• Member Since 14th Feb, 2012
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horizon


Not a changeling.

T

Ponies on Earth have worked a variety of jobs.  Changelings on Earth, though, find their employment prospects limited. Especially the ones who didn't follow Thorax into redemption.

One of them decides to broaden her options by finding … creative financial opportunities … at a college campus.  And then things start going catastrophically wrong.


Rated T for profanity, offscreen violence, and brief discussion of prostitution.

Cover art by Common Tragedy. Additional thanks to GaPJaxie, Sunny, Monochromatic and evelili for prereading feedback!

Written for Admiral Biscuit’s Not A Contest.

Chapters (9)
Comments ( 53 )

First comment reserved for author's notes!

Though I don't know whether I have anything productive to say about it right now, as I post it. My head is too full of this story. It's been living rent-free in my head for four months, and the process of evicting it was rough enough that I'm not sure it went where I wanted it to, or where it needed to go. So, take it for what it is, and let me know what you think.

"Because my services are in a gray area of academic morality which Miss White will take understandable exception to."

Ah. They sit for exams on behalf of their clients, I suspect.

when you're unable to make a lecture. I attend it on your behalf, and give you my notes.

Ooh, okay, not as serious as I'd expected. But yeah, the dean's not gonna be happy about that.

Holy guacamole, this is quite the story to unpack. :pinkiegasp:

Came here for a story about the utility of buggy powers on Earth, stayed for the wheels within wheels and all the deceptions going in every direction. :applejackconfused:

It's so good!

Grew up on The Ants Extended Universe, Kissy Kissy Mew Mew, and The Scary Door.

We don't talk about that incident on Mt. Ebott...

I can be anything, which means I'm everything to everyone.

That is how changeling works mechanically. :raritywink:

Also, the plot thickens. In multiple senses, given what has Harvey's attention.

Outstanding last line

A hard look at academic dishonesty policies, a whole society unmoored from any kind of ethical grounding, nonhuman perspectives on responsibility and morality...

Yeah, this is a fascinating one. There are a lot of layers of deception here, some of them Dark Wing lying to herself. And I don't think all of them were peeled back by the end. Thank you for a most engrossing read.

...and you will break the hive right in fucking half."

stuck the landing

Added to
Admiral Biscuit's Fleet (group)
Signal Boosters (file)

:trollestia:

12078496
I watch enough cop shows to know
BIG mistake to talk without a lawyer.

:facehoof:

12078514
Is it really a changeling story without crazy wheels-within-wheels layers of deception? :duck:

12078538
The last chapter's glimpse inside the changeling brain -- the truth behind Dark Wing's reputation, and the accompanying dive into nonhuman morality -- didn't exist until recently; I think that's what finally helped me pull the tail end of the story together. It was a bit of a shift from the direct focus on Brittle Horn and the immediate fallout of Harvey's attack, but it was the new angle on the whole Catalyst situation that it felt like it needed.

Thank you both for the kind words!

12078912
I appreciate the assist with the group additions!

12078917
Agreed, in reality. For this specific piece of fiction, I did my best to set up a scenario where the lack of lawyer made sense for Brittle Horn: both that she was trying to trick her interrogators, and that wouldn't have worked if she hadn't opened up and volunteered all the information she wanted them to believe; and that she was being grilled about subjects which weren't legally actionable (aside from the solicitation angle, where she used the threat of lawyering up to steer the direction of the conversation). Even so, she was taking a calculated risk, and may well have dealt with bigger problems down the line due to her choice.

12078518
Okay, The Scary Door is The Twilight Zone, but what are the others?

Bloody hell, Dean! We've already covered that she's not actually a student there. What part of that do you think means that she's beholden to the institution's academic policies?!?

"You have a real talent for burning olive branches, did you know that?"

That's good. I'd like to use that sometime.

Dark Wing glanced around, sniffing the air, making certain she was alone. Then a smile slowly spread across her muzzle.

"He actually did," she murmured to the empty room. "I guess Brittle wasn’t lying after all."

Maybe I'm tired (I'm definitely tired), but this lost me.

12078995
I've had four different people ask me about that now, so it looks like I've wrapped back around to the story's original problem, where the ending twist gets lost in outer space. How ironic. :derpytongue2:

The specific thing which I intended was:
(BIG SPOILERS)
She is responding to Tank-Top's parting shot, where he says "I expected better of you", and she realizes that that wasn't just a barb, Tank-Top actually did think more highly of her, until the failed apology set things on fire.

Unfortunately, I think that got lost a bit because I padded the ending just enough to make the link between those two lines non-obvious. I'm going to sleep on it, reread the ending in the morning, and I might well ninja-edit a fix in to make that clearer.

On the other hoof, since the ending did turn out vaguer than I intended, some of the discussion that's been shared with me about the meaning of that line has been fascinating. Other people have read out that line to take the story in awesome directions I wasn't aiming for, and I'm grateful that at least I failed into a state which supports cool alternate readings.

(Death of the author and all that, btw; if you interpreted the line in a different way that's in line with the rest of the text, I am emphatically not calling you wrong.)

12078970
"The Ants Extended Universe" is a joking hypothetical that this world's version of the old Dreamworks movie "Antz" (1998), due to a population of movie-watching changelings, gained a cult following and spawned a massive bunch of spin-offs and has the implied popularity of something like Star Wars where there's decades of lore built up around the continuity.

"Kissy Kissy Mew Mew" is an Undertale joke with the serial numbers similarly filed off - in UT, "Mew Mew Kissy Cutie" is an in-game anime series that one of the game's major characters, Alphys, is a rabid fan of.

I think The Scary Door was a Twilight Zone knock-off, as you mention. But I threw it in from a suggestion from another author at the retreat, and my memories of the specific homage are a little vague at this point.

EDIT: "The Scary Door" was Futurama's Twilight Zone pastiche.

12078978
That's the beauty of dragging the non-student behind closed doors with your friend the off-duty cop ominously taking notes! They don't have to actually be doing anything illegal in order for you to make vague implications of jail time and scare them into handing over their client list!

Which works right up until the person you're threatening calls your bluff and walks out of the room...

This was masterfully written all-around. :pinkiesmile: And as a European, I'm glad to have studied in a country where the lack of student debt makes for a slightly less cut-throat environment than American campus.

But here's one detail which leapt out to me that hasn't been commented on yet;

The unreformed Changelings describe Thorax's hive as a "socialist dystopia". However, and given how thorough the storytelling is here, I would be surprised if the irony wasn't intentional, Thorax's hive is the one where Changelings get to be many different colours, whereas the unreformed Changelings all remain the same uniform black from their drone days.

Thorax's hive may still be a collective, yet it's a kinder form of collectivism than was practiced under Chrysalis, one which allows room for individual expression. By contrast, the unreformed Changelings' brand of individualism simply swaps out one stifling system for another; let loose from living under a queen's yoke, each of them now seeks to be the spider at the centre of their own little web, only making deals and exchanges with one another out of convenience. Living by deceit as they do, it's doubtful if there even is much of a "true" person beneath the mask, except by the most shallow of definitions.

Although, the ending, while fittingly ambiguous, leaves the door open for a spark of hope.

Fantastic story, again, and I do feel this one could only have been told against the backdrop of a human society. :twilightsmile:

12078995
My reading of that last line was Brittle was telling the truth about Tank Top being in love. If so then that would mean Dark didn't know because they'd already made the swap by the time Tank Top first confronted Catalyst. That's why Dark couldn't explain why they tried to make the relationship happen, because it really wasn't Dark at that point. The one who wanted the clients happy was Brittle because the "Good One" amongst the unredeemed Changelings was never Dark, or maybe they were both doing their best and there are different types of good.

Lead here by Admiral Biscuit's news post, thoroughly confused at the end :derpyderp2: which I suppose is a good thing for a story about a group of unapologetic changelings who despite breaking away from Queen Chrysalis's "suck the world dry damn the consequences" still see nothing wrong with deceiving everyone around them, even themselves apparently.

As to their disdain to Thorax's technicolor hippie bug commune, I agree that perhaps that change was a bit too much too quickly, at least in reference to the show, but their current model in this story isn't exactly sustainable in the long term as it currently appears. Saying, "I swear I'm a good changeling" whilst simultaneously metaphorically crossing one's fingers behind one's back...soon it'll be a sort of wolf boy situation which in essence takes them back to square zero.

Delighted to see how this story has matured since the first draft I read at the retreat. You both polished what was already there and added some delightful changeling philosophy at the end. Very nice!

He had awesomed at the sportsball.

Definitely captures the feeling of not knowing what is going on.

There's a whole bunch of perspectives and motivations here, and it's been really interesting trying to follow them all.

The idea of unredeemed trying-to-not-be-Chrysalis changelings is a real headspinner, too.

I am so happy to see this fic shine. The draft version had a lot of promising parts, and in this writer's humble opinion you built that draft into a finished product that knocked my socks off. As I pointed out in a previous comment, there are some truly excellent one-liners here, and the way you write arguments has this like logical brutality that fits these delightfully scummy changeling assholes to a T. The best parts of this fic are those moments when I can't decide if our protagonists are good guys or bad guys--the grey area is a heated pool, and it feels nice to swim around in it. The second to last chapter, The Argument, is this fic's high point for me. Brittle's character shines in this moment. Blowing up their own camp to further their agenda and using Dark as the flash point is so accelerationist and scummy I love it ahahahaha--

The last chapter is something I'm still attempting to wrap my head around, with the novel's final line being the question mark keystone. When Dark says, "I guess Brittle wasn’t lying after all," what I'm getting from that is that Tank Top really did love Harvey? But we already knew that, because Tank Top hit on him a bunch. So I'm a little confused what I'm supposed to be getting from that. Am I to get that Dark was so embroiled in their own plotting and scheming that they are genuinely surprised when a person displays a genuine emotion?

Overall, congratulations on an outstanding fic. I am grateful I got the chance to watch this fic develop in real time.

"When you've spent your whole life as an unthinking extension of the queen's will, and then suddenly have a chance to define yourself without her, there's two ways you can go. Embrace the hive, and turn technicolor, and go join Thorax's candyland socialist bug dystopia. Or embrace individuality, and stay black, and be your own bug by overcoming your instincts."

So there's multiple layers to get out of this whole spiel of hers, and for the record, I'm not ignorant on what some of those other ones are or how important or relevant they are to this story.

But it's telling to me that she seems to think she can't still do all that the Thorax way too. Because there's honestly no reason she couldn't that I can see. The REAL reason she doesn't on that is less about public policy and more about personal identity--she doesn't want to do all that and also give up the identity she originally grew up with. Which I can totally respect. But not only do I know that sometimes in order to keep progressing forward, personal changes big or small are still inevitable, the Thorax way is mostly just an outward change, something that is mostly irrelevant, most especially to a changeling--the Thorax way wouldn't actually mean she'd loose who she is inside, she'd just be given different ways to express it all the same.

An extreme aside for the purposes of this story, I know, given this doesn't really affect the story, but it's still an important point I see fans often trivialize a bit too much, so still one important to stress. :twilightsmile:

" And a debt is just another method of control, binding you with a contract until it's paid off."

This one is totally true though, and to be frank anyone who believes or claims otherwise is a fool. No one should have to put themselves in debts such as that just to succeed in life.

So it's kinda frustrating for the dean here to act otherwise in a sort of judgemental, looking down, sort of way.:twilightangry2:

If I had read "Lower Class":

In the Writeoff, the following are the comments I would've given it. Of course, for me, the Writeoff has always been a "first draft contest" where I gather comments, rewrite the story in question, then, if it's a Pony story, post the final version to Fimfiction. Your blog post has made it pretty clear that you're done whittling at this story, so I don't know how helpful these comments will be. But here goes.

First, though, I wanna say how great it is to be reading stuff from you again. I'll add that we're still doing Writeoffs if you ever want to stop by: Winston and I have the only two entries in the Pony Writeoff currently in the judging stage, in fact... :scootangel:

Still, having read "Lower Class" twice now, I'm still not sure I understand the basic, chronological series of events it covers. I thought I had it figured out after the second-to-last chapter, but then in the last chapter, we hear for the first time that Harvey "almost killed" Tank-Top at some point before he attacks Dark. I would've found it helpful to get that info earlier: maybe Dark could tell it to Brittle in the second-to-last chapter as something she learned while Brittle was in talking to the dean and the detective?

Another thing that makes me doubt my understanding of the chronology is Dark's "pronoun trouble" in the last chapter, the way she says that it was Brittle who met with Tank-Top, then says that it was her, then says that it was Brittle again. If she made a slip of the tongue, then it just makes her sound stupid when she tries to insist that she didn't just say what we all heard her say. And if she did it on purpose, then I can't figure out what her plan is. She must have some plan, some reason she wanted to meet Tank-Top, but I can't for the life of me figure out what that reason is. If it's to make sure that he's okay after everything that happened even if talking to him risks blowing up the cover story Brittle put into place, then that's her being a good person right there, isn't it?

Also, if I do understand the chronology, it's got a big hole in it. Because as near as I can tell, Brittle only comes into things after Harvey attacks Dark: is that right? But with the cops still right there at the scene, how does Dark manage to contact Brittle, get him to travel from wherever he is to meet her in the bathroom, and then have enough time alone with him to fill him in on everything that's happened with Catalyst and Harvey and Tank-Top and all?

I'll admit that all the philosophical talk in the last two chapters goes pretty much over my head, but Dark's whole thing is separation from the hive, right? And there's no indication in the story that she's been in contact with Brittle during the two months she's been working for Harvey. So how does Dark manage to give Brittle enough information so that he can put together the lie that makes up most of the story we actually read? The cops would have to be willing to let an assault victim sit alone in a public bathroom for what would have to be a fairly lengthy amount of time, it seems to me, and I can't imagine any cops who would do that.

Maybe in the chapter where Brittle and Dark talk, you could make it clear that they already have a relationship, that she's already told him about Catalyst or that he otherwise already knows what she's been up to? That would make the amount of info she needs to give him in the bathroom much more manageable.

A smaller thing that still bothered me: why does Dark wear thick makeup in her scene with Brittle if she can appear as her uninjured self the way the last chapter tells us she does?

But it's great fun reading a story with not just one but two unreliable narrators. I just wish I'd been able to piece together a clearer picture of what actually happened by the time I got to the end...

Mike

He had awesomed at the sportsball.

This sums up my own total lack of enthusiasm for sports nicely. :rainbowlaugh:

"My breaking confidence about my clients has already caused quite enough trouble." Brittle shook her head. "I'm sorry, ma'am."

She's absolutely right, it's already been proven violently that betraying the trust of her clients like that is not without serious consequence or potential risk to herself. She's also understandably hypersensitive to the matter. I think this is something the dean would be wise to choose her battles on--it's not strictly relevant to the matter at hand, so let it slide. If it's really that important to you, then get Brittle to agree to not continue business with the campus students and the matter ends here regardless, no further betrayals required.

"You are directly enabling nothing less than fraud, Brittle, fraud on a massive scale."

Is she, though? Because as she herself explained it, all she was doing was just take notes on the lectures she sits in on and give them as tools for the students to use so to stay caught up--the rest was still totally up to them to do, especially as Brittle made it clear she does NOT do this for exams, which as far as the college is concerned, the more important part anyway, at least by US standards. She is hardly enabling students to cheat, because there's still the implied challenge for the students to step up and take what Brittle gives them and apply it accordingly, same as if they had attended the lectures themselves.

Besides, the dean is jumping to the assumption that all of the clients are doing this to slack off, but that's not necessarily true. I can totally see some perfectly invested students finding themselves in a legitimate situation where they can't make a lecture and use this so to avoid falling behind and having to catch up and/or avoiding getting another unsavory absence put on their record, which can also detrimentally hurt their grades, that they can't afford to have for whatever reason. Bruttle's really more offering a safety net to those sort of students, and I can totally see how that could be a lifesaver for them.

Is it the best way to get an education? Probably not, and that mixed with the deceptions and Brittle using it to get her own education for free (because heaven forbid schools should be robbed of their right to charge people through the nose for the chance at an honest education [/sarcasm]) stills leaves it in a morally grey area, as already openly admitted. But it's hardly to morally and academically bankrupt thing the dean is trying to spin it as.

"Pop quizzes," White immediately said.

Oh, you're reaching for straws with that and you know it, dean. :trixieshiftleft:

"Grades are a mechanism of assessing knowledge," Brittle said. "If you're passing students who can't prove their knowledge on midterms and finals, your problem isn't with me."

And she's gotcha there, too! :raritywink:

"Then you're a thief," White snapped, her face reddening. "You're stealing education from us, and money from the students. Everyone loses."

See, that's what this is actually about. The dean is chuffed they can't charge her money for it, and again, that's more a personal problem, and one I think most schools are going to find they don't have as high a moral ground as they think.

And it's not actually robbing the students or really the school as much as she claims. If the students are still passing their exams and getting their degrees, then they accomplished precisely what they were there to do, proving it was money well spent. Meanwhile, the school still keeps it's success rate, preserving it's reputation, it's funding, and it's future.

Seems to me all parties involved still win out in the end. The issue is just that it's not in the way the school planned it, but who cares so long as they still get what they wanted in the end too?

"If you're willing to come clean, I'll personally see to it that we can help you turn a new leaf and continue your education on ethical terms. Let's start by giving her the names of all your clients."

Personally, I'd still refuse and say no, consequences be darned, because to me, that'd still be the moral high ground. This isn't about her other clients anyway, they're just exploiting the situation so to get the other students as a consolation prize that I think is undeserved.

But I'm also not the one writing this, so...

"You keep claiming the moral high ground—but if you would like an opportunity for reflection, you only have to look at the changeling who has done it right. Dark Wing faces all the same struggles you do. She keeps her head down, and pays for classes, and earns fantastic grades. She has faced up to her past, and her fear of accepting help, and overcome them."

And it only cost her her soul!

...yeah, you're not exactly selling your case here, dean.

" We're giving you every possible chance, but unlike Miss Wing, you seem determined to prove all the changeling stereotypes correct."

Well then, sounds like you didn't want her there anyway, so all the more reason for her to refuse.

"Otherwise, we will consider any future presence on university property to be criminal trespass, and I assure you I will not hesitate to press charges."

Now that's admittedly fair. It was clear the charade could never continue on this campus anyway.

12078693
Agreed. This is definitely sticking the landing in a way the original was still stumbling.

12080101
Agreeing. This has been hugely improved all over, now everyone has solid motives and a point, and it all ties together in a great package - I especially loved the final line.

And since you didn't GET it I get to be smug and explain it mwahahaha What it means is that Brittle Wing was right - humans ARE starting to expect better of Dark Wing. She is the Good One in their eyes - and so Tank Top is completely right that /she has failed to grow here/, and is genuinely disappointed because he thought she was the Good One (instead of faking it, as she clearly is)

Basically, it means the Sociopath method of trying to be human is starting to pay dividends!

12080298 maaaaaaan okay i guess whatevs (this ties things together in a way I did not initially understand and deepens my appreciation of the story)

If the cops say you don’t need a lawyer, you need a lawyer. Now.

12079032
That Antz comment is more interesting to me than a one off joke should probably be. It implies demographic shift and time, which tells me the changelings have been here for a while- and I'm a little curious what this alt-timeline looks like otherwise. Food for thought in any case.

Fantastic work with Dark Wing, making me hate someone who A) hasn't done anything and B) hasn't even shown up.

"As you might have noticed, unredeemed changelings are jerks. When they do you a favor, the only thing in their mind is what they will get out of it."

That's the part about this hive that I find so ironic, almost tradegically so--they're trying to not stoop to the Chrysalis way, while also not giving up what is, in effect, still the Chrysalis way in essence. They're trying to have their cake and eat it too by trying to be the middle-ground between the Chrysalis and Thorax ideologies to the point they're ALL living in denial of the harsh reality they don't want to admit that it's not working and the two ideologies are too incompatible. They can only ever be one or the other, not both.

They're what I would call the world's worst sort of rebellious, the ones who foolishly go to their graves claiming they can make their own way besides the ones the world already provides, vainly searching for it only to never find it because it never actually existed.

Now I'm all for finding compromises myself, mind you, and think that just defaulting to the "my way or the highway" method of binary absolutes is equally foolish...but I'm also enough of a realist to know that you can't just invent a new option out of nowhere just because you don't want to swallow your pride and accept the ones life has already provided to you.

Brittle is right--Freedom Hive is sick. But they're all too stubbornly persisting with it anyway, Brittle and Dark Wing included, to just face facts and dare to actually do what is really needed to fix it. And so the charade continues.

That said, despite it all, Brittle is also right in that Dark Wing is the hive's best bet for finding the way out of the hole they've dug for themselves...even if Dark Wing herself doesn't understand why herself (and indeed might actually the one who's MOST in denial about the having the cake and eating it too way isn't actually working).

"Unredeemed changelings don't have a model for goodness, only a rainbow-colored living doormat who believes friendship means never saying no."

You know, his name is Thorax, do the guy the favor of actually using it. :trollestia:

That said, Thorax isn't actually as much of a doormat as claimed. Actually, quite the opposite, for if he had been, he never would've dared to step up and start the ball rolling for the reformation, and then you'd all still be rotting under Chrysalis's reign or worse. :raritywink:

"I can tell. You keep evading what you're actually apologizing for."

Yeah, I've noticed this is a reoccurring problem. Keeps trying to keep everybody at arm's length then proceeds to get confused and frustrated on why everybody seems to take issue with that.

"Because Catalyst was trying to fix everything and then vanish without taking credit. Because that's what good people do."

Well...sort of. You can tell here that there's a lot more to it than she presently understands--that's part of why it instead exploded in her face--but I'll grant there was a good intent behind it still.

"You are entirely too hung up on some extremely specific and incorrect words."

Well yes...except it's really more herself that's getting hung up on "specific and incorrect words." All the guy wants is an honest apology and she's too hung up on technicalities to deliver it.

Part of it is simply culture clash--she's looking at it from a typically changeling point of view while he is not--but part of it really is her trying to keep things at arm's length, including the blame, all for the sake of protecting solely herself.

But then she openly forewarned this would be the case at the start of the conversation, so...she's at least aware of it, even though she could do so much more to fix it.

"You absolutely are. Once again you just wanted me here as proof you're a good person." Tank-Top put his hands on the desk and leaned in. "I get it now. You think the act of apologizing makes you good, so just like when you didn’t charge me anything to set me up with a psychopath, you do the thing which you think earns you goodness points. Then, having scored them, you refuse to engage with what's actually going on, and block any possibility of follow-up so nobody can challenge you on it. You’re going to get punched in the face again someday, and you will deserve it, and you will once again learn jack shit."

Yeah, that. That sums it up nicely.

It goes back to what I've been saying--trying to have the cake and eat it too. And it's not working.

Maybe someday she and the rest of her hive will realize why.

12079025
In an effort to clarify the final line, I've deleted two paragraphs from the end, in hopes it strengthens the link from Dark's final quip to the line it's responding to.

12080298 12080776
I'm curious if you think that helps, or if there's anything else which might signpost people toward the intention of the final line in a non-obtrusive way. There's something to be said for subtlety, but I also want people to be able to appreciate it, and it was whiffing a bit too frequently for my tastes.

12079194
Thanks for reading and responding! And I'm glad you brought that up, because the contrast between Thorax's reformed hive and Freedom Hive was extremely deliberate, and the framing of it equally so.

It's entirely possible that Thorax's hive does have problems -- but if so, we only ever hear about them from the perspective of the unredeemed changelings. We are told, repeatedly, that Thorax is awful, or ineffectual, or a "socialist dystopia" -- by characters who spend the entire story being unreliable narrators, lying to each other and to themselves. So yes, for as much noise as the story makes in telling the reader Thorax's problems, it shows the problems with Freedom Hive rather directly.

I tried to make the subtext fairly obvious, but for non-American readers, it's worth noting some of the explicitly American narrative elements. "Freedom Hive" was deliberate naming; the idea of "freedom" as an axiomatic good to be axiomatically prioritized over competing societal benefits is a very American framing. The use of "socialist" as a thought-terminating curse word, too, is an extremely American affectation. I hadn't considered student debt as particularly American -- medical debt is the real standout there -- but, alas, it looks like we're getting there too.

Which is all to say, I agree with your analysis, and I'm glad that the elements of the story which were written to support it came through as intended. :twilightsmile:

12079202
That's certainly a fascinating alternate reading! I did try to include evidence that it was Dark who made the romantic setup and then got attacked -- the ice pack, several lines of their dialogue, the fact that Brittle told Tony to go talk to Dark -- but the evidence is all indirect and there's still ways to get from there to where you landed. It's definitely in line with my framing of the story, which positions Dark as a lot less good than she presents herself, and Brittle as ambiguously good despite fucking Dark over with their deal. Cool to see where people have taken this.

12079226
It was cool to see Biscuit point people at this! And yes, agreed with the idea that the hive is facing down some fundamental problems that are very, very hard to solve while they cling to their current ideals.

12079691
Thank you!

12079802
Unredeemed non-Chrysalis changelings is something that is, if not specifically supported by the series, at least heavily supported. In "Triple Threat" Thorax mentions that there are a bunch of changelings still sticking to the old love-stealing ways. (Though in the Pharynx episode, it's implied he managed to bring some or all of them into the fold.) Having just finished publishing a novel about the Equestria Girls version of Thorax, that deconstruction's been on my mind a lot lately, and I enjoyed being able to flex that in a different direction.

12080101
Thank you for the kind words, and glad that I managed to elevate the story!

The best parts of this fic are those moments when I can't decide if our protagonists are good guys or bad guys--the grey area is a heated pool, and it feels nice to swim around in it.

I put a lot of effort into making everyone feel reasonable from their own POV, so I'm especially chuffed to hear this!

12080183
Good to see you again!

And thank you for the critique. As you note, I don't intend to edit this significantly, but I can at least try to answer some of the questions, and I do definitely appreciate the time you took to thoughtfully let me know what worked and didn't.

I'm not certain there's any way to have Dark and/or Brittle learn about Tank-Top's fate earlier because their search for him entirely drives the last chapter, which I need to drive all the themes home. In a way, though, I feel like what happened to him isn't actually all that relevant to the story, aside from that? I'd have established it with more care if it drove any plot points.

Re Dark's pronoun slip:

says that it was Brittle who met with Tank-Top, then says that it was her, then says that it was Brittle again. If she made a slip of the tongue, then it just makes her sound stupid when she tries to insist that she didn't just say what we all heard her say. And if she did it on purpose, then I can't figure out what her plan is

A lot of the last chapter is caught up in Dark's specific insistence that she isn't Catalyst, and the specific reason she makes that argument: she hints around the edges that she used to be Catalyst, and finally gives up in disgust and admits to Tank-Top that it was her, but tells him that thinking of the two of them as the same person won't end well. This is the fundamental misunderstanding that gets him frustrated at her. By changeling logic, she has declared Catalyst persona non grata, and is abandoning the identity the same way the hive abandoned Chrysalis: recognizing her as evil and trying to not do things her way. Her extremely pointed denials that she was Catalyst are a significant statement: she's drawing a line that she will no longer cross. But by normal human logic, Tony gets frustrated because she's trying to have her cake and eat it too: she's apologizing on behalf of someone else, and conveniently getting to still think of herself as a good person who never made the mistakes she acknowledges. It comes across as extremely passive-aggressive of her.

If it's to make sure that he's okay after everything that happened even if talking to him risks blowing up the cover story Brittle put into place, then that's her being a good person right there, isn't it?
She is certainly making the attempt! Why, though, is a pretty central question.

how does Dark manage to give Brittle enough information so that he can put together the lie that makes up most of the story we actually read? The cops would have to be willing to let an assault victim sit alone in a public bathroom for what would have to be a fairly lengthy amount of time, it seems to me, and I can't imagine any cops who would do that.

To be honest, I kind of handwaved that one. Every SF story gets one implausibility they don't have to justify and that was the one I punted on.

Your suggested edit would be a good thing to do if I do ever take another pass on it.

A smaller thing that still bothered me: why does Dark wear thick makeup in her scene with Brittle if she can appear as her uninjured self the way the last chapter tells us she does?

Oh, dang, good eye. I don't have a satisfying answer for that one. Let's just say that on the day of the interrogation she was extremely rattled and that was a detail she didn't think of at the time. Or perhaps that it was easier covering it up with external assistance than it would have been to fix it herself. :twilightsheepish:

Glad you had fun regardless!

12080298
I award you 500 Honorary Changeling Points for being so accurately on a changeling-brain wavelength, more than any of the humans reading this thread.

12080862
I am also in love with that sort of worldbuilding by implication, and it's awesome to find someone else appreciating the tiny details that way too much thought went into! :rainbowkiss:

12080950
You've been leaving some detailed, well-thought-out comments, which I very much appreciate, but I spent so much time nodding along with them that I'm not sure I have much to add!

There's a lot of people in this story arguing very vehemently for their position despite their blind spots, and you've called 'em all out, and it's really validating to see that I've managed to write flawed arguments whose shortcomings get under readers' skin in exactly the way I intended them to fall short. So, thank you for getting so deeply into it! It's really good to see that after all the blood and sweat I put into this, that there were a lot of ways in which I did end up correctly calling my shot. :heart:

Well, 12081253, I am a socialist myself. (The Albert Camus avatar is a tip-off.) Even if I am aware both of the crimes committed under the fig-leaf of that ideology throughout the twentieth century, or the fact that self-identifying as one is becoming politically dangerous these days, especially in America.

Ironic, really, that America is the nation which can be positively Orwellian in throwing around terms such as "freedom" or "democracy" while stripping them of meaning.

And, thanks for the watch. :pinkiesmile: I may linger on returning the favour right away, but this story suggests an output to me well worth keeping an eye on; I'll see what else of yours I can check out in the coming year.

12081285
It's doubly good for me to hear all of that, because I admit, for the first couple of comments, before I had fully realized all the directions the story was going, I was somewhat worried I was going off on tangents that were only loosely related to the intended themes. So it's good to hear I was on the mark regardless. :twilightsmile:

12081392
If it's worth anything, horizon has been consistently one of the best (to me, THE best) writer on this site for over a decade. Output may be sporadic but it's always worth your time :)

Lambda Omicron Lambda, eh? :rainbowlaugh:

Oh, nice! Didn't quite expect any of this!

12081273

To be honest, I kind of handwaved that one. Every SF story gets one implausibility they don't have to justify and that was the one I punted on.

Direct changeling emotional transfer! Very efficient but puts a strain on you. :raritywink:

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