Rainbow production is one of the most guarded secrets in all of Equestria. The process of mixing the individual Spectra into a rainbow is known to Pegasi alone, and the creation of the Spectra itself is known to even fewer still…Few know of the process for obtaining Spectra, and none are allowed to talk of it. Cloudsdale has run smoothly for many years and one small issue in the system could derail everything. This is the story of one such problem:
My name is Golden Wing. When I was younger I wanted to join the Wonderbolts. I think that is probably every Pegasi’s dream, but reality sets in and most of us grow out of the dreams. What I aimed for was a simple job that served its importance to all of Equestria. When I passed the Flying Exams, my parents were so proud of me they were crying. I remember going out afterwards with some friends and celebrating our accomplishments. Then came the job assignments.
I was assigned to Spectra Extraction detail. I remember reading those words and thinking, this must be the most important job in all of Cloudsdale. No one who knows how Spectra is harvested. I am one of only a few who will get such a chance. I was so excited, you would’ve thought I had won the lottery…I couldn’t have been more wrong.
One aspect of my job was to never be able to leave the confines of the factory. I guess the best way to ensure that nopony talks about the process is to ensure that nopony talks. Our mail was our only source of communication, and even that was read by guard ponies coming in and out. It was sometimes easier to break off all ties with the outside world than to try to live a double life. I was not so smart.
I had worked the Pegasus Device for many years, and honestly thought that the chill of watching ponies be turned into Spectra would go away with time. It was simple, Spectra came from ponies…Rainbows were needed…thus our device was made…But seeing the faces of all the young Pegasi who thought that their lives were just beginning as they found out their lives were actually coming to an end stays with you. Seeing something so horrible once in a lifetime would be too much for most ponies…seeing it as often as we do, for as long as I worked there is just terrifying.
I kept in contact with some of my best friends from flight school, and tried to live vicariously through them. Every time I heard one of them talk about working towards becoming a Wonderbolt or falling in love with a very special somepony, I tried to imagine what that feeling was like. I think where I failed was that by that point, I wasn’t feeling much of anything. I had become the perfect worker, keeping the fillies and colts in check and helping to clasp them into the machine’s chains. I was able to do all of this without even blinking. I was not like some ponies that actually seemed to enjoy watching this display, I was just emotionally neutral…Yeah, it seems bad that your life would end, but we need rainbows for all of equestrian…
One day, I received a letter from a dear friend of mine talking about the birth of her new colt. I think this was the beginning of the end of my time at the factory. I kept trying to picture what joy this new life brought to her. I saw her training her son to be the best he could be and even the joy she would feel on the day of his final flight test when he passed and moved on into the bright new world. But then a thought crept up in my mind: What if he failed? Failure meant one thing, you became rainbows. My friend would never know what became of her son, let alone the role I would play in his demise. That small glimmer of guilt and fear that she would find out was what made me break off communication with her.
I tried to ignore that thought, what would my friends and family think about what I do? Is this what I envisioned myself ever wanting to do? Every day I told myself that what I do is important and could not be avoided, but that thought stayed with me. Slowly, as if experiencing the process for the first time, I began to hear the screaming of the desperate foals trying to escape their final pain and the guilt built up even more. I found myself a half second slower on the reaction to stop those who tried to run. I found myself a little weaker when leading a filly to the chains.
But the worst part was the nightmares. The screaming was endless, as if all the countless victims of my time there were screaming all at once. I heard the screams over the mechanical sounds of the device as if they were right next time me. The nightmare ended the same way every time, with me getting loaded into the machines by my new “friends” at the factory. And right before I would be dropped into the machine I would wake up, with the physical sensation of falling, my heart beating out of my chest.
I had one colleague whom I trusted above all else. We would hang out after hours and talk about everything. I guess you could say he was the closest thing to a best friend I had since coming to the factory. I trusted Swift Feather, maybe too much. I had to tell him what was going on; I had to try to make sense in all of these feelings.
It all happened at lunch one day. I told him about the letter I received from my old friend and how I was afraid that one day I might have to take her son from her. I told him about how the screams were starting to affect me in ways they hadn’t since I first started. He shocked me with what he said:
“I’ve noticed that you’ve been a little off recently. Almost everypony is affected, but we push through it. It’s not like we are taking the best Cloudsdale has to offer for the machine. The ponies we destroy are not really ponies at all, more like garbage. You have to tell yourself that they have no further use in the world other than to bring color and joy to many more ponies than they could’ve imagined.”
I just sat there, amazed at how carless my “friend” was to judge people. But, that was exactly what I needed to hear for my job. He was right; this was basic educational material here. We only use the Pegasi who failed their final exam because they had no right to get to call themselves residents of Cloudsdale. They made the whole city look bad. But still, there was that small glimmer of guilt, burning away in the back of my mind.
“Besides,” Swift continued, “What could you do? You can’t talk to anypony; you can’t help set anypony free. If you try to act on thoughts such as these, you’d be restrained faster than you can blink. You know she’d stop you.”
He was right, again. We were supervised by one of the cruelest, most heartless ponies anypony has ever met. I’ve heard stories that Rainbow Dash used to be so lively and fun to be around, and very loyal. I don’t know why she became the way she has, but her loyalty to the Rainbow Factory was proven each and every day. She was one of the ponies who seemed to get a kick out of watching the whole gruesome act. And she didn’t care who came through.
Just about a year ago, there was a small group of failures who came through, and Dash seemed to know one of them really well. This pony was shouting something about loving Rainbow Dash like a sister, and Dash gave her no mercy. To be fair, this was probably the closest anypony has come to freeing themselves of that horrible room. This pony was able to unify the whole room in a mini-uprising, and Rainbow Dash went berserk. By the time we were finally able to subdue this escapee, Dash had almost singlehandedly taken out half of the group. We didn’t produce many rainbows that day, and what she did to that filly is still the most horrifying act I’ve ever seen. There is producing rainbows, and then there is being a psychopath…
I knew that if Dash would be like that to a pony that loved her and disappointed her, what chance would I have. After that day three things changed in the factory: 1) the number of foals brought in at a time was diminished, 2) the room was sealed tighter than ever before, and 3) everypony tried to avoid any eye contact with Rainbow Dash. That day was the end of any small innocence she had left. If she was frightening before, she was down-right evil after.
I knew Swift Feather was right, and let him know that everything was okay. I was fine; I just had one moment of being somewhere else. He laughed about it and said I was lucky I chose him to talk to. Even mentioning these types of feelings would’ve gotten me a small suspension for “re-education”. I thanked him and we went about our business as usual.
But still the nightmares persisted.
I took the next couple of weeks and determined to spend my time improving myself. If it looked like a foal was about to make a break for it, I reacted before their muscles even tensed. I was actually getting some good recognition from the other workers, but especially from Rainbow Dash. Maybe it was because I was avoiding her as much as everypony else, but I didn’t realize at the time that not all attention is good for you.
I made up my mind one night. No longer would I be able to stand this life I was living. I decided to make a break for the free world, to tell everypony what was really going on, to see if this cruel act could be vanquished. Surely unicorn magic had become more advanced in the time since we began this grim task. Why couldn’t they help obtain Spectra again? I worked for weeks on what I would do, but it was all for naught.
My escape worked perfectly. With my newfound admiration from some of the other workers I was able to convince a guard that I had a special meeting with our superiors and that I should report immediately. As soon as we left the building, I was able to dispatch the guard and fly as fast as I could away. At one point, I even saw Rainbow Dash trying to keep up, but somehow I was faster than even she, the fastest pony in all of Equestria. I was able to get all the way to Princess Celestia, battling my way through many guards just to be able to tell her of the dark misfortune befalling Cloudsdale. With her help, we put a stop to the injustice being done, and found a better way of getting Spectra…I was a hero, and those who worked in that special section of the Rainbow Factory were locked away for life. I wish that had all come true.
It appeared that Rainbow Dash had also noticed when my performance dropped after my moral awakening. She knew I hung with Swift, and pressured him into telling her about what was bothering me. I guess he didn’t get into any specifics; he just let her know that I was a little off and bothered about the whole process. But this is enough to register on that pony’s radar. She watched me closer than ever before in the following weeks and saw my improvement for more than what it may’ve looked. She saw that I was training for an escape, planning and plotting escape routes. I don’t know how long she tailed me, but she knew exactly what I was doing before I did it.
She has enough pull in this place to get about anything she wants. My brilliant escape felt like a dream, because it was. Two unicorns cast a spell on me in an empty room to make me believe that everything that was happening was real. I felt that I was really flying faster than Rainbow Dash and getting Princess Celestia’s help, yet in reality, I was just going crazy by myself in a dank cell. Eventually, I was rudely pulled out of this fantasy and realized the situation I was in. There was no amount of begging that would save me. I had committed an act of treason, even if only in my head. I had planned to escape and tell the world one of the most closely guarded secrets in all of Pegasi history. For this, I could not be forgiven. There is no point in fighting anymore. The machine will continue doing its job long after I am gone.
They will grant me my one last wish. I asked that in the case of my death, I go out like the countless victims I’ve been executioner to. I told them that I felt my life was a waste to that point, and that I wanted it to have some meaning. I asked them to make Spectra out of me. This is my penance for the crimes I’ve committed to the world. To go through the process of walking into that dark room one last time, getting chained to the machine, having my ribs break so severely that they stick out of my chest, and to be dropped into that nightmarish machine. In this way, I could be relieved of all the pain I’ve caused to many.
Tomorrow, when they walk me into that room, I will do my best to face this final obstacle with dignity. I won’t cry or scream. I don’t know if that is realistic because even now, when I’m writing this down, I’m shaking with a fear that makes all those nightmares look like nothing. I know SHE will be the one to end my existence…and I am scared…Very, very scared.
I’m hearing the screaming again in my head, but instead of other voices, it only seems to be my own.