//------------------------------// // Chapter 7 // Story: The Rainbow Curse // by Prixy05 //------------------------------// Applejack slowly turned her head, transfixed by the sight of dozens of glassy eyes staring out at her from the dark recesses of the cloudominium. The creatures that the eyes belonged to seemed to be just as surprised as the intruder to their hive was, making a droning sound of ticking to themselves as they eyed the pony motionlessly. Applejack hugged Tank, the tortoise having hidden in his shell, closer to her chest, as she took a step backwards, slowly climbing out of the cubby in the ceiling she had opened. “Okay y’all,” she said out loud, trying to not incite the creatures in the ceiling, “I’m just goin’ to take the tortoise and leave. No need to get upset.” The ticking stopped, the eyes having reacted to Applejack’s rhetorical statement. One set of eyes ticked to itself and began to rapidly approach the pony, climbing out the ceiling and resting its claws on the cloudy walls. Its head twitched, swiveling as it looked over the pony. The bug resembled a wasp. Four bulbous eyes poked out from its head, shining a faint pink in the light. From its body wired a skinny body, complete with four jagged legs with a large talon, ending with a curved stinger. The abdomen of the bug pulsed and stretched, as if something was trying to escape. The chitin of its body was a ghostly white, almost translucent; but in more clearer areas, spots of light poked out amidst the exoskeleton, shifting through various colors of the rainbow. From its head a spine, light blue in color, curled down the back connecting with a set of four wings that sprouted from its back. The wings had glowing spots matching the colors of a rainbow and as they flexed instinctively, it gave the appearance the creature had a rainbow sprouting from its back. But notable was its mouth, five chitinous fangs curled up in a hexagonal shape, rubbing against one another, leaving an orifice for the neon colored drool to dribble out continually. The rainbow wasp fluttered it's wings, looking down at the earth pony hungrily. She didn’t move, remaining still in place. The two locked eyes and for a moment, everything seemed still. Then, the wasp attacked. Its mandibles spread, letting out a hiss that sent rainbow spittle flying out at Applejack’s face. The rainbow wasp lunged in a blur of its wings, spreading its claws for impact, but Applejack, who was remarkably experienced by this point, was able to react faster. Her back hooves shot out in a blur as well. The two blurs collided, promptly sending the wasp careening into the cloudy walls. The wasp sputtered as it hit the wall, leaving behind a green splatter of slime. But it quickly got up again, ticking at the pony angrily as it shook its head. Immediately the rest of the bugs above buzzed aggressively as they began to crawl out into the room. Applejack yelled in alarm as the oversized wasps flew at her in a swarm. She began to run out into the hallway, but the rainbow wasps quickly caught up. The wasps used their claws to latch onto her fur as they made contact. Then, they began to sink their fangs into her flesh. A sear of pain bolted through her body, making her stumble as she rolled out of the hallway and into the main area of the cloudominium. Applejack tried to swat away the bugs, but lost her footing as a wasp bit her leg, making her trip backwards off and down the staircase to the floor below, where the cloud-based floor luckily cushioned the fall. Before she could react, the wasps used their claws to pin Applejack to the floor, making sure she was immobilized.  “Twilight!” Applejack called out desperately as one wasp, the original one she had bucked upstairs and who seemed to be larger than the rest, landed squarely on her chest. The wasp inquisitively studied the pony’s chest before raising its stinger. The stinger split down the middle, splitting into three, separate barbs. Unable to move, Applejack watched in horror as rainbow goo dripped out from the exposed opening to the abdomen, along with added gray pellets. The wasp was preparing to lay eggs in her chest. The ticking drone of the wasps filled Applejack’s ears, but then a welcomed voice spoke up over them. “Back off!” Twilight flew out of a door and above the pony and swarm. Spreading her wings in a showcase of power, Twilight’s horn flashed purple, letting out a pulse of magic that swept away the wasps. The wasps scattered, leaving a canvas of green innards against the cloudominium’s walls as they were launched back and collided. Twilight used her magic to quickly right up Applejack, who wearily shook herself off, brushing away rainbow goo that had coalesced around the bite marks scattered across her body. “What the hay are these things?” Applejack asked, picking up Tank, who had bounced and landed safely next to them, “Some kinda new iris bug?” Twilight looked over the wasps, who had begun to recover from the blast. “I don’t know, but you need to go. Now.”  All around them, ticking and knocking began to echo out from within the walls. Awakened by Twilight’s blast, thousands of wasps began to poke their heads out through the clouds, looking for the source of magic that had awakened them. Even the wasps that had just been blasted away seemed to have fully recovered, focusing their glassy eyes on Twilight, a new source of food, a source of innumerable magic for them consume. “Go Applejack!” Twilight repeated, passing Applejack a stern look, “Head to Ponyville, get everypony to safety! Evacuate, herd them into the castle, seal off the School of Friendship; I don’t care what you do, just get everypony away from the swarm!” Though she was hurt and confused, Applejack understood, “What will you do?” she asked. Twilight furrowed her brow in determination, “I’m going to hold them off.” Applejack didn’t take another second, grabbing Tank and making her leave of the overrun cloudominium. She leapt out from the floating house, cushioning her fall in some bushes below. Inside the cloudominium, only Twilight remained, being the sole obstacle blocking the swarm of thousands of rainbow wasps, which now filled the air around her. The monotonous drone of ticking would have driven any other pony mad, but Twilight ignored it. “I don’t know what you’ve done to Rainbow,” she said to the wasps as her horn began to glow once more, “But I’m going to stop you.” She knew that the bugs would siphon away her magic eventually, but for now, she didn’t care. Destroying the wasps was all she could do. Ponyville was in a panic, the whole place being set off after an injured Applejack ran into yelling about rainbow bugs. Most of the town was heading to the Castle of Friendship or the neighboring School of Friendship hoping their magical protection spells would protect their own hides, but one place that remained untouched was the former Ponyville Day Spa.  The spa, having been rebuilt in another section of town, was for all purposes and measures, abandoned, being condemned shortly after the initial rainbow plague. This was because an iris grub queen had burrowed to nest in the warm waters of the spa’s plumbing, inadvertently causing half of the spa’s interior to cave into a sinkhole. Though the tunnels created by the queens had since been sealed off, the rest of the spa had practically gone undisturbed since the staff relocated, leaving the structure as an eerie reminder of the rainbow plague. But now, a bit of life stirred in the spa, for someone had intruded on the former day spa. Inside, at the bottom of the sinkhole, lay a stagnant pool of water. The water used to be the warm nesting place of a queen, but now it lay still and dark. But it was somewhere Rainbow wanted, no, needed to be. The sinkhole stirred up unpleasant memories in her mind, memories she desperately tried to ignore. She wheezed some more, coughing as more bioluminescent rainbow goo got caught in her throat. But Rainbow pressed onward, her hooves feebly emptying out her saddlebag with the things she had gathered before leaving. “What are you doing Rainbow?” The voice in her head asked, expressing an unusual amount of mild curiosity. ”Getting rid of you.” Rainbow growled in response.  “It’s your choice,” the voice answered, seemingly with mild amusement. Rainbow shook her head, trying to shut up the voice. This was her last chance. Rainbow didn’t want an iris grub in her, she didn’t want the rainbow plague to come back. And despite her mind fighting against itself, she forced herself here as a last-ditch effort. To cleanse her mind and body. She pulled out the bath salts she had borrowed from Rarity. The salts’ scents were supposed to cause grub regurgitation, which was Rainbow’s preferred outcome. She stuck a hoof in the water pool, stirring the dirt floating inside in a spiral. It wasn’t warm, but it would be just able to work with the bath salts. With no hesitation, she tossed the salts into the pool, watching as they began to fizz and dissolve. The chalky, white color of the salts spread in the water, coinciding as the pleasant scent of peach filled the hole. Rainbow made sure to breathe it all in, loudly snorting up the scent of the salt as much as she could. But nothing happened. The pegasus looked down at herself, her body felt the same, nothing happened in her stomach or throat. Rainbow shook her head, “No no no! I smelled the salts, why aren’t you leaving?” She poked her stomach, trying to force out something, anything. “Get out of me you stupid grub!” Picking up a nearby rock, she rammed it into her stomach. This caused her pain, forcing Rainbow to the ground as she coughed up rainbow goo that had dislodged from her throat. “Why won’t you leave? I don’t want you in me.” The voice spoke up again, speaking with a hint of remorse in her voice, “Don’t you get it Rainbow? I am not leaving. I can’t leave.” “I don’t get it,” Rainbow sniffed, “I thought- I thought there was rainbow grub inside me. That’s what you are, isn’t it?” “I’ve said it before, I am all inside your head. Rainbow Dash, I am you.” Rainbow didn’t know how or why, but knew that it, that she was speaking the truth. The raspy voice that had filled her dreams, been speaking in her head, it was her voice. “You are special Rainbow, I know, you know it, we both know it. For I was the last queen’s voice, but now I am the new queen’s voice. Because you, Rainbow, are the new queen.” This should have come as a shock to Rainbow, and it did, slightly, but this wasn’t as groundbreaking as she would have assumed. Because inside, since the start of the dreams, she had always known, somehow. “When you destroyed the original queen all those moons ago, I was passed onto you, by going inside the old queen, you were chosen to become the new queen.” Rainbow sat up from off the dirt floor, “So the dreams were all you- uh, me?” “That was the old queen and me, your mind, mixing. The old and the new. The queen’s instincts and our own fighting for dominance. The battle is far from over, but now, because of your element, we’ve changed. I have changed you and you have changed me. It isn’t over, for I am merely your instinct, the choice is still yours to make.” Rainbow didn’t have any patience for her inner voice, “Choice? What do you mean by choice? You, or the queen, or whatever has put me through Tartarus and back! What do you think I’ll choose? You think I want to lead an army of maggots and eat my friends’ magic?” “Unfortunately, despite what I said, I don’t think you have a choice. When your friends came looking for you, they unwittingly awakened the wasps. Don’t hesitate; I know you can feel it too.” Rainbow didn’t, she could feel it. The ticking of thousands of rainbow bugs. But this only made her confused, “Wasps? I thought, your- our- the queen’s whole thing was those grubs!” “That’s the thing about the rainbow plague. It evolves and grows. That was how it was designed, as one last trick if the queen was destroyed. After the queen’s essence was first awakened, she took your own magical essence to create new iris bugs and improve upon their flaws. And now that they are awakened, they shall surely take over Ponyville soon.” Rainbow hopped to her hooves, looking up in alarm, “What? No! If I’m the queen or something, can’t I make them stop?” Her inner voice seemed to nod,“To do that, you need to accept it. All of it. Use the thing that awakened the queen, ring the bell and the decision will be final.” Rainbow paused, “The bell?” Then she realized.  Grogar’s bell. The bell was utilized by the trio of villains weeks prior when they tried to take over Equestria. The queen’s essence, her essence had been lying dormant for years until they were awakened when the bell was rung. That was why it hadn’t happened until now, that was why the dreams didn’t start until now, it was all caused by Grogar’s bell. And now, Rainbow needed that bell. The swarm of rainbow wasps swirled about angrily in the air. They were hungry, having been awakened prematurely, and they wanted to feed. But for now, a single pony kept the swarm at bay. Twilight Sparkle, having retreated from the cramped interior of cloudominium, flashed out another magic spell, creating a purple barrier that blocked another regiment of wasps from flying forward. Though they spewed out their innards when they were injured, the wasps would quickly recover. They were much hardier than the iris grubs of previous, having withstood Twilight’s most powerful attacks. Beads of sweat trickled down her face. She knew that she couldn’t hold them back forever, as the wasps could siphon her magic, and eventually would wear her out. But for now, she just needed to buy Ponyville some time. Her forcefield flickered, it was weakening. One of the larger wasps took the opportunity to directly assault the shield, prying open a hole in the shield with its claws, its maw opening to hiss out technicolor spit at the alicorn. But it was quickly silenced as Twilight thrust her head forward, her horn stabbing the wasp through the mouth. It fell limp to the ground, its body splattering in the dirt next to her hooves. Twilight could only momentarily pass a glance to the corpse of the wasp joining multiple other grimy bodies that lay in the dirt as she strained her rapidly weakening spells. Twilight twisted her head around, noticing her friends galloping up behind her. “Get back! These things are dangerous!” Twilight yelled out, making the group of ponies stop in their tracks, “It's too dangerous for you all to help!”  Applejack, who was leading the group, stood firm, “Twilight, everypony else has taken cover, all of us here are willing to help ya!” The rest of the ponies, Fluttershy, Rarity, Pinkie Pie, and Starlight, nodded. “It’s not like that,” Twilight exclaimed as she cast another spell, “It’s like the rainbow plague again! These things eat magic! Only now they’re highly aggressive!” Rarity eyed the wasps before returning her look to Twilight, “Nonsense Twilight! We don’t care if it's dangerous or if we get hurt! We’re here to save Ponyville and Rainbow Dash!” Twilight would have objected, not wanting more of her friends to get in dire danger, but she wasn’t in a position to argue at the moment. “Oh my, those are some- uh, angry wasps,” Fluttershy commented, staring up at the swirling mass of bugs behind the glowing purple barrier that crossed the sky above, “I’m not sure what we can do to help Twilight.”  “We’re gonna need lots of bug spray,” agreed Pinkie Pie. She jumped back as another wave of wasps splattered on a purple barrier above. Rarity looked perturbed as the wasps’ excrements dripped down the shield. “So those things were in Rainbow’s house? Well, it’s certainly no surprise that she wasn’t getting any sleep!” “Come on y’all!” said Applejack, “We need to do somethin’! Twilight can’t hold ‘em off forever!” Pinkie Pie raised a hoof excitedly, “Ooh! We can use the elements of harmony! We can use them whenever, can't we?” As she finished talking, Pinkie Pie rubbed her hooves together and began to concentrate. Her mane began to glow, but this quickly faded as the pony fell down to the ground. Applejack shook her head, “That won’t work Pinkie, we need all of us to do that, and I don’t know where the hay Rainbow went off to.” “Speaking of Rainbow Dash, did she do this?” the concerned Starlight asked, “You know, with her sudden interest in the rainbow plague again, and then these- rainbow bugs came out. I’m not accusing her or anything, but there’s got to be a connection, right?” Applejack looked uncertain, “I don’t know sugarcube, I just don’t know.” “Hey!” Twilight yelled, recapturing the ponies’ attention, “If you’re not going to do anything, I’d advise you all to get out of here! I can’t hold them back much longer!” As if they were waiting for the opportunity, the entire swarm surged forward at the shields while the alicorn was momentarily turned away. Twilight grimaced with pain, the magical walls bending against the force of thousands of magic-eating bugs pushing their bodies against the magic. Her horn flickered with magic, but it was too much. Twilight fell over, the magic from her horn fading as the shields cracked down the middle and rapidly disapparated. The ponies ran forward to help Twilight. At this point there was nothing they could do. The swirling swarm of wasps didn’t move at first, seeming unsure of what to do. But before the rainbow wasps could redirect their aim at the ponies beneath them, they all froze. “Wha- what are they doing?” Twilight asked weakly, squinting open her eyes as Applejack helped her up. The rest of the ponies looked up as well, looking in the same direction as the wasps. A thunderous boom split the air, making a ring of color crack across the sky. It was a sonic rainboom! And out from the rainboom sped away the familiar sight of a rainbow trail, the telltale sign of Rainbow Dash. The ponies breathlessly watched as the rainboom spread across the sky, with Rainbow’s flying trail speeding far away in the direction of Canterlot. Transfixed, the wasps watched as well, soon leaving in the same direction, following Rainbow’s trail like moths to the flame. Twilight's head was fuzzy, her magic having been drastically weakened, but she was certain of what this meant. Rainbow Dash, for whatever reason, was heading to Canterlot, and the rainbow swarm was following.