...why?"
"Don't question me." Garble said smacking his friend in the side of the head. "We're going to find out where they live, they're day to day schedules, all of that fun stuff. Remember what the end game here is."

"They go to a public school, it should be pretty easy to nose them out." Clunk said another swipe to his head and he was sullenly looking through the binoculars at Spike who was smiling sadly as the pink and purple haired girl was babbling in his arms about something or other.

He couldn't tell, he couldn't read lips.