The Crystal Changeling

by Zoljen

Last Day of Camp

“Well, I can say that the training at that camp was both amusing and painful. I ended up face down in the dirt more often than I care to recall.” Crystal sighed softly as she recalled her days in that training camp.

“So you're just going to skip over it?” Pinkie Pie slumped slightly in her chair. “Of course, most of it would be boring anyway, huh?”

“Yes, it would be. However, I will go into detail on the last day. It was indeed a month after we started running laps and getting tested that things went to Tartarus.”

“So you were trained how to fight?” Rainbow spoke up as she glanced to Talon by her side.

“Well, given that I had no role in a hive until I learned which hive I was a part of. Even then I still had no clue. I was taught in both magic offensive tactics, and defensive tactics, as well as deflecting magic with my hooves, claws, or wings,” Crystal listed off as she floated a cup of water up to drink. “Although the better teacher proved to be much higher up on the chain of command.”

“Shi-” Pinkie started to ask, before a white glow gently closed her mouth.

“Spoilers,” Crystal grinned. “Anyway, this pause has gone on long enough.”

---

Crystal grunted as she landed face first in the dirt, again. She was currently wrestling with a pegasus, namely Wind Blast, and was losing again. She groaned as she stood up and shook out her head.

“Come on Crystal!” He called out as he floated up, chuckling. “It’s only 2-5 in my favor!” Crystal grumbled as she stood low, her hooves spread and wings flared out. She watched the pegasus before her do the same. “One more go, then we can stop.”

“Fine,” Crystal grinned, charging forward and rearing back to throw a hoof. The attack was meant to be slow as Wind reared back and easily deflected the blow, as he threw his own. She was already spinning and let her wings buffet him in the face, throwing off his counter attack as she found herself to his side. She grinned and jumped a little, intending to buck him in the side. However, her hoof hit nothing but air as she felt a gust of wind over her back and side.

She instinctively ducked, a hoof sailing over her head as she glanced up to see him flying up and hovering a yard or so off the dirt. She gasped and bounced back as he came back down, missing her with a haymaker.

“You’re getting really good at dodging attacks,” Wind commented as he floated up from the ground a yard or so again.

“I’ve had plenty of practice lately with other ponies throwing things at me, shooting me, or flat out attacking me.” Crystal let out a quick sigh, before bouncing back from an attack from Wind. He landed and quickly started throwing punches as Crystal reared back and deflected them to the best of her ability.

“I don't know why, you seem pretty cool to be around.” He kept up the attack, throwing wild and loose punches. The attacks were slow and deliberate, but fast enough that she had to keep blocking them. “Although, I am curious why you aren't using your magic in this little match?”

“If this were actual combat, I would be. This is a spar and I’d rather not hurt you more then I have to,” Crystal smirked as she saw an opening. She slid to her left, narrowly dodging a punch and threw a punch to his side. He dodged it like she thought he would, going to his right. He suddenly found a wing in his face again, before he felt something hard connect with his side, knocking the wind from him as he flew a little from the impact and landed on his side.

Wind caught his breath as he held his side, looking up into the smug face of Crystal as she just stood above him. She stood there, waiting for him to catch his breath as he kept gasping for air. “What… was that?” He wheezed out eventually.

“A feint using my wings. Really, it's pretty simple since my wings are durable,” She grinned, showing off her fangs which made him blink and shiver slightly. “Sweep the wings in as well, sure in the air it’s hard to do. But while grounded? Easy.”

“Right,” The stallion slowly stood up, with her help. “And you should really be using your magic in these spars. I mean the unicorns are.” Crystal blinked, then looked over at the unicorns that were indeed fighting with various other ponies. They were using their magic, mostly in the form of small precise, yet weak beams.

However, a pair of ponies caught her eye. Dust Horn and Rose Wind were back to back and fighting a pair of unicorns who didn't seem be to holding back. Two unicorns were firing small beams of magic at the pair, and they were easily deflecting the magic harmlessly to the ground. Off to the side, she noticed Quake nodding and watching them, before she felt a tap on her shoulder. She turned back to Wind Blast, who was grinning slightly.

“See, those two are something else. Anyway, we should resume practicing.” Wind took a few steps back and lowered himself, flaring out his wings. Crystal nodded and turned to face him, doing the same. They were just about to lunge at each other when a loud whistle pierced the air. They both stopped and looked towards Quake, who was lowering his hoof.

“Alright! That's enough training for now, go clean up and get lunch,” Quake shouted as he gestured to the large tent that had become known as the mess hall. Crystal turned and nodded to Blast as they turned and trotted towards the tent. They met up with Rose and Dust just as they entered the tent.

The four went inside, with Dust and Crystal grabbing part of a table for themselves while Blast and Rose went to get the trays. Crystal sat with a sigh and let her head rest on the table as Dust sat next to her.

“Another rough day?” He asked as he rested a hoof on her back, just under a wing and started to rub the area gently, massaging it with his hoof.

“How are you two so skilled?” She grumped as she glanced to Dust.

“Well, to be fair, Dad did try to work us extra hard and keep us in shape, remember?” Crystal nodded slightly at that, slowly sitting up. “Just because you didn't take well to the training, doesn't mean I didn't. Granted, having a unicorn teach me how to fight like that was a bit weird at first. But still.”

“Okay, that explains you. What about Rose?”

“We wrestled a lot?” Dust shrugged slightly and scooted back a little, just as a pair of trays slid in front of them. “For now, eat up. Who knows what comes after lunch with Quake in charge.”

“I bet 20 laps around the campgrounds again,” Rose chuckled as he sat down with his tray. “While wearing heavy armor, and MMPH!” He suddenly found his mouth closed by a soft green glow as Crystal glared at him.

“Don't give him ideas!” Crystal hissed at the grinning bat pony. After he mumbled something in response, she let him go and they started on their meal. The rest of the meal went by with little conversation, mainly talking about how Dust and Rose were picking up the magic deflection and other skills.

After the meal, Quake had informed them they had till dinner off to practice on whatever they felt like, as long as it was something related to fighting or working weights. Crystal felt like she needed to work on her fighting, and her friends were more than willing to help out.

Practice went on for another two hours, with Crystal watching and learning moves, and performing them herself. They kept this up for a while before both the bat pony and pegasus shivered. At this they stopped and finally looked around, it had gotten dark. Not nighttime dark, but like the sun was being blocked and casting an eerie shadow around.

“What's going on and where did this come from?” Rose asked as he floated up, getting a better view around. A few of the others that were out looked about confused as well. Eventually Quake stormed out of his tent and looked around.

“What in Equus?” he asked nobody in particular. Crystal shivered as the cold air hit her, and as she looked around, she could tell almost everypony that was out was looking nervous. This wasn't a normal weather pattern, as she found the pegasi and bat ponies looking confused at the sky.

Crystal suddenly detected a lot of anger in the air, and it was directed at the camp. She stood and took a defensive pose, the others glanced to her, then followed suit as she walked slowly towards Quake. By the time they neared him, the chill grew colder, some of the earth ponies and unicorns not wearing armor shivering faintly.

She stopped a few yards away from him and was about to say something when a shrill scream filled the air. Quake, some of the guards, and the bat ponies all looked one direction, with the rest soon following. The sight made them gasp.

A large group of dark colored ponies were marching towards them, blending in with the darkness of the area. The bat ponies winced and folded their ears back as they stepped away, a deep whistling starting to sound as the rest started to hear it.

The amount of ponies seemed to match the occupants of the campgrounds, at least from a first head count. A few of them being pegasi and floating through the air.

“TO ARMS!” Quake yelled out, as the unicorn guards around scrambled to a tent. Quake growled as he rushed out to the center of the campsite, continuing to yell out to attract the attention of everyone.

It wasn't long before the shadow ponies descended upon the camp. Ponies were defending themselves from shadowy versions of other ponies. All of the shadows appeared as either pegasi or unicorns, but none of the unicorns were using magic. Of course, they probably didn't need to as this camp was caught unaware.

Crystal slid to a stop just in time to dodge a shadowy unicorn flying past her. She got a good view of it as it passed by. The fur almost seemed to be smoking, and appeared as black as the night sky. The unicorn’s horn was twisted and curled upwards. It appeared to lack eyes as well, but the sockets weren't empty, just seemingly covered.

The battlefield was chaos, the veterans in the camp doing their best to fend off the mysterious ponies with blade or magic, while the fresh recruits looked around terrified. Even Dust and Rose looked around in a panic at the carnage that was going on.

One of the shadow ponies landed right in front of Crystal, making her gasp as it reared back, about to throw a punch at her. She squeaked and stepped back, just as she felt a gust of wind rush over her and knock the shadowy unicorn back. She turned around to see Quake land and glare down at her. His eyes focused into a hardened battle glare.

“On your hooves foal!” Quake seemed to glare harder at her. “This is what you’ve been training for! Are you going to let a couple of ghosts scare you?!”

“But the amount of chaos in the --” Crystal started to say, before Quake stamped a hoof towards her.

“Screw the Chaos, Crystal! Ignore that sense and focus on the fight before you!” Quake growled as he spun on the hoof, aiming to buck his hind legs directly at her! She squeaked and crouched down, just as his hooves sailed over head and collided with something. When she felt his wing beats, she glanced up and saw him hovering above her, arms crossed and looking down. “Stand firm and you shall not falter!” He turned and quickly flew off, back into the fray.

Crystal growled lowly as she straightened up, looking around as Dust and Rose came up to her sides.

“What should we do?” Rose asked, “We could run.”

“I doubt we could get very far. There are so many of those shadow ponies, I don't think we’d stand much of a chance if we fled now.” Dust spoke up, looking around.

“We take the fight to them!” Crystal flared her wings out. “Enough standing around, let’s go!” She charged at the nearest shadow pony, a pegasus, and quickly brought her hooves down on it. To her surprise the hooves connected, though it felt like she was hitting a soft pillow. The pegasus turned its head and stared at her, as she bounced back. As she looked it over, she noticed its hooves seemed to shift into blades, and as it focused on her, she took a defensive stance.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Rose run up to the pony this shadow was about to attack and kneel down to check on him. Crystal focused on the pony before her, just in time to see it swipe a blade at her. She quickly brought up a shield of energy to block it and winced as she felt it connect.

A shiver ran down her spine as she felt the blade connect with her shield. It felt cold, lacking the warmth of life, and weird. She quickly shook off the feeling as she remained on the defensive, the shadow pony raining quick blows on her shield. The shadow only got in a few more hits before a tan blur knocked it away.

She shivered as she moved over to Rose, who was looking over Wind’s minor injuries. She looked over at Dust, to make sure he was alright noticed he standing, looking confused. The shadow pony was nowhere to be found. He blinked and looked up at Crystal.

“That was,” he paused a moment. “Confusing. It felt…”

“Like hitting a pillow?” Crystal finished for him.

“Yeah, weird really.” Dust stepped over to the trio and glanced past Crystal, just as she felt something land hard near her. She quickly spun around, bringing a hoof up to attack but it was stopped by an armored wing.

“I see you grew a backbone finally, Crystal,” Quake smirked as he stopped her hoof with the armored wing. “I have a mission for you four,” he looked among them. “Run from here and make your way to Roan. Warn them of what's coming!”

“But Roan is two weeks away by flight!” Wind squeaked out, making Quake glare at him.

“Then I suggest you four get moving, on the double!” Quake stamped a hoof, which made the four stand and salute him. “Now go! We will try to stall this as long as possible!” With that, Quake turned and charged back into the fray. Crystal and Rose turned to Wind.

“Which way is Roan?” they asked at the same time, making the pegasus blink before turning in a direction.

“If memory serves right, it should be this way. Let’s go!” He waved them on with a wing and started to run in that direction, Crystal, Rose, and Dust followed quickly while dodging the chaos that was going on around them. They were able to make it to the edge of camp before Crystal got tackled by one of the shadows.

Wind quickly spun around and tackled it off of her and kept it pinned to the ground. “GO!” He yelled. “Just follow the rising sun!”

“But!” Crystal took a step towards him, only to get grabbed by Rose and dragged away.

“Come on Crystal, let’s go!” Rose shouted as he forced Crystal along.

They managed to get away from the camp and ran further into the forest towards their destination before coming to a small clearing to stop. Crystal was the first to lay down on the ground, panting for breath as she shivered. Rose laid next to her with a sigh.

“I'm sorry.” He mumbled just loud enough.

“How could we leave him? Captain Quake told the four of us to go!” She rolled over and rested her head on Rose’s side, wiggling some to get under one of his wings.

“He was willing to sacrifice himself to allow us to escape.” Dust spoke as he sat down on Crystals other side, panting softly for breath.

“We should just go home.” Crystal mumbled under the wing.

“As much as I’d like to, you know we can't. If we are still being followed by whatever those things were, we can't lead them home.” Rose sighed as he looked towards the night sky. “May Nox watch over them as we make our way to Roan.”

“Then what do we do?” Crystal asked as she peeked her head out from under his wing.

“What we were told.” Dust stood up, looking at the pair. “We have a few bits, we can make it to the next town and plan from there on how to get to Roan as cheaply as possible.”

“But isn't the next town still a few days away?” Crystal crawled out from under Rose’s wing, looking up at Dust.

“Yes, but the land does provide food. We can make it there on berries and grubs. Thankfully you don't require as much as we do.” Dust grinned warmly down to her.

“I'm scared.” Crystal looked down.

“We all are, but we’re together,” Rose stood up slowly. “Come on, we should try to get a little more distance before we stop for the night.” Crystal nodded as she stood up slowly, and the three of them kept marching into the forest in silence.

Author's Note:

And thus does Rose Wind, Crystal, and Dust Horn start their journey! Also yes, Originally I was going to do a day during the camp, show her struggles, but... I couldn't. I tried, but I couldn't bring myself to do it. So I skipped it, essentially.

Comments

[Veyron]

Good so far!