Chapters wings of Shadow - Chapter 1 wings of Shadow - Chapter 2 Unnammed HIE Story - Prologue - So I did the flop Unammed HIE Story - Chapter 1 - Meeting Ponies The Blazing Streaks - Prologue Unammed Changling Story - Prologue - Irony Unnammed Changeling Story - Chapter 1 - Savior Midnight's Horror Show - Chapter 1 - Dark... [Contains, or will, Exceedingly Dark Themes, Gore, Violence, Suggestive scenes, potential clop] Fallout Equestria - Song of Shadows - Volume 1 - Children of the Night - Prologue/Chapter1 [Dark, AU, Gore, Violence] when Nightmares Meet - Prologue - [Nonsensical Villainy for now] Unammed Clop 'story' - Prologue - Dear Princess [Suggestive, Futa, Magical Alteration [running theme honestly].] Unammed Clop 'story' - Day 1 - Part 1 - Arrival [Futa, Heat, Excessive Cum, cum inflation, Transformation = Goo pony, Semi Hyper] wings of Shadow - Chapter 1
Author's Note
[Author's Pre-Note - Strong language ahead, suggestive scenes occasional, 'possible' clop, I can't really assume it will happen because it depends on if I'm in the mood to describe it or not, that said, expect it to 'not' be there unless marked clearly.
Disclaimer aside, I read a lot of Fan-fics, and I'm always worried about letting them influence my own writing 'too much' and feeling like I'm stealing someone elses idea DX I want to stress that I try my damndest to do no such things, but it is inevitable that they affect me in some way with how much I've enjoyed reading them, and it's quite possible that something will eeke it's way in without be realizing it... so lets make a game of it!
If you think you've found something that originated in someone elses Fic, Comment on it, point it out =D You get 20 Internets if you're right, 50 If it's from a Fic I haven't read yet, and 100 If that fic inspires me to go read it! This is mostly because my memory is terrible, and this will help me remember to add notes about giving credit to whoever inspired me on something.
warning: 'Internets' are a completely intangiable currency that have absolutely no true value!]
wings of Shadow - Chapter 1
'Ugh! what a day!' It was rare that a certain colorful pegasus could call herself truely exhausted, but after the day that had been had she was actually not at all ashamed to admit to being completely pooped...
That morning had started out as normal as could be, a pleasant sunny morning to wake everypony up in good spirits and get the day started... Then a freak storm blew in from the everfree shortly after dawn, much too early for most of the weather team to be on duty, or even awake in some cases. By the time some of the other weather pegasi managed to wake up their 'former' Captain, The storm had settled itself in enough to be a troublesome job even for a full team plus wonderbolt, and being woken up 'earlier than early' only served to make the day a bigger pain in Rainbow's Flank.
After several steady hours of weather Rodeo, several more hours of helping clean up followed, and 'then' another hour or beuaracratic argueing to convince the mayor that it wasn't their fault a storm blew in while most of them were still asleep... Beaurocracy was one of the few things that Rainbow was worse at than Diplomacy and 'Tact'.
And what made it worse? 'AUUUGH!, I can't believe this... All this crap, I'm 'actually' tired... and now, I can't bucking sleep!... How does that even work?!' Indeed, the Rainbow mane'd Pegasus was Slumped over on a cloud trying desperately to relax and 'pass out', yet somehow the bliss of sleep evaded her during one of the few times it should've been the most rapid to come... to say she was irritated would be beyond a simple understatement, She considered herself an unmatched proffesional at the art of spontaneous napping.
"GRAAAAGH!, That's it! I can't take it anymore! I'm gonna go see if Twilight can just zap me to sleep for a bit!"
Fast forward about 30 seconds... It would've taken like 10 if she hadn't been exhausted
Rainbow dash landed with a decidedly ungraceful 'THUD' in-front of The Library, though she didn't stumble, nope, certainly not, not even being exhausted could make 'Rainbow dash' Stumble!... It was a noise that certainly could be heard inside, but she was even more impatient than usual and followed it up with rapidly banging on the door with a hoof.
as soon as it started to open she didn't waste a moment launching into making her 'issue' known. "Twilight! Hey! I need a sleep spell! I've had a heck of a... day... and I... can't......-"
That wasn't Twilight standing in the door-way... It wasn't Spike either.
In the door-way was standing a fairly large Thestral, A bit taller than Twilight, Dark Blue-ish Grey fur, Dark Blue mane, Fangs, Fuzzy Ears, Bat wings, and Bright Red Slitted eyes... That's about all that registered in Rainbow's Sleep deprived mind at the moment... well, 'she'd' describe any day that didn't involve a half a dozen naps as sleep deprived.
There was a moment when recognition flashed across his muzzle and the barest bit of a smile cropped up as he prepared to speak, only to suddenly find himself on the recieving end of an Over-reacting Rainbow.
The Adrenaline in her blood shot up with the over-reaction of her tired imagination finding a freaky looking stranger in her friend's house, missing all of the 'not an intruder' signs like answering the door for one, and all at once she forgot she was tired, Lunged forward at him with all of her power, and shouted simply "what did you do with twilight!?"
She'd expected to tackle and pin him to the floor while demanding answers, though after only a short instant of surprise, his expression turned seriously and in a frightingly fluid motion he dropped to the floor, directly under her charge, and clapped his wings up at her as she passed over.
The sudden impact of thick Bat wings against her under-side knocked the wind out of Rainbow, causing her to only crash herself on the floor, though he was a bit impressed at how rapidly she managed to right herself and whirl back around on him despite gasping for that lost breath... And Promptly Lunged again.
'Okay, Obviously my information was right, she's way too hot-headed when she snaps like that... way too Reckless, She might be a wonderbolt but she's got no 'experience'.'
Instead of dodging this time, He chose to counter her Charge, He reared up on his hind legs, Timing a thrust with both fore-limbs to connect a moment after she slammed into his chest hooves first, letting her charge deplete some of it's own momentum before his hooves slammed into her barrel to rebound her and send her into the door, knocking it closed in the process.
It took her a little longer to get back to her hooves this time, but when she saw him un-phased and 'dusting off' his fur where she'd hit him, though that was just her interpretation of him rubbing what was likely to be a good bruise later, she just got more infuriated at the seemingly taunting motion and readied herself in a pose similar to what she used for high-speed take-off.
The Stranger took notice of this and let out a mild sigh 'Oh great, I have to take her seriously now or she's going to break something when she hits the wall... why are so many mares completely nuts?' He readied himself then, lowering into a broad stance, wings out, eyes sharply focused on Rainbow's body, watching for those sharp little hints of movement that would fore-tell her 'attack'.
He didn't have to wait long, he had barely a second to settle and focus his vision before he saw the signs, Flanks tightening, Leg flexing, wings tensing, all at once for just an instant before motion exploded! 'Hah, 'fastest in equestria' indeed! She could easily take anypony who didn't have any real experience facing other fast opponents... but it's not all about speed 'miss' Dash.' She launched at him with enough force to stir the air and send loose papers and even some books flying away from her, and closed the distance of a couple dozen feet in what would be the blink of an eye to some, and the moment would surely be over faster than most would need to even know it happened.
He wrenched himself to the side in a motion so strained it made his muscles ache, Twisted his body side-ways using muscle and wing thrust so that they'd just barely miss slamming head-long into eachother. and a delighted grin crossed his muzzle, Even if she lacked experience she was bursting with speed someponies couldn't even imagine, it was exhilerating to focus so hard, even if he did it more to make sure she didn't hurt 'herself', it still got his blood flowing in ways that mere Sparring could never do.
As he jerked out of the way of her charge, his Right fore-leg zipped into position so that Her Barrel would colide with it, just above her out-stretched hooves, and it curled as soon as fur touched it.
He Grabbed on, and her momentum began to affect him as shoved himself back towards her body, His left hoof rolling around to latch on under her shoulders while her momentum pulled them forward and the disrupting addition of his weight caused them to rotate in mid-air... Followed an instant later by their latched bodies colliding into a book-shelf with the batpony first, Crashing to the floor with all four of his limbs wrapped around her to keep her there while a few dozen books crashed down around them from the shelf.
An Instant later he shifted his hold on her, Fore-legs whipped about to wrap under opposite shoulders and hold her fore-legs out at an angle where she'd have trouble working them comfortably. His hind leg wrapped around hers, squeezing them tightly 'together', having kept concious of the potentially horrifying experience that could come from having done the opposite. He completed the hold with his wings claping around her torso, slamming into position with enough force to knock the breath out of her again and sticking tightly into place to hold her wings down tightly as well.
It had happened so fast she found herself having trouble coprehending that it had actually happened, somepony out-manuevered her, and now even had her in a 6 limbed hold strong enough she wasn't sure she could break it... instantly her mind leapt into the darker thoughts of the fact that she was trapped by a Stallion... She proceeded to freak out, squirm, snarl, kick as much as she could "lemmegolemmegolemmego! I'M GONNA BUCK YOUR HEAD IN IF YOU DON'T LEMME GO!"
'well, This is a tidbit that nopony warned me about... I get the distinct feeling that I've stumbled onto a sensitive spot for her... I'm loathe to risk traumatizing somepony on my first day here, But I can't simply release her if she's just going to get even more aggressive and hurt something.' He held fast still, speaking calmly in an attempt to calm her down.
His voice actually came out as strangely 'cultured'... not at all what most would expect, who tend to assume a batpony would sound a bit growly, gruff, or at least unusually 'masculine'... what came out instead sounded more like it belonged in the upper circles of Canterlot elite, not unlike a certain Cellist known to live in ponyville, thought with somewhat of a 'scoltish' twinge to it "Now, Miss dash, if you'd waited barely a second long I would have been able to explain to you that I am a 'guest' here... and I will 'not' release you until you calm down and stop trying to hurt yourself attacking me!"
That of course didn't work very well, their proximity gave her an all too easy time of feeling his intensely rapid heartbeat thumping against her back, though it was surely from the adrenaline he'd needed to 'catch' her, her worried mind took it as a completely different sound, and her protests turned more frantic.
The thing that froze her struggles though, was Twilight's shout coming from upstairs "wHAT IS GOING ON DOwN HERE!?!?" A Moment later Twilight was sprinting down the steps... correction, 'princess' Twilight, and stopped half way as she saw the situation... Rainbow dash, looking 'scared' for once, Pinned in a hold by her 'visitor' who looked at her with an expression much more along the lines of sympathetic annoyance, if that even makes sense. "what the... Symphony! what the hell is this!?" Normally she'd watch her language to a somewhat unrealistic degree, but the shock of the moment could get to anypony.
Taking advantage of Rainbow's momentarily stunned state, he quickly explained "I opened the door as you asked when somepony started knocking so hard. It was Miss Dash on the other side, and I had barely a second before she charged me... If I had to guess, personally, she thought I was some kind of intruder, honestly freaking ponies out is nothing 'new' to me... However, she kept lunging at me, So I elected to Restrain her physical so that she would not hurt herself with that last one, then she began 'freak out' much more desperately... I'm afraid I may have struck a sensitive nerve of a sort." A moment later he started to loosen his grip to let her go.
The Instant she felt the hold loosening, Rainbow Dash whirled about, Trying desperately to swing at him before Fluttering away to a safe distance, thought with equal agility he slipped out from under her, letting her hit only the floor before finding himself a few feet from his former position looking none the worse for wear.
Now, normally, Twilight would launch into a serious Scolding anytime Rainbow dash over-reacted and assaulted somepony, though normally it didn't involve anyone getting hurt anyway, she looked to be the much worse for wear of the pair involved and likely already suffered enough punishment just by being out-manuevered and... whatever it was that triggered her freak out... So instead, Twilight Zipped right to her Friend's side, wrapping a fore-leg and a wing around Rainbow and hugging her close, electing to handle the situation as a whole 'later'. "Rainbow?... Are you ok?"
The Effect was almost immediate, Rainbow calmed down instantly, Stopped shaking and actually pressed into the hug a bit, the furious and mildly horrified expression had vanished, and a hoof quickly moved to make it look like there had never been any tears in a motion that could only have been practiced by an 'expert of being tough'... Symphony found himself a little impressed actually 'Hmhm, The 'power of friendship' at it's finest I bet... It's kindof beautiful.'
She quickly seemed to stabilize and start speaking "Y-yeah, I'm okay... Just... ya know, He got me, I freaked out a little, no big...... You, called him 'symphony'? You know this guy?"
"Yes, Midnight Symphony, Though I just refer to him as Symphony since I actually know about 3 Midnights already. He's a visitor, Luna sent me a letter last night about a Batpony coming to stay in ponyville for a while, I 'was' going to meet him at the station and then introduce everypony to him to avoid situations exactly like 'this' becoming common, but that freak storm this morning, well, I'm still not the best flyer, I couldn't handle that kind of weather, and with how bad it was, I would've worried about getting hit by a tree or something... He showed up a couple of hours ago after you all cleared that storm out, I helped him dry off and was just upstairs getting ready to go out and start introductions when you showed up."
The 'visitor' chimed in at that point and added on "Technically, I was already here this morning to see that lovely storm, I had settled down in a shadey corner of the park and 'hoped' to enjoy a bit of a nap with the storm making things comfortably dim... After you cleaned it up though, I had a bit of a time sneaking about to Rendevouz with Twilight... I was 'supposed' to make myself known to her first one way or the other, given that my presence could very well cause quite a ruckus until I've managed to settle in and get to be better known."
Oddly enough, out of all of that, the thing Rainbow questioned first was "You're not like... staying 'with' Twilight are you?"
That got a bit of a confused and slightly bemused stare from twilight, though he solved that issue right off "Oh, no, certainly not, I was just supposed to introduce myself and get the starter tour, hmhm, I'd never dream of imposing upon her house-hold long-term... I actually have every intention of building my own little home out near the everfree where things always seem to be a bit darker... I don't wish to be suspicious honestly, but I do enjoy dimmer lighting." with that he quick suddenly... wait, where did those come from!?... plopped a pair of sun-glasses on his muzzle, Deep blue frames and polished black lenses that would certainly reflect off most of the sunlight from his eyes. "Daylight is a bit troublesome for my vision after being nocturnal for so long, but I intend to experience adjusting to it and see how well it works."
Twilight giggled a little at the sight... a batpony, acting casual and cheerful in her library, wearing a pair of sunglasses, something was just a little funny about that scene. "Hmhm, speaking of which, we are 'way' behind Schedule for those introductions... Given that it's a bit late he 'is' going to stay the night here are least once... what about you Rainbow, you wanna come along? Get to know him a little so you don't worry so much?"
The Pegasus tensed up a bit at first, and quickly faded herself back to looking relaxed "Uh, no, no, I was actually coming here to ask if you could... 'knock me out'... I'm completely blitzed after this morning's frantic hours and the boring 'crap' that followed it... But I couldn't sleep, So i came by to see if you could, ya know, do some kinda sleep spell things, i just need a couple hours or something and i'll be fine... probably wake up just intime for the pinkie party that is inevitably going to happen tonight."
"Oh... well, yeah i can do that, but... wow, 'you' not being able to nap?" She snickered just a little too happily.
"Yeah yeah, laugh it up, the napmaster can't nap."
"Heheeheh, eh, sorry Rainbow, come on, you can borrow my bed for a while since you're here... you could even spend the night if you want, Make sure the big bad bat pony isn't gonna try to eat me in my sleep, heehee."
"Ugh... Everytime I over-react about something..."
As the 2 mares started up the stares Symphony called out suddenly "Uh, Rainbow Dash?" She paused and glanced back for a moment, finding him with an expression between apologetic and cool seriousness "Hrm, I am quite aware that I triggered... 'something' when I restrained you... I would like to apologize, my other options were rather disatisfactory for ending the un-needed conflict before anypony actually got hurt... That said, I'm going to be in ponyville for quite a while, I could give you some pointers on how to break that hold so nopony can hold you down, If you're interested."
Her expression wavered between un-readable, irritated, worried, and a couple of other random emotions related to having been held down so helplessly before setting on 'cool indifference' and turning to continue with a simple "Yeah whatever, Maybe." And like that they were gone...
"Dude! That was AwESOME!"
"what do you mean what am I talking about? You out manuevered 'rainbow dash'... RAINBOw DASH! Nopony does 'that'! I mean, sure, you did it on the ground in a library, but still, I've never seen anypony do something like 'that' anywhere!" He could scarcely believe that he had a Dragon fanboying on how he'd trapped an Exhausted and Needlessly Infuriated Rainbow Dash, though he still had to chuckle just a little.
"I suppose I did, Though I have a distinct feeling things would have been a lot more difficult if she hadn't been tired out from the day's events and lost in the adrenaline of a mis-conception... I'd say she's a bit crazy, but from what I've heard about ponyville that's actually normal."
"well, it was still cool! I'm used to Rainbow being too fast for 'anypony', cept Twilight, if being able to catch her with magic even 'counts'." It was also just a bit funny to note that the dragon went about cleaning up the spilled books and putting them back in place without even complaining about the mess, though that did remind him about smashing into the book-case back first, and prompted checking with a hoof 'oof, yep, that's gonna bruise up something furious... That mare's got a lotta force behind her!'
Something clicked for Symphony, and a small sigh escaped his lips as an idea of something important to ask came up "Hmmm, so she's been kindof 'trapped' before in one way or another?"
"Yeah, AJ's got her with a rope on a couple of occasions, even tied her wings down for the Iron pony competition, Twilight's really good at grabbing her with Magic before she bolts off and gets herself in a fight or whatever over-reaction she might be heading towards at a certain moment... Heh, Pinkie Pie's never technically 'trapped' her, but she's always somehow able to keep up with her enough that Dash can't escape which is just as good."
"Hmmm, Has she ever seemed seriously distressed by any of these events before? similar to today?"
"well... ya know, Pegasi are generally 'free spirited' types, getting Tied down or not being able to avoid something tends to sit wrong anyway... Though not on the scale of today... She 'was' pretty flustered from failing to out-run Pinkie pie, but she flew pretty much the entire ponyville area a dozen times 'trying' so I imagine she was pretty blasted tired from all that extra effort... She did look a bit worried about having her wings tied down, but she was also pretty hopped up on adrenaline for the competition, so I don't really know... why you askin?"
The Batpony looked rather deep in thought for a moment, even clichely rubbing one hoof under his chin before answering "Because I get the worrisome feeling she Freaked the way she did because of one of 2 things, perhaps both... One being the 'seeming' ease of which she was out-done, and trust me, it was 'not' easy, It took all my effort to shift my position fast enough... And the Second being that she was pinned so thoroughly by a 'stallion', a creepy looking stranger at that... Symbolicly speaking that could be a recipe for psychological horrors most ponies try very hard not to imagine being possible, but it's a simple fact of instinct for some to consider the worst possible out-comes of a situation."
"what... you mean like... She thought you were gonna rape her or something?"
Hearing 'that' so easily brought up by a dragon he'd been urged to watch his language around for the sake of innocence, actually managed a bit of shock for him... He got the distinct feeling that it was some kind of running gag for ponies to underestimate the little dragon. "Yes... That... Having her control taken away so thoroughly by a Stranger and a Stallion, one she likely assumed was invading the home of a friend... I honestly feel rather bad about causing that moment, But If I hadn't Restrained her and had simply leapt out of the way, then her mad charge would likely have driven her head into one of the book-cases and she could have injured herself... Still..."
"Oh... don't worry about that, Rainbow's tough, and believe me, if you 'had' tried anything like that, you can bet she would've found some way to beat down... probably some freaky Element of harmony power or something... And I'm not exagerating about her being tough... ya know, she can actually crash into the ground at almost sonic rainboom speed and not even get hurt?" This caused Symphony to stare a bit incredulously at him for that claim. "what!? It's true! Twilight saw it happen! More than once too!... and yet somehow she still injured a wing crashing into a tree... I'm not sure how that works."
Pow! Intellectual over-drive moment, GO! "Hmm, It's most likely because of some subconcious use of Pegasi natural magic to protect herself in those moments, not to mention skill at dealing with the dangers of tremendous speed... both of which she was probably not prepared for if she actually injured herself once... It's also possible that her body is especially strong while she's focused hard one something like pulling a rainboom, though... I could probably only pinn her down because the specific hold I used allowed absolute minimal room for actual motion."
He was completely unphased by the sudden intellectual babble... Hey, he lived with Twilight sparkle for his entire life, it's gotta be par for the course for him. "Huh... I feel like I remember Twilight saying something similar at one point, but I was probably distracted by something at the time... Hey, what about batpony's? Aren't you basically a creepy looking version of a pegasus?"
"what?... oh, certainly not, There's a vast array of differences between our species, aside from the obvious aesthetic Differences... For instance, Our wings are solid and thick, instead of feathered... we're built more for 'strong' flight than for 'fast' flight... that's not to say it's not possible to go really fast, the 'natural state' is just very different to start with... There's all kinds of interesting little factors to go over... Uh, don't take this the wrong way, but I was hoping to only have to explain it 'once', I know perfectly well that once I'm finished Settling in, Twilight is going to be allover me hoping to learn about Bat-ponies, most likely resulting in a pile of notes and maybe a book or 2 that you'd certainly be able to read in more detail than I can express in the next few seconds." And he gestured quickly towards the stairs.
Right on cue, as if he'd just 'known', Twilight returned to few and started trotting her way down the stairs with a pleasant smile on, noticing the situation and promptly hopping off the stairs to flutter down to the floor next to the pair "Oh! Spike, you're back! I hope you weren't too worried about what just happened, I mean-"
Spike cut her off there suddenly "It's fine Twi! I'm not a baby, i can handle a little fighting... Besides, I think it was 'awesome'! Somepony who can finally out-manuever Rainbow Dash!"
"Yes, well, There may have been unexpected-"
"Yeah i know, She thought he was do something 'nasty' to her once he had her pinned, But he didn't, and if he had, I'd probably have just set him on fire"
"Spike! That's-"
"Hrhrm!" Symphony cleared his throat quite loudly, fairly certain he saw where this was going "Pardon me, but I am not insulted by that, Honestly, I hope he does burn me if I ever actually try to do 'that' to somepony... Please tell me, Is she going to be okay? I am unfortunately familiar with the power that fear can have on the mind, and I'd hate to think the first memory she'll have of me is fearing I'd do something absolutely unspeakable to her."
Twilight stared for a moment, just slightly dumbfounded at the sudden interuption... Perhaps she was getting used to ponies being afraid to interupt her after being a princess for several years. "Uh... um... hrm, Yes, she's going to be fine, as far as I know at least... I'll know better once she wakes up better rested and see's you at the party, But she's a tough girl, I don't think you could keep her down if you tried."
He seemed to waver for a moment and give off a rather sudden sigh "Thankfully, I am not interested in 'testing' that statement... I loathe thinking about the things I can do to ponies if I have reason."
"Ummm.... okay... "For a moment her face wore an expression between confusion and bafflement on what to do next... then a flash of rememberance "Oh, yes, Introductions! Spike, This is Midnight Symphony, He's a batpony that's come to live in ponyville for a while, to 'see the world' a bit, and so we can start learning about batponies so everypony else will stop worrying so hard about them.... He's oddly more 'cultured' than I expected, But Octavia's doing fine living here so hopefully that won't be an issue."
"Heh, as long as he's not the Batpony version of Blueblood, I think he's awesome so far."
Both of them looked shocked suddenly as Symphony gave a soft snarl, a quick looking revealing a momentarily furious expression of bared teeth, burning eyes, and a distinct Scoltish accent devoid of the previous culture. "UGH!, Don mention that Irritatin' 'worm' aroond meh! ah've neva' had anneh creature, ponneh, Thestral, changelin', dog, er otherwise, manage tah inuriate meh so damn easileh! An ah can onleh excuse layin 'im low once, 'the first time' while pretendin ah didnah know he was a Prince ... Sweet Luna's Flanks if ah ever encounter that blowhard again it'll be too soon!"
The shocked expressions carried on for a few seconds longer before he realized what he'd just done and slumped suddenly and promtly face-hoofed, his voice regaining it's curlture but not quite loosing the edge of irritating memories "Ugh! Fuck! He's not even here and the annoyance he posed just made me snap at the mention of his name and talk about assaulting a prince!"
"Duuuuude.... You hit blueblood?"
"Hrm... yes... It's a good thing he's tougher than his behavior would imply, I knocked him clean into the wall and might have broken something if he wasn't fairly strong."
"Duuuude.... YOU KNOCKED BLUEBLOOD FOR A LOOP!!..... RARITY IS GOING TO LOVE YOU!"
well that was surprising, Twilight and Spike started snickering madly at the prince's expense, and Symphony couldn't help but grin at this "Heh, I think i'm going to like it here."
"Heh, don't get your hopes up, you still shouldn't go talking about that openly, Though I agree with spike, we just 'have' to see Rarity's face when you bring up knocking blue blood... probably at the party tonight so everypony can hear it at once."
"wait... oh no! Rarity's going to 'love' you!" All at once Spike's behavior made a complete U-turn and he was scowling at the Thestral like he'd just stolen from his hoard or something.
Symphony knew the signs, it was naturally part of training to have an idea of what an 'angry dragon' looks like, so you know when to run away... and this look told him he'd somehow stepped on a sensitive nerve without even actually trying to "Um... I'm going to take a wild guess and assume that Rarity is a pony that is especially 'important' to you spike... Hrm, I can't make promises about the future, I'm going to be 'myself' regardless of what anyone circumstance, Though I have no malicious intentions of coming between you and her."
He didn't seem too convinced by that, though one glance at Twilight's angry glare for him jumping to conclusions left him thoroughly cowed. "Uh, sorry dude, I've... Always had a crush on Rarity, even if we kinda can't actually be 'together', She's really important to me... I still get too protective of her sometimes."
"I... had a feeling... Honestly, the way you reacted, I had a feeling I could accurately understand what was going on... Someponies might take it as an insult to be called part of a Dragon's 'hoard', But nothing says that a hoard has be all inanimate objects... If Rarity is anything like I've heard, I imagine she treasures the fact that you'd be so protective of her... honestly, I think it's rather sweet, and I see no reason an apparently mature and protective dragon like yourself can't be in a relationship with a pony... Magic and love are both amazing forces in this world, and as far as I'm concerned, Something is only impossible if let yourself believe it to 'be' impossible."
Symphony seemed to be handling the 'aggressive dragon moment' surprisingly well, if the suddenly 're'shocked expressions were any hint "That said, If by some twist of fate I end up Attracting Rarity's attentions, I swear on my life I will treat her as she deserves... and honestly, If that comes to pass, I'm not afraid to share, look up 'herds' sometime... Love isn't something we should restrict with social norms or to fit the opinions of prissy nobles who believe their standards are superior to everypony elses... Love is as love is, and Love will do as it wishes with the hearts and minds of all who feel it."
He didn't particularly like when somepony acts frightened of him, though it was a reaction that he was undesirably familiar with... however, the contrasting reaction of surprise to a 'scary bat pony' wowing the mind with unexpected intellectual exposition... well, he couldn't help but smile with a bit of pride to find the both of them staring at him with complete befuddlement on their muzzles.
"Um... Twilight?... what's he talking about?"
"Um... oh, he mentioned 'herd'... It's an old Pony custom, though it's fallen waaay out of practice in recent centuries, and tends to be taken as 'unnatural' these days, kinda like 'filly foolers and colt cuddlers', but that is mostly because of, like he said, prissy nobles imposing their opinions on those they think are beneath them. It is not at all illegal nor is it morally wrong as long as those involves actually do love eachother... Simply put, it's just like a marriage, but with more than 2 individuals who love eachother, there's typically an 'alpha' in the relationship who's most responsible both for keeping order in the herd, as well as being charged with ensuring their safety."
"Oh... That's... huh, That doesn't actually sound too bad... I mean, right 'now' I can't see myself with a batpony, no offense dude"
"Of course... Oh, I hope I wasn't giving the feeling I had a plan or anything, I'm just being pragmatic, i think that's the word, and addressing the situation 'incase' it happens... I haven't personally met Rarity myself, though I have heard tell that her ability to balance 'beauty and noble air' with an Open mind and Generous disposition that is a complete opposite of most 'elite' is practically legendary... Hmhm, And honestly, if she has held the attention of a 'dragon' for years, I can only imagine such stories to be true... And if you've spent years thinking about her this way, I think it's safe to say you are way beyond a simple 'crush'."
"I... uh... Thanks dude... I'll.. Try not to over-react, ya know, if things do go a certain way... but... ya know-"
"Heheh, Actually, I find that a lot of emotions that are popularly considered to be 'wholy negative', are actually quite healthy to have in moderation and vital to true 'balance of self'... If you think about it, there's a bit of greed in any form of love, If you don't covet that which you love in 'some' way, what would drive you to feel it is so truely valuable and worth protecting? If there is 'no' greed in you at all, then you cannot feel something to be valuable to you, and i don't mean in the sense of monetaryily or material possessions... Hmhmhm, 'greed' and 'generosity' are another form of balance in the universe, and nothing says that they cannot go claw in hoof together."
Spike, while similarly awed to twilight at the out-pouring of rare wisdom, didn't seem to quite make out the directly related Euphamism to a Dragon, A species full of greed, and a Pony, specifically one full of generosity, having a relationship being a healthy 'balance'... But Twilight certainly did, and Symphony felt an odd sense of pride at seeing a seemingly proud and happy smile directed his way.
He waited a fair bit for the dragon to respond again, though it seemed his mind was currently locked on trying to process everything the Thestral had just described to him... Prompting Twilight to slip in "That's an impressive Philosophy there Symphony... Honestly, It'd be interesting to hear more, But we need to head out and handle introductions while we can"
"Oh! Yes, you're right, I have a nasty habit of losing track of time when i get philosophical, hmhm.... It was a pleasure to meet you spike." The Dragon barely let out an affirming grunt at the statement... boy, he was determined to understand all that talking that had taken place.
"Oh spiiike." Ping! he knew that tone and immediately looked to twilight "You know how things go with a new visitor to town don't you? Pinkie Pie Is inevitably going to throw a party... I'm thinking we'll set this one up as a small afair, just a handful of us, i get the feeling He'd appreciate a smaller get-together for his first time in ponyville... of course, that means Rarity is going to be there, and there won't be a whole swarm of ponies to distract heeerrr."
He got the hint immediately, lit up with a toothy grin and shot out the door all at once... presumably to help pinkie in preparing for the party... as if she needed it.
"Heheh, Ohhhh, Twilight, you are most definitely Celestia's Student..." This got a quizical look from her and Symphony simply smiled "Remember how I said nothing is truely 'perfectly evil'? The same goes for manipulation.... Most may not like the idea of manipulating their friends or loved ones, but it comes down to the fact that sometimes it's healthier to know how manipulate them in a 'good' way without causing them any harm in the process, as it is a slippery slope between percieved good and bad with such a skill... Hmhm, Celestia is pretty much 'the' misstress of 'good' manipulation."
More dumbfounded stare suddenly... maybe it was because he talked about Celestia that way, but with a little snicker and a light bump as he passed by he refocused her attention "Come on, lets handle these 'introductions'."
And they headed off into ponyville, carrying on an exciting day of ponies introducing themselves, or squeeling in shock when they saw 'him' before seeing twilight with him.
wings of Shadow - Chapter 2
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Unnammed HIE Story - Prologue - So I did the flop
'Oh this was gonna fucking hurt!'
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Perspective - Unknown Pony
"Ohhhh! This wasn't supposed to happen!"
I'd actually been listening for a while, a snicker finally giving me away ... Honestly, I thought i had to be imagining those familiar voices, or maybe lost in some dazed daydream from crashing on my face, I've never done that before so i didn't know if it was related. That, and the fact I felt like I was still in bed made me wonder if faceplanting in front of a familiar but supposedly 'ficticious' Library tree had been one of those wierd psycological dreams affected by things that are too frequently fresh in your memory.
Of course, Once I opened my eyes, and saw something I'd only ever imagined before it kindof busted that whole 'dream' theory... I mean, 'my' dreams always shatter as soon as i start to realize it's a dream... ALwAYS! seriously, it pisses me off! But here I was, laying in a no longer familiar bed, staring up at a brown wooden ceiling, book-shelves in the corners of my vision, and, while it all looked much more vivid and colorful than I'm used to, it looked far too 'real' to be a dream inspired by a flash animated cartoon!
This left me somewhere between instinctual freaking out, and bursting with pure joy... I mean, i was never one for especially cutesy stuff, I'm just open minded and all, but I 'have' often imagined ending up in another world, lots of different ones really, but this one was always pretty high on my list... I was so excited I 'must' have had a goofy grin under that fuzzy muzzle i now saw.
"YOU'RE AwAKE!, HI!"
It was obviously twilight's muzzle who popped up in front of my face, Enthusiastic about her 'potential victim' being okay, but close enough that I could see every little detail, if only for an instant before I launched myself away on reflex, crashing out of bed in a tangle of blanket. The shock and proximity left the image of her face embedded in my vision for a few seconds... Seriously, I could see every little hair of fur and mane and lavender... Huh, not as 'toony' as some might expect, something in my mind thought this world seemed more appealing with a 'realistic' element to it.
"Oh no! Are you alright?"
At that I popped back up, planting my own head on the bed and bursting out laughing like a madman, face clenched up in mirth for a moment before I started to shift around get the blanket loose. "Ohhh, hoho... Yes, Yes I'm fine Twilight... that was just the most fucking hilarious way to wake up I've ever experienced... not even the cat jumping on me was that funny... uh, what's with the face?"
She'd stopped half way around the bed on her way to help, looking with a confused expression... Oh look, 'now' i saw the wings, so it's 'princess' Twilight right now, I never did figure out how they measure time in Equestria, maybe they don't actually need to... I wonder how long after the alicornication this is. She also seemed moderately taller than I recalled, perhaps It's a few years 'after' the show currently.
"Um, how do you know my name already?"
"what, that? I've been awake for a couple of minutes, I heard spike say it, and i heard you say his name too, to head that off. And don't worry, I won't take it personally that you 'stomped on my face', Honestly, I think it was Karma messing up that spell you mentioned, I probably deserved a little Cranial Trauma by now, heheheh." I wasn't actually afraid to mention that there was a 'pony cartoon' where i'm from, but i figured I'd play along for now, I read enough entertaining little fics to know how to feign ignorance of such things... but i have always wanted to see a 'whut face' caused by revealing that kinda stuff.
This earned me a look of greater confusion, mixed with apology and furious blush all in one... I can't really describe how it looks, it's not one of those 'main-stream' facial expressions that everybody knows about... huh, should I say every'pony' now?... oh well, i quickly added on "And yes, I am quite healthy still, no brain damage or anything, at least none that I didn't potentially already have prior to face-planting on your door-step, so don't worry about having caused lasting damage... I'm surprised actually, pony skull's must be tougher than human skulls."
"whu... human? wow, I was aiming for somewhere I hadn't already been..."
"Huh? what, you mean the mirror world with humans? naw, there's more human universes out there than 'that'... more pony-verses too i'd imagine."
There it was! Oh GOD I've imagined seeing that face for so long! I couldn't help but howl with laughter while climbing my way back onto the bed... Her expression could only be described as 'Twilight Brain Error'... Her mouth was stretched open enough I swore i heard her jaw pop, eye's wide and twitching madly, ear's stiff enough I could imagine them creaking, and the most adorkable little squeeks and word pieces popping out while she tried to find her voice amidst the sea of shock... and to complete the look, spike off to the side rolling with laughter at her face, totally missing the fact that a 'new to this world' visitor had just mentioned another different world that only Twilight had visited.
I also took note that spike looked larger than in the show, more evidence of several extra years having passed.
"I... uh-whu-huh... ubbuh... huuuhhwHAT!!? How can you possibly know about that!? I only told the princesses and my Friends!... you'd have to have heard from someone on the other side of the mirror, or or, I don't know, it's not like you're a dimensional traveler with experience... are you?"
Yep, here I go... Another laughing fit... I was gagging on the laughing by now, threatening to make myself black out again from how hard it came out... It'd always been easy to make me laugh, i had to really 'try' not to do it enough to make it hurt sometimes. "Oh... OHHAHAHAHAHA!!!, OH THE LOOK ON YOUR FACE!!... I just... HOOOOOOOOOO" I had to stop laughing... i HAD TO!... Crap, too late! "GACK... HACK...AHUUFF" I broke into a coughing fit from laughing too much, ugh i hate when that hapens... her face tarted turning annoyed and a little concerned... 'Crap! I have to calm down and start talking normal! I don't want to tick her off and get sent back already!'
After a few more coughs and a half a dozen deep breaths, and more than a few laugh tears, I finally took a moment to actually answer "I am indeed, 'not' a dimensional traveler with any prior experience, this is my first... I 'do' however have a wildly active imagination, a dozen multiversal theories and dreams of my own, and of course ample supply of inspiring material to drive my imagination and logical deductions to mind blowing conclusions... Oh god it's true, you really are totally 'adorkable' when confused."
There was another blush! and it was soon bowled over by burning curiosity "That's... Fascinating! A 'different' different world... I wonder if my spell locked onto you for being someone more suitable for handling the experience without freaking out. You know... you're really taking this way better than I ever expected... i mean, I expected interdimensional travel to be Stressful, nevermind waking up in a different body... This really is totally backwards from my preconceptions."
"Oh, that's cause I've imagined stuff like this before, about 'other' other worlds too. Being turned into a pony is hardly a new concept to me 'mentally', even if i've never actually experienced it before, I've imagined and read about it enough to be way more prepared than 'normal' people."
I could see the gears turning in her head, slowing to a grinding halt as they stopped working, along with the occasional sudden twitcha, I imagined for myself what she might be thinking 'wait... imagined... Read about it?... READ!?... I DON'T EVEN HAVE BOOKS ABOUT 'THAT!' and I have access to 'forbidden' books nopony is supposed to know even exist!... I... how could... just... *click... Ffffzzzzzz*'
"Okay, that's unexpected! did I break her?"
She'd just... stopped suddenly... Maybe i really did break her... this would be funnier if I wasn't still riding the crash of coming down from a previous laughing fit... She was staring off into space and not so much as twitching anymore... I sure 'thought' it'd be hilarious.
"woah! dude, I've never seen anybody actually 'do' that before! I mean, The pinkie sense thing was the most un'logical' thing she'd faced as far as I remember tell and even that didn't make her 'short out'."
She 'was' shorting out too, not like, 'actually a robot' shorting out, that'd be a bit dumb, as adorable as Sweetiebot happens to be, but her horn was shooting sparks occasionally like her brain was overloading... with the conversation suddenly slamming to a stand-still a thought hit me and I looked to the not entirely 'little' dragon "Hey spike, do you happen to have a mirror?"
"Huh? oh, yeah, Normally twilight just 'summons' one though, so I don't know where she keeps it anymore... there's one in the bathroom over there." He pointed to a slightly opened door at the back of the bedroom.
"Cool, thanks, I'm gonna get a proper look at myself while she's processing that I just told her there's reading material on ponies in my world, hahah."
"Hey, what about dragons?"
"Yeah, them too, Granted, not a 'lot' about Equestria's Dragons, Though there's Buck-tons of Material on other types of dragons, different worlds, so on and so forth, Dragon's have been famous in human culture more than any other creature far as I can tell." Heheh, That put a gale-force wind in his sails suddenly, heh, dragon pride, I remember that feeling.
I slipped from the bed, Carefully spreading out to balance on 4... hooves... to think I used to absolutely hate hooves, then ponies came along... freakin magical even across different dimensions, made me open my mind and accept all kinds of stuff... 'Alright, lets walk... canter?... trot? I never did look up the difference!' This made me giggle a bit as I took a step.
I promptly fell forward and face planted on the wooden floor "OOF!"
"PFffhahah, You okay man?"
"Yeah, yeah I'm okay, I fell out of the sky ya know, a little face plant isn't gonna be a big deal." I righted myself and took another couple of steps.
POw! "Ouch!" and did it 'again'... welp, I'm nothing if not Tenacious when I want something, so I tried again.
After another half a dozen face plants, thankfully i started getting used to avoiding my 'face' at least, and being much closer to the bathroom i just broke out giggling madly, Spike of course was rolling on the floor again "Geez man! Are you 'sure' your okay? I mean... I know it's a new body and all, but just, wow... It's hilarious!... no offense."
"Nah, nah, it's fine, I think this is probably Karma too... I used to really get a kick out of blooper videos and stuff." The laughter slowed with a confused look thrown in "Uh, things that show off mistakes people made while creating something... There's a LOT of scenes of people falling on their faces, asses, or just planting into the ground in general... It sounds a bit cruel to laugh at it, but they only use 'harmless accidents', nothing that'd actually be really 'cruel' to make fun of, if they did, nobody'd watch em... But this... this just reminds me of something I watched just last week, called 'the flop'... Heheh, I feel like i'm in the flop video suddenly."
I sniggered madly for a moment before climbing back to my hooves, trying to take it more seriously... I'd read enough to know it's not supposed to be easy, though I always found it strange that people turned ponies managed to 're-perfect' walking in just a day, or hell, minutes sometimes... I mean, I'd imagined some of how the legs work, observed enough, I had a good idea, but I wouldn't expect to be stable anytime so soon... then again, magic, instincts, who the hell can tell with ponies?!
I took the next motions slower this time, keeping 3 hooves on the floor for balance as I moved bit by bit "Ah, there we go... Slow and steady." I mumbled to myself verbally as I started a steady, if embarassingly slow, walking... Cantering? I think that's the pony version of walking right?... 'why the fuck would they name their capital the equivalent of 'walk a lot' but with a horse pun?'
Before long I managed to find myself before the bathroom Mirror "Oh... Niiice." I liked what I saw... hey, not in that way!... althoouuugh... Nevermind, i'll leave that to my imagination next time I'm alone! "Okay, lets see here."
I went into a 'check-list style once over' that could've made Twilight Proud.
"Okay, Fur, white, check... huh, i prefer black" I took note that I seemed a bit tall for the mirror, so i could assume I was likely noticeably taller than twilight at least, I wasn't 'huge' but was definitely a 'stallion' "... Mane, black, and red?... oooh, 2 tone, I liiiike." My mane was actually quite long, I always liked the 'mane' look, I could pull it off even as a human, and it actually looked more fitting with all that hair spilling around the shoulders of a pony, the hairs seemed to be a deep red up to the half way point, where they faded into black for the rest of the length... I couldn't help myself, I waggled my eyebrows at myself in the mirror and burst out laughing.
"Moving on, Tail, same as mane, Could probably use some grooming, but i 'did' just spend 5 minutes falling on my face... Huh, I wonder" while I was looking 'back there' i decided to check something else, and whistled suddenly "Ooohhh, Impressive, I always wanted... wait, i shouldn't talk bout that out loud." I quickly shifted my focus else-where "... Cutie mark... huh, would it be more 'manly' to say butt brand? nah, sounds more 'frat boyish' to me ... heh, hearing that the first time was hilarious... anyway... no check... oh crap, I'm gonna have to deal with the CMC... maybe I can hide it with saddlebags or a cloak of something... I 'have' always liked playing mysterious... ah, moving on... Eyes, Ice lbue, check."
I just realized something... too many people associated 'black and red' with mary sueing, crap!... wait... why was I thinking about that now? I shouldn't even give a shit, i'm in a different world and those pansy ass internet jockies can't do shit about it! Yeah, that's how much value your opinions 'really' have!... besides, I like Black and red colors! they're my favorite... it's not like I showed up as an alicorn... wait, the check-list! "wings?... no check, okay." Cool, so no 'sue-icorn'... oh god, don't let me turn into one while i'm here!, I mean, being an alicorn could be cool and all, what with the extra magic and such, but, I don't want everything to turn into 'sir this' and 'your highness' that or getting to a point I can just 'do shit with a thought'... being immortal would be fucking awesome though! even with the nasty bits... ahhh, pros and cons.
"okay, last, horn... check, pointy and dangerous, i like... wait... horn... Equals magic... I can do magic... I... Can do... Magic... MAGIC, FUCKING MAGIC, I CAN DO MAGIC!" It was a realization that struck as suddenly as a train, I'd always adored magic and, odd as it might be to have a horn growing out of my skull, I realized I could do freakin MAGIC now! I could just kiss twilight!... i might have... I hadn't whirled to side in the excitement to run back into the bedroom chanting my excitement, only to slam said horn into the wall next to the door-frame, immediately lodging myself in the wood and earning a momentarily paralyzing spike of pain through my skull "UGH, GYAAAHAHAHAHHAAAA, OUCH!... FUCK!, These things 'ARE' sensitive!... Owwww owowowow! That hurt more than slamming my face into the ground!"
This brought spike sprinting into the bathroom, and immediately bursting out laughing again "Oh hahah, i get it okay? I'm new to this stuff... I totally forgot that having a horn on my head meant I'd have to remember that I now have a foot long pointy protrusion growing out of my fore-head to worry about... Could you just... ya know, give me a tug? It's kinda stuck... I don't even know how i'm actually stuck!" By now I had my front hooves on the wall and was pushing away with no success.
"Oh, that's probably one of Twilight's Reinforcement Enchantment... It probably regrew around your horn while you were distracted with the pain... here." I had actually expected something similar to tail pulling, instead he stood up and wrapped his claws around my head... ooh, look at that, a close up of adolescent dragon claws, note to self, don't piss off spike... And suddenly pulled, the direction a bit different than I'd been trying, and my horn popped right out "There ya go, we've actually had a couple other Unicorns get stuck like that before, Turns out the 'normal pulling' doesn't work so well since it's note centered with the horn, it kinda acts like an anchor and traps ya... works nicely for trapping intruders, heheh."
I, of course, fell flat on my rump with a thump and brought a hoof up to gingerly rub my horn, trying to sooth the ache "Ack, that hurts... Heh, you're a smart guy spike, The vast majority of people I've known up until now would've just completely glazed over trying to think about so much as 'wall regrowing', hahah."
"Heh, thanks... I'm gonna check on Twilight... She's smart, but she has a habit of flipping out if she spaces out and suddenly comes back to find herself alone." Heh, he didn't even blush about getting a compliment, yep, i definatelymust be a few years ahead, he seems a lot closer to grown up... A quick exploratory glance gave me an estimate of being roughly my height standing up.
"Yeah, that's probably a good idea... am I gonna hafta put her in the bed?"
"Nah, I'll carry her downstairs, you're probably hungry after being out for a couple hours, right?"
"Huh, ya know, i wasn't thinking about it, but sure, i could go for that."
"Yeah, then it'll be best if she wakes back up down there, I can fix up some breakfast for us all... think you can handle stairs?"
"well, I handled the ground, so i can probably handle crashing down some stairs, hahah."
"Heh, nice one, we can always use another pony with a sense of humor around here... just don't 'really' hurt your self... you're wierd too, normally it'd only be an earth pony taking a fall with no obvious harm... think it's cause you're formerly 'human'?"
"Hmmm, possibly... i mean, wierder shit has happened! and I was already pretty wierd for a human, tougher than I looked, among other things... hmmm, I'll have to look into my 'wierdness' being intact later."
"I don't think ya have ta worry there buddy, you seem pretty wierd to me already."
A moment later He toddled on over to twilight and hefted her up onto one shoulder... come to think of it, the comparison was much more obvious, she was definitely taller, though spike had a few inches in up-right height at least, she also seemed a bit more sleek... nevertheless, she was still light enough for spike to heft along with mild effort, and surprisingly stiff in her brain blasted stupor.
Oddly enough, noting Twilight's differing proportions to the show made me wonder about the possibilities of other differences... specifically my mind wandered onto Celestia, I'd always thought a bit of a 'motherly proportion' fit her personality more... It's not having a little weight on somepony automatically meant they can't be graceful and beautiful too.
"Oh jeez, I hope I don't slip and get my horn stuck in the 'floor' this time... hey wait, dude, i'm walkin already! ACK!" As soon as i started to think about my face slammed into the floor with a thud "Ugh... nevermind... maybe i should crawl down the stairs and worry about walking while waitin for ya to finish cooking."
"Careful, i might get the camera and collect some comedy material for later."
"Hah, you do that buddy!"
A couple of moments later I had dragged myself to the top of the stairs that lead down, spike waiting at the bottom, having deposited twilight on a couch, eager to see what kindof spill might come next... so was i actually, this was fun so far, being harder to hurt, so I took a step. "Oh fuck..."
I under-estimated the distance, tipped my hoof, moved my balance too far forward, and proceeded to face plant on the next step down... or... not... wait, what?
I actually caught myself with both fore-hooves, preventing a face plant while my rear still rose up in the air from the moment, up and over my head, threatening to turn me over on my back, so i pushed a little 'god that was stupid!'
Or so I thought, somehow i got lucky and the momentum whirled me around for my hind hooves to land half a dozen steps down, that same momentum still carrying me back over and down until I rebounded off the wall, changing directions, and pushing off again, back flipping to land on the flat floor at the bottom of the steps... sharing a mirrored look of dumbfounded shock with Spike "How the hell did I DO THAT!?"
"I DON'T KNOw, But it was 'COOL'! like... a ninja thing... PFFF, HAHAHAHA!" I'd landed and was shaking a little from unexpected physical success, then my legs went noodle on me suddenly and I did indeed 'do the flop', joining the laughter myself.
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About 10 minutes later, which I spent most of Cantering about, introducing the book shelves and carpet to my face, and the table once, but steadily improving my walking experience... I managed some believable facsimile of a natural 'canter' before twilight suddenly sprung back to concious thought with a resounding "wHAT THE BUCK!?" Leading to me slipping up and face-planting into the side of the couch she was standing on, returning to my hooves, while backing away, with all of the grace of somepony who has spent half an hour falling on their face and gained lots of experience getting back up!
"Oh, hi Twilight, welcome back!"
She whirled about on the couch, not so much as stumbling and an instant later 'appeared' infront of me nose to nose, mysteriously seeming 'angry' about something "You! How could you have 'read' about humans turning into ponies? Even 'I' don't have access to books like that! And I have access to EVERY book that even EXISTS"
Not missing a beat, I answered "In Equestria"
She seized up suddenly "say what?"
"In... Eques...Tria... Twilight, I had no idea you never got over that little 'short circuit' thing that happens when you can't understand something... we 'were' talking about different worlds, yeah? and me 'being' from another one? right? well, obviously, you have access to every book in 'Equestria', but not in my world... Oh, hohoho... there's enough reading material there to keep you busy for a millenium at least! OOF!"
I was suddenly bowled over, finding myself on my back staring into the frantic eyes of a purple alicorn, wings flared, practically drooling at the implication I made as she almost snarled out, non threateningly honestly "SHOOOwwww MMMMEEEEEEE!!!!"
This was the moment Spike chose to come in and check on the 'twilight freak out' and found the compromising position we were in "Jeez twilight, I know you don't get much but at least let the guy learn how to walk right before you jump his bit."
Oh thank celestia, he pulled her attention away from me, though from the sudden look of apologetic horror on his face I wasn't sure if that was a good thing, and he added on "Uh... Breakfast is ready!" and he bolted back into the kitchen... I took her momentary distraction as my chance and used both fore-hooves to shove against her barrel, sending her into the air a few feet, leading to reflexive wing flapping that gave me enough room to skitter back and get myself back to standing, soon an angry and embarassed expression turning back to me... holy crap, dat blush.
"Twilight, slow ya roll girl! I 'can't' show you, I don't even know how to use magic yet, 'you' brought 'me' here, remember? and most of what I read is considered 'fan fiction', It's stuff made up by some of billions of humans on my world... of course, I take it as the 'science of group logic', If enough people come up with similar experiences, then it's something worth keeping in mind, and so far that method has worked! I got turned into a pony in a different world and didn't freak out! infact, You freaked out because I 'didn't' freak out! I'm not sure if that is awesome or if I should be worried... beyond that, most of those stories are 'digital' so i can't bring em here anyway, unless of course you invent some spell that can connect the internet across dimensions... don't ask right now, I'm in no state to explain the complex electronic and digital constructs that make up our global communication network... I am very hungry now and would like to find out what pony food tastes like to ponies, i've never been much of a vegetarian but I'm more than willing to adapt for the sake of not freaking anypony out."
with that bombardment of information taking time to be processed again, I sauntered on by twilight, even adding a bit of skip in my step, and headed into the kitchen, promptly face planting on the floor "HEY SPIKE!, I MADE IT A DOZEN STEPS THIS TIME! SKIPPING TOO!"
"NICE!"
After a moment of rest, this was a 'tiled' kitchen floor, so 'ow'er, I worked my way back to standing and used a more leisurely pace to park myself at the edge of the table and wait for spike to server up the grub... It's not like I knew how to do it myself yet, I only have hooves at my disposal right now!
Soon steaming bowls were dished out on the table, It looked like some kind of soup with numerous white and orange chunks in it. "Since you don't know how to use magic yet, and you're still clumsy with hooves still, I figured I'd go with soup so you can drink it without having to fumble with the food... It's potato and carrot, a bit of onion and just a dash of 'special sauce'... I still don't know why, but twilight loves the stuff so i figured I'd head right off and see if the same applied to you." Of course, spike's own soup was decorated with some varyingly small and different colored gems... something caught my eye but i decided to rush right into the soup so I wouldn't have second thoughts... I wasn't joking when i said I'd have to 'adapt', as a human, vegi's actually made me ill to eat too often.
Interestingly enough, it seems the instinctual physical adaptation of being in a pony body worked wonders for making it an appetizing meal, as I leaned down and carefully tipped the bowl a bit so I could sip from the edge without having to 'dog it', completely ignoring how hot it was "wow! I never knew vegi's could be so good!... where i'm from, they tend to take a back-seat to just about everything else.
"woah, dude, that stuff was fresh! you're not even a dragon... that didn't burn at all?"
"Heh, nah, close though, but I've been trying to acclimate myself to eating hot food for a while... OH!, I LOVE 'SPICY'!"
"Oh, Cool... and thanks, I like when somepony compliments my cooking." Ohhhh, lookit thaaat! there's the 'puffing out' I recognize from the show, seems his pride in cooking is certainly intact. "Say, the way you talk about Vegi's... Does that mean there's not that many on 'your' world?"
"Oh, nono, there's 'plenty'... I just always preffered meat, nuts, and dairy... they always said it was unhealthy to focus on just that, but seriously, And I'm exagerating here, I just couldn't stomach large ammounts of Vegitables in my diet, it 'seriously' had a habit of making me feel sick, not even that they tasted 'bad' or anything... hell, Cellery tasted like juicy Pecan nuts to me!... but yeah, no worries, with a new body i don't think I'm going to have a problem adapting... though, if there's a griffon place in town I wouldn't mind experimenting, I do like to use variety."
"woah... yeah, you are totally going to be the new 'wierd new guy' in town... you'll probably wanna keep that meat thing to yourself as long as possible though, I mean, I'm a dragon so... ya know, but a lot of normal ponies will get bad ideas if it's too obvious."
"Heh, I can imagine dude... I'll try, i mean, I usually work at being concious of what's 'intelligent to conceal', but at the same time, it's in my nature to just not give a shit about public opinion unless I 'know it'll come back to bite me in the ass."
That was about the time Twilight suddenly wandered into the kitchen derailing that line of conversation, possibly out of vegitarian courtesy, seeming a bit dazed, found a seat at the table, and looked to me "Sooo, basicly, I can't get those books?"
as if I hadn't even stopped the earlier conversation in the other room, I slid right back into explaining on that subject. "Nope, they're digital, as in, not 'physical' books... i mean, i could save them to something portable that might work here, but i'd have to experiment first to see if our electronic constructs are compatible with your type of electricity, ya know? otherwise battery power will only last a few hours and that can't possible be enough for 'you' ... I mean, i can get ahold of 'books' fine, but there's a good chance most will have content you've already read... most new stuff these days is created on the internet."
"Huh... I see... well, that aside, would you mind answering some questions? I was kindof hoping to learn something about another world, even if I already know about humans, you did say it was a 'different' human world... I'd still like to know how you know that."
"Yeah, i don't mind answering some questions, but honestly, i'm giddy to finish perfecting 'walking' and do a bit of looking around, maybe try a bit of learning basic magic... OOH!, there we go... we can trade, Help me learning magic and I'll trade by anwering questions!"
She brightened up a 'lot' very suddenly "That's a good idea! ... I was kindof worried you might be mad or something about being dragged out of your world... I kindof thought about passing it off as a lucid dream before sending the 'visitor' back, but you're taking to it so well I don't think I have to worry about that."
"Heh, yeah, it is a bit invasive to suddenly snatch me out of my world like that, but I'm not complaining... I don't like my world anyway... It's hard to get by in life without having to be some kind of cruel for your own benefit... I'll explain that later too... I don't want to think about it right now... honestly, I'd really rather enjoy a day away, some 'real' 'peace', ya know?"
"hmhm, that's okay, I can wait, not like you're gonna suddenly run away and hide in a cave or something, or turn out to be a changeling... My friends would probably enjoy meeting you anyway."
"yes, that would be a fun way to see the town... also, just for fun since i've always wanted to test this! ... I predict a Pinkie Pie Party Invitation in approximately 73.5 Minutes!"
"Hahah, you can't predict pinkie pie... it's just not possible... wait, how do you know about - Riiight, explain that later... Maybe I should organize everypony together for dinner and you can share some stories about your world with the whole group!... If that's not an issue of course."
"Oh no, I wouldn't mind that at all... I warn you though, I am 'extremely' easy going when it comes to some things, I may accidentally answer a question with something you might consider disturbing that I got over being bothered by ages ago. ya know, numb from exposure and such."
"Um... I'm not sure what to think about that actually... I'd rather not 'scar' anypony with terrible details... then again, it won't help much to ignore those details, if they're there, they could be important to know too... UGH! I hate conundrums! And Fluttershy could very well seize up from hearing about it if it's bad enough... is it really that bad?"
"Eh, it can be, I mean, earth isn't 'always' a bundle of psychotic mind-fuck, But there's a lot more cut-throat survival stuff out there than anyone wants to admit... way too much value in 'appearances' too... honestly, if even a 'tiny' fraction of what I 'think' i know about Equestria is true, I can honestly say that I am far more excited to be 'here' than 'there'."
"well, I hope you're happy with Equestria, i mean, i didn't plan on summoning a permanent resident or anything, but, things change, ya know? oh, and another things... you're language, you're awfully, er, 'out there' with it."
"Oh yeah, well, back on earth, you'd have trouble goin for a walk down even an abandoned street without hearing somebody cursing... I honestly don't get why the words are taken so hard, Their just words, they have a specific meaning, if it's not being said in a directly insulting manner, I don't give 2 shits about what's being spoken... As far as I'm concerned, calling someone a 'bitch' is absolutely equal in meaning to calling someone a 'son of a dog', because they 'are' the same... that, and I've been around it so long It just 'happens' without thinking."
"Um... yeah, I can see where you're coming from... i guess-"
"Don't worry, i can 'clean it up' some if you like... I prefer to just 'be me' but I try to be accepting of the preferences of others, if I can help it at least... I'll still probably slip up sometimes though, I mean, I've been loose tongued for over a decade, it's pretty hard to stop cold turkey."
"I understand, As long as you try I don't think anypony should really have a big issue, unless you directly insult somepony... or talk like that in-front of foals, or the princesses... er, 'other' princesses."
"Right, Think about who i'm talking to, and don't fuck up in-front of foals or royalty."
"... well, I'll take what I can get, so now what?"
"Now? Now I say we oughta get walkin, the sun's up, the day is young, and I've got a 'real' ponyville to see!"
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Unammed HIE Story - Chapter 1 - Meeting Ponies
After spending about 20 or so minutes scarfing down breakfast, and a visit to the bathroom, we were ready to head out.
I was just about to the door when Twilight appeared in front of me suddenly, blasted teleporting, I wonder if I can pull that off sometime. "wAIT! I almost forgot! I mean seriously, I can't believe I forgot something so important... what's your name? and what are you going to go by as a pony, ya know, if you intend to use a different one?"
After the initial Flinch, I did another one... i could hardly believe 'I'd' forgotten to introduce myself too. "Crap! You're right! Hrm, as a human, My name is Sean, S-e-a-n, it's an irish pronunciation I think, I'll explain irish later too! I normally went by 'Shoryu' though, it was sort of a chosen name from a different culture that just 'fit'... In pony stuff, I also went by 'TheBlackPony'... very anonymous... I think... Lets go with 'Midnight Light'... I always liked that name for a pony."
"wow, that's a lot of names... also, you're white"
"I know, i have more but their secondary... And yes, I am, I am 'white' like the 'light' of 'midnight'... Moonlight... see, look closer." I grinned and held up a hoof to look closer at... it was a very slightly blue-ish white, that resembled the color of a full moon.
"ohhhh, I gotcha, ingenius... okay, we'll go with that, I'll just call you midnight."
Official Perspective - Midnight Light, The Oddball Human Turned Unicorn
"I was about to suggest exactly that, now then-*Knock Knock*-Bloody Hell!" I was inches from discovering that I don't know how to grasp door-knobs with hooves yet when somepony else knocked.
A moment later I heard "Twi? Ya alraght in ther? who's shoutin?" a bit of suspicion and worry in the tone.
"Okay Twilight, I think i have a better idea of what 'slip of the tongue' can cause... Oh god, I'm not looking forward to what might shoot from my mouth when Pinkie inevitably 'appears' next to me."
Twilight didn't skip a beat though and hopped forward to pull the door open to reveal a familiar orange farm-pony, wearing an equally familiar stetson, which funny enough i only know is called a stetson from reading about 'her' specifically, and also wearing a not so familiar Neck-tie done up slightly fancy-ish... that's odd. "Sorry Aj! we were literally about a second from heading out, you just startled Midnight with your timing."
"Ohhh, Mighty sorry bout that... who's Midnight?"
I appeared next to Twilight in the door and gave an obvious wave "That'd be me Jackie." Crap!
She looked indignant suddenly "... Nice ta meetcha, but the names Applejack."
"Sorry, i know, It was a slip, heh, i have some 'loose tongue' issues I need to work on, heheh."
"Riiiiight... Twahlight, who is this guy?"
"Oh, um... you remember that thing I mentioned that I was going to try for various scientific and historical reasons as a way to expand my field of study and keep my mind occupied with things that didn't involve dangerous experiments?"
I chimed in suddenly "wait, Dangerous Experiments? like what? I like experiments, long as they're not cruel."
"Uh, yeah I 'member.... wait, this is him? I thought you were gonna-"
"Yeah, I 'was' trying that, and it worked, just, turned him into a pony first... not sure why, it also dropped him face first on my door-step... I was just about to show him around town to settle a bit, then worry about questions later... he doesn't seem in a big hurry to go back, so I figured we have time... I was also considering getting the girls together for dinner where we can 'all' talk about it some, handle introductions too, since I 'know' that's the way it's going to go before long."
"sounds like that hurt, but i don't see any teeth layin around so it musta worked out... Hmmm, I can go find fluttershy, that oughta save ya a couple long trips before dinner to visit her and the farm, she can probably get Rainbow for us, less she drops in on ya while yer out 'n about."
"That's a good idea Aj! I could easily make room on the schedule for lunch and a bit of chatting, maybe introduce him to the mayor or something."
That got my attention suddenly "wait, when did you make a schedule? You were 'brain busted' for most of the time since I got here!"
"Oh please, the better question is when do I 'not' make a schedule" She quickly floated a rolled up piece of paper from her saddlebags... wait... wHEN DID THOSE GET THERE!?... Damn, I knew this girl was efficient but... just, damn. "See?" She quickly unrolled it and floated it in a position for me to get a look "I can move fluttershy to later tonight, we could encounter Rainbow at just about 'any' time, we're handling AJ now, and make room for lunch and other useful introductions... Then we can handle Rarity, check in with the mayor, you'll need to know her anyway if you 'do' decide you wanna stay. Meet with the Local Guard Lieutenant, mostly to make sure they know you're name and face so nopony who doesn't know you yet over-reacts about a stranger being around and sics the guard on you... Ugh, I still hate having to consider it, but being a stranger following a princess around'll get a lot of unwanted suspicion from 'some' ponies... and, well, you know."
"I can imagine at least... I don't like being the recipient of uncomfortable praise either... honestly, sometimes it feels insulting to be praised for something that wasn't all that special to be able to do, granted, turning into an alicorn and becoming a princess is a lot more 'special' than anything I've done, you'd think you have the authority to decide 'not' to get that inherent praise for every little thing, that about right?"
"Y-yeah, exactly right actually... that imagination of yours again?"
"Yeah, pretty much... so." I made a little motion towards applejack to redirect the conversation that way.
"OH!, Right, official introduction time! Applejack, This is Midnight Light, source of information about his home universe and the humans in it, freshly minted Unicorn, and 'temporary' guest resident of the Golden Oaks Library... Midnight, This is Applejack -"
"Hold on, let me try this real quick" There was a moment of surprise when I'd interupted "Applejack, Current Co-proprietor of Sweet apple acres, Bearer of the Element of Honesty, Big and little sister at the same time, walking Lie detector, and probably the 4th to last pony you'd want to annoy into bucking your face, Only behind Big mac, and Princesses Celestia and Luna... am I close?"
God i love those looks... both had totally dumbfounded expressions on their faces, though applejack's had a fair bit of pride slipping through. "Yah... that's exactly right, heh, hate to admit not being the 'best' bucker, but Mac's plain scary if'n ya make 'im angry, so i'm fine takin back-seat there."
"Oh, i can imagine... quick question, and I'm not 'implying' anything, it's just a possibility I heard about and I thought I'd check on... does he turn 'amazing' if he gets drunk?" Oh, that got a bit of reluctant irritation to show.
"Ugh... yes, he does... He tends t'get hi'self hurt too! But-"
"Ah, don't worry, like I said, i'm not implying a drinking problem or something... lets just say I'm a fan of the 'drunken master' style awesomeness... Even though I've never drank anything alcoholic in my life, and i'm quite certain that if I did now, I'd probably try some spell I shouldn't and end up making it back fire and blow up the bar... that'd be just my luck."
Perhaps it seemed like I was getting into wierd territory, or just a desire to push the schedule a bit, but Twilight suddenly jumped back in the middle of the conversation "Hrm, So, AJ, what brings you by suddenly?"
"Oh, Raht! ah was on mah way to a business thing... ugh, I really wish ah didn't need ta, but the apple business is 'still' gettin bigger... I never imagined some fancy pony actually 'liking' mah apple recipes would dump so much fresh work on me, I suddenly gotten work on expanding or... BAH! I don't want no fancy business pony tryin to mess with mah farm, but It's getting 'too' big and I gotta try 'somethin' before we get to that point a 'too much demand and not 'nough supply'... the Meetin's about an hour off still, best to be early... S'why i got this... 'tie'... Ugh, i hate dressy stuff, but so many blasted city ponies won't take ya seriously les' ya at least 'try' and fancy up."
I interjected suddenly "I actually think it seems to fit you, It's not froofy, or excessively fancy, and I could totally see it fitting a cowpony stuck dealin with business stuff."
"Heh, that's mighty nice a ya... Anyway, ah was on my way, headin for the town hall, seemed as good a place as any when we set the meetin up, and outta nowhere pinkie pie appears, bein pinkie pie, and says ah oughta come to the library and borrow a book about business stuff before I go... ah I get the feeling that it's no coincidence I'm also meeting your new friend here at the same time."
"I wouldn't be surprised... from what I know of pinkie, she practically embodies the old saying 'Expect the unexpected'."
"wait, whatcha think you know bout 'pinkie'? Nopony can 'know' pinkie pie."
"Heheh, AJ, He actually acted like he could predict pinkie pie earlier! He predicted a 'pinkie pie party invitation in 7-' oh wait, it's more like 52 Minutes now"
"Hahah, good luck there Midnight, I don't think anypony has ever pulled that off."
"Heh, well i'm not seriously expecting to succeed, but it never hurt no-pony to try... well, except twilight that one time she tried to scientifically explain 'pinkie sense'... then ended up going 'leeroy' on that hydra."
"wait whut? How does he-"
"don't ask AJ... Right now, i'm feeling a bit of 'pinkie' in this one... he says he'll explain later at dinner... aaaanywaaay! go on in, spike's keepin an eye on the library, he can show you where the business books are."
"Um... rahhhgt... Thanks Twi, I'll see ya later tonight, or maybe at Town hall if yer timin hits homes."
"Heheh, sure thing applejack, see ya soon!"
And like that we were off into ponyville... finally...
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we engaged in fairly idle chatter as we walked, drawing some friendly waves and curious stares, broken up a bit by some comical stumbling and my occasional face-plant earning giggles from twilight. I kept fairly frequent attention on the houses we passed, noting what I personally would call a 'medieval yet prettified' style of wooden construction with Thatched rooves, and like everything else so far they looked a lot less cartoony than one might think from simply watching a TV show.
Ironically, it wasn't Twilight who broke out the first tangeant... we had barely spent 5 minutes making our way towards Rarity's before 'I' stopped first, staring at a certain house that seemed 'close' to similar to the rest, but was certainly larger and had the noticeable sign that it was placed farther away from the rest of them... it 'felt' familiar for some reason.
"Um... midnight? Iiiis something wrong with that house?"
"Mmm, I'm not sure... it just feels strangely familiar... hang on." I plopped for a moment, stared a few seconds longer, then closed my eyes and started to think for a moment...
...
...
"Um... Midnight?"
...
"Hrm, we should-"
I love surprising ponies, they make sure adorable 'shocked' faces "Twilight, does that house belong to Vinyl Scratch and Octavia?" I took the sudden dumbfoundedly shocked expression as confirmation "HAH!, that's where I recognize it from... Hang on just a bit, I need to check something, I'll try not to take too long!" And like that I was off suddenly, and after a few seconds a certain lavender princess snapped back to her senses and sprinted off behind me... nearly tripping when my rush suddenly found me skidding to a stop on my face "Ah shit! I hurried too hard!"
"Midnight! what in Equestria are you in such a hurry for?"
I quickly climbed back to my hooves for maybe the 50th time this morning, and started towards the house again, at a much more tame pace of course "I just remembered something Related to Vinyl that in turn reminded me of a freaking awesome thing I've always wanted to do... and it's going to drive me insane if I don't check and see if It 's real or just speculation."
I arrived at the door just intime to hear a suspicious hum building up on the other side, and it took no kind of genius to know exactly what that meant was coming next 'anywhere' that Vinyl Scratch was involved "Crap, no time!" in an instant one of my hooves knocked furiously at the door... the sound didn't stop... and after a couple of seconds...
the door opened to reveal a very familiar white Unicorn, her awesome shades, and Totally Crazy electric blue mane, for just a moment I swore I interpreted a bemused expression when she saw her warm up had been interupted by a stranger, then relaxed an instant later as she noticed one of only a handful of locals more famous than herself "Oh! Hey Twilight, what's up? who's this?" Oh cool, I always liked the slightly tomboyish version of voice, over the ones that just sounded like prissy teenagers failing to be epic.
Twilight however, most assuredly looked a little annoyed from the sudden detour, but she sucked it up and played along anyway "Good Morning Vinyl, Not much, just showing a new pony around town and he just 'suddenly' came running over here... This is Midnight Light, he's... 'visiting', from somehere far away" I couldn't help but roll my eyes a little... I'd read a few stories where that was the first thing that comes up as an explanation, so I decided to test out the 'vinyl personality' and fluster Twilight again.
just as Vinyl's focus returned to 'me' I held out a hoof with a slightly manic grin "Indeed, Midnight Light, Visitor from another world, Human turned pony, and knower of things that make Twilight's Eye's bug out trying to figure out how the hell I know them!" A Moment later the DJ Burst out laughing and with a quick glance I found out that my description of Twilight's reaction was almost perfectly accurate, though there was just a bit of teeth grating.
"Oh! HAHAHAHHAHAHA!, Oh, Holy Hay, Middy, You're a kicker... and if it wasn't for Twilight standing next to you I'd think you're insane, But seriously... wierd stuff happens around her, so I can totally buy that... what brings ya here though?"
"Oh, I'm just a big fan of your music, You're actually the only reason I like dubstep... er, dub'trot'... do you call it that here?"
"Yeah, Trot, Guessing you got something similar?"
"Yeah, thought honestly, Humans fucking Suck at it! I mean damn, I thought Death Metal was bad... If it weren't for being relatable to Jumpstyle and Hardstyle I'd never even bother looking at it."
"Oh sweet Celestia, YES! Somepony else around that appreciates me!" In a totally expectable display of Vinyl Scratch informal invasion of personal space, she threw her fore-legs around my neck in a deliberately over-dramatic display of joking affection for a couple of seconds before hopping back, Busting a gut yet again.
"HAHAH!, I know right? Toomany ponies look poorly on 'different' musical talents... Of course, I have to admit there was a bit of a personal idea that inspired me to interupt Twilight's schedule."
"Ya? what's that?"
"I wanted to see if something I'd heard back home might be true..." I waited a dramatic moment before leaning in and talking in a quieter slightly conspiratorial tone "Are you really designing a set of recording/playing devices that can turn musical information from somepony's head directly into sound and visuals?"
Every moment I continued that line i saw bit by bit more and more shock spreading across her features... then suddenly I found myself jerked inside and the door slammed in-front of Twilight. I soon found myself on the floor again, momentarily considering the possibility that there might be a running gag about me innocently ending up under a lot of different mares today. "How do you know about that!? I've been really careful so nopony can steal it!"
I gave a non-chalant smile and a shrug "Exactly, no'pony' can steal it, of course, no human can recreate it either, so you're safe, they already got their own recording crap and it has nothing to do with mental transfer... To put it simply, I heard about it from reading a story that involved you doing that, but it was in 'my' world, so if you've been careful about it, I doubt any 'pony' actually knows about it yet."
"Vinyl... why is it at least once a week I come downstairs to find you straddling a stallion in the middle of the living room?" a Quick glance up from my prone position revealed a familiar Grey pony just coming downstairs, to which a gave a short and innocent wave.
"OCTY!, That's not what this is! This guys like... an alien who knows stuff that nopony's supposed to know! He knows about my secret project too!"
"Oh good heavens... Vinyl, how drunk are you?"
I chose to interupt suddenly before the confusion could progress "Hrm! Actually, She's right about that, Twilight made it happen... though on a side note, I would totally not be against what she was implying you were doing, just, another day... Twilight'd freak if I ditched her to bang, hahah."
"Yeah! And i'm only slightly buzzed right now... wait, bang? Have you already met cloud kicker?"
"Nah, but there's a whole fucking novel on her sexual exploits back home"
Vinyl looked absolutely gobsmacked at that concept "Jeez..."
"Huh... so, an alien that looks exactly like a pony? Are you sure you're not both drunk?"
At that moment a very exasperated Twilight pushed the front door back open, shooting a glare at the DJ who clearly had me still pinned down "Ugh, I wish he wouldn't go spreading it around so freely, somepony could really freak out about it... but yes, it's true, and he was turned 'into' a pony, I'm not even sure 'why' or 'how' yet but it happened."
"Uhhh, huh... If I didn't know better, I might think all 'three' of you are drunk or something... but, I suppose Vinyl has brought much more unusual individuals home before, just don't leave a mess on a carpet or I'll strangle you with my Chello bow." with that she cantered off to the kitchen.
"Huh... Seems like Octy got more mello over the past few years... She usually just leave you with a calm death threat?"
"Yeah pretty much... now where were we... oh right, You knowing about my covert project that I've never shown to anypony but Octy and Twilight!"
"You mean the one you asked me to help you go over a few times to make sure it wouldn't fry anypony's brain using it?"
"Yeah that one"
"Like I said, wierd other worldly knowledge, I think it's amazing though... I know it's a rediculous long shot but I've always been the type of... er, 'stallion' to take pot shots are long targets to see if it's possible... so I was distantly hoping for some chance of experiencing it... If it helps, I've got memories of a metric buck ton of music in my head, and... honestly, If I can help you with something that'll make it possible to take music 'everywhere'... ohh, hohohoho, Being in Equestria'll get suddenly even sweeter."
"Ugh, I can't believe I'm endorsing this wierdness, but given the nature of turning mental data into music, It'll be helpful to have a 'variety' of brains that have tested it... from what I can tell he is 'physically' an average pony, so he'll make a better 'other unicorn' test... And you can definitely trust 'him' not to steal it, beacuse I could just blast him back to his world if he tries it."
I just gave her a comically apalled expression at that "Hey! I'll have you know that I have designed some things myself before, the keyword being 'designed' not 'built' but I most assuredly understand the deep wounding that can come from someone stealing the figurative equivalent of you're mental baby... er, foal."
Vinyl seemed to mull this over for a while... well, i couldn't really be sure, her shades were in place, but If i were in her position I'd probably be doing that... Though I'd hoped something positive would happen, what 'did' happen was a bit more than I'd expected, and left Twilight Gaping in shock.
I quite suddenly Found myself the recipient of a furious and somewhat forceful kiss... it wasn't half bad, but the surprise of it made it pretty hard to notice and enjoy, though i did get to notice an interesting bit of detail about Vinyl that clicked on some lightbulbs in my brain... no, I'm not going to tell you what those are... It didn't last long of course
"Oh! i was really suspicious at first, but if Twilight'll vouch for you, then 'yes!'... I've been freaking out trying to decide on someponies to use as a testing group... Octy'll sure do fine for an earth pony to test, I'm sure Dash wouldn't mind letting me borrow her for a pegasus test... but I couldn't think of any unicorns around with a lot of musical know how to test it with that I was sure I could trust... Rarity is a definite no there of course, and as sure as I am that it wouldn't hurt an alicorn, there being only a few in existence makes that potential consumer type unfortunately useless to marketability... no offense Twilight."
"None taken, Business is a bitch... ... ... AUGH! Midnight! You've Tainted my vocabulary with your exasperatingly excessive expulsions of expletives!"
Holy crap that was funny... Seriously... after a moment of staring dumbly at her both Myself and Vinyl burst out laughing, twilight feeling the need to blush and sink into her wings a little, of course Vinyl 'had' to make a comment "HAHAHAH!, OH! YES! Princess Twilight finally popped her Cursing Cherry!" I choked on a snicker for a moment before powerfully jerking into an intense laughing fit that caused me to twitch madly, consequently rolling Vinyl off of me and into a similar fit.
After about 30 seconds the laughing fit calmed down and vinyl rolled plant a hoof on the end of my snout while making a serious look, woah, when did her shades vanish? where?... oooh, pretty red! "Alright! This is totally bucking wierd, but Imma give ya a chance to test it, I made a couple of prototypes so I can let ya borrow one, I'm guessing you'll be around Twilight a lot so it's unlikely you'll be able to sneak off even if you 'do' plan something, but You're comin back by here tommorrow to give it back, I'll study it a bit and see how it handled it, and Twilight'll probably do some scanny stuff to make sure it's not messing up your brain or anything... we'll worry about an extended testing period after that... and if you break it or steal it, I'll snap your horn off and shove it up your plot 'before' I kick it, capice?"
"Yep, I gotcha, totally, Don't break it or I have to worry about some form of brutal vengeance... if it breaks, it's totally going to be because 'it' did it itself, not because of me! heheh... also, I like your eyes."
There was only a very slight blush before her shades slid back into place, wait, were they in her hair or something? I didn't see em... ugh, Ponies are magic! "Hah, thanks, but flattery ain't gonna save your plot if ya mess this up... plus, I wanna hear some of this music before you leave with it, dig?"
"Yep! I gotcha, though probably best to only do 1 song, don't wanna bust up Twilight's Schedule any more than I already have, ya know? heheh."
"Yeah that works... wait here just a moment."
As she climbed back to her hooves I scrambled up as well, a bit clumsily for my rushing, but managed to pop up to her side and whisper something privately... something that caused her ears to perk sharply and a hoof to cover her mouth, but I gave what I thought was a reassuring smile and whispered something else before playing it like I was shrugging off something unimportant and let her run off.
[More intended for later]
The Blazing Streaks - Prologue
Intro - It happened so suddenly... The wonderbolts are known internationally as the undeniable elite amongst pegasi fliers, civilian, military, and otherwise, and were even royally endorsed as defenders of Equestria during Crises... Nopony had actively 'challenged' them before... until now.
The Blazing Streams, they appeared out of nowhere right in the middle of a wonderbolts show smack in the middle of canterlot... Nopony got hurt, though their demonstration, and subsequent show of unnatural control, of firey abilities in the midst of an aerial show caused all kinds of unexpected disruption for the Bolts, and drew ample suspicion... Then they dissapeared in blasts of vision distorting heat before anypony could focus an effort to detain the 'show crashers'.
So... now what?
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Prologue - The Party Crashers
It was as impressive a show as ever, The wonderbolts demonstrated yet again their ever present expertise in flight and showy manuevers, zipping through the air above the public Canterlot gardens... Though a lot of the annoyingly posh little bluebloods, including the 'actual' blue blood as well, spent the length of the show cycling between watching for a few seconds and then critiquing the performance with their nearest peer.
Amongst them Sat Equestria's Prime Diarchs, observing with seemingly endless interest... of course, they'd seen the shows many times before, and after so many time, aside from the occasional new tricks, they came to be enjoyed more as an escape from the repetative daily duties of a Princess, and a chance to have the snobby nobles focused on somepony else, which was not hard to believe as the dozen or so flight suited ponies roared through the air over the crowd of rich ponies, the line of contrails following them quickly spreading into many different colors as the central multi-colored trail bled into all the rest.
Most ponies thought of the wonderbolts as a royally sponsored team of showy celebreties, though the Princesses knew that every bit of 'showy skill' they had could also be turned into a scalpel like tool for incapacitating threats to equestria... So it came as quite a surprise when, as they arched up into the air above the crowd to break formation, They hit a barrier... Not a physical barrier, and it didn't seem to hurt, but all at once their flight seemed to just 'stop' and they fell a short way before catching on the air again.
All at once the entertaining show turned into a worrisome phenomena, Most of the on-lookers just chattered curiously at this change while the princesses started to observe things 'closer', and the Bolts themelves began to zip about the still fliable air, searching for a place to get around the mysterious 'no fly zone'. The scattered about the invisible 'cieling' and repeated tried going up, only to fall back into the fliable air.
then all at once things changes.
Streaks of fire launched out of an oddly large cloud nearby, unnoticed previously due to the show taking place, and arched straight towards the crowd, breaking up straight into the unflyable air without a hinderance and coming close enough to reveal ponies at the heads of these trails. These ponies were clad in unique flight suits of their own with varied combinations of Firey colors and patterns as well as white Streaks on occasion.
Something more surprising happened next as the Heat Distortion of their Firey trails Disrupted the flight-less zone, seemingly scattering whatever cut it off about as if it had been suspended water, causing the wonderbolts flying below to become eratic. They wavered in the air at random, every second finding and then losing fliable bits of air, and it spread steadily until they were forced to land... A Gasp spread across the crowd at this, somepony even spoke aloud "The wonderbolts have been 'grounded'!?"
The Firey Fliers in the air, half a dozen in number, spread out suddenly then, as if pulling the same manuever the bolt's had been planning to carry out, Arching up into the air in a wide fanned out movement. The flaming trails behind them much shorter compared to the Contrails of the wonderbolts, but creating noticeable distortion funnels of heated air that left behind oddly varied color patterns, one that even appeared to be a zigzag of green and fiery orange, a strangely familiar pattern that was not lost on a certain colorful pegasus who was absolutely furious at being grounded.
Before long several of the Fliers circled around themselves, gaining enough speed to nearly lick their own fire trail, but never quite enough to actually touch it... with the repeatedly cycling air flow it began to spread, gathering more of the fire within the ring and daring closer to becoming a disc, until the remaining fliers zipped clean through the center of the circles, bringing a powerful spreading trail with them that was immediately joined by the 3 who'd formed the gathered fire in the first place.
They roared through the air like a spear of flame, following sharp twists and turns in the air until it became apparent that the extended trail was spelling something, and message burned in the air, each word vanishing after a few seconds.
wonderbolts - Burned Out - Blazing - Streaks - Rule the sky
One could practically taste the indignation and insult from the wonderbolts stuck on the ground, though the apparent display of dangerous 'fire power' inspired a more direct action from the present princesses, and both quickly took flight... only to quickly land back on their hooves on the ground, looking momentarily bewilered before their horns glowed.
Somepony with sharp ears could potentially hear one of the fliers calling out 'Time to bail!', at least one such pony was definitely present and was already acting on circumventing the blocking air.
The Sky lit up suddenly as the six 'Blazing Streaks' lined back up close to eachother, nearly touching their wings as they began to whirl in a circle, not unlike when some pegasi work to create a tornado of their own... before long it appeared as if the fire was coming from their wings as the heat built up in the circle, and before long the frightful sight of a burning tornado before apparent in mid-air, disrupting the air with enough force and heat that the Princesses 'corrections' were disrupted and delayed until the next moment they tried to change it.
Then all at once the Tornado burst, before even coming close to the ground, sending a wave of scalding but harmless heat in all directions, Filling the air with blinding waves of heat that made it impossible to see where the party crashing pegasi had suddenly vanished off to, clearly having stopped leaving their trails.
It would take a fair bit of time before anypony would notice that the wonderbolt who'd been given her first chance to 'officially' lead the show was now missing.
________________________________
when she'd heard the apparent hint that the intruders intended to 'bail out', Rainbow dash had launched herself away from the area, flying low, close to the ground, for a while, where the natural effect of the earth could dispel enough of the heated disturbance to leave normal flight possible.
She'd been a weather pony for years before becoming a wonderbolt, She was very well acquainted with the effects of Rapid temperature change in the air, and it was liable Canterlot was about to experience a troublesome storm that would distract most of the wonderbolts with breaking it up before it could cause any damage. She was also aware that unexpected drastic temperature changes in the air could completely disrupt a fliers quality of flight... and naturally she also knew that it meant there had to be an edge of it... 'THERE!'
She felt the dissapearance of the heat above herself just as she past the dozenth block worth of Canterlot street, and arched straight up into the air, punching high into the sky and easily catching sight of the late stages of the laming tornado... a fearful display for certain, but when it exploded it was all too obvious that it was meant as a distraction.
Never considering how dangerous somepony could be if they used a 'flaming tornado' as a 'distraction' could be if caught, She launched off high into the sky, aiming high enough to avoid the heat-wave and sweeping her attention through the air, sharp eyes trained over the years scouring the sky for... 'GOTCHA!'
As she broke the layer of the highest clouds, enough that the air chilled and the heat from below did not break the cover, she caught the sight of the party crashers flying along, keeping their pace slow enough not to create enough disturbance to disrupt the clouds, but keeping a brisk pace to make sure they get away before the air below the clouds becomes fliable enough to be followed, and more so they even appeared distorted, as if they had their own aura of heat waves, and oddly comforting thing that helped stave off her own chills from flying so high.
Now, a lot of ponies who didn't know Rainbow Dash, and some who did, wouldn't know that recent years of being a wonderbolt had taught her a lot of useful lessons, lessons few would expect a mare like 'her' to use... Stealth flying for one, learning the important of occasional discretion another... it'd be funny honestly, didn't anypon know she liked 'spy stuff'? Sneaking around was one of the most fun things to do next to flying, napping, and reading daring do.
So now she coasted low, with a speed just barely capable of keeping up with the flyers in the distance... with her position shifting closer to the sun without being directly in-front of it, and the rich blue of the sky, her flight suit kept her mostly invisible, and the glare of the sun would make it near impossible to see the colors of her mane... of course, they seemed distracted enough with the 'success' of their show crashing not to even bother looking back except on rare occasions, though they were too far and kept their voices too low to be heard, though there was apparent snickering motions as thunder was heard in the distance behind them.
The Stalking continued for nearly an hour before finally they started to pick up speed again while arching down... It had not been lost on Rainbow dash that they were now pretty close to Ponyville, which hardly made sense, she was certain one of her friend's would've mentioned 'flaming pegasi' living in ponyville... They didn't go very low though, before long they seemed to just vanish, something that shocked her considerably given her amply sharp eye-sight and complete focus on them, leading her to give a quick look all around to make sure they hadn't somehow tricked her and planned an ambush, then right back where they'd vanished.
It was barely noticeable as she drew closer, but what looked like plain sky was starting 'cover' her vision of the forest in the distance, and it hit her suddenly.
'THEY HAVE A BUCKING SECRET BASE!!!' They had a nearly invisible cloud constructed base above ponyville, colored to match the sky as camouflage, high enough that it'd be quite rare for any pegasi to come close to flying this high, few bothered to brave the colder atmosphere, and it didn't even have any DOORS... Clearly to follow them through the same spot in the wall would reveal her... time for 'hot head dash' to pop up now that she knew where they hid!
All at once She blasted forward at high speed, maybe a bit low for 'her', and shot through the softened cloud barrier that was surprisingly thin and lead to a shockingly small entry room beyond thathadadozenponiesinitandHOLYCRAPTHISISGONNAHURT!!!!
KYAAAAH!FOOMP!
She barrelled straight into 2 of the ponies, tumbling with them straight into the opposite cloud wall, hitting it with a resounding FOOMP as the specially crafted wall dispersed their force and safely dispelled chance of injury.
Then she found herself upside down ontop of a pair of thoroughly stunned Pegasi, looking upside down at 4 more pegasi in those fiery uniforms, one who had already removed her face cover, several more that weren't and 2 ... 'Unicorns!? UP HERE!?' ... 'wait, go back, I recognize that pegasus!'
All in one sudden motion she leapt up, an angry look on her muzzle, though most of it was concealed due to her own mask and goggled, there was no mistaking that rainbow mane, and a look of recognition spread on the other pony's face before a somewhat dangerous 'smirk' followed.
Rainbow of course didn't pay attention to that and started shouting "Lightning Dust!? what the hay do you think you're doing crashing a wonderbolt's show? and looking like kind of fireball too! whu... whut's that look for?" it was quite sudden that the smirk turned into a devious grin, mixed with apparent understanding from her flanking cohorts as they started to move towards Rainbow, the unsuited ponies getting out of the way then.
"Ohhh, Rainbow Dash, sorry, but you can't destroy my efforts to succeed 'this time', hmhm, I've got new skills you can't match and, well, you're going to dissapear for a little while so nopony can trouble us! Mmph, if only you hadn't followed us"
All kinds of things ran through Rainbow's head at hearing this... varying from simple understanding that Dust still held a grudge over being revealed as a dangerous braggart at the academy, to the idea that Lightning Dust might be leading some kind of scary secret group of super villain ponies that can shoot fire out of their butts... but not for a moment did she think 'I'm in trouble'... she was pretty sure she could still take em all just fine.
Rainbow Dash opened her mouth to speak some surely heaven crackingly witty retort, only to have it die in her throat as her mouth hung vastly agape at what she saw next... though at first Lightning dust took this as a sign of victory for herself, she quickly froze up and looked like a filly about to piddle herself, as if she could feel it's presence behind her.
"Lightning Dust." That voice, not quite frightfully deep but certainly very Stallionly, it reverberated in the air with an odd power and a small bit of barely visible heat followed it... That wasn't a questioning call, not a statement, the tone behind her name being spoken was that of a command, and it even made her whimper and shrink in on herself without actually turning to look at the source.
"Oh Fuck!" was barely muttered from her lips before a large hoof pressed on her back, it didn't seem to have enough force to move her at all, but it made her quiver.
Behind Lightning dust, Suddenly stood another Pegasus, a Stallion, and a big one at that, shockingly so, he could even potentially be taller than Celestia!, and he was certainly 'bigger' in that he was a Stallion with a considerable ammount of muscled bulk on him, for a pegasus anyway, which ultimately added up to the likes of a Lithe build. He 'looked' larger though as he was exceedingly fluffy, a fact that that did 'not' detract from his imposing presence in this situation, even with huggable fluff he had a presence that, for once, made Rainbow Dash worry that she wasn't all that safe.
She hyper focused for a moment, looking quickly over the huge Stallion's form.
His fur was pure white almost allover, though his Legs faded to a grayish color starting at the shoulders and ending in black fur around his hooves... hooves that had a strange fiery orange color to them instead of the normal colors for a pony.
His mane and tail were very long, mane nearly reaching the floor as it spilled about his shoulder on the right side, and tail even comparable to fluttershy's floor dragger, though both looked very 'smooth' as if blasted by powerful but tamed wind. Both had an odd color combination, Starting at Dark red near the base and fading into black past the half length of the hair.
His wings though... Rainbow hadn't really been Picky about wing sizes, they all tended to have their use, her's were built for agility and speed, big wings tended to be built for heavy lifted and long flights... This pony, who was already big as buck, Had very large wings folded up againt his sides, though she couldn't guess the span on 'him', they were clearly the proportionally largest wings she'd ever seen... more strangely though, while the 'meat' of the wing was white like his fur, the larger primaries had a 'hot' look to them, fiery orange near the base fading to a blazing yellow at their tips... they looked like they could burst into flames at any moment.
Last she came to his muzzle, her was a pony of course, very stallionly in shape... but he couldn't possibly be a normal pony... he had teeth... sharp teeth... Predator teeth... she could see a couple of fangs even with his muzzle closed... and those eyes... Ice blue slitted pupils on black Chornea... Rainbow generally reffered to this as 'monster eye', and she hadn't seen eyes of that sort since Nightmare moon or Chrysalis, not counting dragons since they're supposed to have them like that... but on a pony they had always bothered her, somewhere deep down, like they were a sign that a pony was especially dangerous... and they were staring at her, unwavering, slowly blinking, but never leaving her eyes... She didn't even realize she'd begun to quiver a little... just a little of course, not like she was actually scared, just pony instincts she hadn't had to deal with yet.
As she stayed focus, looking him in the eye, a conversation had started... or perhaps, more of a scolding.
Lightning Dust shook on her hooves, barely staying up-right at how worried she was by him. "Uh.. I...I-I... I can..."
He interupted her stammering there and pressed just slightly on her back, provoking a quiet whimper "No, you can't explain this, can you?... I will do it for you then... You defied my orders for discretion, assaulted a wonderbolts show in front of the 'princesses', Created a small hurricane in the middle of Canterlot, though 'that' is under control at least, and Lead One of the highest profile wonderbolts right back here..."
If Rainbow had been paying attention to anything other than the eyes locked with hers, she might have noticed a very embarassing smell coming from Lightning Dust, who couldn't seem to form more than whimpers and half sylables.
His hoof slid down along one of her shoulders and tugged just a bit, causing a small stumble to ensure she knew his next words were for 'her' unmistakably "One Month."
this earned another small whimper from her along with a nod "Y-yes sir!" and in an instant she vanished through one of door-ways, leaving a wavy trail behind her.
Then he stomped a hoof shortly, earning the attention of the other 5 'associates' in suits, who immediately lined up at attention, though clearly quite worried, they did their best to still appear as stoic as possible... A simple 2 words from him "1 week" They nodded, Saluted, and vanished as well, leaving the remaining 7 ponies with him, 6 of which had been looking on with minimized smiles as the other's got whatever the hell it was he'd just given them.
Then he moved towards Rainbow, who did her absolute best to look 'tough and aggressive' while he stared into her eyes, though the frequent flicking of ears, trempling in her hooves, and occasional twitching eye spoke volumes of her struggle to keep her pride intact by not running away for help... It actually earned a small chuckle from the Big Stallion... Yeah, there went some of the tension, replaced with a fair bit of confusion aimed at him.
"Hahah... Rainbow Dash, I'm impressed, though for one of the youngest wonderbolts to rise through the rank's as you have, I suppose I shouldn't be surprised to managed to track Dusty back here." It was a complete 180, from the intimidating 'glare monster' that had entered the room, to being relaxed and chatty and just... there... His expression softened into a mild smile and his posture relaxed greatly, his wings even loosened up a bit.
Rainbow's reaction was about as perfectly expected as it could ever be, a shocked face and a beffudled "whu-Huh!?" earning another verbose chuckle.
"Heheh, I suppose this is to be expected as well... I'm sure Dust's little 'show' inspired plenty of suspicion... I bet you dove in here expecting some sort of 'evil genius lair in the sky' didn't you?" His small smile turned into a cocky smirk at the unintentional blush that was barely visible from the slight change of color behind her blue mask. "Technically it could perfectly qualify for the likes of that, but no evil here... Just a new Flier group practicing their methods in private."
She perked up instantly at a certain part of what he said, ears sharply raised and eyes glaring into his in a sudden display of furious passion "wait! 'New Flier Group'? ... Are you saying... The wonderbolts actually have COMPETITION!? AND THEY CAN SHOOT FIRE?!"
He Laughed Heartily at this 'Hahah, just like I planned it!' "Indeed they do! I had a feeling you'd appreciate that, I 'had' heard that you thrive in competition!"
"Are you kidding? this is the BEST! I... I was actually worrying recently that I was getting 'too' good, I mean, being 'the best' is cool and all, but if you don't have anything to over-come then all that hard-work starts to feel stale because there's no challenge to it... I always wondered why nopony else ever tried to Challenge the wonderbolts, of course, not much competition when everypony wants to 'be' a wonderbolt."
"Ya know, I thought the same thing myself, S'why i found the 'Blazing Streams' actually, Competition breeds excellence I always say, as long as it's 'good' competition and doesn't become obssessive or needlessly spiteful. what better way to make Equestria's 'bests' better, than by giving them somepony even better to compete with, at worst you get '2' Elite teams of Fliers to protect Equestria."
"Streams? but that's not... wait, founder? Oh.. Hah...HAHAHHAAH!, that means Dust mispelled it! She called you guys the Streakers of something when writing in the sky with fire!... And, hrm, 'why' exactly was she crashing our show? Aside from embarasing, suddenly showing up spewing fire every which way is kinda dangerous... and why did she look absolutely 'terrified' of you? I have expected you to eat her or something!"
"She... ugh, seriously?... I'm going to have a talk with her later about accepting things set by her superiors! She's been ignoring our actual name and saying 'streaks' for ages now... And Honestly, I think she did it specifically because I told her 'not' to... word got around that 'Rainbow Dash' was leading the next wonderbolt show in canterlot, and I was aware of her grudge against you, so I tried to head it off and tell her to keep away... but she never listens when her mind is set on something... 'sometimes' that can be a good thing... as for the fear, that's just my 'teaching method'... It's more of an instinct thing than actual malicious intent, I look scary, sure, but I don't actually intend to 'harm' them unless they turn violent first... fire is dangerous afterall, i rather have them afraid to use it aggressively." There was a slightly scary tone behind that last part, but it faded quickly.
"So, that was basically her showboating and being an ass, huh? Ya know, it's incredibly rude to 'ground' a pegasus, even more to do it to all the wonderbolts at once 'and' the princesses! I mean, I'm not sure what I'm 'expected' to do with this, but I get the feeling i'm supposed to report it or something."
"Heh, by all means, I was intending a much 'better' show of my own in a week or so, but, well, if you have history with her I imagine you already know how Lightning Dust can be, right? She at least didn't hurt anypony right?"
"Nah, not as far as i can tell, just some bruised egos."
"Hmmm, I suppose I'm going to have to explain this to the princesses now... I can't have her getting us labeled as criminals before I even make the big reveal."
Author's Note
Mildly Incomplete prologue at the moment.
Unammed Changling Story - Prologue - Irony
Oh the Irony... The unbearable pride rending irony of this situation...'[.I]
Chrysalis laid as comfortably as she could across the well worn couch, which wasn't much at this point as her body felt like it was trying to devour itself from the inside, and it very well might be doing exactly that... She had been trapped in this dimensionally twisted castle for several year now, where-in, after a few wees of futile attempts to escape, she had put herself into a hibernative state along with the remnants of her hive present, to preserve as much energy as possible and let the few months worth of love she still contained stretch on as long as possible... it seemed as though she had been forgotten in her prison, left to starve by the 'oh so benevolent ponies'.
She had been Jostled from her hibernation by a rending pain in her stomach that steadily began to spread, similar feelings were present all through the hive-mind at the time, the first thought on her mind was a solemn echo of helplessness 'Time... has run out.' The reserves were drained and the effects of starvation were reaching their peak, it had taken several years but the hive was teetering on the very edge of death now, yet her mind ran through desperate, if futile, hope.
Memories were running rampant at the moment, starvation and instinctual desperation pushing for every little bit of comforting information that could possibly lead to survival, though there was none. She only found the torment of ironic self destruction as her mind wandered over how she had once trapped Cadence in a cave, starved and weakened and hoping for a 'knight in shining armor' to rescue her... and now here she lay, starving and weak, driven by desperation to hold on to a pointless hope for someone to be her own rescuing knight...
A memory shot to the fore-front of her mind, one that was only a few weeks younger than those about the wedding Fiasco, one she had long since pushed from her mind as useless, yet in her starvation stricken state that little piece we all have that clings to the tiniest little hopes for relief, it dragged it back to the surface.
It had happened a couple of weeks after 'landing' from the blast.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
...
The wall of love magic that blasted the Changeling's out of canterlot at body crushing velocity had indeed sprayed them in all imagineable directions... Some had landed nearby, the lucky ones, who crashed into the ground hard enough to not feel the pain... Some had time to lose velocity before Smashing into the ground... And other's still had been launched even farther, to places far more dangerous than equestria.
Chrysalis had recovered as many as she could that could move under their own power, afterall, not all of her changeling's were plain drones, many soldier's managed, if only barely, to take the landing without being completely crippled. She had immediately set them about scattering in every direction to hunt down as many of their siblings as possible, and to 'take the pain' from those who could not be saved... The explosion of love magic had done some serious damage though, even if the landing had done the most, the magic had disrupted the hive mind, though it was recovering it was going far to slowly, and they would have to make due with simply knowing what direction their fellow changeling's were in at best, as opposed to pin-pointing...
Chrysalis could still hear them all though, the cries for help, the suffering, the pain, it was the kind of things that could break some rulers, in a way it did, if they had landed harmlessly then perhaps she would have thought twice about trying to get revenge, but there was such suffering caused by it... but first, recovering her brood was more important, and she set off her functional suboordinates, with a fresh influx of the leftover love she still held, to recover and heal their closer brethren... it would be foolish to send them to the farthest points, there were many dangerous places that even she knew sending her changeling's would be suicide for them, and no matter what any fool pony might think, she loved her 'children', she would have to go personally to save those that survived the farthest reaches, though they were few so far away, they were only in one direction, south, beyond the badlands that they called home... the other's at such a distance were certain dead, from drowing in the oceans or freezing in the north.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
She mused for a moment, even through the intense pain that dominated every second 'If i'd had time to think without the sounds of my subects dying ever in my thoughts, perhaps I would not be here..." Once she'd been trapped and discovered she couldn't escape, she had a lot of time to think, and quickly came to accept that it had been her own fault she was stuck there now, furious as she was while carrying out her vengeful plans, If she hadn't tried to directly harm Twilight Sparkle... well, she realized too late that surviving the first invasion was a second chance that she squandered without realizing it.
She soon returned to that memory... it quickly became 'another's' memory... reliving the memories of her subjects was always an unusual experience, like watching a movie that stared the one she was watching through, though in her current state it was more of that tiny source of comfort that instinct drove her to cling to in hope.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
His little mind reeled, he was too far away to detect the hive mind as more than whispers, he couldn't feel any of his surviving siblings, couldn't hear the queens will or feel her presence... certainly he couldn't have been done in, she was more powerful than all of them, and he'd felt a sudden burst of love energy directed straight in his direction that had roused him from his emergency hibernation, she had to be somewhere nearby!
But for a changeling, using only his eyes was as good as being blind compared to the comforting ocean of family that was the hive mind, and the thick, if rancid and foggy, forest that surrounded him was any hint, he was nowhere that could be safe for an injured drone.
He had already been limping along for hours now, after having been awakened by something that could only be done by his queen, he had felt an explosion of hope that he'd be saved soon, and took off in the direction it had come from...
Yet he'd been going for hours, a shattered wing, and injured leg slow to heal without the help of the hive's ambrosia or the queen's magic, they slowed him down immensely and with every moment growing dread creepy into his little mind, fear mounting as he expected every wasted moment was another second that something deadly came closer to eating him in that forest... he 'was' being watched, but not by a forest beast.
It was almost another half an hour before he grew too weary to continue, with moving being both painful and more strenuous beacuse of the injury he couldn't hold out, and as soon as he came across a sizeable clearing picked the dryest grassy spot he could find and fell into it panting and whimpering as the pains only slowly became subdued by tiny increments.
Then he heard it, hoof-steps coming from the direction he'd been fleeing, sending a fearful shiver down his spine as he quickly realized he was just too tired to flee anymore... almost too much to look back and see what had followed him.
Terror rocked the little drone as he leapt up, A pained chirp slipping out as his haste aggravated the injury on his left fore-leg, and started to back-away
Certainly his overwhelming terror was felt through the link, but he couldn't if anyling could possibly be nearby to save him, as far as he could tell he was alone in a clearing in the middle of a horrifyingly twisted forest, facing down a rival Queen! One that looked larger and even more dangerous than his own at that!
Of course, in the next moment, much that he was taught about changeling royalty was flipped on it's head as what he thought had been a 'queen' spoke.
"I apologize for frightening you little lost drone, but i have not seen any changeling's besides my own in this Forest in decades. I was... intrigued... I sensed a burst of love energy, which is rare enough around here... and then sense growing fear fleeing through the forest... can you tell me why you are here? and what you are called?"
It was impossible and yet he'd heard it himself... This changeling was clearly a royal, it had all the expected qualities, stature, presence, colors, It was even larger and bulkier than his Queen, and looked even healthier, it hardly had any holes for that matter... But what shocked him the most, the voice, 'he' sounded male, but he'd never heard of a Changeling 'king' before... more importantly though, he didn't sound offended by the intrusion, more curious and worried, his voice was powerful and penetrating, yet smooth and caring, it made his bone's shiver as he tried to avoid displaying respect that was reserved only for his own queen, but the non-aggressive tone urged him to try speaking as his only way of surviving this.
It took time, time that this strange 'king' seemed fine with giving him, to find his voice and issue a reply, shakey and uncertain in his tone "I... was thrown... far away... And crashed here. I found a deep hiding place and used hibernation, too hurt to escape alone... I felt a pulse of love... it could only come from my queen, and tried to run to her, but i cannot find her... No... I'm too weak to find her, I grew tired and collapsed here... And... I am Drone 32" The drome couldn't take his eyes of those of the larger changeling, they were Similar to his queens, only Red... the kind of eyes that would normally tell anyling to stay the hell away for their own safety, though if he weren't in constant pain and scared beyond all reason, perhaps he would've picked up on the subtle curiosity and care visible in his gaze.
It was strange, The Royal listened calmly for most of it, but mentioning his 'name' was what seemed to bring a frown to his muzzle "Just, 32?... you must be from one of those kinds of hives...... Hrm, moving on, I thought I smelled One of the queen's in the area, thought i couldn't tell which one from the distance, most wouldn't bother coming this deep anyway as it is incredibly dangerous here, even for a Royal changeling... it is nothing short of a miracle that you managed to flee for so while injured without something else coming after you... hmhm, i might call you Phiyarles myself...... Nevermind that though, i may be able to take you to the queen i smelled, though she may not be 'your' queen... you bear none of the traits of the hives i'm familiar with being in this area, but i can at least keep you safe if it's 'not' her... I could heal your body as well, if you are not adverse to the magic of another"
It baffled 32, a complete stranger, a royal of unknown origin no less, offering to heal a changeling's injuries was another of those things that was considered 'impossible because it's never happened in recorded history yet'... but the fiery pain in his fore-leg, and a suddenly surfacing dread that his wing might not be repairable after the stress of a trek back to the hive without even knowing how far away he was, began to drive an idea into his head to accept the offer... it didn't hurt that his mind also told him that his end was likely inevitable if he denied it and angered this Royal.
"I would... like that... I think... Everything hurts... I would really like to find my queen as well, it could only be 'her' that sent a love pulse, she is the only one who could know I was out here."
I happened quicker than he could accurately percieve in his worn and starving state, the comparatively massive changingly crossed the clearing in a blur and and had lowered his head to accurately direct his magic onto the injured fore-limb... A Horn that looked a lot more like a thick curved 'blade' than the usual jagged royal horn, one that made the little drone fear for the possibility of losing limb or life from just an errant flick of the Royal's head... though his fears began to inevitably dull as the pain began quickly melting away and he found himself shivering in the mind numbing bliss that followed whenever pain finally fades.
Then in an equally fast motion the King move closer, his horn then aimed for the 'partial' wing on 32's back, prompting him to quickly glance back at what was going on, only to find the red aura of magic spread over the wing, seemingly collecting material from the air around it and constructing it into new veins and glassy flesh to rebuild the wing inch by inch, until once more it resembled a full wing, though it looked like a mirror image of the other wing now.
32 Could scarecly believe it, it had been so fast, so simple, he was healed and now felt as good as new, minus hunger pains but that paled by comparison to what else he'd been feeling before. "I... How?... that was so fast!... Tha-"
"Now then, come along, lets go see if we can find your Queen and return you to her, this place is very dangerous."
The Royal gave 32 a soft nudge with his magic while stepping past him, a very deliberate direction in mind as he began trotting along towards an especially foreign scent, seemingly somewhat in a hurry but still taking a moment to look back and check on 32, who quickly stopped worrying about what he was going to say and sprinted along to catch up, eager to return to Chrysalis.
They continued along for nearly another half an hour before another Changeling was seen, one that caused 32 to shoot off towards them.
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Chrysalis had been traveling for days by now, making her way to the farthest of her children that still lived... they were all precious, but the living had priority, the rest she could seek out and handle once they were together again... and after getting her revenge of course.
That wasn't key in her mind at the moment though, she actually found herself feeling... worried.
She was Much farther south than the Badlands, farther than her brood had traveled in ages, a land untamed and too dangerous even for changelings to be, were it not for one of her senses guiding her here in search of one of her lost children she would never have come to such a place... it helped though, that the hive link had had time to recover more, she could tell with certainty that the one she sought was in this forest and not too far away.
Almost on cue several bushes rustled furiously, promting her to prepare to defend herself, only for her to find an instant later that the lost changeling she came to seek bolted from the bush and in a beyond rare fit of emotion wrapped himself around one of her legs, nuzzling and chittering happily at finding himself safely back with his queen, even if not quite so 'safe' per se.
32 naturally gushed in joy "Oh! My Queen! I Feared I wouldn't make it long enough to reach you!"
It had been a shock to have this take place so suddenly, but Chrysalis soon rested the 'non hugged' fore-leg around the little changeling "Hmhm, it is ever a source of joy for one of my children to be found safely... I am surprised, you were such a great distance yet you appear unharmed, did you find a source to feed on and heal nearby?"
The Little changeling hopped back and shook his head, a maniacally gleeful grin still on his muzzle "Oh!, nono, I 'was' hurt, i was hibernating until i felt that love pulse... but i was still hurt and couldn't keep going before long... then i ran into another changeling, it looked like a queen at first, but this one was definitely male, and bigger than you, and red... I didn't know there were changeling 'king's'... hey-" He had glanced back for a moment then proceeded to whirl a full circle to scan over the clearing then back to his queen with a slightly worried tinge to his expression "He was right behind me when I saw you! There was definitely a Royal Changeling that helped me."
He quickly seemed worried that he might be assumed to be making it up, or at least hallucinating, but Chrysalis knew better, her changelings didn't make things up when speaking to 'her', they couldn't really, she could sense his complete certainty over the link and brought a hoof up to silence him, though her expression betrayed some worry of her own. "Calm yourself 32, I am not aware of there 'ever' being a Changeling 'king' in our history, but i can tell how sure you are of this... I will examine your recent memories to find out beyond a doubt, now relax."
32 did so immediately, he trusted his queen perfectly, even when interacting with the most sensitive parts of her subject's minds, and he quickly closed his eyes while angling his horn for easier access... Normally contact wouldn't be needed, but the disruption of the hive-mind made it neccesary, so she carefully touched their horns... it seemed to only take a couple of second but the memories flooded through quickly and she withdrew with both shock and curiosity on her face.
Of course, the little changeling seeing wide-eyed shock... and perhaps even a bit of fear, on his Queen's expression sent some dread seeping into him, though a moment later she steeled herself noticeably and made a motion "Come, we are going to attempt to find this 'other changeling'... I do not know who he is, or 'what' ultimately, but this is too curious to ignore, perhaps he can be of help as well, anyling who lives 'here' must be impressive"
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with that in mind she had set off with the lone changeling in tow, ignoring the fact that they were still in a unknown and dangerous territory while trying to retrace 32's path in the hopes of satisfying the burning curiosity about this unknown changeling 'king'...
However, it seemed that he had vanished just as easily as he had appeared to 32, there wasn't so much as a traceable scent, love trail, or hoof-prints that would hint at anyone but 32 having been there. They spent a couple more hours prowling around in search of this individual, inexplicably lacking any dangerous encounters along the way, before finally finding themselves tiring of this wasteful search and considering finally leaving.
"Grrr... Enough of this searching, if this 'king' is still here then he is certainly avoiding and we don't have time to keep playing at this, we must return and finish healing the rest of the hive... Come 32."
He gave a silent affirmation and started to trot along by her side as they turned to head north again... only then, as if he'd been waiting for them to decide to leave first, he appeared.
"wait." A Simple and calm request came forth, though the sudden appearance of that voice set a shiver through Chrysalis' spine, there hadn't been any hint she could detect of another being nearby still, but the familiarity she felt 32 providing told her it was the same one.
She turned quickly, at first intending to share a bit of her fury for having her time wasted so much, only to stop short as soon as her eyes came upon him, her voice caught in her throat and her jaw dropped.
She'd always been covertly proud of her height, afterall, she stood taller than Celestia, and tended to take great pride in anything about herself that she could claim as superior to the Solar Princess. Yet now she found herself looking 'up' at another changeling, clearly royal from many familiar traits, who made her suddenly feel like a little nymph again... Okay, the size disparity isn't 'that' severe, but he did stand Head and neck above her height, was comparitively broad, and had a number of other traits adding to his imposing figure.
All at once her eyes swept about to look him over, too fast to focus, then tried to do so again at a slightly slower pace...
He was definitely a changeling, that much was clear, but so many things differed between them that another creature might think they were different species entirely.
where her brood had a fully encompasing and smooth carapace, still tough and protective, This one had a Carapace that resembled Armor more than skin, thicker, likely tougher, sharply pointed in some places, but also divided into many sections, serving the purpose of heavy armor while leaving joints and other flexible areas exposed so that even such heavy chitin did not restrict his range of motion, there was even a series of numerous smaller plates on his muzzle to protect it without difusing facial expressions... at least, that's the general assumption she came to based on appearance.
He appeared to have a second layer of protection visible beneath the armored chitin as well, through the exposed joints and characteristic changeling holes in the armor, of which there were remarkably few, was a layer that had a similar look to muscle, countless strings of protective tissue interwoven to protect those soft spots without restricting them.
More strange though, his limbs, though still ending in a hoof-like structure, bore claw-like extensions on the front, attached to the body by the odd muscle like layer, letting them be flexible, displayed by the fact he appeared to be clenching the dirt beneath him... a sign that she wasn't sure was a hint of hostility or his own worry at this situation, though she preffered to er on the side of caution at this.
Beyond the mind boggling structure of his carapace and other protections, his other features were all clearly changeling in nature, his mane and tail, eyes, and wings were all correct as far as she could tell, though the wings seemed larger than usual and there was a slim layer of protective chitin on the front edge sharped like a blade. All of these features had varying Red to them as opposed to her own hive's green and blue scheme.
what caught her attention the most though was his muzzle, finding herself staring transfixed into his eyes when she returned to it, occasionally glancing back to his mouth and horn... The Former being filled with sharp teeth instead of just 2 pairs offangs, and the latter was shaped into a blade like structure, polished and sharpened to a razor's edge, growing up from his fore-head like a vicious curved sword ready to strike, and somehow she had no doubt it could function in the same fashion.
Strangely enough though, he didn't have a 'crown', though perhaps such was seen as frivelous... it didn't exactly serve much of a purpose beyond visual recognition of her rule... or perhaps, it hinted that this beast of a changeling was not 'in fact' the ruler of his hive, and the idea that someling 'more' imposing might be above him sent a fresh shiver down her spine.
He delayed speaking for a short while, simply oberserving her, though she tensed up and appeared ready to strike at a moments notice if he made a hostile move, the reek of mingling fear and curiosity were thick in the air... he knew this was a bad thing to do in this forest, so their time was likely quite short in terms of speaking... of course, while she stared in a semi petrified state, the little changeling with her sprung up with a smile on his face.
"My Queen! This is him! He healed me and watched over me while we searched for you!"
This caused her to flinch suddenly, glancing down at 32, then back to the behemoth of a supposed 'king' "huh?!"
Her freshly shocked reaction actually brought a small chuckle from him, though it was deep and verbose as one might expect "Hmhmhm, So this 'is' your Queen... I am impressed, honestly... I know of several other Queens beyond the reaches of this forest, and I have lived for a good while, yet none have ever gone so far as to follow their children into the forest to see to their safety... I don't know of 'you' yet though, perhaps you are the exception to the norm, a Queen that cares for the safety of her drones enough to seek for them herself... I have certainly not seen such a quality in the other's I've encountered."
Every moment he spoke Chrysalis found her instinctual fear slipping away, he was being... friendly... complimenting her for coming so far to find 32... She found this even more baffling than the fact that he 'existed', though it still took her a moment to find her voice enough to ask "who 'are' you? or 'what' for that matter? I am far from 'young' and even my mother never mentioned anything like 'you' existing. And why in Tartarus would you be in a place like this? It's so Murky and every moment feels dangerous."
Some might have taken her questions as insulting, he might have if he were full of himself enough to assume he should be common knowledge, but he'd done what he could to stay out of notice of even other changelings for a reason. "Understandable Curiosity, though time is drawing short, so i'll have to sum things up... perhaps I can share more if we meet again someday... The Simple version, I am King Rasavadaam, or just Rasav, it's simpler. I am 'in fact' a changeling king, you've probably never heard of such because 'most' queens do everything they can to make sure someling like 'me' doesn't live long enough to gain the power to challenge them, paranoid if you ask me, I don't want them under my rule anyway. That's also why i'm out 'here'... My Brood is comparitively small in number, but we are strong, and this forest is harsh, vicious, it inspires us to become stronger still, and become closer... The other's stay away from here because their brood's are too weak and simple minded to survive this place, I like it that way, it's allowed me to fade from memory and avoid the hassle of killing other changelings."
Her mind twitched on several details... most notably being that he called that 'summing it up', she didn't like the idea of how long winded the full version could have been, but some of it made her uneasy... He said they were made stronger by living 'here', in contrast that would imply that by making her home in Equestria, she was making her brood 'weaker' by using a place that's so peaceful to feed... Then it hit her. "wait, if you're brood lives out here in this Forsaken wilderness... how do you manage to find enough love to even 'survive'? There can't be any ponies out here to feed on!"
He laughed a bit deeper at that question and cast her a toothy smirk, showing off his ample supply of rending teeth and earning a short flinch "Now, Little Queen, surely you must know the answer to that yourself... we are 'changelings'! we adapt, we evolve, we 'CHANGE!'... Hmhmhm, any difficulty can be over-come through evolution and change... except, of course, for the difficulty of running out of difficulties... what does one do when their current environment no longer poses enough challenge to force them to adapt?... I 'have' been considering moving, but so far I thought there was simply more changeling territory in every direction... perhaps I will try--"
In an instant he cut himself off and went silent, ears perked up and muzzled pointed straight, eye locked on the forest behind Chrysalis, before suddenly vanishing from sight as if he'd been merely a ghost... an action that caused her to jump back suddenly while 32 stared on in momentary awe.
She hadn't heard it approach until a vicious Yowl cracked the air, causing her to snap her head back to see what made such a horrid sound, only to find herself staring into the face of a massive beast lunging toward her and only a couple meters away... It looked like a giant feline, not even a manticore, though certainly of similar size, it was sleek though, powerful, possesing Vicious claws and those merciless predatory eyes meant to paralyze it's prey with fear.
She could probably have handled it if it weren't a mere instant from digging claws into her flanks... and even without that it's size and momentum could likely crush her while in such a state of unpreparedness.
Just as the thought of how insulting it would be to have gotten killed by a giant kitty, The recently vanished King reappeared out of the air at the side of the feline, barreling towards it with similar speed and his wings buzzing angrily, creating a sound not unlike a whole swarm of hornets.
His momentum carried him into kicking the Beast's side, putting out enough force to send it tumbling to the side and into another tree, while launching his own smaller form away from the beast in the same motion, allowing him to land side-ways on an opposite tree... And with the failed ambush of the first one, several more began slinking out of the tree's, having been miraculously hard to see despite their size.
Chrysalis was rather thoroughly frozen in place for a moment before a recently learned voice called out, though his tone was far closer to commanding this time "Best you leave now, I'd suggest flying, 'fast', or perhaps teleporting if you can... Unless you want to become a 'snack'." This was not a situation she had ever found herself in, which in her mind meant something special, though it left her confused and momentarily paralyzed until that voice hit her, the suggestions sinking quite deep during her blind stupor, and a moment later she found herself grabbing 32 with one fore-leg while her magic rushed around her and into the ground, forming a familiar black circle ringed with green flame that pulled her down into it, escaping to who knows where.
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She couldn't help but find it pitifully ironic to such a degree it made her chuckle, an act which also hurt at the moment. "Bah... to think, on the brink of death and i'm giving in to a childish little thing like 'hope'... As if he would ever be in equestria... how embarassing, Starving is one thing, but to meet my end with my mind wandering on things only foalish little ponies would waste their last moments on... heheh... 'ow, my pride'." Facing death can do strange thing to anyone... any who knew her, enemy or ally, would never expect her to let those last moments go by simply accepting it and letting go, but there wasn't really much else to do when you're too hungry to move.
The suffering was just tiringly intense, she'd long since closed her eyes and decided to just wait until it had gone away... Futility was in every direction in this stupid castle, so why not? the only way to win against this situation was to make it her own choice to take the one action she could in that state.
*THUNK!*
A Series of noises, very specific, mind bogglingly familiar and yet it took her several moments to realize that it was the sound of the great doors that sealed the main entrance of the castle finally opening from the outsit...
Chrysalis' eyes shot open fast enough to make her wince from the sudden light hitting weary eyes, and reflexlively lifted her head, a shakey motion that barely succeeded, setting her eyes on the now open door. Blurry vision barely made out the light of the outside and numerous shapes pouring through the entrance... but she'd gotten worked up too suddenly, in her horrid state the sudden movement sent her head spinning and her conciousness cascading into darkness as she blacked out, her senses barely registering the clopping of hooves before finally shutting down.
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Unnammed Changeling Story - Chapter 1 - Savior
It had taken a considerable ammount of time for him to collect the information about Chrysalis and her activites among the ponies without making himself known... not an entirely easy thing given that his brood was more acclimated to hostile stealth and fighting than infiltration and espionage, though certain unexpected events saw the most important information fall right in his claws, her current location.
He had spent a year or so among the ponies by then, concealed as best he could and observing, learning about them, collecting what information he could from stray changeling's that didn't seem to know where their Queen had gone... As such, he knew enough to expect them to be 'nice' in general, but they also seemed slothful and negligent of anything that wasn't part of their daily lives or deeply important to them. It came as a surprie to find out that they had 'left' Chrysalis trapped inside some form of enchanted castle roughly 5 'years' ago, were they naive? careless? covertly evil?... or perhaps just stupid? who could have not considered the inevitability of starvation in such an environment?
Regardless, he'd set out immediately for the castle, retrieving his Brood and what remained of Chrysalis' that had remained living amongst ponies waiting for her return, at least those in a position to dissapear for a while.
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'you have 'got' to be kidding me... fuck you 'world', stop torturing me and let me have my peace!'
She had suddenly found herself hurting again, which meant she was concious, which also meant that she her 'last moments' were in fact 'not' truly her last moments, of course it took her a while for her still starving mind to recall the last moments before blacking out.
At the instant of the realization she suddenly lurched up, trying to sit up and suddenly let out a Pained Howl coupled with several noisy crackles before flopping back flat, she wasn't in a state to be moving yet and had certainly hurt something.
Then she felt it, an especially large hoof resting on her shoulder, firm but harmless and holding her down... it was too big for a normal pony, it was... 'not' a normal hoof, she quickly realized, and opened her eyes suddenly, finding herself staring into Large Red eyes she hadn't seen in years, coupled with a worried smile.
"There you are, Stay still, and don't speak yet... I am impressed you held out for so long, but you are still in the deepest stages of changeling starvation... you practically look dead already, but we can fix that given time and a healthy supply... now, you're carapace is weak and cracking, if you move too much you're going to break it and cut yourself up beneath... I can't offer a 'quick fix' this time, but i can make sure you'll live, making a full recovery will be up to 'you' though... Toughing through it without a magical 'fixer upper' is a good way to grow stronger from your experiences."
She found herself thoroughly stunned at this, trying her best not to snicker at Irony kicking her in the flank again by making her wake up to her 'savior' keeping watch over her... perhaps it was her pitiful state at the time, or the perspective, but he seemed even more impressive than her memories implied, though his carapace seemed to have been smoothed out some as it didn't appear 'sharp and deadly' anymore... of course, a moment later something caught in her mind and a worried expression appeared, and as if on cue he continued speaking and moved on to another subject.
"More importantly I'm sure, you're Children are all... well, not okay, but alive, My own hivemates are tending to them as best they can, though they'll heal best if you get healthy again and help them through your own link... It doesn't seem that there were any deaths yet either... I stand impressed by you yet again, most would very likely have executed some drones to save themselves some love to survive on, but you spread it all out with remarkable balance to keep them all alive as long as possible... I can't say my opinion of you isn't dulled a bit by what i've learned you 'did' to end up here, but I'd say you've already been suffering enough because of those mistakes... Those ponies of your's are 'not' easy for me to imitate, hahah... speaking of which..."
She was over-joyed to hear that tidbit, though for some strange reason it ached to think he might be dissapointed, the news that the other's had all still survived and might be able to recover... was that? well shit 'Seriously? I didn't even know I 'could' produce tears...'
Yeah, that was probably another blow to her pride, but at the moment she didn't care, her hive would survive... She found herself trying to move her head, carefully, slowly, wincing frequently as her starved form refused to act smoothly, but in her mind she was desperate to see them, to have a visual reminder to back up his information...
The scene before her was beautiful, horrifying, and shocking at the same time.
Her own changeling's looked as sickly and starved as she did, Grayed and cracked carapace, fading colors, full of holes, bandages on occasion in the few cases that one was physically injured due to their fragile states.
Around them milled about other changelings, though 'red' was the typically common color that she figured identified them a Rasav's along with various forms of armor like carapace, there were many other colors present at random as well... A strikingly obvious theme came to mind, they were all diverse, rarely was one of 'his' changelings just like another of their brothers, each one was a different size, some had bits of armor, some had altered carapace, some barely registered as changelings, and one she swore looked like he was made of goo... a few were still disguised as normal ponies... wait
They didn't have reason to be disguied here, there should only be changeling's around... those 'are' ponies...
A quick 'Ow!' 'slow' glance to scan the room revealed a fair number of them, along with the thankful image of some of her own changeling's that had been lost prior being present and healthy enough to help... but more importantly was the presence of a couple of royal guards and a certain familiar unicorn waiting by the entrance that struck a fresh taste of horror in her mind that led to her snapping attention back to Rasav with a worried look.
"Hmhm, well at least your memory is intact... If I'd known you're territory was 'between' mine and Equestria, I might have found you much earlier... as it stands, I only knew to encounter the ponies first and see if they knew your location... Naturally, I learned of what you've done in Equestria before and since our last meeting, and like-wise, why the initial reaction to my appearance in Equestria was so hostile...
Naturally they didn't like the idea of an entirely separate hive that 'looked' more dangerous, going off to potentially rally with their previous offender and come back to bite them...
The Princesses 'did' seem impressively understanding and open once they'd come to understand I wasn't there to invade, but a ruler always has a duty to consider and plan for the worst possibilities in the interest of their subjects... we reached a compromise... Those you wrong the most, along with a sizeable force of 'their' soldiers would acommpany us."
He leaned in close to whisper with a small smirk "It was no worry for me to accept, It's not like these guard's are a threat to 'my' brood anyway." That got the barest of snickers from her as he rose back up.
"So, to clarify, Prince Shining Armor, as well as Princesses Twilight and Cadance have Tagged along and-"
"You've got-to be-fucking-kidding me!" The voice that interupted him between desperately deep breaths was strained and suffering, Chrysalis was clearly shocked by something she heard "Twilight is-a princess-now?." She recieved a mild glare from him for the insulted tone, something that molified her instantly "Sorry... It's-"
"Your pride rearing it's head... Understandable, though that lets me know just how 'new' she is to the role since you didn't know... You are going to have to sacrifice all of that and build your pride back from the ground up... I want to be completely clear here... I 'am' here to 'save' you, but I am not here to be a magical 'take it all away' button... You will be facing the ponies you've hurt, You'll have to decide the future of your hive and how you intend to make peace... I will keep you healthy until you're strong enough to handle yourself again, but by then you're troubles with Equestria will have been resolved."
She looked... sad, suddenly "Please... tell me you didn't come to save me only to have me dumped in a dungeon..."
He chuckled a little at that and shook his head "No, No I haven't, as I said, the Princesses' are remarkably understanding, and merciful, the fact that no fatalities were caused is of course a factor drastically in your favor... Being that you are far too weak to threaten even a normal pony right now, you'll be in 'my' custody while I am 'officially' under watch by the princesses themselves... I have my own plans for the ponies, much more 'mutual' than your's were, but For the fore-seeable future, my Responsibility is 'you'... I know there is a 'good' queen behind that vengeaful pride and desperation, and I shall see her brought to light where her Carapace will shine gloriously... And it appears it's time for a different talk."
She followed his suddenly shifted gaze to see that familiar white unicorn trotting over, his armor seeming far more crystaline and shiny than the it should have been for an Equestrian Guard captain.
Behind him were 2 alicorns... 2? "You're-shitting me... She-turned-alicorn too?"
Rasav's eyes met the Unicorn's for a moment as they exchanged a very simple greeting "Shining Armor..."
The Light behind the approaching ponies had, for the most part, denied her detailed sight of them, being severely weak with somewhat still blurry vision wasn't helping... but she couldn't mistake the sound that she heard as they got close enough... Sobs... 'they' were crying for 'her'... It made her feel sick, her pride was furious at this affront, yet she was far too weak to act on the feeling beyond simply looking away.
"Shining!"
The sharp tone of a familiar pink princess' voice brought her gaze back, finding the Unicorn suddenly glaring suspicious and angry, the other 2 glaring at him "I can't..."
Cadance wrapped a leg around his withers and tugged him closer, coincidentally just a bit further from Chrysalis "what do you mean?"
"She's... This has to be a trick!... I-"
well, that got a surprised look from Chrysalis, though she was the only one... Through the ranting he'd seemed increasingly more angry, It's not like she could blame him, it was her own fault for being so deceptive and invasive... But the pink one just smacked him upside the head suddenly... from an alicorn that had to hurt, but maybe the armor protected him "Shiny, You know I love you, but you can be such a block head!" She spoke with remarkable calmness despite her tears and her expression being twisted into something only describably as heart-broken at the scene before them. "You've been trained to detect magic, You can tell just like us that she's powerless right now, she can't 'fake' anything now."
"But... she was in my head!... How can we know? How..."
Twilight jump into the arguement with a clearly grumpy but still teary look "Even if somehow she 'were' faking something, It doesn't matter... She's still suffering because 'our' dumb asses forgot we left her here, we just assumed she'd break out of something, not that she'd've used a castle that she didn't know how to escape herself... I'd say nearly starving to death is a way worse punishment than prison time or execution, I could probably name dozens of ponies in canterlot who would've made every sacrifice on the part of others so they'd have more food for themselves... Either way it's our duty to bring her back and make sure nopony, and no 'changeling', dies because of our own stupid mistakes... Believe me, I still want to smack her as much as you do, But we're not cruel enough to beat someone when their down, we help someone who's suffering, we hurt when we see something this horrible, even if it's happening to someone we have plenty of reason to hate"
Twilight, as a new princess, was especially rough around the edges, it didn't take spending a lot of time around her to realize she preffered a no-nonsense style with as little froofy word play and 'noble' nanny pandering as possible, but was still able to pour her heart into making a speech about something she believes... It gave a fairly clear impression impression of her character, even without being able to sense emotions... She might be inexperienced in both the role of leadership and in battle, but he could see the 'potential' that Celestia spoke of and found that he could count her among the very 'very' few ponies that he can respect.
On that Front, Rasav was still impressed with these ponies... even if the out-ward reactions were anger in Shining's case, and the obvious sadness or simply uncertainty for the rest, He could sense an over-whelming and unanimous Ocean of sorrow and self dissapointment... These ponies were disgusted with their own negligence and truly horrified at seeing even an army of, hopefully former, foes in such a tremendous state of suffering.
"Ugh... I can't-believe-this..." Their attention went to Chrysalis suddenly, who was currently biting back as much sentiment as possible "I'm still-not sure-this isn't-some form-of delusion-from starvation... I can't believe-I feel-'love'-flowing from-you... I 'must'-be-delusional..."
Rasav was actually the one to reply to her strained comment "why?" She looked up, finding a rather unusual smile on his face "I haven't found many ponies during my presence in equestria that I could claim deserving of my fashion of respect, I could count the number on my claws honestly, most I can simply 'leave to their lives'." He grumbled just a little bit "Except those 'nobles'... ugh." he made an irritated face that, for just a moment, the other 3 ponies around her mirrored at the mention of 'nobles' "But there is one thing I have found... they are creatures full of emotion, Love having a most dominant presence in their lives... Once the princess made it known that I wasn't there to invade or harm anypony, quite a number of them calmed down immediately... Ponies may seem weak and fragile, but among the most vital lesson's I learned long ago when it was still a challenge to survive in the southern jungles, You will find the potential greatness in the most unexpected of places, and you should never underestimate some creature as though what you know of them is everything there is... Hmph, you'd never think of it looking at me 'now', But ages ago I was merely a drone in another Queens hive, but that's a tale for a different time... for now you need to accept their help, and maybe with a little work we can get you to stop thinking of them as simple prey."
The very idea that this tremendous specimen of Changeling Superiorty [in her mind at least] could... 'respect'... ponies, she could barely process it... then again, she was also incredibly diminished at the time, good luck thinking straight when you've been starving for years. "Ugh... Just-Do what your-going to do... I'll worry-about this-after I don't-feel like death-anymore."
It was an odd thing, even if it sounded like a desperate attempt to hold on to what little pride she had by being rude about it, It was an acceptance, more so it was very final and seemed to spark them into action and the trio moved away to let several ponies and changelings of both hives move in to ready the crippled queen for being moved... though just at the last moment she raised her head to Rasav to speak "One last thing... There's a-question-that's tortured me-for years-ever since we-met-in the jungle..."
A lot of attention was suddenly on her, Rasav's included "Yes?"
"You're a king... How do you-lay eggs?" 'gobsmacked' was a good way to describe the expressions of everyone within ear-shot, she'd even chuckled at asking that question...
a moment later The Changeling king burst out laughing, the depth of his voice in such unrestrained laughter could be 'felt' by anyone near him... A few seconds later he calmed down, though still had a very toothy grin as he looked back at her "You know the answer to that Chrysalis... The same answer to all questions asking how a changeling does something... Evolution my dear." that didn't actually answer the question, and aside from a snicker from 'his' changelings, everyone present was still completely clueless, though they quickly recovered to continue their recovery efforts.
Author's Note
It would actually take a couple of days and plenty of efforts on the parts of both the ponies and changelings to safely transport a crippled hive Back into Equestria's territory... Surely it was an adventure of Epic proportions that tested the wills of all and drove those involved closer as comrades, willing or not...
[Pinkie Interlude: Buuut, the Author doesn't feel like detailing that right now, so we're going to skip right to the end where they get back safely!
Me: Pinkie... do you have to do that? Maybe I want to see if the readers can interpret that I have ideas for it but am fully intent on making them wait until I design it out as a side-story to this one.
Pinkie: Pff, of course I have to, It's not very nice to make them wait, not to mention throwing in character changes that you don't explain.
Me: Ugh, there's no winning with pinkie... I'm still going to make them wait until I make it a side story.]
So, Moving on
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Midnight's Horror Show - Chapter 1 - Dark... [Contains, or will, Exceedingly Dark Themes, Gore, Violence, Suggestive scenes, potential clop]
Ever so slowly, sense of the world faded back into being...
First, the Feeling of laying in something scratchy and dry... not exactly hard but very dry... One would guess dead grass or hay...
with sound still dominated by defeaned ringing, Scent and taste came next, combined as ever to confuse a tired mind... one wonders, is it dirt they taste and rot their smell? or the other way around? Scent always have loved to mix up with taste hasn't it?
Finally the ringing began to quiet... giving way to eerie silence, then the sound of soft wind and crackling of dry and fragile grass snapping apart in the breeze... there was a sound, distant, high pitched... much too far to identify...
Then at last the body balanced enough to return sight, and quickly it was confirmed, Night time, and it was indeed a veritable sea of dead grass, mixed with gray and rotten tree's devoid of leaves and covered in drying sap that leaked from various chasms in the bark... and yes, it was a stink of rot in the air and the taste of ash and dirt in the mouth.
"PLECH!"
________________________________________
Perspective - Midnight Light
"Okay, First thing, injuries?" I paused and looked myself over.
Down... 'yep, all four legs still there... that's there too... no blood anywhere." Raven Black fur was still there too.
Back... 'wing's, check, no apparent injury, not even bruising... Tail's intact... Saddlebags too, remarkably... I half expected those to vanish... It's a good thing I left the note behind separately." a little push shifted a blueish-silvery mane out of the way, Revealing Broad and still healthy wings, a tail to match the mane, and a Cutie mark 'I still think Butt Brand was funnier' that resembled Moon beams cutting through a black cloud with the barely visible curve of a moon behind it.
Up... 'Ah good, that didn't break either.' A hoof rose up to check a long and sharply pointed horn, finding it properly intact still... A short glow produced a half baked mirrored surface in the air to reveal expectedly red eyes and nice sharp teeth 'Okay, everything seems to be intact... now, why am I in a rotting forest?'
I dispelled the reflector and started trotting along, trying to ignore the strangely sick feel that came from my hooves as they trampled the dead crispy grass... It was just dead grass, it shouldn't be a big deal, but something about it made me notice a slightly sick feeling from it's contact. 'I could have sword I'd still be near ponyville... a naturally driven universal jump isn't usually innacurate... oh wait... huh, it still looks like Nightmare night... but...'
I had just pass edge of some forest right on the edge of ponyville... I could hardly tell which one, it didn't look at all familiar... and found the town I was fairly familiar with looking, at first glance, almost just like I'd left it. Everything was dark, windows closed, night lamps off, Tree's and bushes 'creepified'... it looked for a moment like nightmare night, but then.
'The night lamps should still be on for late nighters... the windows aren't 'closed' so much as boarded up, almost no house has an unboarded windows, and those are clearly broken into... some doors are boarded too... And these creepy things are not decorations... and the streets are deserted... I've never heard nightmare night so impossibly silent... Damn... when I knew 'something' was going to happen to me, I didn't expect... whatever 'this' is..."
I continued to move as I talked in my head, head swaying, eyes scanning every direction, ears swiveling this way and that... I was on full alert, expecting something evil to jump out and attack and give me a reason to fight it... or at least a hint of 'why' I was here... Thinking back, it was far to naive to think I would've been pulled away from my love on her favorite night to face some generic evil, but what I really discovered I had never expected.
"Ooh, Look at that, an Alicorn down here in ponyville! I thought all of you flying chickens were still hiding behind you're precious magic wall."
My head and every sense in it snapped to the side suddenly, it seemed like a totally generic house, missing a door of course, and in it stood something pink but only slightly familiar. 'what... it looks like...'
"OH!, EVEN BETTER! You're a new arrival aren't you?! wonderful, I've been needing some new ingredients, the usual has been starting to get rather stale of late."
'Oh that's not good...' The initial shock snapped away at the insinuation, My attention focused sharply suddenly and I took in every detail the same way I used to when dealing with threats.
'Alright, looks like pinkie, balancing on hind hooves for some reason, Apron looks like leather, Face mask, straight hair, not a good sign with 'her'... Belt of knives... Blood.' That stage of rushed analysis had me realize the red that was spattered across her pink, even staining the seeming medical mask covering her muzzle... A quick glance told me her left leg had a very large knife clutched in the lower joint... and a wet thump brought my attention to the other side, where she'd clearly just dropped what was obviously a corpse, some green apparently but most of it was stained red.
'SHIT!' I Jerked back and sent myself back a couple of meters with a push of my wings, this pinkie skidding to a stop with her Knife in a frighteningly precise position that would have buried it into an absolutely vital part of my central anatomy 'Damnit, She's as fast as the pinkie I know too.' that wasn't generally a good thing, 'pinkie-ness' was never a desirable enemy to have to deal with.
"awww, what's wrong, you can't talk? Are you afrraaaid?" I locked eyes with her for a moment, a cold glare in place meeting her own very much Psychotic Grin "Come oooon, I just wanna see how 'tasty' you'll be!" She lunged again.
This time I reacted, creating a simple bright glow of my horn to disrupt her vision as I lept to the side again, whirling to try and give a firm buck, only to have her spin clean of to the side in her own counter-attack, using the moment to slam to Knife into my flank directly into my mark...
I didn't so much shout as I 'roared' the pain, the decidedly un-pony like roar that caught her attention just enough to delay a repeating stab... a delay I took full advantage of by having my body burst into a form of shadow mist that quickly floated away carrying the saddlebags hung inside the cloud.
She reacted to this with a couple of slashes and an annoyed growl "AUGH!, I HATE wHEN THEY DO THAT!!!!"
A few seconds later, after floating for a bit, I re-solidified ontop of the same house she'd come out of, well out of range and favoring my right hind leg, though I didn't intend to chance under-estimating anything 'pinkie', not after previous experiences regardless of how peaceful they'd been.
Upon noticing me again she grew a much more wild grin, though she started going back about her business with the corpse while talking "Heehee, I see now, you're not just an alicorn, you're a 'nightmare' too, those are the only ones that do 'that', heehee... That makes you 'really' exotic, I can't wait to catch you and find out what kind of cupcakes you'll make... Ohhh, if only I'd been equipped for dealing with an alicorn tonight!... Ohhh, I'd get so much more business if I could sell 'nightare' cakes, HEEHEE!"
Once she started to leave my vision from that point of view, I didn't feel like taking a chance of her pulling a 'pinkie' and appearing behind me, I quickly vanished in a burst of black smoke, re-appearing a dozen roof-tops away and quickly taking cover to peek back out... sure enough a pink form popped out of the roof in the distance where I had been, only to give off an annoyed shout and go back to work again.
'okay... This is well beyond what I'd expected... If there's a 'psychotic pinkie' here, It's a safe bet there's other dangerous alternates present... and she managed to sneak up on me too... 'ME!'... I've got a lot of work ahead of me... GYUH!... first things first though."
I looked back to find a thin but very deep wound buried in my flank gushing fresh blood 'I am so glad I'm a magic based creature... I let myself underestimate her, never underestimate pinkie pie... I'm going to have to take 'everything' seriously while i'm here.' I leaned in tightly, guiding my horn to the wound and pouring out some raw magic... 'who needs healing magic when you can simple remake the flesh with magic?... Ugh, there I go again... I'm still not over that reckless 'I can't die' instinct.'
Unfortunately, something else popped up as soon as I finished healing "OI!, wHO'S BLEEDING ON MY ROOF!?"
'Ah crap!' The timing of the shout was startling enough that I stumbled trying to stand, tumbling right off the roof and crashing into several boxes that had been stored between houses.
I soon found myself staring at a set of clearly glowing Red-eyes coming down the alley...
Surprisingly, a simple hello got a reaction, a noticeable flinch from the eyes, they flickered for a moment before going dark as an, interestingly enough, black unicorn moved close enough to be seen in the moon-light, apparently male and with , His eyes suddenly green without that glow, and Mane and tail that were both a sharp Yellow. "well that's different... Usually they attack or run away, not stop and speak... you must be new here."
"Uh, yeah..." He didn't seem to react oddly aside from being non-hostile, though I had a feeling there was plenty of wooden debris concealing certain details about me.
"Huh... so, why ya bleedin on my roof and breakin my boxes?"
I gave him a fairly flat stare at first, though that would probably look a little funny considering I was upside down at the time. "well, I broke your boxes because You startled me shouting and I fell on them... as for the bleeding, I just got done running into pinkie pie." the last words caused a startled reaction from him and he immediately started looking about frantically as if he was about to piddle himself, I surmised why and quickly added "She's not nearby, I teleported away after getting out of range so she couldn't latch on."
That got him to relax for a moment, followed by a different startled reaction "Oh... okay, those pinkie's are seriously... wait, Teleported?"
"Yeah... I... oh, wait." I wiggled abit, finding my horn buried in the dirt and debris thanks to my inverted fall "Ohh, that explains it." I started to move for a moment and gave a sharp wince "Augh, crap! that shouldn't... it's just wood..." It wasn't like it was comfortable or the fall didn't hurt, but I 'was' an alicorn, I was used to it hurting less than it was... after a few more, admitedly fairly stupid, attempts to dislodge some of the debris my brain clicked and I simply burst into smoke again, reforming a moment later standing up on the debris with my Saddlebags in place and nothing... 'ow'
I looked back to find some splinters stuck in my back in a few places and a couple clinging to my wings 'Okay, I don't know why that's actually working, splinters shouldn't be the tiniest problem.' I quickly set about plucking them all out and tossing them aside, then I turned back and... He was staring at me with dumbfounded shock... "Okay, why are you staring at me like that? an Alicorn's not 'that' impossible around here is it?"
He seemed very worried suddenly, like he was ready to flee at a moments notice "w-well... Not... 'impossible', per se... Just... Unheard of actually stopping to talk to someponyinsteadofeatthemalive." He'd already started backing up.
I just stared curiously for a moment before a possibility clicked "Ohhhh... I see... They must have been here for a long time to reach a point of starvation that'd drive them into a Desperation craze 'that' strong... but look, i'm new here, so i'm fresh, I'm not about to snap and try to eat you..."
He calmed down almost instantly and even let off a relieved sigh "Ohhh thank the dark... I was kind of afraid they'd started getting smarter or something... The only thing that really saves us is being bale to out-smart them while their crazed like that."
"Oh, I know, I've seen 'the craze' before, Luna and I experimented with it a bit at one point... oh damnit" He started looking worried yet again "I mean 'my' Luna... lemme guess, there's a 'bad' luna here?"
"Uh, you could say that... There's a couple of them in the 'Feral Herd', and 3 locked up in Canterlot... There's some 'not crazed' alicorns that work together, but they tend to just stay hidden behind the magic wall in canterlot with a small legion of unicorns and some 'lesser ponies' to keep as food... there's a few that are still indipendant... but that's usually because they are 'extremely' dangerous... normally a lone alicorn out here means a lot of running and dying."
Okay, I had to ask this "Okay, is there anything that ponies worry about eating around here aside from other ponies?"
"well... Meat is the only reliable thing 'to' eat here, nothing that is both safe and edible grows anywhere that's safe to get it."
"Jeez... if you have to resort to that... No wonder everything looks so deserted."
"Actually, that's because the pinkie's are out hunting... almost everyone takes cover and just hopes they don't get found, those 'things' are unimagineably invasive, we still haven't got a clue how they do that stuff, though they at least can't enter the shadow-side."
"Huh... wait... so... How many are here?"
"I can't guess an accurate number, but 10's of thousands is a fair guess for ponyville."
"whu... huh? How do they all avoid going into a hunger craze with those kinds of numbers being sustained?"
"They eat eachother." He said it so... matter of factly...
"But... then how do they keep their numbers up?"
For some reason he looked at me like I was the crazy one, then realization dawned suddenly "Ohhh, right, sorry, for a moment I forgot you're new, you must not have experienced it yet... Lucky you, caught by a pinkie and walking away... Nopony who dies here stays dead, in a few hours or a day or so they just 'appear' again, whole and healthy... Honestly, the main reason the Alicorn herd is so dangerous and crazed is because we aren't strong enough to kill them, they are always starving." My turn to stare... "what? Is that impossible where you're from?"
"Uh.. well... not 'impossible' but... Hrm, not on such a massive scale."
"Oh, well, it's just the way the 'master' has altered this world, and before you ask, that's all anypony ever calls him, speaking his name seems to call his attention and that's never good for anyone."
"Damn...... If he can do 'that' I imagine it 'would' be bad to call his attention."
"Yeah, and nopony has ever actually 'seen' him, they just kindof 'feel' when he's watching them."
"Ugh... this just gets better and better... Okay, you seem to know stuff, So, what's the general scale of 'crazy to sane' around here?"
"Depends on the diet, me? I drink blood, so It's easy for me to stay healthy and not have to risk my mind slipping due to hunger... Admitedly, licking up the Pinkie's leavings is pretty degrading, but it's easier than having to tear somepony apart for it, just about everyone here is dangerous in some way. Generally the newbies who want to desperately hold on to their vegitarian origins are the most dangerous, they turn starving faster than anyone else."
"ah, i see, Vampony? or just a blood based diet adaptation?"
"Vampony, though there are some that fit the second."
"right, well, that makes my time here about 50 times easier... I already like meat, but being able to avoid having to eat somepony is a tremendous load off of my concience"
"Really? Just about everypony who ends up 'new' here is some kind of evil or psychotic on their own and don't really worry about others for the first century or so... what exactly 'got' you banished here?"
"Oh, I wasn't banished here, I just kindof, ended up here... I got this suspicious feeling that something was going to happen to me, and last night, it did, I just faded away where I was and woke up here." This was more reaction than I'd expected... He was suddenly staring in slack jawed awe "Ugh, is this going to be a common occurance? I don't like the whole 'awed reverence' thing."
"Uh, oh, nonono, I'm just... shocked... You are an absolute 'first' here, Nopony who's ever ended up here 'hasn't' done something evil somewhere else to get the locals to banish them for their own safety... even 'the master' was banished from somewhere... the few of us who actually had inter-universal experience prior to getting here describe this place as 'the dark', it's simply the dumping ground where the multi-verse throws away banished evils to avoid dumping them on a different universe that doesn't deserve them... we've never once had an instance of somepony coming here who wasn't forcibly banished."
"Oh... wow..." I face-hoofed suddenly "FUCK!"
He jumped at that "what?!"
I just sighed "Uuughhh... Nothing... just... I got dragged away from one of my loves on her favorite night, I can only imagine the kind of pain 'she's' feeling right now... so instead of enjoying The Best Nightmare Night I ever put together, I'm here, in what essentially qualifies as the Universe's evil garbage dump to do who knows what... This place is going to be fucking Tartarus, I mean, I wasn't concious 10 minutes before getting a Butcher's knife buried in my flank and having to run away."
"Oh... well, ya know, you kinda ran into one of the worst afterall, I mean, the Pinkie's even hunt alicorns when they come through town, you're lucky that one wasn't prepared for capturing one... Oh-no..." He suddenly froze wide-eyed
Before I could ask 'why' a childish broke the momentary silence and caused me to quickly move my focus from the other pony, and suddenly my blood froze as I saw '2' Pinkie's at the other end of the alley behind the stranger, they were different from eachother though, one clearly was the same one I'd seen before, but next to her, staying on 4 legs, stood one that more closely resembled the familiar bubbly and adorable 'nice' crazy pink pony, poofy mane and all, save for some blood spatter and a large curved cleaver in her muzzle. "There's more behind me aren't there?"
"Y-yeah..." A Glance back revealed 2 more 'different' pinkies, One looked to have had her color drained and bore a mercilessly cold glare, She had bands on her Fet-locks that held knives. The one next to her, strangely enough, was sitting and her fore-hooves held what resembled a large cross-bow loaded with 2 bolts side-by-side... She didn't exactly look cold or happy or even crazy, just bored.
The sound of somepony clearing their throat brought my attention upwards Just intime to hear "Hi there" spoken in a surprisingly serious but cheery tone, and to have a chain dropped across my back, slamming me into the ground.
"GAH, FUCK!" I guessed this was one of those 'alicorn hunting tools' the first one had mentioned... It instantly felt like the chain was melted to my back, binding my wings, and attached to the ground at the same time... It didn't look like it had any special physical method of attachment, but the magic in the chain could be considered legendary, I could feel it suffocating my own inside and out.... Granted, holding me in place, and completely crippling me are 2 very different things.
"OOooh, this one's got fight in him." The giggling returned and intensified as I forced my way back to my hooves, struggling most certainly, but soon standing all the same. "You were right 'loop', This one's 'fresh'. He oughta be a lot of fun."
I looked back up again to the voice, This one didn't seem to be armed, but instead was wearing a suspiciously clean and pressed suit jacket with a surprisingly pleasant mirthful expression. Next to her was a sixth 'Damnit... How many of them 'are' there?' who stood on her hind-legs like the first one, though this one did so because she was propped up on a Black-handled Scythe that was balanced between her fore-legs 'Ugh... what, is she an iteration of pinkie who thought she was a reaper?'
I must've been eyeing the scythe a bit much because that one answered through an oddly calm smile "The scythe is just my favorite toy, I think of it being kindof like me... Nice and merciful if you accept your fate and let me slice you in half, but if you get troublesome it'll punish you by cutting something else and making you live with the pain until you give in... heeheehee."
I took a couple of seconds to listen to that and turned my eyes to the 'business pinkie' "So... I'm fucked aren't I?"
That reaction must have been entertaining, because the giggling turned into gut busting laughter that even included the serious looking ones "Hahah, yes, yes you are, but it's up to you to sit down and take it, or make this 'fun'."
On the word 'fun' the cruel looking one behind me started sprinting forward, It'd be pretty hard to miss the sound of her hooves mixed with the knifes tinking against the occasional rock in the dirt, but it went quiet suddenly... I dropped completely.
As expected she'd leapt at me, aiming high to go for a quick kill, at least they took fighting an alicorn seriously to a degree... Of course she still let out an absolutely furious shriek at being made to miss, followed a moment later by a Pained scream as I lunged back up with all the force I could still manage, spearing my long horn clean through one of her rear knees. I jerked my head back first to pull back on her momentum, getting another pained sound and spattering my muzzle with blood, followed by wrenching my neck around in a circle dragging her in an arch before Jerking back and arching my head back as far as I could, wrenching her off my horn and sending her back down the alley in a screaming cursing heap of angry bitch pie.
I took just a second to shake my head violently to clear as much running blood as possible before it'd blind me... though when I opened my eyes I found a grinning face charging at me, slowed for barely an instant to snatch her cleaver from the stranger's skull... Damn, they got 'him' fast... and then... she ducked to the side suddenly, my eyes momentarily following her before another bit of pink separated from her former position, causing me to snap back immediately to find the first one I'd encountered aiming to drive that knife home again now that I was stilled.
I clenched 3 legs hard to hold myself standing against the chain while I threw up my right fore-leg to strike her swinging leg... arm... I don't know what to think of this one, her physical structure differed enough to let her move on just her hind legs without falling... Either way, I interupted her before she could dig it in, but this time I curled my fore-leg around her's and pulled as well, Slamming my head into her's hard enough to knock her senseless and leave her stumbling back a few meters.
that was when a burning pain bit into my left Flank as the second Pinkie's cleaver dug in, and my leg siezed up, allowing the chain to buckle the other 2 and pull me down again "GYAAAAH!!" There came that roar again, though it didn't surprise them this time, and it didn't stop her from using the opportunity to leap onto my back, bouncing up and down in a manner that would've been adorable if her muzzle wasn't now covered in my blood "wooo, I GOTCHA! Better give up now! Of I'm gonna getcher head too!"
Obviously her being on my back in this situation was a death sentence, So I did what I could and jerked back up, trying to dislodger her some with the momentum, though it just made her bounce a little higher before crashing onto my back again, but I at least kept standing, though pain screamed in my back leg from the first wound... It took only a moment to hear hoof beats in both directions though, and it wasn't hard to guess what it meant was coming... Honestly, having been told that If I died I'd come right back a little later, did 'not' make it easier to accept a situation where it seemed almost inevitable, and it also did nothing to ease the reaction caused by survival instinct.
One hoof shot out in front to Push back the first Pinkie again, though i didn't have a chance to grab and headbutt her again. I felt the cleaver dig into the front right shoulder then, the same leg I'd been favoring for defending myself in the front, coming back out an instant later, presumably for another swing... I felt her weight leave my back most likely to jump and come back down on my spine, the one in front charged up to aim high, and I couldn't tell what the third one was going to do and- "GYAAAAAHHH!!!!"
One of my legs shut down suddenly from the Scythe that dropped down above, devoid of it's holder "I waarrrned you about resistiiinnng!" fractions of a second suddenly felt like minutes as that primal fear flooded my mind, my flank slammed into the ground from my rear balance cutting out, jamming the scythe's handle down on the ground and causing it to slice free of my leg before dancing through the air behind me... It's actually strange, how sometimes fate and luck work out...
My fallen position disrupted the bouncing Pinkie, screwing up her landing and sending her tumbling back into the third one who'd been in mid leap, a 'clunk' from behind signaled the release of the crossbow, pressumably in reaction to make sure I had no chance of escape because of the stumbling... I hadn't seen it, but the Twin bolts had a Steel wire between them, which would likely has sliced gruesomely deep from that momentum, where it not for the scythe and the other 2 pinkie's getting in the way, all of which crashed into my back-side along with an ample ammount of blood from the wire cutting into 2 of them, and the scythe, without a guiding hoof, landed harmlessly side-ways against my rear.
with the wire attached to something metal, the bolts circled around, more of the wire catching on the chain that held me in place, and brought the bolts up closer... burying into the last charging pinkie who'd been an instant digging that knife in, turning a fatal blow into a stab in my last unhurt joint, and letting the chain finally completely trap me against the ground, now covered in pink and red.
The whole scene seemed to have completely gob-smacked everyone left alive at the moment, Myself included... A few moments later I looked back... The 2 that had fallen behind me and got caught by the flying wire had be somehow impaled on the scythe blade as well as sliced open enough to... well, it was messy, lets just say that... The Crossbowmare Pinkie behind me was completely stunned for only a second before throwing the cross bow down "Oh damnit! Now they're all 3 gonna try to kill me in the morning!"
Then I looked up at the 'boss pinkie' who seemed to... actually be trying to hold in laughter, the other one up there still stunned... I can only assume the raw shock of how I was still alive kept me from noticing the mind shattering pain at the time, or maybe I was going into shock, who knows... either way, i felt the need to joke about this somehow. "Ya know... I would've been totally okay with a pinkie orgy if you'd just asked!" that broke it, and she flopped onto her side laughing.
"oh wow! I like this one! He's gonna be fun to have around here!" The laughing went on for a little while, the 'reaper pinkie' eventually coming out of her shocked state and hopping off the roof to retrieve her scythe... well, I knew what was coming next "Hold it Reapie!" or maybe not "I want to talk to this one first... He's smarter than the rest of those alicorns... and maybe he can make himself useful, now that he knows we can tear him apart just fine."
'reapie' froze in mid-swing "Awww... you sure boss?"
"Yes"
"Oh, fine..."
"well... this is an unexpected turn of events... I get the feeling I'm going to be having a lot of these here."
"Get him loose and put him back together for now."
...
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Fallout Equestria - Song of Shadows - Volume 1 - Children of the Night - Prologue/Chapter1 [Dark, AU, Gore, Violence]
Prologue - whispers of shadow
The wasteland is fully of many things... Monsters, would be saviors, Murderers, Rapists, Slavers, Gangs... the list stretches on and on, but there are some other things such as Myths, Legends, Heroes, commonly puffed up in reputation by the words of Exciteable Radio DJs or the flowing praise of those who've been touched by them in some way or another...
There's one particular legend, or horror story depending on who you ask, that is particularly relevant at this point, a legend reffering to a creature called 'The Light of Night', a bit cheesy of a name, but it essentially compares it to the moonlight. It's a terror of the night-time wasteland said to destroys wickedness to it's very soul, a Towering Stallion of pure black with Red eyes and a mane of pure moon light. His presence is said to turn away the beasts of the wasteland leaving his surroundings perfectly silent save for the melodious singing that he carries with him, said to be singing of innocent souls following him, taking pleasure in his company and awaiting the day his path crosses those who have wronged them.
It is fabled that bullets simply pass through an incorporeal form, magic beams rebound off of his ghostly hide, and explosions don't even phase him as pure force just rolls off of him. He is known to be merciless in the quelling of evil, slaughtering whole bands who would attack him or roving slaver bands that he happens upon, leaving a single survivor to spread his tale and warn their peers to 'do better' to be 'good ponies' else their lives be punctuated with the eternal fear of his wrath day and night...
Most don't believe though, afterall, Legends are just that, it's probably just that some idiot ran away scared when he and his buddies came across a hellhound, a piece of Unity, or just got their asses kicked by a bunch of wanderers or something along those lines. Nevermind the fact that most tall tales are just fluffed up preachery poured ontop of the handful of truths that exist, nopony knows whether such things are the truth, afterall, it's not like this creature just walks up to every slaver and raider den in the wasteland right?
Still, there's the tales of those he has passed without harm, traders awed by his presence that he greets and passes with a simple nod, Lost foals that follow his song to the safety of a nearby settlement, or those who take cover as the wasteland grows silent and have spoken of what they saw from their hiding place, a ghostly light passing by coupled with the melodious song growing closer and farther as time passed.
There's always one source that has all the truth of it though isn't there? The source of the legend itself, that one pony who's story has been taken by others and turned into an epic for the ages or into a tool to frighten off the wicked... isn't it always the case that under it all, there's just a pony, doing what they feel is right, or perhaps just what they feel they should be doing.
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Chapter 1 - Little ones
The silence of the wasteland was stiffling... no, not quite the wasteland, the silence of danger, a silence that hinted that something dangerous was near, dangerous enough that ambient wasteland wildlife, deadly as it could be, was more interested in hiding away than attacking whatever they had detected.
It took seconds for the Silence to grow complete, and the only noises were the occasional whimper, quickly silenced by a jerk from the barrel pressed somewhere that could become fatal in an instant and a harsh voice whispered as viciously as it could without rising above the sound of a whimper itself. "Keep you're whiny little traps shut or we'll leave your corpses to distract whatever it is." There were a pair of bucks, out-fitted in typical black wasteland barding, good for night travel, but the symbol on their shoulder's wasn't, a picture resembling 4 cuffs hanging from a collar to depict them as members of the local slaving Tribe, a bit stupidly identified as 'The Shackles'... They weren't very bold or skilled, known more for ambushing at night, taking and selling even foals if they can find them, the kind that some other slaving bands would call a disgrace to the trade... Tonight happened to see them in possession of a Trio of collected young ponies, tied together with ropes due to the gang's utter lack of explosive collars in little pony size.
Then both of them trembled violently for an instant as a soft click could be heard, the sound of a hoof on the pavement of the road beyond the edge of this half dead little forest that concealed them, the second one mumbling quietly suddenly *click* "Shit...Shit!... There's only a few things with hooves that make the wasteland go quiet... The Light Bringer... Security... The Light of Night... The, GHK!" *click* another hoof was stuffed in his muzzle to silence him *Click* "Shut up you dumb fuck, you want it to hear us? not another sound, period." *click*
the sound drew closer at a steady pace, each second offering it a little more volume, then a very quiet sound joined it, a voice, quiet and solemn in tone and flowing like the breeze of the night, stopping for a short moment just as a glowing mass because visible passing the blind-spot of a tree further down the road, pausing in a distantly visible position and both of the Buck's let out a tiny squeek "fuck me running..." There was a Stallion only known to them in bullshit legends, even from a distance he was obviously twice the height of a normal stallion, wreathed in shadows with ghostly masses of white in the position of a mane and tail... He had stopped in place and seemed to look thoughtful for a moment while staring up at the sky
Quite suddenly, with a drastic enough shift that those observing jumped quitely, he began to prance cheerily along the road, seemingly even dancing, his voice shifting from that solemn almost depressing tone it had been prior to being close enough to understand words, to a boisterous almost drunken verbosity as an absolutely out of place song began to pour from his muzzle, yet still managing to have a ghostly echo to it as if some idiot who'd died from alcohol poisoning was singing.
"IIIIII Really love my alcohol it makes me really queer!
Now he was quickly drawing closer as he pranced along the road, Red eyes and invisible mouth curled in mirth at he sang, the voice strong enough to create Reverberation in those nearby... Perhaps someone smart could have realized it was to disrupt hiding things to reveal their position in shock.
"And then I chug some red wine, Drinking Vodka's not enough!
with his increased pace this 'frightful abomination that was singing a Drinking song' had passed far enough to be right in front of them, all eyes locked on the freaky thing as it just barely started to pass.
"Then I go for some Jack Daniels but I add a little twist!
Then suddenly the voice of a little filly interupted "HELP!"
The singing instantly stopped and all at once the Prancing monster adopted a hostile pose, Red eyes glowing furiously enough to illuminate the forest and those within as his head snapped to the side... there was indeed no promised gun-shot, instead came the sound of the Revolver's hammer snapping clean of in the Buck's mouth as he tried to pull the trigger, followed by a violent gag as the gun was jammed rear first into his throat. An instant later The 2 slavers slammed and were pinned against the tree's by the angry red glow of the Stallion's magic. One was simply pinned, but the one that had shouted and tried to shoot the little filly found a growing pressure around his chest and neck, cutting off air as his eyes bulged with the strain... More pressure... More, he began to gurgle as the pressure grew too severe and things began to rupture, then seconds later was dropped on the ground in a life-less heap.
The second slaver found himself victim to an even more frightening 'click', a stallion proportionate collar taken from the dead one was snapped around his neck before he was released from the hold, quivering and wetting himself as his terrified stare was locked on the Furious red gaze. The voice came again, now deep and angry, echoing as if pouring from the mouth of a demon "Go, and warn of the fate of all Slavers who cross my path!"
"I-I can't I"
"GO!!"
"I CAN'T!! THE COLLAR GOES OFF IF IT GETS TOO FAR FROM HIM!" he said as he motioned to the dead stallion.
For a moment the Shadow regarded the corpse and the desperate denial of the other Slaver then spoke once more, just a bit softer "Then I guess you better dump the saddlebags and get to carrying that corpse with you back home and hope your 'friends' will have more mercy than he did. Now GO!"
The surviving slaver squeeked desperately and poured his magic clumsily over the corpse to lift it up and start staggering off, scared so terribly that he could hardly run straight.
with the slavers removed from the moment I slowly softened my aggression and composed myself, a couple of magical snaps breaking the rope around them loose, and letting the glow die from my eyes as I turned it to the blackness that now surrounded the little ones, an invisible smile growing on my muzzle and perhaps in my eyes as I spoke, the voice far softer now, deep still but almost Fatherly in tone "It's alright little ones, you're safe now... Come, I shall lead you somewhere safe... You needn't fear me... and you may Call me Midnight if you wish." There was a sound of worried mumbling among them, then suddenly
"WAIT, TRICK!"
Quite suddenly the little filly, revealed to be an earth pony, who'd been quite literally 'under the gun' came sprinting out of the tree's with a look of happy tears and without a second thought wrapped her fore-hooves around my left leg and began nuzzling excitedly "THANK YOU THANK YOU MISTER SHADOW THING!" It was an odd feeling seeing a lack of fear, though she quickly realized something and leapt back, smiling a bit apologetically "uhm... sorry, I don't mean like, 'thing' in a bad way... I just don't know what you are." I could hear the worried mumblings coming from beyond the tree line as I looked down on her. She was quite small, compared to the age her behavior implied, a golden yellow coat and Bright orange mane, most notably being unusually clean for the wasteland. I found it more odd still how instead of her eyes I stared at the moon's reflection behind me coming off of that apologetic 'puppy eye' gaze, her actual eye color light enough resemble that white mass in the night sky.
The worry seemed to evaporate as I released a soft little chuckle and leaned far down, giving a deceptively gentle nuzzle at her cheek "Hmhm, that's alright little one, It's the way I like it... If nopony knows what I am then Fear consumes them easier, it makes it easier to save adorable little fillies like yourself." a moment later my gaze shifted to the tree's as a pair of colts, possibly even twins with their identical Green coats and only slightly different blue's in the manes, began to slowly emerge, dragging the pair of large saddlebags behind them that remained after the slavers, a curious behavior for little ponies... I noted that both wore small little dark cloaks that bore the image of a rearing Filly on them... It was rare I saw new identifying symbols around here, it was mostly the same gangs and tribes. "Pardon me... but where are you both from? I don't recognize the symbol on your cloak."
The pair froze for a moment, looking at eachother with a bit of fresh worry and curiosity... perhaps surprised that the creepy talking shadow monster was interested in such information, then back to me with half hearted smiles.
The 2 went on for a little while, drawing a confused look from the filly... though suddenly they went quiet when I released a terribly out of place gleeful giggle and stared in shock "Hrm, sorry... That's a wonderful thing to learn about though... I'm used to finding deplorable bastards around here just asking to be killed for doing terrible things! It's good to hear that someponies from another place are moving in somewhere to help out!... Are you familiar with these 'tales' about me?" I couldn't but imagine the glee in my eyes had to be noticeable even if they glow an angry red.
"Um... well... lesse."
Another soft chuckle slipped out, pausing for a moment as I gave a nod down the road to signal to start moving, as well as levitating the 2 saddlebags so they wouldn't have to tote them around the hard way for so long... they were unsure, but the fact I was carrying their loot seemed to entice them to hurry to keep pace... The little filly staying nice and quiet and smily as she stuck near my left fore-hoof. "well, at least 'some' is known beyond these lands, hmhm... and that's how I like it, being scary keeps me safe, and those around me too... you should get your hooves on some warmer stuff by the way, this far north things get frigid quickly!... Hrm, but if you are interested, I happen to know where a small collection of lonesome young ones are holed up to avoid the horrors of the wasteland... I don't have anywhere to live myself, so I pop in and hang around everyday to keep an eye on them, bring in some extra food and such, help keep em happy and such... I don't baby them though of course, this is the wasteland and that will only get somepony killed someday... they still work to survive when I'm not around, but I'm sure the companionship of an actual group of like young ones would be a great oppurtunity for them, and having a proper safe place to stay that doesn't involve hiding for their lives everytime so much as a Rad-hog wanders by would do wonders for morale!"
The pair seemed quite unsure about that... an offer of that sort from a creepy shadowy beastie was probably the type to set off all kinds of danger radar "well, I don't really know what to think of that, but we can always look and make the offer..."
"It's quite alright Bink... It'll take more than suspicion to make me angry, hmhm... Now then, it's going to be roughly 2 hours before I make my way to the safe place... I make nightly patrols like this to clear out roving raiders and slavers, and keep the bastards on their hoof-tips!... I like fullmoon nights, I feel stronger... but yes, since we'll be going for a while, do you mind if I ask how you 3 got together? and your name is 'Trick' right?"
The name seemed to make her wince and look away for a moment, a slightly surprising sudden sadness, one of the colts spoke up first "well, we kinda got cornered in an abandoned store by those 2 Slavers."
Quite suddenly the filly spoke up, her calmed voice revealing a bit of a sophisticated drawl to it "That's quite enough guys!... I was taken about 3 days earlier than them... I was traveling with my parents from the south, a little 'fine goods' trading caravan heading to Fort Crystal... we made the mistake of being too confident in the improvements the wasteland has made... It might be safe down there where 'The Light Bringer' Is in control of the skys, but it's not safe up here yet... we were ambushed by them and they killed my parents, looted what they thought was actually useful, which should still be in those saddlebags there... Dad almost killed that mean one with his sword, too bad they had healing potions... I would've like to have seen him suffer the whole time, but at least he got what he deserved!... My parents did actually call me 'Hat Trick', but that one wanted to call me 'His' Trick... I adapted... Got over being a whiny little filly fast enough, till you showed up and saved us!..." A certain nasty tone entered her speech about half way through, then at the end she looked up with a smile and wet eyes.
The 2 colts looked Suitably appalled at the tale as well as confused by how easily she could talk about it, and a soft scoff slipped from my muzzle, the implication of the name made me wonder how far he'd gotten with said implication, but I was not keen on pushing the subject. "hmph... That makes me feel better about Crushing him to death... You're name is nice though, I hope you don't mind If I just call you 'Trick', heh... we should be able to sort everything out once we get back to safety. I'd hate for you to lose what's left of them..."
That smile softened a bit and she actually nuzzled into my leg again, leading me to find it just a bit odd how easily affectionate she was being, perhaps it came from the whole 'saving her' thing, though silence prevailed for a moment, she suddenly spoke up with the oddest of questions "um... I hope it's not wierd to ask but... you're all fascinated with the night and moon and such......Are you Related to the Goddess Luna?"
Those Red eyes of mine went wide for a moment... then a laugh that could shake the ground if it were more than magically enhanced broke out. "HAHAHAHAH!!, No, no... Oh that would be amazing, but no... I just relish the night, and like to think I have a unique affinity for the moon... it might be my imagination, or a psychological thing... maybe it's true too... But as far as I 'know'? I just really like the dark, I enjoy bring bits of light into the darkness of the wasteland, just like the moon does now that the skies have begun to clear... who knows... maybe I'm moon blessed and don't really have a way to confirm it... I have heard stories that Luna was particularly fond of the safety of young ponies... Really, who knows? Nopony ever implied that either of them had any children, and far stranger things have taken place in the wasteland, so for all I really 'know'?... Maybe!" Another playful laugh slipped out, being joined by a slightly more confused laugh from the others. "Hmmm, I should get back into routine soon though, Can't have the wasteland think I'm letting my guard down and send something unsavory after us! Feel free to sing along if you know the song!"
I began to hum the beginning of a familiar tune that blended both solemn melody and cheerful patterned tunes, swaying smoothly with the building tune before breaking into song "Trouble, It will find you no matter where you go . . No matter if you're fast, No matter if you're slow..." And on it went.
Time passed in the night, My presence shying away noise aside form the singing, occasionally occompanied by the little ones as I got lucky on a song they knew, only occasionally did danger come and none of it was severe... A little pack of raiders, a stray robopony that had no sentience to understand it's danger... There was one Hellhound that clawed it's way up, but it's remarkable what kinds of creatures you can frighten away when you're roar can make the groud shake, or use magic to create the illusion of shattering the ground... Seriously, it's not like anything can actually 'do' that.
That encounter with the raider's worried the little ones, sure, but after getting to see them dispatched from the side of safety they seemed to stay relaxed completely after that, and after the promised couple hours of travel we began to approach a large crack in a cliff... even though it was not winter the cliff and the area below it was coated in glimmering frost, placed perfectly that the sun never touched this area, and with the moonlight, made it difficult for anyone to see that the crack was more than 'just' a crack.
As we came closer and moved to the side a muted light could be seen in the middle of the crack, the changed position showing it just the right size to admit my large self entry. Upon passing the edge of the crack a door was visible, wooden and reinforced with steel 'just' large enough for me, and painted to resemble the rocks around it, and it possessed a small port-hole like window on it which was producing the very dim light, and from the other side a quiet high pitched giggle could be heard.
I paused for a moment and held up a hoof to make a playful 'shhh' motion, then enveloped the door in my red magic, very quietly slipping in followed by the trio who were looked quite shocked by the little entry way, like a make-shift air-lock made of wood and steel support beams, with another door closed in front of me... beams that appeared to have something resembling small blast charges sitting at their un-protected bases... Then their examination brought them back to me and one let out a quiet eep at the sudden change.
As I'd passed the first door that magical cover dissolved from around me, first the scary looking shadowy stuff and glowy mane, followed in an instant by a red shield shaped to resemble my body... Quickly revealing me to be a head shorter than my scary disguise... I was still a very tall Stallion, though with almost fluffy fur that was a bit closer to Raven blue than actual black, My eyes were still red and my mane black... wait, no, those were sleeves that kept my truthfully white mane from being revealing, exposed as they slid off silently and into the rather large Saddlebags that rested on my back... There was also a pipbuck on my right fore-leg repainted black and possessing of a lovely ice blue glow.
They actually seemed far more relaxed suddenly with the reveal of being a much more normal pony in disguise, probably just someone who used a lot of illusion magic and psychological tactics to frighten threats away... Of course everything tensed up suddenly as silence came from the other side of the door... a short exagerated roll of my eyes loosening said tension as though I knew exactly what it meant.
The door opened into a a fairly large room, kindof looking like a barracks that had been scrapped together, double bunk beds lining one side, a make shift kitchen on the other with a bathroom in the back... Between the areas was a light scattering of objects, a few toys, a couple of weapons in half built states, books and magazines, even some half eaten food... to a discerning eye it was very clear that a lot of something ceased hastily, and a sharp ear could pick up the tiniest of muffled squees hidden away... I knew the scene perfectly well, and so I walked quite casually through the door to accept what was coming.
A Chorus of 'MR.MIDNIGHT!' and one 'FATHER!' Anihilated the silence as I was broadsided by half a dozen smaller ponies, leading to me stumbling slightly, only to have several more come from the other side and assault my legs with debilitating hugs, then one more finally leapt from the ceiling to glomp my muzzle. That was the last straw and I plummeted to the floor with quite a thud and a wild storm of laughter broke out.
Of course this scene left 3 very much stunned little ones still standing in the open inner door wondering what could possibly be taking place... just as suddenly my red aura engulfed most of the little ponies smothering me and began to pick them off a couple at a time very much practiced tosses sending them bouncing harmlessly onto the beds in fresh fits of giggles, and of course leaving me looking more considerably disheveled as I rose back to my hooves and set to smoothing out my mussed up fur and mane, then quickly held out a hoof as a gesture to stop the Various foals from suddenly swarming right back, then waved it in a motion to draw their short attention span to the 3 new arrivals... A Corus of 'Squees' Rang out as the youngest half of those present swarmed suddenly to pelt the new kids with questions so fast it was unlikely anypony could actually understand what one even said.
After taking just a short moment to urge the inner door closed with my magic I gave off a sharp whistle, calling all attention back to myself and got to speaking, motioning to each in turn as I went over the night's exploits.
"Children! I came across a couple of deplorable slavers tonight who failed to keep these delightful young ones hidden from me. These are Bink and Bonk. They are with a little group called the Crusaders, It composed almost entirely of little Foals such as yourself. I hear they are quite impressive and very much capable of surviving in the wasteland together, this means I have at last found a suitably safe group you all can join so you don't have to hide away here to stay safe!" The children had their eyes wide with sparkling attention, always seeming to enjoy hearing about the results of the 'righteous quest' of the creepy shadow monster than saves little fillies and colts allover the wasteland, but the mention of another group of young ones who were capable of survival that they can join instead of hiding in this little safe house acquiring a string of excited cheers and happy mauling on 2 suddenly squeeling colts who suddenly found themselves on the recieving end of an avalanche of Foalish Affection.
Of course, not all of them were particularly little foals, some had been around for a couple of years helping watch over the much younger ones, and were currently quite maturely waiting to my right, another on my left that seemed more interested in only peeking around my hooves to see the new ones. "Now now, calm down children, don't break them! The Crusader's will much more capable of helping you learn to handle the wasteland than myself... I imagine they can have some room for slightly older ponies as well." The 2 on my right suddenly perked up at that, very much used to taking care of these young ones, I imagined it'd be preferable for them if they followed along.
with a little chuckle a nudge from a hoof I urged them to move over and introduce themselves... a slightly morose thought crossing my mind... Each time I returned it occured to me that I protected myself from them as well, trying to minimize how deeply I knew them to prepare for when they would leave... or die. It's only natural to do what one can to avoid pain they know will come... of course, I'm much too soft to just say no and leave them behind even if it will hurt... I'm also terrbile at saying 'no' to those adorable little faces, and I was already irreperably close with at least one who was present... A little smile was cast down to the one hiding on my left, but he didn't seem to want to join the other's in the crowd, so I pushed on with the introductions, of course there was little reason for me to introduce each individual who was already there, they would oh so eagerly handle that themselves.
"Also children, This is Trick, or Tricky, she was... where?"
"Hello!"
I looked to my left suddenly to find that tricky was a more fitting name as she had used the commotion to sneak around me and come up behind the hiding one on my left, scaring him terribly and causing him to leapt out of his hiding spot, revealing a very obvious reason he might have been hiding from the new ones. "Oh my, you 'are' Tricky aren't you? heheh"
One of the Crusader's ended up shouting "A Zebra!?" Indeed, Larger than the other young ones, with a dark grey coat and Black Stripes, with nice wide shocked Blue eyes.
The young zebra, clearly older than the rest of those present, myself excluded, looked as if he'd seen a ghost suddenly and quickly ducked back behind one of my legs, my attention shifted quickly to the pair of crusader's who now looked quite shocked and even a bit worried.
"Is there something wrong?"
"w-well... where we're from..."
Something else was apparent though, a bit of the indirect cruelty of the young, not necesarily intentionally of course, but there was a noticeable ratio of the other young ones that looked to the zebra with various emotions between curiosity and Ire, though most just kept at their playful introductions, or started to disperse in little bits to jump right into packing their things. Trick seemed to catch on to the stares, though instead of joining in she perched right next to the Zebra, urging a little jump out of him again, and gave them a rude look right back... It was interesting.
"Hrm, I see, shock is understandable when one's personal experiences are quite unsavory, but trust me, He is a perfect Gentlecolt... and, Children, as I was saying, this is Tricky, She'll be joining you as well." Then, since she'd seemed particularly interested in sneaking around me to see him I made a little motion to the Zebra "And Tricky, this is Zev... He's actually been with me the longest, 5 years now infact."
Zev worked up a half-hearted smile and turned his attention away from the crown and to Tricky, his voice perhaps the least exotic anypony has ever heard from a zebra... or perhaps faked to sound as pony as possible. "Indeed, I am the one who chose to stay with father after being rescued from the wastes... The North is... unfriendly, to young ones like myself."
For some reason the first thing to come from Trick were the words "Could... Could I stay too?... I mean... I feel safer next to you, you're scary, and that makes you safer cause you'll scare away a lot of other meaner things!." The request garnered equally shocked expressions from both of us.
I already mentioned that I was terrible at saying No "w-well... Sure you can... I mean, I don't have a problem with it, but the wasteland is dangerous even around me, I'm 'scariest' at night ya know... But, I don't have an official home... this place was setup roughly 6 months ago to safely hide-away lost foals I rescued until I could find somewhere suitable to take them... we'll be traveling a lot, and we'll only really have a safe place to stay on the occasion we find, make, or rent one."
"That's okay, I don't have anywhere to go anyway... I'd rather stay with the big scary buck that saved me from... whatever they were going to do... than wander around the wasteland with other Foals... no offense to them, but it's not a tactically sound life-style."
I gave a more simple answer in the form of an accepting nod, then sprung up straight suddenly and gave another whistle "Allright Children! It's almost time to cook dinner." Instantly the swarming of the 2 colts ceased and the collection of young ones poured over the room, cleaning up toys and leftover bits of distraction left allover the place in routined preparation for dinner, while i headed for the makeshift kitchen, Zev and Tricky in tow, and the 2 Crusaders joining us shortly after to ask various bits of information about the other little ones.
The questioning went on for about a dozen minutes as I went through dinner preparations, Zev helping out with Practiced ease while the other 3 watched and I spoke nice and quietly to the boys "I'm sorry boys, but... I really try 'not' to know too much... Inevitably I must move on, as I cannot indefinitely support a growing volume of young ones, nor protect them all while wandering the wasteland... I will come along tommorrow to help escort you to your Crusader haven in the making, and likely help collect materials along the way that can be used in construction or for food, but then I must continue to travel, I am looking for something... heh, the same can likely be said for any who would follow me all the way across the wasteland." I actually gave a playful nudge to Zev at the thought.
"Oh... that's fine... Adults aren't allowed anyway!"
"My my, that sounds interesting... 'almost' as interesting as actually meeting her... Though if it's who I think you're reffering to, I recall her being nicknamed Queen whiskey... and no, I haven't 'met' her personally, but I did observe her drunken antics one day during my more 'broad' travels, hmhm... It was 'very' exciting and honestly... 'she' inspired me to experiment with alcohol and see if there was one 'for me' out there... I foudn it, but, it's horrifyingly rare and difficult to make... oh, listen to me rambling, this is nothing that little fillies and colt's should be worrying about!" I took a moment to activate the stove... of course, there was no electricity out here, but a jurry rigged spark battery was set to take raw magic and turn it into fresh energy so teh stove could create heat.
A quick realization came up and I quickly turned to Zev, a little glow flowing across my horn as one of my bags opened and produced a small book and several slips of paper in it "Zevvy! I found something while I was out this time! It was pure luck though, some dumb Raider didn't know what they had... it smells funny and they kinda marked some bits disrespectfully, but it's the closest I've come so far."
Zev seemed all kinds of excited over what I'd produced for him and immediately took it, flipped through a few pages then closed it back up "Thank you father! It's just fine, even with the 'bits of raider' on it, It'll do wonders for my practice!" He actually hopped up and gave a little hug before tucking it into his own saddlebags nearby and returned to even more fervently helping me cook, and the night went on like that, nice and peacefully... just as any time before, I wasn't sure how i felt about leaving them all behind again, even with another group that could take care of them, but it was neccesary, they won't gain vital experience in the wasteland with me babying them.
The Night after that went pretty routine, broken only by my inquiring as to the precise location of the Crusader's 'base to be', and by the Bink/Bonk Duet regaling the other young ones about the Crusaders, what they do, how 'amazing' they are because everyone there is good at surviving despite being so young, so they'll Crusader's will all grow up to be Amazing wastelanders... they out the 'Those what survive long enough' part of course.
I packed up the most of course, quite overloading an extra set of saddlebags to take along with us, extra supplies, 'gifts' for our arrival, a couple of the children's belongings that might not fit in their own bags... I could just tell I'd be exhausted by the time the next day was done, the most harrowing part of the journey was likely to be keeping control of a dozen colts and fillies while crossing the wasteland, even more than ensuring their safety.
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when Nightmares Meet - Prologue - [Nonsensical Villainy for now]
It happened so suddenly, A rush of power, roaring wind, sounds of explosions, screaming metal.
A tear in space, a featureless portal, showing little other than a metal tunnel and destruction on the other side, appeared in a location planned to be abandoned, a simple nameless meadow in the middle of Equestria, a considerable distance from any settled location.
Through it floated a remarkably quiet block of metal, shaped with a clear angular window on the front, composed of shining black metal and hovering on a series of small orbs about the size of a ponies head, equally black and glowing an eerie red. Ontop of it, instead of inside, sat an odd creature that was bipedal in shape, covered head to hoof in a similarly shiny black material that had various red accents on the gloves, shoulders, and boots, and lastly a smooth black bar on the head concealing eyes.
There was an odd screechy noise in the air for a moment, before it grabbed a square device from it's torso and poked it to silence that, and immediately the device it rode on began moving, wheeling around in a circle and driving forth into the northern-most edge of a forest that looked most invitingly dark and creepy.
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I could scarcely believe I wasn't dreaming, it had been a success, I MADE IT! I left behind a big 'fuck you' to all my doubters and traversed the planes into another world using SCIENCE! as far as I was concerned this is what heaven should be, a new world, filled with new things for me to experience... But first, i needed to find a place to hunker down and hide my things while explore and plot out how to introduce myself on my own terms... afterall, I'd hate for the princesses to come running to investigate that big disturbance and mistake me for an invader.
No, i was a visitor, even if i didn't technically have a way to go back.
Of course, i knew enough of this world from taking to heart my theories born of a certain entertaining little 'kid's show'... they all thought I was insane for trying to prove it was real, but a man of science just gets this 'feeling' of being right and MUST find out for themselves. Of course, I also expected this world to different, afterall, my grand theory of the infinite multi-verse said so, I seriously doubted my aim using a purely experimental device was perfect enough to land directly on the 'prime' equestria, not that I was worried, I at least didn't land in the 'discorded' version.
Once My ATT, all terrain tranport, oh how I loved my world's advanced technology!, passed the edge of this delightfully grim forest I removed my helmet, taking in a deep breath of the air of a new world while letting an ample collecting of red hair fall free. "Ahhh, I can practically smell how different this world is... I wonder if this tingly feeling is the magic I've always dreamed of studying... oh wait, that's the 'danger tingle', wonderful!" I had of course out-fitted the ATT with some basic defense measures, aside from being made of metal that most forest beasts wouldn't be able to easily tear through, it had an electrical stun field to 'pain away' anything that posed a great enough threat, and my favorite bit of technology.
A quick press of a button on my PCA, personal 'control' assistant, as it certainly did far more than just hold 'data', and the ATT became cloaked. Sure it wasn't perfect, it was hardly what I would call invisible, but a reflexive reflection of the surrounding area, in 'this' forest, would work wonders for keeping it un-seen.
It floated on as i scouted for a good hiding place, as well as keeping an eye out for 'danger', though i hardly expected the known creatures of the forest to be a real threat, they hadn't had to tear through 6 inches of Electrical metal armor... Looking back, i should have interpreted this as evidence that the 'danger tingle' was reffering to something that I 'would' consider dangerous.
It took remarkably little time to location a cave... more of a big hole in the ground really, it didn't go very deep, but for the purposes of hiding a camouflaged Transport vehicle it should do wonderfully, at least until I find a more suitable location and start actually 'building'. I took but a minute to step off, slip into it, strip off the protective suit, gather some preffered tools, and step back out clad in my favorite Black lab coat [which might as well just be a trench-coat, they're pretty identical except for lab coats being white], loaded with the fun little tools i'd need to make notice difficult while i study the locals... Then i saw the 2 things that completely changed the path of my future.
In the light at the entrance of the little cave was a pair of... i guess i'd say, 'entities', both appeared to be made of smokey material, one black and the other purple. Though they didn't have faces I'd describe them as 'glaring' at eachother... then they noticed that I'd noticed them, and shot through the air towards me. 'I really should have expected that the 'defeated bodiless evils' would be able to move and track faster than the fancy princesses...'
"Oh Bugger!"
I had not intended for this to happen, and i had nowhere to go, so i did what i consider the best course of action in a situation like this... Accepted that it was going to happen, began plotting methods of turning the inevitable situation in my favor, And proceeded to sit down to avoid physical harm from falling, close my eyes, and see what happens.
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I awoke again in what I could only assume to call my 'Mindscape', It's not like i'd ever done so before, though i had plenty of experiences with lucid dreaming, some meditation, theories about the 'worlds in our minds'...
Mine was unsurprisingly very dark... I liked dark places and disliked bright lights, i'd often keep lights dim wherever i go, it also helped me see better in dark places if i wanted to be sneaky.
Of course the scene around me was hardly a 'sneaky moment'... I was sitting in a large padded chair, comfortably, not restrained, and before me in the dark, a nearly invisible battle between 2 dark forces raged... I have good eye-sight, but not nearly good enough to watch Darkness fighting Darkness inside Darkness... That's way to much darkness!
I could hear it thought, Snarling, shouting, clashing.
I could feel it too, I think, then again it 'was' happening in my mind so it stands to reason that I'd be able to.
I just took a little while to mull over what i remembered before sitting down and presumably being dragged into my mind on the same flow as the 2 entities had used to force their way in through 'opened gates'... From what knowledge i had, i could surmise, through familiarities in the black mist and it's purple counter-part, just 'who' specifically it was fighting for superiority in 'my' mind... I could also reasonably guess how weakened and likely desperate they must be from knowledge of how they had been defeated previously.
Of course, having 'no' knowledge of magic I imagined it was a certainty i couldn't handle either one forcibly even in their current states.
But I 'did' have knowledge, a sharp mind, and LOVED a good mental exercise... So I decided to try something with 'my' mindscape.
It was quite sudden that the world around us lit up, no visible light source produced the red light that poured over everything, mysteriously not altering the natural perception of the 2 'invaders' as they appeared normal then, but the 'world' around me was suitably dark, like a large featureless room, which oddly stood to reason... If my mind had any natural defenses I figured i'd most likely have subconciously guided them to some 'empty room' so that their fight couldn't damage anything.
Of course it also revealed that I was sitting upon something rather throne like 'wow, i didn't think i had enough ego in me to be sitting on a throne while watching a deposed King of darkness fighting the Queen of the Night like entertainment... just... wow.' I didn't really believe that, but it's fun to tease my own mind sometimes.
Of course before me were a familiar Royally armored Unicorn, and regally proportioned Alicorn, both inches from driving horns together with conjured manifestations of their powers surrounding them... which vanished in an instant as their attention was dragged away from eachother at the sound of a booming 'WELCOME!' 'to my mindscape!' echoing through the confines of my mind, drawing their attention to me, which appeared to be a completely black featureless bipedal entity sat in a throne... not exactly black in the cheesy way of implying 'awesomely dark power', more so in the way that It seemed this entity didn't know what it 'should' look like, even inside it's own mind.
I had noticed this but chose to leave it for later as I pulled out a bit of flair to grab attention and see just how effectively i could use words for this, my voice still echoing strangely, but given the emptiness of this little corner it didn't bother me all that much.
I wasn't foolish enough to believe either would consider me important enough to bother answering, but perhaps the strangeness of the environment they were suddenly in, and the surprise, left them a bit more open to playing along.
However, I had to stiffle a snicker as they both spoke in near perfect unisorn.
I'll admit, it 'was' hilarious, but the laughter also should serve my intentions. "GYAAAHAHAHAHAAA!... HAH!, My apologies" I shifted my position, crossing one 'leg' over the other and propping my hands finger to finger in my best 'evil genius planning' pose. "It just never ceases to amuse me how few dark entities actually take the shot at 'asking' first."
This created a moment that appeared as if both had been physically assaulted by those words.
"I have quite a mind, so much active and useful to me, and yet some delightfully 'dark corners' that I would abide containing a couple of new Residents... You needn't fight for control here as i'll gladly just 'let' you in... Have you never considered working 'together' for anything before?"
Sombra's Mildly irritated huff preceded his complaint "PFF, why would I ally with such a creature as you? You don't even have any magic, you're hardly worth more than a shell to recover in."
The Nightmare, not to be out-done, sprung forth next "Besides, what could possibly make you think you would be a worthy vessel for this shadowy pretender? Much less a 'goddess' such as myself?" This of course drew an indignant sneer from The dark unicorn.
Another small snicker earned 'me' a sneer from both "Because you both Failed, one to 'harmony' brought to bear by a half a dozen fillies that had been 'mostly' normal before Twilight Sparkle came along and had them rip you free of a certain princess. The Other to love caused because you were silly enough to leave the key to your defeat in the same place you dwelled, where simply casting it off into the snow could have prevented it."
As I droned on about their failures both grew infinitely more furious towards me, but before anything could 'explode' I rushed into the next part "However! I can promise Victory for you both." this cooled it a bit but the suspicious and unbelieving glares said plenty.
"Simply put, I am a newcomer to this world, an out-side perspective, one with many useful 'toys' that this world has not seen as well as a fair bit of advanced 'knowledge', i 'did' recognize both of you. I may not have magic yet, but I can acquire it, ohhh, I want it so badly." I deliberately poured a sound of soul wrenching hunger to my voice, bringing a curious glint to their expressions. "I had intended to quietly study this world and see what i could learn of magic that might allow me to use it... yet here, both of you 'literally' dove into me, 2 of the most magical entities to exist, dark or not, and I have built my life on being adaptable, countering failure at every turn, ploting contingencies and secondary layers of protection... hmhm, I would relish matching wits with Twilight sparkle! Or Celestia herself!... HRM!"
I may have let myself get a little too carried away there, though it seemed to be doing it's job, a potential third party interested in going against the princess, from another world no less?, the anger and suspicion was very slowly draining into curiousity and scheming faces "The big obstacle at this moment is that I am at the most minor and mundane point of my 'adventure' here, i am but a human, magicless, standing out, and i'm sure your presence would have a noticeable effect on me overtime, So I have a proposition to offer you both, if you'd like to listen?"
Sure, most expect them to just be mindlessly hostile to anything that isn't serving them, but i could see in their eyes that their minds were grinding away at the mystery that was 'me'... oh, i like that idea, being a mystery, something that someone else is having trouble solving, it's ever the useful advantage against an enemy, and until I was certain i could withstand their presence without being over-taken and erased, they were absolutely my enemies, whether in my body or not.
The Nightmare struck first this time "I can see 'potential' here, a body to recover in safely while remaining inconspicuous... But you are as much an unknown to me as to Celestia! I can scarcely trust you when i know nothing of you!"
"one thing I 'can' agree with her on, you wouldn't even register as one of my 'servants' as you are now, you have no 'power'... However impressly you can 'speak', that won't do any good against our enemies, you'd be a burden at best."
I actually snorted at their reaction, something i would not have 'expected' i'd do 'really? can they be this dense? ... well, maybe they can, i mean, look at what 'beat' them? the only one more stupid was chrysalis... seriously, putting your main threat in a cave with the most vital piece of your scheme? utterly idiotic!... but they have power and I won't ignore this chance just because they aren't all that 'geniusy'.' ... though that brought up another idea, perhaps I could encounter Chrysalis as well sometime, perhaps there are other hives, OH! The possibilities... Getting off track here.
I quickly started speaking again as i saw the irritated reactions to my noise "Honestly? Is that how simply you think? No wonder you were beaten! The most vital part of victory against 'do-gooders' is a powerful 'mind', and this I have... I out-smarted the entire world where i came from, oh sure, they found their way to me, far too late... at this moment there is a giant crater where a mountain used to be, and the entire world will be drifting into chaos over the following weeks, turning my home government up on it's head and tearing down every ounce of control they had on the people as they attempt to reign in their corporate 'slaves' once more."
My apparent gloating seemed to get their attention, perhaps it seemed more familiar to them, of course i was gloating after a 'success', and I launched into what appeared to be a full on ego trip, even if I had done it all for personal fulfillment instead of just wierd evil genius kindof shit "I RIPPED THE FOUNDATION OUT FROM UNDER AN ENTIRE CIVILIZATION WITH ONE GROUND BREAKING DISCOVERY! I USED SCIENCE TO TEAR OPEN THE BARRIER BETWEEN WORLDS AND ENTER EQUESTRIA! I USED ELECTRICITY AND WIRES AND STEEL TO REND THE VERY FABRIC OF REALITY!!"
The sudden explosive demonstration of what i let appear to be my interpretation of my achievments got much more 'pleasantly' shocked and interested expressions from them, so i added on one last little bit "Just imagine... what I could do... with 'magic'." Personally, i thought i over-sold it, and i felt so very silly for using such cliche super villain behavior, not to mention a bit dirty for bullshitting my true view of what I'd done, but honestly, i didn't give a shit, If i could talk them into 'allying' instead of 'taking', I didn't just get to keep 'myself', but I could potentially gain access to the delightful magics of this world through them.
Either way, both of them seemed to be contemplating it hard... I always had been a good speaker, I rarely used that ability, it practically felt like mind control sometimes... then suddenly bother spoke at once "FINE!, what is this proposal of yours?!" though neither reacted to having spoken at the same time again.
I saw a small flinch from them, i could only imagine the glee I felt at that acceptance translated into the grin i held, perhaps it actually appeared even though i thought i had no mouth in this place, that would be so wonderfully creepy. "DELIGHTFUL!... As for my proposal, this is it, in several 'requirements' and 3 steps.
The Requirements:
Of course, that indignant fury had returned 2 fold at the sound of what I required... I wasn't about to just let them run rampant in my head, it is 'my' head and I 'will' have control of it.
"Now, the Proposals!
Now, I'm sure you both have magical abilities to modify things, afterall, if you expect to make a new body for yourself, certainly you can modify an already existing one... I would like to be changed, something 'adaptable' that i know can be considered 'of this world', and while you both are recovering your strength in a place where you don't have to waste any extra to keep existing, I will be becoming acquainted with my new abilities... here's a memory that explains it quite thoroughly."
There was a moment of shock, then some recognition, and finally a bit of an impressed grin from both, it seems my idea was appealing so far.
"Step 2
Sombra smirked, and there was a clear annoyance at having to go second, but Nightmare gave an accepting nod.
"Now the last step, and don't get me wrong, you're plans are nice, but they are too simple."
That got glares allover again.
"I'm serious... I'm not saying they are impossible, but they need to be altered, better detailed, and so on. you'll both be responsible for your personal goals and detailing them to be 'better', i can only give suggestions, but likely by the time you 'return' from recovery I will have more than enough plans and counter plans to deal with The Princesses.
First, Nightmare, This 'eternal night', not a bad idea, I love the night, I especially love a full moon night, dark, but with the moon-light detailing the natural beauty of the night... but the world itself is not prepared for it... As beautiful as the night is, the day is still needed in order for life to continue... The biggest obstacle there, is coming up with a way to 'quickly' adapt the world to survive the night... or adapt the night to provide everything that is also provided by the day, without 'becoming' the day... That, or accepting the concept that the way of the world requires a balance of both, regardless of who is in power.
Second, Sombra, There i more to being king than simply controlling your subjects, i can't believe how many dark kings get this wrong... The trick is in holding complete power and control over them while simulataneously putting yourself across as someone to be loved and adored as a leader... heh, make your subjects 'want' to serve you and deny those who say otherwise, make them believe it entirely their will to do so, and you will be a 'true' king.
Lastly, I will be 'integrating' right in the midst of the greatest threats to our success, attempting to put myself off as just another pony, if only one of highly unusual abilities and mental skills. hmhm. There shouldn't be much chance if any of you being detected while you are concealed and resting, but be wary when you 'return', don't accidentally expose us suddenly... if you can remain unnoticed within me, then I should at least be able to get us to the stage of recreating your bodies without being discovered... after that? heh, well, i'm sure you can guess for now"
As they took a few moments to stare at eachother and seemingly silently discuss this, I tried not to think on the fact that I'd just utterly dominated a conversation with 2 creatures that could probably at any moment have torn my mind to shreds and taken control... with any luck they won't notice once i gain enough power to resist them, thankfully I should have plenty of time while they are resting to prepare myself.
Quite suddenly both of them called out "we accept!" of course the threatening glares that accompanied this acceptance spoke of unspeakable horrors for me if I betray them... yeah, spoke of the unspeakable, that bad, of course that's why I included that bit about 'binding vows'.
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Unammed Clop 'story' - Prologue - Dear Princess [Suggestive, Futa, Magical Alteration [running theme honestly].]
Nopony expects to get a letter from a princess... okay, 'almost' nopony expects to get a letter from a princess... But 'nopony' ever expects a Princess to send a Letter to one of Equestria's few proffessional 'pleasers', which of course is a polite word for 'escort', another polite word for, well, you know... One can only imagine the look on her assistant's face when he saw to where the letter was addressed.
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Canterlot Castle got a very rare guest that day... rare as in 'had never been there before in his life'. A fairly large Unicorn stallion roughly half a head taller than average, with a coat that was cherry red, Clean and groomed, and snugglably fluffy at the same time, A tail and mane that were golden blonde, long, and just as well groomed as the fur, the mane even managing a 'Lion Mane-ish' style to it's appearance. There was no 'attire' in place despite being smack in the middle of the palace, though certain Courteous illusion spells were in the works to maintain decency should one encounter any prissy nobles.
This Stallion was clearly 'well worked', yet with a stream-lined smoothness to his musculature, he was hardly a 'mac', but managed to be both large and mildly graceful at the same time. At the moment those eyes were the epitome of what many would describe as 'bed-roomy', Seeming both Ocean and Sky blue depending on the lighting, and combined with a practiced smooth smile one could almost worry the guard's themselves might be in danger of flinching. Then of course there was the cutie mark, a very telling image in-fact, one that displayed the image of a very 'messy' bed, no, not filthy, just messy, well 'used', you get the hint.
"Yeah hi, that's me!"
'I'... am Bedroom blitz, Professional, Premiere Equestrian 'Pleasure pony', and I cannot tell you how mind bogglingly bloody nervous I am right now! Sure, I put on a good show, Strut like a proud Stallion as the guard's in-front of me act as escorts to the Royal chambers, put on that playful smile like I always do... But one Client I would never have expected to have was Princess Celestia, my Heart was fit to beat it's way clean through my Ribs from the stress of imaginging 'me' being expected to satisfy the Eldest ruler of our Country... Sure, I've pulled off some pretty tall orders before, Even handled a dragon once, but 'this' was a Multi Millenia old Immortal princess who's probably seen stuff even 'my' wild imagination has never even cooked up.
Ohhh, I am so glad I'm wearing that illusion spell right now, my imagination started running away with my body... Maybe I should apologize to the maids on my way out.
Then something happened that both made my day, and horrified me at the same time.
There was a drawn out, loud, and Feminine whine from farther down the hall where I could see the Grand doors of Celestia's Chambers cracked open, A whine that proclaimed "Buuuut AAUUUUNNTIIEEEE!"
Followed by a very uncharacteristically forceful, and familiarly 'royal empowered' "NO!" That created a low rumble of air-pressure in the hall-way and sent a familiar white unicorn tumbling back out of the door before it slammed shut.
Now, I've heard of Prince Blueblood before, Managed to 'see' him a couple of times and did everything I could to avoid having to encounter his legendarily insufferable Entitled attitude, so I'd never 'met' him personally, but the very subtle sneer from some of the guards, along with a couple of very quieted chuckles, spoke volumes for their own opinions of him...
Of course, what came sprinting by was hardly the self proclaimed 'Penacle of Stallion-hood' ... Oh no, This was clearly female, horrified i might add, and releasing a constant squeel in the higher Falsetto I'd heard in years, but clearly the 'formerly prince' blueblood, Egressing with a most terrified demeanor... yet honestly, looking every bit the feminine counter-part to his original self.
For a moment after he had gone, I couldn't help but snicker at the event and wonder if maybe he'd finally cauesd one problem too many for Celestia and got punished... 'that' train of thought derailed violently when I noticed other apparent issues present, In the form of one of the guards half-way down the hall appearing very much strained and uneasy, which for anyone who knows 'anything' about the royal guard, is a hint that something is incredibly wrong.
The freaked out look aside nothing really 'looked' wrong, but then I caught it. *sniff sniff* a scent that is absolutely unmistakeable to any 'experienced stallion', the Scent of a mare in heat coming directly from that guard, and I knew what it meant, as well that the armor concealed the physical changes. 'Oh sweet Sun and Moon, He's been turned into a mare!'
As a 'proffesional' in my art to a degree that few if any other stallion would ever strive for, I was experienced in the 'unusual interests' of certain individuals... that is to say, I have used magic to turn into a mare before, the first few times were entirely horrifying and mind blowing at the same time, but worth it to essentially 'double' my potential clientel... This also means that I know exactly how foreign and disturbing it must feel, and I never once experienced 'heat', so naturally I was quite driven to sympathize with the poor stallion and see if I couldn't fix this, consequences of delaying meeting the Princess be damned!
The 2 Escorts, heheh 'escorts', stopped and watched curiosly as I suddenly sprinted to the disturbed guard at the edge of the hall, who immediately jumped and looked quiet terrified... I could easily surmise 'why', it was likely that it was the sheer proffesionalism of the Royal guard that was keeping instinct from getting the poor thing acosted because of whatever condition was forced on him, so first of course I said "Don't worry, I hold perfect control over my mental faculties!" which seemed to relieve some of that terror. "Now tell me, you're not naturally a mare are you?"
now confusion set in, sure everypony could probably smell it and 'know', but it seemed to be a different thing entirely to just come out and say it... He didn't seem sure if he should be offended and angry or embarassed and sad, but eventually nodded, and curiosity spread on the faces of my escorts
"Right then, lets see if we can fix that shall we?" The confusion only grew as I lowered my muzzle and aimed my horn, a Slightly pinkish and cherry red glow spreading over it before gathering into another layer of magic... Honestly, I could probably stand among Canterlot's more prestigious mages, if it weren't for the fact all of my 'talent', both physically and magically, dealt with the kinkier side of things.
worry grew in his expression, certainly it wasn't every day that one runs into a unicorn experienced with Gender changing magic, typically it's considered highly advanced and known to back-fire if done wrong, but I wasn't having any of those 'fearful over-reactions' and released very quickly.
Visually nothing seemed to change at first, the guard winced and shied away on reaction, but then in mere seconds broke into a gleeful laughter and even bounced with joy while shouting "It'S BACK! I'M FIXED!" and repeating this a couple of times before he remembered himself and returned to his post, now far more naturally composed though unable to hide a gleeful smile... of course, some clean-up was still necessary, but my 'job' was done in that situation!
with natural Proffesionalism with left the scene and continued the rest of the moderate distance to the Princess's Chambers, though I did feel a bit better about the moment after 'helping', The nervousness continued to grind at the back of my mind... though as we drew closer I began to notice some other scents that had been concealed by the 'mare-scent' further down the hall, one of the guard's scents managed to resemble a 'dragon' of all things, and another that of a Thestral... Yes, I have been around, I have known many a species.
The more unsettling thing still was that the escorting guards stopped well before reaching the door, seemingly unwilling to venture closer for some purpose, and as the door was pushed open by the 2 already waiting next to it, they even backed away to run off to other duties... This was not helping the nervousness... If it weren't for my own stack of proffessionalism and natural Sureness of self I probably would have fled already, this summons had the makings of terrifying possibilities.
One of the guards called out in a slightly more gruff voice than usual, appearing that the helmets enchantments acted a bit differently with different species "Announcing, Sir... hrm, Bedroom Blitz, at Her Highness' Request!"
There was a mildly tense tone in the voice that answered "Do Come In" Now, almost everypony had heard the princess at least once, She made a point of visiting many places in her domain, and everypony knew that her voice could inspire a feeling of motherly love and adoration no matter who she spoke to, and that it almost never wavered from this loving tone... That was not what I picked up, to an untrained ear it sounded as normal as ever, but I picked up on strain, a bit of desperation, and, dare I say, hunger.
Naturally I responded immediately by Cantering on into the room, trying not to twitch as the doors closed shut behind me, the nervousness making the sound come across as more of a boom than it should... It was quite clear where she was, standing by the window to the balcony, wide open with the wind flowing around her, facing away though, and while it was concealed with practiced subtlty, I could still pick out tenseness in her position.
I was a moment from partaking of normally expected courtesies when she spoke up again "Please ignore the normal Formalities, I am loathe to admit to lacking the patience for such at this point in time... There is a letter there on the table, rare is it I show one of my student's, and fellow Princess's, letters to another, but this one pertains to why you are here, and... I would prefer if reading it explains the reason for me."
Okay, 'now' I felt less nervous in one way, and was totally freaking out in another way entirely as I stepped over to the table to get a look... what in Equestria could twilight have sent to Celestia that could compell her to summon 'me' to her!
Dear, Princess Celestia
I've been hearing strange rumors from some of the other residents of ponyville, a few cases of sudden dissapearances, rumors of some kind of 'magical mutation' [though that hardly makes any sense, magic doesn't just mutate ponies on it's own!], or even more unusual, these rumors about ponies suddenly being a different gender that they weren't supposed to be.
Of course, I haven't seen concrete evidence behind these rumors yet, It's my experience that, true or not, such unsettling rumors becoming 'common place' always hints at something suspicious in the works... Perhaps I'm just paranoid since it's been a few years since our last national Crisis, but it inspired me to seek corespondence, and see if you knew of similar stories popping up else-where.
Of course, I also wanted to write and see how you've been doing, staying in ponyville still creates long periods of never seeing eachother and... OH BUCK!, now?! OF ALL THE TIMES FOR SOMETHING TO... SPIKE!!! YOU'RE NOT SUPPOSED TO RECORD OUTBURTS LIKE THAT... STOP wRITING!!!!
.............
Okay, I'm going to withdraw my previous statement of having not encountered any concrete evidence behind these rumors! I have in-fact, only minutes ago [Spike note: It took an hour to get her to stop hyper-ventilating] I appear to have been affected by... whatever has inspired the rumors... oh this has to be the most embarassing thing to tell a Princess, even when I 'am' one!
I appear to have been transmogrified into a Hermaphrodite... I can honestly say I am having trouble thinking straight suddenly... Geez, how do stallion's deal with this stuff all the time? or when some mare's in heat?!... DAMNIT SPIKE!!
.............
I can only imagine that you'll want me to start researching to seek out some form of solution to this, what I'm afraid to interpret as, spreading epidemic of wanton magical alterations... I just hope I can figure it out before I go loopy from all this new stuff I'm feeling... oh god it won't go the buck down! Maybe Ice will... ugh.
Sincerely, Princess Twilight Sparkle.
P.S. She kindof ran off to, I'm guessing, find a way to solve her 'immediate' dilemma, I figured I'd go ahead and send this message.
well... that had to be an interesting letter to recieve, and without missing a beat Celestia continued, almost as if she knew i was done without looking. "I recieved that letter 2 day ago, I have already sent a reply mentioning that I would send her some 'proffessional' assistance to minimize the difficulty of her affliction, a 'specialist'... It is my understanding that, despite your chosen proffesion, you are indeed highly skilled in certain unusual applications of magic... you proved as much by remedying one of my guards in the hall-way, though I fear what is taking place shall not be quelled so easily.
Now I shall tell you what I know, This 'epidemic' has been in effect for one week so far, I of course sent a summons for 'you' after the first couple of days and the hints that led me to guessing the value of your skills in particular. It has been spreading it's effects seemingly at random, once or twice a day so far I have recieved fresh reports about new cases popping up suddenly...
I 'have' surmised that the changes appear to focus on the following in specific;
These are just the effects we know so far, There are likely to be more surfacing at a later time...
The only defining 'pattern' that we have seen, though it is not solely restricted to this, It is highly common for it to affect those with high magical power... like myself... and seems to repeat off of this individual like a node to chronically affect those around them... That you can even be in this room without being affected is a good hint that you are perhaps uniquely resistant to it's effects, Perhaps because you have partaken of the effects willingly in the past and gained an immunity to unwilling changes.
Before the expectable suspicions arise, I have already investigated Discord... He, or rather 'she' now, has not escaped the effects either, and is not handling it well... It is pleasant that thus far my Sister 'has' managed to escape the effects, though it is not clear as to why, perhaps the past transformations related to nightmare moon.
If it is not clear already, I intend to send you to assist Princess Twilight in her research in any way that you can, and to ease the troubles in pony-ville if possible while you are there... You will of course be compensated plentifully."
I can't say I've ever been hired to listen to a mission briefing such as that and then assigned to directly assist a princess before, but, there's a first time for everything... just to be sure I nipped my tongue a bit to see if I was imagining this *nip*... nope, It's real alright. "That is quite a crisis princess, I know personally how... unsettling some of these effects can be, even the first time experienting 'willingly' with them... The compensation would be greatly appreciated, though I would gladly 'help' for free in such a case as this, I can certainly put it to good use in my efforts."
Now came the bold move, I'm fairly certain I know what comes next, the scent in the air tells all too much about what she's putting up with, but I felt the urge to take the initiative and start to move closer "Now then, I can tell quite thoroughly that you didn't call me here 'just' for that, you are suffering through something yourself, and I would be remiss were I not to offer my assistance in easing your troubles, if only temporarily."
The Chuckle that came as a response was uncharcateristically 'lewd' in tone "I was just about to suggest exactly that... you see, I have been ignoring this 'affliction' ever since it appeared on the first day this week, and honestly, compounded instincts wear even on 'my' patience... I must ask though, can you fix it? and if not, can you 'handle' it safely?"
It was at that moment that she finally moved, turning herself around and revealing... well, a lot.
Her expression looked unnaturally strained for what anyone knows to expect of her, there was an obvious glint of hunger in her otherwise loving gaze, and I swear she was even drooling slightly. "You most certainly 'look' and 'feel' the part of a stallion beffiting your claims of 'proffessional', and since you have entered not a moment has passed that a needing torment hasn't been growing inside."
Of course my eyes drifted down an instant after taking in her expression, a genuine expression of shock crossing my muzzle for a short moment, before fading quickly into something far more along the lines of sympathy. "I will admit, I am far from familiar with 'Alicorn Anatomy', but I can only imagine that, combined with the effects of this 'epidemic', that you are suffering through something far more extreme than what even 'I' have experienced when... experimenting."
Below her currently rested a new 'endowment' who's proportions certainly were beffiting of one occasionally reffered to as a 'goddess', and I could only describe the Reddened Length as being well into stages of over-arousal that would have most stallion's crying for satisfaction. "I will certainly try to 'cure' your 'affliction', but if I cannot, I do believe that I am quite capable of at least relieving you, temporary though it may be... I am familiar with size altering magic, and I have quite a bit of stamina, so I don't think that will be a problem."
"You are very sure of yourself, I still worry for your safety if I stop resisting it, but I suppose that it will be a suitable 'trial by fire' and prove to me that you can handle anything else waiting for you."
"Indeed! now then, lets find out if I can fix this first." I started to focus, leveling my horn for her intensely aching burden... Taking some time to gather up several over-layers of magic to focus on 'gender repair'... and unleashed it with a bright cascading flash that naturally urged me to close my eyes.
After a deep breath I returned my attention to look her over... ohhh, that didn't work... No, it didn't remove it, but the cascading magic certainly had an effect in a way that pushed the arousal even harder, to the point of gushing quite a mess "well, that didn't work... good thing I can handle messy." I could see the control slipping now, and worked fast, Unleashing another spell, for myself this time, counter-acting the gap in our sizes to make what was to come... safe.
Yes, I'm stopping there!, what? You expect me to tell you about sleeping with the princess? Pah, I have too much respect for Celestia to go spilling details about sharing a very long, wet, and intimate session with her, you'll just have to use your imaginations!
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Unammed Clop 'story' - Day 1 - Part 1 - Arrival [Futa, Heat, Excessive Cum, cum inflation, Transformation = Goo pony, Semi Hyper]
Tags: Futa,, Excessive cum, Cum inflation, 'semi'-hyper, Transformation = Goo pony
I drew more than a few confused stares from the guards when I left the Princess' Chambers with an odd quirk in my walk and a dopey grin on my muzzle. They could pretty accurately guess what had happened, but they were having trouble fathoming how it was possible i could walk away from 'that' with only a little wobble in my step. Of course, their failing attempts to figure it out were cut short by the Princess slipping out of the door, uniquely clothed to conceal her undesirable burden, and suddenly filling the air with far more clear headed orders than the previous day leading to the halls becoming a scramble of guards and other staff getting to work.
Thankfully, i was outide the castle before it could reach real clusterfuck levels of hallway swarming, and after collecting a stipend from the canterlot bank, thank celestia for access to the royal budget, I was on the train heading to ponyville... Of course, even though i could 'walk away' from what i had helped with, 'sitting' was another ordeal entirely. Mercifully the train ride was plenty short, a ride I spent going over information I had been provided with concerning important ponies in ponyville.
However, the instant i stepped off the train it became all too apparent that something was wrong in little ponyville... Not that it had been on my list of frequent places to 'work', but even i had heard it was a lively and friendly town. Yet here i saw very few ponies actually walking the streets or chatting, and the few that did looked rather uneasy, and though it wasn't strong enough to overwhelm, i could still smell the familiar under-scent of sex in the air, something that was more likely to happen during 'spring', not summer.
Of course, what i saw that still fit the description of ponyville was accurate, as i left the station just about every pony that 'was' in the street waved and smiled pleasantly, greetings which I returned in kind... It was rather pleasant not to have everypony turning their nose up as I went by. That said, I didn't have time to stop and chat a lot, I had to meet Twilight first and make myself useful... of course, that wasn't all that hard to do as i could see the 'tree house library' the very moment I entered passed onto one of the larger streets.
I was actually moments from approaching the door when a very colorful blur slammed into the ground in-front of me, Kicking up a cloud of dirt and looking all kinds of indignant.
Naturally this caused me to Flinch and choke down a barely audible "FUCK!", just enough that she was probably the only one who could hear it, and right away that seemed to sour her expression further.
"Yeah, not gonna happen Bucky, Buzz off!" It took me a moment that she had interpreted my 'sound of shock' by it's literal meaning... and another to realize that could potentially be accurate given the nature of this 'crisis'.
In the last moment my brain caught up and reminded me that this was 'rainbow dash' blocking my way, a close friend of Twilight that I had been informed of, the element of loyalty, and what one could describe as 'highly protective of her friends'. Judging by the scents wafting off of the door behind her, I could pretty clearly surmise 'why' she had intercepted me, but I'd dealt with more troublesome hinderances than a pegasus that can break the super sonic barrier, and i knew just the right ammount of tact to use with her.
"Yeah, 'also' not gonna happen 'bucky', I'm a proffessional on a mission from Princess Celestia and the only thing you're gonna do by getting in my way is make twilight suffer through whatever ails her 'longer'. Now move aside or I shall be forced to 'move' you aside." Yeah, that was what some might call totally tactless... that was the point
A moment later I found myself on my back, slammed into by the angry pegasus and with her ontop looking all kinds of furious "You think I'm stupid? That's the third time I've heard that just 'this' morning! you got one more chance to leave or I'm gonna just drag you all the way to the guard's." Already her wings were flapping, but this worked out just how i intended, anger is so easy to manipulate, and this was the perfect position to 'prove' that I was a proffessional.
In one sudden motion both fore-legs wrapped around her neck, one low and one high, and I shoved into forceful contact... oh, not 'just' contact, I made our lips meet, twisting my muzzle just slightly, using her wide-eyed shock as an oppurtunity to slip my tongue past her defenses, Simultaneously pushing hard enough into the kiss she'd barely be able to move her head, while forcefully sucking on her tongue at the same time... It was a display of mixed dominance and passion in one seemingly simple kiss that left her baffled for a moment, wing's sprung out strong on either side and a little tremble even slipped through her lips.
Then the next moment she found herself deposited flat on the ground with me walking towards the doors leaving a comment behind "Not bad, but next time you decide to block a 'real' proffessional, Make sure you're ready for a very 'passionate' counter-attack so you don't freeze up... Good job though, Anyone lying about being sent by the princess just they can get a chance to screw twilight needs to be knocked in the head a few times."
Before she could recover of course I closed the last bit of distance and knocked the door several times, several 'fewer' times... A moment later the door opened a crack, The scent of overloading hormones blasting me in the snout like a brick, and a lavender eye peeked out, even through the small crack i could see a highly discheveled mane, a somewhat haggard but evenly controlled voice speaking "Are you the 'proffessional'?" After I gave a little nod she let out a sound that miraculously sounded like a combined sigh of relief, and groan of annoyance... a glance to rainbow dash's seemingly paralyzed form staring at him from behind brought about another line "Rainbow, you can relax, he's the one Celestia sent, thanks for watching out for me though, and, ya know, trusting me not to ambush 'you' too."
There was a sound from Rainbow between a whimper and a groan, timed with a small nod but very little other movement besides occasional twitches... Perhaps I hit her with a bit too much sensory overload given the situation. Of coure a moment later Twilight pulled the door open further and almost growled out a "Get in here!" a Demand that I quite pleasantly obeyed and trotted quickly in the door, taking just a moment to levitate my saddle-bags over to a couch... then turned around.
Twilight 'did' growl this time, clearly intensely annoyed by what she was having to put up with "FIIIIX IIIIT!" Of course now that I could see her in full I could clearly see 'IT' in all it's, in my opinion, glory... but I'm a kinky bastard so that's understandable. Beneath her currently hung an impressively large throbbing cock, similar in color to her fur, though darker at the base and lighter near the tip, darkened a bit more in some places from how infuriatingly aroused she must have been... I could only imagine she had mental fortitude rivaling my own to control her urges when this is her first experience with having one... comparitively speaking, in 'proportion' her's was larger than Celestia's, though thanks to her much smaller overall size it would be plenty manageable without me having to grow again... of course, from the look of the tightly bloated sac behind it, she was going to make one hell of a mess.
A moment later I already had a building glow on my horn, and paused to clarify "Just to be clear, I already tried this with Celestia and it didn't work, so i don't know if I can even affect 'alicorns' in the way you need to be affected, aaand, when it failed with her, it temporarly exacerbated the 'immediate' trouble and I had to relieve her, which is only a temporary solution." That seemed to stop Twilight dead for a moment, her brain clearly processing what she had just heard... the implication that anypony could claim to have 'relieved' the princess in the way she knew I meant, was practically blasphemy for her, though it probably helped that Celestia had sent me personally... otherwise I worry she might have started blasting, instead I got-
"So, if it doesn't work, i'm going to need to be... relieved?... Physically?"
I nodded to that, still collecting the magic for the spell I intended to use... I seemed to have more time here so I could at least build it up and try harder.
surprisingly enough, before she continued, she actually blushed quite heavily, seemingly forgetting her troubles for a moment as a familiar and clearly embarassing thing came to mind "Um... I... I haven't actually... done that... before... or anything... hrm... 'intimate' for that matter... what do i-"
I cut her off for a moment there with a hoof raised "You just let me handle it then... Don't get me wrong, there's plenty of instincts that'll just drive you, and you are probably going to love the fuck out of it... But after what Celestia did this morning, I'm already aching back there and it's going to at least be tommorrow before I can walk straight again, so I don't want anypony getting busy back there right now... I'm soooo glad I could adapt to the situation, If i'd been any normal stallion, or probably even any normal mare... well, nevermind, lets do this."
Her blush blazed furiously on her cheeks from what I'd said about Celestia, I could see the mental images flashing before her eyes with every tiny flick of her ears, twitch of her eye, and pulse of her cock... She did not actually affirm continuing with the attempt to 'cure' her, so I went about my buisiness, lowered my muzzle, aimed, and released the with perfect aim, sending as much magic power as I could square into the broad head of 'It', and caused a howling moan to pour forth from her lips... my eyes could be decieving me, but I could almost swear i saw it grow some, but that shouldn't be right, afterall it's the opposite of the spell's supposed effect.
Of course, a few seconds later the light of the spell faded, and I observed expectantly for a few moments, but it didn't recede at all... if anything, it looked to have become even more agitated than before, with twilight now panting desperately while staring off into space.
Then it started
She let out a sudden little yelp as it gave a spurt, just pre, if a bit stickier than it should be, but a vast ammount for only a first leak, then another, breaking into a steady rythym of small gushes with every throb "Oh no!, nonono! It's gonna make such a MESS! okayokay... i need to-"
I cut in there and leaned in to press a hoof to her snout for attention, which she locked onto with shocking focus "You need to get your bathroom, preferable in the tub where all this mess can be contained and drained without you freaking out and spraying allover the library... NOw!"
it seemed to work, though she kept spurting and leaving a trail, from both sides now that i noticed her running away, she bolted for the stairs, and promptly jammed the head into one of the steps, earning a fresh blast against the wood and a pause for her to moan... immediately followed by some magical 'lifting' and further sprinting. I followed of course, not all that attentive of the sticky mess getting allover my hooves as i followed her trail to the bathroom.
I had only been a couple of seconds behind, but when i turned into the bathroom she was already in the tub, somewhere between drowning in lust, and shivering in fear at the overwhelming and foreign sensations, the absolute opposite of how Celestia had reacted, but for her this was most likely completely foreign.
A Sharp whistle drew her attention as I hopped into the tub from the other side "Alright Twilight, now this is important... 'relax', I'm sure this is new to you, bust honestly it's not a bad new, it's bigger than natural, but not bad, I can handle this ust fine, but you absolutely must 'not' freak out."
After she nodded a little I took the moment to slide closer, this was probably all kinds of awkward and strange to her, but as I lowered my muzzle and places that first lick along the broad head she practically melted into the sensations, spreading her fore-legs out over the back of the tub behind her and sliding deeper, a look of pure euphoria on her muzzle as she splayed out and gave off a mind numbingly hungry moan.
It took this oppurtunity to add just a bit more than pure lustful pleasure to the moment and slid in closer to plant a kiss... though she was borderline unconcious in her state of relaxed pleasure, she still pushed back into it, following new instincts that drove her to twist and shove wantingly into the kiss, pushing her tongue in, even nipping a little, similar actions being brought upon her return before I slowly pulled back from it and gave of a whispered little "That's a good girl" earning an odd effect of a small blush and her body arching to grind into me as a fresh wash of pre smothered my under-side. 'damn, she's 'royal' alright, hahah... oh, Celestia's poor maids, the mess they have to deal with... they're probably still cleaning.'
after that I drew back, letting myself get a more accurate look at her 'burden'... it was effective 'too big' by normal standards, enough to make just about any normal pony frightened for their wellbeing... but I'm Bedroom fucking BLITZ! AND I LIKE EM BIG!
Now I let myself go, both for-legs wrapping around a lower portion of her length and tugging it closer to me, creating a new pressure in her loins that earned a fresh howling moan as it tugged at places she didn't could be tugged. A moment later my mouth found that broad head, giving a kiss equally as passionate as the previous one, even using tongue, it was certainly big enough, and driving her wild enough that the next spurt of pre was enough to fill my muzzle and gush out the edges.
I was in my element here, sure, it's nice to get kinky, bondage, transformation magic, 'magic' in general, toys, potions... I've been around a dozen different entire 'districts' worth of fun, but there's just something unquestionably 'hot' about somepony this productive and so full of need that there can sometimes be barely enough time to breath between drowin gushes of Sexual fluids... sure, it's a bitch to clean up when you're done, but oh my Celestia is it HOT!... If I weren't so focused on making sure she got off before overflowing the tub, the bathroom, and probably the bedroom i passed through on the way in, I might have been more focused just how worked up 'I' was getting too!
As i started to turn that kiss into suckling, grind my body against that excessive length, and move my hooves up and down, she seemed to melt further into letting me do all the work, not even grinding anymore, though her panting moans were mixed with occasional squirming as the feelings grew more intense deep down. That changed quite suddenly!
It had been a very unexpected reaction, given her inexperience perhaps i underestimated her, but i suddenly found hooves and magic shoving me harder against her raging cock, sandwhiching it tightly between 2 bodies that were now almost perfectly covered in slimy pre, and doing her damndest to shove it as deep into my muzzle as possible. It got pretty far actually, I 'am' a highly experienced pony afterall, I reacted quickly by relaxing and joining the pushing, resulting in nearly a foot of length pushing in before reaching the back of my curled throat and finding no room to move further.
More importantly was the sudden lack of breathing space, but i had long since come up with a solution for 'that!', it's an incredibly awkward feeling thing but hardly notice in a moment like this, and i quickly cast a certain enchantment that bypasses the throat and simply teleports air in and out of where it needs to be. The awkardness was more than made up for by the ability to stay 'down' indefinately, and I was quite clad i could use such a useful spell as she suddenly jerked into trying to fit even more.
I could feel Twilight's magic getting rougher trying to find a way to get more of it in, which wasn't working at the moment, and once more expertise came in handy as I solved the problem. I pulled back, using the leverage of her arousal on her body to pull her forward while I slowly went down further, starting to bob and twist as I guided myself to the bottom of the tub, twisting my muzzle carefully suddenly to ensure my horn didn't stab anything as she came down ontop of my back, and all at once i felt myself pulled in deeper until my muzzle met her base.
It was admitedly rare that I was in a mind blowing ammount of bliss myself, since I'd been through just about every kinky thing you can imagine, but something about being stuck under the princess of magic with a more than impressive cock gushing right into my stomach, filling me up, and already buried under gallons of juices that had been flooding the tub, it just hits me in that sensitive spot that sets off all the nerves.
However, her body seemed to choose 'this' time to display her inexperience as i felt a familiar tightening run through her length and... wait, why did I feel magic emanating from inside me? 'Oh fuck me! Inexperienced Alicorn + Legendary magic level + overwhelming sexual sensations = what in Tartarus did I get myself into!?' I had to admit a little fear came up, i mean, i had no idea what she might do, for all i knew i could end up bursting into flames... thankfully that didn't happen, I got lucky with her instincts driving something kinky to happen.
It's quite likely that half of the neighborhood could hear her orgasmic scream, hell, i could hear it and i was submerged with pre-cum in my ears! Thought only I'd get to know just how much there 'was' to orgasm as it surged, quickly over-filling my stomach and backing up through every exit it could reach, while similarly over-whelming the natural 'Can't stretch that far' resistances... lets just say, it's a good thing I keep helpful enchantments on my body for cases like this, not that it mattered in the end.
She barely registered that she was 'rising' in the tub as I swelled up beneath her, seemingly only grind even harder... She didn't seem to notice at all as her grinding motions got enough freedom to start thrusting again, and by the time her explosives gushes of cum starting shooting up to paint the wall behind the tub she was so wracked in bliss the house could fall down and she'd never notice.
It turns out that the tub had been a good idea, it was now filled to the brim and over-flowing with that white substance and strands of red mixed in, a Large ammount had still managed to pour over the edge, bathing the tiled floor, though only a small bit had actually gotten out under the door.
Of course, I was very busy trying to 'pull myself together', So i didn't notice as her relaxed state turned into grand shock at how much of a mess she'd made, then realization that she'd been pumping that mess into somepony... then she saw the strings of red in the tub and let out a horrified teary scream that I obviously couldn't hear at the moment, though i oddly 'felt it' just fine.
Then quite suddenly a large portion of the Goopy substance in the middle of the tub turned much redder, and a familiar, if slimy, head rose up out of it, even forming similar hair color in the right shape "Oi, Bloody hell girl, you 'goo'ed me'! It's a good thing i've done this before!" Naturally 'she' hadn't see this before, and was practically trying to climb up the wall behind her, still half hard even... of course, 'that' scream i heard and so did probably half the neighbors again, and somewhere in the back of my mind a thought came up about a protective dragon that might not be so little anymore, but more importantly was clearing this situation up before anypony reacted to the screaming.
Suddenly a gooey hoof shot up out of an odd place in the cum, turning red and planting on her muzzle to silence her, hilariously enough earning a soft moan as she tasted a slight cherry scent mixed with her own cum leak into her mouth "Hush you, This is hardly the wierdest thing that can happen to me. Honestly, I should have anticipated that your inexperience with that particular bit of anatomy would lead to you unleashing unexpected magical effects through it... lucky you, I've been a goo pony before, it's actually a lot of fun, and whill make cleaning up after you much easier... now, no more screaming."
As I pulled my hoof away she slowly settled back into the other side of the tub... oh god it'd been a while since i felt 'that', a pony relaxing 'into me', my 'body' was slowing spreading through the cummy mess and making it part of 'me' and oh sweet celestia it felt GOOD! it took me a moment to realize Twilight had started talking, with an expression mixed between bliss and worry "Did it hurt? I mean, I got really forceful there, i totally lost it I think, and i saw how much i put out, no-pony can hold that much! I-"
I silenced her with a sudden unexpected 'rub' somewhere sensitive that created a soft meep "No, it didn't hurt, i just kinda 'melted' harmlessly, honestly it feels awesome, like an orgasm in every inch of your body... Your cum is FULL of magic too, so it's pretty easy absorbing it all right now." this got her attention just a bit and she looked down to find my 'red' spreading over more and more of the flooded mess, even outside the tub. "Yeah, you're kindof sitting in 'me' goo right now, don't worry though, it's hardly invasive, it actually feels really awesome." This of course sent a furious blush across her features as she fathomed 'bathing in somepony'.
By now, as more of my body 'collected' into a pony form, I was actually looking larger than before and very gooey besides. "Oh sweet Celestia... I'm not sure if I should be grossed out, intrigued, or horny again! AUGH! Everything is so mixed up because of whatever this 'thing' is that's happening to everypony!... ACK!, THAT'S RIGHT! I'm clear now! I need to get to work!" All at once she started trying to throw herself out of the tub, and promply fell on her face.
Or almost did, a distinct excess of goo rose up from the ground to meet her before she actually impacted, carefully repositioning her to standing and holding her there for a moment "Now wait just a moment, you let me finish 'reforming' so i can clean all that muck off you're body before you go running off flinging bits of cum allover your library." Holy shit she is so adorable when blushing that hard!
It still took a moment, there was a 'lot' of me to take stock of with all that fluid to turn into 'goo material', but before long the tub was mostly empty and I was sliding out... ohhhh geeez, i love that oozy feeling sometimes, I actually tended to stay physical more because it's 'too much' fun to be gooey all the time, it makes me really playful! "Okay, now hold still, this is gonna feel really awkward for you, but it'll get everything clean."
At that point I moved towards her and didn't stop, she looked quite worried by this, but it soon turned into stiffled groans of delight as my goo poured over her form, sucking every last bit of cum from every nook and cranny, earning several barely controlled moans as I washed over more sensitive areas and came back off the other side, now leaving a decidedly pristine Twilight Sparkle standing there, smelling faintly of cherry's and sex. "there we go, all clean, now off you go princess, you bury yourself in some books and i'll go see if there's anypony else in desperate need of my services, you oughta be okay for a couple of days at least, considering that monster of a load, hahah."
The blush remained, but she looked around the bathroom with an impressed expression, clearly surprised at how perfectly 'goo-less' it was aside from me "wow, you're really good at that... Hmmm, perhaps I should look into the viability of a goo pony cleaning service sometime... oh, if only most of the natural ones weren't 'dangerous'." she was already leaving the bathroom, her head clearly in the clouds of knowledge seeking already... I'm sure she was uncomfortable about having to be serviced by a stranger, not to mention all the mess and turning him into a goo pony, but I had to imagine that her academia was her greatest safety mechanism to keep from freaking out about that.
...
well, that was done, So i started out and down the stairs, collecting the last bits of mess left behind prior to reaching the bathroom, taking a glance to see Twilight already nose deep in half a dozen books 'holy crap, that filly is dedicated!' ... I hadn't intended to disturb her, then half way down the stairs the front door slammed open.
"TwILIGHT!? Somepony said they heard you screaming? Is everything... holy crap, what is that?!" I hadn't met Twilight or most of her friends personally prior to today, Rarity would be the only one since she tended to get around sometimes thanks to her fashion business, and no we did not 'get personal'. However, it took no sort of genius to realize that the obvious Dragon in the door-way was most assuredly 'Spike', though it seemed that recent years had been kind to him, he was easily larger than an average pony now, not quite 'mac' big, but given that he was a dragon he still cut an imposing figure, not to mention that protective glint in his eyes could send a burglar into fitful pleas for their safety.
Then a familiar face happened to peek in behind him, though only just "what is what Darling? uh... KYAAAH!" Rarity, looking as pristine as ever, got one look at the extra large gooey pony shaped thing on the stairs, shouted, and hid behind spike, only adding to that dangerously protective expression.
'Oh great, assumption in 3, 2, 1.'
"what are you doing in twilight's Library?! and what are you!? wHERE'S TwILIGHT!?" The glint in his eyes turned into an aggressive posture then and a bit of smoke huffing from his snout.
"SPIKE!, don't threaten him! I'm just fine and he was sent by the princess!"
Instantly the aggression vanished, he perked up, and snapped his head over to the sight of a couple of floating books and a purple hoof waving from behind the Library's center table. "wait, the princess sent a slime monster?"
I felt the need to interject there "Oi! I'm not a slime monster, I am a 'goo pony', there's a HUGE difference... and I didn't arrive like this."
Twilight added on, peeking up from behind the table with a slightly uneasy blush "That's kinda 'my' fault... hrm, he helped me with that 'problem' I've been having all week, remember? the one that needed you to stay at Rarity's until it was fixed, 'just incase'?"
"wait... so, you're okay now? It's all better?"
"well, not quite, it's 'under control' for now, but it's not 'gone'... I can focus now and get to solving this problem, and that's the important part!"
I had moved on down the stairs by then, standing more comfortably closer to spike, though i could still hear the occasional whimper from rarity peeking around and staring at me... while Twilight and spike had a bit of back and forth I decided to address what i 'knew' was the issue "Rarity, you can stop cringing in fear now... I'm not 'dirty'... Infact, goo pony 'goo' is a remarkably clean substance, the bathroom upstairs is completely spotless thanks to this goo... Might feel a little odd but I assure you that contact with me is perfectly hygenic."
Something snapped spike's glare back to me then and I returned it with a defiant certainty in my own "Hey! how do you know Rarity?"
She added on from next to him, still concealed though seemingly less freaked out after being told I wasn't 'dirty' "I had the exact same thought."
"Simple, we've met before." I could 'smell' the suspicion from spike, as if he thought i was after her of something "In manehatten? a few times actually, completely proffesional of course." There wasn't quite a recognition appearing, so I tried something to make things more clear. I focused on the gooiness and tried to tighten it up into a more proper example of my physical form, not perfect yet, but it takes about an hour after going 'gooey' the first time to stand a chance of condensing into a 'solid' form, then it clicked.
Even though I was much larger than i normally should be, the similarities became obvious once I'd started refining my features from just being goopy. "Blitzy! I 'do' remember you... I also remember how dreadfully rude I was the first time the we met, letting the gossip tell me what to think first, oh, 'the shame!'." the sudden confirmation seemed to earn more actual relaxing from spike though, which was a good thing... I had a good feeling about being able to handle a bad situation, afterall this 'twilight powered goo' was saturated with enough magic I could probably imitate an alicorn, if only for a short time before running out, i didn't really like the idea of throwing fire and goo everywhere in a fight.
"Hmhm, Rarity, you weren't even 'close' to the most insulting reaction I've gotten from a pony. Once you calmed down you were actually quite a pleasant conversationalist, and i do so enjoy a bit of dirty gossip about those grimy nobles that are ever so ready to scoff at anything they think is beneath them.
"Dirty?... You didn't-"
"No spike, I have would describe my encounters with Ms.Rarity as Perfectly Proffesional Pontification! At most, a friendly hug was shared."
"Oh, sorry..."
"Nah, it's okay, I've heard enough about ya man, I know you're protective of her, hmhm, I'd say she and twilight are damn lucky honestly, having a dragon around to be protective of them, hmhm." There is something strangely adorable and still even a little manly about a dragon of his current proportions blushing at a compliment, even if his only other reaction is a small cough to act tough about it. "and hey, if you ever need a deep scale cleaning, feel free to look me up, You're not the first dragon i've encountered, and this goo can clean things where almot nopony can possibly get to." There was a mild deepening of the blush and an suddenly defensive addition to his look, so i quickly added "Completely proffessional, i swear... honestly, I get tired of adding that, just because my official occupation is 'Pony Pleaser' doesn't mean I'm not capable of keeping other services 'mature and respectful'... Granted, a 'goo cleaning' will feel rather odd, but I promise, It'll work wonders, there's a couple dragon's out there that are a liiittle less grumpy after getting a proper cleaning."
It was odd to notice, but Rarity seemed to be getting more and more comfortable with the 'slimy thing in the room' with every bit of 'cleaning' talk I carried on, she even acquired a slightly devious expression, as if she were intending to use me to get back at something by 'cleaning' it... that hardly made much sense, but I'm certainly not gonna complain. "Oooh, Spikey, maybe you should take him up on that offer sometime, He could probably get that annoying itch you've been mentioning on your back that I can't seem to locate... Oh! Blitzy! are you sticking around long? If you're half as good for 'cleaning' as you imply, you'd work wonders on my little sister after she's gotten done with her wild escapades... honestly, they've all gotten their cutie marks, and yet they still go out together doing crazy things that somehow result in being glued together with tree sap!"
"You mean the crusaders? Heh, I think I heard about them actually, they seemed to have spread some over the years... ironically, it would not be my first 'sap removal cleaning', though I've never had the pleasure of meeting the 'founders' yet." Ugh! Another look? "Okay seriously, not everytime i mention words related to my proffession has to imply something dirty! I find their antics to be rather entertaining, and it would indeed be a pleasure to observe some of their activities at some point... Of course, I 'am' in town on a business in a way... I was just about to head out to look for other ponies that might need help... now that Twilight is able to think straight It's best if I see to other ponies suffering with this odd plague..."
Being that the conversation was turning casual enough and the initial urges of having heard about Twilight screaming had calmed down, Spike actually moved off from the conversation, still blushing mildly at the cleaning offer, from recieving a decidedly mild scolding about jumping to conclusions over and over, and debating how to feel about Rarity's endorsement of it, and of course heading over to Twilight's side to catch up.
"That is my 'primary' mission as the now Royally endorsed expert on the invasive transformative magics that seem to permeate this magical plague, and for the time being that has been taken care of... It should be a couple days before I have to focus on that again, maybe, I'll still be back here everyday, as an alicorn and all it's quite possible there's other effects I may need to help with. However... Just because that's my primary mission doesn't mean I shouldn't try to lessen the strain on other ponies... I really hate to delve into the darker side of this crisis, but..."
I glanced over a moment before leaning in to speak a little quieter "Listen, Twilight was on the verge on 'rape mode' when I got here, she was 'obviously' struggling desperately with urges she was nowhere near ready to control on her own, and her 'change' is minor compared to some possibilities... There were a couple of guards in the castle I swore smelled like Griffins despite their concealing enchantments... This is to say nothing of other ponies who don't have Twilight's advantage of hardcore mental acuity to drown the urges in logical pursuits... So far there has been reports of 'forceful interactions' that i know of, or worse, but I know how these instincts and urges work, They can drive a pony insane if left alone too long, and that's the 'least' of it honestly... I can only imagine someponies out there are locked away in their bedrooms or something to avoid losing control near friends or family and could very well be starving!... If I can head-off the level of maddening lust that can lead ponies to ruin themselves, I'd gladly take the insulting criticism that comes along with it...
I hate to say it but I must be realistic here... a Magical Plague is indescriminate, as much as I would love to assume it can't happen, it's very possible it could affect your sister or one of her friends, I'll do my best to simply cure it magically, but sometimes the affliction 'requires' something else... for instance, i couldn't 'cure' twilight, she's an Alicorn and beyond my magicly transformative reach... Hell, if it gets 'you', you at least have spike to help out... unless I'm assuming too much there, I mean there's always the obvious 'pony x dragon' issue, but the viability of a relationship is as obvious and night and day with him." One could practically read 'mildly hopeful despair' allover her face after I went into detail on the current crisis, then a furious blush over the last bit.
"I... well, I suppose I can try to 'accept it' if she is suffering this blasted plague and it 'will' help her... oh, but I can't hardly imagine how much 'more' stressful it could be to have this plague result in a foal she's far too young and not ready for... and, well, yes, I am 'with' spike, It took time but we decided to give it a try and simply hope for the best."
"Oh, you don't have to worry about that, I have more than enough contraceptive spells at the ready to make sure that can't happen... I've been 'curing seasonal heat' for years already with no accidents... I dare say I am one of maybe a handful of Stallions completely immune to the effects of Hormones in the air, possibly also why this Plague hasn't affected 'me' yet... and better still, as a 'goo pony' right now, I can simply 'choose' not to be fertile, one of the things I've always liked about this form, heheh."
"Oh! That changes everything.... oh, Here I was worrying there'd be dozens of new foals running around town after this Crisis is dealt with... Oh how silly of me, Here I've been assuming 'too much' about your proffession, and then suddenly I don't assume 'enough'."
"Hahah, It's quite alright, as I said before, I've had faaarrr worse reactions... Now, If you will excuse me, I have a mission to continue!... I can still tell from the scent on the air that there's many ponies out there suffering." and with that, I suddenly dashed out the door and closed it behind me... well, it might have been all kinds of sudden, but I felt the conversation was dying down... aaaand I got this feeling in the back of my head like Spike was burning away my goo glaring at me for being so close and carrying on a suspiciously private conversation with Rarity.