//------------------------------//
// Dawn patrol 
// Story: Things Change 
// by Equimorto 
//------------------------------//

"Lotus? What are you doing?" the Princess said aloud in her sleep, rolling around in her bed.
Chrysalis was lying at her side, staring at the ceiling. She hadn't slept for the whole night. Not that she needed to, given how she'd recently fed, but now it was starting to get a little boring to lay there. She tried to call Celestia but all she got in response was some mumbled out question about a ring. The changeling got up and walked to the mirror, looking at herself.
She felt like she wanted to go outside, to see something beyond the castle's interior after she'd completely explored it the day before. Her eyes danced between her reflection and the sleeping alicorn, then an idea struck her and a devious smile crossed her lips.
"Celestia, can I go out and see the city?" she asked.
"Of course you can, dear," replied back Celestia's image in the mirror in front of her, the Princess' voice ringing in her ears even if it had come from her throat.
The changeling happily strolled out of the royal chambers and took flight from the first broken window she found, assuming the shape of a pegasus maid she had seen in the castle as she began to fly over the city. She took the time to admire the architecture of the palaces in the low light of the last hours of the night, then a movement in the streets caught her eye. She flew down there and found a number of ponies entering a building, and curious she followed them inside.
The inside of the building was a single large room with a long counter at the end opposite to the entrance, behind which were a couple of ponies dressed with the same outfit and a series of bottles-filled shelves near the wall. The room itself had a number of circular tables with chairs around them, and some chairs were in front of the counter as well. Chrysalis walked up to the counter but before she reached it she stopped to listen to the conversations the ponies inside were having.
"So, how is it going?" asked a mare from behind the counter to a unicorn who had just taken a seat in front of her.
"Horribly. Like every other day. A little worse, I guess, Celestia has been even more annoying lately."
"What did she do this time?"
"You know how Chrysalis has been inside the castle lately? We haven't figured out why she's there yet, but yesterday Celestia fed her one of the other guards. And then they left him there. We had to drag his body back to his house. He's fine now, but both him and his family got scared to death. If only we had a better ruler."
"We all think that, but you know how it is. She's an alicorn, and we are ponies, unless another alicorn pops up and decides to lead a revolution we are stuck with her, even if we don't like her."
"Excuse me," Chrysalis interrupted them, walking up to the counter, "did you say you don't like Celestia? But isn't she the best princess in all of Equestria?"
All throughout the room every conversation stopped and all eyes were suddenly on Chrysalis, the changeling in disguise scared at the sudden attention she was receiving.
"You're... not from around here, are you?" asked the unicorn.
Chrysalis gulped. "Yeah, you could say that. I really just got here."
"Well, I guess that means at least the propaganda department is working efficiently. I don't know what you've heard about her, but trust me, no one likes Celestia around here. Not that she's ever given us any reason to like her."
"Yeah," spoke a pegasus from a table near the entrance of the building, "I worked in the royal guard and she fired me because I stepped over some flowers while chasing a thief in the gardens."
"I used to be one of her cooks and when I told her that we no longer had enough ingredients to make cake she threw me out!" said a unicorn.
"I lost my job as a journalist because she said the portrait of her I used on my article was a bad, deformed representation of her image. It was a photograph."
"I asked her if we could have a little more sun to grow our crops and my whole village was burned down," an earth pony chimed in.
"My house was demolished to make space for a giant statue of her face."
"Once we asked her which one of our three foals should have played with the toy they had. She said that it's important to share and proceeded to tear the toy in four pieces. She kept one of the pieces for herself."
"When an ambassador from the griffons came to visit she decided she wanted him to feel like at home, so she forced everyone in the castle to wear outfits decorated with griffon feathers. Real griffon feathers. It almost started a war."
"One time she stole a jewel from the shop I was working at, and then denied that she had even as she was wearing it, even if it still had the price tag on, even as the alarm went off when she walked out," said a unicorn mare.
"She was invited to a birthday party once, she brought no present and ate all the cake."
All through the morning Chrysalis listened to the stories the ponies had to tell her about Celestia, and when they finished the sun was already high up in the sky. Confused and shocked, the Changeling Queen walked out of the building.
"I have to go," she said, "I need to have a talk with the pony I've been staying here with."
"You should, they need to know the truth," said the unicorn, who had followed her outside.
"I'm afraid they might know it already. I'm afraid I might have been lied to."