It feels like wrenching suddenly awake from a dream, scattered impressions blown aside in a moment of a sudden shudder to reality. Except, of course, that this is the dream. Dim light, wet heat—Luna is standing, once again, on Case’s plain. She closes her eyes, trying to hold onto the encounter with the changeling queen.
“Chrysalis,” Case says. “Woke you. Yes?”
Luna opens her eyes, nods. “Indeed.”
“Good.” The changeling looks up, eyes blank for a moment. “Much time lost. Much to do. You—”
Luna exhales sharply. “Case. When was I captured?”
The changeling nods. “Not long, not long. Not more than a day."
A day. It is a short enough time, but—“The others. Moonshine—Caballeron...”
“Much to do. Told you so.”
“Where are they?” Luna demands.
“Caballeron, hm, was captured with you. And the spy. Don’t know where others are. Yet. Queen doesn’t have them.”
Luna sighs. “Very well.”
“Yes.”
The changeling stands there, and Luna cannot quite pretend that she is at ease. There is something unnatural about it—the chest that doesn’t rise and fall with Case’s quiet breath, the unblinking blank blue eyes, the color of cloudless sky and just as empty—“Who are you?” Luna asks.
“Case.”
Luna stares up at the ceiling for a moment, takes in a breath, slowly lets it go. “So it seems. You are unlike the other changelings.”
Case tilts her head from side to side. “Yes. I am Case.”
Luna meets those unnatural eyes. What had Caballeron’s phrase been? Blurring of identity, yes. Except for Chrysalis, and this... “Are you a queen, then?” Luna says.
The changeling’s limbs straighten, stiffen. “There are no changeling queens,” Case says.
“So I have a question,” Soarin said, his voice echoing in the wide cavern. It was, by Soarin’s standards, a reasonably nice cavern—maybe as much as a hundred feet high, nice and empty, minimal air currents. Like an indoor arena, only dark and possibly filled with love-sucking murderbugs. Like the one in front of him. That’s racist, he thought vaguely.
“Shush,” Moonshine whispered.
“Sorry,” Soarin said, more quietly. “So, uh, Friend—can I call you Friend?” Soarin waved at the changeling. It looked at him, without saying anything, then bobbed its head.
“I am going to decide to take that as a yes, Friend. So here’s what I don’t get about the shape-shifting thing—you know?”
The changeling nodded.
“So Doctor Caballeron—”
“You don’t know him,” Moonshine interrupted.
“Right. So he says that you don’t actually change shape, you just make us think you look like the other pony. Right?”
“Yes.”
“So okay, what if you try to look like me, and then we both get on scales—you know, the things that you use to find out how much you weigh—”
“Know what scales are,” Friend said, looking deliberately away from Soarin.
“Oh. Okay. So if we both get on scales, and Moonshine knows how much I weigh, and she can’t see either of us, just the scales, can she tell the difference between us? Or do you... you know.”
“Have no idea,” Friend said. The changeling didn’t have any lips to purse, but somehow nearly managed it anyways.
“Oh,” Soarin said. “That’s disappointing.”
“Yes.”
Moonshine waved. “If I can distract you boys—um, boy and changeling, I guess—”
“Friend could be a boy,” Soarin objected.
“How would you know?” Moonshine asked.
“Could ask,” Friend said.
“Yeah, Moonshine. That’s rude.”
“Anyways,” Moonshine said heavily, “I was thinking that maybe I could get some answers about where we’re going. And where we are, for that matter.”
Friend nodded. “Empty, um, structure. Cave. Outside hive. Changelings don’t come here. Case is close. Um, light.”
“Me?” Moonshine asked.
Case nodded. Moonshine exhaled sharply, and her horn light up brighter, revealing more of the cavern.
“Well, that’s weird,” Soarin said.
There was a house, sitting in the middle of the cavern—a squat, midcentury thing, complete with badly applied paint and a mailbox stuck crookedly in front of it. A single candle flickered behind an empty window frame.
Moonshine took a second to respond. “Yep.”
The house didn’t seem any less out of place as they got closer to it. Friend hopped up to the porch—it was set a few feet above the stone floor of the cavern, without any stairs, and pawed at the door without any apparent success.
“You have to use the knob,” Moonshine said. “How do you get into our buildings? Impersonate somepony attractive and wait for somepony else to come along and do it for you?”
Friend turned around, stared at her. And was suddenly replaced by Soarin.
Moonshine chuckled quietly.
The not-Soarin flickered for a second, and suddenly Moonshine took its place.
Moonshine grinned. “That’s more like it!”
Friend stared at her. Moonshine glanced towards Soarin, who was now up at the door, trying to work the knob. “There we go,” he said, as the door swung open. “Welp, thanks for the ego boost, Friend.”
“Yes,” the changeling said.
“Isn’t he nice, Moonshine?” Soarin asked.
“Downright personable,” Moonshine intoned. “After you.”
“Into the spooky house in the middle of the cave? Sure thing.”
Soarin stepped through, gingerly, the floor—unvarnished, rough wood—creaking loudly beneath his hooves. He made out a couple of empty rooms on either side, and a staircase leading up into the dark. Friend stood on it, eyes glinting as Moonshine walked through the door and peered around.
“Up,” Friend said curtly.
Right. Soarin followed behind the changeling, eyes straining in the darkness. He paused at the top of the stairs, glanced back. Moonshine was standing on the landing. Her face had screwed itself up into a grimace—teeth gritted, eyes pressed shut—and she leaned against the wall.
“Uh. You okay?”
Moonshine inhaled sharply, and stood up. “I’m fine. Headache.”
Soarin caught her gaze for a moment. “If you say so, I guess.”
Friend waved the two of them into another room, his forelimb sweeping back and forth like clockwork. A faint green glow illuminated the room, a dim outline around something on the floor—a changeling, with its limbs folded haphazardly beneath it. Its eyes were closed.
Friend hummed in a low-pitched, unmusical way for a few seconds. One of the other changeling’s eyes opened, slowly, and it responded—a higher, somewhat lilting thrumming noise. Another hum from Friend.
The other changeling started to unfold its legs and raise itself off the floor—it looked like a false start, though. The legs buckled at first, and the changeling staggered, falling back onto the floor. It made a rattling noise. “Um. Apologies,” it said, quietly, not looking up. “Might have guessed already. I am Case. Welcome. We have much to do.”
Golden evening sunlight streams in through the windows of the study, illuminating dust motes that dance in the musty air. Caballeron breathes in deeply, as if he could inhale the history that weighs down the tomes all around him.
It is all his.
He settles down to his well-appointed desk, taking a pen in mouth. The paper before him seems full of possibility, but—there comes a knock from the door.
“Come in!” Caballeron says easily.
The door opens, and it’s as if an angel has walked in. She seems almost the same color as the sunlight that pours in through the wide windows, a rich gold color. Her wings flutter a bit at the sight of Caballeron.
“Hard at work?” she asks, with a slight smile.
“As always, nothing I could not be easily persuaded to abandon for you,” Caballeron says, and means it.
“You’re a hopeless romantic,” she says, and she means it too. Caballeron’s eyes flicker to her flank, lingering for just a moment on the stylized compass. She strides to his desk, leans towards him, deep magenta eyes staring into his. Caballeron finds himself leaning towards her, and their lips meet.
It’s not long, but lasts—long enough to feel more than casual. She leans back, and smiles at him. She chuckles. “You should shave.”
He shrugs. “Probably, yes.”
“But it’s good to see you back.”
“It is good to be back,” he says, and smiles back, a real smile for once. The room blurs, faintly.