//------------------------------// // Chapter 3: Ia Changeling! Ia Chrysalis! // Story: A Changeling of Heart // by Thorax //------------------------------// “No!” snapped the orange mare “There is no possible way I’m going to let her stay here.” It had been the seventeenth “No” within the past hour, after returning home they had been greeted with Chrysalis and one of her minions lounging on Carrot’s couch. They were also met with an empty fridge. To make things worse, the Changeling Queen had created some absurd story about how Princess Celestia said she had to stay with them, till she could find a suitable solution to the changeling food problem. “But Carrot, Princess Celestia said she had to stay with us.” Ditzy said as she finished refilling the fridge with fresh food, it was a weird experience being on the receiving end of the fridge raiding. “And who told you that?” Carrot asked “Prin-“ Ditzy was quickly cut off as Chrysalis entered the room “I did, and I can assure you everything I’ve told you has been the truth.” answered the Changeling Queen, as she magically picked up a can of Soda from the freshly filled fridge. Carrot could feel the urge to harm the large Changeling rise as she heard the hiss of the can opening. However, she fought the thoughts back into their corner. Maybe later she told herself. “Why exactly should I believe you? You aren’t exactly the most trustable creature and you yourself admitted to trying to escape.” “Well if you don’t believe me, why don’t you just go ask her?” “That’s a great idea!” Carrot said sarcastically “I’ll just fly down to Canterlot and ask Princess Celestia if the Changeling Queen I have hiding out in my house, is a fugitive or not. Then I’ll ask her if she’s staying with me.” Chrysalis shrugged “Hey, it’s not like she’s just going to come crashing through the roof to confirm my story.” The mares fell silent as they waiting. After several seconds of awkward silence, Carrot Top was the first to speak up. “I honestly thought that would work, it seems to work every other time.” Ditzy and Chrysalis were in the process of nodding in agreement when the front door was violently ripped from its hinges and set hurtling towards the unfortunate Changeling Queen who was only able to utter a swear before being reasonably crushed by the impact. The three remaining mares winced as the Changelings hoof twitched from underneath the door, before turning their gaze to the large hole where the front door had once sat. “Come in Princess!” Carrot Top cheerfully shouted towards the empty door way. “You got her, though I don’t think this is what we had planned.” “Don’t worry my little pony.” rang the sweet voice of Celestia as she entered through the large hole in the wall. “I’m sure I didn’t hur-“ Celestia paused as she stared at the carnage before her, Chrysalis was almost completely under the large wooden door, except for what she believe to be a front hoof, which continued to twitch “Ouch” Celestia said with a grimace. “Yeah, this seemed funnier on paper, than in reality.” The sun Goddess added awkwardly, After a few seconds of awkwardly staring at each other Celestia’s horn began to glow as she began undoing the revenge scheme gone wrong. The door lifted from the crushed Changeling Queen, after a few seconds the door had been magically reattached and was better than new. Now she turned her focus the Chrysalis who remained crushed on the floor, slowly a golden glow began to surround the Changeling Queen as her injuries were quickly healed by the sun itself, with sharp gasp life returned to the Changeling as she shot to her feet. “What happened?!” Shouted the confused Changeling mare The three other mares stood in silence as Chrysalis gaze shifted to each one of them. After several seconds Ditzy was the first to speak up. “Carrot Top and Princess Celestia, thought it would be funny to get some revenge on you so when we went out to get ice cream Princess Celestia showed up and set up the entire plan to hit you with the door. But I think she messed up the plan and might have killed you, just a bit though, you got better.” Ditzy finished her entire explanation in one breath. Looking like she was about to collapse from lack of oxygen the grey mare fell to her flank. Celestia and Carrot silently stared at Ditzy mouths hung open in complete shock, they had been ratted out in under 20 seconds by their own co-conspirator. The sun fell from the sky and the moon quickly took its place. The mortal mares looked out the window in confusion; it was at least another three hours before sun down. “Oh my, just look at the time.” Blurted the sun goddess “I must be going, please forward any complaints about attempted murder to my sister.” With a brilliant golden flash Celestia was once again gone. “Well then,” Carrot Top began with an awkward smile “why don’t we have somethin-“ The orange mare was cut off by Chrysalis as she began to trot out of the room “I’m going to bed, if you want to see me really angry, try and wake me up.” With that Chrysalis turned the corner into the living room and was gone. “Put a sheet on the couch, I don’t want Changeling goop on it.” Shouted the orange mare. “I’ll swallow your soul” rang the returned shout of the Changeling Queen “Okay then, looks like we are going to bed early.” Muttered Carrot as she exited the room, closely followed by both Dinky and Ditzy. Three Hours later Equestria was silent; many of the confused ponies had accepted that night came early. A few had formed groups and began their march towards Canterlot, where the evil Nightmare Moon held their beloved Princess Hostage. However, that’s a story for another time. Like most of Equestria, Carrot Top’s house was silent, Carrot and Ditzy were soundly asleep in their respective rooms and Dinky had fallen asleep after sneaking into her mother’s bed. However, there was a single exception to the silence of the house, a single mare that rebelled against sleep. Chrysalis, continued to lay on the couch, running through the events that had led to this moment. Then two thoughts snapped into place. The first was how weird the day had been and the second was how uncomfortable this couch was. “This won’t do” Muttered the Changeling Queen as she stood back up. “I’m going to have to get creative if I plan on making this work.” A devious grin slipped across her face as she thought back to a room she had seen during her bout of freedom, and then another thought hit her. “Where in Tartarus did Thorax go?” she shrugged in response, not my problem she told herself. After a few seconds of stumbling in the dark and one quick fall down a flight of dark stairs, Chrysalis found herself in the basement. With a bit of concentrated magic she was able to find the light switch, with a quick flick her sight was restored. With a grin Chrysalis severed the room, sure it would need a “bit” of work, but when she was done with it, she’d have a perfectly good lair. As she began moving some large boxes away from the furthest wall she noticed something strange. “Thorax, what are you doing?” She asked the smaller changeling who apparently fallen asleep in side one of the boxes. The much smaller Changeling quickly snapped to his hooves “Securing the area my queen.” He said with a quick and awkward salute “Sure you were.” Retorted the Queen “Gather yourself my little Changeling, tonight we build.” “As you wish my Queen” Thorax shouted enthusiastically as he proceeded to trip and knocked several smaller boxes to the floor. Chrysalis stared at the mess on the floor before returning her gaze to the Changeling who was happily moving boxes completely oblivious to the mess he was creating “Actually I have a better task for you; I want you to head out Canterlot and contact Celestia.” A look of terror spread across the Smaller Changelings face as he realized he most likely wouldn’t be returning. “Do not worry my little Changeling, we’ve come to an “agreement” you well be welcomed there. However, do not break your disguise, it would be best to keep our remaining presence hidden. Once you’ve found her, ask her to return here.” With that the smaller Changeling disappeared in a wall of green flame. In his place now stood a white Pegasus, with a silent salute Thorax disappeared up the stairs and out of the basement. “Poor fool” Chrysalis said with a chuckle “Disguised himself as one of the day guards, during the night guard’s shift.” Returning her focus back to the task at hand, she continued to move items from the back wall. The next morning The three mares sat at the large wooden table and happily ate their breakfast. Ditzy as usual was eating a large carrot muffin her new personal favorite after an incident with an exploding blue berry muffin. Carrot and Ditzy however, were enjoying a bowl of the latest cereal to hit Equestria, Nightmare O’s according to the box they “Contain a little bit of Lunar Banishment in ever box.” Then something dawned on Carrot, it was silent, too silent. In the one day since their latest “guest” had arrived it was never quiet. Carrot quickly lifted herself from her seat and began trotting towards living room, where the Changeling queen apparently slept. Upon her arrival her worst fears were confirmed, Chrysalis was gone. “Ditzy, we have a bit of a problem!” shouted the orange mare “What’s the matter Carrot?” Answered Ditzy almost instantly, causing Carrot to jump a good foot into the air. “How did yo- actually, never mind. Do you know where our guest is?” “Yeah, she’s in the basement” answered the grey mare cheerfully. “She woke me up last night because she needed to borrow some power tools.” “We don’t have power tools.” Stated the confused orange mare “I keep a full set of power tools in each room, In case of emergencies” Ditzy’s expression became far more serious as she said those last few words. “Disregarding the fact that you’re probably insane, we should probably go see what kind of mess she’s created.” Ditzy’s expression melted back to that of happiness “Okay Carrot!” she happily said as she trotted off towards the Basement. As they descended into the basement any hope of finding Chrysalis hanging shelves was quickly destroyed. As the three ponies continued their slow decent down the stairs, they began to notice a thick black substance coating the walls. Doing their best to avoid the gunk they continued down to the basement. “What did she do down here?!” Shouted the aggravated mare, as she looked at the destruction within her basement. The black substance that coated the stairway was even more prominent within the basement itself. As well as several small sacks of green muck. However, the main source of her anger was the large hole at the back wall. Upon closer inspection Carrot noticed that it wasn’t exactly a hole, as much as it was a stair case. “Well down the Rabbit hole” muttered the orange mare as her and her two companions began their decent into the unknown. Carrots felt her emotions mix as they reached roughly ten minutes of continuous decent. She felt amazed by such a creation. Never had she seen such architecture, the stairs themselves were their own feat; they appeared to be hoof carved with great detail and care. Alien like plants covered the walls, some gave off a sinister glow, providing the light by which they descended. The decent filled Carrot with Horror on its own, the sheer depth at which she had descended seemed impossible and yet here she stood at the entrance to another world. Carrot, Dinky and Ditzy gasped in unison as they entered this new found world. A field of grass spread out as far as the eye could see. Upon looking up, they were met with another amazing site, the sky however, something was off with this sky, instead of bright blue Equestrian sky they had known all their lives, they were met with a completely alien sky, large plant like tendrils descended from the green sky . Dinky and her mother took everything in amazement, whereas Carrots mind had to fight itself to keep from shutting down. “Hey mom, look over there!” shouted the young filly as she took off towards the only landmark in this completely alien worlds. Ditzy quickly following behind her daughter as they headed towards the monolith like rocks that sat beneath a large orb of light, that served as this worlds sun. “Wait!” Shouted the orange mare “We don’t know if it’s safe.” However, her cries fell on deaf ears as her friends took off into the unknown, forcing Carrot to follow behind them. Upon arrival at the strange out crop Carrot was met with something that managed to push her amazement, at the center of the rocks was Chrysalis. However it wasn’t the Changeling Queen that pushed her amazement, it was what she was doing. Chrysalis was hanging shelves on a small wooden bookshelf. “What?” muttered the Changeling as she placed the drill back on the rock. With that, Carrot Top finally felt something snap. “What? You’re asking me what?” snapped the poor mare. “No, I’ll be the one asking that. What in the seven fires of tartarus is this? You’ve destroyed my basement and built this in less than a night.” “Do you like it?” The oblivious Queen asked quite pleased with her work. Carrot was about to continue her rant when she paused to think about the question, sure she thought everything about it was amazing, but that wasn’t the point. Chrysalis had destroyed her basement, and created some secret world beneath Ponyville. Before she had the time to continue her verbal assault she was once again stunned as Princess Celestia walked out from behind some of the largest rocks, completely oblivious to the new arrivals. “See, I told you, with enough explosives and some dark magic we could build a perfectly good lairs for the rest of the Changelings. Once we get everything sorted out, I’m sure it’ll only take a month to get the rest of them moved from the outlining caves.” Celestia turned her gaze back up to the miniature sun “Less than two days and we’ve already made progress.” “More Changelings?” muttered the Carrot Top, her voice less than a whisper. “More Changelings!?” she shouted, her voice alerting Celestia to their presence, the sun goddess felt something she hadn’t felt in eons, fear. “Hey, this isn’t my pantry.” The Princess said awkwardly, before teleporting to some unknown corner of the universe. “How many more?!” Snapped Carrot “One maybe two hundred, from the first colony.” The stress of the morning finally one out and Carrot fell to the ground, she wouldn’t awake for quite some time and when she finally did she would find herself in the presence of Princess Celestia once again. {Quick Note: This Chapter was written entirely on my Ipod, meaning Grammar and Spelling suffered a little more. This chapter is also much shorter than most (1500 – 2000 words) Once again I’d like to apologize for me breaking my computer and screwing things up further}