Chapter 35

The week went on much like this. Lyra enthusiastically followed him around every day, and Luna or Chrysalis occasionally tagged along. Celestia only visited once, exchanging the usual small talk about his school as they wandered around. Luna offered to help with his homework, and Jeremy gladly accepted. As it turned out, her original thousand-year tenure on Equestria had rendered her intelligent in a wide variety of subjects, though she struggled with distinctly human concepts. Chrysalis, meanwhile, claimed she had no interest in learning mathematics, not seeing the use. Jeremy was sorely tempted to argue this point with her, but he decided to let it go for now. He got on the bus with Lyra, who had managed to rebound from her earlier fear of Luna and Chrysalis, though she still addressed them as respectfully as she could.

Suddenly, as the bus lurched into motion and lumbered around the school building, a question occurred to Jeremy – one that he was amazed he hadn’t asked before. “Hey, Lyra. What do you know about Hasbro?” he asked. Lyra thought for a while, and then shrugged.

“Nothing. Why, should I know something?” she asked, and Jeremy debated on whether to tell her. Ah, what the hell.

“They seem to have created your universe,” he answered. Lyra looked at him in shock – thankfully, no one was paying attention to their conversation, and the bus was loud enough to obscure it anyway.

“Yep. You created ours, and we created yours. Fun, right?” Jeremy finished. Lyra appeared to be attempting to puzzle this out, and Jeremy zoned out for a while.

Finally, the weekend rolled around, but Jeremy was not feeling the usual anticipation of a calm Saturday. He packed up his stuff for one or two nights, and Luna joined him, ready for the meeting with the FBI. Chrysalis elected to stay behind, taking the armor suit for her own use. “What if they try to steal your things while you’re away?” she pointed out when Jeremy expressed confusion at her not wanting to come. Agreeing to this point, and wishing he had thought of it earlier, he waved goodbye as he and Luna teleported to Washington D.C.

“Dost thou even know thy way around here?” Luna grumbled.

“No, that’s what Google Maps is for,” Jeremy replied, tapping buttons on his phone. Finally, they established a route, and began walking, Jeremy forced to go slower due to the sheer volume of pedestrian traffic.

Luna, meanwhile, was taking in the sights and sounds of America’s capital. “So many people,” she commented, and Jeremy nodded.

“This is a pretty popular place to watch old white people argue with each other.” Luna laughed, and they continued walking.

Some hours later, they arrived at the J. Edgar Hoover building, housing the FBI’s headquarters. It was an unassuming building but for the pillars across the entrance, featuring the exact same drab gray as the rest of the buildings in the area. Jeremy turned to Luna as they were about to enter. “Stay with me,” he asked her, and Luna solemnly nodded. They walked in, checked in with the front desk, and waited. Finally, they were called into a meeting room, surprisingly well-lit and welcoming, with a cadre of six men waiting for them. Despite the pleasant nature of the room, Jeremy nervously twitched as he shook hands with one of the men, who had stood up to greet them. They exchanged introductions, and the man shook hands with Luna.

“And who might you be?” he asked. Jeremy looked at Luna – should they tell the truth? His question was answered for him when Luna, in a bright blue flash of light, transformed back into her alicorn form and introduced herself, as formally as possible.

“We are the Royal Princess Luna of Equestria, Protector of the Night and Dreams, and Ruler of the Moon.” As scary as the situation was, Jeremy couldn’t resist cracking a smile – what would these guys think of a title like that? To his satisfaction, this caused a whole lot of nervous shifting among the FBI members. Point for us, Jeremy thought. The leader cleared his throat.

“Er, well. Nice to meet you, Princess Luna.”

“Now, I’m sure you’re wondering why you’re here,” another FBI person asked as Jeremy and Luna sat down next to each other in the two remaining chairs. Luna merely impassively stared, and Jeremy followed suit. “You were probably under the impression that we were going to try to dissect ponies, or exploit magic, or something. We get that kind of thing a lot,” remarked the second person, to Jeremy’s surprise. They had certainly caught his interest, at any rate.

“Yeah, I was thinking along those lines,” he mentioned after a short pause. The speaker chuckled a bit before continuing, and Jeremy suddenly recognized that chuckle – this was the man who had called him in the first place.

“Well, hate to disappoint you, but we’re not that evil, despite what everyone thinks,” another member chimed in.

“Very true. We want the United States to be the best that it can be, but we’re not about to pull another Trail of Tears,” the man who had shook their hands added. Jeremy was actually beginning to be somewhat impressed – maybe they were legitimately on Equestria’s side. Or, his cynical side said, maybe they’re buttering you up. He decided to reserve judgment for now.

“What we do want, however, is some sort of assurance that things don’t start ‘bleeding’ across universes – we don’t wake up one morning and find that this ‘Discord’ is destroying the White House, or that the 'mint pony' you mentioned - we're assuming it's Lyra Heartstrings? has changed something fundamental,” the fourth member spoke. Jeremy smirked.

“Not having any control over Discord, I can’t promise anything for certain – but he seems pretty occupied with Fluttershy, so I think we’re fine there. Apart from him, I don’t think anything else is going to find the portal – we have it well hidden and protected. I'll put in a word to Lyra - she seems to be doing fine so far,” Jeremy explained. A few of the committee were taking notes, while the remainder nodded in approval. “And what about your end? What’s to say some hapless Congress member finds out about this and decides he wants to spill everything?” Jeremy asked cynically. Several of the FBI members chuckled.

“Trust me, your secret’s safe with us. The President won’t even know,” one claimed. Jeremy shrugged.

“Works for me, I guess.”

They exited the building, Luna having since turned back into her human form and looking at him expectantly. “What? Oh. Okay, yes, you were completely right. Happy?” Jeremy asked, grinning a little now that it was over. Luna smiled.

“Very. Art thou ready to head home?” Jeremy shook his head.

“We need to find a more secluded place to teleport from – doing that in public would probably cause more than a few people to freak out.” Luna nodded.

“We are aware of this. Come along, then – we can see such a place.” Curious, Jeremy followed her as she made her way through the streets before stopping at an old warehouse. Using her magic discreetly, she unlocked the door and the two slipped inside, Luna locking the door behind her. Jeremy held out his hand, and Luna looked at him curiously.

“I thought you had to be touching each other to teleport?” Jeremy asked after an awkward pause. Luna laughed, and they were engulfed in light. When Jeremy had finished rubbing the spots out of his eyes, he found himself back in his bedroom, Chrysalis looking up from inside her cocoon interestedly.

“Back already? How did it go?” Chrysalis asked, concerned. Jeremy shrugged.

“Pretty well – all they wanted was to know whether stuff could get through the portal and mess with Earth. We told them no, and they let us leave.” Chrysalis raised an eyebrow, adjusting her position in the cocoon to face him better.

“Really? Sounds like you didn’t even have to threaten them,” she remarked. Jeremy blushed.

“Yeah, kind of forgot about that,” he mumbled. Chrysalis sighed.

“Well, at least you ended up not needing to act confident,” she replied. Jeremy gave an embarrassed laugh, before tossing his backpack full of useless clothes to the side.

“So, now that I’ve had enough nervous tension to last six lifetimes, what are we going to do?” he asked. Luna and Chrysalis grinned at him.

“We know of one thing to lighten the mood…” Luna commented, before tackling him onto the bed. Chrysalis watched on, grinning, as the two kissed, Jeremy staring in shock for a moment before leaning back and settling into it. Luna broke away after a moment, smiling. “We have been missing that,” she breathed. Jeremy smiled back, and Chrysalis walked over.

“Well? My turn,” she announced, and was promptly picked up by Jeremy and dumped on the bed, only for him to lean over and kiss her as well. As soon as he stopped, Chrysalis’ cheeks were once again chlorophyllic green. “Well, that was… new,” she commented.

“Better get used to it, wriggler,” Jeremy taunted. Just then, Lyra walked into the room, stopping when she saw them staring at each other and blushing.

“Oh! I’m sorry, I – I’ll just be out here, then,” Lyra exclaimed in embarrassment before quickly shutting the door. Jeremy was also embarrassed – he had completely forgotten they had a guest. Chrysalis was simply glaring in the direction of the door, while Luna seemed more bashful.

“Perhaps we should save this for later, then?” Luna suggested regretfully. Chrysalis shook her head.

“I don’t know about you, but all that time spent alone has made me hungry.” She quickly locked Jeremy back into her embrace, wisps of pink smoke being seemingly drawn out of his body as she inhaled with a deep sigh. After what seemed like quite a while, she stopped, looking much more tired but just as satisfied. Jeremy, meanwhile, felt slightly dizzy.

“Whoa, that was… odd,” he commented, slumping back onto the bed.

“Feeding usually goes something like that – the longer we go at it, the worse you feel. And because changelings are usually hungry enough to take all of their victim’s love, we gained a reputation for knocking hapless ponies unconscious – or worse,” Chrysalis explained. Luna looked on in concern.

"Jeremy, art thou okay?” she asked.

“Mostly, yeah,” Jeremy answered as he got up. “A cup of water and I’ll be good as new.”

1-11-14, 7:00 P.M.

After Jeremy had busied himself drinking directly from the sink (to Luna’s dismay), a shout was heard from downstairs. Ignoring his still-throbbing temples, Jeremy hurried downstairs, Luna and Chrysalis in tow, to find Lyra motioning them over to the television. “Look, it’s Twilight!” she commented happily. Jeremy sighed – here we go again, he thought, and prepared to explain the metaphysical abstraction that was the link between their two universes. Sensing his thoughts, Chrysalis spoke up.

“Don’t worry, I explained after she got a turn on the computer.” Surprised and more than a little pleased, Jeremy gave her a nod, and the three sat down to watch the latest episode. It featured Pinkie Pie apparently finding out she was Applejack’s cousin, and the two going on an adventure to find out whether it was true, Big Macintosh and Granny Smith in tow.

By the time the episode had ended, Jeremy was still laughing, Chrysalis had a hoof to her forehead, Lyra was still gazing raptly towards the television screen, and Luna merely watched calmly, being used to this. “This is what gets shown as an episode these days? How boring,” Chrysalis commented.

“Well, they do have to occupy the time between each finale and opening episode somehow… and besides, the point of the show is valuable life lessons. Such as ‘family's what you make of it?” Jeremy suggested. Chrysalis rolled her eyes, and Luna smirked at her before getting up to head back through the portal, promising to report to Celestia the recent events.

For the rest of the day, Jeremy took care of his homework, teaching Chrysalis the basics of algebra while he worked his way through precalculus. After getting over her initial boredom, Chrysalis actually started to pay attention, making sure to learn each concept. Noticing this, Jeremy was confused. “What’s up with you, by the way? You weren’t interested in this before,” he remarked. Chrysalis shrugged.

“One more step towards becoming ‘civilized’, I suppose. After all, with the love problem finally solved, we changelings need to work on getting the rest of our national assets up to speed. Maybe start an economy or something, I don’t know.” Jeremy pondered this for a moment.

“Well, you’re not going to learn much about economics from algebra… but yeah, it’s a start,” he agreed.

11 PM rolled around, and Chrysalis and Lyra retired to bed, Jeremy staying up to finish reading the comic he had begun earlier. Closing the tab, he turned off his computer, and waited for his eyes to adjust enough to the darkness so he could move safely. As he entered his room after brushing his teeth, Chrysalis’ voice spoke out of the pitch dark corner of the room. “Hey, want to join me in the cocoon?”

Jeremy briefly considered refusing, but realized it would be rude – he did need to be accommodating, after all. “Alright, give me a sec,” he said, taking his clothes off.

“Oh… I didn’t know you had that in mind," Chrysalis remarked in a sultry tone.

“What? No, it’s just… I’m not going to wear clothes in a liquid environment,” he answered. Chrysalis was silent for a moment.

“So… what do you do when you want to swim?” Chrysalis asked.

“Bathing suit,” Jeremy answered as he got into the cocoon. It was surprisingly warm and comfortable, and he immediately relaxed next to Chrysalis. “This really isn’t so bad,” he noted. “How do you make these?”

Chrysalis shifted, though in the low light Jeremy couldn’t tell whether this was from being nervous or simply to adjust her position. “…Do you really want to know?” she asked.

Jeremy nodded, then remembering that it was dark, replied with a short “Try me.” Chrysalis sighed.

“Alright, if you must. The liquid is a mix of nutrients produced by a certain type of changeling, in a manner similar to mammal lactation. The shell is the shed skin of many changelings, woven together. Happy?” she finished.

“Huh,” Jeremy replied, unsure of what else to say. "Sounds pretty cool - so it's like a nutrient bath..." Chrysalis looked at him, and opened her eyes, revealing their green glow.

“…You really aren’t disgusted by that?” she asked. Jeremy made a so-so motion with his hands, by now aware that Chrysalis could see him perfectly well even if he couldn't see her.

“No, not really. That was honestly kind of tame compared to what I was expecting.” Chrysalis made a confused noise, apparently attempting to process this. Finally, she sighed. “You know what, I give up trying to predict you.” With that, she closed her eyes, and Jeremy placed an arm around her before falling asleep himself, head resting on the lip of the cocoon.

Next Chapter: Chapter 36 Estimated time remaining: 6 Hours, 21 Minutes