• Published 6th Aug 2012
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My Little Changeling: Friendship is Weird - Niaeruzu



A changeling attempts to learn about friendship in Ponyville.

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Episode 8: Spare Some Change

Spare Some Change

There are times when your entire day is filled with chaos.

Suncloak is very familiar with that kind of day.

Luckily, today was not one of those days. In fact, it was so non-chaotic that Suncloak was getting worried; either something absolutely crazy was about to happen, or the changeling had gotten used to living like a pony.

He wasn’t really sure which one was worse.

For now, however, he was just spending the day with his friends. Don’t need some kind of nonsensical adventure to have a good time, after all. Currently, the five of them were sitting at a table at a restaurant, drinking shakes. Suncloak sipped his shake, flavoured with about seven different fruits, as he idly listened to his friends talk about everyday life.

“So, Bon Bon,” Lyra said, prodding the aforementioned mare in the side, “are you excited for next week yet? Huh?”

“Next week?” Suncloak raised an eyebrow. Was something going to happen next week? He hoped not. Having nothing exciting or painful happen for a while was a good thing.

“Oh, that’s right! Almost forgot,” Bon Bon said, taking her tail and reaching into it. Odd place to store things. She produced four pink envelopes and put them on the table, one for each of her friends.

Suncloak grabbed his envelope and opened it. Inside was a card. A very colourful card, filled with pictures of balloons and cake and whatnot. It said ‘You’re invited!’ in big letters. Invited? To what? Hesitantly, Suncloak opened the card.

He hadn’t expected what he found inside, though. “A birthday invitation?” he asked. Whoa. Suncloak didn’t even remember when he had last been forced to attend one of those.

“Yep!” Bon Bon happily confirmed. “This friday. It’s going to be great!”

Suncloak looked at the card again, and then back to Bon Bon. “How do birthdays work, again? I mean, I know what it is, but what do you do to celebrate it?”

The others responded by looking at the changeling as if he just told them water could catch on fire. “Okay, I can understand changelings not celebrating Hearth’s Warming Eve,” Vinyl said, “but birthdays? Changelings have birthdays, right?”

“You guys miss out on lots of presents,” Lyra added. “No Hearth’s Warming, no birthdays...”

“We have birthdays,” Suncloak explained, “we just don’t celebrate them. I mean, what’s there to celebrate? ‘Hooray, you and about fifty other annoying dwarves have been pestering us for another year! Now please leave us alone and let us do our jobs.’ Or at least, that’s what I was told.” The changeling sighed. The adults never let him have any fun.

“Birthdays are when you get together with your friends and family and just have a good time,” Derpy said. “Pretty much like every other party. Oh, and everypony gives you neat presents, and... that’s it, really.”

“Huh. That’s simple,” Suncloak said. “What kind of presents?”

“Anything, really,” Vinyl responded. “Just something you can buy from the store, or something you made yourself.”

“Oh, it doesn’t really matter,” Bon Bon said, blushing slightly. “The presents aren’t really important.”

“‘Doesn’t matter’?!” Lyra propped herself up on the table, nearly knocking over her shake and drawing some curious glances from the other guests at the restaurant. “How can you say that?! The presents are the most important thing ever!”

Derpy snickered. “You sound a little bit like Dinky, Lyra.” Gently, she pulled her unicorn friend back on her seat again. “Calm down. It’s just a birthday.”

“But...” Lyra spluttered. “Birthday! presents! It’s the best kind of party, and it happens every year!” Which, Suncloak noted, was similar to Hearth’s Warming Eve. How were they different, again?

Vinyl took a sip from her shake. “The presents are a cool bonus. It’s all about the party!” She turned to Bon Bon. “Want me to take care of the music again?”

“Well, if it isn’t too much trouble,” Bon Bon said. “You and Lyra always make the best music, after all.”

“Alright!” Vinyl said, pumping a hoof. “I’ll make you the best song ever this year! I know I say that every year for everypony’s birthday, but this time it’s true.” She seemed lost in thought for a second. “And I know I say that every time as well, but... Uh, never mind. It’s gonna be great, okay?”

Derpy tapped a hoof on her chin. “Hmm. I’ll have to come up with a good present too. I could make some muffins again, but I’m starting to run out of unique recipes...” She thought for a few more moments, before turning to Suncloak. “Hey, do you have any ideas yet?”

Suncloak didn’t even have the vaguest idea yet. What he did know, was that he should probably give Bon Bon something really neat. She occasionally gave him stuff, even if it wasn’t his birthday, so Suncloak had to give her an awesome present in return. “I don’t know yet,” he said, sighing. “But I can come up with something.”


“I can’t come up with anything!”

Nervously, Suncloak paced around the house, closely followed by his pet moth, Emerald. “I can’t make anything, and I don’t have any money to buy something! What do I do?!” the changeling exclaimed.

Emerald didn’t react. Or rather, couldn't react, because she couldn’t speak.

Suncloak groaned in frustration. “You give the worst advice!” He stopped walking for a moment, waving his front hooves in the general direction of the moth. “Come on, go do something useful. Help me be artsy or something, or get some money!”

Again, Emerald said nothing. Nor did she even do anything, aside from continuing to fly around Suncloak.

Suncloak continued pacing. He wasn’t really the artistic type, so it wasn’t like he could make a painting or something similar to give to Bon Bon. Well, he could try, but it’d probably come out awful. Same with everything else, like writing, or music. Changeling art was right out the window too, considering most changelings didn’t even like art. And whatever changeling did like art, what they made was almost always terrible.

That left one other option: buying something from a store. That brought another list of problems along with it, first and foremost being: Suncloak didn’t have any money. He didn’t really need any, after all. Changelings don’t need to buy food, and he wasn’t really planning on redecorating his house in any way.

He could ask one of his friends for money. Except Bon Bon, obviously. But he couldn’t really do that, because his friends were all taking care of their presents on their own. Borrowing money from them seemed more like they were buying an additional present for Bon Bon.

No, Suncloak had to get money in another way. The standard way.

He had to get a job. And considering that it was monday, and Bon Bon’s party was at friday, Suncloak would have to get that job fast.

He paused for a moment. There was still one big problem in that. “How do I even get a job?” he wondered aloud. Changelings were assigned a job, and that was that. When they were needed for something else, they would get a different job.

Ponies, on the other hoof, picked a job that fit their cutie mark. Considering changelings didn’t have cutie marks, it’d be a bit tricky for Suncloak to find out what job he’d be good at. Back at the hive, he wasn’t exactly the best royal guard, so he already knew that wasn’t an option. It was pretty unlikely ponies needed a guard anyway.

First things first, though. Suncloak had to find out how to get a job, first. Seeing as he wouldn’t get anywhere staying indoors, he decided to head outside. Before closing the door, he made sure Emerald was still inside. Suncloak didn’t need her pestering him right now.

“Right. Where to start?” Suncloak looked around. He didn’t see any vacant jobs in the street. Maybe he had to ask somewhere. Where, though?

Suncloak grumbled. Why did ponies have to make everything so complicated? Birthdays, money, jobs... Was there anything that wasn’t needlessly difficult to understand?

The first place where he could ask something was close by. Suncloak went over to the house next to his. To be exact, Derpy’s house. Awkwardly, the changeling knocked on the door. He wasn’t too keen on asking this straightforward. It felt a bit embarrassing. No, he had to be subtle about it, but not too subtle, to avoid a misunderstanding.

The door swung inward. “Hello Suncloak!” Derpy cheerfully said, still holding the door. “How can I help you?”

Suncloak paused for a moment, mulling over his words. “How do I get a job?” he eventually asked. Yeah. Subtle.

Derpy let go of the door, putting her hoof on the ground. “Uh... Why’re you asking?” The more she thought about it, the more confused her look became.

“I need to get a job, so I can get money, so I can buy a present for Bon Bon,” Suncloak said. Simple, duh.

“Oh.” Derpy thought about it for a few moments. “Maybe you can try being a mailpony? Or... mailchangeling, I guess?”

Suncloak raised an eyebrow. “You mean delivering the mail? I could try, I think.” It didn’t sound very hard. Get letters, dump letters at houses, receive cold, hard cash. Done!

“Well, let’s see if you’re up for it,” Derpy said. She took a step back to reach behind the door, quickly returning with a set of full saddlebags in her mouth. Letters and packages poked out from every single hole. “Try lifting this bag. It’s tomorrow’s mail,” the pegasus said, dumping the bags on the ground with a dull thud.

Suncloak quickly put on the saddlebags. Well, for as far as he could. The belt was pretty long, so the bags were still standing on the ground when the changeling was all strapped in. This was really easy!

However, Derpy went up to him. “Hold on, they’re supposed to be at your sides, like this.” She pulled on another strap, pulling the two bags up to Suncloak’s flanks.

Suddenly, a huge weight added itself to the changeling’s back, and he very nearly found himself falling over on his left side. Only a very frantic sidestepping was able to get him upright again, but then the weight was switched over to his right side. “This is kind of heavy!” Suncloak said, while frantically running left and right in front of Derpy.

The mailmare quickly flew after him, managing to stop Suncloak before he crashed into a fence. Carefully, Derpy made sure the changeling could manage to stand still. “Well, it doesn’t really matter once you get in the air. Try flying!”

Suncloak was getting more and more convinced that this was a really bad idea. Now that he was wearing the mailbags, and managing to not fall over, he decided to go through with it anyway. The changeling beat his wings, though it was really hard to get any lift. He closed his eyes, buzzing with all his strength. To his surprise, he even left the ground! With a smile, Suncloak opened his eyes. “Hey, look! It’s working!”

Derpy, who was still standing on the ground, looked very concerned. “Uh, Suncloak...” she said, pointing at the ground under the changeling.

Suncloak looked down to see the bags still standing on the ground. Huh. A quick glance at his back confirmed that he was still wearing the straps, though. And that the straps were stretched to their limit. The changeling swallowed. Yeah, this wouldn’t be fun.

Instantly, Suncloak was slingshotted toward the ground. With a loud impact and a whole lot of dust, he hit the ground.

As the dust settled, the only thing visible were the saddlebags... And a changeling-shaped hole in the ground. Which meant that it was pretty much a pony-shaped hole, just leaving a few pillars where the holes were in the changeling’s hooves. Concerned, Derpy peeked into the hole. “Suncloak? Are you alright?”

A garbled, incoherent mumbling rose from the hole.

Derpy reached into the hole, pulling Suncloak out. She tried setting him on his hooves as best she could, but the changeling’s dazed wobbling wasn’t making it easy. “I don’t think being a mailchangeling is the right job for you,” Derpy said.

Suncloak shook his head for a few seconds, to get rid of the dizzyness. “Yeah, I think it’s a bit... heavy.” He briefly glanced at the two mailbags, still on the ground. It’d be funny if the hole they were standing next to didn’t remind the changeling of his painful experience from a few seconds ago. Suncloak gave a defeated sigh.

“Oh, chin up!” Derpy said, smiling. “That’s just one job. There’s a whole lot of other jobs to try! Why don’t you take a walk around town, see if there are ponies looking for some help?”

“That’s how you get a job?” Suncloak raised an eyebrow. “You just look for ponies who need help, you help them, and they give you money?” That sounded surprisingly easy.

“No, not like that!” Derpy hastily said. “It has to be a business. And they have to be looking for help. You have to make an agreement and everything.”

“Oh.” Suncloak felt somewhat disappointed now. Seems like ponies really did have to make everything needlessly complicated. Having a job assigned to you made getting a job so much easier. Choices were so overwhelming!

“You know what?” Derpy asked. “I’ll help you get started. Do you have a resumé?”

Suncloak stared at her blankly for a few seconds. “A what now?” A rehzoomay? What? It sounded like some kind of fancy dish from Prance.

Derpy sighed. “I think this’ll take a while...”


Tuesday! Lyra’s favourite day for fun!

Any day was good for some enjoyment, but tuesday always seemed to stand out, for some reason. It was the perfect day for... Well, for having fun on a day off.

Happily, the green unicorn skipped through the streets of Ponyville, humming a tune and waving to the occasional passerby. What would she do today? She played on the lyre every day, she could give that a rest for now. Maybe she could go to the spa. Nah, she’d have to sit still there, and that was hard.

Suddenly, something caught Lyra’s eye. She planted her hooves into the ground, screeching to a halt. She was standing in front of what was possibly one of the greatest, bestest buildings in the whole town: the Ponyville Arcade.

Of course! The perfect way to spend the day: play some games. Sure, some older ponies said the arcade was only for kids, but Lyra was often kidding around anyway. That had to count for something.

She opened the doors, stepping inside. The arcade was pretty much one big hall, filled with big box-thingies in all shapes and sizes. Lyra didn’t really know what they were or how they worked. You threw a coin in, and then you could play a game. That’s all she needed to know.

But which one to play? The bright, colourful lights on the machines beckoned to Lyra. “Play with us!” the boxes shouted. Or at least, that’s how Lyra imagined it. Game machines couldn’t talk, she knew that for sure.

There was one particular game Lyra really liked, so she quickly went to one of the corners of the arcade. There were four, identical blue boxes. One was always broken, and the other three were occupied almost all the time.

While the first three machines were indeed occupied, it seemed that the fourth one had been fixed! It did have a weird vent on the top, but hey, it was working. Eager to play, Lyra went up to the box.

It was a pretty simple thing: blue box, a little bit of text, a whole lot of fancy lights, but most importantly, it had a control stick, a few buttons, and a big screen. The screen read ‘Mega Mare’ in big letters. Underneath it was a smaller line: ‘Please insert coin’. Because Lyra hadn’t really prepared on going to the arcade, she had only one bit on her. She’d have to make this count.

Using her magic, Lyra levitated her emergency bit out of her mane and inserted it into a little slot on the side of the machine. In response, the machine started the game.

It featured a pink mare in a blue outfit, controlled by Lyra, running around and defeating enemies for some reason. Lyra didn’t really pay attention to the story, she just wanted to have a little fun playing. She had played it before, so she didn’t have much trouble with the first few stages.

Everything was going pretty fine, but suddenly, and completely out of nowhere, a pixelated changeling appeared on the screen. It flew over to the bar that indicated Lyra’s health, and looked at it for a few moments, stumping Lyra. If the screen moved, the changeling slid along with it, oddly enough. Like it wasn’t even part of the game at all.

The little changeling’s mouth flapped up and down without producing a sound, but a text box, accompanied with a picture of a pensive changeling, appeared in the lower part of the screen. “You know, your health bar thingie is a bit low. You should be a bit more careful, or something.”

Lyra leaned in closer to take a better look. “What the hay?” she mumbled. This wasn’t in the game before. She briefly leaned back to check the screens on the other machines, but there was no changeling there. The other ponies playing the game were just doing their thing. Lyra tried having her character jump up to attack the changeling, but it didn’t really seem to mind.

The changeling seemed to look straight at Lyra for a moment. The portrait in the text box of the bottom of the screen changed to show the changeling looking more surprised, and new text appeared. “Lyra! Hi!” The on-screen changeling waved at her. “It’s me! Suncloak!”

Lyra’s eyes widened. “What?!” she exclaimed, drawing looks from the other ponies in the arcade. It made the green unicorn blush. Maybe she had to lower her voice a little. “Suncloak, what’re you doing in a game?”

Suncloak’s picture changed to a mid-eyeroll one. “I’m not in the game, I am the game.” The on-screen changeling stopped flying, dropping to the ground. “Or actually, I’m disguised as the machine thingie.”

“That sounds fun!” Lyra said. Sure, it explained nothing, but that didn’t really matter. “But why? And can you even breathe?”

“Oh, that’s what the vent is for.” Suncloak’s portrait briefly changed to a smug look. “Don’t open me up, though. I think I look pretty gross on the inside.” He started walking to the right, prompting Lyra to follow him and continue playing the game. Meanwhile, Suncloak’s text box on the screen persisted.

“I need some money to buy a present for Bon Bon,” the changeling explained. “So I asked Derpy for help, and after some looking around, we found this arcade place. They didn’t really need anyling, but they did have one broken machine. So I’m replacing it until they’ve repaired it!”

“Sounds like fun!” Lyra said. She sure was having fun like this. Playing a game, together with a friend. She could see this becoming a thing in the near future. “I didn’t know changelings could change into a game machine.”

“Well, I didn’t know ponies had these things.” Suncloak smiled, both in the picture and in the game world. “It was pretty difficult, though. They needed to show me the inside of the machine, and I had to modify it a little bit to make sure I could actually stay alive the whole day.”

“Huh. So how do you get love, as a big blue box?” Lyra asked, idly playing with the joystick and tapping buttons. Maybe she was tickling Suncloak by doing this. Though, seeing as he wasn’t giggling, probably not.

“Shoot that guy.” Suncloak pointed at a creature on the screen. Lyra pushed a button, her on-screen character shot and defeated the enemy, and it promptly dropped an item. One that fully replenished Lyra’s health when she picked it up. “Strangely enough,” Suncloak’s on-screen text said, “ponies sometimes give me love when I do that.”

Lyra giggled. “I think I know why. Ponies love this game, so I guess they give you that love when they’re playing! Especially because you’re helping out and being nice.” She continued playing, and knowing that Suncloak was helping her a little was sort of relieving. She could take a whole lot more risks!

Suncloak’s portrait started blushing. “I don’t know. I just do what I think is right.” The changeling flew up and made a little loop. “Now, are you going to finish the game, or what?” he said, grinning.

“You bet!” Lyra said, continuing to play the game. It was a whole lot easier when being assisted by Suncloak. Any time Lyra was low on health, the next enemy would conveniently drop a life-replenishing item.

For about an hour, she played the game and chatted with Suncloak about random things. With the changeling’s help, Lyra managed to play through the entire game on only one bit, something she had never accomplished before.

The game screen showed a list of high scores, but Suncloak was still on there as well. “Wanna play again?” he asked.

“Sorry Suncloak,” Lyra said, letting go of the controls. “I don’t have any more bits on me. Maybe next time?”

“Sure,” Suncloak answered. “Besides, I think the arcade is almost closing for today.”

Lyra looked around, seeing most other ponies starting to leave the arcade. “Yeah, I think so. I’m gonna go home. Bye, Suncloak!” She waved at the changeling-turned-machine, the on-screen changeling waving back at the green unicorn as she left.

A few minutes later, it was closing time. With the characteristic whirl of green flames, Suncloak turned back into a changeling, albeit with a metal box on his left flank. The one where he collected the coins ponies put in the machine. Or in himself, disguised as a machine. That was actually kind of weird.

Feeling pretty proud of himself for having completed his first day of work, Suncloak went to the back of the arcade. Once there, he entered a small office. One with a simple, wooden desk and a few file cabinets. More importantly, behind the desk was a yellow earth pony stallion with green eyes and a short, black mane and tail.

Suncloak went forward, took the metal box on his flank off, and put it on the desk. “There we go, one day of work being a... weird machine thing.” With a smug smile, he added, “I thought it went pretty well.”

The pony turned the box toward himself, smiling. “Well, let’s see!” He opened the box and peered in, but his smile disappeared. “This is... uh... a bit disappointing.”

Suncloak’s smile vanished. “What?! What do you mean?” Impossible! His day went so well!

The yellow earth pony sighed. “You barely got a sixth of what the machines normally get. Best I can pay you is...” He paused for a moment, doing the math in his head. Eventually, he reached into the box. “This,” he said, producing a single coin and putting it in front of Suncloak.

The changeling stared at the coin for a few seconds. “That’s it? Only one bit?” That was way less than he thought he would earn. One bit wasn’t enough to buy anything worthwhile. Well, except a single game at the arcade.

“I guess our little experiment failed,” the pony said with a sigh. Right, Suncloak’s first day had only been an experiment, to see how it would work out. After all, no pony had knowingly employed a changeling before, for their shapeshifting or otherwise. “I don’t think this would be very lucrative,” the pony added.

“But...” Suncloak started to say, but he couldn’t find a way to argue against it. On the one hoof, it didn’t feel very fair, because the changeling had worked for it all day. On the other, he understood that the arcade had to earn a certain amount, and Suncloak’s paltry contribution probably didn’t measure up to how much it would cost to fully employ the changeling. Or at least, that’s what he had understood from Derpy’s explanation. “Yeah, you’re right.”

“I’m really sorry, but I have a business to run, after all,” the pony said, adding an apologetic smile. “Besides, I’m sure you could earn more than...” he pointed at the single bit on the desk. “That. But I don’t think you’d be able to do that here.”

Suncloak sighed. “In other words, no deal?”

The pony shook his head. “No deal. Best of luck finding something that suits you better, though.”

Disappointed, Suncloak grabbed his single bit and left, mumbling a goodbye. Only one bit. At this rate, he wouldn’t be able to buy a present for Bon Bon, so the changeling immediately went out to look for another job. One day wasted, two left to go.


The next day, Suncloak found himself at a wholly different location. Namely, a construction site.

Through a way that really wasn’t a whole lot of begging and pleading, honest, he had managed to land himself a job building... things. Houses, most likely. The current construction site only had a really tall, metal skeleton of some kind of building. Suncloak was wearing the required yellow hardhat and orange, luminescent vest. ‘Wearing’ wasn’t the right word, though, as he had once more just changed himself to appear like that. The hardness of his fake helm would be enough, anyway.

“Hey! New guy!” a pony yelled at him. A tall and burly, light brown pegasus with blue eyes, a dark brown mane and tail and a small stubble stepped in front of the changeling. This pony was also wearing a hardhat and safety vest, although his were probably real. “Changeling. Boss must’ve been pretty desperate to hire you, huh?” he said, guffawing.

Suncloak’s teeth gnashed. This must be the foreman, the pony he was supposed to listen to. Already, Suncloak didn’t like him. However, now was not the time to complain. “Yeah, yeah,” he said, almost growling. “What do I need to do?” It was time to work and earn some money.

“Eager to get to work, huh?” The foreman asked, raising an eyebrow. “Well, how could a changeling possibly help us out?” He gave a cocky smile.

Suncloak smirked in response. “Lots of ways.” He raised one hoof. “For instance...” With continuous whirls of green flame, his hoof changed into a myriad of construction tools. A hammer, a screwdriver, a saw, and more, anything Suncloak could think of. “I don’t need a toolbox. I am all the tools, so I can do anything.” As long as it wasn’t too heavy, of course.

The foreman rolled his eyes. “Right. I’ve got the perfect thing to keep you busy,” he said, beckoning Suncloak to follow him. After a short walk, they reached a relatively empty part of the construction site. “You can build a brick wall right here. There’s bricks over there,” he said, pointing at a large pile of various bricks not far from where the two were, “and you can make your own mortar, right?”

Mortar? “What’s mortar?” It sounded like some kind of weapon, though Suncloak highly doubted that it actually was something pertaining to violence.

“You changelings aren’t very clever, huh?” the foreman said with a groan. He grabbed a large bucket, two bags of... something, and a smaller bucket of water. He dumped some amount of both bags, one containing some kind of grey stuff, the other sand, into the larger bucket, and added the water. “This is mortar,” the foreman said, pointing at the contents of the bucket. Suncloak peered in to see some kind of gross, grey goop. The foreman continued, “You use this as paste to keep the bricks together, okay? Just make sure it doesn’t harden before you have to use it. Keep stirring.”

Suncloak nodded. “Yeah, I can do that.” Truth be told, he only had a vague idea of what he had to do, but he could probably make a brick wall just fine by winging it. Everything had worked out okay so far by just improvising, after all.

“Good,” the foreman said. “I want to see a wall here by the end of the day.” Without waiting for an answer, he flew off. Moments later, out of earshot of the changeling, he joined the other construction workers. “Bet he can’t even stack three bricks,” the foreman said, drawing laughter from the workers.

Meanwhile, Suncloak was ferrying bricks from the large pile to the spot where the foreman told him to build a wall. He had to carry two at a time while hovering. More bricks would be too heavy for the changeling. Every time he reached the bucket of mortar, he made sure to stir it for a few moments, to make sure it didn’t harden.

Now that he had a few bricks, it was time to actually build this wall. Looking at the bricks, though, Suncloak didn’t really know how. Maybe it was similar to how repairs were done in the hive. Take two rocks, put some sticky stuff in between to glue them together, and let it harden. Suncloak turned one of his hooves into a spatula, and scooped up some of the mortar. It felt goopy and somewhat sticky, quite similar to the green gunk changelings stored in their mouth.

Suncloak set one brick down and experimentally slapped the mortar on the side. He set a brick beside it, squeezing the two together. Not wanting to waste any mortar, Suncloak scooped any excess of the grey substance up, depositing it back into the bucket.

“Well, that’s two bricks,” Suncloak said, looking at his progress. Many more bricks to go. Now, how did ponies build their walls, again? They didn’t stack the bricks directly on top of each other, that’s the only thing Suncloak really knew. Oh well, he’d figure it out. As long as the wall didn’t topple.

After a while, Suncloak had managed to make a decent-looking, yet small wall. Well, it looked more like a semi-organized stack of bricks with mortar in between, but it would probably count as a wall somewhere in Equestria.

As he reached into the bucket to get more mortar, Suncloak noticed a problem. Namely, that he was out of mortar. The bucket was completely empty. Suncloak looked around, to see if the foreman was close by. No foreman in sight, sadly.

While Suncloak knew what he had to use to make mortar, he didn’t know exactly how much. Grey stuff, sand and water, in some quantities. All he really knew was that mortar kind of resembled changeling goop.

In fact, that gave Suncloak an idea. Instead of using more mortar, he spat the green, glue-like substance on the bricks, using that to continue building this wall. The ponies probably wouldn’t notice, as long as Suncloak built that wall. The most important thing was that the ponies didn’t actually touch the changeling goop, as it was incredibly sticky to everything that wasn’t changeling hooves.

Oh, and they had to ignore the fact that, while part of the wall had the standard grey mortar, most of it was covered in green slime.

A few hours later, Suncloak was done. Well, he didn’t really know for sure, but he was out of bricks. Couldn’t continue building without bricks, after all. Suncloak left the wall alone, heading off to find the foreman. He had to be somewhere on the construction site. In fact, after a minute, Suncloak found the pegasus in question, talking about something with his pony colleagues and laughing about something. Suncloak tapped him on the flank. “Hey, I was building the wall, and I’m out of bricks.”

The foreman turned around. “Out of bricks?” he asked, raising an eyebrow. “I didn’t think... Let me see that wall!”

Suncloak shrugged. “Sure.” He led the foreman to the wall, followed by a few other construction workers. They were probably just as interested as the foreman himself, ready to marvel in Suncloak’s craftsmanship.

“Well, I’ll be,” the foreman said, looking at the wall Suncloak built. He gave a weak kick against the lower bricks with his hoof. “Not exactly a good wall, but you built this way faster than I thought.” He scowled for a moment. “Guess I underestimated you,” he grumbled.

One of the other construction workers inspected the wall a little more closely. “Hey, what’s this green stuff you used instead of mortar?” he asked, raising a hoof to poke at it.

“Wait!” Suncloak shouted. “Don’t touch that, only changelings can—”

The construction worker touched the green goop with his hoof right as Suncloak shouted, causing the pony to try and jerk his hoof away. To his surprise, his hoof was stuck, glued to the gunk. Panicking, he started pulling on it with all his might. After a few mighty pulls, he suddenly came loose, losing his balance and rolling backwards.

The wall, unstable as it was, couldn’t deal with this kind of force. It wobbled precariously for a few moments, before falling over. Suncloak and the other workers could only barely jump away to avoid getting squished, but they were all engulfed by the ensuing cloud of dust that spread from the impact zone.

“—touch it safely,” Suncloak finished, coughing slightly as the dust settled. “Well, at least there aren’t any injuries, right?” he asked, giving an awkward grin.

The ponies all gave him angry looks.

Suncloak gave a nervous chuckle. “Hey, only the wall I built was broken, I can rebuild that! As I showed you, it isn’t very hard. I didn’t cost you guys any work!”

As if fate took it upon itself to ruin Suncloak’s day, a stray brick rolled off the pile of debris that used to be the changeling’s wall, knocking into a barrel. Said barrel was knocked over, tumbling off the edge of the hill it was unluckily placed upon, rolling straight for the somewhat unstable metal skeleton of the building that was being built on the construction site.

The construction workers all turned and stared at the barrel as it gained speed. “Uh... At least it isn’t causing any major damage?” Suncloak offered. Almost immediately, he wished he hadn’t said that.

With a loud crash, the barrel hit one of the legs of the building’s skeleton, leaving a massive dent. Groaning loudly, the workers’ progress started tilting, before just giving up completely and collapsing in what was probably the biggest mess Suncloak had ever seen.

They were all silent for a while. “Um...” Suncloak started. “It’s... salvageable?” He turned to the other construction workers, who were giving the changeling absolutely furious looks. “No hard feelings?” Suncloak asked, giving another very awkward grin.

The foreman snorted. “No hard feelings.”


“And that’s why I have a black eye,” Suncloak concluded.

He was sitting on a park bench, together with Vinyl. It was thursday, late in the afternoon, and Suncloak still had only that single bit he earned in the arcade. He didn’t get paid for his construction work, which was pretty understandable. At least he wasn’t forced to cover the damage.

“You’ve got a black eye?” Vinyl asked, surprised. “I didn’t notice. You know, ‘cause you’re black all over and stuff.” She briefly raised her sunglasses to take a better look at the changeling.

Suncloak gave her a deadpan look. “Yeah, I landed pretty badly when they threw me out.”

“Harsh,” Vinyl said. “So, what’d you do today?”

Suncloak groaned. “Too much to mention. What I didn’t do, was earn money. And I even tried like five jobs today!”

Vinyl raised an eyebrow. “Five jobs in one day? You’re going through jobs pretty fast, Sunny. But I’m sure there’s something you can do!” She gave the changeling an encouraging pat on the shoulder.

“Doubt it,” Suncloak said with a sigh. “I even got fired from Quills and Sofas because I botched an order.”

“Mr. Davenport fired you over one order?” Vinyl asked. “I thought he was really nice.”

“Well...” Suncloak started. He fidgeted awkwardly for a second. “I did sell a sofa to a pony who needed a quill, and the other way around.” He paused for another second. “Multiple times.”

Vinyl blankly stared ahead. “Wow. Just...” Her mouth flapped up and down uselessly as she tried and failed to find the right words. “Well, what’re you going to do next?”

“I don’t know!” Suncloak said, throwing his hooves up. “I failed at every single job I took! And I got only one bit for it, too.” He sighed. “What kind of present can you buy with one bit?”

“I guess you could buy a piece of candy, or...” Vinyl tapped a hoof on her chin, thinking. “Nah, I think that’s pretty much everything you can buy with a single bit. Though, since Bon Bon is the best candymaker in Ponyville, it’d be weird to buy her sweets.”

Suncloak frowned and pouted. His friends were always really accepting and nice to him, so it felt incredibly annoying to fail at even attempting to repay them. For just this once, it’d be nice to have a cutie mark, to easily know what the changeling was really good at. Then, he could use that skill to earn some money to buy a gift, or make something neat as a present.

“Hey, chin up!” Vinyl said. “Not like it’s some kind of enormous disaster. It’s just a birthday present, you can make up for it some other time. Birthdays happen every year, after all.”

Suncloak continued pouting, not really affected by Vinyl’s attempt at cheering the changeling up. “Showing up at a birthday without a present sound kind of silly, though. Especially if everyling else has one.”

Vinyl shrugged. “If you can’t buy a present, you just can’t buy a present. I’m sure Bon Bon understands that, too.”

“I guess.” Suncloak sighed. “I should at least apologize to her, though. I mean, I can’t make her anything either, I’m not good at that sort of thing.” Speaking of making things, though... “How’s your song coming along?” he asked.

“I’m not telling,” Vinyl said, playfully sticking out her tongue. “You’ll hear it tomorrow. But I can tell you this: it sounds great!”

Suncloak smiled. He didn’t even doubt that for a second. “You always make the best music. I’m looking forward to it!”

Vinyl hopped off the bench. “Well, I gotta get back home. Time for dinner, and I have to finish up that song. See you at the party, Sunny!”

“So soon already?” Suncloak asked. Though, looking up at the sun, he could see that it was getting kind of late. It wasn’t quite at the horizon yet, but it was well on its way down. Silly ponies and their need to eat. The changeling simply shrugged. “See you tomorrow,” he said, waving goodbye to Vinyl.

Suncloak remained sitting on the bench. He wanted to repay his friends, sometime. These last few days showed that actually getting some money was way harder than the changeling had expected. The difficulty of living like a pony kept surprising him, even though he really enjoyed it.

Oh well. As long as he was with his friends, he had more than enough time to figure everything out. Satisfied with that thought, Suncloak stood up and started heading home. He had to be well-rested for tomorrow’s party, after all.


Judgement day had come.

Or, to be more specific, friday. The day of Bon Bon’s birthday party. Timidly, Suncloak went up to the door of her house and knocked. Even though the changeling had reminded himself that he’d get her a present sometime later, it still didn’t feel right to arrive at the party with empty hooves.

The door opened, revealing Lyra. “Hi Suncloak!” she said. “Come in!” She stepped aside and beckoned for the changeling to come in. “I’d offer to take your hat, but I see you’re not wearing one,” the unicorn giggled.

Suncloak smirked as he walked inside. A whirl of green flame surrounded his head, and when it disappeared, the changeling appeared to be wearing a black top hat. “Better?” he asked.

Lyra laughed. “No, I’m good,” she said as Suncloak changed back to normal again. Lyra looked at him again, noting that something was off. “Hey, you don’t have a present for Bon Bon?”

Awkwardly, Suncloak looked down, inspecting the holes in his hooves. “I, uh... I couldn’t get one. Earning money was a bit more difficult than I thought.” At least Lyra couldn’t see his black eye. Suncloak didn’t really want to explain that again.

“Oh, that’s too bad,” Lyra said as she closed the door. “I thought it went so well at the arcade?”

“Not really,” Suncloak said. “Turned out it wouldn’t be worth it for the owner. I tried some other stuff after that, but... that failed too.” And that was putting it lightly. “Bon Bon won’t mind, right?”

“Nah,” Lyra said. “After all, you can make it up later.” She started heading out of the hallway. “But hey, the party’s in the living room. C’mon!”

Suncloak followed after her, entering the living room. The whole place was decorated with balloons, streamers, confetti and other colour things. There was even a table dedicated to tons of different types of candy, and most importantly, a large birthday cake. Derpy was currently at said table, munching on a muffin. In one of the corners of the room was a large sound installation, made up of several speakers and a turntable. Behind the turntable, Suncloak could see Vinyl’s hindquarters sticking up. The DJ was probably still busy hooking the whole thing up.

“Hi Suncloak!” Bon Bon’s voice sounded from the kitchen. Quickly, she went up to him. “I’m so glad you could make it!”

Suncloak gave her a confused look. “Of course I made it.” It wasn’t like he had to do something else, like work. “Though, I, uh...” the changeling murmured, trailing off. It was a bit embarrassing to say he didn’t have a present.

“Want something to drink, or some candy?” Bon Bon asked, not having heard Suncloak’s last few words. It surprised him that Bon Bon didn’t notice him not having a present.

“No thanks,” Suncloak said. “I wanted to say sorry.”

Bon Bon raised an eyebrow. “Why would you need to say that?”

“Because I came here with empty hooves,” Suncloak said. “I took about a bazillion jobs, but I just couldn’t get the money to buy you a present. I’ll make it up to you another time, I swear!”

Bon Bon dismissively waved a hoof. “Oh, that doesn’t matter, Suncloak. I heard about it from Vinyl. It’s the thought that counts, right?”

Suncloak gave Bon Bon a blank stare. It’s the thought that counts? That’s not something the changeling had ever heard of. “Huh? What’re you talking about?”

“It’s the thought that counts,” Bon Bon repeated. “You did all you could to get me a present, but it just didn’t work out. I won’t think any less of you for that.”

Suncloak just continued staring at her, unable to process this train of thought. “I don’t get it.” He was trying to be generous, but he failed, but it still counted as being generous, and... This was making his brain hurt.

Bon Bon sighed. “Even though you couldn’t get me anything, you really wanted to, right?”

Suncloak gave a quick nod. “Yes,” he slowly said.

“Then it doesn’t matter that you don’t have a present,” Bon Bon said. “Knowing that you did your best to get me a present is enough for me. Do you get it now?”

“I think so,” Suncloak said. “So when I—”

Just then, an incredibly loud bass tone sounded from Vinyl’s speakers, interrupting the conversation and causing Suncloak to jump up in fright. With an awkward grin, Vinyl stood up and twisted a dial on her turntable, turning the speakers off. “Whoops, my bad. What were you talking about?”

“Oh, I was just talking to Suncloak about...” Bon Bon said, trailing off when she didn’t see the changeling drop down again. Bon Bon looked up, seeing Suncloak upside-down, clamping to the ceiling, having changed his hooves into something resembling claws out of reflex. His face was locked in an incredibly startled look. Bon Bon sighed. “Uh, nothing. It doesn’t matter. Suncloak, can you come down, sweetie?”

Suncloak merely gave something between a squeak and a hiccup in response, before letting go. He hit the ground face-first, remaining completely stiff. His hooves changed back to normal, surrounded by green flames. A second later, the changeling collapsed to the ground. “My ears,” he whimpered.

Bon Bon extended her hoof to the changeling, helping him up. “You okay?” she asked.

Suncloak groaned. “Yeah, I’m fine.” He briefly shook his head to get his thoughts in order. Said order was somewhere along the lines of ‘ow’, ‘ow’ and ‘ow’.

“Sorry, Sunny,” Vinyl said. “Didn’t realize I forgot to tune down the volume.” She tried scratching the record plate that was currently on the turntable, which generated a sound with a more decent volume. “There! All set for the party.”

“You know what?” Suncloak said, smiling. “I’ll figure the whole ‘thought that counts’ thing out later. Right now, it’s time for a birthday party, not lessons about friendship.”

After all, he already had a group he told friendship lessons to weekly.


“So what you’re saying is, if you just say that you wanted to be generous, you don’t actually have to be generous?” #14 asked.

Suncloak slapped himself in the face with a hoof. “No, what I’m trying to tell you is...” he paused, trying to find the right words.

Like every week, he and the other changeling were in their little cave again, gathered around for yet another session of sharing lessons about friendship. Suncloak had tried to tell them about what he had learned, but it turned out to be more difficult than he thought. “Look, you have to really want to be generous. You can’t just say you want to give someling something without actually wanting to. That’s lying, and that doesn’t really fit well with honesty.”

#145’s face contorted from the sheer mental strain. “I don’t get it.” Understandable for such a little changeling, really.

“I think he’s trying to say that you have to be both generous and honest at the same time,” #21 said. “I’m not sure, though. This is weird.”

Suncloak groaned. “I’m telling you this in the easiest way possible! How can you not understand this?” It only cost him a day or two to figure it all out, after all.

“Being honest isn’t exactly a changeling thing, though,” #14 said. “I mean, it’s kinda difficult.”

Suncloak opened his mouth to protest, but decided against it. He didn’t have much trouble with honesty, but that was after he had been caught and pretty much forced to be honest. After that, he just warmed up to it. Being honest made friendship feel more genuine, and that just felt better, somehow.

“I know honesty is pretty hard for you guys,” Suncloak said. “I mean, you’re still walking around with fake looks and names, too. But if you want to live together with ponies, I think you have to be as honest as you can.”

“I don’t know if it’ll be worth learning,” #21 said. “We’re not going to live in Ponyville forever, after all.”

Suncloak raised an eyebrow. “What, you’re thinking of moving?”

“Uh, no,” #14 said. “We have to go back to the hive someday. We’re on a mission, and we have to report back sometime.”

Suncloak froze for a while. Oh. Right. He had forgotten that the other changelings were all still part of a hive. Sooner or later, they’d have to return to their real homes. For some reason, it made him feel... disappointed.

“But I...” #145 started, but trailed off as the others looked at him. “Uh, never mind.”

#14 sighed. She seemed almost sad about the subject. “Look, it doesn’t matter. I’d just like to learn as much as possible about the way ponies live. So before we go, I want to understand honesty a bit better.”

“I don’t think it’s worth all the effort,” #21 said. “What can we possibly learn from it? It’s not like being honest will be of use in the hive.”

“What do you think, Suncloak?” #14 asked.

Suncloak didn’t answer. He seemed to be looking at nothing in particular.

#145 climbed onto #14’s back and waved a hoof in Suncloak’s direction. “Hello? Boss?” he asked.

The somewhat high-pitched, buzzing voice, coupled with his view being obstructed, pulled Suncloak out of his thoughts. “Huh, what?” He blinked a few times. Right, he was still talking to the group. “Just, uh... Do what you want. Be your own boss. I can’t make choices like that for you.”

The other changelings gave him confused looks. “That’s... Okay,” #14 said. “Well, anyling else got a story to share?”

As the others started talking about their new experiences, Suncloak sighed. He had completely forgotten about the fact that the other changelings had to return to their hives someday. For some weird reason, it made Suncloak sad to think about the others leaving. He continued mulling it over, but he could only come to one conclusion.

Inevitably, he would once again become the only changeling living among ponies.