C’est une histoire au sujet d’un changelin
Today was a good day in the hive.
Changeling X-074Q dozed lazily in its hexagonal chamber, one of hundreds that formed the honeycomb-like walls of the cavern. As the designated sleeping areas of the changeling hive (as declared by the drones themselves), it stretched in a roughly cylindrical shape towards the stone ceiling, too high to be visible to even the most astute eye.
If one, say the Queen of the Changelings herself, were to fly in and glance around the chambers, she would see rows upon rows of black blobs lying in their respective chambers, snoozing and sleeping mindlessly. And she would undoubtedly be livid at their indolence.
Regrettably for X-074Q, Queen Chrysalis, of all changelings, did just that, and chose to direct her anger at that drone.
“X-074Q! What are you doing?!” she fired over the mindlink.
Said changeling jolted into the air, rubbed its pupilless eyes, and, upon fixating its eyes on its Queen, continued to stare at her for several moments. Whatever it was the Queen wished to monologue, it was unlikely that the drone would win the staring contest that came with it. With its compound eyes, it had a perceptible advantage, but the Queen had a millennia or two of practice.
“Well, what in the Tartarus are you doing? Don’t you have nymphs to nurture? Walls to repair? Is this cave not meant to be a literal hive of activity, instead of drones like you acting the role of a sloth?” Her terrifying voice echoed in its head incessantly. It hurt.
X-074Q had hoped that the Queen could pester some other hopeless changeling instead. It was a vain hope, but all it wished to do today was to sleep its lethargy away. And for the rest of the week. Perhaps even for the rest of its life.
It was at that moment that it realised that the Queen could read its thoughts.
She levitated the hapless drone until it was directly in front of her. “Such disobedience in my hive. How disgraceful. It disgusts me—your collective idleness, your unwillingness to perform even the most basic tasks of the hive, and your attrition of the glorious reputation of this hive’s history,” she growled. X-074Q’s eyes continued to meet hers.
“What are you, a dictionary?” the drone thought.
She ignored the jeer. “No matter. I have devised the perfect plan to coerce you cretins to act: an invasion.”
The drone blinked twice. It wasn’t sure what to be more perplexed at: how it had unintentionally transmitted another of its thoughts to the Queen, or the sudden mention of an invasion. X-074Q took a peek behind her and noticed that the other changelings were similarly bewildered at her unexpected announcement.
As the drone found itself being floated back to its chamber, Queen Chrysalis proudly exclaimed, “In a week’s time, there will be a wedding in the pony capital, Canterlot. I will masquerade as the bride, as I have been for the last month. On the day of the wedding, you, my dear changelings, will be breaking the magic shield surrounding the city with your mere noggins.” She barely hid a smirk.
Some disturbing joke, X-074Q wasn’t sure. There weren’t any changelings laughing, though.
“Prepare yourselves, for the date will come sooner than you think,” she concluded. Harlequin flames swiftly shot up around her body, and a nauseatingly pink princess took her place. In an instant, she poofed amid a violent ball of yellow-green sparks.
The hapless drone slumped on the floor of its chamber. Today was not a good day.
It was midnight in the frigid desert of the Badlands, which was irrelevant, as the entire hive was deep underground.
After the failed invasion, the general morale of the hive had plummeted, which was astounding, as the changelings did not think it possible for their faith in the Queen to be at any lower point.
But one could suppose that stepping up ominously to hapless families in alleys was enjoyable to some degree, as well as stepping around a pair of trapped guards while glaring at them, and it was undeniable that the positive emotions they had collected, especially from the white alicorn could last them for years, but the love blast that banished them from Canterlot hurt. Even though it tasted like raspberries.
Still, while the Queen held a grudge against the purple sparkly pony for the embarrassing performance, the vast majority of the hive, i.e. the entirety of the hive save for Queen Chrysalis, placed their displeasure on the Queen, for the sole reason of forcing them from their collective slumbers. And the concussions from bashing their heads against the shield, too.
In a sombre office, deep within the hive tunnels, this displeasure led three changelings to sit around a round table. Each was virtually indistinguishable from each other, as there was but a faint glow from the lantern in the centre that barely stretched towards the table’s edge. They had set up a group conversation in the mindlink a few minutes prior, to ensure the Queen wasn’t listening in on their plans. Changeling X-074Q laid out large posters on the table, which happened to be a deep ivory-black, and made of changeling saliva. While X-074Q tried to push this disturbing fact out of its head, Changeling X-529N, with its night vision, reviewed the diagrams and drawings detailed pensively, before its face crinkled into a face of confusion.
“X-074Q, why are you showing us this? Everyling knows the hive structure, and what the Queen looks like,” X-529N said.
X-816B, who had conveniently been hidden in shadow, revealed its face, which required the drone to physically move its face to within a neck’s length of the lantern. “It adds to the scene, X-529N. If we’re doing something shady, we gotta do it right. Also, every team needs three people. Which is why X-074Q is here. Among other things.” A button pressing coming from X-816B’s direction could be heard, and immediately the wall behind X-816B opened, revealing a brightly-lit room with a glossy-black column made of changeling-spit. On the column was a plate of grated Emmental cheese, covered with a transparent glass dome with a handle at the top. X-816B walked towards the room and motioned for the other drones to follow.
“It wasn’t easy getting the cheese, you know. An unknown love collector gave this as a gift a few months ago, and it’s traded down many hooves—”
“Look, X-816B, I don’t care about your ingenious tactics. I just want to sleep,” X-529N interrupted. For some reason, despite attaining far more than the required hours of rest, the drone had heavy bags under its eyes.
“’Kay, fine. That spiel was just to complete the scene anyway. Anyway, to put it shortly, this is what you’ll put in the Queen’s morning coffee. Say, tomorrow.”
“And what happens after?” X-074Q asked.
“Wait and see.”
Changeling X-529N pushed open two giant doors with its magic, revealing a long throne room. Eerie green torches lined the sides of the hall, releasing sparks every few moments which disappeared on the floor below. A towering black throne, five hoof-lengths high, sat at the end, followed by the lengthy catwalk of the glossy black dais, and a brief section of stairs. Surprisingly, the entire room was a pure black, with a yellow-green tint. As the drone walked up the stairs and through the dais, subtle aromas wafted through the air. It kept its gaze downwards, looking at its own reflection, as it walked slowly towards its Queen.
Upon reaching the throne, the drone bowed low, its rump sticking out from behind, and its forelegs placing an ivory-black mug on the floor. It was incredibly difficult to perform, but as the drone performed this very act of respect every morning for her Queen, the unnaturalness of the bowing became bearable.
Practice made perfect, after all.
Incidentally, the handleless mug was made out of her very own hardened saliva, which the Queen had meticulously moulded like clay with her own hooves. It was something she could claim as her own. Not that everything else in the hive wasn’t hers, of course. Queen Chrysalis’ stoic expression gradually curled into a smile, having been reminded of those two facts.
She, through the mindlink, excused the drone, waited for it to exit the throne room, and then, in the most ignoble manner possible, levitated the mug towards herself, and chugged the contents of the mug directly into her mouth. As the warm, bitter substance, infused with love, travelled down to her stomach, she began to amble slowly down the throne room, and towards her chambers, keeping the mug in her magical hold.
In her morning bliss, the Queen had failed to notice the grated Emmental cheese blended into her coffee.
Today was a good day in the hive.
After X-816B announced that the Queen had deceased due to a very unfortunate case of cheese poisoning, the entire hive erupted into cheer.
Somehow, a group of changelings had arranged the pink cannon pony to arrange a celebration for the auspicious event. The pony called herself ‘Pinkie Pie’, which was quite fitting considering her obnoxiously light pink colouring and the fact that pie was apparently a common party food. Despite the changelings’ initial suspicion with the pony who had caused them much pain (many drones had confetti in their bowels for days), their hesitance had been drained away once the party had started in the former throne room. ‘Pinkie Pie’ added brighter lighting, provided a plethora of pony food (many of which were completely unfamiliar, but included raspberries), and had set up a range of activities. After the party, she also provided (free of charge) an instance of innovative pony technology in every changeling’s chamber, named a ‘pillow’.
Pages ripped from a thesaurus, describing the many synonyms of sleep, was placed on a pedestal. The thesaurus was one of the few books X-074Q had managed to ‘borrow’ from the Canterlot Archives before the drone’s… departure. As for the other books, they were, unfortunately, bodice rippers, as one love collector called them. Whatever that meant, the term was uttered in vitriolic disdain.
With the Queen’s permanent absence, a guard routine was established (with much reluctance, and done only out of necessity), where a different drone each day would watch the entrance for threats, and warn the hive should it discover any.
But most importantly of all, a Constitution had been written and formalised (all by the populace, of course), with its first clause being ‘No changeling shall be compelled, by anyone, to engage in any activity in which it does not wish to be involved’. The reception was unanimously positive. Every changeling could sleep whenever they wished, no matter at what hours it may be.
X-074Q took a light siesta in its hexagonal chamber. It was content, reminiscing on how their way of living was saved once more. Yet, even with this solace, the drone swore it was foreboding something. If this were a slice-of-life short story, what X-074Q felt was the hook for said story’s sequel.
It must have been how that the purple sparky pony thought every day. Even though the newspaper ponies didn’t deliver to their hive entrance (rumour had it that they even delivered to King Sombra!), the love collectors, in their lives as ponies, had overheard many offhand mentions from the purple sparky pony about her frequent misadventures. When they returned monthly, they brought with them fanciful anecdotes like her gaining wings, her experiment in alicorn self-immolation (for ‘science’), and even a recount of her and somepony else defeating a tatzlwurm, whatever that was.
A frantic message from the assigned guard shot through X-074Q’s mind. “Code red! Purple sparky pony entering cavern! Repeat! Code red! Purple sparky pony entering cavern! Repeat…”
As the message trailed on, with no end in sight, X-074Q muffled its ears, as though the blaring noise was emanating from outside its chitinous head.
The drone could not help but sigh.