The Questioning
The Questioning
Doppel spent all night and the next day sleeping; the Twilight’s spell working wonderfully. His breathing was steady, the room had stopped spinning, and the fever dropped, but he still couldn't really get up and his fatigue had yet to leave him.
He heard somepony knocking at the door. He opened an eye with some difficulty but couldn’t tell who it was, though it didn't matter as Fluttershy poked her head through. Poor Fluttershy. I’m forcing her to sleep on her couch while I use her bed. I know she’s the Element of Kindness, but I still need to ask her if she doesn't want her bed. My convalescence wouldn’t change either way.
His thought were cut by the discussion the pegasus had with the pony beside her.
“You see Twilight,” she stated to the librarian, “I told you that he wouldn't run away.”
“Well, I'm pretty sure that he isn't really able to anyway,” Twilight retorted.
The mares looked back at the changeling. I didn't want to flee, mostly because of the fact that I'm still sick and I could be found within the hour.
“At least he looks better now,” she noticed. “Now changeling, I'm going to ask you a few questions. See yesterday I made some research on what you said and I'd like some clarification on some of the details. I want to be better prepared, especially after the wedding disaster.”
Doppel nodded. Twilight took out a very long parchment. She coughed a little and looked down at her list.
“So, Fluttershy said to me that you had a name, except that in my books about the changelings, it says that only the queen has a name.”
“Yes, my name's Doppel Ganger, and the reason I have a name is because I'm an outlaw. I never swore an oath of loyalty to the queen. I decided that her methods weren't all that good for both us and the ponies.”
“What is the purpose of having a name when you live all by yourself?” Twilight asked.
“I never said I live alone.”
There was a shocked silence. It was true that he had never talked about his friends in the Everfree and that they could take it as an invasion. Too late for taking back. Anyway, they'd find out about them sooner or later.
“I have two friends who live in the Everfree Forest, but don't worry, they don't want to invade either. They also prefer method 2 and we are very cautious to not disturb the ponies on which we feed.” the changeling explained.
“The method 2?” the unicorn demanded, like he just spoke squirrel.
“Doppel explained to me that a changeling has three methods to feed love. The first steals love from a pony without doing anything else. The pony will suffer loss of feelings. The second is when the changeling use one form that the pony is in love with to feed from the love he send. This method is far less damaging than the first one. And the third one is when the pony is in love with the changeling. No secondary effect,” Fluttershy responded.
Doppel was astonished by the memory of the pegasus. He thought that for the lack of enough courage to talk in public, she's a good listener.
“So, by the method 2, you tried to cause less damage as possible on ponies' feelings,” Twilight summed up.
“Er, yes, something like that,” the changeling nodded.
“And your friends?” the librarian continued. “What can you tell me about them?”
“They are called Camouflage and Mimic. We agreed to not take the same prey.” Doppel saw the mares winced to the word. “They're outlaws like me, so they don't take orders from the queen either. Mimic was the last that joined us. He arrived shortly before the invasion of Canterlot since that was the reason he left.”
“Shortly before the invasion? If he's the last one to be arrived, it means that you had nothing to do with the invasion?” Twilight was surprised.
“It’s been more than a year since I started living here.”
“But then how did you know about the invasion?” the librarian retorted.
“It was on everypony's lips. But we also had Illusion.”
“Illusion?” Twilight asked, skeptically.
“Yes, she's a changeling who doesn't live with us. She just informs us about what happens in the Hive. It's very bad for an outlaw to come in contact with the queen. So I assure you that Illusion doesn't live with us. Also, she doesn't like her name, but we find easier to call her-”
“She?” Fluttershy was surprised, cutting Doppel in his explanation.
The sick changeling give a puzzled look on his face. Why is this strange to them? Illusion’s a very feminine name to have isn’t it? He looked at Twilight who was giving him a different kind of stare. Not one of suspicion, one of curiosity. It seemed that his question had gotten her out of her distrustful shell.
“You have males and females?” the librarian asked dumbfounded.
“Yes, and?”
He didn't see why it was so important. But the fact that Twilight was curious about this allowed him to be more relaxed.
“I thought that your behavior on the subject was more like the society of insects. The queen gives birth to every changeling forming the Hive. It was what I read in the books,” she admitted.
“Er no... Our mode of reproduction is closer of yours that the ant one. It's one of the only things that the queen has no power over,” he explained.
“So, Illusion is a female. And you are?”
Doppel rose an eyebrow. Really? You had to ask that question? Then he realized that it wouldn’t have been simple for the ponies after all. They weren't used to seeing them after all, so all the changeling must have looked the same for them.
“Male!” he disclosed, with a tone of exasperation that he couldn't hide.
He heard a small squeak come from Fluttershy. She must have not given it a second thought, since she was a bit preoccupied. Twilight became more and more curious, the questioning stemming less to prove that he's not dangerous, but more focused on knowledge on the changeling's society.
A characteristic tickle came to his muzzle, causing a violent sneeze, making him take the appearance of Twilight. A wide smile flickered on his face.
“I've recovered my transforming abilities,” he said joyfully.
“You sneezed and changed your shape,” the unicorn said calmly.
“I couldn't change my form before, but now I can!” he explained, amusing himself to transform several times, just for the fun of it. “Your spell works wonders!”
“Yes... But I remind you that all the energy you lose now must be recovered in the future,” she lectured.
Doppel immediately stopped the series of shape shifting that he took, struck by the fact that he had to save his strength. He took back his changeling appearance and lay down in the bed correctly.
“I think its a good sign that he could change forms again. If somepony were to come, he could hide,” Fluttershy confided.
“Yes, and I think I shouldn't tire him out too much with my questions. I think I should come back tomorrow,” Twilight concluded. “Mister, I warn you. You have to be here when I come back or else...”
“I think I get the idea,” Doppel joked.
After giving a final nod, she waved goodbye to Fluttershy and left.
--|-|--
Rainbow woke up shouting like a scared little filly. She looked at every directions before noticing that she was napping on a cloud. She lay down watching the sky.
“Stupid magazine... If I didn't read that interview, I'd never had that dream,” she mumbled.
She looked down at the ground. She was in fact near the Golden Oaks library, still waiting for the unicorn to come back to tell her what she wanted days ago. Yesterday she couldn't do it because Spike said that Twilight slept the entire day for a reason even he didn't know. Today, she left early before she even woke up.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Twilight coming up the road. Rainbow came down from her cloud and directly faced the unicorn.
“Twilight, you have to believe me,” she insisted. “I know you didn’t think that I was telling the truth, but I think that what I saw wasn't a dream. And seeing how all these ponies aren’t freaking out yet, this changeling is very talented. His act is perfect. He's very dangerous Twilight, we havta do something now!”
Twilight stopped immediately in her tracks, a drop of sweat trickling down her head. She thought about Doppel in Fluttershy's bed. She tried to smile, but it appeared forced.
“I know Rainbow. I haven’t forgotten!” she assured. “I just did some research myself. I think he must be in hiding now. If I was him, I'd be gone for a few days before coming back trying to feed on love again.”
“And where do you think he could be hide?” the pegasus asked.
“Somewhere nopony even dare to go,” the librarian misled.
“Yeah, you're right!” Rainbow exclaimed. “I'm going to search for him again.”
And she flew away, leaving her rainbow colored mark behind her. Twilight sighed and opened the door. ask she walked in, she looked at the book she had been using the day before to get ready for another changeling attack. "I’m still not sure if saving that changeling was right." She levitated the book to her and began to read it again, before stopping mid-page. "Why am I reading this again? The information isn’t even right."
--|-|--
Mimic rested near their cave in the Everfree Forest. Camouflage had put a ban on long term trips to Ponyville, only being allowed for a short period of time to feed, while she took the responsibility to search for Doppel. She continued to use Derpy's form despite the real one being on holidays mostly because the real Octavia was still busy and pretty unknown here in Ponyville.
“Where could he be?” Mimic moaned. “You can't just disappear like this... let alone if you’re a changeling with a cold.”
“You’re talking to yourself now?” a recognizable voice stated.
The male changeling jumped before looking at his speaker. “Illusion!” he complained. “You're insane to startle changelings like that!”
“I'll stop when you stop calling me that,” she remarked.
“Then what am I supposed to call you?” he sneered.
“Well... just do call me anything. I'm not an outlaw and I have no name.”
“Can you stop arguing you two?” a third voice shouted.
Before them stood a gray pegasus with a blonde mane. It was obviously Camouflage coming back from her investigating to find where was Doppel. She took her former appearance back. “We need you Illusion,” she demanded. The spy made a frown at the pronunciation of her name. She decided to not say anything. “You didn't hear about a changeling who get captured some days ago?”
“The royal guards did catch one, but you mustn't know him. He was part of the invasion army who took Canterlot six months ago. He got lost and was caught yesterday.” Mimic and Camouflage looked disappointed and relieved at the same time. However, Illusion rose an eyebrow. “But I was thinking... It's been awhile since I’ve seen Doppel. What’s he up these days?”
“That’s exactly our problem. We don't know where he is and what he’s doing,” Mimic said in a morose tone.
“We haven’t seen him since he left to feed,” continued Camouflage. “That why we wanted to know if there had been a capture that the other ponies didn’t know about.”
“Sorry, but I’ve not seen or heard anything about him. Although, if you see him, tell him that he needs to be really careful. The changeling's arrest in Canterlot had doubled Chrysalis' urges to invade Canterlot. The army’s nearly complete. I’ll try my hardest to keep her from coming through here.”
On these words, she left the changelings. They stared at each other.
“Well, I think we really need to warn Doppel,” Mimic proposed heading towards Ponyville. “You coming or not?”
--|-|--
Doppel opened one eye. How much time was I asleep? It couldn’t have been that long since I'm still tired. Using all the energy that he could, he sat up to look at the clock. Wow, I nearly slept an entire day, he thought before sneezing and taking the form of Lyra.
Alerted by the noise, Fluttershy poked her head inside the room to check if everything was okay. She was followed by Twilight who came back for her “questioning”.
“I didn't know that you lived with Lyra Heartstrings,” the librarian joked.
“Oh no, it's Doppel. He had just changed his form,” the pegasus explained, not understanding the joke. “Oh sorry Doppel, I forgot to knock.”
The changeling took his former appearance before gesturing that he was okay.
“I was wondering. How can you speak Equestrian so fluently even though you aren't a pony? Don't you have a changeling language?” Twilight asked.
“Are these questions still to check if I'm a threat to Ponyville?” Doppel replied, somewhat sarcastic. There was a long pause as Twilight mumbled something. “It doesn't matter, I understand. It doesn't bother me. We don't really have a changeling language anymore. By the fact we always need to take a disguise and speak foreign languages, we ended up to not have a language anymore. Only a few words remained because they're untranslatable in Equestrian.”
“That's why the queen seemed to speak so fluently,” Fluttershy realized.
“Well, when I looked in my notes from yesterday, I noticed that Mimic and Camouflage live with you in the Everfree...” Twilight continued, stressing the name of Doppel's friends.
“They are not dangerous!” he cut, like if the mares were going to capture them.
“No, it's not what she meant. We've discussed it with Twilight,” the pegasus explained. “The Everfree Forest is a really dangerous place to live there. How can you survive?”
“Don't worry about them. It's been more than a year that we’ve lived there. That and changelings have some useful defense techniques. Besides, if you went there without me, they could use it against you, thinking you're a threat.” Fluttershy and Twilight stared at him, with a questioning look. “We use the fear of our opponents to scare them away,” he continued. “As soon as we know their feelings, it's very easy. For example, for you Fluttershy, I'd change into a dragon. And for you Twilight, I'd scold you with the form of your Princess.”
“That’s a pretty great defense mechanism!” the librarian admired.
“Yes. But don't try to look for them,” the changeling warned. “Or you're going to meet your Princess riding a big dragon.”
“Let's go into a bit more detail about Mimic and Camouflage. First, male or female?” Twilight resumed.
“Mimic is a male and Camouflage a female,” Doppel started, before thinking a moment. “Why is this important to know if we're dangerous?” Silence again. “Actually, you trust me now and it's just your curiosity which is driving you to continue.”
“No, not at all. It's... I mean... It will be easier for all of us if I use the right pronouns,” Twilight looked for excuses.
“I'm a changeling. I know that you’ve trusted me for a while now. Otherwise, I wouldn't be speaking to you like this. I feel everything you feel towards me. right now, it's particularly curiosity, with a hint of distress at being read like this. I'm sorry, I won't do that again,” he explained. “Well I won't tell you because I can't really prevent it,” he added just afterward. “So, it's useless to hide that kind of thing from me. I would know it from the start.”
“If you knew, why did you continue to answer?” the unicorn demanded.
“Because it doesn’t really matter to me. All the information I give won't probably change my life anyway. And if it changed the Hive's life, then it's even better. I'm an outlaw, I don't see why I should feel sorry for the Hive's changelings when ponies like me more than them.” Twilight stayed open mouthed. A sneeze later from Doppel (with a transformation to Bon-Bon). “So, now, don't hide me anything and say that you want this for your research, okay?” he spoke again, with one of the Bon-Bon's voice.
The unicorn nodded and took another notebook, visibly to ask questions about the behavior of the changelings. "So, maybe you can help me to fill the gaps with our knowledge on changelings."
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Actually about your Author note its pretty ease to distinguish them, they have pretty different characters.
Ah so Chrysalis is planning another invasion and could potentially bump into Doppel. Well that won't be good for Doppel. I wonder what happens to outlaws if the queen deems them a threat?
2711699
Ok, thanks. It's for the fact that in the beginning, I created Doppel's friends to say that Doppel doesn't wander alone in the Everfree. But, as my story progress, I noticed that they had a bigger place that I initially thought. So I try to give them a little more personality to distinguish them.
2711970
Well, Chrysalis is not nice to outlaws at first. They must get away from her sight, voluntary or not. That's the purpose of Illusion, warning them if the queen is nearby.
Now, is the three of them can be a threat to Chrysalis? (Illusion, despite she's playing double agent for the queen, is still at her orders)
Well, when you see at the episode of the wedding that Chrysalis is able to defeat Celestia and that in the contrary, Twilight and her friends can defeat an army of changelings, I'm not sure that three changelings can do anything against Chrysalis, even with her having less power. Above all when these changelings are far from being soldiers.
“Yes. But don't try to look for them,” the changeling warned. “Or you're going to meet your Princess riding a big dragon.”
Is not having ability to change size as well as shape a bit OP for changelings ( especially drones ), I mean, changelings would just turn into giant dragons and every creature will be to afraid to fight them.
I think that ability to change into giant dragon or alicorn princess is a bit to useful ( even if it does not give fighting bonus ), but it is just my personal opinion.
2717757
It's a valid point. But in my headcannon (and the one I use for this story), when the changeling transform, they don't gain any power, they keep the same abilities. I explain :
Changelings (drones as you call them) have the ability to fly and use magic, but in a very limited way. Their flight is nearer to fluttershy's than rainbow dash's and in magic, besides attack spells, they are limited to the telekinesis and the detection. So, if they transform into Celestia or dragon, really they are very weak.
For me, their transformation is just a disguise. You can disguise yourself into superman, you still won't be able to fly or have superpowers.
2720296
Yes, but this leave a question, if Changelings stayed out of the picture for so long that no one know anything about them, why they just not took form of big powerful beats, imagine 1000 giant dragons flying about Canterlot, demanding they surrender.
Sure, they would not have power of dragons, but enemy would not know it, and Celestia would rather surrender then let her ponies burn.
I think it would be more fair if changelings while able to transform, would be unable to change size to much ( sure, Chrysalis became a bit smaller when taking shape of princess Cadance, but it was small size difference ).
Just my opinion.
2720492
You're perfectly right. Chrysalis could've done that. Most ponies didn't know changelings from what we can gather after the wedding.
But, I think Celestia should've known what changelings are (after more than 1000 years of living, that would be a shame she never met one).
Now, when I see the wedding, I think that Chrysalis could really have done a better plan. I mean, changelings can be the stealthiest creatures that exist and she invade by attacking full force undisguised. I mean, she entered Canterlot despite the shield. She could've made enter her changelings and slowly invade the place by disguising them into ponies and take the important places to let ponies defenseless.
Dragons on the other hand, even if they are sentient creatures, are for me not the type of creature who make ponies surrender to take over a place. They'd just sit where they want to be and if only someone disturbs them, then they rampage the entire place. And apart from the dragon migration, they don't seem to travel in large group. But let assume that dragons can gather and invade someplace. Now that Chrysalis and her army of fake dragons have taken the place, what do they do?
They must stay close to the ponies to steal their love (Even by my story, Chrysalis prefer using what I call the method 1). They can't transform back, if they do, what was the point of doing that.They are big, so they won't fit in houses. So changelings will need to send ponies somewhere else to have the space and the thing necessary for the ponies to live. It's not interesting for the changeling that their preys perish for starvation or something else.
And that without counting that some brave (or idiot) ponies try to attack one of the changelings and notice the trickery.
It's just my view on that subject. We can say also that Chrysalis' plan in the episode of the wedding could've work if she hadn't sent Twilight in the same prison than Cadence. (Her friends didn't believe her anyway and without Cadence, Shining Armor couldn't have enough power to use the shield back, or even wake up from his hypnosis)
But it's interesting to see how a simple sentence can expand into an explanation of how transformation of changelings works and why they use it or not. Especially as I didn't give a lot of thought about this sentence before.
2720635
Well, I suspect that many changelings infiltrated the guards and probably make them be somewhere else during wedding, that is why there were almost no guards defending Canterlot when they invaded.
And that they somehow convince Luna to leave canterlot before the attack.
But if anything else, the fact that instead of huge number of drones guarding Cadance and Twilight in caves, all she did was send 3 brainwashed unicorns to stop alicorn of love and most powerful unicorn in Equestria seems stupid to me.
And the fact that as a creature what feed on love, used love to defeat Celestia, the fact that she ignore love as a tool of mass destruction seems very odd ( making villain arrogant just so they lose is overused for my taste, why not make Chrysalis smarter and in exchange make Celestia and Luna help so they can distract her until Cadance and Shining cast they spell, after all mane 6 beat 100 changelings, and all Celestia got was 15 second defeat and Luna got a line 'did I miss anything' ).
I still fell that villains would be better if they would lose they arrogance and instead give Luna and Celestia a better role in helping mane 6 save the day.
As for Dragons, it was just an example, Chrysalis would make some of her changelings turn into Dragons and then she would demand that unless Canterlot surrender and let her changelings feed on ponies, they would send Dragons to destroy it.
As for Celestia not knowing what changeling is, you got a point, Cadance knew about changelings so maybe Celestia knew too, but it would be a gamble do Dragons were changelings in disguise or were they real.
I'm glad I found this changeling story. I will be following this to see where it goes.
I was going to comment on the style and afew mistakes but seeing as it is from 2013 I will just say for now that I really enjoy this story. It's a awesome idea.
I think I like that.
Dolphins other than humans have sex for pleasure.
9295089
why did you say that? i know its true but its not relevent (is that the word?)
10595293
Yes, relevant is the right word.
We were wondering why changelings even needed to "swear an oath" to begin with...