By a quarter to eleven that night, they are nearly finished cleaning up the library. Spike places a gold-rimmed book called Japonies Cooking back on one of the shelves and shakes his hand as if a crab is attached to it.

“I never want to see another book in my entire life,” Spike concludes.

Rainbow agrees with a tired nod as she places another book on the shelf.

“You’re telling me.”

Fluttershy shrugs undecidedly.

“I think it’s kind of nice. Knowing exactly where all these books are, I mean,” Fluttershy explains. “But I know what you mean.”

Rainbow Dash puts the last book in its place and looks around to see if there are any more books to put away, but there are none. The job is officially done.

“There, we’re done,” Rainbow says. “Now if you’ll all excuse me, I’m going to go home and dip my front hooves in ice water.”

Spike nods in agreement.

“My hands are killing me. I haven’t put away so many books since, well, never,” Spike adds.

“Anypony want to stop by Sugarcube Corner before we go home?” Fluttershy asks.

Spike and Rainbow shake their heads, aggressively against the idea.

“How about we call it a night and go our separate ways until tomorrow?” Rainbow suggests.

Spike and Fluttershy see no cause to argue with this suggestion and nod in agreement.

Rainbow Dash softly opens the back door to her house, careful not to attract any unwanted attention. As she steps into the yellow, flower wallpaper covered kitchen, she hears a voice call out to her from the living room.

“Rainbow is that you?” a female voice demands.

This is what she was trying to avoid.

“Hi, Mom, I’m home,” Rainbow responds.

Suddenly, an older turquoise mare with a pink mane and two yellow lightning bolts as a cutie mark steps into the kitchen. She places a hoof on the dinner table and levels with Rainbow.

“Where have you been, young pony?” She demands.

Rainbow stumbles for an excuse.

“I…eh…had detention and then went to Sugarcube Corner.” Somehow it seemed a more pleasant alternative to telling her she was practically threw her school library into ruins six hours earlier and spent the night cleaning it up.

Her mother, Firefly, gasps.

“Rainbow Dash!” Firefly exclaims. “Detention on your second day of school? Are you trying to get kicked out of this school as well?”

Rainbow fiddles with her hooves and bows her head guiltily.

“I’m not trying to get kicked out,” Rainbow says. “It’s just that the principle has it out for me for some reason.”

“Maybe it’s because you blew up the gym of your last school,” Firefly snaps at her. Rainbow Dash bows her head. Firefly softens her face and gives her daughter an empathetic look. “I’m sorry I threw that in your face Rainbow, but you really worry me sometimes. I didn’t know what to think when you were kicked out of flight school. I just don’t want that happening again.”

“It won’t mom, I promise,” Rainbow assures her. “I’m just trying to adjust to a new school, that’s all.”

Firefly nods in understanding. She nudges Rainbow’s neck lovingly with her head.

“I love you, Rainbow,” She says.

Rainbow pulls away quickly, her Slayer instincts tuned to avoid any contact with the neck at all. She sidesteps her mother.

“Love you too mom,” Rainbow replies quickly. “I’m going to go to bed. Long day.”

Rainbow runs through the kitchen, into the living room, and then proceeds to fly up the stairs to her room. A confused look forms on Firefly’s face as Rainbow slams her bedroom door. However, Firefly quickly dismisses her odd behavior.

“Teenage ponies and their hormones,” Firefly concludes. She looks down at the table where Rainbow’s cold dinner has sat for the past few hours. She sighs, picks up the plate, and sets it into the fridge.

Rainbow Dash trots exhaustedly into her room, brushing past a poster of the Wonderbolts on her wall. On any other day, this would be a painful reminder that she was once an ordinary pony with dreams of becoming a Wonderbolt, but today it was simply an unwanted distraction from sleep. She falls exhaustedly onto the ugly kaleidoscopic blanket covering her bed. She rolls onto her side and reads the time off of the ticking clock hanging from her wall. She blinks. 11:36…11:36:01…11:36:02…Rainbow stares at the clock absently. 11:36:03…11:36:03…11:36:02…the hand on the clock suddenly begins ticking backwards. Tick…tick…tick…the clock chimes monotonously. Suddenly, the hands of the clock pop off and fall onto the ground. Tick…tick…tick…the clock continues to tick, despite its lack of hands. Then the clock begins to sizzle and the black numbers on the clock start melting from the white background. Soon, the small clock’s background is snow white, not a trace of the numbers or the dashes on the clock remain.

Tick…tick…tick…

Rainbow gets out of her bed and walks cautiously towards the clock. She stares at the blank clock in confusion. Rainbow rubs her belly absentmindedly with her hoof. She brings her hoof up to her face: it is covered in blood. She stares at her bloody hoof for a moment, and then begins painting the numbers onto the clock with her blood. When she is halfway done painting the numbers, the clock falls off of her wall, revealing a large hole where her clock used to be, almost as if somepony had punched a hole in her wall. Rainbow lowers her head to look through the hole. Suddenly, a black hoof reaches through the hole in the wall and grabs Rainbow’s neck.

“Your time is almost up Slayer!” a deep, grainy voice hisses from behind the wall.

Rainbow Dash awakens with a start. She sits up to find that both she and her bed are covered in sweat. Rainbow sighs and runs a hoof through her sweat-soaked mane. She slides groggily out of bed and stumbles to the bathroom across the hall. Rainbow turns on the shower and hops in, undisturbed that the water isn’t as warm as she usually insists it be. She stands motionless in the shower letting the ice cold stream of water hit her face as she contemplates the disturbing dream. Rainbow begins shaking. Not from the cold water, but from an even more chilling thought; what if she couldn’t beat the Lord of the Vamponies? It was only a dream, she shouldn’t be so effected up by it, but for some odd reason the dream had shaken her at some deep primal level not even she could explain. Suddenly, Rainbow’s wet mane flaps into her eyes. She blinks and brushes it behind her ears for the moment. Rainbow sighs and turns the knob on the shower to adjust the water to a warmer, more favorable temperature. She stands on her hind hooves runs her front hooves through her mane. She takes a deep breath and tries to relax.

“Your time is almost up Slayer!”