A Week in the Rainbow Factory

by bahatumay

Chapter 1

Octave sat with his back to the wall of the cart. He just looked down, not even noticing the other five ponies with him in the cart.

So this is what happened to failures.

In all honesty, he had expected to fail his flight test from the beginning. He had never been much of a flier. Never had been, never really expected to be. But he hadn’t actually expected to fail. Now it was actually happening.

His aunt in Ponyville said that they had so few pegasi there that their flight test was just a simple question: Can you fly?

But no. He had had to stay here in Cloudsdale. He had had to take their test.

And he had failed drastically. He had the dubious honor of being the only one of their group to get three hooves down. He’d be embarrassed if he weren’t so worried. He wondered what his life would be like now. Rumors abounded about what happened to those who failed their tests. Exile was a common theory, but he had heard from a neighbor's friend's cousin that one pegasus who failed had eventually returned to Cloudsdale, so he tried to keep his spirits up.

Which is amazingly hard to do when you're bouncing along in the back of a crowded wagon listening to two stallions who probably hadn't showered in a month discuss what they termed 'the hot piece of flank at the Cool Cloud last night'.

He suppressed a small whimper and pushed himself back into the wall of the cart.

---

Whatever he had been expecting, it was certainly not to arrive at the Rainbow Factory. It was certainly not to be herded into the lower level of the Factory by ponies in white coats wielding shocksticks. And it most definitely was not being lectured by a red pegasus with a white mane calling himself Dr. Atmosphere.

“You are in the Factory. You will never leave the Factory. Any rumors that you will leave are pure and utter nonsense. I have also heard mutterings that you are useless. That's also nonsense, let me assure you. You have a noble purpose, with an effect both far and wide! You get to help us make…” here he paused for dramatic effect, “-rainbows!”

Octave flinched, and not just in reaction to the spittle that had landed on his face. So that was his fate.

Physical labor was not his forte by any means. He wasn't the strongest of colts, and judging by the ponies he saw working here, there weren't any small ones. Those valves did look pretty heavy and hard to turn, and-

Wait.

He looked around again to confirm what he already knew. There were no other small ponies there. Every single uniformed pony was definitely a grown-up.

So where were the other young ponies that had failed? The other foals that had come here before his group?

Not knowing or caring about Octave's internal musings, Dr. Atmosphere continued. “Doesn't that excite you? It excites me.”

One colt giggled, obviously taking that last sentence in a dirty way.

“Ooh, I'm glad I'm not alone!” Dr. Atmosphere said cheerily, trotting over to the one who had laughed. “Would you like to talk about what's so exciting about rainbows?”

The colt nodded hesitantly, unsure about being singled out like this.

Octave scanned the crowd again. Most of the workers were grinning, or nudging each other at some inside joke.

Suddenly, his eyes were drawn to a yellow pegasus with a light blue mane. She pushed her goggles up onto her forehead and watched. To Octave's surprise, her eyes seemed to be filled with... pity? It was such a foreign expression compared to the other ponies who were chuckling, if they were even paying attention.

No, scratch that. Everypony was now paying attention.

Dr. Atmosphere straightened up again and addressed the crowd. “Who here knows what rainbows are made of?”

There was silence among the foals. Finally, one filly raised a hoof. “Spectra?” she guessed.

“Correct!” Dr. Atmosphere beamed. “And where does spectra come from?”

There was some awkward shuffling among the foals.

One hazarded a guess. “Magic?”

“Not quite!” Dr. Atmosphere kept scanning the crowd, grinning and looking very much like a demented school teacher. “Nopony? Very well. I'll answer this one. Live ponies!”

There was more of an awkward shuffling, and the colt that spoke up at first raised his hoof. “So how do you get it out?” he asked.

Dr. Atmosphere smiled, a thin smile that sent shivers up Octave's back. “Funny you should ask…”

---

Octave walked slowly back, following a deep blue mare he didn't recognize. His eyes were wide and he was just completely shocked at what he had just witnessed. Others were sobbing or even crying openly, but he was silent. He had no words to describe what he had just seen. A colt just like him was just breathing, just fine, and then chains and then his ribs were cracked and the machine just kept grinding and grinding and grinding and-

Before his mind could go further down deconstructing what he had just seen, he ran into the mare’s flanks, knocking himself back onto his tail. She shook her head and muttered something that sounded vaguely like ‘mucking failures’ before opening a door made of thick bars and gesturing inside. Behind the door stood tall cages all in a row, made of a chain-link material, much like the ones Octave had seen at the pound when he had visited the earth ponies on that field trip.

“Get,” she ordered coldly. “Three to a cage.”

The foals needed no second command. As they scampered inside, she followed, locking each door behind them. The rooms were made of compressed cloud, stuff so thick that Octave didn’t think it would ever work loose. The entire room must have been half the size of his bedroom at home, and there were no amenities at all. There weren’t even any bunks to sleep on. He looked at his two cellmates and whimpered quietly.

“Prison’s better than this,” one colt muttered.

The blue mare slammed her shockstick against the cage wall, making them jump. “Prison’s too good for the likes of you,” she retorted. “Now sleep well, failures. Tomorrow’s a busy day!” And with that, the mare locked the main gate and walked away.

Octave lay down and tried to get comfortable. It was a losing affair. The compressed cloud might as well have been concrete.

However, not all the foals had resigned themselves to their dismal fate just yet. As soon as the mare had left, a colt in the cage across from Octave began digging, trying to use his own hooves to get through the cloud layer. Faster and faster he worked, but judging by his grunts of frustration, he wasn’t getting far.

“Don’t bother.”

All the foals jumped at the sound of a new voice. Standing behind the main door was that same yellow mare Octave recognized from earlier. She still wore her lab coat and goggles, pushed back up on her forehead. With a weak smile, she continued, “Each square brick of this cloud is compressed from a forty by forty cumulonimbus. Trust me. It’s not coming loose.”

“How do they do that?” a filly whispered reverently.

The mare shrugged. “This is the Cloudsdale Weather Center. There’s not a lot we can’t do.”

The colt who had been digging stopped and straightened up, staring defiantly. “So it’s compressed tight. So what?”

The mare fished in a pocket for a ring of keys. With a little jangle, she unlocked the main gate and stepped inside. “So if you want to get out, what you need is somepony on the inside.” She stopped in front of the cage of the colt who had spoken and poked a hoof through the bars in invitation for bumping. “Raindrops,” she introduced herself.

The colt looked down at her hoof and back up at her, clearly distrustful, and did not return the gesture.

Raindrops sighed and withdrew her hoof. “Yeah, I get that a lot,” she conceded. “But look. I’m here to help. I don’t want to see more foals die than I have to, so I’m going to help all of you that I can get out of here.”

“Not all of us?”

Raindrops looked over at the filly that had spoken and frowned. “I don’t work every day, sweetie,” she said gently. “And even when I do, I’m not always on failure duty. There are a lot of jobs here.” She smiled wryly. “Seems that once management started noticing that lots of failures started disappearing when I was around, I’ve been getting more and more assignments to clean and do paperwork than actually transport.” She walked over to the filly’s cage and knelt down to look her in the eyes. “But I promise, I’ll do everything I can to get as many of-”

“Raindrops!”

Raindrops’ eyes flew open and a mild epithet left her lips. She sprinted out of the main door and closed it as quietly as she could, while shouting, “Yeah! And then, and then, you get fed into the Device one by one! See? Extract your spectra! That’s what you get for failing, worthless losers!”

“Save it, Raindrops, you’re not fooling anypony.”

Raindrops turned and looked at the pegasus behind her. Even from behind two doors, Octave couldn't help but take an instinctive step back. This mare was huge. Her light green wings must have extended at least three times his span, and her short purple mane and intimidating stare made it look like she was more sizing Raindrops up as a meal than as an actual threat.

“Oh, hey, Blizz,” Raindrops said with just a hint of nervousness. “I didn’t see you there.”

“Like hay you didn’t,” Blizz said airily. “You been talking with the failures again?”

“No,” Raindrops scoffed.

“You’re as useless as they are. Remember what the Boss Mare said about catching you in here when you’re not on shift again?”

“I- it’s not like they can fire me,” Raindrops said, putting on a show of bravado. “You know how hard it is to get ponies to work here.”

“Maybe,” Blizz conceded. “But if you do get fired, that means more overtime for me.” She smirked. “Actually, I think I like this idea. Wonder what she’d say…”

Raindrops wilted a bit at this implied threat. “I can give you my shift tomorrow?” she offered weakly. “Morning shift, five to ten?”

Blizz nodded smugly. “I think that will work. See you tomorrow, Raindrops. Oh wait, I won’t.” Chuckling at her own joke, Blizz continued down the passage.

Raindrops glowered. “Blizzard is such a…” She looked back at the foals and ended her sentence there. “Like I said, I’m not supposed to be here right now, and now I’m not going to be here tomorrow,” she added under her breath, “but the day after I should be able to get something done.” She rested a hoof on the bars. “I promise, I’ll help as many of you as I can.”

Octave watched her leave. He couldn’t smile, but for the briefest of moments, he wanted to.