A Change in Darkness

by David Silver

12 - Reporting

"You work angles." Luna leveled a hoof at Skyline. "Work them." Her horn glowed as her door swung open under her magic. "Skyline is to be permitted at any time."

"Ma'am!" agreed both guards on duty, even if they gave Skyline an odd look for being there at all.

Skyline nodded slowly. "Right..." He could take it as a victory. He'd earned access to her when he wanted it. That was no small thing... "Thank you for listening, ma'am."

"Thank you for putting your thought towards my affairs." Luna drew herself to her full height. "I expect much from your considerations. Now begone. I have dreams yet to monitor."

One last bow, and he stepped free of her room. The door closed, just narrowly missing his back end. The two guards were glaring at him openly with Luna's calming presence removed. "I will give a full report."

"Oh?" demanded the female.

"How I compromised the room." Skyline pointed back in Luna's room. "We can't allow that to remain."

The male shook his head. "We cannot. As soon as you can. Luna falling to harm due to our inaction would be inexcusable."

The female huffed at Skyline. "You should get hung out to dry, sneaking into her chambers like that."

The male crossed a leg in front of her. "She gave us orders. She has already judged him."

"Hmmph." She turned up her nose. "By the way..." She glanced at the door as if it may explode open at any moment. "I heard what the princess asked of you. You think, just because you can be whatever you want..." She made odd outlines with her hooves. It was hard to pantomime a changeling. "You know how to be anything."

"Um... I don't." Skyline inclined his head. "There are many things I've never tried being before." He curled a hoof on himself. "It took practice to not look like a fool in this form."

The she-guard blinked, caught off guard by his humility. "Oh, um, good... But that goes for what you and her are thinking about, if I figured it out properly."

Skyline sat before them. "Please share."

She inclined her head slowly. "You really want to know? I thought... this would be the part you'd tell me to shut up..."

Skyline angled his tufted ears at the guard. "I welcome any ideas you have... This is a complicated situation."

She softened into a smile. "Huh... Well, alright then. Look." She pointed to Skyline's middle. "You have no idea how to mare. You have no female energy, or expertise. Even if you went ahead and did what changelings do to force an egg to happen... You'd still be..." She rolled a hoof in the air. "What, 95% stallion? Now, I know, changeling, you can look however you want, but that isn't the same as being."

The male guard coughed into a hoof lightly. "100% here."

She rolled her eyes at that meek defense. "Please. High 80s at best." She reached a leathery wing towards Skyline. "If it makes her happy, I approve. We're here for that. But you aren't ready. Whatever you make, you will be their mother. Let that sink in. Not pretending, you can't pretend this, they will know... You have to be their mother, or call this whole thing off right now."

Skyline curled a wing under his chin. "Why can't somepony else be the mother?" He scratched with the wing knuckle through his own fur. "Wouldn't be the first child with a new mother."

The lady guard huffed. "What, from the moment they're born? How cruel... That will leave a mark on them for the rest of their life..."

Skyline looked genuinely blank. "But... But..." He made an egg shape in the air with his hooves. "I lay an egg." The guard mare nodded. "It's laid. The result can hatch with whatever mare is ready for them, right there."

The guard raised a hoof, but it fell slowly. "Changelings... do change... that... pun not intended, but accepted." She huffed slowly. "Right... But there... How do I explain this...?" She clopped her hooves to her cheeks. "It's hard to put in words, but a foal knows, deep inside. They may never get words for it, but they know. Their mother ditching on them isn't something they forget, even if they never find out with words. Don't do that."

Skyline considered with a slow frown. "Alright... But that means you want me to stop guarding too."

"Wha?"

"I can't be performing as a mother but also a guard, at the same time." He pointed at the mare. "Would you bring a newborn foal to work?"

"Not guarding... I would make myself available to Her Ladyship for whatever she could find use for." She flashed a bright smile then, fanged batpony smile on display. "I'm South Shore, by the way, nice to meet you." She offered a hoof.

He took it, tapping with her. "Skyline."

"Almost everypony knows who you are." She made shooing motions. "Go do what Princess Luna asked."

"Good luck," barked the male guard. "I don't get it, but Princess Luna wants it, so, good luck."

Skyline offered a nod to both. "Thank you, South Shore." The male got a name too, but no name had been given to return. "About that report." He hustled back to the dorms to sit down and get to doing just that. He outlined exactly how he gained access to Luna, including detailed ideas of how to plug up that security breach. Even if he had found it useful, it shouldn't remain for a moment longer than it had to...

"What's that?" Piercing sat down right next to him, peeking at the words Skyline had just written. "Looks technical."

"It is." Skyline folded the paper firmly. "Security breach and how I suggest addressing it." He felt a tickle. Piercing's love had increased. He liked it when Skyline talked fancy and precise? "I'm going to turn it over to the captain."

"May I?" His horn glowed, not wearing the night guard uniform. "I'll rush it over."

"Thank you." Skyline surrendered the note into Piercing's waiting arcane grip. "Come back afterwards, I want to bounce a few things off you."

"S-sure!" Piercing scrambled off in quite a hurry.

"Poor thing." Another guard was laying on his bunkbed, top bunk. "You are an awful tease."

"I am?" Skyline turned to the guard. "How?"

"I've never seen a stallion so deeply head over heels before... Heard stories... But never actually saw it before." The guard chuckled softly. "It's just as silly as they say it looks. And you're just treating him like normal. Either kiss the guy or let him go."

Skyline flipped an ear back, coloring faintly. "Changelings are not good at loving. What he wants, I don't... have. I can take his love, but giving it back... Isn't really what we do?"

"Get off it." The guard waved Skyline away, dismissing his objections. "You like him, don't you? He's a friend, right?"

"Sure?" Skyline spread his wings, just to fold them restlessly. "How does that help?"

"So you can feel things." The guard rolled over on his bed, away from Skyline. "So either kiss the stallion, or not. Stop pretending it could go either way. Make a decision."

Skyline furrowed their brow for a moment, but suddenly a new idea surfaced. "When he comes back, tell him I went to the library." Skyline made a beeline to the place, surrounded by the many books of Canterlot's archives. The library staff secured the books that were considered off-limits in a forbidden wing of the building. He couldn't walk in there.

He also didn't need to. What he had in mind was in the front. He grabbed books with his wings as he went along slowly. "That... that... Oh, yes, this one." He formed a pile of them and set them heavily on a table. "Pony family structures!" he announced to none but himself, but he seemed pleased with it at least. "Let's do some digging."

"Skyline?" Skyline looked up at his name being called, coming back into the real world. He looked quickly to the clock on the wall. Hours had passed with him hard at study! "Skyline?" Piercing came around a shelf of books and hastened up to him. "There you are." A chorus of shooshes made him color. "Sorry, um..."

Skyline directed a wing at a nearby chair. "Have a seat," he advised quietly. "How'd it go?"

Piercing sank onto the chair. "The captain looked it over and said to thank you, and that he's really mad... But to thank you. What are you doing in here?" Piercing looked around curiously. "I like the library too."

Just the place for some deep thoughts... "I was reading about pony families." Skyline gestured at the pile of books in front of him. "They are not like changeling families."

"Um... what are changeling families like?" Piercing hopped up and over, bouncing the chair to Skyline's side. "If you want to share?"

Skyline could feel it. Piercing was radiating a steady passion. It was love, waiting to be snacked on... "Under Queen Chrysalis... Dysfunctional may be the most charitable term you could use. Broodlings are commanded to make new changelings. They do. They help raise all grubs under the keen watch of Chrysalis. When they're adults, they are given tasks in the hive, and that's the end of that." He tapped at one large pile. "Pony families are way more complicated..."

"Yeah..." Piercing rubbed behind his head. "Mine's mostly normal? I have a mom and a dad and they raised me. Um, I have a sister, she's nice."

Skyline perked a tufted ear at that. "Tell me about her?"

Piercing blushed softly. "Oh! Uh... She's nice. I said that... She works with books, really old ones." He waved around. "A library like this, but she specializes in books so old ponies can't even read them. She fixes that, and fixes the books, so they don't turn to dust."

"Huh... Interesting." Skyline nodded slowly at the idea. "I was reading. You have a basic family. Nothing wrong with that, but it's not the only kind." He tapped at the books with his wings. "Some have more than two, some less. The parents may not be the actual parents. Raised by relatives, or kind strangers. Families come in so many forms... A mom and a dad, two moms, two dads? Maybe just one kindly grandparent." He spread his hooves, turning them skywards. "I don't think I can provide a basic family."

"You can do whatever you want," called Piercing in a supportive way, or so he hoped. "You're really clever."

"Thank you." Skyline inclined his head. "But I don't want to stop being a guard. If I take on the mantle of motherhood, I'll have to stop being a guard, at least a little while... Besides, it's not healthy." He shoved the books side, allowing one to rise to view. "This book speaks of those risks." He flipped it open. "A pony should not make children with their siblings, or other close relatives. It makes weaknesses come to light, and the children grow weaker and weaker."

"Oh..." Piercing rubbed at his cheek. "No offense, but 'making foals' isn't something I have a lot of experience with. What I do, doesn't make foals..."

Skyline considered that. No... No, that was very unlikely... "I suppose not. But I am being asked to think about that specifically. May I kiss you?"

Piercing's eyes contracted to little dots. "What?"

"May I kiss you?"

Piercing slowly blinked. "We were... This is out of nowhere..."

"I was told I'm being mean, and I don't want to be mean." Skyline leaned in. "May I kiss you?"

"S-sure, um, ho--" He didn't get to finish the question, Skyline pressing against him. Their lips collided, awkwardly at first, but passions were lit and soon they melded against one another in a fond exchange..

"What are you doing?!" A librarian approached with the deepest scowl one could muster. "Read, or get out."

Author's Note:

Will they, won't they? Turns out, yes, they do kiss. But there's so much more to be discussed.

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Comments

[DingoAte]

"What are you doing?!" A librarian approached with the deepest scowl one could muster. "Read, or get out."

lol

[redmar]

motherhoof

I think that should be motherhood.
Also Skyline is still clueless in some areas but we'll have to wait and see if he's actually interested in the kind of realtionship Piercing Thought wants.

[tsaukpaetra]

"Read these lips!'
Eventually there is a point that calculation just can't finish the job. Covering all the variables becomes less tenable when they're too numerous to handle. Luckily luckily there's a Gordian Knot fellow who gives a simple truth.