I woke up early the next morning. The train that would take me to Appleloosa was due to leave at what would be breakfast time for ponies, and though I didn’t have much to do in terms of preparations other than to put my pouch of money into one of Sunburst’s old saddlebags that he’d lent me for the duration of my travel, I wanted to be sure I wouldn’t miss it. My escort, Sentinel, was already waiting with her Royal Guard gear stuffed in a suitcase. Though I knew today’s shift was supposed to be hers normally, I hadn’t been sure that Shining wouldn’t assign somepony else to keep an eye on me outside of Crystal Empire’s borders. Unless he’d arranged for more guards to join us further down the line?
I was about to head for the train station when Shining and Cadance intercepted me.
“I didn’t say this was a casual trip, soldier,” he told Sentinel.
“I understand, Sir, but there’s no need to attract attention by being in full body armor.” She tapped her suitcase. “I’ve packed it anyway. The crossbow, too.”
“This isn’t an undercover mission!”
“Permission to speak freely?”
He frowned. “Granted.”
“It isn’t a mission to spread panic and confusion, either. How often do Royal Guards travel by train to remote villages that aren’t their hometown? What I’m trying to do here is to maintain order by ensuring I don’t become inspiration for rumors about some unknown enemy or a government conspiracy or whatever else ponies with wild imagination might deduce.”
“Don’t you think that’s a little paranoid?”
“Maybe, but aren’t all military operations paranoid to some extent?”
“Fine,” he relented. “Do as you wish, but if the bug gets out of control for one second…”
“He won’t, Sir! I promise you that!”
He nodded as if not fully convinced and trotted off. Cadance remained with us.
“Do you have everything you need?” she asked me. “Enough money for the ticket? Blankets if it gets cold? Something to pass the time with?”
“I didn’t think I’d need any of that except the money. How much is the ticket, anyway?”
“I haven’t travelled that far in a while and can’t tell you for sure, but it’ll probably be somewhere between one hundred and one hundred and fifty bits.”
“Oh...” I let my ears drop. “I can’t afford the ticket. Guess I’m staying here after all…”
“No worries,” she said, teleported another pouch to herself, counted two hundred bits, and gave them to me. “Now you have enough.”
“I can loan you if you need more,” Sentinel added.
“But Princess, you gave me that much money less than a week ago!”
“I did, but that was never going to be the only money I’d ever give you! I would have done it tomorrow anyway!”
“But I can’t keep leeching you off like that forever!”
“Thorax, it’s called an allowance, not leeching, and it’s a common thing for parents to give to their not-yet-adult children. Now, I’m not your mother and you’re probably an adult, but you’re still finding your place in the world and I’m responsible for you, therefore our relationship is somewhat akin to that between a mother and a child, and because of that, you have no reason to feel bad about accepting money I give you.”
I glanced at Sentinel. She nodded encouragingly.
“Uh, thanks, I guess.” I accepted the bits hesitantly and put them in my saddlebag. Sunburst’s saddlebag, I corrected myself. “Well, time to get moving!”
“Safe journey, and good luck!” Cadance wished.
“Thank you!”
The walk to the train station was uneventful, and so was the wait for the train. Sentinel and I bought return tickets for one hundred and sixty-five bits each and that was the only thing worth mentioning until the train rolled lazily onto the platform. I adopted my Crystal Hoof disguise and we entered the train car and found our seats. A few more minutes passed until the train started moving, and only three other passengers had arrived in the meantime.
“I kind of expected more ponies would be on the train,” I said at some point, not really expecting an explanation.
“This is the first station on this train’s route and it’s still pretty early in the day,” Sentinel informed me. “There’ll be more in the later trains, and this one will pick up more passengers along the way.”
“Do you know how long this trip is?”
“All day. We’ll arrive after sunset, but I’ve never actually travelled to Appleloosa, so I can’t be more precise.”
“That late?!”
“It’s across Equestria. What did you expect?”
“I don’t know. But honestly, Sentinel, the more I see of pony society and lifestyle, the more my expectations are proven wrong. I never expected that ponies and changelings would be this different! What if we’re so different that I won’t be able to find a common language with Braeburn and the sheriff to convince them that it was all a misunderstanding and that I meant no harm? What if I fail to get them to even listen?”
“You’re forgetting something.”
“I am?”
“Yes. You probably would struggle on your own, but you aren’t alone in this. You’ve got Applejack and me to back you up.”
“You? Didn’t Shining order you to keep me disciplined?”
“Why, do you need to be kept disciplined?” She smirked. “Shining is proving himself to be an idiot, to put it politely. I mean, how much proof does he need to finally realize that you’re not a bloodthirsty monster? Unless he actually knows it and is taking out his frustrations on you because it’s convenient for him, in which case he’s a jerk.” She leaned against the window. “Seeing him like this makes me wish I hadn’t quit the Wonderbolts Academy. I bet Spitfire would have at least tried to be reasonable if you’d landed on her turf.”
“Wonderbolts? They’re the group of fliers that Rainbow Dash is in, aren’t they?”
“Yes. The most talented fliers in all of Equestria, and dare I say, beyond! But Rainbow and I never crossed paths. My time with them was over long before she became a cadet, in fact before they even knew of her.”
“How do you know that they didn’t?”
“Because they met her in a competition where Rainbow saved the lives of three Wonderbolts, one of which was Captain Spitfire.”
“She did that? Wow! What happened?”
“One of the competitors got a little carried away with her performance and knocked them out while they were all in mid-air. I wasn’t there. I heard the story from several different sources and each version was different, some of them all the way down to ridiculous.” She snickered. “For example, one claimed that the competitor was a unicorn, and another that she had butterfly wings. Ridiculous, huh?”
“Maybe she was a changeling,” I suggested jokingly.
“You know, that’s the most likely theory I’ve heard yet!”
We both laughed.
“So why did you leave the Academy?”
“I had a change of priorities. The Wonderbolts seemed so cool and awesome when I was a filly, and I was thrilled when they accepted me into the Academy, but about halfway through, I realized I wanted more from my life than popularity and fancy flying. I thought it was just a phase I’d grow out of, so I pushed myself almost to the graduation before I realized it was pointless and transferred to the Royal Guard. Good thing is, the Wonderbolts have a historic connection with Equestrian military, so my Academy time was acknowledged as the agility-and-endurance part of their curriculum and I only had to spend eight months in bootcamp, learning hoof-to-hoof combat and weapons usage.”
“Did the Wonderbolts forgive you?”
“For leaving them? Spitfire had quite a mouthful to unload on me when I came to tell her, and she and some of the others still pretend to be mad about it, but I don’t think they are, not anymore, anyway. What about you?”
“What about me?”
“C’mon, everypony says you guys only attack other lands and steal love, but I can’t believe that’s all you do! You for one don’t strike me as the military type! So, what did you do before you decided to go away and live with us?”
“I’m going to have to disappoint you. Attacking or infiltrating other lands and stealing love really is all we do! Unless you count those deemed incompetent for battle or infiltration or prey hunting, who are relegated to basic maintenance tasks, which are considered a disgrace even for those who got there by being too injured to fight. I was a janitor in low-clearance areas.”
“Hold on, a disgrace? Really?! You consider your war veterans a disgrace?!”
“I don’t.”
“I didn’t mean you personally! But why?”
“Chrysalis says that they wouldn’t have allowed themselves to get that injured if they were any good at fighting, or loyal to the hive, or both. That’s if the injured soldier is a low-rank grunt, at least. The higher-ranking ones get assigned to less disgraceful non-combative positions such as archive duty, but everyling is supposed to pretend they don’t notice the double standard because, you know, ‘they used to be loyal sub-commanders and they deserve better than to sweep floors’ or whatever.”
“Mother of Celestia, I don’t believe this… And you all put up with that?”
I shrugged. “What else can we do?”
“Well, you escaped! Why don’t the others? Or why don’t you organize a riot and force her to respect you? Or-”
“We can’t! She’d kill us all! Not to mention that I can’t think of a single changeling beside myself who doesn’t agree with her!”
“Talk about brainwashing… Okay, let’s change the subject. I’m afraid to ask anything more about you guys!”
“And I’d like to forget them. Okay, what do you want to talk about?”
She thought about it.
“I have no idea. You?”
“No,” I admitted.
“You mind if I eat my sandwich, then? I skipped breakfast so I wouldn’t be late for the train.”
“Sure!”
She pulled the sandwich out of her suitcase and took a bite. I looked through the window. We were passing between mountains; the Crystal Empire had long ago disappeared on the horizon, and Equestria had yet to come into full view. I caught a glimpse of green terrain between the mountain peaks once or twice, but whether that was Equestria or some other land, I couldn’t tell.
“You want a bite?” Sentinel asked eventually.
“The sandwich? No, thanks, I don’t eat that.”
“Of course you don’t. Silly me,” she forced a chuckle.
“Don’t worry about it. Now that I look like a crystal pony, it might be easy to forget that I’m not really one.”
“That it is.” She took another bite. “What does love taste like?”
“That’s complicated. It doesn’t have a fixed taste, for the lack of a better word, or even a physical taste akin to pony food as far as I understand pony food. I’m not sure if I even have a proper frame of reference to compare it with. But generally speaking, and this is only a rough comparison, it’s like a calming warmth, with nuances that depend on whether it’s friendly, familial, romantic, and so on, as well as varying a little between individuals. It’s also influenced by other emotions. For example, being happy will make the love aura brighter and warmer, being sad will darken it, and fear will cause it to become murky and cold, to name a few. But whatever it tastes like, it’s invariably the best sensation we can imagine! I know this is vague, but did it at least give you an idea?”
“A vague one, like you said, but yes.” She grinned and ate the last bite of her sandwich.
The train came to a halt. We were at a train station; the sign at the platform said, ‘Green Neigh’.
“Welcome to Equestria, Thorax,” Sentinel said.
Like Sentinel had predicted, the train gradually filled up with ponies as the journey went on. This had an effect on our conversation: by an unspoken agreement, we decided to avoid discussing changeling-related topics, lest we draw too much attention to ourselves, so we ran out of ideas for maintaining the conversation a little after Detrot. We spent most of the rest of the journey looking through the window, and I even dozed off at some point.
Contrary to Cadance’s assumption that I’d grow bored enough to require something to entertain myself with such as a book, I found the travel itself an entertaining and pleasant experience. Watching the landscapes from the comfortable seat in a train car, surrounded by the warm aura of love of my fellow passengers, was the kind of experience I’d never known before! My only contact with trains up to that point had been a ride in cargo space away from Ponyville in somewhat of a hurry, and as luck had had it, I’d ended up in the one city in Equestria I’d intended to avoid at all cost! But this was different; I’d planned this trip, I’d had the money to buy the ticket with, and next to me was a pony who intended to help me if she could. Not even Shining’s wrath or the possibility that I was heading to my doom were enough to shake my good mood!
It was dark by the time we arrived in Appleloosa, and seeing the village again killed my spirits as memories flooded my mind. I hadn’t really been in danger then, especially compared to everything that had happened since, but that hardly made it easier to walk down the street and act as if I’d never seen these ponies before, as if they hadn’t watched my differently-disguised self get dragged to the sheriff’s office in chains, thinking who-knows-what and murmuring among themselves. Chances were I’d face a reprise of that soon! Would they understand what I’d tell them and ask of them? Would they care? Would they even bother to listen?
Did they already know?
“Sentinel,” I spoke to her quietly, “where do you think we’ll find Applejack?”
“I don’t know,” she replied. “We could ask around in the morning. She might be with that cousin that was mentioned, but it’s a little late for visits, even if she is expecting you. She’s said to be a farmer, therefore she’s probably an early-rise, early-to-bed type, and could be asleep by now.”
“So what do you suggest?”
“Villages like these usually have an inn, and sometimes the inn has rooms one can rent for the night. Some even sell food. Even if Appleloosa doesn’t have that, it might be worth asking. Somepony might have a spare room we could use for a price.”
“What if I don’t have enough money? I might have to find a place to hide instead…”
“Isn’t that what you tried the last time you were here? Relax, this isn’t anything like a five-star hotel on Bridleway! The rooms should be cheap!”
“If you say so…”
“And since you’re a crystal pony for the time being, it wouldn’t be very convincing to claim that you’re my brother or cousin. What would you prefer: friend, coworker, coltfriend, husband?”
Husband?! Wasn’t that a little extreme?
“Wait, forget the coltfriend or husband. You look a little too young to be romantically involved with me.”
“Wasn’t going to pick that anyway. I prefer friend,” I said.
“Okay, but don’t be surprised if they insist that we take separate rooms. I’ll try to get them to put us in the same one if they have such accommodations. Should be cheaper that way.”
“You’re the boss! Um, is that the correct phrase?”
“Yep!”
We found the inn and got inside, and Sentinel approached the pony who I assumed was working there. She must have started a discussion about rooms, but I tuned her out quickly. The noise might have had something to do with it, but I mostly cowered under the odd-tasting aura of love coming from the other ponies and their curious glare. Even a few buffalo were there, gorging themselves on pies! I knew they wouldn’t recognize me in this form, but their presence alone tugged at my composure. And the more I tried to focus on acting normally, the worse it got!
“Hey! Equestria to Crystal Hoof!” Sentinel gave me a gentle shove. “Do you copy?”
“Huh? What?”
“Are you drunk from the fumes already? C’mon, we got a room upstairs.”
“Oh. Good,” I said absent-mindedly and followed her. To my marginal relief, the ponies and buffalo weren’t showing much interest in us anymore as we ascended the stairs.
The room was small and basic, with two beds, a small table between them, and a dresser in a corner. There were no decorations other than curtains, not that I expected or needed any, and the noise from below was only slightly muffled.
“I’m going to find a bathroom,” Sentinel said. “Choose whichever bed you want, but stay awake and leave the door unlocked until I return. I don’t want to spend the rest of the night banging on the door trying to wake you!”
“With this noise, I might not realize it’s you even while awake,” I agreed.
“Yeah, good point. Be back in a minute!”
We overslept a little the next morning, thanks to the inn’s patrons keeping us awake well into the night, but not so much that anypony would have come looking for us. For once, I’d correctly assumed that might happen; Sentinel had only paid for a single night and was eager to get us out before either the ponies assumed that we’d stay for one more night, which was still a possibility if we failed to find Applejack and Braeburn and do what we were here to do, or they decided to kick us out, which wouldn’t bode well for Sentinel’s reputation if the course of the events forced her to act in official capacity as a Royal Guard. Plus, she was hungry, her food supplies had run out on the train, and apparently the inn didn’t serve breakfast. There weren’t even any leftover pies after last night.
Finding Applejack turned out to be an easier task than expected: we’d barely stepped out of the inn when I heard a familiar voice call at me.
“Crystal Hoof? Ya made it here already?”
I turned to the source of the surprised-in-a-good-way shout. Applejack was trotting toward me, followed by none other than Braeburn! I gasped a little at the sight of him and prayed that he hadn’t noticed, or if he had, that he’d misinterpreted it as an expression of surprise for finding Applejack so quickly. Surely he wouldn’t have recognized me in this form, right? Even if its basic features were similar to those I’d used in the disguise he’d seen before?
Relax, Thorax, of course he wouldn’t recognize you! Earth ponies don’t randomly become crystal ponies so far away from the Crystal Heart! He might notice the similarity but probably won’t think any of it! And if he does catch on, isn’t that what you’re here for?
“Um, hi, Applejack,” I said. “We came here last night, but you were probably asleep by then.”
“An’ who’s yer friend?”
“Sentinel,” she introduced herself.
“Well howdy, Sentinel!” They bumped hooves. “Pleased to make yer acquaintance! Y’all ever been to these parts?”
“No, I’m afraid not. It’s a long way from the Crystal Empire.”
Applejack’s posture and facial expression changed ever so slightly, but I was sure she understood the implications: I’m a Royal Guard escorting Thorax and we don’t want it known yet.
“Well that’s just dandy!” Braeburn interjected. “Crystal Empire’s said to be pretty and all, but I say you haven’t lived until you’ve experienced all that we have to offer, and that starts with me showing you the town of Aaaaaaaaapplelooooooosa!”
He’d barely finished his sentence when his aura of love emitted a warm surge and he pranced excitedly, grabbed all three of us, and dragged us on a tour of the village that we struggled to keep up with in terms of speed, and that made me so dizzy that I feared I’d lose my disguise any second! What was up with this guy? He clearly loved his village, but seriously, even Pinkie didn’t have that much energy!
The hurricane ended abruptly and we found ourselves standing in front of a cottage, eyes spinning wildly, and somehow still in possession of our luggage. Disguise, too, miraculously. Applejack recovered quickly, almost as if she’d already been subjected to such a treatment before, and so did Sentinel, who definitely would have been subjected to similar treatment in bootcamp, but I needed a moment longer. Okay, maybe more than a moment.
“And this is my humble home,” Braeburn concluded. “Do come in! Care for some apple fritters? Apple pie? Applejack here is a superb baker!”
“It sounds wonderful,” Sentinel accepted as we entered the cottage and set the suitcase and saddlebag aside. “I think I’ll take a slice, thank you!”
“And you?” Braeburn asked me.
“Um… thanks, but I’m… I’m not really hungry.”
“Oh come on! Everypony loves my cousin’s fritters and pies!”
“Everypony except Prince Blueblood,” Applejack muttered.
“Maybe later?” I pleaded, hoping to avoid it altogether.
“Now you’re just plain offending my cousin!”
“Braeburn, really,” Applejack interjected. “If he says he ain’t hungry, Ah ain’t gonna push him!”
“I say it’s a darn shame, but have it your way.” We sat at the table and he fetched the food. “You’re welcome to change your mind, you know,” he told me again.
Sentinel forgot all manners and got right to it: three fritters were gone in less time than it would take me to shapeshift, and a big slice of pie followed it at only a marginally slower speed. I couldn’t help but sympathize with her; I knew hunger to its most desperate depths! And judging from how her love aura warmed a little during and after the meal, Braeburn hadn’t lied about the food being delicious! It made me wish I could digest pony food, but as it was, the results could eventually turn… rather unpleasant… to say the least.
“Wow, you weren’t kidding!” Sentinel said. “This must be the best breakfast I’ve had in years! Where do you get the apples?”
“We grow them. See that orchard?” He pointed at a window.
I hadn’t noticed it on arrival, and apparently neither had Sentinel, but sure enough, a vast orchard stood proudly behind the house. Was this the same one I’d been in before? Probably, but why didn’t I remember this cottage? Had I been so distraught that I’d stopped paying attention, or had the sheriff led me away by a different route?
I snuck a questioning glance at Sentinel and Applejack. They both gave a barely perceptible nod as if to tell me to trust them.
“Wow, impressive! Must be a lot of hard work!” she said.
“That it is, but we don’t mind! The orchard’s our pride and joy! Though its history isn’t entirely without trouble…”
“What do you mean?”
“The village borders the buffalo territory, and they didn’t like where we planted the orchard and were trying to sabotage our efforts to set it up. Turns out the field is their traditional stampeding grounds, but we didn’t know that, and even if they’d bothered to tell us, it wouldn’t have mattered because this is the only fertile stretch of land for miles!”
“An’ they nearly went to war over it!” Applejack interjected. “Ah’m glad they agreed to compromise in the end, or Ah don’ know what woulda happened to the town!”
“What did you do?”
“We cut a path through the orchard wide enough for the buffalo tribe to stampede through, and they agreed to let the rest of the orchard remain.”
“You share the land,” Sentinel nodded in awe.
“Yep! And let me tell you, the trees are prospering somethin’ fierce! They even attracted a thief, what was it, about a year ago? I caught him in the act, sheriff put him in jail overnight, but he was gone in the morning! Never found trace of him again!”
Applejack, Sentinel, and I shared a meaningful glance. I knew what they wanted to tell me: Braeburn had just mentioned the incident that I’d been involved in, and this was the perfect chance to come forward. But I was beginning to second-guess myself nervously under the weight of possible bad outcomes: was this really a good idea? What if it went wrong? I didn’t want to go to prison, and I especially didn’t want to die there, which was pretty much guaranteed if I ended up locked in the same cell as any other captured drones! But I’d promised myself that I’d come clean to Braeburn if I ever got the chance!
Okay, Thorax, take a deep breath and calm down! You’ve got friends with you; they’ll make sure things go fine! Just gather up the courage and speak already!
“Actually, Braeburn, I... I might know something about that thief,” I finally said.
“You do? How? Has he been stealing in the Crystal Empire?”
“Not exactly,” Sentinel interjected.
“Then what?”
“I’ll tell you, but…” I fumbled. “The sheriff should hear it too, and I’d rather not have to tell the same story more than once. Can you take us to him?”
“Or bring ‘im here?” Applejack suggested. “Ah’ll keep them guests entertained, an’ ya know sheriff loves mah pies!”
“Sure, cousin,” Braeburn agreed. “Be right back!”
When he left, so did my composure. I let my disguise drop and started shivering at the thought of what was surely coming, barely controlling the urge to turn into a pebble and fling myself into the orchard where he wouldn’t find me so easily.
“Burst mah buttons, Thorax, Ah can’t believe ya had the guts to actually go through with it!” Applejack said, looking through the window after Braeburn. Then she turned around and noticed my pitiable state. “Ah’m guessin’ y’all are wishin’ ya hadn’t?”
“Sort of,” I squeaked.
“Come now, Ah know it’s terrifyin’ to think y’all are bound for prison, but dontcha worry! Ah’ll keep ya out of it if it’s the last thing Ah’ll do!”
“What if it won’t be enough?”
She stomped her hoof. “That’s just stinkin’ thinkin’! Ah know ya did nothin’ wrong an’ Ah’ll make Braeburn and Sheriff listen! An’ Ah ain’t one to give up!”
“Your determination is admirable, Applejack,” Sentinel said, “But Thorax has a point. This isn’t going to be easy!”
“Whatcha suggestin’, sister?”
“You might be able to handle Braeburn, but the sheriff will be a whole different ballgame.” She opened her suitcase and started taking out armor plates. “Something tells me I’m going to have to back you up in official capacity.”
“Right. Royal Guards outrank a sheriff.”
“Exactly. I’d rather not have to pull that card, but I will if I have to.”
“What will Shining Armor say to that?” I asked.
“Do I look like I care?” She finished putting on the main section of the armor and reached for the horseshoes. “If you ask me, he should have come here himself to speak on your behalf, not thrown you into the lion pit hoping you’d get eaten!”
“I sure feel like I’m about to get eaten,” I sighed.
“Aw come here!” Applejack embraced me in a friendly hug. “Easy there, buddy. Ah know it’s hard, but there ain’t no backing out anymore, an’ we’ve got yer back!”
“They’re coming!” Sentinel announced, looking through the window. “Get ready! And Thorax, we’ve got you!”
She put on her helmet, took her crossbow, and hid behind a cupboard. Applejack and I sat at the table again, and I became Crystal Hoof again - and right on time, as the door opened and Braeburn and the sheriff trotted in.
“Howdy there, I’m back!” Braeburn announced.
“So this is the fellow?” the sheriff asked, eyeing me curiously, though without hostility. “Gotta admit, we’ve never had a crystal pony ‘round these parts.”
“Sheriff, this is Crystal Hoof,” Braeburn introduced me. “Crystal Hoof, this is Sheriff Silverstar. Uh, where’s Sentinel?”
“She’ll be along,” Applejack said vaguely. “Said we can start without ‘er.”
Braeburn and Silverstar sat at the remaining chairs, the ones we’d strategically left vacant so that they’d have their backs turned to Sentinel in her hiding spot.
“So, Crystal Hoof,” Silverstar started, “Braeburn here tells me that you know something about the thief we caught in his orchard some months ago?”
I opened my mouth to confirm, but Applejack halted me with a hoof on my shoulder.
“Before ya say anythin’,” she said, “Ah wantcha ta promise me somethin’, Sheriff. Promise y’all will listen to the whole story before ya do anythin’. Dontcha make any moves until ya hear ‘im out, okay?”
“Don’t you worry, Applejack, I’ve learned my lesson after Troubleshoes. I’ll listen.” He turned back to me and raised an eyebrow. “Well?”
His posture and aura of love were too relaxed to suggest that he might be suspicious of me, which would have been a good thing in any other circumstance, but I remembered too well how readily he’d arrested me last time. Not that I hadn’t given him what had looked like a reason… but this time, he was about to have every reason to arrest me right away! Could I count on him to keep the promise he’d made to Applejack? Had it even been a promise? Would he refuse to listen to Applejack and Sentinel too?
Enough, I told myself. I’d made a vow that I’d do this, and there was no turning back now! Stalling would only make things worse! I took a deep breath to calm myself as much as I could, at least to keep my voice from quivering too much, knowing it wouldn’t last long.
“Um, you all assumed you were dealing with a thief, but you weren’t,” I started. “The whole situation was a misunderstanding.”
“Then why didn’t he explain it then and there?”
“Because telling the truth wasn’t an option. Not at the time, anyway.”
“That’s not helping, son, and it’s too cryptic to make any sense. He couldn’t say anything to us, but telling you was fine? How do you even know him?”
“I am him,” I finally stated.
They looked at me as if I’d said that cows grow on trees.
“Excuse me, how am I supposed to believe that? Granted, there is a bit of similarity between you and him, but he must be twice your age, not to mention that he’s an earth pony and you’re not!”
“That’s what I’m getting at. I don’t normally look like this, but I had to in order to come here safely.” I dropped my disguise. “See what I mean?”
No more words were required. Braeburn recoiled so hard that he fell off his chair, and Silverstar sprang up furiously.
“Bloody Tartarus!” he growled. “I will not have a changeling roaming free in my town! Seize him!”
“Dang nabbit, Sheriff,” Applejack countered, “y’all promised ya’d listen to the whole story!”
“Cousin?” Braeburn said incredulously, getting up from the floor. “You knew about this?!”
“Course Ah knew!”
“And you let this thing come here? To my house? Are you out of your mind?”
“Or worse,” Silverstar interjected, “she could be a changeling herself!”
“Ah’m not a changelin’!”
“Likely story!” Both of them tensed up their muscles; they were going to beat us into submission if my previous experience, both with drones and with ponies, was anything to go by!
“Alright, that’s enough!” Sentinel flew out of her hiding spot to hover above Applejack and me, holding the other two on the other end of her crossbow. “No fighting on my watch, or I will put these arrows to use! Sit down, all of you!”
They obeyed, but their auras of love were piercingly ice-hot; they passionately and furiously hated me, or the situation they were in, or most likely, both.
“Sentinel?” Braeburn muttered, dumbfounded. “You’re a Royal Guard?”
“Yes. I was tasked to escort Thorax - that’s his real name, by the way - and to provide assistance if necessary.” She landed next to me, crossbow slightly lowered but still ready to use it if given a reason. An excuse? Perhaps it was better that I didn’t know.
“Escort? From where?”
“The Crystal Empire, where he’s been living for the past few weeks.”
“Now, I know that’s a lie!” Braeburn said. “Applejack here went to the Crystal Empire recently and said nothing about changelings on the prowl! That’s it! You’re all changelings!”
“Only me!” I said urgently; as I’d feared, this was getting out of control fast! “They’re both ponies!”
“Prove it,” Silverstar demanded with a scowl.
“How?” Braeburn protested. “I don’t think we can believe anything they say!”
“The only way I can think of other than asking questions,” I suggested cautiously, “is that changelings can’t maintain their disguise while unconscious, so if we can achieve that-”
“Nopony’s knocking anypony out on my watch!” Silverstar shot back.
“I have another way,” Sentinel said grimly, “but I was hoping we wouldn’t have to resort to it.”
What was she talking about?
“I’m listening,” the sheriff said.
She trotted to her suitcase, took something wrapped up in a piece of cloth, put it onto the table, and unwrapped it. It was a rolled-up chain.
“Captain Shining Armor cast a spell on this on the eve of our departure,” she explained. “He said the spell automatically extends itself onto any metallic object the chain comes in contact with, for as long as that contact is maintained. It was meant primarily as a security enhancement because he still doesn’t trust Thorax, but I think it’ll just as easily clear your doubts.” She turned to me. “You probably have an idea by now which spell that is, and believe me, I wish I had a better option. But I’ll understand if you don’t want to go through with it.”
“I don’t think I have a choice,” I replied hesitantly, looking uneasily at the chain. Yes, I knew what the spell was, and I too wished it didn’t require my cooperation to prove my friends’ identities. But they were here for me, and I owed it to them!
“So how does it work?” the sheriff asked.
“The spell is activated by physical contact, and it’s changeling-specific. It does nothing to ponies.”
“So we touch it? Like this?” Braeburn put his hoof on the chain.
“Yes.” Sentinel put her hoof on it too.
Applejack and Silverstar joined. Now it was my turn, and all eyes were on me: Braeburn and Silverstar’s frowning, Applejack’s puzzled, and Sentinel’s pleading, probably for forgiveness for what she’d suggested.
I swallowed a lump in my throat and cringed as I moved my foreleg slowly toward the chain. Beads of sweat rolled down my head, and I bit my lip about halfway there. When my hoof was close, I closed my eyes; I’d come in contact with the chain any moment-
ZAP!
Before I knew it, I was oozing down a wall.
What a jolt! I might have forgotten the details, but hadn’t the spell he’d used on the bars of my prison cell been weaker than this? Was it simply the case of having had the time to perfect a freshly-learned spell, or had he deliberately made it stronger this time? And what had been the reason? Avoiding the risk of spell weakening when transferred onto any prison bars he’d hoped would hold me? Wanting to make sure the spell would last long enough for me to reach prison without needing to be refreshed? Pure spite?
All eyes were still on me, as wide as they could get, when my head stopped spinning and allowed me to dare to open my own eyes and attempt to get up off the floor. All eyes but Sentinel’s; hers were avoiding me as if her life depended on it, and her face was distorted in a grimace.
“I’m sorry, Thorax,” she whispered. “I didn’t think it would be that strong!”
“What in tarnation…” Applejack muttered.
“I’ll be damned,” Braeburn said. “This really works!”
“On an undisguised changeling,” Silverstar corrected him. “How do we know the spell recognizes a disguise as such?”
“It does,” Sentinel said.
“Forgive me if I don’t believe it until I see it,” he insisted.
“Haven’t you seen enough?”
“Ah know Ah have,” Applejack stated, then got off her chair and approached me. “Are ya alright, sugarcube?”
“Sugarcube?!” Braeburn exclaimed. “That’s no ‘sugarcube’! That’s a disgusting, filthy-”
“We get it!” Sentinel interrupted him.
“Consarn it, Braeburn! He ain’t no disgustin’, filthy-whatever-y’all-were-gonna-say, an’ Ah ain’t lettin’ ya treat ‘im like this!”
“Calm down, Applejack,” the sheriff interjected, examining the chain more closely. Was he looking for a mechanism that could fake the spell’s effects as needed? “This wasn’t a pretty sight, I agree, but I’m afraid I still need proof the spell works on a disguised changeling too.”
“Oh, for the love of zap apples… Why’re y’all just standin’ there, Sentinel? Ain’t ya gonna say somethin’? This is crazy!”
Sentinel sighed and hung her head. “I’m afraid we’ll have to do this, Applejack. The sheriff requested proof and we’re obliged to give it to him, whether we like it or not.” She turned to him. “May I at least request that Thorax is allowed to recover before subjecting him to this again?”
He shook his head and placed the chain back onto the table, apparently satisfied with it. “I don’t have all day, missy, and I’m sure Braeburn doesn’t, either.”
“It’s okay, I’ll do it,” I said, getting up shakily. “Let’s get it over with.”
“No you won’t!” Sentinel protested. “Look at you! You can barely stand on your hooves as it is! Do it later if they insist, but right now it’s too dangerous for you! We’ll think of something in the meantime!”
“I appreciate your concern, Sentinel, but I’ll be fine! I think. It can’t be the worst thing I’ve ever been through, can it?”
“I’m not going to talk you out of it, am I?”
“Don’t worry, I’m ready!” I wasn’t. “The sooner we do this, the sooner we can go on with the rest.”
“Okay, fine. But for the record, I still think it’s a bad idea.”
Braeburn and Silverstar were already waiting with their hooves on the chain. Applejack and Sentinel joined them reluctantly. I took a deep breath and became Crystal Hoof again, then approached the table, gritted my teeth, squeezed my eyes shut, and reached for the chain.
ZAP!
I felt my disguise dissolve on impact with the wall, and the world went dark.