Sub Sole Nihil Novum Est

It stared at the purple native through a glass wall. Pheromones indicated it was female and of suitable age for reproduction, not that it was interested in mating with the locals. Her mouth part moved and sound came out, but it did not understand her language. It would have, had the dark one not splattered the host's brain across a wall a few hours ago. The damage had taken long enough to heal for the alien to very much consider making improvements already. They would be internal, so as not to draw more attention, and it was thankful its captors provided consumables to hold it over.

For starters, the eyes were regrown to tolerate a larger range of light, thus allowing it to see partially into the infrared and ultraviolet spectra. Its pupils were now rectangular and parallel to the floor, making it the most externalized change made to the host's weak shell. The portions of the skull that had once been the braincase were reconstructed out of carbon nanotubes, woven into strands and braided into a shock-absorbent, anti-ballistic shell. Because it did not use a centralized nervous system, and had no real need for an extra cavity, it decided the blast-resistant pocket was a perfect place to hold the enslaved stem cells.

The female was chattering again, and it latched onto a single syllable in the entire flurry of noise: food. Whenever she mentioned this food, more consumables were brought to it and stuffed through a slot in the large window. It may have been mistaken, but it was at least a small portion of the native tongue, and fostering a belief that it was on their side would allow it to survive much longer. It wasn't with them, nor was it against them; it was entirely neutral unless provoked, if one did not count taking over its host.

But, on the subject of this food, the consumables its captor gifted, it would be very much a wonderful thing to understand  what they said, even if it wouldn't let them know until it suited it.

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Twilight stared at the alien that was once Caramel. It looked much the same, save for the regenerated head and square pupils. It stared back, locking eyes with an almost robotic focus. Unlike her, it hadn't blinked with its eyelids, and instead used a nictitating membrane. Not only had it grown its skull from scratch, it had also changed the very shape of the eyes and wildly altered the equine form. Were it not for those two things, Twilight would have almost believed it to be any stallion, so long as it didn't try to speak.

The illusion was broken the moment Luna walked into the observation room, as one of its eyes moved to focus on her instead of Twilight. The princess had found somepony who had come into contact with the alien, though she seemed a bit nervous about the entire ordeal. Again, Twilight knew this pony, but only on a passing basis. Nurse Redheart was paler than usual, her face curling at the thing behind the glass.

“I see its head has grown back.” Luna looked at it with a mixture of disgust and morbid fascination. Her sister was on her way to pass judgment, though it seemed the alien was already on its way to the furnace. She took a small step back as she noticed its eyes darting between her and the other mares, separately.

“How long has he been like this?” Redheart asked, her voice quivering for both grief of what had happened, and fear of what might become of her. Her mind raced through every touch they shared in order to find when she may have been contaminated. She wore gloves for stitching his head, they hadn't shared drinks, they hadn't even shared a kiss when their semi-date ended.

“He was infected shortly after the meteor shower.” She was worried Twilight would say something like that. That left a number of chances for whatever contagion to spread to her. Had Caramel noticed at all, or did he find out only after it was too late?

“Is Caramel still... there? Like he's asleep and this thing just as control for now?” She asked the princess, hopeful that this wasn't permanent. She regretted that she couldn't help Caramel at the hospital, but maybe there was some way to fix this and save both their hides.

“Doubtful. The brain is where the mind rests, and it now exists as a scorch on the side of a market stall.”

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It decided it rather liked this body, even though it couldn't remember any of its previous ones, or even if it had any before this one. It was largely weak, yes, but it had significant amounts of biomass that were begging to be re-purposed into something greater. It couldn't do that under the watchful gaze of its captors, but it could easily mess with its new innards. The colonies of bacteria in its gut had been absorbed and recycled; there simply was no need for them. Speaking of modifications, the unseen other from earlier was outside the holding chamber.

She was easy to identify, as her voice had been one of the first things it had heard upon gaining the ability to interpret aural input. She was white and a bit smaller than the purple one. The host said something over and over again as it left her that afternoon, or perhaps the previous afternoon. Redheart, Redheart, Redheart. over and over again, until sleep finally overtook him. It was sure she was named Redheart, just as the purple one had been called Twilight, and the bigger one was Luna. The patterns were there, it just needed to identify them.

Redheart, the one the host wished to mate with, seemed a bit frantic, almost desperate, as though her survival was on the line. The only thing that warranted worry was discovery and lack of consumables. Did she need something to ingest? If so, why weren't the others providing one of their own with sustenance as they had done it, the obvious outsider and imposter? Natives were strange. It didn't care for her well-being or anything like that, it just wondered about the lack of a pattern in this. All life was patterns, so why not feeding habits?

It tapped a hoof against the glass window, which was meant, possibly, to reflect light back into the chamber and prevent it from seeing the other side. They neglected its ability to adapt, and it saw them perfectly clearly. They seemed a bit surprised, as their eyes widened and they stepped back slightly. It pointed as best it could to Redheart, tapped twice, and then pointed to the slot where the purple one had pushed consumables into the chamber.

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“What in the wide world of Equestria is it doing?” Twilight wasn't surprised it could see them; she had carried on what was essentially a staring contest with it for quite some time. The creature was simply fascinating. She had fed it three times, and it knew what her approach meant when she had a tray with her. She usually collected them after it was done eating, but she had alos wanted to see what it could do with it. “Does it want to... eat you?”

“Oh please don't let it!” The nurse almost yelled. She was terrified of the idea of being some snack for a monster from space. She didn't even want to have to look at it, and she wouldn't get a moment's peace until she was cleared of any chance of infection.

“It hardly has the chance to escape, and it must know that, so why bother with this?” Luna could make no sense of anything the alien did, but that was probably to be expected. She knew it could think, maybe even plan, but she had no idea if it had feelings or emotions, or even if it felt them the same way ponies did. But, like all living things, there must have been a reason for what it did, a method to its madness. “If it doesn't want to eat you, what could it connect between you and food?”

“Caramel and I had lunch together, but he was normal then.”

“Maybe it thinks differently than we do.” Twilight's idea was simple and brilliant. It may not have processed information the same as a pony. She knew it didn't feel pain, otherwise jumping through the window would have elicited some reaction, so what was one thing every living thing needed to take care of when pain wasn't an evolutionary necessity? “Nurse, it doesn't want to eat you; it thinks you're hungry because you're upset.”

“What?” To Redheart, Twilight was as well off speaking Gryphon.

“It doesn't feel pain, and it might not understand pony facial expressions and body language, only how we act on the whole. Any deviation in behavior is to meet a need, that's how nature works, so if it only understands hunger, or a lack of nutrition in its case, then it automatically associates hunger with deviation from the norm.” Twilight was impressed with herself for having figured it out, or at least that much. The scrying had shown it to be an artificial life form, so it was already at a disadvantage when it came to understanding the natural order of things.

“But that doesn't tell us why it cares if one of us is hungry or not.” Luna stared at the thing, and it stared back, almost expectantly. She didn't like it, not one bit, but she had to deal with it until her sister arrived and gave her two bits. “In the meantime, why don't you help yourself to some breakfast, Nurse?”