“Twilight!” thundered Applejack as she burst into the map room, “We got us a whole heap of trouble sugarcube!”

There was a faint shimmer to the air, marking where Twilight had been just moments before she had teleported away, byt Applejack had no way of knowing that. She was too busy trying to catch her breath after having sprinted all the way from one edge of town to the other. If even the champion rodeo pony was winded, then it was really no surprise when Rarity tottered into the room panting in a quite unladylike fashion. Even so, Rarity had enough breath to shout, “Twilight! Get those big book-reading brains of yours out here right now! We have a serious problem and you’re the one pony who can solve it!” It was a shameless appeal to Twilight's intellectual curiosity, but desperate times called for desperate measures.

A pity the alicorn princess wasn't present to hear them.

While it was true it was a rather large castle, Twilight usually wasn't far from the cutie map. She should have at least been within shouting distance, if she were at home. They paused, listening, but the castle was as quiet as a crypt. “Ya reckon they already got to her too then?” Applejack whispered, just in case the castle wasn't as empty as it seemed.

“If they have darling, I'd really rather not find out about it,” moaned Rarity. “The way everyone has been acting today, I don’t think I could handle seeing Twilight’s face with that fake smile plastered across it. I’d positively die.”

“Vhat’s that about dying?” asked the last voice either of the worried ponies wanted to hear, as Starlight Glimmer stepped into the throne room. She was wearing a long crimson robe with a vampire bat motif and a high collar. The costume was clearly store bought, as were the fake fangs that slightly altered her normal speech.

Applejack froze, her blood turning to ice in her veins. “Nothin’!” she blurted. “Ah mean, nopony was talkin’ about dyin’ or getting murdered. Not that anyone was accusin’ anypony of murder, that’d be silly, just taking over their mi-“

The flow of nervous words were quickly stymied by a hoof placed firmly over Applejack’s mouth. A glare was the only warning Rarity gave to her friend before she put on her most charming smile and laughed disarmingly, saying, “What Applejack is trying to say, Starlight, is that we were looking for Twilight. Is she in, perchance? Perhaps studying somewhere in the castle where our voices cannot reach her? Or perhaps she has stepped out for a bit?"

A look of confusion washed over Starlight’s face. “No, Twilight should be here. Ve’re supposed to be meeting the others soon. Ve’ve got a big surprise planned! You guys should come along too!” she added with a big, and to their eyes, horrifying smile. “The more the merrier, as they say!”

That was the straw that broke the exhausted Rarity's back. She fell to her knees and in a sudden rush of tears sobbed, “Please don’t take over our m-m-mi-hi-hi-hinds!!!”

These were not the dainty tears that Rarity sometimes employed to gain sympathy but big, ugly, snotty sobs that twisted the unicorn’s beautiful features and made her mascara trail down her cheeks. She grabbed the hem of Starlight’s cloak, begging unicorn's mercy, which caused Starlight to involuntarily take a step back.

“Ah’m sure ya think you’ve got a good reason for doin’ it, but taking away everypony’s will just ain’t right!” admonished Applejack, suddenly furious. Her cheeks were so rosey red, they almost looked like apples themselves. “We’re yer friends Starlight, and ya ought ta treat us like yer friends! We're not just tools for ya to use when we’re convenient!”

“Whoa, whoa! Where is all this coming from?” sputtered Starlight as she spat out her false vampire fangs, shocked by her friends sudden emotional outbursts. “What are you girls talking about?”

“Do you mean to say you... don’t plan to take over our minds?” asked Rarity, tentatively.

“No! Of course not,” replied Starlight sternly. “I learned my lesson from last time.”

“So... Ya ain’t been goin’ around and turnin’ everypony into yer mind slaves?” Applejack smiled nervously.

“Why would I do that!? I just said I had learned my lesson!” under her breath she added “Besides, it’s not like any of you were particularly useful under the effects of Fiducia Compelus..”

Rarity shared an anxious look and then both burst out laughing. “Hahaha! Oh dear! I can’t believe we jumped to such wild conclusions!”

Applejack looked fit to burst, “Heheh! We've been runnin’ around all day like a pair of fillies lost in a corn maze!’

“Would either of you mind explaining what’s so funny?” Starlight frowned. “I’m glad I could give you two such a good chuckle but I’m still kind of angry that you still don’t trust me.”

“Oh, we are so sorry Starlight,” apologized Rarity.”I think we just let some silly things our friends said about their preparations for Nightmare Night get the best of us.”

“Yeah, we’re plumb sorry there Starlight, we didn’t mean to doubt ya,” Applejack held her hat in one hoof and bowed her head. “Ah think we just let our imaginations run wild there for a bit. Don’t worry none about it, it ain’t no reflection on you, it’s just us bein’ silly.”

“Well... Okay, I guess,. Apology accepted,” there was a sudden knock at the castles front door. Starlight brightened, “Oh, they must finally be here! You two can finish your explanation later.”

The pink unicorn rushed to the front of the castle and threw open the door. On the other side, a furry gremlin and a hideous ogre stood menacingly. “Twick’a’tweet!” “Trick or Treat!” they cried in unison.

An over large pair of wings flopped out from the gremlins back as Flurry Heart flapped into the air. Sunburst, her tutor and occasional babysitter, grinned dazzlingly from behind his glasses. “Wow, great costumes you two!” complimented Starlight. “Very scary!”

“Thanks!” The somewhat nerdy unicorn continued to beam. “I made them myself. I might have gone a little overboard with the green though. Do you think it’s too much?”

“No, no, green is definitely your color,” Starlight giggled.

“Well, howdy there Sunburst,” greeted Applejack, “What brings ya around our neck of the woods?”

“Hey Applejack, Rarity,” Sunburst replied, a bit sheepishly now that he realized he had a small audience. “I’m just in town dropping off Flurry Heart with her aunt for the evening and then Starlight and I are heading to a party at Maud’s. Is Twilight home?”

“Shoot, I guess that you may have just missed her," Starlight looked back over her shoulder. "I know she had been pacing around in the cutie map room earlier, muttering to herself. I left to pick up my costume a little while ago and by the time I got back she was gone. Rarity and Applejack were just saying how they were looking for her as well.”

“We were hoping to get her help in clearing up our... misunderstanding," Rarity cleared her throat. "Though I suppose that’s no longer necessary.”

“Well I hope she gets back soon,” fretted Sunburst as Flurry Heart pinwheeled through the air with her candy bucket clutched in her mouth, making tiny growling and snarling noises. “The suns already setting and there are loads of trick or treaters on the streets. We’ll be lucky if we make it to the center of town in time for the big surprise.”

“What exactly is this surprise everypony keeps talkin’ about?” asked Applejack. “Not gettin’ a straight answer is kind what led us to our ‘misunderstandin’ in the first place.”

“Truthfully, I don’t really know,” admitted Starlight. “All I know is it’s going to be big, and it involves a ton of candy. It’s going down at Town Hall as soon as the sun completely sets. Sunburst and I planned on checking it out before heading for the party. Would you two care to join us?”

“We’d love to darling, just let us stop by my boutique on the way over so we can grab our costumes.”

“Reckon Ah got nothin’ better ta do. Why not?”

“Which just leaves finding Twilight so we can give Flurry Heart to her,” said Sunburst, “Flurry has been so excited to see her aunt she hardly held still the whole way over here. Not that she ever holds still for long anyway-“

“Uh... Where is Flurry Heart?” interrupted Starlight. "Wasn't she just here?"

Everypony looked around for the baby Alicorn, but there was no sign of her. A high pitched giggle caused them all to look out the front door that had been left wide open. They were just in time to see somepony, dressed in a long red cloak, whisking a squealing Flurry Heart out of the castle.

“Hey! Come back here!” Sunburst shouted, alarmed, and ran after the fleeing figure. Sunburst suddenly came to a stop once he stepped outside, and when the others caught up with him they could see why.

The setting sun cast a warm orange glow over the scene of trick or treaters in every kind of costume you could imagine happily running and skipping through the streets with their bags and buckets ready to collect the night’s treats. Almost every adult, however, wore the same long crimson robes and pointed faceless hoods as Flurry Hearts foalnapper. As the quartet of ponies stood, gaping at the sea of ghostly red figures, one or two turned to stare eyelessly at them, before carefully tugging their children away and along the road.

“Seems like red hooded robes are the ‘in’ costume this year,” Rarity joked lamely. "How ghastly."

“How are we gonna find the person that took Flurry Heart in the middle of all of this!?” Starlight worried aloud.

A high pitched giggle off to the left gave the unicorn her answer. “There he goes! After him!” cried Sunburst, renewing the chase. The others followed as he plunged into the crowd.

No one seemed to notice the strange fog that was spilling rapidly into town, or how none of the houses the trick or treaters stopped at seemed to be occupied.

Instead the cloaked adults guided the children steadily towards the center of town, where the light from flickering torches were already throwing strange shadows in the gathering dusk.

Faint music, like a circus calliope, floated through the air lending a festive mood.

Maybe it was the music, or maybe the fog, that masked the screams...

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