"I am a big blob!" Shining looked at her amazingly trim and skinny wife. "How can you love me?"

"Because you are my wife, filled with my foal, making you the most beautiful thing in the world." Cadance spooned some more of the rich cheesecake forward and Shining took it off the utensil. "You remember how I was, with Flurry?"

"But you were gorgeous!" The pregnant mare's wings shot up and her voice dropped to a whisper. "I am just fat and heavy and-" More cake was given a home in her mouth and she dutifully chewed and swallowed. "And you aren't helping!" The last bit was accompanied by a giggle as she tried to bat at Cadance with her wings.

"Oh? You don't want the rest of this? I guess I will just have to eat it myself!" Cadance loaded another spoon and started bringing it up to her own snout but froze; the look on Shining's face was akin to a foal having all their toys taken away. Big tears formed in Shining's eyes and even though Cadance quickly diverted the cake to her wife, the sobbing started again.

"Ir ouv oo ady!" Shining's mouth was full, her eyes leaking tears, and she was happy beyond any hope of her pregnancy-addled brain sorting out. She chewed happily and kept crying.

"I love you too, Shiny." Cadance kissed her wife on the nose, bringing up some tissues to dry Shining's cheeks. "No matter what."

"Daring?" A voice grabbed Please's attention and she opened her door, sticking her head out. "Daring? Can you give me a hoof with something?" It was definitely Slice's voice, coming from deeper in the house.

"Uh, coming!" Please looked at the 'Daring Do' outfit she had just taken off, it was likely the most authentic in all Equestria. "Not that they seemed to recognize her, oh well." She started trotting down the hallway. There was a soft sobbing sound coming from the filly's room, but that seemed like something she should bring up with Slice.

"Just down here." With Please in the kitchen, Slice's voice was coming from the open basement stairs that she hadn't noticed earlier when she walked through the house.

"Oh, you need a hoof? Something heavy? You know your filly is crying?" Please poked her head down the hole into the basement and could only see a dull blue glow from one side. "It's dark!"

"The light has gone out, I just need you to come over here." Slice was laying, on the other side of his old carapace from the mare. "Just…"

Please stepped forward and felt something land on her back. "What is going on? Slice?" It certainly felt pony-shaped, and Please thought the pony was doing something naughty at first, but then she felt it seem to pull her plot up, dragging her legs up and inside… inside it!

"Got you. Struggle if you want. Yell if you want." Slice let his disguise slide away and turned the light on.

Eyes widening at the changeling first, Please looked back and saw… a duplicate of them. Glowing blue eyes looked out of the inky-black changeling on top of her. She squirmed and tried to get her legs out of whatever they were sliding down into. "What are you doing? Get off me!"

"Yup, struggle and yell, I love it when they struggle and yell." Slice grinned around his big fangs, watching his cast-off shell seemed to twist and pull, yanking Please up inside it.

The world was dark at first, Please couldn't see a thing. Her forelegs were cramped and she pushed them, inadvertently shoving them down into the shell around her. What had been supple as it attacked her, now stiffened and froze her movement. She felt something touching around her belly.

Slice produced some rapidly hardening slime from his mouth and smeared it along the crack in the shell's belly. "Gotcha. Now you learn why my tribe has no need for a queen."

The world came back to Please, she was panting hard in fear as all around her she felt tightly gripped and held in place. She couldn't even turn her head away from the blue-tinted scene before her. Something started to press at her nose, squirming and insistently pushing inwards, burrowing into her sinuses and down further.

The pressure in the mare's ears grew and grew until, with a pop, she could hear again. "… going to be trapped in there until it fuses with you. My shell will be your first shell. Welcome to the hive." The changeling turned away from Please, turning out the light and leaving her in a room, a dull blue glow her own light.

Without a sun to see, time passed a little oddly for Please. She was aware of her belly rumbling, but then even that stopped and she was just really, really hungry. Panting through those tubes in her nose, she finally opened her mouth inside the encasing shell, only to feel something shove into her snout and fill her throat.

Pressure, all around her, it grew worse the longer she was in it. She felt the pressure extend into her mouth, and after some awkward whimpering, her rear as well. But it was her insides that felt really strange. Please felt what had to be intense magic at work. Her body, again and again, felt like it was melting and solidifying. She panted through the disgustingly odd sensations, unable to scream for help and unable to move. She stared straight ahead and hoped that her little sister would find her.

"Wakey wakey." Slice stepped down into the dark. "I think someling should be hungry by now." he stepped slowly over to Please. "Nod your head if you are, I know you can move."

Please's eyes widened, she tried and felt new, odd muscles, strain against that thick outer layer. Her head nodded.

"Good. I want you to focus, there are ponies upstairs, they are happy. Feed off them." Slice grinned savagely, he had already been nibbling, but his newest creation needed her first meal. "Hurry up, I need to get back to them."

Please was confused, unable to work out exactly what the changeling meant. She tilted her head and looked up and, immediately, started to salivate. Something tasted delicious, but there was nothing in her mouth. She felt confusion seep through the thinking part of her brain.

Something moved beside her, the changeling coming close. "It's cool, noling gets it the first time. Here…" Please's eyes went wider still, her mind exploding at the sensation of the most tasty meal ever. Happiness. "Drink it down, open up and swallow…" The food came into her, she couldn't fight it, Please gave a snort through her nose as the hollow sensation was soon sated and, her legs able to move now, she slumped to the ground.

"First time is always like that. Was for me, was for everyling I made." Slice turned the light off, closing the trap-door on his way out.

Please Do worked her mouth, feeling sharp teeth in it. Running her tongue along the points she found the oddest yet, two huge fangs at the front of her mouth, extending and hanging outside. Changeling fangs. Bracing her legs, the odd way her muscles worked now seemed to hinder her more than help. She stumbled and fell, over and over, until she was panting for breath.

Never really sure when day and night was, Please jerked awake again as movement and light intruded on her agony. She looked up, closing her eyes down to slits. "Still alive? Ah, you should make it then. Not sure why, some don't. I think it is a kind of 'personal fight'." Slice walked around in front of the trapped pony. "You probably noticed what you are turning into. A changeling, some would call you an 'Engulfer' drone, like me."

"What are you?" Please was shocked and pleased she had a voice again, she blinked a few times in surprise that it had worked.

"The same as you are about to be. We are a hive too stubborn to die when our last queen did." Slice crouched down. "Each drone's cast off shell is the building block of a new 'ling. We eat more than a normal changeling, we eat to build the magic our shells need to make more." Slice gestured to Please's nose. "You will learn to live like this, or be hunted and killed by Equestria's elite."

Please had never felt true hate before, true anger and disgust. But she did now. "My sister will come and-" The mare's strength gave out and she just groaned.

"Nopony but that simple mayor even knew you were here, and I told her you had to go back to Manehatten." Slice leaned in, snout pressing to the ear-fin that let Please hear now. "This process will complete, you will be made into a changeling, and my shell will crack free and you will find you need to feed. And you know who will do the feeding?"

Please hated this changeling more and more. Just when she had gained so much respect for the race, this happened. "Hate… you…"

"Good!" As Slice exclaimed, Please felt that rush of energy again, she tilted her head up, tasting it as it poured down her throat. "Drink it down, it feeds you and your shell."

Even though her work schedule was flexible, what Fancy Pants had done pushed it to the limit.

"Ponyville! Ponyville is the next stop!" The conductor hollered down the train car, grinning and nodding to Fleur. She gave the biggest smile back—the strongest armor, the best defense. Getting up, she levitated her two bags from the rack above her and started trotting for the end of the car.

The train pulled into the station and Fleur counted to five before stepping off, a mare of her standing should never be on time, or hurried. It made her smile wider, it was a game after all. "Miss Dis Lee!" A voice called, Fleur turning to get a face full of camera flash. "Thank you Miss Dis Lee!"

"Sorry about that." The conductor, an older stallion, leaned off the train behind her. "But I guess a filly as pretty as you is used to it'n all."

Fleur turned on the stallion and gave a real, true smile to him. "I am sure I don't know what you are talking about." She leaned up and kissed his cheek, watching the old pony blush, his face lightening up. "Thank you for the wonderful trip."

"Y-Y-Y-You're welcome!" The stallion waved a hoof, signaling the train engineer to start them rolling again. "Any time you need a ride!"

Smiles, it seemed, were going to be easy today, Fleur decided. She stepped down from the platform and looked around the growing town. "Much more, and this town will need an actual developer to come through…"

"That was my thought exactly. I was actually thinking of paying somepony to move the whole thing so it was around Princess Twilight's castle, it would become quite a city then!" The earth pony turned to Fleur. "My name is Mayor Mare, can I take your bags?"

"Oh no, I have them. And I think that might be a good idea, but then, you could just develop on the other side of the castle, urge new homeowners to build out there, more gradual and a lot less alicorn magic needed, I would think. Fleur." Fleur beamed in delight, the mare actually talked with her, which was a touch rare of late.

"I know who you are, you are as famous as our other recent visitor." Mayor Mare puffed herself up, being in charge of Princess Twilight Sparkle's home town was one thing, having HUGE celebrities and heroes visiting nearly daily, was the cream on top of the cake.

At the other end of the train platform, narrowing his eyes at the regular ponies, Dr. Caballeron had dispensed with his usual entourage of henchponies, along with his normal attire. Trotting up to the two mares, he gently nudged into their conversation. "I couldn't help but overhearing, please forgive me."

"Not at all." Mayor Mare was in her element, dealing with visiting ponies. "What could I help you with, uh, mister…?"

"I am loath to admit it, but I am a big fan of miss A.K. Yearling, I was wondering if she were the recent important visitor you mentioned? Oh, where are my manners, Doctor… Cabel." Caballeron nearly kicked himself, he should have come up with some fake names.

"Nope, sorry. But that would be amazing, a famous author visiting, along with the mare whose biography she writes!" Mayor Mare bounced a little on her hooves, her nerd was showing.

Caballeron's eyes flashed. "A shame. I don't suppose she is still here, I would love to meet her."

"Oh no, she left… well, I think she left…" Mayor Mare gave Fleur an apologetic look that the unicorn returned with a smile. "She was staying out with the Tricks." Mayor Mare gestured to a house on the edge of town. "You could ask there."

"My darling, thank you so very much." Caballeron bowed deeply, taking Mayor Mare's hoof and bringing it to his snout to kiss. The gesture flustered the mare and she stuttered a little in surprise as the stallion trotted off.

Something was wrong, Fleur knew. The stallion hadn't looked her way, not once.

Author's Note

Our villain is unveiled. It is Mayor Mare!

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