//------------------------------// // Proper Recognition (Morpheus) Part 3 // Story: dC/dt ≠ 0 // by I Thought I Was Toast //------------------------------// Ve are not sure there are enough words to accurately describe a Pinkie Party. There are a million and one things to enjoy about them, and only a pony as verbose as the Pink Menace herself has the lung capacity to give them justice. Granted, I’m currently shifting myself said lung capacity, but the words may elude us just the same. It’s an illogically logical web of chaotic social interactions, custom tailored by a paradoxically pink party pony. Ve can see the patterns to the madness—make no mistake—but articulating that madness is another matter. Perhaps I’ll should merely stick to the aspects that can be expressed in the Equish language. Many of the decorations for the party had been knocked askew by my entrance, but Pinkie and the others refused my help in redecorating. Ve had pointed out the hypocritical nature of having my subjects still help in what was essentially a Welcome Party for all of us, but that had gotten me a patronizing look that promised many more parties in the near future. “Uncle Mo Mo?” Errant rested in my forelegs—gnawing on them as we watched the party being set up around us. “Why was daddy so afraid of you earlier?” I felt a lump in my throat. “Well… I ordered him to stay at the Hive, and he disobeyed me to bring you and Hera out here.” “Mrgmmf…” The nymph mumbled in thought as its fangs scraped my chitin. Occasionally they would find purchase on the sensitive insides of my fetlock cavities, but I didn’t mind. Their eyes glazed as they looked into hivemind for something—the wisdom to my words, perhaps—before they looked up at me. “Well that’s just stupid. You’re happy to see us. I can taste it! Why would he be scared about that?” I smiled slightly, moving my head in to give a quick appreciative nuzzle with my muzzle. “That’s a good question. I bet if everyling was as smart as you, we wouldn’t need the hivemind.” “Really?” Errant’s voice was the shrill whistle of a tea kettle. Their blocky, coltish, muzzle softened into the narrow snoot of a filly. “Sadly, no.” I booped them on the muzzle, causing my leg to be ravaged by fangs once more. “But you raise a good point.” I let the warm fuzzy tingle of my pride trickle over them. “Ve have certain ideas on how a lord should act, and it’s the same for your father. The hivemind provides a certain example for how he should behave—uncountable years worth of memories telling him what makes the ideal analyst.” I thrummed, aware of the twitching ears of my other subjects as they helped set up the party. “Someday you’ll understand, though. You’ll find your calling, and go through your Chrysaling, and you’ll discover all the pressures placed on your dad and me.” Errant’s wings buzzed impatiently, and I began to pull my hoof away. They leapt after it, but I dodged and booped their muzzle again. Thus a new game began between the hunter and their prey. My hoof was swift to dodge, and even swifter to boop in retaliation, but the errant hunter Errant relentlessly pursued its foe. “It. Still. Sounds. Dumb.” My nephew said between lunging strikes. “I know....” I sighed, slowing down and letting Errant latch onto my leg once more. He nibbled at me a bit before pausing to look up. Smiling, I ruffled their fin with my goop covered hoof. “There are a lot of times I think it’s dumb too, but ve can attest that the old ways exist for good reason.” Looking out at Hera, Webber, and Spi, I felt a hollowness in my heart. “Just… be sure to keep in mind how stupid it sounds now later on. As much as ve hate to admit it, the hivemind isn’t always right.” Errant chittered at first as he was mercilessly noogied, but soon enough he wriggled free and ran off to pester his father. I sat and watched them talk, slowly filtering the saliva left on my foreleg into a nearby trash bin. “Alright! Let’s get this party started!” An unbidden shudder wracked my body at the sugary joy behind Pinkie’s words. “Who wants to start with Pin the Tail on the Pony?! I even made the pieces myself this time!” Grabbed from my spot in the corner, a flurry of pink hooves herded me toward a poster of a familiar lavender unicorn. “Pinkie!” Twilight massaged her temples. “My butt is not that big!” “Well, duh.” Pinkie giggle-snorted. “I had to make sure we had a big enough target, though.” “Why am I even the target?” Twilight groaned, looking to the ceiling as if the woodgrain held all the answers. “So the prince could stick it to ya, of course!” Pinkie waggled her brow. “Come on! Let him get some tail!” Twilight blushed, and I raised my brow. “Really, Pinkie?” She squeaked. I deadpanned. The other Elements and the harvesters tittered and chittered while Hera, Webber, and Spi cocked their heads to the side. “What’s so funny, daddy?” Errant looked up at his father with a scrunched muzzle. Webber didn’t answer immediately, eyes glazing over. “Ve’re not sure.” Oh. Oh no. I had been able to exclude the fact I was ‘dating’ Twilight from our reports so far. As far as anyling was aware, I was being given extra remedial friendship lessons as ordered by Princess Cadance—which was very technically true. It was so technically true ve had a hard time rationalizing that it wasn’t a lie, but the matter was rather personal, and I hadn’t wanted anyling—lord or analyst—suggesting I take advantage of the situation. It seemed I would have to have a number of very important chats soon. The hurricane of hooves returned with a blindfold, some blue and pink velvet, and a nail. Ve were literally shaken from our musings as the blindfold was forced upon me and the ‘tail’ was set in my hoof. One. Two. Three. Four. Four-point-nine-seven clockwise rotations. Correct for the initial zero-point-zero-three rotational error. I walked ahead towards my target. Any dizzy stumbles—all sixteen of them—were similarly corrected when they caused minute rotational errors, and upon reaching the wall ve drew up a virtual map of the room as ve vaguely recalled it. The poster was about two hooves off of the ground and an additional two hooves tall and wide. Twilight’s posterior was slightly off-center, so we took an educated guess and planted the ‘tail’ with around a quarter-hoof’s worth of distance for the margin of error. “Yeah! Mo! You go and nail Twilight there!” Rainbow catcalled from behind me. Peeking from beneath the blindfold, I fought back a blush—quickly transmuting my blood color—for having aimed slightly too low. “I believe there’s a problem with this game.” I bluffed. “It’s too easy for changelings to win.” “Really?” Blindfolded once more by a rush of pink, I was moved back and spun once more. Several tests of exponentially increasing amounts of spinning did indeed prove that ve needed to be spun to the point of sickness to induce any reliable sort of error. “Well, this sucks….” The Pink Menace whined as I tried to settle my stomach. “How are we gonna play Pin the Tail on the Pony?” “I have an idea.” One of the Harvesters coughed politely. I think it was Ekho, but it could have just as easily been Echo or Echoe. “Let’s see if ve can remember how to do this.” She squirmed about with a look of discomfort on her face for a minute or so. I was about to ask what she was doing when her tail popped off to almost everypony’s horror. “Eek!” Rarity screamed, faux fainting onto a couch she pulled from the aether. “It’s fine! I’m fine! Really!” Echo— Echoe— Ekho? Ekho waved reassuringly to everypony. Levitating her tail up, she placed it on her rear end, and waited while there was a brief clicking sound. When she let go, her tail was reattached and everypony sighed in relief – only to gasp in horror again as she yanked it right off once more. I chuckled as ve finally found the relevant memories. “Ve forgot that I could do that.” “You can detach and reattach you tails!” Twilight gasped. Ekho shrugged. “It’s like unhinging your jaw. Temporarily displace the relevant muscles, and it falls right out. Makes a great gag, and it could probably make a great party game too.” She chittered. “So who’s up for Pin the Tail on the Changeling?” The problem with Pin the Tail on the Changeling was that most ponies lacked the acute senses needed to track a moving target while blindfolded. Rainbow had managed, but she was an outlier with her sensitivity to the wind, and the others had simply stumbled about until Pinkie came up with a wonderful solution. “Marco…” Fluttershy’s call was almost lost in the din of the party. “Polo!” Her target, one of the Echo triplets, chirped back. I chuckled as Fluttershy moved towards her target and managed to connect the tail. The telltale hiss and click of success was followed by a startled squeak as Fluttershy lifted her blindfold to find the Harvester grinning back at her, fangs bared playfully. Sipping my punch, I nibbled on another honey bun. The sweet taste of baked love was like a rain of chocolate and honey carried on the freshest of breezes. Bon Bon and Lyra had provided a portion of their honey for the festivities and it was divine. A heady miasma of joy filled the room like cotton candy mist, enough to give even me a slight buzz. The harvesters and Errant reveled in it—playing and laughing with Pinkie, Rainbow, and Fluttershy like nothing was wrong—yet the other changelings were at least somewhat reserved. Spi and Webber were chatting with Twilight and Rarity in the corner, while Hera held a staring contest with Applejack. Lyra and Bon Bon had disappeared, but I suspected it would be unwise to search for them. They’d left trailing a faint taste of leather, and the First Father only knew what they were up to. Closing our eyes and opening our heart to it all, I took another deep draught of the happiness in the room. I heard Rarity titter about something, and a bit of rubber—probably from Twilight—managed to sneak its way in. The strong taste of orange disinfectant hit me briefly before someling’s filter clamped down. The hesitant clatter of hooves headed my way, and I opened my eyes to see Webber squirming before me. “Forgive me for prying, My Lor— I mean, Morpheus, as it is not our place as friend nor servant to do so, but Rarity says you are dating Twilight.” I nearly choked at Webber’s words, and I found myself pounding my chest to restart my heart from the sugary overload of joy. Of course Rarity would tell him and the others. The more ponies to fall for the ruse, the harder it was to label as such. At some point truth and fiction would blur, and Twilight and I would be together whether we wanted it or not. It was a crafty ploy worthy of a lord, and ve would have worried more at her cunning if I hadn’t known she was making an active effort to actually bring Twilight and I together consensually. As it was, ve were fairly sure the fashionista would back off if me or Twilight were truly unhappy. And if she couldn’t—as her machinations could, in fact, spiral beyond her control—ve were positive she would spend the rest of her life attempting to correct things. Slowly, my heart began to beat again, and I glared at Rarity who tittered more, waving coyly. Spi and Twilight watched from afar with trepidation, and I sighed before turning back to Webber. “It’s not exactly what you think.” I kept my voice low and swirled my punch around. Fishing out an ice cube, I crushed it to pieces beneath my fangs. “You, of course, saw the report on how we could feel love.” Webber nodded, and I took a sip mulling over the proper words. “You might have gone through the memories even, but they say nothing of whether we have the capacity to love here and now. ’Dating’ Twilight—if it can even be called that—is partly an attempt to replicate Ichorous’ feelings on my end and partly an attempt to free Twilight from the stress of Rarity’s matchmaking manipulations.” “Oh, good….” Webber nearly collapsed in relief. “For a second ve were worried you were actually falling for her.” I arched my brow. “I did say I was attempting to see if I could develop feelings for her, right?” Webber bowed his head. “Attempting something is different than succeeding in it. No doubt, you’ll cut things off if you actually begin to develop feelings for her. Ve mean, you must have considered all the traps and pitfalls such a relationship would bring to negotiations.” “Ve did.” I grumbled. “One could argue ve were forced into this position, but ve wouldn’t put so much faith in my ability to simply cease any feelings I do begin to have. Love is rarely a logical beast.” There was a rather awkward silence for a minute as ve tried and failed to think of some more appropriate conversation topic. Webber—having a hard time looking up—had turned to watch his offspring. “So Errant seemed happy to see you…” I smiled. “They’ve certainly grown. I was surprised to hear them still calling me uncle, though.” Webber winced. “I didn’t have it in me to tell the breeders to stop that little habit, but ve suppose that’s a good thing now….” I nodded. “Have they started to show any signs of a gender identity? I must admit that I’d prefer a nephew to a niece.” “I haven’t seen any yet.” Webber’s voice was a soft whirring whistle. “Ve’re petty sure they’ll decide to be male, though. They certainly act more like a colt than a filly.” I grinned. “Most fillies don’t slobber that much. Remember the time we stuck Hera in a cocoon? She didn’t get all the goop out for weeks.” Webber chuckled, glancing at the hulking Warrior’s staring contest with Applejack. “I’d forgotten about that. Ve haven’t thought about those days in a long time. Hard to believe I was once taller than her.” I thrummed. “Hard to believe she’s a Warrior, but ve suppose she was always the most enduring of us all.” “She had to be to put up with your—” Realizing he was about to tease me, he choked. Silence descended once more until Errant ran up to pull us both into the Dashathon—where Echo, Echoe, Ekho, and Rainbow were all strutting their stuff to prove to Fluttershy that they were the real Rainbow Dash.