//------------------------------// // FoE Memories Chapter 5.5: Why am I in a cocoon? // Story: Frosty's AU Adventures, featuring probably everything! // by TheBobulator //------------------------------// Chapter 5.5: Why am I in a cocoon? Snug like a bug in a rug. My head hurt. Specifically, the back of my head hurt. I tried to open my eyes, but they refused to open. Something was keeping them glued closed, so I tried to wipe whatever it was away. My claw refused to move, as did my right hoof. Panic set in— I couldn’t move at all! Hindlegs? Stuck. Leg? Unresponsive. I couldn’t really tell whether my talons were opening or closing without the ability to see them. My other senses slowly returned and I began to feel the uncomfortable gel-like substance encasing me. I inhaled in surprise and nearly choked on slime, but somehow I managed to keep breathing. “Mnmmn!” Even my mouth had been sealed! What gives? “Oh good, you’re conscious.” The voice was muffled, and it sounded like it almost echoed around me rather than come from a direction. “Sorry about your, heh, accommodations. It’s been a while since I did this to a pony.” What was going on? I began to squirm with increased urgency, trying to break free. I even tried to scream loud enough to maybe somehow get through the binding around my mouth. A dull thud reverberated around me. “Probably shouldn’t be doing that. You’ll need your energy for the next part.” The voice chuckled, somewhat familiar, if not retaining its echoey quality. Was I inside a box? “Bear with me for a moment.” There was an almost wet, fleshy, cracking noise somewhere above me, and the barest hint of light penetrated the stuff sealing my eyelids. Fluid splashed, everything shifted for a second, then the light faded away. The voice chuckled. “I’ll be back. Sit tight.” A dull thump again, which was probably her slapping the side of the thing I was in— a barrel? Was I going to die? Fear seeped into my system and I began to struggle harder. I needed to get out. My limbs were bound tight enough to prevent me from breaking free, which only solidified the fact that I was completely trapped. The second I began to hyperventilate, I started choking on the liquid. It took the last dregs of my sanity to stop, calm down, and resume breathing properly again. Escaping wouldn’t be easy- all I could do was rock back and forth and hope that momentum would tip me over. With every rock I made, I slowly began to get more and more exhausted. Maybe I should save my strength for another effort later. ^v^v^:::+++++:::^v^v^ I was woken up by pain wracking my wings and body. It felt like my feathers were being pulled out by the hoof-full, my wings twisted and pulled in all the wrong ways. Tears wouldn’t come, my screams couldn’t make it past the thing covering my mouth, so all I could do was writhe and whine in pain. My eyes burned, and I thanked Luna that I couldn’t open them. Time faded away and the tearing pain overwhelmed me. ^v^v^;::+++++:;:^v^v^ Suddenly, I was awake again. I blinked and saw nothing but murky darkness and sickly green. Wait. I blinked. My heart leapt for a second. I could open my eyes, and they didn’t hurt anymore! The rest of me ached and stung, refusing to obey my commands to move, but at least I could see. The stuff over my eyes must have fallen off while I was out, but it still didn’t answer where I was. The feeling subsided once I realized I was still going to die in here. Hoping for a way out, I tried my best to examine my surroundings without the use of my neck. Whatever I was in, it looked organic… almost like a spider’s cocoon. The greenish sludge I was submerged in wasn’t drowning me, but it was like trying to breathe pudding. There was a slightly clearer, almost window-like patch of stuff right ahead of me, and out of that I could barely make out what looked like a beaten-up desk and a chair. I needed to get out of here. If only I could stay awake. Shit. ^v^v^;::+++++:;:^v^v^ A driving pain in my brain shocked me back to life. My head pounded, I couldn’t think. I thrashed and rocked in a vain attempt to make myself feel better. During my struggle, I threw my head back and my forehead touched the back wall of my cocoon. Specifically, something attached to my forehead sent a stab of pain into my head. Panic threw me into overdrive to get rid of the thing, but my limbs refused to move. One last-ditch attempt to break it off only made it hurt more, so I stopped to cry and whimper in pain. What was happening to me? Was this thing full of taint? I didn’t want to die. Dying felt like it hurt. The idea that the goop was trying to keep me asleep seemed like a pretty reasonable hypothesis. ^v^v^;::+-+++:;:^v*v^ Thunk. Thunk-Thunk. Thunk. My eyes snapped open, and I stared at my reflection in the clear area on the cocoon I was trapped in. My head didn’t hurt anymore, but the thing felt like it was still there. I tilted my head in confusion and sighed in relief when the reflection followed suit. Okay, I was still normal. Just trapped in a cocoon-thing and not drowning to death. Of course, that feeling vanished when my reflection sneered at me. “Oh good, you’re alive in there.” The voice no longer had the echoey quality to it— my voice. “Sorry about not being around.” That wasn’t me. I opened my mouth to snap something back, and realized my teeth were different. As in, I could feel them brush past my lower lip. I opened and closed my mouth in curiousity, my pain and stiffness set aside. What was happening to me? “Having fun in there?” I— She snarked at me. Apparently the goo prevented me from talking, since my attempts at conversation were met with blurbling and an amused grin from my evil doppelganger. I attempted to somehow headbutt or ram her, but I barely managed to bend myself forward. Eventually, I settled for an angry glare. Evil Frosty peered in through the clear-ish window and looked around. “Looks like you’re coming along nicely. Next part’s gonna be fun.” She tapped the view hole and smirked, even mockingly winking at me. The buck did that mean? Just by the way she’d said it, whatever happened next was going to be terrifying. I had to rest up and muster my energy for the future. No way was I dying in this bucket. I was going to break out of here and kill Evil Frosty for good. And why couldn't I move still? ^v^A^;:;+-+++:;:^v*v^ The fun began several hours later. Searing pain pressed into the ends of my legs and the base of my stump, along the seam where metal met flesh. It wouldn’t stop, it wouldn’t let up. Trying to move only made the spikes being driven into my limbs hurt more, which wasn’t even remotely fair. I was finally able to move, and now it was just too painful to do it. On the bright side, my… horn, I guess, didn’t really hurt. It was a small bright spot in the barrel of driving agony I was in. A frighteningly warm sensation near my belly wouldn’t stop tempting me to reach down and scratch it, which would only torture me further. I cried, I screamed, I tried to curl myself up and hold myself for comfort. Nothing, nothing made it go away. All I could do was squeeze my stump tightly and hope pressure would make the tearing pain go away. No matter how hard I squeezed, all I felt was hardness and metal, not what I was hoping for. For the first time in a long time, I was well and truly terrified. Everything hurt. I didn’t want to die. Not like this. *v^A^;:;--++=;;:^v*v^ The friendly reminder that I was alive came with the taste of the floor. My eyes snapped open and I took a deep breath, only to choke and cough up fluid. I pushed myself up into a crouch so I could hammer my chest, then I noticed something that made me stop. My right leg was glossy, black, and… well, looked a lot like cheese. The rest of me matched— all my limbs ended with random holes along them, except my claw. Whatever had happened to me apparently didn’t work nearly as well on my metal limb, since etchings of the limb-holes stood out on the surface. I scrambled up and onto my haunches. A spike of pain lanced through my stump and I clutched at it, even though it didn’t help. What was I? What had happened to me? Strands of green dangled into my vision and I realized that my mane had also been forcibly altered. Some sort of green thing was around my midsection, and a tug made me realize it was actually part of me now. I tried to flap my wings in… I don’t know, fright? Rage? They weren’t wings that belonged on a pegasus— these belonged on a bug. “Damn, I did a great job on you.” A voice— my voice, came from behind me. “What did you do to me!?” I whirled around and screamed, and I heard my voice for the first time in a long while. Now it was raspy, and ever so slightly echoing on its own. “What did you do?” Tears ran down my cheeks. Evil me, or rather, old me was sitting on the desk, wearing my duster and dad’s cap, idly tapping it with my claw. “Okay, to be fair I wasn’t expecting this much green.” She chuckled and slid up to me, giving my nose a tap. “You’re an adorable little ‘ling, though. And stop crying already! You’re still dripping and everything.” A quick jab to Evil Frosty’s gut instead resulted in a shock of agony to my leg, so I was forced to pull it short and cradle my tender limb. “Who. Are. You.” I defiantly snarled into the impostor’s face. It still hurt to move, especially after that last stunt, so all I could do was try to look scary. Not-Frosty feigned disappointment and looked taken aback. “You don’t remember me? I’m hurt, Frosty.” Green fire burst from herbody and a moment later he was a different pony altogether— but a pony I recognized. Burnt orange coat. Scars. Dumb red mane. Tabber. “You.” A smug grin appeared on his face. “Me.” He blinked. “Wow, I can’t even stop thinking like you anymore.” “You’re not gonna get away with this, you know,” I coughed, holding my chest. Even talking hurt, but that wasn’t going to stop me. Morphing back into me, Tabber smugly replied, “I already did.” If I wasn’t in so much pain, I would have been surprised that he did a good job of of replicating my claw. Impossible. “Rumcake is going to notice I’m gone. Nopony is better at being me than me.” Once he figured out I wasn’t acting normal, he’d come for me. “You’d be surprised. A little smooth talk, a bit of lovey-dovey gooey stuff, and he hasn’t noticed a thing,” Not-Frosty scoffed. “And he loves you so dearly. Such tasty, tasty love.” She smacked her lips and grinned. “I haven’t had love like that in a long time.” “I—“ So he just didn’t care about me anymore? I’d been replaced? “Y-you’re lying.” “Look at this smug face and tell me I’m lying.” Tabber-Frosty grinned and stared me in the eye. Looking at her didn’t really answer anything. I was a lot more busy failing to bite back whimpers of pain and tears. Why did my stump hurt more than the rest of me? Why wouldn’t the hurt just stop? Frosty looked at her Pipbuck and sighed. “I’ve got somewhere to be.” She stood up and tipped dad’s hat with the tip of a talon. “Oh, and you should probably find somepony to leech off of before you starve to death. Have fun.” I sat still, desperately trying to ignore the agony I was in. Everything I knew before was gone. Everypony I knew wouldn’t even recognize me anymore, and the way I looked right now would only make me a target. I flitted my bug wings and glumly realized that preening wouldn’t be a problem anymore. My stomach hurt, but I wasn’t hungry. My eyes hurt, but I didn’t feel like crying. I just wanted to be me. Want more? Want smut? Here's what's next. Footnote: Level up! New Perk: Changeling Conversion- The term “pony” no longer applies to you. The ability to disguise has been unlocked. Disguises are ten times as effective as before. You gain +15 DR. Health regenerating items work at half potency. Hardcore mode requirements have changed.