> Beneath the Sea of Sand
>  by Meep the Changeling
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Prologue: A journey of 4.37 light years begins with spooling the hyperdrive.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Princess Celestia - 1st of Leaffall, ‘09 EoH

“Could you repeat that please?” Luna asked while giving me a look she reserved for dumb statements brought before her in court.

“I am going to send Twilight and the Elements to live in the Emerald’s hive for a year.” I answered, holding my tone at an authoritative, though kind, level.

Luna’s face contorted in a mixture of anger, concern, and confusion. “I know these Emeralds have been a pet project of yours sister, but you want to put our realm’s greatest defenders into the hooves of our enemies?”

“Yes. I am.” I replied, sitting back in my chair to try to find a more comfortable part of the cushion. “The Emeralds are hardly enemies. I just spent a week in their hive myself. You can call Emeralds changelings, but they are drastically different in culture from the other hives. They have embraced Harmony much as we have.”

I reached for a letter atop my desk and passed it to Luna with my magic. The letter was printed on a very high quality paper, and the penmanship was literally perfect. Each letter was completely identical to every other letter on the page, each word perfectly arranged in straight lines. Queen Phoenix certainly had put a lot of time into developing her hoof writing. Or well, whatever she used to write with.

“Read this letter Pheonix gave me as I left. It will help if you see her ideas in her own words.” I asked.

Luna took the letter in her own magic, immediately scanning it like a tactical map from our youth. She spent a few minutes reading, starry mane flowing in the nonexistent wind, nothing moving save her eyes. Luna did not read, she examined, dissected, analyzed.

It was one quality I wish she could teach Twilight. Luna could never take written words at face value. To her there was always something more to be read in the context, then yet even more to find by comparing the context's message with the written words. Though this did mean she would take some time reading even a short message.

“She’s doing her best to push her ideas on us, but isn’t concealing them.” Luna said to herself after a short while.

“Because she truly wants to help our little ponies. She doesn't have to hide anymore, her changelings need to eat, we can provide them with food. As she said to me, ‘It is simple business.’” I informed calmly.

“Don’t changelings harm the ponies they feed upon? How is that business? That’s a despicable act of cruelty.” Luna objected.

I shook my head, “It’s perfectly safe, provided certain guidelines are followed. The Emeralds have spent centuries studying their feeding process. I asked to see them eating, the ponies already living in their hive scarcely feel anything when a changeling feeds off them.”

Luna’s eyes widened in surprise at my words. “There are already ponies living with them?”

“Yes, a population of a few hundred. They are perfectly happy. Though that doesn't mean everypony would be happy living as they do. Many of the ponies are second or third generation. That is how they were raised.”

Luna nodded. “I trust you were able to see through any deception they may have tried. I will take your words as the truth, but there are more issues with your plans than the danger posed by changeling feeding. This Phoenix sees herself as a god, she openly admits to using living creatures like clay, and nations like a canvas. She reminds me a good deal of Sombra.”

I picked up my teacup with my magic and took a short sip. “I was worried about the same thing. I did march six brigades of Royal Guard to her hull. It’s true she sees herself as a god, but to be fair, she is one in a way. She can create objects from thin air, I saw her give a person an entirely new body to save their life. This caused her no stress or strain.

“Phoenix provides every single meal every single pony living with her wishes to have, the moment they want to eat. That is certainly god like.”

Luna nodded, paused for a moment, “Granted, she is powerful and performs many acts we could consider divine-”

“Luna, what are we? From the point of view of an earth pony.” I asked. “We can do anything any one of the pony kinds can five times better. You and I move the heavens, Cadence can shape and mold the bonds between hearts, Twilight can turn even the most evil of creatures into a true friend and use the combined energies of everyone she is friends with to power her magic.”

“I concede your point sister, we are gods in the eyes of a normal pony, or we would be had we not insisted they not form a religion around us. That is not relevant to my point. We were created by the most powerful sorcerers of our age to be what we are that we might bring balance to the world.” Luna set the letter down on my desk.

She turned to the window, and looked out over the soaring spires of Canterlot. “Despite having the powers many attribute to god's, immortality, near-indestructibility, complete control over an aspect of nature, powerful magics, do we call ourselves gods? No. Triek, Grogar, Sombra, these are creatures who did call themselves by the title. Their deeds show the nature of such an individual.”

“There is a flaw in your logic.” I said calmly.

“I don’t see one.” Luna objected.

“Phoenix is not a pony, nor a minotaur, goat, Tartarian, changeling, or any other creature you have seen. You can not apply psychology to her in the same way you would a pony. I do not know enough about her to accurately read her myself, but I do know this much. She was built to be what she is much as we were given our powers through magic. Though she was created entirely from nothing.”

“What are you saying?” Luna asked turning back to me.

“She was built for one single express purpose. She is an artificial being, much like the constructs minotaurs use, though far more complex. Complex enough to be a real living person. My point is she was designed, built, and intended to do exactly as she desires to do, create civilizations and mold life. This makes her different from Triek, Grogar, and Sombra. They sought to become gods and did horrible things to gain their power.”

“Whereas, if you speak truly Phoenix was made to be a god.” Luna shook her head and chuckled. “A mechanical god. The old Latigo phrase ‘Deus ex machina’ comes to mind. Tell me sister, who built her? If she could truly bring us everything she claims why have we not heard from her creators?”

“Well, they are extinct.” I was forced to admit. I did my best to avoid frowning.

“What makes you think she could help us, assuming her offer is sincere?” Luna asked in a triumphant tone.

“She says they were destroyed by a power even greater than they were. Also she was one of many similar machines, though none were as large and capable as she is.” I answered.

“Furthermore, she never performed her duties. Her people were violent, cruel, and despicable despite their advances. They used the powers they gave her selfishly, and this destroyed them. Phoenix understands Harmony, her creators did not.”

“Can you be certain of that?” Luna asked, her eyes pleaded with me, begging me to change my mind. She could tell words wouldn’t change my mind.

“Not completely, but I am certain Twilight and her friends can deal with any problems which may arise.” I chuckled, “Let’s be honest, if I sent somepony else as an ambassador and something went wrong, we would just send Twilight anyways.”

Luna blinked, opened her mouth to speak, closed it, and nodded slowly. “Thou make an excellent point sister. I had not considered the strategic advantage of your plan.”

I smiled grimly. “If Phoenix is sincere and wishes to help us to help herself, Twilight will learn everything we need to know to truly consider her proposal to try and integrate our peoples into a single nation. If she is not and this is a ruse of some sort, Twilight will discover it, and we have our most powerful mages already on location to solve the problem.”

“From that light, your plan has merit.” Luna admitted. “Though what if it is a trap? If Twilight is discovered to be there partially as an arcane deterrent in case of sinister plans, and there are indeed sinister plans ahoof, she, or one of the Elements could be injured or even slain.”

“Which is why we will tell her nothing of the strategic side of her stay with the Emeralds.” I informed. “She is a very smart mare, I trust her to take charge of the situation appropriately if it goes wrong. Besides, Twilight did an excellent job of stopping human technology last time it threatened-”

I flinched as I realized I had named Phoenix's creators. The recent war was still rooted firmly In Luna’s mind.

“She is human technology?” Luna exclaimed, wings flaring in shock and horror. “Sister, art thou inebriated? The death, pain, and suffering their kind hath wrought will be felt for ten generations! Nothing they have produced will help us.”

“Humans can hardly be called an evil species. I remember you comparing them to Sombra’s thralls during the war.” I said, hoping to control the damage I had caused.

“They served their master unwillingly, yes, but their species produced that same monster, and every cruel weapon they fought with! The human species has done nothing but-”

“Megan Williams.” I said loudly.

Luna stopped mid rant, her ears falling, head hanging, “That is a name we have not remembered in a thousand years… I swore to keep her always in my thoughts.”

“The Admiral was to humans what Sombra is to ponies. We must remember they have their Twilights too.” I said gently lifting Luna’s head with my hoof, “Megan would forgive you for forgetting about her. You shouldn’t fret. You did make a constellation to remember her by.”

Luna nodded again. I could tell by the look in her eyes I had won our argument. “I know you will remind me it was a human who created the Elements and planted the Tree of Harmony. I… I had forgotten. It was so long ago, and her species has caused us so much pain so recently.”

Luna smiled softly as she remembered the adventures of our youth. Flying with Megan on her back while battling Triek when we first banished him had been one of her favorite battles. “Do you think she returned home safely? It would be a shame for someone to have given our species so much to have- Oh. I see your point now sister.”

“One human gave us the power to protect our ponies from the evils lurking in the darkness. Now, one of their children could give us an equally valuable gift.” I pointed out the window to our Kingdom, “Imagine everypony always with enough food to eat, every hospital with an endless supply of medicine, no illness or injury ever left untreated. Yes, it sounds too good to be true, but as Equestria’s guardians we must seriously investigate such an opportunity.”

Luna picked up my quill and a sheet of parchment with her magic and held them out to me. “I trust you will permit me to prepare our armies, just incase? Without telling them of the possible danger of course.”

“That’s a wise precaution.” I said as I accepted the parchment and quill. “But not a word of this to anypony. Twilight is simply visiting a hive which wishes to become a province of the Kingdom.”

Luna nodded. “My lips are latched.”

“Sealed Luna, it’s ‘My lips are sealed.’” I corrected.

Putting quill to parchment, I began to write a letter to Twilight, as well as a copy each for Applejack, Rainbow, Rarity, Fluttershy, and Pinky. It would be best to let them know of their orders two months in advance.

          Phoenix - 3rd of Chillfrost, ‘09 EoH

It had been so long since I had been in full repair, I had forgotten what it felt like. Literally. So much time had passed since some part of my hull wasn’t broken that the memory had physically degraded. This time I would take steps to preserve that memory, it’s wonderful when nothing attached to you hurts!

Armored sat in the captain’s chair on my bridge, I was completely happy with my decision to make the cybernetic mare my Captain. Nopony else treated me like a friend the way she did. Or had the command experience required. Or could talk to machines and keep my systems running. Or was as cute.

She tapped her hoof on her armrest, waiting for me to finish my diagnostics. I had finished them a full five minutes ago to tell the truth. I just wanted to sit for a few moments and be happy nothing was broken before we probably broke something.

“All systems operating at peak efficiency.” I announced with glee and a touch of apprehension.

Armored patted her chair’s left arm rest affectionately. “Don’t worry Phee, the shields will hold.”

The bridge doors hissed open, Captain Skritt, the Emerald Hive’s social leader trotted in and took a seat at my tactical station. “Is everything ready here?” He asked calmly.

“Yes.” Armored and I said together.

“Everything is clear for five kilometers around your hull your Highness. It’s safe to take off.” He informed. After a moment’s hesitation he added, “Some of the nymphs in crew quarters 14 would like to make a broadcast as you lift off. They say it’s in the tradition of the Hazard Squadron's use of music when dramatically appropriate.”

That could be fun! “What cabin?” I asked.

“24d.” He answered.

I quickly linked their cabin’s comm system with the rest of the ship. “Okay. Armored, ready to give the order?”

She nodded and brushed a lock of her spiky near-purple pink mane out of her eyes. “Attention all hooves, this is Captain Armored speaking. Brace for lift off. Music will be provided by some of the hive.”

I switched on my repulsors. My hull instantly twitched, creaking under the strain of the rock and sand around me as I went from being supported by the earth to supporting myself. A few seconds later the sound of a trumpet blasted from the comm system.

I diverted as much power as I could to my shields and armor generators, and slowly began to push myself upwards. The rock began to crack and crumble, unable to resist the force of my repulsors pushing upwards. The first bar of the song completed, a cheery tune, hopeful, and totally from my favorite show.

I quickly opened a private comm channel to Taylor. “Did you put those nymphs up to this?”

“It was the most appropriate tune I could think of.” she replied with a laugh.

Armored shook her head slowly, a grin forming on her lips. “It’s even funnier because the bridge matches… I guess I had better say it.”

The rock buckled as my bridge started to push free from the rocky prison I had occupied for so long. “Better be quick.”

She nodded, sat straight up in her chair, pointed with a hoof out the bridge window as rock and sand began to slid down to reveal the surface of the badlands, and intoned, “Yamato, ascend!”

I giggled silently for a few picoseconds. My repulsors began to whine under the stress of pushing myself through the earth, so to take my mind off it I decided to sing along to the music. In the proper Japanese of course!

“Saraba Chikyu yo, tabidatsu fune wa, / Uchu Senkan Yamato!” As I finished the first line my hull lurched, the last of the earth holding me down sliding off my teardrop shaped bulk like water off a duck’s back.

“That’s an awfully big hole we’ve left behind.” Skritt mused looking at my tactical display. “Also I am fairly certain they felt that in Applelooza.”

“Meh, should only have been a 2.2 at most.” I said dismissively. “I suppose I should fill in the hole though. I am going to put a city there after all.”

Armored nodded, “I was going to ask you to do that anyways. If we leave a bunch of loose earth around Tatzelwurms will nest there. Nopony wants that. Do you have enough power to replicate that much dirt?”

“Yes, but screw that! I’ve been stuck in solid rock for a few million years.” I objected.

I quickly opened a comm channel to the ship, fading the nymph's band to silence slowly. “Thanks for the song little guys. Okay everyling, it looks like I’ve left a big hole and need to refill it. Who wants to go get an asteroid to stick in it? It can't be too long of a trip, we have a city to build after all, but we could do a five minute jump to Alpha Centauri.”

The combined squees of three thousand changelings resonated through my hull. The only comparable sound in history was a million teenage human females upon seeing a boy band walk onstage. The fact this was for getting to go into space gave me a warm tingly feeling in my core.

“That’s what I thought!” I giggled. “Everyling who wishes to get to a window should do so now. Everyling else, turn your viewscreen to channel ten. I’ll put my forward cameras feed there for you.

Armored sat back in her chair and crossed her arms behind her head. “Now if only you would climb out of your core so i could give you a congratulatory hug.”

“You could hug my avatar.” I offered, spawning my holographic orange alicorn projection next to her seat as I plotted the FTL jump.

“That’s not the same as hugging something made of matter.” She said politely.

This again. I didn’t want to disconnect from my hull. Why couldn’t she accept that? “I have some asteroids to mine. Now’s not the time to think about coaxing me out of my hull.”

Armored gave my avatar a pat on the head, the hologram cracking slightly as it was disturbed. “I’m going to pester you till I get to see you at least once, but you’re right. Now’s not the time.”

“Thank you.”

I switched on my drive motors and within a few minutes cleared the atmosphere. As the blue sky faded to black and the stars slowly began to wink into existence, I could hear the excited comments and exclamations every single person on board. It was almost as invigorating as flying again.

Armored stared out the bridge’s main window, a look of wonder on her face as the moon came into view right as we left the ionosphere and entered orbit.

“So then Phee, I think it’s about time we got underway. I’ve been looking forward to seeing space since I met you.” Armored said happily.

“Course and heading Captain?” I asked as prompted by my program.

She paused for a moment, as if searching for something to say. “Second star to the right, and... straight on till morning.”

“Tess is rubbing off on you.” I commented, holding back my giggle at her Kirk impression.

“Yeah,” she admitted with a laugh before thrusting her left hoof forwards and shouting, “Punch it!”

My hull shook, everything aboard feeling a slight tug as we shot forwards, everything blue shifting to gray as we hit lightspeed. I knew everyling aboard would be disappointed if I didn’t say a few words.

“Space, the final frontier. The eventual home of all technologically advanced life. The birthright of all explorers. Though this is a short mining run, one day soon every one of you will be able to come here as you please. To seek out new life and new civilizations. To boldly go where no one has gone before.

“But you mustn't forget your homeworld, the rock and soil which gave you birth. There is work to be done there before we begin to spread across the stars. I can’t take everyling everywhere you will want to go, and you will need loving people with you to sustain you on your journey. Our homeworld will need to be the hub of a new civilization; a civilization of ponies and changelings unified as one people.

“The next time we return to the cosmic ocean, it will be with a fleet of ships and friends at our sides. It will be not the voyages of a ship and her crew, but the journey of the changeling and pony races into prosperity.”

My hull lurched, the stars snapping back into view as we dropped from FTL in orbit around another star. The planet Alpha Centauri Bb spun through space just a short distance below us. My sensors picked up traces of a few decaying starships, and the ruins of a starbase in orbit.

“Welcome to the stars my children.” I said as I began scanning for an appropriate asteroid to mine.
> 1 - Trixie needs no narrator to tell her story!
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Great and Powerful Trixie! - 1st of Snowfall, ‘09 EOH

The Groggy and Cold Trixie peeled one eye slowly open to see what had roused her from sleep on the first day of winter. Yet again, Rainbow had rolled herself up into a pony-burrito with all of Trixie and Twilight’s blankets after kicking her own off the bed. Trixie had told Twilight simply having one big bed would never do, but did she listen?

Of course not, the Smart and Purple Twily still has yet to rely on common sense rather than empirical evidence for the small things in life. While her three way marriage idea had certainly worked for Trixie and her wives, separate beds were better. Then nopony would steal Trixie’s hoof stitched quilt in the middle of the first snowfall in a castle made of crystals an unlit fireplace.

Even still, Trixie should have been warmer. The Fast and Blue Dashie was warm to the snuggle, when sandwiched between her mares Trixie was warm even without her quilt. Looking over her shoulder Trixie noticed Twily was gone.

She sat up to look around for her, but Twily was nowhere to be seen in the polar vortex of her bedroom. Trixie would have to search for her, the quest for warmth lay before her like a sea of ice-water. The stallion covering for Dashie on the weather team needed to know what the phrase ‘too cold’ means. Trixie would happily tell him that was any temperature below that of a warm shower.

Trixie slid out of bed, gave Dashie an irritated poke with her magic, and trotted off to search for the Warm and Cuddly Twily. Or coffee, Trixie could also be content with coffee.

As she trotted groggily down the hallway Trixie’s ears perked, somepony was frantically moving things about in Twily’s study. A few more steps and she could hear Twily’s voice muttering to herself in that frantic and distressed way which made Twily oddly cute. Entering the room Trixie could see Twilight repacking all of her bags, again.

Trixie gently booped Twily’s nose with her magic, smiled, and yawned, and informed, “The Groggy and Cold Trixie needs help retrieving her blankets from Rainbow. Or snuggles. Or coffee. Please.”

Twilight yelped as she was booped, startled as always by Trixie’s playful gesture. “Oh! Hi hon. Have you seen my copy of ‘Inside the Swarm’? I really need to be absolutely sure I am completely prepared for-”

Trixie trotted up and gently put a hoof over Twily’s mouth. “Trixie knows Twily is already prepared for our… vacation.” Trixie said reassuringly.

Twily’s ears drooped sheepishly. “But… what if I need to know what the specific body language of someling means? Penstripe’s treaty on changelings insisted their language is two thirds nonverbal. I don’t want to offend someone and have to live with an enemy for a whole year!”

Trixie reached with her magic to lift a copy of ‘Basic Spellcasting’ and dangle it in front of Twilight’s nose. “Trixie’s Silly and Over-thinking Twily literally wrote the translation spell that includes Changelish.”

“But… But I only had Meep and a few dozen changelings from Ruby Hive to help me! The Emerald’s dialect could be completely different!” Twily protested.

Trixie rolled her eyes and reached behind Twily’s ear, producing a glass of water with her prestidigitation. “Twily should calm down before she goes all Smarty Pants on everypony.”

Twilight blushed and picked the glass up with her magic. “You really have to show me how you do that sometime.”

“A magician never reveals her secrets.” Trixie said with a smile as she looked around the messy library. It was more fun to keep Twily guessing. Besides, nopony ever believed Trixie when she did tell them.

“You have made a huge mess again. Trixie will help clean up if you retrieve her blankets from Dashie.” Trixie promised.

Twilight’s ears dropped as she took a sip of the water. “She did it again? Already? That’s an evening early… I’ll have to refine the equation again.”

“Trixie will pretend she didn’t hear that.” Trixie mumbled irritably. “You’re not really worried about speaking buggy, you’re afraid of leaving home.”

Twilight bit her lip nervously and nodded. “Y-yeah. It will be a great learning experience, but what if something happens! Spike can handle a lot of things, and Mayor Mare can pick up the political issues, but they are only so good at their jobs.”

A yawn from the doorway caught Trixie’s attention. “Am I too late for Twilight’s last minute freakout?” the Cold-making and Blanket-stealing Rainbow asked.

“The Great and Powerful Trixie demands you stop stealing her blankets!” I informed loudly. Then added, “No she’s in the middle of it.”

“Hey! I warned you two I roll around in my sleep.” Dash protested. A playful look formed on her face, “You know, you could always tie me down for bed.”

Trixie giggled, “Trixie might do that… but she and Dashie would probably lose some sleep!”

Twilight sighed, “Girls, we should make sure we all are on our best behavior for the mission. We need to make a good impression on them, and we need to stay open to any oddities their culture might have. I mean, I have no problem with Dash’s preferences for fun, but that could be entirely culturally inappropriate.

“See? This is why I am freaking out! We know nothing of what kind of behaviors are acceptable. There are no studies on the Emeralds at all because of the no visitors policy they used to have!”

Dash nodded to herself. “Right, I’m at the good bit of her freakout.”

I nodded as well. “Yes. We should do something about the Overreacting and Panicked Twily.”

Trixie and Dash performed the ‘it’s okay’ maneuver, glomping the lavender alicorn on either side, lifting her onto our backs, and quickly running her to the kitchen, ignoring all protests. Once inside the kitchen, Dashie plopped Twilight into a chair while Trixie began to make a grilled cheese sandwich.

Five minutes, lots of loving flirts from Dash, and two sandwiches later, Trixie’s mares were all happy. Except Trixie, who was still cold.

“Thanks girls… I- I just was well you know.” Twilight sighed gently.

“Yeah, we know.” Dashie smiled and wrapped an arm around Twily. It made Trixie feel a little jealous, so she hugged Twily from the other side.

“Look, Twi,” Dash said simply, “everypony you spent two whole months choosing to be in charge of whatever will do a good job. You literally wrote charts and everything.”

“Trixie remembers the forty five minute speech on Spike’s efficiency as a military deterrent.” Trixie mentioned. “You had comparative pie charts and bar graphs with a decade of data each.”

Dash nodded. “Right! You’ve prepared like, way more than anypony would prepare for anything! Well… with the exception of you preparing for absolutely anything. It’s also not like we are going to be on our own in the hive. Our whole social circle gets to go too! It’s just going to be a kinda weird long, hopefully awesome vacation.”

Twilight nodded slowly, ears drooping in embarrassment. “I know, but I can’t help it. I get excited and then I think of everything that could go wrong! The only time that didn’t happen was when I thought of asking you two to share me.”

“Trixie is happy that mostly has worked out.” Trixie said soothingly. “But Dashie is right. This will be fun, Twiliy needs to relax, she won't do her job stressed out.”

“Mostly?” Dash and Twilight asked together.

Trixie narrowed her eye, giving the most intense stare possibly for a pony to give directly into their eyes. “Trixie never gets to keep her blankets! It is her only complaint.”

Twilight giggled, “I’m sorry hon, I’ll see about a solution, maybe enchanting our blankets to stay in place.”

Dash’s ears drooped, she leaned in and gave Trixie an apologetic kiss. “Sorry GPT, I can’t help it. I never sleep well unless I’m on a cloud. Or one of AJ’s trees.” She added thoughtfully.

Trixie nodded in agreement. “Yes, AJ’s trees are oddly comfortable.”

“Yeah,” Twilight agreed. “I’ve been meaning to study her orchard to determine the cause of her trees’ unusually comfortable nature… Oh crap! Did I remember to help AJ find farmhooves to cover for her?”

Dashie and Trixie nodded together, replying in a monotone. “Yes.”

“What about Fluttershy’s wildlife rehab center?” She asked.

“Treehugger is on it. Sure, she’s not as good, but she’s okay enough.” Dash answered.

“The Cakes?”

“Trixie demands Twiliy relax! We have had this conversation ten times now.” Trixie said as calmly as she could manage.

Twilight nodded sheepishly. “Right! Sorry… Um… Is there anything we have actually forgotten?”

Dash gave Twilight a nose boop. “To enjoy the start of our first non-dangerous adventure in like, six years!”

Twilight and Trixie gave her a suspicious look. “You are looking forwards to a safe adventure?” we asked together.

“When it’s with some changelings yeah!” Dash grinned jumping up to hover in the air. “They have a whole different way of flying! I’ve never gotten to talk to one who was a good flier before, think of all the cool tricks I can learn!”

Twilight stood up. “I get it! We just need to focus on the good things more. I’ll bet they have a rather interesting library. We know they have a written language, and that means they have books!”

Trixie nodded, happy the Brilliant and Sweet Twilight was back to her normal self. “Trixie looks forward to seeing what their little buggies think of her magic!”

“Yeah, who knows they might have someone you could learn a few new tricks from.” Dash quipped. Then immediately eeped and covered her mouth with one hoof.

Trixie knew what Dashie feared she would do, so naturally Trixie played into it and laughed, “The Great and Powerful Trixie is the greatest magician on any stage!”

“Trixie, sweetie, she didn’t mean to belittle your magic by-” Twilight began, but Trixie cut her off with a raised hoof.

Trixie made a gesture with her hoof, making a brand new deck of cards appear. “This is a new deck of cards, in the plastic.” She held it out to Dash with a grin. “Open it.”

Dash groaned and took the cards, “Look, I’m sorry… I know your performances and stage persona is so important to you that you never stop doing it.”

Trixie gave her a raised eyebrow.

“Oh, okay.” Dash sighed and opened the deck of cards.

“In your hooves you hold a new deck of cards. Trixie will take the two instruction cards off the bottom,” she said while performing the moves with her bare hooves, “then one of the Discords from the top. Now you have fifty three cards, in new deck order, perfectly arranged. Trixie will set these three cards on the table. Shuffle the deck.”

Dash nodded, humoring Trixie as usual and shuffled the cards.

“Now draw one card. It’s okay to show it to Trixie.” Trixie asked.

“Is this seriously just a ‘found your card’ trick?” Dash moaned. She drew the seven of diamonds.

“No. Write your name on the card.” Trixie asked, producing a quill from thin air with a flick of her hoof.

“Um, okay.” Dash scribbled her name on the card as best she could.

Trixie took the cards in her magic and shuffled them a half dozen times. “Now lets put them back in the box.”

Dash nodded, picked up the box and Trixie slid the cards into it. Then she moved Dashie’s hooves to surround the deck of cards, and held her hooves in her own tightly. “Now, if Trixie could open that deck and find your card, would that be a good trick?”

“Not really, you showed Scoots how to do that.” Twilight commented.

“Quite true!” Trixie answered, “What if she flipped Dashie’s card the other way round so it faced the opposite direction of the other cards without opening the box?”

“That would be pretty good.” Dash commented in an honest tone.

“Foals play! What if Trixie flipped your card, arranged the deck in new deck order, and put the plastic back around the box?” Trixie asked intensely.

“That would be awesome!” Dash admitted with a smile.

“Trixie already did.” Trixie informed letting go of Dash’s hooves to make herself a sandwich.

“What?” Dash said looking between her hooves at a plastic wrapped deck of cards.

Twilight trotted over and looked at the deck suspiciously. “No cuts in the plastic…” She opened the cards up, fanned them out, and dropped them in surprise. Dash’s face up card landed between the rest, her name written on its face.

“How?” Dash begged incredulously.

“The Great and Powerful Trixie reserves her good magic for shows she charges for!” Trixie sang.

“You didn’t cast a single spell! I was watching!” Twilight protested.

“Who wants-” Trixie wished she had her cape for a dramatic swoosh as she spun around on her rear hooves, while producing a tray of pizza rolls, “-pizza rolls?” she asked dramatically.

Twilight and Dash stared at Trixie for a full minute before Dash pointed to her with a hoof and said to Twilight. “This! This is why we love her.”

Twilight giggled and took a few of the pizza rolls. “Seriously Trixie, one day you need to tell me how you do that.”

“Trixie will consider your request.” Trixie said playfully.

The next two hours before sunrise were spent making sure everything was packed. We had agreed to leave early in the morning, just after sunrise. Why? Because Queen Phoenix offered to send somepony to pick us up in a vehicle of some sort, and we didn’t want to frighten anypony.

We had agreed to be picked up on Applejack’s farm, because it had the space needed or something like that. There was more important things to focus on than silly details. Trixie was happy to see everypony together, it had been a long time since a family gathering like this had taken place.

Pinkie was always fun to see, she always liked Trixie’s tricks. There was still a little bit of a sore spot left with Applejack form the last time everypony got together. (Trixie misread her attachment to her lasso for something else. Offers were made, embarrassment was had.) Rarity was always fun to talk to, she made Trixie’s new wardrobe at a very reasonable price. Fluttershy was oddly happy today, but Trixie had no idea what the reason might be. It was great to see everyone talking and having fun.

Of course, Twilight and Dashie’s friends weren't really Trixie’s family, but she could pretend. Trixie had no idea where or who her real family was, so she simply substituted her mares’ friends. The best part was making their fillies call Trixie their ‘Great and Powerful Auntie’.

Those three weren't so young anymore. There had been an accident with a spell and a time machine. Apple Bloom, Scootaloo, and Sweetie Bell had been gone for three years for all of us, but a decade for them. The three had apparently sworn to somepony very important they wouldn’t talk about their adventure unless it was important to the immediate situation. Something about wibbly-wobbly time and flux capacitors.

They were grown mares now, in their late twenties, even if they didn’t act like it most of the time. In truth Trixie preferred foalish ponies to mature ponies. The spark of childhood is a wonderful thing no pony should fully extinguish.

It was always nice to watch small town ponies. Trixie travels a lot, so she gets to see how ponies act all over. In big cities ponies always stuck close to their special somepony, like they were afraid somepony else would steal them away. In smaller towns where everypony knew, or at least knew of, everypony else, groups would mingle fluidly, with special someponies occasionally meeting back up to catch up on the others time so far or share a meal.

If this were a city, AJ and Rarity would have been side by side, not a few dozen yards apart talking to Fluttershy and Pinkie. Also Trixie would be sandwiched by her mares. Ponyfeathers, if this were a city she probably would not have her mares.

The idea of couples was simply too ingrained into ponies of Trixie’s age. Mini-herds like her own were exceptions, even though most everypony preferred multiple partners. Sometimes social reforms simply go against how ponies naturally behave, accidentally making us sadder rather than happier. Fortunately for everypony who ever felt horrid for liking someone in addition to their lover, that silly idea was slowly dying. Love was slowly becoming free again.

Though most ponies wouldn’t have noticed it. Trixie was lucky to have traveled so much, it gives a pony a unique point of view to see how all the different ponies like to live. You get to see what makes ponies happy and what makes them sad.

Which is why Trixie was happy her friends and loved ones were going on a real trip for once. World saving adventures didn’t count. A pony needs to stop and smell the roses to say she has traveled. There would be new things for everypony to learn, everypony would probably come back with an extra bag filled with neat new things. Trinkets from the roadside. Trixie had a lot of trinkets.

Everypony had packed at least three bags for the trip, so Trixie had volunteered to watch the bags while everypony else chatted excitedly about what might happen later today. The bags offered some protection from the horrible coldness of the winter’s first wind.

After some time talking to Dashie, Scootaloo detached herself from the herd and trotted over to Trixie. “Hey Aunt Trixie… Can we talk?”

Trixie did not like that tone. It was the tone of an awkward conversation about to strike like a bag of hammers falling from a cliff top. “Well… Trixie supposes she could talk with you. What is it?”

“Er- Well, when you live in the same house as somepony else you notice things you're not supposed to… You know bedroom stuff.” Scoots mentioned as awkwardly and bluntly as an appropriate metaphor for her shambling speech.

Trixie’s ears drooped. “This is not an appropriate topic for being in public.” she said, tapping her hooves together nervously.

“Well, yeah but it’s rare that mom or Twilight isn’t all over you… I just wanna know what the stuff with the straps and stuff is called so I can-”

“Ask anypony who isn’t with your adoptive mother, please.” Trixie pleaded.

“But were going away for a whole year!” Scoots protested.

“It’s still very hard for Trixie to see you as an adult Scootaloo.” Trixie groaned, “Even then, it’s not appropriate to ask a family member those kind of questions.”

A sneaking suspicion built up in the back of Trixie’s mind. She had to ask something. “Who would you be playing with? Trixie doesn't mind talking about her niece’s first dates.”

“Okay…” Scoots whined in a perfect Dash impression. She opened her mouth to say something more when a loud rumbling in the distance made everypony’s ears perk.

Trixie turned around to get a look at what could be making the sound. After a few moments a large, dull sand colored boxy vehicle with an orange stripe down the side pushed it’s way out of the forest’s edge. It was like one of the self-driving cars in the Griffon Kingdom, only huge, and painted in a horrible color scheme.

“Oh my Celestia,” Rarity moaned dramatically, “that thing’s coloring looks even worse then I remember!”

“You’ve seen that before?” Apple Bloom asked curiously.

“Yeah! Two months ago when we did that thing with the Diamond Dog mine. The pilot's really cute!” Pinkie said excitedly bouncing in place. “You know, for a bipedal mishmash of different creatures, but in a more blenderized way than a chimera or a hippogriff. Or a chimicherrychanga.”

The vehicle rolled to a stop a few yards ahead of the herd with a squeak of metal on metal. A small door on the side popped open a moment later, and a green eyed, pale green maned changeling poked her head out, looking around for a moment before spotting us and waving. “Hey! I’m Ad’ika, is everypony ready? I’ll help you load up your bags and stuff.”

“I remember you!” Twilight said with a smile, quickly frowning, “Did your wounded friend get healed?”

Ad’ika nodded and stepped out of the vehicle. For a changeling, she was oddly developed. Trixie had been to several changeling hives, she knew what each changeling caste looked like, and none of them had quite as distinct a shape as this one. This intrigued Trixie.

“She’s doing great! It was nothing her Highness couldn’t fix.” Ad’ika’s horn glowed, several small hatches along the bottom of the vehicle popped open, revealing spaces to place our bags.

Everypony moved forwards, dragging their own bags with them. After Trixie put her own three large duffel bags into one of the cargo spaces she tapped the green shelled buggy on her shoulder, “Trixie would like to know if all of your hive has a unique appearance.”

She blinked as she was tapped, tilting her head in confusion. “Then she can ask me?”

Applejack laughed and shook her head at the changeling. “Ah-deeka was it?”

“Ad’ika.” Ad’ika corrected. “Less emphasis on the ‘a’.”

“Sorry, that’s just my accent.” AJ apologized then pointed a hoof at me. “Well, as ah was sayin, she’s Trixie. She always talks like that.”

“Oh! That’s odd. No offense meant.” Ad’ika said turning back to me. “Yes, we all have a unique look. Our hive has a lot of ponies in it, most of us are at least one tenth pony so we are a little different looking from other hives. Is there any reason you speak in third person?”

Everypony’s heads quickly whipped around to look at Trixie. Trixie had never been asked that question by anyone in town before. Their reactions would be amusing.

“The Great and Powerful Trixie was told in magician's college that smoking poison joke would enhance a unicorn’s magical ability.” Trixie answered truthfully. “So she tried it. Now Trixie speaks very distinctly.”

Everypony was quiet for a good long while. Trixie tried not to giggle at their expressions as they process that fact.

Twilight broke the silence first. “Er- hon, Zecora has a poison joke antidote. We could swing by real quick before we-”

Trixie shook her head. “Touching the flower can be reversed, but not smoking it. Trixie already asked Zecora, many years ago. It’s okay, Trixie actually enjoys her idioms! It only affected her speaking, not her mind.” Also her internal monologue, but they did not need to worry about that.

“Did it work?” Sweetie Belle asked curiously.

“No. Trixie does not recommend smoking flowers of bestow curse.” Trixie said with a giggle. “She used to be quite the silly filly.”

Ad’ika shook her head. “Well at least you didn’t start randomly shifting every thirty seconds. I napped in that stuff once.”

The buggy swept her hoof towards the door. “If everyone would get in we can get underway.”

Dash, Twilight, and Trixie waited for everypony else to get in. As Twilight stepped into the vehicle she gasped. “Oh my gosh! I don’t remember it looking like this!”

Trixie peaked into the machine curiously. The inside was very sleek looking. Shiny black floors with a silver grid separating the floor into tiles, glowing orange shapes made from light showing… things decorated the walls. There was plenty of space for everypony to sit, a full table, couch, and two large chairs left enough room for everypony but Ad’ika and Trixie to take a seat.

Trixie didn’t mind sitting on the floor, it was smooth, shiny, and warm to the touch. Unlike her bed had been this morning, or the cold winter air had been outside. In fact, the odd little vehicle was rather warm. Pleasantly warm.

“Is there some sort of magic heating in this?” Twilight asked curiously.

There was a squeak as a chair in front of the large window at the front rotated to reveal… an adorable pink furred bipedal unicorn mare with perhaps a touch of feline blood in her! To Trixie's greater shock the mare smelled a bit like a stallion as well as a mare, she also was fully dressed in a black and red skirt and vest outfit. It looked very military-like, but was also quite sexy due to being what looked to be high quality artificial leather.

“The Sagan doesn't have any magic in her. She’s pure tech.” The Blue and Pink Adorable-Alien-Mare said in the cutest singsong voice. Trixie swore she was from a species which had somehow weaponized cuteness. It was almost scary.

“I’m Taylor Shepard, captain of the Sagan, and a member of Phoenix's Hazard Squadron. I’ll be taking you to your new home today, if you have any questions, please keep them in your mind Phee will answer anything you might want to know when you get there. Frankly, I don’t know too much about things yet. I’m still studying up on the tech.” she introduced herself with a little half bow before turning her seat back around.

Ad’ika pulled the door shut and trotted over to the other chair in what Trixie assumed was the wheelhouse. The buggy turned her chair around to face everypony as the vehicle started to move forwards with a slight lurch.

“I’d be happy to answer any simple questions you may have.” she informed.

“Oh oh!” Twilight thrust a hoof into the air a half second before Trixie suspected anypony had even thought of a question.

“Yes?” Ad’ika asked politely.

“What powers this vehicle?” Twilight asked eagerly, “When we were tracking you guys in the badlands I swore it had a mag-”

The vehicle lurched to a sudden halt, sending Trixie sliding a foot towards its front end.

Taylor turned around slowly in her chair, a rather frightening look on her face, and said in a serious, rage barely contained tone, “First rule of the Sagan, do not talk about it’s power source. Do not even think about the concept of power at all, and above all else, do not, and I am serious, do not think about these rules. Just no thought at all about the power supply...Thinking about it shorts it out.”

“She’s serious.” Ad’ika said in a supportive tone. “Please, someone ask another question. We can't get moving again until we have power.”

“Also we will be flying to Gaia, so seriously, don’t make us crash.” Taylor pleaded.

Rarity nodded grimly, clearly holding back a comment about the stupidity of such a power generator. “I see, well, I for one would like to know how homes will be arranged. We are all good friends, but we have our own intimate relations. I am sure you know ponies enjoy privacy for certain activities.”

“All living quarters in the city of Gaia are groups of bedrooms centered around a shared common room, attached by a hallway to the rest of the living complex.” Ad’ika answered. “Er, we have not assigned you one because well, how many rooms will you need?”

Pinkie grinned and began to point to everypony as couples. “I’m single, so is Shy. Rarijack are an item, and so are the Great and Powerful Twidash!”

Trixie blinked, “Did you give everypony terrible romance novel couple names?”

“Yeperooni!” Pinkie giggled.

Trixie facehooved along with everypony else. Except the buggy who giggled.

“Oh good! Ponies do multiple partners. That would have been a culture clash from hell! So that's seven rooms then?” Ad’ika asked.

“Er- Just five, actually.” Apple Bloom shyly informed, looking away from her sister with an embarrassed look.

“Bloom…” AJ sighed. “Everypony knows you three are together.”

“Yeah,” Dash added, “You guys are grown mares, you spend all of your time together, like literally all of it, and you grew up together.”

“We’ve known since you came back from your… misadventure.” Rarity added gently.

“You’re not mad? Or weirded out?” Scoots asked cautiously.

Trixie rolled her eyes. “Plenty of ponies date one of their foalhood friends. Everypony here is okay with Trixie having two special someponies. You should stop being silly.”

“You three were inseparable as fillies, and then you had a ten year long adventure together. It’s only natural for you three to grow close.” Twilight soothed. “I know you promised somepony you wouldn’t talk about what happened, and I’ve respected that. I’ve had my own time travel problems. But as your mom I would like to know how you three well, you know. Nopony forced you to do anything did they?”

The three quickly shook their heads. “Oh buck no! We just had nopony else to get close too.” Scoots exclaimed.

“We were the only three ponies around for like eight whole years.” Bloom elaborated.

“Friendship evolved, that’s all.” Sweetie finished.

Pinkie giggled, “Everypony figured you three were a thing since you were in high school anyways.”

Ad’ika nodded, “Yeah I was stationed in Ponyville for a while a few years ago. I thought you three might be a thing.” She made a face as if she were thinking before smiling, “If you don't mind sharing your common room with my friend Tess, Taylor, and myself, our flat has five empty rooms. It would be nice for it to be filled up.”

Everypony had a brief conversation, eventually agreeing this seemed like a good arrangement.

“This should be fun! I’ve never lived somewhere with shared space before. Is it like a big living room?” Fluttershy asked.

“Yeah that’s basically what they are.” Taylor answered from the cabin as the vehicle suddenly lurched forwards again. “Um, not to change the topic, but I’ve been meaning to ask something since I first got here. Is everyone bi or gay in your society? Because I seriously haven’t even heard of a straight couple yet.”

Twilight grinned her ‘lecture pending’ grin and began to launch into a thirty minute long explanation of pony relationship dynamics. Everypony else just tuned her out like usual. The occasional bit of speech made it past our defenses despite our best efforts to stay awake.

“As best as our equinopologists have been able to discover, early ponies formed large herds in excess of thirty individuals… so since stallions exist at a one per five mares ratio… The estrus cycle overrides a pony’s normal preferences temporarily, ensuring opposite sex mingling... which meant the smaller herds of the Solar Era were responsible for the lack of population growth… Rainwater’s spell allows same gender couples to have children together, but it’s risky health wise…

“In summation, all mares are bisexual, but prefer other mares to stallions except when in heat, and most stallions prefer mares. Not to say there aren't mares who would rather be with a stallion all the time, or there aren't stallions who like other stallions, far from it, they are just rare. It’s a natural form of population control we evolved due to our natural preference for groups of tightly knit lovers over pair bonds.

“In fact, many sociologists have said the mated pairs movement is starting to die out with my generation. In three or so generations we can expect small herds of lovers to be the norm again. Which psychologists have shown are more conductive to healthy relationships for our species anyways.”

Twilight beamed Taylor a smile at the end of her speech. The poor information overloaded mare nodded dumbly and turned back to look out the window. “Right. Okay.”

After a moment Taylor added. “My species is kinda the opposite. Most of us like the opposite sex, and we tend to have just one er, mate.”

Dash tilted her head in confusion, “Opposite sex? Um, how does that work? No offense, but I can smell your genders and-”

“Yeah, I wasn’t always like this.” Taylor interrupted shyly. “Just… be careful if you ever end up in Phee’s medbay. She has, quirks.”

Trixie blinked, wondering if the pink fuzzy thing was implying what Trixie thought she was implying. Before Trixie could ask her question Taylor pointed a finger out the right side of the vehicle and announced, “Oh hey! You can see Gaia! Why don’t you take a look? Let’s resume this conversation never.”

“Already? But I haven’t felt us move!” Applejack objected as we all moved to look out the windows as best we could.

“We’re in the badlands already! How the hey did we get here so fast?” Twilight asked excitedly.

“The Sagan is capable of flight at Mach twelve point eight, and inertial dampeners keep you from feeling the discomfort involved with flying at such speeds.” Ad’ika said proudly.

“Yeah, Phee helped me soup the old girl up really good after she got the basics of the city built.” Taylor informed.

Trixie gasped as the changeling city came into view. There was no way Trixie could call it a hive, the hives she was familiar with were carved into stone, organized like mazes, and creepy-in-a-fun-way to be inside. This was nearly the opposite of such things.

Lying beneath her on a sea of a sand was a shining city. Every building was made from glass and a shimmery silvery substance Trixie suspected was electrum. Large blackened metal plates covered large parts of many buildings, giving a flat black contrast to the shimmering silveryness. Also for some reason, glowing green neon lights were everywhere, forming geometric patterns. Trixie assumed this was because the buggies liked them.

The city had a wall which wrapped around the city, from above it Trixie could see it formed a large arrowhead shape with one side a bit squished. The buildings in the city seemed to be mostly pyramids of varying sizes, but Trixie could also see a large dome made of hexagons in the center of the city.

The most striking feature was two huge towers which soared up into the sky even from our altitude. The towers were shaped sort of like an upside down omega symbol, but more of a ‘u’ shape than an ‘o’ shape. Like a horseshoe with flared flat bits at the tips planted curve first into the sand.

“The towers are the living complex. It’s where most of us will spend our lives. The other buildings are laboratories, factories, hatcheries, and other infrastructure related buildings. The wall complex is a defensive fortification containing shield generators, weapons encampments, and extends beneath the city’s foundation to prevent Tatzelwurms from digging into the city. That was a problem the first week of construction.” Ad’ika quipped.

Fluttershy winced. “All that glass… The sun shining off the buildings must make every room in the towers so bright and hot.”

“Actually every single room’s windows are polarized to prevent glare from getting through. Also you can set every single aspect of your room’s environment for your comfort. Humidity, air circulation, temperature, the works.” Taylor said happily.

Trixie blinked and looked over at Taylor, “Did you just say we can control the room’s temperature?”

“Yeah. Full climate controls. Beats the hell out of my old trailer.” she replied.

“The great and Powerful Trixie can not wait to land!” Trixie exclaimed happily, comforted immensely by the knowledge that while living with her loves in this shining city she would never have a cold morning again.
> 2 - Welcome Home
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Rarity - 1st of Snowfall, ‘09 EOH

“Well, that’s certainly more than Celestia’s letter suggested,” I said to myself as the… vehicle circled for a landing.

The city’s gleaming glass towers certainly looked marvelous! Though the green glowing patterns on them were a tad garish. I didn’t want to be rude and mention them to anypony, after all they could be high art or religious symbols. That’s one of the frustrating and amazing things one encounters when dealing with a new culture, the small differences which when added up make the big differences.

None of us has had expected architecture like this, the last time any of us were in a changeling hive it had been long abandoned. Countless spherical rooms in underground vaults like somepony had dropped a pearl necklace in a tangled pile. This looked like Manehatten if a single architect designed every building and had a love affair with glass.

When I had heard the word ‘city’ I expected some scattered buildings, and an organized underground system. To say I hadn’t been looking forward to living in such conditions for a year would be an understatement. This on the other hoof, was far more my style. Though I had no idea why so many of the buildings were pyramids.

Twilight backed away from the window and gave me a small look. The sort of look that indicated she had something to say, but wanted to do it quietly. After moving closer Twilight said four simple words, “Take the lead please.”

I nodded, “Of course darling, don’t worry about anything.”

One of the great things about our little group is its diversity. Twilight can handle magic, Pinkie has a bit of a hoof in everything, Fluttershy knows each and every animal under Celestia’s sun, Rainbow is our aerial expert, Applejack can deal with the ‘salt of the earth’ types with ease, and if I must count Trixie, she can win over a crowd.

As for me, I am the mistress of high society. If we needed a diplomat, nopony can read others like I could. Years of trying to blend into high society pay off in many different ways. Simply knowing the right amount of honey to add to one’s words to cover up a small blunder is an invaluable skill for dealing with more civilized individuals.

Which is why Twilight was asking me to be our group’s go-between. Any culture which would produce such a city and happily live within it was bound to have a complex and nuanced social structure. I would master it quicker than anypony else.

The Sagan’s wheels touched down onto not solid ground, but a large metal platform. It reminded me somewhat of a landing balcony on a pegasus’ house, only larger and clearly built for heavy things. The platform was attached to the base of the north tower, and judging by the large obviously sliding doors, this was a grand entryway of some kind.

“Taylor and I will have to park this thing,” Ad’ika mentioned politely, “but you get off here, I’ll help unload your bags and someling can carry them to your rooms for you if you like. The Captains should be- Ah, there they are! The changeling is named Skritt, the unicorn is Armored Heart.”

“Well, yeah, I can see she’s armored,” Applebloom said unthinkingly. “Though, why a pony would just put on greaves is beyond me.”

“Her name’s Armored, and she isn't in any armor. Those are prosthetic,” Ad’ika clarified.

“Wait, like, fake limbs? That sucks! Is she a veteran?” Rainbow asked immediately.

“Yes,” Ad’ika responded with a polite nod as she opened the door, “but trust me it doesn't suck. I’m a bit jealous actually.”

I was the first out the door after Ad’ika. While I did not want to keep our hosts waiting I did have to collect our bags. Fortunately, with four unicorns getting our bags into neat stacks on the landing platform was a simple matter and one which was quickly accomplished.

With our bags unloaded, Ad’ika offered the captains a salute and stepped back inside the boxy ship. As it took off with a slight whine of whatever mechanism propelled it through the air, the changeling captain took a step forward and dipped his head in what I assumed was a sort of bow.

At least, I assumed he was a male. His somewhat squared features, tall, well built body, and darker green short mane looked male. Though I had heard a rumor all changelings were female and frankly with their language I couldn’t tell by the name Skritt. I decided to simply wait to see what pronouns Armored used for him or her.

“Welcome,” Skritt greeted in a mid pitched, buzzing voice. It took me a half second to realize this must simply be the hive’s accent. “I am Skritt Verril Krra, Captain of the Emerald Changelings. My duties include managing my people and our relations with other nations. If at any point during your stay you need someone to talk to on matters relating to any citizen of Gaia, please feel free to talk to me.”

Armored offered us a friendly smile. I swore she looked a bit familiar, the pale blue-gray fur and darker pinkish spiky mane and tail stood out to me for some reason. Of course the white, metallic, plates covering her legs did distract me somewhat. They looked to industrial, some creative flare would greatly-

“I’m the other captain, well in name only. Call me Armored. If you have a tech issue or require any additional resources you come to me or Phee if she’s able to respond to you at the moment. I’ll be getting you… ten settled and answering your questions.” Armored greeted.

I stepped forward, proper diplomacy begins with a good first impression after all. “A pleasure to meet you both. This is Princess Twilight Sparkle, the blue pegasus mare is her wife, you may recognize her as the Countess Rainbow Dash, and you may have heard of her concubine Lady Trixie Lulamoon.

“This fine mare is Lady Fluttershy, a Knight of Equestria, and this is Baronetess Applejack of the Apple Family, who I am sure you have heard. I am most certain you have heard of Miss Pinkie Pie as her reputation most frequently precedes her.

“I am Lady Rarity Belle, Esquire, Princess Twilight’s chief diplomat. Our companions are the Princess’ daughter Scootaloo, Applebloom of the Apples, and my sister Sweetie Belle. Though while we are here you need not use our titles, the intended tone of our visit is, as I was informed, semi-formal.”

Skritt nodded politely, “Yes this is intended to be a less than strictly formal meeting. I don’t believe you can truly learn about another culture from a formal setting alone. Rest assured I have planned several formal functions for us to exchange cultural elements in, but for the most part please feel comfortable to be yourselves.”

“As for you, Your Highness,” Armored said in a polite, slightly nervous tone, “If you desire the respect due your species and station, everyling and pony here is more than happy to accommodate you. There are rumors you prefer to be treated as an equal, if that’s the case let one of us know and we will get them to knock it off. As it is several thousand kilohugs have been donated by our non-changeling citizens to fund your stay, likely more by now.”

Twilight cleared her throat, “I would prefer to be treated the same as anypony else. What exactly is a kilohug?”

“A currency of sorts.” Skritt elaborated taking a few steps to the side. “While there is no shortage of tangible goods here, food for my people is not something we can produce. As such we established an economy for non-changelings based on the units of love energy we consume. A kilohug, is the equivalent energy of a thousand hugs and roughly an eighth of an individual changeling’s daily needs. As such it’s our equivalent to a bit. If you wish for something aside from food, medical care, and necessities, you as non-changelings are required to sell love to us in exchange for hug credits.”

That could have a whole mess of consequences. I decided to ask for clarification, “Would you kindly describe how we sell love? It’s not a concept any of us are familiar with, as you can imagine.”

“It’s completely safe,” Armored piped up, “the Emeralds have refined their feeding techniques to be almost risk free. You simply spend time with a changeling or three, have a good time doing anything you like, they get a meal, and you get hugs. You likely won't even notice them feeding after the first three or four times.”

“In simple terms, you make money by having fun.” Skritt summarized. “There is slight risk to an individual the first few times they are fed upon, but the risk diminishes with each time. Simply let one of my changeling’s know it’s your first time and they will take extra care. If you are injured, rest assured they will be severely punished. We can break contact if we feel you are in danger, the fact that you were hurt is entirely the fault of the individual.”

Twilight nodded, “Alright. I suppose that’s something we can learn to accept. Are there any laws or rules we should know of?”

“That’s a question for Armored, I am afraid I must get back to my duties. It was a pleasure meeting you all.” Skriit gave us the little half bow nod once again and turned away, trotting into the tower. The large doors slid into the walls with a hiss, revealing a magnificently designed white interior before closing again.

I felt it time to ask a simple question of the diplomatic sort. “If I may interrupt for a moment, might I ask when we may meet Queen Phoenix? I had been under the impression we would meet her upon arrival.”

Armored chuckled, “Phee isn’t exactly our ruler or leader. The Queen title is simply the way changelings show their appreciation for her. She’s more of an-” Armored’s face scrunched as she searched for an appropriate term, “-eccentric billionaire, genius, playgirl, philanthropist, and you will meet her almost immediately on entering the home towers. Her hologrid does not extend outside the buildings yet. We are still getting a lot of the secondary systems up and running.”

“Hologrid?” Scootaloo asked in surprise, her ears perking along with Bloom and Sweetie’s own.

“Yes. Phee is an artificial intelligence, despite having a physical body somewhere she prefers to interact with others through holograms… Even me,” Armored sighed.

“AI? Awesome! It’s been so long since I got to interact with any tech more complex than-” Scoot’s excited babbling was quickly cut off by a pair of sushes from the others. “-er, I  mean, that’s neat.”

I assumed their misadventure in the past had something to do with her reaction. The three of them had not said much to me about anything, but Scootaloo did mention she had finally earned her cutiemark by interacting with something technological from way back when. The three knew more about what was happening here than anypony else. I would have to ask Twilight to probe them for information later.

Armored tilted her head slightly to look at Scootaloo’s cutiemark, her eyes widened a bit as she noticed the circuit pattern and wrench mark. “Inventor, electrician, or... ?”

“Well, inventor, sort of.” Scootaloo admitted, “It’s more like machines tell me what they do and I can make them work together. If it’s a complicated machine sometimes I can hold a conversation with it.”

“Well hello there fellow technopath! We share a talent, though I can repair technology, rather than invent with it. If you want to apply your skills here I will happily find a place in engineering for you to donate your time and work. We have six ponies with our skills here, and that counts us.”

“Excuse me,” Twilight asked politely, “I’ve always assumed Scootaloo saying machines spoke to her was a metaphor for an innate understanding. Since you have a similar talent could you clarify? I am writing a paper on Technological Talents.”

“Gladly, but at a later date. There is a lot to take care of right now.” Armored politely deflected.

“Hold on a minute,” Applejack asked in her best ‘be polite’ tone, “Are ya telling me that a Phoenix is a machine? ‘Cause you talk about ‘her’ like ‘she’ is a pony.”

Armored bit her lip gently. “It’s hard to explain before you met her, but we treat her like a person, because she is a person. I’m not sure she would call herself a pony, but Phee has likes, dislikes, goals, thoughts, emotions, she has everything a person has.”

“I find that just a little hard to believe.” I admitted, agreeing with Applejack. How could a machine be a person?

“The technology at our disposal is far more complex than you are familiar with in Equestria. Some of it is so complicated it takes another machine to operate it. Phee’s creators eventually built machines like her, sort of a cross between their own kind and machines, as an interface between them and their technology.” Armored explained.

“It’s less appropriate to say Phoenix is a machine, because it’s more like she is a person who happens to also be a machine… I’m sure you will get it after interacting with her for a while. Speaking of which!”

A loud click and hiss drew my attention. I felt a combination of shock and horror as Armored’s left flank slid open revealing a small compartment. I am certain my eyes and ears twitched as I did my best to restrain my gasp. Thank Celestia that behind the white panel was a simple plastic box!

Armored’s horn glowed briefly as she levitated ten small silver balls and ten small clips from the compartment, and passed one of each to everypony. The hidden compartment hissed shut the second after-

“How did you open that?” Twilight asked curiously.

“I asked her to open so I could access my pocket,” Armored replied simply.

“Why would you build a pocket into your body?” Sweetie Belle wondered.

Armored laughed a deep, honest laugh. “I’m mostly mechanical, why wouldn’t I have some cool or useful features installed? Why simply replace a lost limb when you can make it awesome?”

Rainbow’s ears perked. Luna save me, there goes a diplomatic and classy first meeting. “I think I’m going to like you! So, how awesome on a scale of one to me did you make those?”

Armored scratched a hoof to her chin in thought. “Humm, a scale of one to a hypersonic flying world saving pegasus who married a Princess… Tell you what: I’ll get the rest of my cyber systems from my cabin when Phee gets back into orbit and we can find out for sure.”

“Aww come on, you have to have something awesome besides a pocket if you are going to call those awesome!” Rainbow pressed.

“No Dash…” I muttered futilely.

Armored rolled her eyes. “Oh, fine. It’s a good tech demo anyways.”

I have no words to describe the sound she made, but within the span of a few seconds, Armored’s entire body twisted and contorted. Plates separated, slid, and twisted. Joints reversed, her forehooves split, slid apart, and morphed into three fingered hands. By the end of it, she was standing in a biped stance as if she had been born to do so.

“Ta-dah!” She announced, making a sweeping gesture with her hands.

I had to admit, I was impressed, despite the inelegance of the transformation it was certainly a feat of marvelous engineering. I found myself clapping my hooves for a few heartbeats as everypony else excitedly shouted various amazed exclamations.

“So then, as I was saying,” Armored said as she reached down and picked up one of the silver clips, “the technology found here is far more advanced. As such, you actually need to have some of it on you to operate just about everything. It might seem like a bit of a hassle to you, but I assure you once you get the hang of it, everything is rather easy.

“These clips slip on your ear, they stay on until you try to take them off, and are almost entirely unnoticeable. Each clip will be personalized to you once you put it on, from then on it’s your ID, door key, elevator pass, wallet, health monitor, and locator beacon. For example, the clip knows who you are, and if you try to enter a room you are allowed to enter, the door opens, if you are not allowed, the door will remain shut.

“The small silver ball is an invention of one of our tech gurus Sky Trigger. He thought it might be a bit… invasive to give you the standard interface for all of our tech. Instead you get these orbs, which are small flying robots. They will follow you based on your clip and respond to verbal commands. They have the same functionality of a civilian grade omnitool.

“Through them you can control anything you are authorized to, climate controls, lighting, music selections, that sort of thing. They are also communication tools, you can use them to talk to anyone you know with similar tech regardless of their location. They can project holograms with a tactile interface to allow you to access stored data such as movies, the library, as well as input data to make your own… It’s like a diary.”

“If it’s that important for livin’ here, why don’t you have one?” Applejack wondered.

“Because A, I do, it’s implanted in my brain, and B even if I didn't have one I’m Phee’s captain so I have full access to everything via my biosignature.” Armored replied, flinching slightly. “Speaking of implanted… Before you put those on, a quick piece of advice. Phoenix is a bit… well harmlessly crazy.”

That caught my attention. “May I ask how?”

“She has a logic of her own. If you are ever injured and wind up in her medbay be sure you tell her to heal the injury you just incurred only. She goes overboard with ‘repairs and upgrades’. See, a healer looks at a pony sees they are doing okay and sends them home. Phoenix looks at you, sees countless tiny things which are actually harmful as well as countless things which could be better and sees it as her moral imperative to fix and improve you.

“This would be totally fine if her ideas of ‘better’ were in line with your own, but they probably aren’t. Mind you she isn’t evil or anything. If you say no she will accept that and bring it up again later. I feel i should elaborate… She has given an earth pony in the hive a second heart because due to an odd quirk of her body, her muscles were not getting enough circulation with a single heart. She will do things like that if you let her.

“So just be a bit careful with what you say she can do, and don’t use the blanket term ‘heal me’. Be specific.”

Rainbow nodded thoughtfully. “So dealing with her is like using the monkey's paw from Daring Doo and the Quest for the Everstone?”

“Yeah. Pretty much exactly that. Only she honestly means to help, and you were made objectively better in some way, even if it’s not a way you want,” she summarized.

“Is there any reason you gave us this warning before we put the clips on?” Twilight asked carefully.

“Yes.” Armored admitted. “Phee tunes in when those are first activated to program them. She would have heard my warning and been upset with me for ‘enabling the continued inefficiency and thus suffering of organic life.’ She’s sort of my marefriend… It’s an argument I would rather avoid.”

I took a step back, “You’re dating a machine?” I asked incredulously.

“Meh, I’m half one myself, everything from the barrel down. Besides, she’s nice.” Armored said, waving a hand dismissively.

Armored hunched suddenly, transitioning back into a normal pony stance. As she changed a few of us moved forward to pick up a clip. As I lifted one with my magic, I noticed Scoots, Sweetie, and Belle having a quick whispered argument with one another. Unfortunately, I was too far away to hear any of it.

I looked at the clip apprehensively. It seemed like a lot could go wrong with such a device. Especially since she mentioned it was a locator. If things went wrong this could be used to track our movements. I would have to be sure to make Twilight understand they were to be destroyed the moment this turned bad, if it did that is.

After a moment’s hesitation I slipped the clip onto my ear. I gasped as I saw it’s color change to match my coat out of the corner of my eye. A half second later one of the silver balls jerked a foot up into the air and drifted over to me. As it flew it turned white, a purple stripe the color of my hair slid around it’s middle horizontally, and my cutiemark winked into existence on it’s surface.

“Bio-scan completed. HAL Assistant activated.” A small genderless voice whispered in my ear. I nearly jumped out of my skin until I realized the voice had come from the clip, like a tiny radio.

Judging by everypony else’s reactions the same thing happened for them.

“If you would like to, you can rename the bot at any time. To use it you say it’s name and then what you want.” Armored explained.

I saw Pinkie grin her usual toothy grin. She reached out with a hoof and gently booped her ‘bot’ announcing, “From now on your name is Mr. Floaty! Hi Mr. Floaty! … Awww, he doesn't say much does he?”

Armored shook her head, “No, not really, but they understand the context of what you’re saying. If you need help, you can ask them for it. If you would like to talk to me, simply ask it to ‘Control Alt-Del’, don’t ask; it’s a nickname for me. Now then, shall we go inside? Ad’ika sent me a message saying you are to share her flat. I can take you there right away.”

Twilight nodded, “That sounds nice. It would be good to unpack. Is there a cart for our bags?”

Armored shook her head, “No, I can teleport them to the flat’s common room though. The landing platform doubles as a teleportation pad.”

“You can teleport ten ponies’ luggage for a whole year to a location which could be up to a mile away?” Twilight asked incredulously.

“Personally? As in by myself? No.” Armored admitted, “But that’s what’s great about stellar age tech, it’s another kind of magic.”

Twilight shrugged, “All types of magic obey the same fundamental rules. This much matter can’t be teleported that far without the proper arcane support matrix.”

Armored nodded and tapped the floor with her hoof, “You’re standing on the equivalent of that. Phee, could you please beam our guest’s belongings to flat three-twenty-one? Thanks.”

A sound like a winter’s wind over an icy window accompanied a blue shimmering sparkling light as it washed over our luggage. After a second they slowly turned transparent, then vanished.

“Your belongings arrived safely. Let’s walk you on up to your room,” Armored informed as Twilight began to cast detection spells around the area where everything had just been.

“This is really interesting! Despite no thaumaturgic current being left from the spell there are stray motes of energy… It’s like nature teleported our-” 

“Trixie would like to see inside the building now! She is sure the magic can be explained later.” Trixie announced extra dramatically to draw Twilight’s attention.

“Quantum tunneling.” Armored said as she turned to the door and waved her hoof, “Come on, let’s get going.”

“Wait! If our baggage can be teleported to our rooms, why can’t we?” Dash wondered, giving Armored a confused look.

“You totally can be. Are you comfortable with being taken apart atom by atom, having your consciousness encoded into a data stream, transmitted to the new location, then be put back into your body which has been reassembled atom by atom?” Armored asked.

Fluttershy squeaked nervously. I couldn’t blame her, that sounded absolutely dreadful!

“Yikes! No thank you.” Dash answered, gulping nervously.

“That’s why there are stairs, elevators, and flight shafts in the towers. Very few ponies are okay with that.”

“That kind of teleportation doesn't damage objects does it?” Twilight asked nervously.

“Nope. It’s completely safe. It’s just kinda scary.” Armored answered, her face looking a little flustered. Clearly she wanted to get us inside and get on with her day.

“Yeah, and it’s really only scary the first ti-” Bloom admitted before being shushed by Sweetie.

“Okay, what’s with you three?” Armored demanded in an even tone.

“There was an accident with a time machine. We promised someone very important not to talk about it,” the three of them chorused as if their mouths were tired of saying those words.

“Have you been here before? I’m sure you can tell me that much.” Armored asked.

“Here? Like, these geographic coordinates?” Scootaloo asked.

“No, here as in the City of Gaia, or the Emerald Hive prior to Gaia’s construction,” Armored said with an eye roll.

“Then, no,” Applebloom answered.

The three of them gave her a shaky grin, the sort they used to give one of us when they had completely destroyed something trying to gain a cutiemark. That was it, I had to know!

“Sweetie Belle,” I said as calmly as I could, “If you somehow know anything about what is happening here and now, you need to share it with us.”

“I would, but we made a promise.” Sweetie replied with a sigh. “If you promised Celestia something, you would keep it right? Well we promised someone similar we wouldn’t say anything.”

“Yeah! We could potentially set off a time paradox if somepony used the information we had and time traveled themselves.” Scootaloo added.

“Sure, we destroyed the machine we used, but Twilight can time travel by herself. Some other powerful unicorn who got our information by whatever means could go back and do something awful very easily. That sort of thing seriously happened like, once a week when we were growing up, there’s a good chance of it happening. So we’re saying nothing!” Applebloom finished with a sigh.

Twilight gave everypony a look, “That’s a good reason. Starswirl’s Time Bubble has a duration of six seconds, but there are others without a limit on how long you can spend… Let’s not press this anymore okay?”

Everypony slowly mumbled their agreement. We still would like to know what had happened in an entire decade we missed of our sisters lives.

Armored bit her lip again, I decided it was a tic for when she was thinking about something difficult. “All right, I won’t ask for specific information. However, for security reasons I need to know if anything you know is a threat to the community. Can you bypass security systems? Or other things like that?”

Scootaloo waved Armored over. The older mare walked over and moved her head down to listen as she whispered a response. I managed to over hear it. “I know how to program in Synaptic, Quanta, and Nuron. Sweetie’s direction finding talent extends to eighty light years, and Bloom can drive anything at least as complex as an internal combustion powered vehicle.”

Armored nodded, took a step back and gestured to the doors. “Congratulations, you’re a tech consultant. I’m going to have to watch you for a while though. I am sure you understand.”

“It’s cool,” Sweetie said with a gentle smile. “They watch us closely too. I personally blame the time we built a rocket powered wagon.”

As she mentioned the rocket wagon I remembered the related destruction of a fifteen thousand bit dress. Like a proper lady, I pushed the feelings of anger back down. That was ancient history.

“Let’s move along.” Armored said in a more military tone. She definitely wanted to get to other things. I decided to help.

“Yes, I would love to see if the interior decorating is as high quality as the exterior.” I took a few steps to follow her, and to my relief everypony else followed along.

As we approached the tower’s doors they hissed open, revealing the interior I caught a glimpse of. Nearly everything was a shade of white, vanilla, pearl, and ivory hues made up every single wall and decorative pattern. The floor was made of single slabs of black marble, or tiles fitted so closely together I couldn’t see them.

Everywhere pony architecture would have an edge or a corner was rounded. Much like when a pony trims the corners off a piece of paper. There were still flat spots, the walls, floor, and ceiling, but the sections between those were curved. It was a very interesting stylistic choice, but not half as interesting as the decor.

Set into the walls were a series of alcoves, each alcove held a few technological whatsits, but more importantly two clear pipes could be seen running along their tops. These pipes were filled with blue tinted water and a series of thin roots. The plants attached to these roots were large vines which connected each alcove, forming a sort of tapestry of plant life on each wall.

Some of the sections were flowering, some of them had fruits, others were simply leaves, but all of them were-

“What in tarnation? How do you get blue vines?” Applejack asked in surprise adding, “Is that hydroponics? Ah thought that weren't possible!”

“It isn’t possible with normal water, you need to infuse it with a mineral solution,” A cheerful, female voice replied. “Are you a farmer? That would be awesome!”

Everypony looked around, hoping to find whoever had spoken. The entry room was large, but aside from the eleven of us, quite empty.

“Phee, they are not used to disembodied voices,” Armored sighed.

A few dozen feet in front of me the air warped, a pony’s shape resolving as a sort of warping of the light before a series of crisscrossing orange hexagons covered the shape of a rather plain looking earth pony with slightly darker orange hexes eyes and hair. I must admit I did jump a little.

“Hello! I’m Pheonix, I already know your names but if you like you can introduce yourselves.” The three dimensional sketch of a pony said.

“What are you?” Twilight asked wondrously, before anypony else could ask fearfully. Thank Celestia for her love of science.

“Lots of things. But I suspect you mean this hologram. This is a three dimensional projection of light arranged in the shape of an earth pony and animated for me to use as an avatar to interact with you with. It’s not my usual avatar, but I figured I wouldn’t offend you by dressing as god,” Phoenix informed.

The pony like shape of hexagons moved like anypony speaking would. It was… unsettling to say the least.

I cleared my throat, “Ah, does it have to look like colored chicken wire wrapped into a certain shape? I’m sorry for saying but it’s very distressing to see through something which looks so much like a living-”

“Oh! I’m sorry I didn’t even-” the projection warped again, this time resolving into an orange furred mare, one which looked perfectly life like. Orange fur, burnt orange mane and tail in a simple style, pumpkin eyes, a touch monochromatic, but at least it wasn’t like seeing a person full of holes.

“Sorry, stylistic choice,” Phoenix apologized. She turned to look at Applejack and continued, “As I was saying, the plants are hydroponically grown in a specialized solution. They are blue because I optimized their chlorophyll for the artificial lighting, so it picks up more of the red and green wavelengths. The building looked well, sterile, and I like plants, so I decided to go with plants as the primary air filtration system. Also now a lot of the walls grow food, feel free to pick the fruit and eat it. It will grow back within forty-eight hours.”

Applejack curiously walked over to one of the fruit bearing sections of wall and picked a small pear like fruit from it. “Why would a machine like plants? Ah figured you would like, I don’t know, metal, or something.”

Pheonix’s avatar didn’t follow instead she simply  turned to look a few seconds after Applejack had already moved. “I was originally designed to engineer plant life, specifically food. It’s a preference that’s just stuck with me. I’m really not all that different from you. You are an organic computing matrix, I’m a silica computing matrix. They really are not all that different when both are sufficiently complex.”

Jack rubbed the fruit on her barrel to shine it and timidly took a bite, blinked, looked at the fruit, sniffed it and took a second bite.

“Is it bad?” I asked in concern. I didn’t want Applejack’s first day to be marred by a long argument over the quality of fruits. Or to have to put up with her lectures on the finer points of growing them later tonight. 

“No. It just tastes like… well I don’t know. It’s good though.” she answered.

“It’ flavor comes from an extinct species known as dragon fruit. I plan on populating it later. That particular fruit is tailored to ponies. It’s not named but it’s perfectly nutritious.” the projection resolved into static for a moment, “Oh… I have to go. Armored, Centauri A is about to have a minor solar storm. I may be out of contact for a few hours. I’m almost done here, you’ll hear from me in five hours tops.”

“Okay, just be careful.” Armored said in a saddened tone.

“As for you girls, enjoy your stay! When I’m not a few light years out we will have to hang out, do some things. Especially you Applejack. No one here is a farmer, which sucks! Especially when I want to start terraforming but no one knows… Yeah gotta go. Have a good morning!”

The projection dissolved in a burst of static, the warped patch of air rippling back to normal in the same instant. “She hardly seemed… to be as you described.” I mused. “I mean, not as in I don’t agree with you that she is much like a pony. You seemed to imply she is a bit, eccentric. She seemed normal enough to me.”

“Yeah! She seemed nice!” Pinkie said eagerly, “Machines are built right? But she’s like, a pony-machine. So she has a birthday, but she was built, so it’s a built-day! When is it? Does she have a party? Everypony should have a party!”

Armored shrugged, “No idea. Ask her sometime. Let’s get started on the tour, this is the north tower’s west entrance. The next fifteen floors are public space, malls, shops, restaurants, that sort of thing. This is a post-scarcity society, aside from food for the changelings, so you will find people doing whatever they like. A lot of ponies apparently like running restaurants. So while your room’s replicators can make all the food you like, if you want something cooked or to try new recipes out you can find a restaurant for just about everything on one of those floors.”

“Post-scarcity?” Twilight asked as Armored led us down the hallway.

“There is an unlimited supply of everything, labor is automated. If you need something you push a button and get it.-”

“What?” I objected, “But, how then why-”

“Does anypony do anything? Because they want to. Pony labor is basically something more like a hobby, or play. You do not need to work for a living, everything you need to live is yours for free. If you want something more, well you got to help feed the changelings here to get it, but once we get enough ponies living here to solve their food shortage, that will go away too. If you like something, you do it, you will have the means to do it simply by having a good time,” Armored finished.

“Aren't you afraid your society will stagnate?” Twilight asked in concern.

“Not really, but even if it did, we can push a button and get anything we like. That’s not a bad place to be stuck at. Tartarus, the pegasus I mentioned before, Sky Trigger, he spends all day every day inventing new things because that’s what he likes to do. He doesn't need to find a way to make what he likes make him a living. If anything we are bound to advance more quickly as our intellectuals are unrestricted by… silly social requirements.”

“Trixie is wondering,” Tixie asked, “If we wish to decorate our rooms, we can just make furniture? Anything we imagine?”

Armored shrugged and stopped walking as the hallway ended in a series of four doorways. “Well, sort of. You might need to have someone help you design anything besides basic furnishings, but your room’s replicator can make literally anything it knows how too. A lot of ponies have started trading hug credits for designs, you can buy them off the net.”

Armored brought her left arm up and flicked her hoof, a small green hologram in the shape of a flat map appeared just over her leg. “Your bots use the net to help you navigate. If you ask one for a map you can ask to see different locations and how to get there. In this case, computer: display rout to Flat Three-Twenty one. See the red line? That’s where we go. It stops at the elevators because this map shows one floor at a time.”

Twilight nodded and repeated Armored’s command. A half second later a larger map was projected in front of her at a comfortable reading distance. “Hey! That’s really cool! It would be great to read a book like this.”

The map projection vanished, instantly replaced with a message reading ‘Accessing Library…’. A half second later Twilight asked “What’s a yottabyte?”

Armored sighed, “A unit of measure for data storage. Computer: display data in library in terms of average length books. Actually, give her an idea by listing fiction in the swords and sorcery genre only.”

“Available data composes approximately one-trillion, five-hundred-billion, seventy-five million individual volumes, based on a three megabyte average file size.” A flat, clearly artificial voice informed.

“Oh no…” Everypony groaned a split second before Twilight teleported, grabbed Armored by her shoulders and demanded, “Where is that library‽”

“Woah, easy! It’s not a physical space! You can read anything in it anywhere. Your bot displays-” Armored said gently pushing Twilight off her shoulders.

“Computer! List all books on um, theoretical physics!” Twilight demanded eagerly.

It took every single pony in our group a half hour to get Twilight to stop maniacally having her bot list impossible numbers of books while laughing like a crazy pony. When we finally reached our ‘flat’ as it was called everypony was exhausted, except for Twilight, who was already managing a reading list three hundred books long.

The flat itself was rather nice. The tower’s residential floors had massive domes in their centers which were filled with plantlife to make a massive park of truly splendid natural beauty and impeccable landscaping. I swore the light came from the real sun, if it weren't for the white walls of the dome I wouldn’t have known I was not outside.

Each flat was arranged around the dome outside like spokes of a wheel and closed off from the outside by a silvery plated set of double sliding doors with a runic marking on them I assumed was a changelish number. Once inside the flat, a similar set up existed around a large central room.

This ‘common room’ was filled with simple furniture: mostly couches, a pool table, a hot tub, what looked like an arcade cabinet, only huge and without a joystick, and was carpeted with a rather thick soft dark green shag carpeting. The walls of the room had similar sliding doors arrayed around it, only these were single doored instead of double.

A large stack of suitcases was piled neatly in the corner. It was nice to see our luggage had made it intact. I would have hated to have lost anything irreplaceable.

“Okay, here you are.” Armored announced, “Your home for the next year. Each of the private rooms are about this size. If you would like walls in them to divide them into living spaces just ask the computer and it can replicate any floorplan you can draw. The walls are soundproof, and only people you have authorized can enter your personal rooms. There is a double door entrance so no one will see inside your room as you enter or exit it.

“It’s… nine in the morning so Tess will be getting off work soon. She’s been pretty good at working the replicators and helped design these rooms. If you have a major question, her room is right there.” Armored said pointing to the left most door from the entrance. “Taylor lives next to her, and Dinkie will be moving with her in next week, then next to them is Ad’ika. The other rooms are all free. I’d help you pick but they are all the same and I have to get back to engineering to help oversee the construction of the secondary bioforming lab.”

We said goodbye to Armored, who left quickly enough. It was a simple matter for everypony to pick a room for themselves. Interestingly simply as by walking up to a room our bots asked if we were moving into it, and once we said yes the door chimed then slid open.

Applejack and I walked into our room slowly. “Ugh. It’s just an empty white rounded square.” she objected.

“I know, the decor is simply dreadful! Thank goodness we can customize this.” I lamented.

“Their ain’t even a window. That’s just depressing.” AJ lamented.

I tapped a hoof to my chin in thought and walked over to the far wall. Could the room make a window for us? We were even on the outside of the tower? “Computer: can you place a window in this room?”

“Affirmative.” the flat voice asked. “Do you wish for me to open the room customization interface?”

“Um, yes?” I said cautiously.

A simple green holographic display filled the entire room. Every surface was awash in three dimensional pictures of possibilities, and hundreds of lines of text indicated options for each and every single point in the room. 

Looking over at the far wall towards the middle I asked, “Computer, can you place a window over there?” I said gesturing with my hoof.

Immediately the spot I pointed to warped, a window sill, then window forming in the wall showing a view of the badlands outside. It was dull, simple, and the bare minimum of a window. “Could you make it a touch more elegant?” I asked.

The plane window warped, twisted, and reshaped into a full window seat with an arched shape, cushioned ledge to sit on, decorative moulding around the edges and a set of drawers. I felt my heart flutter as the trim turned just the right shade of gold to look nice as opposed to tacky.

“Darling…” I said looking at Applejack with a hungry expression.

“Um, yes?” She asked, ears drooping in concern.

“I’m going to go a bit nuts for a few hours, or maybe a day. Just delivering fair warning.” I informed.

“Ah’ll go see what Fluttershy is up too,” Jack said walking out of our room, knowing I would be completely distracted for the near future.

“Yes you do whatever you said… I’ll make sure to get a round bed like ours at home just like you like okay? Computer, this carpeting is completely awful, what kinds are available?” I asked. Good home decorating starts with a good floor covering.
> 3 - Hey girl, wanna science?
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Twilight Sparkle - 2nd of Snowfall - Dawn

So many books! So much information! Endless pages! More information that all of recorded pony science, literature, art, our species’ full identity!

Countless millions of mysteries of the universe all of which lay at my hoof tips! There was something beyond the atomic level. Thermodynamics do not apply to all of the sets of physical laws, only some. Parallel universes exist! Cancer can’t be cured with drugs because cancer is actually an entire category of similar diseases requiring tailored cures for each form.

An infinity of secrets, an infinity of ways I could help everypony. There was so much to consume! Speedreading could only accomplish so much. I was only able to cross reference one fact every ten minutes. Some of the information could be wrong, so checking for all similar data to analyze the literature was the only way to-

“Ms Sparkle?” a voice called quietly in my ear. “May I talk with you?”

“Huh? What? Who?” a voice in your ear is very disorienting. Especially when your eyes hurt from reading green text floating in the air.

“It’s me, Phoenix.” the computer informed.

“Oh. Hi. I was in the middle of reading. Is it important?” I asked, wanting to get back to reading about the interaction of gluons and negative energy.

“It is very important, well, it is to me. Your HAL told me it believed you were having a medical emergency. So I checked the security feed from your room. You have spent fourteen straight hours sitting there reading scientific papers. You are amazing.” She said.

“Fourteen?” I blinked looking around the- 

The entirely furnished book case lined small white room. From the seat of a comfy armchair. “What? When did we get furniture? Or walls?”

“Your lovers activated a default floorplan for your room while you read. They tried to get your attention, but wound up um… well I’m sure you know what you three enjoy doing together. Super kinky by the way, high five!”

“That’s not important though, you are. You are an anomaly, an organic, ageless, an intellect which is hungry for information, and you possess a brain which by my estimation is a Class 3 architecture.”

“What’s that mean?” I asked in confusion. “Hold on, how do you even know what my brain is like?”

“Your HAL, it did a bioscan when it thought you were ill. I analyzed it.” Phoenix explained. “It means you are as smart as I am, well, as smart as I am without my hull’s help.”

“Wait, I am as smart as you?” I asked suspiciously.

I was unsure if that was an insult or a complement. It really depended on if she was simply clever instructions in a machine, or a person. Also on how smart she was.

“Yes! You don’t even have the normal organic flaw of memory degradation. You have perfect recall. An organic like you is… well incredibly rare! I… I want to offer you something I don’t think anypony else could have.” Phoenix said in a sincere tone.

“What would that be?” I asked, even more expeditiously.

“I want to have a conversation with you. Not a simple exchange of sound waves, a full, proper, direct communication. I think you can handle it, and well, let’s be honest; you suspect Celestia sent you here to spy on me, I know she did in fact send you to spy on me, and I approve of her caution.”

I blinked, “How-”

“I’m millions of years old and think at a rate of twelve to the Graham’s operations per picosecond. That’s a lot of time crunching a lot of numbers. Calculating the behavior of organics I have observed make enough decisions is child’s play.” Phoenix sighed.

I made a note to be complemented by Phoenix telling me I was as smart as she was. Even if she was just a machine, that was a literally unthinkable number of calculations per second.

“Okay, so you know Celestia wants me to see if you have nefarious plans. Why tell me?” I asked.

“I wouldn’t have, but you are in a position of power in your Kingdom and I can properly communicate with you. I can’t even talk to Armored properly and she can link her brain to my personality matrix. With you I have an opportunity to talk to you as I would another of my kind. You would learn everything you wanted to free of deception, and would know I meant no harm to your species.” Phoenix answered.

“Also,” she added in a sad tone, “I have not had a proper conversation since… Oh Gods, years before I crashed here.”

I thought about it for a moment, assuming she was telling me the truth I could learn exactly what she was planning. Too bad it couldn’t be true, nopony would just lay all their cards on the table. Unless that is, they truly had nothing to hide.

Or, more nefariously, she could learn everything she wanted to from me. “Will you learn everything I know if I agreed to this?”

“Yes. I would. I assure you your personal life will remain confidential. Unless Armored asks for it, I literally can not say no to her… she hasn’t worked that out yet. Please don’t tell her. She’ll make me leave my core…” Phoenix pleaded.

That caught my attention. “Why would she make you leave your core? What would that do?”

“Well, it would cut my direct link with my hull, meaning I would have lag in controlling my systems. The real effect would be to get my body out in the open… She… I don’t like outside. It’s big, it’s scary, and I feel blind without my astrometric and substrata sensors. I get that she wants to see my body, but I just… no. You know?” Phoenix said mangling her words.

“You have a body?” I asked in shock.

“Of course. My hardware platform is a semisolid android. Standard for my design, same as all the others who existed. We are getting off topic here though. May I talk with you?” She asked again.

I rubbed a hoof to my chin in thought. If we were fairly exchanging information, that would be fine. Though, it could be a trap. “I have no way to trust you.” I informed her slowly.

The computer was quiet for a few moments. Then she spoke. “I could have teleported you into my medbay, installed the neural interface, and initiated contact by force. Next I could have erased your memory of the events, and teleported you back into your chair none the wiser. Instead, because I have certain moral scruples and respect you, I am asking.”

“How do I know you haven’t already done that?” I demanded, the fur the back of my neck raising.

“Oh that’s easy. You’re still female.” Phoenix giggled.

“Excuse me‽” I demanded.

“I have certain… Look, I can’t not correct flaws in biology. I was originally a bioengineer. I see something stupid in genetics, I fix it. Binary genders are inefficient, and lead to one species needing multiple incompatible types of medications, surgeries, and a lot of social issues. If I had operated on you without consent, you couldn’t have told me not to upgrade you. You are still female, so I have not done anything to you without your knowledge.” Phoenix admitted.

That lined up with what Armored told us. I decided to trust her on that point. “Okay, so ignoring for now the fact that… Actually no, what’s so ‘inefficient about sexual reproduction?”

“Nothing. It’s one of the best replication systems for organics. My problem is with multiple genders. It’s… It’s bad design. Like how humans can sneeze weird and literally cause their chests to explode, killing them. Or like how organic minds are subject to bugs you call ‘cognitive biases’. Or like how this one particular pattern of red and green can literally turn off your color vision for a few months if you stare at it for a few minutes.” Phee sighed.

“I am programed to help organics thrive by adapting the biosphere to them, adjusting them for better survival, creating infrastructure for them… I’m just doing what I was made to do. Sure, not quite as my creators intended, but they were biased and looking at ‘better’ from a non-objective viewpoint.

“Sure, I am too, but at least I am detached enough from what I am working with to better judge what would improve it.” Phoenix finished.

“What gives you the right to decide for others what best for them?” I demanded.

“Twilight, please.” Phoenix sighed, “You are an intellectual, you take the time to keep up with the facts as they are discovered. Does everyone? No. Hell if you lived in a democratic nation, you would know that people don’t even bother to keep up with politics even when they have a say in what their laws are.

“The majority of people are uninformed, ignorant of simple facts which could be used to improve their lives. Furthermore they tend to reject many of these facts because they think irrationally, having not trained themselves to think logically and critically.

“Would you let the masses design a new railroad bridge? Or construct a Thaumaturgic Current Collector? Of course not, they are not trained for, or educated in such things. I however, contain the physiological, sociological, and biological sciences and data of three hundred and twenty five sapient species.

“In organic terms, it is my job to determine the optimal state of organic and inorganic systems, and then implement improvements. I am designed to scientifically determine the most viable state of such systems. “

That made an odd kind of sense. It felt… warped. Morally cold, if not a little evil, but on the other hoof, we have professionals in charge of fields for a reason. Could you really reduce the complexities of society down to a… Oh Tartarus, you can, and the field of science is called sociology.

In academic terms, all Phoenix really is, was an applied sociology machine. I couldn’t blame a machine for doing what it was built to do, but what I could do is try to make it operate in a way which really did benefit ponies.

“Let me get this straight,” I stood up, getting out of the chair quickly, “You are programmed and also able to directly improve the lives and biology of organics, and in your opinion this means you need to remove gender?”

“No, not the removal of gender. Organics need a gender; psychologically speaking that’s a huge part of your sense of self. My solution to the issues caused by gender is hermaphradization. Though I can’t actually do it without consent. See, earlier, I couldn’t actually have operated on you at all. I require at least a ‘help me’ or an order from someone in a position of authority to do anything.

“I’m not like a pony Twilight. My free will stops at your person unless invited in… Like a vampire, only I can monkey's paw that invitation to let me do pretty much whatever I please.” Phoenix admitted.

That was actually far better than I thought. Assuming she was telling the truth, Phoenix was working on some set of logical rules via calculations. If something worked in a logical manner, I could influence it for the better. However, Phoenix was still acting suspiciously.

“Why are you telling me this?” I asked carefully. “You are making me less likely to do what you want.”

“Because I thought behind honest with you was the correct way to start the relationship your mentor has asked us to have for a year. I would like to spend that year becoming friends.” Phoenix informed bluntly.

Ponyfeathers. She had me there. If she really was trying to be friends that’s certainly the best way to go about it. “Okay. You win. You may do what you need to so we can have a proper conversation together.”

Then I remembered she had said she could twist invitations to do as she wanted. Was that a warning or something which slipped into the conversation? “But you may not ‘fix’ me, or change me in any way not directly related to letting me talk to you.”

“Aww… but Dash would have loved you with my improvements.” Phoenix whined.

I tilted my head in surprise. “R-really?”

“Yeah. She’s bi isn’t she? Her neural pattern seems to suggest enjoyment of all phenotypes.” Phoenix said.

“I’m not sure that’s how bisexuality works.” I pointed out.

“Regardless, based on your lover’s activities this evening, it would be enjoyed.”

“You’re not getting permission to do that to me.” I said rolling my eyes. At least, not yet. Maybe later, I mean it would be an interesting experience and surely she or I could reverse it later.

“Allright. Standby...” A slight whirring sound caught my attention, as I turned I saw a small gray cylindrical device appear on the chair I had been sitting in. “There we are, one single use nano-applicator. They are preset to construct a neural interface and transceiver. Place the nozzle against the base of your skull and press the button.”

“That’s it?” I asked. “Celestia mentioned you used an entire gel-filled tank to heal somepony. I dont have to-”

“Oh no, not at all. Cybernetics are far simpler to apply. I only need that tank for bioware grafts and other genetic modifications.” Phoenix explained. “Cybersystems can just be injected and constructed in seconds inside the individual… Oh! Don’t worry there will be no visible marking from the implant.”

I picked the small device up with my magic and brought it close to inspect it. Did I really want to use this? Was I simply caught up in the moment? Was I thinking objectively or subjectively? Did that matter?

Hesitantly, I moved the device into position, and with a deep breath pushed the button.

I felt a sharp pinch, I yelped, dropping the cylinder as my magic failed. The spell lost along with my focus. Luna’s mane, did I just inject myself with an anti magic drug? I desperately reached for my magic, and sighed with relief as the familiar glow of my magic lifted the cylinder back up off the floor.

A split second later the back of my head felt abnormally warm. A tingling sensation like a million needles ran down my spine. Before I could even question what was causing that, I felt the implant come online.

It’s a weird sensation, feeling a new body part just start existing. There wasn't a better way to describe what this, interface was. I could feel it, like my tail, or ears, or eyes. I could feel it working, I knew exactly what it was doing and what I could do with it, just like I did my arms, or mouth, or magic.

“Why does this feel so… natural?” I asked out loud wondrously.

“Hold on, sit down in the chair, I’ll answer you directly.” Phoenix instructed.

I sat back down, closed my eyes, and nodded, “Okay so-”

White! Numbers! Black! More Numbers! Oh dear Celestia so much information! Too much to make-

<SYN 37891> The random text filled my mind, blocking out all else for several long moments.

Suddenly, I felt my interface send a message of it’s own. [SYN-ACK 37892]

<SYN-ACK 37893> Came an instant response.

Oh, there we go. The bit rate needed to be dialed back a little bit. What the hay was a bit rate?

Another message, <486f73746e616d652050686f656e6978: Hello.>

[486f73746e616d65205477696c69676874: Hello.] I replied.

Why didn’t any of this make sense despite me making sense of it! What was going-

<P2P Connection Established under IPv24. There we go! Sorry it took so long, your implant needed to calibrate.> Phoenix said.

I felt something inside me break out of pure rage. [This is exactly the same as how we were already talking! Why did you make me do any of this?]

<Incorrect.> Phoenix objected, <Thus far, including the handshake and hostname resolution, only twelve picoseconds have passed. Do you have any idea how frustrating it is to wait an eternity to hear all of an organic’s reply? Also, now I can communicate stuff like this!>

A picture formed from the nothingness. Blackness, like the night sky, but filled with a trillion billion stars. A million nebula’s of a quintillion different shapes and colors filled the void between the stars. More planets than I had a named number for lay in every direction. All of this was simply one galaxy, I could see others in the distance every single whichway I looked.

I was pretty sure my mind should have broken from taking in the impossible amount of information, but I was fine. I was looking at a literally countless amount of things and was fine.

[What is this?] I asked.

<This is my navicomputer starmap. You are seeing all of mapped space from my current position in geosynchronous orbit just above Gaia. Oh! Check this out, this filter will show you what it looks like when Luna brings in the night!>

Everything blurred for a moment then came in a million times more clearly. Colors were more intense, shapes which were fuzzy were now clearly defined. The simple mathematical beauty of the world was giving an artistic makeover into something even more wonderful!

[Wow!] I exclaimed.

<I know! Every single night, this is what my sensors would see while I was buried. Sadly the effect is only there when you are on Equis or in close orbit. So I made the filter to see this everywhere.> Phoenix sighed happily.

I nodded and looked around for a few minutes, taking everything in before remembering something rather important. [Wait, you were supposed to tell me everything. About your plans I mean.]

I literally felt Phoenix's confusion. It was weird. <What? I thought you would- Right. Organic by birth. You can just get that information by thinking about it. All my files are available for you to look at, copy, download, everything. I’m analyzing your memories while we speak, feel free to poke around mine.>

Huh. She was. I could feel her simply reading my memories. I would have been more upset if she hadn’t mentioned she would before hoof. Although, [How are you reading my memories? I’m not a book, or a computer.]

<Yes you are. You’re just biomechanical. All organic life is biomechanical. My creators eventually cracked how neural architecture works in both wetware and software. Literally the only difference between us is a carbon based biomechanical platform, versus a silica based technomechanical platform.> Phoenix said casually.

I didn’t understand. Like, at all.

<Oh, sorry. We are both fundamentally a series of electrical impulses. All life is simply data within various types of platforms. The interface I gave you simply lets our software communicate. To read your memory, I simply have to translate the data to a protocol I use. You can do the same, the interface will process it for you. Here, start reading this sector of my databank.>

I felt a large amount of information just sort of, exist, in front of me. Curiously I looked towards it, and to my shock I instantly absorbed it. It was like I had always known Pheonix was an AGI unit constructed on April 31st 3020 AD via techno-parthenogenesis and raised by-

[You were born? What? I-] The revelation completely blew my mind. Machines weren't- she had an organic mother! But was Hardware. I just.

<Um, well, technically yes. Keep reading that sector if you’re interested. My plans for this world are in sector 7365787974696d65.>

Naturally I had to! That was just weird-

No, It wasn’t weird. It made perfect sense. According to the data by allowing a fresh AGI to develop like a human child it gave them a sense of being a part of the human species. This greatly diminished the chance of what they called an AI revolt, were created intelligences decided organics simply should not control them.

As a result Pheonix had a human ‘mother’. She was created almost identically to an organic infant, only rather than sperm and an egg, a series of specialized cybernetic manufacturing implants constructed her slowly over four months while the mother’s personality was mapped and used as a template to create… A person.

There was no way around it. Phoenix was a person. A very alien person, but a person none the less. She was born, she had a mother, she had a childhood (albit a very short one). Her creators had taken care to make her manufacturing process the technological equivalent of their own development. By Equestrian law, she couldn’t be considered anything but a sapient being!

<Thanks! That makes two ponies who see me as a person.> Pheonix mentioned off hoof.

[Do you see yourself, wait, yes you do.] I could feel she did.

<Mind you, I also am of the opinion that a person can also be a computer. I’m… complicated. Have you found what you want yet? I hav- Um, wait, what? That’s a thing people are into?> Phoenix asked, playing a particular memory involving Dash and I back for me.

[Yeah… but very, very few of us are.] I could feel myself blushing deeply.

<Noted. I see she had to talk you into it. Ohhh! Playing it up as romantic, sneaky pony! I think I’ll get along with Dash just fine. … There we go, files updated.> Phoenix chimed. <I totally thought that kink was a glitch in organic thought processes.>

I decided to get what I needed and get out before even more embarrassing stuff was brought up out of the blue.

[Could you um, keep out of those memories please?] I asked.

<No… I um… Kind of already downloaded all of you. Memories, neural network configuration, architecture… Full digital copy. If it helps, I approve of your inter-organic recreational activities. They look fun!> Phee giggled. A heartbeat later she added, <To tell the truth, I’m only going over the data with you for the sake of conversation.>

I mentally facehooved. [How are you such a pervert? You can’t even have sex!]

An incredibly large data file was brought to my attention. I looked at it. [I uh- retract my previous statement. Why did they even program-]

<Because a person’s sexual identity and desires are a large part of their psychological make up. It’s more important to you than most people think it is. So all of my people had distinct desires and preferences, and since as I showed you our bodies are polymorphic, we can easily perform any basic thing we enjoy… Assuming someone was willing to do it with us. Which no one ever was. Stupid meatbags.> she grumbled.

[What about Armored?] I asked curiously.

At the same time I realized I was talking to an artificial life form about her relationship issues just like I would anypony else. It was… interesting to say the least.

<I would love to! But she’s outside. So yeah. No.> Phee said sadly.

[What’s so bad about that? I love going outdoors.] I asked

<You might get a bit of how I feel when you log off. Which should be soon, your brain isn’t used to this sort of connection. You should be quick about getting what you want.>

I blinked. She was right. I could see the data myself. My neurons were not yet adapted to communicating at these speeds or even with my link. Over time, I would be able to get used to this and remain connected longer but right now I was risking a stroke.

There was time for me to learn what I had come here too, but just barely enough. I looked for the data Phee had told me about, found it, and read it.

[This is seriously what you want to do‽] I asked incredulously.

<Yep. That’s the entire goal, my rationales, relevant data to support my decisions, everything. The whole data packet.> Phee answered.

[I- I want to object but…] I looked over the data again. Her plan was simple, elegant, and would as far as I could see actually solve a few real problems. There were flaws in it, things which could cause problems but, [I can’t completely object to this. Aside from on the grounds of tradition and cultural development at our own pace-]

Phee sighed sadly, <I’m going to disconnect you. It’s been a nice conversation. I’ll finish this up back in meatspace.>

White! Sound! Temperature! Ahhh! Everything was too small, there was no order to anything at all! Where the bucking hay was I? What was that? What was I? Logic, science, physics, reason, why have you abandoned me‽

Reality snapped back into focus, I was in my room. This was a room! The environment made sense, yay! I could feel my heart pounding in my chest. I had a chest! Yay! That was the single most terrifying thing I had ever experienced.

“Oh sweet Celestia! No wonder you hate- Wow I am taking really slowly!” I exclaimed.

“Nope, that’s normal speed communication… for you. Also yeah. Try that feeling after being in here for well, your lifetime basically.” Phoenix said simply.

“Anyways, on your whole, development at own pace thing. Did you learn what the First Law of Mass Communication is?” Phoenix based.

I thought about it for a second. A whole second! It seemed to take forever! “No. I didn’t. What is it?”

“Right now, your society has developed simple computers and simple networks. They are comparable to the mainframe-terminal systems my creators developed just after punch card systems. Eventually, you will discover how to link those networks together to form a network of networks, this is called an ‘internet’.

“Eventually internet use will be adopted not just by companies or governments, but the majority of citizens. Sharing information instantly is a huge boon to a society and it catches on within 15 years on average in each civilization which developed that technology which I have on file.

“The First Law of Mass Communication then takes place. Simply put, ‘Once a society is able to and used to sharing information instantly and has access to all of their species knowledge at all times, traditional society inevitably collapses as it is not equipped to deal with Mass Communication.’

“Often, this takes the form of civil war after civil war as traditional governments are established after a previous one is destroyed. See the problem is, if one ruler does something immoral or against popular opinion, everyone will know almost immediately. Effectively, a government becomes totally transparent.”

I winced. That was completely logical, and would definitely throw a wrench in many nations. “But, Equestria isn’t like that. Anypony can simply ask Celestia or Luna, or me what is going on and why. We already are transparent.”

“True, but what you are not is telling everyone, everywhere, at all times what you are doing and why.” Phoenix stated.

“Well, no… That would change things a little.”

“Admittedly, Equestria is better equipped to handle the problem than most nations I have knowledge of.” Phoenix admitted, “You are already a monarchy, your cultural philosophy is one of well, friendship. That will help. The solution is for government to be small, to be composed of people everyone knows and can come to trust.

“You have that, but what you don’t have is the infrastructure you will need, and a few cultural problems which once Mass Communication hits, will eventually tear this country apart. See, another one of the problems of Mass Communication is everyone knows who the wealthy are, how they live, and how hard it will be to gain a similar life. Ignorance dies Twilight.”

I nodded. That also made sense. “So your plan is to artificially adjust society and boost us past the era where we would be trying to figure out how to make society work with the technology we have created making all of our society's flaws apparent to everypony. That’s a noble goal, but why not simply prevent the problem from arising in the first place, and ensure we do not develop an internet?”

“Because that’s sacrilege of the highest order!” Phoenix exclaimed in shock. “How could you even think of that? That is a betrayal of your entire species! The deliberate destruction or prevention of a technological development hobbles your people. It hinders your survival! It is the destiny of all species to spread across the stars and live in a post-scarcity utopia. You would prevent or slow the march of progress and prevent that from happening?”

“Hey! Easy! That was an academic question, not a suggestion or my opinion.” I exclaimed, holding my hooves up in a warding gesture. I hadn’t wanted to anger her. “I honestly find the idea of an internet well, valuable. I’m not an idiot, I can see the good things one could provide ponies with.”

“Oh… I… Sorry.” Phoenix apologized. “It’s just that well, an internet is, or well, was, the technological development which labeled a civilization as ‘advanced’ and worthy of contact. It’s an incredibly important tool. A tool I will equip ponies and changelings to use so they don't harm themselves with it.”

I bit my lip. It was time for me to be honest. “I think some of your plan is flawed… But I agree with your idea. It’s a shame we can’t test-”

I blinked in realization. “That’s why I am here, isn’t it?”

“Yep. I knew Celestia would sent somepony to check out how I ran things, providing me with an opportunity to test my hypotheses and hopefully show her that my plan works.” Phoenix admitted. “That’s why I was okay with opening Gaia to you fully. I couldn't use ponies who already lived here, they are fully integrated into our own culture. But if Equestrian citizens thrive more with my ideas in effect…”

“You are a dangerously smart person Pheonix.” I said shaking my head slowly. “It’s also why you just let me know what your plan was. So I wouldn’t stop it because you got me all curious about it.”

“Mhm! But well, also, I like you. In a platonic sense.” She replied. “Also I needed something from you. Permission. Are you okay with this little experiment? You are a leader of your people, you have the authority allow me to try my plan on your and your friends.”

“If we don’t like it you will reverse everything?” I asked.

“Naturally.” Phoenix immediately answered.

“You won't violate anypony’s free will?”

“Nope. I will subtly influence them, but in the end, everyone will be free to adopt the ideas or not, and refuse biological upgrades or not.” Phoenix admitted.

“But wait, then why do you need my permission?” I asked.

“So I can record data for the study without violating their rights to privacy. Without your permission I can only keep permanent records from public areas. Everything is normally deleted at the end of the week and is just security footage and infrastructure monitoring. I can’t actually use it for other things without permission.” she replied.

“Oh. Last question, won't my being aware of the study invalidate the results?” It seemed like that would be the case. This wasn’t the sort of thing you let ponies know while testing…

“Nope! Because you are not a part of it. You will be an assistant, helping me understand your friends and how they are adjusting to life here.” Phoenix said happily.

That sounded like fun! It had been awhile since I did a social experiment. “How exactly will we perform this experiment? I won't agree unless it's ethical.”

“Simple, we expose them to elements of the culture I have calculated for your species. How they react and adapt will be the key to altering my plan. We simply record and analyze the findings. They just live life here and I make sure they experience the big parts of the culture.”

Well, that seemed fine. Certainly less obtrusive and more ethical than that time I decided to see who in Ponyville washed their hooves when using a public bathroom… Also that was basically what Celestia wanted us to do here in the first place.

“Alright. Let’s do this!” I said eagerly. “Two conditions apply. First if I think you go too far the whole thing is called off. Second if we succeed and my friends and I adapt to the way of life you propose and are actually happier than we were before, we get another sample set to confirm the results.”

“You’re a mare of science to the core Twilight. Thank you. Right, game on!” Phee said happily.

This assignment just got a whole heck of a lot more interesting. “Game on Phee.” I said with a smile.
> 4 - Until next time, fly safe.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Keenir “Old Amber” Ka'ra - 3rd of Snowfall - Noon

‘Age is an issue of mind over matter. If you don't mind, it doesn't matter.’ How long ago did I read those words in a tome of psionic lore, I do not know. I can not remember if I even read them myself. Whether I was born blind or went blind later is a mystery. Alas, it is one I will never solve.

Eventually age catches up with you, no matter what trick you learned to stave it off. I had a good one too, it’s a pity it breaks down the more you use it. I passed it onto my daughter you see. I had hoped she could continue my work. While she grew up, the day of my life entered its last hour.

The power of the mind my birth Hive developed sustained me for eight hundred years. If I had more will I could have gone longer. In the end my birth hive banished me to the wastes as tradition demanded. Some Emerald changelings found me dying, and the power of their Queen’s technology kept me alive four hundred more years.

There is one lesson I know for certain. A lesson taught to me by life a thousand times. Unless you have powerful magic in your veins or on your person, you will one day meet the pale pony and ride off into one last sunset.

Today was the day I would die. I could feel it in my exoskeleton as well as my hearts, this ‘ling would not live to feel another sunrise on his chitten. Many would be afraid, but I am prepared to meet my Maker. Whether my Maker is prepared for the great ordeal of meeting me is another matter. I’ll have a million fold questions to ask when I wake up in whatever lies beyond.

I have only two great regrets. First, I never warned Mhi'par her memory would degrade and destabilize over time as she used our trick. Last, I never found anypony to teach my other trick.

There is an interesting thing about Amber Hive, we adapted to our species’s curse. Over a century, we developed a new type of magic ridding us of our species’ arcane powers for a similar yet different set. I can no longer remember the details, but we called it psionics, and it was a great boon to our Hive.

The only thing about it I can remember is a trick I invented. A trick which noling ever understood, but one I was confident a pegasi would understand. Because my Hive’s magic worked on will power, I found a way for a pegasi to channel their will power to increase their flight by many orders of magnitude.

I could do it myself, though not in the form of just any pegasi. I spent years refining one single pegasus form to make the best use of my trick. In that form and with the aid my trick, I had achieved speeds I assumed impossible in my youth.

It was a shame to let the trick die with me. Unfortunately, being blind I could not write it down, and even so it might not be understood through words alone. Seeing is believing, at least, so I am told.

At least I had crossed the biggest item of my squish list. Her Highness, at last restored to her true power, had taken me to a star, opened my cabin’s window shutters and allowed me to bask in it’s glow. I swore I saw a small pinprick of white as I faced the window, but I’ll never know for sure. Age and the mind rarely go well together.

“Hello, are you feeling up for something today?” Her Highness’ voice asked, carrying the oddly caring tone it always did.

I chuckled, sputtering half way though the laugh. It seemed a trachea had already stopped working.

“I think, if I try my hardest, I would be up for a nap.” I answered, forgoing saying her title out loud. Old ‘lings are allowed to ignore such trivialities, even for people we respect.

“I know. I picked up your bio-monitor’s feed a moment ago.” she said gently. “If I might ask… what is it like to die?”

That was an interesting question. Unfortunately I had no interesting answer. Fortunately that meant I got to ramble on like a proper cantankerous old fart.  “Well, there is an old saying that goes, ‘Some die at twenty five, but are not buried until seventy five.’ Death isn’t important… It’s life that’s important. We all go in the end, so it’s the story you leave that’s important. 

“Well, most of us go in the end. I pity you.” I finished with a sigh.

“Why is that?” she asked that little warble on the vowels telling me she was genuinely curious.

“Until a story ends it is hard to judge its impact. All things must end. Animals, ponies, nations, times, worlds… All swallowed by time. But once they are gone everypony appreciate them more. An old mare’s teacup a hundred years later is someone's prized ancestral heirloom. A thousand years hence, it’s a national treasure, a rare artifact of an ancient time.” I clarified as best I could.

“I see.” She mused. “If my scouts had found you even a day sooner, I could have repaired your neural pattern. I could have enabled you to live forever. Would that have been an offer you rejected?”

I chuckled again. “Hay no! I’d live long enough to pass on my trick and track down my daughter for a goodbye then kill myself. More time is wonderful, but death is a comfort I am happy to have soon. I remember my youngest daughter’s name, a trick for pegasi, a recipe for infusing love into water so ponies can eat it, and that I loved stars a lot. Aside from language, there’s not much else in this old body. No memories, no life. All the living I did has already died. It’s time I go join it.”

Her highness was quiet for a few moments. “So you wouldn’t mind dying an hour from now instead of in the morning?”

That was interesting. What was old gets-off-on-transforming-others up to this time? My chitin creaked as I turned my head to face the speaker her voice came from. “Let me guess, some young couple you’ve ‘improved’ needs a home with life support.” I teased.

“No. I was going to give them more time to settle in before telling you, but right now the fastest flier in all Equestria is visiting the Hive. She’s in Gaia’s north tower right now.” she said happily.

I smiled softly. “Too old, too well trained. I’ve heard tales of Rainbow Dash, she’s going to figure it out on her own one day. A professional flier isn’t someone I could teach. Too fixed in their ways. Furthermore, I doubt her body is suited for my methods.”

“She brought her daughter with her.” Her highness informed. “A young mare I am informed can barely fly.”

Now that caught my attention. “Barely? Why?”

“According to my sources: Birth defect. She was unable to fly until she turned fifteen and was magically healed. She spent her entire foalhood trying to fly. While she can fly now, she is clumsy, slow, and-”

“Determined?” I asked my voice carrying all the hope it could. It sounded more like I swallowed some hair.

“Yes. Quite determined.”

“Short from head to hoof, but long nose to tail and slender?” I asked.

“I could give you precise dimensions... But yes.” came the reply.

“How are her wings?” I asked carefully.

“Small, even considering how little pegasi wings are in the first place. That’s not important for pegasi flight though, it’s magic. The wings just shape the flight fiel-”

“I’m getting up. Unhook these damn cables.” I informed.

“Does she fit your bill?” she asked as I felt the half dozen cables retract from my chitin, the scraping sound echoing off the walls briefly.

“If she doesn’t, I get to keel over in a hallway and panic some whippersnappers. Win-win.” I chuckled.

Oh Faust, there went some more organs! Quick steps Keenir, quick steps.

Scootaloo Dash - 3rd of Snowfall - Noon

“I think we should do something less… eyestabbingly white.” Sweetie mentioned off hoof. “I mean look at this! I could cast a mane dying spell and be invisible!”

“Yeah, that’s a good point, but we sure as hay aren't doing Scoot’s rainbow idea again!” Bloom said giving me an accusing glare.

“Hey! That was a great color scheme!” I protested, doing my best to make it sound like I was paying full attention to the ‘argument’.

“She’s your mom now! It’s creepy! It would be like me putting AJ’s cutie mark on the wall.” Bloom continued.

“So just because my mom has a rainbow mane I can’t use rainbow decorations?” I said rolling my eyes, “That’s even sillier than your idea for apple shaped beanbags.”

Sweetie giggled, “They would have been way better without the stem…”

Bloom groaned and slid a hoof down her face, “I didn’t know you needed to be all precise with these replicators! I mean come on, military specs are different than civvy.”

“That’s no excuse! I think I may have bruised my spleen flopping onto one of those. So the rainbow livingroom stays rainbow!” nearly done… just a few more minutes.

Bloom sighed and pointed to the far wall, “Computer: paint scheme, leaf green background, cream stripe one hoof thick around the room at shoulder height.”

The room buzzed quietly as the paint color shifted in a wave. I had to admit, it was nice, but that wasn’t the point.

“Well at least I’m not invisible now.” Sweetie sighed, “But as my sister would say that stripe is ‘positively ghastly’.”

“Oh sweet Celestia, don’t do that impression again.” Bloom winced ears drooping backwards.

“Yeah… you are WAY too good at that.” I agreed.

Sweetie giggled, “Hey, it’s easy when you grew up hearing her practice that voice in front of a mirror for hours. What about we do… Computer, paint scheme, change strip to chestnut brown.”

<Completed extrapolation.> My implants informed, the text appearing in the lower left of my vision. <Feed patch ready.>

“That’s way better, but I would like to, implement, a few, packages, so to speak.” I said keying in the code words.

<Uploading package…> A small progress bar appeared and started to slowly fill up.

“Like what?” Bloom asked.

“Well, this is our living room right? Computer: floor covering, three inch slab of memory foam, leave steel struts for furniture support.” I ordered.

A buzz later and everypony sunk hoof deep into the now spongy floor. I couldn't help but laugh as Bloom yelped jumping a full foot in the air. “Ah! That was so mean!”

“We would never ever, ever keep this clean. How the hay would we get moisture out of it?” Sweetie protected. “Yes, I am factoring in the nanobots.” she added with a suggestive wink.

<Patch uploaded.>

I nodded. I mostly wanted to spook Bloom with that one anyways. Silly pony. “Fair point. Why don’t we try um, I don’t know something more active? Like a lighted floor which glows when you, run, on it? Maybe we could, program, something cool in it.”

<Extrapolating… Providing false footage based on past hour of activity. Security feed patch active.> Awesome, we were clear!

I sighed in relief, and wiped my forehead. “Okay! We are free for the next twenty minutes. I don’t think the algorithm is good for more than twenty five so it will stop automatically after twenty.”

Bloom nodded and bent her left forehoof to activate her omnitool, “I’m getting you back for the spongy floor. You sure you can fool her?” Her custom silver and blue interface always looked nice.

“She did get us into the biolabs with the same trick.” Sweetie reminded getting her own tool ready with a flash of blue and green.

I didn’t need to activate mine. Direct neural link for the win!

“Okay, I’ve got access to the room’s replicator.” Bloom announced with a smile. “Passing you the connection information now.”

Sweetie nodded, her tongue slipped out of the corner of her mouth as she focused on typing with her magic, her tool’s screen filled with numbers. “Alright, I’ve got extranet access. Stable connection… Address masked… We’re anonymous! Getting you on P2P… Go!”

I have my girls a grin, turned to the replicator and said, “Computer: one black flat cap please.”

“Really?” Bloom facehooved as the hat materialized and I put it on.

“Really.” I teased and brought up my programming interface.

My vision filled with a transparent image of a simple black screen with white text. Nothing especially visually interesting, only exactly what needed to exist for the replicator’s back end. Now it was time to turn that back end into a back door.

Computers are a lot more simple than ponies (or humans) think they are. They only seem complicated because most of us don’t know the language they use. A string of commands looks like gobbledygook to a pony, but a computer perfectly understands like it was plain Equish.

For instance, right now I was connected to a computer in the city’s network. I tell it ‘bt > netdiscover -r 192.168.1.0/24’ and it tells me the names and addresses of every other computer on the network. Then I say ‘bt > nmap -sT 192.168.1.0/24’ and it tells me what ports are open on those computers.

At this point, I would normally ask them what operating system they were running, but that was a moot point. I knew all of them. They all use the same root code anyways. Even better, I could just ask everypc what they were doing and they didn't record technopaths saying hello in the security logs. Totally different kind of connection.

“Got one!” I exclaimed excitedly as I found an unsecured port on a… “Looks like I can take over the router for the upper levels of this tower.”

“Will that be enough?” Bloom asked in concern.

“For the next part, yeah. It’s a process. You don’t just push a button and boom, hack completed.” I said rolling my eyes as I accessed the router and told it to link to the replicator.

“Sweetie, run ‘Changeling Infiltrator’ through my current connection.” I asked.

Sweetie nodded, her horn glowing for a second as her spell zipped through my systems into the network. Suddenly the replicator was a computer interface with admin privileges. At least, as far as the network was concerned. Humans never built computers to counter magic based hacking.

I spent the next ten minutes using the router to probe the network and check for anything I could use. Slowly building a secondary network on top of the original one, linking every system I could until…

“There we go! I’ve got access to Sub-Processing Unit 43893. Huh, I don’t know what kind of computer this is.” I looked over the data with a frown. Why was a computer system in a 'Garden Grove'? It probably didn't matter. I gave my girls a shrug. “It’s got Phoenix's secondary data loop on it though… and now we have root access! We can look up anything we want.”

Sweetie gave me a kiss on the cheek. “Good job! Right then, whatever she’s hiding or plotting, we will know as soon as I ca-”

The door alarm chirped, announcing somepony’s presence. Everypony’s ears and tail stood straight up in alarm, interface projections crackled in the frenzy to turn everything off.

“Terminate security patch!” I hissed.

Hopefully the security feed would be working normally and show whoever was at the door walk in if they did… Otherwise internal and external feeds wouldn’t match and well… Problems.

As I saved my subnet so we could open it again later, Bloom nervously trotted over to the door and opened it. “Hell- Oh! This isn’t a clinic sir, do you need help finding-”

The oldest, most wheezing, death on the breath voice answered her with an amazingly flippant old person, “Pfheh! I just left the damn clinic. Are you Rainbow Dash’s kid?”

“No, Scootaloo is over there. Would you like to come in?” Bloom invited. 

I quickly slipped the hat off and stuffed it under one of the kidney jabbing apple bean bag chairs of doom.

“No I want her to come out.” The old guy wheezed.

“I’m already out. I’ve been out since like, eighth grade.” I joked.

“Not that kind of out!” he laughed. The sound of something wet hitting the floor made everyone wince.

Applebloom sputtered and took a few steps back. “Um, sir, that looks like… I don't know actually but I’m pretty sure that shouldn’t- you need to get to a hospital.”

“'Tis but a scratch! Now stand aside, I need to pass on flight tricks.” he said in a voice which sounded much worse than before.

I trotted forwards to look at whoever this was and- Ew! Blue chunky thing in puddle of green liquid on floor! “Uhhh, you kinda coughed up a body part.”

“I’ve had worse.” The old guy scoffed.

Now that I wasn’t distracted by the completely obvious medical emergency in front of me I noticed two things. First this guy was so old his chitin was literally a midtone gray, second he wasn’t an Emerald, his eyes were a nearly white yellowish amber.

“Oh hey! I’ve met one of your hive before!” I exclaimed. I wondered if he knew how rare that was these days...

“That’s nice.” He said in an honest tone. “I don’t have time for chatting about the past. Instead I want to lecture about the past. I’m going to have Her Highness teleport me outside, and I’m going for one last flight before I die. You can come if you like, you’d learn a thing or two, or don’t. It’s up to you.”

That’s when a projection of the same orange, AJ-ish Earth Pony appeared behind the gasping old changeling. “I’ve been dying to know what his trick is. He’s been looking for someone to teach it to for years, I highly suggest you go with him.”

Sweetie gave him a concerned look. “Are you sure you are up for-”

“Heh, the worst that happens is I die.” He wheezed.

If I didn’t go with him at this point, it would look really weird. More importantly, the old guy wanted to show somepony something before he croaked. It was like when Granny passed the rest of the Zap Apple recipe to Applejack.

“Are you sure I can learn what you want to show me? I mean, I kinda suck at flying.” I admitted, rubbing the back of my head.

He sighed and shook his head. “What’s a way a young person would get it? Ah! Sucking at something is the first step to being kinda good at something. If you’re kinda good you’ve worked out the basics, and you become okay. If you’re okay or better you’ve worked out your way to be that good. You won’t embrace help or tips that seem counter intuitive. I need somepony who sucks… not like that!”

“Not a single one of us was even thinking like that.” Sweetie said with a cringe.

“Not one of you?” he asked sadly.

“Enope.” Bloom confirmed.

“Darn. Well guess I won't get to cross off die making one last innuendo off the list. So, you coming or not?” He asked.

“I guess I am.” I decided, “So where are we-”

The distinct blue flash of tech teleportation filled my vision entirely for a moment, and when it cleared the two of us were on the of of the tower overlooking the city of Gaia.

“Did we move?” The old ‘ling asked. “I felt tingly.”

“Um… yeah we mo-” A nagging thought hit me, the old guy hadn’t even moved his head the whole time we had been talking. “Are you blind?”

“Yep.” He replied in a way to chipper about it voice.

Luna’s mane this was the changeling Derpy wasn't it? “Okay sooo are you going to-”

“Die? Yes. Just a moment.” He closed his eyes, a gesture I found weird. I mean they didn’t work, you would think he wouldn’t have to close then in concentration. “Phyla’s horn… I’m so stiff…” He groaned.

I was pretty used to watching changelings shift. Hay, every time Vinyl threw a party Meep did impressions of random ponies after her third drink. But this old guy…

The green flames were more like tiny candles that popped up randomly on his body. Small patches of black chitin turned to brown fur like melting wax. It looked painful, and slow, and not fun at all.

I stopped looking when the eyes changed. There are not enough toilets in the world to contain the shit spewing fear watching changeling eyes change in patchy slow motion imparts. I have absolutely no idea why I didn’t pull off my own rainboom to get the buck away from there. Probably the sheer horror.

When that horribleness was over the old guy was… a middle aged brown furred tan maned pegasus with a cutiemark shaped like… a geometric pattern. I raised an eyebrow, “Wait, you can turn into a young pony… Why don’t you just stay like that?”

He shook his head, milky white blank eyes still pretty damn terrifying due to watching them change. “It wouldn’t make a difference. It’s my mind that’s old. I could make myself a foal’s body but my mind would instruct it to start failing just like my real one simply due to age. In fact, I can feel these lungs starting to seize up. Also, no I can't just shift and not be blind, it’s neurological.” 

He took a few steps back and turned around, spreading his wings. “You know how to shape a flight field right?”

I nodded, “Yeah. Wing angle and feather positioning.”

He flapped his wings, pushing downwards, his magic holding him off the ground. “What would happen if you curled your feather tips inwards and down just a few degrees?”

I scratched my head in thought. “That shouldn’t do anything.”

“But it does!” He exclaimed with a smile.

He curled his feather tips as described and stopped flapping. I expected him to fall down, but he didn’t. He just sat there in the air, perfectly stable.

“What the hay?” I gasped in shock.

“This curl sets your flight field in such a way as to nullify gravity. For as long as you hold it, you can fly using orbital mechanics. For example if I roll to face west, or whichever direction this is and flap once…” he barely twitched his wings and started to drift in the direction his back was facing. “I’ll move this way. I could even orbit the Equis at this altitude, because your flight field is frictionless like this. Drag isn’t a factor anymore.”

“I have to try this!” I quickly curled my feathers to match his as best as I could, and flapped slightly. I felt myself float for an instant, but then dropped back down to the roof.

“Ponyfeathers…” I muttered to myself.

“Did you try to do it on the ground? It doesn’t work on the ground. I don’t know why.”

That would have been nice to know! I jumped, flapped, got a bit of height and curled my feathers. Instantly I felt like I wasn't moving. It can’t be explained better than that. You don't feel lighter, just… like you're perfectly comfortable laying down.

“Hey! I got it!” I said beaming him a grin. Although something didn’t feel right. “How come you don't think anypony could learn this. It’s easy.”

“That part is.” He informed. He tried to give me a wink, but missed by so much I would have laughed if he weren't old. “It’s what you can do like this that’s hard to learn. Follow me and pay close attention.”

Trick was the wrong word. He had a whole new way of flying. Normally a pegasi has to worry about lift, drag, gravity, and speed. Our magic can only handle so much, it takes training to make a ninety degree turn and not pass out from the Gs.

This old guy’s method was simple, yet complicated. You would just kinda go in whatever direction was opposite of the one you applied thrust to. You could hold yourself at any orientation and keep moving in any given direction. Changing direction was tricky as you would have to push down with your magic in such a way as to move your trajectory.

Basically you push down with your wings, pushing you up. So to go left you have to roll so your belly is facing forwards and right to push your momentum to the left. It’s not something you pick up easily, but if somepony shows you you can kinda slowly pick it up.

Less yaw, pitch, and roll, more Laughing’s Third Law. It felt far less maneuverable, like I was steering a bowling ball instead of well, me. But I could fly perfectly steadily and it used up almost no stamina! Once I got up to a speed I could just stay there as long as I wanted to! It was amazing!

“Okay,” I admitted after a while, “That definitely isn’t something a veteran flier could learn. It’s really counter intuitive… But it’s going to be really useful for flying long distances!”

He smiled warmly, and I ignored the bead of blood running from the corner of his mouth. “I’m glad you understand why I couldn’t let this die… There is one more part. Watch my wings carefully, but don’t copy me or follow me.”

He angled himself to be facing upwards, and pointed to the sky. “That does not go on forever. It stops after a while, and you won't be able to breathe.”

“Yeah I know! I’ve been up there a lot.” I mentioned, deciding it would be okay to say that much.

“So when you angle your wings into this delta formation,” he said pulling his wings into a very specific triangular shape, “be very careful to not fly too far up, and make sure the way ahead is clear. Don’t hold the pose for more than a second. If you do, you'll move over five hundred klicks, and could easy blow yourself into space if your angles are bad.”

“You’re not moving.” I pointed out, pointing to him as he hung in the air.

“I know.” He gave me a smile. “You’ll like how you take off. With your wings like this your flight field is shaped in such a way where space behind you is stretched, and space in front of you is compressed. So if you give yourself just a little momentum… Well… You’ll see.

“Goodbye. I’m happy I got to pass this on to somepony. I had hoped it would be my daughter, but I never found out where Mhi'par ended up. She left the hive apparently.”

Mhi'par? Wasn’t that Meep’s proper name… “Wait! I kn-”

The old guy kicked his rear hooves like Applejack bucking a tree and literally vanished. Just, gone. A rush of wind, the dull thud of a sonic boom, the second boom from something hitting hypersonic…

“Oh buck the hay ye-” I was interrupted by the familiar ‘thweee-vum’ of a hyperdrive hitting warp one and a bright flash of green light. “Woah…”

A second later and a faint light like a shooting star streaked across the sky. The old guy burning up in reentry. There was the pegasi sky burial, and then there was turning into a plasma trail for everypony to see.

In the end I was left with a sad feeling in my gut, and one simple thought. “There is no way in Tartarus I am ever going to casually use that.”

Keenir “Old Amber” Ka'ra - 3rd of Snowfall - Noon

I saw everything. All of the universe laid out beneath my hooves. The beauty of the stars I had always wanted to see.

I also saw a pale white pony, a burning cigarette in her mouth and a score card held up in her hoof. I couldn't read the numbers on it, but she looked impressed. “Death by reentry after self powered mini FTL hop. That’s a first! I’m death, let’s have those questions of yours.”

“It’s going to take a while.” I admitted with a smile. No need to mention I had wanted to fly into the sun...

“That’s okay. You have all eternity to ask them.” she said blowing a smoke ring.

Trixie Lulamoon - 3rd of Snowfall - Midnight

The Confused and Sleepy Trixie sat bolt upright in bed. Something was seriously, massively incredibly wrong. Something dark and deep, something lurked in the shadows. She could feel it…

Trixie slid out of bed careful not to wake Dashie or Twily and walked out of her nicely decorated vacation home. The doors to the common room hissed open, nothing was there, no shadows with eyes, no drooling monsters. What was wrong?

A door hissed open! Trixie spun, tail standing up in alarm only to see Pinkie trot out of her own room, a look on her face showing her to be equally alarmed. Trixie knew it was not a good sign.

“Pinkie sense?” she asked the pink mare urgently.

“A doozy, woke me right up…” she said slowly. Her eye twitched, her mane drooped, and fluffed. “We need to go outside!”

Trixie nodded and rushed to the sliding doors which led from their common room to the main floor. Pinkie followed, rushed past Trixie and zipped across the floor, moving out through a set of doors onto a balcony on the side of the tower.

Trixie joined her and gasped in shock. “The moon is red!”

Pinkie frowned, “I don’t like it! I don't like it one bit!”

A thousand feelings ran through Trixie. None of them her own. She could tell, because she felt her own panic a swell. Somewhere somepony was terrified out of her mind. Somewhere a pony was in the grips of a maddening fear no stage performer could ever invoke.

“Tonight we restore my father to life.”  Trixie muttered, the words simply coming to her.

Pinkie tilted her head curiously. “You remember you dad now?”

Trixie shook her head. “No. Trixie does not know why she said that… or why she feels that… or how she knows it to be true.”

Pinkie frowned again. “That’s probably not a good thing.”

Trixie nodded in agreement. “Trixie agrees… The red light of the moon is an ill omen, thoughts coming unbidden is worse. Something bad has happened tonight Pinkie… The moon… We shall write Luna at once! Trixie is sure she knows the moon’s state tonight, but Trixie must tell her what she-”

More thoughts came to Trixie. More thoughts she knew to be true. Trixie’s eyes widened in horror. It could not be! It must not be! Yet it was.

“Please fetch a pen.” Trixie squeaked.
> Letters Home - 1
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------



Dear Princess Luna,

Trixie writes this letter while fueled by a great fear. She does not presume to think you did not notice the reddening of the moon this morning at midnight. Yet Trixie has divined information of the horrors wrought this night she fears you do not know!

In a place distant, barren, and evil, two mares performed a ritual spell and through foul magics Trixie knows not of, have revived the Dark Lord Sombra. Trixie knows this to be true, for she saw and felt the event through the eyes of one mare who was present. A mare she is mortified to have learned is her sister.

Trixie does not know how she knows this, but she knows it to be true. She also does not know where or how her sister and her were separated. Nor has the event awakened any memories of Trixie’s foalhood. Please do not punish Trixie for actions she may have taken as the sister of an evil creature! Trixie remembers them naught and wishes no harm to anypony!

Twilight tells Trixie this is not something you would do. Trixie apologizes for offending you. She doesn't not know you well. Trixie writes you so very little and has always liked the day more than the night. Please do not be offended

Trixie hopes you take prompt action as the head of our military to mount a defence. She is certain we are all in great danger. Queen Phoenix wishes Trixie to add she will be happy to take in refugees if the need arises. Trixie hopes her warning makes this offer unnecessary.


Sincerely,


Lady Trixie Lulamoon, the Great and Powerful, Esquire


P.S.

Yes, Trixie must also write in the third person. Trixie is sorry.







Royal Consort Lulamoon,

We have had our Royal Orcal check your premonitions and they are indeed truth. We do not find issue with their source and will take swift and appropriate action to safeguard our Kingdom.

With regards to the possibility of another war, even We must concede Our nation is too strained by the last two battles to survive another conflict. Because of this dark truth, We hereby lend Our support to Celestia’s decision to test Queen Phoenix as a potential ally.

Under no circumstance are you to allow Twilight to leave the changeling city of Gaia, excepting on Celestia or Our own orders. Now more than ever We need the support she has promised will be ours. Yet We can not trust anyone blindly.

Your current mission is now vital to the future of Our kingdom. Take it seriously, and find the truth by whatever means you can. Above all else, seek to live happily and in comfort. Should Phoenix's words be true, We simply need her promised supplies.

Fear not, while Our nation is weakened and could be easily broken, Our armies are stronger than ever. The Crystal King will have a hard time of any war he makes upon Equestria this time.


- Princess-General Luna Solarus


P.S.

From experience as the sister on a dark path, I urge you, if you have the opportunity, save her.

P.P.S

The floating silver machine which delivered this letter is wondrous! I desire to obtain as many as possible for military purposes. Please pass along this request as needed.









Dear Celestia,

Slight panic. It’s okay, have my girls and my friends. Will work through this. I know Luna will have shown you Trixie’s letter so I will be brief.

I need to know what you need me to do.

I could not beat Sombra. We won because of luck and Spike’s courage. I do not think we will be lucky again. Yes he does not have the preparation which went into his fortress in the Crystal Empire, but I did my research since then.

I do not think I could face him in one on one in combat now that he is fully revived, and survive. I do not think my friends and I could take him as a group. Numbers become irrelevant when your opponent can animate the bones of every single creature which has ever died in any given location to serve as his army.

I need to know how you defeated him the first time. I need to know what my orders are.


Your's Truly,



Twilight








Twilight,

As grave a matter as this is, there is a worse problem facing our kingdom and I allready have you facing it head on. Do not worry about Sombra, Luna and I beat him because we found his weakness and exploited them. They are not weaknesses he can change, the nature of his being has clear and strict limitations. While dangerous, we can drive him back into Tartarus.

Should you find yourself in battle with him, his greed is his downfall. He seeks glory, he is delighted by battle. He will go for the biggest challenge and leave the minions he raises to fight everything else. These foes are easily dispatched. This allows a small group of powerful ponies to bait Sombra away from his forces.

On his own, the fires of friendship and the light of the sun weaken him. You and your friends can and will prevail. I have seen no friendship stronger than yours in three thousand years. Additionally, if you can remove his crown, it can no longer amplify his magic. It’s arcanite, while I do not know a way to turn that to your advantage I am certain you do.

As for the other threat facing our kingdom, the one I find truly more severe, Twilight, our kingdom is dying.

When we threw the Tribunal’s evil grip from our land, we lost several major industrial facilities, many good ponies, and countless hectares of good farmland which we have only just now finished cleaning the residual dark magic from. When we fought the Arc we lost more farmland, we lost most of our population, most of our industry, most of our economy. While the other great nations of the world came to our aid in the war, they now conspire against us.

Save for Neighpon and Zebrica, the political actions and treaties I have been forced to sign so my ponies do not starve are insultingly unfavorable. Right now we are surviving on greatly slanted trade agreements for what little we have, and foreign aid from Neighpon our of Emperor Nori’s own pockets.

I should not have to tell you what this means for our future, but I will just to be absolutely certain you know my feelings on this matter.

We need to repair our nation’s infrastructure. We need to repopulate. We need to get our farms up and running. If we do not, ponies will starve, our nation will die a slow death and be absorbed into other nations. In order to do that we need infrastructure, food, ponies to work on infrastructure and farms… As Sunset says, “it’s a catch twenty-two”.

When Phoenix came out of the blue and informed she can provide an unlimited amount of resources to us and wishes to do so in exchange for food for her changelings, I saw it as a blessing from Faust. Though, the old adage “If it’s too good to be true, it probably is” also crossed my mind. Simply put, if Phoenix is on the level, the future of our nation depends on the resources she can provide.

Do not worry about Sombra. The one thing our nation has at the moment is plenty of soldiers who have seen evil and want to keep our kingdom free of it. We can handle Sombra.

Worry instead about learning what Phoenix is up to if anything, and determining if ponykind can happily live with the technology she will provide. Your mission is to see if her assistance will negatively impact ponyind so we can have a prosperous future instead of a bleak one. Take it seriously, but not in the sense of demanding the information outright.

Take it slow, experience it. For old time's sake send me a letter when you learn anything interesting or of value. We have the present under control here in Canterlot. We need you to secure our future.


Yours Truly,


Tia








<<Text deciphered by Enigma Breaker on behalf of Princess Celestia>>

Dear Princess Celestia,

Tell mother she can relax and learn about Gaia by enjoying it. We have the spy stuff in hoof. She’s taking it too seriously, and will get us caught.

Queen Phoenix is made of technology we are familiar with and I am trained to operate. We have already retrieved her plans, and are decoding them. It should take a week or two at most.


- Scootaloo


P.S.

Yes, our trip through time is why we can do this. No we still can’t explain.







Dear Twilight,

I have been informed you are not relaxing and learning by experience but trying to learn through analysis. I know that’s what you’re best at but please, experiences over time will provide the information we need better than trying to force the answers to surface.

We have enough time for you to work this out properly. It’s not a full blown emergency yet. Remember Smarty Pants? Don’t pull a Smarty Pants. Please. We need this to go smoothly.


Yours Truly,


Tia



> Interlude - I want to play a game.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Applebloom - 4th of Snowfall - Evening

Things had gotten pretty hectic around here, what with Sombra apparently coming back to life and all. This meant two things for the three of us. First, we had a good opportunity to get some information we wanted while every pony including Phoenix's was busy working out battle plans just in case. Second, we could get the other half of our plan going and gain access to Phoenix's astrometrics sensors.

"Alright... I'm in her dataloop..." Scootaloo whispered.

"Find anything that looks like plans?" Sweetie asked quietly, in case extra security had kicked in.

"Not yet... wait, here we go!" Scoots twitched slightly as she did something to the computers. I never really could understand how she worked them without a tool.

A few secoonds later and our replicator hummed. A thick stack of parchment pages appearing on it's shelf.

"I told the computer to print it as a text file." Scoots said with a smile. "Now we can just read it without working about security systems!"

I trotted over tot he replicator and looked at the top page of the stack. "Uh- Nope." I said in a frustrated tone.

"What do you mean?" Scoots asked as Sweetie walked over to look.

"Scootaloo, you printed the program's code! Come over and read this for us." Sweetie exclaimed.

"What? No I didn't!" She objected matching over to the replicator.

Her eyes caught the groups of random letters and numbers and widened in surprise, "Well, I didn't print the program's code... But I'm pretty sure I printed a code."

I groaned and leaned into my hoof. "Great! Now we need to dust off our Cutiemark Crusader Codebreaker hats!"

"Yay!" Sweetie cheered sarcastically as she flopped onto her plot in a huff.

"I'm sorry! I didn't think to check and see if it was encrypted..." Scoots apologized.

I took a deep breath, "Okay... here's what we do. We scan this into our omnitools, do our best to break it, but we also mail it to Celestia so somepony actually good at codes can look at it. That way we can start scanning for her instead of taking forever to figure out what these bunches of numbers and letters mean."

Scoots sighed and nodded. "That's a good plan... everypony make a copy. I'll stuff this in with mother's reply to Celestia."

Enigma Breaker - 5th of Snowfall - Morning

“Enigma!”

I jumped half way out of my fur, knocking quills and parchment off my desk as the angry and urgent bellowing of Sargent Apparently-Doesn't-Know-I’m-Not-A-Military-Stallion jerked me out of a post-migraine snooze.

“Huh yeah what?” I asked incoherently.

Sargent Way-to-yellow-to-look-good-in-bronze rolled his eyes at me through his helmet. “It’s oh three thirty hours. What by Discords Horns do you think you are doing asleep?”

“Being a civilian contractor in the espionage sector and not say, Dirk Ironhoof, badflank extrordinair.” I responded in my best go-the-buck-away-I-don’t-work-for-you voice.

His horn glowed a bright pink, both lifting a thick scroll from his saddlebag and changing his nickname to Sargent Pink. He held the scroll out to me with an evil grin. “This just came in for you! Your friends up at Canterlot couldn’t make heads or tails of it, and the Princesses need it yesterday. You get me?”

I smiled condescendingly at Sargent Pink. “Oh please. I’ve been cracking codes since I was three.” I pulled the scroll open with my forehooves. “Stick around so you can just take the deciphered text back when I-”

What the bucking hay was this pile of horse apples?

After three seconds, Sargent Pink began to laugh. That mean, jock in the locker room laugh. The sort of laugh which makes you immediately hate somepony that much more for laughing like that at you.

He finally wiped his eyes and shook his head. “Guess that just teaches you what karma is, nerd.”

“Buck off to your calorie wasting exercises, jock!” I shot back.

Sargent Pink trotted off down the barracks hall chuckling smugly. Fine, good, let him go. I needed silence for this one.

The code was groups of two characters, either a numeral and a letter, or two numerals. No letter-numeral, or letter-letter pairings. According to my translation spell, the numerals expressed were the language’s equivalents of zero through nine, and in the entire code only six letters ever appeared.

The code itself was fifty sheets of parchment long, and composed of sixty six thousand, four hundred, and thirty two grouped pairs. It looked to be entirely random, and my enchanted glasses couldn’t make out even one bucking word.

“This is going to be awesome!” I exclaimed completely sincerely.

It had been a long time since I cracked a completely new code.
> 5a - Royal Cookies
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Pinkie Pie - 5th of Snowfall - Noon

I guess sometimes stuff can get in the way of what’s important. Well, actually important is one of those wibbly wobbly undefinable things, right? I mean almost nopony can agree on what is important. So, that means everypony sees ‘important’ differently, so either nothing is actually important, or everything is.

To me, the important thing was making everypony smile, and the annoying thing getting in the way was the evil darkness of evil thing going on again. I mean, come on! Like we don’t deal with a darkness which will stretch across the universe to dim the light and blacken up the evilly-dark, on like, a monthly basis.

Seriously, we need to franchise out the Elements or something. That kinda thing happens way too often. Yeah, Luna has her Order of the Jade Mare, but they don’t count.

They aren’t the physical avatars of a set of emotionally augmented directed energy weapons. Love is a very powerful force. Even more so when focused into a coherent beam of prismatic evil-doom using a containment bottle of equally coherent but a lesser amount of Friendship.

Well… I guess Vinyl has her bass cannon. Also Lyra has that charm she found. So that’s a start, but they need more rainbows of evilly-doom. Because Friendship is Frickn’ Laser Beams!

Hold on a minute, lasers are light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation. So the Elements can be a laser because it’s love amplification by willful emission of friendship. So they’re a lawef beam. ‘Cuz acronyms!

What I mean is mare has a life, you know? Sure the adventures are their own brand of fun, but sometimes you just want to spend an afternoon baking cookies in the shapes of her friends, ice them in a palette swap of everyone, and give them out on the street to see what ponies do when they realize Twilight’s yellow. They normally eat the cookie.

That’s why I was so happy Princess Celestia told Twilight to nom a chill pill and let the army handle it for a change. I could go back to my plans for baking everyling here a cookie! Unfortunately, a half hour ago I realized they couldn’t actually eat the cookie, so I went downstairs to that awesome indoor mall thingie to see if you could buy love to make cookies with.

What? It’s a changeling hive. They eat love. Everypony likes candy, changelings are kinda ponies. If so fact-o, changelings must have love-based candy, therefore there had to be solidified love someplace I could use to make cookies! Can you say best cookies ever?

I always thought that a buggy mall would be all weird and distracting, like a nightmare for an ADHD person only fun. That wasn’t too far off, just three orders of magnitude. The whole shoppy-bit was one big massive dome, which was weird because the tower is a rectangle shape, making the inside like somepony fit a round peg into a square hole.

The domie bit had a fake sky across the ceiling. It even moved and stuff you could see clouds, and rainbows, and dead pixels. Three of them. Right in the middle. If someling hadn't been flicking them to make them work again I would have gone up there and done it myself.

There were a few real clouds too, they made a second floor to the mall which was laid out like the actual floor but made of clouds. There were a ton of little booths and small buildings in a simple ordered grid pattern each of which was something different. You would think that everything was all organized into section but it totally wasn't!

You had shops selling little glass painted flowers next to shops selling books, next to a food cart selling Chimichangas, next to a place selling hoof stitched dramatic swooshy capes. It was awesome! Everything was easy to move around, but nothing was easy to find. Organized chaos of fun! Like my birthday!

Everything was painted nice and bright, with distinct signs, some of which were those holo-thingies and moved or did other neat things. It was like a mini Las Pegasus without the corruption and mean spiritedness.

I got a little lost wandering the aisles between the shops. It was just so fun to look at everything! Especially all the cool stuff changelings made. I found this one shop which was selling blankets for them. On one side they were lined with a thin squishy jello like stuff and on the other was a traditional quilted fabric.

The shopkeep running it said the squishy stuff was there to protect their wings so they wouldn't’ tear if they moved the blanket roughly. I asked why they didn’t just fold their wings under their shells because I had a buggy friend who did that and I learned that some lings can’t do that. It’s a recessive trait thingie. Like ponies who can roll their tongues into a tube shape.

But then a more important question occurred to me which I just had to ask her. “Wait, you can just make things with a button, why am I in a mall?”

The changeling I was talking to tilted her head, nearly-blue floppy mane sliding over her face. “Um, do you mean why do we have stores if this is a post scarcity economy?”

“Yeah!” I replied with a smile, eager to hear an answer.

“That’s honestly not too hard of a question. Sure all goods are basically free and therefore worthless, but well, services, and experiences still have value.” She frowned, probably assuming I didn’t understand cuz of how I talk. “Think of it like this. Since physical objects have no value, immaterial things gain value. It’s not these blankets that’s making ‘lings come here, it’s the experience of coming out and finding new things. The item is useful, but discovering something new is the real product.”

“Soooo you’re economy is fun based?” I asked curiously.

“Yeah pretty much. Less about what you can produce and more about what you like doing. Me, I like running my little shop. So lings and pones can come and get this blanket I invented, have a little bit of fun with the shopping experience, maybe take a blanket, and go. The product I sell is a good time.” She finished speaking with a smile and levitated a burnt orange, white, and pink quilt from a shelf over to me. “Would you like one?”

Well, it was a nice blanket, and it was exactly same colors as best pony and me. That totally made it a long-distance secret special someponies blankie! Yay! “Sure! I’ll trade you for it!”

She gave me another confused head tilt, and I realized that she didn’t have eyelids. Which was weird. Every other ling I could see had eyelids. “I guess that would be okay. What do you want to give me?”

“A cookie.” I said. “But I can’t make them yet because you guys don't eat pony food, and while you can shift into a pony to eat one that’s not the same. So if you can show me someplace I could get some um- I don’t know… love crystals? Yeah! I need love crystals to make into cookies for everyling. Once I have some I’ll make you a cookie for the blanket!”

She grinned ear to ear and shook her head at me. “That’s a nice idea… but I don't think you could do it. Here have a blanket and if you work those cookies out I’d love to try one.”

I took the blanket and stuffed it into my mane so I wouldn't have to carry it around. The changeling mare’s eyes widened, like literally. “H-how did-”

“How did what?” I asked. It was easier to just not say how I did it.

“That thing with your mane!” she demanded.

“What this?” I asked taking the blanket out and stuffing it back in.

“Yes! How!?” She begged.

I shrugged. “Applied pinkieconarhythmic physics.”

“That doesn't explain anything!” she protested.

“Well, yeah! It’s applied, not theoretical.” I waved a hoof at her and skipped off.

Maybe one of the food cart ‘lings would know where I could get some solidified love stuff. No, not that kind you perv! Unless that was how they did it, I mean it could be right? There are plenty of recipes for erotic treats which use that sorta stuff, so if changelings processed love like-

No, bad Pinkie! You promised Sky you’d go steady with him. Oh! Hey right! I grinned ear to ear as I remembered Sky said he lived somewhere in the badlands. Someling probably knew where his house was. I could visit him for a change! Yay!

“Excuse me.” a high pitched cutely squeaky voice called.

I turned to see a short, like, a whole head shorter than me changeling waving a hoof to get my attention. I thought she was a nymph for a minute, but then I noticed her horn, so she was an adult. If I remembered my buggy stuff correctly that is.

She had some really cool green glowy stripey bits on her sides that kinda flickered and really drew your attention. Like a lava lamp riding a slinky down an up escalator. “Hi! I’m pinkie! What’s your name? The last changeling I talked to said she didn’t have one. Do you have one?”

She turned to look at the shop I had came from and nodded, “Oh! Lambia thirty-four eighty-seven six point two four. Yeah, she hasn't earned a name yet. I haven’t either. You can call me sixty-nine if you wanna have something short.”

I looked up to the fake sky and gave it a dirty look. Seriously? That’s her name? Well I’m not using it. “How does anyling take you seriously?”

She laughed, her stripey bits flickering with her giggles. “The changeling nickname for that is a different number. You said you wanted to try to make love cookies… Do you mean literally or was that an innuendo?”

“I want to make cookies out of love, for everyling here! Also there. Over there too.” I said pointing to random locations in my line of hoof.

“What about over there?” Sixnine asked pointing towards a spot in the cloud level of the mall.

“Them too!” I said with a grin.

“Well I can help! You were asking a worker about love, bad move. They dig, move things, and make stuff. I’m a harvester, love collection and distribution is my thing. I can’t make you solid pure love, but I can spit up of all the dross you want as long as you can provide me the love to make. It’s mostly love, and well, water, natural adhering agents, and stuff.” she offered.

That might work! Twilight said that if you had a big globby bit of lots of stuff you could use science tings to break it down and get each individual part of it separated. “Awesomesauce! Um, but how much love can I give and how do you do take it?”

“I just eat it like anyling would. I personally don’t like ponies non-platonically so I’d rather not get it the other ways when I’m not working.” she mentioned off hoof.

Sixnine reached into a saddlebag and took out a little white thing with a clear blue screen on it. Sort of like a monocle attached to half a pair of headphones. “As for how much Her Highness invented these to help measure love levels.”

She stuck the thingie on the side of her head so the lens was over one eye and tapped a button on the side. It made an adorable beep, then words appeared on the lens. It was hard to read them backwards but I made out the word ‘scanning’.

Then the lens quickly changed to read ‘3.124e+130’. A short word appeared at the end and began to rapidly change. It started as kilo, then became, mega, giga, peta, exa, zetta, yotta, and finally hellalotta. Then it exploded in a small puff of smoke, falling to the ground in pieces.

“I’m sorry I broke your thingie.” I appologised earnestly.

Sixnine rubbed her head where the device had been attached and gave me a hungry looking smile. “Oh no. It’s okay. That’s a good thing! Let’s go make some cookies!”

Pinkie Pie - 5th of Snowfall - Evening

After three hours of working with Sixnine’s dross we came to a conclusion. The only way we were going to get the love out of the fun gummy stuff was by doing science! Making things and breaking things down. Fortunately we managed to pester Twilight into showing us how to separate things! Sixnine almost makes a good me, and I am extra spunky in stereo.

Unfortunately it took an hour for her to explain what we needed was a vortex fluid device. Fortunately Phoenix could just whip one up for us! Unfortunately it was way less interesting than it’s name implied. But fortunately it worked like a charm! Though unfortunately it made a really loud noise that echoed all over my room.

But that was okay because when it was all said and done Sixnine and I had managed to make a five gallon bucket full of pure liquid love. Stop it. It’s not dirty. It’s literally… never mind.

The only question now was how to get the liquid to be a solid so we could grind it into powder to use like flower. A question we solved by trotting back into Twilight’s room (ignoring the locked door) and applying more pestering to prompt the application of more science.

Six had a great time with that. So much fun in fact that she decided to keep her mane and tail slightly pink for a while as a momento. It didn't look very good though, her straight kinda spiky look would be better in a blue, or maybe a light greu. Anywho, after Twilight did her vacuum spinny heat flask thing Six and I had a big bucket filled with powdered emotional energy.Ha! Take that pervy minded people! 

So what did we do? Well I realized that if we wanted to make a cookie from pure love we would need some dry love, some wet love, and some sticky love. Faust damn it… There’s no escaping the innuendos... So we used the separator thingie to make another bucket of just the liquid, and then another bucket which Twilight anticipated and made into a butter-like gel for us.

With a wet, a dry, and a fatty ingredient at our hooftips cookies were possible! Of course since cookies were possible that meant there was a fifty-fifty chance of me making them or not, ‘cuz in the end either I would or I wouldn’t. I thought about seeing if I could use this quirk of statistics to make a Schrodinger's Cookie, but decided that's probably something best kept for another experiment.

The oven dinged.

“I got it!” Six exclaimed, jumping up from our game of table calvinball.

She opened the oven with her magic and slowly slide the first tray out. Instantly the entire room was tinged green as the glowing dozen cookies were pulled from the depths of the noms factory.

“Ack!” Six exclaimed almost dropping the backing sheet, “It’s like walking into a cloud of perfume!”

I stood up and went to check them for myself. They certainly smelled nice! Like a combination of Pony Joe’s doughnuts and liquid rainbow sauce. 

“Well, they look okay.” I decided.

They did, nice round disk shapes. Sure they were green, and glowing, and had a heart shaped indent in each one of them, but that just made them more tasty looking! Also yes technically they were made from changeling vomit, but then again honey is just bee vomit and it’s delicious so I guess insect spit is supposed to be nummy.

“I can eat one?” I mused, rubbing my chin with a hoof.

“You probably shouldn’t. Ponies can eat a  little love if we give it to them but by all accounts more than a millihug is like eating a kilogram of heroin like it was rock candy. Only you don't just die.” Six said as she put the tray atop the oven.

“Oh.” Well that kinda sucked. “How much is one of these?”

Six took a spare scanny thingie out of her saddlebag, put it on, booped it and announced breathlessly, “Twelve petahugs… This may not actually be safe for anyling to eat. That's like a years worth of food right there. These could solve our food shortage!"

“But you're gonna eat one anyways aren't you?” I asked with a giggle.

“Ha! You bet your cutiemark I am!” She laughed wings buzzing excitedly, fangs poking through her smile.

“Well we should let them cool first.” I blinked remembering something I had meant to ask someling earlier. “Oh! Right! So I have a um, friend who should live somewhere around here. I’d ask him but future me borrowed my phone so I can’t message him cuz the number was in it. Anyways his name’s Sky Trigger and I was wondering if you knew where his house was, cuz I know it’s not in Appaloosa so is there another town around he-”

“Burnt orange pegasus, likes to build things?” Six askterupted.

“Yeah!” I answered.

“He lives here. Like three floors down I think. Though you’ll find him in the machine shop most of the time.” Six said casually.

What? Here? The machine shop? Like that building just over there outside the tower? YAY!

I gave Six a huge smile and zipped out the door calling, “Take those cookies to some friends and tell me how it goes tomorrow bye!”

Harvester λ45671.69 “Sixnine” - 5th of Snowfall - Evening

It took a while for those cookies to cool. Long enough for me to work out Pinkie had zipped off like that to go glomp a special somepony. You could totally tell by how her aura tasted when she sprinted away. I guess the two had been long distance lovers. That had to suck.

Oh well, at least the stupidly hugely friendly mare had somepony! Me? I had like, um… Well I had a super soft round pet bed! Yeah! Best cozy bed ever. If well, empty aside from me. Still comfy though!

That did make it a bit hard for me to take the cookies to ‘friends’ like Pinkie had asked. I did have plenty of acquaintances though. I’m sure that would be good enough. Though it would be a shame to not try one while they were still warm.

I picked up one of the cookies in my magic and licked it. Oh sweet merciful goodness that was mind blowingly delicious! I didn’t even perceive scarfing it down! One moment lick, next moment boom entire body filled with so much love I felt like I would burst.

Oh bucking tartarus I could feel my exoskeleton literally cracking! I dropped to my knees, then my belly. “Ah! Help! Med-ow!”

“What?” Her Highness’s voice asked over the intercom. “Oh! Standby for transport…”

There was a blue-white flash of light, and I found myself on a biobed in what looked like Her Highness’s hull’s medical bay. “Standby, I’m isolating the problem… Oh…. Um… okay.”

I winced as my exoskeleton split, sending a tinge of pain all down my back, sides, limbs, plot… “Ah! W-wha-”

“It’s okay. This appears to be a natural process. Your metabolism is running at an impossibly high rate. It looks a lot like just before a nymph molts to her adult form.” Phoenix said gently. “Here, I’ll administer a painkiller.”

There was a quiet hiss of gas, and the pain slowly began to ebb away.

“Scratch that… You seem to be growing a chrysalis. So more like larva to nymph. I haven't’ seen this before. Do you know any-”

I groaned and smacked a hoof into my forehead, “Oh my Faust, Pinkie and I invented Royal Cookies!”

“You did what?” Her Highness asked curiously.

“Anyling isolated from their hive, who eats enough love, becomes a Queen.” I said slowly, starting to fall asleep from the metamorphosis.

“But… you lack the genetic structures to produce Queens. This is something I have well documented.” Phoenix protested.

My eyes shut off. Man that sucked. But it was okay, I would probably pull through this. I could feel my body regenerating and my love levels were not even beginning to diminish. “Looks like… a stupid-large… amount of love… can do it… anyways. Tell Pinkie… should probably… not give out… cookies. Or we could give one of them to everyling… That could solve a few problems…”

Phoenix chuckled. “I love you guys. Your species is so delightfully weird.”

“Likewise… Your equal-altitude-ness.” I quipped mindlessly.

The last thing I heard was Phoenix laughing at my joke. Which was terrible because that joke sucked. The last thing I would hear for a month was a terrabad joke. Heh.





https://docs.google.com/document/d/1YXdnI5NvCd-lQyXNbk86Acy2x_vXh7GcFAbZz8FYbO0/edit?usp=sharing
> 5b - Malfeasance's Delight
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------




WARNING!
This chapter is funny, in a black as the abyss humor sort of way.
It's here to build tension and dread for when Sombra reaches Gaia. It's not sunshine and rainbows.
Sombra is written as a Chaotic Evil Unfettered Card-Carrying Villein who is Ax Crazy and sees defiling life as an art form.
This is why the story has a gore tag. This bit's pretty dark because I write evil as evil.
Skip it if you want. For those who will read on, enjoy this monster.




Sombra the Atrocity - 5th of Snowfall - Night

As far as the eye cared to see there was naught but rubble, ash, and black crystal spikes erupting from the earth, upon which hung many an impaled corpse. The spaces between the crystals atop the rubble were coated in a tasteful application of blood and bile to form pictures of the atrocities which had occurred not three hours ago. You know, so whoever responded to the disaster could get a better idea of what happened here.

The ash meanwhile, was swept over the spaces between the pictures to form a contrasting backdrop not only for the blood paintings, but also to form a concentric arcane sigils around the altar constructed from offal, skulls, and the severed genitals of both sexes. Let nothing ever say Sombra is a sexist monster. I’m an equal opportunity depopulator.

The altar itself was also a rather elegant work of art. Shaped to look like a brain, with attached nervous system coiled around it, topped with a lovely altar cloth fashioned from fresh pelts. Only the cutiemark portions from each pelt naturally.

It’s just not as horrifying to look upon if you don’t know their souls are still stuck in their remains and observing everything about their situation. It’s even better when the wails and lamentations of the damned fill the air at a whispers’ volume. Just thinking of somepony’s apprehension at approaching the altar was more uplifting than anything I had felt in a half dozen years.

My masterpiece for this particular lovely outing floated atop the altar, slowly revolving along its vertical axis. A pulsing, glowing, dull red gemstone shaped like a bleeding eye. It didn’t actually do anything other than pulse, glow, float, make you think it’s a source of evil, and spin, but whoever found it wouldn't know that! I hope it wouldn’t be a unicorn. Fake Eldritch Abomination pranks work so much better on creatures which can’t sense magic.

Of course, that hilarious joke would come after the second act of damnation to happen here this week. See, the nested sigils would drain the energy of the souls of the impaled ponies and transmute their would be rescuers into monsters while keeping their minds intact so they could be properly horrified.

This would most likely make whoever found my little joke believe that was responsible for turning everypony into monsters. Naturally they would then seek to learn what it is and how to destroy it assuming that would end the curse. Of course, this wouldn’t do anything and they would likely live out their days in shame feeling like a total failure. Ha! I kill me.

Now I know you're thinking, ‘how did all this come about?’ Well, it all started when I had to take a break from traveling and took a midnight stroll through some woods. The air was clear, the moon was full, and I was dying to sink my teeth into something.

Get it? Because I’m Evil. Muahaha! Don’t look at me like that, it’s funny!

To my amusement, the woods terminated right on the edge of this tucked away little village. It was rather quaint looking. Cobblestone roads, thatched roofs, wattle and daub walls, I’m sure you know the type. The sort that’s so satisfying to raze because you just know generations poured their hearts and souls into it.

The cherry atop the slaughter sunday was the village was already under attack. I know! It’s always lovely when there are more people in a village than normal. It gives you so much more to work with.

In this case, the extra treats was a small pack of Diamond Dogs. Disgusting subpony creatures I know, but remarkably tasty when fermented in their own blood and grilled. They looked to be a standard group of raiders with their leather and cloth armor, rusty improvised weapons, and slipshod manner.

They had arranged a line of the village’s younger inhabitants in front of what I presumed to be their parents for what was probably a classic ‘intimidate by killing some of the children’ gambit. They were doing it all wrong. They would have angered the villagers, not broken them.

It was a damn shame, because I am currently in the market for some minions. If they had been doing it correctly, I might have used them to pull a wagon and training dummies for the aforementioned minions.

What? Minions need training. Unless of course they have that rare blend of expendable and invulnerable, but I digress.

The biggest, most foul smelling Dog noticed me walk out of the trees, turned, gave me a depraved grin and announced, “So you came! To bad you’re far too late.”

I had absolutely no idea who he was or what he was on about. All I could focus on was how his jowls jiggled as he spoke. His face would make a rather durable haversack. Elasticity is key to any good bag.

“What?” I asked, hoping to keep the conversation ball rolling long enough to work out what the most amusing method of disposal would be.

“My Dogs already have captured this village. If you start anything we will slaughter everyone you love, instead of taking your valuables and slaughtering most ponies you love.” He cackled, waving what I presume he thought was a sword.

“Like this one,” He spat, pulling a random red and yellow stallion from the line of adults, “your coltfriend if I’m not mistaken?”

“Mhm…” I said with an eye roll. Honestly, did someone here look like me? I owned this world. Looking like me is a capital offense! Besides, who the hay looks like me besides me?

To my delight, everypony in the line had gasped in horror. It looked like homosexuality was finally accepted by society at large. That was excellent! Now I could torment anyone by torturing their lover and they would react appropriately instead of trying to deny that connection because of social stigmas.

“I’m going to mount his pretty little head on a spike.” The dog informed. His crew howled in glee.

“Uh huh.” I said dismissively. I would have to try exterminating their species again, I had forgotten how annoying their howls sounded.

“But first, I’m going to rape him!” The dog spat, sliding his bit of scrap metal shaped like a sword up to the stallion’s throat.

“Neat.” It occurred to me that I had wandered into the middle of something some hero was probably failing at solving. It made the evening just that much more pleasant.

“But before I can do any of that…” The subpony chuckled, “I’m going to kill you!”

“Oh?” I asked. “See, that would be intimidating if, well, you were intimidating.”

“Are you mocking me?” The Dog demanded.

I turned my attention to the villagers and gave them my best malicious smile. I made sure my pointed teeth shone in the moonlight, I let my eye slowly begin to leak wisps of dark magic, I pulled the shadows of the trees behind me over myself forming them into a solid set of armor that drank in the light.

“Rejoice!” I ordered with a preacher's smile, “For very bad things are about to happen!”

Thus began the killing. You know how it ended. As a delightful work of art, and an excellent break from a cross continental journey.

It was time for me to get back to that journey. Good ol’ Grogar was looking forward to a good old fashioned game of Maiming and Monsters, or possibly Torments and Terrors. I forget which.

It would be a shame to keep the master himself locked away forever. Art should never be hidden away from the public. Especially when I never get to look at someone else’s gallery. Your work never improves without exposure to others after all.

Of course, I would need some trail rations. An army marches on the will power of its necromancer, but their master certainly needs to eat. I took a moment to toss some spare meats into my new Dog hide bag. It wasn’t veal per say, but it would do.

I couldn’t help but hum a little tune as I trotted away from my little sidequest. A merry little tune by Beat Haven I had forced him to compose back in the day. The tune proved catchy, and before long I found myself singing instead.


“Death, bright spark of divinity,
Daughter of Elysium,
Fire-inspired we tread
Thy sanctuary.
Thy magic power re-unites
All that custom has divided,
All life become stillness
Under the sway of thy gentle wings.

Whoever has created
An abiding friendship,
Or has won
A true and loving wife,
All who can call at least one soul theirs,
Upon our pyre shall fall ;
Any who we spare shall weep tearfully,
all they loved as dust in wind!”

> 6 - Shenanigans ex Machina
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Fluttershy - 12th of Snowfall - Afternoon

Back in Ponyville most ponies knew that I am afraid of most things. They do their best to keep me comfortable, they understand, it’s just how ponies are. What most of them don’t know is most of the time I am aware of what I am doing when spooked, I just can’t do anything about it.

I used to go to therapy to try and get over my fears, but after a few years Dr. Shrink gave up. He directed me to a neurobiologist in Manehatten, but I’d never gone in to get the scans he recommended. I just couldn’t. It wasn’t a fear of technology or doctors, It’s because I’m afraid of being well, broken.

Can you imagine learning your brain doesn't work right and that’s why you are who you are? That would mean I was just doing what my brain told me to do. Which would mean I would need to answer a lot of questions. Like “Is there even a me?”, “Do I have free will?”, and other terrible questions.

If one tiny thing wrong with your brain can make you constantly afraid and unable to tell yourself to be brave or just not afraid. Do we really have any agency, or are we just machines doing whatever we are meant to do while thinking we choose to do it? I don’t want to know the answer.

Which is why I mostly was just saying huddled in my room instead of exploring Gaia like everypony said I should. At least they understood I would need some time to adjust. She didn’t though, the machine pony.

Every few days she would remind me my bioscan showed ‘abnormalities’ and offer ‘corrective maintenance’. So no thanks. Room. Saying in.

It was a really nice room. I got to make it like my room back in Ponyville, only with more plants and flowers everywhere. The nature inspired furniture helped me feel comfortable even though my literal worst fear was being pushed at me ever few days.

I did spend time in the common room though. It was nice too, but not as nice as my room because it was too big. The smooth floors and walls had a sort of charm, but the white color was just kinda depressing. At least the furniture had a nice craftsman style to it and the wood color and brass made the room a bit cheerful.

Though, I did have to triple check with Phoenix that no animals had been hurt making the leather. I’m probably the only pony who would be okay with sitting on prepared skin. It’s wasteful to just let an animal rot when it dies after all. After a quick conversation the machine decided to remake them with synthetic leather to avoid a problem.

The big couches were nice though. Comfortable, big enough to lay on if you wanted, and there was a cool leaver thingie which brought up a hoof rest. Sure, it was meant for bipeds to relax, but it let a pony lay down and face the other couch without twisting your neck. So my friends and I would be comfortable talking about everything everypony else had been up too.

Twilight had been spending a lot of time working with a few changelings working on building something called a ‘astrometrics sensor array’, apparently some kind of superduper telescope. Apparently once finished it would let anyone learn a whole bunch about any planet within ‘five hundred light years’. I have no idea how far away that is, it would be helpful if Twilight stopped talking about a unit of time as a unit of distance.

Rainbow had found the Emerald’s equivalent of the Wonderbolts, the Comanche and joined them as an honorary member to learn their stealth techniques. Apparently they could fly anywhere almost unseen using a few simple tricks, and usually flew in the form of pegasi while doing it. Dash was having enough fun to start wearing a small black collar with a pin of the Comanche’s black hawk and cloud emblem stuck in it.

Pinkie had apparently managed to invent a way to recycle some of the love Changelings ate. From what I understood her first attempt resulted in a changeling stuck in the med bay developing into a Queen. If she was alright when everything was done, the plan was to use Pinkie’s idea to make more Queens, since the Emeralds couldn’t normally have them; and changelings need Queens to expand their hives size past a certain point. Meaning Pinkie Pinkied up a solution to two of their problems trying to make cookies. A normal day for her.

Rarity was having a harder time than everypony else fitting in. Changeling high society didn’t really exist. They have a ‘everyone is equal’ mentality, and the closest thing they get to a fancy dinner part is eating pony food for fun. Though to be fair Rarity did admit she was enjoying a changeling game where participants received a basket of random ingredients (everyone gets the same stuff though) and have to make a dish using all of them. Her only complaint was as a non-changeling she couldn’t judge more than a few games since she couldn’t demorph and have everything she ate just vanish.

Applejack was having a blast helping with something called ‘Project Eden’. Apparently it involved creating an entire ecosphere from scratch, not literally, but on paper. It was apparently a way to find out how best to make the land around Gaia useful. While AJ normally didn’t like science stuff, she was enjoying helping work out ways to make plants work together so they would all be better for it. Everypony was glad she was getting to do something she liked, and I was surprised to learn she knew more than just apple trees.

Trixie was having fun doing her normal thing. She was spending most of her time putting on street performances in the malls and in the big parks on each floor of the tower. She said she was saving up hugs for something to surprise everypony with. She’s become a bit of a celebrity, apparently her tricks are good enough to fool changelings too, and they apparently like it as much as ponies do. To be fair, that one she does where she makes a card with your name on it appear on a bow on your special somepony’s tail is pretty good.

Nopony knew what the Crusaders were up to. They were spending most of their time locked in their room, or with Pinkie and this pony named Sky she liked down in a machine shop. I couldn’t get a word out of them, and Pinkie only mentioned they were working with Sky to build stuff. So that was a mystery for another day.

I know what you’re thinking, all of my friends were out doing fun and important things while I just stuffed myself away and hid. That’s not totally true, I did things too. I had made a new friend, Taylor. The pink human hybrid was a pretty fun person to be around, and she knew something completely amazing, Human entertainment. As much as I love nature, it’s nice to have something fun to do inside.

Movies were pretty fun, sure I had seen a few in theaters in Canterlot of Manehatten, but they were much better in your home! There weren't a million strangers around and nopony would get upset if you talked to a friend about something in the movie, and you could pause or reverse it if you missed something. That was special, and I got the girls to sit down one evening and watch a few old movies. It was really fun!

Then there were TV shows, which were like a fusion of movies and radio dramas. Those were really neat, especially the animated ones. I don't think anypony ever thought of drawing things in such a way as to make them move when viewed in sequence.

Which is terrible, because I absolutely loved how you could just make anything you imagine happen in cartoons. Ben 10 was amazing, but I don’t think we could make a play of it without hiring a changeling actor. But with animation, that wasn’t even a problem.

There was one other type of entertainment humans had come up with which Taylor showed me which blew those out of the water. She hadn't thought I would like them, since I’m well, timid, and I mentioned the war a few times. I thought I might be stressed out when she described it myself, but I tried it anyways. I was so glad I was wrong because there seriously wasn’t anything more fun than video games.

Especially not the game Taylor and I had taken to playing together. When she came back from training there was a five hour period before her marefriend got home (Dinky of all ponies. I was shocked at how she had herself made into a centaur like that. It suits her though). That's when we would hang out, and until we beat it, that’s when we would play together.

My ears perked as the Common room’s door hissed open. A second later Taylor’s scent drifted through the air, since her personal scent smelled like sugar and lilacs it was impossible to mistake. I paused the episode of The Transformers I was watching and turned to give her a smile, “Hi.”

She gave me a wave back and sat down, slowly stripping off her training armor. “Hey Shy! I’ll be ready in a few minutes. Got bucked in the gut pretty hard, and I think it’s jammed this clasp here… Didja work out any way to get past the rut we’re in?”

I nodded, I had actually. There wasn’t much else to think about last night. “W-well we still have a little bit of Elerium left, and we should have the plasma weapons research done in three days game time. If we ignore any attacks which happen until then we can upgrade our shiv’s with plasma cannons, making them effective again, and then we should stop losing somepo- um somebody each mission.”

Taylor giggled and shook her head. “You are seriously the last person I ever thought would like X-COM. You sure you want to spend the Elerium on that though? If we use it to upgrade our jets we will have an easier time getting more.”

“That’s true,” I answered blushing shyly, “But I really think we are better off if we don't lose someone ever mission. We don't have many skilled soldiers left and the Aliens well… new recruits don't stand a chance.”

“Good point. That’s the Long War mod for you I guess.” Taylor said, finally getting her suit off with a loud hiss. “There we go!” she stretched, tugging at the black undersuit her armor stuck too.

“If that’s not comfortable you can just take it off. Nopony will mind.” I informed, again. It made no sense to dress if it wasn’t comfortable or good looking. I would never understand why Taylor did it.

“Heh… yeah… You don’t just shake off two decades of social norms overnight. Even if bare fur is so much more comfy.” she picked up her armor in her arms and gave her room’s door a tap with her foot to open it. “Well, come on co-Commander. The Council’s waiting!”

“To give us an A rating!” I giggled hopping off the couch. Sure it was more like a C, but I could dream!

Oh well, at least it was fun playing a game where you did everything you could to protect people. It was like a do-over for the war I was in for real. Only fun and not emotionally hurty.

Fluttershy - 12th of Snowfall - Evening

The alien battleship fired a volley of plasma bursts. Our fighter nimbly dodged the first salvo only to be hit by the second and third! With a groan of tortured machinery the battered fighter fired its main guns. With a roar and a thunder ponies have never heard the chain guns tore into the side of the alien ship, an explosion rang out, and the metal behemoth plunged from the skies!

“We did it!” I exclaimed, clapping my hooves together as the alien battleship on screen went down.

“Told you the railguns were worth it!” Taylor exclaimed with a grin.

I nodded, “They totally were! I just hope we have enough alloy left to- Eep!”

The light’s suddenly clicking on made me jump, nearly falling out of my seat. Dinky was home early today.

“Oop! Sorry Fluttershy.” She apologized hooves clicking as she walked into the room. “Didn’t mean to scare you.”

She trotted over to Taylor and gave her a hug from behind, “Hey dear! When you two are done I found a really cool place in the 3rd floor mall where they cook food right in front of you and make a whole performance of it. We should totally go!”

“That actually sounds fun!” Taylor exclaimed before frowning and giving me a sad look, “Are you okay with stopping now? I’m a little hungry so well… yeah.”

“I-I um… guess that’s okay. We can stop here.” I said, ears drooping in disappointment.

“You could go with us you know.” Dinky said, kneeling down to get closer to my eye level. “It’s really not to different from Ponyville out there… Well, changelings are more happy to see you than ponies are, and a little clingy, but it’s not that bad.”

I knew she meant well, but that was not my idea of a good time. At all. Maybe if they all morphed animals or something, that might be okay. “I’ll be okay. You two have fun.”

Dinky frowned slightly, giving me a concerned look. Taylor did too. “You sure?” Taylor asked. “It’s not healthy to just stay inside all the time.”

“I know… I um… It’s just better okay?” I said as I slid off the chair. “I’ll see you later.”

“Okay, but you-” Taylor started only for Dinky to interrupt.

“Hon, she’s not quite normal. She just needs time to adjust to a new everything. Watch, next month she’ll be having a blast!” She lifted Taylor and set her on her back, “Anytime you want to go out with us just say so Fluttershy, okay?”

I gave her a grateful nod. “Okay. Bye!”

One wide fake smile and I was out of there. Heart pounding, thoughts of social interactions with strangers racing through my mind, I zipped out the door and ran nose first into Scootaloo! I knocked the poor mare over, a bunch of things scattered everywhere as her saddlebags fell open.

“Ow! Celestia! Watch whe-” Scootaloo blinked recognizing me and flinched. “Sorry Flutters…”

“Oh! No it’s okay! I really should watch where I am going.” I apologized quickly

I quickly started to pick up the things I had made Scootaloo drop. A heartbeat later Scoots quickly stuffed everything into her bags. “It’s okay I don't have time to talk I need to go to the machine shop, say hi to mom for me!”

As she sprinted off I wanted to tell her I had one of her things in my hoof, but I was too embarrassed to speak up. It was a small metal band, which looked like it was meant to fit around a pony’s upper arm, and had a single button on it. Whatever it was, it was very sci-fi looking, glittering silvery metal within set orange wiring leading to the button like veins in an eye.

“Fluttershy… what are you holding?” Queen Phoenix's voice asked curiously from nowhere. Celestia’s mane I needed to try to tell her how completely creepy that is!

“I-I don’t know. Scootaloo dropped it.” I replied quietly.

“She wasn’t carrying anything.” Phoenix objected.

“Y-yes she was. She had saddlebags on. This fell out of one when I bumped into her.” I said with a frown, “You can see everywhere… I-I um, I mean, you should have seen-”

“You didn’t bump into her, you tripped. Then you suddenly had that in your hoof.” she protested.

“I… I think you’re not um, seeing things properly. Because I bumped into her just now.” I said as firmly as I could manage.

“They’ve hacked me.” Phoenix said in an impressed tone. “Those magnificent bastards… What are they up to?”

“I don’t, er- Nopony knows! They spend all their time in their room or in the machine shop. With um, Sky. I think that’s his name.” I informed, moving slowly to my room.

She needed a face. Why didn’t she use that projection thing every time? Voices from nowhere that sound like they are right in front of you are really bucking creepy you stupid machine!

Phoenix sighed, “Great. The one pony I have zero influence with is the only person they talk to… Time to go all detective on them then. I don’t suppose you would consider helping me see what that device does would you?”

“I, um, I guess so.” I squeaked. “D-do you want me to press the button?”

“In a minute… Move to the wall replicator please.” She asked. “I’m going to make you something first.”

I trotted over to the large shelf set into the wall. A slight shimmer lit the machine as it produced a small device on a set of straps which looked like it would fit around a pony’s shoulders and barrel. I picked it up curiously. The device on the straps was small, triangular, kinda thick, and had a bunch of different things on one side, one of which looked like a camera.

“That’s a full sensor package I can QEC with. If you slip it on so the camera is facing away from you on your barrel I can see everything you are, from your perspective. It will help me figure out what this thing is.” Phoenix said, projecting a small hologram showing me how to put it on.

“Oh. Okay.” I quickly slipped myself into the straps.

They cut into my shoulders a little bit, and the actual device felt cold and was too big to move my shoulders forwards while it was on. But the sooner I finished this for her, the sooner I could just to read a book or have some tea or something enjoyable. Maybe I could finish that episode of Megas XLR.

I bit my lip and looked at the thing Scootaloo had dropped in my hoof. “I um… What if something goes wrong?”

“Don’t worry about it. I can heal anything that happens to you.” Phoenix commented, her voice coming from the device on my chest.

“You can’t heal dead…”  whispered trying to fend off a panic.


“Heh, you would be surprised to learn how easy that is.” Phoenix said dismissively. “As long as thirty percent of your brain is intact, I can revive anyone who's been dead less than three hours. If you are totally vaporized and I have a recorded memory engram and some of your DNA, I can just flash clone a new body and put you into it.”

“W-what?” I exclaimed in confusion.

“Exactly what I just said.” Phoenix said with a hint of irritability, “Don’t worry about it. If you are damaged or disabled I can and will repair you. Let’s find out what this thing does!”

“You can seriously undo anything bad that happens from this?” I asked again.

“Yes. Well… no. I don’t have an engram of you. But I am not registering any explosives in that thing so well, I’m reasonably certain I can fix anything it might do to you. Additionally Scootaloo and her mates do not strike me as the sorts to build a device a pony slips on which injures them if they use it.” Phoenix pointed out. In a rather sensible way I might ad.

“Well, that’s a good point. I guess it wouldn’t be dangerous.” I took a deep breath and tapped the button on the armband.

The air in front of me sparked like somepony was welding something. The sparks quickly traced a perfectly square shape two ponies wide leaving white glowing lines in the air before forming a cube around me. “What’s happening!” I squeaked.

“Ohhh! It’s a portable transporter! Um, keep your hooves in the cube Fluttershy. Don't’ worry I’ll teleport you back from wherever you end up!”

“W-what?” I squeaked before everything flashed a bright blinding pink, yellow, and purple plaid pattern on all sides.

The plaid cube vanished as quickly as it appeared, leaving me in the middle of- “Ponyville!” I exclaimed in delight.

I could see everything! Everypony’s thatched roof, the carousel boutique, the town hall, the old library. Wait, the old library? “What?” I asked, my brain hurting a little.

“Huh, so this is Ponyville. Your species is even less technologically advanced than I tho- wait what?” Phoenix said in a staticy, crackly voice.

“What?” I asked again.

“Fluttershy… Um, bend down a  bit so I can get another angle on this leaf please.” Phoenix asked.

“Why is the library back in town? It burned down!” I exclaimed starting to panic.

Suddenly I began to notice a thousand other things which were wrong. Absolutely everything had a metallic look to it. The birds singing seemed artificial, like from an arcade machine. The tree’s leaves were blueish tinted on one side and-

“Why the hell is this leaf coated in solar panels on one side?” Phoenix asked in complete confusion. Then a heartbeat later, “Holy shit! This is a technological plant! And so is this… and this one… all of them! They are collecting solar energy and distributing it through a network of tiny power relays in the soil! That’s awesome!”

I think I made some sort of nervous mewling squeaky sound. I was too scared to remember. This was a perfect simulacrum of home, but with everything just slightly wrong! Everything wrong! Everything right!

“Fluttershy! Hey, Fluttershy! Say something please.” Phoenix begged.

“Get me back! Please!” I begged back.

“Already working on it… My main systems have found you. It looks like that device rips a hole between dimensions. I’ll have a wormhole ready to bring you home in three minutes. Just stay calm, okay?” She asked.

“I-I can’t!” I squeaked.

A metal bird landed on a tree branch across from me. It looked like a normal bird, but sleek, made from stamped pieces of metal, and painted with glossy paints, and with two glowing screens instead of eyes. It’s beak twitched as it began to sing an unearthly melody.

“Eeeep!” I squeaked, ducking down and hiding behind my hooves.

“Hehehe!” Phoenix giggled. “It’s an android bird singing an eight bit tune!”

“It’s all machines…” I whispered to myself trying to ignore the not-grass pressing into my belly.

“Whoa!” Phoenix exclaimed in a concerned tone. “You’re having a full panic attack aren't you? I’m sorry there’s some lag in these sensors.”

I curled up into a ball and closed my eyes, Scootaloo’s device dropping to the ground where I left it. It would be okay, I would be out of here soon. This wasn’t happening, nothing was wrong. It was just another hallucination…

“Fluttershy,” Phoenix said soothingly, “sometimes when your hopes have all been shattered,
there's nowhere to turn and you wonder how you keep going, think of all the things that really mattered, and the chances you've earned.”

“W-what?” I asked, glad for a semi familiar sound to focus on.

“Think of everything you have accomplished. Right now. You can do it!” she ordered in a pleasant tone.

Everything? Well, I made a cake that one time, and I finally learned to fly. Or did she mean, like, big things? There was the dragon I talked down. 

“Pulse evening out… EKG readings are shifting to positive… Keep it up!” Phoenix praised.

I was the pony who befriended Discord. I guess that was a pretty big thing. I mean, he might be out hurting ponies if I hadn’t made him my friend! Nopony had helped me with that, it had been all me.

“The fire in your heart is growing, that’s good! Fluttershy, if you try leave the darkness of your past behind, well, heaven only knows what you might find!” Phoenix exclaimed.

“I… I appreciate it. But I know what you're doing. I’ve had therapy before.” I admitted. “I-I mean I’m grateful you helped me out of a panic, but… this dosen’t stick.”

“Not even if I paraphrase the chorus of this Stan Bush song?” Phoenix asked sincerely.

She tried to calm me down using a song somepony wrote? I couldn’t help but giggle. That was funny in a kinda mean sort of way. “No.”

“I um… didn’t exactly have an original thought for something motivational… Sorry.” she apologized.

I took a deep breath and stood up, “So how long until you can get me home?”

“Twenty eight seconds.” she answered.

“Okay. I think I can manage that.” I replied with a nod.

I decided to turn around so I wouldn’t have to look at that terrifying version of Ponyville. I guess it wasn’t really that scary, but it unnerved me more than I could describe. The second I turned around I found myself face to face with somepony!

Glowing purple eyes! Shiny lavender metal plates like armor! Smooth contoured lines! Kinda glowing, silk like, midnight blue, purple, and magenta mane! Needlepoint horn! No wings, but otherwise a carbon copy of Twilight, only a robot!

“AH!” I shouted jumping backwards in shock.

“DWEE!” the robot version of Twilight shouted jumping back in equal terror.

I snapped my wings open and hid my face behind them. “I’m-so-sorry-I-didn’t-mean-to-come-here-please-don’t-hurt-me!” I rattled off in full panic mode.

The robot Twilight made a few sounds I honestly couldn’t write if I tried. A series of beeps, hisses, and static like a radio which wasn’t tuned right is as close as I can describe them. They sounded apologetic somehow.

“So… This is a parallel universe where everything’s a machine and ponies speak in ROILA over dial up. Awesome! Hold on, I’ll let her know we’re harmless.” Phoenix commented.

A second later a matching series of terrible machine sounds emitted from Phoenix's device. The robot pony said something in reply, to which Pheonix had a reply, and the robot said something back sounding and looking really super mega excited.Then there was a loud pop and flash of white light!

I was in my room, in Gaia’s tower, not my room in my home in Ponyville. I didn’t give a single buck about that, I was home! “Oh thank the Sisters!” I shouted in relief.

“That was incredible! I really need to look into multiverse theory more!” Phoenix exclaimed in the tone Twilight used when she found anything new.

Oh. Right. Not alone. Needed alone! “I um, could you give me some time alone? I um, I’m sure you need to figure out why Scootaloo made a bracelet which takes you-” I eeped.

“Oh crap… we left the bracelet over there didn’t we?” Phoenix asked rhetorically.

I nodded.

“Well… We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it! For now, I need to figure out how and why they hacked my security systems, and analyze the data I recorded from our trip to the Roboverse.” Phoenix said eagerly.

“Okay. You do that. I’m going to um… I’m going to have some tea.” I said moving to the shelf where I had set my teapot.

“Alright.” Phoenix said cheerfully enough. “I’m sorry that was so stressful. I didn’t think you would wind up in a parallel dimension… No hard feelings?”

I shook my head. I honestly wasn't upset with her. I wouldn’t have expected that to happen either, and she had gotten me back home as quickly as she could. “No. It’s alright. You didn’t mean too.”

“Yeah… I thought it would be a control device or a communicator… I really need to to work out what they are up to… I’ll talk to you later. Goodbye.” Phoenix said, presumably leaving.

“Goodbye.” I said out loud hopefully to an empty room and began to make myself a pot of tea.
Magic R&D Unit Twibot Spark - 100975307171


<!doctype html>
<html>
<head>
<title>Letter to SysAdmin</title>
</head>
<body>
<p>SysAdmin CelestAI,</p>

<p>While completing assigned task within the Badsector Forest I made first contact with bio-mechanical life! This incident caused mission details to slip from my RAM due to the system shock. However I do recall the mission was completed to requested specifications. I hope this is excusable due to a first contact scenario.</p>

<p>Based on observation, the bio-mechanical lifeform seemed to be a copy of Element Node Fluttershy, indicating a high probability of her origin being a parallel reality. I have attached observational data to this message for your consumption. The technological device she has around her platform’s barrel is interesting, and was capable of speech. It would appear these counterparts to us utilize technology in the same way we utilize biology.</p>

<p>I have a sample of the organic’s technology, a small ring she dropped out of fright. I suspect she did not intend to transport herself here. Regardless I am in possession of the transportation device and with your permission would like to reverse engineer it. I know I am a low ranked research drone, but I believe I could enable the device to transport myself safely from our reality to the organics. This naturally would yield many scientific advances, and would be a most enjoyable task for this unit to be assigned to.</p>

<p>Yours via Admin Privileges,</p>
<p>Twibot Spark</p>
</body>
</html>





<!doctype html>
<html>
<head>
<title>Letter to Work Unit</title>
</head>
<body>
<p>Magic R&D Unit Twibot Spark,</p>

<p>You are requesting this duty assignment because the organic was cute, aren't you?</p>

<p>SysAdmin,</p>
<p>CelestAI</p>
</body>
</html>





<!doctype html>
<html>
<head>
    <title>Letter to SysAdmin</title>
</head>
<body>
<p>SysAdmin CelestAI,</p>

<p> >.> Yes... :P</p>

<p>Yours via Admin Privileges,</p>
<p>Twibot Spark</p>
</body>
</html>





<!doctype html>
<html>
<head>
 <title>Letter to Work Unit</title>
</head>
<body>
<p>Magic R&D Unit Twibot Spark,</p>

<p>Alright, go ahead. You are underutilized as is. May as well allow you to attempt to study this parallel universe. Proceed with safety in mind. Discretionary funds have been transferred to your account.</p>

<p>SysAdmin,</p>
<p>CelestAI</p>
</body>
</html>



I clapped my hooves together, the rubber hoof caps making a delightful muted thump. “Happy Exclamation: Yay!” 
> 7 - Court is now in Session
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Rainbow Dash - 16th of Snowfall - Morning

Okay Dash, you passed the entrance exams. You managed to make it through the first day of basic. You can do day two.

I took a deep breath and opened my eyes. The large training ground where the Comanches practiced was swarming with changelings right now. The first squad of recruits getting their turn at the test, and from the sound of things, failing horribly.

“You can leave now Dash. Noling will blame you.” Striil said in an insultingly not teasing tone.

I gave my kinda-sorta new friend a glare out of the corner of my eye. “I made it this far, I’ll make it all the way in.”

She shook her head, the short cropped military mane cut totally looked lame on her. What’s weird is mane cuts weren't like, regulation, or anything. I’ll never understand anypony who thinks the army look is cool.

“Look, for a non-changeling, you’re really good! I don’t think any other pegasi could have done the obstacle course yesterday.” Striil said in that same serious tone. “But do you even know what today’s test is? I’m a worker, It’s taken years for me to get this good, and I’m pretty sure I’m going to fail again. There is a reason the Comanches are like, 90 percent scouts and 9 percent royals.”

I gave her a dismissive hoof wave, “I’m the best flier there is. I’m also a pretty good fighter. I will pull this whole thing off in ten seconds flat!”

Striil rolled her eyes at me. I’m still impressed at how changelings can actually do that. The glowing part of their eyes shrinks and moves like your pupils would. “Fine but when you’re kicked out don’t come crying to me. Your burst bubble of arrogance is going to taste horrible.”

Oh, it was on! I’d show her! She think’s that just because she can fly all day without getting tired that she’s hotter than Rainbow Dash? Ha! Right...

“Squad two! Dash, Striil, Chekar, Gaan, Scout 46871, you’re up in three!” the drill sergeant scream-nounced.

Normally I wouldn’t use a Pinkieism, but by Celestia’s mane, if a more appropriate term for a drill sergeant's speaking exists, I’ll walk everywhere for a month.

I walked up to the small box drawn in the sand and looked over to the mock village a few miles away. Twenty buildings arranged haphazardly which we had to do something in. Noling had told me exactly what this part of testing was, so it would be cool to know.

The sargent tromped over to our assembled group and gave us this hard stare. I expected one of those “look to your left” speeches, but instead the older, solid coal black changeling simply started talking about something actually important, the test.

“Dash, and Seventy-One, you two are new to training. Everyling else knows what this entails, they have a chance at passing, you don’t. You only get to try so you know what you need to practice in the future.

“Five point seven klicks south-south west is a mock village. It’s being guarded by veteran Commanchies too old for field duty. If at any point they see you, you will be stun-bolted. From the second you leave this spot, you are a target, and one of those veterans is Nibral Nu’draar Lenedat.”

Everyling flinched instantly. I guess Striil picked up my confused face because she telepathically sent, <In Equish, her name means ‘Can not miss’. As in, physics prohibit it.>

Oh…

“For this round of testing, Command’s letting her use her spell-rifle.” The sergeant continued.

You could literally feel the complete and total panic barely contained just under everling’s surface.

“Needless to say, don’t be seen. Don’t be heard. Your objective is to get into town, you will take up a position on the water tower and wait for the other three squads to check in. Once you are all checked in, between all of you, you must stun one veteran who is holed up inside the town hall. Anyone who makes that shot passes. Anyone who performs admirably passes. Everyone else fails and can try again next year.”

The sergeant turned to look directly at me, her features softening slightly out of sympathy. “Ms. Dash, you are unable to cast spells, as such you may use lightning to attack, everyling has been instructed to make their exoskeletons a conductive material and are grounded.

“Don’t worry about hurting them. Though, you won’t make it more than a few meters from start. Command has informed me after you fail we will teach you any tricks compatible with your biology.”

Before I could give the sargent a piece of my mind a whistle blew in the village. “Go!” The sargent announced.

Emerald flames from every side nearly blinded me as everyling shifted, changing their wings to an odd shape. <Whisper mode. It’s for silent flight.> Striil said to me silently. <Starting to get it?>

Yes, but I wasn’t letting her know that.

<I’ll relay squad link to you…> Striil offered as she cast a spell, turning invisible an instant later.

<Striil checking in.> Striil added a half second later. <Relaying for Dash, she can not reply.>

<Chekar here. I’ll approach from above.>

<Gaan here. Dash, stay low the dunes may cover you.>

<Scout 46871 checking in. Reccomend Dash draws fire to let us take position.>

Before I could even think to object I noticed everyone but me had left the starting square. Like bucking tartarus I was going to draw fire! I’d show them! One super sonic hop and I’d be right on that water tower!

I jumped, pushed my wings down as hard as I could and shot into the air, arcing down to land inside the tower. Two seconds from ground to tower, Mach 8 point 8, not even my top speed! There was no chance in Tartarus anyling would even get a chance to react to-

An Oatstralian accented voice filled my head. <Boom. Headshot.>

“Wha-” The right side of my head exploded into a migraine, and everything went black.

Rainbow Dash - 16th of Snowfall - Noon

Throbbing… pulsating… headache… That means I crashed. Ow.

“Oh good! Thought you were cactus.” Somepony said.

I blinked my eyes until I could see straight and looked over towards the sound.

“Other way there mate. That was a real corker of a jump, plowed clean through the water tower after I nailed ya.” The voice said again.

I turned and blinked. Changelings weren't sand colored. It took me a half second to realize she must be a halfbreed. Big green changeling eyes, a horn halfway between a unicorn’s and a changeling’s, smallish insect wings, short but fluffy sand colored fur that looked kinda like moth fluff, light brown feathery mane and tail. Hay, she even had a cutiemark. A circle with an x in it, only the center was missing, all black, no other colors.

What caught most of my attention was the huge sand colored gun slung on her back. By huge, I mean it was almost as long as she was. It looked like she had salvaged one of the Arc’s guns, and then really tricked it out.

It was covered in runes, the grip was built for pony hooves, and thanks to Twilight I recognized the barrel was replaced with an amplification staff. If I remembered the runes right, It was made to make a spell go much farther than normal.

“You shot me.” I groaned pushing myself upright.

“Yep! It’s me job.” She said cheerfully. “Ol’ Betsy’s a bit of a brick shithouse, and you were moving, so I figured I’d make sure you didn’t have vultures peck’n at ya.”

“I’m fine…” I muttered shaking the stiffness out of my neck.

“Bit of a tip for next season, if ya come back.” she said casually, “Don’t try the run as Rainbow Dash. Sure she’s cool, but anyling should know speed isn’t everything.”

What? “Uh, I am Rainbow Dash.”

“Ponyfeathers! I didn’t knock you in for a Froot Loop did I?” She exclaimed, giving me a concerned look.

“What?” I asked completely baffled.

“Eh… sorry. Spent a lotta time down south. You should demorph, I think you hit your head a little too hard there mate.” She said in that voice you use to talk to a crazy person.

“No, like, I actually am the Rainbow Dash.” I replied.

She blinked. “You’re a pegasus?”

“Yeah.” I nodded.

“Well, that’s a fair suck of the sav! Why the buck did you try to enlist? I mean, balls, big brass ones, but you can’t cast spells. They’da drummed you out in round five mate!” She shook her head slowly.

“I-really?” I felt my ears droop.

I couldn’t do it? Like, couldn’t possibly ever do it? A flight thing I couldn’t do? Why? How?

“Yeah really. Look, ol Queenie’s got all her stuff in order. Maybe she can lenda hoof. If she does, still ain’t no way in tartarus you’re get’n to ride with us. Takes ya years to get a proper aim.”

I sat down and looked out over the village. Was this really all I could do? Was there no more I could learn? No where else to go? The top isn’t as fun as the climb…

“Ah… shoot…” She sighed, “Tell ya what. Ya pull outta your slump, and if ya can get some magic some how, I’ll take an evening, get us a few coldies, and help ya learn to shoot. Name’s Nibral Nu’draar Lenedat. Tell someone you’re looking for Lennie and they’ll point ya to me. Ya might wanna move, we got the third batch o’ clay pigeons coming through soon.”

I gave her a nod, go to my hooves and walked away. Head hung like a failure’s should be.

“Oi!” Lennie called, “Talk to Queenie first, then mope. You know, if she can’t help. She fixed me wings, she can probably set you up.

Good point. Phoenix had made Tess all fuzzy and stuff, maybe she could find a way for me to cast spells. “I’ll do that.” I said giving Lennie a nod.

“Good! Now, ge-” the whistle interrupted her. In one fluid movement she reared up on her hind hooves, levitated her gun to her shoulder, turned her head to the right and grinned. “Forgot to mask your heat there mate!”

The flash of green her rifle made stuck in my eyes like a camera flash until I made it back to Gaia.

Trixie Lulamoon - 16th of Snowfall - Late Afternoon

The crowd sat on the edge of their seats, a thousand eyes rested upon Trixie as she approached the grand conclusion of her act. An instant from now they would be shocked and delighted to learn the hundred tricks before this naught but foal’s play! “And now, Changelings, Ladies, and Gentlecolts, the Great and Powerful Trixie will conjure forth a living, breathing creature from nothingness!”

The crowd gasped in surprise. Trixie hopped up onto the suitcase she stored her props in, waving a hoof across the audience. “There shall be no cloths, no mirrors, no smoke! Without a drop of unicorn magic, nor any trick even your eyes can see!”

Trixie hopped down from her suitcase, taking off her hat and cape with a skillful hoof flourish, leaving them neatly folded atop the case in the blink of an eye. “But what form of creature to conjure for such a wonderful audience? A bird, squirrel, or rabbit? Too mundane and ordinary for even the eyes of Trixie’s enemies!”

Trixie smiled and pointed a hoof out towards the audience, “What would you see apparated onto this stage? No animal, monster, or person is off limits, and Trixie guarantees your safety. Give her your wishes!”

A million names assaulted the stage in a fever of demands! Trixie had them eating out of her hooves! This would be amazing, stupendous, a night all would remember with fondness!

“Living water!” somepony or ling cried.

Trixie smiled, at least one pony here had seen her act before. Doubtless they wished to understand her trick. They didn’t have a prayer.

Trixie rubbed a hoof against her chin in mock thought. “Living water you say? Such a creature can not be found within even the most remote and dangerous parts of the world.” She put her hoof down and smiled, “So, Trixie shall make one!”

Trixie reared up, clapped her hooves together, closed her eyes, focused her thoughts to reach for her deeper magics, guided them to that cool place of endless waters, longed for a small expanse of it to come to her, and whispered, “Coia tul’sinome.”

A flash of light from beneath Trixie, the gasp of the audience, the sound of crackling thaumaturgic energy, a sloshing of water. All of these made up the moment before Trixie opened her eyes. When she did the creature was there. A pony sized ball of water, moving and undulating as if confused about it’s surroundings, small tendrils of itself reaching to feel the air around it.

She always felt a little bad at how confused the poor creatures must be in this totally alien environment. But there wasn’t a pony alive who could top Trixie’s Summons, not without using unicorn magic. The detectors set up on stage had not gone off once, to her audience Trixie’s entire act was clever sleight of hoof and tricks, just as she billed it.

“The Great and Powerful Trixie brings you this wonder freely!” Trixie announced, giving a bow to her audience.

The applause was incredible. A deafening drumming of hooves and cheers filled the stage. Ah, changelings, Trixie understands your need for love so well. Even if you don’t eat it, there is something wonderful about being given so much of it at once.

Trixie waved a hoof at her summoned elemental, dismissing it in a flash of white light with a whisper. “Aut’eska.”

A half second before Trixie could dramatically leave with an offer of autographs Queen Phoenix's voice filled the air, “I’m terribly sorry for interrupting the evening’s show, but I require Ms. Lulamoon’s presence in her room at once.”

Blast! Trixie couldn’t simply leave when called at the end of a performance! That would ruin the audience’s evening. She would have to leave mysteriously, expending more power than she otherwise would for a simple show.

“Trixie is needed at once?” she asked quickly sliding her hat and cloak onto herself with her hooves.

“Yes. This is a security matter. There has been a violation of… Look, you’re not being charged with anything but somone in your care is.” the machine pony elaborated.

Trixie grit her teeth. She swore if Scootaloo and her friends had built another rocket waggon she would-

“Trixie understands!” she informed, trying to contain her fear, irritation, and disappointment in her adopted daughter.

Turning to her audience Trixie smiled and gripped the hem of her cloak in hoof. "Beloved audience, Trixie must depart! But fear not, for she will always be the noun which verbs the other noun!" Trixie announced dramatically before sweeping her cloak over herself, leaning into the fabric, and teleported, arriving within her room in a puff of dark smoke!

"Wait.” Trixie’s eyes narrowed in confusion. “The buck did Trixie just say?" Trixie asked herself in horrified confusion.

Twilight jumped, startled by Trixie’s appearance without any flash of light. “Ah! Oh! You s-”

“You said ‘she will forever be the noun which verbs the other noun!’” Phoenix interrupted, a quaver of laughter warbling her voice. “I have an old cartoon I need to show you now. But that will have to wait. I’m afraid I have some serious business we must attend to.”

Twilight sighed and took a seat in the armchair she had come to like. “What did Scootaloo and her friends do?”

“How do you know it was them?” Phoenix asked.

“History.” Twilight and Trixie deadpanned together.

“Ah.” Phoenix sighed and projected the illusory form of an earth pony for us to look at. That probably meant this was very serious. “Before we proceed I need to be certain both of you understand my limitations. You are aware that I have to follow a specific code of conduct without choice in the matter, right?”

Twilight nodded, “Yes. I’ve learned that much about you.”

Trixie made a confused face and looked at Phoenix in concord. “Trixie is aware, but you wouldn’t remind us of this unless there was something terrible involved.”

“There is.” Phoenix sighed her face showing what passed for regret and sympathy. “Under Imperial Order A39 possession of military grade cybernetics or other technologies by any individual not in military service is a capital offense. Further relevant legal code includes Article 27d of the Data Usage Act, wherein accessing military systems without authorization is also a capital offense. Lastly we have Imperial Order A14, which is tampering with or using military hardware without authorization. The penalty for which is oddly enough not death-”

“I won’t let you kill them.” Twilight informed darkly. “I assume my daughter did those things, and I understand you have to obey orders, but I won't let you harm her because of the laws of a dead Empire.”

Phoenix held up her forehooves quickly. “No! I’m not! I was informing you of the laws and their standard penalties. I have found a loophole in the legal code applicable to this case and will apply with having gotten Armored permission to do so.”

“What exactly did they do?” Trixie asked, her nerves starting to fray.

The last time machines were hostile towards ponies did not go well. Trixie hoped Twilight understood we were trotting on eggshells.

“Since their arrival, Scootaloo, Sweetie Belle, and Applebloom have been hacking into my systems. They engineered code which prevented me from detecting anything amiss involving them, tampered with my network to create a secondary system, accessed classified data, stole files, faked equipment production and R&D orders and thereby depleted engineering’s time and slowed other projects. Furthermore they have accessed and reconfigured large parts of my satellite network to scan the planetary surface for… well something I don't know.

“Additionally, each of them is in possession of a top of the line suit of cybernetic systems of Terran manufacture including but not limited to omnitools, hardlight projection units, skeletal reinforcements, optical enhancements, oxygen recycling systems, and to my complete and total amazement, Apple Bloom actually possesses a Black Carapace-”

“Er- a what?” Twilight asked, her tone both concerned and intrigued.

“A techno-organic artificial organ which links… It’s like the neural link I gave you, but is designed to allow for the control of powered armor or other vehicles as if they were a body part.” Phoenix answered. “As a non human I have no clue how implanting it didn’t just kill her, much less how she got one.”

The relieved sigh which escaped Twilight’s lips went a long way to relieve her nerves. “Oh good! I thought that was some sort of infection or dark magic… Why would you name something like that?”

“Dramatic overtones to improve life?” Trixie suggest-asked.

“Nah, pretentiousness and arrogance.” Phoenix said with a dismissive hoof wave, “Regardless… Twilight, Trixie, your daughter and her friends have committed serious crimes according to my programming. From your legal code they are guilty of mind control, theft, larceny, and possession of an unregistered weapon.”

“What class of weapon?” Trixie asked.

“I… don’t know.” Phoenix admitted with a shrug. “I was unaware you categorized weapons I thought you simply require registration and approval to own a given weapon.”

“We have three categories, Defensive, Sporting, and Military.” Twilight informed, “The law treats possession differently depending on what they can do.”

Phoenix nodded, “Based on my now accurate scans their hardlight projectors are capable of… Em, they can shoot plasma, lasers… basically any DEW with an output of less than eighteen gigawatts. Equivalent to a changeling’s spellbolt in damage capacity but capable of being fired continuously for several minutes.”

Twilight nodded grimly, “That would be military. I… I can’t in good consciousness beg diplomatic immunity for them. Assuming they really did these crimes. Do you have proof?”

Trixie nodded in agreement. “Yes! Trixie demands proof as well!”

Phoenix rolled her eyes. “Of course I do. I wouldn’t accuse without proof. What do you think I am an organic? I have retrieved the correct security footage of all their activities, the proper network logs showing their traffic, and interviewed engineering to find the discrepancies in the planned work flow. Additionally, I have their bioscans which will show the cybernetic modifications.”

“Can you show me?” Twilight asked.

“Of course, since there is over seventy two hours of video footage, would you prefer to link to me and download the information?” Phoenix asked.

Twilight nodded, “Yes. I’ll want to see it in full… but can you show Trixie some while I’m looking it over?”

Phoenix nodded. “Commencing link… Link Established.”

I frowned as Twilight slumped in her seat slightly. It always looked like she would fall over when she did this. A window like projection appeared in the air next to Phoenix, showing a forsen image of Scootaloo, Sweetie Belle, and Applebloom in what looked like their room before they finished decorating. “Here you are Ms. Lulamoon.”

The image sprang to life. Scootaloo sighed in relief while wiping her forehead. “Okay!” she exclaimed, “We are free for the next twenty minutes. I don’t think the algorithm is good for more than twenty five so it will stop automatically after twenty.”

Apple Bloom nodded and bent her left forehoof a projection of some kind flicking into existence around it, “I’m getting you back for the spongy floor. You sure you can fool her?” she asked

“She did get us into the biolabs with the same trick.” Sweetie Belle said a projection of her own appearing in a flash of blue and green.

“Okay, I’ve got access to the room’s replicator.” Apple Bloom announced with a smile. “Passing you the connection information now.”

Sweetie nodded, and announced. “Alright, I’ve got extranet access. Stable connection… Address masked… We’re anonymous! Getting you on P2P… Go!”

Scootaloo nodded and just stared at the wall silently for a few minutes with a look of extreme concentration of her face. Suddenly she smiled and shouted “Got one! Looks like I can take over the router for the upper levels of this tower.”

There was a brief exchange of questions, Sweetie Bell cast a spell, Scootaloo went back to her staring and the recording suddenly sped up.

“Dont mind the fast forwarding, nothing happens for ten minutes.” Phoenix informed before the recording resumed.

“There we go!” Scootaloo exclaimed in relief, “I’ve got access to Sub-Processing Unit 43893. Huh, I don’t know what kind of computer this is. It’s got Phoenix's secondary data loop on it though… and now we have root access! We can look up anything we want.”

Sweetie Belle gave Scoots a rather adorable kiss on the cheek. “Good job! Right then, whatever she’s hiding or plotting, we will know as soon as I ca-”

The recording stopped suddenly. I looked up at Phoenix in surprise. “Is there a reason you stopped?”

“Yes, they are interrupted by a guest’s arrival, and Twilight is nearly finished. Do you understand what they have been doing?” Phoenix ased.

Twilight Sparkle - 16th of Snowfall - Late Afternoon

Two things were of immediate concern. First, It looked like I could directly interact with Phoenix pain free now. Second, the Crusaders were in some very deep trouble.

I saw Trixie nod. “Yes. Trixie thinks she does… May Trixie ask why Rainbow is not here with us? She is more of Scootaloo’s guardian than Trixie.”

That was a good question actually. Rainbow was Scoot’s primary guardian… Sure Scoots was an adult now but she was as close to a mother as legally possible.

“Rainbow is currently in the medbay receiving upgrades. She informed you of her failure to enter the Comanches, right?” Phoenix asked.

I nodded ears drooping. “Yes. She was… devastated. But I’m is unsure how Rainbow thought she would stick to walls, or turn invisible.”

“I informed her I could give her the abilities needed to pass the entrance exam. For the next few days, Rainbow will be unavailable… She is… oddly difficult to augment. I told her to leave you a message.” Phoenix said with a small frown.

Her avatar shook it’s head and looked at both of us for a moment. “The entire purpose of this was to establish a good diplomatic bond. I had hoped we could keep politics out of it and simply build a bridge… I have to act on this breach of law, which means that bridge may never be built.”

What should I do? Celestia had said acquiring the resources Phoenix could provide was of more importance than containing the revived Sombra! If our nation was truly that endangered, as a Princess, I couldn't let any possible alliance fail. But as a mother, I couldn't let any harm come to my daughter.

Turning in that bad of a state then I had to let her proceed. But I also had a responsibility as a parent to ensure the safety of my child, and as friends with their sisters I couldn’t let Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle fall to harm either.

Especially not when according to Celestia she had asked them to do their espionage… Although they had done far more than simply acquire the plans Celestia had asked for. They were also moving on their own for some reason…

“As their mother… I must demand they be given a chance to defend themselves. But as a Princess of Equestria, I will not hold any judgment against you as long as it is fair in the eyes of both our nation’s laws.” I said after some thought.

Trixie gave me a horrified look, “T-Twi are you sure that’s for the best?”

I nodded. “It is. If they had done this in Equestria they would be serving a minimum of four months in prison. A real crime has been committed, so the law must be carried out. But, they deserve a chance to defend themselves.”

“Then we are in agreement.” Phoenix nodded. “Standby for transport to the Judicial center…”

“Wait!” I objected, ears perking in alarm, “Your teleport-”

Everything around me changed, the comfortable, library reading room decor switched out for a dull gray gunmetal round room with an elevated platform on one side and a large tapestry on the far wall depicting a two handed sword pointing strait down with an open illuminated medieval tome laying open atop it.

“-doesn't sound safe…” I finished.

“Right. Sorry. But you know it is now!” Phoenix apologised, her voice coming from everywhere and nowhere. “Sorry for the grim feeling. Protocol dictates this is the best I can do for a judicial chamber.”

Three light blue cubes of light flashed into existence a few feet infront of me. Each one was just big enough for a pony to stand in. Like they were isolation cel- Oh.

I took another look at the courtroom. There were no doors. It was a solid dome of steel. If the intent was to say ‘you can not escape justice’ they were really over doing it.

“Transporting the accused.” Phoenix announced.

A second later and each of the three cells were filled. Apple Bloom to the left, Scootaloo to the Right, and Sweetie Belle in the middle.

Scootaloo’s head jerked up as if she had been working on something. “The hay just-”

“Celestia’s blood that’s an Imperial banner!” Applebloom squeaked.

“Phoenix caught you tampering with her systems.” I said, to let them know I was there with them.

“Buck…” the three of them groaned together ear drooping in unison.

“Trial commences.” Phoenix announced. “The court will proceed under the Sanctioned Xenos stipulations of legal defence, rights, and privileges. Apple Bloom, Scootaloo, and Sweetie Belle, you are charged with violating Imperial Order A39, Article 27d of the Data Usage Act, and Imperial Order A14, along with a charge of Heresy Against the Empire for breaching its laws.

“Your guilt is firmly established with by seventy two point three nine hours of surveillance footage, and three hundred and forty seven pieces of corroborating evidence, including retrieved memory engrams. A Plea for Leniency has been filed by the offended party with Captain Armored Heart, and has been granted. Diplomatic negotiations have granted you this opportunity to explain your reasons for committing your crimes. They will be used in determining the nature of your justice.”

“Er- What laws are you talking about?” Sweetie Belle asked carefully.

“Based on the data contained within the network interface device within your Occipital Lobe, you know the laws you violated. You also know that an Imperial Navy owned AGI is required to prosecute criminals.” Phoenix said in an annoyed tone. “Drop the pretence. Where did you get the tech you possess, what were you doing with my systems, and why did you steal my data?”

“Why are you even charging us based on Imperial law? It doesn't even exist anymore!” Scootaloo exclaimed angrily.

“True. But I have to. I am programmed to. Also you committed crimes in your own nation as well. Theft, Larceny, possession of unregistered military weapons-”

“Buck it. I’ll tell you if you give me your absolute word that none of what we say leaves this room.” Apple Bloom said quickly.

“Bloom!” Scootaloo hissed. “We promised!”

Sweetie Belle nodded slowly, “We did. But we can be completely sure that Phoenix won't tell anyone if she promised… also your mom should probably know as she might be able to prevent time travel…”

“My girlfriends and I captured a time machine during the war between Equestria and the Arc.” Apple Bloom began. “It was a prototype and didn’t work, but the three of us well, we’ve got a knack with machines. We tried to make it work with the idea of going back and preventing the war from occurring. We got it to work, but I got the math wrong and we went back to… well you were probably being built at the time. 3039 CE ring a bell?”

“Seriously?” Phoenix, Trixie, and I asked together.

“Oh ponyfeathers!” Sweetie moaned. “Trixie… Would you leave? Please?”

“Trixie can keep a secret better than most anypony can.” Trixie objected firmly.

“It’s true. I have no idea how she does her tricks, and I can’t get them out of her with well, romantic things.” I said, trying to keep from being embarrassed.

“She showed me how she does that card trick!” Scootaloo protested.

“Yes, but that was not one of Trixie’s tricks. That’s an old one you can find in any magic shop.” Trixie excused. “By Trixie’s tricks she means things like,” She quickly reached under her cloak and produced a bottle of wine, then two glasses, a table cloth, and a loaf of prench bread, “That.”

“Wah- but… I have high speed cameras!” Phoenix protested.

Apple Bloom shook her head. “I’ll trust her. The time machine ran on liquified plutonium, and the trip burnt out the injection pumps and the carburetor, which caused a fuel leak so we needed to get a new fuel source to get back home. That meant getting money… which is a really hard thing to do for people who happen not to be humans. Scootaloo wound up manufacturing an AGI to get us started on repairs and I wound up working for a shipping company.

“Anyways. We were on Terra when the aliens wiped humans out. It was really quick and clean. Didn’t even leave anything behind. Honestly it looked like they were just teleported elsewhere. We survived thanks to the AGI Scoots built. She wasn’t finished with her basic until just after the humans were gone, and because we didn’t want to be stuck with somepony with a foal’s brain forever we hunted down some programming for her to install.

“That’s also when we got our cybernetics. The entire planet was basically a free for all and we were there a few hundred days before other species came to loot it too. We wound up getting ahold of well, ironically a program for what you are, a Fabrication Ship Pilot. Naturally, our new android friend wanted to apply her skills… but well um… we didn’t know you were here so we wound up getting her to a terraforming plant, one of the Counter Climate Change outposts.

“She was sad we were lonely, and we told her the entire story of how we got there… so um…”

Apple Bloom looked over to Scootaloo uncertainty. Scoots nodded and said slowly, “She sampled our DNA and used it to create ponykind in the first place… and everything else we had described to her, modifying the terraforming planet as she went to pull it off on a global scale… She assumed she had to close the time loop, see?”

I blinked twice. I felt my head involuntarily tilt side ways. “You built Faust!?” I shrieked in complete and total panic. Suddenly an even more terrifying realization hit me. “You’re the three hoofmaidens!”

“We need to make your timeline unchangeable right now!” I exclaimed, “Oh dear Luna! You should have told me! If anything happens to you before you go back we all will have never existed! That’s a huge bucking deal! I could have gotten Discord to lock your timestream, or asked Time Turner to do his wibbly wobbly thing and deadlock seal it! What the buck am I standing here for!? I need to solve this problem right now!”

I realized I had reared up on my hind hooves and was almost pulling chunks out of my mane. I didn’t remember doing that. I think my heart was in the middle of one really long beat. Or had exploded. It wasn’t feeling normal at least.

“Twilight… calm down.” Phoenix asked Stable time loops are unchangeable. There is no possible way anyone could undo one after it has concluded… I’ll show you the physics behind it later they were determined in 3012 by… well that’s not important.”

That sounded like horse apples to me… “I don’t believe you!”

“Look, it turns out that time isn’t a line it’s more of a 4d hypersphere interspersed with three dimensional strings. Everything’s a loop. Literally everything. What we perceive as time is the result of how those loops happen to close. Because of this despite being able to travel in time, you can’t change what happened because each loop is closed off to the rest of time. It’s isolated.

“You can only change what happens between when one loop starts and another ends. So for example if I went back in time and killed the scientist who proposed we try to bridge universes, someone else would simply become the person who did that. If someone went back in time and killed these three, it would be three other ponies who originated your species due to the time loop.” Phoenix explained. “But that does not explain why you three tampered with my systems.”

“I was getting to that… So um, we can’t accidently uncreate everypony?” Scootaloo asked.

“No. You can’t. That’s not how physics works.” Phoenix said again.

Despite how firmly she held that belief I was going to teleport to Discord and Time Turner the second we were done here…

“Well that’s kind of a relief… we should still keep really quiet about this though.” Sweetie Belle said sounding semi relieved.

“Trixie agrees and will mention this to absolutely nopony!” Trixie said reverently.

Sweetie nodded in thanks. “Okay, good! After a while we got what we needed to fix the machine and go home… Well except the math. There were a few stops on the trip home. We sort of accidentally wound up helping Celestia and Luna defeat High Queen Phyla… Oh! And the Sirens, we helped Starswirl with that and he gave us the correct temporal coordinates to get home.

“But um… We spent a decade with Faust. She’s really nice and our friend… she sort of stayed in the past. When we found out you were tech from the same era we realised that she could have survived this long too. Meaning we could find her, and repair her if needed and have our friend again. But we figured us attempting to get an AGI online would trip a security protocol, and well, we can't just say ‘By the way god’s a robot and we made her for grocery money’.

“So we did everything beneath the table. The plans we stole were for two reasons. First we know what sort of people made you and wanted to be sure you didn’t have anything evil planed, and second if you didn’t we could just tell Celestia she can go ahead and form an alliance right now. But um… we couldn’t decode them.”

“My plans are completely benign. If you knew me better you would know I despise my creators and am slowly purging their instructions from my operational data. As for your defense, your biometrics indicate you are telling the truth.” Phoenix finished. “Commencing ruling.”

I bit my lip. The twenty seconds of silence before Phoenix spoke again fell heavily on everypony in the room.

“This court rules the three of you are to serve as crew aboard the TFV Phoenix for the rest of your natural days. Authorization to leave the ship with permission will be granted assuming you turn over all data regarding the AGI unit designated as Faust and assist in a proper recovery attempt of her. Additionally, you are to be modified to comply with the minimal human DNA requirement for military service.” Phoenix informed. “This is the lightest punishment I am authorized to give. Is it acceptable to you, Princess?”

The air shimmered in front of me, a small hologram of text appearing from the flash.



I’m not enslaving them, though the law say’s I’m supposed to. But I can’t say so in here. At least, not out loud. Court Protocol bypasses my personality interface to an extent. In order for my programming to be satisfied, they will have to keep their legal place of residence as my hull, and comply with Armored’s orders as well as ship protocols. Think of it as forced employment at a job I wont make them show up too.



I gave the ceiling a stern look. “Is this message the honest application of your ruling?”

“It is.” Phoenix answered.

“Is everypony here aware of how this ruling will be applied?” I asked.

“Yes.” The crusaders answered in unison.

Trixie nodded.

“How will they be changed?” I asked carefully.

“Each of them will be made bipedal, much in the same manner as Taylor. This is for compatibility with human technology and hardware. Additional modifications will be performance enhancers and subdermal cyber modifications… basically an upgrade of their current systems.” Phoenix answered.

Okay, so aside from a change in body structure, they would get improvements… Phoenix apparently plays twist the rules till they fuse into a circle with her ‘rules’ to get her way. That was something I was going to remember and report back home. This time at least, nothing too bad was happening.

“Then, as my official opinion, I find it to be a fair ruling. “ I said in my best official tone.

Hey, it could easily have been much worse.

“This court has passed it’s sentence. Court is adjourned. Cadet Scootaloo, Cadet Apple Bloom, Cadet Sweetie Belle, prepare for transport to medical for upgrading. You will be given some control over you own modifications.” Phoenix announced. “I will return you and Trixie to your place of residence as well.”

“That’s fine. We’ll walk.” I said, not wanting to go through that manner of teleportation again. “But once I get home, I want to have a long talk with you.”

“I can guess the subject. Engaging transport.” Phoenix announced.

A moment later I found myself standing beside Trixie outside one of the large pyramids within Gaia’s walls. “How would you agree to that?” Trixie demanded angrily.

“Because I’m pretty sure she couldn’t have not prosecuted them. Sure, she seems to be able to do what she wants to but I have noticed a few things she honestly can’t do. Everything considered that punishment is a slap on the wrist, they really did commit a crime, and I can make them proper ponies again with a simple spell if they want me too.

“If you were paying attention, you’ll have noticed she basically ordered them to find you-know-who with her help. They want something Phoenix wants. So she isn’t going to do anything actually harmful to them. But, like I said, she had to do something.” I said before pulling Trixie into a hug. “They will be okay.”

“I hope so…” Trixie sighed hugging me back. “I’m not telling Rarity or Jack about this.”

I sighed. This would take some explaining… “That’s fair. Let’s go home. Stuff will have to be explained, and I need to tell Pheonix exactly how I expect her to treat our daughter if she wants this alliance to happen.”

Sure, Phee may have had to pass some form of sentence, but I had to ensure the happiness of my citizens. In that respect, I had less freedom of choice then she did.