BREAKING MY HEART

I let out a contented sigh as the liquid I’m stirring in the tub in front of me goes from pink to yellow. I can’t say I’m surprised that I found the solution to my little problem; solutions are what I do, after all, but that doesn’t make it any less satisfying to tic another item off my list. Then there’s a little splash and the surface of the opaque, syrupy liquid ripples as something, the thing that’s the entire point of the last few weeks efforts, stirs. It refocuses me in the moment. There’s still so far to go.

“Aww, you like that, don’t you little guy?” I coo at the liquid. I know there’s no point to my doing so, seeing as how the life I’m growing hasn’t developed enough to have ears or much of anything else in the way of senses. But it’s only natural for a new mother to want to talk to her baby.

I suppose, in a way, I’m a mother to all the changelings of the swarm, especially those I’ve bred myself. I have three hatcheries running right now, all full to bursting with the most adorable little drones you’ll ever see. But this project is special. Every parent picks favorites, even if they say they don’t (in our house I was totally the favorite. Ignore Shining Armor if he tries to tell you otherwise) and I can’t wait to see what this one grows up into. I’ve spliced so many different species and powers into its patchwork body that not even I can be entirely sure what it’s going to be like, but the one thing I do know for certain is that it’s going to be very, very powerful and very, very dangerous. I reach a foreleg into the goop in front of me and feel around until I brush up against it, already feeling the twitch of muscles like steel cables just beneath the surface of its rigid, unpierceable skin.

It recognizes my touch, bound to me in mind and whatever it has that might pass for a soul. A little fleshy tendril slithers up and into one of the holes in my forelegs, nearly pitching me straight into a giggling fit. They grow up so fast, and in fact my little buddy here has nearly doubled in size just in the last few days. The nutrients from the chemicals I’ve been pouring into the tub won’t be able to keep up for much longer, it’s time to move my little guy to a new environment to encourage the next stage in its development. Luckily, I have just the perfect place in mind already.

Luna’s been distant lately, ever since somepony broke into our bedroom and tried to kill her. I suppose that isn’t entirely surprising, and I hate myself for having put her in danger even though I keep telling myself it wasn’t really my fault. Anypony who would do such a thing must be just the worst sort of monster, deserving of nothing but a slow, torturous, agonizing death as I slowly flay them alive. Still, she needs something that will give her hope again, and relight that wonderful spark I first fell in love with.

A new baby on the way is just the thing.

I’ve always been a multitasker, so the idea of killing two birds with one stone followed by using said stone to bludgeon an empire into subjugation is a naturally appealing one. To that end, I retrieve a big glass jar from the other side of the room and scoop it through the tub. I feel my little bioweapon slip inside, and the rest fills with the liquid it’s been suspended in. That’ll keep it healthy while I’m moving it.

I very carefully carry the precious cargo with me through the halls, not taking my eyes off it or the amorphous silhouette inside that’s writhing and shifting, used to having a bit more space to spread itself out. Better get used to it, since it’ll be living in even more cramped quarters for the next six weeks of its metamorphosis. At least it’ll be somewhere softer and warmer than a glass jar while it grows. Proceeding as methodically as I am, it takes a bit longer to reach our repaired and renovated bedroom. I converted my walk-in closet into a comfy surgical theater, time to put it to good use. “Luna? Are you awake?”

Luna’s eyes are open, but they’re sunken and hollow and show no signs of any life or recognition. See? Distant. “It’s time, hon. Time for what we talked about the other night.” Well, I talked and she mostly listened, but that’s just how close we are. Words would only get in the way. “Do you want to see it before we get started?” I lower the jar near her face, and she does lean forward a bit to gaze into it and try to make out the creature within.

Then she snaps her head back as a tentacle rushes into the wall of the jar and sticks there. Pressing up against the glass we have a clearer view of its underside, covered in pale suckers, and within each little circle a quintet of tiny claws scrape against the glass looking for purchase to grip. Each contraction leaves little grooves and scratches visible in its wake, but there’s nothing that the claws are able to sink into. Yet. Luna’s eyes go wider and unfocus as she starts to hyperventilate while I return the jar to the table. It’s so cute how they’re already bonding! Soon they’ll be inseparable. She looks up at me, pleading, and though her mouth is moving no words emerge.

“It’s too bad I had to leave it outside of you long enough for it to get this big, or the insertion process could have been a lot more fun,” I say with a teasing wink in her direction. All those tentacles; it’s really a missed opportunity, but oh well. I run a hoof over her tight but scarred belly, still bearing all the evidence of her past injuries. I’m about to add a few more. “I’ll dose you with the anaesthetic, then I’ll make the initial incision... hmm... probably right along here.” I trace a path from her sternum down to just past her navel, then on impulse I lower my face down to just between her teats and leave a trail of kisses right back up to where I started. I can’t wait to implant our child into her. To lay down against her bulging abdomen and feel it squirming within her. I know she’s just as excited for it as I am. “It’ll basically be a reverse Cemarean-section. You’ll be sore, and you’ll need to stay on bedrest for a little longer than we talked about, but there shouldn’t be any other complications. Probably. Now I better go wash up. Don’t want to keep you waiting, right?”

I trot away from her with a little extra spring in my step, and into the sterile washroom. Even though both mommy-to-be and baby should be preternaturally resistant to disease, there’s no reason to risk the possibility of infection or sepsis. It’s going to be a very demanding pregnancy for Luna, after all, and her natural defenses might be compromised. I look down at my hooves and try to make sure I’m slathering the antibacterial soap onto every nook and cranny, every gap and hole, and rinsing them under scalding-hot water. When I think I’ve done a good enough job, I look up to regard myself in the mirror for the first time since walking in.

I’m not there.

The room behind me is, and I spin around to confirm that I’m not looking into another room altogether. I pull down a washcloth from a hook on the wall behind me, and when I look back at the reflection shows the same washcloth laying where it fell. But no sign of myself. It’s a little bit unnerving, to say the least. Is the mirror enchanted somehow? It seems like a silly enchantment to put on a washroom mirror, and I certainly didn’t put it there. Confusion turns to curiosity now that I’ve been presented with a new puzzle to solve. A mirror that doesn’t reflect living creatures? Or just me? This calls for an experiment!

I reach out with my changeling senses and find a nearby drone, and with just a bit of extra effort teleport it into the room with me. The confused drone appears in the mirror as well, so this irregularity seems to be localized to just affecting me. Odd. Maybe it’s something to have to do with my shape? I gave the drone a silent command, and it turns into me. Or the little unicorn I used to be at least. I haven’t used that shape in a while now, and even looking at it from outside makes my skin crawl. The drone-Twilight plants its front hooves on the sink next to me, and the reflection in the mirror stares right back at it. The drone turns to me, looking confused, while in the mirror Twilight looks up at nothing but empty air.

I sigh and close my eyes. I don’t have time for this right now, and my head is starting to hurt again. I dismiss the drone, and hear it walk out of the room behind me. Alone again with just my thoughts, I leave my eyes closed for a few more seconds trying to will the pain away before I feel well enough to open them again.

When I do, the drone’s reflection is still there looking out at me from the mirror.

My jaw drops, and I take a hesitant step back. That just makes the me in the mirror lean forward and glare at me, purple sparks flying off her horn. She’s shouting, ranting at me and even pounding her hoof on the edge of the sink for emphasis, but no noises break the plane of the mirror and pass through to my side. “I. Can’t. Hear. You,” I say, exaggerating each word in the hopes that she’ll be able to read my lips.

Whether she hears my reply or not, she just grows more upset. Now she’s pacing around the other room, her mouth flapping at a mile a minute as her magic grows more intense. When I just cock my head and stare back at her, not understanding what she wants, she lets out a silent scream and stamps on the floor. She looks back up at me with bloodshot and angry eyes for a moment, then she lowers her head and charges the mirror.

The rattle of something impacting against the glass from the far side is the first thing I’ve heard since I turned off the water.

“Stay back!” I yell. She can’t come through. I can’t let her out. She has to stay there where I can’t hear her. I can’t hear her. I can’t hear her. My reflection stumbles back, a bit dazed from the impact, and my attention locks on to a little crack that’s spreading out from where she struck. She lowers her head to charge again, and somehow I just know that this time the barrier won’t hold and everything is going to come rushing in and it can’t I can’t let it I won’t let it stop it stop it stay away stay away STAY AWAY!

Without any other option at my disposal, I yank the metal tap out of the wall. A spray of water erupts on both sides of the mirror, soaking me and my unicorn doppelganger. When she looks up at me again, the water flowing down her face almost makes it look like she’s crying.

She hesitates, which is all that I needed. I grip the length of metal piping in my magic and smash it into the glass. The mirror shatters, exposing the truth: there’s nothing on the other side except for dull gray stone. No other world. No other me. I breath a sigh of relief now that everything’s back under control again. I do some quick math in my head, and at three hours each that’s 20,440 loops of bad luck. Lucky I paid in advance, and with considerable interest.

Cutting off the water with the shutoff valve under the sink, I towel off my face and body as best I can. Just my imagination acting up on me, nothing more. No reason a little thing like that should make me postpone performing major surgery, right? Just gotta keep it together and everything will turn out fine. I stride back out into the bedroom and immediately panic when I see the jar with my special little baby teetering on the very edge of the table I left it on. From the bed, Luna strains with what little magic she has left and it passes the tipping point.

By the time I catch it in a field of my own magic, it’s just inches from breaking on the floor. “Luna!” I admonish her, “sweetie, I know you want to keep our new child close, but you have to be more careful! You’re weaker than you realize right now.” Disaster averted, I managed to relax, just a bit. She does too, going limp as I transfer her over to a gurney and wheel her out of her little protective binding circle. Is this the first time she’s left since I inscribed it? She winces as we reach the other room, the bright lights shining straight down into her face. My tools are all set up and waiting for me, a gleaming silver scalpel resting on the nearby tray. “Goodnight, my love,” I whisper into her ear, then I chomp down on her neck and inject her with the cocktail of drugs that will keep her from feeling this, or at least remembering it after she wakes up. Her eyes roll back and blood dribbles down from the two little pinpricks I’ve made. I let a few droplets collect on my hoof, then carefully pry open the lid of my jar and let them drip down into it. At first nothing happens as the blood dissipates and leaves the jar’s contents a slightly darker shade than before. Then it starts to bubble and churn as the thing inside gets its first taste of what I added, and it wants more.

I lift the finely honed scalpel in my magic, and make the initial cut into Luna’s abdomen. She groans, but the venom holds and the vasoconstrictors I mixed in keep her from losing too much blood. I gently separate the layers of tissue and muscle, one by one, until I reach the very deepest part of her, her womb, and slit it open. One of my baby’s tentacles has slithered out from the jar and probes at Luna’s side, curious and eager to explore. I bet it gets that from my side. I gently take it in my hoof and guide it inside of its new mommy. As it finds its destination, instinct takes over as it latches on to her inner walls. The connection made, three more tentacles grip the jar’s rim. The slimy fluid pours out onto the floor as it hoists itself up, it’s central body rising out of the obscuring depths.

I smile. My child is so beautiful.

-----------------------

Surgery is a resounding success. And I leave Luna, now bulging with the new life developing inside her, to sleep off the rest of the anaesthetics while I head for my throne room. Looks like I’ll be planning an invasion and a baby shower! A whole contingent of drones are milling around the Great Hall, and my throne sits vacant waiting for me to claim it. I take a step towards it. Everything is perfect.

Another step, nearly skipping along.

Well, things are almost perfect. That thing with the mirror is still nagging at me. All those vicious, terrible lies that the other Twilight said. The ones I couldn’t hear. I’m still not hearing them over and over in the back of my head.

Another step, not quite as energetic as the last one.

I mean, no kingdom is perfect, really. I still have plenty to be be proud of. I wish my parents could be here to see it, but of course they’re gone now. At least I wiped out the ponies that did that to them, I haven’t seen any evidence of the rebellion for weeks. They’re all dead too. All dead.

The throne is closer, but my hooves feel heavy.

My friends aren’t dead, at least. Sure, they aren’t quite 100% after... after I... I mean the Elements are the one that hurt them, but only because... because I...

It’s like walking through haunch deep mud, but I manage another step.

Cadance and Shining Armor seem fine, at least. Because they’ve avoided me. Because everything I touch ends up twisted and dead. It’s that dumb time loop. It’s the time loop’s fault that I’m planning to invade their city and massacre their citizens while I force them to watch. That’s not excessive. They were really mean to me!

I’ve reached the base of the stairs that lead up to the dais. Just four stairs not more than a couple inches each. They might as well be mile-high cliffs.

At least I’ll always have Luna. As long as I have her love I can keep going. As long as I have her to hold me and kiss me and make love to me even when she says no at first she always say no at first but then I take her I take her when she doesn’t want me to oh no oh no oh please no I’m not a rapist I’m not raping her she wants she doesn’t want it she never wants it she never wanted me and I’ve been raping the mare that I love over and over and over and I can’t be a rapist good ponies aren’t rapists but I am a rapist so that would mean no that would mean NO that would mean—

“NO!” I bawl. When did I collapse? I don’t remember falling, but here I am on the floor being pounded by wave after wave of guilt and shame. Everything the Twilight in mirror said. She was right. I know she’s right. I’ve always known she was right. I can’t. I can’t do this alone but everypony I’ve ever loved is gone. Please don’t be gone. Please come back.

There’s a flash of green in the corner of my vision. I look towards it, and my eyes go wide.

“Mom? Dad?”

“Twilight!” My mother rushes over to me and throws herself around my neck in the greatest hug ever, my father close behind. “But... but you two died. Didn’t you?”

“Ha! You think we’d let a little fire take us away from our favorite little filly?” asks my father. “Not on your life.”

“But...” I stammer, “but then where have you been?”

The two of them look at one another. “After the attack, we had amnesia. We just now recovered.”

Wow! That’s amazing! And completely plausible! “I missed you so much. I think... I think some of the things I’ve done...”

“Don’t worry about that, Twilight,” says Mom, “you have a swarm to care for now. You have to do what it takes to keep them healthy. That’s more important than anything.”

My brow furrows. Something’s wrong, but I can’t quite put my hoof on it. Then my mother cradles my head in her lap and I stop caring. Another flash of green catches my eye. “Girls?”

Standing there, happy and healthy as the day we first met, are my five best friends. They rush me, and I welcome them into the growing cuddle pile. “Boy!” says Rainbow Dash, “those Elements sure have a kick to ‘em, huh? Took me longer to sleep that off than the time I chugged an entire keg of AJ’s special cider reserves.”

“Uh huh, me too!” says Pinkie. “In fact, I think I might have accidentally achieved enlightenment in that no-sensy room! But I forget what I learned so now I’m back to endarkenment.”

“So... so none of you are mad at me? After what I did to you? You forgive me?”

“Oh Twilight,” says Fluttershy, nuzzling my cheek, “there’s nothing to forgive. You needed to destroy the Elements and you needed us to do it. Our pain isn’t important, only that you achieved your goals and helped the changelings prosper. You’re a good queen.”

“A good... queen,” I repeat, my eyes slipping half closed. I could bask in this feeling for days. For months. Forever.

“And an even better student,” says a new voice. My eyes snap back open at the sound, only to find myself staring up at Princess Celestia in her full, radiant glory. “You passed the test. Flying colors.”

I don’t even question her presence. It’s Celestia, she always has worked in mysterious ways. The important thing is that she’s proud of me again.

“Oh my goodness,” exclaims Rarity, looking back towards the door. “Princess Luna, are you pregnant? I simply must make you something new to wear.”

As much as I don’t want to move, I lift my head up in time to see Princess Luna walk into the room. She’s giving off the healthy glow of an expectant mother and smiling, but an icy dagger of guilt plunges into my chest. “Luna. Luna I’m so sorry for what I did. I’m so sorry that I—”

She holds up a hoof and cuts me off. “You didn’t. I enjoyed every second of being with you, whatever I may have said. And now look at me.” She sits down a few steps from me and rubs her bulging belly. “Could there be any greater proof of our love? I don’t just want to give you a child, Twilight. I want to give you an entire brood.”

“You... you do?” I ask. It’s confusing, but being confused hurts so I stop being that way.

“I want to bear thousands of your children. For the glory of Canterlot Hive.” She reaches over and brushes a hoof through my mane, and I smile.

“Of course, Luna. Whatever you want. I love you so much. I’ll never stop giving you children if that’s what makes you happy.”

“It is,” she replies and kisses my forehead. Everything is good. Everything is right.

I look over at the entrance to the throne room. That other Twilight, the Twilight from the mirror, is standing there watching us. Her lower lip quivers and her eyes are wide with alarm. “We did it, Twilight,” I whisper. Even though she’s so far away I know she hears me. “We saved them all. We did it.”

With that, the little unicorn turns and runs. Down the hallway, out of sight, and out of mind.

“You say something, sugarcube?” asks a confused Applejack. She didn’t see her?

“Oh, just talking to myself,” I reply. I lay there with nine ponies who I love more than anything else in the world. I wish that other Twilight would have just let me explain why everything is good. Why everything is right. Eventually, my eyes snap open. “This calls for a friendship report!”

My friends and family stand back as a quill and scroll answer my call. I clear my throat, and the quill immediately begins scratching away. “Dear Princess Celestia,” I begin, grinning at my mentor, “Today I learned that a true friend is a pony who will help you do what’s necessary no matter what. Even when it hurts somepony else, even when it hurts them, a good friend is a pony who will understand that the ends justify the means. One who will make sacrifices for you when you ask it of them. One whose obedience is never in doubt. I’m lucky enough to have friends like that. In fact, I have thousands of them now that I’ve taken control of the hive. And before long I’ll have a whole lot more. Your faithful student, Twilight Sparkle.”

Satisfied that we’ve all learned a valuable lesson from all this, I grab the scroll to re-read what’s written there.

Dear Princess Celestia,

Help me help me help me help me stop me help me help me help me kill me help me help me help me end this end me end me forever help me help me help me stop the pain help me stop the suffering help me help me help me I never wanted this help me help me help

I’m so sorry,
Twilight Sparkle

I stare at the letter for a long time.

Then I tear it to shreds. The others are looking askance at me as I do. “Misspelled ‘obedience.’ I’ll rewrite it later. Right now we should—”

Something happens that cuts off everything else. Something nearby. My horn buzzes as spacetime puckers and warps around us, magic rippling through the entire castle. I reach out with my senses and find that the epicenter is in the library. I look through the eyes of a nearby drone and...

There’s that other Twilight! And she even has a friend with her. I order them brought before me for an audience.

I’m sure we’ll have lots to talk about.