Betrayal of a rock

Spike could usually be described as helpful cute, kind, generous, fun, sarcastic, and at times a bit lazy. Now he could be described as confused worried, and very possibly terrified.

The reason for the fear happened to be right before him in the form of six mares. They looked down at Spike with anger and hate. Spike himself was tied up with a chain wrapped around his arms, legs and one at his midsection to hold him in a sitting position. Looking around Spike noticed he was in the familiar room known as Twilight’s basement/laboratory. He also took into notice the dramatic change in appearance he had undergone when he looked into a mirror that sat near him. It made him gasp in surprise.

"Finally awake changeling?" Spike swiveled his head towards his adoptive sister.

"Twilight... What happened???"

"DONT YOU CALL ME TWILIGHT MONSTER!!!" Twilight jumped into his face, her voice growing to a threatening whisper.

"You will not speak my name, you are not Spike. You will tell me where he is and you will tell me if there are any more of you. If you don’t answer me truthfully we have a lie detector", she motioned her hoof to Applejack,” And a pretty good torture machine if you don’t cooperate." She motioned to Pinkie.

"But Twi!!!" A hoof connected to Spikes black chitin jaw. He barely noticed the punch under all the pain of emotional hurt. How could Twilight hit him like that?

Twilight was scared. A dragon shaped changeling sat in her basement claiming to be her LABBFF (Little adoptive brother best friend forever). Twilight was scared that something had happened to her little Spike, and she could tell all her other friends agreed. The only one who was agreeing with the changeling was Applejack. Now all six mares were gathered in the front room.

"What are you talking about Applejack!!??"

"Really!"

"Darling, you do understand there is a changeling, right? That... THING just couldn’t be Spike!"

Everyone continued to pressure Applejack until she seemed to explode.

"Yall just settle down now!!! I didn’t do nuthin wrong, ya hear! All I did was state my opinion about the changelin, nothin more."

"And why, pray tell, would your opinion be so thick headed?" Rarity said in her sweetest voice, her eyes showing how she had forced it.

"He's not lie'n." The rest of the girls groaned and the farmer scowled.

"There’s no proof that he told the truth!" Twilight growled.

"I am the element of honest. I will choose who is tellin the truth or not." Apple jack held her stubborn head high.

Twilight understood the feeling of her element, for she had been able to sense magic in everything since she had become an element of harmony. She guessed the same of the others.

Pinkie sensed happiness, Rainbow sensed if some pony was loyal, Rarity could tell if some pony was being generous with just a look, Fluttershy could sense kindness, and AJ could sense truthfulness. The only difference with this situation was that it was impossible for Spike to be a changeling. Wasn’t it?

Twilight excused herself from the room, trotting down the basement stairs in a huff. Once at the bottom, her hooves slowed to a walk. She came to the wall that held the changeling.

Hanging on the wall, he looked pitiful. Black chitin covered its body, a strip of pale green scales going down over his belly. His chained up legs and arms were covered in holes. A pair of limp translucent wings graced his back. His head held a set of translucent ears, and a set of horns. A line of green scales, the same colored as Spikes, lined from is head to his tail. At the moment the changeling’s eyes were looking straight into Twilights, the green depths begging her to see the truth. Twilight ignored his silent plea; already sure that she knew the truth.

"I have a few questions changeling." Twilight was ready to get some answers to prove Applejack's opinion false.

"If you don’t answer correct then you aren't Spike, therefore the logical thing to do is to destroy the infiltrator. If you are somehow Spike....I'll let you go." A that Spikes eyes light with hope, and Twilight's lit with anger.

"But don't expect to get into my head with your changeling magic!" Twilight spit out. Her breath had grown heavy and she quickly tried to calm herself down with cadence's method, lifting her arm to her chest and moving it out as she released the breath. Then she started questioning.

"Who is Cadence?"

"The princess of the crystal empire, your old foal sitter, and the wife of your brother Shining Armor. She is also your cousin now that you are a princess." Spike couldn’t help the smirk on his face as he watched Twilights scowl deepen. This was going to be too easy.

"What was my first friendship report about?" Spike thought back to the day they had defeated nightmare moon. Celestia had given Twilight her new mission to discover the magic of friendship. Twilight hadn’t actually created a friendship report until later when Celestia had given her tickets to the Grand Galloping Gala. All of Twilights friends had wanted to go, but Twilight could only choose one. Spike could even remember Twilight’s specific words.

Dear Princess Celestia,

I've learned that one of the joys of friendship is sharing your blessings. But when there's not enough blessings to go around, having more than your friends can make you feel pretty awful. So, though I appreciate the invitation, I will be returning both tickets to the Grand Galloping Gala.

Although at the time it wasn’t much of a report as a ticket return, but Spike thought it counted.

When he re-laid the information Twilight huffed and stomped her hoof on the ground.

"Listen Twi-" The look she gave him made him shudder. "I mean, uh... Just listen. I am Spike and no matter what you think it’s true!!!  I don’t know how it happened. The bolt you fired shot off tom and hit me... That monster might have done something though!!! You should make him come here and-"

"ENOUGH!!!" Twilight shouted and Spike cowered in fear at his former friend.

"Last question! Are you Spike!?!?" Twilight had backed away from him a few feet, and now watched him like a cat, and he was the mouse. Spike started to sweat in fear. If he said yes, she would undoubtedly believe he was lying and 'destroy the infiltrator' as she had put it. If he said no, she would kill him for being the infiltrator. He decided his best interest would be to tell the truth.

"Yes, I am Spike." He braced himself for a death spell, but felt nothing hit him. It seemed like hours before he decided to look up. What he saw made him want to run.

Twilight stood there as she had before, but a sudden shadow had descended over her as well as the whole room. It was like tentacles of darkness where growing out of Twilight, crawling away onto the floor, walls and ceiling all headed towards Spike.

He struggled with all his might, unable to break the chains around him. Twilight had also seemed to grow in size, and her eyes had become crimson red. Her wings spread out their full length like an angel of darkness.

"Your answer…. is wrong."

Her voice was as cold as ice, burning into his mind. It didn’t even compare to the agonizing pain that followed.

Spike heard a scream, barely identifying it as his own. His mind felt like it should be dead and yet something was forcing him to stay awake, the look on Twilights face gave him every reason to suspect her.

Other screams joined in on his own and Spike could pinpoint who's they were. Five mares had rushed into the room upon hearing spike’s scream, and had been shocked by the terror Twilight had done to Spike.

Spike watched Rainbow dash smash into Twilight’s side and three of the mares hold Twilight down while Fluttershy and Rarity raced over to him.

The pain ended.

Then nothing.

A mysterious figure watched from the side window. Its bulky form looked on at the scene of a lavender unicorn held to the ground by three of her closest friends. On the other side of the room it saw two other figures standing over something on the ground. One of the ponies struck the forms emotions, but not enough for it to care.

The ponies moved away, tears rolled down their cheeks, and obviously shaken. Once they moved away a small shape was revealed on the ground. It was a pile of bones lying in a puddle of shadow. This also struck the forms emotions making it happy that the illusion of the dragon being a changeling had held until its end.

The form looked back towards the winged unicorn. It had stood up and was shuddering while the other ponies yelled at it.

The form turned from the window it had been looking through, a green flash going over its body, removing much of its bulk and giving it a pony form. Translucent wings fluttered quickly lifting the form off the ground, and with that, Tom, the changeling, flew away.