Thinksgood prepared his magic, he charged it in his horn as he started his dive. Projecting it out and around he formed the nose-cone of his single-changeling missile as he gained more and more speed and slammed into the ground.
Getting up with a snarl, he looked at the ponies he only just missed hitting. And something made his heart skip a beat.
From the tip of the mare's horn to her pinkish-purple hooves, from her violet eyes to the streaks of tone in her tail, he couldn't find a single thing wrong with her. Thinksgood was instantly smitten.
He gazed at her beautiful hooves as they rose up and came down, connecting with his face and driving him into the crater his impact had caused. "I love you…" His voice was lost to the stomping hooves that pounded past him.
"Thinks, get on your hooves and get after them!" An authoritative voice commanded and the little drone got back up and shook his head. The valkyrie and her friends had stopped, the whole swarm gathering around them to block their path. Thinks was terrified for them.
He began to gallop, his insectile wings buzzing and humming fast to try and propel him to her aid.
The swarm began with the 'great battle technique' that their queen had taught them. Thinks thought it was the stupidest idea ever but he watched as the changelings burnt precious energy transforming into copies of the ponies.
Bopping his own head with a hoof Thinksgood dashed into the fight, at least if he looked like a changeling there was only six ponies that would try and beat him up. All around him the drones had degenerated into fighting, mostly with each other.
There was a very good reason for Thinksgood's name, it had to do with what most drones, and indeed their queen, didn't do.
He needed to get close to his love, to explain to her that he would… what… Thinksgood froze a moment and thought, would he really go against his hive just for a mare he had only just seen? That didn't even know his name.
Taking a deep breath the drone realized he was going against his name but, despite that, it felt right. "Okay," his form flickered and flashed green as a familiar purple unicorn remained, "lets do… ugh, mare-forms are so strange…"
He saw a familiar yellow-furred and pink maned pegasus, looking very lost in the swarm around her. His fellow drones hadn't realized it was the real deal, but they soon would. Trotting up to her, Thinksgood lifted a hoof. "We need to attack over there!"
Fluttershy was confused, the pony before her looked like Twilight but it sure didn't sound like her. Then they winked. The mare's empathy hit her like a small sack of bricks and she realized she had what might be an ally among the swarm. "Oh, oh yes!" Her voice was soft as could be but she tried so hard to make it sound menacing. "Why are you doing this?" Her whisper as left a group of drones who were fighting among themselves was to her new benefactor.
"Dunno, seemed the right thing." It was the best Thinksgood could come up with and, what was worse, it was true. "You are in a lot of trouble, the queen is trying-"
"We know, we are trying to get to the Elements of Harmony." Fluttershy smiled to the drone and got a worried look from them, she quickly shifted to as angry a face as she could. "Oh just wait until we get those ponies!"
Two changelings who had been about to jump the pair grinned and trotted off looking for prey that wasn't so obviously two drones.
"Your friends are here, honestly, I am embarrassed to be a changeling sometimes…" Thinksgood looked around, there were more drones fighting drones than were fighting ponies. He had learned a great word from a book that described this 'great tactic', shemozzle.
"Is that the real Twilight?" Fluttershy saw as a group of Twilight-clones were mobbing one in particular who was burning her magic to fight them off.
Thinksgood didn't think. He dived, buzzing his wings and slamming into the pile and ending up, somehow, under Twilight. It was like a dream, he gazed up into the beautiful eyes, he may have stared a little. Then her magic hit him.
It felt like the fire that transformed him, but backwards, cold and really creepy! She rolled it down his form and it left only his chitin behind. Worse still, it made him feel really odd, really… good-odd. He looked up at Twilight, half in a daze and every bit in love.
She stepped away from him and Thinksgood got to see the mare really unload. Huge wide beams of power poured from the unicorn, slamming changelings off one of her friends who she picked up and floated back over to her.
"Real me! Real me!" Applejack felt the ground under her hooves as Twilight set her down again. She was a good bucker, the best, but when there was so many targets she couldn't buck them all.
The fight became a whirlwind, Twilight and her friends beating up changelings en-mass, using techniques the drones had never prepared for. But Thinksgood knew there was a problem. "Twilight… please, listen to me."
Six heads turned to Thinksgood, he could see there was raw determination in their eyes, they had beaten up dozens of drones and now they had one more.
"Wait!" Fluttershy trotted forward, putting a hoof under the drone's chin. "He helped me, he also got all those other changelings off Twilight, when they mobbed her."
If Thinksgood had thought Twilight was an avenging angel of destruction, this mare was goodness incarnate. He blushed at the praise but refocused on the purple unicorn. "They are waiting for you, another whole swarm. The queen knew you would go for the elements. Quick, we need to switch."
"Switch?" Twilight looked confused. "But I'm not a changeling…" She stepped up to the creature, its words seemed sincere, which was the only positive thing she had gotten all day from any of its kind.
"But your magic, you turned me back into a changeling, you can use that to-" Thinksgood was explaining his plan but was cut off.
"I don't trust 'im." Applejack stepped up, glaring at the dark pony-like thing that now had a yellow pegasus guarding it.
"No, no I understand what he means, here…" Twilight began her spell, she had used it earlier to disrobe the changeling of his disguise, but now she reversed it and crossed it, casting it on herself and the changeling. She felt suddenly very odd. She looked down at her black, chitinous body. "It worked!"
Thinksgood felt about as odd as a changeling could. Being a mare was always confusing and felt strange, but when he was changed by another power completely, that was freaky. "Okay," and his voice was perfectly a copy of Twilight. "come on, we have a trap to walk into. I think you can take advantage of this?" He looked at Twilight, getting a toothy grin back from the changeling.
"Girls, play along, I am going to go spread some mischief." Twilight spread the odd wings and started to buzz them, falling forward and flat on her face. "Okay, no flying… ugh, how does anypony get used to wings?"
Thinksgood looked between the five mares, the toss of his mane feeling strange. "Well, uh, so the plan…"
"The plan is to take down as many as we can before we get caught." The blue pegasus flexed her muscles. Thinksgood would think it a silly boast, but he had seen her in action.
"Darn tootin lets go!"
They trotted along, their pace increasing when they heard the swarm behind them rousing from the sound thrashing. Throwing open the doors of the throne room, however, revealed the trap. "Told you so." Thinksgood gulped as he whispered it, the little group surrounded by changelings. "So, we fight." There was a thrill to it, overwhelming odds, the knowledge they were going to go down so why not go down fighting.
"You know what, I like her." Rainbow Dash lifted a hoof and got a clop back from a lavender hoof. Thinksgood would let the gender insult slide, if he lived.
Hooves flew, magic lanced out. Thinksgood was like most of his fellows, not so great at offensive magic, but he did what he could, trying to keep up with the five as, slowly, they were mobbed under.
A dark, hole-filled hoof connected with Thinks' head and the lights went out. There was a moment of fear, losing consciousness usually dropped their disguise but, as the blow connected, he remembered who had changed him.
Twilight felt all kinds of odd, the spell she had quickly worked was an intrinsic disguise, she not only looked like the changeling, she WAS him… the him part made her blush a little, but she shrugged it off and got back to work. She trotted back to the huge hall where the wedding was taking place.
"Ah, Thinksgood, get over here and make sure this alicorn is properly secured in her pod." Queen Chrysalis gave the order and was looking right at Twilight, there was a moment of terror where she wondered if the disguise would hold… it did.
"Oh, uh, yes my queen?" Twilight trotted over to where her mentor hung upside down in the pod. She worked a little of her magic, a little startled at the green glow it gave, as she first examined the pod and then grinned, adjusting it. Her hoof lifted to the wall, right where Celestia's hoof was, she pressed against it and got an odd look from the princess within. She winked at the white alicorn and saw the slightest of smiles grow on the alabaster snout.
"The pod is secure my queen!" Twilight turned, eyeing off the goop that held Cadance. The real Cadance. "My queen, I should inspect the bindings on your prey!" She began to trot over to her former foalsitter.
"Yes, yes. You will get a reward for this, Thinksgood. I really wish more drones showed so much… initiative." Chrysalis was distracted, she had won after all. Having one of the smarter drones of her hive make sure everything was double-checked was just a good plan.
Twilight inspected the goop, it had hardened around her friend's hooves but with a little work, her green-tinted magic weakened it, she gripped one of Cadance's hooves and jerked it up a little, making sure the alicorn knew she was, effectively, free. "Ladybugs awake." Twilight risked the whisper, getting a shocked look from Cadance, then a knowing grin.
Trotting back to 'her queen' Twilight gave a bow. "It was a little weak, my queen, I shored it up and that mare will be yours, unmoving, as long as you want."
Chrysalis was practically purring when the door burst open and a small swarm of drones hauled in the six mares who, but for a hundred or so changelings, might have been a problem.
"You won't get away with this! Twilight and her friends will-" Cadance had taken a theater elective when she was in school, she twisted her face into shock when she saw her future sister-in-law… then the alicorn's brain stopped, but wasn't Twilight disguised as a changeling? Who was with her friends?
"You were saying?" Chrysalis drank in the sight of the confused and stricken mare, this day was just perfect! "You do realize the reception has been canceled, don't you?" She posed, grinning at the ponies before her. She lifted her head to the drones in attendance. "Go! FEED!" All scattered, except Thinksgood. She wouldn't chastise him, however, he had his uses.
Thinksgood watched as the doors slammed and then his jaw was grabbed by his queen. "It's funny really, Twilight here was suspicious of my behavior all along."
The drone jerked his… well, Twilight's head away from the hoof, trying to maintain a look of despair.
"Too bad the rest of you were too caught up in your wedding planning to realize those suspicions were correct!" Chrysalis laughed, this truly was everything she thought it would be. Oh yes, perfect.
"Sorry Twi, we should have listened to you." Applejack stepped forward, despair and sorrow on her face. Thinksgood realized that the mare was looking right at the disguised Twilight to the side.
Thinksgood had to act quickly. "Uh, it's not your fault, she fooled everypony…" He trailed off, glancing quickly from the mare at his side to his queen, hoping against hope that the ruse worked.
"Mmmm, I did, didn't I?" Chrysalis stepped over to the window, her back to the whole room.
"What's she doing?" Applejack was looking stunned at the queen as she was humming along to something, gazing out the window.
"She gets like that, hold on…" Thinksgood slunk down low and made his way across the room. "Quick," he looked up at the still slightly confused Cadance, "go to him while you have the chance." He began to use what little magics he had to try and free her when, to his shock, she just stepped out of the goop. Something was up.
Everypony, except Chrysalis, watched as the pink alicorn stepped over to her mind-locked special somepony and hugged him. Thinksgood felt a tidal wave start, a glorious delight that made him want to walk up to the two and curl up at their hooves.
"Wha, where? Huh, is the wedding over?" Shining Armor looked around, a little distracted. Then he got very distracted, in light purple eyes.
Four great hooves landed in the middle of the room. "It's all over." Chrysalis eyed the two, like a shark would something that dared swim before it.
Thinksgood wracked his brain, oh! "Your spell! Do your spell!"
Chrysalis laughed as she gained some air, her insectile wings buzzing. "What good would that do? My changelings already roam free!"
"No…" Shining would have none of it, he barely remembered the horrible magics the queen had used on him but, as hard as he might, he couldn't work the simplest shield, let alone one that would repel all the nasty things. "My power's useless now, I don't have the strength to repel them…"
"My love will give you strength!" Cadance stepped forward, pulling the stallion she loved into a hug, her fierce desire for him burning into an inferno.
"What a lovely, but absolutely ridiculous sentiment." Chrysalis stepped over to watch the glorious mayhem outside.
"Is she for real?" Rainbow Dash poked Thinksgood in the flank. "I mean, earlier she used the power of his love to defeat Princess Celestia!"
"Ah don't think that mare is playin' with a full deck." Applejack squinted at Chrysalis.
The power when Cadance and Shining's horn met had Thinksgood wobbling a little, it was so very delicious, he watched as the raw power of the couple's love poured up in a fountain. Then the blast came.
Thinksgood was slammed hard by the wall of pure energy. It tried to catapault him away, even as he saw his queen thrown from the window. He braced against it and had five ponies move in behind him, supporting him. Then a sixth stepped between him and the pure love that drove every other changeling from Canterlot.
Twilight Sparkle leaned in to the duplicate of herself, her fangs not getting in the way as she kissed the changeling on cheek. "Thank you."
The magic that had changed them both undid, as did a lot of other magic in the room. Celestia spilled down from the pod she had been stuffed in, landing on the floor with a wet plop. A gray-pelted pegasus stepped up beside Thinksgood, pulling him aside. "The Canterlot Special Guard have some questions."
Thinksgood blinked his big blue eyes at the wall-eyed mare. "Uh, okay…" He didn't regret his actions in the least, particularly when he got to see how happy Twilight and her friends were. Maybe being a good pony was better than being in a hive. You certainly got to get kisses from awesome mares, and meet new friends.
Thinksgood smiled, trotting along under the watchful eyes of Muffins.