> We Aren't All Monsters
>  by Arctic Inferno
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> The Crystal Forest
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The explosion had been loud and powerful- powerful enough, in fact, to blow all the Changelings and their Queen clean out of Canterlot- but many of them knew that what was coming was going to be much, much louder.

During the attempt to take over the capital of Equestria itself and have the entire planet beneath her nightmarishly black hoof, Queen Chrysalis had very much believed that nopony could possibly have thwarted her wonderful chaos. The sight of those pathetic ponies running from hordes of her subjects had filled her to the brim with an intense feeling of... accomplishment. Yes, that was the word. It was a feeling of accomplishment that she had never truly felt since she was a hatchling and killed her very first prey. The moment she consumed the smallest of her 8 younger sisters she knew that she deserved to rule the kingdom one day.

But then her glorious revolution, the long-awaited day of reckoning for that pitiful race of ponies was halted by six. It took just six ponies to strike down the entirety of a squadron of at least 300 Changelings sent with the single job of killing them in mind, and even after they had been captured there was only a good 50 of them left standing. Queen Chrysalis honestly couldn't remember what happened next, but she remembered a rainbow, followed by a flash of light and the explosion which knocked the Changelings so very far away.

Queen Chrysalis had always hated rainbows. It made ponies smile, and a smiling pony always made her cringe; the last pony that she had seen smiling before her invasion had seriously warranted the need to lose their mouth.

The world was spinning as she pulled herself up onto all four hooves and shook her head to get her bearings as to where exactly she and the failures she called her subjects had landed following the explosion, but it didn't help to try and clear the ringing in her ears so she resorted to shouting angrily instead. Scaring the Tartarus out of one of her inferior Changelings always made her feel better.

"WHO," She began in her loudest voice, "WAS IN CHARGE OF THE KILLING SQUADRON?"
All around her the Changeling race had been getting up onto shaky hooves and stumbling around into rocks and trees as their visions went double, but the shock of the sudden outburst from the Queen shook their eyes back into place and they quickly assembled into a terrified group which eventually spat one of them out. He gulped as Queen Chrysalis walked up to him and lowered her head to look him directly in the eye.
"You, child..." She said, her voice eerily soothing now, "You were in charge of the killing squadron?" The young Changeling beneath her swallowed hard and nodded.
"You were the ones responsible for killing off that pesky purple unicorn and her friends?" The young Changeling nodded again, this time with a slight whimper.
"... Well, then. Why is she not dead?" The Changeling remained silent, quivering beneath his Queen as she glared at him. If looks could kill he would be tortured, hung, drawn and quartered.
"... SPEAK, CHILD!" Queen Chrysalis eventually bellowed. He yelped and spoke quickly,
"M-Ma'am! I-I was t-trying m-my best!! They w-were w-working so well t-together, it was l-like the w-were an entire army!" Queen Chrysalis scowled. 
"Yes..." She said quietly at first, "But you WERE AN ENTIRE ARMY!"

The Queen could not stand to look at the failure beneath her for any longer, so she raised her head at two larger Changelings in the crowd.
"You two. Come and take this child. He deserves to receive The Punishment, I should think." The two Changelings she selected nodded and stepped forward, taking the sobbing Changeling beneath the Queen by the front hooves and dragging him back to where they started from. Every Changeling that had ever been born knew what The Punishment was; they were taught about it from a very young age within The Hatchery. It was one of the worst deaths imaginable, they had been taught, because it was a way of making the Punished feel like they were dead when in fact they were still forced to work on in life.

Queen Chrysalis shot an annoyed look at the rest of her subjects as if to say "Let that be a lesson for you" and then directed her gaze to where they had actually landed. Conveniently they were in the Crystal Forest and she grinned. At least something today had gone right that would actually last. The Queen shot a look at four younger Changelings who immediately caught her drift and raced over, hoisting her up and distributing her weight equally amongst them, and she hissed at them to stop having trouble lifting something they clearly couldn't carry and get them to move forward. They forced themselves to do so and, with a little encouragement in the form of an irritated bellow, the rest of the Changeling race followed in their thousands. As they walked, Queen Chrysalis looked around her at the fog; it was thick and black, like smog hanging low on the ground that obscured the forest floor and led many of the hatchlings that played around the outside of the Hive to trip and fall often on invisible roots and thorny flowers growing in the shape of crystals from the hard mud.

Around the wide path they walked on were the forest's trees. They were unique, to say the least; they towered high above the wide trail and covered up the sky with leaves grown into pure emeralds that glowed faintly with a dark green hue as the Changeling Queen passed them, reacting to the presence of such a damned, sickening race bent purely on ponykind's destruction. The huge trunks of solid grey stone rose up out of the ground around them which made it impossible to see further into the woods past the trail, and the thick crystal leaves blocked all traces of Celestia's pure sunlight from reaching the thick black fog that hung low on the ground like a blanket of darkness. Even during the day, the darkness was a black wall before them that opened up invitingly at the front but snapped shut like a locked door from behind as they walked. Queen Chrysalis sighed dreamily like she used to as a hatchling, playing in these very woods. It was so wonderfully, gloriously, sickeningly peaceful, and she loved every moment she spent there.

The Changeling Queen looked ahead at the wall of darkness that moved away from them just as far away as they got closer and lay, occasionally snapping a command at the hatchlings carrying her to go faster if they tried to catch their breath. It was only when they reached her glorious kingdom and beloved home, the Hive, and that the towering structure marked that they had reached the very centre of the woods that stretched for so many countless miles around it, did she stop issuing orders to the hatchlings and stepped down off of them to enter. She always awed at the sight of it, every single time it materialised out of darkness along the main path from it and the outside entrance at least ten miles away. The Hive was so gorgeously massive; a massive egg-shaped structure of chrysalis, with emerald spikes jutting out from its walls at random intervals that served as landing zones for Changelings on patrol. Inside it was a labyrinth of tunnels interspersed between twelve floors lit dimly with torches lit with a dark green flame that had trouble illuminating the wall it was on, let alone the rest of the tunnel. Queen Chrysalis smirked at the sight and the huge emerald gates opened menacingly as the Changelings approached.

And then they were inside, the doors closed and the trees outside stopped glowing. The Changeling race was home.

***

As soon as they had arrived the Changeling who had been sentenced to The Punishment was taken straight to the higher floors of the Hive and nobody heard from him until a few weeks later when he ran through the corridors in an escape attempt- with no wings or horn. He was quickly subdued by the other Changelings, however, and expired from the panic, so the Changeling Queen sent him to the hatchery for the hatchlings' lunch. She was a little disappointed at first, but her regrets quickly passed when she realised just how delicious he tasted as she nibbled mindlessly on his ear on the way to the hatchery lunch room with his deceased body on the lunch cart.

Queen Chrysalis paced in her room by her desk, the events of that day playing in a loop in her head. Those six ponies were bad enough, but the one she hated most of all was the purple unicorn. She just arrived, walked in and stopped the most powerful race in Equestria in a single sweep of the hoof! The Queen's blood boiled. Oh, the things that she could have had, and the things that the purple unicorn took away from her...

In fury, Queen Chrysalis swiped at her desk, knocking a perfectly preserved skull off of it and onto the floor. She took a moment to compose herself and lifted it back up with her magic, holding it in front of her and stroking its head.
"Sorry, dear," She cooed as she placed the skull of her last husband back on the desk, "I can get very violent when I'm angry, can't I?" She laughed a little at her own statement, both in reference to what she just did and why the only thing that remained of her husband was a skull in the first place. The Queen stared into the empty sockets where the eyes should be for a while before perking up.
"Oh, dear, you're quite right!" She said aloud, "You always had such wonderful ideas!" 

Queen Chrysalis walked over to her door, stuck her head out and yelled for one of her servants to get the Tartarus to her room immediately. One arrived very quickly (six seconds; she always had a great time counting to see how much time it took) and stood to attention as still as he could, though he was very clearly petrified. She stepped forward and looked at him.
"Do you have a name?" She asked in a stern voice. A moment of confused silence passed.
"U-Uh... no, your h-highness. None of u-us do." The Changeling replied slowly.
"Of course you don't!" His Queen laughed, "Only important creatures deserve names."
The Changeling swallowed and nodded, "O-Of course, my Queen."
"So," She said after a moment of her cackling, "How do you like the sound of a little stealth operation?"
"... Pardon m-me, ma'am?" He replied quietly.
"Head up when you speak to your demigod, boy!" She said, back to a stern tone. He quickly obliged and looked straight up at her and she smiled. "Good."

"Now, what I want you to do..." She began, "Is go back to Canterlot and find that cursed purple unicorn."
"Y-Yes, ma'am? To d-do what?"
"My goodness, you're thick. To ruin her, idiot!" Queen Chrysalis cried in frustration, causing the Changeling to flinch. "Disguise as a pony and befriend her or something, then slowly remove all the things-" Queen Changeling paused for effect, "- and other ponies- that make her happy."
The Changeling swallowed, "N-Not kill her?"
"No." Queen Chrysalis said quickly, "No, I want to do that as she sinks to her knees in emotional agony." She bent down and looked at the Changeling before her. "You have 5 weeks."
The Changeling nodded quickly and collected himself, running out of the room, through the halls and exiting from the huge doors, sprinting down the trail. 

As Queen Chrysalis watched him leave through her window she looked over at the mountain with Canterlot perched on its rocky slope so many miles away and grinned, enjoying the thought of a purple unicorn being reduced to tears.
> A New Face
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

No matter how many times the Changeling wandered along this trail, he pondered, he never got tired of the way the trees overhead reacted to his presence. Perhaps when the crystallised leaves just ahead lit up dimly with that faint greenish light and those that passed behind him faded and became lifeless once more, he felt almost important. As if his existence actually meant something. If he had been taught in the hatchery what a smile was or how to do it he likely would have done so.

Maybe, even, the freakishly abnormal "leaves" were trying to communicate with him. A myth had circulated for a while when he was a hatchling that the forest had been normal when Changelings first appeared several millions of years before the ponies did, and over time the trees had been forced to adapt and change to cope with the vast amounts of negativity that so abundantly plagued the Changeling race. The hatchling who spread the rumour disappeared quite quickly when his Queen found out, though, so perhaps it was best to avoid such thoughts and focus on the task at hand.

The Changeling lowered his head and faced forward as he trotted along the path, watching the darkness open up before him and feeling it close behind him. He liked the dark- you had to in order to be a Changeling, or else you would get shunned and exiled for being different to the rest of the Swarm- but he felt that darkness to him was something... special. Like it reached out, soaked into his chest and enveloped his heart with its soothing serenity and touched his soul with its peace. That's what he truly loved about the dark... just how peaceful it was. No ponies ever went in the dark. It was always undisturbed, and there was something about that feeling which he adored. Indeed, craved.

Wherever you went in Equestria, anywhere at all, there was a different kind of light there. Produced artificially, by magic, the sun; there was always some new kind of light to assault his senses. Darkness never changed; it was either there, or it wasn't. Darkness was always the same. That's why he loved the night- although, according to his race's elders, it was so much better before the ponies ruined it and created a moon.

Then all of a sudden the darkness ahead split and opened up to the piercingly bright world beyond. He hissed and covered his eyes with a black hoof, feeling the intense sunlight wash over his body, and hating every second of it. After a while his eyes had adjusted and the Changeling turned to peer at the trail behind; the darkness had since abandoned him and returned to the forest, leaving him standing alone in the middle of a world of piercingly bright lights and eye-watering colours. He growled in frustration and kicked up some gravel from the road beneath in fury, then flapped his wings and took off, sailing into the clear blue sky to check his bearings.

Well, perhaps 'flapped' was the wrong word to describe what Changelings do. 'Buzzed' was more like it. The slim blue wings that sprouted from his back could only really hum furiously to keep him in the air. Maybe, he considered as he perched onto a crisp cloud, Changelings weren't as adept at flying as he had been taught. Not that flying was their talent or anything; they had wonderfully sharp fangs and eyes that could make out clear surroundings in complete darkness, and he knew that flying was just another thing on the list of skills that made them so much better, why those ponies should tremble at their hooves. The Changeling race longed for the day when the pony princesses fell to their knees in despair.

He looked around. The Crystal Forest in all it's disgusting beauty was a mile or so beneath him, and the foreboding city of Canterlot was rising high up out of the mountain in the distance. Drawing in a breath and focusing, the Changeling was enveloped in a bright column of pure green magic. It spun and twirled around him, closing in above his head and hanging around him for a few moments before dissipating just as quickly as it had appeared. A pony stepped out from where the Changeling stood and snickered.

Now, disguised as a pegasus pony, the Changeling truly could flap his wings, and sailed off of his cloud perch in the direction of Canterlot. With these new pony eyes- a pair that were not the result of centuries of evolution to see in utter, bitter darkness- he could see so much clearer, he had a soft blue mane that swept to the side on his head and a medium-length tail of the same colour that flapped in the wind and, of course, two feathery wings that didn't need to work like fury to lift him off the ground. On his flank was a cutie mark resembling a blue droplet of water- though he had no idea what it meant, as Changeling cutie marks are considered random most of the time- etched onto plain white fur. 

Pegasi, he thought, were possibly the most courageous of the three pony races. Evolution, it seems, had favoured the usage of wings- possibly the most dangerous and difficult form of transportation for any animal- and yet they used such a commodity daily to get around, manipulate weather to their will. Although, pegasi were apparently as common on the ground as earth ponies. This, he thought with a small grin, would be a wonderful disguise to get into the pony city.

It took a very, very long time before the Changeling- or, pony, whichever he could truthfully be called- reached Canterlot. The shield had been taken down as the pony princess had decided that his race wouldn't be coming back for a while, so he could freely land onto a roof and examine what the loud noises were. It was so strange; the ponies made exactly the same noises when they were running in fear or being consumed to when they were celebrating in a crowd. Even weeks after the attack, the ponies were still screaming, albeit for a different reason- celebration.

But what they were celebrating was the thing that caught his attention most of all. Along the major road to the castle were crowds of ponies in their thousands standing on either side as a group of six walked along it, cheering, throwing confetti and balloons and flowers. The Changeling recognised that group instantly; the yellow pegasus that had tried to fool them, the orange mare who had the most painful kick he had ever felt, the blue pegasus with the annoyingly bright mane who had managed to trick them so well, the white unicorn with the richly extravagant mane who had tried to flatter them and the pink mare who had treated the whole thing as a game before retrieving a cannon from seemingly nowhere and wiping them out like tissue paper. But the unicorn at the front, with the purple coat and darker violet hair and pointy-shape cutie mark, was the one that really made his blood boil; she looked so happy, so pleased with herself for crushing his fellow Changelings.

But no, it wasn't really her who did it. It was the alicorn and unicorn behind them wearing those meaningless rings on their horns who had cast the Changeling Queen and her children back; they had done something powerful, maybe even more so than his Queen, and it had sent them all clean away like an explosion.

"Thank you very much!" The purple unicorn spoke aloud to the crowds of ponies, "It took a long time, but we've cleaned up Canterlot and witnessed the wedding of Princess Cadence and Shining Armour!" 
Oh, so that was their names. He would try to remember them as his race tore out their throats in coming months.
"Twilight's friends are returning home now," The pink alicorn named Cadence continued, "And we're all very grateful for their help in defeating the Changelings invaders." The crowd followed this with an eruption of applause, whistling and screaming- there it was again- before the six ponies boarded a carriage pulled by two stallion pegasi.
Wait. This wasn't their home?
He turned away from the crowds of applauding ponies to watch the carriage as it departed and drifted smoothly forwards on its descent to the ground. The sun had already begun to set as he followed it like a hunter stalking his prey, darting from cloud to cloud to avoid being spotted. The carriage didn't take long to reach the ground from the soaring peaks of the mountain Canterlot was perched on.

Ponyville? That was where they lived?
Back in the hatchery, he remembered, they had taught him and the other hatchlings which cities were the densest with the richest prey. They had covered Manehatten, Fillydelphia and Las Pegasus, but not one single mention of Ponyville had been made, other than that a pony princess visited every now and again. 
How could six important- no, not important, just overly adored- ponies come from a place that his Queen could destroy with one flick of the hoof? It made no sense to him. Did their princesses have no logic, leaving all six of their most powerful weapons in one small, pathetic cluster of houses.

Observing from the bushes, he watched them all greet the other ponies of the village who had been waiting for them- a grey-and-blonde pegasus with peculiar eyes, an earth pony with extravagant hair and some kind of hat that covered both her ears but not her head who was beating her head to music nopony else could hear, to name just two- and then splitting up and heading in six different directions. It was dark by now and most of the ponies were returning home, so he stepped out of the bush and quietly trotted after the purple unicorn that was his target, just as it began to spit with rain.
> My Name Is...
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Up close her eyes were large and inviting and her home was filled with light and warmth. It took every ounce of the Changeling's willpower not to shudder with hatred.

"Hello," Twilight said happily shortly after answering the door.
"... Hey, er, there," The Changeling responded, not yet attuned to his new voice. It was much more trustworthy and soft, he realised, and had some kind of accent that he couldn't identify. "I was just stopping by to, uh..."
"... Yes?" Twilight said after a brief pause, her face changing from a smile to a look of obvious confusion.
"I, was, uh... just walking through town," He spoke slowly, making up a story as he went along. "I-I'm new here, you know..."
"I was about to ask," She responded with a slight chuckle, "I've certainly never seen your face around here before!"
"Y-Yeah," He agreed, trying to copy her tone, "I just moved in from... um..."
"Yes? From where?"
The Changeling tried to think back to his lesson on pony cities in the hatchery and spoke the first one that popped into his head. "From, uh, Manehatten."
"Ooh! We don't get many Manehatten ponies over here." She chirped happily.
He nodded, starting to grow into his new form. "Yeah. So, uh..."
She smiled and tilted her head a little. "Not much of a talker, huh? You remind me of a friend of mine. So, what's your name?"
The Changeling looked up. "My... name?" 
"Yes, your name!"

The Changeling thought for a moment. He didn't have a name, no Changelings did. The only Changelings who ever received names were the ones who were lucky enough to be selected for his Queen's annual egg-laying season, but they got names from the Queen herself, like "Gutly" and "Spittle". Their names never lasted long, though, because they didn't either; his Queen usually consumed her annual mate when they were finished. In a distant and blurred memory of bringing her a meal he remembered spotting a box under the desk in her room containing a number of skulls, but he had dismissed it as her toys from when she had been a hatchling.

"Um, well, my name is, uh..." He started, trying to pin two words in his head. A slight evening breeze drifted by through the darkened night sky and he suddenly got a burst of inspiration. "B-Breeze... Breeze, um..." He glanced up to see she had a slightly cocked eyebrow and quickly looked around for something else to day, remembering pony names usually had two words. Eventually his gaze drifted upwards.
"Breezy... Breezy Stars." He said after a moment.
"... Well, then, Breezy Stars," Twilight said after an awkward pause, "My name is Twilight Sparkle. Can I ask why you've come to my house when I'm about to go to bed?"
"Yeah, the thing is, uh... I'm new, like I said," He began, "And I have nowhere to stay, so... Would you mind if I stay here for the night? Just one night." Everything he had learnt about pony social habits in the hatchery was coming back to him now and he slowly felt more and more confident.
"... Oh?" Twilight began, not entirely sure what so say. She gave him a careful look over before responding. "... Yes, I'm sure you'll be fine for just one night. Come on in."

Breezy stepped into the library and flinched from the sudden feel of light hitting his skin from all directions. Ponies were used to this, he told himself; they had smooth skin and soft fur to keep them warm when it turned cold. The Changeling carapace was what he was used to, a sturdy exoskeleton of smooth black bone. A shell was so much better, keeping him protected from harmful and irritating things, like light. For a moment he wondered to himself if ponies shed their skins and grow new ones like Changelings do when they hit puberty, but he was interrupted in his thoughts when Twilight spoke up again.
"So, did you bring anything with you from Manehatten?" She said chattily as she started to trot up the stairs running up along the wall. Breezy settled down on the floor by a bookcase as she spoke.
"No," He said simply as if it were perfectly normal, "Didn't think I needed much... or anything."
"Then how-" She began, stopping on the stairs and turning to face him, then suddenly going quiet. "... What are you doing?"
"... Getting some sleep."
There was a pause and she suddenly burst into laugher, catching him off guard.
"Oh, Breezy!" She said between giggles, "Stop messing around and get up here so I can set up the guest bed for you!"

Breezy cocked an eyebrow as he rose from the floor and followed her up the stairs. There were more and more things that kept popping up today that just seemed... strange to him. He knew that ponies slept every night- Changelings got a few hours sleep a week, it was all they needed- but never before had he heard about 'beds'. When the weekly sleep came back at the hive the Changelings all assembled into one room and slept in a pack on the floor; all aside from the Queen, of course, who refused to sleep with her children for reasons unknown to him. Or the other Changelings, for that matter. Now that he thought about it, all Changelings were brothers and sisters, as each were born from eggs his Queen gave birth to every year. That and the converted Changelings, but he tried not to think about those.

Twilight led him upstairs and to her room, which had a strange flat thing rising up from the floor and a small basket on the floor next to it containing what he guessed was a ball of some sort covered in a blanket. She pulled another flat thing out of the wall from a compartment and set it up, getting a thinner flat object- rolled up at first- from within a closet and set it out.
"There you go." She said cheerfully, patting his shoulder with a hoof, "Sleep well!"
And with that, Twilight turned to the other flat thing and lay down onto it, pulling a thin flat object over her and turning her head away from the window next to it. Breezy watched her and copied what she did exactly, but couldn't think exactly why.

So this was a bed, he thought to himself. He hated to admit it, but the way the squashy flat object covered his body almost felt... nice. Warmth was a rare thing and he had been taught to hate, but now he found his head swimming and his eyelids drooping and, before he new it, Breezy was fast asleep.
> A Glance Behind
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Breezy woke up, his head swimming and eyes stinging with the sudden reintroduction to light. He sat up and made a strange noise- sort of a large inhale of air crossed with a sigh- and stretched out his new limbs. He didn't know precisely why, but doing so felt good, almost satisfactory.

"Good morning." Twilight said with a slight chuckle, causing him to turn his head and look at her. "You slept so soundly last night, it was like you hadn't been asleep for weeks." The Changeling failed to catch the unintentional irony in that statement.
"Yeah..." He said dazily, still not fully awake. She smiled at him and motioned for him to follow her down the stairs.
"Come on, sleepyhead." She said back to him, "You need some breakfast before you set off." He didn't know what breakfast was but he knew one thing; he was unimaginably hungry, as he had set off from the hive mere moments before his secondary feeding of the day. Reluctantly he arose from the bed and trotted down the steps after her.

To his surprise the room she had entered on the lower floor had a table spread out with a number of items of food in bowls and on plates, with two seats, one of which occupied by the lavender unicorn. She was eating one of the pony foods he had learnt about in the hatchery, a sandwich of some kind. He sat down on the seat across from her and picked up a similar sandwich on his plate; it had some kind of vegetation inside of it, which he had at least half-expected, considering he had never actually been told that ponies eat meat like Changelings did. Breezy picked it up and took a bite. It wasn't terrible, but his instincts told him that flower petals weren't something he should be eating and he threatened to choke it up. Forcing it down, he looked up to see her tilting her head and looking at his flank.

"Interesting cutie mark," She commented, "What's your special talent?"
"Special... Special talent?" He paused, thinking back to his lesson on pegasi. They really hadn't told him much about them, other than that the wings were the more painful bits to remove before eating, but he could distinctly remember that they controlled the weather. "Um... I like... water." He said, receiving a confused look in response.
"What do you mean?" She asked quizzically, "You swim or something?"
"Yeah, I swim," He said, "And... uh, I just, you know... Like the rain."
She paused for a moment before speaking again. "Well, that's nice to hear. I quite like the sound of the rain on my window too, in the evening whilst I'm reading."
He listened, pretending to be interested, before she stood up.
"Well," She chirped happily, "Shouldn't keep you! I'm sure you came to Ponyville for a reason, right?"
"Uh, no, actually. Just came for the views and the friendly ponies."
"Well then," Twilight smiled brightly at him, "I hope I've set a good example good far!"
He nodded and thanked her a number of times before stepping out of the door.

Immediately the Changeling fell deep into thought. He had learnt a lot about ponies that could likely help out his race in the coming revolution; like, for example, they ate at set times throughout the day, at least in the morning. But now as he looked back at the treehouse and through a window, he saw the beautiful lavender unicorn sat peacefully on a sofa in her front room and reading from a book, and there was a twinge of emotion from deep down in his black heart. Maybe they didn't deserve to be wiped out?

Breezy cursed to himself and pulled his gaze away from the window. No, of course not, they all needed to be converted or consumed. The Changelings had been hiding in the few shadows available, waiting for the day when they could consume the inferior races in a blanket of darkness and smog, and no amount of pony kindness could make him think otherwise. They had banished his Queen to the depths of an inky blackness in the Crystal Forest thousands of years ago, and now they were about to receive a far worse punishment than that.

Still... the unicorn had been nice to him.

He forced the thought to the back of his mind as he looked around to get his bearings and search for some real food. The sun beat down on a bustling town, and ponies of all colours and breeds trotted along, socialising with each other or just enjoying the weather. He walked through them, receiving little more than a moment's glance from anypony, before branching off from the main street onto a path that led along the edge of a nearby forest. A rabbit hopped onto the path from a bush before him and stopped, sniffing at the ground for a moment. Oh, this would do nicely.


***


Back at the hive, Queen Chrysalis sat at the desk in her room, impatiently tapping on the top of the skull she had exchanged pleasantries with after returning from the hatchery. First some hatchling had tried to dig out of the wall and now this.

Of course, the hatchling had been killed immediately. Minor things weren't worthy of The Punishment, but they still found it necessary to kill them. There were three major benefits she had thought of when she came up with that rule; for starters, the problem was dealt with immediately. Secondly, it set a good example to the other hatchlings. And lastly, they no longer needed to go out and hunt some animals for them to eat, they just needed to toss the disobedient hatchling in the meat tenderiser and let the others feed as they please. She usually took the brain, though. The brain was the best part, and as royalty she deserved only the best.

But now there was yet another issue that had arisen, and that was the intruder. She hadn't heard much past the excitement of her child that had informed her, but what she understood from it was that a filly had been found wandering in the edges of the woods and captured. Apparently it was being taken up to her office now so she could do as she pleased with it.

A Changeling appeared in the door with a quick hiss of respect, revealing its slim black tongue. She nodded and stood up as it nudged a filly into the room and left, shutting the door and leaving the Queen and the new filly alone in the room.
"Hello..." Queen Chrysalis said softly, walking up to it. It was clearly terrified, pushing itself up against the wall as she approached and whimpering. "Do you have a name?"
"U-Um..." It stuttered, petrified, "S-Shimmering S-Skies..."
"That's a lovely name." Queen Chrysalis purred as she lowered her head to face the filly directly. Her mouth opened and a long black tongue snaked out, smoothing across the filly's left cheek and coating it with a thin layer of a glossy, sticky fluid. "So, Shimmering Skies, may I ask why you decided to enter our forest?"
"I-I-I..." The filly was starting to weep silently, "I-I thought I s-saw a bunny when I was w-walking with my m-mama, and I f-followed it..."
"Okay. That's entirely fine." Queen Chrysalis straightened up and walked over to a blank wall of the room.

The filly watched in horror as she opened her mouth and started to do something strange to the wall. It was like a cross between vomiting and licking, forming a lumpy mass of a dark black material on the flat surface with a hole in the top and a number of transparent blobs on it to see the hollow inside. Queen Chrysalis turned and, with a heartless smile, lifted the filly up off the ground and placed her inside of the sac. Shimmering Skies was confused at first but quickly started to panic when Queen Chrysalis sprayed a thick green fluid from a number of spouts hidden under the carapace that made up her abdomen.

Queen Chrysalis stopped spraying when the filly was almost entirely submerged and turned to look at her through one of the transparent gaps. She shushed Shimmering and whispered to her in a reassuring tone,
"Don't worry. You'll be back with mama soon."
Somehow, though, it was far less than reassuring. The Queen broke into a hissy laughter as the filly squirmed a little, quickly being forced down by the liquid as it softened and then quickly hardened like ice. The last thing the filly saw was the Changeling Queen turn her back on the chrysalis cocoon and walk away before it slipped into darkness.
> The Apple Stand
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Changeling stepped out of the shrubs, spitting an irritatingly thin bone onto the trail and wiping the blood away from its lips. He had decided that, after capturing the small furry creature and mauling it until it shuddered and expired, it was best if he switched back to his true form to actually consume it. Ponies had little more than just sandpaper for teeth, and eating a creature with a bone structure had proven to be practically impossible. A Changeling's teeth, though; perfect for tearing meat off of the bone. With a quick check around to ensure nopony had seen him he was enveloped by jade light once more and strode back into the town centre as the pegasus he had been disguised as a few minutes prior.

A single rabbit had hardly proven to be a sufficient lunch, but it was a lot better than two slices of bread and a couple of flowers. He strolled back through town to the library and peeked back through a window.

Whilst eating lunch the thought had struck him that if he had moved in the dead of night he could've made a cocoon around the purple unicorn and she'd be halfway to perfection by now. But no; he had been so distracted from the warmth and serenity of a pony bed that he had failed in even that, and now it would be significantly harder to get another chance to do so. Breezy spied a bench on the side of the road directly outside the tree he had spent the night in and copied the way he had seen ponies sitting before, finding it comfortable, and got to thinking. Perhaps a direct approach was a bad idea right now.

He looked up at the clouds in the sky, deep in thought. Maybe if he went back in there she might get suspicious. Yes, that was a poor idea. He needed to find a way to get to her without arousing too much attention. Breezy sat in silence for a while before his pony ears flicked and perked up. The others.

The Changeling stood from his bench and looked around at the town. If he could find one of the unicorn's friends and befriend them then he could earn their trust, which was a sure way of getting easy access to another night at the unicorn's. With a blink and a twinge of emotion he was reminded of how she had addressed him, almost like he was her equal, like she cared for him. He mentally kicked the thoughts to the back of his mind and trotted back away from the bench and into the town centre.

Along the road there were numerous market stalls on either side, each one being run by some pony of any race or colour. He walked through the crowds filling the streets aimlessly until his vision drifted to a stall in the middle of the road some distance ahead; there were a number of baskets lined up filled with apples, some red and others green, and a large banner with a cartoon picture of an apple painted on it. Lined up on the counter were a set of jars filled with a strange purple fluid and behind the counter was an orange mare, which had been the reason the stand caught his eye in the first place. She had a dark brown hat perched on top a lemon mane and freckles dotting her muzzle, and was talking with a larger red stallion when he approached.

"I told ya, Big Mac," He overheard as he came to a standstill on the other side of the stall. Her voice had a heavy southern accent. "That I needed five barrels of apples, not four."
"Well I'm sorry, sis," Her brother responded, his voice incredibly low with the same accent, "But I can't help it if Apple Bloom and her friends are up to trouble while I tryin' to work."
The mare sighed. "Oh geez, what now?"
"Somethin' about a love potion..." He began, but caught sight of Breezy out of the corner of his eye. "I'll tell ya later, ya got a customer." She turned to face Breezy as the stallion turned and walked away.
"Oh, uh, hi there!" She said cheerfully, "You come to buy some apples?"

Breezy was about to say yes when he remembered he didn't actually have any animals. If that's how it worked with ponies, anyway; Changeling economy was limited to simple trades of animal limbs and water containers stolen from pony cities. Upon reflection he remembered that ponies used something in place of those things to have access to anything they wanted, but the only thing he remembered from that lesson in the hatchery was how unnecessary he had thought it was.
"Uh, no..." He began, his mind working to think up a lie.
"Then you've come for some of our grape jam?"
"Still no, I'm afraid." Breezy responded quickly.
"Then..." The mare said after an awkward silence, "Why are ya here?"
"I, uh..." He said slowly, "Just wanted... to know your... your name."
"My name?" She asked with a quizzical look on her face, "Why do you want to know that?"
"I'm new in town." Breezy said, starting to get into the swing of casual conversation, "And I was just hoping to make a few friends before I settle down."

The mare smiled a lot more at that and tilted her hat down over her face a little.
"Aaw, ain't that a nice thought? Somepony I don't even know thinking I'd be a good friend." She smiled at him and he noticed how wide her eyes had become, "My name's Applejack. What's yours, stranger?"
"Breezy Stars." He replied, a little surprised he could remember a name he had literally come up with on the spot, "I just moved here from Manehatten."
Applejack's smile gleamed. "Manehatten? My auntie and uncle live there! I've been and all!" He listened to her as she started to explain the origin of her cutie mark, pretending to care. He had almost zoned out of the conversation entirely, too, before she turned it in his direction.
"So, how about yours?" She asked, looking at the water drop on his flank. "How'd you get yours?" Breezy was taken aback and cleared his throat, looking away from her a little.
"Mine? ... Well, I, uh, was swimming one day, and, uh..." He began, "And it started to rain... You see, I swam in the outdoor pool near my house so I was going to get cold if I got out."
Applejack nodded, "So what did you do?"
"Well, I, uh, stayed in the pool. Swimming underneath so the rain didn't drum on my head, and I found that my wings were really good at manipulating the water to let me go faster. So I flew up out of the pool and into the rain and it turned out I could manipulate the rain, too, even make up masses of it in the air." Breezy was surprised at how creative his mind could be in such short notice.

"Really?" Applejack said, stunned. "I didn't know pegasi could do that!"
"No, uh, just me."
"Well that's some talent you got there," She said happily as she rummaged around through her saddlebags for something, "Next time it rains you gotta show me. So anyway, where do ya live?"
"Nowhere, actually." Breezy said simply.
"Really, you just arrived today?"
"No, yesterday. I spent the night in a unicorn called Twilight's house. A librarian, I think she said she was."
"Ah, yeah." Applejack said as she retrieved the sandwich she had been searching for, "She's a good friend of mine."
Breezy already knew that. "Oh, really? That's news to me." Applejack smiled at him as she took a bite from her lunch. 
"You seem like a nice guy," She said to him cheerfully, "Why don't you come meet my other friends later today?"


***


Queen Chrysalis moved her flank with a swift, sharp motion, slicing the bottom off of the cocoon and allowing the gelatinous fluid inside spill out onto the floor of her room.
"Wake up," She hissed to the filly that fell out along with it, "You're with your mama again..."

The filly's eyes opened slowly, revealing two gleaming orbs of bluish light, and she looked around the room weakly. Her once fluffy coat was now a hardened carapace, her tongue was sticky and black and she had two paper-like wings and a single twisted horn on her head. She attempted to stand up on four hooves but failed and fell over again with a puff of air.
"Oh, look at you!" Queen Chrysalis positively purred, lowering her head to examine the filly. "You're a little symbol of perfection!"
The filly managed to pant out a few words. "M-Mama... Where... M-Mama..."
"Oh, you poor thing. The transformation must have been really hard on you." Queen Chrysalis said, "I'm your mama now, same as all my children."

The filly stood up successfully this time, close to vomiting up what felt like a pile of bricks. The Queen placed a hoof tentatively on the filly's cheek.
"You're no longer one of those disgusting fillies," She said with a sickening grin, "You're one of my hatchlings now." She moved her mouth close to the filly's ear and her voice changed to a hiss.
"You are perfect."

The Queen picked the hazy hatchling up and carried her to the door, calling for a servant who arrived in seven seconds. She handed him the hatchling and he departed to the hatchery, taking the confused and petrified converted with him. She smiled and turned back to the room, walking through the gunky fluid that was now seeping into the floor and returning to her desk. She sat on the chair for a while before looking back at the empty skull perched on the tabletop, then picked it up in a black hoof and stroked it.
"Oh, dear, did she not remind you of our children?" She cooed, "Only half of ours died after I put you to death, you know. Most of them are still with us so many years later." The demented Queen snickered and placed it back down, standing up and looking through her window.

"I think we've just witnessed the birth of a Changeling that will last longer than most of the other converted fillies." She glanced back at the skull, "Oh, very well, then. I bet three slaughtered woodland creatures she'll last two weeks." 
> Sugarcube Corner
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Breezy trotted along the gravel path, passing ponies left and right as he made his way to the café he had agreed with the orange mare to meet at, so he could be introduced to her friends. Of course, he knew who they were. They were the reason his race had failed and he despised them for that, but a chance to get to know them personally was something he had wished for since the day of the invasion. All he had to do was enforce some restraint. Well, a lot of restraint.

Breezy knew that, compared to the numerous fantasies of 'getting to know them' he had dreamt up since the event, he would need to be a lot more subtle and pony-like. It may prove difficult, but he would do his best to be patient. When the time came he would convert them; as slowly, cruelly and painfully as possible, so they would know the true extent of Changeling malice. For his Queen, if not purely for his own spite.

As he trotted Breezy observed the ponies that passed him. A golden-maned pegasus mare with some peculiar eyes, a white unicorn with a mane like blue thunder, a curly-maned earth pony with a strange wrapped object on her flank. Ponies certainly were a diverse race, he gave them that. Each and every one was different in some way or another, if not only for the sake of the pictures that materialised onto their backsides at some point around puberty. A brief lesson in the hatchery had taught him that, put simply, ponies had an aspect of individuality that Changelings did not. At the time he hadn't fully understood why ponies should be eradicated for that, but through adulthood he had kept such thoughts at a minimal. They were the pray, and he was the hunter.

The café looked entrancing under the glare of the sun, but due to the fact that many ponies were doing jobs or going about their daily routine it was practically empty. The outside was pink all over, with a room extending up from the top like a spire with a cupcake design. Numerous decorative sprinkles in varyingly large sizes were scattered all over the roof, and the general appeal of such a place was very positive. Breezy sighed irritably as he entered through the door, almost being caught off guard by the dinging of a bell that hung precariously in front of it from the ceiling overhead.

A pink mare was skipping around with a tray of cupcakes in her mouth, but put it down upon noticing the new customer and allowed her enthusiastic grin to stretch to the point of practically covering the entirety of her lower face. She bounced up to him, a springing sounding from seemingly nowhere with each hop. He flinched with each, the sound fluctuating into the mind of a creature unaccustomed to any positive sound, much less one that repeated so loudly and sporadically.
"Hi!" She mused enthusiastically. Breezy opened his mouth to respond but she spoke up again first, "Applejack told me you'd be here! You're new, right?"
"Uh, yeah." Breezy stuttered, completely taken aback by her loud yet welcoming tone.
"Well then, sit on down over there!" She exclaimed, waving a hoof in the general direction of at least three tables before turning and bouncing away to the kitchen, "The girls will be here soon!"

Breezy wandered over to one of the directed tables and slumped down into a seat, a mixture of annoyed and confused. Perhaps more so the latter. The way that pony bounced and walked and talked just downright made his brain hurt, perhaps due to the fact that most of what she was doing seemed to ignore the laws of physics. He began to wonder if it was such abilities that had made her and her friends such pristine fighters with next to no experience; like, for example, the cannon that she had obtained from nowhere and killed a number of his kin with. And yet here today she was, completely sane after having slaughtered numerous other creatures. Ponies were weak of spirit, he had been told since birth, and they imprisoned any of their kind who murdered another. So how does this one, or even the whole six, cope with the emotional trauma so well?

His thoughts were interrupted abruptly by the doorbell sounding again. He looked up and directed his attention towards the source of the noise. Two pegasi had entered together, one cyan with a brilliant mane of rainbow and the other yellow with a pink, rosy mane. He recognised them immediately and sat up a little bit, sighing almost inaudibly and forcibly expelling any thoughts of murder from his mind.

***

"Be quick about this," Queen Chrysalis hissed impatiently, "I have important matters to attend to, and I can't afford my time to be wasted on any matter I don't deem worthy."
"I-I most certainly assure you, my Queen, t-that this will be most worth your time." Her subservient assured her, tension clearly present in its voice.
"It had better be." She replied darkly, causing the Changeling to swallow hard in anticipation.

Her subject lead the Queen to the hatchery room, large and filled with small holes that the hatchlings had been taught to sit in during lessons. Over in the far corner from the door the hatchlings had gathered into a small group around the new addition that had been tossed in half a day prior. The converted filly in question had drawn a picture on a flat slab of emerald she had taken from the wall; it featured a pony with a long straight mane and a smiling face, as well as the word 'Mama' scrawled underneath it. The Queen pushed aside some of her hatchlings and tenderly removed the picture from the child's grasp.
"This... this is wonderful, darling. Please keep it up." She smiled sickeningly and handed it back to the hatchling, turning and leaving the room with a confused adult Changeling in tow.

She slammed the door and glared at him.
"I've told you before what to do in situations like this."
The Changeling cleared its throat a little. "U-Um, yes, I just thought that-"
"You thought nothing. None of you ever do," She sighed impatiently, her horn beginning to glow with a dark green veil. Screams suddenly echoed from the room they had just left as it began to fill with a disgusting green goop that burnt at the hatchling's flesh. The Queen smiled at the door, delighting in the screams, before directing her attention back to her companion. "And you know what I do to disobedients."

Before the Changeling could even respond a brilliant flash of green light blinded it momentarily. The flash cleared slowly and it looked back up to his Queen with ringing ears, only to see that she now held a pumping, convulsing heart of black in her hoof. The numerous tubes that hung off of it oozed a thick, dark blue colour that started to pool on the floor. The resulting hole in the Changeling's chest began to cave in.
"I'll be sure to tell your loved ones the bad news," She said calmly as he started to choke on his own breath, stumbling down to his knees as his limbs went numb. "Oh, that's right. Nothing loves you!"

The Queen broke into a hideous cackle as she turned and walked away, allowing death to consume the Changeling's mind. Darkness seeped into its eyes as its breath faltered and eventually cut out altogether.
> Friends Circle (until I can think of a better name)
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Breezy looked down at his forehooves which rested on the table and tapped them idly in an effort to dispel the silence that hung in the air, sadly but unsurprisingly to no avail.

With a quick murmur of displeasure under his breath he raised his head, nearly jumping backwards out of his seat at the sight of 5 mares looking at him from all angles. A lavender unicorn, a prismatic pegasus and a toned earth pony with a hat, to name just three. Unacquainted with pony customs, or body language for that matter, he looked between each with an expression of confusion on his fake face.
"... Well?" The white unicorn with the frilly violet mane spoke up, her voice delicate and esteemed, "Are you going to introduce yourself?"
"I... Why?" Breezy said, generally confused, "I thought Applejack told you all about me."
"Oh, dear," The unicorn replied with a chuckle from both herself and a few of the other mares, "It's just polite, I suppose."
"Oh..." Breezy mused, wondering why ponies have so many unwritten social laws in the confines of his mind. It was confusing and made every meeting with inexperienced ponies awkward, so why have them?

The pink mare from before bounced up, setting down a tray of marshmallows and other small sweets and grinning a wide and enthusiastic smile at the Changeling, then turned and bounced back to the kitchen. He flinched a little bit but succeeded in hiding it as nopony seemed to notice.
"I'm, uh, Breezy Stars. Pegasus, as you can see, from out of town." He said in his best small talk voice. The orange mare smiled and nodded at him.
"Well, it's a pleasure t' meet ya, Breezy." She said cheerfully, helping herself to a few of the sugary treats. 
"Er, pleasure to meet you too. And... your names?" Breezy replied, remembering back to one of Twilight's first questions when she let him stay the night.
"Well, you know me and AJ here," Said purple unicorn responded with a smile and a gesture towards the mare with the hat that had been running the stall. "Then we have Rarity, Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash." She cycled through the other present three who Breezy hadn't exchanged pleasantries with yet.

Fluttershy smiled and tilted her head away from him, trying to conceal her face.
"H-Hello." She practically whispered, earning a chuckle from the white unicorn, the coat of whom looked ironically similar to the marshmallow she was eating.
"She's a little... timid, dear," The unicorn explained, "It's very nice to meet you." The remaining pegasus simply nodded and extended a hoof.

Breezy remembered his lesson on hoofshakes from the hatchery and extended his own, taking hers in his and shaking it calmly. Rainbow recoiled in a mixture of surprise and disgust, but the others had quite different responses, Twilight almost falling off her chair as they burst into laughter. Even the shy yellow pegasus allowed herself a subtle giggle.
"I-I, uhm!" Breezy said suddenly, "Did I do something wrong?"
"N-No, dear..." Rarity said between giggles. She took a moment to collect herself and turned to the cyan pegasus, "Rainbow dear, you really should take some things into consideration! He's not from here, he won't know what a hoofbump is! He only knows a hoofshake!"
"Hoofbump?" Breezy questioned, a twinge of irritation worming into his heart. Twilight pulled herself back up and wiped a tear from her eye.
"Yes, a hoofbump. Rainbow got it spreading between teenagers around. It's like a symbol of respect." She mused, still chuckling every few words.

Breezy looked apologetically to Rainbow. "S-Sorry."
"It's fine," She said simply, "Let's try again." Once again a cyan hoof extended halfway to greet him. He raised his own and bumped it simply against hers, hoping that he guessed correctly based on the name. She smiled widely and nodded at him, before the pink mare returned with a tray of cakes balanced expertly on her head.
"Oh, and that's Pinkie Pie." Rainbow told him as the group turned to face the pink mare, who was now serving a few other tables. "She has a habit of being a bit... er..."
"Eccentric?" Twilight completed.
"Yes. What she said." Rainbow finished her sentence and sat back in her chair. The pink mare approached and smiled at them.
"Hiya girls! And boy, I guess!" She exclaimed joyfully.
"Hey, Pinkie." The purple unicorn said with a smile, "This is Breezy Stars."
"Heeeeeeeyyy, Breezy!" Pinkie said aloud, "We need to throw a "Welcome to Ponyville" party for you!" She was just about to dart away and obtain heaven-knows-what before Applejack interrupted her.

"Ah hate to cut the party plannin' short, Pinkie," She said with a slight chuckle, "But Breezy here ain't got anywhere to stay. Twilight told me he had to stay the night at her house."
Breezy nodded, "Yes, I don't have enough bits for a residence yet."
"Ohhh!" Pinkie cried after a moment of silent pondering, "You could stay with me and work in the bakery!"
"I... stay here?" Breezy said, uncertain.
"Yeah! It'll be like a big sleepover!"
"Um... alright, then."

There was a long talk between the group members, with Breezy only occasionally cutting in, perhaps even less so than Fluttershy, and that was saying something. Eventually the conversation came to an end when the lavender unicorn looked out of the window to the sun setting over the horizon and stood up.
"I should really be going now," She said cheerfully, "Spike needs to be put to bed and I had a tea party planned with Zecora for later this evening."
"I should as well," The other unicorn responded, "Sweetie Belle will be arriving home from Applejack's house by now." Over time the other members of the group left, each explaining why they should leave (though Rainbow's was quite pathetic, as even an inexperienced Changeling knew that ponies didn't have "awesome tanks" that needed to be refilled through sleep). Soon Breezy and Pinkie were left alone and the pink mare led him up the stairs to the guest bed, not unlike the one he had slept in at Twilight's. It was just across the room from hers and he settled down into it as she locked up the bakery from downstairs and joined him, flopping into her own.

***

The Changeling's eyes flickered open and he stood up, a brilliant web of cold, green flame surrounding him for a split second before revealing his insect-pony hybrid form. It was almost pitch black to a pony, but for a Changeling's tainted eyes it may as well have been daytime. He snickered to himself as he approached the other bed, seeing the outline of a sleeping mare beneath the sheets.

His plan had worked.

He reared his head back and made a gutting noise as he collected a mixture of phlegm and pus in his throat, then opened his eyes to lock onto his target and spit. He looked down and closed his mouth slowly, almost gagging on his own fluids.
She was asleep on her side with a hoof resting just beneath her chin and snoring. It wasn't a loud, thunderous snore that the larger Changelings made during hibernation; it was quiet and soft, like light breathing. A flare of emotion started to spiral as his heart and his brain conflicted. He wanted to cocoon her, destroy her, transform her, but at the same time he almost... didn't.

He blinked and looked at her again as if the mare was some kind of illusion. She wasn't, perhaps not to his surprise. She made a quiet little noise of approval and her ear twitched slightly as something nice happened in her dreams, making the Changeling falter.

After a solid ten minutes of staring he grunted and pulled away from the bed, morphing back into the pegasus as he returned to his own. Alright, he'd let her live, if only to see her suffer with the others when his Queen arrived. But that was why he was doing it. 

He assured himself over and over that he felt no pity for ponies at all as he forced himself back to sleep.