In the middle of the night, Princess Cadence and her husband are woken by the news that a Changeling drone has been captured. The creature is alone and unaggressive, showing no wish to attack or change shape. Its fate is decided without much difficulty--as an obvious reject of the Swarm and a threat to Cadence's people, it must be destroyed.
But this is no ordinary drone. It can speak, and appears to be separate from the hive mind of the Swarm. It claims to have been sent as an ambassador--Chrysalis, queen of the Changelings, wants to forge an alliance with Cadence's kingdom.
But why now? Why send this strangely intelligent drone? And how will Cadence's people react to learning that their rulers are harboring a Changeling?
WARNING: Contains an OC, much headcanon speculation, and possibly violence/gore further in.
(Image courtesy of the talented Hero, my good friend and artist.)
I'll track, but you might want to improve the layout, as it is, it appears to be a on solid piece of text.
The premise sounds good, I'll have to check back on it later.
More please :)
1153213
Thank you for the suggestion, I believe I'll act on it. Format has never been one of my strong points, unfortunately.
1162358
Try this whenever someone speaks
Instead of having it scrunched like this,
Try this
1164316
Thank you for your help.
1165499
No problem, hope to see more in the future :P
I'm really digging it so far. I'd like to see more.
Oh snap. Well you've done it again; you wrote a very good chapter. I can't wait for the next one.
1168685
Your comments fill me with joy.
I'm glad you like my story!
1168705
I'm glad I can make you happy.
Cadence-kill it with fire!
poor changeling..
what's this?
a sympathetic changeling fic in which the characters actually act believable?
bless you, sir! you've done us all a great service!
no, seriously. I love the changelings, and I can't get enough of these kind of fics. I like seeing all the different ideas authors have about their culture and thought process and whatnot.
But the one thing that always bugs me is how blindly accepting the ponies in such stories tend to be.
I mean, I can sympathise with the changelings as a reader, since I know they're just creatures trying to survive. But ponies are their prey. I imagine it'd be a lot harder for a prey animal to sympathise with its predator.
It'd be especially hard for Cadance and Shining, since they were the most thoroughly traumatized by the whole incident. They couldn't just shrug off weeks (months?) of deception and mental and emotional torture just because they got a happy ending. As you've shown, they'd sooner want to kill a stray changeling than listen to its sob story.
So, props on giving such thorough thought to the characters' actions and mental states. Out of all the "a single changeling ends up stranded in the middle of ponyland" fics out there, this one is by far the most well-done and believable.
Moar please!
1169131
Such kind words! Thank you so much.
I completely understand. After what Chrysalis and the other Changelings put Cadence through, it was my assumption that she'd have to have some kind of phobia. There is no way any pony character in the entire MLP:FiM universe would welcome a non-Mary-Sue Changeling with open arms.
I'm happy for two uploads in one day :D I'm really loving this story. Excellent work!
1170040
Thank you so much! Unfortunately, I probably won't be able to upload anything for a couple of days. My father recently learned that it's possible to watch television on YouTube, and I expect him to foreclose on my laptop any day now.
1170611
oh wow. do you not have a family computer that he can use for such shenanigans?
1174287
Well, we did, but it failed catastrophically about a week ago, making mine the only computer in the house.
1174848
ah sadness. I feel you though; I have to rely on library computers to get online
I felt the first chapter was a bit overdone (you tried too hard), and I almost quit.
Chapter two was a bit better.
Chapter three, though, was at a comfortable readability level.
I'll favor this and see how it turns out.
This is awesome. Please continue.
1174866
That's much worse than my situation. I'm so sorry.
1179062
First of all: thank you so much for the honest feedback. Flowery, awkward prose is one of the many things that I'm trying to fix in my writing, and knowing that the readers notice it helps immensely.
Second of all: from now on, I'll try to make sure that future chapters continue in the pattern that you pointed out.
1184040
Glad I could be of some help.
1180341
Thank you, and that is the plan.
I see no difference in the quality of this chapter, in regards to the quality of the other chapters. Long story short: woohoo, you rock
1188994
I hope you know how happy your comments make me.
1189063
like I was telling someone else, I just call it how I see it
> "Of course, I'd probably find it easier to fell sorry for it if it weren't so bucking ugly."
I'm sorry, but when I read that line, all I could think was "I guess turning into your wife wouldn't do it much good, then."
in all seriousness though, this chapter was every bit as good as the previous ones. the different pronouns didn't confuse me at all; I'd probably do the same thing if I were to write a changeling fic, since I assume most of them are genderless by default.
this was an interesting chapter, since shows just how different the thought processes are of ponies and changelings. the ponies all seem to regard changelings as wild animals: semi-intelligent curiosities at best, and vicious monsters at worst.
whereas changelings just see ponies as a food source, or a potential means to an end.
both groups consider themselves in some way 'superior', so even potentially civil gestures toward each other end up lost in translation:
A little kid tries to 'make friends', and Carapace takes it as an insult.
Another pony shows sympathy, and Carapace just sees it as something useful to exploit.
I have a feeling such misunderstandings will only get worse from here...
This is great keep up the awesome work :D
Aww, you couldn't have changed it to Doritos?
1199894
Now, that would just be silly.
ahhhh
sea pony in the "topaz" fountain
i see what you did there
i think
...if you even did any thing there
... maybe im over thinking things again
hahaha what
I'm now convinced that Cadance is actually the illegitimate child of Discord and Celestia.
also, this whole chapter made me picture Shining Armor saying defensively: "I'm not racist-- some of my best friends are monsters!"
lol, I don't even know what's going on anymore, but I love it. your headcanons are awesome.
Make her a Mexican pony, and call her Frito.
But in all seriousness, I loved this chapter too. Well done again.
This chapter was not boring. In fact it was rather awesome. I liked the Twilight and Shining Armor interactions, especially.
1222330
everything about this, is how I feel. so I'm going to be lazy and say "what they said."
1221405
If I did anything there, it was unintentional. XD What was it that you thought I did?
1222172
Twilight's difficult. I've never actually written her before, which is odd, seeing as she's probably my favorite character from the show. Hopefully, I'll be able to capture the more humble aspect of her personality in the next chapter I write through her perspective.
And thank you so, so much for your input on the city. One of my favorite aspects of writing is worldbuilding. Hence the fact that I'm almost positive I spent more time and energy designing the Crystal City and its culture than I did mapping out the storyline.
As for a fic that focuses on the city itself, you can be almost certain that it's in the cards.
1222330
Curse you! You've revealed the big chapter eighteen plot twist!
I kid, I kid, but reading your comment made me laugh because it fits so well. I never even considered Discord when designing Cadence's city, working more off the fact that her powers have to do with tolerance, but thinking about it, it does have his touch, doesn't it? XD
1227019 topaz = light green
green sea pony
magical mishap that made a seapony versionof lyra
agian it was just me over thinking things
1227033
My god.
Of course.
Congratulations, you just influenced a future chapter and you shall be credited with it.
Unconscious though it may have been, I 'did something there'!
Or more accurately, you did something there. Thank you.
1227062 ...yay now i feel kinda smart...
thank you for your praise
1227740
I would be delighted to help.
As for Twilight, thanks so much for the input. I'll definitely be sure to address those problems in the next chapter that I write through her perspective--as I mentioned before, Twilight is hard. :/ In fact, all of the Mane Six are. Because they get the most screen time in the show, they have the most complex personalities, and therefore are the hardest to write. But most of it's my fault. I didn't spend as much time as I should have on Twilight's chapter--I didn't research the character, and I didn't write pages of randomness to get a feel for her voice like I did when I wrote Cadence and Shining Armor's first chapters. I was in a hurry, I'll admit it. But I'll take my time in the future.
In short, thanks for the comment, and I plan on updating tonight!
Cliffhangers! My greatest enemy!
encrypted-tbn2.google.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQDkaoo0eyNet-8HT71DYRas7qOtVxADY31FhJkyKeSCQSbG8GX5Q
1234195
And I await your PM with bated breath.
And thank you.
Hmm.. I smell possible Changeling mass self awareness and rebellion.
I must say this got me intrigued. A very good idea that needs MOAR chapters :).
Something tells me the drone that brought Chrysalis there isn't quite brain-dead itself...
1279871
This was your first week of school? It was my third! D:
What you suggested probably would have been a better idea, easing Anomaly into the storyline rather than having it just appear. But to be honest, this plot device wasn't planned. I needed another angle, and I
probablydefinitely could have done it better than this, but I was tired. And fatigue is the father of laziness, which is why I try not to write when tired...but I broke my own rule here. >>;Chryssy. Chryssy, listen.
You had an army big enough to zerg rush the captial city of Equestria. You had enough raw power to wipe the floor with the goddess of the sun. And you still managed to lose because your back was turned.
You need sentient drones. You need them like Pinkie Pie needs decaf.
seriously though, I love this. if you'll pardon my french, shit suddenly seems to be getting very real.
up until this point, I thought this was just going to be another 'changeling learns to get along with ponies' story, albeit a very well-done and realistic one...
but now it looks like there's some kind of massive changeling revolution in the works, and whatever Carapace is up to is only the beginning of it.
I'm not sure my body is ready.
whatever happens, I expect it's going to be amazingly awesome, and will probably put Cadance in psychotherapy for several decades.
1155633 Give him a chance, we're barely past chapter one. (Besides... thank god it's not an unexplained alicorn.)
very nicely done.