Her Next Life As a Bug's Big Brother

by TundraStanza


Ch. 1: Power of Love Conquers Amnesia

The Queen's order was absolute: Go feed! He had left the grand hall so that she could deal with the primary threat of ponies as she saw fit. While that was going on, he was rounding up locals and visitors of Canterlot alike. He could barely contain his saliva at the thought of so many options for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. He shook his head and mentally hissed at himself. He had to finish the takeover first. Taking pleasure in the feast of love energy could wait until later.

Pharynx and some of his fellow drones cornered a pegasus pony to a stray cloud. In his peripheral vision, he saw his brood mate hovering idly. If Pharynx had irises to roll, he would have done so. As it was, he simply pushed the thought of reprimanding his brother's weakness to the back of his mind. He led the charge against the pony.

A high-pitched, garbled scream caught his ear's attention. He paused and glanced back at the castle. It was just soon enough to see a giant, pink wave of magic approaching fast. He barely had time to open his eyes all the way before it collided with his entire squadron. In the seconds that it collided with and pushed him out of the city, something strange happened.

His life flashed before his eyes, yet it wasn't exactly his life.

---

A creature on two legs ran along a street. It had a bright red backpack. Its brown mane was tied in a ponytail. She was running late for her next class. Mom was sure to give her a lecture if she ever found out.

Pharynx tilted his head. How did he know what this girl was thinking? The image changed before his eyes. The girl was chopping vegetables on a cutting board. Her finished meal was something that both of her parents appreciated very much.

The moving pictures changed subject and setting even faster. She was riding an airplane to surprise her grandparents for Christmas. She stole a sip of Uncle Tommy's special drink when he wasn't looking. She was at the foot of her bed, praying for a little brother or sister. She was surfing the internet for completely legitimate means to watch animated shows.

Then, the images slowed down on one scene. The girl was well into her teen years and was getting on a public bus. She was going to meet with a friend who was a boy at the theme park. Pharynx remembered she was feeling sleepy and nodded her head for a few seconds.

A screeching of tires woke her up. She saw a wild driver in a vehicle on the wrong side of the road. That car's headlight glanced off the bus's front end. In avoiding a head-on collision, the bus had veered into the side of a bridge over another road. The bus was falling at a bad angle, enough that the pavement below was the last thing the girl got a good look at.

---

When his mind returned to the present, Pharynx was dumbfounded. Those had been memories of another life, and they felt too personal to be someone else. That had been him... her... in all of that. If it wasn't for the wind resistance, the other soaring changelings might have heard him sputtering in a mash of confused emotions. As if to save him from such an embarrassment, his body chose that moment for him to faint. His eyes shut while his jaw dangled open.

---

He woke up to the sound of a river running. He pulled himself along with his front limbs. When he looked down at the water, there were several ripple lines that distorted the reflection. But he could see it. That was the purple-eyed and fanged face he always had. However, he also felt like he was seeing himself with this face for the first time.

He tapped his hoof twice against his face. When he looked at the pattern of holes in his hoof, he felt slightly relieved. At the same time, he felt baffled. In his previous life, she was always told that you only lived once. No science could ever prove doubtlessly that reincarnation was a thing. The religions that believed in second lives were restricted to the third solid planet from the sun.

What was he supposed to do now? He supposed he should probably regroup with his hive. But to what end? A drone's job was to serve his/her queen. Did that extend to a plan to gorge on a large food source only to make it unpalatable for future consumption? Where he would have followed Chrysalis blindly until death before, now doubt was invading his thoughts.

Pharynx pondered as he lowered his head and took a drink. Maybe his queen wasn't nearly as absent-minded as that one mistake made her out to be. He swallowed one more sip of water and stood up. After wiping his mouth lightly, he decided. He had to know the condition of his home and every-ling still there.

Maybe he would feel better after making his brother hit himself again.

---

Flying through the invisible barrier brought a sense of ease to the changeling's nerves. No creature but another changeling could hurt him here. Any who tried would quickly lose their magic mid-cast, thanks to the queen's throne. Yet, the tension returned as he gazed over the land itself.

Any other day, Pharynx would have considered the dry and rocky terrain to be completely normal. Today, he felt nothing but empty as he looked at it. For all its faults, Earth had a tendency to make even a desert or a savanna pretty. Sure, these black jagged rocks probably discouraged intruders. It was just a shame that they looked so devoid of appearance.

As he landed close to the front of the hive, two changelings in purple armor saluted. Pharynx hissed at them, causing them both to resume standing at attention. He hopped up and climbed along a wall. He crawled through a hole in the rock before it closed up behind him.

For a while, he made a few turns crawling, flying, and trotting along the paths inside the mountain. He looked around, noticing a rather lacking number of fellow changelings. Sure, there were some here and there. But it hardly felt as full as it used to be. None of the changelings he passed had his little brother's eye shape.

Pharynx shook his head. What was wrong with him today? Sure, he didn't like it when other changelings ganged up on his punching bug, but he wasn't a worry earwig. He took a deep breath to calm himself before he wandered into the queen's chamber.

It was the largest opening in the entire cavern, minus the pointless spire room. The stone throne was as big and overcompensating as ever. There, the queen was lying down with a hoof holding up her head. She barely glanced at the returning soldier drone.

"My queen." Pharynx bowed deeply.

Chrysalis turned her gaze toward the ceiling. "Tell me why I shouldn't vaporize you for your incompetence at Canterlot."

'Returning home was a mistake.' Pharynx kept looking down without a readable expression. "For the same reason you spared the rest of your incompetent soldiers that were also at Canterlot."

"Touché." One of her eyes looked at him directly. "You're lucky I'm so perfect and merciful. Your punishment for disappointing me is simply a demotion to grunt drone. Crawl over the remaining soldiers if you want to earn your title of Commander back."

'Definitely a mistake.' He nodded once. "Understood, Your Highness. Permission to speak freely?"

Chrysalis sighed. "Out with it, Grunt."

"Has there been any word from my brood mate?" His left eye peeked up at her.

She spat at a far corner of the room. "As far as this hive is concerned, Thorax is dead to me."

"As far as... you mean, you don't know?" He lifted his head back to normal eye level.

"Scouts reported he was headed toward the Frozen North." She snorted. "Any drone who dares to venture without my permission doesn't deserve to be a part of my hive."

Pharynx's right hoof made an audible scratch against the rocky floor.

"Why are you still here, Pharynx?" Chrysalis lifted the spot where her brow would be. "Report to your wall space and rest. You begin your soldier training from scratch first thing tomorrow morning."

He was clenching his fangs, hurting himself to hold back a hiss. "Yes, Your Majessssty." He marched out of the throne room.

After the purple frilled changeling was gone, Chrysalis chuckled. "The best pronunciation to that I've ever heard."

---

Pharynx shape-shifted into a giant spider with scythe limbs. He growled and slashed at every single wall he nearly bumped into on his way to his resting hole. Maybe it was a waste of his energy. He didn't care at that moment. Once he made it back to a familiar set of holes, he shifted back to his default self.

In the years that he knew Thorax, he recalled thinking that he was nothing more than a burden to carry. He was playing with dolls when other changelings were getting in early practice for fighting and scaring. Heck, Pharynx even knew he enjoyed giving his brother a hard time about having a visible weakness. Contrasting that, the human girl's memories didn't have a sibling. Now that her psyche had one, she was losing him before she could really say she spent any time with him? That wasn't fair!

This changeling wasn't sure when he fell asleep. But he recalled feeling angry right until the moment he lost awareness.
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