"You what?"

Acone's tone was, in his mind, appropriate for the situation. Preliminary talks with the Alicorn had placed the creation of a portal squarely in his mind as the most difficult part of this entire thing. Once they were there it would be a relative cakewalk, especially if the military could get their "special project" up and running, but actually crossing the universes seemed difficult. According to Twilight, she could teleport herself back after only a few hours of magical channeling, but creating a portal for others would require her to either consume huge amounts of energy or access the some machines she had back in Equestria. Of course, those machines were almost definitely destroyed by the invading force, so that was really out of the question. Up until this point he'd been developing an idea of somehow hooking her up to a nuclear reactor. He wouldn't admit that his current mental image involved jumper cables, of course, but he thought his general plan was solid.

"I generated a class A inter-universal portal, by myself," Twilight repeated.

"A quite impressive one," Chrysalis commented.

Acone tried to ignore her. He still wasn't comfortable with the Queen, especially after what she'd done to Twilight. She'd saved her life, of course, but the methodology freaked him out—especially since he'd caught a glimpse of Twilight during the process. The best way to describe how she looked was "goopy", and he suspected that it would haunt his nightmares for years to come.

Shuddering, Acone decided it was best for him to look out the window, to keep his mind from wandering. They were passing through a particularly nice part of New Jersey (for New Jersey, anyway), on their way to DC. Now that Twilight had accidentally blown half a floor of a major hospital, he and Marshal decided it would be wise to move her to a more secure location. Besides, the constant media presence was getting to be unbearable. There was a lot of professional journalists, of course, but also a lot of weirdos. He saw a few guys with horse-ear headbands on, even.

"How hard was it to make?" Marshal said. "We don't want you injuring yourself."

"It was trivial," Twilight said, strain visible in her eyes. "The hard part was limiting its sie."

"Wait, what?" Acone said. "We were talking about how difficult that was going to be yesterday. What happened?"

"I don't know!" Twilight exclaimed. "I've felt a bit funny magically since Chrysalis, uh, you know, but I thought it had to be a problem with my senses. I never imagined that my actual magic could be enhanced to the levels I was feeling. It shouldn't even be possible."

Acone swiveled to Chrysalis. Of course the bug had something to do with it.

"The hell did you do?" Acone said, voice a bit louder.

"Trust me, if I had the ability to naturally make my drones as powerful as Twilight is, the war would have ended before she got here," Chrysalis replied, coolly. "I have no idea what could have happened."

"Maybe an interaction?" Marshal suggested. "Hybrid vigor, that kind of thing."

"Possibly," Twilight said. "It has to be something..."

Acone leaned over on the bench of the limousine, reaching for the mini-fridge. Out of all the perks that came with a cabinet position, he loved this car the most. He retrieved a Coca-Cola, popped it open, and took a long drink.

"Maybe it was something you ate?" Acone said. "I mean, I have no idea how magic works, but maybe some Earth food does weird things to it."

The question was mostly a joke, a fact Twilight picked up on. She shook her head, smiling.

"As good as that spaghetti was, I don't believe so," she said. "I felt strange ever since I left the cocoon. It must be some kind of product of my, ah, transformation."

The princess shuddered, a fact Acone appreciated. The bug, meanwhile, did not react.

"You mentioned earlier that Changelings feed on emotion," Marshal said. "Could that have something to do with it?"

"Maybe!" Twilight said, brightly. "Although... the main emotion they feed off is love. I haven't been..."

Twilight continued talking, but Acone didn't hear her. The second he heard the word "love", he bolted upright in his chair.

Holy shit, the bug did have something to do with it. Not something intentional, sure, but she was still the root cause. Her crush had supercharged Twilight. This made some part of Acone extremely happy, and a slightly larger part extremely horrified. It wasn't out of any prejudice against homosexuality, of course, but he simply found Chrysalis sort of creepy, and that unsettling feeling extended to her crush. Still, he supposed he couldn't judge. Her little infatuation with Twilight potentially provided them with a valuable strategic advantage. If it helped him save a world, she could have all the crushes she'd like.

Except on him. That might be a bit over the line.

"Hey, Chrysalis," Acone said.

Chrysalis recognized the sly tone of voice he was using instantly, and was suddenly overcome with the desire to kick him. In fact, she did so, shooting a small burst of magic onto his knee in the hopes he would cease talking. Unfortunately for her, the former Mayor had become completely desensitized to such gestures as a result of years of being himself. He continued unhindered:

"You think that huge crush you have might be doing this?"

Chrysalis winced, closing her eyes. The blasted human. She knew he wouldn't be able to keep his mouth shut about that for long, and here it was. He'd done it.

The idea was, of course, ridiculous, but she was not so much concerned with its scientific validity as she was with its consequences for her relationship with Twilight. Chrysalis was just starting to make friends with her. She'd never really had one of those before. It was a shame that this idiot had ended her opportunity already.

She opened her eyes to mere slits, looking at Twilight. The mare looked back at her, one eye larger than the other. Then, something clicked in her head, and both eyes grew wide.

"Ohhhh," Twilight said. "That makes so much more sense."

Chrysalis blinked. Twilight's tone was not nearly as horrified as she had expected. In fact, there wasn't any horror at all. There also wasn't anything she could use to get her hopes up, to be fair, but the mare didn't seem like Twilight hated her for her feelings.

"Well, I'm, er, flattered," Twilight said. "But, no offense, I don't think whatever you feel towards me is enough."

"Ah, uh, of course , of course it wouldn't be," Chrysalis stammered. "It is primarily lust anyway, which has a small fraction of the potency. It's not nearly as..."

The rest of her sentence died in Chrysalis' throat as she realized what she said. Celestia above, she just explicitly stated that the crush was sexual in nature as opposed to some sort of innocent schoolgirl infatuation. She actually had a chance, and she blew it.

"Not nearly as powerful," Twilight continued, no hint of embarrassment or shock in her voice. "It can't be that."

As Chrysalis marveled at her good fortune, Acone's thoughts turned to a very different idea than his original one. He glanced over at Marshal, who was already looking at him. They locked eyes, and both politicians instantly knew they had the same idea.

As part of their positions, they had received a daily briefing of what public opinion on the entire affair was. Most of the time this consisted of various news clips and article snippets, but it occasionally contained a specialized report on one small sub-section of the population.

One report, for example, detailed the bizarre effect the appearances of both guests had on the world of professional wrestling, the producers of which had written both of them into the story. Another detailed how the appearance of Twilight had caused a massive spike in horse race betting.

Then there was the report he and Marshal were considering, which was titled "Presence of our Guests in Internet Erotica and Pornography." The report, by far the most graphic they'd received, detailed the absolutely ludicrous rate at which the internet was producing pornography of Twilight and Chrysalis. Acone had found it a bit sickening, himself. He was never comfortable with that kind of stuff, and his nerves weren't helped by the section of the report detailing his own presence in some of the material. It was only a few images out of the much, much larger pool of general smut, but the idea of some weirdo drawing him naked made his skin crawl.

Acone dipped his head forward, indicating that he wanted Marshal to bring it up. Marshal nodded immediately. If there was one thing Marshal didn't want, it was for Acone to bring up that subject. He himself would have a hard time proposing the idea with the required tact. Acone trying to talk about it? That would end in disaster.

"Uh, speaking of lust," Marshal began. Mentally, he cursed himself for using that as his opening line, but he kept going: "We have evidence that certain corners of Earthen society might, uh, be experiencing that towards you two. Could that do it?"

Twilight blinked. "What kind of indicators?"

"A, ah, rather large amount of drawn and written pornography," Marshal replied. "To the extent that you are quickly becoming two of the most such parodied people to ever appear on this planet."

Chrysalis suppressed a snort of laughter. "Surely, you aren't serious?"

"Oh no, he's serious," Acone said. "There's a shitload of it."

Marshal silently prayed that this would be Acone's only input. Unfortunately for him, Chrysalis turned to the Italian, and addressed him directly.

"You really expect us to believe that?" Chrysalis said. "I am a changeling, hideous to all but my own kind. She is a pony. Less horrifying, but equally alien. What reason would humans have to make such material of us?"

Acone pulled out his phone, a grimace on his face. Marshal tried to call out, but he soon found himself unable to, frozen in fear. The former mayor typed for two seconds, then turned the device to Chrysalis. The Changeling squinted, getting a better look at the screen, then her mouth dropped open.

"That... that is merely a few," Chrysalis said. "Surly there would be some who..."

Chrysalis was cut off by Acone flicking his finger down on the screen, sending a torrent of pornography tumbling down it. The Changeling stood, dumbstruck, as she watched.

"How much?" Twilight asked. Marshal was glad that she, at least, was not being subjected to this, although it was clear from her tone of voice that she was equally disturbed.

"Uh—a lot," Chrysalis said. "Maybe... maybe even enough."

Author's Note

I'm going to be honest here, I so desperately wanted to put a ship tease in this chapter, but I decided against it. It would have been very minor (probably just Twilight saying she wasn't entirely opposed to dating a Changeling, but that she and Chrysalis had too much history), but I still thought it would be out-of-place. Not the right story for it. Maybe a spin-off.

This is barely edited.

Depressingly, I've gotten out more of this stupid fucking thing in two hours than I have of my real novel in days. It's really frustrating.