The previous chapter had the process of mind assimilation changed. Also added an explanation of how assimilation works with viral infection. See blog for the changed passage.

Blossomforth frowned. "To be honest, Anon, I have never really tried to figure out how the structure of my mind works. It is really weird because there have been times when my whole body did not really have much solidness to it so I'm not sure how my mind can keep its state assuming that the brain needs to be solid to function."

Anon stared at her oddly. "Uhm, do you feel your mind change at all when you, er, melt yourself? Also, I know you kind of explained how your mind hierarchically divides itself within different bodies that you split off but how do you maintain communication between them?"

"I don't really know the answer to that question, Anon. I don't seem to think any differently when that happens." Blossomforth pondered for a few seconds, but then her eyes lit up. "You know what? I think I know how we can find out! I bet if I meditate I should be able to search through the matrix of information the ancestors left me to find out. You want to meditate with me?" Bloss looked over to Anon.

"Hmmm. That actually sounds like a great idea. I definitely need something to calm me down after all of the crazy things you have shown and told me. To be honest, I am still not completely sure if I am dreaming or not. I need something to clear my mind."

Once again, blossomforth's face expressed a shadow of her guilty look. "I'm sorry for bewildering you with these revelations. It would have been so much easier if none of this had happened. I suppose you play with the cards you are dealt."

Anon dismissed her with a wave of his hand. "You don't need to keep apologizing, I forgive you. It's just all so incredible, and the more I think about it all, the more amazed I get. There is a lot of good or bad that could come of this. Let's just try to maximize the good. Sound like a plan?"

"Yup! Let's get meditating then and maybe I can tell you what I find out."

They both climbed off the couch to sit on the floor. Blossomforth folded and tucked her legs under herself and Anon sat indian style on the carpet. They both slowed their breathing and closed their eyes.

Blossomforth cleared her mind slowly and instead thought of what she was looking for. Anon's place was remarkably quiet. His apartment and massage shop was located a bit away from the center of Ponyville, away from the bustle of the main town, and on a weekend, the midmorning was quite peaceful. There was also an absence of machinery and electrical appliances that usually produced background noise in Anon's homeworld. It was so quiet that Blossomforth could hear Anon's soft breathing. The knowledge of her mind structure came to her slowly...

Although Blossomforth did not completely understand how her mind and matrix worked, it was quite an interesting concept. When Blossomforth had undergone her transformation from pony to alien life form, her mind architecture had also undergone a transformation. In her pony brain, neural pathways were grown, and maintained, serving as the pathways that connected the neurons. However, during her transformation the connections were changed.

Primitive organic communication usually occurred with the use of a neuron cell that utilized an extremely long axon "wire" that sent pulses of information to another distant neuron cell. One of the greatest achievements of the Ancestors in their rise to dominance was achieving organic quantum communication. They had an extremely complex enzyme that was capable of producing entangled particle pairs based on the principles of quantum mechanics. These particles would then be packaged in enzymatic based quantum machines that effectively allowed 'spooky communication at a distance'. There were two types of enzymes for each of the paired particles, transmitter and receiver. When a new connection was needed for a growing mind, the newly produced transmitter enzyme would stay where it was created while the receiver would hone in chemically to the type of cell it needed to connect to. Once finished this transmitter-receiver pair of enzymes would be linked by the entangled particles within the pair of enzymes and act as a neural pathway. Instead of a long axon "wire" these distant cells could utilize a quantum communication connection that was "wireless".

In her initial transformation from pony to alien, all of Blossomforth's "wired" axon pathways were meticulously replaced with "wireless" quantum pathways. This allowed her neural architecture to exist in a fluid like form within herself instead of requiring a solid form to be functional. Utilizing these quantum neural information pathways, her mind could exist as if whole even when divided between bodies.

The quantum connection pathways were usually used to support neural architecture and telepathy between distant bodies. The hivemind mechanism would take advantage of these quantum connections for almost instantaneous data and neural transfer between bodies. There was no range limit on the quantum connections. However, the connection would degrade over time which meant they had to be periodically replaced. This meant that while the quantum connections could be used for near instantaneous communication at any distance, long term communication by the Ancestors with their seeds was impossible due to the long time that the seeds would travel through space. Electromagnetic radiation based telepathy was another communication medium, much more short range in comparison, that her mind could use to broadcast commands to many cells at once, similar to how hormones are used in primitive biology. However, the more primitive neuron-axon based wired neural architecture used in most other creatures was usually used to control local organic appendages and functions.

What was more was that her brain could rapidly be rearranged and grow new sections to effectively control rapidly changing appendages and functions required by her changing biology. Algorithms saved in her memory matrix could grow in her neural architecture as organic computational hardware to quickly solve computational problems. A flexible and powerful mind to support a flexible and powerful body.

Blossomforth opened her eyes. It was all so much more clear now. She understood how her mind could do the things it did. She suddenly unfolded her legs and stood up on her hooves. Anon heard her stand and he too stood up from his meditation.

Anon looked down to Blossomforth. "So, any epiphanies or revelations?"

"Yes, actually! I never understood how brains and minds were structured before. It turns out that brains are made of cells called neurons and a cellular appendage called an axon sprouts out of them like vines to talk to the other neuron that is far away." Said Blossomforth excitedly.

Anon looked at Blossomforth thoughtfully. "Yeah, we discovered this in my homeworld and this kind of thing is taught in schools where I come from."

Blossomforth raised an eyebrow in surprise. "Well anyways, here's the really interesting part. When I was converted to alien biology, the neural pathways in my brain were replaced with a more advanced type. The new pathways that replaced the old utilized special enzymes that could produce something called quantum communication where information can be passed between physically separated 'entangled particles', allowing my neural pathways to be wireless! Because of this, my neural architecture can exist as a fluid or even be divided while still working properly as if whole! It can also rapidly rearrange or grow itself to control my changing biology and even be built compute algorithms saved in my memory matrix."

"Well, I now admit that I was wrong and what you went through is probably ten or more times weirder than my trans dimensional escapade." Anon sat down and slumped into the couch still digesting the torrent of information that Blossomforth had given him. The meditation helped but he was still processing all of the crazy things he had seen and heard. "Back on Earth, the scientists of my world also discovered quantum mechanics and entangled particles but our scientists believe that quantum communication is impossible. I suppose you are feeding me spoilers to the secrets of the universe. You naughty pony!" Anon shook his head in playful, fake admonishment.

Blossomforth smiled. "Heh, sorry about that anon. Although it seems that you guys figured out a lot on your own with nothing but your science to help you. That is quite impressive."

"I am still mind boggled about everything." Anon suddenly had a slightly suspicious look. "So, uh, are you really a contortionist when we stretched together or did you 'rearrange your biology'?"

"Nope, I really did train for years to achieve contortion. It was only recently that I got transformed. Even now I do stretch because even if I physically do not need it, it is a calming meditative ritual ingrained in my mind. I even kept my biology strictly pony when we stretched together." She grinned a little guiltily. "I miiight have cheated on the warmup a little though. I wanted to surprise you with my Ty Lee impression, I just couldn't let the perfect opportunity slide. My instincts were also kind of spazing out while I was there but you really helped to calm them down once things got a little more personal." The very tip of her ears became the very slightest shade pinker. "To be honest, before you calmed my instincts, some of your DNA scraps leaked into me when you booped me while I was stretching. You really surprised me and caught me off guard. Your DNA is really diverse, being an alien and all. Very high quality DNA, I had to really concentrate to control my instincts from trying to get me to acquire more." Her sense of shame intensified.

Anon rubbed his fingers together self consciously remembering how odd it felt to boop Blossomforth. "I thought there was something weird going on, I mean your nose felt like putty and it seemed to stick to me!" Anon shivered internally about what might have happened if she had not exerted enough control over herself.

Bloss looked up at Anon and sensed his fear, she cringed very slightly. "I'm so sorry for putting you in that kind of situation, Anon." She sighed. "I was getting really lonely. Against my better judgement I decided to seek someone to share my troubles with. I guess my gamble worked out." She smiled at Anon and then leaned into into his side. "Thanks for being there."

Anon wrapped his arm around her with a lopsided and slightly nervous grin. "Well, thank you for putting in the effort to resist the temptation to assimilate me." Anon looked over to see the reddish hue on the tip of Blossomforth's ears begin to spread downwards. Damnit, how can one pony be so horrifying and cute at the same time?

Blossomforth was incredibly embarrassed at Anon’s statement so she changed the subject. She noticed that the other part of herself, which was shaped like an eagle, had finished assimilating the biological information from its hunt.

“Oh yeah! I suppose you asked for a demonstration of my hivemind abilities?”

“Yeah, I was interested to know about that. It seems like quite the feat. How does it even feel like to exist in two places?”

Blossomforth scrunched her face like she was remembering something unpleasant. “It is one of the strangest feelings I have ever felt. You have to remember that when I divide, I do not directly experience everything that all of my bodies are doing. Only the most important information gets filtered to my core mind. The less "smart" parts of my mind and neural structure get copied to be able to handle so many bodies doing so many different things at the same time. If I try to experience all the information at once in a central way, it quickly becomes overwhelming so I have to let the mid level copies of my mind manage the groups of bodies and feed my core the most important information. It is the quantum neural connections that allow such rapid communication and central organization despite being physically separated."

"I have actually tried this before by splitting my biomass and mind into many little hummingbirds. It was wonderful, empowering, intoxicating, and scary all at once. My little hummingbird bodies were able to suck all of the nectar from two butterfly bushes in less than a minute, gathering a lot of nutrients in a short period of time. There was such a powerful temptation to direct my bodies to fly in all directions and infect every organism they came into contact with. I have had nightmares of what might have happened. I imagined all of my hummingbird bodies finding their own organism, fusing to them and infecting them until their whole body was assimilated. Using this newly assimilated biomass, 100 new hummingbirds would form from each of the assimilated organisms and fly around to find a new organism to assimilate. Exponential growth, Anon. It is what the Ancestors wanted me to do." Blossomforth looked down in sadness. "I fear this is inevitably what I will do no matter what I do to try and stop it. Maybe not anytime soon but eventually."

Anon kneeled down and put a hand on Blossomforth's shoulder and looked at her in the eyes. "I promise you we'll figure something out. If you ever find yourself alone feeling those urges like you have described, then come and see me immediately. I'll help you through it and I promise I won't let you live out your nightmare."

"Thanks, Anon. We probably won't have to worry about that for quite a long time but I would rather it never happened at all. So, uh, I actually split some biomass off of myself this morning to go to the Everfree forest and gather some new DNA samples to help sate my hunger for bioinformation. I programmed a simple neural system into it to catch and release a new species. It should be done by now, want to see it? It is a part of my hivemeind so I suppose it is a demonstration."

"Yeah, sure. Just make sure it does not try to 'gather' my DNA, heh." Anon laughed nervously.

"Don't worry, Anon. I programmed it to find only one non-sapient creature that I have not assimilated before deep in the Everfree. I'll open the door and it'll come in, sound good?"

Anon nodded and Blossomforth suddenly sprouted a tentacle which rapidly reached across the room to curl around the doorknob and opened the door. Through the doorway, an eagle swooped in and landed on Blossomforth's back. Anon flinched in surprise but quickly recovered.

"So, this is what you could call a drone. Not much intelligence but it can do tasks for me. It is part of my flesh and connected to my hivemeind so I can see what it sees. I have gotten the DNA of an eagle before so I can fashion my drone's flesh to that of an eagle and implant some skills I copied from the mind of the eagle I assimilated."

"So that eagle that just flew in is a part of you? Uh, can I pet it?"

Blossomforth shrugged. "It is not a real eagle. It won't behave like one, it is a dumb drone." Like she said, the eagle was perched stock still on Blossomforth's back, showing no reaction to anything. Anon came over and pet the flesh shaped like a bird and it still showed no reaction. "Weird!" Anon exclaimed.

Blossomforth watched Anon pet the drone and shifted her weight back and forth nervously. "Well, it's about to get more weird. I suppose this is a good time too demonstrate an assimilation. I am going to bring the drone's biomass back into myself. I can do it later if you want or you can see me do it now. I know that this kind of thing is a little disturbing to you."

"That's alright, Bloss. I want to see, go ahead and show me."

Blossomforth nodded. Suddenly the flesh on Blossomforth's back which the drone was grasping started fusing to the eagle's claws. Blossomforth's viscous, muscular flesh started crawling up the legs of the bird, slowly pulling more of the eagle into Blossomforth in a sucking motion. Like quicksand the eagle started sinking into Blossomforth's barrel as it was slowly engulfed. The drone showed no reaction as it was pulled into the now shifting folds of Blossomforth's flesh. Blossomforth seemed to get fatter and her muscles more defined as the assimilated biomass shifted and gurgled within the interior of Blossomforth's body.

"It is a bit difficult to keep my figure after taking in that drone." Blossomforth said. The extra biomass compressed inside so that she looked almost like normal albeit more dense and heavy.

"Dang, that drone just disappeared! What did you do to it?" Anon hid his discomfort at seeing living flesh being so quickly and easily consumed by Blossomforth.

"Well, the drone is easy to quickly integrate because it has already been assimilated before. I can just tell the cells in the drone with my enzymes already inside them to recompose their biology to become muscle, fat and other nutrients that my pony body can use. I had to compact the cells densely inside of myself to make myself look like normal but I do weigh more now. However, this also means that I can more easily do things like form more or longer tentacles because of the extra biomass." Blossomforth's eyes widened and she suddenly let out a huge belch, it was much louder and longer than any normal belch that Anon had ever heard. Anon stared at her for a few seconds with incredulity. Suddenly he burst into laughter, and Blossomforth joined despite her embarrassment at burping in such an unladylike way. Anon kept laughing and proceeded to sit down on the couch to help himself recover. Bloss also jumped up onto the sofa and lay on her back to rest her head on Anon's thigh to look up at him. She sighed deeply as Anon finished laughing. Anon looked down to his lap at Blossomforth and she looked up to meet his eyes.

"So, Anon. What do you think of me now? It might not seem like it but I am trying to dump all of the information of my predicament onto you before I lose my nerve. This is hard for me to do. I don't like talking about all of these horrifying things I can do. I have only ever wanted to be a contortionist but now it seems that I have a new destiny and power thrust upon me. What do you think I should do now? What can I do to ensure that my transformation is a good thing? I don't really have a plan, Anon. I am just drifting day to day wondering what I should do. I feel so bad for coming to you like this and asking you all these impossible questions but I don't know who else to turn to. Can you help me?"

Anon stared deeply into Blossomforth's large eyes as he gathered his thoughts. "Well, I have to admit to you that you are a really scary little monster that creeps me out at a very basic and primal level." He punctuated his words by ruffling Blossomforth's mane and rubbing her ears. Blossomforth worriedly stared up at Anon and blinked one of her eyes as her mane hairs brushed her eyelid. She looked a little confused and her legs were folded close to her barrel with her belly up. "However, this little monster is also a sweet, cute, kindhearted, flesh horror masquerading as a little pony, and I love and trust her very much." Blossomforth smiled and giggled as Anon reached over to rub and tickle her white furred belly. "I think I can help you, Bloss. I may not be a horrifyingly dominant eldritch horror but I can give you my love and support to the best of my insignificant mortal abilities."

Blossomforth was gazing into Anon's eyes and tears began filling the crevices in her eyes, giving them a slightly crystal look. "I may be a scary alien creature but my mind and heart came from Equestria. I can still feel love, Anon. Love is more powerful than whatever instinctual concoction these ruthless, machine-like Ancestors have tried to chain me to. Your love and your kindness have done so much. You make me feel safe and your love keeps my damnable instincts at bay. I have been so afraid that revealing myself to you would drive you away. I will never be a real pony again no matter how much I want to. Thank you for being so kind to a monster like me and not abandoning me to the nightmarish hole that is loneliness. You may not have known it, Anon, but you do so much for me. Even if you can't help me in any other way, it is more than enough. I love you, Anon and I want to be with you for ever."

Anon's eyes widened as he heard what she had to say. He had no idea that he was having such a profound effect. Was he the one holding back a wave of assimilation? "Well, I'm so glad that I am able to help you so much without even thinking about it! I'm also glad that you were the pony to gain these abilities. I can think of no kinder pony to have them. If I can do so much to help you passively, then think of how much we can do when we put our minds to it. I think that together we will be able to stop you from becoming a doomsday device. Don't worry, I won't tell anypony about you even though you said you would not stop me. It seems like we have time so maybe in the future you might be able to reveal yourself to others. I'm not really sure how that would turn out but we would have to be very careful about how we would do it. Also, I'm sure I have told you before but you have saved me as well from the depth of depression.”

Blossomforth rolled over and sat up on the couch next to Anon. She gave him a big smile, raised a hoof and poked him in the chest. "You are so awesome, Anon. I would be lost without you." Bloss let herself fall backwards onto her back and collapsed onto the couch. "Ooof!" She sighed out as she impacted the couch. "That is such a load off my shoulders. Ha! I feel so good now! You have no idea how much I have been dreading this. Thank you so much for accepting the real me!”

"Well," Anon said as he got up and stretched his arms. "Now we just have to figure out what to do next."

I hope that was not too much exposition or too boring. I am going to try to introduce conflict and amorphous alien shenanigans soon.