With the joking left aside, my sister Oval, our Unicorn hostess Camellia, and her Earthpony friend Meadowsweet filled me in on some more topics of interest, all the while feeding me more sandwiches until the tray they had been on was left empty on the table. And let's not forget the cups of tea I was forced to consume as well, drawn as it was from the Earthpony's namesake plant, which slowly but surely got rid of my headache as I took in more of it.
From the initial scare a few weeks back, and the occasional freak outburst from one or the other, life in Canterlot had basically just resumed the way it had always done. Businesses and their patrons had quickly adapted to the patrols and extra security checks, and the ponies who had once had dealings with the Changelings had... not reacted well.
Some homes, occupied by Changelings only a few short weeks ago, had already been put up for sale, or in the worst cases had already switched owners. Businesses who had once employed our kind had distanced themselves from us to the point of open hostility towards the very idea of having once employed a Changeling.
It did not matter that our family members had integrated in all levels of pony society; every level had its own overnight disdain for the ones exposed by the activation of the spell now covering all of Canterlot. None of our kin could transform anymore, and all ended up in the dungeon.
As far as the ponies knew, through hearsay or having witnessed it themselves, we were the only two free Changelings left in the city, and we would be unable to avoid being seen in case we needed to get out of the city on short notice.
Meadowsweet's idea to bring the shadow to the attention of some more learned pony friends of hers who may have access to the princesses or the books in the palace library was seen by all of us as the best start right now. Camellia would try to get a message through to a friend of her from Ponyville; Roseluck, who was also active in the Florist business.
It was really our best hope to reach Starlight Glimmer and Moonshine. Through them, perhaps, Princess Twilight Sparkle and friends could help us figure this thing out.
"And I thought I had staved off the worst when we stopped the invasion last year," I had sighed out as I felt the weight of this new situation settle on me.
The problem with lunchtime was that it had all come and gone too quickly, and both Camellia and Meadowsweet had to return to their respective jobs for another few hours. Thus leaving Burst and me by ourselves.
We lounged a bit in the living room until Oval brought up the resin mess we had left upstairs, and I limped back after her to help her clean up. It took us almost an hour for Oval to bite chunks out of my pod and me to mop them into a pile in a corner, and by the time we were finished, we were as splattered by it as we had when I came out of the pod earlier in the day.
Exhausted from the work, I collapsed to the floor with a wet sound and sighed out as my thoughts came back to me again. Oval dropped down in front of me, green goop dripping off her as well, and carefully positioned her head in such a way for her crooked horn to gently bump into mine.
"How are you holding up, Pearl?" she asked, genuinely concerned for my well-being.
I looked up at her blue eyes inches away from mine, and sighed out deeply. My forceful exhumation of air sent splatters of green resin from the tip of my nose to hit Oval in the face, but she barely flinched from it.
"What are we going to do, Burst?" I asked, not at all sure I liked the potential paths my mind had been exploring while we had been cleaning the room. With my hurt head, and resincast leg, I was once again delivered fully into the hooves of others. My future was reliant on others making the right decisions around me, and two of those others were ponies who could potentially get me thrown into a dungeon by simply revealing to the wrong pony where it was that we were located.
"Now we wait for our host to come back," Oval returned with a weak smile, "and hope she has better news for us."
"If worse comes to worst," I started, staring into those blue eyes of hers, "you know I can't run. You could make it out of the city and get to Ponyville or the hive if you're not bogged down by me, but I'm kind of stuck here. And that scares me more than anything else."
"Yeah, I might be able to escape on my own," Oval pondered, but then immediately dismissed the notion, "but you told me the other day that you would not leave me alone, that you would stick with me while the rest of our clutch was spread so thinly across Equestria. I can't forgive myself if I leave you now, now you need my support the most. Whatever happens, happens. We just have to trust that Camellia and Meadowsweet get the word out to the right ponies, Pearl."
I stared into her blue eyes while we both lay on the floor with our horns touching, and realized once again how deeply the four of us had bonded over the past half year; Blaze, Breeze, Burst, and me had truly become sisters in all the ways that entailed. Here Burst was, on the floor with me to give me the support I needed, even if I knew the weight of our situation was weighing her down as well. This was what sisters did for one another; whichever one was stronger at the time would help the other stay upright.
I could not hold back the tears of relief at realizing the unbridled truth in her words; she would not abandon me, just as I would not abandon her in her time of need. They had adopted me into their clutch, and that meant I had a family to back me up even in the darkest of times. I could only hope those of our kind stuck in the dungeons could find solace among each other in a similar vein.
Oval's eyes filled with water as well at seeing me cry, and our foreheads met as she leaned in a bit closer. As she did, her crooked horn slid along mine and I found it was an oddly comfortable feeling, counter-balancing the topics we were discussing. There was something intimate about it, especially with our heads so close together that I could kiss her if I wanted to, but I did not feel the desire to.
Between our sisterly bond, and the knowledge of her mare waiting for her in Hoofton, there was only that odd sensation of two kindred souls sharing a moment. The comfort came from the shared burden, knowing that I did not stand alone in this, and that we had beaten the odds once before already.
A thought occured to me, and I frowned lightly while pressing back more tears. "Why would a botanist need a paralysis spell?"
"Huh?" Oval returned as if I had broken through her own thoughts.
"I mean, is there just some standard set of spells these ponies learn in school before they branch out in more specific directions?" I continued, blinking away the remaining moist from my eyes.
"Like I would know," Oval chuckled, blinking her tears away as well. "You should ask Starlight Glimmer if we ever make it to Ponyville."
"So, why did you lay down with me like this, Burst?" I asked, moving my own head to slide my horn a little along my sister's now. "I mean, you never did this in the hive. I never saw anyone else do it there."
"I don't know," Oval responded with a smirk. "I've seen unicorns do it from time to time, and since you've got a welt healing on the back of your head, I guess I thought it the safest way to make physical contact? Just so you know I'm here with you?"
"Well, it's... oddly comfortable," I told her.
"Isn't it? I'm surprised by it as well," Oval chuckled. "Remember, I'm usually an Earthpony, so I don't have to deal with having a horn in my daily life."
"I guess I'm more comfortable as an Earthpony as well," I pondered. "Not being able to take on my guise makes me feel like my identity was stolen away from me. I really don't like the feeling."
"Yeah," Oval agreed. "My own guise blindsided me as well. It's strange how attached we can get to these identities."
"All four of us except for Breeze, right?" I noted.
"Breeze has a small collection of favourite looks as well, but she has no room to settle. She keeps mimicking young foals, so she is at greater risk of being outed," Oval explained with a frown, as if she was not entirely happy with it. "I think she's just looking for a family to settle in with. I kinda joked around adopting her once or twice."
"Because Celery and you can't have kids of your own?" I blurted out, and Oval closed her eyes with a sad hum.
"Yeah, we're going to have to go for adoption anyway... there's no other choice," she agreed, looking glum.
"I'm sorry, I think my brain-to-mouth filter got damaged when I fell down the stairs," I quickly apologized to her, reaching forward with my left foreleg to bump against her right. "I didn't mean to make you sad."
"No, it's okay," Burst deflected. "As you told the ponies earlier; we're insects and they're mammals. We're just hopelessly incompatible with them. It's a fact of life."
"Well, I guess that prevents the accidental outing of one of our kind when they get a half-Changeling child," I tried to swing the conversation. "I mean, can you imagine them changing into other foals while at daycare? Suddenly getting picked up by unsuspecting pony parents?"
The idea of a changeling child growing up in pony society must have been so preposterous that Oval actually let out a genuine burst of laughter, which forced us to break contact between our foreheads and horns respectively, lest I wanted to get headbutted by her.
As she came down again from her laughing fit a few breaths later, she quickly got more serious again however. "I really hope Camellia can get a message through to Ponyville. Word needs to get out so our other siblings won't end up stuck here as well."
"Twilight Sparkle and her group of friends can do so much more than we can do on our own," I agreed. "We really need their help right now."
"Especially if we need to gain entry into the palace somehow to get to our other siblings," Oval pointed out.
"Yeah... we can't let them stew there. We got our Queen to change her mind, so we should be able to do the same thing to the pony Princesses, no?" I reasoned.
"Heh, you still nearly drowned in her pheromones, though," Burst chuckled.
"Yeah, yeah," I snorted defiantly. "So we're just going to have to stay here chatting until Camellia comes home with more news, then?"
Oval's smile faded, and it took her a while before she responded to my question with one of her own; "How's the hunger, Pearl?"
"After several sandwiches, you mean?" I retorted.
"You know which hunger I mean," Burst bounced back.
"Still manageable? Barely noticeable, really?" I responded awkwardly, not really sure how else to answer the question. "I mean, the resin at home sustained us just fine, and I've been sleeping in the pod, but I still feel as full as I did when we first arrived here. Almost no difference from how I felt while hiding in the bushes with you after our trainride."
"I've noticed that as well," Oval started. "I haven't felt hungry yet either, Pearl. Peckish, yes, but I wake up feeling like I've eaten a full meal every time. It's almost similar to what I feel when at home in Hoofton thanks to Celery sustaining me."
"Camellia watched us sleep together during our first night here. She said we looked adorable; like two of her nieces cuddling together," I offered up. "Is it possible she's sharing her love with us without realizing it?"
"I guess that's possible," Oval agreed. "I had been wondering if there had been some kind of ambient love hanging over Canterlot or something, but that would not make sense with the reports of spreading paranoia. It's a bit creepy to hear we're being watched by a pony while we sleep, but if that fills us up with love at the same time, I'm all for it."
"Yeah," I agreed, although there was a nagging feeling growing in the back of my head. It was most likely the effects of the herbal tea wearing off, I reasoned, and tried not to focus on it too much.