Ditto limped back and forth, waiting for Twilight to return. She was trying to look on the bright side- maybe Twilight wouldn't suspect anything. Maybe she would think it a coincidence and ignore it. Or maybe the nurse wouldn't even be working. Trying to take her mind off of it, Ditto returned to 'Goldhoof the Magical and the Pegasus Race'.
Goldhoof saw the ground coming closer and closer. She was going to smack right into the side of the mountain, and she knew it would not be pretty. In the few seconds before colliding with the mountain, she looked around and saw the Earth Ponies and Unicorns below looking horrified. Then it hit her.
This was the traitor's doing!
Then she had a face full of rock and was knocked unconscious. The last thing she heard was strange laughter... familiar laughter.
Ditto suddenly noticed that she could hear laughter in real life, coming from downstairs. She limped to the door and looked down the staircase to see Minuette letting herself in. The changeling hid behind the doorframe and peeked out to see what the Unicorn was up to.
"They've removed the guards from Ponyville!" Minuette was saying aloud to herself. "I was getting tired of those dumb guards, not letting anypony even leave their house without being searched for traces of Changelings! It was tiring." Then Minuette looked around the library and called, "Hello? Is anypony here?"
Ditto closed her eyes as she flashed green for a moment, then trotted downstairs in her Moonbloom disguise. "Oh, hello Minuette." 'Moonbloom' said. "Did you need anything? You were here less than a few hours ago."
"I didn't see you here." Minuette said, staring at Ditto's solid purple eyes. "You have interesting eyes, there."
"Yes, I do." Ditto said dismissively, "Didn't Twilight get you that book?"
"No, she rushed me out, for whatever reason." Minuette started searching the bookcases, using her magic to pull out random books.
"Well, here's a book." Ditto flicked her hoof at the bookshelf, knocking out a small pink volume. She picked it up and set it on the table. "It's called, 'The Security and Protection of Equestria'. I remember you were worried about the Changelings."
"Yes." Minuette surrounded the book with blue magic as she levitated it in front of her. "I can be...a bit paranoid." She turned and trotted out the door. "I'll see you around." she said, then used her magic to close the door behind her.
Ditto sighed with relief and transformed back into a Changeling. She had been seeing a lot of Minuette, and she was worried that the blue Unicorn was getting suspicious of her as well. She had said that she could be paranoid.
BOOM!
Ditto was almost knocked backwards as the door was flung open with great force. Her eyes rolled for a bit before she could regain her wits. She found herself face-to-face with an angry Twilight Sparkle.
"DITTO!" Twilight yelled at her. "How DARE you!"
Ditto immediately knew that Twilight had indeed found out about her little adventure outside. "I-I... Twilight, please calm down!" she said quickly.
"You went outside! I told you not to go outside! Now you've probably gone to tell your little Changeling friends all about Ponyville! I trusted you, Ditto! You little monster!"
"I would never-" Ditto tried to get a word in, but Twilight just talked over her.
"I bet a group of Changelings is coming to Ponyville right now, about to attack us all! How could you, Ditto? After we were so nice to help you, you go and plan an invasion of Ponyville!" Twilight sighed and turned away from the Changeling, trotting back upstairs. Before she disappeared into the upstairs bedroom, she stopped. "I thought you were different, not like the other changelings, but I guess a changeling is a changeling."
The door slammed behind Twilight, and Ditto was left feeling forlorn on the first floor. She was surprised at how Twilight had reacted- she had been expecting to be thrown out the window or something. At the very least banished from Ponyville. She had even imagined Twilight vaporizing her with her magic, but all that happened was shouting.
And Ditto felt that was worse than any physical punishment. Now she was alone, nopony trusting her, lost in Ponyville and too hurt to find the swarm. And without the bits of love from Twilight and her friends, she would surely starve.
She had now lost all hope.
----
*clink*
Ditto slept in her bed, snoring softly. Her hooves folded under her head, pressing a pattern into her face because of the holes.
*clink*
Beside was 'Goldhoof the Magical and the Pegasus Race', left open from when she had been reading it earlier. All around her bed were the usual piles of books that she just read, tossed aside, then picked up a new one.
*clink*
The ink beside her bed, still there from when she had been writing her novel, twitched and sent a ripple pattern as there was a thump from downstairs.
*CLINK*
Ditto opened her purple eyes with alarm there was another bang from downstairs and a *clink* of glass. She stood to find the source of the noise. Scanning the room, she saw movement beside the window and the hoof clinked it again.
*clink*
It was the middle of the night. Who was knocking on the window? "Hello?" Ditto whispered.
"Ditto? Is that you?" came a whispered voice from outside.
How did this stranger know her name? "Who are you?"
"It's me, Carbon."
"Carbon?" Ditto gasped. She limped over and placed her hooves on the glass of the window, pushing it open. Once it was open enough, Ditto stepped back to let in the guest.
It was another changeling!
"Ditto, don't tell me you've been hiding out with ponies this whole time?" Carbon asked, landing softly beside her. "You're missing all the fun!"
"Carbon, but... how...why are you here?" Ditto managed eventually.
"Come on, Ditty!" Carbon grabbed Ditto's front hooves and flew out the window. "Let's go have some fun!"
"Carbon, don't!" Ditto gasped as she flew through the air above Ponyville. "We'll be seen!"
"Does it matter?" Carbon asked, flipping the purple-eyed Changeling and setting her safely on the ground. "Look around."
A rock dropped in Ditto's stomach as she looked around. There were Changelings everywhere, the whole swarm, flying around and chasing ponies. There was the odd scream as a Changeling gave chase to a pony, then it went silent for several seconds as it was gagged by green goop. With horror, she saw Pinkie Pie green-gooped to the ground. The earth pony was trying to bite a nearby Changeling, but he swooped away just in time.
"We're invading!" Double said happily, flapping his wings excitedly. "Why didn't you come back to the swarm after the attack on Canterlot?" he added.
"I was stranded." Ditto said, waving her broken leg and wincing as a jolt of pain hit it. Of course, she didn't mention that she had grown close to her captors; she had a feeling that the swarm wouldn't appreciate that fact.
"Oh well, it's not like we had trouble invading without you." Double flew off to taunt Ditzy Doo, who was attempting to fly away but another Changeling had her tail and was pulling her back.
"I have to stop this." Ditto said to herself. She limped as fast as she could back to the library. She had to wake up Twilight and have her help!
Suddenly, she was pinned to the ground. "Ya varmints! We'll get rid 'o you!" It was Applejack.
"Applejack, wait!" Ditto squirmed underneath the orange earth pony's hooves. "It's me! 'm on your side!"
"Really?" Applejack sounded doubtful. "Then why is there an invasion after Twilight told me ya sneaked yerself outside when she wasn't home?"
"It's not me who told them, I swear!" Ditto pleaded, "I'm just trying to go get help!"
Suddenly, there was a huge flash of light and silence fell.
"Woah nelly." Applejack murmured, and she stepped back, letting Ditto up. The Changeling saw the huge white form of Celestia flying above the town, her horn glowing.
Ditto raced to the upstairs bedroom of the library, ignoring the pain in her broken leg, to find Twilight awake and looking horrified. "You did tell then to come!" Twilight snapped at Ditto. "You betrayed us!"
"I swear I didn't, Twilight!' Ditto said, "I was trying to help the ponies!"
"Likely story!" Twilight growled. "I was dumb to ever trust you!"
Ditto stepped back as Twilight's horn began to glow. She closed her eyes. Here would come the vaporizing.
Then, suddenly, she was flying again. As she looked back, she saw that Celestia had flung all the Changelings from town, like Shining Armor and Princess Cadance had done the last time. The only thing Ditto was aware of was stabbing horror that she wouldn't be able to survive this fall.
And a book flew next to her.
Spellchecker and Prof-reader:Glitchhunter5000 (The Reviser/Suggester)
please tell me of spelling errors, my spellcheck got messed up when I wrote this chapter
First
An idea VERY similar to mine... Though mine is 2nd person... dl.dropbox.com/u/31471793/FiMFiction/emoticons/shrug_Twilight_Sparkle.png
Whatcha gon' do?
597125
i0.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/000/070/111/halolz-dot-com-nope.avi.gif?1283697184
P.S. A lot of things happened in this chapter, it would have been better if you had paced it all out, made two separated chapters. I didn't even let Twilight being mad, (A little overly so, you should have detailed WHY Twilight was mad, not just having her yell at Ditto, immediately assuming the worst out of Ditto, and abandoning her. INSIDE HER HOUSE, if you thought the person in your house just betrayed you, would you leave them IN the house?) sink in. There was almost no time at all to process what the heck happened, and you never really built any emotion on it. You could have, y'know, emphasized how much Twilight trusted Ditto or her side of the story by switching to her point of view, because Twilight's behavior REALLY needs some explaining. You might just characterize Twilight differently, but I don't think Twilight would jump to conclusions like that. Especially after MMMystery, where Twilight was the rational one and Pinkie was the one doing the jumping. I guess it's a little late for revisions, but maybe you could add a bonus chapter giving Twilight's POV?
P.P.S. Since you asked, here's what I found in the way of spelling:
"Wow nelly." - Just a little mistake here, most people say "Woah nelly," and that includes Applejack.
"You went outside! i told you not to go outside!" - Really little mistake here, Capitalize the "i"
" she had even been imagining twilight vaporizing her with her magic," Capitalize "she" and "twilight"
"Double grabbed ditto's front hooves and flew out the window." Capitalize "ditto"
I'm not that good with grammar, so all I really caught were capitalization errors.
poor Ditto.
Its a dream, I called it!
It's far to farfetch'd that the Changeling army would regroup and invade within such a short time along with the fact it seems far too perfectly timed with her scolding by Twilight.
Did Ditto die?
ditto
i see what you did there you brilliant bastard :D
Poor Ditto.
597336 yeh know, they could have been organizing the raid earlier only waiting untill Double got that book/document.
Oh and also, now comes the the banishment and the inprisonment at the place where she was banished to.
597819
Don't forget that Applejack came out of nowhere and Twilight sleeping through an invasion is odd.
Plus don't forget Pinkie cannot be captured by any mortal means.
I bet the changelings are raiding every here and there and that it Twi will still blame Ditto for it and not feel guilty.
597926 Nor can she be captured by most immortal means. After all, she's Pinkie.
wow
this got good
After reading the story AND the comments, I'm gonna guess that this is a dream. Changelings regrouping extremely fast is one main factor, and they have no leader at the moment(unless Chrysalis got to a quick recovery) and thus would have no means to communicate through the hive. Also, with Ditto feeling very bad, it leads to the theory that she will have nightmares. If you witnessed someone trying to steal from your house and they looked into your eyes, would you break away so easily and dream about puppies and cake that night?...maybe for Pinkie but not for the rest of us. It would haunt us until we deal with it and lift the burden. If I'm wrong about this then logic has failed me.
599094
Got good? Naw, this story was already a good read: it got better.
597336
599230
I'm unable to see how this chapter is unquestionably a dream to ya both.
Story wise, it's been what? Two-Plus weeks since the attack on Canterlot? Surely that's enough time for a rag-tag group of changelings to meet-up and mount a attack on a pony-town.
Also, I didn't get the impression that separation from Chrysalis would prevent roaming changelings from attacking ponies. If anything, the lack of their queen's leadership increases the chance of a changeling attack on ponies. Their queen isn't there to chastise them: "Don't be foals! Us changelings are exposed and scattered. We best retreat to the hive and recover --- not go storming around Equestria's towns, making ourselves a target to Celestia!"
The events in Ditto's life seem a bit too conveniently similar to the book she's reading.
Also... "I was dumb to ever trust you!"
Would Twilight ever use the word "dumb"? Sorry, it just seems a little out of place for the bookworm to settle for layman's terms when a plethora of verbose vocabulary is available to her.
...
Does that make any sense?
597146
About the whole thing with Twilight jumping to conclusions, It makes sense the way I think of it. She didn't trust Ditto at first because she was a Changeling, and I would she's a bit bias to Changelings because of what they have done- cast spells on her brother, injured her mentor, trapped her and Cadance in a cave, and tried to take over Canterlot.
I ditto on it being Ditto's dream; could you have her scream or something when she awakes?
Also when reading this story I couldn't help but notice the overwhelming number of sympathy techniques to make us root for Ditto, it's staggering!
tld;dr: gj.
Excellent story. I really like Ditto's character. I can't wait to read more!
NOOO!! DITTO!!!
FFS TWI. SHUT UP AND LISTEN TO HER!!!
597926 All your arguments are valid... So if its not a dream then its a moment of author derp.
So much for getting thorugh my backlog of 32 chapters from assorted fics...
Track-faved so hard that the fav button may possibly be broken.
599855 Now that I think about it, that's a valid point.
I think it is rather obvious that this chapter is a dream sequence.
Isn't it? That why the pacing is off.
MOAR! YOUR EMPEROR COMMANDS IT!
Nooooooooooooooo! That cliffhanger!
its obviously a dream
At first Im like then I'm like
597023 Spellcheck? a.deviantart.net/avatars/m/i/mingplz.png That's for people who can't spell dl.dropbox.com/u/31471793/FiMFiction/emoticons/misc_Lyra_dealwithit.png
seems like a dream. If it's not I will be very very mad Blargh! Twilight rage
599855
Like you said in your own story, that was all Queen Chrysalis, not changelings in general.
Also, you CAPITALIZED and underlined and italicized and bolded (is that even a word?) "BOOM"
SO MUCH EMPHASIZATION!!! (Again, is that even a word?)
Just sayin'...
832605 a.deviantart.net/avatars/r/a/ragefaceplz.png
What the hell? I sincerely hope this is a dream, I don't want six chapters of the hive.
Missed an I
Wait...the changeling in her dream is Carbon? Or Double? I'm confused...
Oh yeah, and it's totally a dream. I'm pretty sure. And Minuette's a changeling. CALLING IT.
Now to see if she's a Sleeptalker