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// Chapter 2: Changeling Basics 
// Story: Converted 
// by Shaded Changeling 
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	The Changelings fell on the city. Green missiles burning through roofs and ground. Leaving craters.
“They will burn,” came a voice from inside. “You think they are friends? They wish to use you. They know not your power.”
A shadow had overtaken the burning hostile city. Replacing it with a mountain. A city was built into the side, looking pristine with gold and white towers. A waterfall to the right flowing in front of the city a pink bubble surrounding the city, it looked to be protecting the city from some unseen threat.
“They would destroy you.” The voice began. “Unless you show them the truth.” The barrier broke down and those piercing green eyes remained over the city. Like an omen hanging in the sky. “She will be there. And you will be hunted.”
“Do not forget what you were.” A reflective surface came up to show Shade, as he was, a dragon. “And do not squander what you are.” Green flames enveloped the dragon, turning it into a Changeling. “Use what you have…”

“Nymph!”
“Play along. Until…”
“Snake Eye!”
“It is time…”
“Nymph! Wake up damn it!”
“To strike!”
A quick stinging pain brought him out of his trance. He opened his eyes to see Two Changelings staring at him. One, who Shade guessed was Spine, stared at him angrily. While the other, who Shade could only guess was Darkblaze, looked like he was trying to contain a laugh…poorly. Behind them, was the ceiling of a cave.
Shade raised a hoo… hand? Yeah definitely a hand. Up to his carapace face. “Ow!” he said as his hand had been enveloped in green flame and turned back to a hoof. Awww. I wanted to keep that... hold up how did I do that?
“Nymph, what in the Hive were you thinking?!” Spine shouted clearly mad.
“I thought that I saw something down in the tree line sir. I went to check it out. Then I don’t know.”
“That amnesia of yours must be worse than we thought Snake Eye.” Darkblaze responded. “I was worried we would have to carry you all the way to Canterlot.” Hadn’t they? “But you just sort of, flew while you were half asleep. The instant you landed you just passed out fully.”
“When was the last time you fed Nymph?”
That is actually a good question. When was the last time he ate anything? Last he remembered was some kind of…bird-ray. And the ground was on fire... 
“Uhh…” was all Shade could respond with.
“Well it isn’t like he had a lack of energy.” Darkblaze replied, “I mean he flew all the way here, half conscious, besides, as soon as we get the signal from Chrysalis it should be easy for you to feed off the emotions of…”
Wait! What? “Hold up. Emotions?” Shade said now completely lost. How did Changelings feed off emotions? Okay, so he may have been able to tell when someone was afraid, but there were visual cues and sweat was not exactly a subtle smell.
Darkblaze just stared at Shade with his jaw hanging open. “You are kidding me?” Shade immediately knew he said something wrong. “You never fed off…!” He turned to look at Spine, who had a much less surprised look but had his eyes slightly wide instead of completely stupefied. “Sir, permission to teach Snake Eye here.”
“Darkblaze you aren’t under my command. So why are you asking me?” Shade was just looking between the two of them, only slightly aware of the looks from the other changelings around him.
“But he is under your command so I have to ask.”
Spine raised a hoof to the bridge of his nose…snout…whatever… “Fine…”
Darkblaze quickly grabbed Shade by the hole filled leg and was dragging him off deeper into the cave. While his left eye was trying to adjust to the lower light, his right eye seemed perfectly fine throughout the entire ordeal, until he was suddenly dropped on his haunches with a clink.
“Alright.” Darkblaze said walking a few more steps before turning to look at Shade. “Tell me what you DO know about Changelings…” He lay down with his forelegs crossed in front of him.
“Well, apparently we feed off Emotions, can transform, and have holes everywhere.”
“And?” Darkblaze said expectantly.
“Umm…no idea…” Shade said completely truthful.
“Well… we have a lot of ground to cover…”



“So go over it one more time.” Darkblaze said as Shade was now hanging from the ceiling, sticking to it with his hooves.
“I thought you were supposed to be teaching me?” Shade asked as he flew down from the ceiling with a pleasant buzzing sound. As much as he hated to admit it, he was getting used to having these strange new wings and this body, walking was still a much more subconscious thing, as every time he tried to think about it he tripped over himself. Having a horn was still a bit strange to him, but he would get used to it.
The last hour or so had just been Darkblaze trying to teach Shade some of the basics of being a Changeling, such as the mental connection, walking on walls, and a bit of feeding on emotions. While Shade in turn was talking about what he remembered through his dreams, or whatever those visions were.
“It is, but can’t help me being curious. Especially when you don’t know how to transform but know this... Dragon race thing.” He talked about the race while spinning his hoof like you would a wrist.
“Well no I can’t…” Shade sighed. “I must sound like a madman…”
“Not sure about madman but madpony definitely.” Darkblaze said with a little chuckle.
Ah yes, terminology. Shade had to commit these to memory as well. Those would be quite a nuisance. Particularly when attempting to ‘blend in’, as Darkblaze had phrased it, with ponies. The whole amount of new things he had to learn was making his head hurt. Along with being told that the sun and moon were somehow controlled by two sisters. And one was banished but wasn’t and… it all just made Shade’s brain hurt. Oh, and there was also the four races he had to memorize. One of which Shade was sure was the name for the substance a unicorn horn was made from but turned out to be a horse with wings and magic.
While in contrast, the Dragon race he knew about had an idea of magic, it was a kind of sub division of the race. They lived in a smog covered area so they never really saw the sun or moon that much, but they knew it was there. They just preferred seclusion to all this multi race mumbo jumbo. The poison gas from the lava rivers may have also had something to do with it.
Shade had put his hooves on the side of his head, while he rested his head on the ground. “I don’t really know. I remember fire everywhere, blood, smog, and then... I can’t remember much else. Except for those burning eyes…”
“So you don’t even remember much about your own life?” Darkblaze replied. Starting to stand up. “Well…I might as well teach you to use that horn on your head.” He stood up and his horn began to glow slightly green. Before he was engulfed in a flash of green fire and before him stood…a horse?
“Whoa…” Shade had unconsciously said, surprised by the rapid change.
“Neat huh.” The Horse in front of him said. It still sounded like Darkblaze, but different. He had sort of the same voice without the vibrating distortion effect, but the horse in front of him didn’t have the horn. And didn’t even look remotely like Darkblaze. He was gray, with two feathery wings where his insect ones used to be. and back where his hind leg connected to his body, there was some kind of image. Shade couldn’t make it out. He had a mane that was sort of scraggly and black, if Shade hadn’t seen it happen, he would have sworn this wasn’t a Changeling.
“You try it.” Darkblaze replied. But when Shade just stared at him with the look of disbelief he became accustomed to, Darkblaze rolled his eyes. “Just relax your body and focus on a form. It would probably be good if you tried just a normal Earth pony.”
No idea what a normal Earth pony is, but Shade had indeed seen a horse before. So he just focused on what he knew. Closing his eyes, he took a deep breath, in his mind, he focused on what he was trying to look like. Standard, just brown, a little shaggy, he was surprised when suddenly a flash of green pierced through his solid black eyelids.
As he opened his eyes, he was surprised to look down and find that he didn’t have any holes in his legs. And that they were a light brown. Looking over his shoulder. He noticed the wings were gone but he had a small brown tail near his rump. “So?” Shade asked. “How’d I do?”
“Impressive!” Darkblaze said walking around, judging him. “You forgot the Cutie mark.”
“The what now?” Shade said. He had no idea what this Changeling was talking about.
“Think of it like an identifying mark, it shows the ponies special talent and calling in life. Without it, it’s pretty obvious you’re a Changeling.” Darkblaze had explained pointing at the image on his hind leg which appeared to be a brown tornado. “This stallion was named Tornado Dust. He was a local weather control pony in charge of the winds. Nopony even noticed I had taken his place.” Then Darkblaze had looked closely at Shade’s right eye. “You also seem to still have your eye trouble Snake Eye. At least it changed color…”
Alright, so there is a problem with that, hopefully he could come up with a reason if he needed to address it. Well, one better than ‘I used to be a Dragon’ or ‘I was born with it’
“Well I think you should make your own persona to try and make up for it…” Darkblaze had said as he changed back to his sleek black carapace. “We can work on that later. Right now let’s try and get your telekinesis down.”
“Telekinesis?” Shade said as he dropped his own disguise. It was remarkably easy, he just stopped thinking about the form he had taken and thought about his ‘normal’ form, or at least the Changeling form.
“Yeah, we can use basic telekinesis.” He said. His horn glowed with a light green as he demonstrated it by picking up a few pebbles around the cave. “It’s basic magic. But you seem to have no idea what you are doing…” Shade was staring again, completely lost.
“Its basic knowledge, I barely think about it.” Darkblaze had stopped levitating the pebbles and was tapping his chin with one of his front hooves. Trying to figure out how to explain it. A few times he opened his mouth but didn’t commit to his phrasing. “Perhaps you should just stick to Pegasi disguises until you learn to actually use some magic.”
Shade was alright with this idea, walking on his new legs was still very strange to him, even though his wings weren’t much better, he preferred flying to walking at the time being. So he was fine with it.
“Anyway.” Darkblaze said through a yawn. “Might want to get some sleep. We’ve got a big day ahead of us.” He began to walk towards the entrance of the tunnel. “All the love we can hold. Ripe for the taking.”
Shade wasn’t really in the mood to feed off of love from any sentient being, it went against something of a moral code. If they attacked him first, he wouldn’t mind. But he doesn’t just attack for no reason. Would his new Changeling body need that? From the sound of it, he did.
“Tomorrow… Somehow I don’t feel good about this…”