Silver
“Alright, so we got apple pie, apple fritters, apple muffins, apple pancakes, apple strudels, and just good ol’ zap apple jam. Ah say ya should try tha jam first, that’ll definitely wake ya up!” Applejack had been outlining the contents of the meal. Literally everything was made out of apples in one way or another. Not that I complained; apples were, in fact, digestible by Changelings and they were considered a delicacy. I had never tasted Zap Apples, though, so I was quite eager to taste the jam.
Before anypony else could get what they wanted, I picked up the jam, took up a huge spoonful, and put it directly in my mouth.
Oh Celestia why.
“Heh… Ah think we fergot ta mention that the jam generally isn’t very tolerable when taken in large amounts. Sorry’ bout that…” Applejack admitted sheepishly. As soon as she was done talking, I felt a huge surge that felt like the inside of my mouth had been hit by lightning. I immediately swallowed all of it, but that didn’t keep my taste buds from suddenly going nuts. I had to admit, it tasted fine at first, but it then kept feeling like my mouth had been electrically charged and was getting shocked over and over again. The only thing I could do was start jumping and running in place while my tongue was being assaulted. Applebloom, Applejack and the old mare named Granny Smith were bending over with laughter at my display, but Big Mac just frowned.
I never took any more zap apple jam for the rest of the night.
<---------------------------------------------------------------------->
As I was about to leave the house, my mouth still fried from the Zap Apples, Applebloom stopped me on the doorstep.
“Wait, Mister Blacksmith, I want ya to have this.” She handed me the bowl she had made that day. “Ah worked pretty hard on it, but Ah think y’all might need it more than Ah do, considerin’ ya just moved in and all.” I took the bowl and smiled. Nopony had ever given me anything as a gift before, and this show of generosity from a filly made me feel appreciated.
“Thanks a bunch, Applebloom. I’ll make sure to think of you whenever I see this.” I ruffled her mane a little and went on my way. After an hour, when I was about halfway through the orchard, Big Mac stopped me.
He stood roughly at my height, save a few inches that he had over me. He looked down at me with an intimidating scowl on his face. In his mane I could see a braid that had a silver circle tied to the end.
I knew exactly what he was stopping me for. One of the first things I learned when I became a pony was that there were some who were dedicated to killing those changelings who were still pretending to be ponies. Although this contradicted with ponies’ otherwise peaceful nature, they regarded it as necessary, and nopony ever really got in the way of their actions. One of their beliefs was that silver could easily kill Changelings faster than any other material. This was completely false, as Changelings had a complete immunity to all metals, including radioactive ones.
“I really don’t trust ya.” He said in a low, stoic voice. I could only look up at him and prepare for the worst. Nothing happened for a few minutes as we just looked at each other, waiting for the other to do something.
“Ah have every intention to keep ya away from mah family. Ah don’t like the looks of y’all, and Ah have every intention to find out who ya are.” His gaze suddenly shifted to being piercing, and I backed away a few steps. His point made, Big Mac walked calmly back in the direction of his home.
I ran like hell.
<---------------------------------------------------------------------->
The changeling stood proudly in front of his throne. His three horns curled back behind his head like a goat’s horns. He was much larger and much taller than all of his subjects, and a distorted crown of sorts sat on his head. His wings sat by his sides, pierced with holes that somehow did not affect his flight whatsoever. His hooves were also ridden with holes, and a long fiendish tail trailed behind his hollow form.
“ʼyẕt, myyn kyyww, ṗʼatşn myt dy hwngʻr pwn ʼa twyznt ʼarmyz, ʼaz myr zʼln lyygn ʼáṗpʼal ẕw dy ʻrd dy ṗʼányʻs gʻzwkt ẕw ʼáṗnʼarn ʼwndz pwn!” He bellowed, his voice shaking the very foundations of the hive. The Taskmaster, in all his power, stomped the ground, and the hive began to move. It pushed itself out of the ground, revealing eight legs and a twisted little head with eight eyes and gigantic mandibles capable of swallowing cities. The hive had begun moving. It had one command etched into its mind.
Feed.
I sat up in my bed, panting heavily. I started disliking these images that came whenever I closed my eyes at night. After some discreet research I found out that they were called ‘dreams’, vivid images that happen during ‘sleep’. I found the whole concept fascinating, although the only dreams I had ever had seemed to be dark and rather scary. I felt like all the Changelings left in the world knew where I was, knew of my heresy. I feared for my life, quite truthfully, although I obviously never spoke of it to anypony.
It had been roughly nine weeks since I had arrived in Ponyville. During that time I had lost a bit of my ability to speak Chiddish (the Changeling tongue); I had to practice a bit with myself to retain some ability to read it if an opportunity ever came up. Despite that, I could not understand what the Taskmaster was saying in my dream. I knew exactly what sounds were coming out, but I had no idea what he meant. It was strange: shouldn’t I have been able to understand exactly what he was saying? That thought just made me even more terrified, but I forcefully pushed it out of my mind. The last thing I needed with my job was less sleep.
Despite my lack of sleep due to constantly waking up whenever I drifted off, I found enough time to find out Vinyl had gone on something called a ‘tour’. Being a celebrated electronic musician, she had fans all over Equestria and often traveled throughout the country to perform at various cities (to be honest, her music gave me bad headaches). I had no idea when she would be returning, but I felt really anxious to see her again. Every time I would think of her all I could think of was that I desperately wanted to see her again. I really couldn’t understand why. Do friends always think like this about each other? Of course, I cast this off as normal or simply my emotions acting up, but sooner or later I knew I would have to find out what was actually going on with me. I’m certain my emotions didn’t just come from free will. In fact, I’m still unsure to this day why I haven’t ever been able to turn back into a Changeling. No matter how hard I try, I can’t use any of my Changeling powers. I can’t channel any of my energy into polymorph spells like I used to; I’m limited to unicorn magic. Of course, Twilight would probably yell at me for saying that. By her standards, unicorn magic is one of the most powerful forces in the world. I shouldn’t really disagree, either. My skills with magic were still very limited at that point, but my pride held me from asking Twilight for help.
<---------------------------------------------------------------------->
One day I was heading over to Twilight’s library to learn more about magic. I had finally worked up the courage and had swallowed my pride enough to ask her for help on the matter. I would just tell her that I had no real magic training when I was a colt, and I was certain she would understand. I kept thinking about my excuse the whole time as I walked over to the strange tree she lived in. These thoughts kept me from realizing who was trying to get my attention.
THWACK!
“Ah, what the Hay?!” I was suddenly hit on the head with quite a bit of force. As I reeled back from the impact, I saw that the pony who had just hit me was one that I had been waiting to see for a while.
“Can’t you listen when a mare’s trying to talk to you?” Vinyl wore some strange glasses, so I couldn’t really tell if she was actually angry at all. She did have some sort of smirk, but I wasn’t sure what that signified.
I was quite shocked from seeing her so suddenly. So shocked, in fact, that my first reaction was to give her an extremely tight hug.
That was probably not the best idea.
“Woah, woah…! Blacksmith, I can’t...breathe…!” She started turning slightly blue from my squeeze. I immediately let her go, feeling quite embarrassed and apologizing profusely. She giggled a little at my reaction, which made my heart jump a little. I felt like just making a little squealing noise, but that would probably attract unwanted attention.
There was an awkward silence for about twenty seconds.
“So how have you been?” I finally asked to break the silence.
“I’ve been okay,” She looked away from me for about a second when she said ‘okay’, “Touring’s not the easiest thing in the world. I prefer just staying here and playing at the clubs they have in Ponyville. It’s much less traveling and I can bring pretty much all my equipment if I want to.” She took off her sunglasses and slid them over her eyes into her mane.
“But enough about me. How have you been, Blacksmith?” She smiled and looked at me with those big, warm magenta eyes. My heart just melted and I wanted to rub my face all over her fur, smelling her and feeling her soft coat.
Wait. That’s kind of creepy.
I suppressed my thoughts and kept the conversation going as casually as I could.
“Just forging. Some filly named Applebloom came by and wanted to learn how to smith, and she was rather impressive at it! She gave me her ‘masterpiece’, so she calls it.” I replied to her question.
“That sounds just like her. I’m assuming she wanted to get her cutie mark that way?” Vinyl laughed an infectious laugh that got me laughing too. I really enjoyed her company.
“Hey listen…” she started, looking down a bit, “I was thinking since we got off on the wrong foot that we should probably, you know, hang out or something. Get to know each other better.” She looked at me again with a rather shy expression.
I felt like my heart would jump out of my throat and cannonball itself all the way to the Frozen North.
“Alright. What did you have in mind?” I replied as casually as I could. At this point, it was getting extremely difficult to keep myself from panicking. Something was definitely wrong with how I viewed this mare, and I was determined to find out what that was.
One way or another.
<---------------------------------------------------------------------->
I walked a buzzed Vinyl back home. She had brought us to a club that she performed regularly at; the music was excruciatingly loud, and of course it was that strange electronic genre that I hated. Vinyl found it entertaining to watch me wince every time a “drop” occurred, or so she called it. Despite the background noise, we still managed to have a decent conversation. In between drinks she would tell me all about her career and her traveling schedules. I just sat and listened to her talk, fascinated by her voice. After her third drink or so she started looking a little woozy, at which point I paid and offered to walk her back home. I only then realized that I had not had anything to drink. Albeit it didn’t bother me too much; there’d be time for that later.
“Hey, Blacksmith,” She said, suddenly breaking the silence between us, “I’ve been meaning to ask you something.”
“Ask away.” I said. I wasn’t really focusing on what her answer could be; I just basked in the warmth she gave off.
“Where are you even from? You said before that you didn’t remember where you came from, but is that true?” I stopped walking.
Well, Buck.
“I’m, uh…” I decided to formulate something close to the truth, since I couldn’t bring myself to tell a full-on lie to her, “I’m from a village in the badlands. It’s mostly earth ponies, but some unicorns live there too. No pegasi live there, though; that’s why it’s so dry. Nopony’s ever really left from there before, though, so I’m not sure how I arrived here.” It was true that the birthplace of the hive was in the Badlands, but there were absolutely no settlements in that region of Equestria. If there were any, they had been swallowed up centuries ago.
“Oh, that’s cool.” She said. I could tell she was drifting off slightly. Then something just hit me.
“Vinyl, where do you actually live?” I asked her. She just laughed.
“I’m Tavi’s roommate, I’m sure she showed you the house.” Vinyl chuckled a little.
“Well that makes everything simpler.” The conversation at that point became really bland, and I felt that it was in part because I was taking an active part in it. I just decided to shut up for the rest of the way to her home.
When we arrived there, Vinyl thanked me for walking her home and opened the door, walking inside without shutting it. After about two minutes of me just sitting there and wondering why the hay she didn’t shut her own door, she popped her head back out, this time without her sunglasses.
“Well aren’t you gonna come in?” she asked with a rather questionable smile. I obliged and walked into her home.
“Tavi’s probably sleeping, so we shouldn’t make too much noise. I was just thinking that we could chat a bit more while watching TV or something.” I nodded in consent. I was fine with that idea. Nothing unexpected could come of that, could it?
It was roughly midnight. We had been watching a bunch of shows I had never even heard of, considering the fact that the television I had at my home only had about ten channels. Most covered topics I knew nothing about. Quite truthfully, I got bored after a while. I just sort of let my thoughts wander off until I felt something on my shoulder.
I looked to my right to see that Vinyl had just rested her head on me. She had just shut off the TV and her eyes were closed. She must have felt my head turn, as she opened her eyes and looked up at me. She giggled a little and scooted a little closer. I felt my face become completely flushed as I held her in my arms. I rested my head on hers as we drifted off to sleep, our dreams overtaking us.
For the first time, I slept through a night that was completely devoid of any nightmares.
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ALRIGHT, IT BETTER WORK THIS TIME.
IT'S CHAPTER 3, BITCHES.
Since the original was total bullcrap, I revised it and made it fit more into the plot than the last one did. I had a bout of idiocy when I wrote the original, so this one should fit in better. I'm sorry for the length and the lack of real events, but this is truly as much as I could put in there while keeping a good chapter format. I didn't want to end the chapter awkwardly.
So hopefully you guys will enjoy this chapter more than I do, since I'm truthfully quite disappointed in how it turned out. I'm keeping it, though, so long as nopony really complains about it. I'll revise this thing as many times as I have to.
1080156 just stay true to yourself and your writing.
It does fit much better. It's fine if it's a short chapter (hey, it was kind of short term notice after all), but it flows well with the other two, and allows for the possibilities to be available.
You could have maybe hinted, to the readers, that someone/something is stalking him, but that can be saved for later.
D'AWWWWW Vinyl so cuddly
Need moar yo
Ah, this is better. The abrupt spike in action really messed up the flow of the story in the original version of this chapter.
That isn't to say thay you can't go ahead and... y'know... but pace it out. Wait a couple chapters and build suspicions.
Happy writing!
1081037 Alright, and I'll make sure I've slept an adequate amount of time before writing chapters.
I still feel stupid for the original version.
1081355 *Ahem* I hate to burst your bubble, but there's no romance tag.
1081512 Am I the only one here who hated this chapter? ;_;
Oh well, I'm glad you appreciated this version.
1081819
Well, you gotta bridge the juicy bits somehow, right?
Actually, you've started a new conflict in this chapter, added to an existing one, and developed the relationship between Blacksmith and Scratch, while keeping all three at a good pace. Even if you didn't have a good time writing it, it serves it's purpose.
Everyling falls hard for Vinyl. I called it way back when.
Must be the inverted colours thing.
My question: Why didn't mistah blacksmith comment on the silver hair ornament and maybe touch it or something? It would probably have resolved the conflict coming up in the next two chapters.
Of course, that's probably why he didn't.
1088917 I want conflict to happen because plotline.
Don't fucking mess with the plotline.
Likes chapter, tries to read comments
... .... ... ... ... ... ... ... .. ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... . ... ... .. ... ... ... ... . ... What?
1092659 Please clarify so the helpdesk may be of proper assistance.
1093043
People talking about futures and other chapter alternatives and stuff
Yeah, just ignore me, it's better for your health
1093108 I should probably just delete all those comments to keep spoilers from being revealed... ._.
EDIT: Lol fuck that, nobody reads comments anyway.
Somepony's a bit smitten.