Chapter 17

For a moment, when he woke up, Jeremy was still dreaming enough to have forgotten yesterday’s events. But as he pulled on his pants, it all came rushing back. Jeremy grimaced. He was not looking forward to talking with Celestia again. Also… polygamy. What. Just what. Did that mean he could start taking multiple marefriends? Did he even want to do that? So confusing. Having gotten dressed, he wandered off for lunch.

Lunch was a relatively short affair – a simple peanut butter sandwich was sufficient for him on most days. As he ate, Jeremy considered what to do for the day. Well, he still had to talk to Celestia, obviously. And then there was work… He should probably also visit the hive to check up on the machine… Should probably also meet up with Luna, because it had been a while… Hmm. This day had already turned out to be busier than he had anticipated.

Jeremy headed back to his office, to find that the portal-reset field was ready for testing. In addition, two large, thin stone panels were sitting on a table, a small button jutting out on top. Jeremy pressed one, and a new lime-green portal opened on it, the membrane of the closed portal gently pulsing. He opened the other one, to find that this portal was a more bluish-green, and connected to the first. But why would Luna send him a pair of surface-locked portals in the first place? Evidently, the colors meant something, and Jeremy rolled his eyes once he had figured it out. He carried the still-open lime green portal through the original portal set to the hive, and placed it against the wall. Jeremy then propped the teal portal against a wall of the office, and then got to work on the field.

It was relatively simple, consisting of two oblong, gray emitters. Jeremy set them up right in front of the door, and turned it on. The field flickered to life, a sort of web-like pattern slowly moving across it. Jeremy smiled in satisfaction, and went to find the portal gun. It took some searching, but finally he remembered it was under his desk. Grabbing it, he cautiously stuck just the gun through the field. As soon as it reached the back of the gun, his hand felt tingly. As soon as he pulled it out, it stopped, so unless he had just been irradiated, Jeremy felt he was probably fine. He stepped through, and the portal gun flickered, the blue portal on his end disappearing. “Nice,” he said, still warming up his voice after sleeping.

Well, he didn’t have anything else to do but draw, and he had made enough progress on that yesterday that he felt he should take a few hours off. Jeremy put on his suit and boots, and wandered through the portal to the hive.

The changeling guard was different today – bulkier, and with larger fangs. Jeremy dropped him a nod as he went by, and after some hesitation the guard returned it. Walking out of Chrysalis’ room, he noticed that most of the changelings were clustered around the love machine again. Was it good for them to feed constantly like that? he wondered. They didn’t seem to be impaired in any way, so he dismissed his concerns. Chrysalis was nowhere to be found – on the ground level, at least. Jeremy spotted what he thought might be her, far above. Jogging back to grab the portal gun, he shot a portal in the space it had been before he had tested the Emancipation Grid and shot another one roughly where she was.

Thankfully, he was getting better at aiming – and the higher walls of the cave were relatively flat. Chrysalis stared at him in surprise as he slowly approached her from the thinner ledge that he had gotten himself onto. She looked rather indignant. “Hey! Wasn’t that your only way back?” she asked.

“No, we got a new set of portals specifically for that,” Jeremy informed her. At this, she seemed less irritated than before, and went back to her discussion with a regal-looking, presumably male changeling.

“If your… king wants to submit a challenge, I’m afraid he’ll have to send more than an official notice. After all, what’s a threat without proof? Empty. Come back with your finest fighters, and maybe we’ll talk.” With that, the disgruntled silver-shelled changeling left, and Chrysalis turned to face him again.

“Sorry about that,” she apologized politely.

“More political difficulties?” Jeremy asked.

Chrysalis seemed unsure of whether to tell him, then slowly nodded. “After your little… episode… our changeling army has effectively disbanded. What we didn’t count on was that the other hives have been wanting to challenge me for a while, and have been challenging the throne.”

Jeremy sighed. “Great. Just what we needed, more politics.” Chrysalis nodded her head.

“Without our changeling army, the hive is worried that we may not be able to sustain my position as queen. If I don’t find a suitable replacement in time, I will be dead, and both of our efforts will be for naught.”

Jeremy groaned in frustration – what choice did he have now? “Fine, I’ll fight for you,” he answered.

Chrysalis gave him a joyful grin. “Really? Thank you!”

Jeremy rolled his eyes. “I just don’t want to have to go through all that again…” he started explaining, and Chrysalis looked hurt. “Plus, how could I lose my changeling friend?” he finished, chuckling.

Chrysalis semi-indignantly smacked him with a wing. But soon after her expression changed, and she looked almost… relieved? Huh. Jeremy decided to ignore this.

After a short round of small talk, in which Chrysalis assured him that aside from the previous difficulties the hive was doing fine, Jeremy decided to leave. He jumped down to the ground floor – his heart in his throat as he fell what seemed to be over a hundred feet, and promptly landed without so much as a jolt. Jeremy shook his head, and after a second of calming the adrenaline in his legs, strode off for the portal to his office.

When he returned, yet another package was waiting for him – but it was far too small to be anything from the R&D team. He opened it cautiously, to find a stack of papers. Inside was a note reading “From: Lyra – To: Jeremy”. Jeremy set the heavy bundle on top of his desk, next to his drawings.

In addition, a note was attached to his computer monitor, this time from Luna. “Please come back to the office after hours – the R&D team wants to say hello,” he read aloud. “Okay,” he replied to no one in particular, and set this aside as well. He grabbed the first page of Lyra’s story, and began to read.

Halfway through the first page, Jeremy was staring openmouthed. It was a completely modern story, though the main character most likely didn’t exist in his world. Maybe. At least, he hoped so – it would put quite the metaphysical spin on things if Lyra turned out to be responsible for their universe just as they had been responsible for hers. But then, which one came first? With that headache-inducing thought in mind, Jeremy continued reading.

He read on, but couldn’t stop thinking about his upcoming meeting with Celestia. She had flipped her lid at him last time they spoke – what would she do now? He put down the story, too irritated and apprehensive to read. What now? It was an hour until dinnertime, so he might as well get it over with. Sighing in frustration, he left, locking the door.

With each step he took approaching the castle, an inner voice was screaming at him to stop. Fortunately, it was his own and not Luna’s, so Jeremy didn’t have to worry about her misgivings, instead focusing on his own. What if she attacked him? Jeremy wished he remembered his suit, but that would’ve probably also been a bad idea – he didn’t want to put the idea across that he was afraid of her. This was supposed to be a confident and assertive refusal. And it was a refusal – he wasn’t willing to put the time and effort into being with such an unstable person, no matter how wise they seemed on the outside.

Finally, he was outside the doors. Last chance to back out, he thought to himself. Steeling himself, he opened the door.

Celestia seemed surprised to see him, and she put down some paper she had been writing on. “And what do you want today, Jeremy?” she said, her voice bitter and laced with traces of fury.

“I wanted to explain a bit more about our conversation last night.” Jeremy answered calmly. Inside, he was quaking in his shoes.

“Well?” Celestia prompted.

“The thing is, our culture back home is entirely monogamous – I didn’t know yours was polygamous until after we spoke, so I was a little shocked you would be asking me such a question,” Jeremy explained.

Celestia visibly brightened. “So it’s all right then?” Jeremy grimaced. Here came the hardest part.

“No,” he stated flatly. Celestia appeared shocked. “You’re a bit too… unstable for my tastes. I thought something was up when you attempted to punish Chrysalis with no proof, but your outburst last night basically proved it. We are not anything, Celestia, and we never will be.” With that, he turned around and quickly left, noting the look of shock and hurt on Celestia’s face.

What had he gotten himself into now? Jeremy reflected over a plate of fries and grilled vegetables. Should he go back and apologize? No, that would seem weak. But what else could he do? Maybe he’d get lucky, and she would actually calm herself down or something. Jeremy smirked. Yeah right. He knew all about psychotic girlfriends from some of his relatives’ past experiences – they could pretend like no others. Well… damn. Jeremy supposed he would just wait and see how this played out.

He headed back to the office to find a few night pony guards waiting for him. “Oh, hello,” Jeremy greeted. To his surprise, they saluted him, and one opened the door for him. Smiling slightly and now very confused, Jeremy went inside.

He found his coilgun propped up on a table, with a box of nails beside it. No one else was in the room. Just then, the sky switched from day to night, and the guards filed in, taking seats opposite him. One, with more elaborate armor than the others, cleared her throat. “We’re the research and development team. Nice to finally meet you, human.” The others chimed in with their assent.

“Oh. Nice to meet you too, then,” Jeremy responded back, just beginning to understand what was going on.

Luna chose that moment to teleport in right next to Jeremy, nearly startling him off his chair. She chuckled at his reaction. “We would like you to demonstrate this ‘coilgun’,” she informed him.

“Ah. Okay… I guess I can do that,” Jeremy replied, picking up the weapon in question and pointing at various parts. “It uses a rapid pulse of electromagnetic energy, generated by these capacitors, to accelerate any ferromagnetic projectile placed in the barrel. The power source is this fusion battery, and it can probably fire a few thousand times before needing a recharge.” He took a nail and placed it in the barrel, flicking on the switch and waiting for the capacitors to charge. “Anything you want me to hit?” he asked Luna, who shrugged.

“Why don’t thou try there,” she asked, pointing at a table at the other end of the room. Jeremy aimed carefully, and pressed the button. The nail made a small noise as it exited the barrel in a blur, embedding itself deeply into the aforementioned table. This delighted the guards, as they began excitedly muttering.

“So, there you go. It can fire anything made of iron or steel, and doesn’t require any maintenance besides recharging,” Jeremy finished, placing the coilgun on the desk. “Any questions?”

One guard raised his hoof, and Jeremy looked at him. “Do you use these back on your planet?” the guard asked. Jeremy shook his head dejectedly.

“Unfortunately, we don’t have infinite energy or magic – this fusion battery here is a pipe dream for us,” he answered. There were no more questions, so he put the coilgun away and the R&D team filed out, claiming they had to eat. Finally, it was just Jeremy and Luna, alone in the office once again.

Luna looked at him, a small smile playing about her muzzle. “So, what is new with thou?”

Jeremy anxiously frowned. “Well, Celestia’s really, really ticked off at me, because I spurned her advances.”

Luna was openmouthed for a second. “She attempted to seduce thee?”

Jeremy chuckled nervously. “Not quite… She said she wanted to pursue a relationship with me as well, and when I said I was already with you, she kind of... went a bit off. Started talking about how nopony was better than her, stuff like that. She got really mad, and... I think she was about to attack me when I left. Then I learned from Chrysalis that polygamy is the thing here, and went to talk to her again. I turned her down again, because I don’t think I want to be with her if she’s that unstable. And that’s everything.” Jeremy stared apprehensively at Luna, waiting for her reaction.

“And she… ‘flipped out’?” Luna queried, reading his thoughts.

“Yeah – if I hadn’t left, I seriously think I would've gotten badly hurt, or killed,” Jeremy clarified, cringing slightly. Luna, noticing this, placed a reassuring hoof on his shoulder.

“We will speak with her – surely there is some alternative cause than thy conduct,” Luna thought aloud.

“Then - you're not mad?" Jeremy asked, surprised. Luna vigorously shook her head.

"Wherefore should we be angry? Because she is our sister? Nay. We believe thou art not lying, and... that worries us."

Jeremy sighed. "It worries me, too. I thought we could just be happy together..." he trailed off. Luna pulled him into a hug.

"And we shall be. We - I - shall make sure of that personally, even if it means confronting our sister." Jeremy returned the hug, smiling in relief down at the love of his life.

“Now… We believe we owe thee something for that stomach rub thou gave us last night,” Luna mentioned seductively. Jeremy nervously tugged at his shirt collar.

“Ehehe…” his voice trailed off, unsure of her intent.

“Oh, relax, we art more than satisfied with that. We recently had a massage, and wanted to see if thou wouldst like one,” Luna informed him.

“Oh. Sure?” Jeremy answered, and an instant later, they were once again transported to Luna’s bedroom.

“Now lie on thy stomach, and relax,” Luna instructed him. Jeremy complied, unsure what she was going to do until he felt her digging her hooves into his back, almost enough to hurt but not quite.

“What are you- Oooohhh yessss,” Jeremy interrupted himself as a sensation of pure, relaxed bliss settled throughout his spine. He hadn’t felt this good in years. Half asleep, he allowed Luna to continue, and she was evidently enjoying his comfort, humming a comforting tune as she continued to work out the years of stress.

A loud crack snapped him back to reality, and Luna jerked away, staring at him. “Art thou alright? Did we break something?” she worriedly asked.

Jeremy dismissed her concerns. “It’s fine, my joints do that a lot. Keep going, please, you're doing wonderfully.” After a moment’s hesitation, Luna resumed her massage, and Jeremy settled back into utter, calm relaxation.

Next Chapter: Chapter 18 Estimated time remaining: 9 Hours, 54 Minutes