Celestia's burning star was at it's highest as it can be in the sky overlooking Canterlot; signalling the time was now midday. Inside the room of a certain house, a certain brown earth pony mare was finishing up the last of her soup, casually leaning on the back of her chair, letting out a small burp of content.
"Pardon" she sighed happily with a big grin splashed full across her face as she plonked the bowl down on the side of the counter. "That was nice". Her stomach now full with (tomato) soup, Fruit Heart got reminded of the other bowl of soup that she made, the other bowl that was made for her prisoner. "Must have finished it by now" she pondered loud, and then moved off of her chair and made her way across the room and to the stairs.
"You finished?" She called out in hope. And once again; no answer. "Still not talking" she murmured to herself, as she climbed the stairs, turning the corner and stopping short of the room where the captured creature now, apparently, resided. Calmly, she knocked twice on the door as she asked "Can I come in?" Fruit Heart heard a small *grunt* from the other side of the closed door, which she believed to be a sign for 'yes'. Fruit Heart, in a slow fashion, opened the door to the room.
As she opened the door and looked inside, she got a jolt of surprise. Rather than be face-to-face with a still angry, changeling (as what she had suspected to happen) she instead saw, when the door opened enough to allow her to properly see, the changeling peering out of the window. It was sat down on the middle of the floor, staring at the pane of transparent material on the wall as if deep in thought, like his mind was far away from Canterlot but his body lay still. He was calm. Oddly calm.
As the door creaked on it's hinges the black creature turned his head and looked Fruit Heart dead in the eyes, but did not budge an inch otherwise. He said nothing back, and his face hadn't changed either. Strangely, the mare was more frightened of him now then she was earlier; no longer snarling and angry, instead being calm and near-mysterious. She in no way liked to see him like this. He was quiet. Too quiet.
"Umm...hello?" she said meekly, trying to, but failing, to start up a conversation, only to be rewarded by a harsh humph form the creature. Trying to divert her eyes from the changeling's creepy stare. Spying around, she saw the bowl of soup on the floor, somehow finding itself on the other side of the room. Preceding to walk towards the bowl, her gaze half-staring at the hurt changeling from across the side of the room, she discovered the contents of the bowl were now empty. Fruit Heart couldn't help but suppress a giggle, as her mind was thinking back to when she saw him lapping at the soup like a tamed dog. A fine image indeed.
"Good, no?" she asked between her giggles, only to receive an simple grunt from the changeling, who was still sitting down in the middle of the floor. Sighing slightly, Fruit Heart lifted the tray, with the bowl still situated on it, using her mouth and turned around, heading out the door and closed it as she made her way down the stairs, leaving him once again to himself. Staring back at the window, he let his mind wander:
How long? How long will I have to stay here? I no longer have a feeling on one of my wings, my hoof appears to be broken, I may be left with only one eye and I'm being held as a prisoner by a stupid pony. Our invasion failed. They're probably all died. And our queen hath forsaken us. No, she is died too, I can bet.
How much more pain do I have to take? It's bad enough that I have to be a capture to an annoying piece of food, and now she's being nice to me! Why?
What is with her? Is she nice to me because she want's something out of me? No, I shalt not allow it. That can be the only reason, it hath to be!
Can it?
No sooner had he finished asking that question had Fruit Heart returned into the room, awaking him abruptly from his inside conflict as she enthusiastically pushed open the bedroom door. Eyeing her, he saw she was carrying something new in her mouth. He was unsure what it was; to him, it appeared to be a small box with a red cross.
To the mare, on the other hoof, it was a nursing box. Laying it gently on the floor, the changeling watched defensively as the mare opened her box, and pulled a fresh roll of bandages and laying it by her side. "Here" she said as she offered out her hoof "Come near me. I want to check your body." Hearing the last sentence, the changeling recoiled backwards until he hit the side of the bed, his ears splashed as close to his head as possible as his eyes reared back in fear. She wants me! He thought. She wants my body to-
"Please."
....What?
"Please." The mare repeated, her tone worried. "I'm do not want to hurt you. I just want to check you wounds. I won't hurt you, I promise" she called out she made her towards him. Hearing a pleads, he, no matter how much he didn't want to admit it, even to himself, couldn't help but feel slightly trusted towards her. He could tell she was not lying. He was a changeling after all. If anyling knew about lies, it would be him.
Despite still being cautious towards his capture, he tentatively offered back his own hole-filled non-bandaged hoof. "Thank you" the earth pony said as her smile quickly returned to her face "but that's the wrong hoof. I need you other one." Putting his hoof back down, he looked to his wrapped hoof. "I'm not going to hurt it. I just want to put a fresh set of bandages on them." Looking back at the mare, the changeling saw the sincerity in her eyes, and thus offered out his other hoof.
"Thanks" she said as she grabbed his hoof and started to unwrap it, pulling out the splints when she made contact to his fresh skin underneath. Inspecting it, she placed his hoof down and turned around, not even bothering to push the old bandages aside. "Wait here, please." she said called as she left the room, only to appear shortly after sporting a bucket in her mouth and sliding a large, near pony-sized tray along the floor. The tray itself had larger sides then that of a normal tray; more like a small tub, and had a sponge placed inside. As the mare placed the bucket down, the changeling saw it was filled with water; warm water, as small trickles of steam seared out of the hot liquid.
Fruit Heart slid her tray across the room, making sure it stopped just in front of where the changeling was seated. Curiously, he inspected the tray, and after seeing nothing odd with it, turned his eyes towards the mare, who had now dropped the bucket to her side and was holding the sponge in her hoof. "Can you step in, please" she urged, unable to meet his gaze. "Sorry about this, but" she continued as she bashfully rubbed the back of her head "as I placed your empty bowl downstairs earlier, I thought about how I never" she gulped "properly cleaned you when I was healing you yesterday, so..." she trailed off as she held her hoof out towards him; the one that was holding a sponge. "And seeing as you probably never had a bath in a while" her voice appeared very weak "I thought that maybe, after I checked your wounds I could" Fruit Heart clenched her eyes as she forced out the last sentence "wash-you" she finished quickly.
She waited. Waited for a reaction. Waited for him to reply in some way. A yes. A no. A laugh. Anything. But nothing. No answer. Very slowly, Fruit Heart perked open one of her eyes, but rather than seeing.... anything different, she instead saw the changeling doing.... absolutely nothing. He just stared at her, waiting for her to do something else. "Umm...is that a yes, then?" She asked half-hopeful. In response, he stepped inside the tub: and then continued to stare at Fruit Heart. He did nothing else, as he knew what she wanted to do. He was still defensive, but perhaps he understood her now. Or at least, that's what Fruit Heart thought.
Fruit Heart walked over to the still changeling, grabbing the bucket along the way as she made her way towards him. As she got within washing distance she dropped the bucket carefully down and dunked her sponge in, taking it out and squeezing then dunking it back in, making sure she got it as damp as she could. As Fruit Heart was about to clean him, she stopped when she realized something. "Hold on" she said as pointed towards the changeling's other bandage; the one that was wrapped around his wing "I need to take this off" she announced as she did just so, dropping the sponge in the tub. The changeling peered round to see Fruit Heart take off his other bandage, not an easy feat with one eye still wrapped up, and whimpered quietly when the mare finished with unwrapping the last of the bandage; as he saw his left wing was missing, in it's place was nothing more than a stump of it's former self, barely an inch or two long.
Fruit Heart looked back at him when she threw away the bandage across the room, and frowned when she saw his face was left with sadness. It's eyes staring at the wing in hope that this will make the wing grow back to the former glory that it once was. "Sorry" Fruit Heart said suddenly "That's what it was like when I found you. I managed to wrapped it up as best I can...but" Fruit Heart found the rest of the words were stuck in her throat as if they didn't want to be said "I don't know..what will happen to them now..." she trailed off as she looked down and picked up the sponge, keeping her eyes affixed at the wet object. "I can't take back" she started "what happened to you then but" Fruit Heart then smiled slightly as she looked up to meet the creature's gaze "I can help you know, which really does matter, in truth, yes?" He did not answer, and Fruit Heart knew that he wouldn't answer, seeing as both he did not talk and she was asking a rhetorical question. When the changeling turned his head forwards to as to no longer look at her, Fruit Heart could have swore that a tiny, incredibly small, yet present, smile had appeared on his face just both it left out of her sight.
Seeing that made the mare's smile turn from a small lip seal into a big grin, filling her heart with a sense of accomplishment and warmth. In a happy tune in her ears, Fruit Heart then splashed the sponge on the changeling's back, but recoiled back when he tensed up as he felt the comfortingly warm water hit his back, but relaxed almost instantly when it wrapped around his back like a cover of a warm blanket on a cold Hearth's Warming eve. When she was sure he was ready to be properly cleaned from her, Fruit Heart continued to clean him, doing long round strokes all around his body, hooves and what she could call his mane and tail. She made sure she didn't clean his wing with the sponge; not wanting to see the poor lonely wing get damp and limp. She knew about changeling anatomy as much the next pony, but she didn't want to take the risk off wetting his wing and making the changeling be even more disappointed from having a wing that was too limp to work. She knew better than that.
Fruit Heart did a wash and repeat all over the changeling body, and it wasn't long before she found she was humming a rather cheerful tune as she used her sponge to clean the changeling's body. As she washed him she made sure to steer clear of his eyes; she hadn't removed the bandage over his left eye. She knew about this and she did not want to remove it. She told him there was no need to remove it, as it does not need to be cleaned out, but in truth, she didn't feel like she had the heart to remove it and take the chance that he was blind in that eye forever. She hadn't understood why she felt bad, but she just ticked it off as feeling bad for him. (That and the water had liquid soup in it). She also made sure to clean around the rope still attached to his back hoof, unable to clean underneath it as it was too strongly knotted to move.
Not long later Fruit Heart was done with the washing of the changeling and stood back a few steps, admiring her work. His was most definitely cleaner now, in fact, his back chitin appeared to be sparkling. (Well chitin IS smooth after all). The mare smirked as she admired her work. "I think you're nearly squeakily clean" she joked to, trying to silicate at least a chuckle from the unnerving creature, but to no avail. Sighing, Fruit Heart announced "Wait here, I need to get the towels" and left the room forthwith. Sighing to himself, the changeling stepped out of the shallow tub and shook himself off like a dog, managing to wet his surroundings from the stray flying droplets. "You're really are like a dog, aren't you?" a voice joked, making the changeling turn his head suddenly and see the pony staring at him from the open doorway. She had a rather peculiar smile draped across her face.
As Fruit Heart stepped into the room towards the changeling he saw she was caring a large towel over her back. As she stopped beside the un-moving creature she preceded to wrap the towel around him and dried him off. "First you lap at soup" she started "then you shake your water off your fur- I mean....body" she struggled to say "If you start panting your tongue I'm going to have to start calling you 'Fido'" she joked again. Hoping to see him smile for a second time today. Sadly, as she expected, his face never changed, aside form the fact that his eyes burrowed down slightly. "I was kidding!" the mare said defensively, pouting. Less than a minute later of drying she realized he was dry.
"Done!" she said enthusiastically. "Don't worry about your hoof so much" she said as she was rubbing the back of her head bashfully "It wasn't broken at all." This caught the immediate attention of him, looking at her patiently to await her further announcement. "It was just....twisted that way on purpose." She chuckled sheepishly. "However!" she said suddenly "You're wing and eye are not so well, I think" her smile fading into a face of sadness "I'm not a trained doctor or nurse, so I can't help you with any serious problems like that." The changelings head hung downwards in defeat. "Sorry" she said unhappily, almost regretting that she had told to him everything at all.
Looking around, trying to think of something else to say so the awkward tension lingering in the air was cut, Fruit Heart noticed the bunch of random equipment and objects scattered across the floor. "Well I better clean this up" she announced as picked up the the tub, empty bucket, old bandages and other pieces of earlier used stuff, and walked out of the door, carrying the miscellaneous objects over her back and between her teeth. She walked out the room in out the room, mumbling "sorry" as left the room.
"Thank you."
"What!" Fruit Heart said suddenly as she turned her whole body round to meet the origin of the noise, being greeted by only the changeling, who had his head turned away from her. Smiling, the mare walked, a spring ever-present in her step as she donned the biggest grin she had ever grinned.
"I did it!" Fruit Heart shouted between her teeth, skipping down the stairs of her house. "I did it" she repeated in a much calmer tone. "I did it."