//------------------------------//
// Thirteenth Chapter 
// Story: New Bodies, New Life 
// by Boopy Doopy 
//------------------------------//

Thornton didn’t sleep a wink. He wasn’t tired in the slightest. 
He tried to sleep though. He kept his eyes closed for a few hours, and shifted around on the ground to try to get into a comfortable position, but sleep didn’t find him. He wasn’t restless or excited or worried– well, he was all those things, but no emotion was to the extreme of keeping him awake when he should have slept. He was just… not tired. His mind refused to shut down. It made for a dreadfully boring night.
He read some of the books Denver had brought with her for a little while, after a few hours of being awake, but the craving for a stronger stream of that sweet love that drifted from his family made it too hard to concentrate after a while. His stomach felt like it was twisting into knots, he was so painfully hungry. He scooted closer to his parents and little sister so he could soak up those faint emotions while they slept.
They all had love drifting off of them, but the emotions came strongest from his father. The mare had love mixed with something like contentment and relief floating off of him. There was sad confusion there, too, but about what, Thornton didn’t know. He guessed the situation in general. It was confusing that people still radiated emotions, even while they slept.
His mother had love and worry, his little sister had love and excitement of all things, strangely enough. He didn’t know what she might have to be excited about. Wasn’t she feeling terrible when they first showed up? He remembered his father having to comfort her while they walked through that forest.
His older brother didn’t have love so much as fondness and warmth, mixed in with determination. They all had exhaustion, including Barney, who held affection as wiggled in his sleep next to the kirin. And Thornton himself had… nothing? He didn’t know if he actually felt anything. Of course he had base emotions; he loved his family and was determined to find a way back to Earth and worried about what would happen over the next few weeks if a trip home wasn’t forthcoming. But just like tiredness and exhaustion, he didn’t really feel those things very much, even if he knew they were there.
If hunger was an emotion, that was what he felt.
It was basically all he thought about as he lay on the ground, staring up at the ceiling. What the heck did sharing love mean? It was such a frustratingly vague thing he needed to do, with no instructions on how to accomplish such a goal. His stomach growled as he tried to think about what was meant, and he scooted closer to the trio he lay on the ground next to, positioning himself at his father’s side in particular.
The mare stirred and groggily opened his eyes, blinking at the bug with slight confusion before the recognition came to him. “What are you doing still awake, son?” he asked quietly, gently. It wasn’t difficult to do with his new, more feminine voice.
“I can’t sleep,” Thornton replied. “Well, more like I’m not tired. I’ve been awake all night.” The intensity of the emotions he got from his father increased, a stronger stream of them making its way to the bug. They were soft, like a pillow, his mind interpreting that to mean a complex glob of feelings, rather unlike the hardness of the love he felt last night from his father. These emotions were ever changing, and tried to be pushed down, not that such a thing would stop Thornton from sensing them.
“I’m pretty sure feelings are food for me, too,” he continued. “Like, I’ve been smelling and tasting what everyone’s been feeling since I got here. It’s like I can read all your minds.” He avoided telling his father he moved next to him to gobble the love he gave off. Somehow, the thought embarrassed him more than his lack of clothing.
“Well, then that means you know how much I care about you and your siblings, Thorn,” his father told him, petting his head carefully. The bug took a breath and sank into the ground a bit. He felt his eyes practically roll back in his head at the movement. That hit the spot.
The mare laughed softly, but Thornton couldn’t say he cared about embarrassment right then. He imagined he wouldn’t have looked dissimilar to the way Barney would when he was petted, but man. The sweet honey of love and affection he tasted was delicious. He closed his eyes to do nothing but take it all in.
“Are you doing okay, son?” his father finally asked several minutes later, removing his hoof from Thornton’s head. It instantly got the bug to open his eyes again, some of the hunger he was growing accustomed to returning. It wasn’t all the way back– there was still love dripping from the unicorn– but no more affection immediately created a noticeable hole.
“Yeah, I’m fine, Dad,” he replied without a second thought. “What about you?”
“I’m doing fine,” the unicorn nodded, glancing away. “Just worried about you and your brother and your sister is all. I’m glad you’re all safe.”
Thornton didn’t need to be a changeling to tell that his father was lying, but now that he was, it was clear without a shadow of a doubt. Maybe the bug was just plain psychic. A neat power, unless his family started thinking about things he didn’t want to know about.
His father wasn’t fine, he knew that much. The subtle, less powerful emotions told Thornton that the mare was stressed out and confused, as well as insecure. About being in whatever this world was, about being a girl, about what danger might lay ahead, about what might have happened to him and Reece in the worst case, about what it all meant. What did it all mean? Thornton certainly had no idea, but his father must have. There was understanding there, and relief, but also insecurity. He couldn’t pick out about exactly what though. Emotions only gave him a general idea of his family’s thoughts.
“I’m gonna go back to sleep now, Thorn,” his father said after a very long pause, the changeling realizing he was staring him down with the words. “Try and get some rest, please. Okay, son?” He let out a yawn and wiggled to be a bit more under his mother’s wing.
“I’ll try,” he replied flatly in his nasally, buggish voice. “Goodnight, Dad.”
Thornton rested, like he said he would try to do, but still didn’t sleep. Rest, in this case, meant staring at the ceiling and thinking about nothing while time passed. A few more hours went by, and eventually, the sun rose through a window, moving quickly through the sky like last night. Barney moved to lay down next to him, which offered affection that tasted so good, but no one awoke yet. It wasn’t for a few more hours, around mid morning, when his family finally began to stir again at Twilight Sparkle’s hoof knocking on their door.
“I brought you guys some breakfast,” she announced, carrying a tray of pancakes, eggs, cereal, milk, and juice in her hooves. In her magic were quills and paper, as well as notepads and several books on all different subjects. “I was wondering if I could speak to you all again while you ate.”
“Yes, that’s fine,” Reece said as he stretched and yawned, still asserting his leader status over their family. “We have ten thousand questions for you, too.”
“Well, I’ll certainly try my best to answer all of them,” the winged unicorn smiled. “Maybe I can talk to you first, if you want! What’s your name?”
His older brother took the opportunity to sit down in front of her while the rest of Thornton’s family chose to sit at the table to eat. The changeling could both sense and hear the growling stomachs of his parents and siblings, but knew it was probably nothing compared to his never ending hunger. He decided to try one more time to eat.
“Did you sleep at all, Thorn?” his father asked as the bug carefully eyed a bowl of cereal. Concern didn’t taste as sweet, but was kind of fruity in a way, and very slightly tangy. 
“Nope. I stayed up all night,” he replied as he instead carefully picked up a forkful of scrambled eggs. How could hooves do something like pick up a fork? He didn’t know, but didn’t bother questioning it yet.
“I have a feeling I’m not gonna be able to eat any of this stuff,” he said, his nasally voice portraying frustration. He took a bite anyway, but spit it out a second later. It tasted just as bad as the grass from the forest and the carrots from last night. The cereal and waffles offered weren't much better.
“Why the heck do I have to be the weird alien of the group?” he complained as his stomach growled. “I hate this.” He’d rather have been any of the things the rest of his family had turned into, if only so he didn’t have to feel so painfully hungry. 
“If you share the love in your heart,” the purple horse chimed in cheerfully, “you won’t feel hungry anymore– not permanently anyway. And I think it changes you so that you can eat normal food, too.”
“What does that mean though?” Thornton asked, exasperated. “What does sharing the love in my heart mean? How do I do that?”
“Hmm,” she wondered as she put a hoof to her chin, much like a human would do. “I don’t think I’ve ever asked any of the changelings how they shared their love… maybe when Thorax or one of them is in town, I could have them speak to you? If we haven’t found a way to get you back to Earth by then. Speaking of which! Can I get every creature’s measurements?” The juicy sort of giddy excitement this pony displayed as she flapped her wings made Thornton sure she just wanted that for the sake of it.
She took all of their measurements, and then one by one, went through talking to each family member. She got through talking to his mother and Reece when she sat down with Thornton, who didn’t really have much different to offer. He was seventeen years old and probably no different than anyone else his age. He was asleep when he showed up in this world as an alien bug, and didn’t do anything strange the night before. He didn’t know anything about this world or how he might have popped into existence here, and his stomach constantly gnawed with hunger now that he’d been turned into a bug.
He wished he knew what sharing love meant. Loving his family more than he already did? He didn’t see how that was possible, and was almost offended by the thought.
“I also changed back into a human once,” he told her, “but I don’t know how I did it. Just thinking about being something different doesn’t do anything for me, except that once.”
“I think we have books on changelings that might help you in both of those departments in my library,” she told him. “It’d be amazing to see what you creatures looked like before transforming! It’s such a great opportunity to learn about other worlds and their cultures outside of Equus! No offense.”
“We don’t take any,” Reece said for the group. “Learning about this place and ourselves while we’re here is the best idea anyway, just in case there’s no way to get back home.”
It must have been a thought that no one else considered, because the emotion for the rest of his family– and himself, too– immediately changed to fear and worry. What if there was no way to get home and they were just… stuck here? Would he have to be this starving bug for the rest of his life? He didn’t know what he would do in that case, except go crazy.
Twilight Sparkle didn’t let his family consider that terrible possibility for very long. “I’m sure we’ll find a way back home for you all eventually, no matter how long it takes,” she assured them gently. “Now who do I get to interview next? Howard?”
Thornton hoped ‘eventually’ wouldn’t take too long to come.