The Reparation of the Changeling Queens
Chapter Three: Rejection

形変物の女王達の補償
三章：拒絶

I’m still sitting in my uncomfortable, reclined position when the two changeling queens walk back into this dark room, barely illuminated by the semi-bright light coming from my handheld. My eyes have become a bit droopy, wanting to fall asleep, but my tinnitus rings like a school bell in my ear, giving me a reminder to my unfortunate past mistakes.

With the help of the light, I can see Calliphora, the pink-eyed sovereign, pull out some sort of sparkly, yellow, star-headed baton or wand out of her voluminous hair. It looks like a smooth halo, draping down her neck on both sides, with the coloration of dead Autumn leaves dusted with frost. Oddly, there are holes littered throughout the lower ends of her hair; a single spiraled strand of hair pops out in front of her face. She looks young, but there’s a certain oldness to her eyes, like she’s been young for a very long time, or knows more than she should for her age.

Myxine’s hair is the same sea-blue as her eyes and is much shorter than Calliphora’s, just coming out around the right side of her head, with a large fringe slicked over the center-right of her face. Her complexion looks age-worn – bags underneath her eyes and wrinkles to the sides. It seems just from her facial expression that life has taken its toll harshly on her.

Without any warning, Myxine snakes me tight with her blue power, forcing my breath out of my lungs and a gasp from my mouth. She’s squeezing me around my diaphragm.

“What the fu-“ I sputter, clenching my eyes, and teeth. I can’t breathe.

Calliphora grasps the baton with her pink power, also pulling a book out from behind her. She flips the book to a page near the beginning and then starts to draw some sort of symbol on the air.

Once she finishes drawing the symbol, she thrusts the wand forward into the center, causing it to flash brightly.

A huge layer of putrid, green mist surrounds my body, immediately pressing against my skin. It has no smell or taste, but the consistency is that of Nickelodeon slime, or maybe even Gak.

Fucking Gak. So much wasted plastic. Still fun to play with, though.

Suddenly, it begins to burn and glow like hot coals, seeping into my skin. I find myself unable to open my mouth, or close my eyes, or do any other motion. I have been enslaved to this changeling’s power. Where the hell did that mist even come from?

For what seems like a couple minutes, I’m just being held here by Myxine, now able to take heavily labored breaths. Nothing is happening. The burning sensation already disappeared, and my skin returned to its normal, pink color. Suddenly, I lose
consciousness.

A huge, bright, white light shines out of Sonik’s body, causing Myxine to recoil backward, and making Calliphora give a screech, as it nearly blinds her.

Because of the fact that the Nekropolis hive is located underground, the changelings of that hive are very sensitive to light. The amount of light given off by Sonik, to Calliphora, is like any other creature staring at the blazing sun.

Light shines out from Sonik’s eyes, mouth, and every other orifice on his body as raw, magical power explodes out of his body, swirling around like a tornado of unprecedented energy. For a few moments, one could even see the light from outside the hive. Anything on the ground - mainly dirt and dust - is flung into the nearest wall. No sound emerges from the spell, except for the light sound of wind.

For a full minute or so, the blinding energy gleams throughout the hive, rendering every changeling within dazed and unable to see.

Both Calliphora and Myxine shield their eyes with dark-colored magic as they wait for the light to calm down. Myxine looks over to Calliphora, eying her with a ‘what-have-you-done’ demeanor, surprising her because of the change in Myxine’s almost constant stone face.

When the spell dies down, Sonik drops to the ground surrounded by light-green flames, which burn through his hair, clothes and flip-flops, rendering him fully naked. All that can be seen through the flames is his silhouette. He landed on his knife as well, so it burns his skin deeply against his right outer thigh.

The flames illuminate his body as they die down, revealing a huge change in appearance. His skin is dark-gray, with shimmering white lines running down his arms, legs and back, stretching out down all of his fingers and toes. Blade-like extremities pop out of his shoulders, pointing outwards like wings on a sword. His kneecaps are inflated like balloons.

His body immediately starts to glow green once again, shifting form back to his normal, albeit naked, human form.

“Calliphora? What did you just do?” Myxine asks, sighing loudly and closing her stressed, overworked eyes. She shook her head.

“Take Magic,” Calliphora responds.

“That was certainly not Take Magic, Calliphora. I’ve not seen anything such as that. I shall ask you once more: What have you done?” Myxine repeats, a light growl filling the small room.

“You heard me,” Calliphora snaps, narrowing her eyes. She stamps the ground, lifting a layer of newly settled dust up like a blanket.

“Yes, I did hear you, but you and I both understand how that was not the spell you say it was. Tell me now, Calliphora, before I stab you.”

It’s clear to Calliphora that Myxine is losing her sense of natural calm, but it frustrates her to no end that Myxine is questioning her.

“You couldn’t stab me if you had a thousand knives,” Calliphora calls, stepping closer to Myxine. She looks down into Myxine’s eyes, using her greatest thousand-mile stare into her soul and intimidating her. “Your bluff is clear to me, as it always has been throughout your entire life,” she continues. With every word, her voice lowers, and she inches her mouth closer and closer to Myxine’s ear. “You are on my soil in my hive, and I expect more from you than that, hagfish. Do not try me…”

“Th-Then tell me the truth, you maggot,” Myxine growls, stepping back. The quiver in her voice tells Calliphora that Myxine is at the point of fear, so she uses it.

“If you don’t trust me enough and are so paranoid as to not believe my truth, then I don’t feel any inclination to share my hive’s wealth of love with you. Leave.”

Myxine’s jaw drops at the sheer toxicity in Calliphora’s words. She had come all this way from her hive at Horseshoe Bay, over seven-hundred furlongs away, just to be rejected? To have ten days of her precious time completely wasted by this maggot of a queen? She’d been through too much to let that happen to her at this moment. Her hive would not survive for much longer without it. A great desperation kicks in, and the feeling in her stomach quickly becomes an unholy hangman’s knot.

“Wait. Calliphora, please. I can’t have come all the way here just to go back to my hive empty-hooved; it would be shameful! You wouldn’t do that to me, and both of us know it. You’ve assisted me personally so many times in the past.”

“While it is true that I have assisted you before, this would be such a large grievance on my hive that unless you can trust me, I feel there is no reason to help you with this. You may feel free to come back at a later date to try again, but I will not at this time give you what you want, for you are acting childish by trying arguing with me over such menial matters such as debating with me over a spell. A child doesn’t deserve my help.”

With this, Calliphora ignited her horn, using her wand, the Star Smasher, to write another spell symbol within a fraction of a second in the air.

Thrusting her wand into the center of her writing and activating the spell, a blue circle appears around Myxine’s body, glowing with mana.

“Calliphora, don’t-“ she started.

A pillar of light casts down from the heavens through the graveyard’s dusty soil and over Myxine, and in an instant, both the light and Myxine are gone.

Calliphora walked over to Sonik’s body and prodded him with a hoof.

“Are you dead?”

Myxine reappears as the column of light beams her down in front of a huge, complex cave system just outside the outskirts of southern Horseshoe Cove.

“-teleport me,” she finishes. She looks up at the top of the caves, slumping in denial of what Calliphora just did. An intense rage fills her eyes as she straightens herself. “…May the gods damn you, Calliphora!” she angrily mutters, walking furiously into the caves. “How dare she call me childish? I’m the most mature out of all of-”

“My queen, have you good news for us?” an underling changeling asks the moment she walks into her rocky home. She looks dejectedly at her kin, shaking her head in the shame of failure that she feels.

“No, unfortunately. It’s difficult for me to believe that she would decline in the manner that she did; however, I will try with her again at a later time, Posei. For now, we must continue to hunt.”

“Shall we begin organizing for a hunt tonight?”

“That would be a wise thing to do.”

“Very well.”

Author's Note

Once again, I have received assistance from Commissar-Rarity on revisions for this chapter!

A furlong is an eighth of a mile, just for your knowledge.

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