Long ago Celestia imprisoned a powerful, dangerous entity. Too bad nobody seems to realize he's a harmless dope.

This story started out as a parody of the two stories Machinations in the Dark and Celestia's Prophet. You may wish to read them first to get some context for the first chapter.

Now has a tvtropes page!

Ten years ago, the Griffon Empire opened a portal to a strange new world and tried to annex it. In the peace settlement that followed they lost control of the province containing the portal. Since then, the Griffonian Democratic Republic had been completely isolated, surrounded on all sides by a hostile empire. Now, for the first time, a visitor had been allowed.

When the Royal Wedding scatters defeated changelings all over Equestria, a member of the hive winds up being captured in Ponyville, tied up, stunned, repeatedly shot by a cannon, and held against his will.

The truly frightening part is he’s starting to like it.

Thank you to my twisted editors: Tek, Seether00, GameKnut, Cerulean Blue and Peter
The picture Pinkie Pie uses Party Canon is from Atmospark at DeviantArt

This story is listed as comedy⁽*⁾ because the author has an odd sense of humor. No changelings were harmed⁽¹⁾ during the production of this story, despite what the newspapers printed or the ongoing lawsuit from the ESPCA⁽²⁾. The management would like to remind all readers to spay and neuter your pets. Unless your pet is a changeling, in which case…

(*) Dark humor, to be exact. If you are someone who finds pleasure in the misfortune of others, enjoys watching the occasional inept chainsaw juggler or cheers during a NASCAR crash, welcome home. Also, get help.

(1) Excluding blunt trauma, thermal impingement, chemical exposure, radiation, thaumaturgic infusions, and confetti ingestion. All characters represented, including changelings, are the exclusive property of Hasbro, no matter what they may shout at you from between the bars of their cell. Any violence or pain inflicted on the changeling in this story was simulated on a stunt changeling with special effects and mirrors. Except for the cannon. There is no truth to the rumor that Queen Chrysalis provided the stunt changelings from a supply of disobedient changelings in her dungeon⁽³⁾.

(2) Equestrian Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Arthropods

(3) The Changeling Kingdom does not have dungeons. They have Call Centers. It explains a lot, actually.

Here is a link to some appropriate background music to listen to while reading: Piotr Tchaikovneigh’s 1812 Overture

Additional Note: This story is tagged Sex because it has the occasional reference to… well, sex. There are no explicit references, but there are things.

Dear Diary,
Looking back, a scientific, step-by-step plan is completely ineffective for social situations (Note to self: don't do them, ever). Inviting Princess Luna to a Pinkie Pie Hearth's Warming party, with a checklist of steps in your head, was an awful idea. There are too many variables that a checklist cannot prepare for, such as an entrancing outfit. The plan resulted in a spectacular failure of when awkward meets anxious.
For future use, a spreadsheet might be better.
- TS

A super-duper, awesomely-wonderful, amazing podcast review of this fic can be found here by Lapis Lazuli and Inky J! Seriously, they're great. <3
More Awesomeness! Doom Pie has done a super-duper reading for this fic! Thank you so much!

Cover art courtesy of the wonderful lovelyneckbeard, which can be found here.

Looking over some of her old letters, Princess Twilight thinks of her adventures. One in particular struck her as odd. She ran with a theory and found evidence that implicates what seems like an otherwise innocent day of the week.

Queen Chrysalis, ruler of the Changeling Hives, feels a disturbance. Something unusual, something evil... something festive. It doesn't take her long to discover that the source of this dread is a pony holiday by the name of "Hearth's Warming Eve," and it takes even less time for her to decide what she has to do now: She must steal it.

Yes. The whole thing.

It took many long years and far more defeats than he'd care to admit, but at last—at long last—victory was finally within the great Ahuizotl's reach. Absolutely nothing, not even that meddlesome Daring Do, would be able to stand in his way any longer. Yet even with his arch nemesis facing her inevitable demise and the ultimate power literally in his grasp, he can't shake the feeling that he's forgotten about something.

One tiny, crucial detail. Something very important. As in, 'could easily ruin his plans if not attended to' important.

...

Eh, maybe he just left the oven on again.

Princess Changeling Rainbow Magic Pants, the beloved being from beyond Equestria's skies who also resides in a land flooded with magic much as if Starswirl the Bearded's basement was flooded, senses that Twilight Sparkle needs her help.

Now if only ponies would stop screaming or throwing up every time they laid eyes upon her.

Princess Changeling Rainbow Magic Pants created by TheShadowStone

When David volunteered to be part of a cryogenic experiment he thought he'd be at the forefront of human technology, spearheading research and development.

Unfortunately politics doesn't work that way.

Lucky for him, the science was solid... For ten thousand years.

AN: Don't take this seriously. Seriously don't. I don't.

Special thanks to my editor: Thornwing!

A-d-d-ditional Tags: Science Fiction, Parody, Waking Up In the Future, Equestria used to be Earth, Parity Bits, Things That Could Be Considered Irrelevant To The Premise And Is Only Used As Humour, Twi-bright, Kangaroos, Towels and Brawndo.

Rated teen for inappropriate scenarios. Well, lots of inappropriate scenarios. Now with 20% more Dark!

List of Side Stories:

The Story of the Equinos and Celestia
Twilight's Report
A Butterfly Bash
The Very Hungry Caterpillar

Unpublished Stories now available here.

I'll also keep the former list I made here:

The Story of the Gorlians and Equestria
Human Manual I
Equine Manual I
Why Emergencies Should Be Handled Calmly
Why Emergencies Should Be Handled Calmly II
Blue Pill
David's Nightmares
Robot Manticore Attack
The First Law
Discordant
A Dated Journal Entry
McQuestria
McQuestria II
To Touch The Stars

Stargazer, a perfectly normal Canterlot mare, goes to have a perfectly normal chat with Celestia about changelings. Purely for academic reasons, of course. Okay, so most of that was a lie.

But lies are the stock-in-trade of a changeling Infiltrator, and some habits can be hard to kick, so cut her some slack; besides, she just got married, and that can be stressful.

Especially since her new spouse is a pony.

(This story can be read stand-alone, but also serves as a sidestory. Click here for an explanation of how it fits in with other stories.)