Part 4: Targets

..ike…kup..

…pike…ake up

"SPIKE! WAKE UP!"

The purple baby dragon jerked awake and screamed at the large, light-green eyes that peered into his dark-green ones.

"Spike, relax! It's me, Sweetie Belle!" the young, white Unicorn foal took a step back, so that Spike could fully see her. The dragon stopped screaming and took deep breaths, trying to slow down his beating heart; his claws digging into his own chest. He relaxed a little.

"Wh-where am I?" Spike asked. He looked around. He appeared to be in somepony's home, but he didn't know whose, "What happened?"

"We found you tied up and knocked out in an alley." Sweetie continued, "It happened like this…" She explained how she had been spending the night over at Scootaloo's, in an effort to plan out more ideas for the Cutie Mark Crusaders to get their cutie marks. Right before they were about to call it a night, the town hall's bell rang. Spike nodded and said that he remembered the sound. Before Sweetie Belle, Scootaloo, and her father could get to the square, they were called to from behind some crates in an alley. It was Sweetie's schoolmate-she was a year or two younger-Dinky, and her mother, Ditzy, along with a couple of Pegasus ponies and a hoofful of Unicorns.

"Why were they hiding?" Spike asked, a mixture of fear, concern, and confusion was expressed in both his voice and eyes.

"They call it a 'revolution'," A voice came from the darkness. Two ponies stepped into the moonlight that beamed through the windows. One of them, Spike recognized. It was Ditzy Doo, the town mailmare. Spike noticed that something seemed off about her. Her eyes weren't crossed like they usually were, and she had a serious look planted on her face; one that Spike didn't know she could make. Her daughter, Dinky, peered out from underneath her. The other, he didn't know. The Unicorn introduced himself as Pokey Pierce and continued, "but it's nothing more than unjust persecution and imprisonment."

"Revolution? Imprisonment?" Spike began to panic as he thought about Twilight, where she was, and what she was going through. "What are you talking about? How do you know all this?"

Sweetie Belle spoke up again, "Once Scootaloo, her Dad, and I went to where these ponies hiding, Ditzy lead us to a spot that overlooked the town square…." Her eyes began to well up and her voice became strained. She started to sob. Dinky walked out from under her mother and comforted the foal. Apparently her sister, Rarity, had been caught; Spike's heart ached. It also seems Scootaloo's father decided to take himself and his daughter and leave Ponyville to head for Cloudsdale, to remain neutral and not have to "deal with any of this nonsense".

"I took 'em to a safe spot an' showed 'em what was happenin'." Ditzy walked to the window and looked outside, "Nearly every Unicorn in town was rounded up."

So, they were going directly for Twilight. Spike thought. He spoke up, "But-But why the Unicorns?" He tried to keep a serious face, for Sweetie Belle's sake. The foal had calmed down a little, thanks to Dinky.

Pokey answered him, and explained that the Earth Pony, Applejack, and every Earth and Pegasus Pony she could get to follow her were attempting to start a civil war all over Equestria in a matter of hours. Seeing as how the Terras, as they now liked to be called, weren't actively looking for Pegasus ponies, Ditzy had sent the two other Pegasi in their group to go keep watch and report on the happenings every twenty minutes. He went on to say that the last time they came back, they had said that the Terras were carrying the last of the Unicorns to Sweet Apple Acres and that they had sent groups to the South and Northeast.

"So, you're saying that Applejack is the one who started this whole thing?" Spike he ran his claws through his spines, he was on the brink of losing it. Looking at his claws, he suddenly realized he forgot to ask, "And, hey who untied me? Twilight said that the knot was really complicated."

"Mama did it!" Dinky beamed, "She's real good at complicated stuff." Spike never would have guessed.

"Applejack may not be necessarily." Ditzy replied, "She spoke for them, but it's anypony's guess if she's actually in charge 'r not. Or even started it."

Spike slumped to the ground, trying to process what had transpired since he was knocked out by those three stallions from before. Twilight and Rarity, along with nearly every Unicorn in Ponyville had been captured by Applejack, one of his closest friends, and her new Terra ponies. He looked up at the two adult ponies, "So, those groups that they sent out…"

"Probably sent to start more uprisings and captures." Pokey responded.

"And Firefly probably sent the Pegasi she has to Cloudsdale to gather more air support." Ditzy added. Spike knew that name, but couldn't place a face or cutie mark. He knew she was Pegasus that flew around Ponyville all the time. Ditzy took notice, "Firefly's a Pegasus who tried to start a revolt in Cloudsdale once, but failed." She looked out the window once more, "I know, 'cause I was part of her movement." Spike was shocked, as were the two foals sitting on the floor. This was news to them. She continued, making her way to Dinky, "But after I was sent to live in Ponyville, I met my little Dinky-muffin's father." She nuzzled her foal, "And soon you were born. A Unicorn, just like your father." A picture of a light purple stallion Unicorn with a yellow mane, and a muffin as a cutie mark, sat on a nearby table, Ditzy laying next to him, both looking joyfully at a tiny Dinky that lied in-between them. Next to the picture, a funeral card with the name "Blueberry "Muffin" Doo".

There was a moment of silence in the room before a Pegasus opened the door, "They finally finished taking the Unicorns to the apple farm!"

Everypony gave each other a grim look before Pokey addressed her, "Lightning Bolt, go back out with Raindrops one more time. Wait for most of them to leave for the farm, and then come back when they've stopped moving around so much." He looked at the foals, and then the closed door behind him, which was where the rest of the Unicorn ponies lay in hiding, "We'll make a move to leave the town once the coast is mostly clear, since there's no way they'd completely abandon a town they got control of." She nodded and took off out the door.

"Leave the town?" Spike stood up, "What are you talking about? We have to go rescue Twilight, Rarity, and the others!" His outburst was met with sympathetic faces.

"We can't risk it." Pokey shook his head, "They've got way too many ponies on their side. If we went to rescue them, we would be caught up along with them in a flash."

Spike stomped his foot, "Hello! You all have magic!" He poked his head where a horn would be, "If you used your magic, you could stop them before they even touched you!"

"Ya forget," Ditzy added, "half of the ponies at the farm belong to the Apple family. I've been to enough rodeos with my Dinky-muffin to know that the Apples will get a rope around these Unicorns. And as ya know, once that rope makes contact, they can't use magic anymore."

Spike fell silent. She was right. They had better numbers, and that rope. Plus with the Apples at the other end of that rope, capture was almost certain. He looked Ditzy in her eyes, which had still not "derped" as he liked to call it, and sighed.

"But I can still blow my fire, even with the rope tied around me, and-" He was cut off by Sweetie Belle, who hugged him out of the blue.

"You can't do it alone, Spike." She said, he face buried in his shoulder, "Come with us. I know you miss Twilight, but you just can't go by yourself." Spike knew that with the disappearance of her sister, and everything else happening around that made this little filly become a target, he couldn't say no.

A knock came on the door, and everypony in the room turned to face it. Ditzy went to go open it, wondering to herself, Why are they knocking on the door? Every other time, just came in… Then it hit her. She spun around to quickly tell Pokey to hide, but a figure in the window kept waving its hoof. It was Lightning Bolt, and she was frantically signing to Ditzy to get everypony out through the back door.

The remaining Terras in town had found the hiding Unicorns somehow.

The knocking came again, harder this time. Ditzy turned to Pokey, Spike, and the foals, "Get everypony out of here. They found us." She opened the door to where the ponies were hiding. "Quickly, out the back door," she hissed, "all of you go and get out of the town now!"

"But, Ditzy," Spike stepped forward, "what about you?"

The mailmare didn't reply. She just turned around and faced the front door of the house, which was now nearly being beat down. Dinky scurried over and clung to her mother's leg. Ditzy looked into her foal's eyes warmly, "Dinky-muffin, I want ya to go with the nice stallion, okay?"

Dinky shook her head.

"Dinky-muffin…"

She shook her head even harder.

"Dinky," she said sternly, "do as your mother tells you."

"I don't wanna!" she wailed. Ditzy looked at Pokey and nodded. With that, the Unicorn's horn lit up and gently pulled the smaller Unicorn off of the Pegasus. She cried uncontrollably. This time, it was Sweetie Belle's turn to comfort Dinky, and she attempted to calm her down.

"Where are we going?" a Unicorn asked, as the group made their way to the back door.

"I'll meet you all on the East outskirts of the Ponyville." Ditzy called back, "We'll discuss what we're gonna do then. Now go! Before they circle around!"

"Ditzy..." Spike tried to speak up again but was cut off.

"Look, they aren't looking for Pegasus Ponies." She walked to the front door, "besides, I have a little trick up my hoof."

The Unicorns and Spike all filed out of the back door of Ditzy Doo's home, and silently and quickly began to creep their way though the occupied town to the East outskirts. Lightning Bolt stealthily flew in and landed quietly next to Pokey.

"What the hay happened?" he hissed, trying not to be heard, but loud enough to convey his anger.

"It was Raindrops." Lightning Bolt sighed, "She sold us out..."

As soon as she was sure that that everypony was out of the house, Ditzy closed her eyes, and took a deep breath. She opened the door, and the Terras on the other side were greeted by a gray Pegasus with a wide smile, and whose eyes were severely crossed.

"Hiya!" she greeted, "Can I interest you in a muffin?"