Rarity had opened the D-Terminal and read the message, and stomached it the best she could, and stopped and looked at her strange, short new face in the screen, stomached that, too.
As she felt awkwardly with her new fingers splayed into the frills of her skirt for pockets with one hand and nudged the gadget into one with the other, she attempted to reach her will out to the smaller one, and balked.
"My horn."
She tried again, eyes wide and fixed on the thing - no crystal blue glow. She forced all of her focus onto that little machine, and saw nothing.
"My horn! Ah - you ...dearie... Look at my horn! What do you see?"
"I... see a twisty horn," said the ladybug.
"Just a horn? No... light, no magical glow?"
"No. Just a horn."
"What has this place done to my horn?!" Her hands were grabbing the ladybug's claws - whenever they'd started to do so. "Why - the change in shape I can deal with but I imagined that so long as I still have my horn -- "
"What are you?" The bug did not change expression and from its features couldn't - but its voice, which sounded like a young girl's, was demanding. "You're a Chosen Child. You're all supposed to look like this."
"Well, first of all I am not a child! And second of all, I'm a unicorn - I'm a unicorn! Or I was! For without unicorn magic what in the world am I supposed to call myself?!"
Her voice had gone frantically whinnying without whinnying and her brain was a twister of motion and haze and white noise, and somewhere in it were her needles glowing and looping through the air and slipping through cloth trailing string, mannequins coasting in a ballroom fashion to coordinate display - if she'd been sealed off of everything else that made her a pony then why in the world had she been allowed to keep her horn?
"Let me go, Rarity," said the ladybug. "Humans sure make do."
"Why, no, you don't understand! Without my magic - well! How am I supposed to -" Dead stop. Tone bounce. "You know my name?"
"I've been getting ready for when you'd show up."
Another pause for registration. "Do you have a name?"
The ladybug nodded. "Tentomon, thanks for asking."
Silence as she let her brain settle. Articulation formed of the thought of "destiny."
The Terminal Room
As she felt awkwardly with her new fingers splayed into the frills of her skirt for pockets with one hand and nudged the gadget into one with the other, she attempted to reach her will out to the smaller one, and balked.
"My horn."
She tried again, eyes wide and fixed on the thing - no crystal blue glow. She forced all of her focus onto that little machine, and saw nothing.
"My horn! Ah - you ...dearie... Look at my horn! What do you see?"
"I... see a twisty horn," said the ladybug.
"Just a horn? No... light, no magical glow?"
"No. Just a horn."
"What has this place done to my horn?!" Her hands were grabbing the ladybug's claws - whenever they'd started to do so. "Why - the change in shape I can deal with but I imagined that so long as I still have my horn -- "
"What are you?" The bug did not change expression and from its features couldn't - but its voice, which sounded like a young girl's, was demanding. "You're a Chosen Child. You're all supposed to look like this."
"Well, first of all I am not a child! And second of all, I'm a unicorn - I'm a unicorn! Or I was! For without unicorn magic what in the world am I supposed to call myself?!"
Her voice had gone frantically whinnying without whinnying and her brain was a twister of motion and haze and white noise, and somewhere in it were her needles glowing and looping through the air and slipping through cloth trailing string, mannequins coasting in a ballroom fashion to coordinate display - if she'd been sealed off of everything else that made her a pony then why in the world had she been allowed to keep her horn?
"Let me go, Rarity," said the ladybug. "Humans sure make do."
"Why, no, you don't understand! Without my magic - well! How am I supposed to -" Dead stop. Tone bounce. "You know my name?"
"I've been getting ready for when you'd show up."
Another pause for registration. "Do you have a name?"
The ladybug nodded. "Tentomon, thanks for asking."
Silence as she let her brain settle. Articulation formed of the thought of "destiny."