Once upon a time, there was a pegasus pony named Ant Mill. Or, well, a changeling named Ant Mill. Because sure, technically she was biologically a pony but her dad was a changeling and she grew up in the hive and she super identified with changeling culture and even got a tattoo on her legs to make it look like they had holes but everypony just thought she was dappled and she tried to explain but they all assumed she was a changeling in a pony form and were all “But if you’re a shapeshifter why not look like somepony pretty?” and then she’d get super angry and they’d realize they messed up and sure they’d say sorry but it would just be really awkward which didn’t help anything because frankly she already had a lot of self-esteem issues.
Ant Mill was an intern.
Specifically, she was a student intern at Equestrian United Semiconductors’ division of economic forecasting, and she was there to fulfill her second year practical experience graduation requirements. The job wasn’t particularly relevant to her interests—she was studying literature—but the school insisted on a full semester’s internship with one of the companies on their approved list. Ant Mill had picked EUS because one of her friends had told her that working there was just like living in a hive, and Ant Mill was admittedly a little homesick.
That plan backfired fairly quickly. Apparently her “friend” hadn’t meant that it was a safe, supportive, open community that really values its cultural identity. No, apparently she meant that it was regimented, uncreative, and boring. Also, that she was super racist. But by that point, there was nothing Ant Mill could do.
Things could have been worse. Everything was well organized and easy to understand, and Ant Mill wasn’t just fetching coffee or running errands. She gave it her best try, and she did have to admit that if she cared even a little bit about demand forecasting for semiconductor components, it would have been a good experience. But she didn’t care, and so when her initial supply of work ethic and good spirit ran out, the job quickly degraded into an endless procession of graphs and ponies in grey suits.
Ant Mill ended up spending most of her time trying to think of poetic ways to describe her work environment, or doodling herself fighting time traveling giant robots. They were about the same size as the doodle of herself, but it was simple to assume she was also giant to make them easier to fight.
It was very near the end of her internship when Ant Mill and her work group all traveled up to the 47th floor of the building and piled into the big conference room. They’d spent the last three months working on an estimate of demand for semiconductor components in the greater Cloudsdale area, and it was time to present their findings to the division’s associate director. Ant Mill would not be presenting of course—she wouldn’t even be speaking unless first directly spoken to, which she would not be. But it was an honor to attend or whatever, so she sat in the back and watched the rest of her team set up.
It was kind of sad to watch. The whole team showed up twenty minutes early to get ready, and they spent the whole time fiddling with the fancy new conference room computers that had replaced the overhead projector. There was one big, boxy screen in front of each chair, sunk into the table with the glass side tilted up. Each screen showed the same rows of blocky characters in the same ugly phosphorescent green, except on those occasions when somepony wanted to show a graph. Then the whole room got to wait an awkward few seconds while it rendered and displayed the data. In the same ugly phosphorescent green.
In Ant Mill’s opinion, the entire conference room was its own little performance art piece about how technology was destroying culture. Nothing worth reading would ever be written on a computer. So she sat in the back and tuned the whole thing out, ignoring her team in favor of her drawing.
She sensed that the meeting had started when her team’s ambient babble abruptly stopped. Ant Mill’s ears perked, and she lifted her head in time to see two more figures enter the room. The first was an older griffon with a reddish tint to his feathers, while the second was a tall and graceful unicorn mare with a purple coat. Both in grey suits of course.
At first, Ant Mill was surprised—the mare looked younger than she did, and yet it was the mare who was sitting at the head of the table and getting fawned over by the others. How did a mare who couldn't be past twenty end up in senior management? But then Ant Mill noticed that the mare didn’t just have a horn. She also had wings. That made her a changeling, who of course could choose to look any age she wished. Ant Mill sat up straight, and feigned working out a kink in her back. Her foreleg twisted, her tail swished, and her ears twitched twice.
I greet you, changling of indeterminate rank and hive, said her body language. Vespid was a very socially-conscious dialect. Ant Mill waited, but the mare in front didn’t answer her. Instead, she introduced the griffon—who was apparently the company economist or whatever.
Ant Mill wasn’t rude by nature, and it did occur to her that maybe the mare was busy running the meeting and didn’t want to be distracted. So she let things get underway, and waited for a particularly boring lull. Then she stretched out a leg, twisted her neck, and buzzed her wings, letting out a grunt to conceal the action as another stretch. What daughter of Lampyridae do you call queen? she asked. Asking what hive a changeling was from was generally a good icebreaker. But still the mare did not answer.
Ant Mill tried a few more times, in case the mare just hadn’t seen her, but soon reached the obvious conclusion: the mare was ignoring her. It made sense of course—speaking another language didn’t change the fact that she was senior management and Ant Mill was a student intern—but it still hurt, and Ant Mill spent the rest of the meeting in a funk. The discussion did nothing to pull her out of it. It was a solid hour of a pony in a grey suit talking with a griffon in a grey suit about shifting disemployment figures from 6.3% to to 5% and what that meant about pegasi’s willingness to buy electronic watches.
Eventually, mercifully, the meeting wrapped up. Ponies put their binders away and turned off their screens. A few left in a hurry, while others stayed behind to chat. Ant Mill quietly collected her notepad full of doodles and shuffled towards the exit.
“Excuse me.” A voice cut into her awareness, speaking directly to her from not terribly far away. Her head jerked up, and she suddenly saw the purple mare standing right beside her. “I saw you trying to get my attention earlier. I’m sorry if it seemed I was ignoring you. I didn’t mean to be rude, but I don’t speak Vespid and I assumed you didn’t want to draw attention.”
Ant Mill froze for a moment, so unexpected was this mare’s approach. More than that, so unexpected was her tone. It was the first time since arriving at EUS that somepony had treated her like a person instead of as a cog in the machine, and the mare’s expression looked genuinely apologetic. She had a nice sort of face. Regal, but friendly.
Ant Mill waved the apology off. “Oh, it’s fine,” she said, “I was just surprised. I didn’t know there were any other changelings working here.”
“Equestrian United Semiconductors is a big company, and an equal opportunity employer. We have a lot of changelings working here,” the mare said, adding, “though I’m a pony.” Ant Mill frowned and glanced at the mare’s wings and horn, but the mare continued on in a friendly tone. “If you’re looking to swarm up, I understand the break room on floor 14 is popular during lunch.”
“Oh, uh...” Ant Mill stammered.
“Anyway, I need to get going,” the mare said, stepping out the door and moving down the hall. Ant Mill muttered some sort of goodbye, and gave a half-hearted wave. She waited a moment, not certain of what to do. Then, she picked her hooves and dashed out the door.
“Excuse me,” she called, chasing the mare up the hall. From behind, she could see that the mare’s tail was blue with a streak of purple and violet, and that her cutie mark was a star surrounded by five others, like on Equestrian money. “Excuse me!” The mare didn’t stop, but she did turn to look back at Ant Mill, and soon the two were walking side by side. “Hi, sorry,” Ant Mill said quickly, to the mare’s somewhat puzzled expression. “But what did you mean earlier? When you said you weren’t a changeling.”
“I think it’s pretty self-explanatory,” the mare answered, raising one eyebrow slightly.
“You mean you were raised by ponies?” Ant Mill asked. “Sorry, I don’t mean to pry. My name is Ant Mill. My mother was a pony but I was raised by changelings, so I’m curious.”
“It’s quite alright. That’s a very interesting background you have,” the mare answered. “But, no. I was raised by ponies in the sense that most ponies are. I was born and then my parents raised me. I am a member of the species equus sapiens.” They rounded a core, and the mare headed for an office door against one wall. Ant Mill’s eyes jumped to the name plate beside it.
“Associate Director Twilight Sparkle,” it read.
“Anyway,” Twilight Sparkle continued, stepping into the office and sitting behind the desk. “I actually have a call coming up, so if you—”
“That’s not real,” Ant Mill blurted, her eyes darting between the nameplate and Twilight. Twilight looked at her head on, tilting her head and narrowing her eyes. “I mean, your wings. And horn. Those aren’t real. Right? I mean... they’ve gotta be. You’re not an alicorn, right?”
Twilight sighed loudly, lifting a hoof to her face. “Yes, I am.”
“No, you can’t be. Because then you’d...” Ant Mill’s eyes shot back to Twilight’s cutie mark. Her eyes went wide, and she dropped her notebook to the floor. “You’re the Twilight Sparkle from the money.”
“Yes,” Twilight let her hoof slowly drag down her face. “I am.”
“Ohmygosh. You’re the bearer of the Element of Magic!” Ant Mill’s voice rose, very nearly to a shout. “You’re a Pri—”
“I’m the Associate Director of the Economic Forecasting division,” Twilight said sharply, and though her voice never rose, the authority in her tone silenced Ant Mill instantly. “And I’m busy. Thank you for your interest. Goodbye.” Her horn shone purple, and the door abruptly shut in Ant Mill’s face.
Out in the hall, Ant Mill stared at the door. It was only after a delay that she stepped back, as though it took time for her brain to realize she was nearly struck on the nose. She lifted a hoof, and returned it to the floor. Then she lifted it again, and knocked twice in quick succession.
“Hey, uh... Twilight? Uh. Associate Director? Can I get your autograph?” she asked. There was no answer, and after what she judged a suitable delay, she knocked twice more. “Uh, hello? I’m sorry if you want to be left alone. It’s just such an honor to meet you.” Again there was no answer, so again she knocked. “Um. I think I left my notebook on your floor...” Scarcely a second passed before the notebook shot out from under the door, bouncing to a stop in the hallway.
Ant Mill looked down at the notebook, and carefully picked it up with her teeth. Hesitantly, she looked down the hall towards the elevator, and then back to Twilight’s door. Lifting a hoof, she knocked for the fourth time, repeating the pattern of two quick taps. “Look, I can tell you don’t want to talk, but it’s just so amazing to meet you and... can I have five minutes?” She swallowed. “Please?”
Purple light enveloped Twilight’s door, and it swung open as quickly as it had shut. On the other side, Ant Mill opened her mouth to speak, but the light enveloped her hooves before she could. She found herself yanked forward, a startled yelp escaping her as she was sharply pulled in front of Twilight’s desk. She was left panting for breath, her heart racing as her brain struggled to catch up.
In front of her, Twilight tapped the desk. “Five minutes,” she said sternly, shutting the door behind Ant Mill.
“Oh.” Ant Mill nodded, taking a second to catch her breath. “Oh, thank you! Uh... so you’re really Twilight Sparkle?”
“This is an inauspicious start to your limited time.” Twilight said, holding eye contact with Ant Mill.
“Oh, right, sorry,” Ant Mill said quickly. Her eyes went all over the room—looking at the desk, the floor, the ceiling, anything but the pony she actually wanted to look at. Finally, the found the courage to look the other pony head on. “It’s just... that would make you like two thousand years old, right?”
Twilight nodded. “Two thousand and seven next month.”
“Do you still celebrate birthdays?” Ant Mill asked.
“Yes.” Twilight let out a curt little sigh, her eyes rolling slightly.
“Uh... why?” Ant Mill said, her tail giving a little swish back and forth as she rubbed one hoof over the other.
“Because my husband insists,” Twilight said, with a slight edge to her tone. “He thinks I’m embarrassed about my age and the party makes me feel better.”
“Wait... wow. You’re married?” Ant Hill sat up, her ears twitching as the thought. “But you’re like... I mean. Have you been married before?”
“Yes,” Twilight let out a long hiss of breath. “Yes. I have been married fifteen times before.” She spoke with a quick, sharp cadence, the words falling into place one after the other. “Yes, my husband knew that before we started dating. Yes, he’s okay with it. And yes, I will eventually outlive him, and when I do, it will be sad.” She delivered the last word harshly, her tone and glare giving it a sharp kick. “If you want the details, go get a copy of the EY 2998 June edition of Rolling Saddle out of the library. I did an interview with them because apparently ponies never get tired of asking those questions.”
Ant Mill withered under Twilight’s sharp gaze. She turned her head down to the floor and fiddled with her notebook in silence. “I’m sorry,” she finally said.
Twilight sighed, sat back, and shook her head. “No, I’m sorry. I shouldn't have snapped. But I don’t like these sorts of interviews.”
“It’s okay. I’ll... go.” Ant Hill nodded. “But, um...” She lifted her head to Twilight. “Before I do, can I ask one last question? It’s not personal, I promise.”
Twilight lifted a hoof, and then dropped it to the desk. She shrugged and sat back, letting out a breathy: “Okay. Shoot.”
“What are you doing here?” Ant Mill asked.
“Answering an intern’s annoying questions?”
“No, really.” Ant Mill gestured around the office. “What are you doing here? You’re royalty. Why are you working a desk job?”
“Royalty doesn’t mean that much anymore.” Twilight gently shook her head. “See, this thing happened. It’s called ‘Democracy.’ You might not have noticed.”
“Yeah, but weren't you a big part of that?” Ant Hill gestured vaguely in Twilight’s direction. “I mean, it’s not like you were overthrown, right? You practically wrote the constitution. Your familiar was the first Prime Minister and the first dragon to hold office in Equestria.”
“Yes, and ponies were very grateful.” Twilight spread her hooves, pausing for emphasis. “For like five hundred years. Then they got over it. It became less socially acceptable for elected officials to be related to royalty. The populist movement started and a lot of old friends got thrown out of office. Then there were a few parliaments in a row that were hostile to the crown. Things added up and my influence faded.” She shrugged. “If Prime Minister Tweedledee ever wants my advice, I’m at his beck and call, but he’s made it pretty clear he doesn’t.”
“What about the Ponyville Palace?” Ant Hill asked, her ears perking up. “Don’t you still have that?”
“Yes, but I don’t like to live there,” Twilight said. “Too many tourists.”
“Doesn’t it make a lot of money though?” Ant Hill said, with a curious little tilt of her head.
“Quite a bit, yes.” Twilight nodded. “Though, nearly two thousand years of prudent investing has left me with more money then I know what to do with anyway. I prefer to live modestly so I end up giving most of it to support the sciences. Or charity.”
“Then... I don’t understand.” Ant Mill frowned, and she again gestured around the office. “Why would you want this job if not for the money?”
“I think economics is interesting and I enjoy studying it.” Twilight said. “And I’m good at organizing ponies. The job fits my talents well.”
“But there are a million ponies who could do this job.” Ant Mill insisted. “They can’t do what you can do.”
“Like what?” Twilight asked.
“Like...” Ant Mill thought quickly. “Like be the Element of Magic. You’re probably one of the most powerful wizards to ever live. You can reverse gravity and turn ponies into creatures and teleport!”
“Half of the ponies who work here arrived via teleportation,” Twilight said. Her horn briefly glowed, and she glanced up and down at Ant Mill. “Including you, by the residual signatures.”
“That’s different. That’s industrial magic.” Ant Mill shook her head. “You don’t even have to be a unicorn for that. Anypony can teleport if they have a casting circle and a philosopher's stone.”
“And last I checked, you can buy a philosopher's stone for a few hundred bits,” Twilight said, evenly. “Which does put an upper value on how useful my teleportation gifts are.”
“Fine...” Ant Hill frowned, thinking quickly. “But you’re also a historian, aren’t you? The best historian, since you actually lived through all those events.”
“Memory is flawed, especially when you get to my age, and my assessment of what Equestria was like 2000 years ago was hardly objective in the first place.” Twilight gestured to a shelf in the corner of the room, full of books. “I have written a few books on the subject, which were well received. But I’m far from the ‘greatest’ historian.”
“You have rainbow power inside you! If Equestria is in peril you could be its last hope.”
“Yes.” Twilight nodded. “And they do still have me on speed dial for that. But do you know when the last time was Equestria was really threatened by something the government couldn’t handle?” Twilight waited for Ant Mill’s answer, and after a moment’s thought, Ant Mill shook her head. “Twelve-hundred years.”
“But you’re a scholar!” Ant Mill leaned forward. “You have thousands of years of experience!”
“Yes. From an era where we thought fire was an element and some doctors still practiced bloodletting.” Twilight rested a hoof on the desk. “Academic knowledge does have a shelf-life.”
“You’re an alicorn!” Ant Mill raised her hooves and spread them wide, her voice rising to a frustrated peak.
“A pony with your background should understand that race doesn’t matter on its own,” Twilight said, a bit curt. But when Ant Mill hung her head, Twilight paused. “Is this actually bothering you?”
“Well.. a little! Yeah!” Ant Mill lifted a hoof, though her eyes remained on the floor. “I just found out that royalty is working a middle management job at Despair Incorporated. What am I supposed to think?”
Twilight paused, watching Ant Mill from across the desk. Then she rose, and walked around to the other side, and sat down next to the young mare. “Ant Mill? Just... listen, okay?”
Ant Mill lifted her head, hesitantly looking into Twilight’s eyes. And Twilight continued. “Once, I was special for a lot of reasons. Very few ponies had my education. Very few ponies had my magical gifts. Very few ponies had the chance to travel and adventure like I did. I could teleport and do sums and organize like nopony else could. And yes, I ruled a pretty good bit of Equestria for awhile there.” Twilight leaned in a bit, catching Ant Mill’s eyes when she tried to look at the ground again. “But then something happened. Do you know what?”
“Democracy?” Ant Mill asked.
“No. That came later.” Twilight shook her head. “First was universal secondary education. With Princess Celestia’s help, I made it so that every unicorn could have the chance to study magic the way I did. And then we made advanced schools for earth ponies and pegsai too. That meant a lot more unicorns who studied wizardry, and a lot more earth ponies who studied engineering and pegasai formalizing meteorology. It meant that a lot of very smart ponies who otherwise would have spent their lives doing manual labor got a chance to better themselves.”
“Sure,” Ant Mill nodded. “We um... we read about that in history class.”
“Yes, it was a very good thing,” Twilight said. “But it meant that I was a little less special. Suddenly, there were a lot of very smart unicorns studying magic. I was more powerful than them because of my alicorn magic, but I wasn’t better than them -- not all of them. So I went from being the premiere magical scholar, to just being a noted scholar. Then do you know what happened?”
“Then democracy?” Ant Mill tried again.
“Still too early,” Twilight chided. “Then mechanical calculators happened. You wouldn't recognize them. They were these big, bulky things with brass buttons, where you had to pull a lever to make them add or multiply and they’d stamp the answer onto a sheet of paper. But suddenly, everypony in Equestria could do their sums perfectly. It was a revolution in math, science, accounting, and magic.”
“And your ability to... do sums in your head got less important.” Ant Mill swallowed, and then nodded. “Right?”
“Right,” Twilight nodded. “Then came formalized managerial training. Then the self-activating magical circle. Then philosophers stones. And yes, then democracy. Every step took something that used to be very rare, and made it very common. That meant I became a little less special every time. And sure, it’s frustrating sometimes, but think about it. Would you really deny something to everypony else in the world just so you can be the only one who has it?”
“You’re immortal,” Ant Mill mumbled. “That’s special.”
“Ant Mill, think back to how this conversation started.” Twilight put a hoof on her shoulder. “Do you think being special that way makes me happy?”
Ant Mill hung her head. “I’m sorry. I didn’t—”
“I know. It’s okay.” Twilight’s tone was gentle. “I’m not sad that I’m immortal. Life is a beautiful thing and I want to keep on living. But there is nothing I wouldn't give up for the right to give that gift to my husband and children as well. And it’s the same with everything else. I liked being important, but I like this new Equestria more.”
“What’s to like about it?” Ant Mill asked, an almost pleading note to her voice. “You live in a giant grey box. There’s concrete everywhere. They just cut down the last of the Everfree Forest! All the wide open spaces are gone, and... and you...” She gestured sharply at Twilight. “You’re here. That’s messed up!”
Twilight took no offense at the pointed hoof, and gently pushed Ant Mill’s leg back to the floor. “Yes,” she said quietly. “I do miss the wide open space. And the old Ponyville. And a lot of things. But you know what I don’t miss? Changelings and ponies attacking each other on sight. Earth ponies and unicorns not being able to go to the same schools. Indentured servitude at the Trader’s Exchange. And the danger that next time my friends and I wouldn't save the day and the world would explode.”
Twilight gently leaned forward, resting her hoof over Ant Mill’s. “And you know what else? I like this big grey box. It’s not the best job ever, but I enjoy it, and I have a lot of friends here, and it leaves me plenty of time to see my husband and raise my children. Maybe one day I’ll get bored of it and go back to studying magic, or traveling the world, or living in a palace and waving at tourists. But for now, it’s what I want out of life, and that’s all it needs to be.”
“But it’s so...” Ant Mill looked for the word. “Pointless. You shuffle numbers around all day.”
“I don’t think so.” Twilight shook her head. “We’re bringing earth pony technology to Cloudsdale. Sure, it’s just silly things like watches at first, but it’ll build. More pegasai will start to want to live on the ground, or ground-bound ponies will want to see their flying relatives. That means more trade, more intermarriage, a closer and more united Equestria. Maybe an Equestria that doesn’t even think of electronics as earth pony technology. That doesn’t seem so pointless to me.”
Twilight reached out to touch Ant Mill’s shoulder, staring into her eyes and offering her a warm expression. “And look at you. A pony raised by changelings. Fifty years ago, that would have been unthinkable. But now you’re here. And whatever you end up doing, you’re going to draw two cultures closer together. You’re going to make the world a better place.”
“Um...” Ant Mill found her throat suddenly tight, and she nodded quickly. “Um. Thank you. I hope I will.”
“You will,” Twilight said firmly. “Feeling a little better?”
“Yeah, thanks.” Ant Mill rose, and shook herself off. “I uh... I suppose I should get going.”
“I actually do have a call I am now late for, so yes, you should.” Twilight gently patted her shoulder, and then rose as well. “Come on now.”
Ant Mill turned and walked to the door, while Twilight went back behind her desk. Ant Mill paused in the doorway and turned back. “Um, I’m sorry. I know I need to go but... that thing you said? About how you’d rather the world be nice than that you be special? I don’t... I’m not sure I would have made the same decision. Or that most ponies would have, even. So...”
Ant Mill swallowed, and then bowed her head low to the ground. “Thank you, Princess,” she said. Then she left.
Alone in her office Twilight paused. She watched Ant Mill go, then silently glanced down the floor. Sitting forgotten on the carpet was a little spiral bound notebook. Twilight picked it up, and stared at it for a few moments.
She smiled.
