Screams. From where he stood on the balcony just outside of Princess Luna’s personal bedroom, the screams of thousands of innocent ponies being attacked, subdued, and imprisoned by the Changelings was all that Thorax could hear. There wasn’t even the sound of spells going off in retaliation, as the Royal Guard had lost all of their organization not long after Celestia had been taken down. They had crumbled and been subdued, and now, barely twenty minutes later, the civilians were unable to offer any meaningful resistance and their Princesses had both been captured and entrapped in the throne room of the castle; with Queen Chrysalis. And so, with all of their hopes crushed, the ponies did the only thing they could... they screamed.
It was the worst thing Thorax had ever heard. It made his chitin crawl and his wings buzz in agitation. He screwed his eyes shut and drove a hoof into the stone floor beneath him with a frustrated growl. He hated this. He hated this! He wanted nothing more than for all of this senseless violence to just stop!
But there was nothing he could do about it. He was just a lowly, stupid infiltrator drone. He didn’t have power, he didn’t have allies and he didn’t get any sympathy from the other drones. His eyes slowly slid open, his ears folding back against his head as he heaved a sigh. This was his lot. He could either accept his place and live with it or turn his back on the hive and be little more than a snack for the queen.
His eyes wandered the streets of Canterlot far below, sorrowfully observing his fellow drones hunting down every pony in the city, pinning them down and encasing them in those revolting green pods. They were chasing families… foals… Thorax gulped heavily and turned around to trot back into Luna’s room. As he did so, green fire slowly began to appear on his body, burning away the image of Thorax and replacing it with that of Squall Dreamer. He stopped part way in and looked at the tall mirror that rested next to the bed.
He heard the screams outside, including the crying of a filly.
“No,” Thorax said to himself through grit teeth. He turned and trotted back out onto the balcony. “I won’t be a part of this anymore…” spreading his fake bat-wings wide, he stepped off of the balcony and glided down into the city for one very specific home.
On one of the many streets of Canterlot where most of the ponies had already been entrapped, a patrol of three changeling drones stalked along, eyeing each house as they went with scrutiny, looking for any strays to add to the harvest. “Let’s check this one!” One drone called out to the rest of his team as they passed by one such house, a small, modest place. “I don’t think anyone’s gone in here yet.”
The other two changelings he was with nodded and the smaller of the two went to the door. Unsurprisingly, it was locked. “Gah! It’s locked!” he seethed through gritted teeth. The third, who was notably taller and burlier, stepped towards the door and pushed him aside.
“I got it,” he said before lowering his head and charging the door. Cracks appeared along the wooden surface on impact, and a high pitched scream came from the other side of the barrier. “Looks like we’ve got another one!” the big drone grinned before stepping back and ramming the door again. This time, it splintered and came off of its hinges.
“LEAVE ME ALONE!” The only current occupant of the building, a little green thestral filly, screamed. She stood in the farthest corner of the first room, huddled down under a table. Tears were in her eyes and she was hyperventilating. “GO AWAY!”
The big drone chuckled while entering the house. “Not a chance. Come here!”
“HELP ME!” The filly cried out, closing her eyes and covering her face with her hooves while the drone shot towards her. The table she hid under was lifted and toppled to one side before the hard, chitin-covered hooves on the drone came down and picked her up her.
“Hold still, you stupid thing!” the drone growled while his horn lit up, the filly kicking and screaming frantically against him.
“SQUALL! HEEELP!”
The Drone grunted with effort one more time before a cry of pain left his mouth. The filly had just bitten his foreleg. He recoiled and dropped her, growling in anger while she scampered away. “You little-”
The drone’s cut off when a gray blur shot through the door and tackled him. He shouted in surprise and lit up his horn to counter, but he never got the chance. The pony that had just tackled him drove a hoof into his gut, making him double over with the breath leaving his lungs. The pony then, with a growl of anger, struck him in the back of the head, knocking him down and out cold. For a moment, everything was still and silent within the house.
“Squall!” The filly squaled, hurling herself at her big brother and wrapping her forelegs around his shoulder in a tight hug. “Oh, thank goodness! You came for me! I knew you would!”
Squall’s ears folded back a little, but he nodded and returned the hug gratefully. “Sorry I took so long, Whisper. Are you okay?” he asked, looking her over uneasily.
“No. The bug thingy didn’t get a chance to do anything bad to me. I bit him, just like you told me to do if somepony ever tried to take me away!” Wind Whisper replied, looking like she was proud of yourself.
Squall blinked in surprise, then chuckled lightly. “Okay, nice work. Now come on, we have to get out of here,” he said before moving Whisper until she was resting on his back and then began to trot for the door.
“But what about the Princesses?” Whisper asked worriedly. “Isn’t it your job to protect them?”
Squall stopped in the door and heaved a heavy sigh. “...I failed to protect Luna, Wind. She’s gone, and so is Princess Celestia. But I am not going to fail to protect you.” he explained before poking his head out of the house and looking both ways. Laying on the ground just outside of the door were the two changelings that had been with the burly one, both housing large bruises on the backs of their heads.
“But…”
“But nothing… Okay… okay, looks clear. Keep quiet, alright?”
“Okay…” Whisper nodded from his back and held on tight, wrapping her little forehooves around his neck. Squall took a long breath to calm himself, then broke into the fastest gallop he could muster down the street. He went straight for a good block or two before noticing the shadows of more changelings being cast along the road. Grunting, Squall stopped and hooked a sharp right into a narrow alley.
“Are we going to be okay?” Wind asked quietly from Squall’s back, shifting slightly.
“Yeah, if I have anything to say about it,” he replied while slowing his gallop down to a canter so he could more easily listen to their surroundings. “Okay… ah… I think I can get us to the city wall from here without leaving the alleys. Keep your ears peeled, okay? I don’t want any of these things sneaking up on us.”
“Alright,” Wind nodded and perked her ears up, listening carefully to their surroundings as they went deeper and deeper into the alleys. From here, the screams in the city were muffled and distant, not to mention they were growing quieter all the time.
After a few minutes, there was movement. A few rats scampered out from under an old and discarded piece of cardboard that was leaning against the wall of a building. Squall jumped back a little as they ran by, barely able to keep a startled yelp from escaping his lungs. As the rats vanished around a corner, Squall let a small laugh slip out of his mouth before he focused and kept moving.
Finally, after what felt like an eternity of sneaking and listening, they managed to reach the city wall. It was tall, rising well above the tops of even the tallest buildings in this part of the city. Squall eyed it hesitantly before peering back out into the sky over the city. There was still a lot of changelings up there, zipping around and looking for any stragglers they could catch.
“...They might see us if I fly…” he muttered weakly, glancing back to the filly on his back. “But it’s our only option. Are you ready?”
“I’m scared, Dreamy…” Wind whimpered shakily in response and buried her face in his neck. Squall tensed and reached a forehoof up to pat what he could reach of her mane, trying to comfort her as well as he could.
“I know, Wind, I know. I’m scared, too… alright, hold on tight and don’t let go. I’m going to fly us over the wall,” he said to her gently before unfolding his wings and giving them an experimental flap. “We’re going to be fine, I promise.”
Wind Whisper nodded and tightened her grip around his neck with a very faint ‘mm-hmm’ sounding from her throat.
Nodding to himself and taking a deep breath, Squall crouched low and then shot into the air with a flap of his wings. With the cover of the alley gone, they would be really easy to spot if any changelings looked their way. Squall rotated in the air to check and see if they had any pursuers. Thankfully, they seemed to be far enough away from the center of the action that they went unnoticed. Not wasting any more time, he gave his wings another hard flap, which gave them enough speed to sail over the top of the wall. Now over the top of the wall, Squall scanned the immediately surrounding landscape for someplace that could provide cover. A little down the mountainside was a series of platforms jutting out of the slope, each one covered with dense foliage in a sort of tiered forest.
With his destination in mind, he folded his wings against his side and entered a nose-dive for the forest canopy and only opened them at the last moment to slow their descent. He grunted in discomfort when they passed through the canopy, with twigs, branches, and leaves slapping him in the face as he went. On his back, Wind Whisper cried into his mane fearfully, her grip tightening even more to the point it was almost choking. At last, thankfully, Squall managed to touch his hooves down onto the grassy ground under the trees and came to a stop, gasping for breath. For a good minute, he stood there, just breathing and letting his adrenaline wear off. As it did, it occurred to him just how tired he was. He lost his footing and fell to sitting on his haunches.
“Squall?” Wind asked anxiously from his back. “A-are you okay?”
“I’m okay, yeah,” he said between pants. “Just... out of breath. Give me a second and… and we can keep going... okay?”
“Okay,” Wind Whisper murmured while slowly sliding off of Squall’s back. Once on the ground, she took a step away and looked around at the small patch of trees they had hidden away in. “What are they?”
“We’re-” Squall began but then bit his tongue, his eyes closing tightly. He then opened his eyes back up and tried again. “...I’m not sure. All I know for sure is that ponies just started... transforming into them on the streets and in the castle… We never had a chance.”
“What do we do?” Wind asked, looking back at Squall with desperate, helpless eyes.
“For right now, we need to get someplace safe,” Squall answered before slowly standing up. “We can figure out what to do next after we’ve done that.”
Wind opened her mouth to say more, but the words froze in her throat when somewhere nearby, there was the sound of something snapping. Squall and Wind both went rigid at the sound. Nervously, Squall craned his neck to look in the direction of the noise.
“Wind, I want you to run and hide. Right now.”
“But-”
“I’m not going to let you get hurt, too!” Squall shot back at her, his wings flaring up. “Go run and hide! I’ll be fine and I’ll come get you, okay? I promise! But you need to hide!”
With tears forming in her eyes, Wind Whisper nodded, turned and galloped off deeper into the small forest. Once the sound of her tiny hooves faded entirely away, Squall heaved a heavy, trembling sigh. Turning back towards the sound, he saw two purple eyes glaring back at him from the shadows. With a grimace, green fire enveloped Squall’s body, revealing Thorax in his place when it faded.
The purple-eyed changeling stepped out of the shadows and into plain sight. “...Thorax. What are you doing?” he demanded simply.
“I…” Thorax looked down and shied away from the fiery intensity in his big brother’s gaze. “I’m…”
“It looks to me like you’re trying to save a pony and run away,” Pharynx snarled, taking another step forward. “Am I wrong?”
Thorax flinched as if struck, then shook his head. “No. You’re right,” he said before his eyes narrowed slightly. He stood up tall and locked gazes with his big brother. “I’m leaving, Pharynx. This is wrong and I won’t be a part of it anymore.”
“You’re turning your back on the hive, you idiot!” Pharynx snapped, his wings flaring open.
“Yes, I am!” Thorax shot back, his own wings snapping open. “There has to be a better way! These ponies have done nothing to deserve what we’re doing to them!”
“Haven’t you been paying attention?!” Pharynx stepped forward until he was right in Thorax’s face. “If you go through with this, I’m going to have to drag you back to the queen! She’ll destroy you! Is that what you want, huh?! Do you want to let the whole darned hive down? To let me down?!” he shoved Thorax harshly, sending the deserting drone down to the ground.
Now on the ground in a shaking heap, Thorax looked up at Pharynx defiantly.
“There is no way for you to follow through with this stupid idea of yours that doesn’t end with me losing my little brother! Stop this and come back with me right now, Thorax! The queen doesn’t have to know if you give this up!” Pharynx continued, his voice losing some of it’s anger to something more akin to… begging, almost.
Thorax sighed. “...No, Pharynx. I’m not going back. Not willingly,” he said solemnly while pulling himself back up to his hooves. “I’m not going to leave Wind Whisper all on her own out here, either.”
“The filly?!” Pharynx hissed, looking past Thorax incredulously. “What’s so important about a foal that you’d throw your life away?!”
“Because I took her brother away from her!” Thorax angrily snapped back. “The only pony in this city who actually seems to really care about her, and I took him away and took his place! Neither of them deserved that and as long as he’s trapped, I’m going to take care of her for him!”
“You’re being an idiot!” Pharynx snarled through clenched teeth, his horn sparking to life with purple magic.
“And you’re being a monster!” Thorax rebutted with tears forming in his eyes.
Everything fell quiet between them. A stiff breeze blew through the collection of trees, rustling the leaves.
Pharynx’s eyes narrowed and he took a threatening step forward, while Thorax took a step back. Pharynx’s horn sparked to life, about ready to paralyze Thorax so he could drag him back to Chrysalis like he had been told then. He looked at Thorax for several agonizingly slow seconds. He looked into the eyes of his younger brood mate... His little brother. The little nymph who he had defended from other drones in the past… Pharynx’s teeth showed in a frustrated scowl before the light on his horn fizzled out and he let his wings flick back against his sides. “...Get the hay out of here, Thorax.”
Throax’s eyes widened in shock at those words, and he looked at his brother in disbelief. “Wh-what?”
Pharynx growled and shoved Thorax hard, making him stumble back. “I said get out of here! Turn around and run away before I change my mind!” he shouted, baring his teeth.
Thorax took a few more steps back, then nodded with a small smile on his face. “...R-right. Thank you, Pharynx.”
“Don’t thank me for anything. You’re dooming yourself to starvation, you know. And if we cross paths again, I won’t just let you go...” the elder changeling spat before narrowing his eyes. “Now get!”
Thorax didn’t need to be told again. Turning around he broke into a gallop after Wind Whisper, with green flames enveloping his body, replacing the image of Thorax with that of Squall Dreamer.
Pharynx watched him go, then took off into the air with his buzzing wings, doubling back for the now silent city of Canterlot.