Mac kept her mouth shut, she was trying to think about what implications this had for her. Princess Lula is your mare, Jade Sight is your stallion. I don't think you will get both together, however; Lula never really had a thing for stallions.

"She is cute when she is listening to Night." Jade had Luna standing beside him, they were both watching Big Mac's "far away" look that she got when Night Reign spoke. "What did Night sound like?"

Luna grinned. "Night had the most amazing voice, I confess I made her use it a lot." She nudged Jade for effect. "I can offer advice, if you want."

Jade was trying to be comfortable with an alicorn princess, HIS alicorn Princess, suggesting ways to please the mare they were both interested in. He eventually came to a realization, Princess Luna was a different mare to this "Luna." He shook his head, "If it's alright, I would like to spend my time with her learning just what things could coax Mac's voice."

"Hey, I'm standing right here." Mac lifted a hoof up and bopped herself on the forehead. "I can't believe it. What is wrong with you?"

Luna and Jade looked to each other, grinned wider and then looked back to Mac. At the same time, both shrugged and said, "We love you." And both broke into giggles.

Mac strode forward, feeling at last a little sure of something since the recent change in her life. Stepping between the bigger alicorn and bat pony, she pressed her snout forward, offering each a cheek. "I love both of you, in different ways." She couldn't believe she was saying it, but there it was.

"Tell us." Jade nuzzled Mac's cheek, rubbing the strap of his bridle against her, reminding her how much he belonged to her; how much he trusted her.

Luna was no less interested in showing her love for the former stallion. "Yes, tell us both." She only rubbed her cheek once, but kept her head pressed to Mac's.

A thump at the big double doors broke the moment. All three ponies' eyes flew open and each turned to see the door. Luna moved fastest, her horn lit with dark cobalt magic and all three of them suddenly displaced with a POMF.

Seated on the throne, Luna had two of her Lunar Guard at her sides. Both Jade and Mac stared up at Luna, marveling at the amazing magic she casually wielded, each saw her grin and point to the doors. Both bat ponies turned to face the entrance.

"Enter!" Luna's words held the full power of the Royal Canterlot Voice.

It was a shock when Twilight Sparkle was leading the way, but the real surprise came when the mare hobbling along behind her sported not only a lot of changeling aspects, but also a rainbow-like mane. "Rainbow Dash?" Luna was off the throne and striding forward, Mac and Jade suddenly struggling to catch up.

"Your Highness, I did what I could." Twilight stepped aside. "She kept asking to see you. Muttered something about 'two days.' I enchanted this bridle to protect her for now, but it cannot undo what the… what the changelings did."

"What did they do?" Luna's anger was building. "Attacking my envoy is inviting war."

"Whoa, slow down." Dash blinked up at her Princess with a half grin that now showed off fangs. "I am pretty sure they didn't really mean this as an attack." When she got a solid glare from Princess Luna for nearly a minute, Rainbow figured it was time to continue. "They seemed to… well, they think changelings are better than ponies. I think they did this to me as thanks…"

Luna's jaw almost, figuratively speaking, hit the floor. "They did it as 'thanks'?"

"She was wearing this before the guards at the border got it off her." Twilight fetched a small jar from her saddlebag, setting it before Luna. "Near as I can tell, it was controlling the change, making her become a drone. With it off she seems to have continued on becoming a queen instead. I couldn't stop it, but I could make it feed back on itself."

"So the drone parts will become queen parts?" Luna was still perplexed by what her Shadowbolt was reporting. Reaching out with her magic, she slammed the doors closed. "I need to know everything."

Twilight continued. "The bridle controls and slows the changes for now. It will make the drone parts slowly into queen ones, but I have no idea if it will stop once the targeted body-parts are changed, or if it will keep going, searching for new targets."

"Pfft, I am sure you will sort it out, Twi." Rainbow Dash smiled at her old friend. "I really don't think they wanted a queen, but turning me into a drone was… well, I think they considered it an honor, like it was raising my status in their eyes and would make you happy. Drove me bonkers when it started. I like my wings, buck it."

Luna had her temper under control again. "Okay, this is annoying, but… wait, you have a horn!" She stared at the jagged horn that was pushed out of Rainbow's head. "Can you use that?" She immediately turned to Twilight. "Can she use that?"

"There is… well, there were some drones with her. One of the Lunar Guard took them into custody." Twilight couldn't stop herself from leaning slightly against Rainbow, whether it was for her friend's or her own support, she couldn't work out.

"Perfect, they will teach her their magic. Don't get me wrong, Rainbow Dash, if we can undo this we will, but if it is here to stay, or if you are destined to fully change, I will make sure you will have full use of your body." Luna stepped closer and wrapped Rainbow in her dark magic. "Did they accept the offer?"

"Pfft, they practically jumped on it." Rainbow had only bowed once to Luna, and that was when the alicorn had sworn her into her service. "Trixie is still fighting the urges of the technoling equipment. If anypony has an ego big enough to resist that stuff it is her. In the south the Collective… they tried to make our offer of dragons to feed on as something below them, but we both knew they were drooling at the thought of podding dragons. The ponies… I didn't have a chance to talk to any, or inspect their living conditions, but they looked happy."

"Happy wasn't something I expected, but we can talk more with them once they are beholden to us." Luna wove her magic into Dash's slightly odd mane, tickling each of the strands of enchantment. "Some of your enchantments aren't working, head to Ponyville, have them replaced. I want you in top form for the big event."

Dash lifted a wing and sketched a perfect salute. "Yes, Your Highness." She spun on a dime and marched, on hole-filled legs, for the doors.

"Rainbow Dash!" Luna called, "Don't forget to take one of those changelings with you, I am sure there is something you can learn from them. Take a guard too if you think you need it." She opened the big doors for her head Shadowbolt, letting Rainbow Dash leave the hall.

"Big Mac?" Twilight, without Luna dominating the situation, spotted Mac standing behind and to the side of the Princess of the Night. "Ugh, don't worry, when this is all over I will turn you back myself, you and Applejack."

"Uh, eenope." Hearing Twilight using her name brought back memories, and with them speech patterns. "I mean, no. I think I am fitting in a bit better." She stepped forward and reached up with one dark, fleshy wing.

Twilight blinked in shock, seeing Princess Luna turn to Mac, as the smaller pony hugged the Princess with a wing. "Uh… but… wait… I don't…" She stopped, shook her head, and started again. "Applejack, then? She wants out right?"

"You need to ask him, but I think he does. My Princess is a little more… a lot more, everything." Mac was suddenly at a loss for the right words to use. "Besides, this is my place. I walked so far for so long on the farm, pulling a plow and never getting anywhere. Every time I step here, I feel like I am walking my future."

The reply was a lot more than Twilight had expected. She had to stop to think about it. "Uh, but your farm?"

"Our cousin, Braeburn, has taken over working it, I trust him to do right by the place. Apple Bloom… when she is big enough, if she wants to, she could visit me. Ah miss her, but I promised Princess Luna that I would serve her; an Apple never breaks a promise."

Twilight knew that kind of stubbornness, she smiled at the streak of "Apple Family" that ran wide in Big McIntosh. "I have never known one to yet." Twilight stepped over and lifted a hoof up, getting a surprisingly firm clop back.

~~~~~+++++~~~~~

Rainbow Dash stepped out of the throne room and spotted Dawn Glider immediately. "Hey, Dawn." She stepped over to the stallion. "Got another job for you." She started walking past him, reaching out with a wing to snare him away from chatting to the fellow bat pony mares. "Sorry girls, he's mine."

Dawn blinked at the implications, looking back to Sooty Rose who, among the mares, was the stallion he was actually chasing. "Sorry, you know how it is when a pegasus gets possessive…" He trailed off to leave the implications of his words to run riot. When they were around the corner from the others, he turned back to Rainbow. "So what is the job, and why am I 'yours'?"

"The job is escort. Prisoner will be coming with me to Ponyville, want to make sure there is somepony besides myself to keep an eye on them. One of the changelings that came with us." Rainbow Dash turned toward a wall and pressed her hoof against it at an odd height. The wall slid inwards silently.

Dawn's mouth was wide open, but he followed Rainbow Dash into what was apparently a real secret room in the castle. "This… this is awesome… who are you?" He turned as the door slid silently closed again behind him.

"Rainbow Dash." She turned on the stallion, flashing Dawn a smile. "What? Not enough?" Giving a sigh, Rainbow tossed her mane to the side. "What if I said I was Captain of the Shadowbolts?"

"I would call you a liar-" Dawn froze, remembering the pass-phrase she had used, then the way Princess Luna had apparently just let her in to talk. "You aren't lying, are you?"

"As one of my best friends would say, 'eenope.' " Dash grinned. "So, I wasn't lying when I said you were mine. Your old job seems… not really worth it, want to do something more exciting?" She began gathering up some odds and ends, not the least of which was a heavy collar.

"More… look at you, you are turning into a changeling and you think this is exciting?" Dark clopped a hoof on the floor. "This is crazy, you're crazy. Shadowbolts—when anypony talks about them… you, at all—are normal ponies who hide in the shadows and pop out like monsters. I am a bat pony, I work for Princess Luna already, everypony will… every…" He was staring at a wider and wider grinning face. "Buck you are good at this."

"I learned from the best. Princess Luna is playing games a dozen times more complicated than what I am doing, I am just one piece of her games." Rainbow puffed her chest out. "A big piece, but I don't have to deal with the Crystal Empire, or the dragons, or any of that other stuff… for now. So what about it?"

"My old position?" Dawn knew what was coming.

Rainbow Dash didn't disappoint. "Gone I am guessing. What were you out there for?"

"Found a hunky stallion in the Royal Guard. Got caught bucking in Molestia's bedroom while she was in day court." Dawn grinned. "Sent him to Cloudsdale, me to the fort. They basically put all of Equestria between us."

"You meet up with him again?" Dash weighed a null-grenade in her hoof, pondering the weight before stuffing it into her saddle-bag.

"Honestly? It was just a bit of fun. And who else can say they banged another stallion on Princess Molestia's bed?" Dawn Glider lifted his chin up and gave a grin.

"So you love doing crazy stuff. You in?" Rainbow Dash studied Dawn's eyes.

"Yeah, I'm in. I am bucking crazy, probably stupid… not to mention gullible; I am in." Dawn lifted his hoof and got a solid clop back from what was, apparently, his new captain. Hole-filled legs and all.

Author's Note

So I do this "Ask x" thing, x can be any pony within the story. You can ask them anything and ~~I~~ they will definitely hopefully reply. Keep the questions appropriate to the age-rating of the stories and of course, ~~I~~ They will answer the best question(s) in the author notes of the next chapter. The more votes a comment has the more likely I will get it to the right pony to answer, try and keep it to one answer per post! ~~I~~ They will pick one question per chapter.

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