Chapter 8
The first thing she heard was the heart monitor she’d been hooked up to, counting off her heartbeats in the regular rhythm that was a pony’s life. She then heard somepony else stirring, milling about the room with a cart of some sort. Scootaloo tried to talk and say hello to whoever it was, but it only came out as a groan. She opened her eyes to see an orange mare pushing a cart out the door.
“Oh!” the mare startled, “You’re awake. I’ll go fetch the doctor.”
Before Scootaloo could say anything the mare was out the door with her cart. She looked around at the room and saw just what she expected. It was spartanly decorated with neutral colors and a there was an IV hanging from the heart monitor. Before she could consider more a stallion in a white lab coat and a clipboard walked in.
“Hello, little one, I’m Dr. Cox.” He sat down and quickly looked her over before speaking again. Not that there was much to see while she was covered in a too thin sheet. “Can you tell me your name?”
“I’m Scootaloo. How did I get here?”
This elicited a short spurt of scribbling on the doctor’s clipboard. “Very good. And, what is the last thing you remember?”
She looked up and the ceiling and tried to think. Somehow it was more difficult than it should have been.
“What are those things”
“In fact you’re a full royal. Set apart from the hive.”
“Ah told ya t’ stop do’n that, ya featherbrain.”
“You bloated piece of bubblegum”
“RUN!”
“We were … running.”
The doctor nodded and scribbled some more on the clipboard. “And what were you running from?”
Scootaloo tried to get her head to work properly. But she just felt so sluggish. “It was a,” she tried to put in words what the strange creature was, “a little bat monster.”
The doctor nodded as he made a few last notes. “I take it you don’t know what that ‘little bat monster’ is really called, do you?”
“Wouldn’t I have called it that if I did?”
Dr. Cox bowed his head and raised a hoof. “A point for the lady,” he said. “It’s called a vampire sprite. Like the name suggests they are little imp creatures that feed off of other creatures, preferably magical ones such as ponies. They also produce a powerful sedative that can render most of their prey inactive while they feed.”
“Is that why I can’t move?” she asked.
“In part,” he hesitated to answer. “We also needed to cast an immobilization spell to keep you from accidentally hurting yourself if you bolted awake. You suffered some head trauma when you fell and we couldn’t risk you aggravating the injury till we were sure you were through the worst of it. I can dispel it now if you promise to stay in bed.”
Scootaloo managed a nod and the doctors horn flashed briefly. This caused the restraint she’d been feeling to lift away and she suddenly felt cold in the hospital room. “Can I get another blanket?” She asked as she turned to a more comfortable position.
“Of course, I’ll have the nurse bring one in a bit. But before that, I’m afraid the guard has some more questions.”
Scootaloo’s eyes widened at this revelation. “The guard? But,” she involuntarily checked her hooves to make sure she was still a pony. There was a fresh bandage over one where the sprite had bitten her, “but why?” In the background she heard the heart monitor pick up a notch in tempo.
The doctor noticed this too and turned to smile. “Now, now. It’s nothing to be frightened over. She simply wants to sort out a few details to find out what happened. And I’ll be right here to make sure everything is okay.”
As Dr. Cox opened the door sounds of an intense argument flooded in. “For the last time. Nopony is going into any of these rooms without express permission from both the doctor and myself. Is that clear Miss Dash?”
“And I say if you think you can keep me out you’ve got another feathering thing coming, you trumped up …” Scootaloo heard a tussling quickly followed by the sound of something heavy hitting the floor, “OW, my wing!”
Though the guardsmare’s tone was completely calm, nopony could mistake the stern threat her voice now carried. “Now you listen here, Miss Dash. This is a place of healing and rest for the broken, weak, and weary. While in such a place, especially around myself, you will keep a calm head and a civil tongue. Otherwise you will find yourself cooling your heels outside. That is if, of course, you can manage to not become a patient yourself.” Scootaloo couldn’t quite hear the muttered response, but it was followed by a light ruffling and the entrance of a lime green unicorn that bore the cutie mark of a harp.
“L-Lyra?”
She smiled gently and nodded. “I suppose that’s one pleasantry we can dispense with.”
“You’re a- … a guardsmare?”
The mare’s smile turned to a slight cringe. “Eehhh … Technically I’m only an auxiliary on half-pay. But for these purposes, yes, I am the ranking guard on station.”
“Did you just … wrestle Rainbow Dash into submission?”
She winced at this. “You heard that, huh?”
Scootaloo nodded, more amazed that it was possible than anything. Rainbow Dash wasn’t only fast, but she was a pretty good fighter judging from some of the stories she told.
“Well, to be fair, she wasn’t expecting it,” she said, seeming a bit embarrassed. “In a fair fight, I’m sure she’d probably win. However, if you’re in a fair fight, I’d say you’re tactics are questionable.”
Scootaloo couldn’t help but giggle at that as Lyra approached the bed and sat next to it. “On a more serious note though, unfortunately, I need to ask you a few questions about what happened at the school today,” she said, placing a hoof up on the mattress.
Scootaloo broke eye contact and looked down at her hooves. “Oh … okay,” she said. It made sense. Foalnapping was a serious crime, and a rare one at that. In fact, the strange thing was that Lyra was the only guard involved. “I guess I can do that.”
“Can you tell me about the colt that kidnapped you?” She asked.
“He was a unicorn,” she said, “grey. I didn’t get a look at his cutie mark. And … I think he was only a few years older than I am.”
This piqued Lyra’s interest. “Oh? What makes you say that?”
“W-well uhh …” Scootaloo had thought she’d seen the colt at the institute sometime before, but she knew the one who’d ‘foalnapped’ her was a changeling. The colt at the institute could have been somepony else entirely. “It’s just … he didn’t seem all that big to be an adult, I guess.”
“Hmmm … okay. The other students said he took you from the school’s bathroom?”
Scootaloo swallowed at this and nodded. Lyra had already corroborated stories from the other students. She hadn’t planned on lying, but there might be things she already knew even if they got left out. That was scary enough to make the orange filly question the information she was giving out as it was.
“How did he make you go with him?”
This question startled Scootaloo. “W-what?”
“I mean,” Lyra paused a moment to rephrase her question, “did he say or do anything to you that made you go with him?”
This question caused the blood to drain from her face. There was no way she could repeat anything he’d actually told her. “W-wh … I … He.”
This prompted the Doctor to speak up. “It’s okay, dear. Anything you say will stay between us.”
Lyra nodded. “That’s right. We’re just trying to find out what happened so we can help you. That’s all.”
“It just all happened so fast … I just …” she could hear the heart monitor speeding up now. As her mind thought of what had happened several images flashed in her mind.
The grey colt touching his horn to hers and sparking his magic.
Ms. Cheerilee’s eyes fluttering as she slumped down in the hallway.
Green flames erupting from her foalnapper’s horn.
Pain in her flank as the sprite sank it’s fangs into her flesh.
She knew she was panicking, but that knowledge only made her panic more.
“You’re not in trouble,” Lyra said, removing her hoof from Scootaloo’s. “No one is going to blame you for what happened. It’s not your fault.”
“I just … ”
Dr. Cox intervened, “I think it’s time we took a break,” he said stepping up to Lyra and placing a hoof on her shoulder. She’s had a hard day and she should rest.”
Lyra looked back at him and nodded. Standing, she gave the filly a reassuring smile. “We can talk some other time after you’ve had a chance to rest, alright?”
Scootaloo looked back down at her bandaged hoof and nodded. She felt bad for not telling the truth. It was just that nopony would understand. Heck, even she didn’t understand most of it.
“Hey, umm,” she hesitated a moment, but the two adults paused on their way out. “How is Sweetie Belle?”
The two of them exchanged a look of concern before Dr. Cox smiled and spoke. “She’s under the care of another physician,” he said, smiling gently, “so I’m not entirely sure how she is at this moment. Her injuries weren’t as pressing yours though, so I’m sure she’s just fine.”
“Oh, okay then.”
“I’ll see to getting you that blanket you asked for. If there’s anything else, don’t hesitate to call for a nurse.”
Here's how I imagine some of my readers right now. (as well as Sweetie Belle if she were reading this)
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Here's how I imagine some of my readers right now. (as well as Sweetie Bell if she were reading this)
Oh, come on!
3147687
Either she hallucinated the end of last chapter...
That's where you end the chapter?! Why, I oughta....
3148123
Well this isn't "Scootaloo the Changeling Queen" it's "Cutie Mark Crusaders Changelings" So one of the others has to be changeling too... Unless the title is a lie.
3154650
That was what I thought back in Chapter 1, but by Chapter 7 I was starting to think I was taking the title too literally.
3154650>>3154796
I have been somewhat negligent of the other Crusaders in this story up till now, but that is going to change starting next chapter. When i first started i considered the idea of doing the first 3 chapters as a "This is how/when they were switched," but decided after the 2nd or 3rd chapter that Scootaloo's was going to be the only one because it broke the norm and the other 2 were markedly unspectacular or routine (of course the moment i write that my brain suddenly comes up with a potential idea for one of the others, so that may change ... ugh ... muse i want to kiss you and kill you in the same breath). It's just the way things have played out Scoots is, in a general sense at least, more important to the hive and thus she's going to be more prone to stealing the show from time to time. But, as i said, we're getting to the others starting next chapter.
3155139
And then once you wrote out your post, you were inspired on how to make the other two CMC Changelings as well anyway? 
...so, if I'm reading your post right, all three CMC were originally meant to be Changelings, but this was dropped in favor of only Scootaloo?
...I'm confused.
Which is it, all three, or just Scoots?
3156417
lol sry ... it's NOT just Scoots ... what i meant to say was that she was the only one i could come up with an "origin story" for.
She's also a blackbelt in Karate, but I suppose that's beside the point.