//------------------------------// // Change is Good: Final Confrontation // Story: ATC's Scrapbox // by AdmiralTigerclaw //------------------------------// EDIT: Addition of a short, painful fight with two goddesses... Does not end very well. A continuation of the 'Change is Good' scenerio. The idea that sticks in my head is that after 'rehabilitating' the queen over a period of a few months, the human who's perspective the reader shares gets dragged with her back to her home. Except, the same mechanism that made her a human reverses the process and makes the human a changeling. And with no concept of how changeling magic works, he struggles to help her make peace with Equestria, without the slightest ability to change shape, or even use TK. Having not realized how much 'love' energy he's been absorbing, he's got quite a stockpile when the confrontation goes down quite messily in canterlot court. The queen came asking forgiveness for her selfish actions. The princesses kneejerked that it was another coming attack and struck first. The 'powerless Changeling' can only look on in horror as his months of kindness and teaching get blasted to the floor. And he snaps. "What the hell..." "WHAT THE HELL?!" Both of the princesses removed their attention from Chrysalis where she lay cringing on the floor. I had worked so hard to rehabilitate- To point out the error of her ways. And they just went and blasted her full on without provocation! "WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?!" I snarled. It sounded funny in this changeling body. "BE SILENT LITTLE ONE," Luna thundered. "THIS DOES NOT CONCERN YOU UNLESS YOU WANT TO JOIN HER. BE GRATEFUL WE TAKE PITY ON YOU FOR YOUR LACK OF POWER." "NO!" I snapped, stomping one of these deformed hooves. "NOT YET... I'm not done yet... We're not finished here." The princess of the night turned, stepping towards me in a deliberately measured move meant to intimidate. But I felt no such threat from her. I was too angry at what had just transpired. Good Guys or not, kind princesses or not, understandable or not... There are some things you just don't do, and that was one of them. "Sure," I continued. "She made a mistake. She gathered an army, launched an attack, and tried to conquor Equestria. But she did it for her subjects. Like you raise the sun for yours. And she learned from that mistake. Learned that she could do better, BE better. She came to ask forgiveness, and what do you give her?" I glared between the two winged unicorns as they now stood side-by-side, glaring back. Then glanced down where some small curls of smoke drifted from the queen's singed wings, the holes even more pronounced than before. "THIS?!" I snapped my head back up. "THIS IS UNACCEPTABLE!" "S- stop," Chrysalis choked out. "It... It's okay. I desserve it for what I did." "Absolutely not," I turned to the pitiful changeling. "You already served your time, stuck in a world where you spent months afraid of everything that moved. You don't need to be punished twice for your actions. WE don't believe in it. I don't believe in it. They hit you without provocation... This time you desserve to hit back." "And just what do you plan to do, Changeling?" Celestia fixated me with a firm warning gaze that promised I would join the queen on the floor if I continued. "It's funny," I locked gazes with the princess. She was so much bigger... If only I had my own body, I'd be able stand level with her. "I have SO many ideas what I could do to you right now if only I had HANDS." That earned me some confused looks. If only I had HANDS... "You don't have to do this," the queen all but whimpered. "I promised you that if you could change your ways that I would protect you," I kept my gaze locked on the princess in front of me. "You kept your end of the bargain. Now it's my turn." My mouth was writing checks this body couldn't cash. Some corner of my mind was screaming to stop before I ended up a smoldering heap. But my rage wouldn't let me. I saw... green. Green rage instead of red. If only I had my body. IF ONLY I HAD MY BODY! I saw more green, green flames. Then I realized it was a reflection from a body mirror behind the princesses. That weird horn on my 'changeling' head. It was glowing. But not just glowing, it was on fire, burning with a green flame. The queen had told me that to use changeling magic, she just had to 'WANT' something enough. To change form, she just wanted to take that form and visualize it. But that hadn't worked with me. We thought I was simply powerless because I never had that magic to start with. We thought it was just a body with me. But looking at the flame in my reflection, it made sense. I couldn't use that power because I just didn't want it enough. I didn't WANT it enough to use it. Now? Now I wanted something... I wanted it a LOT. I want my old body so I can strangle some sense into these technicolor talking horses. "Crissy..." I used my nickname for the queen. "Leave this to me." I reared back on my 'hind legs', crossing my 'hooves' and drawing out all the want I could muster, visualizing what I really was. I felt the heat from my head, and saw the reflection flare. Both princesses stepped back as a burst of green fire ripped up around me. The sensation was like falling and stretching a day after a heavy workout all at once. The world around me shrank slightly. The awkward sensation of standing improperly for a four-legged creature faded, replaced by the familliar sense of balance I almost thought I'd never feel again. The fire fading, I raised my arm, curling my fingers in front of my face, loosening the tension and causing the knuckles to pop. The small group of nobles audibly gasped as I glanced past the two princesses and smirked at my reflection. THIS was a creature they'd never seen before. Yanking my gaze back down, I impacted my fist into my other hand and squeezed, popping the rest of my knuckles. I KNEW how to use this body. In this form, everything I could find became an ad-hoc weapon. Even the princess' own bodies. All I had to do was get a grip. "ENOUGH TALK..." I glared. "Let's fight." And in retrospect... Perhaps challenging two magically empowered Epic level creatures to a fist fight wasn't exactly my most brilliant move. But even though it hurt, it was strangely satisfying. I think it lasted about two minutes. Something I mulled over as I lay wheezing with one eye swelling shut on the cold stone flagging of Celestia's throne room. Once I'd issued my challenge, Celestia had nodded and promptly shot a magic beam at me. Thing is, I did something simple, I dodged. More adept to my own body than the previously clumsy footwork of the quadraped body I'd been stuck in for days, I had proven to be quite the little worm and had managed to slip in close to the sun princess. Close enough to grab her with my bare hands. But I learned very quickly that grabbing a magically charged horn belonging to a creature who reprisented a glowing nuclear furnace was foolish move. Burned the crap out of my hand... But despite searing my hand on the winged unicorn, I'd managed to yank her right off her feet. I expected more honestly, physically, not just that magic insanity I almost got fried with. But I guess when you spend a millenia without doing any heavy workouts, you lose a bit of body toning. Of course, I wouldn't call her fat. In fact, she was disgustingly light for something that looked to be about my mass. So despite burning myself, I managed to literally throw the pony princess on her side. And had it been a simple one-on-one, I probably would have bagged a victory on momentum alone. But it was two on one, and Princess Luna, while smaller, was a lot more well toned than her elder sister. I think when she kicked me it broke a rib or two. She sent me sprawlng, and that allowed her own sister to recover, but I refused to be dropped that easily. Interesting thing is: They behaved so much like you would expect the 'good guys' to act. They hesitated to continue attacking me. Once I had been knocked down. Were this a fight between humans, chances are I wouldn't have been allowed to get back up. And for good reason. Luna learned rather quickly that just hittng me once wasn't going to stop the fight. Because I got back up and tackled her full on... My hands, though one was burnt, proved to be useful as I got tangled up with her on the ground, grabbing tightly onto anything I could find. When we finally broke the tangle, we each had a few new bruises to add to our counts. Hers from where I had done my best to find some part of her anatomy to punch, and me from getting battered by surprisingly iron-like wings. I'd like to think I came away the victor of that scuffle, seeing as I had come out of it with a fist full of feathers. Of course, once seperated, and while I was distracted, Celestia tried another solar zap... I don't know how she expected to hit me with it though. Or anyone who didn't stand still for that matter... It made the most distinctive whining sound like a distorted tea kettle. I dodged, it missed... Well, mostly. It knicked my side and burned a gash just above my waist. I was forced to duck away from the solar princess, using her own throne-room furniture to keep that laser-horn attack from roasting me. And from that, I had turned from bare-handed brawl to improvised weapons, procuring one of the candle staff... lamp thingies that were sitting on each side of the throne. I got Celstia good with it too... right in the wing with a swing like I was holding a baseball bat. In the heat of the moment, I was rather satisfied at the distinct sound of a crunch on impact. But in attacking one princess, I left myself open to the other. Luna tagged me again. I'm sure it was this hit that gave me my black eye. She'd knocked me right in the noggin, causing me to topple off the raised section of the throne dais, and into the small fountain on its side. And then she'd tried to jump and stomp on me. Which probably would have worked except adrenaline had taken over, and I was moving like a frightened, angry mouse. I'd lost my weapon, but the water slowed Luna down as she splashed in it. I got a nice, clean right-hook to the Lunar Princess' jaw, or snout... er... It was her face. 'Nuff said. But I think she had just about had it after that. Because the next thing I knew, she'd gone Jedi Master on me and simply threw me half way across the room with a telikinetic toss, her eyes glowing a frightening white. Then she'd yanked up the lamp staff I'd been using with that TK and knocked the wind out of me before I had a chance to recover. Probably cracked another rib... After that, things went downhill pretty quickly. The princess finally got it into her head to weaponize her TK, and just beat the tar out of me at a distance until I quit trying to get up. The changeling transformation magic I'd managed to grasp to restore my real body faded, dropping me back into this near impossible to use body once more. Still, as I lay, staring through one good eye at the now huffing princess of the night, I couldn't help but find it strangely satisfying and funny how the brawl turned out. I lost... I guess I knew I was going to lose. Mortal vs near goddesses after all... But I could tell from the way her own eye was starting to swell shut, and the way Celestia's left wing was now bent in a strange direction, that I'd successfully paid them back for their previous uncalled for actions. "Heh..." I managed to breathe at the younger princess and realized how torn up I'd gotten in such a short time. "Well... That went about as well as I expected... But I guess we're even now."