Chapter 65
Amie stood from her makeshift ritual chamber, surrounded by watchful bugs. By then some had distracted themselves with other tasks or wandered off completely. But not all—the orange bugs remained, along with a handful of the smaller ones. Most of them had been given other assignments at one point or another—but Amie wasn’t going to get upset over it.
These bugs were too young and small to contribute much to whatever tasks she’d given, those were always about making them feel useful. If they would rather be around her, she could live with that. Even if it would leave her wondering whether or not they were motivated by some unseen instinct.
It was Pachu'a who approached first, less fearful than the others. Or maybe he was just more driven by his mission. “Queen Amie, is it time for us to complete our task? We are still heavily laden with glamour and know that the struggling bugs are starving still.”
“You personally, yes. I believe I’ve created an opening for you.” She pulled him aside, leaving the watching bugs to look up in silent protest. But secret plans necessarily required information about them not spread, even through the bugs who were loyal and friendly.
“The camp has a large medical facility in the multipurpose building—it’s the biggest building in camp, with the skylights and walkways on top. You can look inside, make sure it’s safe, then get in and distribute glamour. The ones inside are the sickest and weakest. Most of them haven’t suffered the…” There was a word for it in the book, one that Amie hadn’t learned in her quick reading. She was focused more on preventing it than studying a failure state.
“Souldeath,” he supplied, eyes downcast. “But how can that be? If there were many bedridden, there should be just as many who suffered worse. You said there were dead.”
“There were. I revived them, and they are coming here. That is… the source of our opportunity. I’m pretty sure every soldier in camp is following them right now, to my gates. Slip out now, feed the starving. If you have glamour left, ask them about their friends who are in bad shape, and give away the rest.”
Pachu'a watched her in silence for what felt like a long time—mainly because she knew there was a tiny army marching on her while they stood there. Every second she waited was another they got closer. “I am relieved to confirm that you do not wish to hoard the wealth we brought,” he eventually said. “But this seems strange. You reject Albrecht’s authority; you say I should not use him to distribute the food. Why ask me to hide in dark corners, when you are the true queen?”
At least this time she had an answer. She had to send him on his way and prepare for the confrontation to come. “Because I don’t want any more of my campers to… soul-death? If you don’t think you can handle it, then I won’t ask. I’m not asking you to put yourself at risk. I just thought—with the soldiers elsewhere, we had a golden opportunity. We both want to help them.”
Finally, the hunter nodded. “This is not what my queen expected when she sent me here. It seems as though you wish for me to be complicit in your revolution.”
She shrugged. “A bloodless revolution, I hope. Where I come from, we don’t just kill people we disagree with. We have to work out our differences. Aggressively, maybe. But I don’t think anyone has to die here.”
He left the queue behind, and Amie to her audience of two remaining orange bugs, and many children. “You two.” She picked two of the most reliable she knew, then pointed. “Tell everyone that we’re about to be in danger. I want everyone to retreat back to the mine. We don’t have weapons, so there’s no point being up there to fight. I’m going to face this alone.”
She left, with a trail of nervous muttering bugs behind her. They hadn’t even been in the mine a single night, and already danger was finding them.
It was Natane who chased her down, following her all the way into the gift shop before she stopped her by her shoulder. It was clearly not the little drone’s voice who spoke, even if her pitch never changed. “Remember what I told you about the value of your own life, nymph. You are already forgetting the lesson. You have workers that can serve for this task, use one of them.”
She slowed down—partially because of the equipment and debris that now clogged the walkway. Marcus was dragging in junk from all over to block the entrance tunnel. It didn’t look like they would be making an attempt to hold the gift shop. Not that there was a reason to—Stella Lacus had already looted anything of real value months ago.
“Those workers have lives too. If one of them dies while I’m using them, that’s someone I took to preserve myself.”
Natane reacted so swiftly she was unprepared to defend herself. The bug slammed her up against the wood, smashing her shoulder up into Amie’s neck. She was a little smaller than Amie, but had much better leverage, with three of her legs braced against the floor. Amie could only try in vain to push her away with one and ended up just flopping back and forth.
For a few seconds she held her there in silence. Voices of bugs still working echoed in either direction. A few fell suddenly silent—did they sense her distress from that distance? The attack was so unexpected that Amie couldn’t react, just struggled like a trapped animal as the air fled from her lungs and her head started to spin.
“Listen to me, nymph. The homeworld sounds like a wonderful place—home of our noble ancestors, illustrious and honorable. They must live in comfort and joy, beyond the pain of hunger or fear of violence. But you aren’t there anymore. Your virtue is going to get you killed. If I were another queen, you would be dead several times over by now.”
She gasped for air, pushing out with her forelegs—in vain. It just wasn’t enough to lift the drone off her. “Heavy hangs the head that wears the crown, Amie. It is a terrible burden you bear. You must spend the resources before you—food, water, land, and lives. If you choose not to, you damn them all to starvation. It is already happening; they are already dying. So, tell me, is the life of one worker worth the death of all your changelings? If you can answer yes, then you are unfit to be a queen.”
She let go, in the exact instant that bugs emerged from around the corner. It was Marcus, with a flashlight headlamp on his face. He stared at the two of them—Natane unmoving and innocent, Amie panting with vain, struggling breaths. “Is something wrong?”
“I do not know,” Natane said. Though from the lack of any fear or discomfort at her position, Amie had a good idea about who was still in control.
“No,” Amie said. “I just…” She looked sidelong at her spy, then back to him. The price of Kaya’s knowledge seemed to be increasing by the day. “I wanted to warn you that we will be receiving guests soon. How is our new security door coming along?”
He sighed. “In the short term I just made it as inconvenient as possible to get in. With more time, we’re going to bolt some metal plates into the rock. If things get bad, we’ll use dynamite to collapse the gift shop over the entrance and block ourselves in. I can’t do all that in an evening.”
She patted him once on the shoulder. Her voice sounded a little raspy from her brief strangulation. If she tried to move too quickly, she might collapse. “That’s fine. Pull everyone back inside the tunnel. Be ready to clog it full of whatever you can find if you get my signal.”
“Clog it full of…” He trailed off. “Amie? Has Albrecht come to attack us already?”
She turned her back on him. Before, she planned on being the one to stand out there and face their bullets. But Kaya was right. If she died now, everyone did. The crown would be heavy, but she had to wear it.
She wore it quietly, safe inside a locked supply-room identical to so many others. If this was a proper siege, maybe she would do more to lock herself in. But if Albrecht’s men stormed the mine, it was already too late. What happened to Amie after they started killing her kids was no concern of hers, no matter what Kaya said.
She found the bug she was looking for, thanks to her long familiarity with her. Lily seemed to get a little bigger and stronger with every visit. The process of taking her over was quicker too. Maybe that meant she would wake up soon, healed of her brief death. She would probably have a hundred campers in her condition, when the numbers were known.
She had been helping carry something for Marcus’s team. Amie finished bringing it to the designated spot, then set it down, and stepped out of line. Then she changed. She used a unicorn body this time, one as much like her changeling shape as she could. She made her coat black and her mane soft green, about the same length and style. She copied her height, and everything else she could manage.
The one thing she didn’t give the fake pony was a cutie mark. She was not trying to impersonate one of them today.
It took only a few seconds to come up with a new body now—like her other powers, they grew easier with each use. And it was enough that the rushing campers stopped asking her to get back into line. Only Marcus remained, waving everyone deeper into the underground. “Amie again?”
She nodded once, then stepped confidently forward. She had to look confident, anyway. She knew what was coming.
She emerged into the early morning, watching the first light of dawn crest the horizon in a faint orange and purple line. It was in that light that the future of her camp would be decided, and all the humans marooned in Equestria. If they even had a future, it would be because of this moment.
At first, she saw nothing different—they had made no changes to the exterior and didn’t plan to. It should look to any pony patrol in the sky like nothing had happened here, and nothing was different. But then, those patrols might notice the group of bugs flying her way.
She hadn’t taught them this—she couldn’t even do it herself. But if there was one small benefit to the dominance of instinct and the failure of the conscious mind, it was here. The workers could fly, with the same apparent ease that she could run. Without that advantage, Albrecht’s men might be able to stop them, and keep them trapped. It would be one last, ultimate insult to the bugs he had failed the most.
But they were coming. A strange noise echoed down the road ahead, one she recognized only out of old memory. It was a camp jeep, burning some of the rare and precious fuel to get here. The car wasn’t going to beat the flying bugs, but only because the mountain road was winding before it reached the freeway, and the workers could cut directly to her.
They landed one by one in the parking lot, turning into a dense crowd in a few seconds. They were big and small, though mostly small. Only a handful of strong adults had ended up in this sorry group. “Stay with me,” she told them. “I might need your help.”
She could talk all she wanted about a bloodless transfer of power here in camp—but one way or another, it was time for Albrecht’s rule to end. Her ideals would mean nothing if all her bugs died.
An old jeep swerved into the parking lot, just short of the crowd. The driver’s seat was raised, with mechanical extensions to the pedals to let a nonhuman drive.
Six bugs scrambled out, more than the number of seats. But considering all that extra space, she could hardly be surprised.
They were all armed, with the same shotguns once used in shooting class. They had been modified just like the car, removing the trigger-guard entirely, and with a much larger safety switch. Then there were stabilizing straps, probably meant to wrap around a hoof when aimed.
“You should not be here!” one of them shouted, stepping forward. Amie knew his voice—this was Armando, former head of security at camp. He was almost as old as Albrecht himself, before the Transit changed them all. Now he was vigorous and healthy. And angry. “Whatever you did—it’s time to turn around. Return to your cabins, campers. It’s not safe to leave, the natives will kill you.”
“Don’t think they’re trying to run,” said another bug, gesturing into the center of the crowd. Right at Amie. “She can transform. That’s her, the murderer. Amie Blythe.”
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I feared that peace was not possible. He turned some of the kids into an army because he for some reason can't face that fate put someone else in charge and that his way is wrong. He rather lie about the one trying to help them all then choose peace.
Striving for peace is good and all, but Amie really should learn how to handle herself in a fight. Getting slapped about by lil' Natane is just embarrassing at this point.
It's good to hear some actual words out of the 'security' personnel before any bullets fly, but their choice of words makes it look like those bullets aren't gonna be far behind. The whole 'murderer' reputation isn't gonna make Amie's takeover any easier. It would've been great if she could've stayed at the camp to put a stop to that whole rumor mill before it even got going, but then she wouldn't have been able to help the hive from outside and wouldn't have been able to learn what she needed.
And of course you leave it right there.
But the other queen us rught and Amie what rose color glasses are you wearing?
I think Amie would feel Kaya and her hive is not so good as a friends. I think the best relationship now is what is being used in geopolitics: "there is no such thing as permanent allies, only permanent interests."
Although, assuming Kaya apologises for assulting later, both hives could benefit more.
Kaya is right that Amie shouldn't risk herself since it's not certain that Albrecht will actually listen to reason.
I agree with the other Changelings, Amie should execute Albreicht. He has lied to them over and over and is an absolutely unfit leader. He calls Amie a murderer when he has starved her own kids. He is a monster and monsters need to be put down.
Just save everyone a lot of trouble and drop dead, Albrecht. You and your team of (fill in the blanks with some horrid language).
11577135
I disagree. Amie is in the right. She has saved the Starving. Albrecht has only killed them. Amie taught them to transform. Albrecht has only killed them. Amie has brought food and allies. Albrecht has only killed them. Amie saved those thought dead. Albrecht has only killed them.
Amie has done so much more than Albrecht. Only the insane, and stupid, would harm her. Maybe lock her up. Torture her. Lie about her. Harm her. But none of them would kill her. Cause then they only have Albrecht, who has only killed them.
Any adult, any CHILD would be able to tell, Amie is the correct one out of the two. And if Security or Albrecht harmed anyone physically, with guns, especially in front of everyone where they can all see it..... Well, he will swarmed and killed. Cause they know they will be dead anyways, the choice is either a quick and painless death, or a slow starvation to death.
Anyone with 2 brain cells can understand that situation. Amie hiding away, using a pawn, only shows her cowardness, her weakness, her deception, that she is lying, that she is a murderer, that will take control and harms other as a tyrant and dictator. Even if the real person tells the truth, saying they gave her permission, they will lie and say it's just Amie manipulating them. Her actions, using a Decoy, will destroy the very foundation of the belief she is trying to show people. And just prove Albrecht is correct. Humans, would often rather die free, than live has mindless slaves.
11577220
A lot of that is true but there's one problem with that assessment: Amie wasn't there. She's done a lot for the survivors but it doesn't help her if nobody knows it was her who did that, if they all think she's just a runaway murderer. She's gonna try to convince everyone otherwise, but who's gonna trust a murderer?
As much as Amie wants this to be bloodless, this might be the first battle. No doubt she'll have to learn the lesson that civilization doesn't come free. She'll have to learn that she might have to choose to sacrifice or take lives for the benefit of her people.
11577154
It's the number one lesson Kaya is trying to teach Amie. This world is not soft and it demands strength. It's clear Kaya is doing this for her own interests and may possibly be manipulative, but it isn't necessarily true she just sees Amie a means to an end. Tough love, yes, but she seems very invested in seeing Amie succeed and one could see some affection and friendship there.
11577220
Was talking about our wirld. And equestria is no different.
Lives are in the line abd she does not have the luxery of time to get the perfect solution
There's gonna be a fight, obviously, but the royal guard is gonna be awful interested as to why two groups of changelings are fighting each other.
11577107
Wouldn't it be funny if he was doing this stuff because of an impromptu education from Ol' Queen Chryssy?
11577311
Yeah but I doubt it. Some people are just power hungry and care little about right and wrong much less those under them unless it hurts them directly and because most leaders never come close to the battlefield today who thinks about it unless they have a conscience in the first place.
11577220
You're vastly underestimating the insane and the stupid, even before accounting for a month+ of desperate starvation.
11577348
I wouldn't dismiss it immediately. Albrecht is just as naive about being a changeling as Amie was when she first left Stella Lacus. Chrysalis likely has spies watching the royal guard, so she most likely knows about Stella Lacus. Assuming she's plotting a second invasion (like is canon in the show), she'll want as many forces as she can get, and wouldn't it be handy to have some changelings with new weapons the royal guard has never seen before.
11577369
Yeah but I doubt she has enough kindness in her heart to help a young queen who needs training.
11577308
Hopefully it will get the princesses attention and then the beginning of peace.
11577394
What? I was talking about her teaching Albrecht to changeling in exchange for him helping her attack Equestria
You know... I was still holding out for Albrecht. He was obviously an obstacle that had to be dealt with, I wasn't that deep in denial, but I still sympathized with the guy. He was just an ordinary dude in an ordinary administrative position, everything went to hell and he was thrown into a situation he could not have possibly been prepared to deal with, and there were no good solutions for him. He has to maintain order when anyone trying to flee on their own is going to be killed, he has to keep everyone alive in a situation where there just isn't enough food. The propaganda was bad, the authoritarian tendencies were bad, but I could understand how he might rationalize them in his situation.
But it's that one little detail at the end that does it for me. His camp is starving, children are dying en masse... and here's his Secret Service group of enforcers, healthy and well-fed as anything.
Yeah. Time to go, Albrecht.
Very worried for Lily here... it sounds like she might be starting to grow a new personality, but while Kaya was right... well. Kaya was right, and that's the problem. Amie's in immense danger right now, and given how Albrecht's goons are acting, I'm not sure her piloted body is going to survive what's about to go down.
Sending them directly to her stronghold this early probably wasn't the best idea xD
At least this group is obviously outnumbered, which may make them hesitate before going to violence. Still, calling her "the murderer" to her face... There's some real strong resentment of her. I wonder if any of these people know the goons Albrecht sent after her the first time?
11577308
So true!
And, Chrysalis... Possible, but I have a feeling she would be more overt about it. She strikes me as the kind of 'ling who would want you to KNOW she rules you. You know, if she can get away with it.
11577415
The guy doesn't have any idea of how to use his power and he certainly thinks he the queen with his attitude. Love queen wouldn't help anyone without double crossing them and what good are allies who are helpless with their power.
11577473
That's my point though. She comes in, looking just like he does now and offers to help him survive in exchange for his loyalty. He does and she starts telling him how to run things but adding little bits about "making hard choices", like leaving Amie's kids to die because they'll either not listen to him or are too weak in her viewpoint.
Basically I'm saying he's her puppet ruler.
11577492
Yeah but she wants to rule Equestria and having underlings who think they have power is no good to you if all they can do is boss those under them. Tempest may have been tricked into fighting her homeland but she also was strong unlike this guy who only power comes from being the camp leader from before the change.
11577521
And what a perfect peon to eliminate once he's outlived his usefulness
11577556
Yeah but he isn't really. He can't fight or use his powers. His only power is camp director and that certainly wouldn't be good enough for her. She wants power but the only one who gets power from these bugs is twilight.
Let's see if the sword of truth is mightier.
11577420
Yup, time to plant a dumbass tree.
Oh boy...
The gift of ignorance can curse anyone.
And so the confrontation truly begins. The question now is just how invested the current authorities are in the "Amie the murderer" narrative, and how committed they are to staying in power over the welfare of the weak and starving. Giving how Armando is explicitly called out as well-fed...
Yeah, the time has come for a regime change. Even if won't be as peaceful as Amie's hoping for.