The mithril chainmail on Ace Gambit's back weighed less than thirty pounds, but it felt like a mountain to his tired body. Sweat ran in rivulets down his face and the back of his neck in the humid air of the Everfree; breathing was a struggle in its choking atmosphere, especially after having been on the run for the better part of an hour. A short sword repeatedly banged against his chitinous side as he ran helter skelter towards one of the Everfree Forest's denser groves.

"Changeling spotted!"

An orange pegasus in bright golden armor came out of the clouds above, with his spear leveled in Ace's direction. Ace kicked himself for having drawn so much attention. He dove into the trees and drew his sword. The sharp ring of metal filled the air as Ace pointed his weapon at the canopy above, waiting for his pursuer to attack. Strangely, nothing happened; his ears as he strained to hear the flapping of wings, but there was nothing around him except for the ambient sounds of the Everfree Forest. Perhaps his pursuer was waiting for backup, in which case, Ace could still–

"Flash Entry!"

A solid hoof caught Ace in the back, sending him flying into a tree and his sword into a nearby bush. Both of his fangs sank into the trunk and the taste of bitter bark and sap soon overwhelmed his taste buds. Gravity then decided to add insult to injury by dragging him down the tree. Bark soon filled Ace's mouth as his fangs carved two paths down the trunk. He gently touched down on the bottom and fell onto his back. Ace's vision swam as an orange pegasus loomed over him, with a foreleg raised.

"Alright, you're out." Flash Sentry extended a helping hoof to Ace, and pulled him upright. "Go join the others in the castle courtyard."

Ace spat out his mouthful of tree shavings, with a helpful pat on the back from Flash. He nodded mutely to confirm that he had heard, and retrieved his sword. His dignity felt as bruised as his face, but at least he was not the first changeling to have been caught; that dubious honor went to Eta Blue, who had chosen to hide in a bear den, and who was found running out of it much faster than she had gone in.

Seven changelings waited for him in the courtyard of the Castle of the Two Sisters, standing at attention in front of a teal pegasus with an electric blue mane. She turned sharply and shot Ace such a stern glare that it almost distracted him from the fact that her left wing and foreleg were metal prosthetics.

"Mr. Gambit! Would you care to tell us why you are joining us here today?"

He straightened up and kept his eye firmly focused on one of the taller trees on the horizon. Anywhere but her eyes — he had seen her reduce a veteran hive soldier to tears once for looking at her the wrong way. "I, er, got caught?"

There was a smattering of snickers from the crowd. The pegasus was not amused.

"Think you're funny, do you?" She came nose to nose with him, so close that he could feel her breath. "Think you're some kind of comedian?"

A thin river of sweat ran down the back of his neck as he struggled to avoid looking at her. "N-no, ma'am! I just, well, I was in a knot of trees, and Flash Sentry caught me from behind."

She circled around him like a shark that had tasted blood. "And why, exactly, were you standing with your back exposed, Mr. Gambit?"

Ace looked down at his hooves. "Because I'm an idiot?"

"You're damn right you're an idiot; a mistake like that on the battlefield could get you killed! You'd better learn to keep your head together real fast if you want to make the cut, or else–"

Her tirade ended in a cry of pain as she staggered into him. Ace caught her in his hooves and quickly laid her on the ground. "Meriwether! Are you ok?"

"Can't feel my bucking legs," she panted. Her wings twitched sporadically, but the rest of her body refused to respond. "Call Life Preserver, and get her to take me to Ponyville General!"

Ace cradled her head in his hooves as he looked up at the changelings around him. "Eta Blue, Wintergreen, you heard her! Get to it!"

At this point in her life, Meriwether considered herself a connoisseur of hospitals. She had been to the Hospital for Special Surgery in Manehattan to have her wing amputated as a child, the Center for Orthopedic Medicine in Los Pegasus for her leg, and repeated trips to the Canterlot Institute of Health for therapy and screenings.

Ponyville General sucked.

The rooms were comfortable, the staff friendly, and doctors full of optimism. The kind of place that would do its best to cheer you up with false hopes as you lay dying. It was the cruelest thing that could be done to a pony, made worse by the fact that they thought they were doing their patients a favor.

The squeak of door hinges interrupted the steady monotone of beeping from the medical equipment around her. She looked up at the door to see her cousin Thunderball walk in, a dark grey pegasus with a navy blue mane and possibly the saddest green eyes she had ever seen.

"Hey." A strained smile appeared on his face.

"Hey." Meriwether let loose a weary chuckle. "Sorry to keep adding to your plate. Celestia knows you've got enough trouble going on directing our side of the Everfree colony."

Thunderball pulled a chair up to her bed. "So what now?"

"Bone cancer's caused vertebrae deformation. It's pinching my nerves at C-2 and C-3. Doctor says it's inoperable, but I beg to differ." She looked at him with fire in her eyes. "We'll replace the damn vertebrae with replicas, either surgical grade stainless steel or plastic. Don't give me that look, we both know it could be done. I want–"

"No." Thunderball shook his head. "I'm not going to let you mutilate yourself with experimental surgery you just came up with. If anything goes wrong, you'll be a quadriplegic."

"I'll be even worse off if we do nothing," she growled

"And what then?" Thunderball paused, waiting for an answer. "Look, Merry, this isn't going away. What happens next time? Are you going to cut out your ribs next? Your jaw? Your skull?"

Tears welled up in Meriwether's eyes. "I will excise out every traitorous pound of flesh if that's what it takes."

He leaned over her, until her head was pressed against his chest. "Merry, please don't do this. Let me find an alternative, alright? There has to be a better way"

Thunderball felt Meriwether nod into him. "You got it, pone. Doctor says the cancer's progressing quickly, so you'll probably have to grab a cocktrice and petrify me in the meantime." She licked her lips and her breathing grew heavy. "I'm going to become a statue — Celestia have mercy, I'm going to get turned into a rock."

"You'll be fine," Thunderball whispered. "I'll ge as many of us together as I can. We'll read you stories and everything until you're better, I promise."

Years of frustration and worry finally broke through, and Meriwether's tears flooded Thunderball's breast. He felt his own tears mingling with her's as he had done when they were kids.

Adjutant, the administrator of the Everfree Colony, was waiting patiently for Thunderball in his dungeon office in the Castle of the Two Sisters. A multitude of papers were hovering in front of her as she reclined on his couch, lazily sorting through them all. There were production reports for love gathering and the royal jelly the colony produced, patrol logs, and even an offer from the local spa to create a treatment involving royal jelly, which had raised more than a few eyebrows when it was first submitted.

The idea was not far fetched; a mixture of royal jelly and changeling slime was what larvae were raised in, with the amount of royal jelly critically influencing the development of the larva. (Adjutant herself had received quite the dose of royal jelly in development, a fact that she was forever grateful to Queen Chrysalis for, if nothing else.) A similar, but much richer, mixture was used to keep ponies suspended in the cocoons of a pod farm, where they would dream and produce love for changelings to feed on.

Royal jelly would probably have a beneficial effect on pony coats, but exports were out of the question. The fledgeling colony barely had enough royal jelly to maintain the pod farms. The complex mixture of nutrients, enzymes and proteins in it would decay after a few days. The production of royal jelly was a constant affair without room for error. It was the lifeblood of a hive.

The office door swung open with a bang; Adjutant lowered the papers and raised her eyebrow as she saw Thunderball storm into the office. "Bad day?"

He reached his liquor cabinet and pulled out a handle of whiskey. "My cousin's just been petrified to prevent her body from launching a coup d'état."

"Sounds like a very bad day." Adjutant drew herself upright into a proper sitting position and motioned for him to join her. "Come, I have news that might cheer you up."

He hesitated for a moment before curling up on the sofa, with his head nestled against one of the pillows. "Did someone finally tar and feather the Flim-Flam brothers?"

"Not quite," Adjutant chuckled. "Actually, this all began a couple of months ago, when Ace mentioned that Meriwether might have some genetic issues that would require an extensive rewrite of her DNA — such as through assimilation."

"You're suggesting that I let Meriwether be turned into a changeling?" Thunderball raised an eyebrow. "Isn't that terribly dangerous?"

"Oh, absolutely," Adjutant nodded. "An unskilled manipulator could kill the subject, and there's always the risk that a pony might lose their memories and identity, either during the process or to the hivemind. But it would be a certain way to cure her." She paused to let the information sink in. "If it helps, I promise to be very careful, and the lack of a formal hivemind here would reduce the risk of Meriwether losing herself considerably. Besides, she's a very strong-willed pony, and I doubt she has much to fear."

Thunderball nodded. "So what will it take?"

"Ah, now we run into the real problem; we would need a lot of royal jelly. Both for me to turn into a queen and gain the power necessary to convert a pony, and for the process itself."

"And you barely have enough for your own needs." Thunderball frowned. "If we reduced the size of the pod farm–"

"We'd be unable to supply Queen Chrysalis with enough love, and the current cease-fire would collapse." Adjutant shrugged. "We'll need to get some from a bonafide hive."

"Great." Thunderball laid his head down on the pillow and closed his eyes. "Which one? I assume asking Chrysalis for help is off the table?"

The mention of her former queen brought a frown to Adjutant's face. "She knows how much we need, and won't provide one iota more without demanding heavy concessions. Other hives may be willing to help, but it would be an uphill struggle. Chrysalis killed many of her rivals in the Badlands, and the survivors have gone into hiding. Given the aftermath of Chrysalis's invasion and the hostility towards on changelings in Equestria, not to mention your private war with Chrysalis and the terrorists who destroyed Hive Mephera, I would expect hive to be wary about revealing themselves. In addition…"

Adjutant abruptly cleared her throat. "From my admittedly limited experience, a changeling queen is expected to enforce her will absolutely. Insubordination and failure are dealt with harshly; forgiveness is often a foreign concept. When your House was punished lightly for its own private war with Chrysalis, it may have been seen as tacit approval for your actions. I can assure you that's how Chrysalis has interpreted it."

"Celestia would never have sanctioned anything of the sort!" Thunderball growled.

She gently stroked his tail to calm him down. "Of course not. Nevertheless, there would be the suspicion that Celestia wants a group with plausible deniability to carry out illegal missions. Not good for mutual trust."

"Dammit." Thunderball banged his head against the back of the sofa. "I told them that raid was a bad idea."

"Well, it wasn't so bad. You got me out of the deal, didn't you?" Adjutant winked at him. "Let's assess our options. The crown surely has a list of hives, or at least their suspected locations, that we could seek aid from. Why don't we gather a team, ask for directions, and figure things out from there?"

Thunderball sighed and stared at the ceiling. "You'll want to lead, no doubt. We'll need changelings to accompany you if they won't trust ponies. Cunning, well versed in diplomacy, and capable of handling themselves in a fight if negotiations break down. Do you have anyone fitting that description?"

Adjutant tapped her chin as she ran through the list of changelings in the colony. "No, but there is Ace Gambit."