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Description
A few weeks months ago MustLoveFrogs declared a bold solution to the mystery at the heart of the Junior Gala. She applied the Episode Villain Identification Logic (EVIL) Test to proclaim the identity of the true antagonist and their nefarious plan. (comments.deviantart.com/1/6763… ) The EVIL Test, popularized by Dr. Scoobert D. Doo (known in his native tongue as “Rooby-Rooby Roo”) in the early 1970’s, is widely known and used because it is both easy to apply and fairly reliable for many types of mysteries. I respect Frog – she is a renowned mysteriologist, mysterionomer, and mysteriographer – but I think she completely misunderstood the author's intentions with JG. Her solution is unnecessarily complicated and fails to recognize subtle clues left by the author that point to a very different solution.

In order to understand what is really going on in JG, one need only answer a few simple questions:
- Who was there?
- Who was missing?
- Why were they in those particular woods?
- Why were they out on that particular rainy night?
- How were we even able to see what was going on if they were out in the woods or in a hole in the ground?

It is helpful to first understand the original story on which JG was based. Junior Gala is a modern retelling of the ancient Roman myth of “Veneris XIII” which is about a group of kids camping in the forest and being pursued by a monster known as the Voorhees.

Let us start by considering who was there, and why:

Scootaloo:
The hero of our story, she is as easy to love as she is hard to date. None of the typical ways that a colt tries to impress a filly work on her. No matter how strong, fast, or cool you think you are she is stronger, faster, and cares way more about awesomeness than coolness anyway. (To paraphrase Shania Twain: that don't impress her much.)

Her little schmoopy bear was everything she wasn't. He wasn't fast or strong or brave or awesome. He also had no self-confidence. The other colts mocked him relentlessly and he could never figure out why Scootaloo even hung out with him. Beating up the other colts wasn't working, so she needed a clever plan to boost his confidence. She came up with the idea for the campaign trip with the scary “surprise”. The plan was to set up a scary, but not dangerous, encounter that they could face together. (Note: she wasn't going to pretend to let him just rescue her because he would never believe it was real and she might not be able to play a helpless damsel in need of rescue. No, this had to be a group accomplishment.) She knows about Sweetie's plan, but not about anyone else's or about Babs.

Truffle Shuffle:
He is the only one who has absolutely no idea what’s going on (or does he?); he just thinks that he is supposed to be going camping with some friends. No hidden agendas. No scary monsters.

Sweetie Belle:
She strongly supported Scoots’ suggestion and decided that she, too, could play the “strengthening relationships through shared fear” game to her advantage. Sweetie needed some time alone, truly alone, with just her paramour where Silver didn't have anyone around to show off for. She chose the convenient cave so that they would have peace and quiet to talk while staying dry (more on that later). She also made sure to bring a snack because confessing hidden feelings seems like it would lead to an upset stomach so she would need something to eat. She knows about Scootaloo's plan, but not about anyone else's plan or about Babs.

Silver Spoon:
This was going to finally be the day. She would admit her true feelings and not fall into her old trap of saying something rude when she wanted to say something sweet. Her mom is so graceful and eloquent, her dad is so charming and funny, how did she end up being even more awkward at talking to cute fillies than her older sister?

All she wanted was some alone time with her favorite unicorn. She was expecting they would share a cabin or a tent or whatever ponies did when they went camping. She had no idea that something frightening was planned or that running would be required. She paid to take part and provided the perfect location for the whole event (more on that later). She doesn't know about anyone's plans but her own.

Fun fact: Silver and Sweetie's own love story was the inspiration for the movie “Beaches”. Mayim Bialik played young Sweetie Belle and Bette Midler played adult Sweetie (Idina Menzel played Sweetie Belle in the remake). You wouldn't quite recognize the story from the movie because of Hollywood's obsession with human-washing stories and because of the heteronormative changes they made that completely changed the second half. (They will let Micheal Bay film Transformers slashfic all day long, but you try to get one movie made about the love between two mares and it's “too controversial” because “the world isn't ready for pony love stories”.)

Bonus fun fact: Scootaloo eventually takes singing lessons from Sweetie Belle so that she can unironically sing “Wind Beneath My Wings” to her new hubby during their wedding reception.

Apple Bloom:
She thinks the whole thing is stupid. The plan is stupid. Love is stupid. (Her friends are kinda stupid.) However, being a Crusader means always supporting your friends’ ideas, no matter how stupid they are (seriously, it’s written in the club bylaws). AB's role is to be the Safety Officer. She's the only one big and strong enough to stand up to Babs, so she is there to play matador if things go sideways and Babs goes off the plan. She knows everything about Scootaloo's and Sweetie's plans, but nothing about Silver's or Diamond's own plans.

Zirconia “Diamond” Tiara:
Little “Diamond” Tiara is the only child of a nouveau riche family with access to just about anything she wants and raised with a strong sense of entitlement. However, she also has a stepmother (Spoiled Rich) straight out of a fairy tale or a Disney movie. Spoiled has forbidden “Diamond” from several things that other foals take for granted, such as: getting dirty, having friends or other relationships with other foals, failing at anything, making a mistake, telling anyone her “lower class” real birth name, etc.

As a result of her mother's restrictions, “Diamond” grew secretly fixated on mud (and not the fancy spa kind, either) and on a local apple farmer. Sadly, there was no way to make her affections known – she could never bring herself to actually admit it, and her family would disown her if they found out. Like her parents taught her, she chose to throw money at the problem. “Diamond” paid a significant sum (an entire week's allowance – more than you or I make in a month) to be part of the camping trip. Her plan was that she would go hiking or something with her muscular, apple-scented knight in overalls when they would “unexpectedly” get caught in an unscheduled rain storm. She would “accidentally” slip in the mud and pretend to hurt her ankle so that Bloom would have to carry her. (Not being a fan of manual labor, her weak ankles meant that she might actually end up getting hurt when she was pretending.) She bribed the Ponyville weather team to make sure it would rain heavily in the woods that night. She doesn't know about anything except her own plan.

Barbara Ann “Babs” Seed:
The “Hooflyn Humdinger” needs no introduction. She is clearly playing the role of the Voorhees in this play. She was promised a chance to torment some local twerps and dweebs – and being absolved of blame later – which was all the payment she needed. To her credit, she acted her part quite well and didn't ask any questions. She divided up the groups correctly and convincingly, set them on the right path to Moss Rock, and instilled enough fear to get the adrenaline pumping. Importantly, she did not let slip why those groups were assigned or what was so important about that rock. Plus, she successfully resisted the urge to actually give any beatings (“So fah” at least). She's just doing what she's told and doesn't know or care about anyone's plans.

Okay, our cast is set. But there are a few notable omissions. Let’s take a quick look at who is *missing* and what they are up to during all the shenanigans in the forest:

Sticker Shock:
Ahh, good old Sticker Shock – former member of the Teal Berets, Gamma Force, W.A.L.R.U.S. Team Eight, and probably other super-special forces that we don't even know exist.. Does it seem odd that Silver Spoon would be able to disappear for a night in the woods without her bodyguard knowing? As it turns out, he knows everything that is going on (even more than clever little Silver Spoon) and is effectively the narrator of this story. Those are his cameras providing us with a view of all the action. But, to understand how and why he would have all those cameras hidden through Windigo Woods, we must first discuss what work he actually does for the Silver family and their company.

Besides his role as head bodyguard, Sticker is also the Chief Tactical Officer of Silver Bullet, the government security contracting arm of Silver AG (formerly Silver Enterprises; changed to Silver Aktiengesellschaft when someone decided that the name “Silver AG” was too punny to resist).

There is a rumor that “Sticker Shock” is not actually his birth name. Rather, the tale goes, it was a nickname given by one of his military units as a play on his name and his accent. Supposedly his real name is Victory Rock or “Victor”; this, combined with his taste for extremely pricey scotch (instead of the cheap stuff that the rest of the unit choked down), lead to him jokingly being called “Sticker Shock”. None of that is true, of course - they are mistaking him for this other handsome eye-patch-wearing mountain of muscles: tracyjb.deviantart.com/art/Lac… – and Sticker would appreciate you leaving his great-uncle (by marriage) out of this.

So, if Sticker is watching all of these cameras, where exactly is he actually sitting? To answer that we must briefly discuss some of the locations involved in his work:

Field Operations Realistic Environmental Survival Training (FOREST) Facility:
A tactical outdoor training facility owned and operated by Silver Bullet. The forest is wired up with hidden cameras, microphones, speakers, and other sensors. It is used to train security forces (both Royal military and private security teams).

On the map and city documents the forest is actually the Windigo Woods Nature Preserve. That prevents anyone from trying to develop the land while avoiding most questions about what goes on there. It also provides a nice tax deduction for the Silver clan and contributes to their goal of being good members of their community. As the caretakers of the preserve, the family has the authority and “responsibility” to restrict access to the woods during “dangerous conditions” such as “fires”, “Timberwolf mating season”, and other situations that are definitely not cover stories for training exercises.

It might seem unusual to put a classified government facility on the outskirts of a small town, but that turns out to be just about the best place (besides an open desert). The town gives the employees somewhere to live and provides hotels and restaurants for visitors to the site. Plus, it is conveniently located within one day's train ride from Canterlot. Far enough to be out of the potential threat zone bubble, but close enough to accommodate regular use by Canterlot-based EUP Guard special teams.

Haven ALPHA:
A “haven” refers to a security control room in security parlance. ALPHA is the primary security room providing full surveillance of the house and grounds of Silver Manor as well as other properties owned by the family and companies. Ordinarily Sticker would monitor exercises at FOREST from the convenience of this room because it gave him visibility of all of the other areas as well. Unfortunately, a few weeks prior, a certain freeloading DJ decided that she just had to have some of that sweet A/V equipment for her “studio” over the Silvers' garage and removed several screens, a few tape recording decks, and just about every cable and wire. ALPHA was currently unusable until it can be rebuilt.

Haven BRAVO:
The security center located on-site at FOREST that can only observe sensors at that facility and not the other locations. With ALPHA out of service, this would be Sticker's second choice for monitoring the night's goings on. BRAVO is located directly beneath Moss Rock, which is why it is currently unavailable. The surprise party waiting for our protagonists is currently being set up here, conveniently at the “finish line”. Coincidence?

Haven MIKE:
MIKE means “M” and “M” means “mobile”. This is the mobile command center, trading breadth of sensor monitoring for convenience. Basically, it's a fancy van full of TVs and one large, grumpy, blue stallion parked in the lot of the totally-not-a-cover visitor center for the Windigo Woods Nature Preserve. The drawback of this location is that Sticker Shock has no awareness of any other facilities. The benefit is that he can personally intervene if something happens of which he does not approve.

Sticker Shock knows about Silver's plan. He's a well-connected security expert, so he may know about some of the other plans (including Babs, which he allows to happen without intervention). Okay, enough about Sticker Shock; who else is missing?

Sand Dollar, the Lord Silver:
The town's genial uncle who always gives out full-size Milky Hay bars on Nightmare Night. Of course he is currently busy at Haven BRAVO getting the surprise party ready. He knows the foals will be hungry after getting all that exercise being chased through the woods. None of the kids know about this party. He knows about the camping trip and the "prank" that Babs plans to play (she promised to scare them, but not hurt anyone), but he doesn't know about anyone's secret motives.

Silver Sonnet, the Lady Silver:
With Sticker off following her youngest on an ill-advised adventure and her husband once again indulging his daughter and her friends, SOMEONE has to actually do some real work to pay the bills. Of course, that is in no way an excuse to avoid traipsing through the muddy woods during a storm. Besides, someone has to have the hot baths drawn and the cocoa ready once the soaking, shivering group returns from their outing.

Okay, the stage has been set, the actors have been given their roles, but who is the mastermind directing all of this? Who has woven together all of these secret agendas into a single, masterful plan? The cunning; the guile; the ability to get Babs to do anything without getting distracted, it could only be one pony:

Twistabelle T. Twistimane:
That’s right friends, the original Twisty Treat herself is the puppet-master (her uncle would be so proud) behind everything. She is the only one with the full knowledge of the plans, the only one who is in a position to see the entire chessboard at once.

But why did she do it? Why conduct a complex symphony of so many separate personal threads into a single tapestry? The first reason is simple: love. She is a sucker for a good love story, and she could barely contain her excitement at so many of her friends falling in love but not being able to express it. That was a problem she could solve! And, as each friend concocted their own scheme, she realized that she could actually solve ALL of the problems with one clever plan of her own.

The second reason was Babs. As every good Babs owner knows, a Babs must be exercised regularly or they start growling and chewing on furniture and scent-marking everything. It doesn't hurt that after Babs exhausts herself with some good heart-pumping exercise she becomes less grumpy and agitated and much softer, sweeter, and more affectionate. (Hey, no one said Twist was being entirely altruistic here.)

The final answer is money, but probably not in the way that you might think. Twist is a clever and observant filly. She knows that her mom has stacks of bills from her frequent medical treatment. She also knows that Miss Derpy has quite a few stacks of medical bills and property damage claims, too. Way more than a simple mailmare's salary plus Derpy's small military pension (for the time before her medical discharge) could ever hope to catch up on. Mom would never say anything about all the bills, but Twist knew. If there was just some way that she could come up with enough bits to help her mom out, and maybe a little to help out her future second mom, then everyone would be happier, right? Maybe mom could cut back to only working six days a week?

That's where Silver Spoon and Diamond Tiara came in. Silver has a weekly allowance (probably bigger than mom's entire paycheck, but no one ever asked) for personal expenses as well as a separate monthly allowance for charitable donations. Twist has read more books in her life than most adult ponies ever will because of all her bed rest. As it happens, some of those books involved business law (the hospital library isn't THAT big, so she got desperate). A few quick documents later and Silver Spoon happily made a charitable donation to the new Ponyville Postal Workers Benevolent Fund in exchange for help in confessing her feelings to Sweetie Belle.

Diamond was easier, and willing to throw much more money at the idea. Well, throw money at Twist, technically. The whole transaction involved Diamond throwing a bag of bits on the floor (nearly crushing Twist's ankle), saying “make it happen” and walking away. She clearly didn't want anyone seeing her associating with the weird, sick filly. Besides, at least some of whatever Twist had must be contagious.

Of course, it wasn't all profit. There were a few expenses to take care of. Some of the money went to pay first and last month's rent on a small apartment in Zootopia for the nice fox family. (Why do you think they agreed to leave such a nice den?)

And there you have it. All of the mysteries of Junior Gala: Chapter 1 wrapped up in a neat bow that would make Apple Bloom proud. Q.E.D.

*****************************************************

FOURTH WALL BREAK:
Thanks for making it this far, dear reader. Before you roast me in the comments, a few notes:

- This is just a silly thing I did for fun to celebrate one of my favorite comics. Don't take it too seriously. You don't have to tell my what I got wrong because I am not actually claiming any of it to be correct.

- Yes, I know that MustLoveFrogs IS the author of Junior Gala. I was pretending they were separate amphibians for attempted comedic effect.

- Yes, I know that Frog was joking in that comment reply. That was the point of the thread, if I recall.

- None of this is any kind of canon as far as I know. Any resemblance to actual future JG events is purely coincidental. I have no more clue what the author has in store than you do. (Unless you the reader happen to be Frog or Bizerbit or one of their fine feline familiars, in which case I know LESS than you do.)

Description
A few weeks months ago MustLoveFrogs declared a bold solution to the mystery at the heart of the Junior Gala. She applied the Episode Villain Identification Logic (EVIL) Test to proclaim the identity of the true antagonist and their nefarious plan. (comments.deviantart.com/1/6763… ) The EVIL Test, popularized by Dr. Scoobert D. Doo (known in his native tongue as “Rooby-Rooby Roo”) in the early 1970’s, is widely known and used because it is both easy to apply and fairly reliable for many types of mysteries. I respect Frog – she is a renowned mysteriologist, mysterionomer, and mysteriographer – but I think she completely misunderstood the author's intentions with JG. Her solution is unnecessarily complicated and fails to recognize subtle clues left by the author that point to a very different solution.

In order to understand what is really going on in JG, one need only answer a few simple questions:
- Who was there?
- Who was missing?
- Why were they in those particular woods?
- Why were they out on that particular rainy night?
- How were we even able to see what was going on if they were out in the woods or in a hole in the ground?

It is helpful to first understand the original story on which JG was based. Junior Gala is a modern retelling of the ancient Roman myth of “Veneris XIII” which is about a group of kids camping in the forest and being pursued by a monster known as the Voorhees.

Let us start by considering who was there, and why:

Scootaloo:
The hero of our story, she is as easy to love as she is hard to date. None of the typical ways that a colt tries to impress a filly work on her. No matter how strong, fast, or cool you think you are she is stronger, faster, and cares way more about awesomeness than coolness anyway. (To paraphrase Shania Twain: that don't impress her much.)

Her little schmoopy bear was everything she wasn't. He wasn't fast or strong or brave or awesome. He also had no self-confidence. The other colts mocked him relentlessly and he could never figure out why Scootaloo even hung out with him. Beating up the other colts wasn't working, so she needed a clever plan to boost his confidence. She came up with the idea for the campaign trip with the scary “surprise”. The plan was to set up a scary, but not dangerous, encounter that they could face together. (Note: she wasn't going to pretend to let him just rescue her because he would never believe it was real and she might not be able to play a helpless damsel in need of rescue. No, this had to be a group accomplishment.) She knows about Sweetie's plan, but not about anyone else's or about Babs.

Truffle Shuffle:
He is the only one who has absolutely no idea what’s going on (or does he?); he just thinks that he is supposed to be going camping with some friends. No hidden agendas. No scary monsters.

Sweetie Belle:
She strongly supported Scoots’ suggestion and decided that she, too, could play the “strengthening relationships through shared fear” game to her advantage. Sweetie needed some time alone, truly alone, with just her paramour where Silver didn't have anyone around to show off for. She chose the convenient cave so that they would have peace and quiet to talk while staying dry (more on that later). She also made sure to bring a snack because confessing hidden feelings seems like it would lead to an upset stomach so she would need something to eat. She knows about Scootaloo's plan, but not about anyone else's plan or about Babs.

Silver Spoon:
This was going to finally be the day. She would admit her true feelings and not fall into her old trap of saying something rude when she wanted to say something sweet. Her mom is so graceful and eloquent, her dad is so charming and funny, how did she end up being even more awkward at talking to cute fillies than her older sister?

All she wanted was some alone time with her favorite unicorn. She was expecting they would share a cabin or a tent or whatever ponies did when they went camping. She had no idea that something frightening was planned or that running would be required. She paid to take part and provided the perfect location for the whole event (more on that later). She doesn't know about anyone's plans but her own.

Fun fact: Silver and Sweetie's own love story was the inspiration for the movie “Beaches”. Mayim Bialik played young Sweetie Belle and Bette Midler played adult Sweetie (Idina Menzel played Sweetie Belle in the remake). You wouldn't quite recognize the story from the movie because of Hollywood's obsession with human-washing stories and because of the heteronormative changes they made that completely changed the second half. (They will let Micheal Bay film Transformers slashfic all day long, but you try to get one movie made about the love between two mares and it's “too controversial” because “the world isn't ready for pony love stories”.)

Bonus fun fact: Scootaloo eventually takes singing lessons from Sweetie Belle so that she can unironically sing “Wind Beneath My Wings” to her new hubby during their wedding reception.

Apple Bloom:
She thinks the whole thing is stupid. The plan is stupid. Love is stupid. (Her friends are kinda stupid.) However, being a Crusader means always supporting your friends’ ideas, no matter how stupid they are (seriously, it’s written in the club bylaws). AB's role is to be the Safety Officer. She's the only one big and strong enough to stand up to Babs, so she is there to play matador if things go sideways and Babs goes off the plan. She knows everything about Scootaloo's and Sweetie's plans, but nothing about Silver's or Diamond's own plans.

Zirconia “Diamond” Tiara:
Little “Diamond” Tiara is the only child of a nouveau riche family with access to just about anything she wants and raised with a strong sense of entitlement. However, she also has a stepmother (Spoiled Rich) straight out of a fairy tale or a Disney movie. Spoiled has forbidden “Diamond” from several things that other foals take for granted, such as: getting dirty, having friends or other relationships with other foals, failing at anything, making a mistake, telling anyone her “lower class” real birth name, etc.

As a result of her mother's restrictions, “Diamond” grew secretly fixated on mud (and not the fancy spa kind, either) and on a local apple farmer. Sadly, there was no way to make her affections known – she could never bring herself to actually admit it, and her family would disown her if they found out. Like her parents taught her, she chose to throw money at the problem. “Diamond” paid a significant sum (an entire week's allowance – more than you or I make in a month) to be part of the camping trip. Her plan was that she would go hiking or something with her muscular, apple-scented knight in overalls when they would “unexpectedly” get caught in an unscheduled rain storm. She would “accidentally” slip in the mud and pretend to hurt her ankle so that Bloom would have to carry her. (Not being a fan of manual labor, her weak ankles meant that she might actually end up getting hurt when she was pretending.) She bribed the Ponyville weather team to make sure it would rain heavily in the woods that night. She doesn't know about anything except her own plan.

Barbara Ann “Babs” Seed:
The “Hooflyn Humdinger” needs no introduction. She is clearly playing the role of the Voorhees in this play. She was promised a chance to torment some local twerps and dweebs – and being absolved of blame later – which was all the payment she needed. To her credit, she acted her part quite well and didn't ask any questions. She divided up the groups correctly and convincingly, set them on the right path to Moss Rock, and instilled enough fear to get the adrenaline pumping. Importantly, she did not let slip why those groups were assigned or what was so important about that rock. Plus, she successfully resisted the urge to actually give any beatings (“So fah” at least). She's just doing what she's told and doesn't know or care about anyone's plans.

Okay, our cast is set. But there are a few notable omissions. Let’s take a quick look at who is *missing* and what they are up to during all the shenanigans in the forest:

Sticker Shock:
Ahh, good old Sticker Shock – former member of the Teal Berets, Gamma Force, W.A.L.R.U.S. Team Eight, and probably other super-special forces that we don't even know exist.. Does it seem odd that Silver Spoon would be able to disappear for a night in the woods without her bodyguard knowing? As it turns out, he knows everything that is going on (even more than clever little Silver Spoon) and is effectively the narrator of this story. Those are his cameras providing us with a view of all the action. But, to understand how and why he would have all those cameras hidden through Windigo Woods, we must first discuss what work he actually does for the Silver family and their company.

Besides his role as head bodyguard, Sticker is also the Chief Tactical Officer of Silver Bullet, the government security contracting arm of Silver AG (formerly Silver Enterprises; changed to Silver Aktiengesellschaft when someone decided that the name “Silver AG” was too punny to resist).

There is a rumor that “Sticker Shock” is not actually his birth name. Rather, the tale goes, it was a nickname given by one of his military units as a play on his name and his accent. Supposedly his real name is Victory Rock or “Victor”; this, combined with his taste for extremely pricey scotch (instead of the cheap stuff that the rest of the unit choked down), lead to him jokingly being called “Sticker Shock”. None of that is true, of course - they are mistaking him for this other handsome eye-patch-wearing mountain of muscles: tracyjb.deviantart.com/art/Lac… – and Sticker would appreciate you leaving his great-uncle (by marriage) out of this.

So, if Sticker is watching all of these cameras, where exactly is he actually sitting? To answer that we must briefly discuss some of the locations involved in his work:

Field Operations Realistic Environmental Survival Training (FOREST) Facility:
A tactical outdoor training facility owned and operated by Silver Bullet. The forest is wired up with hidden cameras, microphones, speakers, and other sensors. It is used to train security forces (both Royal military and private security teams).

On the map and city documents the forest is actually the Windigo Woods Nature Preserve. That prevents anyone from trying to develop the land while avoiding most questions about what goes on there. It also provides a nice tax deduction for the Silver clan and contributes to their goal of being good members of their community. As the caretakers of the preserve, the family has the authority and “responsibility” to restrict access to the woods during “dangerous conditions” such as “fires”, “Timberwolf mating season”, and other situations that are definitely not cover stories for training exercises.

It might seem unusual to put a classified government facility on the outskirts of a small town, but that turns out to be just about the best place (besides an open desert). The town gives the employees somewhere to live and provides hotels and restaurants for visitors to the site. Plus, it is conveniently located within one day's train ride from Canterlot. Far enough to be out of the potential threat zone bubble, but close enough to accommodate regular use by Canterlot-based EUP Guard special teams.

Haven ALPHA:
A “haven” refers to a security control room in security parlance. ALPHA is the primary security room providing full surveillance of the house and grounds of Silver Manor as well as other properties owned by the family and companies. Ordinarily Sticker would monitor exercises at FOREST from the convenience of this room because it gave him visibility of all of the other areas as well. Unfortunately, a few weeks prior, a certain freeloading DJ decided that she just had to have some of that sweet A/V equipment for her “studio” over the Silvers' garage and removed several screens, a few tape recording decks, and just about every cable and wire. ALPHA was currently unusable until it can be rebuilt.

Haven BRAVO:
The security center located on-site at FOREST that can only observe sensors at that facility and not the other locations. With ALPHA out of service, this would be Sticker's second choice for monitoring the night's goings on. BRAVO is located directly beneath Moss Rock, which is why it is currently unavailable. The surprise party waiting for our protagonists is currently being set up here, conveniently at the “finish line”. Coincidence?

Haven MIKE:
MIKE means “M” and “M” means “mobile”. This is the mobile command center, trading breadth of sensor monitoring for convenience. Basically, it's a fancy van full of TVs and one large, grumpy, blue stallion parked in the lot of the totally-not-a-cover visitor center for the Windigo Woods Nature Preserve. The drawback of this location is that Sticker Shock has no awareness of any other facilities. The benefit is that he can personally intervene if something happens of which he does not approve.

Sticker Shock knows about Silver's plan. He's a well-connected security expert, so he may know about some of the other plans (including Babs, which he allows to happen without intervention). Okay, enough about Sticker Shock; who else is missing?

Sand Dollar, the Lord Silver:
The town's genial uncle who always gives out full-size Milky Hay bars on Nightmare Night. Of course he is currently busy at Haven BRAVO getting the surprise party ready. He knows the foals will be hungry after getting all that exercise being chased through the woods. None of the kids know about this party. He knows about the camping trip and the "prank" that Babs plans to play (she promised to scare them, but not hurt anyone), but he doesn't know about anyone's secret motives.

Silver Sonnet, the Lady Silver:
With Sticker off following her youngest on an ill-advised adventure and her husband once again indulging his daughter and her friends, SOMEONE has to actually do some real work to pay the bills. Of course, that is in no way an excuse to avoid traipsing through the muddy woods during a storm. Besides, someone has to have the hot baths drawn and the cocoa ready once the soaking, shivering group returns from their outing.

Okay, the stage has been set, the actors have been given their roles, but who is the mastermind directing all of this? Who has woven together all of these secret agendas into a single, masterful plan? The cunning; the guile; the ability to get Babs to do anything without getting distracted, it could only be one pony:

Twistabelle T. Twistimane:
That’s right friends, the original Twisty Treat herself is the puppet-master (her uncle would be so proud) behind everything. She is the only one with the full knowledge of the plans, the only one who is in a position to see the entire chessboard at once.

But why did she do it? Why conduct a complex symphony of so many separate personal threads into a single tapestry? The first reason is simple: love. She is a sucker for a good love story, and she could barely contain her excitement at so many of her friends falling in love but not being able to express it. That was a problem she could solve! And, as each friend concocted their own scheme, she realized that she could actually solve ALL of the problems with one clever plan of her own.

The second reason was Babs. As every good Babs owner knows, a Babs must be exercised regularly or they start growling and chewing on furniture and scent-marking everything. It doesn't hurt that after Babs exhausts herself with some good heart-pumping exercise she becomes less grumpy and agitated and much softer, sweeter, and more affectionate. (Hey, no one said Twist was being entirely altruistic here.)

The final answer is money, but probably not in the way that you might think. Twist is a clever and observant filly. She knows that her mom has stacks of bills from her frequent medical treatment. She also knows that Miss Derpy has quite a few stacks of medical bills and property damage claims, too. Way more than a simple mailmare's salary plus Derpy's small military pension (for the time before her medical discharge) could ever hope to catch up on. Mom would never say anything about all the bills, but Twist knew. If there was just some way that she could come up with enough bits to help her mom out, and maybe a little to help out her future second mom, then everyone would be happier, right? Maybe mom could cut back to only working six days a week?

That's where Silver Spoon and Diamond Tiara came in. Silver has a weekly allowance (probably bigger than mom's entire paycheck, but no one ever asked) for personal expenses as well as a separate monthly allowance for charitable donations. Twist has read more books in her life than most adult ponies ever will because of all her bed rest. As it happens, some of those books involved business law (the hospital library isn't THAT big, so she got desperate). A few quick documents later and Silver Spoon happily made a charitable donation to the new Ponyville Postal Workers Benevolent Fund in exchange for help in confessing her feelings to Sweetie Belle.

Diamond was easier, and willing to throw much more money at the idea. Well, throw money at Twist, technically. The whole transaction involved Diamond throwing a bag of bits on the floor (nearly crushing Twist's ankle), saying “make it happen” and walking away. She clearly didn't want anyone seeing her associating with the weird, sick filly. Besides, at least some of whatever Twist had must be contagious.

Of course, it wasn't all profit. There were a few expenses to take care of. Some of the money went to pay first and last month's rent on a small apartment in Zootopia for the nice fox family. (Why do you think they agreed to leave such a nice den?)

And there you have it. All of the mysteries of Junior Gala: Chapter 1 wrapped up in a neat bow that would make Apple Bloom proud. Q.E.D.

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FOURTH WALL BREAK:
Thanks for making it this far, dear reader. Before you roast me in the comments, a few notes:

- This is just a silly thing I did for fun to celebrate one of my favorite comics. Don't take it too seriously. You don't have to tell my what I got wrong because I am not actually claiming any of it to be correct.

- Yes, I know that MustLoveFrogs IS the author of Junior Gala. I was pretending they were separate amphibians for attempted comedic effect.

- Yes, I know that Frog was joking in that comment reply. That was the point of the thread, if I recall.

- None of this is any kind of canon as far as I know. Any resemblance to actual future JG events is purely coincidental. I have no more clue what the author has in store than you do. (Unless you the reader happen to be Frog or Bizerbit or one of their fine feline familiars, in which case I know LESS than you do.)