//------------------------------//
// Rest and Relaxation 
// Story: A Queen's Perspective - Rainbow Rocks 
// by gerandakis 
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As Twilight soon found out, that evening would bring a party to celebrate all the bands that would participate in what should have been a Musical Showcase. Arriving in the gym, which had once more been decorated to host the celebration, the five girls and one transformed pony saw a visible shudder run through Twilight who was walking ahead of them.

"Are you alright, darling?"

"I'm fine. But I can sense what the sirens have done." Twilight spoke quietly, so as to not be overheard. Not the most complicated task to accomplish as the other guests at the party where either keeping to their own bands or having rather noisy arguments between them. "Doesn't exactly make for the best party mood."

Sunset walked up to stand beside her. "Right, you're empathic. Can you sense what exactly they did?"

"As far as I can tell, it's not outright mind-control. It's a combination of suggestion and magically induced emotion, mainly anger, as well as increased competitiveness." Sunset looked troubled, but the others looked at Twilight with expressions that made her question if she had lapsed into vespid again. "It makes them more aggressive and more likely to fight. It also makes them want to prove that they're the best, probably why the students are supporting the idea of a 'Battle of the Bands'."

A round of 'ohh's came from her friends, before a somewhat downtrodden Pinkie spoke up. "Yeah, they're really messing up the party." She gave a singing glare in the direction of the three girls standing alone in a corner.

Following her gaze, Twilight saw them too. A girl with extremely curly orange hair, stood at the front of the group, wearing a tight, purple piece of clothing that, Rarity told her with a not exactly subtle roll of her eyes, was called a siren suit. Her gaze was wandering the hall, across the arguing students, but kept returning to the seven girls who had just arrived.

The second of the three, had long purple hair, held together in two straight ponytails that fell down behind her. She wore long purple trousers and a short green vest. Prominently shown on her outfit was the silver, five pointed star, that was her belt buckle. She seemed to be staring at the newcomers disinterestedly, a frown perpetually marring her face.

The third of the girls had blue hair in a single long ponytail and wore a deep magenta vest and a pink skirt. Unlike the other two, she didn't look at Twilight or her friends, simply staring off into space instead. The most noticeable thing about them, however, was that they wore matching necklaces, holding identical red gems that, if Twilight wasn't imagining things, were glowing.





Across the hall, Aria moved her eyes from the new arrivals and turned to her older sister. "Would you mind explaining to me how this is any different to what we usually do? I can feel there's magic around, but its not here."

Adagio too turned her gaze away from the hall and looked upon her sister with a sly smile upon her lips. "But it is sister dear. Don't you see?"

She pointed a finger in the direction of the seven girls that had just arrived. "Everyone here is affected by our magic. Everyone, except them. Something is protecting them. That has to be the magic."

"And how do you propose we get it from them, oh sister dear?" Aria's voice was dripping with sarcasm as she rolled her eyes and once more looked at the seven friends who were looking back at the three with suspicion clear in their eyes.

"They're too close. That's protecting them. We'll use the classic strategy."

"Ask nicely?"

Adagio's and Aria's hands immediately made contact with their foreheads."No Sonata. She means 'Divide and Conquer'."





With the siren's magic still in place the party never properly got going and it wasn't long before the first of the guests started to leave. After Twilight and the girls left as a group Twilight turned away from them in the entry hall with friendly wave.

"Where're you goin'?"

At Applejack's question Twilight turned to see six confused faces. "Well, last time we were here, Spike and I spent the night in the library."

At that, Pinkie's eyes lit up. "Are you crazy?! We're besties now! Slumber party at my house!"





Half an hour later, the six had accompanied Pinkie home. Twilight had wondered where they would all sleep, but Pinkie had said something about having 'sleeping bags stashed all over the house, in case of unexpected sleepovers' before leaving her room and returning a moment later having managed to procure six extra sleeping bags.

Twilight had learned many things about this world, including but not limited to: the human's strange obsession for clothes, which Sunset had been very helpful in explaining, the concept of social media and the importance of 'status updates', which only seemed to her like a crude version of the hivemind, and the concept of 'selfies', which she still didn't quite understand.

Twilight and Sunset were currently using their native sensitivity to Equestrian magic to try mapping out the reactivating leyline-network of this world. The others had tried asking them to explain what they were doing, but the two only got about ten sentences into their explanation before the others realized that, without some basis to go off of, they likely wouldn't understand magic anytime soon and waved them off.

After the others had turned back to video games, another new concept for Twilight, and makeovers, one she was entirely familiar with, the two Equestrians continued their research.

"I've been trying to do some of this myself, but from only one point of observation ..."

"You can only get a rough idea which way they are. With two of us here, we can get a much better idea of how this network is made up. Now ... let's see what you have so far." The two leaned over a large map of the city and the immediate area on which Sunset had started to draw a number of lines streaking across town.

"From what I could find out so far, the nearest nexus seems to be deep below CHS."

"Somehow I'm not surprised." Twilight focused on the large point Sunset had marked the school with. She tried to sense the leyline network and soon found it streaking throughout the city, growing ever denser the more she focused on the direction of the school. What distracted her, however, was that there seemed to be a leyline passing right underneath the house.

"Sunset, do you feel the one beneath us?"

"Yes. And it's not the only one that does that. Look!" She took out several small pins and started marking places on the map. "We are here, this is the farm, where AJ lives, this is Rarity's home, this is the boutique, this is Fluttershy's house, This is Rainbow's, and I live here."

With every pin Sunset placed Twilight's eyes grew wider. No way! "All these places have leylines beneath them."

Sunset nodded. "Exactly. And that's not even the best part, look here." She pointed at another place on the map and let a finger glide along the exceptionally large line connecting it with the nexus below CHS.

"Hold on, isn't this ..."

"Yup, Sugarcube Corner. It's a favorite hangout for us."

Twilight was baffled. Could it be?

"If only I knew why." Sunset seemed lost with this information.

"Do you think the leylines followed you?"

"What?"

"You know, after the Fall Formal, the network lost its original power source when I left. Think about it!"

"The leylines would follow other sources, like ... Like the remnant magic in the girls and myself. The network would have been unstable for a few weeks. It changed to connect the places we often visited."

Spurred on by this new discovery the two set upon mapping more of the network. Interestingly it didn't seem to stretch far beyond the city yet.





Early the next morning, the seven girls woke up. Applejack was the first to rise, being used to it from the farm. Sunset and Twilight were the next to wake, one having always been an early riser, the other being used to having little sleep and requiring less rest thanks to the hivemind. Rarity, Pinkie and Fluttershy were the next to rise and after some gentle coaxing from Fluttershy, even Rainbow got up, if somewhat reluctantly.

The girls talked over breakfast, with the exception of Twilight. The young queen remained silent most of the time, only speaking to give short answers, a serene expression ever on her face. After some time, the others started to grow worried.

"Twilight, darling, are you alright?"

"Huh? Oh, sure, why, is something wrong?"

Fluttershy looked at her worriedly. "It's just, you've been very quiet today."

"Oh, sorry. I was talking with the nymphs."

"Ah right," Rainbow was interrupted by a massive yawn, "your 2000 kids. How are they?"

"Oh, they're doing fine. But it keeps surprising me how different they all are, even the ones that should be practically clones off me."

"Clones? What's that s'posed ta mean?"

"When a queen doesn't get a consort to fertilize the eggs, they self fertilize upon laying. So the nymphs end up perfect genetic duplicates of their mother, the fact that they're drones aside."

Fluttershy seemed unusually enthusiastic at the topic of nymphs. "And they're all different?"

"Well, my entire first clutch, for example, are rather militarily minded. ... Well as much as you can say that for a two year old." The girls shared a short chuckle. "Others are more the scholarly type like myself, they're even more curious than I am. There is a multitude of different personalities among them, even though they're all my children. I wonder if being a changeling has something to do with that high level of diversity."

Sunset seemed confused. "How do you know that much about their personalities? Is that because of your link."

"Huh?" Twilight gave her a questioning glance before understanding what she meant. "Oh. I see, no, nymphs just develop faster than foals mentally they're at about the level of eight to ten year olds right now."

"Really dear? But however do they learn all they need to know in such a short time?"

"Well they have the hivemind on top of normal school."





After their conversation, the girls quickly finished up breakfast and moved out to an empty barn at Sweet Apple Acres to practice. Twilight quickly integrated into the band, greatly helped by the fact that, thanks to the impromptu musical numbers that were known to happen all throughout Equestria and had even started to happen in Stripped Gear and, if her local friends were to be believed, now also at CHS, everypony in Equestria could sing on at least some level.

After a few hours of practice, Sunset noticed that they should be at the Battle of the Bands in 15 minutes, prompting the girls to quickly pack up their instruments and head for the school, glad that Sweet Apple Acres had been built in a time when the city was much smaller and thus still surprisingly close to the center of the city that had long since grown around it.