Luna was staring at me. Her eyes were wide and her expression uncertain. She shook her head slowly. "Can you understand me?"
Some things didn't change. "Yes."
Cindy was looking around the garden curiously. "I understand you just fine."
Luna snorted softly. "It speaks... and moves independently? You have no idea how sorry we are... There is no excuse for the damage we have caused."
I could hear her regret and held up a hand. "The situation's gotten worse since last time, and this part's not your fault exactly. Our military has arrived to restore order, and since everyone involved looks like an alien and is compelled to 'attack' them, violence was the result. I urged them away, but not before we lost a lot of ponies."
Cindy bobbed herself. "It was just awful, but William did a good job getting them away before more damage could be done, and more than a few of those soldiers will be learning what the hoof life is like."
Luna approached, circling around. "How did you accomplish this? Did you shout at them?" She reached and poked one of my little buds that would eventually be wings. "This is most troubling. Are you certain you are well?"
I lifted my shoulders. "As certain as I can be as I slowly deform into some... thing? I seemed to have some kind of group telepathy during my last dream and was able to just command them to go away and stop fighting the soldiers." I turned to face her even as pain erupted in stabbing agony across my back. I collapsed to a knee, hands supporting me as I shuddered and held back the desire to cry out.
Cindy looked like she tried to get a peek, and Luna just stayed behind me, watching no doubt. "I had wondered... You see, the ritual involved several of our leaders, the alicorns. They became weak for days afterwards, and we were certain some of their essence had been cast into the void, and here it is."
The pain grew worse a moment before the trickle of blood and a great rushing sensation heralded the end of the growth spurt. Over my shoulder, I could see massive pink wings spread out to either side of me. "Why pink?"
"Why not pink?" Luna raised a brow. "One of the leaders is a pale, almost-white pink, the other a very deep pink. You seem somewhere in the middle. Do you wish to speak of the present, or the past?"
I struggled up to my feet and turned back towards her. "How do we fix this?"
Luna shook her head. "I have no new news regarding that. I will start at the beginning, so you may know how this began."
I could feel that I was riding Luna's body from behind the eyes. I couldn't make her do anything, just watch and listen and feel. I was living her memories of the time. There were several other alicorns present. A lavender one, a pink one, a white one (That's pink?), and a brown one. The lavender one was speaking animatedly about how excited she was to open a portal and ran electrodes to a heavy-looking desk.
"An entire new world, and this one isn't close enough to Equestria to suffer resonance effects, like Canterlot High or the mirror worlds in general. We can trade with them without fear, and learn. You all know the wonders they have." Lavender alicorn looked so excited.
Things blurred a little. Luna apparently hadn't been paying close attention. Maybe she was bored as Lavender kept on talking on and on about the little details involved, but she eventually arrived at action. "Alright everypony, this is where I need your help. We're going to need a lot of magic to make a physical portal, so let's sync up."
I could feel Luna do something with her horn, and the other horns in the room glowed, blinking back and forth at one another until they found that sync that Lavender requested. Great energy began to leave my, er, Luna's body and it swirled together with the rest of the alicorns in an unstable looking ball of pure energy, magic I suppose. Lavender pulled a lever and it was all sucked into a series of tubes and machinery, and the room came alive with activity, lights, and whistles. Luna's ears found the whole thing quite unpleasant, but bore it with a quiet dignity.
"And now, the future!" Lavender depressed a button with a hoof, and a series of lights began to rapidly fill up to her obvious delight, but as it hit the classic 95%, it paused, then the lights began to explode, popping in little showers of glass. "That's not right..."
A surprised sound made Luna's head turn. There were armored ponies standing by the door. Guards? They sank to the ground as something was sucked out of them forcefully and pulled into the machine. White and Pink alicorn sank next. Lavender went into full panic mode, running around and trying to figure out what went wrong. The brown alicorn's horn glowed with silver, and everything began to wind down. His magic held what looked to be the plug of the machine.
Lavender sighed loudly. "This was a failure... Is everyone alright?"
Those drained were able to weakly nod. They were fine, or would be, with rest.
"And so it was." Luna folded her wings tightly at her sides. "All the guards in the castle were drained, their essence cast into the void. As you saw, two of our royalty as well, my sister, Celestia, and our niece, Cadance. Unshielded by a body and hurtling between worlds, it is a wonder there is anything recognizable, but I can see the similarities in you." She pointed at Cindy. "You are almost identical to Cadance."
Cindy perked her ears. "My name's like her too. Does that mean William will look like Celestia?"
Her perking ears somehow reminded me of mine, and they swiveled around distractingly, ugh. "Do I get a vote in this?"
Luna shook her head. "The time for voting has long past. We are all pebbles being carried along in a landslide. My guilt grows, knowing on our side, temporary weakness was the worst we suffered, while death and disfigurement haunt your world." She waved a hoof and suddenly I was very naked, and could even feel chilly winds I didn't know were there.
Luna looked freshly surprised. "I thought you were female, or destined for it."
Cindy grinned lecherously. "He's a growing boy."
"I see that." Luna snorted. "Perhaps you got some guard in you...? I had meant to see the full extent of your corruption, not simply to gawk at you."
I held a hand in front of myself, but it felt like trying to hide a sword with a bandaid for how much I actually stopped her from seeing. "Right, uh, so what do you suggest we actually do?"
Before she could answer, I woke up. Lone was sitting on me and looking down at me with big eyes. I could feel the warmth of his body, and his huge horse cock. He smiled brightly when he noticed I was awake. "William, she's gone!"
"Who?" I gently pushed Lone to the side, and he moved off willingly, but nuzzled at me fondly. "Where's Sandy?"
Lone pointed off into the house. "She said she was going to sleep in the bed since the lady left."
I felt I was missing something. I got up and stretched, realizing my new wings were not just a dream and were stretching out along with the rest of me, great. Cindy frowned. "I think we're in trouble."
Lone tilted his head up at Cindy. "Why is that, mistress Cindy?"
Cindy shook herself. "I can't say why exactly, but something awful is coming."
I felt dread knotting up in me and held out a hand to Lone. "I need you to not make any sudden moves if the worst happens. We are not here to 'share the gift', got it?"
Lone looked baffled at the notion. "Why wouldn't we?" He settled on his haunches. "But if you say so."
The warning had barely been received when the front door exploded inwards with a kick and several automated rifles leveled at me and Lone. Shit. I lifted my hands up, palms exposed. "We give up! No shooting!"
Lone shrank back with obvious abject terror, not that I felt any better.
Emerging from the back came Sandra. "What's go..." A bullet caught her in the shoulder and she collapsed with a pitiful whine.
"Command your animals to get on their bellies, then get down yourself. Hands on your head, face in the dirt. Move!" I couldn't see who was talking exactly, there was a bright light being shone in through the door. I didn't fancy my chances with their guns and didn't want to give them more reasons to use them on us and I waved downwards.
Lone sank down as far as his anatomy allowed, shaking like a leaf. Cindy scowled at the soldiers. "You're being very unkind. We're not hurting anyone." I was too busy getting down nice and slowly and assuming a prone position. The thunder of boots came from all around me, and I was zip-tied up with remarkable speed. They repeated the performance on the still whimpering Sandra, though with more hesitation, as if waiting for her to give them an excuse to put more bullets in her.
They didn't know how to deal with Lone and his obvious payload of biohazard. They had him just lay there until they could find and bring in a dog carrier and ordered him in there rather than actually touch him. Once we were all secured, rough hands hefted me up to my feet and we were all dragged out of the house.
On the bright side, we weren't dead. I didn't exactly favor the rest of it, but we weren't dead yet. I couldn't see any of the military's faces. They must be transitioning over to more biohazard approved gear, but not graduated to full biohazard suits yet. We were tossed together in the back of an armored van of some kind, and the door slammed shut on us, but there was a soldier in there, watching us. He didn't have the same rigid readiness of the others, but he was wearing a full biohaz suit. "Fascinating... Can you understand me?"
I was getting very tired of hearing that question, but I nodded. "Yes."
Cindy bobbed herself. "Yep."
Lone peeked up at him and joined the nodding. "Yes."
Sandra pawed at the ground with a whimper. "Yes, but it hurts. Are you a doctor?"
"I am. Will you let me examine you?" Sandra flopped over with a nod, and he approached her. I felt very possessive as he knelt beside my injured herd-mate. I wanted to do something for her, but letting her be treated was perhaps the best thing I could think of, so I grit my teeth and waited.
He worked quietly at first, "You're in luck, the bullet went through cleanly."
"I don't feel lucky."
"No one who's been shot feels lucky." He was cleaning her up and bandaging her, performing triage efficiently. "You are the first captures we've gotten. Are you going to be cooperative?"
Sandra growled a little. "I just woke up and they shot me!"
I leaned against the wall of the van. "We're at your mercy at the moment. We never attacked anyone. We're just trying to survive a bad situation."
"Aren't we all?" He finished with Sandra and rose to his feet. "You're all being very cooperative so far. So, how do you function?" He looked directly at me. "I haven't seen or heard of two heads working in anything more complicated than a worm."
Cindy stuck out her tongue. "We're just special that way."
I had no idea, and shrugged to signal as much. "Whatever this is, this is the result. You probably know more about it, biologically."
"We know almost nothing." The scientist, which I decided he was more than a soldier, sat back. "We're headed back to the field camp, where we can get more work done." As if prompted, the ground lurched, and a low rumble signaled the van's moving.
I sank down onto my ass. "Be honest, what are our odds of not being executed?"
Lone hoofed at the front of his cage. "Can I come out? I promise to be good."
He sighed. "No one is going anywhere until we are back at the camp, so get comfortable."