Undeserved Payment Pt. 1
A/N: Props to Gordon_Freemane for the improved story cover<3 ! I owe ya a hug! (or a drink, but I don't think I can mail beer to you :P)
As Applebloom followed her sister through the familiar orchard enclosure, she caught the gentle scent of apples, and the general, organic aura of any type of plant life. She never got tired of the experience, of the hypnotizing pathways of produce trees that traveled for acres. As soon as she reached a clearing, she saw gnarled roots exposed from the ground, and the ashwood trees they were foundations of. Applejack rarely ever traveled out to the boundaries of the orchard, so what was she hiding way out here?
Applejack stopped abruptly, and her little sister followed. Applebloom could only make out the bare orange blur of Applejack's coat in the darkness.
Tiredly, Applejack beckoned to her filly sister, "Now wait 'ere and, do NOT tell anypony what you saw, ya hear? This stays between us, and maybe even your friends. Twilight knows, Fluttershy knows, and both Princesses know, but everypony else, they don't for their own safety."
"But what are you talking about?" Applebloom eagerly pressed.
"Just...wait," Applejack replied, her voice laced with annoyance. She wandered not far off and whispered, "The things I do fer family..."
Applejack strained her eyes, searching for a holed hoof or horn or a pair of orange glows about, until she gave up. She turned, but tripped over what seemed to be a large, jet-black rotting root from a dying tree.
Somepony...or something groaned as Celestia's gift to the world peaked at the horizon, bringing revelation to Applebloom's eyes.
Whoa. That...is a big, big Changeling. Applebloom was familiar with what the insect infiltrators were shaped like during her interesting experience as a flower filly during the Royal Wedding. But she never saw anything like tha-
Her sister was knocking her hoof on what seemed like its noggin. Oh no.
"Sis...SIS! Let's get away from here!" Applebloom whispered.
Applejack whispered crankily back, "That'd kinda be the 'xact opposite of what I'm trying to do!"
Applejack returned to her regular tone, though slightly amplified, "Cyr. CYR!"
She bucked her rear forehooves into the Changeling's head. Now that got him going.
"Wha-," the Changeling stopped and looked around. It dipped its head so it would impact into the ground. It grumbled stubbornly, its deep voice muffled by the dirt, "Go away. I said I needed time to heal, didn't I?"
"Listen, I know that you probably done more than tha Princesses ever intended for ya to do, but can you help me on ONE last thin-"
"No."
"Ah didn't even fini-"
"No. Do I look like a pet? A plaything? A dog to the whims of ponies everywhere?" answered the beast. Applebloom knew the statement was rhetorical, but the way the Changeling was sleeping was reminiscent of how a canine actually slept. And the image her mind was not improved when the Changeling placed its hooves over its head as if looking at the ponies was going to harm him in some way.
"Errr...No? But listen, I just need ya for one last favor," Applejack argued. Like she said earlier...it was too dang early in the morning to plead for something.
"Applebloom needs a way to get to her school without some fillies seeing her. So, ya can do that invisibility thang, right? So...just let her ride...on...your back and deliver her to school! Sounds like a plan, huh? What'ya think?"
"I think, I will take the remnants of my pride, and not participate in this. Flit and I," Cyr motioned to the hummingbird on his horn who was also rudely awakened, "are thinking of going to the Everfree Forest. I think retirement is long overdue..."
"Come on, Cyr!"
"Four hundred years overdue!" Cyr breathed out. "And what is this for? So a young filly can't be teased for one day? I've been more charitable in the past, but everytime I participate in any shenanigans, whether formulated by ponies or a maniacal Changeling matriarch, I get injured and tossed aside like a doll whose raggedness would be deemed aesthetically unsuitable for further purposes. I might even die one day, because I simply I decided to help somepony."
Applejack edged forward, "Sooo, that's a 'no', Ah take it?"
"Yesss!" Cyr emphasized the 's' sibilance, as if he was relieved that he actually got through to her.
His head thudded to the ground, preparing for a continuation to his slumber. Applejack turned and began to trot away, looking back at jealousy that he, unlike her, was actually going to get decent sleep today.
But Applebloom didn't follow. She was grounded by the misery she predicted would happen today. Especially the heaps of abuse that would be screeched by Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon and directed towards her and her friends. One could take a day of it, maybe even weeks, if they had some decent friends to comfort them through it. But one or two years of DT's laughter at the Cutie Mark Crusader's expense was bringing Applebloom to her breaking point.
She groaned and collapsed onto the ground. She began to quietly sob on the ground. Applebloom admitted that, literally, she reached a new low point.
"Hey..." The Changeling quietly commented. Despite its gravelly, low-pitch quality, it was soothing to her.
"Yeah?"
"Can you keep it down? Somelings are trying to get some sleep to regrow certain limbs. Thanks," Cyr sighed.
"Why should Ah? You ain't gonna help me, Ah might never show my face in town again, and ya can't even spend some of your time helping others!" Applebloom yelled. She admittedly thought her little tangent was a bit selfish at heart, but she had had enough, and by Celestia she was going to scream her frustration out and get everything off her chest.
Cyr opened one of his visual receptors, its orange glow accompanying the rising dawn. Applebloom could make out a deep crack running along the iridescent surface of the "eye" through her tears.
Cyr would have potentially gotten away with his plan. To self-declare retirement. Hide from both villagers and Changelings alike in the vastness of the Everfree Forest, and when his time came, which would be very soon if he didn't find any love to consume, he would close his eyes for the final time, peacefully. This, he wasn't going to reveal to the ponies. To Cyr, they seemed naturally squeamish of such morbid things. And it would be, unfortunately, for the best.
But, he was going to have to put such plans on an indefinite hold. At least for today. The little filly was crying for Chrysalis's sake. Her stare, revealing shaking, over-dilated pupils, scrunched-up facial expressions, and the biting of the bottom lip, set something off in Cyr. It stubbornly reminded him of the Spawnlings at the Nurseries. And the ones down in the mines. And he knew he was going to regret this...
...but hey, retirement, and the eventual "croaking" idea, altogether would have been an incredibly dull experience.
Wait..I should think about this. Don't be a doormat, Cyr!
If only it was so easy though. Besides, I hate idleness.
"Applejack. Applejack!" Cyr roared.
"What?" the annoyed mare yelled back at a distance.
"This...will be one last favor," Cyr replied slowly. He looked at the filly in front of him. "You ponies trust strangers to the point of ignorance. Well, let's get this over with."
Damn those eyes...
"Soooooo," Applebloom began, "what's yer name?"
It was agreed, though grudgingly accepted by Cyr, that Applebloom would start to gather her friends and ride Cyr towards their school. Oh, and was the fact mentioned that Cyr was hating every moment of it?
"Cyr."
Applebloom repeated in her accent, "She-er."
"Cyrilius. That's the full pronunciation."
"Se- Seer...eol- olous.....Cereal?"
Cyr slapped a holed-hoof to his face and contemplated whether he should really correct her or not. "Close enough. Let's go. And it would help if all three of you were absolutely silent during the trip."
The violet-maned pegasus, one of the three, shouted, "You can count on us!"
The three fillies immediately screamed out jubilantly, "CUTIE MARK CRUSADERS CHANGELING RID-"
"Shhhhh!" hissed Cyr. "What did I just say?"
The last to speak, a white-coated unicorn with a fusion of pink, purple, and native white in her curly mane, apologized quietly, a smile and eagerness still lacing her voice, "Heh, sorry!"
Dear Flux....what did I get myself into...
Cyr summoned some of his reserve energy from any erratic emotion he could sponge from his travels around the outskirts of town, diverting most of the love used to heal himself, and channeled almost everything he had into his horn. It didn't work the first time, irritation from certain impatient fillies riding on his back breaking his concentration every 5 seconds, but after some breathing exercises, Cyr got the disillusionment effect to finally, the first time in weeks, to work.
"Whoa..." exclaimed one of the fillies. Cyr didn't know which, but he didn't attempt to quiet her. He, too, was amazed that he succeeded after Luna's botched attempt to take away his abilities.
After exerting more of his energy to concentrate the spell to cover the fillies in the invisible, semi-opaque veil, he quickly began to take a shortcut through the Everfree Forest towards where the schoolhouse was located to avoid detection. He would, of course, have to be whispered where the location of the schoolhouse was, but the fillies guided him, and he would also have to "wing-it" as the self-proclaimed Cutie Mark Crusaders would have no idea how to directly travel to school from the forbidden collection of trees that is the Everfree. What Applejack doesn't know won't kill her, right?
During the surprisingly short trek, among the captivating organic odors of a natural forest, something tugged at Cyr's senses. To Cyr, it was an almost familiar chemical scent, but it did not originate from any pony machinery. It was faint, yet indescribable, as it was ingrained in Cyr's memories to detail something that every Changeling needed to know the day they were born into the world.
Eachother. It was a trail scent.
Cyr nearly panicked. Changelings...here? It could just be my imagination; There's millions of things I could have confused the Changeling trail with, especially in a diverse forest...
Cyr banished all thought of the incident, hoping that it was a coincidence.
After much rough estimations and some vague hoof-waving, Cyr arrived at one of the grassy hills that lurked at the background behind the Ponyville schoolhouse. Near the edge of the forest, Cyr de-cloaked, feeling the waves of fatigue pass through every fiber of his being, now relieved that the "strain-and-drain" effect of Changeling was over, as it drew on the love supply as fuel.
This is what happens when I don't do magic for a month...I need to start using my horn more or else magic exhaustion will get more gradual. And....I'm running on emotional fumes right now. Just wonderful.
"Let me...just lay down here for a while," Cyr wheezed. If he was a pony, he'd either be pale white or green with sickness. He was getting some very contradictory signals from his body right now, and they sort of collided forth and formed a type of "super" magic-rebound.
"Call me if you need me," Cyr said lightly, and when the trio of fillies jumped off, he fell on his back and began to close his eyes. Flit wandered around his unfamiliar surroundings for a short while, but eventually decided to tag along with the Cutie Mark Crusaders. Sometimes even animals needed a break from Cyr's annoyingly melancholy mood.
"See ya, Cereal!" Applebloom exclaimed.
"Thanks for the ride!" Sweetie Belle said.
"That was awesome!" a certain orange-coat pegasus yelled.
"Do you think that we annoyed him? He seemed kinda grouchy..." Sweetie Belle queried. Flit perched on Scootaloo's mane, finding natural kinship with another avian-like being.
All three fillies simultaneously pondered for a few moments, and at the end of their pondering, they all exclaimed, "Nah!"
The Cutie Mark Crusaders, enjoying the unfettered beginning of their day, proceeded to the school grounds only to encounter Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon deprived of their natural prey: the three fillies. However, the devious pair had found another victim to terrorize to fill the void in their usual mornings.
A high-pitched remark snarled through the usual hubbub of a school for young fillies, as they were still quite a distance away from the schoolhouse, "We met your mom the other day, Dinky! She seemed rather happy considering what an utter failure her life has been!"
"Yeah, especially after she had you!"
Banshee-like shrieks filled the air, signaling Diamond Tiara's and Silver Spoon's attempts at laughter.
A pale thistle-coat unicorn filly cowered and found herself isolated, with no pony bothering to look behind the school to see her torment. She quickly retorted, "That's not true! Mommy said that she loves me!"
"Well, what would you say to a mistake that you can't get rid of?", Silver Spoon screeched amusingly. "Don't be too full of yourself, Dinky. There's no shame in being an "oops" filly!"
The cackling continued.
"You're lying!" The last comment debilitated the young unicorn's perseverance, and soon the porttions of her coat around her cheeks were wet.
Scootaloo hollered, "Hey! You can't do that! Stop being so mean!"
Diamond Tiara scoffed, "Well would you look at who arrived, the Cutie Mark Crybabies. And why should we stop? It's not like we were lying or anything."
Silver Spoon sneered, "Oh, and we missed you this morning on our usual route. We've always had fun chats with you!"
"Get away from Dinky! She's done nothing wrong to you!" The three fillies gathered around the terrified unicorn.
"Make us, you-"
Silver Spoon never finished the sentence. A chittering, overbearing shadow has befallen the fillies. The scene just so happened to be near enough the Everfree Forest to awaken a nearby Scorpio. The fillies had just realized this.
But, for Applebloom, the sudden arrival of the creature was too informal, too inconvenient. So it must have been "Cereal" in disguise, right? Don't Changelings, you know, change?
Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon, in the instant they saw the predatory insect of lore, screamed and sprinted away from the scene towards the school, leaving in the dust Dinky Doo and the Cutie Mark Crusaders.
Applebloom whispered to the Scorpio, "Ok, Cereal, that's enough."
"Uhhh, Applebloom?" Sweetie Belle mumbled.
"What?"
"I don't think that's him..."
"And what makes you say that?"
"He's over there," Sweetie said mortified, pointing a hoof of where they trotted from.
And there Cyr was, lying on his back, partially hidden in the brush of the forest's outskirts, with his lower carapace moving up and down from his respiration. One of his hooves were slightly twitching.
"Oh....and if he's over there, then tha Scorpio is..." Applebloom trailed off. Her eyes caught the immeasurable blackness of the Scorpio's eyes. All eight of them.
"Awww, horseapples. And today was just beginning to be a great day, too," Applebloom cursed.
"CYR!"
Stats
Page generated in 0.041 seconds
Total duration
838 users online
1,011,925 hits today, 1,822,946 yesterday
FIMFiction
My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Fanfiction
Designed and coded by knighty & Xaquseg - © 2011-2024
Follow & Support Us
Support us
SubStar
Chat!
Discord
Follow us
Twitter
MLP: Friendship is Magic® - © 2024 Hasbro Inc.®
Fimfiction is in no way affiliated with or endorsed by Hasbro Inc.®
There! I told somepony down in the comments that I would have released a chapter yesterday, but there were time constraints and somewhat of a storyline malfunction in the outline of my head.
Sowwy! But hey, I finished (tho with a lower word count than intended)
dashie.mylittlefacewhen.com/media/f/img/mlfw8540-10f13e81126bdf4a92486c0aac774515.png
This isn't gonna end well...
Cyr in about 30 seconds:
A lower word count is better than no word count! ;)
besides, now I can sleep easy, knowing that I actually read something today.
Aaand... Lets see how DT and SS handle Cyr.
This is gonna be fun.
Scorpio. Poor poor doormat. He actually could use a refresher course in Iron Will's lessons.
I am now hungry for cereal....
Wow, they're literally working him to death! D:
That's kinda sad... :(
Oooohhh scrap! This isn't good! ... Looks like Ponyville will be hearing about Cyr from all the little colts and fillies...
Here let me tell u I actually like Chrysalis.
yes yes IK but alot of clop-fics
1283426
That's cause he's laying down dear.
1685237
Won't end well for the Scorpio you mean. *CRUNCH* Scratch one big bug.
Assuming things play out as I am predicting, I see our reluctant 'hero' being used as a new junglegym before school's out.
At the cost of his pride he'll at least get some well deserved payment of childish adoration... before he starves to death. (Crossing my fingers and toes in hope Cyr gets some lovin' because he really deserves it)
p.s. And if Cyr can get the kids on his side, the rest of Ponyville will have to accept him. I mean, there's no force in Equestria that can stand up to a dozen fillys giving you the puppydog eyes, clinging to Cyr's ankles to protect him. That's weapons grade D'aww right there folks.
I think we need a bigger boot
Cyr will do this last thing, then he run out of his reserves and/or get caught and then it will go on to your know what.
Great chapter and can't wait to see more.
Wait, if Cyr helps the CMC, wouldn't he be revealing to the Changelings that he is alive? I can't see that ending too well for anyone involved...
._. ...
k.
Well F
Cyr:
FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF-
Well, Cyr sure is grumpy. And melodramatic.
AND DIAMOND TIARA AND SILVER SPOON DESERVE TO DIE IN A FIRE. THAT IS THE BEST NON-SWEARING COMMENT I CAN MAKE AT THIS POINT.
Also, I'd remove the Tragedy tag for now and add Comedy. There is nothing tragical here to merit a tag like that, but there is a lot of fun to be had, which deserves highlighting.
I'm hungry. Too bad I'm in study hall. NOOOOOOO!!!
Eh, I prefer apple cider above beer anyway :P
1686138 Now why did I read that in a Canadian accent?
Poor, poor Cyr he just cant get a break.
Typical
, the CMC always manages to get themselves into some kind of trouble, but this time it's Cyr who has to fix it. Poor Cyr, all he wants is some peace and quiet, and love of course. Also, I'm wondering if that scent trail was still there from the changeling spy that reported Cyr's "death" to Queen Chrysalis. If not then that's a serious issue.
1685856 Indeed, Cyr was probably all cdn.memegenerator.net/instances/400x/28033293.jpg
great job man when do you think the next chapter will be out
1685856
If cuteness was weaponized...
[shudder]
Lets...NEVER go there!
1688564
Yessir! One apple cider coming up!
Turns out the post office wasn't going to allow me to send certain fluid containers that hold the shape of a bottle...
In fact, they thought I was a North Korean terrorist sending a alcohol bottle-shaped package through the mail, and someone tazed me. OUCHIES.
So I escaped from Guantanamo Bay, swam a couple hundred miles to the shoreline, and I tried to upload one "applecider.exe" through da internetz by pouring a bottle of it down a USB socket....
I certainly hope that the apple cider has made it to the other side, because I need to buy a new laptop now
1689819
And this is why we can't have nice things.
1687732
Now who said that I wasn't planning on some tragedy?
Ready your jimmies to be rustled soon....
1689845
Noooo, leave them where they belong
If you hurt Cyr, I'ma gonna go to this mare
fc05.deviantart.net/fs70/i/2012/036/e/7/pinkamena_diane_pie_by_makintosh91-d4oq5lx.png
And ask her to vivisect your 4th wall.
Don't try me son. Don't try me
1689954
Hah! You cannot get past me!
static4.fjcdn.com/comments/GO+GO+GADGET+RIOT+SHIELD+_c9949c3d09d1ae21d4db77504a2e4e0c.jpg
Oh Celestia, not the legs, not the legs!
[commence mare-ish screaming]
ERR NER! Exemaquestria is bloody dan-jayrous. Got dang monsterosities comin' out of nowhere and tryin' to eat Ponies!
I'm sorry, but this story is really pissing me off. You are writing it alright, although I have noticed errors here or there, but what's with Cyr's sudden change in character? I understand he underwent a transformation, but it seems like he went from wise elder to whiny moody bitch. Part of me wishes you hadn't done the transformation, as all it seems to have done is make him whiny and take away most of his powers. Although, don't mistake it for my hating the story. I get character progression and everything, and he does seem to have his moments of wisdom, but running from rabbits and passing out? It might seem noble to not feed off of other ponies, but it hasn't been proven that feeding off of the love of other ponies even hurts them. Shining was a rare case, for those of you who were going to say that. That was extreme, and it was the queen.
This is all speculation and personal opinion, so don't take it personally. I'll still read the story.
Although I would recommend some event that makes Cyr at least more like he was before.
1689786
Fluttershy on the front lines,
24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m5obg7Iivj1rrt8lmo1_500.jpg
Suffer your final moments of pure encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRsWBnc1uKhJBwl88u3eVGJS8u5e4HHYPx24fngE6gMtVVoqe1e
1690320
1687714
Nah, man, thats to easy.
First, tie them up and bring them to their backyards. Then take theirs parents and brutally slaughter them in front of them, let their blood splatter their faces and guts cover hooves. Then impale the carcases in front of their houses, and then burn them (houses, not carcases), with every last bit on the floor. And finally let them free, to roam the streets broken both financially and psychically.
How you like them punishments? dl.dropbox.com/u/31471793/FiMFiction/emoticons/misc_Discord.png
1691767
Pfeh.
Drug their parents with psychotropes. When the fillies come home, tie them up and order their parents to slowly cut out parts of their cheeks, frogs, cutie marks etc with dull knives, all the while whispering sweet nothings, such as "This is for your own good, Tiara. The other pony said it will make you better. Don't cry darling, mommy loves you *waves cut out cutie mark in front of her face*".
Then, when enough meat has been shaved, the parents fuck and stab eachother to death, the fillies all the while looking at it. At the end, you make them drink the adult's blood and set them free, telling them that their best friend will die if they ever tell anypony about anything.
And I wasn't even trying
I now have a new, much stronger hatred for DT and SS. Who says shit like that?! My god...
1693511
Duuuude... and I thought I was loco in the coco.
But it's not easy to make parent hurt their own child, even if they're drugged sky high. They would have to be seriously unstable for this behavior to occur, so your plan could not work, or even backfire, where my slaughterhouse is beautiful and simple.
PS. Destroy their money, so no Batmaneing could occur.
1693730
A skilled hypno-therapist and good drugs can change your perception. What you thought was evil can seem like the best of ideas, regardless of your better judgement.
And the money would be left for me, of course
1698122
...duuuude! May I presume, that you are a /b/rother?
1694285>>1698122>>1693730
Yeah...I'm afraid that I'm going to have to ask you guys to stop this.
You guys are making me a little nausous
...and make me want to chop my own manhood off out of all the horrible things that humanity is capable of imagining. 
So....finish up please!
1698373
Im Done If they would like to hear more I could start a thread or something.
Also I am sorry I just.... There is no excuse. I will remove my comments post-haste
On an un related note I do believe you have done quite a good job with this fic
1698373
Sorry. Just trying to think a benevolent way to remind DT and SS, that being an ass is a bad thing m'kay. dl.dropbox.com/u/31471793/FiMFiction/Sweetie_Belle_lolface.png
Second.
1698393>>1698404>>1698436
Sorry, I didn't want to sound offensive (rights of free speech, and all) but, your conversation of how to properly deal with DT and SS were...a bit too imaginative for my tastes!
And thank you! (Though, from what I've seen in the recent Season 3 episode, DT and SS do deserve some of the things you have said
)
1698478
Finally SOMEpony that agrees.
Although I do believe that everyone deserves a second chance.
1698493
Exactly. They HAD a second chance. No regrets
1698502
I would pull one of those really strict overseer things after collecting enough signatures to get The Riches and the Spoons to send them to me to learn social ettiquette.
1698525
"Ok. Little fillies. Cloud Twister's going to twist something into you if ya don't ACT NICELY!"
1698535
There is no greater punishment than to be taught how to act in public by a social failure. I may be polite but Im so socially retarded