I stepped off the train with luggage in hoof into the crowded station that was known as Mane station central Manehatten and froze. There were so many ponies gathered in one place, it felt like I just walked into a sea of Equines. A plethora of tastes assaulted my senses; from sweet and salty to zany sour and even downright disgusting, all gathered in the same place.
“Just focus your taste buds on one of us,” Doctor Loveheart said from behind, “You should be able to do so with your horn.”
I looked at him confused and kind of green. “What horn?” I asked.
The sudden realization flashed across his face. He turned toward Skipper. “Passion!” He called, “Go help your lover; he doesn’t look well!”
Skipper, aka Passion jewel, came rushing toward me with a hug. “Aww, you poor baby,” She cooed, “Let me make you feel all better.” She immediately started snuggling at my sides.
How the hell is cuddling suppose to help? I was about to turn toward to the doctor when I realized something: a lot of the tastes have gotten masked! How the hell did that happen?! Wait, no; better not dwell on it. Questioning things like that will only give me a bigger headache.
The doctor tapped my shoulder, “Come now, we need to take a cab to Elm and Crook street.”
“A cab?” I asked dubiously. Beside the train, I had yet to see any other form of automation.
“It’s a cart pulled by an earth pony,” The doctor answered, already anticipating what I am going to say.
When we first got on the train, I had Loveheart give a lengthy explanation with excruciating detail on how the train worked without the use of compressible gases. It turns out that magic does play the role of physics in this universe in more ways than one. The gist of it is, instead of burning fuel, the pistons work by charging a magical gem set at the top of its cylinder. When the piston strikes the gem, it turns the magical energy into mechanical and pushes the piston down and does an entire cycle which in turn charges the gem with magical energy until the piston strikes the gem again and repeats the cycle. Perpetual motion at its finest; something that only seems achievable with magic.
The only problem is that the design has yet to be miniaturized so automobiles had yet to be invented.The next thing I know I am standing in front of the station. I looked at Doctor Loveheart perplexedly. He shrugged, “You were zoning out so we guided you outside.”
“Silly Support, getting distracted by a choo-choo,” Skipper joked.
“Oh,” I realized, “Then what are we still doing?”
“Waiting for a cab to come pick us up,” The doctor stated.
“And is it that hard to find a cab around here?” I asked.
“Very,” The doctor replied, irritation in his tone.
And he was right. Five minutes into waiting and not a single one of those taxi cabs stopped in front of us or even gave us the time to ask them. While waiting, I started looking around trying to acclimatize myself to these new surroundings. What was the gorgeous neoclassical architecture of Canterlot and the unique style of the buildings that gave one an aristocratic feel has been replaced by skyscrapers of steel and glass. Manehatten was a tall city with buildings that literally reach to the sky. It was one of those places that makes one feel small just by existing, despite feeling lifeless for the most part.
Don’t get me wrong, the city was abuzz with ponies; mainly earth ponies, though one could find a unicorn here and the odd pegasi flying there. Unlike Canterlot however, even with a bit more diverse populous and the fact that it never suffered a crippling invasion, the city had an odd grey hue to it and the ponies didn’t seem as cheerful as in Canterlot. I have been sitting here for nearly ten minutes now and have yet to see someone smile.
But maybe that’s just big city blues. I mean, I barely just walked outside the station and know next to nothing of this place in order to like it. A cart being pulled by a bulky stallion stopped in front of us.
“Finally!” Exclaimed Loveheart as he went to talk to the driver.
At that moment, the cart door swung open and a casual green unicorn mare wearing a white feathered hat stepped out of it. She looked at me and smiled; I greeted her back by nodding my head.
“Book! Passion!” Loveheart yelled our aliases, “We have our…” However his expression turned into shock when he saw the mare, “…Chrysie?” He suddenly exclaimed.
“Heart?” The mare turned around, surprise on her face as well.
BOOOOOM!!!
An explosion sounded and I turned to see all hell breaking loose. Ponies were running around for their lives, cracked windows now littered the tall buildings, and fires were spreading from multiple sources.
And in the middle of it all, changelings fighting each other.
“Well isn’t this peachy,” I moaned. And here I thought this was going to be a normal day.
A changeling landed in front of me and hissed. I gave him a perplexed look, “Uhhh,” I pointed at a random pony, “that guy insulted your mother.” The changeling turned toward the pony who screamed in fright and scampered from view. The changeling turned back at me and hissed.
“Okay, that didn't work as well as I hoped,” I mused out loud, “How about we negotiate?” The changeling took a threatening step toward me when a massive green bolt of energy struck him on his head and he fell... lifeless.
“Hey!” I protested, “What did you do that for?” I turned to where the green mare used to be standing.
Wow, where did that changeling came from? Beside the fact that she is as tall as Celestia, her color scheme was the same as Loveheart; perhaps too much so.
The changeling looked at me agape. “Would you rather be dead instead?”
“Just ignore him Chrysie,” Loveheart had shed his earth pony disguise for his more combat ready changeling form, “And tell me what is going on around here?”
The changeling named Chrysie turned toward Loveheart, “Not here; there is a barricade up ahead where we can talk safely there!” With a single leap she started running, “Over here!”
Loveheart chased after her leaving me behind. I turned around in search of Skipper, but I couldn’t find her. “Skipper!” I yelled, but my voice was drowned with all the hubbub that was going on around me. I walked around a bit until I spotted a changeling's tail hiding behind a lamppost.
I went to the lamppost and tugged at the tail only to have Skipper jump at me. “Support!” She exclaimed in fits of tears and relieve.
“Are you done?” I took her head and turned it toward Loveheart, “Then follow him.”
In a single heartbeat, Skipper scurried toward Loveheart who was urging us to follow him to what appeared to be an opening in a carapace semi dome. When did that appear there? I was sure there was no such structure mere moments ago before the explosion.
Another explosion ripped at the other end of the street. I sighed; running is going to be a drag. I distinctly remember being a bad runner on two legs, and I have never tried running on four yet.
As I walked after Skipper, two scuffling changelings landed on the spot where I found her, an energy beam passed overhead and exploded on a nearby wall, glass shards fell onto the street to my side, and a wall fell in front of me just as I was about to reach the barricade.
Just as I was climbing over the wall of debris in front of me, Loveheart flew up to me, anger in his eyes. “What the hell are you doing?!” He asked with panic.
“I will not waste any physical activity unless I have a probable cause,” I replied with indifference. Another explosion ripped the street behind us sending a hot, sharp glass fragment flying just a hair’s width from cutting Loveheart, steering him into a panic mode. He grabbed me by the shoulder and ran as fast as he could toward the barricade.The moment we were in, the barricade’s door closed after us.
Loveheart looked at me dumbfounded. “Have you no sense of self-preservation, man!?”
“Not sure, might have left that when I became a changeling,” I jested.
Loveheart mouth fell open. “You’re unbelievable!”
“Heart!” The tall changeling named Chrysie returned, “What in Tartarus are you doing with a Nirvana spawn and a discorded ‘ling?”
A discorded what now?
“I came here to help you sort this mess out; it turns out you are only making it worse!” Loveheart scolded her, and she looked ashamed.
“I am not making it worse!” Chrysie reacted defensively, “I made an agreement with the mayor to clear the city from the discorded changelings because of the trouble they caused.”
“The mayor knows you are a changeling?” I asked.
“Oh, he knows,” Chrysie replied with a naughty smile, “He is one of our favorite customers.”
Uugh, sorry I asked...
Chrysie turned to Loveheart a bit puzzled. “Um, Heart? Who is he?”
“Oh right, I think an introduction is in order,” Loveheart waved a hoof toward me, “Chrysie, I’d like you to meet Support Pillar,” He then did the same gesture to Chrysie, who's expression changed from suspicion to interest, “Support, I’d like you to meet Queen Chrysalis, whom I sure you don’t need further introduction.”
“Charmed,” The Queen said giving me her hoof, a predatory smile on her face, “I’ve heard so much about you, Support.”
“Oh?” I took her hoof in mine and gave it a small peck, “And what, may I inquire, have you heard?”
“Just that you managed to make Celestia and Luna miss out on their precious night without lifting a hoof and mocked the entire Equestrian science society with a ludicrous theory, and even ended up distorting a mistake to make it so that you would be correct.”
…
Distorted a Mistake?!?! How dare they!! None of those idiots were even awake when I made that mistake! and had they asked me about it, I would have owned my mistake as a mistake instead of hiding behind the shadow of a cute, purple unicorn with sexy smarts who was accidentally knocked unconscious by…
BOOOM!!
“Well, I do aim to please,” I forced out. Personally I want nothing more than to give it to those snooty uptight idiots who questioned my credibility; with exception of Loveheart, of course.
“What about me?” Skipper raised her hoof high.
For a moment there, I thought Queen Chrysalis was going to slaughter Skipper on sight, “A defective ‘ling is of no concern to me,” She answered venomously making Skipper visibly shake, “Heart, why did you bring her here?”
“I thought you liked using ‘defective ‘lings’ to your own purpose,” Loveheart sneered by imitating her tone, “Or are they only defective when they don’t obey your command?”
If the flames raging inside Queen Chrysalis’s eyes weren’t enough of an indication of her intent...
“If I may interject,” I walked in front of the Queen and Loveheart who seemed mildly disappointed by my action of saving his butt, “Loveheart has yet to tell me anything that happened. may I ask, why did you call Skipper over there a defective changeling?”
Queen Chrysalis barely shifted her glance at Skipper who smiled with all her innocence and waved all naive-like at her. “She is a by-product of the destructive artifact that Discord gave me; an unnatural abomination that caused grave illnesses during the invasion.”
“Abomination?” I asked, “Never mind, who is Discord?”
Queen Chrysalis looked at me astonished, then turned toward Loveheart, “I thought you brought him to help!” she yelled with a crack in her voice.
“I did,” Loveheart replied calmly, “I thought it would be wiser to have you explain things. He’s good at picking hidden emotions apart, and I doubt I would have conveyed the stupidity of your decision as well you could.”
With a frustrated shrill, Queen Chrysalis turned toward me, “Okay, tell me what you do know.”
I shrugged, “Let’s start with nothing and go from there.”
Queen Chrysalis twitched, her shocked expression speaking volumes. Suddenly a wide smile adorned her lips. “Loveheart, my dear,” She spoke with a unique flavor of acidity and empathy, like someone plotting revenge, “Would you be a dear and take over the battlefield for me? All the preparations are done and all you need to do is give the signal to our ‘special’ forces to move when all the discorded changelings have shown all their cards. Is that understood?”
“Yes, yes,” Loveheart waved his queen away and went to talk to the changelings behind him.
“Is that a wise idea?” I asked, “To leave everything to him?”
“My brother is a good commander and all of my changelings respect him more than they respect me,” Wait, Loveheart is the Queen’s brother?! No, I will interrogate him about that afterward. “If you’d follow me. This place is too noisy for an interesting conversation.”
I nodded and followed her. Skipper flew next to me. “Is there anything I should do?” She asked.
“Keep an eye out on Loveheart,” I told her in a somewhat hushed voice, “he’s been keeping too many secrets from me and I want to know why.”
With a nod, Skipper went after Loveheart while I went along with Queen Chrysalis. Just as we walked into yet another trap door that lead to the underground sewers, I decided to open the conversation.
“Sooo your highness, any ideas why Loveheart has yet to tell me anything?”
“He probably doesn’t trust you enough or he most likely believes that he can’t convince you of anything,” The queen rubbed her forehead, her expression turning from anger to frustration, “Who knows? Who cares? You are in the middle of this mess whether you like it or not.”
“I’m in the middle of what exactly?” Hopefully, this is the last time I will have to ask this question.
“You are in the middle of a war between me on one hoof,” With a burst of her flames, an abstract image of her appeared, “my sisters on the other hoof,” Two more images of two changeling appeared, however they looked a lot different than Chrysalis. one had a better build with sharper edges and wings resembling that of a hornet. The other was a lot more petite and had had beautiful butterfly wings.
“And the entire Pony kind on the third hoof.” The third image was of princess Celestia.
“That is quite the mess we got there,” I remarked, “How did you get yourself into all..." I gestured to the floating images, "this, if I may ask?”
“The war between my sisters and I is nothing new,” The three images of the three queens formed a circle and brandished childish weapons against each other, “It started after the death of our mother,” An image of her mother appeared. From the image alone I could tell that the mother was big; probably bigger than Celestia. her horn wasn’t as twisted as that of the sisters, and her wings didn’t even look insect like; in fact they looked bat-like to me. Despite her impressiveness however, the changeling was trapped inside a crystal.
“So, it’s a battle over resources,” I mused approaching the flickering lights of the images.
“Close, but no.” A bright light emanated from her horn blinded me for a moment. After a few blinks, my eyes adjusted to the light spell. “We are constantly fighting over these babies.”
A movement caught my eye; it felt like that of an insect.
“What was that?” I asked, a creepy crawling feeling running under my skin. My eyes darted left and right at the multitude of chirping and clicking sounds.
Chrysalis giggled, I turned to her and…
OH MY GOD, What in the hell is that?!?
The centipede was huge! Bigger than Chrysalis even! It crawled from behind her and into the focus of the light spell, before standing like a snake and rearing it’s… Why does it have a pony head??!!
“My mother specialized in living transmutations allowing her to create a wide range of defensive and offensive creatures,” With a small pat on one of its legs, the centipede-pony-thing turned back and returned to the shadows.
“What,” I asked, my breath finally catching itself, “In all that is heaven and holy! Do You Need That For?!”
“Why, for protection of course,” Chrysalis cheered, “With these creatures here, none would dare to mess with our hives and has allowed us to grow in peace. But after the war, each and every queen had monopolized one type of these creatures, so we can only thrive in only one type of environment.
“My centipedes allow us to live on flat surfaces, but the badlands are infested with Nirvana’s spawn who outnumber my hive ten to one, the woodlands are Zephyre’s domain with her Arachna-lings utilizing the deep tree cover to lay their traps, and the north is too cold and dangerous; my youngest sister Vedalia is barely scraping by as it is.”
“So you guys moved to the city?”
“The cities have proved useful and can be easily protected, but there is a big problem. we can’t expand as easily as we would like,” With a burst from her horn, a map of Equestria rose. With it, there were cities with pins over them and cities without. All in all, there were only three major groups of pins. “Moving a large number of changelings from one city to the next proved challenging; ponies would get suspicious very quickly, so we managed with each hive fending off its own without any help.”
“Must have been tough,” I remarked. It was easy to see the troubles she could go into; each hive needed to be highly independent and capable militaristically in a society that seemed too centralized. A paradox that can bring down such style of governance.
“It was,” Chrysalis agreed, “With transportation so difficult, each hive needed to control its population more so than usual. Because of that, we were always short on changelings. Despite that, we managed things; peacefully, might I add. The real problem began when Discord broke out the first time. He gave one of my most vulnerable hives in Fillidelphia a weapon, a mirror to be precise. Should they ever be in trouble, one of my ‘lings would walk into the mirror and would clone himself without the trouble of having to raise an army.”
That… doesn’t make any sense; it breaks the law of conservation of energy. Where would the mass of these new changeling come from? How was it possible to replicate internal organs without any means of seeing them? Why am I still questioning things based off of my knowledge? I thought I stopped doing that. Okay, let’s look at this from a strategic point of view.
“so basically, you can have an army ready on the get-go."
“Exactly, a very useful tool indeed,” The map then zoomed in on one city in particular, “After Discord was trapped in stone again, Zephyre decided to move in and take the mirror for herself. In a panic the overseer of the hive decided to use it. It was a disaster.”
The image showed a changeling using the mirror, and when he got out there was two of him, “We won the battle, but the mirror kept creating more clones,” Suddenly, another changeling came out, and another, and another, “In a panic, the overseer tried to smash the mirror with an axe,” The image of a changeling with an axe appeared near the mirror. He threw the axe which struck the mirror then ricocheted back at the changeling, hitting him squarely in the face. “As you can see, it didn’t go so well.”
“Then what happened?”
“I went there two days later and used some heavy magic and a lot of resources to blow it up.” The mirror was then buried under a pile of dynamite and blew up in what could only be described as nuclear fashion.
“Wait, so the mirror kept making changelings for two days straight?” That can’t be good.
“Yes,” With a wave of her hoof the images disappeared, leaving me with the queen under her light spell, and whatever was crawling in the back of those sewers, “What was once a hive of five hundred became a hive of fifty thousand.”
So that’s where their numbers came from. “One thing I’m not sure though, how did the ponies get involved and why did you invaded them?”
“Oh, that is easy. When fifty thousand changeling came into existence practically overnight, the ponies noticed. So they sent Princess Cadence to Fillydelphia to negotiate; needless to say the negotiation didn’t go as planned.” Chrysalis was rubbing the back of her neck as well as avoiding eye contact.
“What did you do...?” I asked, suspicion in my tone.
“I accidentally, without any thought or previous planning, totally running on intuition then, I…”
“You kidnapped her and took her place in Canterlot?” I interrupted, annoyed at this turn of event.
“It’s all that little pink abomination’s fault!” Chrysalis snapped, “She wanted to integrate them into their perfect pony society; give them jobs, homes for themselves, names, even have them go to school! Can you imagine the horrors they planned to subjugate my changeling to?!”
“Yes,” I deadpanned, “ The horror of higher education, how dreadful...”
“I just couldn’t accept it,” Chrysalis waved dismissively, “So I decided to use force, and the rest is history.”
The more time I spend with this short-sighted tyrant, the lower my IQ will get; I need to wrap this up quickly.
“You mentioned something about some changelings being discorded, may I ask what those are?”
“Oh, you mean like your friend?” She pointed above; I nodded, “These are the changelings that came out of the mirror.”
“And why is there so much hate toward them?”
The moment I asked this question, Chrysalis’s expression changed, “Every hive have a preferred emotion to feed upon. Mine is love, Nirvana is excitement, Zephyre is wanderlust, Vedalia is warmth. These changelings, the discorded ones like you companion, feed off of pain.”
“My queen!” A changeling suddenly interrupted us, “Loveheart gave the signal and the centipede-lings are destroying whatever remains of the discorded changeling out there!”
“A queen’s job is never done,” Chrysalis muttered, “If you’ll excuse me, I need to corral the centipede-lings before they go loose on the city.”
“Thank you for your time, your highness,” I said with a courteous bow. What the hell have I gotten myself into? A war this complicated is not something I am willing to either commit to or be part of.
“And Support?” I looked at Chrysalis who was halfway out of the sewers, “I know my brother is secretive and kind of manipulative, but he has good intentions. He wouldn’t drag you into this if he didn’t take your best interest at heart.”
“Thank you for your concern, my liege,” I replied to her, “But that does not alleviate my worries one bit.”