> Pinkie's Surprise Quest
>  by Shaded Changeling
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> An Average Afternoon
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Over Thirty years ago, a single Hive dropped off the face of the planet. Communications were suddenly cut off with the Hive and all the Queens thought the worst had happened.
The strange thing though, there was no sign of any struggle at all. There was no blood, no burnt husks; even the cakes were still warm. It was like walking into a ghost town, except there was confetti everywhere and occasional cannons that blew up in your face, or splattered you with cake.
The Hive had been searched thoroughly, every crevice, every water source, every pool of emotion. They even checked all the cakes! Not a single sign of any Changelings within, the only thing that proved they weren’t all dead, was the fact the Queen left a note saying ‘Bye Bye, be in touch’. Since then, the Queens of Equestria have been trying to find the missing Hive, coming no closer than they had when they started, at least, until around a month ago.
Around three weeks ago, there was a raid conducted on the small town of Ponyville, trying to find any Changelings that were hiding amongst the populace. They managed to find one from nearly every Hive, including the missing Hive. After Queen Acari had detained him, he had been questioned about his life. Leading to them finding out he had no idea where the Swarm was either.
He was not connected to any Hivemind, so there was no way to trace back to the Hive. Eventually, the Changeling was let go, and he began trying to find a place for himself, and eventually found it with Pinkamena Diane Pie, a baker from Ponyville. The two shared a similar love of making ponies smile, and Surprise now lives with Pinkie as a member of her family.
In fact, the two of them were just at Pinkie’s family’s Rock Farm, out to the west of Ponyville.
As the train pulled up to the station, Pinkie Pie bounced of the train and began hopping back and forth. “Oh... Wasn’t that just the best sudden family reunion you’ve ever had?”
Surprise walked off the train, his current disguise, a white and yellow Pegasus mare with similar mane and tail to Pinkie. “I don’t know, Pinkie… Lime didn’t seem to like me…”
“What? Are you Cah-razy! She absolutely loved you! I know that it looked like she wanted to throw you off a cliff. But that’s just her normal greeting.” She zipped next to Surprise. “Just be glad you didn’t touch Holder’s Boulder. She get’s really mean when you do.”
Surprise let out a sigh. “Are you sure? I don’t know… Is Marble usually that quiet… and Maud that… Blank?”
“Oh don’t worry Marble loved you too. Maud was happy to have you as a family member.”
“I’m not so…”
“Come here you!” She grabbed Surprise and pulled him into a hug, letting her happiness flow into Surprise. “I know that Mom and Dad were a bit… defensive at first. But they will warm up to you.”
“Well… If you’re sure…” Surprise replied, drawing on the happiness Pinkie always generated. “What are the plans for today?”
Pinkie took a deep breath. “Well, I was thinking, maybe I could show you how to cook cupcakes! I know that you had trouble your first few times, but I bet that seventeen is your lucky number!”
Surprise nodded. “Alright… But can you make sure I don’t add too much yeast this time?”
“Okie Dokie Loki! Now let’s go. I’ve got to pick up some sugar to make some sweeeeeeet Cupcakes!”
Surprise smiled at Pinkie. “Well let’s go! I won’t refuse free Cupcakes!” He bounced up and down a few times, his wings flapping a bit to cushion the landing, he wasn’t as used to constant hopping as Pinkie, and couldn’t do it as long.
“There’s the Surprise I know!” She said beginning to hop. “Now we just have to go put away the rock candy and paper and then we can head out to get us some delicious sugar for the cupcakes.”
“I’m right behind you, Pinkie!” Surprise said, taking off from the ground.
“No. You’re above me.”
Surprise flapped his wings and moved forward. “And now I’m in front.” He flapped his wings again to push himself back. “Behind. Front. Behind. Front.”
“Under!” Pinkie hopped onto Surprise’s back, landing and raising both her hooves over her head. Surprise chuckled and slammed his wings shut instinctively, looking down at the ground. “Whoops…”
Surprise expected to fall, but instead found himself being held by Pinkie’s hooves as her tail was wrapped around the train station’s rafters. “Thanks Pinkie…”
“You know, for a Changeling, you are pretty light.” Pinkie replied. “Those cupcakes you eat must go right through you.”
Surprise smiled nervously. “Eh heh… yeah…” He cleared his throat. “Um… Pinkie… You can let go of…”
Pinkie dropped Surprise, who’s wings shot open and slowed him down before he hit the ground, as he did, he swung his tail under his body and bounced up with a light twang. As he landed on all fours, Pinkie was clapping with her tail still wrapped around the rafter. “And he sticks the landing!”
Surprise bowed. “But can his opponent do the same?”
Pinkie squinted at Surprise, before flipping over the rafter and landing perfectly on her hind legs. “How’s that?”
Surprise held up a sign that had a black ‘10’ drawn on it. “The Changeling judge gives it a ten.”
Surprise looked to his left to see Pinkie wearing a mustache holding up a nine. “Pink judge gives nine.”
Surprise nodded. “And what does the other judge think?” He looked over at a bucket full of turnips, propped against it was the number five.
“We’re sorry, Miss Pie, but you cannot win them all.” He stood up and Pinkie dropped in front of him.
“Wait! I can do better!”
“I’m sorry Miss Pie, but Mister Turnip is a rather difficult judge to convince.”
“NOOOOOOO!!!” Pinkie said falling to her hind legs and raising her front hooves up to the air. She took a deep breath. “Cupcake time!”
Surprise began bouncing next to Pinkie Pie as the two hopped down the street. “What kind of things should we put on the Cupcakes?”
“Well I’d hope we put Frosting. Oh! And Sprinkles!”
“A Cherry?”
Pinkie gasped. “Yes!”
“I’ll get the flour and eggs!” Surprise said.
“I got the cherry and sprinkles!” Pinkie announced as the two stopped hopping and both of their hind legs began spinning up in the air before connecting with the ground and leaving two pony shaped clouds as the two of them dashed down the streets, both of them heading towards the marketplace. Once there, the two strips of yellow and pink split off and began running around the area. Each one stopping right in front of a vender and handing over the bits before grabbing the items, and quickly dashing off to find more. When both of them finally met up in the middle, they had large bags on their backs, they hoofbumped as the two began walking towards Sugar Cube Corner, preparing for the day of baking ahead of them.
When they entered Sugar Cube Corner, Mr. Cake was standing at the counter, looking at the supplies the two were carrying, and he held back a sigh. “Honeybunch, it looks like Pinkie and Surprise are going to use the kitchen again.”
Mrs. Cake looked out at the two ponies, enthusiastically grinning at her. “Well, dearies, try not to destroy it, and Surprise, I expect you to let us use it should we need to.”
“Of course, Mrs. Cake. You can have it whenever you need.” Surprise replied. “I just want to try and get baking down, so that I could be some use here.”
“Oh you don’t have to, with three bakers here you hardly need to.” Mr. Cake replied.
“Yeah… But I want to, this is my new life after all, I might as well be helpful.”
“Well, if you are sure, dearie, just make sure it stays relatively clean.”
“All right, Mrs. Cake I’ll make sure Surprise doesn’t ruin the kitchen. We have Cupcakes to make!” Pinkie said before grabbing Surprise and the bag and dashing towards the kitchen. Once there, Pinkie dashed around, grabbing a bowl, the cupcake tray, an egg beater, a spoon, multiple measuring cups, and a large bag of sugar.
Surprise, meanwhile, was busily getting the purchased ingredients out of the bags and placing them on the counter, he also made sure to stay out of the way of any of the materials Pinkie was launching across the room. When both of them had finished their tasks, they both stood in front of the large bowl. Surprise was covered in a yellow flame as his chartreuse wings and eyes were exposed. His back plate was a darker amber-color as his small fangs poked out through his smile.
“You ready, Surprise?” Pinkie asked, grabbing a cookbook.
“You bet.” Surprise’s horn lit up as he prepped himself to begin trying to bake again. “Seventeenth time’s the charm.”
“AAAAaaaaand…  GO!”



Three tries and around an hour and a half later, Surprise had five burnt rocks, five gooey messes, and one that was somehow both burnt and undercooked. He was now watching the oven as his latest batch was cooking, he glared into the machine, trying to will it to keep the cupcakes nice and cooked without burning them. He heard the ticking of the alarm he set, waiting for it to begin ringing so he could grab the cupcakes.
Please be right… Please be right… Please be right…
He heard the ringing begin and threw open the oven door, reaching it and grabbing the cupcake tray in his gloved hooves, pulling them out of the hot oven, juggling the burning hot tray in his hooves before putting it on the counter. Please don’t be burnt…
He looked over the still warm Cupcakes and let out a sigh when he saw a golden brown coloration. Pinkie peered out from behind him to look at the cupcakes. “Nice work, Surprise. They look perfect.”
“But how do they taste?” Surprise asked, his horn lighting up as he removed one of the cupcakes and levitated it over to Pinkie, who grabbed it out of the air in her mouth, chewing on the confection before her tongue shot out of her mouth with the wrapper on it. Surprise took the wrapper and threw it in the trash using his magic. “So?”
“Yummy!” Pinkie said. “It’s slightly gooey on the inside but overall it tastes delicious.” Pinkie stepped out fully from behind Surprise. “Now we need to decorate them.” Pinkie pulled out a decorating kit from Celestia knows where, and placed it on the counter. “I think you should do the honors. I need to get out there and entertain some ponies. Wanna come?”
Surprise looked out at the sweets shop, seeing the crowd of foals and ponies all talking amongst themselves. “I’ll come and join you once I get these decorated.”
“Okie Dokie, Loki! I’ll hold off on the Magic show until you’re ready. You think we should start or finish with the hat trick?”
Surprise tapped his chin. “Let’s start off with it, that way we could make my entrance a surprise!”
Pinkie giggled. “Alright then, I’ll get the balloons ready!” Pinkie zipped out of the room, leaving Surprise alone, once he was sure she was gone, he let out a deep sigh. “I should have told her…” He said.
“But if you tell her, then she may not understand.” His Mind said back to him.
“But still… Maybe she could help.”
“Or she could just make it worse.”
Surprise sighed. “I can’t keep hiding this… She deserves to know…”
“Listen, we can talk to Twilight about it tomorrow if it is still bugging you. But we shouldn’t tell Pinkie. Queen knows what she could do.” His mind rationalized.
“You’re right…” He sighed. “I should talk to Twilight…” He paused for a moment. “I need to stop talking to myself… I have others around me now… I’m doing it again…” He groaned.
He reached over and grabbed a bowl of frosting, lifting the knife in his magic before grabbing one of the cupcakes and beginning to coat the top in frosting, one of the things he could do flawlessly from all the times Pinkie had him help her. So he let his mind wander a bit, coming to a stop on one of his first encounters with a pony.
He had lived mostly off of rabbits and squirrels, feeding off the small traces of emotion during his Pupation, but once he grew up, the small traces weren’t enough. He needed more, so it was just his luck that a group of ponies were walking through the forest at the time, or his misfortune.
He remembered seeing the shiny gold that he found out later was Royal Guard armor, he climbed up the trees, following behind the strange creatures that looked like him but weren’t him. It had gone pretty well too, up until he misjudged the distance and fell to the ground behind them.
All four of the guards had turned at the noise, coming face to face with the young Changeling, his carapace was covered in mud and scratches, his tail was a matted mess, and his horn was still tiny. He turned to look at them, instinctively making himself smaller to show he wasn’t a threat, but being met with confusion from the Guards.
They had talked, but Surprise couldn’t remember what they had said, one of them had a stick with a sharp end… or three of them… He couldn’t remember. The ones that had sticks lowered them at Surprise, they spoke some more, and one of them looked back at the blank one, without wings or a horn, he was blank to Surprise, which was strange since he was the only other thing that was blank.
The Guards talked again, and one of them moved their pointed stick closer, and Surprise began shaking, he hadn’t seen this before and when the stick poked him in the side, Surprise ran away from the four of them. He maneuvered around the roots and branches quickly and easily, but heard the guards stomping towards him.
“Surprise?”
Surprise blinked as he was brought back to the present, he looked to his left to see Mrs. Cake standing there, looking at the Cupcakes on the finished plate. “Are you all right, dearie?”
“Yes, Mrs. Cake, why do you ask?”
“Because you have been putting frosting on the wall since I walked in.” Surprise looked at the wall in front of him, the knife was still slathering the frosting over the wall. “Are you sure there is nothing bothering you?”
Surprise smiled as he pulled the knife away from the wall. “Everything is just fine Mrs. Cake. I just got lost in my thoughts…” He cast his eyes down towards the cupcakes, each one covered in frosting. He picked up the plate and handed it to Mrs. Cake. “I promise, I’m alright, don’t worry about me.”
Mrs. Cake looked over him, a worried expression on her face. “Are you sure you shouldn’t talk to somepony about this?”
Surprise sighed. “I’m fine Mrs. Cake. I’m just a little shocked by Pinkie’s family, that’s all. I’ll be better tomorrow.”
Mrs. Cake sighed. “If you are sure. But I want you to get some sleep tonight, no sweets, alright?”
Surprise nodded. “I promise I’ll get some sleep tonight. You don’t need to worry.”
“I’ll trust you here, Surprise, and Pinkie needs your help with entertaining the foals.”
Surprise smiled. “Tell her I’m ready.”



“Now behold, the great Pinkdini will now perform one of the greatest feats in magic!” Pinkie said, she was wearing a black cape, a long twirly mustache on her face, a small magical wand in her hoof. On her head was a tall magician hat.
“Now check for yourselves,” She removed the hat and turned it so that the foals could see. “Nothing in the hat, nothing on the hat, no strings attached.” She waved her hoof over the hat. “Now, watch as I create a pony from thin air!”
She placed the hat on the ground and waved the magic wand over it a few times. “Ala-kadbra!” She tapped rim of the hat and took a step back.
She waved at the hat as it began shaking, all of the foals’ attention locked on the hat, waiting to see something happen. The hat continued to shake before it stopped shaking and sat still. “Wait for it…”
Surprise launched himself out of the hat, fully disguised, there was an explosion of confetti as he did a little flip and landed on his hind hooves, he reached into his mane and pulled out a bouquet of flowers, which he tossed out towards the audience before giving a bow, the foals all clapped at the display, as well as the free roses.
Surprise felt a little giddy at the amount of joy he felt from the foals. He fell down to his four hooves and smiled at Pinkie. “The great Pinkdini!”
The foals cheered at them and clapped in excitement. Pinkie looked out at them and bowed. “There is much more where that came from!”



The party went well, the cupcakes Surprise made weren’t terrible, and the foals actually enjoyed them. To top that all off, Surprise now had more emotion to add to his stockpile, which was already enough to last him a few months should he need to go that long without either pony contact, a very real threat before, or without Pinkie.
But now that the party had died down, and Luna’s night had overtaken the sky, and Surprise was undisguised and looking out at the distance, letting out a heavy sigh. He continued to fidget with the small spherical crystal in his hooves, the crystal giving off a small yellow light as he continued to unconsciously fill it with stored emotion.
“Why was I left…” He said quietly, looking down at the crystal. “I don’t know anything about them…” He moved the crystal in his hooves. “Where they are, who my parents are… I don’t even know my Queen’s name…” He sighed as the crystal began to glow a little brighter. “How am I supposed to be able to find them?”
He looked back over at the star-filled sky, seeing the small shards of light blinking back at him. “Why is this bothering me? I never had this much trouble with it before…”
He continued to look out at the night sky until the door opened and Pinkie walked in, as usual a smile was on her face, Surprise quickly turned with a smile on his face to greet Pinkie. “That was some show, huh Surprise?” She said, Gummy clinging onto her tail, she was wearing her sleeping cap on top of her mane. “I bet you felt nice and full after that.”
Surprise chuckled. “Yup, I felt nice and full. Nice job on the Party Cannon, I thought for sure you put too much in there.”
“Nah, I wouldn’t do anything too dangerous.” Pinkie hopped onto her bed. “I don’t know if I’ll ever get to sleep! I’ve got so much planned that I don’t think I could ev…” She fell backwards onto her bed and began snoring.
Surprise sighed as his smile fell. “I need to tell her… I can’t keep hiding it from her…”
“You don’t even really know her.”
“She’s family…”
“She is also one of the craziest mares you’ve met.”
Surprise sighed. “I should see somepony about talking to myself…”
“You are technically talking to Gummy.” Surprise looked over at the young Alligator, still sitting staring at him with that blank expression.
“I guess that’s true…”
“Tomorrow, we’ll talk to Twilight. She’s been going to the Hives, maybe she found something?”
“Hopefully…” Surprise said with a sigh. “Otherwise I’m out of ideas…” Surprise stopped fidgeting with the crystal and placed it on his bedside table before climbing under the covers. “Goodnight, Gummy. Goodnight, Pinkie.”
Surprise listened to Pinkie’s snoring for a few minutes before he eventually reached the same level of sleep she was at, drifting off into his own world, a small smile spreading across his face as he slept.
> Asking Around
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	The morning went as well as Surprise could expect it to, he woke up with Gummy attached to his tail, and a light rumbling in his stomach. He climbed off the bed and in a flash of yellow flame, donned his disguise before heading down the stairs, Gummy still attached to his tail.
“Morning, Mrs. Cake.” He said as he walked into the sweet shop below. “How are you today?”
“Oh I’m just fine. Do you feel any better?”
Surprise nodded. “Much better. I’m sorry for smearing frosting on the wall…”
Mrs. Cake nodded. “It’s hardly the worst thing we’ve had happen around here. No harm done, I promise you.”
“Where’s Pinkie?” Surprise asked, looking around and seeing no sign of the pink pony.
“I asked her to head to the market and pick up a few things for me, we have a request for a wedding cake, we will need to get started on it soon, I’m just hoping that Pinkie can stop herself from eating it. Do you have any plans today, dearie?”
“Oh… Nothing really, I’m just going to go and walk around a bit. Get a bit more acquainted with some ponies.”
“Well I hope you have a good day. Pinkie will find you if we need you.” Mrs. Cake said.
“Alright Mrs. Cake, I’ll be back in a bit.” He waved back to her before walking out of the sweet shop, looking out at his home. He took a deep breath and sighed. “Okay… First is Twilight’s…”
Surprise opened his wings, but then closed them, deciding instead to walk, his legs could use a little exercise. As he began to walk towards the Library Tree, Would it still be a building if it was grown? Would it be called a Growing? He began to say hello to many of the Ponies that he knew. Pinkie had been steadily introducing him to a number of the residents of Ponyville, some of whom were more than happy to have another Changeling in the town, others not so much.
Usually Pinkie would try to explain the situation to those that were less than pleased to have Surprise around, but by that point Surprise had already dashed out of the house, climbed a nearby tree, hid himself in the leaves, and was shaking in fear. He was also occasionally a squirrel.
In fact, his first meeting with many of Pinkie’s sisters followed almost the same, specifically with Limestone. Though do to a lack of trees, he opted instead to climb halfway up the chimney and stay there, until a rather soot covered Pinkie with a chimney sweep managed to get him out.
Meeting Marble went rather well, as both of them were essentially looking at each other and not saying a word until Pinkie pulled both of them into an equally uncomfortable hug for both of them.
Maud had been rather… difficult. Despite Pinkie’s constant saying that Maud was happy to have him, he couldn’t help but feel slightly on edge. She just kept staring at him. Surprise felt like she was judging his every move, so that in case he did anything wrong she could kick him across the sky like that one rock. Every time she spoke with that monotone voice, he thought she would scorn him and then possibly hurt him.
However her parents were the two that Surprise were the most scared to meet, Pinkie told him they were rather traditional, and they could easily just forbid him from ever returning or even seeing Pinkie. Let alone allowing him into their family, he thought for sure he was going to pass out when he finally met them. Surprise wasn’t sure whether it was them being all right with him, or the fact he was shaking terribly that made him almost pass out.
The fact that they were allowing him into the family was quite the unexpected turn, but it did help alleviate a lot of fear that he had, as well as a majority of the ways the meetings would turn out.
It was rather strange that once Surprise cooled down, that he saw just how much they cared for each other, and Maud had been rather… oral about how she felt, so in hindsight, he didn’t really have too much to worry about.
As he continued to walk through the town, he went through his mental list again. First I go to Twilight’s … Then to see Haze, maybe Antenna, then if all else fails… He took a deep breath as he turned down the street to Twilight’s. As he caught sight of the Tree, he began to slow down.
What if she is busy? I mean she is the student of Celestia… I’m sure she has much bigger problems to deal with…
“Or she could have nothing going on.”
But she…
“You said we would do this.”
But… She might be…
“We won’t know if we don’t try.”
Surprise sighed. “You’re right, Brain…”
“And I’ve kept you alive for these past twenty some years, so don’t forget it. By the way, you really need to see somepony about this.”
“I know…” Surprise groaned. “I’m doing it again…” He shook his head and took a deep breath before walking up to the door. He raised his hoof and lightly knocked on the door. After a few seconds he turned around and tried to walk away.
“Surprise…”
“What? They aren’t…”
“Public library… I doubt they heard you.”
Surprise took another deep breath before turning around and walking back up to the door, he slowly pushed the door open and peeked in. Not seeing Twilight or Spike around, he pushed the door open more. “Twilight?” He asked, looking around.
“Good afternoon, Surprise.” Surprise looked up to see the Lavender Unicorn walk down the stairs, her saddlebags over her back, each one full of writing supplies. “How was the trip to Pinkie’s family home?”
“Oh… It was… Fine.” He said, shrinking back a bit. “Twilight, can I talk to you about something… Kind of personal.” He asked, looking back at her Saddlebags. “I mean if you need to go somewhere, I can always ask some other time…” He sighed. “Actually, never mind. I’ll just…” He began to turn back to the door, but Twilight’s voice caught his ears.
“Surprise, I have plenty of time. What do you need?”
Surprise sighed and closed the door before he was covered in a yellow flame and dropped his disguise. “It’s… Changeling related… and… You’ve been going to the Hives so I was wondering… Have you seen any others… Like me?” Surprise began tapping his front hooves together. “I mean… If you haven’t that’s fine but I…”
Twilight shook her head. “I’m sorry, Surprise.” His ears fell against his head. “I haven’t seen any other Changelings with your coloration. I promise that I will tell you if I find anything.”
Surprise sighed. “Oh… alright…” He sat down on the ground and looked down at the ground.
“How long have you been thinking about this?” Twilight asked.
“Well… I’ve been thinking about it since I got welcomed… But I’ve been meaning to ask for…” The sound of a door caught his attention, and he looked towards the basement door to see Spike, the young purple dragon, walking up and looking at a small pocket watch, he walked up to Twilight, showing her the watch.
“Twilight, we need to get to the station if you want to get to Canterlot by…”
Twilight’s eyes widened as she looked at the watch. “Oh NO!” She quickly pulled Spike onto her back as she quickly headed to the door. “Sorry, Surprise. I need to catch a train. I wanted to ask Queen Chrysalis a few things before heading off to Prance. Hope everything goes well!”
Twilight ran past Surprise as he waved back at her. As she ran down the streets, Surprise let out a sigh. “That’s one down…”
“Come on, cheer up. Don’t let it get you down…”
“But that was one of the best ideas I had…” Surprise said as he sat down. “I don’t know how much the others really know about my Hive…”
“Well there is no way to know unless we ask. So where to next?”
Surprise sighed. “To see Haze…” He stood back up and donned his disguise once again before walking out of the library and heading towards the house that was owned by the Changeling couple. Despite his rather poor first impression, Haze and Lockup had been willing to help him learn the small things he didn’t know fully about being a Changeling.
In fact, he had to learn quite a lot by himself, the first being transformation. After his… ‘Escape’ via a bear. Surprise began thinking a lot about the Guards, the way their armor reflected the light, the way their coat was all white as opposed to his black sleek body. So it came as some surprise to him when he looked down and suddenly found his body replaced with the white fur of a pony. He squealed and flailed for a bit before his body returned to normal.
From there he started thinking back to them, after the next time he had a freak out within his little makeshift cave-home for him to realize he was the one doing it. After a few more tries to make a pony form, he was happy to say that he knew that he could do it… But knew nothing else.
He first began to head towards a pony village to test out his new abilities, all things considered it went pretty well. He was only found out by one pony… Who later met him in his little home. Leading to his first, and pretty much only, real teacher.
Surprise sighed as he looked back at his wings, remembering the Pegasus that had taught him so much of what he would need later in his life. As he looked up, he saw the small building that belonged to the couple. He walked up to the house and knocked on it.
A few seconds passed and the door was opened by a small Changeling with bright pink-eyes. “Hi, Mr. Surprise!” The young Changeling said.
“Hello, Zakon. Are your mom and dad here?”
“Mom is here. Dad had to go to work.” Zakon replied.
“Can I come in? I just need to talk to your mom.” Surprise said.
“Okay!” Zakon ran back into the house as Surprise walked in. Surprise looked around the room, pictures hung up of both Haze and Lockup in their disguises. Lockup, a gray Earth Pony with BonBon, a crème colored earth pony with a swirled pink and blue mane. A few of them were pictures of them as Changelings, Lockup’s horn and wings still intact in a majority of them. One family picture was visible, with both of them, a smaller Changeling, and a young nymph in Haze’s hooves.
“That’s the last photo before he was exiled.” Surprise hopped into the air a bit before turning to see Haze standing there, a small smile on her face. “He was a great Soldier for the Hive. Helped put away twenty enemies of Equestria or criminals in general. He was on the task force that helped liberate some of Ovi’s Changelings from the Slave rings.” She sighed. “It was unbelievable what he did…”
Surprise cocked his head. “What did he do exactly? I never heard… Unless you don’t want to talk about it. Actually… We don’t need to talk if you don’t want to… I just thought that you might be able to help given how old you are…” Surprise’s eyes widened. “Not that I’m saying you’re old… I was just…”
Haze snickered a bit. “It’s alright, Surprise. I understand. Now what did you want to ask me? I was going to meet up with BonBon to talk about some… things…” Haze sighed. “It’s not important. What were you asking?”
Surprise looked around the room again, then picked up the family picture and sighed. “I was wondering… Did you know anything about my Hive?”
Haze’s ears fell. “Surprise… Come here. I’ll make you some tea… Or something. We can talk about it in the living room.”
Surprise nodded. “That would be great… Thank you…” He walked into the small living room, a minute or two later, Haze came in and sat down, she placed the two cups of tea on the table.
“So, how long has this been bothering you?”
Surprise let out a sigh. “Since I entered Acari’s Hive…”
Haze tapped her chin. “That was your very first visit into a Hive, wasn’t it?”
Surprise nodded. “And seeing all those Changelings flying around, being part of a family and working together… It made me start thinking about my own Hive… A family I never met, and… Maybe they are still out there somewhere… Just waiting for me…”
Haze nodded. “I’ve met quite a few Exiles in my work with Queen Acari, not including my husband and Spine, each and every one of them refused to believe it had happened. The Hivemind becomes a major part of our lives, and suddenly being cut off from it can be disastrous. We are naturally more social creatures than Ponies, even if we don’t realize it. The Hivemind is a major part of our lives. To be honest, I’m surprised that you weren’t driven insane by the lack of communication over your life.”
“Who’s saying he didn’t?”
Surprise was about to talk back to his brain, but realized it would look rather strange. “I have my ways…”
“Well, hopefully that doesn’t make it difficult to interact with others.” Haze replied, lifting the cup to her lips and taking a sip from it. “Well, I’m sorry to say this Surprise… But I don’t know anything about Eupha’s Hive vanishing.”
“But… You must have been around when it happened.” Surprise replied.
Haze nodded as she took another sip. “I was, but I’m not sure how good of a resource I will be.”
“Why’s that?” Surprise asked, picking up his own tea and drinking it quickly.
“Well, I was only five at the time. I didn’t even notice it was happening until a couple years later. By the time I was grown up, the Queens had kept only a few Changelings on the case. They had scoured all of Equestria in an attempt to find them, turning up nothing. Then Chrysalis began to change and cut herself off for a bit. Things got kind of hectic in those last few years, then everything turned udder’s up with the invasion.” Haze sighed. “You know how that went.”
Surprise nodded and sighed. “So… Do you have any ideas on where they might be?”
Haze sighed. “So far… The only place we haven’t checked is the Frozen North, but Eupha wouldn’t be caught dead up there. Not enough going on, she would get bored from what I’ve heard about her.”
“And… What have you heard?” Surprise asked.
Haze hummed through some tea. Once she swallowed it, she replied. “Oh, I’ve heard she can be quite the hoof full, at times she could be calm and collected. Other times she is bouncing off the wall and only a containment spell would make her stop moving. She could always confuse the other Queens, yet was smart enough to know quite a bit the other Queens didn’t.”
Surprise looked down at the empty cup in his hooves. “What did… My Hive do?”
Haze took another sip. “Sorry, Surprise. I’m not sure. I know it had to do with the ponies’ celebrations. I just don’t know how…” Surprise’s ears fell. “Though, maybe Antenna would know, she is older than me after all. She may have been old enough to remember the event differently.”
Surprise sighed. “Yeah… Do you think she is busy?”
Haze tapped her chin. “I don’t think so… She didn’t seem like she had much going on, and I’m sure she would be happy to help.”
Surprise sighed. “Okay… Thank you for the suggestion.”
“Sorry I couldn’t be much help. I can ask Queen Acari to see if she has anything.”
“No… It’s all right; I wouldn’t want to bother her. She’s probably really busy, dealing with laws and stuff… I don’t want to distract her because I’m feeling lonely…” Surprise sighed. “Thanks for the concern.”
Haze nodded. “Feel free to tell me if you find anything.”
Surprise nodded as he walked out of the room and back out onto the street, he took a deep breath and let out a long sigh. “I really hope Antenna has some idea…”
“Come on, you aren’t going to give up if it turns out otherwise are you?”
“What other choices do I have?” Surprise asked himself. “I can’t tell Pinkie…  You made that very clear…”
“But Antenna might know something, and if not her, than perhaps Ortho.”
Surprise sighed. “I don’t think Ortho knows anything about them… She would be busy with her studies…”
“True… So, what do you plan to do after Antenna?”
“I don’t know…” Surprise replied. “Maybe I’ll look through the Library for clues or something…”
“You have no idea what you are looking for. How would that work?”
“I don’t know!” Surprise said loudly, before slamming his hoof over his mouth. “Nopony heard that right?”
“Sure…”
“Don’t be sarcastic…” Surprise replied, beginning to walk down the street towards the edge of the town, where Darkblaze had set up his home when he first arrived five years ago. It was close to the forest in case he was found out, but not too far from anything too important.
Surprise’s mind continued to wander as he walked, transitioning back to his first meeting with his teacher.

He had still been young at the time, and had just returned from the pony village, which was a rather embarrassing event. He had been doing well, but the fact he couldn’t talk very well, had no idea what was normal, and tried to climb up a building eventually gave him away to one of the ponies. But before they had the chance to call for a guard, Surprise had already dashed out of the town.
He had taken a rather roundabout way of getting back to his cave, hoping that the ponies wouldn’t have followed him, so he was rather shocked when he entered his cave to see one of the ponies standing there, waiting for him.
His first response was to try and get out of the cave, but the pony spoke to him. “You are a long way from the Hives, Nymph.” He said, quickly covered in a green flame and being replaced by another of… Him, only with blue eyes, and a blue back. “How did you get out here?”
Surprise stood there and looked at the blue version of him for a few moments before the other Changeling walked up and lay down in front of him. “Well?”
Surprise blinked again. Opening his mouth to let out a little chirp.
“Can you understand me?” The Changeling asked. “Nod your head if yes, shake if no. Or don’t do anything if no…”
Surprise nodded.
“Can you talk?”
Surprise shook his head and the Changeling sighed. “Then I guess that’s first.”
The Changeling stood up and held out a hoof. “My name is Ardent Mind, I’m here to teach you everything you’ll need to survive out here.”
Surprise looked at the hoof curiously, then looked back at Ardent, noticing he didn’t have any wings. Ardent looked back at where his wings should be. “Long story, kid. I’ve been on my own out here for thirty years, if you listen to me, I promise you won’t get caught. Deal?”
Surprise looked at the hoof again and reached up to touch it, nodding as he did.
“Good, first things first, let’s work on your vocab.”
Surprise had spent another few years getting taught by Ardent, learning about Equestria, Ponies, but he mostly learned about Changelings. What he ate, what he could do, the structure of the Hives, the more important laws and codes he was supposed to keep, even without the Hives.
“You are never to reveal yourself, the only reason you should is if it saves others. Even to other Changelings, keep yourself hidden.”
“Why?” Surprise asked.
“It is best for everyone if you don’t, no telling where ponies are watching or listening, keep your head down if you must. Keep your personal feelings away from your food, you may feel bad for replacing somepony, but it is either that or starvation.”
“But… What if I befriend a pony?”
Ardent sighed. “Listen, you need to remember something very important,” he knelt down in front of Surprise.  “You are vulnerable out there. One pony is all it takes to turn your life around, you can have the best life imaginable, but getting too close to one can have terrible consequences.”
“Is that what happened to you?” Surprise asked.
Ardent looked back at the small stubs he had instead of wings, the muscles making them vibrate. “In a way… The ponies will not understand what you are; other Changelings tend to care more for Hives than Changelings like us. It’s best to keep away from them, and do just what I taught you. Once you find your niche, don’t let it go. I made the mistake of thinking it wouldn’t matter…”
Surprise looked at the small fire in the middle of the cave. “Will… I ever be able to be myself?”
Ardent shook his head. “Listen, kid, I can’t speak for you. Maybe later in life everything calms down, but for the time being, I just don’t see it happening.” Ardent sighed. “I’ll miss you, kid. Promise me if you find that niche, you’ll come give old Ardent a visit.”
Surprise hugged Ardent. “I’ll miss you… Are you sure you can’t come with me?”
Ardent shook his head. “I’m sorry, kid, I’ve got a better life here, I’m getting old, and I’d only slow you down. I’ve enjoyed these past three years. I hope that I’ll see you when you grow up, maybe you’ll become something like personal jester the Princess.”
Surprise snickered. “If I do, then I’ll come with gifts.”
“It wouldn’t matter, so long as I know you are still kicking. Make me proud out there.”
Surprise nodded. “I’ll try.”
Ardent nodded. “I’ve got to head back to my home. The others will wonder where I went.” He hugged Surprise again. “I’ll see you around, kid.” He let go of the hug and walked towards the cave exit, he looked back towards Surprise, the saddlebags Ardent packed before leaving his home sitting next to the young Changeling. “Remember what I taught you, all of it will save your life.”
Surprise nodded as Ardent walked out of the cave and began heading back towards the town, after a few minutes, Surprise picked up the saddlebags and walked out of the cave. Taking a look around before being covered in a yellow flame and taking off from the ground, flying towards one of the nearby towns.

Surprise had followed Ardent’s training almost his whole life. He had taken places of ponies for a day, fed off emotion, and then left the town. He only had a few small mess-ups, a name here, a mark here. But he always managed to get away before they ever caught him. A few times he had run away before they even thought about it. His nerves making him think the worst.
He eventually found the enjoyment of ponies making him feel stronger than just love, and modified his plans accordingly, it wasn’t long until he could spend longer looking for targets, and less time feeding for more energy. He lasted nearly his whole life without many difficulties after that, until the Invasion…
Surprise sighed. “I wonder if Ardent is still alive…”
“You think they found out?”
“I don’t know… I really hope not… I would hate to see him die… I wanted to show him how much better my life is…”
“Once we find them, we’ll tell him.”
Surprise sighed. “If we find them…”
“What did I say about being negative?”
“Shh.” Surprise said as he walked up to the house, he raised his hoof and knocked on the door. A few seconds later, the door was opened by a blue unicorn with a pink curly mane.
“Surprise! What a... unexpected visit.” Candy Floss said, smiling nervously before letting out a sigh. “Sorry… I’m trying to get better at not putting your name and the noun in the same sentence. It just feels weird.”
“You wouldn’t believe how much I get that.” Surprise replied, snickering a bit.
“So, how are you doing? I heard that you went to Pinkie’s foalhood home. What was that like?”
“Oh… You know… Rock Farms…” Surprise said. “Can I talk to you about something… Kind of important?”
Candy Floss nodded. “Come on in, I’m sure Darkblaze wouldn’t mind. I’m just keeping an eye on Echo.”
“How is she doing?” Surprise asked.
“She’s been fine, though I am more curious about you. You were so nervous about meeting her parents before.”
Surprise nodded. “Yeah, turns out it was just me being… Well, afraid of the worst…”
“And since you are still here, I assume everything went well. Is there anything I can get you? Water, coffee, Love?”
“No, thank you. I’m fine for now.”
Candy Floss was covered in a green flame and replaced with the older Changeling. “Why don’t we go and see the little Nymph, I’m sure she’d be happy to see you.”
“Okay… But I do need to talk to you.”
“Sure.” Antenna led Surprise into the living room, in front of the couch; a small Changeling nymph was holding a crayon in her mouth and scribbling on a blank piece of paper. As Surprise walked in, the Nymph looked up and dropped the crayon. “Surprise!” The Changeling waved at the Pegasus. “Look, I’m drawing a picture of Twilight.” The young Changeling turned the paper around so that Surprise could see the picture of the purple Unicorn, as far as child drawings went, it was what he would have expected.
“That’s great, Echo. Are you going to show Twilight when it’s done?”
“Uh-huh.” Echo picked up the crayon again and began scribbling on the page.
“She’s been working at it all day.” Antenna said. “Now remember, Echo, only a little longer before we go outside and play.”
“Okay, Mrs. Antenna.” Echo said cheerily, going back to her drawing.
“She really enjoys drawing, not as much as she enjoys running around, but it is one of her preferred activities.” Antenna sat down in a chair next to the couch, allowing Surprise to sit on the couch. “So, what did you want to ask me?”
Surprise sighed. “Well, I really wanted to ask you about… My Hive…”
Antenna’s mouth fell a little. “Is this about visiting Pinkie’s family?”
Surprise nodded. “I tried to ask Twilight and Haze, but neither of them had any ideas… So I thought I could come to you… Because you might have some ideas… Or at least be able to tell me a little bit about them.”
Antenna fidgeted a little. “Surprise… I…”
“No… It’s alright, it was a silly idea anyway, I’m sorry to disturb you…”
Surprise began getting up, but Antenna spoke up. “Surprise, I will answer anything I can, but I want to know why.”
Surprise sighed. “I… I just want to know. I’ve been on my own so long… I just want to know…” Surprise let out a sniffle and felt a hoof on his shoulder he looked up at Antenna.
“Of course I’ll help you, to the best of my abilities. What do you want to know?”
Surprise rubbed his eyes before replying. “What did we do?”
Antenna sat down. “The Joyous Hive…” Antenna said. “Well, they were responsible for the various celebrations, including the birthdays and anniversaries for the Queens. Not only that, but they were expert builders.”
Surprise’s ears straightened. “Really? Builders?”
Antenna nodded. “Yes, not only were they entertainers, but builders. Every collection of Hives has a technology based Hive, your Queen was named Eupha, though I’m sure that you were told this by Haze.”
Surprise nodded. “What did we build?”
Antenna let out a sigh. “I… Believe you specialized in weaponry… Cannons and the like, but I do remember they made some delicious cakes…” She tapped her chin. “After that… I’m… Having a bit of trouble… I haven’t thought about Queen Eupha for nearly twenty years…”
“Okay…” Surprise replied. “But… Do you remember anything else?”
Antenna tapped her chin. “Well… I think she was working on… Some kind of… Cake making thing… I’m sorry, I was only a teen last time she came to the Hive. Do you have any other questions?”
“What… What do you think happened?”
Antenna blinked. “Well…” Antenna rubbed the back of her head. “There were a lot of theories… They got killed, they moved to another nation… Personally…” She tapped her hooves together. “I thought they all went to the Badlands… I learned they didn’t later…”
Surprise sighed. “Do you have… Anything else you can tell me?”
Antenna tapped her chin. “I… Think I have something else I could tell you. Eupha and the Hive are amazing actors. You can’t even trust your emotional sense; they can manipulate their emotions more than most other Hives. Eupha herself is very good at this, including keeping her energy down if she needs to.”
“Okay… I… Guess that helps…”
Antenna sighed. “I’m sorry, that doesn’t help…“
Surprise’s ears laid against his head. “It’s all right… It was just a stupid dream…”
Antenna looked at Surprise, how his wings relaxed, how he hung his head. She sighed. “Surprise, the Queens have been looking for her for years, I don’t know if we can find her until she wants to reveal herself… But… If you really want to help, I’m sure they could always use it.”
Surprise sniffed. “Okay…”
Antenna looked at Surprise. “Are you alright?”
Echo looked over at Surprise. “Surprise?”
Surprise shuddered a bit. “I’m fine… I just… Need to be alone for a bit…” Surprise turned and started to walk back towards the door. His head hung as he continued to walk. Antenna walked up to him, “I’m sure you’ll see them… And… Please, I’m sorry if I said something…”
“No, it’s alright… I just… Need to be alone.”
Antenna stopped. “Surprise, if I can help, just let me know. Alright?”
Surprise nodded before walking out of the door, heading back to Sugar Cube Corner, a couple tears working inside his eyes as he sniffled a few times.

When he arrived back at the Bakery, he told Mr. and Mrs. Cake that he was going to need to be alone before walking up the stairs. He turned back into his natural form, walking over to his bed and sitting down on it, looking out at the area beyond the town. Thinking about the idea of an entire Hive, there, but just out of his reach, almost like taunting him.
He remained there until the sun went down, only occasionally taking time to walk around the room. He didn’t even look over when Pinkie walked up the stairs. “Surprise? What are you doing up here?  All the food is downstairs.”
Surprise just let out a sigh. “I’m not feeling very hungry, Pinkie.” He said with almost no energy.
“Surprise? Is something wrong?” Pinkie asked.
“Yes… But I don’t think even you could help me, Pinkie…”
Pinkie put her hoof over Surprise’s shoulders. “Hey, why not tell me exactly what’s bothering you. I’m sure there is something I can do. You know me.”
“I want to find my Hive…”
Pinkie blinked. “Well we can just ask one of the…”
“No… We can’t…”
“What?” Pinkie asked. “The Queens would be more than happy to…”
“They don’t know where they are either…” Surprise replied. “The entire Hive is gone, and I have no clue where they went. But I know they are out there… I just… Don’t know where to look.”
Pinkie watched as Surprise picked up the small crystal by his bed and spun it on the windowsill. “All I have is this… And the small amounts of information I’ve gotten from the others.”
Pinkie stroked her chin. “Sooo…. You know they are certainly in Equestria…”
“As far as I know…”
“But you just don’t know where…”
Surprise nodded. “And I have no clue where to start… And I would prefer to be left alone for a while, Pinkie. Is that alright?”
“Of course! I’ll be super quiet you won’t even know I’m here. Goodnight, Surprise.”
She walked backwards down the stairs, making sure to not make a sound as she did so. When she was gone, Surprise looked back out towards the hills and back to the spinning sphere. “I want to find them… But how am I going to…”



Downstairs, Pinkie was backing up into the room where Mr. and Mrs. Cake were sitting around a table. “Is Surprise coming down for dinner?”
“No, he’s feeling a little Hive-sick.” Pinkie replied.
“Oh, poor dear.” Mrs. Cake said. “I do hope it gets easier for him.”
“He sounded like he was pretty down in the dumps. I don’t know how soon he will get better.” Mr. Cake replied.
“Oh don’t worry.” Pinkie said. “I have a plan…” She wrung her hooves together in a dastardly motion and both Mr. and Mrs. Cake looked at each other in slight fear towards whatever it is Pinkie was planning.
> Pinkie's Plan
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Surprise rose slowly the next day. He wanted to just stay in bed all day, but Celestia’s Sun wasn’t going to let him. So what happened was he spent a good thirty minutes just laying in bed, thinking about the fact his Hive was gone, and that these feelings would never leave him. Eventually, he got up, dragging his hooves along the ground with his head hung.
As he walked down the stairs, he let out a sigh before walking up to a nearby table and sitting down, not bothering to transform as he did so, placing his head on the table. It didn’t take long for Mr. Cake to walk over to him. “Surprise?”
“Morning…” Surprise said, not bothering to lift his head.
“What’s the matter? You haven’t been quite yourself for a few days. Is there anything we could do? We both hate to see you like this.”
Surprise sighed. “Only if you could make me do the impossible…”
“Surprise…”
“Sorry… I’m just…” Surprise said. “I’m not feeling very good… I don’t know if it could possibly get any better…”
“Well, Pinkie got up bright and early, well, early for her, said she needed to get some things together for a special… I don’t even know what it is, she wouldn’t tell us.”
“So why are you telling me?” Surprise asked.
“Well, oddly enough, she gave us this list of things she wants you to get.” Mr. Cake pulled out a piece of paper, a number of supplies scribbled on it in crayon. “She said it would help if you could get these for her.”
Surprise lit up his horn and grabbed the list, floating it down to his eye level. “A map of Equestria, a notebook, seven different colored pens and markers, several apples, small bags of flour and sugar, and… The Party Cannon?” Surprise looked at the last one in confusion. “Doesn’t Pinkie always have that with her?”
Mr. Cake rubbed his chin. “I think she left it downstairs.”
Surprise sighed. “I guess I can be some use…” He said, pushing himself up and walking towards the door. As he left, he walked around the building to the basement door, pulling it open, he walked down to the basement and began looking around the storage area. It had bags of sugar and flour everywhere around it, just in case they ever ran out of supplies, Surprise walked around the small maze-like placements until he found a small stand with a sticky note attached to it.
Surprise walked up to the note and took it off the stand.
	Dear Me,
I decided to move the Party Cannon to my room because Mr. and Mrs. Cake wanted to use the basement for storage and they didn’t want to have any more incidents like that one time. That was a lot of sugar. So instead I moved the Mark 4 to the Party Room with the others.
Love,
Pinkie Pie.
Surprise read through the letter and then let out a sigh. He walked back out of the basement, and instead of walking up the stairs, decided to fly up instead. He opened his bright yellow wings, flapping them rapidly as he was lifted off the ground, flying up towards the open window and pushing it open enough for him to enter easily. He hovered into the room and closed his wings, walking over to the closet on the other side of the room.
Opening up the closet, he saw a bunch of Pinkie’s old memorabilia for Party making, a few hats, Madame Leflour, Mister Turnip, Rocky, in the back of the closet was the Party Cannon, a blue metallic cannon with large pink wheels. Surprise reached in and grabbed the cannon, pulling it out of the closet, making sure that the rest of the objects weren’t disturbed.
Surprise looked at the list, releasing a sigh. “Where do I find these again?” Surprise put the Party Cannon on the ground, planning to come back for it later once he had the rest of the stuff.
Surprise looked down at the list. Where should I go first? Surprise rubbed his chin before deciding to go to Quills & Sofas to pick up some paper and pens. Should they change their name? They have a lot more than Quills & Sofas…
Surprise walked over to his bedside table, opening the drawer and taking out a small bag of bits, the golden pieces clinking within as he placed the bag in his leg, sealing it within with a wisp of yellow flame. That same yellow flame soon covered him as he put on his disguise, walking back over to the window and closing it before grabbing his saddlebags and walking back down the stairs. Noticing that Sugar Cube Corner had gained a few customers. Surprise simply walked past them and out onto the street.
As Surprise walked through the streets, he tried to make it seem like he was fine, still happy, not wanting to talk with anypony about it. He didn’t even know if they would understand, not that he held it against them, he just wasn’t sure if they could help. So he went through his normal routine of saying hello to everypony, giving them a smile and a wave.
When he got to ‘Quills and Sofas’ he took a deep breath and pulled open the door. Seeing the owner of the store behind a counter nearby. “Good morning, Mr. Quill.”
Mr. Quill looked up at Surprise. “Oh, morning, Surprise. How can I help you today?”
“Well, Pinkie told me to look for writing supplies and a map. Do you happen to have them around here?”
Quill rubbed his chin. “Yes, I believe we have them around. It should be in the back of the store.”
“Alright, I’ll find them.” Surprise said, walking away from the counter and heading towards the back of the store. He walked past a variety of sofas, some small and made for two ponies, others designed to hold up to four ponies on them. After passing that, he saw the beds and other housing materials. This had been where the Cakes had gotten Surprise his bed, after a few days of sleeping on a rug, a very big difference from the rocks he slept on a lot of his life.
Past the beds, Surprise walked into the Writing section, where a large number of various Quills were placed, each separated based on the bird or creature they came from. Beyond that, there were many different sized notebooks and notepads, all of which was sorted into the number of subjects and sizes. Surprise walked over to the notebooks, looking through them to find a nice warm pink notebook, placing it inside his saddlebag, walking over to a number of maps.
The maps were a variety of areas around Equestria, holding the Vanhoover, Stalliongrad, and Canterlot areas separately. He continued to look through the maps until he found a detailed map of the various cities around the country.
When he found a good map, he walked over to the supplies, and looked through the packs of pencils and markers, finding a lot of basic blacks and grays. He dug around in the packs, slowly finding his way to the more colored varieties. Picking out a couple small packs of ten colored pencils and ten markers. Having gathered what he needed, Surprise worked his way back through the stores, noticing a few of the ponies testing out beds and couches.
When he got back to Quill, he took out the supplies from his bag and placed them on the counter. “How much for all of this?”
Quill looked over the supplies, raising an eyebrow. “What is Pinkie planning to do with these? I can understand the markers, but she came in yesterday to get a notebook, and why a map?”
Surprise shrugged. “I’m not really sure. She didn’t tell any of us… So how much?”
Quill looked over the items again. “That’ll be fifteen bits.”
Surprise raised his leg as it was covered in a yellow flame and the bag fell out of it, landing with a small clink. Surprise opened up the bag and dumped out fifteen of the golden coins. “That should be it.”
Quill counted out the coins quickly, nodding. “Thank you for your purchase, I hope to see you again.”
Surprise nodded and picked up the supplies, putting them into his saddlebag before walking out of the store. He looked around for a moment, getting his bearings before looking down at the list. While he knew that the Cakes had plenty of flour and sugar, but they needed that for their own business, plus, Surprise had learned that if Pinkie wanted bags of Flour and sugar, she didn’t mean from the Cakes.
Surprise turned down the street and began heading towards the store. It was an uneventful walk, more of the same happened, waving and saying hello. But as he passed the town square, one pony flew down to him.
“Hey, Surprise!” Surprise looked over to see the gray Pegasus fly down next to him. “How have you been?”
“Hi, Tornado. I’ve been… Good… How’s your day been?” Surprise replied.
Tornado Dust pointed up at the clouds. “Pretty normal, just clearing some of the clouds.” Tornado sighed before looking directly at Surprise. “You planning a trip or something?”
“Pinkie asked me to get these. I don’t know what they are for.” Surprise replied.
Tornado Dust nodded. “So, I heard you were feeling a little Hivesick.”
Surprise tensed up. “Y-you did? W-well I uh…”
Tornado Dust was covered in a burst of green fire and replaced with a Changeling with dark blue eyes and a dark blue backplate. “Relax, I’m not going to tell you it’s hopeless or anything. I’m just here to tell you that it’s all right to feel that way. Just let others know, all right? Keeping it in isn’t going to help any.”
Surprise sighed. “Is that all?”
Darkblaze shook his head. “Not exactly. I wanted to wish you luck in finding them. Oh, and a little tip, if you go to any of the bigger cities in your little adventure or whatever all that is for, just keep your disguise on, be a bit safer…”
“Why would I need to?” Surprise asked.
“Ehh… Some ponies are still less than hospitable to us, just to be safe, try to avoid it and…”
“Hey Buggy!” Morning Dew said, flying down to Darkblaze. The lime green Pegasus eyed Darkblaze without any conviction, more like she was trying to get him to follow her. “You aren’t done yet. We still have all these Clouds to clear.”
Darkblaze sighed as a green flame covered him. “Well, see ya around, Surprise. Hope you find them.” Tornado Dust waved as he shot into the sky and began flying around, breaking the clouds apart.
Surprise waved back and then focused on getting to the store. While not the biggest store he had ever seen, it served its purpose, selling food and items that couldn’t be grown. As Ponyville was still mainly an Earth pony settlement, a lot of the foods were grown locally. However sugar and flour couldn’t be grown in this climate, no matter how much Earth pony growth magic was shoved into the ground. More specifically the sugar though…
Surprise walked into the store, quickly found the isle he was looking for and found the spot where the two bags were located. The isle itself held a number of various sizes of sugar and flour bags, Surprise pulled out the list to make sure that there wasn’t an exact measurement on the list. Surprise sighed as he looked over the sizes of bags, he quickly dismissed the large sack and the smallest size. After a couple minutes of contemplation, he grabbed the medium sized bag, of flour and sugar, which took up one side of his saddlebags by themselves. After purchasing the bags and walking out of the store. Surprise only had one last thing he needed.
“Apples.” Surprise read. “That’s not too hard to get. I’ll just ask Applejack. She is usually selling at the market at this time, right?” He asked himself, he paused to wait for a reply before sighing. “Who am I talking to…”
Surprise began heading towards the marketplace, luckily it wasn’t very far from the store itself. Applejack’s Apple cart was set up away from most of the others, usually just outside of the town hall, sure enough, that was where it was today as well.
Surprise walked up to the old wooden cart, the orange Earth pony mare waving at him. “Mornin’, Surprise.” Applejack said with her southern drawl. “Yah lookin’ to get some apples?”
Surprise nodded. “Yup, I’m just picking up some things for Pinkie.” Surprise pulled out his bit bag, “How much today?”
“Well, it’s only a couple a bits. How many yah need?”
“Pinkie says she needs seven of them.” Surprise replied.
Applejack nodded and beginning to pick up a few apples and placing them into bags. “So, I heard yah went with Pinkie to her family home.”
Surprise nodded.
“I heard they’re really different thank the folk we got up here. What was that like?”
“Oh… You know… A little stressful, but nothing too bad. It was mostly me worrying…”
Applejack nodded. “So, word is that a couple a Changelings are thinkin’ bout movin’ to Appleloosa.”
“Really?”
“Yup, a few a them wanted to see what life’s like out there I suppose. It ain’t the most interesting place, but they’ll be welcomed with open hooves. Might even earn a place there. Won’t that be somethin’?”
“Yeah…” Surprise released a small sigh, taking out the bits he needed. “So, have you seen Pinkie at all today?”
Applejack rubbed her chin. “Huh… Now that yah mention it… No. I haven’t seen her all day. Which is kinda strange fer her.” Applejack handed the bag over to Surprise, who placed the fourteen bits on the small counter, which was nothing but a plank sticking off of the cart. Surprise grabbed the bag and placed it into his saddlebag before turning away from Applejack.
“Thank you, AJ. I’ll see you around.” Surprise said giving a wave.
“Yah take care for yerself.” Applejack replied, returning to wave.
“Yeah… I’ll do that.” Surprise replied, releasing a sigh. “Hopefully…” Surprise began walking back towards Sugar Cube Corner. Walking through the marketplace, looking around to see the various venders selling tomatoes, potatoes, carrots, cherries, lettuce, pretty much anything that can be grown. He stopped a few times to look at the wares, but moved on quickly.
He walked quietly around the sweet shop, walking back up the stairs without making a sound. He let out a sigh as he reached the landing, removing his disguise. He took out the list, levitating it in front of him. “Now what?”
Surprise looked over the message, it was just a list, there were no instructions for what to do once he got everything together. Surprise sighed as he took off his saddlebags, putting them against the cannon. Walking over to the bed and laying down.
He reached over to try and grab the crystal he kept on his bed stand, but was met with open air. Surprise frowned as his hoof worked its way around the small lamp, after making a few cycles, Surprise’s eyes widened. “Where is it?”
He got off the bed and began to pull the drawers on the table, frantically throwing whatever was in there across the floor, looking for the small crystal, it wasn’t much, but that crystal had been with him for almost his entire travels, slowly growing as he fidgeted with it, a keepsake from his travels. He continued to search until he heard a very low cross between a growl and clicking.
He turned around to see Gummy holding the crystal in his toothless mouth; he stared blankly in the general direction of Surprise, a small paper underneath him. Surprise let out a deep sigh and walked over to Gummy, taking the gem out of his mouth and putting it inside a drawer before picking up the gator and levitating the note up for him to see.
	Hi Surprise!
Sorry if I caused you to run around for a few minutes in panic, but I had to think of some way to get you to find this note. Sorry again.
Anyway, I need you to bring those supplies to the train station. I can’t tell you why. It’s a seeeeeeeecret.
~Pinkie Pie.
Surprise let out a sigh of relief. He knew Gummy wouldn’t have swallowed the gem, it was too big for him, and even if he did decide to, Surprise wasn’t sure how long it would take to do so. He picked up Gummy and placed the Gator on top of the small bed they had for him and then grabbed the supplies, and tied the Party Cannon around his waist.
He walked down the stairs, Cannon in tow, and walked towards the door. “Surprise?” Mr. Cake said, looking at the supplies. “Where are you going?”
“Pinkie asked me to bring these to the Train Station. I’m just going to head there to give her everything.”
“Alright, be careful with the Party Cannon, I’m not sure if it’s loaded.” Mr. Cake replied.
“I’ll be careful.” Surprise replied, making a mental note to not have any sudden movements, before he walked out of the building and stopped, pointing the cannon straight up to avoid hitting anypony with it.
He walked across town, a few ponies asking what he was doing, but most just shrugged it off and thought it had to do with Pinkie. As he walked up to the train station, he looked around, not seeing the Pink pony around him.
He moved over to a bench and sat down, reaching into his saddle and pulling out a smaller crystal, not the one he left in his drawer, but a smaller one that held the same purpose. He began to roll the crystal across his hooves and feeling the happiness inside it, but not taking any of it. He continued to fidget with the sphere until he heard the light whistle of the train.
“CHOO! CHOO!” Came from next to him, causing his grip to falter and the crystal to fumble in his hooves before he caught it in his wings, letting out a sigh, he looked over at the sound, seeing the wide smile of Pinkie next to him.
“I’m so glad you made it on time!” She said quickly. “I was worried that you wouldn’t get the letter in time or that you wouldn’t manage to get everything so I would have to go alone and start trying to help and that wouldn’t have been any fun.” She took a loud gasp. “But you are here and I got you a ticket!” She pulled out two identical tickets. “And you showed up just in time too!”
Surprise blinked as he looked at Pinkie. “What are you talking about, Pinkie?”
Pinkie hopped over to where the train was beginning to slow. “We’re going on a trip!”
“Where?”
“EVERYWHERE!” Pinkie shouted happily.
“Wh-what?” Surprise said.
“Well, when you said that you were missing your Hive, I thought ‘Hey! Surprise knows they are still in Equestria, just not where!’ So I started thinking about how I would manage to narrow it down by even a teeny tiny amount. Then I started thinking about how to get everywhere, then I thought of why it’s called Gouda if the cheese is neither good or an ‘a’ , and then the answer came to me: The TRAINS!”
The Train stopped as she spread her front hooves in announcement.
Surprise twitched. “E-Everywhere?”
“Well, not everywhere, we are going to start at Canterlot because I remembered that two of the Queens are there and I figured that it would be the best place to start since maybe Celestia has an idea of where they went.” Pinkie replied, the Party Canon next to her. “Now come on, we’ve got a city to see!”
Pinkie grabbed Surprise. “P-Pinkie it’s a-alright I can s-stay a…”
“I won’t hear of it,” Pinkie said. “We’re going to find your family, even if we need to travel ALL over Equestria.” She pulled Surprise into the train.
“A-are you sure this is a g-good idea, Pinkie?”
“It’s the only thing I can think of! I thought you would be happy to see your Hive again.”
“I-I am… B-but… Can we avoid the… Bigger cities…”
“Don’t worry, Surprise!” Pinkie said as she sat down on the bench. “I’ll make sure nothing happens to you.”
	“Why do I feel scared…”
Surprise blinked. You’ve been rather quiet.
“I had nothing to say then. By the way, how far do you think she thought this through?”
I… Don’t know…
“Great… Hope our affairs are in order then.”
Surprise swallowed. “So… Pinkie… Do you really think we could find them?”
Pinkie nodded. “I bet we can. We’ve got all of Equestria to find them!” Pinkie said, pulling out the notebook, and opening it. “Do you think we should head ot Appleloosa after, or maybe Manehatten?”
“I’m not sure…” Surprise replied. He knew those towns well, lots of ponies were around there, lots of emotions to feed on. That was also one of the places where emotions were the most difficult to get to. “But if you think so… I’ll come.”
Pinkie hugged Surprise. “I’m glad to hear it, and I promise you we will find them, even if we have to go all the way to Yakyakistan.”
“I hope you know what you are getting us into…”
I’m pretty sure…
“Alright… But if this gets us killed, I swear I will haunt you.”
Like you do already?
“You know what I mean.”
Surprise looked back over at Pinkie as the Train began to pull from the station, she had turned the notebook to show a blank page with a giant heading of ‘CLUES” in big blue letters. “I’m going to keep track of everything!”
Surprise nodded. “So… Why did you want me to get the flour and sugar?”
“So that I could teach you to cook more Cupcakes! I don’t have my portable Cupcake Cooker, but I know that there is a store where I can buy more of the batteries for it. I just can’t wait to see your Hive, Surprise. Do you think they are all as friendly as you? I hope so!”
“I guess we’ll both find out…” Surprise said, leaning against the window, looking out at the plains that passed as the train picked up speed. I’m coming… I promise… I’ll find you… Surprise smiled at the idea. “Home…” He said under his breath. Watching the plains roll by as he thought about the idea of seeing the Hive. A smile crept across his face.
> Canterlot Conundrums 
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	As the train neared the city, Surprise began to get more and more nervous about entering the city. He knew from what Darkblaze said that the ponies in Canterlot were not too friendly about Changelings, whether they would react based on that was something Surprise was worried about.
On the train, Pinkie was excited to be able to help Surprise, she was willing to go across Equestria if need be. Surprise meanwhile, was madly fidgeting with the crystal ball, while trying to debate running back down the tracks at the first chance he got.
“Pinkie… Are you sure that this is a good idea…”
Pinkie looked up from the magazine she was reading, some kind of party catalogue thing, Surprise didn’t bother to read the title. “Well, I would just go straight to the Hive, but we don’t know where they are, so our best bet is coming here and seeing if the Queens know anything.”
“Yeah…” Surprise said, looking down at the ground. “But uh… Are you sure that I’ll be okay?”
“Why wouldn’t you be?” Pinkie asked, the catalogue now gone. “Are you worried about the ponies in Canterlot still being harsh towards you?”
Surprise looked down at the crystal and nodded.
Pinkie put her hoof around Surprise. “Don’t worry about them.” Pinkie replied. “You aren’t in any danger, I’m sure that they completely forgave you guys for that whole attacking their homes thing.”
Surprise swallowed. “Y-Yeah…” He chuckled lightly. “You’ll uh… Stay close though right?”
Pinkie nodded. “Just try not to lose me in the crowd.”
Surprise nodded, and went back to fidgeting with the crystal, his wings unconsciously buzzing. As he looked out of the window, he saw the white and gold city, the one place he hadn’t been around in his travels, Ardent always said it was the easiest place to get caught.
It was his first time looking at the city from this angle, the way it reflected the light of the midday sun and seemed to radiate. Surprise let out a light “Wow…” at the sight. Pinkie grinned at him as he watched the city approach.
When they were close, Pinkie poked the Changeling. “You should get ready. We’re nearing the station.”
Surprise took a deep breath and grabbed his saddlebags, slinging them onto his back before changing into his disguise. Pinkie put on her own saddlebags and smiled at Surprise as the train began to slow. Surprise looked out the window to see a few Unicorn Guards standing at the walls, looking down at the train as it entered the city. Surprise looked over at Pinkie, who gave him a reassuring smile.
As the train stopped at the crowded station, Surprise and Pinkie stepped off the train, looking around the area around the station, Surprise saw the Pegasi flying around, some clearing clouds, others were Guards, watching from on top of buildings or clouds. Surprise followed behind Pinkie, walking to the exit, Surprise sighed as he realized he how much he was freaking out again.
“You’re doing great, Surprise. I told you there was nothing to worry about.”
“Yeah… I guess you were right.” Surprise replied. As the two of them moved to the exit, one of the guards, an Earth Pony, walked up to Surprise.
“Step out of line, please.” The Guard said, looking at Surprise.
Surprise looked at the Guard, then looked behind him to make absolutely sure he meant himself. “M-me?” Surprise pointed at himself.
“Yes.”
“W-why?” Surprise replied. “I-I didn’t do anything! I swear!”
The Guard shook his head. “Don’t worry, you aren’t in trouble.” Surprise sighed. “Just a random check. After we caught somepony trying to bring a Dragon egg, mother not too far behind, into the city, we’ve been just doing random sweeps. As long as you have nothing incriminating, you should be fine. It’s just a quick check.”
Surprise looked over at Pinkie. “It’s alright, Surprise. I’ll just wait for you by the exit, alright?”
Surprise nodded, and after taking a deep breath, followed the guard out of the line. He was led to a small building away from the others, a Unicorn and a red-eyed Changeling inside the room, both playing a game of cards.
Surprise was worried when they entered their own building, did they know? Were they going to get revenge? He sighed in relaxation when he saw the other Changeling.
“Alright, so what’s your name?” The Earth Pony Guard asked.
“Surprise… Uh… I’m not sure if I’m technically a Pie or not…”
The Earth Pony looked at him with a raised eyebrow. “You don’t know your last name?”
Surprise smiled nervously and shook his head. The Earth Pony shook his head, “That’s not a point in your favor.”
“Cut him some slack, Gilded. He’s a Changeling.” The Changeling Guard said. “Probably doesn’t have a pony last name.”
Gilded looked at Surprise. “So, what is your Changeling name then?”
“Surprise.” Surprise replied.
Gilded sighed. “Of course it is… So mare.”
“Stallion actually.” Surprise replied, and even the Changeling Guard looked at him in confusion this time.
“Is this normal?” The Unicorn asked the Changeling.
“Do I look like the type of guy who pays attention to trends, Glint?”
“I figured you would know better than us, Trench.”
Trench sighed and put down his cards. “Just take off the disguise, I’ll search your things and make sure you aren’t carrying anything dangerous.”
Surprise nodded and got rid of his disguise, causing the Guards to look at him in confusion. “What?”
“Haven’t seen one of you guys in around half a century.” Trench replied. “Guess you are the Exile that Acari told the Queen about.”
Surprise nodded.
“Well, then let’s get this over with” His horn lit up as he removed the bags, and opened them, beginning to search through them, pulling out the various items Surprise bought earlier. “Everything’s clear.” Trench placed the items back in the bag. “Mind if I ask what you’re doing in Canterlot?”
“I’m here with my friend, Pinkie. She is helping me find my Hive.”
“Well, I wish you luck there.” Trench said. “You’ll need it…” He said under his breath before handing over Surprise’s bags. “You’re free to go, sorry for the inconvenience.”
Surprise replaced his disguise and walked out, hearing the guards talking a little as he left, something about telling the Commander.
As Surprise walked out of the building, he headed towards the exit of the train station, and when he was out, he froze.
He couldn’t see Pinkie anywhere nearby; all he could see was a sea of unfamiliar faces and Canterlot Ponies. His legs began shaking as he looked out at them, his eyes widened as his ears pointed down. “Pinkie?” He said weakly, looking around frantically for any sign of the pink pony. “Pinkie?” He said again.
He took a tentative step forward, crouching down to the ground and talking long stalking steps to try and avoid the attention of any of the nobles. He kept stalking around, his panic slowly growing bigger and bigger as he looked around to see the sea of unfamiliar ponies all around him, without a single sign of Pinkie nearby. “PINKIE?” He said in his panic, turning to look to the side before colliding with another pony.
Surprise fell backwards onto his flank and rubbed his head a little before looking up at the object he collided with to see a tall white stallion, a blue mane and a monocle, he looked down at Surprise, who was already looking up at the Stallion in pure fear.
“I am terribly sorry for the collision, I wasn’t looking where I was going. Are you all right?” The Stallion asked.
Surprise however, didn’t hear his actual words; his legs began trembling as he looked up at the Stallion, his mouth quivering as the Stallion glared down at him, a look of pure hatred that pierced his mind. Surprise let out a low whine and tried to back away, but collided with another pony. Turning, he saw a mare this time, her eyes glaring down at Surprise. “We don’t want your kind here.” She said.
Surprise whined again and backed away slowly, turning to see the ponies around the area all glaring at him, red eyes all around as he began to shake more and more. His wings feeling limp and non-existent, his ears making everything around him blur out. He whirled around, but saw no clear place to run. He covered his eyes with his hooves, falling to the ground and continuing to shake, whimpering slightly as he did.
But despite the blurred silence around him, a single sound pierced through it. “Surprise?”
Surprise’s shaking slowed, and he sniffed before lowering his hooves slightly to see the familiar Cotton Candy pony kneeling down in front of him, looking at him in concern. He sniffed before looking directly up at Pinkie’s blue eyes, he reached out to her, pulling in the familiar emotion. He felt his legs stop shaking all together as he slowly began to push himself up. When he was standing he looked around to see the ponies all looking at him either curiously or with concern.
Surprise took a deep breath to slow his heart and looked at Pinkie. “Are you alright?” She asked.
Surprise paused for a moment before nodding. He looked over at the Stallion. “Sorry…”
“No, I must apologize, I was not watching where I was going. Please, accept my apologies.”
Surprise nodded, then looked back at the Mare he bumped into.
“Are you alright?” She asked. “You looked terribly frightened.”
Surprise nodded. “Sorry… I-I’m not too good with large crowds… I-I lost my friend and I… well…”
“It is quite alright.” The Stallion said. “Is this your first time in our fair city?”
Surprise nodded.
“Well, I advise you to stay close to your friend then. One can get lost quite easily around here.”
Surprise nodded. “I’ll stick close to her… Don’t worry.” Surprise began to walk away, pulling Pinkie with him. He waved back at the other two before picking up the pace and getting out of the crowd as fast as he possibly could, pulling Pinkie the full way.
When the two of them were away from the crowd, Surprise slowed down and sighed. “I’m sorry about that Pinkie, but I couldn’t see you and when I went to look for you, I couldn’t see you…”
Pinkie reached over and hugged Surprise. “No, I’m sorry, I couldn’t hold it anymore and I had to go! I didn’t know it would cause that much trouble.”
Surprise blinked. “Oh… The bottomless soda.”
Pinkie nodded. “I didn’t know how long you were going to be gone for, and I thought that I could quickly run out and use the bathroom, but when I came back I saw a bunch of ponies standing around you and knew I goofed up and I’m sorry.”
Surprise grinned. “You can make it up to me by not getting sad.”
Pinkie smiled. “Done!” Pinkie pulled Surprise into a hug, letting the Changeling feed on her joy, a much needed snack at the time. When Pinkie let go, Surprise looked back at her. “So… Where to now?”
Pinkie turned to look over at the castle. “Well, I thought that we might be able to talk to one of the Changeling Queens that live around here and…” Pinkie’s eyes widened as she let out a loud gasp. “NO WAY!” She dashed over towards a nearby building. “It’s OUT!”
Surprise blinked before turning to see Pinkie standing outside a store, her face pressed up against the glass as she looked into the store. “Pinkie?”
“Ohmygosh! Ohmygosh! The Mark SIX!” Pinkie said, her face still pressed up against the glass, but Surprise could feel the excitement for the pink pony. “I didn’t think it was supposed to be ready for wide range development for at least another month!”
Surprise walked up next to Pinkie. “What are you talking…” Pinkie pulled Surprise and planted his face into the glass next to her.
“Loooooook!” Pinkie pointed his gaze at a Party Cannon on a pedestal, a card in front of it saying ‘Mark VI Party Cannon! Now in Stock!’ “It’s the newest variant of the Party Cannon! I’ve been waiting months for this. I have every variant of the Party Cannon, ever since I was a filly and I had my first one gifted to me after a really good party.”
Surprise looked at the cannon. “But… It looks almost exactly the same as the one you have now.”
Pinkie gasped. “The same!” Pinkie pulled Surprise off of the glass, pulling the Party Cannon out of nowhere. “They are nothing alike.” Pinkie replied. “I know that they look similar, but the inner mechanisms are what make them different. For instance, the Mark Five was improved from the Mark Four’s initial design, it was changed to be more lightweight and sleek. Easily loaded for quicker firing and better dispersal of confetti. It was the last upgrade of design for the product line. Transforming from the longer barrels and standard ignition fuse. It was replaced with the now standard button activated ignition that became the basis for all of PBI’s merchandise.”
Surprise blinked in confusion. “Uh… Sure?”
“And the Mark Six! Don’t even get me started on the Mark Six! It’s supposed to have faster firing, bigger spread, and it was supposed to be able to fire four Confetti bags at ONCE! That’s huge!” Pinkie put her face against the glass. “It’s so Beautiful….” Pinkie said.
Surprise looked over at the door, seeing the ‘OPEN’ sign on it, he walked over and pushed open the door. “Hi, I wanted to ask about that cannon?”
The Stallion behind the counter looked over at Surprise. “The Mark Six party Cannon? That little beauty sold pretty quickly.”
“WHAT!” Pinkie appeared next to Surprise. “But… You must have more!”
“We do. But they were all ordered in advance. The release for those who didn’t order it before deployment is in another month.”
“But… It’s always been released at the same time!”
“Well, these things are taking more time to build, and those loyal customers are the ones that get it first.”
“But… Why?”
The Stallion shrugged. “I just work here, I don’t bother with the higher ups. Now do you want to buy something?”
Pinkie scowled at the Stallion. “I’ve got my eye on you.” Pinkie said, walking backwards out of the store, followed by Surprise, as they walked out of the store, Pinkie appeared back in front of the store owner, taking her hoof and pointing at her eyes and back at the store owner.
Pinkie released a sigh. “I really wanted to get that cannon too…”
Surprise patted Pinkie on the back. “You’ll get it, just need to wait a month.”
“I’ll never survive that LONG!” Pinkie’s eyes widened as she took a deep breath. “But, that’s for later. Right now, we need to focus on your Hive.”
Surprise nodded. “So… Your plan?”
“Right.” Pinkie said. “Well, first up, we need to go to the Castle. I bet we can get some answers from Chrysalis or maybe even Celestia. RACE YOU THERE!”
“Wait what?” Surprise said as Pinkie began to dash off towards the castle. Surprise opened his wings and took to the sky, trying to keep Pinkie within his sightlines. “Pinkie! Wait up!”



Crimson Lance was bored.
No, she was beyond bored; she was doing paperwork.
Crimson hated paperwork, the dull repetition: Sign here, initial here, Hoofprint here, make an X here, then do it all over again, repeat by two thousand. How Celestia managed to do this every day without going insane from boredom was something Crimson never understood.
As Crimson added her signature to another form for repair of damaged armor for the Lancers, she placed it on the finished pile. Then looked to her left to see the large paper stack that she still had to go through, and sighed. “Chrysalis… You owe me so much for doing this.” Crimson mumbled pulling off another large portion of the papers and levitating them in front of her, shaking her hoof so that the aching would go away.
Article 247-B, Possible profits within the Crystal Caverns.
Crimson sighed. “What does this have to do with the Lancers?” She flipped through a few of the pages, seeing most of it in political techno-babble, all of which was lost to her.
She had been there for what seemed like all day, most of the time she simply ignored the paperwork, content to let it sit and rot, but when she is the only Changeling Queen in Canterlot, she has to deal with this kind of stuff. If paperwork were a pony, that specific pony would have been kidnapped, beaten, cut into a bunch of tiny pieces, blended, and then thrown in a fire.
Crimson looked down at the paper, planning to never sign this one in particular. Chrysalis would probably try to tear her apart if she signed it, emphasis on try.
As she lifted another paper in her magic, the door opened. Crimson looked over the piles to see a member of the Lancers walk in. “My Queen, sorry to interrupt.”
Crimson propped her hooves upon the table. “No harm done, Saber. Just taking care of a couple of Chrysalis’ papers.” She sighed. “Wish one of these was a declaration of war…” She mumbled.
“My Queen, I came to tell you that a couple of ponies are requesting you.”
“For?” Crimson asked.
“I… am unsure, My Queen, but one of them is from the Joyous Hive, he was saying he desperately needed your help.” Crimson suddenly tensed up.
“Pink Earth Pony?”
The Pegasus nodded.
Crimson looked at her work, then smiled. “Well, tell them I’ll gladly meet them at the Castle’s main doors.” She said, tossing the papers over her shoulder.
The Lancer bowed before walking out of the room. Crimson swung her legs around; a smile on her face as she grabbed her helmet and walked out of the room, she unceremoniously kicked the door closed with her hind legs and smirked as she walked away.
A couple minutes passed, and she was now standing in the main entrance hall, the door opened as a Pink Earth Pony and a white and yellow Pegasus walked in, the Pegasus looking around in amazement, the two were being escorted by a couple Royal Guards.
“Well, I think I have to thank you two.” Crimson said as she walked up to the two. “You both got me out of a bunch f dreadful paperwork. Now… I heard that you wanted to speak to me?”
“Uh-huh.” Pinkie replied. “Surprise here wanted to ask you something.”
Crimson raised here eyebrow and looked at the Pegasus. “So, you’re Surprise. I’ll be honest, when I heard Acari had found a member of the Joyous Hive, I was ready to Yee-haw in joy. And I don’t do that. Anyway, what did you want to ask?”
Surprise took a deep breath. “Do you have any idea where my Hive is?”
Crimson blinked. “Uh… Well, not really… We have a fairly good idea of where they aren’t.”
“I’ll take anything.” Surprise said, walking up to the Unicorn.
Crimson sighed. “Alright, just… Follow me.” She looked over at the two guards. “You two, back to positions.” The Royal Guards saluted before leaving the hall. Crimson beckoned the two to follow her.
“You have no idea what kind of trouble your Hive has caused us with their sudden disappearance.” Crimson said. “Mass panic, theories spread, the Hive just vanished. Now I’ve been ignoring them all and focusing on a wide sweep. But of course, no dice. Swept all over Equestria, and not a single clue. I knew from my early birthday parties that she was a pretty sneaky Queen, but vanishing off the earth, she could rival the Shadow Hive.”
“Shadow Hive?” Surprise asked.
Crimson waved her hoof dismissively. “Not important. It’s an old story my mom used to tell me. Anyway, after a while, we got a message from her. All it said was this: ‘Stop following me. I’ll come back when I’m ready.’ She is crazy.” Crimson sighed. “We pulled the main forces back, but all of us kept a small force together, each looking for her. However all we did was manage to find all of the places she isn’t.” Crimson stopped in front of the meeting room door, emblazoned with a sun and moon. As they stepped inside, Crimson closed the door and lit up her horn, pulling over a large map of Equestria, a number of pegs across it.
“This is the War map. Though recently we’ve used it to try and hunt down members of Chrysalis’ Hive and Eupha. See these black pegs? They represent the locations we know Eupha isn’t. The yellow are the possible locations we still need to check, and the green are Chrysalis’ Soldiers that got separated after the Invasion. She’s trying to find them. Anyway, we managed to narrow it down to three larger cities: Los Pegasus, Manehatten, and Griffonstone. Ovi is, hopefully, checking Los Pegasus and not getting plowed all day. I’m supposed to send a group to Griffonstone, and Acari wanted to check Manehatten when her schedule was cleared.”
Pinkie walked up to the map. “What about this?” She pointed at a large white plain up at the top.
“That’s the Frozen North, Eupha wouldn’t be caught dead up there. It’s too cold, isolated, not enough going on there. She is… Kind of an extrovert, at least I’ve never seen her act calm. She even sent two different letters when we had a meeting here, one serious, one joke.”
Surprise tilted his head. “I thought you said you couldn’t contact her?”
“We can’t, I didn’t say anything about her contacting us. She even sent some weird cannon things.”
“Can we see?” Surprise asked.
Crimson shrugged. “Sure, just let me tell one of my boys to bring it here… Done, they’ll be here in a couple minutes. Make yourselves comfortable.” Crimson hopped into a chair, putting her hind legs up on the table.
“Can I ask you something…” Surprise said to Crimson.
“Shoot.” Crimson replied.
“Where was my Hive before?”
“Well, you guys were in a really weird place actually. Your Hive used to be placed near the Bayou, though I’m sure she changed it recently. It kept flooding and she would always say it messed with the cakes.” Crimson replied. “In fact, I think we still need to check the Badlands within Equestria…” Crimson picked up a yellow pin and stuck it to the map, over a large rocky area to the southeast part of Equestria. “I’ll send a few Squads there later.”
There was a knock on the door. “My Queen, I have brought the items.”
Crimson’s horn lit up as she opened the door. A Red-eyed Changeling wearing Royal Guard armor walked in, a box in his magic. “Just put them on the table somewhere. Thanks.”
The Guard placed the box on the table carefully, before saluting and walking out of the room. Crimson lifted the box in her magic and pulled it over to her, opening it slowly before pulling out one of the small cannons. It was shaped much like a party hat, a small pull string in the larger side, Pinkie’s eyes widened.
“She sent these with a cake. Said they were called-”
“Party Hat Poppers!” Pinkie exclaimed, she ran up and grabbed one. “How did you get these? They aren’t supposed to come out for a couple months.”
Crimson blinked. “Wait. Whoa. Whoa. Whoa. How do you know what these things are?”
Pinkie reached into her saddlebags and pulled out the magazine she was reading before. “It’s one of the hottest new items from Party Ballistics Incorporated.” Pinkie flipped through the magazine, stopping at a page that showed the Party Hat Poppers. Letting Crimson read it.
The Party Hat Poppers™
The latest in quick party planning. With a single pull of the string, the hat bursts out and painlessly lands on the head. Some aiming is required and more than a few mistakes, but after a while you get used to it and you’ll be ready to start parties in no time. Each Popper costs only five bits, plus shipping and handling.

Crimson blinked again. “Wait what?”
“You’ve Never heard of PBI?” Pinkie gasped. “They are only the biggest manufacturer in projectile party supplies! Established forty years ago under Giggle Trousers, the company is now run by her daughter Straight Face. They developed the first Party Cannon only twenty years ago and have been building up from its legacy ever since.”
Crimson’s eye twitched. “Did you say Party Cannon?”
Pinkie nodded, pulling the aforementioned cannon out from under the table. “I’ve only got the Mark Five here, but come one month’s time, I’ll have the Mark Six and…”
Crimson grabbed Pinkie. “Do they do Cake related stuff?”
“Pfft, Yeah.” Pinkie replied. “They are working on a special cannon that would…”
Crimson was covered in a red burst of flame before being replaced with a Changeling Queen, her red eyes still twitching while her short orange mane lay against her carapace. “Celestia damn it…” She planted her face in her hooves. “Right in front of us. How do you know about them?”
“Well, I found out when I got my first Party Cannon, and then I found out about their catalog from a friend of a friend of a friend, who was also the uncle of another friend…”
“Skip a bit…”
Pinkie began skipping in place and continued. “And then I found out about all of their various gadgets through the magazine and then…”
Pupa sighed. “Please…. Tell me that it took you a long time to find those catalogues.”
“Oh yeah, they are SUPER hard to find. But since I subscribed, I get them delivered right to me!”
Pupa walked over to the board and pulled out all the yellow pegs. “Where are they set up?”
“Their main office is located in Manehatten and their testing facility is…”
“Don’t care.” Pupa said, placing all of the yellow pegs on Manehatten. “I need to get a group ready to…”
“W-Wait!” Surprise said to the Queen. “C-Could you… Maybe let me see if it really is them first. Maybe I can talk them into coming out?”
Pupa rubbed her chin. “I suppose you would be the ideal member to see if you can talk to them… Fine, but I expect to be told immediately if it is them.”
Surprise nodded. “And uh… Wh-what should I look for?”
Pupa sighed. “I don’t know, see if the CEO is hyper, or even relatively emotional. Bring a Whoopee Cushion; she can never keep a straight face with those around. You shouldn’t be able to sense her emotions either, though she is a good actor.”
Pinkie’s grin widened. “Well, Surprise. Looks like we have one more stop.” She reached over and pulled Surprise into a hug. “Are you ready to meet your Hive?”
Surprise swallowed. “As ready as I’m going to be.”
Pupa looked at the two and coughed. “Well, listen, the train to Manehatten leaves in a half an hour, if you two want to make it there soon, I recommend you get out of here. Because I am going to go there personally and check myself if you don’t come back with good news.”
Pinkie looked over at Surprise. “Let’s go.” She said happily, hopping out of the room.
Surprise sat there stunned. Am I really going to finally see them?
“Not if you sit on your butt all day, get a move on!”
Surprise smiled and nodded before opening his wings and flying out of the doors. Back in the room, Pupa transformed back into Crimson Lance and looked at the map. “How in Tartarus did you manage to hide from us for that long?”
A Guard walked into the room. “Commander Crimson Lance.” Crimson looked back at the Guard. “Celestia needs your help with the paperwork.”
Crimson groaned. “I’m coming…” She sighed before following the Guard out of the room.
> Hive or Bust
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Surprise was fidgeting around, he couldn’t help it. There were two main reasons why, he wanted to meet with the Queen and his Hive and he was nervous about entering the city. It wasn’t as bad as with Canterlot, since he had been to Manehatten before, but it was still present.
As Surprise looked out of the window, he saw the buildings in the distance, the large body of water and the bridges. He let out a sigh. Manehatten had been a good town for him to stay in, plenty of ponies, plenty of small alleyways and areas to hide them for the day. Plenty of escape routes too.
He had spent a long time there he wasn’t sure how long. But seeing those tall buildings reminded him what he went through, and what he had now.
“Hey, Surprise, you getting hungry?” Pinkie asked, looking at the catalogue again.
“A little bit. You want an apple?”
“Yes please.” Surprise reached into his saddlebag and found the bag of apples, taking out two of them while tossing one to Pinkie. They both took big bites out of the apples, before Pinkie put the catalogue away. “So… I’ve been wondering. What are you planning to do if it turns out they are your Hive?”
Surprise blinked. “I… I don’t know…”
“Didn’t think that far ahead did we?”
No… I didn’t…
“Well?”
Surprise sighed. “I… I guess I could go back to them…”
Pinkie nodded. “I would understand. Just make sure you write.” Pinkie replied.
“But… I don’t know if I want to…” Surprise continued. “You’re the first pony who opened up to me. And… You’re like my family now. Look what you did for me. How many other ponies would honestly do this for a Changeling?”
“I just thought that you deserved to meet them, it’s what any good friend would do.”
Surprise smiled as he bit into the apple again, then put it down and pounced onto Pinkie, wrapping her in a hug. “You know that you are like my sister for doing this.” Surprise’s eyes widened. “Oh my Queen! I could have a sister!” Surprise jumped off Pinkie. “I could have a Brother! I never even thought about that! What do I say to them? How would they react? Would I even know if they were my brothers? Oh Celestia! What if I have a twin?”
Pinkie put her hoof on his shoulder. “Let’s work on just finding them first.”
Surprise took a deep breath. “Right, need to make sure they are around before worry… WHAT IF I’M AN UNCLE?” Surprise fell to the ground, his eye twitching slightly.
Pinkie giggled before walking over to Surprise and lifting him up, dusting him off. “Take deep breaths, Surprise. We’ll deal with that later.” Surprise nodded.
“Now… I think I just need to… Eat a bit and… Do you have any water?”
Pinkie reached into her saddlebag and pulled out a bottle of water. Surprise took a drink from it before reaching back over for his apple taking another big bite out of it. “So, what do you want to do first?” Pinkie asked. “We could go to get some lunch when we arrive, or we could head straight there. What do you want to do?”
“I… Think it would be best to just head there right away. See if we can catch her before she goes somewhere… You do know the address right?”
Pinkie nodded. “Shouldn’t be too difficult to find them, I’ve got the catalogue right here. It has their address on it.”
Surprise sighed. “Hopefully we don’t get separated again.”
“Don’t worry, I made sure not to get the bottomless soda, AND I went before we got on the train. I should be fine.”
Surprise nodded as he looked at the buildings around the train as it slowed. Pinkie grabbed her saddlebag and put it on, waiting for Surprise as the train came to a halt.
The two stepped off of the train, looking around the city curiously. Pinkie walked over to an information booth to get a map, and Surprise looked at the familiar streets. Taking a deep breath as he smelt the familiar atmosphere around him. He missed some of the days he spent here, some of them were easier than others, but he enjoyed them regardless.
Pinkie walked back over, a map in her front hooves. “So, if we go this way, it looks like it is the shortest route.”
Surprise looked at the map. “No… There should be a small alleyway here that should cut the time in half…”
Pinkie looked at Surprise. “I didn’t know you had a knowledge of Manehatten.”
“Well… I spent time here… But I can tell you that later.” Surprise said. “If we go through here… Maybe… five minutes?”
“But what if we go this way… The other way leads us to the back of the building, and then we would have to go to the other side of the street and circle around.”
Surprise blinked and looked at the map again. “Oh… You’re right.” He said. “I guess you should lead the way then.”
“Okie dokie, Loki.” Pinkie said, grabbing the map and beginning to lead Surprise through the crowds, all the while, Surprise’s mind began to wander back to his time in Manehatten.
Hey, do you remember our first day here?
“How could I forget…”
Surprise let out a small sigh as he thought back to that day.



I can do this… I can do this… Surprise thought to himself as he looked through the leaves at the tall city nearby. Just go in, grab somepony, and go.
Surprise sighed. “That’s an awful lot of lights though…” The city was lit up in so many ways, the big buildings all lit up, the streetlights all on and casting cones of light on the street below. Even the sky was lit up with the strange multi-colored beams in the air.
“What would Ardent say…” Surprise said.
“Direct approach is too risky, getting seen in the skies is too dangerous. It might be best to try and disguise as an animal at first.”
“I don’t have the energy…” Surprise mumbled.
“Well, coming at night was the best idea, could manage to confuse them. Though they would find out soon enough.”
Surprise shook his head. “I need some food… I’ll have to risk it…”
“Just stay out of sight. You get found, you’re in trouble.”
Surprise nodded as he slunk back into the bushes, slowly creeping along as he looked for the best place to move through. Finding a section of bushes he could dodge in between. As he neared the city, he looked out at the lighted streets, seeing a dark alley nearby, he rushed across the area and into the alley. “Now what?” He looked around the alley.
“Try to keep out of sight.”
Surprise looked out at the lit street, and then looked at the dark wall behind him. He let out a breath as he walked up to the wall, planting his hoof on it and letting a small amount of magic flow through it, sticking it to the wall. He lifted his hind legs and stuck those to the wall before beginning to climb up.
“The roofs are risky, stay away from the edge.”
“I know…” Surprise mumbled, focusing on the wall. As he reached the top, he flipped over the edge, landing on his hooves and looked around.
The sky was covered with stars and the moon’s face glowing down on him as he walked across the top of the building. “So… How do I do this again?”
He walked towards the edge of one of the buildings, lay down, and then took a deep breath, focusing on everything around him. He looked around, looking for the bright yellow flames around him. As he looked, he found the source of the biggest flame, located by a big opening in the buildings. Guess I’m going there.
“Just stay out of sight.”
Surprise crept away from the top of the square building, quickly running towards the edge of the building and jumping across the flat roof. Continuing to run until he found himself near the flame.
“We are going to have to cross the street.”
Surprise sighed as he crept towards the edge, looking down at the street. There were a few ponies around, but nothing really too… “HEY! What are you doing up here?”
Surprise squeaked as he turned to look at the source of the voice, a Stallion was standing in a doorway leading down to the building. “Get over here you little…”
Surprise stood up in alarm, his wings flying open as he jumped off the edge of the building, buzzing his wings to get across the gap, looking down to see a couple of ponies looking up at him. He sped up his wings so he could get to the other side quickly. As he landed, he looked back over towards the other side of the street, seeing the Stallion raising his hoof and shaking it. “Nice stealth job…”
“I don’t see you doing any better.” Surprise hissed.
“You don’t see me getting caught at all.”
Surprise sighed. “Do you think they recognized me as a Changeling?”
"Not sure. Might have just thought you were a Pegasus. No point worrying about it, we need food.”
Surprise nodded, he looked around and saw that the flames were only a little ways away. All he had to do was hop another building and climb down.
Surprise grinned as he walked over to the edge, walked back, and ran up to the edge, jumping across the gap. He walked over to the edge, looking down at the dark alley. He smiled as he saw no ponies and began to climb down the walls. As he reached the bottom, he looked around.
“Are you sure that this? I don’t see any ponies…”
“Relax; I’m sure there is nothing wrong… It’s just over here.” Surprise looked over at the source of the flame; strangely it looked like it was coming from behind a trashcan. He walked up to it and shifted around, looking behind it to see a small box. He grabbed the box and looked inside.
Inside were a number of small spherical crystals, each one glowing a bright yellow to him. Surprise licked his lips at the sight; there must have been several times the amount of joy that he ever got on his own. He picked up one of the gems, tossing it into his mouth and chewing it, feeling the Joy rush over him, filling him up as the warmth spread. He let out a chirp as he was filled up.
A loud clang brought him out of his trance. He turned around quickly to see a Unicorn staring at him, a pot on the ground in front of her as she stared in shock at the Changeling. “Uh…”
“RUN!”
Surprise didn’t need to be told again, he dropped the crystal and made a mad dash at the pony, dodging around before continuing to run.
“Wait!” the pony shouted turning and running after Surprise. Who didn’t hear what she said as he ran quickly into a forested patch in the middle of the city. He quickly ran through it and found a large tree, dashing up it and clinging to a higher up branch. He stopped shaking and just listened to the pounding of his heart, he heard the Pony run under him.
“Wait! Come back. I just want to talk to you!” The Unicorn ran past the tree, still looking for him.
Surprise spent the majority of that night hanging on that tree, waiting for the pony to leave. He wasn’t sure how long he stayed there, but the sun was up, and he found a lot of ponies that day, as he was a squirrel.



“Surprise?” Pinkie said, snapping in front of Surprise’s eyes, causing him to blink as he returned to the current time.
“Yeah?” Surprise asked.
“We’re here.” Pinkie said, pointing up at the large building, full of windows with the name Party Ballistics Incorporated on a sign above the doors. “What were you thinking about?”
Surprise shook his head. “Nothing… Just my time here before.”
Pinkie nodded. “Well, this is the moment of truth. Last chance to turn back?”
Surprise would be lying if he said he wasn’t thinking about running. Bolting away and never coming back… But he had gotten this far, and giving up now would only make the feelings worse. The only way to get over this was to see her. “I’m going in…”
Pinkie smiled as the two of them walked into the building, seeing the insides of the building. It was a fairly normal looking office building. The walls were off-white with a number of chairs around the area, and an orange Unicorn was sitting behind a reception desk.
As the two entered the Unicorn looked up from his work and cleared his throat. “May I assist you two in some way?” He said with a smile.
Pinkie walked up to him. “We would like to speak with the owner.”
“Do you have an appointment?” The Stallion asked.
“Well… No.” Pinkie admitted. "But I would like to bring a complaint directly to her in regards to the Mark Six Party Cannon.”
“Well, I can send your complaint to Manufacturing and they can see if they can fix the issue. If you would just allow us to have the Cannon variant and your address, we would happily replace it with the repairs present, free of charge.”
Pinkie rubbed her chin. “Well…” She shook her head. “No… I’m sorry, but we really need to see her.”
The Stallion raised an eyebrow. “For what reason?”
“It’s personal… and kind of important. You see, we travelled all the way from Ponyville to speak with her, and we won’t leave until we do.”
“Yes… Well, please give me your names.”
“Why?” Surprise asked. “Are you going to let us in?”
“No, I simply need to tell Miss Face who she should file the restraining order against.”
Pinkie frowned. “That’s not very nice…”
The Stallion sighed. “It’s a joke; I’m going to ask my Boss if she knows you. Maybe she could let you see her. I can’t do that without your names.”
“Pinkamena Diane Pie.” Pinkie replied. “And this is Surprise!” She reached over and pulled Surprise up to her. “Like I said, it is really important.”
“I’ll see if she’ll let you up, feel free to take a seat. It should only be a few minutes.”
Pinkie walked over to one of the chairs and sat down. Surprise decided to sit down on the chair next to her. “Do you think we’ll get in?”
“We should, Straight Face knows my name, I buy everything they produce, I’ve even been sent a couple letters by them saying how grateful they are.”
Surprise turned to look over at the Stallion as he wrote down a note on a piece of paper, when he was finished, he carefully folded the paper into a plane, lifting it up and inspecting it before tossing it. The airplane flew towards the two of them before tilting and turning in an arc before flying up a small chute.
Surprise blinked for a few seconds. “Wait… What?”
Pinkie just looked over at the chute. “Paper plane. The enchantment was made to help with memos getting spread across the office. Not many can use Spike and Celestia’s magic letter system.”
“Huh… I guess that makes sense…” Surprise said as another plane flew through the chute, flying in a circle before landing on the reception desk.
The Stallion picked up the plane and unfolded it, reading through it. He cleared his throat and then looked over at Pinkie. “Miss Pie, Straight Face will gladly see you now, her office is on the top floor. Stairs are to your right.”
Pinkie nodded as she stood up from her chair, Surprise following behind as they walked past the reception desk. Walking through another set of door, Surprise saw the rather blank bottom floor. It was a large room, without much in the ways of decoration or change. The only real interesting thing was the wooden floor, which looked like that of a gym. Surprise was led over towards another door, housing a large number of stairs.
“Is this really the only way up?” Surprise asked.
“Well, I heard they were going to put an elevator in for normal use, right now they just have one for the prototypes of cannons and inventions and that kind of stuff.”
Surprise nodded as they both began climbing the stairs. “How many floors are there?”
“Ten.” Pinkie replied. “The first floor is just reception and a big ol’ party room. We’ll climb these things in no time.”
Surprise nodded as they began walking up the stairs. Surprise looked around the blank walls in the staircase, giving him nothing to look at but the dark blue stairs with small circular raises to help with the grip. As he climbed each step, he got a strange exhilaration and nervousness. The best summary would be one internal conversation that he had around the fifth floor.
	‘I’m finally going to meet her!’
“What if it isn’t her?”
‘I’ve finally found them!’
“Did I?”
‘I’ve never been this exited!’
“What if she doesn’t want me?”
‘Of course she would want me! I’m part of her family.’
“Then why didn’t she look for us?”
Surprise’s internal conflict continued, climbing each step slowly becoming a monumental achievement for him. He was going to find her, Pinkie had helped, she was the reason he was finally going to meet his Queen. He had to think of a way to repay her for that, after he got over the shaking legs.
By the time he had reached the final step, he was almost unable to walk due to the shaking in his hooves. His internal conflict continuing even as Pinkie started mutedly talking to him, he simply nodded and followed her into the room beyond.
Inside the floor was a small waiting room, a secretary sitting behind a desk, her small dark blue glasses on her head as she read a letter. The secretary was a dark yellow Earth pony with Amber eyes, as the two of them walked in; she glanced over at the two. “Ah, Miss Pie, Straight Face is waiting to talk to you and your friend.”
“She is just through there, right?” Pinkie asked, pointing at the door behind the secretary.
“Yes, she was quite interested to hear what our best customer has to say. Especially since you became a hero of Equestria.”
“Well, I can’t wait to finally meet her myself.”
The secretary nodded and went back to reading through the letters. Pinkie walked up to the door, turning back to Surprise. “Are you ready?”
Surprise took a deep breath, letting his legs sit still for a few minutes before nodding. Pinkie smiled back at him as she pushed open the door.
As the door slowly opened, Surprise’s heart began pounding with anticipation, every other sound cut out as his heart pounded in his ears, watching the opening door, thoughts swirling in his head, words he would say, tales to tell, what his Queen even looked like. As the door revealed more of the room beyond, Surprise’s entire body began to tighten up. He saw the window beyond, the corner of a desk, a potted plant and then…
He felt his heart fall.
Sitting behind the desk, clearly radiating an emotion of curiosity was a gray earth pony, her mane done into a bun behind her head. Her brown glasses over her blue eyes as she read over a couple papers in her hooves. As the door fully opened, the Earth pony looked over at them over her glasses and placed the papers on the desk. “Ah, Miss Pie. So good to finally meet you.”
Surprise hung his head as he walked in, Pinkie right next to him. “Hello!” Pinkie said, hopping up to the desk.
“My secretary told me you had an issue to report with the Mark Six,” The Earth Pony said. “I do hope that it was not a false statement, I have quite the schedule to keep.”
“Well, I did want to ask something…”
“Go right ahead, I have ten minutes.”
“Why are you releasing the cannons this soon?” Pinkie asked. “And why didn’t I get one?”
“Miss Pie, I understand that under my mother you were the top priority when it came to testing the newest products, however I believe that it is quite the risk sending you prototype explosive devices. These cannons were sent to those that paid before the cannon’s release. I did not wish to deal with the lawsuit that would have followed. Now what is the issue? I could have sworn I checked each and every cannon for…”
“Well the problem is that, I honestly have nothing to complain about.” Pinkie replied. “I just needed to see you really badly.”
“Oh?” Straight Face said. “And why is that?”
“Well, you see, we have a sneaking suspicion that you aren’t quite who you say you are…”
“Really?” Straight face replied, an air of sarcasm in her voice. “Then who am I?”
“Well, we actually think you are a Changeling Queen.” Pinkie said, smiling innocently.
Straight Face frowned. “You’re joking…” She looked between her and Surprise, stopping to look at Surprise. “Please tell me she is joking.”
Surprise shook his head.
Straight Face looked back over at Pinkie. “Would you care to explain where this assumption came from?”
Pinkie smiled. “Certainly.” She reached into her saddlebag and pulled out a blue notebook and a bubble pipe. “Well, I’m sure that you are aware of the Changeling Queens inside of Canterlot.”
“Who isn’t?” Straight replied. “It’s only one of the biggest news stories of the past month. How does that relate to me though?”
“Well, my friend, Surprise, here is a Changeling, but his Hive went missing a long time ago. But recently he has been feeling really sad and wants to find them, but since he never saw the Hive, we can’t go there. I found out that he was feeling bad about it a day ago. So I started thinking about how I could help cheer him up.”
“A noble gesture.” Straight replied. “But what led you to me?”
“Well, when I was thinking about how to make him happy, I thought that I could go and ask one of the Queens inside of Canterlot to see if they know anything.” Pinkie flipped through the notebook. “And so we did go and we talked to Queen Pupa.”
Straight was not impressed; she raised an eyebrow curiously but allowed Pinkie to continue, most likely trying to see how far she is willing to go.
“And so, when we went to see her, we had a talk about Surprise’s Hive and the Queen. She told us about how they had been trying to find the Hive and Queen by looking all over Equestria. There were only three places they hadn’t properly checked: Los Pegasus, Griffonstone, aaaaaaaand…”
Straight Face blinked a bit. “Manehatten?” She asked confused.
“Yupperunni!” Pinkie smiled.
“Yes… Well, if you haven’t noticed, Miss Pie, Manehatten is quite the city, how do you know that the Queen isn’t simply a baker, or even just a street cleaner?”
Pinkie’s smile widened. “I’m glad you asked.” She blew into the bubble pipe, making a few bubbles float out of the pipe. “Well, it turns out that the Queens recently had a meeting in Canterlot, and while Surprise’s Queen wasn’t there, she did send something.”
“Oh?” Straight Face replied. “And what would that be?”
Pinkie reached back into her bag, pulling out the catalogue of Party Ballistics Incorporated, she opened the catalogue to a page showing the Party Hat Poppers. “She sent THESE!” She pushed the catalogue up to Straight, who twitched slightly. “How do you explain that? The Party Hat Poppers were only just recently shown in the latest catalogue AND they aren’t to be released for months! How else could the Queen get a hold of these?”
Straight Face twitched as she looked at the page. She then closed her eyes while taking a deep breath and holding it in before letting out the breath, holding her professional attitude. “Thank you for bringing this to my attention, Miss Pie, I will be interrogating everypony within the development team. Rest assured that I will rectify this issue, if it indeed turns out that one of my employees have been stealing products, know that they will be punished for it.”
Pinkie rubbed her chin. “So… You didn’t notice when five of your experimental products went missing?”
Straight Face sighed. “No, I do not overlook every product that is released. I trust my employees and any issues are supposed to be handled by those that oversee the employees, my expertise is in cannons. My mother helped me with that.”
Pinkie rubbed her chin. “Interesting…” She blew a few more bubbles with her pipe.
“Well… This has been an interesting meeting, however I need to leave and…” Straight Face began to stand up, but Pinkie interjected.
“Well, there was one more thing that Pupa mentioned about Queen Eupha,” Pinkie said.
Straight Face let out a resigned sigh and sat back down. “And what was that?”
Pinkie got up and walked around the chair for a minute before putting her elbow on the desk. “Well, one thing she mentioned was that she was an amazing actor, even by Changeling Standards. What was it she said, Surprise?”
Surprise looked at Pinkie Pie and blinked before realizing she was talking to him. “Uh…Was it… The Emotion thing?”
“Yes. What was it she said again?”
“Umm… She said that Eupha is able to…” His eyes widened, “project emotions…”
“And… There is one thing that she said Eupha. One thing that she could never resist…” Pinkie said. “Something that always made her crack a smile, and that thing, will determine if you really are who you say you are.”
Straight Face raised an eyebrow. “And that would be?”
Pinkie smiled and lifted her tail, planting it on her chair before hopping on top of it, as she landed, a farting sound was emitted from beneath her.
Surprise looked over at Straight Face, who tried to keep an expression off her face, but the side of her mouth twitched a few times before slowly growing as she tried to stifle her laughs. She eventually let out a short snort before raising her hoof up to her mouth. After a few seconds of trying to hold it, she let out a laugh and slammed her hooves over her mouth.
Pinkie smirked. “As I thought.”
Straight Face sighed. “Curse my sense of humor…” She said. “Fine… I’ll admit it… You caught me.”
Surprise began grinning as his wings opened slightly.
“Now what do you plan to do with that information?” Straight Face asked. “Do you plan to go to the other Queens and tell them where I am?”
Pinkie blew a few more bubbles with her pipe. “Not exactly…”
Straight Face raised an eyebrow. “Then enlighten me.”
“Well, I was really curious why you just left Equestria. And why you left poor Surprise here all by himself.” Pinkie grabbed Surprise and pulled him over to her.
Straight Face sighed. “I think this is a discussion best held in private.”
The door opened as the Secretary walked in. “You requested me?”
“Yes, Invoice, I did.” Straight Face sighed. “Please clear my schedule, and tell anypony that I may have had meetings with, that I am taking care of personal ordeals.”
“Of course, Miss Face.” She replied, walking out of the room. When she was gone, Straight Face stood up and walked over to the side of the room, pulling on a rope that caused a blind to fall over the windows, sealing the room off from the outside world. She walked over to her desk, taking off her glasses and placing them on the table. “These aren’t my favorite things to wear, I don’t actually need them, but it helps confuse the rest of the Queens.”
She sat back down in her chair; her blue eyes turned a chartreuse color as she looked back at the two of them. “So, what do you want to know?”
> Q&A
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Even after Straight Face asked the question, both Surprise and Pinkie sat there for a few second, just looking blankly. Surprise had so many questions he wanted to ask: Why they left? Where they went? Why they never looked for him? But the thing that he wanted the most was to actually see his Queen.
“Can… We actually see you?” Surprise asked.
Straight Face nodded. “I guess it’s fair. You are the first in around fifty years to find me. Though I will admit, it feels nice to not have to be a distancing businesspony. Just give me a moment.”
She hopped off of the chair and walked to a cleared section of the room as a yellow flame started below her shortened tail, causing her tail to become longer, easily reaching the floor. The flame spread as her shortened gray tail changed to a light honey color as it continued to grow. When the flame reached her flanks, they were replaced with the black carapace, as her body grew taller. The flames reached her legs, causing holes to form in the tall legs. Two butterscotch colored wings spread out of her back, right next to the amber backplate. Her pinned mane was let free as it extended down her tall neck, changing to a honey color. As the Transformation climbed up to her head, her tall horn became visible, along with her small fangs. As the transformation finished, Eupha opened her mouth as a party blower unfurled and made the common sound before furling back into her mouth and bursting into yellow flame to be replaced with her tongue.
Surprise stared at his Queen in amazement. This was his first time ever seeing her, and it was glorious. “M-My Queen…”
“It’s great to finally meet you!” She reached over and pulled Surprise into a tight hug. “You know, I heard about a Lost-ling around Manehatten before, but I never thought that you would come to me. But first I am going to apologize to you for you being on your own for all those years. I should have noticed, but I was busy trying to get everything worked out and everypony coordinated. I didn’t have the time to find you.”
Surprise looked at the Queen, the fact that she was acting like this was unexpected to say the least. The other Queens were at least somewhat professional, especially Acari, who was on duty probably ninety percent of the time. Where as here, the Queen had turned her tongue into a party blower and was now hugging him.
“Um… Queen Eupha… Can you please put me down…”
“Of course.” She let go of the hug, letting Surprise fall to the ground as she stood up and walked over to Pinkie. “You continue to impress me, Pinkie, that party in Canterlot was really something, an not only that, but you managed to find me. You really are one amazing Earth Pony.”
“Aww… It was nothing.” She said, waving her hoof. “Just helping cheer up, Surprise.”
Surprise picked himself up and removed his disguise, as he did, Eupha looked over at him and gasped. “You!”
Surprise tilted his head. “Me?”
“You were here before, back when we were first setting up the company. I had to keep Crystals all over the city so that we wouldn’t be found by any of the search teams, you were the one that ate one of the crystals that one time.”
Surprise’s ears fell against his head as he smiled nervously. “I-I was hungry…”
“Oh don’t worry about it. I was more worried when my Scouts told me there was an unconnected Nymph running around.” Eupha replied. “I was worried you would be found or die or even lead the other Queens to us.”
“Oh…” Surprise replied.
“Well, not that we weren’t worried, I had a couple of my Scouts looking out for you. But we never found you, so I had them transferred out to the Badlands to watch over the development of a few of the cannons until we could clear out the Hive… Though now I kind of want to build one nearby…” She rubbed her chin. “Do you think I could get building rights for under the city?”
“I’m not sure…” Pinkie replied. “I’d think they would have something against that… But then again it is your home technically so maybe they could change the sewers.”
Surprise looked between the two. “Um… My Queen?”
“Oh, just call me Eupha, Surprise. I enjoy a little bit more informal than most other Queens. Speaking of which, how did Chryssie enjoy the Party Hat Poppers?”
“We didn’t ask…” Surprise replied. “But um… Eupha, can I ask why you did abandon the Hive?”
Eupha gasped. “Abandon!” Surprise shrunk back.
“I-I didn’t mean to say that you did and that you were a bad Queen, not that you are, a bad Queen that is, you aren’t a bad Queen… I just…”
Eupha flipped her mane. “Well, first, I didn’t abandon anypony, I took the whole Hive with me. Even what few Cakes I had done! We gathered up all the eggs, all the pupa, a bunch of food, and I sent them all out in groups to make sure it seemed like we all left at once. It was super hard since we had to not only get everypony out and undercover, but we had to keep the production up, wit ha Skeleton crew at one point. That’s ten Changelings running around the Hive trying to keep everything in order for a week before I managed to get everything set up for us to leave.”
Surprise walked behind Pinkie. “I-I didn’t mean to say that you were a bad Queen… o-or that you ab-abandoned them…” Surprise shivered a bit. “B-but why did you have to leave the H-Hive?”
Eupha sighed. “A lot actually. Though the biggest one was probably our previous location.”
“What was wrong with it?” Pinkie asked.
“Well, I’m sure Pupa told you we used to live in a swamp…” Eupha replied. “That swamp happened to be the most disgusting and leaky place I have ever lived. You would not believe how many ovens and microwaves we lost to the water. Not only that, but the cakes we lost…” She shook her head. “My mother re-established a Hive there, and… Well, it wasn’t as swampy back then…”
“Well, what happened?” Pinkie asked.
“Lets just say that my Mother wasn’t the best at long term planning, and she was kind of bull-headed. So… She decided to build one in the area… Granted it wasn’t a swamp, it started up a couple centuries after she set up the Hive. A lot of rain started falling, and it all collected in the forest they built in… Then the flooding started…” Eupha sighed. “I’ll probably talk to Twilight more about it later.” She reached under her desk. “Cake?”
“Uh… No thanks…” Surprise replied.
“Sure!” Pinkie replied.
Eupha smiled as she pulled a small cake from under her desk, a quarter of the circular cake gone. She pulled a knife from her desk drawer and sliced a piece, giving it to Pinkie. Who quickly stuffed it into her mouth and swallowed it whole.
“Mmm… Sugary.” Pinkie replied.
“Yes, I whipped it up quickly, used a bunch of frosting. I keep it in case I need to have them relax, I say that one of my employees gave it to me, leftovers from a birthday party.”
“Does that work?” Surprise asked.
“Yup. It’s always worked.” She cut another piece of cake, and pulling a fork out of her mane, before putting the rest of the cake away. “Any other questions?” She cut the piece of cake and put a bit into her mouth.
“Well…” Pinkie replied. “I have always wondered about where you got the name PBI?”
Eupha swallowed and tapped her chin. “Well… Party Ballistics Incorporated was my idea. I tried to find what the best possible way to get emotions was while using our engineering potential. Then I thought about Parties! And later I thought about the cannons we were producing for everyone. Then I thought, ‘what if I combined the two?’ And after much discussion with my Hive, we decided to call it Party Ballistics Incorporated.”
“Huh… I thought it was going to be a bigger story than that…”
“Oh, it is. You wouldn’t believe how much we tried to get it past some of the Equestrian divisions. They kept raising their eyebrow and looking at the name a few times before trying to ask if it was a joke and why it was and all that. It was kind of fun, since Giggle Trousers was eccentric and just a wee bit insane.” She winked. “Anyway, I’m guessing you have a question you’ve been holding in.”
Surprise sighed. “Yeah…” He scratched the back of his head. “Why… Why didn’t you look for me?”
Eupha, who just put another piece of cake into her mouth, had her eyes widen. She let out a small sigh and pulled the fork from her mouth, placing it down on the desk
“I’m sorry, Surprise… I didn’t honestly know at first.” Eupha replied. “Getting everypony out of the Hive was stressful on all of us… and a few got lost, but they all found their ways back. I gave everypony a map… Though I guess some of them lost you… What happened to the Caretakers?”
Surprise tapped his hooves together. “Um… I don’t know…”
Eupha raised an eyebrow. “Weren’t you hatched with a Caretaker? I thought I told all of them to carry the eggs. I figured they died some time after you hatched…”
“Umm… I hatched in a forest… alone…”
Eupha’s jaw dropped, and her eye started to twitch. “A-Alone… Out in the…” Se sighed. “Going to have to check on that…” She mumbled, taking a piece of paper and writing on it with a pen she had lying on her desk. “Though, I will admit, I heard about you after the Ceymi incident.”
Surprise’s ears perked up. “Then… Why didn’t you come and tell me?”
Eupha moved her head back and forth before responding. “I… found out where you were staying… Nothing against Ponyville, but it is just a little bit too crazy for me.” She replied. “I mean… You had the spirit of Chaos controlling the town for a bit. How much crazier can you get?”
Surprise looked over at Pinkie in shock. “You had Discord in Ponyville?”
“Only for a bit… and yeah, there was a the whole soap roads thing, but it rained Chocolate Milk from Cotton Candy Clouds!”
“Umm… Pinkie… I don’t…”
“Let me say it again… Chocolate Milk from Cotton Candy Clouds! But without any Whipped cream! Not that you need whipped cream with chocolate milk but it would have made it so much better if he had Whipped Cream Whirlwinds.” She gasped. “That would be amazing!”
“Hmm…” Eupha tapped her chin. “Need to write that one down…” She took out a pad. “Whipped… Cream…” She closed the pad and put it back inside of her desk. “Do you mind if I ask you a couple of things?”
Surprise looked up at the Queen and shook his head.
“Right, well, I’m curious. If you didn’t learn from a caretaker… Then who taught you to transform and such?”
“I learned from an Exiled Changeling… His name was Ardent Mind, and he found me when I first went to a pony town. He taught me everything I knew… How to speak, how to transform… He was basically like my father…”
Eupha nodded. “Well, I need to send him something then, I can’t just expect him to help you and not get something…” She tapped her chin. “Maybe a nice pie… Do you know what kind he likes?”
Surprise shook his head. “Did… You want to know anything else?”
Eupha tapped her hooves together. “Would you like to meet the rest of the Hive?”
Surprise blinked. “Um… I don’t know if I have the time… That’s a lot of Changelings…”
Eupha giggled. “Oh, I didn’t mean like that.” She tapped her head. “Would you like to be connected to my Mind?”
Surprise’s eyes widened. It was a huge step for him, he had never been connected to another Changeling. Was he able to take an entire Hive? Would it be painful to connect? He remembered Shade talking about a couple times where he was connected and he said it was incredibly painful, but he also mentioned that was the point at the time…
“I…I don’t know…” Surprise said. “I-is it going to hurt?”
Eupha blinked. “Not that I think… It’s just like somepony talking through your mind. It’s natural for us… If you want, I can connect you to the Caretakers first, they are usually the first ones that Nymphs connect to. I promise I’ll stop if you don’t want to be connected.”
“O-Okay… I’ve never been connected… But I’ll try…”
Eupha nodded. “Sorry, Pinkie, but this is a Changeling only event.”
Pinkie nodded. “I understand. You just do your Changeling thing. I’ll wait.” She pulled out a notebook and began drawing on it.
Eupha’s horn lit up. “Are you ready, Surprise?”
Surprise took a deep breath. “Yes… I-I think so…”
Eupha nodded as the glow from her horn began to flow over Surprise’s horn, as he watched the glow slowly crawl over his horn, he closed his eyes and began to hope that it wouldn’t be painful.
A few seconds later, Surprise heard… No. Felt, someone talking to him.
“Hello?” The voice said. Surprise opened his eyes to see Eupha still sitting in her chair. She smiled at him and nodded.
“Hi…” he relied, it was quite a strange feeling. Really difficult to explain too, it was as though he could hear the voice, but it didn’t come from his ears, it was like it was coming from the back of his skull, yet he could hear it so clear. “This is really weird…” Surprise raised his hoof to touch the back of his head.
“Pardon?” The voice asked.
Surprise straightened his back. “Oh sorry, I diddn’t think that was going to be audible… I just thought it and I wasn’t sure if…”
“He’s new, Egg.” Eupha’s voice said, Surprise looked over at the Queen to see that she had placed another bit of cake into her mouth. Despite that, her voice was clear as crystal. “Remember that Lost-Ling from around twenty years ago?”
“Yes?”
“That’s him. This is his first time being connected and… He’s staring at me like I grew another head.” Surprise blinked as he realized he was staring at Eupha his mouth slightly open and his head cocked to one side.
When he realized what he was doing he fixed himself before saying: “Sorry, Queen Eupha… She must think I’m such an idiot…”
“I can still hear you.” Eupha replied in a sing-song voice.
Surprise facehoofed. “Please tell me this isn’t as difficult later…”
Eupha swallowed. “Nope, it gets easier. Your instincts should take over soon.”
“My Queen, is something wrong?” Egg asked.
“Nope, everything is fine here. Just filling Surprise here with everything he needs to know. By the way, great job on that cover-up a few days ago, wish I could have seen it.”
“I’m so confused…” Surprise thought.
Eupha giggled. “It’s all right, Surprise. This is your first time. I’ll tell you what. I want to make up for not trying to find you before, and not really being the greatest Queen in the world, by helping you learn the ins and outs of the Hive Mind.”
“I… Don’t know…” Surprise said, tapping his hooves together. “W-would that take long? I-I don’t want to be away from my new family that long…”
Eupha looked over at Pinkie. “Ah…”
Pinkie looked over at the two. “Yup, he’s part of the Pie family now. Well, not officially, since we need to fill out all that paperwork but he’ll be part of the family before he knows it.”
Eupha nodded. “Well, I don’t expect it to take you very long. Probably only a week, maybe even a few days if you can do it fast enough… I would just have to assign you a teacher.”
Surprise tapped his hooves together, on one hoof, he would finally be attached to the Hive Mind and be a part of the Hive like he always wanted to be, but on the other, it might get really crowded with all the voices in his head.
“I’m… I’m not sure… I kind of like keeping my thoughts to myself.”
Eupha nodded. “All Changelings can separate their own thoughts from the Hive, I promise we can teach you everything and if I can’t find you a teacher, I’ll teach you myself.”
Surprise’s eyes widened. “Y-you would do that?”
“It’s the least I can do to help out. I feel like I owe you for all those years you were on your own…”
Pinkie put down her notebook. “So… Does that mean I have to head back to Ponyville by myself?”
Surprise’s ears fell. “Oh… I… I guess…”
Pinkie hugged Surprise. “Don’t you worry your pretty buggy head, Surprise. I can survive for a few days, but you have to promise to send me letters every day. I’ll even have a special party for you when you come back. You just have fun learning about your Hive.”
“Speaking of which!” Eupha pointed her hoof into the air, opening a drawer and pulling out a letter. “I’ve heard some things about the Librarian in Ponyville, so I want you to give her this, and tell her that I want to meet with her. The destination and things needed are in the letter.”
“What about the other Queens?” Surprise asked.
“Oh… Right…” Eupha replied. “I’ll tell them that I’m coming out of hiding. Or you can tell them on the way back to Ponyville if you want. Just make sure they know that I want it kept a secret for a little bit. Ease the ponies into the fact I make cannons. That could end horribly if it got out.”
Pinkie nodded and took the note, placing it into her saddlebag. She looked over at Surprise and pulled him into a hug. “I’ll see you back in Ponyville. I’ll be expecting your letters while you’re there.”
Surprise hugged her back. “I’ll write to you as soon as I get there.”
Pinkie nodded as she squeezed Surprise a little more before releasing the hug. “I’ve got to get on the train if I want to get back to Ponyville to meet up with Twilight when she gets back.” Pinkie got up and walked over to the door.
“Miss Pie!” Eupha said as Pinkie reached for the door, causing her to turn back. “Your Cannon is being overseen personally. You should receive it within the week.”
Pinkie smiled and nodded, walking out of the room as the door closed, Surprise could have sworn that he heard a high-pitched shriek and the sound of a particular pony bouncing off the walls.
“So…” Eupha said as Surprise turned back to look at her. “Is there anypony you want to see before you and I head to the Hive?”
Surprise smiled a little. “Actually… There is one pony I’d like to see…”
> Epilogue: Pinkie's Deliveries
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Pinkie was glad that she managed to find Surprise’s Hive, she wasn’t sure how long it would have taken, but she knew they would find them. The only question was when.
And now that Surprise was going to the Hive, hopefully he was going to feel better, even if he would have to be away for a few days or even a week. But right now, Pinkie needed to do a couple things before beginning her plans.
The first stop was Canterlot, to tell Pupa what was going on before she decided to drag Eupha out of the building by herself. Something Pinkie thought she could do with no trouble.
As soon as the train stopped, Pinkie rushed towards the exits, quickly going through a check before running through the city, apologizing a few times for almost running into ponies. As she rushed up to the castle’s gate, she stopped on a dime and teetered back and forth a little in front of the Guards. “Hello.”
The two guards looked at each other and then back at Pinkie.
“I came by earlier today to talk to Queen Pupa, but I wasn’t sure if you would remember me but I am here to see her with information that she asked me to get her.” She smiled.
The two Guards looked at each other and sighed. “Yes, we remember. Crimson Lance told us to be on the lookout. She is currently working with Celestia, just follow us.”
Pinkie was led up to and through the castle, saying hi to a few of the staff around the castle, as she walked, she looked around at the walls again, trying to find more interesting things around the halls. She even recognized the one stone that was slightly darker than the others.
It didn’t take long for her to find everything, and by that point she was already standing in front of a pair of large ornate doors. One of the Guards walked in for a few seconds before stepping back out of the room. He nodded to the two Door Guards who lit their horns as the door was opened and Pinkie walked in.
Both Celestia and Crimson Lance were sitting at the end of a table, Crimson with her head flat against the table, a paper floating in front of her face as she bit on a quill. “Give me some good news, Pie.” Crimson said without even looking at Pinkie. “Because I cannot handle anymore paperwork without something good happening.” She sighed. “Chrysalis… You better pay me back for this…” She mumbled.
Celestia put down her paperwork, looking much more at home doing it, and smiled at Pinkie. “Hello, Pinkie. Pupa told me that you and Surprise were going to see if Eupha really was located in Manehatten.”
“Yes, Princess. And we did find her!”
The response from Crimson was instant. She straightened up from the table, her fur pressed down on the side of her face; she turned to look at Pinkie with wide eyes. “What did she say?”
“Well, she told me to tell you that she is coming out of hiding, but she still wants her identity to be a secret. Since she doesn’t want everyone to be scared of her and her job.”
Celestia nodded. “Yes, Pupa told me what you believed she did.”
Pupa hoof-pumped the air. “Finally! I’ve spent nearly a quarter of my reign looking for her.” She slumped back in the chair. “Now I can put this chapter of my life behind me. I still wonder how you managed to find her that easily… But I guess that what the others say is true. Never underestimate Pinkie.”
Pinkie Pie smiled and giggled. “Yup. And Surprise is going back to the Hive for a bit to get used to the Hive Mind and then come back. He wants to go and get a feel for the connection so that he wouldn’t feel lonely anymore since he would always have Changelings to talk to.”
Crimson nodded. “Makes sense… Lone Changelings are often times desperate and seek that mental connection. They often try to get other Changelings to connect to them, and only a few accept the loss.” She looked down at the papers. “Well! I need to go and tell the other Queens. So I don’t think I’ll have the time to finish up the rest of Chrysalis’ paperwork. Guess she’ll just have to do that when she come back.” She pushed herself away from the table and quickly walked out of the room, a small smirk on her face.
Celestia shook her head, a small grin on her face. “She’s been trying to get out of this for hours. I thank you, Pinkie Pie, for bringing this information to us. But I assume you would like to get home as soon as possible, and I believe that the train leaves in a half-hour. You are welcome to stay or leave if you wish.”
“That’s all right, Princess. I do kind of need to get back home, Eupha gave me something to give to Twilight, and then I need to send a very important letter.”
Celestia nodded. “Very well, you may leave whenever you like.”
Pinkie nodded and turned, beginning to walk down the hall, speeding up as she walked before running down the halls exiting the castle and rushing to get on the train. She went through the usual issues at a train station before getting on the train and heading back towards Ponyville.
By the time she got off the train the moon was already rose into the air. She ran towards Sugar Cube Corner quietly sneaking through the building as to not disturb Mr. and Mrs. Cake.
As she climbed up to her bedroom, she removed her saddlebags and placed them on the floor, pulling out her notebook, inside the front cover was a number of envelopes and pieces of paper, she took one out and grabbed a pen, lying down in her bed as she looked at the blank paper. “Now… What to say…”



The next day, Pinkie woke up early, well, earlier than usual, and headed to the Ponyville Post Office to send the letter, hoping Surprise would get it. As she walked out of the post-office, she decided to walk over to the Train Station since Twilight was going to be there today. You may ask how she knew, in fact I asked myself, she responded with: “I read the other story.”
When she reached the station, the train skidded to a halt, letting out a hiss. As the Lavender Unicorn and purple dragon stepped off, Pinkie pulled a party Popper, making a bang of confetti shoot over them causing Twilight to jump slightly.
“Pinkie! You scared me.” Twilight said, looking up at the Pink Pony, currently hanging by her hind legs on the rafters.
Pinkie giggled. “Sorry, Twilight.”
“What are you even doing up there?”
“Up where?” Pinkie asked standing next to her.
Twilight looked at Pinkie, and then back to where she was, then back at Pinkie. “What?”
“So how was your trip?” Pinkie asked. shrugging off the question.
“Well… I guess it was good. I learned quite a bit about the Artist Hive, and about the Princesses of the Changelings. I’m just glad that I got a nice and calm outing after… The last one…” She shivered a bit. “Now, I need to get back to the library… I have to get all of this information down into the Master Copy. I’m hoping to get another request for a Hive visit within the next two weeks.”
“Did anything wacky happen?” Pinkie asked.
Twilight nodded. “There was a very strange section of the Hive that took influence from Discord of all ponies.”
“Ooo… Were the clouds there?” Pinkie asked.
Twilight sighed. “Yes… The clouds were there.”
Pinkie’s smile grew. “Ooo… I need to go some time.  Do you think Queen Tettix would let me?”
“Maybe… But I…” She blinked. “Wait, how did you know her name was…”
“It’s not important. You said that there was another thing?”
Twilight looked over Pinkie. “Yeeess… When I got back, I decided to try and give Queen Chrysalis another questioning. Luckily she had just come back from Trottingham. There was a group of Changelings that were thinking of trying to take the town hostage for ransom in order to get Ceymi and Spine released. Though from what she said, an old Exile had made it his home, a little weird since Trottingham is pretty isolated, but he sent a message to Chrysalis and she came flying.”
“Oh really…” Pinkie rubbed her chin. “Did she happen to tell you the name of this Changeling?”
Twilight looked down at Spike. “Did you happen to catch it?”
“Nope, I was still waking up.” Spike replied. “Something with an A…”
“Well anyway, he’s staying with Chrysalis in the castle for a little while so that the incident could blow over.”
Pinkie rubbed her chin again. “Interesting…”
Twilight and Spike looked at each other. “Pinkie, did you have something you wanted to tell us?”
Pinkie blinked. “Oh Yes!” She reached into her saddlebag and pulled out the envelope. “Letter from Queen Eupha.”
Twilight’s eyes widened as she looked at the letter. "Wait… Eupha? Queen? Letter?”
“Mm-hmm.” Pinkie said as she passed the letter to the Unicorn. “She gave it to me after I found her, it has everything you should need in it.”
Twilight looked between the letter and Pinkie. Her mental machine trying to crank out a possible sequence of events that led to it sitting in her hoof, before the only command that causes those cogs to slow popped up. “Never Question Pinkie Pie.”
She sighed. “Thank you, Pinkie… I’ll look at this as soon as possible.”
“Okie Dokie, Loki!” She hopped down the street, heading back to Sugar Cube Corner. Once there, she went back up to her room, pulling out another envelope and letter. “Now then…” She sat down on her bed, with Gummy standing on the pillows. “How do I explain this, Gummy?”
Gummy gave one of his growling clicks and fell to his side as the pressure of the bed caused the pillow to tilt a bit.
“Hmmm…. Great idea, Gummy! I’ll just tell him.” Pinkie began writing out the letter. Once she finished, she reached over and grabbed one of her pink invitation cards, writing out the information before sticking both the letter and the invitation into the envelope. She smiled as she grabbed the letter and rushed out the front door to the post office, hoping to get there before the mail was sent out.



“Cheer up, Surprise.” Eggshell said as the two walked off the train. She was a beige earth pony with a swirling cream and white mane. “I’m sorry that we couldn’t find him.”
Surprise sighed. “I just don’t know why he would leave… He loved it there…” His head was hung low, he had been happy to be heading back to that town; he hoped that he would see him again.
“Well… The rest of the week wasn’t too bad was it?” Eggshell asked.
Surprise shook his head. “It was great. I can’t believe how quickly I got used to it.”
Eggshell smiled. “I’m glad about that. I would have felt terrible if the entire visit was almost pointless due to that setback.”
Surprise nodded. “Thank you again for helping me get used to this. I know it must have been a pain…”
Eggshell giggled. “No, no. It was fine. I was glad to help. Anything to help out a fellow Changeling.” She looked around the town. “So this is your home?”
Surprise nodded. “The first city I’m going to be able to stay in. I’m still really happy that Pinkie Pie brought me into the family. I just wish I had found my actual family…”
Eggshell put her hoof on Surprise’s shoulder. “Don’t worry, we’ll keep looking. We want to see you three united again. We haven’t had much time to check, been busy helping all the nymphs and that weird incident at the development section.”
The two of them continued to talk as they walked, coming up to the Gingerbread house. “You live here?” Eggshell asked.
“Yup, I live upstairs. It makes it easy to get to work everyday.” Surprise chuckled.
The two of them walked up to the doors, and Surprise pulled open the door, walking inside to be greeted by a BANG a rain of confetti and a loud “SURPRISE!”
Surprise jumped a little, but quickly recovered before hitting the floor, taking a deep sigh of relief as he looked at the small collection of ponies and a couple Changelings there. Surprise smiled at the group as Pinkie appeared next to him.
“Hi, Pinkie!”
“Hi, Surprise. Who’s this?” She asked looking at Eggshell.
“That’s Eggshell, she taught me to use the Hive Mind. Along with caring for the Nymphs.”
“A pleasure to finally meet you, Pinkie.” Eggshell said, holding out a hoof. Pinkie grabbed it and shook it.
“Thank you for helping Surprise, I was hoping you would be back today since this was when I had everyone plan the party. But I have a really big surprise for you.” She said, smiling at Surprise.
Surprise looked at Pinkie in confusion. “What do you mean, Pinkie?”
Pinkie smiled as she looked over at what looked like the oldest of the ponies there. Surprise did as well, and he couldn’t recognize the pony, the pony walked up to him and smiled. “Hey, kid.”
Surprise’s wings went slack for a moment as his jaw dropped. He looked at the old pony, his ears and eyes trying to decide which one was lying to him. He knew that voice. He couldn’t forget that voice. “A-Ardent?”
The pony smiled as a green wisp of flame covered him, replacing him with the familiar Changeling. “How have you-oof.”
Surprise pulled Ardent into a hug; his eyes were dripping a few tears as he smiled. “It’s great to see you again, Ardent. I tried t visit you before, but you weren’t there. I thought you had been attacked, or died, or… Or…” He felt Ardent reciprocate the hug. “I’m glad to see you again.”
“Same here, kid. And by the looks of it, you’ve grown into quite the Changeling.”
Surprise nodded as he wiped his eyes. “B-but how are you here? Where did you go?”
Ardent smiled. “I think that’s a discussion for when we are more alone.” He said. “For now, let’s just enjoy the party, you can tell me all about your adventures around Equestria later.”
Surprise nodded, embracing Ardent again as the ponies and Changelings around the room just let the two reunite. After a few seconds, they released the hug and walked into the building.
Pinkie smiled, looking over at Eggshell, whose jaw had dropped at the sight of the Changeling. Pinkie patted her on the back before leading her into the party. “I’ll explain everything if you want.”