What a disaster, I thought, looking at my reflection in the shop's door. My mane and tail had definitely seen better days. Sure, I could hide my bad mane day by 'putting on my face' so to speak, but it didn't change the fact that my mane and tail had suffered significant fire damage. Since I wanted ponies to get used to my buggy form, I'd been going au naturel a bit more often, but now that I looked like I'd lost a fight with a flamethrower, the changeling in the mirror looked a bit more... intimidating than normal.

That's what brought me to the Mane Melody salon. I wanted to see if the stylist Jazz Hooves could do anything before I ended up doing the easy thing, even if it meant I might have to replace some biomass. Besides, it wasn't like short manes were a bad thing. Zipp's mane didn't even go far down her neck, and she still looked good. Hell, It was almost as short as Hitch's. If I decide I don't like the way a short mane looks after all, I am a changeling. Even if I'm a queen, I can be whatever I wanna be. Would definitely throw ponies for a loop if I presented masculine for a while, and that alone might be worth it.

I was unable to stifle a yawn as I decided to just take the plunge. "Hey, Jazz?" I called out as I pushed the door open. "I know I don't have an appointment, but I was wondering if you could—" My words died in my throat. Seated in one of the salon chairs was a pony I'd only seen on the news or in Pipp and Zipp's family photos. That was Queen Haven of Zephyr Heights, in the midst of some sort of spa treatment, and in the chair next to hers was... Sunny? When she popped a cucumber slice off her eye to look at me, I slipped into a quick bow. "Apologies, your Highness; I did not mean to interrupt your treatment. I can come back later."

Even as I saw Sunny mouthing the words 'Help me', Queen Haven smiled. "Think nothing of it dear," she answered in a regal tone. "I'm just here for a little touch-up with my girls for Royal Portrait Day, isn't that right girls?" The older mare glanced around in confusion when no answer came. "Sunny, where did my girls go?"

At the spike of panic from Sunny, I imagine that she was here playing distraction for some reason or another, "I think I just passed them on my way over," I lied; truth be told, I hadn't seen either sister since I woke up in the sheriff's office lock-up and scared the daylights out of Hitch. "They were talking about grabbing a last-minute special accessory." I looked over to the red-headed stylist, even as Sunny discreetly face-hoofed. "I can come back later if now's a bad... "

Before Jazz Hooves had an opportunity to answer one way or another, the queen smiled. "Not at all, dear," Haven responded. "Come, sit. I would love to get to know more about you, especially after your heroic act the other day."

I considered returning to the office to torment Hitch, especially after the pleading look from Sunny. There were shenanigans going on, and without any sort of inkling of whether or not these were good shenanigans or bad ones, I wasn't sure I wanted a part of. I didn't imagine the mother of Zipp and Pipp was a bad pony, but I always had to be very careful how I behaved around crowns, lest the media get the wrong idea.

"I suppose it wouldn't hurt," I agreed, although I turned my attention to Jazz. "I was wondering if there was anything you could do to salvage my mane and tail?"

"I can certainly try," was her only answer. The mare led me over to one of the salon chairs and started getting inspecting my mane. Based on the muttering, it was either gonna be an expensive fix, or it was a hopeless affair. Maybe she's a miracle worker, though.

"So Anonymous," Queen Haven asked after a few moments. "You've introduced yourself as a queen in the past, but never what you are a queen of."

Oh, going right for the throat, I thought, using the large mirror in front of me to gaze at her. "As of right now, nothing," I admitted in an even tone. "In a few decades when I've established a proper hive, I'll be a proper queen, but as of right now, it's more a descriptor of my... I hate to use the word, but it represents my caste. Just as bees have queens, guards, workers, and drones, so do changelings. It's by my caste that I am even capable of ensuring the survival or extinction of my species."

Haven nodded knowingly. "Heavy is the head that wears the crown," she said in a sombre, albeit thoughtful voice. I could sense hints of both respect and doubt coming from her. "Yet still you risked everything to save a stranger..."

I shrugged. "When I establish my hive, I want to lead my children by example, rather than fear," I said firmly. "It didn't work for Chrysalis, but if I can establish a place in the world for my bugs, they won't ever need to resort to predation. We can use our powers to help others." Even if I've still got a grudge against the entity Harmony, I've warmed up to the principles.

Sunny piped up with, "That sounds really cool, and I know that ponies don't seem as wary of you these days."

After that, discussion quickly diverted to my plans. Did I plan on staying in Maritime Bay? Was I considering visiting Zephyr Heights or Bridlewood? Had I given any thought to how I would support myself until I was ready to start my hive? Where was I staying now that the motel had been closed down? You know, that sort of stuff. Honestly, if I didn't know any better, I'd wonder if the older mare wasn't trying to snag herself a court mage.

Until I'd seen the recording fragment of the message Twilight left in the Unity Crystals, I was considering doing a bit of travel and getting the other settlements used to me. If there was something going on, I might be better served to stick around. There was nothing really stopping me from visiting, though. For now, I was just gonna crash in the jail cell until Hitch realised he could just tell me to leave.

As for my income, I had my ideas about how to make some bits.The others definitely seemed fascinated with my bag of holding spell, and I had some ideas as to how I could make personalised spells. I still needed to prototype some things, like making them portable and compact. Unfortunately, it was very much an order-by-order basis, since it required a pony's true name in the spell diagram. Plus, until I'm sure ponies can be trusted with spells, I might wanna find a way to prevent reverse engineering.

~ 04 ~

The manecut we ended up settling on was something just short enough to be considered tomcoltish. Jazzy was willing to dye it, right up until I used bug magic to change the pigmentation of each strand of hair in my mane to resemble a certain blue speedster. She didn't ask me to leave after that, but her demeanour shifted, like the wind was let out of her sails. Then again, maybe she had some suggestions of her own?

After bidding farewell to the Queen, Sunny, and the stylist, I just sorta wandered for a bit. I wasn't exactly ready to press my luck tormenting Hitch for the laughs. There wasn't really anything that I wanted to do right now, and I was pretty sure the other hotel in town was booked well into next year. Hmm, books... Maybe I could check out that Wyld Wytch Edalyn book series I saw someone reading the other day.

Then again, I suppose I could just find somewhere to answer this big backlog of questions that had come in since the fire. Who knew a little heroism was enough to spike the curiosity of others? Save one guy tricked by internet trolls and suddenly everyone wants a question answered. I'd even taken the time to write several of them out to make answering them in bulk easier.

That brought to question the matter of where to do the recording, though. I'd been told in no uncertain terms by a certain by-the-rules killjoy that I couldn't just go recording videos on a roof, regardless of whether or not the building was occupied or not. Similarly, I didn't feel like going caving or walking on clouds. I suppose I could just...

I didn't finish that thought, as I caught sight of a certain pony I'd been hoping to see again. The unicorn I mimicked on the Hitch-stalking day was seated on a bench near the beach. I could tell by the vibrant blue curls peeking over the back of the bench. The young mare was hunched over, radiating anxiety and disappointment.

Quietly, I made my way over to the back of the bench and, hooking my forelegs over the top, I peered down at what seemed to have her attention. It was a mobile phone, much like every pony in this era seemed to have, but from the look of it, it was probably a previous year's model or a hoof-me-down from a family member. Rather than the looking at anything on the screen, the young mare seemed to be fixated on on a hairline crack spiderwebbing across the glass panel of the screen.

"Oooh, cracked screen," I said aloud in a sympathetic tone. "How'd you manage that?"

Misty let out an adorable, startled little squeak, and lost grip of her phone. It bounced between her hooves a couple of times as she tried to catch it, until it got away from her. Luckily, I was there to snag it with my levitation spell. Heck, she looked kinda grateful when I passed it back to her, wreathed in my blue magical field.

"I dropped it on some rocks at the beach when the ground shook," she admitted. It definitely didn't sound like the entire story, but I knew better than to pry. Some ponies simply didn't like it when you drew attention to their clumsiness. "Do you always sneak up on ponies like that?"

I shrugged, looking over the safety barrier in front of the bench and staring over the water. "Only if I wanna get close enough to talk without spooking them. Sorry 'bout the scare, by the way," I answered, flicking my gaze back to her. "Your name's Misty, right? Mine's Anonymous Flicker."

Funny enough, after I mentioned her name, the disappointment she'd been radiating was almost completely eclipsed by an aura of fear and a fresh bloom of anxiety. It was sort of odd, but maybe it just had to do with all those unicorn suspicions. Except, rather than serenade me with a repetition of "Bing bong!" and a demonstration of a jinxie dance, she got herself under control enough to nervously ask, "You, uh... you can't read minds, can you?"

I'll be the first to admit that laughing at such a genuine question was not a nice thing. That I went so far as to drop to the ground in hysterics probably helped very little. Still, I was expecting something... more, you know? Like, 'Are you gonna drain my emotions now?' Asking whether I was psychic had just caught me completely off guard.

"Goodness no," I assured her as I got my laughter reigned in. "Your surface level emotions, sure, and even what you're feeling deep down if I pry, but nothing as clear as thoughts."

Brushing the tears off my face, I rolled back to my belly before once again draping myself over the back of the bench. "No, I sorta borrowed your appearance without permission a while back, when I was stalking the sheriff as part of a bet, and the coffee dude called me by your name," I explained, momentarily transforming all the way into a familiar blue pegasus before returning to my normal state, rainbow mane intact. "It's one thing for me to mimic ponies I knew were cool with it, and those no longer with us, but turning into you without your permission wasn't cool of me. That's why I sought you out... So I could apologise."

Her expression was inscrutable, but her fear quickly bled away, and her anxiety dropped back to previous levels. If anything, she seemed surprised to hear me apologising to her. What kind of home life does someone have to have to have that sort of reaction. "Uh... thanks?"

My eyes flicked down to the phone in her hooves. "I could probably fix that if you want," I offered, glancing across the screen's surface. "Glass looks intact, so a simple Mending spell oughta fix that right up."

There was a lot of suspicion from the young mare, but I was used to that sort of thing. Even before waking up in the current era, some ponies never really trusted that I wasn't about to attack. There was a lot of lingering stigma from one queen's reign, and no amount of goodwill earned by the hive of reformed changelings ever truly erased the trauma my black carapace represented. It was no different now.

She looked from me, down to the phone, and then back to me. "What's in it for you?" Misty wondered aloud, although she immediately looked embarrassed as she brought a hoof up to cover her mouth.

Fair. "Not a thing," I responded with a smile, already projecting and transforming the formula for the cantrip-level transmutation spell into a section of my foreleg. "Sometimes, all we need is to be shown a little kindness, and sometimes, it's just nice to get your good deed for the day out of the way." I held my other hoof over the spell now engraved in my shell and readied myself to channel it. "What'cha say?"

Again, she looked down at her phone. Curiosity, excitement... yeah, you wanna see it, don'tcha kid? "Yes, please," she whispered holding out her phone.

With permission granted, I activated the spell and then reached out with my now glowing hoof. "Boop!" I exclaimed, as I tapped the screen with the glowing hoof. Even as that glow moved over from my hoof to the surface of the screen, we could both see the glass starting to knit itself back together. A dent on the side of the phone itself even popped back out before the spell concluded. "And there you have it,"

As Misty went all starry-eyed, looking at her phone appearing as good as brand new, I reverted the surface of my leg. It was probably time for me to get back to looking for a place to crash or a place to record. Either or would be good. That was the plan, at least, until there came the voice of a certain someone.

"Um... about good deeds," the young unicorn mentioned, hesitance clear in her voice. "I can't offer much, but if there's anything I can do to pay you back..."

~ 04 ~

When Misty returned to Opaline's castle, it was rather late. Although she'd ultimately failed at her objective, it wasn't like hadn't gotten anything out of her excursion. Anonymous had been surprisingly helpful, and had even spent some time with her after fixing her phone screen. She almost felt bad not being honest with the bug pony, but she understood why Opaline wanted her to be cautious.

The dark alicorn was in her throne room when Misty entered, staring down at the magical pool. "So, did you trap them?" Opaline asked, barely looking up from the pool as Misty pushed open the door. "Have those pesky pegasus princesses been provided their stony prison?"

Unable to meet Opaline's eyes, Misty instead stared down at the pool, which seemed to be set to observe the outside of the Crystal Brighthouse, and the pillar of pris-beam energy radiating into the sky. "For awhile, but..."

"But what, Misty," Opaline pressed, frustration already seeping into her voice. "What part of your plan failed?"

Ears drooping, she looked away from the pool and towards the side-door through which the hall to her chambers could be found. Admitting her failures to the mare was akin to admitting weakness, and that was something Misty knew Opaline couldn't abide. "Pipp got a message out on her ClipTrot channel, and ponies showed up to save them," she admitted. "I didn't know there was a hole in the cave roof big enough for them to get a signal through."

With a long drawn-out sigh, the alicorn lit her horn and used what little magic she could access to slam the door shut behind her ward. "Ugh, Misty, what am I going to do with you?" she muttered. "Did anything useful come from today, or has this entire day been a waste?"

Rather than answer, Misty took out her phone, opened ClipTrot, and loaded the changeling's vlog. Queuing up the newest video, she then passed it to Opaline. The alicorn's eyebrows raised when she saw what was on the screen; her ward and the young changeling queen—sporting a garish new mane-style, no less—were standing side-by-side on a scenic overlook in Maretime Bay. The Misty in the paused video looked slightly uneasy, but still... Tentatively, the alicorn hit play.

"Hey, hey, Maretime Bay! Your—hopefully—favourite changeling queen, Anonymous Flicker is here today with a special guest host," the insect on the screen announced, throwing a forelimb over the withers of the pony beside her. "Say hello, Misty!"

Flustered by the physical contact, the unicorn in the video let out a quick, "Hello, Misty!" Opaline could only look up at the real thing in disbelief. Even as the video played, and Anon outlined how she'd gotten a lot of questions, Opaline couldn't stop staring at her young stooge. "Does proceed with caution mean nothing to you?"

Before the mortified young mare before her could respond, the pony's on-screen doppelganger spoke again. "Your first question is from a pony named Sora Borealis," Misty read aloud from a sheet of paper. "You said something before about eating emotions. Does that mean you can tell what ponies are feeling? Can you read minds?"

Onscreen, the changeling nodded. "Yes on the first part, but a gigantic no to the mind-reading," she responded after pretending to take time to consider the question. "Most ponies are quite expressive, and they broadcast their emotional spectrum openly, so I usually know how most ponies are feeling. Back in the day, though, a lot of the Canterlot Royal Guard were good at hiding their surface-level emotions. Prying beyond the surface stuff is super rude though. It's like... seeing what your neighbour has on the clothesline versus rooting through their drawers."

There was a moment that looked as though a few seconds had been cut, and then Misty was there with the next question. "Morning Dew asks, 'If magic can grow huge plants and make ice from thin air, could it also be used to heal somepony who's hurt or sick? If so, how much can it cure?'"

That elicited a sigh from the changeling, and there was another cut. "There are types of healing magic and spells out there," Anon confirmed. "I can't speak for more innate magics like those tied to special talents, but stuff like medical magic usually requires a more in-depth knowledge of the body, its functions, and the like. That said, the effect of magic will vary based on two factors: the type of damage being healed, and how long it takes before your body becomes oversaturated with magic and stops responding to healing spells."

Anon held up her right hoof to the camera, although there was a mark that hadn't been on her foreleg before. "I got into a bit of trouble back when I was a filly, and on top of having a hole going clean through my leg, doctors had to fix up my bones," she said with a laugh, as though it were some kind of fond memory. "I managed to create stress fractures in every bone in my body, and by the time they were done fixing my bones, they had to let the hole heal naturally."

Both the Misty on the screen, and the Misty in the room, did a good job of looking put off by the proclamation. Even Opaline was somewhat disturbed. For a creature to talk about their own suffering as if it was merely Tuesday for her was rattling, even today. Was the changeling entirely sane, or could she snap like little Luna had?

Co-host Misty interrupted by redirecting the conversation away from Anon's grim reminiscence. "Crazy Eightball had a good question," she commented. "When Sunny brought the gem things together, she got those weird wing and horn things, right? Does that mean she's like you, since you have wings and a horn too? What's the difference?"

When there was another jarring cut, she paused the video and looked imploringly to Misty. "She knows a lot of swears," the unicorn explained, "but she wants to keep her blog relatively foal friendly."

"I'm not sure if she can be said to be a true alicorn," Anon said upon the video being resumed. "That said, no, she's not like me. Although a changeling queen's power can rival an alicorn's fully-realised strength, an alicorn's strength comes from their connection to their aspect, whereas my power comes from consumed love and growth over time. I wish I could explain better, but Mom was the one that studied everything."

After a few moments for that to sink in, Misty offered up another question. "Fire Whiskey sent a message asking, 'You said that changelings can feed on love. Does it have a taste, and if yes, can you describe it?'"

It took a few moments for the changeling queen to answer. She'd gone so still that if not for the movements of the Misty on-screen, Opaline might've thought the video had frozen. "Gosh, now that is a hard question," she admitted. "Kinda sorta, but not in the way you think. It's not so much a flavour as it is... Refreshing? If you drink cold water on a hot day, it's not unlike that, but it leaves you feeling all warm inside. You want to savour it, but at the same time, it's something you can't get enough of."

"Are all of these so inane?" Opaline asked her assistant. "These ponies have a veritable trove of information at their hooves, and they don't even know it."

Misty just shrugged as her counterpart on screen read out the next question. "Cracked Egg asks, 'Did you ever have a pet? Are you planning to have a pet, and if so, what kind?'"

The changeling queen shook her head. "No and no. Although I had a wild possum that travelled with me for a time, I've never had a pet. As for right now, it'd be irresponsible to take in any sort of pet when I'm currently without home or fixed income." For a moment, the changeling looked very seriously at the camera, and it felt like she was looking directly into Opaline's soul. "Ponies, although having a pet can be an enriching experience, it is a lifetime commitment—their lifetime. If you cannot ensure a decent quality of living, or afford costly medical bills, please reconsider adopting. When things started falling apart, my friend Fluttershy's animal sanctuary had an influx of sick or elderly pets whose owners could no longer afford to care for them, and some whom could never afford it in the first place, creating health complications. It broke the poor mare's heart, and it wasn't fair to the animals either."

Co-host Misty looked dejected at the end of that little speech. Her ears were folded back, her eyes looked wet with tears, and when she read out the next question, her heart didn't really seem in it. "Celeste wrote, 'Hi Anon, I was reading some science fiction and it got me thinking about something. Are you able to turn ponies into changelings like you, or just transform them into something else in general? I've never really felt right in this body of mine and ever since I've found your blog I've been insanely jealous of your ability to shapeshift.'"

Although the previous question had clearly gotten to Anon, this one straight-up made her look away from the camera. As she looked out over the water, she spoke. "I know how you feel, believe it or not," she said in a hoarse whisper. "Before I became a changeling, before I was a pony, I was something else in another world... I didn't exactly feel used to my pony body, but by the time I'd become a changeling, I'd been through so much that I couldn't even remember what I used to look like."

Blue flame rolled up the changeling's body, and then there stood a tall biped, soft-looking skin of the same black lustre as her chitin had been. A long mane of long rainbow hair spilt down the biped's back, covering their tailless buttocks and anything beneath. If not for the way the hips flared out, there would've been no hint as to the gender. Then, crossing an arm across its chest, it turned, carefully crouching back into frame so that the camera could see the tiny button nose, flat face, and big sad eyes staring back. "The ability to change one's self is only as good as one's ability to keep their goal in sight," she whispered. "I lost sight of that vision when an entire species' cumulative knowledge was stuffed into my head, and this is the closest I'd ever get... but that isn't me anymore."

Opaline could scarcely believe what she'd seen. Long ago, before the age of Starswirl, or even of alicorns, such creatures had been mentioned in legends as ancient friends to ponies. Some even sought to find those creatures through the art of scrying. The only time Opaline had ever glimpsed them were in completely separate planes from Equestria. Humans, they'd been called, but the ones she'd seen were tribal and warlike—vindictive and spiteful; not at all the sort to befriend a completely separate species... and now here one was, albeit reincarnated as a changeling.

Reverting to her original form, Anon looked down at the ground. "I know you're probably coping with your own kinds of hurt, but what it would take to turn someone into a changeling isn't something I'd inflict on anyone," she apologised. "It'd take a number of attendant changelings to create the amount of royal jelly needed for such a transformation, in addition to a whole lot of harvested love. It'd be a long time stuffed in a pod undergoing a painful transformation, and if that didn't break you, the hunger just might drive you feral..."

Misty looked away from the recording. Thinking back, that was probably a painful thing to have to answer, especially since it would probably destroyed that pony's hopes and dreams. It still struck her as odd that she'd choose to answer it, since she definitely would have had time to answer. A more sociable pony would probably have offered a hug, but she'd just stared awkwardly.

"Last question," the Misty on camera announced. "Rainy Skies wrote, 'I saw what you did to that fruit, giving it a 'chilling smile'. Pretty 'cool' trick... Okay, okay, enough with the ice jokes, but runes, huh? Could anypony learn this? You made it sound like we could, but is it realistically possible? Gotta say, conjuring up ice on command would be pretty nice, since it gets pretty warm around here."

Despite this pertaining to the changeling's self-proclaimed favourite topic, there was no life to her answer. "If not for the innate talent in runes provided by my cutie mark, I would've spent decades learning about runes before I got anywhere close to he level of skill I have with them today," she said flatly. "In time, when I think that ponies are ready, I could probably teach about working with runes and spell creation. Until ponies better acclimate to their magic, I shan't do more than perhaps release a book of safe runic spells or translate the copy of Your Horn and You: a Foal's Primer for Magic I have in my magic storage. I might even make a few artefacts containing spells in them on a by-contract basis."

The camera seemed to levitate closer to the changeling's face, which looked very grave. "It's not that I want to hoard knowledge and power for myself, everypony." As the camera pulled back, there was a 3D aerial image of Maretime Bay hovering above Anon's outstretched hoof. In moments, the illusory image of the city was engulfed in a bright light that forced the camera to dim. When the light faded away, the centre of the city was but a massive crater, the outside of which was engulfed in black flame. There was a haunted look in her eyes. Those were eyes that Opaline had seen in soldiers that had come back from war so long ago. "One mistake or really bad day is all it would take to turn everything we know and love into this. An extreme example, to be sure, but magic is not a toy."

As the illusory image dissipated into tiny motes of light, the camera pulled back to reveal a terrified looking Misty. "This is the ancient queen who flew too close to the sun so you don't have to, signing off."

The video ended abruptly. The alicorn looked slowly from the phone to Misty. "Up until she got all scary, she was actually pretty nice," the blue pony offered, accepting the phone back from her mistress. "After she ended the video, she apologised for getting all weird... I think I saw her walk into a bar not long before I left to come back."

"You're dismissed for now, Misty," Opaline said in a strange-sounding voice. "I'll have to intervene on my own as far as those ponies are concerned, but... you did well in bringing this to my attention."

If it weren't for the scary face the alicorn was making, the praise might've made the youth feel happy. The way Opaline was reacting to the video just made the whole thing seem hollow. She couldn't tell what the alicorn was feeling, but this was far worse than anything she'd seen from her before. That's what scared her most.

Once Misty left her throne room, Opaline used her scrying pool to look for the changeling queen. Exactly as Misty had said, the pool revealed the insectine pony slouched over at a bar counter. It looked as if there were a few empty beer bottles sitting beside her, but the big thing worth noting was the two-thirds empty bottle of tequila she was taking shots from. Even though the bug seemed to be making pleasant conversation with the horrified bartender, it was quite obvious she'd been crying.

"What sort of monster did Twilight Sparkle curse us with?" Opaline murmured, rubbing her temples as she fought the onset of a migraine. How could the existence of a true changeling queen have gone unnoticed in the fifteen years following Queen Chrysalis' reformation? Come to think of it, when would Twilight have even had time to experiment on a changeling nymph, give it a cutie mark, and groom it to become proficient in the old magics? The mare was too busy with her school and raising that orphan earth pony... Emerald Flicker, wan't it? That child never had a sister though...

Author's Note

Next time on Vlogs of an Ancient Insect: On Hangovers and Homes.