//------------------------------//
// Purpose 
// Story: Changeling 
// by Criticul 
//------------------------------//

 There was a deformity in the grassy fields beside the reaches of the Everfree—a gap in the far-reaching plains—where dew had gradually begun to pool. Months passed, and the hole grew larger: rain and hail had stripped the grass of its roots and let the disturbance spread. Winds cleared it of soil; heat dried the earth and left nothing but a patch of dust.
    But in the heart of the lifelessness, the cause still remained—the weight that first tugged at the grass. There was an iron chain in the warm dirt, exposed only by shimmering light. It was a relic in some sense: the lock was one of the few remnants of the grievous sin.
    Luna dropped her saddlebags beside the object before dropping to her knees; her eyes never left the metal glare. For but a moment, the Princess was entrapped in her own mind, lost to the memories biting at her skull. She remembered the chain—she remembered where it was from and what it was made for. She remembered pulling it from the gate of an abandoned Castle and tossing it into the darkness.
    It was a relic of sorts: a testament to the grievous sin.
    The Princess sighed as she shut her eyes. She was independent—a rogue—always and forever. The feeling of loneliness was as common to her as was love or joy, but it certainly was far more reliable. In fact, if there was anything that she could count on, it would be in the inevitability of loss: ten lifetimes of silence made that quite obvious.
    But that was why she was here, wasn’t it?
    Luna rifled through the smaller of the two saddlebags, laying out her supplies in careful order. Packing was mostly chaos: she couldn’t have spent more than an hour grabbing at whatever food or tools that she might need. When at last the knapsack was cleared, the Princess looked down blankly.
    She had with her a pair of compasses, a crude map, two canteens, and a thermos.
    Luna then repeated her search of the second, larger bag, which proved to be far more hopeful. There were two bags of plain rice, a few apples for pleasure, and a booklet that classified plants by edibility. The Princess shoved all the food back into the saddlebag and returned to the tools.
    On her own—again.
    As Luna threw the bags back over her head, a small book dropped from the side pocket. At first, she could not recognize the thing: its markless red-leather cover left the book without a name. Perhaps it was something she grabbed in the chaos of packing, or maybe it was something from her last trip—she did not know. But as the time-weathered pages slipped out from the tome, a small bit of memory came back to her.
    It was a journal: something she had found while looking into “Chrysalis” and her “changelings.” The thing had been lying abandoned in the older portions of the library, finding no place along the shelves, as it did not have a known author, but being placed beside the other bestiaries of Equestria. In her time of preparation, Luna scanned through the collection, yet each entry ended as vaguely as the last.
    The journal, which she had only barely bothered with, used the word twice on the few pages that she read; it was her only source.
    The Princess gathered the pages from the dirt and began shoving them back into the cover. Stupidity! Raw stupidity! She was in over her head: not a breath of air—not a flicker of light. What had she been thinking?
    Luna began grabbing at the pages viciously, trembling as she attempted to distract herself from her spiking emotions.
    Had she learned nothing? Had she learned nothing about mercy and love? The queen was gone—dead, perhaps! There was no revenge plot! There was no threat beyond the walls! Everything was perfect in Equestria, but her own damned pride had pulled her from it. Her mind had so greatly fetishized honor and glory—empty words left over from the darker days.
    And this thought—absolution—was something unreal.
    Luna was not a villain—she did not have any blood on her hooves, or at least not since she had been rid of the foreign nightmare. Truly, there was nothing on her part to be redeemed. There was not a drop of darkness to be found in her frail mind.
    As the heat of sadness bit at her eyes, the Princess snagged the final sheet. Dust had already fouled the paper, but even then, she could read its lines.
--~~--
   They told me the truth—the changelings, that is.
But somewhere deep down, I always knew it. It had only taken their hints to expose that little disease within me.
Now, I can hardly go a night without the dreams, the thoughts, or the little voice prying at the back of my skull.
“Love! Love! Love!” it calls to me, sunrise to sunset. I can hardly think clearly anymore; the voice keeps returning, even into my sleep. The doctors think I’m just coping with losses, but they don’t know—they don’t know what we saw.
These things—these changelings!  They’re here, and I know it!
I can’t prove it of course, but I know it.
…
The other day, I had a little bit of an epiphany. It was nothing at first—just a little memory that I tugged at while lying in bed.
Did your parents call you special? Did they say that you were going to be a star like mine did?
Of course they did.
For most of us, that sort of pampering is common. We slowly begin to believe that our mind or body or soul is somehow better than that of our neighbor’s. Everything we do has to be better, right? After all, they’re just piles of flesh and blood walking without thoughts—I’m the only one who can really think.
Then comes the constant rejection; somewhere along the line, we forget that failure can hit us too. Suddenly, our uniqueness is no more than a relic of childhood—a garment we outgrew. The illusions are cast away into the back of our mind, and we slowly lose sight of them.
That’s the end of it, right? We grow up and we realize that life isn’t what it was made out to be. It's a sad fact, but probably one of the most true.
Well, I think I’ve found something a bit more disturbing than that.
Those dreams we had—those little bits of hope and arrogance—are still completely intact. I believe that we’ve only become blind to them when they’re far too large to see completely. Defeat helped the sickness grow.
Now, this might seem like a bit of a jump, but you have to trust me. There’s something about us that keeps feeding this thing—this beast.
And I think it lies in what we’ve come to know as “love”.
Think really hard to yourself: why is love so important to us? Yeah, it keeps us from intentionally hurting one another, but it also angers us. Love can hurt us very much—I know. So why don’t we just try to live without love? We could still support each other, but it could be to satisfy laws.
The reason is simple.
Love tells us that we’re important.
Love places great value on somepony, while importance is the state of being highly valued. The two mesh together perfectly—a symbiotic relationship if there ever was one.
So, as we grow older, we repress the idea of uniqueness, not because it is unrealistic, but because our narcissism protects it. The system is perfect: we search for love, which satisfies the deeply rooted desire to justify our “special” nature. It is the same battle that we had as a child, just resting behind an intricate façade of moral commitments.
They’ve corrupted us! They’re already here!
…
Excuse my outburst—I’ve gotten so tired the last few days. I don’t know how much longer I can hold onto this nothingness—this empty life. My body is beaten each day along the fields, while my mind is chained to these horrible thoughts.
I do not think I’m insane, but everyone has become so distant? Am I really doing anything wrong here? Are my thoughts so backwards that no one can find truth in them?
No, they’ll see soon. They’ll see.
Creatures that feed on love—they’re already here. They’re watching us behind cold, dead eyes. Everypony is always watching.
Those things told me the truth—the changelings, we are.
--~~--
    Luna held the page in front of her for minutes on end, lost in the pains of the author. For just a moment, the princess felt a call—a new world—beyond that which she already knew. It was not so much a realization as it was a strange comfort; rather, it was as though a repressed thought had finally been put to rest.
    Luna picked herself up from the dirt—eyes still glued to the page floating before her. What sort of event could prompt a stallion, or mare for that matter, to speak so vividly about their pain? In all her years of suffering, she knew the parasitic desire was there, but she could never speak of it; it could never be put so blatantly.
    And she knew every word he meant. She knew the feeling of utter uselessness and the weight of her own failures. She knew the pain that came from accepting the inevitability of darkness and falling before it.
    And she knew what it was like to be forgotten.
    No matter how many times she read it, she could not shake the feeling that the author was speaking directly to her. It was as though each word had been tailored for her experiences: personally handled and brought to her in weary times.
    A book on changelings, was it?
    Luna was still hung upon the final words. A changeling, she was: born with a hunger for love that could not be satisfied.
    No. That was absurd.
    This was not about the love. This was not about fame or fortune. This was about herself and her duty she had to the Equestrians. She knew—by her own experience—that the darkness could not be left by its own accords. It had happened before, she knew.
    And it had happened with a prideful sister, too quickly abandoning love.
    Yes, that was surely it. There was not greed that brought her here, but denial. She would not let those things—those changelings—live in the shadows. Even if she was without love, she could not let those demons corrupt it.
    Luna stumbled away from the dust and the abandoned chain. Her mind, so fatally wrapped around its own war, was blind to all else. She returned to the grassy field, continuing on without care.
    The distractions had so viciously consumed her that she failed to notice the world as it changed and shifted around her. She missed the warm, dew-laden grasses as they wrapped around her tired hooves. She missed the gentle touch of spring winds passing over the fields like waves upon the seas. She missed the hum of cicadas as they searched the mud and heat for their own mates.
    And when she at last convinced herself that her duties were solid, all those things were gone—ghosts of the past too soon forgotten. And what remained of that experience was fouled by a constant mental battle over things she already knew.
    But in the end, none of those things mattered. She had a gut feeling, some faith, and one lasting duty. She had to end it before it began.
    For her people.
    For her country.
    For herself.