The Conversion Bureau: Time of the Season

The air was clean, but I expected that. The trees were green, but I expected that too. Everything they said about Equestria at the conversion bureau made it sound like the Garden of Eden, and that’s what it looked like. Something right out of a postcard. Nothing was out of place until I took a breath.

Have you ever had a good, long cry? The kind where your nose gets stuffed up and the tears are hot and you can’t see, and then finally it ends and you take that shaky breath? I had been holding in my emotions ever since we started walking back to camp. I had wanted to cry, but I didn’t. And now, without the intervening part of crying, I got right to the post-cry breath.

It was a breath of hope. It was a breath that said, “Nothing bad has happened yet, and something good might.”

Twilight Sparkle still held us away from the rest of the group. “They’re just getting more routine instruction,” she said. “In your case, I want to talk to Princess Celestia herself about what happened. She’ll decide the best course of action. She’s always able to come up with a good idea.”

“Thank you,” I said.

“Yeah, thanks,” said Caramel. “While we’re waiting, would it be possible to get something to eat?”

I hadn’t eaten for two days. It didn’t even occur to me to be hungry. Now that Caramel had mentioned it, I was ravenous. Moreover, Honeydew must be as bad or worse than me.

“Of course you can,” said Twilight. “Wait right here. I’ll find something for you.”

She ran off. I realized that all three of us were about to have our fates decided by somepony else. As soon as Twilight came back, we would get on a conveyor belt that would take us wherever we were supposed to go. If I wanted to have any say in my own life, any hope of correcting what I had done wrong, it was then, or never.

“Caramel,” I said.

“Yes?”

“I never thanked you properly for coming to find us. You didn’t have to do that. I also need to thank you for returning me to my senses. If you hadn’t suc. . . if you hadn’t done what you did, I would have kept on exactly as I was.”

“I’m not going to pretend that I didn’t enjoy it,” Caramel said.

“That may be. And I’m sure you’re going to make a fine mate for somepony. But I need to tell you that, whatever its significance, it shouldn’t happen again. It shouldn’t have had to happen the first time. For me, my heart belongs to another. Honeydew?”

“Yes?” she said.

“I don’t love you. When I first saw you, back at the bureau, I felt something beyond lust that I hoped might be love. But it was only greed. I wanted to possess you, to own you. A few nights before I was converted, I found out the difference between love and greed. But I couldn’t have the one I loved. I had you instead. And that means that I’m in your debt.”

“Oh, Sleep Tight, you shouldn’t think of it that way.”

“It’s the only way I can think of it, because that’s the way it is. If you want, I will stay with you. Even if Princess Celestia tells us that we should be apart. But I’m going to be bold and ask you to forgive my debt and free me to go seek out the one I do love.”

Honeydew spread her wings and frowned at me. “I don’t love you either. And I don’t want to make you stay. I became a pony because I wanted to be free, and I was lucky enough to grow wings that would let me be even freer. I regret that the first thing they were used for was not flying, but only as an erogenous zone. I mean to correct that at the earliest possible moment. We’ll separate. I’ll learn to fly, and you can go be with her.”

“Agreed, then. We’ll tell the princess that that’s what we want to do.”

Twilight Sparkle returned, and for the next half hour, we were completely focused on eating. The first bites we took were all about getting something in our stomachs, but then the meal became exceedingly pleasant. The food in Equestria proper was even better than the stuff we had in the Bureau. It wasn’t as sharply flavored, but it was savory and nourishing. With the agreement that the mares and I had come to, the meal was filled with pleasant conversation and bonhomie.

“So, Twilight. You’re in charge of the Conversion Bureaus?” I asked.

“Not as directly as that. I came up with some of the organizational structure once Princess Celestia decided to offer conversion to all the humans, and I invented the original ponification serum.”

“Really?” asked Caramel. “Did you get a patent?”

“A what?” said Twilight.

I looked at my fellow newfoals. We didn’t even know if they had property rights here or if everything was communal. It didn’t surprise us that, having performed a major feat of thaumato-chemistry, Twilight had passed it over for general use without demanding a cut of the profits.

“Never mind. How does the serum work?” asked Honeydew.

“Well, it’s difficult to explain to someone who hasn’t been brought up around magic. But I can explain some of the biology. Most of our organs are the same. Where we have mass that humans don’t, I used some vestigial organs to fill in. I believe that your tails are what used to be your appendixes.”

“So it’s a straight one-to-one conversion in mass?” said Caramel. “That would make sense in terms of physics.”

“Actually,” Twilight said, “There is a slight increase in mass when a human is converted. That in itself is not unusual. I once developed a spell to turn a pumpkin into a traveling coach. Conjuring the extra mass is not particularly difficult. It’s just a copy of existing mass. The tricky part is repurposing it. The pumpkin seeds became the wheels. It had to work out that way. I couldn’t have made the pulp the wheels, for example. I can’t really go into more detail without a lot of math.”

I stuck out my tongue. “I can’t stand math. I guess I’m not going to be a very good unicorn.”

Twilight clearly enjoyed explaining her work. “Oh, most unicorns get by just fine without knowing all the science behind their magic. A lot of it is more art than science anyway. What I was going to say is that in the case of the ponificiation serum, I was never able to explain where the extra mass was needed. I ought to have accounted for everything. But it works, so I didn’t pursue the discrepancy further.”

Honeydew looked down at her food. She was clearly deep in thought. “I wonder,” she said.

“Yes?”

“I know that they say we don’t feel anything during the conversion process. But when I was out I had a vague impression. It was like something at the back of my head—what’s the phrase for that bump? The occipital perturbence? That thing. It was like it turned liquid and drained down the back of my neck, down and out of my back. I didn’t think about it at the time. But when I became a pegasus pony, I wondered.”

“It was like that for me too!” I said. “Only it was the front of my head. I felt like my brain turned inside out and became my horn. But then it all filled in later.”

“This could be something,” said Twilight. “How about you, Caramel? Did you feel anything?”

“No. I just went right to sleep and woke up the way you see me.”

“Hang on,” I said. “Maybe I’ve got it. The human brain has three parts. The cerebrum is where the actual thinking happens, the cerebellum controls motor function, and the medulla is for the vitals. What if the conversion takes one of those and uses it to determine what type of pony you are? Unicorns wear their cerebra on their foreheads, pegasi have their motor control become their wings, and Earth ponies’ muscles are made up of the medulla.”

“It’s an interesting hypothesis,” said Twilight. “And definitely worth looking into. I never actually got to work with live humans when I was developing the serum. I need to find one and get a good look at this brain structure you’re talking about. Anyway, is everypony finished eating?”

We were. Ponies used plates and napkins just as much as humans did, but in a pinch they could just eat off the ground. There was no cleanup.

“Can you see the tall towers in the distance?” said Twilight. ”That’s Canterlot Castle. We’ll meet Celestia there.”

Well, this was it. We had been caught having sex on a school trip, and it was time to go to the principal’s office. Fitting, since Equestria was a principality after all.

I really hate puns.

I had imagined Princess Celestia as this ten-story-tall goddess. When we were actually brought in, she was not nearly as scary. She was large, to be sure, and an alicorn, but she was a pony just like the rest of us. Twilight knelt before her, so I did the same.

“Hello, Twilight. Some new friends?” Celestia said.

“Yes, Princess. These are some of the newfoals that just entered. On the way, there was an incident.” She recounted our story without being explicit.

“I see. Ms. Icing?”

“Yes, Princess?” Caramel said.

“You were put in a dangerous situation, and acquitted yourself well. Do you have any further grievance against this stallion?”

“Oh, no, your highness. I really didn’t mind. I actually enjoyed it a little.”

The princess smiled. “Well, it is the season after all. We merely prefer to have things done under controlled situations. You may go.”

Caramel realized that her dismissal was not phrased as a request, and hightailed it out of Celestia’s chamber.

“And now,” the princess said, “on to you.”

I gulped. For all I knew, I was about to be destroyed. But the princess looked at Twilight. “Have you performed the test?” she asked.

“No, Princess,” said Twilight. “I thought it best to wait.”

“Very well. You may do so now.”

I didn’t know what they were talking about, but Twilight pointed her horn at Honeydew and cast a spell. She bristled a little, then her midsection glowed with magic. Twilight turned to the princess and nodded.

“I see,” said Celestia. “Congratulations, Ms. Honeydew. You are going to have a foal.”

“What?!” I said.

I was stupid. I had still been thinking human. Sex among humans, no matter how enlightened they grew, remained a taboo, something dirty. Ponies could talk about it more freely. Babies—foals—were still a blessing to them. I had been worried about being punished simply for my lustful ways. I hadn’t thought about the consequences that nature would have in store.

The princess ignored my outburst. “You will be the first newfoals to have an offspring. I know that it can be overwhelming, but rest assured that everypony will want to help you. Twilight, will you take care of them, please?”

I was still stunned. I walked when they prodded me, but I wasn’t paying attention to where I was going. I didn’t know if Twilight or Honeydew was talking or if we just walked in silence. When I finally returned to my senses, I said, “But we had agreed to separate.”

I forgot that I planned to tell this to the princess. She had hustled us in and out so fast. She was probably busy. That, along with the bombshell she had dropped, had taken me out of the conversation for a while.

Twilight looked at us and said, “Right now I’ve assigned you a double-occupancy dwelling. If you want to change, look around for two singles and let me know.”

We followed her. The dwelling she referred to looked like something out of a book that told you how the Amerindians really lived, and that all your impressions of them were wrong. It was a long, squat building, and by my quick count it could house around a hundred newfoals. Native ponies would not want to live there. It was more of a dormitory than a house. The room that she showed us to was nicer than the single-occupancy rooms that we passed. We at least had a sitting area with a couch and table. This was most definitely a place that we would only live in until we could afford something better.

I would have to get a job. And Honeydew, she would have to find one of her own if we were to be able to separate. There must be something that a pregnant mare can do. Of course, I’d have to save up some so that once she couldn’t work, or even move, I could take care of her. But once I got past that hump, I would be done with her.

Twilight left us alone. She promised to return that afternoon to get us settled further. I started making mental notes of things to ask her. More magic classes, for one, and job training. A week and a half ago, I had gone into the Conversion Bureau looking for a new life. Not better, just different. Well, I had it now, and it was up to me to sink or swim.

Honeydew sat on the couch, her wings folded against her.

“Well, we made it to Equestria,” she said. “Not exactly how we wanted or expected, but we’re here.”

“Yes,” I said. “But we’ve still got a ways to go. I was just thinking that we’ll want to stay on top of getting our own places as soon as possible. When Twilight returns, I’ll talk to her about working and such.

“All right. In the meantime, I’m going to take a little nap. I’m a little overwhelmed.”

“With the new world?”

“With being a mother,” she said.

This was a reversal. I was the one who liked sleeping so much that I took it for my name. She put her head down and closed her eyes. I started to walk away, but something was wrong. The tableau of her lying there offended the eye. I realized what was wrong. Quietly, I found what I thought was the closet. Using my magic, I levitated a pillow and blanket out and brought them to where she was lying. I tucked her in and smiled.

Without opening her eyes, she said, “Thank you, honey.”

I looked at Honeydew, sleeping there. I felt those instincts again. That extra mass in my brain that I hadn’t signed on for. I knew they would never let me leave. The foal would be born in another year, and then I would raise it. Even though I felt nothing for Honeydew, I would fake it. I would learn to become the best actor Equestria had ever seen. For the sake of the foal, who would need the love of a father and a mother, I would have to stay. I had no choice.

I would change diapers, wake up in the middle of the night, and clean up sick. I would teach the ABCs and the basics of math before sending my little one into the hooves of more qualified ponies. I would see my foal growing into maturity, and make sure that my mistakes were not repeated for another generation. And then, finally, have to wave goodbye as the colt or filly became a stallion or a mare. But once all that was done, then I would be my own master again.

Or would I? Eighteen or twenty years meant eighteen or twenty more mating seasons. Would I really be able to keep my hooves off Honeydew when the urge struck me again next year? When she knelt down and flared those wings in my face, would I really be able to resist? And if I didn’t, what would that mean other than brothers and sisters?

How long would this last? How much would I have to go through. A loveless marriage that would last my entire life? No. I swear that someday I will be free.

I will learn to control myself. I will grow beyond my lust. Someday I will be impotent, or Honeydew will fall barren, and my last child will be grown up. Then at last, I know that my instincts will release their hold on me. Honeydew will not need me anymore. I will walk out the door, and we’ll both say goodbye.

That day will be the start of a journey. Until that day all I will have is a flame within me. Not even hope. Just the hope of a hope. There’s no reason to expect that she will wait for me. There’s no reason to think that we’ll both survive that long, or, if we do, that we’ll be able to reach each other. What had she said? Equestria is a big country. It’s getting bigger all the time.

I finally understood the dream I had during my conversion. Princess Celestia had looked into my heart and asked herself if there was anything worth saving in this wretched soul that could be purified into being a pony. I had passed that test. But Princess Luna was not so forgiving. She demanded penance. She saw all of my lust and how it consumed me. That couldn’t be converted by a magic serum. Only time and sacrifice would work.

Very well. I’ll work, and I’ll sacrifice. . . and I’ll make it. If it takes me forty years, I will make that journey. I will keep my heart beating and my hooves moving until the end of it. I will scour all of Equestria if I have to. I’ll pay the penance. I’ll make it through the long day of atonement. And then I will find my Happy Monday.