The Reaction
The daze had worn off, and Celestia looked towards where their prisoner had hung. He was gone.
"How did he manage to escape again?!?!" Twilight yelled. "He does this every time! How many tricks can one changeling have?"
"Calm down, my student. I don't want a repeat of the episode in the hospital." Twilight tried to protest, but was silenced by a sidelong glare from the Princess. "What were those magical canisters he used? I've been alive a few thousand years, and not once have I seen something like that." Celestia scratched her head. The smoke started to die down, revealing a couple scorch marks on the floor. Twilight got up from where she had fallen and scraped her hoof through the ash.
She scrunched up her nose. "Smells like sulphur."
"I concur, Twilight, but I have never even seen magic leave a by-product besides residual heat changes, sound or light, yet this, thing, did all of those, and left a residue."
"But Princess, what if this isn't magic? That would explain why it doesn't match the description of anything we've seen before. But why this changeling would be able to do something like that is beyond me."
"Remember though, he wasn't a normal changeling." She said. Fluttershy timidly peaked around the side of the entrance of the room, and upon seeing no danger, besides the somewhat scary plumes of smoke floating around her ankles, ran in to see the condition of her friends.
"Um, are you guys okay?" Twilight turned to look at her. "I mean, that is, if you want to tell me. It's just that I heard this giant noise, and then after I came out from under the bench that I had crawled under, and I decided to see if all of you were all right. If that's okay."
"We're fine Fluttershy, those loud noises were just a distraction, they weren't meant to kill. Wait a second." She turned to Celestia. "Princess, one of those went off right next to you, right?"
"Yes, my student."
"And you're fine, uninjured, I mean?"
"My ears still hurt, but I seem to be otherwise unharmed."
"So then why were those things not meant to kill us? I mean, he surprised us with those, and if he was an assassin, he would have just finished the job, but he just created a distraction to get away." She paused. "You know, the more I think about it, the weirder this becomes."
"Waddaya mean, Sugarcube?"
"Well, besides the fact that he clearly didn't try to kill us, nopony can just create things out of thin air, I mean Celestia can, but that's part of one of her Alicorn powers, and those are still small things. We can safely assume that he doesn't have that kind of power. He didn't have any of those canisters on him, so he must have an accomplice. I have no idea who that could be, though."
"I will send out search parties while you piece together the evidence, my faithful student. It's nice to know that his mission isn't to kill us, although it does beg the question, why is he here? He could be gathering intel, in which case our only able directive would be to kill him, even though he has dug himself a deeper hole with this recent endeavor, of which the penalty is also death. There is no way I will allow a possible threat like him to threaten the safety of all of my subjects, especially since we don't know what his plan is."
"And it's still unclear why he healed Rainbow Dash, and why he had no fear of you."
"Yes, that too. Good luck, Twilight, I must get started on sending out those search parties." She briskly walked out of the room, flagging down a royal guard. A whoosh was heard, and a ball of green flame appeared, leaving a message on the floor nearby.
Twilight walked over and grabbed it. "This must be from Spike. I asked him before we left to inform me of Rainbow's condition upon her awakening." She opened the scroll, and her smile quickly turned to a frown.
"What is it darling?" Rarity asked.
Twilight looked up, a worried look on her face. "He says that Dash left the hospital, but no one knows when, or why." Her expression grew worse. "Unless..."
"Sugarcube, ya'll aren't goin' ta say that Dash helped this changeling, are ya?"
"Well I don't know what else it could have been. She must be under some kind of mind control magic, to come here and try to save him like that. Nah, it's not her, that would be ridiculous." A wave of despair washed over her. Dash had always been the one to stay true to whatever cause they were per suing. When Dash was the one gone, everything else just felt hopeless. Where were they without their most loyal, daredevil friend, the only one they thought they could always trust? It was a harrowing development, she had definitely never expected it, and that made it all the worse.
"But what if it was her? That sounds an awful lot like something Dash would do, ignorin' the whole fugitive part. Ah guess ah'm just sayin' that it follows her personality, rushin' inta a situation and all."
"I doubt she would betray us over some changeling, element of loyalty and all." Twilight responded, shaking her head.
"But Sugarcube, there's always the change that she thinks this is the right thing to do, and is going with it voluntarily. Ah'm just sayin'. We're assuming it's her though, and we have no proof for any of that, really. It could be anypony, it's not like we saw the pony that we assume broke through that window. It's not like she was acting oddly these last few days, and we still don't even know if there was an associate. If it was Dash, we have no idea how she would've gotten those weapons." Twilight stared at Applejack, her jaw hanging open.
"I didn't expect all of that from you, Applejack, but you're right. Although, Rainbow was the closest to this changeling these last few days, so she is the prime suspect. I'll contact the Princess and see about bringing some of the guard to Dash's house, just to check. Hopefully she isn't involved, but with her close proximity to the changeling, we have to assume the worst. Her being in possible cahoots with the changeling would explain his willingness to heal her, I suppose, although that seems a little too compassionate and caring for a changeling. Let's leave it out of the question that she herself was a changeling. A changeling wouldn't throw itself into a storm to save an enemy town, at least not when it was that dangerous, so it has to be her." She bit her lip. She wasn't sure what to think. When it had just been the changeling involved, her stance had been easy to take, but now she was facing one of her best friends, and she didn't know if she could bring herself to actually stop Dash if the opportunity came. Her only solace was the idea that Dash may not be the culprit, in which case she would be more than a little angry that her friends had even thought of her leaving.
"At least we know nopony's done anything with Dashie! We should throw a party!"
Twilight sighed. "No Pinkie, no parties. Maybe we'll have one after we catch this changeling menace. We should get some wanted posters up, just so everypony can be on the lookout. Not that we can really have a picture of him, shape changer and all." She sighed. "I'll go talk to Celestia. Stay here, I'll be right back." She focused energy in her horn, and after a whoosh and a pop, she appeared in front of the Princess in her throne room. She bowed. "Princess, I have some information that we have put together about the changeling."
"Very well, proceed."
"We have no concrete evidence backing this up, only speculation, but the only suspect we have right now, assuming there was a pony helping that changeling, is Rainbow Dash. The way I can see it, though, the changeling doesn't seem to be holding Dash under a spell, nor does she herself seem to have been replaced by a changeling."
"Why would she turn on her own country then? Changeling manipulation magic must be involved."
"But Princess, as far as we know, that doesn't exist, nor does it allow the personality of the controlled pony to show through, and no changes were seen in Dash. She must have thought that this changeling was the right cause to follow, so either she knows something we don't, or she's being manipulated skillfully. Or both, I suppose. I'm really not sure what to think."
"Well what do you propose?"
"We should send out search parties to scour the nearby towns, especially Ponyville. I want to go by Dash's house and take a look around. For all we know, she isn't even with the changeling, and we're just taking the easiest way out by accusing her. Also, we should probably tell ponies to be on the lookout for anything suspicious."
"Alright then, I will continue to send out search parties. When you are ready to go to Rainbow Dash's house, just send for me and I will assemble a small escort."
"It's quite alright, Princess, but I would like to do this myself."
"Very well, Twilight, I will trust you to be careful."
"Thank you princess." she teleported back to her friends, who jumped a little when she appeared.
"So what did she say Sugarcube?"
"She basically shared my disbelief about Dash leaving. Oh ponyfeathers I'm worried about her. The only reason I'm not going catatonic right now is because we don't know that she left, and we still know that she still has a measure of free will. I just hope we're wrong about this changeling. It doesn't change the fact that his crimes are inexcusable, he's still the number one most wanted criminal right now."
"So what are ya doin' about it?"
"I'm going to Dash's house and taking a look around. If she's there, things should be a lot easier, although she could still be the culprit. The Princess is still sending out search parties, but I told her to focus on Ponyville and the surrounding areas. Hopefully they returned to somewhere familiar."
"How good of a chance do we have of finding them?" Rarity spoke up.
"Not too good, I'd say. We're up against the fastest pony in Equestria and a master of disguise, well, maybe not a master, but anyway the odds aren't in our favor. The best we can hope for is one of them accidentally revealing themselves, or actually having a search party find something useful. With how unpredictable that guy is though, they could be anywhere. He's smart too; he used mathematical formulas I've never heard of, and they all make sense!"
"Well then, ah guess we better get lookin'."
"Not like there's anything else we can do..."