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// Chapter 4: New Home, New Names: 
// Story: The Cutie Mark Crusaders and the Change Brothers 
// by Nikolas 
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None of them knew how long they maintained the hug. This, however, was not relevant to them. For them, in that moment was the most important thing to provide comfort to the sobbing trio.

Finally, the three brothers’ tears dried up and slowly unfolded themselves from the embrace. Then everypony in the hut tried to pull themselves together from the emotionally cavalcade earlier.

The next few minutes passed with quiet thinking, everypony was trying to figure out something to relieve the tension.

"Sorry, we don’t..." began haltingly Sweetie Belle,but the brown colt broke:"You don’t need to apologize. Although it was not easy to reveal all of this, but I think you were right. Let out all of this was as if a weight had been lifted from our shoulders. Thank you for this."

"Oh, it's nothing." Said the white coated filly.

Following this statement the awkward silence returned. But soon, the green changeling came up with an important question:

"Now that you know everything, what's going to happen with us?" Asked the colt gesturing towards himself and his brothers.

After a few quiet moments Scootaloo spoke: "I can not talk in the name of my friends, but as for me, welcome in Equestria!" Then she gave them a wide smile.

"Scootlaoo is right, after what you had went through you at least deserve a chance." Said the unicorn filly, her face too was adorned with a smile.

The trio's attention thereafter was focused on Apple Bloom,who still has not gave her opinion. After taking a deep breath she began:

"I can not imagine how hard the decision was for you to come here, leaving everything what you known behind. As an Apple, I promise to do my best, to help you find a real home here in Equestria!" Said the Apple filly her own smile graced her face.

"You little colts are welcome, since there is no where for you to be stay I am glad to offer you my home." Said Zecora to the three colts with an encouraging smile.

The three changelings smiled as well, then slowly got up and the three of them went to the Crusaders and the zebra and the green colt said: "Thank you for everything, we can never repay you enough what you had done for us."

"You should not move yet, your injuries are still severeneed time to heal." Said Sweetie Belle worriedly.

Now the blonde spoke: "Thank you, but you don’t need to worry, thanks to the kindness and love what you gave us the worst of our injuries had already gone."

"What do you mean?" Asked Scootaloo not really understanding what he had meant.

The cyan maned colt responded to this: "When you was comforted us, the love flooded from you, literally. It was to us as if we inhaled the food, what you were putting to us on a plate. From this our healing had accelerated." Said he uncertainly, how the four of them will react to this.

"Don’t worry!" Interjected quickly the brown changeling, ahead of a possible misunderstanding: "We did not sucked the love out of you, the kindness what you showed toward us just simply flooded from you. We didn’t had to do anything, we just extracted the love what you emitted, from the air."

"As my brother said, as if you have been put out some food on a plate, we were simply taken up this food from the plate. We don’t take away the love with force from the ponies who we met.We just take up the positive energys, that others have emitted into the air."

From this the three filly relaxed, while Zecora seemed unchanged as if she already would’ve knew about this.

Taking advantage of the silence Apple Bloom spoke: "Now that we clarified this, we have some things that we must to take care of."

After getting the colts’ curious glances, she continued:"Scootaloo had right. You will need some new names if you want to fit in, names that not only disguise you, but what you can recognize as your own."

Everypony thought about this for a moment, then the trio nodded (again in sync), and the green coated colt said: "Hmmm, that sounds good, but i don’t think that we would be able to come up with something useful. Any suggestions?"

The three fillies to this began to quickly thinking, while Zecora quietly watched the unfolding events.

Finally Scootaloo was the first who come up with a name. She turned to the cyan maned colt and slowly started:

"How about, if from now on we would call you to Leaf?" After she spoke she watched the colt, waiting for his reaction.

He for a few moments seemed to thinks, then finally said: "Hmmm, that sounds pretty good! From today, call me to Leaf!" When he uttered the name he thrilled for a moment, then smiled broadly.

From this Scootaloo seemed to relaxing, then sighed, unconsciously held back her breath.

Apple Bloom after watching the blonde colt for a few more seconds, soon said:

"What do you would say, if we would call you to Wood. I think it suits to you, because you are looks so strong as an oak tree."

The colt had thinked a little, then he smiled and said: "Hmm… Wood, i like it! Okay, since now my name is Wood!"

Sweetie thought for the longest, while the quietest among the brothers curiously watched her.At first it seemed that she can’t find a good name. Finally, her face brightened up and she said excitedly: "How about Silver! Your mane looks as if it were made out of silver!"

The black changeling colt silently thought for a full minute, his face unreadable.

Then a soft, shy voice said one single word: "Silver."

Then, the newly appointed Silver nodded in confirmation.

All three colts thrilled a bit, when they pronounced their new names, but then they seemed all very happy.

Apple Bloom slowly walked to the brown-coated colt, and discreetly asked: "May I ask, why is Silver so quiet?At first I thought that for some reason he can not speak, but now I don’t know what to think."

Despite that she tried to being discreet, the others also heard the question, turning towards the two.

The newly appointed Wood slowly said: "While it was a hard decision for all of us, it was the hardest to Silver, when we left the hive.Since he is the eldest among us, they put a lot of pressure on him and it was to him the hardest to break the connection with the hive mind and with our "family". "

Here, he had casted a worried look toward his brother, then took a deep breath and continued: "The lot of expectation and responsibility, and the separation was emotionally very hard to him. Since that Silver has been withdrawn and quiet, he only rarely communicated with words."

From this the black changeling had saddened a bit, but quickly organizd his facial features.

Then silence returned, although it was not so awkward.Suddenly Scootaloo ran to the window, and a little frightened, turned to her friends and said: "The sun is about to go down. If wenot get home before evening, we'll be grounded forever!"

Her two friends at this also became nervous, they knew, that if they don’t get back to Ponyville in time, they will never hear the end of the show, what their sisters will give to them.

After some precipitance the three fillies were all at the door, opposite them was the three changeling brothers and Zecora.

Sweetie Belle said:"Now we have to go, but we promise to meet again as soon as possible." She finished it with a smile.

"We can not wait!" Said Wood, and now all three returned to their pony shape. All three of them had a smile on their faces.

Suddenly Scootaloo said: "Hey, I thought that you should have a name as a group. We are the Cutie Mark Crusaders.I thought you should need a groupname too."

For this all the colts and fillies thinked, before Apple Bloom with a radiant smile said: "I have an idea! You could be the Change Brothers. You could use this as a last name."

After some hesitation the green colt excitedly exclaimed: "It's a fantastic name, I like it! Hmmm,Leaf Change!Yes, it's very good!" The other two disguised changeling had agreed, although somewhat more restrained.

"Goodbye, my little friends, i wish that your way to home well ends." Rhymed Zecora.

The Cutie Mark Crusaders said their farewells as well, then they started galopping into the woods.
When the three fillies was no longer be visible, the three young colts and the zebra returned into the hut.





The Cutie Mark Crusaders were able to get home before nightfall, but also they were given a thorough wigging for why did they were out so long.

But fortunately no one was grounded and even more fortunate that no one asked why they had came home so late. It happened earlier, when the fillies crusaded, that they didn’t noticed the passing of time.

Finally, all three of them went to bed peacefully after a long day and quickly fell asleep.

Then the new dawn of a new day has come andafter the usual morning preparations CMC went to the Ponyville Schoolhouse. Most of the forenoon went eventless, then came the lunch break.

At the moment, while the three fillies enjoyed their lunch, they pondered what to do after school.

"I think we should go and cheking them!" Scootaloo stated firmly.

"Are you sure that this is a good idea? I mean, they just recently arrived, we should’ve not give them some time to get used to the vicinity?" Asked Sweetie.

"That's why we should go, the best way to help them to get comfortable, if they have company."Answered Scootaloo, protecting her opinion.

"There is truth in your words Scoot’s,'' began Apple Bloom: "but we must be careful. Sooner or later, the ponies will notice if we go every day into the Everfree Forest."

"Now the least they don’t need, that we direct the attention to them." said the yellow filly.

But before they could continue the conversation, an annoying voice was heard:"Look Silver Spoon! The Cutie Markless Crusaders! What are you thinking about, that today what kind of lame idea will you try to getyour cutie marks,while the only thing you will get is, that you will be enveloped in sap?"Diamond Tiara asked mockingly, the school’s resident bully with her companion Silver Spoon.

The crusaders had just sullenly stared at the two mean fillies. Normally, they'd (especially Scootaloo) would’ve started to come up with a biting response.

But despite what most people assumed about them, they were not foalish. Altough they would happily told the theirs to the two snob fillies, they didn’t want to risk that accidentally reveal their new friends during the hassle.

So the only thing that they did was, that angrily stare at the two bullies, while trying to keep their mouths shut, which at that moment felt really difficult.

The two yet made some attempts to annoy the trio, but after they didn’t show any reaction beyond the stares (at least any visible), they got bored and moved on. "Argh! I hate those two snobs!" Seethed Scootaloo as quietly as she could.

"I understand Scootaloo, but we must be careful, now is the last thing we need is that they come up with something ugly and in the end they reveal the guys." Said Apple Bloom trying to calming down her friend.

At this the other two could not do anything else than to nod. Then quietly they ate the rest of their lunch before returned into the classroom.





After school ended the Cutie Mark Crusaders, after some pondering, decided that they don’t want to make their three new friends thinks, that they had forgotten their promise to visit them.

After they had told to Rarity, who was very busy working on her last fashion line, that they go to visit Zecora, the three fillies quickly started into the forest,however taking care to be as quiet as possible (they did not want to repeat the yesterday's little adventure with the manticore). Finally they successfully reached the zebra’s home.

In most of the afternoon, the six younglings mostly spent the time to talking about all sorts of topics.First, they tried to make a plan for their visits, making it enough random so they don’t direct their families’ or their friends’ suspicions onto themselves. Finally, they decided that on the school days, two or three times at a week they will visit their changeling friends. The weekends were uncertain, but if they had some time they would come to visiting them.

Then they began to talk about less important things. At the beginning of the conversation turned out, that Scootaloo and Leaf will get along well. They both liked extreme sports and they both tried to not show „soft” emotions.It also turned out that both of them were terribly stubborn and tempered.

In this light, it was not too surprising that their conversation topics mostly were about sports and the things that they found "awesome".

But they were not the only ones who find common topics. Apple Bloom chatted pleasantly with Wood. It turned out that they had a reason why they were disguised as different ponies, it came to light that they chosed that pony race’s form, what the best fit to their attributes.

They also learned that Wood is quite intelligent and kind, as well as an open and a bit self-confident.One of his character flaws, was that he was perhaps a little too confident, but he would never let it to endanger his brothers.

Sweetie in meanwhile tried to help Silver in his confidence problems. Gently talked to him about all sorts of trifleand although he only nodded in response, theblack changeling colt just seemed to enjoy the company of the white unicorn filly.

The crusaders talked to them about their families, about Ponyville, how they were trying to find their special talents, and all kinds of strange things that they experienced in Ponyville.

In exchange the Change Brothers told about the places that they visited.As it turned out they wentat quite a few places: to Fillydelphia, to Manehattan, to Vanhoover, to Baltimare and even into Appleloosa.They told about the lovely ponies, they met and the things they saw.

Zecora thankfully reminded the fillies to the time, so they would have time to get home before sunset.

As the bedtime came and they started to fell asleep, despite the uncertain future one thing they knew for sure, from now the things will become more "interesting".