//------------------------------// // Chapter 2 // Story: Persona: Equestria // by scriptshatter //------------------------------// “Mother, why is brother so... pathetic? Why doesn't he join us in ruling the hive?” “Because, my darling, he... he's different. He's not like you or me, or any other changeling in this hive, in fact. He's... adopted.” “Mother, you really did something as nice as adopting a hopeless excuse for a changeling as brother?” “Mmmm... Yet, I suppose I did. Though, I'm sure the 'adoption agency' will miss him dearly~” “Their punishment, for going against the hive, and their fellow subjects, is not just banishment, but death!” I can’t believe what I just heard! Not just banishment, b-but death?? Why?? All he did was v-vent to me about valid frustrations in the hive! I experience a hefty force on me, as the changelings of the hive pile on top of me, nearly completely suffocating me of any air. I can’t breathe- I can’t focus. I’m silently hoping Pharynx comes to save us, because if he doesn’t then there's no hope for me. I feel a blast of energy my way as the changelings that once piled on top of me get flung off by a spell- a spell made of red magic. It’s Spiracle! I couldn’t believe it, he saved me! They must not have gotten to him yet. He’s running over to me, and now… hugging me? He’s hugged me before, but this seems a little out of character for him. Unless he has a plan! Which he might! A red and white flash blinds my vision as the world changes around me. When I open my eyes again, I find a beautiful forest full of wonderful colors I never thought I’d see. The sounds of birds surround me as the sight of the outside fills every corner of my vision. The air is crisp and fresh, and the tree trunks large and healthy. Leaves with colors from brown, to yellow, to even orange and red fall from trees around me. For once in my life, I feel what it’s like to be free. Looking to my side my eyes widen with worry. Spiracle is laying beside me, tears collecting in his eyes, and his horn smoking. He keeps trying to get up- and I’m worried he’ll hurt himself in this state, so I hug him and tell him to calm down. That seems to help. His breaths turn long and deep instead of quick and shallow. With some effort, I hoist him onto my back, his weight pressing down. I was always the physically stronger of the two. Even if I don’t fight, strength is still needed to carry heavy buckets filled with compost or mushrooms. I start walking after hoisting him onto my back. I pick a direction and start trotting, the sound of the leaves causing a small smile to appear on my lips. After trotting for about what I think was about five minutes, I reach the ocean. The calmness of the waves crashing against each other fill my ears, as I take a moment to think. I don’t know where we ended up, but it’s clear we’ve teleported pretty far. I can’t hear the other changelings anymore, so I’ve probably been severed from the hivemind. Which… is more of a good thing than a bad. I’m without a place to stay, and I’m carrying my best friend on my back. I hope the quee… Chrysalis doesn’t send a patrol after us. I don’t think she would… but there's always the chance. I can’t help but wonder what will happen next. I look at my back, and see my best friend. Or, as he would put it, my pseudo little brother. I don’t know what pseudo means. Spiracle always said it just meant that while he considered me a brother, we weren't related. He insisted on it being a good thing, and I believed him, and still do to this day. It has to be if he went out of his way to save me like he did. Spiracle was always strange in the best of ways. He would try and protect me from the other changelings like Pharynx did, even if he wasn’t nearly as strong. He always held up a sort of justice, no matter the situation, even if it meant getting beat up or bullied. I look up to him in that way. He never scared the other changelings off, instead he just stood to get beat up instead of me. I often found myself attempting to care for the wounds he suffered through his own personal need to protect me. I never quite understood why he wanted to protect me so much. It wasn’t because I needed protection. Pharynx was always willing to help, but Spiracle always insisted that he didn’t need any. Then there were the talks that got us in this trouble in the first place. He would tell me what he thought of Chrysalis, every bit of it, and when I asked him why he didn’t do anything, he’d say he couldn’t. Which, to me, is surprising considering his wanting to protect me, even at the cost of himself. And then there's the mystery of his eyes. It could be because he’s Chrysalis’s son… but I doubt that. Tibia has normal eyes, for a queen anyway. It’s not something I ever really paid all that much thought to. Still… I can’t help but think now that I have time. He was, and is the most unique changeling anyling’s ever seen. He’s not like me, a changeling who’s the complete opposite of what we normally are, seeing as how… gruesome his threats could be at times. But he clearly has a strong sense of justice. He wants those who he sees as innocent or good to be protected, and those who are corrupt or evil to be… I’d rather not finish that sentence. I shake my head and clear my thoughts as I get up, and start to walk opposite of the ocean, Spiracle softly breathing as I carry him. I feel like I should be sad but… I’m not. I just lost the only place I could stay, and yet… I’m happy. That’s not to say I’m not worried about the future, I definitely am. I need to find a place where we can stay, and I need to find drinkable water. Love is… a whole different issue. I don’t want to drain any creatures of it, because that just feels… wrong to me. But for now, I’m just going to enjoy the scenery. I hope Spiracle wakes up soon… or at least tomorrow. If he teleported us this far, though… it might take him a while to wake up. A changeling casting a spell like that is unheard of, I mean, not even Chrysalis can normally cast teleportation spells, and she’s supposed to have the most powerful magic. It makes me wonder what else Spiracle is capable of. Even if he does have all that power, though, I’m not sure if he’s ready for it. He would often spend his nights after a hard day of work tired, sneaking into my room to cry to me. I would try to comfort him the best I could, but I could only do so much for him. Even so, I think just the act of crying to me alone helped him enough. He never talked about those nights. I don’t think he ever wanted to remember them. Pharynx never liked Spiracle much, often stating how he believed he faked his own self just to make me like him more. I can’t help but think about how he considered himself. He often called himself a terrible person for things he apparently did in some distant past. He said that he had done horrendous things that apparently make him nothing more than a ruthless assassin. I still think about the things he said to me during those times. The only thing I think I can say for certain about Spiracle, though, is that he’s the best friend I could’ve asked for. Sure, he’s a bit hot headed at times, and he’s definitely a little over confident, but beneath it all is a genuinely good changeling. One who cares about his friends more than anything in the world. Even if it’s just the one. I’m sad that he’s only ever had me, though. As I said, he and pharynx didn’t get along too well. They didn’t hate each other, I know that, but they definitely disagreed. I look back at him and smile. He seems to be resting soundly, and his breaths are deep, so I think he’s fine. I can’t be sure when he’ll wake up, though, and that does worry me. But I have to keep moving. I don’t know when the next stream will be, or the next town, or when I’ll have to feed… and that scares me. I’m tired. I’ve been traveling for more than a day now. The earth is crusty, and I’ve long since left the shade of the forest. The dry land I walk on does my tired hooves no favors, and I can feel my eyelids drooping. My stomach gurgles with a need for love, but I do not know where to get any. I did manage to get some water, and even managed to get Spiracle to awaken for a moment to drink some himself, though he fell back asleep shortly after. I’m happy he drank something, though carrying him is tiring. The heat of the sun beats down on me, and my mouth feels dry, having drunk that water quite a while ago. Not only is this heat unbearable, I feel sick, so much so that I think I’d… no, even this is better than the hive. I just wish Pharynx was here. I wish Spiracle would wake up. That’d make this so, so much easier. But alas, I can’t rush his healing process, no matter how much I want to for the sake of myself. A large gust of wind hits me, and I’m knocked to the ground due to my already weakened limbs. I look up, and see a very, VERY large rock-bird creature. As I look, tears start to form in my eyes. I was already suffering from getting nearly killed, kicked out of the hive, I’m starving, thirsty, weak, and I just can’t take it anymore. And so I cry. The large bird softens and lets out a small coo, picking me up and quickly bringing me to what I can only assume is its nest. It takes me a while to stop crying, all while the bird is keeping me and Spiracle in its wing. Once I do stop, the bird looks at me expectantly. “W-what? W-why’d you t-take us h-here?” I sniffle, the bird wiping my tears away with one of its wings, and looking at me, as if to ask why I was sad. “I- um… I-I’d appreciate it if you’d j-just let us g-go…” I stuttered out, still sniffling. The bird gave me a stern look, before nudging me with its wing. “Sniff P-please… we don’t have a home… we lost the only place where we could l-live… we’re wanted d-dead b-by our own kind…” The bird's expression softened, and it now wore an almost sorry, yet exasperated look. It drags over a bowl-like object filled with what looks like water, and nudges it towards me. “I-is this for u-us?” The bird nodded, and pushed it further towards me and Spiracle. I set Spiracle down, and start drinking, and I drink about half before stopping. “I’m gonna save the rest for my friend. He had some to drink earlier, but that was a while ago.” The bird wraps its wings around us once more, before picking Spiracle up and setting him down on some straw bedding within the nest. It picks me up soon after, and sets me next to him. It doesn’t take me long to fall asleep as the sun sets. I awaken with a start, Spiracle now missing beside me. “Spiracle!? W-where are you??” I call out in a panic, only to find him sitting near the edge of the nest, looking despondently out into the night. “I’m… over here,” He says, lacking the usual sharpness his voice has. I drowsily get up and trot on over, sitting beside him. “Thorax, do you remember when we first met?” Spiracle questions me, his voice quivering slightly. “Yea, you protected me from your sister. Why?” I answer the question without much thought, it’s hard to forget the moment a princess harassed you for seemingly no reason. “No- no, before that.” I tilt my head and raise an eyebrow. Straining my mind for the memories, I come up with them. “You mean when I came up and asked if you wanted to be friends?” That was a little harder to remember. It was an event that got dwarfed by the first time Spiracle defended me. Still, that doesn’t change how important it was. I was glad I could still remember it. “Yes. I just… I want to say thanks. Thank you for being my friend, Thorax, I-” Spiracle starts to tear up, giving slight sniffles as he speaks. “I- I just don’t know what I would’ve done w-without you to lean on. I might’ve ended up a monster. I don’t know.” I pause for a moment, taking in what he said. I eventually settled on “Well… I’m glad you didn’t. Cause then I’d be missing a pretty awesome friend., or, as you put it, pseudo brother.” I put my arm around him and smile, looking off into the stars as he leans his head against my shoulder. “Where… are we, anyway?” Spiracle asks, lifting his head up and wiping away the tears that were left on his chitin, and cleaning himself up. “Huh? Oh, we’re in the nest of that nice bird over there! She offered us water and a place to stay for the night… at least that’s what I’ve gathered. I’m pretty sure she can understand us…” He looks at me inquisitively, tilting his head. “That’s all well and good, but how can you be sure this bird will fly us down?” He looks at me with a hint of worry, the normal sharps in his voice slowly returning. “I’m sure it’ll let us down if we’re nice to it. It… she doesn't seem unreasonable,” I say to him, giving Spiracle a bright smile. “Now, how about we go back to sleep and we can talk to her in the morning?” Spiracle rolled his eyes at that, looking at me with an exasperated look and scoffing. “Thorax, I’ve just slept for who knows how long, I’m not tired.” I could tell he was lying. Not only were there bags under his eyes, but I can only assume that him teleporting, or at least that’s what I think he did, took more out of him than he’d like to admit. “Spiracle, you need sleep,” I pestered. Even if Spiracle didn’t want to, he needed to sleep. “No, I don’t Thorax, I’m fine,” He still refused, so I jokingly stuck up my chest. “Pseudo Little Brother, I demand that you go to sleep right now!” Spiracle looks dumbfounded for a moment, before he lets out a chuckle, and hollers out in laughter. I think the bird’s going to wake up, but looking back it’s still softly asleep. So I decide to join him in laughing, enjoying myself. As we calm down from laughing, we look at each other, and with a smile, Spiracle says “Fine then, Pseudo Big Brother, I will. But only if you sleep with me. I always had to sleep with Tibia, and I never got a good night's sleep because of it. So, sleeping with someling who’s not such a jerk would be a nice experience.” I could understand why he felt that way. Even if I did have Pharynx as a roommate, he still occasionally kicked me in his sleep. Which was uncomfortable. And so, with that last thought we head off to the straw bed to sleep stacked on top of each other. It’s normal for changelings to do that, it’s how we kept ourselves warm in the hive. I closed my eyes with Spiracle, and drifted off into a pleasant sleep, comfortable with my Pseudo little brother on top of me. I wake up, and looking around I see that Spiracle has already woken up, and is talking with the bird. The two seem to be getting along, which causes me to smile. I trot over to them in order to hear what they’re talking about, and to see if I can talk with the bird about getting us off this nest and to and to a place we can properly live and explore. I’m able to pick up on the conversation as I get nearer, and I’m a little shocked at what I hear, considering what I know of Spiracles' personality. “I acknowledge all that you’ve done for us, and I’m very grateful. But we simply must be going. We cannot afford to live here, as our minds would wander too far out of the nest, and hunger for more information, as I do now. It would be nice if you could put us someplace of intrigue, I would most enjoy that. I expect that you’ve heard our story, and, well, with never having been out of the hive, I only received warped views of ponies and their culture. I would much rather prefer to do some research myself, and come to my own conclusions based on that.” I was shocked by what Spiracle had said. I blinked a few times before walking up, and adding myself to the conversation” “Uh- yawn yea… Yea! I-I agree with what he said. He’s definitely got the r-right idea.” Spiracle chuckled a little, before adding on to what I said in a way that shocked me. “I apologize for my brother's accidental rudeness. He’s just woken up, and still hasn’t had the time to ‘start up’, so to speak.” I was left a little confused at his shift in personality compared to what I’m used to. Normally he was either soft, or so blunt and hard headed that you would have to nearly kill him to change his mind. But here he was… I’m not sure how to describe it. I guess how I assumed actual ponies acted? In that case, he probably would’ve made a good scout if SHE wasn’t so bad a ruler that he felt the need to vent it off to me. Not that either of us enjoy draining love from other creatures. Spiracle never liked the idea of draining love, like me. He said it prevented them from being themselves by sapping their strength. Which he does not like, since to him, it gets rid of their freedom by association. Or at least that’s what he says. Though, he should be able to blend into pony society just fine. Shortly after the talk Spiracle has with the bird, she lets down one of her wings for us to climb on to. Spiracle trots on up, and I follow shortly after. Her feathers are soft, and feel nice underneath my chitin, which for almost my entire life have been placed on hard, uncomfortable surfaces. The only thing I might like more are the leaves of the forest, but I’m sure I’ll get to experience that again some other time. Soon, we’re airborne, and she flys much faster than either of us do due to her larger wings. The cool breeze feels nice on my chitin, and I can tell from looking beside me that Spiracle is enjoying himself. I look ahead and join him in enjoying the air that surrounds us. I carefully trot over and sit next to him, and we both enjoy the feeling of the wind together. “Good job with talking to the bird, Spiracle! I wasn’t entirely sure what I was going to say to her this morning in order to get us down, so thanks for taking that off my back. I had no idea you could even smooth talk like that!” He chuckled a little in response to that, giving a soft smile. “Just a little something I had to pick up in my past life. I just never had a reason to create the notion that I was so polite. Keeping up the pleasant detective appearance in my past life for so long makes it a little hard to just forget.” I have never heard of Spiracle being a sort of pleasant detective. He had told me about his past life a couple times, mostly about how he had apparently fooled many people, and done some horrible things. It kinda confused me though, since he was always so vague about everything. Still, him being a detective in his past life was the most solid piece of information I had about his past life. “Why didn’t you tell me you were a detective before now? You were always so eager to tell me how much of a bad person you were, why didn’t you ever tell me you did good?” I quarry, tilting my head. “Because the only mysteries I solved were ones I caused. I wasn’t really a detective, I was a fake. And I fooled so many people on that alone, I’ve at least told you that part. When put that way, I suppose it makes sense this world made me a creature of deception and not one of harmony. But if I wasn’t a changeling I wouldn’t have met you, so there’s a nice silver lining to this,” A smile spread across his face as he closed his eyes, breathing deeply. I don’t know what answer I expected from that question, but what I got makes sense. I put a hoof around him, and he leans his head on my shoulder again. We relax as the bird takes us to our destination, relaxing in the cool air. After only a few hours, The bird lands inside what looks to be an abandoned castle. She lets down her wing, and me and Spiracle climb off shortly after. He says his thanks to her, and after only a moment, she’s gone, flying off into the sky. Love isn’t a problem at the moment, thanks to that encounter, so on top of being decently hydrated, we’re also fed, so that buys us more time. Now we can find a town to stay in by disguising ourselves. Once the bird is out of sight, Spiracle lets out a relaxed breath and looks at me, smiling. “Now, let's go and do some research, shall we? I’d like to learn about how the ponies of this world truly operate, instead of gaining information from the unreliable,” He says, walking towards what looks to be a library. I quickly follow in an attempt to add to the conversation. “Shouldn’t we look for a town first so that we can have a place to stay?” I’m worried about finding more love to sustain the two of us, and about Spiracle. He might get a big head and do something stupid with how proud he seemed when it came to talking to the bird. I could easily see him going to a pony undisguised and trying to speak to them using what charisma he displayed, only for the pony to run off, get the guard, and have him arrested… or even worse, killed! Though, I suppose in that case him doing research would do more good, then the harm that waiting here would. So to the library it is. “There may be a town near, after all, even if it’s abandoned there’s a building here.” He had a point in that respect, but if that’s true I couldn’t help but wonder what would happen if a pony happened to come near here and see us undisguised… Inside the library, Spiracle found a few books to read. He seemed to struggle at first, it had been awhile since he had read anything besides some of the lackluster signs in the hive. Still, it didn’t take him long for him to garner the appearance of someling who was proficient in literature, even if I had only seen him read a handful of times. I, myself, simply browse the spines of the books, hoping something interesting would pop out at me. KA-CHUNK “Spiracle? What was that?” I yelled across the long hall of books. “A secret passageway of sorts! You should get over here!” My hooves clack against the hard floor as I trot over to my pseudo brother. I arrive, and look in his direction to find a large corridor with walls covered in glowing, crystal like sky blue vines. “I can hear a voice down there, Thorax… It’s… calling for me…” I look at Spiracle and raise an eyebrow. “Calling for you? Are you sure you wanna go down there? It seems awfully dangerous…” I say, Spiracle already taking a few steps down. I let out a shaky sigh and wearily follow, my hooves shaking slightly from fear. The ground beneath my hooves was worn and broken, buts of plant life coming up through the cracks. The walls, covered in vines, had little in terms of stone, the majority of it being worn away by the strange plant life that invaded it. I caught up with Spiracle, finding him staring at a rather strange book. It was labeled “Journal of the Everfree Dissonance,” and it was written by, presumably a pony, named “Starswirl the Bearded”. The cover had a picture of two trees bent opposite sides, with a single, large eyeball with a star for a pupil staring through the middle of them. Spiracle, for whatever reason, what slack jawed at the eye in particular. “What’s up? Are you alright?” I asked him, nudging him a little. “That’s… i-impossible…” Is all Spiracle said. My head tilts in confusion as I look at him in confusion. “What’s impossible?” I ask, nudging him. He looks at me with a look that can only be explained as dread. “T-the metaverse, it’s here. The thing… the t-thing that ruined my life before, the thing that I regret, the… the… the…” He’s starting to hyperventilate, tears rolling down his cheeks as he screams. “I DON’T WANNA DO THAT SHIT ANYMORE. I CAN’T- I DON’T WANNA BE SOME TOOL FOR FATE TO ABUSE. I’M NOT ANYONE’S MINION, I’M NOT A SERVANT, I’M NOT-” I interrupt him by hugging him before he can say anything else. I cry into his shoulder, saying “Spiracle, I… I don’t know what happened in your past, and I-I don’t ever need to know. But I do want you to know that no creature will force you to do anything. Not while I’m around. I may not be the strongest… or the most confident, or the most assertive, but you’re my little brother, even if it’s not by blood. And that means protecting you. I may not have done a very good job in the past but… I still have the future.” Spiracle sniffles at that as he still tries to choke back tears, saying “I-I’m scared… I’m scared I’ll be forced to kill, that I-I’ll become someone I don’t want to become… I’m scared of being manipulated… I’m scared…” I rub the back of his head, and say “I know, I know. And that’s okay. But just know I’ll be here if you’re ever worried about anything like that happening to you, and I’ll do the best I can to help.” He sniffs, the last of his tears drying up before he responds with a squeaky “okay,” before pulling away from the hug. Wiping away my own tears and sniffling a few more times, we look back at the book. Spiracle takes it in his magic, and goes to hiss at the contents before equipping a look of confusion, and shaking his head in minor shock. “What… the hell?” He said, squinting at the book. I looked over next to him. It seemed to be an average book on flora and fauna, nothing out of the ordinary. Which makes the fact it was hidden away kinda weird… “I’m going to guess you don’t have a fear of plants and you were scared of something else you were expecting to find in the book? Why’d you open the book up to hiss at it anyway? Why not just hiss at the cover?” Spiracle snapped himself out of his own trance before saying “Oh! Uhh… Well I thought it would open up to a… monster of sorts, since I thought this was gonna be a book on something about… well, I thought it was gonna be a book on a kind of alternate world. It’s hard to explain. I guess it could still be? The inclusion of plants is confusing though… Come to think of it, how would anyone even find out about this world? I know ponies have magic and everything, but still…” I take the book in my own magic and close it, before setting it on my back. “It’s getting rather late, Spiracle. We can read the book tomorrow, but for now we should probably get to bed. I think I saw a bedroom when we were flying in. With actual beds!” Spiracle perked up at that “Really? Screw the book, let's go! This’ll be the best damn sleep of our lives!” He used a forbidden word again. He doesn’t do that a lot, but he should completely weed it out if we’re going to be integrating into pony society. Saying words like that is taboo even for changelings, I can only imagine what it’s like for ponies. I trot after Spiracles galloping as he quickly finds the bedroom, two old beds sitting next to each other, Spiracle already laying on one. “I take it you’ll go to bed without any fighting like last night?” I ask. Based on his expression, I could tell Spiracles normal slyness was already returning, which is a good sign. “Of course. A prince needs his beauty sleep, after all.” He said slyly. I let out a short chuckle. “Didn’t you hate being a prince there?” I asked him. “I hated being a prince of queen tyrants subservient drone program, yes. Not that they even considered me one. But now I’m the prince of something greater. Prince Spiracles powerful and free two changeling duo. Much better than being the prince to queen tyrant.” I couldn’t help but burst into laughter at my brother's antics, before getting into the bed next to his, setting the book on the nightstand beside it as I did. “Ha… hoo… Good night, Spiracle,” I said as I started to close my eyes. “Good night, Thorax,” He said in a sleepy, but happy tone, as we both fell asleep.