//------------------------------// // Chapter Four: Of Changeling Sheep // Story: My Little Bug Pony // by Liarra Sniffles //------------------------------// It's not clop, I don't even have any coconuts. ~ Liarra Sniffles 'This waking up business is the bees knees.' Maline's eyelids slowly rose, refusing to open fully without some coercion from a dark finger. 'Huh, that's odd. I could have sworn I fell asleep in the pod.' Maline noted the large blue bed she was currently seated in, thinking about it, she didn't feel any of the dull aches that she had fallen asleep with after her impromptu game of pod wrestling. Looking around the room she found herself in, she took in the strange decor. The tall room had a strong night-time theme, little moons and stars decorating every one of the many bits of fabric hanging from various spots on the walls and ceiling. Even the dark blue bed cover had rows and rows of golden moons around the edges, the body of the thing being filled with specks probably representing stars. 'Where am I, how did I get here and where is Wispy.' Maline's heart-rate rose when she spotted the view from an open door leading onto a balcony; an endless black expanse of nothing. It was as if this room was the entire universe, but she had just gotten used to the idea of the entire universe not being endless green goo, why did everything have to turn on its head again now of all times. 'Speaking of head, what got into me last night. Suddenly getting frisky doesn't seem entirely right, despite how cute the little bug is.' It was true, while she had technically spent the majority of her life thinking about and ogling at her cute friend, the thought of actually getting down with the bug hadn't occurred to her until she had suggested it. 'Perhaps this is another one of those things that jostled free, although being a horny-ling doesn't entirely sit right with me. I'll have to ask about changeling libido when I find my way back to the hive.' Remaining surprisingly calm about finding herself in a strange place, it had happened already after all, Maline peeled the blankets from the bed and made her way to the edge. Several loud cracks rang out in the silence as she stretched her back, arms and neck. Giving a satisfied sigh she wandered towards the large gold and blue doors and pushed, giving a light grunt at the force required to open them. While the room had many knickknacks and objects to look at, she couldn't focus on any of them enough to identify what they were, it was almost as though the world wanted her to know they where there, but not what they are. The hallway outside was wide and clean, the white marble floors shining as the moonlight beamed down from on high, glistening through large skylights in almost visible beams. More banners and fabrics adorned the walls, the moon theme continuing throughout. Turning to the right Maline padded down the hall, her bare feet only making slight slapping sounds despite the lack of a carpet. Several turns and a lot of empty hallway later, she came to a much larger, more impressive door. This time the decoration was different, only half of the door having a moon theme, while the other half had a sun theme, the two meeting in the middle perfectly. If Maline had more than a rudimentary understanding of design, she would have marvelled at the magnificent door, instead she only hesitated briefly before pushing one side open. The room she found herself in was much larger and higher than the high walls of the hallways, huge marble pillars ran the length of the room, the door she had opened seemingly only a side entrance between two of said columns. A large red carpet ran from a massive gold door to her left, all the way to an equally impressive golden throne to her right, the room seemed to emit a feeling of power and security. On the sides of the room she spotted several tall stained glass windows, each depicting some scene of what looked like ponies, Maline didn't recognise any of them from the brief description of the pony race she had been given so far. "Impressive is it not? My sister always did enjoy her grand architecture." A loud voice boomed from the hitherto unnoticed figure on the throne, though how she had missed the large blue alicorn Maline couldn't say. Maline carefully approached the pony, taking in the details of the deep blue pony. Her hair being her most striking feature, it seemed to float gently in an invisible breeze and appeared to be filled with stars. They shared their stares for a time, before the pony continued speaking. "Our name is Princes Luna, we are the guardian of dreams and keeper of the moon. What art thou and what am I to call thee?" 'Princess Luna' pointed her hoof at Maline, who had finally made it to the foot of the throne. "My name is Sweet Tourmaline, and I do not know what I was but I am now a changeling." It was the best she could do given her rather unique circumstances, unless she wanted to christen her previous race herself. Her response gave the princess pause, her brow furrowing at the mention of changelings. "We would call thee a deceiver were it not for your form, nopony can hide their true form in this place of dreams without far more power than thou possesses." Maline felt a tad insulted by the princesses blunt delivery, but she did not object. "Thou art the first changeling to ever visit my realm, prove to us the validity of thine claims with changeling magic." Luna's hoof made a slight 'clop' as she placed it back on the ground, her expression morphing into an expectant one. Maline blushed. So far the only magic she had learned of any kind was a simple transformation spell, although Wispy insisted that changeling transformations were far deeper than a spell. 'That transformation definitely went deeper than I was expecting.' Unfortunately, Wispy had only spared the time to teach Maline the very basics of the basics, only needing one specific part to be changed for what she had wanted when they had decided to swap after the first two hours. 'But, Luna is royalty if her wings and horn are anything to go by, so I should probably obey her commands.' Confound these traitor cheeks and the blood rushing to them. "Yes, your highness." Closing her eyes with a slight nod, Maline focused like she had been taught. Feeling around for the pulse of her heart, she latched on to the warmth within. Wispy hadn't really explained how this worked, other than the fact that a changeling needn't 'channel magic' once the transformation was complete like a pony spell, else how would they sleep in disguise?! Instead the magic was burned figuratively and literally as fire spread from her heart, flowing down to her toes before bursting out and briefly covered her form from bottom to top. The hard part was focusing on the changes she wanted, a lack of focus would lead to a lack of changes. Wispy being an ex-gatherer could probably focus her mind on an entire pony at once, everything from the colours of each area of hair to the specific tubing of their insides at once. That level of focus intimidated Maline slightly, like being able to focus on every brush stroke in a painting at once. Luckily for her, smaller changes to her base form were actually quite easy as long as she knew how the parts in question worked well enough to replicate them, like making a biological model of a working body part in her mind. Despite the feeling of hours passing due to the concentration required, the whole ordeal was over in a moment. Green fire erupted from below her and raced to the tip of her horn with a gentle 'whoosh'. The sudden increase in weight on her front told Maline that she had been successful, but she stole a glance down at her new extremity to make sure it looked correct before returning her eyes to Luna. For her part, Luna's eyes had grown wide and a blush appeared on her cheeks. "Ahem, that is quite proof enough, thank you." Despite sounding embarrassed, Maline noted that the night alicorn did not avert her gaze from Maline's new equipment until the fire rushed over her again, removing it completely. "Wait a minute, this is a dream right?" Luna could almost hear the sound of a light coming on inside the strange changeling's head. ==== Wispy awoke with a start, Maline's big blue eyes intently staring into her own as they floated in the pod. Shaking off her fright at the unexpected sight, she stared intently back into the luminous portals. Finding herself unable to tear her gaze away, Wispy felt she could stare into those eyes for hours. So she did. After a good hour of staring, Wispy determined that Maline was actually still asleep. It wasn't that uncommon for someone to sleep with their eyes open, if Maline's eyes were not so enrapturing to stare at, her thousand mile stare would have been unnerving. Finding her thoughts waxing poetic, she attempted to put into thought how Maline's eyes made her feel. Not being a particularly creative creature, this venture was probably doomed to fail. 'It's like staring into the eyes of the world, and having the world stare back. A calming embrace on the soul, as though one can see the many ways she wishes to express her love forming just under the surface. I really like her eyes?' A snort sent some bubbles up from her snout, perhaps she should leave the poetry to someone with a bit more experience than her. After all, the most poetry Wispy had been exposed to was one noble in particular who had insisted on quoting some famous pony playwright while they bucked in the back of his coach. 'Speaking of bucking, I would never have pegged Maline as such a willing partner from her somewhat reserved demeanour.' While it was true that the tall beauty had been radiating love charged pheromones like an aphrodisiac scented candle, she hadn't felt anything but love from Maline until she had offered to show her the ways of her people. The sudden change from seemingly unflappable interrogation to inexperienced but incredibly enthusiastic lover caught the little changeling off guard. Perhaps there was more to the pheromones than she had first thought? The idea of becoming more than just a friend with Maline brought a soft smile to her face, there hadn't been a real lasting relationship between the changelings in the hive in decades at least. Chrysalis seemed to prefer her subjects to be little more than independent servants, mere extensions of her will and nothing more. As such, her hive had gradually shifted from a large family to a collection of allies in arms, loyal to a fault to each other and the queen but lacking much in the way of a social ecosystem within the hive. Happily the queen had not seen fit to stop allowing new drones independent thought like some queens in the past had done, she may have been the most strict and feared leader in a thousand years, but even she would not stoop so low. Wispy didn't know if the queen thought of them all as her children or her subjects more, while her previous actions such as letting most drones name themselves (often leading to drones named after the first thing they could say in common) made the latter seem more likely, Wispy had sensed something from the queen when dealing with Maline. While she wouldn't jump to any conclusions, it did seem like the queen had felt something more than just another drone around Maline. Then again, how often does a strange changeling produce more love than even the alicorn of love, Maline truly is a special case. Of course, she didn't know if Maline really did think of her as much more than a friend, it might just be how stuffed full of love she was right now talking when she thought of her recent exploits. Even now, while she was still asleep, Maline was sending enough love to feed the hive for weeks out constantly. Closing her eyes in concentration Wispy could feel her fellow changelings helping themselves to bits of love every few seconds or so, visualising it as a massive wave of rapidly dispersing love being pulled in different directions slightly as someling went for a nibble. Wispy shivered at the thought, what must it feel like to have hundreds of changelings nibbling at your love from further than your eyes can see in every direction, the nature of love meaning that sharing among changelings was usually a far more intimate affair than that. Wispy was snapped from her thoughts by Maline, her tall friend seemed to have woken up if her investigation of their surroundings was anything to go by. Wispy felt arms around her sides and back as she was pulled into a proper hug. If she had to be honest, Wispy was quite jealous of Maline's body, her arms and legs seemed perfectly designed to hug and scratch at all the right spots on a pony. 'Maybe I ought to test the waters a little.' Wispy nervously nuzzled at Maline to get her attention, the goo they floated in stopping them from speaking in the common lang' as Maline did not yet understand the vibrating wings that most changelings conversed with. Reaching forward to plant a kiss onto Maline's lips, she noted with satisfaction that she was not repelled. For her part, Maline was slightly confused. They had shared many kisses and much more the previous night, but something was different about this one. That is, it seemed like her bug friend was a bit overloaded on love if the dopey smile was anything to go by. She decided that cuddly Wispy was better than horny Wispy. Maline idly wondered if it was normal for changelings to move so quickly, it was only her second day alive and she had already been propositioned by one of the only three individuals whom she could even name, assuming the mare in her dreams was as real as she claimed to be. Not only that, but she had gotten extremely intimate with Wispy after mere hours of existing. Some part of her was telling her that there was a proper process to these things, and that rushing right to the good stuff would only lead to heartbreak, but as she didn't yet know how or if a heart could break Maline decided that she was just being overly dramatic. Pushing Wispy from her embrace, so that she could actually talk to the changeling if nothing else, Maline half pulled half swam her way to the edge of the pod and slid her leg out. Unlike her first pod, this one had very soft edges, Maline was unsure how it kept the contents inside but allowed users to simply slide in and our without spilling everywhere. Turning back to grab the changeling she pulled Wispy out with her, it seemed strange that the changelings had more trouble navigating inside a pod designed for them than she did, but it didn't seem important enough to bring up at the moment. "Did you have sweet dreams?" Maline asked while she performed her usual stretches, Wispy cringing slightly at the loud popping sounds coming from the girl's spine. "Changelings don't dream Maline." Was all the response she could muster, something kept her from meeting Maline's eyes, causing the girl to frown slightly. "I guess that confirms that I was not a changeling then, as I not only dreamed but I met with someone calling themselves 'princess Luna'." The shocked silence was broken by Maline continuing when it appeared that Wispy was not going to respond. "We talked of many things and she told me quite a lot about the ponies. She expressed a desire to meet me 'in the pony', I promised to ask the queen if it could be arranged." Again she was met with nothing but silence at this, Wispy's only move being the gentle opening and closing of her mouth, like a fish out of water. "She seemed nice enough, although her mannerisms were a little odd." Finishing her story to find the changeling still stationary, Maline waved her hand in front of the silent changeling, getting no reaction out of the stunned bug. "Wispy? Hello are you-" Wispy interrupted her with a thunk as she passed to the floor in a dead faint, her limbs splayed around her haphazardly like a puppet with its strings cut. Placing her fingers around the back of her neck and head, Maline gently lifted Wispy's face at look into her eyes, the somewhat amusing expression still frozen on her face. "Uh-oh, I better see Chrysalis."