A small chip of plaster bounced off Scootaloo's nose, prompting a sneeze. The three of them looked rather sheepish piled on a heap of debris under a splintered, gaping hole in the wall.

Looming over them was a tan mare with silky brown hair and a glare that could slice a pony clean through. “Why?”

“Uh, well, ya said we could come in,” Apple said with a wide grin.

“I opened the door! You didn't have to break through the wall.”

“Er, whoops?” Scootaloo said, also grinning.

“Why did you break through the wall?”

“It was a force of habit,” Sweetie Belle said. She opened her eyes big and wide and grinned as if her life depended on it.

Glaring, Button's mother, Love Tap, folded her ears back and narrowed her eyes. “Force of habit? Really?”

“Fer some reason, most ponies don't seem ta want us in their homes,” Apple Bloom said, shrugging.

Groaning, Love Tap relented and leaned back, taking the time to rub her temple. “I can't imagine why.”

“Yeah. Neither can we. It's really weird,” Scootaloo said. She got up and brushed plaster bits off herself. When she fanned her wings, she kicked up a cloud of dust that got all three of them coughing. While doing so, Apple Bloom bumped the wall, causing a dangling picture to finally pull free from its loose nail and fall.

Love Tap winced as glass shattered, scattering glittery sharpness onto the mahogany carpet. Reaching down, she picked up the picture and frowned at an image of her son trapped behind a veil of shattered glass. Gritting her teeth, she muttered, “Ergh. You'd better sit down before you break anything else.” She pointed towards the currently undemolished living room. The fillies nodded and scampered off. “Please tell me that you can do something as simple as sitting down without causing everything to catch on fire.”

“Uh, yeah, we can totally do that,” Scootaloo said as she hopped onto a lounge chair, buzzing her tiny wings for extra lift. Plopping down, she sank deep into the soft seat cushion that was far too big for her. Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle both hopped onto the nearby needlepoint sofa.

“Stuff usually doesn't catch on fire 'till we start playin' with matches,” Apple Bloom said.

Sitting on the hoofrest, Sweetie Belle leaned over and opened a drawer on the adjacent lamp stand. Her eyes lit up and she pulled out a small, white box with a black sandpaper strip on one side. “Ooh! Matches!”

“Awesome!” Scootaloo yelled. The lounge chair shook as she struggled to escape from the seat cushion. “I want to play with them first.”

“Give me that!” There was a loud clack as Love Tap swatted the matches from Sweetie Belle. Tears welled up in the little unicorn's eyes and she sucked on her hoof.

Love Tap's chest heaved and wisps of hot steam curled from her nostrils. She took a few deep breaths, and her tense posture relaxed. “Why are you even here? Please tell me you didn't come to just wreck everything.”

“Oh, well...” Scootaloo began.

“We were wonderin' if ya'd let us play with Button Mash?” Apple Bloom asked. Sweetie Belle bit her tongue and nodded.

Love Tap scowled so hard that dark shadows filled the fissures on her scrunched-up face. “And just why would I let you do that?”

“ 'Cause we're the Cutie Mark Crusaders, and he doesn't have a cutie mark, and we think we can help and—” Apple Bloom tapped her hooves together as she went on, like she was counting.

“—and you've gotten every other pony you've tried to 'help' maimed and/or killed,” Love Tap added testily.

“We aren't that bad.” Scootaloo poked her head out of the seat cushion and narrowed her own eyes, only to be cowed when the angry mare loomed over her.

“What about that girl from Cloudsdale, hmm?” Love Tap asked, pressing her face down against Scootaloo's rapidly retreating position.

“Hey! How were we supposed to know that there's no such thing as a staring-directly-into-the-sun-with-binoculars cutie mark?” Sweetie Belle asked.

“I'm sure Snowdrop's eyesight will get better soon,” Apple Bloom added.

“And what about that Razorhooves fellow?” Love Tap shot back, zipping over and pressing down on Sweetie Belle's personal space.

“He got away from the rabid quartzalcobra without a scratch. Why are you so mad about that?” Scootaloo asked.

Love Tap lowered her head, growled, and snorted brimstone. A vein on her forehead popped out and she shook with barely-contained fury.

“If ya ask me, that whole 'havin' parents' thing is overrated.” Apple Bloom waved a hoof dismissively. “Nopony supervises us an' we turned out just fine.”

Pivoting, Love Tap turned to glare at Apple Bloom, who instantly froze. The little filly gulped and beads of sweat rolled down her hide. Both Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo wondered if they'd be able to escape in the confusion while this pony-shaped demon murdered their friend.

Fortunately, Love Tap hadn't quite been pushed over the edge. Turning away, she rubbed her throbbing forehead and groaned. “Okay, on the one hoof, these three are pure destruction ponysonified. Even the horseponies of the apocalypse would flee before them. On the other hoof, my sweet little boy's locked himself in his room for three days straight now on another one of his gaming binges. He didn't even answer when I knocked on his door this morning and it'd probably take a force of nature just to get him out of his room.”

Getting back up, she turned back to look at the Crusaders and thoughtfully rubbed her chin. “I hope I don't regret this,” she muttered to herself. Clearing her throat, she raised a hoof high in the air. “Alright, sprouts, here's the deal: I'm going to give you permission to play with Button Mash but if you so much as hurt a single hair on his precious little head—” Love Tap jerked her head up and drew her hoof across her neck, mimicking a cutting motion “—k-k-k-k-k-k-k. Got it?”

The Crusaders gulped and nodded.

“Good.” Swinging her hoof to her left, she pointed up at the staircase. “Button's room is the first one on the right. There's also a bathroom at the end of the hall if you need one.”

Hopping off their seats, well, Scootaloo more swam than hopped, they started making their way to the staircase. Love Tap stepped in front of them, stretched out her neck again, and repeated the cutting motion. “K-k-k-k-k-k-k.”

The Crusaders halted, but when she said nothing further, they quickly scurried past. Halfway up the stairs, Love Tap slammed two frying pans together. Standing at the bottom, she reared up and crossed both front hooves in front of her neck in a double-chopping motion. “K-K-K-K-K-K-K!”

At this point, the little fillies ran for their lives.

Rounding the corner at the top of the stairs, they paused to catch their breaths. Scootaloo wiped sweat from her forehead. “Wow. You were right. Button's mom really is sca—”

Pinkie Pie popped of a nearby urn and waved a hoof across her own neck. “K-k-k-k-k-k-k.”

“Aaaaah!” They jumped.

Giggling, she sunk back into the urn. “Sorry. I couldn't resist.”

After a full minute of standing there frozen in fear, listening to their own hearts beat, they finally calmed down. On the right, the door to Button's room was easy to spot because it was covered in posters of ponytars from arcane games. Apple Bloom tried the handle, but it didn't budge. The door was locked.

Sweetie Belle yelled, “Button Mash! It's us: Apple Bloom, Scootaloo, and, um...” she paused to tap on her chin, “...me. Can you let us in?”

There was no response.

Glancing at each other, they frowned. “Darn. I guess she wasn't kiddin' about his not answerin'. Now how are we gonna get in?” Apple Bloom asked.

“Actually, he gave me a key the last time I was here,” Sweetie Belle said. She rummaged in her mane and pulled it out.

Squinting, Scootaloo examined the small, copper item. “That's nice and all, but he's not in jail. How's that going to help us?”

“Oh. Good point.” Sweetie Belle stared at the key in her hooves, then looked up at the keyhole on the door. “...I have no idea.”

They came in through the window this time, which, oddly enough, was already open. All they had to do was zipline through it. Well, they would have ziplined if the rope hadn't caught fire and broken halfway. They never could figure out why that kept happening. Instead, they used a ladder that they borrowed from a nearby construction site. That guy screaming at them from up in the rafters probably didn't need it anyway.

Inside, Button's room looked as if a natural disaster stopped by for a tea party, a tea treaty, and tea industrial revolution. Posters were torn and scattered about, lying in crumpled heaps or loosely dangling in tattered strips. Jagged burn scars lined the walls in spiderwebs of blackened soot. Gagging, the Crusaders had to pinch their noses as a miasma of vile funk from the scattered empty containers of Rabid Pony and Cheese Oats hit them. No wonder the window was open.

“Where's Button?” Sweetie Belle asked, fanning a hoof in front of her scrunched-up face.

His bed, while messy with a lumpy mass of covers that dangled off the edge, was the cleanest spot in the room. Apple Bloom hopped up rummaged through the sheets. Button wasn't there.

Scootaloo checked his ponycade machine, which was hissing a faint static. She frowned, then started kicking through the empty cans, stirring up a swarm of flies. The whole room seemed to buzz, and the cans that weren't covered in flies were swarming with ants. “Eww. This place is so gross.”

“What the hay happened in here?” Apple Bloom wiped a hoof along the wall, smearing one of the thin lines of soot.

“Look—over there!” Still holding her nose, Sweetie Belle pointed her other hoof at a discarded beanie cap lying near the far back corner. Despite there being no wind, the little propeller was still spinning. Beyond that a brown hoof stuck out from under a large poster of a singing, dancing triangle.

Tearing off the paper, Scootaloo uncovered Button Mash, who laid slumped up against the wall. Some kind of glossy red paint was smeared all over him in strange, messy symbols and wobbly lines. There were broken strings tied around his body, legs and short, rusty red tail. White foam slowly oozed from his mouth and his wide open, dull orange eyes stared at the ceiling. They were shallow and lifeless.

“Button?” Apple Bloom raised an eyebrow and hopped off the bed. She shivered as she trudged through the windswept piles of filth. She was used to dirt, but actual garbage made her queasy. Plus, Button was ominously still and Scootaloo had paled. Waving a hoof in front of his face, Apple Bloom asked, “Button? Are ya okay?”

There was no response.

Sweetie Belle crept between them and pressed her hoof against his forehead. She shuddered. “He's cold.”

“Uh...” Wrinkling her nose, Scootaloo took a step back. “He's... uh...”

He was stone dead. They could all see it.

“He ran out of green mushrooms,” Apple Bloom said.

“He stepped on one too may spike traps,” Scootaloo said.

“He... He...” Sweetie Belle gulped. “...left to enter his high score in the sky.”

“Button, dear, remember to play nice with your guests, and girls, don't you dare even think about scratching his precious little hide or you're dead!” Love Tap yelled from downstairs.

The three of them jumped and huddled together. “He's dead.” Sweetie Belle sniffled.

“He's dead? We're dead,” Scootaloo whimpered. “His mom's so going to kill us.”

“What are we gonna do?” Apple Bloom moaned. Next Chapter: Panic Time Estimated time remaining: 1 Hour, 14 Minutes