Bon Bon took a hoofful of red candies and tossed them into the depths of the basement. Standing in the safe distance, she listened to the hisses, screams and smacks. Finally, the noises silenced. Bon Bon smiled uncontrollably, feeling that her mind became filled with images. The darkness was no longer an obstacle. Through the eyes of her minions she could see as easily as if it was day.

“Lyra! Can you come to the basement for a minute?” Bon Bon shouted.

“In a while!” Lyra replied. Soon, Bon Bon heard her trotting. The door to the basement opened and Lyra joined Bon Bon next to an iron barrier dividing the cellar into two parts. “I just finished rebuilding our old radio,” she said. “It now picks up even the weakest signals...”

“Cool,” Bon Bon muttered without any trace of emotion, avoiding Lyra’s gaze. “Can you, please, stand behind the barrier?” she asked. “I need to check something.”

“Sure,” Lyra replied. She climbed on the barrier and jumped to the floor on the other side of it. “It’s kinda dark here...”

“Don’t light up your horn,” Bon Bon said. “And walk a bit deeper into the room...”

“Are you sure?” Lyra asked. “It’s kinda creepy in here...”

“Don’t worry,” Bon Bon replied, clenching her hooves on a barrier. “Soon it’ll be over...”

Suddenly, Lyra tripped and fell in the darkness. “I’m okay!” she shouted back to Bon Bon. “I’m okay... I’m... Okay?”

Then Lyra screamed. Bon Bon gritted her teeth – any feelings she had towards her marefriend had disappeared long ago, replaced by thoughts about power, but still it was difficult to listen to that calmly. Lyra continued to scream. She was screaming louder and louder, making Bon Bon think that soundproofing the whole basement was a good idea. Finally, some merciful pair of teeth ripped Lyra’s trachea out of her neck and screams changed into gurgling and gagging, punctuated by the sounds usually associated with a herd of hyenas.

Finally, everything went silent. Bon Bon lowered her head. “I’m sorry, Lyra,” she said. “I hope you’ll understand that I sacrificed you for bigger ideas... SUCH AS UNLIMITED POWER!” She threw her head backwards and started to laugh madly, only to start to cough when she choked on her saliva.

There were lots of things about being a supervillain that Bon Bon had yet to learn.

“It’s good that ya decided to help me with that, sugarcube,” Applejack said, watching Fluttershy struggling with an apple cart.

“Oh, it’s not a problem,” Fluttershy replied, panting. “Granny Smith asked me to do it...”

“She hopes ya and Big Mac will give ‘er grandfoals...” Applejack muttered. She shuddered, remembering a large “Fluttershy vs. Cheerilee” chart she once found in Granny’s room, containing pros and cons of Big Macintosh marrying each of the mares. Little she knew that her chart consisted of two sheets of A2 paper and included, among the others, Caramel, Thunderlane, Bulk Biceps, Braeburn, and Rainbow Dash (her name stroked out, with “Sadly, not a fillyfooler” written in red ink above it).

“What?” Fluttershy asked.

“N-nothing, sugarcube,” Applejack replied quickly. “Ah just thought that we should find Big Mac to pull that cart for us. Ya can’t overexert herself...”

“That’d be nice...” Fluttershy admitted, looking at the sky. It was a bright, sunny day. There wasn’t a single cloud on the sky. A couple of young pegasi were just flying above the sky in formation. Applejack was about to go and find Big Macintosh, when she noticed that the pegasi dived towards them.

“I wonder what do they want...” Fluttershy muttered.

Fluttershy liked foals. She didn’t want to have kids on her own yet, but she was always happy to help them.

Applejack, on the other hoof, always thought that foals were like farts. They were fine, as long as they were her own. Having to be around other ponies’ foals was a nuisance.

That was probably what saved her life. When the first pegasus, who looked conspicuously similar to Rumble, approached her, she instantly noticed his teeth – teeth no foal and no adult pony should have, suitable rather for drawing blood than munching hay. Applejack reacted instinctively – she dodged him and slammed his wing when he was flying past her. He didn’t manage to pull up in time – instead, he rammed into the ground and skid to a halt few feet from shocked Fluttershy.

Before Applejack could say something, she was attacked by another small pegasus. This time, she was prepared – she bucked the pegasus, sending him towards the ground with cracked ribs. She turned around and saw that two other pegasi were attacking Fluttershy, trying to sink their teeth in her body.

“C’mon, Fluttershy!” Applejack yelled, running towards her. “Buck ‘em where it hurts!”

“Eep!” Fluttershy screamed, dodging the pegasus clumsily. Applejack shook her head and ran towards her, taking her lasso from the cart. When the attacker gained altitude and started to dive at Fluttershy again, the lasso wrapped around his leg. Applejack yanked the rope, directing the foal into a nearby barn. He hit the wooden wall, leaving a pony-shaped hole in it. Then Applejack rammed into the last of the pegasi, knocking him out.

“What in tarnation was that?” she asked.

Fluttershy didn’t answer, too busy hyperventilating. “W-what did you do?” she asked finally. “T-they were foals...”

“Ah’m not sure anymore...” Applejack muttered, watching the unconscious pegasus. Then she raised her head. “Horseapples...”

They were surrounded by another dozen of foals – this time they were earth ponies and unicorns. All of them were staring blankly at them, drooling and walking staggeringly towards them.

“W-what do you want?” Fluttershy asked. She was at the verge of tears; she wanted to run away or fight, but she couldn’t just hit a foal.

“Brainsss...” was the crowd’s reply.

“Typical,” Applejack muttered. “Just when Ah thought y’all were changelings, ya just haveta be zombies...”

“I thought zombies didn’t exist...” Fluttershy muttered, cowering on the ground.

“As ya can see, sugarcube, they do...” Applejack replied, bracing herself as the foals were approaching them.

“But how’d it happen?” Fluttershy asked. “Who could change foals into zombies?”

“No time for that!” Applejack exclaimed, punching the foal that charged at her, hissing and spitting some green substance. “We need to fight ‘em!”

Fluttershy took off, letting a small filly run below them. Several pegasi joined the group attacking them, trying to pin her to the ground. One of them, a filly she knew as Tornado Bolt, caught her mane and opened her mouth to sink her teeth in her skull.

Applejack wasted no time. She grabbed a stone from the ground and threw it at Tornado Bolt. The pegasus went limp when the stone hit her temple and fell under the hooves of her companions who trampled her. Fluttershy’s face went pale.

Applejack turned around and bucked blindly, sending the nearest foal flying. He hit the apple tree about twenty feet away with a sound suggesting lots of broken bones and possibly multiple internal injuries.

Fluttershy froze, seeing that Applejack was preparing to kick another of the little assailants. "You can't kick them like that!" she exclaimed. "Sure, they were trying to eat our brains, but they're foals! There has to be a way to turn them back to normal!"

Applejack shook her head and grabbed a nearby filly, pinning her to the ground. "Listen, sugarcube..." she muttered. "My friend here says that we may heal ya." She thought for a moment. "Ah've read about it in one book and Ah hope it'll work. Now Ah'll count to three and tap your head... After that y'all should be a cute little filly again, instead of bein' the bloodthirsty varmint ya are now... One... Two..." On "three" Applejack lowered her hoof quickly.

Fluttershy screamed when it connected with the filly's skull. She covered her mouth with her hoof and staggered. A bunch of foals took advantage of it and attacked her from behind, sinking their sharp teeth in her wings, trying to tear off as much flesh as they could.

"Ah'm sorry, sugarcube, it didn't work," Applejack muttered, scraping some sticky substance off of her hoof and looking at it with a mix of disgust and fascination. "By the way, is brain supposed to be green and glowin'?" She looked around. “Sugarcube? Whoa Nelly!”

She ran to Fluttershy, ramming into the foals trying to stop her. She broke somepony’s teeth and trampled poor Tornado Bolt again, snapping her spine in two. Finally, she reached the ponies piling on the top of Fluttershy and started to punch them mercilessly. She noticed that there was no blood in their bodies – their veins were filled with some weird, slightly acidic goo. Before she reached Fluttershy, the fur on her forelegs was charred, but Applejack didn’t care. She grabbed Fluttershy’s tail with her teeth and dragged her to the barn, locking the door.

There was, of course, a half-conscious zombie lying there on the floor, with lasso wrapped around one of his legs. Applejack tied the other end of the lasso to one of the pillars, in case he’d wake up. Then she went back to Fluttershy, who opened her eyes and looked around groggily.

“I can’t... feel... my wings...” Fluttershy whispered, panting.

Applejack looked at her and sighed. “Do ya want bad news or good news first, sugarcube?” she asked.

“Good...” Fluttershy muttered.

“Your wings ain’t gonna hurt no more... Same with the right hind leg and...” Applejack took a closer look, furrowing her eyebrows. “Seems like a half of the right kidney.”

Fluttershy hissed. “Do you think I’ll become a zombie myself?” she asked. “You’ll have to kill me as soon as I start to transform...”

“Ah wonder how do ya know all those cliches...” Applejack muttered, listening to the foals banging against the door and the walls of the barn and hoping that the building was sturdy enough to withstand it. “When we watched zombie movies, y’all always were hiding in the bathroom...”

“I’ve read... the spoilers...” Fluttershy muttered, rolling on her back.

“Well, too bad ya can’t read the spoilers to this here situation...” Applejack said, looking around, trying to find the way out.

“In Killer Beavers from Outer Space...” Fluttershy paused to catch a breath. “That shy filly... dies at the end...”

“Hey, Ah haven’t seen that movie!” Applejack exclaimed. “Ya know Ah don’t like spoilers, Fluttershy... Fluttershy? Fluttershy!” She ran to Fluttershy only to find out that her body was limp; her empty eyes were now looking at the ceiling.

Equestria had seen various kinds of rage. It is said that when Tirek was first defeated, his scream caused the ground to crack, thus creating Ghastly Gorge. Applejack’s scream didn’t manage that. However, the low-flying barn door turned out to be quite deadly, changing at least twenty zombies into a bloody, unrecognisable pulp, before Applejack finally thrashed it to pieces. This, however, wasn’t enough to satisfy her. Her mind went blank, focused only on tearing off limbs, gouging eyes, and avoiding the streams of green acid. She’d never studied anatomy, but she was a quick learner; after a few first zombies she knew exactly where to hit to achieve the best results, such as choking an opponent with his own pancreas, or beating somepony to death with a femur. Only when she collapsed in the middle of the pile of bodies, she felt that her revenge was complete.

“Applejack?” she heard Rainbow Dash’s voice above her. “Are you okay?”

Applejack slowly opened her eyes. “Fluttershy...” she muttered.

Rainbow Dash either didn’t hear, or she didn’t seem to care. “There are underaged zombies running all over the place!” she exclaimed. “I’ve never known there’s so many kids in Ponyville! And I can’t find Scootaloo in this madness!”

Applejack got up, shuddering. “Apple Bloom!” she shouted. “Where is she?”

“Eat this, ya rotten core!” Apple Bloom exclaimed, whacking some colt with a cricket bat while they rode past him. Scootaloo was flapping her wings like crazy, trying to avoid ramming her scooter into scattered debris or bodies lying on the ground.

“I know him,” Sweetie Belle muttered, watching the colt slowly getting up. “He was trying to invite me for a milkshake...”

“Scootaloo, can y’all go back there? I wanna whack him once more...” Apple Bloom said. “Also, tryin’?”

“Rarity always says that a lady shouldn’t be cheap,” Sweetie Belle explained.

“I’m not going back there,” Scootaloo muttered through gritted teeth. “One of those guys wanted to rip my heart out. You know, the one who kept saying ‘Kali-ma!’”

“Ah’d like to remind ya that he won’t threaten us anymore, since Ah hit him with this...” Apple Bloom said, swinging the cricket bat. “By the way, did somepony know him?”

“Nope,” Scootaloo replied. “I guess some of them are not from here.”

“Good,” Apple Bloom muttered, swinging her bat at a zombie trying to catch them. Some acid and vitreous fluid sprayed on her. “Ah’d feel awkward if Ah had to beat somepony Ah used to know...”

“That was Snips, actually...” Sweetie Belle said, watching the colt who was now trying to gather the remains of his eyeball.

“Meh,” Apple Bloom replied.

Some houses were already on fire. Several of the ponies were still fighting with zombies. Many of them were already ripped apart or half-eaten. Scootaloo was doing her best to not focus on the views, but a few times she felt her stomach twist when she rested her eyes on a body for too long. “Six zombies on 12 o’clock...” she muttered.

“What will we do?” Apple Bloom asked. “Ah can’t reach ‘em from here...”

“Maybe we can use that cart and those planks that coincidentally look like a ramp?” Sweetie Belle asked.

Scootaloo flapped her wings even harder. She turned towards the ramp, clenching her hooves on the handlebars.

“Weeeee!” Sweetie Belle shouted when they took off into the air. Some pegasus tried to tackle them, but a short and painful contact with Apple Bloom’s bat sent him spinning towards the fence of a nearby building.

“Eww...” Sweetie Belle shuddered. “He got impaled on it...”

“Not my fault...” Apple Bloom said innocently. “He shouldn’t have eaten those candies...”

“Who even put them there?” Sweetie Belle asked. “It isn’t normal when somepony puts some candies in random places in the town and when you eat them, you become all zombie-thingy...”

“You should be happy that we stopped you, or we’d have to kill you...” Scootaloo muttered.

“Hey!” Sweetie Belle exclaimed. “We agreed to never talk about Diamond Tiara again!”

“We should,” Apple Bloom said grimly. “Or ya may get issues. Applejack says that Rarity has issues...”

“What? My sister doesn’t have any issues! I was looking for them recently and I found none!” Sweetie Belle exclaimed.

Apple Bloom facehoofed. Scootaloo only sighed and decided to focus on finding the way around the makeshift barricades. Those of Ponyville citizens who hadn’t eaten candies were surprisingly effective in building them. Usually, however, after they finished building one, zombies were right behind their backs.

The scooter reached Sweet Apple Acres. They could hardly see anything due to a large cloud of dust around one of the barns. From time to time mangled bodies of zombified foals were hitting the ground around them.

“We’d better go to the clubhouse...” Scootaloo said. “It’s not safe here...”

“What about Applejack?” Apple Bloom asked. “We can’t leave her there!”

With a loud thud, a body landed in front of them, causing Scootaloo to brake hard. One look revealed the distinctive hoofprints on its head.

“I have a feeling that Applejack is doing great,” Scootaloo deadpanned. “Let’s get outta here...”

They darted forward towards their clubhouse. They didn’t go far, when they saw that they were being chased – this time not only by foals but also by some adult zombies. Apple Bloom noticed Lily running away from Roseluck and Daisy, screaming, “the horror! The horror!” before she tripped, allowing them to catch her. It seemed, however, that despite being transformed, Roseluck and Daisy remembered that Lily was their friend – they mercifully snapped her neck before proceeding to eat her.

Scootaloo, Apple Bloom, and Sweetie Belle finally got to their clubhouse. They quickly climbed to it and took the ladder with them. Then they started to look for slingshots and a catapult they had once built – they were safe from the unicorns and earth ponies, but since there were also pegasi among the group, they had to be ready for a sudden air strike.

Suddenly, Sweetie Belle collapsed on the floor, her eyes focused on some point at least a thousand yards from her. "Good thing we didn't eat those candies..." she muttered unconsciously. "I... I had to mercy kill Diamond Tiara..."

Scootaloo shook her head. "Sweetie, you smashed her head with a cobblestone... I wouldn't call it 'mercy'..."

"Hey!" Sweetie Belle exclaimed, shaking off and getting up. "She wanted to stick a straw up my nose and drink my brain! I feel justified..."

"Girls, stop!" Apple Bloom shouted, looking through the window at the crowd of foals approaching them. "Also, Scootaloo, Ah'd like to remind ya that ya snapped Silver Spoon's neck..."

"So?"

"She didn't even eat the candies!"

"Details," Scootaloo muttered.

“Such ‘details’ may help us survive!” Apple Bloom exclaimed. “Who knows, maybe after Sweetie killed Diamond, Silver would become our friend?”

“Are you going to remind me about that for the rest of my life?” Sweetie Belle asked.

“Yes.”

“Don’t worry, Sweetie,” Scootaloo said, looking through the window. “It won’t last long... Ten minutes, maybe twelve before they figure out how to climb here.”

“What?” Sweetie exclaimed.

“They’re making a ladder out of Lily’s intestines.”

“Horseapples!” Apple Bloom shouted, slamming her hoof against the floor. “We’re gonna die because of her!”

“It’s not her fault.” Scootaloo sighed. “She was born that way. With guts inside and so on...”

For a moment, they stood in silence.

“Scootaloo...” Sweetie Belle said. “Before we die, I want to tell you something...”

Scootaloo’s heart fluttered in her chest. “Yes?”

"I'm the one who ate all your ice cream last Hearts and Hooves Day."

"Oh," Scootaloo said flatly.

Sweetie stifled a sob. "And I'm also the one who popped your Rainbow Dash balloon doll, but it was an accident, I swear!"

"That's okay, Sweetie."

"And, just after you were born, I lured your parents out into the Everfree Forest, knocked them out, tied them up, and let timberwolves eat them alive while I watched from a tree and touched myself."

"Wait, what?"

“Sweetie, weren’t ya a bit too young for that?” Apple Bloom asked.

“For what?” Sweetie Belle asked, ignoring Scootaloo, who was standing in the middle of the clubhouse, staring blankly into space. “I’ve read a book Rarity gave me. Foals touch themselves, then they stop and start again when they’re teenagers. There’s nothing bad about that.”

“Ah mean... The tying and luring stuff...”

“Well...” Sweetie Belle backpedalled. “It was... a really bad witch who lived in the Everfree Forest made me do that!”

Scootaloo blinked and turned to Sweetie Belle, piercing her with her gaze. “Witch, right... There’s still evil in you!”

“Why so dramatic out of the sudden?” Apple Bloom asked.

“What you do when we have sleepovers...” Scootaloo continued, poking Sweetie’s chest with her hoof. “It creeps me out, okay? Stop doing that.”

Sweetie’s face became pale. “I don’t– Err... What exactly do you mean?”

“Don’t pretend you don’t know!” Scootaloo exclaimed. “I asked Rainbow Dash and she said that I shouldn’t let anypony do that to me when I don’t want it...”

“Geez, Scoots...” Apple Bloom muttered, throwing a firework into a crowd of zombies. “We’re about to be eaten and ya throw a tantrum over some flank massages?”

Scootaloo looked at Apple Bloom, raising her eyebrows. “I’ve never said anything about flank massages...”

“Umm...” Apple Bloom scratched her head. “Ah think we may get out of here...”

“Don’t change the topic!” Scootaloo exclaimed. “Why am I even friends with you?”

“Chill out, Scoots...” Apple Bloom said, wrapping her hoof around Scootaloo. “Ya know... I lost mah parents too... When Ah was a foal, somepony lured them into the forest, tied them up and let timberwolves eat them...”

Apple Bloom and Scootaloo looked at each other. Then they looked at Sweetie Belle. “Ah really have a plan how to get outta here,” Apple Bloom muttered. “But only two of us will live, while the third sacrifices themselves...”

“You know, AB?” Scootaloo asked, piercing Sweetie with her gaze. “I think we have a volunteer...”

“Umm...” Sweetie Belle smiled in the cutest way she could muster. “Don’t do anything you’ll regret later...” She backpedalled only to shudder, when her flank touched the wall of the clubhouse. “I’m sure somepony else survived and will save us...”

Author's Notes:

If you're not sure what you've just read, the next chapters won't make things better (updates should be quick, since originally it was a 15k words long one-shot).