Max sat at the breakfast table, surrounded by the most important mares of the age. Well, two were definitely important. Seven was much more important due to her being the only breeding queen, and Crystal had Luna's ear(and her tail-end). So overall, pretty important. The current topic of discussion? Last night's movie.

"-no such thing as the undead. A creature cannot remain in its body after the body has ceased to function."

"T'was obviously a magical binding. We have not even begun to delve into the depths of magic, Tia. What makes you think such a curse would be impossible?"

"Curses are not real."

"Just because Starswirl said it does not make it so!"

Seven stirred her drink thoughtfully.
"You said there were larger battles to come, Max?"

"There are. This was the tip of the iceberg. The story's just started; it's a three parter."

"Three? And it was-are the other's as long?"

"Yup," he nodded, looking to Seven curiously. "You enjoyed it. That came as a surprise."

"While many parts were boring, I will admit some of the battles were exciting and some of the individuals were...fun to listen to. The silliness of the short ones as well as the bickering of the tall and short warriors was especially interesting."

"Yea, I always enjoyed their friendly competitions, especially because of how strange it is when you consider it. Battle is not a nice experience and yet there they are, joking about achieving a higher kill-count. I'll do the next movie tonight if you like. Consider yourselves lucky, I had to wait several years to see them all."

"I was especially impressed by their abilities to mask themselves," Celestia added as she stirred her grits. "They were all humans, correct? Yet one looked almost divine while others were grotesque, even though they were all human."

"Makeup is one of the oldest creations on the planet," Max explained. "As we gain access to new technologies, we tend to have at least one or two people who go back over what we already have and ask how it can be improved. The issues come with accessibility. Just because we can reach the moon doesn't mean everyone can try out their own experiments on moon dust or check to see the effects of lowered gravity on cooking."

"Viability. You used that term before when speaking of things we could use. Like...plumbing I believe you called it. The material needs would be much too great for our current means," Luna said.

"Yea, you'd either need to dig out a sewage system, which I'm still recommending and should be easier with either the dogs or changelings, or install pipes. The best metal solution would be corrosion-resistant, and I don't think we have enough information to know which pipes would work best in that case, and that's if we can get the amount of metal processed and worked to make miles of piping that we'd need."
Shaking his head, the male chuckled.
"Anyway, as more and more new technologies are either discovered or rediscovered you'll find both better ways to create them as well as ways to simplify the processes. That's advancement in the simplest terms. The wagons for instance? Those things are fairly simple and yet we only have four in the keep at the moment, two being owned by nobles. I owned a self-powered wagon back home, one that had a decent cargo capacity and that could travel pretty quickly. It's why I've been pushing for different areas of advancement. Even if I could make a car myself, the people of this world can't create the fuel I'd need. What good is a car without gas? What good is a rune without the magic to power it?"
"Back to the movie though, there are things humans have recognized as crucial to storytelling. The protagonist, the hero. The antagonist, the villain. In this movie they're fairly obvious but a good movie usually has more than one of each. Strider for instance is also a protagonist, not just Frodo. Each will have their own story, and the next two movies will see their story diverge. So be ready for that; the story is going to get really complicated."

"Ah, I believe I understand." Seven finally announced. "As rulers, the alicorns will be dealing with multiple stories at all times."

"True, but not the real reason for the movie. For one I just really enjoyed it and thought it was an excellent display of both what humans can do with technology and makeup, as well as what a good story looks like. This one is really good not just in the narrative, but in the lore and how the writer created the world. There were maps, a language for the elves, Tolkien was very good at what he did.”

“Perhaps, but I also see possibilities. Binding invisibility spells to rings, blades that act as warnings to the presence of specific species-“

“-illusions of fire that would terrify the uninformed, the idea of warding a gate with a locking phrase, one that will only open to those who know the words,” Seven continued, her own smile becoming dangerous. “The idea of a hive in the trees. I know there are large forests out there in this world, maybe even as large as the one we saw. I also didn’t know a simple sheet of mithril could do that.”

“I do not think it can,” Celestia said interrupted. “It may merely be a part of the tale, or perhaps Earth-mithril is stronger?”

“Earth-mithril is a myth. It’s a fantasy metal. As is adamantium and saronite. After all, we haven't found magic in any of our metals, so maybe other metals would hold magic, or perhaps worlds with magic would have different metals? Don’t assume any properties of metals you see in these stories are real. If you're curious, ask. I'd rather have you ask me about silver than assume something based on a movie and waste time and money building something the material won't work for.”

Celestia nodded.
“And since nopony else is saying it I shall. Those creatures unsettled me.”

“The ones that looked like tall ponies?” Luna asked. “I admit they were strange, but I figured they were beasts of burden.”

“As the taller one, she is closer in appearance to them,” Seven said. “I imagine seeing a creature, especially a mindless beast, that is similar in appearance and coloration to herself was a bit unsettling.”

“I understand,” Max said with a nod. “I think the closest we have to a species that looks like us but is a beast is the ape. Nothing like the comparison between alicorns and horses though.”

“I also noticed fire seems to be a very prevalent thing. Do humans fear fire?” The white mare asked.

Max cocked his head.
“Not exactly. Our relationship with fire is infinitely more complicated than that. There’s two sides to fire. The destroyer, an entity that burns all, living and dead, with equal fury, and then there is the life-giver. With fire we cook, we purify water, we warm ourselves, and we bring light to the darkness. That’s why the monster in the mines was so scary. It was something more powerful than a primal force. Something that ignored the rules of fire.”

“So humans would find ponies scary?” The Lunar alicorn asked.

“You two? Of course. Two immortals that control the sun and moon, you’re deities by most definitions. And humans don’t just worship what they love. Many worship what they fear.”
Max smiled at as he imagined it.
“Even normal ponies would be seen as unnatural and dangerous. Unicorns that use magic, Pegasi that fly even though physics says they shouldn’t, Earth ponies who can shape metal and push crops to their limits, changelings that can alter their forms, and even the diamond dogs who can dig through rock like it’s sand. All these races bend the rules, and humans aren’t used to that. It would be a terrifying time while they learned to adapt to these new rules. Some would be fine, but a lot would panic.”

“But then you’d start trying to learn how to use it to your advantage,” Crystal giggled. “I like that. To look at a balrog and say ‘they would make an excellent heat-source for a forge’ or better yet to look at a rushing river and say ‘we can use this to grind our grain.’ I feel that way sometimes now, and it feels amazing!”

“I will admit I like being able to think in more directions then mere survival, as many of us were trained to in the Hive. I, I really must find my sisters and share this. Not just the ability to lay eggs, but to be able to think in multiple directions.”
“For instance, I am well aware of the dangers of merely handing the ability to lay eggs over to them. Most would immediately attempt to use the fix, draining their likely minimal food reserves in days. They’d attempt to harvest more, but eventually they’d all probably starve. Because several queens living in close proximity may not be able to survive that sort of demand.”
Seven sighed, staring into her cup.
“Being able to consider these things is both a gift and a curse. They will not understand why I deny them their right. I only hope they trust me enough to listen to reason.”

“Only going to be one way to find out, Seven,” Max said.

The queen nodded, her expression dark.
“I know.”

For nearly five months everything was calm. The castle was expanded in several ways, from a few small hive/storage rooms to a new and larger treasury(to which Lady Sapphire was assigned most of the time, sorting and cutting gems in such a way as to maximize their value or making note of which ones were being removed from the vault for enchanting purposes).
Patrols began to include the odd changeling, and a new group was created after a brief panic with a small blaze in the shanty-town outside the walls. The first fire-response team, a mixed-race group that were normally peasants or knights with additional training as overseen by Maximus. By adding a few different alarms throughout the town, the fire-response team was able to reach the fire within a few minutes of the alarm being raised, a vast improvement from the peasantry fleeing in terror while a few tried throwing water at an inferno.

The first attempt at a hospital was also made, a small-ish and wide-open building more akin to a warehouse that could hold dozens of patients built in a second spoke of their castle wall-wheel. The doctors attempting to apply were heavily scrutinized and Max spent every chance he could adding to Crack’s library of medicinal knowledge. The changeling drone had complete control over the hospital at the end of the day, too. If any doctor hoped to make it, he had to either prove his knowledge, an impossible feat given Crack was working with Maximus' medical knowledge, or agree to study medicine and start as an assistant until the drone was comfortable with their efforts. More than a few medicine mares were insulted by the new rules and some even left, but after considering why Max wasn't about to complain. They could take their damned leeches with them.

Finally, a trader arrived. An honest to god trader dragging along a small wagon of goods and looking to make a living for herself. While it almost passed by without their knowing, the addition of so many eyes to the hive meant Crystal and Seven knew about the trader before the guards did. Therefore the mare and her husband, a brutish looking male in armor, were met not just by a bustle of curious peasants but two large alicorn mares who also took a look at their wares, as well as three large changelings.
He’d debated on giving them a small jar of honey in return for a trinket that had caught his eye but he didn’t want to make them a target. The lord of a Keep was one thing, a pair of traders walking down the forest paths would be hit by starving changelings before they knew what happened.

<-(0)->

Max rolled his neck as his attention was pulled from his notes. Around his new desk were a plethora of notes and scrolls on the ideas he'd decided were viable as well as his calculations for changeling energy consumption. It was a pretty easy thing to set up once he found a decent unit for love energy. The trick had been finding that love to energy conversion unit. Naming it was...he'd been outvoted four to one on that topic.
"Still think Kiss is a stupid name for an energy unit," he grumbled.

The average changeling drone used about ten, er, Kisses per day with a variance of 1-3 Kisses if their work was physically intensive. If magic was involved that number could rise exponentially, as the magic being used was a direct burn of energy. As such any magic use by changelings was intensely regulated until such a time as large reserves could be created.
Which wasn't happening with their new queen going through so much energy in egg laying and egg care. In fact even with Seven's low egg count, the sheer number of eggs that they were maintaining and supplying kept their outgoing supply about even with their intake.

As such Crystal was still in her proto queen stage even after five months, unable to mature until they had either found a better source of energy or the number of drones bringing in more than enough energy to survive on was higher. That was one of the things he felt was holding them back. Many of the drones were terrified of ponies, in some cases more so than the ponies were of them. As such only a few of the first drones were really bringing in any additional emotion. Several even outright refused to form relationships, stating it wasn't their job. That they were workers or soldiers, not harvesters.

Still, Crystal and Seven had at least come to an understanding. The two were fond of swapping now, Crystal because she wanted to experience motherhood and Seven because she was learning just how restricted an egg laying queen was in movement and schedule. Perhaps in the future they'd learn how to focus the egg laying over certain times or get it to fit their schedules, but as it stood the mare was waking up at odd hours every week to lay more eggs.
'Just glad she took my advice and kept the number low. Otherwise we'd be swimming in eggs and that would be a problem.'

While the low egg count helped keep the love drain manageable, what they'd found to be the real saving grace was the true drones. By laying those for the majority of the clutches, only every fourth or so clutch being fertilized, they were able to more than half the resource drain. They'd also found other uses for the golem-like drones.
Basic tasks, like cleaning and maintenance. Dangerous tasks, times that they didn't want to risk losing an actual drone. It was a hard mental jump to make but when he looked at it 'realistically' the drones were basically made for this. They were disposable. They were a resource.

And that was a terrifying idea to Maximus.

To be able to throw away life in this way was built into the changeling form. The queens were all but required to lay eggs, and this second type of drone was both cheaper from a resource perspective and something you could throw away if needed. He couldn't even fault anyone for thinking in that way; it was the way these drones were supposed to be used!

He sighed, looking to Bot as the drone waited in the corner for orders. It was already looking ragged and old even after a few months. It was likely a good thing though. The true drones were not meant to last, and it meant that it would keep numbers within a certain level once things leveled out. Once the true drones began dying as new eggs were laid.
"Scheduled breeding, this is ridiculous. And yet letting Crystal and Seven lay as much as they desire would kill us all."

Bot moved on his command, opening the door as Luna approached. The mare was a little more settled around Bot by now, but many ponies found the true drones a worrying if not scary presence.

"Maximus, will you be joining us for dinner?"

"Yes, I'm just doing some last minute calculations. There's just so much to do and the queens are already stressed with eggs and making lists of all the changes that were made to their bodies so far in the name of repairs, that means they're not watching intake and output. We're fine for now, but I'm so glad Crystal listened and held off. Add the two other drones that showed up last month, we're keeping afloat. In fact, we're saving a little love for a rainy day. But if we had two fully functional queens that would not be the case. We'd be looking at a shortage with our current intake. I've let a few drones do some passive gathering like they're used to, but I also have them reporting any and all changes in their target's habits. That's actually what that stack over by the wall is. A study on prolonged unaware feeding. Three different 'lings using three different methods. It's not producing nearly as much as Flick is with her new herd but its what changelings are used to. Even if there are negative effects we can use them to find other changelings in the future. It's also the first real documented proof that undisguised gathering is the way to go."

"You have actual numbers now, not just guesses," Luna said, nodding. She approached the desk and looked over his work, frowning. "Max, how can you read this?"

He looked down. It was all in English; well, most of his notes were. Then he realized that some of the reports were in changeling script, there was one or two papers in earth pony, and another in unicorn...and focusing on them he had no problem reading all four languages.
"I uh, think I'm pulling information. Like how Crystal and Seven will ask for stuff? I just don't really think about asking. I'll ask if it's bothering anyone, but I haven't heard anything."

"Well I'm certain Seven will be happy to know that you're keeping the notes in a language most creatures cant read. In fact she may find it comforting that she can't read it."

"I think she could as long as she was connected to me. Actually there's a good chance she could read English quite well even without the connection considering how many memories she's eaten."

The mare tensed, her wings flaring slightly.

"No, not like that. I mean her mind has had to process them. I didn't find them all Luna. Her mind had recovered enough that it could start healing on its own, and it sort of incorporated those extra memories. At least that's what I think happened. I don't think she purged them herself as she couldn't tell what was hers and what wasn't. She's also griped at me a few times for strange terms or ideas."

"If you are certain no damage has been done. I still find this interconnected mind web difficult to understand even with your explanations and examples."

Max chuckled.
"Luna, I have a hard time understanding it myself and I have real-world examples of what's going on. The issue I run into is computers were both designed for that kind of sharing and needed a physical connection to each other for the longest time. Wireless stuff was catching on and becoming commonplace for computers, but it was taking an old concept and improving it, making the computers use signals to communicate with each other. Old hat at that point. Problem people ran into was power, signal readability, and how expensive the equipment was."
"Converting that to changelings though, we have better range than the best wireless routers I've seen, can transfer a lot of information ranging from actual communications to images and memories, and we can even transfer consciousness. That's big. I don't think we're just projecting when that happens, I think it's an actual transfer of the mind into the other body. Otherwise Seven and I would have felt what the other was doing during those days we were swapped. I don't have those memories or sensations though. When she transferred back, she took the memories with her."

"You're giving it more thought than most of the changelings, I see," Luna said with a smile. "Do you have any idea how long before Crystal will be able to mature?"

"Too long," he replied, making a few last notes before standing. "The drain isn't dangerous, but Seven isn't going anywhere if you haven't noticed. She'd starve quickly out there at the rate she's burning energy. it also reinforces my opinion. You wouldn't be able to supply two producing queens. It may harm you, it could very well cause permanent emotional damage to you if we pushed it. I'm not taking that risk and neither is Crystal. As it stands we're comfortable and making a small profit but all it would require would be a bad stunt by a rogue changeling to change that."

"The issue with living on the good feelings of others. I would think that the individuals in the keep and the peasants would help. You're certainly popular with the fire fighter idea."

"That's...it's not like our connection. To them I'm not an individual. Most may have seen me but there's no real connection. I'm an idea, a being that exists in some far off place that they'll likely never see. Being grateful is also different than having a meaningful emotional connection."

"So the connection is just not strong enough. I was sort of hoping that would help."

"Don't get me wrong, it's nice and it means I get a nice burst of energy just by walking around outside but its not something I can keep the hive running on."

Luna nodded.
"As with running the keep being more involved than anyone bothered to tell us. In theory things should be simple. When it comes time to actually implement things it gets much more difficult."
"Elder Duke will be visiting tomorrow. Something about a strange creature flying by their cave a few times."

"How are they doing? I haven't managed to visit them lately."

"Well enough. They're more focused n rebuilding a small city at the moment, which Crystal and Seven find more comfortable than Tia or myself. It's mostly underground, a few holes in the earth that Crystal has asked be marked so there aren't any accidental deaths like..."

"I still feel bad about that even now. But unfortunately that's sometimes the only way we learn about an issue."

"Yes. As I was saying, they're beginning to grow. I think I even heard a few young ones last time. If they were newborns or merely young though, I do not know. I do not have enough experience with their kind to be able to tell."

"What? Luna, that's racist!" Max laughed. "How could you! Next you'll be telling me all changelings look alike or that a dragon looks like a lizard."
"Don't do that by the way. I don't know if it's a thing, but calling a dragon a lizard was a grave insult in most games and stories. Good way to end up in a fight and since those things can be huge-"

"-I should avoid doing so. Yes, I will definitely take the advice of the male who has insulted nobles within minutes of meeting them."

Opening the door to the dining room and catching a quick glimpse of the three other important females, he rolled his eyes.
"Right, because they actually were nobles. I'm still convinced most of them were lying."

The two sat down, several serving ponies bringing out the evening meal nearly the moment they were settled. Max, Crystal and Seven were also served glasses of glowing emotion. Max and Crystal's glasses were a mosaic of colors while Seven's was completely pink, as was the small jug of additional emotion that was set down near the exhausted looking queen.

"Being a full queen not all it's cracked up to be?"

"Be quiet," Seven shot back, her scowl slipping into a small smile. "It's exhausting, but I don't regret it. Not when I have someone willing to help."

Crystal brightened at the compliment, but Celestia just looked confused.
"How can she help? I thought you were laying eggs and overseeing a hive."

Seven smiled, looked to Crystal, and then Crystal started speaking.
"It's easy when you can trade off duties, even if they're bound to your body."

"So Crystal has experienced a few clutchtes?" Max asked. "How did it treat you, Crystal?"

"It was...tiring but I enjoy it. It's not something I ever thought I'd experience!" she giggled, jittering slightly in her seat. "I know you said we need to wait and I've seen your calculations, but I still can't wait!"

"I see a few flashes of orders about the wall from time to time, how's it coming?" Max asked before beginning to eat.

"It's going well. With the diamond dogs and changelings we're also looking at ways to magically reinforced the ground around the city so that enemies cant simply dig through the dirt. We're also improving the walls a bit, as the dogs can apparently shred stone."
Crystal, still in Seven's form, nodded.
"It was fun, overseeing defenses for once. I've done so many infiltrations and even an invasion or two, but I've never had to see to a defense. Knowing a few things about both my own tactics and having that unicorn to add what ponies tend to work with, I think we're doing well. We're also doing the wheel thing you mentioned. It's easy enough to expand with a bit of magic to meld the corners."

"Are you certain you don't want me to meld the wall? A solid stone wall would be stronger."

"It wouldn't hold to weather though," Seven replied, sitting next to Luna now. "If it gets cold the wall will crack and break."

"Speaking of cold, how long are the seasons?" Max asked, looking to the alicorns. "It feels like it's been summer for several months."

Luna looked at Celestia for a moment before looking back to the changeling stallion.
"Seasons?"

Author's Notes:

Not much happening, just some more progress on the town. Headed to Chicago soon(today or tomorrow), so I may not get anything else posted. Merry Christmas. Next chapter of Sub will be done shortly...hopefully.