"That is the changeling inside of you." Chitter looked down at the four ponies, smiling a little at their limbs showing signs of their changes. Something seemed to relax in the changeling. "It might seem like it… I sort of remember feeling like it, but they aren't monsters. They are learning from you, connecting with you."
Vinyl's jaw almost dropped, the changeling seemed almost completely different, softer and nicer—she almost didn't want to say anything. "And it's changing us? It is… I am shorter now." She hated that aspect a little, but as usual the heat behind the negative emotion drained away. 'Ugh, this drug is annoying.'
"She doesn't have a choice." Waving a hoof, Chitter pointed at all four of the ponies. "They will grow a little inside you, but when they are freed of your body, they will become a perfect copy of you." He gestured at Vinyl. "Which means you will both end up as mares." He squinted when the target of his example snorted loudly. "Eat now, we are marching a long way today."
The tone-change surprised Vinyl a little, she couldn't help but take note of it. "Yeah, yeah. Let me get them all fed." She began funneling out magic-bowls of food for the three, and just dunked her own head into the bag. The oats were dry, of course, and while it filled a hollow feeling inside Vinyl, it did nothing to settle the cold feeling growing inside.
"Enough food, time to move." Chitter's words, punctuated by four groans, carried to the ponies forcing them to pull back from their meal. "You all walk today, no carrying." He marched out of the cave, not even bothering to see if he was being followed.
"Are you up to it, Sweetie Belle?" Apple Bloom turned to her friend, a worried look on her face. "We can…" She struggled against the command they had been given. "We can support you."
"Besides," Scootaloo pointed to Vinyl, now not quite as big, "I think our vampony friend hasn't gotten enough wubs. Look how she is shrinking."
Sweetie couldn't help but grin a little. "Maybe she got washed too much? Rarity complains when I wash her clothes and they end up smaller than when I started."
"I didn't shrink in the wash." Vinyl had to fight to keep the annoyed tone out of her voice. "And I am really not a vampony."
"Then why don't you have a shadow?" Sweetie Belle pointed at the ground under Vinyl.
"Reflections, Sweetie Belle. Vamponies don't have reflections." Apple Bloom rolled her eyes.
"It's dark in here." Vinyl spoke the words in shock, a little surprised that it was dark enough that no shadows could fall, but light enough to see reasonably well. "Of course I don't have a shadow in here, neither do you."
"She infected us!" Scootaloo squealed in mock-fear. "RUN!"
Rolling her eyes, Vinyl gave chase. 'I am only doing this to make sure they are okay. This totally isn't playing a game with them.'
~~~~~+++++~~~~~
"This is where you have a lunchtime nap." Chitter watched as three ponies yawned the moment he said it. "The more changed you are by the time we reach the hive, the easier your transition will be."
Vinyl snapped her mouth closed, biting back the nasty comment she had for the changeling. 'Sweet side, callous side. That means something, but I can't figure it out...' She looked at the three fillies, finding the height change disorientating. "So why am I smaller? What is going on?"
Chitter gave a chirping laugh. "There is a reason we take foals, rather than ponies." He made sure the four were trotting after him along the trail south. "All changelings start as nymphs."
"What's being a wimp got to do with it?" Scootaloo looked up at Chitter, starting to get a little confused by their mercurial changes in moods.
"He said 'nymph,' " Sweetie Belle replied. "A nymph is an immature insect." She beamed in delight at knowing the word. Then she frowned and looked to Vinyl. "Does this mean we are going to become young changelings?"
"All of you, yes." Chitter looked back to see Vinyl had stopped. "Curl up and sleep."
Vinyl's head spun at the implications. She stared ahead as if blind, but her hooves began to move—it was just too hard to keep from doing what he said. "But… I am an adult… I am a—" She cut off and trembled; her legs still trotted forward.
"You will shrink to about their size. See what comes of butting-in on others' business?" Chitter gave a grunt of self-approval. "If you had ignored us, everything would have been smooth, nopony would have been—"
"You foalnapped them!" Vinyl's confusion had a bare moment of becoming manifest before it faded, sluiced away by the drugs in her system. She frowned at the changeling, wanting to be angry, mad, at the very least mildly upset. "Girls, please cover your ears." She waited for the three fillies to dutifully cover their ears with their hooves. "You are a bucking horse-apple."
Two of the fillies' faces went as white as the third. All three stared at Vinyl. "I told you to cover your ears." It was the best she could come up with before everything started to tumble in around her. She sniffed loudly before the first sob came. "I was… I was getting married in a few months!" Three not-so-little-to-her forms clustered around Vinyl, their forelegs pulling her to a stop and hugging her.
Vinyl felt more tears come, more and more. She saw hopelessness in how effectively the changeling had taken control of their lives and, worse, she wasn't sure how long it would be before she was missed. Her legs folded under her and she was guided down to a soft landing by her three little supporters. 'Not so little...'
"No biting my—" Apple Bloom's words were cut short by a yawn. "No biting my neck, vampony." She smiled and nuzzled in against Vinyl, hearing the mare mumble something about not being a vampony.
Waking up immediately, Vinyl raised to a sitting position and looked around. Something strange had happened, however, she was Shining Armor again. "What is going on? Where are the fillies?"
"We are dreaming." The words felt odd, indistinct. The thing that confused Shining the most was that the word "we" was an amalgam of "we," "I," "you," and "me." A shape formed in the edge of Shining's vision, pulling his vision toward it. "We," the voice did the same thing again, "are not quite normal, are we?"
At the risk of going crazy by talking to himself, Shining shook his big head. "All my life I haven't been 'Normal.' I had to be Shining Armor, tough stallion, big brother, brave guard, captain of the guard." He snorted sharply. "Vinyl is—" No sooner had he said the name, than the other being walked toward him, looking just like Vinyl. "You aren't Vinyl Scratch, I am!"
"Vinyl is the mare you are inside, what you would be if you could be." Vinyl looked at Shining. "Okay, this is a little confusing."
"No!" Shining froze, those red-rimmed eyes looking into his own, something finally making sense to him. "You can be Vinyl, if it makes you comfortable." He shifted his plot a little on the ground. "You are inside me, aren't you? Okay, that was a stupid question."
"Vinyl has always been inside you, doofus." Vinyl grinned at Shining, although her voice wasn't doing the mixed pronouns anymore. "You have more questions, just ask." She lifted up a perfect hoof and booped Shining on the snout.
"You are me?" Shining couldn't help asking it, it was the first thing that came to him.
"Kinda. I can feel… up until I…" Vinyl grumbled something dire under her breath. "You would think I would know all about what I am, and what I am doing. All I know is that I am inside myself, doing horrible things to the only pony I know, and I can't stop it." Two powerful forelegs wrapped around her as the tears came.
Shining couldn't keep from comforting Vinyl, hugging that mare was something he had always dreamed of doing, of thanking her for being his escape. He held her close as she cried. "It's alright."
"No it's not. You didn't want this, I don't want this. Why do I have to hurt you?" Vinyl looked up at the stallion face she could remember seeing in a mirror for most of her/Shining's life. "And what am I doing to your head? You have to listen to that bug-butt? Ugh, if you could kick his plot, I say go with it and live with the consequences."
"Hey, just relax, Vinyl." Shining gave the mare another squeeze. "Life is sometimes not fair. Sometimes a pony is born a stallion who has a destiny of duty to princesses—"
"A hot princess." Vinyl couldn't help herself.
"One of them is very hot, yeah." He gave her another squeeze before loosening his grip a touch. "So then what are we going to do about it?" Shining looked Vinyl in the eyes, seeing they were now both perfectly blue.
"Whatever we can do, we do it together." Vinyl leaned up and nuzzled Shining's chin. "But if things ever get bad, and we have a choice to make, you save yourself."
"Vinyl?" The word was loud, cutting through the dream like a knife. "Vinyl? Wake up!"
Shining had a moment of confusion before he was Vinyl again, lifting a groggy head up. "Ugh, Cady, it's too early…"
"Vampony," Apple Bloom used the word that would snap the nice mare back to the present, "we have to get up and start moving. The High-Lord Stink-bug said so."
The words had the desired effect, Vinyl was pulled back to the present, the strange dream fading from her mind. "What? Lord…" Vinyl fished for a suitable insult, "chirpy-pants, is demanding we do something? Amazing!" She reached a black, hole-filled hoof up to rub Apple Bloom's mane. "How did you sleep? Meet a new friend?"
"How did you…" Apple Bloom blinked. "You dreamed of yours, too?" She watched Vinyl nod. "So I guess even a vampony can be affected by these things." She laughed and dodged the weak hoof, swinging at her head. "Help girls, the vampony is after me!"
Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo jerked awake, each trying to make sense of their friend hiding behind them, while Vinyl, now smaller still, seemed intent on catching her.
"I am not a vampony! I was only telling you that to distract you from Prince Ant-Plot!" Vinyl couldn't keep the giggle out of her voice, and spotted each of the fillies—the bigger than before fillies—laugh too. "That's it, I am going to scare the wubs out of you!"
Three shrieks and a laugh cut through the peaceful countryside, as the four chased each other around until a voice cut through their play. "Stop, keep quiet." Chitter almost snarled at the display. "We are supposed to be sneaking to the badlands, not playing."
Vinyl looked at the changeling, then back to the fillies she had been playing with. 'Playing, really playing. They are cute and adorable, and don't deserve what is happening either.' Leveling her head, looking up at the changeling, she blew a raspberry.
Giggles and soft laughter rang in peals from Apple Bloom, Sweetie Bell, and Scootaloo. All three had been given a few moments when they didn't have to think about what was wrong.
At last, Apple Bloom got her giggles under control and reached out a hoof to Vinyl. "Come on, vampony, we have a long way to trot."
Vinyl blinked at the filly, a sense of relaxation coming over her. "Yeah, we do." Not waiting to be told, not making the changeling force them to walk, was oddly freeing. She trotted up to the fillies, now significantly less "filly sized" compared to her, and as one they began to trot south.
The tension in Chitter's head eased again, his urgent need to keep the ponies moving sated without him having to give an order. He couldn't keep from smiling a little too, but for different reasons to the ponies. "Not far now, just two days or so."