12.5: Interviews
It was amazing how much a week could change things. Whereas before the enclosed open space of the pony concentration camp was a befittingly dingy and cold military facility, now the atmosphere was one of community. The grounds were now packed to the point of claustrophobia with colorful ponies of mixed nationalities. They socialized, laughed and even flirted, sometimes forgetting they were locked up at all. Maria might have been imagining it, but the grass even seemed a bit greener than it had been a week ago.
In any case, Maria’s arrival had heralded a series of reforms to the former prison camp. The warden was certainly not pleased and repeatedly voiced his outrage about inmates running his prison. She got the impression that he blamed her for the changes, despite clear evidence that such decisions had been made prior to her feedback. The dehumanizing conditions had been partly the result of panic and partly the result of the harried necessity for a coverup. However, it hadn’t taken long for sympathy for the former humans to come through. True, they might be spies or aliens, but they weren’t such a danger to warrant ensconcing them in tiny cells.
It probably helps that they’re so cute, Maria thought to herself. I shudder to think how badly they might have been treated otherwise. If they were slimy, or had fangs, the government would probably have dissected them first, or worse…
“Maria? Is something wrong?” Buttercup asked.
Snapping herself out of it, she looked down at the huggable earth pony. She was holding a clipboard in her hoof—a feat that still amazed her—and had a pencil snugly tucked behind her furry, goldenrod ear.
“No, nothing’s wrong, Buttercup. I just was thinking about this whole situation, and I got lost in thought.”
“It does no good to dwell on it,” Buttercup said with a smile.
“I know, I know,” Maria replied, stroking the pony. In hindsight she realized how condescending the gesture could be, but the mare seemed to be enjoying it nonetheless.
“So who do we have next?” Maria asked when she had finished petting a deserving pony.
“It’s actually time for cell eleven. Excluding myself, we have to go get June, Cherry Violet, Colette, Gregor and the twins”
“Quite the group you are,” Maria casually remarked.
“Yep! Though that’s true of every group more or less! Everyone has a story. Some have certainly adapted better than others. And how about that last guy we interviewed? He really loved being the attention of so many mares!”
Maria sighed. “With guys like him around it’s only a matter of time before we have our first accident, regardless of what the rules may say.”
“Yeah…” Buttercup looked momentarily troubled before recovering her pep. “Say, are you sure it’s okay for me to help you with this?”
“Honestly, I’m not sure if I’m qualified to be doing this quite frankly. I have minimal training in mental health and this is an entirely novel problem in the field. I still can’t believe how tight the budget is for the camp.”
“You’re doing great!” Buttercup said, perky.
Maria just nodded, unable to wholeheartedly agree. Nonetheless, understanding who was here was an important job, and she had to try her best. As she and Buttercup pushed their way through the crowd, Maria was once more amazed at her size relative to the ponies. They instinctively recognized this and cleared the way for her. The change in size was another dimension to the change she had rarely considered prior.
Searching for a particular pony in a gaggle of them was surprisingly difficult. True, they were distinct colors, but in a large group, the color could overwhelm one’s eyes quickly. But in this case, they found their mark in no time. Unsurprisingly, they only needed to find one of the ponies in question to locate the lot of them. A social order of sorts had emerged in the camp. Surprisingly, despite the complete randomness of groupings, cell groups had become the building blocks of the nascent community.
“Hello,” Colette greeted.
The others murmured mixed greetings.
“Hi,” Maria said. “We’re looking for June.”
The mare in question nodded. “Guess it’s my turn, huh? I’ll be back.”
The black and red unicorn followed Maria and Buttercup to the clinic. It was a small, hastily constructed building with only the barest of necessities. It was barely adequate to screen for anything, but more equipment was forever on its way. Surprisingly, this deficiency proved to be a non-issue as the ponies proved to be as healthy as a—well…
“Can we get this over with?” June asked, annoyed.
“I know procedural matters are never fun, but we have to take stock of who’s here and how they’re faring. Can we start by getting your name—or rather, your name before.”
“Zyun Wei,” the unicorn responded.
“What is your citizenship?”
“I’m from China. I study on a visa.”
Maria mechanically filled out a form by pen as the pony responded.
“Now, I normally just check the box based on the name, but in your case I have to ask. Now, we don’t mean to pry by asking this, but what was your sex before you became a pony?”
“Not saying,” June said defiantly.
“You still won’t tell?” Buttercup pleaded with only slight surprise.
“No.”
“Why not?” Maria asked, keeping her eyes on the clipboard.
The pony shrugged. “It doesn’t matter, does it? I’m a mare now regardless. I’ll do what is expected of me as a female. If I have any kind of future outside of this camp that will probably include bearing children and raising a family while deferring to my husband’s career ambitions.” June laughed. “That is—if I can even get a stallion of my own. At any rate, if you really want to know you can find out on your own.”
Maria thought she sounded bitter. Surely this pointed to her being male before. On the other hand, perhaps she was just disenchanted with culturally-enforced gender roles and missed an opportunity to escape them. Regardless, Maria moved onto the next question.
From there she ran her through a basic assessment for depression before ending on the question of most interest to her personally: “How are you getting along with the other ponies. Are there any that you are particularly close to?”
It seemed like an innocuous question, but it was actually quite nosy. The government wanted to understand the obviously lopsided gender ratio of these ponies. From a cynical perspective, they needed to grasp the mating habits of these ponies, just in case they might need more. After all, according to the books that had appeared with some of their changes, the ponies might be capable of great things.
“I’m good friends with Gong Hao Feng. She’s on good terms with one of the stallions and wants to introduce the two of us. Weird isn’t it? It’s not like we can share. That’s what you really wanted to know, right?”
Buttercup had a transparently guilty look on her face, while Maria tried her hardest to deny any such interest.
“Besides them,” June continued, “I’m close to the twins, Colette, Cherry, Gregor and you.”
“That’s all we need,” Maria said cheerfully. “Thank you.”
June left with a huff. Despite Maria’s effort to be as diplomatic as possible, the black and red mare still didn’t trust her. She supposed it was to be expected.
The next pony, however, was much more talkative.
“Ze change in gender has led to fascinating ramifications. I have observed subtle changes in ze vays those formerly male ponies have adapted. Their valk, vocal inflections and mannerisms have all become very feminine. Zere appears to be an inclination to form groups as vell. I hypothesize zat ponies are predisposed to form mating groups of three to four. To zat end, ze sexual orientation of all heterosexual ponies has shifted to accommodate zis polyamory.”
“This is all fascinating, Gregor,” Maria said, “but what about you?”
“Me?” Gregor blushed. “I only observe I have no desire for myself for romance.”
Maria appreciated the former sociologist’s observations. They largely correlated with her own observations.
With a smirk, Buttercup leaned in to whisper into Maria’s ear. “He’s totally got a crush on that former science teacher.” Maria had to stifle a giggle.
The next pony was already waiting at the door as Gregor left. Her red mane was neatly groomed and it framed her magenta furred face nicely. The earth mare entered, nuzzled Buttercup and sat down across from Maria.
“Hello, Cherry,” Maria greeted in English.
“Hi,” said Cherry said tentatively. “So is this some kind of psychological evaluation?” She was clearly somewhat nervous, but this was tempered by Buttercup’s presence.
“Somewhat,” Maria replied. “We just need to check that everyone is taking the change all right.”
“Yeah, about that…” Cherry said, looking down.
Buttercup closed the distance between them and started rubbing Cherry’s withers Cherry cooed, poofy tail wagging.
Maria was about to start the questioning, but surprisingly she opened up on her own.
“My name was Fred Spencer…” Cherry said unprompted. If she expected that to elicit a reaction, there was none. Such things had become commonplace in the camp’s corner of reality." I—my work was as a trademark attorney. I was in Germany arguing a case—it was my life’s work really. Lipro Engineering was the client. When the patents expired, their biggest competitor came charging into the market. It was shaping up to big a gargantuan fight. The rub was despite my advice to the contrary, they had allowed some of the relevant public to start calling their alloy Lipro Steel. Hundreds of millions of pounds were at stake. My contingency fee was—well, it was so high I never would have had to work again! But if we were to lose, the entire brand could be torpedoed by the genericness allegation! And at the pivotal moment—I.... I....“
Buttercup nuzzled the mare now known as Cherry. “You seem really passionate about it. Care to tell me a bit more about it?”
“Well”— Cherry sniffed—”I could, but I don’t think you’d understand it…”
“I can try!” the other earth pony declared with vigor.
Maria grinned as she watched the scene unfolding in front of her. She couldn’t help it—the fact this high-powered attorney had been reduced to a pony being cuddled was just too funny. Adding to the absurdity, the cute creature’s intelligence had not been lost in translation in the slightest. Cherry kept rattling off legal doctrines and multi-faceted arguments with learned ease. Buttercup was great at faking interest, but the pony was clearly doing no better than her at keeping up with the legal jargon.
When she (or perhaps he—pronouns were a never-ending source of confusion at the camp) was finished, Maria picked up her clipboard to continue her no-pressure interrogation.
“I can definitely understand your guilt,” Buttercup said. “But remember: it was not your fault. You held out a lot longer than anyone could reasonably expect you under the circumstances. You were growing a tail for ponies’ sake!”
Maria raised an eyebrow at that and scribbled down a note. There had been some subtle vernacular changes she had noticed from time to time. At first, she had thought someone was making light of the situation, but such expressions had been uttered by even the most pessimistic and downtrodden among them. When pressed, they were just as shocked as she was at the change.
“Is this why you have been waking up in the middle of the night? How long has that been going on?”
The nurse smiled at her assistant. She was very good at getting other ponies to talk, and Maria had nicknamed her the Chief Interrogator. The warden certainly did not find this funny. In any case, all she had to do was note the answers as Buttercup slipped their questions into the normal flow of conversation.
After some time, Maria directly posed Cherry the final question about her relationship with the other ponies. The two earth mares smiled at her before exchanging a quick kiss.
“Well… as you can see…” Cherry stammered.
“That will be all,” Maria said in as neutral a tone as possible. “Thank you for your time.”
After three more ponies, Maria let out a sigh, took her forms out of the clipboard and collated them.
“Wow! We made it through that many ponies!?” Buttercup asked, hopping in place. Maria had the urge to pet her again, but she already did so far more than was appropriate for her station.
“That we did. You did well, Buttercup!” She briefly cringed. That had to have been condescending.
Buttercup either didn’t notice or didn’t mind. “No problem! It’s not like there’s anything else to do around here. What am I saying—I mean, even if that weren’t the case, it’s still been super fun helping out. I get to learn about everyone and their background before coming here.”
“I know what you mean. Madame Labit was especially interesting. She’s just... amazingly forthcoming. I don’t know if that’s because she was so old before, or if she’s just excited to have a youthful body again.”
Buttercup blushed. “Yeah, she didn’t really need to tell us how attractive she finds the young studs around here. Although I can definitely understand the strangeness of not knowing if she’s talking to someone a quarter of her age or not. I’m sure Gregor would have something to say about the disintegration of barriers of social status.”
“And that’s not even taking into consideration that there’s no pattern to what gender a pony was before. I mean, there are some tells, but Colette is hardly alone in preferring to associate stallions that were men and mares that were women.” Maria looked Buttercup over, subtlety failing her. Come to think of it, she had hardly asked this friendly pony anything about herself.
“I can be happy that she’s happy at least. Flying sounds like it’s a thrill.”
“Are you jealous?” Maria asked in a neutral tone.
“Nah, the books say we earth ponies get our own powers. Besides, even if we didn’t I wouldn’t mind so much. Magic and flying are cool on their own, but interacting with others is still most important in life, wouldn’t you say?
Maria flipped off the lights and the miniature equine followed her out. “Did the change make you completely sappy as well?”
Buttercup shrugged. “People have been telling me I was a softie my whole life. Well now the outside matches the inside!”
As Maria waded through the throng of ponies to the housing area, she let silence linger, while the pony seemed unnerved by it.
“It was a shame we couldn’t find a translator for those twins,” Buttercup remarked. “And you said they’re Italian like you, right?”
Maria nodded. “They’re from the island of Sardinia. Apparently they’re from such a remote, rural area that I can’t even hazard a guess about what they were saying to me.”
“Well, they seem close. That much is clear. Kind of strange that the two of them still look almost exactly the same. And that’s not even the strangest part; after all, we have a couple sets of twins here.”
Maria paused. That’s true. I had suspected some genetic predisposition that made them vulnerable to this condition. But given the diversity we see, it seems even more unlikely that twins would turn out the same. Perhaps they contracted the same strain? Unless—could we possibly show regional trends with how the changes manifest? She recalled a few ponies of varying nationalities. However, no pattern was readily apparent.
As curfew arrived, the numerous members of the camp’s herd shuffled into their respective stable buildings. For ten minutes Maria just stood in place as she watched the field clear out. She made light conversation with Buttercup, but for the most part she just let awe wash over her as she admired the parade of colors. This colorful cheer contrasted with the static faces who owned them. The nurse checked her watch.
“I suppose I have to send you to bed now as well,” Maria said as she observed the last pony’s tail disappear through the doorway. “It must be horrible—crammed in there with ponies you don’t even know.”
Buttercup shook her head. “It’s not just Cherry, you know. I care for all of my cellmates—gee, we need to come up with a better term, uhh… let’s go with roomies! Yeah, that’ll work. Colette, Gregor, June, the twins are all great. Granted, it’s hard to get through to the twins, but they’re nice girls—or at least I assumed that’s what they were.
Maria smiled, but then a disturbing thought overtook her. Uncharacteristically, she decided to voice it: “What if what you are feeling—the affection for your roommates is artificial. That whatever did this to you made you bond with them. Your fast bonding with Cherry—doesn’t it seem strange to you?”
Buttercup looked down for a moment, but her head quickly bobbed back up. “I suppose you could be right, but I don’t really care! After all, there are all sorts of stupid things that influence whom people decide to date. It’s not like it’s an entirely conscious process, you know? Besides, if you start analyzing where all your feelings come from you can start to lose your head.”
“You’re right, Buttercup. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
She smiled and saluted. “Another job well done, Captain.”
Maria didn’t have to but she followed the mare into the stables anyway. She didn’t seem to mind her watching as she stroked each of her “roommates” in turn before curling up against the little pony that used to be Fred Spencer.
After pondering the scene for a few moments, she stepped outside again. She lit up a cigarette, inhaling deeply. These new ponies were clearly social animals, even more so than humans.
The question is—can they thrive in such an environment? Or out there for that matter?
What the hell, guys!? I constantly joke that nobody reads this fic and all of a sudden I get more favorites than I thought I had readers. Thanks for taking away my ammunition 
In any event, I had this chapter written as the intro bit to another chapter, but it fizzled out and didn't mesh with the tone. Seeing some positives since the rebrand, I decided to salvage it and try to deliver something. Hopefully, it'll give me the chance to prove that I can still write in this universe. Besides, it isn't filler because I have plans for these ponies... I think? 
If nothing else, they're good to use as extras in that other self-indulgent fic of mine. But poor Gregor didn't even get as much as a cameo before being shipped off to the Crystal Empire 
So... yeah.
Hey, I probably shouldn't admit this, but I still haven't decided on Buttercup's previous gender.
I should probably leave before I spoil the end of my fic.
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Hey good to see you back!
Nice chapter. A bit confusing since it was lobg time ago i read the previous. But it works well :)
Enjoying the new chapter ^_^
I love the interactions you have been humans turned ponies and humans. I wonder if actual ponies would be as weird, or if it's an overcompensation thing.
8354875
That's definitely a problem with any work that releases sporadically. I tried to at least mention the color combinations again, but maybe I can do more in the future to recap.
8355906
Glad to be able to deliver.
8356956
It's a mixtute, but these ponies definitely aren't as naturally silly as in Borrowed Time. However, Buttercup is certainly an outlier for embracing it so quickly. The jury's out on Yuki, though.
8358138
Adding some descriptive words here and there sure helps :)
Missed a quotation mark there.
Well, so ponies are getting... friendlier, I guess is the word? I'm not so sure if I'm comfortable with the soothing massages Buttercup's giving to Cherry.
Relationship or no, PDAs aren't exactly the most professional thing to do, especially during an interview.
...super fun?
Gregor seems not to have realized that “I only observe I have no desire for myself for romance.” might indicate that the role of sexual aggressor may have changed genders, too...
Why is Buttercup using pony swears? Is she a fan, or something?
I did the math incidentally, even ran a statistical trial run, and actually, no matter what ratio of male to female you start out with, if there's a 75:25 ratio of mare to stallion, and it's completely random, then 75% of the men will become mares, 25% will remain stallions, and 75% of the women will remain mares, while 25% turn into stallions. So 1 in 4 women are going to be dealing with a little something "extra" if you know what I mean. That should adjust to whatever proportion you choose, so if there's 9 mares for every stallion, it'd be 90% of the guys going girl, and 10% of the girls going guy.
8498749
Pony Displays of Affection, however, are welcome in any setting.
You're spot on with the math. I try to allude to both populations, but formerly female stallions are not represented in the main cast. Perhaps the most important statistic is that for any given pony, regardless of gender, it's a 50-50 shot for what they were before.
8499215
It's fine, really. I just wanted to mention the statistics, if it were truly random. As a general rule, you do not want to be truly random in your selection of characters. If it's better that they're mares, make them mares!
But... seriously? If it's a 50:50 chance of being a stallion or mare, then there'll be 50% stallions and 50% mares. That's not what I'd call a lopsided gender ratio.
Drat almost a year past. Just when it felt like it was picking up speed. Oh well off to the pile of faves/watch
Would Love to have this in the completed pile. I just hate reading incompletes and find out they are abandoned. Hope all is well.
9189452
If I have truly abandoned it, I will post the remaining plot in summary form. I may need to take some liberties if I return to this, but hopefully I can give something.
Was a fun little read. The earlier chapters were a little confusing with the time jumps but it’s turned into a nice story that’s fit to place itself by the originals. Hope you come back to it someday.
10418343
Yeah, I hope to. The problem is that I mapped out the story in three days thinking about it nonstop. I came up with the plot up to this point (the biggest deviation so far was that Alaine is still with my A group) and the ending to the story. Somehow the middlegame still eludes me. I've thought of jokes, character interactions, and entire character arcs, but no events or places.
I might write the few scenes I have in my head about 'Unicorn,' and see if there's anything that outgrows.
10420015
From my own experience its good to have certain major points planned out that are pivots for characters, but then allow yourself to change how they reach those points. Sometimes you find better paths as you write.