I sighed as I looked up at the sky. As the sun was setting, the moon was out and the first stars were stepping out into the sky.
The light pollution on Equus was nearly nonexistent, even here on the edge of Manehattan. The warehouse’s parking lot area, if you could call it that and not just a small expanse of concrete, had a pretty good view of the night sky.
“Hmmm… Yeah, I can definitely see what you’re getting at.”
“You see the spot?” I asked.
“Yes,” Coxa replied.
“And you think we’ll have enough room?”
“There’s enough for what you’re asking, but not much more.”
“That’s fine. All we really need to be sure of is that the love we’re transporting isn’t discovered. If the alcohol is found, then… We can deal with jail time, fines, what have you.”
Coxa popped his head up from the side of the pulled cart. I was lying prone on my back on the back of the empty cart while Coxa was examining the front part.
“I’m certain we can fit these hidden compartments. There’s plenty of space under the seats. The rest of the cargo can go in those crates you bought and had the lings modify.”
“That’s good to hear,” I said through a yawn, and readjusted myself to try to get comfortable on the wooden floor of the cart. “How soon can the first carts and crates be ready to receive the shipments? We’ve already got orders lined up and waiting.”
“I can get a team together to start the retrofitting tonight. So… tomorrow, you’ll have enough carts for what you need. By the end of the week, all the carts and crates should be fixed up and ready to break laws.”
“That’s what I like to hear,” I said with a smile.
“Have you put thought into diversifying the methods of gettin’ shit from one place to another?”
“Some…”
I didn’t look into purchasing ships or negotiating contracts for sea smugglers as I viewed it as inferior to simply bringing in alcohol already produced in Equestria, but I kept my ear out for opportunities. There was some famous American family that made their money off importing alcohol during the Prohibition, I think it was the Kennedies. But with the carts we had– both the land-based and the enchanted ones that could be pulled by pegasi in the air, we could begin moving things to and fro.
We had gotten good deals on all of them, as one of the changelings within the Fifth were good acquaintances with what had to be a fence. Being wanted by the law already nudged us towards the disreputable parts of Equestria, and that was just aces for setting up this business.
“Heya Phasma?”
“Coxa.”
“When this whole thing is off the ground and bringing in bits, how are we going to… use them?”
I rolled my head to look at him as we talked.
“Well, It’ll be one huge fund that will be the main income for the Fifth Hive’s government for a while. From that fund, we can dispense bits out to changelings who need them for a good purpose.”
“No plans on making a hoard for yourself that would turn a dragon green with envy?”
“Of course not. Not at first, at least.”
“So if I were to ask for the money to create my own business…?”
“I’d say that would be fine, as long as the money gets paid back.”
“Cool, Cool…”
I was curious, “What business are you thinking of creating?”
“Hm? Oh, I don’t know. I’m still rather new to this whole capitalism thing. Nothing like it back in the hive. Shit, the way things are going, I’m probably going to be too busy with the Fifth Hive to do anything like that, anyways. You’d probably drown in paperwork without me. Crash and burn. No survivors.”
“You’re probably not wrong.”
“Still, I’m glad to hear that it’s an option,” Coxa said.
A silver oval emerged from behind one of the high rises of Manehattan. An airship, soaring high above the cityscape.
‘Hmmm….’
“I’ll go get the team assembled, then. Don’t fall asleep out here in the open, Phasma.”
“Yeah yeah. Don’t overwork yourself Coxa, we can afford delays. In fact, after the first batch of carts are modified, take a day off.”
“Sounds good, boss.”
I heard his hoofsteps as he walked towards the warehouse. I laid there for a moment longer, thinking.
‘I’ve never been on a dirigible before. I wonder if I can find some excuse to buy one. Maybe I should even look into hiring a Captain or two to smuggle for me… I guess I’ll look into that when I eventually get to the point where I’m importing booze from other nations around Equestria.’
The Manehattan Guard reared back and bucked the door down. The old wooden thing, rotting on its hinges, collapsed inwards with a spray of splinters and mold spores. The guards then rushed in, yelling unintelligible commands. The whole thing was… amateurish. There was no organization. No plan. No elegance. It looked like it was a breach and clear method reverse engineered from testimonies from ponies in Canterlot, who were on the receiving end of changelings breaking down doors and clearing their homes with expert efficiency. The whole thing seemed far more chaotic than it should have been.
I nudged Double Diamond from behind, and nodded towards Thorax. We were wearing disguises while going out shopping.
“Come on, let’s get a move on.”
Diamond hesitantly started walking forwards, but kept his focus on the raid across the street.
“Eyes forward, Diamond. I don’t want to attract unnecessary attention.”
“What’s going on over there?” He asked.
“Nothing that concerns us.”
Reluctantly, Diamond tore his gaze away.
“Why are they doing that?”
“Who knows?” I asked. “It could be a tip off for a changeling there– though there isn’t any, it could be a warrant for an arrest, or it could be because whoever lives in that building pissed off Daybreaker personally.”
“Guards are supposed to protect ponies,” Diamond shook his head.
Thorax tried to reassure Diamond, “As long as we stick together, we’ll get through anything that gets in our way. I know we will.”
Diamond grinned, “Thanks, Nimble. I’d never have thought that this is what the world was coming to, but… Is it wrong that I’m kinda glad? You know, if it hadn’t turned out this way…”
“... We would have never met,” Thorax finished.
They started to lean in towards each other.
“Hey you two, not to interrupt or anything, but where exactly is this sports shop that we’re heading to?”
“Just a couple blocks down,” Diamond replied, still leaning towards Thorax.
And then they kissed.
‘Great, happiness. How disgusting; I’d rather be watching the guards violate ponies’ rights than watch these two.’
“How do the boots fit?” Diamond asked.
I lifted my right two legs and shook them.
“It feels wrong to have all four limbs dedicated to skis.”
“Ha! The pros use only their hindlegs for skis, and use their forelegs for poles. But you’re not a pro.”
‘I take it snowboards don’t exist then. Makes sense, it’d be impossible to use. How would they stand on one? Which legs would it be under? Why bother when skis are the superior way of traversing snow?’
“You don’t know that. For all you know, I could be the next… uh… I don’t know enough about Equestrian culture to make references. Whatever, just pretend I said something clever.”
“That would be a huge stretch of the imagination,” Thorax replied from behind one of the standing shelves of skis and ski poles. There was a loud series of clacks as he picked some up, inspected them, and put them back on the rack.
“Disparaging me is C– Face Value’s job. You’re supposed to be cute, cuddly, and hopelessly naive. The boots do seem to fit well. They don’t move when I shake my hooves, they aren’t too tight. And they don’t look bad.”
‘Even if they didn’t fit, I could just shapeshift into a hoof size to make them.’
The boots were black. You know, like chitin. Diamond shook his head slowly at the obvious joke.
“Right, dude. Now we pick out some skis and a helmet.”
A little while later, Diamond and I were sitting by the checkout with my selected winter gear. Thorax was deeper in the large sports store, looking at potential gear for himself. Diamond chose to ask a few questions that must have been bugging him.
‘Heh, bug.’
“So Expected… Thorax told me you were doin’ somethin’ that would bring around a profit. Something about a new business?”
“Yeah. It’s in a market with no competition, so there should be ample opportunity to make a profit.”
“I was never much for the numbers part of running a business. That’s why my sister is the one who is inheriting our family’s business.”
“What business is that?”
“They’re engineers. They work on things here and there, but their true passion is inventing. I couldn’t manage the bookkeeping side of things, let alone the actual engineering, but last I checked they were completely knee-deep into their latest project. Something with all sorts of doodads, from transistors to those glass tube things.”
“I.. wasn’t aware Equestria had electronics.”
He shrugged, “For the most part, we don’t. It’s just a thing in engineering labs. But they’re convinced they’re about to find a use for electronics that will actually compete against magic-related competition: long range communication.”
“Radio,” I whispered.
“What did you say?”
“Ah, doesn’t matter. What matters is that I think your parents are going to be successful. You said that they have to compete against magic items?”
“Course. That’s why there are no big generators powering cities or whatever, dude. Why use up all that room, supplies, fuel, and make all that noise and smoke when four enchanted things will do the job?”
“That’s a very limited view on the potential of electricity, but I guess it’s warranted?”
“Yeah.” Diamond looked around us before asking his next question, “How exactly do you even know about electricity? It’s kinda a thing only for engineers and whomever they rope into listening into their nonsense. Not even Canterlot really cares about it, except for the most advanced machines they use. You’re from pretty much the opposite of Canterlot.”
“I uh… it doesn’t matter.”
He frowned, “It’s just, that’s not something that comes into everyday conversation. It’s like stopping a pony on the street and asking them about... I dunno, it’s weird! You especially. Nimble said you aren’t old. In fact, he said you were…”
“He wasn’t lying.”
“That doesn’t make any sense though.”
“It’s complicated. I’d rather not talk about it.”
“So you do know why you’re like this?”
“I said I don’t want to talk about it.”
After a minute, Thorax arrived, holding his skis, helmet, and extra padding under his wings.
“They were out of cyan skis, so I got red ones instead. Look Expected, they match my brother’s colors!”
“They look nice, Nimble,” Diamond said. “We were just talking about Expected’s history.”
“Then we finished talking,” I said.
Thorax looked between us, “You should open up more, Expected. It’ll help you out.”
“What are you, my psychiatrist? Speaking of poor transitions into other conversations, let’s check this stuff out.”
“This is a lot of new equipment… You sure you can pay for all this, Expected? You were kinda crashing on our sofa last week, and now you’re buying new skiing equipment…?”
“Yeah I’ve got it covered. The last of the bits I personally saved. Don’t worry, the new business we started should be making a profit very soon.”
Indeed, very soon had come.
I watched as the changelings finished unhitching themselves from the cart, parking the last one inside the warehouse.
There were shelves and boxes in the building now, as well as replacement glass for the broken windows. In the office section, I ordered the rotting boards be replaced with new ones, and Coxa got right on it. All around the main room, changelings were bustling to and fro with their work or leisure time.
It had been a full week since I had purchased the carts and ordered them to be retrofitted. And over the past week, while out looking for suppliers, we found more groups of exiled changelings in Fillydelphia and Baltimare and brought them here to Manehattan. We now numbered twenty changelings in total with thirty or so newcomers that had yet to be fully inducted. From the original fifteen in Hooferville to over triple that number, in such a short span of time.
Once we began our mafia in earnest, that number would only grow as we spread throughout Equestria. I was sure that quickly, we would come into contact with every changeling in Equestria. Every changeling that wanted to be found by us, at least. Infiltrators… if they wanted to stay hidden, then they never would be found. Other than Infiltrators, changelings tended to try to stick together and were sorta obvious when you knew where to look and what to look for. Hang out in clubs, bars, and so on, and just find the ponies that were completely emotionless.
Still, there was probably going to be the need to hire out-of-house for muscle and rum runners. Those members would obviously never be in on the big secret of the Family, but they would be useful regardless. That was a long ways away, but it paid to keep that in mind. You never know when a trustworthy pony could come in handy.
All this was just in time too, the stockpile of bits we had accumulated to start the criminal empire was beginning to dry up. We needed income, and we needed it fast. With the Fifth Hive segmented into teams dedicated to locating suppliers, finding buyers, and transporting the goods, bits and alcohol could start flowing. For now, the majority of the changelings and I lived in cheap bunk beds in the office section, with a number sleeping in the warehouse section itself. While in the warehouse, many changelings forgoed their disguise, both for comfort and for the ability to sit and sleep anywhere with relative comfort. Relative, not a whole lot.
I was currently sitting on a wooden crate, overlooking the warehouse floor as changelings began to load up carts with boxes that contained hidden caches of alcohol. There was a lot of business in Manehattan already, with plenty of locations chomping at the bit to get their hooves on alcohol.
But I was not satisfied with just that. I knew that there was an immense amount of room to grow, and I needed to get in on the market as quickly as possible. The locations buying from us probably would only last for so long before the Manehattan Guard started cracking down and kicking doors in. We needed more secure sources of income. More… trustworthy.
With Thalamus looking into potential Speakeasy locations, that was a while down the line, but I wanted to be prepared. The ability to serve alcohol to ponies in the front room while also hooking changelings up with love rations in the back room was something I looked forward to. Though I did debate the wisdom of that, and whether or not I should keep the two activities as separated as possible. For now, the few changelings– including Thorax– who were actually bringing in love were now storing it within the warehouse directly.
Speaking of, I also wanted to construct some sort of airlock or waterlock at the main garage door. The whole two-doors-system. That way, carts would enter, close the door behind them, and open the one in front. No pony walking by would be able to see inside of the warehouse, and it would be much harder to break into. That was just one of a number of upgrades I was eventually hoping to achieve.
Right now, I was writing in a journal notes for the business. Who was buying what, how much, and how trustworthy and honest they seemed. As I finished writing my notes on secondary locations Coxa had picked out for storage, Cricket walked up to me. She had a thick ledger she was placing into an open bag on her back, having just finished taking account of the transaction the last changeling team completed.
“Good evening, Cricket.”
“Your Majesty,” she bowed.
“Please, no bowing. Not until I bring us out of these gutters will I accept any praise for this.”
We were all pooling our money together for this, and while the changelings were perfectly adapted to this and completely okay with it, I wanted to eventually get to the point where the money the Crown had and the money the changelings had were separate. The standard capitalist system had far more potential than any other system outside of a post-scarcity society.
Cricket rose back up to her hooves.
“The first shipments from Manehattan, Fillydelphia, and Baltimare have arrived, been split up into their respective delivery loads, and are being shipped out.”
“Good work.”
“Thank you, Your Majesty. As per your request, we’ve refrained from scouting out Hooferville and the settlements south of Canterlot and Baltimare.”
I explained my reasoning, “No point checking south of Baltimare, the Legions foalnapped every pony down there. The area south of Canterlot is too hot, too well patrolled by the Royal Guards. Hooferville is too hot as well, with Division-P likely to be active in that settlement for the next indeterminate amount of time. Speaking of which, if Division-P is spotted within a town, I want that town marked as hot. We need to develop a warning system, and map out the Division's activities.”
“That will be accomplishable when we have found more changelings, Your Majesty.”
“Very well then, I’ll just have to write that down as a plan for the future. In the meantime, keep up the good work and I promise we will see returns very soon.”
Cricket nodded, “Yes, King Phasma. Thrips is currently accompanying the largest shipment to a location right here in Manehattan. I expect the bits he will bring back will be the windfall we need to continue purchasing from suppliers.”
“Excellent. I trust that there was no issue in smuggling the alcohol here?”
She shook her head, “The ponies have not yet begun to inspect cargo shipments. It seems they are slower to implement Daybreaker’s laws than you predicted, Your Majesty.”
“Expect that to change. She’s been here for a week, and there’s no way in hell she’s spent that time idly. Have all the teams been practicing their lingo, cover story, and contingency plans?”
“Yes, Your Majesty. It’s been slow going but we’ve been making training documents as we go along. The abundance of paper here in Equestria has made all this so much easier. So much easier… I digress, we should have the training streamlined within a month, and everything ready for new changelings.”
“Everything but space,” I said as I scanned the warehouse.
“I believe Coxa voiced his wishes to purchase other locations, Your Majesty?”
“Yes, he has. I’ve taken notes on his proposals, from additional warehouses to run-down apartment buildings that we can fix up and turn into safe havens. But until we build a satisfactory amount of capital, this is what we’re stuck with…”
Cricket bowed her head, “If you could excuse me, Your Majesty, I would like to retire for the evening.”
I waved a hoof, “Go on, and great work today Cricket. Tell the others I said so, too.”
“Thank you for being so kind, Your Majesty. We are simply doing our duty and serving the Hive.”
“Which I am thankful for. We are all working towards a better future for us, where we no longer starve. The fact that everyone is throwing themselves into their duties with such enthusiasm is… I simply cannot describe it.”
“Permission to speak candidly, My King?”
“Always granted.”
“That’s just it. Life under Queen Chrysalis was… harsh. We couldn’t speak our minds. We did our duties without complaining. We worked hard and were never thanked. I was not a member of one of the Lodges, but I can imagine why they flocked to your banner, King Phasma. You.. you listen to us. You promise us the moon, then actually go on the front lines and work yourself for that goal. No one blames you for falling short, and you just picked yourself up and got right back to it. For once in living memory, and maybe in changeling history, we have a royal who listens to us drones, actually listens. We have something that was once reserved only for royals; we have hope.”
I wiped an eye.
“Uh, wow. Cricket, that’s… were things that bad?”
“You have no idea, My King. Especially towards the setup for the invasion, restrictions on what we could do or say were harsh…”
A couple of changelings put on disguises and walked past us towards the door to the office area. Each of them gave me a slight bow of the head as they entered.
“That’s not how things will be under my rule. I promise that.”
Cricket smiled, “I know, My King. I believe that. We all do. Have a good evening, Your Majesty.”
“Take care, Cricket.”
She smiled as she turned and walked off to the office area. The changelings set up a recreation in one of the bottom rooms, and the three others were turned into what were essentially barracks. From the window, I could see a couple of changelings talking around a table, half of them playing cards, the other simply chatting.
‘Tonight’s gonna have a full house. We definitely need to look into expanding our base of operations. Preferably somewhere with working plumbing…’