[ponyville][SAA][CMC][OPEN]Wha...huh? what happened?

[Ashton]

Scootaloo

Celestia's sun cast it's first ray of light over the town, illuminating the clouds that the workers were breaking up, and slowly making it's way to the farm, where in the west field, it landed on the eyelids of a magenta pegasus filly. her eyes slowly opened and looked around... what happened? She remembered school yesterday... and she was going to meet the other CMC at the clubhouse, then everything was a blur and now she was... where was she exactly?

Scotoaloo struggled to her feet, sore from sleeping in the hard ground "even the beds in the home are softer than this..." she muttered as she looked around "looks like I'm in the field of sweet apple acres... but... how did I get here?" she asked, scratching her head, making a long twig that was tangled in her mane shake. Her mane and wings had hair and feathers pointing on all directions, as well as debris caught in them from her night under the trees...

Just what HAD happened?

[SteelEagle]

Sweetie Belle slept as sound as a sleeping filly could even though she made lots and lots of sound. She didn't really know if she was snoring quite that loud or if her parents and Rarity were just exaggerating, but she often found herself sleeping outside her room often. Usually it was on the coach. She slept so soundly that she often didn't even really feel being moved, which was a pretty good thing because she imagined it'd feel scary and she'd probably cry and that was never a good thing! The important thing was that her Crusader friends had never said she had a snoring problem. Maybe they had but she was too sleepy to hear it and they weren't big enough to carry her away, so she would just believe she wasn't a big snoring machine. The idea made her want to close her muzzle shut- snores sounded so crude and brutish and not at all like what she wanted to sound like. Obviously she didn't snore. Or didn't want to believe she did. Which she didn't, unless she did, which she didn't think she did.

But none of that mattered because snore or not, she woke up woozily on a tree branch, hanging like a piece of laundry being dried as Scootaloo fell to the ground with a thud. It took her a few seconds to become aware of her surrounding but soon Sweetie Belle shook her head and woke- and met immediately with the crushing pain that came with sleeping on a tree branch in that manner, her midsection in terrible aches and pain. She didn't register that as much as immediate shock and fear.

“Ahhhhh!“ She screamed before flailing about, knocking leaves and twigs off before falling off, still screaming with her legs and hooves flailing. Luckily she crashed not into the hard ground but a soft pegasus, smack dab on top of Scootaloo. She cushioned the fall so much for her unicorn friend that Sweetie Belle rolled right off, shaking her head as two leaves fell right on Scootaloo's eyes. Sweetie gave her Crusader pal the once-over and then pulled her up. “Thanks for catching me, Scootaloo! Do you have any idea how we ended up there? I don't remember much aside from the leopard trap!"

[Ashton]

Scootaloo let out a grunt that might have been a naughty word, but it was mangled by how fast the air was knocked out of the tiny pegasus as she pushed herself up again "no... problem..." she said, reaching around to rub her aching wings and back where SB had landed. luckily she wasn't heavy enough to do any permanent damage, but it still hurt "yeah... I dont remember much either" she said "your ahead of me with the leopard trap, I just remember heading to the clubhouse after school..." she groaned "did applebloom trick us into drinking another of her botched potions or something?" she asked, looking around, wondering if she'd ever even made it to the clubhouse last night or not...

[Rosewind]

Apple Bloom made her way across the front of Sweet Apple Acres farmstead, enjoying the first breath of the day. Dewy leaves, tweeting birds, and the ever-present smell of ripening apples graced her senses. She was certainly a down-to-earth filly, being an Earth Pony especially -- she did enjoy the little things, which she reckoned added to the grand whole of everything. Her stomach grumbled loudly; she had been up rather late last night, but she couldn't really remember much, outside of a leopard trap. And a cupcake. She blinked, inwardly wondering to herself how and what, and most importantly -- why -- she was here, right now, without any real recollection of recent events.

She blinked sleep out of her eyes, noticing a blob of orange and yellow in her peripheral vision. She knew those blob colors anywhere! The young filly broke into a gallop, making her way to her friends.

"Er, mornin' ya'll! Say, what are ya doin' here so early? Did our plan last night work ... er, whatever that plan was?" She tilted her head to the side, giving her friends a quizzical look.

[SteelEagle]

Ahh, so they went to the clubhouse after the trap! Or did they go before the trap to discuss what to do, which in turn led to the trap discussion? Did they even discuss the trap or did they just start doing it? Now that she was thinking about it, what was a leopard trap? It made so much more sense last night and it would make just as much sense now if she could remember it, but she couldn't even touch the outer rim of understanding anything except the fact that last night they made leopard traps. It made her brain hurt in a real manner and not in the metaphysical sense that Rarity meant when she stared at Sweetie Belle after she explained what the Crusaders were up to. She rubbed her mane, head, and eyes a bit to get the pounding to go away to no avail. Dumb pounding head, stop being so poundinging! Maybe unicorns had more pounding brains than the other pony types did?

As that question rumbled across her pounding brain, Apple Bloom came upon her allies in crusading. Any hope that the de facto leader of the trio could shed any light on this poorly lit situation was dashed like the dashed lights that had once illuminated it. So they had a plan involving leopard traps and the clubhouse was somewhere in the mix. Hmm. Huh. Ehuh. Ehh. Nope, nothing, even as she squinted and tried really hard to come up with the answer to the question they were all asking.

“Hmm, I don't know at all, Apple Bloom. Do we have out cutie marks?" Sweetie Belle looked at her flank. Nope, nothing. “Not over here, so I guess not. All I can remember is that we had polka dots somewhere. Scootaloo, do you remember the polka dots? Oh, and why is my tail shaved- WAIT!" She said, suddenly pulling her tail under her in shame. Why the heck was her tail shaved SUPER SHORT?!

[Ashton]

Scootaloo looked from one of her friends to the over and scratched her head, this was making less and less sence, she had to fight not to laugh but a snicker still crept out "maybe we were in the trees because a leopard bit your tail and got all the fur?" she suggested "whatever a leopard is..." she added, more confused than before "Hey Applebloom, you need to grow softer trees" she said, trying to make a joke "sweeteibelle and I slept in one last night... and we cant remember anything about why though..." she admitted "hey wait, we didnt have twilight time yesterday, did we? maybe one of Twilights spells misfired again! No, wait, it's not tuesday... is it?" she asked, confusing herself again

[Rosewind]

Apple Bloom shook her head. Something felt off. "Er no, Twilight Time was a few days ago! We had to skip the last one so she could clean up the fire thing that happened." Her yellow cheeks blushed a ruddy shade of pink. Her attention quickly turned to Sweetie's tail. She had admittedly been secretly envious of Sweetie's tail -- with the fanciful, curly locks of multicolored mane. Apple Bloom had, well, a tail. She considered it quite pedestrian; not to say she wasn't proud of her mane, but she did wonder what it would be like to have the whole polychromatic hair thing going on. Nevertheless, a true sin had been committed. She poked Sweetie's tail, blinking her yellow eyes worriedly.

"Girls, there's nuthin', and ah say nuthin' that would make getting our cutie marks worth cutting up poor 'ol Sweetie's tail. Ah'd rather be a blank flank for the rest of mah days!" Apple Bloom still felt something was way off. Her head felt lighter. She reached her hooves up. Her mane seemed fine, just lighter. She swallowed hard, grasping at the back of her head. "Mah bow! It's...it's gone!"

[SteelEagle]

Sweetie's tail found a warm and safe spot to hide from the terrible terribleness of the sun in all of it's tail-shaving revealing light. What the hay had happened? Her tail was so pretty! She wasn't one to brag about most things but she'd brag about her tail and mane. Rarity helped her and Sweetie Belle was happy to say that at least in that one area she had really lived up to the trust her sster had placed in her. Now her tail as shaved like some sort of rat, and not one of the nice and cute mice but a real ugly and mean rat who didn't have friends because he kept on biting little fillies in the hoof and then running away. And then Sweetie had to get all sorts of shots and that taught her to be afraid of rats and now she felt like the former Missus Bigglesworth the Third. A rat.

And then a second massive revelation- Apple Bloom's bow was missing! Oh no oh no! What was going on here- was Scootaloo right and did whatever they did last night involving a jaguar come back to bite them in the flank or, in Sweetie's case, tail? Of course it wouldn't solve the bow dilemma but who knew!

“Your bow! But your bow is so pretty, Apple Bloom!” Sweetie Belle groaned in exasperated worry, her eyes darting from Apple Bloom to Scootaloo. Sweetie was missing parts of her tail and Apple Bloom her bow- which was the bigger disaster, who could tell?!- but what about Scootaloo? Surely she was missing something as well, right? “Scootaloo, are YOU missing anything? And I think we bbetter start retracing our hoofsteps from last night. I don't want to live as a blank flank with an ugly tail forever!”

[Ashton]

Scootaloo quickly checked her own tail and mane, and even her wings --- not that she wouldn't have noticed her wings vanishing, but she was being careful "I dont think... wait, where are my bags?" she asked "Where's my Rainbow Dash Plushie!?" she exclaimed, looking all around, completely ignorant of how very immature and childish it sounded to be worried about a plushie, and even more to be carrying it around with her "It took me months to collect tall that mane and tail hair without rainbow noticing!" she whined, not realizing just how stalkerish that sounded... of course that part probably didnt suprise her friends at all, given her obsession with the older pegasus...

"Did that leopard thing we were trying to trap steal our stuff?" she asked "Can we track it back to it's tree?" she added, assuming since the trap was in a tree that leopards lived in trees........

[Rosewind]

Apple Bloom bit her lower lip. She never considered herself a tomfilly, but she certainly felt like one at the moment. Her bow was an important part of her character. It gave her a certain feminine je ne sais quoi. It was bright, pink, and bold. It stood against wind and rain, just like her family. She was proud of that bow. It was her. She quickly swallowed her anxiety and doubt -- her friends were also missing important things to them, and they came first. It was the Crusader way. Apple Bloom actually admired Scoot's Rainbow Plushie. Stalking Rainbow for hours and hours to get different colored bits of her mane took weeks. It was a labor of love, and as an Earth Pony, Apple Bloom understood and appreciated labors of love. Again, it was the Apple creedo. Maybe it was a little bit weird, but she conspired to herself that everypony had a little weird in them. It's what made a pony unique!

"Hmm, ah like that idear! Let's retrace our steps, startin' with waking up yesterday before all that leopard business! Where did ya'll wake up? Ah remember it was kinda cloudy, 'an I started the day in mah room. Since we're already here at the farm, maybe we should check there first?" She looked left and right between her two friends, cracking an awkward grin. At this point, any plan was a good plan.

[SteelEagle]

Were there thieving leopards rolling around Equestria and stealing filly tails and pretty bows and kind of creepy dolls made from real pieces of a mare's mane? It would e really strange to see and even odder to think that a trio of fillies cold have ever hoped to pen them up with traps, stopping their thieving for the day. Maybe that was what they were trying to do. Building traps for the thieving leopards to try and stop the leopards from thievering some more stuff but they failed so the leopades thieveried all over the Crusaders. Well, that was just plain mean and she didn't like them much if that was what the leopard thieves were all about. She generally tried to think well of other creatures but it was a truth that sometimes some things were simply bad. She hoped they weren't thievering leopards and instead this was all a big misunderstanding and they'd share ice cream by the end of the day. Did leopards eat ice cream? They'd have to find out. Cutie Mark Crusader leopard ice cream sharers, yay? Ehhh, maybe not so much.

Apple Bloom agreed with the idea of retracing their steps. That was good. Apple Bloom was their leaderish sort of figure and she was quick om her hooves. And quick on her mind, too! Overall, she was just quick. Maybe not as quick as Scootaloo an on her scooter, but quick. So ig they were going to retrace their steps they'd have to do it as quickly as Apple Bloom, which would also help Sweetie Belle move fast enough to try and hide the fact her tail was a terror to the eyes. If Rarity saw it she might faint and without a couch around to catch her the result may be bad, so better to wrap this up quickly!

“Let's start there, Apple Bloom. My sky was just as cloudy, but I thought I saw a snake in the bathroom and I couldn't go back to sleep. Turned out it was just one of Rarity's new patterned robes. But it seems like my room is really far away so your room will probably tell us more about the leopard thieveries. Come on Scootaloo, let's go find your creepy Rainbow Dash doll!” Sweetie exclaimed as she bounded off towards Apple Bloom's room.

[Rosewind]

Apple Bloom broke into a trot beside her friends as they made their way toward the homestead of Sweet Apple Acres. It loomed in the distance, dotted on all sides by the apple orchards, and of course the great red barn. An idea quickly flashed in Apple Bloom's mind. "Hey, Sweetie! Ya'll know ah have more than one bow. Maybe once we get to mah room, ya'll could wear one on yer tail! Your big sister would just die if she saw it right now! Like, dead, cold, and buried dead." She accented the last few of her words with a serious dead-pan. She was being facetious, but in all actuality, she was just plain right about that. Rarity could barely stand when Sweetie had bed mane, so she was sure that a shaved tail was an entirely new tier of freak out.

Once, Apple Bloom had tried to trim her own mane, with obvious results. Of course when her big sister saw it, she bust out laughing. It was a rite of passage for any young filly to cut her own mane, mess it up, then spend the next month at school with a weird hat on, or perhaps an entirely different mane do. She shook away her reverie, glancing over her shoulder. "Ya'll comin', Scoots?!"