The larvae squirmed and hissed, tiny tongues licking at the air, searching in vain for the love they’d never tasted but desperately longed for. The one who should have loved them walked past the line they’d been herded into, staring dispassionately at them.
“Nursery,” she said, shaking a particularly touchy larva from the hole in her foreleg. The caretakers nodded, likewise showing no emotion.
“Construction,” she said pointing at a pair who were already chewing a hole into the floor.
“Infiltration,” was her assessment of the four who stood very still, watching her intently.
“Recon,” she said about the one cowering behind a stray lump of hardened slime.
The last hatchling hissed loudly at her, and moved to interpose itself between her and the others. For the first time, she smiled. “Patrol.”
===
“Patrol is the most important job in the hive,” said the older changeling to the newbies. “Can anyone tell me why?”
Pharynx eyed him suspiciously. There were rumors about him. That didn’t stop him from being the first to answer, however. “Because we protect the hive!”
“Ha. No. Recon protects the hive,” replied their teacher. “Yes, we’ll get involved in the actual fighting, but knowing who we need to bring our hoof down on with overwhelming force makes the actual fight easy. Easy enough that we hardly ever have to actually fight.
“Recon protects us,” he continued, “Infiltration keeps us fed. Construction keeps a roof over our heads. The Nursery keeps the hive growing. But Patrol is the most important job in the hive, because we keep the hive loyal.”
None of them were stupid enough not to pretend to understand what he meant by that, and he wasn’t stupid enough to mistake their silence for understanding.
“When you’re standing guard, you’re not there to stop some outsider from getting past,” he explained. “You’re there to watch the other changelings. Is someone trying to go somewhere they don’t belong? Sick, injured or confused? Trying to shirk their duty? Any deviation from the norm is suspicious, and it’s our job to pounce on it, without mercy.”
“I’ve never seen any of the changelings on Patrol kill anyone,” Pharynx remarked.
“Good. You’re not supposed to. And don’t get me wrong – not every infraction deserves death. Sometimes a good changeling just needs a warning, or a reminder – the right kind of dirty look at the right moment can be enough to put someone back on the loyal path. But sometimes…” He shook his head. “Officially, if we suspect any sort of serious disloyalty, we’re to bring the suspect before the Queen for judgment. There she’ll listen to them whine and make their excuses, and then execute them by sucking out all their love. But Chrysalis hates doing that. We’re her children – she loves us. She doesn’t want to see one of us fall so far that she has to resort to the ultimate penalty.
“Fortunately, as Patrol, we’re allowed to deputize any changeling we see to come with us on our rounds.” The instructor shook his head. “And it’s a sad fact of life that not everyone who goes out on one of our deep patrols comes back alive. Do with that knowledge what you will.”
“So you’re saying we should take them out into the desert and kill them,” one of the other trainees asked, looking proud to have figured it out.
Pharynx rolled his eyes. What an idiot.
“Yes that’s what I’m saying!” snapped the instructor. “I didn’t want to actually say it though. You’re supposed to be smarter than that!” He slapped the offender on the side of the head, knocking him to the ground.
===
Thorax climbed into the burrow Pharynx shared with him, late again, looking dejected and tired. This wasn’t exactly unusual. “Brother, I don’t think I’m cut out for being a scout.”
“What is it this time?” Pharynx asked. Thorax doubting himself wasn’t exactly unusual either. “We managed to get your shape changing under control, so what in Chrysalis’ name is it this time?”
“We were doing threat assessment, and when it was my turn they asked me how many changelings I should summon to intercept a lost foal,” Thorax said.
“Let me guess – you wanted half the hive?” Pharynx snorted. “Can’t underestimate the destructive power of a high-pitched shriek.”
“No, I –” he sighed. “That’s just it – you’re just like all the rest of them! Why would we summon anyone to take out a foal? I said we just turn into a butterfly or something and lead them away.”
Pharynx laughed.
“And they all laughed at me, just like that,” Thorax said. “‘You’re not an infiltrator, don’t try to manipulate ponies, you don’t have the training’, blah blah blah. They want me to bring down the wrath of the hive to murder a foal!”
“Foals have eyes, and mouths,” Pharynx said. “They can give away our presence just as easily as any adult. Besides, we don’t kill ponies. We capture them and put them in pods to use as a love source. You like to eat, don’t you?”
Thorax was silent for a while, but just as Pharynx was about to officially call the nightly temper tantrum handled, he spoke up again. “Not really,” he said, in a whisper. “I can’t help but—”
“Thorax, stop talking,” Pharynx growled.
He didn’t stop. “I can’t stop thinking about the ponies in pods, or the ones our infiltrators trick.”
“Stop talking now,” Pharynx repeated.
“The ones we capture, the ones we kidnap, they never see their loved ones again!”
Pharynx growled, “Seriously, shut your mouth this instant.”
“I don’t want to be part of this hive anymore. We’re monsters, Pharynx. Evil, soulless monsters.”
Pharynx closed his eyes, and cleared his thoughts. “Thorax,” he said. “I think you need to learn to look at this from another perspective.”
“What do you mean?” Thorax asked.
“Come with me on patrol tomorrow, and I’ll show you what we’re protecting.”
===
“Where are we going?” Thorax asked, as the two of them flew quietly through the clear sky of the badlands. They were shaped like falcons, of course – deep aerial patrols couldn’t be done in changeling form, for fear of giving away the hive.
“We’re on patrol, we’re not going anywhere,” Pharynx answered. Why was his brother such an idiot? Had they really hatched from the same clutch?
“You said you were going to show me something,” Thorax said.
Pharynx didn’t answer, and they flew on for a while, until they reached Ghastly Gorge, on the edge of the Badlands. It was close enough to pony territory that you’d sometimes see a straggler, and dangerous enough that the ponies didn’t think anything of said stragglers vanishing into thin air. Today they were alone, however. Pharynx lead Thorax down to the edge of the gorge, over the section where the Quarry Eels lurked, waiting to snap up any bit of meat that fell down into their jaws.
“I don’t like this place,” Thorax said, turning into a rock, reflexively. “I don’t feel safe here.”
“It isn’t safe,” Pharynx said. “I take changelings here when they have their doubts about what we need to do to protect the hive. When they start to see us as the bad guys. As the monsters.”
He kicked a rock over the edge – not Thorax. Not yet. A giant eel lunged out of the wall and crushed it to gravel in its jaws, then retreated as if it was never there.
“So you show them the real monsters?” Thorax asked.
Phraynx set a hoof on his brother’s… rock. “I guess I do,” he replied.
“And then they stop questioning Chrysalis’ orders?”
Pharynx laughed, bitterly. “I guess they do.” But he still didn’t kick his brother over the edge.
“Because you kill them,” Thorax said. He didn’t sound scared. He just sounded tired.
“Ha! I knew you weren’t as stupid as you look,” Pharynx said.
Thorax turned back into a changeling, and looked up at Pharynx, pitifully. “Do it, then. I can’t live another day as a monster.”
“Get out,” Pharynx said, turning his back on his brother.
“What?”
“Get out of here!” he snapped. “Turn into a bird and fly the feathery flock away.”
“You’re letting me go?” Thorax asked, incredulous.
Pharynx nodded, without turning back around. “Just don’t come back. Ever. Or they’ll kill me.”
There was the rush of flames as Thorax transformed, but before he left, he asked, with hope in his voice “Did you let the others run away too?”
Pharynx closed his eyes, and shook his head. When he turned around, minutes later, Thorax was gone.
