Carapace woke to pitch blackness. She squinted, trying to penetrate the oppressive darkness. She ran a hoof full of holes over the shredded fringe on the back of her neck as she tried to silence the pounding in her head. She moved to roll onto her hooves, when a blinding flash of pain cut into her side. She gingerly ran a hoof down the affected side, feeling nothing but solid chitin, until she found the source of her discomfort.
“Damn… looks like those ponies aren’t as dumb as I thought…” She inspected the wound the best she could without a light source. She felt hard chitin running down her side, until it just… stopped, turning into ragged flesh and a wet fluid she wasn't sure she wanted to see.
Oh Chrysalis, this is bad. I can’t fight until that chitin seals, which means I’m stuck here. Another, just as insistent pain assaulted her senses. She checked her love levels, cursing. I’ve only got twenty-five percent of what I left the farm with. I’ll be dead within two weeks, unless I can somehow get love from somepony… She sat up a bit more, focusing her dwindling supply of love on the affected area of herself. She felt over half of her remaining love supply disappear, and a warm burning sensation on her side. There, that should do it. Hopefully that will patch me up fast enough that I die of starvation instead of from infection. Now I just need to talk my way out of this cell, and replace one of the guards… She thought back to what had happened at the gate. Maybe that's a bad idea. I have no idea if i can even disguise at all right now, and I don't want to burn love to find out...
Meanwhile, in the Castle's throne room
Twilight paced worriedly back and forth across the floor. "I just don't understand. If that... thing was telling the truth about the farm, what else wasn't it lying about?" Could it really be Applejack? "No, of course not, that's ridiculous!" Twilight self-consciously patted her mane back into shape. "You're just getting yourself worked up again, Twilight! Keep it together!"
"Twilight, you're talking to yourself again..."
"Oops! Sorry!"
"It's quite alright, Twilight, let's just try to focus on the problem at hoof, okay?"
"Right, It's just that I don't know what to believe anymore, and I want to believe that Applejack was simply captured, and ohmygosh I'm a horrible friend, I mean who even thinks that? It's like I want Chrysalis to come back and... and I don't want Chrysalis to come back, but-" Celestia stopped the rapid-fire mental breakdown by putting a hoof around her babbling student.
"I think I know of a way to discern if this changeling is telling the truth." Twilight's eyes narrowed.
"But how? The only way to tell is to get somepony who can read body language, or stumble upon somepony who's really bad at lying, like me or Applejack..." Twilight trailed off, noticing a wide smile on Celestia's face. "You're not thinking..."
"Something like that, my Student, something like that..."
Back in the Dungeon
Carapace paced the small cell, horn flickering with a sickly green glow. I can't believe they haven't sent down a guard yet! What are they waiting for? She took a deep, calming breath, and sat down in the center of the cell. Calm down Carapace, just remember that you were bred for this. You can figure this out...
The Hive, one week after the Invasion of Canterlot
Queen Chrysalis observed the purple pod sitting in the center of the Breeding Room. All I have to do is release these drones into Equestria once they are mature, and I'll be unstoppable! Restraining a laugh, she turned to the drone cowering at her feet. She knelt down so that she was level with the quaking changeling, eyeing him with a bored expression. "Doctor Thorax, Tell me again why this new breed of drone will 'cause Equestria to crumble', as you say?" Thorax remained bowing, but he grew visibly more confidant, eager to gain his queen's acceptance.
"Well, as I explained earlier, my queen, this brood of drones are the perfect scouting party to infiltrate Equestria. Grown specifically to completely and perfectly replace any pony, even the princesses, should you so choose." Thorax was on his hooves now, brimming with hope and excitement at the prospect. Chrysalis just gave him an irritated look.
"Yes, yes, that's the same load of trite jabber you've been spouting since this project's conception." Thorax's hopeful energy seeped from him faster than a drone that had had it's morning ration exchanged for a block of pure sedative. Chrysalis leaned closer, fangs perilously close to his neck. "Now, what I actually want to hear is what allows them to do this, not the mere fact that they can." Thorax straightened once again under her thorny gaze, his relief almost palpable.
"You see, my Queen, the normal changeling drone is bred with the ability to store enough love energy to flawlessly imitate and replace any pony they have seen before. They also come with a built-in healing ability so the hive doesn't need to waste resources fixing damaged drones." Chrysalis gave him a borderline-furious look.
"I know that much, you pompous foal! I'm the Queen! I know how my underlings function! What I don't know, and what I've spent the last half of my day trying to pry from you, is what makes the new drones DIFFERENT! Now-", she said, regaining her composure, "Now, you are going to explain my new troops, or am I going to find a competent drone who will!" Thorax picked his lower jaw up off the floor, and pushed it back up to meet his upper one with a loud *CLICK*. Still half-cowering, he resumed his explanation, voice wavering in fear.
"W-well, my q-queen, the new d-drones can hold more love energy within them, and heal even faster than the originals." He grew slowly more confidant at the fact that she wasn't yelling at him again, and plowed on. "In addition, we have added a few other features." A few assistant drones, formerly cowering behind the various maturation pods, nodded emphatically. "The new drones have a completely revised infiltration system. Instead of simply appearing as the pony in question, these new drones not only copy the appearance of said pony, but also their organic structure. As you know, when a base model infiltrates, it must employ good acting and care to avoid physical contact, as it will still feel like a changeling. These new drones have no such issues. Their other improvement is that they are inherently better actors." Chrysalis raised an eyebrow. Hurrying to explain himself, Thorax sputtered, "A-as you know, the *ahem* the way our current drones infiltrate is to simply act like their target. They are often discovered due to a 'personality slip' as it were. What I mean, is, say a pony is replaced by a base model changeling..." He looked at her expectantly.
"Go on..."
"That changeling stands a forty-seven percent chance at last count of being discovered, because they are under the massive psychological strain of attempting to pass as a pony without any familiarity with that pony's life. This new brood, however becomes an exact genetic copy of the pony in question, making it easier to act like that pony!" Chrysalis raised an eyebrow. Thorax quickly cut in. "For example: My Queen, when you impersonated Mi Amore Cadenza, how were you discovered?"
Chrysalis' eyes narrowed, and with a snarl, she said: "I was discovered, because some incompetant foal decided that I didn't need any notes on Cadenza's behavior patterns! I was also, understandably a bit stressed because I had to handle interacting with Six. Surprise. GUESTS!" Dr. Thorax poked his muzzle out from behind the love-charged pod.
"I understand that, my Queen, but just imagine if you were physically an Alicorn with an affinity for love! You would've instinctively known how to act in those situations, and could have improvised much more easily than you did. You would have been able to swallow those treats, and-"
"Enough. I get the idea. Since you brought up Canterlot, doctor; Would you mind telling me how I was able to sense the thoughts of an EARTH PONY from some tiny town miles from Canterlot over the Hive Mind?! Dr. Thorax groaned.
"It was a failed experiment, my Queen. We thought it was destroyed by the Nightmare!" Chrysalis grabbed the doctor by the throat.
"Explain," she hissed, "before I find reason to show you what happens to those who waste my time!"
"Gchkk... My Queen, Gchkk... Please... Have Mer-GCHKK..."
Chrysalis kicked the drone's body aside, eyeing the changeling cowering behind the pod to her left.
"You. What happened?"
Poison Gland cautiously peered around the pod. "I-is h-he alright?
Chrysalis almost gagged at the sentiment. "Ugh, he'll live. Now, What. Happened?"
"W-Well we had grown a drone similar to the one in this p-pod years a-ago, b-before the pods were all allocated t-to basic drones. We h-had had a few g-grubs survive the first few weeks, and once mature, we sent a few out to relatively safe t-test locations. W-we chose small, rural towns that had p-pre-existing changeling populations." She hiccuped. "I-I wasn't ex-exactly involved with the next part, but as far as I know, the tests went b-b-badly. Two were killed en route, and I think I heard about one being torn apart by a hydra. The only one that survived was stationed on a farm in a small town south of Canterlot, and we lost contact with it when Nightmare Moon r-returned. Our best guess was that it had been discovered when the Elements of Harmony activated."
Chrysalis grimaced. "Apparently not."
Carapace skulked in the dungeon, holding her hooves to her pounding head. Memories swirled through her mind, both foreign and familiar at once. She heard words echoing in her head with each dull, pounding ache.
Love.
Friends.
Apples.
Feed.
Hate.
Family.
Farm.
Hive.
Lies. Truth.
Lies! Truth!
Lies! Truth!
LI-
She screamed. She wailed in agony as her head burned as if it were going to split open. The pain was building, bringing images with it now. Bare trees, surrounded by barrels of cider. A cave, luminous fungi lighting the way beneath the ground. Big Macintosh, standing next to her, wrapped in bandages. Her Queen, glowing eyes boring straight through her. Sounds began whispering in her ears, even as her screams of agony echoed off the walls of her cell.
Eeyup."
EhheheHAHAHA!
"Applejack, You're not a failure! And besides, we're your friends, you could've come in fiftieth place, you're still number one in our books!"
"Ever since I replaced you, his spell's grown weaker,especially since my minions are chipping away at it..."
Minion... The word was a wedge, splitting her mind in two. One half of her felt revulsion and indignation at being belittled that way, but her other half craved it, feeling a longing to be part of the hive, part of a whole.
She was an overripe apple, held together by only her skin; She was the sun, two halves of a whole pushing away from the other, generating massive amounts of heat and fire. Bound by pain; by pain set free. She was...