Love is Life

Twilight's sensitive nose flared and she gagged on the potent aroma of the smelling salts that Zecora had passed underneath it. She shook her head and looked around, seeing two Zecora's, "Did... Okay, which one of you is Mebulu."

"I thought this would be a good test, to help you tell a changeling from the rest," said the zebra on the right.

The zebra on the left nodded, "A Mwindanji is trained for many years to notice the subtle things and have no fears."

"To separate the real from the fake, less than a second for the best does it take."

"So how do I tell?"

'You are a queen, it is instinct. It's the one on the right.'

'How can you tell?'

'Breathe the air, notice the subtle undertone of mint below everything, most noticeable around the pony on the right. Her coat is also just slightly darker, unnoticeable to the untrained eye, but yours is, can you see it now? If you look really close, you can still see the segments of her eyes in the right light.'

Twilight turned to the right confidently, "You are Mebulu. Having the former queen's imprint teaching me everything is useful."

"I can imagine it would be. Is she sorry for what she did in Canterlot?"

"She is. That is the only reason why I agreed to take up the mantle. That and I did not want my brother and sister-in-law to have an act of genocide staining their souls. Though, that brings up the question, you were in Canterlot, how come you weren't blown away with the others?"

"Your brother and the Princess' spell only targeted those changelings with ill intent, so I wasn't affected."

"Hm, well, Cadence is the Princess of Love, so I'm sure she knew if there were any exiles in Canterlot living safely and happily that they weren't part of the attack..."

"She does seem like the type."

"But how come Chrysalis didn't notice?"

'I was distracted by your brother being a fabulous piece of flank and my plans for taking over the world, remember? I didn't have the time to care about an exile.'

Twilight's brow furrowed as she attempted to glare into her own head, bringing a small giggle from the two zebra's watching her. 'Rule number 3: You are never allowed to refer to my brother as a piece of flank ever again OR show me any memories involving him!' She mentally shouted with a shudder.

'Ah, inhibitions and taboos, how cute!'

"Twilight, you're spacing out on us,"

"Sorry, making a new rule for Chrysalis to follow. We have a standing deal where if she violates any of the rules I make for her, she's gone and I find a way to change back into a pony permanently."

Mebulu nodded, "A good idea."

Twilight smiled slightly before assuming her original form, "Anyway, thank you both for everything, but I really should be getting back to Ponyville, it's getting late."

Zecora tilted her head slightly, "By all means if you must go, please do not hesitate to do so."

"I'll see you again soon, I'm sure. I'll be passing this way regularly until I find a new hive and set up a teleport beacon."

"Please don't turn into my mother," begged Mebulu.

"I won't, I promise. If I start to turn into her at all, please tell me. I hope with my friends around though, I won't become what she was in the end."

The trio shared a brief moment of silence before Twilight left, teleporting back to the library as soon as neared the edge of the forest. Opening the door, she saw an interesting sight before her. Rarity and Spike were sitting rather close together reading a book while Pinkie and Big Mac were discussing apples. When she entered, all four of them zoomed up close to her and smiled, "Hi... everypony... What brings you all here?"

"Well, darling, I was simply teaching Spike about why you needed him to stay with me for a week. I think he's old enough to understand that, finally," said the seamstress with a subtle wink.

"I came over to talk about that thing you were talking about while I was talking to Rarity earlier!" bounced the party pony.

"Ah... Actually don't rightly know why ah'm here, Miss Sparkle," said Big Mac through a rapidly growing blush, "Ah musta had it in mind to get a book on farmin', but fergot what it was when ah got here..."

"It's fine, Big Mac, really. I'm sure we can find it easily enough. Thank you for agreeing to take care of Spike, Rarity. Will you be okay with her, Spike?"

"Of course, Twilight, and I totally understand not wanting me around. That would just... be all kinds of creepy and awkward forever."

"I agree... Well, Pinkie, if you'll wait upstairs while I help Macintosh find that book, I think we'll be all set."

'So why is Big Mac here?'

'I don't... Oh, horseapples...'

'Uh-oh, what didn't you tell me?'

'I forgot... Your lubricant is now highly addictive. Usually it takes longer to take effect since it has to be absorbed through the skin of the penis, but, he knows how to please a mare so he dove right in and got a snoot-full. I wouldn't be surprised if he starts experiencing withdrawal tomorrow morning.'

'So he has to... do that... with me regularly or...?'

'Well, it's much more potent if actually ingested, and given that it was the first emissions of a young queen... if he doesn't get a regular dose he could die... but if he does, he'll become a changeling king.'

'A king?'

The discussion was interrupted by Big Mac's strong voice, "Ah reckon ah just needed a walk, then Pinkie got me talking about apples and their relationship to pies. Ah'll leave y'all to whatever you were doin'," he said, shaking slightly as he walked out the door.

Twilight smiled sadly and started walking up the stairs to her room and the waiting party pony, 'I don't want him to die...'

'Then turn him. He'll still be Big Mac, just subservient to you and capable of producing self-aware, intelligent drones, just like you want.'

'Alright... now what to do about Pinkie Pie...' the unicorn thought, opening the door to her bedroom to find that she had set up for a party, "Pinkie? What's all this?"

"Oh! It's the 'Congratulations on becoming the new queen, Twilight' party and the 'Pinkie becomes a changeling' party at the same time! I thought it would be fun to have two parties at once and even though it's just the two of us since I didn't want to tell anyone given the socio-political climate relating to Changelings I thought it would still be a really good idea. I made cake! Can you still eat cake? Can you still eat at all? Will I still be able to eat? Oh no, I don't want to be a changeling if I can't ever have cake again. Love can't taste as good as cake, it's completely impossible."

"PINKIE!" Twilight shouted, interrupting the rant, "Calm down. You'll still be able to eat, it just won't give you as much energy as love does. Now, are you sure you want to be a changeling? Do you know what that even means?"

"It means I can become anypony anywhere anytime! It's awesome!"

Twilight sighed, and with a purple flash, was her queen self again, "It means you would be my subject, a loyal drone to Queen Neoptera of the Everfree Hive. You would have to draw love from your friends or your special somepony to survive, and while this won't harm them, it may have other side-effects as I'm rapidly discovering. They may become dependent on your feeding like an addiction. You may get addicted too and try to feed too much. If that happens, I'll have to... " Twilight couldn't finish the sentence. She didn't want to have to think about putting one of her friends down.

"Twilight, I may be a really silly pony, and the craziest mare in this mental asylum called a town next to Screw Ball and her sister, but I swear on my family none of that will happen. Besides, passive feeding doesn't have any side-effects and everypony in this town loves me enough as a friend that I'm sure I can get plenty of energy that way!"

"And you're absolutely sure about this?"

"Only Sith deal in absolutes."

"I... wait, what?"

"I'm sure, silly! Now how do we do this, is there a spell you cast or is a bite thing like a vampony?"

"Actually, we... uh, we have to..." Twilight's carapace somehow turned bright red as Chrysalis finished explaining the process, "You have to uh... lick me... down there... while I do other things to you..."

Pinkie Pie's grin almost looked like it would split her head in half, "Now THAT sounds like a party!"

Twilight facehoofed, "Just get on the bed while I wait for Chrysalis to stop laughing at me."