• Published 14th Jun 2012
  • 2,386 Views, 34 Comments

Volde the Changeling - Hawkeye



Sometimes, weird shit happens and you end up somewhere you never thought possible. This is my story.

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Unlikely Place to Find a Friend (2)

As I stood at the edge of the forest, still in the form of a bear, I could tell plainly that the town- or rather, former town- I was looking at was not Ponyville. It was burnt to ash, only a few buildings actually remained standing- those were the outlines I was able to spot. Not a single pony was around, at least none that I saw. Despite all the charred wood, the colours of the few remaining houses hurt my eyes- far too much pink.

I took the opportunity of probably being alone to make my way into the remains of the small town. Looking all around made me wonder what could possibly have done such a thing here. Could have been some pyromaniac pony, but I doubted that- it didn’t seem like there would be ponies like that from watching the show. Possibly some kind of dragon, that seemed most likely even though I still doubted that- again, because it’s Equestria and for some reason I couldn’t think that was possible.

Walking around some more revealed far too much for my liking. Inside one of the destroyed houses laid a skeleton- the skeleton of a dead pony. There was a large piece of heavily charred wood laying on top of the bottom half of the former pony. Poor bastard had been trapped there to burn to death. The bones were also heavily charred- they looked like any touch would cause them all to shatter into ash. The only part of the building that seemed to still be intact was a small brick fireplace, long since extinguished. There was nothing else of note in the building so I simply left with a nauseous feeling in my stomach.

I decided that it was time to explore one of the buildings that was still standing. The one I chose was bright pink and was two stories high. When I opened the door to the still-standing house and peered inside I was amazed that everything looked like it was intact. Not only that, but it seemed like most of it had been used recently. After I walked inside, I started carefully examining everything in the room- starting with a tea set that was sitting on a small table in the middle of the room. The teapot was still warm to the touch, that meant that it couldn’t have been sitting like that for very long- maybe only about twenty minutes. That was when I heard movement above me, on the second floor. What the heck was someone doing, living in a place like this?

My ears perked up at more sounds, specifically the sound of a door opening. Obviously whoever or whatever was living here was going to be coming downstairs. I needed to think of a form I could take in order to get through this. I couldn’t take the form of anyone that is undoubtedly famous, so any of the Elements were out of the question. I also needed to know their voice, how they acted, and how they looked. I needed a background character that had at least one speaking role in the show. Bon-Bon was out of the question- she had so many different voices it would be impossible to know which one to use, not to mention how annoying they all were. I had always liked Roseluck’s design but I couldn’t remember what her voice sounded like in the show, so she was out. Of course! I can use Derpy! The perfect pony to use, at least for me. Now all I needed to do was focus and change.

I was brought out of my indecision when I heard a loud, feminine, shrill scream. I winced at the sound before I turned my head and saw a unicorn with a coat that could only be described as a light, desaturated, peachy yellow and crystal clear blue eyes. Her mane and tail were both braided- the braids on her mane started just at the back of her head, while the braids on her tail started right at the base- and were coloured an interestingly vibrant red and orange. The mark on her flank was what seemed to be three suns placed in what looked to be an upside down triangle. But all of this information was unimportant to me at the moment as she was currently backed against a wall with her ears splade back with obvious terror in her eyes from the large bear that was currently standing in the middle of her living room. It was at that moment that I realized that I needed to stop being so indecisive because now changing would be pointless.

I pointed my muzzle down and let out a loud sigh - which sounded more like a growl - before my body was engulfed in green flame once more and I returned to my Changeling form. If it was even possible, she seemed to shrink even more from the sight. I wondered briefly why it was that she didn’t just run - there was a doorway right next to where she was standing after all. Terror and shock can do strange things to people- er, ponies it seemed.

“W-what are you?” she suddenly asked. Despite the obvious terror in her voice, she seemed to speak in a bit of a high class voice with what sounded like an Australian accent. It seemed she didn’t know what a Changeling was, which meant one of two things. One, the wedding hadn’t happened yet. Or two, she just didn’t know about the invasion because there haven’t been any papers coming to this place for some time. In either case, the less this pony knew about me was for the better.

“That’s not important right now. What’s important is that you know that I’m not going to hurt you,” I replied in what I hoped was as reassuring a tone as I could manage with this voice. It seemed to work a bit because she looked as if she perked up slightly, so I added “What’s your name?”

“What?”

“I said, what is your name?” I snorted in slight irritation at having to repeat myself.

“Oh... Uh, Sunbeam...”

You’d think that I would be used to names like this from the show, but for some reason, the sweet name caused me to feel sick to my stomach, must have just been the new form’s distaste for ponies. “Alright, Sunbeam. Now then, why are you here, in the middle of this dead town? Or more importantly, what happened here?”

She seemed to relax more as she finally seemed to realize that I really wasn’t going to hurt her. “A... A dragon attacked the town one day, seemingly out of the blue. It... It killed almost everypony in town. I was lucky that my home didn’t get touched by the beast. Those that weren’t killed ran away from the town, I was the only pony that stayed here. I was... I was too scared to leave, on top of the fact that this is my home, I couldn’t just leave it all behind like that. Plus, I... I don’t know if it’s even safe to leave, for all I know that dragon could be out there, waiting to eat me!”

“Look, I’ve been walking through this town for a couple hours, I walked all the way up to your home and did a dragon eat me? No. I didn’t even see one, so obviously it is long gone. You don’t need to stay here anymore, so why not just leave and head to another town, maybe find your family?”

She hesitated for a moment, it was understandable considering what I was. What I didn’t understand, was why she told me what she did... “None to speak of. They’re all dead, all lived here. I was the only one in my family that survived the attack as far as I know...”

She said it jarringly nonchalantly. I could tell that she was trying hard to hide her true feelings on the matter, but it was obvious to me that she was sad. Once again, understandable. I knew that if I had to go through something like that, I would probably have broken down into tears, definitely wouldn’t have been able to give off the illusion of being indifferent like this mare was trying to now. I had to admit that she was pretty good at hiding her feelings. Problem with that was, Changelings can feel any emotions that a pony is feeling, meaning that trying to hide her real feelings from me was pointless. I could feel that she was sad... maybe even depressed. With the massive waves of emotion I could feel off of her, I was amazed she wasn’t crying. This was one tough mare.

However, it was then that I realized something else that I seemed to be lacking. I was having a difficult time caring... Back when I used to be a human, I was a caring guy, I always cared about how others felt... But here, in this new body, I could barely bring myself to care about her sadness. I had no idea why that was, and it sickened me how uncaring I was. This was definitely something I would have to learn to overcome about this new form: its natural instincts. A Changeling is nothing more than a cold, uncaring husk controlled by a hive mind, kind of like the Zerg...

I was brought out of my thoughts when I noticed that she was staring at me and shifting her hooves awkwardly, probably because I had yet to reply to what she said. I shook my head to clear my mind in order to speak. “Look, I understand that you’re feeling sad about all this, but staying here isn’t a good idea,” I nearly gagged on the next words to come out of my mouth. “... I think you should come with me, at least until we reach the next town,” as menacing as I looked and sounded, I was trying my best to give off the impression of sympathy and understanding.

“But, this is my home... I can’t just leave like that...”

In my world, I had a fairly thin patience, here it was definitely even thinner. I didn’t have time for this whole rigmarole of craptastic sincerity. “Listen Sunshine...”

“Sunbeam,” she corrected, obviously not getting my insult of her name.

I felt my eye twitch from annoyance. “Whatever, listen. The way I see it, you have two options here. You can come with me and live, or, you can stay here and starve to death. As far as I know, starvation is a very painful way to go. You’ve got five minutes to catch up to me before I leave town, after that, you’re on your own,” I turned around, and walked outside.

Even though I hadn’t been in there for long, the sun seemed to be setting by now. At least as far as I could tell with everything being tinted cyan. I frowned at the thought of what the forest might be like in the night as I began to walk through the town once more, heading for the opposite side of where I came from. I still had the bear form commited to memory so I was fairly certain I’d be able to defend myself if need be.

I heard hoofsteps behind me. I stopped and turned my head, but I did not turn around. It was obvious who it was. I let her walk up next to me before I continued to walk out into the forest with her walking beside me, not saying a word. At least not until she spoke.

“I.. didn’t catch your name...”

“I didn’t give it.”

“Well can I atleast know it if we’re going to be travelling together?”

“No,” I said flatly.

“No?”

“No.”

“Well... Then at least just tell me what you are.”

“Changeling.”

She perked up as if I’d given her some small victory. “... Well, what does a Changeling even do?”

“I’ll tell you if and when we get to the point of me trusting you farther than I could throw you.”

“Oh... Where are you from?”

In response, I simply sighed in irritation. This was going to be a very long trip.


Author's Notes: A couple things. First, the story will pick up from here, I promise, with probably longer chapters. These first few were to just get everything going. I'll try to be faster as well, this chapter took me WAY too long to complete. Second, Sunbeam is an OC created by my friend infohippie, and belongs to them. I'm not sure if I got the description correct, so here is a picture of her. The picture of the pony was drawn by another friend named Scruffy, and the background for the picture was created by Trixie: