I was in the library. Not the castle library, but rather my dream library. It was still unclear to me why my dream realm had locked onto the library concept. After my first dream back in the spire, every subsequent dream here had been entirely unprompted. Maybe it was because it made me feel safe... Admittedly, it was based on one of my safe spaces and a place I felt comfortable as any, but it was kind of surprising just how... natural it had begun to feel.

Or maybe it wasn't natural... but a sign of my mind slowly growing to be more synthetic. Looking around, I couldn't really deny it. My brain didn't used to have such clearly synthetic categorisation of all my knowledge, nor did any of my dreams have the weird digital fragmentation effect I could see in places. The only way that I could see this getting any more... robotic was if screens started popping up on the walls or tables.

Now, when I was a filly, I used to take a lot more daytime naps. Sure, becoming a bug screwed with my circadian rhythm a bit, in that I needed less sleep on the whole, but even then I'd never previously been so erratic regarding when I slept. That, in part, had a lot to do with the fact that I was now effectively allergic to the sun, but I found that Copper-9—or rather, COP9AU, as that spell had named the universe—was on a completely different timezone compared to this Equestria. I'd successfully reset the system clock again, although the calendar was completely worthless here without completely rewriting it, but it also meant that the next 'call' I was gonna receive from Mom was likely to be some time this afternoon.

Still, it wasn't like I had a lot to do. After rounding up Chelicerae and giving her some of the same love I'd fed to Ocellus, it hadn't been too hard to convince her to seek out Chrysalis and offer the Equestrian crown's olive branch. Until she returned, there wasn't much need for me to be out and about. So I was pretty much just chilling in one of the castle's guest rooms with the curtains drawn. Since I didn't technically need a bed, and Ocellus wasn't technically an employee of the crown, it was easier for them if she just stayed in here with me. Not that I knew what she was doing right now, seeing as I was... you know, in sleep mode.

Honestly, it's probably for the best that I'm in this low-power state. Since I's systems reacted to Mary and I lost control, and then killing J, I'd been postponing setting the FEEL_GUILT boolean to "True." As a result, I hadn't really contemplated the ramifications of anything that I'd really done. Not betraying J alongside N, or murdering Mary, or even the two drones I'd ended up butchering in the cafe when I was more I than Anon.

The practical part of me made me wonder whether leaving it off might not be such a bad thing. After all, who knew what sorts of things I might have to do to survive. I could still understand right and wrong perfectly fine with the conscience alpha running, but a feeling like guilt could easily get in the way of things at an inopportune time. I could only die two more times before I was stuck somewhere hoping that Mom and Starlight could find a way to bring me home. Better I do what needs to be done and get home safe, right?

Except... feeling guilt was a significant part of having a conscience in the first place. If I didn't feel any guilt for what I did or didn't do, there was no actual motivator to do the right or wrong thing. I would effectively be turning myself into a sociopath. While that might be helpful in cases where I'm in some morally ambiguous situation where everyone sucks, it wouldn't make it very hard to slip into being a bad person. It took me longer than I'd have liked to get myself out of the tendency to prepare to protect myself—lethally if need be. The last thing I wanted to do was start to accept murder as the simplest course of action. When I was back in my body, I was gonna have Celestia knows how many sins weighing down on my soul.

SYS://"../CONSCIENCE_V0.1A"

BOOLEAN "FEEL_GUILT" HAS BEEN SET TO "TRUE" BY ADMINISTRATION "ANON"

Nothing seemed to happen at first. I dunno, but maybe I was expecting some mind-crushing guilt over what I'd done. I'd killed three people and, in choosing N and Uzi over J, I had been every bit as responsible for J's end, and yet I hadn't begun to feel a thing over any of that. That was bad, right?

Hmm... No, wait... Maybe it isn't that simple. I was expecting things to behave as it had while running off of changeling or even pony wetware. It might very well go into effect if I ran a full system reboot, but then I might have to deal with it all at once. If there was one thing I was experienced with, it was dealing with a lot at once, as well as my inability to... and some of that inability couldn't even be attributed to starving.

No, if I was gonna do this, I'd have to approach this one case at a time and address how I really felt about it. Starting with the two that were killed when I first wound up in that body. Can I really say that was even really me? My soul might've bonded to this body at that point, but my memories, personal feelings, and everything that made me me was quarantined and blocked off. Wouldn't that make that I's fault, as I was running almost entirely on her programming with no sense of who I was, rather than my own?

It felt like an excuse, or rationalisation, and although I felt bad for those two... I couldn't bring myself to feel guilty over their deaths. Besides, assuming I just stayed with them for a while, N would still probably have shown up and killed them both, and we'd likely have fought until I revealed I was 'like him'. Wouldn't that mean that my part in that was more of a spectator role? I couldn't see myself just casually doing that. Especially not with I's sadistic glee.

With Mary, it wasn't so easy to absolve myself. I was fully conscious as to what happened, but I was powerless to stop my body from doing so. Sure, she was part of the group that disabled I, presumably to the point where she didn't automatically repair herself like what was happening with J, but what did it matter? I genuinely felt guilty over putting her down, and I can only hope my words brought her some comfort in her final moments; it certainly didn't change the fact that, at the end of the day, I'd been at the wheel before some remaining trace of I took control and drove us into Mary. What made it worse was the fact that my conscience program finished compiling the moment after I'd terminated her.

It makes me wonder, though, whether this wasn't going to be a repeat of what happened with Emerald all those years ago. Back when I first ended up in Equestria, I'd been on the verge of death, and then the next thing I knew, I was a pony. I never did ask the Sun Horse what happened with my body. It wasn't until nearly an Equestrian month down the line that we reached some degree of certainty that I was occupying Emerald's body, and by that point, her own consciousness resurfaced and I ended up bound to Hunger. Was this gonna become a running theme for my entire existence? Get stuck into a body until its own consciousness reasserts itself?

With Serial Designation J, the answer should have been clear that I shouldn't feel guilty. She was, after all, going to kill all those people in that bunker, and she'd already tried to murder N at that point. Stabbing her in the back should have been the moral choice, and thus the one I should feel the least guilty over... and yet... She's maybe the one I felt the guiltiest about. I can't explain it.

It almost felt like something that wasn't entirely my own. It seemed as though there was something in MEMORY_DATA calling on the conscience software I'd compiled. But what could be doing that? Most of my personality data was running from MEMORY_DATA_(EQUESTRIA). It was... curious, and yet, my mind couldn't leave it alone.

SEARCH RESULTS - "J" (CONTEXT PROPER NOUN) IN: SYS://"../MEMORY_DATA/" BEFORE:3071

NAME DESCRIPTION

UNKNOWN_MEMORIES "RESTRICTED DATA, INACCESSIBLE TO SERIAL DESIGNATION I."

From my spot at the desk in the library, I glanced over at the MEMORY_DATA shelves, and focused on dragging over the book. Exactly as it would have if I'd focused on my magic, a book levitated over to me, and I froze. Unlike everything else that I'd noticed in that section of the library, which was all softcover and modern like stuff over on the other side of the mirror, this was old, leather-bound and in rough condition. At first, I thought it was something misplaced from my Equestrian memories, until I looked at the cover, where a familiar symbol was embossed in faded gold leaf. The mark of the Absolute Solver. I was embossed beneath.

Upon opening it to the first page, I found my eyebrow rising. It's a photo album. There, in the middle of the page was a sepia photograph, titled, Tessa and Friends, Elliott Manor. There was a human girl, maybe in her teens, wearing a pretty Victorian-style gown and a massive bow. She was surrounded by several Worker Drones in maid and butler outfits, but all of them with the typical helmets worn by workers. Despite never having seen such drones on Copper-9, I could recognise three of them because of the hair and the armbands. Nearest to Tessa was J, N, and then V, the last one wearing glasses, interestingly enough. Near one edge of the photo, I could even see Cyn, complete with the same hunched stance she had when we met here in the library.

What really caught my attention, however, was another bespectacled drone near J. All of the workers in the photo were shorter than Tessa by a few inches, but the drone that my eyes were locked on looked like her legs had been intentionally shortened, placing her shorter than the other drones. Her hair was done up exactly like J's, and she seemed to be looking at J with a look of... admiration? Jealousy? No, I've seen Emerald look at me the same way. This drone idolised J.

Even without looking at the armband, I somehow realised this was I. On the next page, I found a pair of photographs titled First Day on the Job. Once again, there she was, alongside J. In the first, she was simply watching J scrubbing the floor with a rag and a bucket of water. The second had her on the floor with the bucket on her head, while J looked at her with disappointment. In yet another photo, J was teaching I how to fold laundry.

I shut the book and put it down on the table. I don't understand... If J, N, and V all worked for the Elliott family, presumably on Earth, why were they on Copper-9? Wouldn't they have recognised I the way I'd recognise a loved one? No, probably not... If that same data was restricted for them... And Cyn mentioned back-ups... I mean, it's clear this body I'm in isn't a Worker Drone, and the J and V that I met both mentioned the model being discontinued. I wasn't the only I, or even the original, and yet this was probably true for all of them.

I conjured up a three-dimensional image of I and J side-by-side in front of me. Sure enough, without the sepia filter, there wasn't much of a similarity between us. But... If I strip out the colour in my hair, and put it up in twin-tails... The image changed before my eyes, and suddenly the similarity wasn't so out there. Even if neither was the original, she still remembered them all on some level... And having been party to killing J, of course it'd hurt.

I'm sorry it had to end that way for you two, I decided as I conjured up a bookmark and stuck it in that book. There was no denying the curiosity as to what kind of life this Tessa and her drones had at Elliott Manor, but I was not so crazy as to dig it all up at once. A few not-so-great scenarios came to mind if I addressed that all at once. I might wake up and we'd end up struggling for control of the body at the worst of times, or I might accidentally integrate all of that into my personality data and go berserk. At least going at it piecemeal could let me monitor myself for any changes.

Putting all that aside, enabling my ability to feel guilt had an unexpected benefit. I definitely felt a lot better about my plan of action as far as this world's changelings were concerned. While it might not be enough to prevent Harmony's corruption of the idea of the changeling coming into existence here, I think that there would be enough that they wouldn't all have to change. Harmony's ponies and Hunger's changelings were thesis and antithesis, but if they could come together in a symbiotic relationship... It'd be a pure example of synthesis.

Why wouldn't I want to achieve that sort of goal?

WARNING

PROXIMITY ALERT
--INSISTENT JOSTLE DETECTED--
INITIATING WAKE-UP SEQUENCE

Again, the library vanished and then seamlessly the world faded back into view. There was Ocellus in her natural buggy form, albeit still wearing the maid outfit. She looked... panicked, standing over me as she was. But why would that be?

"Um, Ms. Anon?" she quietly whispered. "There's, um... there's someling here who wants to talk to you, but..."

I sat up and looked about the room. In front of the closed door, I saw one of Luna's night pony guards glaring at the undisguised bug with barely contained rage. It was kind of odd, given that it was midday. Also unusual was the fact that Ocellus had gone and said someling instead of somepony. That wasn't exactly the sort of dialect thing you could fuck up by accident, as I knew from interactions with Thorax's hive. Does that mean...

Upon toggling the thermal picture-in-picture overlay I'd been using earlier, I let out a sigh. That's 32°C... Making that a changeling, and since we don't expect Chelicerae back with an answer—or Chrysalis—until this evening... That meant that this was the last of the three bugs stationed in Canterlot castle prior to the invasion. Given his role, and what he probably thinks happened...

"You must be Enforcer Odonata," I greeted in a tired voice as I rose to my feet. Reflexively, I reached up to brush the crust from the corners of my eyes before remembering that I didn't have physical eyes to rub. "It's a pleasure to finally meet you."

The disguised bug looked anything but thrilled to be addressed as such. With a snarl, his body was engulfed in green flames, revealing his own true nature. "First, Intelligencer Chelicerae misses check-in and goes missing," he hissed, storming toward the younger changeling. "Then I hear whispers of changelings among the guards, and now I find you've broken the masquerade and revealed our names to an outsider? Apprentice Ocellus, for your treason against the queen and the hive, you will be put to death alongside this interloper."

Shit, that's right... I forgot that the trio of changelings included an enforcer. Now that he'd made his threats, I remembered why I hated their whole masquerade concept. According to Biologia Mutabilis, infiltration happened in groups of three... An intelligencer served as the lead in their squad, gathering the most information and love. Then you had the apprentice, who was sent to learn beneath the intelligencer—basically it was on-the-job training, getting practice blending in among ponies, gathering love, and information gathering. Finally, you had the enforcers, who were effectively religious zealots who aspired to become one of the queen's praetorian guards, although they were closer in scope to commissars.

The enforcers are maybe the only bugs I wouldn't mind handing over to Harmony for 'redemption'.

In one fluid motion, I interposed myself between Odonata and Ocellus, using a portion of my tail's length to push him back while guiding him away from the door. "Now hold on one fucking minute," I bellowed. As I had in the dining room at breakfast, I momentarily activated my emitters, projecting an image of blue flames rolling up my body to reveal my changeling queen nature, and then 'reverting' back to this disguise. He tensed, somehow managing to look even more furious; I couldn't blame him because I had no pheromones to prove that silent claim. "I am working with these ponies to make sure our kind do not go extinct, you insipid little gnat. Intelligencer Chelicerae is bringing news and an olive branch to Queen Chrysalis as we speak. I will not let your zealotry or your queen's desperation doom our kind to the same ignominious end it faced in my Equestria." I leaned in close and bared my teeth. "STAND DOWN."

If I'd been smarter, I might not have been close, and thus so slow to react as his horn glowed. Alas, hubris is an old comrade of mine, so when he unsheathed a knife strapped to his side, I was unprepared to act as he cut through the length of tail I'd pushed him back with, and scored a deep gash in my faceplate. "Death to false prophets!" he shrieked, grabbing up the stinger of my severed tail and lunging for me. "Death to traitors!"

Even as I brought my hand up to protect myself, I snatched the knife out of the air. This isn't just any old knife, though... This is a blade fashioned from steel and tempered hive resin used almost exclusively in executions by enforcers, or so the book says. A Swarm-minder's Oath blade. "Ocellus, get out of here and get help!" I groaned as the nanite acid burned a hole through my left palm and the sting got stuck in my hand. She didn't need a second prod to get moving, although I did have to drop the knife and throw myself at Odonata when he made a lunge for her. "No, you're playing with me, little drone."

Although I was just as tall as an average pony, I definitely had the weight on them. That meant that I, in turn, had a significant weight advantage over the enforcer. "That fucking hurt, you know," I hissed into his ear as I threw him into a headlock. Although I couldn't choke him out, keeping him immobilised until a guard came and stunned the motherfucker wasn't so much of a challenge. "You're lucky that I'd rather give you back to Chryssi alive as a gesture of goodwill."

He of course, attempted to bite me, although he managed to sink his teeth into my left forearm. All that managed to accomplish was get his teeth stuck, and when he attempted to get them out, he only managed to rip out his own fangs. Thus my arm gained a coating of green haemolymph as he hissed and snarled impotently. Dumbshit.

Except, it wasn't as though he was defenceless, however. With the knife no longer in my grip, he was free to grab it with his magic and stab me in the lower back. Of course, he'd also seen the way the nanite acid had burned a hole through my hand as he stabbed it with my own sting, and before I could even consider what he might do, he wrenched it out of my hand with his magic and jammed it into where my right eye would have been if I were organic.

WARNING

RIGHT EYE SENSOR DESTROYED

NOTE: DEPTH PERCEPTION WILL BE CRIPPLED UNTIL REPAIRED
NANITE ACID DETECTED INSIDE CRANIOFACIAL CAVITY
REGENERATION... FAILED!
SUGGESTION: NEUTRALISE NANITE ACID
SUGGESTION: REMOVE FOREIGN BODY FROM BACK

I released him and stumbled off, thrusting my damaged left hand into my mouth to neutralise the acid. "You know... Alive has a very broad definition," I warned as I wrenched my sting out of my face plate and smeared the neutralising saliva across the hole. I could feel my mind reacting to the sadism setting as I geared up for a fight. "You just reminded me of the fact that I don't have to leave all your limbs attached."

As I held out my sting in my free hand, I thrust my tail against the severed end and allowed for the regeneration to kick in. At the same time, my left hand withdrew into the mechanical iris in my forearm and out emerged a long, single-edged blade. His eyes widened at the sight of the blade longer than my leg emerging from my arm, but his lack of a discernible pupil made it hard to gauge whether that was just simple surprise or fear. When my right hand repeated the same action as my left, being replaced by a similar blade, he actually wilted.

When I realised the only thing he really had left was his armour, since the knife was still lodged in my lower back, my grin grew a bit more savage and I dropped into a stance that would make it easier to lunge at him. "What's it gonna be, Odonata?" I asked, bringing one of the blades up to my mouth so I could run my tongue up the back of it. "Surrender? Or are we going to see how much I can carve off of you before you go into shock?"

Before he could come to a decision, the door burst open to reveal Captain Shining Armour and a troupe of unicorn guards. I must've been a horrifying sight, because one of the captain's unicorns promptly fainted upon looking at me. "Drop the weapons and stand down, Anonymous," he warned, putting a barrier up around the changeling. "We've got it from here."

I nodded, stepping back as the blades withdrew. My hands were raised just to show that I was no threat. That was when a mare with a medic's armband stepped forward. "Sir, she's wounded!" exclaimed the guardsmare as she took in the sight of me. Without even waiting for her CO's response, she teleported in a first aid kit and rushed over to me. Never mind the fact that she had no fucking clue how to even treat me. That didn't stop her from levitating out a roll of gauze and wrapping my head to cover up the hole. "Ma'am, please sit down so I can dress your other wounds."

When the captain met my gaze, I emoted a rolling eye and waved off his medic. "I can regenerate this whenever I want," I casually noted as I turned around and started walking back to my bed to show off the knife still lodged inside my back. The comment was directed at both Shining and his medic. "I'm just choosing not to. Don't touch that knife, by the way. I plan on using that plus my injury to pressure Chrysalis in the peace negotiations."

He simply sighed and shook his head. "If that is what you wish." Without further ado, he lifted the shield bubble off the ground and carried his new prisoner out of the room. It would be fun to see how he would deal with getting Odonata out of the bubble to put a magic damper on his horn to keep him from doing further magic, but honestly, I just wanted to sit and relax for a bit before the inevitable check-in came.

As the guards all filed out, a familiar pony maid re-entered the room. Once the door was shut behind her, she dropped her own disguise and slowly approached. She seemed horrified by the hole in my hand and the bandage wrapped around my head, which was to say nothing of the executioner's blade sticking out of me. At the same time though, in those glittering compound eyes, I thought I could make out a bit of awe.

It caught me completely off guard as Ocellus wrapped me in a tight hug. Her face was buried in my neck, and it took me a moment to realise that she was weeping. "You saved my life, Anon," she whispered. "Thank you..."

NOTICE

REMOTE ACCESS ESTABLISHED

USER(S) "TWILIGHT", "STARLIGHT" (SHARED SESSION)
SOURCE: UNKNOWN
USER "TWILIGHT" HAS OPENED A GROUP CHAT

The notification came up when I was taking my lunch. Specifically, I was lying on my belly on the bed, sipping from a pitcher of lantern oil while snacking some scrap metal that the chefs found in the kitchen. Based on the look of it, it was old and damaged cutlery that was beyond repair. It didn't matter much to me, given that my choppers had no real issue biting into the metal. Made me wonder just what the fuck they were made of, and what sort of PSI there was to my bite.

TWILIGHT > SORRY IF WE'RE A BIT LATE CHECKING IN WITH YOU. AFTER YOUR UNEXPECTED JUMP, WE HAD TO DETERMINE WHICH UNIVERSE YOU TRANSFERRED TO.
STARLIGHT > AFTER THAT, WE HAD TO ADJUST THE SPELL. I CAN SEE BASED ON YOUR NEW COMPANION THAT YOU'RE IN AN EQUESTRIA THIS TIME.
STARLIGHT > EQUS78Σ ACCORDING TO THE SCRYING SPELL.

I nodded quietly to myself and popped the end of a fork that was missing most of its tines into my mouth and began chewing. My gaze drifted over to a sofa, where Ocellus was napping. Theoretically, it'd be fine if I chatted with them out loud, but this wasn't the dream room and it didn't feel as natural as two talking portraits. Maybe somewhere down the line, I could get the generative AI part of my systems to manufacture a script that'd project their portraits into my vision and run some sort of text-to-speech, but until then, I was fine with the terminal, or being in the dream room for messages.

ANON > YEAH. THIS ONE'S A BIT BEFORE MOM BECAME A PRINCESS. BEFORE AUNTIE'S WEDDING IN FACT.
ANON > AS YOU CAN GUESS FROM THE ROOM, I'M IN CANTERLOT RIGHT NOW.
TWILIGHT > I CAN SEE THAT YOU'RE INJURED; IS THAT FROM WHATEVER HAD YOU TESTING THE DEATH PARAMETER?
ANON > NAH. I HEALED THE GAPING CHEST WOUND WHILE I WAS IN A JAIL CELL. THIS IS FROM A BUG BY THE NAME ODONATA. ENFORCER MENTIONED IN BIOLOGIA MUTABILIS, PAGE... 78, PARAGRAPH 5. WOW. THAT RECALL IS WAY TOO SPECIFIC.
STARLIGHT > I'M ASSUMING THAT'S NOT THE CHANGELING IN QUESTION SHARING YOUR ROOM.
ANON > OCELLUS, ACTUALLY. I KINDA BROKE HER COVER WHILE DINING WITH CELESTIA, LUNA, AND YOUR BROTHER THIS MORNING.
ANON > ODONATA WAS PISSED ABOUT THE MASQUERADE BEING BROKEN AND JEOPARDISING CHRYSALIS' PLAN, SO HE WAS PLANNING ON KILLING HER AND ME.
ANON > DON'T WORRY; I DIDN'T KILL HIM, AS MUCH AS THE SADISM VALUE IN MY PROGRAMMING WANTED ME TO 'PLAY' WITH HIM. YOUR BROTHER SAVED HIM FROM ME.
STARLIGHT > I KNOW THAT'S NOT YOUR BODY, BUT IT'S HARD SEEING YOU BEAT UP LIKE THAT... AND IS THAT A KNIFE IN YOUR BACK!?
TWILIGHT > ANON, IF YOU COULD HEAL A GAPING CHEST WOUND WITH EASE, WHY ARE YOU PREVENTING YOUR WOUNDS FROM REGENERATING?

With a sigh, I went into a long-winded explanation of my plan, on how I was in the process of brokering peace between Chrysalis' changelings and Equestria so that Harmony's bullshit never needed to happen, and Hunger wouldn't need to pull shit like she did with me on anyone else. I'm not sure they approved of the fact that I was planning on using my injuries to try and force Chryssi into a more agreeable position, but meh. It didn't change the fact that I was fully determined to follow the path I'd set out for myself.

Following that little discussion, we somehow looped back to the fact that I'd ended up in the situation where I'd triggered the death warp. That of course resulted in my retelling of how I ended up in that situation in the first place... Retelling how I'd saved a random robo-cop, and the horror we found in the room where I fought J alongside Uzi only days before. Oh, and letting slip the fact that I made a deal with what I'm pretty sure was Robo-Satan pretending to be a derpy little robot maid.

STARLIGHT > ANON... I THOUGHT YOU KNEW BETTER BY NOW.

I could practically see Starlight face-hoofing in my mind's eye. Not that she was wrong. I should have known better, and this was most certainly going to come bite me in the ass, but at the same time, I was totally gonna die either way, so why shouldn't I get something out of it? Especially since my choice, and my gaining access to those powers, might've prevented a second eldritch Disassembly Drone from running around eating people in that bunker.

A sigh escaped me as I activated translate and levitated over the Victim's Guitar before using edit to tidy it up and remove all the nicks and scratches that were present in the polished wood. Popping the last of the scrap metal into my mouth, I downed the rest of the lantern oil in the pitcher. I then sat up and casually began strumming the instrument. I needed something to keep me distracted about all this.

ANON > YEAH... I DO KNOW BETTER, BUT... IS IT SO WRONG OF ME TO WANT EVERY ADVANTAGE I CAN GET ON THIS JOURNEY HOME?
ANON > AT LEAST MY BARGAIN WITH CYN WILL LET SOME PART OF ME LIVE ON IN THAT WORLD, AND SHOULD I DIE PERMANENTLY, YOU MIGHT BE ABLE TO MAKE A DEAL WITH IT TO GET A COPY OF MY MIND.
ANON > MY CHOICE MAY HAVE BEEN A SPUR OF THE MOMENT DECISION, BUT IT WASN'T WITHOUT DUE CONSIDERATION.
TWILIGHT > DO YOU TRUST HER TO KEEP HER WORD?
STARLIGHT > TWILIGHT, YOU'RE NOT SERIOUSLY APPROVING OF HER CHOICE, ARE YOU?
TWILIGHT > NO. EVEN IF ANON SUCCESSFULLY BARTERED FOR EQUESTRIA'S SAFETY, SHE'S ALERTED AN ENTITY WORSE THAN OUR SPIRIT OF HUNGER TO THE GREATER MULTIVERSE AS A WHOLE.
TWILIGHT > ANON'S GOING TO HAVE TO LIVE WITH THE KNOWLEDGE THAT THIS CYN MIGHT NOT STOP AT JUST HER UNIVERSE... THAT IT'S NOW TOO LATE TO PUT THAT GENIE BACK IN THE BOTTLE.
TWILIGHT > I JUST HOPE SHE TRULY BELIEVES THAT RISK TO BE WORTH GETTING HOME.

I found myself chewing my lip as I considered that. Eventually, Cyn—or the Absolute Solver, if she was just its puppet—might discover a means to hop realities. Translate was the most likely method, and given enough time with my mind, it might even use me to figure it out. Except, in order to use my mind to do it, it'd have to be an unaltered copy, and I don't think any iteration of me would willingly give any Equestrias to Cyn.

ANON > THERE WERE NO GOOD CHOICES. AS CALLOUS AS IT IS, I PROMISED MYSELF I WOULD GET HOME AT ANY COST.
ANON > EVEN IF I NEED MORE THERAPY BY THE END OF IT... EVEN IF MY SOUL BECOMES STAINED BLACK WITH MY SINS, I WON'T ABANDON MY FAMILY... NEVER AGAIN.

There was an extended period where no messages came down the line. It was just me, the guitar, and Ocellus, with nothing but time to kill. At least my roomie was enjoying the music as she picked at the pasta bowl I'd had the chefs bring her. After all, if she was gonna recover from all that starvation-inflicted damage caused by lack of love and insufficient biomass intake, she was gonna need to eat an awful lot.

Hmm, maybe suggest having this world's Pinkie Pie team up with the world's best bakers and pâtissiers to cook a grand feast for all the changelings after an accord is struck?

Admittedly, the cute little bug was slowly starting to look better than she had been when she first dropped her disguise in the dining room. Her chitin was beginning to look a bit glossier than it was, and cracks were beginning to naturally fill in. Get a couple of more meals and another serving of love into her, and she'd be the healthiest drone this side of the universal divide.

For that matter, I should probably come up with a list of professions that changelings could partake in to make integration worth it. Let's see, acting is an obvious one, as well as fashion. Having a changeling present during an interrogation of a non-bug would be useful in ferreting out deceit. Then you've got the choice of them going into therapy. Hive resin is surprisingly sterile, which makes it good for patch jobs in medical situations, too. I felt myself grinning. Heheh... EMS... Bug EMS... Buggy MS...

TWILIGHT > I KNOW, ANON. JUST... CAN YOU PROMISE YOU'LL TRY TO AVOID USING DEATH TO GET YOU CLOSER TO HOME.
TWILIGHT > ALTHOUGH IT WORKED OUT FOR YOU THIS TIME, I WORRY THAT YOUR BODY WON'T BE ABLE TO TAKE ANOTHER.
ANON > I WILL, MOM. TAKE CARE... OH, BEFORE I FORGET... IF YOU GUYS START SCRYING AND YOU SEE ME FIGHTING, COULD YOU... I DUNNO... COULD YOU REFRAIN FROM WATCHING?
ANON > I DON'T WANT YOU HAVING TO SEE THE ENDS I MIGHT HAVE TO GO TO IN ORDER TO STAY ALIVE... OR TO 'MOVE THE PLOT ALONG', SO TO SPEAK.
ANON > FOR NOW, I PROBABLY NEED TO GET READY TO MEET WITH A BUG QUEEN.
TWILIGHT > STAY SAFE.
STARLIGHT > DITTO.

USER "TWILIGHT" HAS CLOSED THE CHAT

The queen was staring me in the face, mocking me. No matter how many times I tried to get rid of her, she kept coming back. It wasn't fair. A guard would take her off my hands, and then not too long after, she'd be right back in front of me, mocking me. Ocellus simply looked amused by it all, which only made it worse. That was maybe the worst part—I knew the others had to be cheating somehow.

I lowered my hand of cards and glared at the young changeling. "Are you looking at my hand reflected in my faceplate?" I demanded, looking from her to the two guards I roped into a game of Old Maid this evening. Oh sure, Shining would probably have words for these goons, but holy shit was I bored. A mare can only play so much minesweeper and solitaire before she starts to lose her mind. "Well?"

Don't ask me how bugs can blush through chitin. I genuinely still don't know how that shit works and I've been one for the better part of a decade. Still, I'll give Ocellus credit, she had the decency to look guilty when caught out. "Well... maybe, but it's kind of hard not to see the reflection." One of the guards, the one to my left, nodded in agreement. "But if you really think it's unfair, I can stop."

I simply emoted a raised eyebrow at her and then shook my head. "It's my own fault for introducing the free-for-all rule variation, rather than the standard ruleset." I responded as the guard to my right's turn came about. I set my hand—the queen of spades, the ace of hearts, the two of diamonds, and the seven of spades—face down in my palm, shuffled it, and then fanned it out when he pointed at me. When he took his card, I was glad to see the queen gone. "Besides, it's not like we're playing for any sort of stakes."

The guard to my left, a pegasus mare rendered snow-white by the standard concealment charm, nodded in agreement. "Cap'n banned on-shift gambling, but even he recognises that some shifts get long," she commented, fanning out her own cards for me. "As long as VIPs are getting guarded, he's pretty lax as to whether we're in the room with them or posted outside."

I refrained from snarking at her about the fact that they basically already let an assassin into my room and Ocellus had to fetch the captain of the guard. Admittedly, from what they've told me, they'd been sent away by who they thought to be a ranking night guard. Could hardly hold them following the orders of who they thought to be someone with authority when they had no reason to expect such a thing to happen, although there would probably be different procedures in the near future.

Instead, I snatched up her ace of clubs and threw my two aces down on the pile between us all. "I wonder what changed," I asked redundantly as I watched her have a go at the hand of the guy to my right. "My Equestria's a few years ahead of yours, and my Shining Armour's shiny boys and girls are all stick-in-the-mud absolute professionals." I didn't bother pointing out that it was most certainly caused by a certain invasion I was presently trying to prevent.

The unicorn stallion to my right chuckled as the pegasus guard took a card and instantly scowled. "Marriage changes a stallion, don't you know?" he barked. "Why wouldn't he wanna shape up the guard to take care of that pretty princess fiancé of his?"

Before Ocellus could take her turn, the door opened and a nondescript unicorn butler stepped in. "Anonymous Flicker and Ocellus?" he asked, more to catch our attention than anything else. "The Princesses have convened in the dining room. Word is that the expected guest has arrived in the city with an honour guard and will be at the castle shortly."

I nodded, setting my hand of cards down on the floor and reaching over to pat the pegasus guard on the shoulder. "Guess that makes you the loser since you had that queen, huh?" Slowly, being careful not to disturb the blade in my back, I rose onto my feet and began to stretch. I considered grabbing the Shapeshifter's Parasol, but at seven thirty in the evening, I reckoned that I had enough darkness to get by without needing the parasol if passing any open windows.

Ocellus was a bit slower at rising, but was right on my metaphorical heels as the butler led us out towards the dining hall. Now, you're probably wondering why we were taking this meeting in the dining hall rather than the throne room. One would think that the best place to take any sort of diplomatic envoy would be the throne room, but there was another reason I suggested we take it with a meal.

See, the changelings were starving not only because their hive was located in the Badlands—an unfortunate climate disaster a few centuries back rendered it the inhospitable mess it was—but due to their need for love. In the case of queens and queen nymphs, the physiological need to feed on someone directly was much more important than with drones. If we could give Chrysalis and anyone in her party the love that guards had been donating since this morning, and feed them something filling, she might be much more open to negotiating a peace. That was the plan, at least.

When we were led into the royal dining room, there were startled gasps from all three princesses. I'd managed to avoid meeting Princess Cadance at all today, but it made sense that she'd be attending, especially given it was her wedding that Chrysalis was planning on hijacking. A shame her first glimpse of me was all banged up and a blade sticking out of my back. Still, she looked exactly like my world's Cadance, albeit younger looking. Even with the eternal youth of an alicorn, ten years makes a hell of a difference in appearance.

"Anonymous," Celestia noted as I strolled in. "Captain Armour alerted me to the attack earlier, but I was under the impression that, given your condition when apprehended yesterday, you'd have regenerated such damage."

I shrugged, turning slightly to show the knife in my back. "I chose to hold off until Queen Chrysalis joined us, Princess Celestia," I casually replied, turning my one good optical sensor back to the door as I took up position at the neutral side of the table. Interestingly, Ocellus stuck by me, even though she was of Chryssi's brood. "Figured it might be helpful if I expressed my continued interest in peace between our kinds, despite the injuries acquired preventing the assassination of Apprentice Ocellus by Enforcer Odonata."

That got a worried look from the Princess of Love. Probably because she was too kind of a pony to comprehend accepting what would be a grievous bodily injury for any living creature for the purpose of a little political ammunition. Still, I gave a quick curtsy to the pink one. "Apologies, Princess Cadenza," I continued, choosing to use her formal name to remain impersonal. This wasn't my world's Cadance or Shiny, or my Sun Horse and Moon Horse. "I am Anonymous Flicker, a traveller between realities. Although this body is on loan from the last universe I visited, I am normally of the same species as Ocellus here."

Before I could say more, the dining room doors opened to admit a large group of changelings. At the head of the group was Intelligencer Chelicerae, whom we'd convinced to extend this olive branch to Chrysalis. Much like Ocellus, she too was dressed in a maid outfit, but had shed said disguise. Ten praetorian guards in hive-resin plate, five on either side, followed behind her, boxing in their VIP.

Finally, there was her royal bugginess herself, Queen Chrysalis. Unlike the only time I saw her when I was a foal, she didn't look nearly as mangy and deranged. Despite being called out and put on the back hoof, she was standing proud with her black fungal crown atop her head. Much like her guards, her chitin was dull and flaking in places... Nowhere near as nice as the sheen on Ocellus and Chelicerae.

The larger infiltrator stepped forward, and calmly announced, "Presenting Her Royal Majesty, Queen Chrysalis of the Badlands Hive, last bastion of the changeling race." She stepped aside, allowing Chrysalis to step forward. "Also attending is the Royal Heiress, Princess Anonymous, daughter of Queen Chrysalis."

My brain threw a major segfault, and for a moment I swore that I did a quick reboot, but no, my auditory sensors were not deceiving me. She'd just said Princess Anonymous, and sure enough, sticking close to the queen's legs was a nymph who couldn't have been more than a few months outside her pupa. She was very thin and sickly looking, but she looked just like I did as a nymph... Navy elytra, dark green hair, and vivid green eyes.

I wasn't expecting this world to have an Anon, I thought drily as I turned to glance down at Ocellus and then accusingly at Chelicerae. Neither one had informed me that the queen in this reality had a daughter, nor what her name was, and given that we shared a goddamn name, that was pretty fucking important information to leave out.

Chrysalis' gaze swept across all three princesses, before straying over to me and the now cowering drone beside me. Her eyes narrowed, and she let out a low growl. "Apprentice Ocellus," she all but spat, addressing the drone rather than any of the princesses. "I suppose I have you to thank for breaking the masquerade and ruining months of careful planning. That the ponies offer parlay is the only reason I am not executing you where you stand for your betrayal."

All of the ponies looked outraged, but I raised my bandaged hand to stay them as I stepped forward. "No, Queen Chrysalis, even if they weren't offering parlay, you would not be executing her," I warned. "I was the one that caught your infiltrator out and revealed your plan to the ponies, and it was I who invoked the Goddess of the Swarm in promising this drone safety in my presence... an oath I've already had to make good on thanks to Enforcer Odonata, as you no doubt see."

She gawped at me, and her guards bristled, as I removed my bandages and showed them my damaged faceplate. When I turned to show her the knife in my back, I continued. "That reminds me, you may have the Swarm-minder's Oath back," I continued, wrapping my tail around the handle of the blade and wrenching it out of my back. I slid it across the floor towards her. When I turned back to face her, I let my systems finally begin to stitch me back together right in front of her eyes. "Worry not; Odonata is unharmed, just as Chelicerae and Ocellus are." I paused for a moment before smirking. "Although, his bark may be worse than his bite for a while."

The queen bug stared at me for several moments before turning to the ponies. With a sigh, she asked, "Does she ever shut up, or is this annoyance going to be a mainstay in this meeting?" In response, I flickered my holos on and demonstrated my changeling form before grinning at her. "Terrific."

Friendship Get!

Friends

N, Disassembly Drone - COP9AU
Uzi, Worker Drone - COP9AU
Ocellus, Unreformed Changeling - EQUS78Σ *NEW*

Items

The Victim's Guitar - COP9AU
WDF Aviators - COP9AU
Shapeshifter's Parasol - EQUS78Σ *UPDATED*

Software

Conscience_v0.1a - COP9AU
absoluteSolver (?) - COP9AU

2 extra lives remaining

Author's Note

Arc 2 will continue its regular release schedule, although upon publishing the final for 'Hunger Fae, Time to Play,' I will be putting the story on hiatus in order to work on a side-project in a separate fandom.