//------------------------------// // Part II // Story: My Little Chryssie // by Scarheart //------------------------------// I awake the next morning to a pair of green harlequin eyes looking at my face, blinking wide and nuzzling with an urgent little snout. I groan, roll on my side as Chrysalis half crawls, half climbs over my shoulder and side, grunting and protesting with little snorts. I peer at the clock. It's reading five after five in the morning. I was being woken up on a Sunday after less than five hours of sleep. By a cartoon character. She bats my nose and chin with a hoof, making a little shriek with her voice. Little whimpers tell me I'd better get up and see what she wants. "Oh, God you are real!" I groan, realizing last night was not a dream. There was a My Little Pony character on my bed and she was doing... I'm staring at her now, watching the odd little dance she's doing. Almost as if... It became a bit of a race when she started trickling and I pick her up, saying, "Please don't, no! Hold it! Hold it!" while the changeling filly is doing her best to hold her urine in. After a quick lesson in showing her how to use the facilities and giving her an impromptu bath after, I set a squeaky clean changeling down on the floor and set to the much needed task of cleaning up. Chrysalis wore a downcast expression. She must have felt awful. That's one way to convince someone you're not a dream. Pee on everything. Thirty minutes later, I've got a load of laundry in the washing machine and scrubbing the last of the stains up from the carpeting while a shame-faced princess watches me from the other side of the hallway. She's looking absolutely pitiful, her ears drooping and she's sniffling, making little circles on the hardwood floor with a holey hoof. Chrysalis had not moved at all since I started cleaning her mishap. "It was an accident," I tell her with a smile, trying to reassure her. She sniffles again, looking away. I finish cleaning and she follows me, making little sounds. I don't think she can talk, but Chrysalis is vocal little princess. As I'm putting the cleaning supplies away in the kitchen, she's nuzzling the back of my leg, still trying to apologize. Or at least I think she is. Maybe she just wants attention? "What?" I ask her, arching both eyebrows. She's humming at me, her little horn glowing green, her eyes insistent and pleading. Picking her up, I figure out she's wanting attention, or at least wanting to be picked up. It makes her happy and she nuzzles my face. "Sowwy," she says, trembling. It's her own voice, but oddly enough it wasn't disjointed. Maybe that develops as she gets older. Right now, it's just a little squeaky voice. "That's okay," I say to her, surprised she can do something else other than mimic me and make little sounds. "You're not in trouble, Chrysalis. You're a good girl." I had no idea changelings were affectionate. This throws me off as this is in stark contrast to the love hungry - no, maybe this is right after all. Taking an approach to changelings was going to have to require an open mind and a lot of patience. I'm sure she doesn't know how to be a changeling other than what her instincts tell her. One episode with changelings in it was not going to be like watching three seasons of the Mane Six and knowing the characteristics of each mare. No, this was uncharted territory. Was this version of Chrysalis going to grow up and try and conquer Chicago? Of course, that was utterly ridiculous as I sat at the kitchen table with this little dark filly on my knee and playing with her. It's almost six in the morning now and I ask her if she's hungry. Idly I wonder if she's feeding off my emotions right now. Maybe that's why she was so affectionate, trying to get me to lavish her with an emotional feast of some sort. How exactly did that work? According to the show, it weakened the hell out of Shining Armor, but that was magic. How about physically? Mentally? Did it drain on a mental capacity? Was I going to feel mentally fatigued? Or was it both mentally and physically? I set her on the table, leaning on my elbows while she nuzzles me, giggles and starts pressing the folds of my skin in different ways with her hooves, getting me to make funny faces. This amuses her greatly, Chrysalis sitting there on her rump, her little mouth open with laughter. Her little shrieks of joy are infectious and soon I'm giggling right along with her. "We're going to learn a lot from each other," I tell her. She's so adorable! "Learn from each other," she agrees - though she's imitating me. I wonder if that's the first thing changelings learn before shape-shifting. Can they do more than just ponies? Can they do humans? How would I be able to teach her? How am I going to teach her magic, for that matter? Magic doesn't exist on Earth, save for the tricks magicians do for their performances. But that's smoke and mirrors, sleight of hand, the hand being quicker than the eye and all that jazz. Right now, this little princess honking my nose was the most powerful magic user on the planet, unless some other sap somewhere had a Celestia or a Luna filly on their doorstep right now. I'm cringing at the thought of such a thing happening and there being a meeting. Stuff like that makes me think of things blowing up; trees, houses, small cities, whole mountain ranges. How powerful were they, exactly? I could easily picture a crater where Mt. Everest once was with some very confused Sherpas staring where their money maker once was. Okay, so I have a twisted sense of humor. I don't know the limits of this filly who is now starting to get hungry. All I know is she is now my responsibility. Yay me. Again, I'm thinking of the guy who wrote the original story. The more I thought about it, the more I was beginning to think - and this might be the crazy talk in me - Equestrian futures were somehow finding their way into the Earth past. Of course, that was just ridiculous. But I had evidence right in front of me. The last I saw of Chrysalis in the show was at the end of Season Two, with her and her invading army doing their best Team Rocket impersonation. I prepare breakfast as I ponder this, Chrysalis watching me curiously. I don't let her on the counter, but I do pull a chair near me so she can sit on it and watch what I'm doing. I'm showing her how to make pancakes, using the recipe my grandma copied from a Betty Crocker cookbook fifty years ago and for years claimed as her own. She's pretty intelligent and her eyes don't miss a thing I do. I even slow down and make the batter slowly, pointing out with my finger on the index card with the recipe written on it and telling her how to mix everything in. She is, of course too young and too little to actually help, but it's pretty fun to watch her learn. The stove top is electric and Chrysalis feels the heat from the coils beneath the skillet I have set on it. "Don't touch," I tell her, pulling her away when she gets too close. "It's hot and you'll get burnt." She lays her ears back and pouts a little, even going so far as to stamp a little hind foot imperiously. "Hot?" she asks me, using her own voice. Her head is tilted to one side. "Very," I tell her with a nod. I begin to pour the first set of hotcakes. We settle down for breakfast. Chrysalis has a sweet tooth as she discovers the power of maple syrup. I let her try a dab on her tongue as she looks at the bottle suspiciously when I set it on the table. Her eyes literally glow and I'm laughing as she's trying to pour it on her pancakes after I show her how to do it with mine, her hooves not exactly grasping the plastic successfully as she is small. She gets a lot on everything else, but manages to get a little of the syrup on her food. I have to help her, realizing I'm the one that's going to have to clean up the mess. The little filly glares at me for laughing at her, sticking out her lower lip as she pouts. There's maple syrup on her face, in her hair, sticking to her hooves. I cut up her pancakes for her and we eat. I can't help but giggle at her. At least she's strong enough in magic to lift her cut up breakfast to her mouth. That's actually pretty cool to watch. She gets back at me for laughing at her when I'm suddenly being pelted by bite-sized hotcakes loaded with syrup. The smug little look on her face was worth it. My little princess so far is showing me she's got spunk with plenty to spare. I clean her up with a bath in the kitchen sink, do the dishes, clean up the mess on the table and the stove while she sits and watches the television. Once the kitchen is spotless an hour later, I check on her and find she's watching the boob tube with her snout nearly pressing up against the screen. I pull her back to a more reasonable distance and tell her to stay put at the foot of the couch. Chrysalis sighs and watches me go, but I could have sworn her expression was a tad too innocent and she was a bit too compliant. Sure enough, she's planted with her face inches from the television and watching Shrek tell Donkey to leave him alone. The changeling is giggling ceaselessly, her little mane bouncing as she tries to touch the characters with her hooves. "Chryssie," I warn her, half serious. She's scooting on her rump away from the TV, staring up at me, eyes wide as she whimpers, being caught being where she was told not to be. I don't yell at her. She's too adorable to be mad at. It's like having one of the Cutie Mark Crusaders hanging around your house, except this one happens to be a changeling. And this changeling will eventually grow up to be a queen. How big would she get, anyway? I spend that Sunday discovering Chrysalis is essentially a very intelligent toddler with a curiosity for everything. Giving her the grand tour is very interesting as she pokes her head everywhere, sniffing and letting me know when she finds something interesting. It doesn't take long to show her the first floor as she's already fairly familiar with it. I just have to constantly remind her to not play with the china in the dining room. Almost everything in there had belonged to my grandmother; the fine china, the silverware (needing to be polished) and other family heirlooms that had been exclusively hers until she passed two years ago. She had outlived grandpa five years, never going upstairs as she simply grew too old and frail to attempt the stairs. She had her neat little figurines and her collection of tea spoons from around the world. So, I'm telling the little princess all about my grandparents. I was way closer to them than my actual parents. They divorced when I was six and I spent the next eleven years bouncing between them from state to state as both of them had jobs requiring them to move frequently. As a result, I saw a lot of the country and developed a personal love for taking trips. There was always something new to see over the next hill. In between those trips, I would spend the summers of my childhood here, in this house. The house sat on a little over twenty acres of land. There used to be more, a few hundred acres of farmland, but it was sold off after Grandma died and divvied up among her six kids, including my mom. I got the house in the will and everything in it. It was the most bittersweet gift I had ever gotten. I'm telling this changeling child my life story. There's a beer in my hand, somehow transitioning from the fridge to my fist. The one-sided conversation continues. I'm speaking slowly, as if it's important to me Chrysalis understands what I'm saying. It doesn't seem to matter if she fully understands my words or their meanings, but I talk anyway. I don't talk to many people as it is, but I'm compelled to talk to a cartoon character. I need to stop referring to her as one. She's a bright, intelligent little foal and she's listening to me. By now, we're sitting outside on the porch swing, just watching the time go by, the conversation and the birds singing outside luring me to go out the front door. Chrysalis follows closely. It's a lazy Sunday and she's on my lap, just listening to more of my rambling at first before she starts dozing. Then I feel her head lay down on my lap and she's asleep. As much as she's been listening to me, I've been studying her, watching her movements. Her wings, for one thing are restless. They buzz constantly. I'm learning to associate them with her moods, or at least it's a beginning. I can tell when she's excited and trying to hide it, for one thing. She enjoys the concept of family, I think. She's still pining for affection, but I get the feeling she's already feeding off me me. I'm feeling a little tired. Crap, do I love her already? Or is it something else? No, too soon for love. Sympathy? Concern? Pity? She's tapping at my half empty beer can in my right hand, interrupting her nap. Chrysalis seems to be a light sleeper. Curious as to what I'm holding, she follows her little expanding and contracting nostrils to the rim of the can until they're less than a half an inch away. She recoils in disgust, her head swiveling up as if to ask me, How can you drink that? "It's an acquired taste," I tell her, taking a sip. Chrysalis makes a sour face, sticking her tongue out and going, "Bleh, bleh!" I realize this might become a problem. I'm more worried because I don't know if I can stop drinking. I've been in a fluctuating state of inebriation every day for over a year now, yet this little filly is giving me pause to reconsider her first full day with me. Of course, there are a lot of circumstances behind her and other ponies with their interactions with humans adding weight. It's striking me right now that like it or not, I'm a father again. "I'll work on it," I promise her, making a point to set the remaining beer aside. This mollifies her and I wonder if she even know what a drunk was. Was this my second chance at being a dad? Chrysalis is watching the world from the porch swing, her eyes and ears following the sights and sounds catching her fancy. She watches a pickup truck barrel down the dirt road going by the driveway. As she does so, she's trying to blend herself into my side, frightened by the red paint and sunlight glinting off glass and metal. With a squeak, Chrysalis is trembling, her hoof pawing at my chest. I pull her from my side and hold her to my chest in a safe and comforting embrace. "It's just a truck," I said, almost adding a comment that it's an evil Chevy out hunting for little changeling princesses to devour. It was probably better I didn't as I have this scared little filly wanting to feel safe from something inanimate. It's hard for me to see her as a powerful monarch who might grow as tall as I am and capable of shooting green magic bolts from her horn. Would she get that tall? Would she stay cute like this or turn into something monstrous? Did I really want to find out? "I'll protect you, Chryssie," I say to her as I feel her neck wrap around mine, her snout touching the back of my neck. "Nobody will hurt you while I'm around. I promise." I've got to teach her about this world, teach her what can and can't hurt her. Unfortunately, I can only think of a lot of things under the list of 'can hurt'. It's a very long list. Still, she's got a lot going to protect herself, I'm thinking as she settles down and smiles at me, having accepted my promise as the honest truth. Her most important ability for keeping her out of trouble - and again, I have no idea how this will come to pass - will be her shape-shifting ability. "I wonder what you can change into," I ask her in idle curiosity. Was it just other ponies? I'm brushing that aside as I think she will be able to manipulate her form in other ways. Right now, she's too young for a lot of things. But she does have some use of her magic, as evident from her dining skills earlier at breakfast. The sun is out, so I decide to take her to the backyard and let her run around on the grass. It's still a little wet outside, but the sod and thickness of the lawn should keep her from getting muddy. Plus Chrysalis isn't heavy enough to tear up the sod and get dirty. The weather is just perfect. I watch her play for an hour, thinking six million thoughts as I watch her run around and explore. She minds me when I tell her to stay in sight, but there's a tool shed, the little garden shed, the two rusted hulks of old tractors with all sorts of overgrown bushes working on claiming them in the form of miniature jungles. The changeling is just having the time of her life looking and exploring every and anything catching her attention. As her little charcoal gray form darts to and fro and from place to place, I can't help but keep thinking how this could happen. The same question from last night persists. Why me? The 'why not?' answer is great and all and I'm more than happy to settle for that, but there's that logical side of me (you know, the one I've pretty much ignored lately...hello alcoholism!) that wants to know the minute details in the events leading up to and causing the subsequent point where the Queen of the Changelings is now romping around my grandfather's old broken down farm tractor, the big lawn ornament she's now in the middle of conquering - "Chrysalis, get down from there!" I'm running to her, waving for her to get down and that it's not safe and all those other things dads rant and rave about before reaching her and plucking her from the rust bucket. I don't scold her or yell at her, but she's on the verge of tears, her ears laid back as she thinks she did something wrong. I point at the rusty deathtrap next to her. "That's not safe to climb, okay? I don't want you to get hurt. I'm not mad at you. I just don't know what I'd do if you hurt yourself, okay?" I've given her a terrible fright, I realize. Of course, I'm two hundred pounds of alcoholic apathy and pathos with a dash of indifference thrown in for good measure, but I'm still way bigger than she is and I was at that moment a looming monster over a little helpless child. A hug and a reassuring talk later, everything is all right between us and Chrysalis is off and running again, the incident gone but not forgotten. She's not climbing anything now, but she's in the throes of exploring her new little world It's clear I'll need to watch her like a hawk as she is a complete bundle of exploratory energy. I'll also have to say "no" a lot and correct her. I'm already imagining her as a little human girl as she responds a lot like one her age. But she's not my real daughter, the one my ex now has somewhere on the East Coast. Even as I think that, I wonder if Chrysalis is all I'll ever have. These things happen for a reason. All things do. That's what Grandpa always used to say before the story of his life ended with him in his sleep, dreaming his way to Heaven. Grandma went the same way, now that I think about it, in his footsteps. They had been the two most wonderful and compassionate people I had ever known, convicted in their religious faith and to each other. Mom did her best to emulate them, but life and career left her divorced and bitter towards my dad, who was probably on wife number four or five by now. I call him on his birthday and on Christmas. I talk to my mom once a month. My sister sells real estate in Texas. I'm the poor one in the family and that suits me fine. But I do want to see my daughter again. I talk to her mother on a monthly basis, trying to make arrangements to see her without getting lawyers I can't afford involved. I tried to speak to the state about it, but they seemed indifferent to me. It doesn't take me much to think of my real daughter. Her name is Crystal. No, I don't think it's a coincidence either. Without calling her, Chrysalis comes running to me when I think it's time for lunch. As soon as I start speaking her name, she stops what she's doing and she's pounding her little hooves into the sod and coming straight at me with a grin on her little dark face, her mane flopping wildly in her wake. It'll get longer and fuller as she gets older, I'm thinking, watching as she's now standing on her hind legs and letting me know she is getting hungry. I'm looking down at her, thinking she must have read my mind or sensed I was going to call her. Somehow, I realize I am feeling her thoughts. Not sensing them, but feeling them! I get pictures, blurred images conveying her meaning. Was this some sort of developing form of telepathy? Some sort of mental link? "Please don't do that," I tell her as my head throbs from her little mental intrusion. It's not particularly painful, but it caught me completely by surprise. This really creeped me out because I raised my voice louder than intended, stepping away from the wide-eyed filly. Again, she thinks she's done something wrong. It takes some reassuring, but I've managed again to convince her it's not her fault and that we're still learning about each other. What I don't tell her is she just scared the living hell out of me with that little mental thing she did. It also opened my eyes to the tip of a very large iceberg. I was not sure at this point if I really want to scratch the surface anymore. Scooting her inside, I watch her head for the kitchen, drooping a little as she's still feeling bad about going inside my head, or whatever it was she just did. I go to the fridge and kill a beer before getting a second one to sip on. Chrysalis sits on the floor by my feet. I'm standing there with the door open, the first empty can crushed and just tossed in the sink with the second beer opened and in my hand and exchanging looks with a filly who suddenly has an unreadable expression. Mine must have been just as blank. She stares at me. I stare at her. Her ears flop indolently at me. I take a loud slurp of beer. She snorts, makes that sour face again and looks away, going to the kitchen table. She is not a fan of my drinking habit is what her body language is telling me. With that little odd exchange done, I start lunch. It's simple; tomato soup and peanut butter sandwiches with a glass of milk for Chrysalis. We eat quietly, the mood having been dampened by the head thing she did and my decision to chug a beer right in front of her after she had already decided beer is icky. She barely touches her food and sighs a lot, becoming withdrawn. She won't even raise her eyes to match mine. I hate seeing her this way. I'm also feeling like a jerk right now. I try to show her how to dip her sandwich wedge into the bowl of soup, but she doesn't want to pay attention. I give this a moment to think, setting back in my chair and tapping a finger on the table with one hand while rubbing my chin with the other. At that moment, I'm glad I gave up smoking when I found out my girlfriend was pregnant, otherwise I'd be halfway through a pack since the filly's mind first touched mine. "Does it bother you that much I drink?" I ask Chrysalis gently. Her ears go forward and she looks up at me for the first time since the fridge. As much as I think this is just a filly - a very young child - looking at me, I can't help but think she knows every word I speak and is far more intelligent than I should probably be giving her credit for. I'm not saying she's stupid; far from it. But she's still very young, practically a toddler, but I keep assuming she's got the mind of a queen with conquest on her mind. "Too much?" she's mimicking my voice again, but I get her point. I tell myself I can't afford beer anyway and the money was going to be needed to help keep a growing changeling fed. I'm also seeing Chrysalis is not afraid at all to express her feelings on matters, even if she didn't fully understand them. On the other hand, she has senses I don't use very well (common sense probably being one of them, I'm ashamed to admit) and her sense of smell was more than enough to tell her beer is bad. If she thinks its bad, then it must be bad for me. Therefore, I must not partake in beer. You're a little too young to start acting like a queen, young lady. Demurely she sets about to her meal, her forked tongue lapping delicately at the soup. It meets with her approval and she's tilting the bowl towards her mouth with her hooves, slopping as much soup on her royal person as she is into her mouth. By now it's cool enough she can simply gulp it. For the second time that day, I'm laughing at her eating habits, or lack thereof, but I remember to keep it to a chuckle this time as I don't want her squirting soup at me this time. "Use your magic," I tell her simply, holding up my spoon. She sets her bowl down and observes the form of her person, taking note she is once again a sloppy mess. An indolent sigh escapes from her mouth and she glares at me like I'm being a smartass. I waggle the spoon in my fingers. "If you can throw food at me with your horn, you can use it to pick up your spoon and ladel your soup to your mouth," I say with a shrug. Chrysalis blushes, looks at the instrument to the right of her bowl and concentrates. The spoon lifts slowly in the air with a wobble as she tries to figure out how exactly to hold it. Thinking I'm being helpful, I start spooning tomato soup to my mouth, slurping each time. The filly glares again at me, though flickers her harlequin eyes to my hands. Maybe she's thinking about my hands in relation to how she thinks about how to handle her spoon? As I had noticed before, she's pretty smart and has a good sense of perception. Her first few attempts are unsuccessful, but she stubbornly keeps trying and soon is eating her soup properly and is very proud of herself at her accomplishment. I find I'm proud of her as well and tell her so. Then, I clean up and give her the third bath of the day. As I'm towelling her off again, I ask her, "This isn't going to start being a habit now, is it?" The giggle I get in response isn't very reassuring. Yay me. We spend the rest of the day watching movies. Chrysalis loves sitting on the couch, facing the television, her hooves dangling over the edge as she sits up straight, wide-eyed and wondrous of the stories and the movements on the television screen. Her attention was transfixed, trance-like, ears perked forward and locked. Completely and utterly adorable with diabetes-inducing cuteness. Our first film is The Princess Bride, one of my personal favorites. Chrysalis absolutely loves the movie and I'm sure she would have asked me a ton of questions if she was old enough to talk. Instead, she's mimicking the lines and the voices of the actors. For the rest of my life, the one word I will always associate with Chrysalis is the word "inconceivable". This would apply to her on so many levels in our time together, it would become something of a running gag for me, leaving me smiling at times, sad at others, and absolutely confused somewhere in between. In between the first and second movie, I make a bowl of popcorn. Offering her some for the first time begins a love affair between the changeling and the movie treat. I even have to get my own sepearate bowl after watching her instant habit of not looking the bowl and just using her tongue to feel out and pick up the next bit of popped corn. Stretching her neck towards the bowl, she would - without breaking eye contact with the screen - snake out her long tongue with its forked ends and let it do a searching stroll through the popcorn. It's both cute and disturbing to watch, if that's at all possible and I really don't enjoy having changeling saliva on my popcorn. I let her have that bowl and make another one for myself. Or second movie is my absolute favorite. Casablanca. Chrysalis is a little confused as the picture is in black and white, but she watches anyway. I can hear her munching, munching, munching away at her popcorn. She's leaning against my leg, comfortable and just enjoying herself. The filly is about as comfortable as I've seen her in the sixteen hours or so since she came into my life. She can't understand the plot of the movie or the story line or even the reasons for the characters in any of the movies, but she knows it is entertaining. I was also keen to not show her anything too violent with either movie (she absolutely loved the sword fights). I keep thinking maybe I should show her movies more appropriate for her age, but the two movies I thought were very tame and were both new to her, so she wasn't bored by them. I also got the sense it might be insulting to plop her down in front of a cartoon with inane characters and no plot to speak of. Right now, I just wanted to entertain her while giving myself time to think. The second movie knocks her out. I can hear her snoring softly as Humphrey Bogart tell Claude Rains, "Louie, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship." I let her sleep while I pick up the bowls, pausing for a moment to stroke one of her cheeks with the back of my hand. How could anything so adorable become the monster as depicted in the show? Yeah, I think there was a lot they glossed over in an effort to give the idea of her life. Boy, did they ever give her life! By the time I'm done doing my usual cleanup, the new routine I've seemed to have acquired since Chrysalis showed up in my life, it's time to make supper. While making popcorn, I had pulled some hamburger patties from the freezer and let them thaw out while we watched the second movie. Two patties are now sizzling on the frying pan, making the crackling hiss associated with cooking meat. I don't have lettuce or tomatoes or onions to cut up, but I do have slices of American cheese. As I like my burgers a little rare sometimes, I decide to go that route with Chrysalis' burger as well. I feel a tug at my pant leg and look down. There she is, looking up at me. And she's hungry. The third and final movie we watch that evening is the only movie my ex didn't take that was intended for my daughter; Sleeping Beauty. I'll take a moment right now to thank my mom, where ever she is, for showing sometimes the old flicks are the best flicks ever made. We're having our hamburgers (Chryssie opts out of cheese for hers) and watching one of the greatest animated movies of all time and it absolutely leaves the filly filled with awe and wonder. She's really getting into the story of the princess, the three good fairies looking after her, the prince, and the black witch, Malificent. I actually find myself holding my breath, suddenly wondering if showing her this movie was such a good idea. I mean, here was one of the most beautifully crafted animated villains ever to grace the silver screen for any animated film and Chrysalis watched everything she did carefully, even leaning forward in rapt attention. When the villainess turned into the purple and black dragon (the best ever made, by the way), Chryssie gave out a little shriek and was trying to wedge herself between me and the couch. All I could see was her little butt and her tail and her back legs as she tried to bury herself. I had no idea that part would scare her like that. "Hey! Hey!" I'm digging her out and setting her on my lap. "Nothing's going to happen! See? It's not real. It's like the other movies, it's just a story, Chryssie." Yeah, I notice it at this point, too. I'm calling her Chryssie. She relaxes a bit, even giving a little triumphant stamp of her hoof when the prince hurls the sword and impales Malificent, killing the dragon. Again, I'm cleaning up after the movie, putting things away. Chryssie follows me around. I know she wants to help, but there's very little she can really do. Besides, I'm mentally exhausted and I'm convinced more than ever she's been feeding off my emotions. It's not eve nine o'clock and I'm already feeling my bed calling to me. I really want to figure out how she does that, if I can. I get ready for bed and she watches me up to the point where I'm changing my clothes. I pointedly set her outside my room and close the door and tell her to give me a minute to change. The whole time I'm changing, she's scraping at the door with her hooves and making little whimpering sounds. "I'm not going to change in front of you!" I say through a laugh. The scraping continues as I drop my jeans and step out of them. It's like listening to a toddler trying to communicate through sound instead of words. I've heard her speak one word with her own voice so far. Now I'm hearing her first sentence. "Want in!" she begins to wail. I'm hopping into my sweats. "You'll wait like a good girl." "Want in!" she cries out, a bit louder. I'm taking off my shirt and reaching for the one I sleep in. "Patience, Chryssie." "WANT IN!" Chrysalis shrieks. I go over and fling the door open, tugging on it harder than I remember needing to before, more amused at her outburst. I stare down, ready to pick her up when I notice her horn is glowing fiercely. It fades quickly and she looks abashed, again hanging her head and looking away. "What did you do?" I ask her. She won't look at me, but I see her eyes flicker to the door I'm holding open. I look in the direction her focus is set on, at the bottom of the door. I kneel, not believing exactly what it is I'm staring at. Oh, everything's intact and all, but there's one teeny-tiny problem. The wood is warped, as if something had been pushing it in. "Sowwy," I can hear her whisper with a sniffle. Yay me. I have a lot of work cut out for me. Inconceivable!