Breakfast was silent as we ate. I don't think either of us was willing to spoil our appetites with rough conversation, so we just enjoyed our waffles and blueberries in peace. Inevitably though, our plates were left bare and all that was left to do was for one of us to speak up. I ended up going first, unwilling to let it stew any further.

"... Last night was, amazing. I, don't know how to describe how I felt about it. You, are so important to me on a level that I- its, impossible. It's primal. Instinctual almost. I don't know if this is how it is supposed to feel, or its a quirk of what I am, but I Love you. I need you to be safe, and okay..." She looked shocked. I felt the same way, I liked Carina, I had slept with her, I had already been living with her, but these feelings were kicking my ass and I couldn't pinpoint where exactly they were coming from. Only that they were for her.

"I, I don't know what to say? I love you too? No, sorry, that's not a question. You have done so much for me in a short amount of time and all you have asked me to do is be myself. Even if this never goes any further, I am grateful for everything. I don't want you to ever think otherwise." I looked down and nodded to her in understanding silently. "I just, where is all of this coming from and where is it all going? That's the question I guess. What does our relationship have to do with you smelling like my mom?"

"... You didn't notice last night, but you began to molt again."

"What? When?" She was looking over at herself, trying to find the cracks.

"Around your barrel, and it cracked away from you every time I, uh, hilted?"

"Balls-deep?"

"Whatever you want to call it. You went down, the chitin popped off." I pulled out the plating I pulled off of her last night through a portal, blushing. "This came off of you. You can see where your mammaries were and everything, and you are slightly rounder in the abdomen now."

"Wow, your right! Wait, is it just the sex? Do I think you smell like my mom now because you both smell like sex?"

"No, I'm getting there." I put the plate down and tapped my finger over it, stalling. "... I was worried. I still am worried. Toby, who we still have to pick up, caused you to molt everywhere all at once. He basically overfed you and your body grew to make use of all the Love. The sex though, it didn't just make you grow, it changed your shape." She was poking at her teats now. I ignored it as best I could. "So, I thought, I needed to know what was happening to you. What I was doing to you. And I remembered what you told me about your hive..." She narrowed her eyes at me.

"You confronted my mom. What made you think that was a good idea? I'm not even built the same as the rest of my family anymore."

"No, but you changed, albeit slightly, as a result of having sex. You and your siblings were outright banned from, and severely punished for having sex while Queen Culicidae had sex nearly constantly, with men of any species. Changelings included. Seeing you change, as a result of us sleeping together, it made me suspicious. She was hiding something." Carina raised an eyebrow at me, skepticism written all over her face.

"You thought she was keeping the 'power of sex' all to herself? You know how ridiculous that sounds?"

"Yeah, well, she admitted to it."

"... What? How did you get her to tell you anything." I gulped.

"I, started by trying to trade the information in return for some items I could create that held Love in them. She wouldn't play ball though. She was lying and I called her out on her bullshit. Your mom, well, attacked me. And I, responded in kind." She had her hoofs over her eyes.

"Elfilis, why?"

"I don't know what came over me. I'm not very happy with myself either. I... I think that I really did almost kill her..." Tense silence. Uneasy peace. I hated it. "... Regardless, I found out what I needed. Your mom, she isn't Queen because she is older or anything like that. Any changeling can become like her, but it requires that they have sex. It sends signals to the rest of the body that says 'I'm an adult, I'm ready to start my own hive, I'm trying right now,' and then the body creates all the stuff it needs to reach royal maturity."

"So you and I last night...?"

"Yeah. It wasn't just the next step for us, it literally started your metamorphosis into a full mature changeling. And, I don't even know what that will entail, not just because I don't know how prolific your kind is, but because you also aren't of the same kind anymore." Carina had her eyes furrowed in concentration. She clearly understood just how big a deal this was, or was at least understanding of how strongly I felt about it.

"... All right. Come on, we're going to the lake to wash up. I'm not continuing this conversation while we're sticky and you smell like mother."

I ran a soapy comb through her mane as we waded into the shallower end of the water, meanwhile she scrubbed my thighs clean with a towel. It was much easier than when I had to deal with all this fur myself.

"Alright big guy, do you have any ideas on what to do?" I got started on her tail as I gave her my two cents... The hell is a cent?

"I don't want to bother the princesses about this. They are trying to restructure an entire government to give Luna back some power, make an education reform, and are brainstorming a solution to the changeling hive and their invasive plans. We could ask Celestia's student for help though. I would tentatively call her a friend, or at least friendly. Plus she owes me for shooting me in the sack."

"She what?"

"Unimportant. She's really smart and could at least offer us insight or point us in the right direction if nothing else."

"Alright, I'm convinced. Don't think we aren't going to talk about you attacking my mom by the way. She's a bitch but she's still mother, you know?"

"I don't know. And not to distract you, but if you keep changing shape Rarity is going to have to keep remaking your dress."

"Fuck, your right. Help me clean myself up, I'm not going to make her measure my ass while it's got your stains on it."
Sweet angel Carina. Don't ever change.

We ended up going to Twilight's first. After a short greeting we were all seated at her table with some tea. She was still tired from this morning I guess.

"Not that I mind seeing you two, but what is it that you needed me to send Spike away for at ten in the morning?" Carina chuckled as she put an empty teacup down.

"Unless you want him to hear about how Elfilis was in my marehood last night..." I took over at this point. I didn't need Twilight getting flustered right now.

"What she means to say, is that her body is changing dramatically as a result and we were hoping you would be willing to help us figure out what, exactly, is happening to her body." The lavender librarian was blushing something fierce, but I could see that look she had when I spoke to her and her friends at the castle. I had caught her curiosity.

"What kinds of changes are we talking about? Most mare's bodies start changing as a result of copulation, especially if it results in pregnancy."

"Well, Carina had a minor molt during sex. Her barrel changed shape and size enough that her old chitin didn't fit anymore. And if what little information I was able to find myself is correct, that will only be the beginning." She had her notebook out.
"I... can't tell you what species she is right now. That information is a bit sensitive right now, I think. You'll have to ask the Princesses if you really want to know more." She frowned, but nodded and started writing a letter off to the side with her magic. She now had two quills writing two different things at the same time. Damn. Carina took over for me.

"I'm unique among my kind, so I can guess what I'll look like after so long, but I'll probably only be half-right. And my only example of a sexually active... pony, is my own mom. So... If you could help us track what my body does to itself, that would be great."

"What do you hypothesize will happen to you? Physiologically?" Twilight was in full-swing now. She really was as smart as Spike said she was.

"Her mom is the same height as Celestia, but we can only assume she started her transformation much smaller than Carina already is. Assuming that Alicorn height isn't the hard cap of her species height, she could easily end up larger than me." Both mares seemed shocked at this. It made sense didn't it? "Carina? How many children does your mom have on average?"

"Oh, uh... A clutch or two every month? It was never exact, and she had partners too often for me or Chrysie to really figure out when it was she was getting pregnant." Twilight slowed down in her note-taking to look at her.

"Her pregnancies were variable? Did the number of eggs laid per clutch change based on the amount of time passed since the last birth? And how many eggs is in a clutch generally?"

"Phhht, okay. So, yes, I think so, and it was usually no more than ten eggs? I was never allowed to see them, so I'm only guessing."

"Your mom really didn't want any of you understanding your own biology, did she? Can you think of any reason why this is?" I could think of a few.

"Carina's mom is physically and magically stronger than all of her children as a result of her promiscuous lifestyle. Presumably anyway, her body is definitely stronger but I can't confirm if her magic is made any more potent for it. So theory one is that she kept the results of sex a secret to conserve power."

"That's crazy! She would really do that to her kids?"

"Maybe, I have a second theory though." Carina was curious too, I hadn't discussed this with her yet. "We are talking about a hive, all members are the child of the same Queen. And as we just heard, the Queen laid any number of new members between ten or twenty every month. One member of the race can have more than a hundred children a year. I think, if all of the females were just as sexually active, the hive would very quickly run into a food shortage." The two of them had looks of pensiveness on their face, though it looked like pouting on Carina. Twilight spoke up next.

"That also makes sense, but food is pretty plentiful nowadays. What do... What does the hive eat? What makes up your diet?" I just looked at Carina. That one was all for her to answer. She huffed at me before talking to Twilight.

"We can eat just about anything, but fruits and vegetables, meats and grains, all of them are complementary to our most vital food source. We could eat all the apples in the world and we would still starve just as quickly as if we chose to fast without it." She tapped her hooves on the table. "Its... Love. Of other creatures. The actual emotion, and the energy it generates while a pony or otherwise is feeling it."

"Well, how does that work?" Twilight didn't even pause. She just kept going, and I could tell that caught the pink bug off guard.

"Um, we have to know how magic moves through somepony's body, and we use those channels to siphon the magical energy of Love from them into us. We can store it in small amounts for later, but it's not very efficient. But, yeah. I guess it's possible that our typically predatory nature might mean we have a harder time feeding than others."

"You did tell me," I said, "That there was no one who could ever claim to have not been hungry at any point in time. You might just be the only healthy mare of your kind, which is why you haven't felt hungry." Twilight's quill was being run between her teeth as she concentrated on her notes. She put them down to talk to us.

"I'll need a day to organize all this, but I am willing to help. I'll need to see if I can't get Ponyville General to lend some medical equipment before I try anything though. Just let me take a measurement of your barrel before you go so if changes before we meet again I can calculate the rate of growth."

It was only moments later we found ourselves on our way to Rarity's. I had just been about to knock on her door when Carina saw how late in the day it had gotten and ran off to collect Toby. So I ended up in front of the fashionista by myself when she answered.

"Elfilis darling? Is there anything I can do for you?"

"Uh, yeah I need to talk to you about 'Rina's dress. Is it okay if I come in?"

"Of course, of course, right this way." I ducked my way and only stoppped for a second to wave at some filly in the corner who was sipping at a juice box. Her eyes were quite wide as she shyly waved back at me. "Ah, that is my sister, Sweetie Belle. Sweetie, this is Elfilis, he is a friend of me and the girls." I guess we were friends. Not like I had only talked to them a few times since I face-planted in front of them all. "Now, what did you wish to discuss?"

"I know it's probably a pain, but is it possible to make it... stretchy? Or so it can get bigger?"

"I... suppose. May I ask why? It's not a normal request. I usually get such order from mares when they, are... expecting..."

"Oh, uh, no. Nothing-"

"Sweetie Belle? Why don't you go hang out with your friends for a bit? This might be a bit of a big order." The filly just nodded, the juice box falling off its straw as she ran out of the Boutique. "Now, tell me everything. When did this happen? You have only been here for awhile, and I thought you had met Carina after the whole Nightmare Moon fiasco."

"Uh, last night?" She just looked at me weird. "I don't think she's pregnant. Her species just, changes, in response to sex. Her body is growing, and between yesterday and today some of her measurements changed. Treating the dress like a pregnancy dress is probably the right idea though."

"I see. Well, it is no issue. All of the Gala dresses are in their early stages, it will be easy to make changes as they are. You know, I won't judge if she is pregnant. You don't need to make excuses." I shook my head and opened my mouth, but then something occurred to me.

Queen Culicidae laid eggs at least once every month.

"... If she she is pregnant, we'll find out within the month... No, probably within the week... Fuck."

Author's Note

Being sick sucks and stuff. Enjoy