The Pony Dreadfuls Rise Again

by No one is home

Shadow Of the Rainbow: Madness in the Light of the the Sun

“It’s been a long time.” The impossible painting of the sun’s cheerful words silently proclaimed, “Take time to reconnect with an old friend.”

“Detective!” Dutchess Amiss snapped, “If any of us are going to survive then repeat after me…”

“...Unlock dimensional translation,” Skye repeated in a hollow monotone. And then the world folded and then folded again.

A stick pony with a stupid detective hat screamed.

A stick changeling in a fancy dress would have heaved a sigh of relief if she had lungs, instead the word “sigh” hovered over her.

The stick pony that clearly took too many performance enhancing drugs rolled her eyes.

“We can all read the narration captions when you do this.” Yeah she knows she’s hot for a burnout. “Like that, I CAN read dammit, and I read that! There is not enough brain bleach to unread that!”

The cel seems to just fucking oozed black pointy spikes around the changeling bitch. “I swear I didn’t know! Not until it was too late!”

“What? Where? Why?” The pony in the stupid hat is broken.

“Goddammit, how long do we have to stay like this?!?!” Best worst pony knows she’s hot. “And you KNOW I can read that! What is wrong with you? That is a real question!”

The goddamm sun shines in a beautiful happy blue sky where the mackerel swim freely. I could honestly be happier shitting my pants right now, but saddly I have no pants. My pants are always the very first thing they take from me. The doctors are wise to fear what I can do with the power of pants.

“Dolphins repeating stale jokes in tuna nets will never attract the notice of scallops nor potatoes!” The Sun’s words are dry and tired and honestly smell like feet and fritos. Tartarus also smells like feet and fritos, as do most places I go for some reason. “Flying fish are eating manta rays again?”

The Sun’s question is as stupid as its smile, because obviously yes we are doing this, but then the stick pony in the stupid hat screams something not-stupid. “Reinstate dimensional translation lock!”

-=-=-=-=-

The wall is clean… unnaturally so, a wall that old should have graffiti by the right of all social order. There is no graffiti. There never was, and on some level I know this. Lightning Dust is vomiting and the thing is glaring murder at our client. I suspect its locks against physical violence are all that are keeping her alive right now.

“The sun didn’t find you on it’s own, Alias,” the abomination snarled and physically spat on the road, “That’s your thing, you're the alias, you’re not the one they're looking for. You can’t be found unless you want to be…”

The thing’s physical form seems to shift in directions that shouldn’t exist as it struggles against it’s magical anchors. Gone is the languid Tirek-may-care degeneracy. There is no sign of it’s twisted playfulness. I suddenly realize I have underestimated that thing. Just as suddenly I realize I had completely forgotten our client until the Duchess… no… Madame Alias spoke again. “Listen to me, Iam! It wasn’t my fault! We were converting the abandoned houses into apartments for the dancers! One of the ponies brought home an inspirational poster. She had no idea what it really was, or where it came from. Remember, I’m the one who called you!” It suddenly occurred to me that I had somehow been completely ignoring who this changeling was since the moment I deduced her identity.

“Madame Alias,” my sudden sneer is a pure mask of bravado, “Dimensional Translation! I see why you used it now. I always knew the how of it,” I can’t hide my disgusted sneer as I speak, “just feed it drugs and point it at a problem.”

“You wound me boss” For the first time since I’ve heard that thing speak it actually sounds… sincere. It’s voice twists to a snarl. “Did ya really think I couldn’t get better drugs on my own. I followed the nopony for the same reason I follow you. I was a thing and a tool and I never had not no say in how I was used.”

“Do not mistake my words for sympathy,” I spit on the cracked pavement, “Answer me as succinctly as possible for… yourself… What was that… just that?”

“It’s an abstract concept given form via the subliminal demi-plane.” The abomination shrugs, swallowing a handful of pills, that I suddenly wonder how it obtained. “We used to hang out. The entire collective, they call it a ‘constelation’, is nine of them. Used to be eleven, but they ran into some trouble is one of the post apoc universes. Heh, I told it, I said ‘Dude, do NOT mess around with the Cannibal Head.’ But no one listens to the drug addicted ‘insaniac’... it calls itself Mr. Sunshine.”

“And this… conglomerate thing… is what causing these maulings?” I can not believe I am deferring to this degenerate’s expertise.

“Sunshine? Naw, not his style.” The thing glares again at our client. “His thing is he makes deals. It’s kinda like a mafia where the whole gang is all the gang boss. He’s not even here yet. What you just saw… well that was just a two dimensional projection of one of it’s nine suns. He feeds suffering with false hope. But you gotta have suffering to plant the seed…”

“So it wasn’t the Sun that caused the malignant reanimation of the Rainbow Factory,” I mused out loud, “But rather said reanimation that drew attention of the Sun…”

“And now he knows we exist here,” the abomination suddenly takes a very serious tone, there is for the first time a note of true concern in it’s voice, “Yer gonna wanna put Dust on suicide watch for 24 hours, boss. Alias has just thrown us in the shadow of the leering sun.”