⁂
A sound like fresh celery crunching underhoof shocks me out of my spiraling thoughts and all of a sudden the looming presence in the back of my head that I hadn't even noticed is gone, as is the very real looming presence of Night Light, replaced by the slightly less so presence of my own half-bleached backside.
It takes me a moment to really process what I'm seeing, and by the time I’ve done so, someone is wrapping me up in a blanket while being very careful not to touch me with either hoof or magic. Almost blankly, I watch Night Light trying to get back up on his hooves while wiping away a bloody lip, but he winces and stumbles, suddenly groggy and swaying on his knees before falling over unconscious, the whole thing eerily silent to someone not connected to the hive mind.
“Hive damn it,” Shimmering Armor curses quietly under her breath, pinching the bridge of her nose in the crook of her hoof for a moment before turning to check on me with a tired and exasperated look. She apparently doesn’t like what she sees, as she curses, “Buzzing hell, we do not need this right now.”
Without my input, the changeling who was carefully swaddling me picks me up and hugs me to her chest. I realize belatedly that it is, of course, Twilight Velvet, my brain is still trying to catch up with the situation. “Hey, hey, it's okay,” she says, rubbing my back up and down through the blanket.
Her affections don’t really help the situation any as I stiffen, anticipating with each stroke an accidental slip that might connect me to the hive mind. My reaction doesn't go unnoticed and she quickly stops. After a moment of uncertainty, she simply hugs me tighter, which is at least consistent, but it's only when I hear the sound of a body rolling down the stairs and impacting the wall opposite the landing that I realize Night Light is gone and can finally calm down.
A small, vulnerable part of me says that it’s over. They saved me; they protected me. My tiny heart doesn't quite get the message and continues beating like a caffeinated hummingbird while the bitter, jaded rest of me takes offense to both points of view. I feel like I should say something; make some biting remark and object to being treated like a foal, but the words don't come. This isn't a situation I'm familiar with. I… I can't actually remember the last time anypony has actually protected me from something. I've always been self-sufficient. I haven't needed or wanted protecting.
I haven't really made any progress beyond curling up in the blanket by the time Shimmering Armor returns from doing whatever it is she did with Night Light, and I… Damn it, that single moment of fight or flight instinct really got to me. My pitch to Moon Dancer was supposed to be just blind honesty; I don't know if I can just walk back into that room as if nothing happened.
Do I still want to?
“Sunset?” Shimmering Armor probes, but I don't have it in me to respond. Unsurprised, she shakes her head and lets out a sigh. “Sunset, I'm sorry, this should never have happened. Look, don't worry about anything; Moon Dancer, the chrysalis—we'll handle it. Just… just try to calm down and try to believe that we're on your side here—the queen is on your side. She's furious. You'll never see that changeling again.”
That’s… That’s good. If Shimmering Armor had come any later or any less violently… If he was just given a slap on the wrist and told to behave, I don’t think I would have stood for it. I’d have had to do something; fight or flight, I’m not sure which, but it wouldn’t have been pretty.
Shimmering Armor waits only a moment for a response that isn't coming before she picks me up with her magic and carries me off to find some place to put me.
⁂
I end up in Shimmering Armor's bedroom—or is it still be considered Shining Armor's bedroom? I’ve kinda taken the whole alternate name thing a little far in order to disassociate from the fact that it’s my body he’s driving. Well, whether it’s Shining or Shimmering either way, with Moon Dancer in Twilight’s bedroom and Night Light most likely down to the lab, it’s the only place left that isn't the master bedroom, and that… No. I don’t care if he arrived this morning and never even used it. Just no.
This one, though… It's okay. It's a stereotypical colt’s room with all the paraphernalia you'd expect from a military hopeful, though here and there there's the odd thing that stands out as artificial. Alongside the royal guard and EUP posters are a few from the Coast Guard and less impressive regiments—not too suspicious, but it gives me the impression that someling just grabbed a hoof-full without much attention to what's actually popular or poster-worthy. It’s also cleaner than I'd expect from a colt’s room, but that's probably appropriate.
Still, it’s not great. I'm not entirely comfortable being in someone else's space and honestly, I'd probably rather be down in the lab, but I get the logic and appreciate the chance to get a little peace and quiet without just being stuffed in a cupboard, which is about what I’ve come to expect… though I guess in hindsight that could probably be laid at the hooves of Twilight’s previous set of parents who were—how did Shimmering Armor put it?—‘basic low-class collectors’?
I really would have preferred it if they hadn’t been replaced; even if it meant waking up glued to the floor with resin down my throat for the rest of my time as a changeling. Tartarus is it going to be great when I’m finally put into that damn egg. At least as a dragon I’ll be able to bite and set fire to anyone who pisses me off instead of… instead of what, really? What did I even do? I wobbled in queasiness and indecision until someling came to help and then I slunk off to try and forget it ever happened.
I hate it, but that's about all I can do right now. I rest and I don't think. I don't spend the whole time obsessing over what happened or trying to figure out my conflicted feelings over what happened, because that would be pointless. It's not bucking complicated, it's just… You would think that a group of creatures that can read each other's minds would have better control of their people.
Then again, I've met them, so I should really know better than that.
It’s not even a sense of betrayal that lingers; I know better than that and any that I did feel would pretty well be offset by the reactions of the changelings I actually trust. Hay, looking back, I think half of how I did feel was coming from the hive mind itself, which is simultaneously disturbing and oddly heartening. No, what bothers me as I lie listlessly in Shimmering Armor's comparatively oversized bed is just a disquieting sense of unease.
There's just no reason for him to have gone off the rails like that. I’m on their Celestia-damned side. Even when the changelings and I have argued and disagreed, it's all been sickeningly domestic. Buck it, I like them. I don't really understand why someling would risk pissing off the hive mind and their queen just to—to what? To seemingly ‘help’ with Moon Dancer while reveling in his power over me in private?
…
Okay, I guess it's not actually all that unfathomable. I've known spiteful ponies and ponies that would put words in my mouth if they could. I guess it could really be just that simple. There wasn’t any end-goal because the hurt and hate were exactly what he wanted. He wasn't even feeding off of it. He couldn’t—not from another changeling, even as little of one as I am. He was just disturbed enough to do something like that for fun. Then again, he'd have to be, wouldn't he? It's a disheartening thought. Getting changelings who want to collect love—that's easy. It takes is a special kind of sicko to go out into the world to harvest hate.
It actually kind of helps to realize that.
It's not long before I'm bored and looking through Shining Armor's stuff for something to do. Unfortunately, all of the books we bought are downstairs in the living room and I'm not really in the mood for that kind of reading anyway. Really, I'm just in a mood period and it's not for the first time I wish I was down in the lab getting something productive done.
Maybe I should go down there after all. I'm not some foal that needs to be coddled. Sure, I was a little shaken up, but it's fine. I've calmed down, and I don't need to hide from him. He’s certainly not going to do anything now and even if I don't stay and help with the chrysalis, I really should cycle my store of magic for love since I’ve been neglecting it so far today. The less of that I do the longer it will take to actually get what I was promised. I'd also feel better if I was a little less beholden to the changelings right now—not that I'm considering bailing on them or anything, but I'd just like to know that I could if it came to that. I don't actually have many illusions as to how well I would fare on the streets as a baby bug thing that needs loves to survive.
Well, strictly playing Discord’s advocate, I suppose I am adorable. Maybe I could make it work—but no, I am not running out on things here. It's fine. Everything is fine. I'm sure that if I go downstairs I'll find that everything's been resolved and Twilight Velvet will be playing second mother to Moon Dancer, not making insulting insinuations about her dead father. Probably.
Okay, you know what? I'm gonna go check. I roll up onto my hooves, grab the pillow I was resting on, heave it over to the side of the bed and kick it off. It lands with a muffled thump and I follow after it, making about the same amount of noise, if not less. Briefly, I consider dragging the pillow along with me, but I can't really see it helping with the stairs. Thankfully, my faint magic is at least strong enough to turn doorknobs, or I'd be even more helpless.
The door glides shut with a harsh click, and I'm surprised how quiet it is. The changelings’ house isn't normally noisy to begin with, but it just seems more so than normal. It think it’s unlikely that they would leave with Moon Dancer to consider and the chrysalis to build, so they must all just be downstairs. As I pass Twilight's room, though, I hesitate and decide that I might as well check in on her and see how she's doing. I can't really see myself making things any worse after having run out on her earlier.
The door to Twilight’s room opens silently to an empty room. That's either a very good sign or a very bad one. For me, personally, it's kind of a bad one—or at least unfortunate—because it means that my only next step is to tackle the stairs.
Hopefully it won’t be literal.
It should be fine, I tell myself. Going downstairs is more nerve-racking than going up, but it’s also a lot easier and I have a lot of practice with it.
Hop—grunt. Hop—grunt—teeter. Hop—grunt.
Apart from nearly stumbling a few times, my progress goes relatively fine and I stop to rest halfway down the stairs. It's incredibly surreal being this tiny and light, and I think my heavy breathing is as much due to the excitement and stress of trying not to tumble forward after each jump then it is any actual exertion on my part. Either way, the adrenaline actually shakes off some of the mood I was in and by the time I'm at the bottom of the stairs, I feel like the empty house is looming a little less.
A lot less, actually.
It's… strange. I search the bottom floor of the house and even though I find it completely empty, it still feels more alive to me. I feel less alone somehow—almost like there's always a group of ponies talking in the next room even though my ears disagree.
At first I think the feeling is strongest in the kitchen, but of course, the kitchen is right across from the stairs down to the basement, so that must be it, obviously. I can't actually hear anything, but the sounds of whatever they're doing down there must be reverberating through the old house and I’ve been picking up on it subconsciously.
You would think that I would know better by now.
The weight of the hive mind crashes over me just as the door to the basement crashes into me. My first reaction is to expect that Night Light is making a run for it—and he is there—except he's unconscious and floating in the magic of a pony that I've never met. Well, a changeling I've never met, obviously; the green coat and black mane are a bit of a giveaway. Whoever this is, she is not subtle. She has the overly slim look that a lot of models have, so maybe she's a collector of some sort, I suspect. The instant her eyes fall on me, though, my mouth goes dry and the weight of the hive mind bears down on me tenfold of what it was a moment ago.
Queen Chrysalis.
The locus of the hive mind.
The look she gives me is… strained. There's no question that she sees me as something lesser, but all the same, it’s not entirely unkind even while her lips are pressed in consternation. More than that, though, it’s what’s behind her eyes that really grips me and holds me in place. I feel like the entire hive is looking at me en masse, confusing any impression of what she's thinking. I don’t have much chance to dwell on it as she turns with a snap and quickly makes her way out the door, dragging Night Light along in her magic with Twilight Velvet following after her, apparently in no less of a hurry.
As the oppressive feeling of the hive mind fades away in the queen's wake, I belatedly remember what Twilight Sparkle said when she recommended that I stay the everloving buck away from her at all costs. Specifically the part where the queen’s voice is a conduit for the hive mind. That seems… odd. Did the queen actually… specifically hold herself back from speaking aloud for my benefit? Heck, even the hive mind, as intense as it was, really just kind of flowed over me in her presence, not commanding or demanding in any way.
I'm prevented from thinking much on the implications of that by the appearance of Shimmering Armor coming up from the basement with a concerned bearing similar to the queen. Something tells me that she doesn't have good news.
It just seems to be one of those days.
⁂
Shimmering Armor takes me downstairs into the lab where we find Moon Dancer curiously prodding the chrysalis with Shining Armor in it and the barely begun shell of its duplicate. I wipe my eyes clear and blink them a few times just to make sure I'm seeing what I think I'm seeing, but the image hasn't changed. In fact, she even brightens up at the sight of ‘Shimmering Armor’ returning, only to cock her head in question at the sight of me. I find myself subconsciously hiding behind Shimmering Armor's legs and scold myself. She's just a filly; nothing to be afraid of, even if I did probably give her a weird first impression thanks to the interference of a certain changeling.
Shimmering Armor seems amused, but it's short-lived as she looks over the progress on the new chrysalis with a grimace and takes command of the conversation with a seriousness slightly reminiscent of his personality pre-brotherfication. “Look, girls. Normally we'd take this a lot slower. We tried that and someling else buzzed it all up. Now, even more issues have come up and we just don't have the time.
“Moon Dancer, if you haven't figured it out yet, this is the real Sunset Shimmer; she's between species right now and won't be a changeling for much longer, but you can still ask her what it's been like for her.
“Sunset, we've explained things to Moon Dancer and she's tentatively accepted that you're probably not to blame for the accident that killed her family. Evidently, her father had enemies, and several things had to go wrong for her family to get locked in the alchemy lab's clean room at exactly the moment an accident started endlessly producing a certain non-toxic but extremely thick non-neightonian fluid.” She pauses for a moment as if she's considering the wording of her next sentence then just shakes her head. “Never mind. How it happened isn't important. What is important is that someone a lot less subtle has escalated to outright foalnapping and ‘Moon Dancer’ has been injured in the process.”
I look at Moon Dancer and she seems fine.
“And by Moon Dancer I mean Twilight Sparkle, who disguised herself when she left earlier today.”
Oh, right. Awkward.
“So, here's what's going to happen. First off, Twilight's going to have to be Moon Dancer for the foreseeable future, at least until she gets out of the hospital, which means, Moon Dancer, that we’re going to need you to be Twilight. Don't worry, we're not sending you to school, so you shouldn't need to actually know anything about her.
“Secondly, we're getting the kitchen remodeled. That's not a euphemism for anything, we really are going to have the kitchen remodeled, but it’s also a cover for getting changelings in here to build two new chrysalises—one for Moon Dancer, and one for Twilight, because her face is apparently punchable enough that we’re going to have to rebirth her sooner rather than later. We just don't have the lingpower right now to do it reasonably on our own, especially without Twilight overseeing things.
“The downside is that we're going to have to feed those changelings for both jobs, which means, Sunset, that you’re going to have to do more foalsitting from Princess Cadence. The hive wants you to maintain our relationship with her while I'm in the chrysalis anyway,” she says, gesturing at her male body beside her. “So there's not going to be any getting out of that. On the upside, until Moon Dancer has to go into her chrysalis, you'll have her with you to distract the Princess, which should make things easier for a little while, at least. Oh, she’ll have to be able to be Twilight enough for that, I suppose. It still shouldn’t pose a problem. You’re fillies; you could spend the entire night talking like pirates and no one would think it odd.”
I want to object on principle, but… yeah, she has a point.
Not that I’m going to do that.
“That should about cover it,” she finishes up. “Any questions?”
I shake my head, still going over everything she said, but pretty solid on the broad strokes.
Moon Dancer, on the other hoof, looks a little more dazed. “Um, dozens?” she says, making it itself a question.
“Ask Sunset,” was Shimmering Armor's immediate response. “You two do need to get to know each other, especially since you are going to be spending a lot of time together. Well, technically we all will be since we need to stay out from under hoof of the construction, but you two in particular.”
Yeah, yeah, make buddy-buddy with new filly, whatever. I all but forget about it the moment it’s said because I’m giving Shimmering Armor a hopeful look about something else entirely.
She only looks confused for a moment before she remembers the plans we had for the day before Twilight Sparkle and Moon Dancer came crashing in. “Yes, Sunset, that means we can get out of the house—and to that point, we need to finish bleaching me so we can go buy the dyes we’ll need to turn Moon Dancer into Twilight Sparkle, okay? Good. Upstairs, now.”
⁂
Shimmering Armor couldn't make this more awkward if she was trying. The process of bleaching the rest of her goes by almost in silence except for the occasional instruction from me. Moon Dancer, at least, seems enthusiastic enough about helping, and I'm stuck really wondering just how exactly the conversation with her went. I mean, I realize that changelings are good at convincing ponies of things and Moon Dancer is in a vulnerable place after the death of her family, but that's just it. Her family is dead; I kind of would have expected her to take a little longer to bounce back.
Watching her hand things to Shimmering Armor from my perch on the bathroom sink, I consider the fact that she was alone with the changelings when I came downstairs—and that included Night Light. Now, admittedly, he was unconscious when Shimmering Armor took him down there and he was unconscious when Queen Chrysalis brought him back up, but I don't doubt that she could have woken him up for a bit in order to dose Moon Dancer with something.
But would she?
Probably, if she thought she could get away with it, I admit. Sure, Shimmering Armor said that she was angry on my behalf, but even with as little as I know of the queen, I kind of doubt the severe and pragmatic leader of a secret hive of shapeshifting parasites would have any qualms about smoothing things over here and there. It's times like this that I really wish I knew what was actually going on in the hive mind, since I don’t think you can actually lie over it—not that I want a connection to the hive mind, considering this whole clusterbuck is because that asshole connected me to it without my permission, but…
Well, no, it's more the manipulation that happened through it, I suppose, and—err, wait, Shimmering Armor had me literally soften Moon Dancer up by rubbing my magic into her, so maybe I don't actually have the moral high ground here. I… should probably feel bad about that, come to think of it.
…
Right, maybe later.
“So, Moon Dancer,” I speak up, completely abandoning that train of thought. “Not exactly the sort of activity you were picturing when you thought this was a cult, huh?”
She gives me a deadpan look. “Communal bathing and grooming is not uncommon in many cults as it engenders a sense of community while simultaneously enforcing a lack of privacy in a socially acceptable way. Some cults see significance in the first bathing of a foal or inductee and make a ceremony of it.” She looks around at the plain, tiled bathroom. “This is much more practical, though.”
I'm thrown off by the contrast between the vigor with which she's been acting and the flatness of her response. “…Okay, point, I suppose, but other than that?”
“It's less common, but still not unknown for cults to form around especially large, sometimes incestuous families, especially ones led by a strong matriarchal or patriarchal figure," she adds.
“Oh, come on,” I argue back, not entirely sure if she's being serious. “The entire point of a cult is that it's a religious organization. Everything else has to follow from that."
“If it walks like a duck, talks like a duck and bathes like a duck, it's duck,” she recites, almost emotionless as she rubs her gloved forehooves into Shimmering Armor's side.
“Okay…” I say, seeing that I'm getting nowhere with this. I’m not sure if she’s being terse because she’s upset with me, or if it’s just because she no longer thinks I’m a foal; she had been rather doting, before. Either way, I’m not going to let it stop me. “So, what do you think of our little cult, then?” I ask with a wry smile. “And by ‘little’ I mean absolutely massive… probably. Come to think of it, I don't actually have any idea how big it is. We are, after all, only one hive with a single queen… I think?”
Moon Dancer remains silent for a while, and when she finally responds, she seems to have simply ignored my meandering uncertainty. “It's nice,” she helpfully responds.
Right. Guess she's not the most talkative of fillies, which is actually what I would expect, so… you know. Makes sense. Seems like I'm on my own for this conversation. “Okay, well… Changelings! You got the talk from ‘Shimmering Armor’ here while I had to make do with Twilight Sparkle, so I don't know exactly what all was left out, but I'm still guessing it was probably a lot regardless…”
⁂
“…So yes, you basically signed up to be a giant telepathic shapeshifting breezie that feeds on love.”
“I’m aware.”
Good Celestia, it's like being stuck with somepony who never shuts up, except that somepony is me. I'm not used to being the one to carry conversations like this, but what else can I do? We're forcing this ‘friendship,’ and even if it crashes and burns, well, this filly's at least going to be intimately familiar with my cantankerous opinion of a lot of things.
Okay, maybe I'm exaggerating. In the time it took us to finish bleaching Shimmering Armor's coat and mane and then do Moon Dancer too since we can't leave her in the house alone, I've gotten a few responses that were longer than two words and she seems nice and intelligent enough, so maybe it's not entirely her fault. I mean, at least part of the blame has to go to Shimmering Armor for just sitting there silently making things awkward like a third wheel butting in on a date they arranged in the first place. It’s not exactly a metaphor, except for the fact that this isn’t a date unless friendship dates are a thing. Actually, at my age, I guess play-dates are a thing. Whatever, it’s weird is the point.
“All right, well, as long as you're sure,” I tell her. “I think that's all of the surprises I've run into so far. It really isn't bad and I’m not trying to dissuade you, I just want make sure that you know what you're getting into.”
“…I actually don't,” she says at length, nearly making me facehoof in exasperation.
I try not to make a big deal of it since it seems like she's going to actually ask a question. “Alright, what'd I miss?” I ask while making some pretense at helping her dry off by kneading her flank with my tiny hooves.
“What is it they want me to actually do?” she mumbles through her towel as she dries off her face.
I stop what I'm doing as I think back and realize she has a point. “Well, uh… Engaging with the practical actualization of research for the purpose of assaying the function and benefits thereof.”
She just gives me a look and says, “You can just say ‘guinea pig.’”
“Technically, you're also—” She just keeps giving me that look. “Fine, she also wants your body, obviously. You've seen what use they’re getting out of mine,” I say, gesturing at Shimmering Armor. “In spite of evidence to the contrary, it can actually talk when there's an actual changeling plugged into it over the hive mind.”
Shimmering Armor simply ignores me, continuing to brush her mane in silence. Moon Dancer, meanwhile, gives her a considering look. “Convenient,” she remarks. “And a distraction.”
“That's… debatable?” I hedge. “I think most ponies would actually object more to having their body used in strange ways when it's outside of their control. I mean, my situation is kind of unique since I am actively trying to distance myself from that identity, but I guess yours kind of is too, since you and Twilight Sparkle are just somehow miraculous coincidental twins, so, you know whatever.”
Moon Dancer silently waits for me to continue. Huh, so this is what it's like being on this end of it. I wonder if changelings have a natural disposition towards leading ponies on. It would… kind of make sense with the love collecting thing, I suppose? No idea, to be honest.
“Anyway,” I say, finally getting around to it. “Twilight Sparkle's whole thing is that changelings are kind of monumentally bad at magic and it's her job to fix that. Now, Shining Armor—that's her when she's not strutting around in my body,” I gesture at said pony meat-suit who has moved on to brushing her tail, “—was supposed to be our primary genetic testbed since he's going into the military, but he's kinda gone and gotten the attention of the princess of love, which would be an issue even if she wasn't an all-you-can-eat-and-then-some buffet that every changeling in the world would kill to suck on.
“Now, to be honest, I have absolutely no idea how dangerous it's actually supposed to be, but so far her record with violating the natural laws using bug science is pretty good, and I’m speaking from personal experience. I figure, worst case, something goes wrong and you come out of the chrysalis as a horrible misshapen wretch, she'll just put you back in and fix it. Best case, it should be a lot more fun than that. Actually, that brings up a point, I don't think anyone's actually asked you how you are with magic, because that's kind of important.”
She gives me a flat look. “…Basically, you're just going to keep me in a dark hole and feed me books?”
“Err, I guess that's one way to put it,” I admit, scratching the back of my neck.
She considers that for a moment, gets up, drops her towel, walks over to Shimmering Armor and wraps her legs around one of her legs. “Thank you for foalnapping me.”