Logan briefly paused, standing up with his fur flaring at the looks of sudden suspicion from the ponies. Celestia’s horn had begun to glow, and even Rainbow Dash’s wings had extended. Logan met their glares with one of his own, and let his lightning flare ominously.
“I know what you’re thinking,” he snarled. “And if you attack me, I don’t care if it’ll just fuel suspicion; I’ll knock your head sideways!”
“Wait, what…” Pinkie Pie jumped between them. “What’s every pony getting so worked up about?” She was pulled back by Rarity.
“If you were captured by the hive,” Twilight said. “How do we know you’re the real Logan?”
Logan’s snarl faded to a deadpan look. “After I literally narrated my entire story to you?” he asked.
“The Changelings are incredibly proficient spies,” Twilight countered. “They would’ve been watching you for every step of your journey.”
“And what if they were the ones that had put the other bounty out on me?” Logan replied. “If they were watching, why didn’t they just attack me?”
“They did,” Twilight countered. “That changeling on the train? Maybe even some of the griffons in that inn?”
Logan’s ears flared up, and flattened as his paws shifted.
“Logan,” Twilight said slowly. “Is that really you in there?”
Logan’s tail flicked from side to side. The fillies were pulled away, every one convinced he was about to change form and lunge. But instead of lunging, he spoke.
“My father’s name was Kodo,” he said, forcing it out like it pained him to share. “My mother’s name was Reaper. You already know Carol, but the rest of my pack? Krios, Griffin, and Darius were all the pack mates of my dad, and my uncles by pack law.” He stood a little straighter. “Do you really think a Changeling would know that?”
For a brief moment, the mares started to relax. But then…
“How do we know the changelings didn’t force you to reveal that?” Rainbow Dash asked. “Or that you’re just making that up?”
Instantly, the tension was back, and Pinkie Pie gave Rainbow Dash an aghast glare.
“Dashie,” she exclaimed. “Why?!”
“I’m just looking at the worst-case scenario,” Rainbow Dash insisted.
“Rainbow Dash, I’m sorry,” Fluttershy began. “But… you do know Logan, right? He would have fought to the bitter end. He would have died before revealing such private information!”
"Would it help if I added that you're a jerk, Dash?" Logan growled.
For a moment, the mares exchanged worried, concerned, and even slightly bemused glances, while Logan continued to stare at them, his fur glowing more golden than before. But then, Celestia stepped up.
“You don’t need to worry, girls,” she said, the light fading from her horn as she looked at Logan. “That’s still the Lone Wolf. He’s not part of the hive mind.”
Logan touched a claw to his head, noticing how his fur had lost the golden sheen. He glared at Celestia.
“Did you just…” he snarled, before Celestia backed away.
“After the first changeling invasion,” Celestia explained hastily. “My sister and I practiced and mastered spells to counter deception.”
“And I’ve been practicing listening to my element ever since I let Chrysalis' Cadence disguise get the drop on me during the wedding,” Applejack said, stepping up and putting herself between them and Logan. “Trust me, girls… Logan ain’t no changeling.”
Logan’s look softened at their defense, though he still looked slightly miffed at having to rely on Celestia. Despite his irritation, the tension faded, and the mares slowly let their guards down.
“Okay,” Twilight said slowly. “So… you’re not a changeling. But… how did you get out of there?”
“It took everything we had and more to fight Chrysalis the first time,” Rainbow Dash said, “And even then, we would have lost. How’d you do it all on your own?”
Logan looked down. “It wasn’t on my own,” he admitted.
#
When I managed to force myself back into consciousness, I expected to find myself in some sort of insect hive. Imagine how surprised I was when I instead found myself back at Fluttershy’s cottage. The sun was shining above me; I swear I could feel it’s warmth on my fur. That same calming scent of Ponyville filled my nostrils, relaxing me and almost making me forget about the utter beating the Changelings put me through.
The Changelings! My mind screamed. This has to be one of their illusions! A way to manipulate me!
I tried to move, but something held me in place. I tried to look down, but my head didn’t respond. I may as well have been in a dream for all the good my body was doing.
Then Fluttershy appeared. Same warm smile. The same pink mane that covered one of her eyes.
“Welcome back, Logan,” she said, even in that same soft voice.
I’ll give the Changelings this much; they knew how to use their illusions.
But even as she took my paw, and tried to lead me to her cottage, I knew that it couldn’t be real. I was way too far away, had gone through too much to give up and go back to her. I ordered my paws to dig into whatever I was standing on, and managed to shut my eyes with gritted teeth.
“This isn’t real,” I growled to myself. “It’s not real. IT’S NOT REAL!”
My eyes shot open. The illusion was gone. I was caked into some sort of hard green substance, attaching me to a smooth wall. Above me, everything was bathed in a sickly green light. And right in front of me was a very irritated looking changeling. But unlike the others I had seen, this one was the size of Celestia. Her eyes, bottle green and slit pupiled, were narrowed in annoyance.
“Idiot!” she hissed at a more normal looking changeling that was right behind her. “You said he was closest to the Element of Kindness!”
“H-He is, my Queen!” the changeling insisted. “At least he was!” It stared at me with those pure blue eyes. “I can sense it; the conflict in his soul!”
The Queen glared back at me, though her irritation faded to curiosity as she scanned my features. I kept wriggling in the substance they had restrained me with; didn’t do a lot of good, but at least it was getting feeling back into my body. The Queen shook her head.
“It is no use,” she declared. “We cannot use ponies on this one. If he is to provide us with the love we seek, we must use something more… close to home.”
Green fire flared around me; sort of like the stuff that the imposter Twilight had. But it wasn’t warm; if anything, it was cold. Looked like the changelings had me beat in terms of actually cold fire. But before I could ponder too long on it, the fire faded. I was in a meadow, cherry blossoms floating around me. And standing right in front of me…
My heart lurched. It was my mother. Whole and alive.
“My son,” she whispered. Those same words that had been her last. The Queen captured them perfectly. “So, glad I found you.”
I’ll admit… I faltered here. My legs grew weak; if I hadn’t been restrained in that goo, I likely would have fallen to my haunches. My chin trembled.
“M-Mom…” I whimpered. I knew that it could be real. It wasn’t supposed to be this real! My mother… she was…
She was right there. In front of me. Approaching me, as if out of a dream.
A dream! It was a dream! I knew it was a dream!
But as she lifted herself up and hugged me, I felt something that could never have been forced upon me. I felt the urge to give up; to just accept this as reality.
But I couldn’t. Because wolves don’t hug.
And when she whispered, “I love you,” into my ear… wolves don’t say ‘love.’ Words can’t even describe the care we feel for each other.
It tore at my heart, but I leaned back. If my arms were free, I would have pushed her away.
“You…” I winced, not wanting to say it, but… I forced my eyes up, and said, “You’re not my mother.”
“My son, please,” the illusion insisted… by everything sacred, it hurt to call her that. “You’re all I have left!”
“To the extent that you want to mate with me?” I snapped, clinging to that feeling of disgust. The same feeling that had enshrouded me when you mares implied the same about my father.
Her eyes widened, but her ears didn’t flatten, nor did her tail tuck.
“Huh?” she asked.
“You want to mate with your own son?!” I screamed. “What kind of sick pervert are you, and how dare you try to assume the identity of my mother?!”
I lunged forward, my jaws snapping inches from her face. Unfortunately, I was still restrained, and she had plenty of room to fall away from me.
As the illusion was chased away a second time, I gasped and panted, overcoming the agony that had swelled up again in my gut, while the Queen chased her assistant from me.
“Idiot,” she wailed. “Numbskull! I almost had him! I tasted his love! It…” she turned back to me, her eyes hungry and desperate.
“I felt it too, my Queen,” the changeling whimpered. “By the Hive…” she inched towards me, raising a hopeful hoof for my face. “He’s unlike any kind of love…”
“NO!” the Queen seized her assistant and flung her away from me. “I will deal with him myself!” She turned back to me, practically drooling. “His love is mine to extract. Mine to taste…”
The assistant wisely scurried away, while the queen and I glared at each other. I may have been restrained and seconds away from being cocooned like a fly in a spider’s web, but I still glared at her as if I could shoot knives from my eyes. I likely could, considering my lightning, but these changelings would put a pin on that if I couldn’t get myself loose in time.
“Now,” the Queen growled, huffing as if she had run a mile. “You have resisted me thus far, Lone Wolf of Equestria. But you have no idea how far reaching the Hive of Queen Chrysalis truly is!”
She flared her wings, and a brief glow of lights shined behind her. It took me a half moment to realize those were the eyes of several hundred Changelings. Despite my heart pounding in my chest, I tried to keep my gaze defiant.
“Ever since the Tyrant Celestia brought you to this world, I have watched you,” Chrysalis said, pacing before me. “I have seen you struggle against those who would control you. I have witnessed your darkest nightmares take form.” She smiled softly as the flames of illusion burned around me again, returning me to that meadow. “But I can offer you everything Celestia denied you: revenge… freedom…”
“You offer nothing but lies,” I spat at her. I tugged at my restraints. “If you call this freedom, let’s see what you call wild and untamed.”
Chrysalis smiled, amused.
“You act as if I’m the villain, Lone Wolf,” she insisted. “When all I want is your love. You have lived in the wild for some time now; don’t you know what it’s like to be starving?”
I glared at her, trying not to think of the times when I hadn’t been able to find anything, and had to run on fumes, my stomach groaning its insistence that I find something to eat. Yet she nodded as I tried to repress the memories, as if she could see them on my face.
“My entire brood has lived that way,” she said. “We’ve been forced to embrace it; to accept it as normal. But you must also know what it’s like… to be full after such a long period of hunger.”
I looked away with a huff. But that couldn’t stop the memories either. Wolves lived for that sort of feeling; we’d go for weeks without food, then feast when we finally found prey. Humans would call it bulimia, we call it using the gifts given to us, long before Myst ever came around.
“And more importantly,” Chrysalis noted. “You know what it is like to be humiliated… by Celestia.”
She glowed. When I looked back at her, she had changed into Celestia, smirking down at me. The sight of that godly face, now twisted with a smug and superior expression, made my hackles bare and a guttural growl to escape my throat. Chrysalis changed back into her wolf form, smiling softly.
“Exactly,” she said. “Help me tear down Celestia. Help me bring her to her rightful place. And be rewarded with everything you have strived for…” She changed into another wolf. Younger this time. Red fur… almost like fire. There was no way she could know. But… wow, did she look similar to her. She indicated the field, where I faintly saw more wolves.
But I shook my head. “It isn’t real,” I insisted.
She turned back to me, her form slowly growing more and more like Carol’s.
“It can be your reality,” she tempted me, almost pressing me to the wall. “The hard part is over, Lone Wolf. You have made it to my side; you are ready to be mine.” Her claws drifted down to my hips, pulling me closer to her. “Let your love flow into me. It is stronger than even a pony’s love. It will strengthen us both; fill my hive with our children. And one day, I will awaken you from your paradise to a sight that will give you unimaginable ecstasy…”
She shifted the illusion, showing a ruined Canterlot. Another changeling had taken the shape of Celestia, bound and gagged before us. Chrysalis trotted away from me, and teasingly traced Celestia’s chin, forcing her gagged mouth up.
“The so-called sun goddess Celestia, reduced to the slave of a true Queen…” Chrysalis looked up at me with a grin, changing into a strange hybrid of wolf and changeling. “By an army, you helped create.”
My head bowed. I didn’t want to listen to her; she was manipulating. Like humans did. When force didn’t work, they tried to use their words. Tried to mold your mind into whatever would aid them.
And yet… there were other reasons. Maybe I didn’t feel that Celestia deserved to be turned into a slave for this egomaniac. Maybe I knew that if Celestia fell, you guys would be affected as well. The reasons aren’t really that important.
What was important was that I wasn’t going to let this bug queen think she had won. Thus, with my head down, I focused on Myst’s rage. I pulled it from my gut, calling for Myst herself to aid me.
The changeling goo wasn’t made out of water, and so, with a crackle of thunder, I burst my way out of the goo and swiped at Chrysalis. But she must have been expecting it. That, or my fur glowing was a dead giveaway. For whatever reason, she launched away from my swipe, soaring up over me as the illusion was changed to the insect hive. Millions of Changelings crawling towards me, hissing and baring fangs as their queen glared down at me in disappointment.
“So be it,” she said in an irritated tone. “If you will not submit willingly… then your mind will be destroyed.”
I growled and extended my claws, glaring at her above all the changelings.
“Bring it on,” I snarled, my fur lighting up; a single white glow against the dark green and black.
The changelings paused at that, looking at each other, and up at their queen. The Queen was shooting me a bemused look.
“You really think you can stop us?” she asked with a small chuckle. “You really are a fool. A bold fool… but a fool nonetheless.”