The abandoned factory was falling apart as Trixie and the mob filed into the old building to produce their way to freedom.
The conveyor belts were rusty, the piping was shot, and a piece of the roof had fallen down and nearly squished Red Flag. Many of the workers quietly talked amongst themselves as the high from the song began to wear off, and the reality of their situation began to seep in.
Trixie was undeterred; this was simply a challenge to be overcome, and to test the mettle of her fellow workers. As the workers were walking about the dilapidated structure. Trixie found an old wrench on the floor and picked it up, while at the same time jumping on one of the long-deactivated assembly lines.
She tapped the heavy tool against some of the machinery and the metallic sound echoed throughout the factory, setting all eyes on her. Now the center of attention, Trixie did what she did best.
"Workers of Fillydelphia!" she exclaimed (and wished she still had some fireworks left over for her speech), "the fifth epoch is upon us! Never before have the workers owned the means of production by seizure and democratic ownership of property!"
Murmurs slithered throughout the crowd as the ponies looked to each other with vague confusion. Trixie fought back a gag; how could the revolution succeed if the workers lacked consciousness about their own slavery?
She gave a nervous cough and continued, "We will strike at the heart of our capitalist oppressors by using their weapons of pollution and oppression against them!"
One of the ponies in the back gave a small cheer. Finally, something to feed on.
"Indeed, comrade!" she replied to the pony in the back, "And when we get this factory running once more, the tidal wave of production and shift from the decadence of the rich shall be glorious!"
A few more ponies roused in agreement, and one raised his hoof.
"Uh, Fooler?"
"It's Comrade Trixie, comrade."
"How are we going to power this factory?"
Several of the other ponies whispered in agreement. Trixie hadn't anticipated this, and first shrugged off the question with a nervous laugh.
"Don't be a defeatist, comrade! We will address problems to the production when they arise. For now, let us deal with the problems as they arise. The first order of business is to create a worker's council!"
"A what?"
Trixie's eye twitched. Did these ponies want to remain in eternal bondage to the bourgeois?
"A worker's council! A deliberative body what shall be produced, and in what quantities! Democratic possession of the means of production! Don't any of you remember what I said back in the city?"
"Actually," one pony said, "every time I get involved in a song everything gets kind of fuzzy. How did we get here again?"
Other ponies asked the same, and soon the entire crowd was full of questions.
"What's 'democratic' mean?"
"Will this nail give me tetanus?"
"Where's the free cider! I was promised free cider!"
Trixie started sweating bullets as the crowd quickly turned against her. Hammer Jammer and his companions attempted to quell the crowd, but to no avail. Just when it seemed that Trixie was in danger of losing them all, a sharp hiss followed by a clang sounded outside the factory. All the questioning ceased as the ponies began to run out of the factory to find the source of the noise. Trixie followed, relieved for a respite to think of more propaganda.
The ponies left the factory to find two lanky ponies surrounding a strange contraption, which appeared to have broken down. Steam rose out from ruptures in its metal frame and one of the wheels was broken beyond repair, with the paint peeling off in several places. The two bacon-haired ponies were inspecting the damage, oblivious to the crowd behind them.
"I say Flam, if the 6000 hasn't made it here we'd be done for!"
The mustachioed of the two nodded, and spun the broken wheel. It slid right off the machine and rolled in the direction of the crowd. The twin unicorns followed its movement, and froze when they saw the large crowd behind them headed by an annoyed blue unicorn.
"Oh my," Flam muttered. He adjusted his worn straw hat and composed himself, "Sorry folks! The Super Speedy Cider Squeezy 6000 is out of order at the moment! But we'll have her back up and running before you can say pony pulls the wagon!"
Trixie stepped closer to the two, "What are you doing here?"
Flam took off his hat and placed it on his chest, his best attempt to look nonthreatening, "Oh, we're just stopping here for repairs, ma'am."
"What kind of repairs?"
"Well, this contraption you see here is a miracle of modern engineering, but sadly I must admit that she's seen better days. She's supposed to make cider, but we've had a bit of trouble finding customers. Baltimare, Las Pegasus, Ponyville—"
Trixie's eyes went wide as she stuffed a hoof in Flam's mouth, "Wait. Did you say Ponyville?"
Flam nodded and said a muffled "yes" through Trixie's hoof.
Trixie looked Flam straight in the eye, "were you foiled by a loathsome purple unicorn with five friends?"
"Why yes, we were!" said Flim, "Say, how did you know about that?"
Trixie stared off for a second before returning her gaze, "We have a common enemy, it seems."
Flim smiled, "Oh, I wouldn't say enemy. We prefer the term 'competitor'. It's good for business!"
Trixie's thoughtful look faded as she shot daggers at Flim, "Business?"
"Why, yes!" Flim replied, "We're travelling salesponies. He's Flam, I'm Flim, and we're the world famous—"
"Why are you here?" Trixie interrupted.
Flam politely removed Trixie's hoof, "Well, we heard that old factory behind you used to make cider. We were gonna look around in it for spare parts for the ol' 6000 here." To make his point, Flam confidently slapped the side of the Cider Squeezy 6000, which promptly crashed to the ground and the other three wheels rolled away.
"The old girl's seen better days," Flim sighed.
"So," Flam went on, "If you'd just let us by to that factory we'll quickly be out of your mane."
Trixie laughed, an evil haughty chuckle that made the twins' blood run cold, "Ha ha! Yeah, that's not happening. We were here first."
"But—"
"In fact," she said, "you said you were businessponies. Petit-bourgeois, yes?"
The blood drained from Flam's face as he recognized the rhetoric, "Uh oh."
Trixie whipped around and faced the crowd, pointing back at the two brothers, "WORKERS! WE HAVE TWO COUNTER-REVOLUTIONARIES WHO PLAN TO WRESTLE THE FACTORY AWAY FROM US!"
The crowd booed and hissed. A horseshoe was thrown from the back of the audience, and clunked Flim right on the head.
Flam went to the aid of his brother, and looked up at Trixie, "Fine! We won't loot the factory!"
"THEY WERE GOING TO LOOT THE FACTORY!" Trixie bellowed. Flim started to come to as a mallet was thrown from the crowd and hit him in the eye, knocking him right back out.
Panicking, Flam started to drag his brother away from the crowd. He only progressed a few feet until he backed into something solid. He turned around to see Red Flag glaring at him, flanked by Hammer Jammer and a twitching System Smasher. Red Flag's horn lit up with a red aura and constricted itself around Flam's back leg, lifting him up in the air along with his brother.
Flim regained his senses once again, although the knocks to his noggin had made him loopy, "I'm a pretty pony princess!" he slurred. He tilted his head from side to side as he slowly sung to himself, "No way of knowing where we'll be going, our adventures never end..."
Trixie walked up to him, and Flam clasped his hooves together, "Take the 6000! Take anything! Just don't hurt us!"
"I, uh, we don't want your worthless doodad."
"Oh. Well, can we go then?"
Trixie's horn glowed and she stepped closer, "Afraid not. You're too dangerous to be left wandering around, poisoning the countryside with your capitalist methods. I think a little re-education is in order."
Trixie's horn grew even brighter, and an bright light engulfed the two brothers. Flam's scream could be heard for miles. Flim simply sung about a pony always dressing in style as the magic overtook them.
---
Sharp Sickle was brushing up on his cider molotov recipe when he looked out the window to see smoke arising from the direction of the old factory. He did a double take, at first thinking that his idiot brother probably just managed to burn the place down. No, this was industrial smoke.
"Well I'll be," he muttered, setting his cidertov down.
He walked outside to get a better look. No doubt about it, the old factory was going at full tilt, and he could just barely make out the sounds of industry and activity all the way from his bar. With nothing better to do, he put on his best flap cap and raggedy scarf and set off toward the factory, wondering how they managed to get it working so quickly.
---
The sounds of churning gears and whirring belts greeted Sharp Sickle's ears as the factory's old rusted walls came into view. Several ponies milled about on the outside, scrubbing the walls and painting them to restore the factory to its former glory. He also noticed the wreck of a strange contraption in the front yard, although it appeared to have been stripped down to everything but its framework. He stopped one of the workers to ask where Trixie or his brother was, and they led him to inside the factory.
Sharp Sickle's jaw nearly hit the floor when he saw the insides of the factory. The machinery had been restored to full working order, and the assembly lines were making cider at a mind-boggling pace. He saw no sign of his brother or Trixie, but did catch Proley overseeing one line of workers.
"Hey!" he called, "You seen my idiot brother?"
Proley looked pointed him toward the back of the factory. As he approached the rear of the facility the whirring of turbines became apparent. At the very back he was greeted with a door that read "HIGH VOLTAGE, STAFF ONLY" with a menacing lighting bolt painted on the door's frame. He ignored it and opened the door.
The roar of machinery and electricity made his ears ring as he saw Trixie and co. watching a turning wheel, which appeared to be the turbine supplying the factory with power.
Smooth Sickle saw his brother and called out to him, "Hey! Get down here! Trixie's telling us about Stage 2!"
Sharp Sickle sighed and complied, standing by his brother as Trixie and Hammer Jammer used an empty wall as a makeshift chalkboard.
"Our production output, oh hi Sharp Sickle, is ten tons of cider per day. Once Flim wakes back up, we can expect roughly seventeen tons of output, assuming we stop there."
"Which we won't!" replied Trixie, drawing an outline of Fillydelphia, "We will use this cider production to gain the hearts and minds of the hard-working ponies of this city. With them behind us, we can unify the entire city's productive capacity!"
"Yes," said Hammer Jammer, "and from there we will be able to build class consciousness. Within a few years we should—"
"A few years!?" Trixie screamed, "We need the revolution now!"
Hammer Jammer frowned, "We can't just up and march on Canterl—"
"Every day of capitalism is one step closer to extinc—"
"Shaddap both of you!" Sharp Sickle roared, "Who the hay is Flim, how did you get this factory working so fast, and where are you getting the supplies to make all this cider!?"
Trixie smiled and walked over to one of the turbines, opening a small hatch on the side and inviting Sharp Sickle to peek his head inside. He did so, and one of his stony eyebrows arched in confusion as he saw a skinny unicorn pony supplying power to the turbine with magic, a green aura dynamo. The unicorn eventually noticed him and lifted his hat, although Sharp Sickle noticed that his eyes appeared slightly glazed.
"Greetings, comrade!" Flam said cheerily, "Is the quota being met?"
"Uh, yeah, sure," Sharp Sickle replied, and closed the hatch.
"That would be Flam," Trixie explained, "He tried to stop our occupation of the factory, and I showed them the error of his ways."
"Okay, so who's Flim?"
"His brother. He didn't take the socialist learning as well as his brother. He'll be out for a few more hours."
Sharp Sickle scratched his chin, "Well, that explains Flim and the power source. But what about the supplies?"
Red Flag pointed to a window, "There's a wild apple orchard out back. We have enough to last us for a month."
"Which is why we need to act now!" Trixie exclaimed again, picking the chalk back up and circling Fillydelphia a few more times for emphasis.
Red Flag spoke up, "What about Canterlot? If we take over Fillydelphia, Celestia won't just ignore a commune on her front door."
Smooth Sickle adjusted his glasses, "And the princesses aren't exactly pushovers militarily. Hmmm."
Trixie had spent quite a while in the boondocks, but she wasn't totally ignorant of what went on in the country. She knew of Twilight's escapade against Discord and Nightmare Moon, and how they used the Elements of Harmony to defeat them. Those relics were more powerful than Celestia herself, and if she could get her hooves on them...
"What do you guys know about the Elements of Harmony?" Trixie wondered aloud, fishing for an answer.
Smooth Sickle lit up, "Oh, yes! Very, very powerful magical artifacts! Scholars haven't been able to get a close look due to the security, but they're believed to be physical manifestations of ideals. Starswirl's Second Law of Conversion does state that thoughts have incredibly high magical potential."
"Could a pony make Elements out of ideals other than friendship?"
"Oh, no. The mages that knew how to do that are long gone."
Trixie contemplated that fact for a second before answering again, "What about changing Elements that already exist? Changing them to, say, Elements more friendly to the revolution?"
"That's absolutely, well, I suppose it could work. But we'd need to—"
Smooth Sickle's sentence trailed off, "You're insane! The Elements have the highest security of anything in the world! Nopony can get in there!"
Trixie grinned evilly, "Who says a pony will be the one to get them?"
"Where are you going with this?" Sharp Sickle demanded.
Trixie walked up to the wall and circled various portions of the map, "I know for a fact that the keepers of the Elements and Equestria have made some really nasty enemies over the years."
Sharp Sickle yawned, "And?"
"And they'd just love to see Celestia and Twilight and all her horrid friends sent to the gulags. We've got a few letters to write..."