//------------------------------// // Chapter 2 // Story: Fly on the Wall // by RattPitt //------------------------------// After two days, the prince finally makes a decision. Part of me thinks the wait is just punishment for being a changeling. ‘Love and tolerance’ is a complete lie among these ponies. “Changeling.” The prince says to me. “Or should I say ‘Spy?’ You’re hired. Follow Sergeant Lance. You already have a mission.” I give him a nod. Judging by his past attitude and current, taking his form would be a death sentence. I want to find Queen Chrysalis. Doing it in one piece would certainly make it an easier task. I follow Sergeant Lance down the long halls of the dungeon. They twist and turn several times. We stop at a metal door. “The Prince Shining Armor has placed his trust into you, changeling. Be sure it stays there. Enter this room for your mission briefing.” Lance says before walking back down the halls. I open the door. There are a few ponies in the room. The most noticeable is Princess Celestia and Princess Luna directly in front of me. We’re only separated by a table. At the sides of the table is another winged unicorn, this one being light pink with multi-colored hair of various shades of purple. I recognize her as the bride. I believe her name is Cadance. I refuse to give her the respect of having a name or the fact that she’s royalty. On the other side of the table is a small lavender unicorn about the size of an average pony or changeling. She doesn’t look very special, so why is she here? After a second, I recognize her as one of the Element of Harmony bearers. The Element of Magic. Her name is Twilight Sparkle. Like the bride, she doesn’t deserve a name or title. Along with the alicorns and unicorn, there are three guards in golden armor and red manes instead of the normal blue or silver manes. These guard must be high ranking. “Good, you have agreed to serve us.” Princess Celestia says. I hear a bit of anger in her voice. She’s likely mad at me for trying to take over her city. I guess she doesn’t understand that changelings need to feed to survive. She looks to one of the guards in the room. “Will one of you three be willing to lend your appearance to this so it can speak?” She asks, gesturing to me. She doesn’t even bother to say my species. Once again, I wish the invasion was successful. After a few seconds of looking at each other, one of the guards steps forward. “I volunteer, Princess.” I take his form. Despite him looking disturbed for a second, nopony else has a major reaction. The lavender unicorn looks like she wants to kill me, though. I lock eyes with her. After a few seconds, she looks down. With a smile, I turn to Princess Celestia. She noticed the staring war I had with the unicorn, so she looks even more angry than before. “So what is it exactly you want me to do? I know it’s a spy mission, but what are the details?” “Straight to the point. That’s a good quality.” The bride says. “Changeling, do you have a name?” “No.” I reply. Only changelings with royalty have names. “What do you want me to do?” The ponies hesitate to answer. The dark coated one, Luna, breaks the brief, but uncomfortable, silence. “There is a foreign politician of Saddle Arabia in the city of Maredina. He’s been lying about my sister, Cadence, and I, along with the Elements of Harmony for some time now. These lies could easily get us all in serious trouble. They may even get us executed by Saddle Arabians. We… We want you to take care of him.” “You want me to kill a politician.” I say. This isn’t what I expected. I grew up hearing stories about love and tolerance coming from ponies. Asking me to assassinate somepony is almost unbelievable. Almost. They did force me into a prison after trying to survive, then exiled and maybe killed my queen, then executed my family. They’ve ruined my life. They’ve forced me to live with them. If they can even consider doing that to a creature that did what they had to do to survive, asking them to kill somepony shouldn’t be a surprise. If I had any other choice, other than having to wander the planet with no aim, I would have taken it. The second I’m able to choose an alternate life, I’m going to. “What’s his name?” I ask. “His name is Toma Jabhir.” Luna says after a brief hesitation. “He looks like this.” She slides a picture of a pony across the table and to me. His coat is light brown and his mane is dusty blonde. I notice almost immediately that he doesn’t look like the average pony by his build. He closely resembles a full grown horse rather than a pony. “What’s with his appearance?” I ask. “Normal ponies don’t have this sort of build.” “Most ponies from Saddle Arabia look like this, changeling.” Celestia says, making sure to put poison into that last word. It doesn’t affect me. I don’t ask and I don’t care about what Toma Jabhir did, other than the lies. Probably something tyrannical by Equestrian standards. Maybe he served edible food to Saddle Arabian prisoners? Maybe he gave them clean water? It doesn’t matter to me. There is something that matters, though. “How will I be able to find him?” “We don’t actually know where Jabhir is.” The bride admits. I notice that the unicorn hasn’t said anything. She’s still looking down, actually. Celestia noticed as well and placed a hoof on the unicorn’s shoulder, likely to comfort her. “His exact whereabouts are unknown.” Celestia adds. “There is a party planned in Saddle Arabia scheduled. It will happen in three days. We believe that information on Jabhir’s whereabouts are somewhere in the party.” Celestia is still comforting the unicorn and is whispering something quietly to her. I’ve learned a few things about reading lips, so I know some of what the two are saying to each other. ‘Changeling’, ‘Saddle Arabia’, and ‘failure’ are among the words. I narrow my eyes at the princess and she stops talking to the unicorn. Her emotions shift from love to hate in a matter of seconds. I know exactly where the hate is directed. I don’t need to be able to identify emotions to know that. “So you four, or three since the unicorn isn’t talking, want me to go to this party and find out where your tyrant is?” The unicorn looks up at me, but doesn’t say anything. “Just tell me where it is and the job will be done.” The bride shakes her head. “You need training first.” “I’m a changeling. I was born a changeling. Since you seem to have forgotten what we do, I’ll remind you. We copy the appearance of others flawlessly.” To prove my point, I take the form of Celestia, then Luna, then the bride, then the unicorn and back to the guard. “I can fight. I killed 15 ponies during our attack on your capital.” The unicorn gets out of her chair. “I’m going to kill you, changeling.” She looks like she’s about to attack. If Celestia didn’t hold her back, I’m sure she would have. “We know, changeling.” Luna says calmly. “We know your talents.” “Then why did she-” I point to the bride “-say that I need training?” “Just because you have some talents doesn’t mean you’re ready.” I glare at her. “We attacked your wedding, but we won’t attack your funeral.” She tries to stand up, but Luna holds her down. The bitch bride stares at me with daggers in her eyes, but doesn’t say anything. I know what she would say, though. It’s not what a trained princess would say. I smile and look at the two real princesses. “I’m not the only one that needs training.” Celestia stands up and pounds on the desk. Everypony in the room looks at her, even the bride and guards. “Can we all not act like little foals? Let’s get back to business.” She looks around. “We’re all adults here. Cadence, I understand why you are so angry at this changeling. You two will have to set aside your differences for the time being.” “He tried to kill me and destroy my wedding!” The bride shouts with a hoof pointed in my direction. “And we would have gotten away with it, if it weren’t for that unicorn and her friends.” I point to the purple unicorn. “Calm down, you two.” Celestia says with a soothing and motherly voice. I can sense suppressed anger. “All of the wedding business does not matter right now. We have more important business at hand.” “Right. Toma Jabhir.” I say. “You already told me about him.” “I know.” Celestia says. “I never had a chance to say this, but I don’t believe you need training, changeling. If… what you said is really true, you’re skilled at combat.” I give the princess a smile. “You mean about me killing 15 ponies?” Celestia gives me a glare that would kill me if it could. She breathes in and out a few times, probably to calm herself down. She turns to a guard. “Take this changeling away to train him.” The three guards grab me and drag me out of the room. They stop just outside and throw me into the wall. “What was that about love and tolerance?” I say to them. “Treat the Princesses like that ever again,” one of them says, “and we’re going to kill you.” I notice that he’s the guard that I’m in the form of. The guard punches me in the face and my vision fades to black.