//------------------------------// // 1988, 9999: 9 // Story: They're EVERYWHERE! // by Nameless Narrator //------------------------------// The Equestrian Intelligence Service knew about events in Riverside, or at least suspected something was wrong, long before Half-Hearted Fury arrived in Canterlot accompanied by Riverside police force who escaped from Chrysalis and the gathered changeling survivors. In response to lost periodic contact, Princess Celestia authorized the assignment of a ranger unit to scout out the area and report with their findings. However, with the arrival of Fury and her testimony, the ranger report saying the Riverside changelings were gone, and the potential of the shapeshifters being far from a singular hostile entity, Celestia sent a representative to Riverside, one who wouldn’t kill a changeling on sight. To Bright Star’s surprise, the town was slowly recovering from the trauma of being completely taken over by changelings, although the signs of damage were clearly visible despite the organizational efforts of ponies wearing leather armors and dark green cloaks clearly suited for sneaking in the wilderness. Bright Star’s paladin armor gives him enough authority to straight up stop a pegasus ranger barking orders in the town square and ask: “Who’s in charge here, ranger?” “Who’s asking?” the pegasus measures the paladin from head to hooves. “Bright Star, paladin.” “Then the pony in charge would be me, sir,” his tone turns more official as he salutes. “And you are?” “Commander Whisper Wind, sir!” “Got a full situation report somewhere, Commander?” “I borrowed a room inside the town hall. All the information we’ve gathered so far is there. Testimonies, full damage reports, everything,” Whisper Wind nods sideways to the biggest building in town. “Let’s go. In the meantime, how’s the town?” asks Bright Star, unceremoniously heading towards the entrance and expecting the ranger to follow him without objections, which Whisper Wind does. “In short, minimal property damage outside of broken doors and windows, sir. Clearly, the goal of the changelings was to get to ponies, not to go for scorched earth tactic.” “Speaking of the ponies, how are the locals holding up? The situation in Canterlot is… bleak to say the least.” “The vast majority are accounted for and recovering. So far, no more victims. It seems that the townsfolk were barely fed upon and mostly had no idea what even happened until they woke up covered in green goo as we cut them out of the cocoons.” “Not everypony then.” “No, sir. Details are in the full report.” “Any changelings?” “Not a single one, sir. Dead or alive.” “Tracks?” “Nothing in the vicinity of Riverside itself, but a wide search revealed what could be tracks to the northwest.” “But nothing around town...” “That’s nothing special, sir. Escaping parties often cover their tracks well around the crime scene but let up further away due to time constraints.” “Any clue it’s the changelings?” “Judging from the map of regular trade routes, it’s unlikely that it would be anypony else.” “Have you sent anyone to follow the trail?” “Yes, sir. A group of six rangers.” “Can you spare a ranger to lead me to them?” “Yes, sir. Our investigation here is pretty much finished. We’re waiting for a report from the scouts before returning to Canterlot.” “Hmmm...” Bright Star rubs his short beard, “In that case, how about we go join the scouts?” “Sir?” “Commander, the changeling situation is a little different than we thought. As it turns out, instead of a frenzied army we saw them as, it might be more akin to civilians being forcefully drafted and used as a front line by elites in charge. Princess Celestia sent me here to see if there are any potential non-hostiles left. If so...” Bright Star pauses. “We negotiate, sir?” “No. Do you rangers still use hoof-mounted crossbows?” “Yes, sir.” “Commander, changelings are still a hostile faction, especially in groups, and they caused horrific damage to the lives of ponies. We’re not risking anypony trying to negotiate. We shoot first, but in the light of the new circumstances, we aim to wound.” *** Two days have passed since the group of changelings taking the cocooned ponies north to presumed safety left the lumber camp, and the remaining lings quickly returned to their routine. Unfortunately, 1988 inspecting everyone every evening had to note that their overall love level was barely even holding steady and he had no idea why. A casual poke into the minds of the drones revealed nothing suspicious, and a more detailed examination would only exhaust them all even more. If this keeps going on, it might come to him having to take the more aggressive approach in preparation for the cocoon group eventually returning, undoubtedly exhausted to the point of dropping, but there’s still enough time for that. Right now, the best thing he can do is sit down, close his eyes, and focus entirely on maintaining the hive mind knowledge accessible to the drones from as much range as possible. *** 36658 shares exactly no worries with 1988 as it’s walking around the camp before noon. Empty stomach and starvation level of love might be something unusual to infiltrators but for a drone it’s the basic level of existence. Normally, it would be helping someone with their job but the logging site the drone was supposed to be in was empty. After waiting for some time and concluding that no one was coming, it returned back to the mostly empty camp. “You!” a female voice coming from the repurposed shipping container section makes 36658 jump. “Who you? Me you?” the drone looks around. “Do you see anypony else around?” replies the medical mare whom 36658 met only once before and who was pretty clear about not being exactly happy about it. 36658 looks again. “Ummm, you?” The mare grits her teeth before shaking her head. “Why would I be- nevermind. You, I need you to come with me,” she beckons 36658 to follow her. “I’m not sure I should,” 36658 hesitates, “You’re the mean healing lady.” “My name is Triage and I’m not mean! Generally.” “I’m 36658 and you were mean to me. Specifically.” “Because you’re a weird, black, insectoid drug dealer.” “That’s speciesist!” “The drug dealer part was my problem.” “Hmmm. Makes sense, but still mean.” “Just come!” she insists. “Eeeeh… nope? When a high rank tells a drone to follow them without direct orders, it never ends well.” “What? No, you idiot, I need your help. Now!” 36658 narrows its eyes. “How hungry are you?” “What? We don’t have time for this nonsense.” 36658 nervously steps backwards. “I… I think I should go check up on 9999… or… anything else that gets me away from here… aaand from getting eaten.” “I’m not hungry, I just had breakfast! NOW CAN WE GO?! Please...” 36658 sighs but decides to risk it and follows Triage. “...leggies, don’t fail me now...” Several moments later, inside the makeshift infirmary, the problem becomes quite clear. “That’s a biiiiiig hole,” 36658 winces as it looks at a sedated stallion with a massive gash in his hind leg surrounded by bags of ice, bottles, and tied up in various places, “Oh hey, I think I was supposed to be working with this guy today.” “Now do you see my problem?” “I see his problem.” “I’m the doctor. His problem is my problem.” “I have leg holes too,” 36658 shows Triage that it, indeed, does have leg holes. “You’re supposed to, I think. Ponies aren’t, and that I know.” “When this happens to us, we kinda just goop it up.” “I’m not risking sepsis from one of you puking all over him. No, I need painkillers.” “Agonyslayers.” “No!” “Totally yes. And that’s easy!” it shoves its hoof down its throat. “No, I don’t want your bark puke,” Triage pulls the drone’s hoof out. “Then it’s not easy. Wait, why did you need me then?” 36658 tilts its head, now completely stumped. “Look. I need to operate, and if I do it under your makeshift version of aspirin or the small amount of morphine I have left there’s too much of a risk of him moving at the wrong time. If he does so, he’s bound to lose the leg.” 36658 leans in conspiratorially. “Don’t tell anyone I told you this, but 57999 has a super nice stick stashed in its hiding spot. It can totally work as a leg with some proper glue.” “No, I want him to keep his, which is where you come in.” “I came in through the door.” “That’s what I need you for. I need better painkillers.” “Agonysl-” “Shut up!” “You’re mean.” “I’m under stress because a pony is in danger of a crippling injury and my best chance of minimizing risks is spouting nonsense!” “Ummm, you mean me, right?” “YES!” “I, umm, can see a hole in the plan. I can’t make anything better. I tried with more zebra bark, some grass, or other combinations, but nothing worked better. I think I got the agonyslayers pretty much perfected.” “Did you try poppies?” “Last time I was near the latrines, a mare smacked me over the head with a rolled up paper thingy. Called me a peeping tom. I don’t even know what that is.” “Oh Celestia...” Triage facehoofs, “No, I meant poppy, a red plant.” “No idea what that is either.” “It’s a base for an exponentially stronger painkiller than aspirin, and your primitive bark p- agony slayer-” “One word- agonyslayer. It rolls off the tongue way better.” “One more naming-related interruption and I’ll flip a coin and either kill you or myself based on the result.” “...” 36658 clamps its forelegs over its mouth. “Good. I have zero idea how your internal chemistry works but you’re skipping a lot of steps in the preparation of aspirin, yet the green things you make from bark are close enough. My idea is that if you eat a bunch of poppies, you might make… well, a lot of illegal things but I hope it would be some level of opiate. Or you might explode, I don’t know. Look, if it works you’ll save a pony’s leg. If not… we tried our best and I’ll give you… umm, something. Okay?” “Neat! Do you have any poopies?” “Poppies. Please never say that again.” “Okay. Got any?” “No, but I talked with Sawtooth and he said there was a poppy field roughly three hours away from here. I think it belongs to somepony but if you just quickly nab some of the plants you should be in and out before anypony notices. You’re going to need a map and a bag. In the meantime, I should be able to use my magic to keep the leg sterile and stop necrosis from setting in.” “Can’t you just magic him asleep?” “Oh, why didn’t I think of that?” Triage rolls her eyes, sarcasm dripping from her words… and completely going down the drain before reaching 36658. “Wohoo! I’m helpful already!” 36658 punches the air victoriously. “No, you moron. I can’t keep him asleep, prevent him from thrashing around, holding my equipment, and scanning the wound at the same time. Surgery like this usually takes at least two ponies. Now, map!” she glares at the drone who gulps under the mare’s equally desperate and furious stare. “13415 copied a picture of the world from Sawtooth but I don’t know where its stash is. I don’t have a bag, though. I was explicitly told not to take those without asking.” “I can get you both but I need you to hurry,” Triage sighs, “I’m serious. He won’t last long like this.” “Wait! I’ll ask 57999 to help and we can get two bags!” “Good. Go do that then. Let’s meet up at your prayer spot or whatever in two minutes,” she storms off. As instructed, 36658 heads off towards the meeting spot while mentally tapping into the strongest hive link around. “1988. Calling 1988!” “What’s wrong, 36658?” “I need you to connect me to 57999. It’s too far from me. We have to gather popping red peas soon so that a pony doesn’t have to walk with a peg leg or a cupholder.” “For the love of holes, 36658, if you overdid it with bark again-” “Nope! It’s a mission from the mean medicine lady.” “Fine. There, you’re linked up,” replies 1988, and 36658 feels his mental presence being replaced by a much more familiar one. “57999, you there?” “Yep. What’s up?” asks the other drone in a chipper tone. “Meet me at the place I just pinged you on the local map. We’re off to save a pony and maybe make something special, something amazing, something even better than agonyslayers - tormentannihilators.” “Oh. My. Holes.” *** To 17070’s surprise, the huge, bubbling cauldron in the middle of the logging camp is unattended.  That can’t be right. The drone stands up on its hind legs, propping itself on the edge of the cauldron with its forelegs and looking in. Yep, filled with vegetables. If there’s something I remember, it’s that this needs to be stirred continuously or the… taste will be bad or something. In absence of anything better to do, 17070 pulls up a chair, sits down on it, grabs the big metal ladle, and starts stirring. “Heya!” it hears a mental greeting a short while later. “Hi, 36658! I thought you’d be away with someone,” 17070 greets the other drone approaching it. 36658 shrugs. “There wasn’t anyone around, so I came back. Whatcha doing?” “Stirring! Normally, Miss Ladle does that but she isn’t around so I think she had to run off because… reasons.” “Can I help?” “I don’t think so,” 17070 shakes its head, “There’s only one ladle and I was told I’m not supposed to add ingredients without supervision due to having weird taste buddies.” “Alrighty. I’ll go see what the ponies do at this time of day. I hear something from the containers in the back. Maybe they’ll throw out something interesting.” “I can trade you a cup- helmet thingy. Just don’t walk with it near a fire if you don’t want to end up like me.” “We’ll see about that.” 36658 chuckles and walks off. As it walks around the central office building, Swirling Ladle rushes out of it, striding quickly towards the stirring 17070. “Hello!” the drone waves at her when it notices her approaching. Ladle smiles, pats its head, points at the cauldron, then at the drone, and makes a stirring motion. “Yes, I was just stirring. I didn’t add anything,” says 17070. In response, Ladle nods and rubs her chin before gesturing towards the table with ingredients. “You can go prepare stuff, I will keep stirring,” 17070 hazards a guess. A wrong one judging by Ladle’s shake of the head. This time she beckons the drone to follow her. At the table, she dices a carrot before pushing the cutting board to 17070 and putting the knife in front of it. “Me?” asks the drone. Ladle nods. When the carrot is diced into almost perfectly even pieces, Ladle grins and pushes basically a bucket full of various other produce. “All of that?”  Ladle nods again. No complaints, nothing. As Ladle goes to stir the usual stew, she can’t stop herself from wishing she could take the weird bugpony home. Roughly an hour later, the huge pile of vegetables is all prepared, but to 17070’s surprise, Ladle leaves and returns with a smaller cauldron filled with water. Then she moves the stew one onto a hook further away from the fire pit since the cast iron frame holding it has multiple of those. On the hook directly above, she puts the smaller cauldron. Then she walks over to the table with the assorted vegetables and splits off a small part from each kind. When she’s done, she points at each pile from left to right, then at 17070, and finally at the small cauldron. 17070 ponders it for a moment, scoops the leftmost pile onto the cutting board, waits for a nod of approval, and then hauls it over to the secondary cauldron. One nod later, 17070 gets the idea and begins walking back and forth while Ladle points towards the latrines at the far side of the camp and leaves. The drone finishes its job. “No ladle to stir this,” it mutters. It grabs the big one from the main cauldron and positions itself over the small one. Manipulating a ladle roughly one third of the size of the cauldron proves tricky, and the drone sticks its tongue out in concentration. A glob of drool soon hanging from the tip of its tongue drops directly into the mixture. In front of the drone’s eyes, a black rip in space opens.   “Aaah?!” 17070 jumps backwards, its legs tangling up and landing it on its butt. A dark blue foreleg reaches out, visibly straining against powerful resistance. A second one succeeds in reaching out, and they both pull. A mare’s head sporting a mane looking like the night sky follows. Her teal eyes lock on the drone, and her mouth opens repeatedly. The mare’s clearly desperate expression pushes 17070’s fear away, and the drone stands up. “Sorry, stew pony lady. I can’t hear you. But hang on, I’ll call Miss Ladle!” it runs off towards the latrines. “Miss Ladle, Miss Ladle! There’s a pony in my stew,” it bangs on the door. A moment later, Ladle’s head peeks out of the door cracked open, looks towards the fire pit, and the mare raises an eyebrow. 17070 looks back and sees nothing out of ordinary. “She was there! A big, dark blue mare with a horn and wings, teal eyes,” it points vigorously before looking at Ladle again and sighing, “Aww… you don’t believe me- WAIT! I CAN PROVE IT!” 17070 rushes off. One mad dash later, 17070 ends up in the changeling clearing, staring directly into 1988’s eyes. “1988, 1988, 1988! Miss Ladle doesn’t believe that I saw a pony in my stew. I need you to look into my head and tell her I wasn’t lying.” “Is it relevant to our situation in ANY way?” the infiltrator facehoofs. “Miss Ladle will think I’m a dummy and won’t like me!” “Aaaaand?” “Less love!” “Ugh, fine...” he rolls his eyes. 1988 scours the drone’s most recent memories which, thankfully, isn’t particularly exhausting with it basically shoving those into his face. Then it hits and, even without sound, to an infiltrator Luna’s body language is crystal clear - enough desperation to consider a changeling her… hope. 1988 sits down, his jaw drops, his eyes go wide, and he whispers: “...oh holes...” “Told you so!” 17070 starts nearly vibrating with excitement, clearly stopping itself from running back and forth, “Now will you help me?” 1988 gathers himself from the ground, his mind racing and reaching for any possible explanation about Princess Celestia’s presumed sister calling for help from... wherever. “...and how in all holes would she reach… this guy?” he shakes his head, following 17070. As soon as they reach the center of the camp, 17070 starts calling out: “Miss Ladle! Miss Ladle!” “Where did you run off- oh, hello. Can I help you?” she tilts her head when she sees 1988 accompanying the drone. “17070 called me here to vouch that it saw an alicorn in its stew, no matter how insane it sounds,” says 1988. “Uhhh, okay...” “It really thought it was important… for some reason,” 1988 keeps explaining flatly. It was, but definitely for a completely different reason than the drone thinks. “Aaand you would know that it wasn’t just smoke from the fire or anything?” “Because, and I know you know this, we can communicate telepathically and we can also, sort of, share minds. I don’t think a pony can completely grasp the details but 17070 wasn’t lying, wasn’t mistaken, and didn’t suffer a temporary bout of insanity. That’s all.” “There. Message relayed.” “She doesn’t look satisfied,”  mumbles 17070. “Because she clearly has no idea why this was necessary and, to be honest, neither do I.” “Miss Ladle, I wanted 1988 to tell you I really did see a stew pony so that you didn’t think I was a dummy and stopped liking me...” says 17070 out loud in its unstable tone caused by deafness. “Awwww,” Ladle scoops the drone into a quick hug before putting it on her back, “That never even crossed my mind.” “Never even crossed her mind, idiot. The idiot part is from me, not her.” “Yaaay!” 17070 hugs the back of her neck. “But since I’m here. Do you have any idea why a pony resembling who I suppose was Princess Luna might appear in your… stew, or soup?” he glances at the two cauldrons. Ladle bursts into laughter. “Earth. Pony. Cook,” she shakes her head when she calms down and points to her forehead, “Kinda missing the pointy bit up here to understand magic. You’re the guys who can make explosives from your puke.” “Huh...” that gives 1988 a pause. “And, I mean, you don’t have cutie marks but I sure as hay know that zebras can basically cook magic so who’s to say that this little critter didn’t stumble upon something special?” “Huuuuuh...” “Blew your mind, didn’t I, Miss?” “Not. A. Mare!” “Shoot! Anyway, you might still look good with a bit of silver eyeliner and lipstick. You know, a nice mix of black and white.” 1988’s eye twitches. “I will think about it. In the meantime, adios!” he storms off, grumbling to himself, “First Hacksmith, then this.”