//------------------------------// // Chapter Twenty-One // Story: The Day My Life Continued // by Authora97 //------------------------------// The changeling and I ran down a lot of hallways. Most of them closed halfway down, others changed before I could climb through the opening. Eventually, the changeling and I stopped. I tried to catch my breath. Though I was in Equestria, this place was still a black building in the middle of a dead desert. It was hot. I’d just been running for my life, my friends all trapped in goo pods, my children and last remaining friend were not long for it if Chrysalis was right. I was tired. This whole day was just exhausting me. Physically, and emotionally. This wasn’t how I planned my night. Or my week. Or my month. To be fair, everything just fell apart after the GL thing at Tiffany’s. It was a small cove we had landed ourselves in. Barely bigger than a broom closet back Home. The room had pitch black walls, the few walkways letting in the light. It was enough to show the changeling. He was standing off by the walkway hole, his body pressed against the wall as he panted. Now that we had slowed, I let myself get a look at him. He looked the same as the other drones from the Wedding. The only real difference was the sparkling wings he had. His eyes were the same blue his pegasus form had, the kind he said he covered with contacts. Story, how stupid I must have looked to him? To not be able to see it? If I wasn’t so tired, I might have hit myself. There was a wall behind my head which served the purpose of smacking the back of my head. Across the small room, the changeling that was (used to be?) my coltfriend lifted his head to look at me. “Chrysalis said..” You were a traitor. That we both were. That you were obsessed with me. That she was looking for my daughters. “...her throne was a power source.” I panted. “What...what did she mean?” The changeling was still huffing. “It’s...made of an ancient dark magic stone... that soaks up the outside magic... the same way changelings soak up love. It’s how... she keeps the Hive safe. “So...it does hold all the magic?” “Yeah.” He huffed, finally catching his breath. “Your magic doesn’t work because Chrysalis has a throne made of dark stone. It absorbs magic like changelings absorb love.” The changeling explained. “That’s why whatever magic you were using to disguise yourself fell through.” “It’s not magic, it’s biology.” (Well magic biology, but I’m not explaining that to you) “Thought you would understand that much.” “I do understand the difference, Raspberry.” He snapped off the name like some new Equestrian swear word. Or maybe it was a changeling one. “My name isn’t Raspberry!” I snapped. The changeling blinked at me. “It’s really weird for you to be shouting a fruit at me!” The changeling was silent for a long time. “...you know mine.” “Yeah. You’re Thorax.” I quoted Chrysalis. “The traitor. Just like me, huh Bumblebee?” None of you may believe this, but I wanted to mock him to the ends of time for that stupid name he picked. Even if we somehow made it out of this alive, I wanted to put this one whatever gravestone he would get. “It would’ve been my hue-mans name too.” Reminded the changeling with hiss. I scoffed. His human? That sounded ridiculous. Because a deep part of me hated he was calling anyone but me ‘his human’. I was the only human he’s ever met. That title is mine! No one else’s. But that would be unreasonable. “What? Remembering that you met my other dimensional self and still didn’t know who I was? What I was?” I didn’t answer. Mature of me, I know, but when arguing with a (sort of) ex all is fair. There was a green flash beside me. My first thought was that we had been spotted, that the green light was a spell about to hit me in the side. If only it had been. When my head turned to the sound, I saw Bumblebee the human standing there. He was wearing that same tux from the Fall Formal. He had Thorax’s sparkling blue eyes. For a moment I stared in shock. Instead of that beaming but resigned look he had given me as I said goodbye, his eyes was the emotion of calm before the storm. Not going to lie. My heart ached when I realized I had caused that look again. “Or maybe you just figured out which one you liked more.” Thorax snapped. I didn’t say anything, too surprised at the sudden anger on Thorax. “What? Like this better than the insect?” He grabbed my arms to pull me in for a fierce kiss. It was different than I’d seen other humans kiss. Humans would cup your face. They would caress you with thumbs. They would be brushing back hair behind your ear. In the movies, humans would pull you against their chest and wrap you up in their arms. Or they would push you up against the wall, high enough for you to wrap your legs around their waist. This was different than how Bee kissed me. He kissed me with some kind of shy confidence. Bee knew he could kiss me, that I always welcomed his kiss, but he would be shy in case this was the time I’d say no. Looking back, maybe Bee had felt for my emotions before. Maybe he’d worried that I was so closed off I’d brush away his love. This was neither of those. Thorax wasn’t shy now. His hands were confused, unsure of their own uses. They curled and uncurled around my arms. He was squeezing to tight, then not at all. His head was tilted one way before moving to the other, as if choosing which direction he preferred. He pushed his new humans lips against mine not taking any questions. There was some hesitance as he tried out the lips. He pressed them hard enough to bruise against my own. His tongue snaked out soon enough, trying for purchase in my mouth. Like I always did with him, I let him in. I had never kissed Bee as a human before. Never with the truth laid out before us, never so openly. It was what I’d been craving to do since I first realized I was in love with him. With that thought I pushed my every affection in this kiss. My hands grabbed hold of the tux (which gave me pause. Could they change clothes? Then why wasn’t the Twilight changeling wearing the right labcoat? Was this just a thing when changing into a human?) to keep him against him But as much love I poured out, Thorax pushed out anger and hurt. I slapped him off. That wasn’t what I wanted. Angry kissing, well Darcy had talked a big game out of them only for me to realize they were shit. “You ever play with my emotions like again, and I’ll hit you so hard your carapace stays red.” I warned, pointing a raised finger at his red cheek. Thorax scoffed. He flared back to his changeling self. His blue compound eyes, the same blue as his pegasus ones, were avoiding me. The wings on his back still glittered against what little light we had. His shoulders sagged a bit. His ears were flat on his head. It didn’t take changeling magic to know he was actually sorry. I didn’t want that, not on his face. “Do you know why I’m so angry right now?” Growled me, words full of bite and hurt. He didn’t look up from the ground. “You want to know why I didn’t trust you with this? This, my biggest secret? The one I didn’t tell my own parents until a few months ago? I trust people, again and again, only for them to spit it in my face. I trusted my classmates, they threw me down the stairs. I trusted my sister, she tried to throw me off a rollercoaster. I trust ponies, and they break into my house and tell my daughter I’m a liar. I trusted Dominic Chamberlin and he killed my sister.” There was a long pause before Thorax said “And what, I’m no better?” “I’m angry because I still trust you. You, not the other one.” I revealed. Thorax looked up at me in disbelief. “Because you’re my coltfriend. And it’s killing me to doubt you like this.” Thorax actually looked surprised at that. Surprised...and hopeful. “You do?” “And I can’t even be angry that you didn’t tell me, because I didn’t tell you about this-” I gestured to my human body “I was scared. I ended up telling the other Bumble-the other Thorax before you. That wasn’t right. You should have been the first you I told. I wanted to tell you ever since then, but I kept telling myself that you weren’t him. It’s rude and judge-y to think you’re the same person as him.” “I trust you too.” Thorax apologized. He changed back to his natural form-though his wings were still shiny. “I was too scared to say anything. I kept thinking you were the Great Betrayer the Queen said you were, so I never said.” “I was worried you would hear how bizarre I really was then break up with me.” “I thought you would send me to the Princess.” “...guess we both had a lot to work through.” Thorax snorted in agreement. “Have your wings always looked like that?” Thorax lifted up his glittering wings. “No. I think this only happened a few hours ago, after we slept together on your couch-” He cut himself off. “Today’s not my best day.” “It’s not mine either, if it helps.” “No I mean...it’s been really bad.” Thorax visibly slumped. His compound blue eyes started to shake, in what I can only assume was what happened when changelings started to cry. “He...he took my sister, then threw me back to the Queen.” I sat down, lowering myself to his level for eye contact. Thorax continued on. His voice was heavy. “There was somepony in my house. I sent Lilac and Cookie-” His compound eyes widened in what I figured was fear. “They made it to Fluttershy’s, right?” “Yes. Discord and I found them. He put a bubble around the house. I don’t know if it’s going to hold if that throne is sucking up his magic.” I admitted. Thorax pondered for a moment, then shook his head. “It’s for active magic. Still, the changelings could start smashing against it like we did at Canterlot. I don’t know how long it’ll last with...you know.” “Yeah. I can’t stop...you said somepony was in your house?” “Yes.” Thorax cleared his throat, nervously. “After sending the girls away, I went to check it out. I went inside and...there was an earth pony. I thought I had seen him before, but I couldn’t remember where. He was with the changeling princess, Cyanide. They had my sister. She was.” Thorax’s form trembled only slightly. “She was scared. This pony had her trapped.” I put a comforting hand on his shoulder. His trembling lessened at the touch, more so as I brushed down on his carapace (to be honest, the carapace was a lot softer than it looked). He pushed him shoulder against my hand. It vibrated with a soft chirping. He was giving me a faint smile. “Thank you.” “It’s okay.” I assured. It took me a minute after he calmed down to realize I hadn’t moved my hand off him. “Aren’t all changelings related? Or something? I don’t actually know anything about them. Kinda bad if you guys call me your biggest enemy.” Thorax snorted. “We are sorta related. We can chose our family ones, though. The Royals don’t get much option, they have to treat other Royals as relatives. Us drones can chose our brothers and sisters.” “Huh. So, your chosen sister was taken?” Thorax nodded. “By an earth pony working with the changelings? I thought they hated ponies because we’re food.” I blinked when Thorax looked down. “Oh, present company excluded.” “It’s okay. I’m not sure what’s food to you though.” He eyed my face. “You have...um...sharp canines in the back.” My cheek darkened. ‘Way to accidentally bring up Morgana, my idiot boyfriend.’ “Yeah I eat some meat, like fish or chicken. Mostly fruit though. You’re fine.” Thorax winced. “Sorry. I can feel your emotions. Sore subject?” The emotion reading only sorta phased me. You probably needed empathy on a changeling’s scale to see what was going on in my head. “...yes.” Was my answer after a pause. He nodded. “Wait a second. You said you couldn’t remember where you saw the earth pony.” I recalled. “That means you remembered eventually. If I know who he is, maybe I could help-” “You don’t want to mess with this one.” Thorax warned immediately. “I mean it, Starry. The other changelings talk about him, the few that’ve seen him. They never had good things to say. He can use magic. He’s thrown changelings across the room so hard they have to be healed! The wall and the changeling! Some of us wonder if he’s even a pony and not some horrible monster with razor sharp teeth!” “Hold on-” “I said I wouldn’t bring up the teeth-” “You think he’s human?” I motioned to my body. “Like this?” “Changelings didn’t know humans existed before you...but yeah.” “So who is he?” Thorax let out a small sigh. “I hate that you’re so stubborn. But, it’s why I love you.” Thorax leaned in. His sharp teeth were exposed in a menacing snarl. “He calls himself...Garfield Logan.” Oh I was gonna lose my shit. “That was the most terrific failure I’ve ever seen.” Garfield spoke up. Chrysalis snarled, turning her body towards the earth pony. He emerged from the shadows. There was an awfully smug glint in his black eyes. She hated that there was nothing she could do against the dark creature. “I mean it. I’ve seen some screw ups in the past but this tops them. There was this incident at a power plant that could’ve gone better. Then there’s every Bond villain ever. Did I mention a Voldemort? Boy was that a disaster-” “Quit it!” She snarled. The earth pony mastermind only grinned. “Then, Your Majesty, this is where we part ways.” He stood up, making his way to the doors. Chrysalis was happy to be rid of him. Logan chuckled as the doors were opened for him. “At least she’s alone. It shouldn’t be hard to find a human in a Changeling Hive-” “Ha! Finally I know something you do not! She’s not alone!” Chrysalis hissed in pride. He stopped. “She was with that second traitor! The one you had my daughter retrieve!” Chrysalis went on. At Logan’s continued silence, the Queen felt empowered. She’d never felt more superior to him. “We released him from his cocoon to show the Betrayer. His changeling skin was exposed before her very eyes! The Great Betrayer, fooled by a changeling!” The Queen laughed. If Logan had his fists... “She ran off with him, unfortunately. I trust my changeling guards and patrol to find them. She’s without magic and he’s nothing more than a drone-” “You idiot.” He seethed. Chrysalis froze. “I told you specifically not to let that trash out of his cocoon.” “Do you have any idea what monster you’ve just let out?” “The drone? He’s meaningless.” Chrysalis tried to argue. “And he has reason to hate both of us. He knows you gave Cicada to me. Raspberry takes family far more seriously than you do. She’s not going to stop now until your entire Hive is in ash. You’ve given it to her all wrapped up in a carapace covered bow.” If Chrysalis felt fear, like a pathetic pony, she would be squeaking. Logan growled at her ignorance. He teleported out of the Hive, furious.