Forgotten Children

The ground was soft, and damp. A departure from the stone above, this area seemed almost like tilled soil, but with no sunlight it would never bear anything but mushrooms and fungus. The changeling looked around as he was escorted, his eyes combing up the massive walls to a high ceiling lit with green pods. They cast an eerie glow down, Creating sharp edges of shadows against rocks where all manner of things could be hiding in wait. The area they landed in had been open; a mighty cathedral inside the mountain, and an imposing one at that.

Artful decors lined the cave walls. In the dim light they appeared to be depictions of past battles and eras, and great statues of changeling warriors in small alcoves, armored and armed with various weapons. A keen-eyed observer would note the glowing green eyes of these statues. But few outside the changeling realm would know that they were not statues, but the Hive guard, watching over their last city.

In front of them, stood a great wall chiseled out of bare rock. The wall went from floor to ceiling, and not a pit marred its glossy surface. This wall had not yet seen a battle, but its imposing nature and its outer defenses were built to make sure no army ever advanced that close. At the base of it lay a moat of a foul-smelling substance. The larger changeling peered down into it, curious.

The rear guard shoved him roughly to keep moving along the outer edge of the moat. “Don’t fall in there. That shit will melt your eyes and wings and you’ll become a part of it. Not to say you might not wind up at the bottom of it anyway.” He snickered, a wicked grin spreading over his face.

A sharp crack brought the large changeling’s attention to the wall, where seemingly solid rock split before his eyes, rolling back with a green glow to reveal a doorway. On the other side, two additional guards wearing massive plate armor and carrying broad shields stood side by side. The lead guard hopped the moat with a quiz buzz of his wings and said something to the guards. They nodded, and moved aside and the rear guard poked his captive over. The armored guards did not follow or even scowl, but just returned to their places behind the still open door. As it started to slide closed, two cave guards scrambled out to replace the station of the two who just entered with their charge.

Now inside the outer walls, a more functional and less decorative Hive was apparent. Looking up again, one would see high columns and walls with green lamps on the ceiling, but lining these walls were now single alcoves holding empty pods. Changeling workers skittered about the floor and within the alcoves, checking here and there and running off again. They passed deeper into the Hive, and row upon row of empty pods. Spiders and rats had take up residence in most of them, and filth from their activities lined the floors of the empty nests.

It was apparent that these pods had been empty a long time, but due to the sheer number of them, the changeling wondered why he saw so little activity. The trio walked for quite some time, and each row was just as abandoned as the last.

At last they came upon a more inhabited part of the Hive; A long, narrow bridge over a deep chasm with several guards both in front and along the causeway. Again, the lead guard approached, and they talked. They pointed back and forth, and the bridge guards sneered, but sent a messenger across.

“YOU!” the bridge guard thundered, looking at their purple-winged captive, “Mother Chrysalis will decide if she wants to see you. And you will walk carefully, we don’t take kindly to your kind in here.” The messenger came running back. “She will see you,” said the same bridge guard, and stepped to the side.

He sneered at the last part, and the purple winged changeling started to think there was a bigger story at play than just his markings. He walked slowly, carefully, onto the bridge and started to cross. Armored guards stood on either side, each holding a barbed spear at his chest as the passed, so there was always a tip at his heart. This configuration allowed only a very small amount of space for him to walk, and so he did so carefully but quickly, wanting to get to the other side as soon as possible. The chasm he walked over was not endless, he could see a faint glow coming the bottom. This glow was not green, but as red as fire, and seemed to shift about as if alive. The walls also contained many sharp spikes and craigs, which would easily rip his wings and prevent him from getting back out.

He looked away from the edge and found himself nearing the end of the bridge. Here, there was no hidden door, but the opening was barred with heavy iron rods both horizontally and vertically that seemed to be jutting out from the rock, across the doorway, and back into the rock. They were covered in small spikes themselves, and did not appear to be able to be moved. Beyond was just more inky blackness. As he approached the bars, they glowed with a familiar green aura, and with a mighty creak and groan, they stretched apart, until a small hole slightly bigger than his shoulders formed in between.

The changeling hesitated, not knowing if he would fit, but was kicked from behind, and slowly fit himself through the small gap. Twisting himself around so not to catch on any of the bars’ rough edges, he wiggled through and looked back as the bars formed themselves back into their original shape. Looking forward, the blackness remained, but he could hear a skittering, chittering sound.

He rose to his feet and took a small step forward. The blackness seemed to ebb a bit, so he stepped forward again. He sighed and steeled himself, taking more steps forward. He was dimly aware of something moving in front of him as he walked, and after a dozen steps, started to notice that the movement was everywhere. He looked down, and could see a dim green glow emanating from the cracks in the floor. “Not cracks,” he thought, “Shells. I’m walking on the missing hive.”

He peered forward, and could see dim reddish-orange light in the distance. As he moved, it became brighter as the hive moved around him, young changelings stepping to the side, allowing him just enough room to pass before they moved back into their living wall arrangement. The light grew brighter bit by bit, then suddenly bright as day as the changeling passed into the center chamber.

As his eyes adjusted to the sudden light, The room’s details came into view. He appeared to be standing inside a great dome, but inside of walls a swarming mass of changeling moved like churning water, all facing inward. Behind him the “wall” closed up and he saw the faces of the hive looking back with curiosity. Halfway to the center of the room were many magical fire pits, bathing the room in their orange light and puffing smoke up to the ceiling, where a small vent led to parts unknown.

In the center was a sunken area, filled with sheets and linens, pillows and throws. And in the middle of that, lay the one that he had come here to see: his Mother.

He approached respectfully, head bowed, until he was at the edge of the steps leading down to her bed. “Mother…” he spoke softly, not knowing quite what to say.

Queen Chrysalis looked over her visitor quickly, then more carefully. “I know why the Hive has been so reluctant to let you in here. You bear markings of a very old, very scorned changeling. Yet I sense you are here for a reason. Come, sit here with me.”

He obeyed, stepping down to her level, and onto the sheets. To his surprise, they were atop a great fluffy mass, and rivaled that of the most comfortable bed he had ever slept in in the equine world. He shifted about on his haunches, lifting a pillow nearby with his levitation and placed it behind his back as he sat. He looked up, and found his mother staring quite intently at him. “What is it that makes you react so?” he inquired. “Am I in the wrong HIve?”

“No, no…” Chrysalis cooed, “I can always recognize one of my own. You are most certainly mine. But I have many children,” she waved her arms, motioning to the living walls, “But I dare say I do not remember you specifically. Help me, child, what is your name?”

“I don’t have one,” he replied flatly.

“Yes, child, you do. All my children have names. We are not so uncivilized to have moved past individuality. Those that have come before, those that are still here, and those yet to come all have names. What is yours?” Chrysalis moved in closer, trying to look him over without being obvious about it.

“I do not have one,” he stated again. “Or, I don’t remember having one. I don’t remember you, nor do I remember having a father.”

“Child, your father has been dead for several hundred years. He-”

“And should I care?” he cut her off. “Let me tell you why I am here. I have lived and ‘died’, been ‘born’ and grown, been ‘killed’ and have killed, and done it more times than I care to talk to you about. And I no longer care to do it anymore. Nor do I remember why I was bidden to do it in the first place. Looking around, it seems I have come too late. This hive is dying, and those that remain already hate me. Let me leave.”

Chrysalis shook her head, and stretched out on her stomach, sinking slightly into her bed. “I can’t let you go just yet. But I will, eventually. I want to hear your stories. You must have valuable information.” She rolled over and looked at him upside down. “And I can feel that you are hungry. Would you even make it back above ground if you do not feed?”

He blinked once, slowly, but retained his empty stare past her. Chrysalis sighed and rolled back over. She crawled along the sheets to him until she was a few feet away. “Let me have a good look at you.” She inspected him closely. He was certainly taller than most changelings, and almost as tall as herself. She scooted closer, and gingerly took one of her hooves in her own. It was smooth, with no divots or holes where there should be. She frowned, and looked at him. “You are whole. How? All changelings share this trait.”

He moved his leg out of her grasp. He looked away and said nothing. Chrysalis brought her hoof to his face and moved it back around. “You are not on trial here. You are my child. I don’t hate you.”

“I know that,” he said softly. “I just didn’t think that you would have forgotten me.”

Chrysalis took his leg back in hers again. She leaned and kissed it softly. “I haven’t forgotten you. Do not be so quick to judge. We are your family, my dear, and you are a long-lost relative. I will tell you why you have encountered the worst in us, but first I need to know why you grew up to be the way you are. Please?”

He sighed, and looked her in the eyes. They were a deep emerald like his own, but they held a compassion and a love that he recognized as a mother’s concern. Enough years spent around equine foals and their families had taught him this expression well. “I don’t like what I look like,” he told her.

“Why?” she asked, “You are the only you. Why would you want to look like anything other than that?

“”I just...I just don’t like myself.” He looked down at the sheets, avoiding her eyes. “I don’t like what I do and I dislike myself for doing it anyway.” He shut his eyes as a wet spot appeared on the sheets where a tear fell off his cheek. “I don’t want to do it anymore but I don’t know how to do anything else.”

Chrysalis leaned on him, wrapping her forelegs around him and hugging him close. “Oh dearie…you can go anywhere and be anyone or anything. Why don’t you just start doing something you like?”

“Because its still a lie!” he shouted, sobs coming more frequently and tears flowing down his face. He tried half-heartedly to pull away but Chrysalis held him tight. “I have to pretend to be someone and something that I’m not, and in doing so I’ve come to hate myself.”

Chrysalis nuzzled him. His sobs hurt her heart, and she hugged him closer to try and take his pain. She loved all her children equally, but this one had never known it. She rubbed his back with her forehooves, trying to calm him. Her hooves ran down the hard shell of his back, and into something soft, then back to hard again. Chrysalis rubbed his back again, cooing softly. She rubbed the soft area, and found it sticky, almost wet. She brought her hoof up behind his head so that she could look and found a black mass akin to tar on it. “Why do you hide yourself from your own eyes?” she asked him, pushing him back so they were face to face. “Please show me the real you.” She held up her hoof so he could see what she meant.

“Its been a long time, “ he said, wiping his tears. The comforting, calming embrace of his mother was a powerful medicine that even he had never known. “I used magic to harden pitch around my body. I don’t know how to get it off.”

“I do,” Chrysalis said, standing and pulling him up with her. She led him off the sheets and towards the far end of the room from which he had entered. She addressed her living wall. “Go put hot water on for your brother.” The wall chittered and churned, sinking in and opening up to form a walkway. Chrysalis led him him down it, making small talk. “You may have noticed that I don’t have a throne. I prefer my chambers to be shared with my children. The guards outside are a necessary compromise, but if I thought I could bring them in here, that’s where we would be.

“You have much pain in your heart, my child. Let me help you wash it away.” They reached another room, with another dark stone floor and a small pool which bubbled away. Magical lamps around the tub cast a dim whitish light around the area. “There is a kiln I had built underneath it,” she explained, “I do enjoy a hot bath, and so my children keep this bath clean and ready for me whenever I should want to use it.”

She helped him up one side, and he sighed as he slid into the warm water. The stone at the bottom was clearly the source of the heat, and he shifted around to try and avoid touching it. The bath felt great otherwise. He had never been to a pony spa but heard enough about them that he imagined this is what it must be like. Chrysalis leaned in from the side of the tub and splashed water at him playfully. Despite his best efforts, he cracked a smile.

“Aha!” Chrysalis exclaimed, “So you do have something in you except pain and loss.” She fished around in the tub and brought up a well-used but clean brush. “Let me help you.” She gently scrubbed him as he lay in the tub. He let out a contented sigh as she scrubbed, letting his magic fade and allowing the pitch to soften and fall to the bottom of the tub.

Chrysalis smiled, and licked his cheek tenderly. She tongue picked up sweat, grime, earth, and a hint of blood. She continued to smile and began to hum a tune, to which he asked, “What is that? It sounds familiar…”

“When my children are growing in their pods, I always sing to them. I want your earliest memories to be fond ones. Even if all your later memories are hurtful, at least I gave you one good one.” She smiled and licked his cheek again. “I think we’ve gotten most of it. Sit and relax and come find me when you are ready.” She backed away from the tub and turned back toward her chambers, humming her tune and swishing her tail as she left.

He lay in the tub for several more minutes, enjoying the feeling of the warm water and regaining his strength by the minute. His mother had put out some strong emotions, of which he drank deeply. But sitting with his back to the tub wall was becoming uncomfortable, so he reluctantly climbed out and back towards the main chamber. Looking back at the vacated tub, he saw several of the changeling occupants descend from their places in the wall and start cleaning it out. Once came down next to him and said sweetly, “We’ll take care of this. Do you need a drying?”

He shook his head no, and the changeling retreated back from whence it came. He walked back down the tunnel, noticing that the others around him seemed a lot more interested and a lot less suspicious than before. They whispered to one another as he passed, and he glimpsed some smiling at him. Upon reaching the main chamber, he saw Chrysalis on her bed, rolling about with another small changeling. They laughed as she tickled its stomach. On seeing him approach, Chrysalis shooed it away, back into the swirling wall where it disappeared.

“Do you feel better now?” she asked brightly. He nodded and thanked her. Chrysalis moved up to the edge of her sprawling bed. Her horn glowed and the magical fires in the room increased in intensity. “Come here, I do want to really get a look at you now.”

Displayed in his raw form for the first time in recent memory, he walked up to her, standing tall over her. She craned up to see him. “Oooh! Aren’t you a fine specimen.” She lowered her gaze back down and started from his hooves, carefully tracing her hooves around his features. The pitch had come free of the lower parts of his legs and they were now pockmarked with small holes as she would expect. Above that on his upper legs, both front and back, was a thick chitin plate that covered him like metal armor would on a warrior. The plate had several small thorns coming off the sides, black near the base and purple at the tip.

His shoulders and haunches too had a chitin armor, this one segmented and overlapping each other. “Pick this hoof up for me, dear,” she asked. He did so, and she watched the plates slide against one another but freely allowed his movement. “You can put that back down.” He did as commanded.

Chrysalis felt underneath his stomach, and found the same chitin armor here, but only covering his chest. It was rough from years of growth and damage. She licked her lips and slid her hoof back toward his nether regions. He hissed and backed up from her touch.

“Sorry, dear, I meant no harm…” she gestured for him to come back. “I was just checking this armor of yours. Its so…” she searched for the right word, but unable to come up with one she just shrugged. “Come back, I won’t do it again…” He hesitated. She had been nothing but nice, so he stepped forward to let her continue.

Chrysalis felt over his shoulders and found the chitin plate she had touched earlier, Pulling herself up to a standing position, she stood beside him and looked it over in wonder. It extended from the back of his skull all the way down to his shoulders. It was one solid plate with small spines at its edge. It was also quite firmly attached, and in trying to move it she was moving him along with it.

“You do realize that its attached to me, right?” he asked cynically.

“I do,” she said, tapping her hooves along his segmented shell that extended over his back and haunches. “Its just rare to see these so well-developed. Even your ‘normal’ shell is tougher than that of other changelings. Its rough…almost like the hide of a lizard.” She moved forward to his head, inspecting it closely. “You’re built like a soldier. But most soldiers don’t live as long as you.” She cupped his jaws in her hooves, rolling his head around. “And what long teeth you have! Do you spend a lot of time eating food?”

He pulled his head away from her, stretching his neck. “While immersed in society, very rarely. Only when others expect me to. But I have been spending the years in between with the timberwolf pack and there I do eat a fair amount of raw meat. Disgusting stuff.” He gritted his teeth and shook his head in an attempt to clear the memory from it.

Chrysalis mused at that statement, looking at his four long canine teeth again. “Ah, perhaps your body is adapting. Changelings are not only visually adaptable, but over long enough time, you may change to fit your environment. Before you ask, your armor is hereditary. There’s no getting rid of that.”

“Do you have any pearls of wisdom regarding my horn or my wings?” he asked, exasperated with her constant explanations of things he really cared nothing about.

“Your wings are the color of your father’s. Your eyes are the color of mine. That’s unusual, sons typically retain all of their fathers’ traits and daughters that of their mother. You’re unique, but I don’t love you any less.” She bumped her nose against his and smiled. She moved back onto the bed, leading him behind her.

They sat down in the middle of the bed, and Chrysalis brought a pillow with her magic to put under her. Without looking at him, she said, “You have been very patient with me and my questions. Let me tell you a little bit of my past, yours, and bring you up to date and our Hive. If you have questions, please feel free to ask. Also, you will want to get comfortable. This might take a while.”

He settled himself in, laying on his stomach with his head propped up. He also noticed that the surrounding hive had become more still with all eyes on their mother. They apparently knew story time when it happened.

“I have lived a long time and seen all manner of species rise and fall. I have always been Queen, but several Kings have come and gone in that time. See…” she paused, collecting her thoughts. ”Your father, whose name I don’t care to speak out loud, had some very different ideas on how to grow our Hive than I did. He convinced me that we needed agents wholly removed from our ranks. He feared that if we were ever discovered, our enemies might find a way to track all of our children down. And as a failsafe, we should put those out that might carry on our legacy should something happen to us.

“I loved him deeply, and despite my better judgement, I agreed to this plan. We hatched a small clutch of our children, and had them sent away with learned changelings to hide in the world away from us. It caused me so much sorrow to see them go and not know what happened to them.

“You see, beloved child, you are the first and only of that clutch to ever return.” She leaned and kissed his cheek. She leaned back and looked down at the bed as she continued. “My despair grew over the years for my lost children, and resentment grew in my heart for my mate. But he refused to allow me to search for my lost children, insisting that I forget about them. I could not, and I could not forgive him for tricking me into this awful plan. I confronted him about it, and he raised his sons against me to take over the Hive.

He underestimated my power, and my daughters who came solely from my own eggs and I fought a great battle within our then Hive. It seemed for a time that he might prevail, but as the tide shifted in my favor he resorted to changing to my form to infiltrate and kill the weakest and youngest of my brood in the nursery. I cornered him there, and fought him myself. When I stuck him down, the remaining resistance fled. My Hive was destroyed, my children murdered, and I could no longer to stay in that place where I had so many terrible memories, and so we set out to cultivate a new Hive. And we have been here ever since.

“I believe you may have seen the walls outside the Hive entrance? They are depictions of that terrible time when our Hive divided against itself. More upsetting than the loss of my mate was the loss of over half of my children. Loved sons and daughters all. I grieve for their sacrifice, that they may have lived if not for one foolish mistake that I made.” Tears formed in the corners of her eyes, and she wiped them away with the corner of one of her sheets. The Hive wall chittered and cooed for their mother.

“So I was telling the truth when I said I had not forgotten you. You are not a forgotten child. You are strong. I still weep for the lost ones that have not returned, but you you rekindled hope in my heart that I might yet find all the children I so foolishly abandoned.” She looked back at him, tears welling in her eyes and jumped upon him, embracing him tightly. “I love you…please don’t leave me again.”

He was taken aback by her sudden change in demeanor and show of affection. He hugged her back, but he felt empty inside. “Thank you Mother. It does bring me great comfort to know my reason for being, but I am unable to have these same feelings for you.”

“I know,” she replied, still holding him tight. “I am alone in my ability to love. It is the burden that I bear for all of my children. I must support you where you cannot support yourselves. I know you feel sad for me, but please try not to. I think that is a Mother’s condition: the sacrifice of herself for her children.”

He understood. He had seen and experienced it enough in his time that he knew she sincerely cared for him, for them. He kissed his mother softly on the forehead and felt her embrace tighten momentarily before letting him go. Softly, he heard her whisper to him, “You are strong, and you can help your family. Will you at least stay a while?”

He smiled. “Yes, I can stay a while. What would you have me teach you? You are surely more experienced than I.”

“I hear that you are quite accomplished when it comes to changing form.” Chrysalis moved back to the edge of the bed and onto the stone floor. “Move, please,” she said to the wall. “Make some space so all can see.” The changelings obeyed, and the room’s diameter expanded while keeping the floor level until a great amphitheatre was formed from their bodies. They looked on with excitement and spoke to each other in hushed tones.

Chrysalis walked out onto the space they created. “Let me go first, then you. Maybe a little competition by applause?” She smiled, and her horn started to glow. A ring of magic appeared around her and a wall of black swept up and over her head. When the magical wall fell, The shining white coat and flowing hair of Celestia stood in its place. Applause thundered from around the room. “I should tell you, my faithful student, that the only form you are forbidden from taking within my Hive is my own. For…previously mentioned reasons. How about you show us that timberwolf that you used, hmm?”

He knew that there would be no ‘winning’ here, but he closed his eyes and concentrated anyway. A slight shimmer rode over his body, and as if from nowhere, sticks and twigs surfaced and covered his plating, then the rest of this body. His teeth shrank out of view and sharp wooden pegs formed his wolfen teeth, and thorns grew from his hooves into sharp claws. His posture lowered from an upright equine stance to the low gait of a wolf. As he completed the transformation and opened his glowing eyes, he noticed two things: the silence that pervaded the room, and the intense stares from both Chrysalis and the other changelings.

He looked around curiously, and sat on his haunches. Drawing in a great breath, he raised his head and let loose a mighty howl, which echoed off the walls and through the Hive. Those working in the empty Hive, the guards on the bridge, and all in the queen’s chamber fixated on the alien sound, and as it died off a small applause started and grew in intensity. The wolf grinned and looked back at his mother, his wooden tail wagging against the floor.

“Hmmpf,” Chrysalis scoffed, her facade falling in a flash of green and black as the applause died away. “That is definitely different. It also takes more time and energy.”

“I suppose,” he replied, “But its the only way I know how. Besides, the rumors I hear are that changelings can’t maintain form when asleep or unconscious. I can keep this form indefinitely. And it has…other advantages as well.”

Chrysalis perked up an eye. “You are correct. Keeping form while unconscious is extremely difficult and takes great skill. What other advantages do you have?”

“Well…” he shook slightly, letting his hard coat become soft, translucent, and semi-soft. His gently shaking shook the coat off him and onto the floor. “I can now either use the coat again, or eat it, or throw it away, or just ditch it. It will dissolve within an hour or so on its own.”

“Eat it?” Chrysalis looked at him incredulously.

He bent and took the coat with his teeth, and using his hooves, stuffed it unceremoniously into his mouth. Swallowing quickly, it was gone in a matter of seconds. “It really doesn’t taste like anything,” he explained. Pausing, he added, “Depending on how long you’ve been wearing it.”

Chrysalis came up beside him and nuzzled his cheek. “You certainly are full of surprises.” She led him in an apparently random direction, but as she walked the Hive moved and shifted, forming a walkway for them. “Come, I want to show you something.”

They walked side by side as the Hive shifted around them, opening up new area in front and closing off the tunnel behind them. “I do have a question,” he asked.

“Yes?”

“You said that during the uprising that your daughters fought for you and the sons all fled. Are there any of them left?” He looked at her, awaiting a response.

She sighed. “Yes, you heard me correctly. All of the Hive, and the operatives that are currently out in the world, are female. My daughters, your sisters. Have you ever met another changeling, other than the one who raised you?”

“No. And I barely even knew him. It was such a long time ago. He taught me very little and one day, he was gone. Most of my formative years were spent in the forests by myself, learning to survive.” He thumped his armored chest. “I wish I would have had these back then. But I was young. And everything I’ve ever known about changelings - other than myself - has been all rumor and hearsay.”

“Ah, well then let me give you the talk.” She alternated looking at him and looking forward. “Queens are the producers of new changelings, as you know. I birth eggs which we put in pods while you develop. Simple, right? Well, with a King, I can birth offspring with his traits too, and make our Hive stronger. But moreover, without a mate, I can produce only females.”

He furrowed his brow, sensing that this conversation was going somewhere that he wasn’t going to like. “Do I sense that my being male is going to be a major point of why you want me here?”

Chrysalis only smiled. She continued to walk, leading him into another room, this one with its own rock walls, floor, and ceiling. There were rows with alcoves here as well, but they were all empty. The room was noticeably more hot and humid than the other areas of the Hive, but there was no smell of mold or rot. This area had been kept extremely clean.

“When we came here, this area was the first on my list, even before my own chambers.” Chrysalis looked around woefully, and continued, “This was to be the great nursery for my new brood. I had pods prepped and prepared, and workers ready to fill them with new children.” She stopped, and looked at him solemnly. “But something happened. Either due to the stress of losing my previous HIve or injuries sustained in the battle, or some other cause, the eggs I laid only produced malformed young.” She gritted her teeth and looked away. “The dead pods were taken out to the parts of the Hive I have not visited in some time.” She looked back at him, her eyes locking with his. “My bloodline is dying. All the eggs I lay either fail to develop or crack within minutes, killing the child inside. I need new material.”

Chrysalis approached him and rubbed her haunches against him seductively and licking at the side of his head. “Help me and your HIve…Come, show your Mother that you do love her…” She stepped past him and wiggled her butt at his face, her green slit coming into view inches away from his eyes. From such a close distance, he could see the moisture building on the edges of her entrance.

“No.”

Chrysalis stopped dead in her tracks. “What…did you say?”

“I said no.” He bared his teeth. “I should have known that you had some scheme in mind for me. I no longer wish to be a part of your plan, or anyone else’s plan. I came here, foolishly as it turns out, to try something different with my life. I am not your little fuck toy for you to do as you wish with.”

Chrysalis turned on him, frowning her disappointment. “And what? You would leave your mother and your family to die? To wither and rot, and be only a fading memory in the eyes of others? What kind of insolent little shit are you? You dare refuse me!?” As she grew more angry, chittering sounded around her, and the Hive closed in on the two of them.

“I have had nothing for hundreds of years!” He shouted at her, his eyes and horn glowing bright green. His entire body shook with rage, and the black of his skin shifted to a dull gray. “I came back to a ‘family’ that attacked me and distrusted me because of something I had no part in, and then I get told that my father is dead as if that should make me feel better!” The gray of his body expanded, growing his form and producing club hands and stub feet grew out of his hooves. His voice boomed across the walls as he rose above her height. “I am not and never have been one to be fucked with! You want my seed so bad, come and rip it from my body your-fucking-self.”

The stone golem towered over Chrysalis. Hissing, she pointed her Hive at him. “Take him down! Do not let him destroy our HIve!”

A swarming mass of changeling flew at him from all directions. He swung his right arm in a wide arc, knocking all in its path to the floor. Cracks and screams sounded as his arm shattered the shells of young changelings. Sneering, he reared back his left arm, knocking it against the walls of the empty alcoves. Rock shook loose and fell on him, adding to his bulk and armor.

Overhead, changelings in the ceiling cloaked themselves in a magical shield and sped downward, pelting him with their bodies. He picked up a small boulder from the floor and hurled it at the living wall. It hit with another sickening crunch, but stopped and rolled forward as the mass of changelings in front of it pushed back. It rolled along the floor, leaving prints of the green slime from crushed changelings upon the floor.

Changelings swarmed in greater numbers now, clinging to his body and biting anything that wasn’t rock. His legs weighed down with the weight of their combined mass, he curled himself into a ball and rolled about the floor to shake them loose. Hitting a column in the center of the nursery, he stood back upright, only to be pushed back by a great wall of angry changelings who had been waiting for him to stop. Together they reeled backward, breaking the column and landing on the floor. Great chunks of rock fell and the column broke into pieces, and cracks appeared in the stone ceiling where it had stood. They landed with a dull thud on the floor, pinning changeling and golem alike between them.

Armored guards from the out parts of the Hive arrived to enter the fight. Raising their barbed spears, they aimed at the center of the rocky mass where he struggled to free himself.

“Wait!” Chrysalis shouted as she moved in between her guards. “Don’t kill him! Strip that ugly mass off of him and take him down below. He is powerful, make sure he does not escape.” Her horn glowed again, and she cast a magic beam across his body, blasting his magical coat away from his shell.

His extra body mass gone, he quickly wiggled free of the stone and rose to his feet, spreading his wings and launching himself at Chrysalis. Guards instinctively lowered their spears to block his path.

“No!” Chrysalis pushed her guards to the side and caught the full force of his tackle, flying across the room into one of the alcoves from the force of the blow. The ceiling cracked, and dust fell on the two of them, lying in a crumpled heap. The armored guards approached, and saw Chrysalis rise up painfully, pushing her child off of her. Still lying on the floor he bared his teeth and hissed as he looked weakly up at her.

Chrysalis put one hoof on his chest plate and rolled him onto his back. Using her magic to pick up a chunk of rock nearby, she looked at him. “Why did you make me do this, child?” She struck his face with the piece of her broken home, and he felt blackness take him.

“Take him. Go.” She waved at her guards, and they roughly grabbed his rear legs and dragged him away. Her younger children approached, frightened, but she pushed them away. “Leave me alone!” she cried, striking one of them across its face. “Take care of your sisters. Just…just go away…” Chrysalis sniffled, sitting on the floor.

Her children moved away in silence to take their battered kin to be cared for. They solemnly picked up the bodies of the less fortunate and took them away into the darkness. And retreating away, they looked with great sorrow back upon their mother, sitting amongst the rubble.

When she thought they could no longer hear, Chrysalis’ despair broke through and she began to sob.