PORT HAVEN, NEW EVERFREE – 16:29 Local Time
[Seven hours after Incident]
The clip-clop of Ebony’s hooves echoed through the corridor of the detention block as she trotted to Kiln Bread’s cell, wearing only a saddlebag slung under her right wing and her omni-tool on her left foreleg. Tickles was tucked snugly under her left wing.
A lone Kirin buck in dressed up to his neck in ceramic plate armour stood guard at the door, idly watching something on the screen of his magic-held tablet.
She waved her free wing at him. “Hi, Long Drought!”
“Here to see the core-worlder, eh?” he asked without even looking at Ebony.
“Ya.” She raised her foreleg and swiped a data package from her omni-tool, sending it to his tablet. “Here’s my clearance.”
Drought nodded, then finally turned to look at her. His eyes briskly scanned her nude body from hoof to ear, pausing only on her saddlebag.
“What’s in there?” he asked.
Using her wing, she flipped the cover up from her saddlebag and allowed him to peer at its contents. “Late lunch for me and him. Files are my medical records and an NDA for the detainee.”
“Okay, you’re clear.”
Ebony raised a hoof. “One more thing—can you turn off the anti-magic field? We wanna be more comfortable eating.”
Drought raised an eyebrow. “You want to die fast, is it?”
She snorted. “He’s my old school friend, not a hardened criminal. I’ll be fine.”
“Your skin, not mine.” He tapped a few buttons on the control panel, and the red warning light above the door went out. Then, he beckoned her in as the door slid open. “Shout if anything, and I fry him.”
“Ya, ya,” she said, waving him off as she trotted into the cell.
Inside, she found Kiln lying belly-up on the bed, with his head turned towards the door. He blinked, then yelped when he accidentally jostled his swollen right foreleg in his hasty scramble to sit upright.
Despite the assortment of bruises he’d acquired and the slight odour of a day’s missed shower, Ebony’s heart still fluttered at the sight of his well-proportioned limbs and musculature. He’d shed pretty much all of his foal fat over the years, and she wouldn’t have taken him for a desk jockey if at first glance—he probably exercised. She’d bet that his tan coat and purplish mane would be silky-smooth after a nice shower, and wouldn’t it be great if she could be there with hi—
Tickles interrupted her train of thought with a sharp prick at the back of her mind.
Killjoy. He was never like this in school…
He poked her brain again.
Fine, fine!
She shook her head and gave Kiln a polite smile. “It’s probably obvious, but I think I should ask anyway—how are you feeling?”
Kiln snorted. “Starving, but aside from that, surprisingly okay. What about you?”
“I’m fine. No lasting damage from getting zapped.”
He winced. “Sorry.”
Ebony got a little itch at the back of her mind, which was Tickles’ mental equivalent of a scoff.
She ignored it and began transferring the contents of her saddlebag onto the table—a few small pies wrapped in foil, two cartons of orange juice and some fresh apples. “Well, good thing you’re hungry, otherwise I won’t be able to finish these by myself!”
They sat on opposite sides of the table, whilst Tickles levitated himself onto the edge perpendicular to either of them, with his back to the adjacent wall.
Kiln blinked at the sight of Tickles’ magic, and after meeting her eyes for permission, he ignited his own horn to peel the foil off his pie.
“No fancy spells, by the way,” said Tickles. “We’re being watched. If you try anything…”
“Yeah, I get it. I’m not stupid.”
“Could’ve fooled me.”
Ebony scowled at Tickles. “Could you not? We’re trying to smooth things out, here.”
Kiln gulped down a mouthful of pie and sighed. “I… look, I’m sorry, okay? I didn’t mean to stick my muzzle where it doesn’t belong, but I was worried after all the things I heard from your dad. And I didn’t mean to freak out and accidentally stun you or scramble your ship. And—are you wearing contacts?”
She tilted her head. “What?”
He gestured at his eyes. “Your eyes are green. Like, changeling-green. I am absolutely sure that they used to be amber or golden…”
“My eyes are—oh, crud, I’d forgotten about that.” Ebony groaned and rubbed her forehead. “Yeah, my eyes changed colour when I was around twenty—it’s one of the, uh, side effects of my condition. I had partial heterochromia for about a year before they fully switched over. Frag it, no wonder you panicked when I got all up in your face.”
“Yeah. I’m sorry—”
She shook her head. “No, don’t be. I… wasn’t being fair to you. You touched a sore spot for me, and I kind of forgot that it’s not your fault you were getting sketchy info from my father. I’m sorry I jumped to conclusions.”
“Yeah, me too.”
After pausing for a beat, Ebony turned to Tickles and gave him a pointed look. He remained stubbornly inert for several seconds, but she could already feel him squirming in a corner of her mind under her mental gaze.
Eventually, he shook his stuffed head and looked at Kiln, miming a heavy sigh as he did so. “I’m also sorry for assuming the worst about you. I could sense that you were hiding things from her, but I can’t actually read your mind. I didn’t know that you were being kept in the dark and that you were honestly just trying to help.”
“And I’m sorry for still thinking that you weren’t real.”
“You’ve finally come around, huh?”
“After what happened today? It’s probably the least crazy explanation. How’d you even do all of that stuff in the cockpit?”
“Separate somatic nervous system. Knocking Ebby out doesn’t affect me, and I can remain conscious without oxygen for a long time. I've also learnt to sense my surroundings with magic when I can't rely on Ebby's senses.”
“Cool.” Kiln smiled and held his hoof out to both of them. “Friends?”
Ebony grinned, and the three of them bumped hooves.
They then spent several minutes eating in companionable silence. For a moment, she could close her eyes and imagine that they were all back in school during recess, just spending time together without a care in the world other than homework.
She couldn’t put off the inevitable, though.
Kiln was working up the courage to get back to the matter of her health, judging by the way he kept giving the table a thousand-yard stare whilst he chewed.
“So,” he eventually said, “are you sure that you’re going to be okay? Long term, I mean.”
“I can’t say for sure.” Ebony sighed and showed him the underneath of her hoof, where she had a patch of chitinous fibres growing out of her frog. “I seem to be accumulating changeling characteristics over time. But we have no idea if that’s because I’m slowly turning into a changeling, or if a changeling is growing inside me.”
“The latter is technically true already,” said Tickles.
“Yeah, but we just don’t know how far it’ll go. Will I turn into a full changeling, a hybrid, or a nasty mishmash like a draconequus? Or is Tickles going to become the dominant body whilst I get to live rent-free in his brain?”
Kiln winced. “None of those sound particularly good. Aren’t you guys doing anything about it?
Ebony reached into her saddlebag and slid her scans over to him. “We’re monitoring it. As you can see, they’re more advanced that what my father’s shown you, but I haven’t actually suffered any negative symptoms, yet.”
“But there have been medical advancements since you were last in Equestria.” Kiln brushed aside the photos and shook his head. “Surely there must be some new drugs or therapies which can do something—”
“Doctor Axle is familiar with the latest med tech in the Core Worlds. Most of them would probably stop whatever’s happening to me, but Tickles didn’t react well to the samples we tried, which is expected, since they’re functioning like he’s the cancer. The full course might kill him or turn him into a vegetable. We can’t risk that.”
Kiln glanced at Tickles.
“And please don’t guilt-trip him into making that sacrifice for me,” she growled, a little more harshly than she’d intended.
“It might not be your choice to make when the time comes,” said Tickles, radiating mixture of warm concern and cold pragmatism.
“We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.”
“But…” Kiln touched her hoof and swallowed. “Aren’t you afraid of what might happen if you don’t try anything?”
“Kiln, I was supposed to die before reaching two. I’m only here today because of Tickles.”
“What about getting another artificial heart?”
“Papa’s choice, huh?” She snorted. “Tickles can’t survive in a jar if we cut him out, and that’s if we can even get all of him out safely in once piece. He gets nutrients from all my organs, and more importantly, he’s piggybacked into my nervous system. If we put him in a jar, it’s going to be total sensory deprivation on top of having no organic body to love and be loved by. That’s a nightmare I wouldn’t wish on anypony.”
He sagged in his chair. “I—I get it. But have you checked with the changelings? The Hive may know something we don’t.”
“Doctor Axle is a former Hive scientist,” said Tickles. “Why else do you think we trust him so much?”
“Huh. Guess you really do meet all sorts out here,” Kiln murmured.
“Besides, remember what I said about my transplant being an unsanctioned experiment?”
He nodded.
“The doctor whom my father paid for the procedure was jailed because of some other shady stuff he did later on. But before that happened, he was working for Glimmerlife.” She gave him a thin smile. “You work for a megacorp. Tell me, what’s the likelihood of the suits claiming that Glimmerlife owns a biological miracle like Tickles because he was made using their technology and resources? What’s the likelihood of me owing them every bit I earn for the rest of eternity if they save my life?”
Kiln averted his eyes. “Stars above…”
“Yeah.” Ebony sighed and rubbed her temples. “That’s another reason why we’re not keen on going back. Or talking to my father.”
“Out here, we’ve found people who don’t treat Ebby like she’s insane.” Tickles trotted across the table and draped a wing over her foreleg. “Heck, there are even a few people here who treat me like an actual person—one of them oversaw my exams and granted my flight license. That’s more than we could’ve hoped for anywhere else.”
“We’ve found a family here,” she said.
Kiln remained silent for a long moment, distracting himself with an apple. After downing the last bite, he said, “If there’s a chance of reconnecting with your mom and dad, would you do it? I think they do miss you—your dad seems to, at least. When he’s not talking about your condition. I actually have his contact info.”
“I don’t know. If it were on my own terms, maybe. But not for some time yet. I… a lot of things are still raw for me.” She reached over and hugged Tickles close to her chest. “And I don’t know if Papa will ever see past his obsession with ‘fixing’ me and getting rid of Tickles. Mama might never stop blaming him for starting this in the first place.”
“Can’t you just show them something like what happened on your ship today?”
“If you strapped them down and forced them to shut up and stop walking over me for a minute, maybe.” Her chuckle sounded bitter as she shook her head. “To them, I’m still their little airheaded filly who can’t tell her butt from her brain. I don’t know if a functional horn is going to change that.”
“I’ll help any way I can,” he murmured, “Maybe I could talk to them.”
“Good luck with that.”
“We appreciate it, at any rate,” Ebony added with a rueful grin. “Anyway, as for the legal matters of what happened today…”
Kiln shifted uneasily in his seat. “I’m not staying in jail, am I?”
“So long as you don’t mention anything to the Equestrian embassy, the Director is quite happy to let you out without pressing charges,” said Tickles as he levitated the NDA form and pen out of her saddlebag and into Kiln’s hooves. “The freighter apparently suffered an unfortunate engine failure during re-entry. Normal wear and tear.”
He stared at the form for several seconds. “Just like that?”
“Yep. Everything will be returned to you, and you’re even free to continue your ‘business’ here, or just take a vacation if you feel like it.”
The corners of Kiln’s mouth slowly curled upwards, and Ebony felt her heart rate spike when she realised how much she wanted him to keep doing that. Tickles’ horn sputtered for a moment, and then she felt him giving off waves of mock-disgust mixed with ravenous hunger.
“A vacation sounds nice. Any recommendations? Someplace where I can just relax and catch up with long-lost friends?”
She giggled and traced a wing finger along his foreleg. “You know, I’ve got a couple of ideas…”
Tickles looked down at his plush belly and patted it gingerly. “Great... between the two of you, I'm going to get so fat once this is all over.”
Ebony shared a look with Kiln for a moment, and then they both chuckled at Tickles' expense.
“Think you have enough leave to spend that much time with us?” she asked with a grin.
“Well, captain...” Kiln matched her grin as he signed the NDA. “A friend once told me that it’s less a question of who’s going to let us, and more a question of who’s going to stop us.”