• Published 17th May 2021
  • 9,145 Views, 1,859 Comments

And Hell Followed - BaeroRemedy



The sun hangs in the sky and it hasn't moved in nearly a month. The sounds outside are enough to make you want to never figure out why.

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Heart to Heart

Rainbow Dash felt great! Her heart was pounding, her brain was firing at a mile a minute and her entire body was shaking with energy! She felt like she could fly several marathons in a row without stopping and then fly some more! The blue electricity jumping from her coat and mane to the crystals around her only made her feel even cooler!

“Rainbow, are y’allright…?” Applejack pushed forward past Pinkie and the toppled Sunburst. “You’re kinda glowing?” Every eye in the room was on her and filled with curiosity and excitement, though most of the excitement was coming from Pinkie.

“I feel AMAZING, Applejack!” Dash landed, the mere presence of her hooves on the ground causing small crystals around her to levitate as the electricity from her body charged them. “Like I could take on the whole world and some other world back to back!” This was a far cry from the delirium she had been in for the past week and she was going to enjoy it.

“Rainbow Dash…” Sunburst was on his hooves again and speaking very slowly. “Listen to me, I don’t know how you’re not dead.” She opened her mouth, but was shut up with a raised hoof from the only stallion in the room. “That much pure mana should’ve deep fried your nervous system. You may be alive, but you have too much energy in your system. You need to bleed some of it off.” His words were slow and carefully annunciated, like he was talking to a foal.

“Hey, didn’t Twilight say that when we beat Nightmare Moon?” Rainbow was listening, but she was also staring at a big boulder right by the side of the bright blue pool she had been thrown into. “‘When those elements are ignited by the spark in the heart of us all yadda yadda blah blah blah.’ or something like that? Sorry my mind is like racing!” It was hard to stay on one train of thought, she couldn’t really focus on anything right now for long.

“Yes, exactly!” Sunburst yelled at her and waved a hoof in front of her face to get her attention back. “You can’t handle the amount of power in your system! You need to use some of it or else you will burn out.” The stallion looked away and started mumbling to himself. “Element of Harmony, has to be. She’s used to increased magic throughput from the Elements. Only way.”

“What?” Focusing was getting even harder. It felt like her entire body was twitching. Why was everypony moving so slow? Why could she hear them all breathe? Did she hear their heartbeats too? It sounded like it.

“Dashie you need to fly!” Pinkie, who was finally bright pink again with her mane regaining some of it’s usual poof, shouted at her. That was something Rainbow Dash understood completely.

“I can do that!” Rainbow nodded as she flared her wings and dug her hooves into the ground below. She felt the arcs of pure energy flash and jump between her feathers, between every hair on her body.

A single beat of her charged wings sent her rocketing across the room at speeds that would make a Wonderbolt blush. Despite the incredible velocity it felt like slow motion to her. She saw the door approaching and tucked her wings in to fit through, slamming them open on the other side to airbrake before she hit a spiral staircase that seemed to go upwards forever. All it took was yet another flap to send her straight up.

The column of free airspace in the middle of the staircase was just enough that her wings could be spread out entirely. There were moments, milliseconds really, where the very tip of one of her feathers would brush some of the crystal and she would readjust instantly. It was maybe three flaps of her wings before she was at the top of the shaft.

The hole to get out was just big enough for a pony to get through, and that’s all she needed. Rainbow Dash sucked in her stomach, pulled her wings as close to her sides as she possibly could and turned at the best angle to shoot through.

As soon as the supercharged speedster came through the gap, she turned on a dime and fired off towards the castle doors. She briefly caught a glimpse of the ponies in the map room, each of them with a look of shock on their faces as she raced by.

When she got to the main hall, Rainbow came to the realization that she couldn’t stop. Not at this speed. She had been building speed the whole time and there was no way she could stop long enough to open the doors, not anymore. So instead she banked towards the stairs and left only a strong gust and a rainbow trail in her wake.

Her wings took her out through the balcony a few floors up, luckily the doors were open and she didn’t have to slow down. As she stormed into the open air of the outdoors, a few things caught her eye and she absorbed all of the information in a few seconds.

Canterlot was gone, the surface of the mountain was smooth as glass and just as shiny. Three alicorns circled it and a fourth was on it’s way there from Ponyville, almost three quarters to the mountain already. Clouds dotted the sky, not typical weather clouds, construction grade. Either her house had been destroyed or the princesses had gotten to Cloudsdale or Las Pegasus. Ponyville was lousy with unicorns now, they almost seemed to clog the streets near the town hall, probably from other towns or Canterlot.

Having thought about all of that her wings shot her upward at a steep, almost vertical, angle. She was still gaining speed, even when taking such a steep ascent. Coming down was going to be interesting and fun. Upwards she continued to go until she was at the point that the air was nearly too thin to breathe and a bitter chill bit at her bones.

Rainbow Dash came back around and hurtled back to the surface. If she needed to fly, if she needed to burn off excess magic energy, she knew just the right way to do it! She had just started to come back down and she could feel the energy building in her hooves already, she could feel that familiar tug of the magic barrier that existed in the air.

When she had tried this last time, she had been stopped and tossed aside. She had been rejected and denied her conquest, denied her glory! Not this time! The crackling energy that filled her body didn’t just break the barrier before her, it shattered the once staunch wall high above Equestria’s surface.

The resulting rainboom from the complete decimation of the magic barrier was something that anypony who saw it would be in awe at. It was the biggest one she had ever created, and it most likely covered all of Equestria in its glory.

Rainbow Dash finally started to decelerate, the glow from her body fading quickly as she approached the castle once more. Her hooves hit the balcony and what looked like electric blue steam vented off of her body. She hadn’t even broken a sweat.

Now she didn’t feel as good as she did when she first exited the pool, but she wasn’t lying comatose in a bed! She could walk, she could fly, she could probably even sing if she wanted to! That was preferable to the alternative.

Rainbow walked into the castle, her hooves smoking and a giant smile on her face. She sat down and just waited. It took minutes for anypony else to come up to greet her, and when one entered the room, they all did. Everypony in the castle was in the room that led to the balcony now and asking so many questions.

“What took you all so long? I’ve been sitting here for like five minutes!” The looks of confusion she received only spread that confusion to her. Did they think she was lying? Rainbow thought it had been five minutes, granted she didn’t have a watch or a clock around.

“Rainbow, you left six minutes ago.” Cheerilee spoke up from the crowd and got some agreeing nods and sounds from the crowd. “I don’t even think I saw you leave. One moment you were there and the next you weren’t.”

“You were soooo fast, Dashie!” Pinkie Pie bounced to the front of the group. The pink pony giggled, her eyes bright blue and full of energy. “I knew it would work!” Rainbow was bowled over by the earth pony and wrapped in a tight hug. “I knew it…” She whispered softly.

“Jeez, everything seemed so slow.” Dash did what a good friend did and hugged the now re-energized Element of Laughter back. Pinkie had been by her side through all of this, she knew that much. The few times she had woken up there had been only one pony by her bed. When somepony had held her hoof or spoke to her, it had only been one voice. “Thanks, Pinkie. For saving me.” Rainbow whispered back to her friend and gave her another squeeze.

Somepony else asked something, but Rainbow didn’t hear them. She was too consumed with the sudden feeling of lips against her own and a blush overtaking her entire fence. The fact that they had an audience didn’t help one little bit. When the kiss finally broke, she found herself looking right into Pinkie’s shining blue eyes.

“W-we might want to talk about this...somewhere without a crowd…” Dash muttered to her friend as every other pony in the room kept their eyes on the pair. Intense confusion rattled around in her head like a loose screw. How long had Pinkie been feeling like this, and why didn’t Rainbow Dash hate it?

“How are you feeling, Dash?” Thank Celestia Sunburst had no sense of social tact. It let Rainbow move her mind away from Pinkie, who still wasn’t letting her go. “Any...side effects? Twitching, blurry vision, racing thoughts?”

“No?” Rainbow shook her head double checked to make sure she felt one-hundred percent. “I feel fine, honestly. Better than fine, really.” She wasn’t in her bed dying a slow death, so she felt better than ever. “I mean, I feel awesome from that rainboom. Did you guys see it? It was the biggest one ever!”

“We were inside, Dash.” Applejack retorted.

“We were theorizing you got sick because you attempted one when rescuing…” Sunburst trailed off and cleared his throat as he glanced at Applejack. “...when you went outside. Are we right?”

“I don’t know if that’s what got me, but yeah. I tried one.” She frowned at the memory. It was still a rather fresh wound on her pride. “There’s like a barrier when I go that fast. Usually I can push through it and that’s what causes a rainboom, but it felt really solid.” Rainbow brought one of her blue hooves up to her face to look at it. “I guess all that juice helped me push through it.”

“Hmm.” Sunburst brought a hoof up to stroke his beard as he studied the pegasus before him. “Interesting. The power from the pool was enough to let you break it, and it successfully dispersed. Pure mana pumped into the magic field. Hmm.” He snapped out of his thoughts and turned around. “We should do some tests to be sure you’re okay.” Dash sighed and groaned at the stallion. She stood up, Pinkie still practically wrapped around her. “It’ll be quick, don’t complain.”

----

“Didn’t see that comin’...” Applejack blinked and shook her head. “Long as they’re happy, Ah guess.” Cheerilee was standing right next to the farmpony as Pinkie and Rainbow Dash finally uncoupled and everypony started to shuffle out of the room awkwardly.

“Applejack, can I talk to you?” Cheerilee needed to broach this subject with AJ. As soon as the eldest Apple had come rushing in after Pinkie down in the mana pool cavern, an overwhelming need to talk about Elytra had overcome her.

“If Ah guess what it’s about, can Ah say no?” The mare raised an eyebrow at the teacher. “Y’know what, Ah ain’t gonna even argue. Sure, let’s talk about the bug in the room.” The two waited until the other ponies had exited the room to continue. “Alright, say what’cha want.”

“I know you’re…” Cheerilee stopped and sighed. There was no easy way to go about this, but that wasn’t it. She didn’t know how Applejack was feeling, it was impossible. Cheerilee was an only child and her father had died a decade ago. She couldn’t connect with losing a family member in this. “I can’t even imagine how you’re feeling or what you’re going through. Big Mac was...he was a friend to me and seeing him-it hurt.” She couldn’t say the word, not right to AJ’s face. “So I...I can’t imagine how much it hurt you.” Cheerilee was rambling, and the fiery green glare she was now receiving from the pony in front of her wasn’t helping her get to the point.

“Lemme stop you right there, Cheerilee.” Applejack placed a hoof on the smaller mare’s chest and gave a gentle push, easily forcing the teacher to sit down. “Ah know where you’re goin’ and Ah’m just gonna head you off at the pass.” Applejack took a deep breath before speaking again. “You’ve grown fond of Scootaloo, haven’t’cha?”

“Y-yes.” Cheerilee nodded. She had forgotten just how imposing AJ could be up close. The power in those legs and the fire in those eyes would be enough to send the toughest pony in Equestria scurrying away. Cheerilee was far from the toughest pony in Equestria.

“Alright.” Applejack sat down with a grunt of effort. “So let’s say it was Scoots that died out there. Same way.” The soft smooth cadence of AJ’s speech made Cheerilee uneasy deep down. “For the heck of it, let’s say Ah had something or some information that coulda taken her outta that situation. Maybe there was a way that nopony would’ve died and Ah kept that from you.” The mare leaned in and narrowed her eyes. “Tell me you’d forgive me. Go ahead and lie to me.”

“She…” Cheerilee had no good response, she had no rebuttal. To say that the thought of Scootaloo falling to those things wasn’t upsetting would be wrong. She bit back so many excuses, all of them dying in her throat. “She’s not evil, Applejack. She saved Scootaloo.” That was Cheerilee’s only defense. “If it wasn’t for her, Scootaloo would be dead.” Yes Cheerilee avoided the question that had been asked of her, but she had a point to make.

“One good thing.” Applejack retorted. “She lied to us for a month and made us think she was our friend, she muddied the waters about what this whole disease is and now she’s been hidin’ stuff from us.” Applejack threw her hooves up in the air. “What’s next, huh? How long until she pods somepony up and takes their place?”

“Applejack, you’re being ridiculous.” Cheerilee sighed and rolled her eyes. “The changelings changed, you know that. You were there. They don’t...they don’t do that stuff anymore!” To think that Elytra would try to replace somepony that was already here was ridiculous. It was ludicrous. “She only took Vinyl’s appearance because she knew if you found a changeling outside you would act just like this.

“Do I know she wouldn’t do that? ‘Cause from where Ah’m sittin’, she’s still actin’ like an old changeling.” Applejack leaned back, but her eyes never left Cheerilee’s. “Ah want you to think if she brought back anythin’ useful.” Applejack paused. “The scooter sure does help, Ah’ll give you that. We could do without it, though.” She shifted her weight and cleared her throat. “Food, though, we could use that. We’re runnin’ mighty low and she knows that, she could make it into Filthy Rich’s store and get some stuff. She never did though, never offered either.” Applejack tilted her head to the side quizzically and then shook it. “Wonder why that is.”

“She was trying to cheer us up, Applejack.” Cheerilee scoffed and shook her head. “She brought us all cider so we could relax. She brought the scooter to help Scootaloo get around and raise her spirits. It’s not difficult to understand.” To imply that there was anything else at play other than a creature doing her best to bring cheer in a time like this was appalling. Elytra had done nothing but try her best. “We need food, but look around Applejack. Before today we needed a morale boost a lot more.”

“Ah ain’t denyin’ that she cheered us up, Ah’m just sayin’ she was gettin’ food for someone, just not us.” Cheerilee closed her eyes and grimaced once the realization hit her. The cider, the scooter, Scootaloo had said she had given something to Pinkie as well. “She’s feedin’ herself. Placatin’ us and makin’ us happy so she can stay nice and full.” Applejack shrugged. “Just what she is. She’s savin’ her own skin without thinkin’ of us. You and Ah, we know that all we got right now is each other but she don’t get that. She ain’t like us, she don’t have our values.”

The two sat there in silence for a few minutes. The implication of what Applejack had said washed over Cheerilee like the tide, slowly pulling her into a roiling sea of emotions. It was frustrating that the idea that Elytra was using them all was getting to her. It kept drilling into her head. She glared at Applejack and opened her mouth.

“Why did you bring him along?” She regretted the words as soon as they fell from her lips, but she couldn’t stop now. “Why is it her fault that Big Mac died and not yours? You’re the one who dragged him out there with you, not Elytra.”

Applejack shot to her hooves. Her orange face turned redder by the second as the anger built. Those bright green eyes glared at Cheerilee with such intensity that if looks could kill, the schoolmare would’ve been dead within seconds. The various thoughts dancing through the farmer’s mind could be read as plain as day.

“It shoulda been her! Not Mac!” AJ turned and stormed out of the room. “If she just stopped lying, Mac would still be here and we’d be down a bug instead!” The door was slammed shut as the raging mare left Cheerilee alone.

The cerise schoolteacher sat there for what felt like an hour, just thinking. The guilt from calling Applejack out over Big Mac’s death was getting to her, but that wasn’t the only thing. Elytra. The thought that all of this was an elaborate ruse, like one of the harvesting missions Chrysalis had once sent the changelings on, kept coming back into her mind. She couldn’t shake it.

Eventually her hooves picked her up and carried her to Elytra’s door. Cheerilee didn’t even knock, she just pushed open the door and entered. Inside, if Pinkie Pie’s account was to be believed, looked like a changeling hive. Dark, humid, covered with a weird substance and with some sort of...nest in the corner made out of the remains of the bed.

“Hey Cheerilee!” Scootaloo emerged from the nest with a smile on her face. “Elytra was napping and asked me to join, I hope that’s okay.” Cheerilee didn’t even think, she just hugged Scootaloo as tight as she could. “O-okay…?”

“Rainbow Dash is awake, dear.” She needed to talk to Elytra alone, and this was the surefire way to do it. “Pinkie Pie fixed her and I think you should go say hi. They’re in Rainbow’s room, I think.” The best fake smile you would ever see graced Cheerilee’s face as she spoke to her pupil. In response, the little filly’s wings buzzed in excitement.

“I knew she would be okay!” Scootaloo hollered as she hobbled over to her scooter and sped out of the room. Once she heard the excited voice of the Crusader banging on Rainbow’s door, Cheerilee closed Elytra’s door.

“What’s up, Cheerilee?” Elytra crawled out of her little nest and stretched out, her wings unfolding and buzzing. “I kind of wish you would’ve knocked, but oh well. It’s always good to see you.” The smile the changeling gave seemed a lot more hollow than it once had.

“What are we to you?” The question seemed a little too narrow considering the kiss Cheerilee had planted on Elytra’s cheek recently, so she expanded it. “Everypony in this castle, I mean. Including Scootaloo and I.”

“O-Oh…” Elytra was, understandably, caught off guard by this. “You’re all...well you’re not all my friends. You and Scootaloo are, and I guess Pinkie Pie is okay too, but everypony else is...they’re just surviving. Like me.” That answer was more telling than the bug realized.

“Mhm.” Cheerilee nodded and looked away for a moment. That’s when she saw the various spheres around the room, smooth and the same blackish green as the slime. The inside had whirling clouds. “What are those?”

“Th-they’re called…Hearts.” Elytra clicked and buzzed nervously as her eyes followed Cheerilee. “They store my extra food.” She stepped closer and placed a chitinous hoof on the mare’s shoulder. “Is everything okay?”

“You seem to have a lot of extra.” Cheerilee stated flatly. She was getting flustered as everything Applejack said started to dig into her brain more and more. She couldn’t hold back the question any longer. “Is this what you did when you were harvesting ponies?” She just wanted the truth, that’s all. She wanted to know if she was being used or not. “Make a little...hive, give them gifts you knew would make them happy and be all nice and sweet? Take their love and happiness, bottle it and save it for later?” There was supposed to be venom in her words, instead there was only pain.

“W-what?” Elytra looked around. “I mean...yes?” The look that Cheerilee shot her told the bug she had said the wrong thing. “I mean no! Not like that!” The pony turned, only for the changeling to move to stand in front of her again. “I’m not...I’m not that anymore. I’m better than that.”

“Who are you trying to convince?” She could only sigh and bring a hoof up to her face. “You’re using us, aren’t you?” She desperately didn’t want it to be true. “You brought the scooter and the cider because you knew ponies would like it. You cozied up to Scootaloo and I because we let you in, because we liked you.” The more of the theory Cheerilee said, the more the pieces started to fall into place and the more it hurt.

Why did it hurt so bad?

“I just wanted to make you happy!” Elytra defended herself vehemently, an offended hoof to her own chest and everything. “Was I going to get something out of it too, yes. But I’m not-I’m not a monster anymore.” Elytra’s voice started to waver and shake as the sadness built up and threatened to burst a dam. “I should’ve told you. I should’ve helped but all I could think about was how to make you all happy so…” The words died on her lips as she stared into the distance. It was a few seconds before she spoke again. “So I could eat, because happiness and love is better than sadness and grief.” The changeling let out a deep sigh as tears started to fall again, who knew if they were real or not anymore. “I fell back into my old ways. I slipped up. I-I was just trying to survive.”

“You never really cared, did you?” Both creatures looked away from the other. It hurt them both to say. It was a painful reality that they both had to acknowledge. Cheerilee needed to say it and accept it, and Elytra needed to hear it and figure out if it was true or not.

“I don’t know.” Elytra shrugged and shook her head. “But I want to.” Elytra stepped forward, her wings constant buzzing becoming louder and louder with each passing second. “I came here to learn how to be better, Cheerilee. I don’t know how to be the type of changeling ponies need me to be, I only know how to be what I’ve been my whole life.” A shelled hoof touched the pony, only for the mare to recoil. “I came to Ponyville to learn from the ponies who are authorities on friendship and harmony. I want to be better, but I need help.”

Cheerilee just wanted Scootaloo to be okay, she wanted the filly to make it out of this relatively unscathed. She had already failed once when Meriwether had pushed the filly off the balcony, and she didn’t want to fail again by letting Elytra lie and use the pegasus for food.

“Please, Cheerilee.” Elytra pleaded with the pony. “I-I’m not sure what I can do to make this right. I don’t know what to do to make any of you trust me.” The sadness morphed into frustration. “Since I’ve been found out, it has been nothing but accusations leveled at me. I’m always up to something bad, I’m always the problem.” She stepped close to Cheerilee and took one of the pony’s hooves in her own. “I don’t want to be. I want to be someone you all can trust, I want to help. I just...I just need to be taught how.” That struck an unlikely chord with the mare.

“Okay…” Sweet Celestia, why did Cheerilee still care? “I can do that.”

----

On the opposite side of Ponyville, right on the edge of the Everfree Forest, a small cottage reappeared. It sat exactly where it had once stood almost one month ago in a flash of light. A yellow pegasus with a long flowing pink mane poked her head out of the door and looked around.

“I-I don’t see anything...or anypony.” The mare said in a small voice. She looked out at the world with frightened eyes, especially as she saw Canterlot through the trees. “Oh no…”

“Well, someone cleared the air enough for me to finally get through.” A lanky serpentine creature that looked like it was stitched together with spare parts leaned out of the door above the pony. While the snark in his voice still remained, his usual vibrant appearance and posture was subdued. He looked tired and gray, like the color had been drained from him almost entirely. “I’m sure one of those little ponies will come by...they usually solve problems like this in twenty-two minutes or less.”

Neither of them moved, for they were both far too scared to venture beyond the safety of the cottage.

Author's Note:

Okay. I added 1K words to this and I'm a lot happier with this version of it.