My dearest friend,

I know we don’t see eye-to-eye on many things these days, but if there’s somepony in the world who will understand this then it is you. In recent years, and especially throughout my cooperation with Magnus, I’ve grown to realize that I’m not the pony you wanted me to be, not anymore. I’ve grown detached and I’ve strayed too far from who I wanted to be. From who you hoped I would become as well. In that, I’ve grown suspicious that it’s something that happened to you a long time ago and that I was your attempt at fixing it.

I used to believe that friendship was magic, but now I know the distinction as much as I suspect that you do. Magic is magic, magic is power, and with rulership I need more and more power to protect my ponies. However, understanding magic takes too much time. After all, as my predecessor and the primal alicorn of Magic, Magnus has been studying the inner workings of reality since the formation of this planet. To become who he is, he had to do it alone. Here’s the problem you’re fully aware of - the more powerful I grow, the less ponies are capable of thinking of me as a friend. Respected and revered ruler? Yes. A foreign and skilled diplomat in the case of other races? Yes. At best a motherly figure, but a friend? Less and less.

And the real kicker is that I am more powerful than I ever was with friends by my side and that terrifies me, even though I’m sure most of my divinity related to friendship is gone. I must admit I’m somewhat curious about where that divinity is now. You know, since it coalesces into the right avatar. The only thing I hope for is that whoever has the right affinity for friendship these days doesn’t stray from the path like both of us did.

Why don’t I just walk upstairs from the laboratory to talk about it in person? At first I wanted to, but then I recalled how cathartic writing these used to be.

Sincerely,

I’m sure you know who.

“Mister Magpie?” asks Thirteen quietly in case the griffon on the upper bunk is still asleep.

“Hmm?” she hears the griffon grunt and roll over.

“You were right.”

“I tend to be,” he mumbles without any interest in continuing the morning conversation.

“I just want to say sorry about snapping at you when you said I should sleep on it after Three explained what he needed from me.”

“That was two days ago,” moans Magpie, “And it’s not like me forgiving you means anything.”

“It just didn’t feel right not saying it.”

“Look, I used to be a noble, and don’t you dare tell anyone. Even Gem doesn’t know any details, so lock this up inside your head or whatever you changelings do. It was politics all the time. Everyone kept saying things and lying over and over and over and thinking that in the end it was the same as doing things. It wasn’t, it didn’t do any good. You can keep talking about anything forever, but the important thing is what you do.”

“Umm, how do I do sorry?” Thirteen shifts under the blanket, “I can’t do Three’s kicked puppy look, at least not like he does it.”

“Are all you changelings smartasses when you want to be?”

“Sorry.”

“Here we go again...” Magpie sighs.

“Fine, we’ll do it your way,” Thirteen crosses her forelegs on her chest, strangely warm inside, “Once I do sorry, will you accept it?”

“Sure, whatever. Does that mean you’ve come up with something about you know what?”

“Yep. I’ll need mister minotaur’s help first and you to tell that unicorn gang to stay out of the way during breakfast no matter what happens, though.”

“You’re planning on something happening to you, aren’t you?”

“How did you guess that?”

“The only thing I, the minotaur, and those hornhead supremacists have in common is promising Three to make sure nothing happens to you. Speaking of which, you’re assuming Three’s going to be in the castle today again, right?”

“Mhm. He should be back earlier again, though. He said he was only overseeing the final testing of the mechanical farms now.”

“Good.”

Thirteen ponders saying something but quickly reminds herself of what Magpie said. On the other hole, she can’t help but wonder how a griffon noble would end up leaving that for life as a mercenary slash caravan guard. She read several books Gem brought from the surface and she knows about the dwarf upper class, and she got a good guess that being on top usually meant a better life. What she does know, though, is that asking about it right now would do no good.

Thirteen walks into the cafeteria, not caring about being noticed for the first time since her arrival in the prison. Standing upright without looking away from any glances her way still makes her feel a grip tightening around her chest. Despite that, she patiently waits in the queue, forcing her breathing under control.

It’s going to be okay, Thirteen. You got an idea and now you need to make it work. You’ve seen how this works before, scraps between inmates are common.

But what if I thought wrong? What if I’m completely wrong? Everyone is relying on me... ME!

She starts trembling which makes the oatmeal she takes from the serving lady wobble in its bowl as she walks over to the unnamed minotaur sitting alone at the central table like always.

“H-Hi,” she sits down on the bench next to him for once instead of taking her place across the table as usual.

The minotaur nods mid-chew, finishes his bite, and swallows.

“Morning,” he grunts which, as Thirteen knows by now, is in his terms a sign of absolute friendship.

The changeling looks around and spots Magpie chatting up several members of the unicorn brotherhood in the back of the cafeteria. Shoving her bowl towards the minotaur, Thirteen leans closer and whispers:

“I need your help. It’s about the plan.”

“Alright.”

“You know? I still haven’t asked you what you’re in here for.”

“And that’s the best part about you,” he doesn’t even bother looking at her.

“Oh… got it,” Thirteen looks around again.

“Now focus and tell me what you want.”

Thirteen takes a deep breath and taps against the brown secondary armor plating around her barrel.

“I need you to attack me and rip it off. Over the past two days, I’ve been slowly transforming as much as the suppressor allows. The secondary armor isn’t completely separated from my chitin, so it’ll get messy.”

“Mind if I ask why?”

“I need to get to the infirmary, and this way is a lot less inconvenient than breaking a leg or something. A lot more painful, though, but it’s the only thing I’ve come up with. If mutilating myself is the only way I can be useful then so be it. I don’t deserve to look like a queen-type changeling anyway.”

“Just the brown carapace around your barrel then?”

“Mhm. That should be enough and not cripple me,” Thirteen nods, “I’m really sorry about the beating the wardens will give you. Trust me, if I could do it on my own, I-”

She can’t finish the sentence as the minotaur backhands her so hard that starts begin dancing in front of her eyes. She barely notices the impact of her back against the floor as well as the minotaur’s roar:

“I may have lost my honor, but a worthless bug like you doesn’t get to say anything!”

He grabs Thirteen by her neck, pushes her fingers deep against the soft chitin of her barrel and under the ‘hem’ of the secondary carapace which cracks as he squeezes it. His fingers sink deeper into her chitin than any skin would allow, and the wet squishiness feels as if he was reaching into someone’s ribcage.

Lightning of pure agony fries Thirteen’s brain instantly, her eyes rolling back. Not in her worst nightmares could she have expected it to be this bad.

Thankfully, it doesn’t last long. Only until she throws up and passes out. Unfortunately, her world shuts down with the knowledge that this is still the easy part.

She doesn’t know how long she’s been out, only that she’s suddenly lying on something much softer than the bunk in her cell. Not opening her eyes, she listens for any possibility of anyone being in the room with her before she concludes she’s in the clear and sits upright… or at least as upright as the leather straps around her fetlocks allow.

Alright, alright. It’s just like miss Gem taught me back in the hive. You’re a changeling, so you should always expect to get tied up and suppressed when in hostile situations.

Softening her chitin wasn’t the only transformation she’s been working on since she thought of the first steps of her plan to melt the suppressors. The second part was to change her internal organs in such way that she’d be able to absorb painkillers in liquid or pill form. Normally, changelings don’t have anything save for the mucus membrane in their noses, so if she was sure she could snort any painkillers she’d find there would be no need to take over a full day of slow shapeshifting to grow something even remotely resembling a rapid digesting system.

So, step one - she’s in the intensive care and no one is around. The doctor must have slipped out before sending her off to the recovery ward.

Step two - find a medicine cabinet. Right on the opposite wall with glass and chain mesh front, padlocked with rows of bottles lying on the shelves.

Taking a deep breath, she narrows her legs by simply opening small holes right under the leather straps, which allows her legs to easily slip out. From a different hole in her foreleg, she pulls out the fake suppressor.

Step three…

With both forelegs, she pushes against the glass which cracks and slowly drops into Thirteen’s lap. A pony would be badly cut by now, even before getting through the mesh to the bottles of pills, but even her softened chitin protects her as long as she’s careful.

Now, her fangs aren’t the sharpest but with her not caring about cutting her gums or tongue she bites through few thin chain links and then unceremoniously shoves a hoof in and rips open the rest, reaching for a name she recognizes - morphine. Amusingly, there are two of those hoof-sized bottles, one with pills and one with liquid.

Knowing the next step is going to hurt so much that any training with One would be akin to a gentle massage, she downs the full bottle of pills and washes them down with the liquid one.

It takes less than a minute before her legs collapse under her and everything blurs.

Alright, Thirteen. Now or never!

Her eyes go wide as the rush of pure agony and adrenaline wash away the dose of painkillers enough to knock out a dragon moment after she pulls on the suppressor on her horn.

She just needs to twist it a little…

She can’t pass out yet…

Her body reacts without any input from Thirteen, throwing up partially-digested pills mid-screw. Thankfully, by now Thirteen can barely feel anything other than her horn and skull fried from the inside out until…

...it all stops and the suppressor slips off.

The final step. Just few more seconds. Please, don’t mess this up. It’s the only thing they needed from me. I can’t mess this up. I can’t mess this up. I can’t mess this up.

A leg hole opens and Thirteen slips the real suppressor into it.

Mustn’t mess this up. They need me. The first time someone really needs me.

The final step.

Thirteen reaches for the fake suppressor on the bed and barely grabs the blanket before she collapses on the floor, the blanket along with the suppressor landing by her head.

Just screw it on.

Just need to screw it on.

No matter how hard she tries, her body doesn’t move anymore.

No no no no no! Please no! Body, listen to me! Just put it on, that’s all. One little screw and then I can pretend it got dislodged when I fell or something.

I can’t fail Three, Gem, everyone here. The doctor will find me… with a fake suppressor…

I’ll ruin the whole plan...

Despite her internal begging, she doesn’t even twitch anymore as her vision fades.

Mom was right all along...

Author's Notes:

Looks like people not being able to go out due to the quarantine won't save this story