"Well, I'm sure you're both pretty immune to the kind of stuff they're using, maybe you two should be focused on getting people out of the way?" Sunset gestured at Marble. "And take your sister. If anyone can help us clean up after this, it's her."
"Oh. Um." Marble clenched her hands together in her lap and looked from one Pinkie to the other. Life was complicated. "I guess I can help, I just don't think I can do this easily. Trixie was—She has a strong sense of self. Freeing her mind just required me to free that small—big—part of her."
"Trixie is—" Cutting off Trixie wrestled with her conscience and clamped her teeth together. "Thank you." The words barely got free past her clenched jaw. That she still felt calm whenever she thought about Marble rankled in Trixie's mind, not that she could do anything to fight the sensation, since thinking about it calmed her. "Trixie will help with these efforts too."
Sunset liked the idea of having a plan this time. "So that leaves us to fight them together. Will music be the answer again?"
"Music will always be the best and worst way to fight them," Sonata said. "If you know you can beat them with music, and I think you can, then you fight them with music. You don't have your friend's car this time."
Rainbow snorted. "I can call Flash. I'm not sure if you guys have seen what he did with his car, but there's no back seat in it anymore—just speakers."
Don't admit to knowing that. Don't admit to knowing that. Don't admit to knowing that. Sunset's thoughts chased the words around. All she had to do was admit to not knowing that Flash's car lacked a back seat.
"We'll probably all need to play then, won't we?" Human Pinkie Pie asked.
"Lucky we've got two Pinkie Pies—Wait. Is the plural of Pinkie Pie Pinkie Pies, or Pinkies Pie? Maybe we could be the Pinkettes?" Pony Pinkie Pie asked.
"Whatever we play, it needs to be from the heart. That was how we beat them before, and it's how we'll do it again." Rainbow Dash looked around her friends—all her friends—and gave each a supportive smile. "We're gonna need someone to play bass, though."
"I can handle that. I know all our songs and I have a bass in my bedroom." Walking to the hallway, Sunset was already halfway to the bedroom she shared with Pinkie Pie (and sometimes Pinkie Pie) as she heard the others start scattering to get their own instruments.
Unlike the others, Rainbow had to run home to get her guitar, not that it made her significantly slower in returning to the living room with her instrument. Just leaning on her magic had made her legs itch to move, and with little conscious effort she was running faster than any car could drive.
She was home and back just as Sunset walked back down the hallway. Opening the dark case, Rainbow lifted her guitar out and felt its eagerness to be played. To her, it almost felt like the guitar was alive—a thing that wanted to play with her to create music. Her magic was in the guitar.
When she settled the strap over her shoulder, Rainbow felt eagerness in her guitar. "Yeah, we're gonna rock 'em."
"Well, it's alright for all of you to just plug up into Flash's car stereo and do your thing. Drums aren't exactly easy to carry, you know. Then we have to worry about the sound check, and—" Pinkie Pie stopped as Pinkie Pie poker her shoulder. "Huh?"
"I can help, silly. Two Pinkies are better than one!"
"Don't I know it." The moment the words left Sunset's mouth, she knew she was in trouble. Two pink-on-pink demons bounced over to her and hugged her from opposing sides. Fighting her girlfriend and her girlfriend's doppelganger was not on the cards for Sunset, so instead she put an arm around each as they neared her and relaxed as they kissed each of her cheeks.
"Huh. You know, I didn't realize they'd all gotten together like that. Neat." Rainbow, her own life a complicated tangle of lives and loves, could appreciate finding solace in more than one partner. "So we're going there now?"
"That's probably my cue to leave, I think. I won't be much good in a fight." Lavender kept telling herself that as much as she could in her head, but actually saying it made her feel like a wet blanket. "U-Unless you need me to help with—"
"You can help Trixie," Trixie said. "Sorry for being stuck speaking like this. Trixie knows she's normally not this bad, but feeling more great and powerful is helping to keep Trixie on track. Anyway, do you want to help?"
Lavender hadn't been part of the solution the previous time the sirens had done their thing—quite the opposite. She wanted revenge for having been used. "Alright. What are we going to do?"
"Trixie and at least one of her illusions are going to save everyone while they—" Trixie nodded her head toward the friends getting their instruments ready, "—distract the bad guys." She turned to look at Marble. "Would you like to be an Illusion, too?"
"W-What's an illusion. Err, what's an illusion in this context?" Marble felt oddly okay with the close group of people she was with. She knew the parasite in her head was trying to rewire her to at least find one stable partner for food, but it almost seemed like it was making her just a little more outgoing.
"Trixie and the Illusions is Trixie's group!" Trixie struck a pose and was pleased to see Lavender strike a complimentary one. "And we seem to be down one Illusion."
"Are you three coming, or what?" Rainbow and her friends were almost heading out the door when they realized they were three extras short. "Let's go be the heroes!"
"They're going to fight something, aren't they?" Thunderbolt asked.
"I hate it too." Spicy had already closed the store and was sitting on the couch in his flat, leaning against Thunderbolt while the dragon ran pointed claws through his spiky hair. He hated how uncomfortable and comfortable he felt. "But we're not equipped to do their job for them."
Running the back of his hand down Spicy's cheek, Thunderbolt hadn't realized how much of his heart he'd lost to the bat. "We could go and watch."
Spicy had never been particularly feline, but nestled against Thunderbolt's powerful chest he found himself wishing her could purr. "I don't want them to be hurt because of us. You remember what Sonata said about a siren's magic, right?"
"We'd be easy targets for them. But that was before we had magic." He couldn't hear a purr, but Thunderbolt could hear Spicy making soft noises of appreciation regardless. "And I couldn't help even if we weren't affected."
"I need to get into martial arts again. I'm so rusty. We'd just be in the way."
Despite both their protests, Spicy and Thunderbolt both felt their bellies tighten.
"It's not fair." Thunderbolt rested his head atop Spicy's. "How can I be so big but so powerless?"
"Welcome to life, Thunderbolt. It's never fair. We have to hold onto who we can and hoard our precious moments to—to…" Spicy Hot saw the mistake in his logic as soon as he tried to finish the sentence. "I'll get my keys. Do you wanna fly?"
Thunderbolt had become quite fond of one particular show of affection—he kissed Spicy's cheek. "It will help me work out where we're going." He purred enough for both of them.
"This is being stupid, you know. Sonata told us to stay here." Spicy stood up and stretched, almost able to feel Thunderbolt's eyes on butt as he did so. Being ogled agreed with Spicy. "So we better do it before I rethink things. C'mon."
Dropping to all fours, Thunderbolt led the way out the door and down the stairs to the street. He straightened up for a moment and lifted his head toward the north-west. "I don't think I need to try to find them."
Spicy watched the light show flickering above the buildings and high into the sky. "I think you're right. You still up for this?"
"I have too much to lose." Thunderbolt stepped out into the street and jumped. He caught himself with the first downflap of his wings, and repeated the stroke again and again as he ripped and clawed his bulk into the sky with the tenacity of a dragon that should not be able to fly.
For a heartbeat Spicy Hot considered trying to join Thunderbolt in the sky, but he thought better of it and climbed into his VW. The little car was old, slow, and absolutely reliable so long as he fed it a steady diet of gas and oil. Turning the key, it took the customary three cranks to start before the little four-cylinder engine grunted to life and spat out its first breath of black fumes.
The roads were deserted. Spicy couldn't see another car, but he did see someone walking nearly two blocks from where he was going—or more to the point, they were running. "Get in!"
Limestone looked at the "car" that'd pulled up beside her and almost turned the guy inside down out of habit, but then she noticed he had wings and a funky hairdo that reminded her of her little sister. "You're heading up there?"
"Yeah." Spicy had seen the gun in Limestone's holster and noticed the stencil of ARMY on the back of her singlet. "You're not mind controlled, are you?"
Limestone made up her mind and opened the door to the car and slung her big frame inside. "Nah. Is that's what going on? Something like those sirens again?"
"Two of them, actually. The third is a friend now, but her sisters are up to their old tricks. You, uh, allowed to use that?" Spicy put the VW back into gear and begged the little engine with his foot to lurch forward again.
"Whadda ya think?" Limestone let out a sigh, knowing that wouldn't be enough to satisfy a civilian. "Threat analysis. If their actions have already caused or will certainly lead to deaths, I am authorized to use deadly force. If their actions result in major crimes or grievous bodily harm, I am authorized to use deadly force. If they're only screwing around in minor ways, I get to have fun."
Spicy watched the way Limestone smashed one fist into her other hand. Her idea of fun appealed to him, because it meant she'd be beating the snot out of the bad guys (or girls as the case may be). "Okay. So just for reference, it's the one with the massive pile of orange hair and the one with the big purple pigtails."
"I was at your club meetings, remember? I was the quiet bullet stopper in the corner listening, but I was there." For an instant Limestone Pie thought she heard something, then it got louder, and then it got into her head.
Pinkie's Jeep had both Pinkies, Sunset, Marble, Trixie, and Twilight riding in it. That left Fluttershy to take her van alone (because the back was filled with their instruments), and Rarity to drive herself, Rainbow, Lavender, and Sonata in her little car.
The drive wasn't far, and everyone had gone quiet as they mentally prepared to deal with siren magic again. When she turned the corner into Trixie's house's street, Rarity could feel an ominous weight settle on her shoulders. "Are you ready, Rainbow? We need you to try to distract them long enough that we can set up our instruments."
"Duh. I already know that, Rarity. Can't you go any faster? Kinda wanna be there first, so they're not distracted." The advantage Rainbow Dash always had over anyone else, when it came to getting into someone else's car, was that she could call shotgun first. Reflexes and speed came with benefits.
When Rarity began to slow behind Pinkie's Jeep, Rainbow just gave up, undid her belt, and got out of the car. Ignoring Rarity's complaints, Rainbow judged the speed was only about ten miles an hour or so. She quickly sped up and headed to the house, her hooves making a sharp clip-clopping sound on the road.
Rainbow had visited Trixie just once, and remembered that her sorta-friend's family was old money. The place bordered on mansion in proportions. Rainbow worried she wouldn't find the sirens let alone Applejack, but she slowed in the back yard when she saw Aria stretched out on a pool chair with Applejack curled up—naked—beside her on the ground. Her friend wore what looked like a dog collar, and had her head resting against Aria's leg while the siren slowly stroked her fingers through Applejack's hair.
"Oh. Please don't tell me you've done some kind of kinky, bullshit sex-rape thing with her?" Rainbow said.
Aria jerked awake. Her life, for the past few days, had become a dream come true. Her body thrummed with siren magic, she had several pets, and Adagio was taking care of all the annoying stuff. But she'd just heard something discordant to her little idyll.
Halting the little song she'd been humming, Aria Blaze sat up and turned her head to look back at Rainbow Dash. "Oh. You. Brought your friends, have you?"
"Yeah, but it's me you have to deal with. Messed with Applejack's head, I see. Hope you left somethin', or this is gonna end real bad for ya." Every word was a struggle for Rainbow to get out and make sound normal. Her senses and reflexes were turned up to eleven, and that meant the whole world was in slow motion. "Look, offer's still open from the other day. Undo whatever you've done to my friend and just give up. No stress, you can—"
Aria broke into a gale of laughter and then stopped just as quickly. She leaned down to Applejack. "Kill her and I'll give you a treat."