Young Love Is The Tastiest

Laying in bed with a lover during a holiday where love is exemplified should be a tender, sweet sensation, especially for a creature that literally thrived on love itself.

Carapace, however, wasn't feeling the love.

Well, literally, that wasn't true; there was enough ambient love energy in the air to keep her alive for a month, at the very least, not even putting into account the love she sucked from the pegasus mare that was now laying next to her similarly knocked-out partner. And she had had a fantastic day, all things considered. Her own goals have advanced to a point where she could actually take time and settle in within her little domain. Her eggs were safe, for one, and she had her two first ponies for her hives breeding stock.

Getting those two pegasi was easily the most nervewracking thing she had done in a while, by far. She actually had to get the stallion to carry the mare on his back because she actually miscalculated on how well she could hold two ponies under her mental thrall at once! Her head hurt like a bitch afterward, too; even with the amount of excess love floating around she couldn't overextend herself like she did with those two.

And then, after two hours of getting a frantic well-built stallion to stop struggling against his restraints and then having to put him under with a more permanent enthralling spell, she just decided to do the same with the pegasus mare. As much as she didn't want to think about it, she was still a little confused about the responses she had gotten from the two ponies about changelings. She wasn't a fool to think that either of them would have good feelings about her kind, especially because of the fiasco with Chrysalis's hive. It was disquieting, though. She would have thought that she would find at least one pony who would want to undergo the process willingly. She would have thought it would have had a sort of appeal to some, or at least a few downtrodden individuals. Sort of like how some ponies idolized things that didn't exist, like vamponies. A shame no pony author has yet to write a romance novilla featuring a changeling yet.

Then again, she had all the time in the world to explain why their lives would improve when she was controlling them, after she had spent more time with them. She would have to, too, if she wanted to have a good and orderly starting point for a hive. Even though she might have put a little too much power in the spell that currently held Buttercream in thrall, she could afford it, because it wasn't like the mare was going to be moving much in a while anyway. But with a breeding stallion and a brood mother, she needed to take a more personal approach, especially because the former will be one of the two main genetic factors in her hive's changelings and the latter will be instrumental in producing more intelligent drones for her hive.

Her hive. Even thinking about it was sort of exhilarating. It was all hers, hers to oversee and rule and command and love unconditionally, because it came from her.

She knew she could have taken some parts slower. She didn't need to get greedy and grab three ponies in the same day, but she did and, well, it worked.

It all worked, and even if she felt like a utter wreck she was happy, because everything was fine.

Mostly.

She had accomplished so much in so little time, and what some might consider her greatest one was sleeping peacefully next to her, new and improved.

Sterling Sword was and has been her longest project yet. It took her weeks to get the right magical substances to instigate a pony's metamorphosis into a changeling down, and it was even harder to slip him the certain mixtures into his food without him noticing. Luckily, ponies in Equestria enjoyed sweets, the ooze was sweet, and it survived heat well enough.

Normally, it took two weeks of isolation and constant maintenance for a pony to transform into a changeling, which was the main reason why there were even any ponies left. But, she had managed to get the transformation down to less than a hour and forty-seven minutes, which was probably the fastest anyone has ever gotten such a complicated metamagical transmutation down without a horrible failure. That wasn't even counting the fact that she only knew how to produce the chemicals and magical materials from her books; it came naturally to Queens, but Princesses were not actually supposed to do what she was doing, so she had her work cut out for her anyway. That was another thing, too; she needed far more intelligent drones than the average hive, if she wanted to control it properly.

But that wasn't a issue, because with Sterling converted, she had her own little stud. With the pegasus stallion, that was one for normal drones and intelligent ones.

She had all her bases covered.

At least, she thought she had, because something wasn't right.

She was in bed with her coltfriend, and she was nuzzling his neck like she would do any other time she was happy. The only thing that made the situation different than any other time was that she was in her true form, and that the stallion she loved was now in a better, more proper form. She felt great, he felt great, smooth and muscular and perfect, but something was missing, but she couldn't name what. It was like it was something you didn't know that existed until it was gone.

What it was, she couldn't even begin to fathom. It wasn't him, surely; as a changeling, he was still as stocky as he was before, except rather than being all soft and furry he was covered in smooth chitin. His eyes were different, yes, but that came with being a changeling. It might have been because he was a drone, but she really didn't think that could have been it.

"Sterling?" she mumbled into the nape of her partner's neck.

"Yes, princess?" the changeling replied immediately, going from almost asleep to completely rigid in a manner of moments.

She winced slightly at how not-relaxed he was.

"Sweetie, are you okay?" she asked quietly, hoping that he was say 'yes'.

"Yes, I am." replied Sterling Sword.

Carapace felt a wave of nausea. He sounded the same, but it didn't have the same warm tone as he usually had when he spoke to her. It was probably because he was freshly converted and still under the mental fog, but...

"Did you like the gift I brought you?" she asked quietly, bringing a hoof to the drone's side. His wings were a little off to the side of his body, which she thought was interesting; conversion was a process that was normally just done, not studied. She would've thought someone would have noted that changelings converted from ponies had wings that budded farther apart than usual, for one.

Sterling Sword the changeling was quiet for a long time, which surprised Carapace slightly. She was used to other changelings answering her quickly.

"Of course, my lady." the drone said after some time, voice holding a tinge of the warmth she associated with her coltfriend. She let out a sigh of relief that she didn't know she was holding.

She let herself smile and pulled him closer to her, and hugged him like she used to do, back when he was a squishy pony.

"You are still my big teddy bear, right?"

The drone took it's time to answer, but Carapace was okay with that, because she was busy snuggling into the drone's back.

"My lady." the drone replied, sounding uncertain enough to give her a reason to worry, "If you do not mind, I wish to do something."

Carapace, who wasn't sure how to reply to that, just replied with a non-judgemental "Of course."

In a flash of green light and non-existent fire, the changeling drone that was Sterling Sword transformed into the form of Sterling Sword, the unicorn.

Carapace, who didn't know what to say for a few moments, decided to change into the form she was better known for, that of Emerald Gleam, to humor the drone.

Hugging the stallion close to her, with the both of them in the form of ponies, she suddenly felt that feeling that something was wrong dissipate.

She was utterly horrified by this realization, but she didn't vocalize this. She didn't want to say she was in love with Sterling Sword the pony. She liked him for his personality, of course, but he was better as a changeling. She wasn't a freak.

While she was wondering how to approach this newfound discovery, Sterling Sword addressed her in the voice she associated with him more than anything else. His voice was light and pleasant, and carried a sort of softness in it that a mear drone could not reproduce.

"Is this okay, your majesty?" he said, slow and soft.

Carapace, after some careful thought, dropped the form the drone was more comfortable with, the form of a Trotsylvanian peasent she personally found garnish but ponies seemed to find vaguly attractive, before shuddering and getting off the bed.

"No, it is not." she said quietly, but with force behind her words, "Revert to your true form, now."

The drone waited long enough for Carapace to feel quite foolish, but right before she started to speak the form of the unicorn erupted into green flame and white fur turned into black chitin.

Carapace stared at the large drone on it's side of the bed, giving her a look that either hid it's feelings or showed that it had none at all.

"I expect my orders to be followed quickly." she said, after beliving that she could sound properly upset, "Sterling. I am your princess now, and nothing has changed. Did I not give you a gift, earlier?"

As the drone righted itself on the bed, she wondered if there was a reason why she suddenly felt so silly. She had never had to argue with a drone before, but then again, this wasn't a normal drone. She hadn't delt with many changelings who used to be ponies; her mother's hive was situated under a old pony castle, and usually the only ponies who came close enough to be smuggled into the ruins were either too young or too foolish to be converted or to be worth converting. Or, perhaps she just wasn't yet used to talking to another changeling who wasn't either related to her or were simple servants.

When the drone spoke, it sounded almost upset, which Carapace thought was silly.

"You did, princess." he spoke, "But I didn't want to have sex with her. That was wrong."

His words were simple and clear, but Carapace felt like the drone simply walked over to her and slapped her. Repeatedly. With a blunt object. It took her a few moments to process that the drone just refuted her gift, the little pegasus mare that was a little brat who tried to pretend that she couldn't bear young. She wondered what could possibly be running through the drone's head, to not be at least happy that she procured a mate for him that wasn't herself.

She briefly wondered if she should have ever done what she's been doing for the better part of a day, and if she would have been happier if she had waited a while before she put her plans in motion. If she would have been happier if she never put her plans in motion.

But, she had a sudden, acute moment of clarity, and the silly doubts that were clouding her mind faded away.

"Know your place, Sterling Sword. I am you're ruler now, and my gifts and affections may not come so easily in later days."

The words sounded out of place, coming from her mouth, but she stood firm and glared at the drone with as much fierceness as she was able to muster. Admitedly, if there was one thing every changeling could do well, it was the ability to bare their teeth and hiss.

The drone, pleasingly, deflated slightly at her anger, and leaned itself slowly back down on the bed. He looked at her with big, sad eyes that were more like the pony he used to be then anything else, if green and with slitted pupils.

She didn't know her people could make puppy-dog looks until then. It was actually rather impressive that he could make one with a face as rigid as any other part of his body, actually. It was uncanny. But it would have been cuter if...

No. No it wouldn't, and no, they will never again be that shade of chocolate-brown again, as long as she lived.

Talking a few moments to calm herself, she started to make for the door, pausing only once to say one last thing to her colt-friend.

"You are to stay here until I command you otherwise, Sterling."

When he didn't respond, she took his silence as enough of an answer and walked out of the bedroom, to check on the captives, and to find some way to distract herself from the disappointment that her choice of consort was being.

She thought she would check on the fat one first.