Quill silently made his way back to the school. He didn't need to hide himself any longer, as now he knew the truth. Changelings could live freely in Equestria now, free of reprisal, so long as they were peaceful. No strings attached whatsoever.
But he didn't feel comfortable with it yet. After so long watching from the shadows, he felt safe there. After so long living a double life, he didn't know if he wanted to live without it.
Quill, who'd operated under the codename "Kevin", had invented a new persona for himself when he'd come to Ponyville for the first time. He'd toyed around with different names like Purple Prose, Written Word, Happy Trails, Sundown, Hat Trick, but they'd all been too pompous for his tastes. At first, Quill had been temporary, until he could find something more inspired. Something that fit himself better.
He never had found anything better. After a while, he'd found that he actually liked the name a lot better than his old one. After all, names were incredibly important to Pony culture. It was generally accepted that you could change your name after significant life events, like when you'd changed so fundamentally that the old name no longer applied. Or conversely, after marriage.
Accordingly, much of Pony society was surprisingly receptive to change, but some of the parts that mattered most were still set in the old ways. For example, laws rarely were changed, amended, or even overturned. The monarchy, having been in place for millennia at this point, still had strong public support. And most tellingly of all? On the world stage, Equestria was hardly at the cutting edge of technological progress.
Whomever held that honour depended on who you were asking. Most agreed that the Griffons, for all their bluster and strife, were on the verge of discovering something groundbreaking. Others believed that the Zebras would soon overtake them, building massive cities and architectural marvels in their arid homeland.
But others still knew that there was an older, deeper civilisation that was far more advanced and knowledgeable than any of the others. Quill knew of them, though he'd never met one of them in the flesh. There were some Changelings who claimed they had, telling tales of their fantastical encounters.
Of course, that had very little bearing on the life of Quill, here and now. With Ocellus's help, he could learn to step into the light, to let the Equestrians see him for who he was, not what his species was.
When he reached the school grounds, he paused for a moment. Did he really need to keep up his current disguise? While his metamorphosis was by no means complete, the other students here had come to know him, and were used to seeing him join their lessons, though he did not consider himself one of them.
After some deliberation, he decided that it was for the best. He lowered his disguise in a pale green flash -- in the time since meeting Ink Blot, his once emerald green magical aura had begun to fade to a different, brighter colour. He wasn't sure if it should unnerve him or not.
He tried to ignore it for now, continuing towards the classroom where he'd meet with Ocellus for his tutoring.
When he entered, Starlight and Trixie were there. They'd been chatting about something, but went quiet when arrived.
"Ah, Quill, you're early." Starlight greeted him.
Trixie looked past him. "Is Ink Blot with you? I thought you were going to visit him."
"He'll come when he's ready," Quill dismissed. "He's still mourning."
"He can't mourn alone forever." Trixie shook her head disapprovingly.
"How long did Starlight mourn her lost friendship?" Quill smirked.
Starlight cringed. "Please don't joke about that. I made more than my share of mistakes because of that."
"Sorry." Quill said.
"It's too bad he's not here yet, though. The Grrrr-eat and Powerful Trixie has often offered a unique perspective in her counseling duties." Trixie boasted, though even so, it was an accurate boast.
Quill shrugged. "He'll only share when he's ready. He's only just begun sharing with me, and that's because he trusts me."
"Oh, then it's simple. He shares with you, you share with me, then I tell you what to tell him. Everypony wins." Trixie said dismissively.
"That would be a significant breach of his trust," Quill shook his head. He would never have dreamed of doing something like that. "He kept my secrets without hesitation, and now I'm going to do the same for him."
Trixie scrunched up her face, like that hadn't been what she'd meant. "I was just saying. It would be a lot easier and quicker than waiting for Celestia knows how long."
"And it would be a lot easier for me to simply disappear without a trace, never to return! But I'm not going to, because being easy doesn't mean it's the right choice!" he snapped. It was an empty threat, but it helped him get his point across.
Starlight sighed and rubbed her eyes. "Why did you have to start getting so passionate? And stubborn?"
Quill gave them a knowing smile. The other two looked at eachother like they were questioning every decision that had led them to this point. They meant well, but as Ink Blot had wisely said sometime before, Just because you mean well, doesn't mean you're right.
He'd only been with them for a month and a bit, but in that time he'd become more open in some ways, and more closed in others. It was a strange dualism. He'd become more confident, sure of himself in situations that weren't familiar to him. But he'd also learned how to step back and let others take the lead when he wasn't the bug for the job.
"Um, hello?" someone said from the door quietly.
"Hello there." Quill replied without hesitation. The clock had just reached 2 o'clock in the afternoon, the agreed-upon time that his tutoring would officially start.
"Ah, Ocellus, right on time as always." Starlight said happily.
Ocellus stepped into the room meekly. "Yeah. Are you two staying? I won't make you leave, it's just that I teach best when it's one on one."
"Actually, we were--" Trixie began
"Just about to leave for a late lunch." Starlight cut her off sharply.
Trixie was about to protest, but wisely held her tongue.
Ocellus either didn't notice, or didn't care. She exchanged pleasantries with the two unicorns as they left, waiting until she was certain that the two Changelings were alone in the classroom.
"Don't worry, I know why they were here. Asking about Ink Blot, right?" she smiled.
"Yeah. He's been distant to them, and they're getting worried. That's what I think, anyway." Quill replied.
"Ah, that explains a few things, then."
Quill frowned skeptically. "What's that, then?"
"Well, he said he's not from around here, right? He doesn't know anyone, and he left behind all his old friends. It's hard to make new friends when you don't know where to start." Ocellus explained. Even if she didn't have the whole picture, she was right. It was a universal problem that everyone needed to overcome in some way.
"But he's made a few friends, me included. At least I think he considers us friends." said Quill.
"True. But he's also going through a lot of self-discovery, isn't he? He doesn't know how he fits into the world, doesn't know what he wants to do." Ocellus added.
"I think it's more along the lines of not knowing what he can do."
"Sometimes those two are the same thing," Ocellus said wisely. "But you're here for Friendship lessons, not just Friendship advice. Have you been hungry at all?"
Quill shook his head. "No. I know it's like you said that the metamorphosis has already started, but I'm still reluctant to let it happen. I can't explain it."
"Either way, your magical aura is different now. And your wings are glittery. Soon enough the scars will fade and you'll take on your true shine. It'll happen when you're ready." Ocellus smiled.
Quill did not immediately respond. He was lost in introspection, thinking about her words. What exactly was he worried about? He changed how he looked every day, could change it at any time he wanted. It was as easy as putting on a hat. It was second nature to take the appearance of someone else.
So why did this change scare him the most of all?
Ink Blot blinked. Was he dreaming? Or hallucinating, for that matter? He didn't trust what his eyes were telling him had appeared. It had to be a mistake. Because the alternative, that his reflection had stepped out of the strange underground pool and was now staring at his face in confusion, was too much for him right now.
"Who are you?" asked Ink Blot.
"Who am I?" Ink Blot asked back. It was like an echo, bouncing off of the walls of the cavern, back to him. But it was real, it was actually someone else right there in front of him.
He frowned. Who was he indeed? The other Ink Blot frowned as well, lost in thought. Both Blots had the same cutie mark, the same claw boots, the same horn, the same scrapes along their underside from when they'd slid across the ground while fleeing from the Timberwolves.
They were the same.
"You're me." Ink Blot said.
The other Ink Blot looked up, understanding dawning on his face. "I'm you." he said.
"Well isn't this a little awkward." Ink Blot said with a wry smile.
"Yes, quite awkward," the other Blot agreed. "Makes you wonder which one came first."
"Something tells me that might be a chicken and egg situation."
Both Blots's stomachs growled in unison. Ink Blot had skipped breakfast, as was now his habit, but it must have been getting close to lunch time. They were hungry.
"I could go for a nice sandwich right now." Ink Blot said.
"That's not actually a bad idea. What kind are you thinking of?" he agreed with himself.
Ink Blot smiled again. "Well you should know about as well as I do."
"I've always wanted to try that sandwich where it's two slices of bread-"
"-with the potato chips in between?" he interrupted himself.
"How'd you know?" Ink Blot smiled.
"Call it... intuition."
At the same time, the Blots tapped the sides of their heads thoughtfully, like it was some kind of tongue-in-cheek joke between them.
Though, now that there were two of them, there was... going to be more than a little confusion. They both had the same name, the same face. How could they tell eachother apart?
"Quite the conundrum." Ink Blot commented.
"Yep." the other Blot sighed.
"We're clones of eachother. Doppelgängers."
The other Blot made a face. "That implies one of us is evil."
"Well, are you?" Ink Blot asked.
"Well, am I?" The other Blot retorted.
"There has to be some kind of difference. No matter how small."
The two of them thought for a moment, until the original realised something. It was like a switch turned on in his mind.
"It's simple. Which of us emerged from the pool, and which of us stepped away from it?" he asked his clone.
"That's easy. I stepped out of it, didn't I?" the clone said thoughtfully.
"Then that, of course, would make me the original Ink Blot. Though, I imagine that from your perspective, you stepped through the pool from your side into my side." the original Ink Blot explained out.
"Wouldn't that mean that the, quote on quote, "original" is an entirely arbitrary designation? From our own perspectives, we'd see ourselves as the original, no matter what the order of events was."
"You could very well be correct in that, I won't lie," the original Ink Blot frowned. "But for the purposes of identification we need to have a difference, no matter how arbitrary. Thusly, I will christen you "Secundus"."
"I suppose that makes you "Primus", then?" Secundus scoffed.
Ink Blot shrugged. "Maybe it does, but you know me better than anyone else. Primus is too lofty, too..."
"Arrogant?" Secundus supplied.
"Yeah, arrogant," Ink Blot agreed. "For the purposes of talking to other people, we'll both still be Ink Blot, at least in public. In private we can we whoever we want to be."
Secundus nodded in acceptance, though he clearly had a few reservations. The original smiled and turned away, starting to make his way to the exit.
Sometimes it was just better to leave an argument for another day, to accept terms and place your hopes on renegotiation in the future.
Of course, if the renegotiation failed...
"You know, clone subplots never turn out very well."
Ink Blot stopped and looked back at Secundus. "Well this isn't a subplot. This is reality. I'm real, you're real, and now that you're here, we need to figure out how we're going to live our lives going forward."
He was right. Both of them knew that. Where there had once been one, there were now two. Such a small change, almost unnoticeable on the grand scale.
But even the smallest change could make all the difference.
Traversing the forest was a relatively easy task. The sun was still out, and the two Blots both had compasses. They forged their way north, past bush and shrub, carefully avoiding the patches of glowing blue flowers, and listening for the approach of the Timberwolves. Neither of them wanted to risk another confrontation.
At the very edge of the forest, though, Ink Blot soon realised that a problem would inevitably emerge.
"How are people going to react when they see two of us?" Ink Blot wondered aloud.
"Probably not very well. Think they'd buy the excuse that we were twins?" Secundus replied.
Ink Blot shook his head. "We'd have different cutie marks. Could use the Changeling excuse, that's a touch more plausible."
"Possibly," Secundus said. "Would it really be worth it, though? We could just go at different times, take different routes, and meet back up at the castle. Sound good?"
"Alright. I'll go west side, you'll go east side. Ten minutes between." Ink Blot suggested.
Secundus nodded in agreement. Ink Blot left first, as his path would take him through the busiest part of town. As he aproached, he did his best to act like he was coming back from his usual period of meditation.
The key to moving through a crowd undetected is to mimic their overall mood and atmosphere. If they're keeping to themselves, keep to yourself. If they're smiling and celebrating, smile as well. The important part was to avoid standing out in any meaningful way: to be average.
Ink Blot knew this well, as he'd been on the opposite side of the coin. When searching for someone who intends to cause trouble, their body movements, their attitude, how they react to developing situations, would indicate their guilt. Similarly, if you knew what to look for, you could discover who was trying to hide something.
He'd been there more times than he really knew. Watching a crowd as him and his comrades delivered relief supplies. Food, water, medicine, all being given to the very people that hated the invading soldiers. Maybe it was an earnest attempt to make up for past mistakes, maybe it was an underhanded attempt to foster goodwill for further bloodshed. Ink Blot didn't know. Probably the latter, knowing what kind of people really gave the orders.
Ponies of all shapes and sizes thronged the streets. As Autumn had begun, they were preparing for the Running of the Leaves, which if Ink Blot remembered correctly were a series of hoofraces through the nearby forests. The strength of the runner's hoofbeats would cause the leaves to fall from the trees, with only bare limbs and pine needles remaining in the canopies.
An interesting tradition, considering that the leaves would fall with or without pony intervention.
Ink Blot sidled carefully through town, taking in the sights and sounds. In addition to the hoofraces, Nightmare Night was on the way. Costumes were being sewn, decorations were being hung -- and of course, there was the candy.
He wasn't sure if he'd be interested in partaking. Maybe if someone invited him, he'd join them, but the Running of the Leaves seemed redundant, and Nightmare Night felt like an uninspired revision of a holiday they'd had back home. But... he had to admit, it was nice seeing all the happy faces around. It was a lot nicer than the faces he'd seen back home, before he'd gone AWOL.
Every time he and his platoon were involved with humanitarian drops, he'd seen the faces. By the gods, the faces. Sadness, for the ones they'd lost. Regret, for not having prepared. Fear, for their very survival. Even with the Keleseth Guard assisting with peacekeeping and security efforts, crime had run rampant. Armed gangs terrorised the streets, and clashed with law enforcement in bloody skirmishes. At the same time, disease had spread nearly unopposed, and large portions of Dormus proper were barricaded off, with many people still inside.
That was what had prompted their leadership to begin the crackdown, to enforce martial law. They had no other option. Or at least that was what their leadership had thought. Even with all the chaos, a sort of status quo had emerged by then. The gangs, ironically enough, began policing their own parts of the city, and often co-operated with the military to distribute supplies as they deemed necessary. A faction had emerged within the civilian population that wanted to take charge of things, to coordinate efforts, to rebuild what they could, and to eventually bring order to the other nearby cities.
But Colonel Sullivan, commanding officer of the Keleseth Guard, was a man with a chest full of medals who always hungered for more glory. He wanted the credit for bringing order to the city, and credit for him alone. He'd chased glory in Kirma by throwing his own men away, and he was going to do it again in Dormus. That's when Knight had the idea to leave, and at the same time cripple Sullivan's ability to command. Which, funnily enough, indirectly resulted in their deaths, shortly before Ink Blot found himself in Equestria.
Funny, that.
Soon enough, Ink Blot found himself at the castle, and let himself in. The halls were quiet, as Starlight was still at the school for an hour or so longer. While she wasn't quite as staunchly dedicated as she had been prior, she still put in a surprising amount of hours to make sure her job was done correctly. If only he'd had a commanding officer as dedicated as she was to that bloody school.
He waited tensely by the door, looking out towards the town. Would anyone notice? Would there be suspicions? Possibly. They'd taken as many precautions as they reasonably could given the circumstances, under a strict time frame. All they had to do now was wait.
It was not long before he breathed a sigh of relief. There was Secundus, making his way towards the castle. Alone, just as they'd planned.
"All's well." Secundus said as he let himself in.
"No trouble?" Ink Blot asked.
"None at all. Barely even saw a soul." his clone replied.
Ink Blot nodded in satisfaction. "Then let's eat."
The two of them made their way into the kitchen, brainstorming potential meals. Cooking for two was harder than they'd realised, as when there's been only one of them they'd been satisfied with eating whatever filled their bellies. It was... confusing them, in a way. Both would have settled for a simple snack of whatever leftovers were in the fridge, but the other's presence put them into the mindset that they were feeding a visitor.
Naturally they acknowledged this, with wry comments that resembled inside jokes between old friends.
They eventually settled on making fried egg sandwiches. They'd have preferred to fry up some ham or bacon, but pony society was still culturally vegetarian. Animal products were very much okay, but it made most ponies uncomfortable to partake in the flesh of creatures that so closely resembled themselves in both body and mind. Privately, they acknowledged that Griffon culture might not have the same qualms.
"What now?" Secundus asked Ink Blot after they had finished eating.
"I don't know." he admitted.
"I meant what we're going to now, now that there's two of us?" Secundus clarified.
"I don't know," Ink Blot said again. "Do you?"
Secundus snorted. "Of course not. We're the same person, remember? All the movies and stories say that trying to have both of us live the same life at the same time is moronic."
"True. We wouldn't be able to properly communicate every minute detail of every day, leading to discrepancies."
"And assuming that we were cloned both in body and mind, there would come a point where our personalities diverged due to different experiences."
"Exactly," Secundus smiled. "Even if we had somehow managed to be perfectly the same up until a pivotal moment, there would be a fundamental difference."
"That being?" Ink Blot asked, but he knew the answer before his double even said it.
"I'm standing here, and you're standing there. Even if we looked at the same object, like the salt shaker on the kitchen counter over there, our perspectives are different. I see once side, and you see the other. We see the same object, but never quite the whole object." Secundus explained.
"And even if our views overlapped somewhat, there would be some of the object we couldn't both see, because of our differing perspectives." Ink Blot finished.
The two of them nodded sagely. They had to admit, the other one did make a lot of sense. It was oddly introspective.
"So I ask you again. What happens now?" Secundus asked yet again, but this time it was a lot more thoughtful than the first two times.
"Whatever we want, I suppose. The fact that we're having this conversation means that we're okay with eachother's existence, none of that "there can be only one!" business." Ink Blot replied with a chuckle.
Secundus nodded in agreement. "Then the question is not "What happens now?", but rather "What do I want to happen now?"."
"And do you have an answer?" Ink Blot asked himself.
Secundus was quiet for a long while. His eyes darted back and forth, following the cracks and divots in the table as he thought. Those scars in the table's surface told stories to him, of what the table had experienced in its lifetime. It was a nice table, but something told him that it hadn't always been in this castle. It was wooden, stained and varnished to a lovely walnut brown. But in some places the varnish had been scraped or worn away, revealing the bare wood beneath. In one place, there were scorch marks, likely from a a time when the table had been burned by a candle left unattended for far too long.
Oh yes, this table had stories to tell. If Secundus had to guess, it had been bought second hand from a family that had used it throughout two or three generations. Such a table was a silent workhorse that held many dinners, many parties, much tragedy and sadness yes, but many miracles and happiness as well.
"I'd like to spend some more time reading," Secundus finally answered. "History. Equestrian history of all stripes. Ancient and new, personal and national, and as many sources as I can find."
Ink Blot smiled fondly. "History always was our favourite subject in school."
"Mostly because we could talk a lot and coast along on our background knowledge." Secundus smiled, the memories they shared coming back to them.
"It's like dad used to say..." Ink Blot began.
The two of them looked at eachother and said in unison, "Knowing is half the battle!"
The doubles took their leave, with Ink Blot making his way to the School of Friendship, and Secundus quickly shutting himself into the library. Quill had long since cleaned up the... uh... Changeling nesting goo, as he called it, so the library was back to its usual appearance.
Approaching the bookshelves, Secundus browsed them thoughtfully. Last time, he'd gone in with a specific goal in mind, and took out books based on how relevant they were likely to be to his goal. If a book didn't seem to have anything useful, or only reiterated information he'd already gleaned without any additions, he'd set it aside. Today, he was going to read these books for reading's sake.
And if he fell down a strange rabbit hole? If he found a mystery that he needed to solve?
So be it.
It was interesting having access to the collected knowledge of an unfamiliar world. He knew how his own had developed, at least the broad strokes, but Equestria had developed in surprising ways. As expected of a world that relied on magic for a lot of daily life, the surface level understanding of Equestria would say that it wasn't nearly as developed as the human world.
But it was, in ways he didn't expect. For example, though a large subset of the population had access to magic, the rest had to make-do with more mundane solutions. Teleportation was impossible for all but the most skilled and dedicated of spell-casters. Thusly, being able to move from one place to another had developed along very familiar lines. At first, ponies would walk or gallop everywhere. Then, they developed the wheel to facilitate the movement of larger and heavier loads across longer distances, faster than it was possible without it. As carts and wheeled conveyance became common, it was necessary to build infrastructure to cater to such conveyance. Roads became longer, wider, and better built against wear and tear. As the roads grew, so did Equestria.
Where their path had differed, however, was the development of powered vehicles. The internal combustion engine existed, and the railway was well developed, but there was either no need or no interest in adapting road vehicles to self-propellance. It wasn't impossible to build a sufficiently sized engine that could power a single vehicle, as Gyro had proven with her most recent flying devices, just not necessary.
It was like their use of electricity. Motors could convert movement to electricity, and electricity to movement, but electricity itself was used very little outside of communities that had very few unicorn residents, such as Appaloosa. Conversely, communities that had mostly unicorns used magical conduits that could wirelessly transmit power without losing any of it, though that particular subject was still treated like it was magic in and of itself.
But Secundus soon figured out why that was the case. Particle theory was nearly non-existent here, and most science relied on hypothetical mathematic equations to determine results. It wasn't nearly as interesting as he'd hoped, but when the field of magic had spells that could literally convert matter into a completely different and unrelated element, it made a little sense as to why they had a different understanding of how the world was put together. Thank the gods they understood germ theory, as opposed to something silly like all sickness being caused by evil spirits that could be cured by subscribing to some herbalist's newsletter and selling water that had a leaf in it at some point.
Though he had to remember that it was a world of magic, and that in theory anything that could be imagined could be done with enough power put into it.
Eventually, he turned his attention to myths and legends of old. At first he read about the Elements of Harmony, which were magical artifacts that represented elements of Friendship. By bringing the five together, a magic of great power could be awakened. This power had been wielded by the Alicorn princesses, and later passed onto Twilight and her friends when Nightmare Moon was defeated. The physical artifacts were later destroyed, though it was discovered that the artifacts themselves were unneeded to use the power that Friendship could unlock.
It seemed that this power was what had kept Equestria safe and secure, despite numerous attempts to subvert it. Only... some of those attempts had come shockingly close to success. If at any point Twilight or her friends had faltered or given up, then Equestria would have fallen. They had a laughably weak military, and the most advanced non-magical weapons they had were heavy cannons that saw near-exclusive use in naval engagements.
What would happen if Equestria encountered a threat that could not be defeated by Friendship alone? Secundus looked to the major evils that had beset Equestria in recent memory. Chrysalis, despite being defeated multiple times, continued to be a nuisance well into the end of the Alicorn Sisters's reign. Tirek had the ability to absorb the magic of others, and only a random shot in the dark had stopped him the first time. And Cozy Glow, the pegasus filly who'd sought to control the magic of Friendship, had successfully cut off magic in Equestria so that she could be the only one with any power at all. Later, all three had used to power of an ancient artifact called "The Bell of Grogar" to temporarily hold dominion over Equestria.
But somehow, the magic of Friendship had triumphed over them in the end.
Then of course there was Sombra, who had once ruled the Crystal Empire in the north. He was... different. He had been defeated like the others, yes, but if he'd been unopposed he would have brought war to Equestria. Such was the account of Princess Twilight Sparkle, who'd traveled into alternate timelines due to Starlight's interference. Now from the description of what he'd done before the Crystal Empire was cast into a time vortex, he had immense power yet represented a conventional threat. Secundus knew how to deal with conventional threats.
Only through great effort and sacrifice had the other timeline managed to bring his advance to a stalemate. If Equestria had been prepared against such a threat, when the war began they'd have been able to defeat him with or without the magic of Friendship. That, at least, gave them options in how to deal with the enemy.
A similar event had occurred with the so-called Storm King. He'd struck without warning, overcoming Canterlot and the Alicorn princesses in a matter of minutes. His forces occupied Canterlot, Ponyville, and slowly extended his control across the heartland, while his second-in-command pursued the fleeing Princess Twilight and her friends. He would have succeeded in his bid to take the power of the Alicorns for his own, if it were not for the intervention of Twilight's friends and a crack team of infiltrators, as well as the defection of his second-in-command.
Secundus couldn't help but wonder how well these "villains" would have fared against lead and gunpowder.
Eventually, as night began in earnest, he decided to figure out his sleeping arrangements. It was while doing this he stumbled upon an old, scorched book. The cover was illegible due to the burns, but its contents had remained intact. The book intrigued him, and so he opened it.
The book was a study done on something called "The Mirror Pool".
For some reason, it filled him with dread.
With a cautious look around, Secundus silently slipped the book into his saddlebags, and left the library.