18-The Pendragon's Fall
Chapter 18
Alan woke up the next morning to the sound of humming, singing, hammering and a dozen other sounds.
Getting up, he found forty changelings all in the cistern practicing their new found trade with glee.
Whittler was now building a table, using some wonderfully made dovetail joints to hold the sides of the tables together before bolting the legs to it.
Grim, Ghastly and Curtain Call stood on the far wall, performing for an unseen audience.
Another changeling, named Linguini was cooking up breakfast while Color Pallet, as she had taken to calling herself was painting away.
They really needed to slow down…
Still, they were happy, which was something they hadn’t really been through before.
“Ah! Buongiorno, Signore!” Linguini said with a smile. “Breakfast is only a few minutes away!”
Alan nodded, thankful for the meal.
“Sir!” A changeling said, running up to him, “Chess Piece would like to speak to you.”
“Chess Piece? He called himself Chess Piece?”
“Herself, sir.”
Alan blinked. “Oh, right the ear thing…”
<<<|Ω|>>>
“Wait, what?” Twilight asked.
“Hm? Oh yeah, it’s the ears,” Alan explained.
“It is?”
“Well...Even when you look at their more,” he coughed, “parts, it’s hard to tell. What with them having fake sets and all. So I asked if there was a polite way to tell, and they said the ears. Females have longer ears.”
Twilight blinked. “Huh…”
“Anyway…”
<<<|Ω|>>>
Chess Piece looked up at the opposite wall to the entrance of her small room, giving Alan an amazing view of the papers that had been pasted up there with notes scrawled into them.
The changeling herself, with her slightly longer than average ears and white Queen chess piece cutie mark stared up at the wall with intensity up until Alan entered.
“Sir!” She said with a salute.
“At ease,” Alan said from habit. “You wanted to see me?”
“I wanted to talk about Chaos,” she said, dropping the salute and turning to the maps. “From what you’ve told me, Chaos seems to be playing a political spy game, and using you as pawn in it. By using only a hooful of ponies under his indirect control he keeps just enough clout to be a threat himself while keeping blame off of himself. It’s brilliant in it simplicity, really,” she said.
“Thanks…” Alan muttered.
“But, as with any political plan, it can be worked around,” she said, dismissively, before turning back to the maps. “All we need to do is step off of his plane.”
“What do you mean?” Alan asked.
“Simple,” Chess said, “Chaos did the same thing to you. Rather than face you in combat, he simply changed battlefields, moving around you until he had complete control in the political sphere. Once there, you didn’t have many things to do other than move straight into his trap.”
“Again, thanks…”
“So all we need to do, then,” the strategist continued, “is move the battle to our own sphere.”
“And how are we going to do that?” Alan asked.
“I have a few ideas,” she said before smiling. “Yes I do…”
Alan waited.
Chess coughed nervously. “So...anyway, you have a couple of options, but the one I would suggest would be faking your death.”
Alan blinked. “Really?”
“The advantages of killing yourself are quite useful,” she continued. “Escaping a clingy lover, escaping trouble with the law, putting an old identity to rest, I’ve used it enough times myself to be a bit of an expert on the matter.”
Alan raised an eyebrow at her. “So you want me to off myself?”
Chess Piece smiled. “For you the advantages have just begun. Follow along, if you will. With you dead, what reason does Chaos have to keep your wife?”
Alan went silent.
“In fact, the sorrow alone might break the mind bending he has on her anyway.”
Alan nodded. “A-Anything else?”
“Well, besides that, if Chaos buys it, then we get his eyes off our backs, and we’d be even more free to move than he was with Luna in his corner.”
“So how do I get him to buy it?”
Chess Piece turned to him, staring at him in a deadpan stare. “You have forty changelings at your disposal and you ask how you’re going to fake your death?”
Alan blinked, before a blush crept onto his cheeks. “Right…”
Chess rolled her eyes. “Alright, I’ll get some of our actors together, see who wants to do this. How do you want to go?”
“Um...what’s easiest for you to do?”
“Falling deaths, typically,” she said.
<<<|Ω|>>>
“Wait. Falling?” Twilight asked.
“Yeah, you see—”
A knock sounded on the door to their little room, and a deep voice, reminiscent of an opera singer, echoed into the room. “Breakfast has arrived, sir.”
“Ah, speak of the devil,” Alan said. “Come in!”
In came a cart, ladened with food that made Twilight’s mouth water instantly. It was being pushed by a changeling that...Twilight guessed was male. He had average-looking ears.
She thought.
Maybe.
Back to what she did know. (S)he came in, smiling through his/her fangs, and other than the red curtain on his flanks was not in anyway noteworthy from the rest of the changelings.
“Twilight,” Alan said, “This is Curtain Call, this is the changeling that took my places for my death.”
“A pleasure to finally meet you properly, Mrs. Sparkle,” Curtain Call said with a bow.
Twilight looked up at the changeling and blinked.
“Go ahead,” Alan said. “Ask him anything you want.”
Twilight blinked, before speaking. “So...falling’s easy for you to fake?”
“Faking a death?” Curtain asked. “The easiest.”
“How?” Twilight questioned, confused.
“What do you mean?”
“Impact,” she said. “No matter what you’re doing you are going to be falling at 9.807 meters per second squared, which means that it takes very little time to reach a high speed. Impact is a measure of force as defined by mass multiplied by the change in velocity over change in time. If coming to a complete stop upon hitting the ground is your change in velocity, then the only thing that’ll save you from external and internal damage is to lessen the force by extending the amount of time it takes to come to a complete stop, which you can’t do if you’re trying to make it look like you’ve died!”
There was silence for a second or two.
And then Curtain Call laughed. “As clever as you are beautiful, Mrs. Sparkle.” he said, handing the mare her breakfast. “Yes, that is how it works, but changelings have a bit of an advantage when it comes to falls.”
“Again, how?”
Curtain Call smiled. “Exoskeletons.”
Twilight blinked again.
“Allow me to explain,” he said. “The changeling art of transformation is based around a simple secret. Are you familiar with shape-shifting theory?”
She nodded. “Mostly temporary, lasts maybe an hour or two before the object returns to normal.”
“Correct. This spell, however, is of little use to a changeling, who has to keep up a disguise for days, weeks, or maybe even years on end. So, what’s our secret? The answer is the manipulation of our chitin. Instead of changing ourselves entirely, all we need to do is alter the properties of our exoskeletons. Transforming our chitin to something soft and furry, at least, on the surface, is a far more efficient spell.”
“So you shapeshift by altering your chitin?” Twilight asked.
Curtain Call nodded.
“But what about the Queen? She transformed into Cadence, who was smaller than her. If it’s only altering the skin doesn’t that mean that you’re crushing yourselves in your own skin?”
“You’d think so,” the changeling said, “However, our lack of proper blood vessels and our miniscule organs means that we can even shrink our forms with only a slight amount of discomfort, and an increase in power expenditure the smaller you get. No, the real problem arises in becoming something larger.”
Twilight cocked her head. “Explain.”
“Gladly. The Law of Conservation of Mass.”
Twilight blinked. “You...you don’t actually gain the muscles to fill the form, so you become less dense.”
“And weaker, since our muscle mass is stretched thinner the larger we become. I can become a fully grown dragon with little problem, the issue arises when you blow at me and I fall down.”
Twilight nodded. “Okay...I’m following you. How do you survive a fall?”
“Well, I’m glad you asked about the...Ex-Queen. You see, as well as stretching and compressing our chitin, we can manipulate it around our bodies as well. So, with a simple little push, we can place a chitin cushion around the point of impact with our bodies, and further manipulate it to be firm, but just soft enough to allow for some life-saving penetration. Of course, it only works up to a certain point. After enough speed, it just doesn’t matter anymore.”
Twilight went silent for a moment, while Alan watched her think, eating away. “Is that how you made your neck bend like that?” she asked, remembering the terrifying angle Alan’s head hung at.
“Exactly, you’re catching on,” he said.
“Well...what about your pulse?” Twilight asked. “I didn’t hear your pulse.”
Curtain Call laughed. “And you never will. The truth of the matter is you can’t hear a changeling’s pulse through the chitin. We actually have to fake one with magic whenever somepony get’s too close to our chest. It’s really the biggest weakness of every changeling disguise in existence.”
Twilight blinked. “Really?”
He nodded.
“Of course,” Alan said, “that’s not the only problem we came across.”
<<<|Ω|>>>
Curtain Call had volunteered to be the Pendragon for the all-important event, while both Grim and Ghastly had declined, and now the smiling actor was looking the Pendragon around.
Alan felt slightly uncomfortable as the changeling looked him over with quiet, all-encompassing eyes that studied him.
“Alright,” the changeling said, before erupting into green flame. “What do you think?”
Alan found himself staring at a perfect reflection of himself, from the mane to the tail.
The Pendragon then blinked. “Is my mane really that disheveled?”
Chess Piece nodded. “We can get someone to get a comb if you want.”
“Sure…” Alan said, as he kept going around.
He stopped at the flank. “Um...we might have a problem.”
Both Chess Piece and Curtain Call both looked at his flanks.
The problem became quite evident.
Curtain Call’s cutie mark sat in front of Alan’s making it appear that the shield was standing behind the curtains of a stage.
Curtain Call blinked. “Oh...dear…”
“That’s a problem…” Chess Piece confirmed.
“So…” Alan said.
Curtain Call blinked. “Um...well I can honestly say this has never happened to me before…”
“Okay, we need to fix this if we want it to work,” Alan said, looking over the mark.
“Any ideas how?”
Alan shook his head. “I need to think about this.”
Chess Piece nodded. “Alright, you figure this one out, we’ll work on finding the best place for you to fall.”
Alan nodded, and headed back to his small room. He needed to think about this.
<<<|Ω|>>>
It had been three days since Alan had gotten out, and still he hadn’t come up with an answer. Everything else had been ironed out, it was just the Cutie Mark issue.
It had shown up across the entire...hive, I suppose you could call it, the changelings could alter every aspect of the of their appearance, with the exception of their Cutie Mark.
Chess Piece said it was probably because they had identities now. They were somebody putting on a mask rather than nobody putting on a face.
Or something like that…
Regardless, with their imitation ability handicapped, it was going to make things difficult.
They did start making their own identities to walk around in, so they were happy, but still.
Alan shook his head, racking his brain for some solution to this problem.
The magic was beyond him, as was, practically all magic with a few exceptions. Still, there had to be some solution to the problem.
Alan shook his head once more and yawned. His ‘window’ up at the top of his room showed an empty street in the night, and he was becoming more tired by the second.
He kept thinking, even as he climbed into bed. There had to be something…
There had to be…
Something…
Something…
Something…
<<<|Ω|>>>
“That night,” Alan said, as Twilight ate her breakfast, listening intently, “I had a dream. Not a normal dream, but one of those dreams. I still don’t remember what happened in it, all I know is that when I woke up, I had an answer.”
<<<|Ω|>>>
Alan’s eyes snapped open and he leapt out of bed. “I’ve got it!”
He ran out of the room, into the cistern, yelping happily. “I’ve got the answer!”
Chess Piece looked out the door to her room. “What? What’s going on?”
“I’ve got it! I’ve got the answer, Chess!” Alan said, grabbing the changeling by the withers and giving her a good shake.
“What? What? What?” she asked, hoping he’d stop before he shook her to pieces.
“Fake Cutie Marks!”
“What?” she asked, confused.
“Back in Ponyville! There was a filly! She used to be incredibly annoying, but that’s not the point! She had a fake set of cutie marks, velcro backed! We can do that!”
“What?”
“We need to buy some fakes of my cutie mark!”
“We can do that?”
“We are going to do that.”
<<<|Ω|>>>
It was a Friday.
It was not just any Friday, it was the perfect Friday.
Celestia and all the others had gathered here today, with Chaos in full view. It was now or never.
His eyes locked onto the draconequus and a hard-mana blade formed next to him.
A song popped into his head, and he began to sing to himself.
“Glory, glory what a hell of a way to die,
Glory, glory what a hell of a way to die,
Glory, glory what a hell of a way to die,
And he ain’t gonna jump no more…”
Curtain Call stood next to him, stickers on his flanks. “Ready?” the changeling asked.
Alan nodded. “‘Bout as ready as I’ll ever be…” Alan said.
Curtain Call nodded, and with a flash of green fire, Alan was facing himself again.
The Pendragon looked the disguised changeling over, before ruffling his mane. “Make the eyes look more tired.”
The false Alan’s eyes went bloodshot and grew dark rings under his eyes.
Alan nodded. “Good. You’re almost ready,” he said, before pulling out the small marriage earing, and handing it to the changeling.
Curtain Call looked down at it.
Alan smirked. “Don’t lose it, now.”
The False Pendragon nodded.
Alan hovered the hard-mana sword next to the disguised changeling. “Alright, I guess that this is the day I die…”
Curtain Call nodded, and made his way to the edge.
The first thing he felt was the magical backlash as his sword shattered on the hard ground below.
And then he heard the cry.
“Justice!”
And then he heard her call.
“Alan?”
He winced.
“Alan?”
“Alan? Alan?” she cried, her voice becoming more and more worried. “Alan?”:
He shook his head. The sound...the hurt in her voice…
At-at least...at least he knew...at least he knew she loved him.
<<<|Ω|>>>
The two morticians stood over the gurney, staring down at the body of the Pendragon.
“It’s sad,” the first one said. “This stallion saved my son’s life during the war.”
“Died young, too…” the other one said.
The first one shook his head, and with the ring of magic from his horn, picked up a scalpel.
“Alright, time to begin. Simple embalming procedure…”
A knock sounded on the door, and the unicorn doctors paused.
Opening, in walked in a guard and a doctor.
“Evening Gentlecolts,” the mare in the lab coat said. “Just come down from Her Majesty’s Medical Wing. The Princess wants me to do this.”
The doctors looked between the two of them.
The mare spoke up again. “I’m sorry, did you want to…”
The lead doctor shook his head. “No...no not really. It’s a shame, though.”
The mare nodded. “There’s a saying that the good die young. The problem is when they go and prove it right.”
The other doctors nodded, and began to file out.
The mare looked over to the guard, and once the doors closed, spoke. “Alright, get back to the barracks ASAP. They’ll notice the armor’s gone within the next thirty minutes.”
The Guard nodded, and took a running leap out the window.
The mare then turned to body on the sheet. “How’s it been so far, Curtain Call?”
The body sat up and rolled his neck. “So far so good. Just got to make it through the wake.”
The mare in the lab coat nodded. “Good luck, see you when you get back home.”
<<<|Ω|>>>
“What do you mean I can’t tell her?” Alan asked. “She’s free!”
“For now,” Chess Piece said, pleading. “We can’t guarantee that Chaos won’t find a use for her later.”
“You told me he’d let her go!”
“And he did!” the changeling said, angrily. “But we can’t risk any holes in this.”
Two mana-hands gripped the sides of Alan’s head as he tried to suppress a headache. “I wanted her to be free, but I don’t want her to be in pain like this…”
Chess Piece shook her head. “We’ve killed you, she has to be in pain. If she’s not...if she’s not then Chaos becomes suspicious and we need the utmost secrecy if this plan is going to work.”
Alan shook his head. “This better be worth it.”
Chess Piece shook her head. “I hope so too…”
<<<|Ω|>>>
Grim and Ghastly walked through the graveyard, shovels over their shoulders. Grim shook his head. “She was really torn up about this.”
Ghastly nodded. “Glad we asked the boss about her favorite foods.”
Grim nodded, and the two of them soon found themselves in front of the fresh earth of the Pendragon’s grave.
“To life,” Grim said, holding his shovel up.
“L'chaim,” Ghastly replied, clinking shovels together.
And they began to dig.
Two hours passed, and finally they hit the heavy oak of the coffin.
“Time to get up, no curtains for you, Curtain Call,” Ghastly said, prying the lid open.
Curtain Call the changeling gasped for air. “Thank Celestia!” He said, jumping into the air. “I thought she’d never leave!”
“Hurry up,” Grim grumbled. “We need to get this coffin covered before anypony notices.”
Curtain climbed out, freeing himself from the dirt as Ghastly shut the lid behind him. “You guys go ahead and do that,” he said, as his magic grabbed the earring on his ring. “I’ve got to make a delivery…”
<<<|Ω|>>>
The guard looked down at her as she stared out her door. She looked like a mess.
He sighed, and held out a hoof. “I recieved this,” he told her, “as well as a letter a few days ago, Ma’am. It had slipped my mind, Ma’am. It said to deliver it to you as soon as possible, Ma’am.”
Twilight sighed, before looking down at the outstretched hoof.
In it rested a small, golden earring.
Her eyes widened, and she shakily took it from him.
It was her earring.
New tears began to spring to her eyes as she held it up. A sob escaped her, before she took a breath to compose herself. Trying to keep calm, she then raised the little piece of jewelry to her ear, and clasped it shut.
Right where it belonged.
“Th-thank you,” she whispered. “You have no idea, how much this means to me.”
The guard nodded and walked away. And as he left, Curtain Call sighed.
This had better be worth it.
--------------------------------
And chapter! It’s all coming together guys.
“Oh really?”
Really.
“All coming together.”
You better believe it, Pinkie.
“We’ll see, Miner...we’ll see…”
Anyway guys, hope you’ve finally started enjoy the story again, and I hope you enjoyed the little world building I did with changelings.
“About that…”
Okay, stop right there.
“What?”
I know what you’re going to say, and I really don’t want that subject dominating the comments.
“I just want to know what kind of set up you thought about.”
And curiosity killed the cat. Or in this case, my sanity.
“Just a hint? Please?”
...Fine. But only if you and the readers promise never to mention it again (or at least once and then never again).
“Promise!”
...Okay...how do I put this delicately…um…the...the males have a really deep sheath that looks suspiciously like something else.
“Oh. Ew.”
You asked.
“Anyway guys, next time, Mr. PervMiner will give you more secrets from the Pendragon.”
Hey!
“Be sure to comment, guys!”
Bye!
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Pardon me, I have nothing to say!
I never stopped enjoying the story
I can only look back at the outrage of the others who protested these turn of events and giggle .
I still find it hilarious people didn't see through the fake death immediately and actually got butthurt over it. Gotta have more faith in your writers, and having faith this time has brought upon a great bit of worldbuilding... And a new headcanon for changelings.
What about the corpse in the coffin? Unless a Changelling live in the coffin... Twilight managed to open the coffin and it was not something they have time to just put.
Me? Stop enjoying this story?
Dude, I have stuck through two of your damned books. If I can't make it through the final book I have no business attending to the entire Harmony For All trilogy in the first place.
I am sticking through to the end, no matter what kind of mind-rending revelations and plot twists you put me through.
I bid my sanity adieu
5652186
Yes...how did they pull off the coffin that first appeared empty, and then had a body in it?
5652391 I don't suposse they put a doll or something like that of him... Right?
There had to be some serious air holes in that coffin for Curtain to be able to breathe. (On that note, I find it ironic that only three Changelings, possibly the world's best actors, have a liking for it.)
On a separate note, how much longer are females ears compared to males? (I mean is it noticeable or is it one of those things you have to actively look for?)
5652793
Got to look for it. Changelings don't make anything easy.
Gotta say, the fake death thing, kinda figured that one out. Still, what I really looked forward to was seeing HOW you pulled it off, and gotta say, bravo man, bravo. The left behind Changelings, a thought like that never even crossed my mind, and thinking back, it should have. You had foreshadowed the entire concept of Changelings with identity all the way back in book 2. You really have put a lot of thought into this story, and it's well worth the effort.
Allow me to make my opinion on this story clear, I've been a long time reader of fantasy novels, and the ones I've loved the most, the ones that I think are truly worthwhile reads, are the ones that leave you feeling satisfied, but a little sad that the story is over, cause you want them to just continue on. I must say, that with the way this story is going, the thought that this is the last book, does in fact make me a little sad, but I have faith that the ending will be satisfying. =3
That was fun. Looking forward to more.
Keep up the good work. Deus tecum.
So not only did you explain his death in a way that I can both except and apritiate, but you did it with... CHANGLING HEAD-CANON! Seriously, LOVE all the Changling head-canon in this chapter. Well done.
I must say, I haven't enjoyed Changelings this much since The Three Sisters.
Hmn, I suppose if you have forty individuals all suddenly express their special talents, you might just get some useful ones like tactician or cook.
Pfft, I still don't like that an entire courtyard full of ponies that survived both a war with and then an infiltration of a nation of flying enemies would just stand there dumbly while a friend falls to his death. You'd think they'd have developed reflexes to stop things that might try to fly down and kill you, especially any guards on the scene that ought to understand that royal assassins might attack from above in exactly the manner that Curtain Call did. But ehh.
Anyway, nothing too surprising this chapter. Once we got the forty changelings reveal the manner of Alan's fake death more or less wrote itself, minus any small details like how the fall wasn't just a fatal event for whoever was the stand-in.
To Life!
Hmmm....Fascinating!
And there's the wall. Now I have to wait...
Anyway, definitely enjoying the story so far! I think it may have had a few too many loose ends for me until you started tying them up in these latest chapters, the story felt really unfocused for a bit. I thought Alan was still alive, but I actually wasn't 100% sure. I could still see you actually killing him, thigh I may not have enjoyed it. Really, there was two main things that made me think he was still around: I didn't believe Alan was stupid enough to jump off a building like that, sleep deprived or not, and I caught the hint earlier that Luna couldn't see his dreams because of the visions. So when chaos asked Luna to check for his dreams she really couldn't see him.
Anyway, looking forward to more. There are still loose ends everywhere. (Sometimes I think this story has a.d.d.) Sombra's out there somewhere, I'm really curious how Big Mac's druid powers are going to come into play, we still don't know how Alan pulled off the ghost trick, what plans for Orion does chaos have, will Blueblood cone back into the picture, and what the hell was that cloud thing? Ok, I think I'll leave it there... got a little carried away...
So yeah, you've got me reading!
Honestly, I am of the opinion that Changelings are originally asexual. As Twilight has often proven, transformation spells are easy. And Changeling bodies have ADAPTED to make it all the easier. Changing the mind isn't as easy though, as Chrysalis having to do repeated attempts on Shining proved.
But though I think Changelings are naturally asexual... doesn't mean they can't choose a gender once they've developed enough self-sapience, eh?
5754030
5754027
You probably already know this by now...but that doesn't seem to be the case anymore when Starlight & Trixie met Thorax's hive. It was all an ASSUMPTION.
That or when Changelings get Reformed they get a gender. Either way *Shrugs*