Skid felt himself at that moment, and felt his entire being as he seemed to send his consciousness around him and was aware of off the lives around him. He felt a thousand destinies upon his shoulders, and knew who had caused this problem in the first place. It was not his queen. Nor was it Twilight, Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, Rarity, Pinkie Pie, or Applejack. It was him and him alone that caused it. Any other changeling would have taken a familiar pony’s face and memories, and simply done his job, observing from afar. But he also knew they would not have found as much as he had. He had gotten close, and had learned deep secrets about them, and had also given a bit of himself to them as well. Even now, he could feel their hope, as slight as it was that he would change his mind and save them, or someone would save them. The sky darkened above as the sun slowly set, and he opened his eyes and gazed at the changelings around him standing in the small area in front of the Town Hall. To one side, he saw his queen, and he also saw her watching him carefully. This was a test, for what he couldn’t tell. He turned his gaze in the opposite direction where five ponies gazed to their sixth friend, Twilight Sparkle, each seeming to hold their own look as they saw him gaze toward them. Applejack was still holding onto hope, Rainbow Dash was crying out in injustice. He didn’t know Rarity enough to identify how she was feeling, but he could see the flickering of a spell on her horn, ready to attack when she got the opportunity to try casting it. She had probably seen what had happened to Twilight, and didn’t want to experience the same pain. Pinkie Pie seemed to be trying to reach into nothing, mumbling something about a party canon. Fluttershy just layed there, breathing heavily, she was injured after all. He turned back to Twilight, gazing at her accepting eyes. She was done crying, she had accepted she couldn’t run from her fate.
“Syth, may I ask one final question?” Gazing at her, Skid considered it, and gave a small nod. She gave a thankful smile, and opened her mouth.
“Will it hurt?” Her eyes broke into tears again, before she forced them away. This was the one thing that she could ask that would still affect her. He sighed; her final wish.
“It won’t hurt you” he said truthfully, and he saw some amount of closure in her eyes as she closed them and prepared for the spell. He closed his eyes, his horn glowing green and his disguise vanishing. Four cries of outrage sprung up, and he felt their anger and fear lash him and for a brief moment he paused, for the final time and opened his eyes and gave Twilight a final glance. She was a strong person, holding to her beliefs even when she was in the middle of an attack on her mind. He closed his eyes again.
“Goodbye Twilight…” he spoke, beginning the spell more strongly.
“Goodbye Ski-Dddd…” her voice faded as his spell first immobilised her. She would no longer be able to show any outward sign of anything being wrong. Skid began the second part of the spell, the part that required for him to first steal her memories, and semi-impose them over his own. This process would practically give him a second personality, but one that was under his control. This was important because it meant he was Twilight Sparkle, the princess would not notice the difference. To everyone outside of, and inside his own mind, he would be Twilight Sparkle. Next was the process of stealing her innate ability and her body. However, before that he had to remove the last vestiges of Twilight from her body, and this required a special place for that to happen. It was something, not that Skid knew this, which changelings were so rare to have. Only one changeling currently alive other than him had it. It was a special storage for the heart of the pony, something changelings could only feed on and never steal. With this piece stored safely in Skid’s second heart, the body was now just an empty shell. Twilight Sparkle was no more. There was one final piece to the spell, and Skid began to concentrate, drawing on the body’s own magical ability for the process. Skid finished the spell, and prepared for the pain about to overwhelm him.
“Twilight!” spoke one of the friends, as her body suddenly exploded into light, though the shape was still visible. Skid’s eyes sprung open, and his mouth opened in a silent scream of pain as his entire body structure was shifted, moved, changed to accommodate the new features this body had, and remove the ones his old one had on the outside. His insides burned, desperately fighting for supremacy over the unicorn organs and winning with a scrap of energy to spare, he gasped for breath, surprise by the pain through his body. It was like he had been engorged on a spike and someone was dragging it around his body, twisting it left and right. It paused for a moment and then the real pain began.
“A-Ahhh!” his own voice cut off, replaced by the female voice of Twilight, his throught feeling as if it had just been torn out. His head sprouted into flame as his hard, bug like body shattered and a thin membrane kept his organs inside as they began to shift into a new form, more feminine then his old one. Skid didn’t know any of this, his was too busy feeling waves of pain lash him; he was drowning, burning, freezing, and being ripped to shreds in one single moment. He wasn’t aware of his body slowly hover in the air, and the membrane solidify into a single layer of thin skin as the organs settled into their new shape, nor of the purple fur and muscles sprouting over his body, and a small mark appearing on his flank and hair growing out of the back of his body and turning a different shade of purple with highlights, nor of the fact his horn reformed into a more solid horn and his eyes change colour and him grow eyelashes. All he was aware of was a rippling pain thought his body that burned him worse than the sun, a searing cold that settled on his body, and a tearing inside his organs, changing his gender as a final statement. And then just like that, it was over and she fell to the ground, and layed there. As she recovered she didn’t notice that the light radiating from where Twilight had once been faded, leaving behind a small pile of ash.
Within a few moments, Twilight opened her eyes and groaned her memory of the last few moments fuzzy at best. Why did she feel a numb tingling through her body? She sat up and rubbed her head, feeling the solid horn which channelled her magic and the fur that protected her skin. Her eyes were blurry, and she could make out many forms around her that were black, but she couldn’t distinguish anything as of yet. And quite suddenly as her eyes cleared, her memory returned of the last few moments and she rocketed to her feet, gazing around rapidly for Skid and her friends. She couldn’t see Skid at first, but as her eyes fell on her friends she saw their horrified gazes and frowned. Following their line of sight, she noticed the pile of ash and blinked in open shock. Was-Was that Skid? Her eyes gazed to the changelings, who were keeping their distance and she drew some quick conclusions. Skid had tried the spell, and somehow had ended up as ash. She turned to her friends and prepared a spell to knockout the guards when suddenly she was tackled by all the surrounding changelings and bound once more. Tossed beside her friends, she growled as the queen merely gazed at her curiously, before walking away. She turned to her friends, and saw them looking at her with that horrified gaze.
“W-What happened while I was out, where’s Skid?” She saw all five of them blink in absolute shock, as if her asking that had been such a surprise that they hadn’t even considered the possibility.
“T-Twilight is that you?”Dash spoke, seeming as if he was shocked to see his friend. Truth be told Twilight could understand, after all she had almost died there. She gave a hesitant smile and nodded.
“Who else would I be? W-What happened to Skid?” Rarity answered this time, glancing to the pile of ash.
“You’re not Twilight, Twilight is over there as a pile of ash after what YOU did to her” Twilight’s eyes widened in silent horror as she gazed at the ashes and knew, without being told, she had indeed died there.
“B-But if that’s the case, how am I still alive” she asked, her eyes filled with horror and confusion. Applejack gazed to her, eyes in a deep frown as she tried to consider if this was indeed Twilight. Suddenly Two Changelings disguised as ponies, walked by and began talking to the guards.
“Skid messed up again, as predicted” one chortled, and Twilight frowned, listening in.
“He is such a disappointment to all changeling kind, messing up such a simple spell, spent too much time trying to get some pony flank I think” they all laughed over that, Twilight blinked in shock, a small blush coming over her face.
“Now we’ve got the same pony we had before, honestly he was so weak not being able to overpower a simple pony consciousness. Well I have to get back to duty, you two go and grab me some food would ya?” The other too nodded and headed off. Twilight mused, and realised what they meant.
“Skid couldn’t overpower my consciousness, so instead he got consumed by my own! But what does this mean” she frowned, a headache growing from unanswered questions. If only she had read more books on changelings. She felt exactly the same as she always did. Her friends seemed to be gazing at her with relief on their faces, Pinkie breaking down into cascading tears, which fell onto Rainbow Dash who got a little annoyed. Pinkie stopped, and shared a sheepish smile. Twilight gazed to the guards, and a smile formed on her face. Skid had made one critical mistake. He had taught her how to connect to minds mentally. She paused, her horn glowing only slightly and a small sliver of purple magic, barely noticeable even to her friends connected with them. It was easy this time to link their minds, and she quickly shared her plan. They all agreed it sounded like a good plan, and she disconnected.
“Celestia…”she whispered, and her eyes closed as a stray breeze blew her hair for a moment before settling. Her friends quickly hid the colour coming from her horn, using different poses trying to be ‘sly’ about it. Twilight’s horn slowly glowed more and more brightly as she extended her reach further and further, and just as she was starting to reach her limit, gritting her teeth, she felt her. Immediately she recognised the gentle mind of her Mentor, before her magic reached its limit and snapped back into her own mind and she blinked her eyes open. She growled silently in annoyance, she had been so close! As she tried to think of an alternate plan, she barely noticed the faint presence of a pony with the magic to move the sun by her own will. It wasn’t until she spoke, that Twilight realised she was there.
’Twilight; what has you so frantic, that you would go to the limits of your magic with a telepathy spell, just to reach me?’ Twilight felt relief gush through her and tears coat her face as she felt her mentor and knew everything would be ok now.
’Celestia, changelings have attacked and a friend was a changeling and he tried to do something to me and now we’re all captive and I can’t do obvious magic or they’ll hurt me and-‘ Celestia gently cut her student off.
’I shall be on my way soon, I will have to convince Luna to go ahead of me as she is much closer to lend some support while I make my way there.’ Twilight felt Celestia gently close the link, and turned to her hopeful friends and spoke the news they had been waiting for.
“She’s on her way, they both are. Help is coming” they all seemed to lift up as they hugged each other. As they knew help was on the way, they quickly devised a plan to get themselves free the instant an opportunity arose. Soon the nightmare would be over.