Aren't You Hungry, Dear?

Handen Foot groaned softly as she awoke on the soft blanket that was one of the infirmary "beds".
She slowly stood up, her legs shaking as she walked, head hung low. The mood in the tunnels felt lower than usual; which was impressive. They were living like ants. Worse than ants, really; ants had a queen, a social structure, and a proper place for every single one of themselves. They were runabouts, foraging what little they could and hiding away from everything else. It tore at her. Foals weren't supposed to live like this. They should be free and happy, not terrified of what an adult might do to them if they were found.

She looked at the congregation of several fillies in the front chamber.
"Good… Morning…?" Handen stumbled out awkwardly.
"Chief, we need to talk about the plan," Applebloom said bluntly, "You told Sunny Daze about the location of the potion; we need to act on it."
Handen gulped. "I… I understand," She expressed softly. She'd hoped for a bit more time, but maybe it was good that the fillies were ready to go.

"We need a saddlebag and empty bottles that they can fill; the potion is in the water cooler. The employees drink it when they break," She explained, taking on a more authoritative voice.
A few of the fillies nodded.
"Scootaloo, Toola Roola, and Noisette will come with me," She explained.
Peachy Pie perked up, "I have Toola's spear ready to go!" She said.
"Good," Handen replied, "We will meet here at dusk. Until then, it's business as usual," She stated.
The small crowd dispersed to prepare for the plan, and Handen sighed. This was do or die, now. It all hinged on this.

Handen looked at Scootaloo, Toola Roola, and Noisette.
"Now, the plan is simple," She explained, "We will circle around back and head through a vent; Scootaloo, you will guard our exit. Toola Roola and Noisette will come with me, we will take as much as Noisette can carry as I hold back the door. Then, we leave," She instructs.
"Yes ma'am!" Replied the task force in unison.
Handen looked at Applebloom. "If I don't come back, you're the chief, okay? I spent my day writing down who to give the potion to first," She explained.
Applebloom nodded tensely, "Alright, chief. I'll be strong; y'all go make the chief proud," Applebloom said.

Handen would lead her team out through the streets, showing them the back alleyways to dive through. She had deliberately waited until late, so there'd be as little hoof traffic as possible.
"It's so quiet…" Scootaloo murmured.
"Everyone's busy eating," Handen explained in a whisper.
They poked their heads out to see the vent. It had been replaced, but it seemed that the Hungry Horse crew had assumed they'd mopped up the last of the resistant ones.
Handen pointed to the flower box. "Flowerbox, sill. Got it?" She orders simply, "Toola, you're up first. Two hops."

Toola Roola nodded, gripping her spear tightly in her mouth, running to the flower box. She hopped up onto it, then the sill, using her spear to pry the vent open.
"Now, Noisette," Handen ordered quietly.
Noisette repeated the movements, making it to the flower box before Handen sent Scootaloo over.
It was a good thing too, as Noisette misjudged her second jump. Scootaloo pushed her up, "Gotcha," Scootaloo whispered.
Handen then ran forward and led up the rear, sneaking inside and carefully leading her team through the vents. She halted them as she heard voices in the break room.

"Think we've got everyone now that Toffee dealt with that little creep sneaking around?" One employee asked.
The other nodded, "Probably. I heard that stubborn old bird out on the farm finally got some sense knocked into her, too."
Scootaloo nearly cussed. "How dare they talk about Granny like that?" She thought silently.
Eventually, the voices subsided, the door closing behind them.
"Now," Handen instructs in a sharp whisper, kicking the grate through, "Scootaloo, make sure we've got an opening on our way out."
Scootaloo nodded, heading back the way they had come as the other three dropped down.
Noisette ran to the water cooler, beginning to fill her bottles, as Toola Roola and Handen locked the door and held it shut.

For a long moment, all that could be heard was the steady glug, glug, glug of the water cooler as it filled up the bottles with the pink solution.
Then, a confused employee's voice. "I think the break room door's stuck. Who's the manager tonight…?" They asked, trailing off as they walked away to go get assistance.
"We're on the clock now. Go help Noisette," Handen whispered sharply to Toola Roola, who nodded and went to help in filling bottles.
Gluglug, gluglug, gluglug.
It was like a clock ticking down.

"We got it chief!" Noisette said softly as she capped the fourth bottle of potion.
"Good," Handen said, walking to the other two and helping them up into the vent.
"What about you, chief?" Toola Roola asked, looking down at Handen, who was standing on the desk.
Handen gave a small smile, "I'm gonna get caught," She said, "Go!" She ordered as she heard the jingle of keys from the other side of the door.
Toola Roola and Noisette disappeared into the vent, and Handen leapt from the desk.
Glug, glug, glug…

Two large ponies walked into the break room as it was unlocked, staring at Handen.
"You!? What're you doing back here!?" Toffee exclaimed.
Handen gave a sheepish smile to the stallion next to her, "I was hungry," She admitted innocently.
Toffee looked like she was about to explode, but the blue stallion next to her took the bait. "Oh, you poor thing. Come here, we'll get you settled, okay?" He said gently, gesturing for Handen to follow him.
Toffee blinked. She hadn't actually told anyone how she "dealt with" the trespasser. Served her right for getting cocky.
Handen allowed the stallion to lead her forward. "Glazed Frosting," his name tag read.

Glazed Frosting led Handen to a small break table at the back of the kitchen. "I'll go get you some things to try, alright? You can tell us all about how much you love each one," He said cheerily, leaving the proximity.
Toffee glared at Handen, "What exactly are you doing back here?" She asked.
"Well, you said I wouldn't eat no matter how hard you tried. I couldn't just let you be right," Handen said, grinning up at the mare.
Before Toffee could tell her what was what, Glazed Frosting came back with a picnic basket full of hayfries and an uncomfortably large side tub of some sort of thick, orange sauce.

"Here you are, little one; eat up, okay?" Glazed said gently.
"You can't be serious," Toffee muttered, glaring at him.
Glazed seemed confused, "What?" He asked.
"You don't find it weird that we found the one pony who's been avoiding us for months in our break room, asking for food?" Toffee asked.
Glaze shook his head, "I'm sure she just finally came around. Isn't that right, little one?" He asked.

Handen nodded and gave him a sheepish smile. She wasn't sure what was dirtier; the mud caked onto her fur and mane, or the hayfries dripping with so much grease that they looked more liquid than solid by volume. Sheepishly, she took a fry in her mouth and dipped it in the sauce, before taking the whole fry in her mouth and chewing.
Handen had to suppress a slight gag at first; there was so much oil. It oozed out of the fry as she chewed on it. It wasn't actually that bad, really; heavier than anything she'd ever had before, but it didn't taste terrible. She could see eating it once or twice a week, perhaps, but not every waking moment.
Wait, she wasn't brainwashed. The potion had worked!

Handen took a few more fries, dipping them and eating them. The sauce wasn't bad either; somewhere between ketchup and honey mustard.
Glazed Frosting smiled widely. "There you go," He said, rubbing Handen's back, "Doesn't it feel good to have some nice hot food in your belly?"
Handen nodded absently. She only hoped the fillies had made it back safely, especially as a third pony brought her a burger that looked like it could've eaten her.
"They'd better be following that list to the letter," She thought to herself, hesitantly leaning forward to bite the burger, groaning discontentedly as grease dripped down her chin.

Applebloom stared at the bottles full of pink liquid. "This is the potion?" She asked.
Noisette nodded. "The chief said so," She replied.
Scootaloo fumbled the cap off one of the bottles and took a sip, gulping hard. "Ugh… It tastes like… Sour," She grunted.
Applebloom took a curious swig, and coughed lightly as she gulped her sample down. It really did just taste sour; not like anything sour in particular.
They took the bottles of potion around the camp, making sure every filly and colt got a taste of the preventative liquid.
Then, Applebloom read over the notebook simply labeled "hit list".

It didn't hit every pony in town, of course, Handen couldn't write that fast. But it did give carefully-explained advice on who to give the potion to first; those who were most important to propagate the potion's presence. Rarity for her generosity, Twilight being a princess, and so on. It was very well thought out. Perhaps with this plan, they could finally end the year and a half of terror that Hungry Horse had wrought upon them.

Handen whined and waved her hoof, "N-No more," She groaned weakly, looking at the damage she had done to the hot "food" before her. It really was pathetic, compared to how other ponies endlessly gulped down burger after burger; she'd only managed about two dozen hayfries and a quarter of the burger before her. It was the most she'd eaten in her entire life; and probably more than she'd eaten in the past few months.
Toffee Crumble snickered, "What's the matter? Your tiny tummy all stuffed silly?"
Handen weakly nodded, trying to avoid thinking about the deluge of nausea that was already building in her guts.
Glazed Frosting gently nuzzled her, "Aww, it's okay," He said gently, "If you're full, you can always come back when you're hungry again."
Handen shied away from the oddly affectionate stallion. His coat was somehow more caked in grease than the food he had served her; if she had to guess, he probably bathed in oil.

"Thank you," Handen choked out, "Can I go now?" She asked.
Glazed nodded, helping her to the door.
Handen instinctively went to run, but nearly fell flat on her face. Her stomach was overcapacity and then some; all to give the fillies a chance to carry out the second phase of the plan.
Toffee Crumbled smirked, watching the mare stumble off. "Run, little pony. You'll need to go very, very far~" She teased under breath, looking at the small strap of the leather muzzle she had stuffed in her uniform earlier.

Handen stumbled out into an alleyway, making sure she was out of view of the restaurant, before she finally succumbed to her body's retching.
Her stomach contracted as it emptied its contents onto the street. Handen didn't fight her body at all; this was for the best. It was way too heavy, it was way too greasy, and it had been way, way too much food for her past calorie intake.
She looked at the puddle of ex-food on the ground, and started laughing. Her plan worked. Her crazy plan had worked. She'd heard neither hide nor hair of anyone having seen her task force. She threw up again, but that didn't stop her from laughing.
She stumbled slowly forward, groaning. She wasn't going to make it home. She crawled behind a bush and hunkered down.

The cutie mark crusaders slunky lowly through the streets, "Chief said we should avoid the open roads," Scootaloo commented quietly, "I hope she's alright… Toola Roola said she got caught."
Sweetie Bell gasped lightly. "She let herself get caught? What if she got…" She trailed off, trembling.
"She was in the room with the potion; she probably snuck a few gulps for herself, girls. The chief ain't stupid," Applebloom remarked.
They looked at the carousel boutique as it came into view. What had once been a lovingly maintained and carefully groomed building was now an unkept mess of wrappers and boxes.

Sweetie Bell expected to have to take the spare key out of the mailbox, but the door was already open.
"Rarity?" Sweetie called into the building.
All that replied to her were swinelike snores; deep, labored breaths of a large creature.
"Oh right… Ponies sleep at night," Applebloom remarked; none of the fillies and colts had a normal sleep schedule anymore. They usually worked at night, when even the most technicolour of ponies would be hard to see.
They crept through the house, letting out small disgusted grunts at all the greasy cardboard and paper. If Rarity were herself, she would have probably fainted at the mess.

Sweetie Bell almost screamed as she got a sight of her sister's now grotesquely porcine form. A massive glob of white fur and purple mane, with only a moderately strong suggestion of limbs. Rarity's fur was matted with oil and sweat, and even as she slept her body's mass moved in strange, undulating ways.
Applebloom looked at Scootaloo, "You stay here as lookout, Scoots. Sweetie and I'll get her to wake up," Applebloom said, creeping into the room.
Sweetie followed her, magicking a small cupful of the pink potion over as Applebloom crawled onto the sweat soaked bed.
"Rarity," Applebloom said calmly into a fold of white fur she assumed was an ear. A resounding snore confirmed her suspicions that this would be harder than she thought.

Applebloom grabbed what she thought was a fold of Rarity's neck and attempted to shake her awake. Applebloom immediately regretted her decision, given that it felt like she was grabbing a pillow that had been dipped in oil.
This did, however, rouse the slumbering blob of pony; she snorted awake, blinking once or twice. She fumbled around a bit, seemingly looking for something to eat.

"Here, sis, drink this!" Sweetie says, waving the cup of liquid before her face.
Rarity needed no further invitation; the magic coursing through her body demanded she consume, and consume she did, her own magic snatching it from Sweetie's hold and tipping it into her mouth.
Rarity gasped and coughed if she were an animal being waterboarded; the sour taste and lacking viscosity angered her tastebuds. It was already down the hatch, though.
The cutie mark crusaders watched with bated breath.

"S-sis?" Sweetie Bell asked after a couple minutes.
Rarity's eyes shot open. "Sweetie Bell!" She exclaimed excitedly, "Oh, goodness… I haven't seen you in weeks!" She expressed.
"Weeks?" Applebloom asked, "Rare, it's been over a year since either of us saw you."
Rarity's eyes shrank to pinpricks. "A year!? Is that why I'm so…?" Her voice trailed off.
Sweetie nodded, "We've been calling it getting 'greased'," She explained.
Rarity huffed and puffed. "Help me out of bed, with you?" She requested, "I need to take a walk. And a bath. And about four moons of moderate-intensity exercise," She grumbled.
"Are ya sure, Rare?" Applebloom asked, "You're, uh… Oddly calm about all this."

Rarity grunted, attempting to roll herself out of bed, "I don't have the energy to be dramatic, darling. Look at me; I'm a landwhale! I'm closer to a bag of lard than a pony," She expressed, some of her dramatic energy coming back.
Sweetie ran to her side, and with Applebloom's help, managed to get Rarity upright.
Rarity panted heavily as she landed right-side-up on the floor.
The cutie mark crusaders helped her through the boutique. Rarity briefly wept at the sight of her domain being a shrine to gluttony and consumption. The wrappers and boxes were piled high; it was amazing the restaurant could source all the packaging, really.

"What… What was it like?" Scootaloo asked softly.
"What, being greased?" Rarity asked, remembering the term the fillies had used, "Well, if I'm being honest… It's all hazy bliss. So long as I was eating, I was happy. All that mattered was that there was something in my mouth, edible or not," Rarity explained.
Applebloom shuddered, "Ugh… I can't imagine piling all that garbage down, nevermind being happy about it."

Rarity grunted as she squeezed out the already somewhat distended door of her boutique, taking deep gulps of the fresh, cool night air. In this moment, the clean air tasted better than any sort of food or drink. "I didn't think… It was just a compulsion; the hunger demanded I ate, so I ate," Rarity explained, "Though I do remember, briefly, one scrawny mare… The poor thing looked like she was skin and bones," She expressed.
Applebloom looked away slightly, "Chief…" She whispered, "We were all skin and bones, Rare. At least until the chief started sneaking out to the farm to get us food," She expressed.
"All?" Rarity asked.
Applebloom rattled off the names of those she'd lived with for the past eighteen months.

"We locked up in the schoolhouse initially, but then Miss Cheerilee got greased, an' we had to leave… Then we found the chief. She took us in, stole blankets and food and stuff for us; showed us tunnel living so we could sleep without worry of being fed that slop," She explained.
Rarity gasped, "Oh my goodness, that's awful… No wonder you're all so dirty," She expressed.
Scootaloo looked at her spear, "Chief gave us safety when none of the other adults could," She expressed, "I hope she's alright… When we stole the potion stuff to start waking everybody up, she let herself get caught by the Hungry Horse workers."

Sweetie Bell nodded, "She even stole books and stuff so we could read and write; we had our own little town underground. Silver Spoon even volunteered to be the nurse after Diamond Tiara got sick and we had to hoof her over."
Rarity blinked as the fillies told her the stories of the past year and a half. It sounded truly, truly dreadful; at least compared to the gluttonous heaven she had been partaking in.
"So… We need your help. The chief's hit list says we need to get to Twilight so we can have a princess on our side," Scootaloo eventually explained.
Rarity nodded, "Absolutely. We will show her how bad it's gotten," She stated sternly.