The Smallest Invasion

Chapter Two: Applejack

Despite everything that had just happened, the second group still had all the bravado of the first. The group of three hundred felt confident as they knew of the red, twisting forest they were getting into. But when the light of teleportation cleared, and they gazed upon the land before them, they froze stiff. They just couldn’t believe what they saw, and what it meant for their place in the Universe.

Instead of a tight, constricting forest, they gazed upon a vast, open plain that stretched out for what looked like fifty kilometres to them. The ground was a glossy brown that felt hard and unyielding. The plains were almost perfectly flat, with only small imperfections in the terrain that were a few times deeper than they were tall. Open basins and valleys, worming through the land like cracks upon a window. But it wasn’t blank and featureless like a salt-flat, but it wasn’t grass of trees that dotted the landscape.

Like what the scout group had reported, there was a littering of debris across the vast plains. Long, thin tubes wider than them, and vast hills made up of a brownish black material. Giant cubes dotted the landscape as well. All loomed larger than them, making it nigh impossible to see far. They couldn’t even see the far end of the flats, with it instead obscured by the junk.

But they didn’t need to in order to see where it ended. Four vertical cliff-faces, all perfectly straight and square with each other, signalled the end.

And that was what broke their brain, for they did not look anything like stone, but a floral pattern of green and yellow. Their minds, having been accustomed to the world they knew, didn’t quite understand it at first, attempting to rationalise it as the features they knew. The green and yellow was thought to be a strange, mossy covering. The brown, wooden surface several dozen kilometres above them was thought just to be an overcast sky. In the centre of the flats was a massive wooden structured that stretched kilometres upwards; they thought it was just a greatwood tree.

But, one by one, all these safety nets fell away as they realised the reality of their situation.

They were not the masters of the Universe they thought they were.
They were not gazing upon a vast open landscape.
They were but specks in just one room of this colossal abode.

The several hundred of them were nothing more than a barely perceptible patch of darkness upon the wooden floor. They were in a dining room with a colossal table at the very centre, stretching taller than any building. Beneath it was a thick carpet, the brown spires of the fabric just peeking up through the junk littered across the ground. The rest of the floor had a simple wooden floor. On the opposite side of the wall to them was a white cupboard that stretched taller than any skyscraper.

The group themselves were against the opposite corner, with the vast, vast wall stretching up just behind them. In comparison to everything else it was merely a kilometre away.

Several minutes passed of them staring in dumbstruck awe at the sight before them. But when the awe passed, they did not feel fear, but even greater excitement. The bigger the world, the bigger the plunder. And besides, with everything they had at hand, even they, mere specks of sand, felt unstoppable.

At the wall behind them was a crack in the wooden-baseboard, stretching up like a fissure opened up by an earthquake. It was only shallow and dark, but for them, it looked like a perfect place to setup. They hurried over with all of their supplies and started making their foothold in the strange, new world. Any thoughts for the other team were quickly forgotten; they would have to fend for themselves. With prefab buildings, expandable equipment and tools, they put together a small colony in the shadow of the crack. Residences, workshops, armouries, scanning rooms, and most importantly, a stable portal to Earth.

It was in the late afternoon that they finished their labours and setup their base. With every second it continued to grow with more materials and people from their home-base. Their refuge, their sanctum, their only hope in this new world. And it was smaller than an ant, cowering for shelter in a tiny crack in the wall.

While the colonists bustled around their home, building and improving, scouts were dispatched to map the strange land. Racing across the brown expanse were lightweight buggies, with six wheels each and open frames. They drove in a group of four, with six people inside each one, gazing out at the tiny landscape they went through. They lurched and swayed though from all the bumps and grooves in the terrain. The dents from especially strong hoof-falls created craters in the terrain, visible only to them. The floor was smooth, polished and waxed, but to them it was still uneven. The seams between individual boards were deep, dark chasms to places unknown that they dared not to tread inside. Minutes would be spent driving along it before finding a place where they touched, giving them a bridge across.

They had to contend with all the litter as well. Even for a normally sized being it was all visible, being a filthy floor, forcing the tinies to drive around it. One would expect they could see far, and while they could gaze far upwards, along the floor itself they could see much past all the junk. It was like an intergalactic graveyard almost, being filled with strewn objects with little rhyme or reason. The tiny group of specks drove in the shadow of dust, crumbs, and strands of fur.

After driving for two hours they approached the opposite wall of the colossal room. A large, heavy-set door sat in the middle of it, with sunlight streaming through a window inside it. They were still a sizeable distance from it though, being half an hour’s drive away. As they arced around a colossal yellow crumb, presumably from a cake of some sort, the lead car detected something on the radar. It was ahead of them, towards the door, and moving roughly towards them, at a 45 degree angle. Having not seen movement before, they raced towards it, wondering what it could be. Heading around the giant crumb, they rounded the corner and gazed in wonder, upon a colossal, awe-inspiring ... ant.

The black, chitinous creature scurried across the floor with unthinkable speed. It was simply massive, with their cars not even coming up to the midpoint of its long, spindly legs, while their bodies were half as thick as them too. Relative to them, it 15 stories, 65 metres tall, and it was longer than a football field. A massive construct of humans, and a mere ant could fill it entirely. At such scale, at such detail, it didn’t even look like an ant, instead like a strange, other-worldly horror. Bristling spines dotted its body, imperceptible at a normal scale, yet each longer than their bodies. Its black, beady eyes were the same size at the specks of humans. In two massive, serrated tusks it held a tiny crumb of food. A morsel, which to the shock of the humans, was the same size as their cars.

Yet they felt some safety, some security, from the fact that relative to them, it was a kilometre or so away. Until its beady eyes swivelled across the floor and settled on them. It let out a horrific, unearthly screech, dropped the crumb, and headed straight for the group. They were but mere crumbs to an ant, but their strange colour, their strange scent, it piqued its curiosity. There was no reason it couldn’t get another crumb of food.

As soon as they realised that they were being hunted by an ant, the entire group screamed and turned around. They gunned their engines to maximum speed away from the ant, yet it was gaining on them. Every pound of its long, gangly legs brought it closer and closer to the tiny group. In no time at all a kilometre’s gap dwindled to a few hundred metres, and before long, less. It slowly, consistently gained on them like an unstoppable horror, merely stepping over the obstacles that forced them to swerve. Those in the back leaned out the sides and unloaded their rifles upon the ant. Tiny splashes of red and orange plasma could be glimpsed on its chitin, yet it didn’t recognise the blows.

Reaching the one in the very back, it snapped its jaws before lunging down for the kill. It swerved, just missing the snap of chitin. The sudden turn brough them to a screeching halt, right in front of its legs. They screamed and held their hands upwards as one of its legs descended from the sky, before coming down upon them and effortlessly crushing them flat. A crunch of meat and flesh as they were simply flattened, now just a red and black smear across the floor and its leg.

The rest continued to flee, feeling no sympathy for their colleagues, and the ant was upon the next in no time at all. It lunged, they swerved, but they weren’t fast enough. The jaws came down and effortlessly skewed them through the middle, its bite rending their armour and almost splitting it in twain. Two were eviscerated from the sudden snap, while the rest watched on in horror as the jaws lifted, and brought them to its glistening mouth. With a scream they were all tossed inside, the mangled wreck landing neatly in its maw before it snapped shut. The headlights gave them a glimpse of the dark, twisting cave, before they were effortlessly pulverised by its slicing, grinding incisors. They were quickly swallowed down, beginning the long journey towards its stomach. For the one who miraculously was thrown clear of the car and spared the chewing, they would be treated to being digested alive by an ant.

Two more left, and it approached the survivors, before a tremor ripped through the ground. It grew stronger and stronger, bouncing the cars off the ground, yet the ant didn’t flinch. A massive rush of air then ripped across the ground, sending dust flying, as the gigantic opened. And an equally giant being strode through. With the lurching motion of fleeing and the blur of distance between the two, they weren’t sure what they laid they saw. Something gigantic, an orange blur with four legs, and a thick, long body. A disc of darker brown was tossed off its head, tumbling to the ground like a distant meteor, slamming into the floor with enough force to bring another rush of air. Vocalisations, deep, powerful and impossible to understand rippled through the air like the clap of thunder. The distant being turned to leave, raising its hoof with another rush of air, before it turned its head to face them.

A thunderous growl, and it took a powerful step towards them. The world bounced as its hoof slammed down, lurching both everyone into the air, but the ant barely noticed. It continued to chase, jaws about to close upon them...

Before the being lifted its hoof. A shadow fell over them as it arced over head, before sailing down. They screamed as they watched the muck covered hoof descend, escape impossible from the kilometre wide object. The underside was her dark hoof, with dirt and grime worked into every crevice. It was simply filthy, but it did not matter. They screamed as it descended before their entire existence was obliterated with a single step.

Applejack sighed and rolled her sore shoulders as she pushed the door open and stepped inside. Sweat and dirt covered her fur, having been earned over the course of a long day picking apples. She stepped into the dining room through the side entrance to Sweet Apple Acres. As soon as she set her hoof inside, she felt the soft give of the dirt smeared beneath it, mud tracked in from outside.

“At least Big McIntosh or the others ain’t around to see this, all the dirt I’m bringing in...” she muttered as she stepped the rest of the way inside, closing the door with her hoof. Any other day she would’ve bothered to wipe her filthy hooves off, but she was just too tired. With a toss of her head she threw her leather hat off, which fluttered down upside-down next to the door. She started for the bathroom, ready to wash herself off in a nice, cool shower, but stopped. Scurrying across the floor, not too far from her was a black ant.

“Ugh...” she grunted, her fur bristling in disgust. “Gross little ants think they can eat all of our food, all of our apples...”

Bringing her hoof over, she swiftly stomped down flattening the ant in an instant. She then put all of her weight on it and turned it from side to side, crunching and grinding the ant and humans down. When she pulled her hoof away, she couldn’t even see the ant anymore. There was just muck and grime smeared in the shape of her hoof-print. The final resting place of several dozen humans, now nothing more than a thin smear across the ground.

“Good riddance, little pest...” she grunted. She turned for the bathroom once more, only to see that the floor was quite dirty. Dust, crumbs, dirt scattered across the floor; it was no wonder that ants were starting to come in. She really needed to sweep the floor. Yet the shower was so tempting, she thought of doing it afterwards ... yet changed her mind on a whim. No point getting clean if only to get dirty again while sweeping, she figured.

Trotting across the room, she opened the large, white cupboard with her hoof, then gingerly picked out a broom with her teeth. It was an old broom, with long, dry straw for a head and worn wood for the shaft. Bringing it back to the door, she clutched in her teeth and started sweeping. The straw-head swished and swayed from side to side as she swept it all towards the door. Plumes of dust flew into the air, some scattering across her hat, but she didn’t mind in the slightest. She continued sweeping, pushing it all into the corner, while humming a sweet little tune as she went. A quick little chore, one last job for the day before retiring to a nice shower.

But for the tiny specks underhoof, it was a world ending disaster for them. The group that had been crushed was only one of six, with five others scattered near the door. They all watched on in horror as the colossal being strode inside and crushed the first group without even realising it. Any thoughts as to how ponies built a home were left to the wayside, all they could think about was escape. They all raced back to the hovel as fast as they could.

As she strode towards the cupboard, one group saw her heading straight towards them. They tried to get out of her way at top speed but it wasn’t fast enough, her hoof effortlessly obliterating them. The four surviving groups didn’t even think of checking for survivors, continuing to speed back to the base. But even their best efforts weren’t enough, for Applejack returned back to them before they moved even a few centimetres, and began sweeping them up.

Every strand of the broom’s head was several times wider than them, a colossal spire stretching into the sky amongst a forest of them. With every sweep it came closer and closer, building an ever climbing wall of dust to its front. An encroaching tsunami of dust, dirt and grime. With every sweep plumes of dust were thrown into the air like volcanic ash, darkening their sky, and raining down around them. They peltered down like meteors, slamming into the floor with enough force to splatter dirt across their wind-screens.

Group three, the closest to the broom, never had a chance. A clod of dirt sailed through the air before slamming directly down on top of them, crushing them all into a mangled wreck. But some survived, desperately pushing at the doors to try and flee, unaware of just how close the broom was. But they could hear it, a constant, swishing and grinding of a forest of straw dragging across the floor, building to a deafening crescendo. They never even managed to open the doors before it was upon them. A single strand of straw struck them directly and obliterated them into a thin layer of dust. Nothing more than particles to be swept up by the broom.

The third last group almost met their doom as the broom swept directly towards them, pulling back in her stroke just before it hit them. Yet the volume of air slammed into them and ripped them off the ground, sending them flying in a plume of dust. They twisted and tumbled through the sky in the middle of a dust-cloud, large chunks flying right past them as if they were aloft in a tornado. For one car, the last thing they’d ever see would be a strand of yellow fur through the windscreen, before it slammed into them and crumpled them with a tiny plume of flame. The rest landed in the hat, half bursting instantly on landing, while the rest bounced and tumbled to a stop. When they freed themselves from the wreckage, they would find themselves in a vast, vast bowl, stretching up and out for seemingly kilometres. Thick, rough walls hemmed them in from all sides, trapping them at the very bottom of the hat.

They thought little of those still on the ground, nor did those on the ground think about those swept up. The second last group was right in front of Applejack, and the broom came straight towards them, only to pull up. Applejack missed them by a few centimetres, the straw arcing overhead for them as she missed a small patch. They breathed a collective sigh of relief as they watched the straw arc just above them, despite the comets of dust falling down. The broom slammed back down again just in front of them while Applejack continued her sweep. They felt sweet relief ... right until the broom swept backwards as Applejack tried to get the patch she missed. The sudden, strong whip sent a plume of dust and air, ripping them up and sending them flying through the air.

Swept towards her body, the currents and eddies of her motion caught them, like the specks of dust in the wind they were. Twisting up towards her barrel, they then were sucked towards her right fore-leg as she lifted it while walking. Arcing underneath, they then sailed upwards, before landing right back down on the back of her neck. They bounced and tumbled across the rough, uneven skin, the surface ever shifting from the natural motion of her body. One tumbled into a crevasse in her skin, a fissure formed between two flakes. They had but a moment to thank their good luck, before her head dipped, tightening the skin and closing the crevasse, crushing them unaware.

The rest would find themselves tumbling through a pale forest filled with thick fibres constricting from all angles. It was like the carpet, yet so much more dense, and ever shifting, ever moving. There was no rest, only endless tumbling across the expanse of her form.

As for the final group, they would be afforded no such thought. At the very front of the broom, they would see a massive tidal wave of dust rush towards them. One by one they were swept up into the mess, consumed by the filth, becoming nothing more than a speck amongst the brown. In the darkness, surrounded on all sides by grime, they tumbled and turned in their new prisons. The stale, musty air seeped in from every angle, honing in their insignificance. They were now just dust, and were going to be treated as such by the deity Applejack.

Closer and closer they were brough to the colossal tower of the entranceway, two pillars stretching far into the sky. Beyond that was a vast, vast land beyond anything they could imagine. But many could not see it, either buried in filth, or too busy trying to get out. Several on the surface leapt from their stricken vehicles and tried to flee on foot across the twisting, broken island on the tip of her broom. But none made it far before the shifting dirt swallowed them up, dragging them down into the darkness to be crushed by a ripple of motion.

With a final sweep, the pile was brought before the door, resting against the lower edge of the frame. For those who could still see, they would see a vast landscape to their front, and a vast deity behind them. The spires of straw suddenly pulled away, sucking them back slightly with the vacuum of air, before reaching its peak and coming right back down again. They had a moment to scream before the broom slammed into their pile, and sent them flying out into the beyond.

Several dozen, a quarter of their group, were killed instantly by the shockwave of the broom. The rest were sent flying through the air in a cloud of debris, specks hailing down all around them, pelting them on all sides. It was as if they were caught in an explosion. Another quarter never even reached the ground, being obliterated by errant specks of dust caught in the twisting cloud.

And the rest? The rest would be obliterated upon impact with the wooden floor of the patio outside the door. A shower of metal crumpling in plumes of fire and tiny bodies splattering red against the floor. Tiny, imperceptible specks heralding the humans’ end, before it all fell silent.

Applejack swept the pile of dirt out the door, watching the tiny specks sail through the air before settling on the floor outside. She thought she saw flashes of light in it, but marked it down to just shards of glass catching the afternoon’s light. Pulling the door shut, she leaned the broom against the wall, and sighed in satisfaction as she looked over the room. All swept up, and it looked much cleaner now! Turning on her hoof, she picked up her hat in her teeth and headed for the hallway to the bathroom, swishing her tail.

But, not all of the pests scurrying around her hooves had been dealt with. And this wasn’t counting those trying and failing to escape her hat, or the ones slipping and sliding across her neck with every step. Outside, a single survivor slowly pulled themselves out of the wreckage of their vehicle. They had gotten lucky, with their car being struck with an upwards flying dust speck, slowing them down before landing in an especially soft patch. The rest of the occupants weren’t so lucky however, being sucked out of the hole created by the dust strike, and now littering the ground as splatters of red.

Pulling themselves out, they took a moment to look around, finding themselves in a forest of thick, coarse fibres, even wider than those of the carpet. Not taking a moment to question it or feel sorrow for the others, they grabbed their bag and set off for home...

CRUNCH!

Before being erased by a cityscape of brown landing directly on top of them. Where there was once a human was now nothing more than brown, having been obliterated in an instant. But it wasn’t hard ebony across their remains, but an entire layer of dirt and mud that oozed across into the forest of fibres. Any crumpled remains were simply buried in it. But then, the entire mud layer was dragged backwards, smearing it and the remains thinner and thinner with every scrape.

Stretching out above the thin smear that was getting smear was a colossal hoof, and above it, an even more colossal pony. A giant, even among his own kind. Big McIntosh ground his hoof against the doormat, wiping away all of the mud and dirt tracked in from the fields. Content he had gotten it all, he strode inside and sighed in relief.

“Applejack finally swept the floor ... I hope she didn’t crush any bugs when she did so...” he muttered, before heading to the kitchen to prepare dinner.

Applejack meanwhile went up the stairs and headed down the hallway to her bedroom. She nudged the door open and stepped onto the bright yellow carpet that coated her bedroom. Against the far wall was a bed beneath a large window, a dresser besides it, and a desk near the door. Applejack didn’t notice any of that though, merely tossing the hat to rest beside her bed and heading straight into the bathroom. The ensuite bathroom was small and tiled, with a shower against one wall, and a toilet and sink on the opposite.

After pulling the door shut with her tail and flicking it locked, she stepped on the cool tiles of the shower’s floor, then pulled the door closed. It was small, with barely any room to turn around, but it was enough. At the very centre in a small depression was a drain, a few strands of her fur dangling from it. A few stains covered the walls and glass, but she couldn’t care, instead standing right beneath the shower head and turning on the taps. As soon as the warm water cascaded across her mane and fur she sighed, letting serenity flow through her after a long day. The warm water started at her head and flowed downwards, soaking her fur as it spread downwards like a nice, warm blanket. For the specks still on the back of her neck however, it was a tsunami that washed over them, sending spiralling down to the water below. From there, it was a water rapids ride straight into the sewers.

But she did not know, instead flicking her mane, sending droplets of water and a few specks splattering against the tiled walls. Feeling a particular patch of dust across her underbelly, she reared up on her hind legs and planted them against the front wall. Water spilled across her underbelly and washed all the dust away. Head next to the jet, she opened her mouth and drank a few drops. She then got back down on her hooves and turned around to let it run across her back. Her hooves rose and fell as she awkwardly turned herself around, splashing into the water currents and crushing several more tinies as she went.

The water now ran down her spine, parting in the middle to create rivers dripping down either side. Warm tendrils of water ran down her legs and the back of her thighs, even reaching down underneath her now sodden tail, much to her delight. With it the last tinies were swept away with nowhere to hide. A few managed to cling to the spires of her fur dangling in the drain, but even they were knocked off before long. Swept away into the dark, foul pipes, never to be seen again.

Applejack just continued to wash herself, putting a dollop of her soap on her forehoof and running it all over herself. She worked herself into a bubbly, frothy lather, before letting the warm water wash it all away. After five minutes of showering, she turned the taps off, now completely soaked from head to hoof. Shaking most of it off, she stepped out and wiped herself down with a towel. Mostly dry, she left the bathroom and headed off into the house. After a full evening of eating, talking, cleaning up and a few games, she retired to her bedroom.

Now in the evening, moonlight streamed through the window. Hopping up into her bed, she tugged the blanket over herself and quickly fell into a deep, peaceful sleep.

But the evening wasn’t as serene for the tiny specks still living in her hat. The walls were too thick and tall, making it impossible to escape. Any radios they had were simply destroyed in the crash as well, meaning they had no rescue. All they could do was wait until tomorrow morning, when the hat would be put on once more. They would find themselves not in a forest of carpet, but one of hair instead.
Definitely not what they were expecting when colonising a new world, that’s for sure.