Swartt Sixclaw and his horde walked down the Everfree Forest path, whistling and snapping their fingers like the Jets. Swartt and the other male vermin were wearing black leather jackets, jeans, tennis shoes, and sunglasses, and they all had their headfur slicked back. The females were wearing pink jackets, poodle skirts, and loafers. Those whose fur was long enough had it piled up on top of their heads in beehives.
And then the sky abruptly turned from day to night! The vermin stopped in their tracks.
"What happened?"
"I can't see a t'ing!"
"Everything's gone dark!"
"It must be sum kinda sorcery," a weasel called Muggra opined.
Swartt's paw was straying dangerously close to the switchblade concealed in his jacket pocket. "What makes ya say dat, Muggra? I don't see any reason t' be scared. A course it's dark, dat's what happens at night."
"But not all of a sudden like dis. It ain't right, Chief."
Suddenly, Swartt struck, slashing Muggra across the footpaw with his flick knife. Muggra screamed and sat down, hugging his injured footpaw.
"Fools! Cowards!" Swartt shouted. "I ain't afraid a no sorcery! Now, we're gonna go an' take over Ponyville, an' nobeast is gonna stop us, wit' or wit'out magic, ya dig? Get up, weasel, or I'll use dis knife again, an' dis time it won't be on your paw!"
As he spoke, the sky lightened and the sun came up again. Then it started changing back and forth from day to night, faster and faster. The vermin were terrified. Even Swartt began to be afraid, though he did not let the scowl leave his face.
As abruptly as this unnatural switching had begun, it stopped again, ending with the darkness of the night.
Then a loud booming voice called: "Begone!"
Swartt seized Nightshade's paw. "Where did dat voice come from?"
The vixen tried desperately to extricate her paw from the ferret's vicelike grasp. "I don't know, Lord, but it looks to me like some sort of warning that we should go no further!"
Swartt held on to the paw, glaring at her. "Tell me da truth! Did ya have any visions or dreams about dis?"
Nightshade wrenched her paw away, shaking her head. "None, Sire, I saw nothing!"
"Begone!" Princess Luna commanded again in her Royal Voice from where she was hidden with Celestia in the treetops. "Begone from this site, or else we shall have to deform ye! Worms feast upon any who try to stand against us; their bones rot upon the territory of the phantom slayers! Go now!"
"We're not the only two here," Celestia chimed in. "There are many of us!"
"Listen, you ain't goin' ta stop us, whoever ya are!" Swartt roared. "Now stand aside, an' let us pass! Forward march!"
"We are not affected by thy weak demands," Luna warned. "Ye have no powers to defeat us!"
Screams rang out as three vermin fell, struck down by unseen blasts of magic from the alicorns' horns. Suddenly the horde was in disarray.
"They're in da woods on da east side!" Swartt. "Scraw, charge 'em wid spears, wipe every last one of dem out! Aggal, Nightshade, line some archers up, here- jump to it!"
Celestia watched the spearbeasts charge into the woodlands, letting them get sufficiently far from the path before nodding to her sister. Half of the spear carriers were brought down by more blasts of magical energy. The rest turned to run back in a panic. What little order remained in the ranks instantly disintegrated as all of the rats, weasels, ferrets, and foxes took to their heels and fled for their lives.
Swartt looked around wildy. He could not stop the horde retreating deeper into the woods; they ignored his commands. "Stop!" he yelled. "What are ya runnin' from, some ragtailed little bunch o' horsies? Stand an' fight! You're a bunch of jive squares!"
A flutter of wings above him caused him to look up. In the sky, he saw two great horse-like creatures, with wings and horns. Silently, the ferret decided that discretion was the better part of valor and fled too.
When the last of the vermin had gone, Celestia and Luna flew back down to the forest floor. "We did a great thing here today, eh sister?" said Luna.
"Yes, it was risky, but we pulled it off, just as we did with King Mortspear and his army all those years ago," said Celestia.
Then she noticed something moving down in a ditch. She went to investigate. It was a baby ferret! "Look what I found," she called to her sister.
"What is it?"
"It looks like one of their young that they left behind." Celestia tried to pick the ferretbabe up, but it bit her hoof. The pony princess drew back.
"What are we supposed to do with him?" Luna demanded. "We can't just go catch up with the vermin and say, 'Here's your baby that you forgot!'"
"I suppose we'll have to take him to Bella and Sunflash and talk it over with them," Celestia sighed.
There was silence. Luna touched the ferretbabe gently, and it bit her too. Stonefaced, she watched the small creature licking its teeth, savoring the taste of blood, and said, "I know 'tis a hard thing to say about an infant creature, but I predict that no good will ever come of this one. Don't ask me why, I just feel it in my hooves!"
