AN HOUR AFTER THE EVENTS OF "NOT AS PINKIE PLANNED"

Celestia looked over the guards around Pinkie Pie. Pinkie was still unconsious, but had been tied up and was wearing manacles attached to one of the guards. Pinkie had been coated in blood but had no injuries beyond the burning. Celestia sighed and wondered what had happened. She had only got gabbled explainations from Spike so far, who was obviously in a panic. Twilight Sparkle was being attended to by Nurse Redheart, who had seen the explosion, rushed over and gotten Spike to send a note to Celestia. But the medical supplies, needles and small knives in a satchel inside the library were worrying in a few ways. Who was selling them for one thing, and what they were being used for. Part of the library was filled with half-burned books in a huge fallen pile and there was a line of blood all up the stairs and pooling near the burned books next to a bloody knife. The two ponies were not awake and the pink mare was being treated as the main suspect, judging from the blood everywhere and all over her. But now she would just wait for the ponies to rise, then get her explainations. Luna could have a go at raising the Sun for once anyway.

Pinkie was standing on darkness, surrounded by gnarled trees twisting improbably out of the darkness and leaking glowing, dark pink sap out of huge cracks in their bark that vanished when it touched the darkness. The ghost ponies were all around her, groaning in pain and asleep. Then she saw one who was still awake. It was the Madame. She was however fallen on her knees and was groaning. Pinkie nudged her then looked into eyes as empty as the darkness below her. The Madame groaned again and stared at the darkness. The trees seemed to be leaning in closer. Some of the sap dripped on one of the ghost ponies, a small dust coloured stallion who screamed and writhed with an expression of horror when it dripped on him. Pinkie quickly rushed over, grabbed his mane and tried to drag him away. His mane turned to dust in her grip and he stared at her, still wearing a horrified rictus. He seemed to... melt away, falling to pieces then slipping through and into the darkness. Pinkie sobbed for him. He had shown up at the party she had held for the ghosts once, but hadn't attended any of the others. He had taken a lot of offense when Pinkie had defended her old friends a few times. But still, Pinkie cried as the pink sap started to cover her and she clutched at where he had been, feeling incredible grief as it washed over her and vanished into the darkness.

Twilight had woken up a few hours after Celestia had settled down to wait. She had bandages around her flank and a large one on her shoulder and was in a fair piece of pain. She was trying to explain to Celestia what had happened. Celestia listened attentively then said "This is... strange Twilight. I don't know why Pinkie would have done such a thing, and I don't think you would get Spike to burn half your library then stab yourself to frame her." Celestia saw Twilight try to ready an annoyed reply. "I said I didn't think that. Don't start getting annoyed. But we will search Sugarcube corner for evidence too. That satchel downstairs seems very important."

Celestia looked at her pained ex-student and decided to show her some trust.

"Would you like to come help inspect it with us? This is rather important, after all..."

Twilight had been staggering around Sugarcube Corner for half an hour, feeling rather useless. She kept tripping over the trailing bandages and had to keep attaching them back with her magic every time she accidentally unravelled one with a clumsy movement. A few guards were searching through Pinkie's possessions and Celestia was walking with Twilight. A rather flustered guard came down the stairs of Sugarcube Corner.
"Princess Celestia! You should come see this..."

It was a book. There were pictures of many different ponies in it, and a number tacked to the bottom of each picture. Some of the pictures had spalshes of red around and on them. Twilight peered over Celestia's shoulder looking at a page she had stared at a long while. Twilight felt a small jump in her thoughts. It was her old friends. Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Fluttershy and herself. There was a picture of Pinkie with the number "1" tacked under it. It was outlined in pink. The others had splashes of that red on them. All except Twilight's. She felt a swirling in her stomach and wondered what in Equastria was happening. Whatever it was, she didn't like it.

Celestia gently levitated the book into the bags of one of the guards and told him to take it to Canterlot with all speed. "Something is wrong, whatever it is." she said, sounding worried. Celestia, worried? She hadn't heard this much worry ever in her voice. "I haven't seen a few of your friends in the flesh for a while, and with what could have been an attack on you..." Twilight noticed the "Could". "Let's keep searching."

Twilight had found something. There was a barely discernible shadow on the wall. They were in the basement of Sugarcube Corner. Celestia had lit her horn on fire, something which had surprised Twilight. Twilight trotted over to the place the shadow was at and pushed at it. Nothing happened. But the shadow was much closer now, and she could see there was something there. "Princess, can you help me please? There's something here. I think it's a door."

Celestia came closer, then turned away and bucked the door violently, scaring Twilight substantially. The Princess was seemed to be stronger than she looked, as there was a sudden crack and the wall had broken in half, exposing bare wood. Celestia smashed it all out the way, then levitated the pile of scrap into a corner. Twilight had never seen her do anything even approaching violence before, but she looked into the space that was inside when Celestia nodded at it. There was a long corridor. Twilight saw Celestia head up the stairs, presumably to get the guards. Twilight felt a surge of irrational anger. Didn't Celestia trust her at all? Did she have to rely on her guards to keep Twilight under control all the time? On this angry thought, she stepping into the corridor, hoping she could find something to totally prove her innocence.

She emerged into a dark room. She could hardly see anything except some barely visible shapes in the darkness. She lit her horn with a small pop that echoed in the hopefully empty room. The light didn't extend far from her as she walked forwards. She saw the words "L e is P t y" on one of the walls and stopped to stare. It looked like it was made of blood. Someone had tried to rub it off, and only succeeded in getting part off. There were marks on the wall where whatever the missing letters were had been. Twilight couldn't tell what it had used to say. She continued on in a state of anxiety. The blood writing worried her, but her mind felt curiously dead. There was something here for her, and she had to see it.

She saw some shadow that was pony shaped ahead of her and stopped suddenly. She didn't extinguish the light. The pony would have seen it already and she didn't want to be in the dark here. "H-Hello?" she said. "Hello? Hello!" she said loudly when there was no answer. After staring and the motionless pony for a few minutes, she walked slowly forwards. It did nothing. Then she noticed it was hanging a few inches above the ground. She tried to increase the light slightly and then looked into a face she had not seen for months. Applejack. Applejack. Applejack, who had died in a train overturning? Applejack here? Nononononono... She saw that Applejack had rips in her flesh, with thread holding her together. No, no, no... she spun around, intending to rush out, and crashed right into another shadow. She tripped over her banages and knocked whatever it was over. She looked straight into the face of Rainbow Dash, grinning. She stared at it for what felt like days as she leant over it, then she felt the stirring in her stomach escalate and vomited violently next to the thing. Then she felt a shaking hoof touch her shoulder and she screamed. What was happening, what was happening... she saw white in front of her and wondered what fresh horror it was. She felt a quick pain to her mouth and heard "Twilight, stop! Don't panic, don't panic!" the voice was itself filled with horror. Twilight stared at what had said it for a while then looked at the grinning face on the floor behind it. Then the colour seemed to wash out of everything slowly as the voice continued gabbling at her in something she didn't understand. She didn't even hear herself hit the floor.