Dilemma of a Changeling

by Hydra_1324

Chapter 3: Wrong

It was a while since he had any visitors. A while ago, just after the bouncy one left, or as Chameleon now knew her, Pinkie Pie, had left, and a guard had come in and given him a large amount of food. Pity he couldn't tell what any of it was.

So he had scarfed that down. It didn't give him much, in terms of well, anything, but he felt less hungry. How long it took him? He had no idea.

Then, the nerdy one came back. Something about how she came in gave him goosebumps. He shivered slightly. He couldn't put his hoof on exactly what it was though. He shook off that thought. He didn't need... Why was he thinking about the nymph eater princess? No. Get that thought out of your head. You don't need nightmares today, Chameleon.

...

The first thing she said was "Hello." He couldn't tell much from the inflexion of it, nor her tone. He couldn't actually tell much of anything from her tone. It just felt bland. Like bread with nothing on it. Was that what "calm" was? Something felt wrong, but he pushed it away again. He didn't want these feelings. They confused him. Scared him. But made him push forward, regardless.

He looked up at her and sighed. "Hey... J...Just so you know my eyesight isn't any better. But my head's hurting a lot less." Then, he added: "I know, it sucks, not being able to see properly, but it's kiiiiinda my fault it's this way. I crashed into something, and pretty hard."

She was silent for a good while, before whispering a few words he only just made out. "Oh... I see..."

He, then looked at her... blobby form and sighed. He wanted to move this conversation along, rather than it just be awkward for both of them. "...I... But that... doesn't stop me from helping you, does it? I... I got the impression from your last meeting with me that you wanted to learn about changelings. I might not be able to see very well, but my head's not hurting as much as it was. ...Really, though, I don't want to sit in silence. I've... I've already had enough of that, not just here, but... in the hive too. I was alone. Before the invasion, my... former queen... She said the only purpose I had for her was for war. She saw me... me as a weapon. That... terrified me. It still does."

She went silent for a few moments before speaking up, "A-Alright..." She took in a deep breath, "Your, er..., I mean, Chrysalis' hive... Why do you say that your only purpose was war? Was it something about the way she runs her hive or is it common among changeling hives?" She's nervous, but so are you, Chameleon. At least she's not suspicious...

He took a deep breath inwards as he collected his thoughts on the question, before slowly answering. He wasn't even too sure of the specifics, but he knew for sure what he was supposed to be. A specialist. "Well... It's... generally for specialists, because our other abilities are heavily diminished as a result. Shapeshifting becomes much more taxing, for example. But yeah... She was... is a cruel queen. If you were a specialist, that just meant you generally could only do the thing that you specialised in particularly well. That... Isn't helpful when the only thing you can do without too much effort is change your body's overall material. I wasn't very good at helping around the hive, not that she tried to help change that." He took another deep breath as his body shuddered just thinking about it. "She... saw me as u-useless. Anything other than just a tool to achieve her aims, nothing m-more... She didn't care, and she called me Zero... She said that was my worth to the hive." He shook as he spoke, obviously terrified of the matter.

"A-And..." The nerdy one took a deep breath too, almost as if she was scared of the same thing he was. Or just collecting her thoughts. "Was this the case with most specialist's? The seeing changelings as tools at best, I-I mean..."

He took a shaky sigh, saying one simple word, and nearly failing at it when he felt something deeply sting him. He grimaced, and masked it by saying it. "Y-Yeah..." You need to feed kinda soon, Chameleon, but there's no one around who might trust you enough to... do that.

A question suddenly left her lips, perhaps not with thinking the question through. "A-And.. could a Changeling society work without a Queen, or at least without her having absolute power?" He was quick to answer, at least at first. "It's never been tried... I guess it might, but I dare not try. I don't know if it'd work, but... It could, I guess. ...The idea... It scares me." Was she no longer thinking about her questions? These ones made him extremely uncomfortable to think about. "A-And... Would the Other Queens put a stop to her?" They had never even bucking tried. He immediately felt rage at the subject of the question, but managed to calm himself. He hoped she didn't notice his anger. "They... They've never tried. They... just ignore that we exist. ...They've got their own hives to deal with." She spoke again, and it was another uncomfortable question! "And if Chrysalis' actions threatened their hives?" He couldn't imagine being a queen, or thinking like one. He never knew what they were thinking. "...I... I don't know. I... Really don't know. Sorry."

He hoped these kinds of questions would soon stop. He really didn't like them. Maybe she'd get the message, Chameleon? "Well... would you be willing to speak to Princess Celestia?" Well, it just got worse! He took a deep breath inwards, shaking nervously, feeling like fear itself was dripping from him. "It might... sound weird to you, but... I... I think I'm scared of her. It doesn't take much, mind you, but... I am. ...If... If I talk to her... Could you stay with me? I... I don't want anything to get out of hoof. ...Especially knowing that she could kill me if she wanted to, especially in this state." ... "She wouldn't kill you, but alright..."

He took another deep breath in as he thought of how an encounter with... her, would go. Don't think about it. "...Thanks... Does... Does she already know about... what we've talked about, and... my condition?" ... "She knows about your condition, but I have only told her a small part of what you've told me" Well, thanks for being really unspecific in how much you actually told her! I don't know how much "small" means in the hooves of a extremely nerdy pony! "...Okay... So... Should I expect to have to repeat myself on some things?" ... "Yeah." She told him, with not much discernible information from her tone. "She will probably ask some of the same things." He took in a deep breath and sighed, "Alright then... I'm ready." He really wasn't, but just wanted to get this out of the way. Even if he was thinking of the absolute worst that could happen.

As if on cue, as if "Princess Celestia" herself was listening in, the doors opened loudly, startling him. But the nerdy one didn't seem concerned, as he heard calm, quiet but noisy hoofsteps in his direction. Then they stopped, with the room itself almost feeling warmer with her presence. The very feeling felt suffocating to him, however the nerdy one didn't seem harmed by it, or anything of the sort. None of the stories he heard about her were true, right? Or was she... acting nice, acting like his own kind. "You need not fear me." She said calmly, not much he could tell from her tone. "I do not plan on feasting on you." Well, that would be almost a relief, if he didn't have a dark thought at the back of his mind that she was lying through her teeth! ...Just like his own kind. Why was he drawing parallels there? Either way, she seemed to know the legends he was told as a child, and, well... Now he was curious and terrified. What a combination. "Y...You know about the legends about your...yourself?" ... "Yes, Queen Lynthea of the Eastern Hive told me of some legends during the negotiations... Although Chrysalis was not a part to those..." ... "...Yeah... I don't really know much about any other hive than my own... so... I don't know who that is." ... "Yes... Chrysalis has always been a bit... seclusive when it comes to that" The princess responded with a small sigh. After a few moments of nervous silence, she spoke up again. "I heard that Twilight had offered to search for ponies that would be willing to receive Changelings as Actors... Do you believe that Chrysalis could be willing to accept?" ...Curse you, nerdy one. He looked down, knowing all too well what Chrysalis was like. Is. She still is. "She's... too proud, too stubborn to accept anything you have to offer... unless it benefited her much more than anyone else... That's... that's why she wanted to invade Canterlot. Invading and winning would've benefited her and the hive massively, especially if she didn't let any other hive get involved..." ... "I see..." A sizeable pause followed as she collected her thoughts. "Well, In that case, I will be on my way. And you do not have to be afraid. I will see to it that you are not harmed." There it is again... Trying to reassure me.

"T...Thanks. It means a lot." I smiled, or tried to. It felt like I was smiling. Though... It did feel odd. Thought she'd ask more. "It is the least I can do." She said, before quietly leaving.

He felt relief. Surprise, that it was that easy. "...That... That went better than I expected..." He admitted, surprise very much in his tone as a main feature, and the nerdy one seemed similar with her tone. He heard her take a breath "Yeah, she... she is like that..." ... "...I'm glad she's like that, rather... rather than what I spoke about her..." The noises that came from the nerdy one sounded like she was struggling not to laugh "Yeah." ... "...To be honest, when I thought I was going to meet her... I thought it'd take longer, be harder, you know? ...But I was wrong. ...I should've apologised... for what our kind painted her to be like..." ... "Ah... I'm sure it will be fine, I mean, it seems that she already knew... and I did not know that she did know..." She let out a small and somewhat awkward laugh. "...I understand, I... I just had braced myself for the worst, and got the... best." ... "Thanks for staying with me regardless though." ... "It's nothing" She replied simply, and more than a bit awkwardly. "I know that coming face to face with a princess for the first time can be... intimidating..."

"Yeah..." He laid back onto the bed...

...

The next thing he knew, he was in a dark forest, a very dark forest. It was quiet, very quiet, too quiet. He could see, so this was another nightmare. This forest seemed like the ones where Luna... the moon princess... would harvest the organs of changelings with a scythe. Ones that he had seen through this nightmares, and forcibly been read to him by his hive to keep him... scared. Docile.

So he started to run. He didn't want to encounter her. Even if it was a nightmare. Yet, he slowly felt a presence. So he tried to run faster, but he fell on his face. She was here. ...The other sister. The one with the war scythe. The murderer of his own kind. ...Surely he was wrong, like he was with the other one? So he slowly looked around, terrified. Like something was going to jump out at him. The forest was so dark around him. Like it wanted to eat him up. Rip him limb from limb.

But then, he heard something. He slowly pushed himself up - it sounded like tiny little hoof-steps. He slowly turned around, and came face-to-face with her. The other princess. But she was unarmed. You could kill her right now, Chameleon... A hardly noticeable shake of his head followed that thought. He managed to utter 1 question. One that shook him to the core. he was afraid of the answer. "A-Are you here to s-s-slaughter me?" His very voice made her look at him. A sigh left her. She was disappointed. Surprised, too. "We... I am not here to harm you." He noticed that "we". But her answer surprised him. Terror still filled him, but now he was curious. "What... a-are you here for then?" ... "I had never walked into a Changeling's dream before. But this forest... there is something wrong with it." She stated as a matter of fact. He then informed her with more than his fair share of fear that this was the place. "This... This is the place where they... they said you killed changelings in with a scythe... r-ripping out their organs..." ... "I... I did what?" She sounded appalled. "So... you didn't?" He questioned, an almost quiet but burning hope in him that he was WRONG. "I... I have killed some of your kind, that much is true," and immediately, that hope almost died. "It was more than a thousand years ago, in a battlefield that looked nothing like this... But no, I do not drag those of your kind to a forest to rip their organs out, and you need not fear that I would do that to you." It was back, in full force. He didn't even know he could feel emotions properly, but here he was!

"...They hammered into us that every story was true... Every single one...They said if we were discovered... well..." He shuddered, and continued. "I have nightmares about the stories every day..." ... "I see..." She got further away from him, as he looked away, terror once again filling him. Moments later, he felt a lot less fear. The forest was getting a lot less foreboding. "It's... gone." He couldn't believe it. "It may return in the future..." She made that evidently clear. "But you are under my protection, as you are under my sister's." She stated calmly, approaching him once more. "I would like to have your name, as it would make things... easier..."

"Thank you... My name is Chameleon..."

"Chameleon... a fitting name I suppose," She told him with a small, almost awkward smile.

"I... uh.... Kinda chose it. My mom wanted to call me... Z-Zero. Because she said that was the worth I had to the hive..."

"Then she was wrong," Luna stated calmly. "If you learn only one thing here, then let it be that, she was wrong."

Then, the realm started to lighten up. His dream was ending. "Now it is time to awake, I will visit at some point, when I can." Her voice almost felt tenderly. Motherly. Even if it felt awkward still.

Author's Note:

Sorry about the large delay, I was busy with life in general, and was ill, but I'm past the worst of them.

Comments

[Dashie04]

I think having this changeling grow close to the princesses would be good.

Also, may I suggest starting a new paragraph every time someone speaks? It’ll make it easier to read. Again, nothing against the story as it stands.

[Hydra_1324]

10008497
Yeah, I need to get a habit of doing that lmao

[Cyonix]

Oh, here's your review; forgot to link it here when I posted yesterday