"Keeping secrets secret is dangerous. I'm sure you would agree."

Ocellus' ears twitch. They strain for the sound of gurgling and muddy sloshing, of liquefied chitin sliding against itself. She breathes the painfully frigid air in through her nose, trying to discern the acrid reek of rotted pumpkins on fire.

There is nothing. Ocellus expected the Nightmare to be on top of them by now. After the tumult minutes ago, the silence is even more frightening.

Can the Nightmare transform? Could It be hiding as a goblet or a potted plant? Despite the Nightmare's amorphous body, Ocellus doubts the abomination can truly hold a mimicked form like a changeling can.

The air is thin and the cold has a stronger bite. Ocellus finds herself blinking out of worry that her ocelli might freeze. She chides herself, knowing that yaks live in a climate that is probably often this cold in the winter. She's not a yak, but changelings can survive in most climates. If a yak can take this cold, her ocelli are not in danger of freezing.

The room beyond the library is a sitting balcony. Smaller chairs and an end table of wrought iron flank a small, gothic throne from which Nightmare Moon could gaze out over the multi-story greenhouse of her Conservatory. The view now was blocked by the twisted, tortured branches of black-barked wood similar to the Crooked Trees visited on one of their field trips. Their large, dark-hued leaves shimmer like an oil slick with purple and green. Large bushels of glowing cerulean fruits hang from the branches like chandeliers.

Luna told her that the Conservatory was used to cultivate the plants that created the most concentrated, potent fruits of dark essence. Ocellus remembers the changeling pods containing cuttings of plants with cerulean fruit in the kitchen pantry. The doors with metalwork shaped like vines with cerulean gemstones.

"Concentrated dark essence glows with the color of the midday sky?" she voices aloud as she turns off her lantern's flame and tucks it safely away in her dice pouch. That must have been an unpleasant irony for the night alicorn's villainous personification.

Ocellus looks over the maze of twisted, malformed branches. There are plenty of gaps to crawl through, but no clear path for flight. Once they get in, they can climb for the top and fly above the trees. The canopy will at least provide some cover from enemies.

Except maybe it will. In Ogres & Oubliettes terms, taste isn't exactly a targeting sense. The Nightmare will recognize her proximity, but may not be able to find her if they keep out of sight.

Smolder hops up onto a branch and sits there, looking down at Ocellus with a smile. "I don't have to be a changeling to taste what you're feeling."

Part of Ocellus wants to pedantically correct Smolder that she isn't an empath and can really only taste love. But a much bigger part feels her curiosity piqued. That almost sounds like a challenge to her race's senses.

What she is feeling is the cold. And anxiety. Her caution and common sense is struggling against a mindless urge to rush forward as fast as they can and try to grab Wrath. The Nightmare is somewhere close by, and she is Its prey. They have to be smart. From Smolder's smile and confident demeanor, she doubts the dragon is thinking of any of that.

Smolder nods, slipping between two large branches, finding good footing on the next. "You know I like kindness and gentleness and cute things," she says, offering a claw. "But I'm a dragon. I'm competitive. You're worried how I'm going to feel about you beating me in a fight after all this is over."

It wasn't what she had been thinking right then. But Ocellus has to admit it had crossed her mind. That hadn't just been Smolder, but a crude approximation of the strength and power Smolder could aspire to as an adult. She was afraid Smolder might lose pride in herself, or feel fundamentally lessened by it.

Ocellus takes the claw despite not really needing the help to climb. "A little, yeah."

Smolder nods, dropping her voice as they move through the dense labyrinth of branches and glowing fruit. "Well, if you've been paying attention at all to my Feast of Fire stories, you'll know one thing Dragons aren't attracted to is weakness."

"Coming to the School of Friendship, I've learned a lot about types of strength that have nothing to do with being big and powerful. I've learned that kindness isn't weakness," Smolder tells Ocellus as she helps the nymph unsnag her saddlebags from a branch. "My friends are strong in all sorts of ways. And so am I. You really think I'd be upset if you can be physically stronger or you're a better fighter than me?"

Ocellus smiles thankfully, adjusting her saddlebags. They ride heavier on her chitin, filled with rubble. Together, they slip between two thick branches, pushing through a curtain of leaves.

"Mother didn't choose Father to mate with because he was a pushover," Smolder says, smirking. "And despite what some of Spike's pony comics would have you believe, we don't go snatching up defenseless mares and keeping them in our caves as decoration."

With a wave of her claws, Smolder smugs, "Honestly, damsels in distress do nothing for me."

Flashes of red light end the conversation. Ocellus slips down to a lower branch and carefully pushes away a tangle of leaves.

Below, the branches become less thick for the first three meters above the vine-covered Conservatory floor. Ocellush sees a gaunt, bat-winged equine flying through the spaces between. An angry scarlet light strikes it, slamming the equine against the branches. The creature dissolves into blue smoke with sparkles of cerulean light.

Three not-changelings shrouded in coronas of deep crimson. Ocellus eases the leaves back to conceal herself and climbs back to Smolder. "Pharynx is killing the thestrals!" she whispers.

Her heart wants to cry out "Why??" But her head already knows the answer. She has bathed too long in the paranoia of this place to not understand. Like Gallus beating those goblets back in the buttery, Pharynx is eliminating anything that he thinks might be a changeling in disguise.

The pale, cold light of the stars stare down upon the wreckage. The Conservatory is the size of a professional buckball field. Above the first floor, glass walls rise to a ceiling of arched glass held in fan-vaulted tracery. A tenth of the ceiling has been shattered inwards, revealing the Nightmare's point of ingress.

Beneath the opening, metal scaffolding is torn and twisted. A moonsilver catwalk hangs canted over a torn jungle of vines, black-barked plants and glowing cerulean fruit. Broken glass and sheared beams of metal are caught in the vines and litter the Conservatory floor below among broken planter tables and a few smashed carts.

The Nightmare is neither visible nor audible. It passed this way, but seems to have moved on.

Ocellus and Smolder fly above the catwalk. Neither would trust it with their weight, but they are merely using its moonsilver latticework for extra visual cover.

The flamboyant moonsilver adorning the dangling, bent catwalk reminds Ocellus of the glass balconies in the Grand Hall. Like them, the catwalk's floor was glass, but that shattered in the Nightmare's violent descent, leaving only the moonsilver tracery.

An eerily gorgeous forest of black plants and glowing cerulean fruit sprawls below. Occasional flashes of red pierce the canopy. Vines grow up the sides of the walls, spreading out over the glass and tracery. More rise up along the scaffolding. Suspended beams are covered in hanging plants with dangling fruit. Originally, the catwalk ran between them. Ocellus imagines thestrals harvesting fruit, putting them into carts on the walkway.

"So this new changeling queen," Smolder says quietly, trying to banish some of the cold and gloom with conversation. "Queen Not-Chrysalis...?"

"Her name is Queen Elytra," Ocellus whispers back, eager to hear Smolder's voice in the eerie silence, but not wishing either of them to be heard.

Smolder stops, hovering. The orange-scaled dragon thinks a moment, then looks to Ocellus with her big blue eyes. "Is it bad that I think that's a pretty name?"

Ocellus loves those eyes. She has the urge to become a dragon. She would justify it with her desire to roll her eyes. Ocelli can't manage that expression like other creatures' eyes can.

Smolder watches her, clearly admiring the display. "Is it awkward that I love your elytra?"

She does. Ocellus can taste it. Jalapeno and strawberry. Definitely Smolder-love, but a very unusual flavor of it.

"They're like armor for your wings," her friend says. "That's pretty amazing. And they're beautiful."

Ocellus blinks at Smolder, surprised by this confession and unsure what to feel... but knowing she is a breath away from blushing.

Smolder gives an innocent huff at Ocellus' look. "What? I like red. The first creature I ever cared about is red."

Ocellus feels the blush breaking across her cheeks. Smolder rubs the back of her head, her stance betraying all of the awkward.

"So... uh..." The awkwardness continues, punctuated even more by their whispering. "I've never asked but... what does 'ocellus' mean?"

Smolder blinks. She seems to process that just a moment before her face scrunches as something unpleasant occurs to her. "Wait... so when changelings stick themselves with those needles...?"

Ocellus' frown deepens. "They're stabbing themselves in their ocellus." Her mouth tastes bitter. She has vehemently avoided thinking about that. In her head, she hears Gallus' voice: Okay, I have to ask, why the eye?!

That is not the reason. It is a coincidence. Not a symbolic violation. It's not personal.

Smolder stares off into the distance. "And I thought that couldn't get any creepier."

Ocellus looks up. Then down. The lights of the cerulean fruits are winking out. The furthest plants have already been extinguished, plunging the edges of the Conservatory into absolute night. The eclipsing of the lights speeds towards them on all sides like a closing iris of darkness.

The blackness closes around them, leaving only the ethereal gleam of the catwalk's moonsilver latticework, suspended over an endless void.

On the catwalk lies the slumped corpse of a drone, three needles sticking out of its ruined left eye.

The heavy mass of a speeding drone strikes Ocellus from above, driving her hard into the catwalk, her body replacing the drone corpse. The impact crushes her elytra down on her wings, sending an excruciating shock of pain through the nymph as her wings are brutally pinched. Ocellus screams.

The drone passes through Ocellus and the catwalk, its prey suddenly not moving with it. Ocellus feels a bone-freezing, electric chill as the drone passes through her. It stops, hovering, staring at its empty hooves in bewilderment with its one good eye. Then it dissipates into smoke as Smolder's fiery breath blasts through it.

Smolder swoops back and lands on the catwalk, reaching for Ocellus. The dragon wobbles as the catwalk pivots, then dips to a precarious angle with a tormented squeal.

Ocellus scrambles as she begins to slide. She feels Smolder wrap her arms and tail around her, being cautious of her wings.

Beyond the catwalk, smoke swirls tightly, forming a cocoon. The cocoon cracks and peels, flaking away to reveal a melted blob of carapace floating in the air before them. It stretches out its limbs in a sick mockery of the heart beam stance. Glass and rubble fly into the air, spinning about it. The dead thing's one eye opens, staring into them. The wreckage stops swirling, the debris suddenly locked in place -- large shards of broken glass, sheared metal tracery and torn scaffold piping ring the poltergeist like the numbers on a clock.

"Uuugh. Really?" Smolder vents her displeasure as she dodges sideways and folds her wings, dropping with both of them towards a floor they can't see as a hurricane of deadly debris rips apart the catwalk.

Their falling bodies are caught in vines. The wreckage of the catwalk above rains down. The bulk of the moonsilver walkway tears free of its remaining moorings with a metal scream, plunging towards them.

Ocellus twists, throwing herself over Smolder, transforming into the giant insect monster she had become when showing off their first day at the lake.

"What do you say, Ocellus?" Smolder challenges. "Can you be weirder than a flying yak?"

Monstrous-Insect-Ocellus hears Smolder murphle against her chitin as the catwalk SLAMS into her back, driving her down through the vines, ripping them apart in spurts of smoke and strange liquids. They hit the rubble-strewn floor, the catwalk pinning Ocellus, Smolder buried beneath her.

Monstrous-Insect-Ocellus claws at the floor, scraping and tearing at the disfigured marble, fighting for proper purchase to push the catwalk off of her. She could turn to something smaller, but the catwalk could still pin her, or collapse on Smolder. She can feel Smolder squirming beneath her.

Ocellus gets her foreclaws under her and pushes, feeling the mangled catwalk shift against her back. She manages to lift herself enough for Smolder to scramble out. The dragon is gasping.

She looks around for the poltergeist. The cerulean light of the fruits is back. They gleam like a field of blue stars in the shadowed gloom of the Conservatory forest. (The stars, she suspects, are back too.) Their grim foe is not showing itself.

Unicorn telekinesis, illusions, invisibility, and conditional intangibility? Beyond being terrifying, the dead drone has an alarming array of abilities. Ocellus empathizes with Smolder's exasperation. But she's been thinking about this, and she has a trick of her own.

"Oh no." Smolder flaps her wings, flying to the catwalk and pulling on it. The catwalk lifts. Ocellus would again be amazed at her friend's strength if she wasn't frozen in place by the sound rushing at them.

The Nightmare spills through the trees. It rears up before Its prey, lifting Itself on spindly legs, a hundred drone mouths slumping together to form one single maw.

The Nightmare's jaw yawns wide, and Ocellus can see the faces of her parents, the heads of her little brother and sister -- for a moment as she knows them before shifting to the ebony-carapaced indistinguishability of love-starved drones -- melting into the black licorice mass that is the Nightmare's tongue.

"Ocellussssssss!"

"Ocellusssssssssss!!"

"Ocellussssssssssssss!!!"

Ocellus isn't even aware of transforming into a nymph again. It just seems the Nightmare grows phenomenally, blotting out the glass ceiling and the star-strewn sky. The Nightmare lets out a primeval roar. The ice of her blood shatters, her paralysis broken as all thought and reason are extinguished. All that remains is a primal, unevolved and all-consuming instinct:

"O-okay, I w-was wrong," Smolder gasps, collapsing onto the cracked table. "We can't handle that Nightmare thing. How can we f-fight something with the power to make us run away?"

Ocellus huddles against the grandmare clock, trying to get her shaking under control. The Nightmare had chased them all the way back to the library. She isn't sure how they escaped it.

"I-I don't know," the nymph admits helplessly. She at least has an idea for the poltergeist -- assuming the Nightmare's shriek isn't also effective on the dead and it is somewhere on the far side of the moon. But the Nightmare? "I t-tried Fluttershy's lesson about f-f-facing our fears, but..."

Smolder points a claw at the ceiling accusingly. "But that fear effect is cheating." There is a soft splintering sound beneath her, and the table's legs give out, dumping her onto the floor.

Luna's image flickers in the cracked central mirror of the gothic vanity's triptych. "Thank goodness you are both all right. I felt the Nightmare attack again." The connection is clearly unstable, her image flickering. But even through the distortions, Ocellus can hear the slight wetness in Luna's voice. She recognizes eyes that have been crying.

"L-Luna?" Ocellus pushes herself away from the grandmare clock. Having Luna's distress to focus on helps her ignore her own. "Are you..." Ocellus stops as she reaches the vanity.

No, don't ask if she's okay. She's not. Ocellus isn't going to leave the words hanging. That would be just like asking. She needs another approach. "...able to help us? We escaped the Nightmare, but now it is between us and Pharynx. And its power to make us panic is too strong."

Ocellus watches the way Luna keeps herself from cringing, the corners of her eyes creasing a little at the word help.

Smolder pips up, "You wouldn't happen to know a way to counter that, would you?"

Luna sighs. "I did once distill a magical potion from the light of the moon which can protect against such unnatural fear. But I am sorry, it only works on adults."

Ocellus keeps her eyes focused on Luna. Enough that the flickering image slips back a little under her gaze. Finally, she tells the night alicorn, "This isn't your fault. You didn't cast the spell that corrupted the mirror; Queen Elytra did. You have been helpful..."

"Without you, I'd be lost. Or captured. Or dead," Ocellus protests. "I certainly wouldn't have any idea of what's going on. Or have a plan..."

Smolder stands up, huffing. "I'd still be a gigantic, greed-consumed brute who attacks her friends and tries to kill and eat everything that moves."

Smolder's eyes widen. "And I'm now really hoping the changeling queen didn't have drones waiting for me like she did for Ocellus," the dragon moans. "Because if she did, I ate them!"

Ocellus cringes. "I... I don't think so. I-I'm sure we would h-have f-found something."

Ocellus hears Luna's stifled sniff. She feels torn between hugging Smolder and trying to ease Luna's pain. As much as this ordeal has made manifest one personal nightmare after another, she is not the only one tormented.

Luna was so tortured by what she did as Nightmare Moon -- so wracked by guilt -- that she created the Tantabus to punish herself. And now, Luna is seeing everything she abandoned here once again threaten Equestria. She's being forced to watch creatures she cares about try to fight an apocalypse of her making, being hurt and traumatized by this catastrophe while trapped and unable to directly help herself. This is as much Luna's living hell as her own. Maybe more.

With a flash of turquoise, Ocellus shifts into dragon form, knowing the favorable emotional response that will trigger in Smolder. She reaches out, taking Smolder's claws in her own, pulling the orange-scaled dragon close enough to press tan scales against her.

"You say you trust me," Ocellus says, keeping her voice gentle but firm. "Now listen to me. None of the bad things that have happened tonight are your fault." Ocellus rests her head on Smolder's, whispering into her dear friend's ear. As she speaks, she looks to Luna, saying those words as much to the former princess. "There is nothing to forgive," she maintains. "We. Will. Be. Okay."

The shockingly potent taste of Luna's love touches her receptors again, causing everything else to drop away. Ocellus has to close her receptors to focus.

Ocellus tries to redirect every creature's thoughts to what is ahead. There is too much pain and ugliness behind. She could get lost in this night if she allowed herself to. But she won't, and she won't allow her friends to either. "We need to get past that Nightmare."

Smolder nods, not backing away. "Agreed," she says, her muzzle moving against Dragon-Ocellus' breast scales. "How?"

Ocellus feels Smolder straighten up. Hears her snap her claws. The orange dragon presses her muzzle against Ocellus' breast, letting Ocellus feel her smirk, then backs up enough to speak. "Maybe we can get Pharynx' pseudolings to attack it. Get by while it's distracted!"

Ocellus considers that. That's a good plan. "We would have to know where It is before It attacks us and uses Its terror power. Get the..." Ocellus' thoughts lock up. She releases Smolder, stepping back to look at her friend. "...pseudolings? Really?"

As Ocellus stares at Smolder, one thought breaks through: Smolder used "pseudo"? Wait... she must have learned that from me! Her heart surges: love mixed with pride and... whatever the emotion is that says: gosh, that's cute!

She recalls the Nightmare's attacks, both in the Conservatory and in the Throne Room. The queen's taunt. And the earlier revelation that she considered Ocellus the true threat to her plans. "That might not work. The queen made It with a single purpose. It's hunting me. It might not care about them."

Smolder nods. Then stops. She blinks once, then crosses her arms, leaning forward and giving Dragon-Ocellus a skeptical eye. Ocellus brushes her left arm with her right claw, feeling an awkward sense of deja vu.

"Hold on!" Smolder stares. "If this is going into the cave of Ocellus Goes It Alone, no. Absolutely no."

With a flash, Ocellus transforms into a Generic Pony Victim (or, at least, a good approximation, helped by having plenty of pony forms in her repertoire) and cheerfully suggests, "Creepy, isolated place full of monsters? Let's split up. We can cover more ground that way."

Ocellus transforms back into her natural body. "I've read too many books to do that."

The lovebug smiles softly, the edge of her smile curling with a tiny bit of smugness. She has an idea. It's actually one she's had before: something she's daydreamed about in private, back before she started to question who she really was. Perhaps ideas like this lead to that. But she has other worries right now.

She feels her heart flutter and a knot tie in her stomach. She could just tell Smolder what she wants to try. But that wouldn't be as fun. Or as risky, although she knows enough to know there is very little risk from Smolder.

In the back of Ocellus' mind, she contemplates that the real risk is that this won't work at all. There's no reason it shouldn't... in theory. But she's never done it before. And she's never heard about any other changeling doing it before.

Ocellus faces Smolder, stepping so close their faces are nearly touching. She can feel the heat of Smolder's breath on her nose.

Smolder leans back a bit, flushing under her scales. Her eyes dart side to side just once before locking on the changeling in front of her.

The air around Ocellus is a fiery cinnamon -- not like candy, but like hot spiced tea. There are subtle notes of ruby and licorice. Mixed are other flavors that she cannot taste -- emotions with little or nor love.

Ocellus can see Smolder is flustered, and probably becoming a bit worried. In a palace full of monsters, many of which are love-starved changelings, that sort of fear is hardly unfounded.

Ocellus breaks the kiss, feeling a tiny strand of saliva stretch between her lips and Smolder's before breaking. Her tongue is tingling; her face is flush. Her whole body feels pleasantly hot. The air about her is so rich with cinnamon and rubies that it almost hurts to breathe.

Ocellus can feel her body reacting, wanting to shift, wanting to take on a form that will elicit an even greater response from her friend. She has to force herself not to. Just as she has to force herself not to feed. Even for a changeling whose life is filled with love, it is tempting -- and she is young. It takes more will than she expected.

Sometime in the kiss, Smolder's wide eyes had lidded and closed. Now they open again, staring at her.

The lovebug takes a step back, closing her eyes. The taste of Smolder's love is so potent. She takes it in, but she does not feed. Instead, she wraps it around herself like a warm blanket, encasing herself in a cocoon woven from Smolder's heart. The flash of turquoise fire that surrounds her is tinged with highlights of topaz as she transforms...

Ocellus smiles. "When changelings collect love from someone, we don't have to eat it. We can store it," she tells her friend. "We used to do it to take the love back to our queen. Trust me, when Headmare Starlight convinced us to share our love... if all we had to share was the love inside the hearts of love-starved changelings, it wouldn't have been much of a light show."

Ocellus explains, "I took the love you gave me and cocooned myself in it. Now, I don't just look like you, but to another changeling, I taste like you. It's a perfect disguise!"

Seeing Smolder's bewildered look, Ocellus forges on, "I am certain the queen designed the Nightmare to hunt with a changeling's senses. Now, it won't be able to track us."

Ocellus frowns. This is not the reaction she expected. Neither to her new trick -- which she rather hoped would impress her friend -- nor to her kiss. Smolder is staring at her, scrutinizing her. Almost like the first time they met.

Ocellus tries to taste Smolder, hoping for some insight into what the other girl is feeling. But all she can taste is the love she has encased herself in -- so potent it drowns out everything. Her eyes widen, a chord of deep unease striking inside her. She feels like she has gone blind.

The lovebug watches as Smolder's expression changes. The Dragon stands back, straightening. Her wings sag just a little. Her tail droops. The expression on her face is one of resignation. Or possibly, worse, disappointment. Suddenly, Ocellus feels she has made a terrible mistake somehow. She wants to go back in time and undo this. To take it all back somehow.

Ocellus opens her mouth, thinking that at least she can say the kiss was just because she needed the love.

Smolder holds up a claw. "Don't." The dragon turns towards the hole in the wall, looking back at the hallway. The fires have gone out. "...Just... let's go."

Ocellus shuts her mouth and nods numbly. She walks to the wall, following Smolder.

Smolder and Ocellus turn back to face Luna in the cracked central mirror. The triptych is black. Luna's image is as solid as she was in the Grand Mirror.

"Talk to each other," Luna says, her voice carrying the regal authority she once held. "Failure to talk about problems -- even small ones -- can allow them to fester. That can cause much greater damage to a relationship than the thing you remain silent about."

Ocellus chuckes awkwardly. "That... sounds like a friendship lesson our Headmare would teach."

Ocellus looks at Smolder, then at the floor. Then back to Smolder. "You're disappointed." Every second feels like another heavy blanket being piled onto her. Each one bearable alone, but together becoming crushing and smothering. "Was... I not good at kissing?"

Smolder's eyes widen with shock. "No!" The dragon flinches and waves her claws in panic at her own words. "I mean, not no. I don't mean no! I... it's not that!"

Ocellus looks at her blankly. She feels like the carpet has been pulled out from under her, and reality is still deciding where she is supposed to fall.

With a heavy sigh, Smolder tells her, "This wasn't what I expected my first kiss to be like."

Ocellus feels the metaphorical landing. And it hurts, breaking her emotions and casting them into a swirling hurricane. The winds buffet her between dismay and confusion.

Smolder watches Ocellus, seeing the hurt and confusion. For a moment, Smolder seems to consider leaving Ocellus to her storm. But instead, the dragon snaps her attention, breaking through it.

"Look. I know you know how I feel about you. And I know you. You aren't cruel. You wouldn't play with my heart. So I know you didn't kiss me just to get my love."

Ocellus feels herself growing small. She actually has to look down to make sure she hasn't changed form.

Smolder smiles just a slight bit. "In fact, I'm pretty sure you didn't need to kiss me to get the love you needed for this..." The dragon holds her paws out towards her Ocellus twin. "...at all. You could have gotten that just from the way I felt having you stand that close to me!"

Smolder crosses her arms, glaring but still smiling that slight smile. "So you kissed me because you wanted to kiss me," she decides. "And I want to be really happy about that. I hope it means you feel about me like I feel about you."

The smile leaves Smolder's face. "But you waited to kiss me until you had an excuse other than how you feel about me. I-I guess in case it got weird. Or I got weird."

Ocellus feels the rush to interrupt and proclaim her feelings. But the last words cut cold. Worse because she has no defense against that. She was just thinking virtually that very thing.

"I wanted my first kiss to be because we both wanted each other with no reservations," Smolder tells her flatly. "Not because one of us had a chance to do so with an escape hatch."

She wants to fix this. She needs to fix this. But how can she? You don't get a second chance at a first kiss. Ocellus feels her stomach drop out of her. She wants to bury herself.

Smolder moves to her, taking her by the arms. "Hey, hey. You're sorry. I get it. Don't. I hate to see you cry." She looks into her own eyes, but can only hold the look for a moment before wincing. "I hate to see me cry. Brimstone, this is weird."

"Look. For starters, I'm going to kiss you. A kiss without any backdoors or excuses," she vows. "But not right now. Not when you look like me. Because that is just no."

Ocellus looks around the wrecked and vine-infested room with the creepy grandmare clock. "Y-yeah... not romantic."

They look at each other in silence a moment before either remembers their audience.

From the mirror, Luna's voice laments. "Considering the circumstances, no offense taken."

Crossing the Conservatory directly didn't work before. But the first story of the Conservatory had walls that were not glass. According to Luna, there were rooms that ran along one side of the Conservatory, used for maintenance and storage. The duct hidden behind that vent cover should take them across the Conservatory and to the essence pools. Hopefully, with her new "perfect disguise", undetected.

The two identical orange dragons fly up and begin working together to unscrew the screws holding the cover in place. Ocellus catches Smolder sneaking looks at her.

Smolder turns back to the screw she is working. "You know what it's like to see yourself in a mirror? This is nothing like that."

Ocellus can understand that. She wonders what it would be like to see some other creature disguised as herself. The answer is easy: it would depend on who. For one of her siblings to become her might be fun. Or rude. But the only one who has ever tried, to her knowledge, was that guard drone near Queen Elytra's hive. She knows that would not be pleasant.

Smolder lifts her identical twin Ocellus up into the vent, then crawls in after her.

The duct is dark and layered with vines. But unlike those in Envy's wing, these are running in efficient paths along the surfaces of the duct, not filling the space with a knotted mess.

The two begin crawling through the duct that runs between the Conservatory and the adjacent utility rooms, the vines digging into their knees. What would be uncomfortable and soon painful to a softer form surprises Ocellus by being almost pleasant through the toughness of dragon scales. Almost like a massage.

A circle of light on the side of the passage wall ahead is broken by the tangled mass of vines that crawl up through it before spreading out in every direction within the vent. Ocellus pauses as she reaches the opening, peeking cautiously out into the Conservatory. Checking to make sure the Nightmare is still where they last saw it.

The huge, black form of the monstrous hunter saunters through the trees. Searching for her.

Ocellus stops breathing when its head turns to look her way. Scores of changeling ocelli swarm together to form a massive eye, staring in her direction. Then it turns the other way, surveying its surroundings, oblivious to her presence. Her perfect disguise is working.

The dragon-disguised lovebug breathes again and pushes herself through the tangle of vines, turning to make sure Smolder doesn't get entangled. She sees her friend reach out with her claws to slash away the mess in front of her and she quickly waves her tail to get the dragon's attention. Smolder stops, eyeing her with a weird look.

Ocellus points to the vines and shakes her head, waving her claws near her throat. Smolder's eyes widen a little, the dragon looking from her to the vines then back again. She gives a nod of understanding.

When (thanks to Gallus) Ocellus had first discovered the small passages that snaked throughout the palace hidden above ceilings and behind walls, she had wondered about the vines that spread throughout them like invading ivy. She had immediately associated the passages with the air vents she had seen in many pony buildings. But now they seem more like the animal passages in Professor Fluttershy's home. (The professor had been so wonderful as to invite her and Smolder to a tea party once.) Only these passages were for the vines.

Ocellus can see that all of the vines originate from the potent plants in the Conservatory, and from here they spread throughout Nightmare Moon's entire palace, delivering the dark essence that becomes the fire for the torches, the water for the fountains and bathrooms, and the substance for every other amenity. All hidden to keep from marring the elegance of the palace.

If there had been a fifth anti-Element, maybe it would have been Vanity. Or would that just be Pride in another form?

Still, Ocellus finds the design fascinating -- quite unlike anything at the hive, either now or during the reign of Chrysalis -- permitting function without sacrificing form. Professor Rarity would approve.

Ocellus whispers back, "I was just remembering when we had tea with Professor Fluttershy, and Discord made your dress drink your tea before you could."

The light behind her from Smolder's snort of flame only makes her giggle harder, having to cover her (cute!) snout with her (fearsome!) claws.

Smolder and Smolder-Ocellus crouch in the open mouth of the duct, looking down at the rows of supplies in the Conservatory's storage room. And at the swarm of red-tinged pseudolings in the room.

Ocellus cringes back from the opening, then looks across the room to the opposite vent cover. A frown etches across her draconic face. So much for a continuous duct. They'll have to cross the room to continue this way. But they can't fight all those pseudolings. And there was no way they can sneak across. Ocellus feels certain they will be spotted any moment -- they are bright orange!

Keeping her voice as soft as possible -- a feat natural for her, but requiring focus with the rambunctious voice of Smolder -- she whispers to the real dragon. "I think we need to go with your plan. Get their attention and lead them back towards the Nightmare..."

Smolder cups her paws to her muzzle, opening her mouth to call out to them, but Ocellus holds up an identical paw to her snout.

"Don't shout," she whispers. "They shoot rage lasers, remember? We need to get the attention of just one of them -- from a distance. We'll get a head start while he rallies the others."

Ocellus turns back, looking over the pseudolings with their coronas of dark red. They are gathered like patrols. But with a hive-mind, would there actually be a leader? Does Pharynx just treat them like appendages? Or would Pharynx make one in each grouping act out the patrol leader role because it fits his idea of a proper hive?

The thoughts pull Ocellus deep enough into contemplation that she barely hears the cheap-sounding clack beside her.

Something hits one of the pseudolings on the head, bouncing off with a cute squeak. The pseudoling's eyes go wide, and they all fly upwards and back, as if expecting an explosion of resin. The red-aura drones begin looking around the floor for the object that struck one of them.

Ocellus turns and sees a smug Smolder holding Gallus' toy crossbow. A moment later, they are scurrying back down the vent as fast as they can.

The two reach the vine-choked opening only seconds before the pseudoling patrols burst out of the storage room, searching for their attacker. The Nightmare looms in the Conservatory forest, Its eyes splitting apart to form new ones, peering at the ebony-carapaced, red-tinted drones that are clearly not part of Queen Elytra's hive.

The four forward-most pseudolings rise up, their chests burning with scarlet rage. Beams of fury lash out, staggering the Nightmare as they rip through Its amorphous being.

The Nightmare's mouth splits open in a scream devoid of teeth. All the teeth and fangs embedded throughout its body slither and slide across the black surface of its carapace like scurrying ants, coming together at the tips of tentacles of greasy smoke. Clattering and molding together to create giant fangs the size of Smolder's brother.

Ocellus and Smolder watch through the vent opening as the Nightmare begins to decimate the pseudolings.

Like a dark shadow, the changeling queen rises up from the shifting black mass of the Nightmare's back. Ocellus hadn't even seen her there. For a moment, she has the insane impression that the Nightmare birthed Queen Elytra from its back, despite knowing that she instead created It.

The Nightmare skewers a pseudoling with one of its massive fangs. A black tentacle lashes out, snatching another from the air, wrapping it tight enough that Ocellus can hear its chitin crack.

The tentacle lifts the pseudoling up to Queen Elytra. Her horn erupts in lime-green light as she stares into the pseudoling's eyes.

Ocellus turns to leave while the Nightmare and queen are distracted, but Smolder snags her. Ocellus looks back at her friend questioningly.

Smolder gives a nod towards the Nightmare and Queen Elytra, mouthing silently: What's she doing? The dragon turns back to watch, seeming to think it worth the risk to spy on the three of them.

After a long moment of concentration, the changeling queen's eyes go wide. Her voice belts out, ringing with shock and amazement. "Pharynx? Is that you?"

Ocellus' mind races, recalling what Luna had said. The red aura suggests they are being controlled through Wrath. Pharynx was actively controlling his pseudo-hive of essence creations... Oh wow. "She's tracing the magical control back to its source."

Queen Elytra stares, shouting at the pseudoling like it is one of a set of cans attached by a string.

"Even with Wrath, I'd know you in any form, Pharynx! Always the stalwart Defender of the Hive, protecting it from whatever you consider a threat!"

Red light flashes about Queen Elytra. The Nightmare continues to kill the attacking pseudolings. Whenever several fire their rage at once, It is staggered. But it never falls. And the pseudolings don't even seem to try to attack Queen Elytra directly.

"I offered you power, Pharynx!" Queen Elytra shouts. "A place at my side! But instead of love, I got BETRAYAL!"

The surprise in Smolder's voice mirrors her own. Ocellus had never heard of another queen! Although... Ocellus has to admit she finds some sense in the revelation. In the very least, it gives her greater perspective on Pharynx volunteering to come here.

What she is hearing severely redefines the primary mystery in her mental Unanswered Questions notebook: Why are there changelings on the moon?

Ocellus cannot help but hear a change in the queen's voice. A dark resonance that was not there before. As if she is tapping into the Nightmare's power somehow. Feeding from it, her voice becoming more like its own.

"Now it is I who shall crush you! I will destroy your pathetic essence soldiers... and when that grub Ocellus opens the portal, I will start by conquering mother's precious hive that you love so much. I will drain and devour every last one of them. And when I have taken everything from her, and Chrysalis is alone, mother will bow to ME!"

The last pseudoling twitches as the tentacle holding it tightens, the air is filled with the sound of its chitin shattering.

The changeling queen looks up through the Conservatory's glass at the world hanging in space. "DO YOU HEAR ME, MOTHER!?"

The changeling queen's voice hardly sounds anything like it did back when she fought Ocellus and Yona. Like she has taken the Nightmare's voice for herself.

Ocellus has to bite back a scream as the tentacle grip squeezes so hard the pseudoling is completely crushed, the broken and pulped body going limp, the red aura fading away. Then the changeling-like body dissolves into blue smoke.

"I WILL TEACH YOU THAT YOU CANNOT GIVE BIRTH TO SOMEONE AND THEN JUST THROW THEM AWAY!"

Prey

by Kkat

Chapter 14: Replica