To or to Not be Alone

Dusk sighed as he wandered the streets of Ponyville. Already, the orphanage started to remind him of Canterlot, just with some random pony he didn’t know telling him what to do. It had been a pain just sitting in there, not being allowed to go anywhere before the other new pony arrived. Turns out, they were being forced to stay together in one room! It wasn’t even a colt, for Celestia’s sake! At least they didn’t need to share a bed… ugh… Dusk had to suppress shivering at the thought in the middle of the sidewalk.

Throughout the day Dusk had pretty much entered shops at random, getting to know where to get anything he might need. His visits included a barber shop, nearly every market stall, the library, the orphanage… somehow, a theater, the train station that he totally didn’t squee at, and now… a real life gingerbread house with a cupcake on top. What-

“Surprise!”

...And they may or may not be closed or something. Despite (or because of) the volume, Dusk’s ears happened to hurt too much for him to understand the yell. He sat on his haunches, groaning and rubbing the sides of his head.

Slowly, he opened his eyes to see a crowd of random ponies huddled inside, a huge “Welcome Dusk and Frost to Ponyville!” banner, and the other new filly, Frost if the banner was anything to go by, at the doorway hiding the biggest smirk Dusk had seen in his life.

“So, haven’t met the Crusaders yet?” She taunted.

“Should I have?” Dusk risked the thought.

“They taught me everything I know.”

Another groan later, and Dusk walked in, taking in everything before him. Games, dances, food, there almost seemed to be no end in sight the the level of planning went into this party. He shot Frost an angry glare before starting to head off to the food tables.

“What? Can’t a ‘ling have some fun around here?”

Dusk froze at what he heard. Ling? That couldn’t have been right, yet nothing that he could think of that should have went there even sounded anything like ‘ling’. But this was a party, and the music was pretty loud now that he thought about it. He figured that he should only ask if he heard about it again.

. . . . .

Frost mentally smacked herself for her mistake. At least it was a minor one, one that could be explained has just a weird sound because of the music. She could feel Dusk’s suspicion for a moment, but it quickly disappeared in favor of the nearby snack table.

Seeing nothing better to do, she decided to see if the CMC had made it to the party. She did see Mrs. Cake, though, someli-pony struck her as the opposite of a party animal. Then again, she was the one that used the “party cannon” to decorate everything while-

Oh yeah. The Element Bearers and the CMC were out to attend some kind of royal wedding at Canterlot.

‘Stupid memory,’ she mentally scolded.

It was really weird how the pink party pony was so eager to throw a party as soon as possible, despite the fact that she pretty much know nol-pony and end up somewhat dissatisfied. Sure, she may have made an offhooved remark about Ponyville being a little too crazy for her, but she didn’t really want to leave! Hopefully in the future, she can keep up with Pinkie’s crazy rambles to prevent this kind of mishap.

Suddenly, she felt a presence in the back of her mind. She was excited at first, until the voice of Chrysalis echoed through Frost’s mind.

‘Sure, I know I said my punishment to you would last a year, but I’m afraid I’m falling through the sky at a hundred mph and I want to be alive to see the end of your banishment. It didn’t seem to do much anyways, so I’m just going to give you the rest right away,’

Pain blasted through Frost’s mind and she fought back a scream, and opens her eyes just barely enough to see the party goers, and the not-too-far-away exit. To everypony’s surprise, she ran right out of the party, and to her surprise, right to the orphanage and into her new room. She closed the door as gently as possible, jumped on one of the beds, and screamed into a pillow so nothing could hear her.

. . . . .

Dusk left the party near the end of the day, deciding to resume is semi-tour for at least another hour or so. Before he was able to get very far, however, a winded orphanage nanny ran up to him.

“Dusk! Dusk, oh tha-”

“Just say what you want!” Dusk interrupted.

“It’s Frost. She’s in her room crying, and nopony can get to her,” her eyes narrowed, “I don’t suppose you had anything to do with this, like at thee par-tey?”

“We barely know each other. I doubt I can be much better about it than you or anypony else. And no, we only ever greeted at ‘thee par-tey’,”

“At least try, please?”

“Whatever...”

. . . . .

When Frost had screamed her throat hoarse and teared her eyes dry, she opted to just lay on the pillow, occasionally sniffing to herself. By now the physical agony was long gone, replaced with the hollowness and emotional flood that came with the real severing of the hive-mind.

The hive-mind itself normally acts as a second mind for most changelings. The connections allow everyling to use the knowledge and thoughts of others to keep things like emotions in check, while knowing what to do in nearly any situation and which ponies have already been taken, whether they be replacements or originals. Rejects like her were banished because the other members couldn’t fathom such incompetence with something like that at everyling’s disposal.

With even the subconscious links just gone, Frost now had to deal with everything bad that had ever happened to her, from the simplest of insults to the initial, soul-crushing abandonment.

“Frost, you ‘kay?” Suddenly, a voice interrupted her thoughts and in response she struggled to make herself presentable. Tears were weakness, after all.

Turning around, she spotted Dusk, concern with a faint bit of annoyance pouring out of him. The emotion aided her throat somewhat, but everything else couldn’t be helped.

“Y-yeah, I’m fine…” was her response.

“No, you’re not,” he deadpanned, ”I shouldn’t have said it that way. Why are you so down?”

“Uh… I… can’t…” She struggled to find an adequate lie without the hive-mind’s help.

“Yes, you can! I promise, here and now, that I will not run away or mock or judge you in any way!” he jumped onto the bed, next to Frost, “I don’t want to see you sad like this. They’re taking time out of my day forcing me to comfort you. When I was sad once, I was sad until I talked it out of an old friend of mine. Talking helps, so please, talk to me.”

“Who…?”

“And don’t try to dodge the question, either. Why are you sad?”

She flinched, the anger emanating from Dusk was too much for her. Thankfully, he saw her and dropped it, offering more concern instead. Hesitantly, she answered as best as she could, given the circumstances.

“I… don’t… know…”

“Yes you do. For your sake and mind, just tell me please!”

“Cut me some slack, okay? I’m not-” she caught herself, but it was too late. Embarrassed, she gave a curt “Rambling, sorry,”

“...A pony?” To her dismay, Dusk finished her sentence perfectly, “I don’t care what you are or aren’t. I’m not going to just leave you here the way you are, especially if this is apparently as big as ‘I’m not a pony’. Now, I believe the term is ‘ling’,”

“Changeling,” she automatically corrected, and gasped at what she revealed.

“Okay, a changeling. And that is…?” she gave no answer, “Deep breathes now, please. My promise still stands. Even if you eat meat or steal for a living or something, I won’t place my judgement until you have nothing left to say,”

“We eat love,” Frost finally whispered.

“Love? How?”

“...and other positive emotions. While we can eat other foods, only emotions can sustain us. We’ve silently been gathering these for our hive for many generations,”

“O… kay? What does th-”

“EVERYTHING!” she snapped, before forcing herself calm, “Not just that, but we impersonate ponies to do it. A life of lies, that’s what it is. Thing is, I’ve never been really good at it. Terrible memory. It’s why I said ‘pony’ instead of ‘ling’ earlier,”

“‘ling instead of pony’” Dusk suddenly corrected.

“That’s what I said. Anyways, Because of that, I was banished from the hive for a year. A false hope, this was supposed to be. I would’ve lasted around a week, had I not landed in a place like this.

“Sadly, Queen Chrysalis realized her mistake and cut me off from the hive mind permanently, leaving me to deal with every single emotion I would have to have had dealt with before,”

“Hive mind?”

“Every changeling of a single hive is able to communicate through a telepathic bond called the hive mind. When I was banished, the link was blocked so I felt alone, but still had a subconscious link. Now that that’s gone…”

“Oh… oh…”

“Yeah. That leaves me here,” she look all around the room for a moment before continuing, “And I suppose… it did help a little bit. Thanks,”

“So, do you have a normal appearance or something? If you’re impersonating somepony, that must be a disguise,”

Frost was startled a bit, but figured she might as well show him while they were alone and mostly unpressured. She concentrated, and felt the familiar tingle of magical fire coating her body and altering her appearance.

“GAH!” Dusk suddenly screamed.

“Huh?”

“Y-y-... how are you alive?”

“What do you mean?”

“You burst into flames,” Dusk deadpanned.

“Those were harmless, trust me. Sorry, it’s too easy to forget what most fires are like. Anyways, this is the real me,”

“Oddly… buggy…” Dusk idly commented, “So… what do we do know?”

“Before Chrysalis cut my connection for real, she made a comment about how she was falling through the sky. Changelings normally fly without problem. There was a royal wedding recently, and that sounds like the exact thing that someling like her would try to infiltrate… Oh no…”

“What?”

“If she messed up, that means that changelings will soon be known to the world, revealed in one of the worst possible ways. I fear we may need to prepare…”