Cimmerian stepped back into their current base at a brisk trot, yanking a small arrow out of his wings. The weapons of the thestrals weren't even that painful, it was the fact that he'd not been the only one getting hit. In the last few hours it had all gone to hell.
For whatever reason, the Nightmare had ordered her troops to attack everything in the city. This included other Nightmare supporters for some reason, leaving many of the groups with a Highlander attitude or thinking the Nightmare would bless those who were victorious. On the plus side, by showing himself in the middle of town he'd made himself a huge target and allowed many of the loyal thestrals to escape. That coupled with the fact that most of the Nightmare's bats were no longer being sneaky made things simpler. Then it had showed up.
As he was shielding himself from most of the small-arms fire(and by that he meant bows, crossbows and, very rarely, what sounded like a small cannon), a bolt of sickly pink magic had cut across the courtyard and slammed into his shield. . As his newest attacker stepped into the yard the alicorn was holding, a silence fell over the thestrals present.
"...well, are you going to say anything or are you going to attack me?"
The armored being moved forward, the smell of rot and death becoming more powerful the closer it came. It picked up a good bit of speed before its armor flared, the runed metal pulling Cimmerian's shield down to power itself. With a flash, the pony struck with a punch that released a portion of the energy it had stolen from the shield.
The alicorn shook his head as he rose from the rubble of a wall, his vision a little blurry and an ache in his chest from the impact.
"That...was new," he coughed, stepping back into the yard in time to see the armored pony charging at him again.
Cimmerian was vaguely tempted to throw one of his imperfect blades just to see what the unstable magic would do but decided against it, opting instead to make a wing-assisted leap and slam down on the pony's back.
It was unfortunately another mistake. The pony shifted itself slightly, moving forward and swinging its flank to the left in such a way that left it squarely underneath the dark alicorn. Undisturbed by the shattered pathway not a pace from its head, the being lashed out with two more empowered strikes. The first caught the dark alicorn in the back of his leg, causing a loud pop to echo before a spark of pain to shoot up his right foreleg. As he stumbled, the armored pony twisted onto its back and struck upward, throwing the alicorn into the roof of the cave.
Seeing nothing but stars at this point, he stared down from his current position blankly for a moment before shaking his head.
"...ow."
"Honestly, do I need to do everything for you?"
He looked up, or down and to the right at this point, to see his wife-friend-body-swapped whatever they were at this point hovering below him. She didn't look happy.
"You seem cross, though I can't quite place why."
"You just had your flank handed to you, that's why. You're an important pony, Cimmerian, you cant go around playing in the mud. Or stone."
"Aw, you're no fun," he slurred, chuckling as he shifted loose from the stone.
"Do you have a concussion? Again? You weren't even out of my sight for a day, Cimmerian. Why do you keep getting hit in the head."
"Because I'm tough," he said as he slipped free, only to be caught by the changeling. "That and I think the universe hates me. Which is odd because I've been doing a lot to keep myself on the positive side of karma."
"I'm fairly certain the powers that be made you an alicorn because you'd not survive as anything less," the mare sighed, carrying him lower and looking at his opponent. An armored unicorn who surprisingly wasn't firing spells at them.
"Drop me, I'm gonna kick his ass for that."
"I'll do no such thing. That pony isn't even alive," Din responded, drawing a few shocked gasps from her surroundings. "Oh don't tell me you can't tell. If the smell didn't give it away, the lack of spells should have. A dead unicorn has no magic."
"You will not stop the Nightmare!" One shouted, earning a few cheers even as a few of the others took a few steps from the field.
Din sighed, sticking a bit of adhesive to Cimmerian's back and reattaching him to the ceiling.
"Don't go anywhere."
"Don't worry, I'll just hang out here till you get back," he chuckled, kicking his dangling legs. He winced as he moved his right foreleg though, causing the queen to frown in concern.
"I'm not letting you go anywhere without a bodyguard from now on," she sighed.
"Technically, you took my bodyguard when you...yea, I'll be quiet."
Flitting down to the surface and ignoring the few thestrals that were making a run at her husband, as he'd quickly erected another shield once she was far enough away, she landed lightly before the armored unicorn and stepped closer to it.
She negligently used a burst of magic to bat away a thestral who was trying to sneak up on her, the pony's emotions giving away its position, and approached the unicorn. It turned to her and she felt a burst of...something attempting to push into her mind.
"An array? No, not quite."
"Din? You okay?"
"There's some magic, something I don't remember. It's..."
The unicorn suddenly screamed, a bloodcurdling shriek that tore into the soul of every being present. Pandinus jumped back, shouting in fear as the air nearby suddenly became bone-chilling. The armor was covered in a sheet of ice and even the stone under its hooves froze almost instantly.
Cimmerian looked down with renewed focus. The magic in the air was becoming dark, twisted.
'Smell of death, soul binding? If that's the case, then the soul would be put through agony and in that case two outcomes are possible. Shrieker or-
"Din, back up, Wendigo."
"Windigo? Aren't those things repelled by cooperation?"
"Wendigos are beings of hunger and ice, stay clear of it. It will try to eat anything and anyone!"
Din flew up out of the creatures reach and it gave another screaming roar before turning on the nearby thestrals. Before the nearest could fly away it was on them, tearing into a pony and beginning to eat the still weakly struggling thestral.
"How do you kill them?"
"I don't know, most of the stories had them as unstoppable beings of ice and terror! They're also supposed to be just that, stories!"
After a minute of staring at the rampaging monster, Cimmerian struck himself with a hoof.
"Din, you're linked to a mare who is right next to three of the oldest beings on the planet. Tell Twilight to ask the alicorns and Pulmonus about a Wendigo."
The queen took off, keeping clear of the creature as it continued feasting on the hapless thestral it had caught.
"She is...they keep asking if I mean Windigo, they don't know what a Wendigo is."
"So they're useless. Wonderful," Cimmerian sighed.
"It's an undead monster, how hard can it be to destroy?" Pandinus asked, charging her horn with magic. With a roar, she dove downwards, intent on smashing the monster into a paste.
<-(0)->
Night jumped as an explosion rocked the city behind her. It seemed her plan had worked for once.
'I don't exactly have an upstanding track record at the moment, do I?'
Perhaps it was the start of her recovery; the start of a return to some semblance of power. She may not be able to destroy everything at this point but she was finding herself uninterested in such a course of action. She was becoming attached to her own existence and her form. Not just in referring to it as hers, either. It was hard to explain but living...it somehow made her want to continue doing so.
"Your majesty, where would you have us go?"
She blinked out of her thoughts, looking to a few of the Nightmare thestrals. Some had markings on their armor or clothing, others had tattoes or dyes, but all carried her mark. A symbol of the slit pupil.
"We're going south west. There is a lot of unexplored land there, somewhere we can rebuild. I won't die in some last-ditch effort. If that alicorn can manage to turn a few cultists into an actual civilization, I expect you to be capable of at least matching this."
The thestral bowed, moving forward and leading her small entourage from the caves. It was a blow to her ego, seeing so few now bowing and scraping before her but it was what she had to work with. In some ways it was more than enough. Her followers were well supplied with things they'd scrounged, they were willing to follow her, and a few even had wilderness survival training. She had more than twice as much starting equipment. She'd just have to learn. Learn to use her body, her magic, and her new existence.
Looking over her purple coat she scowled. She needed to find a way to change the colors to something nicer. Maybe black? Yes, all black. Black coat, black mane, black tail. Even her mark would...be.
Night didn't scream, nor did she do more than slow slightly in her pace. The starburst mark that had adorned the flank of her body since before she had taken it was gone.
She stared at the blank space on her rear for another minute, trying to comprehend what had happened before turning back to the road. The mark was a sign to the world that the pony had found their calling, so if the soul the mark belonged to was no longer present...
'I hate ponies.'
Things were much too complicated. She sighed, remembering when she would just sit in the shadows and torment her host. Those were simpler times, a time when she likely wouldn't have even cared if she was discovered and destroyed. now though, the thought of being purged like that...
She would survive. If that alicorn could do so, she would do so as well. And she'd do it in relative comfort.
<-(0)->
Twilight slumped into a bed, her body burning in ways a pony form was incapable of understanding. The magic in her body was her lifeblood, and her lifeblood was burning through her form.
'Magic exhaustion as a changeling is exponentially worse than as a pony.'
"Done already, little princess?"
Twilight jumped, wincing as every muscle in her body protested the movement.
"D-discord. I, um, I'm sorry about-"
"Pshaw, that little trap? Seen its like and many others hundreds of times over the years. Good use of the interception array. That was a new one. Usually they try to set up a couple hundred of those or attempt to lead me into those. I don't think I've ever been forced into one before."
"You're...impressed? By my trap I locked you in?"
"Oh please, only the Elements have ever really stopped me. Traps like that are a nifty puzzle, rife with holes and flaws that are fun to find. It gives me something to do. After all, something new is infinitely more interesting than just wandering the countryside. It took me a good day to figure out how you'd managed to intercept my return teleport. Impressive considering I was coming in from another plane. Starswirl's mirror?"
"Uh, yes. I used the mirror's type of magic to specify what a dimensional breach felt like and then had to filter the style of magic. Since you're the only one using chaos magic that I've ever met even as a princess, I set it to check for that kind of magic being used and if it was, then the trap would activate and relocate your beacon. Then you'd teleport yourself where I wanted."
"Clever little pony. It makes me wonder why you still haven't figured out the game Pulmy's playing."
"Game?" Twilight asked, running the scenario through her mind again. She'd been asked to control drones, not a difficult prospect when you knew as much about the arrays as she did, but for some reason she just couldn't form a proper link with them. She'd even inspected them, going as far as to scan the drones for any modifications a mare with the title Flesh-Sculptor would be able to make. The drones were fairly simple, so simple that she realized the queen had created this clutch for the sole purpose of this training.
"I don't...it doesn't make sense, I know how this works, I know how a queen issues commands and I know the frequencies. I know more about changeling links than most changelings, and this is from Pandinus and Zelus. I just, I don't understand what's wrong."
Discord grinned his best 'I know something you don't' grin before raising a single talon.
"So is there something wrong with the drones you're attempting to control?"
"No. I couldn't find any modifications that would cause problems and Din had said there weren't any changes, that she knew what was wrong but wouldn't tell me."
"So something's wrong. You have confirmation but the issue isn't with the drones you're attempting to control. What's the other possibility?"
"Something's wrong with me?" Twilight asked. "Zelus and I worked on this drone together. There's nothing wrong with it."
Discord chuckled, leaning closer as his grin grew wider.
"I'm so close I'm saying the answer, aren't I?" Twilight asked, her expression flat. "I oversaw this drone's modifications...I know there weren't any changes to its connection to the hive. A different hive? No, the drones weren't even shielded, any queen could have ordered them."
Her horn lit up to conjure some paper and a quill but she gasped in pain, curling into a ball as her entire magic system protested the strain. When she managed to open her eyes again, she found an easel sitting before her bed.
"I wont give you anything more, Twiggles. It's up to you now."
She ignored the strange sound that came with the draconequus' teleport, though it did sound like an error sound from one of her first golems.
'Poor Doewin, I'm sorry I put your optical-sensor arrays on backwards.'
Twilight didn't even bother trying to lift the quill in her magic, resorting to mouth writing. She etched it as Discord had suggested; a problem. On one side was her, on the other was the drones. Between them she wrote the command. From the command sprouted the complex algorithms changelings used to communicate, though for them it was as simple as walking. A thought even. By the changeling drones she began etching all the details from age to the variance in their spinal structure from what she usually saw in drones. It wasn't enough to stop the drones from reacting to an order though, so she soon moved to the other end. To herself.
"Non-standard changeling drone. Increased capacity of...casting potential...reserves are increased to allow contact with friends and family, as well as increased emotional transmission range to allow dumping or, in an emergency, intake of emotions."
She scowled at her information. She needed more to find this issue. It was staring her in the face but she still couldn't see it.
"Age, weight, magical frequency, link frequency-which shouldn't matter since the drones were unshielded. I just..."
Twilight climbed back on her bed, staring at the now-filled easel of information. She was feeling sluggish though. Her mind wasn't picking up on it. She was in pain, her everything hurt, she just...
"I don't know..."
"What was that, hatchling?"
"I don't know. I don't know what I don't know. I'm missing it and I don't know what it is," Twilight admitted, curling up on the bed. She wouldn't cry. She was done crying, even though she'd failed another teacher and this one in less than a few days.
"Good. Because you can't learn if you already know everything. Now, what are you going to do to correct your deficiencies?"
Twilight blinked, looking through her hooves at the queen standing by her charts.
"Uh...books?"
"There are no records of this information. Sorry, little bookworm."
Twilight wanted to object, as she had tons of papers on the information in her labs. Then again, if she didn't know the issue in the first place, she may not have it written down. After all, it wasn't like she could just ask a changeling...oh.
"You?"
"Me what?"
"Would you teach me?"
Pulmonus cocked her head in mock curiosity.
"Is that a guess or a request?"
"Will you teach me what I'm doing wrong?" Twilight said, this time with a little more certainty in her voice.
"I'd be delighted to," she replied, grabbing a quill and dabbing it in ink. Under the figure of Twilight, she wrote a single word.
Drone.
Twilight stared at the word.
"I don't...."
"What kind of hive connection does a drone have?"
"A receptive..." she trailed off, her eyes widening.
"A receptive one, yes. A drone is different from a queen in more ways than just laying eggs, dear. If you're going to order drones, you need to change your connection type."
"But isn't that extremely invasive? Not to mention the amount of energy such a rework would take and I don't think I can do that sort of thing..."
"I will show you how to make a form with the proper connections. We'll use an egg and start from there, Heart will connect it to the hive you are bound to."
"Um, what eggs?"
Pulmonus opened a back-plate, revealing a few small changeling eggs.
"I will not ask you to do something without the proper resources. Even in the last test you had all that you needed, mainly, I was right there. All you needed to do was ask, hatchling."
"I...oh. I, I'm sorry, I've just become so used to being expected to figure things out on my own. I mean, even in ponyville my friends left things to me to figure out, so I thought that..."
"Your teachers in the school, aside from Celestia? They left you to teach yourself because you were so far ahead of others. They were unused to such a quick student. Queens learn quickly though, Twilight. I am quite accustomed to a student who excels. As I am used to teaching a single pupil. Listen to what I have to say, ask questions, do not allow nerves or squeamishness to stop you from asking. My daughters were all taught this- I never punished questions. I punished their lack of listening skills."
"Now, lets start with simple things," Pulmonus said, flipping the paper on the easel over and leaving her with a clean paper to work with. "The connection a queen has with her drones is not a simple one way street of orders. It is a complicated street of orders, reports, sensory information, requests for information, relevant memories, and backup, and even your personal opinion on a matter. There are even arguments between drones. These are dealt with quickly and by a queen or a drone appointed as her speaker and if a speaker is the deciding voice, the drones may ask the queen for her decision. Once the queen makes her decision, the matter is settled, as we cannot have these things fester. It does something to hives, makes them...fall apart. I've seen it happen a few times, so do not be afraid to put your hoof down."
"Another thing to remember is that you are not the end-all be-all of the hive. While a queen is necessary, you are not. Drones are capable of morphing if the need is great enough. While rare, a brutal or uninterested queen who does nothing will cause a drone to evolve to challenge her."
Twilight listened in rapt attention. She was too sore to take notes, but the queen was writing a lot of this down for her to study later. This was what she loved, what she lived for. A pure, unfiltered stream of new information.
Sitting on her bed in a borrowed body, Twilight Sparkle found herself in her element again. A lecture, new information, and friends who loved her.
Neither she nor her teacher noticed the slight shimmer of magic that flowed over her form, marking her new body as it once did her old one.