A Small Change for Smaller Voices

"Really? I mean I heard some of the mover stallions were that way, but I didn't think--"

Daisy Meadows choked on her words as a cloud of dragon fire blossomed into life before her eyes. The colt across from her barely had time to give a look of surprise over his grilled cheese sandwich when what appeared to be a book sprung forth from the flames, extinguishing the fire like a drain plug being pulled as it plopped down neatly over the plate of hashbrowns and eggs Daisy had been eating from.

The earth pony set his sandwich down slowly, his mouth forming a question that was for the most part inaudible. Daisy's own mouth gaped as she desperately thought of an explaination for the magazine itself, let alone the mare covered in bedsheets on the cover.

"Sorry, dad's probably screwing around with a new spell." She said with a forced, hopefully convincing giggle.

"Your dad is a unicorn? Why don't you have a...you know?" Sunny Side asked, making a motion with his hoof over his head.

Daisy cursed inwardly, not having prepared her excuse for further questioning but nontheless responding calmly.

"Mom was an earth pony, I took after her." Daisy said causually sliding the magazine towards her lap, Sunny's eyes following her hoof.

"What did he send you? Heck, HOW did he send it to you anyway?"

"Oh its his Cutie Mark thing, he does it all the time-" Daisy was cut off as Sunny continued.

"And why did he send a lingerie magazine?"

Daisy peeked down at the mare in her lap, the logo above her read "Kiss and Tell". Indeed, it seemed to be a magazine of a more adult nature.

"Could you excuse me for one sec? I just gotta check something out." Daisy gave one of her best smiles to the colt, who gave a smile of his own back, albeit a bewildered one.

"Its cool, I should probably put more stuff on for the lunch crowd anyway." Sunny stood from his seat, his tray and sandwich carefully placed upon his back.

Daisy stood as well, crumpling the magazine into a careless fold in one hoof.

"You work too hard you know?" She said in a voice tinged with the color of flirtation. Sunny cracked a shy smile and looked down at his hooves.

"I just make the coffee and eggs around here."

"And its pretty good you know?" Daisy said over her shoulder as she walked in the direction of the restroom, taking care to sway her hips as she did so. She was sure she felt Sunny's eyes on her as she went.

"What in Equestria did Twilight just send to me!?" Princess Celestia said to herself as she slid the lock closed on the bathroom door. She ran a hoof through her long brown mane, letting the magic drain out from each hair. In the bathroom mirror, a short mare was reflected with a long flowing mane that cascaded up to nearly touch the ceiling, imbued as it was with cosmic magic beyond the comprehension of any unicorn but Twilight Sparkle. Celestia held her breath as she let go of the "Changeling" spell she had put in effect that morning, her legs and torso immediately responding with a grinding and burning sensation.

In the span of five seconds, Daisy Meadows' body had expanded out like an accordian being stretched, and two large white wings shot out from beneath her fur like they had always been there. Feeling relief spread through her body, Celestia craned her neck to the side and was rewarded with a small crackle.

Casting a glance in the bathroom mirror, Celestia found herself to still look strange and alien without her crown, amulet, and other jewelry. She was simply a large white alicorn with an obscenely large hair-do. The princess smiled sadly, thinking what the Earth Pony she had been sitting with only moments ago would say if he could see her now.

She sighed as she sat back on her haunches, looking at the magazine that had very nearly cost her the morning's fruit. It was clearly a subscription, like the kind you would recieve in the mail after spending so much money in a certain store. This one looked to be from one of the more....adult-oriented sleepwear stores one would find in only the big cities like Canterlot or Manehattan and the sort.

Celestia's interest piqued as she opened the magazine, the spot her hoof poked into being page 19. Here there was a mare with a sandy brown coat in a matching corset and panties, both dyed an appealing shade of pearly white that highlighted her exceptionally "feminine" attributes.

"Spike." Celestia smirked, the answer clicking into place as she imagined the little dragon's excited face as he flipped through page after page of mares, each with their backsides lifted high for the camera and their tails lifted out of the kindness of their hearts rather than simple obligation to their paychecks. Such a thing as a lingerie retailer's magazine would no doubt be a treasure to a young male first experiencing the allure of the opposite sex.

Perhaps, and this was assuming the guilty party was indeed an aroused little dragon, the magazine was being hidden. Yes that would make sense, she thought. A sneeze, a hiccup, a cough, anything that expelled too much air at once from the dragon's lungs could activate the transportation spell. Celestia imagined the dragon stowed away somewhere in an attic, a candle burning brightly beside him as he turned each page with sweaty, trembling claws.

Celestia briefly wondered if at such a young age Spike would know what to do if one of the mares leapt from the page and hitched their panties down for him. But she quickly banished the thought from her mind, reasoning that she shouldn't think such things about a being not even a hundreth of her age, and that when the right mare came along he might be fine if he knew where to touch. There were simply times to be a Princess of Equestria and times to be an understanding mare, and Princesses didn't cut it in situations like these.

She turned another page, deciding that she would return the magazine back to Spike and not make a big deal out of it. On the page she found herself on was an order form for each of the products presented on the previous pages. The princess wiggled her nose as she watched for a certain color to pop up, until finally her eyes found what she wanted. A deep, cherry red set of "nightwear" she felt would go great on the pearly white pelt Daisy had shared with her. The limitations of emulated Changeling magic had discouraged her at first, but her natural pelt went well with Daisy's mane and surely with everything else she could wear.

She tore the order form out and folded it neatly, the pages bending under the golden light of the humming Alicorn magic. From there it was tucked behind her ear, where it would not be remembered until much later that night when Celestia once again released the false color from her mane.

The princess set her hooves firmly onto the sink, inhaling deeply. The smells of bargain store cleaning chemicals and hoof soap filled her lungs as she stared deeply into the eyes of her reflection. Setting the copycat Changeling spell back into place was much like lifting a very heavy and very flimsy box, probably much MUCH harder than the actual processes employed by the Changelings.

Celestia held her breath and listened to the thrum of the blood in her temples, watching as the magenta in her iris's were smoked over with a deep brown like an invisible needle was injecting ink directly into her eyeballs.

****

"Hey you got a pencil back there?" A voice rang out from the window over the stoves where Sunny stood flipping a pancake over. He looked up to see Daisy smiling at him, her chin resting on her folded forehooves that rested on the window.

"Oh, um..." Sunny turned this way and that, feeling sure there was something to write with. His paper hat fell a bit to the side as he craned his head into the pantry, where he found a short stubby pencil that had probably sat in the same spot for a year or so. He felt some level of disgust at the taste of the dust on his tongue as he picked it up with his teeth.

"Found one." He tried to make a smile out of clenched teeth as he poked his head out of the window. Daisy smirked and tipped his hat right way up with a flick of her hoof and craned her head up to take the other end of the pencil in her teeth. As the eraser end left Sunny's mouth, heat flushed into his face and (to a greater degree) his groin and he politely cleared his throat before slipping back down below the window.

Daisy smiled, knowing full well what she was doing to tease the stallion she was smitten with and decided to keep going. She turned to scribble a message on the inside of the magazine's cover, gently swaying her tail from side to side in hopes to catch Sunny's gaze.

"I feel like going to the picture show on Friday, if you feel like coming along?" She said, listening to Sunny groan a bit.

"I don't get paid til next week." Sunny said, instant guilt washing over him at denying the mare's request. Especially since she seemed to be imying more than what her words confirmed.

"So? I'll pay your way in." Daisy slapped the pen down onto the window counter, one eyebrow raised like a cocky chessplayer. Sunny of course, was reluctant to catch on to the solution.

"I dunno Daisy, I'd feel bad taking bits from you-" Daisy had reached in through the window and put a hoof to his lips.

"There's a movie I really want to see, and I have nobody to go with me. I'd be afraid going all alone." Daisy poured mock-despair into her last sentence, pouting out her bottom lip. Sunny smiled and rolled his eyes, having gotten quickly used to Daisy's verbal flirtations over the past few weeks.

"So you want me to just walk you there?" Sunny returned, deciding to send a little of the heat back to the sender.

"Well, it iiiiiiisssss supposed to be scary..." She trailed off, tapping her chin with her hoof. "I suppose I'll just have to buy your ticket so I have somepony to hold onto."

*****

Spike rubbed his face as his stomach grumbled. He had been to the bathroom five times so far, FIVE TIMES!! His nerves were trying to kill him from the inside, or so he reasoned as his bowels turned against him. He rubbed slowly at his stomach with both claws as he watched his feet dangle under the porcelian bowl, all the while his mind racing a thousand miles a second.

Would Princess Celestia tell Twilight?

What if Princess Celestia thought he was some kind of weirdo?

Would Twilight throw him out?

He scrubbed at his face again with a groan. Ms. Fluttershy finding out about him being a pervert would be the least of his worries. But perhaps Pinkie Pie would let him stay with her while Twilight cooled down, she was always supportive right?

The slosh of the thick, cold anxiety in his stomach immediately froze into a solid brick of fear as a scroll burst forth from a cloud of golden glitter. He coughed away the metallic taste of the golden smoke as the scroll plopped neatly down into his lap (and thankfully did not fall between his legs into the toilet bowl below). He felt tears welling into his eyes as he looked down at the scroll, no seal from the Princess present but still no doubt in his mind she had sent this.

With one claw he picked up the scroll and let it unfurl at arm's length, as if some great beast lie within the parchment ready to drive its talons into his eyes. The paper crinkled as it rolled down, revealing large letters written in copious amounts of ink.

"ARE YOU ALONE SPIKE? THIS IS FOR YOUR EYES ONLY, BY ORDER OF PRINCESS CELESTIA OF EQUESTRIA."

Two checkboxes rested below the bold print, one titled "YES" and the other "NOT YET." His worry momentarily frozen between curiosity and terror, he scanned the bathroom for any writing utensils. Relatively little caught his attention besides an old black crayon lying in a nook just under where the bathtub met the hardwood carpet, and he wasn't exactly in any state to stand up at the moment to grab it.

Spike set his jaw as he looked down at the "YES" box, then he let his eyes wander to the digits holding the parchment. With his tongue poked out for the sake of concentration, Spike poked the end of one claw through the paper. It sunk into the middle of the box with relatively little crinkling, roughly the size of thumbtack-head.

Spike took a shaky breath, which felt colder than it should have in his lungs, as he rolled the paper back up. With his lungs still full, he puffed out his chest to let the sparking flame build there and held the scroll out in front of his face. He scrunched his face up as the magical flame washed over his tongue and out onto the paper, leaving behind a taste not unlike copper.

The flames met the paper like a summer breeze would blow a restaurant reciept out of one's hooves. It disintergrated and blew apart into a sparkling cloud of smoke, and then it was gone. As suddenly as it came, the note had left and Spike once again felt his anxiety gnaw at him. He chewed his claws as his stomach heaved, threatening to spill its seemingly myriad of contents into the bowl below once again. He briefly wondered if he had enough toilet paper, as Twilight had marked just that morning that they had been running a bit low.

All thought dropped away the second the magazine landed in his lap. Its pages slapping together made a loud *SLAP* in the otherwise silent bathroom and made his already upset stomach lurch once more. Spike hadn't figured Princess Celestia to send a message back so quickly, but there on a blank space on the magazine's table of content were a few lines of small, looping letters.

"As a growing drake, you need to learn to be more careful about protecting materials you use during "private time." You don't want Twilight finding any of this do you?"

Underneath the message was Celestia's first name spelled out in great loops of cursive, and a simple smiley face.