A Conspiracy of Order

With morning came awareness, and awareness brought with it the realization that several preparations were needed before the meeting with Twilight Sparkle. The parasite inside his ass passed those requirements up Dapper-Bit’s spine, and he felt them slotting into place like items on a list.

Collect urine to mix with cider.

Rent a cart from Mr. Cumulus.

Re-pot the Nest.

The last was accompanied by an image-concept of the Nest’s point of view of him from behind. The plant, which had once been barely two feet tall, now stood at least five feet high, and the top actually peered over his rump. It was nearly at a level with his head if he leaned forward rather than standing tall, and that meant that the pot was going to need some serious expansion. Dapper-Bit was given the dimensions by the parasite, and knew that the parasite had been given the dimensions in image-translation from the Nest itself so that it would be done properly.

But the process started with urine collection. He would start at the top and work his way down, as instructed.

He was trotted mechanically over to the nightstand, where he’d left a series of other bottles after a quick trip back down to the wagon. Rather than wine, this time he chose cider, pulling the cork out before tilting the bottle out. He drained a little less than half of the drink, ensuring that the remaining yellow liquid should mask most of the taste that he’d be putting in to replace it, and set the bottle on the floor.

Even without the parasite helping him, he knew that this would have been a nearly-impossible task for a solo stallion. Without hooves to hold the bottle, or someone else to guide his shaft, there was no way to aim easily at it. Yet, the parasite knew what the body could do, and knew how to guide it better than he did.

Slither, slide, shift. His shaft came loose from his sheath in short order, wiggling down and half-extending as the parasite experimented with various levels of erection until it found one that would fit for the purpose, neither so soft that it would flop around, nor so hard that it would strangle the flow of urine and send it spraying. It was just the right level of rigidity for their purposes.

He felt the pleasant drain more as information than sensation, something that he was noticing was becoming more and more the case. The parasite and the Nest dealt with basic data rather than sensation, and to make him a better drone, they were encouraging the same sort of thought with him. The feelings of his body, the pleasure, the general intimate sensations that it felt, were distant unless appropriate, and that seemed to be the case for the immediate future, as well.

He wondered, briefly, if he would feel anything if he was made to rut or be rutted. The curiosity was stifled shortly after; it was not suitable to the Nest’s purposes.

Once the bottle was refilled with his urine, mixed properly with the cider until there was no visual difference, he corked the bottle again and set it on the nightstand. He glanced over his shoulder at the Nest, agreed with its measurements –

No. Second item on the list first. Cart.

The parasite barely needed to nudge him for that one. He was learning, and he was getting better.

It didn’t take long. Mr. Cumulus was always on the lookout for more bits, and passing over a few to rent one of the inn’s carts for the morning and afternoon was fine with him. Only cost the drone a couple bits, too, so it wasn’t like he lost much doing it. Not that it would have mattered if he did. This was for the Nest, after all.

He brought the half-shattered pot that the Nest rested in down the stairs. The early morning meant that there was nobody to watch the clumsy attempts to get it around corners or avoid cracking the pot further, which was all for the better, because it quickly became ridiculous. Even Mr. Cumulus arched an eyebrow as he went by, and the pegasus was usually quite a bit more circumspect about his customers than that.

But bits were bits, and business was business. The other stallion left him to his business.

Step three, replanting the Nest, took less time than he expected, and the rich soil just outside of the wagon lot was more than sufficient for his purposes. The bigger pot meant getting rid of a little more of his inventory in his wagon, but the continued existence of the Nest, and its comfort and viability, was the only important factor. Bits, income, all of that didn’t matter for the moment.

With that done, it was time to move on. It was time for Twilight Sparkle to become part of the Nest.

He half-expected the plant to plug into him as they walked through Ponyville, but either the Nest was hiding its identity from any morning walkers, or it was allowing the parasite within him to stay in control. Dapper-Bit didn’t know which it was, and in short order, he was convinced that it didn’t matter. Either way, he was of service to the Nest, and that meant that he was being a proper drone.

As he trotted through town, he was aware of the lack of many ponies on the street. The early hour was part of that, but he imagined that was the reason for their early departure. Getting to the library early would mean fewer ponies that might see what was happening between him and Twilight, less potential witnesses to the infestation and programming, and less likelihood that the Nest would be in danger. All good reasoning, and all done without his intervention. The Nest was growing, becoming more and more capable of making its own decisions, and that was all for the better; he was supposed to rely on it rather than the other way around.

It did not take long to reach the town library. Dapper-Bit looked up, feeling the parasite looking through his eyes, analyzing and storing away what he saw. The tree itself had once been – according to his older memories, back when he was younger – a tree that had stood in a small clearing in the middle of the town. It hadn’t been that large back then, little more than a little tree that offered the unicorn that lived there a home. It could have housed a few people, but not much more than that in addition to the small library.

Now, with the power of the alicorn princess that still lived there after her rise to Princess-hood, it had spread. The massive trunk of the tree had spread to take up the entirety of the clearing, and some of the houses that had once bordered it had been attached to the new, larger trunk. It soared over the center of Ponyville, creating a shaded, surprisingly comfortable sort of place, and he had come here many times to offer some of the rare things that he’d found on his trips to the librarian within. Considering that she got half her budget from Canterlot and the royal siblings, she often had plenty to spend.

Rapping a hoof against the front door, he heard the usual tumble from inside, followed by a familiar yelp, and then the tinkle-tinkle of magic catching a few things falling down. The instinctive smile was not allowed; the parasite was in full control, now, and it didn’t need to smile until –

Right then. As the door opened, he felt the parasite pull the corners of his mouth back and up, and just in time as Twilight poked her head around the door. Her glasses reflected him, and he saw no difference to his usual appearance. The parasite was imitating him perfectly.

“Hello?” Twilight called, her horn glowing as her glasses adjusted themselves. “Oh, Dapper-Bit! Hello! It’s been a while.”

“Indeed, indeed. I have a new specimen for you.”

“Oh, where – oh Celestia!”

The alicorn all but darted out of the library building, running in blurred circles around the cart as her eyes went wider and wider and her smile grew bigger and bigger. It would have been charming, but he was only vaguely aware of the smile that the parasite forced on his face. It knew that he would have indulged Twilight with that even if he hadn’t felt it himself, and so it waited, pushing down the impatience that it felt on behalf of the Nest to allow the alicorn her fascination.

“This is extraordinary! I’ve never seen anything like it. Even the changeling-plants were more like standard deviations of flora species, but this –” She shook her head. “Where did you find it?”

“Not that far outside of Dodge Junction; it was hiding in the shade.”

“It’s a desert flower? It’s huge.”

“I know, but that’s part of what makes it so interesting, right?”

“Oh, stars, yes.”

She was completely infatuated with the plant already. The parasite and the Nest had known from his memories that she would be, and Dapper-Bit felt a slight surge of pride at the knowledge that he had been helpful to the Nest. She had been completely enraptured by its strangeness, and now, they could move in for the kill.

“I wanted you to have the chance to see it before everything got busy,” he said. “Shall we go inside?”

“Oh, yes, yes. That’s a better idea. You just take the cart around, and I’ll float this right in. Oh, boy, oh, boy, oh, boy.”

She was beyond excited, all but bouncing on her hoof-tips, and the parasite held that information in deep. There was a possibility that she would be too excited to see through any mistakes it made, but the parasite told itself – and him – that they should still be careful. The Nest was in the hooves of one of the most powerful alicorns in the land, according to Dapper-Bit’s own memories. It was best not to take too many chances while they were dealing with this.

They rolled the cart around to the other side of the tree before stepping inside. No sooner had they passed through the door than the lock came down, keeping it shut tight against any other clients of the library. Dapper-Bit had assumed that would happen – it always did when they had their early morning meetings, as Twilight didn’t like interruptions of her experiments and fascinations – and he nodded to himself as things went the same as they always did.

The parasite was content, too. It squeezed him as a reward, and he took the tingling data of pleasure as the satisfaction that it was meant to be.

They walked through the lines of bookshelves to find her again, eventually stumbling upon the purple-maned, lavender-furred mare in one of the open areas of the library. A table served as the Nest’s resting place, and she circled it with poofs and pops of teleportation spells, staring at the long tendrils that hung down from the Nest’s petals, whispering to herself constantly. There were bursts of notes and observations, some of which were written down on spare pieces of paper that flew through the air, but most of them were just lost to the echoes of the empty library.

Dapper-Bit’s smile was gone, but ready to come back at a moment’s notice if the parasite decided that it was needed. He walked around the table, carrying with him the bottle of urine-cider between his jaws. She didn’t even notice until he pulled a couple of cups out from under the table that he had even come back.

“Oh! Sorry, I was just – this is so – it’s so different. It doesn’t seem like a desert plant at all.”

“I was hoping that you could tell me what it was. Maybe tell me where I can sell it.”

“That’s the thing! I don’t know if I can.”

“Oh? Is it that new?”

He popped the cork as the mare began her litany of just how strange and new the plant was. He barely heard her, focusing instead on the scent coming from the bottle. The parasite made him smell it as it came out, comparing it to the memories of what the cider was supposed to smell like.

It was a bit more sterile, if anything, with the more acrid scent of the added urine not making any real difference. They should be fine, the parasite decided.

He poured some for both of them. The parasite, Dapper-Bit was informed, was part of him. He could not be affected by the same fluids that came out of him, not when he was infested and the source of the chemicals in it to begin with. Even if another member of the Nest were to fuck him, he would not go all light-headed the way that the victims and potential hosts would. That was something reserved specifically for them.

As soon as the cups were poured, he nosed one across the table. Twilight took it with her magic without even thinking about it, shaking her head still as she stared at the half-hidden stalk of the great Nest.

“I can’t believe what I’m looking at. It just seems so…so…”

“So what?” he asked.

“Alien.”

There was a possibility there, and he wondered if it was true. It didn’t matter, of course, but he still wondered.

“Take a drink. Don’t want to get too worked up.”

“Mmm.”

Twilight nodded, though she barely tilted the side of her muzzle to her right at the cup approached. She sipped from it without taking her eyes off the Nest, continuing to circle it, hop up on the table, take close looks at everything.

But at the same time, she was drinking the drugged, spiked cider, and he and his parasite waited for the first sign of her weakening to it.

When Mrs. Cake had enjoyed the spiked wine the night before, she had shown her reaction almost instantly. That might have been from the older mare being completely unused to anything alcoholic, or perhaps the wine was stronger than the cider, or it might have been that seed carried more of the corruption and the drugged effects than urine. In either case, Twilight didn’t show any sign of heat, or lust, or anything distracted until she reached the bottom of her cup, and even then, it wasn’t as much as Mrs. Cake showed.

He poured her a second cup when she floated her cup back, and he carefully drank his own. The taste of the additive was muted, at most, and he doubted that anyone – even a pony that was interested in it – would have tasted that over the stronger flavor of the cider. It was unclear whether the taste had been muted due to the differences, or whether it was something that he just didn’t care about anymore, but either way, it wasn’t bothersome.

Twilight reached the halfway point of her second cup when she finally stopped darting around. Her face was reddened, and her tail flicked up for a moment, revealing just a hint of moisture around her sex. She flicked it back down a moment later, almost like she hadn’t realized that she was doing it, and looked back at him.

He was, of course, looking away, indulgently smiling. The parasite had memories that expression from memories of himself in the mirror, of the many hours that Dapper-Bit had taken to practice how he looked while trying to make a sale. It knew how to imitate him down to a T, and it was doing it perfectly.

“So? What do you think?” he asked.

“I think…I think…I need to learn…more. Do you know anything about – hic – about it? Excuse me, goodness.”

A little drunk, a little tipsy, and definitely a little aroused. The mare was going to be easier to manage now, they hoped.

“I did find out that it has a means of bio-communication,” he said, putting his mug down. “The long tendrils –”

“It what?!”

Without warning, Twilight was right in front of his face. He expected it, but the parasite almost didn’t. If it wasn’t for the fact that it was running off a ‘program’ to imitate him, it might have lots its disguise in sheer shock at that moment. Twilight had their face between her front hooves, holding it still as she bumped her head against his.

“Are you telling me that this thing can talk and we’ve been wasting time looking at it?!”

“I mean – it’s not –”

“How?!”

“You – you just let it use the tendrils –”

“How!?”

“Just back up and let it work!”

She let go of him and did just that, grinning like crazy. She looked positively manic, like someone that had just been given their favorite toy that they’d been begging for off the shelf.

It was something that shocked the parasite, inasmuch as it could be. It had clearly been expecting to work harder to convince Twilight to do this, but in some ways, Dapper-Bit wasn’t that shocked. If there was one thing that the alicorn princess could be relied on for, it was curiosity. She had too much for her own good, and it meant that she was always getting herself – and others – into trouble.

The way that she backed up, she clearly expected the tendrils and the flower to come down over her head, almost like a helmet. The Nest loomed over her, the various bulbous tendrils rising, but rather than reaching for her head…well, it reached for the same place that it always did with him.

Twilight was shocked, jumping in place, but she didn’t run away. She blushed heavily, though, her cheeks burning like the sun, and she looked anywhere but at him. Dapper-Bit adjusted his top hat before climbing onto the table, standing in front of the alicorn as a pair of tendrils slithered inside of her, one in each orifice, working themselves deeper and deeper as they did.

“Are you alright?” he asked.

“Didn’t – mmph! – didn’t expect them to go…there.”

“Do you want me to –”

“N-no, just let them – oh – just let them go ahead…if this is…if this is how they…how it talks…”

That was what the parasite and the Nest had hoped for, and what Dapper-Bit had known would happen. Once turned on, she would accept even something like this in the name of science and examination. Twilight might have been the Princess of Friendship, but anyone that knew her knew that magic and knowledge were her great loves. Finding something out, even in this most undignified way, was something that she would pursue at whatever cost.

At least, at first.

They saw her eyes flick, blinking as they started to haze over, then stopped. Her horn glowed, flickered, then glowed again.

“Nnngh…”

“Is something wrong?” they asked.

“It’s…mmph…it’s doing something…”

“Well, yes, it’s –”

“Not that! Or…not just…not just – ah – not just that,” she said, her horn glowing a little bit brighter. “It’s…is this…is this how it…talked to…mmmph…mm…”

That was less good. She was supposed to be out of it, too horny to care about the fact that the Nest would be trying to get information out of her and commands into her. If the alicorn was conscious enough to actually fight back, Dapper-Bit’s memories were full of things that she could do to fight off infestation, and if that happened, the Nest could be burned. Or worse.

Stop her.

The command came with an image of its own. If urine wasn’t enough, then there were other things that were.

Just as Twilight started to push back with her magic, he was made to leap forward. Her head dropped as he put his hooves on her, and the parasite’s perfect control of his body made his cock leap from his sheath so quickly that it was hard and throbbing by the time her head came down. The tip pushed past her lips as she opened her mouth to shout, the head popped into her throat, and the parasite did what it did best: it controlled the situation.

There were no moans.

There were no sounds.

There was only the pulsing, throbbing, churning feeling in his sac as the parasite yanked enough semen up and through his prostate to do its job. The conversion rate was less than perfect, but he could feel Twilight stiffening up as soon as he shot the first few ropes of that tainted seed down her throat. Her horn dimmed, flickered, and went out, her face going as red as it was possible to go, and the smell of horny mare started dribbling down her thighs, covering the top of the table.

The Nest had sufficient tentacles to reach around her, one of them sliding up Dapper-Bit’s ass. The feeling of connection brought with it a sense of satisfaction, and the reward of acknowledgement.

He had done well.

Dapper-Bit did not bow, or blush, but he took some greater sense of relief from that. The fact that he was a good drone –

Shock.

Spasm.

Stillness.

The Nest controlled him, taking the matter out of the parasite’s control, and it held him and Twilight Sparkle in tandem. There was no link between the two of them, but the Nest received information from the both of them. It was a moment of testing.

Clench.

Squirt.

Dapper-Bit was made to orgasm, the pleasure something different. It took him a moment to realize the difference between what he felt when the parasite made him edge, ooze, and cum compared to what the Nest made him feel, and with his cock buried down a mare’s throat and his own hole being teased, nudged, rubbed by a thicker than usual intruder, that was difficult. Yet, he had little else to do as he was manipulated to feed Twilight more and more drugged fluids, and he was allowed, rather than dissuaded, to think about it.

Eventually, he realized that the Nest allowed him to feel pleasure, where the parasite only allowed him to be aware that it existed. It was still muted compared to the memories of the pleasure that he had when he was a non-drone, when he was ‘free,’ but that was still more than he expected. He thanked the Nest for the gift of the pleasure, and the Nest granted him a trifle more.

His orgasms were ramped up, pulled down, and ramped up again. The shocks of pleasure and information that flowed through him all stemmed from his back end, from his prostate and his cock. Dapper-Bit was not informed what it was for, but there were a few slow guesses rising in the drone’s head. With both of them connected, the Nest could test how much was needed to put Twilight out, how much was needed to merely discombobulate her, and how much was not enough to keep her magic low.

It was the perfect test situation, and he was honored to be part of it.

As Dapper-Bit was kept there, cock lodged down Twilight’s throat, he was almost surprised to feel her tonguing at his shaft. At first, he thought that it was the Nest rewarding him further, but no. The surprise-tingle that went up his spine showed that it was startled by the way that she was behaving, as well. This was not required of her, nor was it being forced upon her. This was her natural behavior.

The information was filed away. The Nest would use it later.

Just as they were getting ‘comfortable,’ however, the sound of a knock on the door echoed through the otherwise quiet library. Dapper-Bit was tapped for information, and Twilight stiffened, indicating that she’d been tapped for the same.

Dapper-Bit felt the Nest’s tentacle sliding from his hole, a few last-second commands jolting up his spine as the parasite took over once more. Given the Nest’s latest commands, it made him step off the table, softening his cock as they walked towards the front door. It was only when he had gone completely soft that the orders themselves finally popped into his mind properly:

Keep others away.

The stallion trotted through the library to the front door, adjusting his top hat and his vest in the process. When the earth pony opened the door, a small crowd of clients waiting for their turn in the library greeted him. They all looked confused at his appearance, and the parasite pulled his lips up into a forced smile once more.

“Sorry, but Ms. Sparkle is examining a rare item this morning. I’m afraid that the library is closed until evening, at least.”

“Oh, come on. I have an assignment today,” a young stallion complained. “Can’t we just –”

“Ms. Sparkle asked for the library to be emptied for everyone’s safety while she works,” he said. “I’m sorry, but that means everyone.”

“Ugh.”

“There are no exceptions?” one of the mares gathered outside asked. “None at all?”

“It’s something at least vaguely magical. She can handle it, but distractions aren’t a good idea right now.”

That seemed to settle it for the mare, and for the crowd as a whole. Some of them complained, admittedly, and they walked off with a few dirty glances back at him, but none of them gainsaid that. Considering the number of times that Twilight had saved Ponyville from its own stupidity as she’d grown up – and from her own – Dapper-Bit knew that it was something that they took seriously.

The smile dropped off his face instantly as soon as they weren’t looking at him, and he kicked the door shut behind him. The lock latched in place once more, and the parasite in his rump drove him back to the core of the library as fast as it could. Orders had been accomplished, and there was still a captive to take care of, a potential host to drain.

Thankfully, Twilight was still almost completely insensate with the various drugged compounds in her. Her mouth hung open, her eyes staring forward, and a hint of drool had collected at the edge of her mouth. Despite her obvious arousal, her dripping slick running along the vaginal tentacle, she didn’t push back any longer. She’d gone almost entirely still.

Dapper-Bit turned toward the Nest. His tail went up in response to the edited programming to his own parasite as he offered his rump, and one smaller tendril pressed close. It entered easily, and he stared straight ahead.

The information passed into him quickly, the transfer seemingly getting faster with each iteration of their connection. The parasite within him helped speed it up further still, of course, but that was secondary compared to the feeling of becoming more useful.

Image-concepts played out in his mind, showing things from the point of view of the mare beside him. She was nearly catatonic, out of her own head from the multiple doses of tainted seed that she’d taken in. Her resistance was down, and her body and mind were, for the moment, in the grip of the Nest.

More image-concepts followed, giving Dapper-Bit and his parasite the sense of time and scale that they were dealing with. The alicorn was powerful, more powerful than he was by a wide margin, and they would need time to completely program her mind and ensure that there was a sufficient copy of her memory for the Nest to deal with. By nightfall, they would have a copy of that and she would be at least partially programmed, but they would need to be careful, keep anyone that might be a threat out of the library, and – most importantly – keep Twilight drugged and catatonic. If she became sober again before the Nest was done, then the whole thing was as good as gone.

When he asked what he could do, the Nest had an answer for him. He pressed back as instructed, feeling the thicker tendril pressing further inside of him. There were new additions to the tip of the tendrils, he felt, little feelers, fronds that were more precise and more delicate than the blunt tip that he had been used to feeling up to that point. It pressed up –

“Mmph!”

And his awareness was shoved backwards. The Nest took control of him, putting the entirety of his mind to its own use. He could not think, see, hear, or anything; the Nest turned him into nothing more than an extension of its own thoughts and processes, and he was so far back that he couldn’t even see those. It was nothing more than shadows on a wall, remnants of a show on stage that he could not see.

Yet, even that offered him something. He saw pictures, hazy things, bits and pieces that showed the Nest spreading further and further. He saw it taking root beneath the tree, finding a hiding place among the roots of the library so that it could keep growing. He saw it growing, growing, and growing more, until it reached the point where it would displace the library tree and become the central feature of the town.

And all around it were other ponies…other hosts…other drones.

Dapper-Drone.

Dapper-Drone stiffened again, a surge of satisfaction and pleasure and electric joy surging through him at the new designation. As the sensation faded, so did his awareness of everything else. All that remained, outside of the knowledge that he was just an extension of the Nest’s capabilities, was the new designation.

Dapper-Drone.

It fit him, feeling right. He had been not-quite-himself for a while, the constant changes from the Nest and his parasite making him feel less and less like a stallion, more and more like an extension of the group. It had started to feel almost wrong to think of himself as a pony, for a pony was more free, more willful, whereas he was just…a thing. A piece that would be pushed around by something bigger, greater, better than himself.

That was what he was, then. Dapper-Drone. Not Dapper-Bit Twist, not Dapper-Bit, not even Dapper. Just…Dapper-Drone, a distinction that would set him apart from the other drones so that the Nest could call on him more easily.

It was good.

It was right.

It was proper.

The day passed mostly uneventfully, save for the occasional waking to spend his time at the door to discourage the different clients that wanted to use the library against the announcement he’d made, or the occasional interruption to feed Twilight more drugged seed. She never fought it that hard, mostly due to the fact that the Nest woke him whenever it detected her levels getting too low, and so the danger of an actual break-out was never more than minimal.

As the day went by, in his scattered moments of awareness, Dapper-Drone was aware of being content. Not happy, not anymore, but content. The fact that he could do as much for the Nest as he could, and the fact that he had earned a designation – so far as he knew, the first designation – made him feel as if he were valued by the Nest. Of course, the fact that he needed to be valued was probably a mark of how he had much more to do before he was a proper drone, but he was learning, and he was doing his best to dedicate himself to the Nest and the future that it offered.

In and out of being its extension, he felt like he was losing little bits and pieces of his sense of self. More and more, the parasite stuck out in his mind, taking more control when he was off the tendril and doing what he was told. His body was no longer his, he had accepted that, but there was something greater going on, something that seemed to put him further and further back. The parasite was getting more and more prominent, no longer just directing him and taking charge when it needed to, but keeping him more as a sort of back-up in his own head rather than allowing him to do anything.

But it was fine.

He was a drone.

Drones didn’t do things on their own.

The hours passed, and eventually, the Nest shifted again. It had grown by a full foot and a half, nearly at seven feet tall now, and its tentacles were broad and wide. It left Twilight Sparkle empty and gaping from both holes, and as it pulled away, making a soft ‘pop’ as it slid between her soaked vaginal lips and puffy pucker, she just…stood there, staring straight ahead, not saying anything, not moving, not nothing. There was no parasite, not yet, but with the hours of programming, she would be open to one when one was ready, and Dapper-Drone knew it would be ready soon.

He wondered, idly, what was going through her head, and knew that there would be no answer that wasn’t at least partially formed by the Nest. As it would eventually have over all things, the Nest had control of her.