Chapter 18
Pain and cold are never the best things to wake up to. You are still lying on the dusty floor of the Ponyville candy shop basement and feel like a steamroller has driven over you. The bruises left by Chrysalis throb painfully, and the scratches left from all the broken glass make your arm and legs stiff and difficult to use. Nevertheless, with some perseverance, you're able to push yourself up to a sitting position against the wall, letting loose a hacking cough once you manage to do so. It's only then that you notice you're not alone in the basement. Two light yellow unicorns are there with you, quietly staring at you, clearly scared. You recognise them as the twin troublemakers you met earlier, only this time their stripy shirts have vanished and bizarre stone locks are attached to their horns, which you assume has something to do with diminishing the horns' magic.
"Hey, fellas." You mumble and hold your hands up. "It's okay, I won't hurt ya." You then realise that one of their shirts is wrapped around your right arm, specifically the deep gash where the glass really dug in. The other shirt has been ripped in two and tied tightly around your feet to keep them from bleeding out. "Did you guys do this while I was asleep? Guess I was wrong about ya."
The unicorns merely blink at you and exchange hushed whispers. You leave them to their conversation and try to come up with a plan. Obviously, you and your compatriots have been locked in. I need a battle plan. But nothing about this makes any sense! This isn't what Changelings do! Though Princess Luna had managed to use her strange magic to show you everything she knew about these creatures, their behaviour still didn't add up.
Well, if you don't know what you're doing, go back to the beginning. That's what momma Anon always told ya.
Flash... boom, no more Equestria. And all these eggs... the temperature outside was unbearably humid, so Chrysalis was using the pony-controlled weather to turn the land into one giant incubator... for her new army.
Wait, what was it I saw in Luna's mind...? The memory of it was vague, like a dream, but with some concentration, you were able to pull it back. Ponies... in darkness, in caves. Filled with all sorts of bug shit. One little flash, and everypony was trapped deep down below, yet the land was filled with eggs... she switched it around. The entire world. With a spell. One spell. You rub your skull, trying to make sense of it. Why would Chrysalis care where her eggs are hatched? Unless she couldn't hatch them down there, but those nests have always been the Changelings' home, so... bah, that's not important! How do we reverse this, Anon-old boy?
One spell. It took one spell to do all this, so it has to be one spell to reverse it. Just gotta get a unicorn…
You eye the huddling pair across the room from you with the magic nullifiers clamped on their horns.
Is this why they're down here? No, that doesn't make sense. There were other unicorns upstairs. And why are we all still here anyway? My... anti-magic thingy isn't that powerful. It never affects my surroundings. Chrysalis wanted this place to stick around. But she doesn't need me, she tried to kill me.
Memories of your return to the candy store start coming back to you. Everyone unconscious, bathed in green Changeling energy... but not the twins.
They need love as fire needs wood. Unless those cupcakes really are some serious Walter White magic, they need the ponies, not the shop. So what's so special about these ponies, EXCEPT for the twins?
You squint as the unicorns neigh at one another, angrily waving hooves about over a sack of granulated sugar.
Why take this place...?
Your mind flashes back to when you first entered the shop... you don't even know when. The place was decked out in red hearts, Cutie Pie offering you free candy, the apple farmer and the purple mare staring into each other's eyes lovingly, all celebrating…
FUCK YOU, VALENTINE'S DAY. FUCK YOU. It's love! These two unicorns were shit-heads, they can't supply anyone with love! So okay, this whole place is a battery, all fixed up with lovey-dovey ponies. But it couldn't possibly feed all those Changeling eggs out there. It has to be for something else. Something, something…
scratch
You frown. "Shhhh!" You hiss at the nitwit twins chomping on sugar. "Shut up!" The two look up at you in confusion.
scratch
"Where's that coming from?"
scratch scratch scratch
Using your left arm, you pull yourself towards the stairs leading up to the door. "Okay. Here goes." Leaning on your left hand, you push your body up to the first step. And the second. And the third. You wince every time you're forced to rest your weight on your cut-up legs, and snarl out in pain involuntarily. "Ohhh... you think you get to be in a nice little world full of snuggly ponies, but no, nooo, fucking overgrown fucking cockroaches gotta fuck you up! Oooh, let's use our fancy magic to screw everything up and then dump Anon in the piss snow that's left, that'll be fun! Owww..." you grumble to distract yourself from the pain until you're up at the door.
"Who is it?" You whisper.
The only response is the sound of grinding as a little golden key emerges from the gap between the door and the floor. You can't help, but grin. Grabbing ahold of the door knob, you pull yourself to your feet, forcing down the sensation of glass in your feet with gritted teeth. You unlock the door, revealing Sweetheart's white little bunny, with a smug grin and one ear bent in a military salute.
"Mini-Me!" You whisper gleefully. The bunny runs up your leg and chest to your shoulder, thumping his fist against your cheek playfully. "Good to see you too, buddy. We got a big-ass problem to mop up." You motion for the two unicorns downstairs to follow you up but they emphatically shake their heads, shuddering and moving out of your sight. "Get. Up!" You hiss at them. "Pfft, if you wanna stay down there..." You quietly close the door behind them and turn back to the bunny. "Do you know which pony here is the Changeling?"
The bunny shrugs.
You roll your eyes. "Great. Okay, best guess..."
You did remember the farmer was the one who nearly gave you a concussion and threw you down here to begin with... but your, or rather, Luna's memories of Chrysalis' M.O. suggested that she preferred to take the image of other mares. Someone with a devoted partner or followers.
And mr Applebutt had come here with that fluffy-maned purple mare you'd not seen before. The one who'd hovered around your favourite three fillies since this whole mess started, like a bloody tick.
As quietly as possible, you limp your way away from the door and the stairs leading to the owners' living space on the 2nd floor, to the back end of the store. There's no other movement that you can notice, no chittering bug sounds or the flutter of Chrysalis' membrane wings. You find your clothes still neatly set down next to the door, just where you left them. "Listen..." you tell the bunny. "I can't... bend down. Can you get my knife for me?"
Bunnystorm nods once and runs down your back and into your clothes, emerging with the long, sharp kitchen knife you'd borrowed. Unable to climb up your leg with it, he holds it up as high as he can. You wince and, leaning against the wall, lower yourself down enough to grasp the blade between your fingers and pull the knife out of your friend's paws. "Phew. Okay... okay." You take a breather and rest your head against the wall, suddenly feeling a bit dizzy.
You slowly orient yourself again and limp into the central room of the store, eyeing Daffodil-butt lying on the mattress, using part of the fillies' mattress as a pillow and apparently as comatose as everyone else. As you watch her chest slowly rise and fall in a regular rhythm, doubt starts creeping into your mind. Is it really her? I can't attack her without knowing for sure.
You intentionally buckle your knees(it being the only way you could get to kneel in your current state) and hold your slender kitchen knife at the mare's throat, breathing heavily. "I know it's-it's you." You stutter, waiting for the mare to spring to life and attack you. Who knows what other aces she might hold up her metaphorical sleeve. "I'm going to stop you."
They don't speak English.
"Oh... God." You pull the knife away from the sleeping mare and rub your forehead in pure frustration. "What am I doing?"
The cold steel blade at your throat answers that question. Your whole body tenses up and you tilt your head very gently to the right, breathing in short spurts. To your shock, Cutie Pie's sweet baby blue eyes look back at you, a victorious smirk on her pink muzzle. With her hoof, she reaches up into her frizzy mane and pulls off the Sherlock Holmes deerstalker to reveal a black, crooked horn glowing green.
You scowl and grab ahold of her knife, your anti-magic capability cancelling out her grip on it. “You know what? My feet REALLY FUCKING HURT!!” Cutie/Chrysalis' eyes widen as you thrust the knife forward in her direction, and she barely dodges your attack. Worn down by your injuries, you slide down to the floor and see your bunny friend skitter across the floor towards the Changeling Queen, baring his minuscule teeth. A moment later, the rabbit flies across the room squealing and crashes into a wall.
A series of loud thumping noises from the kitchen interrupt the fight. Cutie/Chrysalis hisses in displeasure and abandons you to rush through the kitchen doors, and you're forced to drag your beaten body after her, still clutching onto the knives. You push the doors open just in time to see the Cake ponies' oven melt away to reveal a strange large stone with lines etched all over, where magical green light shines out. It was something that you'd never seen before either in real life or the memories Luna had hammered into your head, but you guessed that the stone was related to the massive displacement spell cast over Equestria.
Chrysalis, having dropped her disguise, leans against the stone with her front hooves, the magic of her horn throbbing in rhythm with the stone. Her eyes are scrunched shut in concentration, and she pays no attention to you.
Right... this is it... you force yourself up to a sitting position and throw one of your two knives right at Chrysalis. It bounces off of the bugpony's chitin harmlessly with a clang, and she doesn't even react. Damn, I forgot about the armor. You crawl closer towards the Changeling Queen, holding a firm sweaty grip over your other knife. When you're finally sitting right next to the bugpony, you hold up the blade, ready to strike down at one of the soft, fleshy bits between the impenetrable cover.
However, a red hoof slaps your hand, knocking the knife onto the ground and sending a sensation of lightning across your nerves. You let loose a howl and hold onto your hand as the ferocious farmer stallion, still mind-controlled by the Changeling Queen, puts his hooves around you and easily throws your limp form across the room and into the opposite wall. Some fancy crockery tumble off the shelves, a cup shattering on your head. You’re officially down for the count.
The dazed red stallion blinks and rubs his face in a circular motion, having gotten a few drops of your blood in his eyes. Ever-so-subtly, his poisonous green eyes shift to a softer, deeper grass green and the pony tilts his head in confusion as he sees the mess in the room. Focusing on Chrysalis, the stallion's face contorts in righteous fury and he charges at the Changeling Queen, only to be forced to deal with a dozen different kitchen appliances being magically thrown in his direction to allow the cockroach of a pony to focus on the stone.
As the stallion tries fruitlessly to get past her defences, you regain enough of your mental faculties to pull yourself across the room with one hand, leaving a bloody trail behind. Just... have to... get to... stone... You only have one shot at stopping her. It appears that the farmer stallion realises this, as he starts neighing aggressively and, in a remarkable feat of strength, pulls out the kitchen sink to throw at the bugpony queen, distracting her even more.
Reaching the stone, you run your fingers over the blood running down from your head and squeeze your drenched digits into the glowing gaps in the stone.
FLASH
As the green blaze of light fades away, the first thing you see is Chrysalis, staring at the now-dead stone in utter disbelief before slowly turning towards you and giving you a look of utter hatred. You laugh in her face deliriously, ready to be crushed under her vengeful hooves, but the recovered farmer stallion's growl and the loud horse noises in the next room force her to reconsider and instead, the visage of the innocent Cutie Pie replaces her fearsome insect appearance. Before Mr. Applebutt can even lay a hoof on her, the Queen of Cockroaches dashes out of the window and disappears into the confused crowd.
Finally... can take a nap... you think as the room turns blurry and you slowly pass out for the third and last time today.
Resuming regular service next chapter!!!
Nah, in all honesty, all I really wanted to do was see how Anon would handle being thrown in the middle of a typical MLP episode, and the idea I came up with was doing a detective mystery sort of thing. Plotwise, the purpose of everyone else disappearing was to isolate Sugarcube Corner and have Anon try and figure out which one of them is the Changeling.
In hindsight, it'd probably have worked better as a story in its own right, but hey, live and learn. I'm glad for all the input I got on it regardless. Can't let a writer just go off the deep end like that, can we? 
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I still ship them...
Huh neat
When your explanation leaves more questions than answers, you're doing it wrong.
I'm happy to see an author experiment, but I agree that this would have been better as a separate story. Radical changes in tone and content in the middle of a story rarely work out, and this experiment burned through a lot of my goodwill.
I liked this spin on the story. Cutie Pie was suspicious after Anon got the knowledge from Luna. Great chapter!
9518806
Well, in my defense, Anon WAS left with a ton of questions. He's been thrown into a magical world that he can barely comprehend and has to sink or swim. The only reason he was even able to survive this was because he got a quick emergency Changelings 101 from Luna burned into his brain. And it's not like Luna would know everything there is to know about them to begin with.
So the weird alien saves Equestria (or Ponyville anyway)? Won't that make the Mane 6 look sheepish, heh.
Still wondering if his magic scrambler touch also works on Chaos. Would be odd if there was only a small circle of "normalcy" under his feet during the attack when Discord goes nuts on Ponyville. At least Twilight will snap out of that mind-reversal as soon as Mr.Growly McGrowlerson gives her a hug because she's so sad. Come to think of it, that would work on all the girls too-- and ruin a perfectly good opportunity for a heart song about saving your friends.
Huh, we haven't had any heart songs, have we? Wonder what he'd think of the ponies singing(?) and dancing to music coming out of nowhere? "The ponies in this town are crazy!"
9518827
Anon wasn't the only one left with questions. The key to a good mystery is that it should be fun to unravel. But the only way to solve this mystery was the way Anon did: by having the answer given to you because there weren't even close to enough clues left behind. Anon has an excuse but the readers already know these things and we also had no hope of figuring this put.
And now we're going to be left with a ton of questions because Anon can't reasonably be told the answers, if they even exist.
Was wondering when he was going to get stuck in with their hijinx and save Equestria.
9518875
That is a fair point. I'm not experienced in writing mysteries. I guess I focused too much on making it interesting for myself rather than looking at it purely from an audience perspective.
9518916
It's not a big deal, this is the best sort of place to figure that kind of thing out. And if you enjoyed writing it, take what you learned and have fun.
Though I definitely suggest writing a separate story next time. It was a bit jarring having the main character get into a knife-fight with a series main villain in such a fluffy story.
9518978
I guess we ought to be glad I didn't decide to homage a slasher flick instead of Holmes.
Trying to think what MLP episode this was based on?
Plot twist! That stone was our hero's only way to understand ponyspeak.
9518996
It wasn't based specifically on any MLP episode.
Mission success! Well, kinda.
So his blood is anti-magical enough to drain spells? Wondering how long it can do that for...
Keep going! ;)
Wait... I’m confuse, so it’s the Flam Brothers That where down stairs and Pinkie Pie & Big Mac are dating?
Also, since Queen buggy was using a stone in the oven why not turn it on? Cooked Bug Stone sounds good
9519129
Yes, it was the Flam Bros in the cellar.
No, Pinkie and Mac weren't dating(Anon just assumed Chrysalis would take the form of someone he dated).
It wasn't a stone in the oven. It was a stone as large as an oven, disguised as an oven.
9519138
So it’s a Stone shape as a oven with a stone inside?
9519160
i48.tinypic.com/fvgtgm.jpg
It's just a stone... that's been disguised as an oven. And as such, is relatively the same size as the oven. The oven disappears and voila, there is the stone.
Like a cloaking device, or how the Changelings themselves work.
9519178
Wait... Changlings can’t make objects change but themselves... Oh dear... The human killed a Changling with his blood turning it into a rock
9519195
Chrysalis has a magic horn.
It is not that much of a stretch to assume she can disguise something as something else.
9519198
Yea, that could happened.
This was fun, keep doing the awesome story
We need more Fluffy Hugs
What about her torn throat, did she do it while hurt or did she manage to heal herself between encounters?
9519195
omg, dude... magic... magic make things appear as other things, also known as "illusions". Heck, any Trixie could have done it if she had a reason to. But I do agree we need to go back to the fluffy stuff. Anon here is walking wounded after trying to imitate a stuntman and glass windows, he seriously needs the time to heal.
I hope they don't drag him around in a parade. Well, it might not be so bad. At least he'd get to sit down in a carriage or something and princess-wave to confused yet happy-we-didn't-all-end-up-in-pods (that will be the banner at Pinkie's Party in horseprint) ponies.
9519459
holes aren't a big deal for Changelings
9519195
Changeling hive can change parts of itself to confuse trespassers, not that much of stretch to consider that a changling made device could disguise itself as an everyday object.
9518870
More than works... #AnnoyinglyAmbiguous
Damn... so his blood is sucking up magic... Interesting
Need this mod for Among Us
Magic pony land rescued by anti magic ape. Niceee!
Main, forget calling him Anon, this dude is literally Touma from Certain Magical Index.
This whole chapter felt oc for The character you establish is weak and skinny can't fightto the point he complains about giving piggy backs to fillies. I'm having doubts in this old story might drop it before it ends bad to me imo.
It was a fine ch great story so far
Buddy in what world does a horse win a fight against a man? Smart or not they walk on 4 legs, they can't fight for shit without magic