My magic research progress in the two months that followed, as well as a bit of Twilight’s research, had lead me to believe that my progress in the metamorphic shape-shifting spell was enough for it to be in proper working order. In the morning I decided to try it out as my usual disguise.
If the disguise was moderately off for any reason, I’d be able to claim that it was a spell that I was practicing. Of course, whoever caught the flaw would likely want me checked for being a changeling, but I made sure that the spell would withstand any and all disguise and transformation dispels that I could get my hooves on at the very least. That would include nearly, if not all of them.
I was excited at the prospects of what I could do. I was undetectable. Nobody could reveal me but myself. I could canter right into Canterlot Castle and get away with it every time!
After applying the new spell to myself and giving Frost a short petting, I exited my apartment. Only a few steps out I sensed someone close being suspicious of me, which was also when one of my next door neighbors came out of her door with an expression of such.
“You’re not Shapeshift, your a changeling!" she told me.
I could only reply with, “Uh… what?”
She just continued with, “You can’t hind you’re disguises’ gender! The real Shapeshift is male!”
Her bringing that to my attention made me realize that I did not, in fact, feel anything between my hind legs.
The spell swapped my gender? This is going to get awkward…
A bit weirded out, I asked, “Why would you be looking there?”
But she ignored my question, as she spotted a unicorn Guard and shouted out to her, “Guard! I need your help!”
The Guard galloped to us and she asked, “How can I be of assistance, mam?”
Pointing to me, my neighbor said, “I need you to confirm that he’s a changeling!”
This aroused the guard’s suspicion, so she faced me, sighed, and said, “I’d recommend you allow me to cast the dispel," in a voice that said that she was tired of being a changeling detector.
I sighed as well and rolled my eyes, saying, “Yeah, go ahead," even though I knew that I should be a bit worried because the spell hasn’t been through absolutely all the proper tests yet.
The Guard then began casting the dispel and as usual, I could feel it pulling at my disguise, but this time it was almost nonexistent. After finishing the dispel, the Guard was far less suspicious of me, so she turned to my neighbor to tell her, “He’s not a changeling, mam.”
My neighbor seemed to be three fries short of a Hay Burger meal, because the next thing she said was, “But I’ve seen that changeling goop resin stuff in his trash, and the real pony’s a stallion! Look for yourself!”
The Guard facehoofed. “Look, I’d have no good reason to resort to something that violates somepony’s privacy like that, even if we’re all mostly naked most of the time. And seeing as the dispel didn’t do anything at all, he’s not a changeling.”
“And even if I did change genders, my talent is shape-shifting," I added.
“But I can do some other short tests on the spot," the Guard said, then turned her head to me. “If that’s okay with you.”
In a tired voice I said, “Yeah, that’s fine.”
The Guard began casting a few more dispels, all of which barely tugged at my disguise. Then she suddenly cast a water spray spell, which caught me off guard, and I fell to the ground.
I irately asked, “Why did you spray me?" as she helped me back up.
She calmly told me, “Sorry. That was more than I intended, and to answer your question, some ponies paint themselves to make surprisingly convincing disguises. Now can you please cast a spell?”
I decided to just take my saddlebags off with my telekinesis, which had the Guard saying, “Green, but too pale. He’s certainly not a changeling, but do you see anything different about him after the dispels?”
I could feel my neighbor’s suspicion only slightly lower while her irritation had been rising more and more, to the point that she was now clenching her jaw intensely and grinding her teeth every few seconds. The latter of which is something that I can barely stand, and it didn’t help that she decided to take the guard’s question as an invitation to closely examine me for several minutes.
She made irritated hums several times and gave me a dirty look. When she was done she suddenly yelled, “Forget it!" stomped back into her apartment unit grumbling, and slammed the door behind her while I gave a slight grin of mischievousness.
The guard had a confused look until she turned to me and concluded her exams in a happy mood with, “It’s odd, but somehow I still have a small nagging suspicion that you’re a changeling even though it should be impossible for one to keep a disguise after all that. I’ll just have to ignore it. You can carry on with what you were doing.”
She started walking off and so did I, but after a few seconds she came back to me and asked, “Hey, you said that you can transform things, right? If it’s not too much trouble, can you change my apple into some other fruit?”
I said, “Yeah, I can do that.”
So she took the apple out of her small pouch, gave it to me, and I sat upright with it in my hoof. I then lit up my horn and concentrated on the spell, which I shot at the apple after it’s short charging period. The resulting flash replaced the apple with an orange, and the Guard was impressed yet at the same time a bit disappointed.
“Wow. That’s pretty cool! I was hoping for a peach, but it beats having an apple for a snack the tenth time in a row. Beggars can’t be choosers and all that. Either way, thanks for doing that!”
“No problem," I told her. “Though I should really get going.”
“Alright then. I’ll see you around," she told me as she left me to my business.
While heading to Cordial’s store I keep as low a profile as someone who technically just changed genders could, but that didn’t help as much as I hoped.
Once I arrived at Cordial’s store, I went right towards his office with as much haste as half my trip and entered without knocking. After closing the door behind me, Cordial took a whiff of something unexpected and put down his newspaper to see me with lipstick, mascara, and eyeliner smeared all over my face.
I sensed his joy and noticed his face turning red with his barely contained laughter. He managed to say, “What happened?" with a wavering voice before he burst out laughing, his head slowly coming to rest on the desk.
I just stood there with a frowning, half lidded gaze devoid of amusement until he seemed to be done, at which point I asked, “Are you done yet?”
“Mostly," he said while still snickering.
In a flat tone I told him “A small group of mares decided that it was a good idea to give me a makeover.”
Cordial managed to ask, “Why?" between more snickering.
I decided to start off with using my magic to shut and lock all the doors and windows to change back to my default disguise using my usual shape-shifting spell. This prompted Cordial to ask, “What was that about?”.
So I told him, “My new shape-shifting spell gave me the wrong gender," then I unlocked and opened the doors and windows, and said “I’ll be right back.”
After a quick trip to the porcelain throne room, I came back with a clean face and Cordial was silently reading his newspaper. So I sat down on the chair at the other side of the desk and realized that he was reading The Horse’s Mouth for laughs.
He shortly set the newspaper down. “It’s always more funny to read this than any newspaper’s comic section and it’s almost never good for anything else.”
He then turned it around and pointed to an article while raising an eyebrow and telling me, “Though this falls under that ‘almost never’.”
I wouldn’t blame you for not wanting to read a joke of a newspaper, but I thought I’d find it amusing to read.
Are There Changeling Hunters?
The Royal Guard has declined answering questions regarding the matter of two ponies that seem to be mysteriously saved from being abducted by changelings. But we've managed to interview one out of the two that have been saved, by an unknown pony or changeling, from being abducted.
But after that, the question of who saved the ponies remains, even though the mystery changeling in a picture taken during one of the occurrences was found at it’s associated crime scene. Said changeling was likely the one that saved the pony, though any questions about it have remained unanswered as the Guard have had no luck with finding him. Are they incompetent, do they not actually care about the crime, or are they part of some kind of conspiracy?
Several speculations on this entire event have been made, including that the changeling is part of a group of skilled infiltrators, that it's a changeling who has created new spells that help him find infiltrators, that it's a pony with such spells and a special skill in shape-shifting, that it's multiple citizens getting lucky about their guesses, or that it’s mean spirited prankster changelings.
A few small groups of citizens have each strongly suspected a different changeling or pony, but none have been proven to be the hunter. Though make no mistake. The princesses are not entirely above conspiring to get ponies to believe that changelings are more trustworthy than they really are.
Whatever the case may be, citizens are highly suggested to report such suspicions of changelings affiliated with the hive to the Royal Guard and let them take care of it.
When I finished I looked at Cordial, who comfortably leaned back into his chair and told me, “I’ve known you for a few months now but I didn’t think you’d ever try to play hero, even if you could team up with someone. I especially didn’t expect you to go for it more than once.”
I could sense his interest and hope in me, so I asked, “Why are you telling me this?”
“The hidden changeling operated market, which is far more of a grey market than a black market, has found out that a certain mare is looking hard for ‘the changeling hunter’ to get his help.”
I wasn’t expecting anybody to want my new talent so soon, but I wondered what about me she was hoping for.
“Why does she want my help, of all changelings?”
Cordial gave me a serious look and said, “We’ve tried finding out a few times, but with no luck. It could be any number of things.”
I gave him a serious look of my own while saying, “Then I’m going to try finding her," which gave a small spike to his surprise.
He gave me a look that you’d only give to somebody who’s likely got something wrong with them. “That’s not a good idea! She could be a changeling! She might even want to capture you whether or not she is one!”
I confidently responded with, “I’ve made a set of spells specifically for detecting and tracking changelings. I even made a shape-shifting spell that’s designed to be hard to dispel. If any number of things happen, I’ll have a way out.”
Cordial sighed and started looking in his desk for something while saying, “If you’re going to go looking for her, I might as well give you a picture.”
“Why would you have a picture of her?" I asked, before he found it and hoofed it to me.
“The changeling that told me about her, had some pictures. I don’t know why for sure, but he might have been one of the changelings watching her to find out what she wanted.”
“No, I mean why did you keep it?”
Cordial then facehoofed and told me, “I was going to give it to you so you could avoid her, not go looking for her!”
I rolled my eyes and said, “Well, if you’re done trying to convince me to not do that, I could use some help in trying to contact her without her knowing who I really am.”
He thought for a moment and told me “There’s not many options for that and the only one I have to offer is passing a message through the gray market so the mare eventually gets it. The problem with that is it may take a few months, because the others and I try to meet infrequently.”
I wasn’t expecting that kind of service to be cheep, even if it was slow. “How much is it going to cost?”
“It depends on how much each changeling’s willing to do it for. I’d say one hundred bits will get you five to ten changelings to pass it on.”
“One hundred bits it is then," I told him. “But I want to hold off on that for now. I’ve still got one thing to take care of before meeting with this pony.”
“Well feel free to come back when you want me to start sending it. Is there any other business you need to talk about?”
“No, but I have an unrelated question.”
“Go ahead.”
“Is there any kind of injury that can inhibit a changeling’s transformation ability?”
Cordial thought for a minute but said, “I’ve only heard a few stories of it happening and no one I know has had that happen before.” He then got up and started going through his filing cabinets. “Though I have contact info for a pony that’s researching changeling physiology.”
I sighed and asked “How much is that going to cost me?”
“Just two bits," he said. “It’s just one pony, I already have the info for her, and I have a pretty good idea of where I put it.”
He pulled out a single paper and I told him “Sounds pretty fair," so he started copying it.
It’s risky to get this researcher’s help, even if I disguised myself as a different pony. She may know how to physically disable a changeling’s shape-shifting, but she might also try it on me if she’s absolutely sure that I’m trying to pull something on her. I’ll have to hold off on that for who knows how long.
Once he was done, he gave me the info and I hoofed over the bits while saying, “I should go.”
“Alright. Good doing business with you," he said and started doing paperwork as I left.
I decided to make some other purchases at Cordial’s store before leaving and dropping it all off at my apartment. After that I thought of where I could change disguises so I could safely look for that mare.
It’s not like trying to find the spots that she was hanging out at was more dangerous than actually meeting with her. Even if she was at one of the places at the same time as me, I’d know that she’s there far before she would know that I’m there even if she was an infiltrator.
After thinking for several minutes, it turned out that I didn’t know any good places in the city, so I decided that somewhere close to the city was best. Besides pegisi, not many ponies at all travel off the roads into the city and there was plenty of spots that weren’t in view of them. Not only that but ponies would notice my persona walking into the city, giving it the alibi of a visitor.
After finding a cave entrance far enough away from the roads, I changed into a Trottingham unicorn mare I made up by the name of Neon Dancer, who had a pink coat, white mane and tail, and a glow stick cutie mark. I then climbed back to one of the more empty roads and entered back into the city.
From there I started searching for the mare by visiting restaurants and food stores, because even if she was a changeling she’d have to still eat food every day to look like a normal pony. I went through a few places before finding one called Omelette Au Fromage.
Practically bouncing in with joy, I noticed that it was a fancier place where they only served breakfast and lunch, and closed a few hours before dinner. A waiter came up to me and asked, “Just one?”
“No, just looking for somepony," I said a bit fast, then hoofed her a picture of the mystery mare. “Have ya seen her?”
The waiter hummed in thought then told me, “I believe I have, though the pony that waited their table isn’t here today. Why do you need to find her?”
“I’m trying find her so I can help her with a major problem, but she never gave me her address or told me to meet her anywhere, and she does odd jobs so it’s going to be hard to find her.”
I could sense that my oddly upbeat attitude of my made up situation was a little weird to him, but that didn’t stop him from continuing the conversation. “It was little over a week ago that she came here with a few other ponies, but that is all I know.”
“Alright, bye-bye!" I suddenly told him, and immediately rushed out. Yes, her awkward exits meant that she was more memorable, and memorable was something that infiltrators usually tried to avoid. Though, again, my shape-shifting’s difference compared to any other changeling saves me the typical nuisance of avoiding the dispel.
The next place of note was another restaurant called The Mystic Scent. Rushing in, I caught the smell of fish and a lot of hot spices. It was enough that I’d think some ponies wouldn’t be able to stand being there for more than five minutes without feeling like Tatarus it’s self was leaking out from the kitchen. Though my sense of smell was questionably bad, so I would have no problem if I was going to end up stuck there for several hours.
It was one of the places where you helped yourself to a table, but I wasn’t looking to eat so I speed up to the register.
The mare behind it said, “Hello! You can take a seat and we’ll be happy to serve you shortly.”
“I’m not actually here to get food," I told her with a smile.
“Oh? Then what do you need?" she sweetly asked.
As I hoofed her the picture of the mystery mare I asked her, “Do you know anything about this pony? I need to find her really soon, but she never gave me her new address or a place to meet so I can’t help her until I find her.”
She took a good look at the picture and grew a bit confused, then mentioned, “She’s been here a few times in the past two weeks, sometimes with friends. But why would you not have her address? Didn’t she send a letter?”
That was a good question and I wasn’t prepared for it, but it was easy to make up an answer to. “I don’t live in this city so I had to get her message by letter, but she didn’t put down a return address.”
“As far as I remember, she never gave any hints on where she lived," she said while rubbing her chin in thought, though I sensed that her confusion remained.
I took a few quick glaces around the place, hoping that it would help me think of a solution, then asked, “What about any of her friend’s addresses? I could try getting her’s from one of them if I could find them.”
If it came to it I really would try to find one of her friends for help, but that wasn’t ideal for a primary method. It would be another pony to deal with and I’d gain far more obligations from them than restaurant staff. Not keeping up with those obligations would be a disaster for both my cover and the mystery mare’s odd secrecy.
The waitress said, “I don’t believe that any of her friends gave any easy hints on their home’s locations. The light blue coated one mentioned loud construction noise at night, but that might not even be going on anymore. Sorry that I’m not much of a help.”
My smile remained as I told her, “It’s fine.”
She raised an eyebrow a bit at that. “You seem oddly happy for being in this dilemma.”
I responded with, “Well, when you’re chewing on life’s gristle, don’t grumble. Give a whistle!" then proceeded to literally skip out of the place while humming and whistling a tune. Once I was a block away, I stopped doing it and decided to head to one of the food markets.
My final noteworthy location turned out to be at the market not far from the castle. The particular stall I visited had delicious looking cherries and a few other fruits for sale, but despite the mare running it looking happy, I sensed that she was bummed out about something.
Upon coming up to the stall she said, “Hey! Looking to buy some fruit? My cherries are the best out of everything I have!”
“I’m actually looking for a pony," I told her.
She gave me a slightly confused look and said “You know that’s what nightclubs are for, right?”
“What?”
She let her facade go a bit, “Sorry, sorry. My stallionfriend just- never mind. You came here to buy fruit, not hear about my problems.”
I put on a serious face and said, “No! You said something about a nightclub! I have to know what this is about!”
“Are you sure you want to know?”
“Yes. You’re even so distracted by whatever it is that you forgot that I was looking for a pony, not fruit.”
She sighed. “Okay, fine… My stallionfriend’s been going to nightclubs recently without telling me and I’ve been worried that he’s trying to pick up other mares.”
I didn’t quite expect that. “Jeez. Maybe he feels like the relationship is getting stale. You should offer to go with him to a club! Maybe skydiving, or bungee jumping!”
She wasn’t convinced that was the problem, and she seemed to have an aversion to the last two suggestions. “And if he’s been seeing other mares?”
I gave her a smile and said, “Then you should totally dump his flank for somepony more loyal!”
She gave me this strange look. “You’re… oddly cheery about giving that last advice.”
I continued to smile as I explained. “Why not? If you figure it out now and it turns out that he’s doing what you feared, you’re just getting it over with sooner! Even if he isn’t doing it, you’d be putting your worries to rest sooner as well!”
She gave me a look that seemed to suggest she heard that before, though she was still considering it. “My friends keep saying that same thing. Maybe their right.” She gave me a lighthearted smile. “Thanks.”
“No problem.”
She seemed a bit happier by now, but still nervous about it. “So what was that about looking for a pony?”
“Oh," I hoofed her the picture as I said, “She’s a friend of mine and I’ve been trying to get to her to help her with something important since yesterday when she sent me a letter with no return address. She recently moved, does odd jobs, and didn’t give me a meeting spot, so I have no idea where and when to meet her.”
She stared at her fruit in thought then said “She bought something at my stall a few days ago, but I don’t remember ever hearing anything about where she goes on a regular basis. Sorry.”
“Did any of her friends say anything useful?”
Her face lit up a bit with realization. “She did have a friend with her. The only useful thing she mentioned was that she goes to Celestia’s School For Gifted Unicorns.”
“Thanks and try not to explode!" I exclaimed, and left her there confused.
It was getting late by then, so I started back home. While on my way I couldn’t help but think on who the mystery mare was. She may have been new to Canterlot or she could have been a changeling, but both would mean that she’d be harder to find. I didn’t want to risk going to the castle to get her address either. The less everyone knew about what I was trying to do, the better.