"Alright, everyone, gather around."
Mole Cricket looked at the collection of youngsters around him. No two of them looked alike: different species, different ages, and different nations of origin. Yet each and every one of them was now a dear friend... and it was time to say goodbye.
In the weeks that had followed his interview with Shining Armor, the changeling had steadily mended, in no small part due to the constant stream of love energy that radiated from the Crystal Heart. While he had refrained from 'burning' love to accelerate his healing, it's well known that, regardless of your species, being well fed will always help you heal more quickly. And the fact that he had twenty plus little friends to keep him in good spirits had certainly not hurt. But with winter over, and the various arrangements made for each of these youngsters to return home having been finalized, it was time for everyone to return home.
Changelings can't cry, but they can wish that they could.
Looking at all of the faces staring at him, tears in their eyes, Cricket began, "We all knew this would happen one day. You all have your own lives to live, and while I certainly enjoy your company, I understand that keeping you all here in my hospital room would be selfish: you all need to go out there and brighten up someone else's life. You'll need to leave soon, so I'll try to keep this brief."
Looking over to the young minotaur in the group, Cricket said, "Phil, if you don't stop putting ketchup on everything you eat, you're going to turn into a tomato. That is a prophecy." This got an assortment of giggles from the assembled children, and a blush from Phil, whose love for ketchup bordered on the absurd. "There is a wide world of condiments out there, so find a few others and add them to the list. Don't be afraid to change things up a little: variety is the spice of life."
Turning over to the young warg, the changeling said, "Mut-Wolf, you are capable of great things." At this, the diminutive wolf cub's ears perked up: he was small for his age, and wasn't very strong or brave. In fact, he was a little bit of a crybaby. "You may be small now, but I know you'll grow up to be something spectacular. The only failure is in accepting failure. Find something that you want to dedicate your life to, and apply yourself to it with all your heart. Never let anyone tell you that you can't be great. The only thing that can hold you back is yourself. Courage is all you really need."
Addressing the worg in the group, Cricket smiled and said, "Gwallgofrwydd, no, Wally, you need to tone it down a bit. There's being a bit wild, and there's being a maniac. Right now, you're beyond maniacal." This got a big laugh from everyone, even from the black-coated, red eyed worg. Worgs are well known for being wild, but Wally was so far beyond that he could be considered a caricature of a caricature of a worg. "But you shouldn't tone it down too far: the best solution, sometimes, is an insane solution. We're never going to survive unless we get a little crazy."
"Miw-Sher," Cricket began, turning over to a young sphinx. The young lady immediately began to hide her face bashfully behind one of her wings. "Kitten, you don't need to hide your face, just because you don't have any makeup. You don't need it to make yourself look beautiful. Kohl around the eyes, blush on your cheeks, lipstick on your lips, you don't need any of that: you're beautiful just the way you are, and putting anything over that lovely face of yours would be a crime." The sphinx promptly dropped her wing, and smiled angelically. That young lady would be a heartbreaker when she grew up...
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On and on, it went. It took the better part of an hour to cover everyone, but he did it. Finally, he reached the end of the list.
"Oh, Alex, Alex, Alex," he said, then sighed theatrically. "What are we going to do with you?" The snow white griffin blushed, her cheeks turning an adorable shade of pink. "You refuse to sleep anywhere other than right here in my bed, and worse, you hog the covers, and insist on borrowing my pillow. You won't eat your vegetables, and I know for a fact that you're the one who keeps stealing my dessert. Just because I don't eat it doesn't mean you can take it without asking, you know?"
The griffin was now blushing incandescent. Cricket continued, now on a roll. "You snore. Did you know that? I mean, it's a cute little snore, but still. You kick when you're having a good dream, and with your claws, a kick can be really uncomfortable. You lisp, even though we both know you only do it to get attention. But the thing that really worries me is the fact that you won't go to sleep without a goodnight hug from me." With a weary sigh, Cricket said, "In fact, you can't seem to go fifteen minutes without a hug from me, or you start sniffling and crying, and let me tell you, there's nothing sadder in the whole wide world than a crying little griffin chick. Worse, when you're sad, I feel sad. So, in order to keep you from crying all the time, I got you something."
Cricket reached behind his pillow, and pulled out a stuffed toy, a brown and white bunny doll. It was fluffy, with little button eyes and nose. It was, in a word, adorable. It had taken days to get it stitched together in secret while Alex was asleep, or while she was out of the room, but the look on the griffin's face at this moment made it worthwhile.
"This," the changeling said, grinning, "Is the Huggabunny. I've stuffed him with as many hugs as I thought that he could safely hold." That wasn't quite true: the bunny was stuffed with fluff, not hugs. However, upon completing the creation, he had given the toy a good, long hug, which was just as good, he thought. "So," he continued, "Whenever you feel you need a hug from me, hug the bunny." Alex did so, smiling cheerfully. "Now, I don't know how long a hug can last, but I'm sure they can keep for a good long time. However, the next time we see each other, if it seems like the hugs are getting a little stale, let me know: I'll swap them out with some fresh ones." This got a lot of laughs from the assembled children, but Alex nodded seriously: for a four-year-old, that made perfect sense.
Alex abruptly turned her head, then whistled. A nurse walked in, carrying a small bunny rabbit on her back. Grinning, Alex said, "I got you a gift, too. This is Miss Bunny Wunny Cuddlewumpus." The assembled children giggled at that, but the griffin continued unabashed. "You never seem to sweep, er, sleep well without me cuddled up next to you, so I got you something nice, warm, and fwuffy that you can use to take my place."
The bunny promptly jumped off of the nurse's back, and hugged Cricket's face energetically. Apparently, Alex had chosen a natural born cuddler...
Cricket, blushing bright blue, said, "Ah, thank you Alex, I really do appreciate this. Ummm, I'm not sure about the name..." There was no way he could use that name in public...
Alex, tears welling up in her eyes, asked, "You don't wike it?"
Ah, Cricket's one weakness: he was a complete pushover when it came to children, girls, and anything cute...
"...I wuv it," Cricket said, hugging the bunny enthusiastically. He'd have to learn to live with that, he supposed...
There were cheers that followed, then hugs, laughs, and tears, but a few minutes after that, the children filed out, one by one, until Cricket was alone in his hospital room, feeding his new pet a carrot. Miss Bunny really was an adorable little thing...
There was a knock on the door. Cricket looked up, and saw an earth pony walk in, a knapsack upon his back. The pony in question was... striking. He was tall, well built, with a great deal of tone to his muscles, in spite of being a bit old. With a grey coat and a white mane and tail, the pony could be anywhere between forty and sixty. But what really struck the changeling was something that he had trouble defining. This pony had... presence: if he walked into a room, everyone would turn to look. If he spoke, everyone would stop to listen. It may have just been the fact that he had an impressive moustache (a good moustache can have authority all on it's own), but Cricket abruptly wished that he could stand at attention. Sadly, while his foreleg was out of the sling, his legs were still in traction...
"I," the pony began, in a strong, clear voice that set his prodigious handlebar moustache shaking dramatically, "Am Stainless Steel. Shining Armor sent me to have a talk with you. Do you mind if I sit?"
Cricket shook his head, and said, "I don't mind one bit."
The pony nodded gratefully, then pulled up a chair. Before sitting down, he closed the door, then said, "Shining Armor already briefed me regarding your, ah, unique condition. If it would make you feel more comfortable, you can dispense with the disguise."
Cricket nodded gratefully, then dropped the disguise. After wearing it for so long, it was getting to where it was starting to feel like a second skin...
Steel nodded, then said, "Shining Armor informed me that you were planning on remaining in Equestria for the duration, and that you had certain aspirations towards knighthood after your recovery was complete. Is that correct?" Cricket nodded. "Capital. Now, there are certain protocols that will have to be observed, before you can be considered qualified to become a squire, your first step in that direction. Since you're currently injured, and will have considerable physical therapy afterwards, the physical portions of the examination will have to wait until after you are fully healed. However, the assessments regarding your mental acuity and psychological state can be done in the meantime."
Cricket nodded, petting the bunny. Over the last few weeks, Shining Armor had popped in from time to time to check on the changeling. During those visits, the subject of knighthood had come up now and again. The unicorn had briefed the changeling on the major points: while physical prowess was important, the most important part was the psychological examination: a knight had a great deal of power, not just in terms of physical might, but also in military authority, and in politics as well. As such, before somepony was considered for knighthood, they had to undergo a battery of tests to make certain that they were capable of handling that responsibility... and were unlikely to abuse it.
Steel smiled, and said, "Now, given the fact that you are a changeling, the tests that you will need to go through will require a bit of reassessment: it would be unfair to expect you to be knowledgeable about Equestrian history, or culture, at this juncture. You will, of course, be expected to catch up, but for now, the tests you'll be given will be a bit more abstract than the norm. After the tests, books will be brought in for you to study, so that you can be caught up while you recover, and I will see to it that tutors will be brought in to help you in catching up with any subjects that you are found to be having any difficulty with."
This surprised the changeling a bit: he'd expected to have some difficulty in those fields, and that he'd probably have to explain, more than once, that he'd had little to no formal education, at least as a pony would understand it. The fact that somepony had already thought that far ahead was surprising...
The earth pony stood up, grabbed a table, then pulled it over to where it would stand between the changeling and himself. Pulling out his knapsack, the pony set a curious device upon the table: it was a square, subdivided into a set of black and white squares. Afterwards, the pony pulled out a set of small black and white figurines, and began setting them upon the squares in some sort of configuration.
"In the meantime," Steel said, as he continued, "We can get started with something a bit less... formal. I thought we might begin with a few games of chess."
Cricket, now thoroughly lost, asked, "What's chess?"
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That evening, Shining Armor and Stainless Steel sat on the balcony overlooking the Crystal Empire, watching the sunset turn the city into a thousand glittering diamonds.
Shining Armor, his expression one of pure surprise, asked, "He'd never heard of chess before today?"
Stainless Steel, Knight Grand Cross of the Order Of The Crown, Knight Grand Master of the Order of the Knights Hospitaller, and Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Golden Cloak, nodded, chuckling. "Yes. It gave me a bit of a surprise myself. Nearly every other culture in the world plays chess, or some version of it, but apparently, changelings have almost no understanding of board games. I had to teach him the entire game today."
Shining Armor chuckled himself. Steel was an avid chess player, and he'd often stated that you could tell a great deal about somepony based upon how they played the game. The fact that, when he turned thirty, he had earned the rank of grandmaster, and his cutie mark was a knight chess piece besides, spoke volumes for Steel's skill in the game. "So," Shiny asked, grinning, "How did he do?"
"Surprisingly well," the older knight admitted, smiling. "The first three games, he did about as well as an amateur could be expected to do when playing against an expert. After that, he began to improve significantly. By our fifth game, he'd really started getting a feel for it. He won our seventh game, although it was a hard fought victory, and I intentionally passed on a move that would have turned the game in my favor. I'll be heading over tomorrow, and we'll continue from there. I feel he has a strong understanding of the game now, and in a few more rounds, he'll start developing strategies of his own. From there, I should be able to assess his grasp of strategic thinking, and get an overall feel for his mindset."
The younger knight nodded. Chess strategy, while not strictly necessary, wasn't a bad thing for the changeling to learn. If the changeling had aspirations for knighthood, he'd definitely need to demonstrate that he had not only the ability to lead others, but the ability to lead others well: many well known strategists in Equestria were also avid players of the game.
"I will admit," Steel said, with a rueful chuckle, "That it is a pity that he has decided to become a knight."
Shining Armor raised an eyebrow at that, and asked, "Oh? Why's that?"
Stainless Steel laughed, then said, "Think on it, boy. In less than a day, he was able to learn the game well enough to challenge a ranked grandmaster. Even if I was going easy on him, that is no small accomplishment. If he decided to dedicate himself fully to the game, instead of to knighthood, he could easily become a grandmaster himself."