(A/N: Warning: This chapter has squick. Proceed with caution.)

“Dude, I think I may have eaten some bad meat. My stomach is not feeling 100% right now. I think I’m going to try to sleep it off,” I said to Nick. I got up from my gaming chair and headed into the meat preparation chambers, AKA the kitchen. Reaching up, I opened up the medicine cabinet and grabbed some Tylenol and Pepto Bismol. Taking both, I trudged down the hall and went into my room. I flopped down on my extra large bed and fell asleep without removing my clothes.

“Hello, William. It’s been a while since we have shared a dream, hasn’t it?” Chrysalis said. The two of us stood in the streets of a city. From the looks of the buildings, this was a prominent pony city. White towers soared over shorter white buildings, a purple and gold motif for the rooftops. The entire city was devoid of ponies, the shop windows devoid of goods, and a featureless grey sky hung over head. “Canterlot is quite the city.”

“This is Canterlot? You planned to attack here. Why?” I asked. In the week since Chrysalis had placed her order for explosives, I had been tormented by curiosity. Why make such an outlandishly big show? What did she hope to gain from this?

“Nope. No spoilers,” she said with a smug grin. Every single time I had asked her, I had gotten the same response. It was maddening. “Maybe you could come and find out? Hmmm?”

“And how do you propose that I do that? I can’t very well magic myself to Equa, now can I? Besides, even if I could, what would I look for?” I asked.

“Easy, I’ll get you an invitation to the wedding, and you just ‘magic’ one of your children over,” Chrysalis said. The smug tone still saturated her voice. I face-palmed, remembering that I had teased Nick about sending him over to spy for me. It looks like I actually would be doing that. I won’t use Marcus, because I need him in his place.

“Yeah, yeah. Nick will meet you in there. I’ll send the goods over with him. And Chrysalis?”

“Yes?”

“I don’t have any kids.”

“Tell me, have you had any stomach aches recently? Feelings of indigestion?” She asked.

‘Oh, no. Please don’t tell me this is going where I think it’s going,’ I thought before answering, “Yes…”

“Changelings don’t get stomach aches or indigestion,” Chrysalis snickered. “Congratulations, it’s an egg!”

“OH COME ON! HOW DOES THAT EVEN HAPPEN!” I raged. “I’m still a virgin!” Chrysalis burst out laughing at my confession slip up. I just scowled at her. I did not want to be a teenage father, and now she is telling me I am going to be a teenage mother and father at the same time. That mare is laughing at me because I failed twice as hard. And all without even having sex!

“My changelings already explained it to you. As I recall, they said you fainted when they told you about self-impregnation.” She laughed at my expense some more. “You must have wanted a larvae of your own sometime within the past week, and your body is granting your wish.”

“Does this mean that every single time I think about having a child, I will?”

“Don’t be silly. That only happens the first time.” Chrysalis dove into an anatomy lesson at that point. I listened to her explanation while trying not to get dream vomit all over my dream self. Of course, she had to demonstrate. What made it worse was that she did it while sitting on a park bench.

‘I have seen some weird junk on the internet, but this takes the cake. I never thought that I would be getting self-sex ed. from an alien bug queen in a shared dream.’ I shuddered at the thought. “Hey, Chrysalis, thank you for the lesson, but I’m just going to go over here and curl up in a ball. You know, to preserve what remains of my sanity.”

I awoke the next morning to find myself swollen like a pregnant lady. I groaned and hauled myself out of bed. Instinct clouded my mind as I shuffled over to the corner of the room. I pulled of my pants and squatted down. I felt my insides begin to shuffle around and a feeling of being stretched spread from my nether regions.

I don’t think that there is a comparable feeling to having an egg slide out of you. I could not tell you what birthing a human baby feels like, but this most definitely was not the same. For one thing, it did not hurt like a human birth, and the muscular movement felt more like a pleasant poop than the painful cramps that I hear are involved in human birth.

A minute later, my egg sat in the corner. Still clouded by instinct, I began to bind the egg in place with my goo secretions until it was firmly held upright. Task done, I could finally take a clear look at what had just happened. The green egg looked like something out of the old Alien movies. At a foot and a half long, it was far larger than any animal on Earth could have laid. How in the world did I manage to lay something like that? Talk about a blow to my masculinity, unless of course we’re talking Mr. Seahorse here.

I sat at the table in my apartment, wolfing down my eggs and bacon. Thank whatever deities are out there that the bacon still tasted fine, even if the eggs were a little bland. Nick noticed my rapid pace, saying, “I see you’re feeling better. Was it just indigestion?”

I stared at him, trying to see if he was mocking me. I even went so far as to probe into his mind to see if he had somehow found out what had happened. Seeing that he really knew nothing and was not mocking me, I said to him, “Go look in my room. Come back and don’t say anything. Got it?” He gave me a confused nod and stood up to take a look. I felt his surprise register in the back of my mind when he opened the door.

He sat back down at the table, his black carapace paler than normal. He picked up his fork, but only managed to push his food around his plate. After a moment, Nick asked, “Is that an egg?”

Nod.

“Yours?”

Nod.

“Is Catherine involved?”

“Nope.”

“You’re the mother?”

“Yep, somehow,” I replied.

“Did you bang me and then make me forget the whole experience?” Nick asked, concern crossing his features.

“Eww, no. I’m straight. There's nothing wrong with being gay,” I said, "but I don't want to think about that sort of stuff."

“That means nothing coming from someone who can change genders at will and is naturally both genders,” Nick retorted

“I think like a guy. You think like a guy. I’m dating a girl named Catherine. I’m straight,” I declared resolutely.

“There’s nothing wrong with being gay," Nick paused for a moment, stroking his chin, "or would it be bi for us?”

“I know. But I’m not. Are you?”

“Maaaaaaayyyyyyybeeeeee…” Nick said while leaning closer to me.

“Are you asking me to do you?” I asked. I sure hoped not.

“Maaaaaaayyyyyyybeeeeee…” Nick said again. His expression was hopeful.

“No.”

Nick pouted with a quick “Fine.” Whether or not he was joking, I could not tell.

This whole exchange took less than a minute. We stared at each other for a second before my roommate and I burst into laughter. A person can only take so much weirdness before they completely lose it. We laughed and laughed. We laughed until our sides hurt. We laughed until we could laugh no more.

Eventually, after managing to calm down to a reasonable level, Nick commented, “That egg really looks like one of those pods from the Alien movies.”

“I know. I thought the same thing after I laid it," I said with a chuckle. "I sure hope a facehugger doesn’t come jumping out of it.”

“Ugghh…” Nick gave a shudder. “That would be horrible.”

“You know, I think I can feel it,” I said to my roommate. I could feel the two adult members of my hive in the back of my mind all the time, similar to how you can always feel a properly functioning limb but never pay attention to it. “It’s weak, but my kid’s starting to integrate into the hive mind. I would not be surprised if you could feel it before too long.”

“What are you going to name it?” Nick asked.

“I don’t know. This is so sudden, you know? I never thought about it. Maybe I will let it name itself. Chrysalis said they mature really fast as soon as they are fully integrated into the hive mind.”

It took three days for my egg to finally hatch. I was reading a book in my room when a feeling of anticipation and excitement overcame me. After a moment, I realized that it was not my own emotions, but the emotions of my child. The egg started jerking around and audibly cracked. I called out for Nick to come see.

I took a step forward to help my child out, but something held me back. ‘It needs to do it on its own,’ I realized. By the time Nick finally arrived, It had crawled out of its egg and into the sunlight and was busy drying its wings.

The first thing out of Nick’s mouth when he saw it was, “Ugly little thing, isn’t it?”

“Oh come on. It’s adorable,” I retorted.

“The little baby-vampire-bug-thing covered in its egg juices is so adorable with a face that only a mother could love,” he said. He made his eyes human just so that he could roll them.

My kid gave out a soft murmur. My mind translated it: <<I’m hungry. Hold me.>> I complied, scooping up the kid. I channeled a bit of my magic through our connection into it. The kid giggled, happy with his meal. I went into my bathroom and grabbed a towel. Once it had been cleaned of the goo, it actually did look quite adorable. Big blue eyes and cute little fangs on such a tiny body. Its little wings twitching every now and again. I’m just gushing with parental pride. For the first time, I have a real family bond with the rest of my hive. I will do anything to protect it.

Over the course of three days, it grew very rapidly. Nick swore that if you stared at it long enough, you could see it visibly grow in size. It’s appetite for physical food was nearly insatiable. The little thing could eat through a week’s supply of meat for both Nick and I in a day. Within hours on the first day, it was walking. Morning of the second day, it was saying basic words; by late afternoon, it was saying full sentences. The third day, it was almost the size of a ten year old human child. By this point, it had fully connected to the hive mind and had access to the shared memories. I found it surreal seeing a creature that was less than eighty hours old discussing multi-variable calculus.

“Daddy?”

“Yeah, kiddo?”

“What’s my name? You call me ‘kiddo’ and Uncle Nick calls me ‘squirt,’ but the hive memory says those are just nick-names. I’ve never heard you call me by my real name, and the hive won’t tell me.”

“That’s because I don’t know your name. I wanted you to pick it for yourself. Do you want a girl’s name, a boy’s name, or do you want to make up a brand new one?”

“Hmmmm…” It scrunched up its face in concentration. “I want to be… Klika.” ‘Daughter.’

“Klika… I like it. Very well then, from this day forward, you will be Klika.” I smiled and scooped up my newly named daughter and held her tight.

“Daaaad…. You’re squishing my wings!” she whined. I set her down.

“Opps, sorry," I said sheepishly. "Hey, Klika, I was thinking… my name is not very cool. It was the name I was born with, but I was born a human. I want an awesome changeling name. I think I will call myself…”

Author's Notes:

*Ding* Have a longer chapter.

Look, more changeling biology!

Introducing Klika, the first changeling ever born on Earth.

I've always felt that there was something odd with the relationship between Nick and William. Now I know why.
Is it gay if you can swap your parts?

Hive population: 4
Hive finances: $856,200

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Voting for William's new name is still open, but the choices have been narrowed down:

1) Alvaruim Rex (Hive King) - Alternate Madness (10 votes as of now)
2) King Mendax (liar) - the monkey ninja (5 votes as of now)
3) King Patrem (father) - the monkey ninja (1 vote as of now)

Voting is closed. Thank you for your participation.

(edited 12/21/2013)