Converted

by Shaded Changeling

Chapter 23: Roommates?

Shade had enjoyed the party while it lasted, sure he couldn’t move from the bed because his legs were still far too injured for him walk on, but he didn’t let that stop him. Pinkie had been a thrill to have back, the constant happiness she had provided nearly endless energy for Shade. The food was much better than what Shade had eaten in a while, and Twilight had even brought more of the Daring Do books for him to read.

That’s why he was sad when the party had to end, even though he knew it was inevitable. Though he was pleased when Rainbow, Twilight, and Pinkie all agreed to stay in Canterlot until the whole situation blew over. Pinkie even made a promise to come see him every day until he was able to walk again.

So as the night began to crawl in and the clock ticked away the hours, Shade picked up the Daring Do book and continued to read from where he left off.

He managed to get a decent way into it when he picked up what sounded like four sets of hooves rushing down the hall while a very squeaky cart was carried behind them. Then he saw the door flung open, which caused him to jolt up from where he was sitting.

“Put her right there.” Sapphire ordered to the other two doctors, they placed the bed a little ways away from Shade.

Curious, Shade placed the quill Pinkie gave him inside the book to hold his place and watched.

The doctors had quickly stopped the cart, plugged the black unicorn up into the various vital monitors, and placed an IV into one of her front legs. While Shade couldn’t be sure, he guessed that the Unicorn was in a coma, given that nothing about her changed except for the slow rise and fall of her chest. She was clearly reaching an elderly age, as her orange mane was beginning to grey.

“Everything is good.” One of the doctors said to Sapphire.

“Alright, Carrie, you can come in now.” Sapphire announced to the door. Shade looked to see what looked like a smaller version of the black unicorn, only the mane was a bit curlier and a little less grey. Her orange eyes were fascinating, as they were the first thing that Shade’s attention was drawn to.

“Are you sure about this?” Carrie asked.

“Of course…” Sapphire said motioning at Shade, who smiled reassuringly. “He won’t hurt her.”

The unicorn looked at Shade and backed up slightly. Causing Shade to remember he had two rather large fangs and the smile was probably just showing them off, so he lowered the smile.

“I’m not sure…” Carrie said not taking her eyes off Shade.

“Oh don’t worry about him.” Sapphire replied. “He wouldn’t hurt either of you.” She moved her glasses further down her snout. “Isn’t that right?”

Shade smiled nervously. “Yeah…”

“Besides,” Sapphire said fixing her glasses. “He knows what happens if he tries anything.” She said it with a threatening tone that made Shade swallow loudly. “Now if there are no more complications…” She yawned. “I think it’s time to hit the hay.” She began walking towards the door.

“Oh, and Shade.” The Changeling in question looked up at the mention of his name. “Rose should be back tomorrow.”

Shade nodded appreciatively as the Unicorn left the room. He still thought there was something off about her, but couldn’t put his…hoof on it….

Though almost the instant the door closed, the young black unicorn switched her personality all together to snap Shade’s head around to look at her.

“Let’s get one thing straight, love sucker.” She spoke in a cold angry voice. “If you so much as lay a hoof on her.” She moved Shade’s head to look at the older unicorn. “I will end you.” She stared Shade directly in the eyes. “Got it?”

Shade nodded. “I understand.” It was the only thing he could do to not get in trouble with the Guards outside again. “Now can you please let go of my head? I still need that.”

The unicorn glared at him for a few seconds before letting go of him and walking over to her mother.

“Note to self: Don’t mess with them.” He said under his breath, grabbing the book he had been reading and reopening it.

---

“What in Tartarus is going on?” Sunglider shouted to the pegasi.

“Canterlot is under attack!” The Lunar Captain shouted. “Pegasi! Get your feathered Flanks up there!”

Obediently Sunglider grabbed his helmet and took off into the sky. Flying through the oncoming insects. He flew up and tackled one of them, slamming it into the ground.

“Sunglider!” He turned to see his unicorn brother. “Get back!”

Sunglider jumped off the pony shaped insect as a beam of red hit it, throwing it into a wall, knocking it unconscious.

“What are these things?” Sunglider asked.

“Changelings. They feed off love. And they’re attacking.”

At that moment, a group of ponies ran past the alleyway.

“There go the Element bearers.” Silver said checking over the unconscious Changeling.

“What are they planning to-?” Sunglider began as a Changeling slammed in between Sunglider and Silver. It looked towards Silver, and then pounced on Sunglider. Pinning him to the wall while hissing at him.

“Sunny!” A red beam hit the changeling. Silver ran up and tackled the Changeling, pining it to the ground with his hoof.

“Traitor!” it snapped at Silver. “Chrysalis will-”

“Shut it!” Silver brought his hoof down on the Changeling’s head, knocking it out. “Sunny! You alright?”

“Yeah…just a little winded. Why was it calling you a traitor?”

“No idea.” Silver replied, looking up at the sky. “That one looks like it’s trying to follow the Bearers.”

“I’m on it.” Sunglider said jumping into the air. He could hear his brother trying to get his attention. But he was busy building speed.

He slammed quickly into the Changeling's chest, causing it to spiral a few yards away. As it managed to steady itself, Sunglider charged at it again. He planned to slam it into the ground as hard as he can. But when he expected to hit it, he felt a pulling on his wings.

‘What in Tartarus?’ He thought as he found himself getting closer to the ground.

He was flipped around in the air and saw up close what had grabbed him, two long fangs, black carapace, a curved horn, and two mismatched eyes. Sunglider didn’t have a chance to try and maneuver. Before he saw the Changeling’s horn glow and felt all the energy drain from him. He had barely enough energy to keep his eyes open as the Changeling pushed itself off him, causing Sunglider to slam into the ground.

“SUNNY!” he heard his brother shout at him. Looking up at the sky, he saw a second Changeling meet up with the first, before the second one dashed and slammed into Silver.

“Hey…” Sunglider heard close to his ear, it sounded so distant.

He managed to open his eye to see a black unicorn.

“Try to stay still…” The Unicorn replied.

He didn’t have anyway to move, his legs wouldn’t listen to him, his wings felt broken, and he couldn’t keep his eyes open.

The world began to blur as darkness filled his vision. He could barely hear some strange chanting, then from the black, a single orange eye snapped open, glaring down, a wicked white smile pierced the darkness, as the snakelike creature burst into flames it charged towards Sunglider, opening its sharp teeth.

Shade jolted awake. That wasn’t my memory. He thought over what he just saw. He remembered everything happening from his own point of view, he understood what was going on, switched perspective. However, what was what the giant fire snake? That didn’t happen, probably just his imagination messing with him… again.

He looked up at the clock. For the first time I’ve had a nightmare, and it didn’t make me wake up at midnight. Awesome.

He decided to grab his book and continue reading, seeing how he had nothing else really to do. When he heard the Unicorn begin to stir slightly.

“Dr…one…”

“Well, hello there.” Shade said, looking over at her.

“Where…”

“Hospital.”

“Care…”

“No idea actually.” Shade replied. “I just got up.”

The unicorn looked as though she tried to move, but couldn’t manage it.

“Don’t rush yourself.” Shade said opening the Daring Do book. “They must have been very desperate to put you in this room.”

Shade looked over to see the Unicorn trying to lift herself up. Clearly it took a lot of effort, because of how she wobbled as she tried to lift herself, and the fact that the machines connected to her were going crazy. Shade watched both fearfully and curiously.

“You okay?”

“I…jus-” She slammed onto the bed.

“Umm…you still with me?” Shade asked, trying to look at her. At that time, Carrie walked into the room.

She gasped loudly. “What did you do to her?” Before Shade had the chance to look at her, she rushed over to her mother. “Mom? Did he hurt you?”

She turned to glare at Shade. “I swear…”

Shade rolled his eyes. “How could I do anything?” He tapped the ring on his horn, and then motioned to the two clamps on his hind legs. “Unless I somehow willed her to move slightly, I don’t see why you are blaming me.”

Carrie just glared at him, and Shade could have sworn he saw small fangs…

The door opened and Rose walked into the room, she saw the two other Unicorns in the room. “Oh… you have a roommate now.” She said, not noticing the deadly look Carrie was giving him. “Well that is a good way to boost public relations.”

Shade took his eyes off of Carrie. “So…how did I manage to scare you off this time?” Shade asked.

“Oh… you turned into Sunglider for a bit and then became a brainless savage and tried to kill both me and my boss.”

Shade’s ears fell against his carapace. “Did I-”

“No… no… Sapphire stopped you before you did anything too drastic.”

Shade let out a small sigh. “Didn’t stop me from killing that Changeling…”

“You did what now?” Rose asked.

“Ask Sapphire… I don’t know.” Shade replied, noticing the angry look from Carrie.

“Well, on that note.” Rose replied. “I’m here to tell you that you are due for another X-ray of that leg of yours.” She put on a smile. “And… I managed to talk the Guards into allowing a side by side comparison of your bone structure when in your pony form.”

“You’re kidding!”

“Nope.” Rose replied. “Turns out that Sapphire wanted to get a better look at your injuries, and Celestia was curious how the injuries you sustained link up with a pony’s biology.”

“You going to tell me how you managed to talk them into letting you do this?”

“Didn’t plan on it.” Rose replied. “Just so you know, that won’t be happening for a few hours… and you have a guest.” Shade caught Pinkie rushing up to him and braced himself for what he knew was coming.

“Sunny!” Pinkie hugged him tightly.

“Well, at least you aren’t crushing me this time.” Shade replied.

“When we got back to the hotel, I wanted to come back and see you right away!”

“That’s-” Pinkie Pie tightened her hug. “Great, Pinkie… But I was kind of expecting you to be back later.”

Pinkie released her grip and began talking quickly. “I couldn’t wait. You were gone for almost a week! I just-”

“Pinkie. Breathe.”

Pinkie took a deep breath before continuing. “I’m sorry. I’m just so excited! I want to throw you a Changeling party! I’ve been making plans since I found out. But I didn’t know if there was anything special I needed to know about how parties are thrown.” Somehow she pulled out a notebook, a box set of crayons, and a marker.

“Where…” Shade began before slapping himself. “Rule 1: Don’t Question Pinkie Pie…” He looked over to where Carrie was, and saw that she was both confused at Pinkie and simultaneously hate filled.

“Well…uh…” Shade said, surprised scratching the back of his head. “I’ve never really…heard of…Changelings having parties…” He saw Carrie roll her eyes.

“Stupid Love Sucker,” She sighed.

Pinkie Pie looked over at Carrie. “Hi there! I didn’t see you there!” She rushed over. “My name’s Pinkie Pie. Who are you?”

“Carrie.” She replied, looking over her mother.

“Carrie? That’s a nice name. So what are you doing here?”

“Keeping a watch on my mom…” Carrie replied looking down at the Unicorn in the bed.

“Oh no… What happened?”

Carrie’s eyes started to water. “She-she wanted to protect us…She didn’t think about herself. She only wanted to protect us!”

Shade knew what she was talking about, the invasion probably left a lot of ponies around Canterlot, she must have just been found… or she got much worse...

“What happened to her?” Shade asked, feeling responsible for what happened.

“Why would you care?” Carrie shouted at Shade. “You’re the reason this happened to her! Your Queen caused all of this! Cytes was wrong about you!”

“Cytes?” Shade repeated confused.

“Hey! Don’t yell at Sunny. He didn’t do anything.” Pinkie retorted. “Sure he may have been a bad changeling at one point, but he isn’t like those other meanies.”

“Prove it!” Carrie yelled towards Pinkie. “Prove to me that this isn’t all just an act!” Carrie pointed towards Rose, who was still in shock from the outburst. “Sapphire must have told you what HE did! How can I trust him if he sees his own family as threats!”

Shade was shocked by the hatred in her words. He didn’t expect her to treat him as well as Pinkie or even Rainbow Dash, but she was treating him as if he had personally done this to her.

“Prove it to me he won’t rejoin Chrysalis the next chance he gets!”

Pinkie gasped. “Sunny would never do something like that.”

“Oh please, he’s using you!” Carrie pointed her hoof angrily at Shade. “And once he doesn’t need you, he’ll just throw you aside.”

“No he wouldn’t do that!” both of them started to raise their voices.

Shade just placed his hooves over his ears, trying to block out the sounds of the two mares arguing. He just wanted to have a peaceful day for once, but all he got was more and more trouble as his time in Canterlot continued.

“girls…” He said trying to be heard over the two of them. “Pinkie…” His temper was coming to a point.

“PINKIE!” Shade shouted. Causing both mares to look towards him. “I can’t…Ugh!” Shade said planting both of his hooves into his face. He took a deep breath. “I’m sorry, Pinkie, but I think you need to leave.”

“But-”

Shade held up his hoof and pointed it towards the door. “Now, Pinkie.” Pinkie’s head drooped as she walked over to the door. “I’ll try and help later.” Shade said as she looked back.

“I’m sorry, Sunny.” Pinkie said walking out the door.

When Pinkie left the room, Shade couldn’t help but feel bad, she was only trying to help him and he yelled at her. He let out an aggravated breath.

“Typical.” Carrie replied. “Care for them until they aren’t needed.”

Shade had to stop himself from trying to lunge at the unicorn. It hurt Shade to have to yell at Pinkie like that, and she was acting as though he didn’t care about her. He was going to start arguing, but he saw Pinkie left her planning stuff right next to him.

Shade flashed Carrie a glare before turning his attention to the planning notebook, on the outside it was just a pink notebook with the words “PARTY PLANS” written in multicolored crayon. But when Shade opened it and started looking it was much more than that.

Inside was a list of everything she knew about him. Where he was from, favorite pastry, color palette, even his cover story was written down. Pinkie must have asked everyone he had talked to, either that or she was one sneaky pony.

Every page he flipped through had either information on a different pony, location, or even a separate party she had thrown. He was surprised by the details, How did Pinkie have this much information?

“I underestimated Pinkie Pie’s tenacity.” Shade mumbled.

“Wouldn’t be the first time…” Carrie replied.

Rose walked over to look at what Shade was reading. “Is that…”

Shade nodded. “Pinkie takes her job as Ponyville’s Party Planner very seriously from the looks of it.” He flipped the page to find the plans for a party planned almost two weeks ago…

“Hey.” Shade said, remembering the details. “This was the first one Pinkie threw me.”

Rose leaned in to look over the notebook; it had a drawing of a small house, with a variety of markings. The ceilings had streamers drawn on them, balloons were drawn everywhere. The entire house looked like some kind of wild party.

“That was an enjoyable night.” Shade said looking back on it. “If a bit frightening.”

“Why’s that?” Rose asked.

“I had to place a small spell on myself I learned that blocked out my emotional senses so that I wouldn’t freak out.” Shade remembered how he shook Darkblaze into almost dropping his disguise. “That made it so much easier…”

Rose looked away from the notebook. “Well, I can see you are going to be occupied for a while,” she began moving back to the door. “I need to go get the X-Ray prepped for your use, so I’ll just get going.”

As Rose left the room, Shade reached over and grabbed the marker Pinkie had left behind with his mouth, being careful not to puncture the marker with his fangs.

He flipped through the notebook until he found a page that was full of questions labeled “Shade’s Welcome Back Party” The questions all seemed to be based around his preferences, or about the hives. While he had only gotten a fairly brief look at the layout of the Hive he had been in, but he figured he could determine the rest of the hive followed a similar aesthetic.

He looked through the questions, modified how he held the marker slightly, and began to fill it out.

---

“Are you sure this is a good idea, Just?” Sapphire asked the gray unicorn mare next to her as the two walked down the Hospital halls. “Aren’t you worried about any possible court duties you have?”

The gray mare waved dismissively. “You know that nothing ever happens that requires my aid and even then, I get weeks' worth of warning.”

“Even so…won’t it draw attention to you?” Sapphire asked. It wasn’t common for the Equestrian Court’s Judge to be seen on the streets, mostly because she didn’t like to push her luck.

“I have been around town a few times,” Just Sentence replied. “I told you why I decided to stay, I wanted to see Lieutenant Sunglider’s condition myself before I was forced to make any kind of judgment.”

Sapphire knew it was a lie, mostly because Just had told her that she needed to look at Sunglider’s condition to see if the problem was fixable, and if so, how to fix it.

“He is just in here.” Sapphire said as they passed a room with the White Pegasus, his armor still attached. His wings still broken, his legs all bent oddly, and his back slightly arched. His eyes just stared at the ceiling, unblinking.

When the two of them walked in, both of them nodded before closing the blinds and the room, blocking out the world beyond the room.

Just Sentence’s horn glowed with a pink light, and kept it constant. “Silence spell is up.”

“All right, Acari,” Sapphire said looking towards the Pegasi. “He was found with two broken wings, his legs messed up, and his spine nearly severed in three different locations.”

“All from a single fall?” Acari asked, walking over to the side of Sunglider. “Why haven’t you removed his armor?”

“The fall wasn’t the only thing, minor bruising sustained before the fall, his left wing seemed damaged before the spine was, and we can’t remove the armor.” Sapphire replied. “Some strange enchantment locking it in place, anytime we try to remove it, that doctor gets a nasty burn.”

“A burn?” Sentence replied. “How could he manage that?”

“We still aren’t sure, the closest we came up with was an enchantment placed on the armor so it couldn’t be removed.” Sapphire replied, adjusting her glasses. “Celestia has admitted that a few soldiers have agreed to take part in an experimental enchantment to avoid espionage tactics.”

“Cross referenced him?”

“Of course…he was on the list, so the only one who can remove the armor is him.” Sapphire replied. “And before you ask, we have tried transformation, the armor won’t come off.”

Just Sentence was now looking over Sunglider, looking in his eyes, moving his eyelids, and checking his breathing. “Have there been any irregularities? Any brain activity spikes, heart beat rushes, anything?”

Sapphire shook her head. “Nothing noticeable, small sparks, but nothing important.”

“Do you have records of when Shade swapped personalities?” Acari asked, flashing a light into Sunglider’s eye, which caused no dilation.

“We only have two records,” Sapphire summoned a few papers out of thin air. “When Shade did it in front of me, and when it happened in front of Rose.” She levitated the two papers up to Just Sentence. “The one on the left is Sunglider’s vitals at those times, the one on the right is Shade’s.”

The two papers could have been interchanged, as they were practically identical. If not for the small scan of heart beats that spiked on Shade.

“So…the two of them are connected somehow.” Just replied. “It seems as though whenever Shade’s heartbeat raises quickly, he switches personality… strange.”

“The real question is can you fix this?” Sapphire asked looking at the guard.

“Perhaps…” Just replied. “However it would require me to drop my disguise to be sure.”

Sapphire nodded as her horn glowed blue, slowly Just Sentence’s horn dimmed. “I’ve got it. You just handle the rest.”

Just Sentence nodded as a wisp of pink flame surrounded her and she returned to her Queenly appearance.

She lowered her horn to touch the Pegasus’s forehead; she closed her eyes as a bright light appeared from where she touched.

Shade dropped the marker he had been holding as a wave of pain shot through his skull. “Son of a Phoenix!”

He put his hoof up to his forehead as the searing pain began to spread. Moving up to where his horn was, almost as though it was trying to focus on something.

He couldn’t think. It was like the pain was focused on not letting him think. Similar to a migraine, it just moved along his skull focusing around his horn mostly, but spreading to various points.

Carrie looked towards him, confused. She tried to talk to him, but Shade couldn’t focus on anything at all. His horn began to glow green, only near the base as it came to a stop when it touched the Suppression Ring.

The pain became more focused, being centered on his horn. He couldn’t think of anything to do, the only thing he could do in response was to start clawing at the suppression ring, desperate to pull it off. He just kept clawing at the enchanted metal, but he couldn’t pull it off, the ring refused to budge.

He started to see images flash before his eyes, The Invasion, Meadow, The Timber Wolf, The Fiords...

Drone, calm yourself

The voice pierced through his mind, breaking through the images and sound that it surprised him at first. It was a very commanding voice, giving an order. He could understand what the voice was trying to do, but he couldn’t manage it.

Drone, clear your mind. Do it now.

Shade didn’t know whether to trust the voice, but it was all he could do. So he stopped focusing on anything just tried to focus on the voice, a strangely motherly voice.

As he did, the pain began to disperse, and slowly it vanished. Leaving a small feeling of familiarity behind. It was…pleasant, almost like a weight was leaving him.

Remain calm. Focus on my voice. Do not think about anything else.

Shade only thought about one thing. “Who are you?”

A friend…

Acari was still focusing on the Guard, and Sapphire was beginning to get nervous.

“What’s on your mind, Sapphire?” Acari asked.

“Are you almost done?” Sapphire asked, constantly looking towards the door. “I don’t want you to get found.”

Acari smirked. “I’m almost done. There was a bit of resistance at first. It’s died down now, that makes this much easier.”

“So…can you fix it?” Sapphire asked.

“I may be able to…” Acari replied. “I can start the process now but he will only remember basic information.”

“Such as?”

“Name, Race, and what happened to him.” Acari replied. “He will still be able to fly, just pull the Amnesia card for a while. I need time to figure out the procedure to handle this.”

“If you would, then we may be able to help him remember on his own.”

Acari nodded and her horn flashed for a second before she transformed back into Just Sentence. “He’ll wake up in a few hours, his personality will be intact, and his instincts will remain. Just like Amnesia.”

At that moment Rose walked into the room. “Sapphire, I’m sorry to disturb you… But the Guards are not allowing me into Shade’s room, something about an outburst.”

Just Sentence and Sapphire looked at each other surprised.

“What do you mean, Rose?” Sapphire asked.

“I’m not sure… Silver Shield is being his aggressive self.” Rose looked at Just Sentence. “What is Celestia’s Court Judge doing here?”

“The number of times Nobles have thrown that Changeling at my door…I decided to come look at his one known casualty.”

“You could just ask him yourself…” Rose began but Just Sentence held up her hoof.

“A judge must remain impartial. It would break my code to speak with him. Even slightly.” She turned to Sapphire. “I will speak with you later.” She walked out of the room. “I will need to return to Cloudsdale. Speak with you later Cytes,” Acari said to Sapphire through her mental link.

“So what is going on with Shade?”

“What did you just do, Changeling?”

“I have no idea. My head started hurting, and now it doesn’t.” Shade replied. “Now can I have my hoof back?”

Shade had been locked back into the restraints, barring the muzzle. The guards had rushed quickly to make sure he couldn’t do anything. Again.

“Not a chance.” Silver growled. “Now what did you do?”

“Silver, what did I tell you about interrogating our patients?” Sapphire said walking in. “You did promise to stop trying to scare my patients.”

“Doctor Sapphire, I-“

“And what is this I hear about you preventing Dr. Rose from inspecting her patient?”

“Sapphire, I’m just-“

“Following orders, yes I know.” Sapphire replied adjusting her glasses. “But I want to remind you that while Celestia gave you permission to handle any situation in which he, himself, tries anything aggressive...”

Silver tried to talk, but Sapphire held up her hoof to stop him. “From what I have learned, he has not attempted anything that would cause harm to me or my employees. If he attempts any form of aggressive attack, you have my blessings to detain him however you see fit. Until then however,” Sapphire used her magic to remove Shade’s restraints. “He will be treated as a normal patient.”

“Sapphire, while I understand what Celest-“

“Do you know how many bits a single X-ray costs?” Sapphire replied.

Silver shook his head.

“Over five-hundred and seventy five bits to power up the machine for a single X-ray. This Changeling has not one, but two full body X-rays and multiple X-rays along his wings and legs. Celestia has approved this operation, and seeing how the time of the reservation is in ten minutes. I would like for you to remove the magical suppressor around his horn.”

Silver looked shocked. “Doctor, tha-”

“Now, Silver.” Sapphire replied as Rose looked between them surprised.

Silver sighed as his horn glowed red and Shade watched the metallic ring fall in front of him. “If he tries any magic, even if it isn’t harmful, that ring is going right back on.”

“A fair deal… It will be replaced when we are finished, Sergeant, you have my word.” Sapphire looked back at Rose. “Now I believe we have somewhere to be.”

---

“Pinkie?” Pinkie hadn’t left the hotel since she came back from her visit with Shade, and Twilight was starting to worry about what happened.

“Pinkie? Are you all right?” Twilight said knocking. “You haven’t left the room for nearly six hours. Is everything okay?”

“No…” Pinkie replied.

“Do you wanna talk about it?” Twilight asked. She knew firsthand how much a problem can weigh down on you if you don’t talk about it. And she never wanted to talk about that day again.

“Yes…” Pinkie walked up to the door and opened it. Her hair wasn’t as curly as usual, but wasn’t flat, it was in a sort of half way state.

Twilight walked into the small bedroom. Noticing it lacked the normal Pinkie Pie style of having everything thrown everywhere. “So what happened?”

Pinkie walked over to the bed and fell onto it. “I made Sunny mad.”

“Pinkie… You shouldn’t feel bad about something like that.” Twilight always thought Pinkie tried way too hard to keep all her friends happy. “What happened?”

“I went to talk to Sunny about his special ‘Welcome Back To Ponyville’ Changeling Party when I found out he has a roommate.”

“They found another changeling?” Twilight asked surprised.

“No… They put a pony in the room with him.”

“Oh…”

“And the Unicorn’s daughter started yelling at Sunny for something he didn’t even do. So I started to defend Sunny, and she kept yelling at Sunny for stuff.”

“And then what?” Twilight asked, looking at Pinkie.

“Sunny yelled at me and told me to leave.” Pinkie turned to look at Twilight. “I was just trying to help…”

“Pinkie… I’m not saying what you did was necessarily wrong, we just don’t know enough about Changelings. Maybe he didn’t want the problem solved.”

“But she was such a meanie about it.” Pinkie retorted. “She kept yelling like Sunny was the one who did whatever happened to her mother.”

“Pinkie…remember when Cranky came into town?” Twilight asked. Cranky was a donkey that moved into Ponyville a while ago.

Pinkie nodded.

“And remember how he acted before finding Matilda?”

Pinkie nodded.

“Well… Shade was a part of the invasion force; he may not have directly hurt this Unicorn, but he was there, and I think he was just getting irritated at the situation. There are just so many ways he could have handled it…I'm not sure that you handled it the best. Not everypony is going to accept that he has changed.”

“But Twilight, she was so mean to Sunny.” Pinkie lifted herself up. “She kept saying that Sunny was just using us. She didn’t even know about how much he did to protect Meadow.”

“Nopony is going to trust him overnight, this kind of thing will take time. I’m sure that Shade has already forgiven you.”

“You think?”

“I’m sure of it, if he really thought of you as a friend, he wouldn’t hold something like this against you.” Twilight gave her friend a small hug. “I’ll tell you what, you come with me and Rainbow out to Lunch and we’ll go talk to Shade together okay?”

Pinkie’s hair exploded back to its normal curls and size. “Okie Doki, Twily” Pinkie hopped off the bed. “I’ve got a party to plan!”

---

“Cytes, I still don’t know how you can trust him.” Carrie replied, looking at the Queen behind her desk, her red-rimmed glasses lowered to look at the documents in front of her. “What has he done to warrant your trust? Especially after what his Queen has done.”

Cytes removed her glasses and placed them on the table. “I understand your hatred for him. It is well deserved. However we cannot blame the actions of a single Queen on her Drones.” She floated the documents so that Carrie could see them. “He has been under a near constant lie detection spell from the Guards, not once has he done anything to warrant hatred.”

“But, Cytes,” Carrie began “He is using those ponies, even you must see it.”

“All I see is six ponies that trust him, see him as a friend.” Cytes placed her glasses back on. “Acari seems to trust him.”

“But do you?” Carrie asked.

Cytes looked over her glasses at the caretaker before sighing. “When I went through Medical school, they taught us the Hippocratic oath: ‘Do no harm’. What that means is that regardless of my own personal feelings towards a patient, I have to help.” Cytes had to learn this lesson over fifteen times during her time as a Queen, why can’t ponies have longer life spans?

“I am not asking the Doctor. I am asking you as a Queen.” Carrie replied.

Cytes let out a sigh of annoyance; she placed the documents down, “Were I not a practitioner of medicine, I would have had him interrogated for everything he knew the instant he set hoof in this hospital.” She removed her glasses and closed them before laying them down. “But knowing he has no knowledge of his hive or even a mental connection, I would try to keep him alive as best I could.”

“But…what did he do to earn your trust?” Carrie asked. She understood the reasons to keep him alive, but she wanted to know if he could be trusted.

“Acari has told me of what he has done to save a single filly. I didn’t want to believe her at first, but after spending a little time watching over him, I’m certain that he wants to redeem himself.” Cytes looked at the Drone. “And while your Queen is within my care, she has placed me in charge of her Hive. Since then, the number of deaths has reduced among the Changelings, which allows me to focus on the ponies.”

Carrie looked angrily at her. “Are you saying my Queen’s condition is a good thing?”

“The loss of any one Queen will always be a tragedy,” Cytes replied. “However at this time, we are collecting more and more emotional energy to help keep those Changelings that are in critical conditions alive, while I regret that Ovi is in such a dangerous condition, it has made my job easier.” Cytes turned her attention back to the documents.

“If you are so sure he is deceiving us, then why not interrogate him yourself.” Cytes replied over her work. “You are practically living in that room, why not make use of it? I’m sure he will cooperate. Just…don’t mention that she is a Changeling Queen, he doesn’t seem to understand how many of us are out there yet.”

Carrie sighed. “Of course, Cytes…” She bowed before walking out of the room.

Cytes looked up in time to see Carrie put on her disguise. When Carrie left, Cytes turned her attention to her documents. Ovi… Please recover quickly. I don’t know how much longer I can keep this up.

---

Shade had enjoyed what little time he had to transform, sure it was under nearly full-armed supervision, but he enjoyed the familiar feel of Sunstreak, and the lack of a horn made it easier to see straight up. He was only really allowed to transform for as long as it took for the X-Rays to finish, afterwards he had to transform back into his Changeling form, while he would have liked a few more minutes with his magic, he knew it was for the best.

Back in his room, he just sat with Pinkie’s Party plans and looked them over, it was clearly originally planned to be a town wide celebration, but it had been pulled back, probably by Twilight. She really must have been planning it since she did find out, because on the other side, there was what looked like a shopping list, with checks next to half of the items.

As he was trying to figure out which building Pinkie based the schematics for the party off of, the door opened and Carrie walked in.

“Hi…” She said nervously.

Shade spat out the marker he was holding in his mouth. “Hello.”

Carrie was rubbing one of her front legs. “Listen. I’m…sorry for how I reacted.” She seemed to be having trouble saying this, almost like a child forced into apologizing. “We got off on the wrong hoof…”

Shade nodded. “What with the whole threatening my life thing? I just thought that was how you ponies said ‘Hi’.”

Shade saw that she giggled slightly. “So you aren’t mad at me?” She asked timidly.

Shade waved his hoof in a dismissive manner. “It’s all in the past.” Shade saw that she was surprised by how easily he forgave her. “Is there something you wanted to talk about?”

Carrie sighed. “I…wanted to apologize for earlier, and try again.”

“That’s fine by me.” Shade replied giving a small smile.

Carrie took a deep breath. “Hi, my name is Carrie.”

“My name is Shade or Sunstreak.”

Carrie raised her eyebrow. “You have two names?”

“Well… Not really,” Shade replied. “My real name is Shade, but my pony disguise is Sunstreak. I’ve gotten used to it.”

“Strange for you to make your own identity.” Carrie replied. “I thought all of you just replaced ponies.”

Shade rubbed the back of his head. “I…um…Maybe… I really don’t know too much about my race…” Shade gave an unsure smile. “I just made it up.”

“So… what made you create an identity?”

“Well…” Shade began. “I figured out how to disguise before the invasion, so I just used that form I made. And now, I just consider it my base pony form.”

“Well…if you were shot out of the city, then why did you come back?” Carrie asked, looking up at Shade.

“I made a promise to a young filly named Meadow Song, that promise was to get her back home.” Shade lowered his head and his ears drooped. “But I failed…”

Carrie felt a small pang of sympathy, but she had many more doubts about him. “Failed… How?”

Shade told her about how he had brought Meadow to her home and about how Spine had captured her and crippled him. He had answered her questions about the prison, his time in Ponyville, almost anything she asked.

“Alright…” Carrie replied. “You may have a complete story…and I may believe you.”

“All of it was true.” Shade replied.

“Regardless. There is only one thing left I want to ask you.”

“Go ahead.”

“If Chrysalis came back and offered you the chance to be free if you killed another Changeling, would you?”

Shade was stunned for a moment. The idea of Chrysalis coming back had been a source of some hope in him that he could repay her for what she did to him, but the thought of going back to her never crossed his mind. But it didn’t matter there was only one true answer. “No.”

“Are you lying to me?” Carrie asked.

“I have no reason to lie to you. She may be the Queen of the Hive, but she is not My Queen.” Shade replied, he never had a queen, he didn’t want one, never has.

Carrie looked at him for a few seconds. “Then I suppose I have no reason to mistrust you… I am sorry for how I acted before…”

“Like I said… All in the past.”

Carrie smiled a little before walking back over to where her mother was and standing on the far side of her mother’s bed. Looking over her.

Shade grabbed the marker again and started looking over Pinkie’s Party Plans, when something bothered him.

He had been mentally suppressing his emotional senses for some time, mostly because he felt wrong doing it when talking to someone, but also because he still wasn’t used to seeing a small fire near someone. Now that wouldn’t have been a problem, except that when he was looking at Carrie, he hadn’t been thinking about it.

He looked back over to Carrie. Now he wasn’t used to being inside of hospitals, but if his mom was in a coma and next to a member of the invasion force that did it to her, he would feel, something. Looking at Carrie, he focused. He was at least happy to see a small blue flicker, mixed with a large red one.

He let out a small breath. Alright…crisis averted. He turned back to the notebook and looked over a few more of the questions Pinkie wrote down.

‘Do Changeling’s have any kind of special dance?’ Shade read, trying to think back to Darkblaze, he never mentioned anything about that. So he just left that one blank, along with half of the questions he had no clue about.

Then the door began to open and Shade looked up to see Rose walking in, levitating multiple X-Ray scans in her magic, she was currently looking at one that looked like it was of Shade’s wing.

“Hello, Rose.” Shade said to the unicorn. Shifting the marker to the side of his mouth. “Learn anything?”

“Actually yes.” Rose replied placing the X-Rays on a backlight. “By pony standards, your wings can handle a little bit of flying, and your leg has recovered enough to begin Physical Therapy.”

“What about by Changeling standards?” Shade understood that she had no idea how a normal Changeling’s body works the best, but it was probably close enough to a pony to make a guess.

“Well…when you weren’t disguised, the inner chitin in your right leg has fixed itself and closed up nicely.”

“So no more needles jabbing into my leg?”

“No more needles. And your left leg isn’t fully healed yet, still a bit of cracks on the outer Chitin. But so long as you don’t get hit with anything heavy you should be fine.”

“So… What does that mean for me?” Shade asked. He never figured out what would happen after he was cleared.

“Well… After you can walk and at least fly a bit, the Royal Guard will have to take you back to that dungeon.”

Shade lowered his head. “Oh…well it was fun to stay above ground while it lasted…” He hadn’t been looking forward to being fully recovered for the pure reasoning of fear he would just be thrown back into the dungeon. “Well… all good things must come to an end…”

“Listen… Sapphire has been trying to work something out with the Captain of the Royal Guard. He’s looking for somepony on the guard that is willing to take you in.” Rose explained. “But…you can understand the implications and why they wouldn’t exactly be alright with it.”

Shade nodded. He could understand why the guard wouldn’t want him in their house… but if they just asked Candlelight she would probably allow it, but who was she really. To the guard, she was nobody. It would take a miracle for Shade to be allowed out…or maybe…

“By the way… You have guests.” Rose said as Twilight and Pinkie walked in, Rainbow Dash just sort of hovered in.

“Hey, Sunny…” Pinkie said without as much energy as he was used to from her.

“Pinkie, are you okay? You aren’t-URK!” Pinkie had pulled him into a bone-crushing hug.

“Sunny, I’m so sorry I didn’t mean to make you mad. Please don’t be mad at me!” She was talking very quickly but Shade couldn’t hear her as he was focusing on trying to breathe.

“Air…Pinkie…Lungs!” Shade tried to say as Pinkie kept her tight grip. “Twilight…help…”

Shade’s vision was covered with a purple light and he found himself on the floor gasping for air. “Thank…you…ugh…”

“No problem. I thought that Pinkie could handle this” Twilight sighed. “Especially after all the practice.”

“Really…You girls…practiced?” Shade said through gasps of air, he looked back at his wings and buzzed them to make sure they weren’t damaged.

“Yeah we practiced how to handle this situation.” She said before adding a bit embarrassed. “Thirty seven times."

“Pinkie, I’m not mad at you…I was just…stressed that’s it.” Pinkie rushed over and lightly hugged him.

“I’m sorry for making you mad, Sunny. I won’t to do it again.” Pinkie said, squeezing slightly.

“Pinkie…I think we both know who you should be apologizing to.” Shade pointed his hoof over to Carrie. “She already said sorry about what happened earlier, so I think you two need to make up.” And I need to figure out how my legs work again…

Pinkie let the hug go as Shade tried to stand up on his hind legs but found sitting to be the closest thing he could manage.

“Do you need some help there?” Rainbow asked, flying down to Shade.

“Just…give me a minute.” Luckily Shade still remembered how to fly. He was buzzing his wings and hovered back over to the bed. “Okay…legs don’t want to work… glad my wings still work.”

Shade looked over to where Pinkie was hugging a very confused unicorn, Carrie appeared to be trying to figure out whether she should be scared or accept it.

“So how have you three been holding up?” Shade asked looking towards the other two; Twilight had turned her attention to the X-ray images.

“Hm?” Twilight said not taking her eyes off the images.

“Well we spent most of today trying to get Pinkie out of the apartment.” Rainbow Dash replied.

Shade rubbed the back of his neck, “Sorry about that…”

“Whatever… It just made it difficult to get her out. I was busy trying to find Pinkie’s stuff she lost.”

Shade closed the notebook and held it up to Rainbow. “You mean these?”

Pinkie rushed over to the side of the bed. “My Party Planner! I must have left it here.” Pinkie giggled. “I guess you didn’t have to search all over Canterlot after all.”

“Now you tell me.” Rainbow Dash put her hoof in her face.

Pinkie grabbed the notebook and flipped through it. “Hey. You were looking in here.”

Shade shied away from the topic. “I couldn’t help myself… It was too tempting.”

Pinkie didn’t look angry, if anything, she looked happy. “So…what’d yah think?”

“It’s a good plan…but I don’t know a lot about Changelings so I won’t be able to answer many of your questions…”

“Then I’ll just throw you a Pony Party! Is that okay?”

“That’s more than alright Pinkie.” Shade replied. Looking over at Twilight. “See anything you like?”

Twilight looked over at Shade. “Sorry I was just…”

Shade chuckled slightly. “I understand. A strange unknown creature and you get to look at its endoskeleton.”

Twilight blushed a little. “Yeah… Sorry.” She pointed to the Pegasus skeleton. “Is this one you as well?”

Rose walked up. “Yes. Sapphire managed to get the OK from Celestia to get a skeletal X-Ray of him when disguised. And I must say, if I didn’t see you transform in front of me before this X-Ray was taken, I would have sworn you were just a Pegasus.”

“That must be distressing, it means that they take on the complete anatomical look of whatever creature they become,” Twilight replied looking at the X-Rays. “That would mean that there could be hundreds of Changelings and we wouldn’t even know.”

Carrie looked a little nervous, Shade picked up on it but none of the others seemed to. “I’m sure that none of them are left in Canterlot.” Shade replied. “I mean…I was the only one to get found here, and it was around a week after the invasion.”

“Yeah…you’re probably right, that spell Cadence and Shining used blasted you clear out of Canterlot.” Twilight replied.

“Actually…something weird happened during the invasion…Sapphire got thrown into a wall by that blast thing.” Rose said thinking. “It was really weird.”

Pinkie gasped. “Maybe she is a changeling!”

Twilight rolled her eyes. “Pinkie…changeling magic is green.”

“But what about Aca-“ Rainbow Dash quickly put her hoof in Pinkie’s mouth.

“Pinkie…you’re such a joker.” Rainbow said to Pinkie.

Shade let out a held breath, they almost mentioned Acari’s hive that would only end badly. Twilight looked at Pinkie in shock, and Rose looked confused. Shade turned to look at Carrie, who looked scared. Why is she so scared?

To break the tension Shade remembered something he wanted to tell Twilight. “Twilight! I need you to do me a huge favor.”

“Of course…what is it?”

“I need you to talk with your brother, or Cadence, or whoever is in charge of this…” Shade took a deep breath. “Shining Armor is trying to find someone to keep an eye on me within the Royal Guard so that I don’t go back to the dungeon, I was thinking maybe you could talk to them to allow them to let you handle that.”

Rainbow and Rose looked shocked. Twilight looked curious. “Well…I’m not sure if I have a high enough-“

“You are the personal student of Celestia. Try to talk to her or something. Please…I need to get to finding Meadow!” Shade was pleading now. “At the very least try! I don’t want Meadow to be stuck with that deranged insect for any longer than is absolutely required.”

Twilight was shocked for a second. “I’ll… Try but I’m not sure that I’ll be able to persuade them…”

“Please Twilight…You are my best chance.” If Shade could get down on his knees he would, but as of this moment, his legs still had the maneuverability of wet noodles. “I’m begging you here. Just Pinkie Promise me you will try.”

“Cross my Heart and Hope to Fly, stick a cupcake in my eye.” Twilight said while doing the required movements, but she appeared to forget to close her eye.

Shade let out a loud sigh and fell back onto the bed. “Well…that’s great…”

“I’ll try but…”

“Shhh shhh shh” Shade said. “Keep that negative Nancy stuff out of here. This is one of the best things to happen in a while… just let me have this.”

“Yeah, Twilight, don’t be such a downer.” Pinkie Pie replied. “I’ve got to make up for lost time!”

Pinkie Pie grabbed the notebook, box of crayons and the marker before placing all of them into her mane where they somehow vanished. She then began to hop out of the room.

“I’ll see what I can do.” Twilight said as she walked out of the room, quickly followed by Rainbow Dash.

When they left, Rose looked back at Shade. “So… When do you want to start Therapy?”

Author's Note:

*Looks at time*
OH DAMNIT! I almost forgot to upload something!
So first off, going to apologize for any grammar issues, did this one kind of quickly...

Comments

[Razzy]

Snrk. Poor Carrie, probably sweating bullets.

[Cursed Quill]

the Changelings chest,

changeling's

anyway to move

any way

opening it’s sharp teeth.

its

weeks worth

weeks'

Cytes” Acari said

Cytes,” Acari said

just a Pegasi.

Pegasus

baited breath

held breath

[kitsune5000]

Not My President Queen

[Black--Soul]

Holy hell... This is going to be a long Journey... lets hope meadow get out of this alive and get therapy for all the shit happend to her...